5 Chapter 2: Birth, life among the people and the hunt.

…

So this is what being born feels like? I think while feeling warmth as I float in my mother's womb. Despite it being pitch black, I feel that I'm in a sanctuary, where no harm can reach- OW, OW, OW, OW! MY HEAD!!

Forget what I said earlier. That safe haven was a lie! Once you're ejected out, you can only feel pressure building on your head as it is being squeezed out of the mother's womb. Why is it painful? Well, a homo erectus' brain is 900CC, so it is painful for both the mother and the child. Does that answer your question?

Now gone is the warmth, and hello cruel and cold world.

I then get lifted by my tired mother and hugged close to her chest to breastfeed. Do I really have to? I mean I have to get used to it, at least until my teeth grow. And shouldn't she clean me first?

I reluctantly start suckling on her right nipple. Actually this isn't so bad. Her milk is warm and not too bad. The only problem is the hair, though it's not that much of a problem considering it keeps me warm and protects me from the elements in place of clothing and fire. Not by much though, since it is still a little chilly.

It's still enough to take a nap, right?... Stupid infants lack of energy… I can bare…ly… stay awak…ZZZ….

So starts my life among the Homo erectus.

...

It's been 3 to 4 years, I think. There's no way to tell time other than the fact that apes stop clinging to their mother's between 3 and 4 years. Though can I really consider this species a type of ape? Can it even be called a part of the Homo family tree? considering they or should I say we, are not humans? We have horns, tails, and blue skin. What part of that is even human? And how can we even walk straight with a human gait? When I move my arms, the range of movement is the same as a human, considering what I've seen and that our shoulder placement is the same. So what are we?

Though we have horns and tails, there are many differences between us and any mythical races that I know of. The closest races that I know of that have any similarities to us are 5. 3 from our world and 2 from the Terrans. The Eljikan from Kusar, who may look like us, but have red skin and are said to be born from fire. The Ninates from ancient Norian myths, water spirits who had fair blue skin and slender tails. They're known to either escort sailors from danger or drag them to a watery death o a whim. The Zemer from the desert kingdom of Samar, who prey on travelers during a sandstorm by taking the form of loved ones and lead them astray from caravans. Then you have the Terran djinns and demons. But we're neither great spirits with immense power nor evil creatures who are sworn to bring the downfall of mankind. Is there even a mankind in this world?

So consider if there are and we take the term demon as our race's name. What should we be scientifically called at this point? Daemonium Erectus?

Hm? Why do I keep using latin and how do I know English which is a Terran language? Well, didn't you know? The Ship already had everything necessary installed before the final phase where it was accidently transferred to our world.

Yeah, I know. If this was a novel, the ship would be the very definition of plot armor, but think about it this way, say you have a crew who managed to crash land on a habitable planet, wouldn't you want them to have a chance of survival? So you'd install a survival guide. Say they'd need metals to create necessary tools and they don't have any of them in the cargo, you give them a guide on minerals and instructions on how to use the onboard fabricator. Say they discover signs of intelligent life and manage to find tools belonging to an unknown native civilization, You'd give them hover drones to scan the area and a guide on history to identify the current technological level before even trying to make contact. Maybe the natives live in the stone age and they might belong to a cannibal tribe? Yeah, they found life on the last planet they colonized, just that it wasn't intelligent, but that doesn't mean the same for all habitable planets. Anyways, what I mean to say is, it is mandatory for a ship to have a dictionary, language books, medical guides and survival guides installed on it under any circumstances. How do you think we could even decipher that much knowledge without deciphering everything? By learning a core Terran language and teaching it as a secondary language in schools. Why recreate everything from scratch, when you can assimilate it? They already organized all forms of data and created a better measurement system, so why not use them first, then adapt them to our culture?

While the reason I mainly use English is due to the fact that most used programming languages are in English and I'm already used to QWERTZY keyboards. That and I prefer it over my native tongue, where unlike English which uses prepositions, it uses propositions. That's not even the problem, the problem is our writing system where the differentiation between sounds is decided by dots, dashes and circles either on the top or bottom of the letter or a combination of two of them, and the fact that a word could have multiple meanings. How do you use that in programming!? I'll just stick to the Terran alphabet and to one of their languages thank you.

