Adrenaline

He crawled out of the carcass of twisted and mangled metal, his mind dazed and the taste of blood strong in his mouth. Black spots danced across his vision like angry bees swarming around a nest. Unconsciousness tugged at him, pulling him into an abyss of darkness as he stumbled and fell onto the hard roadway. The asphalt smelled of tar and oil. He laid there on his stomach as the seconds passed, his face turned to one side pressed against the hard macadam. It caressed his skin with the warmth it had retained from the beating sun earlier in the day. A trickle of blood paved its way from his forehead, down the bridge of his nose and dropped onto the roadway. The blood pooling inside his cheek was warm and began seeping out the side of his mouth. The swarming bees blackening his vision were dissipating now, but the world was tilting on its side, trying to turn upside down.

The warm macadam was consoling in his current condition, but the cold night air snatched what little warmth it provided, not allowing his body to store what little heat it provided. He could see his breath pushing out in front of him, expelling every few seconds into a thin white fog, much like a dragon breathing fire, and then disappearing altogether only a few feet from his face.

He could hear his pursuer’s car skidding to a stop just behind him. The screaming of tires clawing at the pavement snapped him back into the world of consciousness.

They were upon him.

He pushed himself up into a standing position, the world began to spin. He leaned in the opposite direction of the stopping car, hoping to God his feet would follow. They did.

The further he leaned the faster he moved until he was finally at a slow run moving to the edge of the road and into the tree-lined woods. He would lose them there, he would have to. As he passed the first of the trees he heard the gas tank of the car he was just driving give way to the ferocious chemical reaction of fire and gasoline, the sound reverberated in his ears as pieces of metal and debris assaulted the trees surrounding him. The explosion most assuredly demolished the vehicle and with any luck, provided him his opportunity to escape.
The explosion would slow them down no doubt, and if he were lucky, lucky at all, they would think he was still inside the metal-wheeled coffin, a charred and burning corpse now. It was an appealing thought - that they might think he was still in the vehicle, not that he had become a burning corpse - but he couldn’t linger on it. He ran the best he could through the wooded maze of trees and vines trying to avoid further injury.

He lost his balance several times, but always kept in a straight direction, at least he hoped it was a straight direction. Although the world around him was shifting back to normal he was still highly dazed. He hurt all over, but he knew nothing would hurt more than to be taken back by these would-be captors. Behind him he heard the screeching of even more tires, then even more tires. He pressed on, hard.

The cold night air blasting across his bruised and bloody face was beginning to awaken him from his fight with consciousness. The crash had been so bad he was surprised to still be alive, much less making his way through these trees at his current pace. He tripped over a fallen branch hidden by the leaves and darkness and landed squarely on his belly. He pushed off the mud and leaves and moved on.

The turn had come so quickly, he barely saw it all. He had hoped the narrow and winding road he had chosen as his escape route through this wooded park land area would aid him, but it may have been his undoing if he didn’t move and move fast. He had left suburban area houses and commercial businesses behind as he had chosen the solitude of the park land road as his path to freedom.

He felt a massing pain in his left arm. He glanced down and noticed it was dangling at his side, bruised and broken just below the elbow. He was unable to move it by shear will alone. He grabbed it with is good hand and pulled it close to his body. The pain was strong, but dull. He knew the real pain would come soon enough once the shock from the wreck had passed.

He could barely make out the sound of cars echoing through the night, lots of them. A road, maybe a highway even, he thought. If he could just make it there, someone would stop. Someone would give him a ride to safety, to sanctuary. Anywhere would be safer than here. He heard one of them yelling behind him, “into the woods! He went into the woods!” They had spotted his escape. He cursed and ran harder.

In the car he stood half a chance to escape, but now, in these woods and injured, his chances were withering by the second and he knew it. He could make out the yellowish glow of a full moon through the tree tops illuminating every tree around him in an almost unnatural light, making it easier for his pursuers to follow him. He cursed that too.

Feeling like a wounded gazelle that had just been singled-out by a pride of lions, he ran with all his life. His only chance was the highway or whatever vehicle pathway it was. He would have to make it there and wave down a car, and do it fast. He knew he wasn’t thinking clearly and that it wasn’t much of a plan, but he couldn’t help himself, it was all he had.

He made it to the top of a tree-ridden hill and stopped, scanning the woods behind him. The fog from his breath visibly burst from his lungs and expelled much farther into the night before dissipating now. Even in the cold night air he could feel sweat beads forming on his face and neck, or was it more blood? Oh, how it felt good to stop.

He could make out flashlights contorting in the distance, shaking around in multiple directions seemingly without a goal, without purpose. He could see six maybe seven, but they were far behind him and moving erratically through the wooded maze that had seemingly now become his temporary haven. Suddenly, he spotted another flashlight, about half the distance between him and others. It was constant and moved with purpose, but worst of all, it was moving in his direction. He cursed again, turned and ran even harder.

