《Wicked West - A LitRPG Western》 Chapter 1 Chapter 1 I remember the first day of my retirement with crystal clarity. One second, I was strapping a helmet on my head and offering a shaking hand of cookies to two kids who looked like Jehovah¡¯s Witnesses. They weren¡¯t, of course. They were with EveNet¡¯s continuation services and this was their second visit to my house. I had been struggling. Tyler, my husband of 61 years, had died. That was three years before EveNet¡¯s first visit. And yes, I still counted the years we were married after his death. He was still with me, so those years counted. After Tyler died, I threw myself into being Grandma. I loved Winifred, but it was just as much about not focusing on my loss. Then I got the news. Fucking cancer. Again. I had no illusions of my survival, and it would seem neither did the insurance company. They scheduled for the EveNet boys to show up a week after the doctors gave me my results. The knock on the door startled me. I swear I almost died right there. That first visit was January 14th, 2056. ¡°Samantha Howell?¡± the kid at the front door asked. I¡¯m not being generous, he was probably in his early twenties, but when you¡¯re my age, everybody is a kid. The other one stood behind him with a clipboard of paperwork that I couldn¡¯t see. Both of them must have thought that they looked like salesmen, but the stark white button ups with the black ties only put that Jehovah¡¯s Witnesses image in my mind. ¡°That¡¯s me,¡± I answered. ¡°Can I help you?¡± The kid in front was the one leading the conversation. He had a shaved head that was starting to stubble with black hair and a clean-shaven face. His pal behind him was the polar opposite. He had a thick head of hair that was tied off into a ponytail in the back and a thick brown beard in the front. That was the first time I had heard of EveNet. It turned out they were relatively new in the last year. My insurance had an option in it, that if I was willing to sign on the dotted line, my children, Ashley and Rose, wouldn''t have to deal with any costs from my passing. The thing they had me sign was called a "Continuation Contract," and even if the deal to wipe out the debt of my death wasn''t part of it, I would have still considered it. "A Continuation Contract is exactly that," the bald one explained. His name was Greg. "You download your consciousness to our servers and we upload you to a digital environment, populating it for other contractees or gamers. Live for a while in our game, and after that you can unlock the opportunity to move to different environments, games, or anything you can dream of." My ''digital avatar,'' as he kept calling it, wouldn''t be turned on until I physically died. That way there wouldn''t be two of me floating around. It would also be a separate legal entity, with no rights to any of my assets from the real world. Basically, when I died, I got downloaded to a video game. I don''t remember my death, which is probably a good thing. At 89, and the build up of my arthritis that I was dealing with, it wasn''t something that I had been looking forward to. I didn''t remember anything after Greg and his friends put that headset on me. That was the first time I saw them. The second time was when they brought the equipment. I have never been overly spiritual. I¡¯m sure there¡¯s something out there and I try to live a good life, and that¡¯s about where it ended. Tyler was dead and it hurt more than anything I had ever gone through. I was desperate to see him again and the only way that was going to happen was when this cancer finally ended me. The problem was that I also didn¡¯t want to die. I still had so much that I wanted to do, so much that I could accomplish with my life. There were adventures that I had never experienced and things that I still hadn¡¯t done. The Continuation Contract seemed like the best of both worlds. I would die and still get to see my Tyler, but I would also continue on as a digital clone of some kind. Me and my memories would continue on in immortality and my children would have none of my debt. The hairy one, who¡¯s name I couldn¡¯t remember, placed the weird helmet on my head. I listened to it hum for about half an hour before I realized I was no longer in my body. That¡¯s a weird as hell situation to wake up into. At first, I thought I had fallen asleep, but that didn¡¯t make sense because I felt more alert than before. Unauthorized usage: this narrative is on Amazon without the author''s consent. Report any sightings. The darkness, that I thought must have been the helmet, was gone and replaced by a blinding white light. Reflexively, I threw my hands up to cover my face, but nothing changed. That was when I noticed the complete lack of hands, or arms, or anything. ¡°Welcome to EveNet,¡± a calm woman¡¯s voice filled the space where I wasn¡¯t. Or was. It was very confusing. ¡°You are the digital avatar created by Samantha Howell. I regret to inform you that she passed away on this day, May 13th, 2057.¡± I died? EveNet? They were just in my house. 2057? Before I could ask any questions, the voice continued. ¡°I am sure that you have a lot of questions,¡± she said. ¡°You died about a year after you put on the download helmet. Your digital avatar was created the day you put the helmet on and left in a powered down mode until the living you had passed. For the digital avatar, it would seem like no time had passed and that you were instantly thrown from one place, your home with the helmet on, to this new and less familiar place. The living Samantha continued with her life, taking off the helmet and spending the next year with many hospital visits.¡± The voice grew softer. ¡°If it helps at all, she died surrounded by her loved ones.¡± I was crying, or at least felt like I was. Without a body, there were no tears, no screams of agony, no heartbreaking sobs. Someone, the voice heard me in my grief. ¡°Take your time,¡± she said. ¡°This is a lot to take in.¡± And I did. I was mostly alright after what felt like ten minutes. Then, I remembered how this other Samantha, the living one, was able to see Tyler again and I, this digital copy, would not. That took another fifteen to twenty minutes. When I was finally collected enough to continue, I said, ¡°What now?¡± I didn¡¯t hear my voice, just like I couldn¡¯t see my body, but that didn¡¯t stop the EveNet representative from hearing me. ¡°Now,¡± she sounded excited, ¡°the fun begins.¡± I was back in my body and the white space shifted into my bedroom. I was standing in front of a long mirror that I didn¡¯t own. There was nothing special about whatever scene this was supposed to be. My reflection was everything I had expected in my long years. A black woman in her late eighties with a habit of wearing her dead husband¡¯s flannel shirts and my own jeans. My hair was tied in the back and I had my glasses on. Large things, with a purple frame that I had let Winnie pick out. The disembodied voice returned. ¡°How old would you like to be?¡± she asked. ¡°We have access to images of you at every age, thanks to your family and the internet, as well as the best technology for analyzing your visual memories.¡± ¡°That¡¯s not creepy or anything,¡± I mumbled. ¡°If you are going to scan my memories, try to stay out of my early twenties.¡± I thought about it for a moment before smirking and answering, ¡°Forever 29, right?¡± My reflection showed the years reverse. My back straightened, or maybe I just got taller, and my silver hair turned black. Crows'' feet vanished while my breasts decided to shift back to where they had been in those days. In less than two seconds, I was 29 again. ¡°You can change this in the future, if you wish,¡± the voice said as I admired the old me. As I looked over my body as it once had been, a thought creeped in. ¡°Can I make adjustments?¡± ¡°Of course,¡± the voice answered and suddenly there were digital sliders on the mirror. I had taken to wearing colored contacts when I was in college. I don''t remember why, other than I liked the idea of my eyes always changing colors. Green had been my favorite. I found the slider next to my eye color and started adjusting. I watched as they shifted from their normal brown (Tyler''s favorite) to the dark, forest green that I had favored back then. That was the only change that I made. ¡°If you¡¯re satisfied with the changes to your avatar, we can move on to life selection.¡± ¡°Life selection?¡± I asked. ¡°The digital environment that you will spend the next 250 levels, per your contract,¡± she explained. That number, 250, seemed like a lot, but I had no point of reference. I was a gamer when I was younger and had started back up when Winnie had taken an interest, but that was mostly survival games without any sort of level tracking. You moved forward by finding new resources and recipes and any levels were arbitrary. ¡°Sure,¡± I answered. ¡°Let¡¯s get a life.¡± The digital sliders were all replaced with a list of games. None of them sounded familiar, but when I touched one it expanded into pictures and a summary of what the game was about. Most of them were open world and massive. Car Crimes 9 was one that I was familiar with by reputation. It was a world of multiple large cities with options to do literally anything. You could live out a normal existence with a job, an apartment, and whatever else you wanted, or you could be a billionaire on their yacht, or you could be a career criminal. There were hundreds of games and I wanted nothing to do with Car Crimes, but I liked the open world idea and said as much to the voice. ¡°By the way,¡± I asked, ¡°do you have a name that I can call you?¡± ¡°You may call me Eve,¡± she said. Eve changed the list to all the open world options. A few of them sounded like fun, but were maybe too specific for my tastes. Farmington was a farm life simulator with no cities and only individual houses. This game was more for solo play and socializing was an afterthought. Space Crew: The Game was about assembling a crew for a spaceship and making your way across the universe as a freelancer. Different jobs helped you build a reputation and you could choose to work towards a galaxy wide empire or simple space pirate. There were a ton of options, but I wasn¡¯t much into farming or science fiction. That was when I noticed the picture of bison on a rolling plain. I had been selecting each name in order, glancing at the pictures to gauge my interest, and then moving on. The bison caught me and I stared at it for a moment before looking at the title and description. Wicked West In this open world adventure game in the wild west, choose your life! Live the simple life farming, hunting, and fishing, or take on the law as a criminal in your own gang. Dislike lawbreakers? Hunt them down as a bounty hunter or become a banker in New Paris. Tame the west or let the west tame you. The choice is yours. The pictures were of majestic mountains and rivers. It was a world barely touched by civilization and reruns of Doctor Quinn: Medicine Woman, Little House on the Prairie, and Bonanza danced through my mind. Maybe in this new retirement, I could be a cowgirl. It sounded peaceful, but it also sounded like something that could be fun. I almost hit the button, but had to ask. ¡°What if I don¡¯t like the game I go into?¡± ¡°You can leave to any world of your choice at level 250. This is considered a period of adaptation to your new life. Once you reach 250 in whatever video game you choose, you can move between worlds whenever you like.¡± That still seemed like a large number to me, but Eve didn¡¯t seem worried. Life was about the unknown, so I hit the button and started my journey into the Wicked West. Chapter 2 Chapter 2 Sammy#0421 Level 1 0/150 XP Profession: None Darkness surrounded me and it felt good. Actually, it felt warm and wet, and my feet were being tickled. What the hell? My hands moved about and I realized that I was naked, too. The tickling on my feet shifted to a scrubbing. It was like some large animal was licking my foot. I yanked it back and my body shifted, plunging me into whatever the warm liquid was. When I came up, my eyes had loaded in, or opened, or whatever a digital avatar did to see. The room was dark and I was sitting in a brass or copper tub. It probably wasn¡¯t copper, or maybe it didn¡¯t matter since all of this was digital. I realized that I was already struggling with what was real and what wasn¡¯t and I either needed to accept my new reality or go crazy trying to understand it. The water was filled with bubbles and toward my feet there was a pair of hands holding a scrub brush. The person attached to the hands looked a little annoyed. ¡°Um,¡± I had no idea what to say, ¡°sorry?¡± ¡°Just give me the foot back so we can finish up here,¡± she said. Her voice was identical to Eve¡¯s. ¡°Are you Eve?¡± She shrugged and gave up on waiting for me to give her my foot back. Her hand plunged into the water, gripped my ankle and yanked it up. My head almost went back under, but I caught myself on the side of the tub. ¡°For now,¡± she returned to scrubbing my foot. ¡°Just for the orientation into Wicked West." The room was dark and difficult to see in. As my eyes adjusted, I realized that it was because it had only one lamp and it was one of those old camping lanterns. Tyler used to take those antiques and put LED''s in them. Here, they weren''t nearly as bright. I took another look at Eve. She was young, likely around the age I was pretending to be. Most men would find her attractive, with the red hair and round cheeks. She was dressed plainly with a white dress that went along with the general aesthetic of the place. The dress was simple, but it looked aged, which brought a million more questions to my mind about the rules in my digital world. The dress was also lower cut than I had been expecting for old west, and that led me to my next question. "Are you supposed to be a whore?" "You''re direct, aren''t you?" Eve didn''t look up from my feet as she spoke. "The only shame in the conversation won''t be coming from me. Work is work." I shrugged. "Nobody knows what other people are struggling with." Eve looked up and her eyes bore into me. It wasn¡¯t anger or upset, she seemed genuinely to be observing me for the first time. "I am going to have to watch you," she said quietly. "We don''t get many like you in here." "This a sausage party? Or do you mean old ladies who mind their own business?" I leaned back and tried to enjoy the foot scrub. "I meant the second one," she grinned, "but this is the type of game to pull in more men than women." As my eyes adjusted, I saw several stacks of clothes on a table in the corner. Likely mine,when I got out. Or at least, I hoped they were. I really hoped they didn''t expect me to prance around naked until I found or stole clothing. "You mentioned orientation?" Eve nodded and shifted her hands to my other foot. "You''re already aware of the level requirement before you leave. Me borrowing this avatar is to prepare you for when you leave this room." "Where can I see my current level?" Granny or not, I wasn''t unfamiliar with gaming. The author''s tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon. As I said it, a series of images popped up in the air directly in front of my eyes. They were stationary directly in front of wherever my head was facing and I could move my eyes to look around. I realized that this was an in-game heads up display. On the left were two vertical bars. The one furthest left had a heart underneath it, while the one to the right of it had a lightning bolt. At the top of my vision was a drawing of a cowboy with a plain expression. Underneath his face, it read "Neutral." To the right of that was listed $15.32 with a dividing line and the number 0 in gold type to its right. On the bottom right of my vision was an old-timey map, letting me take a look at my surrounding area. As I focused on it, it swelled so that I was looking at a map that filled all of my vision with the town of Easter, as it was labeled.There were a number of gray dots moving around, but Eve wasn¡¯t one of them. As I shifted my attention, the map receded. In the center at the bottom of my vision was the words, ¡°Level 1.¡± ¡°You just found your HUD,¡± Eve explained. ¡°You¡¯re important information for everything going on at this moment can be found there.¡± She closed her eyes for a moment before opening them again. ¡°You also have a journal,¡± she nodded behind me. When I craned my neck, I could see a pile of clothes that I assumed must be mine. ¡°You will find it, and most of your basic equipment in your satchel there. The journal, aside from being a journal that only you can read and write in, also has a lot of pertinent information regarding how this game works, when items and equipment will become available to you. There¡¯s also a lot of free space, so you can take notes on your journey. Your satchel is more or less unlimited. You can fit almost anything in there, without any effects on weight. Within reason, of course. You aren¡¯t shoving a corpse into your satchel.¡± Eve let my foot drop and she slid down the tub toward me. ¡°Look,¡± she said quietly, ¡°you don¡¯t have a lot of time. A raid started about three minutes ago and you missed out on picking a side to be on.¡± ¡°What the hell does that mean?¡± I sat up, looking to get out of the tub, but Eve¡¯s hand clutched mine. ¡°It means that I only have enough time for one piece of advice for you,¡± she stood up and helped me from the tub, tossing me a towel when my feet touched the rough wood. ¡°What is it?¡± ¡°Levels don¡¯t change anything except which gear you can purchase. It does not give your guns more power, and a headshot kills everybody.¡± I moved toward the pile of clothing and rushed to put them on. The shirt was a dark red button up. The pants were gray slacks with suspenders that held them in place. That was when I saw the satchel and the gun belt. I put the belt on quickly, not sure how loose or tight it should be. Once it was in place and the satchel was slung over my shoulders and situated behind my reach so as to be out of the way, I drew the pistol. Looking at it, my HUD switched to an item description. Farmer¡¯s Pistol Six Shots Accuracy 4/10 Distance 4/10 Damage 3/10 Underneath my money situation on the HUD a new item popped up. It showed a circle with a dot in it, meant to represent a bullet, I assumed, and to the right of it read ¡°6/40.¡± I guessed that was my ammo count, with the first number being the amount loaded in the gun and the second being how many bullets I carried on me. ¡°If you get a chance,¡± Eve was saying as I looked the pistol over, ¡°you reload the gun by miming putting bullets in the chamber. As long as you have ammo, it will work.¡± Gunshots could be heard in the distance. I didn¡¯t know the town or the area at all, but my map showed me several red dots moving quickly through the building I was in. A closer look showed me that they weren¡¯t dots, so much as teardrop shaped, with the point of the teardrop being the direction they were facing. On them was also a small arrow aiming down. Footsteps and creaking floorboards filled my ears and as they got louder the small arrows disappeared. That must have meant they were on a level beneath me. As three of the dots stopped outside of the room, I raised the pistol and aimed at the door. As I did so, a small crosshair, almost like a laser sight, appeared on the door where I pointed the gun. ¡°One last thing,¡± Eve said. ¡°Death isn¡¯t permanent anymore. Don¡¯t hesitate.¡± My dad had taught me to shoot a long time ago. It was a fun thing to do when he would take me to visit my grandpa. We would aim at cans and try to do trick shots. He showed me how to safely handle a gun and how to be responsible with it. That was close to seventy years ago. Since then, I hadn¡¯t had much use to use a weapon of any kind. Somehow, the lessons he had taught me came back as if they had been yesterday. The gun felt like an extension of my arm. The door burst open with a kick and I fired instantly. My shot proved how comfortable I actually was with the weapon as I dealt deadly force to the door frame. The man who kicked the door was covered in furs and a big hat. He saw me and wagged his finger. ¡°You only get the one shot,¡± then he raised his pistol and shot Eve in the head. ¡°Fuck,¡± I shouted as gore exploded from the impact. I dropped to my knees, hiding behind the tub. ¡°Is that a noob, Larry?¡± One of the guys in the back asked. ¡°Don¡¯t be stupid,¡± the guy in furs answered. I peeked over the edge of the tub to let my HUD see Larry. Over his hat was his name and level, floating in the air as if it belonged there. RadicalLarry19 Level 18 37230/38070 XP Profession: Mountain Man ¡°Sammy,¡± Larry kept his voice soft, but he was still red on my map and I had no doubts about his intentions. ¡°Level 1, huh?¡± A boot hit me in the back and I sprawled out on the floor next to the tub. I saw the man who had snuck up behind me as I rolled over. Larry carried a sawed-off shotgun and had it aimed just inches from my head. The man who had kicked me also was aiming at me, but I was less concerned about him. ¡°Welcome to Wicked West.¡± RadicalLarry19 pulled the trigger. Chapter 3 Chapter 3 ¡°What the fuck?¡± I shouted. When Larry¡¯s gun had blown apart my skull, I expected pain. What I got instead was a picture of my headless body lying on the floor of Eve¡¯s bathroom. My head was a gory mess. When the photograph faded, I spent another brief moment as a disembodied group of thoughts before everything went dark. The darkness was almost instantly replaced by the feeling of grass under me. The world shifted and I was laying on my back. I could feel the sun beaming down on my face. I opened my eyes and sat up to take in my surroundings. The town wasn¡¯t far and I could make out its outline. I was in the woods and near a trail. Further away from the trail was a group of bushes that seemed thick enough to hide behind. I needed more information before I marched back into Easter. The HUD was open and I kept an eye on the map as I crouched and began searching through my pockets and satchel. The holster only seemed to have my Farmer¡¯s Pistol and nothing else. The pockets on my britches were empty except for a pocket watch. I looked at it, but I had no idea what time it had been previously, so it didn¡¯t do anything to confirm what Eve had told me about the hour cooldown time after getting killed. The satchel was another story. It was a small leather pouch with a flap over it and a thin piece of leather that I had been wearing over one shoulder and across my chest. Opening it turned on a display that overrode my HUD, replacing it with an inventory set of checkboxes. It was opaque, letting me still see the world around me. From what I could tell, there was no limit to how many things I could put into the satchel, but that could just be because I hadn¡¯t hit that limit yet. The bag had 5 of what it called Jerky Strips, a Lantern, a Campfire Kit, and a bottle labeled Opened Brandy. Digital or not, I could feel the pangs of hunger and mentally selected the Jerky Strips. As I did, my HUD vanished and I watched as my hand reached into the bag and pulled out the meat. Again, I found myself surprised by how real everything felt and looked. I needed to get over that. This was my new reality and gawking every time something looked neat was going to get me killed. The taste was exactly how I expected the meat to taste, based on how it looked. I couldn¡¯t figure out which memory of mine it was pulling from, or if it even was. When I swallowed, my HUD popped back up and I saw that my health hadn¡¯t been at max, sitting somewhere around 90%. About when the meat hit my stomach, I saw my health gauge blink and grow until it was back at the 100% level. It was a slow process, with the entire health regeneration taking about 10 seconds. Food offered healing, although gradual. That was good to know. A lot of this stuff was likely outlined in that journal Eve had mentioned to me, but I preferred to learn by doing. Chewing on the jerky gave my mind enough background noise for my brain to kick into gear and start planning. This was how I handled daily chores when I had been alive. Either an audio book, the television, or music needed to be playing. Once that was taken care of, I could plan the work and then work my plan. First up was learning as much as I could about this new world. This might be the wild west, but there was a gaming element influenced by modern culture that made this place unpredictable. When I was alive, I would have pulled up my phone and searched for the information I needed, but that wasn¡¯t available to me anymore. The HUD came back up as I willed it and I expanded the map to look at the surrounding area. Eve had been right and I was about a mile outside of Easter. I could make out a few of the players and non-playable characters from the city. The non-playable characters, or NPC¡¯s, came up as gray tear drops while the other players, like myself, came up as blue. Except RadicalLarry19 had been red. I didn¡¯t know if that was because he was the attacking party from the ¡°raid,¡± as Eve had called it, or if it was because he was specifically hostile toward me. Not for the first time, I wished I had selected a different game. I wasn¡¯t going to get answers popping a squat in the woods. Closing my map, I stood from my hiding place and marched back toward Easter. The surrounding environment was so incredibly realistic that it was easy to forget my new circumstances. This was a digital world, but it didn''t feel that way at all. It made me question the reality that I had come from. Maybe there was something to all those simulation theory conspiracies. My march toward Easter was only distracted by the world around me. A flower growing out of the grass with large purple petals caught my attention. Bending down, I tore it from the ground and was surprised by how real even that felt. +5 XP The alert flashed in the upper left side of my vision, even though the HUD was down. Seeing that, I brought up my HUD and examined the flower. It said, "Violet Snowdrop," with not much else. My experience bar had moved too. Instead of the 0/150 is had read before, it now said 5/150. That made me think, did everything give you experience? Could I gain some levels just by picking flowers? At 5 experience per flower, that was going to be a lot of flowers. Looking around, I couldn''t see any more of the purple petals. I did see a rabbit, though. It stood there in the middle of the field to my right. So close to the town of Easter, but not near anyone. I didn''t know the different types of rabbits in the world, so no names floated to the top of my head. It was small, brown, with a white tail and ears that seemed longer than I was expecting. The little bunny wasn''t real, I kept telling myself. Just a digital creation. I had no problem with hunting or killing animals in the sense that we needed food to eat. The problem came when it was up to me. The thought of taking the cute bunny''s life made my emotions bubble to the surface. This might be a digital world with no human deaths, but it was hard to see this world as almost too real and as a game at the same time. I forced a mental shrug and continued aiming down the barrel. It was no different than those fifty or so mice that Tyler and I had hunted in our second home. One winter, the entire place had been overrun. Tyler had suggested I use peanut butter on the traps, but I had a better idea. I put Nutella on half of the traps after I wrote my name on them. Tyler rose to the competition and our little pest problem became a contest. That I won. I aimed the pistol much as I had against RadicalLarry19, except that this time I wasn''t about to get killed. The rabbit was pawing at the ground and not moving much. I squeezed the trigger and the gun jerked. The noise had been as loud as I remembered, but the kickback wasn''t. The gun barely moved, choosing to lift a little. It affected the aim, but not much else. +10 XP "Only 10?" I stood up and walked to where the dead rabbit was. The happiness that I felt from hitting the rabbit was replaced quickly by my frustration over the only 10 experience I received. I was still looking at my HUD and my experience bar when I made it to the dead animal. That was why I noticed when an option came up. Skin animal? There was no yes or no option, just the question. I knelt down to pick it up and felt my satchel get heavier. I looked down and saw that my knife was sticking out of the open flap. I have never skinned anything in my entire life, but for some reason the knowledge on how to do it was there at the surface of my mind. The ''yes'' option highlighted and selected. Beffore I could stop myself the knife was in my hand and the rabbit was skinned. I didn''t know how realistic the process was, but I was mostly surprised by the amount of blood. It felt like there should be more as I tore the skin off of the animal with my brute force and shoved the skin into my satchel where it disappeared. I cut off two chunks of meat and automatically wrapped them in stained leather that my hands also pulled from the satchel. When they were wrapped, I shoved them into the satchel too. So, that was how you got meat in Wicked West. +10 Skinning XP Skinning XP? Did that mean that I could level up certain skills, too? Did bigger animals increase the amount of experience I received from skinning? My HUD had gone up by 10, as well. Specialized experience points counted toward my overall level, it would seem. Picking flowers, skinning animals, killing assholes, and who knew what else all added to my experience total. Maybe I shouldn''t have been so worried about the small amounts of experience. I put the knife away, realizing in the back of my mind that my hands were entirely back under my control, and started walking again. The part of town that I came in next to was the large barn that must be the town stables. There was an icon on my map for it in the shape of a horseshoe, but there was a lock on that icon, too. For whatever reason, I hadn''t unlocked a horse or the ability to care for one. You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story. The road I came up to cut in front of the stables with a branch to the left. If I continued straight, it looked like the road would take me around the town and to the envelope on my map. That must be the post office. The road to the left looked like the main street in any town, except covered in dirt and horse shit. Each side of the road was lined with different wood and stone buildings, the fanciest of which looked to be a hotel. My first thought was to head there, but I remembered a lot of noise coming from somewhere when Eve had been talking to me. I looked around until I saw the sign that fit the memory. Then I went into the saloon. It was appropriately placed almost directly across the street from the hotel. Past that, I saw a sign for a doctor and a badge on a sign that I took to understand as the sheriff''s office. And yes, walking through the double doors of the saloon was the coolest thing that had happened so far. I pushed them open and walked in slowly. I half expected every head to slowly turn my direction, but nobody seemed to care. They probably saw me on their minimaps. People sat at tables and the piano was still playing. It looked as crowded as I expected it should be in the middle of the night, but a quick glance at my pocket watch showed that it was closer to 6 am. As I walked toward the bar and sat down, I pulled up my own minimap and assessed the bar. I should have done this before even coming into Easter. You don''t survive if you aren''t more paranoid than I was being. The patrons at the tables were a mix of NPC''s and players, while only two players were upstairs. The closest players, a group of two playing cards at a nearby table, had their hands on their pistols. They looked like hobos, covered in dirt and grime and torn clothes. With my HUD up, I could see their names and used that to look up their levels. TommyGunZZZ Level 16 21225/22110 XP Profession: Gold Digger Freya_Trippin Level 19 33705/38070 XP Profession: Mountain Man Freya, the only woman player in the bar besides me, seemed to relax when she saw that I wasn''t reaching for my gun. Tommy didn''t, but his hand never inched closer to the pistol either. The bar stool hadn''t touched my ass yet, and the bartender was in front of me. He was a bald man with a thick mustache and a stained apron. "What can I get ya?" his voice was deep and rough. "A shot of whiskey, please," I said. He poured me a glass and I saw as fifty cents removed itself from my money at the top of my HUD. The drink was smooth, and reminded me of another time that Tyler and I had been out on the town. Except this time, it reminded me of the time that we went to Vegas. Was every drink going to be a blast to the past? If so, I didn''t know if it would turn me into a complete alcoholic or if I might quit the stuff entirely. I leaned away from the bar and that was when I saw Eve. She was wiping down an empty table and picking up the dirty glasses from it. My feet were on the floor and over to her before I knew what I was even doing. "Eve," I spoke quickly. "What the hell happened last night?" Eve straightened and looked at me with her eyebrown raised. That was when I saw that her eyes seemed different somehow. Like someone else was behind them. "You''re a noob, then?" she asked with a thick southern accent. "Um," I stuttered as my confidence drained out of my feet. "Yes," I managed. "We met last night." I let out a heavy sigh. "A little over an hour ago." "You poor thing," she said. "You were killed during the raid?" I nodded. "So were you," my voice was low and quiet. "Yes and no," she said. "I am not Eve. I''m a retired player. I help Stu manage the bar." She thrust out her hand to me and I shook it. "I''m Marcy." "Sam," I gave, still confused. Marcy seemed to understand this and attempted to explain. "Eve possesses my body sometimes to assist with getting new players spun up. The raid made things complicated, so she probably hopped in there," she pointed to her head, "to give you the quickest rundown she could before you got, well, rundown." "Do you know where I could find Eve?" Marcy frowned. "That''s not how it works. She isn''t in the game." "Then where is she?" Marcy thought she was helping, but this was only making my head spin. "She''s the first of us," Marcy said. "A digital person, downloaded to the system. She helps us figure out this new world and then she''s mostly hands off. She would have mailed you some extra stuff that you can get at the post office. That might help you with a lot of your questions." "How do I get in touch with her?" I asked. "I''ve got a lot of a questions that I don''t think I''ll find the answers to at the post office." Marcy shook her head. "How''d you find answers in the ''real world''?" This had been a question that had been pissing me off about choosing the wild west setting that I had. Modern conveniences were no longer available to me. "I would Google it." Marcy snickered. "Before Google? Do you remember before Google?" My eyes rolled so hard, I thought I might hurt myself. I was almost 90 years old. I remembered jokes about Prince Albert in a can, penny candies, and the Reagan years. "Yes," I said instead. Marcy was loving this conversation and the grin on her face was beginning to wear on me. "Well, silly, how did you learn things before Google?" "Libraries, watching the news, asking questions." "Bingo! Except the nearest library is in Saint Emile, and that''s a few days'' ride. And we don''t even have radios out here, although the phonograph in the hotel is almost the same." "So, I need to ask around if I want answers?" Marcy was a little much and I was ready to move on to the next victim of my questioning. "Go to the hotel, get a room for the night and start there." Marcy said before adding, "Good luck." "You''re a retired player," I said. "Can''t you help me?" "Honey," she smiled at me, but didn''t stop wiping the table. "I just did." The hotel was across the street, but crossing it was both a joke and a nightmare. My map was filled with the blue teardrops of other players and as I stepped out of the saloon, I could see every eye either turning to evaluate me, or already mid-evaluation on someone else nearby. Death not being permanent meant that anybody could fuck you up without much of a moral obligation, but I would still lose an hour and have to walk back to town. To them, I was an experience farm. On the other hand, so were they and I think that¡¯s the only thing that kept them in check. If this environment of fear was ever going to stop ruling my new life it wouldn¡¯t be until after I had gained enough levels to handle myself. I had to force my grip to relax on my pistol and kept mumbling to myself, ¡°Please don¡¯t kill me, please don¡¯t kill me.¡± Judging by some of the looks I was getting, I had a feeling this was going to be my mantra for at least the next few levels. Stepping out into the mud of the street, I allowed a little distraction. Players were riding horses, driving wagons, sitting in covered carriages, and, in one case, being dragged behind and laughing as he was pulled through the mud behind a horse. This game let us do or ride anything and that meant opportunities. If I could wrap my head around the mechanics of this place and what we could do, maybe I could stay alive longer than not. The hotel was nicer than the rest of the buildings with what looked like a fresh coat of paint. I stepped in to see a man sweeping the floor directly in front of the stairs to the second floor. The main lobby was small with a reception desk and two chairs in the corners. When facing the hotel desk, the stairs were to the right and to the left was a hall covered by a curtain. The hotel proprietor looked up and smiled when I came in. His clothes were a mix of browns, with a jacket over a tight vest. He wore small, round glasses and what I could only think of as a red ascot, like Fred from Scooby Doo. It probably wasn¡¯t an ascot, or called that, but I didn¡¯t know the name. ¡°Good morning,¡± he set the broom against the wall and slid behind the desk. ¡°Victim of the raid, I¡¯m guessing?¡± I nodded. ¡°Killed within the first ten minutes of arriving.¡± He frowned. ¡°Then you likely only have the usual starter sum of money, unless you went to the store or the saloon first?¡± ¡°Close enough,¡± I agreed. In an old habit, I stuck out my hand. He flinched and quickly tried to hide it behind a smile.¡±Uh, I¡¯m Sammy.¡± ¡°Yes,¡± he grabbed my hand and shook. ¡°I¡¯m Hubert. Hubert Clark. Would you be looking for a room then?¡± ¡°Until I can figure out what I am doing here.¡± I hooked my thumb over my shoulder, toward the saloon. ¡°Marcy told me to come by here and see about getting a room, but she also seemed to think that I could find some answers here.¡± Hubert scoffed, turning to grab a key and set it on the desk. ¡°Marcy could have told you the same thing that I will.¡± He nodded to where my grip still rested against my gun in its holster. ¡°That¡¯s a good habit to get into. That¡¯s your first bit of advice: a lot of players would rather kill you for the experience than play nice.¡± His hand was still resting on the key. ¡°The room will be a dollar for tonight.¡± The moment that I thought that wasn¡¯t a bad price, I had a dollar in my hand and my HUD showed my total sum dropping. I handed the cash to Hubert and he slid the key over to me. ¡°Fifty cents and I¡¯ll give you the best piece of advice you¡¯ll get today.¡± I sighed and mentally agreed, letting fifty cents appear in my hand. As he took it, he said, ¡°You know what, I¡¯m generous. Here¡¯s two pieces of advice. The first is to get yourself to the post office. A lot of information will be there, but so will a lot of rewards for leveling. That¡¯s stuff you can use.¡± I had heard as much many times already and decided to start heading that way soon. ¡°And the second piece of advice?¡± I asked. Hubert pointed out the window to the barn I had passed on my way into town. ¡°Go to the stables sometime today and they¡¯ll give you a horse-stealing job. It is kind of a beginner¡¯s quest to help you get used to horses and jobs, so they¡¯ll give you the horse when you complete it and a good chunk of experience, too.¡± I frowned, shaking my head almost immediately. ¡°Breaking the law is how you get shot.¡± Hubert laughed. ¡°No, breaking the law is how you make money. Existing in this world is how you get shot.¡± He winked and added, ¡°The trick is to keep something between you and the bullets.¡± he sighed. ¡°The law in Wicked West, or at least in Easter, is a joke. It exists to hound players, but mostly acts as a negative reputation experience farm. Break the law, the cops come, you mow them down, I have to raise my prices for just you and everyone frowns and says nasty things when you walk by. Reputation is important, but there¡¯s nothing in this game you can¡¯t buy.¡± That was a lot to unpack. I figured he was talking about that neutral face in my HUD. So, reputation had a direct effect on not just how people treated me, but also the cost of goods. That, combined with how useless the law sounded, meant that I needed to keep my head down, but I also had no one to look out for me but me. Did the police care if I shot someone in self-defense? If they didn¡¯t, reputation wouldn¡¯t be easy to manage, at the very least. I put another fifty cents on the desk. ¡°You gave me more than two pieces of information. Thank you.¡± A smiling cowboy face appeared in my notifications along with the words: Reputation Increased. Being a decent person was rewarded. That was also good to know. ¡°Thank you,¡± Hubert pocketed the coins. ¡°Your room is this way.¡± He led me upstairs and into the first room to the right of them. It was better than I expected for a dollar with a twin sized bed, a fireplace, a chair, and a nightstand. The bed was directly under the window, and I didn¡¯t like that at all, but I would figure something out. Before Hubert shut the door and left me with my new room, he repeated, quietly, ¡°The only law worth a damn in Easter is your gun. Do the quest.¡± Chapter 4
Chapter 4
¡°None of that makes any sense,¡± I stared at the paper, yellowed with age, that held the job specifics for me.
¡°What doesn¡¯t make sense about it?¡± The stable manager, Henrik Clancy, was getting frustrated with me, which I could understand. Your average gamer probably accepted the jobs without any questions, but I saw myself with a rare opportunity to test the limits of what the NPC¡¯s could do.
Yes, they were normal people with tasks assigned, but maybe they could be negotiated with for more pay or easier jobs for the same pay. I didn¡¯t know, and until I actually took the time to go to that damned post office, I had to learn the hard way.
It wasn¡¯t that I didn¡¯t want to go to the post office. It was that I felt that was when the nature of my new reality would hit me the hardest. Up until now, everything was weird, but it all felt real. As far as I understood it, the post office would be the place where my game questions were all answered. It was the closest thing to texting or email that I was ever going to find again, but in a scenario that made it seem like a normal part of the Wild West. The two opposing ideas, email and the edge of prairie life, scared me.
So, I was here accepting a job to become an outlaw instead of going and checking my mail. Somehow, that was easier.
Mr. Clancy was my height with hair that resembled straw poking out from underneath a well-worn hat. His hands were as dirty as he smelled, which was to be expected, given his line of work.
¡°I read it, and I hear you,¡± I let out a long sigh, ¡°there¡¯s just no logic to it. You want me to go and steal a horse for you, and then you are just going to give me the horse?¡±
Henrik stepped forward with a finger on his lips, shushing me as he moved in. ¡°Listen, noob. The reward is part of the story. Normally, it¡¯ll be gear or some good cash and knowing about it in advance is why you take the job. Not this time. This time, it¡¯s on there so that you know, but it has to seem natural. You bring back the horse, and I see that you don¡¯t have one, so I offer you this one, implying that you¡¯ll bring me more horses in the future. It sets us up for a mutually beneficial relationship, if that¡¯s the route you want to go. Either way, that¡¯s how you get your horse. So, stop being an idiot and let me play my bit out.¡±
That was the first time in a while that I remembered I was supposed to be broadcasting on that streaming thingy. Henrik saw my thoughts shift and held up a hand, stepping back to his original spot as he did.
¡°Don¡¯t worry about broadcasting, yet,¡± he explained. ¡°You could, if you¡¯ve been to the post office, but nobody cares about the horse mission.¡±
There was that damned post office again. Whether I liked it or not, the entirety of this game was pushing me in that direction. Realizing that my holdup with the post office was similar to Henrik¡¯s wanting to stay in character for handing out missions, I nodded and put the mission in my bag.
A ¡®ding¡¯ went off in my head and my HUD popped up without warning. My minimap expanded until I was looking at a place just a little north of Easter. A spot marked by a box, a barn I was guessing, had three red X¡¯s in it.
I figured that those had to be the horses.
I got out of the map and saw that there was a red line leaving my teardrop mark on the map and extending behind me.
¡°The maps have GPS?¡± The idea was hilarious and I snort laughed for a moment before realizing that Henrik was just staring at me.
¡°It¡¯s not GPS,¡± his frustration hadn¡¯t left from earlier in the conversation. ¡°It¡¯s a visual representation of your supposed knowledge of the area.¡± He held up his hands and shouted to the digital sky, ¡°It¡¯s for the people who are trying to remain in character.¡±
¡°Alright, alright,¡± I held up my hand, frowning at him. ¡°I get it.¡±
Henrik lowered his hands and stared at me for a moment longer before turning back to the stables and leaving me alone in the road.
That was when I realized that I didn''t have a horse yet, which meant that I had to walk to wherever this ranch was that had horses to steal.
The path on my map stayed to the roads, which I learned quickly enough, was the safe route. Anytime I strayed from the path, the ground became uneven and it didn''t take me long to find that the entire town of Easter was surrounded by cliffs. To the east were cliffs that rose above Easter, and I could see those in the distance looking relatively impassable. It made me wonder if the odd game world that I found myself in used the terrain to lock people in.
To the west, and in the general direction that I needed to go, were cliff edges with more than 200 foot drops. The road wound between the valleys and along the cliff sides, allowing for safe passage. It was easy to see how the people who saw this as more a game and less their new way of life might try to slide down the cliff or hop down in an attempt to invent a shortcut, but that kind of stupid thinking would get you killed. With every death stealing an hour from you, that was a guaranteed way to lose daylight.
And I had no intention of discovering how it felt to die with a broken neck, or bleeding out from a torn off or crushed limb.
I passed people on the road, too. NPC''s on their way to Easter were working their way up the winding trail on their horses.
I thought about trying to steal one of them. I had a pistol and was on my way somewhere to do just that. I was up to my waist in river water, crossing the lowest point of the first valley when it took everything in my power not to draw my pistol on the NPC smirking down at me from his horse.
I came close to shooting him then, but I was looking at all of this as if it was my new world. These people didn''t die, but they could probably hold a grudge or two. I''m sure I would have plenty of time to earn grudges, I didn''t need to start making them just because I didn''t enjoy walking.
On the plus side, I wasn''t getting tired. Maybe three miles into the walk, I realized that I should have been a little wiped, but I wasn''t feeling anything. I picked up the pace as the decline switched to an incline. I figured if I wasn''t getting tired, then it shouldn''t be a problem running.
That was dumb-think.
It turned out that Wicked West''s stamina bar climbed down slowly throughout the day, and mine had barely been affected during the march to criminality, but when I started to run, it dropped fast.
When the bar was below half, I stopped and searched through my satchel. The first bit of meat I found showed that it would help my stamina a little, so I bit into that. My bar went up a bit, but not enough to be of much value. I would have to eat all of my meat to recover the stamina, and I wasn''t ready to finish off my entire supply of meat, yet.
So, I kept walking.
After what felt like forever, but was closer to under two hours of travel, my minimap trail disappeared and the map flooded with red. When I expanded it, I saw that the red only covered the farm that I had come up to. Inside one of the structures on the map were three red X''s. I figured that those had to be the horses and I had a sudden concern that I had been set up.
Three horses could mean a lot of different things. The simplest is that this job wasn''t meant to be done alone. Should I have found another new guy, or maybe a veteran, to help me with this? I had spent the last few years relearning how to live alone and I could see how that wasn''t helping me in my planning. If the three horses meant that I wasn''t supposed to do this alone, then the forces aligned against me were probably forces meant for fighting three outlaws instead of one. I wasn''t prepared for that.
Come to think of it, I wasn''t really prepared for any fight, yet.
That many horses could also mean that when the mission started they would scatter. Three horses would give me options on which to catch, but also meant that even if I survived I might still fail the job if they all ran away.
I studied the map some more before realizing that I needed to move closer. I inched into the red until I was fully engulfed by it. When my teardrop was surrounded by the red, it disappeared and red teardrops popped up everywhere.
The enemy NPC''s.
Or, as my conscience called them, ''the rightful owners.''
Something tickled my memory at that moment and pulled back out the paper that the job from the Organized Horse Criminal had given me.
The bit I was looking for was at the bottom.
I
I wasn''t the smartest retiree at the party, but I figured that there was no way to avoid the law with all those people there. Maybe I could put off them seeing me until the last minute.
Near the front of the barn, I could make out nine other people. I moved close enough that I could see a handful of them and the barn. From the way it looked, I might be able to get into the back of the barn without being seen.
The barn was a large brown building. Other than the color, it looked like it was designed like one of those farms you give toddlers. The ones with the Weebles or whatever.
I hugged the tree line and moved closer until I was directly behind the barn. I took a deep breath before stepping out of the woods. The surrounding area was mostly flat land and thick trees. The house, smaller than the barn, was off to the side and I couldn''t see it from behind the barn. Inside, I could hear the horses moving around.
It was weird how the flatter lands around the farm were so close to the cliffs. It all looked so realistic, yet this flat area seemed to make me question that. Or maybe I was being a little too critical of something because I knew it wasn''t real.
This is real, Sammy, I cursed myself. Accept it or things aren''t going to get easier.
I shook the thoughts from my head and drew my Farmer¡¯s Pistol before walking up to the door on the back of the barn. The front had a large double-door setup for the animals and wagons to move in and out of, but the back had a single door for people just off center to the right as I was facing it. On the left side was a window with no glass in it. That seemed dumb to me, but what did I know? I was never a farmer.
Or a reality/game designer.
The window was a perfect opportunity, though. Looking through and not seeing anyone, I double-checked my minimap and, seeing nobody inside, crawled through.
The horse stall that I landed in was empty. The gate on the stall was my next hurdle. I pushed it open, half expecting it to let out a shrill cry for oil, but it opened silently.
Two steps out of the stall was as far as I made it before a hand yanked my hair back and a blade was pressed against my throat.
¡°Noobs making noob mistakes,¡± a gravelly voice grunted into my ear.
¡°What the hell?¡± I gasped. ¡°How?¡±
I figured I was dead anyway, so I looked again at my map and there he was. A bright red teardrop shape almost covered my own white teardrop.
¡°A word of advice,¡± the knife slid into my neck and I felt the sharp sting as my flesh pulled apart. It was slow and I felt all of it as he emptied my throat on the floor of that barn. ¡°Don¡¯t come back until you figure out how I hid from you.¡±
He let me go and I spun around, falling to my knees as blood pulsed out my new neck-hole. It sprayed onto his feet and then I was on my knees gasping and getting weaker.
What the hell was this? Why wasn¡¯t I dead, yet, instead of bleeding out slowly. Was this an option? This was a nightmare. It was every nightmare.
I finally looked at my killer.
He was in his late forties at best. An older man than the body I chose for this new wild west rebirth I was going through. He had silver hair and a little scruff on his chin with an orange shirt, brown slacks, and suspenders.
¡°Y¡¯all come back soon.¡±
Finally, I died.
The weird photograph thing filled my vision again, showing a picture of the farmer with his bloody knife. Everything went black for a moment and then I could feel the grass under me again.
¡°Fucking hell,¡± I shouted.
How the fuck hadn¡¯t I seen him? This was the wild west, with realistic rules, as I understood it. People didn¡¯t go invisible.
I had to think this through.
First, though, I had to see where I had resurrected.
¡°Well, I didn¡¯t hear a shot, so I¡¯m guessing they stabbed you,¡± a raspy chuckle said. ¡°Or you got mauled by something. You¡¯re well into bear country here.¡±
"I didn''t fall," I said. "A guy slit my throat."
The prospector looking guy tipped his hat up and looked me up and down. There was nothing sexual about it, but I felt like I was being weighed.
It was another moment of me staring at this man in denim overalls before I managed to take in the rest of where I had resurrected. They were covered in holes and he didn''t seem to be wearing anything else with them besides his hat. He had a dirty beard with some sort of weeds stuck in it.
When I finally looked at my surroundings, I was no better off than I had been when I first woke up. I was somewhere in the woods on the side of a hill. It was too thick to see anything but the trees.
The old man let out a long and slow whistle.
"That''ll do it alright. Did he sneak up on you?"
I nodded. "Yes. How did he do that? I didn''t see him on the map at all."
"Map helps, but it can''t tell you everything. It ain''t Google. You''re gonna kick yourself when I tell you."
"I can take it."
"Look at your map," he said and I brought it up. There was his marker on the map directly next to her own.
He crouched and the teardrop marker disappeared.
When he stood up, the mark appeared where it had been. He did it about three more times before I held up my hand.
"Alright," I said, "I get it. So, when I jumped through the window, he was crouched somewhere in the barn."
"Bingo!" he snapped his fingers and winked at me.
Deciding it was in my best interest, I brought up my hud and examined the old man.
D0C70RC007
Level 6
No Profession
"What''s that name?" I asked. "Doctor Cool? I can''t read the number speak as well as everyone else."
He let out a holler of laughter, something like a shrill laugh and stood from where he had been crouched. "No, ma''am. That''s Doctor Coot. You can just call me Coot, but I don''t take too kindly to being called Cooter."
"Well, thanks Coot." I had a sudden fear about his level, even being only 5 above mine, and put my hand on the but of my pistol. "You probably wouldn''t tell me if you were going to kill me would you?"
"Can''t say that I would, but," he shrugged, "I was actually waiting on you, little lady."
"How?" I looked around. "I didn''t even know that I was going to be here."
"Not you, silly," Coot shoved his thumbs under his overall straps and flashed a grin that was missing as many teeth as it had. "I was waiting for anyone else to die and spawn where I did."
"How long have you been waiting? I can''t imagine everyone spawns in the same place."
"Nah," he gave a wink that was entirely unnecessary, and explained. "I figured that no matter how many spawn locations there are, that even a set spawn circumference only has 360 degrees. Even if the distribution was uneven, sooner or later someone had to pop up here."
"Level 6, though. You could probably handle it yourself."
Coot shook his head. "I might as well be a level 1. I got these by shooting rabbits and eating them."
My eyes went wide. "Level 6 by just shooting and skinning rabbits?"
Coot looked embarrassed. "I''ve been here a while."
"Maybe we could help each other out," I suggested.
"That was my plan," his energies returned to their cartoon-like levels. "We need a gang."
"A gang?"
"A gang, or a posse, a party. A shared experience group where we coordinate our efforts, but with a wild west turn."
"You want to attack the farm together?"
Coot nodded so hard it looked like his head might snap off.
"I''m all for that, but how much ammo do you have left?" I didn''t know that we could party up, but it made sense. Everything seemed only limited by how big we could think. Making a gang and stealing the horses together made sense, but I wasn''t sure Coot was a great idea for a teammate.
"I have 3 bullets and a knife left." He rushed forward and pressed his finger to my mouth. "I have something better, though." He stepped back and started digging in his own satchel. "About a week ago, these came in the mail for me as some sort of welcome package."
He pulled out three sticks of dynamite.
Coot started giggling and I was beginning to think that the old man was insane.
"How do we start this gang?"
"Ask me to join your gang. It''s that easy," Coot explained.
"Alright," I said, "Coot, will you join my gang, please?"
"Yes," he beamed.
The HUD displayed a new message.
