This Side and Beyond

 

 

This Side and Beyond

by

Sanjay Sonawani

 

1

 

It had been a long time since he felt like leaving the shelter of darkness and stepping outside.

He couldn’t have said why he felt that way on that particular day, but he did. Who can ever say what will occur to whom?

And when even the act of feeling has become rare, such a feeling itself becomes a wonder.  But when he used his nails to scrape off the blackened, clotted layers of dried rat blood from his chest and chin, he felt somewhat better and sat up.

Outside, bands of men must have already set out to hunt the rats, he thought. Whatever was available to eat was there were only rats, but it wasn’t easy to get them. One had to fight life-and-death battles, chase them down, and dodge their ferocious attacks. After the hunt, quarrels, brawls, and sometimes even corpses would fall among the bands of men. No one cared particularly. Even if a band of fifteen or twenty managed to kill five or ten rats, their stomachs would be filled. And if a man died in the rats’ attack, twenty or twenty-five rats could fill their bellies too.

Once everyone’s belly was full, they would rush back to their respective shelters. For one never knew when the rats would attack the men, or the men the rats.

He lived alone in his dark cave. He rarely ventured out. He had no desire left even to see daylight. Nor did he feel any need for people. Besides, his experience had taught him that going out alone was dangerous. If someone was seen alone, the rats would swarm from all sides, pounce, and in the end only a skeleton would remain. There was no hope of anyone coming to help. Still, occasionally someone would step out in a fit of mental frenzy, and that would be their last wander. He was not one to make such a mistake. Moreover, he had long left the company of human bands, and no one was concerned about that. He simply purposelessly felt like taking a look outside.

Below his shack ran many burrows... from them the hidden rats would dart out... he could hear their sounds even from above. Long ago, he had cleverly made a vertical shaft above those underground burrows—just wide enough to yank a rat through. As soon as he sensed them moving, he would suddenly thrust his hand in and pull one up silently. The other rats, rushing straight through the lower burrows, had no space to turn upward onto the ground, which is why he had survived so long. Of course, suddenly thrusting a hand into the burrow and yanking out a rat required immense skill. He had acquired it through the intensity of his need and constant practice. Thus, his daily food and drink were taken care of. There was no need to go out and hunt with a pack.

The rest of the rats would emerge from their countless burrows all over the settlement, gather in the open, and with fierce screeches set out in search of humans. The humans too would lie in wait somewhere for them.

This was the daily struggle to fill one’s belly.

He trampled over the half-eaten, stinking carcasses of rats and pushed open the door of his shack, stepping into the blinding light. As soon as he came out, a band of men rushed past him, screeching hungrily while chasing some rats. The fleeing rats were screeching in rage, looking for cover, attempting counterattacks. They were shrieking harshly to scare the men. But now that the men had understood their nature, they were shrieking even louder and hurling stones at them. The rats hit by the stones would let out deathly screams and perish. People would pounce on their carcasses, tear open the wounds, and drink the warm blood.

There were brawls among them over who would grab the blood-soaked rat first.

This sight was not new to him. He stood at the door for a few moments, watching the fleeting scene, when his eyes fell on a collapsing woman who had been left behind. What had suddenly happened to her? Had she got the Piriya disease? She turned towards him with a face contorted in pain. Holding her thigh, face twisted in agony, she tried to sit down.

Like all other women and men, she too was completely naked. Her sagging breasts and the hairy patch between her thighs looked seductive even in that state. It must be Piriya. otherwise, why would strength suddenly leave her body?

Recognizing these symptoms was not difficult. He knew it happened to many. So he felt nothing. While she was trying to sit, all strength left her body and she suddenly collapsed. She had fallen not far from his shack and was now writhing. It was impossible for him to feel any urge to care for her. Nor did she expect it. The woman gave a few final convulsions and soon became lifeless. As soon as she fell, some rats hiding nearby emerged and pounced on her body. They began tearing at her flesh. The sound of ripping meat could be heard.

The band of men had already moved ahead, chasing the rats that had come into the open. Probably another human band had blocked their path in the square. The sounds of their clash were turning harsher. A fight was breaking out. Some humans would die fighting each other. He ignored that direction and looked at the woman’s corpse.

Now only her bones remained. The pack of rats had already torn away the last scraps of flesh still clinging to the bones and were scampering off nimbly, chewing. Their bellies were full now. They were free to return to their respective burrows and rest.

He was confident that their eyes would no longer turn toward him, yet there were many other thirsty packs around. Better to get back inside the shack before any other pack noticed him, he thought. He turned back, closed the door of the shack, and sat down on his accustomed stinking bed that reeked of  rotten blood of the rats.

He closed his eyes in darkness only to confront darkness.

He no longer wanted light anyway. It suffocated him. The embrace of darkness, however, felt affectionate and warm. It seemed to give him support.

It felt safe.

Even after darkness fell, he had no desire to go out.

What was there anyway?

When darkness fell, the few humans left in that ruined and now dust-buried ancient city would gorge on the day’s rat hunt and fall asleep. Those who could would satisfy their lust with whatever woman they could get, in a pack, and lie there motionless. Those who killed the most rats were naturally the most attractive for such sex parties. Instead of one, they easily got two or three women. Since it was also a way of displaying masculinity, it was considered obligatory to please all the women who had been aroused that night.

Of course, this was not possible for everyone. Killing rats was one thing, and satisfying two or three women with copulation in a single night was quite another.

But it was still a kind of amusement, and the people in the band would revel in it. That was their entertainment. That was their ritual. It was the moment that inspired them to kill the most rats the next day. The young and the old would watch that spectacle with greedy eyes. Everyone would screech. The rest, aroused by the scene, would watch with glazed hunger, stroking their own cocks or grabbing whatever woman they could find and joining the game. They also took care that the sounds did not travel outside. It was dangerous to invite the rats at such a time.

To him, even while lying down, there was pleasure in listening to those muffled, intoxicating screeches in the deep silence of the night.

Hearing them, even without seeing the scene, his own lust would stir. In his shack, he would stroke his erect organ vigorously, giving vent to those desires. Once the jet of semen spurted out, he would grow limp and sprawl on his back.

He knew this was not enough. But if he wanted a woman, he would have to join a band. And he did not want to join any band. That did not mean he had never been in one. He too had once been lost in such frenzies of passion. But he had left the band long ago. Convinced that he would now die alone like this, no one had opposed him. He had found shelter in this ancient ruin and turned it into a cave-like shack. He had made meticulous arrangements for his daily food and drink and to ensure that rats could not enter from outside.

