Cosmic Champs Lore — Chapter 3
Singularity Era Origin Story: Gunslinger Triggerman
To celebrate the 8 different types of Champs being launched in Singularity Era of the NFT Genesis, each week we will be sharing a chapter of the story behind our game Cosmic Champs. Read Chapter 2 here, or in the #lore channel of our Discord!
Gunslinger turned on his camouflage and slunk back deeper into the shadows of the corridor. That brash fool Cybi had rushed forward into the arms of the mentors, but he wasn’t about to have her give his location away. At least she had enough sense not to call back for him. Why should she? He was no ally of hers.
A mentor had their hand on Cybi’s arm as they guided her, and then other mentors came out, clouding his view of her. They were mostly silent — in fact, with their heads down, their blank faces, and their shuffling feet, you’d almost think they were shell shocked.
Gunslinger rubbed his chin. This was outside his range of experience. Something was up. And for his sake, so he knew how to keep himself safe, he wanted to know what. The answer was whatever was in that room they had all come out of. But he had to be sure they were gone.
When Gunslinger was back on his home planet, 2541 Punarvasu IV, in the megacity Sari Henta, he’d had countless hours when he just had to hang low, and wait for the right time to move. Waiting until the coast was clear so that he could steal food, steal away, or steal a weapon. There was no point trying to steal coins — it was all implanted with digital chips, and it was all tracked. He didn’t want anything that would give away the fact that he had nothing to his name — that he was no one — as soon as he tried to pay anyone with it, the central authorities would have been alerted that someone was trying to pay with a coin that wasn’t theirs and there would have been a price on his head.
Gunslinger felt into his feet, and slowed down his breathing so that his chest barely moved at all. When he was home, on Punarvasu, he’d pictured a line running from him down through the sands beneath the foundations of the buildings. If he did that here, there was nothing beneath him, apart from the ship, for an unfathomable distance. Just blackness, and space. Maybe he’d hit a star in a lifetime or two. He was barely breathing now. He could stay like this as long as he’d want.
Here, in the elite program, the battles were pretend, but in Sari Henta the battles were for real. As the years went by, he’d lost count of how many friends hadn’t come back to nap, one eye open, on the warm sands at night — he’d given up having friends at all. Friends were people you had to protect, and defend — having friends risked your life.
But he had been loyal to his mob of misfits. He was the second eldest there — which meant he was one of the longest surviving. He had been a mentor, too, in his own way — someone for the others to look up to, and model themselves on. He didn’t school them in anything particular, but he showed them the type of attitude, and grit, that was necessary to make sure you got back alive and unharmed at the end of each day.
He didn’t really remember what it was like to have parents. He’d been on the streets as long as he could remember. If he had memories of a happier childhood, he’d killed them off long ago. Better to keep it real, if you wanted to stay alive.
It wasn’t the first time he’d seen the selectors when they’d come by to watch the streetlings fight. Every couple of turns he’d seen them lurking, and wondered where the streetlings went that they took with them. He’d never see the kids again, but what the others told him, when he was younger, was that they were going to a better place — where there was food, clothes, and weapons that you didn’t even have to steal.
As he got older, and more world wise, he knew it was all bullocks. If anyone had bothered to ask him who they were, he’d have said to keep your distance and go the other way — who they were probably was just another member of the imperial forces there to hunt you, hurt you, and take from you the last scrap of sovereignty over your own choices, just like everyone else.
Ace Gunamo was the oldest amongst them — he’d joined their ranks after Gunslinger had — and he still remembered having a family, which Gunslinger laughed at him about. Ace had tried to recreate the mob as a family — telling them to look out for each other, and he’d look after them, and recount another story from his childhood when he remembered something — mostly useless and impractical — that his father and uncles had told him in a distant memory.
Gunslinger used to get up and walk off in those moments, he didn’t need his head filled with nonsense. Life was hard, life was brutal, better to remember that.