You have started your Gang. Would you like to name it? Chapter 5 Chapter 5 "How about Backwood Concho?" "What?" I asked. "What even is that? Is that racist?" "Racist? How?" Coot seemed genuinely perplexed. I shrugged. "I don''t know. Sounds like an Indian thing." "Crazy Branch?" "Did you hit one on the way down?" "Maverick Drillers?" "Are you just putting any words together that you can think of?" Coot huffed. "You don''t have to be rude." He concentrated. "Hoof Hiders?" "What does that even mean?" His eyes lit up. "I got one," he held up his fingers and thumbs in a box, like he was taking a picture of a sign. "Death Soldiers." "Well," I was shaking my head, "that was the best one so far, but still the wrong kind of message, I think." "Savage Skulls?" "Who hurt you, man?" I shook my head at him again. Then an idea struck me. "Oh, how about ''The Bonafides?''" "Hoo boy, that''s fancy sounding," Coot''s face lit up with a broad grin. "Alright," I agreed. "I''ll enter that as our Gang name and we can finally get this party started." After we had examined each other''s embarrassingly low stats the idea of a gang name had struck me as momentous. This was my first major decision in my new life. This would be how I began to build my reputation, and everyone seemed to implying that reputation meant everything. The name had to be perfect. Using the mental commands for my HUD, I found where Coot had told me the Gang menu was and began creating it. The instructions were fairly simple. The first Gang was free and if I wanted to start a new Gang in place of this first one it would cost me $200. The pricing was absolutely insane to me. Especially only having about $9 to my name and no job. Please Enter Your Gang Name. "Hey, what about Pink Flamingos?" Coot interrupted my thoughts with another name. "Pink Flamingos?" I asked. "How is that a reputation builder?" Gang Pink Flamingos Accepted. Who would you like to add to your gang? "No, no, no," I tried to find a way to undo the name, but it seemed to accept it instantly. "Are you kidding me? Dammit, Coot!" I added Coot to the gang and sat back in the grass. Before I said anything I let out a long and slow sigh. "Welcome to the Pink Flamingos." When we made our way back to the farm, Coot explained the tiniest part of his plan to me. It wasn''t much, but I wasn''t against it. He was going to use the dynamite to create a diversion. While he kept the farmers busy, I was going to grab two of the horses and ride them out the front. Coot managed to get a good look at the horses before he was killed in a ¡°hail of gunfire and brimstone,¡± as he described it. Both of them were already saddled. With any luck, Coot would jump on one and ride with me as they chased us. Hopefully, we could lose them and get back to the stables at Easter. If one of us died, the plan was to take the second horse and hide out for the hour as close to where Coot found me as possible. If we respawned and couldn''t find the other, then we would meet back up in Easter. If we both died, then we hoped we would spawn near each other. The gang mechanics made finding each other the easy part. Once Coot joined the Pink Flamingos, his dot became a brighter shade of blue on my map and I could see him anywhere, no matter how close he was to me. Now we just had to do the mission, and I had to put an insane amount of hope into a person who not only acted a little crazy, but also had died and decided coming back looking like an insane and very dirty hobo was a great way to start your second life. I wasn''t sure how well this gang thing was going to work out, but until I met someone else who wasn''t trying to kill me, Coot was my best option. The plan was for me to sneak into the back of the barn again, this time without getting caught, while Coot made his distraction. "How will you know when I am ready?" I asked him. "You don''t know about party chat, yet?" He shook his head. "Of course you don''t. Never mind. Open your HUD and think my name." I did and a chat window opened in the top left corner. As I thought the words, they typed out on the screen. It was a simple enough interface to use, and I could already see some future ways we could use this, especially if we were in a more populated area, like a town. A half an hour later I was back behind the barn. Well, mostly. I was expecting Coot to screw this up and I wanted to see what he had in mind for a distraction. I was hanging around the back of the barn when the chat window let out a ding that startled the crap out of me. D0C70RC007 : I can''t do my part until you are in position. Damn. He was right. He was waiting on me. I was going to have to trust him. I forced the fear rising in my belly back down and climbed through the window. I didn¡¯t know if climbing through would make me visible on their maps for a moment or if trying to stay crouched was all that mattered. I came down in the same stall I had died outside of before and crept forward. Gaps in the slats of wood that made the front door to the stall gave me a clear enough view of the rest of the barn. A loud creak drew my attention to the ceiling. I looked at my map again. Two of the red tear drops had little arrows inside of them that I hadn¡¯t noticed before. There were two men upstairs. The man who killed me before was on the opposite side from the stall I was in. There was a door there to the back. He was crouched behind it waiting for someone to come in. He was probably there before, too. When I came in like a bull covered in bells, he just turned and took me out. D0C70RC007 : Wait for my signal and then get your horse and get out of here. Sammy#0421 : What signal? I thought you were going to wave around the dynamite and get them to chase you. D0C70RC007 : Relax. Minor change in plans. All will be well. Get ready. I cussed. The damned old man was going to fuck this up for us and I was going to die again. Painfully. Fuck that. I was calling an audible. Support the creativity of authors by visiting the original site for this novel and more. My knife was already in my hand when I pushed open the stall door as quickly and quietly as I could. I figured he would hear the noise no matter what I did, but I didn¡¯t want anyone outside hearing it. The door was just noisy enough that he did hear it, but I was already slamming into him with everything I had. Years of watching movies and CBS murder mysteries had stopped me from chopping down at him like Mike Myers at a family reunion. I ran at him with the blade at my waist and he seemed not to even notice it. The blade went in, but he wasn¡¯t down yet. In the real world, a stomach wound would be a life-ending event, but even that could take a while. He started bleeding out and fell to his knees, dropping his own knife. Someone might say they weren¡¯t proud of what happened next, but this asshole had watched me bleed out. I kicked him onto his back. As he opened his mouth to shout for help, I dropped my knees onto his chest and slammed the tip of the blade into his Adam¡¯s apple. +5 XP Melee Kill +10 XP Kill +10 XP Silent Kill Admittedly, the entire scene was too real. This man wasn¡¯t dead and would return in an hour, but his corpse was still lying there as blood dripped from my blade and soaked into the hay and dirt that made up the floor. I was breathing so loud and starting to shake. I made myself get off of him and move away. I didn¡¯t want to die again and hovering over a digital corpse while an idiot was outside waving around a stick of dynamite was a dumb way to die. The horses we needed were each in stalls closer to the front of the barn. I moved in that direction slowly and still crouched, checking every stall and constantly looking up. I was surprised that they hadn¡¯t heard the tussle, but I figured that as long as I was crouched the game kept me in some sort of silent mode. I could hear Coot talking outside and stepped up the door. From where I was standing, if someone came in they would knock me over, but no one upstairs could see me. ¡°Back off, man,¡± I could hear someone outside talking. ¡°Or we¡¯ll shoot you.¡± Coot let out a cackle that was one hundred percent on brand for a toothless prospector. ¡°I don¡¯t think that ye will,¡± he said. ¡°Aged Dynamite isn¡¯t the same as your regular variety. Aged Dynamite is meant to simulate what happens to dynamite in the real world, ya see. That means that this stuff,¡± he paused and I imagined he was holding up the stick he had shown me, ¡°is more volatile, but, and this is where our new reality differs only a little, also has a bigger blast radius.¡± ¡°You¡¯re level 6,¡± the first voice said. ¡°You can¡¯t have Aged Dynamite yet.¡± ¡°You sure are a smart one,¡± Coot laughed. ¡°At level 6, I can¡¯t buy it, but anyone can just hand me one.¡± ¡°What the hell?¡± I heard a voice shout from behind me. In what was possibly the smartest move of that day, I didn¡¯t look behind me and instead dove into the nearest stall. Bullets riddled the door where I was standing. I heard Coot¡¯s voice shout something and then an explosion knocked open the front doors of the barn. Wood rained down on me. D0C70RC007 has blown himself up. My ears were ringing and I almost missed the notification that Coot had died. I didn¡¯t miss the notification and flashing red on my map telling me that I was now wanted by the local law enforcement. Coot was gone and the front was cleared.The clock was running and I still needed to get two horses and escape without dying. My pistol was in my hand only a moment before someone came around and into the stall after me. My firing was mostly on reflex and I hit him mostly because of how close he was to me when I shot. As he was still falling over and the XP was tallying on my HUD, I fell back into the stall and reloaded. One bullet or not, I wasn¡¯t going to waste the small amount of time I had while I had it. I burst out of the stall not even looking out of the opened barn doors. One man was running at me from the back of the barn where I saw a ladder. That must have been where the first guy had climbed down. I fired at him three times, hitting him only once. He tackled me to the ground, anyway. One good whack to the side of his head from the butt of my pistol rolled him off me. My gun boomed as I shot him in the temple before he could get to his feet. Another man was above me and shooting down. He was missing a lot, and I figured he was either a bad shot or couldn¡¯t see me. Either way, I returned fire until my pistol emptied. More would be coming and I needed to reload my gun, but I also needed to steal two horses and get out of there. As if reading my thoughts, the plain brown one of the two horses burst out of its stall and then from the barn. ¡°Shit, shit, shit,¡± I dove into the stall that still had the black horse, jumped on, and tried to go after the other horse. I kept spurring it, and it wasn¡¯t moving. Why was this happening now? ¡°Stop kicking me and ask nicely.¡± ¡°What?¡± my head and my empty gun spun around, looking for the voice. ¡°I¡¯m the horse,¡± the voice said. ¡°Just ask me nicely. You don¡¯t have to kick.¡± ¡°Ask?¡± I didn¡¯t have time for this. ¡°Please?¡± I grunted out. ¡°Good enough.¡± Without another word, we were out the damaged barn doors and onto the road. Before I heard them, I saw five red stars moving in my direction on the map. The horse, intelligent or not, responded to my every tug on the reins as if our original interaction hadn¡¯t happened. I could see the brown horse in the distance. Ignoring the law, I leaned forward and kept after it. The horse said something again in its male, ye feminine sounding voice, but this time I didn¡¯t catch it. ¡°What?¡± I asked. Louder, the horse said, ¡°Reload your gun. I¡¯ll catch Sandra.¡± ¡°Sandra?¡± I said as I began to fumble with my pistol. Then I stopped myself. ¡°I just stole you. Why would you help me?¡± The horse snorted. ¡°They are shooting at me, too.¡± I nodded and resumed reloading my pistol. For all my initial fumbling, when I committed to the task, my hands found the bullets and slid them in with a practiced grace I hadn¡¯t expected. This was obviously a mechanic of the game, but the bullets whizzing by my head wouldn¡¯t let me contemplate what that meant to me. I twisted on the horse¡¯s back and aimed down the sights. That was when I realized what I was about to do. ¡°They¡¯re cops,¡± I said. ¡°I can¡¯t shoot cops.¡± ¡°Your perspective,¡± the horse huffed, ¡°is very backwards. You just killed people to steal two of their horses. They are going to kill you.¡± Again, the horse was right. This was where the line blurred. I understood that this was a video game but everything here felt real. Killing the men in the barn had been necessary, but I could feel that man¡¯s death as my knife stabbed into his throat. I saw that look¡­ That was when I found my comfort with killing. The look in that man¡¯s eyes and the eyes of his friends I shot weren¡¯t the eyes of being betrayed by humanity. Those were the eyes of payback. They weren¡¯t saying goodbye. They were saying, ¡°See you soon.¡± Suddenly, everything felt just a little easier. It was less a murder and more a game of cards. I had won that hand, but I could lose the next. My gun jerked in my hand as I tried to hit the sheriffs or marshalls or whatever chasing us. ¡°Take your time and aim,¡± the horse said. ¡°You won¡¯t fall unless I do.¡± I focused down the sites and noticed my hands tugging toward the different silhouettes behind me. It took me a moment to realize that it was some sort of auto-aiming feature. I let it guide me through the turbulence and fired. I hit the horse the lawman was riding on. It was better than if I hit the man himself. His horse collapsed and the rider hit the ground hard. I was already shifting to the next guy when his horse tripped on the first¡¯s and they both went down. ¡°Yeehaw!¡± I allowed myself a moment of celebration because I¡¯m a damned fool. A bullet hit me dead center of the chest. I grunted and leaned over on my horse. ¡°We¡¯re almost there,¡± the horse said. ¡°I¡¯ll ride up beside him and you jump on him. If you hold my reins, you can pull me alongside you as ¡­¡± he paused. ¡°Are you bleeding on me?¡± He let out a loud huff and spit flew from his mouth. ¡°Get some jerky from your bag. That¡¯ll help you heal.¡± The pain in my chest wasn¡¯t nearly as bad as I expected it to be, and I was able to maneuver to my pouch and sort through my inventory. Two bites of the jerky and my health bar on my HUD, which had dropped to somewhere just under half, started to crawl back toward the top. I wasn¡¯t out of the woods yet, but would be soon if I could avoid getting hit again. ¡°Wait,¡± I said as we came within ten yards of the other horse. ¡°Did you say jump? I¡¯m not jumping onto another horse.¡± Aside from the fears of missing and ruining this entire mission, I had no interest in bruising my butt. ¡°You¡¯re no fun,¡± he sounded more entertained than annoyed. Was he joking with me or something? I didn¡¯t have time for this. ¡°Any other bright ideas?¡± ¡°You have a lasso, don¡¯t you?¡± ¡°Shit, no. Where do I get a lasso?¡± If he said my mailbox, I was going to scream. ¡°They usually gift new players one in the mail.¡± I screamed. ¡°Don¡¯t worry,¡± he said. The huffs between his words were getting further apart. On my HUD, I noticed that a smaller health and stamina bar had been placed next to my own and the stamina was nearing the bottom. That had to be the horse¡¯s. I needed to do this soon. ¡°I¡¯ll get you close,¡± the horse said. ¡°You grab the reins. Can you do that? Or,¡± he gave another loud huff, ¡°do we need to discuss how short your arms are?¡± ¡°Shut up, you. Just get me close.¡± A bullet grazed the horse. He let out a grunt but didn¡¯t sway from his course as he pulled us up and next to the brown one. The reins were bouncing, jostled by all the movement. On the fourth try, I snagged them and pulled the wayward animal alongside us. ¡°Alright,¡± I said. ¡°Now what?¡± Chapter 6 Chapter 6 With all of the commotion and running from the law, I hadn''t paid attention to where we were. My horse still hadn''t provided me with his name and, as a result, I was just calling him Horse. Horse was still propelling us and ''Sandra'' forward and his stamina bar was almost empty. Around us wasn''t much, but I was looking as someone who had never needed to hide from the law before. "Are there any needles in your bag?" Horse huffed. "No," I said without looking. A needle is something that would have stuck in my memory if I had seen it. "Damn," he said through gasps. "Too tired. Need to stop." There was a small collection of trees coming up on our right. Aside from those and the forest a little farther to our left, there wasn''t much in the way of cover. "Get there," I pointed with my free hand. My wanted level, measured by the size of the flashing red area on my map, was shrinking, and falling behind me, but we were still in it. As if reading my mind, Horse said, "They have to not see you until the red goes away. The trees might work, but," he stopped running and started walking to the treeline, "you are going to have to crouch." The red on my map was a shrinking cloud that was starting to move closer to my location now that we had slowed. We hit the tree line just as the two law enforcement markers on my map entered the red. "Can you guys crouch or lie down or something?" "Pull Sandra down," Horse said. "I was a person once, she wasn''t. You''ll have to guide her." I hopped down and laid in the grass, pulling Sandra down with me. Horse joined us. He was finally catching his breath and decided to waste it on whispering to me. "The red cloud on your map is the search area," he explained. "When you''re wanted, it will show the place where the sheriff and his gang will be hunting for you. If you can stay hidden or, better yet, completely out of the cloud until it shrinks away, then they will call off the hunt. Even if they see you after the fact they can''t do anything about it." He snorted. "Has something to do with no longer being able to tie you to the scene of the crime anymore." I slowly went about reloading my Farmer''s Pistol while Horse spoke. When he was done, I started to ask a question, but he snorted to cut me off. "You can hear me because you''re my rider. It''s a glitch of the quest because I will be your reward, even if I''m not actually yours yet. Horses that are players can only be heard by their riders and the other horse players." He dipped his head toward the law and I saw that they were almost on us. "Sit still." All I could see on my map were the two cops, but I knew that wasn''t all that was going to be coming. If this wanted level didn''t go away, I could be in serious trouble. A younger man, one of the youngest I had seen in-game I realized, was almost on top of me. Without even realizing it, his gun was aimed right at my body. I didn''t move and I didn''t need to. My pistol had been trained on him since he entered the trees. If the map grew again, he was dead. It grew smaller and he stepped closer. Smaller still and he was only seven feet away. Smaller and he was five feet. Smaller again and he was two feet away. His foot bumped me and he looked down. When our eyes locked, the map flashed and went back to its original ''old-timey'' look. No red anywhere. "You lucked out," he smirked and turned. "First round is on me," he shrugged, "assuming no one else tries to break the law." He and his older partner stomped back to their horses laughing almost too much at the small joke. Horse and I took a minute to collect ourselves. My constant state of having a million questions with no time for answers was beginning to wear on me. On the other hand, it was nice to know what I had to do next. ¡°Let¡¯s get back to Easter and turn you in,¡± I said to Horse. I hopped on the saddle, which I had only just noticed wasn¡¯t the most comfortable, and grabbed Sandra¡¯s reins. After we were situated, I had to stop myself before I spurred Horse forward. ¡°Uh,¡± I let out a nervous cough and continued, ¡°Would you mind yeehawing toward Easter, please?¡± ¡°If you keep asking your horse to move,¡± Horse replied, ¡°people are going to think you¡¯re crazy.¡± ¡°Shut up, you,¡± I laughed. ¡°Just git already.¡± We were pulling into Easter sooner than I expected. As we rode up to the stables, I could clearly make out Henrik. He could see me too, and started to wave. ¡°We are going to need to pump the brakes,¡± I said to Horse. ¡°What? Why?¡± he asked. ¡°If we stop now, the original owners could show up and report you. That whole chase scene back there would be for nothing if that happens.¡± ¡°Then we need to hide,¡± I explained. ¡°I promised Coot that he could turn in the second horse. He said that if I finish without him, he will probably have to start over.¡± I patted the horse¡¯s side. ¡°Neither of us want that.¡± Horse turned toward the way we had come. ¡°Then we shouldn¡¯t even enter town. If we get too close to the quest giver, it could trigger his ending the quest.¡± I did some quick math and we still had at least 15 minutes before when I suspected Coot would resurrect. That combined with his having to walk all the way to Easter, assuming he didn¡¯t piss off the law by stealing a faster ride, meant that I had another hour or so before my posse member would show up. We could use party chat when he respawned. That would give me a better idea of when he would be getting into town. Until then, I either had to befriend a person who decided that living life as a horse would be a hoot, or I had to come up with something else to occupy my time. I brought up the map and looked at Easter in all of its old-timey glory. ¡°Would the post office be outside of the quest range?¡± Horse dipped his head. ¡°Yes, but-¡° I cut him off. ¡°-but, it¡¯s locked down when you¡¯re in the middle of a mission?¡± ¡°Everything useful is,¡± he admitted. ¡°I think the idea is to make you stock up and prepare for the mission instead of getting into it and making changes.¡± "Well," I said, "that''s a dumb idea." For the next twenty minutes, since my math was off, we sat in the grass about a hundred yards outside of Easter. I spent the time looking over my HUD and inventory a little more to see if there was anything that I might have missed. At the same time, I kept an eye on my map for any other players. The last thing that I needed was to get killed by one of them while I was on the mission. From my inventory, I learned that I could examine and clean my weapons. I could trigger the actions by digging around in my inventory, selecting my gun and then mentally choosing the option to inspect it, and then the option to clean it. Or I could pick up my gun and just start cleaning it like I would in the real world. It was weird how it gave you the option. It was as if they didn''t want me to forget that it was a game, even if a little bit of roleplay was encouraged. I couldn''t help but wonder if that was some sort of mental health aspect to the game. Was I seeing some hinted warning that forgetting you were in a game could cause some sort of issues? Or was I so bored and angry at having to wait on Coot to respawn that I was inventing conspiracy theories out of my inventory? When Coot did his miraculous rebirth, a notification popped up to let me know. D0C70RC007: Did you live? Sammy#0421: Yes. Got both horses and lost the law. I''m sitting outside of Easter now. South road that leads to the stables. D0C70RC007: I see you on the map. Shouldn''t take me too long. Sammy#0421: Hurry up. I got the chatty horse. D0C70RC007: Chatty? Sammy#0421: You''ll see. I wasn''t exaggerating either. While Horse had remained incredibly useful during combat, his demeanor shifted entirely when he was bored. He talked a lot. At first, I thought that I could use it and get information out of him. That failed miserably. He only wanted to talk about the battle, the daring escape, and the new saddle he hoped I would buy. "There''s one that you can get," Horse explained, "that has a lantern on the front." He lifted his head. "It hangs under my neck and acts like a headlight." "Why would I want that one?" I asked. "People would shoot me first at night." "Did you not see the fight we just escaped from?" He raspberried me. "Woosh, I was fast. You didn''t get hit or anything." I pointed at the blood on my chest. "What are you talking about? We both got hit." "Any bullet you walk away from doesn''t count. Everyone knows that." Another half hour and Coot''s blue dot came up on my minimap. He was close. "Hello to camp, or whatever the parlance of our situation is," he bellowed from about 25 feet away. This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience. "Hello," I waved him over. "Can we turn these horses in now?" Coot was grinning ear to ear when he held up his hands and said, "Now, hold your horses. I want to see your talking horse." I rolled my eyes. "You aren''t as funny as you look." He huffed but stepped past me to address Horse. "Is it a gimmick or glitch or something?" "No, weirdo," Horse said. "I''m a player like you, just in a horse body." Coot eyed me. "Was that the talking? You do know what a horse sounds like, right?" "He said only his owner could hear him, and other player horses." I nodded to Horse. "He said that he''s a player just like us, but he chose to be a horse." Coot frowned at me and then at Horse before laughing and raising his hands. "I''m not here to judge," he grabbed the reins of Sandra and didn''t even look at her as he started his march toward the stables. "Let''s turn them in and get our prizes." I couldn''t disagree with that. He handled the talking horse thing better than I did, but then again, he probably thought I was crazy and just wanted to get his XP and get out of here. I couldn''t fault him for that. Who knew? I probably was crazy. Henrik had a weird look in his eye that almost rivaled Coot''s resting face. "Were you just sitting out there this entire time?" I hooked my thumb at Coot. "Made a friend." Henrik nodded. "Thank you for doing such a fine job and," Henrik winked, "procuring me these fine products," he raised his voice, "from our supplier in Aberdine." It was all part of the lines he had to say for the quest, but I was almost entertained. It was a type of art, or stage play, but we were all part of it. It was both mesmerizing and terrifying and I couldn''t help but get swept up in it. "You''re in luck, though," Henrik continued. "My brother-in-law ain''t good for much, but he managed to procure me two horses as well and suddenly I have a surplus of horses. So, how about I make you a deal? How about you keep your horses and," he pulled some weird looking dollars from his pockets and started unfolding them, "something for your efforts and the next time you need work, you come to me with some horses and I''ll find them a new home?" As he handed us each the cash, my numbers on my HUD went up by $12. "Do I have to keep this horse?" I whispered. Henrik was surprised. "What? Why? What''s wrong with this horse?" "He talks," I said. "He''s a real person. That''s kind of weird right?" Henrik raised an eyebrow. "He didn''t proposition you, did he?" Anger rose on his face. "There are some things even Wicked West won''t cotton to ..." Horse and I both shouted in unison, "No, no, no." Henrik broke into a grin while Coot just stood there snickering at me. "Most of the horses talk," Henrik said. "It''s a fun way to spend a few years of your retirement. Besides, no training required. He can tell you what he needs and you can give him commands that he understands and responds to instantly." The stable manager could tell that I still wasn''t entirely sold on the idea. "Look," he said, "you can also mute him whenever you like, although he won''t forget that, so maybe make it a discussion item before acting on it." Horse had been helpful and pleasant to be around. It wasn''t the person inside of Horse, it was the fact that there was a person inside of Horse. It made me uncomfortable, but what could I do about it if most of the horses in this game were possessed? "Nevermind," I said. "I''ll take him." Henrik clapped his hands together. "Great. When you need horse supplies, come to the stables. Otherwise, our business is done here." He turned and went back into the stables, leaving me and Coot alone with Horse and Sandra. "What do you want to name me?" Horse said. His voice was just as pleasant as ever, as if he hadn''t just heard me trying to replace him. "What is your name?" Horse shook his head. "I''m retired and living the horse experience. You get to name me." I shrugged, "I''ve been calling you Horse in my head. I''ll just stick with that." "That''s horrible," Horse said. As he said it, a name flashed above him in the same shade of blue that Coot''s name did. Horse. I looked over to where Coot was paying attention to something in his HUD. Since his horse couldn''t ask him what to name it, he was probably doing it all manually. ¡°Hey boss,¡± Coot turned to me. ¡°I¡¯m gonna head to the gunsmith. Let me know when you¡¯re ready for the next thing.¡± ¡°Boss? I said. ¡°Please don¡¯t call me boss, and what next thing?¡± Coot shrugged and started walking away pulling Sandra along by the reins. ¡°You¡¯re the gang boss, but whatever. As for the next thing, whatever and whenever it is, I¡¯m on board. Just let me know.¡± I sighed and decided that, even though the post office was open to me, I wanted a drink and to see if Eve was available to talk to. I didn¡¯t need to guide Horse. He followed me to the bar and started drinking from the trough without saying anything. I started to worry that I might have offended him by trying to get a replacement, but figured I would wait for him to bring it up. There wasn¡¯t any decorum for the first time you meet a talking horse. As I walked in and up to the bar, the bartender mostly ignored me to finish cleaning his glass. I cast my eyes around for Marcy and found her quick enough. When she saw me looking her way, she came over. ¡°Are you Marcy or Eve today?¡± ¡°Sorry, darling,¡± Marcy said. I smiled. ¡°Don¡¯t ever apologize for being yourself. Especially when an all powerful internet god can take you over at any time.¡± Marcy touched my shoulder and went back to bussing tables. The bowl of almonds was just off to my left. I reached out and grabbed a handful and began crunching. The bartender approached me, having finished cleaning the glass, and surprised me by not having the deeper voice that I had heard him use earlier. ¡°You¡¯re boring,¡± Eve said through the bartender¡¯s mouth. ¡°What?¡± My shock at the change in his voice was only muted by my confusion made by Eve¡¯s statement. She held up the bartender¡¯s hands in a pacifying motion, probably worried I might try to shoot her or something. ¡°Not entirely boring,¡± she said. ¡°You were clever during the horse mission. People love watching players figure out the rules on their own. Making a posse was great stuff, but so was your look of shock when Horse started talking.¡± She let out a small sigh. ¡°So, you¡¯re sticking with calling him Horse?¡± I shrugged. ¡°He wanted the full horse experience, right? What¡¯s more ¡®horse experience¡¯ than being called a horse?¡± I leaned back. ¡°Besides, who cares how boring I am in my retirement? Isn¡¯t that the point of retiring? You don¡¯t have to worry about how boring people think you are?¡± Eve nodded. ¡°Boring is great in a normal retirement, but that¡¯s not what this is, is it? And to answer your question; you.¡± ¡°Me? Me what?¡± ¡°You cared how boring you would be in your retirement,¡± Eve explained. ¡°Great,¡± I said. ¡°More opinions from the me that got to go to Heaven.¡± ¡°Now that you¡¯re more integrated into the system,¡± Eve leaned against the bottles behind the bar, ¡°we can talk about the addendum to your contract.¡± I held up my hand. ¡°Stop right there. Before you go and start listing off contractual obligations, can I even be held responsible for the contractual obligations signed by an essentially different person?¡± The legal repercussions of this entire system had been bouncing around in the back of my mind since this journey had first started. From the moment my digital version came into existence, I was an entirely different person with experiences that the other Sammy and I have never shared. There was no legal precedent that I was aware of that would make me contractually obligated to someone else¡¯s poor decision making. ¡°I completely agree,¡± Eve said, ¡°but before you go fighting it, maybe hear what the addendum has to say?¡± I sighed. ¡°I¡¯ll listen to your sales pitch after you bring me a whiskey.¡± Eve poured me the whiskey and I ignored the fifty cents leaving my inventory as I took a sip. ¡°So,¡± Eve continued, ¡°I have forwarded all the contracts to your inbox so that you can review and verify everything.¡± Her voice got softer, ¡°I know this isn¡¯t easy. You¡¯ve been thrust, alone, into a new world with new rules without knowing who you can even trust. I hope that you will someday come to know that you can trust me.¡± I raised the glass, ¡°If that happens, I¡¯ll let you know.¡± Eve nodded. ¡°What you need to know is that when we ran a credit check on Samantha Howell to sign her up for this digital cloning procedure, we saw that she had co-signed some student loans for her, your, granddaughter. She graduated before you were, um, retired and has since defaulted on the loans you signed with her.¡± Winnie had gotten into computer sciences or digital marketing, I wasn¡¯t sure. She was still undecided when I had put on that damned helmet. ¡°What degree did she get?¡± I interrupted the explanation. ¡°Computational mathematics,¡± Eve said it as if it were real words. I¡¯m sure they were, but I was just as in the dark about her degree as I had been before I asked. ¡°Anyway,¡± she kept going, ¡°we presented this information to the other-you and she decided that her digital avatar would be more than happy to assist if she were aware of the situation.¡± ¡°What does any of that even mean?¡± Of course I would help Winnie if she needed it, but how does a digital avatar help someone with money trouble in the real world. We are literally worlds apart. ¡°The other-Sammy signed you up to broadcast your exploits on Stream-Time.¡± ¡°And what the hell is Stream-Time?¡± ¡°Stream-Time is a channel for airing gameplay. Once you have reviewed the contracts, a new button will be available on your HUD that reads ¡®broadcast.¡¯ After that button is available to you, any time that you hit it you will be broadcasting your exploits live on the internet for everyone with any interest to watch.¡± ¡°How does being an internet star help my granddaughter?¡± Eve spread her hands. ¡°Money. You make it, she gets it.¡± Doing the quick math, I figured Winnie had to be somewhere around 22 years old now. I remembered my 20¡¯s well enough to know that having bills wasn¡¯t easy. Gunshots went off just outside the saloon. I raised my head at that and sent a quick message to check on Coot. He replied that it, so far, had nothing to do with him. Eve didn¡¯t even notice the gunfire, or else she didn¡¯t care. ¡°The more views you get, the more ad-revenue goes into paying off her college. Any extra goes into a fund she will receive when you reach level 250.¡± Eve leaned in. ¡°She doesn¡¯t know anything about this, of course. All she knows is that you had a fund put together to help her pay off college.¡± I had put it together before this, but asked for confirmation anyway. ¡°Being boring means less views and less views means less money for Winnie?¡± ¡°That sums it up,¡± Eve agreed. ¡°Except it isn¡¯t that dire. She has a job and is trying to pay things off, but ¡­¡± ¡°But, money always helps,¡± I finished for her. ¡°What happens if I don¡¯t get enough ad-revenue? Does the contract get nullified?¡± Eve shrugged. ¡°It won¡¯t be the end of the world, but she will get a bill and a letter saying that the fund you put her name on has run out. Your contract with Stream-Time will end and you can return to doing whatever.¡± I was a little annoyed at being beholden to something that I knew nothing about, but I would do anything for Winnie, and this sounded like easy money I started to stand up so that I could finally go to the post office and get this button thing started. There was no point dallying when I could be making money for Winnie. ¡°Let¡¯s get this show on the road, then.¡± ¡°Hold on¡± Eve crossed her arms. ¡°There¡¯s a few rules. First, no real names. Anytime you try to let the world know who you really are, Stream-Time censors it. That¡¯s the big rule, but all of the rules branch off of that. Even your username will likely get censored. Some new name will be generated for the viewers to watch.¡± ¡°When should I push the broadcast button?¡± I asked. ¡°Will I know when is a good time?¡± ¡°It¡¯ll record the minute before you start broadcasting so that we can get all the juicy surprises as well,¡± Eve said. ¡°Any time something neat starts to happen to you, hit the button.¡± Another burst of gunshots made me jump this time. It was much closer to the saloon. Three NPC¡¯s came running into the saloon, knocking over tables as they scrambled to the back and out the door there. Nodding, I downed the last of my whiskey and drew my pistol, annoyed that it was still the only weapon I had. I checked my ammo in the HUD, not wasting time doing it the physical way. 6/18 That was going to have to be enough. ¡°A level 1 can kill any other level just as easily as anyone else, you said?¡± Eve nodded. ¡°What weapons you have access to change as you level, but a bullet is a bullet when it hits the brain.¡± Before I could acknowledge what she said, she quickly added, ¡°Almost level 2.¡± ¡°What?¡± ¡°You didn¡¯t notice, I¡¯m guessing,¡± she explained. ¡°You¡¯re a hair away from level 2 now.¡± Still in my HUD, I confirmed what the digital possessor told me and slid off of the stool. ¡°Guess it¡¯s time to level up, then.¡± Chapter 7 Chapter 7 Before I even made it to the doors of the saloon, a bullet hit me in the arm. Real bullets obviously didn''t feel like this. A spark of pain, arguably annoying, but not crippling, spread out from my upper shoulder and blood started to ooze out. Aside from that initial reaction, the only other indication that I had been hit was the dip in my health bar. It went down by about a quarter. I hadn''t even reached the end of the bar, yet, and staggered against it. Eve, or the bartender, or whoever, pushed a bowl of almonds toward me. I started to raise an eyebrow at the dumbest response to a bullet wound I had ever seen before I remembered that this was a game world. A handful of nuts later and not only was I feeling better, I felt better than ever. A glance at my health bar showed that it had turned a flashing yellow. "Woah," I said. "Is that how Mario feels when he eats a star?" Nobody answered me so I kept moving. This time, I crouched toward the doors. When I got there, I pushed through and ran to the left where I remembered an alley was between the saloon and whatever building was next. When I rounded the corner a gun was pressed to the side of my head before I could even bring mine up. "You an Agitator?" the voice asked. I looked past the end of the gun and saw a young man, around the age of 19, with an almost "Billy the Kid" look of a saggy hat and a blue bandana around his neck. He wore a leather vest over mostly denim clothes. I examined his username. EdtheMund2021 Level 11 Profession: Ruthless Bounty Hunter "No," I said as quickly as I could. "I was coming out to see what''s going on? Looking to level up." The pistol lowered. "A raid is happening, again." Ed let out a sigh. "Real Agitators, but not doing Agitator stuff." He peaked out and pulled back against the wall of the alley with me. "What do you mean?" He started reloading. "It''s a group of Agitators that my gang has had a feud with. They like to do raids on Easter." He smiled up at me and knocked the cylinder of his pistol back into place. "We like to stop them." "How many of you are there?" I asked, suddenly wondering what other people''s gangs looked like. "Eight today," Ed inched forward and past me to the end of the alley. "Most of mine are in Aberdine and won''t get here until the raid is over. I''ve got two in the hotel. Want in?" "I''m already in a gang," I said. He shrugged. "Then don''t shoot me or mine. You''ll know soon enough who the others are." He sprinted from our cover and toward the hotel. I assumed his plan at this point was to rally with whoever of his gang was in town and move from there. I sent Coot a chat. Sammy#0421: Meet at the hotel. 2 gangs in town. Raid is going down. We''re on the side of the Gladiat0rz. Don''t know who the other group is yet. D0C70RC007: Not sure, either. Pinned down at the post office. Send help. Or a coffin. "Damn," I said out loud and sprinted after Ed. Gunfire peppered the ground around me. One bullet hit me, but all that changed was my health bar went from the flashing yellow to the original white color. I took no damage. Almonds were basically a free hit. I would need to remember that. I slammed into the door at the hotel and hit the floor as bullets riddled the glass. I still wasn''t able to see who had been doing the shooting but noticed the bullets were hitting the floor next to me. They were shooting from up high. The rooftops. "I need to get to the post office," I shouted to Ed as he ran past the front desk and up the stairs. "What the hell for?" "Coot," I sighed, realizing I hadn''t had a chance to explain more about my gang situation. "My gang is two people. The other one is pinned down at the post office." To my surprise, Ed nodded. "There''s a ton of cover if we go out the back steps of the hotel. Let''s get my men and then head that way." I sent Coot a quick message to let him know we were on our way. I added that he should do less about shooting at them and more about staying alive until we get there. Ed lead the way of the stairs, where the stairs ended in a hallway that went both left and right. The gang leader took a right and then started firing before I had even reached the top. When I joined him, I saw what he was shooting at. The end of the hall was an open doorway out to a back porch and stairs down to the ground level. Several men were standing and kneeling in that doorway and shooting down the hall. A quick glance at my map showed me why. Directly to my right was one of the hotel rooms. Inside were two dark blue teardrops. The rest of the Gladiat0rz were just as pinned down as Coot was. As I drew my pistol, Ed holstered his and drew a bolt action rifle from his back. With practiced motions, he brought it up, aimed, fired, and rotated the bolt in and out faster than I could empty my Farmer''s Pistol. +25 XP +25 XP You are now Level 2. We cleared the doorway but knew it wouldn''t keep. I grabbed Ed and dragged him back into the room where his friends were. "We need to move quick," Ed said. "They''ll be back." I quickly examined the two people. JemmyCloister Level 16 Profession: Gold Digger KentuckyPaddler Level 19 Profession: Mountain Man Jem was a woman that looked about my age, but I wasn''t entirely sure. She had more blood and mud on her than I figured were in all of Easter. She carried what I first thought were two pistols but soon realized were actually two sawed-off shotguns being held like pistols. Ken, or Kentucky, or whatever you wanted to call him, was surprisingly clean in some sort of fancy banker suit with a top hat. He had no blood on him and I wondered if he had just been holed up in here the entire raid or if he really was just that good at not getting shot at. This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it. "This is Sammy," Ed said, surprising me for a moment at knowing my name before I realized he had already examined me as well. "Her gang is going to help us push back the Colossals, but first we need to save her gang." He ran past me and slammed the door shut. I realized I had left it open and pushed past my embarrassment to grab the nearby chair and slam it under the doorknob. "Uh," I was all sorts of lost but decided to continue what Ed had said. "I''ve got a guy over at the post office. His name is Doctor Coot, but it''s with all those letters as numbers." "I don''t think we can do this, Ed," Ken said to their leader. "We defended Easter before," Ed smirked at Ken. "When it was just you and me and no ammo, remember? Four of us," he nodded out the window, "soon to be five. The Colossals have no chance." It was bravado and meant to inspire, but I could see Ken wasn''t having it. I didn''t know anything about this game world or the people who populated it, but I knew a lot about one thing, and that was how to be a mom, or a grandmother. I knew that this fear would either take root and he would just let them kill him so he could ''not deal with it'' later or we could stamp out the fear now and replace it with some good old-fashioned confidence. "Eve was in the bar," I watched as Ken''s eyes perked up. I figured everyone in the game knew who Eve was. I held no delusions about how special I was, and if they were going to roll out the first digital person to introduce me to my retirement, then they must have done that for everyone. "She told me to get out here and help you. Help you save Easter. And she didn''t tell me that so that I could die. She knows how badly I need to level and get good at this game and she sent me out here to you guys." It was a blatant lie, but to Ken and Jem I just pulled out a piece of toast with the face of baby Jesus burned into it. I looked right at Ken. "Ken, I have only been here a day and I don''t know where anything in this town is. Can you stay by me in case the group gets split up?" He nodded. It was slow, but it was there. Ed was at the door with his rifle over his shoulder and his hands on the chair. "Ready when you are." I decided to take the lead and hoped the rest would follow. There was no bravery in that decision so much as practicality. Coot and I wouldn''t get the experience we needed from the raid unless someone from the gang finished it. If I stepped out that door and was gunned down, I might take one of them with me, and my new companions could use my corpse for cover, buying them precious moments to get to Coot and save him. On the other hand, if Ed goes down, the drop in morale for his gang would get the rest of them killed. That might not be entirely fair to Jem, who I hadn''t read as anything but present and still alive, but she seemed to be in step with Ken. The pull of the gun that I associated with auto-aim hadn''t had a chance to kick in before I was already squeezing the trigger. The bullets slammed into the wall to the right of the door as two men, one with a pistol and one with a hatchet, came running in the door at me. The guy with the hatchet almost got me when Ken''s pistols roared behind me taking him down. Jem''s shotguns barked and sent the gunman back through the door and over the railing outside. That was when I realized that the sounds must be muted, or maybe the limitations of my original body were echoing through my memory. A shotgun going off less than a foot from my head should have deafened me, but I felt nothing when the noise hit. We stalked toward the door together and made it almost there before a woman in a bandana rounded the corner with a shotgun. "Window," I heard Ed shout. Without thinking about it, I dove at the still closed window. I crashed through and landed on the deck that, to my happy surprise, wrapped around to the side of the hotel. Ed, Jem, and Ken all landed next to me, but Jem was groaning. Blood oozed from her side where a large hole had been made. Without even thinking, I dug into my bag and tossed her strip of jerky. I didn''t know how much I had left and hoped I wouldn''t need it again before I had a chance to get more. On the porch, we could hear them stomping up the stairs with more clarity. "The railing," I said before leading the charge over. Two bodies thudded into the ground next to me and I was surprised my health hadn''t dropped. The landing had been painful, but not damaging, I guessed. Behind us, I could see Ed firing with his bolt action rifle. Each shot was a headshot. It was mesmerizing to watch. I could see as he aimed, then the slight tug down on the end of his gun as the auto-aim tried to drag his rifle to the center mass right before he tugged back up, only slightly. Then the raiders'' heads exploded. One by one, each pull of the trigger was a headshot. I aimed my pistol at the stairs and fired to push them back. "Get down here," I shouted. Ed was beside us in a second and then leading us through what looked like a farm in the middle of the town. It wasn''t. I would find out later that the stables and fenced in areas were all set up to house animal auctions. To our luck, there wasn''t one today and we were able to sprint through the area they would usually parade the animals. That was when I began hearing the gunshots from the other direction. My minimap showed red teardrops, raiders, with their points aimed at a building that I figured had to be the post office. I didn''t have time to open up my map fully, or I would have likely seen Coot over there. I held up my hands and dropped to a crouch. They were still coming at us from behind, so I ran toward the nearest horse stall and hid behind it. To my relief, each of my new companions dropped into a crouch too. Whether Coot''s attackers saw us on their maps or not, we didn''t have long. The rest of their gang were right behind us and had access to party chat. I moved as quickly as I could in a crouch toward the edge of the stall. Then I stood up and ran around firing. I hit nothing. The three men on the other side of the stables all survived my onslaught with little more than curious looks on their faces. Which was totally what I had planned. Absolutely. I meant to miss. And that''s why they weren''t ready when my companions followed me around and mowed them down in a monsoon of bullets. Maybe it wasn''t a monsoon, but I''ll bet each of them was going to tell their gang leader it was. "Where is he?" Jem asked. I pointed at the post office. "Awesome," Ed''s smile implied that he had at least some part of a plan. "Everyone into the post office." We all ran in just as the rest of the gang caught up to us. I was hit in the leg, but it wasn''t enough damage to even worry about my food situation. Once we were all inside, the shooting stopped. "Why did it get so quiet?" I asked. Ken was the one smiling now. "They can''t shoot people in the post office?" "What?" That didn''t make any sense to me. Ed explained. "The post office, your camp when the flag is up, and anytime you''re talking to a vendor you are essentially immune to attacks. It allows for the market to continue without harassing being used to slow the movement of goods," he shrugged, "anymore than waylaying deliveries already does, anyway." "Great," I said. "We can just stay in here and kill them." Ed shook his head. "We can''t shoot our guns while we''re in here and they can still win the raid by killing sixty percent of the city''s population." I rolled my eyes and started looking around for Coot. When I didn''t see him, I checked my map. Coot''s map marker showed him hiding behind the mailroom counter. Now that I knew bullets weren''t going to be killing me I went over there and waved down at him. "Howdy, partner." He looked up and smiled his toothless grin at me. "You''re a sight for sore eyes." "Hey," I called back at the Gladiat0rz, "if they can''t shoot us in here, why were they shooting at Coot?" "To keep him pinned down," Jem said. Her face indicated she was disappointed at this revelation and I suddenly understood why. "This was a trap?" Jem nodded. "They wanted us here so that a handful of them could watch us and hold us here while the rest went about winning the raid." "Fuck that," I shouted and began reloading my gun. "There''s five of us now." I pointed at Ed. "You said you and him stopped them with just the two of you." "That might have been a bit of an exaggeration," Ed admitted. "We stopped a raid but it wasn''t against the Colossals." "Let''s change that, then," I said. Ken held up his hands. "I get that you''re excited, but that''s a dumb idea. Five of us or not, their numbers are upwards of twenty-plus veteran players." I shrugged. "What do we get if we lose?" "Dead for an hour and a ding to our reputation," Jem said. "My reputation barely exists," I said, "and I don''t know, yet, how in-game reputation works, but those folks out there are people. We might take a ding to our stats if we fail, but the people out there will know we fought for them. That has to count for something." Ed smiled and started emptying his rifle and then reloading it with bullets that were a slightly different color. "I don''t know where you came from Sammy," he said, "but I like the way you think." "What about the dead part?" Coot called out. "We''ve died before," I laughed. "It hurts less the second time." "You''re just a pain in my wrinkled ass," Coot mumbled as he climbed out from behind the counter and started reloading his own gun. "Alright," Ed finished loading his gun. "What''s the plan?" "Oh," I shrugged, "no plan. I was just going to run out shooting." Everyone stared at me blankly for a moment before I started laughing. "I''m kidding, well, sort of. My plan is still in the middle stages." Before Coot could be a smartass, I held up my hand and explained. "The way I see it, they are likely surrounding the post office with enough people to hit us if we escape, but not enough to keep us here if we force our way out. Those numbers, whoever''s left that we haven''t killed, would be better used killing townspeople to end this quick." I tilted my head to the side as I thought out loud. "I''ll bet they only have one person on each side. They would only need two, but the extra two would be backup. We need to either clear one side, or make them think we''re all going to hit one side so that they all shift that way to cover it." I pointed to the far side of the post office. "What''s that way?" "The post office is also a train station," Jem explained. She was sitting, looking rather tired, on a bench against the wall. "That way is the tracks and then the road out of town." "You alright?" I asked. "You need something for your stamina or whatever?" "I''m resting," she waved me off. "It''ll be back to normal in a minute." I filed that in the back of my mind as likely important to remember. "Man, it would be nice if a train pulled up right now." I snapped my fingers. "Or better yet, you all got horses?" They nodded. Coot shook his head at first, but then the goofy old-timer nodded enthusiastically. "Is there a way to communicate with our horses?" I asked. "Communicate..." Ed snapped his fingers, "Oh, you got a live one?" I nodded. "Is there?" "Yes," he said. "We can all call our horses, from just about anywhere, by whistling." "So, if I whistle, he just comes here?" I asked for clarification. They all nodded. "Do they come right to the spot I whistle from? Or is it a direct line to us from where they are?" Ed''s eyes lit up as he understood what I was asking. He ran over to the train tracks side of the station and pressed against the wall. "As close to where you are as they can get." I smiled. "Everyone get against that wall and whistle. Then, when I give the word. We''re getting out of here." Chapter 8 Chapter 8 It was my plan, but I was more than happy when Ed started barking orders at his people. "Jem, when the horses show up, I want you to count to three and then step out and between them. Use the horses for cover. Ken and I will come out behind you and start shooting toward the sides. We''ll take out the raiders as they come around." "Coot and I will go out the front and circle around," I added as the idea popped into my head. "We''ll get anyone that is hanging back." "Why can''t I be the bait?" Coot asked in what I could only assume was his usual insane twist on being serious. "Because you guys are lower level with worse weapons," Ed said. He held up his bolt action rifle with one hand and used the other to point at Jem''s and Ken''s weapons. "Also, I have explosive rounds. You likely won''t have to shoot any of these folks." "Are we going to whistle or what?" I was growing impatient. I was anxious and we were on the clock. Ed nodded. We all whistled. On my minimap, the icon of a horse, shaped like the horse from that old Operation board game, moved along the outside. I expanded my map and saw the raiders start to move closer to the station. "They heard us," Ken said. "They are looking to see what side the horses go to." The horses all did as we expected them to do and came to the trackside of the station. They actually did it too well and I could hear Horse complaining about everyone crowding the door. "Seriously, guys, how are they supposed to get out?" he let out a raspberry. "I swear, the AI is so stupid sometimes." "They''re moving," Ken reported what I was already seeing on the map. Ken and Ed crouched and followed behind Jem as she approached the doors. Jem didn''t crouch, bait as she was, and burst through the door with both shotguns out. For all of Horse''s bitching, the horses weren''t crowding the door too much and Jem walked out with no cover. I saw her fire both sawed-off shotguns before Coot was tugging me toward the front. We were crouched, too, and hoped that the Colossal assholes weren''t smart enough to leave a lookout. We came out and saw no one. I went left as Coot went right. The platform extended the direction Coot went, but I had to hop a railing and land in the grass. Again, I found myself worried that I could have flashed red on someone''s map. I didn''t have time to check on the minimap and pushed my fear down. I stayed crouched as I moved quickly around the corner of the building. My chest reverberated with the explosion that came. I felt it deep in my bones, or whatever code constituted my bones, and while I knew there was a sound to it, I didn''t remember it. The body blasted past the corner I was about to come around. It hit the ground smoking. A hole as big as my head had been put in the middle of the man. What level did I have to be to get explosive bullets? I needed explosive bullets. My ears were still ringing as I came around and ran toward where Jem should have been. The horses were gone, and I could see the horse icon on my map off a ways past the tracks. Where Jem had been now stood Ed. At his feet was her body. "Fuck," Ed said when he saw me. "Jem is down." "Damn," that sucked. I stepped toward her body, some remainder of living human emotions wanting me to check on her, when bullets started slamming into the train station walls near enough to my head for me to be worried. Some guy was running at us from out of town and firing madly. I don''t know if his plan was to drive us inside or to kill us, but he wasn''t hitting anything of importance. "He''s the one that got Jem," Ed said. He started to raise his rifle, but somehow I beat him to it. My pistol was up, auto-aim tugged me toward the center mass of this guy, but I had a flash of what I had seen Ed do earlier. I pulled up against the auto-aim and pulled the trigger. The raider dropped as the bullet from my level 1 Farmer''s Pistol put a hole in his head. Ed smiled at me. "Good move, rookie." I looked down at Jem again. "What do we do? Do we just leave her there?" "Her body will despawn when we walk away." He shrugged at me. "Not much we can do." That was when I noticed that, while Coot had managed to join us, KentuckyPaddler was still missing. "Where''s Ken?" I asked. A hand popped up from the other side of a broken window from inside the train station. "I''m here." "He''s crafting special ammunition," Ed said. It makes you crouch to do it, so you remain hidden from most people." I could hear the clock ticking as we were losing this raid. There was no way to know how much time we had left before they killed their quota to claim a win, but waiting on Ken to finish making ammunition sounded like a horrible idea. I whistled. "Well," Horse said as he rode back up to me, "it''s about damned time, don''t you think?" "What are you doing?" Ed asked. "I can''t sit around and wait to lose. Are you guys going to mount up or what?" "What about Ken?" Ed asked. "Ken''s back in the station and safe." I called out. "Ken, do you have a horse?" "Yes," he said without getting up. "Great," I climbed onto Horse as Coot let out his whistle. "Catch up to us when you can." I turned my attention back to Ed. "Our odds of winning this are close to non-existent. I don''t know the rules, yet, but from what I''m understanding, losers don''t get all the experience that the winners get. Is that correct?" Ed was climbing onto his horse. "Yeah, that''s right." I sighed and replaced the bullet I had spent. "Then the only way for us to maximize the experience we get is to kill as many of those assholes as we can before we die. So," I shrugged, "let''s get to killing then." I took off, letting Horse guide me off of the platform before I steered him back toward the main town. "You resurrect if you die, too, right?" I leaned in and asked Horse. This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings. "Yes," his voice was especially whiney, "but I don''t want to die, so try not to get me shot." "No promises." I turned in Coot''s direction. "Flamingos, let''s ride." I heard Ed behind us, "Flamingos?" We came around to the front of the station and began the gallop back toward the main street of town. Instead of cutting through the auction yard, like before we stuck to the road to the right of it, passing another saloon that I hadn''t known existed, and a church, before turning left on the main strip. "Ed," I shouted. "The rooftops." With his rifle and more experience, he would be better suited for those. "Coot," I pointed to the Sheriff''s office, across the street from the church. "Porch for cover." While he dropped from his horse and ran that way, I did the same and took off across the main drag to a building that had the gun icon on my map. I determined this to be the gunsmith and took cover behind some barrels. When I glanced over my shoulder, I saw one of the strangest, and possibly coolest things I had ever seen. Ed had jumped down from his horse and ran to the outhouse attached to the Sheriff¡¯s office. He hopped up, pulling himself on top of it, and then used that same move to get up onto a ledge and then the roof of the Sheriff¡¯s office. And then he jumped between the rooftops. He went two rooftops before I had to focus on what was happening on the road. That was when I saw him. RadicalLarry19 Level 21 Profession: Mountain Man He was in the middle of the street, running back and forth and shooting anyone in front of him. I sent Coot a chat. The old prospector came running over to me and handed me exactly what I needed. A volatile stick of dynamite. ¡°Light it or shoot it,¡± when he saw my confusion at the shoot it part, he added, ¡°you can just set it down or press it against stuff and it¡¯ll stay there.¡± ¡°Thanks, now get out of here.