ATV Gang

Nuclear power plants ranked among the most complex achievements of human progress — and among the most catastrophic places on earth should anything go wrong.

That dual nature had spawned procedures and internal architectures no ordinary person could even begin to imagine, let alone grasp, and the result was a volume of data so vast that cramming it into a single human skull was simply impossible. As always, though, knowledge sorted itself by necessity. For Icarus operatives, the criterion was straightforward: How do you keep a major accident from happening in the middle of a firefight?

At a nuclear plant, a major accident meant a radiation leak.

Or, in a situation like the present one, there was the theoretical possibility that Artemis PMCs might try to steal high-risk radioactive waste and repurpose it into something like a dirty bomb — but the practical odds of that were low. They might have been ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠operating in a half-ruined world with nothing left to lose, but Artemis PMCs were neither undereducated escapees nor garden-variety terrorists. They had been trained. Their intelligence was not so low that they would casually risk becoming not only casualties of their own scheme, but the sworn enemies of the entire world.

So the chance that Artemis would deliberately trigger a meltdown, or try something with high-level radioactive waste, was slim. They lacked the technical means to crack open a reactor pressure vessel in the first place, and hauling material that put out sieverts per hour was simply not feasible. Artemis's past record of building every kind of cyborg imaginable meant it wasn't strictly impossible — but this was a game. Some degree of correction had almost certainly been applied.

Which left the question of the worst thing they could still realistically attempt — and then the answer arrived on its own.

"What does that mean?"

"It means people who don't know the first thing about reactors are fiddling with one."

Of course.

People who couldn't spell "nuclear," who knew how to shoot a gun, follow a tactical manual, and maybe tinker with machinery at best, were putting their hands on one of the crowning achievements of human engineering. Their motive wasn't entirely incomprehensible. Who wouldn't covet a power plant's output? Run even one of them properly and you'd have enough electricity to drown in for decades.

The flip side, though, was equally obvious: a facility capable of that kind of generation was not going to spin up just because a bunch of amateurs poked at it.

Time to deliver a nuclear knuckle sandwich to people who only ever did the one thing they were told not to do.

"From here on, we're heading for the backup power facility. Even if the enemy tries something stupid, as long as we have backup power, an emergency shutdown is still possible. Without that…" I paused. "Well. Nothing good comes of it."

"Then we should go right now."

"Exactly."

We left the parking lot and pushed deeper into the plant grounds.

Long skid marks snaked across the asphalt in every direction. Roughly twenty meters ahead, at the entrance of a building that at a glance could have passed for a hangar, a single armed UTV sat parked in a complete mess. Tactical to the point of futuristic — ballistic plates, a front-mounted ballistic panel capable of projecting a hologram, and mounted on top of it all a bizarre Artemis-made triple-shot grenade launcher, partially incorporating Metal Storm technology for a grotesque rate of fire.

The backup generator facility sat several hundred meters away on the shore of Lake Ontario — in other words, the complete opposite side of our current position.

"Whoa, this thing doesn't even have a back seat."

"Where the back seat should be is a grenade magazine reinforced with armor plate. Everyone except the driver and passenger rides on the sides. It was built for fire support, not personnel transport."

I gave it a light kick with my boot and added,

"There are going to be a lot of enemies, so I'll run the grenade launcher. You just drive. The route will pop up on your UI automatically."

"What? No — I have a paper license! We might flip!"

"It's only about six hundred meters. Get in!"

At the same time I climbed into the passenger seat and seized control of the vehicle. The moment my lenses finished syncing with the grenade launcher's sight picture, thought alone was enough to rotate it a full three hundred sixty degrees. A quick override through the Icarus OS converted the Artemis IFF registered to the vehicle into a tool for identifying hostiles.

In short, the friend-or-foe beacons clipped to every PMC body — originally meant to prevent friendly fire — had just become the lights that would hasten their own demise.

Red triangles marking enemies popped up in every direction. The count alone came to roughly a company and a half. Under ordinary circumstances, the smartest move would have been to leave them alone. At this point, though, drawing aggro was the entire point.

