The jungle did not help me.
It was the first thing which I perceived as I came to myself.
No compression on my injuries. There was not heat to warm my body. The hum in the ground--the thing that had lingered above me since the time I had wakened--was still remote, unmoved.
I lay against a tree, the bark of which was very rough. My breathing was shallow, unequal. Every inhale burned. Each breathing was weaker than the previous one.
My chest and side were dried with blood.
Too much of it.
You are awake, the viewer said to himself.
His voice sounded strained. Tired.
I tried to sit up. The agony was flying through my torso that I was taking a sharp breath out of my lungs. My sight became cloudy, and then cleared away.
"How long?" I asked.
"Hours," he replied. You wasted more blood than you ought to have lived.
I laughed weakly. "Seems to be a pattern."
He didn't smile.
Changes are made by that fight, he said. The jungle is no longer making you stable.
"I noticed."
My body felt wrong. Not unstable as in the past- just... unsupported. The hunger within me was serene, and far, as though it had been biding its time to be given permission to do so.
I laid a hand on my side. The wound was bound on, and still not closing. The edges remained raw, angry.
No regeneration.
No assistance.
Just consequences.
You mentioned, said anomalies do not have balance, I said.
"Yes," the observer said. "But this is different."
He hesitated.
It is observing what will become of you should you make a failure alone.
That made me pause.
I was not being punished by the jungle.
It was observing outcomes.
I pushed myself up and disregarded the dizziness that came afterwards. My legs shuddered, and they caught.
"Where are we?" I asked.
Outer boundary of a correction zone, he said. Hunters cannot come right back. They're regrouping."
Good.
That meant time.
Not safety.
Never safety.
Strange silence was in the air. No insects. No distant movement. Even the wind seemed absent.
Dead quiet.
I frowned. "Something's wrong."
The observer nodded slowly. "You feel it too."
The absence of the jungle did not exist.
It was... divided.
Slim wires of consciousness were flashing through the trees, turning to the right, and then to the left, as though several objects were being pursued simultaneously.
Not just me.
Others.
A distant echo had reached us with a low sound. Not a roar. Not a scream.
Something being born.
We were advancing slowly toward the sound. Each movement was painful, however, to pause was to be weak, and to be weak was to die. That had been long since made known by the jungle.
The trees before us became less thick, and an undeep spot was in the ground.
And something inside it.
One of the figures lay still in the dirt on his knees.
Human-shaped.
Nude flesh with small glowing lines, the ones that had spread across my own arm--but purer. Controlled. Symmetrical.
Its head lifted slowly.
Eyes opened.
There was empty amber light starring back at us.
The viewer drew in his breath. "No..."
The figure stood.
Its movements were smooth. Efficient. Too finer than a newly awakened person could be.
It looked at me.
Not with curiosity.
With recognition.
The hunger in my breast is restless.
"What is it?" I asked.
The observer's voice dropped. "Replacement anomaly."
The words were lying down in the air.
The character leaned his head and examined me in the manner a predator examines his counterpart. Its body bore no wounds. No instability. No signs of struggle.
Perfect adaptation.
No fear, the spectator said to himself. "No hesitation. No emotional conflict."
I understood immediately.
And this is what the jungle liked.
Something strong.
Something controlled.
No resistance.
The replacement anomaly came forward.
The jungle was responsive--roots moving, ground leveling to its feet. Not assistance.
Alignment.
It belonged here.
I didn't.
It moved suddenly.
Fast.
I just just lifted my reformed arm. The effect made me recoil several steps as the shock ran down my bones. The agony was throbbing through my exposed injuries, and my eyes were blinking.
It didn't stop.
It attacked with cleanly and efficiently towards weak points. No wasted motion. No anger.
Just correction.
I repulsed once more, but my strength sank. Blood loss slowed me. My reactions lagged.
Some one was yelling back at the observer, but it seemed far away.
Replacement anomaly stuck my side--the injured side--and I fell on one knee.
It gave its hand the final strike.
Then stopped.
Its head was turning a little and I heard nothing.
The jungle.
A mute order was flung across the air.
The anomaly stepped back.
Not retreating.
Waiting.
Studying.
Then it turned and walked into the trees and vanished without a step more.
I kept on my knees, with heavy breathing, and confusion with pain.
"Why didn't it finish it?" I asked.
The viewer looked into the jungle with a pallid face.
Since it was not sent to kill you, he said slowly.
"It was sent to measure you."
There was a sickening feeling that sunk in my heart.
Replacement.
The jungle was no longer attempting to destroy me.
It was making something better.
I brought myself to my feet, not minding the weakness in my legs. Said: You mean there is no anomaly that takes its departure.
"Yes."
"Why?"
The spectator was slower in this instance.
Because the answer mattered.
And because leaving is failure, he said at last. There is only one thing that is released by the jungle.
I waited.
He met my eyes.
"The completed replacement."
The silence was between us.
The reality crept down into position, painfully.
Anomalies didn't escape.
They either died...
Or made the next nucleus of the jungle.
In some distant spot the ground shook. More movements. More awakenings.
Not one replacement.
Many.
The jungle was accelerating.
I wiped my mouth, and I had to stand erectly though it hurt me.
"Then we stop it," I said.
The observer shook his head. "You don't understand. You are no longer fighting with hunters.
The jungle roused itself up, big and waiting.
"You're competing."
The hunger within me throbbed a single time.
Not fear.
Recognition.
Something old and ancient stirred something somewhere in the Death Jungle--conscious of the new phase being started.
And this time it was not going to be survival.