Prey World - Counterrevolution

Frank and Alfred had driven from Orsa to Smolensk in the early morning hours. In the southern part of the city, they had joined a group of their comrades and now they were waiting for the beginning of the rally. Meanwhile, it was already 11.00 o`clock and more and more Rus came from everywhere. After a while, the crowd started to move and marched flag-waving and singing in the direction of downtown, where even more Rus were waiting for them.

  Hundreds of citizens came out of their houses and followed the marching columns of Tschistokjow`s men. Two hours later, about 30000 enthusiastic supporters welcomed the leader of the freedom movement with loud chants.

  Shortly afterwards, they had reached the city center of Smolensk. A huge crowd had already gathered there - the police talked of more than 100000 people - who had come to the rally of the collectivists. Police helicopters circled above the heads of the demonstrants, filming everything the Rus did.

  When Tschistokjow`s supporters had arrived in Smolensk, there had already been clashes between them and Uljanin`s followers. Three Rus had been attacked by a masked horde of their political opponents. One of them was killed with a knife. An atmosphere of violence and hatred had meanwhile seized the whole city and Frank expected the worst for this day.

  “What shall we do now? The large square in the inner city, the Mesto Tschelabeki, is packed with collectivists! It`s a great mass! Uljanin himself leads them!”, said Kohlhaas and his heart was pounding with excitement.

  Artur Tschistokjow stared at him grimly and growled in German: “Yes, I know. These pigs knew about our demonstration. We will march from the Novaya Ulitsa to Mesto Smolenski - then I will start with my speech.”

  “You want to march through Smolensk in the direct proximity of Uljanin`s rally? Only two streets are between the Novaya Ulitsa and the Mesto Tschelabeki. They can probably even see us!”, said Frank, holding the electronic map of Smolensk on his DC-Stick under Tschistokjow`s nose.

  The leader of the Freedom Movement of the Rus nodded and replied: “We must have no fear, Frank!”

  They still waited for some stragglers, while Kohlhaas became more and more nervous. Finally, Frank called the trooper units together and gave them the order to advance. More than 30000 demonstrants followed.

  “Russian workers come to Artur Tschistokjow!”, shouted the protesters at the top of their lungs. The long worm of people slowly made its way through the streets and finally turned into the Novaya Ulitsa, a broad side street near the large square in the city center.

  Frank heard Uljanin`s voice in the distance. Shortly afterwards, the first collectivists and policemen appeared. Immediately, the men on both sides started to shout insults, while more and more collectivists blocked the way of the Rus.

  Frank took his gun from the shoulder and the trooper next to him did the same. Alf peered nervously around and loaded his rifle, while Uljanin`s supporters were raising their fists in the distance, screaming and howling.

  “Traitors of the workers! Reactionists! Fascists!”, they yelled full of hate.

  A few minutes later, they attacked. Hundreds of collectivists rushed forward, poured out of the streets and a hail of cobblestones came down on Tschistokjow`s men. Frank quickly put on his helmet. Somewhere he heard a shot, then the chaos was complete. A few dozen men of the CLJ opened fire from a side street, and the Russian policemen started to shoot too.

  “Come on!”, screamed Frank, pushing Alf to the side.

  With a loud cry, the furious collectivists assaulted the Rus and beat them down with iron bars and clubs. Frank smashed his rifle butt into the hateful grimace of an attacker, while a Russian trooper behind him was hit by a bullet .

  Tschistokjow`s followers retreated, some of them jumped behind garbage cans and cars, in order to find cover. Then the collectivists came even from behind, attacking the Rus like angry beasts. Finally, the men of the freedom movement were seized by panic and many of them desperately tried to break out of the encirclement.

  Frank jumped out his cover behind a burning car and fended an opponent off. After his well-aimed stroke, the collectivist staggered backwards and Frank rammed a combat knife right into his throat. Blood squirted into his face and the man fell to the ground with a short death-rattle.

  “Come on! Get out of here!”, roared Bäumer and fired at a group of approaching police officers. They two rebels ran towards a big park and tried to regroup the other troopers, but they failed. Most of them were already fleeing, running for their lives and trying to escape through the narrow side streets .