Now he was comfortable.

The woman who had died a little while ago kept floating before his eyes. She was dead. He was certain she had suffered from Piriya.

It was a terrible disease. It would contract all the muscles in the body and drain the life out of it in a moment. Some people said that eating a rat’s brain could cure it, but that remedy had never shown any positive effect on anyone. In the end, the people scattered across the various bands had reached a consensus that this was a natural calamity and they simply had to accept it. Where one could not fight, it was necessary to surrender and be done with it. Why waste energy banging one’s head against it?

Whatever it was, the woman who had just died was stirring something in his mind. The sagging breasts he had seen while she was alive, her seductive thighs, and the hairy vulva between them aroused him. His cock began to harden. He closed his eyes, took his organ in his hand, and began imagining copulation with her. The movement of his hand grew faster. He began screeching to himself. Gasping, he thrust into her with imaginary savage force. The tension in his body reached a peak.

And then, in a moment, he was released along with a spurt of semen. He carefully licked the semen that had landed on his hand. It felt good. It was a fine change from the monotonous taste of rat meat. Satisfied, he lay down on his back. Weariness had now overtaken him. He needed sleep. He turned on his side and, out of habit, pressed his ear to the ground and began listening for what the rats were doing in the burrows below.

But no one was coming or going. Even at such times, some hungry rats would venture out in search of prey. At night it was difficult for them to find food. But if luck was on their side, some human who had come out craving the stale air might fall into their clutches. That, however, was very rare.

Daytime, on the other hand, was a time of frantic activity for the rats too. Screeching fiercely, leaping, launching attacks, killing humans or getting wounded in human attacks and becoming prey themselves, or fleeing for their lives; keeping watch for any careless victim; and saving themselves when a volley of sharp stones came flying — all this demanded enormous effort.

There was never any guarantee of survival, for every day they saw many of their companions die. They knew that one day a stone would strike their own heads and they too would perish.

Yet, as long as they lived, human flesh was essential food. There was nothing else on earth they could eat. Even a single human could somewhat satisfy an entire pack.

Lately they had grown more worried because humans were decreasing in number. Therefore, all the rat packs had mutually agreed not to kill more humans than necessary. Their language was transmitted through their constant chittering and squeaking, and only they understood it.

No human had ever imagined that the rats’ speech might be more advanced than their own. How could he? Besides, he was not a man who lived in a pack. And no one cared that he lived alone.

They came together only out of necessity; there was no loyalty of one toward another.

And he too cared nothing for others.

He was content living in solitude, satisfying his hunger and thirst on his own.

At night all the rats silently digested the meat they had eaten in their burrows and fell asleep. No matter how intently he listened, no sound could reach him from their shelters below. Still, waiting for some sound to come from somewhere had become his pastime for passing the time.

 Doing this, he never knew when sleep would overtake him.

Well, he did not have many memories worth remembering anyway. Those he had, he had chewed over so often that they had long since turned into lifeless husks. Many memories he had simply forgotten because they were not worth noticing.

There was nothing worth seeing even in dreams.

If any dream did come, it was only of the vast burned and blackened earth. There was nothing else worth seeing in it. If anything, only rats.

That did not mean he had any control over his dreams.

In fact, he did not even know whether he dreamed or not. Indeed, he had forgotten dreams themselves. He had forgotten everything.

This sheltering darkness was his eternal companion. He had no desire to leave its company and step outside.

Today he had stepped out a little, and that frenzied scene had appeared before him. Then, lying there, he had released his own frenzy as well.

Now drowsiness had come over him.

No sound was coming from the burrows below. No rat had returned. That meant no one had yet found any prey. Outside, the struggles were still going on everywhere. From all directions came the fierce shouting and the screeching of rats or humans — whether in rage or in pain.

These sounds seemed to him like sweet music.

For there was nothing else left that could be called music.

He waited a little longer. Then he lay on his back. Above him was the slanted ceiling made by stacking pieces of ancient, hard remnants from the settlement. It was so tightly packed that not even a drop of the poisonous rain that sometimes came could seep through.

He and a companion he once had built it together. But that companion too had died in a rat attack.

He had seen him dying. The pain visible on his bloodied face as sharp teeth tore at it had been horrifying. But it had meant nothing to him. The sight was not new, and he no longer had any feelings left that could be stirred.

No one had any such feelings left. And now so much time had passed that even if he died, no one would remember.

There was one thing — this companion of his had been rather strange. He had a great curiosity to go beyond the vast heaps of ruins — shattered and turned into a daily battlefield by the packs — and find out exactly what lay there.

A couple of times he had dragged him along too. What he saw then still remained dimly in his memory. It had been strange. Incomprehensible. Terrifying and astonishing... but how excited his companion would become after seeing it!

Once at night he had taken him near a blackish rock outside the settlement. What he saw then — even if the memory surged up, he would suppress it. It was a memory he did not want to recall, so he had found peace in forgetting it.

This companion would become ecstatic whenever he spotted any faint, ancient mark anywhere. He would babble endlessly about what it might be, how it might have worked, and what use it could have. He had even invented new words that existed in neither his own nor anyone else’s vocabulary, but only he knew their meaning. The other would simply stare at him in bewilderment, making futile attempts to understand.

Because, in reality, only as much language as was necessary for their daily survival had remained. Whatever could not be expressed in that language was conveyed through gestures. Many thoughts would rise in their minds, but they had neither the words nor the grammar left to express them.

Making a face of astonishment or a look of sorrow was almost the only means left for their inner expression.

But his companion had formed some theories about how the earth had burned.

That the earth had burned was now known to everyone, but how and when it had happened, no one remembered anymore — because they had not been born when that catastrophe occurred.

Yet this companion had created several stories about it.

They were only guesses. But he was very enthusiastic about telling them. Many of his words went over the other’s head. Even when he did not understand, he would sit and listen quietly. Having no enthusiasm left in him, he had to silently endure these incomprehensible, imaginary wonders.

Because this companion was useful to him.

He was a fierce rat-killer. Agile. A good shot. In truth, he could have been the leader of the pack. But he had no interest in that either.

Still, because of him, food came easily and without trouble, so he had stuck to him. He moved according to his signals.

But one day he died.

He was such a sharp and cautious marksman, yet the rats tricked him. Using guerrilla tactics, they attacked him from behind, sinking their teeth into his neck with such force that he fell down screaming.

Right before his eyes, his body was torn apart. He watched it all in silence and then turned back. Not even once did it occur to him that he should save him. Staying alive was what mattered.

