What would you do? - The New Order

lynksys · **What would you do?** 03-29-2011

Hostage situation.

Violent terrorists and military forces have had a long shootout between each other on school grounds for nearly an hour. After suffering heavy losses, the terrorists have retreated into a gym full of hostages. Most of the hostages are women, children, and the elderly.

Infiltration teams are ready to go in and shoot everyone down, but there's a catch. The gym is rigged with high explosives and the terrorists are threatening to detonate them if they are attacked. Already 3 hours have passed, and the terrorists are growing restless.

Every 30 minutes, they kill a hostage and continuously ask for their demands to be met. So far, 6 civilians lay dead.

Now, we bring you into play. You are part of a sniper team that is to search and exterminate the terrorists who are holding the detonators. You are armed with a low caliber rifle so that the report and collateral damage caused is reduced. Say, an AR-15 variant with subsonic FMJ ammunition and a scope. The distance from you and the target building is roughly 300 meters. An easy shot for any marksmen, especially when one is equipped with a scope.

While scanning the area, you see a young girl, possibly 7-8 years old, and she is walking slowly over to the gymnasium. She is one of the survivors of the confrontation that occurred on the school grounds earlier. She is about 50 meters away from the gym, and she is headed there because the rest of her family is in there.

Instantly, a flood of thoughts pour through your mind.

You move the cross-hairs over the girls knee and switch the rifle from "safe" to "semi". There are two possible choices you can make, and both will have devastating consequences.

Should you choose to shoot the girl in the knee, it will effectively stop her from making it back into the gym. There will only be minor damage in the long run, but it will shatter her kneecap so she will probably require a few years of therapy in order for her to walk normally. The terrorist would never know what happened if you took the shot because of the subsonic ammo. However, should the situation go FUBAR, the girl's family will most likely be all killed and she will be the only one left.

If you don't take the shot, the girl will crawl in through the window, and if the terrorists notice, they will without a doubt execute her and several other in order to prevent further "escapes". But at least the girl won't have permanent disabilities and won't be alone if they all die together.

Hurry up and decide.

40 meters and closing.

35. . .

30. . .

Hurry up and decide. Pull the trigger? Or decide to not intervene? Why?

25. . .

20. . .