Mai groaned as her internal clock sounded its alarm inside her head. She’d gone for what was called ‘whale song’. Its low, mournful sound seemed apropos to her setting, and her mental state.
After the ladder climb, she’d managed to get into an office block. The company running it provided services to the sewers, and so its premises were surrounded on all sides by sewer tunnels. There wasn’t a window in sight, although the holo-projections did a good job of faking an outside view. Of other city blocks.
Views weren’t really a thing unless you were able to get a ticket for a proper public park. Other than that, most people were used to staring across at other hab blocks. Those that were lucky enough to be in an apartment on the atrium side of a hab block at least got to look out across the wide open space and down to the levels below. And they didn’t have to put up with the incessant condenrain either.
Empty because of a public holiday commemorating a local saint, it was conveniently installed with sleeper coffins. Constructed to allow workers just enough space to sleep, eat pre-cooked meals and watch holomyths, the coffins were designed for those unlucky enough to be indentured to the company running the office, but lucky enough to avoid being sent into the sewers.
A flyer, hovering in the air on her retinal monitor advertised a corporate event to which attendance was ‘strongly advised, as we commemorate the Sainthood of Chap Man, the glorious fifth floor manager who quelled a worker uprising using nothing more than the day-to-day tools he used for his role.’
Mai didn’t want to think about how he’d managed that. Death by stapler immediately sprang to mind. Scratching as she sat up, she gave a bone-cracking stretch, mouth gaping wide as she yawned, cursing as she stretched out too far and her hands punched into the side of the coffin.
Moving to the end of the coffin, which measured a pace and half in width, and roughly three in length, she selected a meal from the dispenser and hungrily started shovelling it into her mouth as soon as it appeared.
She was ordering another bowl before she’d even finished the first. Gulping down the hot soup once she’d finished the noodles and aqua-based protein, she shoved the bowl into the recycler and grabbed the next.
This is some of the best food I’ve ever eaten! Mai thought, surprised at the quality. Then again, she was on a managerial level, so maybe the corporation took care to feed their managers well, even if they were indentured. Probably hoping that if there’s another rebellion the managers will be so grateful for the food that they’ll try and emulate Chap Man.
That was a sobering thought. She’d been indentured into the sewer companies, whilst others were being indentured into mundane every-day jobs where even the promise of good food might keep the workers under control.
Bastards, fucking Celestial Court bastards, she ordered another bowl, determined to make the most of the free food and to get her BIO-MASS up without having to rely on her BOOST. Scanning through the dispenser’s menu, she had it print off as many protein bars and bottles of drinks that she thought she could carry in a small pack she crafted. Half a bar covered the cost of that easily.
Groaning at how full her stomach was, and already slightly regretting her greed, she popped the door on the coffin open, catching it so that it didn’t spring open. Slowly she peeked her head out, looking to the left first, then down, and then to the right.
Swinging her feet out through the door, she flipped onto her stomach and slipped her feet onto the rungs of the ladder leading to the floor twenty paces below. Climbing carefully down, she stopped a pace or so above the floor, twisting so that she could pick up the mine she’d laid the night before.
Sighing in relief as she succeeded in not blowing herself up, she re-absorbed the mine and stepped onto the floor.
DOMINATION EVENT!
25 SUCCESS BONUS TO ALL SKILLS FOR SUCCESSFUL CULLERS
HOLD THE DESIGNATED AREA FOR THE LONGEST TIME.
CHALLENGE STARTS IN THIRTY (30) MINUTES
DO YOU ACCEPT YES/NO?
Twenty-five per cent success increases all of my skills! Mai stabbed the YES button before she even realised her finger was moving. Holding the designated area for the longest time would see her ranking up in nearly every skill she had.
She chuckled as she realised that she was finally going to rank up in CLEANING and MOPPING. Maybe even WASTE MANAGEMENT. All completely useless skills now. Even if she was able to Ascend, she doubted that she’d ever find a use for them.
That gave her pause for thought, however. Was it possible for the Ascended to fall out of favour perhaps? The holomyths were all filled with tales of Lords and Ladies from the Celestial Court and how they found new lives and loves after being banished by the Emperor.
Of course, they were only holomyths, but it was well-known that myths had a root in truth. Even if it had happened once it didn’t mean that wouldn’t, or couldn’t, happen again. And if it was going to happen again, it would be sure to happen to her.
Looking back to her minimap, she tried to see if there was a safer but slower route to the designated area. She was still close enough to get there before the event started, she hoped, but she was willing to sacrifice a few seconds of scoring if it meant she got there safely.
“Shit, every Culler and their mum’s going to be wanting that reward,” she sighed as the mission guideline appeared. Opening up her minimap, she traced the route, working out how long it would take for her to travel the three hundred-odd paces.
As with every journey she’d undertaken in the City, it wasn’t a matter of walking in a roughly straight line. She had to ascend and descend several levels, cross any number of public spaces, and all whilst trying not to be killed. Three hundred paces as the Death Bat might fly
There were no kill markers on the map, which hopefully meant the Culler to area ratio was low. Pleading to Lady Luck that it meant she was currently the only other Culler in the area, she checked her weapons menu to make sure she had a good range of weapons ready to go and set off.
