Rolling further in the awe-inspiring speed of mach 3 (4cm per second) Tedior finally crosses the thresholds of some particular string of grass to another area with yet again, more grass. His spiralling views at this rate is still managable and he can just about manage to make out what he is seeing;
Grass.
Grass.
Grass.
Oh! A stick!
Grass.
Grass.
Wow! Another stick!
Grass...
As is, the initial excitement slowly dwindles and his rolling comes to a complete stop. He pendulum swings himself to a seat, once again balancing precariously on his butt or back to a semblance of having a sit like a man.
He plays around the mesmerising synchronised movements of his tiny little stubble legs as he ponders.
"Maybe I am too small to take a big enough step to feed my dopamine. Hmm... I need to roll faster then." He muses to himself as he idly tries to pick up a dirt granule with his two front limbs aka tharacic legs.
Tedior remembers learning about the angular momentum, the moment of inertia and angular velocity. If he applies that mechanism to his current predicament which translate to rolling forward while elongating and shortening his torso, he could gain enough momentum to increase his rolling speed.
Without further ado, he immediately sets it into motion, testing out his theory of sorts, doing trial and error with the subjects he calls torso and limbs. Learning more about his body movements, neural activities, dynamics and structural mechanics. Is it a tension-based mechanism involving his locomotion?
After spending almost an hour of erratic full body spasm (and maybe even scaring some other fellow bugs away), he comes to the conclusion that constricting and relaxing his muscle works with correlation of the length of his torso. Of course there are other hypotheses he has found regarding his new super cool body, but mach 3.2 takes priority.
Now to put all he has learnt into action...
30 seconds later, his views of the world went into a myriad of vomit-inducing spiralling colors.
Now if only he can stick his tongue out and enjoy the mach 3.2 (10cm per second) and the wind.
Downside to this is the incapability to see where he is going. But, that's how he rolls anyway. Thus he zips forwards carelessly in full speed without a destination in mind nor sight in view. Barelling past the massive strings of grass that easily bends to his will.
He does hits a couple annoying obstacles mainly the stray pebbles and humongous tiny sticks but with much maneuvoring and implementations of what he learnt before, the art of instantaneous stick, release and roll has been mastered.
He traverses for quite some time only stopping briefly to check on his surroundings before continuing onwards when he spys nothing of interests.
That is until he is rudely and abruptly put to a stop, vigoriously flinged at a neck breaking speed into a nearby stone.
Splat!
He hits the tiny stone with an unforgiving impact, almost ending his second life.
It is a sickening splat, signifying that some unnamed part of his body is most probably ruptured including the minority of his legs which for that brief moment in midair, he manages to minimalise the damage on himself by bracing his legs for the impact instead.
He meticulously peels himself off the giant-tiny stone, falling onto the cold unforgiving ground a second time of the day.
Even though he is feeling slightly disoriented, he pushes himself to assess his injuries. Surprisingly he does not feel much pain. Maybe just a tiny bit of pinch-like sensation to the lower back and two of his hind legs aka the ventral prolegs. Do caterpillars not feel pain? Does that not meant caterpillar has no limitations on their body?
Finish cataloguing his injuries, he glances curiously at the approaching perpetrator. It was a... a... he does not know what that is. It looks somewhat like a mix of a scorpian and prickly stick insect. It is very interestingly colored, five times larger than him and its tiny pincers glinting menacingly as its scorpian tail lays dormant for this easy prey.
He constricts his muscles, building up pressure and propells himselft straight at the insect with bulldozing speed, intending for harm.
Tedior uses tackle.
It was not very effective.
"Ooft!"
He is effortlessly caught mid air. The insect lifts him closer to its face, seemingly for an inspection or for a quick bite. Well no matter, its carelessness in not finishing him off instantly with its pincer will be his gain.
The only weapon he knows of is his mandible. He promptly reaches for the offending pincer and munches on it as violent and vigorously as he can.
To his unconstrained delight, his mandible actually pierces through the exoskeleton of the insect!
It is super effective!
As he is once again flung away towards his freedom, he chews on the mouthful, flavoring it and finds it delectable. He wants more.
Effectively tucking in his body, he manages to do an amazing 10/10 acrobatic landing with his remaining stickly legs. Without a moment of hesitation, he rapidly zips right back towards the insect.
He readies his mandible, jaws open, eager to munch on more of his opponent. As the stick insect appears within sight, he launches himself at the unsuspecting back of the insect, attaches his tiny stubbles to the stinger and chews through its soft and delicate anus, severing its telson completely from its tail.