Shocklanders

Liwolf1


 * Based on the MMORPG Shocklander

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In the near future, Virtual Reality becomes a popular commodity. People from around the world play exciting games, and see and feel everything around them. But, when one virtual War Game, Shocklander, is hacked into, and the bullets become real and dangerous, a group of strangers inside the game must not only discover the truth behind this murderous scheme, but they must first survive.

ONE
The bomber plane was flying low, heading towards the bridge. The bombs it had dropped made the few boats in the strait below either sink or flee. The pilot wasn't too good with planes, and he would have landed sooner, but all these kills had been getting him quite a few points for the ScoreBoard. Unfortunately, it had taken a few rounds of its own. I knew I had to land it soon.

A couple cannon rounds finished the job for me. Two engines broke right off, and the others were almost in the same condition. I couldn't land in the water if I wanted to survive and stay in the game, so I pulled up as best as I could, and turned towards the half-circle tower on my left, one of the only four buildings on the Bridge Map. Of course, my angle of approach was all wrong, but hey, that's life for you. Or, in this case, Virtual life.

Somehow, thanks to my amazing virtual skills, I landed safely on the roof. Sort of. My plane didn't make it: it screeched its way off the building after I jumped out, and fell into the sea. And crashed into a boat. Great, more points. And, anyhow, this roof was a perfect sniping spot. Most people probably thought I was dead (it was common knowledge that I couldn't pilot a plane). With the luck I'd been having for the past two hours, I might have made it to TopScore in all of Manhattan, but I doubted it (a lot. I was good, but many people were better. Very many). I looked up and around, making sure there were no planes or heli's, and crawled to the edge of the roof.

Below me was a great sight. I could see the whole bridge and strait, with clear views of the other three buildings. Nothing looked Virtual at all. I remember when VR first came out. Everything still looked digital. But now, the mental graphics were so amazing. The game I was playing, Shocklanders, had been around from even before VR, near the turn of the century on the computers. It only became popular recently, but it was always a great game. The goal was basically to kill your opponents, at the time, the bullets only being mimicked, harmless (although they could be made dangerous, convincing your mind that you're dead). The times you killed people and the times you were killed were subtracted and gave you a score, which could be compared at Burough, City, County, Region, Country, Continent, and World levels (seven in all).

I used a couple missiles, shooting at an APC (missing both), and realized my launcher was empty, and I had used all of my shocketts while replenishing my health. I sighed, knowing that bullets would miss at such a high altitude. I tried to think of a way off the roof, knowing that jumping would make me lose a point, and restart at the lobby. Then came my salvation. All of a sudden, a round of bullets dented the cement floor beside me, missing me by a foot. I turned to see a mini-jet flying straight for me. I looked at my enpty missile launcher.

"Damn it."

My machine gun did no good, at all. Thank god this game's painless, I thought, for the millionth time. Even from a distance, I could see the jet changing its weapon from bullets to missiles. So much for being lucky. Or so I thought. A familiar, deafening sound came up from behind me. A bladeless, jet-propulsed helicopter. I assumed it was just another guy wanting to steal a kill. I was wrong about that.

First of all, the moment the heli' rose to an altitude level with me, it fired two rockets, which went past me, and hit the jet, obliterating it into smoke. Second of all, it didn't kill me after, but turned, making the open side face me. A black-haired girl was piloting the helicopter, and waved for me to come.

"Teams?" she said. Teaming's a major part of the game, where two players (obviously) help eachother kill more, and get killed less. Of course, people didn't usually save someone else, but hey, everyone's different.

"Of course!" I replied. I couldn't really refuse without getting killed. I hopped in, and strapped myself in the shotgun seat. Then, with a second thought, unstrapped myself. You never know when you have to jump out of a vehicule. Meanwhile, the girld piloting made a sharp right turn, and went back towards the bridge.

"Name's Jade." she said, without looking away from the windshield, with a sort of smile on her face.

"Joey. Heh, that's funny, we're both J's." she didn't seem to appreciate my annoying sense of humour, but she nodded her head, confirming my name, I guess. And, then, all of a sudden, she looked at me seriously and asked "What do you think about the violence of this game?"

Now, that completely took me by surprise. I hadn't had guessed that she would ask that (I don't think most people would), and it kind of baffled me. She seemed to see my bewilderment.

"Sorry. Journalist. Writing an article on in-game violence." She said. She apparently had no love of pronouns.

"Oh, well, in that case, I think this is an awful game. No one should play it. Killing and bombing and all that. No fun at all." I proclaimed, sticking my nose up arrogantly. I continued seriously. "You don't have to play a game to talk about its violence, you know." But I was still interested. Who knows, maybe I could have gotten my name in a NewsWeb. "What Site do you work for?"

She made a small, almost unnoticable laugh. "None, I'm with the New York times. Jade Joneston? Never heard of me?."

"I'm sorry, I don't read the works of tree killers. Paper-waster. I'm going to jump out of this vehicule right now..." I looked out the side and noticed the drop. "Nevermind." I looked out again, and shot a few rounds at a jeep. "Are you gonna play, or not?" She looked as if she was going to say something, when everything went black. I couldn't see or hear anything. I didn't feel like I was sitting on a hard helicopter seat. Actually, I didn't feel anything at all.