Heart's tale

Chapter 6 part 2

The octopus awoke only during the first sunset. His body had almost regained its healthy blue color, but there were still purple spots in places. Snorri snorted loudly and did not respond to attempts to wake him. Raud slowly floated through the air to the doll and let out a few bubbles of gratitude:

"Thank you, woody. I was sure we were going to die."

"Are you all right?" the doll asked.

"Alive. But the burns are still there. I'm afraid it's going to take a long time to heal," the octopus gurgled and turned to the man.

Snorri crawled under the shadow of another rock and curled up.

"It's time to wake up this pile of meat," Raud winked at the doll.

He swam up to the big guy and again slammed him in the face with a tentacle. Snorri jumped up and hit the rock above his head.

"What are you doing, you cephalopod?" he wailed, half asleep.

"It's going to get cold soon, we should get to the gorge, you have a bad cough, and it looks like I have a fever, too."

Snorri rubbed his eyes and the bruised back of his head, and then stood up. But his strength did not want to return to him. Staggering, he leaned against a rock and somehow managed to get up. When he noticed the stream, he went to it, knelt down, and drank again. He wiped his mouth with his hand and, still on all fours, panted. Water was dripping from his lips, and his eyes were bulging and wild, like those of an animal. But he found the strength to pull himself together, got to his feet again, and looked around.

"How did we get here?" he asked in a husky voice.

The octopus pointed its tentacle at the animated one, who was sitting in the deep shadows and studying the man intently.

"Ahem," was the only thing Snorri said.

"Don't expect any thanks from him," Raud gurgled sarcastically, "He's the rudest bumpkin I know."

"Bloody log," the doll nodded and laughed unexpectedly to itself.

The laugh, created from the squeak of the gears and the rattle of the springs, was unnaturally metallic, but a laugh nonetheless. The doll was surprised at itself and wrapped its arms around its chest, frightened that something might pop out of it. The octopus, on the other hand, was resting several tentacles on the ground and letting out some hiccuping bubbles.

"Idiots," stated Snorri.

He staggered toward the mountains, but immediately stumbled and fell, causing his companions to burst into laughter.

By nightfall, they had reached the gorge between the rocks where the stream flowed, and they took shelter from the wind in a small cave. There Snorri, barely able to stand on his feet, made a fire from the dry twigs he had picked up along the way. He easily struck a spark from the splinters of rock he had picked up and went back to sleep, telling the doll to plant twigs in the fire so that the flames would not go out before morning. Raud settled away from the flames and stared at the narrow strip of sky between the rocks.

"What do they call you, anyway?" the octopus asked, laying his head on a flat rock.

The doll looked at him puzzled. And the one who had no name yet became aware of his presence for the first time. He tried to associate himself with some word he'd managed to hear, but couldn't find the right one.

The feeling that he existed and that he was experiencing it all by himself, apart from everything else, so overwhelmed him that he immediately forgot the question. Until that moment, he had somehow not separated himself from what was happening, from these unexpected companions, the heat, the chase. But now that he thought about it, he could distinguish himself as a separate individual in all that was happening, and the feeling was so new and unexpected that he stood up. Then he sat up again and searched his whole body, getting even under his visor and under the armor that protected his chest.