"Creation" Prologue

Just making sure you're okay and alive. I hope you're having/had a good thanksgiving or holiday. 😭🫶

The break really did me good, and I feel great right now) Thank you, sunshine 🥰✨

If you look closely, you can see - my MBTI has changed. I checked several times, because I check everything. I mean EVERYTHING... 😅😂

Expect a hint from me for the next chapter of "Creation" in the next few days 🍃🌱🙊

"Creation" Chapter 5. If time had been kind

A/N: I realy really really apologize for making you wait for two days... Publication of the chapter was complicated by a boil in my eye. Right now, there is still no use in treating it. Yeah, I'm becoming a regular patient at the local hospital, what a hell... But I couldn't keep putting it off. I hope I was able to live up to expectations and pleasantly surprise

Word count: 5,4K

Warnings: indirect insults, blood, brief references to murder, oppression of women and children, themes of slavery and parenthood, post-traumatic memories, perverted religious motives, killing of an animal, fear of men, beating, attempted rape, veiled intimate prejudices, implied xenophilia (forcing the events seemed to me simply a necessary tool after so much forced narration — the rope is tied in an unexpected knot! And then — more. But gradually ...)

🎧 Joel Sunny — Luminary

Bustle and hubbub fill the Eagle Clan so suddenly, that you don't even have time to blink. For the last week, certainly, you've noticed preparations for some unknown holiday — but now that summer has come into its own, everything and everyone has become a jumbled mess.

Everyone seemed to become a single, coherent mechanism.

And you seemed to became like an unnecessary, defective detail.

Because, no matter how much Suna, or Kantis and her husband Ogun in two voices, or omnipresent Anaya, tried to explain you what the essence of the holiday was — to you didn't become clearer. It seemed that the very concept of the celebration needed to be explained to you anew. With patience and deliberation. After all, those celebrations that were imprinted in your memory — obscurantist and didn't bring any joy to anyone, except those, who reveled in the annual harvest of cruelty.

***

The vines, woven into intricate garlands, exude an unfamiliar sweetish aroma. Children rush about, hanging them everywhere. Lum, Lup and Elan, with six small nimble hands, help you decorate your home with vines, which is gradually acquiring a lived-in appearance.

Every now and then the kids ask you, vying with each other, about the things in backpack. About things from your blurry past, next to things from your equally blurry present. When you're done with the decorations, you tell them about the purpose of each thing. About the almost unfaded photographs and the events captured on them. About the spools of thread and rusty needles. About the calligraphic inscriptions on the worn-out pages of a prayer book. About the tiny mirror, that only fate hasn't broken. About the broken comb. About the slightly chipped camera, waiting for new pictures. About the grumpy patches on the clothes and the backpack itself.

About everything, that consisted of, and still consist to that day, your best memories.

It's unusual to be in the narrator's place.

Kids listen to you, cuddling the rabbit that has recently stopped being afraid of hands. Now not the rabbit without a name — but the rabbit, that you named Daisy.

For some reason the name seemed to suit brown fur.

You're sitting on the floor, right in front of the spacious cage Noa has built, your hand through the bars. You're stroking the rabbit's sides, still skinny — and at the same time, you're ruffling the kids' hair... When suddenly someone places on you a fragrant, elegant wreath.

“Now you look like... a princess!” remaining standing behind you, Kaidy claps her hands.

"Natural princess!.. It's good that here are no evil dragons!" Paco laughs, flying like a whirlwind into the hut with a lot of tangled vines and curved branches, tied with intricate, hand-woven ribbons.

"Indeed, exactly the same as" You pick up the childish delightful exclamations, adjusting the thin droping branches. "And a young knight would definitely protect me from the dragons, right?"

And, taking the decor, you wink at Paco. He immediately nods, proudly — and Kaidy, not missing the opportunity, playfully pokes him in the nose. Boy gives in to her, allowing girlish mischief to prevail. Now they are already running from corner to corner, running outside. Somersaulting in the june grass. Threaten each other with tickling. Sincere, sparkling laughter fills your house and the emerald-lit lawn nearby, making you forget about the sad memories that had already flooded in. Having called the breathless mischiefs over and seated them, you ask about the ribbons. They are directly connected with the approaching holiday.

It's your turn to hear stories about the purpose of things. And you can't hold back curiosity.

With children this is not necessary at all. And it encourages you.

The explanation, that children use — understandable intuitively, although it's blocked by an insurmountable cultural barrier.

Looking back at the recent past, you had already forgotten, that gratitude could be dedicated to an entire day in the season and on the calendar.

"This is a holiday of gratitude... for everything... Whatever you decide to thank";

"Elders thank nature... for the sent gifts... For a good catch of fish or for the quick sprouting of shoots";

"For a winter without winds... and for a summer without drought";

"We thank our mothers and fathers... Brothers and sisters... Grandmothers and grandfathers... Whole family... For that we have them. For that we are... together";

"For that we able to quickly learn something... or grow up";

"Also, those... who are older, thank... their wives and husbands...";

Answers came out, as in cornucopia. Everyone, who could be considered an adult, gave much more succinct answers — like, you yourself should understand what to what.

But how should you understand without explanations, if this holiday, with its laudatory ceremonies, is too different from the holidays, that celebrated in the settlement?

There, the derogatory, disregardful traditions became an integral part of a colorless life long before you — and more others, like you — were born. There the scum, calling themselves men, amused themselves with bloodshed and misogyny.

Do apes, living on land unspoiled by other faiths, know what meaning "misogyny"?..

If you yourself know this term only from books about the vague science, that studies the human brain.

You can't just go and spill out, like from a leaky sack, those customs, that there called "ceremonial".

No, of course, there was no female circumcision or anything worse. The physical harm was constant, and don't need to be set aside for a separate day. Instead, at the beginning of the festival, women, girls and young women, who were already someone's property, were given shameful collars. And, driven like cattle into rooms, they were locked with all the locks until the end of the festival. On the second day, all the girls, who these boors call ownerless, were brought out to the main platform. And they moved on to the sacrifice. One of the horses — one of those, that remained tied up at the top, — was tied up, eyes were gouged out, ears were cut off, hung up, and then ripped open so, that the blood oozed out and collected in a huge jug. Or did you, looking around furtively like a mouse studying the corridors and tunnels, assume, that there horses were, because the neighing, snorting and clattering of hooves often came from above. But if the horses for this numbing ritual were obtained from other, neighboring settlements...

You felt sick every damn year, because couldn't not show up to this flayer spectacle. Just as couldn't turn away.

Those who turned away were ripped open in the same way, as sacrificial horses.

When the jug was full — contents were given to those girls, who's came of adult in that year. Those girls, who were obliged to go into use of men and begin to fulfill a debt that no one needed. Slave labor and carrying future slaves in the womb.

On the third day, the girls were prepared for the first night. They were fed the meat of a killed horse, soaked in something unbearably stinking. On the fourth day, the girls were taken behind iron doors, which from behind could be heard maddening screams, blows and crying. On the fifth day, the girls came back out, already women and already broken. Beaten until their internal organs bleeding and having lost the will to live. Sixth and seventh days passed like a bad dream, with a din of blasphemous prayers and dancing of cackling scums with limp rag dolls. That's all... Apart from this holiday, which lasted a week, all the others were celebrated casually.

No Birthdays, no Christmas, all other holidays were forbidden.

Except for this devilry. By misunderstanding called God's Feast.

You won't be able to talk about feasts and games, which they have entertain with there, under the meters of earth and rust. If you dare to talk about it, you will be considered as perverted, as those who came up with it. Otherwise, why would you talk about something vile, unnatural?..

It's like a dome of soul-sucking memories hangs over your head. You're transported back there, to the main platform, a year ago. You're seventeen and you're frantically looking for something to look at — to not look at the endless streams of blood from horse's belly.

Then they threatened to rip out your guts and feed them to those, who wouldn't turn away. Now you're eighteen, and you're not going through the circles of Hell.

And you don't know, who to thank for this.

Five little chatterboxes shake you by the shoulders, finally bringing back to reality.

"So what would you thank for?.. And what?.. Or who?"

They are curious without any underlying reason. Like all children their age. But you don't answer them right away, pretending to be much carefree — so as not to frighten them with your dejected look. If answer with all honesty, then you're grateful to God for sending Noa on the path, that you were walking without hope of salvation. You're grateful to Dar and Elders. You're grateful to every mother in the clan, because they all trusted you with their children. You're grateful to every child in the clan, because not one of them was afraid of you, an stranger.

But above all, you are grateful to Noa. Even though you don’t know how to express this gratitude. Even though the circumstances are favorable now, for Noa you're none of the things the children have listed. So if you say, what you said in the middle of the frozen plain a few weeks ago again, in front of so many eyes and ears, it will be taken the wrong way. Or not seriously. One is no better than the other, however. Touch the cross hanging around your neck, you ask yourself a very strange question.

How can it be that you grateful to God and Noa almost equally?..

"I would like to start by thanking you. For being my assistants in everything" After a short pause, you saying, smiling broadly for the first time in the past few months.

"Because with you... it's always interesting!" the cubs smile back. "Even doing boring things!.. And else?"

"There are still many things and many people. I would like to thank my family. But, unfortunately, I can only thank the memory of my family..."

Why? With your family happen something... bad? Kaidy gasps. The smiles instantly slip off the children's faces, when you find the strength to only nod.

Mischief on children's faces gives way to compassion.

Just at that moment Noa's voice is heard from outside the door.

