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Eighteen Hundred Seconds
Part II
The only noise I heard was the sound of my own ragged breathing. Dario had stopped talking to me, and I had to find my own way through the maze. I saw several people and we shot at each other a little bit, but so far I hadn’t been hit and had only hit a few people. As soon as I saw my shot make contact, I was running down the hall. People didn’t take being shot at very kindly.
“How long has it been?” I asked Dario, pressing against a tall wall.
“Can’t tell you,” Dario said casually.
“What do you mean, you can’t tell me?” I snapped, spinning around and catching someone right in the head. I spun back into the wall and ran to find somewhere else to hide. “I want to survive for thirty minutes. How am I supposed to know when it’s okay to die?”
“Since when did you want to die?”
“I just need to survive thirty minutes, don’t I?” I retorted, jumping onto a low wall and running towards its highest point. I only had to jump about twelve hands, but the part I was running towards was really high up, maybe eighty hands.
Dario laughed dryly. “You only want to live for thirty minutes? That’s a different type of soldier. How long do you plan on staying with us, Kearin?”
I shut up, finally realizing what he was saying. This was all about survival, not winning a stupid game.
I heard a bunch of guns going off a couple of corridors down, and I pulled one of my grenades from my belt. Unable to tear off the cap with my teeth, I cursed my helmet and fumbled it off with my gloved hands.
“That was entirely unnecessary,” Dario scolded. “I didn’t teach you that language, and if you’re with people who do—“
“Are you Anglophobic, Master Dario?” I asked, throwing the grenade and running back down the wall.
“Anglophobic?” Dario repeated, confused. “No. Why?”
“Because cursing is in every-day English. Prefieres Espańol?”
“What?”
I swore again as I heard the grenade go off. I was still on high ground and it would be coming after me as well as the people I had tried to kill. I saw red lights as the lasers shot from the small ball I had thrown, bouncing around for a few seconds like real debris and stopping on the ground. One red laser came shooting after me, and I jumped the last twenty or thirty hands.
The thin ray of light bounced against the wall in front of me, hit the ground, and disappeared.
“Impressive,” I said with a smile. “Almost like real rubble.”
“Just,” Dario corrected. “Just like real rubble.”
“How does it work?”
“I wouldn’t know,” he said tersely. “I didn’t design the thing.”
I touched the floor where the ray had dissipated, then the wall it had bounced off. “There’s either something in the floor,” I told him. “Or in the wall.”
Dario snorted. “While you are working on your physics project, you are in the middle of a battlefield, an easy target for any level two that snuck in here.”
That I winced at. I had tried it once, and almost made it, too.
“You’re just trying to preserve your dignity,” I teased, pretending I had forgotten. “Being outwitted by your own student on how the arena works. It must be a brutal blow to your pride.”
“Look,” he snapped. “Are you going to sit in the middle of the hallway with a target on your chest or are you going to survive eighteen hundred seconds?”
Laughing softly, I turned back down the corridor. “Fine, fine, I’ll leave you and your little sense of honor alone with each other.”
“Watch out behind you!” Dario shouted.
I spun around, gun raised.
There was nothing there.
“That was cruel, Master Dario,” I muttered, bringing my gun back up against my shoulder and moving down the corridor.
“You knew I wasn’t allowed to tell you things like that,” he replied smugly.
Deciding it wise to leave that comment unanswered, I continued using my hit-and-run technique, and after a close hit by a sniper, I learned to look up as well as forward and behind. It took a lot of squinting and dodging, but eventually I found who was shooting at me and shot him down. He disappeared, and I congratulated myself aloud.
“Don’t get too smug about it,” Dario warned.
“Why not?” I said with fake haughtiness. “I’ve shot more than you did your first time, haven’t I?”
“I’m looking forward to when you get shot down,” he muttered.
“You’ll be an old man by then,” I teased. He laughed and contented himself at “hmm”ing at every decision I made at a crossroad. I ignored him, knowing that he was just trying to trim my nerves. I shut him out of my mind and glanced casually up.
