TUNGE LOVES TO RUN – Preview Scene from Pupazzo Universo (The Musical)

Tunge loves to run.

The wild trails of Marion twist through vast, untouched habitats—endless corridors for speed and skill. Like every Marionet who dares to travel deep into the wilderness, she carries a Taz—a slim, baton-shaped device designed to repel the planet’s most dangerous predators without harming them.

Most hazards have long been managed: the Great Lizardz were relocated to another world; the BOTZ escaped into the stars. But some predators remain by design. Marion’s scientists learned the hard way that apex creatures are vital to healthy trophic cascades. One of them is the Zoar—the largest omnivore on Marion, tusked and ravenous, six to eight hundred pounds of muscle and teeth. It can gore, shred, and devour in minutes.

And now one of the biggest Zoars Tunge has ever seen is thundering down the mountain trail a quarter mile behind her.

She could trigger the Taz. She hasn’t.

Outrunning danger thrills her more.

Her running is legendary—speed matched by agility, reflexes honed by terrain. She wears a thin, flexible survival suit: earth-colored, breathable, resistant to insects and extreme weather. Even so, sweat soaks her. Her heart hammers against her ribs. She has been sprinting full-bore for miles with a thirteen-foot, single-horned Zoar tracking her every stride.

And the exertion is doing something to her mind.

She’s rising above herself—seeing her life from a mile high.

Flashes of the secret lab on Zorab Mountain: her parents’ forbidden experiments, hidden under the cover of “family treks.” The notebooks they left behind after their deaths—meticulous on method, silent on motive. Their obsession with intergalactic quantum communication, their refusal to accept the Marion covenant forbidding contact with extraterrestrials, their dream of an AI capable of managing a wormhole portal. “Marion lives in a cocoon,” they said. She now understands. Cocoon strategies always fail; they make you soft and visible. Despite satellites, cloaking fields, and deep-space probes, Marion will never be truly hidden. The BOTZ are loose in the universe. They will return. Others deserve warning.

Snap.

A branch cracks behind her.

She’s back in her body. Sweat streams down her face. The Zoar is closer, crashing through brush, grunting, squealing. She can hear it now—a few hundred feet. The window to use the Taz is closing. Its effect takes minutes to kick in. She has miles to go.

Tunge leans forward and runs harder. She’s practically flying, breath coming in hard bursts: tuk a tuk, tuk a tuk, tuk a tuk. Her heart feels like it will burst.

In the settlement ahead, a lone security master watches her tracker and the massive red blob chasing it. He has warned her before; he’s not rushing to her rescue now. She’s on the watch list. If this ends badly, no one will blame him.

She reaches for the Taz—hesitates. Her sensor shows a mile to go. A flock of bush birds erupts from the undergrowth, whirling around her. Marionets are superstitious about birds—descendants, in their own way. Long ago “Bastard Birds” were banished to another world for failing to meet Marionet standards. The moment spooks her.

She stumbles, careens, palms slapping the massive trunk of a Duk tree to keep upright. Heart flutters, rhythm falters. The Zoar is louder. Gaining.

The path opens. Her footfall shifts from a tuk a tuk a tuk a tuk a tuk a tuk to an intense pounding—padapum padapum padapum padapum.

Thoughts race. The work she’s been doing, the secret she’s about to share with her closest circle in less than two moons. None of it matters if she dies now. The thrill of survival floods her system. Energy surges. Pace quickens.

There—the settlement entrance, a slick glass-covered funnel disappearing into the earth. Forcefield markers glow. She triggers neutralization on her suit.

She sprints for the opening, leaps, spins mid-air. Behind her, the Zoar barrels into the reactivated forcefield. It glows red, shrieks, and repels the beast like a giant slingshot.

Tunge slides down the glass funnel into safety, already scripting the story she’ll tell security—why she almost became Zoar food, why she never used her Taz. On the way down she smashes the Taz against the wall, a last-minute plea for leniency. She knows she’s being watched.

But for now, she’s alive. Heart still racing. Feet still echoing. Padapum. Padapum. Padapum.

Tunge Runs for Love (Lyrics)

a tuk a tuk a tuk a tuk
a tuk a tuk a tuk a tuk
a tuk a tuk a tuk a tuk
Run—run—run—for love

Dust in my mouth, sweat in my eyes
a tuk a tuk, a tuk a tuk
Zoar’s on my trail, the mountain replies
a tuk a tuk, a tuk a tuk

Heartbeat’s hammer, chest on fire
Feet like thunder, climbing higher—

Run, Tunge, run — don’t you stop!
a tuk a tuk a tuk a tuk a tuk a tuk
Run, Tunge, run — to the mountaintop!
padapum, padapum, padapum, padapum

The forest screams, the beast behind,
The rhythm’s mine, the rhythm’s mine!
Run, Tunge, run — till the world’s alive!

Branches break — snap! snap!
Shadow’s gaining — trap! trap!
Don’t you stumble, don’t you fall,
One mistake — it ends it all.

Sweat runs salt, blood runs heat,
My life’s a drum beneath my feet—

Run, Tunge, run — don’t you stop!
a tuk a tuk a tuk a tuk a tuk a tuk
Run, Tunge, run — the hill won’t drop!
padapum, padapum, padapum, padapum

The beast it roars, the ground it shakes,
One slip, one breath — is all it takes!
Run, Tunge, run — for the world you’ll make!

Secret lab — the secret door—
Cocoon will break — can’t hide no more—
Wormholes waiting, sky unsealed—
Future racing, fate revealed—

Heart skips!
Knee twists!
Tree trunk—fist!

Almost gone—
But I push on—

Run, Tunge, run — the gates are near!
padapum padapum padapum padapum
Run, Tunge, run — through the shield of fear!
tuk a tuk a tuk a tuk a tuk a tuk a tuk a tuk a tuk

Forcefield rising, funnel shines,
Leap through glass, the world’s still mine!
Run, Tunge, run — till the stars align!

a tuk a tuk a tuk a tuk
a tuk a tuk a tuk a tuk
Run—run—run—run for love!