Keep Your Eyes Open

Preparation

Of all the things I needed in the world, outdoor survival skills was not one of them. What I needed was a normal life, but that was never going to happen again.

The instructor was a dull, middle aged man who had a monotone voice.  I would not have been surprised if he just suddenly went,

"Fuck it."

And walked out of the room.

I could also see Harri's attention starting to wear thin. He knew all this already, because before this all happened, he used to watch Bear Grylls. The room we were all crammed into was dark and much like every other room in this wretched place. There was a single projector hanging from the ceiling, and the bulb needed changing.

Half-way through the guy's speech about how to make a shiv out of a stick, Mr Ford bursts into the room.

"Have you done gun training yet?" His voice boomed. The silence that followed answered his question. "Right, sorry to cut it short Mr Mallow, you lot need to come with me right now." My legs complained as I stood up. I was still sore from yesterday. I doubted I would be alright in time for the hunt in a two days time.

We were hurried down too many corridors, until a soft breeze caught my cheeks. We were going outside. Mr Ford, who wasn't the thinnest of all people, sort of waddled along, guiding us to the shooting range that was just outside the headquarters. It was an entirely separate building, perhaps to stop a crazy person from breaking in and stealing all the guns.

We all filed in and took a pair of bright red ear protectors. Someone told us to only put it round our neck, which was an obvious thing to say. But perhaps it was necessary.

The leader of the 'activity' (as I would call it) was a female that looked like she was in her early twenties. The other members of the squad were eyeing her, and it nearly made me throw up. She was a professional trying to teach us about gun safety and how to us them, but all they were thinking about were her body parts.

She noticed this and begun to talk about guns as if they weren't doing it.

"I'm Maddy, and, as you may have guessed, I'm going to teach you how to use the guns you will be given for the hunt." She took out a handgun and what looked like an assault rifle. "This, is a glock." She held up the handgun and begun to tell us that it was only single action  and therefore must be cocked manually before you are able to fire.

A guard who was standing by handed us all one. It was heavy and cold. 

"They're all empty at the moment, but you can see that there is a magazine already loaded. We're going to practice removing and loading the magazine." It seemed like preschool. Push the button, catch the magazine and reload it again. Simples. "In the hunt, just dispose of the empty magazine, as you will have fully loaded magazines strapped to you."

The hunt is all they're talking about. I don't want to be part of this hunt, I just want to go home to my family again, and feel their arms around me again and... I had to bite my lip to prevent myself from crying out. Something was clawing at my chest again and it seemed to be doing damage. Stop it. Stop it.

"Right, each of you take a fully loaded magazine and load it in." We each grabbed one from a table that was behind us. I watched as everyone else loaded their magazines in, and it scared me. It scared me that we were teens, going to go on a hunt for zombies.

"Ok, great guys. Now each take a booth." I hadn't noticed the small partitions that looked out onto a target. I took one next to Harri, and I felt too far away from him. He was the only thing I had left, besides my friends. "Ok, cock the gun." I'm guessing she assumed how it all worked, we all knew the typical gun movement. "Right. Now, in a moment I want you guys to put on your ear protectors. But, here's the thing. See that light up there above the target? Only fire when that is green. And watch for the kick at the end. You will keep firing until you run out of ammo."

A short pause. When she spoke again, it was further away. "Right. Ear protectors on and wait for the signal." As I pulled them on, my heart began to race, and my hands began to shake. I hadn

My eyes were wide and were looking straight at the light. I did not want to raise my gun a moment early.

The sudden change in colour made my heart leap and I took the gun up and aimed. I fired and my wrist flew back. It wasn't as painful as the first time I did it. I hadn't realised that I shut my eyes, and as I gingerly opened them, I saw my aim wasn't too far off. I smiled smugly. But that smile faded as I saw that Harri's was on the bulls-eye.

Oh well. At least that means he can shoot.

I continued firing until it locked. I hadn't done so badly, but my hits grew more sporadic as my wrist began to ache.

However, I knew that if the situation did arise, I could use this gun. After what seemed like a few minutes of silence, I took my ear protectors off, turned around, and placed my glock on the table.

"You will only use the glock when in close-range combat. It doesn't do much damage if you use it for long-range combat. So, for long-ranged combat, we'll  use the G36 assault rifle. It is a semiautomatic and single action. We'll be going outside to use these." Maddy motioned for us to follow her outside, and in one silent line we did.

She took us round the back of the building we were just in and to the other side of it. It had fake torsos set up at varying different ranges. The assault rifles were being guarded by an enormous bloke who had rock-like facial features.

"There should be enough targets, please take the one that you feel most comfortable shooting for." I took one of the closer ones, as I still wasn't too sure. The targets were a dull grey. By the end of my visit here I never want to see grey ever again. I stood by the marker and waited for someone to pass my an assault rifle.

It worked much like the glock, it had a magazine that reloaded the chamber after you had fired a round. However, I knew it was going to batter my shoulder in. When Maddy told us to, we put on our ear protection and waited for the signal.

When I saw the signal, I anxiously aimed and fired. The rifle shot backwards into my shoulder and hit a bone at an awkward angle.

"Shit," I muttered, moving my shoulder about. It seemed fine, but I was definitely going to get some good bruising.

Much like before, I kept firing until I had run out of ammunition.

We had a quick debriefing session before being let back inside for lunch. A wind had started to pick up by the time we were back inside, and it had nipped at my cheeks.

Apparently we were going to have a melee weapon training session after lunch, just in case it should come to that.

I sat down with my friends, who were all chatting about how their shooting skills were good. For the last exercise, I hadn't done too well, but I did manage to shoot the target three times in the chest.

"You alright?" Harri asked, turning towards me. I nodded whilst slowly chewing my food. I swallowed and then asked him the same question.

"Yeah, just nervous for this whole hunt thing... " He took my hand and held it for the duration of the meal.

I did not even want to think about the hunt. I was so scared I was going to lose Harri, or Harri was going to lose me.

But, Harri could fend for himself, so it would be me who dies in the end.