by Wolfe Locke
“You shouldn’t have attacked us,” I shouted as the bat slammed into the horseman’s leg with a sickening crack. The centaur went sprawling.
The octopus lady screamed and immediately made a B-Line for me, but I was ready for her. My bat frosted over, and I prepared to meet her head on until a spear erupted out of my chest, I looked down in shock. “Huh?”
The Satyr stood behind me. “I told you to run away when you had the chance.”
I tried to duck out of the way. He looked at me, half expecting me to fall over dead, but unfortunately, my ability blocked the death blow. It hurt like crazy, and I tried to get away, but the Satyr was quicker than I expected, stronger too. He grabbed me by the neck with his free hand and pulled me up.
“Not a chance,” he said. “You’re not getting out of here alive. You had your shot at just walking away, and you blew it.”
“This seems like an extreme reaction,” I was able to choke out as his hand tightened on my throat.
The Centaur stumbled over, his front leg held up and clearly broken. “Boy, I’ve been fighting evil for years. And if there is one thing I’ve learned, it’s that you can’t go halfway. And you strike me as a halfway kind of guy.” The centaur kept going. “You’ve got to be all-or-nothing, do or die.”
“You really think I’m evil?” I protested as the Satyr tightened his hold for a moment. “On par with what? The crazy monsters everywhere, or the Hamburger King I just fought? That’s insane.”
He laughed. “I know you can reincarnate. So, none of this is really that big a deal for you. In this case, I’d say you should take this as a valuable lesson. Don’t piss off demi-humans. We can be sensitive.”
You didn’t have to tell me twice. The Satyr dropped me on the ground like I was a sack of meat and the Centaur brought his scimitar down on my neck. I have to say, as far as deaths go, this one wasn’t that bad. It hurt and lasted longer than I thought it would, in addition to being extremely unpleasant.
The feeling of choking on my own blood as I watched my body collapse and my head roll on the ground was definitely horrifying, but it didn’t last that long. Weird doesn’t even describe how it felt to look back at my own body to see my head rolling away, though. Definitely not an experience I’d like to repeat.
Chapter Sixteen: And Then There Was One
* * *
I woke up back in my own bed, the number on my chest had decreased. I was down to my last respawn before getting kicked out of the Crusaders and maybe losing my republic. As for my mimic, Napoleon was nowhere to be seen. He’ll be ok, I hope.
I took a moment to enjoy the feeling of not having a slab of cooked meat for an arm. A benefit of respawning was the soft reset it gave my body. Burns, more than other injuries, I had discovered tended to be more painful. Basically, it came down to how hurt I was when I died. The more the reincarnation had to recover, the more pain there would be when I reincarnated.
I sighed and rolled out of bed. Stretching, I looked out through the window, wondering if the materials had made it back. Sure enough, there was a neat pile of wood stacked next to the existing wall with a consistent stream of hovering boards stacking themselves neatly. The new recruits were hard at work and had already started laying it out, building new sections of fence.
They were working together, laughing and watching out for each other. How nice.
Bjorn was laying bags of fast food out on the Coopers’ picnic table, and my mouth started watering. Man, I loved Hamburger King, even if I never wanted to see that mascot again. A large box of fries and three-quarter pounders with cheese would really hit the spot right now. I wondered if Lirai had been able to interface at all when we took over the resources and included drinks. God, I loved Coke. I was just glad they hadn’t eaten all of it before I got back. The Crusaders seemed like they might have eaten it all in my absence. Maybe not Bjorn. He seemed like a pretty stand up guy the longer I spent with him.
My uniform was brand new and clean, as usual. I wondered how long I’d have to work with the Crusaders. I really wanted to go back to wearing normal clothes. I’d spent the last decade of my life out of uniform and in something far more comfortable, and I felt no need to change that.
“Napoleon,” I called out, hoping the mimic had just been hiding and could hear me. “Want to go get some food?”
He didn’t respond, which was weird. Usually, he was starving. Maybe he didn’t respawn after all. I got worried.
“Napoleon?” I called out again
Still nothing. I bent down and looked under the bed. He was curled up in the corner with his back to me. He seemed a bit upset.
“Hey, buddy,” I said quietly, trying to draw him out. “Burgers outside. You love burgers. Right? From the Hamburger King?”
He looked at me and growled, very much not a friendly growl this time. Then he rolled himself tighter into a little ball and went to sleep. He likes respawning less than I do.
Aww. I felt bad. I hadn’t meant for him to die in the parking lot. He was clearly annoyed about it. I just hoped it wouldn’t take him too long to get over it.
What was up with the demi-humans anyways? Every time I’d met any of them, they were total dicks with anger management problems. They seemed to hate humans for some reason. It didn’t make any sense at all. Next time, things are going to be very different. I vowed revenge.
I remembered I had a few points to spend after gaining all those levels and headed over to the computer to apply them.
