What the fuck?! Max windmilled for a second, before wrapping himself around the duffle bag and struggling to right himself so that the bag hit first.He struck slender branches, slowing his fall. The lighter branches gave way to thicker ones that didn’t give way. Max grunted in pain as the second impact broke a rib, and cried out when the next impact broke his shin. When the final impact came, he could do nothing but breathe raggedly and stare at the two moons in the sky.
“Two...?” he wheezed. He tried to focus on the moons, because the fall hurt. Oh god, it hurt. It hurt more than second Fallujah, and he just wanted to lay there and die. He struggled to get the dual moons to resolve into a single moon, and after a short time, realized that they were, in fact, two moons, and he was not seeing double. For starters, they were different sizes. And colors.
“Morgan...” He had to get up. He had to move. His little girl needed him, and that knowledge allowed him to dig into reserves he didn’t know he had. He tried moving parts of his body. He was relieved when his feet twitched, but winced when he realized his leg was broken. Miraculously, most of his left side was untouched. He rolled onto it, hissing in pain.
Max lay on his side for a minute or two, collecting himself. He had somehow managed to retain his grip on the bag, and he sighed in relief. Having his bug-out bag with him was a stroke of fortune that made him smile, despite the pain. It meant he was going to survive. He unbuckled the bag with one hand and fished around inside for a pair of Vicodin, which he chewed, grimacing. He followed it with one of his few precious bottles of Gatorade, and gingerly levered himself to a sitting position. He wanted a look at that leg.
Max took his pocket knife, slit his pant leg from kneecap to ankle, and folded the cloth back. He grimaced; that was an ugly break. “This is really going to hurt.” Like it didn’t hurt already, he thought. Max looked around for something to hook his ankle on, so he could set his leg. That, and he might have been stalling a little, because he knew this was going to hurt even more.
The clearing Max had landed in was clearly artificial, and had been made by someone. A series of carefully spaced rough-hewn stones were dotted around a 100-foot-tall tree, on top of a large mound. The tree was pale, and bore some kind of large fruit, many of which were freshly on the ground due to Max bouncing off the top branches. The stones were scribed with runes, and at the base of the tree, bracketed by roots, was a hole going into the mound. The “hole” had an odd oily tinge to the darkness inside it, and radiated a vague sense of “You do not want to be here”. Max wasn’t really paying attention, mostly due to having multiple broken bones.
Max found a likely shaped root sticking out of the ground. He crawled over to it, working on his ‘good’ side and, with much cussing, managed to get his ankle situated in the crook of the root. Bracing with his good leg, and grabbing another root with both hands, he pulled. It was quite possibly the worst pain he’d ever experienced, as the two halves of the bone slid back into place. He screamed and dropped to the ground, gasping.
After a long silence of just laying there, trying to recover himself:
“Fuck, I think I pissed myself.”
Another pause.
“No, I’m just sweaty, and close to being in shock, ok, that’s good.”
Max lay there panting for a moment before gingerly unhooking his ankle from the roots. He dragged himself to one of the stones, and propped himself up against it. He lay on his side against the stone, rummaging in his bag, and pulled out a small first aid pouch. He cleaned the wounds on his leg, doing his best to clean his whole shin, and then bandaged his injuries. Once that was done, he fished around in the duffle and grabbed the tool roll of ‘torture implements’. Emptying most of the tools out of the roll, leaving a few of the longer knives in to provide stiffness, he wrapped it around his leg. Then he took off a paracord bracelet, using a mix of the cord as well as some duct tape to turn the roll into a makeshift cast. He followed this with a third Vicodin. “Don’t get greedy, Max.” He lay there, and let the painkillers work their magic.
The sun came up. At least it looked normal to Max. A nice, normal, bright yellow ball in the sky. The air was warm, and the sky was a clear blue. The only thing that convinced Max something was seriously wrong was all the plants looked wrong. That, and the presence of two moons in the daytime sky.
He thought about this for a long time…
Eventually, he spoke. “Pascal’s wager. Either I’ve had a stroke or something similar, and I’m hallucinating wildly; or this is real. If I treat it like it’s real, I should survive, and if it’s not real, I probably haven’t harmed myself anyhow because I’ve tried not to do anything stupid.”
