It was an act without sound. The dismembered bodies were placed on the soil of Mogushal with great care, to the point of leaving the earth silent. The monkeys formed a circle around them, united by the pain of loss.
Tears streamed down their faces, their bodies curved in mourning. Sadness was evident in their deep sighs, a sincere and desolate farewell. Mokessa, in the center, bore the burden of being the leader, the alpha; her feelings turbulent, the pain that wounded her soul, yet, ambiguously, awakening an intimate warmth, a hope that tried to break through the darkness of her emotions.
The eyes captured the tragedy: bodies resting upon green foliage, dried blood marking the fertile earth, while the sun, with its rays filtered through the trees, drew wavering shadows like specters.
Her weeping intensified, hot tears sliding through her silvery fur. The muffled sobs, hers and those of the others, defied the silence of the jungle, where even the birds dared not sing in that moment.
Thoughts haunted her:
"I should have protected them!" "Mogu, where are you now?"
The pack closed around her, a multitude of bodies and support—gentle touches on her shoulders, low laments of solidarity. It was the tension of loss, but also the strength of unity. The female marked by scars embraced Mokessa with the compassion that only pain teaches in such a delicate moment.
Amid the weeping, Mokessa perceived something strange: the earth beneath her paws trembled slightly, an invisible vibration rising, like the rhythm of a hidden heartbeat of the forest. No one else felt it; the pack remained still, drowning in mourning.
"What is this?"
She asked herself, confusion creating an odd difference between what she saw and what she felt. She looked at the ground, where the leaves moved subtly with the movement of winds and the soil undulating in a pattern never before seen by her.
Who knows if it was not a warning of something greater, an almost divine intuition?
Her weeping stopped suddenly, like a jolt, and her eyes, in fright, widened, the sadness intensifying her sensations.
— Do you not feel it? The ground... it is trembling... — The others stared at her, understanding nothing.
A young male touched the ground and affirmed:
— What do you mean, Alpha? — Her silence was a mute confession, as if she admitted that only she perceived the phenomenon. He rose, seeking the ground beneath his feet: — There is nothing happening, Mokessa. It is your heart that stirs, and I understand you well.
- - -
— Where have we ended up? — she murmured, her voice a thread of curiosity and uncertainty, while her eyes traveled across the faces and the green of the forest around them. There was an almost childlike search in her face, perhaps to notice something that was familiar, or perhaps merely for the sweet memory of the first fruit she had tasted.
Someone from that world of people approached, their speech like a soft echo in the air:
— So far, no one knows. — it was a tall and stout man. — And nor how we were born with the ability to speak.
She drew near, and her gaze lingered upon him, a tender interest in the nakedness that revealed itself.
Her hand sought his skin—a touch of discovery. The man, in turn, placed a light finger upon her hand, in a silent exchange, while they learned the geography of their own bodies.
— Are we not like a mirror? — she whispered, in a tone laden with sweetness. — So close, almost the same being?
— All here. All of us are alike, but… so different. — he stepped back exactly half a pace. — See that woman? — he pointed and gazed. — Her hair undulates like the water of a river I witnessed just a few meters from here, and her skin is as clear as the day.
— Such diversity of skin, in colors that meet and admire one another... It is a beauty I have never seen, a new world unfolding for me. I carry no memories of what I was, only of that green clarity. It seems that tomorrow and yesterday are a mystery without a map. — She shrank, the volume of her speech lowering. — It is a strange sensation. After all, what are we?
— No one understands. — the man answered. — And I feel that one day we will be capable of knowing everything and everyone. And the reason we were born.
The woman experienced, for the first time, melancholy. Yet there was also a new emotion igniting her chest, a gentle expectation for the discoveries that awaited her in this newly born existence, so mysterious and without clear roots of origin.
— Come with me. I will take you to the river. — the man said, beginning to walk.
— A river? What would that be…
He quickly interrupted her:
— Where the waters flow united. I think I am the only one who has known those banks so far. — he looked at her, waiting for the woman to follow him.
They walked side by side, and the journey unfolded through hills that, so gentle, seemed to invite the step. There, where the earth was generous, the trees absorbed water from rivers and lakes through their roots, in an eternal cycle that made them grow lush.
Then, the path embraced them in dense forests, where the light of day merely squeezed through, filtered by a living roof of intertwined branches and leaves that seemed to whisper on slopes that barely dared to have an incline.
— Is this a river? — the woman was perplexed, glimpsing the movement of the waters behind shrubs and leaves that obstructed the view. — It moves! Is it alive as we are?
— I do not know. — he breathed deeply. — You ask many questions that most of us have no idea how to answer. — The woman raised her eyebrows and he said: — Let us descend. I want you to see it up close.
The woman nodded and accompanied him, blazing the descent of the slightly steep hill, yet one that left them at the banks of the stream intact and without injury.
— May I touch it? — she asked another question.
The man quickly knelt, looked at her, and placed his hands in the waters, rubbing them wet across his face with gentleness. She, then, began to imitate him.
— I use the river to wash myself or to drink water. I believe that soon the others will discover it, if they feel thirst as I do.
— Do we all feel thirst? — she inquired, as she rubbed the expression of doubts from her face with her wet hands. — What is thirst?
— I have already said, young woman: no one knows anything here, about any place.