Crusader Systems - Terminal - Upgrades - Quests – Settlement, Item Synthesis, Etc.
Username dkg1986
Password trustno1
-Forgot Password?- ( )
Crusader Systems - Upgrade Terminal
Account Login Confirmed
Welcome, Dan Hanson.
ERROR. 404
ERROR. 404
Contact an administrator.
“Lirai? What’s going on here? I've never had this kind of issue before.” I was feeling some type of way, and it definitely didn’t leave me with a smile on my face. Change wasn’t always good.
Notification: Query “What’s Going on”
Details: The Crusader System is currently offline and cannot be accessed. Player is unable to put to use accumulated points.
I moved away from the terminal. Whatever. This wasn’t my problem to deal with, at least, not right now. Time to eat. Below, Bjorn had opened up the burger packages, and the scent of cheap meat wafted in through the open window. It smelled delicious. Moving faster than I had in years, I sprinted out the door to join the rest of the recruits.
Chapter Seventeen: The Gang's All Here
* * *
The whole gang cheered me on when they saw me. It was hard not to. Everybody had a mouth full of hot fries and burgers that got all over the place. Well, everyone except Edgar, that is. He just stood off to the side, watching everyone eat. I didn’t mind if he wanted to be a Debbie Downer and stand off to the side all creeperish, just watching us. Totally fine, totally not an issue. Okay, maybe it was a little bit of an issue.
“It’s the man of the hour!” Eric said, clapping me on the back with one hand while he shoved a chicken tendie into his mouth with the other. “Where would we be without you?” Wait? When did I get chicken tendies?
“Hungry no more!” Bjorn said, sounding jolly. “We ate the last of the food in camp this morning after you took off. We’d have nothing to eat if you hadn’t gone out there and secured these supplies for us.”
Ashley snagged a box of fries. “This is cool, but are there any other places we can go? I don’t know if I can eat Hamburger King every day. Isn’t there a Pandera around somewhere?”
Everyone’s a critic, and no one is ever satisfied. But lack of appreciation couldn't bring me down. I was high on the sweet triumph of a quest well done. But, as I’d learned in this world, you never get a chance to stay on top for long. My time at top lasted just a few moments.
“Alright,” Edgar said when he’d s
een enough. “This has been fun, but time to go back to work. We need to get these defenses up today.” He looked straight at me. “That means you too, recruit. And, if my guess is correct, you died again, didn’t you? You’re down to your last respawn before you wash out.”
That didn’t seem fair. I’d just gotten back from a quest. I’d died trying to get into Live, Laugh, Love Home Goods, and I was dying to sit down for a second and eat some food. But orders were orders. I grabbed two bags of fast food and took them over to the piece of wall the other recruits were working on. Before I got to it, I turned and asked Edgar about the upgrade terminal.
“I couldn’t use the terminal. What’s up with that?” I figured this was as good a time as any.
Edgar looked at me and almost smiled. “Ah, that. We’ve been doing a soft relaunch of the system here. If all goes well, we should be able to unscrew the mistakes of more than a few recruits in selection.”
Ah. Nothing to be done about it then. I turned back to the task at hand. Namely, feeding myself. I stuffed everything in my mouth as fast as I could. Six burgers, two large fries, and a Mister Ice with mini M&Ms. It was basically heaven, but instead of heavenly gates of pearl resting in a palace of clouds, it was in the heat on the side of the road on the walkway of my cul de sac. The ice drink still managed to give me an ice cream headache.
“Alright, listen up,” Edgard said, looking at me with disgust. “Dan got us enough wood to rebuild this entire wall. So long as we control Rowes, this outpost will continue to be resupplied. Let’s divide and conquer. We’ll pair recruits with experienced Crusaders. They can show you how we usually build fortifications, and you can help them with anything they need.”
‘Anything they need’. Yeah, that one sounded familiar. I knew what it meant. Carrying heavy things from one place to another, wherever the Crusaders wanted something carried. I had heard words like that thrown around pretty casually before. Usually, it was at work before being assigned a gig nobody wanted, or when I was in the service and somebody came looking for “volunteers”.
I got paired with Eric and a burly dark-haired Crusader that I recognized from around the camp. I’d never caught his name before, but he had this face that only a mother could love. I felt bad for the guy. He reminded me of all those new parents on social media posting pictures of new babies that all looked like deep sea blob fishes.
“I’m James,” he introduced, holding out a hand that was missing a few fingers. It took Eric and me a few seconds before we realized that we were supposed to shake it.
“Nice to meet you,” he said enthusiastically once we finally caught on.
His handshake was impressively firm, especially considering the lacking digits. But... there was something a little too intense about him. You could see it in his eyes. He seemed the type to get a little too aggressive when playing table tennis.
“Well… nice to meet you James,” I said. “I’m Dan, and this almost-stranger is Eric. We’re here to help you with the wall.”
