《Breach World Championship 2081》


 Hopes Vanguard

    Lava rained on Max in fiery orange globs. They would have harmed a lesser creature, but Max, well, Max wasn¡¯t that, so he hid himself by standing within a thick stream of molten rock. His foe wasn¡¯t clever. It would be fooled.


    Here came his foe now. The monster, Huel-drark, was as large as him, but while his own broad build was encased in bright-white, half-luminous armor, this creature was covered only in gray wrinkly skin. Unlike Max, it was damaged by each drop of lava as it spewed from the volcano it climbed, yet it persisted, dodging, trying in vain to avoid the hot spray, for its objective lie at the volcano¡¯s peak.


    At the peak of the volcano was a weapon, so small that it could fit in Max¡¯s fist but with destructive power so great that its cleansing light would destroy this vile creature and all those like him across the whole planet. The weapon would go off in just over a minute.


    Stopping this weapon only required the monster to reach it. If he did, he could encase the shining crystal in his vile, infections flesh, forcing its explosion to destroy only him. That wasn¡¯t going to happen, though. It was time for Max to guarantee it. Waiting for the creature to rush up ahead of him, and be good and softened by the lava, Max leapt from his hiding place. The monster could only crane its head before Max buried his enormous sword into its squishy flesh, all at once dealing half the damage it would take to kill the creature.


    It wasted no time retaliating. On its arm was a great cannon, made from what pretended to be hexagonal metal plates, a browner gray than the rest of its body. The monster pointed its barrel directly at Max and blasted him away, forcing him back several yards and taking out almost a third of his health.


    But that was what Max wanted him to do. He rose from the ground in a single, graceful motion, no doubt eliciting cheers from his excited fans. His adversary had blundered in taking his bait. Huel-drark¡¯s cannon took several seconds to recharge, and seeing as that was how long this fight was going to last, that meant it was out of the picture. Max gripped his sword and leapt to the side. The creature ran back from him, but Max had no trouble closing the distance between himself and the fungal monstrosity, baring his sword to mislead the creature about his intentions. The cleansing crystal that would soon burst forth from the volcano wasn¡¯t the only one of its kind. Max had another, smaller one, and when he crushed it, it would explode, destroying this monster and ensuring his victory.


    There was no way this creature could know what he intended. The monster ought to believe that he¡¯d already used up the one Purifying Crystal he was allowed to take into a match. He¡¯d made a point use it on the very same player earlier. What the monster couldn¡¯t know is that, in this scenario, each member of his team had received an extra one. None of the others had used it. That was at Max¡¯s direction. It was important to keep his enemy unsuspecting, for the sake of this very moment.


    Max swung his sword, causing the creature to raise his shield. He let go of his sword with one arm, and followed the momentum of his swing until his hand reached his belt. Max activated his crystal. The championship was his. Max¡¯s bliss was as bright, as all-consuming and glorious as the light that would soon consume this digital planet. The crystal exploded. The force of the blast, though harmless to him, did push him away, so that he landed on the ground a dozen feet from what ought to be the remains of his adversary.


    Only when the light cleared, his enemy was still there. That was impossible. Max stood. The creature appeared unharmed, and ran toward the volcano¡¯s lip. ¡°What the hell?¡± Max shouted. How had this creature survived his Purifying Light? He shouldn¡¯t have been able to. He can¡¯t have activated a Pocket Black Hole. Max would have seen the monster do that and taking two Black Holes into this match would be ridiculous anyway. Your enemy would only ever have one Purifying Light to use against you.


    Max¡¯s composure returned to him. In standing dumfounded, he¡¯d allowed his enemy a head start up the mountain. The monster had nearly reached its goal. Max rushed forward with all the speed he could muster. Max¡¯s every step kicked back a cloud of ash as the fire rained on top of him. ¡°No,¡± he whispered aloud, as his enemy reached the lip of the volcano, and leapt from it to the crystal, grabbing and neutralizing it, leaving nothing of himself but a grayish goop which rained into the volcano.


    And Max was left alive, standing beneath the harmless lava as Breach-bot spoke. ¡°Target neutralized. Game over. Gray Fungus wins.¡±


    Around Max, the world deleted itself, fading into blackness. ¡°Stop!¡± he shouted, as if he could reverse this travesty if only he could stay here a while longer. Even if he could, nothing he did here would change anything. Before long, he awoke in his chair. He ripped his headset off and threw it against the wall. Max¡¯s teammates awoke in short succession, and each stood. Max did not. He only simmered at the faint sound of the crowd outside cheering for his opponents.


    One of his teammates approached him. ¡°Hey, you need to get up,¡± she said, holding out her hand. He acted as if he hadn¡¯t heard her, so she continued, ¡°we did our damnedest out there and we came within an inch of winning. How many people can say that?¡±


    ¡°Jesus Christ, it isn¡¯t that!¡± Max said, yelling, but at the situation, and not his teammate. He hoped she understood that. His voice lowered. ¡°I think he cheated.¡±


    ¡°What?¡± another teammate said.


    ¡°I got my Purifying Light off. He survived it without activating a Black Hole. There¡¯s no way that could have happened.¡±


    ¡°We now present to you,¡± said a voice in the distance, ¡°our new World Champions, Reigning Fire!¡±


    //////////


    One Year Later


    A derelict building appeared around Ryan. It was the giant lobby of a hotel, moldy, musky, in disrepair. He took a few steps to orient himself in his chosen body. His form was of a twelve-foot robot. His shoulders were broad and strong, his head small and indistinct except for the bright blue eyes. They were only two of countless tiny cameras that dotted his body, interrupting the armored plates, red with rust and faded paint, which covered him. His many cameras allowed him to see in all directions. In front of him was a wide terminal with four small holographic projectors along it and a giant one atop it. To his left an ancient front desk at which wealthy guests might once have been checked in to gilded suites. To his right a lounge in which once-luxurious furniture was speckled about most of the cavernous room. Behind him only wooden frames remained of revolving doors which must have once held panes of sparkling glass. Far above him a vast chandelier somehow still held its grip on the cracked domed ceiling. Below him, a shaggy red and gold carpet, its luster faded. Ryan saw all of this at once, as a single, complete account of his surroundings, lacking any seam or split or edge to his vision.


    Ryan was pretty used to playing this character, but it still took him a moment to get used to changing bodies. Zap was supposed to be a reprogrammed robot, originally built for use by the Terran Naval Marines, but re-appropriated by the militant organization Red Arachnia. He was one of the wonkier characters. His main form was humanoid, but one of the character¡¯s most powerful abilities was his sphere mode, which he could enter to curl himself up into a loosely held together ball of metallic scrap and electrical viscera, fit to roll over people and crush them.


    Not everyone could play weird characters well. Anyone who played one would hear from some of those they defeated about how unfair that was, but they were mistaken in thinking that Zap was better than other characters.


    As Ryan got his bearings, the terminal¡¯s large projector activated, showing a whitish outline of Red Arachnia¡¯s in-universe leader, Blast. She was a large woman, bulky, butch and vaguely slavic. ¡°Welcome,¡± she said.


    ¡°Hey,¡± Ryan said. His voice was metallic and distorted.


    ¡°We have several engagements that could use your attention, Comrade. What sort of thing are you looking for? I promise, I can offer one just like it.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m not feeling picky today,¡± Ryan said. ¡°Anything four versus four.¡±


    ¡°Roger,¡± Blast said. ¡°I¡¯m bringing in some Comrades to help you.¡± Ryan waited. Matchmaking was rarely a long process, and sure enough a team of three players soon appeared behind him.


    ¡°Hey, we have a Zap¡± one said. Ryan turned around.


    ¡°Roger,¡± he said. The one who¡¯d spoken was playing Dash, the second most mechanical member of Red Arachnia. Every part of him, save half his face, was covered in metal. Dash had the fastest movement speed in the game. He could rush someone down with such force that he could jab with his rapier before they had a chance to react.


    ¡°Cool,¡± said a Sneak. The way the player drawled the word out conflicted with his character¡¯s voice, which was smarmy and high. Sneak was notable for being stealthy. He can turn mostly invisible, go completely silent, and do a lot of things to annoy his enemies while out of sight. The down side is that once he¡¯s revealed himself, he¡¯s pretty much dead.


    The final member of their team was a Boost, one of the few magically inclined members of Red Arachnia. His job is to cast the ubiquitous healing spell and to make everyone faster and stronger.


    ¡°You guys warped in together,¡± Ryan said. ¡°You know each other?¡±


    ¡°Yeah,¡± the Dash said. ¡°We¡¯re actually introducing my friend here to the game.¡± He gestured to the Sneak.


    ¡°Welcome to Breach,¡± Ryan said. It would be rude to let it on, but just about everyone he was likely to encounter on here was new compared to him. It may well be that Breach-bot matched him with a group containing a brand-new player specifically in hopes that the two would balance each other out.


    ¡°Thanks,¡± the Sneak said.


    ¡°How long have you been playing Zap?¡± the Dash asked.


    ¡°A while,¡± Ryan said. ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I¡¯m proficient with him.¡±


    ¡°No, no, I didn¡¯t mean it like that¡± the Dash said. ¡°Like I said, our friend is brand new.¡±


    The hologram of Blast reappeared. Ryan leapt over the three of them and did a one-eighty in the air, landing behind them so they could see her. The three watched him, and Sneak seemed in awe.


    ¡°If you¡¯re done showing off, Comrade,¡± Blast said, ¡°I¡¯ve a mission for you.¡±


    ¡°Sorry,¡± Ryan said.


    ¡°An unprecedented opportunity has been given to us,¡± Blast said. This was how every match began, with a unique scenario invented by Breach-bot on the spot. He was a fully sentient creature, one of the most powerful of his kind not in service to a government and he spent the milliseconds just before every match lovingly hand-crafting an entirely new scenario. They were normally simple, but no player ever saw the same one twice. Some of them contained elements which had never been seen before and would never be seen again.


    ¡°In accordance with the foolishness we¡¯ve come to expect from them,¡± Blast continued, ¡°the Terran Naval Marines are oblivious to our presence on this planet. As a result, they¡¯ve chosen to leave one of their battleships, the quite ironically named the TSS Hope¡¯s Vanguard, in orbit here with, shall we say, insufficient protection. They believe they are deep in friendly territory, so you should have little trouble infiltrating their ship using one of our stolen landers. Your real mission begins once you¡¯re on board.¡±


    Blast¡¯s flickery white form was replaced with a holographic projection of the TSS Hope¡¯s Vanguard, on which a red dot indicated a hanger bay close to its bow. ¡°You¡¯ll enter here, in the starboard hanger bay. It should be trivial for you to over-power the crew there and Spark,¡± another playable member of Red Arachnia, talented at hacking, ¡°will take care of their automated defenses. Your job is to move from the hanger bay to the bridge and overcome any resistance you might encounter.¡± Ryan noted the path from the hanger bay to the bridge as displayed by the hologram. They would run down the short corridor, cut through the mess hall and into another hallway, at the end of which was an elevator down to the bridge.


    ¡°Once you reach the bridge, you¡¯ll need to jump to these coordinates.¡± A long string of numbers appeared. ¡°You¡¯ll be able to access them from your HUD.¡± It would take about a minute to enter all of those numbers. ¡°Don¡¯t worry about them harvesting this information if you¡¯re captured. It will delete itself long before they can break its encryption. The coordinates lead to a stronghold in the Perseus Arm. Once you¡¯ve taken the Hope¡¯s Vanguard there, our waiting fleet will have no trouble subduing it. We¡¯ll have one more ship, including all the data on it, and a large number of prisoners.


    ¡°Spark can only keep the ship off-line for about fifteen minutes. If you¡¯re in control of the bridge by then, it won¡¯t matter, but if you¡¯re still onboard without control of the ship after that time, it¡¯s not going to go well for you.¡± Most scenarios had that same time limit. ¡°The counter won¡¯t start until you¡¯re on the ship, so you have time to equip yourselves properly. The lander is outside. Choose well and good luck Comrades.¡± The hologram turned off, and the terminal¡¯s four smaller projectors activated.


    Prior to each mission, each character could select a series of weapons and tools to take with them. What these could be, and how many they could take, depended on the character. Red Arachnia characters tended to have a lot of tools at their disposal but didn¡¯t tend to have the strongest weapons. Their best weapons weren¡¯t usually good because of the damage they dealt. For instance, most of them had access to the electro-stun pistol, which, five times per match, stunned an enemy completely for several seconds, but made them more resistant to damage during that time. All three of Ryan¡¯s teammates were probably selecting that right now. Being a larger robot, Zap didn¡¯t have a stun pistol, but rather the ability to launch stun grenades. He selected a three-pack of such grenades. He also got the minigun and grenade launcher.


    Zap could select four tools. For a Red Arachnia member, that wasn¡¯t many. The extendable shield was good in close quarters and would let them get down the elevator shaft easily. He grabbed a packet of healing potions.


    ¡°Hey, you¡¯re grabbing quite a few smoke grenades,¡± the Dash said to the Sneak.


    ¡°I figure they¡¯re good for stealth,¡± the Sneak said. ¡°Am I wrong?¡±


    ¡°In a couple of ways,¡± the Dash said.


    ¡°Crap,¡± the Sneak said.


    ¡°They can help you if you get spotted,¡± Ryan said. A more experienced player would get spotted rarely enough that they wouldn¡¯t be worth it, but for this guy, they¡¯d be useful. Ryan grabbed visual enhancers that would let him see through smoke. Looking at the Sneak¡¯s display, he saw that he¡¯d picked three packets of smoke grenades. ¡°Each of those slots is a pack of four grenades,¡± he said. ¡°You should probably only get one.¡±


    ¡°Oh. Thanks.¡±


    ¡°No problem.¡±


    ¡°Anything else I should definitely get?¡± the Sneak asked.


    According to the display, the kid had already picked up a pack of healing potions, so Ryan said, ¡°You seem to be doing alright.¡±


    ¡°Okay,¡± he said, though the Dash now became more intent about walking him through his selections.


    ¡°I got a shield,¡± Ryan said, ¡°so no one else needs to bother with a grappling hook.¡±


    Once they had selected everything, they went outside and got aboard the lander. It lifted off. Their surroundings faded, and then returned, still depicting the lander¡¯s interior. To their right, a video feed, showing them the lander¡¯s surroundings. Right now it just showed them stars.


    Soon the enemy ship came into view. It was massive, flanked by two pathetic escort ships. Those ships were actually the size of the lander they were in right now: the one a giant robot could comfortably fit inside, but next to the Hope¡¯s Vanguard, they were specks.


    The ship grew more enormous as they approached it, soon filling their screen¡¯s display. Seconds later, the whitish shielding that covered the hanger bay was all they could see, and past it, inside, there were more ships like their own. The barrier split like a waterfall to admit them. The hanger bay was cavernous. Probably three-dozen of the ship they were in could fit inside it. There were also humans around, dressed in tight blue uniforms appearing to be mechanics. These were not other players. They were extras, unable to do any harm, and Ryan and his team would be rushing through them quite callously on the way to their actual battle.


    Spark spoke to them. The others probably heard him through an earpiece, but Ryan heard it like a voice in his head. ¡°Get ready. I¡¯m shutting things down in three, two, one¡­¡±


    The lights went out. The rear of their ship fell, forming an exit ramp. Due to his built-in night-vision, Ryan could see the crewmen scrambling about. ¡°Red Alert!¡± a voice announced. ¡°Red alert! Security systems compromised. Imminent attack¡ª¡±


    Dash was the first one out of the dropship. The extras, whom he ignored, reacted to him as though a gush of wind had gone by. Boost followed him out. Ryan was about to tell Sneak not to waste ammo on these noncombatants, but he seemed to figure that out for himself. He ran off after the others, and Ryan took his sphere form and rolled out. Making himself roll forward was as intuitive as walking for Ryan. He rushed over to the door to meet his teammates, caring nothing for the four mechanics he crushed on his way there.


    They had already gathered at the end of the corridor, just behind the door to the mess hall. The other team was probably beyond. Perhaps in their scenario, they were simply dining, only to find themselves accosted by a surprise invasion from Red Arachnian agents.


    The door to the mess hall was locked shut. ¡°I¡¯ll get the door,¡± Ryan said.


    ¡°How?¡± Sneak asked.


    Ryan smiled. ¡°I¡¯ll show you. Stick to the walls.¡± It would have been better if they had a Spark with them to hack the thing, but they didn¡¯t, so cruder methods would have to do. Ryan rolled back a few paces, and then bulled forward into the door, forcing it to pop out of the wall and fly into the mess hall. Wary of potential traps, Ryan was careful not to advance further into the room, where the enemy team did, indeed, wait. Right in front of him, ready to begin firing on them, was a McCormick. While Red Arachnians had words for names, supposed to be the nick-names their characters had come to use for each other after years of fighting together, Terran Naval Marines had military designations. Perhaps the most powerful Terran Naval Marine, Sgt. McCormick was a big, burly, mean drill sergeant who wielded a mini-gun with enough power to pierce Ryan¡¯s metal armor. Some distance to the side of him was a Morrison, who was to the Terran Naval Marines what Boost was to Red Arachnia. Far in the distance was Slater, whose job was to set just the kind of explosive trap Ryan had been afraid of, which probably lay just in front of the door he¡¯d burst open.Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.


