I forced myself to do several minutes of walking on the treadmill as a warm up. The aching fear throughout my body demanded I start jogging right away, to exert myself faster, but I knew if I did that then I would quickly burn out.

Step-woo, step-woo, step-woo.

I tried to let the rhythmic hitting of my plimsolls on the matt ease me into a steady motion. It didn't work. I wasn't built for this. I wasn't built for exercise at all. I wanted to cry and lay down. The clean feeling I enjoyed after the shower had been replaced with a grimy, sweaty feeling again. Someone within the Pied Piper organization really hadn't thought through this torment because the overalls trapped in the sweat trying to escape my body and the plimsolls offered little in the way of cushion for my feet.

Step-woo, step-woo, step-woo.

I checked my Meter every few seconds hoping that each time that the little flashing LED had become a steady orange glow, at least. The flashing wasn't going anywhere and just looking at it gave me a migraine. Once I felt warmed up and borderline feverish I pressed an upward arrow key on the treadmill and increased the speed until the rolling mat beneath me demanded I move at a jogging pace.

I'm going to die, I thought, over and over again, because my body was already starting to cramp up, demanding that I stop and take a breather despite it not even being ten minutes since I started. Tiffany was faring well at a walking pace, her long legs making easy work striding briskly. I had hoped to catch her attention, to meet her gaze, to steal a moment of support from her. I needed it badly. But she had her eyes closed with her head faced towards the ceiling.

Alex Landly was continuing at a walking pace, his face stoic and focused. You're like a freaking gazelle, I thought to myself, smirking darkly. Walking briskly up the steep main road to even get to Lintern's Gym had been an ordeal in and of itself that made my legs burn and cramp up. If anything that had been the warm up. To be jogging on top of all that, after being sat cramped in a black van, then later on the coach, for hours and hours, only to be stuck on a treadmill…it was the worst kind of torture imaginable.

Chook-Chook, Chook-Chook.

Ten minutes passed on the treadmill. Come on, I thought, looking down at the still blinking Meter on my wrist, change you little bastard. Change! Change!

A scream tore through the air from somewhere behind me, followed by rapid gasps for air and crying. I didn't dare turn around for fear of losing my rhythm and falling off the treadmill. In the reflection of the window in front of me I thought I saw a glimpse of a girl being picked up off the floor by Pied Piper officers and maybe her Meter device shining a steady red, but it happened so fast I couldn't be sure that was what I saw. I did however hear the last sobbing cries of the girl before she was escorted out of the room, not the way our group had come in, but ahead towards a different set of doors. Were they taking her to the Remote Zone as they called it?

I lost my footing for a moment and nearly tripped. I gripped onto the edges of the treadmill, my sweaty palms touching the cool, unyielding gray plastic. I let my arms take the weight of my body for a few moments, selfishly taking a brief reprieve before fear of blowing up and my Meter turning red forcing me to start jogging again.

Chook-Chook, Chook-Chook.

My mind used the escape valve it used before, this time forcing me back to a memory of running laps around the rugby pitch I remembered so well. I was about fourteen and it was the dead of winter and still I went to practice. For most of the winter period it had just been myself and Harry Turnhouse running laps with his Dad, the team's coach, giving us training and instructions. My Dad was there too smoking in the dark in his own large puffy black coat. Harry Turnhouse got to play every single game when our team played. I was only ever given a few minutes here or there in total. Our team never won a game. I didn't even like rugby, never watched it on TV, so winning or losing the game didn't matter to me much. I never had that killer do-or-die mentality that great athletes likely needed to succeed in sports. Besides hanging out with my Dad I wondered why I stuck out playing for a team that didn't want me for two years. Did I particularly like running in the cold, splashing and diving in the mud, catching the soaring rugby ball with my frost-bitten fingertips? Not particularly, no. It occurred to me then, running on the treadmill, thinking of that past experience, that I had done all of that to see if I could break out of my shell.

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

What if I was an excellent rugby player and I didn't know it? What if I could have stopped being the scrawny, nerdy little boy nobody particularly liked and could be reborn as a better me?

Those two years grinding away on the field, practicing, learning, trying, all amounted to nothing in the end.

Chook-Chook, Chook-Chook.

A pain in my lower back demanded my attention, taking me out of my reverie. For about twenty seconds I must have been able to ignore what my body was experiencing. My breathing had quickened to huffing breaths and sweat had started to build into droplets around my temples.

I glanced over to Alex Landly. He was still walking, taking it easy. It didn't seem fair that he wasn't having to jog the way I was jogging. A small part of me was thankful he wasn't made to start matching my pace because, I knew, he would make my efforts seem pathetic in comparison. I looked away from him and stared down at my plimsolls, watching the white blurs moving up and down, up and down, the movement of the treadmill mat looking like the road before a fast moving car. I felt dizzy. I needed water. The realization that I didn't have any water to drink made my eyes go wide like a hungry shark.

This time I dared to look around. I couldn't see any sign of a water dispenser anywhere but my view was very limited, and the room was huge, so that didn't mean much. I raised my hand and looked around for a Pied Piper officer. After about a minute a Pied Piper officer walked by. He wasn't one of the uniform wearing ones. He was in full attire, with a machine gun in his grip.

"What?" he said, indignantly.

"I–need–water," I said between hampered breaths.

"No water," said the Pied Piper officer, "Not until you leave here with a green light."

Several audible gasps followed. Others in our group had been listening. Teenagers that were already aware of this revelation, lined up on other treadmills, continued on struggling. My mouth felt suddenly dry. No water.

I started to laugh despite hardly being able to breathe. I couldn't help it. This was too stupid. Too insane.

"Ha! Ha! Ha!"

The Pied Piper officer grinned and looked at me like I must be going mad, then he turned and continued back down along the row of treadmills, likely to break more bad news of no water to other teenagers newly brought to the room.

My loud laughter became a mix of smaller laughter and choking coughs. At some point I noticed Tiffany saying my name.

"Burgess!" she said, shouting it.

I looked at her with a smirk on my face. My stomach ached with the onset of the worst stitch I had ever felt.

"S-sorry," I said, just barely getting the word out, "It's–all–just–so-s-stupid."

"Slow down," said TIffany, "You're exerting yourself enough. Take it easy."

I looked down at my Meter. It was still blinking.

"I can't," I said, wiping sweat away from my brow using the back of my right forearm.

"You can-" Tiffany said, but she stopped what she was saying. She had noticed her own Meter. It had started blinking orange too. Reflexively she reached forward and pressed the treadmill button to increase her speed until she reached a jogging pace.

I coughed, hard, and fought the urge to laugh more. Like a wave however the smile wiped from my face. What was funny suddenly wasn't funny anymore. I could feel my body getting suddenly more desperate for everything. Air. Water. Rest.

Chook-Chook, Chook-Chook.

"Argh!" Came a sudden cry.

I glanced out of the corner of my eyes and saw that Alex Landly's Meter had also just started to flash orange. He hadn't even started to sweat yet. He reached forward and also turned his treadmill speed up until he too had to start jogging.

Welcome to the club, I thought, it's about time.