Play 2 Wage: Linked

The firing range was hidden behind a signless door, nestled into a little alcove between two shop fronts near the center of the neighborhood. When I stepped into the alcove and attempted to pull the door open, it flashed a holographic green “guest permit registered” across the metal door and the lock thunked open for my second pull.

The door led to a staircase going down, and I caught the acrid smell of gunpowder mixed with the heady scent of oil as I followed the well lit and grip-taped stairs down to a second door that slid open on its own on my approach.

Inside was a small and sort of sterile feeling room. Like a shop that had only been open for a week and had not had a chance to damage or decorate the place. There were waist-high display cases around three sides of the rectangular space, and a door in each corner of the far wall. About half of the wall space was a blank off white that matched the ceiling, while the rest was filled with locked racks of various weapons.

Someone was sitting behind the cases, kicked back in their seat with their well-worn and slightly pointy boots up on the counter, their legs crossed at the ankle and face hidden behind a tablet. Without looking at me or revealing himself, the figure hooked a thumb over at one of the doors against the back wall. “Welcome. Tev’s in there, been waitin’ on ya.”

I thanked the man and went through the door he had indicated. Through the door was a small air-lock room. The smell of gunpowder grew stronger in here, and I could hear the sharp smacking whumps of rifle fire now. Impressed that I only now was hearing the gunfire, I pushed through the last door and stepped into the back line of a fairly small firing range.

There were only 3 lanes, each with a big semi-translucent divider between them. I glanced down range and saw a number of holographic humanoid targets all maneuvering around.

Instead of stationary targets, these crouched behind corners and low walls as they advanced upon the firing position, and each had little number counters hovering over them as they raised rifles to mock-fire back. I saw one duck behind a barrier, before popping up in a firing position with a 2 second timer over its head. A few glowing red dots punched into it where Tevins fire passed through, turning the timer into a green X and causing the target to dissolve away.

I stood in one of the empty lanes and watched, waiting for his run to finish. The holo-mooks kept coming, dashing into existence from the back of the range and pushing through cover towards us, while Tev expertly rattled off controlled bursts of fire and caused them to dissipate.

During a big rush at the very end of the exercise, a couple of them managed to get off shots before being destroyed, causing the whole room to flash red for an instant. Tev yelled something unintelligible when the room flashed, and drowned it out with automatic fire.

When he finished and laid his rifle down on the counter, I stepped around the divider and announced myself.

“Hey! Looks like a few got through. Need to step up your game!” I teased.

He simply grinned at me over the shoulder as he dumped a box of fresh ammo onto the counter. “That’s what I’m doing! I won’t get any better if I don’t keep upping the difficulty. How’d your first day with the dwarves go?”

I stepped up beside him and started to help by attempting to reload one of the emptied magazines. “Makes sense. The dwarves are… smelly, and strange, but not too bad. They grouped me up with a bunch of teen dwarves to pass some kind of big coming-of-age trial that’ll make me a full Clan member.”

Tevin laughed, “Teen dwarves? What does that even mean?”

I thought about that for a moment. The group had definitely given me the impression of youthful awkwardness and confidence, but they were aliens afterall. I had no real idea of the age of any of the dwarves, only a loose idea based on beard length or the amount of gray or white in their hair.

“I have no f’n clue, to be honest. They just felt like teens? One of ‘em called me out for staring at another one’s chest. Gave me that ‘you better not be moving in on my crush’ kind of vibe, even if I was just trying to read her shirt. Looked like some human metal band T-shirt, with the crazy lettering that's near impossible to decipher”

Tev only laughed harder and slapped my shoulder. “There ya go! Were they worth staring at?”

I shot him a glare, realizing I probably should have left that part out with Tev. “It wasn't like that. They’re giant bugs who can spit up caustic chemicals under those masks, that's just… no thanks.”

Tevin kept his grin and shook his head, laying down the refilled mag he was working on before he grabbed a small case that was leaning against the divider wall on the floor. He dropped the case onto the counter, scattering the loose shells.

“Hey, don’t knock it till you try it. I had a few squaddies who dabbled in alien poon. I don’t remember if any of ‘em were dwarves, but they seemed pretty into it. Check this thing out though, Katie agreed to cover some of the cost even.”

I shook my head, dismissing his comment and not wanting to argue with him about my romantic life again.

