---

The forest of Hatuga is not just a static land, but a living, breathing organism. Every vine, every rock, every waterfall draws breath and participates in the cycle of life and death. Some parts, however, are more alive than others. These are vibrant communities that depend on conduits plugged directly into nature itself, creatures serving as the foundation of a small ecosystem, one housing hundreds of inhabitants much smaller than them. They exist in harmony, each providing for and living off the other, not in a parasitic relationship, but for the sake of keeping their little patch of Hatuga alive.

Most of these communities were built on the back of giant tortoises, by far the most reliable and stable of conduits, able to power through almost any external environment. Giant armadillos were also popular, but could only be appreciated by a certain niche group of animals, as their shells were segmented and not always comfortable when the creature habitually rolled into a ball. Giant crabs appealed solely to the coastline, and outdid the giant clams when it came to underwater ability. But, above all of these, the most impressive isolated ecosystem could be found on top of an enormous Glyptodon, dubbed affectionately by its three-thousand and six passengers as Old Gyro.

Old Gyro was a magnificent beast with a peculiarly curved shell, one that sharply arched over his back, sloping down half a mile on either side before curving upwards, gathering ponds in the rim. Deciduous trees sprung up all over his back, rooted deeply in his spine and flowering all through the winter as they drew their power from his endless supply of blood. The birds fought for a place in those trees, which sprouted the most invigorating fruit and the tastiest nuts. Their flowers lured bugs by the millions each month with their rich perfumes, proving a haven for amphibians, reptiles, and arachnids, who simply had to open their mouths to find their stomachs full in an instant. There were no big cats, scavenging dogs, or birds of prey, for Old Gyro would let nothing that would upset his prized ecosystem come near enough to threaten it. All those predators could do was jeer from afar, awaiting the moment that Old Gyro finally collapsed from the weight of his burden. But it was no burden to him; it was his life’s work. These creatures, great and small, were his charges, and his purpose was to protect and nurture them with his life.

It was a day like any other day on the back of Old Gyro when a magpie looked around and decided he was not satisfied with his surroundings. Of the creatures who lived atop that Glyptodon, the magpie certainly contributed the absolute least. His sole interest was for his own little nest, which didn’t even house eggs but worthless materials that gleamed prettily in the sunlight. He puzzled and puzzled over why he was so deep in the dregs, and eventually decided it was no fault of his, but Old Gyro’s. After all, their world was limited by the scope of that magnificent shell. Were these not representative of the limits he felt encumbered him?

The magpie called a meeting of minds to figure out how their community could improve. These minds dubbed themselves “The Council of Deciding What is the Right Thing to Do.” It was comprised of a koala, who served as head of the board, a hognose snake, who offered up tactical defense strategies, a sloth, who analyzed modes and methods of transport, and a cane toad, who was versed in the act of educating the young. The magpie was in charge of finances, but also self-appointed primary speaker of the council. So he opened the meeting, having first called it, as was his right.

“Fellow citizens of the Shell,” trilled the magpie in his alluring digitized warble, “my name is Zit. I, like you, have enjoyed the life we have been living on the back of Old Gyro…to a point. Only recently have I realized that our life here is not perfect – far from it, actually! And as I meditated on the reasons for why our life here is not perfect, day and night and night and day, I was inspired to form this meeting of minds so that I may ask you the question that troubles me. So, I put this question forth to you: what, precisely, makes our life here not perfect?”

The other animals lowered their heads and debated the magpie Zit’s existential crisis. After a few moments, the Koala poked her head out with an answer.

“Just the other day, as I was enjoying some fresh berries, I noticed a few flightless birds below begging for the juicy remnants that dripped from the corners of my cheeks. Then, all of a sudden, Old Gyro tripped over his own clumsy feet and shook me out of the tree! The flightless birds retreated with the rest of my snack, and I’ve had a splitting headache ever since…”

Zit squawked with delight. Of course! It was all Old Gyro’s fault, for he was the foundation on which their home stood. Corrections were planned immediately within the council, and, with enough signatures from unwitting animals who did not quite understand what all the buzz was about, Zit flew to the ancient glyptodon’s ear and voiced their complaints.

“Listen here, you clumsy oaf. Don’t you realize what you’ve done? All your lumbering about has put animals in a panic, so we’re going to cripple you at the legs. Who needs walking, anyhow, when they’re basically one peak short of a mountain? You must do comply, it’s for the benefit of all involved.”

Old Gyro nodded with gentile complicity. After all, he did not live on his back, so surely those who relied upon him knew what was best for their own living conditions. Accepting his fate, the gentle giant wandered onwards until he reached a lake, settled down comfortably, and didn’t even feel a thing as his nerves were severed at the ankles. With his mouth near the water, Old Gyro was now rendered immobile, but still self-sufficient.

