"Davies!" Michael shouted across the test bay, "Why is the RPG-7 pointed at my—"
The world turned white.
The first thing Michael noticed was that he wasn't in pain. That seemed wrong. He'd just been liquefied by a malfunctioning rocket-propelled grenade in a defense contractor's testing facility in rural Nevada.
There should have been some pain. A little courtesy agony, at minimum.
Michael sat up slowly.
He was in a forest clearing. Birds singing somewhere overhead... birds that sounded wrong, too melodic, like someone had auto-tuned sparrows.
A pale purple sky peeked between the canopy. Two moons. One large and cream-colored, one small and faintly blue, both visible in what looked like late afternoon.
"Okay," Michael said to nobody. "Okay... I'm dead."
He patted his chest. Solid. He pinched his arm. That hurt.
"I'm not dead..."
He stood up. He was wearing the same clothes... worn jeans, steel-toed boots, his Hargrove Defense polo with the little logo on the chest.
Thirty-one years old, five-eleven, twelve years in munitions R&D, one spectacularly lethal accident to his name.
That's when the screen appeared. It just popped into existence about two feet in front of his face, hovering in the air.
[Weapon System Interface]
STATUS Level: 1 EXP: 0 / 100 Coins: 50
[OPEN SHOP]
[VIEW INVENTORY]
[SKILLS]
[QUEST LOG]
Michael stared at it. He reached out and poked the [OPEN SHOP] button.
The screen expanded.
TIER 1 — AVAILABLE Glock 17 (9mm Pistol) — 30 Coins Standard sidearm. 17-round mag.
TIER 2 — LOCKED (Reach Level 5) Uzi (9mm Submachine Gun) — 120 Coins Full auto. 32-round mag.
TIER 3 — LOCKED (Reach Level 10) M4A1 Carbine — 300 Coins
TIER 4 — LOCKED (Reach Level 20) M32 Grenade Launcher — 800 Coins
TIER 5 — LOCKED (Reach Level 35) FIM-92 Stinger MANPADS — 2,500 Coins
(Scroll for more...)
"Holy shit," Michael whispered.
He scrolled. There were more. Way more...
He bought the Glock 17. It cost him 30 coins and it materialized in his hand between one blink and the next... solid, real, slightly warm, magazine fully loaded.
Twelve years in munitions. He knew this gun like he knew his own handwriting.
"Alright," he said, and something in his chest settled. Something professional clicked into place behind his eyes.
Whatever the hell was happening, he had a weapon. He had a system. Panic was a luxury for people who didn't spend their careers around live explosives.
He dismissed the shop screen with a thought and looked around the clearing properly.
That's when he noticed the village.
Maybe two hundred meters through the treeline, visible through the bronze-barked trunks: stone buildings, thatched roofs, a dirt road.
Medieval. Absolutely, categorically, no-plumbing-no-electricity medieval. And it was on fire. Not a lot but the screaming suggested the situation was developing.
Michael had exactly three seconds to process this before something ran out of the treeline toward him.
It was a girl. Twelve, maybe thirteen, in a rough wool dress, red-faced and crying, clutching something to her chest. She skidded to a stop when she saw him.
They stared at each other.
"Uh," Michael said.
She said something. It was not English. It was not any language Michael recognized.
She said it louder, more urgently, gesturing back toward the village with one shaking hand.
"I genuinely do not understand a word you're—"
"—the soldiers are killing everyone and they took my father and I don't know where my mother is!"
Her words landed perfectly clear. Like they'd always been English. Like a switch had flipped.
Michael blinked. Then he looked back toward the village, where the smoke was getting thicker.
He looked at the kid in front of him, who had snot running down her lip and was shaking like a leaf and staring at his gun like she'd never seen anything like it in her life... which, fair, she probably hadn't.
"Okay," Michael said, and clicked the safety off. "What kind of soldiers?"
"The Duke's men," she said. "Thirty of them. Maybe more. They have swords and they have a mage, a fire mage, he's the one who—"
"A mage?" Michael repeated.
"Yes."
"A fire mage?!"
"Yes, please, my father—"
"No, I just—" Michael pinched the bridge of his nose.
Magic was real. Obviously magic was real, because he'd died in Nevada and woken up under two moons with a video game interface floating in his face, so sure, why not, magic is real.
"Okay. What's your name?"
"Lena."
"Lena. I'm Michael." He glanced at his inventory screen... 20 coins remaining, Glock 17 equipped.
"I'm going to be honest with you. I have no idea what's happening or where I am or how any of this works."
She stared at him.
"But I have seventeen rounds and a very bad attitude about people who burn down villages." He started moving toward the treeline.
"So. Show me where your dad is."
Lena ran to keep up with his stride. She glanced at the strange flat metal thing in his hand, then up at his face, trying to read whether this strange man in bizarre clothes was actually going to help or just get them both killed.
"What is that weapon?" she asked. "Is it magic?"
Michael thought about explaining ballistics, gunpowder, semi-automatic firing mechanisms, and the storied history of Gaston Glock's Austrian engineering genius.
"Yeah," he said instead. "Something like that..."
The burning building came into view through the trees.
A man in black armor stood in the road, sword in hand, while three peasants knelt in the mud before him. Behind him, a robed figure with fire literally dancing between his fingers was smiling at the sky.