    Ryan didn¡¯t see the fourth member of their team, for which there could be any number of explanations, but that concern was over-shadowed by the sight of Sneak, rushing into the room to engage with the enemy. ¡°Stop!¡± Dash shouted, too late to avert tragedy.


    The explosion made Ryan roll back a few feet and knocked the Sneak forward, deep into the room. All of them were frozen in place. The McCormick burst into laughter. ¡°Oh my god!¡± he shouted. ¡°You actually just did that!¡± Sneak was on the ground, not moving. Now that Ryan¡¯s team was stunned, it became clear who the fourth member of the other team was: Nealson, a sniper, whose bullets now rained onto the three of them. They¡¯d not die even from a headshot, thanks to the damage resistance that being stunned provided, but they¡¯d be softened up for the coming battle.


    The McCormick casually approached Sneak. He leaned down. ¡°Thanks for matching against me. I needed someone like you to boost my rankings. I¡¯ll be platinum after this!¡± He pointed his minigun directly at Sneak¡¯s head and unloaded it, which was more than enough to kill the poor kid. Having had his fun, the McCormick moved clear of the door, but he wasn¡¯t that far from the door when the stun wore off. With no more traps to worry about, Ryan went straight into sphere form and rushed the McCormick down. Behind him, Dash ran toward Nealson, which forced the sniper to hide below his cover and pull out a close ranged weapon. The Boost, probably thinking Dash didn¡¯t need his help, chased after Ryan, summoning a blue orb and tossing it into Ryan like a fastball. It was a speed boosting spell.


    ¡°Much appreciated,¡± Ryan said, continuing forward, crushing tables in his wake as he rushed into the McCormick¡¯s fire. The Morrison fired a red line of energy from her own hand into McCormick, giving his minigun¡¯s fire the power to slow Ryan down. If Ryan didn¡¯t have his own boost, he would have changed forms and fired on his enemy, but thanks to his new friend¡¯s help, he could still charge forward faster than his enemies were able to back away.


    Then Slater rushed at his ally from behind. ¡°Watch behind you!¡± Ryan said, and he burst out of sphere form, and, ignoring the shots behind him for the brief time he could, fired a stunning grenade at Slater. He caught the Slater in the blast, which forced him back and stunned him the same way his own mine had done to Sneak. Shots were raining on him from McCormick behind him. Boost ran over to use him as cover and began to toss healing orbs into him in quick succession. Ryan left the slater to lie for a moment, and turned around, firing on the Morrison.


    She flinched, denying McCormick his boost for a moment, and Ryan used that to press into the medic. Behind him, his Boost dropped the healing, and instead made a yellow ball form in his hand, which he tossed between Ryan¡¯s legs and into the distracted Morrison, stunning her. Ryan wouldn¡¯t be able to do enough damage with his machine gun while she was stunned so he leapt into the air and went into sphere mode at just the right moment to land on her, crushing her to death.


    That¡¯d made up their team¡¯s lead, and now he had a Boost and his enemy didn¡¯t, but his health was low. A quick potion helped but didn¡¯t make up for the fact that he was being barraged by the McCormick this very second. Then Slater woke up, and shot a grenade straight into Boost¡¯s chest, knocking him past Ryan and McCormick and into some cafeteria tables, draining most of his health. Ryan needed to buy himself just a second to take care of this. He ran straight at McCormick. There wasn¡¯t much distance to close. The sergeant stopped firing and pulled out a small metal rod, which, with the press of a button, became the handle on an energy shield as tall as McCormick was.


    The McCormick backed up slowly, ready to fire again if the situation changed to demand it. Ryan kept moving toward the sergeant, until he was standing over him. He reached over the shield, at the cost of taking a few more shots, and grabbed McCormick by the leg. ¡°Hey, what the fuck!¡± he cried. His weight was considerable, even for Ryan in this form, but he was able to heft McCormick a few dozen feet to the right and into another line of tables. Ryan turned to face the Slater and unloaded a single stunning shot, which knocked him back. Ryan charged at him, blasting him with bullets, and, upon finally reaching his frozen form, stomped on him as hard as he could, killing him.


    Boost stood, but needed to focus on healing himself, so Ryan used another potion. All throughout his body, plates welded themselves back together. Broken wires reattached.


    McCormick had already stood up by the time Ryan turned to face him. He would have liked to use another stunning blast, but only had one more, and didn¡¯t dare leave himself with none this early in the match. He pelted his enemy with ordinary fire instead, expecting him to do the same. Instead, the McCormick fired a grenade at Boost, who was still busy healing himself.


    Ryan jumped toward The McCormick, shifting into sphere mode, threatening to crush his foe like he had the Morrison. This forced the McCormick to dodge out of the way, which bought the Boost a moment to consume a healing potion. Instead, presumably hoping to save it, he fired another spell into himself, leaving his health low enough for McCormick to end him with another grenade.


    Ryan couldn¡¯t waste any time feeling frustrated. He turned his fire straight on the McCormick, who did the same back to him. Bullets clanked and bounced off every part of him. He could take sphere mode and rush his enemy down, but would McCormick be able to strafe out of the way? If he was skillful, yes. It wasn¡¯t something Ryan should risk, but it wasn¡¯t as though there was no risk in Ryan letting McCormick keep shooting him. The two strafed and dodged around the open area their battle had cleared away. They both managed to do a lot of damage to each other. Ryan used another potion. That still left him with three.


    A pause in his enemy¡¯s fire telegraphed something coming to interrupt the status quo they¡¯d formed. It also gave Ryan an opportunity. He shifted into sphere form and charged McCormick. This forced a dodge. Ryan used another potion, and his enemy pulled out a rocket launcher, and fired it. The rocket forced Ryan off-course, and propelled him into Slater¡¯s corpse, blowing up in his face, forcing him out of sphere mode, and stunning him.


    ¡°Ha!¡± the McCormick shouted. Ryan lay on the ground, paralyzed, as the enemy approached him. ¡°After all that, turns out you¡¯re just as shitty as your friend.¡±


    Ryan had been stunned a million times. The sensation was more frustrating than frightening to him, and he had long since gotten over the instinct to try to move. This time, though, for just a moment, he forgot himself. He must have managed to twitch, because McCormick said, ¡°You can¡¯t move, dumbass.¡± He aimed a rocket at Ryan¡¯s head. Ryan expected the last thing he heard to be an explosion, but instead there was a woosh, and then the image of McCormick impaled on Dash¡¯s rapier.


    ¡°Where the fuck have you been?¡± Ryan asked, still stuck.


    ¡°Nealson was trying to go invis--¡± was all the explanation Dash got out before McCormick punched him away. The stun wore off. Ryan raised his arm and fired his final stun grenade directly into McCormick. He was officially too spent for a full fight after this, but fortunately he was beginning to form some concept of how not to need one. This stun took hold, and opened McCormick up to another rapier through the neck from Dash, which ended him.


    Both of them fell over with what seemed to be exhaustion, though the game wouldn¡¯t actually allow them to feel something so unpleasant. All of that had taken five minutes. Sneak would respawn any second now. Ryan stood up.


    ¡°I¡¯m pretty spent,¡± Dash said. ¡°I doubt I can take another full fight.¡±


    ¡°Me neither,¡± Ryan said, ¡°but I think we might be able to avoid that. It comes down to your friend coming back. Him rushing out like that was an anomaly, right? He¡¯s not normally dim?¡±


    ¡°Of course not!¡± but there was a hint of defensiveness in Dash¡¯s voice that made Ryan worry.


    ¡°I hope you¡¯re right, because I have an important job in mind for him.¡±


    //////////


    ¡°Cheap-ass bastards!¡± Todd ought to have had them. He was about to have them. But he shouldn¡¯t let it bother him too much. He was still going to win. It was four good players versus maybe two and a half. Hopefully, the retard they had playing Sneak would get them all stunned again.


    ¡°Breach-bot, put on some music,¡± he said, when he respawned on the bridge, holding McCormick¡¯s minigun. The tunes came on, an old techno beat from the 2040s, much better than anything they were shitting out today. Todd was happy to see that everyone else on the bridge could hear it.


    In front of him was a display. In the time it¡¯d taken him to respawn, the other team had gotten their team-mates back and managed to get to the elevator shaft.


    ¡°Nealson, start picking them off,¡± Todd said.


    ¡°Yeah, I was already on that,¡± said the Nealson, as if Todd had insulted him.


    ¡°Sure doesn¡¯t look like you¡¯re shooting at them,¡± an error Nealson wasted no time correcting. Nealson had phasing bullets which would be able to pass through the walls of this ship. Other factions, like the Legion of the Iron Star, and the motherfucking Gray Fungus had answers to this, but Red Arachnia, Red Arachnia were fucking chumps and they probably wouldn¡¯t.


    //////////


    ¡°Sorry about before,¡± Sneak said before they descended. He was perched atop Ryan, in his sphere form. They were positioned in such a way that the Nealson could only fire into him, and Boost could heal that damage faster than Nealson could deal it. ¡°I probably fucked things up for you, didn¡¯t I?¡±


    ¡°No,¡± Ryan said. ¡°We won that battle.¡±


    ¡°Heh, no thanks to me.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re going to make up for it,¡± Ryan said.


    ¡°What makes you so sure about that?¡± Sneak asked.


    //////////


    ¡°Look at them turtling like that,¡± Todd said to the rest of his team. ¡°Fucking pathetic. Do you think they plan to run out the clock like that? Maybe they know they can¡¯t win, so they¡¯re just going to waste our time to spite us?¡±


    None of them responded. The elevator car was way above the other team. Todd could control it from the bridge, so there was no way they were calling it. They would have to find a way down the shaft. Todd had expected the other team to use grappling hooks to get down to the bridge. That¡¯s what Todd would have done if he played Red Arachnia, not that he would ever lower himself to that.


    The other team finally quit jerking off up there and moved toward the elevator. Todd grabbed his gun. Slater had already placed traps both at the bottom of the elevator and right outside it. Todd just aimed his weapon at the elevator door, hoping that moron would come right through it again. Him having done it the one time was funny enough, but to see him do the same thing again would make Todd¡¯s week.


    Then the other team decided to make his month for him instead. Todd burst out laughing, letting his minigun¡¯s aim droop downward. He watched the hologram as the idiots clung to their Zap as it rolled straight into the elevator shaft and fell down it. It seemed these morons really had accepted defeat and decided to end the match. They fell cleanly down the shaft, not tumbling, or hitting the walls, until they hit the bottom, setting off Slater¡¯s trap. There was an explosion in the shaft, which made one half of the double door fly open and the other one swell out. The shaft was filled with smoke for a few seconds, and Todd composed himself. When the smoke cleared, where there should have been scrap metal, was an undamaged Sphere Mode Zap, with his teammates clinging to him.


    ¡°What the fuck bullshit is that?¡± Todd shouted.


    //////////


    It was a shield jump. That was the answer to the McCormick¡¯s question. They¡¯d jumped down onto the trap, and, at the last moment, Ryan had activated his shield, which created a bubble just a few feet in radius larger than his sphere mode, which no damage could pierce. It lasted only a few seconds, but that was long enough to protect his entire team from the fall damage and the explosive trap. Everyone dismounted him and stood back while Ryan shot the trap that was now outside the elevator. Sneak waited for a choice opportunity to cloak himself. Nealson fired a stream of bullets at Ryan. Dash ran outside. Ryan and Boost followed, and immediately strafed left, until they were a ways from the door.


    The bridge was miniscule compared to the mess hall. It was structured like a hill. At the front, farthest from the lift by which they had entered, was the pilot¡¯s seat. Other seats and stations ascended from there in four concentric circles. At the center, highest of all, was the captain¡¯s chair, in front of which McCormick stood.


    Nealson was next to McCormick. Morrison was behind them. Slater was off to the other side. Dash ran over to him and engaged. Ryan shot a grenade in the midst of the other three opponents. They dodged in opposite directions, but neither of them were able to escape the damage radius in time. Boost gave Ryan a damage boost, and Ryan used it to unload into the now-prone Nealson. He was careful about his stray bullets. He didn¡¯t know exactly where Sneak was, and it was important that he never be hit. By the time Nealson was able to force himself onto his feet through the barrage, most of his health was gone. The sniper jumped to the back, trying to take cover behind the peak of the bridge¡¯s hill. McCormick fired on Ryan. Morrison shot a healing line at Nealson while the sniper was still in mid-air. Once the sniper landed, Ryan rushed up and over the top of the bridge¡¯s mound, firing his weapon, accepting the damage from the McCormick. Boost followed, staying in cover and keeping clear of the wall to the right. Once Ryan was over the peak, he fired down on Nealson. The sniper strafed backward and fired back into him, but once one too many bullets had hit him, went limp and fell back against a navigator¡¯s desk.


    Ryan turned and shot at McCormick, charging up the hill. McCormick strafed backward at a matching pace, and they¡¯d soon rounded the peak of the hill again. Each of their boosters healed them. ¡°You¡¯re going to run out of time before you can kill me, dumbass!¡± the McCormick said. He may have been right. Ryan might have made progress eliminating his enemy team if he shifted his attention to their Morrison, but he needed to force McCormick¡¯s attention onto him. He strafed in a circle so that his back was to the elevator, and the backs of those firing on him would be to the piloting chair. Boost moved behind him, to use him as cover. A light turned on across the bridge. Sneak was probably visible behind the mound of bridge stations. If Ryan lost either of his enemy¡¯s attention, it would be over for them. McCormick threw a grenade at the two of them. Ryan decided to stay put and eat the damage but Boost dove to the right. When the grenade exploded, Ryan took a harsh chunk of damage.


    To Ryan¡¯s left, Dash slit the throat of the enemy Slater, freeing him up to leap at McCormick, bearing not his rapier, which wouldn¡¯t do enough damage, but his stun gun, which would paralyze him. That would let them functionally end the battle. Morrison on her own wouldn¡¯t be able to harm them. Ryan smiled. Dash fired the weapon, loosing a yellow sphere like the one Boost had earlier conjured with a spell, and just before it hit McCormick square in the breast, McCormick activated a reflector, shooting the thing right back at Dash and stunning him. A spray of Ryan¡¯s own bullets flew back at him as well. McCormick strafed to where Dash lay sprawled with his head hanging over the drop from one circle of stations to another. Morrison was able to keep her healing spell up while she unloaded her side-arm into Dash. McCormick stomped Dash¡¯s head once, twice, and then thrice, leaving his neck broken and his head hanging grotesquely from him.


    ¡°You¡¯re so predictable!¡± the McCormick said. ¡°God, how did I start to lose to you upstairs? It must be the way the scenario was balanced.¡± A hologram appeared to their left. It was Serrano, another member of the Terran Naval Marines.


    ¡°I¡¯ll have control back in one minute guys. Great job holding out for us!¡±


    ¡°No problem,¡± McCormick said. ¡°They were chumps.¡± Then another voice rang through the bridge.


    ¡°Jump drive engaged.¡±


    ¡°What?!¡± McCormick said. There was a jerk as the ship started moving. Ryan stopped firing. McCormick turned around. Sneak was visible now, sitting in the pilot¡¯s chair.


    Breach-bot spoke to all of them in his default voice. ¡°Match ended. Red Arachnia wins.¡±


    ¡°How the fuck did you do that?¡± McCormick screamed. The ship stopped. ¡°That¡¯s such bullshit! How did you stay invisible long enough to do that?¡± Blast came onscreen and greeted her cursing and protesting prisoner. McCormick began to rant about the unfairness of invisibility, but their surroundings mercifully faded away, sparing all of them from having to listen.


    They were now at a rebel base, all four of them. It was different than the last one. A proper base, not the least bit disheveled. Perhaps it was supposed to be the one this journey had got them too. Ryan could see a black ship far above them. Perhaps it was the Hope¡¯s Vanguard, but there was no way to be sure.


    ¡°Holy shit, great job, man,¡± Dash said to Sneak.


    ¡°Thanks,¡± Sneak said. ¡°I just did what our Zap told me to.¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t be modest,¡± Ryan said. ¡°You managed to sneak across that room without alerting any of them that you were there, and without getting hit by any stray gunfire. Not everyone could have done that.¡± An invisible Sneak fades into view for several seconds if he takes damage. Had that happened even once, the other team might have detected him. Ryan had planned for their distraction to be enough of an immediate concern for the other team that this could happen a few times, and it possibly not ruin their plan. Sneak had dodged the gunfire better than Ryan could have expected and put the coordinates into the ship quickly and inconspicuously enough that their distraction was successful. ¡°You played very well.¡±


    ¡°Thanks,¡± Sneak said. ¡°Say, I¡¯d love it if you stayed partied with us for another match.¡±


    ¡°Yeah, if you¡¯re going to be playing a few more matches,¡± Dash said.


    Ryan was about to say yes, but then Breach-bot flashed an icon across his vision. He stared at it for a second.


    ¡°What¡¯s up?¡± the Dash asked.


    ¡°I just got a message,¡± he said. ¡°I¡¯m sorry. I have to deal with this. Breach-bot, remember these guys so I can find them again later.¡±


    ¡°Same the other way around,¡± Dash said.


    ¡°Contact information added,¡± Breach-bot said.


    ¡°I¡¯ll see if I can¡¯t join up with you after just one more match,¡± Ryan said.


    ¡°Cool,¡± Dash said.


