Alan crouched on a low lying ridge overlooking a murky pond. The surface was as still as glass, however, nothing could penetrate the inky waters. He’d spent much of his afternoons in the last few days getting to this place. It would have been simple to come here on his own, but without his companions, he couldn’t guarantee he would be successful in the hunt.

So instead, he’d trained with them, helping them adjust to their new bodies and abilities and to work more as a team a few hours a day in the last week.

Training had been simple enough Adrian, who had focused on coordination and reflexes for his piloting skills had done well with firearms. Nick, on the other hand, had found it much more difficult.

He loved his AR-15, but his accuracy was abysmal. When facing the toads, if the target moved he missed more often than not. Alan had suggested recently a different method for combat...

“Are you ready?” He spoke quietly into a wireless microphone.

“Yes. Yep,” Came the responses.

Alan stood, charging his gloves with vervetic energy, and creating a ball of energy the size of a soft ball. It shot toward the pool, crashing into it and leaving a temporary crater at its center. The energy itself, arced wildly across the surface, resulting in large clouds of steam.

CROOOAK!!!

A dark shadow leapt from the pond, partially covered by the swirling steam. It immediately turned toward Alan and jumped, bursting from the fog bank.

Alan, even knowing beforehand what to expect, was unprepared for the massively fierce entity which emerged. The toad, if you could call it that, was completely covered in jagged plates, that glowed red at the seams. It gave the look of being about to burst into flames. It’s size was that of a small car.

Alan immediately scrambled away from the oncoming monster.

The Toad landed, opening it’s mouth briefly to shoot a fiery substance from hit’s mouth. Dodging quickly, Alan avoided it as it splashed near him.. Less than a second later, a gun opened fire.

The bullets sparked and ricocheted off the metal plates of the Toad. Distracted by the bullets, it leapt once again in the direction of the gun fire. Relseasing, another fiery projectile, this time in mid flight toward the now running figure of Adrian.

Alan continued to run in a new direction. Activating his gloves, he released a scatter shot of energy toward the just now landed toad, which like the bullets before, seemed to harmlessly bounce off the thick hide.

Having just missed Adrian in it’s leap, the monstrous toad now being once again pestered by the electrical shock, turned to face Alan. In a feat of incredible strength, it bounded in a single jump toward Alan once again. Alan, remaining unfazed, moved quickly avoiding the heavy landing monster.

Once more it landed. And once more, Adrian struck again, painfully striking the tough monster hide with his AR-15.

Alan and Adrian continued to play ‘keep away’ from the troublesome beast. Neither the team or monster were able to gain advantage over each other. Their weapons did nothing more but to cause pain and irritation. While the Toad, on the other hand, was unable to land the killing blow to stop the irritants. The only change seemed to be that both parties were growing more tired.

“I think it’s time.” Alan said breathlessly, positioning himself.

The toad lept again toward Alan. It’s eyes grew more frantic and angry, as the time between it’s jumps grew longer. Crashing before Alan, it noticed that it’s prey stood closer, far closer than it had before. For a brief moment, it sensed it might be able to kill the annoying creature. It was about to leap again, when it suddenly felt a jarring pain in its right hind leg.

Nick, moments before, concealed carefully in the debris, had stood up as the toad landed before him. In both hands he wielded the VE sledgehammer which Alan had lent him, and using all his enhanced strength, landed a heavy blow, shattering plating and deeply bruising the lower leg of the Toad.

Infuriated, the toad turned suddenly, catching Nick and throwing him back. But the damage had already been done, Adrian, precise in his shooting, shot at the now vulnerable leg.. Bullets tore through muscle and ligaments, effectively crippling the massive toad.

Nick, back on his feet, didn’t hesitate, as the toad had turned once again toward Adrian in a futile effort to protect it’s leg. Nick ran toward it, hammer in hand, and leaping better than any Olympian, brought it down on it’s back, removing large chunks of plate and exposing more skin. The perfect targe for both Alan and Adrian.

It didn’t take long before the alpha monster took its final breath.

“That was Awesome!” Nick exclaimed while holding the hammer over his head.

“We couldn’t have done it without you.” Alan responded sincerely.

The monster's carcass was too important to just simply remove its nyamisium core and leave the rest. The plates were excellent at stopping projectiles, and Alan had specifically selected this beast for one of it’s additional properties. They stored the beast whole, and hopped on their 4 wheelers to head to the base.

Arriving back at the base, Alan and his friends were exhausted, but still pulled up in front of a very large tent that was much darker in color and seemed to be more ominous than the rest.

