It was the time of pre-dawn when orange light had started colouring clouds over the hills. Roderick missed its elegance while sleeping in mud while being surrounded by insects. His dream came to end when the brightness passed through his eyelids. Then only his sleep broke.

Roderick saw a cockroach on his forearm. He got up with all of his strength and brushed off the stuck insect from his arm. It fell on ground with its feet folded together.

He watched around and saw insects like crickets, cockroaches, flies and spiders lying lifeless on their backs. Roderick stood on his feet and walked over the dead insects, squishing them in every step he took.

After walking on the bed of insects he, at last, got rid of them and reached to open land. Even things were not all right in there. Animals were lying on ground with their abdomens facing sky. None of them showed any sign of life.

Even predators had lost their lives.

Roderick wondered if he should be checking a dead tiger or boar. He chose a boar with smallest tusk and kneeled to see its face. It had bloodshot eyes just like every other dead animal around. He was pretty sure the insects also had red eyes. They were just too small to be seen.

What happened here? Roderick wondered at the corpses. Even the birds had not avoided their fates.

His stomach roared. Roderick patted his stomach and realized how empty it was. And he was feeling it. He had not eaten much ever since he had been cursed to travel dimensions.

Soon he understood he couldn’t compromise with his hunger. His stomach walls had glued together.

Despite of searching for food, he was unable to discover anything he could trust as edible. He didn’t make his mind on devouring on dead animals because he had no speculation on what had killed them.

He kept on walking till he found a pond with clear water.

Roderick didn’t step inside the water but drank water by cupping his palms. He saw his reflection in there. Roderick was happy for not having red eyes. Though he hadn’t been here for long, he knew coloured eyes were not good signs to begin the day with.

He killed his thirst from the pond and strolled further inside the forest. Roderick found dead animals there too but they were outnumbered by those he had seen where he had woken up.

Roderick kept passing trees which had marks of knives on their trunks.

People must be bears. He deducted after finding more signs of habitation.

By walking for half an hour, he reached to a small trail with footmarks of animals as well as people. Following the path, he stumbled to a cart.

At first Roderick was skeptical about a cart being in the middle of the forest for no apparent reason. He went to it and picked some fruits. Roderick sniffed few and put it back there when he saw slaughtered chickens in the same cart.

Roderick flinched and backed away after seeing a red eyed man leaning on a tree trunk. Seeing him without any motion, Roderick chose the reddest apple from the cart and sank his teeth on it.