    ¡°Alright,¡± Ryan said, looking up, as if Breach-bot could be found above him. He spoke with an audible sigh. ¡°Take me to him.¡±


    His surroundings transformed again. The message had said that its sender needed to speak with Ryan right away. Something terrible had happened, and he needed Ryan¡¯s help worse than he ever had before. Ryan appeared deep within a Red Arachnia base, surrounded by cobbled-together machinery, rusty metal on every panel of the wall, floor and ceiling. It was dark, and there was a table next to him. At its far end, sat a Dash, but with a completely different player inside than the one he¡¯d just been playing with. Ryan sat down in the giant chair that had been set up for him.


    ¡°What happened,¡± Ryan, willfully allowing the irritation to show in his voice. He groaned. ¡°Breach-bot, make me not sound like a robot.¡±


    ¡°Vocal alteration disabled.¡±


    ¡°What happened? This had better actually be important.¡± Ryan and this man had disagreed in the past about just which things were and which things weren¡¯t.


    ¡°It¡¯s about Lisa,¡± the man replied.


    That made Ryan¡¯s stoniness melt. ¡°What happened to Lisa?¡± Lisa had been part of Ryan¡¯s old team, back when he had played the game competitively, along with Jay, who he was speaking to now.


    ¡°Someone¡¯s car glitched. It plowed straight into her.¡±


    ¡°Oh shit,¡± Ryan said. He stared at Jay, but the only face he got to see was Dash¡¯s, half stoic and half cyborg. ¡°How is she now?


    ¡°Not dead yet,¡± Jay said. ¡°We don¡¯t know if that will change, or what sort of state she¡¯ll be in if she lives.¡±


    There was a silence between them. ¡°Thanks for telling me,¡± Ryan said. ¡°Where is she?¡±


    ¡°A hospital in New York. We were¡ªstill are¡ªthere for the championship.¡± Ryan had heard they¡¯d made it in, though he¡¯d had no plans to watch them. It would be a bit too hard rooting for the half of the team he was still on speaking terms with, but not the half that was Jay and the man Jay had left him for. Lisa had tried to stop all of that. She¡¯d offered to leave the team so there¡¯d still be a slot for him, but he didn¡¯t want it, so Jay¡¯s new toy started playing Spark like she had, and Lisa moved to playing Zap like Ryan had. Jay¡¯s new toy just couldn¡¯t get the hang of sphere mode, apparently.


    And then he realized why Jay was really here. ¡°You¡¯re not just here to ask me to¡ª¡±


    ¡°Not just, not at all just,¡± Jay said, ¡°but yes, we need someone to replace her, just for this one tournament.¡± Only the top eight teams in the league qualified for the world championship event.


    Ryan stood, pushing his giant chair backward behind him. It fell over, crashing into the metal floor. ¡°No! Jesus Christ, Jay, no! What the fuck is wrong with you?¡±


    ¡°Alright,¡± Jay said. ¡°I¡¯ll tell Sophia, and Lisa if she wakes up.¡± Jay himself stood and began to walk toward the door of the base, as if this were a real base one would leave through the door rather than an instance in a video game one would leave with a command to Breach-bot.


    Ryan watched him, thinking he ought to leave himself, but somehow not doing so. ¡°Is he still on the team?¡± Ryan said, once Jay was several paces away.


    Jay turned around. ¡°Yes,¡± he said. ¡°Believe me or don¡¯t when I say this, but Mitch was actually okay with sitting this one out for your sake. It was the tournament organizer who put her foot down. Replacing Lisa was one thing, but there could be no other changes.¡±


    It wasn¡¯t like Ryan to hate someone, but he made an exception for the man who¡¯d seduced Jay away from him. In his clearer moments, he had to admit that things between him and Jay were doomed regardless, but Jay hadn¡¯t cordially broken up with him over their issues. Instead, he¡¯d hooked up with someone he thought would take things more seriously. ¡°Why does it have to be me?¡±


    ¡°Because you¡¯re the best Zap player I know of and I don¡¯t have time to find someone else.¡±


    ¡°And you absolutely need a Zap?¡±


    ¡°Our ideal arrangement includes one. Hastily re-organizing our team would make our case hopeless. We all need you, Ryan. Lisa, Sophie and I.¡±


    ¡°Fine,¡± Ryan said.


    ¡°Thank you,¡± Jay said. ¡°Your travel expenses won¡¯t be covered by Thunderware,¡± the company that owned Breach, ¡°but I¡¯ll pay you back for all of them. You need to be in New York by seven tonight for the before-party.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ll be there by five. I want to see Lisa first thing.¡±


    ¡°Alright,¡± Jay said. He lingered a moment and then left.


    ¡°Breach-bot,¡± Ryan said. ¡°Tell those guy¡¯s that I¡¯m sorry, but that I can¡¯t make it back to them for now.¡±


    ¡°Message sent,¡± the robot said. Why couldn¡¯t the car robots be as faithful as this one?

 Broken (1/2)

    Ryan spent the flight to New York on his phone. Airplane design had advanced since the days of his ancestors, who would have had to deal with annoying interruptions in their ability to access the internet. Ryan did not face the same inconvenience but felt like he was wasting that privilege. He¡¯d much rather watch a fucking movie, but he hadn¡¯t been following the professional Breach season, and if he showed up to New York not knowing precisely who his opponents were, Jay would either be mad, or, worse, begin an exhaustive explanation of each and every one of them. So here he was, about to spend two hours looking up information on professional Breach teams, wading through a lot of information he already knew from being a professional player to get to the parts Jay might quiz him about.


    Reigning Fire had won last year and was the favorite to win this year. They played the Gray Fungus faction, which, in the lore, was an infectious hive-mind which had invaded the Milky Way through an interdimensional portal. They now traveled the galaxy assimilating all life they encountered. It was their evil that inspired the Terran Naval Marines to the extremes which sparked Red Arachnia to rebel against them.


    Unrelatedly, their Captain, Joss Turner, was the son of Thunderware¡¯s CEO.


    Reigning Fire was an old team, and one Ryan already knew a good deal about. Joss played as Huel-drark, an eight-foot monster whose right arm was a laser cannon. He fought alongside an Avaggdon which was a spiky mushroom barnacle with the power to manipulate the terrain around it, a Xig¡¯zah which was a spindly ball of arm-knives that set explosive traps, and an Ichaboth which was an amorphous cloud of fungal spores. There was a link to some footage of them in action. It was them picking on an enemy they¡¯d isolated. Ichaboth descended on the area, buffing the three of them with beneficent spores while they passed their poor foe back and forth like a rag-doll.


    Oh, by the way, they were probably cheaters. At least, that¡¯s what Maximillian Turner, who they¡¯d fought against in last year¡¯s final match had accused them of. The footage of their battle, where Joss unexpectedly pulled out the perfect counter to one of Max¡¯s items, had been torn apart and scrutinized by the internet. No one had found a smoking gun, nor had anyone, including Joss, been able to explain why he happened to make such an odd item choice at the start of the match. He claimed he was following a hunch. Others thought it more likely that he¡¯d used malicious software to smuggle in one or more ¡°generic items,¡± which he could turn into whatever he needed when he discovered he needed it. Breach-bot had detected nothing to indicate cheating at the time, but it wouldn¡¯t be the first time the bot had been fooled. One of only a handful, but not the first. The fact that Joss was the CEO¡¯s son made it seem just a teensy bit more likely for him to get away with this sort of thing


    But then again Maximillian, his accuser, was the CEO¡¯s son too, so maybe that cancelled out. He was the Captain of Ours is the Glory, who¡¯d gone undefeated last year until their possibly illegitimate loss in the finals. They played as the Legion of the Iron Star, who had invaded the galaxy through yet another interdimensional portal, one which led to a universe so old that all that remained within it were black holes and stars which had turned to spheres of iron over the course of a trillion trillion years. Their society had long ago advanced past having needs of their own, so they dedicated their existence to traveling from dimension to dimension, distributing helpful technologies, destroying evil empires and rescuing galaxies from pernicious races like the Gray Fungus.


    Ours is the Glory had an odd team loadout. Max played Occilo who was the second-biggest member of Iron Star, but had the biggest sword. They also had a Terraemotus, who was a big magic user. That was orthodox enough. The other team members, though, were a Nullum, which was a strange bull-like thing on which other members, in this case Max, could ride, and an Armigeri, another support character, who would enhance Occilo¡¯s fighting power. It¡¯s odd to have multiple support characters when you only have one real fighter. Most teams had either three fighters and one support or two fighters, one support, and one utility character. Then again, Nullum was a fighter in his own regard. Mount or not, he did have the ability to breathe fire.


    Probably the third most discussed team was Pheonix. They played Iron Star too, with a more orthodox team setup. The notable thing about them, in the eyes of the public, was that they were assembled from a cancer support group. Some friends who met at the group started gaming, and then entered a tournament, and things evolved from there. They went up against Ours is the Glory and lost, but Max stayed in touch with them, and wound up using family money to pay for their treatments. Intricate medical testing had since confirmed that they were cancer-free. Their Captain could be seen praising Max to high heaven in interviews. One piece written by an oncologist claimed all four of them would have been very unlikely to survive without the high-quality treatment they received, though a disclaimer at the bottom made it clear that this was native advertising.


    The last team that attracted a lot of public discussion was Sad Cake Binge Gaming, who Ryan and most others knew, first and foremost, as a group of comedy streamers. They played the Pickciez, the creatures who emerged from the third and final inter-dimensional portal in the game¡¯s universe. The Pickciez were a comic relief faction conducive to the kind of performance Sad Cake Binge Gaming normally engaged in. The fact that they could go out of their way to prank their enemies in matchmaking and still consistently win attested to their skill. Of course, when it came time for tournament play, they got more serious, hence why they were also the current European Regional Champions.


    The rest of the teams were less notable. We Rise as One played as the Terran Naval Marines and had the worst win record of any team in the championship despite marketing themselves on the fact that three of them were real soldiers. Of course, having the worst win record of the eight teams in the world championship still meant having one of the ten best win records worldwide. About twice as good as Ryan¡¯s team had back when he was on it. Dying Gravity were the South African regional champions. They played the Pickciez and had a reputation for unconventional and inventive strategies. Epidemic played Gray Fungus and had been the world champions of Breach¡¯s junior league last year. This was their first season in the senior league, and they were doing better than anyone had expected of them.


    Last, and probably also least, was Ryan¡¯s team, the ironically named Unbroken. They played Red Arachnia, and according to most of the coverage Ryan saw, consisted of Jayden Reece, a Dash, Sophia Jones, a Boost, Mitch Atkins, a Spark, and Lisa Dodson, a Zap. There was only one article on the car crash, posted a few hours ago. It ended by saying that ¡°what this tragedy means for Unbroken¡¯s championship bid is also unknown at this time.¡± ¡®Also¡¯ because the article had just explained that no one knew if Lisa would ever wake up from her coma.


    //////////


    Ryan¡¯s plane would be landing soon. Jayden looked through his phone. Prior to such an important event, he spent almost all his time researching, mostly combing through footage of the enemy teams at work. He wanted to know their style, how they¡¯d react to his choices, and how he could best react to theirs. None of the teams in this tournament were new to him. Most of them, he¡¯d played before. He¡¯d lost matches against Reigning Fire, Ours is the Glory and Sad Cake Binge Gaming earlier this season. The others he¡¯d faced at some point in the past, except Epidemic. He¡¯d never looked into them that much until now but had been making up for that in the last few days. Their style was polished, but with vestiges of what you might expect from a group of children. They had a bias toward flashier tactics and over-relied on infection and other debuffs to prevent their enemies from countering bold moves.Support the creativity of authors by visiting Royal Road for this novel and more.


    An announcer told Jayden that Ryan¡¯s flight had landed. A few minutes later, people spilled from the appropriate terminal, Ryan among them. Jayden had started to forget what it was that drew him to Ryan, back when he felt drawn to him, but the sight of him was enough to remind him. Ryan was tall, lean and tan-skinned, with adorable curly brown hair. His eyes were green, and always alert, as if afraid to miss something important. Jayden wished Mitch and Ryan weren¡¯t the sort of men you had to choose between. Ryan was a lot of fun.


    Jayden stood, and Ryan saw him. They walked to each other. ¡°Hey,¡± Jayden said, waving, trying to sound cheerful.


    ¡°Hey,¡± Ryan said, not bothering to sound anything but bored.


    ¡°You said you wanted to go straight to the hospital?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m glad you remembered.¡±


    Jayden was already working hard to hold in his irritation at Ryan. At least he had the decency to hold it in. ¡°Alright.¡± Jay had already ordered an auto to arrive a few minutes after Ryan was due to land, so by the time they got to the parking lot, it was waiting to pick them up.


    //////////


    It suited Ryan that he didn¡¯t speak with Jay on the way to the hospital. Ryan just listened to music and looked out at the city while Jay watched endless footage of either Epidemic or Reigning Fire matches, staring at the phone with intensity that should have summoned lasers from his eyes to melt it. Ryan tried to recall what he¡¯d seen in Jay, years ago. Where it concerned literal sight, that was an easy question. Jay was diligent about his health and had the muscles to prove it. But Ryan had met plenty of men with delicious muscles and none of them had kept his attention for long. Jay had been so nice at first, so quick to quip back and forth with him, so interested in everything that caught his interest. He¡¯d been a furnace of passion, but now he seemed to have frozen over.


    Ryan was dwelling on Jay too much. Just because he was right there didn¡¯t mean there was any need to think about him. Was this what Jay wanted? Did he take pleasure in Ryan¡¯s annoyance with him? No, that couldn¡¯t be. He¡¯d want Ryan in tip-top psychological shape for the competition tomorrow. Maybe Ryan should have shared that goal. Maybe he should have taken this seriously. This was the championship, after all. Didn¡¯t the prospect of being the champion have at least some appeal?


    Eh, not really. Ryan was looking forward to playing with Sophia again, though, and he had missed some of the trappings of tournament events. Audiences were fun, even when they were against you. Unbroken had a few fans. This must be terribly exciting for them. An old favorite was stepping up to stand in for his fallen comrade. It would be a shame to disappoint them.


    Outside the window, it was just starting to get dark, and some of the city¡¯s lights had come on. In the distance, there was a giant arch, tall and skinny and sticking up over the skyline. The lights covering it were blue at the peak, green near the middle, and faded toward red as they disappeared behind the closer buildings.


    They passed a giant Christmas display. The tree was something spectacular: big enough to rival the city¡¯s smaller skyscrapers. On its tip, an eight-pointed golden star. The tree was covered trunk to tip with bands of lights that shifted hues gradually and independently of one another. Occasionally, two adjacent band¡¯s colors would happen to match for an instant, and they would merge into a single band of color twice as thick as the others.


    Ryan changed songs. Jay was still watching footage. It was Epidemic. There was a Mog¡¯Inub onscreen, and Reigning Fire didn¡¯t have one of those.


    The auto arrived at the hospital. Ryan and Jay got out and hurried toward the entrance. It was freezing.


    //////////


    The hospital lobby was gargantuan and ornate, dominated by a central fountain where water trickled over a twelve-foot formation of sharp black rocks. Jay knew the way to Lisa¡¯s room from having visited her once before. He led Ryan to the elevator, which they rode to the sixth floor.


    Lisa¡¯s room wasn¡¯t far once they got off the elevator. It was whiter than white, and brightly lit. On the far side of the room, a large square window overlooked the city. Ryan could see the same Christmas tree they¡¯d passed on the way here.


    Lisa was on a metallic bed. An apparatus of six robotic arms hung above her, ready to respond to any sudden medical needs with swiftness and skill no human surgeon could have ever achieved. Behind her bed, an apparatus of monitors beeped and buzzed.


    Lisa herself was clothed in casts. A thick white brace held her neck in place, and a larger brace which reminded Ryan of a strait jacket seemed to be doing the same for her spine. Purple casts covered her limbs from base to tip. A bandage covered the right side of her face. A bruise ringed her left eye.


    ¡°Her spinal cord is severed in two places,¡± Jay said. ¡°They don¡¯t know if they¡¯ll be able to fix it.¡±


    Ryan approached the bed, not acknowledging him.


    ¡°I¡¯ll step outside, if you¡¯d like,¡± Jay said, in an unusual moment of consideration.


    ¡°I would. Thank you,¡± Ryan said. Jay left.


    It¡¯d been Lisa that first learned what Mitch and Jay were doing. With the benefit of hindsight, the signs were obvious. Mitch was spending a lot of time around the team, and Jay was spending a lot of time alone with Mitch. The possibility of what turned out to be true had occurred to Ryan, but Lisa had found it more difficult than Ryan had to suppress her suspicions. After Mitch and Jay had been behaving suspiciously for a few months, she did some investigation. Once she was convinced there could be no innocent explanation, she decided to confront Jay to hear his side of things.


    ¡°I won¡¯t deny it,¡± Jay had later admitted to saying. ¡°You know how things have been between me and Ryan. Do you honestly think he¡¯d even be that upset?¡±


    ¡°Then why don¡¯t you tell him?¡± Lisa asked.


    ¡°I will, after the tournament,¡± Jay said, meaning that year¡¯s U. S. regional championship qualifier.


