Dusk had dawned.The child still lay asleep near the giant tree, blanketed beneath its towering presence. The bleeding—stopped. The injury—remained, waiting to be carved into a scar like the one on his forehead.
The child lay there, back pressed to the ground. It was too painful to move.And as the light faded—slowly—into a dim tinge of red in the air, the child woke.Just the eyes.Not wide. Not alert. But narrow. Peeking through half-lidded eyes, filled with pain.Even lifting a single hand was a task too great.
But hunger doesn't wait.
The hunger struck again. Too severe to let him return to sleep. And so, the child lay there—starving and motionless. Little by little, the last traces of light in the sky faded into deep black.Too dark for anything but night predators to move freely in this forest.
The birds—gone to sleep.The hunters of night? Beginning to stir.
But the child knew none of this.Some time passed.A tinge of white light crept in, reflected from above—not bright like the day, but just enough to see a few feet ahead, though never clearly.
The hunger, now unbearable, pushed the child to move.Slowly.Painfully.He brought the arms originating from his back over his wounded sides—a natural shield.Using the strength of his upper arms, the child rolled once…Then—twice.Then—thrice.Inching toward the water stream.
And finally, with every ounce of his strength, the child nibbled at the water.
His head swelled with painful thoughts. His hands moved not from joy, but from the sheer need to survive.There was no pleasure in the act.Only need.
And then—warning calls.
They came from the trees, the ground, the wind itself. Different species sounded off together. The child, clutching his sides tightly with his back arms, scrambled into the bushes. Barely managing it.
The Olf was making its rounds again.
It passed.Unaware—of the child's tiny presence.
Then—A shriek.Somewhere not too far.
An animal's cry of fear, or pain. Maybe both.The child, trembling, lay flat to the earth. Unmoving.Unwilling to risk.
Then came the tremble.The ground itself seemed to shake, subtly.The shrieks grew louder, joined by more.The warning calls intensified.
And then—Gradually—They began to fade.
Lower.Lower still.Until there was—nothing.
The shrieks… silenced.The hunt and the hunted—gone, swallowed by the forest.
And so, everything returned to what passed for normal in the jungle.Silent.
The child, too, fell asleep.
Though nothing felt hopeful, the only comfort he had was that his hunger had been quenched, if only for now.And in this massive, endless forest, that was enough.