Cursed Bunny(33)

IV

Just like the other times he was dragged away, the youth was one day being thrown into the outside world again.

Soaring through the air, It had him in its jaws. When the cave disappeared over the horizon, the youth suddenly swung his limbs.

An unplanned, compulsive act. It hadn’t expected the boy’s movement. When the chains tied around the boy slammed into It, It let out a cry the likes of which the youth had never heard before and dropped him from its grasp.

The youth fell through the air.

He collided into something hard.

He lost consciousness.

When he woke, a red sun hung over a forest. Having not seen such a thing for so long, the youth gazed at the sun as its red light bled into the horizon.

And the youth rose.

His whole body felt shattered. His head ached. But he was alive.

He still had the manacles on his wrists and shackles on his ankles, but the chain attached to them wasn’t tied to anything anymore and simply dangled there.

The only thing he wore on his body were those manacles and shackles. Scored onto his naked body, on his arms and legs and vertebrae and both racks of ribs, were a hundred and twenty large, triangular scars.

Towards the melting crimson light that was spreading into the sky, he turned and began walking.

His movements were slow.

For too long, he had become used to solely crouching in a cave or struggling mid-air or underwater. To stand and walk on his own two legs was like any other distant memory he had of his childhood—a faint dream from long ago. Not to mention all the places he injured when he plummeted from the sky. The manacles and shackles impeded his movements. When he got tired, he tried bending down and crawling or grabbing a branch to support himself upright for a bit, trying to stand steadily on his own two feet, slowly learning once more how to use his own body.

He didn’t know where the raw meat that he had often eaten had come from, but he knew how to identify edible greens and fruit from trees. He grabbed whatever he could get his hands on and chewed, continuing to walk toward the unknown.

This was an escape. Tired, yes, and in pain, but he was free. Which was why even though he didn’t know where he was going, he rushed toward it.

Never did he want to be caught again. That must not happen. Going back to the darkness of the cave would mean It would finally kill him. Of that he was certain.

V

When he reached a village, the villagers stared at him, frozen in place.

Seeing his naked body, the mothers covered the eyes of their children, but once they glimpsed the scars on his back, their mouths that had been opening to speak clamped shut. No one approached him. All they did was stare with eyes filled with fear. No one tried to help him, but on the other hand, no one ran away, cursed him, or tried to banish him. In the almost shockingly stark silence, they stared wide-eyed at him.

The last time he had met another person was a very long time ago. And even back then, he had never met so many people at once. And the sight of so many people concentrating on him was something he never could have imagined before. Their stony faces and wide-open eyes and the mysterious silence that ruled over it all suppressed his courage.

As he awkwardly stood there and stared around him, the villagers turned away one by one and disappeared into their homes. After a while, there were only a few left, who continued to keep their distance while silently staring before they, too, disappeared. Soon enough, he was alone at the edge of the village.

He was truly at a loss as to what to do. At first there had been too many people and now there were none. It was too bright. No rock wall that had defined the boundaries of his world, no chain on a stake driven into the ground. He thought about how after being catapulted through the icy air and tossed into cold water, the cave he had been thrown back into had felt safe. For a brief moment, he missed the familiar darkness of that place.

Then suddenly, people were crowding around him again. Maintaining their distance like before, they appeared in ones and twos, staring at him.

This time, the people were quietly conversing amongst themselves. He had a hard time reading their expressions, and their sheer number continued to overwhelm him, making him uncertain of what to do.

A voice was heard over the low rumblings of the crowd.

“All right, it’s all right! Get out of the way, will you? Ah, here we go, there he is.”

The loud voice had come from a bald, middle-aged man. Led by a young man through the crowd, he kept blustering and shouting as he approached. The bald man, when he approached the edge of the crowd nearest to the youth from the cave, whispered something to the young companion, who turned and disappeared back in the crowd. The older man, however, kept shouting things like “It’s all right!” or “Ah, here we go!” as he came up to the youth.

When he extended his hand, the youth took a step back in surprise. But the bald man, smiling gamely, took another step and slipped his hand onto the chain dangling from the youth’s manacles. He gently pulled.

“All right, then, here we go. Nothing more to see. Go about your business everyone, we’re all good to go.”

It had been so long since he had heard the sound of another person’s voice that it wasn’t heartening, it was merely strange. He couldn’t understand half the words the bald man was saying. But just as he had cowered instinctively in the cave when stretching out his arms and legs and the chains had pulled them back, he cowered now when the man pulled lightly at his chain.