THE RUN AND GO : JOSHLER

31 : SAHLO

It was raining the day Clancy left.

'Of course,' Clancy thought as he ran through the mud, 'it always rains.'

When ever something sad, or angry, or dramatic, or anything even relatively important to somebody's life happened, it always fucking rained.

Clancy was running for his life. Running for his life. Running for his life.

He was wearing pants, but he had cut them off at knees to make shorts, as sometimes it could be so incredibly hot in Dema all he wanted was a drop of water. Nights were freezing cold, so freezing that he even felt paralyzed. He would just wrap himself up in that scratchy wool blanket, then be prepared to sweat in the morning.

He had been punished for that, for cutting his uniform. Put in the Tower of Silence for a whole week, locked up with Jason.

Now that he was out, now that he was free, little things like hot and cold began to surface in Clancy's mind.

He had never realized how terrible life was in Dema until he escaped. He was brainwashed, and his eyes were now opened.

Trench.

He was running to Trench. Through Trench.

It was beautiful. He didn't need to see it; he knew it was beautiful. He knew the wide, deep gorge that seemed to go on forever and ever, with the rushing river at the bottom and dark caves and green grass on the sides.

But through the thick curtain of rain and dark night sky, everything was a hideous shade of grey-blue.

Everything looked the same to Clancy. The rainfall has turned the crystal clear river at his feet into pools of mud. The sides and cliffs and caves of the trench all morphed together into one big, ugly, blue-grey blur.

His boots kicked up mud as he ran, all of that disgusting brown mud splashing up onto his bare legs. He regretted cutting off his pants now.

Fear bubbled up inside Clancy's chest as he ran blindly through the rain. His light grey shirt stuck to his skin, soaked in mud and rain. His black jacket flew out behind him, almost falling off his thin shoulders, and was crusty with dried dirt. A tattered brown backpack was slung over his shoulders, slapping against his back as he ran, sending pain up his spine.

He could barely see two feet in front of him, but he figured anything he was toward was better than what he was running away from.

Clancy tightened the yellow bandana around his head, still running, his dirty hands splashing mud in his face.

He painfully squeezed his eyes shut and winced as he felt the mud rolling down his forehead and burning his eyes. He kept running. He couldn't stop. Stopping meant going back to Dema.

And going back to Dema was worse than death.

As soon as Clancy opened his eyes again, they grew to the size of them moon. A huge jagged boulder was sticking up right in front of him, and he didn't even see it. Before he even knew what was happening, he smacked into the rock and fell backwards.

He cried out as he fell flat on his face, right into the freezing river at his feet. His backpack fell off and landed somewhere in the mud next to him.