Modest Gifts From Loved Ones

There is something wrong with the requests in my blog😐 So if you want to ask a question, write to me in the comments here or under the 2nd chapter of "Creation". I am happy with every word and hug you all 💞❤️

😍❤️

Will I now experiment with kissing and cozy moments ? Yes, sir.

❗ Bunnies, it's unfortunate, but I can't write in a hurry...

And I also really want to spend New Year's Eve with my family. The chapter will be written next year. I promise that I will try my best to live up to your expectations.

And yes, here is that ai fragment of y/n and lil bunny that I mentioned earlier - so that at least y'all have something from me as a gift and compensation 🫶🩷

And, more details on what I'm going to do here:

🍃 I will appear rarely, apart from the publication of chapters of “Creation” - but these will definitely be important pieces of my life

🍃 Or Noa/reader one-shots, who knows?

🍃 Or memes about the franchise, lol

🍃 I love all ape men - but, unfortunately, I don’t accept requests.  I can’t write in a hurry, and I’m sorely, chronically short of time.  Maybe in the future - if I have both ideas and the strength to implement them

🍃 In the meantime, I'll be happy to answer any questions. Luv y'all ^^

Assure, I haven't disappeared. It's just that March 12 was my Birthday — and I got caught up in the holiday hustle and bustle, as it happens. I'm a bit burnt out, so I moved the publication date — but it will definitely be delicious ☺️😋💗💞🎊💐

Well... Hello everyone) 

This is really exciting, and I don’t really know where to start - but perhaps I’ll start with a few words about myself.

I'm 21. Russian, but I try to improve my English all the time.

I’m almost successfully fighting mental disorders... Almost.

I’m a florist, but I’m not working right now because I quit.  And while I have time, I make the most of it.

And this is me with my babies - lop-eared Rose and fluffy Leo 😚💞

Glad to be here, create (Keep that word in your mind, cause I'll back soon with some thing 'bout that 🙊) and communicate, mwah ^^

Yes, I finally got out of the hole😅 Really well rested)) I solemnly declare that by Christmas or thereabouts, a present awaits you - a new chapter of "Creation"... Where everything will become a little clearer and things will start to happen a little faster...^^ Wish y'all happy holydays, bunnies!

❄️☃️🥧🎀🎁🎉🎄

A bit late due to household chores,

sorry 👉👈

The main detail of the next part of "Creation" — is an event that will be a kind of gift for everyone who watches this story...📑 Look at the cover of the masterlist ☝️🤫🔎 To see what I'm hinting at ;)

"Creation" Chapter 4.2. Forest filled with fragrance

A/N: The battle with the time deficit was obviously unequal. In addition to the main ideas, side ideas appear, brazenly storming the imagination. And to manage everything at once is quite a challenge. Of course, I can do several tasks at once — but right now I feel a little burnout

Word count: 4,3K

Warnings: several mentions of death and murder, mentions of children dying, a continuation of the theme of female oppression and slavery as well as a continuation of the theme of parenthood, a wounded animal, fear of men in general, musings on sexual forcing and prejudice (and yes, this is the last chapter, focused on thoughts — for next I will focus on the event, that will tie the rope, that was twisting, into a knot)

🎧 Power-Haus, Christian Reindl, Lucie Paradis — Hel

Yellow sunset. Poison soaked forest. Squealing exhausted rabbit. Returning to alarmed branches birds. Hanging in the air words.

You are overcome by a belated, desperate desire to bite your tongue again. To chew and swallow.

To lose the ability to speak forever for sure.

It borders on bad habits, disappointing diagnoses, insanity. You want to fold your palms in prayer. You wrap your palms around rabbit feet.

***

It's too late to retreat and repent. You broke the oath you gave yourself... The fact of what happened falls on you like a crushing weight. Your shoulders sag guiltly, and at the bottom of your soul toils guilt and ineradicable fear. The desire to kill yourself on this very spot, piercing your neck with a sharp wooden peg, grows with each passing second. This seems to be the only right decision if you are unfaithful to yourself.

Having broken an oath, even though there were no witnesses, you have become disgusting to yourself in an instant. You seem to yourself a frivolous traitor. You seem to yourself unworthy of the things, that you went for — the things, that preserve your faith and principles. You seem to yourself unworthy of anything but self-abasement.

An unbroken oath would've been worth nothing, if you had kept silent, allowing Noa to deal with a defenseless animal. If God remembers your oath, he will also see the reason, why you resisted yourself. And, perhaps, God will even grant you forgiveness... Rabbit's paws shake, the squeak turns into a snort. The spear that you clutched in your hand rolls into the dusty hollow. There, too, where Noa's spear fell when you screamed for the whole area.

***

“Or maybe someone is hunting a deceitful ape?” you suggest, unable to contain the regret in your trembling voice. You look at Noa with reproach. And immediately look away.

Biting tongue would've definitely been better than saying that.

The words that escaped seem to you unforgivable. And you expect the worst.

"The apes come... here... by a different path. But the echo... didn't know about it" Noa chooses words with such difficulty, that you can hardly read, if he is lying now. He looks at you, as if apologizing. You don't believe anymore.

"It turns out, I didn't know about too many... Such as, that you finish off animals that are caught in a vice" Nuisance mixed with anger don't allow you to remain silent. It's as if a dam has burst inside you. Noa approaches you one step closer, which seems like an intrusion. "Don't come closer!.. I have one more spear. Unlike you, I will admit to duplicity right away"

To prove your point, you pull out from the tight knot of sky-blue fabric on your hip unsharpened spearhead. Still holding the rabbit, which is poking its nose into your recently healed shoulder.