¡± Coot didn¡¯t need to be told twice and returned to the Sheriff¡¯s office. I thought about calling out to Larry, but I felt that would just broadcast that I was laying a trap. Instead of shouting my name and that he would never forget this day, I just took aim and started shooting. He was all over the place and even auto-aim was having trouble tracking him, which was probably why he was all over the place. I didn¡¯t have a lot of ammo left, so I took my time and waited until he stopped to turn around. Then I shot him in the neck. Blood gushed out like I had cut a running garden hose. His hand slapped up to cover it and he turned and saw me. A smile crossed his face, but there was nothing happy about it. Then he reached into his bag and grabbed a bottle. When he pulled the cork out and drank it, the blood stopped leaking out. I tried to hit him again, but he dove behind a crate. I purposefully emptied my gun into the crate before making it click a few times. I put a look of fear on my face and then took off, rounding the corner of the gunsmiths and hoping he was following. The stick of dynamite dropped from my hand landing in the grass at the corner of the building. I flinched when it hit, half expecting it to explode then and there. Then I turned and ran. Right into a set of stairs leading up to the second floor of the gunshop. It was the underside of the stairs, so I was too cornered to do much of anything, but there was only one thing that I wanted to do anyway. I loaded one bullet into the Farmer¡¯s Pistol and raised my gun toward the dynamite. To my surprise, the auto-aim kicked in then too and pulled my aim toward the dynamite. I was aiming directly at it. Then I just watched as the red teardrop came toward the corner. He could see me just as well as I could see him and he took his time, not wanting to walk around and get shot in the gun for his troubles. Or, as it turned out, preparing his own trap. A bottle with fire coming out of one end, a good ol-fashioned Molitov came around the corner and hit the ground almost directly at my feet. Fire burst out and covered everything. It hurt a lot and pushed every thought out of my head as my clothes and body started burning. The stairs and the wall caught on fire, too, and a thought managed to break through. The dynamite. I watched as RadicalLarry19 came around smiling and with his gun drawn. My smile stopped him in his tracks. Even being a digital person with pain being a muted memory of what it had been in my real life, it was hard to hold the smile. Something inside of me needed him to see it. I fell to my knees and his smile slowly crept back onto his face. His smile vanished when he saw me reaching for something on the ground. It was too late when he realized what I was doing, but he tried to shoot me anyway. The explosion rocked us both. My death picture that they liked to show every time that I died was of me, burned worse than Freddy on Elm Street, flying through the air. I stayed alert through the resurrection process. Resurrection was still a new idea, and I didn¡¯t have all the rules down, yet. I wish I had found a moment to ask Coot where he had respawned when he had died last. It would let me know the chances of Larry spawning in the same place as me. The moment that I felt grass underneath me, even without being able to open my eyes, I forced myself to my feet and slapped my hand against my holster. When my eyes finished loading in, or whatever they needed to do, I spun around with my pistol, aiming in every direction. +25 XP That notification must have been from when Larry died. I should see him somewhere, at least on my map, but I wasn¡¯t. It must be a random radius or with some sort of code or something that made it so we didn¡¯t spawn right next to each other. When I didn¡¯t see anyone, I whistled and opened party chat. Coot hadn¡¯t responded by the time Horse arrived. So, I jumped on and rode into town with my pistol still out. I only knew of one place where I needed to go and that would be safe if any of Larry¡¯s Colossal douchebags were still around. Horse and I poured on the speed and came to a graceless stop at the post office/train station. By ¡®graceless,¡¯ I mean that Horse stopped when I wanted him to, but conservation of momentum was still a thing in this digital world and I landed face-first in the mud. To my credit, that didn¡¯t slow me and I dove into the train station. And right into Jem. ¡°Hey now,¡± she said, trying to brush the mud off of me. ¡°Deep breaths. I¡¯m guessing you died soon after I did?¡± I nodded, my eyes darting in every direction. ¡°They¡¯re gone,¡± Jem explained. ¡°They met up with one of their guys out that way,¡± she pointed out past the tracks, ¡°and they just kept riding after that.¡± The anxiety released from my every muscle and I fell into the nearest bench. ¡°What went down?¡± Jem was next to me in a second. ¡°Hasn¡¯t Ed or Ken told you?¡± Jem shook her head. ¡°Both must have died after you then.¡± I¡¯m not some great orator who missed their calling, but I did my best to fill her in on how the plan succeeded, minus her death, and how we went to the center of town. When I mentioned Ed on the rooftops, she started laughing. ¡°He likes doing that. Something about the rifle and being able to see everywhere.¡± Then I told her about RadicalLarry19 and my feud with him. ¡°Wait, RadicalLarry? You killed him?¡± She seemed surprised. ¡°Yup, why?¡± Her interest only piqued mine. ¡°He leads them,¡± she explained. ¡°He¡¯s the leader of the gang, Colossal Payne. We don¡¯t know why, but he¡¯s got some sort of hard on for Easter. He and his gang, somewhere upwards of twenty people, like to raid the town as often as possible. They get the XP, but it¡¯s not about that for him. I think he just likes the easy kills of all the rookies who start here.¡± It made me angry. I don¡¯t know why, but all I wanted to do was shut him down. I needed to get better at this if I wanted to stop him. ¡°Are you going to join us?¡± Jem said. ¡°You wouldn¡¯t have to get rid of your gang, just switch to ours and when you wanted to do your own thing, start yours back up.¡± Her smile was genuine. ¡°You give me ¡®leader¡¯ vibes, and I think that works well with us. It did with Kentucky, anyway.¡± I laughed. ¡°Your vibe-meter is broken. My plan got us all killed.¡± Jem shook her head. ¡°There was no plan where we would win that fight. Your plan took out the leader of the Colossals. That¡¯s not a small thing to do.¡± This wasn¡¯t the first time the thought had crossed my mind. Joining up with Ed and his crew of Gladiat0rz gave us allies who had a working knowledge of what was going on. ¡°No,¡± I said at last. ¡°I don¡¯t think I will. Not yet, anyway. I want to do some things that might be hazardous to my reputation and I want to make Larry hurt. To do that, it might be best if we just stayed allies for now.¡± Jem¡¯s shoulders sunk, but she nodded. ¡°That makes sense. Allies, then. Stick out your arm.¡± I thrust my arm out, slowly and with confusion, but caught on when she reached forward and grabbed my forearm in a kind of old-timey handshake with her hand near my elbow. ¡°Grab mine,¡± she directed. When I did, a notification popped up. You are now friends with JemmyCloister. ¡°We can send each other messages now.¡± She saw my surprise and raised an eyebrow. ¡°Did you not know how to do that?¡± ¡°Don¡¯t tell me about the letter in my mail,¡± I held up a finger. ¡°I¡¯ve been busy.¡± ¡°So, what¡¯s next for you?¡± Jem asked. ¡°Well, I¡¯m going to check my mail,¡± I stood up and started walking toward the mail clerk. A sudden memory popped into my head of Tyler. He used to replace the word ¡®clerk¡¯ with ¡®jerk¡¯ when it was just us. I don¡¯t know why that hurt so much to think about. I stopped to let my emotions settle down. Then I added, ¡°Then I¡¯m going to start working on being the biggest pain in the ass that RadicalLarry19 ever had to deal with.¡± Chapter 9 Chapter 9 The counter where the ticket master or mailman was was centered in the station. It was completely enclosed, but easy enough to jump over, as Coot had shown me. "How can I help you?" The gentleman said to me as I stepped up. He looked to be in his mid-forties, with auburn hair and a long handlebar mustache. "I would like to check my mail, please." He nodded and brought up a clipboard. "Sammy Howell, level 3 with no profession," he read it out loud. "Would you like to pay your bounty?" The first thing that surprised me was the level. A quick glance at my HUD showed that sometime in the last hour and a half, my XP had been enough to barely push me over and into level 3. That was exciting and I wondered what all would be waiting for me. Then his question hit me. "Bounty? I have a bounty?" He nodded. "Yes, ma''am. You have a bounty for thirty two cents. Would you like to pay it?" I decided against asking about the bounty as I figured he would tell me to check my mail instead. "Sure," as I said it, the money was removed from my balance. "Can I check my mail now?" I asked. He nodded and turned the clipboard my way to read. The clipboard was the weirdest thing that I had seen, yet. From the look of it, it was a clipboard with a yellowed sheet of paper attached to it. On closer inspection, that was not the case. It was an interactive tablet, sort of. It still felt like paper, but there was a scroll bar on the right and it acted like a tablet. The paper held a list of items. At the top, it claimed to be the inventory of my mailbox. Next to each item was a box that read, "Claim." The first thing in the list was a "Gift from EveNet." It was a box of long range carbine ammunition. 100 bullets. I clicked the "Claim" box and watched as the item removed itself from the list. I felt a little movement in my satchel and checked it. Sure enough, the new ammunition was in my inventory. There was another box at the top of the paper that read "Claim All?" and I chose note to hit that quite yet. I wanted to see what everything was. The second thing in the list was that manual that everyone had been mentioning to me. It was labeled as "Eve''s Orientation Packet." I claimed that and moved on down the list. The lasso that Horse had mentioned was in there as well as a Camp Kit that I would need to read up on, two letters, five horse treats, and a box of five cooked steaks. I was most excited about the coupon for a free double-barreled shotgun. Everything seemed to read that it was a "Gift from EveNet" which I took to mean that everyone got this when they started. The other stuff in my mail included a map with absolutely no explanation and a letter from the living and then dead version of me. That was going to wait until I was in a dower enough mood to consider reading a letter from beyond the grave. Finally, there were the 3 sticks of Aged Dynamite, like Coot had said would be there and a delightful surprise. A gold nugget. For reasons that I would later think back on as stupid, I did everything in my power to keep my excitement from showing on my face. Was this a glitch? Was Eve showing favoritism? Did I just win some wild west lottery? It didn¡¯t matter. Out of everything in my bag, I was the most excited about that gold nugget and what that might mean for my finances. All of that was dashed from my mind when I sat down and Jem opened her mouth. ¡°Did you get your nugget?¡± ¡°Wait, what?¡± ¡°All the starter stuff really,¡± she shrugged. ¡°Seeing as you haven¡¯t been to the post office, I figured you hadn¡¯t gotten your nugget. Yet.¡± ¡°Everyone gets a gold nugget?¡± I asked. Jem nodded. ¡°Yes, but they are kind of useless until you get ten of them, then they,¡± she waved her hands about dramatically, ¡°magically turn into a gold bar.¡± ¡°What can I do with a gold bar?¡± ¡°Lots of stuff,¡± was all she provided. ¡°It¡¯s all in that book of facts you would have just gotten.¡± Right. The book. Now that I had it, I would need to read it, but before I got to that, I decided to examine the other new stuff in my inventory. Of the three letters, I ignored the one from myself. That was either an update on life after she downloaded me, orders on how she wanted me to live my new life, or an explanation on the Stream-Time thing. I wasn¡¯t interested in any of that, yet, and wasn¡¯t sure when I would be. The next letter was a woman named Joan Cremont. She claimed that I had reached out to her about being the cook for my personal camp. The letter explained that if I came and met her at McLintock Ranch, she would teach me how to set up a base camp and would provide me with regular ¡®house-keeping¡¯ as long as I kept paying her thirty cents a day and food to eat. The camp sounded nice. I remembered Ed saying that a camp with the flag up was a safe spot. The idea that I wouldn¡¯t have to rent a room for a buck a night and could rest relatively safely in a spot that I could call my own sounded almost divine. I just needed to find this McLintock Ranch. The final letter was the Stream-Time activation. All that the letter said was a slimmed down version of what Bartender-Eve had told me. The difference was that when I opened this letter the Broadcast button appeared on my wrist. I held it out to Jem and showed her. ¡°What¡¯s this? Eve said it would be in my HUD.¡± She stood up, her eyes seemed distant and I assumed Ed and Ken must have been reviving or something. ¡°Uh,¡± she started before turning her attention on me. ¡°The HUD is one place, but it¡¯s a setting. You can put it on your arm, too. Nobody else can see it but you. I only know what you¡¯re talking about because that¡¯s where mine is.¡± ¡°You stream, too? Are there a lot of streamers?¡± ¡°Across the games, yes,¡± Jem answered. ¡°But not everyone signed up for that contract. I just wanted my husband to be able to enjoy retirement.¡± She shrugged. ¡°I never had much of a retirement income.¡± I bumped the side of her arm and offered her a smile. ¡°Now you do.¡± Unauthorized content usage: if you discover this narrative on Amazon, report the violation. ¡°Yes, I guess so.¡± She looked out the window. ¡°Ed and Ken are back now. They fast traveled to their camp, but it¡¯s not near here. I¡¯m going to go and do the same. You will need to clasp arms with them if you want to message them directly. Until then, I can relay messages for you. Thanks again for earlier.¡± ¡°You mean getting you killed?¡± I waved her off before she could counter with her previous optimism. ¡°I know what you mean and thank you, too. Thank the boys for me when you get a chance.¡± Jem smiled and left the post office. I didn¡¯t really have anywhere else to be, so I pulled out ¡°Eve¡¯s Orientation Packet¡± and started flipping through it. It was a lot of information, but I found the parts that I needed right then. Mostly, I wanted to know how to get better weapons and ammunition and there was a page that listed just that and what level they would be available. It worked a lot like a gamer guide. I only ever bought one when Zelda: Into the Future came out in the mid-2020¡¯s, but this was very similar. The part of the manual that no one had explained to me was that the back of it was a catalog. I could go through and order goods to have delivered by way of the post office. I wasn¡¯t flush with cash, so I only tried it on a can of fruit. I touched the can on the page and twelve cents vanished from my inventory. When I went back up to the mailman, he showed me the clipboard again and there it was. The next thing I skipped to was the wanted level section of the book. It turned out that the more crimes that I committed while I was wanted the higher my bounty would become. The bounty was for in-game bounty hunters to collect if they caught me. That made me nervous. At any time on my trek to the post office after my mission, that required me to get a wanted level, by the way, a random player could have killed me and made a few coins. On the other hand, that was an interesting concept and I was wondering if being some high plains vigilante was a lucrative option for earning cash. The other thing that I found in Eve¡¯s manual was a map that was entirely discovered. The map in my HUD mostly had places near Easter and anything further out than that just looked like blank paper until I got to it. Other games called it a fog of war, while I called it a pain in the ass. I found where McLintock''s Ranch was and was pleased to see that it wasn''t as far as most of the other towns and places on it. The map didn''t have a key, but I recognized where the farm was that we stole the horses from. Even with Horse, it would be several hours ride before I made it to McLintock. I set a marker on my map by focusing on the map in my HUD and, like everything else in the HUD, it appeared the moment my mind conjured it. Just like with my earlier horse-stealing mission, a line from my current position all the way to my McLintock Ranch marker appeared on the minimap. I checked the chat window again to see if Coot had respawned, but it was looking like he must have been the last man standing again with the Colossals. I put away everything and decided it would be a good time to try two things. The first was getting my new shotgun. The sooner I got that, the better. The Farmer''s Pistol had served me well, but it was obvious that I wasn''t going to be able to fight entire raids with it. The second thing, but arguably the first in the fact that I had to do it before I got my gun, was to hit the Broadcast button. I looked down at my bare arm. Just on the underside and where my rolled up sleeve ended, was the big red tattoo. It was the size of a chalkboard eraser and red with the white lettering reading "Broadcast." "My name is Johnny Knoxville," I whispered the only incantation I knew to summon the great stupidity that is internet streaming, "and this is Jackass." The only indication that anything had changed was a red dot with a red circle around it near the bottom right of vision. It stayed there whether or not my HUD was up. When I did bring my HUD up, it also included a number at the bottom. It read zero. I scanned through the manual for the page on broadcasting and saw that the number was my viewer count. This was there so that I knew how nuts to be. It didn''t put it quite that way, but it did say that I could use the counter to determine how to entice viewers. You wanted as many as possible, and that only increased through word of mouth or people searching specifically for the game on Stream-Time. People were only likely to spread the word if they knew something wacky was going to happen. Wacky, or especially violent. It also said that each stream would be recorded so that if I wanted to create a following, people would be able to go back and rewatch the old videos on Youtube. I waved at no one in particular. "Welcome to my stream, or show, or whatever." I suddenly remembered that kids like to watch streaming things. "I might cuss, like," I shrugged, "maybe a lot. I get shot a lot, and there''s no good way to get shot and not cuss. So, if you are a kid, go tell your parents first. Or don''t." I shrugged again. "I''m not your mom." That made me think of Winnie again, and I shook my head and started from the train station. I hopped onto Horse, who was surprisingly not very chatty for once. The gunsmith wasn''t far away, but everything was a little faster when I used a horse instead of walking. I tied him off outside the gunsmith and turned to him. "What''s your problem?" I asked. "It was a short ride but you''re usually more chatty than that." He spoke softly without moving his lips. "Viewers can hear me," he explained. "I didn''t know you were going to be streaming." I laughed. "Wait, are you trying to tell me that you have stage fright?" "I am just saying that asking for my permission before showing the world my face would have been appreciated." I did my best to wipe the smile from my face and nodded. "That''s fair. You''re absolutely right." I straightened up and added an bit of confidence to my voice as I asked, "Horse, do you mind if I film you?" He was quiet for a moment before saying, "Yes. I think that I do." I let out a sigh and nodded before stepping closer and whispering. Whispering or not, I hoped that Stream-Time would sensor out most of what I was about to say. It would not be in my best interest if they pulled my sponsorship before I had even had a chance to film anything useful. "Thank you for being honest with me, and I appreciate you reminding me that this isn''t just going to be the Sammy-show, but there''s a reason I''m doing this." I started stroking the side of his dark face. "My granddaughter needs my help and this is the only way that I can do it, but you made a great point; this isn''t just my show. This is Sammy and Horse''s show." I pointed at my arm and the dumb tattoo. "So, if you can agree to help me be the next Johnny Carson and help my daughter, I promise you that I won''t hit this button unless you agree to it. Is that alright?" Horse shook his head and I had to pull away a bit. "I need to think about it," he tilted his head toward the gunsmith. "Go do what you need to do and I''ll have an answer for you when you get out." He didn''t tell me to stop broadcasting. "Well, ain''t you a new face?" The shop owner said as I entered. The shop was exactly what I expected. Guns lined every wall with a bar of wood and a lock in front of each of them. I don''t know if this is what a gunshop looked like in the 19th century, but it was at least similar to what I had grown up with. The woman behind the counter looked like she had seen better days. Her clothes, a simple dress made of dark blue fabric, had several holes in it. Her face still had soot and mud in the places she didn''t see she needed to wipe off. Unlike all the other women and half the men I had seen, her hair was surprisingly short, ending at her chin. I stuck out my hand. "The name is Sammy, and they don''t get much newer than me." She shook it and a genuine smile replaced her shopkeep one. "Adeline. How can I help you?" "I think that maybe I can help you, Adeline," I said. I rolled down my sleeve and pulled it over my hand before lifting it toward her face and stopping. "Do you mind?" Adeline raised her eyebrow at me. "You helped during the raid? Probably got shot, or knocked over?" My finger poked out of the end of the sleeve. "I know this because your face is still a mess." A flash of surprise was replaced by a quick nod before I was helping her get the muck off her face. +5 to Reputation. "Thank you," Adeline said when I had gotten everything I could see. "Now, what can I help you with, Sammy?" "I have a coupon," I dug around in my bag. "For a free shotgun," Adeline took the offered ticket. "Congratulations on leveling up." She turned around and unlocked the gun rack behind the counter. She pulled down a long double-barreled shotgun and set it on the counter. "When you need it cleaned, you can do that yourself, or you can bring it to me to do for a minimal charge." She brought up a box of ammunition. "You can hold up to 30 shells right now. That''ll change when you get to a higher level. 30 shells will cost you $3.00." "I''ll take it," the money subtracted from my finances as Adeline slid the box over to me and then dug around for two more boxes. I put both into my satchel. Their weight disappeared as they entered my inventory. Then Adeline slid the shotgun over to me and I hesitated before picking it up. Society has taught us, rightfully so, to avoid playing with guns and aiming them at people and here I was spending my afterlife, or whatever you wanted to call it, collecting guns and ammunition to kill people for money or to defend myself from them killing me. It gave me an odd mix of fear, excitement, and fun. It felt wrong, but what was I supposed to do? I couldn¡¯t change the world I lived in, or the rules that we lived by for a long time. Then a chat window popped up. It was Coot. D0C70RC007: Boss. Meet at the Post Office. Found work. Chapter 10 Chapter 10 I walked back into the train station posing as a post office and went straight to Coot, pulling the old man into a hug and then stepping back. ¡°What happened to you?¡± I demanded. ¡°No offense, but how did you last longer than Ken and Ed?¡± Coot stared at me with confusion and that¡¯s when I realized he hadn¡¯t returned my hug. ¡°Are you alright?¡± I asked. He shook it off. ¡°Yep, boss, sure thing.¡± He took a breath and the serious look of ¡®dazed and confused¡¯ was replaced with that goofy grin that I kept associating with prospectors and henchmen from animated movies. ¡°Uh, I hid.¡± He shrugged. ¡°When you blew up, I ducked into the doc¡¯s office, whistled for my horse, and rode it back to the train station.¡± ¡°Then how did you die?¡± ¡°Well, I wasn¡¯t sneaky about it, now was I?¡± He shook his head. ¡°No, I was not. The train had just pulled up, and I thought I could escape on that. Took a seat in a passenger car and let my horse race behind the train. Somebody up and saw me board the train and about a mile out of Easter they found what car I was in. I shot them twice but they got me, pop,¡± he poked the middle of his forehead. ¡°Then I woke up not far from Easter. I reckon it spawned me so close because I was still considered part of the defending army for the raid.¡± ¡°Did you get any experience?¡± I asked. Coot nodded. ¡°I¡¯m level 7 now.¡± He drew a pistol that I hadn¡¯t seen before and I jumped back, grabbing at my own before I remembered that this was Coot, a member of my gang, and that we were in the safe zone provided by the post office being located in the train station. ¡°Easy now,¡± he snickered at me. ¡°This was my big win from our helping that other gang with the raid. At level 5, I was able to buy this, but I ain¡¯t had the money. I managed to get about $50 when the raid was done and could finally buy it.¡± Fifty dollars? How the hell? Then I opened up my inventory and sure enough, the raid had deposited somewhere around $65 to me when it was done. ¡°We got paid for losing the raid?¡± I was shocked. Coot nodded. ¡°I¡¯ll bet your britches that the pay gets bigger if you win.¡± ¡°What is that gun?¡± I asked. ¡°They call it a Volcanic Pistol,¡± Coot held it up so that I could look at it. It was boxier and larger than the Farmer¡¯s Pistol, otherwise, it was just another gun that I knew next to nothing about. ¡°It holds 8 bullets instead of the 6 of the starter pistol.¡± He leaned in. ¡°And it hits hard. I shot a pig with it and the dang thing,¡± he cut his empty hand through the air, ¡°went sailing.¡± I was jealous, to say the least, but that jealousy was mitigated by my own success from the raid. While I hadn¡¯t realized that good money had come from it, I was able to show Coot my new shotgun. I finished my story and Coot seemed energized. ¡°We¡¯re moving on up,¡± he said and then spun toward the mailman. ¡°Come on, I want you to meet the job guy.¡± He led me around the ticket booth to where a bench was against the wall. A man was sitting on the bench reading a newspaper. He was dressed just like the ticketmaster but didn¡¯t seem to care anything for what was going on in the station. ¡°Ah,¡± he said without looking up from his paper. ¡°I see the person who makes the decisions has arrived.¡± ¡°He¡¯ll only talk to the gang leader,¡± Coot explained. ¡°Your friend says that you¡¯re looking for work?¡± the man said. I took a moment to examine him. His name was Clarence Peabody. On my minimap he had an orange dot instead of the usual teardrop shape. I saw something in the manual that those were people I could go to for jobs. ¡°What kind of work?¡± I asked. ¡°We won¡¯t take just anything.¡± He folded his paper and laid it across his lap before leaning back and throwing one arm up over the back of the bench. ¡°Good. I would be concerned if you took any job without reading the fine print.¡± He was only looking at me, ignoring Coot. I wondered if all gang jobs were going to start this way. ¡°I have a family from Saint Emile that wants to go from here to Aberdine. It¡¯s a long drive, but the road is heavy with bandits. Getting ambushed isn¡¯t just likely, it¡¯s a foregone conclusion. This family is well-off, financially speaking, and have done nothing to hide the fact that they are traveling.¡± ¡°Well-off?¡± I put my hands on my hips. ¡°They¡¯ll pay well, then?¡± ¡°Well enough,¡± Clarence provided. ¡°And more if they arrive in Aberdine unscathed.¡± ¡°How much?¡± Clarence flinched. ¡°What?¡± ¡°How much if we get them to Aberdine unscathed?¡± I repeated. ¡°Uh,¡± it was obvious that Clarence was more familiar with dealing with gamers and not someone looking to make a living, ¡°the standard rate, after the, um, level of your success has been, uh, tallied.¡± In other words, all jobs pay the same but pay less or more depending on if poor Susie RichGal makes it to the end of the quest without getting too banged up. I would be able to get a more specific idea of what to expect after I finished this first job. And something told me that this wasn¡¯t going to pay nearly as much as losing at the raid would. I hoped that I was wrong. ¡°Alright,¡± I agreed. ¡°Where do we meet them?¡± Clarence relaxed and lifted the hand that still rested on the back of the bench, pointing out the window toward the tracks. When we met the traveling fancypants family from Saint Emile, they were already in the carriage. It wasn¡¯t a wagon, that wasn¡¯t a title that alerted people to this vehicle¡¯s grandiose design. This was a legitimate, belonged-in-Sherlock¡¯s-London, horse-drawn carriage. It was painted red with gold trim. Every edge was covered in gold paint. The horses were almost twice the size of Horse and Sandra. I walked up to the side of the carriage and leaned into the window. Inside were two adults, dressed to the nines in fancy, Downton Abbey-like, black clothes. Between them sat the most shocking thing I had seen since entering this game. A kid. A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation. A boy, about ten years old, sat between what I could only assume were his parents. ¡°Um,¡± Eve had said there were no kids in these games and I was almost too shocked to continue. ¡°Howdy?¡± It came out as a question. ¡°We will get you folks safely to Aberdine.¡± I forced a smile through my surprise. ¡°Please keep your arms and legs inside the carriage at all times.¡± When I dropped back down, Coot was riding up to me on Sandra with Horse trotting behind them. I got up close to Coot. ¡°There¡¯s a kid in there.¡± My voice was barely a whisper. ¡°So?¡± He looked as confused as I was shocked. ¡°So? What do you mean ¡®So?¡¯ I was told there weren¡¯t any kids in here.¡± ¡°There aren¡¯t,¡± he was smiling now. ¡°Then what the hell was that?¡± ¡°That was a literal NPC,¡± Coot explained. ¡°He¡¯s not a real person, just an artificial intelligence that follows the parental figures. He¡¯s more like a pet than anything¡± He shrugged. ¡°Half the time they aren¡¯t real, neither.¡± I let my stress bleed from me as quickly as I could and jumped up onto Horse. As soon as I was on my horse, the carriage driver cracked his reins and our mission started. I had no idea how far Aberdine was, but I did my best to focus on the hills while also watching my map. ¡°What¡¯s the plan?¡± Coot came up beside me on Sandra. ¡°What do you mean?¡± I asked. ¡°Get to Aberdine, collect the money and experience, pick another job.¡± Coot shook his head before squinting one eye at me. ¡°You might not know it, but I consider myself a bonafide judge of character.¡± He straightened and hooked a thumb under his overalls. ¡°I would not go as far as to claim to be psychic, especially in no video game with my body long since being food for worms, but I do have a good eye for reading people¡¯s faces and yours is screaming at me that you are thinking about the long game.¡± He wasn¡¯t wrong. My broadcast button was still going and I had to think about how to keep people¡¯s attention. At the same time, if everyone watching heard my plan, they wouldn¡¯t have incentive to stay tuned. I smiled at Coot to let him know his intuition wasn¡¯t wrong. ¡°What do you know about the raids?¡± Coot frowned as he thought back, probably to his manual but maybe to the one we were just in, as well. ¡°Not a whole lot,¡± he admitted. ¡°Good for XP farmin¡¯. Good if you like to get a little bit of murder going. Not good if you don¡¯t like getting shot at. Why?¡± ¡°Adeline,¡± I paused, realizing not everybody was going to memorize the names of every gunslinger in this world, ¡°the gunsmith in Easter, was still covered in mud and mess when I met her. That was more than an hour after the raid. Was she busy that whole time? Was she dead and waiting to resurrect? Or ¡­¡± I trailed off. ¡°Or,¡± he was doing his squinty eye thing again, ¡°does she get raided so much that she just doesn¡¯t care about trying to clean up.¡± ¡°Exactly.¡± We were out of Easter now and starting down the same road that led to the horse farm from the first mission. I had a brief moment of concern that if those farmers saw us they might give chase, but then I remembered this was a game and that once the quest was done, I had nothing to worry about. Except, those had been real people, and they might hold a grudge. I hoped not. ¡°There was still blood in the streets,¡± I continued. ¡°Does the damage of the raids stop progress from happening? Can the people who have paid their dues and can no retire actually get a chance to relax?¡± ¡°Those are some big questions for a video game about murder and survival,¡± Coot said. ¡°But they aren¡¯t big questions if we¡¯re talking about something that¡¯s meant to be fun and about getting a literal second chance.¡± I sighed. ¡°How many of the people who have signed up for this did so to relax, but have since been trapped in a constant circle of murder and rebirth.¡± ¡°Damn, you¡¯re morbid, boss,¡± Coot was laughing. ¡°You¡¯re not wrong, but they chose this. They made it to their level and they chose to say.¡± ¡°That doesn¡¯t mean that they didn¡¯t hope for better.¡± ¡°Alright, alright,¡± he was looking hard to his right and away from me. He shook his head and then turned back to me. ¡°What¡¯s to be done about it?¡± ¡°Does every town get raided?¡± Coot nodded slowly, ¡°I think so. I ain¡¯t never left Easter, though.¡± He nodded ahead, ¡°This here is an adventure for me.¡± ¡°Me too,¡± I agreed. ¡°I don¡¯t know what¡¯s to be done about it,¡± I gave as an answer. ¡°You asked what¡¯s on my mind, and I told you.¡± ¡°You aren¡¯t going to let this go, though, are you?¡± He was smiling and squinting again. I shrugged, ¡°Not likely.¡± I decided to change the subject. ¡°What¡¯s your deal? Why are you still part of my gang?¡± ¡°Well, that,¡± Coot started, ¡°is a long-¡± A bullet hit the side of the carriage. ¡°Do you see them?¡± I shouted so that the driver or the passengers might answer if they had. Coot shook his head and no one else spoke. ¡°There,¡± Horse whinnied. I twisted toward where he had pointed his nose and there they were. We were in a spot with gentle hills. You could see almost unhindered for quite a ways, but the crest of those hills gave mild cover to anything just far enough away. Horse had seen them as their heads were bobbing up and down on their horses and cresting the hill. They were coming up fast. I leveled my shotgun, felt the pull of the auto-aim and decided not to fight it. Blam! Blam! Neither shot seemed to have any effect even though it looked like I should have hit them. That¡¯s when I remembered that shotguns had different types of ammunition. ¡°Slugs for distance,¡± Horse seemed to read my mind. ¡°You won¡¯t get those until you level up some more. Save the birdshot for when they get closer.¡± My hands seemed to know what they were doing even though I didn¡¯t and broke the shotgun in the middle. It folded and the shells ejected into the air. I pulled two more from my satchel and put them in. When the automated reload released me and I had my hands back, I put the shotgun on my back with the strap across my chest. Then I pulled my Farmer¡¯s Pistol. It looked like me and this little pea-shooter still had some work to do. I tried for a couple of headshots with no luck. Somehow, they were hitting the carriage from that distance, while on horses, and I couldn¡¯t hit them at all. ¡°What¡¯s the call, boss?¡± Coot said from behind me. When I twisted to look at him, I saw that he was shooting over his shoulder. They hadn¡¯t even popped up on my minimap yet, but there they were, sneaking up behind us on horses. Just from what I could see, there were four in front of us and four in the back. ¡°We gotta let them get closer,¡± I shouted to Coot. I said to Horse, ¡°You said I could jump on a horse?¡± ¡°Yes, why?¡± He answered. We weren¡¯t traveling fast, instead opting to match speed with the carriage, and his stamina had not been affected enough to notice. ¡°You wanting to ride up next to one of them and steal a horse that doesn¡¯t talk?¡± I rolled my eyes, ¡°I said I was sorry. Besides, a talking horse is weird. Why am I the only one who sees this?¡± I didn¡¯t wait for his response. ¡°Can I jump on the wagon?¡± ¡°Yes,¡± was all he said. He was obviously still frustrated with me, but it would have to wait until later. ¡°Let¡¯s get up close to it then,¡± I said. I turned and shouted, ¡°Coot, get on the wagon.¡± Horse pulled me up next to the right side of the carriage. I shifted all of my weight to my left foot and slid my right from the stirrup. I was mostly certain that this was an automated thing, like getting on the horse or reloading my gun, but just in case, I wanted to be prepared for the effort. I jumped. My hands hit the side of the carriage and I realized that hanging from the side didn¡¯t cost me any stamina. I could hang there, shooting with my right hand, or I could move to another location. Coot came up on the left and did the same thing. His Volcanic Pistol was discharging into the distance, but our enemies were getting closer. I scooted up toward the front where the driver was and pulled myself up next to him. Sitting down, I switched weapons again. ¡°Stay with the wagon,¡± I shouted to Coot. ¡°Shoot anything that gets near enough to die.¡± Chapter 11 Chapter 11 The riders coming at us were thicker than I had expected. At the farm, I only saw around ten law enforcers. Once I had lost them, they stopped coming. This was different. Everyone Coot and I killed was replaced by a new bandit there to rob this family on their road to Aberdine. The riders cresting the hill got to the front, and me, sooner than the one''s coming up from behind. I could hear Coot''s new pistol blasting away as he hung from the side. His position provided him with cover, but it limited his field of view. On the other hand, I had no cover, sitting next to the driver. To his credit, he was firing when they got too close, but it wasn''t very helpful. "Behind you," I shouted to Coot. Behind him wasn''t behind the wagon anymore, and he twisted to shoot at a pair of riders on one horse coming up on the left side of the wagon. A rider with an almost cartoon mustache came up on our right. He brought a pistol up and aimed it right at our driver and that''s when I realized that they didn''t need to kill us, only stop us. I didn''t even try to aim as I swung around and pulled the first trigger on my shotgun. His head vanished in a spray of mist and the horse he was riding slowed to pull away from us. I wondered, briefly, if that horse was a player, too. An idea occurred to me, and I whistled. Horse''s icon appeared on my map way behind us, but that was good enough. I didn''t need him yet, and hoped I wouldn''t at all. Spinning back toward Coot, I saw that he had only been able to take out one of the riders on that tandem horse. I didn''t know if it was the front or back one, just that there was a horse with only one rider when there had been two. I watched him fire a few more misses before I decided to assist. My second shot hit the rider in the chest. For whatever reason, his horse went to the ground in a tumble. The XP notifications were coming in, but I didn''t have time, nor the care, to look. The map looked mostly clean for the moment, but this had already been the third wave of them and Coot and I knew better than to assume we were in the clear. "Reload everything now," I shouted. The driver seemed to take my words to heart as well and began reloading his pistol too. "You guys got any guns?" I shouted down to the cab of the carriage. "Us?" the woman stuck her head out to answer. "We''re dreadfully against violence," was all she gave as an answer. "Then duck back inside and keep your heads down," I said. "Let''s hope we run into some bandits that share your point of view." I turned to the driver. "How much farther to Aberdine?" "We''re about half way." Shit. This was getting rough as far as resources. This seemed like maybe a better mission for a larger gang. That being said, Coot and I were still alive. I reloaded the shotgun and switched to my Farmer''s Pistol to reload it as well. My minimap flashed. I was beginning to recognize that as incoming enemies. The flash was always red and brightest in the direction where they were coming from. It also meant that they were shooting. If they didn''t shoot, we wouldn''t know they were coming until they were almost on top of us. That flash also told me another thing. Our attackers consistently started shooting as soon as they could see us. So, if my map was alerting me, that meant that they could see us. And if they could see us ... "The road is blocked," Coot shouted and pointed ahead of us with his pistol. My map also had a yellow line that I recognized. It was the path to the mission end, to Aberdine. That made me wonder if we could still pass this mission if the driver died. ¡°Slow down,¡± I told him right as bullets started buzzing by our heads again. ¡°Go around them.¡± ¡°Wagon won¡¯t make it,¡± the driver said. I drew my pistol and started taking aim from our stopped position. The bandits had erected several wooden barricades made of barrels and some sort of spiked fencing to stop us from racing through it. I fired twice and they started spreading out. Some stayed behind the barricades for cover, but the rest went into the open, which should have made them easier to hit, but they were circling wide and moving closer. The further they spread out, the harder it was to see them all. ¡°We¡¯re going to die if we stay here,¡± I shouted. ¡°Go around them.¡± The driver shrugged. ¡°Can¡¯t do it. If we die here or die because they caught us when the wagon broke down doesn¡¯t change how dead we¡¯ll be.¡± A drastic decision needed to be made at that moment and I didn¡¯t have to make it. Coot twisted and shot the driver in the head. Blood splashed on my face and the driver slid forward and off the wagon, landing between the two horses that were pulling us. I was shocked, mostly by the blatant murder of our driver, but also because Coot had beat me to it. The way I, and obviously Coot, had seen it was that we weren¡¯t going to survive this mission if we let them surround us and the driver wasn¡¯t willing to move us. It would seem that Coot had already been thinking about the roadblock that the driver had made himself become. ¡°Grab the reins, boss,¡± he twisted back to fire at the oncoming bandits. ¡°Coming up behind us.¡± ¡°Get up here with me,¡± I demanded as I grabbed the reins and cracked them against the horses. Begging the driver to take us around the blockade was the original plan, but with about twenty of them spreading out to circle us, going around no longer seemed any less dangerous than going through. We started moving and I did my best to ignore both the bullets screaming by my head and the passengers screaming in fear beneath us. I used a free hand to grab a stick of jerky, my last one, and keep it ready in case I got hit. Oddly enough, the road itself wasn¡¯t blocked. The path was surrounded by things meant to block the path, but the actual path was wide open. It was more like they wanted us to stop inside. They shouldn¡¯t have shot at us if that had been the plan. Four of the outlaws were still within the blockade and they emptied every bullet they could at us. Coot took out two of them with one well-placed bullet into an oil lantern behind them. The fire made them scatter but also caught their pants. They were rolling and screaming as the other sixteen of their friends came running up the way we had come from. You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version. The other two were my problem, mostly because I made them so. I held the reins in my left hand and drew my pistol, much as I had seen the driver do. Unlike the driver, I actually tried to aim, or at least let the auto-aim do its thing. I hit one in the chest. It sent him back a few steps but didn¡¯t drop him. The other one took my bullet to his neck with the rewarding spray of blood hitting the side of our carriage. The map flashed. ¡°Ahead,¡± Coot said without turning around. He continued to fire at our pursuers while I focused on pushing the horses as hard as I could. We were both just an accurate shot away from this mission being over. Coot bent forward and started reloading as the bandits in front of us started shooting. ¡°Just a thought,¡± he said with his crooked grin, ¡°we might want to recruit some more folks for the Flamingos.¡± ¡°Great idea,¡± I said through gritted teeth. Then the rain started. I hadn¡¯t been in Wicked West long enough to even realize that dynamic weather conditions was a thing, but I had been on this mission long enough to know that this was the last thing that we needed. ¡°Does fire still work in the rain?¡± I asked Coot. ¡°Not normally, but in here it might,¡± he said, slapping the last bullet into his pistol and twisting towards the back again. A bullet hit him in the arm. I saw it because he was next to me, but that was also when I noticed that it wasn¡¯t the only hole in him. I handed him the jerky. ¡°Eat. I can¡¯t do this alone.¡± He munched down on the jerky and I could see in his face as the energy flooded his body. ¡°Why?¡± Coot said. ¡°You were dying.¡± ¡°Not the jerky,¡± he explained, ¡°why about the fire and rain?¡± I pointed ahead. Coot turned and saw what I was pointing at. Three people on horses were riding down the trail. Each of them was carrying a bow and the arrows at the end were on fire. ¡°Well, shit,¡± he mumbled. ¡°Any ideas?¡± ¡°Not good ones,¡± I said. ¡°Pick a bad one and stick with it,¡± Coot said. I nodded. ¡°Call your horse.¡± Coot whistled. I couldn¡¯t see his horse¡¯s icon on my minimap, but I knew it had to be coming. I could still see Horse mixed in with our attackers behind us. They were ignoring him entirely, which made me think they only really wanted us and the folks we were escorting. ¡°Take the reins.¡± Coot grabbed them from me and I opened up my map completely to see how far Aberdine was. We were looking at another two miles or so. We wouldn¡¯t make it. I got back out of the map and took the reins back from Coot. ¡°I¡¯m going to stop the wagon at an angle,¡± I explained. ¡°When I do, grab the kid and get on your horse. Don¡¯t use the roads. Go straight to Aberdine. Don¡¯t stop for anything.¡± I expected some more conversation from my gang member. At least some sort of addendum or adjustment to my weak-ass plan, but all Coot did was nod. We were about a quarter mile from the archers when I pulled the carriage to the right, giving them a too-broad target to aim at. Real world archers would have a little trouble hitting something that far, but this world had weird aiming assistance and I wasn¡¯t going to bet on it. ¡°Move, move, move,¡± I shouted unnecessarily. Coot was already pulling the kid onto Sandra. They took off just as our pursuers were starting to catch up. An arrow hit the side of the wagon, just as I was expecting it to, and I cracked the reins again. I turned us back toward the archers and glanced over my shoulder just to make sure that the plan was working. Sure enough, about half of the people chasing us cut away from their group and took off after Coot and the kid. I cracked the reins again and drew my pistol. I had already experimented enough with the reins to know that if I put them down or let them go the horses would begin to veer away from the path. Instead, loosely held onto them and used my left hand to steady my grip on my pistol. I could feel the heat radiating from behind me. The familiar pull toward the first archer¡¯s center mass followed by Ed¡¯s trick of pulling up, just lightly, against it, and then I pulled the trigger. Head shot. Another flaming arrow landed in the seat where Coot had been. Center mass, gentle pull up, and fire. Head shot. I didn¡¯t have time to hit the final archer. I let go of the reins and swung down and toward the door of the cab. I pulled it open and pulled the kid¡¯s parents out and into the mud before jumping and landing roughly in it myself. A normal arrow hit me in the side as I stood up. I let out a howl of pain and pulled it out. My health was less than half, somewhere around the forty-five percent mark. I really needed to buy a bag of almonds or something. Horse came up beside us. ¡°Get on,¡± I said to the couple. ¡°I can only carry two people,¡± Horse said. ¡°They can¡¯t both get on.¡± I shook my head. ¡°They can get on,¡± I aimed and fired behind us, emptying my pistol, holstering it, and drawing my shotgun. ¡°I can¡¯t.¡± ¡°Another suicide win?¡± Horse asked. ¡°I get put in the stables when you die. Automatically. So, if you die with them on me, this mission is over.¡± ¡°I¡¯m not planning to die. Not if I can help it.¡± I stepped further behind the flaming wreckage of the wagon. I noticed that the horses had somehow become disconnected and taken off. ¡°I read something in the manual about stealing horses from riders.¡± Horse whinnied. ¡°Cheating on me already?¡± The couple climbed onto him. ¡°What do you want me to do?¡± ¡°Get them to Aberdine.¡± I stepped forward and pushed against Horse. He stepped backward in confusion and the rider that was coming up crashed into the back of Horse. The other thing that I had read in the manual was about horse collisions. It wasn¡¯t much, just one line that said that when horses collided the one moving forward tended to be the one to take the brunt of the impact. That was an understatement. Horse didn¡¯t even flinch. As far as the bandit and his horse were concerned, Horse was a statue. The rider went ass-over-tea-kettle and landed in the mud. His horse landed on its side behind Horse, but got up quick enough. I ran past Horse, slapping his ass as I shouted. ¡°Get!¡± Then I jumped on the new horse and followed. Our pursuers were closer and the couple I was escorting had lost their carriage that was acting as cover, but now we were about a mile and a half from the mission end point and we could move faster. Speed made the difference. The horse I stole seemed to tire faster than Horse did, and I wondered if that was because I had stolen it or if it was just a less healthy horse. Even with the lower stamina, we made great time. When the borrowed horse grew tired, I would slow so that it could rest while Horse and his riders continued on. Any pursuers who caught up with me while the horse rested were either dispatched in a bloody mess or kept back by my gunfire enough for me to get back on the horse and put some distance between us. When I rode into what I assumed had to be Aberdine, I was surprised by what I saw. Easter was a place that looked like your stereotypical old west town. Everything was rustic wood and dust and mud. Aberdine was the exact opposite. We rode into Aberdine between two large homesteads and a cemetery. As we moved further into town, with its two-story buildings and patrolling law-enforcement, the dirt gave way to brick roadwork. There was a courthouse to my left that looked like something out of Back to the Future. The buildings nearest me were the two-storied kind, but once I was further into the city it was easy to see that this port town had several stretching at least three stories high. I couldn¡¯t imagine how Ed would handle a raid on this town. The yellow line brought us to a back alley between several of the buildings. It only took me a little bit of investigation to see that this was behind one of the main hotels of Aberdine. I had never caught the names of our charges, but I was relieved to see that Coot and the kid had arrived safely. Both of his parents climbed off of Horse as I climbed off of the stolen horse. I don¡¯t know if robbing bandits was enough to get me wanted by the police. I also had a passing thought that I should take a moment and find out what the law was actually called around here. Were they police? I had no idea. I walked toward the family I had just escorted across the bloody hell of this game and realized I was walking toward a small yellow circle on the map. When I stepped into it, the couple came alive. Hands were shaking, thanks were being offered, and wads of cash were getting shoved into my hands. For whatever reason, the little shit came up to me and kicked me in the shin. I glared at the little cretin until his mother shoved another bit of cash into my hand. Then they were gone and I was standing alone with Coot. Coot had a smile from ear to ear and was completely oblivious to the blood coating all of his clothes and most of his skin. He turned that smile on me and I wasn¡¯t sure if I should laugh or hit him. ¡°Aren¡¯t kids just precious?¡± Chapter 12 Chapter 12 Once the experience and money were all registered in our HUD as collected, I pressed the button on my arm to turn off the stream. The view counter had been 367 when I turned it off. I was too busy during the mission to even notice it, so I didn''t know if that was our peak or not. Either way, that seemed like a good start. I checked my HUD and was happy to see that I had $113.52 as well as 0.3 gold total. It was a lot better than what I had started with only yesterday. How was that just yesterday? Had we really been moving that much? The rain was starting to let up and the sky was still gray, but I was excited about the prospect of a new town. "Go get supplies," I told Coot. "Explore, too. Aberdine is new to me, so I''ll be doing the same. Maybe we set up here tonight," I said, but found myself wondering how far away McLintock Ranch was from Aberdine. If I didn''t burn too much of whatever daylight remained by exploring, then there was no reason I couldn''t make my way to the Ranch and meet up with Joan Cremont. It would be nice to sleep in something that I could consider my own. Also, I was ashamed to admit that I wanted to watch the fight that we just went through and the only way to review my streams was from my camp. "Want me to recruit anybody?" Coot asked. I sighed. I hadn''t wanted to gang up with Coot, but that had turned out alright. It was likely that everything in this world could be easier with allies, but strangers would backstab you. Shaking my head, I said, "Socialize and feel them out. If you see anyone who might be a candidate, let me know. Maybe we can join them for a bit and see if they are our kind of people." I shrugged. "I don''t want a big gang." Coot''s eyes took on a wistful look as he nodded slowly. "Right, not a big gang. You''re looking for a family." "What?" I demanded. "I''m not looking for a family, I''m looking for people who won''t stab me in the back because it''s funny. Can we do that?" He put his finger against his crooked nose and nodded. "I''ll find you just what you''re looking for." He turned and ran down the street like I had told him to go and fetch a doctor. I hoped he remembered to get supplies. Aberdine was pretty. Not "let''s get a drink," pretty, but maybe "showroom" pretty, but at least "put a magnet on it and put it on the fridge" pretty. There were shops that actually looked like shops, signs with lights on them, even street lamps with electricity. It was so different from Aberdine that it almost felt like I was in an entirely different game. "When are you gonna treat me with some respect?" Horse asked over my shoulder as I watched Coot sprint away. "What are you talking about?" I spun toward him. I couldn''t read horse faces and their emotions, so I had no idea if he was kidding. "You get more say in what we do than Coot does." "Yes, that''s true," he admitted, "but I don''t get mission rewards. When do you start spoiling me like an old house cat?" "Never," I shook my head. "You''re not an old house cat, you''re a member of my gang that is shaped like a horse. That is it." "Except that I need some attention." "Attention? What are you even talking about?" "I''m saying," Horse was getting annoyed with me or pretending to get annoyed with me, I couldn''t tell, "let''s leave this alley and walk over to the stables. Then you can ask them to wash and feed me." Whether he was a horse or not, he was right. He wasn''t getting anything out of these missions other than the satisfaction of knowing that his rider might take care of him, and that had not been happening so far. He chose to be a horse for the horse experience, and that wasn''t just being a work animal. That meant care, feeding, and maybe a few scratches behind the ears. I didn''t think we were anywhere near scratching the ears, but I could pony up some cash for a bath. Maybe even that new saddle he wanted. I agreed and let him lead the way. He seemed to know where to go and I didn''t feel like looking at my map again for the billionth time in the last hour. The Aberdine stables had no one in them, not even the clerk, Horse explained that they can''t watch the place all the time and still live out their lives. When we walked in, a menu popped up on my HUD with a list of options of things to purchase for Horse. I selected the wash, a brush, and a feeding. The price came up as $10, which I thought was robbery, but Horse said was pretty good. I paid and a notification told me that he would be ready for pickup in about an hour. I dug around in my satchel for that pocket watch I had seen and checked it. It was three. The gunsmith was easy to find, but was closed. The grocer was still open and I grabbed some canned goods that looked like they could heal me up really well and the few boxes of ammo they had. I asked the clerk how someone got anywhere quickly if their horse was busy, and he pointed me in the direction of the stagecoach. He called it a stagecoach, but I could overhear the handful of other players near it calling it a "Fast Travel." That''s what I wanted. I don''t know if it was the clean city or the lack of aggression in people''s eyes, but the other players here didn''t put me nearly on edge as they did in Easter. It made me wonder what raids were like here. There were a lot of things that I still didn¡¯t know and getting to a place where I could sit and review what had happened to me, and plan for what might be coming, was still something that I needed to do. My body was still aching from the mission. It was weird how I could feel these pains that made me think my body was real, when I was anything but. The analytical part of me wanted to know if that was my mind interpreting the weird signals indicating I had been shot or if that was all part of the simulation. The rest of me popped open one of those cans of food, peaches, and drank from it like a cup as I walked through Aberdine toward the Fast Travel. The Fast Travel was different. It was a bench with a sign next to it. The sign had arrows pointing along the different roads. Each arrow had a name for it. I wasn¡¯t entirely certain what to do, so I reached out and touched the part of the sign that read McLintock Ranch. Three dollars deducted from my funds. When nothing else happened, I tried sitting down. I was somewhere else. It wasn¡¯t the weirdest thing I had ever experienced, especially since first coming to Wicked West, but it was up there. The moment my butt touched the wooden bench, I wasn¡¯t sitting in Aberdine, I was sitting at the edge of a farm next to some train tracks. This was obviously supposed to be McLintock Ranch, but I only knew that because it was where I had been trying to go. This wasn¡¯t just a ranch, like I had been expecting it to be, but it was an entire small village. There were stables and pens for the animals, at least two barns and a large house with smaller shacks or cabins littered all over the place. I was next to a literal train station that stood just a few feet outside the fence line. I brought up my map and noticed all the little things that weren¡¯t at McLintock. It might have looked like a little village, but it didn¡¯t have the things that the other towns had. There was no post office or shops of any kind. Actually, the only things that the Ranch had were an orange teardrop at the large house that I assumed were more jobs for hire and a yellow circle at one of the cabins just behind it. Assuming everything went well, I could meet with Ms. Cremont and get back to Aberdine in time to get Horse and Coot. Unauthorized content usage: if you discover this narrative on Amazon, report the violation. I walked through the fence half-expecting someone to shout at me for trespassing as they shot at me. Nothing like that happened. Instead, I was greeted with hat-tips and howdy¡¯s. Easter was a northern town with tall trees and cliffs with rivers nearby. Although it was built on a flat area with plains not far away, Easter reminded me of the visit to the Adirondacks that Tyler and I had made about thirty years before he died. Aberdine had been different. It was a port town on a wide river. It reminded me of the midwest, like a town on the edge of the Mississippi. McLintock Ranch was another environment entirely. It reminded me, again, of Tyler. Everything did, but this memory was dumb and cute and made me smile as I walked. It reminded me of binge watching all of Dr. Quinn Medicine Woman. It was a show from the 1990¡¯s about a pioneer woman pushing back against the world that said women couldn¡¯t be doctors. It took place in a town called Colorado Springs, but it had a windswept and dried look that made western towns look dirty and rugged. That show was why I thought retiring as a pioneer woman would be fun. I was still learning my lesson in ¡®be careful what you wish for,¡¯ but that show was a happy place for me and Tyler. Up until now, Wicked West had been doing everything it could to dissuade me of those happy pioneer thoughts. This was the first time since I had arrived in this world that I had found a place that fit my dream ideas. Looking around, it gave me an idea of what I might do after level 250. It also solidified my plans on what I would need to do to make sure that my post-retirement retirement was exactly what I needed it to be. Everyone that I passed was either cheerful or busy. I made my way to the yellow circle on the map and found an older woman with deep lines on her face sitting in a rocking chair on a porch attached to a small cabin. Joan was rocking gently in her chair with a book in her hand. I couldn¡¯t see what it was, but I found myself suddenly wondering what kind of books were available to us here. We weren¡¯t shut off from the developing real world, we were only restricted on communicating with them. Could we get real world newspapers and books? I hoped so. It gave me a low level of excitement to think that I could read the latest Paolini or Hambling novel. ¡°I was beginning to wonder if you got my letter,¡± Joan didn¡¯t look up from her book as she spoke. ¡°I¡¯ll do the job, but it¡¯ll be a dollar a day and I expect you to provide me with the meat that we¡¯ll eat.¡± ¡°That¡¯s simple enough,¡± I said. I placed my left foot on the first step of the porch but didn¡¯t move any closer. ¡°Is it?¡± She finally put her book down and leaned forward. ¡°Can you manage a dollar a day? You¡¯re thin and you look weak. I don¡¯t even know that you could bring the food we¡¯ll need.¡± ¡°Are you trying to test me?¡± I asked. ¡°Is this part of you taking the job? Or are you always this,¡± I looked for an old west word, ¡°ornery when you¡¯re being interviewed by a gang leader?¡± My bravado was also a test. I wanted to see how scripted she was, but I also wanted to see what kind of reputation I had, if any. ¡°Gang leader?¡± She slow-clapped three times. ¡°We¡¯ve got us a bonafide outlaw, is that it?¡± She sighed and returned to rocking in her chair. ¡°Job interview, indeed. This ain¡¯t no job interview. You want a safe place to rest your head, food on your table, and good conversation. You want me to make you a home. That ain¡¯t no job interview. No, ma¡¯am. That makes me a third-party contractor. Or a wife. No third-party contract, or wife, takes on that kind of work without knowing that the job will be safe and well paid for.¡± She crossed her arms and gave a smug smile. ¡°A woman needs to know she¡¯ll be cared for before she commits to anything.¡± Something about McLintock Ranch, or maybe just seeing Joan Cremont sitting there being her ornery old self, solidified the plan that I hadn¡¯t been sure I was thinking of committing to. The plan that I had been asking Coot about. ¡°I have a plan,¡± I don¡¯t know why I was telling her. Everything about this felt like I was in a safe place. Maybe that was her role, not just building a camp and a safe place for me to rest, but also making it feel like a safe place. ¡°A grand crusade.¡± ¡°A grand crusade? In a game where nothing changes?¡± She addressed the fact we were in a game. That was weird. That seemed like the kind of thing they usually avoid talking about. She saw the look on my face. ¡°Don¡¯t give me that. What are they going to do? Delete me? Nah, that¡¯s a waste of the energy to press the button.¡± She took a breath. ¡°We aren¡¯t normal NPC¡¯s. Other NPC¡¯s have to give you the quest and hand out the rewards to everyone, no exceptions. That¡¯s how they keep their jobs. Not me. Camp Cookies get to pick their charges, if only because some sick bastards might like the idea of keeping someone under their thumb. The sickos can¡¯t be allowed to run amuck in here.¡± She leaned forward again. ¡°So, tell me, Sammy#0421, why would I want to be part of your grand crusade?¡± I was kicking myself for using that phrase already. A deep breath later, I said, ¡°You¡¯re right. Players can¡¯t be allowed to run amuck, but aside from your ability to choose what happens, who stops them? When a new person joins this world, they are greeted by questions and blood. The only answers they are given are more violence and to check their mailbox. This world needs something in place that slaps the wrist of those who take advantage of the new people.¡± I raised an eyebrow at her. ¡°Agitators, assholes, whatever you want to call them, they get the same boost in experience from killing new players, only minutes in the game, that they get when they kill experienced folks who have been in here for years. That¡¯s wrong.