Burned

Chapter Four

His belly is full but he does not stay. The bright light dims and he feels the need to move. He glances at the carcass, and the thing that did not scare him while alive, that did not scare him when dead, now, looking at the remains, rib cage poking through everything covered in blood, he feels a sense of unease.

And the light is dimming and his legs itch with the urge to run and there is the thing behind him by the nearly stripped berry tree and so he leaves.

It is grassland at first, high grass that makes him feel safe and terrified at the same time, and he doesn't know why this is. Nothing can see him and he can see nothing and he doesn't know what to be afraid of. He moves, but not fast, simply walking, not even trotting along, the sharp blades striking him in the face an almost meaningless annoyance and yet he has to slow wants to-

But his paws are below and behind his head and that's not it anyway. He tries to lift them anyway, just a little, to see if that's it but that isn't it he's sure of it but he doesn't know what is and he breaks into a run shooting through the blades tiny cuts opening on his muzzle and sides and he jumps and then-

Nothing. Air. He looks around, feeling small soft baby blades below him and behind him is the tall grass and why is this place different and so familiar?

In front of him, not close but he can see it, is a brown line like but not like the forest floor, not the right color exactly but it is the right color and maybe the forest is the wrong color and he doesn't even understand his own thoughts because he knows that the tall grass and the forest floor are right and not just because he saw them first and that this new place, the not-grass and the not-forest are alien and yet they are the ones that are familiar to him.

And he is afraid and he is here and this is the right place and he should leave it and he doesn't even know what it is.

He whines softly, jumping at the sound, moving forward, staring behind him because the sound is that of-

Redthingbutsmalleryetscaryhow

-And it scares him and so he moves forward on the small soft baby blades toward the brown that's right or wrong or both or neither because he doesn't see anything before him and so it must be behind him.

He stops at the very edge of the brown strip, not touching it. His paws still in the grass as if held there by iron, he leans over, sniffing with his soft black nose just above the dust feeling the tiny bits of dirt on it and-

And NO this was not it not it at all wrong not right he hadn't he shouldn't why was he because he COULDN'T and he had to stop doing it now because he wasn't able to to begin with and so it was impossible he was doing it now and so he wasn't.

Gingerly, he stepped onto the dirt path, which felt so different under his paws then the grass or the forest and not familiar at all, and meekly began to walk along the path, breathing through his mouth instead of nose.