Without the fears, as it was before, you allow him to enter and ask, why he has come.

"Just wanted to... help with decorate the house... And with nest" Noa looks from under brows at the wreath that hugs your hair. Noa looks at you for a long. Not at all, like he usually does. "You're like a queen in this... crown"

"Oh, right!.. But this a princess's crown. Queen can't rule without a king" looking away and laughing carefree, you clarify. "Maybe you'll sit down?"

Hanging an awkward silence. Is this a coincidence, nothing much more?..

You don't know, how to hide your commotion. Is Noa really serious? You thought, all this talk about the ritual of raising a companion — was nothing more than just covering up the gaps in your knowledge. It turns out, that this apes ritual concerns you, a human, directly.

In Noa's hands is a pile of branches, vines and... fluff? Nests in the bird pen, where the tiny chicks, just hatched from their shells, are kept warm and well-fed, are lined with exactly the same material. You heard, that everyone in the clan, upon reaching adulthood, undergoes initiation by proving responsibility for their own bird. Does this mean, that you are allowed to stay not out of pity, but as an equal?.. But then first you need to find the egg yourself and watch over it tirelessly. You weren't rushed with this ritual — and now Noa has literally provided you with all the necessary supplies. All that remains is to build a nest, as Soona and the other females taught you. Perhaps, being here, this is the only thing, that you have learned to do correctly...

And, probably, after that you will have go to the eagle's nesting place on the rocks?

In an awkward silence, Noa lays out everything he brought a short distance from your bed. Then he sits down, an arm's length away — so as not to trigger the anxiety, that's still gripping you by the scruff of the neck — and scratches Daisy behind the ear.

Meanwhile five pairs of children's eyes are looking at you fixedly, waiting for the continuation of the untold story.

"With my parents happen something very bad. And someday, later, I will definitely tell you about it..." but you're looking not at the children. It is too early for them to hear such monstrous details about the far world.

You looking at Noa. Was not was. Maybe, that's a good way to hint at how important to you were his actions?

After all, what else, expect honesty, can you thank him? He deserves to know that about you.

And you're almost ready to share it with him.

And he imperceptibly nods to you.

"But now I don't want ya'll to be sad. So I'd better tell you who else I would thank..." you take a deep breath of morning air, to satisfy returned for children curiosity. "I would thank Nature and the Lord. For being able to be here. To look at the sun, the moon and the stars. I would thank the Elders. For sharing their wisdom with ya'll and being indulgent towards me, who doesn't know, how to do anything that is customary here.

"Not true!" Paco exclaims, and the others immediately echoing him. "You already know everything, that should know... a real ape! You plane... spears and beams on par with Master of Birds!.. And mess around... with the little ones no worse than their mothers"

Immediate praise makes Noa smile at the corners of his lips and move a little closer to you, chuckling.

"By the way of the little ones. I have to go to them, while their mothers are busy. And ya'll, I have no doubt, will turn this hut into real royal chambers by the time I return" you feel your heart warm from what you've noticed. And you laugh quietly, when you see the enthusiasm of the five assistants.

Ask Noa to stay with them — while you, according to your recently habitual routine, go to look after the babies of the mothers-gatherer.

Mothers will return only in the evening, bringing berries, roots, and medicinal herbs. So during the daytime hours you — a full-fledged nanny.

And this new status, this necessity is flattering even after fusion with responsibilities.

***

Soared into the twilight sky sparks fascinate you. Official, if it may say so, part of the celebration came to an end — all the gratitude was carefully absorbed by the crimson evening. As for you, you plucked up the courage to say thank not only to the sky and the earth, but also to name all the names. Elders, impressed, remained on the logs that resembled perches. Noa, — Master of Birds, confused by your sincerity, — having listened to you, answered the same way, as he answered all the others who spoke, if don't count smile from ear to ear. True, he immediately left the field back towards the huts. And promised to return later.

Your knees were shaking, when you spoke. But, even those who hadn't had the best opinion of you before highly appreciated this step. Isn't this a success, albeit a minor one?

It gives you confidence — but not so much, that you join in the general, strange to you, fun. You look at dancing crowd through dancing fire. Movements to the accompaniment of huge drums are so outlandish, chaotic. But not grinning. As in, it would seem, human society. Dance is like fooling. Although very frivolous, but fooling. Without any vulgar subtext. Well, unless this context was desired by the dancing couples.

Yes, only couples danced. Married, heading towards marriage.

Or friendly teasing. Like Soona and Anaya, for example.

So you, sitting on a fallen log, enjoyed strung on a peeled twig mangoes, leaving the dancers aside.

Was unnecessary to put on a parade dress, only to feel uncomfortable in it now. It wasn't that much parade. Gray, washed out. Wreath still adorned you — and it was the only thing, that calmed you down in the motley mess. It was fun to watch. But you didn't want to take part in this mess. What, if you did something wrong?

"Why are you sitting here... alone?" Kantis sits down next to you. Must be, she upset, that you're not with the others.

"The scar on my leg still hurts" you lie with all your might. But don't keep quiet about the real reason. "Besides, I've never danced in my life. My clumsiness could ruin everything."

"Is that... such a problem? Let me... help you find... a cavalier, who won't be afraid of your clumsiness?" she giggles, putting her arm around your shoulder in a family-like manner. But then she falls silent. "...Or is it you're afraid of something..? Right..?"

“Yes,” squinting from the smoke from the fire, you sigh. “Not here, in the clan. Place, where I grew up, was different. In a bad way. That’s what I’m afraid of"

Smoke spreads in the gusts of wind, and you wrap yourself in the sky-blue fabric over your dress, so that you feel like a caterpillar. It takes Kantis less than a second, to hug you tighter, realizing your words. She says nothing. She rocks you from side to side, like a frightened child. She says nothing, because she understands, what you mean. That's why you're was silent as a fish.

Waving his hands and laughing, Ogun beckons Kantis — she can’t sit like this for the rest of the evening, saddened along with you — back.

And you move away from the dancers. Maybe, this will be better?

It seemed, like you were alone not in a firelit field, but in the entire forest. But that was okay. A little uneasy. But okay.

It didn't feel, like loneliness.

And would be better if it were loneliness.

Anything would be better, than appearing out of nowhere Jeru. You realized right away, he was the same as the bastards from the settlement, when he opened his filthy mouth and was supported by the embittered jackal and mutt. Over the months of living in the clan, you always managed to fight off his advances. More precisely, there were always those nearby, who could fight him off. Now you only hoped for the favor of fate, so that this bastard would stop bothering.

"I think... if we have fun with you... properly..." drawn-out, mocking phrase makes your soul run to your heels. "No one will notice... the loss"

"Go away. Right now. Or I'll call everyone, to see, how you're enjoying yourself" there's not an ounce of firmness in your voice, but there's plenty of determination.

"Are you sure, that... you... at least someone will hear? Because you're... so far from the others"

You look around in all directions. To make sure that situation is hopeless. Now Jeru is with one of his henchmen, nameless and brainless. They are accompanied by the same intention, with which lustful male hands climbed under your skirt. They reek of the same intention to have fun. One thought is spinning in your head: "Not for anything show fear!" Jeru waddles up to you. Looks you up and down. Calls you muck again. Tears the fabric off you with one greedy jerk. First he reaches for the buttons on your dress. Then he spits somewhere under your feet, shod in worn-out shoes. Four fur slimy hands grab your elbows, dragging you deeper into the thicket.

Wreath of delicate flowers falls, getting lost in the grass.

As you trying break free, you scream. Heart-wrenchingly, to the point of squealing, to the point of wheezing. Loud to the point of madness. Grip becomes crackingly strong. Slap, that Jeru gives you, blazes.

Falling, for a few moments you grow into the ground. You faint from the washed over you icy rain of horror. You decide, which blow would best suit his vile mug.

You clench your fists until dark spots appear before your eyes, waiting for the right moment — you hit furiously, not knowing, what you're doing. Hit the bastard, wherever you can end up. Continue to scream, hitting the second one. Your rage to them, is like a club to an elephant. Grunting like a pig, Jeru leans on you with his heavy body, squeezes your boobs... And one by one, tears off the buttons of your dress.

While the nameless jackal, having dropped down, raging tries to pull off your underwear.

Fire's glow is invisible behind the trees, bushes and moss. Sparks don't fly off. Smoke don't curl.

Tears roll down your cheeks involuntarily. Miserable, ugly tears.

Everything repeats itself.

Bring your legs.

You're kicking.

With his hands around your throat, ripping your dress to shreds and clawing your boobs with a ravenous greed, Jeru grabs your thighs. Everything blurs and darkens, just like that night. Even worse. It's your own fault, for being separated from the celebration. You were out of place there. But there was safe.

In the grass flashes barrel of a pistol. It wouldn't take any effort to reach it, if you won't suffocate.

Knock the jackal off yourself, bite the bloated bastard on the strangling hand — and, crawling away, reach for the pistol. Taking aim, pull the trigger...

Nothing happens. You miss, twice — the bullets grazing the ear of one and the chin of the other, whistling off into the night.

No more bullets. Damn it!.. Shaking themselves off, they pounce on you again. The gun flies off, you can't reach it again. They dig their four hands into your knees. With terrible force. Until crunch. Your kneecaps are probably broken. Only now you feel, how cold in your skin, because there is almost nothing left of your dress. You can't move from the paralyzing pain, but you continue to fight back. So that they, having changed places, don't dare to reach the same place, where tried to reach those insignificant scum. You resist, but the resistance is cut short by a beating, from which your jaws tremble. You bite through your tongue and cheeks. You choke on your own spit and blood. And you continue to scream in despair, as your bones continue to break under the brute force of Jeru and his lackey. Fangs snap in front of your face. You squeeze your eyes shut. Already preparing to accept the fate, that awaited you...

