“Hello there,” I said to the undefended building, no bigger than a regular house. It hung, attached to a single balloon, which had risen all the way to the ceiling of the bubble. The sight reminded me of that Pixar movie with the kid and the old dude in the flying house.
“Well, we didn’t get the castle. But we broke all the armor off it.”
The balloon continued to move north, past the edge of the bowl’s ridge. I zoomed tighter, focusing on the gnome standing at the building’s doorway. It wasn’t Commandant Kane, but a young woman. Actually, a child. Probably about ten years old. She stood holding a farseer and was looking in my direction. I raised my hand to wave. She turned and went back into the house. In the short moment the door was open, I saw another gnome. This was the Commandant. It looked like it was just him and his daughter.
“We can hit it with another missile after it flies over the bowl,” Katia said. “That’ll drop the stairwell to the surface.”
“Maybe,” I said. “But I think I want to get up there and take it the old-fashioned way.”
“Why?” She still had duct tape all up and down her body.
I pulled the fake pocket watch from my inventory and tossed it to her. “Henrik has one, Commandant Kane has one, and I’m pretty sure there’s a third, and the Mad Dune Mage guy has it. If that’s the case, I think all three of the watches come together somehow to make that artifact. The Gate of the Feral Gods.”
“You don’t even know what it does,” she said.
“I know it’s a celestial-equivalent item,” I said. “And it shouldn’t be available this early. They don’t put this stuff in here to be ignored. I want it. First we’re going to take the watch from Henrik, then we’re going to get to that castle, take the throne room and take the watch from Kane, and then we’re going to get the third and final piece from the mage.”
She looked at me dubiously. “You know we just barely survived this, right?”
“Carl, Carl, I just got my benefactor box!” Donut said. “Also, I went up yet another level to 36. I think we might’ve killed a lot of gnomes.”
“We did,” I said, looking in the direction of the last bit of the Wasteland, barely holding onto life. I couldn’t see it with my naked eye, but I sensed it there. I’d gone up two levels to 43, and I was on the precipice of 44. I wondered just how many gnomes we’d just killed.
Zev: Hey guys! Wow, that was fantastic. Great job. Your social numbers are looking great!
Donut: ZEV! OH MY GOD I MISSED YOU! WHEN CAN I SEE YOU?
Zev: Sorry, Crawler Donut. I’m just your social media manager now. I will be able to give you tips on how the audience is feeling, but Administrator Loita is now in charge of all public appearances. You are not able to message me directly unless I open the chat.
Donut: ARE YOU OKAY?
Zev: I’ve never been better. Thank you for your concern, Donut. Carl, the audience is noting that you’re being short with the other crawlers. By short, I mean extra angry. You might wish to tone that down a bit. Katia, your numbers are rising steadily. Good job. Donut, people want more Mongo action. You’re keeping him cooped up too much. Plus you haven’t used your new spells yet except once. When you get new loot, people expect you to use it.
Donut looked up at me, concern etched on her face.
Donut: OKAY WE WILL. WHY CAN’T I MESSAGE YOU?
Zev: It’s not necessary, crawler. Don’t worry, I will let you know if there are any additional areas of concern. Now get back out there and kill, kill, kill!
13
Instead of meeting up with the others in the Bactrian ruins, we limped our way back to Hump Town. Above, dozens of airplanes and airships continued to angrily harass the air defenses of the city, but without the threat of high-altitude bombardment, the multiple anti-air guns were equal to the task. The gnomes were on borrowed time. Some were already landing on the far side of the bowl. I noted that several were flying up and above the lip of the bowl and then disappearing, presumably to seek a landing spot somewhere on the land quadrant. I sent a warning to Gwen.
Without protection and shelter, the surviving gnomes would be hard-pressed to make it through the next day.
Donut was worried about Zev, and it was doubly frustrating, I knew, because she couldn’t talk about it. Not out loud and not over chat. I reached over and stroked her back. Her entire body was stiff.
