Three Days of Stone

Day Two

Yesterday's hunt was a success. I had collected plenty of meat from the mammoth to last seven sunrises or so. But man could not survive on mammoth alone. I needed to gather plant based foods to supplement the rich meat.

With it being late Winter, food like this was scarce. But I had been on my own for a long time. I knew exactly what to do.

The trees surrounding my cave may have been bare, but hiding under the frosted earth were the edible roots of several plants. Grabbing my small stone axe from my belt, I hacked sections of ice from the ground. Eventually, I heard a scrape as the stone hit the top soil. Continuing to scrape off the hardened top layer of dirt, my fingers ached as the raw stone caused a friction burn on my callused skin.

The strong smell of long hidden earth whacked my nostrils as I turned over the soil. White roots were encased in the dirt. I pulled out several and stored them in a leather pouch stitched onto my belt, insulated by goat hair.

Suddenly, I heard a crack coming from the trees to my right. Pivoting on my heel, I simultaneously grabbed my spear, ready to defend myself. Peering through the icicled branches, I could not believe what I saw.

About twelve feet away from me was a small group of what my family called the 'ape men'. My mother had explained that they were actually humans too, like us, but an earlier type. We evolved from them, or something, and due to our more complex brains we managed to outcompete them for every resource. They told me it was rare to see ape men in these parts now. I went my whole life without seeing even one until this very moment.

One of the ape men was male, I noticed. It was hard to see details from the distance between us, but I noticed his face was laden with unkempt dark hair. I at least attempted to neaten mine with a comb made from some sort of animal bone which my father gave me not long before his death. The other two appeared to be female. I crept closer, crouching as low as I could without sitting in the snow. The females communicated with each other in low voices, making sounds I could not understand. Their faces looked nearly identical - protruding brow bones shaded their murky eyes, and their wide noses were incredibly prominent on their faces.

My nose tickled and I felt a flash of something, perhaps fear, as I realised I had to sneeze.

Trying my best to muffle the sound by covering my mouth with my inner elbow, I sneezed. I was unsuccessful, as one of the women (was women the right word? Maybe they had different names for the male and female members of their species) turned and looked right in my direction, narrowing her eyes and pulling an odd looking weapon from the poorly made garment covering her pelvis.

She seemed not to notice me, as after scanning the perimeter, she replaced her weapon and nodded to her companions. They stalked off in the opposite direction from me.

I exhaled sharply when I realised I had been holding my breath. Thin clouds of water vapour appeared in front of my face, telling me that the temperature was starting to drop. The sky remained a stark white, so I knew the day was still young.

Intrigued, I began to follow the ape men, being careful to stay a good distance away from them incase they noticed me and turned hostile. I had no idea how the ape men reacted when they came across humans. I never thought I would ever need to know.

Their gait was different to mine. They walked upright, just as I did, but their short bodies and limbs made their steps faster and harder, almost as if they were angrily stomping away from me. Perhaps they were agitated by something, though their faces looked relaxed. Then again, I only saw their expressions when they stopped every so often to check their surroundings were safe, as I hurriedly dashed behind large rocks and piles of snow.

Eventually, we came to a clearing. I saw the ape men enter a limestone cave which looked similar to mine, albeit about three times the size. I heard them speak to each other again in their loud voices, seemingly quite excited. Peering round the side of a large boulder, I realised that their excitement came from a large partially skinned carcass of a woolly rhinoceros. Judging by the size of it, it was an adult male. I wondered how on earth such backwards men managed to kill such a dangerous creature. Perhaps they worked well together, hunting as a pack.

I watched the female who looked at me pick up two pieces of flint and whack one off the other, creating sparks. I was shocked when I realised they were starting a fire - I thought that was something only humans like me were aware of.

The light of the sky began to fade. I realised with a jolt that if I did not leave now, I would not make it back before dark. I could not believe I had wasted valuable foraging time following these strange lesser men.

As I walked back through the forest, following my deep footprints, a thought hit me.

I knew exactly how I would get more food. I was going to steal from the ape men. They must've had plenty of food stored in that cave.