The oppressive silence of Kasara Ghats's night was shattered by a sudden and violent jerk. The man's body convulsed as he awoke with a gasp, his breath ragged and uneven. He lay sprawled amidst the tangled undergrowth beside the railway tracks. It was the very same place where his nightmare had seemed to bleed into reality.
His eyelids fluttered open with heavy with exhaustion and pain. The damp earth beneath him clung to his sweat-slicked skin and the cold night air bit into his exposed flesh. He wiped his tear-streaked, mudsmeared face with trembling and filthy palms struggling to clear the fog clouding his mind.
A sharp burning pain radiated from his belly. Blood seeped through the tattered fabric of his shirt staining the ground beneath him a dark and ominous red.
With a groan he forced himself upright, every movement agonizing. His legs wobbled like unsteady pillars but he refused to surrender to the darkness. He staggered forward with a slow stiff gait where each step a battle against the searing pain.
His hips swayed awkwardly as he limped along the mucky and rainsoaked roads. The puddles reflected the dim moonlight rippling with each faltering step. He tried to move further but collapsed after a few yards. His body hitting the ground with a dull thud. Yet with iron will he pushed himself up again.
"Come on…you can't give up now," he muttered, voice hoarse and broken.
He waded through swampy patches and sometimes sinking into shallow waterlogged areas beside the railway tracks. His drenched and heavy clothes clung to him. The cold gnawed at his bones but something deeper drove him forward and that's a strange and inexplicable compulsion.
His mind replayed the Image of the black-hooded figure from his dream. That tall and dark hunk in the Kashmiri Pheran who had beckoned him with a malicious smile. The man's gait took on a peculiar smugness, as if enchanted, bewitched and compelled by invisible threads.
He pushed aside long blades of grass that whipped against his face. The wet leaves brushing cold against his skin.
"Why do I follow him?" he whispered to the night. His voice barely audible. "What does he want from me?"
His breath came in ragged gasps as he trudged on. The jungle swallowing his figure into shadows.