The bear had a while to wait before he could escape his world.
He laid on the frigid floor, motionless, one paw placed atop the other. He waited for something to happen. For the playful breeze to return, for the firebeast to begin moving again, anything. His jaw set. His chin plopped upon his folded limbs.
Shadows lengthened. The desolate absence of the wind had suddenly become unmanageable to him. To replace the wind, an impatience swelled within him. This eagerness to break out of this world was typical, especially rushing inside him when the time for arrival approached. He began to pace the length of the firebeast belly, claws scraping wood, his gaze locked upon the entrance. The entrance seemed like the rest of this place: just more thin stacks lumber. Nevertheless, the flatfaces managed to make it swing up and allowed another world for him see.
Perhaps he could try again. The bear hesitated. His throat tightened, shrinking away from the twine that never left him.
He learned quick that this twine kept him from racing out into the open. If he stepped one more paw toward the entrance... he gulped. Choking was not a pleasant memory he wanted to repeat.
Bizarre calls tingled his ears. Grumbling flatfaces, resonating barks, and horrible wails. Judging by all this activity, the flatfaces were lugging the other creatures out of their firebeasts. This scene remained familiar to him.
Releasing all the other animals meant the firebeast had stopped by the multicolored dome. His trembling body froze with this thought. He no longer shivered because of his weakness or eagerness; he shuddered in fear. His legs weakened. He closed his eyes and attempted to stay calm. The process was like swimming through slush: shoving his trepidation aside only to have it weigh him down further into panic.
He paced with more vigor. He stumbled, tried to right himself, failed, and his chin collided with the floor. His wounds screamed, serving as vicious reminders of what occurs under that glaring, unnatural sky. Out! I need out, out, out, out... he couldn't control his thoughts. He instinctively denied the truth.
Anywhere but the multicolored structure.
His cubhood persisted as a blur of red agony. His remembrance unearthed nothing from his past- just those flatfaces welding the hooked branches. The scars along his back prickled in protest. They still clobber him with those sticks. They still make him balance atop a tiny flatface thing and make him move it across the ground.
A tang soured his mouth. Blood. His abrupt collapse caused him to sink his teeth into his tongue. He licked his chops to rid himself of the taste.
The bear refused to budge. His distress had grown too much for him to handle. Anxiety trickling throughout him, his closed his eyes and basked in the rush he felt.
Rays of sunlight smacked his eyelids. He yanked them wide open, yelping when he spotted the slim, upright figures of two flatfaces. They murmured to each other, both hefting those familiar branches. He recalled all too well the torment that laid in their paws.
His alarm diminished into a manageable presence; however, his frame still twitched in agitation. His urges to flee quieted with the twine and the snaking threat of choking.
The smaller of the pair tread near him. They seized the twine and yapped to the larger partner, who hurried over and snatched it as well. The bear shied away from them. A growl craved to burst from him; though terror overpowered the instinct.
He huffed at them. The shorter one sniffed in response and jerked him forward. He gasped and propelled himself toward the entrance to elude the wrath of the twine. The bulky one curled his lip in satisfaction.
He lowered his gaze to the timber flooring. Lumber transformed into spiky, white grass- and he took a pace into another world.
The breeze greeted him, inspiring him to glance up. A herd of ligneous firebeasts rested in a haphazard line, stretching far. The landscape was bumpy and cold to his bare pawpads, and no trees survived the horizon. Flatfaces milled about in clumps. The multicolored dome had already appeared, a foreboding lump against the pale blue sky. A massive gray beast raised its floppy snout and produced a stuttering, nervous sound. Barking crashed back at him; despite the gangly creatures not being in sight. He recognized Sadiyya, her white pelt, although dull, still a fierce contrast to the setting around her. She was a few bear-lengths away, and with three flatfaces leading her in the opposite direction, he knew it would be impossible to talk to her.
He heard the bigger flatface say something in a hissing tone. He flinched away from the spectacle to peek at him. Whatever it was saying, it was not directed at him. The bear attempted to relax.
A low buzz rumbled in his ears. He paused, his head cocked, searching for the source. His chest twisted. The only thing that could produce that rumble was the immense brute. He swiveled to face the beast, scuffing the mire below him. Nothing seemed odd, until he raised his gaze into its stare. He tensed.
Those eyes would not stay still. They whirled everywhere, penetrating and yet unfocused. A fresh wave of fright immersed him; he wished to put as much distance as he could between him and those eyes.
The flatfaces jerked at the twine, pulling him from the flood of fear. They wrenched him toward the multicolored dome, but away from those eyes. The gale whispered a reluctant goodbye to him.
Those eyes only left him when the agony begun.