  Like hunted dogs, Frank and Alf raced through an avenue and turned then into a side street, where they met the next opponents. A screaming horde of collectivists jumped out of a dark corner, brandishing clubs and baseball bats. It were scary looking men, eager to smash some of the hated Rus. Dirty, unshaven guys, incited from head to toe. One of them just missed Frank`s face when he tried to crush his head with a crowbar. Finally he hit the shoulder of the rebel and the young man screamed out in pain.

  In return, Kohlhaas slammed him to the ground and kicked him against the skull with full force, while Alf mowed down two roaring collectivists with his rifle. The rest of the enemies ran away after Bäumer`s shots.

  “Give me the DC-Stick!”, shouted Frank and pulled the data carrier out of Alf`s hand. With trembling fingers, he typed through the menu and opened the city map of Smolensk.

  “Follow me!” He waved Bäumer nearer and they turned into another street.

  After half an hour, the two had reached their car and drove away with screeching tires. At the roadside, a few supporters of Uljanin were shouting at them, while they throw some cobblestones in the direction of the car. Frank suddenly rolled down the window.

  “What are you doing?”, asked Bäumer.

  “I send our friends a volley of gunfire!”, snorted Kohlhaas.

  “No, put that rifle away, man!”, hissed Alf nervously.

  But his friend did not listen to him, the adrenaline had already whipped him up like a wild animal. As the collectivists saw his assault rifle behind the window, they ran away screaming, but Frank fired at them, sending five of them to the ground.

  “Greetings from Belarus, assholes!”, he yelled.

  “Let`s get out of here! You are totally crazy. I have enough for today!”, muttered Alf and accelerated the car.

  Finally, the two found a feeder road to Orsa and reached the Belarusian border after a perilous journey.

  What had happened to their comrades, they did not know at that time. However, they could imagine that the rally had ended in a giant debacle.

  In fact, the demonstration in Smolensk had been a disaster and a total defeat for the Freedom Movement of the Rus. Several members of Tschistokjow`s organization had been killed or heavily wounded.

  After the rally, the collectivists had chased the scattered groups of their rivals through the streets of Smolensk till the morning hours of the next day. They had ambushed Tschistokjow`s men at the railway stations or had waited for them in dark streets to beat them up or even murder them. Artur Tschistokjow had escaped a raging horde of his enemies and had even been wounded in the upper arm.

  The media in Russia reported about the riots in Smolensk in their usual way, and made the rally of the freedom movement to an “Attack of the Rus on the peaceful demonstration of the collectivists”.

  “Each state has arisen from the need to suppress the eternal conflict between rich and poor. Moreover, each state has arisen under the influence of the constant struggle of rich and poor people. Hence, every state is always the state of the moste powerful economic class, which is also the ruling political group.

  This ruling, economic class is always thinking up new methods to put down the poor masses. The state and its regulations are therefore the base of the capitalist exploitation system, what means that the natural character of each state is exploitation…”

  Artur Tschistokjow crumpled up a piece of paper and threw it into the middle of the big conference table. The other members of
his cabinet shook their heads.

  “Well, well! This is Mardochow`s great philosophy! Silly talk and lies! We all know the global state, that his Lodge Brothers have created in reality. And we know its character: Brutal Oppression, destruction of cultures and nations and slavery of all mankind. This agent of the World Government can not fool me with his cheap lies!”, grumbled the Belarusian president in German, while Frank and his foreign minister were staring at him.

  General Kohlhaas was back in the presidential palace in Minsk and rolled his eyes, when Tschistokjow talked about the collectivist ideology.

  “Mardochow can not fool us, but he can fool most of the people. This concept has already worked many times in mankind`s history, because the mass is credulous and stupid!”, remarked Wilden angrily.

  Artur Tschistokjow held his injured arm, swore under his breath and told his ministers a few things in Russian.

  Then he applied the attention to the foreign minister again. “I have seen on TV, that the collectivists now are driving with cars full of bread through the country to feed the poor. Understand?”, said the leader of the Rus in German.

