Chapter 11

Game Play

The abandoned base was the picture of desolation. But as soon as they entered, a mob of screaming Infected came out of nowhere, climbing over abandoned cars and buildings to get at the two newcomers.

Leo was so scared his first shots went wild. It was all he could do to not turn and run. You can do this. It's just a game. Just a game. If you die here, it's fine. He took a deep breath to steady his shaking hands.

“They're faster than you, kid. So stand and fight!” He remembered a no-neck sergeant from the other distant future shouting at him. But this wasn't strictly true. He suppressed a hysterical giggle, thinking of the old joke about two men running away from a bear. “I don't have to be faster than the bear. I just have to be faster than you.”

He forced himself to take a deep breath and shoot with care.

***

Hours later, Leo felt like he'd been through the meat grinder, and then clubbed by an army of angry ogres. The first thing he did, when they finished gaming, was run to the bathroom and throw up. He stayed there, taking deep breaths, waiting for his body to stop shaking. Then he drank some water, swirling it around his mouth to get the vomit taste out.

The VR world wasn't quite like the real one, but it was close enough for his adrenaline to kick in big time and his body to relearn fighting skills that had kept him alive in his previous future. His strategy had been simple. Visualize the Afflicted that had killed Shawna, and act accordingly.

In addition, Imp informed him he'd leveled up multiple times in VR knife fighting and VR shooting, and gained 7 Demon Tears from four hours of gaming. He now qualified for the character class Fighter. Swordsman/Common. If he couldn't do better than that, he'd kill himself. Fortunately, he had weeks to improve.

Jason knocked on the bathroom door. “Leo, are you okay?”

“Fine,” he croaked.

“You were amazing. I couldn't have done the base run without you.”

“You did pretty well yourself,” Leo said, studying himself in the mirror. A twelve-year-old boy in a torn, stained shirt looked back. Something about the boy's eyes was different: tired, frightened, but also frightening. It felt good to be killing stuff instead of hiding from it, even if only in a game.

“Your mom wants you to go home right now. Says your dad's working another late shift. She has to go to work, and she doesn't want to leave your brat sister by herself.”

“I'm coming,” Leo said. He left the bathroom. “Sorry I killed your girlfriend.”

“She wasn't my girlfriend, and she did turn into one of them and try to bite my head off, so there wasn't much choice.” Jason handed Leo his pack. “Before that, I never would have thought to stab that Boss Infected thing's feet.”

“People don't think of feet as a weak point,” Leo said. “But if you hurt someone's feet enough, they tend to stop fighting.”

“Sorry about my brother. He lied about jailbreaking the game. All the good stuff is still digitally covered.”

“No big. We should do this again sometime,” Leo said, taking his pack from Jason.

Leaving Jason's house, he jogged home, feeling physically and mentally drained—thoughts of the gameplay going through his mind.

***

Mom had made spaghetti, but by the time Leo got home, Lydia had finished off the last of the spaghetti sauce. Fortunately, Leo had plenty of experience with improvising meals. He put some margarine on the remaining noodles, along with the last of the Parmesan cheese, and heated it in the microwave for a minute. A little salt and pepper, and dinner was served.

The mutant sand puppies in Lydia's show were battling the evil Cattulla who was trying to take over the beach for some reason. He joined his sister in the living room and watched the show while he ate, grateful for their time together, knowing soon that these pleasant evenings would be nothing more than a memory.

He couldn't sleep that night. His mind was full of sounds and images from the game. The game had far too much in common with the Change for it to be a coincidence. Who created School's Out? Were these creators involved with the aliens? If so, he needed to contact them. And how the hell was he going to save the world?

Finally, he got up, grabbing his dirty clothes, that he hadn't gotten around to washing. Leo wasn't sure how to use the washer and dryer, but he'd had a lot of experience washing clothes by hand.

So, one o'clock in the morning found him washing his dirty clothes in the bathroom sink.

What was he going to do? Especially since his attempts to warn people had been ignored.

Step one: Stop the world from ending. Unfortunately, he had no idea how to do this.

Step two: If unable to do step one, warn everyone. Particularly those with an implant. But how?

Step three: Get a great character class.

A great character class alone wasn't going to do it. He'd met and heard of implant wearers with powerful characters: Guardians. Paladins. Assassins. They'd gotten their asses kicked along with everyone else. Demigod Bosses were too strong.

