I have officially run out of ammo.
A soldier shoots at me and the bullets ricochet off of the metal trash can which I’m hiding behind. I fidget with my gun and hold it to the side of the trash can and return the fire, and when I hear the distant moaning right after, I can tell that the bullet made its mark.
Killing is not a fun thing to me. It’s a job. It’s my job to protect my friends and family back home, and if a small village in Mongolia is where I have to start, then so be it.
I slowly stand up from behind the trash can and point my gun around to people who potentially might try and kill me. All I see are children and old grandmas hurrying inside the small shops and staring at me in terror.
Do I really look that bad?
I turn to the right and look at my reflection off of a dirty window pane.
My red hair is messy as hell and reaches to my shoulders now. Dirt covers my facial features and there are blood splatters all over me.
I can barely recognize myself.
“204, can you hear me? 204?”
As much as a “good” of a cadet I am, I still fumble into my pocket and pull out the small radio transmitter and switch it on so that I’m not muted.
“This is 204, copy, over.”
This time, instead of a voice transmitting through the machine, a face appears. She has dark, curly brown hair and bronze skin with a scorching look that could melt any man around her.
Including me.
I can’t help but chuckle at the sight of Merlinda’s scowl as she watches me laugh through the telecomm. Her eyebrows furrow together and her fists clench as if she were ready to punch me through the screen.
“Heyyyyyy Merl,” I say, wiggling my eyebrows at her. I can feel the corner of my mouth pulling up into a smirk.
“Shut up 204,” She snaps back instead, folding her arms to her chest. She cocks her head quizzically, not unlike a bird at me.
Merlinda’s a friend of mine. Ever since we started training together, she’s always been there for me– whether it’s a weapon malfunction, test, or even an injury– Merl has always kept an eye on me just in case I do something stupid.
Which is a lot.
No matter how much she says that she hates me, I know she loves me. She’s always on the other side of the telecomm, looking out for me. She’s like a sister to me. No matter how annoying she is, I’ll always listen to her.
“Have you found The Rooster yet?” She asked, grabbing a bluetooth keyboard and beginning to furiously type, her fingers flying across the keys as she stared at the screen above her.
“Nope. I don’t even know why they’d send me to a small village in Mongolia– freaking Mongolia, Merl. Nobody lives here besides old ladies with their grandchildren..” I pause, glancing around me and ducking into a small corner store where the owner looks positively frightened and offers me a cup of tea with shaking hands, bowing his head. I nod to him, raising a flat palm to try and communicate to him that I will not harm him. “I don’t think somebody as violet as The Rooster will hide here. I’ve only shot like four bodyguards anyway–”
At that exact moment, shots ring out and screaming started echoing through the doorway of the corner store, and I raise an eyebrow.
“Well, shit. I always jinx it,” I say rather cheerfully, dumping the last of the rather dry tea into my mouth. God, caffeine. I haven’t tasted that in a long, long time.
I miss coffee so much I’d chop off my leg for it.
I tilt my head down towards the store owner and place the cup of tea on a rickety wooden table in the corner and look out the door for any soldiers.
Sure enough, there are seven of them– each one with various colored and decorated scarves covering the bottom half of their faces and various weapons in their hands. The one closest to me has a maroon rhinestone decorated scarf.
What a bad fashion choice, I think dully to myself. It’s not like I’m going to get blinded by those cheap-ass pieces of plastic.
You see, the COBRA network– led by the infamous Rooster– is a sort of cult.
I don’t know much about the cult because it’s apparently “classified,” as Merl tells me, but honestly, I really wouldn’t give a damn.
I do know that they wear the scarves as a heritage to themselves. It’s a personalization and it apparently tells others who they are– for example, the maroon of the scarf might represent bloodshed and the rhinestones of their liking of really bad and cheap jewelry.
“I can hear you criticizing the color choice,” Merl says through the transmitter with a roll of her eyes. “Just shoot them, for christ’s sake.”
“You can see through my camera?” I asked, surprised. Every cadet is equipped with a camera hidden somewhere on their body– just in case they die, or something bad happens.
Mine is embedded in the front of my shoulder. My friend Zack’s is embedded in his crotch.
Or so he tells me.
“Yes, I can see through your camera,” she says with a huff.
“I never thought you would be able to hack through it,” I say with a mischievous grin while loading my gun of bullets. A tease, of course. Merlinda is the best hacker in the whole country. Unrivaled for years.
“Shut up and find the door on the westside of that building.”
Before I can point out that the building she’s talking about is a bathroom, she tells me that there’s a trapdoor at the bottom.
As she continues talking about the schematics of the bathroom and what to avoid, like maybe the millions of mosquitos swarming around it, I notice the man with the maroon scarf walk towards the shop where I am slowly.
Before he can point the gun at me, I point my gun at him and fire a single bullet which goes through his forehead with a loud crack.
Dammit. I forgot to turn on the silencer.
Vaguely, I can hear Merlinda yell and scold me through the transmitter. I simply clip it into my pocket and put the rubber earpiece on so that I can still follow her instructions.
The other six men start running towards the source of the sound and I duck into the shop. The owner is gone, and in his spot is a girl with a rubber earpiece just like mine. Her eyes narrow and she reloads the gun in her right hand.
I now realize that the store owner is lying dead at her feet.
Before I can react she points her gun at me and shoots me in my left kneecap.
I buckle down and grit my teeth together in pain, trying not to scream. If I scream, they can find me, if I scream, I’ll die, I’ve still got a chance–
Through my blurry vision I can the blunt of a gun slam against the side of my head. My ears ring and my vision goes black.
YOU ARE READING
Sharpshooter
AcciónA twisted government full of propoganda and lies, a soldier who discovers his job is a lie and is forced to choose a future- in a cruel world with his family or a better one without.
