Chapter 33
The Range
Next to the shooting range, Leo saw another billboard. “THE ONE WITH THE MOST, WINS.” He sighed. What was up with that stupid slogan, anyway?
As they entered, the guns in the next room kept going off with deafening pows, and the smell of gunpowder filled the air. Dad bought some ammo and reserved a shooting lane. They were given a small stack of paper targets and issued noise-blocking headphones. Then they headed for the back as Dad grumbled about the cost of ammo.
They took their assigned lane next to an overweight man in a red flannel shirt. Dad placed the plastic box on the old wooden counter in front of them, and opened it, revealing a large 45 semi-automatic pistol and two magazines. “This is a Hellspark 9000,” Dad shouted proudly over the noise. “One of the best automatic pistols money can buy. At least, that's what the guy in the gun shop told me. Supposedly you throw it in the water and cover it with mud and it'll still shoot, not that I intend to test that. It holds nine rounds in the magazine and one in the chamber. Like any firearm, this pistol is dangerous. If you drop it, it could go off accidentally and kill someone. Never point this at anyone you don't intend to shoot. Keep your finger away from the trigger until you're ready to shoot. Keep the safety on, and the hammer down, until you're ready to pull the trigger...”
Leo tuned him out. He knew this already.
Finally, Dad clipped a target and sent it 20 feet down the lane. Then he loaded his gun, aimed, and fired. The gun went off with a loud bang. A brass cartridge got flung to the right, and a hole appeared in the upper left side of the target, just above the inner black circles. Dad fired nine more shots, filling the target with holes. Four were in the black, the rest in the outer surrounding rings.
“Not bad,” Dad said, “considering I haven't fired it in years. Your turn, kid. Show us what you got.”
Leo took the gun, remembering his former training.
***
“Go! Go! Move your ass!” the no-neck Sergeant shouted.
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Leo, covered in sand and dirt, crouched to avoid enemy fire, desperately running from one gun emplacement to the next, firing his rifle at the target, running, then doing it again. That was how he'd learned to shoot. His training had been minimal, though. Everywhere he went, there'd been an ammo shortage. The reason was simple: everybody needed bullets, but hardly anyone knew how to make more. That was also why he almost never carried a gun. A gun without bullets was pretty useless.
***
First, under Dad's watchful eye, Leo pushed nine bullets into the magazine. Then, with some fiddling, slid the magazine into the pistol and pushed it until it clicked home. The pistol felt large, heavy, and awkward in his twelve-year-old hands. He pulled the slide back to put a bullet in the chamber. Remembering lessons from his previous life, he inhaled, pointed the gun at the target, flicked off the safety, then, holding it as still as he could, he exhaled and fired. The gun jumped in his hands and he almost dropped it. He hit the target, though, barely. A hole appeared in the upper right corner.
“Not bad, kid,” Dad shouted encouragingly.
Leo tried again, aiming carefully, pointing below the target's center to compensate for the recoil, and fired a second time. By the ninth shot, Imp informed him he'd leveled up in shooting pistols.
Dad brought the target back, and they studied it. Leo had hit the black twice, but this was more luck than any skill on Leo's part. “What do you think, Leo? Not bad, considering it's your first time firing a gun and you're twelve.”
“It's okay,” Leo said, not at all happy with the results. “I'd like to try again. I think I can do better.”
Dad set up a new target. “Great. Let's see what you got.”
The one hundred bullets ran out much faster than one would expect. By the time they finished half an hour later, Leo had leveled up again in shooting and was hitting the black part of the target exclusively. He'd even got a couple bullseyes.
“You're a better shot than I am,” Dad said proudly, showing Leo how to use the cleaning kit to clean the pistol after use. “Maybe you should join the military. I think they have classes in school.”
“Thanks,” Leo said.
They were silent as Dad packed up the gun and they left the shooting range.
“It's like you matured overnight,” Dad said as they drove home. “I wasn't going to do this until you were older, but you and your sister are alone some nights and I think I can trust you to treat my gun with respect and not take it out to play stupid games with it. The safe combination is 05521. Your mother's birthday. Think you can remember that?”
Leo nodded, grateful for Dad's trust. He'd been thinking he'd have to break into Dad's gun safe or something, but this was better. “Thanks, Dad.”
If he couldn't stop Dad from turning into a mindless monster in a month, it was good to have this opportunity to say goodbye.