Ten
I have made a fortuitous discovery! The last remaining fruit from the offering I was given, the large and hard and hairy one with the internal shifting weight, is filled with water! Well, not pure water. More a sort of pinkish fluid. Definitely safe to drink, with a slightly syrupy taste. Satisfying. Almost the sort of drink that might be served at a child’s birthday party. I must find more of these fruit, as my supply of potability tablets is beginning to dwindle.
My supply of food squares is also close to its end, though with my relative success at locating renewable food sources this is not such a huge issue. It may be a bit too early to call, but long-term survival may just be in the cards for me. We’ll see.
My next goal was of course the responsible cultivation of fire using the contraption I created, and I spent the better part of a morning gathering materials and constructing a campfire.
I started with a ring of large stones set up some feet from my camp, and partially shielded from the wind by the broken monolith. Within that, a base of dried tree fronds picked from the forest floor, and then a cone of assorted twigs and branches.
The fluffy grass tufts left behind from my cord-making process had gone damp, so I had to go on an excursion to deprive yet more of the plants of their plumage. That’s when I noticed something interesting.
Several sets of tiny cloven hoof prints trailing across the beach. I bent down and grazed them with the calloused tips of my fingers.
Curious. They seemed exact match to the feet of the unfortunate carcass that had been gifted to me, which was now in pieces back at my camp.
My handful of tinder quickly sparked alight against the friction of my bowdrill, although not without some damage to my fireboard. I picked up the bundle and blew on it, coaxing the young embers until they flared into vibrant orange life.
I dropped the bundle onto the fire just as it began to burn the skin of my fingertips. The finer twigs and branches caught first, and then the rest of it.
Fire! I had made fire!
I let out a ragged primal hoot and jumped to my feet, punching the air in a sort of ecstatic dance. My clothes were scraps and my body was thin and gristled, but I was muscled in ways I never had been before and the movement felt electric. I can only imagine that this is what it felt like to be one of the very earliest people.
The light of the fire danced against the monolith that shielded it, illuminating every inclusion as if it held a myriad of flickering spirits.
I cooked up the last pieces of the mammal I had been given. The heat softened the meat’s grain so much that it almost seemed to melt in the mouth. The kiss of flame made even the most unsavoury (and by now, slightly rotten) internal organs edible.