I ran. I don't remember when I started, only that at some point, the thought of standing still had become impossible. My lungs burned as I pushed through the burned forest, boots slipping on ash and wood, every step sending a dull ache through legs that were already begging me to stop. I didn't. Branches scraped my arms and face as I stumbled between what remained of the past. My own breathing was too loud, too desperate, echoing inside my skull, and every crack under my feet made me flinch, every shadow stretched too far and lingered too long.
Something was following me. Or maybe it wasn't. Somehow that was worse.
My vision blurred with tears and sweat. My chest tightened, panic climbing my throat. I didn't know where I was going. I didn't know why I was running, only that stopping felt like dying. Then I saw it: ahead, half-hidden by the trees, something that almost looked safe. A hollow, a space between a massive fallen trunk and a jagged cluster of rock. The ground there looked more solid, less choked with ash. Shadows pooled thick inside it, but they were still just shadows. Still nothing. Shelter. The word hit me with more force than it should have.
I forced my legs faster, nearly tripping as I reached it, threw myself into the narrow gap, scraped my shoulder on stone, and collapsed against the rough bark of the trunk. For a moment I just lay there, breathing, gasping, alive. The world hadn't ended. My heart thundered as I pressed my back to the rock, knees drawn up, and the smell of ash faded to something muted, distant, almost bearable. I laughed, a short, broken sound that startled even me. "Okay," I whispered hoarsely. "Okay. I'm good. I'm fine." My hands wouldn't stop shaking. Every muscle ached under a fatigue like a lead blanket. I closed my eyes for one second, forehead against my knees. Just one second.
My breathing slowly settled into something manageable. Every inhale still scraped my throat, but the blind panic faded enough for my thoughts to return. I looked around the small shelter with more attention than before. The trunk shielding it from above had fallen centuries ago, yet it still held together, its blackened wood harder than stone. The rock beside me carried deep scars where countless impacts had chipped away at its surface. Something had happened here long before I arrived.
I ran my hand across the ground. Layers of gray ash covered everything, interrupted here and there by old footprints preserved like fossils. Human, I thought at first, until I noticed the size. Some prints belonged to creatures far too large to imagine, their weight pressed so deeply into the hardened ash that time itself had failed to erase them. Others looked strangely elegant, long and narrow, ending in too many claw marks. Whatever walked through this forest came in every shape imaginable. One realization settled quietly in my mind. I had spent all my energy fearing what chased me. I had forgotten that this place had existed long before I arrived, and every mark surrounding me was proof that I had entered someone else's hunting ground.
That's when the ground moved. Not a shake. Not a tremor. It gave.
The earth beneath me softened, sagged inward like it was hollow, and my eyes snapped open just as the ash and soil collapsed, dragging my lower body into a widening void. "No —" I screamed as it swallowed me to the waist, panic exploding through me, raw and blinding, my hands flailing uselessly against loose dirt. Instinct took over before thought could. I reached out and my hand slammed against the trunk above me, fingers digging into a jagged split in the charred wood, pain lancing up my arm as my weight jerked to a stop.
For one frozen heartbeat I hung there. Then something pulled, not a clean tug, a slow, grinding pressure from below that dragged me down inch by inch. The ground wasn't collapsing anymore. It was closing, folding in on itself like a starving mouth. "Stop, STOP!" My voice broke on the word. My grip slipped. I clawed at the bark until my nails tore and skin split, pain sharp and distant at once, drowned under pure terror.
Then came the sound. A wet, muffled crack. White-hot agony exploded up my arm as something tore free, and I screamed until my throat burned raw, the sound ripping itself out of me as my body lurched up and back, slamming hard into the rocks. I rolled, choking, sobbing, clutching my arm, and saw it. Or rather, what wasn't there anymore.
Where my left hand should have been, there was only torn flesh and bone, blood pouring out in thick, dark waves. The stump throbbed with every heartbeat, each pulse a fresh wave of agony. For one second my mind simply refused the information. This isn't real. This can't be real. Then the pain caught up. I screamed again, a raw animal sound, curling in on myself as nausea crashed through me, my vision narrowing, dark spots blooming at the edges as blood soaked into the ash beneath me.
The ground had already closed. No hole. No sign of whatever had taken my hand. Just the forest. I pressed the ruined arm to my chest, sobbing, shaking, the whole world reduced to pain, panic, and the certainty, cold and absolute, that something out there had tasted me, and wanted more.
I don't know how long I stayed there, curled against the rock, pressing my ruined arm to my chest. Time dissolved into waves of pain. Every heartbeat sent another pulse through the stump, each one weaker than the last, yet somehow more frightening. The ash beneath me had turned dark where my blood soaked into it.
The forest had gone quiet after the collapse and that silence terrified me.
I held my breath, straining to catch the smallest sound. At first there was nothing except the pounding inside my skull. Then, somewhere in the distance, wood creaked. Another answered it from farther away. A dry crack echoed high above, followed by something heavy shifting its weight. My scream. They had heard it. The thought settled into my mind, the forest was full of things I hadn't met yet. I should move.
My legs barely obeyed me. The moment I pushed against the ground, dizziness swept through my body. The world tilted violently and I collapsed back onto the ash, vomiting until there was nothing left inside me. My vision narrowed to a tunnel. Black spots floated across it, drifting lazily like insects.
"Come on..."
My own voice sounded distant.
"Just... stand up."
I tried again. My knees locked for a second before folding underneath me. My remaining hand slipped on blood and ash, sending another explosion of pain through my arm. A broken sob escaped before I could stop it.
"I don't want to die..."
A few hours ago I had been worried about exams, parties and whether a girl liked me. Now surviving the next minute felt like an impossible luxury.
Cold spread through my body despite the stale heat hanging in the burned forest. My teeth rattled uncontrollably. Every shiver made the wound burn. I wrapped my arms around myself as tightly as I could, trying to hold together a body that already felt like it belonged to someone else.
"Mum..."
The word slipped out on its own.
I hadn't thought about her since I woke here.
"I want to go home."
Tears blurred my vision. They wouldn't stop. I pressed my forehead against the stone like a child hiding from a nightmare.
"I'm sorry..."
Sorry for what, I couldn't even tell anymore. For leaving without saying goodbye. For every phone call I had ignored because I was busy. For every dinner I had skipped. For every stupid complaint about my comfortable life.
"Please..."
I wasn't even sure who I was talking to anymore.
"God... anyone... please..."
The forest answered with another distant groan. Something was moving.
I bit my sleeve to silence myself, terrified another sound would betray me. Every instinct screamed to run, but my body had reached its limit. Blood loss dulled every thought into a thick fog. Decisions stopped feeling like decisions. I stared into the darkness, unable to choose whether staying meant death or whether taking a single step would simply bring it faster.