26. Bad news

After eating with nothing to do, he decided to head to the gun range, he wanted to practice his handling with a gun in case an emergency were to crop up. Getting his handgun and some ammunition he went off with Mikage hiding in his shirt.

He could still hear the constant munching from the various refugees around them, seeing their happy smiles the mood around the camp was pleasant even he was infected and a small smile appeared on his face.

Continuing on he would occasionally pass the various military, some would nod with him and he would nod back. It was currently night time but the base was lit up making it as bright as day, it also deterred any nocturnal predators that wanted to attack the base. Of course there were those that were attracted by the light but they were picked off by the patrols then after scanning the surroundings a group of soldiers would exit the base and gather the dead bodies for processing.

Gareth headed to one of the various military barracks where he could access a gun range, once he neared he was stopped by a guard in response he requested to use the firing range. The guard immediately squinted at him but did not reject him or chase him away instead he communicated with a higher up and after a bit of silence there was an affirmation but with supervision.

Heading into the barracks he saw a security checkpoint which was supervised by automated turrets and 4 guards, after the correct authorisation Gareth passed a through the checkpoint. There he was led through some winding tunnels and reached the gun range.

Another soldier came towards him and with a salute told him he would be supervising him. Gareth nodded and stepped towards the gun range. Although one of his arms was useless, he could still handle a handgun with one hand. Drawing out the handgun and it took a few seconds to load the handgun, he did a few more practices and soon he was able to smoothly reload a handgun.

He closed his eyes and began to concentrate as his body began to remember his experience with weapons, just like an old machine the old gears that had stopped moving began shaking and slowly turning, powering up other functions.

Gareth's body began shivering and soon a strange aura crept out making those who was under its influence see Gareth as a super weapon specialist. The supervisor who was watching Gareth was heavily intimidated that he drew his weapon by response, he felt that his vulnerabilities had been marked by a red paint and magnified by 500 times and he felt all alone in a vast empty plain.

The soldier woke up with sweet pouring out of his body, he saw Gareth had all his body parts subtly twitching still in a concentrated state. Then he saw Gareth raise the gun slowly and fire, the soldier felt it would miss and it did miss but upon looking at the target he saw that it hit a vulnerable point that would hinder the opposing party.

Gareth had opened his eyes after his first shot, his gaze was monotonous as if the target wasn't 10 meters away but less than 2 meters. He shook his body before he fired another shot this time it was off the centre of the target by a meter. He continued firing more rounds and Fred the first magazine which had 15 bullets more than two thirds had hit the centre.

Gareth moved to a different target this time there were multiple targets at various distances, he began to fire and the bullets all hit the the various targets but the more distant targets all had been hit at the centre, while the nearer targets had also hit the centre but had deviations.

His time he went to the moving targets, the results had a minor improvement of hitting nearer targets more in the absolute centre. The moving targets had varying speeds and Gareth had hit all of the targets in the distance that had speeds up to half the speed of sound dead centre. Gareth didn't aim for the targets faster than that as it would shock the supervisor although he wanted to see the limits he restrained that desire.

When Gareth lowered the handgun, he noticed that he had 20 soldiers staring at him with awe, soon they began clapping with appreciation seeing his skill, Gareth waved back in acknowledgement. He exited the compound amidst the respectful gazes of the soldiers and headed back to the tent to rest.

The next few days were about the same and on the third day news arrived that a convoy would pick up the refugees in 3 weeks. Soon as the days passed more and more refugee groups had arrived and the seventh refugee group only had half a million. What's more was that the number of escorts only numbered after being questioned the response was that the attacks in the North had become fiercer and more lines had broken, and that they couldn't spare anymore soldiers.

The bad news had clouded the moods of everyone within the base and some of the smarter people realised what this meant and whispered to their friends. Soon it spread that the war was gradually encroaching towards them and it made the refugees panic. The commander had already requested reinforcements and they would arrive in 13 days.