*
Kill notifications and markers had been popping up for the last couple of minutes. At first they had been singular; Cullers coming across each other, fighting one-on-one, but as time passed, there had been more and more signs of groups of Cullers working together. Pitched battles.
Mai had checked the rules for a DOMINATION event as she walked.
DOMINATION – Cullers must hold the designated area for as long as possible. The Culler who spends the longest time in the designated area without being Culled, wins the specified reward.
In order to be considered as being inside a designated area, Cullers must have either both feet, or at least fifty per cent of their body within the area.
The clock starts counting as soon as the criteria are met, with other Cullers already in the designated area being informed that the section is ‘Contested’. For every Culler in the designated area who is not part of the informed Culler’s team, the Culler will suffer a time lag, with .25 seconds being added before one second is counted.
This means that if a Culler enters the area, and is then informed that four other Cullers have also entered the area, then they must wait for two seconds before one second is added. If there are ten other Cullers, then they must wait four seconds for each second added to their counter.
It was clear that in order to make time up, Cullers would have to try and Cull as many other Cullers as they could within the designated area. Unless they were willing to accept the penalty.
Mai wasn’t going to gamble on all the other Cullers in the area being happy to sit it out though. And with each additional Culler entering the circle, the penalty would only continue to grow.
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She reached a ladder leading down to a connecting sewer leading to the edge of the DOMINATION event. More Culling notifications and kill markers popped. A sudden flurry of deaths.
Activating SPOT HIDDEN, she took hold of the ladder and started to make her way down. Every three or four rungs, she paused to listen. Whilst she’d decided to go down to the event, there was another route which meant others could be coming up. And she most certainly didn’t want to be shot from below.
Not that I want to be shot from any direction, she thought. Just that the idea of having bullets, or sharp objects entering her from below was terrifying.
A few seconds later, and she was back on terra firma, or rather sewer firma. Checking her retinal map, she looked at where the guideline was leading her. It always took the optimal course, getting her there in the shortest time possible.
On some occasions, such as when she was rescuing Fat John, she’d been more than happy to just follow it, dealing with anything she might encounter on the way. But this was different. The event was going to draw more and more Cullers. Just walking up to it was not going to ensure a long and fruitful life.
Instead, she looked at the areas the designated area touched upon. And, whilst it was certain that others would be doing the same in order to avoid the combat, the larger groups wouldn’t be.
‘Meaning that if I want better odds, I need to keep away from the centre and skirt the edges of the area,’ she muttered to herself as her finger traced the map. Anyone looking at her would have thought she was drawing shapes in the air.
From what she could see, the area was over five levels and covered a wide variety of terrain. On one level was an arboretum, a haven for citizens who liked to walk along carefully curated paths between the huge, levels-tall trees which helped clean the hab block air.
Another area was a water park. At least a thousand metres wide, by two thousand long, it provided many hiding spaces. But also a lot of places where a killer could be trapped. Kill markers were already dotting it, and she watched as they gradually made their way into the centre.
That’s a group of Cullers, hunting those hiding, she thought as a chill raced over her. She was watching the murder of Cullers trying to hide. And from the way the kill markers displayed, the hunt was nearly totally one-sided.
As a location, the water park was completely out of the question. But, looking at where the water from the park ran off, there was a small water cleaning station with a two-story pump house.
‘Perfect,’ she said, smiling at hopefully having found somewhere she could hide, and also run from at the same time.
I’m going to gamble that people won’t want to chase me if I leave the area as otherwise they’ll be losing time themselves.
She looked back at the map. Kill markers were appearing every few seconds, with barely a pause between them.
And the event hasn’t even started! There were still ten minutes left on the event counter, more than enough time for her to make her way to the pump house. And plenty if she decided that she needed to relocate.
*
‘This is bloody perfect,’ Mai thought out loud as she looked at the pump house. Pipes, as large as three men standing on each other’s shoulders, came from all directions into the industrial building.
Stairs led directly up to the entrance door on the second floor. Anyone trying to run directly up would be vulnerable to anyone taking cover there. Although there was line of sight enough for a team to keep up a steady barrage of bullets and explosives to keep the defenders suppressed.
But it was a trade off, and she’d already identified a room to the rear of the main entrance which would be near impossible to hit with a deflection shot. All she needed to do was smash a couple of holes in the wall nearest the foyer and she’d have her own little pill box.
First though, she had to cross ten paces of open ground, get up the stairs, through the door and into cover without being hideously maimed or killed.
SPOT HIDDEN hadn’t helped. And she’d spent five minutes carefully going over the surrounding area. Nothing stood out. No-one had shot at her. But still she delayed. Where she was, she was ‘safe’. If she didn’t move, those in the area wouldn’t hunt her. But as soon as she climbed the first three steps she’d be in the DOMINATION event area.
Three minutes before it starts, one hundred and eighty seconds. Three thousand heart beats, she thought as she tried, and failed, to slow her heart. Fuck it.
