Bash get Kth random number in a sequence

[DBQ]

Hi everybody. I am using the bash's $RANDOM magic variable. I seed it in the beginning (ie RANDOM=1234), and use it to get numbers in a sequence. Say I would like get a kth number in a sequence. Is there a way to accomplish this without looping through all the previous numbers?

[stylishpants]

No, once you seed RANDOM, you have to get all k numbers to see the kth. Random number generators in general are deliberately designed to work this way.

Since you are getting your random numbers in a specific order anyway, you could cheat and capture a bunch of them in advance, for easy reference.