Duel of systems

First mission

The drive to the hospital with Lucia was a real odyssey. My mind was overwhelmed by the stress of the mission full of complications that had brought us to this point. I waited in the hospital room, desperately yearning for news of Lucia's condition.

One of her imposing bodyguards approached me, breaking the uncertainty-laden silence. Holding a credit card and business card in his hands, he informed me in a gravelly voice:

"The lady sent this to you."

I would have preferred to speak directly to Lucia, but we were like strangers bound by a fragile alliance. I took both cards in my hands, noting with intrigue that the business card had the address of an obscure shop that sold guns in town.

I needed to talk to Lucia, but before I could say a word, the bodyguard added, in a threatening tone:

"She doesn't want to talk to anyone. I don't know what happened to her, but she has bruises on her body. It's pretty strange. I don't know if it was you, but I'm warning you, if I find out it was you, I'll kill you."

I understood that the bruises on Lucia's body were a clear indication that the fight with that man had not been easy for her.

I contemplated the idea of buying small knives to face him, still feeling the discomfort in my stomach from the kick I had received. However, I knew that a melee would be a losing battle. The wise thing to do was to avoid it.

I accepted the card silently, with grim determination. I left the hospital shrouded in the darkness of the night, aware that I had to leave Manhattan without delay. I decided to head for the bus stop, seeking refuge in its lonely corner. My mind slipped into my system, consulting my nearest targets. I chose the target that seemed to me the simplest among the complex ones: eliminate a gang member in California. I was eager to quickly complete that weekly mission and rest, but the other targets were farther away and more difficult.

Anxiety overcame me, aware that I had to prepare myself to enter a hostile environment. My statistics lacked information that could help me in this unknown situation. It was my first solo mission, and I felt the yearning to talk to Lucia, to seek her advice and support, but she had chosen to avoid it, and I could not claim her or ask for more help. I had accomplished my daily mission, which gave me a small sense of calm, and now I could catch a plane to California without worry. I just hoped the mission wouldn't be too difficult.

[...]

After several hours of a stressful and crowded flight, I finally landed in California.

As I disembarked at the airport, my phone vibrated insistently, interrupting my thoughts. An anonymous message popped up on the screen, unveiling a legal notice that stunned me: my ex-wife, Adriana, had sued me for abuse and an arrest warrant had been placed on me. A judge had acted with disturbing celerity in the whole process.

Despite that, I forced myself to keep my focus on my mission. My mind was focused on the need to obtain weapons, facing multiple constraints and challenges. My goal was clear: eliminate the target without being discovered by any civilian who could point and accuse me.

The unrelenting heat of that place enveloped me, suffocating me. The hot climate, alien to my usual environment, added to the pressure I felt. My mission took me to a neighborhood known as "Soledad", where the lush, tropical tree-lined streets held dangerous secrets. Fortunately, my target was not in the heart of the neighborhood, where the deadliest gangs gathered.

That name echoed in the shadowy corners: Jack Smith, a felon with a record tainted by multiple charges in Denver and other parts of the country. I plunged into a thorough investigation, realizing that it would not be as easy to eliminate him as I had imagined.

People's suspicious glances followed me as I made my way through the streets, sensing their wariness. Perhaps they thought I was an undercover cop. I continued to a warehouse, looking to acquire something necessary for my mission and check my system for information about the place where my target was, it showed that it was two and a half kilometers away, and I had to get there without arousing suspicion.

To appear to be an ordinary person and hydrate myself in the oppressive heat, I grabbed a soda and headed for the cash register of the store. But something unexpected happened. My attention was caught by a group of suspicious young men. However, it was the salesman who reacted first, pulling out a shotgun without hesitation.

The situation became awkward in the blink of an eye, and the two young men quickly fled the scene, leaving us in a tense silence. I tried to pay for my soda and leave, as I didn't want to get involved in problems unrelated to my mission. But the vendor, in a serious tone full of knowledge, spoke to me:

"You're not from here, are you?"

"Uh... I'm just looking for something. I have unfinished business," I replied somewhat nervously.

"This neighborhood is dangerous, a single blink of an eye can cost you your life. You look like a damn clerk. You'll be dead in two hours," he warned with contempt in his voice, shooting me a disapproving look as he scanned my bottle of soda I had given him.