Zit could not explain why he felt even worse than before. They had done good for all animals of the Shell, so why did he feel like small beans had been accomplished in the grand scheme of things?

Within the next week, another meeting of the minds was called. After much careful deliberation, the Koala poked her head forth with a new solution.

“The other day, I was coiled inside my burrow, dreaming lovely dreams of the progress we would make for our fellow creatures and a throat full of rodents, when I felt parched for a sip of cool water. I slithered to the rims of Old Gyro’s shell, only to discover that they were dry as a rhino’s buttookis. Yet, when I made the journey all the way to the front of this land, what do I see? Old Gyro, slurping up an entire lake to his heart’s content!”

Zit squawked, aghast. Of course! It was all Old Gyro’s fault, for the rainclouds could see how full he was with their blessing, which prevented them from dropping further rain for the other creatures. Adjustments were decided upon immediately within the council, and, with enough support bought with leaflets full of water from animals who did not feel safe leaving their home and walking two feet to sip from the lake, Zit flapped to the ancient glyptodon’s ear and croaked their complaints.

“Can you hear me, you ignorant beast? You’ve done it again! As you lay there, your fat face filling itself up with as much water as you want, the rest of us aren’t spared a drop. So, to help you do the right thing, we’re going to tie your gaping jewels shut, for all our sakes. You must do comply, for what good are you if you can’t provide your citizens their basic needs?”

Old Gyro nodded with hesitant complicity. After all, he could drink as much as he desired from those boundless waters, so he trusted those who relied upon him knew how to manage their part of the ecosystem. Accepting his fate, the generous giant grit his teeth harshly together, and begrudgingly allowed vines to be wrung around and around until his mouth was clamped shut for good.

Now, the other animals on the back of Old Gyro’s shell were starting to realize that maybe this self-appointed council didn’t really know what they were doing. Their true troubles only seemed to become evident once Old Gyro was crippled, and then compounded once he was deprived of water. They stopped aging, as if the glyptodon’s movement were like the rotation of a planet, whereas the foliage around them showed its age by decaying rapidly, for it relied on the healthiness of Old Gyro’s blood to flower and bloom. All of a sudden, it came back to them that a similar disaster had befallen Ankylosaur, considered the utopia of shelled communities, who which had met its end mysteriously from within. Was history to repeat itself? It mustn’t! It couldn’t! Not when they had played some part in it, no!

Hundreds of creatures, from mammal to the insect, beseeched “The Council of Deciding What is the Right Thing to Do,” but all the members had taken up residence in the heights of the tallest Camphor tree sprouting from the peak of the shell, too high up to hear these widespread complaints.

That is, all except the cane toad, who secretly vacated the shell from time to time to moisten her skin in the lake outside. She had passed by some of the protests and organized efforts to overturn the damage done by their well-meaning efforts, and swiftly reported back to the president of the council. Who, in turn, explained the experience to everyone else.

“Not even an hour ago,” explained the Koala, “I was hopping about our beautiful forest, looking for some young who might need gentle guidance from all-too-eager lips, when the sting of ungrateful discontent burned my ears. Down there, below us, at the foot of our tree, our fellow citizens of the shell are voicing complaints and miseries to us. But we are not the problem, of course! Everything we have done was for their benefit and interest, I’m not seeing where this spirit of outrage has sprouted from.”

Zit knew. Oh, he knew, for every problem they had dealt with, every blockade in their path to progress, was erected by that crafty Old Gyro! He flew at once to the glyptodon’s wheezing nostrils, perched irritatedly upon them, and looked brazenly into his sad eyes.

“How dare you, you selfish thing! Can you hear the voices razing against progress on your behalf? And what for? You should feel purposeful in providing for them, and for us, but for some reason your discomfort is worth jeopardizing all that. Cease spreading lies about our goodwill at once! Do you want everyone to leave your shell for somewhere else?”

But, as Zit tried to figure out some way to make Old Gyro comply, he remembered that he had already tied his mouth shut. So, then, how were complaints of his situation getting out? He studied, and pondered, and it dawned on him, looking into his glassy, innocent eyes…his eyes. Old Gyro was conveying so much emotion through those depressive eyes alone, surely those were what made all the other citizens of the shell depressed! Before Old Gyro could understand his critic’s intentions, the magpie dove straight for one of his eyes and popped it with his beak.