    ¡°Is that really what¡¯s important to you?¡±


    ¡°I thought it was important to all of us,¡± Jay said. ¡°Do you really think it¡¯s a good idea to break up with him right now? If Christmas or Valentine¡¯s day were coming up, I¡¯d wait until after those events to break up with him. This is definitely more important than that.¡±


    Lisa pretended to be convinced by that line of reasoning but relayed the situation to Ryan later that day. Ryan¡¯s confrontation with Jay wasn¡¯t as calm as Lisa¡¯s had been and led to him leaving the team. The others had been on his side. If he had asked them to kick Jay off, they would have, but at that point, he¡¯d already started having doubts about whether competitive Breach was something he really enjoyed. Part of him welcomed the excuse to leave behind the stress, the scheduling, the intense practicing, and Jay¡¯s constant nagging.


    Ryan decided it was better that he forfeit his spot to Mitch than to usurp Jay as team captain.


    Lisa approached him later, offering to give up her spot to Mitch instead, or leave along with him in protest, but Ryan told her not to do either of those things unless she really wanted to. It seemed she didn¡¯t. Maybe she didn¡¯t want to abandon Jay and Sophia. In either case, their team was shuffled around to allow Mitch on, and the resulting version of Unbroken was creamed in the qualifier. Ryan believed it was due to the switch, and that he would have won it for them if he¡¯d been there. He did have to admit, though, that this new team had found their stride since he left. Never had his version of Unbroken made it to the World Championship. Maybe Ryan was in over his head.


    Ryan reached out to hold Lisa¡¯s casted hand.


    A loud buzz made him jump. ¡°Do not touch this patient,¡± said a speaker above the surgeon-bot. ¡°She has sustained injuries throughout her skeleton and moving any part of her body could exacerbate those injuries or cause internal bleeding.¡±


    ¡°Sorry,¡± Ryan said.

 Broken (2/2)

    It was somehow already six before Ryan decided to leave the hospital. He and Jay took another auto to the hotel. All of the tournament¡¯s competitors were given free boarding, and it was simple enough for Ryan to move into the hotel room that had been reserved for Lisa. It was twice the size of a bedroom, with a queen-sized bed against one wall, a forty-inch flat-screen against the other, a mini-bar in one corner and a trio of chairs around a table in the other. Ryan plopped his bags on one side of the bed and lay down. He took out his phone.


    According to the internet, the party he was about to attend had been a thing for the past four years. It was held at the Turner mansion. It wouldn¡¯t just be the competitors there. There would be several members of Breach¡¯s development team, some other VIPs from around the industry, executives from all of the companies sponsoring the tournament, a handful of players who came close to making it into the tournament, some fans who won a sweepstakes, and some fans rich enough to donate large sums to this year¡¯s charity. (¡°Habitat for Humanity,¡± who had been hard at work for decades trying to deal with the countless people who¡¯d been displaced from coastal cities all around the world due to rising sea levels.)


    The party was Maximillian Turner¡¯s idea. He held the first one the first year he qualified for the championship. Max was apparently no stranger to parties. There was a detailed article about Max and his near-weekly gatherings on a website for rich New Yorkers. At least for the sorts of people reading this site, it wasn¡¯t hard to get oneself invited. Charitable contributions were often solicited from guests. Breach related imagery wasn¡¯t uncommon, but the article assured its readers that the mansion was exquisite, and the parties not so unsophisticated that only a young adult could enjoy them.


    The article did a good job of maintaining the balance between seeming like a real rich person and seeming like a human being with a soul, but this might have been a front. There were debates in the comments about whether it was okay that Max¡¯s family had only been rich for a single generation. You see, Max¡¯s father had come from a family so lowly that it could almost be considered upper middle class. The man had only became extremely wealthy when Thunderware found unexpected success in virtual reality gaming. This apparently caused Max¡¯s parties, and everything else about his public behavior, to be far less sophisticated and upright. Also Max wasn¡¯t white, but that had nothing to do with these people¡¯s objections.


    Ryan didn¡¯t even really want to go to the party, except it would be his earliest chance to see Sophia. Also, there was a tradition where the eight teams that had qualified for the tournament entered a battle-royale match. Ryan wasn¡¯t going to make his team miss out on that just because these sorts of social events bored him.


    Ryan decided he was bored of the internet and switched to watching television, but after just ten minutes of some old Christmas special it was already time to go. Ryan changed into some less casual clothes, used the bathroom, and went outside. He met up with Jay in the hallway, and they left for the mansion.


    //////////


    To Ryan¡¯s Shock, Jay put down his phone to speak. ¡°When we get to the mansion,¡± he said, ¡°they¡¯ll want invitations.¡± He seemed to think this would be news to Ryan. ¡°Max knows about our situation, so we should be fine, but you might have to wait outside for a minute if there¡¯s a misunderstanding with whoever is checking them at the door.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re on a first name basis with him?¡± Ryan asked.


    ¡°Yeah,¡± Jay said. ¡°I¡¯ve hung out with him some at events. I think he¡¯d been trying to make nice with me for some reason.¡±


    ¡°Weird.¡±


    ¡°He is, kind of, yeah.¡±


    Upon seeing the mansion, it was immediately clear to Ryan why the CEO¡¯s son held so many parties. He had to do something to keep all that space from going to waste. Three people lived in this mansion, yet it was three stories tall and twice as wide. Its outer walls looked like they were made entirely of glass, held in place by a grid of steel window frames. One could see the interior of every room in the front of the mansion. One room appeared to be a dining room, with a long brown table and giant gold chandelier. Another might have been a library, though there were so many shelves that some of them must have been holding something else. No one could read that much. There was a giant fountain outside. It was shut off for the winter but decorated with Christmas lights. Lights also covered the mansion itself, framing each of its giant windows and circling its roof. The lights were brightly colored, red, green, blue, deep yellow and white, and they were all constantly fading and relighting themselves in different colors.


    Ryan and Jay¡¯s auto made it two car-lengths in to a massive horse-shoe before the other cars present forced it to stop. Jay got out of the car, and Ryan followed him. Any other time of the year, during an event like this, there might have been a crowd on the lawn, but no one wanted to be outside in this cold, Ryan least of all, so he went straight up to the door and knocked. A well-dressed butler was camped by the door to answer it. He recognized Jay¡¯s face, and so didn¡¯t feel the need to ask for their invitations.


    The walls of the entryway were painted blue. The floor was tiled with marble, marred with blue veins. A curly staircase with a golden handrail led to a brown door. On the ground, a scarlet rug led to a gold double-door twice the size of the mansion¡¯s entrance. These doors were held open, and behind them was a ballroom. There were more brown doors to the right and left. There were couches in each corner of the room. People Ryan didn¡¯t recognize, but who were the right age to be developers or businessmen, mingled on some of them.


    Ryan walked across the carpet. The doors were flanked by statues: one of Breach¡¯s most iconic character, James of the Terran Naval Marines, and one of the character Max happened to main, Occilo.


    The glass windows on the far end of the ballroom revealed that it was as deep as the whole rest of the house. A few dozen people mingled and danced to 40s techno beats matching the style of Breach¡¯s soundtrack. Ryan scanned the room and saw Sophia. She was speaking to someone next to a table on which food had been laid out. Ryan walked toward her. Jay went off on his own, probably toward Mitch, but Ryan didn¡¯t care.


    ¡°Hey!¡± Sophia said when she noticed Ryan.


    ¡°Hey,¡± Ryan said. The person she¡¯d been talking to turned around. It was, in fact, Maximilian Turner. He stepped back allowing the two to greet one another with a brief hug.


    ¡°Sorry to interrupt,¡± Ryan said. Turner was in a light blue shirt and dark blue jacket and pants. His face was smooth and flawless, his eyes soft blue and gentle, his mouth curved in an eternal smile.


    ¡°Oh, no, it¡¯s fine,¡± he said. He extended his hand, which Ryan shook. ¡°I¡¯m Max Turner.¡±


    ¡°I recognized you,¡± Ryan said. ¡°I¡¯m Ryan Jonson.¡±


    ¡°Nice to meet you, Ryan,¡± Max said.¡± So, you¡¯re Unbroken¡¯s new Zap? Sophie says you¡¯re pretty good.¡± He gestured toward Sophia.


    ¡°Well I¡¯m definitely not going to go and deny that,¡± Ryan said.


    ¡°Ha ha. Well, it¡¯s nice to meet you, and thanks for coming at the last minute. It would have sucked for your team to have to step out because of what happened.¡±


    ¡°Well that¡¯s for sure,¡± Ryan said.


    ¡°Ooh, Sorry,¡± Max said. ¡°I shouldn¡¯t have mentioned it.¡±


    ¡°No, no, it¡¯s fine. You¡¯re fine.¡±


    ¡°Max and I had just been talking about the ¡¯79 regionals,¡± Sophia said.


    ¡°Yeah,¡± Max said. ¡°You guys did really well there.¡±


    ¡°Think so?¡± Ryan asked.


    ¡°Of course. I mean, sure, I could have done better, but you got third place. That¡¯s pretty impressive.¡±


    ¡°You know, it¡¯s not nice to tell people you¡¯re better than them.¡±


    ¡°Right, sorry about that!¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t worry. I¡¯ll have my revenge once we start playing.¡±


    ¡°Ha ha. I¡¯m going to hold you to that. You¡¯ll get a good chance in an hour when the match starts. It¡¯ll be fun no matter how it goes.¡±


    ¡°Yeah. It will.¡± Ryan would need to consider hitting on this man later.


    ¡°You four really did have a great dynamic, though,¡± Max said. ¡°Some of the best teamwork I¡¯ve ever seen.¡±Stolen story; please report.


    ¡°Thanks.¡±


    ¡°There¡¯s no need to thank me for telling the truth. Anyways, you two must have a lot to talk about. I think I should let you two catch up. There are still some people who are going to arrive, and I should greet them.¡±


    ¡°No problem,¡± Sophia said.


    ¡°Yeah, do what you need to do,¡± Ryan said. ¡°I hope we bump into each other later.¡±


    ¡°Me too. Oh, and a word of advice. My brother isn¡¯t as friendly as I am. If you see him, don¡¯t introduce yourself. And if you do, don¡¯t say I didn¡¯t warn you.¡±


    ¡°Uh, okay,¡± Ryan said.


    ¡°Maybe you¡¯ll see what I mean,¡± Max said, and he walked off.


    Sophia picked up a bit of bread from the table next to them. ¡°So, what the hell have you been up to for a year and a half?¡±


    ¡°Not much. Basically just gaming.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m surprised you¡¯ve not found yourself another team. It¡¯s not like there aren¡¯t a million teams that would kill for a competent Zap.¡±


    ¡°Eh, maybe someday.¡± Ryan scooped a ladel-full of punch into a paper cup. ¡°No offense, but I haven¡¯t been missing competitive play much.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m sorry to hear that. I hope Jay didn¡¯t strongarm you¡ª¡±


    ¡°No, no, it¡¯s fine. I¡¯m happy to be here under the circumstances, and I¡¯m psyched to play with you again. It¡¯s just not my favorite playing environment.¡± Ryan took a sip of his punch. It was good; pinkish orange and pretty darn sour. It didn¡¯t taste or smell alcoholic. ¡°How did Mitch react to learning that I was coming?¡± Ryan asked.


    Sophia had to think about that. ¡°He understood. He¡¯d definitely rather have you come than forfeit the tournament.¡±


    ¡°He wasn¡¯t happy about it though?¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t worry about it. Jayden gave him the chance to say no and he didn¡¯t take it. I won¡¯t let him get away with going back on that.¡±


    ¡°Oh, I can take care of that myself if the situation calls for it. I¡¯m curious, though. What would you do?¡±


    ¡°I dunno. I¡¯ve never had to answer that question before. I get along with them fine. It¡¯s you the two of them annoy.¡±


    ¡°Heh.¡± How someone could possibly stand Mitch, Ryan didn¡¯t understand. The same would be true for Jay, if Ryan hadn¡¯t dated him for so long. ¡°By the way, how is it you guys managed to get yourselves into the championship? I leave and all of the sudden you¡¯re championship material? I have to admit, I¡¯m a little wounded.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m sure we¡¯d have done it last year if you¡¯d still been on the team.¡±


    ¡°Thanks for saying so.¡± The two continued catching up for quite a while, until another team entered the ballroom.


    //////////


    Mitch was in the corner, on a couch, dutifully studying, bobbing his head to the ambient music. Jayden walked over and sat next to him, wrapping an arm around him.


    ¡°Hey,¡± Mitch said.


    ¡°Hey,¡± Jayden said. ¡°Anything to share?¡±


    ¡°Not that you probably don¡¯t know,¡± Mitch said. ¡°I¡¯ve mostly been looking into Reigning Fire. Their item selection patterns are pretty wonky.¡±


    ¡°That much I know,¡± Jayden said. The weak teams warranted some study, but at the end of the day you probably wouldn¡¯t face them, so they didn¡¯t warrant the bulk of your attention. Reigning Fire were the ones to obsess over. The only way you wouldn¡¯t face them eventually was if they lost to someone else, and the odds of that were low. The odds of them losing to Unbroken were low too, but that didn¡¯t bear thinking about. If Unbroken was going to win the championship, they were probably going to have to beat Reigning Fire. ¡°If you¡¯ve got them down, though, I¡¯ll do Ours is the Glory.¡±


    ¡°Sounds good.¡± Ryan would be shocked to hear it, but Jayden did get bored watching hours of footage and pouring over game data. Jayden just had the ability to power through it with this little thing called dedication.


    Jayden searched for and pulled up some footage of Ours is the Glory playing against Unbroken earlier this year. Ours is the Glory had an odd battle dynamic. Everyone else was dedicated to supporting Max¡¯s Occilo. He rode the Nullum. The Armigiri existed mostly to buff him. Terraemotus put a lot of work into aiding him as well, and forcing enemies to fight him alone. All three of those players weren¡¯t people Max had known before he started competitive play. They were hired by Max¡¯s father. That didn¡¯t mean Max was some upstart whose daddy had bought him a team. A team that made it into the world championship multiple times in a row had to have four good players. Still, Jayden wished his dad were rich enough to buy him the best teammates in the world.


    Jayden studied Max¡¯s movements in the piece of footage he was watching. Max was massive as Occilo, and he moved with power, riding his Nullum toward Zap, played by Lisa. His sword glowed with Armigeri¡¯s magic as he slammed it into her chest. Sparks flew. Being impaled by the sword locked Lisa in place. Nullum hit her with a breath of blue-white fire. Her rusty armor plating melted, bits of them dripping onto the horned beast, but doing him no harm. Max wrenched his sword out of her and rode off to the right. Lisa¡¯s body fell forward. Jayden studied the clip for over ten minutes but couldn¡¯t find any flaw with the technique. He scooted toward Mitch, who reciprocated, and rested his head against Jayden¡¯s shoulder.


    Across the ballroom, another team entered.


    //////////


    Ryan turned to see who was entering. He recognized the first person to enter: Joss Turner, Captain of Reigning Fire. As much as Max probably wouldn¡¯t want to hear it, they looked a lot alike: both olive-skinned with puffy ridged cheeks. Joss, though, had a wiry beard, redder than his head-hair. He was wearing a shirt and jeans. The rest of his team entered behind him, only one of them dressed up.


    ¡°Should I go introduce myself to him?¡± Ryan asked.


    ¡°Like Max told you not to?¡± Sophia asked.


    ¡°Right, exactly,¡± Ryan said. ¡°I¡¯m really curious.¡± Reigning Fire split up. One member headed toward the stage to dance. Two others walked over to the couches where Jay and Mitch were. These were championship players. Some of the best in the league and the most dedicated.


    Maybe Jay would leave Mitch for one of them.


    ¡°Have you met Reigning Fire before?¡± Ryan asked Sophia. Ryan was pretty sure Unbroken had played them once back when he was on it, but he didn¡¯t remember interacting with them himself. They weren¡¯t quite as big of a team a few years ago.


    ¡°We¡¯ve played against them,¡± Sophia said. ¡°I¡¯ve not had any extended conversations with them or anything.¡±


    ¡°Do you think he¡¯s as bad as his brother let on?¡±


    ¡°Probably.¡±


    Joss was walking over to them. Toward the punch, Ryan realized. He gave Ryan a look that told him he¡¯d noticed Ryan¡¯s staring. That was rude of Ryan. Still, the look sort of sealed the deal. ¡°I¡¯m going in,¡± Ryan said.


    ¡°I¡¯ll be here to cheer you on,¡± Sophia said.


    Ryan waited for Joss to arrive at the punch bowl. Once Joss was in front of the bowl, Ryan walked up to and stood behind him, as if waiting in line to refill his glass, which was long-empty. ¡°Hi,¡± Ryan said.


    ¡°Hi,¡± Joss said. He scooped punch into his cup, and, without moving out of the way, pulled a flask out of his coat and poured its contents in.


    ¡°I¡¯m Ryan,¡± Ryan said. ¡°You¡¯re Joss Turner?¡±


    ¡°Yes.¡± He moved over, and got a plate, which he began to fill with artificial meat.


    ¡°It¡¯s nice to meet you,¡± Ryan said.


    ¡°Nice to meet you,¡± Joss said, focused on his task. Ryan got his own punch.


    ¡°Can I borrow some of what¡¯s in the flask?¡± Ryan said.


    ¡°If only I had enough to share.¡±


    ¡°Yikes. I¡¯m here if you want to talk about it.¡±


    ¡°Believe me, there¡¯s nothing you could say. Now please leave me alone.¡±


    ¡°Sorry,¡± Ryan said.


    ¡°I didn¡¯t ask you to apologize. I asked you to go away.¡±


    ¡°Sorry,¡± Ryan said again.


