A lifetime ago I was just a child living on a small farm outside Tir. My pa was working the fields in leather armor with his rifle slung over his shoulder and his eyes more on the surounding landscape than on the plough. My ma I never knew. Pa once told me that she'd been killed by mutants on her way home from Tir, and that was how much I ever managed to get out of him about ma's passing away. Anyway, life on the farm wasn't to bad. It was tough, I'll admit to that, but I remember I used to love sitting at the bullet proof window at night, watching the lights from Tir playing on the horizon. If I was lucky I even saw a space ship or someone going by in a Yalm. Hadn't it been for the harsh land and the mutants, it might've been idyllic.
When I reached the age of four, my pa decided I was old enough to help on the lands. "You're small and fast," he said, "you might be able to figure out what the bloody mutants are up to." He gave me my first rifle, one that was so heavy I almost dropped it when trying to shoot standing. "Make sure you aim straight at the torso," my pa used to say, "that won't kill a mutant, but it will slow him down enough for you to be able to outrun it." So I spent my days sneaking around the fields looking for mutants. Some days I saw them at a distance, other days I saw them up close, yet other days went by without any mutants comming my way.
Then one day, I guess I was 10 or 11, my friend Granz and I was comming home from school. School was fun, 3 days a week we went trought the fields, over a hilltop and into a settlement so small it's not on any map I've ever seen in my life. There Miss Rina did a good job teaching us the letters, a bit math and some history. During breaks we fooled around, safe within the guarded area of the little community. Comming over the hilltop we saw the fields of my pa's farm, and further back we saw the farm itself. The image I saw this day still clings to me like flies to dung though, as the farmhouse was set on fire, and a swarm of mutants had surounded it. Then I heard my pa, he was shouting: "I will never sell the farm to Omni-Tek, no matter how many mutants you send against me you mofo!" Dropping our schoolbooks Granz and I ran towards the farm while we readied our guns. Grantz had a very old OET he had inherited from his older brother as a way to learn more in school as it give a boost to a persons intellingence, and I had the rifle my pa had given me all those years back.
I flung myself to the ground and started shooting at the mutants. Adrenaline was pumping trought my veins and my vision was blurred, but I kept pumping shots in the direction of the farm. I know now that I didn't hit the barn door, and I sure didn't do anything to the mutants. Granz had taken cover right next to me and suddenly he screamed and emptied his gun into a mutant that came at us from behind. The body landed across us and its blood and gore ran all over the both of us. Then and there I knew Granz was out, as he still fired his now empty gun at the corpse. Heaving the body of me took a few minutes, but luckily no more mutants came our way. I could hear my father swear and scream in anger at the mutants. His rate of fire was fast, and every now and then a mutant cried out or just dropped to the ground. I figured that I was to far away to hit anything and decided to leave Granz and see if I could sneak closer. I souldered my rifle and started moving. After having taken two steps Granz was right next to me, shaking with fear and begging me not to leave him alone. I sighed and told him to be quiet. He still sobbed a bit as we moved towards the farm, but he was as quiet as he could, and he was my friend, so I couldn't be so heartless as to leave him behind.
Approaching the farm, we saw a Yalm parked behind the barn. It had the markings of some Omni-Tek land-buying agency. Next to it stood a solitus with a pistol and a smirk. On the ground at his feet lay my pa, a red stain on his torso getting larger by the second. I screamed and the Omni turned against me and bared his fangs in an evil grin. "So, the bastards bitch is back from school," he said, "and she's got a boyfriend, how cute. I guess it's a bit to early to tell her that troxes don't have a ding-dong eh?" He laughed like a hyena at his own joke. I sunk down next to my pa still sure he was invinsible. Why do all kids think that? It's not true. Pa looked into my eyes and said, "This is it Saph, aim straight at their torso and keel the mofos! Do this and you might be able to run away." I bendt down, tears running to hug pa, when another bullet slammed into him. He never spoke again. I looked up at the Omni while muttering "Aim Straight, Aim Straight" over and over. He said "Ops, it went off" and started laughing again. Granz sat paralyzed, looking at pa, looking at all the blood, looking up he said "... I don't want to die Saph, please, I don't want to..." I flung my rifle off my shoulder, raised it, still chanting "Aim Straight", and shot the Omni-Tek scum straight in the head. He dropped, and I turned to the closest mutant. Five minutes and a year later it was over. Around me lay ten - fifteen mutants and their Omni leader, and at my feet sat Granz sobbing quietly. "Aim Straight saved my life," he said, and just as he said it I knew that was my name. I am Aimstraight, and I hate mutants.
