Warning!

Critical damage received!

Pain effect

Bleeding effect

Incapacitated!

“This is not fun.” Rex muttered, but only came out as a cough as he choked on his blood. He had been the first to fall, taken down by a Groll that attacked him from his blind spot, something that should have been prevented by of the other guys in the group. Now, he lay on the cold concrete looking up at the brightening dawn as Anna, the team’s medic, hovered over him and tended to his wounds.

Warning! -5 health

Rex was bleeding out. His health bar ticked ever closer to zero. He looked to the side to his his broken rifle laying next to him. The over levelled Groll had gotten a good swipe at him before he could dodge. The strike had cut through his shields. A second swipe cut a rent across the rifle’s receiver he used to defend himself. The blow slapped the rifle away from his grasp for a final overhand swipe to take him down, almost disemboweling him as its claws cut his chest and down to his stomach. It was about to finish him off, only for it to be driven away by his friend, Anna, with a flurry of energy fire.

“Don’t worry, you’ll be fine.” Anna said as she finished packing his wounds with a compression bandage and wrapped his torso.

Attention! Heavy bleeding abated

Fresh wound status

It was going too slow. Rex should have bought one of the stims sold in the stores, if only for himself. Unfortunately, their earnings from hunting and questing weren’t able to afford him the extremely useful medical consumable and help him get back on the fight. Instead, he could only think about what happened for them to be in the situation in the first place.

“Hey Anna, remember what I said about just doing what were here to do?” he said, remembering his protests a few hours ago for not risking their run by taking on more than they could handle. He, of course, was overruled by Rider, their party leader, along with the support of his two other friends.

“I think its too late to talk about it now.” Anna replied, “Let’s just focus on now, okay?”

Attention! You are no longer incapacitated

Rex sighed. She’s right. “Give me your rifle. And prop me up so I could shoot.” He said, gesturing to the energy rifle slung on her shoulder.

Anna handed him the rifle, and he shouldered it, aiming at one of the many Grolls scaling the side of the buildings.

Due to your injuries, your abilities are reduced

Attention! Due to your injuries, your abilities are reduced

Aim time 2.5x

Accuracy .5x

Rex ignored the message and held his aim as he tracked the monster’s movements with his sights. ‘The cone of probability’, a term which he dubbed by himself slowly shrunk for every second. It was the game’s way of assisting the player’s aim. He was starting to hate the thing, as it seems to hinder him more than help.

The cone shrunk enough for him to have a decent chance of hitting and fired. The laser lanced through the air and impacted the Groll. It flinched, missing a purchase as it reached for a handhold and fell to the ground, hitting the concrete with a satisfying crunch.

Motivated, he aimed at another, but before he could fire; he watched as his target flinch, a puff of blood sprayed on the concrete face it was climbing, and too fell to the ground. There was no laser fire, and he looked at the others in his group to find them already busy fending off the encirclement.

Another fell from the buildings, followed quickly by a muffled shot in the distance. Rex finally realized what was going on. He tried to yell for the others but only came out as another bloody cough..

“Player!” Rider, their party leader, yelled out in panic. Frantically looking around, he shifted his fire away from the mobs surrounding them and fired towards the general direction of the player instead.

“Player!” Rider yelled again, scanning north as another a burst muffled shots echoed from that direction, dropping a charging Groll on the ground and caused it to tumble end over end, skidding to a stop feet in front of them and bleeding from multiple wounds where the bullets peppered it.

Looking at the buildings, Rex could not pinpoint the exact location of the shooter and hoped that the next shot he takes towards them would be a miss.

“Get out of the street!” Rex yelled, finally getting clearing his throat and pushed Anna away. The monsters were scrambling to get away too after seeing three of them fall in short of a minute. Rider, Raze and Cotton ran past him, picking up his bag as they went past to getting to the nearby cover.

“If we move you too far, Rex, we risk opening your wounds.” Anna replied, still tending to his wounds. She finished clipping a bandage and slapped him on the shoulder.

“If I’m slowing you down, just leave me.” Rex said, getting to his feet and groaned in an effort to stave past the simulated pain.

“Popping smoke.” Cotton said, throwing the canister out where it landed ahead of the two. The grenade blew out a plume of smoke, quickly concealing them as they followed along with the others.

Rex, aided by Anna, shambled past the door and into cover. It was an abandoned restaurant with the chairs and tables still left behind. Anna helped Rex get into an empty chair and continued treating him. He looked for the other three in his group and found them gathered amongst themselves as they discussed in hushed tones, instead of watching out for the other player.

Noticing Rex’s gaze on them, the three broke off. Cotton and Raze went towards the windows to look out for danger while Rider approached them.

“I don’t have any other way to say this Rex, but we have to keep moving.” Rider said in a regretful tone.

‘Bullshit.’ Rex wanted to reply, but kept his mouth shut. They were outnumbered and they could easily turn on one another. It was their quest with Rex and Anna joining in after, and they could easily be kicked out of the group if they even give them the slightest reason. They hold all the power and Rex could do nothing but watch the man in front of him take advantage of it. “Okay.” He replied.

“Sorry. We can’t have you slowing us down, Rex.” Cotton added from the other side of the room.

“We’ll still share the rewards, don’t worry.” Raze added his bit.

