Project Alpha

by R. A. Mejia

  Seeing the look on my face, Lillian says, “I see you haven’t thought about this yet. Well, there’s no rush. The System Games aren’t until September, and we have until January to register you for any events. We have plenty of time to work out what you're good at.”

  “The System Games? Is that some weird take on the Hunger Games? If it is, we’re in trouble because I’m terrible with the bow.”

  Lillian laughs at the joke. “No, it’s an event held once every four years, sponsored by the largest companies that use the System but organized by the Governing Users. They create a group of challenges and events that Users can participate in to get money and prizes. The individuals or groups that do the best get some fantastic rewards. This year's big prize is a dungeon core.” Lillian’s eyes light up, and she claps her hands together excitedly when she mentions the dungeon core.

  I smile, sure she’s going to chastise me for not already having looked it up in the Idiot’s Guide to the System, but ask, “What’s a dungeon core?”

  “Oh, well I guess you wouldn’t know about those yet.” She leaned forward, an excited look in her eyes. “You know the dungeon we just cleared?” I nod. “Well, imagine that you could create your dungeon like that. Only this kind doesn’t hurt anyone by existing. Plus, you could summon your monsters, decide it’s theme, generate specific types of loot, design the various levels of the dungeon. A dungeon core lets you do exactly that. It’s an incredible source of income and experience for the owner. User’s from around the world travel to the few in existence and pays huge fees to explore them.”

  Wow. I can only imagine what it would be like to create your dungeon. No wonder it’s the top prize.

  She continues, “If we can win the top prize, our company will be set. So, we need as many entrants as possible, especially if we plan on entering any of the group events. The minimum team size is three. Part of what we’ll be doing with you is leveling you up and training you for some of these events. So, go home and think about what kind of role you want to have on the team.”

  “Sure thing, boss.”

  Lillian frowns at the term, and I correct myself. “I mean, Lillian.”

  “That’s better.”

  A quick hug goodbye, and I’m stepping through the portal to my home.

  Sitting on my bed, I remember that I leveled up when we cleared that dungeon and quickly pull up my character sheet. I see that I have four stat points to use and now have a total of fifty skill points banked. I decide to save the skill points till after I determine my role on Lillian’s team. After all, I’d hate to spend the skill points and never use the skill because I decide I’m better at something else. The stat points go into Intelligence and Wisdom—two in each stat—bringing my Intelligence up to twenty, and my Wisdom up to eighteen. As usual, the moment I save the changes, my mind and body feel woozy. When the dizziness passes, I feel a sense of clarity and insight that I’ve come to associate with an increase in those mental stats.

  Suddenly, remembering I have a work in a few minutes, I change into my Quickie Stop Mart uniform as I run out the door, giving my mom a quick kiss on her cheek goodbye before leaving.

  Chapter 22

  I’m finally able to get a new cell phone with the extra cash. It’s nothing fancy, just a basic smartphone. But at least I can call my family if I’m going to be late coming home again.

  School and work are pretty easy the next week. Without another dungeon to clear, I’m able to spend more time studying. I gain even more free time since I paid for a port to the school. No more riding the bus to college for this guy. I’ve also been able to raise Speed Reading, Mental Math, and Analysis all to level 4 without spending extra skill points. Due to the combination of extra study time and my improved academic skills, my midterms are easy, and I score A’s on all my tests.

  Work, though, has become more tedious. Inventory Management and Inspect can only be used so many times before they stop increasing in skill. Inventory Management is stuck at level 3 and Inspect at level 5. I’m not sure if it’s the result of my Analysis skill or my improved intelligence, but I know that it’s taken me 64 hours of practice to get Inspect from level 4 to 5 and that I can look forward to 128 hours of practice to get it to level 6. It’s that or spend six skill points.

  However, Lillian seems to have plans for those skill points. Since I never told her what I wanted to train in, she brought me in for testing to see which role in the party I would best be suited. Lillian’s office has a training room that will let you fight holograms of different monsters or create simple scenarios for practicing skills. You don’t get any experience points from killing the monsters or completing the scenarios, but it’s good practice. Lillian has me try out the leading roles in a group, including the appropriate armor and weapons.

  As a tank, I wear heavy chain mail and wield a shield and long sword. The tank's job is to keep the attention of the monsters and use superior defense and high hit points to absorb the damage in the fight. Unfortunately, I just don’t have the skills. Even when the training program lets me pretend to have a taunt skill, I just forget to use it as I should. The scenario given me is one of protecting a group of innocent and buxom women from a pack of wolves. I’m supposed to use my taunt skills to keep the wolves’ attention on me until I can whittle down the health of the wolves, but I keep losing the monsters attention, and they keep killing the women.

  I also try the healer/support role in a scenario. I’m made a healer in a virtual group of five and given spells to heal the team members. I’m also given two buff spells that enhance a team members damage and defense. The two support spells only last a minute and have to be recast. The whole situation becomes a tedious grind of watching each team member's health bar and timer that indicates when their buffs wear off. Even though I’m not bad at the job, it’s just so boring that I know that it’s not something that I want to do full-time in a group.

