"Next up, Victor Sakuta!"
The man carrying the Armatix iP1 stepped out of hiding and mounted the rifle to his chest. He moved to avoid the opponent's attack and began to pull the trigger from the firearm he was carrying. He started aiming at the human-like artificial pawns. He ran to the southwest and lowered his head. The man fired several bullets as accurately as possible to hit the target. Exactly where he wanted it.
In the heart.
He smiled with satisfaction when one of the pawns just fell.
He ran again. He rolled over once. His uniform was dirty with mud from the area where he played all this time.
"9 o'clock, three meters from you."
He listened carefully to the commands ringing in his ears through his helmet. He nodded curtly and hid behind a pine tree. Calmly, he waited breathlessly and sweated profusely.
"How far?"
"Ten feet away from you."
"Up or down?"
The figure behind the phone snorted in annoyance. "Up! For God's sake! Why are you still asking?"
The man, whose last name was Sakuta, giggled in amusement. He likes to hear the irritated voice of his lover, who scolds him continuously. According to him, his girl looked so beautiful and sexy.
"Now!"
Victor made a high jump over some of the boulders beside him. He fired consecutive shots that dropped about 5 pieces of pawns. Not a single shot missed. He laughed happily to see the results of his work right on target.
"Done!" he shouted. He took off the helmet that protected his cranium and wiped his sweat fiercely.
His girlfriend, Nora Sakuta, got out of a capsule at the training control center and stepped toward the fallen pawns. Behind her followed obediently a young man in his early twenties carrying a folder and a pen. The young man was preparing to record all the results of his senior training.
"Nine out of ten hit the heart. The other one hit the right eye," said Nora.
The woman was followed by a younger youth who took quick painstaking notes.
"Where is the position of the bullet?"
"Five on the body, three lodged right in the middle, one grazed the bone, and one tore the eye. It causes permanent blindness due to nerve damage and heavy bleeding."
The young man who was engrossed in taking notes nodded vigorously. He looked so amazed at the rapid progress of the senior, who he considered his own brother. His hands automatically clapped his hands in salute to the results he saw.
"Bro, you are cool! It's twice as good as last week."
"I think it's because of the weapon." Nora took off her clear wide-lensed glasses and tucked them between the buttons of her shirt. "Bigger is better, right?"
Victor walked over to his lover and hugged his hips casually. He brought his lips to the ear of a woman two years older than him.
"Isn't that your favorite?" Victor whispered seductively. "Bigger, better?"
Nora's ears suddenly turned red as tomatoes.
She elbowed her man in the ribs and cleared her throat loudly.
"Honestly, I prefer the Cornershot you gave me yesterday. Or FN Five-Seven. It fits more in my hand than this one," said Victor, stroking the weapon in his hand affectionately.
"For supplies matters, just ask Dazel. I'm only in charge of monitoring and recording your progress."
The young man, engrossed in taking notes, took off the hat on his head and smiled broadly at his lord. "One day, I will be as cool as you, Bro. Just wait for it. I'll learn to fight harder and practice shooting harder until one day you will all gather and watch me display the skills I have in this Vena."
Victor patted his junior's shoulder and smiled reassuringly. "You'll be cooler than me, Bara. Let's see later. I'm waiting for you to prove your promise."
Bara nodded and laughed awkwardly. He really felt incredibly proud to be given words of encouragement from his idol.
"Sure I will," he said determinedly.
Nora laughed and put her arm around Bara's thin body. She looked into her younger Bara's brown eyes. Deep in her heart, she imagined a figure thousands of kilometers away from her. She thought that the distant figure was now the same age as Bara. They might become close friends if they met there.
She smiled to hide her sadness.
Clearing her throat again, Nora took Bara's hand in her right hand and her lover's, Victor's hand in her left.
"Come in. Uncle Yoda is waiting inside the Artery."
***
Aaron Magnifico stared in disbelief at his smartphone screen, which displayed a picture of his fiancé, Joy.
19 missed calls and 20 messages sent blindly by his beautiful fiancé. He read them one by one holding his breath. His fiancee generally asked about how he was and told about her desire to take her out when the first snow fell.
Aaron rubbed his forehead with his knuckle. He feels guilty for ignoring his fiancee's calls and messages and choosing to spend time with his Copulation partner.
In fact, soon, they will do that.
He growled and tugged at his hair in annoyance. Even though his body and his lover are separated, he can also feel the disappointment that Joy must have felt. He had promised not to ignore it even though he chose to join the Copulation event. However, he had only just begun to break his own promise.
He felt guilty, really. He repeatedly imagined how his fiancé would react when he found out he was about to have sex with Ivory. He feels like an ambivalent bastard who ignores his partner.
But right now, he felt worse for Ivory. Ivory is still traumatized, it seems. That young girl had never been touched by anyone before. Ivory had never had a girlfriend either. And now he had to let her body be touched by a man who was nobody for her. Isn't that a little unfair to her?
As complicated as the road that must be taken, they still have to go through and complete it. There's no way out. He and Ivory did have to do the copulation.
His eyes looked at the screen of his phone, which had a photo of the beautiful Joy on it. The photo was taken when the two of them were on vacation a year ago. Joy, who is wearing a light blue baby doll, looks so beautiful and sexy at the same time. He thinks that that photo is the best among hundreds of other images. Therefore, he made it as wallpaper on his smartphone.
A second later, Aaron realized that Ivory would also use this phone. They plan to use the phone together for a while. Does Ivory wants to use it if the wallpaper was just another woman in his heart?
Therefore, Aaron's index finger and thumb moved nimbly. He sifted through the thousands of photos and decided to use the ocean photo instead of Joy's face. He did it to make Ivory more comfortable using his cellphone.
"I'm sorry, Joy."
After that, he pressed the lock button, and the phone was locked. Aaron decided to shut down Joy for the time being and let Ivory take center stage this time.