Time flew and they both realized they needed to go home when they'd been in the restaurant for almost four hours. It wasn't that they felt thrown out by the staff or anything, they just knew they had a workday tomorrow and needed to sleep.

They ordered the check and started talking about doing this again sometime when Stylox and Gazzt once again interfered in John's life.

Through the door stormed a man in worn jeans and a leather jacket armed with a automatic rifle. He fired a few shots in the air and started screaming about money. Instinctively John placed himself between the man and Rachel as he got closer.

There were only about ten other people in there, including the staff, so the armed guy had a pretty good overview of the situation and spotted John's movement immediately. He turned his head in their direction immediately and smiled an unsettling smile that really made John nervous.

Maybe it was the smile, maybe it was his eyes, but there was something about him that almost made John

panic. It could just have been the gun of course, but it most likely wasn't.

"Trying to be a hero, eh lover boy?" the man said as he walked towards them. "Maybe I should see just how big of a hero you are."

Before John could answer, the man told the rest of the crowd to group themselves in a corner and then he told Rachel to go stand in the middle of the room.

A few of the people were crying from terror and all others were very pale and obviously scared. John was left at his original position and when the man was done organizing the rest to his liking he came up to John' side.

"I don't like heroes," he said. "They make me sick, so I guess I'd better teach you that there are no heroes."

John tried looking at the man's face, but found his smile to unsettling so he turned his eyes away. "I don't understand…" he said. "I was just…"

"Oh, shut up with your pathetic excuses," the man said and hit John in the stomach with the back of his

weapon, something that made John fall to his knees gasping for breath. "Stand up and listen, lover boy."

John did as he was told, still holding his arms around his stomach.

"I'm going to give you a choice, lover boy," the man said, his smile even more twisted. "Here's the deal, I am going to kill someone tonight."

There were a few whimpers and gasps among the people in the corner.

"Now, I am going to leave it up to the hero to choose whom. That'd be you by the way," he said as he leaned towards John. "It's really easy, actually. Either I kill all the people over there in the corner or I kill your girlfriend over there. Or is it your wife? Or maybe mistress? Doesn't matter, what's it going to be, lover boy?"

John looked at the man with a questioning, almost stupid, look on his face, as if he hadn't heard the question. "What?"

"Come on, it's not that hard. You decide who lives or die. The girl or the crowd? Come on, who will it be?"