Deaths beating heart, p.21
Surviving the Ashlands 2: A Post-Apocalyptic LitRPG Adventure Book Two, page 21
This would be the closest settlement location to Castle Rock I would claim and hold before we took the city back. From what Avery said, this would be a fantastic place to observe and then launch our assault from to liberate the last of the city.
“Those buildings would be great if we held them,” Valerie said as she walked up behind me.
“I have a feeling there are raiders in there,” I responded without turning to face her.
Valerie placed a hand on my shoulder and pulled me to face her. I turned and looked into her eyes. I had finally gotten used to seeing the cybernetic eye. “We need to clear the area, if we are going to set up an observation post here...”
I gave her a smile, then turned to face the group of ruined homes. “Okay. Time to clear these out and set up shop.”
Hans, Valerie, Kendall, Avery, Kayla, and George followed me through the homes clearing out animals and ghuls. I watched the experience notifications come and go. Trying to get over the level fifteen hurdle had become a slog.
In the second to last house we cleared, I stumbled across another perk magazine. I picked up the magazine from the ground.
You have collected an issue of Survival in the Wasteland, you now have the innate ability to gather meat from hunted animals.
Experience: 100
“Huh, neat,” I said, handing the magazine to Valerie as she stepped up next to me.
“Thanks,” she said, taking it from me.
“Oh, that’s a good one. Too bad we can’t share these with others,” Valerie said in a hushed tone.
“It would be nice to share. Make things a little easier,” I agreed, taking the magazine back and slid it into my inventory.
The final home was empty but contained the workshop bench to connect my tacpad to. Once connected, the internal system did the work and granted me access and control to the settlement. Avery and George brought the Humvee over and I pulled supplies from the trunk to transfer them into the workbench.
Hans trotted over to me and sat down. “Hey buddy,” I said as I looked over the settlement workbench menu.
I gave his head a rub between his ears. “Sorry I haven’t taken you with me more often.”
Hans whined and nuzzled my leg. “I know, I know I’ll take you out more often.”
Hans panted and let his tongue fall out of the side of his mouth. I swiped a few screens away and sighed. I would need a bit more supplies than what I brought to build a suitable observation post. I closed the screen and gathered everyone up. “Alright, collection time. Bring me everything you can carry. I need to scrap and store what I can in the system.”
The five split up and headed to different houses. I was banking on most of these homes still having a lot of supplies inside. I made my way closer to the schools to look through a couple of houses for supplies. Hans trailed behind me, being my guard dog.
I had been losing myself in trying to keep everything together and progress the story. Something continued to bug me in the back of my mind. I could not shake the feeling every time I thought about the Paragon and their reseeding programs and plans in place for the front range and the rest of America.
The plague was step one, then through a “seed” plan they would repopulate an area with a mixture of androids and their growing population. If I were to side with the Paragon, some of their missions would require the player to harvest humans. Drug them and bring them back to their underground laboratory to be tested on and then processed for biomass to turn into an android.
Part of the Paragon mentality was that any surface dweller which had not been seeded by them was too radiated from the war and every descendant from the war was not a worthy successor as the fallen government would not have a chance to repeat the actions ever again.
As of now, I was aligned with the American Remnant, the group stood on the pillar opposite of the Paragon, but it did not mean they were the ‘Good Guys’. Every faction was morally grey at best. Even the front range militia to be considered a morally grey faction. There were enough choices to be made where somebody who could be a potentially strong ally would end up dead due to them not wanting to stay neutral.
My long-term goal to continue surviving in this world was to attempt to bridge the gap and forge bonds and alliances to keep the handful of slightly more morally acceptable actions around and eliminate those who would be seen as outright evil by most modern standards.
As I made my way through the different homes, I continued to ponder my different options. I would need to handle some of the major choices in the coming months.
An unavoidable decision was about to plop into my lap. Who would live and who would die during the coming plague. Due to a limiting factor on the production of the plague cure and it bothered me.
After spending a few hours scavenging and using the settlement system to scrap miscellaneous and broken furniture, I made my way to each person and put their supplies into the settlement system. I still found it odd that no one batted an eye when the material magically disappeared into the system.
After the last pile dematerialized into the settlement system, I brought up the building menu and did some quick math to make sure I had enough supplies to construct the observation post. I cracked a smile when the math worked out. I closed the menu and made my way to the spot I wanted the observation post to be.
There was a small park in the neighborhood I wanted to use, as it was not as crowded and would provide enough space such that it could be secured, so that anyone staying would feel safe enough to rest.
Once I made it to the park, I pulled the menu back up and began construction on the outpost. I watched as the experience notifications started appearing as I placed each section of the foundation.
Experience: 1
Experience: 1
Experience: 1
I pushed the rest out of my view and focused on building. Time ticked by as I work on the first level of the observation post. I put up wooden slat walls to obscure line of sight for any oncoming attacker. Just as I sat down the stairs to begin the base of the watchtower itself, the crack of a rifle grabbed my attention from somewhere in the neighborhood.
