The ancient garden lay in total silence and behind one of the columns stands a man tightly pressed against it. With a trained ear he searches the small grove for any sound, but he hears nothing. His opponent is good, perhaps even as good as he is. No, no one is as good as him, though the other guy had drawn his gun with great speed. His hand slides down the kevlar reinforced coat until it reaches the large hole in the left side. The ray had shredded the side of his precious coat. A coat he had made a great deal of effort to obtain, it had not been easy to find a coat like this. It would never be whole again. There he heard it, a breath somewhere in the grove, so the opponent was not that good. Without making any sound he slowly slides down the column. He reaches for his boot and when his fingers come in touch with it he lets his hand slide over the smooth surface. If the coat had been hard to get it was nothing to the boots and they had cost him a fortune. They were made from the skin of a Sangarian pit frog and were almost indestructible. At the same time they were silent and wearing them felt like walking on clouds. They were one of a kind just like him. He reaches inside the right boot to get his spare gun but it’s not there, he must have dropped it. Damn. From one of the coat pockets he gets a small mirror and with a steady hand he uses it to check around the corner of the column. He slowly lets the mirror reflect the surrounding area, somewhere out there is his opponent. But it’s impossible to say where, as there are numerous places where a man could hide. Then he sees his handgun, it lays on the ground 7-8 meters away from him. It’s a pulse inducing semi gun, with a grip specially made for him. It’s perfectly balanced and matches his DNA. If anyone else tries to use it, it will explode. How could he have been so clumsy to drop it? Has he become sloppy? Anyways, he needs to get it, but how? He goes through the coat pockets and retrieves the objects inside. That is another advantage with the coat, its perfectly fitted pockets. To get his gun he needs a diversion or rather a couple as you should never lay your life in one, something he learned long ago. He inspects the things he has retrieved from his pockets one stun grenade, two auto-robots and one flare. It doesn’t take long before he reaches a plan and he immediately puts it in action. He activates the robots that instantly lift from his hand and fly away as they will as a diversion fly around the garden. To disorient his opponent he throws the stun grenade against the gun. As soon as it goes off he throws the flare in the opposite direction, this is in case the opponent has heat seeking ammo. When the flare leaves his hand he starts to run towards the gun in a pattern, which to an untrained eye looks random but it’s a pattern designed to induce as much insecurity to observers as possible. It’s only a couple of meters left when he feels the bullet penetrate his skin. Before he reaches his handgun he hits the solid ground and the impact is enormous. The pain is incredible, not the physical pain, which he learned long ago to control, no, it’s the mental pain, the pain of disappointment. With blurry eyes he looks towards the gun, it’s too far away, and no matter how hard he tries he can’t get up. Someone enters his field of view and he sees a boot kicking the gun away. As the wearer closes in on him he can see that the boots are made from the skin of a Sangarian pit frog. The last thing in his life is hearing someone saying “Now I’m number one”.
