300,000 BCE – 299,995 BCE
Billions of years had passed since this world was born.
The ground was still moving. The oceans were still changing shape. Living things had survived by changing form within those changes.
There were creatures that stood on two legs. What later ages would call them, no one yet knew.
They were not one kind. Those with protruding brows lived in one place. Those with narrow jaws lived in another. Without knowing each other, on the same world, under the same sky, they lived.
Each spent their own nights.
The thread connected.
The one was thirty-two years old. Since birth, the thread had been there. The one did not know.
Five years passed. The thread continued.
That was all.
The one had a scarred right hand.
It was from splitting a stone. The pain was gone. But before the rain, it ached.
The group was about forty. The one chased prey farther than anyone else. Not because of speed. Because of refusal to give up.
At night, tending the fire, the one looked at the sky. Lights were moving. The one had never wondered why. They simply moved.
Five years passed. The scar ached again before the rain.