Cramer chewed his gum thoughtfully. So far he’d been lucky. His paintgun could only fire a single shot at a time so he’d have real problems if he came up against more than one opponent. He could have borrowed Preston’s gun but something about the team leader’s attitude had got under his skin. He reloaded and ducked into the next room. Clear. He heard a cough from the room ahead and smiled thinly. Despite all the money they spent on the gear, the weekend warriors just didn’t take it seriously. They got hit, they wiped off the paint and they played again. That made them careless because they knew that they’d always get another chance. Cramer had trained in a different school. He picked up a wooden chair and placed it at the side of the doorway, careful to make no sound as the legs touched the wooden floor. He placed his foot against it and then kicked it hard into the middle of the next room. It hadn’t travelled three feet before it was peppered with paintballs. The guy had his finger tight on the trigger sending out a stream of the small spheres which burst in fountains of yellow paint whenever they hit their target. Cramer bent low around the doorway, and aimed and fired with one smooth movement, catching the man dead centre in his chest. The man stopped firing and shook his head sorrowfully. “Dumb, dumb, dumb,” he muttered.

“Can’t argue with that,” said Cramer, reloading.

He waited until the defeated opponent was going back down before moving ahead, knowing that the sound of footsteps on the stairs would be a distraction. Three down, four to go.