I was not intimidated by his words, nor by the contempt that emanated from his being. I simply left a bottle at the register to pay for it, keeping my gaze steady. A simple gang member would not succeed in scaring me.

"Let me pay for the bottle of soda," I said nonchalantly, facing him with a serenity, as he shot me a disapproving look and scanned the product with a listless gesture.

As I left the warehouse, my mind was immersed in the urgency to finish everything quickly. However, a gunshot scratched my cheek. It was at that moment that the burning wound on my face reminded me of my own vulnerability, I moved stealthily to a safer place, aware that a sniper had fired at me from some unknown location. I had been negligent, and now I had to move with pinpoint accuracy, watching every step I took. The person who had shot at me could be another system user or an unscrupulous criminal, and it was hard to know who it was.

I walked quickly through streets where the sniper's visibility would be compromised, trying to keep moving to make his aim more difficult. I was close to the gang member's hideout, and fortunately I was not in the most dangerous area of the neighborhood known as "Soledad".

However, as I cautiously moved forward, I felt a sharp stab in my leg, right in the back. My knees gave way and I fell to the ground, engulfed in a mixture of pain and surprise. As I turned my head, I recognized Harold, the man I had been in trouble with a few hours earlier. The mask covering his face tried to hide his identity, but his malice-filled eyes and violent intentions were unmistakable.

"Well, nothing will save you this time, you good-for-nothing," he uttered disdainfully, as he threatened to kill me. However, at that precise instant, someone passed by on the street and watched us curiously. Harold hesitated whether or not to murder me in front of those unexpected witnesses. His hesitation reflected his fear of the consequences of his actions.

Taking advantage of his moment of doubt, I threw a handful of sand in his face, obstructing his vision. Harold tried to brush the sand away with his hand, and I, seizing the opportunity, picked myself up off the ground, slowly crawling to safety. My mind was desperately searching for a way out of the neighborhood and a way to get away from that confrontation that only left more scars on my being. I had had enough of Harold and the sniper who wanted to kill me. The closest place I found was an apartment complex, out the back. I frantically checked my system and noticed that Jack was moving around, perhaps preparing to leave the place. However, due to the presence of security cameras and civilians, I could not eliminate him at that point. So, masked by a balaclava, I hid in the trees and waited patiently, I was quite nervous and my hands were shaking.

From my hiding place, I saw a tall man come out of one of the apartments. His blue eyes flashed in the darkness, and the tattoos that adorned his body gave away his affiliation to the criminal life. It was the right time to act and put an end to the mission. Without hesitation, I drew my revolver and fired three accurate shots. Jack had no time to react, he only looked me in the eye for a brief moment before falling to the ground.

That experience was strange and chilling. It was the first time I had killed someone like that, and although my objective was clear, I could not help but feel a mixture of bewilderment and fear for the dark path I was starting down. However, I knew that I had to complete the missions to gain my freedom, to get out of this world. I didn't know how the system selected the targets, but most of them were not exactly good people. I walked to a nearby park to avoid being recognized, to give myself a break.

A few meters later, I took off my ski mask, feeling the weight of what happened. An intense pain in my leg reminded me of vulnerability and fragility. Now I understood a little better how Lucia had experienced that feeling of pain and weakness when she was injured in the hotel. I sat down on a park chair, feeling the accumulated fatigue. I checked my system, and there, in the midst of the satisfaction of having accomplished the mission, was a message on the screen that read:

(Congratulations, mission accomplished).

My mind plunged into uncertainty and doubt. I had 10 points to raise any skill I chose and 15 points to improve a stat. I wasn't sure what I should choose, I just knew I had to decide on something that would give me advantages for the upcoming missions. But before I could make a decision, someone sat down next to me in the park. I didn't think anything of it at first, I tried to get up from the chair, I felt a gun against my ribs.

"Stand still, don't make any strange moves. I don't care if the system punishes me."

He carried a guitar case on his back, and his unkempt appearance, with curly hair and scruffy beard, reflected a life filled with disenchantment and disillusionment. His green eyes shone with a spark of disappointment, as if life had left deep scars on his being. He continued to bring his weapon closer to my abdomen, as if to reassert his control and power over me.

In the midst of that tense silence, I understood that he was not playing, that there was no room for mistakes. Maybe he really wanted to end my life. At that moment, a question hovered in my mind: who was this man and why was he pointing this gun at me?