Chapter 2

Taoreta

What am I doing here? I don't belong out here with all of these professional players, why did I even sign up?

I slumped into a chair by myself placing my head in my hands before coming to my senses. I looked around the room and caught the eye of several players, competitors. I came eye to eye with one man in particular who trapped me in his gaze, there was a certain aura about him, dark, terrifying. I shuddered and broke from his gaze and saw two of the top players of late sitting together, if they teamed up then there'd be an issue. Kiriko and Sinon, the two largest threats on the field, right up there with Yamikaze.

I breathed in and closed my eyes before running over my equipment for the third time. Medical supplies, check. M1 Carbine, check. M1911, check. Ammo, check. All was well in my equipment. I flipped down the blast resistant visor on my helmet and then retracted it again, it was working fine. I shook my head and sighed, at least I had a bit of time to th- "The third BoB begins now!"

Well shit. A blue flash of light and I appeared in the desert. Great, my least favorite weather, heat. I immediately geared myself in the direction of the city. There shouldn't be any players near me just yet. I set a nice pace for myself, gun in hand and meds at the ready, just in case.

-Minutes Later-

I broke the edge of the city limits and took a deep breath, taking to the side of the road. I could hear distant gunshots, barely a crack through the air once they'd reached my ears. I was nearing the center of the city when I heard what was akin more to an explosion than a gunshot. I nearly jumped out of my skin, fumbling my carbine in my hands before listening for the direction in which the crack was resonating. I heard the reverberations from the bullet and nearly decided to not take action, but I couldn't help myself from looking. Whatever had made that humongous pounding must have been an impressive piece.

I decided to head towards the sound, planting foot after foot towards the forested area of the map. Far in the distance was the bridge that connected the two environments. It was at least a good 1000 metres away, no good with my carbine. I blew a strand of hair from my face and kept jogging, after what seemed an eternity I was… 500 metres away. Great.

A red line came across my field of view and I leaned back, the bullet whizzing directly past my nose. I looked to my left and back stepped behind a column, clutching my rifle to my chest as bullets broke pieces of stone off all around me. I sunk down to a near seated position and closed my eyes, waiting for the click of a magazine drop, the bullets just never seemed to end.

There appeared to be a voice in the background, and suddenly the shots stopped coming. I peaked around my little tree and spotted two figures wrestling on the pavement. One dressed in all black, except for a red bandana drawn across his face, and the other in some sort of urban camouflage. The one in black drew a knife and brought it down at the camoed one's neck. The man in camouflage kicked his attacker off him, swiped up his assault rifle and unloaded into the black clad man's direction. The shadow dodged and serpentined through the hail storm but was hit several times, and I could see his health bar dropping lower and lower.

I gritted my teeth and clutched my rifle tighter, spinning around the column and leveling my rifle at the man in camo. I sent several rounds his way, one striking him in the shoulder, then the chest, and finally, right in between his eyes. The man fell and shattered into a clump of red crystals as a sign appeared to confirm my kill. I looked down to the one that was left and stared down the barrel of a long outdated weapon, as old as mine, the Karabiner 98k.

I see his eyes dart to his health bar and then back to me. He was clearly wondering if his Kar98 had enough power to one shot me. I glance to his health bar as well, and notice that he had nearly one percent left. I activated the blast shield of my helmet and raised one hand to him, open palmed and outstretched, aiming my rifle behind me. He looked at me curiously as I kneeled and pulled out a syringe, stabbing it into his leg and pushing the plunger. His health shot upwards, 92 percent. It wasn't full but good enough.

The barrel lowered out of my face and he stood up, towering nearly 8 inches over me. He offered his hand to me and I took it. He'd saved me, I'd saved him, he seemed trustworthy enough. I let him pull me to my feet with the hand that enveloped mine entirely.

"Taoreta." I said, retracting my blast shield and smiling at him.

"Jaegis." He responded, and something told me I should remember his name though nothing came. His eyes seemed oddly… distant. And he didn't remove his bandana.

I continued to smile as I dropped my hand, placing it back on the side of my gun, "So, where we headed?"

"We?"

I felt my mind click the pieces into place and I felt a bit of crippling social anxiety, just a touch, "I-I'm sorry, just uh, assumed you'd wanna stick together." I stuttered out, my now forced smile faltering a bit.

I could see the battle raging behind his eyes. He looked down at me, and then back to the city, and then to the woods, and then back to me. He sighed audibly. "Fine, follow me… And stay close, last thing I need is a noob lagging behind me."

I seethed inside at the insult but he seemed nice...enough...I guess?

"Great! Did you hear that really loud shot earlier? I was coming towards it and then well, you know the rest."

"Yeah, I saw it."

"Really? What was it? Anti material rifle?"

"Yup."