Old Gyro roared, louder than any roar heard since the sleeping gator upon whose back all Hatuga now prospered. His life on the line, Old Gyro finally decided to fight back. He tried to stand up to the magpie – but his ankles were clipped, and he could not rise. He growled and tried to devour the magpie in one bite – but his jaws were tied shut, he could not open them. Besides, he was so deprived of water, he hadn’t the energy to move his massive frame even if he did have control of all his faculties.

With one eye remaining, Old Gyro couldn’t tell where the magpie would come from next. His heart pounded, sending tremors throughout the land on his back. To think, a beast as magnificent as he, reduced to fear of a puny tittering bird! Yet that’s where he was at, for he had given the Magpie such power on his own. And he could do nothing else but regret as Zit flapped up from below and jabbed his remaining eye, blinding him permanently.

Old Gyro didn’t roar this time – he sighed. He heaved such a monumental sigh, laying his head at the shore of the lake, and was still forevermore. The other citizens of the shell had no idea what happened, but they all felt rocked to their core by the impromptu silence; they could feel that life had left all the plants and rocks around them, even if they couldn’t see it. It weighed heavily upon their hearts, and they couldn’t explain why – they just knew there was no use trying to make things better now.

“The Council of Deciding What is the Right Thing to Do” also felt something like that, but they were more concerned as to where their leader flew off to. They felt aimless without him, and waited worrisomely for his return. They waited, even as a crack split Old Gyro’s shell straight down the middle. They stood fast in the heights of the Camphor tree, even as the shell caved in and the ground beneath them crashed like dust into a yawning fissure. And, still, they did not budge – even as the Camphor tree tipped over into the depths, taking them all crashing down into the barren grave of Old Gyro’s ribcage.

The survivors made their way carefully down the ruins of their home’s imploded foundation. They were sad, downcast – but it would be a lie to say they had not been expecting this outcome, sooner or later. And so they knew exactly their response as the shadow of Zit the Magpie covered them all, offering to sell them his cheap comfort.

“My fellow citizens of the shell,” clucked Zit, “What a tremendously traumatic experience we have all endured. But do not worry! Once we have elected a few of you to oversee the creation of our new home, we can begin-“

“That’s enough!” erupted a Kiwi, who had grown especially weary of the magpie’s posturing. “We all had a hand in this travesty, but let’s not forget it’s you who led the charge! Maybe we deserve this for our complicity, or for taking for granted what Old Gyro gifted all of us, but one thing is for certain: we all learned a valuable lesson. And that lesson was, whatever second rate ecosystem we build as basically a shell of what we once had, you, my friend, will not be a part of it.”

A rallying cry rose up from the ranks of the former citizens of the shell, who started off to join other communities, or were spirited enough to build themselves a new one that would rival what they once had. Their home might be beyond recovery, but they would rise up from the dirt and reclaim what idle complicity had taken from them; it was a setback, and setbacks are never permanent. Only defeat is final.

Zit was left behind, hurt and bewildered by their abandonment. Didn’t they know the pains he had taken in forming the council, in making the hard decisions – all for them and a better way of life? All he cared about was improving their community, and they cruelly abandoned him! He wondered where he had gone wrong, and could not find the answer to that question, so he wondered what gave him such unselfish visions of grandeur in the first place, when he recalled his nest of pretty shinies. His shinies! Had they survived the collapse? Zit flew frantically into the rubble, searching and clawing among the dust and bone for his collection. As long as he could reclaim what he possessed before he threw it so carelessly away for others, he might be partly whole again. Oh, if only they had brought him happiness back then, maybe none of this would have happened! He didn’t deserve defeat, but here it was all around him, and he could account it so as the Treasurer of a broken bank.

Zit dug and dug with more passion than he ever had leading the council. He dug and dug with more single-mindedness, more inspiration to recover his belongings, that he willfully ignored the jeering of scavengers as their predatory circle tightened around him.

---

---

The forest of Hatuga is a land of stories. Our tribe, being forest-dwellers of that land, are consequently a people of stories. I might even go so far to say that, without stories, we wouldn’t exist – the concept itself is that important to us. Culture, experiences and values, all of these are passed down in the form of fables; weaned from childbirth on the oral text, we age with the faint voices of legendary ancestors always in our ears. True, some of those ancestors might have lost their human form for the sake of the fable, but what actually defines them as human? Is it the form – or the spirit? I like to think it is the latter…that, no matter the truth, no matter the experience, everything recorded in story is part of the history of Hatuga. Likewise, the tales of Hatuga are an ongoing history of our people; they are one and the same.

When I was younger, this sort of thinking brought me relief; it was nice to think that I was part of a larger plot than my own. Now that I’m older, I cannot lie – the concept frightens me! In ways more than any story can convey, it chills me to my bones. But to help you understand why that is, I will have to tell a story. Yes, I will have to tell you a Hatugan Forest-People Fable. But don’t you worry. This isn’t just any old fable.

