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 Posted: Thu Feb 04, 2010 9:19 am
Planning to run fast wasn’t working to his plans. He was too good and too experienced for her, and while he had been hoping her longer legs would allow the race to be more convincing, he actually had to ease up. On any other day, he would have taken this as a great achievement that he had to force himself to slow down, but with what he had in mind, Fallon’s poor health greatly irked him. He even went so far as to insult her poor health, wishing she had taken the time to get off the couch more often to give her a bit more of a push. Even at this pace, it wouldn’t be long until she was winded and started to cramp. Remembering the wheezing girl he happened upon, she wouldn’t last this race as well as he might.
He ran, but then he eased back, pretending to be too focused to notice but let Fallon ease up to his side. Run faster, damnit! The progression in the race had to look convincing and it was actually harder to pretend to slow down than to run faster.
She gained on him, and he pretended to try harder. If she thought he was letting her win, she would stop and complain. It was what he would have done.
The path would turn shortly and she had to be ahead of him for it. By that point, he could slip away. It was a good thing Fallon was focused, and if it had been any other race, he would have liked that about her. Too bad it wouldn’t help her in the end as he intended to break that focus.
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Posted: Thu Feb 04, 2010 9:45 am
Slowly but surely, Fallon was gaining on Ladon. She was moving too quickly to realize that part of her advancement had to do with Ladon slowing down as opposed to her speeding up. It was all movement to her. No grin broke out on her face as she slowly passed him. She was in the zone and could handle no distractions.
Up ahead, the path turned, and Fallon bent with it, putting more distance between she and Ladon. She might have passed him, but the girl was certain he had a great deal of endurance. A sprint was a bit more difficult for her than a long, slow run too. Already her muscles were on fire, begging for some easing up.
But Fallon would not.
She kept running, arms pumping up and down and encouraging her legs to keep pumping too. The counts never fell out of rhythm, body obeying the time her head was keeping. Perhaps she had a shot to win this after all?
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Posted: Thu Feb 04, 2010 10:06 am
Fallon was in the mindset, and it made pulling back all the more easy. Slowly, he went from a slower run, to a jog, to a walk, till he stopped all together, watching her turn the bend and keep going. She was fast, he’d give her that, and the concentration she put into the race was something to envy. It made him wonder even more if she would be able to hold up.
Looking about, he walked off the trail and against a tree, let his uniform materialize. It was one of the handiest tricks and took only a few seconds. Smiling, he looked up to the trees. He’d been practicing recently, and while not capable of doing flips and back turns like Serandite, he could climb up from branch to branch now. Leaping up, he rose up higher and higher, glad that without any leaves, he could see where he was aiming. With the trees barren, he would have to hide behind the trunks and high enough not to be seen. While it took some time to run, it took less to just cut through a few trees and be in front of the path. She had still a ways to go, but was making good time. If she kept at it, she wouldn’t notice anything.
Time to get her attention.
Moving with her, he reached up to a brittle branch and yanked down, breaking it. Moving over, he positioned himself above the path and waited for her to come close. Then, he dropped the branch. It went tumbling down, hitting a few more branches along the way and showering the path with little twigs before the final branch hit the ground.
From above, he shot back to hide but also looked down to catch her expression, fighting the compulsion to snicker.
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Posted: Thu Feb 04, 2010 10:17 am
Fallon was so caught up in her focus that she did not notice Ladon disappear, and she didn't notice the branches until one cartwheeled out in front of her. Slamming to a stop, she caught her toe on the branch and narrowly avoided falling on her face. A gasp rattled in her throat. Where had the branch come from?
Her chest rose and fell at a hurried pace, mouth open and panting. It wasn't from fear; the girl was just winded. Stopping that quickly made her heart pinch in her chest, and Fallon was trying to catch her breath.
Wait -- where was Ladon?
He hadn't passed her, she would have noticed that. Glancing down the path, she saw no dark-haired boy. She didn't see anyone, in fact. "Ladon?" she called, drawing in more and more air to slow her heart. Hands propped up on both hips, and she slowly walked backward, retracing the path. When she got to the bend, Fallon glanced down the previous leg of the race.