Until out of the blur of night blue looms approaching Noa's shadow. His strides are wide and uncharacteristically fast. Too fast. Noa breaks you free of his predatory grip and swings at Jeru, backhanding the nameless shakal, that has sunk teeth into your thigh. He rains down more blows on them, until they are spitting blood on their knees. Then Noa says something, that you can’t understand — in your temples pounding your own heart. You spit into the scarlet-stained grass. You feel sick to your stomach, the contents of your stomach spilling out in a liquid mess. You can hardly even hold your head up, because you want to lie down and bury yourself alive. You press your hand to the frighful wound on your thigh, but it doesn't help. Noa hits Jeru again, when he tries to continue the fight that just ended. Noa growls at him in isn't his own voice. He utters only one word: "Away." The bastards, indistinguishable from other bastards, evaporate into thin air.

You can hardly see anything through hair, which hangs down like nasty wet straw.

Not hovering, but sitting down opposite you, Noa stretches out his palms to you — stained with blood and rotten earth, again saving. You reflexively put forward one disobedient palm, with the other trying in vain to cover your nakedness — shameful, unforeseen, and almost absolute. Noa offers you to put on the bright blue scrap of fabric, that covered his shoulders during the holiday and that he threw off in anger. Half-dead from beatings and shock, you are unable to do this. The dress hangs on your waist in uneven stripes.

“Can I..?” with this unfinished question, Noa himself wraps you in the robe that just belonged to him.

"You can watch... What now a difference..." you smile without any emotion. It's unbearably painful to extract sounds from yourself. With incredible persistence, Noa avoids looking at your scratched nipples, visible under the fabric.

"If... I do this... I'll be no better than them" in Noa's words are clear both, desire and regret. He again intertwines his fingers with yours. And looks exclusively into your eyes. "But I don't want to be... like them... in your eyes. I want to... you look at me... differently. I shouldn't have... left. Everything... should have been... not that"

Your heart skips a few beats, dropping and pricking like a pin. Just a few steps away from the two of you in the flattened, low grass sparkles a handmade bracelet.

Beads on it are transparent-blue. Cut from precious stones.

This can't be, no-no-no...

These bracelets signify a proposal to become a couple.

This bracelet is thin. Braided to size of your wrist.

All you able to think about — is the overwhelming realization, that you aren’t safe here either. Yes, with Noa to you nothing straitening. Yes, under his robe you’re covered from your neck to your broken knees. But the fabric is immediately soaked with your blood, clinging to your body as you failed try to rise. You can’t stand, let alone walk. A portion of bloody vomit accumulates in your mouth. You shudder. Shrink. Road to the hut is short, but winding. And Noa has just confessed to you it something, that you could hardly even imagine. In that case, how long will Noa, whom you have only recently begun to trust, be able to maintain control? How long will he do impossible, being with you, in this state, so close?..

"No one will hurt you... again. Never. Y/N, I promise you" Noa carefully helps you up. Still trying not to look at you. Although in vain, but causing you to feel a surge of endless respect. "Let's go..?"

“Let’s go...” you can only sob and sound like a bloodless echo, allowing Noa to cover you with wide, warm palms. “I'm so much want to go home...”

Noa could have long ago undress, lay and dishonored you.

Noa could have gnaw off your virginity, and leave you in total darkness.

But Noa holds you so gently. Gently!.. Damn... Tears are eating away at your eyes, and you tossing in Noa's arms, to wipe them away. The fabric bunches up, sticks, revealing the curves and hollows of your collarbones.

You no longer mind, how many inches of your body are exposed to his excited gaze.

For some reason, for some unknown reason, he is not like all the men, who you have met before. He doesn't harass, but almost begs. He expresses sympathy, crush, which you only knew about from fairytales.

For some reason, even more mysterious, inexplicable reason, even if you had the strength to defend yourself, you wouldn't. He doesn't give you that spine-crawling anxiety, that you're used to.

If time had been kind to the two of you, Noa could have become your closest friend. You've called him friend out loud more than once in the past month.

But to become a couple...

What does Noa know about you? Does he know, why you were so hostile? Does he know, that you were subjected to attempted rape more, than twice? Does he know, that you can't always tell the difference between the stretched from the past nightmare images and the real events? Does he know, that you thought of him as a dirty animal, even while acknowledging his nobility? Does he know, that you were seriously prepared to kill him in the middle of a fragrant plain? Does he know, that your hatred of the man kind has only begun to dull thanks to... he himself?

Barefoot walking on rocks and branches is unbearable. You barely move your feet, hoping to see your lost shoes.

Stumble, you grab onto Noa as tightly, as you had, when you staggered in the saddle. Just like yours first met...

His cleared long glances still don't added up into the puzzle...

When and why did he think of you in that watercourse?..

Is even possible that union?..

"Wait..." the seconds seem like years, when you, almost falling, pick up glittering in the light of the scattering stars bracelet. You would have fallen, if Noa hadn’t held you on.

"So that... none of them... ever try to..." Noa pauses, but doesn't let go of you. His gaze is focused on the bracelet in your weakened palm. "You... can... become not my mate, but... my... woman?" he speaks so quietly and so decisively, that you are almost afraid, having misinterpreted his words. "I will not touch you... Will just... live under the same roof. I will always... protect you. I swear"

Everything happens fast. Too fast. You don't know, what to answer to the asked question.

You have never before talked so much.

This is unusual.

Harassment will continue anywhere.

Because women have become valuable commodity, important trinket, everywhere. Wherever you go. Besides, you have nowhere else to go. And you scarcely get far. A worthless cripple. That's who you are now.

Of all the things, you've had the misfortune to endure, Noa — isn't the least of your evils. Noa — is a blessing. And you don't want to hurt him by refusal. Even if agreement will lead you to an unpredictable future.

Noa looks, like ashamed of his own suggestion.

Noa looks, like he stabbed by a dagger.

"Can we... pretend? No one will dare look at you like a... thing. We can live not as... husband and wife, but... as allies..." you feel so sick, that the treetops curl into spirals. Sensing something is wrong, Noa holds you tighter.

"We can pretend, that concluding marriage. But we know, it won't be a marriage..." It feels so awkward to talk about, so that you sit back down on the ground. Halfway to your home. "I don't know, what prompted in you that thoughts, Noa. I don't know, how I can be useful to you."

“It’s... I want to be useful to you, Y/N” determination comes from Noa. He breathes on the top of your head, adjusting your hair. Your world turns upside down. “For you to stand behind my back, Y/N... I want to be... your man"

"If you become my man, what will be the condemnation of your own congeners?.. You deserve another union. Truly. We're different..." bowing your head, you sigh deeply and hopelessly. Laugh. Tremble. You look at Noa for a long. Completely different, from usual. "If we return to the clan with this intention, we will condemn each other to eternal loneliness..." what is happening seems unreal. You give him all your secret thoughts. And your wrist. "But if you intend to help me, I will help you as much, as possible. You are the only one, who I trust completely. I owe you my life. Therefore, I entrust my life to you. Whatever the consequences"

"Shall we ask the children... to weave a new crown?" turning it into humor, Noa actually giving you time to change your mind.

"As soon as king takes queen back to chambers" you answer this question with consent too, smiling. And without changing your mind.

Putting aside doubts, you present to Noa your claw scarred wrist.

Putting aside doubts, Noa places the bracelet on your wrist unacceptably carefully.

***

It's impossible to challenge taken decision.

It's too late to retreat.

All that was left of fire is a handful of ashes. All that was left of dancing crowd is a handful of those, who were not tired yet remained — and looked at Noa, who was leading you not into your, uninhabited, hut, but into his own, the leader's hut, not with suspicion, but with acceptance. Someone called the healers.

Ground tilts, heaves. Unaware of yourself from the pain, you press yourself into the wool on Noa's strong shoulders. You, falling, fading, are caught by reliable hands. Everything plunges into darkness, emptiness, oblivion.

Due to some personal reasons and lack of personal time, I'll publish the chapter a lil later... Be patient a little, my bunnies 🤞🫰🐰

And, yeah... I updated the original cover of "Creation" - to give the anticipation some imagery ~~~

🍃🌱🙊🤱🏻🌺

Yeah, somehow I'm still alive. And

due to hormonal imbalance, I received a recommendation from the doctor to review my diet and consume more animal protein 😶🍽️🍗

Well, I really felt very bad in the last few days. I don’t know yet how exactly, but I will make adjustments...

"Creation" Chapter 2. Moment that stretching out for minutes

A/N: I have terrible insomnia - but I decided to turn it to my advantage and publish now

Word count: 3,9K

Warnings: mentions of violence, blood and injuries, molestation, corpses and death, post-traumatic stress, short description of nudity, swear words and self-harm (but there mostly safe)

🎧 Jurrivh — Forever

The sun, making way through the hut, beats on your temples. It is stuffy under the blanket of skins. The nest is heated and disturbed — you were tossing and turning in your sleep as if in a battle.

Slimy dreams of encroachments on you. There is no getting rid of it. It has been going on for years, and these memories will follow you, follow your footprints and squeeze the strength out of you.