¡± ¡°We can¡¯t change the system,¡± Joan countered. ¡°Even if we could, if we change one thing, then everyone will want to change things. This won¡¯t even be the same game after.¡± ¡°Then we use the system to change the behavior.¡± ¡°Is that it, then?¡± Joan pressed. ¡°Do you have some plan to use the system against the people who abuse it?¡± ¡°Something like that,¡± I nodded. ¡°Most players spawn in Easter. I woke up in a tub and was dead within two minutes of being here. Nobody¡¯s first experience should be violence. My plan is to stop it. Find people like me, mobilize the townspeople, turn Easter into a safe place for new people.¡± ¡°There¡¯s no way to win every raid.¡± I shook my head. ¡°No, but winning some might give rookies a chance to see that they can make a life here.¡± I threw up my hands. ¡°That¡¯s the big sell, isn¡¯t it? Come to Wicked West and live your life. A second chance in a different kind of world. That¡¯s what they are selling but that isn¡¯t what we¡¯re getting, unless we do what the wild west was meant for. Unless we tame this land ourselves.¡± ¡°Starting with Easter?¡± ¡°Starting with Easter.¡± I agreed. ¡°What do you say? Do you want to be the camp cook for someone like that?¡± ¡°That was a good speech. You should have hit your broadcast button.¡± She shrugged. ¡°The cook doesn¡¯t fight and there¡¯s good pay in raids, whether you win or lose. I guess I¡¯m in.¡± You now have access to Camp. What town would you like to set your Camp near? ¡°Easter,¡± I said out loud. Camp location set. One dollar deducted itself from my funds. ¡°By the time you get there,¡± Joan picked her book back up and resumed reading, ¡°camp will be ready and the stew will be hot.¡± I tipped my hat to her, ¡°Thank you.¡± ¡°I expect a full deer in camp at least weekly,¡± Joan said. ¡°Now get out of here, vigilante, before someone catches wind of your grand crusade.¡± I thanked her again and started the march back to the Fast Travel. One of the signs at the Fast Travel read ¡°Camp.¡± That was interesting. I could take the ¡°stagecoach¡± directly to camp. With camp being a safe place, supposedly, where I couldn¡¯t be killed, that was an incredibly powerful tool. I contemplated going straight there and seeing if Joan would beat me or if the camp would even be set up yet. I had already noticed the market of it on the map. It was a blue tent. When I opened my map all the way up, it looked to be on a cliff face just north of Easter. That was a perfect place for what I had planned. Almost too perfect, and I wondered if Joan had picked it for me based on my plan. Either way, camp and Easter would have to wait. I still needed to collect Horse and Coot and see who he might have wrangled up for our cause. I had several messages from him that he found us a level 10 that had just accepted the Mountain Man profession. I still hadn¡¯t had much of a chance to read up on professions, but that seemed like something valuable to add to the group. Before I touched any sign, that reminded me to check my stats. Sammy#0421 Level 4 No Profession That was interesting. I had somehow missed level 3 entirely. I wondered if that had happened when I was on the mission to Aberdine. New levels meant new gear and surprises in the mail. Before I gathered Horse, I should check out the post office. I touched the Aberdine sign, lost $3, and sat down. Before I could stand back up in Aberdine, I fell. My ass hit the brick road of the city with a thud. ¡°What the hell?¡± I had made it to Aberdine, but suddenly the Fast Travel was intangible. I stood up and looked at the bench. It was still there but when I tried to touch it, a message popped up in the HUD. Fast Travel is unavailable during a Raid. ¡°Well, shit.¡± I spun around, pulling my shotgun from my shoulder and aiming at nothing in particular. I didn¡¯t see anyone, yet, but that wouldn¡¯t last. I found myself worried that Coot was cornered again. D0C70RC007: Hey boss, me and my mountain man friend are pinned down in a cemetery. Almost no cover. Could really use help. I replied that I was on my way and didn¡¯t mention that I hoped this new mountain man would be worth saving. I found Coot¡¯s teardrop on the minimap and started running in that direction. Then I stopped running, realizing that I wasn¡¯t too far from the stables. Aberdine was twice as big as Easter. I glanced at my pocket watch. Time to grab my ride. Chapter 13 Chapter 13 I pressed the broadcast button again. It was easy to second guess myself. Multiple times today, I found myself asking why I was the gang leader when Coot had a higher level and better knowledge of what we were up against. Then there were moments like now, where multiple times in that same day I had to risk getting killed just to save the old codger. Horse was happy to get picked up before I told him what was going on. "So what if he dies?" Horse asked. "He''s gonna spawn in an hour anyway. We could be picking flowers in the Heartland. Wild carrots grow out there. I love wild carrots." I jumped on and took off in the direction of Coot''s marker on the map. "We are going to save him because we would want him to save us," I spoke like I was talking to my children. Slow and clipped, thinking I sound like I''m making each root itself in his brain. That wasn''t the case, and the response was similar to what I would have gotten fifty or so years ago. "Whatever," he huffed. Red was flashing in several directions on my map, but my plan wasn''t to defend the raid, not at least until I had my gang together. The bit about the manual about Raids was bookmarked, but I hadn''t read it yet. Seeing how often they''ve been happening to me, that was a huge oversight. Riding through a new town was an adventure all its own. Everytime I took a turn to head in Coot''s direction, I found a new obstacle. There were a ton of back alleys in Aberdine, and I ended up taking a lot of those, which meant that Horse got to show me how quickly he could jump over close together obstacles. The back alley was also where I ran into the first bunch of attackers for the raid. 3 guys on foot were running directly at me and Horse from the other end. "Screw it," I said out loud hoping that Horse knew what that meant. I wrapped the reins around the horn on his saddle and brought my shotgun up. Then I spurred Horse again. I could see them trying to get their sights on me, but I could also see them panicking. One shot hit me, brushing my leg, and two more shots went wide, before I brought up the shotgun and fired. The two on the sides scattered as the middle one launched backwards. I didn''t see any XP notifications until Horse ran him over. We burst out of the end of the alley and into an area behind what I think was the Sheriff''s office. None of the map icons were popping up on my minimap with the raid going on, so until I knew Aberdine better, I would be guessing where I was. The area behind the jail was wide open except for a few stacked crates. I could see the courthouse across the road and directly in front of where we came out. To the left and up a hill from there was a road that led to two houses and what I could see of an iron gate. Like a cemetery. My map showed red all over that hill and several teardrop shapes were running down the hill and at us. I drew my pistol and kept riding, letting Horse guide us the right way while I aimed and fired. Five people were coming down the hill. I clipped two of them but they, and us, were just moving too fast. I pulled the dynamite from my bag and it lit with a thought. I hadn''t expected that. The players saw what I was doing and stopped running to try and focus their fire. A bullet found its way into my stomach, and another one quickly followed it. My health bar was almost entirely gone. I threw the dynamite at the biggest group of them to scatter them and then grabbed a can of peaches from my bag. It pulled open too easily, and I slurped them down quicker than Popeye with a can of spinach. My health started crawling up and I didn''t have the attention span to watch if it went all the way back up. I hunched forward so that the bullets would have a smaller target. "Get between them and the raiders," I said in Horse''s ear. "Be ready to run." The ground flattened out at the top of the hill and at the front of the houses. We went past them and turned left, where the iron fence was. Horse yanked hard to the left and jumped the fence. Huddled on the back porch, which was only a little more than a set of stairs with a roof over it, were Coot and his mountain man. They were firing constantly, only taking breaks to eat food. To the right of us were the attackers that had them pinned down. I didn''t even try counting them. There were more than ten, and likely even more than that. The stick of explosive landed right in the middle of them. Coot''s head exploded as a bullet hit him. Horse and I hadn''t been fast enough. "Get on," I shouted at the mountain man as Coot''s body was still falling. Horse had pulled right up to the steps and was getting hit pretty regularly. I glanced at his health and saw it was still yellow from his cleaning. They must have fed him well. Yellow or not, we weren''t going to last long if we didn''t move. The mountain man didn''t hesitate. He was on my horse and we were moving quicker than I had expected. I felt the heat of the explosion and ignored the notifications that scrolled past. I had killed a few, but that''s not what this was about. Horse jumped the other side of the fence, and I pulled his reins to turn us left and flush with the house. I spurred Horse again and we went racing down the hill and back toward the town. An arm covered in leathers came up next to my head, pointing at a building. "There''s a ladder there," the mountain man said. "Get us to that building. We might survive this if we can get on the roof." I looked up and saw several other players on a couple of the rooftops as well. That seemed to be the survival strategy and right now it was better than what I didn''t have. I leaned forward again to give Horse orders. "Get us to the ladder and get the hell out of here. I''ll buy you another bath when this is over." Horse let out a grunt of pain and I glanced at his health bar again. He was just above half health. He could take maybe two more shots before he went down. I didn''t know what happened when he went down and was kicking myself for not reading that part of the manual. "You''ll owe me more than that," Horse hissed. "And your crazy friend owes me sweets." Horse got us to the ladder and we jumped down. The mountain man was the first up the ladder while I shot at people racing toward us. There were enough people defending against the raid that the numbers against us were trickling down just enough for me to take my time and shoot. These weren''t NPC''s, though. Real NPC''s, like from an original video game, you could pick off as their artificial intelligence directed them down the best, yet predictable, paths. These raiders were ducking and using better weapons than I had available. I had to eat two more cans of I-don''t-even-know-what just to survive long enough for my turn up the ladder. "I''m up," the mountain man yelled from the roof. I killed one more player, a woman decked out like she was some sort of bayou voodoo shaman from a Disney movie, and then jumped on the ladder. A bullet hit me in the ass, but otherwise I made it all the way up. This book''s true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience. I collapsed onto the roof and just laid there. After my breath finally caught back up with me, I slammed my fist down on the rooftop in a mild tantrum. I wanted to save Easter? I want to be the person who makes it so that Easter is a place for new folks to live? I can''t even keep my own gang alive. "Reload and eat whatever you have," the mountain man was saying. "If you''ve got any potions, pound them." I rolled onto my side and stayed low to reload my guns. While I did so, I examined my newest ally. Panda_Bear_Polka Level 10 Profession: Mountain Man "Panda bear?" I asked him. "I''m not going to call you Panda bear." He let out a chuckle and drank something. "You can call me Bear," he said. "Bear," I sat up and looked across the rooftops at our allies-for-now. They might be defending Aberdine, but they were other players, and other players were best avoided. "Bear," I said again, "want to join our gang?" "That''s it?" He drew a knife and threw it past me. I spun and watched as some guy at the top of the ladder grabbed at the knife in his chest before falling backward. "All you needed was to meet me? I knew I was that charming." I shook my head and crawled to the ledge, aiming my pistol at the nearest red teardrops on the map. "No," I answered. "I didn''t know it until I met you, but all I needed was for Coot to say you could be trusted." Then I sent him the invitation to the gang. Panda_Bear_Polka has joined your The Pink Flamingos. "Let''s get this," I said. I stood into a crouch. It was too late to worry about if I was invisible or not, but I still needed the cover that the ledge provided. "What gang started the raid?" I demanded, for some reason I figured that it had to be the Colossals. "One second," Bear said. He was checking something on his HUD. I would need to figure out how to see that kind of thing in the menu. To my surprise, it wasn''t the Colossals. "The Gladiat0rz." I let out a laugh. If there was a chance, it would be fun to meet up with Ed and his crew. That being said, I was acting like it had been days since I had seen them, but we had defended Easter just earlier today. These battles were getting to be nonstop and I could see this kind of life tiring me out quickly. I was going to need to look into trying out my camp soon before I got too burned out. That didn¡¯t even account for how quickly I was using and replacing, and then using again, my resources. At this rate, I wouldn¡¯t get much of a chance to read the rest of the manual. I finished reloading and took aim down the back of the building. I fired twice, but didn¡¯t hit anyone. I sent Jem a message. Sammy#0421: Which one of you assholes killed Coot, lol? JemmyCloister: I think that was Ken. I wasn¡¯t sure I read the name right. You¡¯re defending then? Sammy#0421: Us and a few others. Just picked up a third for our gang. If you ever want to switch sides, let me know. JemmyCloister: Keep chatting. I almost have my sights on you¡­ I thought she was joking right before a bullet slammed into the bit of wall that I was hanging over. I pulled back and fell flat, but not before I saw where she was hiding. From the building I was on, I could clearly see everything up to the house where Coot had died. Just to the left of the house was a big tree with a lot of shade under it. And a Jem. Unfortunately, neither my pistol or my shotgun would reach that far. ¡°Hey, new guy,¡± I called over my shoulder. ¡°Do you see that cowgirl out there trying to snipe us?¡± Bear had built his avatar wider than the average person did, aiming for a bulky look underneath the leathers and furs. So, when he came clomping over to me, I had to scoot to the side to give him room behind the same cover I was using. ¡°Behind the tree?¡± He pulled binoculars from his bag and then nodded, ¡°Yes, I see her.¡± ¡°Do you have anything that can hit her?¡± Bear smiled. ¡°That¡¯s what my rifle is for.¡± He pulled a rifle off of his back that I hadn¡¯t noticed, which was surprising because of how long it was. It was a bolt action rifle similar to the one that Ed had, but it was longer with a larger magazine. This one also had a much longer scope on it than Ed¡¯s had. ¡°This my long rifle, a Carcano,¡± Bear explained. ¡°I use this when I feel someone needs me to reach out and say hello.¡± ¡°Oh,¡± I smiled. ¡°That¡¯s good. I know her. Let me know when you¡¯ve got her in your sights and don¡¯t fire until I say so.¡± ¡°Alright,¡± Bear raised an eyebrow, ¡°but keep an eye on the ladder, too.¡± I nodded and drew my shotgun before rolling onto my back and aiming it directly at the ladder. ¡°She¡¯s in my sights,¡± Bear had already rested the rifle on the ledge and taken aim. Sammy#0421: By the way, my newest gang member wants to say hello. ¡°Fire,¡± I shouted. JemmyCloister: Huh?¡± Bear pulled the trigger. ¡°Got her.¡± I laughed way more than I probably should have because right then was when someone made it up the ladder and I was in no way as prepared for their arrival as I had said I would be. A yelp of surprise came out of my throat as I finally noticed feet touching down on the roof in front of me. ¡°Shit,¡± I shouted and tried to swing my shotgun up. The man who had come up the stairs was dressed like Val Kilmer from Tombstone. He drew a pistol and fired twice into my stomach right before he was tackled by Bear. Bear wrestled with the attacker for a minute but I lost focus. My vision blurred and someone else came up the ladder. I tried to grab at my shotgun again, but it was no use. A quick glance at my HUD showed that my health bar was almost entirely empty. I was either bleeding out or about to die. Either way, it was game over for me. Whatever happened with Kilmer, Bear was in front of me again. This time, he backhanded the new guy, shoved a knife into his stomach, and then pushed him off the roof. That was about when I experienced something new. Bear crouched over me and pulled something from his bag and waved it under my nose. It smelled like every horrible thing that I had ever smelled before. My sight came back into focus as memories of baby vomit, burned rubber, and a particularly bad fart Tyler had made while we tried workout videos during the 2020¡¯s all flooded my sinuses. I was on my feet without remembering getting up. ¡°What the fuck was that?¡± I demanded. It wasn¡¯t just the smell that woke me up. My body felt alive with electric fire and my health bar had gone up about 20%.¡± Bear shrugged. ¡°It¡¯s whatever animation they tie to me reviving you.¡± ¡°Reviving? You can revive me?¡± The entire idea made no sense. If I could be revived, why wasn¡¯t anyone else trying to revive anyone? ¡°Sometimes, but it depends on how close your allies are and how bad your wounds were. I think if your health falls under 5% and an ally is nearby, you can be revived in the next 15 seconds. Otherwise, you just die.¡± Bear¡¯s explanation was appreciated, and I was happy to not be dead yet, but this was entirely new news and I would need some time to process it. Now was not that time. I picked my shotgun off the ground and crouched, taking the time to eat another can of something that tasted like beans but didn¡¯t look like beans. I needed to get my hands on those tonics or potions or whatever that I had heard about. Or at least a bag of almonds. No sooner had the can hit the rooftop then I heard steps behind me. I spun and brought up my shotgun. ¡°Get out of here and we won¡¯t have any issues,¡± Ed said. His rifle was raised and he was grinning like the cat who had cornered the canary. I returned his smile. ¡°I don¡¯t think that I can let that happen.¡± I shrugged. ¡°Plus, that¡¯s the fun of it, isn¡¯t it? When friends meet on the battlefield?¡± ¡°Are we friends, then?¡± he asked. He was still smiling or I would have been hurt by the implication. ¡°Of course, we are.¡± I waved my hands around. ¡°I¡¯ve never started a raid before, only defended. When this is over, I¡¯m going to need you to give me the tutorial.¡± He rolled his eyes. ¡°Have you still not read the manual?¡± ¡°Everytime I pick that damned book up, somebody starts a raid and I¡¯ve got to run and save Coot.¡± He nodded, completely understanding. ¡°Last chance,¡± Ed said. ¡°I¡¯ll tell everyone to leave you alone if you lower-¡± Auto-aim tugged to center mass, I tugged up, and pulled the trigger. Ed¡¯s head exploded and I ran over and squatted next to his body with the biggest grin I could manage. I had to move quickly. The death photo gets taken really fast and I wanted him to see me next to him before he woke up in an hour. +25 XP Bear let out a slow whistle. ¡°To be completely honest with you, Sam, I expected you to take his offer.¡± I shrugged and dropped back down to a crouch. ¡°I¡¯ve been murdered so many times at this point by people who just wanted to ruin my day that I sure as hell wasn¡¯t going to pass up the chance to play with some actual friends.¡± There was something different about killing and possibly getting killed in something that felt way more like a game than the egregious acts of violence that had been put against me without my say so. Ed would understand. ¡°Are you going to loot him, or can I?¡± I looked at Bear. ¡°Loot him?¡± Anger at my own continued ignorance rose from my gut. ¡°I can loot the dead?¡± Bear shrugged. ¡°You didn¡¯t know that?¡± Somewhere, far away, I could hear Ed laughing at me. Chapter 14 Chapter 14 The raid took less than an hour but I wasn¡¯t around to see it. After I killed Ed and got the lovely notification that I was now level 5, everything coasted for a bit before going downhill entirely. Bear showed me that if there were multiple groups defending an area, the attackers would divide up and try to get whoever they could. That meant that if I wanted to take a breather, I could crouch way low down and ride it out for a bit without much interference from the raiders. It was a great plan. Bear and I talked for a bit about raid tactics and then I remembered the tattoo on my arm. I checked my view counter and was surprised to see that my numbers weren¡¯t super high. I had just over forty people watching me and it was going down. Obviously, it was dropping because I was sitting on my ass on a rooftop in a town where action should be easy to find. Viewers were bored. That was my first ¡®oops,¡¯ of the raid. Yes, only my first one, because I wasn¡¯t going to count Coot¡¯s dying. I did my damnedest. It isn¡¯t my fault that he keeps getting himself cornered in the middle of a raid. Seeing that counter reminded me of Winnie and why I had the counter in the first place. So, I stood up and started looking for people to kill. When I couldn¡¯t find anyone on the minimap, I expanded it to take a look at what I could see. The entire map filled my HUD. That was my second ¡®oops,¡¯ of the raid. My map was open for less than half a second, but when a bullet hit the ground directly in front of my feet. During my discussions with Bear, we had shifted toward the front of the building so he could show me where the raiders were entering alleys and how we could best rain down our fiery death on them. The bullet and the spray of rooftop chunks that it kicked up startled me. I spun. I tripped on the ledge. I fell off the roof. It wasn¡¯t even that I fell off the roof, so much as how I hit everything on the way down. My head hit a sign on the front of the building. That sent me into a spin that gave my mild hope when my leg broke a window. I figured that maybe I could hook it and slow my fall, but that didn¡¯t happen. The next things that I hit, in the order that I hit them, were an awning, a lamp post, and a horse carriage. I didn¡¯t land anywhere fun or safe like the back of the horse carriage. That would have been nice. I landed sideways on the armrest, more specifically the board on the side of the driver¡¯s seat, and spun over and onto the street. The picture of my death, in that familiar, yet annoying, sepia they liked to use, had my body, broken and abused, twisted up in the spokes of the same wagon. It was a great picture that I¡¯m elated I didn¡¯t have to experience. My actual death was caused by breaking my back on the side of the horse carriage. The only positive thing that I can take from the experience is that nobody gained any levels from my death. I didn¡¯t bother looking at my watch when I resurrected. As I expected, I was about a mile outside of Aberdine. I took the long hike back and sent a message to the guys to meet me at camp. I got the alert back that Bear was still dead, but Coot answered with excitement. D0C70RC007: Camp? We have a camp? I can¡¯t wait!!!!!! Sammy#0421: You¡¯ll probably beat me there. Don¡¯t say anything, I want to see it for myself. D0C70RC007: What¡¯d you think of Panda_Bear_Polka? Sammy#0421: Already added him to the gang. We¡¯ll talk more in person. To my surprise, the broadcast turned itself off when I died. That meant that either my viewers would see me be triumphant, or they would see me fail at the end of every ¡®episode.¡¯ If I didn¡¯t want to lose viewers, I would need to keep a healthy mix and the only way to control that would be to get into a few fights that I had more control over than the feed would see. I had no guilt whatsoever about trying to rig the streaming stuff. If I could cheat my way into a better life for Winnie, then I¡¯d be damned if anything was going to stand in my way. Of course, I didn¡¯t want to rig the feeds, but I was going to take advantage of choosing when the button was pressed at every opportunity. I examined my notifications and saw that, instead of being just barely into level 5, I was already level 6. My other notifications showed why. Even though my team had died, we had been part of a successful defense against a raid. The XP had been through the roof. The pay wasn¡¯t bad either. I had an extra $287 in my account. If this was what I got for defending a town, I could see why someone would raid one. The Colossals were using them as farms for experience and money, as much as they could get. If all that I cared about was leveling up, I would probably do the same thing. Except, Easter was a problem. The Colossals weren¡¯t raiding Aberdine or Saint Emile every day because that¡¯s where the veteran players hung out. They were raiding Easter for the easy raid wins and the even easier rookie player kills. It felt wrong, like they were cheating. Taking advantage of new player ignorance to cash in without any repercussions. It only made me want to be one of those repercussions even more. Smoke filled the streets, but the damage that could be seen was minimal. Aberdine had seen better days, but because of the little bit of help I had to offer, today wasn¡¯t the worst of them. Yes, that sounded corny as hell to me too. The Fast Travel was untouched. I touched the sign, saw the money leave my account, and sat on the bench. When I blinked, I was no longer in Aberdine. The table that I sat at was small and consisted of several boards nailed together to form the surface. It was held up with two barrels. On top of it sat a lantern. I was sitting in a folding wooden chair. Twisting around in my seat, I took in the rest of camp. The center of camp was a fire pit with a stew pot hanging over it on an A-frame. There was a small tent with what I thought looked like a sleeping bag and a crate in it off to the right of the fire. I¡¯m sure they would call it a bedroll or whatever, but it looked like a sleeping bag. To the left of the fire was a large covered wagon. The horse was separate and tied to a nearby tree. Horse was keeping him company. Joan sat on her own folding chair by the wagon. She was prying open a box of something. When she got it open, she pulled out a brown bottle before leaning back and throwing her feet up on the opened box. She pulled out a cork and started drinking. ¡°It¡¯s about time you got here,¡± she said. ¡°Your bed is all made up. I ain¡¯t your mother, so try to keep it tidy.¡± On the other side of the table, across from me, were two more tents. The wagon and the tents made a circle that enclosed the camp. From the logs being sawed from one of the furthest tents from me, I could tell that Coot had already made it. ¡°Which tent is mine?¡± I asked Joan as I stood from the table. She pointed at the first one that I had noticed. ¡°In there you will find your wardrobe, past recordings, a safe place to rest, and an inventory of all of your weapons if you end up purchasing the weapon locker.¡± Joan shifted and pointed at a red box on the ground near the horses. ¡°Mail can be picked up there.¡± Not only did I have a safe place that I could, essentially, teleport to, but I could check my mail there as well. That was great news and I filed it away in the back of my brain to plan my trips around if I didn¡¯t have time to hit a town for the post office. The mailbox was my first stop. The box had a latch with a spot for a lock. The lock wasn¡¯t there, and likely had never been. I opened it and was greeted with the same clipboard that had been at the post office in Easter. Picking it up, I started scrolling through the list. I had several gifts from EveNet, which included ammo boxes, another gold nugget, and a wardrobe coupon that I put directly into my pouch. There wasn¡¯t much need for me to change my clothes yet and I could examine it later. There was a letter from a man who I had never heard of, but because of the way this game worked, he spoke like I had been the one who reached out to him. Basically, since I had passed level 5, he was offering me jobs. This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there. Another coupon said that I could get a new type of mount at the stables for a discounted price since I had reached level 4. I pocketed that, but had no intentions of using it. Horse was beginning to grow on me. Passing level 5 also gave me access to the Volcanic Pistol that Coot was using, but I needed to stop by a gunsmith to buy it. That was about it for the mail and I wasn¡¯t sure if I was disappointed or not. That¡¯s a lot of mail for checking twice in one day. My pocket watch said that it was just past seven and the sun looked like it was ready to drop. I decided that the rest of my day could be spent in my bunk, but not without stopping by the crate at Joan¡¯s feet first. The beer tasted better than I had expected, which was more of a failing on my ability to expect things than it was on the beer. The flavors of this world were supposed to be based on things pulled from our minds. I knew that. So, when the beer tasted like a craft beer I remembered liking a lot when I was in my forties, or maybe fifties, I should not have been surprised. I clinked my bottle with Joan''s and walked over to my tent. I wanted to review the feeds, but I also needed to finally force myself to read the manual. That''s what I did for the next two hours. My bedroll wasn''t actually as comfortable as I had expected it to, and I learned why on the section about camps in the manual. The standard camp had only what we had, minus Coot and Bear''s tents. Their tents were here only because the gang was still formed. If I was on my own, their camps would be wherever they wanted to put down their camps. By design, my camp was not the most comfortable. If I wanted to improve my camp, I would need to talk to Joan and mention making upgrades. She would give me a list of things that I could do to the camp, including increasing the tent size and comfort, putting a Fast Travel at the camp, and even getting a dog. I just needed to be able to pay her for it and by the next time I was back in camp, it would be taken care of. The gangs were another part of the manual that offered me a few surprises. I was worried that if I disbanded the gang then I would have to go through effort and cost if I wanted it back up. That wasn''t the case. The Pink Flamingos existed until I deleted them. I could disband them at anytime, which mostly just meant I could release everyone until I needed the gang again. I could also reform the gang, let everyone keep doing their own things, and just be a one person gang until Coot or Bear decided they wanted to rejoin with me. More interestingly, I could join up to 5 gangs total at any time. I made a mental note to send a message to Jemmy about joining up with each other now that I knew it wouldn''t lock me out of my own. Gangs led into raids and jobs. Raids could only be started by gang leaders. Jobs were different in that there were jobs meant for people to do by themselves and there were jobs that could only be done by a gang. Gang jobs always paid more and nothing paid as well as the raids. The manual encouraged you to do raids. I didn''t disagree, but the more I read about it the more it was obvious that they didn''t really want you raiding the areas where new players came in. That included Easter, and two towns that I hadn''t heard of yet, Rooster and Juniper. The wording on that part of the raids description stated: While it is easier to get experience in areas where people are less knowledgeable about Wicked West, negative reputation bonuses will be doubled during raids on Easter, Juniper, and Rooster. That took me to the reputation page. Reputation had two sides. You had to be considerate of the reputation you made but you also had a gang reputation. If your gang was doing things that negatively effected the group, than certain towns would react negatively when we went to them. It wasn''t clear what it meant by ''negatively,'' but I had to assume that they meant prices would go up. That''s how the word was used when explaining the effect on individual reputation. I kept reading, only breaking when Bear showed up and made stew. I grabbed bowl and migrated from the tent to the table again, choosing to read while I ate my stew so that I wasn''t completely ignoring my crew. When I finally got bored with reading the manual, which was about two hours in, I put it back into my inventory and turned to my gang. The stew was gone from our bowls butwe were all still at the table. Coot was digging through his bag while Bear was cleaning his rifle. "What do you guys want out of all this?" I asked. They both started at the sudden conversation breaking the long silence of the camp. "Want out of what?" Bear asked finally. I shrugged. "Out of this second life, maybe? Or out of being in this gang? I don''t know. I want to know you guys better. You''re the only friends I have made in this new life and that''s a very lonely thought." Coot nodded slowly. Then he stood up. He was trying to make a pose. He straightened his back, jutted his beared chin out, and twisted his hips so that his left shoulder and hip were facing us, with his arm out. He tucked his right arm behind his back. It looked like he was trying to thrust out his chest. Then he cleared his throat and said loudly. "If I were to win this award, I would use it to expand the knowledge of our youth. Not only our youth, but the youth of the world, by creating the first Miss Iowa Center for Advanced Learning. With it, we would offer a safe space for children under the age of 16 to opt into college level courses of their choosing. Each would be provided in both one on one tutorial labs that are both fun and educational, and virtual spaces, with Virtual Reality headsets that will give children without the monetary means to travel and experience wonders from around the world." Coot slouched and somehow stopped being the weird supermodel contestant before plopping back down on his chair. "I want to learn and teach. I am still in the learning phase." "What the hell was that?" Bear echoed my thoughts. Coot looked at Bear and then at me and then back to Bear before down at his empty bowl of stew. "I didn''t plan on telling anyone," he said, "but I''ve been lonely in this world too. You," he was looking right at me, "you''ve made me feel less lonely. I am hoping this gang can be my new friends, so if you tell anyone what I am about to tell you I will be very disappointed." We just sat there staring at him. Finally, I gave him a nod. "We won''t say anything," I smacked Bear. "Right?" He nodded. "I was the 2046 Miss Iowa winner." "Huh?" Bear and I said at the same time. Coot slapped his knee and let out a cackle. I was expecting him to say it was a joke, but suddenly he wasn''t slouching anymore and his voice didn''t have his old prospector accent. "That was part of my speech I had to give." He shrugged and crossed his arms, obviously uncomfortable opening up. "I won, and never got to make the education center. I had three doctorates and was working on my fourth. Miss Iowa seemed like a fast track toward paying off some of those while also making me more marketable on my CV." Coot let out a long and slow sigh. "Being what the general population considered attractive meant that no one expected me to be smart. I grew familiar with it and then I started using it. When everyone thinks that you''re a dumb blonde, they don''t expect you to manipulate them." He shrugged. "I signed my retirement contract as a publicity stunt. Then I was dead the next day. I''m told it was a car accident and I''m happy that I don''t remember it." Bear waved at Coot. "What''s all this then?" I smiled because I knew. Coot shrugged, but I answered for him. "Dumb blonde to dumb prospector. You didn''t want to give up the power of being ignored." Coot smiled. "It really is a super power." He returned to slouching and his dumb accent. "It''s fun too." "Wow," I said, finally. "First, thank you. Thank you for sharing that story with us. That could not have been easy." Coot shook his head. "Second, our lips are sealed. As far as how we''re concerned, you''re just the crazy prospector in our group." "Except," Coot smirked, "now you know my power. You," he was looking right at me, "can use that." "What?" I was genuinely confused. "I have doctorates in Anthropology, History, and Mathematics. Consulting with me in chat when we have big decisions as a group will help you out." He was right. His Miss Iowa experience was one thing, but Coot was describing himself as a genius. That would be helpful. "And it would take a lot of the suspicion of your intelligence off of you." I winked, knowing that his plan had a second piece to it. "Agreed." "What about you, Bear?" I turned to our newest companion. "Are you secretly a horse trainer with years of sky-diving experience?" "Me?" He laughed. "In life I looked a lot like this. A few less furs. I worked in an IT support center. Eve told me I died of an aneurysm while on a call." He set down his rifle on the table. "No doctorates. I gamed a lot. I was good at grinding and figuring things out." He shrugged. "I''m an open book. No superpowers." "We''ll see about that," I winked. "What about you?" Coot asked me. I touch of sadness creeped into my voice. Guilt, I think. Guilt at surviving and living a full life when these kids didn''t. "I was a lonely widow. Died at 89 years old." I pointed at the broadcast button. "Signed up for this to help my family out. I gamed a little when I was younger, but that was more my husband''s thing. I wanted to join a game that was peaceful and like those old frontier shows." I spread my hands out. "This is as close to that dream as Eve could find me." Coot and Bear both laughed. "Your first few days haven''t been anything like that," Coot said. I shook my head. "That''s part of why I''m asking you all what you want. Bear, what do you want?" "I''m here to have fun until it''s not fun anymore." I nodded, completely understanding. "I want to make it so that people like us don''t have to have a rough first few days." "How do you plan on doing that?" Bear asked. "She wants to use the Pink Flamingos as a defending force for the rookie towns," Coot answered for me. "The Colossals have been using the rookie town raids as easy XP farms. Sammy wants to put us between them and the people of Easter, giving the NPC''s and noobs a chance to learn to love their second lives before they are covered in the gore that drenches this place." "Thanks, Lovecraft," I smirked. "That''s weird how you switch so easily between the guy we know and the woman you were." Coot dipped his head. "Thank you." "He''s right," I confirmed. "They don''t have a chance to be happy in Easter. They have no time to live and be themselves in a town that is constantly under threat of attack." I turned the lantern on the table up a bit and then asked them both. "Knowing that''s my plan, are you guys still in?" "I''ve always been in," Coot nodded. Bear nodded too. "I''ve always wanted a crusade." Chapter 15 Chapter 15 Our mad crusade in futility couldn''t start until we were better prepared. Coot was level 7 now while Bear was still hovering at 10. He had a profession, which was something Coot and I needed to get. At level 10 we could pick our professions. The manual didn''t explain how that part was triggered, but Bear filled in the gaps. When he hit level 10, he received three letters in the mail. Depending on which sender you chose to answer was how you picked which profession you were. According to the manual, there were three professions. Bear had chosen the Mountain Man profession. That''s why he was covered in furs. Before he had chosen the profession he had been running around shirtless in suspenders and getting his levels by punching and stabbing people. I hadn''t realized it before, but he said that melee kills gained you an extra 10 XP. I would have to remember that when I was grinding later. The manual''s description of the Mountain Man profession made it sound like a wild west hippy. Mountain Man: Anything in those woods needs finding and you''re the person they go to. You can track anything in the forest much easier than you could before. Your aim is steadier when hunting animals and you have an increased knowledge on how to use the bounty that nature has provided to your benefit. Find herbs to heal yourself and make spices to boost your buffs from foods you prepare. Comes with periodic Class rewards. Bear said that he liked the ability to track, as it made it easier to find food. He also liked that it made it easier to hide in nature. Most of the people that he bumped into before he could choose his profession were one of the other classes. If he needed to escape being pursued, he could head for the nearest line of trees and avoid them better than they could chase him. It was a powerful option, if not for the reasons Bear wanted it, then for the fact that we could give ourselves buffs through our food and better find the herbs and such we would need for healing. The second profession was called the Ruthless Bounty Hunter. Ruthless Bounty Hunter: Somebody needs finding, you get it done. Dead or alive (alive pays more, but that''s not fun!) and you always find your man (or woman!). As a Bounty Hunter you are more charming by nature. Your persuasion increases when you are talking to witnesses. You can tell if someone is lying to you if you ask them a direct question. Your aim is steadier when aiming at people. Comes with periodic class rewards. Steadier aiming and the lie-detector skill made that class worth having. Having natural charm sounded like something that would help with my reputation stats. Gold Digger: You always know where the gold is. Unfortunately, this means everyone knows you know where the gold is. Higher payouts on just about everything and you get "Prospector''s Intuition" showing you ideal places to dig to find gold. Additionally, you get the "Paranoia" skill, which allows you to know when you are being hunted. Killing you will result in any gold not saved in a lockbox being dropped as loot. Gold Digger sounded incredibly valuable. Forget the gold bits, just knowing that someone was after you was worth its weight in gold. If I had the Gold Digger class and someone was chasing us, we could follow Bear into the woods and hide before they were even on top of us. For a gang leader, Gold Digger provided some obvious perks. Ruthless Bounty Hunter was a solid choice as well, simply for the added benefit of being able to kill a little better than other folks. No matter which profession you chose, it seemed each were designed for increasing income. The Bounty Hunter class provided more missions, the Mountain Man could sell herbs and tonics, possibly any extra meat products, and the Gold Digger class was literally about being a gold digger. In the end, my choice would be determined by what Coot took. While he looked like he would be the perfect contender for the Gold Digger profession, I now knew much more about him and that new information meant he might choose whatever role he thought would better serve his future in this game. It was safe to bet that Coot would take the smartest choice before him and I would be an idiot to not ask his advice on my choice as well. I was smart, but Coot was the first person I had met in either life with three doctorates. I wasn''t going to waste him as a resource. We discussed most of this, as well some very rudimentary plans for how to best start our new crusade before going to bed. There was a lot more to do, but the smart move was to take it one day at a time and one task at a time. Right now, we weren''t worth anything until we each had a profession to augment our skills. That meant we needed to grind. In bed was when I finally got to rewatch my feeds from Stream Time. That was an interesting experience. There was a book in my tent labeled ''Memories.'' When I opened it, it had a list of events with time stamps. There were only two at the moment, but I was sure it would fill up quickly. When I touched the first time-stamped entry, a window popped up in the book. I watched the entire raid of Easter from behind my head. A third-person view gave me a different perspective of the fight and showed me how close to getting killed I was long before I blew up myself RadicalLarry19. The part of this that was the most interesting, in this viewing anyway, was that I could see the comments made by people as they were watching live on Stream Time. It was fun to see that some people knew my plan before I even did. Obviously, people watching the stream knew Larry was there long before I knew who The Colossals even were. The anticipation they were having on when we would meet made me wonder what they had heard about our previous encounter. Larry probably had a Stream Time account. If he did, they probably watched him kill me the first time and assumed there would be some sort of vendetta. That was a problem, and not just because it made me predictable. Being predictable was the problem. Nobody was going to tune into a regular show if they knew my every move every time I made it. That meant I would need to start varying my tactics and maybe choosing slightly more wild ideas. That being said, if Larry had a Broadcast button and his people were regular viewers, that was great news. His thing was doing raids, repeatedly. He was boring, but because he was excessively violent he was getting views. I could probably steal some of his viewers just by playing against him. That was easy money. I would need to ask Eve, if I ever saw her again, where I needed to look to see how much money I was making for Winnie. With my luck, they would probably not share that with me for fear of me being too much part of the real world again or something. I wasn''t stupid. It was obvious that these streams made money for someone else, likely Stream Time and EveNet. That being the case, their rules could be bent if I was more valuable than I am now. Getting a good stream would be the ticket to both helping Winnie and maybe getting favors, such as hearing how well she''s doing in life, in the future. The Easter stream wasn''t me at my best and there was not a lot to watch. Reviewing the feed taught me more about the controls and allowed me to evaluate some dumb moves I made after the fact. Later feeds would be more important to review as I became more familiar with my settings. I would be able to hone my skills a little further and evaluate what my blind spots were. Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings. Once I was finished with the review, I closed my eyes and laid back on my bunk. I was finally comfortable enough to not focus too much on the existential crisis of ''what happens to a digital mind when they go to sleep.'' Unfortunately, the resident supermodel turned gnarled old man was not. "Hey boss," Coot called out from his tent. "Yes, Coot?" "We''re all just digital code in a digital framework stored on a series of super computers on some data-farm somewhere, right?" He couldn''t see me, but I shrugged anyway. "I guess so. Wouldn''t you know better than me?" "Nah," Coot chuckled quietly. "I was never into computers much." He paused. "But that''s my question. What happens when they turn off the power? Do we know if there''s a blackout? Or, do we not notice? How do we know that there wasn''t some bankruptcy at EveNet, they turned off the servers in the middle of this conversation and some archaeologist three hundred years from when we died is powering them back on for the first time? Did time stop for us and we just ceased existing for a while or would there be an entire reboot sequence that shot us back to starting positions?" I was about to dismiss this entire conversation as ridiculous when a memory popped into my head. Tyler and I had just gone to bed. I was almost asleep, much like now, and he decided to start talking to me about the cosmos and what we considered real or not. "Have you ever heard of simulation theory?" I asked Coot. "Of course," was all the old man said. "These questions are valid here only because someone has told us of the new existence we live in. They were just as valid in our old lives. What if we didn''t know that? What if we woke up here thinking these were our lives with no memory of the previous versions? That question would still be valid. As a matter of fact, it was valid in our old lives. So, I pose the question to you: In your old life, driving down a highway in Iowa, what would happen if the universe turned off, and then turned on again. The big creators pulling the plug and rebooting it when the Heavenly Father felt like it? Would we notice? Would we notice now?" "That''s not an answer," Bear said. "That''s just philosophy or something." "Nah," Coot said. "That''s fair. The only reason we know we''re in a simulation is because someone told us we were, but," I could hear the smirk on Coot''s crooked face from my tent, "if the real world is a simulation, what are we?" "Recursion," I said. "Inception. We''re the dream within a dream." "At least once, as we know it. If we''re the dream within a dream once, then it stands to reason that we could be the dream within a dream within a dream." Coot said. "Damn," I whistled. "How do you sleep with so much shit in your head?" Coot laughed again. "I used to smoke a lot of weed." That got a good chuckle from all of us. "Hey," Bear said when we all got quiet again, "they have booze in this world, so they have to have weed right? Where would we get that?" "Historically," Coot answered, "probably a reservation, if there are any. I haven''t seen any, yet." "Why is the mountain man asking us?" I demanded. "If anyone is going to know what the local flora and fauna is like, it has to be you." "That''s not how it works," Bear explained. "I know what something is when I''m near it. Then a menu pops up explaining how I can use it. Unless I run into some Mary-Jane while on a hike, I won''t know anything about it." "That''s dumb," was all that I offered as a retort. "We should look into that," Coot said quietly. "Otherwise, we''re going to have a lot of conversations about the nature of existence before bed." "Alright guys," I said by way of declaration, "our agenda tomorrow, and perhaps for the rest of the week is to farm experience and upgrade our stats while also looking for what this world holds for intoxicants." "Big words, boss," Coot giggled. "Go to sleep." With that, I was surprised to not hear another word from any of them until Joan was waking us up with breakfast. My sleep was restful, and I was surprised by how good I felt. I shouldn''t have been, but I was still thinking with the back I had before I died. Sleeping on the ground in my late eighties would have been debilitating for at least a week. This young, and digital, body just didn''t care. Joan''s breakfast, she claimed, was rabbit stew. I only say claimed because I don''t know where she got the rabbit from. Maybe that was what she did with the money I paid her. Either way, it was delicious. I had two bowls. Better yet, it both of my status bars yellow. I was going to be feeling great for at least a little bit today. "What''s the plan, boss?" Coot asked. "How are we going to farm experience?" "That was something I had been thinking about last night," I said. "The quickest XP comes from raids and jobs, but past experience shows me that we don''t have much in the way of said experience to guarantee success at raids." "You can get jobs just about anywhere," Bear said. "There''s always somebody in town or any outlying shack will have someone hovering around needing work." "I need to see about upgrading my weapons," I nodded at Bear. "So, let''s hit a town, get our supplies, and find work." They both didn''t move. "Nearest town is Easter," Coot said quietly. I nodded, "Yes, and it is likely that the town could be under attack when we get there." I shrugged. "So?" The idea was a little rough, but they pieced it together on their own. If we got stuck defending a town, especially Easter, we would fail, but that wasn''t all bad. We would get decent experience, some money, and lose an hour, but wasn''t that the point? "I am not going to avoid a fight," I said. "Not when that''s the point of what we want to do." I repeated myself, "Town, supplies, work. One way or another." I looked at Coot. "That sound good?" Both men nodded. Easter was bustling with activity when we got there. The camp was only two miles from town, and on a ridge. If it wasn''t for the trees, we probably could have seen the town long before we got to it. On Horse, we were there quick enough. The activity in town wasn''t anything suspicious or terrible. It turned out that today was Sunday, and by the time we entered town, the church was letting out. Adeline, unlike before, was in a great mood when I entered the store. I made an effort to strike up a conversation with her. I wanted everyone in this town to at least think of me in a positive way in case I ever needed their help. It was the reputation thing, but I wasn''t using it for cheaper prices. The Pink Flamingos were contemplating war. We would need allies. I filled her in on the raid in Aberdine and saw her mood darken slightly. That was when I turned the conversation to what she really liked to talk about. "I want to buy a new pistol and a new rifle, but I don''t know if I have enough." Adeline perked right up. "What are you looking at?" I had her bring out the Volcanic Pistol and the Bolt Action Rifle that I had seen Ed using. That was when I hit a snag. I wanted both, but I couldn''t afford both. My money was sitting at a nice spot, at $367.19, but the Bolt Action Rifle was $250.00 while the Volcanic Pistol was $150.00. It just wasn''t going to happen today. "How about a second holster?" Adeline said. "What good would that do me? I don''t have two guns," I countered. "Here''s the deal," she explained, "I have a piece of shit second holster you can have, free of charge. Then you buy another Farmer''s Pistol for $20.00." "Why would I want another Farmer''s Pistol?" I was genuinely curious. "I saw you the other day when you were fighting off those assholes," Adeline said. "You were good. You don''t need a better pistol yet. You just need more options. Get the second pistol, with the second holster, and I promise that you won''t regret it." A little more than $290 later, I had the second holster, a second Farmer''s Pistol, and the gun that I really wanted, the Bolt Action Rifle along with all the ammunition that I needed. I walked out of Adeline''s shop just in time to see Bear leaving the doctor''s office with a handful of money. "What''s that for?" He was grinning ear to ear. "I just sold a ton of herbs I had on me." That was good news. I knew we would be able to make some more money with the professions. Now I was more excited than ever to get to level 10. That meant only one thing left to do. "Let''s go find that guy who was handing out jobs." Chapter 16