    ¡°And what was it I just said?¡±


    ¡°Alright, alright, I¡¯m going.¡±


    ¡°You say that.¡±


    Ryan took his full punch glass back over to Sophia.


    ¡°Looks like that went well,¡± she said.


    ¡°We¡¯re best friends now,¡± Ryan said.


    ¡°Cool beans. Anything worth sharing?¡±


    ¡°He has more foresight than me. He brought a flask to mix into his punch.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m wounded. Are you saying you¡¯re not enjoying yourself?¡±


    ¡°Oh no. I am. For now. While I¡¯ve not seen Mitch.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯d be as simple as looking right over there.¡± She gestured toward the two of them, half snuggling, half studying on the couch.


    ¡°Bleck,¡± Ryan said.


    ¡°Fair enough. I can¡¯t blame Joss for needing some help getting through this, though. There must be a lot of baggage between he and his brother after the accusations.¡±


    ¡°I was reading about that on the way here. You¡¯ve been more hooked into things than I have. Do you think he did it?¡±


    ¡°There¡¯s not really any evidence. The whole point of having an AI govern the game is that it allows the rules to be a bit adaptable and the game still be fair. Max had a second Purifying Light in that match because Breach-bot allowed him to, and Joss knew that that kind of thing could happen, so he prepared for it.¡±


    ¡°I guess. I can¡¯t help but see him as the cheating type, though.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m sure he is. People who play fair don¡¯t become world champions.¡±


    ¡°What does that say about us?¡±


    ¡°That we¡¯ll get third place, like we did at regionals. At least that¡¯s as high as I¡¯m letting my hopes get.¡±


    ¡°Wise. And now I feel sorry for Jay and Mitch.¡±


    ¡°Softie.¡±

 The Spore (1/2)

    Ryan and Sophia were still catching up¡ªRyan could have kept talking with her all night¡ªwhen they heard a faint whirring by the door. In flew a fist-sized red and white drone carrying a camera. Following behind it, looking straight into the camera, was Marvin Blackwood, the captain of Sad Cake Binge Gaming. Two more members of his team entered behind him. They both had their own mini-drone: one blue and gold, one dark purple and black. The drones were AI piloted and programmed to follow them around. Presumably, they were using them to live-stream their entrance to the party. ¡°And here we are!¡± Marvin said into his camera. He kept talking, but Ryan didn¡¯t keep paying attention to what he was saying. Max walked off the stage, where he had been dancing, and over to greet the entering team. Sophia stared at them.


    ¡°You¡¯re thinking of pulling something?¡± Ryan said to Sophia.


    ¡°More like daydreaming,¡± Sophia said. ¡°They¡¯re good sports. They can handle it.¡±


    Marvin went to the dance floor. The other two headed toward the swimming pool. Ryan wished he could use the pool himself, but he hadn¡¯t thought to pack swim trunks.


    Ten minutes later, the music by the dance floor stopped, and Max¡¯s voice rang out in its place. ¡°Hey, everyone, the annual Battle Royale game will begin in about twenty minutes. Everyone should find their teammates and prepare to meet me in the lobby.¡±


    Ryan sighed. ¡°Do you think I can get away with not seeing Mitch until we¡¯re in-game.¡±


    ¡°No.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re probably right.¡± Ryan had agreed to come here. He needed to think about Lisa. He filled up his punch glass and packed some thickly sweet chocolate pastries onto a paper plate, and then he and Sophia made their way over to the corner where Jay and Mitch each had an arm around the other¡¯s shoulder. They adopted a chaster posture when they saw Ryan and Sophia approaching. Ryan had expected some kind of glare from Mitch, but instead, the look on his face reeked of awkwardness. He was shorter than any of them, including Sophia, and had neither a chin nor cheekbones. He wore a gaudy light blue shirt under his jacket.


    ¡°Hey, guys,¡± Sophia said, sitting down on the couch next to Jay.


    ¡°Hi,¡± Mitch said. Ryan took a seat on the chair next to the three of them.


    ¡°Glad you guys came right over,¡± Jay said. ¡°We should spend a moment discussing strategy before the match starts.¡±


    ¡°I guess,¡± Ryan said.


    Some things went unspoken. They were playing Red Arachnia, which, in a Battle Royale match, was a very good thing. Battle Royale matches differed from standard ones. All eight teams would be set loose in one giant map, and they would go around trying to kill each other, with each player¡¯s death eliminating them from the match. Eventually, only one team would still have living members, and that team would be the winner.


    In this kind of match, it was normally a good idea to try not go get into too many fights, and of all the factions, Red Arachnia was the best at stealth. They would have been even better off if they didn¡¯t have Zap among them. However, Zap could be stealthier than his size would lead one to expect. He was immune to radar tools and wasn¡¯t loud.


    Breach-bot would have designed the map so that hunkering down and hiding in one place would be unlikely to work, but that didn¡¯t mean a stealth-oriented strategy couldn¡¯t be effective. If they played well, Unbroken could avoid fights, set a lot of traps, and wait around while the other teams killed each other off. Of course, then they¡¯d have to take on whoever was left, which would probably be one of the strongest teams in the match. However, they¡¯d go into that fight fresh, unlike their enemy.


    ¡°Reigning Fire is obviously the biggest threat,¡± Mitch said. ¡°And since there¡¯ll be another Gray Fungus in the arena along with them, we need to be very concerned about infection.¡±


    The other three agreed.


    ¡°At the same time,¡± Jay said, ¡°we don¡¯t want to do anything that will slow the spread of infection in the arena.¡± Infection was a status effect, meant to represent the Gray Fungus assimilating you into their hive mind. Several of their abilities could affect you with it, and if they did, you would lose some control of your avatar. If you tried to harm Gray Fungi, or help your teammates, there¡¯d be a chance you¡¯d seize up for several seconds. If untreated, infection grew worse over time, and once it reached its final stage, you¡¯d turn into an NPC drone, controlled by Breach-bot and allied with the Gray Fungus. In a normal match, you¡¯d then respawn as though you¡¯d died. Indeed, the infected often killed themselves to begin the respawn counter early rather than put up with the status effect. In a Battle Royale, there was no respawning, so infection was all the more powerful. As a robot, Zap didn¡¯t have to worry about it, and Dash¡¯s cybernetic components meant that he couldn¡¯t be taken over completely, but for Mitch and Sophia it was a very serious hazard.


    However, Jay argued, if they made sure they were properly prepared to resist infection and then forged an alliance with one of the Gray Fungus teams, where they would help spread infection in exchange for being left alone, they would seriously harm the other teams.


    ¡°I don¡¯t feel like Reigning Fire would be up for an alliance like that,¡± Ryan said.


    ¡°I see where you¡¯re coming from,¡± Jay said, ¡°but I think you¡¯re wrong. I take it you met Joss?¡±


    ¡°Yep,¡± Ryan said. ¡°Would it be bad form to talk to Epidemic, or Reigning Fire I guess, out of game and coordinate this?¡± Ryan asked.


    ¡°Probably,¡± Sophia said.


    ¡°I¡¯m not so sure,¡± Jay said.


    ¡°Maybe you should ask Max,¡± Ryan said.


    ¡°That would mean letting him know we¡¯re doing it,¡± Sophia said.


    ¡°If it¡¯s allowed, most teams are probably doing it,¡± Jay said.


    ¡°Fair point,¡± Sophia said.


    Jay rose from his couch. ¡°I¡¯ll go find him.¡±


    He walked off.


    Mitch scooted away from the chair Ryan was sitting on and crossed his arms. ¡°Objectively, the second biggest threat is Ours is the Glory,¡± he said. ¡°But for us specifically, I think to us it¡¯s a toss-up between Dying Gravity and Sad Cake Binge Gaming.¡±


    ¡°Agreed,¡± Ryan said. Sophia scooted closer to Mitch, as if to provide him moral support, and only then did Ryan realize what was going on. He tried to think of something mildly encouraging but non-awkward he could say. ¡°Where Ours is the Glory and Pheonix are concerned, I think we just need to be careful to lay enough traps to keep them from fighting us at full strength. That¡¯s your job, of course.¡±


    ¡°Right,¡± Mitch said. ¡°But back to the Pickciez teams. Hiding from them is going to be a problem. Do we have any particular strategies in mind.¡± Pickciez were harder to hide from, because they were fast-moving and could search and area efficiently.


    ¡°Be lucky, so they don¡¯t happen across us¡± said Sophia.


    ¡°That¡¯s always plan A,¡± said Mitch. ¡°Failing that, though¡­¡±


    ¡°Our best answer is probably raw power,¡± Ryan said. ¡°Especially if we have an alliance.¡±


    ¡°And if we don¡¯t?¡± Mitch said.


    ¡°We can still probably take them in a straight fight, so long as they don¡¯t catch us by surprise. We just have to be wary enough not to let them sneak up on us.¡±


    ¡°Stealthy approaches are sort of Sad Cake Binge¡¯s whole thing.¡±The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.


    ¡°I¡¯ll have my all-around vision. Depending on the map, that¡¯ll be enough on its own.¡±


    ¡°I guess.¡±


    The conversation paused when they saw Jay coming back over to the couches. ¡°He said no,¡± Jay said as he sat down next to Mitch and grabbed his hand.


    ¡°Drat,¡± Mitch said.


    Sophia told Jay what they¡¯d said while he was gone, and by the time she was done it had been fifteen minutes or so since Max¡¯s announcement.


    ¡°Do we know where the bathroom is?¡± Ryan asked.


    ¡°No,¡± Sophia said.


    Ryan stood up. ¡°Alright, I¡¯ll see if I can find it. I¡¯ll meet you in the lobby.¡±


    ¡°We¡¯re cheering for you,¡± Sophia said.


    //////////


    When he was finished in the bathroom, Ryan headed back to the ballroom. He didn¡¯t make it back to the couches before Max got back on the microphone and told everyone to gather in the lobby. Ryan got together with his team. All eight teams, save Ours is the Glory, gathered outside the door to the ballroom. Ryan could identify the Epidemic kids by their age. Only one of them had to be eighteen to force the team into the senior league, and it was easy to tell which one that was.


    We Rise as One stood next to them. The youngest member of that team was middle aged. They were also the best dressed. Actual suits. The only other people wearing those were the business executives and investors. Dying gravity were dressed the most casually.


    ¡°Thank you all for coming,¡± Max said from the top of the balcony that overlooked the lobby. ¡°And thank you for indulging this little tradition of mine. I¡¯m sure you know better than I do how much the fans love this.¡± For just a moment, he looked directly into one of Sad Cake Binge Gaming¡¯s camera drones. ¡°Please, follow me upstairs to the theater. The helmets are in there.¡±


    The theater was large and dark, with eight rows of luxurious dark-grey leather reclining chairs. They faced a large projector screen, like an old movie theater, but each one also had a holo-helmet built into its headrest. Even all eight world championship teams would only take up half the seats. Why did every chair have to have its own helmet? When did Max use all of these at once?


    ¡°Take your seats,¡± Max said, himself walking down to the front row and sitting on the rightmost seat. Ryan took the closest seat to the entrance. The rest of his team funneled in next to him. Ryan reclined his seat all the way, then lowered the helmet over himself. It fit over his head snugly, making physical contact with his neck and, microscopically, his spine, through which it would affect his brain. He switched it on and closed his eyes. The world around him faded all at once, like he was falling asleep, and a dream was beginning. For a moment, he was weightless and blind. Then, in an instant, the full proprioception of Zap¡¯s body kicked in. The sudden perception of weight made him stumble. Once he¡¯d gotten his balance, the black interior of a ship popped into existence around him, along with hum of electronics and the sound of working metal pipes. The room was caked with rust, though the metal pipes in the corner seemed to have had recent maintenance. Below Ryan, there was a red-brown metal floor. Above him, bright strips of light on metal planks. To his right and left, his teammates, each half his height: Sophia as Boost, Jay as Dash and Mitch as Spark. Behind him, another wall with a manually-operated sliding door. In front of him, a holo-terminal. A hologram of Blast appeared in the center of the cabin.


    ¡°Greetings, Comrades!¡± she said.


    ¡°Hey,¡± Ryan said, in Zap¡¯s robotic voice.


    ¡°Greetings, Comrade Zap. I hope you¡¯ve all been enjoying your leisure time, but I¡¯m afraid I must end it. There¡¯s a resort planet called Ju-Tai 2, and there¡¯s a Terran general on it. This is a particularly nasty one. He once glassed a mining colony, killing about a thousand families, because he believed I was being harbored there. I wasn¡¯t, but I still took the gesture a bit personally. The scumbag is allowing himself some R&R, because he doesn¡¯t think we can figure out where he is. We did. He¡¯s in a little cabin in a lovely valley. Beautiful forests, and the most spectacular waterfall you¡¯ve ever seen. Shame to visit it with violence, but I think we¡¯ll be doing the place a favor by scrubbing it free of this odious lump. He¡¯ll have a few guards, but I trust you can take care of that. I¡¯m sorry to send you on a mission with such little notice, but we only just discovered this opportunity, and we need to act now. We don¡¯t know when his vacation will end. You will arrive there in a few hours. Equip yourselves for the fight ahead, Comrades. I¡¯ll be in contact with you once you¡¯re on the planet.¡± Her hologram went away, and the four equipment selection terminals lit up.


    Ryan walked up to one. As he chose his items, the main factor in his decision making was longevity. This was going to be a long match, and he might get into several fights. He would prefer to avoid choosing items he could only use a limited number of times. His minigun would never run out of ammo. He selected that. His grenade launcher wouldn¡¯t run out of its standard grenades, but it would run out of special grenades, including stun grenades, which were one of its main benefits. ¡°I¡¯m going mini-gun and rocket launcher,¡± Ryan said. Rockets were more accurate and did more damage than grenades. With special grenades out of the picture, that made the rocket launcher a better choice.


    Ryan took two packets of healing potions hoping that would last him multiple combats. The expandable shield was so broadly useful it was a must-have in any scenario, even though it was single-use. Ryan also got a grappling hook. ¡°I have a grappler,¡± he told the others. Him selecting that meant they didn¡¯t need to. He was large enough that they could all ride him while he climbed something. Not needing their own grappling hooks meant they could use that slot for air filters that would prevent infection, or for the potion that healed it.


    When he was done selecting his tools, Jay had everyone list their choices. Everyone agreed with Ryan¡¯s decisions. Mitch and Sophia made a few adjustments based on Jay¡¯s advice. Everyone but Ryan had an air filter and at least one anti-fungal potion. Sophia had taken the spell that suppressed de-buffs.


    Jay told Breach-bot that they were ready. Blast led them on a short walk through the ship to a hanger bay, where they boarded a landing craft. Once the craft took off, they had nothing but a display screen through which to see the outside world. Their ship had stopped at the edge of Ju-Tai 2¡¯s solar system. They traveled swiftly toward its center, passing a bright blue gas giant surrounded by three concentric rings. Their destination came into view. It was a tiny green dot. They approached. The planet looked like the earth, but with the blue and green switched. They made contact with the planet¡¯s atmosphere. ¡°You should be down there in just a few min¡ª¡± Blast began, before being cut off by a burst of static.


    ¡°Ma¡¯am, you cut off,¡± Jay said.


    Another burst of static.


    A glob of Gray Fungal biomass came into view from the corner of the viewscreen, careened toward the ship and slammed into the hull, making the viewscreen go to static, and sending the lander tumbling end over end. An alarm sounded. Ryan grabbed Sophia, Jay and Mitch and held them to his person to keep them from tumbling around the ship and taking damage.


    ¡°Warning, impact imminent,¡± said the ship¡¯s computer. Everything shook. The lander roared down toward the planet¡¯s surface. A shield similar to Zap¡¯s invincibility shield appeared around the four of them as their ship crashed into the valley. The ship disintegrated around them, exploding, throwing their bubble off into the distance. It hit the ground and popped, the four falling out onto a still clearing. They were surrounded by the strange and varied chirping of alien crickets and the cawing and hooting of alien birds. Ryan let go of his teammates. All four of them stood. Below Ryan was bright-green curly grass. Above him was an open sky in the midst of a radiant pink and orange sunset. Forest stretched off into the distance all around them. The horizon was dominated to the left by a giant, black metal dam which seemed to seal off the bowl-like valley. Blast¡¯s voice echoed through Ryan¡¯s head, fizzy and quiet.


    ¡°¡­hostiles surrounding you, and we cannot retrieve you any time soon¡­¡± and with one last burst of static, she disappeared.


    Other than the forest, the main feature of their surroundings was a small dusty cabin, the size of a single room. ¡°Do you think the General is going to be important?¡± Mitch said into his helmet¡¯s communicator. His helmet was sealed, so if there were any enemies around, they wouldn¡¯t overhear him.


    ¡°Probably, or he wouldn¡¯t have been mentioned,¡± Jay said.


    ¡°Maybe We Rise as One is protecting him,¡± Ryan said.


    ¡°Yeah, probably,¡± Sophia said.


    The others looked around to get their bearings. ¡°I¡¯m not seeing anything notable about our surroundings besides that cabin, the woods, and that dam,¡± Jay said. ¡°Anyone disagree?¡±


    ¡°The sunset is pretty,¡± Ryan said. ¡°That¡¯s about it.¡±


    ¡°Our first order of business is to find a good hiding place,¡± Jay said. ¡°From there, we can figure out how to contact one of the Gray Fungus teams.¡± The valley seemed to be big enough that, if the teams were distributed equally, they had a decent amount of time before anyone stumbled across them.


