It was almost impossible to block out the thoughts of all the odds that are against us at this point…. Not only are we losing, we also have one person who is doing all they can to drag us down. Disrupting us with utility, destroying the artifact everytime we even inch close to an advantage, even getting himself killed so it feeds an easy point to the enemy.
The team is heavily disorganized as a result, most of them have given up and only want this game to end….the others are shouting at each other, especially to the griefer who is having the time of his life at the moment. Everyone on my team has accepted an inevitable loss…..but not me.
I can’t lose this match….I am not going to let them get away…let them rebuild and re-inflict what they did to us…..to her.
“Score, 50-19…. Team Red Advantage” the announcer notified
I am at my wits end as I can’t seem to come up with a plan here. I can’t go after their backline anymore as our scout is calling out my position on all chat…helping the enemy. I can’t do this alone anymore
(81 points…..8 Banks and 1 kill, or 81 kills ... .And they got more than double the points leading on us… Worst of it all is that we are moments away from getting spawn trapped….Goddamnit)
“Hey guys…got a present for ya” the griefing scout pulls a flashbang on us, throwing it behind our shield and leaving us to get himself killed by the enemy
But before any of us could react to it, it went off… causing our ears to ring so loudly, I could feel it in every part of my brain. As a result, all of us were forced to clutch our ears in pain, leaving us with no return pressure, allowing the enemy team to take away the little space we had. Next thing we knew, we were held behind the confines of our spawn room with the gap increasing even more.
All of a sudden, the action heavy environment grinded to a halt. Everyone just packed up into the corner, and just sat down on the floor
“What’s this…. Given up already? Come on, keep trying, keep struggling…. Give me more excitement” If any of my blows could land on him right now, I’d rip that smirk right off his face
“What are you guys doing?” I said on the team comms where the griefer couldn’t hear
“What does it look like we are doing? It’s over… Best we just save our strength for the next game”
(No…. It can’t end like this)
The griefer sat down on one of the chairs, looking very proud of himself
“And my work here is done….Man, you guys are a piece of work… Had to burn through almost all of my utility make you give up”
(Don’t lose your cool, it won’t get you anywhere…. Right now, I have to somehow get these guys through that door…. Aaaaah, people are such a pain to deal with)
I took a second for myself to think, as my next few words could decide everything
(I should’ve asked Hayato or Haru about this, but usually I could just join them in that corner and chalk this game up as a learning experience…. But how am I going to get them to come around?)
I looked at the wall between us and the spawn door which protected us from enemy gunfire
(Let’s try to read the room…. The what? The how? The why? And-) my eyes immediately caught on to the relaxing griefer (-well we already know the who.)
(What’s got everyone to give up? One reason couldn’t be more obvious, but is that really it?)
“Artifact Deposited….Score….60-21….Team Red Advantage”
(How are we losing? None of the enemies are standout dangerous…. Their backliner is always at the right place at the right time, but none of their executes look tightly coordinated. Is it the number’s advantage?)
“Artifact Deposited…Score…70-21….Team Red Advantage”
(The final question is why is he throwing? Back in my first ever game, he was the only one who was willing to talk, willing to work with anyone. Why is he having so much of a good time sabotaging us?)
“Sabotaging us…..” I whispered to myself as I might just have a plan
I turned my hand over to peek at who was on team comms, and it was just our luck to see that the griefer was still on public, allowing the rest of us to talk in confidence
“Everyone!”
<< “Have confidence in your plans…If you don’t believe in them, no one else will”>>
(Thank you for this…. Haru)
“I think I know how we can win this” I began
“Artifact Deposited….Score…80-21…. Team Red Advantage”
“This game is a lost cause, just let it go” said our tank
“I’d listen to him if I were you, the score deficit is way too high right now, probably best if we just-”
“And you are just okay with letting him win?!” I interrupted
That was effective in getting their attention
“We might’ve drawn a short straw with this guy….but do you really believe that he is the only one?.... And then what, everytime you end up with this guy or anyone like him on your team, you all are just going to give up?”
