I was crouching, hands flat against the wet pavement, eyes locked onto the darkness that was ahead. My breathing was heavy and it left my lungs as small clouds of warm steam that met cool air. I was sweating and my eyes were burning but I didn't notice. My clothes were rags and my hair was matted and all I could think about was how I was going to evade Justice.
A quick glance behind me; clear.
I stood, leaned forward and began running again, as fast as I could toward the dirty alleyways across the dirty street that wound around this dirty city that sat upon the dirty face of this dirty, filthy, long-forsaken world.
I was a thief. Stealing was how I had been surviving for over eight standard months. War gear, vehicles, water. Name it, I've most likely stolen it.
But things have a way of catching up with a man. I always knew that sooner or later I would bite off just a little too much. Greed would lead me straight to Justice and then they would catch me, incarcerate me and then probably kill me.
I deserved it, but I didn't welcome it. And so now I would run.
The street stretched out before me as I began sprinting over it. My peripheral vision told me that there were headlights to my left joined by a sweeping searchlight that momentarily illuminated me before gliding past.
Yes, you bastards, it's me.
A bounding leap took me over some shadowed obstacle that stood before me and my stride broke not as I continued to close the distance between myself and that alleyway.
Once inside the twists and turns of the passages freedom was mine. No vehicle could follow and no biped could intercept. I had learned that running fast meant escape and escape had become a way of life for me.
I could here the screech of tires behind me as the vehicle came to a sudden halt. Scuttling footsteps on the pavement initiated the chase and we were off, headlong down the corridors that whipped by me on either side.
Within the sanctuary of the alleys it was darker than the rest of the night and the reverberation of my steps was louder. The concrete beneath seemed always damp and the walls were never without their thin coating of filth. Though the ways were tight around me I never felt confined for overhead there was no ceiling and a mere few stories up the walls gave way to the night. A dim-glowing light showed the way every few meters and a doorway could be found every now and again, hanging quietly on the walls like paintings.
My first turn lay ahead, a jagged left that would seem to the untrained eye to be impassable but I knew better. Toward the crumbling plasteel I sprinted, slowing only long enough to weave around refuse upon the floor.
Another quick glance behind me and then my eyes were before me again.
I focused now on the storage unit ahead, planting my gaze on the small ridge that circled it like a belt. Then my foot was on that ridge and I felt myself being boosted into the air, over the bulk of the unit. My hand instinctively reached as high as it could and after a short glide through space I could feel my grip tighten around the low guttering of the wall on my left.
As my body stopped swinging I could hear the footsteps behind me, shouts accompanied them and another beam of light found its way to me. I swung my gaze toward them but my eyes were unable to penetrate the blinding light that stared back.
Then I was in motion again, feet planting as firmly as possible onto the bricks of the building that I clung to. I pulled myself up onto the narrow ledge and rolled away from the edge. I got my feet under me quickly and began moving along the makeshift walkway toward my next point.
I would like to see them pull that one off.
I could hear their hopeless commotion below me and it always made me smile.
But it wasn't over. They knew these alleyways, too, and they knew where my escape route would inevitably dump me. I would have to hurry if I were to beat them to it.
Ah, the roofs. Great, sprawling affairs that opened wide to me, giving me so much room to breathe. I'd often considered the roofs to be the only place in this city that liked me. They were always here for me when I needed them. They allowed me to move freely across them to wherever it was that I was going.
But tonight something was wrong. I could feel it. Tonight the rooftops didn't greet me with that silent welcome, they instead warned me of an inaudible danger. My eyes could detect nothing out of the ordinary and my ears could sense no predators. Footsteps were nowhere and movement did not give away the position of any part of Justice.
But they were here. They had caught onto my routes at last and now a trap had been cast down before me and I, the unweary prey that I am, am stumbling into the midst of the enemy, my neck coming to rest within the braided loops of the noose.
My stride broke. My eyes swung left to right. My heartbeat rose up my throat and broke its way into my ears.
And then silence. The night closed in around me. I turned round in place, arms at my sides. I waited for the bullet.
But a voice came instead.
"I want you on your face, hands on the ground!" It echoed. "Any sudden movement and we will open fire!"
Instinctively I turned toward the source of the voice but before my eyes could focus that damned spotlight was in my face again. That spotlight just didn't give up.
I complied. Bending slowly I put my hands on the damp concrete before slowly letting myself down to rest my tired frame on the dampness.
I had been caught. Justice closed in.
***
That night has been replayed in my thoughts and dreams for a long time now. The trials of a small-time thief are over and a new beginning lies ahead; more honorable but much more deadly.
They gave me a new name, they call me 'Hollowbone' because I can run fast. And though it seems as if the officers above me would rather kill me than give me an encouraging word, I feel as though I'm part of something vast and great.
I polish my armor every few weeks and I clean my weapon at least three times a day. I eat better than I ever have. I'm constantly being sent to labs where tests are run on me and random members of my squad. They are constantly extracting things from us or pumping something into us. Guess they're having trouble making us perfect.
I'm bigger, stronger and feel alot more aggressive than before.
