RUNNING CLUB
By Michael Wade Layne
RUNNING CLUB
By Michael W. Layne
This short story is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination, or, if real, used fictitiously.
Copyright 2013 Michael W. Layne
Cover Design by Michael W. Layne
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The people at work call me by my first name, but you can call me Runner.
I’m not the fastest there is, but I’ve come in second to the Norwegian three years in a row at our annual 5k race, and that means that I’m not the slowest there is either. At least that’s what I keep telling myself as I step onto the cracked asphalt trail and look up at the almost full moon. The path’s overgrown here and there but not too bad—a five mile expanse of old train rails once turned into a biking path that our club now maintains in secret. Gives us a place where it’s relatively safe to run.
With only two weeks until the big race, I depress the button on my vintage GPS watch that I unearthed at the antique mall, and I’m off and running through the cool night. I start off gently for the first mile and slowly build up speed as I check all my systems. Legs. Breathing. Stomach. Temperature. Potential hot spots. Achilles slowly warming up and stretching. Everything seems in order. Despite its age, the watch face still lights up when I press the button, and I can see that I’m steady cruising around a seven minute pace. Not bad for a guy with a desk job who only gets to run clandestinely at night a few times a week.
I let the illuminated face dim, and I’m back to seeing everything by blue moon light. I own a headlamp, but I like running without it as often as possible. Makes me feel more like a human. Like an animal. Plus, it’s safer this way. Harder for the healthcare authorities to spot me.
My father used to talk about the days when running and exercising were all the rage. When everyone was either a runner, a biker, belonged to a gym, or took a group exercise class. My heart speeds up a bit just thinking about it. Entire rooms full of people exercising out in the open. I can barely fathom the concept. Sometimes, it was hard to believe my dad at all, like he was just making it all up as he approached the chaotic times of his last days. Assuming he was telling the truth, things today certainly are different. So far, the Big Three haven’t been able to get the government to make exercise completely illegal, but running in public is outlawed at night around here. And if you do it during the daylight hours, you won’t be breaking any laws, but you’ll still go on their list as someone who engages in dangerous behavior.
Makes me feel stupid at times for risking so much just so I can get my kicks, so to speak, but I’m careful. I run with a group of people whom I trust (literally) with my life. My running club. No outsiders other than the ones we meet at the yearly race. Despite the precautions clubs like mine take, we’ve all heard the rumors of infiltrators—spies from the Big Three sent in to bust up the underground running clubs. Either that or tales of insiders turned to the dark side to make a quick buck or to protect a loved one in need of serious healthcare. I can only hope they’re just rumors.
I notice that my pace has sped up closer to six just thinking about those healthcare assholes. Unfortunately, this is a speed I can’t maintain for the full five miles I plan on running tonight. Not yet, at least. So I slow it down a bit. I breathe deeply every third intake of air. I clear my mind and focus on the remaining distance. I know five miles is a bit longer than the upcoming race distance, but I’m a firm believer in training longer than I have to race. As I run, the soft sound of my feet striking the ground puts me into a sorta trance. I instinctively go over the route I’ve picked out for sneaking back to my car that’s parked in the one blind spot overlooked in my company’s garage—safe from the matrix of high-tech video surveillance cameras and sensors.
I dwell on getting home for a nice hot shower and allow myself a short laugh as I think about the next time the video doc gives me a checkup. I think about how I’ll have to run in place for ten minutes before logging on just so my heart rate isn’t too low when he examines me through the medical attachments that plug into my tablet. That’s when I hear the whir of rubber wheels behind me on the trail. I turn my head. I can’t see a thing, but I know that sound. Bikers. They like to be called “cyclists,” of course, which is why we all call them “bikers.” Suddenly, four more miles seems like a long way from home. And even a six-minute pace doesn’t seem nearly fast enough.