Out of curiosity, he pulled up his list of character classes. The Power-Wielder category was completely grayed out. But in the Fighter category, he qualified for Swordsman/Common. Under Other, he qualified for Garbage-Collector/Common, Housekeeper/Common, and Janitor/Common.

“I did not tell you about the non-combat classes you qualified for, because I knew you wouldn't be interested,” Imp said, noticing Leo's inquiries.

“What can I do to qualify for better character classes?” Leo asked.

“You need to complete the quests and work to improve your stats, Leo. Also, if there's a class you are interested in, performing activities related to that class should help. I believe your VR knife work is what qualified you to be a swordsman.”

“If I performed unusual or rare activities, would that get me an unusual or rare character class?”

“I'm afraid I do not have that information, Leo. But it's possible.”

“How come you haven't given me any more quests?” Leo asked. Last time around, he'd been given five quests in the first few days. He hadn't completed any of them, but...

“Well, Leo. I was going to give you a quest to perform selfless acts of kindness. But you've given your sister food when you were hungry and agreed to watch a show you hate because it would make her happy. To give you a quest or other rewards for something you are already doing would cheapen such an act. But your kindness has been noted and taken into consideration.”

“I guess that's good,” Leo said. It would have been nice to get the Demon Tears, but if his actions were getting him closer to a decent class, then so be it.

The author's narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

He finished washing his clothes, deep in thought.

***

Thursday, September 18th, 2059

28 days to the apocalypse

The first thing Leo did when he got up in the morning was put away his clothes. Mom would get strange ideas if she saw his damp clothes hanging around his bedroom.

“Remember, tonight is pork chop night,” Lydia said from across the kitchen table at breakfast. They were out of cornflakes, but Leo found some oatmeal in the back of the pantry and heated it up in the microwave. Lydia hated oatmeal. She was eating toast covered with the last of the grape jelly. Leo heard a frightened whimpering noise from the living room. He jumped up and rushed over to see what was going on.

“Eeee!” The jerky video looked like it came from someone's cellphone and was of a man literally eating a live dog. The large man tore the whimpering dog's throat out with long sharp teeth, and proceeded to eat it raw, face and body covered in the dog's blood as he did so. Leo felt sick. This sort of thing wasn't supposed to happen for another month.

“It's just a political ad, Leo,” Mom said, not looking up from her desk, where she was fighting with a pile of bills.

“Yeah, stupid,” Lydia called out from the kitchen.

“Terrible acting. The dog is an obvious fake,” one of the spokespeople on the show was saying. “I remember when senators put work into their political ads.”

“I think it speaks well of dog-loving, vegetarian, Senator Bumblin for trying something new. In a dog-eat-dog world he's going to eat a dog,” Spokesperson Two responded.

“No, no, no! He claims to be a man of the people, but he's eating a purebred Cocker Spaniel on his yacht. How out of touch can you get? And can you believe those terrible special effects?” Spokesperson One said.

“The committee to reelect Senator Bumblin has declined to comment at this time. Animal rights activists all over the world have criticized Senator Bumblin...” The man hosting the show droned on.

Leo stopped listening. He'd seen enough of the real thing. Hell, he'd eaten a few dogs in the wild and there was nothing fake about that video. Bio-Blessed increased protein cravings and lowered inhibitions. He suspected that was the real cause of what they had seen. Last time around, he must have believed the video was fake and ignored it.

“Are you okay, Leo?” Mom was staring at him now, looking concerned. He'd noticed more and more adults looking at him strangely. It seemed being an old man in the body of a child wasn't going as unnoticed as he'd like. He'd found the best way to avoid these stares was to act boyish and stupid.

“For a second I thought that dog looked like Lydia,” Leo said. “Better watch out, Lydia. Senator Bumblin will get you.”

“Shut up!”

“That's enough, Leo. Both of you, eat your breakfast,” Mom said.

“Leo's being weird, again. He forgot about pork chop night!” Lydia shouted.

“I did not!” Leo said. With some difficulty, he remembered that Thursday was the only day both Mom and Dad took the night off. It had become a tradition for Mom and Dad to cook a decent meal (for a change) and then they'd eat it together as a family. The meal often included pork chops. Hence the name ‘pork chop night’.

“You'd better be home for dinner, Leo,” Mom said. “You can play video games with your friend some other time.”

“It's VR gaming... I mean, we're studying chemistry.” Leo had been hoping to play more, but he supposed it would have to wait.