Because the rear seats had been converted wholesale into a 40mm grenade magazine, the buggy's onboard load came to a full eighty-one rounds — an entirely appropriate and more than sufficient number for turning the surrounding area into a wasteland.

"All right. Floor it!"

"If I ram into something, that's on you!"

───Vrrrrrooom!

True to its tactical design, the vehicle's engine noise was minimized to near silence. It shoved hard against the asphalt and shot forward in a straight line. As the speed climbed and the scenery began to streak, the red dots drew steadily closer, and the Artemis radio net dissolved into confused static — what the hell is that sound?

The distance to our destination was closing fast. That also meant the distance to the enemy was closing just as fast.

There was no need to answer.

The reason was simple.

—KRA-BOOM!

"Aaaagh!"

"Damn it, HQ! We're under attack! Dublin 1-2's vehicle has been hijacked!"

Thud-thud-thud.

Three grenades carved clean arcs through the air and showed off explosive power and lethality every bit as superior as the technology packed into the buggy itself. In an instant, an entire strike team — UGVs included — became permanent residents of the afterlife right in front of us.

The screams coming through the enemy net were remarkably clear. We were already halfway to the destination. On foot it would have been a bit of a walk, but six hundred meters by vehicle was almost nothing, and the enemies began to appear not ahead of us but creeping up from behind.

I adjusted the grenade launcher's angle and lobbed rounds at the PMCs closing from the rear. Somewhere in the middle of that, Harmony was looking at me with naked envy.

"I want ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠to shoot the grenades too…"

"Next time, I'll drive."

Her face lit up at once. She really was an easy person to read.

That, however, was a separate matter from the chaos still unfolding around us. It didn't take long for her expression to crumple again — this time because enemy troops were starting to trickle out of our destination one by one and take potshots.

I swung the launcher's aim point around in a hurry and opened fire in that direction. Which, of course, meant I had less attention to spare for the ones chasing us from behind.

───WHOOM!

"Waaah!"

"Hold the wheel tight!"

An enemy rocket launcher scored a near hit, and the chassis shuddered violently. I kept firing grenades, but the whole buggy was rocking, and accuracy suffered. Being boxed in front and ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠back was not a good sign by any measure — but what choice did we have? I was still turning that over when Harmony spoke up, her voice thick with panic and raw feeling.

"T-Teacher! The brakes aren't working!"

"Something must have gone out from that impact earlier. Somehow… Harmony. Do you see a vehicle up ahead?"

"Yes, yes! Should I ram it?"

"You catch on quick."

Brakes were, in the end, just a tool for reducing speed. If that was the case, then any method that dropped our speed would do.

Six hundred meters was far too short a run for a vehicle, and an armed buggy's acceleration was excellent. Even if we'd wanted another option, there wouldn't have been time — so we charged at full speed toward the destination now right in front of us, and the enemies dug in before it.

───WHOOM!

"Aaaagh!"

"Hang on!"

One enemy caught on the front of the chassis went flying. Our speed dropped a fraction, but not enough to help much. Amid savage vibration and inertia, the vehicle that had been barreling straight ahead slammed into another car that had reached the backup power facility ahead of us, then skidded another dozen-odd meters before finally grinding to a stop. I made sure, of course, not to neglect turning the Artemis grunts swarming the area into ash along the way.

I let out a short breath and shook Harmony's half-vacant shoulder.

"Up you get. We're here."

"…Teacher."

"Yes?"

"If there's another chance like this, I'm not driving."

"…Understood."

Being an operator, as it turned out, was very much a dirty, dangerous, and difficult line of work.

A tournament was a proving ground where countless pro gamers who'd prepared for that single day clashed for supremacy — but it was also a festival everyone could laugh at and enjoy. And when that festival was a single massive event staged on a global scale, the audience hardly needed an explanation: they could simply ride the cascade of side events all the way through the final matches of the main bracket.

Naturally, the organization overseeing all of it was Icarus International.