The buzzing of their tires keeps getting louder and closer. There’s a hard-packed dirt embankment studded with trees and foliage on either side of me, so there’s nowhere to hide or to seek cover. All I can do is hug the edge of the trail and hope they’re going too fast to notice. I don’t have to wait long until they’re almost right on top of me. They’re running with their lights off, so they must be sporting night vision, which gives me a definite disadvantage trying to hide from them. At the last second, I run up the slope to my right and feel the weeds and thorns tear at my legs as my right ankle torques a bit on the incline of the hill. I count as three of them flash by me, clocking at least twenty miles per hour as best I can guess. I stay posted in the weeds, waiting to see if they keep going or if it’s about to become one of those nights. Even with just the moonlight, I can see the mini peloton make a skidding u-turn and come to a stop as one. They’re probably trying to decide what it was they just passed. Am I a deer? Or a Healthcare Compliance Officer? Or just a single, stupid runner out by himself at night.
Just as I’m exploring my limited choices, the bikers spin around again and take off into the night. I’m relieved, but suddenly I’m also very worried. Three bikers cruising at top speed and not stopping to take the opportunity to harass a lone runner? There’s really only one answer. I might be running for home, but those three are racing away from something or someone. I drop down onto the asphalt, and start after them, checking out the sides of the path as I go, looking for anywhere to turn off and hide. From what, I’m not yet sure. I don’t check my watch, because I don’t want to give away my position, but I’m full up on the balls of my feet, and I know I must be zipping along at a six minute or faster pace again. If I ever make it home, I’m gonna love reviewing the data from tonight’s run.
Before I can find a place to ditch the trail, the sound of a single whining engine splits the night behind me, and everything lights up with strobes of white and red washes. The signature colors of a Healthcare Compliance Officer, or as I like to say, a Helmet Head. The good news is that the Helmet Head isn’t really interested in the fact that I’m breaking the law tonight. The bad news is that if he gets a positive ID on me while I’m engaging in risky behavior, I’ll be put on a list and banned outright from all legal forms of health insurance with no recourse, and that would be a very bad thing. My father used to tell me that health insurance companies didn’t always have this kind of power over our lives, but even if that was the case once upon a time, it sure isn’t true now.
I see my shadow long in front of me, my arms rotating in circles like I’m running in place. I’m just about to find out if my legs have another gear in them tonight, and that’s when I see it. A deer trail leading off into the woods to the left. Without thinking, I take the path. It’s muddy, and there’s just enough moonlight where I think I can see fresh tire treads from the bikers who decided to get off the path as well. I can only hope that whateve
r the Helmet Head is driving or flying tonight is too big to follow me down the narrow dirt path.
Within a second, I’m in the woods. The moon flittering above as it come into and fades out of view through the tree canopy. I keep looking over my shoulder as often as possible to see if there’s anyone following me. Soon, I’m in a thicket, which effectively takes my speed down to almost nil. So much for my data tonight. Through the brambles and the trees, I see a lone hovercycle inching its way down the main trail I’ve just come off, the healthcare cop craning his neck, trying to spot me through the forest. My nemesis has figured out that I’ve ditched the trail somewhere, but he isn’t sure where or else he’d be trying to get in here with me. I stop running all together and crouch down. My sweat starts to dry on my skin, making me shiver, and my heart starts to slow, despite my mounting anxiety. Now the little shit is directly parallel from me only about ten feet away through the trees. I hold my breath and remain still. For how long, I’m not sure. The hovercycle continues slowly forward again until I can finally see its taillights. I exhale slowly. And then my watch beeps, and the hovercycle stops.
I look down, and a message on my watch face is asking me if I want it to go into power save mode. I hit the “no” button and start making my way farther along the path, hoping that it lets me out somewhere away from our main running trail or at least that it takes me deeper into the forest. Suddenly, I feel a large gust of wind and look up to see the hovercycle in the air above me, a trick I didn’t know it could do. Must be one of the new models, I think, as it shines its red and white spots down at me. I start running, but now the cycle is above the tree line and easily following me like a helicopter tracking an escaped fugitive. I’m starting to panic as I realize the Helmet Head has probably already called in his backup. I keep running until I see a thin trail going up a hill and the promise of light pollution from the city waiting for me over the crest. I book it up the path as quickly as I can, and I see a residential road in front of me. I make the choice to leave my relative cover in an instant, and soon I’m hauling it as fast as I can down the middle of the road with old Helmet Head on his hovercycle right above me, no doubt corralling me into the waiting arms of his fellow officers.