"...Does I... done you any... harm?" In Noa's green eyes betrays confusion.

Looking into his face, you find the same bitter niusance that sounds in you. You turn away. You feel disgusting. You point the tip at him, unable to take back what was said with any words.

You make it worse, by releasing a sudden, gnawing from within resentment.

If you had your hands free — you would cover your mouth so, that the extra exhale wouldn’t seep.

But your hands are busy with a tossing, blood-smeared little animal.

"You said that hunting only helps in harsh winters. You said that you can't hurt anything living unless it's necessary... Why did you point a spear at the rabbit?" You break another vow you made to yourself when you feel tears streaming down your cheeks. You sob in a fit of helplessness. "He was already bleeding. He would've died a natural death in this trap..."

"When I saw you... You were bleeding too. You would've died a natural death too... trapped. Even... before you were... ruffled... by the scavengers" As your sobs turn to sobs, Noa makes another attempt to come closer. "But I didn't want your... fate... to be like this"

The reminder about that you tried so hard to forget these months hits your knees with frenzy. Over the golden, warm evening layers dank, freezing night.

Thoughtless rapid steps, Noa comes to you contiguously.

In your ears, instead of the birds chirping that begin again, whistles a cold wind.

The distance between you is so insignificantly, that you feel, Noa's ragged breathing making your hair slightly sway — and then you jump back stunned. Having planted the spear between Noa's ribs and accidentally drawing a cut on his collarbone with a trembling hand, you unclench your clenched fingers. You screaming, shaking your head. The spear falls.

Gasping and coughing, you falling onto the dusty, yellowing grass.

Like an paltry speck of dust.

"I swear. I... wouldn't kill" Noa puts his hands together, in a gesture that means an appeal to the heavens. How ironic, that this gesture is the same in all faiths.

"You killed two" You state, struggling with the impenetrable emptiness before your eyes. The streams of tears from your eyes don't stop and don't dry.

"I killed to... save. To... pull you out of... filthy jaws. And I... regret. But if here again one of... them... Second time i would've cost... without regret"

Something in Noa's words brings calm back to the disturbed forest.

Something, that makes you stop crying. You gulp in warm — not the deathly-cold, as of that terrible night, — air. You look at the thick, orange feather beds of clouds. You soothingly stroke the rabbit's tummy. You soothing the worried scars. You pray incoherently. You swallow the lump cutting your throat. You straighten your shirt, which has slipped and come apart at the seams finally. You rush between hysteria and devastation. You remember about your backpack. Your gaze catches on a scrap of gray fabric, visible in the grass.

You rejoice mentally. But not for long.

The backpack should've been on the other side of the bridge. Not here, not in the clearing. Many meters further. For the animals thing wouldn't was handy, so there's only one conclusion - Noa is right again.

And the footprints are such, that you, even if you wanted to, would not confuse them with any other footprints.

***

They were here.

They lured you out.

And it would be better if you fell into the trap set. Certainly better, than a new portion of Noa's suspicions of uncharacteristic motives and an irreversibly worsened relationship with him. If, of course, many days of boycotting can be considered any kind of relationship...

Shame bites into harder than fear. What was bound to happen, has happened. You don't trust anyone anymore. You've out of practice to be human. You've out of practice to be yourself, living among people who turned out to be demons, who don't wearing horns. This is an irreversible process. These are conclusions that are not supported by anything other, than the pain from your past. When Noa is honest, you feel like he's manipulating. When Noa is sincere, you feel like he's still manipulating. Just more skillfully. And that's problem — only yours. After all, it's unlikely that Noa fully understands, what exactly you're accusing him of.

This problem —  your personal, rooted in the subcortex of brain. Your mistrust has nothing to do with Noa. Almost. The only argument, that you use to justify your uncontrollable panic — he is a man. Not a human man, but in your clogged consciousness that doesn't matter. It makes no difference what race Noa belongs to. You see him wrong, the fractured perception can't be changed. You can't erase the horror, hammered into you by the nails of past misfortunes. The bullying, in which the boors from the settlement are not lacking in cunning, knocks in your memory like jackhammers. Dozens of looks strike lustfulness, thousands of words spitting out misogyny, cuffs, slaps, smacks, twisting of hands, tearing off clothes, stealing honor, appropriating a body, depriving of any glimmer of hope for salvation... You know men are like this.

In your thinking there no room for other options. Noa saved you. Noa keeps saving you, but you expect him to screw you over — and when you don't, the momentary surges of anxiety give way to speculations.

Occupying all night long, multi-component, and even more anxious.

Clan in fact — is also settlement?..

In none of the rites, that the apes told you about, you didn't see even the slightest resemblance to the distorted rites — supposedly the fulfillment of God's will — that were performed annually there, in the blasphemous cramped grave.

In none of the apes families you didn't see wives unrecognizably changhing from signs of violence.

None apes child don't look appears to be soulfully crippled and prematurely grown-up.

But you still suspected, that the calm and certainty that reigned in the clan had a dark, unsightly side.

The weapon, that Noa aim, confirmed your suspicions. The round dance of thoughts was stamping, cackling in hundreds of mouths. "Which was to be proved", "Everything was clear from the beginning", "There was no need to even try to trust him" — the spurring echoes in your head changed, one after another. Yes, everything at that moment was reduced to the other side. To a double bottom.

Until you saw the marks of rough soles.

And until you remember, so by the way, one interesting observation.

