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Drop Zones
The field was a vast expanse of stubbly grass untended in recent memory.
Running across the plateau, dreamlike, my legs windmilling wildly but propelling
me forward agonizingly slowly, I sloshed my head in drunken circles, peering
about for some movement other than my wild stumbling. As I reached what
I judged to be the center, I felt a sudden pain in my heart. I allowed myself
to fall to the ground with a thud. The ground was warm. Scorched earth?
I pressed a hand against the soil and let all other sensation slip by. Silent,
blood pounding in my temples, I pressed both hands now against the soil.
All around me not a blade of grass remained. The earth was densely packed,
as if a multitude of feet had run across it, packing it. It was warm like
blood.
Agents now ringed me from a distance. Dark suits came slowly towards me
from all points of the compass, interrupting my exhausted temperature reverie.
I momentarily clawed at the ground but the nearly black dirt was packed
so tightly I merely succeeded in embedding small scraping of it in my ragged
fingernails. I was wearing a black pajama-style costume and for the briefest
of instants I humored myself with the sartorial matching my scrabbling had
achieved.
They were closer now. I could see their attempt at corporate attire that
probably came from a discount outlet ten levels below the surface in a prefab
plastic pocket mall. Their glasses glinted but the eyes behind those lenses
had died years ago, if they had ever lived at all. I pulled myself into
a cross-legged position and resolutely folded my arms across my chest. I
tensed my arm muscles as tight as I could until they burned like live wires
and the veins on the back of my wrists popped out, barely constrained by
the skin. I could feel the heat of the ground now through my flimsy pants.
They stopped.