From the overwhelming despair you want to scream, to tear your voice until it is hoarse, to choke in powerless, unceasing sobs — you cannot forget your past and cannot know your future in advance. You do not know how to live in the present. Without regrets, without disappointments and without fear. Tracks of tears cut your cheeks, flow to your lips.

You can't cry! — you remind yourself of one of the damned rules.

You can't cry here, because you don't trust this place. Because you don't trust any place you'll ever find yourself. And because you don't have faith in the best, no matter what.

You wipe away the tears that are pouring down your face — and almost laugh from the relief that has come all at once. Not a single cut on your face or hands stings from the salt.

You look at yourself, look at the layers of ointment applied to your tortured skin — to understand where the excruciating pain inflicted by the tormentors has evaporated. After all, only the itching scattered across the body reminds you of it.

And the scars that heal surprisingly quickly.

On your thigh, mutilated by a knife — also healed, but festering — over the shreds of your trousers, there is a bandage. Neat and clean. Made exactly like your blood mother did, when you played and mutilated yourself. And exactly like your foster mother did, when she treated your wounds in a glass room smelling of medicine... You put your palm on the bandage and drive the memories away. You pray that the tears rolling down your chin will dry quick.  And so that these memories return in dreams, and not others.

The fabric of your pants is no longer good for anything. You tear off the legs, above the knees, without regret. The threads crack. The scraps of fabric that remain on you now resemble not clothes, but the underwear that is usually hidden under that.

But even if you leave everything as is, your soaking wet, mud-stained clothes were already underwear. Rags. The kind that men tore off screaming, beaten girls and women where you died.

Your eyes dart to the corners.

Your eyes search, where is something to hide the body parts that the men in the settlement hunted?..

And will this hunt continue here?..

After all, you are sure they are all the same.

You feel naked when the evening wind seeps into the hut and blows on your unprotected shoulders and legs. You hug yourself. Your gaze falls on the sky spread out at arm's length.

The sky-blue robe Noa left behind is first in your hands as you sit at the head of the bed — and then, the sky-blue robe is on your body, covering your bare skin and healing injuries.

Stepping onto the floor with bare feet, you smile blissfully — your legs gain strength. The mark of the knife is still purple on you, but you can straighten your back and look forward. And not shake with anxiety.

The fabric lies along the hollows of your collarbones and neck.

The heavenly surface envelops you. It feels like calm. A silent question freezes in your throat — can you trust this feeling?

The fabric is enough to hide your boobs, visible through the shirt, from the eyes of the clan males. The curves of your hips and knees are also hidden in the falling blue.

Your human nature is also hidden, albeit only partially.

Flowing and half-transparent, this robe gives you a semblance of confidence — it is similar to what covers the shoulders of Noa's mother. Her name is Dar, as you heard from the anxious questions and requests addressed to her. She is virtuous. You remember how it was she who washed you from blood and smeared you with life-giving ointment when you fell unconscious. The robe also resembles the feathers in the bracelet on Noa's forearm. He carried you in his arms.  But when the healing female chimpanzees began to undress you, fallen asleep, in order to heal your countless injuries, he immediately left — so as not to see your nakedness.

Another memory creeps under the fabric you've put on, from your waist to your neck. A man's mouth twisted into a smirk. A man's eyes greedily examining your untouched body. A man's hands folding you almost in half. Your hiked-up dress skirt. Your escape into the oppressive room of changing cloth the corpses...

When Noa said he'd seen you shirtless, you were scared. And angry. What if he'd lied? What if he'd seen much more?..

But he was honest.

After all, knowing many stories about the ferocious strength of apes, you couldn't help but admit — if only Noa wanted, he would easily see those parts of your body that you hid from all of the men. And he certainly wouldn't need to account to you for what he may saw. Or for what he may did.

But Noa didn't cling into you, didn't decide to have fun with you, a weak little echo.

Instead, Noa gave you a thing that could replace your crippled past.

And you accept this thing.

This fabric is bright. Not at all like the almost colorless shirts, trousers, skirts and dresses made of crushed materials. Left in the closet that you will never open again.

The fabric is bright, like the immaculate morning sky. Like a pond babbling with joy. Like the colors of the butterflies that once long ago circled around you...

The fabric is bright, like your childhood left behind the hills and lowlands...

A lump of sadness trembles inside you.

This sadness creates an immeasurable emptiness inside you — because of this, despite everything, you do not want to cry... This sadness creates a light inside you that doesn't dissipate and does not go out.

Nothing will return the good, cloudless, that was in your past. But no one can take away your memory. It cannot be expressed, but the unfamiliar sky-blue fabric reminds you of the most carefully preserved days lived. You accept this reminder humbly — you accept the future that has come. Even if it is foggy.

In the end, if you didn't have a chance for the future, and if the apes were so bloodthirsty — they would have finished you off while you were sleeping. Or, you would have already been tortured until you breathed your last... Or, you would have already been passed around in circles... Or, you would have been eaten alive... But you were saved by the apes and your wounds are healing thanks to them.

And you have nowhere to go from here.

You no longer hesitate because of the rain pouring down in your soul — the evening is clear, and you grab tightly onto everything that comes your way.

After spending monotonous years in confinement underground, you will be able to adapt to life in the bosom of nature.

Adjusting the fabric gathers and adjusting it on yourself so as to more reliably cover your own vulnerability, you are tormented not by doubts, but by curiosity. Does other apes wears something like this? What significance do things like that have here?

You nod to yourself, tightening the tight knot and unclenching your trembling fingers. A sky-blue stain spreads over you, from your collarbones to your calves.

You will think about the meaning of this robe later. For now — painting yourself in this color seems like the least you can do now to express your gratitude.

Although, you still tie the old, torn to shreds shirt around your hips, over the new robe.

The next step you take — to find out what your life will be like in this, as yet uninhabited, hut — seems important and necessary. And interesting. You move away from the nest, starting to examine and touch everything you can reach.

The arrangement of apes differs from the arrangement of peaceful people who lived next to your blood parents, too insignificantly. The same semblance of curtains, the same dishes. Probably, the same habits. The same bits of houses, not prisons, which you will always keep in your memory in order to live on...

Looking around, you come across a feather tickling your palm. Light brown, fluffy. Taking it carefully and twirling it between your fingers, you assume that the bird it belongs to is definitely large. This fact does not cause you any concern — for almost a day of wandering, leaving a bloody trail like a tail, you have avoided attacks from any forest dwellers. Since childhood, you believed that if you do nothing bad to the creatures of nature and respect its laws, nature will be merciful.

Thanks to this faith, you are alive, health and healing. And therefore you follow this faith.

The feather was lying not far from the exit of the hut, among other household utensils. The winged guest must have dropped it on his way home.

Or is this the bird's home — here?

The teen apes, standing apart from the general excitement, said something about birds after Noa announced his decision — but you didn't hear what exactly.

Among the things created by hand and almost indistinguishable from those you used before, your gaze stops on painstakingly hewn, sharpened blocks of wood. They are small, fit in both your folded hands — you do not understand what they are intended for and you want to take a closer look.

Footsteps are heard beyond the threshold.

As if scalded with boiling water, you twitch. And look for a place to hide. Again... It will take you a long time to get rid of this reflex.

Still holding the feather and wooden block that captured your attention in your hands, you listen. Not the same footsteps that Noa took as he left the shelter you had found, the one he had provided, into the thickening darkness — not heavy, and not shuffling from restrained righteous anger.

Cautious footsteps.

You turn around to see who's milling around outside your new home. You shake your head, not believing yourself and your own sleepy thoughts. Your new home?..

Seeing you on two legs and without heavy eyelids, Soona smiles. At least, that's what you think. It's hard to be sure, since she's still hesitating on the threshold, not going inside. Oh, damn. It's probably because of your rude, unnecessary words spoken with gestures. Noa probably warned his friends not to bother you.

Lowering your head and sighing, you gesture for Soona to come in.

“Echo is feeling... better? That’s good. Then... it’s a long day ahead” Soona’s voice is actually happy when she sees you standing and moving without pain.

“How long did I sleep?.. Children were not scared?” you say. After a long silence, these words seem difficult to say.

“They were worried... about you” Soona adds with gestures that two days have passed. You think that you should fulfill your promise. Go quickly to the little chimps and tell them a new story.

"So where you were?.." You can’t help but ask. After all, you don’t understand why Noa was next to your bed when you woke up?

"Next to you... One by one... Me. Then Anaya. Then Noa... Now again"

The thoughts in your head are confused, mixed up. This is confusion. This is a coincidence. Even after he snatched you from the jaws of death, Noa is a stranger to you. A male. From which comes a hidden threat. He killed to save you. He was ready to fight his kindred, who humiliated you in front of the crowd. Even when he walked away, without answering your silent accusations with a single bad word, he was furious. His breath reared the hanging lights, his intonation chilled you to the heels.

That's why you woke up from the nightmare, wrapped in panic and animal skins. You are grateful to Noa. But you are afraid of him. You don't know what must happen for you to utter even a word intended for him.

And you must always be on guard.

Noa's behavior is not at all like what your father's instructions warned you about. His actions are similar to those feats that were told to you in the semi-darkness by your mother's voice. Everything about him is different from the horror that you lived through. Everything about him is different from the horror that you managed to avoid. But how do you know that he will not compromise his own honor? How do you know that he will not encroach on your honor?..

"So why is there a long day ahead?" You ask, looking determined and smiling. To get out of your own thoughts, wandering into a dangerous thicket.

