Despite it being night for everyone else, it was daytime at the station. The lights were at its full intensity and the goblins were out browsing and engaging at the bustling marketplace. Walking among them, Marcus noticed that his presence around the goblins was getting to be a more common occurrence and so they were getting more comfortable with him around. Sure, there was still the buffer zone forced into him where the smaller creatures would go around or slow down. All the while, they would look up at him with wide eyes as he passed.

Passing through a pair of kids doing just that, Marcus chuckled. It was like when he took a vacation for an entire summer in South East Asia; it was the same look they were giving him back then. For the kids, it was easy to explain, as it was the first time they’ve seen a white man in their life.

The crowd in the open market considerably thinned out as Marcus neared the gunsmith’s area. Marcus cared a peek into their stores to find them busy. They sat hunched over their workbenches, one was measuring grains of what looked to be gunpowder in fine scales and carefully depositing them into spent shotgun shells, passing them over to the next in line where he insert a wad then a measure of shot then handing it over to the last in line who would crimp it, inspect it and pass it over to the last inspection before being tossed into a pile of reloaded shotguns shells.

Marcus spent a few more minutes watching the process. Despite their set up being crude, they made it up by being meticulous. Each hand the shell passed, it was inspected. If any defect was found, it was tossed into the rejects bin.

Marcus sighed. Watching the goblins reload ammunition made him remember the times when he was a kid. Back then, he would sit on his father’s lap, his brother standing on the side, and the three of them went on to the tedious process of reloading rifle rounds by hand. Every step in the process had to be done right, if not perfectly. First was cleaning the brass, then lubing, sizing, cleaning it again, measuring, priming, setting the powder and seating the bullet. It would have been boring for his young mind if not for his father. He had a way of making it interesting, giving the reason of why you do it, what it means and passing along lessons which sunk deep in his developing mind.

The next day, or in the same afternoon, if they finish early, they would go to the range and shoot rounds into paper using his old Springfield. It was an heirloom that survived the First World War and was passed down the line and into his father. It was never told how his great grandfather got it. For all everyone knew, they just got it at one point and no one asked, or no one even bothered to ask where he got it.

All the hours of work put to make the bullets only for them to be shot in just mere moments. First, they would shoot factory ammo, then check the groups. The best they could get from the old rifle was 2 MOA. It was piss poor compared to its modern counterparts, but that was not the point. After walking back, they would then switch their ammo to their hand loads and find their rounds land almost on top of each other at a hundred yards.

“Listen, almost every outcome in life is not decided in the moment of truth, but in the measure of preparation applied long before. If we hadn’t done everything right as we loaded these rounds, we wouldn’t have had this result.” His father said.

Movement in the corner of his eye took Marcus out of his musing. He closed his eyes and shook his head slightly as he wondered why the memory came back to the surface. He opened his eyes to see the chief walking towards him.

The old goblin bore a grin on his face as he looked over at the bag slung over Marcus’ shoulder. He handed it to his entourage, who checked it and nodded.

Marcus nodded back. Delivery complete. Attention: Purchase contract: Deliver 8 pump action shotguns and 200 shotgun shells complete! Increased relations towards Goblin Chief Tiul. 10,000 Exp +2 Fame +3 contribution to Songbird Station

With his contract complete, Marcus looked for Bo, who was online and entered the central HVAC room where he usually hang around. Inside, he found goblins working the machines. They did simple stuff, running around and monitoring the feeds, then manually logging them at intervals.

They all looked up at him as he entered, and Marcus gave them a quick nod back. Recognizing him, everyone ignored him and went back into their jobs. Marcus found Bo in the connected machine shop, currently working on installing a new metal lathe while the motor he was previously working on was running in the corner without load.

“Hey,” Bo greeted as he looked up. “Nice drone you got there.”

“I got it after doing some shit. Now it’s stuck with me.” Marcus replied, stepping further inside to see more steel stock stacked up on shelves. If he wanted, Bo could make another lathe for the shop as it was one of the few machines that could make itself. “Finally got some new equipment?”

“Oh yeah. Transporting it here took longer than I would have liked, but we got it here. We found it in one of the buildings up north. With the help of the new guns you gifted the chief, we got enough of a breathing room clearing out the monsters on the way long enough to move it down the northern tunnel.”

“And the new little green men?”