I paused briefly “If we ever want to get out of this place, we have to be better than giving up the moment we run into a wall.”
I didn’t get a single response, not even a speck of hope from any of them. But I clenched my fist and refused to give up
“I have an idea on how we could turn this around, and I can’t do it alone….. but that won’t stop me if I have to…. You might be okay with letting others stomp over your efforts, but I am not.”
I turned around with nothing more to say…same as the amount of hope I had in any of them. I walked towards the spawn barrier and observed what was outside. The answer was…. a lot less than I expected.
The silence has given the enemy a sense of pseudo-victory. They were in position just in case but their weapons were far from battle ready. Safety’s on or stowed away, I knew if we were to strike, this was the time to do so.
“What do you have in mind?” as I looked back, our scout was behind me, waiting for instruction.
“Oi, what are you guys trying to do? Don’t tell me that you are trying to fight back” and guess who is watching us for the chance to spoil the mood again
“We can easily pick their mids off, but I can’t see their sniper from this angle. We let her act freely, our loss is inevitable”
“HELLOOOO, JUST SO YOU GUYS OUT THERE KNOW, MY TEAM HERE IS TRYING TO MAKE A COMEBACK….BEST BE READY TO GUN THEM DOWN”
(Well there goes most of the advantage we had)
“That asshole, what’s his damn problem” said the scout
“It’s his kind….they find it more fun to ruin other people’s games rather than playing it fair and square. Don’t bother even trying to get into their head”
(So we use that against him….)
I kept my eyes on the interface as I relayed my plan to everyone, just to make sure that he doesn’t hear a single word of it. As soon as I did, we made our attempt to climb the enormous hill ahead of us.
The enemy was playing it lax, as they were 2 banks away from sealing this game out… Which is why I made the call for us to make our breakout of spawn the moment we see their carrier coming in for the bank.
They were playing more in the open, not giving a care in the world whether they get killed. And if this game is anything close to resembling reality, their overconfidence is a weakness we can use against them.
The moment the opportunity came, we struck. With the protection of a barrier in front of us, me and the other mid player laid down pressure onto the two who were guarding way too close to our spawn. The moment they ducked behind cover due to the pressure of an assault rifle and a lever-action throwing lead at them, I pushed forward to take ground away from them, and assessed more of my surrounding
At this moment, I had a bead of everything that was going on…. Their mids are being pressured and their tank was playing too far back…. Their scout was holding the Artifact and was closing on our base but our scout, who snuck out from one of the other exits in spawn, caught him off guard…. Which means I have to cover him from…
But I didn’t have to stick out for too long, as the high powered laser on her gun’s guard rail was giving away her whereabouts.
“Mid…Keep them down” I shouted out to our AR user who was giving the enemy riflers a hard time
I slipped out of spawn and ran across the sightline of the two suppressed enemies, hoping they don’t get up and shoot me in the back. In a moment’s notice, I was right behind the distracted sniper who was looking to save her team’s scout player.
She sensed me coming, but she was well within my kill range. She turned at me trying to quickdraw her handgun, but by the time it was even in my direction,my blade had found the tendon behind her knee, and then followed by her other knee
She fell backwards and was met with the bottom of my sole to her chest as she stared into the barrel of my gun. Two trigger pulls sent her back to the spawn room and I carried that moment over as I doubled down on the pressure on the two enemy midrangers who were now behind the shield of their tank player, pushing them back into the sights of the sniper of my team’s tank and the rifle of the other midranger who was playing alongside him.
“Team Blue…Team Kill”
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And just like that, we broke out of our spawn all that was left was to-
“What do you think you are doing? You actually think you can win?” A disgruntled voice asked from behind me, but I didn’t even have to turn to know who it was
I switched my comms over to public…just to add a bit more fuel to the his fire
“Back away from a fight before it ends you’ll only know defeat…See it through to the end, at the least you’ll know what it’s like to reach out for victory….. My father’s words”
“Huh! What the hell is that supposed to mean? You guys are down by 60 points, don’t tell me you are still expecting to claw your way back…… You either win or you lose… Noone cares about losers, and nothing comes from it.”