“I’m not leaving him.” Anna replied, not bothering to look up as she finished bandaging Rex.

Attention! All bleeding abated

Fresh wound status

Warning, low health

“No, I agree. You should go with them.” Rex said, turning to Anna and hoping for her to look up and get the hint, but she didn’t. She continued looking down at his wounds and applied antibiotics to aid in his regeneration.

“I said, I’m not leaving him.”

“We don’t have much time. We have to go now.” Rider replied, giving only the token resistance.

“I’m not changing my mind.”

“I understand. Then, we will go ahead. Try to get away and we’ll meet up on that diner we rested on the way out here.”

“Yeah, okay.” Anna replied.

Rider nodded and signalled for the other two. They nodded back and peeled back from their position to meet up in the center of the room and went for the backdoor towards the kitchen. They gave Rex a nod as they passed by and disappeared out of sight.

“You know there’s nothing stopping them from betraying us, right?” Rex said as Anna finished up and sat on one of the nearby seats.

Attention! +1 health

“I know.” Anna replied. Sinking to her seat “If they’re going to betray us, then its better for them to do it now than later right?”

“I guess that makes sense. If that player comes and PK us, then it won’t be a skin off their back since they already had the quest items with them. All they need is to turn it in.”

“He won’t PK us.” Anna replied, turning a pair of scissors on his finger and playing with it. “I had a good look at the guy when you were getting up and the rest were running to cover. He was looking at us out one of the windows and had a clear shot on all of us, but didn’t take the shot. Instead, he was flicking his light on and off to show us his position.”

“Instead, he just shot at the Grolls attacking us.” Rex replied. “I’m sorry. I should have been more assertive for us to not be in this situation.”

“Why are you sorry?” Anna asked. “It would have been boring if we just keep farming mobs and turning them in for bounties. I think we’ve done enough of that.”

“So now what? We’ve only got one energy rifle between us and a whole two miles from the nearest safe zone.”

“We wait you dummy.”

Attention! You are no longer suffering from low health

“Maybe he’s not coming.” Rex said as he looked at his health. They have been waiting for about an hour where the only notable event to happen was for a low levelled critter to run into the wrong restaurant. By that time, the sun had risen and everything brighter. Soon, more players and scavengers would start flooding in to the location, making it much more difficult to move through the city safely.

“Lets wait for a bit.” Anna replied, tossing a spent fusion cell up and catching it. “You could get incapacitated again just by a mob looking at you the wrong way.”

“Don’t worry. I’m here.” A voice came from the kitchen, startling both of them. “No sudden movements, please. And I’d appreciate if you lower that gun.” Rex followed the commands and laid the rifle on the table in front of him. He looked to the side for Anna, already looking at the source of the voice and he turned behind him to see another man pointing a rifle at him.

“See, I told you.” Anna said in a smug voice. “What took you so long?”

The man ignored the question and peeked out of the restaurant’s kitchen and scanned the area and clear the corners. Keeping to the dark interior, Rex could only see his silhouette against the darkness behind him and could only watch as he cleared the rest of the room. His demeanor was much more intense than what he had seen in other players and seemed to know what he was doing. Content, the man turned his attention back to them. “Where’s the rest?”

“They left.” Anna answered, “They left because Rex here is going to slow them down and I stayed because I had to keep him from dying.”

“Yeah.” Rex added, “what she said.”

“You guys friendly, then?” He asked, “Because if you don’t want me here, I could just leave.”

Surprised by the question, Rex could only reply, “No, you’re fine. You did help us after all.”

The man grunted, “Alright.” He said and stepped forward into the light. The man wore a simple gray shirt underneath a universal vest, and a pair of khaki pants. He had a backpack strapped tight and in his arms was a rifle Rex was not familiar with. It was fitted with sights, a light and a suppressor.

Despite that, his vest bulged with multiple magazines and grenades which made him look to be preparing for a battle. He sent Rex and Anna one more glance and sighed, taking a seat and dragging to sit against the wall.

“You guys need anything? Maybe some meds?” He asked.

Rex and Anna looked at each other. “I think were good. Were just waiting for me to heal up enough that we could move again.”

“Will this help?” the man said, tossing him a stim.

Item Information:

TGC-1 Regeneration Coctail

Regeneration stimulant utilizing a coctail of advanced nanobots to boost regeneration.

Removes Pain

+3 Health/3 Seconds (300s)

Debuffs:

Tremor (60 minutes)

X.7 Health (180 minutes)

X.7 Endurance

-70 Energy

-70 Hydration

“It will. Thanks.” Rex replied, handing the stim towards Anna. She took the stim and jabbed it at his shoulder, her skills allowing the medicine to have a more potent effect than Rex administering it himself.

“Why are you helping us?” Rex asked. Wondering about the man’s generosity. Something that was treasured and kept between players was just handed off so nonchalantly.

“Yeah,” Anna added, “You could have just left us there since we’d have been overrun without your help.”

The man only shrugged. “You guy are going my way. I thought it’d be better to move through the city in numbers.”

“You didn’t have anyone else with you?”

The man only shrugged, fishing a cigarette and lighting it. “Not really.”

“You want to team up?” Anna offered, “We know the area and could point out where the player hotspots are.”

“That works.” The man replied, “Name’s Hartdegen, yours?”

“Rex. Assaulter.”

“Anna. Medic.”