  “I have seen it too. The collectivists get that a lot of sympathy from the people with things like that. A rolling Suppenküche!”, muttered Kohlhaas.

  “Suppeküsche? What is that?” Artur was puzzled.

  “A rolling soup kitchen - in English. Anyway, the problem is, that the collectivists apparently have never-ending reserves of money to finance such actions. Feeding the people is the best method to recruit new members for the CASJ. And then, they can instigate them against us”, remarked Wilden.

  “But it is nothing but a giant fake! A fraud!”, complained Tschistokjow. “We are the real revolutionaries and we will be the only ones, who can free the Russian people and solve the social problems!”

  “We know this, but the mass of the people does not!”, said Frank and shook his head.

  Economy minister Dr. Gugin and the other participants of the meeting were getting a bit grumpy and Artur apologized for having previously ignored them. He repeated everything of importance in Russian and the audience nodded, smiling at Frank and Wilden. Then, the German foreign minister added some things in perfect Russian, and talked about a few additional details.

  Shortly afterwards, defense ministers Lossov said: “It would be the best for us, if the collectivists would make their revolution in Russia. After a while, all the people would recognize, that their economical concept is just nonsense.”

  “That`s right!” General Kohlhaas chuckled quietly.

  Wilden came a bit closer to him and whispered: “It`s amazing how the collectivist movement has virtually appeared out of nowhere, and how it has become a force like this within only a few months. It must be a new strategy of the Lodge Brothers to put us down. The media support Uljanin with all their might and have already unleashed a collectivist revolution hype.

  Who is that Uljanin at all? Where does he come from? He was there at once! The media made him famous - overnight! And it is the same with Theodore Mardochow.”

  Frank grimaced and stared into space. “We can only go on, Thorsten! There is no more turning back!”

  While Uljanin and his followers made several rallies and demonstrations in several Russian cities, winning more and more ground, the revolutionary zeal of the Freedom Movement of the Rus began to stagnate. The aftereffects of the defeat in Smolensk had heavily damaged the morale of many Rus.

  Until the end of the month, the Belarusian president and his cabinet concentrated only on domestic things. Tschistokjow initiated his new settlement and agriculture program to give young families a future in the rural areas of Belarus. Apart from that, Dr. Gugin desperately tried to end the economic crisis and did everything to create new jobs.

  After an incubation period of intense frustration, Artur Tschistokjow was again ready to fight. Meanwhile, a lot of his supporters in Russia and the Ukraine had left the movement and some of them had even changed sides. Now they were members of the much more successful CASJ.

  Almost everywhere in western Russia, the collectivists had build up structures, worked with a good organization and did everything to put down the Rus. Soon they used intimidation and terror to keep their enemies calm.

  They collected the names of their political opponents, sought out their addresses, raided their meetings points, burned their houses and beat them up.

  In September, Tschistokjow went to Pskov, where he founded a new chapter. Frank and Alfred drove again, together with hundreds of their comrades, to northern Russia and distributed newspapers and pamphlets. In Ostrov, at the Latvian border, they were attacked by a small group of young collectivists. However, the attackers did not know that Frank, Alf and the other troopers were no ordinary Rus, but experienced street fighters, and finally ended in the hospital.

  But ultimately, these actions were only a drop in the bucket. It was time for a successful demonstration to eradicate the humiliation of Smolensk and to regain the lost pride.

  Hence, Artur Tschistokjow eventually chose the city of Roslav at the Belarusian border and led a crowd of 10000 people through the streets. The local police wasn`t able to stop the Rus and the rally blindsided the collectivists. The few hundred of them, who had gathered for a spontaneous demonstration, were beaten down by Tschistokjow`s troopers. This was some kind of success, and it was more than necessary after the defeat of Smolensk. However, Belarusian television glorified the protest march in Roslav as a “great political victory”.

  Shortly afterwards, the Rus went on with their actions in the small villages along the border. They went to the poor and the desperate, giving bread to the people like the collectivists had done it before.

  In the meantime, Peter Ulljewski and his DSR men raised a collectivist underground group in Vilnius and several men were arrested.