Chapter 17 Chapter 17 ¡°-me could have a bad romance,¡± Coot belted out as we crossed into Hardy. ¡°Coot,¡± my voice was firm, ¡°if I ever put you in control of the music again, shoot me.¡± Bear snickered, but he¡¯d been in his menus the entire ride. He was blessed with a limited enough attention span that I was the only one of the crew, aside from Coot himself, who had to put up with the old man¡¯s singing every Lady Gaga song he had in his memory. Coot¡¯s grin told me how aware he was of his effect on my psyche. I shot him a glare before taking in the sights. The line on our maps took us through Hardy and to a large enough plantation to see the house as a grayed out block on our maps. We still had another twenty-minute ride, but I needed to scope out the town first. I didn¡¯t like how close this fight was likely to take place to the populated area. If Foghorn was right, we were walking into a stronghold prepared for a large-scale assault. Our only advantages were that of surprise and our smaller numbers. Our lower quantity was only going to be an advantage for moving around the place, once they made us, it wouldn¡¯t be in our favor any more. Hardy wasn¡¯t much. Actually, it felt a lot like Easter because of its size, but if Easter had been plopped down in the Great Plains, versus the mountains where Easter was actually located. Unlike Easter, there was only one two story building. It looked like a restaurant or something. If I had more time, it would be nice to sit down and have a decent meal. Joan was great, but change was always appreciated. There was a post office/train station, a sheriff¡¯s office, and a gunsmith. There weren¡¯t nearly as many businesses as Easter had, but Bear said that had everything to do with proximity. ¡°We¡¯re only an afternoon¡¯s ride from Saint Emile,¡± he explained. ¡°Any business owners that can afford to, prefer to have their stores there. More people go through Saint Emile than Hardy.¡± I grumbled that maybe they¡¯d have more reason to go through Hardy if there were more shops, but neither of my team seemed to hear me. After a final check to see if anyone wanted to stop for any reason, we left Hardy at a decent trot. We were close enough that it was easy to see each of us growing more anxious. We stopped about a hundred yards from where the area was marked on our maps. I checked my pocket watch, which I had moved from my bag to my britches, and saw that the ride only took us about eleven minutes from Hardy. ¡°We communicate using the chat,¡± I explained. ¡°We only hold the advantage as long as they don¡¯t know how many of us there are.¡± ¡°I don¡¯t do too well with sneaking,¡± Bear said. ¡°Then get good, really quick,¡± I said to him. ¡°We need to set dynamite, all that we have, around the perimeter. Only the front side. The idea is to lure as many toward you and those spots as we can and then set it off. One bullet, ten kills is the best way to do this.¡± ¡°What about you?¡± Coot asked. His nervous look confirmed something I had been worrying about since the raid in Easter. He was scared. He ran away and died the first time. I was hoping that this time we could avoid the running and the dying. ¡°Anita should be in the house,¡± I said. ¡°Once you get them hating on you, I am going to try and get into the house from the back. Once inside, maybe I can get her to tell her men to stand down.¡± ¡°If you get that far,¡± Coot said. I nodded. ¡°If I get that far. If I don¡¯t, get your horses and ride in different directions. Split them up. You might be able to buy yourself some time.¡± I pointed at both of them. ¡°When you¡¯re not on your horses, you are going to need to crouch. All the time if you have to. We need them to not know where you are for this to work.¡± I sent a quick message to Bear explaining that he needed to watch Coot. We couldn¡¯t have Coot running off just because he was scared, but I told him to try and talk to him, don¡¯t just hover. I didn¡¯t want to force Coot into being better at the battle stuff so much as I wanted his confidence in himself to grow. That didn¡¯t mean Bear was the best tool for that job, just the only tool that I had at the moment. As I circled around the space surrounding the plantation, I was crouched as I activated the broadcast button. Then, so I wouldn¡¯t fixate on the wrong things, I hid the view window. It was about time to start the show. Coot had established a simple clock description that they could use in the chat to figure out the numbers. The road leading up to the house, and the one that they were still on, was 12 o¡¯clock, with the house being the center of the clock. As they approached, they broke from the road, tied their horses, and split up with Coot going left of the house and Bear and me going right. I broke from Bear soon so that I could sneak around the back. My plan was to see what kind of forces they had at the back of the house, report it to the gang, and then sneak into the house. I felt like the back of the house would have more gaps in security and hoped that I wasn¡¯t about to figure out how wrong I was. The house looked dilapidated, to be completely honest. It was huge and built like you would expect a plantation house to be, with the white walls, pillars around the front porch, and small balconies scattered around the second floor. Where normally you could view the wealth exuding from the exterior, that wasn¡¯t the case here. The white walls were stained with dust and in some places there were holes that could stand a visit from a basic carpenter. A fresh coat of paint would have done wonders for the entire place. Or, at least that¡¯s what I thought until I saw that most of the windows were gone as well. In Anita Keller¡¯s desire to be less an heiress and more a crime boss, she¡¯d let the place go. When Bear and I split off, Coot was already reporting numbers. D0C70RC007: 3 men by a wagon. 1 o¡¯clock. Look bored. Got close enough to steal a stick of dynamite from a crate. Left the crate. Going to hit it when you give the word. A little while later, another message came through. D0C70RC007: Put dynamite at 3 o¡¯clock. Moving slow. Found a moonshine bottle. Pouring that between the two. Can probably set both off with one shot. D0C70RC007: Almost seen. There¡¯s a man patrolling with a shotgun. I¡¯m watching on my minimap. Looks like he¡¯s circling the house. Panda_Bear_Polka: Place 2 dynamite. Weird. They have dynamite everywhere. Don¡¯t know if it''s the game or if they are preparing for their robbery. If I see any moonshine, I¡¯ll connect them. Sammy#0421: Keep as much of the dynamite toward the front. We¡¯ll use it as a distraction to pull the people from the back. That was about when the area behind the house came into view. There were two more wagons without horses with three men each on them. Two men sat in chairs on the back porch holding their shotguns in the crook of their arms. I also noticed that each wagon had at least one bright red crate of dynamite. It would be nice to steal some before we started this, but I just didn¡¯t see how. Did you know this text is from a different site? Read the official version to support the creator. I looked up to see if anyone was on the one large balcony over the back porch. Instead of people, I saw the multiple cylinders of a gatling gun. That could be a problem. Especially if they had more than one. In my inventory, I had eight sticks of Aged Dynamite. Our inventories limited how many we could have to eight. I figured that was so we couldn¡¯t just spam throw them in some odd display of too much power. Either way, everyone in our gang started this raid with eight sticks. The goal was to plant as many of them as possible before we kicked this thing off. Well, that was Coot and Bear¡¯s plan. Mine was a little different. I had one stick for the signal and something special planned for the rest. D0C70RC007: Mine are all planted. I¡¯m aiming at the nearest one. Should be a chain reaction. 1 o¡¯clock to 3 o¡¯clock will go off. Panda_Bear_Polka: I¡¯ve got two people with rifles at 10 o¡¯clock. Nobody else. My sticks are planted from 12 o''clock to 10 o¡¯clock. Ready when you are, Sammy. Sammy#0421: When you hear the signal, start yours off. They are gonna head your direction. It¡¯ll clear the back. I¡¯ve got 6 back here with 2 more covering the porch. I¡¯m hoping they all run your way. Stay down. If they spot you go through a window, but stay in the rooms off the main hall. Main hall won¡¯t be safe. Panda_Bear_Polka: First it''s sneaking, now it''s diving through windows. You sure are testing my agility today, boss. Sammy#0421: Let¡¯s hope you¡¯re up to the task. I knew what I wanted to do to trigger the signal, but the problem was how to do it without alerting the eight men near the back that I was there. My original plan had been to toss a stick of the Aged Dynamite up onto the back balcony and take out that machine gun. The single explosion would shock everyone, but the resulting ten or so explosions from the front would draw them there. That was the idea anyway. And the more I thought about it, the dumber that idea became. To get the dynamite up to the balcony, I was going to need to throw it and a lit stick of dynamite was going to give away my position. My second plan, that only just popped into my head, was that I could use my new bolt action rifle and hit the dynamite near one of the wagons. That would have the same effect and kill at least three of the men, but then the third plan popped into my head. I could test Coot¡¯s resolve. He had the hair-brained idea to step out in front of that barn and die as part of our first mission, but he had also been stuck in the woods for who-knew-how-long. Since then, I had only seen him take a backseat in the harder events. I toyed around with that idea long enough that they started messaging me in the chat. I decided against it only because I didn¡¯t want to alienate my friend just to see if he was willing to kill people in a video game. Especially when it wasn¡¯t necessary. There would be less dangerous times to feel him out later. Besides, three dead men were three less to fight later. I drew my bolt action rifle and lifted it to my eye. The scope filled my perception. It was a low-end scope with barely any magnification, but anything was better than the iron sights that it came with. For the closer fights, I could adjust my hold on the rifle to look under the scope and use the sights. I pulled the trigger. The wagon furthest from me exploded. The notifications rolled in that each of those men had died. I barely acknowledged them as I instead focused on the remaining members of Anita¡¯s gang. The guys on the porch and the other wagon ran toward the wagon with their guns all raised. When I looked up to check on the balcony, I saw someone was now manning the machine gun, but they obviously didn¡¯t know where the shot had come from. Fire and debris were still falling when Bear and Coot set off their explosions. Whoever had the gatling gun wasn¡¯t moving, but the rest all ran to the front. I was surprised they did, to be honest. The first explosion meant that someone was obviously back here. The second explosion should have implied that they were surrounded. If I was Anita, the standing orders would have been to fall back to the house. That bothered me and I wasn¡¯t entirely sure why. Were they idiots? Possibly. Did they know something we didn¡¯t? Highly likely. Sammy#0421: I¡¯m moving in. Stay hidden for as long as you can. D0C70RC007: Too late. Bear is in the thick of it. They spotted him and are focused on him. Sammy#0421: WTF Bear? Stay alive. Don¡¯t retreat to the house yet. Not until I clear it. Panda_Bear_Polka: Tld u! Cant snek. Damn it! This was going to be impossible with the three of us. If Bear died, Coot and I would barely make it out of here. Sammy#0421: If he goes down, the plan is the same. Get on your horse and go south, Coot. I¡¯ll go north. We¡¯ll spread them out and try to finish them that way. Nobody responded, but I hadn¡¯t expected them to. Gunfire roared while the pieces of wagons continued to rain down all over the place. When the gatling gun was turned in the direction of the remains of the far wagon, I ran for the back door while remaining crouched. That was when my piece of the plan started. I peeked my head around the corner of the open door and looked inside. It was a long hall that looked as dilapidated as the rest of the place. It crossed through several large rooms, but from what I could see, no one had stayed in the house. A quick glance at my map confirmed that Anita, the person on the gun, and two others were upstairs. Assuming no one was crouching. Don¡¯t forget that again. The first stick of dynamite I placed on the inside of the door frame. I moved quickly through the plantation house, putting two more in what I hoped was the blast radius of each other. I wanted these to set each other off. Of course, if someone saw what I was doing, they could shoot one of the sticks and take me out, but I was hopeful that wasn¡¯t about to happen. Two more sticks took me to the front of the house. I checked each room quickly as I passed them, but the explosions had ruined any interest that Anita¡¯s gang had in hiding inside. They wanted Bear, and by the sounds of the gunshots, they were already onto Coot as well. A thud came from behind me and I spun with my rifle and almost shot Bear. ¡°Damn you!¡± I hissed. ¡°I didn¡¯t give the all-clear.¡± ¡°It was now or never, boss.¡± Bear shrugged. I pointed at a stick of dynamite in front of the room he had just jumped into. I was still in the hall, but Bear had jumped into some sparsely furnished dining room. He was already up with his back against the wall and bullets were peppering the window he had just come through. ¡°Hey,¡± I whisper-yelled. ¡°See that?¡± I was pointing to a stick of dynamite I had just placed on the wall across from the door to the room he was in. ¡°If they get in, wait until you can see them, then shoot it.¡± Bear nodded but the bullets hitting the wood near his head was distracting enough that I didn¡¯t expect anything else. Before I climbed the stairs, I slung my bolt action rifle over my shoulder and drew one of my Farmer¡¯s Pistols. Halfway up, I placed a final piece of dynamite on a step. From there, if it exploded, it should cause the one near the room Bear was in to go off. At least, that was the plan. Upstairs of the plantation house was worse off than the rest of the place. Walls had entire sections blown out from some previous battle and the plaster was falling in more places than it wasn¡¯t. The boards were creaking and it was obvious that someone was coming up the stairs and into a potential ambush, but I wasn¡¯t about to stop crouching just yet. Coot sent me a quick message saying that he had been hit, had eaten a piece of jerky and was now sneaking around to the side of the house to catch the remaining gunmen unaware. So far, so good, but I wasn¡¯t dumb enough to think we had this in the bag. In video game terms, we hadn¡¯t even made it to the boss yet. My minimap still showed the one person with the gatling gun, although I couldn¡¯t imagine they were doing anything exciting with me and Bear in here and Coot out front. That shooter was directly across from where the stairs ended. If I came up and they turned around, it would be down to whoever drew first. There was a room to the right of the steps that had three red teardrops in it. They weren¡¯t moving and I was running through scenarios on why that would be. The only thing that I could come up with was that Anita was in there, and those were her guards. To the left, in a room that I could see had holes through most of the walls, was the final red teardrop. I crouch-walked to the top of the steps and peered through the hole. There was a man with a damned hatchet. Why did he have a hatchet? Why was he hanging out in a room entirely by himself? He was the decoy. That was the best conclusion that I could come up with. If I had to guess, the hatchet was probably the quickest way to one-shot kill someone that he had available. They expected me to search the rooms, or maybe they thought I would think the person alone was Anita and rush in there. Either way, that wasn¡¯t how that played out. Chapter 18 Chapter 18 The wall behind the hatchet-man exploded. There was no fire or heat that I could feel. It was as if the wood and glass of the wall had decided it simply didn¡¯t like being in one piece anymore. Just as surprisingly, the ceiling above me and behind me exploded as well. The first thing I did was flatten myself out on the stairs and cover my face as debris collapsed around me. The second thing I did was freak out as I remembered all the volatile dynamite that I had planted all over this building. I scrambled the rest of the way up the stairs and the only direction that I knew there were no explosives. Where the hatchet-man had been was a hole in the wall. I could clearly see out into the front yard where Coot had been fighting and beyond onto the road and into the trees. I looked up and saw that whatever had blasted the hole in the wall had carved a path upward and through the roof. I still couldn¡¯t see the hatchet-man, but he wasn¡¯t who had my attention. Coot had just posted something to chat that was taking my head a moment to wrap around. D0C70RC007: They have a CANON! Sammy#0421: What the fuck? A canon? How did we not see that? D0C70RC007: It¡¯s on a wagon. They just pulled up. Panda_Bear_Polka: Reinforcements? That¡¯s too fast. Bear was right. How did they even have time to get a message out? Maybe they were close by? We hadn¡¯t exactly been quiet. Another blast rocked the house, but they must have repositioned because no more debris rained down. Why the canon was here was a question for another time. I could use it to my advantage, though. Checking the map showed me that Anita and her two friends were still in the room, although they had spread out from the center. None of them had come near the door yet. I crouched and drew both my Farmer¡¯s Pistols before edging my way toward the door. I stopped about a foot from it and waited. The report of the canon was deafening, even with it sitting outside. The blast shook the house again, but the moment that I registered the sound I took off. Leaping to my feet, I propelled my shoulder forward and into the door, hitting it as hard as I could. To my surprise, it didn¡¯t need much force. The door slammed open and I stepped in shooting. The room was mostly bare except for a simple wooden table in the center. Behind it stood a woman in her mid-fifties with a white cowboy hat and coveralls over a brown shirt. I figured this had to be Anita. Her two men stood to her left and right and were dressed in blues and grays but were wearing bowler hats. Before they could recover from the blast of the explosion, I had shot them both. The one on my right went down, but I didn¡¯t get the experience notification. The other one took the bullet I sent his way directly in the face. I got the notification for his death. I trained my left pistol on Anita while my right pistol hovered over where I expected her companion to stand up from behind the table. ¡°Don¡¯t move,¡± I shouted at her as she started to raise her shotgun. ¡°Drop it!¡± Blinding pain hit me in the back, over my right shoulder. Pure reaction and instinct took over. I spun around, putting my back to Anita and her shotgun. Behind me was the damned hatchet-man, sans hatchet. As I spun and the pain continued, it was an easy guess where his hatchet had ended up. If I had any rational thoughts running through my head, I would have wondered why it hadn¡¯t been an instant kill. With the pain shooting through my back, my right arm was useless for shooting, but I backhanded the hatchet-man as I spun around before bringing the pistol from my left around and burying it in his stomach. I shot him three times before an explosion blasted the door frame apart. Anita¡¯s shotgun was working overtime as I jumped out of the way of the next blast and back into the hall. I tripped over the hatchet-man¡¯s corpse and landed on the floor. I tried to roll over so I could see Anita and her wounded friend, but the hatchet handle hit the wall and I yelped in pain. For whatever reason, neither of them finished me off. The next thing I heard was their feet on the stairs. Sammy#421: Bear, shoot the dynamite now. Panda_Bear_Polka: Which one? Sammy#421: Any of them! Now! I didn¡¯t hear the gunshot, but the explosions went off like a string of firecrackers loud enough to shake the entire house. It wasn¡¯t louder than the canon, but it was definitely a longer explosion. None of the fun experience notifications popped up to confirm any deaths by the explosions, but Horse had said something similar on the ride in. Essentially, it didn¡¯t matter that I was the one who planted the dynamite. The experience from the kills caused by the dynamite would belong to whoever set them off. You¡¯re welcome, Bear. On the other hand, I was really hoping that he didn¡¯t kill everyone who was running down the stairs. I got to my feet and demanded a check-in from the gang. Coot was wrestling with the wagon still. At the moment, he was moving between hiding spots and trying to snipe the person manning the weapon with his Volcanic Pistol. Bear was wounded and not sure he could do anything about it. He had cleared his room and his side of the house but someone had hit him with a poisoned arrow. It had caused him to begin bleeding out and nothing he did was slowing it down. Standing caused a wave of nausea to come over me. At that moment, I felt more real than I had since coming to Wicked West. I knelt to collect myself and quickly check hatchet-man¡¯s pockets before getting back to my feet and going down the stairs. ¡°Eleven cents?¡± I scoffed as I shuffled down the steps. ¡°If Anita¡¯s still alive, I¡¯m going to tell her she needs to pay you guys more.¡± Another thunderous roar let me know that Coot hadn¡¯t taken out the canon yet. It was the notification that let me know that Coot had been hit by it. D0C70RC007 has been killed by Freya_Trippin. Freya was here? Why the hell was Freya here? Panda_Bear_Polka: Did you see that, boss? With Bear bleeding out, I was about to be on my own with the Colossal Paynes just outside. If I was lucky it was just Freya, but that kind of luck didn¡¯t exist. At the very least, someone had to be driving the wagon. I hit the last step with my pistol in my left hand raised and looking around. My right arm was mostly staying to my side, although I still clutched my other gun. There was a dead man on the bottom of the steps. He was burned up but I recognized his hat from upstairs. If you encounter this story on Amazon, note that it''s taken without permission from the author. Report it. Further along, and directly in front of the door to where I had last seen Bear, was Anita¡¯s body. Directly across from that door was where I had put the dynamite. I was mostly surprised that she was still in one piece, but she was most-definitely dead. I searched her body and came up with a dollar and what looked like a train schedule. A quick glance got me what I was looking for: the date and time for the federal shipment. I put it in my satchel and turned toward where I hoped Bear still was. He was bleeding on the floor. Not just squirting a bit here and there, but bleeding a lot. I ran up to him and knelt. ¡°What can I do?¡± I demanded. ¡°Stay alive,¡± Bear said. ¡°I¡¯ll try and meet you in Hardy. I think the fancy building was a hotel. Get a room and lay low.¡± He nodded toward the window. ¡°Did you see who got Coot?¡± I nodded. ¡°Paynes are here. But how?¡± He shrugged and winced with the effort. ¡°Likely took on the same job. Probably saw us come in and are waiting to kill us and take the information.¡± He saw me grunting as I shifted about and said, ¡°Turn around.¡± I did and he yanked the hatchet out of my back. It hurt for a second, but then I saw my health start to drop. ¡°Quick,¡± Bear said. ¡°Eat something.¡± I grabbed a jerky and started chewing. My health stopped going down and the pain stopped almost immediately. When I was done eating the piece, my health was closer to eighty percent, but I was doing much better. ¡°There¡¯s no smart play here,¡± Bear was wheezing. ¡°Any way you go out, this place is likely surrounded.¡± ¡°Any suggestions?¡± I was practically begging for a good idea. He reached into his satchel and pulled out a small bottle, corked and unlabeled. ¡°I made this before we came in. Only had ingredients for the one. I was saving it, but fuck that. You need it or you¡¯re not getting out of here.¡± I uncorked it and drank it without question. My health was suddenly glowing and completely full. ¡°That doubles your health,¡± Bear explained. ¡°Not immortal.¡± He coughed and then I received the notification. Panda_Bear_Polka has been killed by TommyGunZZZ. Dammit. What now? Right, I had the location. Now I just needed to get out of here without getting killed and looted. I was crouched and that was likely to be a problem. If I was outside and saw no one on the map, I would work my way in. I stood up and put my back to the nearest wall. ¡°Is Larry out there?¡± I shouted. ¡°Is that the noob?¡± I heard RadicalLarry19¡¯s rough voice call back. ¡°You got it in one guess,¡± I said. ¡°Good job.¡± ¡°Why don¡¯t you come on out and let us kill you so we can get that loot?¡± ¡°Or, and this is just me workshopping, you let me go with it since I got here first.¡± I could hear the majority of his crew laughing. ¡°That¡¯s not going to happen,¡± Larry replied after the laughter had calmed down. ¡°Just come on out here so we can make this quick. Believe me when I say, you do not want me riding in there and dragging you out.¡± Wait, what? Riding in here? I stared at the door that to the room Bear had died in. Anita was still lying in front of it. And yes, it was wide enough for a horse. I whistled. ¡°Oh, I don¡¯t know,¡± I said loudly, hoping they hadn¡¯t heard the whistle. On my minimap I could see the symbol for Horse start moving my direction, stop, shift to a new spot and then dart toward me. ¡°What color is your horse? I¡¯ve always wanted to be swept away by a man on a white steed.¡± ¡°Oh, yeah?¡± Larry said. ¡°That¡¯d be more Tom¡¯s ride than- Shoot that horse!¡± ¡°Fuck,¡± I hissed under my breath and ran to the door and peeked around to see Horse running up the main road and straight for me. A bullet hit his flank, but he didn¡¯t slow. And then I heard him. ¡°Damn you. I hate you. I hate you. IhateyouIhateyou.¡± He only said it faster the harder he ran until he was in the house. ¡°Out the back,¡± I said to him. He didn¡¯t slow as I grabbed his reins and jumped onto him, staying low to avoid the door frames and ceiling. ¡°You think?¡± was all Horse had to say besides the constant mumbling of hating me. The moment his feet hit the back porch, a molotov hit the ground in front of us. ¡°Through it,¡± I said to him. The few of the Colossals that I could see, I fired on. Horse ran right through the fire as if it was nothing. I surveyed our surroundings as quickly as I could. People lined the property edge. To the right was a thin crop of trees with fields beyond. To the left was so thick with forest and foliage that I couldn¡¯t see through to what was past it. ¡°Left. Get cover.¡± I was hit twice but that potion or whatever that Bear had given me was doing its job. Other than the impact of the bullets, I didn¡¯t feel anything. My health was still glowing, but those shots would have put me below half normally, so I had to assume that it would run out soon. I kept my head low, shooting as RadicalLarry19¡¯s gang fired on us. Right before we were to dive into the woods, I pulled hard on Horse¡¯s reins and spun around, raising my Farmer¡¯s Pistol. Auto-Aim took over, but couldn¡¯t decide which target to focus on. I forced it toward where I saw Larry running around the far side of the house. I pulled up, just a bit. The gun roared as two more bullets hit me and I saw my health go down by about a third. Hat Shot! +10 XP! Fuck! I spurred Horse and we hit the woods, bursting through the foliage into a thick nest of trees and darkness. He weaved between them until he could get up to a better pace, and then opened the throttle, so to speak. We were far from done, though. These were other players, each of whom had their own horse and actual skill on their side. Bullets, though fewer, had continued to whistle past my head. ¡°I¡¯m steering,¡± Horse said. ¡°Pull out your rifle.¡± He was right. As long as he had control, I could focus on fighting them off. I holstered my pistols and swung the Bolt Action Rifle off my back and placed the butt against my shoulder. Behind me, I could see three riders coming up fast but not close, yet. Twisting in my seat, I took aim, let the auto-aim take over and pulled up for that sweet headshot action. Then reality struck me in that it was dumb to kill this guy. So, I headshot random henchman #4, then what? He wakes in an hour and comes after me? Or his horse peels away and another takes its place? Larry had at least eight guys covering the back of Anita¡¯s plantation house. At best, that meant the front had another eight guys. All of which would be riding after me in just a moment. I lowered my aim, and then lowered it some more. ¡°Hey Horse,¡± I shouted. ¡°What?¡± ¡°What are your thoughts on me killing horses?¡± I heard my usually less aggressive mount grunt a laugh before saying, ¡°If you ride with the bad ¡­¡± he stopped to pant, but I knew what he was going to say. ¡°Then you die with the bad.¡± The horse of the first rider I was aiming at went down as the bullet passed through its chest. The rider went down, obviously hurting himself but still breathing. The rider behind him didn¡¯t have time to adjust and his horse tripped over the still rolling corpse of the other one. With both of them down, I had only one rider on me. A quick bullet into his horse stopped him from scooping up his companions. Now I just had to hope that none of the rest were able to catch up to me before I could get somewhere safer. We burst out of the woods and onto an empty road. I pulled up my minimap and looked around. Hardy was the plan, but plans could change. If I was RadicalLarry19 and looking for, well, me, then I would check Hardy first. Assuming they didn¡¯t have a bounty hunter and could track me wherever I went anyway. With as many people in his gang, he would have a few, likely. Hardy wasn¡¯t safe or smart. I needed someplace close and with a fast travel. Looking at the map, there was only one place with a fast travel that was close and also big enough that if I had to hide, I likely could for a while. I was headed to Saint Emile. Chapter 19 Chapter 19 ¡°I¡¯m not arguing whether or not it was a good idea at the time,¡± Horse was droning on. ¡°My only problem was that it was a knee-jerk plan. If you¡¯re going into a situation like that, maybe plan an escape beforehand.¡± For what felt like the hundredth time in the twenty minute ride to Saint Emile, Horse was reminding me that any plan that includes him getting shot was a horrible plan. Pointing out that we both survived didn¡¯t seem to slow his whining down at all. We were still moving quickly toward Saint Emile. I didn¡¯t know enough about the tracking abilities of the Bounty Hunter profession to know how far I had to be to be safe, or if there even was a safe distance. We didn¡¯t need signs or even the map to tell us when we were getting closer to Saint Emile. The traffic on the road increased from the standard one or two horses every ten minutes to something closer to a busy intersection in a rural community. Wagons and horses were lining up behind and in front of us on one side of the road while the other side had just as much traffic going the other direction. It was just enough to make me miss the bustling life of a real world city. Almost enough, but not quite. I was continuously staring at my minimap, looking for the red teardrops of other players hunting me. I barely even heard all of Horse¡¯s complaining and only noticed when we were entering Saint Emile when the sound changed from horse hooves on dirt to horse hooves on a wooden bridge. With my map closed, I decided to focus on the town. I needed to find someplace to hold up for the next half hour or so until my gang respawned. Doing so wouldn¡¯t be easy in Easter, which I was familiar with. I suspected that hiding in a place I didn¡¯t know was going to be, at least initially, harder. My first stop was the post office. I collected my mail after giving some treats to Horse. He had earned more than his share and had told me as much multiple times. The fight at the plantation house had yielded some decent experience, but we hadn¡¯t finished the mission yet, so nothing major. I had leveled up, but only to level 8. A letter in the mail let me know that at level 8 I could buy the Winchester Repeater. I didn¡¯t see any reason why I would want to, so I ignored the letter. That was about when I realized that I should turn off my Stream-Time broadcast. I opened the menu and saw that my peak viewership had been around ten thousand people. The idea that in my short time here I had amassed that many people interested in watching me fight to survive blew my mind. My pessimistic side immediately assumed that RadicalLarry19¡¯s followers were watching both feeds, but whatever. The more that watched, the more money I could push toward keeping Winnie in school. Before I left the post office, I asked the man behind the window where someone could rest. ¡°The best hotel is the Beaumont on the northern side of town,¡± he responded without looking up. I dropped a dollar on the counter, slapping the counter hard, and looked down at my blood-covered clothes. ¡°I need to clean up and rest, but I need it to be cheap and quiet. I¡¯m probably not made for the fanciest place in town.¡± He looked up at my money and then at me before taking the dollar. ¡°I see. Then I would follow this road along the train tracks. When you get to the market, look for Henry¡¯s pawn shop. He has rooms for rent above it. He doesn¡¯t ask too many questions.¡± I nodded my thanks and dropped hatchet-man¡¯s eleven cents on the counter before leaving. Never in my life had I visited New Orleans. When I would have wanted to, I didn¡¯t have the opportunity. You wouldn¡¯t be wrong if you read ¡®opportunity¡¯ as ¡®money.¡¯ When I finally had the income to travel, New Orleans seemed too ¡­ local. Not quite exotic enough for the adventures that Tyler and I had talked about. So, when I say that Saint Emile gave off an entirely New Orleans vibe, what I mean to say is that it gave off the kind of feeling someone who had seen a lot of New Orleans on television would notice. There was age, French names on the buildings, and street vendors. The train station, which was oddly separate from the post office, was nestled in with some dock warehouses along what I could only assume was the ocean. Saint Emile was also the first place in all of Wicked West that I could only describe as a city. It still had all the hallmarks of the decade that the game was pretending to take place in, such as wagons, open air meat markets, and the clothes to match, but even those clothes were somewhat fancier, or more elegant than anything I had seen in Easter or Hardy. Aberdine was big, but not this big. French names and fancy dressing aside, the area of town that the mail clerk sent me to was exactly the opposite. Every city had a financially-less-impressive area, and Saint Emile took it to another degree. It was like a shanty town with the small houses built from just about anything that could be found. The shops were a little more suspect as well. There was a harried woman shouting about the ills of mistreating animals while selling cat pheromones in a stall directly next to some guy named Goose, offering to buy anyone¡¯s pelts in exchange for his magical trinkets. If this was the real world, I would have dismissed it. Instead, I filed away the information for later. If this game had a hidden element of magic to it, especially regarding nature, it might be best to let Bear know. Those stalls were directly across from the pawn shop the clerk had directed me to. I tried the door on the street side several times before peeking in and seeing there was a shelving unit against it. I kept looking through windows as I circled the building. It was tall and old with several other shops in it. I couldn¡¯t see through some of the windows, but finally, after what felt like forever, Horse and I found the back entrance was wide open. ¡°Stay here,¡± I said to Horse as he stared at a kid eating an apple. The NPC didn¡¯t seem to take notice to Horse¡¯s attention. ¡°Just because we ran through one building doesn¡¯t mean I can take you everywhere.¡± ¡°Really?¡± Horse¡¯s mouth went wide with mock-shock. ¡°I thought you were going to take me to a fancy dinner.¡± ¡°Shut up,¡± I said. Then I pulled an apple I had picked up in Easter out of my bag and gave it to him. ¡°You did great back there,¡± I said. ¡°Thank you.¡± ¡°Don¡¯t thank me,¡± he said as he chewed. ¡°If you die, I¡¯ve got to sit and wait an hour, bored out of mind. It was entirely self-serving.¡± I smiled and nodded. ¡°Sure it was.¡± The shop was crowded with merchandise. All of it looked generic. Old dresses sat next to worn saddles and some sort of imported dishwares. I had to walk through tight aisles of people¡¯s unwanted stuff before finally coming to a well-polished wooden counter with a man of Asian descent standing behind it. ¡°Yo,¡± he was counting coins with one hand while his other hand rested on a pistol resting on the countertop. ¡°What can I do for you?¡± His accent was almost comically from Brooklyn. ¡°I¡¯m being hunted by a rival gang. I was told you could give me a place to stay until the heat dies down.¡± He snickered. ¡°And who told you that, I wonder? Or more importantly, who are you hunting that you think I¡¯ll just let you know where my people are staying? It¡¯s one thing to help a person out, and another to trust a new face.¡± I could see him eying the bullet holes in my coat that, for whatever reason, hadn¡¯t disappeared yet. Usually, they stayed around for a little while after I had healed up. Washing made them go away quicker, but when was the last time I had a chance for a bath. ¡°Look, I really don¡¯t want to die,¡± I sighed. ¡°I¡¯m waiting on friends of mine, but we need a safe place before we get found. I also need supplies.¡± The pawn shop owner only stared at her. ¡°I¡¯m not a cop,¡± I added. This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere. He pulled out a key, slowly and placed it on the counter. He didn¡¯t remove his hand from the top of it. ¡°Upstairs. Fifty dollars.¡± ¡°Fifty?¡± I almost choked. I had $98.15 after the purchase of my new guns, food and supplies for me and horse, and then the raid on the plantation. I could afford it, but I was going to need a payday soon if I was going to avoid starving. I paid the money and he slid me the key which I pocketed as quickly as I could. Before I headed up, I made sure Horse didn¡¯t need anything. He seemed to be playing some game of ¡°steal-the-food¡± from an NPC. I told him I wasn¡¯t going to step in if this got out of hand, and then went upstairs. The stairs in question were outside of the pawn shop. I had seen them when I was looking for the entrance, but hadn¡¯t realized they were the rooms the heavily accented pawn shop owner was renting. At the top of the stairs, I found my room and went in. It was not impressive. The entire room was bare with stains on the walls and floor. It had one cot with nothing on it and a chair that was laying on its side in the center of the room. I had seen that most of Saint Emile had electricity, but for some reason, it hadn¡¯t made it to my room. I was going to have to bring out my lantern if I ended up staying the night. I laid on the bed for the rest of the next half hour until Coot messaged me that he was back. I told him where I was and combed through my mail until I heard from Bear. I was tempted to take a look at the plans that we looted from Anita, but I was worried that the quest or job or whatever would continue without giving my friends their experience or whatever. It was smarter to just sit, wait, and watch the map out of the corner of my eye. Minutes before Bear messaged me, the map did give me a scare. Two red teardrops rode past, stopped, and did something in the pawn shop. Laying down worked just like crouching, which I appreciated. They couldn¡¯t see me on their map, but they were players, and they could decide that they needed to check to make sure some wayward cowgirl wasn¡¯t lying on a cot upstairs. While they were talking to the pawn shop owner, Bear respawned. I sent him a quick message saying where I was. He pressed me about not being in Hardy. I told him I wasn¡¯t there because I didn¡¯t want to die and that mostly shut him up. He seemed more annoyed that he would have to travel a little farther than Hardy to meet up. Either way, I told them both to take their time and be careful. If there were two Colossals downstairs, there would be more in town. When they left and weren¡¯t on my map anymore, I crouch-walked downstairs and didn¡¯t risk standing until I was next to the shopkeep. ¡°What are you doing, eh?¡± he asked. It was a fair question when he asked it, as I was still crouched. ¡°Hiding,¡± I shrugged. ¡°Like I told you I was.¡± He nodded and didn¡¯t say anything else. I put a dollar on the counter. ¡°Can you tell me what they wanted?¡± ¡°Not for a dollar.¡± I sighed and put two more dollars down. ¡°Your pals were looking for you, just like you said. They weren¡¯t paying me to hide them, though, so I said nothing.¡± He shrugged. ¡°They bought a bunch of dynamite and jugs of moonshine and then left.¡± ¡°Did they say why they wanted the gear?¡± He shrugged again. ¡°Something about a raid in Easter in the morning.¡± I relayed the information to the Flamingos. ¡°How much for dynamite?¡± I asked. ¡°Dollar a stick. You can only carry eight, unless you make dynamite arrows, then you can carry eight more as arrows.¡± ¡°I really do look that new, huh?¡± ¡°You walked down a flight of stairs while crouched,¡± he snickered. ¡°I didn¡¯t even have to check your level.¡± He made a valid point. ¡°I¡¯ll take eight. How much for the moonshine?¡± ¡°You can only carry one in your inventory,¡± he said. ¡°One jug is twenty dollars.¡± That seemed like a lot, but maybe my reputation had taken a dip. I checked my HUD and it was still good, so that had to be the normal price. That still was a lot of money for me. After the room, I only had around $48. After the dynamite, I was at an even $40. If the next part of our plan didn¡¯t pay out much, I was going to be tight on any other needs I had. I¡¯d have to ask the boys what their finances looked like. It didn¡¯t matter. In light of the news that the Colossal Paynes would be raiding Easter in the morning, I needed to be armed. I needed to get back there as quickly as possible. I bought the ¡®shine and went back up to my room to wait for the gang. For the mission, the Easter raid was a good thing. Time was short for me to even think about stopping them, but that also meant that time was short for them too. If they hadn¡¯t called off the hunt, they would soon, just so they could get back to camp and prepare for tomorrow¡¯s attack. Of course, I would need to prepare, too, but this mission had to happen first. We could skip defending this one time and then start our crusade after the next, but that just felt wrong. Especially after the rousing speech that I had given the Pink Flamingos. More importantly, and still personal, I was tired of them winning. How many times are they going to kill me and mine, or rookies just trying to figure out what happens after you die? How many of my missions are they going to hound and bully me on before someone finally stands up to them? We won¡¯t win every fight, but I¡¯ll be damned if I will just sit here and keep taking the losses. Joy flooded me when I saw the blue icons of the guys riding up to the pawn shop. I expanded my map to the full size to see if anyone was within range enough to hunt us. Seeing no one, I ran down there and hugged them both before dragging them upstairs and telling them what they missed. I looked at Coot through the gang menu and saw that he hadn¡¯t missed too much. He was now level 10. ¡°You stop and get your letters?¡± I asked him. He nodded. ¡°I did, but that¡¯s something we¡¯re gonna have to talk about later. I can¡¯t do anything about it right now and I think I have an idea on how you and I should spec ourselves.¡± ¡°Not now?¡± I asked. ¡°Do we have the time?¡± he smirked. I shook my head. ¡°Larry is going to hit Easter tomorrow. We¡¯ve got to do this tonight.¡± ¡°If that¡¯s what the schedule says,¡± Bear pointed out. ¡°Speaking of that,¡± I pulled the plans from my inventory and laid them out on the floor in front of the gang. We all sat cross-legged on the floor to examine it. They were entirely blank except for a picture of a train. ¡°Well,¡± I was completely confused, ¡°shit.¡± The plans shifted a bit, making me rub my eyes, before changes started to appear. ¡°It¡¯s a mission that is supposed to be available when you want it to be,¡± Coot explained. ¡°I¡¯ve heard of these. Basically, they don¡¯t want the excitement from the story to slow down, so they make the second half of the mission adjust to when you open this.¡± Just as Coot said, the date and time for the mission wasn¡¯t on the plans. Instead, a yellow area popped up on the map with a line leading along the road to where we needed to go. We examined the map and saw that it was the train station here in Saint Emile. The rest of the plans did fill out. The government was moving a train car of money across all of whatever this continent was called. It was supposed to be a complete secret, but Anita had ruined that. The train was scheduled to leave as soon as we entered the yellow area of the map. The entire area would be covered with more law enforcement than we had ever seen. ¡°Here¡¯s the good news,¡± I said, ¡°we can get this done tonight and turn in the mission and then fast travel to Easter before Larry and his fellow assholes can attack. We might even have time to prepare the town before the attack.¡± ¡°The bad news is that we aren¡¯t going to survive this,¡± Bear added. ¡°Not with that attitude,¡± I said. ¡°Thoughts, Coot?¡± Coot leaned back and stroked his scraggly beard. He sat like that for a while, his eye twitching slightly, until he finally leaned forward. ¡°Nope. Ain¡¯t got much.¡± ¡°Well, shit again,¡± I said. ¡°The problem is that we ain¡¯t got enough data, boss,¡± he said. ¡°Lots of cops ain¡¯t a number. How much money isn¡¯t listed. All we¡¯ve got is us and guns.¡± He shrugged. ¡°My next idea was how would you get us on board quietly. Maybe we could pose as passengers and be all stealthy about it, but, let¡¯s face it, we suck at sneaking.¡± Coot winced as another idea came to him, and then shook his head. ¡°There¡¯s nothing we can do, short of hiring an army, that would work.¡± ¡°Wait a minute,¡± Bear pointed at Coot¡¯s face. ¡°What was that look you gave? You had an idea.¡± Coot shook his head. ¡°Yeah, I had an idea. A dumb as shit idea.¡± ¡°That¡¯s better than nothing,¡± I said. ¡°We need to get this money, end the mission, and get to Easter as quick as we can. That means we can¡¯t die, because we can¡¯t afford the hour wait. We also can¡¯t get waylaid on the way. This thing is going to happen, and we have to get it done right the first time.¡± Coot pulled hard on his beard and scrunched up his face. ¡°Fine.¡± ¡°Well?¡± Bear and I said together. ¡°We can¡¯t sneak on board as passengers, and the number of law at the station will be much higher than the number on the train, so ¡­¡± ¡°Spit it out, man!¡± Bear was leaning forward in anticipation. ¡°We are gonna have to hijack the train.¡± Chapter 20 Chapter 20 ¡°You¡¯re going to get me shot again,¡± Horse said as we rode ahead. Bear and I were about a mile east of Saint Emile and sitting on our horses. We were off the tracks and facing the water. I wondered at the odd beauty of this digitally recreated sight. Were they convincing my perceptions to fill in the gaps and make it look this real, or was this just a work of art? Realism in an entirely digital fallacy? Weird. Our horses were backed up against a hill with trees around us. Unless they were paying exceptionally close attention, nobody on the train would see us until it was too late. The good doctor, Mr. Coot, was walking the docks of Saint Emile as nonchalantly as he could and reporting back on numbers. Specifically, he was reporting back on the number of law enforcement on the train. We only cared about the ones on the train. The plan was fairly simple in design and would only hit snags as we implemented it. We were to jump on the train, something that Bear was too excited for, whereas I was nervous as hell about it. We needed to jump on in about the same spot, otherwise, we would be separated and too easily overwhelmed. Once on board, we would fight and kill until we got to the car with the money. The train could not be allowed to stop. Coot had made that part of the plan mandatory. Once Coot activated the mission by stepping into the yellow zone on the map in Saint Emile, the train would take off. If there were any issues on the train, like three idiots trying to rob it, every law enforcer would get on a horse and head down the tracks to try and assist. As long as the train was moving, the chance of them catching us was non-existent, but the moment the train stopped we would be swarmed. We also needed to be off the train before it made it to the next town for the same reason. The next town going east on the tracks was Hardy, so we had a general idea of how much time we had. It wasn¡¯t too much, but enough to get the job done, we hoped. ¡°In the last week,¡± I said, ¡°I¡¯ve been shot more than I had in my entire life.¡± Bear gave me a sidelong look. ¡°So, shut up and deal with it. I¡¯ll get you an apple for every time you¡¯re shot.¡± ¡°I can¡¯t eat apples if I¡¯m dead,¡± Horse harrumphed. ¡°I saw candies in the pawn shop,¡± I patted Horse on his mane. ¡°If you die, I¡¯ll get you a couple bags.¡± ¡°Its so weird your horse talks,¡± Bear said. ¡°Not as weird as you think,¡± I shrugged at the idea. ¡°According to Horse, it¡¯s about twenty percent of the horses in game that are inhabited by retired players.¡± Bear shook his head. ¡°I¡¯ll have to find one and see if it wants to work with me. You have access to someone who¡¯s had to deal with anything and everything between now and level 250. No wonder you never feel the need to read the manual.¡± Horse preened at the compliment, lifting his head to nuzzle Bear¡¯s leg. D0C70RC007: Final count is 27 on the train, not including the conductor. Are you ready for me to start it? Sammy#0421: Bring it on! A loud and dramatic tune played in my head before slowly fading out. When the music vanished completely, my map showed the yellow lines disappear and a big red X in Saint Emile started moving our direction. I checked over my weapons. As much as I wanted to use my Bolt Action Rifle some more, but a rifle on close-quarters train fight didn¡¯t make much sense. I made sure both of my Farmer¡¯s Pistols were loaded and placed them back in their holsters. The two pistols, the rifle, and my shotgun made me a walking and riding force to be reckoned with. Or at least I hoped so. Bear started loading some red bullets into his one sawed-off shotgun and holstered it. ¡°What were those?¡± I asked. ¡°Explosive rounds,¡± he explained. ¡°I only have eight. I figure I¡¯ll use my pistol and my knife until things get nuts, and save the shotgun as a get-out-of-the-shit-free card.¡± I nodded, jealous for explosive rounds, but also certain that if I had explosive rounds I would likely blow my arm off. A train whistle went off in the distance. ¡°Ready?¡± I asked as I rolled up my sleeve. ¡°Ready.¡± I checked the map again to see where the train was and where Coot was. He was keeping his pace a steady distance behind the train. ¡°We join Coot when he passes us. Then we board the back of the train,¡± I repeated the plan one last time, mostly for my own benefit. My fingers found the tattooed button on my arm, and pressed it. Here we go. When the train was finally visible, Bear tossed me a bottle. ¡°Save that for when you¡¯re really hurt,¡± he said. ¡°Otherwise, use your own supplies.¡± I nodded as the train passed us. The conductor didn¡¯t even look at us. Through the gaps, I could see a handful of the law enforcement guys scattered across the train. We had discussed using the dynamite and trying to clear the train out while riding beside it, but I was worried that we would need it for the raid in Easter. There was no guarantee that we would have enough time after the train robbery to get supplies and get to Easter in time. Less so if we died during the robbery. The ass of the train went past Bear and I and then we saw Coot racing toward us on Sandra. He stood up in his saddle as he passed us. Bear and I spurred our horses and were right behind him. Our approach didn¡¯t go unnoticed. The caboose wasn¡¯t actually a traditional caboose. Instead, it was an open platform with stacks of some sort of goods packed away in crates that were tied down. This was great for our jumping onto the train. We wouldn¡¯t need to aim for a small door. It wasn¡¯t that great for getting on the train without getting shot. Four lawmen were on the back. One of them saw us and smacked his neighbor. They all turned and raised their guns. My boys needed cover. ¡°Keep riding,¡± I yelled at Horse. ¡°Do not slow down!¡± Horse actually sped up and I started to pass Coot while Bear urged his horse along the side of the train. I guess my Bolt Action was going to get in on the fun anyway. I drew my rifle and steadied myself as much as I could, for what it was worth. Shooting while riding on a horse at full gallop was one of those things that my mind told me should be difficult, but this world made it incredibly easy with the aim-assist. Bullets whizzed by us as I took aim at the closest lawman and fired. I wasn¡¯t going to try and take time to make headshots when what I really needed was to distract these men long enough for the Flamingos to board. The first shot tore through the lawman¡¯s gut. He was bleeding out, but still firing. I decided to ignore him and move onto the next one. He dove behind one of the crates as I fired and missed. He wasn¡¯t worth it, so I shifted aim to the third. At this point, a fifth had come from the car beyond this one and was firing wildly at us. Bear placed a leg on the seat of his saddle and kicked off. He launched his large mass at the train and hit the floor of the platform with enough force that I felt my own bones rattle. He wasted no time. Jumping to his feet, Bear slammed his knife into the neck of the lawman that was still bleeding out before he stepped toward the one behind the crate and kicked him in the shoulder. The lawman toppled back and over the side of the platform, rolling away and down the hill. Coot and Sandra barely missed him. Coot was next. He did the same thing as Bear, placing one foot on the saddle and jumping. I figured that had to be the default animation for jumping onto a train, but it was a thought in the back of my mind. Bear had already grabbed the next guy, thrust his knife into the man¡¯s belly and was walking him backward, as a shield for Coot to get to his feet. When Coot was up and firing his Volcanic Pistol, I slung the rifle onto my back and directed Horse to follow up on Coot¡¯s side of the train. As we closed the gap, I was impressed with the efficiency of my boys. In the last few days, we had gone from a clumsy group of newbies trying to survive walking through a generally peaceful town to an efficient group robbing a train. Even if we lost this mission, I was impressed. ¡°Jump,¡± Horse shouted. I looked at the train and fear took me over. Support the creativity of authors by visiting Royal Road for this novel and more. Whatever. I thought. Fuck it. I put my foot on the saddle and jumped. And missed. I am not entirely sure what happened, but to be completely honest, it was probably my fault. I hit the ground close to the rails and the wheels of the train. My health dipped as I bounced on the dirt and rolled. Panic was setting in before I came to a stop. Scrambling to my feet, I tripped and ran after the train as it started to leave me. That was when I saw Coot pull something from his satchel and swing it over his head. He had a lasso. Shit. The rope went over my head and pinned my arms to my side as it tightened around me. Faster than I could think, I was airborne. That wasn¡¯t entirely true. I dragged and bounced on the ground for a brief second and then I was mostly flying, with random moments of hitting the ground as the train progressed. This had been discussed, but I figured it was a joke. Bear had asked what would happen if we don¡¯t all make it on the train. Coot¡¯s response had been delivered with no humor but Bear and I had snickered anyway. ¡°One of us can just pull out the lasso and rope them.¡± What had made that seem funny, aside from the obvious image of one friend dragging another behind a train, was I thought we would likely die being dragged behind a train. I was learning now that that wasn¡¯t the case. The lasso was held by a member of my gang, and friendly-fire was turned off, meaning that Coot couldn¡¯t hurt me directly in any way. That included his rope. So, while I was bouncing on dirt, steel, and horse manure, I was taking no damage. He was reeling me in, as well. In moments, I was on the platform and Coot was pulling the rope off of me. I ate a piece of jerky and drew my pistol. I could have said something snarky then, but the entire ordeal left me somewhere between the highest my adrenaline had ever spiked and disoriented from, well, all of it. They covered me while I took in my surroundings. The lawmen on the back had all been killed and the platform was clear. Our horses had pulled away and were pacing the train. Ahead of us and in the next car, I could see a handful of lawmen standing and shooting at us, but they weren¡¯t going to hit us until either them or us advanced. ¡°Advancing,¡± Bear shouted. I don¡¯t know when it happened, but Bear had switched to his shotgun with the exploding ammunition. He cleared the next car out with almost no help from us. I kept looking over my shoulder to see if the police from the station were on us yet. There was red on my map in that direction, but I couldn¡¯t see anyone. Hopefully, it would remain that way. The next train car was another open platform. Bear and Coot had taken up positions on each side of the door to the car we were on and used those walls as cover. I slid up beside Bear. ¡°They have a gatling gun on that car,¡± Bear said. ¡°We need to take it out.¡± As if he had summoned it, the machine gun opened up, filling the space between us and Coot with a river of iron. I had to yell for Bear to hear me. ¡°When he stops, get to the back of the car and use your Carcano. We¡¯ll distract him, you put him down.¡± ¡°Someone else will take his spot,¡± Bear countered. I shook my head. ¡°I won¡¯t let them.¡± Bear prepared to run for it, squaring his shoulders and leaning toward the back of the train. I touched his arm. ¡°You have to kill him with the first shot, or this isn¡¯t going to work,¡± I said. Bear looked confused by the statement, but nodded, trusting me. The gatling gun stopped, leaving only the raining sound of shells hitting the wood. Bear ran. The gatling gun couldn¡¯t spin up fast enough to hit him before he was out the back of the car and around the corner taking cover. I drew my left hand Farmer¡¯s Pistol and peeked around the door as the gun was spinning up. I fired blindly in the general direction and was rewarded by hearing lawmen dive for cover. Coot took over as I reloaded and then a single shot, louder than I was expecting, filled the cabin with its noise and smoke. I didn¡¯t look or check on my team. Instead, I stepped out from behind my cover with both pistols drawn and fired both of them in the general direction of the lawmen until they emptied. A bullet hit my leg and my right shoulder, but my health only went down to around the sixty percent mark. When my pistols both clicked onto empty chambers, I dove behind the nearest crate. Bear fired two more Carcano shots to clear the path for Coot who joined me. Bear ran past us. Coot and I both poked our heads up and watched as Bear leaped, his entire girthy mass slamming into the next lawman and pinning him to the floor long enough for Bear to raise his knife and slam it down. There were two more lawmen on this car. Both of them weren¡¯t as shocked by Bear¡¯s attack as we were and trained their guns on him. He was directly between them. They wouldn¡¯t miss. Aim, pull up, one down. Coot got the other one with one bullet from his gun. We moved and joined Bear. ¡°We¡¯ve got a problem,¡± Coot said. ¡°What?¡± Bear and I both asked over the roar of the train and wind rushing past our heads. ¡°The next car is where the money is. It''s guarded, but I don¡¯t think that¡¯s the problem,¡± he explained. ¡°Then what is? Spit it out,¡± I nodded toward the back of the train, ¡°backup is almost here.¡± ¡°This game doesn¡¯t have bosses like other video games,¡± Coot explained. ¡°They have something similar, but nothing too major. In that car is an armored man. He is covered in cast iron and a helmet. He¡¯s big, tough, and carrying a shotgun.¡± ¡°How do you know that?¡± Bear asked. ¡°I heard a gang talking about the armored ones back in Easter, before I met you guys,¡± he said. ¡°Most of the missions with guarded stuff have them, and you can see them on your minimap.¡± He was right. I opened my minimap and one of the teardrops was double the size of the others. ¡°Shit. What do we do?¡± I asked. Bear drew his sawed-off shotgun and loaded two more red slugs into it. ¡°Let me handle him. You guys take the little bitches and get the money.¡± ¡°Can¡¯t argue with explosive rounds,¡± I said. Coot nodded his agreement and we all stepped up to the shut door of the next car. Coot touched the handle and looked to each of us for approval. We both nodded, and he opened it. Bear ran in roaring while I was right behind him, firing to each side. He slammed into the armored man. The living tank was exactly as Coot had described. His eyes were the only part of him that I could see that looked human. The rest of a bunch of old fashioned metal that looked like it had been borrowed from a kitchen and what looked like a knight¡¯s helmet. Normally, when Bear slammed into anyone, they both went to the ground, but that didn¡¯t happen. Instead, they bounced off of each other and tried again. They were grappling with each other and Bear couldn¡¯t bring his gun arm down enough to end the armored lawman. There were only four other lawmen in the car, and Coot and I dispatched them with surprising ease. Bear and the armored guy continued to grapple until they were back and on the previous platform car. The bags of money we needed to get, one for each one of us, were glowing faintly golden on the floor of the car we were in. ¡°How many can you carry?¡± I asked Coot. ¡°Two,¡± he said, ¡°but only if I can get my horse up here.¡± He let out a whistle. ¡°Do what you can,¡± I turned and headed after Bear. ¡°I¡¯ll help Bear.¡± I drew my double-barreled shotgun. I hadn¡¯t used this in a while, but it was only for special emergencies anyway. Emergencies like when your gang member¡¯s soft and fleshy bits are being bunched by a metal piston. Both of their guns were being held by the other¡¯s arm, while Bear used his free hand to try and block the metal fist hitting his stomach. I didn¡¯t need to see Bear¡¯s health to know he wasn¡¯t going to last long. Blam! I pulled both triggers. The metal asshole staggered back and away from Bear. I ran forward. ¡°Get the money,¡± I shouted. Then my body hit the armored lawman and we tumbled from the side of the train. We hit the ground hard, but my health didn¡¯t move. I think he mostly cushioned my fall, or the included animation for tackling someone didn¡¯t allow for the one doing the tackling to get hurt. I could see a health bar over the armored lawman¡¯s head. He was around the eighty percent mark and since Bear hadn¡¯t done much but wrestle with him, I had to assume that any damage he had was from hitting the ground. He was heavier and slower to his feet. I whistled and pulled something from my satchel as the train got farther away. I dropped it on the tracks and stood up. Somehow, during my tackle the shotgun had returned to my back. I drew both of my Farmer¡¯s Pistols and emptied as many headshots into the beast as I could. His health went to about half before my guns were both empty. He stomped toward me and punched me in the face. Blood exploded from my nose and I felt the dirt hit the back of my head. I forced my feet back under me and tackled him again. This time, he was ready and slammed his fist into my back, driving me to the ground next to the tracks. Somewhere in the tussle or the drop from the train, he had lost his gun. ¡°Stay down,¡± he barked at me from inside his helmet. I stood up. He swung at me again. His swings were slow, but what they lacked in speed he made up for in force. I ducked the next two swings before attempting a block. I caught his fist swing with my raised forearm and then punched him square in the face. I can¡¯t really tell you what I expected to happen. It was dumb and hurt me way more than it hurt him. The fucker laughed. That only made me angrier. I brought my leg up and kicked him in the chest. That was the first physical attack of mine that gave me some sort of satisfaction. He was top heavy and rocked back onto his butt, landing on the tracks. I could hear gunshots coming from the direction of Saint Emile. I looked up and saw the lawmen from the station coming our way. In moments my work on this mission would be over. I needed to do something to help my boys. I drew my pistol and started reloading it as the knight in dumbass armor climbed to his feet. ¡°It¡¯s over,¡± he was saying. ¡°Lower your gun and we can take you in. You can tell us who hired you and who¡¯s in your gang. You won¡¯t hang if you cooperate.¡± I laughed and raised my hands, my Farmer¡¯s Pistol aimed in the air. ¡°That¡¯s right,¡± he said as his backup team circled me with their horses. ¡°Just lower your gun.¡± The smile never left my face as I brought my arms down, lowering my gun almost to point at my feet. Panda_Bear_Polks: We¡¯re clear, boss. How you doing? Not quite my feet. It pointed at the tracks. Actually, it pointed to where I had decided it was alright to waste just one stick of dynamite. There were about fifteen other lawmen all packed in around me. The armored lawman looked to where my gun was pointing and started to curse. That old-fashioned portrait of my death and all the bodies flying away in pieces, will always be my favorite. Chapter 21 Chapter 21 After the picture faded, I should have respawned, but everything remained dark. My HUD came up when I wanted it to, but I could not see anything else. Working through the logic, I opened my inventory from my HUD and pulled out the lantern. It blazed to life and brought my immediate area into focus. I expanded the map to try and nail down where I was. It was somewhere deep in the woods, but when I zoomed out enough I could see that I was only about a mile from the train tracks. That must have been where I died. Sammy#0421: I¡¯m back. Did you already cash it in? D0C70RC007: We¡¯re sitting outside the place waiting to talk to the chicken guy. Sammy#0421: Do it. If he offers you another job, politely decline until we have more time. Panda_Bear_Polka: What? You don¡¯t want us to punch him and take his fancy suit? Sammy#0421: I really can¡¯t tell if you¡¯re kidding. Don¡¯t punch him, please. I whistled and waited for Horse and the Mission Complete notifications. When the job was done, I received a whopping $250, half of a gold bar, and enough experience to put me past level 10. You have mail waiting for you at the post office or camp lockbox. It was going to have to wait. My pocket watch told me it was just after sunset. The boys and I would have tonight to get armed, get to Easter, and hopefully organize them into a slightly better defense than they¡¯ve been. I plotted a course to Hardy, which turned out to be the closest fast travel to where I had resurrected. Then I summoned Horse. ¡°Look who finally decided to show up,¡± he snorted when he arrived. If it wasn¡¯t for my lantern, I would never have seen him coming. ¡°Can you navigate through this?¡± I asked. ¡°Does a bear place bets on which dumb hunter won¡¯t make it home?¡± I just stared at him blankly. ¡°Yes,¡± he snorted. ¡°The answer is yet. Geeze, why are you such a noob?¡± ¡°Excuse me,¡± I said. ¡°Probably because I am a noob.¡± ¡°Really? I feel like this is your hundredth death or something.¡± I swung up onto his back. ¡°Shut up and get us out of here. I need to send a message.¡± ¡°Oh? And who¡¯s the lucky boy?¡± ¡°Ed from the Gladiat0rz,¡± I answered. ¡°I''m going to try and recruit him.¡± Fast Traveling from Hardy to the camp was an entertaining experience. Normally when I sat on the bench it would put me at the similar bench in the destination town. Since this was a trip to my camp, it put me at the camp table. This wouldn¡¯t have been a problem, except that Bear and Coot were sitting at the table when I appeared seemingly from nowhere. Bear screamed. Coot screamed. Joan screamed. I screamed. Horse screamed. I glared at Horse. ¡°You¡¯re not helping,¡± I shouted. ¡°Everyone else was doing it!¡± he said. ¡°You never let me join in anything fun.¡± When everyone had finally calmed down, I grabbed a bowl from Joan and started eating. The lanterns provided a lot of light and I could see most of the camp clearly enough. ¡°The boys tell me this is it. You¡¯re gonna stand between an army and a town just to make a point?¡± I shook my head. ¡°No. I¡¯m going to stand between an army and a town so that not everyone¡¯s birth into this new life is as traumatic as mine was.¡± I mimed placing a gun to my head and blowing my brains out. ¡°That¡¯s hardly the welcome wagon that people should be greeted with after already dealing with the trauma of realizing that they died.¡± ¡°All fine and dandy,¡± Joan added another scoop of the stew to my bowl, ¡°until you die, the entire gang still kills everyone, and then you¡¯ve let down an entire city of folks.¡± I jabbed my spoon in her direction. ¡°Easter is not what I would call a city. And I¡¯ve already thought of that.¡± ¡°Oh?¡± Coot and Bear asked at the same time. ¡°Sure she has,¡± Horse answered for me. ¡°She¡¯ll do what she always does. She¡¯ll die, come back, try again, rinse, repeat. I¡¯ll get shot in the ass. It¡¯ll be fun. You should come with us.¡± ¡°Shut up, you,¡± Joan shouted at him and surprised me. I hadn¡¯t realized she could hear him. I was going to have to ask her about that. She returned her attention to me. ¡°That isn¡¯t your plan, is it?¡± ¡°Nope,¡± I finished my bowl and handed it back to her. My health was glowing gold and would for a while now. ¡°We¡¯re going to get the town to fight back and we¡¯re going to win.¡± I got into my chat and sent my second message since I had been resurrected. ¡°That¡¯s not a plan,¡± Coot said. ¡°That¡¯s a mission statement.¡± ¡°You¡¯re right,¡± I agreed. ¡°So, here¡¯s the plan.¡± I pulled out the manual. That same manual that I hadn¡¯t been reading until recently, and I slapped it down on the table. ¡°Did you know that the game rules don¡¯t get suspended just because you start a raid?¡± ¡°What?¡± Bear asked. ¡°The game rules,¡± I held my hands wide to encompass everything around us. ¡°Our entire world does not stop existing just because RadicalLoser started a raid. Shops still sell. Bars still serve. Cows still shit.¡± ¡°So?¡± Joan crossed her arms. ¡°That doesn¡¯t change anything.¡± ¡°Wrong,¡± I stood up and shoved my hands into my pockets. ¡°It changes everything. Larry and his Paynes attack a town, kill the defenseless, and reap the rewards. The sheriff can¡¯t do anything, because he¡¯s outnumbered. The defenders could, but there¡¯s no point in it. It¡¯s easier to defend Aberdine with its high rooftops where you can earn the same reward for less effort.¡± I smiled. ¡°But what if it wasn¡¯t about defending Easter? What if Larry had to worry about a fight on two fronts?¡± ¡°You¡¯re talking riddles,¡± Bear said. ¡°Spit it out.¡± A chat message popped up and I opened it. It had directions and a message. RadicalLarry19: We could arrange that. Meet me here. ¡°No time,¡± I said. ¡°We¡¯ve got to get somewhere. I¡¯ll explain on the way.¡± I whistled and the Pink Flamingos rode into the night. There was a railroad bridge outside of McClintock Ranch that passed over a deep gorge. It was beautiful and obviously the reason that someone would have added it to the game. On one side you could see everywhere south of McClintock for miles. On the other side, a beautiful waterfall fell from a cliff face and continued down the river through the gorge. This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it I turned on the broadcast button. This was where Larry had wanted to meet me. Well, kind of. When I had reached out to Larry, I more or less knew where he would want to meet. The area was close to where I had guessed their camp had to be and the train tracks made it secluded enough that I couldn¡¯t ambush him if I wanted to. That was part of my plan, though. I didn¡¯t want to ambush him. Location picked, and by Larry, I only had one more thing to do before I could meet with him. D0C70RC007 is now Leader of the Gang Pink Flamingos. Sammy#0421 has left the Gang Pink Flamingos. ¡°Are you sure about this?