"Wow, someone's really packing."

He scoffed, "Yeah? No kidding."

He began walking in the direction I'd come from, and I followed right behind him. Not too long afterward we were reaching the center of the city, everything was familiar now, so I knew we were a good trek away from the desert.

All of the weight bearing down on my back, especially for a girl my size, was beginning to tire me out.

"Hey, can we uh, take a break right here?"

He sighed, "Didn't I tell you I didn't need a noob dragging me down?"

"No, you technically told me not to lag behind, and I'm not if we both stop, so can we please rest for a minute."

He ran a hand over his face and finally, after another aggravated exhale, nodded. I sat immediately, gracious for the break on my legs. All of my equipment was too heavy for a character of my stats, but I carried it anyway, great decision right?

I saw him wander around the rubble, glancing into every nook and cranny, checking for… something, anything.

"So why an M1 Carbine?" He asked without even looking at me.

"Huh?"

"Your gun, the M1 Carbine, why'd you pick it."

I snapped to my senses, "Oh, ah, it's lightweight, nice fire rate, it's not a bad gun… Is it?"

He shook his head, and dragged a broken piece of table in front of our little alcove. "Not particularly. Just not many people use it. I heard it practically got neutered a few patches ago…"

"It did, but it doesn't look like it mattered much to that guy back in the forest as to how many patches it had now did it?" I said, almost in defense of my gun.

For a second I thought I saw the ghost of a smile dance in his eyes, but whatever it was it didn't last long. "Nope, guess not."

He sat down with his back to a concrete wall, resting as well. He popped his virtual neck and stretched before looking back to me and then beyond the walls of our little hovel. Again, he gained that distant look, as if he wasn't truly there, but had retreated back into the deepest recesses of his mind.

We sat in deafening silence for what seemed like an eternity, I waiting for my legs and lungs alike to quit burning, and Jaegis...well I don't really know what he was doing. He suddenly sighed so loud I nearly jumped out of my skin, again. He looked at me, reached up to his bandana and pulled it down, revealing his angular features. His face was deadpan as he spoke.

"Ok… so here's the plan."

I stared intently at him, listening to whatever I was supposed to be doing in all of this.

"There are four people in the game right now who we really want to avoid. Kiriko, Sinon, Yamikaze, and a cloaked guy with red eyes. They are way too serious for either of us to handle. So what we are going to do is shadow them, as to make sure they don't start shadowing us. You following me?"

"Well I'm going to have to follow you if I'm a part of the plan right?"

He rolled his silver eyes at me before continuing, "Anyways, I don't plan on engaging them until I am absolutely sure that we can take them."

"I definitely like that idea. But what about Sinon and Kiriko? Sinon's a sniper and Kiriko can block our bullets."

Jaegis just smirked and shrugged at me. "She can't block an explosion, and there is such a thing as Counter-Snipers."

I shuddered at the mention of explosives, chuckling nervously, "That's not to say we're going to use explosives right?"

He raises his eyebrow at me, "Well, that's kind of how you make something explode…"

"Well we aren't making anything explode of course. Right Jaegis?" I chuckled nervously again, subconsciously clutching my gun a bit tighter to my chest.

He gave me a once over, examining me with squinted eyes. "You're not… scared of explosions are you?"

"Of course not!" I said a bit too quickly, "Uuhhh… Wouldn't it just be easier to catch her off guard with a bullet from that?" I pointed to his sniper.

He looked down at his feet. "Wish I could, but that chick cut a Hecate round in half at 10 metres during the preliminaries. But I'm pretty sure if I tossed a few HE grenades at her she'd go down easily enough…"

I choked up a bit, making a mewling sound as I realized he was right. I bit my lower lip and looked back up at him and clutched the gun a bit tighter, "Can you at least not use something with high explosive literally in the name…"

He looked at me for a second, and again a war broke out behind his eyes. He broke his gaze away from mine and looked out again. He gritted his teeth and bared an angry look. He closed his eyes and let out a shaky breath. He looked back at me and gave a gentle smile.

"Okay, scaredy cat..." He ruffled my hair, "I won't use explosives. For your sake."

He went red as soon he realized what he had said. "I mean, I can't have my teammate freezing up on me, can I?"

As soon as his hand made contact with my head I loosened a bit, lower lip separating from my top. I hardly registered anything he said afterward, almost missed it when he removed the shattered wood and stepped out. I placed a hand to my head and went beet red.

"Hey?" he said.

"Oh, huh?"

"Are we going or not, we've rested long enough."

I scrambled to grab my gear and scuttled out from under the rubble standing and thumbing over my weapon's safety as I fell in behind him. I let out a shaky breath and swallowed, looking at his back. Did he even notice what he had done to me with just a simple touch?

Hell did I even know?