When Clay was 8, he'd been learning how to ride a bike without training wheels with two other kids in the neighborhood.
There was a three-week period after moving there where the two boys would curiously attempt to interact with the one they saw walking in and out of the house in passing.
Clay was shy, though. Had it not been for the coaxing of his mother, he'd have definitely spent most of his time inside playing video games. It turned out to be a good thing—the boys were nice enough and also his own age.
It was just a little embarrassing that he was the only one still with training wheels on his bike.
Strangely enough, he'd actually been a faster learner than his reluctance made him out to be. Within a few hours, it was him challenging the other two to race down the road they lived on.
Unfortunately, he'd gotten overexcited and leaned too far forward while going top speed. The young boy was sent flying forward, his face skidding against the road with a screeching sound that resembled the noise a car's tire might make when braking suddenly.
It hurt. Not as bad as one would think, but it hurt. It was only after an older sister of one of the other boys showed him his face in a makeup mirror that he started crying. The skin on his nose and a portion of his face had been ground away by the road.
It healed back to a point where you'd never know such a thing happened within about a year, but the problem was mainly that this incident took place the day before Clay's first day at his new school. Being seen with what he thought was a life-changing facial disfigurement horrified him, but more coaxing from his mother allowed him to put on a brave face. Nobody scorned or bullied him for his injury, and, in the long term, it hadn't really amounted to much more than a story to tell people when he got older.
By the time Clay was 10, he was already moving again.
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Once Clay was in the alley, he recreated last time's events. In order to reach him, the Hammer slammed its fists into the buildings on either side of its body and powered its way through a gap that was too narrow for its body.
Two things were different. The loss in body mass translated to a loss in physical strength as well; it was still breaking through, just not as fluidly.
The other point of divergence was that Clay had prepared for this ahead of time.
Well, it was more Radman's doing than his own.
Clay thought that blowing up the gas station would do a good enough job winning the day, but Radman thought differently.
"I'm going to put some propane tanks in strategic locations while I'm out there. Hammers, especially ones that have eaten like this one, are even tougher than you think they might be. If you're planning on taking one down, use what you think will kill it, then prepare at least 50% more."
Good call!
Clay took a shot at a propane tank on a fire escape next to the Hammer's head. He missed.
Too bad I'm not a good shot.
The propane tanks were smaller targets than Clay was used to shooting from this range. The intermittent shaking of the ground also threw off his aim.
Even an expert marksman would have trouble under these conditions, right?
Clay continued stepping back as he pulled the lever. Three shots left.
Noticing his sweat somehow made his body feel even colder.
This time he waited until right after it took a step, the brief period between shaking when he could expect to land a bullet anywhere close to where he was aiming.
At the same time, the Hammer's path caused its arm to start breaking through the fire escape. The metal bent and twisted in a way that could have easily caused his shot to miss.
It hadn't.
The bad news was that it did cause the tank to start falling in the moment before exploding, slamming it somewhere between the back of its neck and shoulder. Damage was damage, but it still narrowly avoided a direct hit to its head.
"Son of a bitch!" Clay shouted at it. "Just when I thought we were starting to get along, you pull a stunt like this!"
As usual, the only noises it made were of the destruction it caused.
If it kept obliterating every path of escape and pushing him back like this, Clay would be pushed against a wall. He also had to keep his distance to ensure he wouldn't get caught up in the aftermath of the collapsing buildings.
Bricks fell onto the Hammer's body like raindrops. It disaffectedly continued as if the clay blocks really were just water running down its back.
Radman overprepared in terms of the quantity of propane tanks, but some of them weren't in useful spots and were either another casualty of the Hammer's approach or had to be forgotten. It took a few steps, but Clay finally found one in an actionable position, within hand's reach.
He tossed it into the path of his pursuer and blew it up once it had rolled between its feet.
Lever pull. Two shots left.
The idea had been to slow it down while also creating a wider gap between steps. The damage dealt to its feet had only slowed it down a little, but it had also decreased the intensity of the shaking due to the loss in mass.