There, in the rotting dungeon, the brave soldiers most often sent youngsters to spy. Who knew absolutely nothing about defense. Unable to defend themselves even from angry bees. Unarmed and unprepared for the harsh reality. Most of them didn't return back, down. Then you thought, they simply ran away, having received the opportunity... Now you understand, how ented lives of boys taken from their mothers. Now you clearly see — they received wounds incompatible with life. From spears, from hands, from teeth. And from accidents.

No wonder, that youngsters were killed. The desire to defend territory can dictate monstrous decisions.

Sometimes these decisions end up hurting those, who pose no danger.

But Noa didn't know, who he was dealing with. He was ready to defend you a second time, protecting you from armed soldiers. He was even ready to accept death at your hand, if you decided to strike a blow in his heart...

The curved line of blood you traced, running down Noa's collarbones, seems to be a dividing line. Only, perhaps, neither God's eye nor Mother Nature's design don't knows for certain, what that line divides.

A mixture of gratitude and numbness is pricksing.

You don't know, which of the two feelings outweighs the cup.

"Even if you didn't want to stab the rabbit..." wrapping the squirming little animal in the hanging sleeve of your shirt, you whisper, carefully hiding all emotions. "You wanted to stab the child."

"A child?.." bending down to lift you to your feet, Noa freezes. On his face froze the question, that he doesn't express. And worry, that is also the same in all faiths.

"Yes, imagine that. Where I grew up, they kicked in the ass very young boys out on reconnaissance missions. If a scout comes back, it’s not that dangerous. If he doesn’t come back... It’s one less mouth to feed" The story comes out of your mouth, as if you hadn’t realized this truth a few breaths of wind ago, but had always known it. "They can easily be expended. After all, they have slightly fewer functions than wom..." You stopped, flashing at Noah still distrustful look.

Not about that. No, no, no.

Every, glowing with the coming summer, tree heard — you spoke to the one, with whom you swore never to speak. And the sky didn't open up, punishing you with lightnings.

From now on you don't have to be burdened by an oath, that borders on paranoia. Your mind will be healed from it, just as your body was healed from the ointment.

But none of Noa's acts, none of his causing respect traits, don't means you'll ever tell him about your deepest traumas. Nothing, no matter what he does, won't make you dare to that storytelling.

It happened inside you, it lives inside you.

And it will die inside you.

No one needs to know about it — and you won't let your memories, good or bad, be known to anyone.

Looking down at you, Noa holds out his hand to help you up. You look through his outstretched hand, through the grass and bushes. You look through the sky, melted from gold to platinum — and you pull back, sighing, but don't move. You sit on the rotten ground, clutching the wheezing bunny as tightly as you can.

Taking another step, sound quieter than the previous ones, Noa sits up, so that he can see your eyes. Noa says nothing, he just looks at you.  In the sunlit green of his gaze is no self-interest. He doesn't pursue any personal gain. He doesn't devour your body with his eyes. He doesn't search your body for a target to release his anger. All the looks at you, even before you came of age, were either lecherous or derogatory. Noa's look is different from the looks, that you scraped off yourself. Tears fall as hail. The tiny animal nuzzles your weak palms. Your arms hug the rabbit in a kind of rabbit hole. You smile through your distressing thoughts.

An animal, unpredictable and dangerous. That's what Noa seemed to you before.

A predator, that softly lays.

And anticipate, when he will break the back of a herbivore, like you — it's impossible.

Before Noa seemed to you part of a cycle, consisting of a stalking hunter and the stalked, doomed to be eaten prey. Tearing flesh fangs, death grip on the neck... When suddenly the wheel of the Universe staggered, stopped turning.

The cycle has resumed. But too unusual.

It was like that, and when Noa's gaze met your gaze in the eagle pen. You didn't want to admit it then, but you can't deny it now...

Noa's look is unlike anything, that you fear.

"Hope you... will always talk... like that" saying this simple phrase, Noa placing his palm on the place, where restlessly beating your heart. You want to fall through. You are sure, that Noa hear this beat.

"Hope, I never say that much again... To anyone" You don't even know, how explain to Noah the reason for your suddenly broken vow. "Sorry, and... Thanks"

After everything that has already been said, only these two words seem to you appropriate.

Silence tangles in the strands of your hair as you close your lips. Gratitude is finally expressed. Relief washes you over. Looking at you, Noa doesn’t change the position of his broad, callused palm. His fingers remain resting on your heaving chest. “Pawing” — is what you would call his gesture, if you continued feeding your fears. It is what would feed the worst, that you could possibly think. The worst, you have seen. The worst that was waiting for you between iron walls. But Noa’s fingers don’t grab your boobs, mocking — though should, given his background… Noa’s fingers touch your heartbeat.

The rhythm of thoughts is knocks so loud, that your ears are clogged. You want Noa to stop, to take his hand and his compassion away, but something you can’t find a name, holds you back from this instinctive demand. Without moving, and without resisting, you wait for the ending of this moment.

The sky changes color once again, spreading like honey.

The arch of the bridge, leading straight to the human crypt, remains behind the ape shoulders... The symbolism seems far-fetched.

Noa's touch feels awkward. Not nearly as offensive, not nearly as ignoring moral, as the touches you wish you could cut off along with your skin. Noa's touch feels interrogative.

Cutting off any extraneous thoughts — enough for today, — you turn away from Noa. You look first at the bunny curled up in a ball, then at the backpack lying near the bridge. And at the large palm, resting on your heart. You remember how, through the dizzy, you listened to Noa's heartbeat that morning, when he rode you into an uncertain future. You were cutted and exhausted, unable to stay in the saddle, and you held on to him. Like a straw... Noa jerks his hand away, as if waking from forgetting.

