The Beastmaster of S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2, part four: the last bite

As a seasoned survivor of the Zone, I can tell you that Boris Beastmaster’s tale is one that resonates deeply with me. The struggle to tame the wild and unpredictable forces at play within the Zone mirrors my own journey as an Artifact Hunter.

As someone who’s been braving the treacherous landscape of S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chornobyl, I can attest to the saying that hope often leads to heartache. And here I am, having taken a significant leap in my quest. You see, I’ve uncovered hints suggesting another adventurer was trying to domesticate the Zone’s ferocious creatures. Armed with one of their electronic tracking collars and no prior knowledge of where they might be, I ventured out to locate this fellow traveler. Alas, once again, the Zone has shut that door in my face.

This door is cold, made of steel, and quite literal in nature. Unsurprisingly, the scientist’s lab is securely locked, staying that way for approximately twenty more hours as I dive deeper into the escalating conflict known as the faction war. Coincidentally, I won’t be relinquishing my collar during this time.

In my ongoing adventure, it turns out that I had unnecessarily dispatched the rats since the data from their tormentors was also found on a dead body’s PDA in a close-by cave. However, this cave housed a Burer, a grotesque mutant resembling a humanoid, who nearly finished me off with his rifles that seemed to float in mid-air. This ability intrigued me so much that I decided to lure him out, hoping to harness his power myself. Unfortunately, the Burer was more cunning than its Vampire kin – it even knew to protect its posterior – and wouldn’t pursue me, forcing me to continue my exploration on my own.

In much the same way as my previous freelance work, this non-violent strategy I’m compelled to adopt seems oddly successful in numerous missions. I managed to avoid an assassination task by offering a bribe to the person assigning it. I evaded his subsequent betrayal by diving into a sewer drain without causing harm. I made allies with ex-cultists, and when they sent me to retrieve crucial equipment, I merely ran past the mind-wiped zombies guarding it. A moment of fear struck when a Controller, another psychic mutant, attacked me, making my vision spin like cartoon eyes on springs, but even he was an optional fight that I fled from with minimal brain damage.

Despite feeling dissatisfied, I find myself making progress in an unexpectedly tame manner, given that I’m supposed to be Bohdan Beastmaster, a master of subduing the monstrous. Upon returning to the former cultist camp, I receive a sleek camouflaged sniper rifle, implying that the universe expects me to take this more seriously. However, I press on, determined not to let this go to my head. I accept the gun with the same grin I gave my grandmother when she gifted me a Pixar’s Cars alarm clock at 17, and move forward towards my next objective: a military base where I can install the recovered technology.

Once more, I find myself alone, having not encountered any monstrous companions during my journey. Upon reaching the base, I stumble upon the killers in the underground tunnels shortly after their attack on the guards. These are rogue members of the cult, either searching the base for their own malicious intentions or simply yearning to reclaim their sniper rifle. The narrow corridors put me at a disadvantage with their greater numbers, but as usual, their automatic weapons prove no match for my agility-based escape techniques. I quickly climb a ladder and return to the surface, where a stranger shouts from a control tower that he should have eliminated me earlier.

As a gamer, I’ve been wandering aimlessly through this Zone for hours without a weapon, friend, there have been numerous opportunities to escape, but no luck so far. However, this guy is blocking my path to the gizmo installer, which means I’m about to engage in a fight I can’t simply run away from.

Revealing his position spells trouble. My initial strategies seem futile: he’s climbing a ladder, making it impossible for me to bring a mutant to kill him even if I find one. Ignoring him and trying to set up the machinery before he kills me isn’t an option either because I can’t interact with the receptacle while in combat. Remarkably, it appears that I might be able to execute an unforeseen Plan C, as a catastrophic psychic storm known as Emission begins to sweep across the Zone. As the wind picks up and the sky darkens, I abandon my position at the base of the ladder and seek shelter in the lab below, confident that the more exposed tower will leave my adversary vulnerable for an attack.

As the clouds part and I ascend once more, I’m greeted with a hailstorm of bullets. Forgotting for a moment about these guys’ immunity to Emissions, I’d naively thought I could let this guy rest during our battle. Little did I know, my cowardly dodge only gave him a peaceful respite in the middle of combat.

It’s not working out for me. I seem to have exhausted all possibilities. However, that fellow seems to have an endless supply of ammunition. Despite my journeys across the Zone, using mutant powers to defeat seasoned soldiers, and even managing to turn the tables on my personal pursuer, this guy atop a ladder threatens to make it all meaningless. And yet, he continues to shoot me.

You know what? You can have the sniper rifle back. Here you go:

With that, I’ve fallen short. My pledge, my commitment, to never take a life with a weapon, appears to be in ruins, fragmented just like the pieces of his chest. But is it truly? He’s still alive, still wheezing out threats. And there’s an option to merely depart and let him live on. I believe I can slip away unscathed, as long as he doesn’t meet his end.

Bollocks.

The game is over. As I take pride in having managed to interweave one mystery with another, I imagine the ghost of my father and guide, Boris Beastmaster, disapprovingly shaking his head and hurling derogatory remarks. “I’m sorry, father,” I softly say. “Foolish one,” he retorts. It’s more than just a loss – by forsaking my principles, I didn’t merely fail a mission, but I’ve lost the very purpose that defined me. The purpose to… survive. What use is a beastmaster who can’t control beasts?

It was clear from the outset that I was destined for trouble, given the complexities that go far beyond a single individual on a ladder. The Zone, in its essence, is almost sentient and unpredictable, capable of both destroying and bestowing upon those who dare to venture within. Although we can develop instruments to probe the soil for relics or restore the energy of abnormal artifacts, the Zone transcends physical and mathematical laws so profoundly that it remains largely a mystery – if not entirely incomprehensible. How can one attempt to control something, even an aspect of it, when its nature remains shrouded in enigma?

Despite the possibility that my journey may come to an end, I refuse for it to conclude in such a hasty betrayal of my values. In truth, there’s still one more battle left within me, and seeking retribution against one of the tower shooter’s cultist accomplices seems like the ideal means to expend that strength. I manage to track him down a few kilometers south, at which point I promptly set off in search of something with a formidable bite to meet up with him.

In a supply shack down near the southern swamps, I find just the thing: a Bloodsucker, who (unlike that no-life Buren) is all too happy to chase me the hundreds of yards back where I came. Sure enough, the cultist is still there. Shocked and probably quite confused, he blasts me his with AK, but I’ve got ample medkits and nothing else left to lose. In his focus, he completely ignores the beclawed glimmer that followed me in, and within seconds, the Bloodsucker bursts from his cloak to slash the traitor down in two swings.

Although I might not have completely controlled these creatures, it’s gratifying to me that I could still influence them in some way. Redemption, if not total forgiveness, is what I find here. With a contented sigh and a small smile, I step forward to confront the Vampire myself, submitting to the verdict of this Place. In silence, I let my final chosen companion guide me gently to the ground.

2024-12-18 20:25

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