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Man on the Run

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Man on the Run Empty Man on the Run

Post by tangmcgame Fri Jun 12, 2009 2:34 pm

He breathes in. He breaths out.

The treadmill beneath him whirs and pulses like a heartbeat. His legs burn with the struggle to keep up, and his throat feels shredded by his ragged breathing.

In. Out.

He brushes sweat from his forehead. The counter ticks off a third mile.

Samantha.

He ramps up the speed, his legs and feet burning to keep up. His arms feel like putty and his heart pumps as if to break through his chest. He can feel himself leaving behind his memories. His wife. His daughter. His father. They fall behind him like dust on the trail until there is only a man running. No thought or feeling, only mechanical action. Muscle contractions. Chemical reactions.

He feels thought slipping away. He runs like an animal would.

Until his very human body loses its rhythm. It starts with the foot, the ankle acting too slowly to bring it back down in time. Toby's toe catches the surface of the treadmill and yanks his leg out. His knee collides with the moving plastic, dragging him further, and if he'd had more strength left in his arms he would have caught himself before his nose and face slam down with a wet crunch.

Toby shuffles back, away from the machine, the alien hardware that attacked him. As his mind remembers how to think, how to be a man instead of an animal, he realizes people are staring at him. He tastes blood on his lips, his blood. Someone is talking to him, asking him something. Toby hastily finds his feet and scampers to the dressing room, the gym sounds restarting behind him.

He seethes in embarrassment. He wipes the blood away from his nose and no new blood replaces it. Toby already feels the strength coming back, his body returning to a resting state, but his heart still beats furiously. They were staring. They saw him fall. Weakness. They think they are so much better, so much stronger.

'can kill them bring them down,' the animal thinks to Toby. He can't quite see clearly. There is a droning buzz in his ear. Unconsciously, he brushes his fingers across his teeth.

He hears a noise behind him, something small and weak. Toby whips around to meet the gaze of a boy. He couldn't be older than 20, and wears the skin of the gym's clan.

"What?" Toby hears the words rasp out of his throat, like a growl. The gym-clan pup says nothing. Toby is on him in a heartbeat, pushing him against the wall, scenting his fear, heart colliding against the walls of his chest, teeth nearly on the pup's throat.

"WHAT!" The roar echoes against the metal lockers.

Samantha.

He drops the boy, backing away. In fear and confusion, the pup stares at Toby who casts his gaze violently around the room. Toby runs to his locker and grabs his clothes, and then bolts outside. They stare again. A man running with dried blood on his arms, on his lips. They're staring and he should care, but he doesn't.

He has to run. He has to.

Outside he is free. The air is crisp in the sun's fading light. The field glows in invitation, and he won't resist.

He clutches his work pants in his mouth and discards the rest. The carriage is awkward at first, but as Toby becomes an animal again, his grip is stronger on the pants. Less awkward. He is faster this way. Stronger. And animals can feel the laws of nature, an instinct they are born with.

Unfettered by human reason, by obligation and regret, Toby hurtles away from humanity.

'I am not a man,' the human thinks to Toby.

Toby, lunging forward on four legs with pants gripped in his sharp, white teeth, finds comfort in that thought.

tangmcgame


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