On a night in a metropolis that never sleeps, Aron was running through the park, as he always did after a long day of work.
He was about twenty-four or twenty-five years old—tall, well-built, with straight brown hair and light brown eyes.
The cool night breeze gently cut through the air, carrying with it the distant smell of food stalls and freshly cut grass. The city lights illuminated the concrete path, casting long shadows between the trees.
You might be wondering: who would exercise after an entire day of work?
Well, for someone who works in a biotechnology laboratory, the day is not as hectic as it sounds. Most of the time is spent among microscopes, samples, and reports. Tiring for the mind, perhaps—but not exactly for the body.
Besides, I've always liked running. I've been doing it since I was a child.
It has been a year and a half since I graduated, and since then I've been working in a laboratory. I like what I do—and, modestly speaking, I'm good at it. That's why it wasn't difficult to find a job right after college.
As I slowed my pace, I looked around.
The park was emptier than usual.
Normally there were couples walking hand in hand, parents strolling with their children near the snack stalls, or people like me running along the illuminated paths. Today, however, the place seemed strangely quiet.
Still, nothing truly out of the ordinary.
Back in high school, during an Agronomy fair, a few classmates and I presented a variant of corn seeds—the kind you can buy in any supermarket or market.
We started simply. We selected some seeds and planted them in a small plot of land at the school. Our biology teacher helped us with the selection and soil preparation.
We had two years to develop the project.
Every week we recorded everything: growth, resistance, production. We separated the seedlings that grew faster, the ones that developed better, and those that produced more ears of corn. Plants that did not meet the criteria were discarded.
But we didn't waste them.
We harvested them, cooked them, and ate them.
In the final year, we finally arrived at a variant that needed only four-fifths of the normal time to start producing. The ears were also larger, fuller, and surprisingly sweeter.
That caught people's attention.
In the end, we received a scholarship to study abroad.
There were four of us on the team, but only two actually traveled. One couldn't go because he needed to take care of his sick mother and younger brother. The other decided to pursue a military career.
So after saying goodbye to my parents, I left for another country alongside one of my teammates.
She ended up becoming my first girlfriend.
During the four years of college, I lived abroad. My visits to my family were rare.
Maybe by the end of this year, I'll finally go visit them.
I slowed down and sat on a bench to rest.
That was when I noticed a man walking toward me.
He was coming along the same path I had passed through minutes earlier.
He didn't seem strange at all. The park was emptier, but there were still a few people around.
When he approached, he stopped right in front of me.
I raised my eyes.
And saw the gun.
For a moment, my brain refused to understand what was happening.
He said something, but I couldn't hear it. The music in my earphones was too loud.
I slowly raised my hands.
"Calm down…" I said, pulling one side of the earphone out. "You can take everything."
As I removed the earphone and stood up, I saw the man smile beneath the hooded shirt that covered much of his face.
It wasn't a nervous smile.
It was… mocking.
When I finally managed to hear him, he said only one sentence:
"Well… now my debt is paid."
The gunshot echoed through the park.
The sound was dry and brutal.
For a second, I thought someone had set off a firecracker too close.
Then I felt the impact.
My body took a step back without my command.
I looked down.
A red stain was slowly spreading across my shirt.
Warm.
Sticky.
My brain took a few seconds to understand.
I had been shot.
When I raised my eyes again, the man was already walking away calmly along the illuminated path.
As if nothing had happened.
I tried to call out to him.
To ask why.
But no words came out of my mouth.
The air felt too heavy to breathe.
My legs lost their strength.
I fell to the ground.
In the distance, I heard screams.
People running.
Someone saying to call an ambulance.
The sounds felt distant, as if they were happening somewhere else.
I was already tired from the run.
And now… I was even more tired.
Lying on the cold ground, I looked at the sky.
The city was too bright for the stars to appear.
I thought about my family.
It had been years since I had last seen them.
My father—childish at times, but strict when he needed to be.
My mother—always caring… but when she got angry, no one wanted to be nearby.
And my sister.
A little adorable pest who was probably now reaching the age where she would start giving my father headaches.
Maybe I should have visited them sooner.
My vision began to darken at the edges.
The sounds faded away.
My body felt light.
And then…
Darkness took over everything.
And I could no longer feel anything.