And then I see them. The three bikers are coming at us head on, their headlights now blinding. I wonder briefly if they’re working with the cop, but I quickly toss that thought aside as they race past me, causing Helmet Head to turn around and come to a stop in mid-air. Bikers and runners aren’t really what anyone would call friendly to each other, but cycling is just as verboten as running in the eyes of the authorities, and for a brief moment, we have one of those enemy of my enemy things going on as best as I can tell.
I look down and see a large stone that one of the suburbanites has used as trim for her mulched flower garden. I pick it up and heave it up at the bottom of the hover turbine while the cop is still deciding who to pursue. The rock makes contact with the blades and is spit out at almost bullet velocity, nearly taking my head off along the way. But the hovercycle and its driver go down. The bikers turn around in the distance and within seconds, they pass by me without so much as a wave, high fiving each other and laughing about how they had to help the poor, helpless runner out of his jam. They have done more than their share tonight, but I hope they remember who actually took the hovercycle down. Still, if I ever see those fuckers it’ll kill me, but I’ll have to thank them. I owe them a solid if the opportunity ever presents.
As I turn around from watching the bikers pedal away, my face is met by a heavy gauntleted hand, and it hurts. A lot. Helmet Head is in full body armor, and even though I can’t see his face, I’m guessing he’s pretty pissed right about now. I start to run, but the cop is on me, more fluid and graceful than I would think a guy in plate mail would be. He’s probably weak and skinny on the inside, since he most likely hasn’t exercised a day in his life, but his battle armor is half exoskeleton, and it gives him plenty of strength to deal with me if I let him. All of this as my body is falling to ground and my arm is stretching out, grasping for another rock or something to hit him with. A heavy boot stomps down on my wrist. I pivot on my hip and bring my foot around until its aimed right at the back of the guy’s knee. I jam my foot in with all my strength, collapsing his leg and making him fall backwards, and luckily he hits his head on the pavement. In less than a heartbeat I’m on top of him, pulling off his own metal glove while he’s still shaking off the impact from the fall. I slip the glove onto my own hand and wail into him as hard as I can. I’m not just punching him. I’m punching my shitty cog-in-the-wheel job and the whole healthcare trinity. Health insurance, the pharmaceutical coalition, and of course, the doctors and the hospitals. His unarmored hand is still in its insulation glove as he reaches for his sidearm. I am totally screwed if he gets that, no matter how fast I can run. They aren’t empowered to kill me, but they have all been deputized, and they can kill me if it’s in self-defense. All I can think of to do is to punch his grasping hand as hard as I can with his own armored fist. I see his glove rip, and some blood pours out as he howls behind his reflective face shield.
I grab his gun and take off running to the main street. I wipe the gun down as best as I can with my shirt and drop it down a curbside drain. This isn’t going to do any good at all if he finds the gun in the first place, but I’m taking a chance that Helmet Head would have a tough time squeezing down into the sewers with all his metal duds on. Then I get an idea. In the distance, sirens are getting closer. I turn the corner and thank the runner gods that there’s a manhole cover. I shove my still-gauntleted hand into the holes and pull the cover up easily. Within seconds, I’m in the sewer system, running as fast as I can. I ditch the glove and follow the streets, which are labeled with placards, so it doesn’t take me too long to get back to my office building. I may smell like shit, but my mood is definitely improving. I pop open the trunk of my car in the underground garage, do a quick change into a clean shirt, slip into my jeans over top of my running shorts, and within a minute, I’m on the road, trying to drive below the speed limit. As I’m waiting at a red light, five red-and-whites swoosh by in the direction of their injured comrade. While I’m waiting for the light to go green, I look at my watch and hit “stop.” Shit. I hate when I forget to turn my watch off after a run.