But one day the selectors came, and they walked up to a wary but friendly Ace, and said they’d been looking for talent like his. Gunslinger waited back, behind the corner of a building, and watched. Ace laughed lightly — Gunslinger could see he didn’t really believe them, but he wasn’t about to draw attention to himself by forcing a chase either.
When they had gone, Ace joined Gunslinger by the side of the building. “What did they want?”
“The imperial selectors for the elite program. You’ve seen them before. Here like usual to scout for talent to take part in the tournaments. This time they were looking for me.”
“Will you go?”
Ace thought for a moment. “Yes, I said I would. I owe it to the rest of you to make something of myself. I won’t disappear though, like the others. I’ll come back, take care of you.”
Gunslinger snorted at that. “Yeah, whatever. It sounds like a risk to me. How do you know who they are, or what they do with you? What if they just take the toughest and smartest and throw you in jail, so you aren’t a threat to them?”
“We’ve never heard rumors like that. We’d have heard something if they really did that. It’s worth the risk, don’t you think? It might really lead to something. Something better.”
Gunslinger threw a pebble in the air and caught it. “I guess it’s possible. I mean, the elite program is a real thing. Someone goes there every year. You see them on the billboards, all glorified. Just not someone we know. And no one’s ever come back to tell us it was real.”
“Yeah, but who’d want to. If they give you a better life, after this — like maybe joining the army or something — who’d want to come back. Life’s hard enough without remembering your past.”
With that, Gunslinger could agree. “Well, you better make sure you come back then, tell us what it was like. When are you going?”
“They said a transport vehicle would rendezvous here again and to show them this card.” Ace held up a white card with a gold chip woven into it. Gunslinger looked at it, and gave it a bite.
“Idiot, it’s not food.”
“No, it doesn’t even taste good. What if we swap it for some good knives, or some boots? Let someone else go for you.”
Ace thought for a moment. “We could, but this is worth a try. I’ll miss you. Look after them for me, would you, till I get back? They don’t deserve a life left to fend for themselves alone.”
Gunslinger squinted at Ace, but didn’t say anything. He wasn’t one for making promises he had to stick to.
That night, there was another street battle. It lasted for hours, as the gangs chased each other down the dark alleyways, even onto the sands. Another gang was moving in, and was trying to eradicate them. Gunslinger watched 2 or 3 of their young mates fall that night. No time to look at their wounds, or drag them into a doorway. Ace’s tactic was to take the offensive and was pushing them back, with Gunslinger at his side.
They were crouched behind a rubble pile of bricks. “Well protect them, whatever the cost,” Ace said. Gunslinger saw something white glimmer on the stones. He reached out with his fingers, felt for it. Ace scuttled along on his haunches, firing into the distance. Ace got up, and ran into the bursting red and orange lights, signally with his hand for Gunslinger to follow him. Gunslinger put the card into his pocket, checking first there was no hole in the bottom for it to fall out.
For a moment, Gunslinger thought to go after him. Then there was more firing. A thud. “I deserve a chance for a better life, too,” Gunslinger thought. Now it was hard to see through the flares, and the smoke, and then he could hear the sirens in the distance. It was the imperial forces, come, too late again, to bring order back to the streets. Gunslinger breathed deeply, looked side to side to make sure he wasn’t watched, and then slunk back again into the shadows, his hands over the pocket where he’d placed the white card.
That night, and morning, he laid low, waiting for all the units to be gone. If his mates were wounded, they’d be found, cleaned up, probably dumped back again in a day or two. Cheaper to leave them on the streets for fend for themselves, than keep them in a jail, or an orphanage. The ones that were OK didn’t need him, and the ones that weren’t OK he couldn’t do anything for.
He was there in the transport vehicle at the time the card stated. He showed the guard his card, and alighted. There were other young Punarvasus there, looking just as dirty, and tired, as he did. He sat down silently and didn’t look back.
