Mount Everfall wanting things from people who don't want to give them to me.

you're okay.

that resonates in his head.

you're okay, you're okay, you're —

know, known, hnn... his jaw flexed. the tongue inside obeyed one instant then felt too heavy the next. that singular eye rolled in his head.

hours passed. aeons. seconds. each breath felt like an earthquake. his heart was a stuttering drum. okay.

[ . . . ]

somewhere along the trip he found real sleep. his eye remained open for half of it, red along the edges, unfocused.

did the snake linger long? did it hope to see him suffocate within himself, to become a meal fit to swallow up? he wouldn't have known — perhaps even welcomed it.

[ . . . ]

when it ended, however long that took, he was alive. he woke in a puddle of saliva-soaked mud, on his belly, stained by grass and decorated with a tangle of red and gold leaves; the embodiment of these wet forests.