Anything else stupid, you mean. Max winced at the reminder from his internal voice. He was so going to prison when the world started making sense again. He put those thoughts aside and began to focus on the task at hand. Surviving.
“Step one, take inventory.” Max reopened the duffle bag and started going through the contents. A stun gun. Flashlight. Couple of sets of spare batteries. Solar charger. Six MREs. Four pairs of socks, four pairs of underpants, four t-shirts. Sweat pants. A poncho. A poncho liner. A Molle-based LBE that doubled as a plate carrier. A second, unopened medical kit. A pair of decent sneakers. Three quarts of gatorade. Four large bags of jerky. A large bottle of penicillin. A large bottle of Vicodin. A liter of decent vodka. Water purification pills. A water filter. Fire starter. Tinder. One of those tiny stoves, and a baggie of thermatabs. Two canteens. A Glock G21 and six 20-round magazines. The Colt. Five seven round magazines, plus the one in the pistol. And, finally, a rifle case. He opened it and assembled the highly-illegal stubby M4 clone, carefully inspecting it to make sure it had survived the drop. He counted the seven magazines in the case, inspecting them as well. He took a magazine and slid it into the mag well, pulling the charging handle. “That’s better.”
Max loaded all his loot onto his LBE harness and started to put it on, before the stab in his ribs reminded him he had unfinished business to deal with. He grunted and used the last of the duct tape to stabilize his rib. “That’s going to suck to take off…” he grumbled, but it worked. “Next time, two rolls of tape. ”Max gingerly got his LBE on and snugged it tight, providing an extra layer of stabilization for his busted rib. After that, he crawled over to a smaller tree and used a kukri to chop it down. Taking his pocket knife, he began to whittle. After about an hour, and a little paracord, he’d managed to make a decent crutch that would hold his weight. He used a tree to pull himself upright and began to make a painfully slow and careful survey of his immediate area.
This place is weird as hell, Max thought for a moment. Come to think of it, it might be hell. I don’t know. Max hobbled over to the branches he’d broken on the way down and collected them to make a lean-to to hang the poncho on, making a small shelter. He collected the fruit, looking at it suspiciously. “Damndest thing I’ve seen in a while. Still, it looks edible. Put it aside for now, I guess.” He made a pile of the softball-sized fruit, while stripping the branches and cunningly whittling a frame inside the poncho hang, then laid out his woobie and crawled inside. He ate an entire MRE, and after camouflaging his hide as best as he could, given the circumstances, Max went to sleep.
If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.
He awoke to the sound of voices, arguing…
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“<...Deal.>”
Max frowned. He had gone a lot of places as a Marine, but he didn’t recognize that language. Still, the tone suggested something bad, so he poked his head out of the hide. It was late, but the two moons gave excellent light. He wriggled around in his hide and slid the barrel of his rifle out, moving like a ghost, even with his injuries. He crawled across the crest of the mound, sticking close to the tree in case he needed to use it for cover. He peered through his low powered optic, and smiled. These people were making no effort to conceal themselves. He saw a line of robed figures walking through the night, carrying a bundle strapped to a pole. His eyes narrowed. No, not a bundle, a person. Short, with long dark hair. Was it Morgan? Hard to tell. It might be.
“Who cares? I see fuckers who need killing.” Max grinned, thumbed the selector switch to ‘fire,’ and picked out the asshole at the back of the line. The little carbine cheerfully belched out a bullet with an abrupt crack! that the also-illegal suppressor struggled to muffle.
Suppressors were funny. Everyone thought that they were like what they saw in the movies, but they weren't silent at all. What they did do was muddle, soften, and disperse the sound of a gunshot, reducing it to a volume that didn't damage the ears of the shooter. It was still moderately loud. They also concealed muzzle flash.
Two things happened when he fired. Firstly, the little column stopped dead and started looking around. Secondly, the robed figure at the end of the column dropped to the ground without a sound.
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...Crack! The second to last in the column, who had been bending over the deceased Johan, dropped to the deck with a scream and lay there, thrashing and screaming. The two robed figures carrying the woman strapped to the pole began to run.
Toward the tree.
Toward Max.
“The hell?” Max would worry about it later. Right now, there were targets to service. His blood sang, and for the first time in years, he felt alive. He didn’t even notice the [System] messages.
Crack-crack-crack-crack-crack! said Max’s little carbine, happily spitting out death, unconcerned about the weirdness its owner was currently in the middle of.