"You came for... bag? Why are you... all alone? Echo... it's dangerous... to be alone in the forest" Noa asks. And abruptly, but in a familiar careful way, he lifts you by the elbows.

“Why are you so suave?” you burst into a new flurry of bewilderment. “How do you know why I came? You were watching me, right? So that I wouldn’t get lost or hurt myself?.. Why?”

Ability to small talk has never been your strong point. Inability to keep your mouth shut time and again has cost you dearly. You said so many unflattering things, before you apologized and thanked Noa. And you didn't skimp after... Everything in you was preparing to consider him a traitor — obviously, you hit him. But he doesn't show it. There, where you ran away from, for the words were sometimes beaten three times harder, than for the actions. Women defended themselves from harassment and humiliation in the only way they knew — with a sharp word. Women and girls of all ages spat out blood clots the size of small fish heads, after enraged men took their revenge on them in full... Nothing guaranteed safety — the fragility of children's joints, bruises that had not yet faded, pregnancy, postpartum weakness...

What are the punishments for men, who want to wean their women off the blade-cutting words, in other scattered settlements?..

And what kind of self-control must Noa have, if all your defense mechanisms, borrowed from the dungeon, didn't make a gap in his armor?..

“So that no one gets hurt you” Noa’s answer is so succinct and clear, that you can barely keep yourself from going on the defensive.

You have nothing to answer him.

But you want to argue with him. You are capable of protecting yourself, you are disgusted by surveillance. You don’t want to call it protection, much less care. Because it can’t be that. Because never, after the death of your parents, blood and foster, have you felt any care. The fact that Noa cares about you, is something that comes with great difficulty.

The care is not greedy — like protecting things, from breakage and theft, — it is friendly.

It's something from children's fairy tales about mutual assistance, about support. And about everything else, that you never had.

You never had friends.

When did Noa become your friend?..

When did Noa become anything other, than your savior? And can that change anything?

***

Blue of the sky encircles shine of the clouds. Evening changes into day for a minute.

You, unable to utter a single sound, and clutching rabbit feet tighter, set off for the backpack. Knead the dust and dirt with your bare feet. Almost reach out for the frayed strap. You freeze halfway — Noa blocks your path, picking up the backpack warily. While he stands with his back to you, turned away, you concentrated invoke and listen to your inner voice. How does Noa know, that you will not use the perfect opportunity to hit his skull with a rock that comes to hand, to jump on him from behind and strangle him, to press his eyes deep into their orbital basins?..

You wouldn't for nothing do that. After all you owe Noa.

And you have no reason to deal with Noa like that. Even if that owe didn't exist — Noa isn't someone, who you could kill without a guilty conscience.

But why is Noa so improvident? Does he really trust you that much, after only half a spring and a handful of summer swelter?

***

Setting sun and impatience dry your tears. Noa hands you the backpack, still looking into your eyes. Quickly counting the contents, you put it on and... freeze. In the distance, on a withered branch hangs cross. Looks like the rosary beads, that bastards carry with them. They recite prayers, drunkenly shuffling the words around. They shuffle, when they are nervous about the approach of retribution, which they themselves have molded from double standards and cardboard idolatry. They give them to youngsters. For luck, damn them... What is this, if not a sign from God? You need this cross, to heed the aspirations of your soul. And you take this cross off the extended as a serve branch.

“What is this?.. An echo ward?” Noah suggests with such precision, that pull you out of your silent veil.

"Yes, a ward. In my religion, that wear to protect against misfortune and temptation" You nod, not trying to hide your joy at the find. And, putting the cross in your pocket, you complete the answer so frankly, that immediately reproach yourself.

What is the probability, that Noa understands the meaning of the word "temptation"?

If so, isn't the meaning, implied by humans, different from the meaning of this word among apes? Why did you even mention that?.. It was easier to remain silent, if only because silence saves from different interpretations of the same thing out loud.

"If... this is bait?" Noa questions, as you zip up your pocket.

The fresh blood on his collarbones turns crimson.

If the wound had been even a millimeter deeper, you would have needed both threads and bandages. You would've had to stitch Noa up, as if he had just returned from a grueling battle... What a nonsense!.. It would've been the healing females, not you, who would've had to stitch Noa up. They, might, have allowed you to join their cause, but they would never have allowed you to take control of Master of Bird's health. They would've hovered around Noa in a line. They would've fussed about him in a crowd. And, unlike you, they would've considered this an honor.

"If so, we'll be gone faster, than they can catch us on the hook" you say without hesitation. Your arms are tired from holding the rescued animal and the backpack filled with priceless things, but it's a pleasant weight. "So which path do the apes take? I want to get home, before it gets dark."

It would be weird to apologize a second time. That's why you chose different words to apologize.

After all, until now you've called the clan your new home only mentally. Putting that thought into spoken form feels like something meaningful.

And the word "home" is pleasant to pronounce.

Fluttered from your lips question and wish made Noa smile faintly. He point to a winding path, hidden in the thickets of a plant, that familiar to you from the impeccably preserved 21st century botanical reference book, filled with handwritten notes by your foster mother. Against the spreading leaves of the plant timidly press wild strawberry. Almost the same, as that one you learning how to pick in a basket by your blood mother. Well... Many miles from the places, where you were born and grew up, a message from your most reverently treasured memories unexpectedly winked at you.

Forest filled with fragrance, that flowing into you.

