Chapter 14
Belly of the Beast
Option D. Shoot the general in the head.
Leo/Joseph pointed his AK-47 at the general, who was still talking to his soldiers, and pulled the trigger. Three shots hit the man's face and forehead.
Instead of dying like a normal person, the general, seemingly unhurt, noticed the two boys for the first time. Then, the already large man began to expand, growing bigger, and bigger.
Oh shit shit shit shit shit!
Leo/Joseph grabbed Jason/Gavin and dragged him away, shouting, “RUN!”
Tentacles shot out of the General's body as he expanded, losing his humanoid form. With his tentacles, he picked up the armored troop carrier next to him, and threw it at the two boys.
Leo pulled Jason/Gavin to one side, feeling the wind created by the armored troop carrier as it flew by them, slamming into the nearby ground with a deafening crash.
“General Schultzberg is a shareholder in DUMB and in charge of our complaints department!” The DUMB representative shouted at the two running boys. “Feel free to talk to him about any of your concerns!”
“They can't do this!” Jason/Gavin shouted. “You can't send a Boss monster at the beginning of a level!”
“You have a quest,” Imp piped up, surprising Leo. “Destroy that virtual monster before it kills all these virtual people. Reward is 20 Demon Tears.”
“First,” Leo said between breaths, “you've got to be kidding. Second, twenty Demon Tears is nowhere near enough for killing this thing!”
“What?” Jason shouted, breathing hard despite only running in the virtual world.
“I do not set the rewards, Leo. That is determined automatically,” Imp responded, sounding indignant.
General Schultzberg, now a giant tentacled blob, ten feet tall and twenty feet wide, half-jumped, half-levitated into the air, landing fifty feet away from the two boys.
“That's a High-Level Boss!” Leo/Joseph shouted. “Get behind those trees! Shoot anything that looks vulnerable, like its eyes, and avoid its tentacles at all costs! If that thing grabs you, you're dead!” Leo/Joseph pushed Jason/Gavin in the direction of the distant pine trees. He himself ran like hell in the opposite direction, towards a large meadow which served as the prepper's parking lot. where some twenty cars and pickup trucks had parked in a haphazard fashion.
Leo/Joseph activated Prolonged Surge, one of his three surge abilities. Its effects were less noticeable, but they lasted a lot longer. Assuming he wasn't killed immediately, this battle would be a marathon effort, not a sprint.
At least the soldiers serving the general didn't seem inclined to get involved. In the distance, he could see them running for cover.
He ran behind one truck, then slipped underneath a second one, coming out the other side and dodging behind a third. Tentacles wrapped around the first truck, picked it up, then with an angry roar, the Boss threw it at Jason/Gavin, who was running for the trees on the other side of the meadow. A red gas can fell out of the vehicle, rolling and bouncing across the meadow until it slammed into a faded red pickup truck.
Jason/Gavin dodged to the right, just in time. The flying truck missed him by inches as it slammed into the ground with a thunderous crash, rolling several times before crashing into a tree.
Leo/Joseph used the opportunity to shoot at one of the Boss's many eyes—there were at least twenty—before ducking back behind another car. The Boss's response was to lash out with its tentacles. It had hundreds of them now, and they went under, over, and through the vehicles to get at Leo/Joseph as he dodged behind a brown Volkswagen van, somehow avoiding being grabbed.
This was how a mouse felt, running from a cat. A feeling Leo was all too familiar with.
The Bosses they'd fought previously were Low-Level Bosses. Meaning, though they were larger, stronger, and smarter than a non-Boss, they were more or less humanoid-shaped and had human weaknesses. Ergo, two arms, two legs, one brain, and one heart (mostly). High-Level Bosses, on the other hand, could have hundreds of hearts, thousands of arms and legs, and a brain spread throughout their body. And they always seemed to have lots and lots of tentacles.
Needless to say, they were much harder to kill.
Tentacles picked up the car Leo/Joseph had been hiding behind. He slashed one of the tentacles with a razor-sharp Kukri he'd taken from an inbred mountain-man Boss hours before. The severed tentacle twisted and flopped on the ground like an angry snake. Leo/Joseph ducked under another truck, barely avoiding the twenty tentacles trying to grab him. Jason/Gavin opened fire from the pine trees he'd hidden behind, shooting at part of the Boss that was pixelated out. Its penis, presumably. A splash of red showed he'd scored a hit, but aside from annoying the Boss, Gavin did no significant damage.
The battle went on for hours, with the huge Boss trying to catch the two boys and tear them apart, and the boys running for their lives and hiding, while doing no significant damage to the Boss. Cars, trucks, uprooted trees, and still squirming, cut tentacles littered the landscape. There were too many trees for the Boss to make much headway into the pine forest—the trees were the only thing keeping the two of them alive. As the Boss grew angrier and more frustrated, it started picking up its own soldiers, dragging them out from where they'd taken cover and throwing them screaming at the boys. Considering they were the Boss's own men, it was almost funny, in a not funny kind of way.
There was no question the boys were losing. Leo/Joseph was out of healing packs, his health bar was in the yellow and his Prolonged Surge had long since worn off. He was lucky to be alive by this point. Jason/Gavin was little better off. They were getting tired. The Boss had far more endurance than they did and it was only a matter of time until they messed up or got unlucky. If they somehow lasted until nightfall, they'd be dead. The Boss also had much better night vision.
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One of the general's airborne soldiers slammed into a truck next to Leo/Joseph. Quickly searching the body, Leo found much-needed ammo and grenades. He knew better than to throw grenades at the Boss. It would just flick them back with its tentacles, but it did give him the beginnings of a desperate plan. While playing his life-or-death game of tag with the Boss, he searched the rest of the dead soldiers, coming up with ten grenades.