With that she was off, sprinting hard, arms pumping, head down, eyes raised to keep the steps in view. Two steps up and she formed a large shield, tucking her shoulder into it. Five more steps and she was well and truly into the event area. Six steps later, heart hammering faster than it ever had, lungs heaving for breath, she crashed into the door. Fortunately, she’d scanned it first to see where the hinges were, and so saved herself an embarrassing tumble back down the steps.
After a split second of doubt, the door gave way and she bowled into the relative darkness of the room beyond, small SMG in her hand as she tracked for anyone who might have beaten her there.
Nothing. Turning, shield up, SMG resting on the rim, she slowly approached the door. Using the shield to push the door shut, she absorbed the SMG then formed a small metal wedge which she placed at the bottom of the door.
As barricades went, it was spectacularly dismal, but it would stop any casual Cullers – if such a thing existed – from just strolling right in, and also meant that she could move about the foyer without fear of being sniped. Especially after she crafted a bit of nano-oil and smeared it over the small head-height window. That done she re-absorbed the shield, bringing her BIO-MASS back to one hundred per cent.
Next, she formed two mines, for ten per cent BIO-MASS, dropping her BIO-MASS down to ninety per cent. One, she placed slightly to the right of the door, as the hinges were on the left. It didn’t matter if an attacker came through carefully or charged through. They’d still get caught by that mine.
The other mine she placed to the left, just inside where a large pipe entered the building. It was a perfect hiding place for anyone assaulting the building to make a beachhead and pin down any defenders. Looking at it for a moment, she mentally traced the steps she would take to enter the position, picked up the mine and stuck it to the wall at roughly head height.
Next, she went through the exit at the far left into a short corridor, turned right and entered the room she planned to make her stand in. Sucking her teeth for a couple of seconds, she plotted her actions once again, created a straight iron bar with a spike at the end, and proceeded to knock holes in the wall at lying, kneeling and standing height.
Her mini-fort complete, Mai next had to decide what sort of weapon she was going to use. Whilst an SMG might have a high rate of fire, it also had a small magazine size, and she didn’t want to be wasting time forming bullets no matter how quickly the process was. Not if any enemies decided to charge into the room en-masse.
Shotguns were good for causing SUPPRESSION, INTIMIDATION and, depending on the ammunition type, BLEEDING. DRAGON’S BREATH was always an option, but she wasn’t sure she wanted to set her hideout alight. Not only would the flames and smoke draw unwanted attention, they could also kill her.
A sniper rifle was also out of the question. Whilst it could SUPPRESS, INTIMIDATE and cause additional SOAK damage to any armour worn by an opponent, they were slow firing, cumbersome and the scope narrowed the field of vision so much that she didn’t deem it worth the risk.
Next on the list was assault rifles. They came with SUPPRESS and SOAK damage, and their magazines were also a decent size. However, the maximum magazine size she currently had available to her was fifty rounds. Which was better considering they had a slower firing rate than an SMG, but still not what she was looking for.
Which led her to the light machine gun section.
These guns are beasts! She thought as she looked at the various options presented to her. All of them offered SUPPRESSION, INTIMIDATION, SOAK damage and additional options for bullets which were armour-piercing, incendiary, and frangible.
She looked that up.
FRANGIBLE BULLETS are designed to disintegrate upon hitting a hard surface i.e. not flesh, such as armour and bone. This prevents over-penetration by the bullet and the potential injuring or killing of people beyond the intended target.
FRANGIBLE BULLETS cause BLEED at a minimum of 5% PER SECOND and CRIPPLE if they hit any bone.
Which meant that if she used a light machine gun, she’d have a good chance of SUPPRESSING, INTIMIDATING, BLEEDING and CRIPPLING her attackers all with one burst. She would have to lose the SOAK bonus though, as the bullets would disintegrate upon impact. And there was the risk that if her opponents wore full suits, that her rounds would have no effect.
The cost also gave her cause to pause for thought. Each round cost nought point five per cent BIOMASS. LMGs came with magazines of fifty or one hundred rounds, meaning that she’d have to either pay twenty-five, or fifty per cent BIOMASS per magazine.
She still had a stack of protein bars and other forms of food available, plus some BOOST, but it still had her chewing her lip as she worked over the various options. In the end, she decided she’d have to go for it, but added a bare bones assault rifle to her quick select menu in case she had to switch.
A light machine gun cost five BIOMASS with a standard magazine capacity of fifty rounds. Upgrading to one hundred rounds cost her one per cent extra. That brought her to eighty-three point five per cent. There was no need to add a scope, since she would only be a few paces away from any attackers. It was practically point blank.
Filling the magazine cost her another fifty per cent, dropping her BIOMASS to only thirty-three point five per cent. Wincing as she formed the weapon, both from the pain of creation and the cost, she quickly ripped open some sachets of food and started cramming it into her mouth.
She’d barely added five per cent to her total before a message popped up.
DOMINATION EVENT HAS STARTED!
DESIGNATED AREA CONTESTED!