But I Digress...

Jason yawned and stretched. The sunlight was too bright. Hadn't he closed the curtains last night? He sat up and got out of bed, squishing his toes in the thick carpet.

After getting dressed, Jason walked over to the window and squinted out into the new day. He glanced at his watch. 10:00. He yawned again. Saturday mornings are so lazy, he thought as his eyes played over the green lawn behind him and up the ivy-covered brick wall. Something bright was glinting at the top of the wall. It hurt his eyes, so he turned away groggily and walked across the room to his dresser to look in the mirror. His eyes had dark bags under them. What time did I get to bed last night? He couldn't remember. Not early enough. The glint from the wall was flashing at him in the mirror too. Ugh.

His eyes scanned the dresser in front of him. The vase that Kendra had given him was still empty. He wasn't much into flowers, but he liked the vase. Well, he liked who the vase was from at least. He leaned forward too quickly and his knee struck the dresser hard. A picture frame tottered on the edge of the dresser, and he clumsily lunged to grab it. It hit the floor.

CRASH

That's not right, he thought. That frame didn't have any glass in it. What made the shattering noise? He looked back at the vase, but it was gone. There was glass scattered all over the dresser. Jason stood still. And a bullet in the wall. He moved fast. The mirror shattered behind him as he dove towards the door and rolled out into the hallway.

Crouching, Jason moved quickly down the stairs and towards the entrance to his garage, being careful not to come in full view of any windows. As he crawled through the kitchen, some movement caught his eye. There above the sink was a tiny camera, watching him. He rolled towards it and got beneath its view. Carefully staying out of view, he reached up and opened the silverware drawer, and felt around until he found a knife. Grasping the knife so that the blunt end stuck out from his hand, he leapt up and brought it down hard on the camera. The second time he hit it, it came loose from the wall. He dropped it in the garbage bucket under the sink and slunk off towards the garage.

No windows in the garage. He stepped out and shut the door behind him. A slight tide of relief washed over him, and his mind cleared. He had been surviving on reflexes, and now he felt himself coming awake through a deep fog, as if the last two minutes had been a dream. His brain clicked into gear.

What am I doing in the garage? Take the car. The car is the fastest way to leave. What if they tampered with the car? They were able to open my curtains, weren't they? Hmmm...

He knew that whoever they were, they wouldn't be far behind. Opening the car door, he took his keys from above the windshield and inserted them into the starter. String. Jason realized that he was wearing his socks but no shoes. He grabbed a loose thread and unravelled about seven feet of string. Tying one end to the head of the key, he looped the thread around the steering wheel and pulled the other end out of the car until it was taught. If he pulled just a bit more it should turn the key and start the car... Was six feet away far enough? He grasped the thread tightly and lunged away from the car. The key turned. The thread snapped. His body hit a metal garbage can hard.

The car exploded.

Nursing a very bruised shoulder, Jason crawled to the back of the garage and found the loose boards. His attackers would be coming quickly after hearing the explosion. The garage door started to open. Prying the wood loose, he forced himself through the small opening. The wood splintered into his arm, and left a large scrape on his leg. He dove into a neatly trimmed bush, ignoring the bite of the sharp branches, and held his breath. Inside the garage he heard a man talking on a radio.

"The car bomb exploded, but he seems to have avoided it somehow. I'll search the garage, he must be in here somewhere......... Send in the cars, in case he escaped. He can't get very far on foot. If he got out, my man outside will get him."

A man outside. There's two of them. And more coming. Jason tried in vain to quiet his breathing. He peered through the leaves, hoping to find the other man before the other man found him. He did. A tall man dressed in black sprinted around the corner of the garage and began scouring the backyard. Then, he noticed the hole in the back of the garage. Jason thought quickly. A distraction. He needed a distraction. He pushed his way slowly out of the bush so that it was between the man in black and himself. His knee struck a fist-sized rock. Biting back a moan, he lay silently on the lawn, tears coming to his eyes.

The rock! Ignoring the pain, he closed his fingers around the rock and heaved it at the second story window above him. Glass rained down as the man in black jumped backwards. Jason sprang out from behind the bush and locked his arm around the man's neck, choking him. In a second, the man had reversed the hold and Jason was on his back, shards of glass from the broken window cutting into him. He cried out. The man in black pointed a gun at Jason, and spoke into his radio.

"I've got him. He's in the back. He tried to jump me."
"Very good. You know your orders. Do it."

The man's finger tensed on the trigger. The burst of speed came from years of working out, mixed with the raw terror and instinct of human survival. Jason spun to the side as the bullet came smashing down into the dirt; he launched himself upwards with his hands, spinning to face his attacker with a large piece of glass in his hand. Taken off guard, the man in black struggled to cock the gun again, and Jason lunged, driving the glass deep into the man's arm, causing him to scream and drop the gun. Jason brought his leg up, smashing his knee into the man's chest and knocking him out cold. He grabbed the gun, and saw his own blood pouring from his hand where he had grasped the glass. Tucking the gun under his belt, he sprinted around the far side of the house towards the road.

Out of sheer luck, there was an empty taxi driving by. Jason clambered into the backseat and yelled at the stunned driver to burn rubber. And two blocks ahead of them, four police cars raced around the corner and cruised straight towards them. Jason gasped and lay flat against the back seat. The taxi driver began to slow and pull over. Oh no. His mind flashed. The gun. "Keep moving!" he shouted as he pulled out the gun and held it to the driver's head. "Drive!" This did not have the effect Jason had hoped. The taxi driver froze, his hands twitching, mouth open in a silent protest.

THUMP! The back of a gun has its uses too.

Jason opened the driver's door and shoved the unconscious man out onto the road, then pushed his foot to the gas pedal. Careening past the four police cars, he caught a brief glimpse of the confusion on the faces of the cops. He had his head start. The chase had just begun.