The Wood

Awakening

My eyes flew open and I shot up. My first breath was a sharp inhale, and then I was coughing and my head felt like it was splitting apart. Pain burned through my body like a thousand fire ants crawling across my skin, lava clogging my veins. It was badly concentrated at the tips of my fingers and toes, as if someone had hammered nails through each of my fingertips and the soles of my feet had been pressed against burning coals. The pain in my head ebbed and flowed like a malicious tide as I looked around, bewildered. I was naked, sitting in dark, thick mud, huge trees shooting out of the ground around me and disappearing into the mist above. I was frigid yet burning, chills making my flesh prickle as intense heat boiled my insides. When I lifted my hands shakily to my face, I was treated to a gruesome sight. Where my fingernails should have been, there were gaping, bloody holes in my flesh, and when I looked at my feet, I realized it was the same for my toes. I suddenly was hit with a wave of overpowering nausea, and I retched and vomited, once, and then twice and then a third time. What I managed to expel was bloody and burned my throat. As soon as I finished, I collapsed and everything went black.

Oh my little pup, your claws hidden under fur

Run like the wind that howls as you do

And learn that the world is not yet yours

But if you grow strong it will bow to you

When I awoke again, the intense pain having reduced itself to a dull ache that seeped like cold rain through loose dirt, seeping into my bones. I felt weightless, and leaden, floating and sinking and utterly exhausted. I pushed myself up from the ground and realized I had collapsed into my own bloody vomit, and when I rose, it stayed caked against my side and arm, mixed with the black mud. I attempted to stand, but the pain returned, driving me back to the earth. I sucked in a deep breath and groaned, my vision blurred. After a moment, I tried again, with similar result. I lay there for a few seconds and then, determined, I pushed myself up. I managed to stay standing, and decided to take a few tentative steps. My first step drove me back to my knees. The pain was excruciating, like stepping on an upturned nail. After letting the pain fade, I feebly stood once more, putting as little weight as possible on my foot as I could. It still hurt, but it was bearable. I took another step, and the pain was far more tolerable. I slowly made my way to a nearby pine trunk and leaned against it, my chest heaving as the taste of bile made me want to vomit again. I swallowed the disgust, and began to walk, stumbling and wincing. I only made a few steps of progress at a time, needing to rest and let the pain decrease to a tolerable level. At one point I stubbed my mangled toe, and the pain was so intense it brought tears to my eyes. I immediately was on the ground, clutching my foot in my hand. The whole while, the splitting pain in my head refused to leave, a consistent hammer slamming a spike of fire into the base of my skull every few moments. I don't know how I got back up, but after a few muddy minutes I was up again and walking. I kept one for a long while, until I finally stumbled across a path. It was small but well-used, the dirt compacted under thousands of footprints. I felt completely drained of any energy, so I sank to the ground and sat, shivering and begging for death. It never came, and I sank into an restless sleep.

RUN RUN RUN RUN run run leap close close close so close SO SWEET run run RUN

"No! Oh god please no! Someone help me!!"

No NO NO run run run GRAB BITE BITE BITE blood flesh HUNGRY silence

The beautiful red-lipped smile is gone before it can even really register.

My little pup.