Rob was grateful for the scent of the Salisbury steak, and ate slowly. The scent was fatty, greasy, oversaturated with artificial herb flavoring, and slightly off-putting, but it was one that he could actually perceive, and know that it existed in reality. The stench surrounding him was unreal in that it did not exist, and in that it was impossibly strong and obscenely powerful; it overpowered his consciousness as the sensations of so many children in such a relatively small area forced their way into his brain in some mockery of his natural senses. He concentrated instead on the pressure in his thin wrists, beating out his pulse; rise, fall, in, out, up, down. The pressure’s rhythm was erratic at first, but he brought his mind to full bear and drove it from chaos to a regular, if sliding, tempo. Gradually he felt the stink of the mob fading, but it was impossible to ignore; with each inhalation between bites, the noxious non-gas forced its way into his lungs, invading him, threatening him. Each breath disrupted his heartbeat, and he reached for another bite of the industrial meat product to try in vain to flood his nose with something real. There wasn’t any more; he’d finished his lunch. He set his flatware down, slid his tray gently to the side, and laid his right hand down on the table. Palm up, it looked like a gesture of surrender.
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