As I reach my basic mandarin class, I glance at my watch. "Crap. On the first day!?" I mumble as I realize I'm late for class. I step inside and immediately notice two things. One, my friend Mac had the seat next to mine. Two, the girl from the bus had the seat in front of mine. I stand there in the door and stare at her. "Excuse me!? Are you even listening!?" I snap out of it and look at the teacher. "Y-yes ma'am. I'll take my seat right away." As I sit down, Mac leans over and whispers "You got a crush already?" Followed by muffled snickering. "Shut. Up." I reply.

The teacher tells us about the exams, where, when, and how they would be carried out. She then called for assault butei to head to the course. Thirty minutes later, it was detectives and spies. After that, logistics. Finally, the teacher poked her head in the room and said "Reki, Connor, you're up." Despite the pressure the exam is putting on me, all I can think is what an odd name Reki is. We grab our gear and head to the range. On our way there, I ask Reki "So you're new here, what rank were you at your last school?". She stares at me and says "In the act of combat, rank does not matter. But if you must know, I was S-class." My jaw dropped. So not only was she beautiful, but also an amazing shot. "Hey, uh, can I call you Reki?" I ask with a waver in my voice. She looks straight ahead and says "Yes, you may. I would prefer Bullet though."

We reach the range and she leaves for her pod. As I stand outside my pod and load my rifle, I hear some girls in a nearby pod gossiping. "Did you see that!" "I know, right!" "I can't believe we saw that." And last of all "Does Connor really think he has a chance with that stone cold monster?" I stop listening long enough to reassemble my rifle and blush. I align my scope and pull the bolt back.

The "start bell" rings and we all head into our pods. A screen on the wall of the pod opens and gives us our challenge. This year it's a cityscape and we have to find and deduce the identity of fifty different "automan's", a robotic semblance of an actual person. This takes place in the city of Detroit. In order to pass, you have to kill one. In order to reach B-Class, you must kill two. A-class, three. And S-class, five. You may also eliminate other live competitors for a point. As we equip our HUD helmets, the door opens up to a large model of Detroit. Our hints show up on our HUD.

I immediately take cover, and just in time, too. Pellets pepper the ground where I was just standing. I use a stick mirror and throw it towards the side of a nearby building. It sticks and does its job. Reflecting light like the lens of a scope would. As the barage of pellets move towards the mirror, I pop out of cover and glance down the street. There. I aim down my scope and dispatch the enemy in one shot. One point shows up in my roster. I look up towards the sky to see which building offers the highest vantage point. I see a building slightly taller than the others as I attach my grappling hook. As I fire the hook, I see something flare In the corner of my eye.

I let go of my rifle and take a step back. My rifle goes shooting up to the roof of the building, leaving me behind. I dash towards the door of the building, but stop just before I reach it. A pellet whizzes by where my head would have been in just a moment. I step inside and look around. The adrenaline starts pumping me into my "mode". I push it down. The last time I went into the "mode" bad things happened. I notice that I am in a bar. As I search the room visually, within milliseconds I see the four automen sitting at the bar, being served by an automan bartender. The bartender looks at me and reaches under his drink stand.

I quickly throw a table on its side and hide behind it. Pellets pummel the other side of the table. I pull out my Colt M1911 sidearm, and wait for the right moment. The shooting stops for a second and I see the automan bartender reloading as one of the ones that was at the bar escapes out of a backdoor. Without hesitation I shoot the escaping one in the back of the head. I now have two points. And that's when I got shot in the side by the automan with a gun. I crumple behind my table and check my weapon. No way I'm going to settle for C-Class.

I dive out sideways and shoot the bartender in the head. I lose a point. A "that wasn't a target" alert goes off in my helmet. It dawns on me how this actually works. I grimace and leave the three automen at the bar behind as I look for the stairs. Each room I walk through, I find some more automen. As i walk up the last flight of stairs, I notice well hidden tracks in the dust. I go back down the stairs and grab an automan. With automan in hand, I climb the stairs to the roof. As I open the latch on the door, I brace myself behind the automan. As i kick the door down, a barage of pellets ping off of the metallic humanoid. I reach around the robot with my M1911 in hand and shoot my adversary in the chest.

As I look around the roof for my rifle, a single pellet pings off the ground a few feet away. I dive behind an air vent as it is followed by two more accurate shots. I look around and see my rifle not far away. "God. Really?" I say aloud to myself. Doing some quick thinking, I throw the automan out from behind my vent. It gets immediately pinged in the head. I use this millisecond to dive for my rifle. I pull the weapon over the edge of the roof and thrust it in front of my face. A pellet wacks into the side of the rifle. I aim through my scope towards the direction of fire. As I search the opposite building for a target, another pellet wops into my side. I grimace and look even higher up. At the roof of the tallest building in the entire city, a tiny light flashes. As a trained anti-sniper unit, I recognize this as glare on the scope.

Jumping behind cover yet again, I notice a sniper chasing an automan down in the street. I quickly take the reckless sniper and his escapee down. This puts me at four points. An alert shows up on my HUD for "two combatants left". Frowning, I wait for the scores to pop up. My name shows on the screen with four points, as does the other. The HUD does not tell me my foes name, only their score. I adjust the zoom on my scope and take a glance at the other building. As I scroll across the roof, I see a shock of greenish blue hair, and orange headphones. I quickly duck behind my vent again, blushing. "W-why am I blushing at a time like this!?" I ask myself. I know I can't shoot her, but I promised myself I'd get S-class this year... deciding to take out an automan instead, I pull my bolt back again.

The HUD shows another message saying automen would no longer have any impact on our scores. And that they've all been programmed to find and kill us. That spiked my blood pressure. My adrenaline starts flowing. I feel "it" coming on. The first automan breaks through the door. I spin out of cover and for a small moment, nothing happens. Then all hell breaks loose. The automen fire at me, but they all miss. I hear the familiar boom of a Dragunov, yet nothing hits me. I pull my rifle in one hand and my pistol in the other. Automan after automan fall, and still more come from all over. They climb over the sides, jump from other buildings, enter through the door. And yet I'm untouched. I spin, never missing a single shot. I reload seamlessly and keep shooting. It's not long before they slow and eventually, I hit the last one. I went through 175 rounds. 180 is the max allowed.

I fired two at the automan bartender and drinker, one at the first sniper, and one at the second sniper. That leaves me with one bullet. My evil smile that always comes out during my "mode" shows up. I pull back the bolt, and roll out of cover. My scope instantly locks onto the bright blue hair and I pull the trigger. I can't miss. Everything is in slow motion. I watch my bullet fly towards the target. Sueddenly, another round shows up out of nowhere. I watch it hit my bullet out of the air.

Almost as quick as that, another pellet smacks into my forehead. "Game over" shows up on my HUD. I stare at the sky as I realize that, even in the "mode", I failed to be an S-class sniper. I get up and slowly walk toward the exit. All around me, the others are high fiving and congratulating each other. I step into line as the captain goes down the line and gives us our badges. Some get sent home. Some cry. Some kiss others. I sit there, wondering how yet again, my older brother managed to score higher than me. I grab my A-Class badge and start heading out.

I'm stopped by a tiny hand on my shoulder. I turn around and see Reki. "Yes?" I ask dryly. She looks me in the eye and says "you're really good." and leaves. I saunter my way to my dorm and sit down on my bed. Cleaning my rifle, I doze off...