On the wall were two vertical, glowing yellow slits, hovering just on the corner of my eye. I knew instantly who it was and surprised that I was actually able to see him. Pretending not to notice him, I glanced around, as if making sure no one was around. The two yellow slits were trained on me, but I didn’t moved. Tyke always aimed with one eye before shooting, just to make sure he was accurate.
With an exaggerated sigh, I leaned against the wall, tucked away my gun, acting as though I was exhausted.
“What are you doing?” Dario cried. Obviously he knew Tyke was there. “You can’t just sit there in the middle of a corridor. Do you want to get—“ he stopped abruptly, then said quietly, “What are you aiming at?”
“My gun isn’t even out,” I answered with a grin. “How could I aim?”
“You know what I mean,” he snapped, but I didn’t answer. I was busy watching Tyke. What was taking him so long?
Finally, I saw one eye disappear, and I jumped to the side as the red laser shot by my shoulder. “Ha!” I shouted, pulling my gun back out and aiming it right towards him.
His cover blown, Tyke jumped up for a safer place to shoot. But as soon as he stood up, I caught him square in the chest. “Gotcha!” I shouted with a triumphant smile.
With a muffled gasp, he clutched his chest, his eyes disappearing for a moment as he squeezed them shut. When they reopened, they were filled with shock and pain, and he stumbled over the back of the wall, landing in the corridor behind it with a sick thud.
Slowly, my smile faded, and I lowered my gun. “…Master Dario?” I asked hesitantly. “What did I just do to Tyke?”
“Well, obviously, you shot him,” he answered impassively. “A bullet in the chest usually does that to people.”
“Bullet…” I licked my lips and tried again. “These are laser weapons! they don’t kill!”
“Did you think this is a game?” Dario said, sounding a little frustrating. “Kearin, this is battle. Tyke was just shot in the chest. Side effect: death.”
He said more, I’m sure of it, but I didn’t listen. I rushed down through the hallways, trying to get to the corridor Tyke had fallen into. Dimly I heard Dario yelling at me in the background, and vaguely I saw someone shoot at me, but I didn’t care.
When I finally got to the right corridor, breathing heavily, I found Tyke’s lanky form sprawled in the middle of the hallway. His eyes were still half open, glowing faintly. I ran to his side and knelt, feeling his neck for a pulse.
There wasn’t one.
Franticly, I tried the other side of his neck, and both his wrists. But Tyke’s heart wasn’t beating.
“Dario!” I cried. “he’s dead!”
“Only natural,” Dario said calmly.
“I don’t believe it!”
“No? Fine, then, I’ll check the log on that gun of yours.” There was a pause, and I frantically searched for any sign of a pulse again. Still nothing.
“There,” Dario said triumphantly. “You’re gun was fired exactly three minutes and forty-three seconds ago, the exact same time Tyke was dispatched. Now do you believe me?”
“Dispa…” I could hardly speak. “Laser weapons…don’t kill…” I protested weakly.
“This is the Arena, Kearin,” my mentor snapped. I had never heard a more serious tone. “This isn’t a game, like you’ve heard. This is a real battle. Get over it.”
My breath caught. Tyke’s eyes still glowed, but they no longer had the will to keep alight and were fading fast.
“People are coming from behind you,” he warned, his voice much gentler than before.
I ignored him.
“Kearin, you need to get out of there. I can’t have you lying in the middle of the Arena like Tyke.”
My fingers clenched, but I gradually got to my feet and started to walk away. I didn’t want to be there when his eyes went out.
“You’re not going to pass up fresh ammunition, are you?” Dario asked suddenly, sounding surprised.
I looked back at Tyke, his half-used sniper rifle across his chest and the unused weapons on his belt, then gagged. “Dario, that’s disgusting!”
“Doesn’t exist,” he replied. “On the battle, nothing exists. Cowardice, pride, honor, they’re all nothing here. The only thing that does exist is death and survival. There’s nothing in between, Kearin. Either you come out of this alive or you don’t. It’s a simple concept.”