  It’s not until I try out the role of damage dealer that I find my place. I’m first equipped with light leather armor and a knife and given the role of thief. I can sneak around and backstab for lots of damage. Unfortunately, while I enjoy dealing out damage, I just don’t have the health pool to go toe to toe with monsters in a stand-up fight.

  Still, the experience shows me that I enjoy dealing out damage more than I like taking or healing it. Honestly, in the video games I play, I create jack of all skills characters capable of doing a little of everything and taking care of themselves.

  The last role I try out is the ranged damage dealer, whose job it is to hurt the enemy from afar. I’m given the task of mage, with several spells, and I find it easy to keep my distance from the monsters and kill them from far away while the tank in the virtual group keeps their attention focused on himself. If a monster breaks away and runs after me, I have no problem leading the monster on a merry chase, firing my spells back at it. It’s quite fun.

  Decided on my role as a ranged damage dealer, the only question now is which skills to invest. There’s an almost endless list of skills, and I want to get the ones that will help me the most.

  Lillian suggested purchasing the skills Ranged Magic and Firearms. She said that I’d need to get both of those before I can purchase related skills like Rifle and Handgun. John points out that if I want to use any high-tech weapons, I’ll need skills in Laser Technology, Plasma Technology, and Nuclear Technology. He also suggests general skill investment in Computers and Bionics.

  Lillian tells me that she’s scheduled some time at a User Dungeon for me so that I can level up and use Absorb to get some new abilities.

  “A User Dungeon?”

  “Remember how we talked about a dungeon that’s controlled by a User? Well, this is one of them. This one, in particular, is pretty popular around Halloween since it’s zombie themed. There are lots of mission types that you can sign up for with the owner of the dungeon. We have you signed up for an escort and defense mission this weekend with some other low-level Users.”

 
“Wait, why can’t you, me, and John just clear some regular dungeons. Wouldn’t that get me some levels too?”

  “True, it would, but you’d hardly earn any experience since John and I are so much higher level than you. We’d be power leveling you so you wouldn’t learn much from the experiences and you wouldn’t improve your skills much.”

  That makes sense. I can’t learn how to be a good team member until I have more experience under my belt. My only concern is money. To go on this training mission, I’m going to have to skip my shifts at work.

  “Uh, I feel a little silly asking this, but will I get paid for going on this training course thing?”

  “This training course thing costs us credits to setup. A lot of them. But we also need to get you at a higher level and some experience working with other people.”

  “It’s not that I’m trying to sound ungrateful. But I still have bills to pay. If I’m going to be skipping work, I need to be making money while I train.”

  “That’s reasonable. Well, whether or not you make money this weekend is up to you. User Dungeons work just like regular dungeons. The monsters you kill give experience points and drop loot. You can either take the loot or try to get some new abilities with your Absorb skill.”

  Isn’t it always that kind of choice? Loot or abilities. Choose one, and you lose out on the other.

  “Well, I’m in then if I can make a few bucks and earn some experience points.”

  Chapter 23

  The next weekend, Lillian and I teleport to Arizona where I’m scheduled to join a team of other Users to clear this mission. We port to an old run-down looking hotel in the middle of the desert. Apparently, the User that runs the dungeon uses each of the rooms as port sites that take the teams or individuals to their areas of the dungeon, where they can start their missions.

  According to Lillian, the zombie dungeon is geared towards training teamwork and non-magical skills. The User who runs the dungeon is a huge fan of the zombie genre of movies and TV shows. He has a huge variety of zombies in his dungeons. Everything from the George Romero slow moving zombies to the World War Z speed zombies. He even has special missions that recreate the scenes from movies and TV shows. I’d be pretty excited to come back sometime to reenact the journey to the pub from Shaun of the Dead or the attack on the prison from The Walking Dead.

  However, in line with that obsession with zombie films, the User that runs the dungeon has also set rules that prevent magic and high-tech weapons from functioning in the dungeon. So, no magic missiles or laser cannons will work inside the dungeon. The tech level allowed is just about what is used in the real world, except Users that come into the dungeon can’t bring in any weapons, armor, or items. They must use only the things they find in the dungeon. The idea is that Users learn to be resourceful and work together.

  With those rules in mind, I’m standing in the hotel lobby wearing my regular blue jeans and a Firefly Season 2 t-shirt. Fox finally made that second season of the show, and it was worth the wait.

  I meet three other Users who are all about my level. However, I’m quite surprised to find that they’re all teenagers. Nancy, Frank, and Joe are teens that attend some exclusive academy in the mid-west and have only recently been allowed by their parents to start training using the System. Nancy is level 6 and the oldest of the group at 16. Frank is 15 and is level 5. Joe, the youngest, is 14 years old and is level 4. Even though I’m only a few years older them, I still feel like I’m their babysitter.