This is a true story. And I was there to watch it become a fable.

Most of you are familiar with Hatugan seasons. Each doesn’t strike the forest all at once, but moves from the north to the south. Like a wave, moving inland. Some say it is because of the ancient magic in the extreme North, but that’s up for debate amongst scholars. All I know is what I have seen, staying up all night to watch the leaves decay, the snow fall, the flowers bloom, the fireflies glow: it happens overnight.

That’s what any uninspired person would tell you. I however, have stayed awake to witness the change, and will tell you the truth in case you haven’t yet sought it out for yourselves.

Yes, the seasons change overnight. But, no, it does not happen all at once.

You see, the transition is technically instantaneous – you cannot mark the effects on the forest over a period of days. The effects are, in actuality, gradual – though rapid, you can mark the seasonal transition in the course of a single night. That night, no matter the season, is a hallowed night.

We call this night, “Tabidmas Eve.” It is a celebration of Hatuga’s maturity! Each season does not act as a cycle in our eyes, upon which the forest dies and is reborn with new life. That’s not what we believe in at all. We believe instead that Hatuga is stretched before us on a finite line, and every season (no matter its characteristics) is one step closer to the end of that line. Hatuga is always moving once step closer to an utter death, rather than moving endlessly in circles.

You might find it a morbid perspective, but consider this: if Hatugans are made of stories, would not an endless cycle of mistakes prove all of our efforts pointless? For the sins of the previous year, told so splendidly in the colors of spring, only to be buried beneath the snow of forgetfulness, and then bloom again as fresh naivety? No, ‘tis better that Hatuga is decaying. That is why each Tabidmas Eve is a testament to our fables, and how they encompass the maturity and experience that comes as the forest draws ever nearer to death. Our fables are the richness of an almost-whole existence.

Now you know why it is in our nature to treasure fables so much. Without history, how exactly can you expect anything from the future? Without context, how can you derive true content?

Yet, I tell you this: the fable exists so we can derive truth in a word-isolated context, outside of reality. The stories themselves – or, rather, the events themselves, before they are translated into a story – are distressing. As I said before, I never would have come to this conclusion…had I not found myself in the center of events that would eventually become just another fable of tradition. But it was more than just a fable to me; it was a chance occurrence that would shake my faith in the fable, down to the core. In the fable, and in the very nature of the forest itself.

That Tabidmas Eve so many years ago, as the leaves turned brown-orange and brittle, I met a demon from another world. A demon, indeed…one destined to haunt me forever.

This is the true account.

The celebration of Tabidmas Eve was more traditional back then. We had herb and drink as we do now, spiced for jubilee. I suppose you could say, well, that there was a ritual to the practice, one that is no longer kept.

As dusk seemed to prevail more than any other time of day, its rusty, musky hues more stark than any blue or black, my neighbors and I gathered a harvest for the forthcoming winter. The Tabidmas Eve that was to come in the autumn before the storm was an occasion to fill oneself with ciders, roasted squashes, and sweet meats; the idea was, the more steam you ingested, the warmer you would be when snow covered the land. A baseless pseudo-diet, you might laugh at the idea – we knew it was baseless as we ate – but we still found comfort in the idea that one could have some autonomy over one’s good health. The crowded festival probably kept us warmer than the food, honestly.

Oh, there were mountains of it – Roasted gourds of all sorts, and roasted hinds of all kinds! We still lived in trees then, a level web of lofts joined together by rope bridges, with a community plaza wrapped around the thickest sequoia across all Hatuga. We built our houses in trees because of a vicious…, hmm…well, there are a hundred fables that could explain our tree-bound situation. I’m not going to use my story to explain.

Anyways, the tricky thing about the meals was preparing them. My loft planned a nutty array, with shaved pork, red kuri squash, and candied pecans. My parents, siblings, and myself worked hard to gather, chop, season, and bake; the end result was something we could be proud of, as a family. It was worth the labor, to ogle the artistic array and sniff its harvest smells. As soon as it was finished cooking, we loaded it in the wagon and set off for the center of the web.

It was always frightening to me, walking the bridges at night. The autumnal Tabidmas Eve, however, was a special kind of frightening. On that Tabidmas Eve, even before the sun had set, you couldn’t see the forest floor. A cold front would come through to signal the change in season, and a thick sea of bluish-grey mist would flow between the trees. They were so thick that, if ever one fell, they would feel a false security that the fog would catch them before hitting the ground. But we never learned if it was thick enough to catch us – fear of the bridges’ strength was always unfounded.
There was something else…maybe. I’m not sure. But…back then, I couldn’t be certain of it, or I just discounted it as our wagon’s wheels across the wooden slats. I was young, but I knew what fear could do. Now I’m certain of what I heard.