  The GCF invasion of Belarus, originally planned for September 2036, was postponed again. More and more soldiers of the Global Control Force were transferred from Russia to Iran, where the rebels were slowly driven back into the mountains.

  Furthermore, it was heading towards a crisis also in other countries. In India, above all in the larger cities, there were riots in the course of water shortages, which had to be quelled by the GCF. Once again, the World Government recruited new soldiers for the international force, because they were needed to keep millions of discontent people under control.

  For wars against secessionist states like Japan or Belarus, they were currently not available. But with the collectivists and the Russian security forces, the Rus had more than enough enemies. Moreover, it was improbale that Tschistokjow`s movement was able to resist Uljanin`s organization in the long term.

  Despite everything, Tschistokjow`s men continued to infiltrate the northern part of the Ukraine and western Russia. The confrontation with the collectivists steadily increased, but this did not impress most of the Rus. Minister Dr. Gugin had meanwhile stabilized the economy of Belarus, up to a certain point. Nearly all inland revenues flowed back into the domestic industry and agriculture as subsidies, or were used for various reconstruction activities. In early October, Artur Tschistokjow finally abolished the Scanchip and reintroduced the cash. All banks in Belarus, Lithuania and Latvia were nationalized, while the international press reacted with a fire of hatred and slander. The money value was now connected with the manpower of the people - a revolutionary act, which caused the Global Bank Trust a lot of headaches.

  Frank had barely had time to return to Ivas. So Julia was still far away from him. Furthermore, she had ignored his offer to rent an apartment in Minsk. No, in these days, Frank lived only for politics…

  Outside it was dark and Frank was sitting in an almost empty apartment in the center of Gomel. He was already here since three days, but tomorrow Kohlhaas would drive to the Russian border again, in order to go on with the propaganda campaign for Tschistokjow. Alf and five other Russians from the trooper units lived here too, sleeping on old mattresses or uncomfo
rtable cots. At the moment, Frank was alone, because Bäumer and the others were somewhere in the city to buy food.

  Gomel - this city had seen a terrible bloodbath in the times, when the freedom movement had conquered Belarus. Frank and Alf always remembered the so called “Blood Rally”, when they walked down the streets here.

  In the course of the infamous Gomel rally, the Belarusian police had once shot down hundreds of protesters. Today, the younger members of the freedom movement often talked about “Gomel” with a touch of heroic glorification, but Frank and Alf, who had been there, only remembered a slaughter.

  And scenarios like this would return, if they tried to conquer Russia. There was no doubt, as Frank said to himself. And one day, his eternal luck would finally vanish and death would find him.

  “Sisyphean task…”, muttered Frank, staring at the ugly, yellow wallpaper on the opposite wall.

  “If Julia goes to Vilnius to study, then I will lose her in the end”, it flashed through his mind.

  But what should Frank except from her? Should she wait for him forever, always hoping that he would come back one day? After decades of struggling? He would probably rather return in a coffin to his home village, Kohlhaas thought sadly. This was much more realistic than any great victories over an enemy that still seemed to be invincible.

  In any case, he had Julia “under control” if she would stay in Ivas, as he explained it to himself. He would have her in sight, like a military unit or a squadron of troopers. However, Julia was no trooper on a strategic map, but a very intelligent, beautiful woman who had the right to do something with her life.

  “Soon you will be vanished, my dear. And I will still be trapped in this life that becomes more and more meaningless for me”, said Frank, while he beheld Julia`s photo.

  What would happen, if she studied in Vilna, Minsk or another city? Would a second “Victor” appear? A nicer, wiser and better man than himself? A man who was not a hero, but a normal, lovely person?

  Frank tried to ban these thoughts from his mind and his mood became worse with each passing minute.

  “If she would be a good woman, then she would support me. I sacrifice myself also for her and everyone else”, he hissed angrily and suddenly clenched his fist.

  But only seconds later, he became aware of the fact that Julia was an independent human being. Moreover, the daughter of the foreign minister was more than just an appendage of her father. And she was no barbie doll in the hand of a depressive street fighter like him. She had not only an angelic face, but also a keen mind. Anyway, she would live her own life. She would study and leave Ivas, and Frank had no right to stop her.