Server management and operations, countless events, external publicity, official talks with pro team organizations, in-game events, assorted quizzes, management of contracted casters, royalties, coordination with Icarus branches in other countries… the sheer scale of work unfolding under the banner of a single tournament was beyond listing, let alone fitting inside one person's head.

Even at the tail end of the preliminary rankings — before the Asia qualifiers had started, before even the KSM matches had begun — popularity wasn't shrinking. It was swelling exponentially year after year, the fuse still burning down.

And in the middle of all that, of course, countless viewers each had their own favorites. Ten AP pro organizations alone made that obvious, and the first-string players ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠across those teams numbered well over a hundred. Pros whose names a casual fan would never recognize kept appearing without end — and naturally, these were the frontline fighters their organizations pushed hardest.

Their popularity was accelerated further by the teams and by headquarters alike, and the methods varied. One of them was the preparation of a basic profile for the pro gamer in question — whether the organization footed the bill itself, or whether Icarus International, recognizing skill, fame, and promise, put in the request. And it wasn't just that. Interviews that soothed the curiosity of countless fans and drew more eyes, and so on — the things that could be done, and the things that had to be done, were effectively endless.

Of course—

"…Does this person not care about the tournament at all?"

—exceptions always existed.

As had been explained more than once, a tournament covered a scope far too vast and sprawling for any single person to track. In a storm of that size, the occasional fact slipping through the cracks was easier than eating cold porridge.

Eugene, of course, was far too large a presence to simply be forgotten or omitted. She was brought up several times a day; her fame had already spread wide. But being talked about was also an act of remembering — and even a presence like Eugene's could, tangled in endless workloads, occasionally evaporate from the schedule.

Either way, her existence was enormous regardless. Countless viewers were waiting for information on Eugene, and even the staff of Icarus's publicity team were no different. When an entire branch office started laying out schedules for a single user — rather than the other way around — further explanation was unnecessary.

But the world does not always turn the way people want it to.

Icarus staff were hitting a wall with her pre-tournament interview.

In a situation like this, as one might expect, no one could force the issue. A player's schedule had to be respected, and managing it was ultimately the player's own responsibility. That principle was taken as given, and in practice there was nothing left to push on.

The ones left wanting were always the users, not the branch. If individuals didn't manage their own email and contacts, the losses were theirs. But as the wanting gradually shifted toward the branch side, the principle mentioned above underwent a strange chemical reaction and drove them into a self-inflicted bind no one had ever seen before.

It hadn't been that long since the emails went out — but waiting was an unavoidable part of the process. Specifically, waiting long enough that posts like the ones above started appearing on the company intranet because replies weren't coming quickly.

The stream's entertaining, at least…

The people with the least need to worry about any of this were the temporarily assembled monitoring team. They weren't surveilling her every move. They were closer to a failsafe — one of their jobs was to flag, through donations and other channels, any information she might have missed. Put simply, staff who'd finished early or whose shifts started later were being pulled and assigned as viewers of Eugene's stream.

It was more or less what they'd expected.

A monitoring staffer pulled up a separate popup and checked today's stream schedule. Packed solid with main mission progression. Two blank slots of about thirty minutes each sat in the middle — matching the preliminary ranking windows exactly.

In other words, unlike other pro gamers who spent the lead-up to a match in scrims and practice, she would casually push the main mission and then drop into the match when the time came. That was very much like her. It lined up perfectly with the word bold.

Eugene's stream hours had grown considerably irregular of late, and it was not uncommon for her to already be in Dark Zone the moment the stream went live. Today was no different.

At the very bottom of the schedule: Just Chatting.

At a timing that wouldn't disrupt the broadcast, if anything had been missed, they would pass the information along through donations and other channels. Waiting only for that, they simply watched the screen in silence.

Meanwhile — and of course—

"Be careful with your fire. If you hit the backup power supply facility, it'll break."

"Ugh, not being able to shoot properly when I need to makes this harder than a normal engagement…!"

"That's how it is. Nothing's easy."

Regardless of any of that, they were operating as usual.

This is Eugene, tactical hammer in hand.

If you don't want to become ground meat, you know what to do.