Tevin slid the case to me from amongst the pile of ammo boxes. “I looked into it, and getting to carry one of these around is one of the perks of your new status.”

This case was flat and wide. I popped the latches and opened it to reveal a chromed long barreled pistol with two extra magazines. I noticed they both were loaded with surprisingly skinny yet lengthy bullets that had pointy little green tips, each shell only slightly wider than a pencil.

I picked up the gun and looked it over, earning a squawk of annoyance from Tevin. “Hey! Watch where you point that thing, even if it's not loaded.” He reached over and pushed my hand to face a different direction.

“I’ve never even touched one of these things, you sure it's legal for me to have one?”

“Yup, I had Rin search through the council bylaws and everything.” Tevin answered, while fiddling with a screen set into the divider wall.

I felt a little guilty, I had been given so much so quickly that it was starting to weigh on me. It seemed like everyone around me was pouring their limited resources into a hope that hung like a lead vice strapped around my neck.

“How much did you spend on this, Tevin?” I asked, as I continued turning the gleaming pistol over in my hands, watching the bright overhead lamps scattering bars and dots of reflected light around the range.

He shrugged, still facing the screen set into the wall as he answered. “Less than the combat bonuses I’ve gotten for saving your ass. Don’t worry about it.”

He prodded the screen one last time, which caused the lighting to shift and brightened the downrange area, and turned to face me. He pointed at the lone stationary target that had appeared.

“It’s my job, both professionally and as a friend, to keep you alive and prepare you to keep defending yourself. So if you’re going to be wandering around without me, you’re damn well going to learn to defend yourself. Alright? So, keep that thing pointed down range and ram one of those mags home.”

Over the next few hours, Tevin did his best to show me the basics of firearm use and etiquette. The biggest lessons being keeping the thing pointed at the ground, and to only ever point it at something you wanted dead in a hurry. I did my best to listen and absorb the information, but after the long day of training, the interrupted night of sleep, the change of scenery and everything else that was piling on to me, I was too burnt out to really pay much attention to the finer details he elaborated on.

By the end of our impromptu extra credit training session, I was able to load and draw the handgun. Most of my shots hit the man-shaped target as well, but my spread was messy. My form was bad, and I could sense Tevin holding himself back from giving me all sorts of crap for it. It was weird getting to see more and more of his soldier side, something he’d always been pretty good about not bringing home with him.

While we had been roommates for the past few years, Tevin had been the goofy caretaker around the house, doing most of the cooking and smoothing over conflicts between Rin and myself. He was the one who forced Rin to eat when he got too caught up in his data, or reminded me to wash my bedding or to take a moment to relax from my own grind and play some silly game on the couch with him for an evening.

Seeing this side of Tevin was different. He was serious and focused, and while he was not the best teacher who ever tried to show me something, he cut the jokes and the bro-talk and kept things professional in a way that just felt weird coming from him.

I was grateful when we finally called it a night and left the range to go to the nearest Link. After asking Tevin to come by my new place with Rin in the morning so we could talk about my first day with Clan Theedrite, we parted ways and went into our own booths.

After I paid the import fee for my new True equipment, including a whole 100 Credits for the Megaphone engram, I Linked-out and woke up in my fancy holodeck-esque private room. The screens around me still showed the view of a rainy forest, and the movement of the locking bars retracting from the doorway drew my attention as I stood from the mechanical arm of the Link device.

I crossed the room and pushed at the place I had seen Ali open for the impex, but it refused to budge at first. In my drained and sleep deprived state, I just stared at the wall while wondering if it was worth calling Rin or bothering Ali for help with, when the door in the wall opened all on its own.

Inside lay my new pistol in its holster, and the steel badge of my Engram, which now had a little protrusion coming from the top, as well as a number of boxes of ammo, a small cleaning kit, and the case the weapon had originally been packaged within. I picked up the Engram first, and realized the new little loop at the top was probably to be able to clip it onto something, or you could loop some cord or fine chain through it to wear it as a necklace.

I actually tried to stick the Engram onto my neck like I had worn it in-game, a couple of times. When that did not work, I just stuffed it into my pocket and gathered the other items from the impex tray into my arms.

Thinking I’d look over this stuff more seriously in the morning when I could think straight, I made for the short step up to the door, looking forward to my huge and amazingly comfortable bed that I had only barely gotten acquainted with the night before.