  “Fuck!”, he growled and kicked against the old, shabby sofa in the middle of the room.

  Shortly afterwards, the door was unlocked and a bunch of loud chattering troopers came in. Alf made a stupid joke in broken Russian and his comrades started to laugh. Kohlhaas moaned quietly and shook his head.

  “Good food, my friend. Very tasty…hmmm…”, said Bäumer with Turkish accent, brandishing a plastic bag. A stupid grin followed.

  “Tasty…hmmm…”,

  “Yes, nice!”, muttered Frank.

  “Aren`t you hungry? Here my friend, good food, my friend!”, bugged Alf.

  “Very funny!”

  “What`s up, dude?”

  “Nothing!”

  “Hey, Alexei! Tell Frank that joke with the young women and the car. It`s really great!”, shouted Bäumer at a Russian.

  A broad-shouldered trooper immediately came to Kohlhaas and started to talk. Alf was laughing in advance, although he had heard the joke many times before.

  “Okay, Frank…”, said the Russian. “Four young women are on a hill where an old car is. Suddenly, a guy comes around and he has a huge…”

  Bäumer started to laugh like a drunken sailor and the sturdy Russian lost the thread for a moment. Then he tried to remember the rest of the joke, while Frank was staring at him, full of frustration and rolling his eyes…

  While the freedom movement tried to expand its influence in western Russia, they CASJ conquered one city after another. Vitali Uljanin conducted the “Day of the Workers and the Disenfranchised” in Moscow, and no less than 300000 people gathered in front of the Kremlin. But his time, the situation got out of control.

  After the event, thousands of frustrated people marched through the city on their own and the anger exploded. Clashes with the police, who had received the order to let the demonstrators act, followed and 23 officers were killed.

  Uljanin`s supporters stormed through the streets like a marauding horde and smashed everything to pieces. Many immigrants from the republics of the former Soviet Union, which now inhabited great parts of Moscow, joined the frenzied mass and devastated the inner city. Finally, the mob was raging in the streets of Moscow for several days.

  The media tried to hush up the riots, but the “Day of the Workers and the Disenfranchised”, which had originally been planned as a promotional event for collectivism, remained in the minds of many citizens of Moscow as an outbreak of violence and terror.

  Artur Tschistokjow immediately took the opportunity and announced on television, that the collectivists had shown their “devil`s faces” in Moscow.

  In return, the Rus organized a number of smaller rallies in the Russian cities near the border. They marched with over 12000 demonstrators through the small town of Pytalovo and could not be stopped by the police. A few days later, Artur Tschistokjow spoke in Nowgorod, Percoy, Izborks and Sebez in front of several thousand people. These border towns could be reached and left quickly, in case of emergency. But all the rallies took place without bigger problems. Where collectivist disturbers appeared, they were chased away by the armed troopers. Slowly but surely, Tschistokjow`s organization won ground in some parts of western Russia and new local chapters and trooper units were founded.

  Artur Tschistokjow made Sergei Spehar, an ambitious and combative man in the early thirties, to the supreme leader of the Russian section of the freedom movement. His younger brother, Timur, got the leadership of the freedom movement in the Ukraine.

  Furthermore, Tschistokjow gave the local chapters more independence and autonomy, so that it was easier for them to organize rallies and demonstrations on their own.

  And this strategy was successful. The two brothers deployed a feverish activism and expanded the influence of the freedom movement in many cities.

  They made several demonstrations in the Ukraine and even one in the south of Nowgorod. But the Rus chose only smaller towns and avoided the bigger cities, which were already in the hand of the CASJ. Nevertheless, the conflict between the Rus and the collecitvists became more intense. At the end of October, four young members of the freedom movement were shot in Krestcy by some CLJ men. Four days later, masked thugs stabbed the local chapter leader of the freedom movement in Jamm. Tschistokjow`s supporters took revenge and killed three collectivists in Nowgorod. But this was just the beginning…

  After weeks full of activism, Frank and Alfred had returned to Ivas and enjoyed some quiet days. Sven Weber and the other young men from the village were still on the road - somewhere in Russia. One week ago, two young men from Ivas had been caught by the police and were taken into custody, as Julia told them. Since this day, nobody had heard from them anymore.