Besides, he himself was not as agile as his companion.

On his own strength, he could not kill even a single rat in direct combat. If he felt disheartened by his absence, it was only for this reason. If there was any sorrow for his death, it was only this much!

Now the terrible question of how to hunt stood before him like a cruel rat with its jaws wide open.

He thought hard about whether he should join a pack or not. They would have accepted him easily. After all, packs always needed more men. At worst, if he proved useless, he would die… but there was no loss in adding one more person.

Yet he still avoided going out for a few days. After several days of fasting, he came up with this simple trick. Using a narrow stone, he carefully dug a vertical shaft intersecting the horizontal burrows through which the rats moved, and his problem was solved.

He was satisfied with it.

Considering the nature of the rats, when they were rushing out in excitement, they would never suspect that someone had made a hole right above their heads to suddenly yank them up. Even if they did suspect, there was no space to turn upward. And in that hurry, where did they have the leisure to look up?

And even if they had looked, what could they have seen in the darkness?

Besides, they were in a rush to get out, find humans, destroy them, and fill their bellies.

Knowing exactly where humans made mistakes, the rats had perfected the skill of seizing the right moment, pouncing, bringing them to the brink of death, and then tearing at their blood and flesh. They did not need much intelligence, and whatever they had, they had developed it to an extraordinary degree.

Through such long association, both sides had at least become aware of each other’s weaknesses. For example, humans had realized that if the rats faced them and began a unified, continuous growling, confronting them would be an uneven battle. So they had found a way: distract their attention in as many directions as possible and attack, or if that did not work, simply run away in a pack and evade their frenzied, ferocious pursuit.

But he no longer needed such desperate running. His belly was filled effortlessly. His thirst was quenched. He had never even considered what would happen if a rat somehow came up through that very burrow. He did not need to. He let out a sigh for no particular reason and began snoring in a slow rhythm.

 

 

2

 

How long it had been since the earth burned, he did not know. In truth, no one knew.

Everyone had forgotten even the very reckoning of time. If one were to speak of generations, the very concept of a generation had ceased to exist. Who was whose offspring and who had died when — there was no way to tell.

There was no system left to keep any records. When no one even knew how to read or write, what record could possibly be kept, and on what? Writing, after all, had once been the highest leap of human genius — but they no longer knew even that.

And what was the point of keeping records anyway?

One memory, however, had come down through tradition: that the earth had once burned.

And its signs were still visible everywhere. The ground had turned black and ashen. Apart from humans and rats, no other living creatures remained. Only the charred stumps of ancient trees that had once existed were left… and they were still called “trees,” though no one knew what they had really looked like. The water too was dead. The rain was agonizing. They wished it would never fall. For if its drops touched the skin, it would blister and peel. Boils would erupt all over the body. One would writhe in pain and surrender to death.

So whenever anyone sensed the approach of such rain, they would start running in search of shelter.

But there was one mercy. The rain came only rarely. Before it arrived, dirty-looking clouds would gather in the sky and let out terrifying roars. This gave enough warning to find shelter — provided one was nearby. Otherwise, a painful death was inevitable.

Because of this, no one ventured too far from their shelters.

Yet such events were infrequent. Mostly the sky remained dull and blackened. No one bothered to look at the faint stars in the hazy night sky. There was no need.

Desires had shrunk enormously.

Since humans did not come out at night, the rats too rarely emerged from their burrows after dark. It was as if a silent truce had been declared between humans and rats.

But the equation was clear: if you stepped out and the rats caught even a hint of you, death was certain. Except for those driven mad by the Piriya disease, no one went out at night.

The signs that anything had ever grown beyond the rubble of the settlement had long been erased. So yes, the earth had indeed burned.

But collective amnesia had made their lives somewhat easier.

The exhausted survivors and those who had escaped by sheer chance would repeat the legends passed down by their ancestors. No one believed there was much truth in them. They listened only for entertainment — laughing, screeching.

“Where could such things exist?” they would say, giggling foolishly. Yet the fear would still clutch at their throats: what if it had really happened?

Still, it remained a mere amusement. Tomorrow they had to hunt rats to fill their bellies — that much they knew for certain.

If the earth had burned long ago, what difference did it make to them now? They could not even make fire anymore. Since nothing that could burn was left, no one even needed to think about what fire was. The old people still spoke of the earth burning, but they could no longer explain what burning meant.

So what meaning did the phrase “the earth burned” even hold?

It had become nothing more than a meaningless, incomprehensible word wrapped in a halo of wonder. Nothing more.

Why carry that fear today?

The earth was lifeless now, wasn’t it?

And wasn’t that better for them?

When one does not even know what it means to be truly alive, what meaning can lifelessness hold?

The world they lived in had shaped their present psychology. Imagining that something which did not exist here might once have existed was acceptable as fantasy, but what was the use?

Yet their unimaginable stories were equally strange.

Once upon a time, it was said, a great war had raged between humans and rats. Those were the ancestors of today’s rats — enormous and cruel. They had supposedly succeeded in dislodging a massive stone slab placed by humans over an underground cavern and had burst onto the surface. They began destroying human settlements with sweeps of their paws. Humans of that era were also gigantic. At first they were terrified, but then they started fighting back. They invented weapons to annihilate the rats. When all weapons were exhausted, they began hurling stones in a frenzy.

But rats do not surrender easily. They were powerful. At most they would be wounded. It was humans who died. Then humans began searching for newer ways to survive.

The crucial discovery was that rats could be driven back only by attacking them in packs.

Humans began forming bands. They started predicting when and where the rats would attack. They located their shelters and launched systematic destruction using the strength of numbers.

Forming bands became a life-sustaining moral principle for humans.

When human packs began marching together, the rats were first frightened, then enraged. They too started forming packs and launched simultaneous ferocious attacks on human settlements everywhere.

Chaos erupted across the world. Human civilization was shattered.

Humans then used all their intelligence. They took the help of fire. They made weapons of it and unleashed it. A monstrous inferno erupted that seemed it would never die. Countless rats were killed. The entire creation was reduced to ashes. All animals perished. Forests vanished. Rivers and seas dried up.

The rats’ condition became desperate. To escape the flames, they dug burrows deep into the earth and took shelter there. They devoured the creatures that already lived underground. The rats shrank in size.

And countless humans too were consumed by the very fire they had lit.

Many survived, but they were deformed.

Eventually the fiery apocalypse subsided — because there was nothing left in the world that could burn.