I flipped through my achievements as we trudged back to town. Despite everything we’d done, I hadn’t received much. There was only one achievement of note:
New Achievement! Cannonball!
You fell from a great height, and you survived! You know who else fell from a…? You know what, never mind. Fuck you.
Reward: You’ve received a Silver Skydiver’s Box! Not that you deserve it you little punk.
The system AI was always fluctuating back and forth from adoring to outright hostile, but this was the moodiest I’d ever seen, and I didn’t know why. Sure, the thing was bipolar at best and psychotic the rest of the time, but ever since we’d blown the Wasteland to hell there was just something off with it.
That was not good.
As we approached the gates of Hump Town, keeping our heads low to avoid detection from the airplanes, we started to notice multiple X’s on the map. These were gnomes who’d fallen from the Wasteland when it had broken up. Most of them exploded like tomatoes upon impact, but a few here and there were intact enough that we could loot their bodies. Most didn’t have much on them. Donut was going around collecting their little red hats. I picked up a few intact bodies to add to my ever-growing graveyard. I looted some tools, lots of broken hunks of metal and cogs and springs, plus the odd gold coin and little bits of unenchanted armor here and there.
All of them said the same thing. Dirigible Gnome Corpse – Killed by falling from a great height with an assist by the Crawler Bitch Boy Carl.
“What did you do?” Katia asked. “I’m starting to get more than a little worried about this.”
“I don’t know,” I said, “but hopefully it gets over it soon.” I looked up into the air. “I don’t know what I did, but I promise it wasn’t on purpose.”
“This is just like with you and Miss Beatrice,” Donut said. “Do you remember that time she made you sleep on the couch for a week and wouldn’t tell you why she was mad?”
“I do remember,” I said. I shrugged. “I think it was because I’d bought the wrong type of coffee pods. I ended up beating Fallout because of it.”
Donut laughed. “It was because she’d read an article that said big fights make relationships stronger, and sometimes they cause guys to propose.”
Katia shook her head. “That does not sound healthy. Not that I’m one to judge.”
We came across a group of three intact corpses, all gnomish snipers. All three had their giant rifles with them, but only one of the weapons wasn’t broken. They all also wore the bandoliers over their shoulders. The little balls on all the bandoliers were gone except on one gnome who’d landed on his back. His was still unbroken with five grenade balls. Donut jumped forward, looted the good rifle along with their little red hats. She made a face, and then she looted the good bandolier.
“Carl,” Donut said a moment later. “I believe I figured it out. It appears you have given the system AI a case of… what is the term? Oh yes, I believe it is called ‘blue balls.’”
“What? What do you mean?”
She dropped the bandolier at my feet, and I picked it up.
I examined one of the fist-sized grenade balls. I was confused for a moment, but then I finally understood.
Live Ammo Ball.
Live ammo balls are a common and versatile ranged weapon of the Dirigible Gnomes. These round, clamshell spheres are designed to be fired great distances using a gnomish Tickle Stick, or they may be manually lobbed like a grenade. They are also fired in large clusters from anti-aircraft point defense batteries. Just be glad you’re not in charge of cleaning up that mess.
A liv
ing, usually angry, creature is placed inside the ball, and the ball opens upon impact with the target. The stasis field keeps the creature within safe from injury until the ball is opened.
These balls are similar in technology to pet carriers. As such, any mobs stored within are able to be placed within one’s inventory. Balls may be recycled if the mechanism doesn’t break upon impact. They usually break upon impact.
This ball contains:
Frenzied Gerbil. Level 11.
I groaned. Every single ball contained the same thing. A goddamned frenzied gerbil.
During that last battle, there were multiple instances when I’d almost been hit with one of these balls. First, Crixus the sniper had thrown one at me, but it missed and sailed over the edge. Then a sniper from one of the other airships had fired and missed. And then the Wasteland had blasted a hundred of them at us. Each time, the balls had overflown their mark.