Approaching the door, Nick coughed lightly and made up an excuse to go somewhere. Alan and Adrian grinned at each other, as their friend walked quickly away. Entering inside, the room was humid and dim. Piles of items lined the walls, waiting to be organized. Rummaging through one of the piles, was a lithe, black figure, with antennae. Her long slender arms stopped, as she turned toward the entrance. What greeted Alan was a pair of milky white eyes.

“Hello Blatta,” Alan greeted the Croatht, one of the first alien’s he’d run into on Kragga.

“Ahh Alan.” She half hissed, half spoke. “I was wondering when you would arrive. It seems that your friends didn’t lie when they told me about the new settlement. I just hope it is as profitable as they promised.” She walked up to him slowly. “It’s been awhile since I’ve been under the care of an actual landowner.” She glanced around him, looking for something. “Where is your friend, Nick?”

“He said he had somewhere to be.” Alan sighed.

“Oh, that's dissappointing. I do enjoy playing with him.” She smiled wickedly, her long tongue flicking.

Alan tried not to laugh. Both Adrian and Nick, had gone to the settlement on the edge of the wastes to recruit a few alien’s for this location. Blatta was one of them. Too bad for Nick, that one of the reasons she’d agreed to come was her obvious interest in him. Or at least that’s what she half said. Alan suspected that what he offered, low taxes, land, and potentially large group of new customers might have been the real reason.

Despite these perks, however, Nick and Adrian had only been able to so far recruit Blatta .

“Blatta, my understanding is that you are an expert at recovering resources from monsters?” Alan inquired.

She smiled and a pair of attached razor sharp blades fluttered from her forearm to extend dangerously at her wrist. “You have to be an expert at many trades to survive on Kragga.”

After a brief exchange they handed over the large monstrous toad to her. After a brief inspection she spoke briefly. “This is in good condition. Usually these beasts are torn apart by explosives, or cut up badly. The nyamisium core is good, likely High E grade, maybe even D. But unless you want to make a serum for bulky armor, or have terrible acid reflux I wouldn’t suggest extracting the genetic material. However,” she pulled out a long syringe and plunged it into the hide between the plates, “There iss something you will definitely want.”

In the syringe was an amber liquid, “This iss a special liquid from the monster’s gland, when used it will infuse players with a +1 to their strength, if it is under 10. You can only use it once though, after that it will give you a small boost of strength, but only for a limited time.” She handed him 6 doses of the liquid. “Give me sometime and I’ll take care of the rest later.” She added dangerously, “If you have Nick pick it up, I’ll be sure to give him a discount on what I’ll be charging you.”

As they left the tent, Alanhanded two doses to Adrian. “Make sure you and Nick each take one. And feel free to take the rest of the materials from Blatta, it should be worth some good credits.”

“Sounds good, what about you?”

“I’m going to check in on Shelley, see if she might like one.” He held up one of the doses.

“Oh well that's a nice gift for your business partner.” Adrian smirked.

Alan only just rolled his eyes, ignoring Adrian and taking the other 4 doses with him.

Walking through the camp, groups of vehicles and personnel hustled from one end to the other. It seemed that even though it was late, that the camp hadn’t yet decided to go to sleep. They stayed busy, especially after the President’s announcement. Catching the attention of one of the guards he found that Shelley was in the medical wing at one of the three permanent structures.

Walking inside, he saw her standing next to the chief of security and Mr. Jakes, the company's manager. The three were in deep discussion. The area seemed unusually busy.

“Hi Shelley, what's going on? I brought you something.” Alan interrupted the trio.

She looked up, “Alan, there’s been some significant casualties from one of our scouting parties. Three were decimated, while the other needed medical attention to prevent log out.” She handed him a report. The security chief spoke up before he could read it.

“We’ve been sending our scouting parties for reconnaissance and hunting. More often than not, it also became a chance to kill a few monsters. However, it sounds like they kicked up a hornet’s nest. We’ve received reports from the other three already, they reported that there was a large mass of bug-like creatures swarming about a half day's drive from here. They got caught by the enemy scouts. Worse yet, the swarm seems to be slowly making its way to this location.”

Quickly scanning through the report Alan immediately noticed the swarm were coming from the direction of the nest he’d explored to retrieve a cache of ancient tech. What worried him more were the descriptions of the monsters. The list included some that he had encountered in the next, however, there was a description that matched the pair of bugs that had ambushed him in The Brick.

“Alan, if they come this way, they’ll easily run over this whole operation. And we can’t afford any delays.” Shelley spoke worriedly.