So what should we call our race? Though I do like English, as a former Median, I would really like to call them a Median name. Hol kel Tagan, which means "People of the horns". Though if I want an accurate description it would be Hol Ruka kel Tagan Sal or "Bluish People of the straight horns", which I'm sure won't really translate well in other languages, is too long and just isn't cool. If you want a small lesson on the Median language. Hol means 'horn', ruka is 'blue', kel can mean either 'of' or 'and' and Tagan means 'People'.

"Owa! (Come!)", Oh, it seems my mother is calling. So I go towards her for her to carry me. Today we're migrating again, but this time, we're going south east.

Azan and me really seem to have underestimated their intelligence. They actually do have a language, just that their vocal apparatus isn't well developed, which makes it seem like just mere grunts, and they didn't have enough time to improve upon it. It's extremely simple and consists mostly of simple commands, warnings and very few nouns. And in just a short period, they managed to learn to create tools according to the Acheulean industry. They range from choppers and scrappers to hand axes. The one who made the most progress was the one who I influenced, by discovering the methods to make better stone tools, he gained a higher position in the eyes of the community. They respect him not out of strength, but out of his contribution, which means they have a more advanced social structure than we thought.

We've waited for everyone to gather before we leave this place. The guy that I helped seemed to be the last to come, since he was working on making additional hand axes on his stone anvil. When he came, we left the cave and started our trip migrating south.

…

It's been one month since we departed and now we're split into small groups to hunt and ours is waiting in the tall grass, my mother kept me by her side as she waits, gazing at the unsuspecting prey as they graze in the fields while keeping an eye out for any predators.

It was a small group of 10 large rodent-like creatures with red striped fur that had a single curved horn in the middle of the forehead, small round ears and a long flat tail. They don't have a name in the Hol ke Tagan's primitive language, but for the moment let's call them rodites. There're about 6 adult rodites with the biggest one being twice the size of a man. Despite their size and how they look, they're pretty cowardly and would run away at the first sign of danger, so the plan is for 2 groups which includes ours to surprise them and lure them into an ambush.The biggest surprise from the-I'm tired of saying the entire thing so let's say Tagans. The biggest shock for me from the Tagans was that they knew how to make strategies and use tactics during hunting and combat, also their groups are mostly cooperative and help each other to improve mutual chances of survival, and when there aren't enough resources for everyone they settle matters in endemic wars, which means as long as the injuries during said wars aren't severe, almost no one dies. But not all Tagan groups are friendly as there are a few cannibalistic ones that tried to attack us from time to time, but with a 35 strong group and the mode 2 tools they were easily repelled, if not annihilated.

Anyways, we waited for the first group to lure them here first before we redirect the rodites into the ambush. The adults' eyes are kept on the target, their breath slow and steady, and in their hands are hand axes and spears of sharpened wood ready to be thrown and pierce the prey before us scattering them in fear towards their doom. Then it came! The first group roared and launched their attack, their weapons managing to pierces 4 of the rodites drawing first blood, causing 3 of them to shriek in pain as the last one has fallen due to a lucky blow.

They ran, they ran with fear in their red beady eyes, trying to avoid certain doom, then again a roar! This one is from our side as the adults among them my mother, threw their weapons and 3 of them struck true, 2 spears piercing the legs of 2 rodites, while the last one went into shock from the pain after a hand axe pierced its eye all the way to the brain, then it died.

5 of the remaining battered, bruised and bleeding rodites fell into the trap and ran to their imminent demise, while the last one had enough! For it was a mother and one of the pierced rodites was its child. Its motherly instincts overcame its fear, as it charged straight at us, brandishing its horn and swung it like a blade. It slashed the hand of an unarmed hunter, then it pierced another in the chest. In return two spears pierced its hide and it released a furious shriek. One hunter tried to charge at it with a hand axe. A foolish move, as its long flat tail slammed his head and causing him to hit on a jagged rock spelling his end, then it charged straight at us, freezing my blood in my veins and causing my heart to pump faster as I stare at the maddened beast charging our way. A spear struck its thigh, but it did not slow, a hand axe struck its head leaving a bleeding scar above its left eye, but it did not slow down, then as it was close, my mother put me down and grabbed a spear to pierce the prey trying to harm her child, and as the rodite closed the distance, a hand axe sharper than any other struck its horn, cracking it in the process! It was the first tool maker who I guided before reincarnation, but that did not stop beast, but it did slow it down, and that moment spelled its doom as my mother's spear pierced its eye and plunged into its brain! And the beast yelled a cry of pain as it fell, then it turned to sorrow as it saw its child be slain before it succumbed to its wounds and joining him in the sweet embrace of death.