I remembered Ralph, the boss from the second floor. He was also a frenzied gerbil. It was right before we’d found Mongo in that prize room. The system AI had been particularly… excited about how I had killed the creature.
“Fuck me,” I said as I fully realized what was going on.
The AI had wanted me to get hit with the gerbil ball. It wanted me to fight one. It wanted me to kill it by smushing it with my foot. I looked at the five balls hanging off the belt like fist-sized Christmas ornaments. I swallowed. Go ahead, I thought. Drop one on the ground. They’re only level 11. Easy to kill on their own. I suddenly felt dirty, and I hadn’t even done anything yet.
No, I thought. Fuck you. There was only so much a person could take.
I became aware that Donut was loudly explaining to Katia what was going on, since our boss battle with Ralph had been before we’d met up with her.
“…And after he squished down on poor Ralph with his foot, the whole dungeon shook like Carl used to after he went on that website that gave his computer a virus. And we’d received a prize room after that, and that’s where we found Mongo. Right, Mongo?”
Mongo waved his arms and screeched in agreement.
“The dungeon did the same thing when Carl got stomped on by Grull,” Katia said. She appeared to be half amused, half horrified.
“Oh that was nothing compared to the first time. You know, I always thought its infatuation with our Carl was a good thing,” Donut said, “but if the AI is going to throw a temper tantrum every time Carl doesn’t wrap his tootsies around a furry little creature, it’s going to be a problem. Carl, we should start stocking up on squish-sized creatures so you can sacrifice one every morning. At least now we have a five-pack of gerbils. Maybe you should do two at the same time. You know, to make sure everyone is back to being happy with one another again. It’d be almost like having a threesome. On Gossip Girl, there was this one episode where Dan and…”
“No,” I said, interrupting. “No fucking way. Fuck the consequences. I am absolutely not going…”
“Guys,” Katia said. “We have incoming. A lot of incoming.”
I looked up at the map just as the red wave of dots appeared. There were thousands of them. Where had they come from?
“They’re gerbils,” Donut said, her voice in awe. “Wow. That’s a lot of them.”
“Goddamnit,” I said. “Goddamnit to hell.” I realized what had happened. With all the gnomish snipers and Wasteland chunks raining from the sky, there were likely hundreds, if not thousands, of those ammo balls up there. They were designed to survive heavy impacts. Holy shit they’re moving fast. They’d likely all been released and then found each other. Now that they’d regrouped, they were coming in hot.
“Carl,” said Donut, “I don’t think your friend up in the sky is going to take ‘no’ for an answer.”
“Fuck me,” I said as we rushed toward the main gate.
“Carl, they’re cheating!” Donut cried after ten solid minutes of fighting. A gerbil launched itself at me, and I cried out as it attached itself to my neck. I grasped it with my gauntlet and squeezed before it could burrow. It exploded in my hand. “They keep coming and coming.”
Donut cast Wall of Fire just as the next wave of gerbils shot at our defensive line. That ended up being a mistake.
The little bastards could launch themselves through the air, and when they passed through Donut’s magical fire, they ignited, turning into miniature, gnashing fireballs. The fire killed the attackers, eventually, but not before they attached to the chests of the camel defenders, catching them on fire in the process.
We’d been pushed all the way back to the entrance of Weird Shit Alley. The town’s walls had too many holes to properly defend, so we’d run through the main gates, screaming for the defenders to fall back. There were just too many of them. Even though the screeching little fuckers were only level 11, they could burrow themselves straight into flesh and eat their way out through to the other side.
The dromedarians were forced to abandon their anti-air guns to meet the creatures. But the things never stopped coming. All around us, camels fought and fell.
Katia converted to her tank form with the shield on her arm and her crossbow over her head while I tossed hob-lobbers into the street using my xistera, killing dozens of them at a time. Mongo and two clockwork versions roared and snapped and crunched on the gerbils. A camel fired a rocket into the carpet of monsters only to be overwhelmed a moment later.
“Don’t swallow them whole,” I warned Mongo. I remembered a danger dingo had done that once, and it hadn’t ended well for the dingo.