By then the rats were starving and scorched. They grew bold and hunted down the remaining humans wherever they hid, unleashing terror in the surviving human world. They pounced on anyone they saw, tearing at their flesh and satisfying their hunger. Many they killed purely for revenge. They destroyed whatever means of survival humans had left.

This happened everywhere at once. The few remaining humans began to flee. They sought shelter wherever they could find it.

But now the rats ruled the world. Wherever humans went — to fields, plains, or mountains — the rats were there to greet them ferociously.

Some tried to escape by jumping into the remnants of the sea, but the rats followed them into the water and killed them. Eventually the sea too became poisonous. No one dared step into it.

In the end, countless people became their prey. The few who survived fled back. They sought shelter in their old, burned, ruined dwellings.

Protecting themselves from the rats had become essential. But what about food? The old stockpiles mostly fell into the rats’ hands, as the rat packs had begun destroying them too. The rats wouldn’t even let humans approach the grain.

In the end, humans began to make the rats themselves their food. They discovered an immortal taste in them. Discussions arose about which part of the rat was the most delicious. And humans had long since become the rats’ primary food.

By eating one another, both species grew even smaller. Their original strength diminished. But everyone accepted this reality as inevitable.

Gradually they became so accustomed to it that even though the rats were their enemies, they came to realize that the rats were also their providers of sustenance. Yet they made plans and improvements in every generation so that they themselves would not become food. Some plans failed, some succeeded. Their world began to revolve around rats. Their thoughts and actions became rat-centric. It no longer occurred to them that any other world could exist, or ever had.

For the rats too, human flesh had become the only option left. As humans decreased, the rats too began dying rapidly from hunger and human attacks.

Now, wherever humans lived, rats lived alongside them. What other path did they have?

The conflict between humans and rats had been going on for a very long time. No one could say exactly since when. All means of measuring time had long been destroyed, and the desire to know how much time had passed or how much remained had also died.

In fact, the atmosphere was such that no other desires remained at all.

Protecting oneself from the ferocious rats, killing as many rats as possible to fill one’s belly, and quenching one’s thirst with their blood — this had become the only song of life. Who would pay attention to empty, meaningless things in such a world?

The entire world had become lifeless.

This did not mean rain never fell. It did — rarely. But its touch was lethal. The skin would burn. Many humans and rats had once died from the rain. Drinking that water meant giving up one’s life. But for many ages now, as soon as humans or rats sensed the approach of rain, they would run for shelter. The rain was so poisonous that nothing ever grew in it. If drunk, it would burn the intestines and the drinker would die convulsing. No one drank even the stored water. No one had the courage to approach the few remaining foul, evaporating ponds or lifeless streams.

No one believed that this water could cool the burned earth.

But everyone agreed that the earth had burned. It did not matter that no one knew when or how. At this moment the entire surroundings were barren. It had been so since they were born. The old and knowledgeable said the earth had always been like this, the sky always leaden. By day a blackened sun, by night a faint moon and stars — nothing else. The air was thick with heat. Winds blew sometimes, carrying dust with them.

This dust had now become their daily reality.

Ancient structures built by someone long ago had crumbled and lay buried under mounds of dust. Any hard, sharp objects useful for hunting rats that might have existed in those buried ruins had been used up long ago. Now only unrecognizable remnants remained.

Beneath the dust were the rats’ burrows in the ground. Digging there meant inviting death. When their burrows were attacked, the rats would come swarming out in fury and fall upon the attackers with lethal force. Fighting them then became impossible.

Humans had therefore stopped digging up the dust mounds in search of rats. Over time, this practice had come to be considered forbidden.

The only opportunity to hunt rats came when they emerged to hunt. And seizing that opportunity while protecting one’s own life had become crucial for humans. New moral rules were evolving for survival.

Of course, it had taken humans a very long time to understand this — many ages. Now only two kinds of creatures remained on earth. Along with plants, all other animals had been reduced to ashes when the earth burned. Occasionally one might see their blackened skeletons — but only if one went beyond the settlement. And no one left the settlement anymore.

Since there was no drinkable water, rat blood had become the answer to their thirst.

Rats too quenched their thirst with whatever liquid they could get from human blood. In fact, everyone’s thirst had diminished, and perhaps one day it would disappear completely.

The earth had burned. This reality had now seeped into everyone’s bones. It had matured within them. And so no one cared about it anymore. They considered hunting the greatest joy in life. They trained themselves to become increasingly skilled at dodging rat attacks and launching counterattacks.

The rats were no less skilled.

They had mastered the art of calculating when a human would lift a stone, how he would throw it, and how long it would take to reach them — using those few moments to strike and sink their teeth into a human throat.

They too had developed a kind of neural network. It worked quite accurately. Earlier, many rats were killed even when not hungry, and many humans were killed too. As a result, both populations kept shrinking. Eventually the fear that no one would be left drove both sides to find a way. The rats among themselves and the humans in their meetings held grave discussions and decided to hunt only as much as needed to fill their bellies, so that the remaining numbers could be maintained.

But rat reproduction was enormous. A single female rat would give birth to fifteen or twenty pups. Humans did not. This imbalance was stark. No matter what, the number of rats remained higher.

Yet humans too had become clever and agile, so they killed more rats than necessary. But the existence of humans was more important to the rats. How many rats died was not a big question. No one asked it. The basic instinct was that there must be enough living beings to fill the belly.

Rats ate humans and humans ate rats — this eternal truth had been accepted by both sides.

As for what the situation was when the earth burned, only imaginations remained now — legends, some myths. Whether the myths of this settlement existed wherever humans still lived, no one knew. In fact, they did not even know if any other settlements existed beyond this one (which was once a vast city, now reduced to countless heaps of rubble). Some had gone out in search long ago, but no one had ever returned. That was why the fear of leaving this settlement lived in every human heart.

He had once gone with his companion to a cave one night. There he had witnessed a utterly terrifying demonstration of how the world had burned. After that he had never gone near the place again, and had now even forgotten that memory.

For the rats, there was never any question of leaving the settlement. The barren soil outside would blister their skin. They had no reason to know what lay in that soil. If any rat ever ventured there, it would return in frantic panic, struggling desperately for life, and dive back into its burrow. Within a short time red boils would appear on its skin and it would die. Of course, that too had happened long ago.

Now neither humans nor rats dared to venture beyond the settlement.

The world had even forgotten the answer to why this was so. This settlement was their only home. Food was here. Blood that could quench thirst was here.

How could they leave this settlement?