  Today, Kohlhaas had stayed in his bed for hours. Around noon, he got up and walked through the forest behind his house. How much had he missed this little village in the last months!

  Then he visited Julia and went with her to Steffen de Vries café. Towards evening, he went to HOK, the computer expert of the community.

  “Let`s see, what has become of my nephew Nico!”, he thought to himself, and decided to ask the corpulent computer freak to take a look at Nico`s Scanchip.

  HOK`s still not renovated house appeared abandoned. The shutters were closed and no sign of life could be seen from outside.

  “Holger, get out!”, shouted Frank and banged aga
inst the front door. A shutter was pulled up and a rumble was heard.

  “Who`s there?”, it resounded inside.

  “The GSA!”

  “What?”

  “It`s me! Frank!”

  Kohlhaas heard HOK coming down the stairs with loud steps. Then Holger opened the door.

  “Frank! What can I do for you?”

  “Am I disturbing?”

  “No!” HOK grinned.

  “Oh, I just wanted to visit you. Maybe there is something new on Nico`s Scanchip…”

  “Nico?”

  “My nephew!”

  “Oh, that Nico! Shall I look at his chip?”

  “Yes, if it is not too much work for you.”

  “Oh, no! Since the revolution in Lithuania, I`m not very busy anymore”, grumbled HOK disappointedly.

  “And what are you doing all day long now?”, asked Frank.

  “This and that. Hanging around, surfing on the Internet and so on”, answered computer scientist.

  “You could join the freedom movement. It would keep you fit!”, said Frank sardonically.

  “To get a bullet in my head? No, street fights are not my specialty. Sorry!”, returned HOK. “And now come in please.”

  They went to the upper floor. Meanwhile, the cyber-freak had a second computer room - with a view on his neglected garden.

  “This is true luxury! Two computers! One on every floor!”, explained HOK. Frank perked his eyebrows up and looked around.

  Suddenly, his glance hit a dirty glass vitrine full of odd miniatures. Frank was baffled.

  “Hey, that`s impossible! No, this can`t be! These figures are old miniatures from Battle Hammer, aren`t they? How cool is that?”, he exclaimed.

  HOK smiled. “Oh? You know Battle Hammer?”

  “Sure! Once I had a lot of these miniatures: Orcs, humans, elves, dwarves and so on”, answered Kohlhaas delightedly.

  “Then you will know these guys…”, said HOK, pointing at some great painted miniatures.

  “Uh, these are some knights of the Golden Order, right?”

  “Bingo! That`s right. Congratulaions! I have more than 6000 miniatures. A huge army of humans, an orc horde, several hundred dwarves…”

  “Brilliant!”, shouted Frank and was happy like a little boy.

  “Come on!” The computer freak pulled his guest with him, leading him into another room.

  Frank gaped. Here were even more vitrines full of miniatures.

  “Wow!” Kohlhaas was more than amazed.

  “I have the fantasy and the science-fiction version of Battle Hammer. And the expansion packs. Last week, I have ordered some more undeads on the Internet. Meanwhile, these old miniatures are very valuable!”, remarked HOK with a grin.

  “I had some undeads too…”, said Frank.

  “Look at this, Frank. My undeads! Vampires! Normal skeleton warriors! Zombies, Tomb crawlers...”, mumbled the corpulent computer nerd and showed his astonished guest a giant army of miniatures which was standing on the window sill.

  “I had to leave my beloved orcs and the rest of my collection in my apartment in Berlin, when they have brought me to Big Eye”, muttered Frank.

  “Do you still know the old rules of Battle Hammer?”, asked HOK.

  “Well, it is a long time ago…”

  “I have all the rule books here, Frank!”

  “Sounds good...”

  “Finally, I have found someone who knows Battle Hammer. Here in Ivas! That`s crazy”, cheered HOK.

  “Yes, it is!” Kohlhaas became more und more enthusiastic.

  “We should play in the next days. What do you think? Do you prefer Space Battle Hammer or Battle Hammer Fantasy?”, urged HOK.