If I had my revolver, I'd just do that a few more times. Whatever! I can take advantage--
Clay was caught off guard when the Hammer shoved its body against the side of a dumpster, sending it barreling towards him just by continuing to move. He was wired enough that he could react and move to the side, but it still clipped his elbow and sent him spinning awkwardly to the ground.
BANG!
The jolt to his body made him accidentally pull the trigger and waste a shot.
His teeth clenched against an undignified sound the pain from his elbow caused. If he’d fallen with a little less grace, he could have shot himself.
His trigger discipline was usually so good, too.
Clay dejectedly pulled the lever as he stood up. One shot left.
Possibilities were drying up. He didn't see a way to win with only one shot. Adrenaline was pumping, but even now he was starting to feel his body's aches and pains.
His retreat went on, gun pointed but rendered useless by Clay's inability to let fly his last bullet.
Wait. It wasn't over. There were more guns.
Some of the men who died had left their firearms behind. If Clay could get around this thing and back to that street, he could arm himself back up.
Two problems: not only would this mean leaving behind the remainder of Radman's preparations, but it would also mean having to find a way to get around something with a body so massive that it had to walk through buildings to move around the alleys. As well, stepping out onto an open street would let it pick up dangerous amounts of momentum.
There was only one way to escape and preserve the path ahead, even if Clay didn't like it.
SLAM!...SLAM!...SLAM!
This was the only way. He took a running start and jumped to throw his weight into the window of a building a little farther up ahead. Some kind of business building with desks, computers, and a set of stairs leading to a second floor.
He ignored the sound it made, the shattered glass falling away from his body as he stood up, and the possibility of any Crowders in the building as he forced his legs to continue moving.
Being inside a building, especially a multi-floor one like this, with a Hammer around was ill-advised, but if he was quick enough he could get back outside through an opposite opening and circle back around to where he could steal more weapons.
There was a Crowder in the way that had been drawn in by the sound of the window shattering. He didn't feel like he had time to kill it, but it would be a nuisance while running from the Hammer. Clay didn't put much thought into sprinting towards it and slamming his foot into one of its knees with so much built-up force that he caved in its leg and inverted the bend of its knee joint, then continued on as it fell forward.
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It was only as he was halfway towards a door that he remembered the ability that made him fear the Hammer most: its ability to regenerate by eating. The reason why some of the damage it had been dealt by the asshole patrol hadn't felt as substantial as he expected might have been because he ate some of them and regained the mass that they'd taken away.
Leaving a disabled Crowder behind was too dangerous. Even if it were dead, that didn't make its meat any less useful to the overpowered monster.
Clay agonized over whether or not he could allow it.
He had to, right? Realistically, what could he even do? Take the Crowder with him?
Then an idea popped into the back of his mind. Small at first, half-disregarded. However, it continued to grow.
It’d be incredibly risky, severely decreasing his options and even cornering him in the event of a failure, but…
Maybe it could work!
The building shook, filing cabinets and bookcases fell over, and parts of the ceiling cracked and splintered. The Hammer stepped through the room with all the destruction that entailed. Once one of the far walls was gone, it seemed like the only thing keeping the building from collapsing on that end completely was the bulky body of the one wrecking everything.
Clay hid himself, watching closely. He likened the unnatural stillness he was pulling off to the Jumper when it had been attempting to ambush him; his view was equally elevated.
The Hammer hardly looked around before it lurched towards the crippled Crowder.
He had an inkling before, but looking at it a little closer confirmed his thought. It had definitely gotten a little taller since he last saw it.
It had its back to Clay as it took the weaker zombie from the floor by its arm and began the process of ripping it apart. Clay saw what he'd been looking for.
There was a gap in its skin near where the back of its neck started to meet the shoulder. In fact, its back was even more of a messy patchwork of missing pieces than its front.
Just as the Hammer was dropping the first limb into its mouth, the barrel of Clay's gun emerged from between the railings of the staircase and into the hole in its skin at an upward angle towards its brain.
Just in time. The skin around that part had already been healing and now did so around Clay's gun.
It presumably used to be a person, but now it was just a dumb animal. Animals have behaviors that one can analyze and predict if they watch them long enough.