I punched then punted another gerbil. I had to be careful with the timing of my attacks. The monsters’ mouths opened bigger than should be possible, and they could get their physics-defying jaws around my entire fist if I wasn’t careful.
Donut was right. There were too many of these things. These weren’t just from the wreckage. They were being generated. This was a punishment. Goddamnit. If this continued, we were going to lose the town. “Fuck you,” I growled up into the air. “Fuck you to hell.”
I tossed a smoke curtain followed by a pair of hob-lobbers. I stepped over the hastily-constructed barricade and waded out toward the street. “Everyone stay back,” I called.
“Carl, Carl, what are you doing?” Donut yelled.
I extended my left arm shield. I caught a flying gerbil with the auto-buckler, and it fell hard to the ground, blinded and dazed. I was too tired to fight it anymore.
I stepped down on the squirming gerbil.
“This is not so funny anymore,” Katia said, looking over the mass of gerbil corpses. The bewildered camels moved back to the walls and the anti-aircraft guns, though it appeared all of the remaining airplanes had made emergency landings. All that was left was a handful of balloons, and most of those were making their way up and over the bowl, leaving the area.
“It was never funny,” I replied. I had blood up to my kneepads. I’d stepped on and smushed at least fifty of the things before the wave had stopped, as suddenly as it had started. I needed a shower. A long shower.
“It was a little funny,” she said. “But the AI is not even trying to be fair anymore. That wasn’t just a temper tantrum. That was the equivalent of a psycho ex-boyfriend going nuts and trying to murder you and your entire family because of something you didn’t even know you did.”
I nodded. I had a new achievement. I was the only one who’d received it. I was afraid to click on it. I did anyway.
New Achievement! You’re the reason why daddy drinks!
You have, for an unspecified reason, raised the ire of the System AI. You have corrected the issue, and everything is back to normal. The acceleration action has been suspended. This time.
Good boy.
Reward: You’ve received a Gold Makeup Sex is the Best Sex box.
You’re not going to break me. Fuck you all. I will break you.
“Acceleration?” Katia said after I read the description to the others. “My original game guide mentioned that before.”
“Yeah,” I said. “We’ve been threatened with it a few times. That… that really sucked.”
“You didn’t even do anything wrong,” she said, shaking her head.
“At least you two are back together now,” Donut said. “And you got a nice box out of it. I know you find it unpleasant, Carl. But you being stubborn about this is causing everything to be more dangerous. We have to kill these things anyway, so if the AI wants you to kill in a certain way, I don’t see why it matters. This is just like one of those agility courses that Miss Beatrice used to insist I complete at all the regional cat shows. I did not like doing it, and I never ribboned of course, but I knew if I did well, I would get an extra brushing that evening. We are all prostitutes in one way or another, I suppose. ”
“I…” I was too tired to argue. “Let’s go let everyone out of the personal space. I need a nap.”
Louis and the others had made it to the Bactrian ruins and were searching the remains for loot and any other signs of life, including other crawlers. So far they’d found nothing except a single saferoom that was abandoned but still useable and a caved-in Club Vanquisher entrance that was useless anyway because nobody in the group had a pass. They were going to spend the rest of the day grinding and searching. They’d weather the sand storm in the saferoom before returning. In the meantime, we’d open our boxes and reset and then formulate a new plan to get into the now-undefended castle.
The camels went to work repairing the wall, putting out fires, and mending the fabric cover for the sand storm. The changelings, Donut noted, were all but gone from the ranks of the camels. I hadn’t thought about it during the chaotic fight with the gerbils, but all of the fallen had been true dromedarians. She didn’t see any of the changeling principals about, including Henrik.
The Toe had been mostly destroyed. A massive chunk of Wasteland had taken out the whole block. Luckily we could still go through the front door and enter the personal space. I’d been worried that if we’d lost the entrance here, all the NPCs still inside would be stuck.
The Gate of the Feral Gods Page 19