A car slammed into Leo/Joseph, sending him flying. He crawled slowly away, trying to find cover, his health bar in the red. The tentacled monstrosity approached Leo, looking down on him, knowing he was out of the fight. Instead of picking him up and finishing him off, the Boss grabbed the soldier Leo/Joseph had been next to, and tossed him into the giant, many-toothed cavern that passed for its mouth.
There was a huge explosion as the ten grenades Leo/Joseph had planted on the soldier went off, and an angry roar rose from the wounded Boss. He had been counting on the Boss being hungry. Bosses were always hungry. He held the ten firing pins he'd pulled from the grenades he'd planted on the dead soldier.
Of course, the explosion didn't kill the Boss, but it did weaken the monster significantly. The tentacled monstrosity remained still for a few seconds, shocked by what had happened.
Leo/Joseph used the two health packs he'd taken from the soldiers and activated his two remaining surge skills. Maximum Surge and Super Surge. He'd found out by accident that the different surges in his special skills stacked together, but they only lasted as long as the shortest skill, and as always, the cool-down time was significant. Time slowed way down. Even the fast-moving tentacles of the Boss seemed to slow, making them easy to dodge. He grabbed the ten gallon gas container he'd spotted earlier in the meadow and charged the wounded Boss.
He hurled the gas can into the Boss's gaping, smoking mouth, firing at the gas can with the last of his ammo. The gas ignited, releasing a ball of flame and dark, foul-smelling smoke. The Boss screamed in rage, lashing out with its tentacles. Leo tossed his empty gun aside and attacked, cutting off any slower-moving tentacles he encountered and dodging the rest. The mouth closed with a horrible hissing noise, putting out the fire. In the distance, Leo/Joseph knew Jason/Gavin was still shooting at it, but it all happened slowly.
A tentacle grabbed him by the leg and picked him up. He sliced it in two, and it fell to the ground next to a pile of ineffectually squirming severed tentacles. The Boss's mouth reopened, letting off a deafening scream. Leo/Joseph threw himself into its mouth attacking from within with his Kukri knives, cutting anything that might be a weak point. Time would speed up soon, and he had to make every second count.
The virtual stench of burnt flesh and gasoline made him gag. The mouth closed as it tried to swallow him. Darkness. Leo held his breath and kept hacking at the giant mouth. Sick mucus-like fluids covered him, burning his skin. They must be acidic, he thought. His health bar went down. He kept stabbing and hacking, searching for any organ that might be a weak point. This was an all or nothing attack. If he failed here, they were done for.
Hacking deeper inside the creature, he encountered a pulsing organ the size of a basketball. He stabbed. It exploded, a hot, tar-like fluid combined with the rest of the fluids covering Leo/Joseph. He desperately tried to breathe and couldn't. Everything started going black.
There was light as its mouth was wrenched open, and hands reached in to pull him out. He collapsed outside, coughing up fluids and gasping for breath. His health bar was firmly in the red.
With a loud shuddering breath, the Boss breathed its last.
They'd done it.
“Congratulations! You have completed your quest!” Imp said. “You have also leveled up in running, hiding, and fighting virtual monsters, virtual shooting, and knife-wielding skills, and you have gained 30 Demon Tears.”
Another cut-scene began. A tired, dirty, banged up and battered Gunslinger Gavin stood on top of the dead monster Boss and shouted. “WHO'S NEXT?”
Leo thought this was unfair, considering he'd done most of the work of killing the thing, but kept it to himself.
One of the few surviving soldiers waved a white T-shirt in surrender.
In the distance, the DUMB representative made a run for it. Gavin raised a pistol and fired, shooting out her left knee and sending her crashing to the ground.
“We just want to go home and see our families again, assuming we have any left,” a crying soldier said. All fourteen surviving soldiers (of the original fifty) were disarmed and surrounded by heavily armed preppers who were less than happy with them. One of the younger prepper men had picked up the “Don't Tread on Me,” flag and was trying to brush off the footprints with his hands.
The two boys followed the DUMB official as she crawled away, quickly catching up with her.
“Not so tough now that your general isn't around,” Gavin said, sucking on his vape pen, taking another hit of his medication. She stared up at him, a plastic smile was still on her face, but her eyes were full of hate. “I distinctly remember asking you a question. Now, the way I see it, I got plenty of bullets from those surrendering soldiers.”
She spat in his direction. “Idiots!” she hissed. “You've gotten yourselves into more trouble than you can imagine! My people will crush you. They will annihilate you!”
“Then it must be Wednesday,” Gavin yawned. “My answer?” he raised his gun.
“Sir? Uh, sir?” a voice came from behind them. “Sorry to bother you, but the Constitution forbids torture.”
“It does not. Does it?” Jason/Gavin looked at Leo/Joseph.
He shrugged. Civics had never been his strong suit.
“The eighth amendment to the Constitution states 'nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted'.” The NPC (non-player character) speaker, a short gray-haired man, looked at them nervously.
“So what should--” Jason/Gavin started to say.
There was a high-pitched humming noise. The lights went out, and he was back in his gaming capsule.
With a groan, Leo pushed open the lid and climbed out. He was so exhausted he could barely stand. How long had they been playing?
“Just what do you two think you're doing?”
Leo jumped. The woman's voice reminded him of the evil DUMB official in the game.
“Hi, Mom,” said Jason, emerging from his own pod, looking scared.
The woman stood in the doorway, next to a large, musclebound man in the doorway. They looked pissed.
Shit. This was going to be bad.