I rolled my eyes and turned back. I wouldn’t be a grave robber. For a moment I wondered how many people my mentor had killed.
“If you don’t take the weapons,” Dario warned. “Someone else will. You might have to fight that someone else, and I don’t think you would want him to have any advantage over you.”
Hesitantly, I stepped back towards my friend. Holding my breath for no reason at all, I bent and picked up the sniper rifle, slinging it over my shoulder next to mine. Then I unbuckled his belt and transferred each weapon to my own. I held the empty weapon belt for a moment, then let it fall back. I looked down on his eyes for a moment—then instantly regretted it.
They were a dull red an barely visible through the visor.
I turned and ran, but as soon as I turned the corner, I fell to my knees and was violently sick. Fortunately I was able to get my helmet off in time.
I wiped my mouth and snarled, “That’s what I think of you, grave robber.”
Dario didn’t answer.
I slipped my helmet back on and wrinkled my nose as the smell of my own vomit reached me, but I heard Dario typing at his keyboard, and my helmet vented itself.
“Now, about the people who are on your tail?” Dario said expressionlessly.
I gritted my teeth, wondering how many criminals I had learned about had a past with the Inter-Galactic Military. I thought about going criminal myself.
It took a red laser past my ear to pull me out of my contemplations and plans for the future.
I ducked and turned mechanically to my attacker, shooting him in the head. He stumbled back and collapsed, and did not get up.
I heard another shot from behind me, and this time I ran. I didn’t want to kill any more people.
I had a few more minutes of silence, my nerves frayed and my shoulders tensed, as I pointed my gun into every shadow. I skirted a health light that was in the spot light and ignored several ammunition lights.
When I turned a corner, someone jumped out and shot at me.
Taken off guard, I shot back, recognizing Jel’s red hair. Vaguely I wondered how many students she killed.
A red laser caught my right arm, and I cried out, dropping my handgun. When she shot me again in the same arm, I ran.
Dario sniffed. “It shouldn’t have taken you two shots to realize that you needed to run.”
“Shut up!” I shouted at him. ”Just shut up! I’ve had enough of you!”
I turned down one corridor and leaned against a corner, gasping for breath and clutching my wounded arm. I didn’t dare look for a blue health light, now knowing that this wasn’t some friendly game of laser-tag.
I hissed and examined my arm. Of course, there was no wound, but it hurt like none of anyone’s business.
I let out another low gasp as it throbbed to the rhythm of my heartbeat, which was very fast at the moment, heightening the pain.
“Man, that hurts!” I hissed to myself, wincing as I touched it again.
“Well, of course it does,” Dario said, sounding a little piqued. “You just got shot.”
With a shout of rage, I pulled off my helmet, yanked out my earpiece and tossed it away. I was tempted to tear away the microphone, too, but I decided that Dario could listen to what I was saying.
“If you won’t shut up, then I’m not listening,” I said angrily, slipping my helmet back on with my left hand. I rubbed my right arm and tried to move it, but it wasn’t obeying me.
Great. I was caught in the middle of a deadly battle, and the arm that controlled the trigger was gone.
I pulled out my pistol and started down the hallway. Vaguely I heard something coming from the earpiece on the ground, but I was through with my mentor.
I walked for what seemed like forever, avoiding people but shooting down anyone who insisted to come after me. I wasn’t taken off guard by any more campers like Jel, and a few shots, however far off their mark they were, were enough to send them running to another camp-out spot.
Unfortunately, it was only a mater of time before I ran into Jel again, and this time my dominant hand was out for the count. And she knew it. My wild shots did nothing to scare her off.
I was shot in one leg, and it buckled under me. I cried out as another laser slashed into my left wrist. The gun clattered to the ground. She stepped forward and pushed me all the way down, onto my back.
I panicked as she raised her gun.
“Dario!” I shouted, scared witless.
Jel pumped four rounds into my chest.
End part II
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