"There is a lot to learn... And a lot to do" Soona explains and takes your hand, leading you outside.

***

The evening spreads out over the dwellings, golden-burgundy. The sun rolls below the horizon, disappearing behind the forest, hills and rocks. This is the first sunset you have seen in endless years — just like the dawn that blessed you two days ago among the damp earth and grass.

Seeing off and greeting the heavenly light seems like a waking dream to you — although you know that for Mother Nature this is a daily hand-made labor. You want to pinch yourself when the haze of clouds changes shade in front of your amazed eyes. The sky is pink-red, covered with a crumbly sun shine...

Tears are creeping up to your eyelashes, but you blink them away and continue to peer at the painstakingly painted heavenly canvas.

A thin blue stripe is visible under the raspberry-pink clouds.

Soona, holding your hand, gently pulls your palm — you have lost track of time and have been standing there admiring the sky for several minutes.

"Is there sky always like this?.. So multi-colored?" you ask, returning from the sky to the ground.

"You will have time... to see for yourself" Soona assures you. You follow her along the monkey village, awkwardly climbing up. "And now... we need to hear the word of the Elders. Then, go... to the lake"

"The word of the Elders about me?.." you wonder, already entering another, spacious hut hung with many intricate accessories.

This is not someone's house. More like a meeting room.

And this confuses you. Hasn't everything about you already been discussed before the noisy crowd?.. You hear muffled, low voices. And you are not afraid. Even though there are a few males among the lived long lives chimps, they have the same gray hair and wrinkles as the veterans in the dungeon. And they were there, in the boiling lava Hell, a ray of hope and wisdom.

Besides, Dar is sitting in the depths of the hut. This gives you a shaky confidence that there is no reason to worry.

You bow in an attempt to repeat the bow that among the apes, as you have come to understand, expresses respect.

Right above the heads of the Elders, eagles have settled down, as if conferring with them. Their beaks are directed at your forehead when you straighten up again. Or, are their beaks directed at the fish on the flat plate?.. You look at the birds with genuine interest. After all, you have seen them, like so many other things that the world has kept from you, only on the colorless pages of books.

Colorless... The color... No, that can't be. That, too, is a coincidence. Only now do you notice - everyone sitting here is dressed in blue. Here sit the minds of the clan, wise with graces, adversities, and experience. And they are wearing the same fabrics that you are wearing. A little darker and worn differently. But the same fabrics. What does this mean?.. Why did Noa tell you to wear this?.. The knot you tied at your waist feels tight.

There are a swarm of questions in your head.

Nodding at the gesture you don't understand, Soona lets go of your hand and leaves the hut — but she doesn't leave, she stays to watch from the outside.

"Come closer, child... And sit down" the voices are still ringing out, but all sounds in your ears suddenly fade away when Dar calls you. Hesitantly, you sit down on the indicated place, next to her. "Soon you will run... like a little deer" She examines your wounds almost motherly.

"Thank you for helping me..." you whisper with your lips, folding your hands in the only expression of gratitude you know. The elders sympathize with you, but they are unhappy with your presence. "I know I have disturbed. I can leave at dawn... Just let me survive this night here, I beg"

Tear out and chew your own tongue - that's what you want to do now. After all, you swore not to be like this. Not to show weakness. But the plea escapes from your mouth against your will. After all, another night in the forest may be your last.

Praising all the gods known and unknown and whispering nonsense, you sink to the floor. Nothing helps. You are about to burst into tears.

"Not me, that's my son... helped you" Dar puts his hands on your shoulders, calming you down and helping you up. "I'm proud of him. But not everyone agrees... with his decision... Right, Vikima?.."

That elderly female chimpanzee with the cane sits in the circle. Dar addresses her as an equal — and you are ashamed that she saw your stupid, worthless behavior. But her eyes are almost blind, she does not put down the cane even while sitting. That is not why she is against you. She is against all echoes. You understand her fear — from her mournful, unseeing gaze, it is clear that this fear is not groundless.

Noa's silhouette is visible at the entrance to the hut.

Hunched over and breathing noisily, he doesn't bow — his status allows him not to do so. But he expresses respect with a complex movement of his hands, which you will hardly be able to remember and repeat. He was in a hurry.

He looks at you, at your eyelashes shaking with tears. Just like the first time you met, when tears flowed down your scratched cheeks like dew.

“Well... I won’t argue with... the new Master of the Birds. Too old...” Vikima’s voice creaks as Noa also sits down next to his mother. “Let just... your son answering... where has it ever been seen that... echoes shared their homes with apes? Has he really... forgotten... that echoes bring with them... only destruction... and death?”

“If she... had a home. If she hadn’t hidden... like a rabbit from an owl. And if she hadn’t been almost killed by four hands... of echoes like her. And if she hadn’t bled to death...” You hear the growl lingering in Noa’s ribs, not escaping from his mouth.  "I wouldn't bring her... But from this day on, she's going to live here. There's no other place for her"

The disgruntled grumbling stops, but it's like you're back in the forest. Among the thorny branches and wet leaves. Noa was watching you before the bastards threw you down on the cobblestones.

Noa couldn't help but save you. The thought sounds so strange in your head.

Before, men only wanted to beat you, fuck you and kill you — and the male chimpanzee who appeared like a shadow saved you. Not to make fun of you in the most vulgar sense — as the upside-down stories said, — but to ensure your safety... You don't know how to believe this thought.

"For her here... everything is strange" the bald old male, sitting in the distance, support Vikima. "How will an echo divide... our householding?"

You refrain from objecting only when you notice Noa's dissuading glance, invisible to anyone except you.

"The children are happy with her appearance... Isn't this a word from above?" Dar asks, looking up. At the birds and the sky covered with twilight. On this question, which does not require an answer, the advice, apparently, is over. "Let her go to them for now... Settle in... Then we will decide what work she will take up... Go, son. And you go, child"

Silently agreeing, albeit reluctantly, the Elders disperse. Their blue robes darken in the light of the flickering hanging lights.

Fidgeting in your usual place, you think about the words that sounded like an alarm. Your hair tangled under the fabric sticks to your back like snakes.

What the deaths?..

Who brought grief to this primeval place? Why do apes think of all people like this? Do they, too, like you lived all this dark time, live in captivity of delusions?.. It is not difficult for you to believe that this is so. After all, only two days ago you yourself were convinced that all the unsightly stories about apes were true. You were afraid to the point of trembling, to tears and numbness — but even wariness did not force the monkeys to drive you out into the cold of the night. Learning to trust you will not be easy, but not impossible.

"The heavens have sent... so many problems with me for you, Mom" Noa admits guiltily, as soon as the hut is empty and only Dar, he and you remain.

"As much as... happiness" The gesture with which the mother says this to her son is intuitive to you.

You sit like a ball-jointed doll — and memorize this expression that squeezes your heart.

Who knows, maybe you'll have a chance to say this phrase to someone?..

***

Weaving between huts and lean-tos with Soona, Anaya and Noa, you find yourself at the bird pens. They are securely built, tied with ropes and secured to the dry earth with sticks. You run your hand along the wooden crossbars, and the eagles greet you with a many-voiced  scream and clicking. Tiny chicks are scurrying in the distance — you don't dare disturb them, and watch from a distance.

On all fours, closest to the pen, Anaya asks Noa about something, jumping from theme to theme — like from branch to branch. You want to listen, but your attention is riveted to the majestic birds and their home.

There is almost as much space here as in your new home.

The apes don't treat their birds as heartlessly as the people in your settlement treat their starved pets.

"Does everyone in the clan have eagles?" You ask, remembering that there were exactly as many birds perched above the Elders as there were of them.

"For those who find... and raise an eagle from an egg... Like me, like Anaya... Here they are, the shells!.." Soona explains, pointing to the fluffy chicks and following your warm gaze, lost among the flapping of many wings. "Or for those who have an eagle become... a comrade."

"They can choose for themselves...?" You can't find the right word to ask the question on the tip of your tongue.

The word "owner" seems inappropriate to you. The word "friend" seems unpronounceable to you.

Another eagle flies up to the four of you, emerging from the leafy branches surrounding the enclosure. He circles around Noa, who greets him with a special sound. It sounds like a singing language. After that, Noa speaks again, and you listen more attentively.

The burgundy evening covers the sky, the wind blows on your shoulders. You don't shiver, but you sneeze. You wrap yourself in the thin fabric, like a cocoon. Soona asks if everything is okay — and after your timid nod, she continues to answer the question you asked.

"If they... lost the ones they helped before" you know what Soona means. After all, when she speaks, even Anaya stops his careless chatter.

"As happened with Noa and... Sun? That's your name, right?" you ask, taking a small step closer to the bird perched on Noa's shoulder, but not to him.

You heard Noa name the eagle, patting his back. Friendly.

You reach out and do the same. You coo at Sun, praising his plumage.

When you put two and two together, you're sure it was Noa's friend who dropped the feather on your threshold. If Sun was there, does that mean Noa was there too?  So he was worried about you — really worried about you in the way you're trying to comprehend?.. You don't risk telling Noa anything with gestures again, instead trying to silently correct your recent recklessness.

It seems to you the most free, but natural impulse. To show that you are not afraid of everything around you here. To show that in addition to the fear that has taken root in you, here you feel a small, hatching peace.

"He definitely likes echo... A good sign" Anaya laughs with all his teeth, coming closer to the wooden poles.