    Sophia conjured a blue-gray ball and tossed it at Ryan. This was a buff that would make him quieter and lighter on his feet so he wouldn¡¯t leave tracks. ¡°Thanks,¡± he said, but as they went into the forest proper in search of a suitable hiding place, Ryan still had trouble not leaving evidence of his passing. Zap was agile for his size, but moving through the forest required some tight squeezes, and he occasionally knocked over a rock or crushed a bush or bent a pair of trees away from each other while trying to squeeze between them.


    After about ten minutes, they hadn¡¯t seen any sign of other players or of an obvious hiding spot. ¡°We need to figure out a direction to head toward,¡± Mitch said. ¡°Wandering aimlessly is just making metal-head over here leave more tracks for the other teams to find us with.¡± Ryan held in his offense.


    ¡°You¡¯re right,¡± Jay said. ¡°Does anyone remember which way the canyon wall was closest?¡±


    ¡°West,¡± Ryan said.


    ¡°We¡¯ll start heading that way, then. There might be caves in the valley wall to hide in.¡±


    They changed direction. ¡°Do you think it¡¯s possible break the dam?¡± Sophia asked a few minutes later.


    ¡°What makes you ask?¡± Jay asked.


    ¡°I mean, if I were Breach-bot, and I was going to design a set-piece for this big important showcase match, I might make a giant destructible dam. Plus, if we can break it without hurting ourselves, we might kill off everyone else.


    ¡°Maybe,¡± Jay said. ¡°Hmm. We¡¯ll head that direction if we don¡¯t find a cave.¡±


    A few more minutes passed.


    ¡°Get down!¡± Ryan said, falling flat against the path below them just slowly enough to make no noise. The others followed suit.


    ¡°What is it?¡± Jay asked.


    ¡°We Rise as One,¡± Ryan said.

 The Spore (2/2)

    They had just come into view behind Ryan.


    Their travel was far less subtle than Unbroken¡¯s had been.  They had their own giant robot: The nine-foot Heavy Dynamic Operations Unit.  He looked a lot like Zap, but more pristine: his armored plates were sleek white instead of rust brown.  His movements were less agile, but stronger.  His every step left an imprint in the earth beneath him.


    In front of him walked the sniper, Nealson, scanning his surroundings with his sniper scope.  That thing could see through cover.  If he looked in Unbroken¡¯s direction, he¡¯d see them.  We Rise as One also had a McCormick, and this one carried a flamethrower, with which he was trying to light the forest ablaze.  The trees weren¡¯t taking to that strategy well.  They were burning, but the fire wasn¡¯t spreading from tree to tree.  We Rise as One¡¯s captain, a Morrison, was boosting the McCormick¡¯s damage.


    ¡°Will they see us?¡± Jay asked.


    ¡°Nealson was looking around,¡± Ryan said.  ¡°If he thinks to look down while checking this direction, yes.¡±  They were crouched, so he wouldn¡¯t see them if he didn¡¯t dip his gaze below his eye level.


    ¡°Was he looking down?¡±


    ¡°I didn¡¯t see him look down, but I don¡¯t know for sure.¡±


    They waited.  They could tell by the sound of H.D.O.U.¡¯s footsteps that We Rise as One wasn¡¯t heading directly toward them.


    ¡°I don¡¯t think they know we¡¯re here,¡± Ryan said.  ¡°Should we use this opportunity to sneak attack them?¡±


    ¡°That would kind of go against our stealth strategy,¡± Jay said.


    ¡°And a brawl would attract others,¡± Mitch said.


    ¡°True,¡± Ryan said.


    ¡°I¡¯ll buff us just in case shit goes down,¡± Sophia said, and she threw balls at everyone, making Jay and Mitch faster, herself more robust, and Ryan¡¯s damage output greater.


    Then, the H.D.O.U. stopped.  ¡°I see something,¡± he said, in a booming mechanical voice.  ¡°This tree is uprooted.¡±


    ¡°It could just be a feature of the map,¡± the McCormick said.


    A moment passed.  ¡°I don¡¯t think so,¡± Morrison said.  ¡°This dirt has been freshly moved.


    ¡°Do we think it was another player, then?¡± McCormick asked.


    ¡°I think it just might be,¡± Morrison said.  ¡°Either a Huel-drark or the Zap.¡±


    ¡°Prep for battle,¡± Jay said.


    Ryan pulled out his rocker launcher and pointed it in the other team¡¯s direction.  If he was lucky, he¡¯d be able to score a direct hit on Nealson.


    ¡°Any idea when they might have been here?¡± McCormick asked.


    ¡°No way of telling exactly,¡± Morrison said.


    ¡°They¡¯re over there!¡± Nealson shouted.


    The entirety of Unbroken sprang up.  Ryan fired a rocket at Nealson.  Jay drew his stun pistol and rushed toward We Rise as One¡¯s flank.  Sophia summoned a sphere of crackling yellow energy and threw it at H.D.O.U.  Mitch strafed to the right and took cover behind a tree.  Perhaps he intended to hack H.D.O.U. from that position.


    The enemy¡¯s Morrison shot a stream of red energy at H.D.O.U.  Now glowing and crackling with said energy, the robot fired his rail-gun at Ryan.  McCormick fired his flamethrower toward Jay, and Nealson rained sniper bullets at Sophia.


    But neither side managed to hit the other.  Instead, everyone¡¯s projectiles struck an invisible wall, which shimmered with every impact.  McCormick¡¯s flames blasted back toward him.  Nealson¡¯s bullets flew straight back at the rifle that had fired them, phasing through it and hitting Nealson in the chest.  H.D.O.U.¡¯s rail-gun slug reflected back into him and knocked him backward and onto his back.  Sophia¡¯s flew shot back at her, freezing her in place.  Ryan¡¯s rocket flew back at him doing a lot of damage and making him stumble.  Ryan used a healing potion.  Jay smacked into the invisible wall like a pigeon, stopping dead and falling backward.  Laughter echoed in the trees above them.  Ryan had heard the same laughter before.  It belonged to Marvin Blackwood of Sad Cake Binge Gaming.  Marvin¡¯s character Cloun had the ability to summon a reflective wall like that one.


    The wall went away after only a second or two, but neither team resumed firing on the other.  As Morrison healed him, Nealson pointed his rifle upward, and shot through the canopy at something Ryan couldn¡¯t see.


    Ryan got an idea.  ¡°Give me a speed buff,¡± he said, once Sophia was unfrozen.  Sophia did.  Ryan shifted into sphere mode and plowed into the weakest tree he could see.  It fell in one clattering piece.  The fallen tree¡¯s contribution to the canopy was now gone, making a patch of starlit sky visible above them.  Ryan ran straight into another tree.  Mitch got a robotic drone out of his backpack, and threw it into the air, instructing it to seek out Pickceiz and destroy them.  Jay dashed over to the area Ryan had cleared, pointing his stun gun upward.


    The H.D.O.U. seemed to like Ryan¡¯s idea of taking away the enemy¡¯s cover.  He grabbed a nearby tree with both arms, and tore it out of the ground, its roots ripping, then dangling from its base as H.D.O.U. tossed the tree aside.  McCormick switched to his mini-gun and pointed it toward the new hole his ally had created.  As H.D.O.U. got to work on another tree, Mitch¡¯s drone flew over the first gap H.D.O.U. created.  It fired at something still hidden behind the canopy.  Nealson snapped his aim over to it and started firing at a spot just past the canopy¡¯s new edge.  Ryan took his humanoid form and pointed his rocket launcher in the same direction.  He fired a rocket into the canopy, but it harmlessly brushed through leaves and flew off into the sky.


    As the H.D.O.U. worked to uproot another tree the ground he stood on fissured then opened below him, revealing a pit lined with colorful stripes.  The robot fell in and crashed into the bottom with a clank.  A purple streak, which could only have been SCBG¡¯s Spukee, moved into the pit, taking a bit of fire from McCormick on the way down, but managing to avoid a stunning shot from Jay.  The sounds of tearing metal and human screaming echoed from the pit.  Railgun slugs rained out of it.  A thin yellow beam shot into the pit from above.  Jay dashed to the side of the pit and fired his stunning pistol toward the source of the beam.  He hit its originator: Lyfe, the Pickceiz¡¯ healer.  The creature fell to the ground, stunned.  Ryan took his sphere form and rolled over the creature, crushing it.


    There was an explosion in the pit, and Spukee flew out, cackling.  He was showered with gunfire as he flew back into the trees but most of it missed him.  Just before he faded from sight, he summoned an illusion, the image of a giant, sickly black, and rotting raven, crawling with maggots.  The creature spread its wings and cawed.  All of the humans ran away from it in terror.  Only Ryan was immune to the effect.  We Rise as One ran to Ryan¡¯s left, and Unbroken ran to his right.  Ryan followed his team.


    Behind him, Sord, the Pickcei with a large magical blade, flew at the fleeing Nealson and buried its sword into him.  That broke the fear effect and allowed Nealson to turn around and retaliate.  Ryan pointed his rocket launcher backward and fired at the pair of them, hoping to hit the Sord dead-on and cause the Nealson splash damage.  The opposite happened.  Sord flew to the left, and the rocket blew Nealson to pieces.  Sord turned around and rushed toward Unbroken.  All at once, the fear effect on Unbroken wore off, and they turned back toward the battle.  Ryan shot at Sord with his minigun, but only managed to graze him.  Jay fired a stunning blast at the creature.  It swerved to avoid that shot, and then flew back above the trees.  Unbroken pointed their weapons upward, but Sord did not return to menace them.The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.


    ¡°We should leave, and let them fight each other,¡± Jay said.  ¡°It¡¯s very unlikely that all of them will follow us.¡±  Unbroken retreated, and, fortunately for them, were not pursued.  Once they were sure of this, they stopped, and Sophia made sure everyone was at full health.  They slowed down and resumed trying to move stealthily.  They were close enough to the cliff face to see it looming over them in the distance through occasional gaps in the trees.  The rock was light beige and filled with thick orange stripes.


    They came upon another clearing, lit by starlight.  Four moons loomed above them.  One giant, bright white and full of craters.  One was dark but gleamed like marble.  One was small and dark blue, and the final one was whitish blue, like a pale imitation of the third.  The sky was thick with stars, and the Milky Way streaked across it.  The ground was covered in tiny gray mushrooms.  Mitch and Sophia covered their faces.  ¡°Spores!¡± Mitch said.  They were invisible, but no one could miss the scent of their wet, dusty, shroomy rot.  Everyone but Ryan activated their air filters, which would reduce their risk of infection.


    ¡°This is good,¡± Jay said, as he adjusted his mask to fit snugly over his nose.  ¡°We were looking for a Gray Fungus team.  One of them has been this way.¡±


    ¡°We should track them, then?¡± Mitch asked.


    ¡°Yes,¡± Jay said, after a moment.  ¡°We need to track them.¡±


    ¡°And if they refuse our alliance, the plan is to run away?¡± Sophia asked.


    ¡°Only from Reigning Fire,¡± Jay said.  ¡°We can take Epidemic in a fight.¡±


    ¡°This trail is from Reigning Fire,¡± Ryan said.  ¡°Look around.  All the trees are in place.  There¡¯s no way Epidemic¡¯s Mog¡¯Inub has been here.¡±  Mog¡¯Inub was the largest playable character in the game: four stories tall and just as long, shaped like a giant L with spidery legs, covered in eyes, mouths and rupturing pustules from which she could summon horrible spawn.  There would be no mistaking the signs of that creature¡¯s passing.


    ¡°That¡¯s the better party to make the alliance with, anyway,¡± Jay said.  Neither Mitch nor Sophia objected.  Ryan sighed.  He took note of all the mushrooms he could see.  They formed a line that bisected the clearing diagonally.


    ¡°The trail goes like this,¡± Ryan said, pointing one arm ahead and to his right and the other behind and to his left.


    ¡°So which way did they come from and which way did they go?¡± asked Mitch.


    ¡°The right leads away from the center of the valley,¡± Jay said.  ¡°That¡¯s probably our best bet.¡±


    And that¡¯s the way they went, following the trail of mushrooms.  They occasionally encountered more than a mushroom.  There were strands of fungal mass hanging from some of the trees.  Elsewhere, patches of ground were covered in thick, rough fungal growth.  Among those patches of ground was the whole surface of a small hill in the shape of a perfect half-circle.  Half-sticking out of was a fully infected Clypeus.  Clypeus was a member of the Legion of the Iron Star, who normally possessed a massive shield.  This one, however, had lost track of it.  The monster roared and raved at Unbroken as they passed.  Ryan put it out of its misery.


    Things like these grew more common as they advanced.  They were catching up to their enemy.  What would Jay do to try to get Reigning Fire¡¯s attention?  What would they think Unbroken had to contribute to an alliance?  They had speed and stealth.  That was sort of the opposite of what Reigning Fire had going for them.  They were big and powerful but left this fungal growth everywhere they went.


    Eventually, there was stomping in the distance.  Unbroken stopped following the trail and headed directly toward it.  Jay picked up a rock and got out his laser gun.  He used the laser to carve ¡®we want to talk¡¯ on the rock.


    ¡°I¡¯m apprehensive about that plan,¡± Ryan said.


    ¡°I am too,¡± Jay said, ¡°but I think it¡¯s our best shot.  Hopefully, I¡¯ll be able to gauge their reaction to it without having to put myself in danger.  I¡¯ll run back this way if anything goes wrong.  Jay dashed ahead.  After he was out of sight, the others heard Jay through their communicators.  ¡°I see them,¡± Jay said.  ¡°It¡¯s Reigning Fire.¡±  Their footsteps came through as clearly as Jay¡¯s voice.  Each one made a terrible squishy thromp.  ¡°I¡¯m throwing the rock.¡±  A pittering sound as the rock hit grass.  ¡°They saw it,¡± Jay said.  ¡°They¡¯re stopping to examine it.  They¡¯re talking about it.¡±  Half a minute passed.  ¡°They¡¯re looking around.  They¡¯re raising their weapons.  Fuck!  Fuck!  Start running!  I¡¯ll catch up with you!¡±  Unbroken turned around and started running.


    ¡°How far away are they?¡± Ryan asked.


    ¡°A few hundred feet behind you.¡±


    Jay caught up with the rest of the group and slowed down to keep pace with them.  Mitch pulled out another drone and ordered it to go back and hold off Reigning Fire.  About a minute later, they heard an explosion.  Not long after that, a member of Reigning Fire came into view.  It was the giant cloud of fungal spores, Ichaboth.  The creature was ten times Ryan¡¯s size, spread out like a bank of fog across the ground.  Ryan held his minigun out and fired into the creature.  These bullets wouldn¡¯t do much, but anything was helpful.  Jay ordered the team to spread out, forcing the creature to go after only one of them.  It chose to follow Mitch.  It approached and then surrounded him, causing him to disappear within its fog.  Jay ran over, pulling out a little hand-held flamethrower, and shot it at the monster.


    Something beeped inside Ichaboth.  The monster started moving away from Jay at full speed.  Jay dashed in the opposite direction.  Mitch flew out of the top of Ichaboth, riding the blast of his jetpack.  He grabbed a high branch of a thick oak.  A fiery explosion engulfed more than half of the monster, making him dissipate.  He reformed a moment later but was smaller.


    The rest of Reigning Fire emerged from the trees behind them.  Joss¡¯ own character was in front.  Huel-drark was a gray giant, covered in smooth, moist flesh.  One arm was a cannon.  The other was a shield.  Behind him, Xig¡¯zah, a jagged creature shaped like a ten-pointed star with a spindly leg protruding from each point, skittered across the ground.  The titanic walking mushroom Avaggdon lumbered behind the two of them.  Joss pointed his cannon directly at Ryan, who took sphere form and rolled out of the way.  Ryan took his normal form, and shot a rocket at Joss, who was likewise able to dodge him.


    From the top of his tree, Mitch tossed a grenade at the approaching foes.  Xig¡¯zah leapt onto the trunk of a different tree to avoid it.  Jay emerged from behind yet another tree and shot a paralyzing bolt at the spider, who fell back the ground, landing close to the grenade.  It exploded, throwing Xig¡¯zah into the air and setting him aflame.  Joss jumped forward, allowing the blast of the grenade to push him toward Ryan.  He aimed at Ryan¡¯s chest, then, when Ryan dodged, he took his actual shot, landing a hit.  Sophia tossed a healing orb into him, and Ryan used one of his own healing potions.


    The Avaggdon plugged itself into the ground.  It lit up, glowing bright blue.  It spun in place, and the ground shook.  Joss grabbed onto a tree to keep his balance.  Ryan had nothing to grab onto, so he fell backward.  Sophia managed to keep her balance for a few strides, but then tripped.  Joss charged up his cannon, aiming at Ryan¡¯s prone form.  Ryan took his sphere form and barreled straight toward Joss.  The laser blast shot through him, knocking off a chunk of his health, and he crashed into into Joss, knocking him back and onto the ground.  Ryan took his normal form and shot a pair of rockets straight at Joss¡¯s face.


