Chapter 20- Till he drops!

Wilson ran directly into the forest. He ran non-stop for about half an hour. But Wilson could feel something was wrong. He just couldn't put his finger on it. What was it that kept eating at him? He could not tell. He slid to a stop and tried to figure it out. He couldn't, so he continued running trying to reach the end of the forest and return to the wooden house before dusk. He didn't like obeying the old man but was afraid of what he might do to him if he dared to disobey. Old and bent men like him were usually sick in the head. They could attack for the most petty reasons.

Soon enough, he stopped. There didn't seem to be a river in sight. He realized that he did not know the forest. He barely left the cabin anyway. He might very well have gone the wrong way. He looked back and tried to remember where he passed but that was a futile endeavour. He was not paying attention and could not remember his way back. He was hopelessly lost in the woods.

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In the cabin, the young girl came back after seeing Wilson run out like a mad man. She knew the old man had instilled fear in him like he did all his students.

"What did you do to make him run out like a mentally unstable man under the influence?" She asked him.

The old man grinned.

"Nothing much."

"He is going to realize with time that there is no water source in this forest." She said as she sat beside him.

"Well, we will just have to wait till he finds out!"

"When will that be?"

"I don't know. Like I said before, we will just have to find out." And with that, the man stood up and left the cabin alongside his granddaughter.

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Days passed by. Wilson was still lost in the woods. By this time, he had taken so many twists and turn in a bid to find the river. And when he couldn't, tried to find his way back to the cabin. That didn't work as well. As a result, he was gone. He refused to give up, and kept running around the forest. He finally got tired of running, so he sat down to rest under a huge tree. He dozed off under a tree.

Few minutes later....

*PIAK* *PIAK* *PIAK*

He woke up instantly to the immense pain on his cheeks. His cheeks stung badly.

"What mentally deranged being dares to slap me while I nap?" He roared as he looked around. His eyes blazing, as if ready to burn the forest to the ground.

He heard chattering above him, so he looked up at the high branches of the tree he had chosen to sleep under. He saw nearly four dozen monkeys with horns of different colours. Wilson visibly shook with anger. Those horned-monkeys were making fun of him and jumped on the large tree branches in their excitement.

Wilson glared at them. He counted all of them and jumped towards the nearest branch to him. He grabbed the branch and swung to the next branch right above him. And so he went till he got to the nearest monkey; a small monkey with a purple horn. As he tried to grab it, a bigger pink-horned monkey hit him from behind. The force was so great, it pushed him off the branch and ricocheted off the previous branches he had scaled till he hit the ground with a loud and painful thud. The monkeys began to move him again.

He roared and climbed upwards again but this time towards another monkey even smaller than the first one he tried to grab. As he reached out to grab it, another big monkey grabbed him from behind and pulled him making him lose his footing and fall back all the way down to the hard ground with an even harder thud. He tried again but with a different monkey and was thrown back to the ground.

Wilson wasn't willing to let them go scot-free. He climbed again and again and again and was pulled, pushed or hot back to the ground below the tree.

The monkeys laughed at him hysterically.

A few trees away, old man Jenkins and his granddaughter sat and watched the show starring Wilson.

"He must be like the stupidest person in the world. Going up after horned-monkeys in their own home without a plan. He is fighting a battle he has already lost!"

"He doesn't know that! He is blinded by rage! And what did I tell you about rage?"

"If it doesn't become your strength, it becomes an even stronger weakness!"

"Good!" The old man nodded in approval.

They kept quiet for a while and watched Wilson climb again only to be grabbed and thrown back down by a three-metre tall, blue-horned monkey.

He shouted at the monkeys in rage and punched the tree. The tree shook violently but no harm was done to it or the monkeys on it. Instead, the punch had broken Wilson's fingers and wrist and he screamed in pain.

"He is very loud!" She said. Her Grandpa nodded.

"How long will this go on?"

"Till he learns his lesson!"

"But what if he doesn't learn his lesson?"

"Then he will learn till he drops!" Old man Jenkins words shocked his granddaughter.

"Till he drops?"She asked. He nodded.

"Till he drops!"