My Socom Story

Sit down, my friends, and I shall tell you a tale.

In the beginning, when God created Socom, when the newbie cannon was the M63, the map of choice was Frostfire, and the claymores dominated the hostage room of Desert Glory, there was a young lad by the name of (NMC) C-MAN. He was a good friend, and a great player.

I speak of Socom, not of Socom II, mind you. In the time I speak of, the game was pure; there were no ghosts in the walls and the end-of-round screen clearly displayed that people were downed with 2-3 shots.

But I digress.

(NMC) C-MAN was once happily sitting at his couch in front of his modest 19 inch color television, bought nearly 20 years before to watch the 1984 Summer Olympics. In this late winter of 2003, C-MAN had no idea of the challenge he would face that afternoon after period seven. After about forty minutes of comfortable grenading to the soothing voice of a Russian terrorist singing the words Au Shlaa Grenada, C-MAN decided to change to the less familiar scene of Rat's Nest, which was then blanketed with bright sunshine. The enemy was formidable. It would be that game, when the rounds were tied five-five, that would test C-MAN's abilities.

Because he and his teammates were on the terrorist side, the initial plan was obviously to wait behind the sheet metal in the cavernous tunnels with claymores positioned at every corner. Had he known of the immense attack the opposition was plotting, C-MAN may have agreed and camped as well. As the round started, however, and C-MAN ran left to an opening beneath a blue cloud-spotted sky, he heard the cries of teammates dying and the roar of claymores exploding in vain. The noise was from the right side of the terrorist starting point. C-MAN's right thumb moved to the O button, and he awkwardly placed an unused left finger to substitute control of the right analog stick. In a weak voice he asked what happened on the right side, but because he had instinctively been watching the top of the screen for tactical messages, he already knew there would be no answer. Seven terrorists were fragged by M67s and HEs. Not one of them had killed a seal. It was eight on one.

C-MAN tapped the L2 button, and a black grenade appeared in the bottom left of his screen. He turned around from the opening and headed back to his own base. His right index was fully pressed, which filled the circular, yellow reticle and gauged a throw of about a hundred and fifty feet. He popped around the corner of the left side of the enormous underground room he had started from. "FIRE IN THE HOLE" appeared six times in yellow letters in the message box. Each grenade soared across the room and landed behind the corrugated metal standing upright in between the wall and a vertical wooden pole. As the sixth one flew, he heard the fourth frag a seal. Seven.

After frantically searching for a body, he found a dead terrorist and dove on his body. He was rewarded with four claymores. Air blew forth from the heater in his livingroom. Although it was warm, it caused his body to erupt in goose-bumps. Focusing again on the right-side opening of his base, he laid down six rounds of cover fire, leaving 94 left on his clip. As he turned around to leave the starting place again, he saw small clouds of dirt flying off the walls and heard hisses from the left speaker. They were in pursuit. C-MAN brushed the hair away from his sweaty forehead. He opened the menu to get his claymores and placed one just outside the left entrance to the base, facing away from the base. He backed away, and placed another behind the first metal panel after the opening. A mental timer went off in his head. He fired his M60 at the entrance as he walked backwards. The cross-hairs widened and rose above the middle of the screen. 94, 93, 92, 91, 90, 89, 88, 87; the bullets seemed to travel in slow motion. But they hit their mark. Six.

C-MAN backed to the right, which would have been to the left if he were facing forward. He placed another claymore around the corner, once again facing away from the direction he had just come from. And then he waited.

He didn't have to wait long; he knew it would only be a matter of seconds. He had hoped that when the first seal appeared in front of his last claymore, the others behind him would be in front of the other claymores.

One tan-camouflaged seal in a cotton, brimmed hat hurled around the last corner. C-MAN's index twitched, then plunged over the R1 button. The seal in front of him was blasted to the ground. Five, he thought, and as he glanced in the message box he anxiously confirmed what he had hoped: two more seals had been killed in the other blasts. Three.

He continued to back away, pressing down fully on the trigger and watching the numbers in his clip diminish. Another seal came around the corner. C-MAN nearly smiled as his cross-hairs went red over the charging seal, but his facial muscled contracted when the last two followed their crewman into the diminishing smoke of the last claymore. Guns roared and bullets flew. C-MAN's left joystick was smooth like a pendulum but unpredictable like this week's lotto numbers. He strafed left and right. The first of the three to appear was already dead, having walked right into C-MAN's heated barrel. Two.

The last, however, were just as random as he. Their movements were executed perfectly to avoid his fire. Soon, C-MAN knew, they would have to reload, and he still had a bit of a clip left. Indeed, they did reload. The opportunity was not what C-MAN had hoped it would be, but it was not completely futile. Blood squirted from the torso of one of the seals, and from the left shoulder of the other. But neither went down.

The standoff continued. C-MAN's clip was now running low, but his senses told him that their clips were low as well. In a few seconds, C-MAN, the two live seals, and the thirteen dead comrades heard the loudest silence of their lives. In was the sound of three magazines changing at once; from two M4A1SDs and one M60E3. Six feet scurried back and forth over the dirt.

All guns were once again ready, and the sound of the heavy machine gun poured through TV speakers. C-MAN heard none of it. No sound went in his ears, and he saw nothing but the yellow cross-hairs. His bullets tore through the neck of one of the seals. The seal's head went back as he threw up a pint of blood. One.

C-MAN gently pushed his right thumb to move the cross-hairs over the last remaining seal. His gun pulsed round after round into the seal's supple belly. At the same time, the seals silent bullets were slipping past C-MAN's blue turban. One penetrated the cloth.

The firing stopped. In perfect synchrony, the seal and the terrorist fell to their knees, and collapsed face first into the floor of the cave.

C-MAN knew that the first sign of victory would be Zipper's rendition of Turmkmenistan music.

No harmonious minor chords were to be heard.

The seals had won.

C-MAN died that day, never to return. I retired his name and started anew. Another legend was born, and his name was StealthFire.

By StealthFire on the PlayStation Forums
Images from GameSpot