Restoring Balance - A Fight of Three Friends

The adrenaline rushed through my veins. My heart was beating so fast that I could barely hear my own thoughts, let alone the sound of footsteps following behind me.

I could see him, his shadow growing larger and larger as he followed me through the alleyway. He had been following me for what felt like hours now. I didn't know where I was going; I just knew that I couldn't afford to stop running.

"Stop!" His voice echoed off the walls of the alley and bounced back into my ears. The man's voice was unfamiliar, but it sounded menacing. He was getting closer now, so close that his heavy footsteps were growing louder and louder. This man was big; much bigger than me. But that wasn't anything new. I had grown used to being small in this world.

Although I hadn't quite grown used to being hunted by men like him. Men with thick necks and muscles that looked as if they were made of steel instead of flesh and bones. Men with angry eyes that seemed to glow red in the night. Men who did not think twice about killing someone like me -- a homeless child living on the streets because their family had abandoned them or worse, because their family had died trying to protect them from people like him.

"Stop or I'll kill you," he continued. His voice was getting closer now, and my legs were starting to get tired from running so long without stopping to rest or eat anything during this journey that would take me miles away from home -- wherever home was these days. All I knew was that it wasn't here right now. That was the thing about living on the streets in a city such as this one: after a while, you lose track of home and start to consider any place you can find food and shelter as home, even if it is only temporary. "I swear I will kill you," he said again with more force in his voice this time around, "What do you have? Give it to me."

I had nothing to give him except for my clothes and what little food I'd managed to steal today, nothing valuable at all that would be worth his life or mine for that matter -- but then again, what did he even want from me? My life? Was that worth more than whatever he imagined could be held within my dirty backpack?

My lungs started to burn as I searched for an answer amidst all the questions in my head, but before I could find one he had already caught up with me and grabbed me by the collar of my shirt before throwing me against the wall with enough force to make me black out momentarily before waking up again seconds later with a splitting headache and a stinging pain across my face which had been scraped raw against the hard concrete wall next to where I fell. Before I could even register what happened next, he grabbed a fistful of my hair and slammed my head against the wall once more before letting go of me abruptly and making way towards my backpack lying on the ground next to us where he rummaged through its contents until finding something inside that seemed to meet his approval: an apple which he promptly bit into triumphantly while eyeing me menacingly like a predator staring down its prey before devouring it wholeheartedly as if it were something deliciously sinful instead of plain old fruit picked up from a nearby street vendor's cart along with all the other produce left behind after being bought by passersby who preferred freshness over price tags when shopping for groceries; evidently this man had not seen much in his lifetime aside from violence since slicing fruit at its skin never crossed his mind before biting into it so savagely.

After chewing up every last bit of fruit before swallowing it down with some water from a bottle in my backpack, he finally spoke again:

"You're not from around here," he stated simply after wiping off some excess apple juice from his mouth with one hand while holding onto my hair tightly with the other; apparently, he still intended on keeping hold of me until we were both satisfied with our relationship whether physically or emotionally or both: either way there didn't seem much room for refusal on either side since refusing meant death and accepting meant submission -- two things which were never easy choices when locked in mortal combat against each other such as what we were doing right now in this alleyway somewhere near downtown Seattle where many buildings lay destroyed after some terrifying terrorist attack earlier tonight during which nearly half the population died; either directly due to attacks carried out by terrorists themselves or indirectly due to the resulting fires caused by those attacks in buildings high enough to burn everything within thousands of miles worth of land for weeks after their initial ignition; buildings whose ruins littered downtown Seattle today alongside all sorts of debris from cars burnt beyond recognition among other stuff that no longer made sense anymore since they belonged neither past nor present but rather somewhere stuck between time itself without moving forward towards future or backwards towards past: they just became part of what people called 'the rubble' today