¡± Coot wasn¡¯t happy with any of this plan. ¡°Nope, not at all, but if I¡¯m wrong, you can just invite me back in. That¡¯s easy as pie and we don¡¯t lose anything for it.¡± He continued to shake his head but didn¡¯t say anything. ¡°You guys know your role, get. I¡¯ve got someone to meet.¡± I said. They rode off into the darkness and I got down from Horse and started onto the bridge. ¡°Be careful,¡± Horse said. He huffed and shook his head. ¡°Me no likey heights.¡± ¡°No likey?¡± I asked. ¡°What decade are you even from?¡± ¡°I also no likey back story,¡± he snorted. ¡°Whatever.¡± The entirety of the plan had been laid out for the boys on the ride here. The goal of my meeting was to take Larry off the board for the morning¡¯s fight and also put a hitch in the giddyup for the entire Colossal Paynes. Coot was worried for nothing. If I was wrong and this didn¡¯t play out as I hoped it would, we wouldn¡¯t be any worse off. Larry already hated us and it''s not like death had a permanent cost. We would be back at square one, trying to figure out how to make Easter a safe-haven, but that wasn¡¯t very far from where we already were. When I reached the halfway point, I stopped and eyed my surroundings. Mostly, I eyed the lack of them. I could go back toward Horse, or I could go forward toward Larry and his crew. It didn¡¯t get more direct than that. Larry and his posse showed up only a minute or so after I reached the middle. That annoyed me a little. I had hoped he would come alone. Make a plan and EveNet laughs, or whatever the saying is. I watched him get down from his horse and stomp down the bridge toward me. He stopped about twenty feet from me and I relaxed. Not dead yet. ¡°Alright, I¡¯m here,¡± Larry said. ¡°Speak your piece.¡± ¡°I¡¯m tired of dying,¡± I said. ¡°I¡¯m good at killing and I¡¯m smart.¡± ¡°So?¡± Larry spit. ¡°I want to join the Colossals.¡± He snickered. ¡°Can¡¯t be too smart going to the only person you¡¯ve pissed off more than Satan himself and asking for help.¡± ¡°I don¡¯t want help,¡± I crossed my arms. ¡°And you know that I don¡¯t need it. But you need someone smarter than whoever has been doing your mission plans.¡± ¡°How¡¯s that?¡± he looked annoyed. ¡°You had my gang of three surrounded by what? Twenty men?¡± I smirked and raised a finger. ¡°Sorry, you had only me surrounded by twenty men. All you had to do was kill a little old woman and all of your group couldn¡¯t do even that much.¡± He snarled as he drew his pistol and thrust it in my direction. ¡°I can rectify that if you like.¡± My hands went up but my smile never dropped. ¡°Look,¡± I said, ¡°I¡¯m not trying to get killed. Just the opposite. Consider that my application. Whoever planned your attack on me and mine was smart. I¡¯d beaten you before and surrounding me with overwhelming force was a smart move.¡± I shrugged and lowered my hands. ¡°A lazy move, but a smart one.¡± ¡°Oh,¡± Larry lowered his pistol slowly and eyed me, ¡°and what would you have done?¡± My arms crossed again, I answered. ¡°You didn¡¯t need me alive to take the mission from me. Why didn¡¯t you set the house on fire?¡± I snapped my fingers. ¡°Or, what you should have done was have your men surround the house with moonshine. Then light it as I tried to escape.¡± He nodded. ¡°Simple, but you¡¯re right. Tom thought bodies were enough.¡± Larry smiled. ¡°For anyone else, they would have been.¡± ¡°So? Can I join the Paynes?¡± He frowned as his brow furrowed. He wasn¡¯t dumb even though he liked to play the ¡®oafish brute.¡¯ I would do well to remember that when dealing with him. ¡°What about the codger and the mountain man? They ain¡¯t gonna like it that their boss up and left. I don¡¯t think I want them on the team. They seem soft and not overly intelligent.¡± Coot would have eaten that right up. I nodded. ¡°They are. I told them to fuck off and left the gang already. They¡¯re dealing with the confusion but they won¡¯t come after me.¡± ¡°How do I know this ain¡¯t some kind of ambush or trick?¡± See? What did I tell you? Smarter than he looked. ¡°You know it isn¡¯t because I can¡¯t kill you if I¡¯m in your gang. Friendly fire. You¡¯re safe as a bug in a rug. If I¡¯m going to try and hurt you, it¡¯ll have to be now or never.¡± I spread my hands and tilted my head, as if I was listening for his death. ¡°I guess it''s never,¡± I said. ¡°So, can I join up?¡± He stared at me without moving, without even blinking, for what felt like forever. Finally, a message popped up in my HUD. You have been invited to join the Colossal Paynes. Do you accept? I thought the yes as loudly and quickly as I could. Sammy#0421 is now a member of the Gang Colossal Paynes. Larry finally broke the silence. ¡°Welcome to the gang. Let¡¯s get back to camp.¡± I nodded and started behind him as he turned and left the way he had come. Then I drew my Farmer¡¯s Pistol and let auto-aim do the rest. I wasn¡¯t lying that I couldn¡¯t kill him or anyone in his gang now that I was part of it. The gangs had Friendly Fire turned off, so nothing I could do would kill Larry. But physics was still physics, and explosions had two components to them. The first was fire and death. The second was the force of the blast. Auto-aim found the Aged Dynamite that I had ridden ahead and placed in several places along Larry¡¯s end of the bridge. A shout went up and Larry spun, drawing his pistol. He fired three times at me and hit me in the face with each one. And sure, my head jerked with each hit, but I didn¡¯t die. My gun went off. The dynamite exploded. Then the next one. Then the next one. The look on Larry¡¯s face was priceless. It was a mix of both surprise and rage. Flames erupted all around him as his feet lifted from the tracks and arced him out and over nothing. Well, not exactly nothing. He had a river, more of a stream really, about two-hundred feet below him. A gang-only notification went across my HUD. RadicalLarry19 has died from a great fall. I wasn¡¯t exactly sure how many people Larry had brought with him, but I ran through the dissipating cloud of smoke and fire with both of my pistols up. It was a waste of effort, though. By the time I got to them, Bear had already tied them up and tossed them over the cliff edge to join their boss. That was kind of funny. Their boss. My boss, too, for now. The notifications for both of them read the same thing. My only real concern at this point was whether or not they had had the wherewithal to message anyone back at their base before hitting the stones and water below. You have been invited to join the Pink Flamingos. Do you accept? I waved it out of my face to dismiss it and yelled up to where Coot was hiding. ¡°Not yet,¡± I flashed him a smile as he came out from behind some rocks with a frown on his face. ¡°The Colossal Paynes have a reputation to live up to.¡± I sent the boys back to camp. They wouldn¡¯t go at first and then I explained what I needed to do. Bear loved the plan. Coot appreciated it for its deviousness, but otherwise thought we could be spending our time better. I agreed with him and gave him the role of getting back to Easter and mobilizing them. ¡°Get them guns and get them positioned. The fight is coming sooner rather than later.¡± Horse arrived then, and I jumped up onto him. ¡°Especially after what I just did.¡± ¡°I won¡¯t be able to invite you back into the gang if the raid has already started,¡± Coot said. ¡°It will make us wait until it''s over. You won¡¯t be part of it if you don¡¯t accept in time.¡± I nodded. ¡°If I¡¯m not already back, send me the invite anyway. I¡¯ll accept it.¡± ¡°Unless you¡¯re dead,¡± Bear said. ¡°Who cares?¡± I finally demanded. ¡°Levels and experience are great but the mission is about keeping Easter safe. This isn¡¯t a one and done. We make a stand today, and then we have to hold that stand. Nobody takes it. You know what you signed up for.¡± I was annoyed, but not heartless. ¡°Look. If this doesn¡¯t go the way I¡¯m hoping it will, or if you just don¡¯t enjoy this crusade as much anymore, I encourage you to own your retirement and do something else. Mine is going to be spent defending noobs, but I respect that that¡¯s not everyone¡¯s choice.¡± Coot and Bear were silent for a while before finally nodding. ¡°Thank you,¡± Coot said. ¡°Yeah,¡± Bear added. ¡°Thanks, but we don¡¯t want to quit, we¡¯re just worried about you. We¡¯re here, boss. Don¡¯t sweat it. Just try and stay alive.¡± I smiled. It was nice to have such polite and nice boys on the team. Chapter 22 Chapter 22 ¡°You still owe me those sweets.¡± Horse wasn¡¯t the type to talk much when we were running. I don¡¯t know if it was because it just wasn¡¯t easy to do or if he liked the ride as much as I did. When your horse is intelligent and can speak, it¡¯s appreciated when they let you have the quiet moments that you can enjoy. That¡¯s why I knew that my current course of action had Horse scared. He hadn¡¯t shut up since I had left Bear and Coot. I was beginning to think that he really didn¡¯t like getting shot. ¡°Aberdine, huh?¡± he went on. ¡°There are a lot of cops in Aberdine. I¡¯d say at least as many as in Saint Emile, and that¡¯s three times the size of Aberdine. Is there any reason that we¡¯re headed to Aberdine and not one of the other, less policed, cities?¡± My lips curled into a smile. I liked torturing the poor animal. ¡°Because it has so many cops and perfect rooftops for taking cover.¡± ¡°Are you going to start a raid by yourself?¡± Horse asked. It was surprising because he knew the gist of my plan and that hadn¡¯t been part of it at all. ¡°You know I¡¯m not,¡± I called him out. ¡°What kind of question is that?¡± ¡°I get the basic idea,¡± he said, ¡°but that idea is pretty stupid, so I figured you were probably doing more than one stupid thing, and it crossed my mind that the Colossals couldn¡¯t start a raid in Easter if one had already been started for them in Aberdine.¡± I actually hadn¡¯t known that but it made sense. If they could hit every town at the same time, then it wouldn¡¯t matter if they lost because the experience and pay could be multiplied by the number of people in your gang. Then I remembered what the manual had said. ¡°Only gang leaders can start raids, so that¡¯s not happening.¡±¡± We were entering Aberdine as the sun was coming up from the same cemetery where Coot had lost his head. The road curved down the hill and by the courthouse. ¡°Oh my,¡± Horse¡¯s voice went up an octave and he started huffing in and out. ¡°You¡¯re going right toward the police. Yup, that¡¯s what you¡¯re doing. Shit.¡± I tugged the reins and directed him toward the three guys who best fit the description of what I had in my mind as a ¡®constable.¡¯ They had blue uniforms on with round hats that flared at the bottom. It looked like something from a period piece in Europe. ¡°Howdy.¡± I tipped my hat to them as I pulled on the reins to stop Horse. ¡°No, no, no, no,¡± Horse was whispering. I patted him on the neck and was only mildly hopeful that these men couldn¡¯t understand him as Joan could. ¡°Hello ma¡¯am,¡± the front most one replied with a nod of his head. He had a thick mustache. ¡°How can we help you today?¡± ¡°Are you familiar with the gang the Colossal Paynes?¡± I asked. All of their eyes went wide. ¡°Why, miss? Are they planning a raid?¡± I shook my head and pushed down my feelings. Only a few days ago, I had been concerned with the killing of anybody, now here I was, about to make a very ruthless decision. For a good cause, I reminded myself. ¡°Yes, but not here.¡± I nodded back the way that I had come. ¡°Easter is looking to get hit this morning. That¡¯s where you¡¯ll be able to find them.¡± ¡°Find them, miss?¡± Mustache asked. ¡°As much as we feel for the plight of Easter, we have no current reason to go after the Colossal Paynes at this moment.¡± ¡°Not yet,¡± I said. Then I pulled out a stick of dynamite, lit it with my mind, and tossed it at their feet. ¡°Shit, damn, shit,¡± Horse just took off without me prompting him. Unfortunately for me, he took off toward the water and away from the buildings. I drew my pistol and swung off, hitting the brick streets harder than I meant to and tumbling a bit. Righting myself, I drew my Bolt Action Rifle and sprinted toward the nearest ladder on the side of a building that I could find. My wanted level was flashing at the top of my HUD. I got to the ladder and did a quick spin to see who was running up on me. My minimap was flashing red in the direction that we had blown up the constables, but no one was visible yet. I raised the rifle and took in the surroundings. A woman who looked closer to my earthly age came around the corner of the building and froze when she saw me. I gave a quick wave and gulped. ¡°Hi,¡± I said. ¡°Oh, and I¡¯m really sorry about this.¡± Auto-aim, tug up, blam. I blew off her bonnet with an unfortunate hole through her face. My stomach lurched, and I realized that while death wasn¡¯t a permanent fixture here, that these people would remember me. I would be the terror of Aberdine. Well, Aberdine had a defensive force. Easter didn¡¯t. I shot a guy running toward the sheriff¡¯s office, which turned out to be the building I was standing in front of. Then I shot a woman who looked a lot like Jane Seymour as she tried to ride her wagon out of town. This was good, but it wasn¡¯t good enough. I climbed the ladder. The roof was flat and the buildings were close enough that I could jump from rooftop to rooftop if I needed to. Correction: when I needed to. It was a game, which was easy for me to forget sometimes. So, when a posse of ten marshalls rode into town, my first thought was wondering how they had known to come so quickly. Right, the wanted level. I was just a beacon of trouble. That was good. I ducked behind the lip of the roof and squatted. One eye watched the minimap to see if anyone was going to climb the ladder, while the other took aim at the posse. I took out two of them before they dove behind cover. An idea crossed my mind to place a stick of dynamite at the base of the ladder. The idea would be that they would step over it when they climbed the ladder and not see it. I would use the time to get some space, jumping the rooftops and then shoot it at a distance. I loved that idea, but wanted to keep my dynamite, so instead I pulled out my flammable moonshine. I crouch-walked to the ladder and poured it all over where the roof touched the ladder. It didn¡¯t take much, and I still had 82% of my moonshine when I put it back into my inventory. Unauthorized usage: this tale is on Amazon without the author''s consent. Report any sightings. The break in my shooting gave them all a false level of confidence and they rushed the ladder. That had been my hope but I wasn¡¯t betting on it. Risking it, I stood and ran. Bullets hit the roof around my feet. That was when I noticed people across the street on the other rooftops. They had been moving into position during my moonshine plan. That was a problem. Going to the roof had only been a good plan when no one else was doing it. It didn¡¯t matter. At this point, I just needed to kill a few more people and then get out of here. Running across the rooftop, I slung the rifle over my shoulder and switched to one of my Farmer¡¯s Pistols. I fired blindly in their direction, letting auto-aim do its thing, but not expecting much. I was rewarded with a few hits but no kills. When I got to the edge of the roof, I didn¡¯t slow down. I leaped into the air and crossed the two foot gap, landing on the next roof and continuing forward. When I landed on the third roof, I spun around and looked back at the ladder I had gassed. Two men were already on the roof of the Sheriff¡¯s office, and one more was just getting off the ladder. My Bolt Action Rifle was back in my hands and I took aim. Auto-aim made me hit one of them, which wasn¡¯t what I wanted at all. I had to push against the pull of the programmed assistance to get the wet space just under the ladder. Bang. Whoosh. A flash of humanity washed over me with guilt and disgust as I watched the three men writhe and scream in agony before dying. I was fucking horrible. Whatever. I didn¡¯t have time for that. Turning back, I saw that a group of men had climbed up the building where I was headed. I was pinned between them and the fire. Bullets whizzed by my head with a few of them hitting me in the chest. Joan¡¯s stew did the trick, and I saw my health flash from yellow back to white but otherwise not change. I turned back toward the fire and ran. When I came to the gap between the buildings, I looked down, hoped Eve was watching, and jumped. The space between the buildings was a few feet, and the fall was more than thirty feet. It would have killed me, except there were wires between the buildings. Aberdine had electricity. It would be nice to say that I pulled an Aladdin and hooked a wire, pressed my feet to the wall, the wire snapped, and I slid gracefully down to the ground. It would also be a lie. I tried to grab the first wire, it hit my forearm and I spun. Control was entirely lost after that point. I hit another wire, a window sill, an open door that should have broken my back, and then the ground. My health had dropped by half, but I was alive. Red teardrops were moving toward me from all directions, but none were near me yet. I grabbed a piece of jerky from my bag and took two large bites before putting it back. The minimap showed that the alley behind the buildings was wide open, for now. I whistled and ran to it. Horse¡¯s icon was still by the water, but he began moving my way. I ran in his direction, which took me back toward the Sheriff¡¯s office. While I ran, I switched guns again. This time I pulled my double-barreled shotgun from my back and didn¡¯t even try aiming. The alley was thin and the law officers coming around the corner had to do so in single-file. Two shots, two dead, reload. A bullet to the back of my right shoulder spun me around and I tripped over my own feet. It hurt, which meant I didn¡¯t need to look at my health to know that it had almost taken me out. At the far end of the alley, the law was coming that way too. I fired and reloaded before deciding the shotgun was too slow and switching back to both pistols. Horse plowed through the police on my end of the alley. They didn¡¯t even seem to notice him. He knocked them over and I struggled to my feet. He was taking off and already at the cemetery before I was fully in the saddle. ¡°Eat something, you dumb woman,¡± he barked at me. ¡°Have you been shot yet?¡± I asked. ¡°Not for lack of trying,¡± was his answer. ¡°Then shut up and ride,¡± I laughed and tore into another piece of jerky. In addition to the wanted sign flashing in my HUD to show how wanted I was, there was a search radius of red on my map that showed their interest. When we left that, the wanted level began to flash. I yanked on the reins and turned us around. ¡°What are you doing? They¡¯ll kill us,¡± Horse protested. ¡°We need them to follow us, or this was a waste of time,¡± I shouted. We rode back into the red. The law was still getting onto their horses. I killed one with the rifle to remind them where I was and then waited for them to resume the chase. Then Horse turned around and continued our ¡®escape.¡¯ You have been invited to join the Pink Flamingos. Do you accept? Shit, I thought. I can¡¯t accept. Not yet. We weren¡¯t ready yet. D0C70RC007: Colossals were spotted about three miles outside of Easter. Are you close? Sammy#0421: Just leaving Aberdine. I might be late. I pulled out my stopwatch. Larry would respawn in fifteen minutes. I was still half an hour away from Easter. Sammy#0421: How¡¯s the town look? Are they ready? Panda_Bear_Polka: As ready as they can be. They don¡¯t have potions or food on them. Any damage they take will have to be fixed by us if they want to last. Sammy#0421: You¡¯re the healer. First priority is staying alive. Your second priority is to keep the townspeople alive. D0C70RC007: I¡¯m on the roof of the hotel. Bear is going to stay on the ground and use the buildings for cover. Where are you going to be? Sammy#0421: No. Get on the ground now. Place dynamite, everything you¡¯ve got, at each of the ends of town on the road. Hide them and keep them far enough from each other that they don¡¯t set each other off. Move quickly and then get back on the roof. Do not set them off without my say so unless I¡¯m dead. ¡°We need to move quicker,¡± I told Horse. ¡°Then next time pick up some horse stims,¡± he panted. ¡°This is all you¡¯re getting.¡± It was dumb to even bring up. For this to work, I couldn¡¯t move faster than the men chasing me. I had hoped that telling them the Colossals were headed to Easter would make this part unnecessary, but even in the manual it had said that the wanted level was only going to stay as long as they were searching for me. Then an idea struck me. I tugged the reins and went behind a crop of trees just off the road. My feet hit the grass and I dragged Horse into a crouch. Mostly for my own peace of mind than for any actual tactical advantage. During battles like these, the NPC¡¯s didn¡¯t seem to notice the horses. ¡°Yes, this is a great idea. They will definitely not lose you if you stand still on the path they are already traveling.¡± ¡°Shut up,¡± I elbowed him and pulled out my lasso. ¡°I haven¡¯t used this thing much. Anything that I need to know?¡± Horse didn¡¯t look at me as he answered. His attention was around the tree and staring at the stampede of lawmen headed our direction. ¡°Just aim and shoot, just like the guns. Same mechanic.¡± He mumbled something else, but I couldn¡¯t quite make it out. It almost sounded like ¡°Idiot,¡± and if I¡¯d had the time, I would have smacked him. We stayed like that for what seemed like forever. The time only stretched further knowing that Larry was moments away from starting the raid in Easter. To my relief, and moreso, to Horse¡¯s, the riders all went past us. As the last one was even with us, I stepped out from behind the trees and threw the lasso. Auto-aim worked here, too and he was roped and tugged off of his horse faster than he could realize what was happening. I ran up to him and saw that my HUD was offering to bind him. I agreed and watched as my hands worked to tie him up. Then I scooped up his heavy ass and dropped him on the back of Horse. I glanced at my stopwatch again and realized time was getting short. Sammy#0421: I need an update. Where¡¯s the Paynes right now? Panda_Bear_Polka: They stopped about two miles outside of Easter. West of us. That path that runs through the break in the cliffs to the river. I don¡¯t know why they stopped, but its buying you a little time. Sammy#0421: I know it. How goes preparations? D0C70RC007: Bombs set. People armed. I¡¯m back on the roof. Bear is handing out food and bottles of whatever to the people at each end of town. He won¡¯t listen to me. He¡¯s giving away too much. I checked my inventory and frowned. I only had a few pieces of meat left and the one tonic that Bear had given me earlier. Sammy#0421: Coot, your priority will be to make sure he stays up. Bear, speak up if you are getting hit. They both acknowledged the orders. They weren¡¯t questioning any of my decisions and I was beginning to wonder what I had done to deserve such unwavering faith. It was probably more a fear of having the entire situation fall at their feet. At least they wouldn¡¯t be to blame. No. That was a negative way to look at it. We were a team. They were my friends. We were helping each other. Now I just needed to get to that pass two miles west of Easter. Chapter 23 Chapter 23 The thing about reading a manual when your new existence is blessed with complete recall is that you have to know what you need to want to go back to that page in your mind and remember exactly that one piece of important information. The thing that I didn¡¯t know I needed to remember and for some reason hadn¡¯t stuck in the forefront of my mind was that I could clearly see where every member of my gang was if I expanded my map. And they could see me. I was almost to the pass when suddenly I was surrounded. I couldn¡¯t see them, but they were there on my map. That was why they stopped. They were trying to decide what I was doing. You have been removed from the Colossal Paynes. Oh, and Larry was alive again. The good news for this scenario was that Jim, which is what Horse had named the guy tied up on his back, was still alive and still within range of the other members of the Colossal Paynes. While I was still wanted, so were they, and now I could leave and lose the law while they stayed in their wanted level. Larry wasn¡¯t who greeted me when we stopped. TommyGunZZZ rode into the clearing. When I looked I could see the other Paynes just peeking out from behind their different covers. ¡°You dumb bitch,¡± Tommy said. ¡°You could have had a good family with us and you blew it. For what? NPC¡¯s? How stupid are you?¡± ¡°You¡¯re in for it now,¡± Jim said. ¡°Shut up, Jim,¡± Horse and I said for at least the hundredth time since capturing him. ¡°Who the fuck is that?¡± Tommy asked. I held up my finger. ¡°First of all, I already have a family. Second of all, I didn¡¯t do this just for the NPC¡¯s. I am doing it for the noobs. On your first day, weren¡¯t you confused? Lost? In mourning for the loss of your old life? And how did you process all of that?¡± Tommy wasn¡¯t used to being in charge without Larry, it would seem. So he just frowned as I continued talking. ¡°Or did some asshole in a gang show up and shoot you in the head before you could even dry off from the bath?¡± I shrugged. ¡°It doesn¡¯t matter. You don¡¯t deserve a reason from me. As for this guy,¡± I took the reins and smacked Jim. ¡°Say hi, Jim.¡± ¡°My name isn¡¯t Jim,¡± he shouted. To be fair, he had said this many times already. ¡°Shut up, Jim,¡± Horse and I said again. ¡°Jim here is some sort of law officer.¡± I let out a slow sigh. ¡°You guys notice that you¡¯re wanted, yet? Well, they were hunting me as a violent member of both society and of the Colossal Paynes. Now they are hunting you. Jim was kind enough to invite his friends along.¡± ¡°You bet your ass I was,¡± Jim smirked. I didn¡¯t like that. I hit him with the reins again. ¡°This isn¡¯t your moment, Jim.¡± Tommy was growing visibly angrier. ¡°You brought the law down on us?¡± Sammy#0421: You can send the invite, but I¡¯m still wanted. Probably won¡¯t be a problem once the raid starts. They won¡¯t be able to get to us in the town with these assholes outside of it. Panda_Bear_Polka: These assholes? Are you with them now? Sammy#0421: Don¡¯t worry about it. My part is done. Get ready to defend the town. ¡°Now,¡± I said to Horse. He bucked and Jim hit the ground. While he did that, I pulled Bear¡¯s tonic out and drank it. To the crowd, I said, ¡°You can go to Easter, have your Raid, but you¡¯ll be doing it with the law coming after you. Or you can turn around and try again another day.¡± Larry showed up then, sliding in on his horse. ¡°They¡¯ll be hunting you, too.¡± He hopped down and aimed his sawed-off shotgun at my chest. ¡°Well, not if we kill you I guess.¡± ¡°How is that sporting?¡± I countered. ¡°If you¡¯re going to start the raid, wouldn¡¯t it be more fun with competition?¡± ¡°Nope. We just want the money and experience.¡± He shrugged. ¡°If we wanted competition or a challenge, we¡¯d raid Saint Emile.¡± My map flashed red to the west and east of me. Jim¡¯s friends had just spawned in. ¡°Well, if you¡¯re the cowards that I think you are, then go ahead and shoot me and do the raid tomorrow when you¡¯re no longer wanted. Otherwise, I¡¯ll see you in Easter.¡± For a moment, nothing was happening and the world seemed to freeze. Then Larry shot Jim. Horse jerked but otherwise we didn¡¯t move. We had both talked about this happening. Jim had heard us, so it was likely that he wasn¡¯t surprised by the turn of events either. Larry turned to walk away and stopped only to touch Tommy¡¯s shoulder. ¡°Kill her and the horse.¡± I had shot Tommy dead before Larry had finished the sentence. We turned to ride away as everyone started firing. Horse and I both got hit, but my health stayed in the magical yellow from Bear¡¯s tonic. ¡°I¡¯ve been shot, again,¡± Horse shouted as we headed up the pass toward Easter. ¡°Get cover,¡± I shouted to him while looking at the map. They were here. The law was there in droves. A force of ten coming from the direction of Easter and down the pass toward the Colossals and another force of ten coming from down the river and to the west. Bullets started flying but none of them were aimed at Horse or me. He slammed his body against the rock wall of the pass as they rode by firing at the gang. Horse had hit the wall hard enough that when he pulled away to take off, I could see a bloodstain from where my leg had hit it. ¡°That¡¯s what you get for getting me shot,¡± Horse said when I mentioned it. Fine. He had a point. The law was still after me, but the greater prize was the gang. We rode all the way to Easter with barely any issues. You have been invited to join the Pink Flamingos. Do you accept? You bet your ass I do. Help support creative writers by finding and reading their stories on the original site. I could now stop using the generic chat window and return to the gang chat, which was much nicer in that it was a different shade of blue that stood out against the other notifications I was receiving. I jumped off of Horse as we came into Easter. I dug around in my bag and grabbed the sweets and almost choked him with them. ¡°Get out of here. This fight isn¡¯t for you, buddy.¡± ¡°You want to dismiss me or have me hide somewhere in case you need me?¡± He looked upset, counter to his usual kind of upset anyway. ¡°What? Are you saying you want to help?¡± I raised an eyebrow. ¡°I don¡¯t want to get killed off and go to that nothing void again until the raid is over, but if I can help the team out, yes, I want to help.¡± I hugged Horse around the neck. ¡°I just don¡¯t know what you could do that won¡¯t get you killed at this point. Thank you so much, though. Whether this works or not, you¡¯ve earned a spa day.¡± He turned to leave and stopped. ¡°You¡¯re not the worst rider. Easter doesn¡¯t deserve you.¡± I almost teared up. Instead, I smacked him lightly on the rump and watched him take off towards the woods north of town. I saw Coot up on the roof and sent both boys a message that the raid would start soon. Instead of replying in chat, Coot pointed out toward the pass and shouted. ¡°Sooner than you think. Get in position.¡± I had done a lot of thinking about where I wanted to be during this fight and the main position that I wanted, especially after the Aberdine slaughter, was to be on the roof of the Sheriff¡¯s office. Aberdine buildings were straight and tall. A lot like modern buildings back in the real world, but not nearly that tall. In Easter, the buildings were more traditionally of the old west. No ladders to get on slanted rooftops, but one look at the sheriff¡¯s office and then a glance back at the hotel and I realized they all had subtle ways to get on top of them. I climbed the stairs on the outside of the building and stopped when they turned into the door. A raid is starting in the town of Easter. Are you defending? I selected yes and then jumped straight up. There was an awning over the door into the second floor. I grabbed it, pulled myself up onto my stomach and rolled onto the roof. Then I drew my rifle and waited. From where I was standing, I could see people all over the town. They were scared but they had guns and cover. Even Hubert was standing on the porch to the hotel with a small pistol. Marcy and Henrik were across the street hiding behind some new construction going up next to the saloon. Underneath me, I could see the sheriff, who I still hadn¡¯t had the pleasure to meet yet, and Clarence from the post office. No matter how nervous they looked, they were there. That¡¯s more than they¡¯d ever done before. There were also a number of other players there that I didn¡¯t recognize, but I had expected that as well. They were why we were doing this. The level ones who had just spawned in. The people who had just found out that they were ghosts. The people who had to come to terms with the idea that a better, more real version of them got to continue on in some version of the afterlife that had their loved ones in it. Instead of this new version of them that had been barred from ever seeing those loved ones again and were instead sent to this bloody hellscape. I wish you were next to me, Tyler, I thought. Maybe it was a prayer. I don¡¯t know. Just to see you. Just to know that I was doing something you thought was worth, well, anything. My eyes started to water and I had to force that feeling down. Sorry, hubby, but your ghost will have to wait for when this town doesn¡¯t need me. Those poor souls down there were in for a surprise, but hopefully a good one. That was when I saw Bear step out of the gunsmith with Adeline. They were laughing and handing out boxes of ammunition to anyone they saw. ¡°Get cover,¡± I shouted to them. ¡°Here they come.¡± As if on cue, Coot¡¯s Volcanic Pistol roared. I brought up my rifle and looked through the scope. Sure enough, there were the Colossals. I couldn¡¯t see RadicalLarry19, but I made out Freya and a few of the others I didn¡¯t know the names of. Flashes of red on my minimap told me that they were coming from the other direction as well. That¡¯s why I had picked this spot. I swung around and brought up my rifle. There they were. They weren¡¯t an army, but they were more people than I thought were actually in the Paynes. Some were on horses, some were just running. They were spaced out, probably to stop us from using a stick of dynamite to end the entire raid. More red on the minimap and I could see folks running up from the post office. How many people were in the Colossal Paynes? I should have done a headcount while I was in the gang. It didn¡¯t matter. We had our jobs. I checked my messages one more time. Nothing new. That was ¡­ unfortunate. My rifle felt good in my hands. I raised it and took aim through the scope and gently tugged up. Headshot. I aimed from the lead runners and riders, shooting the horses of the riders first so they¡¯d trip up the rest. They hit the town like a wave. I was firing nonstop trying to keep the crowd thinned out. The group on the ground were already getting overwhelmed, but this was already a better show than the last time I had seen a raid in Easter. Reloading. As I reloaded, which was mostly automatic, I looked at my map. I was lucky that I did. The Paynes had caught onto my trick with the roof and one was climbing up behind me. My gun wasn¡¯t reloaded yet, so I grabbed my pistol and brought it up. That was a dumb move. As I lowered the rifle with my left hand and tried to quick draw my pistol up, the toothless Colossal closed the gap and swiped my arm aside. He had a hatchet. What was with this game and hatchets? Were they more prevalent in the old west? I didn¡¯t buy that. The hatchet missed my face by a hair as I leaned back and kicked out and up. The slanted roof was to my advantage as my foot caught toothless on the chin and he rocked back, dropping the hatchet and rolling off the roof. He missed the stairs, hitting the railing and falling to the ground dead. I rolled over to see someone coming up the backside of the roof. I hadn¡¯t even realized there was a way up from there. I fired and missed as he came in running laterally to me before cutting in toward me and up the incline. He tackled me around the waste, drew his pistol and placed it under my chin. Somewhere in the tackle, I had lost my weapons, but the hatchet was still right there. I picked it up and swung wildly, hitting him in the side of the head. The heat of adrenaline was coursing through my veins as I tore it from his head, got to my feet and found my weapons. I slid the hatchet into my inventory. Time to readjust. With the folks getting overwhelmed in the streets, I was going to cover them while keeping an eye on anyone approaching the roof. Adeline and Bear had their backs together as they fended off attackers. A quick glance at Coot showed me that he had his own issues. Two men had gotten onto his roof and he was grappling with one while the other was moving in for the kill. Aim, tug up, fire. The head of the one behind Coot exploded, which surprised his friend. Coot pulled a knife and shoved it into the neck of the other man before flashing me a thumbs up. Then he turned and shot another one trying to climb on his roof before dropping flat and using the roof as cover again. I spun and started picking off people around Adeline and Bear. Where had Larry found these folks? How did he collect so many? And then I got it. This was why he hit Easter all the time. He was recruiting and the more people he recruited, the easier it was to do the next raid and recruit more. That was also a good thing for the Flamingos. When Coot, Bear, and I had been fighting to gain every level and just to survive, whether literally or to get money to buy supplies, we were learning how to compete in this bloody and violent environment. That wasn¡¯t the situation for everyone in the Colossals. They had either been recruited early and had most everything done for them or they had been the ones doing the recruiting. Their plan was great if it went unchallenged, but against a group of people who had to learn everything the hard way, they were weak. Of course, that didn¡¯t account for the vast numbers they were overwhelming us with. That was when I saw the wagon. Coming down the road and aimed almost directly at Bear and Adeline was an armored wagon. I hadn¡¯t seen anything like this before. It was a cast-iron box on wheels being pulled by a team of horses. It had a metal seat at the top that was almost entirely enclosed in more of the same metal. A small window allowed for a gatling gun to be fired out of it. Oh, and the top swiveled. I fired continuously trying to shoot through that small window and hit the gunner. When that failed I tried shooting at the open seat for the driver, except he had a metal overhang that mostly covered him. Then I fired on the horses. I hated doing it, but at the same time, Horse wasn¡¯t wrong. Ride with the bad, die with the bad. The horses went down and under the wagon and it came to a very sudden stop about twenty feet from Bear and Adeline. They stood there staring at it. Waiting. A small part of me hoped that the wagon was done, but I wasn¡¯t that stupid. The rifle swung around and landed on my back, held in place by a small leather strap and weird game physics. I took four running steps and leaped. I was in the air above the street and falling. Chapter 24 Chapter 24 When the digital adrenaline is pumping, you don¡¯t think about what you¡¯re doing. I landed on a man who was raising his pistol to the back of Adeline¡¯s head. For what should have been a life ending fall, I received no damage. If this had been Aberdine, I know I would have hit several things and died before colliding with the gunman. Lucky for me, this wasn¡¯t Aberdine. He grappled with me, trying to bring his gun around to aim at me on his back. It was useless and I was able to put my pistol to his head and give him his hour of rest. ¡°What are you doing, Sammy?¡± Adeline demanded while Bear seemed to finally notice the gun on the wagon spinning toward them. ¡°Get down,¡± he shouted before diving into each of us. Bullets sprayed where he had been standing and tracked us as we all ran into the sheriff¡¯s office and dove to the floor. The gun wasn¡¯t aiming at its own people, and they pressed the advantage, following us. The three of us laid on the floor firing at anyone dumb enough to come through that door behind us. We were racking up the experience, but at this pace and with these numbers, we weren¡¯t going to be surviving much longer unless something changed. ¡°I don¡¯t know where the dynamite is,¡± I shouted over the roar of bullets peppering the building. ¡°Is it near the wagon?¡± Bear shook his head. ¡°We put it closer to where we were standing,¡± he shouted. ¡° We figured to use it when they got too close.¡± I hit the ground in frustration and checked my inventory. There were still three sticks of dynamite in there. ¡°We need a distraction.¡± I nodded to Bear. ¡°Got any more tonics?¡± He shook his head. D0C70RC007: Where¡¯d you guys go? Still alive? Wagon is making it hot out here. Sammy#0421: Pinned down in the sheriff¡¯s. Working on a plan. Stay safe. D0C70RC007: Going into the hotel. Going to take refuge in a room until things calm down a bit. Feels like they are aiming for the Flamingos. They probably were, I realized. I went and made this personal for them. Now it wasn¡¯t just a matter of winning the raid, they wanted to make us feel the hurt. I peered out the door and across the street. I saw one of the townsfolk go down in a flurry of bullets on the porch to the gunsmith. To Adeline¡¯s shop. ¡°Is your shop unlocked?¡± I asked her. ¡°Now isn¡¯t the time to upgrade your guns,¡± she said and her eyes glazed over just a little as if it was a recorded thing she had to say during raids. ¡°No, I don¡¯t want to buy anything,¡± I explained. ¡°If I ran across, could I dive in there for cover?¡± Adeline shook her head. ¡°Only I can get in.¡± I nodded, half-expecting that to be her answer. ¡°Can you do it?¡± ¡°Do what?¡± ¡°Run into the street, get the wagon¡¯s attention, not get killed and dive into your store for protection?¡± I explained. ¡°If you¡¯re the only one who can open that door, you¡¯ll be safe in there if you keep your head down.¡± ¡°What about the town?¡± she asked. ¡°The town is fucked if we can¡¯t stop that wagon.¡± She took a moment to think about it. During that time, Bear and I killed four more people trying to get in through the door. D0C70RC007: Room I¡¯m in has a window. Killed that Tommy fella. They know where I am. Sammy#0421: Hang in there, we¡¯re dealing with the wagon and then we¡¯ll come for you. ¡°We will?¡± Bear asked. ¡°Will what?¡± Adeline was confused. ¡°Will you, is what he meant to say,¡± I eyed Bear. ¡°Will you distract the wagon?¡± She shook her head, waffling between options, realizing she didn¡¯t have many, and then got to her feet, nodding. ¡°Yes, alright, I¡¯ll do it.¡± ¡°Get close to the door,¡± I said. I inched in behind her so that we were both still covered and directly next to the door. ¡°When I say go, you head straight for your store. When the gun starts shooting at you, I¡¯ll run out and directly at it with a stick of dynamite. ¡°This sounds like a plan I would have made,¡± Bear said. ¡°Not helping,¡± I shouted. To Adeline, I asked, ¡°Are you ready?¡± Adeline nodded. ¡°Go!¡± I pushed on her back lightly, but she was already moving. The problem with this plan was that the wagon wasn¡¯t going to be the only thing shooting at her or me. Adeline was halfway across the street with two new kills to her name before the gatling gun noticed her. That was when I dove out the door and stayed close to the building. I ran hard and fast. We couldn¡¯t afford for this to not work, so I needed to put the dynamite as close to the wagon as possible. ¡°Hey bitch!¡± I heard a voice call from past the wagon as I came around the corner of the sheriff¡¯s office. Freya_Trippin was running at me with a bow in her hand. An arrow whizzed by my head. Damn. She wasn¡¯t going to just let me blow up the wagon. I didn¡¯t have time for this. My tactics changed as I angled toward the front of the wagon. It had come down the same hill that Freya was running down, so this would put a big iron wall directly between us until she caught up. I let my body slam into the side, just under the cockpit, or driver¡¯s seat, or whatever the spot the wagon-driver was sitting in. And he was still sitting there and shooting at anything he saw moving which, for some reason, hadn¡¯t included me. I reached up and placed my pistol under his head and ignored the shower of blood that rained down around me. Then I pulled out the dynamite and placed it right in his dead lap. The notification asking for my mental assistance in lighting it popped up. An arrow hit me in the hip. I grunted in pain and fell away from the wagon. The notification disappeared as I was suddenly too far to light it. Having put it in his lap, I couldn¡¯t see it to aim at it. Freya was suddenly above me. I pulled out my pistol, she kicked it away. I reached for the second one, and she stomped on my wrist. The wagon continued to fire but I was in no danger from it because I was too close. In a minute, Freya would have more people coming up behind her and I would be dead. Fuck that. She was still on my wrist as I used my other hand to yank out the arrow and then I slammed it into her calf. Freya howled in pain and backed off of my hand. I didn¡¯t bother looking at my health and figured this was going to be my last stand. My death was going to cost her something. I hurt everywhere as I climbed to my feet and then tackled her. It was our third date when Tyler felt comfortable enough to drone on about football. He loved the sport and as someone who loved sports, he was obsessed with the mechanics of it. Specifically, on that third date, he was telling me why tackling someone was an art. You couldn¡¯t just hit anyone because people were top heavy. As soon as you slammed your mass into someone who was expecting it nothing was going to happen the way you planned on it happening. They can plant their feet or control your momentum. Tyler had said that if you go low, though, and hook your arms around the back of their legs, you could lift as you were running and they would lose their control. Your momentum would drive you both to the ground. Thanks again, Tyler. She hit the ground like a sack of potatoes. Thud. My punches hit her face before I realized I had decided to punch her. I was thinking of grabbing my knife and finishing her, but my fists were powered by rage. Rage at her, at her gang, at dying, at Tyler dying, at Winnie not knowing I was still out here, at a world that thought Coot couldn¡¯t be an attractive and intelligent person, at a game that continued that thought process, and at this dumb skank for calling me a bitch. A bullet whizzed over my head and clinked the side of the wagon. That snapped me out of my fury. When I looked down, Freya was a mess. Suddenly, her head sagged to the side and I got the player kill notification. Well, fuck. I just beat a woman to death. That was¡­ new. I didn¡¯t have any time to think about it. I got to my feet and limped up to the wagon. A bullet hit me in the back. I risked a glance at my health and could see that I was in major trouble. It was under 10%. I limped closer and the query popped up asking if I wanted to light the fuse. Damn straight. When the fuse was lit, I dropped to my ass right next to the wagon. It was nighty-night time. I hoped we were going to win. Probably not, but maybe they will think twice before trying again next time. Gun shots, the sizzle of the fuse, and the smell of blood were all that my senses picked up as I closed my eyes. Then there was a pinch on my shoulder and I was getting yanked away from the wagon and dragged at considerable speed. I opened my eyes and Horse had me in his teeth. ¡°Get up,¡± he mumbled through the cloth of my jacket. When I looked back at the wagon, it exploded and I was far enough away that I didn¡¯t even feel the heat. Horse let me go and I used him and the saddle to drag myself to my feet. ¡°I dismissed you.¡± ¡°I ignored you.¡± This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience. ¡°Get me to Bear,¡± I said, pointing at the sheriff¡¯s office as I climbed slowly onto the saddle. Horse was inside the building in seconds. Bear was surprised at first, but then he saw me bleeding out all over Horse. ¡°Help her out before she stains me,¡± he said. Only I could hear him, but it was funny and I coughed up blood laughing. I fell off of Horse and rolled onto my back. A timer started counting down from twenty. ¡°What¡¯s the timer?¡± ¡°You¡¯re bleeding out,¡± Bear ran up to me and went down on his knees before fumbling around in his satchel. ¡°You¡¯re going to die when that timer hits zero.¡± I must have been getting delirious, because I found that funny. ¡°Wait, you mean they are giving me an exact countdown to when I die? I can pose this time.¡± I tried to roll over to shove my ass in the air but moving was difficult and Bear pushed me back down. Ass-in-the-air would have been a hilarious old-timey photo. I never claimed to have class. Bear pulled something from his bag. It looked like a small patch of paper, or like a saline packet for one of those nasal rinses, but without the branding on it. He tore it and poured it on me. White powder dusted me and the ground around me and then disappeared. And, I shit you not, I was suddenly on my feet. My health was at 75% and I felt a lot better than I had a moment ago. ¡°What? That doesn¡¯t make any sense.¡± Bear shrugged. ¡°It¡¯s a video game. Anyone can do it. If you see a gang member down, that is.¡± Responsibility to my team snapped me back into the moment. ¡°We need to get to Coot. Did Adeline make it?¡± Bear nodded. ¡°She¡¯s hurt, but I gave her some meat before you met up with us. She¡¯s locked in her shop.¡± He pointed out the window and I saw Adeline wave, a bullet hit the wall near the window, and then she ducked back down. ¡°She¡¯s safe.¡± Sammy#0421: How are my Flamingos doing? Are you still flocking around? D0C70RC007: !!!!*#$%^&* ¡°That¡¯s probably not good,¡± I looked at Horse. ¡°Can you get us to the hotel?¡± ¡°Did I just shit on the floor?¡± he asked as the smell hit me. ¡°Get on.¡± I hopped on up and checked my holsters. Even though Freya had kicked my guns away, both pistols were still there. When they ended up back in their holsters, I had no idea. Bear placed his hands on Horse¡¯s ass and used them to help him hop up and behind me on the saddle. We ducked as he burst through the door of the sheriff¡¯s office and out onto the road. I had both of those pistols out and aimed to the front while Bear was using his guns to mow down anyone he saw on the sides. Horse was in a full gallop as bullets whizzed by us. We were halfway to the hotel when Horse was hit. He staggered, shouted something about knowing this was going to happen, and continued on until another shot knocked him and us over. Horse landed on his side and Bear and I rolled and got up. ¡°Horse!¡± I ran to him but as I did he struggled to try and get to his feet. Your horse has been wounded. Almost to him, bullets peppered the ground next to me. Bear grabbed me by the arm to try and pull me back toward some boxes that could be used for cover. To our right, and back toward where the wagon¡¯s corpse still smoldered, a large group of men were coming around the corner. ¡°Go,¡± Horse shouted. ¡°I¡¯ll be back after the raid. Just get out of here.¡± My eyes met his and I could see the man that was inside that fiery beast. ¡°You have to win this.¡± I nodded and turned to Bear. ¡°Shoot the dynamite.¡± Bear drew his Carcano Rifle and crouched, placing his elbow on his knee and taking aim. The first shot set off the stick he was aiming at. Everyone that I could see went flying, but then Bear shot again. The bullet hit the dirt about five feet in front of the explosion. At first nothing happened. Then there was a loud whoosh of noise as the ground lit up and the entire intersection was covered in flames. ¡°Moonshine,¡± Bear explained as he stood up and we resumed our run to the hotel. ¡°We put it at the ends of each street, just out of reach of the dynamite, just in case we needed to cover our backs.¡± The hotel was packed. It looked like anyone who wasn¡¯t currently behind a wall of fire on the other end of town had crammed into that single hotel. Your horse has died. You will have to wait until the raid is over to summon him again. I cringed at that and whispered an apology to my dead friend. ¡°Shoot out the window,¡± I said to Bear. I pulled out a stick of dynamite and lit it. He fired on the window with his shotgun and I tossed the dynamite in. Everyone inside tried to dive back, but crashed into the people behind them, the people on the porch turned and started firing on us. Bear and I dove into the alley and I looked for where Coot had climbed up and onto the roof. The explosion went off and I got a lot of experience from that. There was a stack of crates clearly designed, as they do in games, for climbing up. We scaled those, swung our legs up onto a second floor balcony that overlooked the road and ducked down to see if we could see through the windows. The people from the porch were already following us. I couldn¡¯t see much behind the windowed door, but Bear and I rushed through anyway. The room we entered was opened to the hall, and we could see people pushing and shoving. All of them were players. I had no idea where Hubert was. If I saw the hotel manager, I would lend him a hand, but I was only there for Coot. The sound of gunfire was constant and it made it hard to communicate with Bear. Panda_Bear_Polka: What do we do? Dynamite? Sammy#0421: I¡¯ve got one stick left. You? Panda_Bear_Polka: None. Coot and I used all ours all over the town. I nodded, lit my last stick and threw it into the hall. The explosion shook the building, but the video game seemed adamant about not destroying structures too much, so the walls remained standing. A lot more player kill notifications popped up and I peeked my head around the corner. There were still some coming up the stairs, but everyone in the hall was dead. At the end of what I assumed were the bodies from the explosion was a pile of bodies directly in front of one of the hotel rooms. ¡°That you, Coot?¡± I shouted. ¡°Yep,¡± he shouted back. ¡°Me and the manager are holding up in here.¡± ¡°We¡¯re coming,¡± I said. ¡°Then we¡¯re ending this.¡± The guys on the stairs were carrying hatchets and machetes. I wasn¡¯t too excited about that, but at this point there wasn¡¯t much they could have sent my way that would have surprised me. I drew my double-barreled shotgun and stepped out of the room. I held off on shooting until they looked at me. When they did, I was only going to have a moment. One shot, and the first two guys at the top of the stairs flew back, slamming into the men behind them. By the time I had the next shot ready to fire, Bear was quick firing into the stairs, clearing it out. I never needed the second shot. Coot and Hubert were huddled up the corner of a room. It was the first room just past the stairs and we had to step over the mound of corpses just to get in. The old codger looked worn out, but he was in one piece. ¡°How¡¯s your health?¡± I asked. ¡°Decent,¡± was the only answer he gave. ¡°How are you doing, Hubert?¡± Hubert Clark was smiling widely. ¡°I am doing absolutely wonderful. Do you know how many times those assholes have stabbed me, burned me, shot me, or thrown a hatchet into my face?¡± His eyes closed and he made a ¡®chef¡¯s kiss¡¯ motion with his hand. ¡°Payback has been sweet.¡± ¡°Gotta hurry up, boss,¡± Bear said. ¡°Something¡¯s happening outside.¡± ¡°What do you mean?¡± I asked and moved to the window that Coot had referenced before. From the window, I could see the town from the end where I had entered at the beginning of the raid. Bodies writhed in a fire in the streets, a few townsfolk milled about, looking for someone to shoot. I was hard pressed to find anyone from the Colossal Paynes who was still alive. ¡°I don¡¯t see anything,¡± I said. Just then, I got my answer. Out toward the main street, I heard a voice shouting. ¡°Flamingos,¡± the voice of RadicalLarry19 roared, ¡°get your asses out here and end this.¡± I helped Coot and Hubert to their feet and we all treaded lightly as we made our way over more corpses and down the stairs into the lobby of the hotel. Through the smoldering debris and broken windows, I saw a man in metal armor. I brought up my HUD and, sure enough, it was Larry. He had armored up. ¡°This isn¡¯t done,¡± he shouted. ¡°The rest of my cowards might be running, but,¡± a bullet clinked against his armor from behind and he turned to stare through the helmet at Henrik, standing over the body of Marcy, as he held a pistol aimed at Larry. Larry twisted and fired his sawed-off. Henrik¡¯s head exploded. ¡°As I was saying,¡± Larry turned back toward the hotel and continued, ¡°this fight isn¡¯t over until I cancel the raid or you kill the last Colossal Payne in town.¡± He spread his arms and looked around. ¡°Well, I ain¡¯t canceling the raid.¡± ¡°Didn¡¯t you kill someone in armor like that just yesterday?¡± Coot asked. I shook my head. ¡°Not without dynamite. Oh, and I died too.¡± ¡°He still takes damage when you shoot him,¡± Bear said. He was slurping peaches from a can. I stole a bite and saw my health go up a hair. ¡°The armor doesn¡¯t block damage, it just mitigates it.¡± He frowned. ¡°It mitigates a lot of it, but if we hit him with everything we got, aim mostly for the head, we should be able to bring him down.¡± ¡°Go out loud,¡± I said. ¡°That¡¯s what you¡¯re saying?¡± Bear nodded. All three of us began reloading our weapons. ¡°I¡¯m waiting,¡± Larry shouted. ¡°Shut up, you asshole,¡± I shouted back. I stepped forward and kicked open what remained of the hotel door and leveled my shotgun. ¡°Get the fuck out of our town.¡± Both barrels at once knocked him back on his ass. That gave Coot and Bear a chance to step out and fan out. Then we opened fire. I swung the shotgun back onto my back and in the same motion brought out my pistols. Auto-aim tugged and I tugged back and we gave him everything we got, spreading out and making him have to pick which one of us he was going to shoot. Once Larry was on his feet, he swung up his sawed-off shotgun and fired. Panda_Bear_Polka has been killed by RadicalLarry19. I¡¯m not entirely sure what happened next. Coot was suddenly enraged. He literally roared before running at the armored leader of the Colossal Paynes. Friendly-fire was on and that meant that I couldn¡¯t hurt Coot even if I was trying to, but I still stopped shooting. Mostly, I was confused but I also didn¡¯t want to waste any bullets. He slammed into Larry and tackled him to the ground, much as I had to Freya. Then he was punching him over and over, hitting his helmet with his bare fists. Blood sprayed everywhere, and it wasn¡¯t until the fourth punch when I realized that it was coming from Coot¡¯s hands. Figuring he was going to die anyway, I opened fire again. Something, either all of the punches and bullets or sheer luck, knocked Larry¡¯s helmet off. At the same time, Larry managed to dig a knife from either his satchel or from the ground and thrust it up and into Coot¡¯s chin. D0C70RC007 has been killed by RadicalLarry19. ¡°No!¡± I shouted and ran at him as he tossed Coot¡¯s still form off. As I got to him, he leaped at me. His body hit me around the waste and the sheer mass of it knocked the wind from me as I slammed into the ground. ¡°Now,¡± he spit as he spoke, ¡°I am going to beat you to death. Next time, maybe you¡¯ll remember that Easter belongs to me.¡± And he punched me. Over and over again. When he got tired of my face, he hit me in the chest. I gasped in pain and watched as my health dropped. This couldn¡¯t be it. I couldn¡¯t let this be it. He straddled my chest. I tried to slap at him and knock him off of me, and I wheezed as he hit me in the chest again. ¡°I remember that night,¡± he leaned in and whispered to me. ¡°I remember you hiding in the washroom. You were a good shot. That was the real reason that I agreed to let you into the Paynes, but today and all of this, you should be proud. Today was the day you almost stopped a raid by a gang of forty-eight people.¡± He let out a laugh. ¡°You three idiots almost killed all of us. I can¡¯t fucking believe that.¡± I never heard the shot, but blood was suddenly oozing out of Larry¡¯s cheek. ¡°What?¡± was all he said as a lasso went around his chest, a horse rode by us, and he was gone. Rolling over, I forced myself up while digging in my satchel for my last hunk of meat. Jemmy was suddenly by my side and helping me up. ¡°About fucking time,¡± I coughed up blood over the meat. ¡°I was beginning to think Ed was ignoring my messages.¡± ¡°We were deep in the woods and unprepared for the weather,¡± Jemmy explained. ¡°Snow and blizzard conditions. We had to wait for some of us to respawn.¡± My wounds healed up and I watched as my health filled. I walked with Jemmy as she took me to where Ed and Kenny were aiming their weapons at the tied up RadicalLarry19. I kicked him in the face. ¡°I remember that night, too,¡± I said as I knelt down beside him. ¡°I had just been told that I was dead. That everyone I cared about was gone. That I wouldn¡¯t even get the sweet touch of an afterlife with-¡± I choked up. ¡°I remember it.¡± I nodded toward the Gladiat0rz surrounding us. ¡°I told them I wanted to make Easter safe for new arrivals. I told them that I wanted to stop a bully and look at how they turned out. The entire town fought you. Two gangs banded together to,¡± I jabbed my gun against his forehead, pressing harder with every word, ¡°put-you-down. We¡¯re done taking shit from you, asshole. Yeah,¡± I smiled, ¡°I remember that night and I remember your words to me.¡± His face was red with rage as I leaned in and whispered. ¡°Welcome to Wicked West.¡± I pulled the trigger. Epilogue Epilogue ¡°He spawned a few minutes after I did,¡± Coot was explaining. ¡°I saw him pop in.¡± We were sitting around camp in the afternoon sun as Joan walked around and topped off glasses of shine for each of us. When the battle had ended, I had thanked Ed and his crew for showing up and sent Jemmy another invitation to the Pink Flamingos that she was probably still ignoring. Then I turned off the broadcast, but not until after I saw that the view counter had peaked at 102,349 people watching. Somehow, we had been the show to watch. That little fact had me silently hoping each of them were paying subscribers and that Winnie was confused about the truck load of money being dropped off in her dorm. ¡°I¡¯m surprised he didn¡¯t just start fighting you guys all over again,¡± Joan was saying. ¡°Nah,¡± I answered. ¡°He needs to rethink his position and how he¡¯ll get his payback.¡± ¡°You think so?¡± Bear looked concerned. ¡°I hope not. We were prepared for that one raid. We won¡¯t be prepared for a direct attack.¡± I shrugged and grabbed a hunk of bread that Joan was handing me. Around a mouthful, I said, ¡°We¡¯ll deal with that when it comes. Today, we celebrate.¡± Eyeing Coot as he sipped his glass, I finally asked him, ¡°What happened back there? Why¡¯d you rush him?¡± Coot looked at the ground. ¡°How many people did we have to kill? How many people did we have to defeat that wanted to hurt that town? Who wanted to hurt us?¡± He looked up and eyed each of us slowly. ¡°I got scared the last time Easter was raided. You died and I was alone, but then I got to thinking about how you put this entire crusade of yours in front of us and then told us we didn¡¯t have to.¡± He pointed at Bear. ¡°We could see it in your eyes, you didn¡¯t expect anyone to stay on for the actual fight. It was kind of hopeless. It still is.¡± He shrugged, ¡°Then we were done. All of us had made it. As a team, as a gang, we had defeated an army of assholes telling us we couldn¡¯t do it. Telling us we were less.¡± Bear nodded. ¡°Then I went down.¡± If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation. ¡°Yeah, then you went down and I just saw red. Who was this,¡± he paused looking for the right word, ¡°this monster to take our victory from us?¡± I stood up and touched his shoulder. ¡°That makes sense to me.¡± Then rage filled his eyes, ¡°It just reminded me of Miss Kentucky.¡± ¡°What?¡± Bear, Joan, and myself all said at once. Then Coot¡¯s eyes softened and a smile crested his lips. ¡°Just kidding. She was cool. Miss Florida was a piece of work though.¡± We all laughed a bit at that before settling down a bit and doing our own things. I walked back to my cot and pulled up the Stream-Time menu to go over the battle and see what I might not have seen. Halfway through the review, I got bored and started reading the comments. A lot of people were cheering for us. A lot weren¡¯t. Internet comments were usually too flattering or meant to be hurtful, there was never a lot of middle ground on that. A handful were sexual, especially around the time Jemmy came onto the scene. Folks who didn¡¯t know much about me and my past life were hoping she and I would have some sort of ride into the sunset makeout scene or something. Nice try, not gonna happen, but thanks for hoping for a happy ending. Larry¡¯s fans were in the chat, as well. A lot of comments were bordering on and crossing the line on racist remarks and I kind of loved it. Have your tantrums. I won. I stood up to head to the mailbox. Coot and I still needed to pick our professions. I think he had some sort of plan about them that I still needed to talk to him about. ¡°Hello to camp,¡± a voice called out. All of us, including Joan, were on our feet and with guns drawn the moment we registered someone else was here. Standing at the edge of our camp, near Joan¡¯s supply wagon, was a woman who looked about the age I had chosen for my avatar, in her mid-twenties. She was dark-skinned like I was and dressed in slacks, an undershirt, and suspenders, much like Coot. I pulled up the HUD and looked at her name. H0neeP0t!! Level 1 5/150 XP Profession: None Then I looked at her face. ¡°No!