I’ve been running all day. I am just starting to slowdown. The last time I ran I was escaping them. That time I succeeded but I ran away from them before that as well.

I wasn’t a Zax then though. I ran crooked, zig zaging around stuff. With all the things I forgot I am amazed I still remember the first time I ran away from them. It was me and my mom who ran, they drove a van. I was in front, my mom was behind me. I heard a pop pop pop. When I turned I saw that my mom had fallen down, just like the tree. I stopped running

I stop running. I don’t know why it took me so long to see it, the ocean. No one told me it sparkled. It looks like the stars. I miss my friends, the tree and the lizard. I wish they could see this. The ocean makes the same sound my mom’s broom made. That is strange.

I walk down till the water touches my feet. I stop again, by the edge of the water. I can’t believe there are places like this. The sand seems so different from the sand of the desert. I wish I could feel the sand beneath me, or the wind that is blowing the sand. Or the water that is touching my legs.

But I am a Zax I go east, always east. Down into the deep dark water I walk. I don’t even try and hold my breath I just walk east.

I am not a human. I don’t need all the things you humans need. Sleep, food, water, warmth, light, friendship and air. I have been walking across the ocean for two weeks now. I have run out of words for the stuff around me.

Plants, water, fish all these words seem so meager but to us Zax they have amazing depth. I used to think water had only one shade, one color, but that was before I was a Zax. I have seen ten different colors of water from the misty blue to the dark purple. The fish I have seen, some of them are beyond descriptions.

My flesh has peeled off completely now. It flaked off slowly after the first few days in the water. Beneath my styrofoam flesh was the metal body they gave me.

I can see my heart. Metal spikes hold it in the middle of a large plastic sphere in my chest. I can see the blood pumping through the tiny plastic veins up to my brain. They did this to me.

I move east. A shark stops in front of me. I want to keep going, I want to see what is beyond the ocean. But I am a Zax so I wait for the shark to move. The shark turns and looks at me.

We stare at each other for a while then we move on. I don’t know why I mention this. Even after I have traveled this far I still don’t know. It makes you feel lost, when you don’t know. I’m glad I am a Zax when I don’t know. Zax, we have a rule, we learn this as boys. Never budge, that’s the rule. Never budge in the least. I never budge, not an inch to the north or the south, I always go east.