And what lay elsewhere — who knew?

Thinking such unnameable thoughts, he lay down. In no time he fell into a deep sleep.

Suddenly he woke up. Some kind of light was falling on his eyes.

It was not time for daylight, and even if it were, he had made sure no daylight could enter his cave.

He shaded his eyes with his hand and looked.

A strange wall of light stood at his door. He sat up with a jolt. Inside that wall of light, something seemed to be shimmering. It felt as if it were calling him. He remained sitting in a state of confusion for some time.

Then, shaking off the drowsiness, he rose unthinkingly and stepped through the wall of light, coming outside.

·         

 

 

3

 

He stepped outside and the clear light of the outer world dazzled his eyes. For a few moments he could see nothing. He rubbed his eyes repeatedly, trying to adjust his vision to the light. But this was not the world he usually saw.

He rubbed his eyes again and again.

But no matter what he did, the scene refused to change.

He was seeing a wondrous world he had never seen before. He was stunned by the sight. His own world had been filled with savage, wild-faced men and women, starving, hollow-cheeked children, and ferocious rats.

In the settlement, there was once said to be a river with living water, but its bed was now filled with rat skeletons. An old blind man who lived with him — his neck limp, the flesh of his face and arms hanging lifelessly — used to tell him that living water once flowed in it.

Now, who among the young knew what living water was? Even the old man did not truly know. Water was visible now, but it was no less poisonous than venom.

Everyone avoided it.

Then the old man would say that this river must be flowing with blood, like rat blood. That idea would please him. How enchanting was the thought of standing alone beside such a river with endless blood to drink!

Once, during a rat hunt, aggressive rats had eaten the old man’s eyes. They had gnawed off part of his nose. The remaining piece hung loosely, making the old man look grotesque. Still, he would listen to the old man’s words. Because he too was useful.

Even though blind, if he sensed the slightest movement, he could aim a stone so accurately that two or three rats would die.

He was extremely pleased with the old man’s skill. The rats he killed were enough to feed both of them.

But later he could not even remember when the old man had died. What he did remember was that he himself had thrown the corpse outside the cave without any emotion — whether to feed the rats or to dispose of the body.

He had taken care that not even a sliver of light entered his shack, leaving the outside world to its fate. He lived moment by moment in the underground shelter, surrounded by the sounds of rats and the embrace of darkness, leading a thoughtless life.

He had become so accustomed to the stench that he could not even imagine living without it.

Because his mind was empty of thoughts, he did not care whether time passed quickly or slowly.

Whether it was day or night outside, whether he was alive or dead — he had no awareness of any of it.

And today, the sudden, unimaginable sight before him left him stunned.

So much so that he wondered whether he was really seeing this or if it was a hallucination.

Whatever was in front of him was completely unexpected.

What was this world that carried no trace of the familiar stench?

He sniffed. The clean air made his whole being writhe.

No… this could not possibly be his world!

There were no heaps of ruins from the old city buried in the earth, nor clusters of cramped, stinking, closed-off shacks. Nor was there any pack of starving, hollow-eyed humans running to hunt rats, nor the agonized cries of the old and the children tormented by hunger and thirst.

Before him was a wondrous sight — one he had never even imagined.

A lush carpet of grass of an unknown, pleasant color stretched out. Where the slope ended, there flowed a stream that looked as if someone had drawn a line of strange sky-blue color. It flowed freely, lost in its own rhythm.

The touch of the air was more soothing than anything he had ever known. But what was this tingling sensation it carried? He did not know. Some creatures were flying in the sky. A herd of tall, four-legged animals of different colors grazed peacefully on the grass, eating with quiet freedom whatever felt soft and pleasant under their feet.

There was no fear anywhere. No clamor. No stench of hunger. Only boundless peace. And when he looked toward the horizon, he was even more astonished. On the horizon stood a wall of dazzling light that seemed to pierce into the sky itself.

What is this?

Where have I come?

He rubbed his eyes. He pinched himself.

But the scene did not change.

He stood dazed. Just then a small creature bumped into him and darted away. Of course, he had no name for an animal bigger than a rat — he did not know it was called a rabbit — but the unexpected jolt did make him lose his balance for a moment.

Steadying himself, he stared wide-eyed at the fleeing little creature.

In his world, it was unimaginable that anything could fly in the sky.

He looked back hopefully, wishing to see his familiar world again. But the hunting pack and the entire settlement had vanished somewhere. All that remained was a vast open field covered with some kind of covering.

The realization that this was not his world finally unnerved him.

He began to feel utterly alone.

It was true that his world was cruel, but no matter how destructive a familiar world is, doesn’t it still feel dear?

Then where had that deeply familiar world suddenly disappeared?

What was this strange vision before him?

He could not understand anything.

If this was a dream, then in his dreams there had only ever been hunting rats, their blood-soaked bodies thrashing at the end, and his own frenzied howls of release — nothing else had ever appeared.

So what was this?

Had he caught the Piriya disease? Were these hallucinations?

Overwhelmed, he dropped down heavily onto the soft green grass.

Even that pleasant, gentle touch unnerved him.

What do they call this?

He did not know.

In their world, such words and their meanings had long since been destroyed. But whatever they might call it, he saw strange bushes with clusters of different colors rising from the grass that looked like the long tails of rats.

This was a slope… descending deep somewhere.

What used to be here?

Yes… heaps of bones from dead rats… and that heap was so huge that one could not see what lay beyond it. And he had never needed to know. He had no curiosity. No work took him there.

The desire to see beyond it had long since died in him or in anyone else.

But now it had all disappeared somewhere…

Or someone had swallowed it whole.

He rubbed his eyes again and again… but that mysterious, mesmerizing scene did not change.

 He got up and, like a man walking in a dream, began moving forward with an unnamed curiosity to see what this was.

One part of him felt drawn to this world, another part rejected it. Because it had never come into his contact before.

The blue line in front was widening as he advanced. The sound of the living water flowing in it seemed far more enchanting than the screeches of rats. There was no cry of meat being torn from humans in it. It was a pure, unbroken sound that comforted the mind.

He was enchanted.

In that surge of emotion, he began running down the slope, arms raised, letting out incoherent screams. And he reached the bank of the stream.

The stream flowed with a pure, continuous murmur. Living creatures were actually swimming in it. So this was the living water the old man used to speak of.

Though afraid, he stretched his hands toward the stream.

After thinking for what seemed like an eternity, as if drawn by some irresistible charm, he dipped his hands into the water.

