Running

The sky was grey.

The dark fluffy breadths combined within one another in a mass of different shades, sizes and swirls high in the sky above him. These dark clouds stretched for as far as the eye could see, predicting oncoming rain for the first time in over a year. The smell was crisp and sweet. Almost like an herb but nowhere near as strong or tangy.

The forest was a blur.

The trees stretched high up into the dark sky, the bark singed from the sun of the summer just passed. The leaves were varied pigments of green and orange, swaying weightlessly in the wind like whispers of a forgotten song. He heaved in deep, ragged breaths that made his throat sound clogged with breathlessness as he ran. He pushed onwards without stopping. Step after step. Foot after foot. Never stopping. The landscape around him was nothing but a corpus of distorted colours as he sped past, never decreasing his speed.

Dodge that tree.

Jump that log.

Don’t pull too tight.

Stay strong.

The detritus underfoot crunched.

His heavy stomps echoed unheard through the heavy silence of the forest around him. The emptiness of the woodland made itself known through its thick soundlessness and piercingly cold air. The ground was a mass of dead leaves, broken sticks and lost trunks of fallen trees. There was no possible way for him to move silently, he felt as though he couldn’t move fast enough. His tiresome feet would stomp through the fallen debris, colliding with the ground beneath like a hammer to a nail.

The rope irritated.

His slender hands were bound behind him tightly at the wrists, causing him to run at a painfully hunched angle. Despite the endless distance, he hadn’t been able to free himself of the harsh bindings. The nylon strings rubbed and burned the soft flesh of his wrists while the fraying tendrils of the rope tickled his palms and forehands. They were tied tight. So tight that it felt as though he would either break his wrists or skin his hands if he tried to pull them free.

Dodge that tree.

Jump that log.

Don’t pull too tight.

Stay strong.

He was getting weak.

His muscles ached and felt as though they were tearing at the seams. He pushed onward sluggishly, knowing that if he stopped now he wouldn’t be able to continue. His legs were tiring, his feet throbbing and his head pounding from lack of sleep. There was no way he would get to the end. The strain on his body was like nothing he’d ever felt before. It was like he was drowning and being burned alive all at once. The clogging of his desert-like throat and the immense burning heat that emanated all through his body.

But, there it was.

An opening through the trees. Freedom. Hope. The hope pounded its way through his body, already reviving the lack of strength within. He pushed onward as the pain began to subside. It was as though he’d been brought to the surface for a breath of fresh air. As if the fire that pulsated through his aching body had been splashed with cool water. The relief was something he could never find the words to explain. But the hope that had awoken within, died all too suddenly when he saw what was beyond. Not freedom. Hardly hope. A barren desert. The sand would be twice as hard to run through, and the distance twice as far.

That freshly sweet smell intensified as the on slaughter of pouring rain struck to the earth; creating a wondrous earthy scent that attacked his nostrils. The icy cold, spear-like droplets cut through his clothes, hitting his skin like hundreds of tiny daggers. It was both relieving and vexing. Despite the relief of fresh water, it would only make the sand harder to trudge through. Once again his journey was to be made even harder. As though there would never be an end to this tedious cycle of false hope and pretence.

Despite it all, he continued onward for he had nothing else but to move forward.

Don’t pull too tight.

Stay strong.