Journey takes only a few minutes. The landmark is a full-flowing river, along which Noa walks, taking your hand - telling, that you not to fall behind. You don't resist another his touch. You don't argue, because you are exhausted, and don't want trouble.

Count in your mind the things, you've reunited with — to distract yourself. And not to think about Noa's fingers, tightly intertwined with your fingers. Blancet of a clouds, meanwhile, covers the forest from bad dreams.

***

Night blows through your hair, as you follow the noise, coming from behind the logs. Right from behind that place, where Noa taught you how to make fancy pegs.

Looking around, you find Noa from carving on some sturdy rods, tied together similarity to cage. In the dim flickering light of the torch, Noa's sitting back to you again — but as you mince closer, trying to remain unnoticed, his shoulder blades strain under dark fur. Now you know. His animal nature is one way or another always aware your precence. You wrap yourself in the rags of your shirt, when he turns.

"A rabbit can't... hop around in your... house" The lighting is so meager, that you almost trip over the wooden debris. But you notice, that Noa is definitely smiling again. "Need... a rabbit house."

"Rabbit houses are in holes... It's good, that your tribesmen didn't offer to send this poor back"  In not imaginary, but real darkness, you allow yourself to smile, sitting down opposite Noa and studying the construction.

"Not tribesmen, but... the arsonists... suggested that I... expel you. Don't give their barking... weight. Apart from them, everyone... is glad, that you appeared here" Noa's voice is hoarse, affirmative and almost tangible in the crackling of the hanging fire.

"...Can I take this house home, right after you finish?" your voice, on the contrary, dissolves in the measured crackle, the thick night and the glow of the constellations.

Wait, until the painstakingly constructed cage is ready, need not long.

It means sitting next to Noa. In directly closeness, what would have seemed unacceptable to you just this morning. But the day has been edifying, expounding you — not everything is that, as it seems.

In the middle of the leafy plain, your thoughts were tossed between the possibility of Noa's kill at your hands and the possibility of giving him first aid with your hands... Both originated thoughts seems equally absurd. But if fate played a joke on you, and you had to choose — you would readily choose not a stone, but bandages and threads.

A lot you have to rethink.

After just one fragmentary conversation it's hard to be sure of anything. But you're sure — insde of you has begun a slow thaw, gradually catching up spreading through the forest vessels warmth.

"Creation" Chapter 4.1. Forest sprinkled with poison

A/N: I got behind schedule because of an unexpected feeling of illness, loss of consciousness and a visit to the city hospital... The adventure was so-so. I will monitor my health more carefully so that this does not happen again. I hope the events of the chapter will justify me

Word count: 4,1K

Warnings: brief mentions of death, hints of rape, sexual oppression and abuse, use of children, themes of parenthood and breeding, mentions of blood, injuries and mutilation, swearing, animal torture (oh... it will be fine, I promise you - because I consider the last point inhumane and it is only necessary for the plot twist)

🎧 Power-Haus, Christian Reindl, Lucie Paradis — Gefion

Crystal-clear sky. White with a dash of blue and grey. Not a cloud, but the feeling of mischievous rain is hovering in the air.

You were three or four years old then, not more. You didn't pronounce letters well, were distracted by this and that.

And you keep this memory far, far away in memory, like a ward.

Sitting on your father's shoulder, you hold your mother's hand. You point your parents to the strawberry patch visible at the fork in the paths, like an experienced lookout. Your parents take heed to your babble with laughter, your father lowers you onto the short grass, flattened by the summer breeze, and your mother hints you how to pick berries from the bushes. The handbusket you hold is filled in a matter of minutes.

Happy, with your plump palms stained with berry juice, you hand the dainty to your mother — a gesture, that she praises your efforts, is full of pride. She ruffles your unruly curls. Lifting you into the air, your father places you back on his shoulders.

Parents questioning you about the recently learned words, asking you to name everything you see — you swing your legs and name every grass blade, every bug on the way home.

Scarcely the slanted, moss-covered ruins could be called home. But here you lived the brightest years of your childhood.

The door creaks as you stomp inside, hallooed out to your mother and father. They are standing behind.

The sun is hiding, but the rain doesn't drip.

Parents look at you with a love that you will never be able to forget — and will barely find anywhere else.

***

The turned-down edge of a yellowed, worn book. The letters on the pages are ghostly. The illustrations are bright.

Your foster parents always encouraged your curiosity — for your seventeenth birthday you received a book about the world structure. A book about all the phenomenas and inhabitants of a planet that has been continiously changing — there, upstairs — for many billions of years.

You kept book with carefully and cautiosly. Just like every story told by your foster mother, imbued with wisdom. Just like every instruction from your foster father, aimed at save you from scourges.

A year later, running away, you didn’t manage to take a single thing. Not a single memory.

These parents also look at you, buried under layers of metal and earth, with love. It's a different feeling — but just as eternal. And that you'll also barely some day find.

***

You wake up with a naive gust to get at least a little warmth of your mother's hands from your hair. Straighten out yourself, lying in a nest warmed by the sun — this warmth can also be settle with. Albeit with a creak, even with aching sadness.

Since your blood parents died, have passed thousands of days, filled with darkness. Since your foster parents died, have passed months, and your heart is howling.

The book was left there, in the rotten underground prison. One of the bastards dropped it on the floor of your room. In a fight where life was at stake, you still managed to take the most valuable things from your involuntary home. Only one was mattered — hide, strike a blow, and get out of the shackles to the surface. Had to sacrifice the book, in order to run without looking back. The pages and the binding were probably already trampled. While they were prowling, sniffing out your footprints.