A pleasant sensation rippled through his body. He was mesmerized by that touch alone. The feel against his hands was gentle and soft.

It seemed to invite surrender.

He became so absorbed in that pleasant enchantment that it felt as if he had entered a wondrous world, and he had no desire to move even an inch away from it.

He had never had any occasion to know that the creatures of different colors swimming in the water were called fish. The very idea that such clear, living water could exist in their world was beyond the imagination not only of him but of all the remaining humans.

But when the light changed, he came back to his senses.

This was not the usual dim, murky light.

It was a golden light, full of brilliance, signaling the approach of sunset.

This too was wondrous to him.

With unblinking eyes, he kept staring at the unknown and never-before-seen play of colors where the horizon met the sky. His settlement was nowhere to be seen. There were vast stretches of land extending to the horizon and, beyond that, a faint hazy line.

And then, like a bad dream forcing its way into waking life, an old memory surfaced.

He sat stunned, staring fixedly at the murmuring stream, lost in his own thoughts — wondering whether this was real or that other life had been real.

No… how could the earth have burned? And if it had, then what was all this?

That old memory, long suppressed deep inside his chest, surged up violently.

He shook his head in sorrow and cried out from the depths of his being, “No… not that memory now.”

But whether true or false, whether forgotten or perhaps never happened at all, that memory floated before him anyway…

 

 

4

 

His companion had once jabbed him in the ribs with an elbow, waking him up like that.

“Hunt? Where?” he had asked, bewildered.

His companion had sat up, grabbed his hand, and started pulling him.

He could not understand why he was being called — there were no screeches of rats nor vicious sound of any human pack.

There was only a deep, fate-laden silence. It must be dark outside too. Yet his companion kept pulling him with strange sounds.

Finally he got up and went outside with him.

In the barren sky, faint specks of dull light were visible.

The people in the settlement and the rats underground were all in deep sleep.

As soon as they stepped out, his companion took the path leading outside the settlement.

What was all this for? But he did not even have words to ask.

Even though he resisted, his companion dragged him quite far.

So far that his feet began to ache.

Finally the companion began running down a slope. He too stumbled after him. The companion suddenly stopped in front of a rock, and he stopped too.

In the darkness the rock looked, in the faint light, as if it had been carved into the shape of an enormous rat.

He grew afraid.

He took two steps back.

His companion bent down, picked up something in his hands. He saw the two hands come close. The sound of two stones striking each other rang out in that profound silence like the screech of a rat’s paw.

Sparks flew into the air and vanished.

He stepped back in fear. Was his companion some demon, as the ancestors used to describe?

But the companion kept chattering excitedly and striking sparks.

After some time, light appeared.

In that light he saw his companion, wild with joy, looking at him and making strange gestures.

He panicked. He lifted his feet to run, but his companion stopped him in one leap.

“Don’t…” he said insistently. “Look…” He lifted the light on a stick and urged him to look ahead.

What lay ahead was no longer rock but a large fissure in the rock — many times bigger than a rat’s burrow.

The companion pushed him forward and entered himself, holding the light. In that glow he saw strange shapes. Their meaning was beyond him.

He stopped midway and looked at his companion like a fool. The companion signaled him to keep walking and moved ahead himself as if possessed.

As if he had found easy prey here.

Now the companion was ahead, running as if in a trance.

 He too ran behind him, afraid the light would disappear.

The companion suddenly stopped. There was a huge hollow here. Cold drops were falling from above. But they were not poisonous.

He knew his companion often wandered alone in search of something, but that he had found this strange place… and that he could even create light — this knowledge made him look at his companion with strange respect.

But the companion was looking somewhere and signaling him with his hand.

Curious and unnerved about what he might see now, he took a few steps with him. The companion held the light toward the wall in front.

He stepped back in fear.

What he saw shook him to the core.

In that light he saw a colored painting of a human figure. He could tell it was a human because it had a face, hands, and feet. Since there were no breasts and the waist was not curved, it was certainly not a woman. The body was covered with something. The painting was colorful. It looked as if the man were alive… and it was so large that it covered the entire wall.

His companion grabbed his hand with uncontrollable excitement and placed it on the chest of the painting.

In that instant it felt as if countless rats had sunk their teeth into him.

But there was a powerful jolt… something raced through his body.

And before his bewildered mind appeared a vision.

Something was spewing terrifying light from the sky. Then he saw a dreadful explosion — deafening. Then he saw humans running and burning, screaming in pain. There were women… men… children too… their screams were blood-curdling. And in no time their bodies turned into light, then black, and collapsed.

Then the bodies vanished into the light.

What remained were horrifying skeletons.

And even they slowly turned to dust.

Some tall, unimaginable structures were also seen collapsing.

Those harsh sounds began to deafen his ears. Then the sky. Dazzling light everywhere… light that turned even the sky into something terrifying… a wail as if countless rats were screaming in unison… then the earth… it turned completely black… poisonous rain began to fall from the sky and then everywhere there was darkness…

So this was how the earth had burned?

Was his companion trying to tell him this?

What world was this?

What did it mean?

Or was this a sharp depiction of how the earth had burned?

And who had done it?

Why?

He sat down on the ground, stunned.

This was beyond the reach of his understanding.

Even while watching humans and animals turning into dust and the earth turning black, he had felt nothing. To him it had seemed like some shocking miracle. A troubling miracle.

As if a ghost long buried deep inside had suddenly appeared before him.

Thinking this must be a hallucination, he shut his eyes tightly.

Just then his companion shook him awake and said…

“This… happened… when happen?… Look…”

He had clamped his hands over his ears, screamed in terror, and run into the deep darkness.

When he came outside, he dropped to his knees, spread both arms wide, looked up at the sky and sat there letting out mad howls.

His companion came out a little later.

He tried to shake him and calm him down. No one in the settlement ever did such a thing for anyone. This too was strange. But at that moment, it had felt good. That much was true.

Both started back. His stunned state lasted for several days, and soon after he forgot that night completely.

As if it had never happened.

Then, a few days later, his brave companion died in a rat attack.

Now he had even forgotten him.

But the moment he tried to dip his hand in the stream, that suppressed memory had surged up violently. That much was true.

Was this stream also some unimaginable illusion like what he had seen in the cave that night?

But this illusion had truly enchanted him.

Driven by an irresistible pull, he stood up and stepped into the water. Fish tickled his feet and darted away. He was startled by the touch of those strange water creatures. He pushed his feet deeper and walked forward faster.