Before, when it lost track of Clay, it satiated itself by eating Crowders instead. Repeating that incident and taking advantage of the opening was all he needed to do. Dragging it closer to the side of the stairs to put the Hammer in the best position was the hard part, and now he was thinking he should have taken a little more time to make sure the angle had been right.
As it was, the awkward angle he had to put his gun in meant that he couldn't prime it against his shoulder. When he pulled the trigger, the recoil rocked it back and out of his hands. It had been buried so deep that there was hardly any noise.
Everything was still. He had to have gotten it right in its actual head.
Clay waited for it to flop forward or even let go of the Crowder hanging from its grip that was now pointlessly reaching in his direction. The Hammer didn't move at all.
Notifications brought him out of the fog.
It was dead. The corpse it left behind was a pillar of meat that barely kept everything from falling down around him.
>+500 XP!
>ACHIEVEMENT UNLOCKED! [HAMMERHEAD]
>ACHIEVEMENT UNLOCKED! [DEFIANT NAIL]
Clay finally let out the breath he'd been holding. His smile was both weary and incredulous.
Not even enough for a level? How cruel can you get?
Still, his body thrummed and ached in equal measure.
He fell back laughing onto the stairs, fingers gripping at his face as if to make absolutely sure this was real.
"Hahahahahaha! I did it! Fuck! It hurts! My body hurts!"
But I feel amazing!
Squeak!
Clay removed Kissy from his pocket and brought her up to his face. "Sorry! Hahaha! You're totally right! We did it! We're the best! What about you? Are you okay?"
Squeak!
"That's awesome! You were putting on such a good show earlier that I thought maybe you were really hurt! Hahahaha! You're a really good actor! Me too! I'm a good actor, too! Pfthahahahaha! No, I'm not! I'm definitely not! I really thought I was going to die! I'm so embarrassed that you and Alan saw me like that, but I still feel so good! It's okay if you think less of me! Hahahaha!"
Squeak! Squeak! Squeak!
Not only was he a badass monster hunter, but he was also pushing the boundaries of human/animal relationships. Had there ever been a time in this world or his where man and rat laughed together?
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[HAMMERHEAD] (+1 Skill Slot)
Kill a Hammer!
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Nothing unusual about that. Too many Skill Slots and not enough Skills.
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[DEFIANT NAIL] (+1 White Skill | Id Boost)
Kill a Hammer single-handedly!
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Single-handedly? Not even close. Not only did he have help from Radman in the background, he also technically had assistance from the asshole patrol. Did neither of those things count?
If he had to guess, Radman's help was too indirect to count, and the asshole patrol didn't help him; he used them. If the criteria for gaining Achievements like this were so ambiguous, would it be possible for him to use that ambiguity to his advantage?
Probably not. This was an Achievement with conditions that he couldn't have predicted and also the only one of its kind. He didn't get anything like this when he killed the Jumper alone.
Honestly, he just wanted to put this out of mind and focus on finding out what the hell a White Skill even was.
>White Skill: Skills given as rewards for accomplishing noteworthy feats!
>White Skills are not added to your Skill Shop and can not be upgraded using Skill Points!
>All White Skills have the additional ability of giving you an extra Skill Slot, canceling out the space it would take up!
So earning a White Skill wouldn't fill up a Skill Slot?
Sure enough…
>SKILLS: 3/5
White Skills create their own Skill Slots.
Neat!
But what did this Skill actually do?
When he pulled up his Skills, they all appeared as red card-shaped boxes that floated in front of him. The only outlier among his three Skills was the one he'd just acquired, which was as white as he imagined it'd be.
[Id Boost]
…
…
What? This Skill is amazing! Is he seriously getting a Skill like this for free?
He turned his head and looked at the statue of meat.
That's right, it hadn't been free at all. It took a lot of planning and effort to make this happen, and even then it had been a close call.
"Sorry, meatman, but your smashing days are over."
The Crowder made noises of exertion as it tried to reach for him while dangling from the meat statue's fist.
"Whoops, almost forgot about you. Sorry."
>+10 XP!
