{"sf1_id":755049,"sf2_id":null,"title":"A Marksman's Tale","author":"Dedragon Shotun","words":1502,"posted_at":"2014-09-10T06:21:00.000Z","tags":["Action","Clean","Death","Guns","Sci-Fi","Violence (not In Yiff)","War"],"url":"https://fse.anthro.fr/stories/755049-a-marksman-s-tale","original_url":"https://sofurry.com/view/755049","image_url":"https://www.sofurryfiles.com/std/thumb?page=755049\u0026ext=.jpg","description":"Hope you guys will enjoy this short story.","content":"Seargearnt Clark Scmidt stared down at J'thruatua. Its lush\nforests being peppered with gunfire. The fighting on both sides were\ntremendous, and so were the casualties reported. The planet's natural\nblistering heat had made the conflict even worse, considering the growing\nscarcity of water around. Many trees had been toppled over, the result of\ninsisting rocket barrages. Many large tanks had been destroyed in the\nbattlefield, their hulls split open and their ruptured pulse cannons leaking\ntoxic liquids into the soil, further poisoning this already polluted planet.\nThe sky was filled with a yellowish hue, and clouds contaminated with uranium\nwere spread out. The air itself contains enough oxygen for humans to breathe,\nbut the concentrated amounts of chlorine and ammonia made breathing without a\ngas mask suicidal. At the intersection of hill 45 and a Hill 30, was a city.\nThis city was dubbed the Thratuan Chorazin. It had seen much fighting, and its\nmany buildings had been reduced to a devastation and resembled a maze, an ugly\npuzzle of shattered bricks, and twisted steel. Body parts littered the streets\nof the city,  arms, legs and feet shod or\nunshod even a head or two would stick out of the bloody soil. A dead native\ncould be seen here, a self-proclaimed Colonel could be seen there.\nOccasionally, a plane would roar overhead, looking for targets to drop their\nbombs upon, like predators looking for prey to kill and eat.But for now, the intersection was quiet, though a lethal\nacid rain washed over head. Eroding away bloodstains, entrails, faecal\ndeposits, and muffling the screams for men who had lost their leg or their\ntesticles. The whole destruction of a bitter war fought at close quarters in\nscorching conditions, under the visage of a burning forest, set on a planet so\nunforgiving, many had sworn that this was a vision of hell itself.One man however, was quite comfortable in this inferno. He\nis positioned lying prone with a 50. Calibre rifle in his arms, in what had\nbeen a temple, which it no longer had any roof and all that was left was a few\nwalls. He laid belly-down on a soft cushion. An oxygen masked sheathed his\nmouth and nose  And a pair of goggles hid\nhis eyes.This prone man was named Clark Schmidt, and he was a sniper,\na sergeant in the 3rd battalion of the 44th Infantry\nDivision in the XI corps in the sixth Army under a Colonel Richardson. The\nenemy, were the Roxons, an intellectual, war-like species originating in Roxon\nPrime, whose only meaningless reason to go to war was a conquest for ultimate\npower. Many vary in height from 6-8 feet tall, and closely resemble humans,\ndespite being totally hairless. They opposing army was trying desperately to\nencircle Richardson  as a preliminary to\ndestroying himself and his 3 hundred thousand men. None of that mattered to\nSchmidt of course, he'd wouldn't be bothered to check up on the latest updates\nin the war, other than those in his 6 power telescopic sight.He was a sniper, and he was hunting a sniper. That was all.The human had been shipped to this inferno two weeks ago.\nHis mission hadn't changed however. He was a talented stalker, and even more so\nmarksman. He had already brought down 23 Roxons, 8 of them officers. He liked to kill Roxons. But now a Roxon with the same skill\nsets, similar weapon, and a mission to kill him. Schmidt felt challenged. And\nSchmidt liked challenges, he liked nothing for than to prove his adversary\nwrong and that he was the very best in the world.This game was now part of a dimension he had not yet\nencountered. Normally, you stalk, you pop up or dip down, and sooner or later a\nRoxon with a rifle or machine gun walks past, doing his patrols, you settle in\nyour position. You hold your breath. Steady your weapon and watch at the scoped\ncrosshairs ooze unto you oblivious foe and then you fire. The Roxon staggers\nand falls, or he steps back and falls, or he just falls. But it always ends\nwith the fall.However, the figure across the street knows this too, so the\ngame plan has changed. You don't move at all. You don't swing your rifle around\ncarelessly and you don't look up and around.  