As he walked, the water rose to his chest. The current was so strong that he felt his feet would lose their grip on the bottom. He panicked… and tried to walk faster. The water level dropped. He reached the other bank. He looked back.

The scene had not changed.

Where have I come?

If his companion were alive today, perhaps he would have made some sense of this too.

But he had vanished into that flood of light, hadn’t he?

Where would he come from now to explain what he was seeing?

He reached the bank. He felt uneasy. The layers of blood and dirt below his chest had been washed away, making him feel strangely naked. He ran his hand over his body. This new touch gave him a sharp awareness of being alive.

He stood there helplessly, staring at his now somewhat clean skin with unease.

Then he looked toward the horizon and saw the wall of light again.

What lay beyond it?

He stopped worrying about his skin and, driven by a curiosity he had never felt before, began walking rapidly in that direction.

 

 

5

 

As he approached the wall of light, it kept receding backward. As if he was hunting it.

He began to tire. Cramps started in his legs.

Yet, for some unknown reason, that uncontrollable curiosity made him keep running. He wanted to see what lay beyond that wall at any cost.

What he had avoided looking at further in the cave seemed to be waiting for him here…

A blaze of light and burning humans… a burned earth.

But though gripped by overwhelming fear, he no longer wanted to run away from it… he wanted to confront that inferno.

He too wanted to be scorched in that divine light and turn to dust.

He wanted to burn… even though he did not know what burning meant!

But as he moved forward, the wall moved backward.

He began to realize that something strange was happening.

Otherwise, how could his deeply familiar settlement have disappeared like this? Wasn’t it? What was this soft thing under his feet that felt like hair growing from the earth? What were those strange creatures that did not look like rats?

How could the water be so soft? Why was it not burning and poisonous?

He stopped. The wall of light stopped too.

He was speechless.

Like a defeated man, he sat down. He buried his head between his knees.

He covered his eyes with both hands. He looked again.

The wall of light stood motionless. He lay down on his back. Above was a clear, tender bluish sky — something neither he nor anyone in his settlement, nor even his unknown ancestors, had ever seen.

We must be dead… or perhaps I have caught the Piriya disease. Otherwise why would such sights appear before me?

And why is there no human being visible anywhere?

This question shook him deeply.

No rats… no starving humans… no one at all… only creatures and plants he had never seen before…

What world was he looking at?

Was this before the earth burned, or after?

He could not understand anything.

Exhausted, he lay down on his back. Drowsiness came over him and he closed his eyes. He thought, I don’t want this world. There are no rats in it. No hollow-eyed humans. He wanted his two-colored world back.

This world of many colors, without any sharp stench, felt unwanted to him.

Let me wake up now in my own world.

Listening to the familiar screeches of rats… quickly thrusting his hand into the burrow as they passed below… grabbing one by the throat, sinking his teeth into it, calmly drinking its blood and then eating its flesh…

Let me wake up in such a world, he prayed, and lay flat on his stomach with his eyes closed.

He no longer wanted to see anything.

But he woke to the laughter, chatter, and playful shouts of human children.

He opened his eyes. The wall of light was no longer there. What lay before him was a flat stretch of rock. And below that rock, children were playing in a pool… and from the rock, a stream of water was continuously cascading into the pool…

How were these children alive in this poisonous water? He pushed himself up with his hands… walked urgently to the edge of the rock and shouted…

“Go… you die… all you, go…”

At his strange voice the children looked up. Seeing his grotesque naked body, they got scared and ran out of the water, screaming. Something strange was lying on the bank. They quickly put it on and ran away.

It was the same kind of covering he had seen on people in the cave.

These children had not died in the water.

He too had walked through the water and had not died.

That meant the water here was not deadly. It was living water. He realized his mistake and burst into wild, foolish laughter at his own stupidity.

But there were humans here.

That meant there would be rats too.

The memory of rats made the fire of hunger flare up in his belly.

He would have to find rats.

As a precaution, he picked up a loose, sharp stone from the rock. Now satisfied, he started walking in the direction the children had fled.

Until he found at least one rat, his mind would not rest.

Until he drank its blood, his thirst would not be quenched.

But his throat was burning with thirst.

Should he try drinking this living water?

Gathering courage, he went to the stream.

For some time he stared thirstily at the little waves rippling on the flowing water.

Then he bent down. He lay flat. He brought his mouth to the water.

The cold touch sent nameless shivers through his body.

With great daring he put his lips in the water and took a sip.

It was tasteless.

Completely unbearable.

The memory of rat blood surged up even more strongly.

He spat the mouthful out in disgust.

Then, with sudden urgency, he got up and began walking along the bank of the flowing stream.

Though the music of the water tormented his ears, he kept looking here and there, searching for any sign of rats.

After some distance he saw tall trees, reaching all the way to the sky. He stood astonished, staring. This too was strange. But as soon as hunger and thirst reminded him, he left the wonder behind and moved ahead.

Later, on both sides of the stream, he saw some people driving large animals and working in an orderly manner, thrusting something into the belly of the earth. Seeing this, he let out a screech.

The people turned and looked at him sharply.

First fear flashed across their faces. Then it turned into anger. They picked up clods of earth and hurled them at him.

None hit him, but in reflexive reaction he threw the stone in his hand toward them.

His aim was accurate. Two men staggered and fell. The rest screamed and ran away.

He too jumped to the other side of the stream and ran crookedly, dodging this way and that. Passing through a thicket of tall trees, he reached a settlement.

The houses here were neat. Clean. There were roads. Some women and children were moving about wearing strange colored coverings. There was noise. He felt a little intimidated. He slowed his pace.

His eyes were drawn to the women. Even with the coverings, the shape of their breasts and the curve below their waists made his lust surge.

His cock hardened. Desire clouded his eyes, and in that haze he ran toward a woman standing nearby.

But as soon as they noticed him, the women began screaming. They turned away, grabbed the children, rushed into the houses and slammed the doors shut one after another.

What had happened to them?

He stood bewildered.

Just then a group of ten or fifteen men came running toward him carrying sticks.

“Naked… have you no shame?” they shouted.

 He did not even know what shame was. But realizing they had come to kill him, he turned and ran in the opposite direction.

He left the path and plunged into a dense area of rocks.

When he found a safe spot, he sat down, trying to steady his breathing.

When he disappeared from sight, the people turned back, shouting and screaming.

This brought him some relief.

He became cautious and listened for any sign of rats around him. He also looked for burrows. But he found nothing.

Hunger and thirst began to torment him fiercely.