Down, down beneath us, echoing across the forest floor – it was the thunder of hooves. They struck the ground like a pair of stones colliding, two after the others – a mad dash in steady, hollow rhythm. Far off in the distance, far off in the mists somewhere, I heard them gallop recklessly.

But I was young then; I could only guess the source of the sound. What was out there in the forest tonight? Was it a beast? A spirit? A rockslide? Drums, or hooves, or thunder? It could have been anything and everything, on Tabidmas Eve…But no one else in my family seemed to hear, so I convinced myself to wonder why our wagon was as noisy as a horse.

As I was just starting to break into a nervous sweat, we finally saw the lantern, dimly blowing in the wind, long before we reached the community center. The lantern was an enormous girded cage attached to a simple conveyer belt, a single metal band encircling the sequoia beyond the octagonal reach of the plaza that held the lantern aloft. The whole tribe would contribute, each of us, by tugging it around a full circle. The adults were responsible for two revolutions each, and the children for one, the idea being to greet all members of the tribe, no matter where they were or how long it had been since you’d last seen them, and to keep everyone awake to watch the transitions of Tabidmas Eve.

No one ever stayed awake to watch the lantern burn out.

The center was decorated with all our effects of the season, from scarecrows to cornucopias – their last hurrah before being burned as fuel for the lantern. It saddened me to watch them go, considering the effort and joy of the season put into crafting them; but that same joy would return next year with the arrival of new projects. It was worth it, to feel the dual warmth of community and our treasured fables as we sat near the lantern. The wind blows hard in the canopy, so the heat was soothing as it licked us, bundled up as we were.

As the feast gradually disappeared, and the lantern slowed its orbit to a halt, we huddled together and told stories. These stories, they tended to focus on the qualities of family, of tradition, of goodwill and generosity – we heard the same comforting tales every year, and never grew tired of them. The harvest had been especially good this year, with much to be thankful for, and so I ate up the grateful atmosphere, as did every one of the listeners.

But then you had the few stories, mostly told by young adults who had yet to establish a tradition or a family, who had grown weary of tradition. They made their own stories, told from the mind over the heart, with the intentions of conveying warnings, or criticisms. I firmly believe each of those stories was so well-crafted that they deserved to be fables in their own right – they just had a tendency to read the wrong mood, and the greatest numbers gathered round would fall asleep during the arrival of a new tale.

I was about to fall asleep myself, when another of those young adults commanded our attention. I cannot recall her name, but I remember every bit of her face: energetic, full of life, yet completely and utterly blank. Her story contradicted her face.

One Autumnal Tabidmas of her youth, she told us, she woke when all the adults and children still huddled together in slumber. The girl tried in vain to return to her dreams, but the chill of the wind and the dim light of the moon kept her awake. What was she to do, but listen to cicadas? Their irritating chirp droned on and on, rising and falling, that she felt herself on the verge of going back to sleep – until all the cicadas silenced at once. She wasn’t expecting it, but the buzz cut short as if they had all just vanished in thin air. She rose up, as if seeing her might comfort them and start the drone again. She admitted that the silence frightened her.

Then came the drums. At least, they sounded like drums at first to her – low, steady, hollow beating. But that’s when they were far away to the North. They drew closer and closer, until the source of the sound became clear to her.

It was the mad gallop of hooves.

The girl rushed to the side of the plaza and peered down over the railing, into the dark and swirling mists. Even the firm sequoia shook as the galloping drew nearer and nearer – she gripped on for dear life! And then…it passed.

Her eyes accustomed to the darkness, the girl saw two jagged antlers break through the mists. A single glowing eye, staring dead ahead, lighted the muscular figure of a steed, upon which the owner of the antlers and the eye rode, bound in a mossy cloak. Every Hatugan knew this figure as that ancient elf, harvester of souls, guardian of the forest – the Erlking. Our narrator’s heart stopped, she said, as his dark flowing figure tore through the mists at a breakneck speed, unhindered by the darkness, and disappeared between the trees.

His undead steed’s gallop died down as he gained distance from the tribe, until only the stir of the mists gave any indication he was there. But then they, too, eventually settled and covered the Erlking’s tracks. Our orator concluded her tale by saying she has never woken up in the middle of a Tabidmas Eve since that night. But, just before she goes to bed every year, she is certain she hears the hooves of the Erlking on his ride through the waking hours. He is looking for to find a soul awake and wandering about on the forest floor to drag along with him, back to his kingdom of the dead underground.

