I was house sitting for my parents about 10 years ago and I walked in on a late night robbery. Instead of being smart and running away, I ran inside to grab the phone and ran into the basement (where the guns were). All bravado and no brains, I was determined to arm myself and chase these dickheads away.

I called 911 while failing to unlock the gun cabinet and started to get super freaked out when I realized I just cornered myself inside with no exits. When I couldn't unlock the gun rack, I grabbed a hammer and smashed the (mostly wooden) gun rack. With my stealth blown, and my adrenaline at maximum output; my hands were shaking so badly that I couldn't open a box of 12gauge shells. I eventually just tore the box open sending shells scattering all over the room. I loaded 1 round. By this point I was nearly in tears begging the 911 responder to send the police, NOW! I knew I had seriously fucked up, but I was too terrified to run back up the stairs and out of the house; I have a bad leg and probably couldn't run very far. The perps must have heard all the commotion and ripped the cordless phone receiver from the wall in the kitchen, just up the stairs.

Having lost contact with the police, and hearing the robbers advancing through the kitchen, I slid a large metal filing cabinet to the furthest edge of the basement. My last stand, I'm so dead, I thought. I positioned myself behind the cabinet and lined up the bead of the shotgun on the stairs. No one's coming down those stairs alive. I never turned on the lights, and the basement was very dark. I could barely see up the stairs. I heard the little dickhead stealthly making his way down the first set of stairs, just around the corner. I cocked the shotgun (sending the single round I had loaded flying across the dark room) and yelled out all tough-like with a cracking voice that I'd end this motherfucker if he didn't gtfo. Silence. Warning shot, I thought -click-. Luckily bullets were all over the room, so I quickly swan dived across the floor in a scooping fashion and gathered a couple rounds. I load my gun again, 2 rounds this time; as I hear the people on the stairs advancing. I blindly fire, sending a round through the ceiling before gathering enough courage to point the gun back at the stairs.

Then I notice the backyard lights come on as they fiddled with all the light switches at the top of the stairs. Then the porch light, then the garage lights, and then .. then the basement lights.

I found myself point my shotgun at a fresh ~18 yr old kid, who was in turn pointing my father's 40cal pistol at me. We both sat there, for what felt like an eternity, just looking in each others eyes. I literally pissed myself while pulling the trigger. I missed, but the shot scared the kid so badly that he dropped the pistol, which then misfired (another round through the ceiling). They ran.

I sat there in my own piss with an empty shotgun just wondering how years of gun training could have failed me so badly. I was a coward. When the bead of the shotgun was lined up with a real human being's noggin' I became a bumbling fool.