His attention turned to the bushes beyond the rocks. He ran toward them. On some bushes there were round, reddish fruits. But he did not know what to do with them. He sat there, cursing this wretched world in words that did not exist, and finally, exhausted and powerless, he collapsed motionless on the ground.

Imagining how seductive those women would look without their coverings, he began stroking his hardened cock. But hunger had gripped him so fiercely that he no longer had the strength left to continue.

He lay there helplessly.

He got up when darkness fell.

The air felt icy. His body shivered. Trembling, he looked around. He was terrified. No matter how many times he woke, he could not find his own world. He had fallen into the clutches of this nightmare.

 If his companion were here today, perhaps he would have explained the meaning of all this.

 But even that was uncertain. What incomprehensible language he used to speak…

Just like these people here!

What did these people eat?

Were they digging burrows in the forest to search for rats?

Then why couldn’t he see any rats?

He rose with a cry of anguish.

With some resolve, he began walking toward the settlement.

Everyone must be asleep by now. He might find something to eat, he thought.

Hope strengthened him. He started walking fast.

He saw a flickering light.

It was a shack on the edge of the settlement.

He fixed that as his target.

As he drew near and stepped forward, his foot landed on a fence made of thorns.

Pain shot through him.

How was he going to take even a few more steps?

The question tormented him.

Then he examined it carefully.

Even though thorns had pierced his hands, he realized the fence, made of thorny branches, could be moved.

He began slowly pulling aside the thorny branches.

Just then the crowing of a rooster fell on his ears.

And immediately after, from inside the shack, came the screams of a man and a woman at the peak of passion.

Food first, or should he enter and copulate with the woman?

Which first?

Eat first — that would give him strength for the thrust.

He quickly pulled the branches aside and slipped in.

Outside the shack everything was dim. But in that dimness he saw many unfamiliar objects in the yard. Some large… some small.

For a few moments he stood bewildered.

Then he heard the flapping of wings and the sleepy, harsh cackling of chickens.

There was no sign of rats anywhere.

But at least this was food… let me eat this first, he thought, and sprang toward the sound.

In that coop were chickens. He picked up a stone and tried to hunt them, but the stone got stuck back somewhere.

The noise made the chickens cackle even louder.

He sat down in despair, stunned.

What now?

He reached forward with his hands to find where the stone had stuck.

His hands touched a mesh. What was this? He felt around. One finger slipped easily inside. Then he pushed all his fingers in.

He used all his strength and pulled.

The door of the coop came off in his hands. The chickens inside fluttered their wings, making noise, and began running out. His skill came in handy.

Like grabbing a rat, he caught one flying chicken.

It screeched, pecked at him, tried to escape from his grip, but he held it tightly and sank his teeth deep into its neck with a crunch.

Blood flowed. He chewed it and tried to drive his teeth deeper… but the taste of that blood filled him with horror.

He felt like vomiting.

Instantly he threw the lifeless chicken down.

“Ugh…” he spat in disgust and began spitting repeatedly.

What kind of strange creatures were these?

Where were the rats?

Just then the door of the shack opened.

A man came out holding a light and shouted…

“Who is there?” And then he screamed, “Thief… thief… help…!”

At that sound he was so terrified that he ran back the way he had come. He stumbled, fell, the thorny branches tore him bloody, pain raged through him, but he got up again and ran for his life.

But as he passed through the settlement, people came out of their houses with sticks and began trying to stop him…to kill him.

Yet he ran so wildly that no one could catch him.

Behind him the people chased, shouting fiercely, while he ran like a madman.

Where is that wall of light?

He thought desperately.

He did not want to become anyone’s prey here.

The people were still chasing him.

I want that wall of light. Beyond it is my heaven. There are rats. There is food. And that is my water too. Even if it is black and burned, that is my earth.

This world is demonic. The people here are crueler than rats.

He ran with the cry of his soul. His chest heaved so violently it felt as if it would burst any moment.

He crossed the rock where he had first woken up in this world.

He guessed — this was the place. But the wall of light was not there. Nothing was there. Air more terrible than stench and a filthy sky.

He stopped. He felt helpless. The wall of light was gone… his deeply familiar world was gone…

Strength was leaving his legs.

In despair he sat down heavily. He rested his head on the soft, moist grass that looked like the endlessly long tails of rats.

He had never known how to cry… but his heart was so full that he began sobbing uncontrollably.

Broken and shattered, he drew his legs to his stomach, looked up at the sky and let out a wail.

“Living world… I don’t want this dead one…” he kept saying.

There was no one to hear him. Only the still, silent, cold air and the earth enveloped in darkness.

Blackened ground. Once burned to ashes. Where was it?

He was completely worn out by hunger, thirst, and exhaustion.

He closed his eyes.

The pursuers must have lost their way somewhere — that was the only consolation.

He lost himself in that deep darkness.

He fell unconscious.

How much time passed, he didn’t know.

Suddenly he began to hear the screeches of rats.

First distant, then closer.

His ears strained.

This sound… this was familiar. This was the sound of his world.

Relieved, he tried to open his eyes.

Just then a sharp, burning bite sank into his neck.

The rats had finally found the shaft he had made above their burrow. One after another they came leaping out.

The enemy who had been silently pulling them up all this time had finally fallen into their clutches.

He writhed in unbearable, yet soothing pain.

A large rat had sunk its teeth into his neck and was drinking his blood. Its sharp teeth dug deep into his flesh. While it drank the hot flowing blood, the other rats licked it and began sinking their teeth into the rest of his body.

He tried to shake them off with his hands. He kicked his legs.

But the rats had now taken complete control. With even greater frenzy they began tearing at his flesh.

Waves of unbearable pain surged through his body…

He screamed, but the rats kept ripping into him with their sharp teeth.

They were eating his flesh.

He made one last desperate struggle.

He gathered all his strength, pulled out one rat and sank his teeth into its neck.

The moment its blood touched his tongue, a sense of satisfaction that his thirst was quenched spread through him.

It was as if he had found peace.

Then he began to feel an eternal joy in the knowledge that his own body was now food for the rats.

After some time the screeches of hungry humans began to rise.

Morning had come. The packs were ready for the hunt.

From all directions the screeches of rats and humans tore into his already deafened ears.

Whatever it was, he had finally returned to his beloved world.

The flesh was being torn from his body and he was experiencing boundless pleasure in it.

Dying in this world was better than living in that one…

That was his final thought.

One rat crushed his windpipe in its jaws, and his wordless thoughts turned to dust and dissolved somewhere.

 

The End