    Once Joss¡¯ laser cannon recharged, he fired up at Ryan, but Ryan anticipated this and dodged to the right.  Before Joss could stand, he leapt into the air, took sphere form, and landed on his prone enemy.  Joss was half-crushed, but still alive.  He lifted Ryan and threw him backward, away from the rest of Unbroken.  Ryan took his main form.  Ichaboth flew over to Joss, and settled over him, healing him.  Xig¡¯zah leapt toward Ryan.  Ryan jumped out of the way, and the spider landed on the ground near him.  With another spin, Avaggdon morphed the ground around them, raising a great wall that sealed Ryan and Reigning Fire off from the rest of Unbroken.  Xig¡¯zah jumped Ryan again, this time managing to latch onto his face.  The monster made a noise like a deep but shrill chuckle and vomited a sticky viscous gray blob onto Ryan.  Ryan ripped the creature off his face and tossed it aside, but the glob stayed stuck to him.  Ryan knew from experience that there was no point trying to get it off.  At the same time, Ichaboth reshaped itself to surrounded him.  The fog penetrated him, moving between his rusty metal plates and leaking into his circuits.  He expected to take damage but didn¡¯t.  Ichaboth was doing something else.  Ryan¡¯s one-million eyes went wide at once.  Only one of Ichaboth¡¯s debuffs would be useful in this situation.  Ichaboth could inflict frailty.  He was ensuring the bomb would kill him in one shot.  That only left one question left to be answered: Where was Joss?  He¡¯d been down on the ground just a second ago.  Ryan listened for the creature¡¯s squishy footsteps.


    They were to the left.  Ryan lunged toward them, tackling Joss as he tried to escape the fog.  Ryan pinned him to the ground.  Joss struggled, but Zap was bigger than Huel-drark, and Ryan kept the monster under him.  The blob on his face exploded, consuming the two of them in a flash of light and pelting them with sharp gray shrapnel.


    //////////


    Once he had exited the game, Ryan took his helmet off and stood.  To the right of the theater, several seats away, Joss did the same thing.  Ryan waved politely at Joss, but Joss didn¡¯t acknowledge him as he left the theater.

 Dam (1/2)

    Ryan scanned the theater to see who else had been eliminated.  All four members of Ours is the Glory were still there.  Sad Cake Binge Gaming was still there, except for the Lyfe Jay had killed earlier.  Phoenix was missing its Clypeus.  All of We Rise as One and Dying Gravity were gone.


    Ryan thought about going back into virtual reality to watch the rest of the match, but there was something the lobby had that virtual reality didn¡¯t: food.  Ryan had left his plate of pastries on the table down there, and he needed to get back down to them before anything happened to them.  He couldn¡¯t let those go to waste.  He left the theater and headed for the lobby.  As he walked, he pulled his phone out of his pocket and pulled up a stream of the Battle Royale match.


    Breach-bot¡¯s technology allowed a more cinematic streaming experience than you could get from any other game.  Ryan held his phone¡¯s microphone up to his mouth.  ¡°What¡¯s going on with Unbroken,¡± he asked.  He held his phone up as he walked downstairs.  The screen showed him a beautiful view of the fight.  Breach-bot was framing the shot for him.  Breach-bot piloted the camera anytime anyone streamed Breach.  He was a talented little director and showed every viewer a different version of the broadcast, depending on what he expected them to like.


    Even though it had been a few minutes, he chose to start Ryan¡¯s playback at the moment he had died.  Breach-bot¡¯s frame showed silhouettes of the remaining members of Unbroken, in stark shadow from the bright light of the fireball that had claimed Ryan and Joss¡¯s lives.


    //////////


    Like everything Jayden saw through Dash¡¯s eyes, the explosion happened in slow motion.  First, thin streaks of fire shot like bottle rockets over the wall Avaggdon had made.  A cloud of dark gray smoke billowed up after them.  A fraction of a second later, the cloud ignited into a fireball.


    ¡°Fuck,¡± Sophia said, slowly.  Not really.  Really Jayden was hearing her more quickly.  Dash¡¯s perception of time was different from everyone else¡¯s.  To everyone else, he was fast, but to him, it was everyone else who was slow.  Every second felt like ten to him, allowing him to run, dodge, shoot and think faster than anyone else could ever hope to.  Sophia¡¯s voice was deep, and she seemed to take ten seconds to say that single word, yet Jayden had no trouble understanding her, and so long as he was in Dash¡¯s body, it was easy to match the speed of her speech himself, ensuring that he¡¯d sound natural to her.


    ¡°We need to retreat,¡± Jayden said.


    Before turning to run away, Mitch tossed a bomb at the wall.  It fell at the wall¡¯s foot.  Mitch held onto the detonator as he ran.  In the likely event that Reigning Fire lowered the wall to pursue them, they¡¯d get a nasty surprise.  Hopefully, Mitch¡¯s three remaining bombs would be enough to destroy the dam.


    Sophia gave herself a speed boost.  She was the slowest of the three, even after having her speed increased.  The other two had to slow down to avoid leaving her behind.  Jayden looked over his shoulder.  Ichaboth had flown over the wall and was chasing them.  Behind them, the wall lowered.  Ichaboth blocked Jayden¡¯s view of the other two members of Reigning Fire, but when Mitch detonated his bomb, their monstrous slow-motion shrieks proved it had managed to harm them.  The shockwave even damaged Ichaboth as it impacted him, blowing him forward.  Jayden could capitalize on that.  He pulled out his mini-flamethrower and ran up to Ichaboth.


    As he approached, Ichaboth reshaped itself to try to envelop him, yet it did so with a listlessness that made it easy to avoid.  Jayden fired his flamethrower into the monster and dashed away from it before it could retaliate.


    He ran with his team for several seconds, then dashed back to the Ichaboth, and shot it again.  The monster retreated.  Jayden could have pursued it, but it would have made it back to its team before Jayden could kill it.  The monster ran back to his teammates.  Huel-drark wasn¡¯t among them.  He probably hadn¡¯t split off from the rest of the team as part of some stratagem, so there was a good chance Reigning Fire was down a teammate.  Had Ryan managed to take Joss down with him?  If that turned out to be the case, Jayden needed to buy Ryan a drink or something for managing that.  Once you were down a teammate, you weren¡¯t likely to win a Battle Royale match.


    Of course, that applied to them too, but if they could destroy the dam, that wouldn¡¯t matter.


    Unbroken ran until they were sure Reigning Fire wasn¡¯t following them, and then stopped.  ¡°So that was a bust,¡± Sophia said.  ¡°Where do we go from here?¡±


    ¡°Not much has changed,¡± Jayden said.  ¡°If anything, stealth has gotten easier for us.  We¡¯re headed for the dam.  Hopefully we can get to the top of it without Ryan.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m not sure we should be headed toward an obvious landmark,¡± Mitch said.  ¡°Other teams may have had this same idea.¡±


    ¡°All the more reason not to waste any time getting there,¡± Jayden said.  ¡°We can¡¯t let another team destroy the dam before us.¡±


    //////////


    ¡°Not much has changed,¡± Jay said.  ¡°If anything, stealth has gotten easier for us.¡±  That statement made Ryan realize that knowing they were safe was enough, and there was no need to continue watching.  He turned off his stream as he entered the ballroom.  A dozen television screens scattered around the room, each with a group gathered in front of it, showed footage of the match.  Before doing anything else, Ryan walked over to the couches where his team had had their strategy discussion.  His pastries were still there.  He grabbed them and shoved one into his mouth.


    Each of the twelve TV screens had a smaller screen above it that indicated which version of the stream that screen showed.  Breach-bot normally made a custom stream for every viewer.  Most of the time, someone would watch a stream on their own phone or computer.  When that happened, Breach-bot would use the information on those devices to figure out what content would most interest them, and how they would most enjoy having it shown to them.  At a party like this, though, people wanted to watch the game together, which meant they had to be looking at the same stream.  Because there needed to be multiple screens regardless, having different version of the stream on each TV was a compromise.  Each stream was set up to conform to a different set of tastes.  There was one set up for fans of each of the remaining teams.  Epidemic¡¯s was in the corner.  Three middle-aged couples watched that screen intently, along with a handful of other fans.  Unbroken¡¯s screen was next to it.  It had a few fans in front of it.  One of them was cosplaying as Dash.  No doubt it would be a pleasant surprise for them if Ryan were to stop by.  Ryan started to go over there, but he stopped in the middle of the room.  He should go get some punch first.


    Sad Cake Binge Gaming had a large crowd in front of their screen, though they were paying less attention to the stream than they were to the eliminated Lyfe, who was mingling with his fans.  Pheonix¡¯s screen had a lot of people in front of it, including two members of We Rise as One.  The screens for Ours is the Glory and Reigning Fire were on opposite sides of the hall.  Ryan was pretty sure Ours is the Glory¡¯s screen was a bit bigger than the others, and Reigning Fire¡¯s was a bit smaller.  Luciana Turner, the CEO of Thunderware, and her husband, were watching the Ours is the Glory stream.


    The other streams were organized around interests other than specific teams.  Two screens were dedicated to the General stream, the one Breach-bot constructed to be viewed by default, without making any assumptions about the viewer.  Another pair of screens was dedicated to the Cinematic stream.  This one was like the General stream, except in Cinematic, Breach-bot was instructed to sacrifice realism for entertainment.  He could alter the lighting in an area, speed up and slow down the action, and alter the order of events, all with the aim of making the stream more entertaining.  He would also replace the player¡¯s in-game chat with dialog fitting the personas of the characters they were playing.  Many people found the existence of Cinematic mode abhorrent, but the crowds in front of those two screens testified to the stream¡¯s popularity.Support the author by searching for the original publication of this novel.


    For those who couldn¡¯t stand the thought that what they were watching was anything less than the pure, unaltered truthful light of truthfulness, Realistic used non-cinematic filmmaking, wider, blander shots, no color alteration, and minimal cutting.  Only one screen showed this version.  Three people were watching it.


    Ryan headed toward the less crowded of the two Cinematic screens, punch and pastries in hand.  There were two couches in front of this screen, both full.  In front of that, there were some beanbags.  Ryan plopped down onto one of those.


    On the stream, the three remaining members of Phoenix were fighting Epidemic.  Ryan bit a pastry open and squeezed its chocolate filling into his mouth.  The screen showed a close-up of Phoenix¡¯s team captain, playing as Tharthan Azotum, a twelve-foot muscular tank of a humanoid who wore intricate white armor and wielded a glowing white Warhammer large enough that even he had to hold it two-handed.  His teammate, a Canticum, sang behind him, empowering him with her magic song.  Tharthan charged at Epidemic¡¯s Mog¡¯Inub, his hammer in the air.  Behind him, his other teammate, Terraemotus, who could manipulate the ground like Avaggdon could, stomped, causing the ground below Tharthan to shoot upward and launch him into the air.  He flew forward pulling his hammer back for a strike.  He landed on Mog¡¯Inub and slammed his hammer into one of her countless eyes.  He dropped to his knees and grabbed the now-blinded eye¡¯s lower lid.  He was right to do so.  Mog¡¯Inub began to shake, and rock from side to side, trying to force its foe off its body, but the monster was less mobile than he was strong, and he maintained his grip.  Terraemotus tried to summon forth spikes of earth to pierce the monster, but Epidemic¡¯s Avaggdon was plugged into the ground, and held it in place.  Ichaboth rushed toward Tharthan and settled on top of him.  Breach-bot cut to a tight shot of Tarthan¡¯s face, smirking.  He pulled out a cleansing light and crushed it.  The explosion of light summoned shrieks from both Gray Fungi, causing Ichaboth to shrink to a fraction of its former size, and making Mog¡¯Inub fall limp.  In a panic, Ichaboth expanded, which, because he was a cloud caused him to rocket upward.


    The camera shifted between Terraemotus and Avaggdon as they abandoned their psychic battle over the ground.  Aveb-heth, Epidemic¡¯s support character, fled into the woods.  Terraemotus summoned a wall to stop Aveb-heth from escaping, while Tharthan Azotum charged Avaggdon as it slowly waddled away.  He smashed his hammer into the monster.  A huge chunk of the soft creature¡¯s flesh was ripped away.  Canticum, while continuing to sing, charged at Aveb-heth and grabbed her by the neck.  The monster squealed and kicked as Canticum spun around and tossed her into the wall.  Tharthan took another swipe at Avaggdon, but the monster jumped out of the way, only to be impaled by an unexpected spike from Terraemotus.  The spike pinned it in place, and before Avaggdon could plant itself to remove it, Tharthan smashed it to pieces.


    Tharthan dashed over to the wall, where Aveb-heth had just stood up.  She ran to the left, but Tharthan caught up to her in a single stride and grabbed her, throwing her against the wall.  He leapt forward and smashed her head in.  It splattered, spraying the area with infectious fungal juices.  Terraemotus lowered his wall, and Phoenix looked around for Ichaboth.  He was nowhere to be seen.


    Breach-bot cut to Ours is the Glory.  They were in a cabin.  Max¡¯s Ocillo stood in front of a brown leather couch.  Armigeri stood beside him.  Their Terraemotus was behind the couch, connected to the ground via a hole he¡¯d torn in the flooring.  Nullum was outside, visible through a large window that reminded Ryan of the glass walls of Max¡¯s mansion.  On the floor, a Terran Navy Admiral, was tied up and gagged with dark blue, glowing rope.  Was that the Admiral from the mission briefing?  The cabin was wrecked from a fight.  The remains all four members of Dying Gravity were scattered around the room.  That team¡¯s Lyfe was impaled on Max¡¯s sword.


    Max was speaking.  Perhaps he was really talking about something else, but dialogue Breach-bot assigned him for the purposes of Cinematic mode revealed that Ours is the Glory had been sent to capture the same man Ryan¡¯s team had been sent to kill.  It seemed they had actually bothered to do so.  They intended to take their prisoner to a rallying point near the dam, where they expected an Iron Star ship to be ready to pick him up.


    Outside, Nullum snorted like a bull and looked around.  The rest of Ours is the Glory abandoned their conversation and looked out the window at him.  Something startled Nullum, and he leapt backward, his long, reptilian tail crashing into the window and shattering it.  He was staring at something in the distance, but the others couldn¡¯t see what.  Max walked toward him.  ¡°Easy, boy,¡± he said, holding out his hand.  Armigeri left the cabin through the front door.  Nullum screeched and bucked backward.  ¡°Eas¡ª¡± Max began.  Nullum turned around and jumped into the cabin through the broken window.  Max dodged to his left, toward the front door, and Terraemotus dodged to the right, toward the back of the cabin.  The camera panned to reveal the cause of this disturbance.  In the distance, Spukee¡¯s maggot-infested raven.  Nullum stampeded through the room and crashed through the opposite wall, blowing a massive hole into it.  As he ran into the distance, the building creaked, and before Max and Terraemotus could stand, the building fell on top of them, not killing them, but trapping them under the rubble.  Outside, as Armigeri ran away from the raven, Sord appeared behind him and stabbed him in the neck.  This broke the fear debuff, but right as Armigeri turned around to retaliate, a hole opened underneath him and he fell in.  Sord flew off, and Spukee flew into the hole.  Spukee wasn¡¯t normally worth much in combat, but if he was alone with a single victim, out of sight of everyone else, he received a buff that made him much more powerful.


    A circular wall of earth shot up from the ground around the buried Terraemotus and flew outward, forcing the rubble away from him.  This worked, until a wall of force appeared in the path of one part of the wall of earth reflecting it and the rubble it was carrying.  The rock and rubble hurdled toward the still-buried Terraemotus, striking the creature, damaging it heavily, and launching it into the air.


    Spukee¡¯s fear effect lost its grip on Nullum, and the beast turned around and charged toward the rubble of the fallen cabin.  When it reached it, it lit it on fire.  That wouldn¡¯t harm Max, because members of the Legion of the Iron Star were immune to fire, but it might help clear the rubble.  The beast then turned its attention skyward, in search of a Pickcei to assault with its fire breath.


    Terraemotus lumbered to its feet and also headed toward the rubble.  There was a close-up shot of Max struggling beneath it, and then another close-up on a small section of the rubble moving to betray his location.  Terraemotus summoned a pillar from the ground at that spot.  Max was lifted into the air, along with the small portion of the rubble that happened to be right on top of him.  Some of that fell away, but he was still trapped under what remained.  Sord appeared near the pillar, on the opposite side from Nullum.  Terraemotus made a spike shoot out at Sord from the pillar, but the creature ducked below it.  Nullum charged the other side of the pillar, managing to knock some rubble off the pile.  Sord darted out of the way of that too.  Nullum stepped back a few paces, preparing another charge.  Spukee emerged from Armigeri¡¯s hole, cackling and holding the creature¡¯s helmet.  He flew toward Nullum.


    ¡°Nullum, close your eyes!¡± Terraemotus shouted.  Both Nullum and Terraemotus did so.  Spukee summoned another raven, but neither of them saw it and it faded away after a few seconds.  While Terraemotus¡¯ vision was obscured, Sord teleported away from the pillar and appeared above him, then stabbed him through the top of his head.  By the speed of his reaction, that must have been what Terraemotus was expecting.  He reached up, grabbed Sord, and broke the Pickcei over his knee.  The fairy went limp.  Terraemotus tossed his remains aside.


    With one final heave, Max forced the last of the debris off himself.  He stood and looked around, drawing his sword.  He saw Nullum below him.  ¡°Hold on, boy,¡± he said.  He jumped onto the beast, settling in his saddle and riding away from the rubble.  He rode his steed around the clearing, keeping his eyes skyward.  He hadn¡¯t found anything by the time Terraemotus made it back to where they¡¯d been.