"He can... peck your fingers" Noa warns you quietly, turning to your face. His green eyes approach yours and you feel anxiety scratching. "Be careful"

"I'll go to the lake alone!.." you squeal when Noa's huge palm meets yours while you stroke the shiny feathers of the Sun. Just one moment that stretching out for minutes.

Too loud, too cowardly squeal.  Where Noa touched you, it's like hot coals are smoldering and scorching your skin. Soona and Anaya are confused and ignoranced.

You cover your mouth with both hands and back away.

Running into the bird pen, you freeze. Noa did nothing wrong to you. Nothing that was done to you in the place that cut your soul. He already held your hands in his, squeezed and caught you when you couldn't move on your own, when you fell and barely realized where you were... Luckily, the birds didn't fly away. They didn't even move, allowing you to remain among them.

Holding onto the sticks, you desperately want to apologize to Noa — but you bite your tongue, cheeks and lips.

Gagging and choking, you cough. Blood pours out of your mouth, probably as much as the healers washed off you.

You swore. Your mouth will not say a single word to any of the male race.

"Why are you doing this?.. How many times have you been scared, so that you are afraid... so much?" Noa asks, approaching you and trying to establish eye contact again, confused. You close your eyes until your temples hurt.

You can't cope with the fear that has attacked you. And you won't be able to tell the story you promised the cubs... They will be afraid of you this...

Splinters dig into your tightly clenched palms.

Why would he even want to know how much and how you were scared?..

"Echo is joking, right?... The forest will soon fall asleep... Dangerous" Anaya asks, trying his best to smile.

"There will be long days... many more" Soona reaches her hand through the stakes towards you, you clasp your hands together.  "Now Echo needs to... go home and..."

"Leave me alone!..." Your voice breaks and you shake your head in convulsions. "I just want to wash my old things..."

"You'll get lost if you go... alone..." Noa says more firmly, but there's no anger in his voice, but pity for you. You stubbornly dodge his gaze, and only by the grace of fate you don't bump your head into the claws of a bird's paws. "Come back before... darkness, echo"

In the settlement where you hid from waking nightmares, they would have dragged you by the ankles, spitting on your worthless objections... Noa looks at you, slumped on the ground and almost incorporeal from the incessant lamentations that you won't tell anyone about — and leaves.

As you asked. No, no, no!..

Why does Noa treat you as if you mean something in this vast world?

You blink away the panic that has overcome you. Breathe in-breathe out-breathe in. Feathers float in the air, dancing with the wind. You can even see the specks of dust. Everything that is real right now — and not crawl to you from nightmares.

Wiping your lips and shaking off the dust, you leave the bird pen. You look at the birds again, and head towards the lake along the path strewn with fragrant flowers.

The journey takes you very little time — and the evening does not even have time to turn into twilight, while you bend over the wild petals to inhale their scent. Touches of spring are felt here and there, in their purest beauty comparable only to poetry. Pulling the shirt off your hips, you begin to untie the knot of sky-blue fabric tied at your waist.

The healers may have washed you, healing your wounds — but you need to wash yourself differently after what you ran away from.

You need to wash yourself to the very core, to banish these terrible thoughts.

Taking off robe, which were left on the sandy slope, you go into the lake. You hide among the tall rustling grass and cattails up to your neck, frozen in bliss. The water lulls your cuts, bruises and sorrows. Dragonflies are circling by the water again, little unreasonable tadpoles are swimming in the water... You can hear breathing behind the trees, just a few meters away from you. It seems to you that the lake is turning into an ocean — and you are drowning in its bottomless depths.

Someone is watching you. Watching the splash of water enveloping your naked body.

Hiding behind the stones scattered near the shore, you look around — and shiver from the thickening cold and darkness.

Now, that I have my first mutual subscriber, I am so grateful💓 And I'm

"Creation" Chapter 1. A scream that almost sounded

A/N: It was difficult in a good way. No more, no less

Word count: 4,2K

Warnings: Brief descriptions of murder and death, mentions of blood and injuries, swear words, child kidnapping, hints of rape and sexual harrasment (oh Jesus...)

🎧 Senn — Lone Wanderer

The wind blows the twittering of birds across the endless plain. Its gusts are benevolent, soft - but instead of bird trills, you, having woken up, hear heart-rending cries.

The ones you heard every day for almost a twelve years.

The ones in which you yourself risked losing your voice very soon.

Still not daring to open your eyes, you involuntarily wrap your arms around Noa again - after all, you have nothing else to grab onto except him. You exhale a scream that almost sounded.

If you weren't sitting in the saddle now, you would curl up into a small, unnoticeable ball.

Like that morning.

***

It was not yet dawn when they burst into your home on a hill that was probably now trampled. A dozen men in dirty uniforms, weapons at the ready. They killed your silent mother, who loved you unconditionally - and her every gesture became a voice in your ears. They killed your fearless father, who protected you with strength and wisdom - and his every word became a silent anger flowing through your veins.

But then you were too young to see your parents die. You were too young to fight.

Running to the attic, closing your eyes and curling up in a ball in the closet, in a pile of clothes - all you could do while strangers mockingly talked to the bodies of your parents.

Just a few minutes ago they were alive... And now they were getting kicked by dirty soles.

A single sob gave them away where you were hiding. The wooden closet door shattered into splinters. You shuddered as they told you in a disgusting chorus that you had a cute face. One of them twisted your arms and you burst into tears. He covered your mouth with his cruel palm and blindfolded you, ordering you to be obedient.

Even then you wanted to bite off the rough fingers that touched you.

Tied up tightly, you shuddered as one of them, then another, scooped you up and put you down in God knows where. You knew from the sound of the wheels on the gravel and embankment that it was a cart. It was impossible to tell where they were taking you. You had lost the way to the house where the memory of all the good things that had happened to you. And that made tears roll down your cheeks again. But you cried silently, so that they wouldn't hear.

In the dungeon, the blindfold was removed from your eyes - but you saw nothing more. Only blood and the glassy eyes of your parents.

There you were given to people for training.

But these people, contrary to the laws, became attached to you. And were as kind to you as possible. Your foster mother taught you to adapt to the present and the future, whatever it might be. Your foster father taught you to use your inquisitive mind and defend yourself from encroachment.

After a few months, you were given work - you sewed and patched clothes in a cramped room.

And everything you were taught came in handy.

The times of day and seasons here, many meters underground, were indistinguishable. And only by the holidays marked on the distorted calendars nailed to the walls, you could count how old you were.

The numbers were becoming increasingly frightening. Not only you. There were many such stolen girls here.

Here, working as assistants, you had no time for chirping girlish conversations. You had no time for friendship. If you managed to talk to girls like you, it was only about the danger lurking around every corner. Older and younger than you - they were all afraid of the blood that appeared on their clothes every month.

It meant only one thing - sufficient "ripeness". That's what they called it. Then they took the girls downstairs, locked them there, tied them up and raped them. Sometimes they involved their sons in this. Sometimes the girls they abused were their daughters who had been born and grown up here. When you found out about this by accident, you were bitterly glad that you had no relatives in this decaying pit.

They glorified the human race, they wanted to revive God's plan. They shouted about it through megaphones. The screams coming from below were unbearable... You don't know a single prayer, but you know - it was blasphemy.

It was Hell, depriving you of reason and dreams.

The first time you saw the red stain spreading on your skirt, you wanted to cry. But you couldn't cry. Just as you couldn't go up to the blessed world. Just as you couldn't refuse food that looked like scabs. Just as you couldn't know too much. Just as you couldn't find a way out of the iron leper box.

Having propped up the door of the sewing closet with a wooden box, you burst into tears from helplessness in the face of your foreseeable future. You prayed that your tears would remain among the needle cases and junk. But, damn, one of them heard and swung the door open.

He didn't do anything then. He just remarked on how pretty you were when you cried. You wanted to bite off his omnipresent ears.

Months and years now dragged on like centuries. They had long ago noticed you.

They circled around you like a pack. Only drool did not drip from their beards. It was scary to work and return to the assigned room, through the hooting and darkness.

When one of them sniffed you lustfully, lifted the hem of your dress and grabbed your thigh like a meaty game - you pierced his prickly, bristly cheek with a needle. Blows rained down on you.

From now on, when you heard the approaching shuffling of boots, you hid anywhere.

Under the bed, among the hanging, matted sheets. Or in the kitchen, among the pots filled with stinking brew. Or among the things that their previous owners would no longer use... Sometimes it helped against the peals of men anger. Sometimes - no.

Then only running away was your salvation.

The dungeon was a labyrinth, and as you ran away, you remembered, studied each corridor. The flickering dim light. The turns leading to nowhere. The room, from top to bottom filled with sharp objects - suspiciously clean among everything that was happening in every corner.

They found you from everywhere. But they wouldn't look for you there. Knowing their intentions, your foster mother told you about this room. She worked there with several other women - those who God did not give their own children. Those who had a lot of time for this frightening place that smelled of caustic alcohol and poisonous solutions. Children conceived on the lower floor were born there. Wounds, burns, suppurations were treated there. And too severe beatings. Entering there without orders was strictly prohibited. You understood what would happen to her if you violated this prohibition. You avoided this room.

Until the ill-fated day that crossed out everything. That day they chose you. They told your foster parents about it. And killed them, having eloquently thanked them before that for their contribution to the development of the commune.

They, these inhuman people, took away your childhood. Growing up. Learning. Twilight, glare. Joy. They took away the last thing from you.

