Sniper

 “If the third time wasn’t the charm, I doubt the fourth time will be.”

Such a thought crossed my mind as I braced myself to open an unfamiliar door. The stagnant air and silent vibe only confirmed my suspicion - it’s going to be one sad, lonely room. In this small room with only a bed, a table and a wardrobe, I unpacked what little I have and made it look similar to my previous room. I guess I was just used to dormitory life. As I was moving my books to the drawer under the table, I found that the previous room owner had left something heavy.

An airsoft gun with scope, complete with ammo at the back.

“Is this even legal,” I muttered as I closed the wardrobe as soon as I noticed it. The books therefore went to a different drawer, and already I had two things to settle: finding out whether the dorm allows such a thing, and finding the previous owner of the room. I wasn’t in a rush though, so I moved on to prepare for class that I had the following day.

“Ah, so you’ve heard about the Sniper,” a girl replied when I asked a group of girls about the airsoft gun.

“The Sniper?” another girl from the group asked.

“Rumor has it that the dorm employs a watchful marksman, who will shoot you if he notices you doing things you’re not supposed to,” the discussion continued into gossip. What I got from the rest is that there’s no dorm rule against it. Meanwhile, the sniper discussion had gotten way out of hand, and they didn’t notice me walking away as they happily talked about how cool and handsome this sniper can be.

I returned to my room after dinner, with the quest of finding the previous owner coming up short. I pulled the gun drawer again, and this time I found a note at the far back of the drawer, that simply says “watch the railings - shoot if necessary”. I took another look outside my window, and sure enough, I could see the railings of all the levels in the opposite building. They’re all copy-paste of each other; a small corridor for waiting for lifts, and the railing is at the end of that corridor which immediately leads to a view of the garden between buildings. My room happens to be the exact center horizontally, and slightly higher than the vertical center; it’s the perfect spot to land shots to those railings.

“What am I thinking,” I stopped myself. “I play shooting games too much.”

Yet the thought never really left my mind. Every night I study, I would take a random break just to scan through the railings - at some point it had become a habit that I didn’t even realize when I’m doing it. For a few weeks I had not seen anything unusual.

Then enter the tests. It was an easy set of tests for me since it covers only a few weeks of material, but that might not be true for people attending different classes, as some would be taking their finals. I passed everything with an average score and I thought that would be it for the month - the rest would be just business as usual. I didn’t know that I needed to make a critical decision soon after.

One November night, I was just about done studying when I unconsciously did another scan. This time however, I noticed a short-haired girl on one of the higher floors, with a few pieces of paper held against the wind. It was a bit on the far right side, so I couldn’t see her face very well. “I could see clearer with the gun’s scope,” a stupid idea crossed my mind, yet my body naturally reached the drawer and pulled out the gun.

And then she let go of the papers.

Through the scope I could see her crying; her eyes bulging as if she had been at it for hours. I scratched my head wondering what happened to her; who she was, which class she’s from, whether she lived on said floor and so on. It hadn’t clicked with me how weird it was to point a gun at a crying girl.

And then she took off her shoes.

It clicked. She took a step closer to the railing. Blood rushed through my entire body. She was still crying. I didn’t know if the gun was loaded. She looked up towards the sky. I didn’t know where I’m supposed to aim. She closed her eyes, as if giving up everything. I had my finger find the trigger. She lowered her body, preparing for what’s next. I had to do it.

Bang.

By reflex, I crouched right after the shot to hide; but quickly took another peek at the girl afterwards. It seems like the shock from the shot made her push herself away from the railing. She frantically looked for the direction of the shot, before taking her shoes and running inside. When I noticed my body shaking, I took a deep breath to stop it, wondering if I did the right thing. I didn’t sleep for the rest of the night, constantly scanning for the other railings until the sun took over.

“Did you hear? The Sniper had shot!” I overheard a discussion among a group of girls the next day. Words do travel quickly, I thought to myself. The rumor that was spreading was that the sniper shot at someone trying to smoke weed, which was obviously false. To this day, I still don’t know who the girl was, why she was there, and whether I shouldn’t have shot.

I tried to join the airsoft club after that, thinking of improving my aim. It was just luck that I didn’t actually hurt her that night, and I can’t rely on luck for the next time. Fortunately the Sniper hype had brought more people into the airsoft club so I wasn’t suspicious in the least. I stocked coffee, and routinely drank them in the evening so that I could keep watch for longer. Sometimes it made me oversleep and be late to class the next day - but I couldn’t bring myself to skip the watch. What if another person goes to the railings? What if I wasn’t awake to stop them?

Strangely, I felt less lonely when I’m on the watch. 

I kept going until the end of the semester, when I had to move rooms again. I left the gun in its place, silently praying that the next person would keep up the watch.