“I always thought you had to hire them directly from the system with their presets, but I took your advice and taught them myself. It was hard starting them out, but that’s until I got the Instruction skill. Now I had them taught and got them working on all the menial tasks which free me up to do something else. They can’t do anything else, but that’s fine. All that matters right now is that we just proved that you can teach the NPCs skills that could be useful and tailored to you at a much cheaper price. If it weren’t for your advice, I never would have thought of anything else. Thanks.”

“Not a problem. You did all the legwork, so most of the credit goes to you.” Marcus replied. “Say, how did you get them to work under you and how much are you paying them?”

“It’s not much. I pay them twenty rounds every day. A lot cheaper than 1000c per day if I hire them from the system.” Bo shrugged. “The hard part would be convincing the chief. For me, it was simple as just asking, but that could be different with you.”

Marcus nodded. That could prove difficult. The chief’s hold in his power would likely be his monopoly of violence and would not be keen on letting go of his grip, even for a bit. It would have to be within extreme conditions for him to loosen his hold and let him command his troops of little green men.

“Thanks.” Marcus replied, handing Bo his own order of small parts and went to leave the room when he felt the ground shook. The lights flickered and dust and debris fell from the ceiling.

“That doesn’t feel like an earthquake.” Marcus said, looking back over at Bo. “That felt more like an explosion.”

“It’s coming from the main entrance. I think its under attack.” Bo said, walking over to a locker by the door and pulled out an HK-33, the little brother of the HK-G3, chambered in 5.56 with the collapsible stock. Racking the charging handle, he then took out a bandolier of STANAG magazines and slung it on his shoulder. Bo then pointed at the goblins. “All of you. Stay here.”

Seeing this, Marcus readied his weapon, and checked chamber. Brass gleamed under the flickering light with more hollow point rounds packed in the magazine. Patting his magazines, Marcus nodded and the two ran out of the utility room.

Marcus followed Bo, as he knew the station well. They ran through maintenance halls and came out of the northern side of the station. There, they found goblins scampering to get to the commotion.

Guns were held all around, but the number of makeshift weapons did nothing to bolster Marcus’ confidence in the defending force. As a force of habit, he checked of his equipment once more then fast walked towards the erupting gunfire ahead.

Marcus and Bo arrived at the other end of the station. There, the large bulkhead was open, fortified with bunkers and sandbags set in the middle of the rails. Dim firelight lit the space as the overhead fluorescent lights have been shot out. Spikes were set into the ground, pointed outwards to defend against charging beasts, but were barely effective at defending from the attacking force.

“They took out the sentry.” Bo said, pointing at the smoking hulk hanging from the ceiling. Seeing the sentry the first time, Marcus knew they would need an anti-tank weapon to take it out, which the attackers did. He only hoped that they didn’t bring more, as the tight quarters in the tunnels would make quick work of them if they had more explosives.

From the top of the platform, Marcus took a second to make out the situation. Goblins ducked behind the sandbags and bunkers, only popping their heads at intervals to fire at the darkness in front of them. It was not effective, seeing as a Goblin peeking over his sandbag line jerked its head back. It slumped forward and let go of its makeshift shotgun to clatter over the rails, only for another to pick it up and take its old position

The bunker with the PKM was silent. Goblins were running to it and were being suppressed by silent shots. There was no sonic crack as the bullets passed by, which meant that the bullets were subsonic.

Energy beams also lanced from the darkness of the tunnels. Goblins hit had holes burned into their skin as the lights cauterized everything they touched. Thankfully, it was no Imperial lasgun. Marcus read enough about the description of its effect and was not keen on seeing it for himself.

“Tell them to keep in cover. They ain’t doing shit!” Marcus ordered Bo.

“I can’t! They won’t listen to me!” He said.

“Then point me to who does!”

“That one!” He said, pointing to a goblin with the only functional gun in the stack. It was an old AK with a broken wooden stock held together by a length of baling wire. Its fore grip was wrapped in what was once a white piece of cloth now colored into a dirty, greasy brown.

“Then go tell him!” Marcus said, running forward towards their furthest line. Jumping into cover, he pulled out a flare and struck the end, throwing it as far as he could go, only to find a team of five figures illuminated and backing away from its light. From a second’s glimpse, Marcus recognized mounts set into their helmeted heads, holding binocular devices lowered towards their eyes.