You had nothing to lose. Except for your damn virginity, which they decided to feast on without haste. Dumb boors. You won't give it to them.

The accumulated anger that filled you to the brim finally spilled out.

Reaching the glass room was a miracle. Opening a similar glass cabinet and taking out scissors from there - not at all like the ones you used to cut the tough fibrous fabric - was a gift. Stabbing one of them to death was too insignificant. Yes, it was he who sniffed you, letting out dirty jokes. But it was not he who squeezed your body until you had bruises, who pulled the knot of the bandage over your eyes. It was not he who killed everyone you loved.

Confused tracks in the crooked corridors, you did not even notice how a sharpened kitchen knife pierced your shoulder. You did not notice how you bit into someone else's slimy skin with a squeal. You did not notice how you spat out someone else's disgusting meat and rushed into battle with a vengeance.

Desire to get to the surface was stronger than you yourself then...

***

Inside, from the throat to the stomach, it’s as if small bones are scattered, scraps of food scraping the insides - it’s so painful... You simply fell asleep from the shallow but numerous wounds eating you alive - but it’s as if you’ve returned back to the dungeon. Into the darkness.

From the tormenting memories, you almost fall off the slowly walking horse. Your stomach is twisted with a frightened spasm, horror crawls up your spine. Noa palm catches your slipped fingers at the very moment when you remember that now you will not return to the dungeon.

You convince yourself that this will never happen again, and now the past can find a loophole to you only in restless dreams - and you don’t trust your own convictions.

The horses walk slower. So, the clan, scraps of conversations about which you heard, is already nearby. Many dragonflies with bright wings flutter near the lake spilling in the shadow.  Before, you had only seen them in a colourless, time-worn children's book - you had looked at the pictures so often that the pages had turned to dust under your curious touch. Now these strange insects are so close, and you are enchanted by their shimmering dance.

The apes are talking about you again. Worried about you. They don't say a single bad word about you. You try to read between the lines - but there is no hidden meaning in their actions. And you don't know what to think.

"What will the elders say? If they... refuse?" listening to Anaya's words, you understand that this is indeed an important question.

"But who else can... help this echo? And if so... What will we do?" Soona answers him, looking at you with compassion.

"Even if they refuse her to live... among us... she needs to be cured. She needs food. Clothes. Weapon" Noa's voice is quiet, but determined. You do not understand his actions at all. "To avoid being caught by them. To survive here"

An echo glides across the crystal water of the lake.

You, now an echo too, have many questions in your head. And they torture.

There must be more people nearby. Lost and wandering in the pouring rain, you came across huts and asked for help. You knocked on boarded-up windows, peered into the huts inside. You screamed at the top of your voice, you begged. No one helped. But these people are not your family. You are a stranger on this earth, so why would these people should let you in?..

Are all people like this?.. And why then did you so tirelessly cherish the hope of someday meeting people better than those who keep prisoners locked up by force and public humiliation?

What would have happened to your body and soul if you hadn't managed to escape? If they had caught you, knocked out your teeth, dragged you downstairs and tied you up? Or if death at their hands, soaked in the blood of so many innocents, had overtaken you in the ravine?.. They wouldn't have been averse to having fun with you anyway. You know that about them, too. You don't need the answers to these questions anymore.

After all, neither your lost tracks, nor the drops of yesterday's rain, nor the blood that flowed down the stones mean anything anymore. The earth has absorbed everything.

These two of them who took both your families set out to chase you. The realization that Noa killed them gives birth to gratitude in your soul. Now the impossibility of revenge will not gnaw you from the inside.

But what has now been decided by the forces of nature,

who have left you alive?

What will happen where you are destined to end up? Surely, grins and reproaches? Primal hatred directed at you? Mistrust, contempt? What use could you possibly be to the apes? Do they treat people as human stories say? .. What if this salvation is just a deception, akin to human lies? Besides, now you, almost mute, dirty and frightened, resemble an animal much more than they do. So why shouldn't they eat you, their easy-to-catch prey? Or stuff you? ..

Or why shouldn't they have fun with you?.. Carnivorously. Carnally.

Just as the guards of the dungeon from which you escaped straight into the monkey's paws would have been amused.

And now, no matter how hard you clench your hands into fists, you will not be able to break free.

You are shaking as if the wind has become winter.

Noa's calloused fingers place your twitching hand almost at his heart, just a little higher and to the right. Broad shoulders rise from your coldered breath.

All this, his words and movements, seems like... a desire to protect you? But you are a human. People and apes have been feuding for so long that no one can answer how the feud began. But it is ineradicable. So why does he need you not to get hurt or trampled?

Be that as it may, you do not trust anyone or anything.

The fur on Noa's back - where you press your scratched cheek again - is wet. Probably because your temperature has risen. You don't know why he helped you. You are afraid of him no less than the men in the hopeless settlement. You look at him with gratitude, with a doubt tearing your throat... You want to believe him. Because there is no one else to trust in the world that you are getting to know anew. But you will not ask him questions that soak you with fear and foreboding. Just as you will not be able to tell him words of gratitude.

You are hot. And you are overcome by an unbearable thirst again.

The lake, reflecting the sun's rays, is left behind, replaced by a meadow, deciduous trees and fruit-bearing bushes. The berries that you tasted only in your too-short-lived childhood smell sweet. Has their taste changed as much as you have changed over the past years?

Bees scurry around, and their buzzing calms your restless thoughts.

Somewhere in the distance, where Noa directs a long glance, the wings of iron birds are visible.

They are planes, it seems. Old, rusty, forgotten. You have seen them only once. Blueprints on worn, yellowed paper. Then they were like fiction — alien, huge structures that could touch the clouds. And now these piles of metal, embraced by ivy, are like an extension of the forest. Noa looks at them as if they might one day fly again.

How long have they been chained to these ruins? Have they flown over other distant lands?

What would it be like to soar into the sky?..

You are shaking. Everything you see - trees, grass, and the sun hanging somewhere impossibly high - floats and spins. Your mouth feels like it is full of hot sand.

The glitter of dew. You think it looks like gemstones.

You're swaying from side to side, and you're clutching the fur on Noa's shoulder with cottony fingers. It's not helping at all.

Noa huffs as he realizes you might fall again. He squeezes your fingers tighter, now on the very spot where you can feel the unwavering thump. Warm blood still seeping from your hand is spreading across his chest.

If you could think of anything other than the dew scattered beneath your feet, you'd try to figure out — was it any different from a human's, beating in ape's heart?..

Consciousness is slowly returning to you. The unknown world, stretching for many miles, stops spinning.

Through the sweat running down your forehead and the tangled hair stuck to your face, you peer at each thread of the huge canvas above the horizon. With delight, trepidation and awe.

And with unspoken fear. With your last breath, you are still thinking - where to go if the apes rightly decide that you have no place among them? And how to escape if the apes decide to deal with you?.. But nothing betrays the apes's bloodthirstiness that you have heard so much and so often about.

You are just a stone's throw away from buildings you have never seen before.

Gusts of wind blow around you, embracing you. Morning flows into day, the forest flows into a built-up village humming with routine.

The beaten path along which the apes take you leads to surprisingly well-equipped dwellings, towering above the earth heated by midday. And these dwellings are not at all like the walls, floors and bars from which you emerged. There are no cages and tools designed to force submission, and there is no torture chamber.

Families live here. And these families are not molded from circumstances, as if from clay. These families — are blood families. Kinship among those who talk and those who are silent, imperceptible to the eye. It feels different.

Here the industry is seething, here and there the noise is heard. Here is unity and freedom.

Houses on the surface, life on the surface, among the clean air and the many-faced sky seems incredible...

A smile touches the corners of your lips. Your palm reaches out to outline the place in front of your eyes - but then falls back, squeezing the wool on Noa's elbow in the approaching fever.

"Echo needs help getting down... to the ground" Noa assures, freeing his long arm from your weak grip and dismounting.

His hands reach for your waist to help, and you squeal in protest and dodge.

"Is something... wrong?" Soona, who is walking ahead, turns around worriedly.

"I can do it myself" you say hesitantly in response, stroking the horse's mane.  "I don't need his help"

When your body was overwhelmed by the pain that clouded your consciousness, Noa had already done so, helping you to mount. And you, unconscious, held on to him for many hours on the road. Feeling him so close was not scary. It was necessary. Like grasping at a straw. But after a terrible dream, you don't want him to touch you... No, not now.

Stepping onto the ground from the back of a snorting horse seems easy to you. But without the slightest idea of ​​​​how to do it, you fail.

Anaya hides in one of the dwellings when Noa gives him a sign that seems vaguely familiar to you. Soona remains nearby, ready to help you - but she is unlikely to be strong enough to cope with this.

The sign language of the apes differs from the one you are used to only slightly, and with the help of this language you repeat that you will manage without help.

Without support, you risk flying like a tiny leaf from a branch. You grab the reins and the horse's mane in vain attempts to get out of the saddle. The horse kicks. The cape you're sitting on slips - and you, trying so hard, almost fall backwards.

Stuck in the stirrup, you don't even have time to squeak - Noa catches you, when you almost hitting the ground with your shoulder blades. He holds you almost the same way as when you were exhausted in his palms, in the middle of the plain.

"I told you. You need help" A disgruntled growl escapes from his chest.

Only now, as Noa releases you, your bare, punctured feet finally meeting the ground, you can understand what in the stories about the apes were right.

Is it how different they are in their wild nature. And their size.