However, the grey backpack with one strap, in which you had raked the remains of the past, also remained somewhere not far from their lair. You held it to clouding tightly — until fell off the bridge.

Rolling tumble, smearing in mud, you prayed — if only they wouldn't find what belonged to you. If only they wouldn't plundered it, wouldn't messed it.

If only backpack remained lying somewhere in the grass.

You'll have found it, you'll have be able to... If it hadn't been mortally dangerous to go back there.

The guilt that you were unable to retain even one complete memory of your former life rises in your throat. Everything is lost there. Your daily, worn-out clothes. Your comb with bent teeth. Your locket turned into a bracelet. Notebook. Prayer book. Drawings of how you remember your blood parents. Photo album of how you remember your foster parents. Old camera with several empty rolls, that could have been used to capture something important... You had to try to catch at least something... But what is lost cannot be returned.

You look at the rising sun.

Providing your face to the rays crumbling across the hut.

Tears don't flow, eyes don't sting. And lungs don't cramp in desolate spasm. Maybe, this is what means reconcile.

During the time you spent in the clan, summer had almost blossomed from the spring buds. The daylight hours had increased, the working hours — too. It was strange to realize this. You had asked only to wait out the cold night, without hoping for anything more. Now you've lived here for the rest of the cold spring.

The shades of the seasons, while you were freezing among cruelty and heresy, did not change at all. Spring remained elegant and tender, like a wreath woven from wild flowers. Summer remained playful, like many-colored pebbles glittering on the lake bottom.

Raising your head to the sky, admiring its palette — and look around, searching for differences from the past. Except for your broken growing up, everything is the same. Like in distant childhood memories. Can't even believe it.

Everything is exactly the same. Even the feeling warmth of mother's hands.

The warmth of a mother's touch, carreeing through the roofs of the huts and through the space under open sky.

Through the past, the present, and, definitely, through the future.

A touch that came before civilizations and wars. A touch that cannot disappear as long as families exist. Unforgettable, unshakable. Repeated in a multitude of meanings and forms... Once upon a time, these were the hands of your own mother, who silently told you all the basics for a child's mind necessary.

Now these are the hands of a female chimpanzee lulling her cub.

Yes, the same one who hurried to move away from you, saving the most important she has - her children. Now Kantis and her husband (it's incredible, but in fact, apes unions, bonded with rituals, and not with spots of seals, are mostly stronger and durable than humans), who perceived you with hostility, are much more favorable. As you managed to find out by chance, the age of people and apes is calculated nearly the same - which means that Kantis was a not much older than you. But at first, with grumpiness, she let you under her wing. Like an unfledged chick.

You admit, that this is how it is.

The shells cracked on you just as they did on those eaglets you watched with awe among the sticks, rods and softly carpeted perches. Even if those shells were not visible, you were afraid to climb out of the egg.

You needed help, from start to finish, to feel like you weren't out of place. The decision was made unspoken. When both Kantis's little cubs, Nober and Febri, who can only slither and babble, took their first clumsy steps towards you... More and more often you visit them, for a short time or for many talkative hours, to remember the feeling of family, unbreakable kinship.

***

The cuts healed, leaving almost no scars. As Dar had said, you no longer dragged your feet, but ran like a little deer. Together with the apes children, having memorized all the ringing names. Especially the names of the five mischief-makers who attacked you with curiosity and naivety. Insightful as adult Kaidy, modest Lum and her little brother Lup, thoughtful Elan, and, of course, brave hooligan Paco. Answering their pouring like rivulets questions, you found real joy. Forgetting about the bothering wounds, you played unknown games with them — and taught them the games you knew. It was an honest, pure exchange.

The apes children were no different from the human children — and you were both a strict adult and a noisy child with them at the same time.

Uncorked yourself from the iron jar just recently and re-learning the outlines of everything familiar, you responded to many things with the same childish delight as the five apes cubs. They didn't draw out dark secrets out of you — they only asked for exciting stories and catch-ups. It was easier for you to find with them a common language.

Watching the incessant, peaceful flow of weeks, you yourself sometimes questioned them with genuine curiosity.

This seemed to you that, what would make you happier.

As much it possible while hidden from everyone mourning.

In the dungeon, too, in your free time from back-breaking work, you did not miss a single chance to mess around with the children. Here you eagerly awaited the moment when you could bring at least some slightly advantage. But this moment never doesn't coming.

Everyone was busy, but the Elders were in no hurry to assign any businesses to you. Even though you yourself asked for responsibilities. Even though the crumbs of kindness that you kept within yourself and joyfully gave to the cubs, softened the initial sharp edges. Still, even though you received shelter here — mistrust outweighed virtue.

Mistrust settled in Vikima's blind, transparent pupils. She not drive you away. She called all people grief-sending spirits. The teen-chimps, who adore her stories of the past, told you of the fresh grieving that lay in her wrinkles. She had lost three sons and a husband. Fault for that — human and the disfavor of fate.

Without daring to express it, you shared her sadness. And, as if seeing what was happening in your soul, the Elders replaced their disguised, justified anger on mercy.

Once you've adjusted and healed your wounds, assured Dar, you'll be able to do work that you can handle.

You were flattered.

You were guessed, that Dar means taking care of the children. Just as like you dreamed.

And then, maybe you'll join the healing. Elders know about this your skill. The opportunity to mention it already presented itself, when one of the cubs got a splinter and you helped to take it out, without a single childish tear. But it's better not to rush events.

***

So far, under the constant, mentoring supervision, you have learned to live as is commonly in the clan. And surprisingly, you have done well.