Bryan Jakes, chief manager, spoke up.“Ms. Cordata, I don’t see any other way around it, there is too much at stake here to stay. We’ve got evac. The longer we delay getting our equipment out of here the worse it might be. We can spare a few squads to try and slow them down, but ultimately we’re not going to be able to hold them back.”

Alan too was worried, he had some very specialized equipment in The Brick, the VE Generator, that if damaged was irreplaceable. He was just as anxious as Jakes and the chief of security to get back to the ship for the generator and securing it.

Shelley nodded reluctantly. “All right, let’s give the order. I don’t see any other way around it.” As if half remembering something she turned to Alan.” Was there something you wanted to give me?”

He handed her the vile half heartedly. “I just got this from a hunt, Blattas said it should increase your strength +1 permanently.” He tried to sound positive, despite the circumstances.

Taking the vile with a slight nod, she handed the dose to Jakes. “Thanks Alan.” She said dismissively, her mind clearly focused on the impending danger. “We have a lot of equipment to move, it took us over a week to get it here, and we’ve got a lot to do to get it back.”

Alan tried to hide his disappointment, as he stepped away from the now overly stressed trio. It can’t be helped, I wish there was something I could do, but their plan makes sense. Had it been a few more weeks…

His thoughts were interrupted by system notification.

System Warning: Your territory now borders the territory of Queen Komaxa of the Hive.

System Warning to all inhabitants of Alan’s territory: Queen Komaxa of the Hive has declared war on your territory

System Warning all inhabitants of Alan’s territory: ‘War Rules’ have now been enacted by Queen Komaxa of the Hive. All Inhabitants have 3 minutes before ‘War Rules’ are fully enabled in the territory.

A sinking feeling clutched at Alan’s stomach. Territory Boundary, War Rules, Alan knew exactly what this meant.

He turned to see a very confused Shelley, “What’s going on Alan?”

Alan didn’t even explain, instead he bolted from the room, and pulled out his phone.

Sprinting, he spent a few precious minutes looking frantically for his friends, only to find Nick wolfing down his third ice cream sundae in the canteen.

“Hey Alan,” He said nonchalantly, “What's this about a war?”

Alan hurridley handed Nick his phone, “No time buddy.” Alan looked at the clock and it had already reached less than 30 seconds. “Just give this to my sister or mom, it will explain everything. Log out Now!”

Nick looked like he wanted to protest.

“GO!”

Startled. Nick nodded, having never really seen his friend like this, and logged out, phone in hand.

Right behind him, came Shelley, Jakes and her chief of security looking rather upset.

“What is going on Alan!” She asked furiously.

“Change of plans.” He said as the countdown timer hit zero.

System Warning: War Rules have been implemented for the territories involved.

“We’re not going anywhere now.”

****

“What do you mean we can’t go anywhere! I have millions of dollars of equipment lying here.” Shelley yelled furiously.

Alan tried explaining it to her again.

“Look, when one territory attacks another they can implement war rules.”

“I know that already, why can’t I leave?!”

Though she was really angry, Alan couldn’t help but think she was rather cute at the same time.

No, this wasn’t the time to get distracted.

“The war rules restrict players from logging into and out of a territory.”

Shelley swallowed hard.

Alan continued reluctantly, “It gets worse. It also limits what we can store in our rings. Basically, we can’t put anything inside until the conflict is resolved or we leave the disputed territory.”

Shelley sat down hard. The manager and chief of security stood there silently taking in the new information.

“Basically, if we don't want to lose everything we’ve just built in the last week, we’re going to have to fight.”

The group sat there silently for a few moments before a shrill hiss came loudly from outside.

“Alan! This is not what you promisssed me!”

Blatta, burst through the canteen door, “Don’t think you can hide from me you ssswindler, I could smell your treacherouss sscent from anywhere in this prison!” She walked ominously toward him, blades at the ready.

The chief of security pulled out his side arm, while another security officer pulled out his.

Alan had to act quickly, “Blatta, just the person I was looking for.” He stood in between her and Shelley.

She seemed to pause slightly at his reaction, “Speak, quickly or die.”

“I have a plan, but I’ll need to make some purchases from you. I have a way out of this.” He quickly pulled out the Toad Monster Core that he’d just earned and handed it to her. “Give me an hour, and I’ll come find you to explain your part. This is just a small upfront payment.”

She took it quickly, letting the blades flutter back onto her forearms. “I better like it, what use are a few credits if I lose my whole stock.” With that she stalked out silently.

The security officers both relaxed significantly at her departure. Alan too felt his shoulders relax.

“What plan?” The skeptical voice of Shelley came from behind him. She’d been smart enough not to question the outrageous statement by Alan when the threatening alien had been present. But now she wanted answers.