The air was soft and hot, the sky was clear, and the golden, shimmering rays of the sun were bestrewn across the sky. In the late 1900s in Umbra, an island located near the equator, such a summery scene was very common—in fact, it was present almost year-round. Dwellus Parry, a boy who grew up in an abusive household, wandered around his town, Greenville, for several hours in quest of a hardware store; however, he searched to no avail. Dwellus’s home was very plain: it was small, white, wooden, rectangular, and had a few square windows on most of its faces. Unfortunately, most of Greenville was very unsafe—it was actually called “The Bed of Bullets” for a long period of time due to the frequent occurrence of untraceable, gun-related deaths in the community. On his way home from downtown Greenville, punting stones into the rusty apertures of the gutter, Dwellus lost his footing and struck his head against the scorching pavement. Soon after, he woke up in oblivion, confused about what had happened. Feeling faint, Dwellus continued on his journey home; virtually all of his senses were recovered, but he perceived a rhythmic clicking in his head. At that moment, Dwellus, a naïve child, dismissed this as a trifling matter; having said this, sheer disorder awaited him.
             Minutes rolled past, and Dwellus became lost. He forgot his usual route from Greenville to his house, leaving his mind opaque with anxiety and casting him adrift in an ocean of dread. As he eventually found himself tramping through woody plants and shrubs, Dwellus listened to the diverse sounds of his immediate environment; more and more, he heard the warbling larks in the sky, which led him to think that he had entered the woods and separated himself from Greenville. Hysterical, Dwellus decided that he would call his parents by his roaring, shrill cry. After Dwellus had cleaved a path of sound waves through the sky, birds winged their way through the air with fear, crickets quivered with terror, and the land quaked.
              Hours elapsed, but no one came to the aid of Dwellus. He decided that he would spend the night in the woods. As the sun dipped and divine paintbrushes decorated the sky, he huddled beneath a protruding rock dug deeply into the earth. Although Dwellus was enervated by the heat of the day, he was ultimately unable to sleep. As the hours of darkness wore on, Dwellus became very tense and unsettled; nocturnal animals were scurrying through the bushes, coyotes were baying at the moon, and countless jetliners were flying overhead through the navy waves of the midnight sky. In spite of the fact that Dwellus was an impassive individual, his deep-rooted sense of alienation forced him to stop his sniveling and instead bellow in the ear of the earth, “Somebody, please help! At this rate, I will be killed by the wildlife around me!” Dwellus repeated this multiple times until he became deprived of his breath; just then, regaining his strength and resolution, Dwellus heard shouts in the distance, followed by rustles, and finally, he discerned a svelte silhouette, stark in appearance, steadily moving through the many groves of the woods. Rendered paralyzed with fear, Dwellus’s face bathed in pallor; he was so petrified that he was left speechless. Footsteps resounded around the woods, and Dwellus slowly made out a circular, green light in the distance, partially shielded by leaves. Suddenly, the lights multiplied until they were everywhere across the woodland. Frightened, Dwellus realized that these circles were far from harmless in purpose—they actually were the lenses of firearms. He could not completely distinguish between the lenses; however, this did not matter to Dwellus, as he was much more concerned about the fact that he was going to face death far before he had hoped to.
            Dwellus soon regained his color and composure, laid himself down, and closed his eyes. He reconciled himself to his ill fate and mentally and physically prepared himself for a brutal butchery. A gunshot was fired into the ebony sky above, and Dwellus screeched. After being given a narrow window for escape, he stood up, looked in all directions, and darted further into the woods. Numerous branches and stones were strewn across the ground, which worried Dwellus; he avoided tripping over these obstacles to the best of his ability so that he might not be overwhelmed by the all but invisible figures behind him. In view of the fact that he had taken a survival class a few months prior to this horrid event, Dwellus remembered an overarching rule that applied to circumstances like these: when one is being followed, he or she must hide. Dwellus began to skulk around behind bushes when he remembered another procedure essential to remain alive: to craft weapons of his own. Although he was not a proponent of such actions, Dwellus considered it necessary in order to survive. Amassing twigs and rocks from the ground, Dwellus tied a sharper rock from his stockpile to a thick twig by a loose string in his shirt; he knew it was not the most substantial weapon, but it would certainly do its job. As the sun began to ascend into the sky, Dwellus agonized over the fact that he was becoming far too visible to be considered “safe.” Even though Dwellus did not enjoy taking risks, he knew that he had to continue to dash throughout the woods. Just as he started to sprint once again, Dwellus thought he saw one of the lights in the corner of his eye; not paying attention to the rough terrain in front of him, he stepped in a small pit, lost his balance, smashed his temple against a honed rock, and fell into a coma. Dwellus’s face, having bled for many hours, began to turn purple after he lost a sufficient oxygen supply to his brain; however, there was still hope, for he was breathing.
          Months went by, and Greenville opted to hold a funeral for Dwellus, seeing as he was most likely dead. Considered so by most everyone who heard of his disappearance, Dwellus was a lost soul; to his dismay, he was not too meaningful or dear to anyone beyond his immediate family and close friends. Not long after his funeral, a newscast occurred reporting the discovery of Dwellus Parry wandering on the outskirts of Greenville. Many of the observers, including the news reporters, expected Dwellus to be very gracious, for he was saved; however, when the police arrived at the scene, they noticed that Dwellus was very combative and aggressive, perhaps because he had become one with the wild and forsaken his previous life. A police officer by the name of Roberts initially asked Dwellus in a kindly manner to return to his town. Dwellus was vexed by her request, so he fought her; since Officer Roberts was far stronger than Dwellus, she grabbed him and tried to pull him further into Greenville. Dwellus seized Officer Robert’s gun with the goal of shooting her, but, in the process, he accidentally pulled the trigger and shot himself directly in the chest. Perhaps all of the gun-related deaths in Greenville were mishaps after all.