Turns out the building had been for a law firm that represented people involved in workplace accidents if the signage he saw on his way out was any indication.
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Now that the excitement was over and he had to start walking home, Clay made as much use of Kissy as he could to make sure he wouldn't have to engage in any more intensive physical activity. If he had to run away, he felt he could at least do that, but another bout of combat would be asking too much of him.
He'd have liked to help Alan and Radman. It sucked getting sidelined, even if he knew they could handle themselves. The real danger was whether or not they could cooperate long enough to put this to bed.
A stray thought popped into his head.
Did they have to wait until the day they were going out to get diesel?
…
Actually, it took them a little longer than it should have for them to decide the situation was suspicious enough to move in. There'd been a five-day gap between his second meeting with Radman and the asshole patrol confronting them. Was there something to that?
That only brought the question back to how they even knew Radman was talking to someone. The fact that they only came with suspicions the second time as well all but confirmed that Radman was unintentionally sending information back to the enemy player beyond just his rough location.
It was either a Skill different from [Tagging] or an evolution of it.
Clay envisioned it as being similar to a Steam notification.
>Radman is
>Talking to someone
Something like that.
It would explain why they knew Radman was communicating with people but couldn't be sure of who. The specifics were just as rough as their bead on where he was.
So why did it take them so long to act on this information? It had to be that there was a delay in the Skill, or in the means of communication between the asshole patrol and the main group. Maybe both?
Ugh…
The incongruity of how tired his body was and how in-depth his train of thought became made him dizzy.
"Hahaha…"
Clay still laughed a little when his mind drifted back towards his fight with the Hammer and how pathetic he'd become in the moments leading up to it. He was even starting to become embarrassed at his overly chipper celebration after the deed was done.
I'm so embarrassing…
But also.
I'm kind of cool…
Alan's apartment complex was fast approaching.
Milly and everyone else were sure to get a kick out of this one. As the first one back, he'd get to tell her all about it. There'd be some worry over how Alan was doing, but he hadn't expended as much energy as Clay had before things went down, knew where to ambush them where they thought they'd be safe, and even got himself a gun.
He wasn't worried about them, but he was perplexed by what he found when he entered the alleyway.
The ladder to the fire escape was already down. Had Alan gotten back before him? That didn't feel right, but Clay's walk home had been slow enough for him to believe it could be possible.
Once he moved up the ladder and slipped into the building, he noticed something else that bothered him. The window that he came in through had already been open.
For someone like Clay, who had been paranoid enough about people entering his space to tell when someone else had opened his bedroom door by the subtle differences in the way the doorknob opened after they closed it, it only took a change in these two consistent variables to set him on edge.
He proceeded slowly, with his empty gun pointed in front of him. Zombies couldn't infiltrate this place like humans could. Humans could be scared by depleted firearms.
Clay was halfway up the stairs to Alan's floor when he heard the screaming. He still went slowly.
"Oh, it's you. This is a little awkward."
"Mom! Mommy!"
Ed was standing halfway down the hall. He was a little banged up and without his gun, but he did have a knife in his hand.
His other hand was tugging Angie out of the apartment by her arm while she continuously tried to pull herself away and go back inside. She was hardly paying attention to Ed or Clay, just loudly sobbing while she tried to grip the doorframe to keep herself from being pulled away.
"Mom! Mom! Help! Help me, Mom! Don't lay down!"
There was blood on Ed's knife.
"What did you do…?" Clay asked, his voice only just stable enough to keep from quivering.
"Only what I had to." Ed wrapped an arm around Angie and picked her up. She was made into a perfect shield to protect his torso. "I tried to explain it in a way she'd understand, but she just wouldn't stop--"
"What did you do!?" Clay asked louder this time, pointing his gun at them and trying his best to lock onto his head. He was so mixed up that he didn't even realize how pointless it was.
"Let me go!" Angie whined, kicking and trying to scratch Ed's arm. "Momm! Get up! Don't go to sleep!"
"I forgot I was dealing with two children." Ed's knife edged closer to Angie's throat. "Don't worry, I'll simplify things so even you two can understand it."