The sounds of traffic racing down the busy highway were becoming louder as he neared his only avenue of escape. His chest pounded with fury now. His rhythm of running and breathing in sync had now been taken over by an erratic and unbalanced combination of exhaustion, pain, and fear. Every time he breathed, the cold air choked at his burning lungs. With a quick glance he looked behind him. The flashlight was closer, about half the distance it had been before.
The lion was gaining.

He ran with an almost renewed sense of purpose, he didn’t need the oxygen anymore, he had forgotten about the pain in his arm and the blood in his mouth. Like a swimmer trying to hold his breath just a little longer before exploding through the surface, he ran on sheer will alone. The branches and vines ripped at him like a giant spider web trying to ensnare him, to hold him long enough to be captured once again. It seemed the whole world was now against him. He pressed through them and finally made it to the embankment for the highway. Sanctuary, almost there.

He began to climb this last barrier to freedom, using his good hand to claw his way to the top. His legs felt like a fire had been released in them, burning its way through his veins and muscles, as he pushed upward to the highway. The ensnaring woods had released him and he was now free to move at a much quicker pace. He actually picked up speed as he climbed the embankment until he reached the level surface of the highway.

Just as he reached the top of the embankment he felt the pain, the fiery burn...the muscle tearing. His right quad muscle ripped, bowing itself into a small ball in the front of his leg. He could feel the protrusion pushing against the front of his pant leg. He dropped to one knee. The pain was virtually unbearable, twice as bad as any leg cramp he had ever had. No, at least three times as bad. He wanted to collapse on the shoulder of the highway, to scream out in pain, to pray for the pain to put him in a state of unconsciousness so he wouldn’t have to feel it any more.

He heard a noise behind him. He had heard that noise before, only seconds before. It was the noise of his pursuer exiting the vine-entrenched wooded area.

He willed himself onto both legs and dangerously limped towards the passing cars only feet in front of him.

The first car blew its horn as it shot by him. The driver was most certainly stunned by the sight of someone exiting the woods at this place and this time of night.

He began to wave his good hand frantically as the cars dashed by him. He heard footsteps behind him now, the relentless lion was almost upon him. He ran into the oncoming traffic without thought of the consequences, not sure what he was going to accomplish, but he knew one thing. He wasn’t going back. He would die first. Yes, he would die first.

The cars raced by him, their horns blazing, their headlights brightened by horrified drivers switching on their high beams. Tires ripped the asphalt, metal rubbed metal, cars ran into the embankment on the side of the highway. It was a virtual symphony of competitive catastrophe forming around him, one horrific noise following another, each growing in volume and destruction, the next one, greater than the previous.

He could see all of this happening around him, but all he could hear were the footsteps behind him, the pounding footsteps of this relentless pursuer and his calls to cease. This was all he heard...until the monstrous sounds of the eighteen-wheeler moving upon him drowned out everything else.

The unyielding gigantic metal beast crashed through the few remaining cars on the highway that had managed to stop early enough to avoid a collision or had ended up by pure unlucky chance in the path of the huge, unrelenting metal monster. The cars bounced off the enormous truck like flies off its windshield. The ill-fated cars began ricocheting off one another as pieces of misshapen metal shot into the air.

The truck’s tires roared with pain as they tore at the asphalt’s black surface, white smoke pouring from them like water over a falls. The vehicle’s trailer began to slant to one side causing the massive truck to turn sideways in the middle of the road, jack-knifing as it continued its forward movement.

His pursuer called out to him again, but he didn’t listen, he didn’t care any more. Never again would he let them take him back. Death would be a preferable release than going back there.

Yes, death would be preferable.

He limped to the middle of the devastated highway, awaiting the Grim Reaper that was coming for him in the shape and guise of an oncoming semi-tractor trailer. He never knew accepting death could be so easy, so undoubting...so releasing. He stood there waiting as time seemed to slow, almost stop.

The driver of the massive truck had turned, pulling the cab of the truck onto the median of the highway, but the trailer was still coming for him, slanted in a jack-knife fashion running perpendicular to the highway. The roar of the tires resounded within him, the horn from the great metal beast screaming in pain, almost as if it were calling to him. Smoke billowing from the scalding tires like the steam from an enormous, unstoppable locomotive. Closer and closer the beast drew to him, the noise almost painful to his ears now.

Suddenly, he felt a powerful hit. He struck the pavement hard, landing on his chest and face. His front teeth shattered at the sudden and powerful contact with the macadam. The trailer traveled over him as the tires burned the pavement next to his face. The white smoke scorched his eyes and choked at his lungs. The blowing horn still buzzed in his ears. He felt someone on top of him. It was his pursuer, the lion. He had tackled him from behind just before the trailer should have ended his pain and his misery.

The lion held him down, his knee pushing hard into his back. His captor pulled his good arm behind him and spoke the words he was willing to die to prevent himself from having to hear, “you're under arrest.”