9. Tara
We returned fire, periodically rewarded with better weapons and even explosives as we continued to level up between swells of enemies.
Our team worked efficiently, hiding behind the rocks and wooden barriers set up all around the flowered field as drove after drove of alien enemies continued to press us backwards.
The little soldier grunt types fell easily enough, but even low-level enemies were a pain if there were too many of them and we were soon overwhelmed, forcing us to fall back in the hopes of staying alive.
As we ran, the ruins of a crumbling farm came into view, offering valuable cover.
“Everybody inside!” Jesse ordered, holding the door open for Charlie and I to rush into the house. I crouched at one of the windows, pointing my gun through the shattered glass pane to continue shooting, picking off enemies as my teammates healed and reloaded.
The game was harder than I thought it would be, my skin warm under my clothes. I was sure that my head was sweaty, my breathing ragged as I tried to recover from sprinting.
Even if I could partially chalk it up to the adrenaline of it all, I really, really needed to make use of the gym in my building. There was no reason that a video game should have me so winded in just a matter of minutes.
Larger enemies began to arrive, and I continued to fire, tossing a grenade through the door as some dog-like alien monsters began to breach the porch with an explosion and a fair amount of animated blood.
Beside me, Jesse went down after a well-placed plasma cannon hit him clear in the face.
“Fuck,” Charlie hissed at my back. “My reload animation keeps glitching.”
It took everything I had not to look back at him. Even in game he was a distraction. The alpha that’d haunted my dreams for months after my stay at the Omega’s Lust, never to be heard from again.
I wanted to talk to Jesse about it. To tell him that Charlie—dweeb of eternity, as my boyfriend affectionately called him—was Mr. Heat Hotel.
And to ask him what he wanted to do about it, if anything.
“Stuck?” I asked, going to fire again with a hideous click that warned I was out of bullets. “Fuck, I’m out. Give me yours.”
I put my hand back expectantly, but it was no use, one of the hard to kill large purple aliens forcing its massive shoulders through the cracked doorway one at a time, its long black tongue tasting the air for us.
I scrambled backwards past Charlie, looking for a place to hide. Luckily there was just enough space under the covered stairs for me to squeeze into, covering my mouth with my hand to try and quiet my gasping breaths.
It was so fucking hot with this stupid headset on that I couldn’t breathe, Charlie’s scent sitting heavy in the back of my throat with every inhale threatening to pull me out of my hiding spot and into his lap.
The alien bore down on his hiding spot and I opened my menu, sifting through for anything useful.
Bingo .