[BROWTOBER] Part 1 (Prompts 5-8)

Prompt 5: The Hunt 

Quiet. 

Wet peat. 

Dead eyes. 

Grind. 

A fly buzzes by the tip of his ear. He flicks it away just as fast. 

The crease of his palm glides along the back of the blade, grating when his nails collide against the flat of the tip. Once. Twice. 

How many years since it’s been like this? How many months? 

Velveteen ears swivel in the dark, a bat no doubt to the east. They flatten down. The bulky yet sickeningly soft texture underneath makes him roll over his haunch, a mass of caked fur as he re-settles on uncomfortable white rot. It smells. 

He stares at the curled parchment by his right side, the tops of triple digits peeking out from the shredded bottom and the last remnants of rules rubbed out from the stained top. Tch. 

He goes back to sharpening his knife. 

He never used to be this careless. Others would give excuses. ‘It was on the way,’ ‘This one was cheaper,’ ‘A stopover would actually be good for a breath of fresh air.’ Gwilym didn’t do stopovers. He didn’t do casual walks off-grid in the backwoods of primary jungle terrain for fresh air. There was none there, only the acrid alcoholic sting from the fruit that continues to spoil beneath him. He hasn’t been back at the cabin in a week. He looks down at his left, the leatherback notebook bound with the original string that doesn’t dare snap even after two years of unraveling. It still doesn’t when he unravels it once more. He never used to be this careless.

Or was it meticulous? 

Sharp red dots prick the first layer of taped in maps. Black lines spiral on the second. He never manages to remember to bring a pen. Far too busy to think beyond opening the door, just wide enough too so his body doesn’t manage to slam into it like a drunk stumbling before 4 PM. It’s this planet’s fault for having such early nights. He makes his own ink instead. 

Two days until the ship finishes restock, and then it will be another four before they stop again. That one will only be for a day though. Far too little, though it wouldn’t be the first time ‘it’ appeared when they traveled light. The stab of the knife makes a crunch as its driven through the center of the loose page at his right. No, definitely careless. 

Today would be the last day he would be able to do this. He has no clue why, but he feels it, as he always does. It has been long since he began to loath how right his instincts were. He twitches in the first light peeping through the trees. 7:21, he knew it without the watch. Early nights and late rises. Red slices evenly across the joints of his hand, and the blood wells cleanly as he begins to write the log. Good-bye to this wonderful cover of darkness. The next planet will not be as generous. 

When he finishes, he walks slow, not for the sake of his numb muscles, nor the silence of caution, and the mockingbird announces his rise to the low branch of the tree. When he gets to the camera he pauses, hot breath puffing out against hotter air on the collar of his undone cloak. Yes, today would be the last day. And there would be another last day. And another. And another. The sharp tear of the paper behind him is lost in the song. 

For the sake of The Hunt. 

Prompt 6: Found Footage 

It came at night. It wasn’t known why, but every time it appeared, the reason became more clear with the soft translucent glow of its grainy features flitting across the screen. Shy blue light changing to an almost purple with ribbons of lace that flowed after. The journal was filled with these vague apparitions, each more delicate than the last as harsh scripts bled into the margins with increasing accuracy. This time it was the ribs that lined the bell of the head. He had learned the terminology from the archival book that had been sitting on his shelf for the past seven months. 

Gwilym was by no means a scientific man, even if he was by objective standard when it came to his trade. Still, he made the effort for this. His pen scratches at the pulp of the paper, long languid strokes that rounded at the bottom and scribbled up in ruffled overlaps to the side. The creature danced without meaning, and as such, a static drawing of it should dance as well. The dark oval of its core was hard to mark, and every time he did, he wondered if he should make it shine with the same light it cast on everything else, because it looked rather sad if it didn’t. However, no matter which way it turned on the camera, he never saw it do such a thing, so he opts to blot it out once again. 

And then it disappears.

Disappeared wasn’t the right word for it, but as an unscientific man there really wasn’t anything else he could say. It flew into the Sea? It faded into the sky? Now that really did make him sound uneducated. But there it is, plain as day on the footage, and on the other tapes before this one too. The red light of the recording blinks with his sticky eyes as he replays the last seconds, sure enough mild static covering the moment of the creature’s departure, but not enough to where he couldn’t see its ascent. It was ridiculous wasn’t it? The notion of something so insubstantial surviving alone in the Sea.   

The only thing more ridiculous was the peak at the top of its head that looked strangely like a hat. 

Prompt 7: Secrets

Bruno woke with a stretch. Scratch the skin under his fur, wash in a relatively clean puddle, and fluff out his hair before smoothing it down to its natural– …not…shine. The routine was the same. The tree bark had left cricks along his back, and he was pretty sure his butt had reshaped to the root’s ridge without a good chunk of his magic keeping it in place. Sköll was ridiculous. Astral projecting so close to the departure time? What if he couldn’t come back? What if all his belongings were taken for scrap and used to pay out the crew’s service fees? It would be like that one time he had a lag that Sköll simply explained as ‘weekend hours’. He didn’t know that the universe had the concept of the weekend, but hahahAHAHAHAHA. He clears his throat. 