A light seemed to go off in James’s head. “Right, right,” he muttered, more to himself than to us. “You’re the guy who went out into the suburbs to get the supplies, right?”
“One and the same,” I admitted, really enjoying the attention. “That was me.”
“Wow. It’s been a while since I saw any action. Did you see anything crazy out there?” The man leaned in real close and got way too excited. Maniac?
I thought about his question for a minute, and decided it would be better for me not to ignore him. “I fought some spiders and this plastic golem. It took the form of a Hamburger King, actually. Really, it was nothing too wild.”
A few weeks ago, what I’d seen already would have haunted my dreams for years. But now? It was just another day. It’s amazing what you can get used to.
“Well, thanks for your service.” James continued, “This is everything we need, materials-wise. After today, we should be all set to hunker down here for a while.”
To my surprise, we actually got to do some hands-on building rather than playing fetch-and-carry all day. Apparently, an effect of the “soft reset” Edgar had been talking about. It wasn’t hard work, just a simple palisade wall, but James cared about construction. It seemed like it would hold up well against monster attacks. I’d been skeptical about Edgar’s goal to finish by the end of day, but the Crusaders worked quickly. By halfway through the afternoon, we’d gotten through a good chunk of the wall.
“So, did you work in construction before all this?” I asked.
James laughed. “Not really. Well, kind of. I was a hobbyist. I was really into building treehouses for kids.”
“Treehouses? That seems.. uh, cool?” I struggled to find anything positive to say.
“Oh, I get it. Yeah, but it’s not what you think. I always get the looks, the whole raised brow skepticism. See, these aren’t basic treehouses. Not at all what you’re picturing. Mine were deluxe, specialty treehouses. They were the sort you’d only find in the right neighborhoods. I wish I had photos, man, you’d be really impressed. But they all, unfortunately, got destroyed at the start of this apocalypse. Well…” he started, but then his voice trailed off. “Not all, Edgar told me a few turned into dungeons.”
“Uh, that kind of sucks.” I responded. There wasn’t really anything else to say. The longer I talked to him, the more I got this feeling. Something about James made me a little uncomfortable.
I was about to ask for more details about the dungeons and how he got started with the Crusaders when Edgar walked over. He looked as stern as always. He looked closely at the section of wall we had been working on.
“Nice work, recruits, maybe you’re not completely useless,” he said before turning towards James. “You outdid yourself as always, keep up the good work. We are depending on you.”
James smiled and looked bashful. I had to repress an urge to be petty and bitter and lash out. I mean, what was he? Five?
Edgar turned and looked at me, it was pretty obvious he wanted answers. “Did you see anything unusual on your trip? You should have debriefed me as soon as you respawned.” I narrowed my eyes and thought, I would have, but you sort of cut me off and put me on extra duty. “Anything worth mentioning? What killed you?”
In regard to his question, I had an answer. “I ran into some demi-humans by the mall. They killed me because they seemed to think we were in some kind of territory dispute.”
“Demi-humans, you say?” Edgar seemed pensive. “Already? Interesting they’ve moved out this far. Let’s talk more about that once we break today.”
Without saying more, he walked away to inspect the next piece of wall.
“What was that about?” I asked, turning to James and Eric. Eric shrugged, but James seemed like he knew.
James shook his head. “Demi-humans tend to avoid any and all areas controlled by humans, or at least that’s what I’ve been told. They definitely don’t spend much time at the mall. Edgar probably thinks they’re up to something.”
They definitely had been up to something when I saw them, but I didn’t think it was particularly interesting. Still, whatever Edgar wanted, he was in charge... or at least, he claimed to be. It's still my Republic.
We got through rebuilding almost all of the fortifications by the time we stopped for dinner. I had to admit the camp was actually looking pretty good. Republic. It was annoying that I had to correct myself. Still, it was getting close to being a real fort. We recruits were all thrilled about it. I even caught Edgar looking at it proudly once or twice. He called us over to the Coopers’ picnic table to eat more Hamburger King, of course. Bjorn was right, it was the only food we had.
“Let’s break for today,” he said. “After today’s work, we should be fine now.”
Everyone cheered, although I looked around skeptically. Had the original plan been to keep us working all night? When, exactly, had he been planning on telling us that?
“And Dan has some news,” Edgar continued. Uh, what
?
They all turned to me expectantly.
“What do you mean by news? This is the first I’ve heard,” I responded.
“About the demi-humans,” Edgar responded with a little prodding.
“Oh, yeah.” I turned and looked at all of them, running my hand through my hair. It took a second, but I eventually got around to working up a script of sorts before finally addressing all of them. “I saw some demi-humans outside the mall near the entrance to Live, Laugh, Love. One of them skewered me, one of them killed Napoleon, and another decapitated me. I wouldn’t say they were friendly. I advise caution if you’re going out around there.”