He just kept going as I was reloading my weapons and was now following me as I moved to position to intercept “There’s no coming back from this ... .Just give up already. All you are doing is wasting everyone’s time”
“It’s only a waste of time if you see it as one… But this match in particular means everything to me”
“Artifact Deposited…..Score 80-31. Team Red Advantage” The announcer cuts me off
As much as I wanted to ignore him and walk off, I decided to throw him a challenge to throw him off even more
I stopped for a moment “We will be winning this….but you won’t”
For a second there, he looked afraid, but his expression bounced back to a grin.
I put my hand on my earpiece and cycled it back onto team comms as I rushed to take point for the next fight.
(A desperate enemy is an exploitable one…..and he is very much on that track)
I crossed over to the construction part of the map and took point along with the rest of my team to attempt to do what they did to us. But it didn’t last as long since we lacked suppressive power unlike theirs, while my team was able to fall back to our side of the map when they took their side back from us, I opted to hide out on the far end of their side, in case their sniper opts to take her old position again…where I’ll be waiting to punish her if she does.
If she doesn’t decide to take this position, I had my suppressor and flip sight on my gun, so in case they planned an offense on our side, I’d be able to shoot them in the back. My plan would be perfect, if it wasn’t for the unwelcome company
“You really are a strange one….”
The griefer hung over me like a specter of those I’ve slain…. The question I had was why was he singling me out? He wasn’t calling me out, rather just…staring. Crouched down with his hand to his cheeks
I kept my eyes on the task at hand, reading my opponent’s movements as I looked back every few seconds.
“HELLOOO….. YOU HEAR ME IN THERE?”
All of us might have muted him in comms, but there’s not much I can do when he is screaming right next to my ear on the public comms. Thankfully the whole enemy team crossed over to our side moments before he started trying to give me away
(Time to move)
Eventhough my stamina gauge assured me that at my peak performance, what I felt was anything but. I wasn’t used to the feeling of not having the answer to a combat situation before I engaged in it, in a very long time.
My body felt sluggish and I was barely keeping focus, but I had no choice but to power through….to not let my limits hold me back
I had my eyes trained where I knew the enemy team was going to be ... .taking up the middle part of the building on our side, where they will attempt to spawn trap us again. Problem was even without our permanent number’s disadvantage, we still were fighting up a mountain with boulders being hurled down at us…. With the problem being two things….our tank, and me.
While that shield has been the factor that has been preventing us from getting sent through a meat grinder, he can barely get any use out of that sniper considering how aggressive the enemy team has been.
But I probably should’ve paid attention to my surroundings, especially before I was about to make the cross.
“Oops, my bad” A sudden jolt of force immediately sent me sideways moments before I leaped, killing most of my momentum.
(Shit!)
My back was facing the drop of death and I was seconds away from getting a one way ticket back to spawn. But for this once, I treated this as any other mission.
While the griefer colliding into me ensured I wouldn’t get to the other side, I was close enough to the outside wall of the opposite building. I used the remaining momentum I had to turn myself toward the side and jammed my right hand into the wall, hoping I would latch onto any gap in the wall….lucky for me, I did.
All that downward momentum immediately died as I hung on, as I felt the shock all the way from my cracked shoulder to my fingertips that were clearly shattered, exposing the white inside. It hurt enough that I could scream, but I endured, not wanting to alert my query…. Immediately swinging myself towards the wall and gaining a grip with my left arm and gaining any footholds I could find. Another break was that I didn’t hear him anymore, probably not expecting me to hang on inches away from a sure death.
I looked down towards the drop, only to witness my gun dropping into the abyss below.