And thus ends the hunt as we saw the other groups coming our way. It was not out of hate, it was not out of spite, but it was the cycle known as the predator and the prey, the hunter and the hunted, the eater and the eaten.

...

After the hunt, 3 adults were lost, 4 adults were slightly injured and one child was moderately injured as he was slammed by a juvenile rodite's tail. They didn't have any form of natural medication or healing magic which is not surprising considering their level of technology, so for them it all depends on time and luck.

Some of us, including my mother, start searching for any hand axes or spears that are still intact while the others either start scraping the flesh off the meat for everyone to eat or start searching for tumors, except 2 who try to find a stream or river to drink some water and a cave or someplace safe to sleep in for tonight.

In the end they couldn't find a cave, but they did find a stream and a bunch of trees tall and sturdy enough to support everyone. Then we got together and ate our delicious pieces of bloody meat that's been scraped by a dirty rock and enjoyed a delicious drink of warm blood right from the source, and my mom shared with me the grand prize! The brain!

...

Yeah, you might get used to seeing the blood and gore, but you never get used to the horrible, horrible food. At least I stopped crying from seeing the stomach opened and the entrails getting eaten raw 3 months ago…

And another great part of this life is what comes after the food. The playing with other kids? No, so is it the part where the parents teach the child how to make tools? Again, no… It's the part never mentioned in any documentary. The part where the mother cleans her baby's ass with her hand without washing it later and may even finger it to remove any shit that got stuck inside… I've been defiled and I'll never be clean…

Anyways, let's forget about the bad stuff and focus on the less bad stuff, which might miraculously be good stuff.

Which is that we've almost reached our destination, and now I'm being taught with a bunch of other kids how to make tools by the toolmaker, yeah if you noticed during the hunt, I've started calling him toolmaker, it's better than calling him the guy I've influenced into making mode 2 tools. I already know these techniques and I'll slowly improve them, since they're still only using stones to knack the cores, I'll try showing him how to make better tools by using wood and bones in the process. In what way do they help? Well, they give more control for the user in trying to shape his tools.

I start by hitting a suitable stone core with a hammerstone, which causes the toolmaker to nod, and after hitting it enough times, the flakes broke off. I then start working on a suitably large flake's edges which get me another nod with a slight smile, but I then grabbed a bone which I got from a rodite and used it to further shaped the tool. That first surprised the toolmaker and I'm pretty sure he thought I either got bored or somehow messed up, but considering that he's quite the bright individual, he easily understood the reason for this. It gave us more control on how to shape the tools… Well, that's what I thought at first before he tried doing the opposite, breaking a bone with rocks, and congratulations, you've shattered a good bone and paved the way for bone meal. He got it right eventually.

After the lesson, we tried to help the adults by grabbing our self-made tubers, which are tools made to help in digging up plants and our hand axes, before we started searching in the nearby vicinity for any edible plants that can either be picked, cut easily or dug up. We searched around the area for quite some time and we did manage find some things that were confirmed by the adults to be edible.

After that tiresome activity. I tried to go to my mother, but a bunch of the kids started playing and one of the boys shoved me as a joke in the process, causing me to fall on my face into a pile of mud and he started laughing. He was until he got mud ball in the face. Which is what started the great mud war, which will be remembered across generations after generations of men. Or not.

"Owa!(come)", calls my mother, allowing me to take a break from playing around with the other kids. She then hugs me and lifts me on her back, then she starts climbing one of the trees for safety from the predators of the night.

I stare at the stars in the sky, and start thinking if it is the right time to introduce fire, would they even be able to control it? History disagrees on whether man controlled fire a million years ago or if it was an accident and he truly managed to tame the flames hundreds of thousands of year ago. Despite the life changing effects of fire which would only benefit the Tagan, they might burn the entire area that they'd inhabit if they're not careful, so is it still early? And also to spread my influence, I should make them believe in my existence, so should I introduce art by carving an image of myself? How come I exist and they're my race if they're not even aware of me? It was kind of hard with a simple language, but I found out that they don't believe in any spirits, gods, or anything yet. They don't even believe in ancestral spirits. Once I get back, I'll ask Azan about this.

With these thoughts, I fell asleep.

And so ends an eventful day of my life among them and tomorrow will come another.