You mimic the dead. Your entire vision\nencompassed the entire battlefield, and you can drop a Roxon at about 500\nmeters. You stay disciplined. Your rifle loaded and cocked, so there was no\nritual of bolt throw, with its bobbing head and flying elbows, either of which\ncould get you so very dead.The name of this game was patience. The opponent will come\nto you, it was just a question of waiting.He had set himself up at the 5th storey. If his\nopponent or himself had set themselves a floor higher or lower, or a window to\nthe left or the right, they would never encounter each other. Wait,wait,wait.And finally the ordeal seemed to be paying off. He was\nconvinced that a dark shadow the corner of the room of an apartment was a shape\nmore defined and intense than it was a few hours ago. Schmidt had convinced\nhimself of seeing movement. The Seargent closed his eyes from behind his telescopic\nsight. Eyestrain can lead to hallucinatory visions. Now coupled with the fact\nthat he had hardly received enough sleep in the previous days made that very\nreal. Once he had opened them, he was sure that there was a new shape in the\nwindow. It could be a broken window pane, twisted and mangled left on the\nfloor, or a spine of a broken chair or even a table who'd lost a fight with a\nmortar round, but it could also be a Roxon, hunched similarly over a weapon,\neye similarly pressed against a scope. It didn't help that discriminations were\nmade more difficult by reason of an occasional sunbeam that would break through\nthe clouds and illuminate the room just above the suspected enemy. Whenever\nthis happened, Schmidt would have to look away and blink his eyes until the\nconditions passed. But Schmidt felt safe. The Roxons possed a 5.5 laser optic\nscope , which meant at this position even his enemy were on him, the details\nwould be so blurry that he would be sure that no sigh picture could be made. So\nSchmidt felt invisible, unseen and undetectable. Maybe even a little godlike.\nHis higher degree of magnification was a good advantage. Schmidt would wait awhile longer. The alien sun would\ndisappear and full darkness would come. Both opponents, if there was an\nopponent, would wait until that happened and then would gradually disengage and\ncome back and fight tomorrow. But Schmidt had decided to shoot. He'd been on\nthis stand for a week, and he's more than sure that this shape was new, and\nsomething he hasn't seen before. He closed his eyes. He counted to sixty.Schmidt opened his eyes, and carefully assembled his\nposition to fire. He found angles for his limbs, making pronounced adjustments\nslowly, building bone trusses under his rifle resting on a sandbag, pushing the\nsafety off, and sliding his finger onto the trigger. He felt the trigger's\nheat, his fingertip engage it, felt it move back, stacking slightly as it went,\nuntil it had finally reached the precise edge of firing and not firing. At this\npoint, he had committed fully by opening his eyes to aquire the picture through\nthe glass of his scope, and setteked the intersection of the crosshairs on the\ncentre. He exhaled half of his breath, and put his weight behind the trigger.Then he pulled.The flash blinded him for a moment, but once he had\nsuccumbed to his senses he stood up smiling, he was sure he had hit him, or it\nin this case. The shape had snapped back from where it originally was, and a\nfresh coat of Roxon blood was to be seen from the wall inches behind it. He has to move. No doubt had the shot attracted the Roxon\ntroops nearby, and-A round had hit him on a slightly downward angle at the\nmidpoint of his right shoulder, breaking a whole network of bones, though\nmissing any major arteries and blood-bearing organs. To Schmidt it felt like someone had unloaded a full swing\nten-kilo sledge hammer against him, lifting him, twisting him, depositing him. Dazzled by shock, he recovered quickly and tried to cock his\nrifle, but of course found that the arm attached to his now-destroyed shoulder\nno longer worked. Still, on instinct, Schmidt found himself trying to place his\ncheek back on to the stock, his eye returned to the scope and searched the\nwindows above his destroyed target. And so it happened, that his opponent had\nrisen to depart after firing the shot. His hood fell away and Schmidt caught\nthe pale Skin of the Roxon reflect in the sunlight. Then the sniper was gone."}