¡± I screamed and fell to my knees. The girl held up her hand in a small wave. ¡°Hi, grandma.¡± Wicked West 2 - Chapter 1 Chapter 1 There¡¯s a sensation that I hope you never have to experience. Given the state of our society and the unstoppable march of technological progress, I doubt my hopes are anything but shouts into the void. A little while ago I died. That isn¡¯t the sensation that I¡¯m referencing. I don¡¯t remember that part. My mind was digitally uploaded into a video game called Wicked West. Lots of murder and ole-timey fun, but otherwise, just another violent video game. No, the feeling is two-fold. First, I just found out that my granddaughter has entered this damned video game. A video game that I know you can¡¯t enter unless you¡¯ve died. So there¡¯s that horrible feeling, but also another. The moment I made this realization, I was filled with rage, terror, and my soul left my body through my feet and in that same moment, the overlord, god, or bored ruler of our little slice of digital afterlife paused the fucking game. So, I sat there with all of those emotions, staring at the digital avatar of my dead granddaughter¡ªthe very reason for my existence¡ªfilled with every possible emotion, and I couldn¡¯t even blink my eyes to shed a tear. Aside from my own tears being stopped mid-fall on my cheek, the entire scene before me looked like everyone was just taking a moment to decide how to react. We were still in camp and dusk was settling. The sky had an orange hue that would have looked attractive in an Ansel Adams picture. Joan Cremont, our hired cook and camp manager, was bent over by the supply wagon with her hands in a crate. My posse was standing by the table, where they had been when the representative from EveNet stopped by. D0C70RC007, or Coot, had his thumbs behind the straps of his dirty coveralls while he scrutinized the representative and her guest. Panda_Bear_Polka, or Bear, stood behind him. His face was completely devoid of expression. The representative was the namesake of the company, Eve. For whatever reason, she had taken an interest in me and would show up from time to time by possessing other people¡¯s avatars. The world freezing into place forced me to notice her for the first time. Whoever¡¯s skin she was wearing this time must have been chosen based on proximity. Eve looked like a farmer in a blue shirt with suspenders and brown pants. His hat was straw and rested on his head at a slant. I knew that Eve was a woman, and while she hadn¡¯t introduced herself it was easy to see who this man really was. It was Eve¡¯s eyes. Every time she took over someone new, you could see it in her eyes. They were softer, as if she actually cared about the people who lived in this world of hers. Nobody in Wicked West had eyes like that. Not for long, anyway. Next to her was a woman about the same height as myself. I still wasn¡¯t comfortable seeing myself at the age I was presenting, but this woman looked comfortable in her skin, and she should, as her age didn¡¯t need to be adjusted for this afterlife. And the face was unmistakable. That was Winnifred. That was my granddaughter. To my surprise, the entire world was not actually frozen. The man that was Eve stepped past Winnie, past my boys, and came up to me before crouching so that we could be at eye level. Her voice came out of his mouth. Eve shook her head slowly before casting a quick glance back at Winnie. ¡°We should talk.¡± *** The world vanished in a blast of white light. Slowly, images began to come into focus. Eve had transported us to some new spot. It still looked like we were in Wicked West, but instead of being at camp at dusk, we were at a small mountain cabin with fog moving around our ankles. It was calm and quiet. Until I drew my pistol and shot Eve in the head three times. My entire situation had been an exercise in getting over my shock as quickly as possible if I was going to make any sort of progress in this new afterlife. Eve surprising me with my granddaughter was a bit bigger than I had dealt with, but getting transported to a new place with nothing but my violent emotions and an entirely new set of confusing details? That had become the norm with a very standard response: Shoot everything. My hand was empty after the third shot. A quick glance at my belt showed me that Eve had made the gun return to its holster. ¡°Stop shooting me!¡± Eve shouted. ¡°What the fuck was that?¡± I shouted back at Eve. Instead of looking angry or even mildly annoyed, Eve looked sympathetic as she shouted over me. ¡°She¡¯s not dead!¡± My thoughts were a hurricane of emotion more than any single, coherent message. I drew my gun and waved it in Eve¡¯s direction as hope became a lighthouse in my storm. I let out one final grunt or roar or something of emotion before I found my voice. ¡°What?¡± Eve sighed and lowered her own hands. ¡°Have you checked your mail at all?¡± She shook her head. ¡°No, that¡¯s not fair. I know you have and this one came in when you were streaming.¡± She looked up and to the left, at a screen or something that I couldn¡¯t see. ¡°Looks like a few people are a little freaked out right now.¡± Eve turned her man-face back toward me. ¡°Mass notice went out a few hours ago. Good news for a lot of people, and a little frustrating for some.¡± I continued to stare at Eve while she spoke. ¡°EveNet and all the digital environments, the technology to upload people to video games, all of that was a product in beta testing, but that was awaiting final approvals before we could open it up to the world. One of the millions of documents that you had to sign to get here was a Non-Disclosure Agreement. It was put into place to protect you, of course, but to protect us, there was also a waiver. We personally vetted anyone who was offered this opportunity. Everyone here fit a specific profile so that we could get our numbers and prepare for the official launch, which was today.¡± Royal Road is the home of this novel. Visit there to read the original and support the author. ¡°So, more people are coming?¡± I still didn¡¯t understand how this explained Winnie being here and being alive. ¡°Way more. The worlds are going to have to have multiple servers just to keep up with the influx. We have also lowered the cost, so that this becomes the norm. Anyone can join, barring legal oddities.¡± She frowned. ¡°For obvious reasons, we wouldn¡¯t be mixing death row inmates with players in FarmTree Hillock.¡± I was more annoyed than anything. Eve was clearly distracted, as she kept checking her own screens. Whatever it was, it was leading to her burying the lead. ¡°How does this explain Winnie being alive and being here?¡± I demanded. All of Eve¡¯s distraction disappeared and she turned her focus entirely on me and smiled for the first time since I had seen Winnifred. ¡°The rules have changed. Almost all of them in some way or another have been altered with the announcement. EveNet and its world, including Wicked West, aren¡¯t for just the dead anymore.¡± She shrugged. ¡°This is more like a fancy retirement home. The living can¡¯t live here, but they can visit. One of those new rules is tied to account access. Normally, when a person dies their online accounts are handed off to a secondary so that they can be managed. Because of the unusual nature of our product, we could not do that. Now that we¡¯re public, we can. Family members get the list of people in their families that have taken part in the project and are given the option to sign up and create their own account. They can¡¯t join the actual gameplay until they pass away, but they can visit relatives for therapeutic reasons as long as it doesn¡¯t become too disruptive for the user.¡± ¡°Family can visit us?¡± I wasn¡¯t sure how I felt about that from my family¡¯s perspective, but on a selfish level it sounded too good to be true. Eve nodded. ¡°Family can visit and even do some in-game grinding to add some levels to their characters before they join on a more permanent basis. As long as neither of you make things difficult, I¡¯ve assigned Winnie as your StreamTime Media Manager. This gives her a few more freedoms than most visitors would.¡± ¡°Why me? What¡¯s so special about me?¡± I asked. Eve was personally visiting me, and this wasn¡¯t the first time. Now she was here to deliver my granddaughter to me, personally, and she was getting some sort of special role. It didn¡¯t add up. ¡°Nothing,¡± Eve answered. ¡°If a person is using StreamTime then one family member can be designated as the Media Manager. There¡¯s a few other roles that have some benefits, but that¡¯s the one that best fits yours and your posse¡¯s needs.¡± ¡°That¡¯s not what I meant and you know it.¡± As happy as I should be, I was starting to get angry. ¡°I spoke to my boys and they¡¯ve never met you. I¡¯ve barely met anyone who¡¯s met you directly, but you visit me like I¡¯m your sick aunt. I¡¯ve been getting special treatment. Why?¡± There was silence that stretched on for a while before Eve answered. ¡°I am like you,¡± she waved her hand in the air, ¡°and them. I was human first, then I died, and I was here. My world changed that day and it had nothing to do with this and my being here. A person very close to me decided that day that the world could be better if he sacrificed for it. He didn¡¯t know it, but I was one of those sacrifices. And you know what? He was right. A little bit of blood, a whole lot of tears, and sitting down and working and he did his part. He made this world so much better than it was. Then things got complicated. I wanted to do something with my new life and I started making all of this. It was an idea that grew out of what he already knew.¡± She let out a slow sigh. ¡°That was years ago, though, and to get things done, you sometimes get lost in the weeds. I am very good at putting my head down, running ahead, and not seeing where I am until it''s too late and I did that with all of this. I spent so much time building this place that I didn¡¯t think about the actual quality of life for people when they get here.¡± Eve¡¯s eyes lit up with excitement. ¡°Then you showed up and it was like I was staring right at him again. You saw this place and your first thought was ¡®I can make this a safe place to live.¡¯ You decided that this world could be better.¡± ¡°You like me because I remind you of an old boyfriend?¡± I asked. She was right, though. Since coming to Wicked West, I had done some shitty things, but even those shitty things had been to make it easier for new people to come here without being shocked back to life by the instant violence. ¡°He was my brother,¡± Eve said. ¡°And yes, but no. Today I like you because you¡¯re a good person who¡¯s doing good things, even if it costs you. Tomorrow is another day for both of us, but you have the look in your eyes of someone who doesn¡¯t get affected by tomorrows.¡± Suddenly Eve¡¯s eyebrow shot up and she smirked. ¡°Besides, haven¡¯t you been doing all of this for a little girl?¡± It was my turn to sigh. I had been. I wanted to help the people of Easter, where most new players spawned, come into this world with a gentle hand, not a bullet, but I was streaming everything I was doing specifically to earn money for Winnie. ¡°Alright,¡± I decided to look for the catch. ¡°You¡¯re saying that if I keep my cool, Winnie and I can hang out regularly?¡± Eve nodded. ¡°What about The Pink Flamingos?¡± I asked about the gang. ¡°That¡¯s going to be a lot of media managers in camp.¡± Eve shrugged. ¡°Camps are scalable, which you would know if you visited your allies or had gone all the way to RadicalLarry19¡¯s camp. Either way, Winnie was the first to sign up. She has been hounding our company for a while now over a suspicion that you were in here.¡± Even smirked again. ¡°It turns out that no matter how well you hide a user¡¯s StreamTime details, it doesn¡¯t change the fact that you just talk and act like you, even to someone who¡¯s only ever known, well, old-you.¡± A bit of pride almost made me cry at that. Of course Winnie recognized me. She was my partner in crime. She¡¯d recognize me anywhere. ¡°She can only visit you because she created an account with EveNet and signed up for our plan. No one else in your family has done that yet.¡± That was mildly disappointing, but whether Eve thought their service was cheap or not, the fact that only Winnie was here told me everything I needed to know about their payment plan. ¡°What about Coot and Bear¡¯s families?¡± I asked. Eve took a moment before she answered and visibly collected her thoughts. ¡°I am not allowed to provide any personal information about residents within the EveNet gaming properties.¡± She let her shoulders slump a little. ¡°I am sure that Bear and Coot will read their mail now that all this has happened, so they can provide that answer for you.¡± It was impossible to read Eve¡¯s emotions on the boys and their families maybe joining us, so I gave up trying. Either way, I suspected it wasn¡¯t the best news. ¡°So,¡± Eve asked, ¡°are you calmer now?¡± The short answer was no. The timeline for all of this was bothering me. They became a federally approved product more than a day ago, or else that wouldn¡¯t explain Winnie being able to get signed up, or all of the other player¡¯s family members. Contracts would need to be reviewed, announcements in the news to gather an interest, marketing would be all over the place, and then a launch party paid for by all the new users signing up. Even if they skipped the launch party, that¡¯s still weeks of work and marketing. So, why would they send an email an hour before adding everyone to the game and create so much turmoil? Turmoil was definitely the right word. Even as Eve had been talking to me, she had almost entirely been fixated on a screen I can¡¯t see that likely had the reports from all over the many games of EveNet judging by her expression. For all the heads up they should have had, this was looking like a very unsuccessful launch day. I was sure-as-hell not going to say any of that though. I was one ¡°Yes, I¡¯m fine,¡± from spending quality time with my favorite person in all of existence. ¡°Yes,¡± I answered. ¡°I¡¯m fine. Now, take me to my granddaughter.¡± Wicked West 2 - Chapter 2 Chapter 2 I made a show of holstering my pistol and crossing my arms to show that I had, although not easily, accepted the current state of things and would behave. Once I felt Eve was buying my I¡¯m-totally-not a-Karen-vibe, another blinding flash of light signaled the world changing. When I was done blinking, Eve and I were both standing where we had been when she had taken us away for our chat. I could see that the entire camp, including Joan and the boys, was still paused. As I turned my neck to take it in, I realized that I was not included in it this time. A small wave from Winnie showed me that she wasn¡¯t either. Eve cleared her throat and we both turned our attention to her. ¡°I am going to unpause your session in just a bit,¡± she explained as she scratched the stubble on her face. ¡°Before I do, you both need to know the rules.¡± Winnie was nodding. She was the stranger in the strange land and likely didn¡¯t want to ruin her chance to have a conversation with the ghost of her dead grandmother. I, on the other hand, wanted to know why the world was paused just for us, when supposedly everyone across Wicked West and who-knew-how-many games was also getting a living family member added to their crew. Eve¡¯s interest in me had been explained, but I wasn¡¯t buying it. Not all of it, anyway. If Eve admired me the same way she did her brother, that was fine, but you don¡¯t get this kind of special attention for admiration. She had something invested in me and my role here, and I needed to find out what it was. Above all of that, I was still more excited to talk to Winnie than I was in being Fox Mulder from The X-Files. I nodded. ¡°The rules are the same for everybody, but they still matter.¡± She eyed me as if these were going to be rules that I would bend at the first opportunity. ¡°Winnifred cannot do anything outside of the camp. She¡¯s basically a hired hand that¡¯s protected by the camp protections. Joan and sometimes the posse leader can give her quests and jobs for experience but she won¡¯t get it the same way you do. Also, while she cannot do anything outside of camp, she can travel outside of camp. At that point, she becomes transparent to everyone except for you and the other members of The Pink Flamingos, but she is incapable of interacting with anyone. She can¡¯t even talk to anyone else without touching you. This is meant to be your afterlife experience, and her only role is media manager and preparing for her eventual addition to this experience.¡± ¡°She¡¯s a ghost?¡± I snickered. ¡°I¡¯m the one who¡¯s dead.¡± Winnie smiled. It was one of those barely contained smiles you would normally see in a six year old. That smile that shows they only want that thing on the other side of the room that they saw, but mom is making them sit and wait patiently for them to go get it. It made my heart sing. I felt the same way. ¡°Yes,¡± Eve replied. ¡°I thought it was ironic, as well.¡± She took a breath. ¡°The other rule is on us; well, me. Nothing said between the two of you, specifically you two, not Coot and Winnie or anybody and Winnie, will be recorded or monitored. She is family and conversations between family members cannot legally be recorded. Besides the fines, I¡¯d just feel icky about it. Any time that happens, and it won¡¯t, I and EveNet experience fines and severe legal repercussions that could end everything that we¡¯re doing here.¡± Her face went from the mask of a teacher reading us the rules to relaxed with a gentle smile. ¡°Well,¡± she asked, ¡°are you ready for me to resume the server? It would seem that all other liaisons are only waiting on us at this point.¡± I looked at Winnie and she looked back at me with mild confusion on her face. Likely, her expression mirrored mine. ¡°I mean I¡¯ll unpause the game,¡± she waved at the camp, indicating the still forms of Coot, Bear, and Joan. ¡°The entire game is frozen except for the groups having conversations. While we could stay like this forever, I am sure that people are interested in getting on with their afterlives.¡± I was suspicious by nature, and more so since having died. ¡°So, that¡¯s it for the rules?¡± Eve hung her head and let out a long sigh. I got the hint. ¡°I get it, I¡¯ll read the mail.¡± My hands went up in surrender. Everything around us unfroze. Everyone started to move again, and by the snap of their heads to where my new location was, just a few feet from where I had been when the world paused, it was clear that, for them, no time had passed. ¡°How¡¯d you -¡± Bear started to say, looking from where I had been to where I was, but Coot cut him off. He was looking at Eve. ¡°You went and paused the server, didn¡¯t ya?¡± Eve said nothing. ¡°That must have taken a lot of processin¡¯ power,¡± his eyes didn¡¯t waiver from where he stared at the EveNet namesake. Love this novel? Read it on Royal Road to ensure the author gets credit. Eve shrugged. ¡°Big updates, a patch here or there. It was scheduled. The moderators and myself just took advantage of it for certain folks. Details will be in your mailbox.¡± Coot nodded, and I saw that something was not sitting right with him. I liked that. Coot was smarter than anyone in this world would expect him to be. He was easily one of the smartest people that I had ever met. If he was paying attention, I was too. That all played out in the back of my mind. I was just told that we could move. ¡°Hi Gran-¡±, Winnie was cut off as I rushed to her and scooped her up in a hug so strong, I heard her gasp. This hug was the longest. This huge was too short. Behind us, I could hear the guys asking what was going on. Eve took them aside and explained. When Winnie and I broke from our embrace, I could see that I wasn¡¯t the only one who had been crying. ¡°I have missed you so much,¡± we said at the same time before snot-laughing. ¡°Well,¡± Winnie¡¯s smile took up most of her face, ¡°you¡¯ve been busy, haven¡¯t you? Where¡¯d you learn to do half of that stuff you did during the raid?¡± I smirked as I wiped my face. ¡°What? You didn¡¯t know your grandmother was such a badass?¡± I stopped as what she said hit the rest of my brain. ¡°Wait? How¡¯d you know about the raid?¡± Winnie¡¯s smile didn¡¯t stop as she explained. ¡°I watch StreamTime, that¡¯s how I started to put together the pieces that this might be a place where you ended up. They didn¡¯t just assign me as your media manager for no reason. I actually applied to work at EveNet to integrate StreamTime more directly into their gaming environments.¡± ¡°Eve said bills were tight, but it sounds like you found a decent job.¡± I said. Winnie nodded. ¡°Bills have been tight, but then I got a call from EveNet about an incoming deposit. That told me that one of you had to be in a game somewhere.¡± One of us. She meant me or Tyler. My happiness dipped for only a moment at the idea of him not being here, before her smile reminded me to be in the moment. Winnie wasn¡¯t slowing down her explanation. ¡°From that, it was only a couple of internet searches before I found out what families generally make from StreamTime, what streamers were the more popular ones, and who was the most popular in the last few days. Once I figured that out and felt like I recognized most of your mannerisms, my phone rang again.¡± I rolled my eyes. ¡°Eve?¡± Winnie nodded. ¡°She had caught onto my arm-chair detecting and decided to meet me before I stormed their headquarters.¡± My granddaughter was impressive. ¡°But it¡¯s only been a few days. How are we that popular?¡± It was Coot who spoke up, reminding me that Winnie and I were not alone. ¡°Well, boss,¡± he said, ¡°that¡¯s the easy one. They¡¯re watching us ¡®cause we¡¯re different.¡± ¡°Different?¡± I asked him, but Winnie answered. ¡°Exactly. People watch StreamTime for three reasons,¡± she held up three fingers as she counted them off. ¡°One: to spot loved ones. There are entire forums dedicated to that. Most of their researchers don¡¯t even have family in EveNet, they just love a good mystery. Two: To watch the quests and jobs like its a television show or Let¡¯s Play. Streaming gameplay is an industry that covers at least a third of the revenue from online television. And three: the violence. That one is pretty simple. People love blood.¡± She dropped her hands and seemed to ramp up her excitement again. ¡°But you did everything differently. You gave them quests and violence, but all with a purpose. None of it was senseless. It''s like you gave yourself a full season story arc that you¡¯re dealing with during quests and people love it.¡± Clinically, what she was saying made sense. The part that didn¡¯t make any sense was that this was all about me. ¡°So,¡± I asked, ¡°you¡¯re saying that I blew up RadicalLarry19 and everyone started liking me?¡± Winnie shook her head. ¡°No. I am saying that you blew up Larry and did it to help the family members of all the people watching. When you declared what you were going to do, that you wanted to keep Easter safe for noobs, you gave everyone out there all three reasons to watch when every other feed only gives them one.¡± She smiled and hooked her thumbs into her waistband. That alone almost yanked me entirely out of Wicked West and into the literal afterlife. That was such a ¡°Winnie¡± thing to do. She did that almost immediately after she started walking and never stopped. When she was a toddler it led to a lot of cowboy and farmer jokes. She cut through my mind with the next sentence. Her face beamed with pride as she said it. ¡°You¡¯re the violent defender of the dead. The tickets basically sell themselves.¡± The violent defender of the dead, huh? That sounded like a show Tyler would watch. At the time, I didn¡¯t know why, but that made my smile just a little brighter. That was a lot to process and instead of getting time to process it, more just kept coming. I needed to breathe and to think, but I also didn¡¯t want to. I wanted to spend time with Winnie. She was still alive. Alive! That meant she had to get back to work, a life, friends, and living family. She couldn¡¯t be here all the time. I turned to Eve. ¡°What happens to Winnie when she leaves Wicked West?¡± Eve had been silently observing us, but I had a feeling she had also been managing some other situations somewhere. When she realized I was speaking to her, she started and then stepped forward. ¡°When Winnie leaves?¡± Eve repeated. ¡°A Base-Model of Winnie¡¯s artificial intelligence will take over her body. Kind of like an experience farm. Winnie will gain passive experience generation for her character while the AI Winnie stays here and does camp work.¡± ¡°Wait, just a second,¡± an AI Winnie was just like an AI version of me. It was an exact copy of that person. That wouldn¡¯t only be confusing, but the ethical questions surrounding two copies of a person who fully feels like the original would be huge. Especially if this was happening in all the games on all the servers. ¡°Are you saying there will be another copy of Winnie here? That sounds wrong ¡­¡± Eve shook her head. ¡°The AI Winnie is just for data collection. Any memories of events that happen around her will be stored as notes for Winnifred to review, but it will not be Winnie. Not like the avatars that you are now. She will only be an NPC in the most literal sense. Not a person acting as an NPC as part of their retirement. Just an NPC with the, um, ¡®flavor¡¯ of Winnie.¡± That was weird, but I didn¡¯t know what to say about it that wouldn¡¯t risk me losing this gift that I had received. I nodded and decided to bite my tongue for now. I reached out and touched Winnie¡¯s shoulder. She turned away from Eve and smiled back at me. ¡°Forget all that,¡± I said. ¡°Let¡¯s go for a walk.¡± Wicked West 2 - Chapter 3 Chapter 3 When we had chosen where to set up our camp, we had done so with purpose. The Pink Flamingos had decided to act as the protectors of Easter, the small town that new players spawned into. Unlike games from when I was alive and constantly aching, these new players were all dead. Everyone who entered Wicked West by way of Easter was coming into a brand new world. It was, quite literally, their birth into their afterlife, and most of them experienced it the same way that I did: a gunshot to the face. That¡¯s a shitty way to be born and I wanted to do what I could to make sure that didn¡¯t happen. To facilitate that, the camp needed to be closer to Easter than not. That was the road that I took Winnie on. As we walked, I wondered if it looked like I was talking to myself, a ghost, or just another player. That all hummed in the back of my mind, but Winnie was at the forefront. Once we were a hundred yards or so from the camp, I let my smile drop for the first time in a while. ¡°Please,¡± I begged in almost a whisper as Winnie walked on my left, ¡°promise me that you aren¡¯t dead.¡± We hadn¡¯t even made it to the dirt road that led to Easter when she surprised me, stopped, and grabbed my hand. ¡°I promise you that I am not dead,¡± she smirked, but her eyes were wet, ¡°not yet, anyway. I am alive. I live in Darden Valley and I have a cat.¡± She shrugged. ¡°Well, he¡¯s a kitten. I just got him.¡± I hugged her again. I was never going to stop hugging her. We were both tearing up, but we managed to hold back the waterfalls this time. When we broke the embrace, I asked, ¡°What kind of cat?¡± My granddaughter shrugged again, ¡°I think he¡¯s got some Tabby in him, but I really don¡¯t know. He was a rescue.¡± ¡°What¡¯s his name?¡± I asked. She restarted the walk toward Easter and I had to catch up. ¡°Nope,¡± she said. ¡°Not telling you that. You¡¯ll laugh at me.¡± ¡°Winnie,¡± I explained, ¡°About twenty minutes ago, I thought you were dead and here you are alive and well. I can promise you this, I won¡¯t tease you over anything for at least another twenty minutes.¡± She sighed and stopped when she got to the actual road. ¡°Fine,¡± she said. ¡°I call my kitten Doctor Coot.¡± I snickered. ¡°That¡¯s adorable. It will make his day. You should tell him.¡± Winnie¡¯s face took on a darker look and I was suddenly very scared about what she might say next. As if she was about to tell me she had been lying and she was actually dead. ¡°No one is coming for them.¡± ¡°What?¡± That phrase didn¡¯t make any sense to me. ¡°Coming for who?¡± Winnie gestured back toward the camp. ¡°Coot and Bear,¡± she answered. ¡°No one from their families is going to create an avatar for Wicked West.¡± ¡°What?¡± I demanded. I was furious on behalf of my boys. How dare those people even consider themselves family if they aren¡¯t even going to opt in to visit. ¡°Why the hell not?¡± ¡°You never used to cuss like this,¡± Winnie smirked as I caught up and we started down the road toward the town. ¡°You never used to be this old,¡± I spit out. ¡°Don¡¯t bury the headline. What¡¯s going on?¡± ¡°I don¡¯t know all of it,¡± Winnie said. ¡°Eve didn¡¯t say much. There¡¯s a lot of laws and legal stuff around what she can and can¡¯t say about a dead person¡¯s personal relationships. Especially now that dead people don¡¯t necessarily stay dead.¡± ¡°We aren¡¯t zombies,¡± I mumbled. ¡°No, you aren¡¯t.¡± She agreed. ¡°Zombies would be easier. At least they don¡¯t have autonomy, like wishes and dreams and feelings and stuff.¡± Winnie shrugged. ¡°Eve said Bear¡¯s mom is the only one in his family who is physically capable, but her religion won¡¯t let her do it.¡± ¡°Religion? What does that have to do with it?¡± ¡°Things have gotten weird since you ¡­ uh, died,¡± Winnie said. ¡°Is that cool to say? You don¡¯t have some post-life trauma or anything with the word do you? Should I say, ¡®joined Wicked West,¡¯ instead?¡± The answer to that question was that I hadn¡¯t even thought about it. ¡°Died works,¡± I answered quickly. ¡°How¡¯d things get weird?¡± ¡°Well, weird regarding life and death surrounding the entire EveNet business model.¡± In my silence, she explained. ¡°EveNet did something entirely new. They gave people an afterlife, or at least sort of. A large group of people see it as the machines stealing souls to put them into the game environments. At best, they think of it as robbing Heaven of what¡¯s rightfully God¡¯s. At the worst, they think the machines are using the souls for some nefarious purpose.¡± ¡°That¡¯s batshit,¡± I said. ¡°That¡¯s people,¡± Winnie countered. Having lived through the early half of the 21st century, I knew she was right. ¡°Either way, that¡¯s not everyone or Stream-Time and EveNet wouldn¡¯t be the billion-dollar businesses they are. Even so, that means Bear can¡¯t see his mom. She doesn¡¯t even think he¡¯s real, just that he¡¯s a copy of who her son used to be.¡± I hated everything about this. People in our world will take every reason they can to put themselves and others through more pain for insubstantial concepts than for any other reason. Even if he was just a copy, what wouldn¡¯t you do to see and talk to even the memory of your passed away son one more time? She¡¯s not only hurting Bear, though, she¡¯s hurting herself and leaving the hole in her heart there a little longer than it needs to be. Stolen story; please report. Or maybe I¡¯m wrong. I hate that thought, too. What if she¡¯s right and we aren¡¯t really people and instead are just copies with access to a database of a specific person¡¯s memories? I keep wondering about how real I am and keep coming back to one phrase that probably means less in today¡¯s world of artificial intelligence than it meant back in the day. I think, therefore I am. It should be enough for me, but it isn¡¯t. I¡¯ll always come back to wondering if I¡¯m real or just a wooden kid in a toy shop. Maybe that¡¯s why Winnie¡¯s referring to me as dead didn¡¯t bother me. I don¡¯t know if I am. ¡°What about Coot?¡± I asked, but I figured that I already knew the truth. Winnie shrugged. ¡°Eve didn¡¯t say much. Only that she had to give him a letter in person.¡± That made sense, in an unfortunate way. Coot was in a unique situation. He hadn¡¯t always been an old, toothless, goofball. Before he died, he had been Miss Iowa, with the sash and everything. She¡¯d had a handful of doctorates and a dream, but no one took her seriously because she was pretty. Instead of seeing that as a disadvantage, she had wielded it like a superpower. When she died and got to the character creation screen, she had come to the conclusion that death didn¡¯t mean she had to give up her being underestimated. She picked an old, prospector-looking, toothless man and it worked out exactly as her being gorgeous in reality had. Coot literally had ¡°Doctor¡± in his username, and everyone still treated him like the dumbest man who entered the room, while I used him as the de facto planner of all of our missions. Or, at the very least, I ran every idea by him that I had so that he could point out the flaws before we all died horrible deaths. The fact that he felt he could trust me with all of this warmed my heart. And from the sounds of it, it might have turned some other hearts to stone. I was going to have to find time to take Coot aside and see how he was doing. ¡°Well,¡± I said instead of lamenting my friend¡¯s poor fortune, ¡°maybe you¡¯re here for all of us then.¡± Winnie¡¯s head snapped up, just a bit, to look at me before smiling and turning back toward the road. ¡°That¡¯s sweet.¡± She returned her attention to the path. ¡°You seem to have made a family out of a posse. They seem like nice people.¡± She chuckled and shrugged. ¡°I mean, I¡¯ve only seen the streams, so they are always murdering and shooting folks, but they seem to do it nicely.¡± I laughed and nodded. ¡°They are good people. I hope the world knows what it''s missing by them being here.¡± ¡°I think it does,¡± she said. ¡°You guys became the most popular stream overnight just by being yourselves. That kind of thing doesn¡¯t happen normally.¡± The last thing I wanted to think about right now was Stream-Time and the raid from earlier. I could see the lights of Easter in the distance as the sun started to sink behind us. ¡°Well?¡± I asked. ¡°You get to watch my life on television, tell me more about yours. What¡¯s going on in your life? Do you have anyone special?¡± My questions caught Winnie off guard but she kept walking. ¡°You¡¯re just as bad as mom,¡± she mumbled before answering. ¡°No, I don¡¯t have anyone special. I was dating a guy for a while, Freddy, but we were going different ways. It''s just me and Coot now.¡± I let out a long sigh. ¡°Are you really going to vague-book me?¡± ¡°Vague-book you?¡± She laughed. ¡°You sound so old.¡± ¡°Bite me,¡± I smiled, though. ¡°What does different directions mean to your generation?¡± This was the kind of conversation that I was worried I would never have gotten with Winnie. At my age, with only a few years ahead of me, I never expected to meet this woman. The child would always be in my heart, but I had resigned myself to never knowing the adult who now walked with me. I almost cried right then, but held back. She didn¡¯t need to see me crying anymore right now. Even with all of my adapting that I have had to do in the last week, this would take some time to get used to. Winnie shrugged in response to my question. ¡°We were living in Des Moines, but I wanted to move to Darden Valley so I could work at EveNet headquarters. Freddy didn¡¯t want to move. We weren¡¯t together long, so we both agreed to do our own thing.¡± I took that all in, but was interrupted by her next question. ¡°So, you¡¯ve had some work done?¡± ¡°Oh, you should talk,¡± I countered. ¡°You look, what? Twenty-six?¡± ¡°I¡¯m twenty-five,¡± she smiled. ¡°And this is exactly what I look like, minus the floppy hat.¡± ¡°Then, fine,¡± I let her win, ¡°you look great.¡± ¡°So do you,¡± Winnie said. ¡°That¡¯s my point. Who is this and what have you done with the aged grandmother that I would have recognized?¡± I shook my head at her. ¡°Have you not looked through one damned photo album? Seriously, did you think that when I died and you met me up at the pearly gates, that I would have picked something better than saggy butt cheeks and veiny skin?¡± I waved a hand up and down to indicate my entire self. ¡°This was me in my late 20¡¯s, the me that I always feel that I really am until I look in the mirror.¡± ¡°Explain your eyes,¡± she said. Oh shit, I forgot about my eyes. Dammit. ¡°Yes, alright, you caught me on that one. But I think it¡¯s pretty good, don¡¯t you? I had the entire character-maker-thingy and the only things I changed were my age and my eye color. I think that¡¯s pretty decent of me.¡± ¡°I¡¯m just giving you a hard time,¡± Winnie surrendered. ¡°Your eyes are very pretty.¡± ¡°They better be,¡± I smirked. ¡°They cost me everything.¡± Winnie rolled her eyes. ¡°Your jokes are worse than dad¡¯s.¡± ¡°How are your parents? Lori?¡± I asked. Lori was my daughter. We used to be as close as Winnie and I had become, and as far as I knew, we still were. When Winnie was born, Lori and her husband, Jordan, had been trying to hold down two jobs each. It wasn¡¯t that we had grown apart, so much as we just revolved around each other, with me watching Winnie and them having to work all the time. ¡°Mom is good,¡± Winnie said with a hint of hesitation. ¡°Dad is ¡­ dad, hasn¡¯t changed much.¡± She shrugged. ¡°Mom wanted to do this, but when she found out it could be a full-time gig, she opted out. You¡¯ll probably get a message from her in the next few days, instead. Nothing phases dad. He¡¯s still just goofy about the serious stuff and serious about the goofy stuff, like always.¡± It made me happy to know that Lori had wanted to see me. Seeing Winnie had been a flood of emotions, but the one question right behind them all had been, ¡°Where¡¯s Lori?¡± As for Jordan, Winnie¡¯s father was a nerd who had a lot of emotions and some minor mental health stuff going on. Sometimes he got overwhelmed and he did his best to manage it in a way that made a lot of what he said sound flippant or just plain silly. If you knew him, like Winnie and I did, anyway, then you knew it was just him working through stuff. He had always been a great father to Winnie, and that¡¯s all I¡¯ve ever wanted from him, so I was happy to hear he hadn¡¯t changed. We were just entering Easter as the sun went down. We walked by the butcher¡¯s table and I found myself suddenly wondering if Winnie¡¯s ghost-like form could smell the meat. Or the shit. The wild west was gross. Before I could ask her, a gunshot went off. Our eyes darted toward the saloon, because of course that¡¯s where it was coming from. A man stumbled out, shirtless and in pants with suspenders. He was trying to pull his suspenders back on as he aimed the pistol back the way he had come. ¡°Well, shit,¡± I said. ¡°Another evening in Easter.¡± I checked my minimap on my HUD. He hadn¡¯t turned red for me, yet, but that just meant he hadn¡¯t decided I was someone who needed holes. That being said, my issue with Easter was that there were seasoned players who liked to kill new players that spawned here for easy experience. I was going to need to know if this man was good or bad before I did anything. Then he spun, saw us, and shouted, ¡°Ghost,¡± before emptying his pistol into Winnie. Wicked West 2 - Chapter 4 Chapter 4 My bullet tore through his skull in a gory haze of blood. River_R33L3R has been killed by Sammy#0421. +25 XP Player Kill +10 XP Headshot Before the notification had spun up, or before River_R33L3R had even hit the ground, I had spun to check on my granddaughter. Winnie was frowning, but I could see the surprise still on her face. ¡°I¡¯m still not really here, remember?¡± ¡°That¡¯s not the point,¡± I said as I pulled her in close. ¡°He didn¡¯t know that, obviously. Next time, likely in about an hour, he¡¯ll think twice before he draws his gun again.¡± I took longer than I should have to let Winnie go, but to her credit she didn¡¯t force me to break my hug on her. To fill the silence, I made a show of looking around the town to take in the damage from our earlier defense from the raid. For the good or the bad of it all, the town was healing, literally. One of the few things that made this world feel different was that damage to physical structures was never permanent. Over time, likely before the next raid can be scheduled or whatever, the scars on the buildings, blast craters in the mud, and entirely burned down structures would see their issues fade away. Then the buildings would be back to normal and the next group could act like they were the first players to have the genius idea of raiding Easter for the easy experience. Stepping over River_R33L3R¡¯s body, we walked into the saloon to a full house. Winnie followed me as I pushed my way to some chairs that weren¡¯t occupied, up on the second floor balcony, and caught up on everything that I had been missing in the real world. As far as I could tell, we took over that bar for the next hour and everyone else ceased to exist. After an hour of digital booze that, per her ¡®condition,¡¯ Winnie couldn¡¯t taste, she told me that she needed to rejoin the land of the living. I was terrified that when she logged off I wouldn¡¯t see her again and it was clear she saw that in my eyes as we stood outside the saloon hugging. ¡°I¡¯ve got to log off or Coot is going to starve to death,¡± she laughed at my concerns. She was right of course, but I hated it. ¡°I¡¯ll come back tomorrow. Either way, if you hit that record button I¡¯ll be at least paying attention.¡± Winnie took on a look of pride. ¡°I¡¯ve got a new job to do.¡± I was proud too, of her and everything she had become and still could be. I always would be. So, I comforted myself with how capable this young woman was and gave her one last hug before her avatar vanished from the realm of the dead cowboys. I meandered out of the saloon at a mildly intoxicated rate before stopping in the dark of the evening in the mud and letting out a long whistle. It had been about an hour, maybe a little more, and perhaps I might be able to locate this dummy that decided to shoot at my granddaughter and offer up some education. Well, no ¡®perhaps¡¯ about it, actually. I could see his little red teardrop on my minimap and, assuming he was a noob, I could probably find him before he even thought to look at his map. Horse, my appropriately named ride, came galloping into town before slowing down in front of me. I swung my foot into the stirrup and climbed up. ¡°Your granddaughter, huh?¡± Horse asked me. Horse was a player who had reached the coveted freedom of level 250. At 250, you could either switch games, or start swapping between them. He had decided to exercise that freedom another way and created a new character that was entirely just a horse. I nodded, even though he couldn¡¯t see me, before saying, ¡°Yup, that was her.¡± ¡°That¡¯s a lot to take in,¡± he said quietly. ¡°How are you doing?¡± I thought on it for a moment before answering. There had just been so many emotions in the last day that I was almost too exhausted to even understand what was going on in my heart or head. ¡°Scared,¡± I said at last. ¡°Scared and excited, but mostly alright, I think.¡± ¡°Good enough for me,¡± Horse said with a snort. ¡°Where to?¡± ¡°I¡¯ll drive,¡± I gave as an answer. ¡°I think we¡¯re going to try and recruit someone new to the posse.¡± ¡°New people?¡± He snorted again. ¡°That always works out well.¡± ¡°Oh?¡± I laughed at that. ¡°Well, we have nothing to worry about. I already got the shooting-him part out of the way.¡± ¡°Then this should be easy.¡± We rode out into the dark, I brought a lantern up from my satchel and held it up so that Horse and I could both see. As we got closer to where the kid in suspenders seemed to be hiding, I saw his teardrop marker on my minimap disappear and smiled. We came up to a set of bushes that I wouldn¡¯t have seen without the lantern and I stayed on the horse as I called out. ¡°I know you¡¯re there. I¡¯m not planning to shoot you, so come on out.¡± Crouched, he stumbled out of the bushes and fumbled with his pistol. He was acting as scared and intimidated as a bunny might around a big dog. I patted the pistol I was lazily holding in my lap. ¡°First,¡± I said, ¡°you¡¯re going to need to calm down.¡± I raised an eyebrow that I wasn¡¯t even sure he could see. ¡°You know where you are right?¡± He was staring at my pistol as he answered. ¡°I died. That¡¯s what the lady said. She asked me what kind of game I wanted to be in and I said I liked fishing and wanted to do something like that.¡± It all started to click then. ¡°Did you show up in the middle of the raid, then?¡± I asked. ¡°Raid?¡± He looked confused, but his gun was down a bit more, so I took that as a good sign. ¡°A lot of noise and explosions? People dead in the streets?¡± I clarified. He nodded enthusiastically and I let out a long and slow sigh. This was what I was trying to put a stop to, but it clearly wasn¡¯t going to be solved in one bloody battle with one gang. ¡°I told Eve, the lady you told that you wanted to go fishing, that I wanted to retire on a quiet farm and tend animals. One of those farming simulators that seemed peaceful. So she dropped me here, because it was the closest option out of what they had available.¡± I left the pistol on my lap and stuck out my free hand. ¡°My name is Sammy, what¡¯s yours?¡± Even though I asked him, I checked out his status on my heads-up display. River_R33L3R Help support creative writers by finding and reading their stories on the original site. Level 1 0/150 XP Profession: None ¡°You can call me River,¡± he stood slowly and shook my hand. His free hand still held his pistol loosely, but I figured that he had mostly forgotten that it was there. ¡°Well, River,¡± I said, ¡°Here¡¯s your first lesson. Do you know how to pull up your minimap?¡± ¡°The small map in the corner? Yes, I think so.¡± He answered. That made me think for just a second. Before I continued with the lesson, I figured it might be good to find out what kind of gamer I was dealing with. ¡°How old are you, River?¡± I asked. ¡°Not anything anymore,¡± he let out a nervous chuckle. I laughed with him. ¡°Gallows humor is good. It¡¯ll help you with getting used to this. What were you when you died?¡± ¡°I was, am,¡± he shrugged. ¡°I¡¯m 63.¡± ¡°A youngin¡¯,¡± I smiled. ¡°I died at 89. Afterlife can be a little rough on us older folks. River let out a whistle. ¡°Well, you look good for being almost 90.¡± I nodded at the joke. ¡°Thank you. Now, back to the lesson. You see your minimap? That red dot is me because I shot you earlier. It¡¯ll shift back to blue in a bit if we¡¯re not attacking each other. The other dot, that¡¯s a little bigger, is you.¡± ¡°Alright,¡± he wasn¡¯t looking at me, but clearly had his eyes looking at his HUD. We could not see each other¡¯s HUD¡¯s but everybody got the same look when they were reading it. I felt it looked a lot like when folks are too into their phones and can¡¯t be bothered to look up during a conversation. ¡°Now crouch,¡± I said. He did and I watched as his eyes lit up. ¡°Where¡¯d I go?¡± River asked. ¡°That is how stealth works in this game,¡± I explained. ¡°You can be as quiet as you want, but everyone, including the NPC¡¯s have a map. You will want to crouch if you¡¯re sneaking around.¡± ¡°What¡¯s an NPC?¡± River asked. ¡°Wow,¡± I laughed again. ¡°You really do love to fish, don¡¯t you?¡± He didn¡¯t get my joke, clearly calling out the man thirty years younger than me for not knowing gamer terms. ¡°An NPC is a Non-Playable Character. It just means the people who run the shops, hand out jobs, and generally aren¡¯t floundering around trying to guess what¡¯s going on.¡± I patted Horse. ¡°Get on.¡± ¡°Your horse?¡± River¡¯s face blanched. ¡°Yes, my horse. I¡¯ve got a camp where you can rest for the night. If you want, you can join my posse, but you don¡¯t have to. Either way, I¡¯ll try to fill you in on how this world works while we head back.¡± I heard shots in the distance. ¡°Get a move on. The dark doesn¡¯t stop bullets and I¡¯m holding a lantern.¡± River tried it out a few more times before giving me a confused look. ¡°I was crouched when you came up. How did you find me?¡± I chuckled. ¡°Well, you weren¡¯t crouched until we got close. The map gets a little bigger when you have an enemy on it. Are you getting on or what?¡± ¡°How do I know you won¡¯t kill me?¡± River hadn¡¯t moved his feet. I shrugged. ¡°I already did. It¡¯s never as fun the second time around.¡± It was probably an entire minute of River¡¯s face contorting through different thoughts before realizing that I was telling a joke. He smirked and then took my hand. With a grunt, I pulled him up onto Horse and behind me and let my equine companion take us back home. The ride wasn¡¯t long, but I went over the basics that I didn¡¯t quite understand when I had arrived. I directed him to take on a job at the stables tomorrow and he would end up with a horse. He didn¡¯t believe me when I told him not to be surprised if his horse talks to him. One of the odd rules around keeping the narrative for the players is that the players that decide to be animals can only be heard by their owners and other animals. This led to me trying harder to convince River that Horse could talk than trying to get him to join The Pink Flamingos. We talked about how shops work and how pricing makes less sense than it should before I spun off on the weird structure around reputation in this game. Finally, I came to my mission. The idea of making the west a little less wild for new folks. Of course, this is when River decided to call me out. ¡°You shot me as soon as you met me,¡± he said from behind me. I let a little bit of annoyance enter my voice. ¡°You shot my granddaughter. I assume that even given the most peaceful mission, there is still inexcusable behavior.¡± He agreed but didn¡¯t say anything else about my mission. I started to wonder if it would be a mistake to add him to the posse, but he hadn¡¯t accepted yet, so that was tomorrow¡¯s concern. Either way, if he accepted, I wasn¡¯t likely to say no. I can''t claim to be out here trying to do some good if I end up turning away the first person I meet who I can actually help. When we got back to the camp, I had a better idea of River. He was married when he had died and along with the trauma of learning you¡¯re dead and then waking up in Easter in the middle of a raid, he was still mourning his wife and wasn¡¯t certain how he felt about anything outside of that. Eve hadn¡¯t mentioned anything to him about the ghosts of our loved ones possibly joining and I figured that was more of a contractual thing. She probably didn¡¯t want to tell him his family could join him digitally before he had a chance to settle into the game world and whatever legal documents that entailed had been finalized. Or she just plain forgot. Joan got River a bedroll and I went over to my tent for only a moment before changing my mind. Winnie hadn¡¯t known much about what was going on with Coot and Bear¡¯s families, but she¡¯d known enough. They were probably hurting and I wouldn¡¯t be a good friend if I didn¡¯t check on them. Bear¡¯s situation seemed simpler, so I meandered over to his tent. He had a lantern on and was laying on his mat reading through a book that I couldn¡¯t see the title of. ¡°How are you doing, Bear?¡± I asked. He must have been deep into whatever he was reading, because he started at my voice. He smiled and calmed some of my fears. ¡°I¡¯m doing good, Sammy,¡± he patted the book and then glanced at where a pile of books I hadn¡¯t noticed rested. ¡°Just doing some homework. Who¡¯s the kid?¡± ¡°That¡¯s River,¡± I said. ¡°And watch who you¡¯re calling a kid around here. He¡¯s in his sixties. I shot him in the face and felt bad, so I thought he could take a look at the camp and think about joining us.¡± I pointed at the books. ¡°Homework for what?¡± He waved at me dismissively, laughing as he did. ¡°I already told you. I want to find some weed.¡± Bear held up the book he was reading. ¡°Some of the herbs that I can locate need me to read up on them before I can. Now that you and Coot are over 10, you two should be looking over your professions, too.¡± Oh shit. I had forgotten about the professions. How could I not, though. There was so much going on. Would there ever be a moment to take a breath? Coot was level 12 now and I was level 11. We should have three letters, one for each of the professions, in our mail waiting for us. I hadn¡¯t realized how excited for the profession choices I was until Bear reminded me. Well, that and the weed. I wasn¡¯t going to deny my increased interest in Bear¡¯s proclivities. ¡°I should try and read those tonight,¡± I said before changing the subject. ¡°I was really asking you about Winnie and her media manager thing,¡± I nodded toward an open letter on the table. It was white and not the normally dirty yellow of the paper we normally had access to, so I assumed it had to be the letter from Eve. ¡°And any news you might have.¡± Bear¡¯s smile shifted from the feel-good smile of a man on the hunt for weed to one that looked like he didn¡¯t really want to talk about it. ¡°Your granddaughter seems nice, and I am happy she has the job. Better her than us, no offense.¡± ¡°None taken,¡± I replied. ¡°I never understood social media or being viral.¡± ¡°Me either,¡± he said. ¡°Besides, it can only make us more money, and I am all about that.¡± He picked up the letter, folded it and slid it into the book he still held. ¡°The letter didn¡¯t say much. My mom loves me. I¡¯m good with that today.¡± ¡°Today?¡± I was genuinely confused. Bear¡¯s smile softened. ¡°I am good with it today. Tomorrow is another day. I think it¡¯ll take me a while to figure out how I feel about, well,¡± he held up the book again, ¡°what she had to say. But today, I¡¯m good.¡± With that, he laid back on his bunk and I wished Bear a good evening before making my way over to Coot¡¯s bunk. He sat on a stool and he was staring at the stark-white letter, but his eyes weren¡¯t moving. ¡°Hey, Coot,¡± I started but he held up a hand. ¡°Small camp,¡± my friend forced a smile. ¡°I heard you and Bear. I am happy that your girl is here but still among the land of the living. Making her our media manager will allow us to focus more on the jobs. I like that a lot.¡± I moved to open my mouth and Coot¡¯s open hand turned to one finger, pausing me. ¡°In no way are we discussing my letter. It is off the table to discuss until I say further. Does that work for you, boss?¡± That was a little surprising, but not unexpected. You don¡¯t have to be Coot to see that I was going to be asking everyone about what surprise the digital-gift-fairy gave them. My mouth opened to reply before I thought better of it and closed it. Instead, I nodded. Friendships mean respect. Respect means boundaries too. I could wait. ¡°Well, then,¡± I said instead, ¡°what are you doing?¡± His smile switched to something closer to genuine when he answered. ¡°I am assessing how to become a lucrative member of society.¡± ¡°You¡¯re reading through your professions?¡± ¡°I was about to,¡± Coot set the letter down and grabbed a stack of yellow ones from behind him. ¡°As you should. Bear is already a mountain man, so that¡¯s gonna affect our decisions. We should read through them and discuss in the morning.¡± ¡°Fair enough. Rest well,¡± I said as I turned back toward my bed. ¡°If you need me-¡± ¡°I know, I know,¡± he waved me off. ¡°Now get!¡± Wicked West 2 - Chapter 5 Chapter 5 When I woke up the next morning, those letters from my mailbox were still on my chest. I hadn¡¯t even realized I had fallen asleep, but I had mostly made up my mind about the direction I had wanted to go and now needed to sit with Coot and Bear to discuss our choices. Even though I had set my mind on one of the professions, I still needed to talk with my boys. We all were interested in continuing to work together and that included making our skill sets complimentary. I had never been a serious gamer and the professions seemed odd to me. Instead of picking a class and race like you would in any other role-playing game, Wicked West chose to give you an option after you got comfortable with the game mechanics. Other than being an entirely new concept to me, I loved this. If I had chosen one of those fantasy games, like Realms of the Forever King or the 16th Edition of Dungeons and Dragons, I would have had a very difficult time choosing the thing that would define me for the next 250 levels. This method, of waiting until we were level 10 before we could choose and making it seem more like a job or career, gave us a chance to figure out how everything worked in this world, make alliances, like we had, and generally get a feel for our place in this new society, made the choices more personal. Also, like those other RPG games, we could always buy into the other professions later if we chose. What was the word? Dual-specialties or something like that. Either way, we could pick what¡¯s good for us and make it even better later. These jobs also gave us abilities. Not being a fantasy game, they couldn¡¯t just say ¡°You studied and learned a new spell.¡± Instead, we had to have natural reasons for why we knew what we knew. That was why Bear was reading his books last night. He had the ability to track just about any flower or plant that we might need, but only if he knew enough information about it. I had a feeling the other professions had books with them as well. The letters themselves were also fairly immersive to the entire experience. A lot like the letter for when we hired Joan and got access to a permanent home location in the camp. At level 10 you get your letters, all three of them, but then you have to decide which one to answer, but not by actually writing a letter back. As if they had all the time in the world, each of the letter¡¯s writers was waiting at a location to meet us about the job offer. All we had to do was go to the correct location and accept. If we decided we wanted to do more than one profession, we could head to where the other two letters indicated and pay 5 gold bars. I¡¯ll admit, this world¡¯s view on money was a joke. 5 gold bars wasn¡¯t cheap, and the idea of me having to pay an employer for the opportunity to work for them made me want to write to my representative. The first letter that I read was for Bear¡¯s Mountain Man profession. I wasn¡¯t planning on taking up that one, but his search for some decent THC in this backwards world had my interest piqued. Like every document in this place, that wasn¡¯t directly from the outside world, the letter was yellowed with age, but clear enough to read. Hello Prospective Partner, I write to you with an urgent opportunity to assist in cataloging the vast wilderness that we, as a people, have strayed so far from. The need is great, but the rewards could be greater still. I''m in dire need of herbs, not just any, mind you, but specific kinds that only someone with your skill and keen eye might gather. Our survival, our very connection to this earth, depends on rediscovering the remedies nature offers. Ginseng for the gut, wild tobacco to clear the mind¡ªthese are just a taste of what¡¯s required. My husband, well, he needs pelts. His age keeps him from venturing into the forests and plains as he once did, but you, madam, have already shown yourself to be a capable hunter and gatherer. Between your travels and expertise, you could stand to make quite the fortune supplying us with what we need: pelts for him, herbs for me. This venture stands to benefit us all, but most of all, you and I. If you''re inclined to seize this opportunity, come find me in Saint Emile. I¡¯ll be waiting near the shops on the East Side, close to the train tracks. Look for the woman adorned with peacock feathers¡ªyou won¡¯t miss me. Yours in anticipation, Abigail Frond The invitation wasn¡¯t alone, though. The back of it listed the description of what benefits and totally-not-spells that being a Mountain Man would give me. Mountain Man Venturing deep into the heart of the wilderness, the Mountain Man is a master of the untamed frontier. You¡¯re the one people seek when something in the forest needs tracking, whether it¡¯s an elusive stag or a hidden trail. With your heightened senses, you can find animals and resources with ease, and your aim is steady when it counts¡ªmaking you the perfect hunter. But your talents go beyond hunting. You possess extensive knowledge of nature¡¯s bounty, allowing you to identify herbs for healing and spices to enhance the food you prepare, giving you stronger buffs. Whether you¡¯re cooking up a hearty stew or crafting remedies from wild plants, the wilderness is your larder. Of course, not every encounter goes smoothly. Did you mistakenly take out the Farmer''s beloved goose? Maybe a misunderstanding with his son didn¡¯t end well? No need to fret. Your deep understanding of the natural world allows you to disappear into the environment, easily losing pursuers in the woods. But be careful¡ªstealth is key, as even the sharpest skills aren¡¯t foolproof. This profession also includes periodic class rewards, providing you with the tools and perks necessary to further master the great outdoors. It was easy to see why Bear took this when he did. He was alone when I found him in Aberdine. The hunting and gathering nature of it would keep him alive and the ability to hide from the law just by diving into the woods was almost a no-brainer. It almost made me sad thinking about it. Mountain Man was a profession that was meant for people who played solo. Back when I was a kid, that just meant a good game with a good story, but in this parody of the afterlife it meant that he didn¡¯t expect or want to have to rely on anyone. Or that my stoner friend has always known what he was after. The pattern of the rest of the letters was the same, with a letter from the ¡®quest-giver¡¯ and a request to meet somewhere along with a description of the perks and special abilities that I would receive on the back of the letter. Stolen story; please report. Dear Friend, Word of your skills has reached my ears, and I reckon you''re the sort of person we need. We¡¯ve got a fine opportunity here in Rooster for someone capable and fearless to bring law and order to these untamed lands. There¡¯s no shortage of criminals who¡¯ve forgotten what justice feels like, and I need someone with the nerve and skill to remind them. The work won¡¯t be easy, but it¡¯ll be rewarding, both in coin and reputation. The town needs a hand in rounding up the worst of them¡ªdead or alive. And you, madam, seem just the kind of person who can handle that. If you¡¯re interested, come to the Sheriff¡¯s Office in Rooster. Ask for me¡ªFrank Dusharm. We¡¯ll talk terms, settle the details, and I¡¯ll make sure you¡¯re properly equipped for the task ahead. Lawmen are in short supply, but that makes the pay all the better for those who answer the call. I¡¯ll be here waiting. Rooster¡¯s got its fair share of problems, and we could sure use someone with your talents. Best regards, Sheriff Frank Dusharm Rooster Sheriff''s Office I couldn¡¯t deny the benefits of this job either. Especially the charm skill, which might help out my reputation stats later. Ruthless Bounty Hunter In a world where justice is as elusive as a shadow at dusk, the Ruthless Bounty Hunter is your best bet to track down those who have slipped through the cracks. When someone needs finding, you¡¯re the one to get it done¡ªwhether they''re dead or alive (though let¡¯s be honest, alive pays better, even if it¡¯s less thrilling). Your reputation precedes you, and your targets know that escaping your grasp is no easy feat. With a natural charm that puts others at ease, you excel in persuasion. Your words carry weight, and witnesses find it hard to resist your inquiries. You¡¯ve honed your skills to discern truth from deceit, able to sniff out a lie with a well-placed question. This keen intuition makes you a formidable interrogator, and those with secrets quickly learn that they¡¯d better come clean. In the heat of the chase, your aim is steady and true, allowing you to take down targets with precision when the moment calls for it. You thrive in the chaos of pursuit, turning every job into a thrilling hunt. As you carve your path through the underbelly of society, remember: the ruthless always prevail, and your skills come with the promise of periodic class rewards, sharpening your edge as you climb the ranks of the most feared bounty hunters in the West. I found myself wondering if the tracking skills would work on someone with a Mountain Man profession and, if they did, what the limitations would be. EdtheMund2021, a friend that we had made during our first attempt to defend Easter, had the Ruthless Bounty Hunter role. If we had any questions, he would be the first person that I would ask. Dear Aspiring Gold Miner, I trust this letter finds you well. Allow me to introduce myself¡ªI am Gwendolyn Harmon, a lady of some means residing in Juniper. I have a rather splendid opportunity that I believe may pique your interest, especially if you have a penchant for adventure and a keen eye for treasure. I am seeking a skilled prospector to assist me in uncovering the gold hidden within our fair mountains. The riches that lie beneath the surface could bring prosperity not just to you, but to our entire community. However, the task requires someone with both tenacity and talent¡ªqualities you appear to possess. If this endeavor captures your imagination, I invite you to join me for coffee on the deck of the Juniper Hotel. I host my morning gatherings between 6 a.m. and 10 a.m., where we can discuss the finer details of the job, as well as the rewards that await. I do hope to see you soon, as there is much to discuss, and time is of the essence in matters of gold! Warm regards, Gwendolyn Harmon Juniper Hotel The perks for the Gold Miner were selling me hard. You could know if a Bounty Hunter was tailing you just as if it was the law alert we got in our HUD when we were being chased. No matter what got chosen today by who, one of us had to have this. Gold Digger In a land where fortune favors the bold, the Gold Digger is the ultimate seeker of wealth, blessed with an uncanny knack for locating gold. You have an instinctive sense for the glimmer beneath the earth, allowing you to unearth treasures that others can only dream of. But be wary: with your skills comes attention, and it doesn¡¯t take long for others to realize that you know exactly where to find the riches. With higher payouts for jobs and quests, your ability to strike gold translates into significant rewards. You possess the coveted ¡°Prospector¡¯s Intuition,¡± a unique skill that guides you to the most promising spots to dig and reveals hidden veins of precious metal. Every expedition becomes a lucrative opportunity, and your reputation as a gold-hunting savant grows with each successful find. However, in this world, riches come with risks. Your ¡°Paranoia¡± skill heightens your awareness, alerting you when danger is near, helping you stay one step ahead of those who might want to claim your bounty for themselves. After all, no one can resist the allure of your gold. Should misfortune strike and you fall to an enemy, any gold not safely stashed in a lockbox becomes loot for the taking, making your life a constant game of cat and mouse. Embrace the thrill of the chase and the allure of wealth, as the Gold Digger thrives in the unforgiving landscape of the Wild West, always on the lookout for the next glittering prize. Periodic class rewards enhance your skills, ensuring you remain a step ahead in both finding gold and surviving the hunt. Coot definitely looked the part, but I was hoping that he would take the bounty hunter role. For a lot of reasons that had nothing to do, not immediately, with the money. I didn¡¯t want any of my boys being a target. If I had the Gold Digger profession, they would only ever come after me and the boys could use me as bait or at least avenge me and get the money back. I took a few notes as I was reading the letters, jotting down the basic skills each provided in that notebook that nobody but I could supposedly read. I didn¡¯t buy that either, as everything here was just ones and zeroes, and I was around when internet security was first invented. You can¡¯t fool me: the only safe place to store things is in your mind. Well, ¡®was¡¯ instead of is, I guess. My mind is just ones and zeroes now, too. That thought disconcerted me whenever it drifted back to the forefront of my frontal cortex and I passed out doing my best not to think about it. I was slowing gathering the letters off of my chest as the dawn was creeping up over the hills between us and Easter. ¡°Get up, gran,¡± Winnie was suddenly beside me and she wasn¡¯t whispering. ¡°You¡¯ve got to go!