As a child, that sort of hokey legend did little to faze me. Erlking? Rubbish! To explain away a possible natural disaster as a figure from nightmares and not reality, was the very definition of irresponsible. What if the sequoia was in danger, from whatever is the source of this constant sound as it narrowly misses the base of the tree? What if it is a predator, who might someday climb and finish us off in our sleep if we leave it alone? The probability of a real problem was being minimized by this girl’s fable, and most were just content to bask in the entertainment rather than confront the implications.

I kept criticism to myself. All words and no action was a flaw I chose to avoid, being a man and a capable warrior, so I decided to stay awake and bring some fact to the fable. I determined to witness the dangers of this so-called “Erlking” phenomena, and put a stop to it.

You must keep in mind, though, that staying awake through Tabidmas Eve is a difficult prospect. As the air thins quickly, most lose consciousness a mere stroke into midnight. I didn’t want to disturb them moving about to keep myself awake, so I contorted into the most uncomfortable position I could think of to remain restless. A lack of comfort could override any of nature’s temptations, surely! With my spear nearby, propped against the trunk of the tree, I steeled myself and strained my ears for that haunting gallop. I think it took a mere twenty minutes of struggling before I finally caved in to sleep.

When I awoke, drowsiness kept me from thinking clearly. A few seconds passed as I was absorbed in the drone of the cicadas, before I started with a jolt, my first worry being that the “Erlking” might have already passed. I lightly yet hastily crept towards the railing and peered over.

Still. The mists, hundreds of yards below, lay undisturbed.

Relief washed over me. Relief soon gave way to doubt. Was the sound I heard actually just our old wagon? Was the girl just trying to scare us with a scary story? Was I a sucker, deserving of the headache I would likely wake with in the morning. I stared blankly below, feeling just a little annoyed that there was no problem to solve after all.

Then the cicadas stopped.

Mimicking the young girl’s story before, their buzzing ceased all at once. My breath, stopped, too, because I could hear, ever faintly, the sound of hooves far off in the distance. Gradually getting louder.

I was late! With excitement, a leap over my friends and family, and spear in hand, I scrambled across one of the bridges. Looping my foot in the first pulley I could find, I lowered myself to the forest floor, spooking the horses tied in at their post. I luckily quieted them with some leftover carrots stuffed in a pack – meant for that failed task of keeping myself awake – and hid between their ranks. The first priority was keeping our means of transportation and labor safe, and I would be crushed underfoot before this Tabidmas turns out to be their last.

We waited with bated breath, the horses and I. They stirred as the hooffalls stampeded in our direction, but I reassured with whispers and pats that they would be all right. The moon was a husky reddish-orange that tainted even the mists through the canopy, and I could tell that the Erlking, or whatever it was, would be upon us soon; the ground rumbled, and the rusted mist blew in and out as steam from a horse’s nostrils. My palms were slicked with sweat, but I gripped my spear and crouched with poised anticipation.

His silhouette only darkened the mists for a moment before he burst out of the mist atop his hulking beast – the fabled Erlking himself! I couldn’t believe my eyes at first, but I could believe my ears heard the horses whinnying and struggling at their reins as that towering abomination came straight at us. He wasn’t even slowing down; he’d run us right over, the crazed demon! Coming to terms with the truth of the myth, and worried that it was me he was after, I unhooked the smallest horse and posted off a ways. Why should the rest of our stallions suffer because of me, was the thought.

The Erlking drew closer and closer, and I became conscious of his enormous antlers, like arms reached towards the sky, and the hulking beast he rode on. I never saw his singular glowing eye, but I was certain that he saw us, dead ahead. Yet…I couldn’t understand why he was so tall, and yet so small, as he ran us down. Then I realized; the Erlking himself was small. Or, he was leaning forward so far that he could have been sleeping on his ride. It was his ride that was so huge – the biggest horse I’d ever seen, towering nearly eight feet at the shoulder! It could bowl right through me and my small horse with ease.

Regardless, I stood my ground. Whatever this reckless beast and its foolish rider intended, I refused to let the risk of their rampage threaten Hatuga. With spear in hand, drawn and aimed before me, I accosted the Erlking.

“Stop,” I shouted with a quiver in my voice, “Or will you force me to stop you?”

The Erlking did not slow down or respond.

“This is your final warning! Stop, or prepare yourself for my spear!”

The Erlking did not slow down or respond. Instead, his steed veered in a wide curve to my left, meeting me almost adjacently as he adjusted his course. I was flushed with relief for almost a second; it left me as quickly when I saw the Erlking turn his head towards me. His mouth gaped open, and I heard the faint voice of that ancient spirit:
“h…help me…please…”

The undead steed thundered away into the mists, dragging with it those faint pleas on its back. I did not think twice, but spurred my horse after it.

