It was hard to breathe going as fast they were, Lex realized quite suddenly. He couldn’t breathe, and he felt<span style="font-style: italic">ill.</span>He was an unfortunate mix of miserable and terrified. A thought raced through his mind that Marcus had never<span style="font-style: italic">actually</span>driven the speeder before. It was strangely reminiscent of how your life is supposed to flash before your eyes right before you die. Only, Lex couldn’t see his life flash before his eyes if it were compacted and displayed neatly in a cinematic reel. So instead, he remembered very, very terrible things. They were going to fucking die and it wasn’t even going to be the Realians’ fault.<br/><br/>Blue’s head buried into his back, and he could understand why. He couldn’t imagine how<span style="font-style: italic">horrifying</span>this must look. He just imagined blurs of color and seeing sound. Meanwhile, from up in front of him, he could practically<span style="font-style: italic">feel</span>Marcus’ radiating adrenaline. Because, again, they’d never taken the speeder out before. This was like his heyday.<br/><br/>Marcus could see the South Gate coming into view. One of the men stationed atop the two guard towers hung lifelessly over the railings of his post. The other guard tower was bereft of a guard at all. Good. That meant they’d already come through this way, that might mean they were less likely to look back.