The traditions of the apes, maybe, been foreign to you — but their culture and beliefs were certainly not about vandalism and widespread wrecking. They revered Mother-Nature and all her bountiful gifts, lived in harmony with her powers. In contrast to the settlement where you could never exist. There was no respect for anything that existed. The teachings of that place hummed: tear out, hack away. Destroy.

Resounding in a bass voice heartless choir. Consisting of hundreds of pests, tormenting you in nightmares, and only occasionally interspersed with pictures of an unblemished childhood... Here this raging choir died down, giving you brief moments of peace.

Finding yourself in the womb of forest, among strangers who were being vilified by gossips, you seemed to breathe for the first time in many, many strained years.

Let in not air, but entire grassy expanses inside yourself, your consciousness.

You couldn't know in advance, that what evil tongues were telling might turn out to be true.

You couldn't know nothing, until you convinced it personally.

This, of course, would require many more seasons. But despite their wariness, the apess welcomed you with cordiality. And when you were about to leave, gathering your meager belongings — Noa suggested, that you stay until you found a better place. And you, and he knew, that such a place simply didn't exist — and from anywhere you would be like a patch on a cloth that did not need to be patched. This was an offer not to huddle as a guest, but to settle down forever. With this wording between the lines you agreed. Here you were not subjected to any violence, not even an indirect hint of violence. Here you were granted, to some extent, freedom of thought, speech and action. In the settlement, leniency was granted only to slaves, living commodity as a reward, when the slave owners achieved whatever cruel aim.

There were not many aims and needs for which girls, young women and women were needed there. Only two. Small, painstaking labor and childbearing. If your escape failed — you'll would have suffer, like pretty, until one of these men who had no right to be called men disgraced you in the most painful way. The rapes would have continue until your womb bore a child. If it were a girl — she would be left in your arms, waiting for her to become a resource. If it were a boy — he would be removed to a compartment located just below the surface as soon as you finished feeding him with breast milk. It is difficult to determine which fate is worse. A doll for plaything or a mannequin for huntmastering?..

Children were born rarely, but there they meant nothing. Children were just instruments.

Attachment to children was conditional. Parental love was frowned.

A crime against all the precepts that has bequeathed God... Aimless childbearing and equally aimless labor. If from the chosen victim could be obtained neither of these  — or if the result did not satisfy the tormentors — victim was thrown into the garbage. Exhausted and used. It was a hellish cycle. It was written in blood and flesh law...

Regarding life as burden, you had never before considered, whether you would ever want to have your own children. Here you thought about it in the silence of the night, ringing among the animals calling.

There was no point in looking around too intently. In every hut, in addition to the nest that served as a bed, there was something reminiscent of a cradle for newborns. Your hut was no exception. This uncurtained cradle distracted you from your work, all your thoughts circled around the cradle... You know, there are more such seeds-prisons scattered underground, made of an alloy of cold metals and glass. These seeds will not germinate through decades or through centuries. You are doomed to loneliness, cutting yourself off from imprisonment — and from human men.

Maybe, it's for the better?.. What life could live children who were born not for unconditional love, but for the preservation of a morally fallen race? Hardly a happy one.

This aim was disgusting to you, but understandable. The desire of the bastards, who got what they deserved, to possess you was at least explainable.

You were already a working unit, serged and darned for days. And you would have become a good mother, even if you had no chances to give your children a childhood with a clear sky above their heads. Now you are deprived of the chance for motherhood...

But, given the theoretical possibility of helping in the apes manger, would you be so useful? Several generations of females manage this perfectly well without you. Your help is as great, as a grain in a sack. Not to mention that here you are useless as a vessel for conceiving and bearing offspring. Everything in you is breaking under the weight of questions and breaking through, for the first time in months, selfishness. If you stay here, you will inevitably end up an old maid. No matter how you look at it, are you needed here for any aim?..

But, otherwise, why would Noa teach the stubbornly silent you everything he himself knew?.. Obviously, he made your stay in the clan easier. He shared with you the tricks, necessary for survival — as he himself let it slip, the second time luck will not save you.

Indeed, it was not luck that saved you, but he, Noa. One of the apes. One of those, whom people admitted as evil incarnate. One of those, who did not drive you away, when all the people around were deaf to your despair. So, you were convinced only that the slander is a lie. Because you see in apes much more humanity, than in the hateful dungeon, teeming with unhappy people and inhuman cruelty.

And, living side by side with apes, you want to strengthened in this conviction.

You would like to thank Noa even, perhaps, more — only thanks to his contradictory act you see, what this whole world can be. Only this act of his already roots your withered, eaten away by fear, like parasite, hope. But the oath, that rumbles in your head, prevents you from saying just one word. The fact, that he is not a human, does not cancel your prejudice. You will not utter a single word, intended for a man. Even if his thoughts are pure.

It feels wrong to use gestures for explaining — but your tongue feels like it’s falling into your stomach, when you try to even imagine a conversation with Noa. And your lips feel like a needle is piercing them, pulling tiny stitches of a nonexistent thread.

At your silent request, Noa tells you what these strange, small wooden blocks are that have caught your attention. It's sort of ward. You can find them in every hut, as you noticed when you looked in on Soona. Trinket with a mystical meaning. And everyone in the clan makes these blocks for themselves single-handedly.

Tiny blocks laid in a row in your hut were made by Noa.

Without knowing why, you get in earnest angry when you find it out — and you ask Noa to take them to his own home and teach you this skill. So that there in your room will be nothing foreign.

If you said it out loud, would sound absurd.