  “I don`t really care. The main thing is we play and have some fun”, replied Frank smiling.

  “Hach!” The twisted computer freak tenderly stroke a monster of tin with his thick fingers. Meanwhile, the miniature was covered with dust, but HOK treated it like a treasure chest. “My little one, I thought that you would never get used again…”

  A little later, the two sat in front of a computer and HOK was racing again, with inconceivable velocity, through the secret data banks of the registration authority of the administrative sector “Central Europe”.

  “There he is, your nephew”, he said after a while.

  Frank stared at the screen. It had only lasted a few minutes until HOK had found the access to the sub-files on Nico`s Scanchip.

  “Oh, shit!”, he suddenly shouted out.

  “What`s up?”, asked Frank, trying to decipher the tiny letters on the screen.

  “Nico Günther, GCF Junior Academy Berlin. What the hell...?”, muttered the computer freak.

  Frank swallowed and could not believe his eyes. This was a bit too much for his mind…

  After Kohlhaas had gone home, he was on the Internet again and visited the website of the “GCF Junior Academy Berlin”.

  There was a photo of his nephew, where the ten year old boy was proudly smiling in his uniform, holding a certificate in his hands. “Junior officer of the year 2036, Nico Günther” could be read under the photo. Frank shook his head and turned the computer off.

  “That`s more than sick!”, remarked Alf who had come into the living room. He clapped Frank on the shoulder and tried to calm him.

  “He is the best in his class, the little boy”, said Kohlhaas with a quiet sigh.

  “I did not want to believe it, when you told me that”, came from Bäumer, who was puzzled too.

  Frank gave him a cynical smile. “First they liquidate his mother, put him into an orphanage and now they make the boy to an officer of the GCF. These damn rats!”

  “The GCF likes orphans, good human material…”

  “I know! It is the best human material!”

  “What can I say?!” Alf shrugged his shoulders.

  “My last living relative becomes an officer of the GCF. That`s a bad joke!”, groaned Frank.

  “Maybe one day he will shoot his uncle Frank and they will tell him that he has saved the world from an evil terrorist monster.”

  “Who knows what they have told him about his mother and you, Frank?”

  “Lies! What else?”, grumbled Kohlhaas.

  Alfred was silent and beheld his friend, who looked out the window with tears in his eyes.

  “Welcome to the madhouse! This world is nothing but a giant pile of shit!”, he whispered and went into his bedroom.

  Although he had been tortured by doubts, depressions and almost no sleep, Frank went nevertheless to HOK to play Battle Hammer. After all, it was a good method to find some distraction for a few hours. The tabletop game let Frank dive into another world, where he was save from the unpleasant reality around him.

  HOK had positioned hundreds of miniatures on a beautifully decorated table. Frank commanded a lovingly painted orc horde, while his opponent played the humans.

  “I cast with my orc shaman the “Magic Head Butt” on your general!”, said Frank and diced.

  “Ha, ha! It does not work!”, laughed HOK.

  Kohlhaas moaned. “Well, let`s do the close-combat phase! I start with my orc warlord and his bodyguards!”

  “Damn!”, mumbled the computer freak, sceptically staring at the dice that rolled across the table.

  “Your soldiers will be smashed by the green horde”, said Frank dryly.

  “Wait until my turn…”, replied his thick counterplayer, waiting for revenge.

  HOK moved his troops forward and put on a self-sure grin. “My knights attack your goblins!”

  “And my swordsmen will kick some orc asses!”

  Shortly afterwards, HOK diced and a triumphant cry resounded through the shabby house. Frank scratched his head.

  “Hmmm…”, he muttered thoughfully.

  In the end, Frank was ultimately defeated by his experienced opponent, but the game had nevertheless given him a lot of fun. The two men agreed to meet for a rematch in the next days, and Frank asked HOK to b
uy some more miniatures for him on the Internet.

  “I`m starting with Battle Hammer again. It`s just the coolest game on earth. If you can find some of these old figures on the Internet, then please order them for me”, said Frank and walked off.

  “Got it!”, answered HOK and smiled.

  Having a Tough Time...