14 The Cat and The mouse

GRAYON'S FEET POUNDED THE GROUND, Bolting down the dark forest like an Olympic champion at the gun start. His feet slip outwards on the wet autumn leaves as he rounded the corner by passing the millionth trees, his breathing coming out in small spurts, hot and nervous. At his sides, his arms moved back and forth, pumping faster and faster for speed. He wasn't stopping. "Oh fuck me!" He cried out in his head, throwing himself forward with even greater abandon. His lungs and heart were pumping, but the air didn't seem to be enough as he sprinted forward, panic trembling in his exhausting limbs.

In the mist of dawn he kept running, but he knew his time was up. As their paws pounded, their howls echoing the dark forest. Vibrating and pulsating in a rhythm. Consuming the silences around him, too consuming to just simply ignore. The flicking of fear he felt completely eating him alive, the heart that pumped blood within his veins hammered in his chest... every single pound in his chest. Hectic and erratic. Not through his eyes, that was occupied by the steady drum, pipe, a dark sound of their howling; drowning it out in the ears. But he couldn't stop, he had to keep on moving but he couldn't. The great pounding, this great pressure; every beat. He couldn't hear it, but he could feel it. It remained there, that dark beating remained, alone. Every beat a turbulent push from within pushing as a giant placed within the chest; He could feel it still, beating, pulsing, thumping.

The lungs within his throat begged him to stop, the undeniable tightness in his throat demanded it. But he only quickened his pace, never slowing down. Never stopping. He just kept pushing and pushing, the further he pushed the less he could breathe, his breath short and painful, like his muscles were ready to just give up the fight. The darkness closed in and all he can do is just hang on until he lost them, but even he knew that he couldn't outrun them forever, they were in their wolf form. Way quicker then a human, but even that didn't stop him from trying. Maybe it was the coldness, maybe he was just plain scared of being caged or trapped once again, for his freedom to be taken away, for it wither away before he even had the chanced to grasp it. Hold it. To feel it.

The further he ran, the harder it became, he was breathing but now the air just wouldn't go in, like his lungs were surrounded by metal bands. The dizzying feeling and the need to get low to the ground, but he pushed it away. At the corner of his eyes, he saw them. From the shadows they came, gaining on him, staring with almost human eyes, but their flaring nostrils gave the intent of violence and blood thirsty. He already knew his fate, in seconds his throat will be ripped out, his flesh consumed. Their thirst for blood was increasing by the minute. His blood.

Just a few meters away, sounds of violence could be heard clearly now, as they marched on the ground surrounding him. Halting him into a stop by force. Fuck, fuck, fuck... cussing at his frustrating situation, it echoed within his mind. He felt the tension and the intensity in their stance, teeth gnashed in a frenzy of feeding. There's a great deal of emotion behind their eyes. Indignant and anger, much like lightening on a pitch black night. Determined. Ready. Ready to fight.

Hands clenched, as he walked a few steps forward, but stopping instantly. Halting himself in place, trapped as they ferociously growled at his movements, hostile. They defiantly didn't like him, he thought laughter ringing in his mind. He was the enemy, that was fact, they saw him for what he was, the enemy. The trees around him veiled in the lightest of mists, their trunks sombre brown with sable cracks that gnarl the barks. As his eyes traveled around looking for a way out, hoping for a way out. The idea of fighting was something he didn't want to do, he had enough for today, all he ever did was fight. Forced into a circle he didn't particularly want to be in, but then again did he really have a choice? His free will was stripped away from along time ago.

Seeing their stance, ready to fight. He could feel the blood in water, the smoke in the air filling his lungs. Full of demise. Marcel had once told him that in this world people have too many monsters, so learn from nature. Those predators need predators of their own, and the only way to wine is to become theirs.

Grayson knew that they wanted him gone, dead even. To hear his mourning, his cries, to look him in the eyes as they tore him apart. Spilling his blood, staining the earth with it. He knew he was done for, hearing the sound of his freedom wither away, melting becoming something so unattainable for him. What choice did he have? He didn't. He never did...

His attempt to outrun didn't seem to work, they were too determined, too determined to end him or even to just capture, he knew that they wouldn't be satisfied with just ending him, especially for what he'd done, killing their own was treason. For them to kill him would be a less of a punishment for what he'd done, he needed to be punished further. At least he wouldn't be, but it was hard to see their perspective, because he was in their position he was do it differently, if he were them he would make them suffer. For his Prey to beg for mercy, to hear his cries. That's what he was taught, there was no other way. But Grayson made a choice instead of waiting for the disaster to unfold. He made a choice. "Don't you dare," the beast defiantly wasn't going to be willing to just back down but it was a smart decision.

As he put his hands in the air and behind his head. Shame consumed him, he truly felt ashamed of his defeat. This was a wild game of survival, something he was so familiar with, his been playing this game for so long, long enough to know that the ball wasn't on his court, they had officially check-mated him. Sacrificing his position as hunter, he was the prey encircled with his predators. The sacrifice was high, he never gave up but the voice in his mind mumbled words of defeat. He knelt down on his knees, signalling surrender, "Coward..." The beast whispers echoed in his mind... Before he too retreated into the back of his mind, too ashamed of his human counterpart's actions. Betrayal etched into the silences that became hollow so quickly. For the first time, Grayson felt silence and it wasn't what he'd expected.

It felt like poison to him, for in that void of sounds the shallowness of his conversation with the beast was laid bare. The presence's of his beast grew and the quietness grew deeper and he could hear his own steady rhythm from within, for the first time hearing nothing but silence within his own mind. But felt empty. Alone. But that didn't matter now. That flicker of numbness would soon end.

He stared at the earthy ground, he couldn't look at them, everything happened too fast. Before he had even the chance to react, the pain took over a portion of his brain, as if dealing with its energy expenditure enough, falling slowly. Eyesight blurring with each seconds that pasted, but not because tears were welling up.

Everything became fuzzy; then he saw nothing, nothing at all. Grayson consciousness was floating through am empty space filled with thick static. Throughout the inky space his heartbeat pounded loudly, echoing in his ears, that sound he couldn't hear earlier was too loud to ignore now. He now had realised what was happening, they'd injected him will a liquid. Poisoning his body, draining it away painfully, it was the sort of pain that burned, an invisible flame where held against his skin.

The familiarity was all too real. How had they known? He thought, but as his body fell to the ground, her face came into his blurry vision. Before everything went black, he only saw her looking down at him. Her angry eyes haunting him, feeling the rage seep through him and never leaving. That pain in his neck never left, just increased, burnt his insides as everything went dark. The emotions of loss are that way, right? Death, abandonment or betrayal, they all led here, he thought. Emily had finally broke him.