New Orbit Magazine Issue 08; Feb 2020, The Future of Animals

I
Muh roamed the corners of what was, in
times past, his home.
_____________
Now he was prey. The hunter was on his
tail. He sniffed like a hound. Destroyed his
hideouts. Muh’s time was nearing its end.
There was no way out, and the Gods of
Water and Mist had stopped answering him
thousands of moons ago. So, he blinked his
purple eyes open and braced himself for the
blow.
The shot came at him as if in slow
motion: a flash of pain laced through his
translucent skin. For a brief moment, he
attempted to wiggle out of the electrical net
the hunter had thrown over his wounded
body, but soon he gave up. Muh understood.
It was a fair price. For too many eons, he had
postponed that moment of liberation and
forgiveness.
Slowly, he let himself be dragged into
the void.
The sour taste of his fluids bathed his
body. He convulsed. His wound was severe.
He didn’t have to see to know that. Blind, he
dragged his tactile extensions that hung like
weak horns on his forehead to measure the
size of the fire hole that singed his guts.
Immense like a lunar crater. Painful.
He screamed in terror.
Water trickled through the hole in his
stomach. His body had turned into a flimsy
layer of skin and some bones as thin as fog.
He tried to keep his liquids from being
drained, but in vain. Soon he’d be as dry as
a root of that Red Winter of the Conquest
that already extended to several moons.