No sign of him, just a squirrel. Her brow furrowed, and she moved back toward the branch.
"Ladon, where'd you go?"
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Posted: Thu Feb 04, 2010 10:51 am
Higher up, the branches were precarious, and he made sure to keep his footing as he went around breaking off sticks. It was one thing to have a stick fall near you. That was fall. Wood expanded and broke off all the time. But to have it happen over and over – he only hoped it was enough to get her panicking. Maybe he should be making noises? The only real worry he had was that as a Negaverser, it would tie in too closely for Fallon to see him and than to reappear again as Ladon. It was too close to tying the two together, and while he doubted Fallon could do anything about it if she found out, it was still too early in the game to make a mistake like revealing his identity. For now, he was just messing around and trying to get a good scare out of her.
Reaching up for another branch, it gave a loud, crrreeeaaakk that made him wince as it echoed. The wind was picking up, swaying the trees.
Going to a sturdier branch, he placed a hand to his mouth and spoke ot the side in the way that one tried when throwing off their voice. “Falloonnn, where are yyoouuu?” He hoped it sounded distant, and with the wind blowing, it carried his voice around.
Then he dropped a few heavy branches. Not on her. The last thing he wanted was for her to get a concussion. Where was the fun in that? But enough to make he worried that she was in a dangerous part of the woods. In retrospect, these were the things that would scare him, and a lot of things scared him. It was also the first time he ever messed with anyone. He hoped it was working.
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Posted: Fri Feb 05, 2010 4:58 am
The second snap of wood made Fallon draw backward. Was there something in the trees? She squinted to see, raising a hand to shadow her eyes from the sun, but the vegetation was too thick. The path wove through a densely wooded area, and good eyesight or not, Fallon couldn't make out anything other than more leaves and more branches.
What could make so much noise in the trees?
...a bear? Holy s**t, was it a bear? Fear prickled in Fallon's stomach. She didn't do well with animals other than fish or horses. Puppy and kittens were not instantly loveable in her eyes. She saw only slobbering, pooping monsters whose single mission in life was to shed their hair all over her belongings.
Thoughts of her potential bear-murderer fell from her mind when she heard a voice. Was it... Ladon? Was he being attacked by the bear? "Ladon!" she said, jogging a few steps backward. What was going on? The path wasn't terribly complicated. How could she have gotten so lost from him? No, she couldn't. This had to be a joke. Some terrible joke at her expense.
"Ladon, stop playing around! I don't like jokes." He had sounded far away, but Fallon tried to shout as loudly as she could. A crash of wood behind her startled Fallon out of her scolding, and she jumped up, heart skipping a few beats. The last crash was loud -- too loud. If there was a bear in the trees, it must have just fallen out. Her eyes searched the path up ahead, the direction that Ladon told them to go.
Ladon was nice and all, but Fallon wouldn't be eaten by a bear for him.
Slowly, she started walking back up the path, eyes glancing over her shoulder. No sudden movements, no sudden movements, no sudden movements...
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Posted: Fri Feb 05, 2010 4:53 pm
What was he doing? This was utterly ridiculous! She didn’t even think he was anything! You’d think that years of being picked on would make him an expert on delivering it back, but he really wasn’t hitting the mark. Really, in the end, what frightened a person? Well, he knew he always feared getting chased and the thread of getting beaten up. It was what got him running in the first place, and Fallon seemed to be worried about the same thing.
He looked down as the girl slowly walked down the path, and he frowned. What are you doing, Wolframite? You’re not suppose to just be throwing twigs about and making noises. What are you, a ghost? Grow a pair and do something worthy of your new position! This is something Ladon would do. Not you! Not Wolframite!
“I think you made a wrong turn, little girl.” He stepped out, standing high on a thick branch as he crossed his arms. Even with the bows, the black military uniform would have sent up warning flares.“I don’t think you’re suppose to be in this neck of the woods. I hear there are wolves around.” Okay, in his defense, it sounded a lot cooler in his head.
There was something empowering with looking down at someone. Sure, the height thing still made him nauseous, but if he could get past that, he could really get use to being higher up than everyone for a change.
