Into Nothingness
Glowing embers. Artificial fireflies floating out of its torching nest, dancing in the dark, disappearing into nothingness.
I watch them intently, for there is nothing better to do. In light of mild hypothermia, two missing toes and Alzheimer-like shivers, it is the only element fueling me. In the course of human events, it has been commonly regarded, that a flame is a symbol of hope. An emblem of expectation. But what Prometheus has bestowed so generously to man, the sky gods has depleted of me. The flame, which took a lifetime to ignite, is lost to the Alaskan rain.

And so now mere embers — remnants of another chance to watch the sunrise and taste its warmth — was lost. I know the time is nigh. The impending question is not whether I would last through the night, but how I would cease to exist. And what would happen next. Will my eyes close and limbs congeal as I slowly turns into cured meat for the wolves to divulge? Will I be struck by mama grizzly for a dessert? Will it be fast or slow? Which part of me would be eaten first? Which part’s the tastiest?
Or will I simply doze off into peaceful limbo? And when I’m en route to Nirvana (or its undesirable counterpart), little crawling things would decompose me beautifully into the earth, leaving my bones for fellow hikers to find.
Such is the deliberation zig-zagging through my mind. An idiotic, idealist version of myself had deliberately strayed off a marked trail two fortnights ago. And now a mind of confusion (who the hell walks into the Alaskan wilderness alone without any hiking experience?), chiseled by infortune, deceived by Bear Grylls, seduced by the premise of finding truth through masochistic means, must bear the consequences.
