Thursday, March 8, 2007

Choices

Griffin sat perfectly still, eyes shut tight, deep in his meditations. Beneath the shade of a massive oak tree the young man pondered the wonders of the universe, the beauty of nature. Cool wind blew through the leaves, causing the branches to rock every so faintly, lifting his spirits.

Suddenly a gunshot echoed within the park, causing the young man’s steely eyes to snap open even as he dived to the side. A bullet of bright silver burned through his spiky black hair, burying itself into the bark just above where his ear had been moments before. The smell of melting wax and burnt wood began to waft into the air.

Still moving from his dive, Griffin continued to roll, stopping only when he had found a large rock to hide behind. Back pressed hard against stone, a snarl touched his face as the former assassin reached for his pistol, realizing as he did so that he no longer carried a gun wherever he went.

His right hand then rose up to his left shoulder, fingers feeling and then grasping the moulded handle of his custom made Japanese throwing knife secured there under his short sleeved shirt. Drawing it smoothly from the sheath, he raised it slightly above the rock, angling the reflection to survey the direction from which the shot had originated. At the distance he sat, nothing appeared out of the ordinary, most likely because the nearest cover was almost 50 meters away.

Looking around, the young man took quick stock of his surroundings. The tree where he had previously sat stood on a small hill in the middle of a large green hill. Hiding as he was behind this rock, he was half way down the incline, with the woods directly before him. If he could just get amongst the trees, he had a good chance of escape. That or he could go for the long barrelled Beretta that was stashed in his Crumpler bag hanging from a branch in the tree.

Which do you choose:

A: RUN for the hills… ehh trees!

B: The best defence is a good offence!

ATTACK!

‘The best way to survive any encounter is to keep your opponent off balance.’ Those were the words of Griffin’s mentor many years ago. ‘If you focus too much on yourself, you neglect one whole half of the fight.’

Griffin smiled briefly as he recalled the situation in which he had learnt those fateful words. With a kick flip, he stood up and sprinted towards the tree. Approaching quickly, he flung his knife from almost 10 meters away. It nipped through the strap holding up the Crumpler. Slowly the bag began to fall.

Leaping into the air, the agile youth pressed off the side of the tree springing up to catch the bag.

As he landed, Griffin curled into a roll and extricated the pistol within all within seconds. With huge tug, he ripped it from the holster within and levelled it at the direction from which he believed the shot had been fired.

It was then that he saw the assailant, dressed all in black; heave up an RPG on his shoulder about 40 meters away.

“Ahh crap.” He muttered realizing his immediate peril.

However a small part of his imagination kicked in and he sank to a crouch where he stood.

“That’s a rocket.” He reasoned. “Rockets explode.”

Even as the trigger for the RPG was pressed, Griffin began to fire.

The second shot hit the rocket. It made a very big explosion.

Running

Griffin cast around hurriedly for something to use as a distraction, yet the area around the rock was fairly barren. This presented a slight problem to the trapped young man. Faced with no other options, it seemed that he was going to take the risk. After all, the sniper had missed a stationary target once; hopefully he’d miss a moving one.

Squirming back into a somewhat crouched position, Griffin slid his weapon back into its sheath, and took off a sprint.

A fair few seconds passed and he didn’t hear any sounds. It seemed like a good sign.

Suddenly, there was a noise, though it sounded more like the whoosh of a speeding train then a bullet. Griffin didn’t look back though, he knew the secret to these things.

Without warning a massive explosion took place to his left, the shockwave expanding far faster then his puny running speed. A second later, all which remained of the coward was a charred crater.