(Crap)
I pulled myself up one hold at a time, until after some strenuous effort, I pulled myself onto our side of the map. I looked up to see that I was still behind the enemy and they were completely unaware of my position, however, I had to scurry up and scramble my way out of sight so that the griefer wouldn’t give me away
I looked at my shattered arm and downed an HP vial to heal it back up and for the pain to settle. I assessed my situation and the only thing that was different was the respawn timer for my weapon showing 2 whole minutes.
I took out my Karambit and placed it on both my hands, as I realize that I’m going to be confined to it until my weapon comes back. This blade has never let me down until now, but not only am I outmatched in range, I have no way to apply or escape from pressure… and even if I do get close, it takes too long for me finish off an enemy
Taking a deep breath, I gripped my blade and attempted to push forward. Closing the distance, I held back for a second to not give away my advantage. I carefully peeked out, observing the situation in front of me.
(Okay, all 5 enemy players accounted for… Tank and two assault riflers engaging ours in a battle of attrition and ammo reserves, but damage is only getting traded, not capitalized on.)
The enemy scout rushed back behind the safety of his team’s shield as he attempted to heal up.
(If I only had my gun right now)
I turned my hand over and looked at my interface, reminding me that I still have to play without a gun for 1 minute and 40 seconds. Time which I don’t have to spare right now….
I can’t fight this alone with only my blade, I’d be shot to bits before I could even get a kill
(Ahhhh if only I could borrow a….gun)
As I realized it, my focus shifted towards my teammates who were holding down the fort.
(Wait, maybe I could borrow a gun…. I got three of them. But can they make it count…. if they miss,)
I shook my head in disapproval
(No… you are doing it again….. They can’t shoot you, if they could, the griefer would be a bigger problem than he already is……My team plays a much better defense game than I thought, but offense?)
<< “The player who drags down a team is always the player who thinks that they are better than others”>> Tatsuo’s voice replayed his wisdom in my head
(Give them a chance…. And help them make the most of it)
As I started paying attention to my team, I happened to notice that I had been hearing nothing but silence in my ear ... .As I checked my earpiece, I had accidentally muted my whole team. I rectified that error immediately
Comms were all over the place, people were talking over each other and I didn’t find a single moment to take over, so I waited a couple of seconds until they stopped to breathe
“Everyone!”
“There she is, what’s the deal about telling us to do something and going mute on us?” asked the tank
“My bad, didn’t notice till now-” I head checked again and they still hadn’t noticed me “ I’m right behind them, but I lost my gun…. I need you guys to hit them with everything you got on my go”
“Okay, everyone ready?” he checked up with the others
“Yes, sir” They all replied at the same time
“Shield is weak, if you going to do something, do it fast”
I checked my inventory and my utility was completely drained…. If my team is even a second late, I’m going to be facing down an entire firing squad…. As much as every fiber in me hesitated, I decided to go against that.
Staying low, I rushed the closest rifler.
“NOW!”
While he reacted, it wasn’t fast enough…..I dug my blade into his collar bone, dragging him down to the ground….. I tried to high kick the other rifler who was next to him, but it felt as if I just kicked a thick steel wall, followed by a stinging shock that followed.
I immediately recovered, placing my foot on his arm pushed, allowing me to roll away from him while leaving his teammate on the floor. I was wide open now, no way to get to cover, staring down two gun barrels in front of me from the other rifler and scout and the laser of the backliner on my left catching my eye.
My gamble yielded results as my whole team collapsed onto the enemy team… Their tank was having a hard time keeping up as his whole team was getting ripped into. Our scout rushed the backliner, keeping her busy while our other mid player didn’t let their tank turn around, demolishing his armor with bursts of gunfire, forcing him to bring up his shield. Their impulsive scout came at me in full panic mode, launching his chain sickles at me
I bent down, avoiding the sickles that went over my head and his movement was predictable enough for our tank to put a crater size hole in his head with that sniper rifle. The scout’s body fell but the other enemy rifler was readjusting his aim to shoot at me.