¡± ¡°What?¡± My girl had startled me so much that I had my Farmer¡¯s Pistol in my hand beore I realized what I was doing. Winnie eyed me with a smirk. ¡°You¡¯d already be dead.¡± ¡°What¡¯s going on?¡± Winnie was still smiling, but she had the manic look in her eyes that she¡¯d get when her dad or my Tyler was getting ready to take her hunting or to some amusement park. She was excited almost to the level of panic. ¡°What¡¯s going on?¡± She said with a heavy tone of incredulity. ¡°It¡¯s showtime.¡± I still didn¡¯t understand and I knew Winnie well enough to know that this was likely something good, but Then I saw Coot coming up behind her. That¡¯s when I remembered exactly how the dynamic might be different. Good to someone with feet still in the land of the living meant entertaining. ¡®Entertaining¡¯ for them was almost never good for us. ¡°We still need to pick our professions,¡± I said. ¡°Those skills will help.¡± Coot shook his head at me as he finished pulling up his one strap on his overalls and then began checking over his Volcanic Pistol. ¡°The only thing that¡¯s going to help us is hussle,¡± he smiled but it didn¡¯t make the trek all the way to his eyes. ¡°We can talk about it later.¡± Winnie spun away and started toward Horse with a bag in her hands. I grabbed Coot¡¯s wrist as I stood up, ¡°What is this? What¡¯s going on? His face finally switched to a level of stress that matched Winnie¡¯s level of excitement. ¡°Colonel Sanders is back and he¡¯s very angry about his missing chickens.¡± Wicked West 2 - Chapter 6 Chapter 6 It was not the Colonel Sanders of Kentucky Fried Fame, but we had taken to calling him that based on how he dressed and spoke. Whatever the person behind the avatar was like, he obviously had a sense of humor. Not-Colonel Sanders went by the name of Foghorn Lee. He runs a gang called The Midlands moving guns, moonshine, and money all across this fictionalized version of the wild west. Winnie was riding behind me on Horse, hugging my sides as she filled me in. I was following Coot while Bear rode a little behind and to my right. Leaving camp, we had traveled down and into the ravine before following the trail by the main river north. "Your chicken guy sent a messenger to camp, so he knows where you live," Winnie was explaining. "Some little guy, he couldn''t have been more than 17 years old." Coot slowed down and we came up on his right side. "He weren''t no young avatar either," Coot said, addressing my usual concern of people being too young to be in this world. "Or if he was, he was new. He was real nervous." "I would be too," Bear said from a little behind, "if I had just rode up on the gang that absolutely wrecked the Colossal Paynes yesterday." Coot shook his head."Nah, it was more than that." "He looked very unsure of himself," Winnie agreed. So, if it was a kid, then EveNet had a different age limit than I had assumed. I don''t know why, but that felt important. Winnie kept explaining, "The boy was seen by Joan first. She sent me the signal to get online. When I signed in, Coot was already up and they were both sitting with him at the table. He told us that Foghorn wanted to see you as soon as possible. He made it clear that if we didn''t make it a top priority that we were going to likely end up dead." Coot pointed at something on his HUD that we couldn''t see, but I knew that he was pointing to the map. "He said we needed to meet him an hour north of Easter at a log cabin just off the trail. It''ll have a fence and a drying rack for the meat out front." I saw Bear start loading his shotgun with red shells. "Explosive rounds?" I asked. Bear nodded. "Coot doesn''t think this will end well for us and I''m not going to let somebody named after a cartoon chicken aim a shotgun at my nutsack again if I can help it!" "The table is five feet from my bedroll," I said. "How did I not hear any of this?" "You were out," Winnie laughed. "Snoring and everything." "Alright, that''s enough of that," I said over my shoulder. "What about you, Bear?" "Unlike our crazier companions, who were both awake at the ass-crack of holy-shit-that''s-early, I was asleep," he laughed. I turned my attention back to my crazier looking companion. ¡°If it¡¯s a mission, then why are we racing off to it? These things don¡¯t usually start until we get there anyway.¡± Coot nodded in agreement. ¡°Regularly, that would be the situation, boss. But, according to our camp cooky, this ain¡¯t regular. The request said ¡®as soon as possible.¡¯ According to Joan, that put a clock on it.¡± He let out a little chuckle. ¡°The chicken czar is there now, waiting for us and he won¡¯t be none too happy if we don¡¯t make our appointment.¡± ¡°But, like, I mean¡­¡± I was stuttering it out, ¡°what¡¯s the worst that could happen if we don¡¯t go?¡± Coot twisted in his seat to square up and eye me quizzically. ¡°I am going to have to make the assumption that you are still in a groggy state of being,¡± he said, like a parent reprimanding a child. ¡°Clearly, pissing off the only mob boss we know while trying to run a protective militia around a town that is, mostly, unaware of our recent criminal enterprises would be a violently horrible idea.¡± ¡°I second that emotion,¡± Bear said. I held up a hand. ¡°Alright, fair point. Maybe next time give me coffee before you shove me onto the horse.¡± The trail went across two rivers, but I wasn¡¯t really paying attention. It could have been one river that we crossed over twice. After that, it took us into the woods. The air grew chillier as the trees began to grow taller. This forest was thick with tall pines and I found myself wondering which kinds of violent animals might be in here. Bear had mentioned once that folks can get mauled by animals while out and about. I wasn¡¯t too keen on knowing how dying to a mountain lion would feel. The messenger had given the physical directions to Coot, Joan, and Winnie, and they had shared them with Bear and I, but there was no point to it. The map highlighted the route we were on the moment I accepted the job. The highlighted path spread out on the map and I could see that we were entering the area of the meeting. This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report. Looking up, I took in the cabin. It was quaint, and larger than the cabin that we had met Foghorn Lee in the first time. Another glaring difference was the state of the cabin; it was kind of pretty. The cabin was surrounded by a roofed deck that extended the cabin look with rough-cut logs. Those same logs continued to the fencing all around the property and sectioning off the side yard from the two flower beds on each side of the path up to the home. That was the difference. This wasn¡¯t just a pretty place. It felt like a home. I wondered if this had been pulled from someone¡¯s memories or if it was the product of an artistic game developer. Either way, they nailed it. The side yard was where the drying racks for the meat were. There was a wooden table and some chairs, a fire with a stewpot over it, a drying rack, and a butcher¡¯s table. It was a nice setup and I wondered if Not-Colonel Sanders also sold meat. Perhaps we could surprise Joan with cash and a cow leg. The map on each of our HUD¡¯s showed us just on the edge of the yellow tint that indicated our mission would start once we entered it. That tint encompassed the entire property up to the fence. Once we walked in, we were not going to be able to back out. ¡°Well,¡± I turned to Coot, ¡°any ideas on how we should handle this?¡± Coot smiled at me through his scraggly beard. "You ain''t too sleepy, are ya? That was a great question.¡± He made a show of adjusting his hat and checking his pistols as he answered me. ¡°It''s been less than a day since the train robbery, but we can''t say we didn''t stop by because we were lying low. Nobody on this continent would believe that.¡± He nodded to Winnie who had mostly remained quiet once she had spilled her guts on the morning¡¯s visitor. ¡°Your wonderful granddaughter has given us more information than most get. In her tellin¡¯, we¡¯re fixing to be famous in the outside world. I¡¯d bet dollars to donuts that the game will respond to that. Everyone inside and outside the game has already heard about Easter. So we don''t lie. We explain that Easter was a side job that we were asked onto and took up once we saw that the raiders were the same people that Foghorn,¡± he snickered and shook his head at the name, ¡°double-crossed us with.¡± He nods. ¡°We¡¯re either going to get a shoot-out or a job out of this, so we might as well call him out on his back-stabbing. The way I see it, he might reward us for figuring it out and besting the Colossal Paynes.¡± He returned his attention back to me. ¡°How¡¯s that plan sound?¡± He wasn¡¯t lying about the double-cross, either. We almost failed that mission because RadicalLarry19 and his posse, the Colossal Paynes, showed up. I hadn¡¯t realized it at the time, but the folks who give out freelance jobs, good or evil, give out the same ones to everyone. If you¡¯re doing them at the same time, then you have to fight over who is going to finish it. I don¡¯t believe it was an accident that the same gang that had been griefing me since minute-1 was the same one who took up the job at the same time that we did. Clearly, neigher did Coot. I climbed down from Horse and whispered to him. ¡°This is going to go south. It always does.¡± I pulled his reins toward the fence, preparing to hitch him when a thought struck me. ¡°Hey, when I tie you off, does that slow down how quickly you can get to me when I whistle?¡± Horse shook his large head. ¡°When you whistle, the reins lose tangibility and fall through the post.¡± I chuckled softly. ¡°Right. Video game logic.¡± I nodded toward the cabin. ¡°Keep your ears open.¡± Then I turned to Winnie. ¡°Now what?¡± I asked her. ¡°What do you do and how do I not think about you during any of this?¡± Winnie¡¯s perpetual grin since I woke up this morning finally started to fade as the weight of her job took over. ¡°I¡¯ll hit the button once you guys enter. Each of your streams will go live and I¡¯ll go invisible,¡± she explained. This was her first time, but she sounded like she had done this for years. ¡°There¡¯s a sort of range from you that I can¡¯t leave, so don¡¯t wait for me if you have to go after someone. I¡¯ll still be invisible, but you will pull me along. So, just do your thing.¡± Even though she was my granddaughter, her presence made everything about this feel like some sort of movie set. Not knowing what to say back to Winnie, I gave her a thumbs up and said, ¡°Wish me luck,¡± before turning and stepping into the fenceline. I approached the deck slowly, but as casually as I could force myself. Bear and Coot weren¡¯t far behind me. My pistols were holstered and the Bolt Action Rifle was slung on my back. My hand was close to a pistol, just in case, but my boys weren¡¯t here to play polite. Coot¡¯s Volcanic Pistol was out and cocked, while Bear had his shotgun with the explosive ammo already propped against his shoulder. I stopped about five steps from the deck. "Lee!" I called out. "We''ve arrived, and the mission''s complete. But we ran into some trouble along the way, and the team''s on edge. For everyone''s safety, come out slowly, alright?" I could hear movement inside, subtle and shuffling, but there was nothing on my minimap. Sammy#0421: What? Is everyone crouched inside? This is playing like a trap. Bear and Coot both looked at me and shrugged. I drew my pistol. Sammy#0421: Bear, keep the boomstick on the door. I¡¯ll go to the left and check the sides. Coot, go around the other way and check the back and the windows. Coot took off to the right while I stepped through the gaps in the fence and moved toward the left. ¡°Hey Lee,¡± I shouted as I moved. ¡°Say something. You¡¯re making us nervous out here.¡± Polar_Bear_Polka: Boss! Bench by the racks. I risked taking my eyes from the building to look to my left at where the drying racks were. Sure enough, there was a tin cup of something still steaming in the cool morning air. The bench had blood on it, but it was wet and there was no meat on the racks. Cursing to myself, I holstered my pistol and drew the Bolt Action Rifle. Sammy#0421: Talk to me. D0C70RC007: 5 inside. All crouched. Got seen. Coming back around. Get READY! I crouched next to the nearest fence post and brought my rifle up. Sammy#0421: Lee? Coot came around the corner then and hissed, ¡°Didn¡¯t see him.¡± Then he took up position opposite me with Bear standing directly in the path to the house, his shotgun ready. The front door burst outward, slamming against the frame as a woman at least twice my side came out with a pump shotgun. She swung it in my direction and fired. It was so quick that I forgot to even duck as bits of wood exploded from the fencepost. She missed and I fell back and scrambled to get back to my minimal bit of safety behind the post. No sense pretending anymore. This was definitely a trap. Wicked West 2 - Chapter 7 Chapter 7 An explosion that I felt as much as heard erupted from Bear. The woman exiting the doorway was propelled right back through it in a haze of smoke and fire. As she went down, windows began shattering on the front of the cabin. Both windows were broken by the barrel of a gun that immediately began shooting. ¡°What in tarnation did we walk into?¡± Coot shouted at us. He could have typed it into chat and kept shooting, but he clearly remembered that Winnie was producing our ¡®show¡¯ and adjusted accordingly. ¡°A trap,¡± I shouted back, but Bear was still firing the explosive rounds and I doubt anyone heard me. ¡°Bounty Hunters,¡± Bear shouted between blasts. He was a sitting duck in the middle of the path and was doing his best to shuffle toward the fence that I was using for my meager cover. ¡°How would you know that?¡± I asked before taking another shot with the rifle at the windows. The wood next to the window exploded from my shot. I needed to calm down and focus. ¡°That woman I blew up,¡± Bear explained. ¡°I knew her. Saw her gun down somebody in my early days.¡± ¡°Players?¡± I asked. He shook his head. ¡°They respond to bounties posted by players and by larger missions.¡± ¡°Did Lee send them after us, then?¡± Coot shouted. Bear shook his head again. ¡°It¡¯s too early.¡± The volume of the gunfight was impossible to talk over and we were all too distracted to type. ¡°Later,¡± Bear finally said, and we just accepted it. That didn¡¯t mean that my mind wasn¡¯t still wondering. If this wasn¡¯t Lee, then it was likely the Colossal Paynes, but given how vocal everyone had been about our stunt with the raid yesterday, it could be just about anyone in this digital landscape. I pushed that from my head and kept an eye on the windows, waiting for someone to poke their head out. ¡°Riders!¡± Coot shouted. My eyes were torn from the windows as my head spun to first see my friend and then spun further to where he was pointing. Sure, enough, three men on horses were riding up the trail from the direction that we had come. They stopped next to our horses, but behind the fence line. I spun and fired, hitting one in the side, but he seemed barely to notice. I hadn¡¯t had a chance to examine this newest group of attackers, so I didn¡¯t notice that one of them had a bow until the arrow slammed into my thigh. ¡°They have a bow,¡± I shouted through clenched teeth. Bear spun on the toes of his feet and fired almost blindly. The exploding shell hit the lead horse in the chest and dropped the animal with its rider. Coot had already shot the rider in the head by the time he had hit the ground. Unfortunately, that wasn¡¯t going to be enough. We were exposed on all sides and needed to do something about that. Bear spun back toward the door and fired again before shooting us a message to our HUDS. Panda_Bear_Polka: Out of exploding shot. I fired again at the horse riders and caught a glimpse of Coot. He was crouched behind the fence opposite myself with both his Volcanic and his Farmer¡¯s Pistols out firing in both directions. We had to get out of here. I whistled. Horse pulled away from where he was tied up and started my way, leaping over the fence between us and ¡­ ¡­ immediately dying as the men he rode passed adjusted their aim from me to him. His blood sprayed across me before he collapsed. From my place, prone on the ground with an arrow in my leg and covered with Horse¡¯s blood, I leaned over and fired, hitting my friend¡¯s killer right in the face. I spared another quick glance to my downed friend when a bullet hit me in the arm. From somewhere between Bear and I, I heard Winnie gasp. I didn¡¯t need to glance at my HUD to know my health was dangerously low. We weren¡¯t going to last like this. My rifle was my preferred weapon at this point, but I just wasn¡¯t working fast enough. I quickly swapped it for my pistols and attempted to take stock of our options while my boys returned fire. The forefront of my mind was the pain and how close to death that I was. Whatever plan I came up with would need to take that into account. That was when I saw Coot with an arrow directly through his chest and another that seemed to be in his knee. He was moving entirely unhindered, leaping and rolling, as he fired and reloaded. Video game rules, Sammy! I said to myself before getting to my feet and ignoring all the ghost pains of my past life. That¡¯s what these were, right? Just a digital recreation of pain and how someone would feel if these things happened to them, but it was still a game. Almost every game that I had heard of wouldn¡¯t count you out until your health hit zero, so if I ignored the pain, I should move as easily as any other time in my life. I winced as I climbed to my feet, but I was so distracted, I didn¡¯t know if that was the pain in my leg or the natural reaction to bullets whizzing by over my head. Movement was much easier when I wasn¡¯t thinking about it, only lending credibility to my theory. That was also when I noticed that the three of us had started to clump together. Coot was now on the middle path only feet away from Bear and I was still climbing through the fence to join them. Coot seemed to be focusing on the two still on their horses, so I joined Bear in covering the house. As I fired, I checked my minimap for movement, but everyone was jumping between crouched and standing as they poked out of the windows and back down. Their teardrops on my map were appearing and disappearing too quickly and I couldn¡¯t get a count of how many were in there. That was when some dude came running out the front door. He must have been paying attention, because Bear was still reloading and I almost didn¡¯t notice him. He ran at Bear with a machete over his head. I raised my pistol, lifted it a bit to drag the auto-aim up to the head, and fired. Click. Shit. What happened next was entirely my body running on instinct. I put the pistol back into its holster and used my HUD to swipe through my weapon options. Normally, I would just grab what I needed physically so as to not ruin the illusion of reality that I had here, but I always had my digital inventory display that I could use without moving. I selected the hatchet I had and watched as my hand went down with the pistol and came back up with the blade. My feet were already moving and I met him two steps before he would have slammed into Bear.Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings. My hatchet sunk into his forehead and he fell to the ground in front of us. ¡°Screw this,¡± I said. Then I shouted. ¡°Push into the house!¡± There were still people in the house if the bullets were any indication, but we were running out of options. If the house was the only real cover, then we could at least die trying to do the smart thing. Bear and I tried to clear the door and our path while Coot walked behind us covering the trail. ¡°More com-¡± Coot was suddenly cut off. Bear and I couldn¡¯t help ourselves as we spun to check on our friend. An arrow protruded from his stomach. Blood poured from the wound like a facet had been turned on. There was so much blood that I hoped it was just the game being dramatic and not some recreation of what would have really happened from an arrow wound to the gut that Eve pulled from someone¡¯s memory. I might have been slowed down by the shock of it all getting piled on by the shock of seeing my friend¡¯s guts pouring out, but Bear was a surgeon on a battlefield. I didn¡¯t even see what he did with his shotgun, but he caught Coot with one arm as the man was dropping and with his other arm Bear pulled a bottle from his inventory and pressed it to Coot¡¯s lips. After killing the guy that came at Bear, I hadn¡¯t reloaded my right pistol. My left pistol came around as I saw what Coot had been shouting about when he got hit. More riders were coming, and I couldn¡¯t tell how many, yet. They were already firing. ¡°We gotta move!¡± I said. Whatever liquid Bear had given Coot, Coot was now standing on his own and firing back at the folks behind us. I joined him, covering our tails while Bear moved us forward. After another bullet shot my hat off of me, I crouched and continued to walk backwards toward the house. ¡°Left window,¡± Bear hissed out. I twisted and checked my minimap for the attacker at the window and saw my pistol was almost empty. As I continued to twist, I did the same trick I had done before, using my inventory to put the hatchet back into my hand. The first time I had seen this hatchet, someone had thrown it at me. So, I replayed the incident in real-time. The hatchet was in my hand only a moment before it was sailing through the air and into the window of the cabin. I barely noticed the experience notification confirming the kill as Bear ran up the stairs. Right behind him, but slower, I swapped my pistol for my bolt action rifle again. I was too slow reloading the pistol versus the rifle. I don¡¯t know if it was a skill issue on my part, a game mechanic related to the weapons, or what, but sandwiched between Coot and Bear was likely to be the only time that I would have to do so. During that swap was when I saw my map expand, zooming into the house itself. I realized in the back of my head that it must be because we stepped on the porch. I pushed Bear to the right so that he could cover the folks on the left side of the cabin, and I slammed my shoulder against the wall to the left of the door. I fired once at an old woman with pistols out. She dove out of my view as Bear fired twice and stepped in, sweeping right and taking out my target for me. Coot came limping in behind us, slamming the door before he collapsed into a lone chair toward the back of the main room of the cabin. I could see that another, smaller, room was to the right side with the door wide open. I ran to inspect it and called out that it was clear. ¡°Well,¡± Bear was wheezing as he tried to peer out the windows without getting shot, ¡°that sucked.¡± I went over and inspected Coot. ¡°How you doing?¡± Coot was smiling, even though he was a bloody mess. ¡°Right as rain in just a minute, Cap,¡± he held up a slice of jerky. ¡°Bear¡¯s elixir got me up and the food is healing me.¡± ¡°Good,¡± I turned and tried to keep my eyes on the windows. I saw movement at the front and back. They were circling us. I slid my rifle back to my shoulder just to take the moment to reload my pistols. ¡°How are we on resources?¡± My pistol ammo was almost gone. I had enough to fill one of the six-shooters, the other one wasn¡¯t going to leave the holster anytime soon. Coot answered first. ¡°My pistols are low, but I have a shotgun I can switch to when they are out.¡± Bear never looked away from the window as he answered. ¡°My shotgun is almost empty. I have pistol ammo though.¡± ¡°I¡¯m about the same as Coot,¡± I shared. ¡°Once my pistol is empty, I¡¯ll be switching back to the rifle, but I have plenty of ammo there.¡± A thought resurfaced and I said out loud, ¡°It¡¯s a video game!¡± Then I dove at the nearest corpse. ¡°Oh yeah,¡± Coot laughed as he slowly stood from the chair. ¡°I forgot we could loot the bodies.¡± I found about five pistol bullets and fifty cents. ¡°Yeah, some shells over here. Check the others.¡± It wasn¡¯t a lot, but we were desperate at this point. ¡°Make this easy and come on out!¡± some man outside shouted. ¡°Can I take a minute to discuss with my companions?¡± I shouted back. There was a chuckle that washed over our attackers before the original voice shouted, ¡°Sure. Get your prayers in and all that.¡± I hadn¡¯t expected that to work, but I didn¡¯t waste a second. ¡°Coot? What ya got?¡± Coot¡¯s brow furrowed. ¡°Blood outside before we got here.¡± He shook his head. ¡°I don¡¯t like that. The bounty hunters are likely someone who heard of what we did, but would have to be someone who knew about the train robbery.¡± ¡°Has to be Larry,¡± Bear said. ¡°Then what about Lee?¡± I asked. ¡°Is he dead, or in on this, or what?¡± Coot shrugged. ¡°Not enough data. We need to save the Scooby-Doo stuff for later, right now we need to be thinking on how to survive this.¡± A thought struck me. ¡°Coot, you thought this was going to be a trap anyway, right? You thought Lee was going to try and catch us off guard?¡± He shrugged. ¡°Nah, I thought we¡¯d get ambushed by the story he was selling when he was in the middle of explaining our second part.¡± I shook my head and waved that thought away. ¡°But you were expecting us to be taken by surprise?¡± Coot nodded slowly. ¡°Then give me the damned dynamite you brought.¡± Coot¡¯s eyes lit up. ¡°Oh, I forgot about that.¡± He rummaged in his satchel and gently pulled one out. ¡°I only have the one. Just haven¡¯t had a chance to restock since our raid.¡± I took it from him with much less gentility than he showed, making both of them flinch. ¡°Relax boys,¡± I said. ¡°There¡¯s only one way we¡¯re winning this and that¡¯s if they can¡¯t collect on this bounty. If I accidentally blow us up, we still win, but that¡¯s not the plan.¡± ¡°What¡¯s the plan then?¡± Bear said, pulling away from the window. ¡°They are edging closer to the porch.¡± There was a small table behind the chair that Coot had rested in. I kicked it over. ¡°Bear, get as many of them in here as you can,¡± I whispered and then turned to Coot. ¡°Get your shotgun out and get behind the table. Shoot anyone that¡¯s outside of Bear¡¯s control. If shit hits the fan, everyone get behind the table.¡± Bear was eyeing the window and the door, trying to figure out how to do what I was asking. ¡°Bear, push open the door, slowly.¡± Bear shook his head, but did what I asked. He scooted along the floor until he was between the door and the window he had been standing at before. Using that bit of wall for cover, he prepared himself with a few deep breaths. When his hand touched the door and he began to swing it open, I called out. ¡°Hold your fire! We are surrendering.¡± There was a bit of silence and I could see near the door the cloth of a man¡¯s jacket peaking out. That was the man Bear had seen coming up on the porch. He was sitting directly opposite that same piece of the wall that Bear was hiding behind. Sammy#0421: Bear - there¡¯s a man on the other side of that wall you¡¯re at. Get ready to grab him. Bear nodded that he got my message and put away his gun before pulling out a large knife. Slowly, with my hands raised, I lowered to my knees directly in front of the open door. Seeing me in such a vulnerable state really put some gas in their engines and they started marching closer. I hissed at Bear, ¡°Now,¡± and he reached around the door frame and grabbed the dude on the other side. With his one hand, Bear yanked him around and onto the floor before plunging his knife into the man¡¯s face. I flinched from that mess. ¡°Was that necessary?¡± I asked, but Bear just rolled his eyes at me. After seeing their guy get grabbed, the rushing bounty hunters all slowed down, but didn¡¯t stop, instead raising their guns, they returned to shooting. I pulled out the dynamite and used the HUD to light it. This was either going to be really cool or lame as hell. I reared back, aimed at the mass of hunters, and threw it. ¡°Yippee kay aye, mother-aww shit, damn!¡± A bullet hit me in the shoulder as I threw the explosive and it spun me. The dynamite¡¯s trajectory was shit and it slammed into the door frame before bouncing on the floor and rolling between myself and Bear. The last thing that I heard before a sepia image of my body consumed by fire and force was Bear laughing. Wicked West 2 - Chapter 8 Chapter 8 I woke up about a mile from the cabin, but I wasn''t through with it. Bear was nearby and we decided to call our Horses and meet back at the cabin so that we could suss out what went wrong. Then I told Bear that I might be lagging a bit. I wanted to talk to Horse. Horse came when I whistled, as I expected. What I didn''t expect was how calm he was. I patted his nose as he came up to me, likely expecting me to jump on and take off, but he wasn''t a normal horse and I certainly wasn''t going to start treating him like one. "I got you killed again," I said as I pulled his head into a tight hug. "Sorry about that." He pressed against me and huffed. "While getting shot is," he sighed, "literally the worst, I was playing this game long before you got here. This will not be the last time either of us dies." I shook my head as I broke the hug and climbed up and into the saddle. "No, it won''t be." Then I spurred him a little. "I''ll be damned if I don''t find out why it happened though." We rode through the woods, with Horse driving. He knew where we were going and it gave me time-enough to figure out what was going on. Immediately, the first thing that I was trying to figure out was what had happened to Coot. It was clear to Horse and me that he had to have died. He wasn''t answering a single chat message and that wasn''t like him. Then there was all of this mess with Foghorn Lee. I couldn''t figure out if this was a trap set by him but using players to do it, or if he was just a pawn in RadicalLarry19''s petty revenge on us. When we got close to the cabin, Horse slowed down. "Check your map," he said. He wasn''t whispering because I was the only one who could understand him. "I don''t see anything," I said. "I can see Bear on the backside. I don''t know what he''s doing, but if he saw anyone he''d probably tell us." Horse took off again and we came up to the still blood-soaked path that led up to the house. I hopped down but not before asking him to look around outside and let me know if he saw anything like a clue. "Is this what we do now?" He snorted. "CSI: Easter?" I shrugged, "It''s something new to do at least. Can''t always be shooting and robbing folks." Moving toward the back of the house around the right side, I had to climb through the fence and noticed all the bullet holes in the wood, the dirt, the house, just everywhere. Surprisingly, no arrows, though. When I finally found Bear, he was kneeling and looking at some marks in the dirt. "The game is doing its repairs, but we got here just in time." He pointed at the ground. "Someone died here." He frowned. "I can''t tell much more than that." He turned and walked away from the house by a few feet before stopping to point at new marks. "But any mountain man worth their spit could tell you that several horses were back that way, at the tree line, sitting still for a while before we got here." "The bounty hunters?" I asked. He shook his head. "I don''t think so. We watched most of them arrive and someone was hogtied over there." He gestured toward the fenced-in camp with the drying rack. "If I were to guess, I would say that Foghorn or someone was here to meet us, just like the quest, or job, or whatever, said, but someone got here first." "Larry?" I deduced. "I don''t know, but likely," Bear agreed. ¡°That doesn¡¯t make sense,¡± I put my hands on my hips. ¡°Larry took an NPC? He can do that? Or, what would he even do with him?¡± Then another thought struck me. ¡°Even if this wasn¡¯t a game, he is still a man in charge of some big criminal gang. Wouldn¡¯t that be like stealing Al Capone? Someone would come looking for him.¡± ¡°Not nice people, either,¡± Bear agreed. I shook my head. ¡°I don¡¯t get any of this. Why do it? Just to inconvenience us on one job? To kill us dead for an hour? And where the hell is Coot? It took me half an hour to get here, and we¡¯ve been talking for a bit. What happened to him?¡± Bear just shrugged. Coot was a resource, and would be helpful, but more than anything I just wanted to know what had happened and how he was. ¡°What if this had nothing to do with us?¡± Bear asked me. ¡°It¡¯s Larry,¡± was my immediate response. ¡°Anybody else, I would think you might be right, but this was Larry and the guy from the one job that Larry tried to screw us on. The odds of it having nothing to do with us are smaller than if it does.¡± ¡°Hey!¡± I could hear someone yelling from the front of the house. ¡°Hey!¡± It sounded like Horse ¡­ ¡­ who only I could understand. ¡°Shit,¡± I hissed, dropping into a crouch and pulling my pistol. I expanded my minimap and saw them. An entire posse of the local law enforcement. ¡°Why can¡¯t we catch a break?¡± Bear asked as he fell against the back wall of the cabin and started checking his shotgun over. ¡°No Coot or Winnie, either. Not good.¡± Then a thought crossed my mind. ¡°We¡¯ve been set up,¡± I said. I put my pistol away and turned to Bear. ¡°Put your gun away. We need information and dying just puts us right back here in an hour.¡± ¡°What are you going to do?¡± Bear hissed as I started walking around to the side of the cabin. ¡°I¡¯m fixing to get myself arrested.¡± I was halfway to the front of the house when Bear came running up beside me. ¡°I hate this,¡± he said. ¡°Me too,¡± I agreed. That was when one of the posse saw us. He snapped to attention and took aim. ¡°Over here,¡± he said to his companions. ¡°Hands in the air,¡± his voice was like something from a cop drama, but with a drawl. We continued forward, thrusting our hands up and awkwardly stepping through the fence line. I didn¡¯t even try to count how many of them surrounded us. They were all dressed in the standard cowboy browns and hats and layers and they were all aiming their guns at us. When we were ordered to stop in the center of the path to the cabin, and exactly where we had tried to hold our ground just over an hour before, the group directly in front of us parted to let a more official lawman step up to us. He looked like a doofus. I mean that in a nice way, though. It wasn¡¯t his face or clothes, so much as his bowler hat. Every single time I saw someone in one of those it took me back to The Three Stooges. What wasn¡¯t helping the memory, was that his hat was clearly covering up a bald head. Aside from the bowler hat, he was wearing a tan and brown suit. The entire thing reminded me, once I put aside the Stooges, of what the Pinkerton Detectives tended to look like in those old westerns. Every club needed a uniform and the Pinkertons had the suits with the dumb hat. Oh, and he did have a badge. It was pinned on his chest. His mama must be so proud. Sorry, I was really trying to get into the outlaw mood. Curly walked up to me and reached into his jacket. Just like some stupid movie, Bear and I flinched. This didn¡¯t slow Curly¡¯s motions, though. Just as quickly as his hand flashed into his coat, it came out with a large piece of paper that he held up. ¡°Sammy-hashtag-zero-four-two-one?¡± He asked. ¡°Since the day I was born,¡± I smirked. ¡°I am Agent Dalton Hayes of the Redbriar Detective Agency. Last night, we were given a tip that you would be here. You and your companion are under arrest for the murder of 13 men, including a gentleman of high regard in this country, Mr. Foghorn Lee.¡± He spun me around and began putting some heavy-duty looking cuffs on my wrists. ¡°Do you have anything you¡¯d like to say?¡±This narrative has been purloined without the author''s approval. Report any appearances on Amazon. Another man, dressed much like Agent Hayes, came over and began shackling Bear. ¡°Redbriar? Not Pinkerton? So, are you the discount version? Or did we get the premium package?¡± I wasn¡¯t sure if I was fishing for actual in-game information, or simply trying to piss him off. Either might be useful. ¡°No Pinkerton¡¯s here, miss.¡± His voice carried a weird sense of satisfaction with it, as if he had won some competition that I was unaware of. ¡°Just Redbriar.¡± *** We were lucky enough to get thrown into a large iron wagon with bars on the back doors and small rectangular holes near the ceiling for airflow. We sat back there with two guards. Something I hadn¡¯t noticed when the shackles went on was that I lost access to my HUD. That combined with them taking my weapons and bag, I was just a woman on an uncomfortable bench in a jerky wagon. It also meant that I couldn¡¯t talk directly to Bear without others hearing. I didn¡¯t care much about that. ¡°Think we could take them,¡± I lifted my wrists with the shackles behind my back and nodded toward the two sitting across from us. Our guards were two more of the Redbriar detectives. They both held shotguns on their laps and frowned at my question. Bear, who¡¯s head hadn¡¯t turned away from the door to our traveling prison, finally faced me. A glare was all he provided. ¡°You alright?¡± I asked my forlorn friend. He let out a long sigh. ¡°The jails here are real, and I wish we had come up with a way to tell you that before this plan. They won¡¯t execute you, they¡¯ll just stop you from escaping.¡± I shrugged, ¡°That¡¯s shitty, but it doesn¡¯t change anything. I mean,¡± I made a big shrug with my shoulders to indicate, as best as I could with shackles on, the rest of the world, ¡°all the old Coots out there, and they caught us. We¡¯re special, because we¡¯re not going to be held long.¡± My message was clear as I could make it: Worst case scenario, Coot could save us. Through gritted teeth, Bear replied, ¡°If only we knew where we were going.¡± Alright, that was a valid point. It didn¡¯t matter if Coot was out there to save us, he likely couldn¡¯t tell where we were. Except he could. We were still part of The Pink Flamingos. He should be able to see us on his map. I started to open my mouth but Bear already knew what I was thinking and shook his head. Just to clarify, he added. ¡°It¡¯s too bad these shackles close off our HUD and turn off our maps.¡± Got it. No maps, not weapons, no Coot. ¡°Where¡¯d you put him anyway?¡± the detective across from me asked. ¡°Who?¡± I had no idea what he was talking about. ¡°Lee,¡± he huffed. ¡°Who the hell did you think I meant? He should have respawned, but he hasn¡¯t. Which means you didn¡¯t murder him, you hid him away. So, where is he?¡± ¡°So, you acted on a tip without any evidence?¡± I laughed. ¡°Let me guess, law enforcement isn¡¯t new to you.¡± Quicker than I expected, he hit me across the face. When Bear got to his feet in protest, the other Redbriar hit him in the chest with the butt of his shotgun. ¡°Back down!¡± Bear grunted as he slammed back into the seat. ¡°We didn¡¯t kill or kidnap anyone,¡± I could feel blood on my split lip. ¡°We were there to collect on a job. The Kell-¡± Bear elbowed me hard. Oh right. Foghorn Lee was part of a large criminal enterprise. Whether or not the Redbriar¡¯s knew about it, I had no idea, but it wouldn¡¯t do for me to incriminate ourselves further. I shot Bear a glare with a wink that only he could see. ¡°Like I was saying; He had us running groceries out to the Kelly farm west of Aberdine. The family is sick and can¡¯t make trips on their own.¡± They smirked, which let me think they knew exactly who Lee was and they were likely corrupt. Which would also explain why they moved so quickly on a ¡®tip.¡¯ ¡°And yes,¡± Bear said. ¡°I just don¡¯t think we should yet.¡± That took me a moment until I realized he was finally getting around to answering my original question. The two across from me didn¡¯t seem to get it. ¡°No, you¡¯re right,¡± I said as I looked the one across from me dead in the eyes. ¡°Let¡¯s gather more information before we escape.¡± The looks on their faces switched from mildly entertained to annoyed, but before I could say anything, I rattled the cuffs behind my back. ¡°Also, are these for sale? These would be great to have.¡± I got hit again. ¡°Can you respawn?¡± I shouted at the one who hit me. He hit me again, this time while he laughed at me. Fuck it. I leaned back and kicked him hard in the chin. His friend started to rise, but Bear did the same move. It did little more than stun both of our guards, but it felt good. The guard across from me started to recover when I lunged and threw my shoulder into his solar plexus. He wheezed and bent forward. I was mostly still standing, even if the wagon was making it harder than not. So, I bent over and whispered in his ear. ¡°You better shoot me if you like your ear.¡± ¡°Wha-?¡± his question ended in a scream as I sunk my teeth into his dirty ear and tore at it. I looked back at Bear and his guard while mine writhed trying to catch his breath and stop the pain and blood coming from his ear. The bloody one uncorked something I laughed as I spit out his own ear at him. ¡°Chug it, baby! Grow mama another ear to bite!¡± Then I turned to Bear¡¯s guard. Bear had returned to sitting as the guard just stood, wide-legged, not sure what to do with his gun. ¡°You¡¯d better shoot me,¡± I said. ¡°Or I am going to bite your ears next.¡± A sharp pain to the back of my head ended all of my thoughts. *** Alright, I will admit that I hadn¡¯t been expecting them to knock me unconscious. I woke up to find that I had been cradled in Bear¡¯s lap for the journey. Our guards had decided that it was safer to guard us from outside of the wagon. The blood that still stained the floor and benches was satisfying. ¡°It was a nice try,¡± Bear said, noticing that I was stirring. ¡°It would have been nicer if he killed me.¡± Bear agreed and then placed a hand on my shoulder as I started to get up. ¡°Slow, you might have a concussion. Also,¡± he tugged at a fur blanket that was on top of me that I hadn¡¯t noticed was there, ¡°you might want to keep that on.¡± That was when I noticed how cold I was. It was damned near freezing in this metal box. ¡°Did we steal an ice cream truck or something?¡± I asked. ¡°I wish,¡± Bear shook his head. ¡°No, I heard one of them say we were going north of the mountains, through the forest to something called Pine Hollow.¡± ¡°Is that a town?¡± I hadn¡¯t heard of it in my short time here. My friend shrugged. Neither had he. ¡°Why is it so cold?¡± I asked. Bear nodded toward the back and I had to twist around, sitting up fully, to see it. Snow. We were still on a trail, but we were surrounded by snow. ¡°I¡¯ll be damned.¡± It was so bright and clean. It was surprising. ¡°Well, I hope Coot packs warm.¡± Bear shook his head. ¡°You still think he can save us?¡± ¡°Of course I do,¡± I pulled the blanket up tighter around me. ¡°I just don¡¯t think he can do it before I can.¡± Bear laughed. I almost fell off the bench as the wagon came to a jarring stop. ¡°Just get in the damned wagon,¡± one of the posse was shouting as he wrestled with something. ¡°I won¡¯t be manhandled by the likes of you,¡± it sounded like an old woman. ¡°Get back. You don¡¯t know who I am.¡± ¡°Yes,¡± the cowboy said, ¡°I do. You¡¯re that damned witch. Now get in.¡± With that, they came around to the back of the wagon and I could see our newcomer. It was an older woman, but it was hard to tell. She had known where she was traveling and was wrapped in furs and clothing that almost hid her smaller body. As another of our arresting party came to unlock the door, Bear started to get up. I touched his arm. Now was not the time. If they weren¡¯t going to kill us outright, and therefore let us respawn somewhere else, then we needed more information. They might not know where Lee is, but they had a vested interest in his return, and so did we. Bear relaxed as they threw the ¡®witch¡¯ in with us. Noticeably, she wasn¡¯t shackled. As the door was locked back up, I heard someone else shout, ¡°Only another mile.¡± With my hands shackled behind me, there wasn¡¯t much I could do to assist this woman, so I waited for her to right herself and sit on the bench before I said anything. ¡°Are you alright?¡± I asked softly. ¡°My dear,¡± the woman¡¯s face turned to me and I saw the wild look in her eye, ¡°you heard them. I am a witch. I am more than alright.¡± She snorted and spit on the floor. ¡°What are you in for?¡± ¡°I think they said we murdered 14 people,¡± Bear said. ¡°13,¡± I corrected. ¡°But, that¡¯s dumb. I killed way more than that yesterday and it wasn¡¯t any of the ones we¡¯re accused of killing.¡± ¡°Oh, my. You¡¯re dangerous folks. I think we¡¯ll get along.¡± I couldn¡¯t tell what the noise was she made after because she buried her face into one of her many scarves. It was either a choking fit or she was cackling. ¡°Why are you here?¡± Bear asked. ¡°Witchcraft illegal?¡± ¡°Almost always, but not this time. I¡¯m something of a wandering trader. Redbriar doesn¡¯t like it.¡± ¡°Trader of what?¡± I asked. She winked. ¡°Just about anything you can think of. You must be new. Anyone can sell to me, but in later jobs you¡¯ll learn more about me and I pay the most then.¡± It was weird hearing her go off-script but kind of worked because she was seemingly crazy. ¡°When you find pretty things, or shiny things, or someone you kill has a gold tooth, you bring that to me, and I give you coin. If you bring me coin, I sell you things that you cannot find anywhere else.¡± ¡°What kind of things?¡± Bear was leaning in now. I joined him. ¡°Well,¡± the witch looked annoyed, ¡°if you weren¡¯t cuffed, I could let you look at my inventory. When you¡¯ve done something about that, let¡¯s talk.¡± With that, she pulled away from us and pulled the scarves over her face. Essentially, she shut the door in our faces. The wagon took a sharp turn a few minutes later and then we went through a large stone wall with wooden doors for a gate. We couldn¡¯t see much except for what was behind us as we went through the walls. A rider that could see us through the wagon bars smirked when he saw me eyeing the walls. ¡°That¡¯s right, take it in,¡± he was almost shouting the words. ¡°Welcome to your new home away from home. Welcome to Fort Pine Hollow.¡± Wicked West 2 - Chapter 9 Chapter 9 When Lori was a kid, video games had all sorts of fancy tricks to them. One of the neat things that stuck with me was when she was playing a game with a snow world. If she wasn¡¯t dressed appropriately, the edges of the screen would start to frost over with the frost growing toward the center. She¡¯d be slowed down and she would start taking damage. That was the thought occupying my mind as we exited the wagon. If I could see my HUD, I was sure that it would be frozen over and my health would be slowly ticking down. Well, I hoped it was slow. I hopped down from the wagon before the witch did and then finally Bear. If my hands were free and in front of me, I would be hugging myself. The air was as crisp as a December morning and the snow was about ankle deep in the places it hadn¡¯t been packed down by feet and wheels. Out of the three of us, only the old lady looked warm. Agent Dalton Hayes came over to us, down from whatever horse he had been riding and stood in front of us. He had a pistol on his side, but nothing else. ¡°Welcome to Fort Pine Hollow. This is your home away from home for the next ten days. At which point, we will begin the long and arduous journey to Hardpan Prison. It will be a two days ride, but it¡¯ll be warmer than here. As a matter of fact, the hardest part of your journey will be this place.¡± One of his men came up behind Bear and I could hear him fiddling around with the cuffs. ¡°At this point,¡± Hayes continued, ¡°my friend, Agent Gibbs, will be removing your shackles and reattaching them to your feet. This will allow you the majority of your free movement but will keep your inventory and heads-up display unavailable. In other words, you¡¯re keeping the shackles on to keep you under control.¡± Gibbs finished with Bear and came over to me. He was gentle as he swapped them and I was eager to see if my HUD turned back on, even briefly. It did not. Hayes continued. "While this will be your home, do not go thinking you can stay out late and invite friends over. You are fugitives and outlaws and will be treated as such. Every man and woman in this place is carrying a weapon specifically meant for ending you and each of them is well-versed in how to use it." A little chuckle came up from the back of the men still trailing in. I couldn''t tell if it was in agreement with Hayes or something that I hadn''t overheard. Either way, I didn''t care. Did I mention that it was cold? Because I was freezing. That was about when one of the Fort''s soldiers, dressed in blue that was both faded and snow-covered, came over and gave us coats. Can you guess how they were decorated? That''s right, black and white stripes, like I was in one of those cartoons from when my Gran was a toddler. Bear and I put on our coats while the witch stared at the one they handed her before taking it and deciding to just hold it. "Fall in line, and I will show you your quarters," Agent Hayes said before marching away. "Does he mean to follow him?" I asked. "He doesn''t mean to warm yourself up with your farts," the old lady stomped off behind the Redbriar agent. I shrugged at Bear and started following. Behind me, I heard Bear mumble, "I don''t even think we can fart anymore." We followed Hayes toward the main building in the center of the fort. The walls around Pine Hollow encompassed a large courtyard filled with a gallows that I considered might assist us with a respawn escape, a lot of horses tied up in makeshift stables, and men and women wandering around with different chores and urgencies. The courtyard was divided by a wall that the stables were built against. The other side of the wall, accessed via a large arch built into the right side of the wall. The left side had the only sort of building. It was two stories high and granted access to the walls for defense. I assumed that whatever was inside was living quarters and cells. I was wrong. Inside was only a table, chairs, some crates for storage and a lot of people running around as if planning some sort of military action. To that point, I noticed that aside from the five Redbriar agents that I had been interacting with, everyone else here was dressed in the military outfit of the man who had given us the jackets. This was an active military base. That made me wonder why a video game would need a military. Then I remembered that most of this was likely for ambiance. Or at least, I hoped so. "This is the only place with a roof on it," Hayes said as he came to a stop. Several of the soldiers stopped and looked at us before returning to what they were doing. "As you can see, there are no beds. That is an oversight that we all have to deal with." "Where do folks sleep?" I asked. Bear added, "Or us?" The old woman wasn''t even paying attention. From what I could tell she was eyeing something on the table. It looked like a brush. "That''s why I brought you in here," Hayes smirked. "I wanted you to see it. If you are called in here, it will likely be because you screwed up. In the next ten days, don''t make me call you into here." He turned and marched toward a door at the far end. "Come!" We followed him, shuffling our chained feet, back to the outside. The door he went through took us to the other side of the dividing wall of the fort. What greeted us was tents, and lots of them. I didn¡¯t bother to count them, but the entire other half of the fort was where everyone was sleeping. Each grouping of crowded tents was around its own fire. Squeezing between them, while shackled, to keep up with Hayes was tough. When he finally stopped an old tent with holes throughout it near the wall on the backside of the fort, I was exhausted as well as cold.If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it. ¡°This is where you will sleep. At night, and in any moments that we feel like it, you will be shackled together as well as to the wall.¡± Hayes stepped aside so that we could inspect the tent. It had four bedrolls in it, all perpendicular to the opening. The back of the tent was completely open to the wall where four iron rings were attached. I assumed that was where we would be shackled at night. A soldier handed us each a tin cup and a chunk of bread. ¡°That¡¯s your ration for today,¡± Hayes said. ¡°It¡¯ll be night soon. We¡¯ll start you on the hard labor tomorrow. A Redbriar agent will come by in two hours to shackle you to the wall.¡± With that Agent Hayes turned to leave. ¡°Wait,¡± I called after him. When he stopped and looked at me with both a look of ¡®How dare you,¡¯ and ¡®Oh, this¡¯ll be good,¡¯ I asked, ¡°What about a trial? You¡¯re going to take us straight to the prison?¡± Hayes started to laugh and then I realized so was everyone who had heard me ask the question except for Bear. Even the old lady was chuckling. ¡°Sorry, but that was just downright hilarious,¡± Hayes said. ¡°Trials are for missions, jobs, or story. They ain¡¯t got much worth when death isn¡¯t permanent and crime is a game.¡± He spread his hands and looked up to the sky as if beckoning his digital creator. ¡°This is all just a game and this fort, the prison you¡¯re going to and that long two-day ride between, they are all part of this game too. Now, you could be a model citizen, do everything you¡¯re told and get out of prison in a few years when we realize you¡¯re no fun. Or while you¡¯re in there you could start taking jobs to become some sort of prison informant, or level into an underground kingpin, but nah, I can already see you¡¯re not here for the period-piece prison sim. No, you¡¯re a cowgirl, through and through, so your game will be different, but it''s all still a game. Your game will be to escape, or maybe we¡¯ll get an assignment to give you a mission to work off your sentence for us, or perhaps this is all still part of whatever job you said you were trying to claim from Lee. Either way, your game will be the cowgirl game, but none of that, or the kingpin route, or just being a model citizen until your code degrades and you¡¯re deleted just for fun, none of it ever allows a player to sit through a boring-ass trial.¡± Then he turned and walked away from me. ¡°Well, then. I guess that¡¯s that,¡± I said. ¡°That was incredibly generous of him,¡± the old lady mumbled. Bear looked at her and waved toward Hayes¡¯ back. ¡°Generous? We¡¯re screwed, what part of that was generous?¡± Bear wasn¡¯t getting it, but I did. Agent Hayes could have just ignored me and kept walking and there was a good chance we would have just sat here until our ¡®code degrades.¡¯ That¡¯s not what he did though. Instead, he just gave us a ton more information about the game and some of it was stuff I didn¡¯t even know that I should ask. For starters, he told me that escape is exactly what we need to be focusing on. He also gave us a good idea of how they got jobs. I was thinking they were all preset scripts, but now I¡¯m wondering if that only accounted for some of them. If you keep going to the same guy in the post office, sooner or later you will see the same or similar jobs being offered, but that sounded like this, the fort, the prison escape, and probably much more, could be jobs that are more complex and likely come with scalability for the different scenarios that might trigger them. When I finished explaining that to Bear, I spun on the self-proclaimed witch. "Which brings us to you," I said. "You''re an in-game merchant, but you got caught. So, what does that mean? Are you part of this mission? Was this supposed to happen?" The witch cackled. "Not quite. I''m something of a limited edition." She was obviously going to make getting information not easy, but a quick glance at my ankles told me that all I had was time. "What''s your name?" "I am she-that-shall-not-be-named," she said waggling her fingers and lowering her voice. Then she started laughing again. "Just joshing you. I''m Linda, the hag. It''s an in-game name, and its incredibly rude, but I kind of love it." I nodded at Linda and then asked, "So, you''re some sort of collector of shiny things? Give us jobs, money, better loot and shit like that?" "More or less," Linda agreed. "My loot is better than ''shit,'' though." I smirked, "My apologies. What are you doing here then if you are an NPC and meeting us wasn''t part of a mission?" "NPC''s are just folks. We''re still playing the game, we just have been around long enough to earn some privileges. Me, I like to wander the woods and roads looking for trouble." "What trouble got you thrown into the wagon?" Bear asked. Linda''s smile faded, just a little. "They took my ivory comb. I was trying to reclaim it." "Who? The soldiers?" I asked. "No, those crooks that call themselves detectives," she hissed through her teeth. "Redbriar." "Crooks?" I pressed. "Redbriar are this game''s version of the Pinkerton''s but just like their more famous real-world counterparts they are corruption. They are basically mercenaries for hire, but they work with the law, so they get protections." Linda let out a small grunt of annoyance that was just loud enough to turn a few of the closer heads. "And they like shiny things, too. Which is why, when they saw my ivory brush, they stopped me and confiscated it, claiming that I must have stolen it." "You seem to be a straight shooter," I said. "If we are looking to escape, would you be someone who could help, or would you get in our way?" The warmly dressed old lady''s smile only got bigger. "Likely both, but I can promise you won''t be escaping anything without my assistance." Bear looked annoyed. "Why is that? You going to tell them?" She shook her head. "Not at all, but I can sell a skeleton key that takes shackles off. While you can''t use your HUD with them on, if you can give me something I want, such as an Ivory Brush, and you tell me that you will trade me for a skeleton key, then you can take your shackles off and leave these premises with haste." "There it is," I smirked. "The job. We have to steal that brush we saw in the war-room thing back there." Bear touched my arm and I turned to face him. "What about Coot? He''s looking for us. If he finds out we''re here and we end up not being here, we''ll have to rescue him." I shook my head. "The second we get the shackles off, we message him. If he''s already here, we wait, and make a mess in here when he does his attack. If he''s still lost, we tell him to meet us at camp." "A friend on the outside?" The witch said as she overheard. "The chances for utter chaos are growing and I absolutely love it." Bear was clearly not liking any of this and I wasn''t quite sure why. Everything up until now he had treated as a fun adventure. For some reason getting arrested and taken to the fort had put him on edge. I pulled him aside. "What''s going on man? You''ve been off ever since we got scooped up." He was looking everywhere but at me. "I did time," he whispered so quietly I almost didn''t hear him. So, that was it. He was reliving his life stuff. "Can I ask what for?" I pressed. He shrugged, and I don''t know if it was my imagination or if it just talking was helping, but I thought I saw him relax a little. "I had a plan to buy credit cards off of the dark web, get the max cash withdrawals and then hit up a casino. I bought two credit cards directly from a federal agent. I was in prison for 18 months." I smacked him on the chest with the back of my hand. "Here I was thinking you were a smart outlaw." He smirked, "Nope, boss. Just a dumb crook." "Well, I promise you that whatever you experienced during your time in the clinker this ain''t that." "Oh, yeah?" Bear asked. "Did you have me and a witch on your side then?" I asked. "No, I guess not." Bear''s shoulders were starting to ease a bit, but he still looked tense. That was probably the best that I could ask for. I spun back to Linda. "Alright. Any suggestions on how we get the brush?"