With a few leaps, he stepped down and landed on the barely-worn path. The drop alone would have killed a normal person. “You look like a runner. I wonder how fast you can run if your life depended on it.” Wasn’t that what she was after all along? If she wanted to keep safe during the night, she’d have to be able to outrun someone like him.
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Posted: Sat Feb 06, 2010 11:21 am
Fallon had never met a Negaverse agent before, but she knew that no boy who stood over ten feet off the ground on a precarious tree branch could be trusted. She stepped back instinctively, one hand raising in front of her chest. Little girl? How condescending. If he were just a normal boy, Fallon might of scolded him. But this guy looked dangerous. She kept her mouth shut.
When he leaped out of the tree, Fallon's fear only grew sharper. "I was just leaving," she said, taking slow steps backwards. Everything about this guy was predatory, and Fallon had no desire to set him off. He was offering thinly veiled threats about her leaving? Well, by all means, she'd be happy to get right out of his hair. For an instant, her mind wandered back to Ladon. Was this what had kept him? Had he been ambushed by this guy too? Was that was all the falling branches and noise was about?
Fallon took another step back. If she ran, he would chase her. If he could jump out of the tree like that, then chances were that he could just as easily chase her down. So she lingered, confused. What should she do? Calling out would be useless. Running could be a death sentence.
So she settled for backing away from him, little by little.
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Posted: Sat Feb 06, 2010 12:01 pm
“You were leaving? You seem to be slow at it.” He looked at her with narrowing eyes. “Why so slow? Aren’t you afraid of me – or do you think I’m not a threat? Is that why you’re taking your time?” He watched her slow retreat, and he followed her, step for slow step. His black boots broke the branches and twigs that now scattered the path. “What if I don’t want you to leave? What if I want you to stay? I think it’s unfair you came here and expect to leave just like that? I think you have to ask permission first.” All the lines, all the tools that he was given came from other people and voices he heard. Expert taunters, and they curled around his tongue, flooding his mouth, and it all tasted delicious. These words.
“Maybe I should be more of a threat. How about that?” He reached a hand out and out of the blue materialized his weapon. A dull rope slid into his palm as he clenched it tightly and two dull-brown ends hung to the ground. It was clearly a jump rope, even if it was an old-fashioned one. His steps went faster, eating up the distance between them. If she continued at her pace, he'd rush up to meet her in no time.
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Posted: Sat Feb 06, 2010 12:29 pm
With each word, the stranger grew more intimidating. Fallon kept backing up, counting her paces to try and gain some control on the moment. Then the strange boy pulled a jump rope out of thin air. Suddenly, Fallon realized what she was dealing with: Negaverse.
The thought sent a jolt of electricity through Fallon. She spun on her heel and took off at a blind sprint, arms pumping like pistons at her sides. If she stood there, he was certain to attack. If she ran, she at least had a shot. Breath pulled in and out of her chest in gasping breaths, and she tried her best to put as much distance between the two of them as possible.
Sure, he was just wielding a jump rope, but Fallon watched him jump out of a massive tree and live. She watched him perform what could only be explained as magic. Fallon was not going to take a chance on the Negaverse agent's penchant for mercy.
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Posted: Sat Feb 06, 2010 12:43 pm
Wolframite didn’t know if he had mercy. Part of him said yet, and another part said he was having fun and who knew what could happen when you really got into a game. He’d like to think he’d just mess around, and he really wasn’t after killing anyone. He was only testing out something he never had the chance to try before. Having the upper hand. Not only in running, but also in power. The fact she was afraid, the fact she saw him as nothing other than one of the dangerous and shadowy figures the news talked about, delighted him. For once, he was being taken seriously, and was chasing instead of being chased.
When she ran, he stood up and watched with dark, glimmering eyes in a quick gust of awe that filled his lungs with cold air. Fallon was running away from him.
It was almost enough to just keep watching, but he lowered and started to run. Everything was telling him to chase after and show her that she wasn’t fit or able to escape. Sometimes running didn’t matter at all. What he didn’t realize was that with the benefits of jumping, he was also quicker, faster than he ever had been. Taking no effort, he gained more and more, and felt the wind rush by as he watched Fallon drawing nearer and nearer. It was ….almost too easy!
