Pixelized

5. [Connection Interrupted]

Chapter five

[Connection Interrupted]

Elle was in cover before Desmond she was faster as things like this, luckily, desmond was the best shot, he scrabbled from the gunfire and rolled onto his stomach, letting loose some of his own, they thudded into an emery’s chest, sending him spinning to the floor. He guessed others knew where he was and quickly continued his scrabbling; he pulled himself behind a heavy iron door that had somehow ended up lodged in the ground and scanned for Elle, she was sprinting towards him. He shot from cover, carefully taking down any threaten to catch out Elle mid-sprint. She skidded to his side just as Desmond felt a sharp stab in his hand “motherfu-” Elle’s gunfire drowned him out. “what?” she asked, before firing another burst.

Desmond looked down at his hand, a large, hideous hole seeped blood, his HUD flashed in front of him:

[RIGHT HAND DISABLED]

“I got hit, right hand” he shouted. He looked back; it didn’t hurt like a real bullet would. It was like being hit with a point-blank paintball gun. He knew the stinging sensation wouldn’t die away until he healed “got a med-pack?” he asked hopefully

“Fresh out” Elle called back “swap to your revolver, use your left”

He pulled out his revolver and opened the chamber with a quick snap of the wrist, six gleaming bullets sat in each spot, he flicked it back and it loaded with a satisfying click “use your left” he mumbled before firing once, the bullet missed completely and imbedded in a wall.

“Yep…we’re dead” he sighed, watching as Elle took down someone with a concentrated burst “shut up and shoot” she called and Desmond missed again.

Desmond shot three more bullets, each one digging into the ground or wall

“I need to train on my left hand more” he grumbled while Elle was reloading, “you’re telling me” he smiled and began to turn before pausing “Desmond?”

“Yeah?” he raised his head from the gun

Elle waited before saying “why aren’t they shooting?”

Desmond frowned and slowly the both poked there heads from cover, the last four enemies stood silently, hands at there sides and a blank look on their face's, Elle stood up warily “what the hell?”

A single gunshot rang through the air and one of the idle figures collapsed.

“Got one!” Desmond said triumphantly, a stupid grin on his face.

Both their HUD’s flashed:

[INCOMING MESSAGE]

Elle opened the chatlink and George’s voice crackled into their ears.

“Hey you two, got a minute?”

“Erm, yeah” Elle said, walking up to an enemy, looking closely at their military outfits “George, I think we’ve got a bug here”

“Huh? Oh no, we did that, that was us” he said “you’re needed elsewhere guys, you know that issue we had? Well it’s popped up again; it’s on the Multi-server this time. Could you check it out before someone else finds it?”

Elle turned to Desmond, who gave her a weird look before speaking.

“George, we’re level testers. We test Single-server levels for bugs and exploits before its put online, why are you asking us to look into a Multi-server bug?”

“Well” George said sheepishly “no one here seems to be able to log in, you’re the only two on our systems at the moment”

“What?” Elle said confused “the Ominex is your system but no one can log in?”

“No, the rest of the world can log in fine; we’re just having connection issues”

“Okaaaaay” Desmond said, he glanced up at Elle “should we check it out?”

Elle shrugged “I doubt Dr Treant will resume the level if we don’t” she sighed “okay George, send us in”

There was a rush and a blue flash, Desmond opened his eyes in mid air and crashed into the floor, Elle followed “ow” he shouted and Elle slammed into him.

“Sorry guys” George said quickly “our systems are acting up I think the chatlink might-”

[DISCONNECTED]

Desmond pushed himself up and sighed, he turned to help up Elle who gratefully took his hand. “Thanks” she said “any idea where this bug is?”

Desmond scanned the area, various other players wandered around in default black suits or other outfit that they had bough, all holding guns and swords that Desmond hat to admit looked pretty cool. He looked over at a player running around wearing a traffic cone as a hat and the name “Drunk-Badger” appeared above his head. His Gamer name. Desmond glanced upwards and saw “HotShot411” floating over him; he glanced at Elle and watched “Go1denGir1” materialize.

“not really” he answered “close by I guess” he began wandering through the crowds of players, he didn’t use the Multi-server as much but he knew his way around, right now he was in Ominexous. It’s where all new players started off, no enemies spawned in this area and weapons didn’t work. There were a few safe zones through out the Multi-server, were players could meet up to tackle the world together or to heal up and buy things. The server was full of chatter because people were stupid like that and had left their voice option on default, meaning everyone could hear what you were saying rather than just the people they were speaking too.

Elle pushed past a kid who was singing both loudly and terribly, he stumbled and called out after her “hey! Watch your step bitch!” Elle didn’t pay him any attention until he moved to push her, she span, caught his arm and flipped him over her knee. He hit the ground with a smack, Desmond cracked a smile. While weapons were disabled the system still had a problem with hands. They weren’t seen as weapons so a punch would still make contact, it didn’t hurt, but Desmond was very aware that being thrown to the floor did make you look like an idiot.

The boy scrabbled to his feet, obviously shaken, but trying to act cool in front of his gamer pals, he stood straighter and shouted after her again “hey, you’re lucky I wasn’t ready other wise you’d have been dead”

A space had appeared around them both and Elle stopped “oh really?” she said unimpressed “yeah, I’d take you out easy”

Elle turned and looked up at his name “Gamerlord” she laughed to herself.

No contest.

“Okay then, care to prove that?” she said, not sounding even slightly bothered about the outcome to her question.

Everyone saw Gamerlord’s smile waver. He looked round at the people watching the show “anytime” he said more panicked then threatening.

“Great” Elle said, flashing a smile, she looked over at Desmond “give me-” she looked Gamerlord up and down “two minutes” she decided.

A very noticeably bead of virtual sweat dripped down Gamerlord’s face.