Side-stepping his initial burst, I launch myself at him with my Karambit in front of me. Two shots of his burst finds my left hand. I only realized those shots shot off my fingers when I tried to grip his face as I attempted to floor him for the kill. He blocked my blade with his gun, holding it by the rail cover and the stock. I followed up by sweeping his legs to floor him as he tried to stop the blade from getting near his throat.
We were stuck in a test of strength, but I noticed that one hand on his grip was dangerously close to the barrel of his gun. I leaned my whole body into it, forcing him to widen his grip little by little to get more leverage…. And I started smacking the back of my blade, to jolt up the pressure on him… and finally, he gripped the barrel of the gun he was firing moments ago, immediately letting go as the heated barrel burned his hand to the point that he couldn’t endure it even with the pain dampening.
My blade cut into the side of his neck, and I just had to pull sideways to tear a crack through his neck.
That is when I immediately felt another sharp sting in my back, as I got shot from the rifler I first floored… but as I expected more shots to finish me off, the bullets didn’t reach me, eventhough I heard close gunshots.
Our non-griefing scout slayed the survivor before he killed me. Our eyes met and we exchanged nods.
Three points on the board and the enemy was on retreat, which effectively reset the battlefield. Now, for the big haul
The griefer didn’t strike the entirety of that whole fight, which most probably means that he is trying to stop us from getting the Artifact.
“Artifact on field” said the announcer
I looked around me to spot the bright blink that the Artifact lets out when at a distance, and it took me less than a second to spot it……and I was the closest to it, with only a straight dash and vault between us. Considering it was still blinking as I closed the distance, looks like the griefer hadn’t got to it yet.
I stopped for a second to confirm my move here. While the most logical thing to do here was to gain possession, my gut was saying anything but. The griefer was too quiet all this time and I lost track of him when he almost sent me down the death drop.
“Wake up, leader….can’t have you caught napping on us right now” our other mid player ran past me
“Leader?” but my mind wandering elsewhere for that split second was enough for my grip on this situation to slip
“Wait, something ain’t-”
But before I could warn him, he had put his hand on the artifact before getting vaporized instantly, and by how it blasted, the artifact was rigged with a claymore….. While I had kept a bit of distance, I was wide in the open…..and although I shielded myself from the immediate blast, I ended up taking shrapnel to my arm and all of my left side.
It might’ve made me crack, but the lack of bleeding didn’t make it feel any less irritating, and by the time I looked back at where the Artifact was, it was already gone.
I couldn’t hear anything on my comms and I couldn’t say anything back as my ears were ringing loudly, and all I could do now was hope that there isn’t any enemy near me as I healed myself up.
The ringing started to settle as I finished up a heal vial, and it was enough for me to be able to hear my own voice and the voices through my ear.
“Griefer’s got the objective. He’s-” I reported, talking over all the muddled voices trying to relay info
“I’m on his tail but there’s very little I can do, I won’t be able to stop him from throwing it over the edge” said our scout
“He won't,” I reassured. “He said it himself, he’s low on utility meaning he’s running out of ways to hinder us. He’s going to try to get the Artifact to the enemy so they can bank and end this quickly.”
“Then what do you suggest?” asked the tank
“Plan hasn’t changed… but right now, the enemy team away from the griefer, make him throw the objective out of the map…. I got an idea”
(Eventhough it’s gonna hurt)
As our scout was on the griefer’s tail and putting as much pressure on him as possible, the rest of the team crossed over in the hopes of pressuring the enemy team away from him. I, on the other hand, decided to take point elsewhere.
Moving along the broken glass wall, I kept my eyes on the action across from me….and right on time, I had been reunited with my gun as the respawn timer ran out.
It was at this time the enemy team was coming out of spawn, however it looked like they were still comfortably riding their lead. Apart from their backliner, their defense was shabby…..Their shield was in the middle but the mid-rangers were not even behind it, and their scout was just firing his sidearm from behind the shield. They were so relaxed in fact that they didn’t even notice me taking aim from directly across them.