Marcus ducked his head down to cover as rounds shot where it had been a second ago. Rounds zipped overhead and a stray round hit his shield, lowering it. He looked to the side of him to see the terrified face of a goblin looking at him with wide eyes.

Then Marcus noticed. His heart was pounding, fingers tingling from the dump of adrenaline coursing through his system. ‘I always wanted to know what being shot at was like’ He remembered telling the scion. Now he was here, in the same position he described, and smiled.

Slumping, he kept his head as low as he could and laid prone behind the sandbag position. Looking up, he saw the drone housing the scion looking down at him instead of the enemies. ‘Fucking useless’ Marcus snarled and nudged it higher using the barrel of his weapon. The drone flew higher and out of cover to stay away from the barrel, then shattered as a round found its mark and hit it. Marcus couldn’t help but chuckle at the sight.

He felt alive. Winking at the terrified goblin, he pulled the pin off a smoke grenade and chucked it to fall in front of their line and cutting line of sight. With the ranges of the goblin’s guns, putting their positions in the middle of the track was stupid. It allowed players with longer ranged weapons to effectively suppress them without the defenders having enough capability to fight back. The developing smoke screen should mitigate their range disadvantage and turn it to their side. If the men on the other side would dive through the smoke for a frontal charge, then they’re welcome to do so.

But for now, it was enough to buy the defenders time.

There is also the fact that smokes have a minimal effect on thermal devices, unlike night vision goggles.

Marcus grinned as he flicked down the mount holding his thermal scope and turned it on. With both eyes open, the black and white feed from the scope superimposed onto what he could see with his naked eye. In one, Marcus could only see the billowing white smoke while from the other, he could see the team of five posted on the other side, aiming at the smoke and not firing.

He had time. A few seconds was enough for Marcus to switch his magazines containing hollow points to armor piercing. Charging his rifle once more to eject the hollow point round in the chamber and feed the armor piercing round, Marcus raised his rifle to the figure laying prone in the middle of the tracks. For a second, he wondered what they were trying to do, then quickly caught himself.

He flicked the rifle into Semi, then squeezed the trigger.

The hot gas coming out of the barrel blinded his thermals for a second. Marcus didn’t wait for it to reset, as he dumped more rounds at the last position of his target. He then lowered his rifle a fraction and confirmed his kill through the unmoving thermal signature on the ground. His target had its head slumped to the ground and its rifle held loosely in his hand.

“Sorry buddy.” Marcus muttered as he raised his rifle again and shifted his aim towards the other figures.

He fired just as the men realized what happened and started backing up. They shot towards the smoke to cover their escape, but hit nothing. Now, tunnel fights had shown its first rule. There are only two ways to go.

Marcus stood and kept firing. Emboldened by his actions, the rest of the defending force followed his action and started sending rounds through the smoke. Marcus could see the effect as the white hot rounds seared through the cold tunnel air, mostly missing their targets but still enough to make their overwhelming presence known.

Marcus broke through the second man’s shields and took him down with a shot in his throat. Marcus could see the warm spray of blood through his thermals. The body fell, which caused the other three to lose their composure and break into a straight run.

“Charge!” Marcus yelled, pointing his rifle towards the men and running through the smoke. The goblins followed, yelling at the top of their lungs. Their shouts echoed through the tunnels along with the report of their guns.

The three paused and turned around to fire back, but it only slowed them down. Marcus already had his rifle lined to his third target. With a flurry of rounds, he took out the third man in the group just as the goblins broke through the cloud of smoke.

The last survivors tried their best to fight back, but could not resist the green tide that approached them. Marcus held his fire, letting the goblins take care of the rest. They melted under the volume of fire sent their way as soon as the goblins came within range of their weapons. Contrary to what media had led most to believe, shotguns are still lethal at ranges within fifty yards and even more using slugs. Still, buckshot was enough with their pellets and their tendency to ricochet off concrete. They are the perfect tunnel weapons.

The two survivors tried to fight for their lives, but were powerless as the pellets chipped at their shields. Their protection lasted only a few seconds under fire until it broke, leaving the flesh underneath.

“Hey! Don’t touch my fucking loot!” Marcus yelled, which pierced through the din of celebrating goblins. It’s time to find out who these people were.