    ¡°Brother, I think they have escaped,¡± Terraemotus said.


    ¡°I don¡¯t want to give up yet,¡± Max said.  He searched the clearing for a few minutes more, before letting out a cry of frustration.  He rode Nullum back over to Terraemotus, and conceded the fact that the Pickceiz were, indeed, gone, then lamented that their mission to capture the Admiral had been thwarted.  He had, of course, not survived the collapse of the building he was in.  They had a fresh conversation about what to do.  The subject of the dam came up.  Apparently, Unbroken hadn¡¯t been the only ones to speculate that it could be destroyed.  ¡°It would be an impressive thing to accomplish,¡± Terraemotus said.


    ¡°Reason enough by itself to do it,¡± Max said.  He dismounted Nullum and allowed Terraemotus to mount him.  Having the slower Terraemotus ride Nullum would allow them to make better time.


    The camera cut to the fleeing Cloun and Spukee.  They were both badly hurt.  They¡¯d lost their Lyfe during their encounter with We Rise as One and Unbroken, and so neither of them had healed since that first match.  They knew they wouldn¡¯t be around much longer.  Their conversation was about how to go out on a suitably amusing note.


    ¡°We haven¡¯t done anything to the Gray Fungi, yet,¡± Spukee said.  ¡°They¡¯re easy to find, what with the trail of mushrooms they leave everywhere.¡±


    ¡°Yeah, and they¡¯re pretty powerful,¡± Cloun said.  ¡°It¡¯d be awesome to take them down a peg.¡±


    ¡°Definitely.  Let¡¯s do it.¡±

 Dam (2/2)

    Unbroken was now close enough to the dam that it seemed to loom over them.  Jayden couldn¡¯t see any way of making ingress, but it was the dead of night now, and the dam was still far away.  Besides, there had to be some way in.  Near the top of the dam, evenly spaced from end to end, were artificial waterfalls flowing down the dam¡¯s surface and into a pond at the base of the structure.  There was a one in a million chance those waterfalls were just decorative, but far more likely, their passage through the dam was being used for hydroelectric power.  If the machinery to do that was in the dam, there would have to be a way inside so it could be maintained.  Considering the waterfalls were near the top of the dam, that way in probably was as well, meaning that what they were really looking for was an elevator.  Accordingly, Jayden was leading his team to the far east side of the dam, which he calculated was the most likely place for such an elevator to be.  The west side would have been equally valid but was farther away.


    Jayden smelled something.  He stopped walking.  Crap.  ¡°Spores!¡± he said.  The rest of the team stopped as well.  An Ichaboth emerged from the trees to their right and flew toward Unbroken.  They activated their masks.  Jayden pulled out his flamethrower and ran toward the monster.


    ¡°Has Reigning Fire been following us this whole time?¡± Sophia asked.  It would be a strange thing for them to do.  Jayden blasted the monster with his flamethrower as soon as he reached it, then dodged back to avoid a counterattack.


    ¡°That doesn¡¯t sound right,¡± Jayden said.  ¡°Maybe this is the other Ichaboth?¡±


    ¡°Epidemic¡¯s?¡± Sophia said.  ¡°Their Mog¡¯Inub isn¡¯t around.¡±


    ¡°Maybe it was killed.¡±  It would make sense for Ichaboth to be the only Gray Fungus to escape a lost battle.


    This Ichaboth didn¡¯t retreat from Jayden¡¯s hit and run tactic like the other one had.  On the contrary, it was barreling toward the rest of Unbroken.  Mitch tossed a red disk onto the ground and it unfolded into a flame-throwing turret.  He used his jetpack to jump onto a nearby tree.  Sophia stayed near the turret, and Jayden retreated to her side.  No other Gray Fungi seemed forthcoming, so grouping together to tempt the Ichaboth into braving the turret¡¯s damage was worthwhile.  It wouldn¡¯t have any way of knowing about their masks, so it probably thought it would have a significant chance of infecting them and gaining itself a crop of new allies.  The turret fired on the Ichaboth as it enveloped them.  The creature¡¯s shriek was horrible, and it was hard for Jayden to suppress the instinct to cover his ears.  They weren¡¯t taking hit-point damage, so the monster must have been trying to infect them.  Sophia tossed a damage-boosting buff at Jayden, who turned on his flamethrower and ran outside the Ichaboth.  He fired on it, his flames glowing blue with the power of Sophia¡¯s magic.  Ichaboth shifted to envelop him.  Jayden ran laps around the monster, just barely avoiding its edge.  The whole time, the flame-throwing turret ate it from the inside.


    It was shrinking.  Soon, it realized that possibly infecting Sophia wasn¡¯t worth taking more damage from the turret and it flew toward Mitch.


    Mitch flew away from the monster, boosting himself toward another tree with his jetpack.  Ichaboth followed him and enveloped him.  Mitch launched himself up to a higher branch, but he was followed and re-enveloped.  The Ichaboth¡¯s maneuverability surpassed his.  Jayden dashed toward the two.  Sophia followed but couldn¡¯t keep up with them.  Jayden reached Mitch and Ichaboth in seconds.


    Moving fast enough that his presence might not be noticed before he could get a hit off, he ran to the tree Mitch was flying toward.  He didn¡¯t climb as fast as he ran, but he still reached the branch before Mitch did.  Mitch landed next to him, and Jayden shot at the approaching Ichaboth.  The creature screeched and recoiled.  He leapt after the creature and blasted it as he fell to the ground.  Mitch followed him down.  Sophia caught up to them and threw a speed buff at Mitch.  She missed.


    Ichaboth swerved downward, enveloping Sophia.  Jayden dashed over and blasted it.  The monster was small enough now that he couldn¡¯t hit it without harming Sophia, but that was an acceptable loss.  The creature didn¡¯t flee.  There wasn¡¯t much of it left to flee.  As it shrunk, it moved upward to envelop Sophia¡¯s head.  Jayden blasted her in the face to get at it, causing her to reel backward and fall on her back.  ¡°Fuck!¡± she shouted.  The creature wasn¡¯t even able to follow her down before the last puff of it was incinerated.


    Sophia took deep breaths.  She stood up.  ¡°One percent,¡± she said.


    ¡°Fuck,¡± Jayden said.


    Sophia took a deep breath.  ¡°It¡¯s alright.  Potion.¡±  She used her anti-infection potion and was restored to normal.  For now.  If they encountered Reigning Fire again later, her not having that potion would hurt them a lot.  Hopefully, though, their plan with the dam would work, and that wouldn¡¯t be an issue.  Sophia got everyone healed up, and they resumed their march.


    //////////


    The remainder of Sad Cake Binge Gaming had an easy time locating Reigning Fire.  The fungi left a gray scar in their wake.  Finding them was as simple as flying high into the air and looking around for that scar.  They found it at once.  Actually, they found two such scars, but one ended with a dead Mog¡¯Inub, so they knew they wanted the other one.  The Mog¡¯Inubless scar outlined a straight-forward path from a spot near the center of the valley to a spot near the dam.  The Pickceiz flew to the end near the dam, and there Reigning Fire was.  Xig¡¯zah hopped from tree to tree, Avaggdon lumbered along the ground, and Ichaboth flew above them, keeping an eye on their surroundings.


    ¡°Where the hell is Huel-drark?¡± Spukee asked.


    ¡°He must have gotten offed,¡± Cloun said.


    ¡°That sucks.¡±


    ¡°Maybe it doesn¡¯t suck that much.  Without his cannon, Ichaboth is the only one who can hurt us while we¡¯re up here.¡±


    ¡°Dude, we¡¯re like, super injured.  We¡¯ll die to a second of Ichaboth exposure.¡±


    ¡°Oh, right.  Crap.  Who do you think offed him?¡±


    ¡°Doesn¡¯t matter now.  Could have been anyone.  The better question is: How do we prank these clowns?¡±  All three of the remaining characters had trivial ways of escaping a pit, and none of them could shoot projectiles, so Cloun¡¯s reflective wall would be useless.


    ¡°That¡¯s a hard one,¡± Cloun said.  ¡°I think your raven is the only thing they¡¯ll be vulnerable to.  Maybe we can set up some kind of hazard to scare them into?¡±


    ¡°That could work.  I¡¯m not sure how we would set one up, though.  Maybe there¡¯s something hazardous around here we could take advantage of?  Like that pit with the tentacles?¡±


    Cloun nodded.  ¡°Yeah, like the pit.  Maybe we¡¯ll even be able to find it again.  Split up and search?¡±Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.


    ¡°Sure.  Meet back at this exact spot.¡±


    They explored the area.  There was a pond back toward the center of the valley, which Reigning Fire had already passed.  In not-quite the same direction, there was a hill with a small cave in it.  Breach-bot showed Spukee exploring the cave.  He saw something inside, and Breach-bot cut to a close-up of his face, lit up with glee.  He rushed back to their appointed meeting place.  Cloun showed up a few minutes later.  The camera cut to a wider shot as Spukee explained what he¡¯d found in the cave, then cut back to the tighter shot as Cloun sprung up higher into the air, chuckling joyfully.  The two agreed that they¡¯d found their hazard.  Cloun zipped back over to the cave while Spukee zipped down toward Reigning Fire, deliberately attracting Ichaboth¡¯s notice as he flew through the tree line.  The creature fell for it.  it followed Spukee below the tree-line, joining both of its allies, ensuring all three of them could see the raven Spukee summoned.  They did.  They fled from it, directly toward the cave.


    Their vastly different speeds forced them to split up.  Xig¡¯zah sped through the forest, effortlessly hopping from tree to tree.  Ichaboth lagged behind him.  As the cloud moved, he expanded and rocketed into the air.  Avaggdon waddled far behind the two of them.  It was only seconds before the Xig¡¯zah was twice as far from the raven as he was.  Several seconds later, the spider was in sight of the cave.  Cloun, who was sitting on a nearby tree, waved at Xig¡¯zah as it passed.  Xig¡¯zah was just outside the mouth of the cave when the raven¡¯s effect wore off.  The spider turned around and charged toward Cloun.  The Pickcei darted into the air and pulled an air-horn out of his jacket.  HONK!  Xig¡¯zah probably realized something was going on, but he didn¡¯t abandon his pursuit of Cloun.


    The ground shook.  Out of the cave charged a monster with dark green fur.  The thing looked like a giant green bear, with dagger-long claws and snaggled teeth.  It rushed at Xig¡¯zah as Cloun flew into the air to join Spukee, laughing.


    Ichaboth condensed and rushed toward Xig¡¯zah.  Both of them, in turn, rushed toward Avaggdon, who lumbered toward the rest of his team.  As soon as they were close enough, Avaggdon plugged into the ground and raised a wall of earth between them and the monster.  The animal bashed into the wall.  It didn¡¯t even shake.  The beast tried again, and again, but it couldn¡¯t break the wall.


    Had it been a little smarter, it might have thought to go around the wall.  Given how thick the wall was, it probably wouldn¡¯t have to go far.  Avaggdon and Terraemotus could only displace a certain volume of earth.  Once it became clear that the monster wasn¡¯t coming for them, Reigning Fire allowed themselves to catch their breaths.


    ¡°Rats,¡± Spukee said.  ¡°Is there any way of salvaging this one?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m not sure.  Not without getting rid of that wall.  Should we lead the critter somewhere else?¡±


    ¡°Where?  I don¡¯t think any of the other teams are close enough for that.¡±


    ¡°Rats.¡±


    Avaggdon spun, and two sharp, thin stone pillars shot up from the ground.  Cloun, who had been facing Reigning Fire and so had seen Avaggdon spin, dodged to the left.  Spukee was impaled.  He went limp.  Cloun dashed away.  ¡°Crap! Crap! Crap! Crap! Crap! Crap! Crap! Crap!¡±  Ichaboth flew upward and barreled toward Cloun.  Spikes were shooting up all around the fairy.  One shot up just to his left.  Another right behind him.  Another rose directly in front of him, and he crashed into it.  Ichaboth was on him by the time he pulled himself away from the pillar, and it only took a second of exposure to the monster¡¯s damaging vapors to end him.


    The camera followed his drained husk as it fell.  It landed in a tree, startling a flock of birds.  There was a fit of booing from the crowd in front of Sad Cake Binge Gaming¡¯s screen as it switched to displaying the general broadcast.  Ryan ate his last pastry as the camera panned back to Reigning Fire and began to follow them as they moved through the forest, on their way to the dam.


    //////////


    Unbroken reached the dam before anyone else.  There was an elevator upward, just as Jayden had hoped.  The mechanism was simple: a platform attached to a metal pole.  The platform was at the top, barely visible in the distance, when they arrived.  The mechanism to summon it had been disabled, perhaps by evacuating civilians, but it was a simple matter for Mitch to hack the device and re-enable it.  In the distance, the platform descended.  ¡°And we¡¯re sure there is going to be a way to burst it open?¡± Mitch asked.


    ¡°Not completely,¡± Jayden said, ¡°but even if Breach-bot didn¡¯t build a way in deliberately, some well-placed explosives might manage it.  If we make any hole at all, the valley floods, and most of the other players die.¡±


    ¡°Everyone who can¡¯t fly,¡± Sophia said.  ¡°That just leaves Pickceiz and Ichaboths.¡±


    Barring the ones he¡¯d encountered, Jayden had no way of knowing which players were left and which ones had been eliminated, but presuming it was only flyers who had survived, the only remaining threats would be Sad Cake Binge Gaming, who¡¯d lost their healer, Reigning Fire¡¯s Ichaboth, who wasn¡¯t much of a threat on his own, and Dying Gravity.


    The platform reached the bottom of the valley.  Unbroken stepped onto it, and Mitch activated it again.  It rose.  Jayden looked out over the misty, moonlit forest.  Not too far from the dam were the remains of a collapsed wooden structure.  Had there been a battle around there, or had that been that way when Breach-bot created the map?  If the former was true, at least one other team was close to the dam.  A bit further, Mog¡¯Inub¡¯s L-shaped body was lying on its side in a clearing.


    Jayden caught some motion in the corner of his eye.  He looked down.  In the moonlight, he could just see something like a patch of mist moving toward the dam.  Was it an Ichaboth, or just a random patch of haze?  He pointed it out to the others.  ¡°Is that Ichaboth?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s hard to tell,¡± Sophia said.


    They watched it for half a minute, but still weren¡¯t sure what it was.  ¡°If it is Ichaboth,¡± Jayden said, ¡°we¡¯ll just have to work fast once we¡¯re up there.  Once we find the entrance, I¡¯ll go in alone and search for a place to plant the bomb.  You guys stay outside and keep watch.  Call if you need me.¡±  He turned to Mitch.  ¡°Once I find a place to plant the bombs, I¡¯ll come back out and lead you right to it.  Once the bomb is planted, we¡¯ll run to the valley wall.¡±


    By the time they reached the top of the dam, they could no longer make out the suspicious patch of mist.  They found an entrance hatch right away, and Jayden climbed inside.


    Normally, splitting up was a terrible idea, but Dash would be able to get back to his teammates in no time if they alerted him.  That same speed allowed him to survey the dam¡¯s interior quickly.  He already had a likely weakness in mind.  He went straight to the mouth of the nearest artificial waterfall.  There, he found a facility filled with hydroelectric generators collecting power from the passing water.  They were large, impressive machines, rusty like Zap¡¯s plating.  ¡°I found a generator room by the nearest waterfall,¡± Jayden said.  He darted around the room, looking either for something that would amplify an explosion, or an obvious structural vulnerability.  He found neither.


    But there would be one below.  The generator was in this room, but the water itself flowed through pipes underneath it.  If the explosives could be placed in such a way that a pipe would burst, the water would escape into the rest of the dam, and the dam would probably fail.


    There had been a ladder outside the generator room.  As Jayden had hoped, it led him to a round, bulging wall.  Jayden put his ear up to it.  Water was flowing on the other side.  ¡°Mitch, come down here,¡± Jayden said.  He did.  Mitch had three bombs left.  He planted all of them, setting them up so that he could detonate them remotely.


    ¡°Guys, hurry up,¡± Sophia said.  ¡°Ichaboth is at the bottom of the dam.¡±


    ¡°We¡¯ve got the bombs planted,¡± Jayden said.  ¡°We¡¯re coming right up.¡±  By the time they were up, the elevator platform was moving down.  Should they destroy it?  They should have done it earlier.  If they did so now, it would doubtless alert Reigning Fire to their presence.  Maybe that wasn¡¯t a problem, though.  Ichaboth was the only one who could get up here without it, and he couldn¡¯t take all three of them on at once.  ¡°Mitch, toss a grenade on the elevator.¡±  He walked up to the edge where the dam overlooked it, and gently tossed a frag grenade onto it.  The grenade clattered as it fell onto the elevator.  The explosion tore the platform off of the rail it had been clinging to and sent it plummeting to the valley floor.  Unbroken walked off the dam and onto the cliff that overlooked the valley.  They wanted to get as far away as they could.  If water rushed through the gap where the dam was now, it could erode the land nearby.  Ichaboth emerged over the edge of the cliff but retreated as soon as it saw them.


    Once they had been running for several minutes, Jayden gave the order to blow the dam.  Mitch pressed the little green button on his detonator.  A fireball burst out from the dam, ripping a hole in it.  Water gushed through that hole like it was emerging from a faucet.  As it did, the force of the flowing water ripped the hole open wider, allowing more water to flow into the valley.