Putting one in the head of one of their out of position mid players, the spotlight was immediately on me now…. Their shield now facing my way along with a hail of gunfire following that. However they couldn’t keep me suppressed for long as now they were open to being hit by my team….. and everything was going according to what I had in mind, now we just had to stick the landing.
With the ability to only cover one direction, their tank opted to turn his shield back towards the side where many players were pushing them from, however that just left me with an easy shooting gallery. I first focused on their backliner considering she is the biggest threat of them all, and managed to injure her enough to knock her out of the fight for a while ... .which was all my team needed to overpower the enemy.
Not even one of them could turn towards the griefer to get both the artifact and a free kill, and even with a mid-powered scope on, I could see the frustration on his face. And that was my queue.
I moved fast before he had time to realize….and moments later, it was just as I had predicted it. He extended his arm out towards the death drop, holding it there just to gloat…luckily he didn’t notice that I was hanging onto the wall right underneath him.
I dug my blade into the wall to secure more grip and I silently and patiently waited….and he finally dropped it.
With my eyes trained on the Artifact, I reached out to it…and caught it, barely keeping my grip on the wall. However it didn’t take him long to realize as there was no announcement that it had been destroyed like every other time. The griefer looked over the edge and realized what he had happened
“You…”
He pulled out his gun and tried shooting me, forgetting that he is unable to do so in this situation. But in that moment of confusion, he was suddenly pushed off the edge. Narrowly missing grabbing onto me, he fell down the full length and disappeared into the spawn room.
“Consider that payback, asshole” said the other scout on the team comms, sounding satisfied
I climbed up the wall and towards the construction side, close to the enemy’s base zone, and my team was already there to back me up. Our shield was up and we barely had to put up any pressure since the enemy team was still weak and down on numbers.
“We’ll keep them busy, make a run for it”
The base zone was visible from our position, and without a moment wasted, I made a dash for it. Gunfire was being thrown my way but my team was not letting them get to me…intercepting anyone who tried to put up a defense.
“Team Blue…Team Kill”
I did take a few shots along the way but I was evasive enough for them to not do any lethal damage. And with a lot less effort than anything we’ve done so far, I scored my first Artifact bank.
“Artifact Deposited…..Score 83-46. Team Red Advantage”
(Gaining ground…..don’t let up now)
“Let’s goooo ... .we keep this up and we might be able to make a grand comeback” said our other mid-player to keep the team’s revitalized morale up.
“Don’t get cocky, we can’t afford any more mistakes…. Talk to each other and have each other’s backs, and don’t forget the…plan” the moment I realized what I was doing made me pause for a moment. For once, I wasn’t thinking only about myself.
I took the risk of trusting a group of strangers to have my back…. As much as my old man’s voice tormented me by reminding me that trust in others is taboo, I was almost willing to admit that he was wrong.
I took a look at the group once again, cheering each other on, high fives going all around. Cherishing the brief moment they had to amp themselves and each other up.
Turns out that also extends to me as the tank approached me with an extended fist.
“Come on, don’t leave me hanging” but I still didn’t return it
“Let’s not pat ourselves on the back just yet” I walked past him “All of this can go wrong in an instant….we should-”
“You know, of all the people I’ve met, you have the be the most uptight out of everyone”
I turned around halfway, looking over my shoulder at him in silence
“Maybe this can all go wrong, maybe the moment the enemy walks out of spawn, they destroy us immediately. But you gotta enjoy the small moments ... .because that’s what matters at the end of the day. In-game or out of it”
He extends his fist out to me again “What you say…. You with us?”
I hesitated again, but as I stopped to think about it, I might as well go along with it if it helps them be in the right mind.
I pushed my hand forward and hit his fist and attempted to walk away
“Here’s hoping your plan works”
“Oh don’t worry about that, he won’t even know what he’s done until it’s too late” I assured him, basing it off all I’ve seen
And now,it was time for the finish, or be finished.