Once the mists are kicked up, it becomes almost impossible to see. We lagged behind for a while, my horse and I, before the Erlking suddenly appeared on our right; I wasn’t aware until we saw him parallel to us through the trees. By the light of the orangeish moon, I could make him out clearly. And what I saw was no Erlking.

The being that begged for my help was none but a man. He was gaunt and shriveled, gangly with barely a pound of flesh on his bones. He grasped tight to his horse’s mane for dear life, but seemed to do so with his last drop of life, for his eyes were so sunken that I could not be sure he wasn’t a skeleton already. His long beard rustled in the wind, and, atop his head, tangled in a ragged mess of crusty hair, were enormous branches that stuck out like antlers.

The gaunt man’s eyes creaked open, imbued with brightness when he registered me riding astride him.

“You…you’re not a ghost?”

“I’m not. Are you?”

“Not the last time I checked. You got any water on you, or food?”

“I do. Stop your horse, and you can have some.”

“Give it to me now…I’m starving.

More curious than controlling, I agreed to his demands without hesitation. Who knows how long my tiny horse can keep up with his gargantuan steed? On second look, I must ask, is that really a steed he’s riding on? I’ve never seen one quite like it, with an enormous hunch and threatening horns.

I steered right next to him, rustled out a slab of beef and a flask of water, and handed them over. He ravenously finished both in a heartbeat.

“Thank you, thank you so much! God, I don’t know how long it’s been since I’ve had any food or drink. Where am I, exactly?”

“You are in the forest of Hatuga.”

“H-Hatuga? Where the heck is Hatuga?”

“It is –“

The gaunt man coughed and wheezed, then wiped his nose on his horse’s mane. His eyes darted about, confused by his surroundings.

“Wha…Why is the sky this color? What’s with the fog?”

“Have you not seen a Tabidmas Eve cold front come in before? It’s my first time, too.”

“Tabidmas Eve?”

There was a brief pause, as if the season was sinking in on him. The gaunt man abruptly laughed, in an almost fake boisterous manner, as if he was trying to unnerve me and assuage his own nerves. He calmed down just as abruptly, though I’m sure that was just an act, too.

“I get it, I get it. I’m trapped in a nightmare! Probably that hotel food, gave me gut rot or something. Dang, and I dropped my phone a while back, too.”

He splashed the remainder of the water in his face and gave his cheek a pinch.

“Hotel?…Pho–”

“Yeah, hotel! You know the one, um…that’s right! Glacier Park Lodge! Almost had five stars, so I expected it to be great. Didn’t expect them to try and poison me with undercooked food, the idiots. I bet it was the spinach, probably had pesticides in them.”

“Sir! I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

I received a glare of scrutiny from the gaunt man. He seemed to soften after reminding himself that he was talking to a child.

“I’m Hewie. Hewie Chase. You might have heard of me? I contribute to current events columns for the AJC, but I’m more popular for being a travel vlogger. Ever seen one of my videos?”

“I must admit, sir, I’ve never seen a vlogger before.”

“Really? What, you live under a rock or something? Oh,” Hewie held up his hands as if he could stop me from thinking something. “I’m sorry! I didn’t mean it that way. I mean, not everyone can afford a computer.”

I had long gone past a state of curiosity and into one of pure confusion. Rather than continue the misunderstandings and mismeanings between us, why not cut straight to the point? The gargled breathing of his strange horse was starting to unnerve me.

“Do you have any way of stopping your horse, Mr. Chase?”

“Mr. Chase? I’m not that old! Call me Hewie. Here, I’ll tell you how it is, kid,” Hewie went on as though he hadn’t even heard me. “The world’s going to Hell in a handbasket! That’s all there is to it. No matter how much you try to warn folks, they still refuse to see how they’re contributing to the state of things. They’re lost in their pathetic little Instagram accounts, with their silly little followers…I mean, don’t get me wrong, I have one, too. They’re muy, muy important.”

I nodded, somewhat understanding what he was getting at. My horse’s labored breathing was starting to worry me, and I thought some reassurances would get the gaunt man to listen to me.

“Ah, yeah! You get me,” he perked up, but not in the way I had hoped. His eyes got wilder, and some drool was starting to glisten on his chin. “So, anyway, I said to myself, I said, ‘Hey! Hewie! Why not take your travel blog on the road again, educate people on how they’re really living? How they’re infecting the environment, and each other?’ So, what did I do?”