But even from the crumpled gestures, your hands nervously twitched.

It was further proof of Noa's good intentions towards you, which you couldn't be angry about. But you couldn't pacify the vague indignation. How and the crudely expressed movements of fingers.

To your sincere surprise, Noa once again does exactly as you asked. By sunset, not a single wooden trinket remains in your hut. The next dawn, Noa begins teaching you how to handle wood.

If you dared to ask for such a stupid little thing there, among the boors seething with anger and bile — on your face would already be turning blue hematomas.

Here you shake off the sawdust, use one of the gestures you learned over the spring to ask Noa if you’re doing well — and twirl in your hands a crooked short peg.

A snarky laugh is heard. Jeru and Nigig, who's else, damn...

They are no better than what is happening in the place you fled from. They have been trying so hard to ridicule you, to vomit more vileness at you since the day Noa brought you into the clan. No matter what they say, you remain silent. Not because Noa insisted on such tactics, although you did listen to his advice then. You just do not consider Nigig a representative of the female kind. You could have answered her a hundred fold more painfully, but there is no need.

Jeru keeps Nigig around not as his woman, but as his empty-barking henchman. He treats her like a mutt. She behaves accordingly, indulging in his unreasonable attacks.

Listening to their dry conversation one day, you are perplexed. They have nothing to talk about, if not to insult. They are united only by malice. For a brief moment, you wonder — why do they live under the same roof, if their union is based on the desire to verbally mock someone, and not on the desire to while away the evenings together, to raise offspring together?..

Such abscesses are present on the body of any society, you suppose. Without them, good treatment wouldn't be appreciated.

Spending even a sound on them both — squandering. You put the unfinished trinket aside, folding your arms across your boobs. You close yourself off from the male's gaze rummaging your body, and don't understand, how his companion allows it. You involuntarily step behind Noa's shoulder, he growling, bristling fur and losing his patience. You look through their grimacing foreheads.

"In a long time haven't seen... such muck" Jeru laughs, grinning. And you can hear from his intonation, that he's not talking about your unskillful work, but about you.

"Don't amuse me... What else is capable of this... bedding?" Nigig looks at you dismissively, stretching out the last word into syllables.

"I'll pretend that you... didn't yipedd nothing. Now get lost" Noa replies, shielding you with his back. The indignation in his voice makes you stupefied.

Wooden block fall to the ground, when Jeru tries to grab your wrist.

Without a second thought, Noa knocks him down. You scream and stand rooted to the spot, and Nigig's trail went cold. Who would doubted it.

The second time Noa fights is because of you, damn him. You take a step back, toward the wood chips and shavings. You beg to stop, as splashes of someone's blood are drif apart. Sound of crushing bone. Noa stands up, shaking himself. He's unharmed, save for the blood trickling from his nose. Beating he gave Jeru, on the other hand, was more than serious. Tucked tail, that's what he lacks.

Your impressions of what happened are controversial. There is no one here except you, Noa, and the future wooden amulets. He clearly didn't get into a fight to maintain status, his or yours.

Noa protects you selflessly. With arguments and fists. In every way. From that night, appearing as a saving shadow, and to this day. Even if this aim is not voiced — now it is understandable to you. But why?..

It takes a few moments to indecisiveness, but you hesitate, for what feels, like a whole summer. You walk up to Noa, quickly wiping the blood off his face with the back of your hand. And run so fast, that you can't catch your breath, when you get back to your house. Those are still not the words you want to say. But at least it's something.

***

You dream of a backpack. Nothing but a backpack and the area where you dropped it.

A steep hill right behind the lake, surrounded by thin-armed trees. Cobblestones, small pebbles. Tenacious bushes. A bridge...

***

In a dream the realize, that you went back for your backpack and lost it again very close to the place where Noa found you, gives you unprecedented strength.

You'll find. You'll be able.

You run at your two legs, as if on a galloping horse. Along the way you fall into the dried on sun mud, suffocate in a column of rising dust. You see a stone bridge in sight. You run faster, hoping to meet the almost lost memories...

Hear a squeak, from which your heart is ruptures.

Like sick infants cry. Only more shriller. As if death was breathing down neck again, pacing somewhere nearby...

Beneath a low-growing gooseberry bush, rendingly screaming a rabbit. Its hind leg caught in the jaws of a trap. Noa towers over it, aimed a spear.

"Hey, owl!" you yelling at the top of your throat. Louder than the poor rabbit. Louder than the birds flying in all directions. Louder than a weapon falling with a crash.

Hands down, Noa looks straight at you, turning around. You're holding a sharpened spear. You're learning fast. And you're filled with dissapointment.

"Yes, Noa, I'm talking to you! It was you, who spoke of owls and rabbits. So you were feint? Well, I'm glad, that I saw your deception with my own eyes"

Forest sprinkled with poison of your words.

These weren't supposed to be the first words you spoke to Noa. Not at all. You rehearsed them in your head, wandering through the swirls of ornate phrases — waiting until you were ready to speak them without fear. Now you're waiting to see if Noa will pick up his spear and if you strike a blow again.

Leaning down towards the incessantly squeaking lump, you open the trap with incredible effort. When Noa tries to help, you don't let him near and hiss.

"Or you move away, or I'll stick your hand there!" you say in a weak, loud whisper as he reaches for the rabbit you pick up. "You wanted to kill him..."

"I wanted to kill whoever... set the trap. Look. Too big for... a rabbit" Noa says confused. You hide the wounded animal in your hands, seeing yourself as if in a reflection. "Someone is hunting echo"