Collar, collar..Ah! It’s by the root of the tree right where he left it. Dusted off from the dirt and thatch, it doesn’t look too bad, although the pleats are a bit stretched. He pulls it over his head to pop the fur on his chest out over it, hopefully hiding the imperfections. Finally there’s the hat that stands almost completely pristine on the trampled grass next to where he hid himself to ride out the night. Perfect. It’s not, but it is. 

He hightails it back in the direction he can vaguely remember coming from, not paying any mind to the coloring of the sky or the state of the sun. He never brought anything with him, and unfortunately clocks were a godsend– WOW, he REALLY had to stop saying that. Luckily, the ship is still in sight. He’s not trusting it though. 

By the time he makes it on deck, he’s a white orbular blur through the door and down the stairs to the three floors of cabins. Despite his size, he had paid well enough to stay out of the storage closet off the galley. 

“Hey, Bruno!” 

Oh, just the person he needed to see. He stops short of his own door to wring his hands as he gestures pointedly to his wrist. Gwilym was a relatively tall and busy person, and Bruno is far too high flown to keep both the satyr’s attention and his hands from messing up the translation. 

“Hm? It’s–,” he checks the horizon, “9:45.”

And there’s the sigh of relief that wrings out of him. ‘Thank you,’ he signs. Gwilym gives a gruff nod in acknowledgement. 

“What happened to your collar?” 

His eyes widen. Collar. Bed. Sleep. Sleep, but for how long? Left, but for how long? What day was it? He can’t get into his room fast enough. He can’t ask Gwilym, he’d sooner question his coherence. 

“...What’d ya? Sleep on it?” 

His eyes dart around, too nervous to really think about the question while he’s busy fiddling with the lock, but he doesn’t want to be rude. What did he ask? If he slept? In theory or in practice? Was that even supposed to be a question for sleep? He nods once. 

“WHAT?” 

Why couldn’t things be simple like before? He could have the favor of a kingdom, a quiet place to work. 

It’s then that the lock works, only barely getting in the door before his hand sticks back out with a wave and he slams it shut behind him. The calendar at the foot of his bed tells him all he needs to know. The next day. Thank g– Nope. Nope! 

He collapses on the quilt duvet, the eyebags starting to pit with the same sinking weight as his sore limbs. Flying would’ve been easier but he couldn’t risk being seen. He’d have to apologize to Gwilym later. He was probably twice as tired and yet he was walking around with a mug full of something herbal and a freshly showered scent. 

Huh. Wonder how his hunt went. 

Prompt 8: In the Shadows 

Gwilym taps his claw on the porcelain mug. 

Why was he there? 

He had gone back to see if he could track a scent. He always did. It was easy for him to discern any leftover trail imprinted in the natural settle of the environment, and the mark was anything but natural. The trees he saw in the video’s frame should have had its touch, but nothing seemed off. Again, he had found nothing. That’s when he had smelled it. 

Bruno had a certain scent to him. Usually it was soured, but there was a uniformity there that was specific in a way that only a kitbull could have. It was unique to the time and place they were born in; the events that led to their creation. Other species came into life as replicants, things the gods desired or born from what already exists. Kitbulls were special. They were one of a kind in every sense of the word. But he didn’t smell that. He smelled nothing. 

He leans against the wall that separates their rooms. 

Life had its energy, and contrary to popular belief that included the dirt. It had its patterns and directions that you went against and received its counter with open arms. It was something that was perceived, no matter how devoid of blessing a creature might be. So why was it that there was absolutely none of it at the root of a tree? Its heart. He almost didn’t want to look its way. It was unnatural, it was suffering. Like a part of the world had been ripped out and it hurt so much that it didn’t want to grow back to keep the pain fresh. It was at times like these he loathed his ancestry, instincts along with it. Slowly he approached, the void closing in. Something was there, under the leaves and the brush. Cool mud and humid death. And something… white– And then he froze. 

Nothing. 

He rakes a hand down from his hair and grips the pits into his cheek. 

The next thing he knew he was hiding. In the shadows, in the same brush. His feet did not move but somehow he was carried there. His hands touched nothing but still felt the softness of fiber. His tongue prickled and his skin itched. It was time for a bath. After all, 

There was nothing there. 

When he saw Bruno rushing back on the deck he thought it was odd, but then again that usually happened the further into a voyage they got. His fur was the slightest bit musted, his hair weighed down with strands of mud. Did he not sleep in last night? He wasn’t fooling anyone with the state of his clothing, though his hat curiously remained whi– 

White. 

The mug trembles only for a moment. He keeps trying to keep up with the fragments flooding in, putting them in the right places and turning their pictures around until they make sense, but they keep sticking and clotting and it feels like something will burst if he doesn’t keep remembering to breathe. But that just makes them build up more. 

Some of them come from last night, others he has to search for from messed up solar cycles past. They return to him from somewhere deep and dark, and by the nature god’s great left horn he wasn’t exactly sure it was his own mind. Still, what drives him closer and closer to breaking the mug, the thing he grips like a lifeline to remind him of four wood walls and artificial light, is that for all the things he has apparently lost, they still stop short of the answer he hoped in some horrid little dream that they would convey instead of the big gaping void in their middles. 

Why was he there?