I quickly swiped the settlement building system screen away and pulled out my GS3. I looked in my immediate surroundings and found Hans on high alert hackles up in his ears perked up. “You know where that came from boy?”
Hans woofed and headed out of the observation post and down the street. I bolted after the dog as more shots rang out. Hans barked as we found our way to the commotion. A small band of raiders had come toward us from the south.
George and Kayla were stuck behind a ruined vehicle. I watched as bullets pierced through the rusted exterior of the car. One of them would eventually hit them. They were concealed, but they were not in protective cover.
Hans picked up speed and headed directly for the closest raider. I slowed my pace and tried to catch my breath. I brought up my rifle sprayed a few bullets wide. My ragged breath was making it difficult to aim properly. But my initial plan succeeded, which was to get the raiders attention away from Kayla and George.
With a short glance I spotted four raiders, but with the angle of the Sun and large distance between myself and them there was probably a number still trailing behind. I sprayed wide again with a burst of rounds, and the four directed their entire attention on me and Hans.
I dashed forward, continuing to fire at the raiders. I saw one drop in pain as the bullet nicked the side of one going to aid the raider in Hans’ clutches.
Kayla and George realized what was going on, and revealed themselves from the concealment behind the car took down the other two.
I got up close to the raider I had grazed and finished him off.
Experience: 24
Hans pulled a giant chunk out of the raider’s face that he had pounced upon. The man stopped moving a few seconds later, blood pooling underneath of him. “Thanks for the assist,” George said from is the spot from the vehicle.
I waved at him. “No problem looked like a scouting group find the others have a feeling we’re gonna run into more trouble soon.”
George nodded as Kayla walked up next to him. “I think they came from the schools we might have to deal with those sooner than later.”
“If that's the case we’ll make sure to hit them fast and hard, so they don’t have a chance to go warn the others in Castle Rock.”
The four of us went and found Valerie and Kendall. Both had been on their way toward us as they had heard the shots as well. They had been on the Northwest end of Butterfield Crossing looking for more supplies.
Avery showed up after a few minutes. The seven of us headed to the under construction observation post. If we were about to engage a larger raider force, we wanted the advantage and protection. Upon our arrival I continued building the observation post so we would be able to catch the raiders by surprise.
I placed a standing platform on all four interior walls to we could see over it but only have half our bodies exposed. Once completed, I started the inner tower. If the raiders did not know where we were, they would soon from the protruding building.
While I began placing the walls, Kendall, Valerie, Avery, George, and Kayla were setting up a makeshift barrier behind the door.
An hour passed and I continued to shore up the defenses. I placed a turret on every corner of the walls. With each defense I put up, the safer I began to feel. If a group of raiders did show up, we would be able to defend and repel the attackers.
With over one hundred items placed, I looked at my total experience notification.
Experience: 158
A handful of the larger construction prices gave me two to four experience per item not matching the physical count of parts placed. I still had more to do, but I wanted to stop and survey the surroundings while elevated four stories.
With the menu closed I looked towards the south, where the initial raider scouts had come from. It looked quiet but looks were likely deceiving. I shifted my gaze towards the schools. I had a feeling the scouts were from there. Which building, I did not know, but it was hard to deny each of those were a stronghold and would require us to clear them out.
I started to turn when I caught a shadow moving quickly towards us. Pulling up my rifle I looked down the scope to see two raider trucks coming right for us. Too slow suckers.
“Enemy incoming! West side!” I called down to the others.
Not a second later, I heard the others scrambling to get into position.
The sounds of footsteps climbing upstairs rang out as I focused in on the two moving vehicles. “I'm glad I took that initial perk.”
The improved handling of weapons was one of the best decisions I had made. I aimed down my scope and zeroed in on the first driver. Keeping up with him was difficult and I did my best to wait until we slowed down.
I moved my reticle in front of the car and attempted to try to count how long it took until the vehicle crossed my reticle again. With my best guess I lined up a shot and fired, hoping I would hit the driver as he passed by.
Sadly, my luck did not hold, and I saw the bullet ricochet off the top of the pickup. The raiders in the back of the truck ducked and the driver swerved slightly before getting them back on track. I cursed, as I made the mistake of giving away our position without making any dent in the raider force.
It was not long before I heard the whooping and hollering from the raiders. But as the vehicles drew closer, Valerie and the others made it to my side.
The vehicles pulled off behind a house just outside of turret range. We waited in anticipation for the attackers to show themselves. I cursed myself again for not looking at what kind of weaponry they were carrying with them.
“No warnings, just take them out,” Kendall said as she checked for a cartridge in her chamber.