When there were no targets left moving under their own power, Max crawled out of his hide and levered himself to his feet, his carbine hanging on it’s sling as he hobbled awkwardly across the battlefield towards the prisoner. He’d need to move fast; he was certain at least one of the maggots had escaped.
By the time he reached the prisoner, he realized something was…not right with his leg. Or rather, not wrong. He felt like he could put weight on it. “Better not, it’s just the adrenaline talking.”
He leaned on his crutch over the woman tied to the pole. “Ma’am? I’m gonna cut you off that pole now; please don’t wiggle, I wouldn’t want to cut you.”
The bound and gagged woman held very still as Max cut her free. Once he was done, he leaned on his crutch, breathing heavy. “You gonna be ok, Ma’am?”
The woman laughed shakily. “”
“I wish I knew what the hell you are saying.”
“”
“My name’s Max, and I don’t know where I am. Can you help me?”
“
The woman stood up and pointed at Max, and then at the ground, and then she started walking after one of the supply train mules. He made no move to stop her. She seemed to know what she was doing, and he was in no condition to stop her.
Max leaned on his crutch and waited, surrounded by cooling corpses. The woman seemed to recover from her situation pretty quickly; he was impressed. Most folk would be still on the ground, freaking out. Instead, she was up and moving, doing...something. That was good, that meant she was one of the sort that got up and acted in a crisis, instead of crumbling.
She came back with the first mule quickly. Flashing Max a smile, she spoke. “
The mule stared at Max, and Max stared back.
“Most intelligent conversation I’ve had all day.”
Max's deep and meaninful conversation with the mule was abruptly interrupted.
Ding!
“What the fuck was that?” He looked around for the source of the sound. Without warning, glowing silver script appeared, floating in mid-air. Max gaped at it. The script followed his field of vision wherever he looked, and refused to disappear, even after he shook his head, and blinked several times. He reached out to touch it, and his fingers passed through it, but glowed brighter when his fingers came in contact, reacting to his touch. After a moment of fiddling with the display, trying to understand what was going on, he read the display.
You have defeated [Necro Cultist (lvl 5)]
+100 experience gained.
Max stared at the silver script hovering in the air in front of himself.
“That’s…a thing...What the hell are you?”
You have defeated [Necro Cultist (lvl 5)]
+100 experience gained.
“You already said that, whatever the hell you are.”
You have defeated [Necro Cultist (lvl 5)]
+100 experience gained.
You have defeated [Necro Cultist (lvl 6)]
+150 experience gained.
You have defeated [Necro Cultist (lvl 4)]
+80 experience gained.
You have defeated [Necro Cultist (lvl 7)]
+200 experience gained.
You have defeated [Necro Cultist (lvl 5)]
+100 experience gained.
You have defeated [Necro Cultist (lvl 3)]
+60 experience gained.
You have defeated [Necro Cultist (lvl 13)]
+1300 experience gained.
You have reached Level 2! Health and Status partially restored!
You have reached Level 3! Health and Status partially restored!
You have reached Level 4! Health and Status partially restored!
You have reached Level 5! Health and Status partially restored!
You have reached Level 6! Health and Status partially restored!
60 distributable Stat Points awarded.
60 Skill Points awarded.
Skill purchases unlocked! (Check available skills through your Status Menu)
“The hell is a status menu?”
Silver Text hung in the air in front of Max.
Status Information for: Maxwell Mackenzie
Level - 6
Primary Class: [Locked]
Secondary Class: [Locked]
Health - 68/90
Stamina - 34/50
Mana - 25/26
STR - 7
AGI - 6
CON - 7
VIT - 7
INT - 6
Stat points available to distribute: 30
Current Skills: None
Basic Skills now available for purchase!
Skill Points available: 50
Titles, Mantles, and Aspects
[Worldwalker (Title)] - You have travelled through the void between the many worlds! Every world is different, each with its own gifts and dangers. To help you survive strange new places, you gain a slight boost to health and an increased ability to learn new things! (+50 to Health, +50% increased gains to Skill Experience)
[Necrobane (Mantle)] - You have made a specialty of killing Necro cultists, giving you a boost in experience gain, and a boost to damage vs necro cultists.
Max stared at the Status Page for a long moment. “Well, this is...different.”