Even Soona is taller than you by several inches. Not to mention Noa, towering over you like a mountain range. The wind picks up the many voices and the rattling of abandoned work. The apes emerge from their homes and stop working. Their humming and whispering makes you uncomfortable. The wounds immediately remind you of themselves with a dull ache. You look through the crowd at the neatly laid roofs, bathed in rays of sunlight.

Noa lets out a wheeze and hides you behind his broad shoulders. He asks you to walk beside him and be quiet. You follow him without complaint, and because of his furry back you can hardly see anything - except for the feathers in the braided bracelet on his forearm, shimmering in shades of blue.

Step by step, you make out the expressions on the apes's faces. Some of them are confused, some do not hide their irritation. You see a lot, but you do not see malice. Only this calms you down when you stop at a spacious structure and dozens of monkeys look at you with an unspoken question and a respectful bow, directed straight at Noa.

Now you understand that he must be the leader of this clan.

And his action is not presumptuously, but magnanimous.

An approaching hostile sounds.  Noa assumes an obviously protective pose, and you press yourself into the fur on his shoulder again. This time consciously. After all, it seems that you were wrong not to see the malice.

"What is this? Another echo?.." the voice of a stocky male chimpanzee is heard, drawing level with Noa and casting an appraising glance at you. There is something unkind in it. "Did the animals batter her? Or did someone... play with the curiosity?"

"Let her go back... to the pasture"  the female picks up his intonation, letting out a nasty laugh. She looks like a hanger-on, not a companion.

"True" another male grins, clearly younger and trying to assert himself in this way. "There... is her place!"

They hardly guess, reveling in their slander, but for you, everything they spew — pointless. You were never part of the whole. You shattered into pieces, long ago. You became a fragment with broken edges.

That's why there is no place for you anywhere.

A shirt, sticky with rain, blood and weeds, torn at the seams - your only refuge.

"...She swallowed her tongue?" you hear, insulting and goading, somewhere in the distance.

Soona, standing next to you, gasps at the insolence of her fellows. They laugh at your helplessness, continuing to curse. You regret that you cannot lash them with curses now.

Listening to their rumble, Noa straightens his back. You are almost invisible behind him.

"This echo is wounded. By other echoes. They wanted to... play. They lose" After Noa's short and clear words, bewilderment is visible in the apes's eyes. Baring his fangs, he finishes. "And she will not return... to the pasture. She will graze here"

The phrase is sharp. Noa stands his ground, his nostrils flaring menacingly. This, of course, silences the ill-wishers. But you feel the sediment prickling.

What if they'll treat you like a thing here too?..

You can hardly breathe. The lead of a frightening assumption presses on your collarbones. You take a step back from Noa, upset and ready to break from the despair that has washed over you. It takes even more effort not to recoil from Noa when he turns and leans towards you. He had to say this to stop the vile discussion.

His green eyes apologize to you for what he said.

Something in his piercing gaze tells you to trust. It speaks louder than his answer to the clan, who doesn't stops talking and doesn't notice.

Five baby-chimps run up to you, distracted from their game of tag.

The first thing you do — is sit down so that you are the same height as the children who are asking you questions. They reach out to you, and the pain that has been increasing with each passing second becomes unimportant. Soona follows your lead, her actions clearly supportive. The growing rebellious tension disappears, as does the hubbub that has surrounded you from all sides.

Seeing that you are kind to the clan's most valuable treasure, the apes stop arguing and return to their work. Only the adults who are looking after the little ones do not leave.

Even now, laughing, Noa is still ready to rush into battle.

The children are impressed, but they don't understand what is happening - and you are undoubtedly happy of their attack. It seems like a serene meadow in the chaos that is playing with your fate.

"Are you hurt?" a very small boy babbles, tilting his head to the side. You nod.

"What happened to you?" a girl who looks like this little one like two peas in a pod timidly puts her hand on your wounded shoulder.

"This echo fought... With opponents and the forest" Soona tells the curious cubs.

"Did you get a scar in battle?" an older boy looks at you with surprise.

"This battle could have been my last..." you begin your story like an instructive fairytale. "But the journey was worth it"

"So who hurt you?" seeing the sparkle of tears in your eyes, the liveliest boy asks, putting his hands on his hips importantly. "Do you want me to protect you?"

"You already have a protector, right?" a smart, dark-eyed girl looks at you and Noa with mischief.

Not expecting this, Noa freezes. He looks at you, captured by the curious crowd. He still shields you with his back and his presence. He smiles indulgently - which you can't help but notice. He is confused. But you are not taken surprise by spontaneity, but are warmed.

"Yes, and he is very brave" you agree with the girl, expressing gratitude to Noa at least in this way.

"So who did the Master of Birds save you from?" everyone is curious in one ringing voice.

When Noa sits down next to you, his weight almost touching yours for the umpteenth time in the day that has just begun, you don't move away.

"From evil, cunning... predators" playing along with the fictional plot, Noa ruffles the children's heads.

Staying with you and naive chatter, Noa still helps you tell the fascinating truth. Having plopped down nearby and forcing Soona to snort good-naturedly, Anaya returns to the company.

While you are enthusiastically answering the children's questions, you do not immediately notice female chimpanzee in venerable years approaching you. Only when Noa raises her head, still sitting on the ground, do you see that everyone is moving aside. Her robe, like the feathers indicating Noa's dominant status, is a deep blue.

"Time goes by... And you, my son, remain the same" hearing both reproach and pride in her words, you cannot help but look down.

Who else but parents could say that?..

Noa rises with a gesture that you will not confuse with anything - this is how you asked your blood mother for advice.

The children say polite greetings, holding on to you like tenacious little crabs. You don't know what to say - and cannot make a single sound.

"Nobility is sometimes worse than vices" sadness sounds in the voice of another, an elderly female chimpanzee with a wooden cane. "With her, to our homes comes... troubles. Again."

"...Is she hiding something?.." the young female asks impatiently, taking her two cubs away from you. The male calms her down in a way that husbands never calmed wives in a settlement unfamiliar to you.

The unknown frightens them as much as it frightens you. It hovers in the dying wind and the sparks from the fire crackling in the distance.

Squinting from the sun and your exhausted appearance, Noa's mother sighs.

"This soul is innocent" she looks at, it seems, every scar and every aspiration. "Come here, child... Your path has been... thorny. You need to rest"

"Thanks..." you whisper from the bottom of your heart, when her palm touches your burning forehead.

Taking Noa's outstretched hand, you rise. Your hideously cut thigh, under the equally cut leg of your trousers, pierces with pain. You whining through cracked lips. The children don't want to let you go, but you promise that very soon you will tell them an even more fascinating story.

The smell of smoking fish tickles your nose. Everything tilts and fades...

***

You dream of water dripping from holes in the basement pipes - rusty, almost red. Streams flow down the cobblestones from grinning skulls.

Their eye sockets are empty. Worms have settled in their decaying bodies, laying larvae. Their hands reach out to you. They strangle you, they tear your dress. Their toothless mouths shower you with stench and obscenities...

***

Waking up in the hut, you scream. Indistinguishable from the animal cries that echo in the twilight. Your eyes are filled with unshed tears. Dreams have been cruel to you for as long as you can remember. The dreams of future nights, you are sure, will be merciless.

And there is no way to escape this.

The bed you slept in resembles a perch. Someone is scurrying around at the head of the bed.

The woven nest creaks as you jump up, drawing your knees up to your cheeks. You are not wearing a shirt - only a T-shirt, trousers, and a viscous ointment applied to your exhausted body. And animal skins, serving as a blanket.

Turning around at the noise, you see Noa with two bowls in his palms. He places them closer to you, and you pull the blanket up to your neck. The contents of the bowls smell pleasant. In one of them the same ointment that burns and heals your injuries. In the other a lake fish, large and ruddy. Your stomach rumbles. You forgot about hunger - and now hunger is devouring you.

When Noa's large palm reaches for the blanket, you crawl away to the edge of the nest in panic.

"When they were treating your wounds, I saw you without... this" Noa admits, taking out your shirt among other things. "It will hurt, inside... Take that"

Pointing to the thin sky-blue robe, Noa explains with a gesture that it will be safer this way. Then he insistently brings the bowl with the fish to your closed lips.

You coudn't refuse food. You learned this rule over the years of life on a leash - a hearty meal was a reward for following commands and orders, and starvation was a punishment for disobedience.

You was only punished. So you use what you learned from your foster mother.

The fish in the bowl dissolves into a scent in a matter of moments. And only now do you respond with gestures that it would be safer if Noa left your assigned dwelling the same way he came. You don't believe in the security provided. You admit that you're scared. And you ask if Noa has taken you in as a curiosity pet?..

If you said it out loud, you would cover your mouth with both hands in shame.

Noa slouches and turns to go outside. His steps are sharp. The wheezing in his heaving chest is low and abrupt. You look at his back, expecting anger and insults. He stops, looking at you and the untouched robe.

"To heal, an echo needs sleep... A lot" is all Noa says before leaving the hut.

You scold yourself. You admire the fabric of the robe flowing between your fingertips in the dim light.

The sparkling hanging lights lull you to sleep. All you want to do — lay down, as like fetuses laying in wombs, and forget about all the nightmares you've experienced in reality or in broken dreams. But you, without closing your eyes, stare at the glow.

Insomnia was tormenting me especially mercilessly — and I decided to retake the MBTI test. I felt an overbalance of introversion, if I may say so...

And so it turned out (two Milenas are cramped in one😝)