  The three teens give their mom and dad a kiss goodbye before walking through the portal to the zombie dungeon. I awkwardly wave goodbye to Lillian, who I hear whisper to the other parents, “They grow up so fast, don’t they?”

  There’s a flash of light as I step through the dungeon door and when it clears, I see the zombie world dungeon. The four of us are standing on a deserted highway that runs through the middle of a thickly wooded forest. Strewn along the road are abandoned cars, human remains, and debris. The world seems eerily silent, and the only sounds are that of the wind blowing through the landscape.

  The three teenagers walk to the Respawn Crystal and bind to it then start talking to one another. I walk over and bind to the respawn crystal too, then up to the group to see what the plan is for the mission. Since I'm the oldest of the four of us, I assumed that I’d be taking charge of the mission however it seems like the oldest girl has other plans.

  Before I can say anything, she turns and tells me, “Okay, new guy, me and my brothers have been working together for a long time and since you're new to the group that means you follow my lead and I'm sure you'll do fine. First things first, we have to find the group we’re supposed to be escorting.”

  Frank adds, “Yeah, just follow us and you'll do fine, kid.” Turning to speak to his sister he says, “We should also scavenge for weapons and supplies along the way.”

  Joe nods in agreement as if he's used to simply listening to his two older siblings.

  Not wanting to disrupt the authority Nancy has over her brothers, I only shrug and ask, “You three ever done this mission before?”

  Nancy, answers, “Not this mission in particular but we've done one in this zombie world before.”

  I smile at her and suggest, “If we need to find the group to start the escort mission, I propose that we spread out and look for signs of them.”

  The girl rolls her eyes, huffs in irritation, and says, “I was just about to say that okay?” Then turning to each one of her brothers she orders, “Frank, you take the left side of the road. Joe, you and what's his name take the right side of the road. I'll take the center and also look for stuff to scavenge from cars as we walk.”

  I can't help but smile at Nancy’s take-charge attitude. I'll have to remember not to give out orders. After all, this isn't my family. It may be difficult not to default into ‘boss mode’ because my sister is about Nancy’s age.

  Each sibling moves into their assigned position and starts to walk along the road. Nancy quickly outpaces her brothers as she jogs to the abandoned cars, looking inside each for scavengable items. Frank, on the left side of the road, scans for danger and signs of other people.

  Joe, short for a 14-year-old, moves to the right side of the road near the forest and mimics his brother, scanning as he walks. I have to jog a little to catch up with the kid.

  “Joe, is it? I'm Anthony.” I hold my hand out for him to shake. His bowl-shaped sandy blonde hair swings as he turns to look at me. Seeing my outstretched hand, he shakes it and smiles at me.

  “Hey, Anthony. Nice to meet you.” He sneaks a look at his sister Nancy then turns back to me. “We shouldn't talk so loud though. Nancy will get mad if we make too much noise.”

  I lower my voice to a whisper and ask him, “Does your sister always take charge like this?”

  The kid smiles at me, and I see that he has a gap between his two front teeth that makes his smile extra charming. “Yeah, she's always bossy like this when Mom and Dad aren't around.” He glances to see if his sister can hear him. Then adds with a slight giggle, “I call her Nagging Nancy when she can't hear.”

  I have to stifle my laughter at the kid’s nickname for his sister. I wonder if Marie has a similar nickname for me. Maybe when I'm not around, she calls me ‘Argumentative Anthony’ or ‘Too Tough On Me Tony.’

  We travel down the road for about an hour before Frank finds human tracks leading into the forest. During that hour, Nancy has found a purse, an assortment of nuts and bolts, a first-aid kit, a baseball bat, and a large canteen. Joe has scavenged some berries, and I have made an improvised weapon out of a fallen branch. One thing that the Zelda Mario dungeon taught me was that anything could be a weapon.

  The stats on the weapon aren't great. It does one damage and has a durability of 10, but it's better than not having a weapon at all.

  When Frank finds the tracks that lead into the forest, he calls out, and we all walk over to him. After examining the tracks for herself, Nancy agrees that
this is probably the trail we're meant to follow. She hands the baseball bat off to Frank. Gives the empty canteen to Joe and keeps the purse, the first aid kit, and the nuts and bolts for herself. Then she orders the group to follow the trail.

  These kids must have some unique tracking ability because all I see is the forest floor. Still, I follow their lead since I don't have a better idea.

  We follow the trail for ten minutes before I hear an odd crying sound. I ask the group to stop, and though Nancy gives me a dirty look, the rest of the group stops. I close my eyes and listen intently. I'm about to chalk up the sound to my imagination when it repeats. Someone is crying for help ahead.

  Without thought or explanation, I run ahead towards the cry for help. Crashing through some bushes, I see two people being attacked by three Zombies. A lanky black man is on the ground clutching his arm. Defending him against the zombies is a thin blonde woman wielding a knife.