MEKA BORN: UNKNOWN

004

The bright orange zero froze above Kade's booth. Each second it stayed, the more horrified he felt. The target blinked off, and disappeared. His gut twisted, and shrank, the other Initiates started to gather around his booth and laughed at him. Kade set the gun down and hung his head.

"Hey. Hey!" Keller barked loudly. "Back to your booths now or I'll make every single one of you run a hundred laps!"

Kade heard Keller's heavy footsteps march up behind him. He heard the hesitation in the steps when Keller noticed the fat zero above Kade's head.

"Wow..." Keller said. "That's a...first... here I'll reload it for you, then watch you take more shots."

Keller moved next to Kade in the booth. Kade shrank against the wall, and hoped he could just blend in and not be seen ever again. Keller reloaded the pistol quickly, and held it out for Kade.

"Ten more shots, ten more targets, go," Keller handed Kade the gun, and the target reset back into the smaller version of a Grunt.

Hesitantly, Kade took the pistol. Got back in his stance, and aimed down the sight, and put the Reaper Grunt hologram in danger. Kade fired, and when the gun clicked empty. Another fat orange zero appeared over his head. He had failed again. Scorch marks started to gather all around where the target stood. With the target, having gone untouched.

"Ok..." Keller said. "I've never see this happen before... I've had people get scores of one and two. But never zero... you know what, third times the charm." Keller reloaded the pistol, and Kade fired again. And again, missed every shot. Snickers echoed from down the line of the other booths. "Maybe the sights off, I haven't shot it in...a week..." Keller said. Then he reloaded the gun, aimed and hit ten for ten. "Figured..." Keller sighed and turned around to lean back on the booth's table. "Your stance is perfect, and missing thirty in a row is near impossible. I have no clue—" Keller trailed off, and got a far off look, and Kade could almost see the lightbulb form over his gnarled head.

Keller grabbed Kade's arm, and dragged him backwards. Further and further Kade struggled to match Keller's pace, as he was almost jogging backwards now. His foot caught on something, and Kade fell to his back, and landed on something soft and grainy.

"Sorry about that," Keller said. "Grab you one of those on the rack."

Kade rolled to his knees, he was in the sand pit. He was mesmerized, and slowly dug his fingers through the thick coarse sand. He felt every grain run through his fingers, even grabbed a handful and watched it drain from his hand.

"Come on BLK-001, plenty of time to play in the sandbox later," Keller said.

"What's a sandbox?' Kade asked, as he drew lines in the sand with his fingers.

"Never mind that! Get to the rack!" Keller barked.

Kade jumped, then got to his feet and hurried to the rack. There were dozens of different types of long weapons. None of them guns, or even had barrels. They had handles, and a small part that went made the weapons go into a sort of 't' shape. Kade grabbed one.

The grip felt perfect in his had, and it was heavy but also felt light, like it made specifically for him. The white dulled training blade had a single edge, and slightly curved upward.

"The Katana, nice choice," Keller said. "Stand in the sand, and try to not get hit or kicked out of the circle."

Kade, now with his sword in his right hand. Stepped back into the beige sand pit, eager to touch it again. Keller pulled up his tablet and scrolled on it until he tapped on the screen. An orange holographic humanoid figure appeared across the sad pit from Kade. It too had one of these weapons. But that thing's was straight and had a bigger cross handle over the grip.