A round of agreements echoed before silence. The anticipation grew as the raiders were clearly going to be attacking soon. I kept looking left, then right, then left again. My finger was in the trigger well of the GS3 and began to twitch.
A stream of light flew into the air, whistling until it popped and slowly began to fall towards the earth. They sent up a flare.
Five raiders attempted to attack the outpost. Battle cries and threats of murder and rape went up through the air as they opened fire at us.
The SCR soldiers wasted no time but dispatching the small group attempting to break the gate. As soon as it was started, it was over. Silence quickly took over again. And then just as it became quiet, another group of raiders charged at us. This time I joined in the shooting.
Experience: 32
The first one went down, and I immediately moved to the raider to the right and took him down too.
Experience: 29
“Damnable fools, they should know they won't be able to break this,” George said from my left.
One last wave of about nine raiders came out from behind the houses, this time one of them had a heavy weapon I was terrified to see.
A missile was launched from the raider in the rear of the group. The missile flew and hit the side of our barricaded outpost. Wood splintered and flew everywhere. I was still cursing I had not been able to collect enough concrete over the last month to build any heavy fortified places. The walls rocked and grown from the change in support structure weight.
“Take the heavy weapon out!” I yelled almost letting go of my rifle to point of the man.
A group of us changed our sights and took down the heavy weapon before he could finish reloading for another shot. But the damage was done, the hole was made had been in the base of the Outpost wall. We changed our view, but six of the raiders made it inside the walls.
“Looks like this will be close quarters from here,” Avery said as he shifted to head down the stairs.
As we made our way down, I heard a high-pitched screen mixed with the growls of an angry dog. Hans had jumped on them, but I hoped we could get down there fast enough before the raiders could do anything else to the dog.
I wanted to throw a hand grenade just like I had at the comms array, but I did not want to risk hitting Hans.
Avery, George, and I made our way down faster than Valerie, Kendall, and Kayla. The three of us men engaged immediately, catching the rest of the raiders mostly off guard as they were focused on the Great Dane who had attacked the first raider inside the wall.
I popped off two rounds and the raider closest to me fell dead.
Experience: 34
With the first one down I looked for the next closest and popped off a few more rounds. Another raider fell screaming in agony as he did.
Experience: 37
I heard more cries of pain and agony as the raiders fell to both George and Avery. The two soldiers were well trained. Their swift handling of the raiders increased my expectations for the militia they had all been training. If the militia would be half his train as these soldiers were, taking Castle Rock would become an easy task.
Hans finished ripping out the throat of a raider, just as the three women made their way to the bottom of the stairs.
“If you were not all that effective, I'd be more pissed that I am right now,” Kendall said scolding the three of us.
“I wasn't going to let them kill Hans,” Avery said shrugging.
I looked at the man, a little surprised he had as much concern for the dog as I did.
“Clearly he handled himself well,” Kendall said pointing to the dead raider soaking in his own blood.
“We should get them cleared out here and then repair the wall,” I said walking over to the closest body.
“Remember to loot them first.” Valerie reminded everyone, as we were dragging the bodies to the outside of the wall.
We did, but there was not much worth anything on them. They had clearly come out here to take us out and not on a scavenger run. We took the last of the ammo, and I made sure to grab the missile launcher in any spare missiles off the dead raider a few hundred feet away from the outpost.
Avery and George went and stripped to the vehicles, bringing back to half used fission cores and a damaged thirty caliber machine gun.
At first when I looked over the machine gun, I was curious why the raiders had not used it on us, but when I made it to the magazine well, I saw why. There was a larger caliber bullet stuck in the chamber. Chances were, I would have to either scrap the machine gun using the settlement system or hopefully repair it using the same system. I would like to mount this machine gun to the top of one of the Humvees for our assault on Castle Rock.
I directed Avery to put the machine gun in the back of our Humvee along with the rest of the ammunition we had collected while I fixed the massive hole in the Outpost walls.
I hoped once we took Castle Rock, I would be able to get some of the old factories up and running to some degree to pump out supplies. There were some native ones I could build using the settlement system, but they were a huge resource drain.
Repairing some of the damaged ones would cost a fraction of the resources and if I played my cards right, I could even haul out of some of the factories and move them to better strategic locations as I built up the different settlements.
Another hour passed before all the bodies were removed, and I completed the wall repair. Our group gathered near the door to the Outpost. Kendall struck up the initial conversation.
“Once we have one or two more better trained militia members, will be able to better utilize this Outpost. But for now, George and Kayla will take the first watch and stay here. David, I know we took both fission cores out of the vehicles. I think we should not leave them here without an easy way to get us information. Until we get a radio tower up reports will have to come back to us by foot.”
“Absolutely. I didn't even think about that,” I said. “Actually, if we’re okay with waiting a little longer, I can go fix and fortify one of the garages to store one in. I’d get the radio tower up now, but I know we don’t have the right materials with us.”
