Chapter 2

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Run. I had to run—

It slinked its fingers onto my shoulder and pushed me down to the ground. I screamed. Not that it mattered. In fact, it seemed to laugh as it shifted its body forward, pressing onto me with all of its weight so that I had to prop myself up with my other arm and rely on both my knees.

It hovered its face beside my head. By my ear. I shivered. Its mouth clicked as its lips—from what it sounded like—curved upward. It breathed into my ear. Three short, energetic puffs. I swallowed, ending with a whimper. I shut my eyes. I ignored the smell of the thick, dripping rot that relished the thought of painting my face.

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My entire body trembled. Do I… need to fight back? What do I even have?

Its weight. I…

Here I am mustering all the strength I have. Yet it was still slowly crushing me. I couldn’t stop it.

I could blame my own weakness. I don’t know where I am. I don’t know who I am. I haven’t eaten. I haven’t drunk any water for as long as I could remember. Maybe this was why I was losing. I just couldn’t. I had nothing. Nothing to fight for. No path to traverse. No home to go to.

But the question was why. I screamed louder, hoping that this thing would find some meaning in the noise I was making. Why was this thing keeping me alive? Was it to torture me? Was there something I missed? What…

It pressed the side of its face against mine, its wet, sticky tongue tracing the edge of my ear. Its breath was warm, making the hair on the back of my neck and arm stand. The smell—it reminded me of the pool of half-rotten bodies waiting to be claimed by the ground I had seen before.

The feeling grasped my throat, acting as though it were to rip it out, until it went further down and twisted my stomach instead. My eyes welled with tears. I grimaced. Before I could count to three, something warm burned through my throat, something rancid touched my throat, and I threw up nothing but fluids and a few pale bits of raw flesh.

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It rubbed its face against mine. That—that and seeing what came out of my body—gave me the faintest sliver of courage I never knew I had to try and fight back.

I failed.

I tried to turn my body. To maybe slip free. To maybe break into a run deeper into the forest where it could never chase me. I was… able to push myself a few steps away.

But then it grabbed my other arm, twisted it over my back, and used it to push me down to the ground. It made me taste the dirt with my half-open mouth, welcoming even the blades of grass and smaller rocks biting into my skin. My teeth broke, making me scream not just due to the taste, but also at the fact of the blood washing over the randomness of my mouth.

Despite that, it seemed surprised.

Pleased, even. For some reason I could not understand.

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It seemed to… laugh? What was this? Something I could understand? But how? Why?

I forgot to follow through with this question of mine. This… being… grabbed by the back of my head—sinking its nails deep into my scalp—and slammed my face into the ground.

I asked it to stop.

I begged, again and again.

It stopped for a moment.

Then, it looked at me. Slowly, the shape… I could see its eyes.

It was looking at me.

I smiled.

It drove my head into the ground once more. This time, I was even more aware of how my blood tasted when mixed with the earth. The gross concoction stuck to my face, making it look like this being was ripping my face off from the ground itself.

It kept doing it. And it actually put more force into it, especially when I cried for it to stop. And at the end of every slam, it would move its face beside mine and whisper more and more incomprehensible things that terrified me so… because slowly, they were becoming more and more familiar.

More and more.

But not really… it might be in the sense that I was starting to believe I could understand it.

I don’t know anymore.

Finally, it stopped—its nails still caking with blood against the back of my head—and dragged me back toward the lake. Closer and closer. I tread screaming at it again, hoping that it would glean some kind of meaning from the noises I would make.

I failed again.

It looked at me like I was some piece of meat. Worse. Trash. Then, it drove my head against the floor again.

Finally, it left me alone.

I dared not move. Not immediately, as I felt it take a few steps backward before entirely disappearing into the sound of rustling… maybe trees. I was too terrified to tell for sure.

I counted the seconds until a few minutes passed. Feeling a bit safer, I picked myself up and noticed that I was just a few steps away from the bank. I spat out my broken teeth along with a handful of small rocks. The pain was slowly disappearing.

Looking around, I saw that being beyond the trees.

A glitch in reality. A monster. Seeing this indescribable, incomprehensible being take a shape more recognizable in my eyes made me remember the things it whispered in my ear. The sound… It was cheerful. Sweet. A bit proud. The feeling, in its entirety, eluded me, its remnants remaining in the deepest parts of my memory. Of the things I never had or experienced. Of the parents that never were. Of the siblings I didn't know existed or not.

I grabbed a nearby rock, glaring at it while I did. Its frame was hiding behind the shadow of a large tree. Now it seemed eager, curious, and—wait. Was it going to kill me here? I felt myself smiling. Was that it? It seemed to be whispering something. Then it moved. Some kind of signal I could not understand. It lifted its arm and stretched its finger toward me.

No. Not me. And as if on cue, I heard another sound.

I turned back and my eyes widened. I was… surprised. Not exactly out of fear. I realized the feeling when I felt my own hand tighten around the rock.

There was another.

A few more steps away, by a large tree beside the edge of the lake. Another being. Something. Somehow… like me? I touched my own clothes. Again, they weren’t exactly clean. But the texture. The grime. The stickiness. The dirt. I glanced at the monster and back to that being. I could… somehow understand—no, believe—that this one was wearing the same thing as me.

It was just that its shape was becoming more abstract. I grimaced. The things I had noticed. The shape. The form. The texture. The touch… What was this…

I let myself smile.

Its smell. This new one’s smell. Of blood… it was coming from a shape that was supposed to be a leg, but was gone. The smell. Heavens. Of sweat. Of grime. Of the earth. Of the water. Of the trees. Of the winds that made everything around me rustle.

My mouth watered.

I shivered at a thought I immediately forgot.

This thing…

I walked toward it, slowly opening my mouth.

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That other being. The one that hurt me—no. I wasn’t hurt. That didn’t matter, anyway. What mattered was this thing in front of me. I felt excited. It was… alluring. I swallowed again, widening my grin, especially when it shook its head and waved its limbs as if it could stop me.

I could not take my eyes off it. This thing. This… flesh. Meat.

It was not a matter of fear, contrary to what I expected. I needed a boost. Just a smidge of confidence. Which the being that hurt me readily gave. It showed itself and crawled toward my side.

And I… I could tell. A smile found me. Its skin was a mix of dried wounds, pus… boils… and strands of hair. Its face was a bit elongated, its ears perking up. Its yellowish teeth bared at us. It was smiling at me, joyful as it took its small, short, and ragged breaths with its tongue out. I smiled even more. It was the most beautiful thing I’ve noticed.

My heart skipped a beat when its eyes bounced from mine to the meat in front of us, and back to me. It nodded, which made me so happy. It was as if I was falling from the sky.

It was trying to tell me something. For the first time in a long while… I felt like I could somehow believe what it was saying, what it was telling me to do.

My heart tightened to squeeze a tear out of my right eye.

H-help. I… I do not want to do it.