When he’d got to the training center, they hadn’t jailed him, or sold him as a slave. He was fed, clothed, given some basic skills and trained in weaponry. He was hardened and tough, just like the others — but he had an edge to him the others didn’t — the willingness to win at any cost. No one wanted to be the one to fight him — because he didn’t fight clean. Once he was there, and he knew the chance to go to the elite program was real, he wasn’t letting anyone else be the one to go. He didn’t talk to anyone, or hang out. He slept, ate, and trained. He was going to be the one getting off this blasted, darned planet.
But once he was on the elite program ship, he wondered what it was all for. So what, he could have mock little battles in mock little arenas — he’d already seen and experienced more real street fights in his life than these pampered princesses would see in their entire life times. Sure, they could fight on a bigger scale because their mummies could afford it- with mechs and droids — but he could always beat them in a war of attrition.
Gunslinger’s attention came back to the corridor outside the mentor’s guild room. It was quiet now, and had been for some time. It was probably OK to step out slowly, and enter, to see what they had all been meeting about. At best, he’d see some real evidence — at worst, there’d be some nice cookies on a bench leftover from the meeting that he could pilfer.
He slid sideways along the hall, and then stepped meaningfully into the room as if he was meant to be there.
No one was there. The seats were empty. He stepped through the chairs. There weren’t any snacks or catering. There was a large screen, over by one of the windows, but it was mostly blank, except for a few words and numbers scrolling across it that he couldn’t read.
Gunslinger turned to go, and then saw Invin in the corner, watching him. “Are you meant to be here?” Invin asked.
“I came to see someone,” said Gunslinger, “But they aren’t here. I’ll be going.”
“Wait a moment. You will have missed the meeting with the trainees that the mentors called. They need to tell you something.”
“What?”
“I guess I can, everyone else will know. It’s the planets. They’ve all gone.”
Gunslinger screwed his face at this. “The planets? Gone? What planets? You’re a smarter one than me, Robot.”
“The home planets. Of all the trainees and mentors. Of the galactic federation. We can’t contact any of them, and no signals are coming to us. We can’t find them. We could be alone.”
Gunslinger, if he were honest, didn’t know much about planetary affairs, space, or galactic federations. But he knew this sounded ridiculous. The droid was either messing with his head, or had something wrong with its wires.
“So are we lost, or the planets? Sounds to me like it’s a lot more reasonable that we’re lost than the planets are. I mean, all they have to do is go around a sun, right? It’s not like they can go for a walk in space and get lost.”
“We’ll come up with a plan for next steps to ascertain the exact situation. In the meantime, please wait for further information and attend your classes.”
Gunslinger wasn’t going to bother saying goodbye to a robot, soul or no soul. He turned to walk out. Invin started talking as he moved.
“I understand it’s a lot to take in. But you know, if you want to know something in, there’s no reason to hide in the hallways. You can just ask.”
Ask? For what? Gunslinger stopped. “Let’s just say, there are no planets. How about stars? Other ships? What does your brain compute about all that?”
“That’s a good question,” said Invin. “I expect that we will have more information about that soon. It depends what we find out there, and if anyone finds us. For now, we are alone.”
Gunslinger threw a disc into the air. Alone? Ridiculous. What he wanted right now was to be off this ship, alone from these idiots, and good riddance.
About Cosmic Champs
Cosmic Champs is a play to earn, tower rush, real time strategy game developed by gaming studio, Mad Shapes. It aims to remove many of the existing barriers of entry for typical P2E games. This means it’s mobile first and no wallet, tokens, or NFTs are required to play. These innovations position Cosmic Champs to become the benchmark for crypto games in GameFi. The game will be available in Android and iOS app stores late 2022. Cosmic Champs NFTs are the gold standard in 3D game ready NFTs on the Algorand blockchain — a carbon negative blockchain built to be sustainable and secure, and the home to the FIFA+ Collect World Cup 2022 series of digital collectibles. The native governance token Cosmic Gold (COSG) is available on all major Algorand exchanges. Cosmic Champs graduated from the Algorand Foundation and Draper University Blockchain Accelerator Program in 2021 and conducted an over subscribed private sale led by Borderless Capital.