“He doesn't have a chemistry class,” Lydia responded.

“Shut up, Lydia. How would you even know that?”

“I read your class schedule.”

“Stay out of my stuff.”

They continued in that vein until Leo left for school. While walking to school, he pulled up his stats:

Subject: Leo

Sex: Male

Age: 12

Strength: 5.5

Vitality: 5.5

Agility: 4.8

Intelligence: 5.3

Charisma: 5.5

Common Sense: 4.4

Class: Undetermined

Qualifies for Swordsman/Common, Garbage-Collector/Common, Housekeeper/Common, and Janitor/Common.

Special skills: None.

Demon Tears: 16

Corruption: 0

Strength had gone up another 0.1 points. Agility 0.3, Intelligence 0.1, Charisma 0.3, and he felt healthier, despite getting two hours of sleep the night before. Odd how his Charisma kept going up, despite his putting no effort into it.

***

Leo somehow made it to his homeroom class unscathed. “Psst, Jason, VR gaming helps my 'plant level up. I was wondering if playing another game character might help me learn useful weapon skills?”

Jason thought it over and shook his head. “GI Joseph is the best all-around character in the game. Any weapons the other characters use, you will too, eventually.”

“So, what are the other characters?” Leo asked.

“There's six total, counting our own. Big Byron is a huge obese guy who goes berserk. Real tank. Best melee fighter in the game, gains the ability to blast stuff and light fires with his mind.”

“That could be useful,” Leo responded. “I want to blast stuff with my mind.”

“But he's slow-moving, no shooting skills. Ninja Nina is good with a sword, fast, great melee fighter. She learns to turn invisible and walk on walls, but again no shooting skills.”

“Could be useful,” Leo said.

“GI Joseph gets a sword on the next mission, assuming he/you wants it.”

“Yeah, but will he learn to walk on walls?” Leo asked.

“I'm not sure. Terrible Teresa was part of a hacker anarchist cell before the game begins. She gets two drones at the beginning and is good at finding things and breaking into places, but she's small, and not good for much else. Your character should get a drone at level ten. Also, she and Gavin have a love affair during the game. If you play as her, I'm quitting.”

“She sounds useful. Except for the love affair part,” Leo responded.

“The last one is Psycho Sophie. She's good with heavy weaponry, and she has super strength. I've heard she's useful late in the game, but you'll get heavier weaponry yourself when you reach higher levels.”

“I see,” Leo said. Jason had given him a lot to think about.

“Leo, Jason. Maybe you can tell us what's so much more important than the systematic destruction of our environment due to global warming?” Mr. Candish asked.

Shit. Unable to think of a response, Leo opted for silence.

“School's Out is for losers,” a boy sitting behind them said. “Divine Ultimate Destiny is the only decent game out there. The one with the most wins a lifetime supply of Bio-Blessed.” There were cheers from other classmates.

“D.U.D. is the dumbest game there is!” Jason snapped at the other boy. “Stupid puzzles on a farm where you grow Bio-Blessed and learn about all the environmentally friendly things our billionaire corporations claim to be doing for our environment!”

“Jason, that's enough. Take a seat in the front of the class,” Mr. Candish snapped. “One more outburst like that and you're going to the principal. And this is going on your class participation record.”

“I hope the world does end, so I won't have to explain this to my parents,” Jason grumbled, stomping to the one free desk at the front of the class, directly in front of the teacher.

The teacher continued his lecture. Leo pretended to pay attention while tuning him out. Global warming was the least of his concerns. He needed to figure out how to level up GI Joseph and possibly other game characters as much as possible, to hopefully carry over to his implant.

D.U.D boy punched Leo in the back of the head several times when Mr. Candish wasn't looking. Leo did his best to ignore it. The punches hurt less than they should. His levels in getting punched in the head must be paying off.

He wasn't sure if his levels made his skin and skull harder and more resistant to trauma, or simply made it hurt less when someone hit him. A bit of both, maybe.

On the way to the next class, D.U.D boy ran up and tripped Jason by kicking his legs out from under him. Leo decided the boy had a very punchable face, so he punched it, sending the boy flying back against the lockers.

Leo helped Jason up, then took off for his next class, hoping nobody had seen him.

As soon as he made it to his basic math class and sat down, the loudspeakers came on. “Leo Edwards, please report to the principal's office.”

Dammit.