I follow the footsteps backwards. For a few steps, I entertain myself making sure the toes of my shoes fit in the heel imprint. It's pretty easy and doesn't amuse me for very long. It doesn't distract me from how boring this woodland is. Do all trees really look the same? Or is it just a feature of the dream that I've run out of tree images and started to imagine the same ones again?
There's another bloody rock that looks suspiciously similar to the other two I passed, from yet another angle.
I'm getting tired, so I sit on the rock.
I look up, half expecting to see the zombie giant yelling at me. She's not there. Yet. Thank fuck.
I wish I had a drink or something to eat.
I hear the scurrying before I see it. Dry leaves, a slight squelch of mud, and someone muttering "Oh, my ears and whiskers!"
A large white rabbit walks past. It's walking quickly so it can only be the source of the scurrying noises, but it walks like a human. This is without mentioning the clothing. I'm not mentioning the clothing. I'm trying not to think of the clothing. Who chooses those colours?
I'm tempted to follow. It may be late but it seems to know where it's going, which is more than I do.
I stand ad take a couple of steps after the vanishing white rabbit.
"I wouldn't do that if I were you," a voice says from the rock I just got off.
I turn around. There's a more normal brown rabbit lounging in my spot. Well, normal aside from the talking. People eat rabbits, don't they? I wonder how they cook them.
The rabbit looks at me and I look back.
"This is where you introduce yourself," it says finally.
Or kill it.
"Or try to kill me," it says.
"Lots of people try," it adds airily, "but no-one manages it."
"I'm looking for a squirrel," I say.
"Not a rabbit?" it asks. It stretches lazily. "What a shame."
I have forgotten the name of the squirrel I'm looking for. But there was something about an oak tree. "I'm supposed to free it from an oak tree."
"Fascinating," says the rabbit and it yawns.
"There must be a thousand squirrels in oak trees," it says when it finishes. "At least."
"At least," I agree.
It jumps up. "There's no need to beg so desperately, human. I will help in this adventure! Just think of the stories the little ones will tell of me! I, the prince of a thousand enemies, benificiously helping one of those enemies!"
Is that beni-thing he said even a word?
"A thousand?" I ask.
It keeps using that word. Mind you, so does everyone else around here.
"Yes," it says, nodding. "That's the word for any number after four, right? One! Two! Three! Four! Thousand!"
It counts off with its paws, slapping the ground with a different paw until it gets to "thousand", when it jumps.
"This way!" it yells as all four paws hit the ground again.
It runs off the path and into the woods. I do my best to follow the vanishing white tail, until the ground vanishes beneath me and I'm falling into a hole I didn't even realise was there.
I should have followed the white rabbit.