Chapter 5:Death on all sides
Translated by: Chua
Edited by: I and Elkassar
The massively thick phonebook contained a huge amount of names along with their house address, job and personal phone numbers. Every phone booth had an allocated sector to prevent crowding, however it is already 9 plus at night, and the night was still young and free causing a huge queue outside every phone booth.
Sheyan’s goal wasn’t to make a phone call, but to research on the person named “Sarah Connor” through the phone book. Primarily, it looked as if there was no relation between his main mission and this female character, however looking in retrospect to this Terminator world, Sarah Connor is no doubt a pivotal character. If Sheyan was able to locate her earlier on, then he would have a much bigger advantage.
Sheyan waited at a phonebooth with a seemingly shorter queue. Actually with Sheyan’s power, he could forcefully obtain money from others, threaten others to lead him to places, and even cut this queue without others going against him. Why should he go through this much trouble?
Based on Sheyan’s conventional behavior, he was generally a person with great morals, but that was definitely not the main reason. Within him, he felt a tiny intuition that once he committed such immoral actions, it would trigger several unnecessary or detrimental consequences. This intuition should be the advantage of his high perceptive sensing.
Looking ahead there were still 3 people in the queue, Sheyan went ahead and entered a mini-mart first. Purchasing a pack of cigarettes, he starting smoking and leisurely paid 50 dollars without waiting for the change from the stubby middle-aged sales woman behind the counter. The elderly woman was so pleased that her smile pushed her cheek fats all the way to the corners of her face. To the sales woman, this strong and sturdy man probably had an ulterior motive, 70-80% he should be looking to develop a one night stand. As Sheyan was about to join back the phone queue, he was suddenly attracted to the noise from a nearby television.
Los Angeles crime news report, there’s been a new development in the Bulude street case with a suspect named Porter. At approximately 5:07 PM he robbed a supermarket, killing 6 civilians and stealing the day’s earnings. 2 of the police amongst the 3 on his tail were also killed in the line of duty. According to investigators, the suspect had probably gone through intensive rigorous strength enhancing exercises, as his escaping abilities in running and jumping far exceeded the normal person. As of now, police have activated a large task force to capture this criminal, this is all from our reporter on site.”
Sheyan immediately raised his brows, he himself should have entered this world at about 5 pm and that guy named Porter committed the crime at 5:07 PM. The timing is too coincidental… at this time, the television broadcasted a live image. On site, there were several police cars with their flashing siren lights on the street. 20-30 Policemen were taking cover while holding on to their guns, someone was shouting at the suspect to surrender.
Suddenly, a high speed sedan came charging out! That screeching sound from the wheels made people want to pull out their ears, and the policemen without hesitation, started firing off their guns. Thick white smoke were emerging from the sports car’s hood. At this moment, matchless bulky silhouette pushed out from the car door, in the air he appeared extremely agile and graceful as though a fish swimming in the pond. Somersaulting, he landed in the middle of those policemen.
At once, the american policemen started panicking, as they were afraid of firing at him in fear of shooting at their comrades, just like refraining from hitting rats for fear of breaking the vases (Chinese idiom). That unrestrained black figure moved as though possessing super speed, a moment he was charging forward, the next he had already heavily struck down one of the policeman. The might of the strike threw the poor cop 5-6 metres away. Screaming, the cop flew and landed onto the windscreen of a police car shattering it looking as though he had broken a dozen of bones.
Sheyan took a deep breath, he naturally observed that the black figure’s speed was fairly superior to his. According to his calculation, it must have been faster than an average person by threefolds. In retrospect, if this guy was a contestant, his agility must at least have been 15 points or more! If that guy’s innate ability could further hasten his speed, then his speed would further multiply a few folds!
That black figure slid around the police cars nimbly like a snake – swift, precise, deadly, one at a time the policemen drop helplessly. This strange scene left the onlookers aghast, shocked, uneasy and frightened! This was basically a massacre!
However it was at this moment, a dark green police car came speeding in from far, this police car was extremely huge, about the same size as an ambulance or fire truck. The siren was flashing atop the car roof without a sound, its swift as lightning speed coupled with the reckless drifting gave one a misconception of its arrival.
Sheyan looked at this police car as a feeling of dread came upon him, unconsciously taking a few steps back and clenching his fists – even the threat was immensely felt through the television screen. He wondered how he would have felt if he was on scene himself.
While he was still lost in thought, the police car’s windscreen suddenly retracted as three black gun barrels emerged silently from within. Distinctly, one could see a black glove holding on the grip of the gun – a grip with boulder like stability! Then, a spray of glaring gun fire shot out from the tip of the barrel! Before the broken car glass fragments fell to the ground, the distant black figure had already been shot excessively. First the chest, then the forehead followed by the rest of the body as blood spilled out from the gunshot wounds as he was thrown off from the impact. Taking another 3 shots in mid air, he flew 7-8 metres and landed on the ground with a “Pam!”, rolling several more times and finally came to a motionless halt.
Under the intense glare of the spotlight, this guys’s blood drained out slowly flowing into the nearby drain cover. Apart from the occasional twitch, he looked as though he could not die an uglier death.
Consecutively, Sheyan’s nightmare imprint spoke through his ears:
“Through your perceptive sensing, you have gained the following information.”
“Contestant number 1844 was assaulted by special anti-terror task force delta.”
“Contestant number 1844 is dead.”
“Because you have witnessed the death scene of contestant no. 1844 through the television screen, thus you are unable to retrieve any battle statistics.”
Sheyan took in a deep breath, as he started breaking out in cold sweat. Since the appearance of the delta anti-terror task force, he had never battered his eyelid even once! It was obvious his current strength was vastly inadequate. At this moment he realized something, it was also one of the initial pointers: In the Terminator world, slaughtering over a hundred innocent civilians would lead one to accomplish the “Butcher” milestone. This was definitely not difficult to achieve, but contained a great underlying danger!
From this unfortunate contestant no. 1884, it can be seen that even powerful contestants with superhuman abilities could not resist the balance and laws of the society. To the aforementioned contestant: Meaningless crime and slaughter would definitely attract the police, but it was extremely easy for him to escape the clutches of the police. He had even resisted and dealt with most of the policemen, which unknowingly activated the shocking delta anti-terror task force!
No matter what, if a contestant breaks the laws of society, he would still face the full force of the law through the police. The ordinary policemen were the primary boundary of this world, however if one were to forcefully step over the boundary, they would definitely invoke a stronger response for example the delta anti-terror task force! Beyond this anti-terror task force, who knew what other stronger defense mechanism were there.
On scene through the television, rescue and clean up works had begun, as corpses dripping with blood were being dragged about. Followed by new reporters and critics voicing out their views about this incident and the dead criminal. They were swiftly trying to deduce the criminal with their own reasoning – drug addict, drug enhancements, serial killer, heartless, mentally impaired etc. The public quickly accepted the reported theories.
Sheyan puffed on his cigarette, shutting his eyes, as he allowed the smoke to escape out this lungs and through his nostrils. As though this could relieve the stress in his heart. He pondered awhile, he finally noticed the queue at the phone booth as finally empty and proceeded to walk forward to check through the phone book for a “Sarah Connor”.
According to the movies, due to the destruction of the information storages before the war, even the Terminator was unable to locate his assassination target, “Sarah Connor”. As such, he also used the phone books to check on Sarah’s whereabouts. Luckily, the female lead “Sarah Connor” was the third Sarah on the list. After eliminating the first two Sarahs, the Terminator then started looking for the actual Sarah, thus giving her a lot of time to hide and prepare herself.