Rusted Over

When we met for the first time we were both nude. Birthed from a metaphysical womb into barren and grassy plains. We first encountered one another by the side of the road. He stood tall (though no taller than me), hunched over oh so slightly, the stone hatchet in his hand giving away his in-game age. I didn’t want to fight, but that can rarely be said of the other inhabitants of the world in Rust.

“Hey,” I typed into the chat.

Silence was his only reply. I backed up slightly as he stared through me into space.

“I’m friendly.”

Still nothing. We sat for a moment staring at each other. If he wanted to kill me he probably could have. A stone hatchet isn’t weapon of the year but it can generally beat the single “rock” that you spawn into the world with. I was mentally preparing myself to respawn and begin life anew when his arms fell to his side, the hatchet un-equipped. A split second later he too held in his hand the default “rock” weapon. At first I thought he just wanted to have an even fight. Two naked men slamming boulders into one another’s face, sure, there was something romantic about that. I was preparing my first swing when he crouched before me and held his rock towards me. This wasn’t a rock battle, this was a rock treaty. I crouched to match him and we pressed our rocks together in a sign of everlasting peace and friendship.

In our time together I only saw a chat message from him twice. The first simply said “follow”. And so I did exactly that. He led me deep into the woods to a place that I would later identify on a third party map of the game world as Ballzack Valley. What better place to make friends with a nude stranger?

Anything can happen in a world where you can mine chicken breasts out of a radioactive bear’s corpse.

We walked well off the beaten path, into an area of the game that it felt like the developers hadn’t really gotten around to finishing just yet. There were trees, and rocks, but not much else. It was here that he’d built what could only be described as a shanty. He opened the door and walked inside closing it behind him. When he returned he was brandishing building material and he quickly set up a small room connecting to his. He put up two doors and gave me a sleeping bag to set down. On one of the doors he set a code, so I figured the other was mine to code as I pleased.

Once I was situated he moved to the door to his locked section of the house and opened it. Everything was pretty standard, there was a sleeping bag and some storage along the outer wall, but what struck me was the single storage box in the center of the room. He stood by it and gestured as though he wanted me to look inside. I opened it and found it was completely empty except for a single M4 with a half full clip.

This was the only gun in the camp, and boy what a gun to have. I had no idea how he’d found what is essentially the most coveted weapon in the game, but there it was resting peacefully in a box that he didn’t dare remove it from. It certainly wasn’t well protected, the doors had codes, yes, but all anyone would have to do was blow up a single wall and they’d have the king of firearms in their hands. I couldn’t decide if this guy was new to the game or not, he obviously knew the M4 had value, but he was also satisfied with his policy of security through obscurity.

“Cool gun,” I typed.

Rather than granting my blatantly obvious statement a verbal response he instead removed the gun from its resting place and fired a single round into the wall, reducing our precious stock of 12 ammunition down to 11 and certainly making anyone within a mile radius jump at the sound of gunfire.

It was an incredibly unnecessary demonstration but I figured I would indulge him. “Awesome.”

Respect the M4.

While there is some mining and resource gathering to be done in Rust’s unfinished zones, you’ll usually garner better results if you stay closer to the main road that loops through the game’s world. When morning hit I made my way to an area nearby called Spain Valley and began my work there. My new friend decided to stay back, presumably to protect and pay tribute to our rifle god.

Shortly upon arrival I heard gunfire and noticed a stranger running straight at me. At first I thought he was coming for me but as he got closer I saw that he had two mobs tailing him.  He was getting pretty close to me when he finally keeled over from what I presume was blood loss. The mobs headed back to their original positions and I decided that I may as well see what this lost vagrant had been carrying.

There were a couple choice bits, a now empty shotgun, two research kits, and a couple pieces of kevlar. The kind of stuff you would come back for. I loaded up all the stuff I could but as I went to turn around I noticed three people in the distance. I had a sleeping bag to respawn at, and I had none of this equipment five seconds ago, dying would just mean losing nothing more than thirty minutes of my time. But as it so often does greed prevailed over cooler heads and I could hear bullets zipping past me as I turned to run back home.

What I would have looked like with an awesome shotgun.

I’d absorbed a couple shots and mostly mitigated them with medkits, but I still wound up slowly bleeding to death when the house finally came into view. It was going to be close, but if I made it through the door I could probably bandage myself up and make a recovery. I wasn’t really sure what the plan was to deal with the three armed people that would surely siege our base afterwards, but it was too late to do anything else.

As I made my final approach the nearest door on the house opened and revealed my new friend, obviously alerted by the never-ending stream of gunshots, he was brandishing our coveted M4. Perfect!  He expertly aimed down the barrel and unleashed his first wave of justice. The shots connected directly with my face and dropped me almost instantly. I don’t think he realized who he had shot until I spawned directly behind him.

Although I appreciate the good manners I think his time could have been better spent killing the three people following me instead of issuing his second and final only written statement to me. “Sorry,” he said in chat before collapsing to the ground in a bloody puddle. I ran for his body desperate to collect our precious M4 before they arrived, but I was too late. Another shot took me down and my sleeping bag was destroyed before I could respawn.

I’m not sure what happened to my friend, by the time I found our spot once more the building had been reduced to wood foundations. I typed his name into world chat a couple times but he never responded.

Literally everything that could have gone wrong that day went wrong mostly due to my poor judgment, but boy I had a great time fucking up. I hope you can forgive me Xxx420SmokezxxX, I did the best I could. All praise to the M4.