A loud cackle started to bubble out of his mouth, breaking out past his chilled lips and taken by the wind. “Is that all you got?!”
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Posted: Sat Feb 06, 2010 1:05 pm
At first, Fallon did not hear the tell-tale stomp of footsteps behind her. Wait -- was he actually letting her get away? Her hope last bare moments. In a flash, she could hear the boy moving behind her, and he sounded fast. Her footsteps clopped heavily, but his was a rushed pitter-patter of sound, each step faster than the next.
A gasp ripped from her throat when she heard his voice behind her -- so close. "NO!" she shouted, leaning forward and bearing down against the pain.
Fallon had survived Barren Pines. She refused to be ended by a guy with a jump rope! Her legs screamed for rest, but Fallon had decided to run -- and that was that. She would run until she collapsed if she had to.
Either way, she would not give up.
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Posted: Sat Feb 06, 2010 2:26 pm
She was afraid. She was running for her life. She was giving it her all, past her all, and THIS was all she had. Even as she pushed harder, strained herself to move past the limits of her own body, he was still catching up. Any other day and the sprint would have been the end of him. He had the endurance, but never before did he have the swiftness that he had now. The ability to go above that of runners with longer legs, more strength, and he prided himself in that he could now match up. Go farther. He finally had the speed he wanted, and he almost forgot Fallon in the revelation.
“Is that all! STILL?!” He kept advancing, kept moving behind her, and he could almost reach out and push her. “Come on. If I reach you, you loose!” It was motivation. What were the limits of a human body when everything was on the line? If Fallon thought he was actually going to hurt her. If this had been a scenario where she was running away from someone in the dark. How far would she run?
He reached out. Just one tap and she would know that if this had been any other place and time, she would have failed. She would have lost.
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Posted: Sat Feb 06, 2010 4:34 pm
His words were like missiles aimed between her shoulderblades. Fallon could feel herself reaching the end of her exhaustion. Up ahead, she could see the spot where Ladon said he would meet her. Would she even make it that far?
When the Negaverse agent reached out and touched her, Fallon jumped out of her skin. The pressure was not enough to knock her over, but her fear made up for it. Her muscles locked and Fallon stumbled, somersaulting over the hard-picked dirt of the trail. She collapsed hard, dragging the skin of her arm along the last length. It burned immediately.
Lying there, Fallon struggled to get to her feet, but she couldn't. She had wasted all of her energy. He had touched her, he had caught up, he had won. Hot tears spilled down her cheeks, fear rattling her. Would this be her death? After everything?
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Posted: Sat Feb 06, 2010 4:50 pm
He had his own momentum going, and he had to kick out to stop himself or else risk falling over the girl too. With the same force, he kicked back and stepped away, landing a few feet away and seeing her on the ground. He knew what the dirt would taste like in her mouth, maple and dried leaves, gritty against her cheek. He could practically taste it on his own tongue. Panting, he watched, waiting. In this game of tag, he won. Looking back, he knew a sprint like this would have been Ladon’s loss, but it was Wolframite’s victory. “You lost.” He breathed out, and then noticed her shoulders hitch and back shake.
“I’m really disappointed. I thought you could escape.” He twirled the end of the rope he held and went over, seeing her down in the dirt, unable to move. “Not even bothering to get up? Are you just going to roll up into a ball and take this? How can you live with yourself – being this way?” He gritted his teeth and pressed his slender shoe against her spine, pressing down. “I don’t see why you even bother!” What was the point in running when everyone eventually caught up to you to beat you into the ground? She should have expected this to happen. She should have stayed home. The sole of his shoe twisted the thin fabric of her workout clothes.
“You’re so pathetic!” Breathe hitching, he took the sleeve of his arm and wiped his eyes.
The pressing weight was gone, and looking around, so was the Negaverser.
Back on the trail further ahead, Ladon waited, dressed in his workout clothes and rubbing his eyes, catching his breath, waiting for Fallon.
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