I can’t feel my legs, I am exhausted…
My lungs are burning.
The ground is rocky and goes up more and more.
With each stride, I risk stumbling and falling.
If I fall, it’s the end, I will be eaten.
They are gaining ground.
How can they go so fast?
I can’t take it anymore!
Every time I turn around, I see them through the trees.
Big black balls, open jaws, drooling lips, haggard eyes, sharp teeth, … It’s a black mass that advances, powerful, noisy, soulless.
It crushes everything in its path, vegetation, animals, rocks, …
No way to escape, only one possible direction.
It is a race ahead, without end, without goal…
How long will I be able to hold on ?
I miss the air, I feel my heart beating all over my body.
I can’t take it anymore… what’s the point..
Wouldn’t it be easier to just give up, close my eyes and accept this fate?
My legs continue despite my thoughts.
I have to hold on!
I can see the end of the forest, a wave of hope invades me as the daylight illuminates the path in front of me a little more.
I secretly hope for a way out, a fortress, a refuge, a savior…
The forest gives way to an open space in front of me, I feel freer, with more possibilities to escape my pursuer.
I turn around.
I am seized with fear.
The forest hid the size of this dark wave.
The forest is no more, it is shredded, crushed, annihilated.
And the wave extends to infinity behind me, to the left and to the right.
The world behind me no longer exists.
I scan the horizon in front of me, looking for a refuge, a shelter, a solution.
My leg muscles burn, my face tenses with pain.
Nothing as far as the eye can see.
Except…
Are my eyes playing tricks on me?
It seems to me that the space in front of me is shrinking, to the left and to the right, as if the edges of the world were getting closer.
In the background, a solitary tree, tired and without branches as a point of view.
In my mad rush, I had not paid attention to it.
The wind.
The wind suddenly intensified.
Suddenly on my right, a change of relief reveals the horizon and I discover cliffs with horror!
I see the black mass advancing towards the ocean in the distance and I observe with horror that it inevitably throws itself from the edge of the cliff …
I start to cry, I know what to expect but I keep running.
In the distance in front of me, the cliff gets closer.
The magnificent ocean appears in front of me, majestic, the sunlight glittering on the waves off the coast.
To hold on until the end, until the last breath.
To hold.
A few more seconds and I’m out.
A last look at the cliff on the right.
The black mass has disappeared into the water.
Behind it is the desert, calm and empty.
If only I could find a way to let this black mass pass!
The tree at the edge seems to mark the end of the world.
I pass it and jump into the void.
The black mass has completely disappeared at the bottom of the water.
The noise has given way to silence.
The wind carries away the dust of the desolate landscape.
There is not much left of the tree.
The trunk is shredded but the roots have held on.
It is no longer my legs that are burning but my arms.
Clinging to one of the tree’s roots that protrude on the side of the cliff, I catch my breath.
The black mass passed over my head in a deafening din, a tornado of apocalyptic darkness.
Then everything fell silent.
I felt the warmth of the sun on my face and opened my eyes again.
I think I have never loved emptiness so much!
I remain hanging like this for a few minutes.
I take support on a leg to pull me up but I slip.
My tensed fingers begin to weaken.
To go up, it is necessary to go up!
My right hand slips slightly, and the rough root scratches my fingers.
I pinch my lips in pain.
I look underneath me.
The waves are crashing with force on the wall.
I can’t jump and survive the fall.
I close my eyes.
I talk to myself.
Hold on … get back up … find a solution ..
“Need a hand?”
I hesitate, not knowing if it is just a voice in my head.
“Come on, come on, you’re not spending the night here!”
I open my eyes, raise my head and see a hand stretched out towards me.
Lying on the ground, leaning on my elbows, my muscles fully express their pain.
I look at the desolate landscape in front of me, both sad and relieved:
— They have left nothing behind, everything is ravaged, destroyed, bruised.
— But they are gone for good now, since the time they sowed terror and desolation everywhere, their hunger led them to their loss, my companion answers me.
I sigh.
— All this time we thought we could stop them, contain them, make them change..
— The only way out was for them to go to the end of their destructive madness and destroy themselves, he answers me.
I interrupted a long silence.
— And now what? What do we do now?
He smiles.
— We rebuild!