…

…

“I don’t–“

“I listened to myself, of course! I loaded up my stuff and headed to the most beautiful place in America: Montana! The most refreshing place I’ve ever been…helped me reconnect with my inner humanity. I felt like I was doing some good just by…by being there, you know? As if, to tell nature, ‘Don’t worry. I remember you. I won’t let you be forgotten, no matter how much we trample over you, abuse you, eat you…’”

Tears welled up in Hewie’s eyes. He caressed his horse’s hump lovingly.

“That’s why it’s been a privilege for this little guy to let me ride with him. I knew we connected when I saw him in the clearing. He saw me, and he was like, ‘Hewie. Hewie,’” Hewie was doing a different voice now, that made him sound kind of foolish. “’I feel your pain, buddy. No one listens to your columns. People criticize your blogs. Climb on my back, Hewie, and feel how humans were suppose to feel. Feel the power you deserve.’”

Hewie laughed like a child and embraced his horse.

“Man, could this guy run! The wind in your hair, the ground so far below…I’ve never felt so alive! I feel like I’m a part of him now. I don’t even mind that I’ve been stuck on his back for…hey, how many days has it been?”

…

…

“I…I don’t know, Mr. Hewie.”

“Way-way-way-way-wait. Weren’t you looking for me?”

“No? I mean, not you in particular, I was-“

“Let me stop you right there, okay? Work with me here. They didn’t send a search party out to find me? It’s got to have at least been a week!”

“I did not expect to find you out here, Mr. Hewie.”

The poor pitiful man atop his enormous steed seemed offended, and deeply hurt.

“Well, how do you like that. Who were you waiting for, then? And why the spear?”

“Um…” it felt stupid now, hearing it come out of my mouth. “I was waiting for the Erlking.”

“…The Erlking? You mean, like,” Hewie burst out singing in a deep voice, some song in a language I had never heard before. It tickled him, and his tune turned to laughter before he could go very far. “You’ve got to be kidding! Aren’t you a hero, huh? The Erlking’s a legend! A very old one, too. What made you think I was the Erlking?”

My eyes instinctively wandered up to the branches entwined with Hewie’s hair. He reached up, felt them, and his laughter only got louder.

“That’s great! Ooooh, I love it. But, c’mon, I mean, the Erlking rides a horse! You ever heard of an Erlking riding a moose?”

“A…a moose?”

“Obviously. Man, you are a strange kid.”

Something was bothering Hewie as he said those words. He no longer found amusement in my ignorance.

“Hey, kid…You say you’ve never seen a vlogger before?”

I repeated it for him.

“You’ve never seen them, or…Are you saying you don’t know what a vlogger is?”

I don’t.

“Have you ever heard of video before?”

I had not. And, to this day, I never heard of it again.

My answers did not please Hewie. His tongue rolled back and forth in his mouth for a moment, as if restructuring his thoughts before they spilled out.

“Hey kid…” his voice was raspy and serious. “Get me off this moose, will you?”

I nodded, fished out some rope, and tossed it to him. He fumbled with it, fingers crusted stiff with what looked like dried mucus, and leaned forward to tie it around the moose’s neck.

He shrieked and fell back.

“What the HELL is going ON?”

I pulled my horse right up to the moose, to see if I could take hold of its antlers and slow it down myself. With one of its antlers stretching out in front of me, I grabbed for it.

My palms sunk in, squeezing through fibrous goop that is definitely not the makeup for antlers. My hands were covered in the stuff, grey, rank and pulsating. I sat back down and spurred my horse ahead, wanting to see the face of this creature.

What I saw put the rest of it into clearer perspective. While the moose had fur around the area where Hewie sat, specifically its hump, the rest of the body was a loosely formed, grey mass. The head was the worst. I could make out a rounded nose and small jaw, but the particulars had melted away like mud, leaving no clearly defined eyes or ears. Its breathing was muffled and wet, perhaps because even its windpipe and lungs were liquidated. The monster’s hooves and legs were strong but sleek, leaving a trail of grey mucous dripping off behind as it stampeded mindlessly onward with Hewie trapped on its back.

If this abomination was once what Hewie called a “moose,” I found it hard to believe it was one any longer. Now, it was as if God had put spirit into an unfinished clay puppet.

When I slowed down to speak with Hewie, his visage was different. He glared forward, thinking, with a bitter twitch to his smile, then rested his head in his hands.

“Kid, will you be honest with me? Am I dead?”

“I don’t know. But I don’t think so.”

“Don’t know a lot, do you? Do you at least know where the police are around here?”

“Um…”

“Let me guess! Never seen one of those, either?”

He threw up his hands before I could even shake my head. Hewie opened his mouth to say something else, then stopped. A gleam returned to his eye, almost a spark of fire. I tried not to think about this contradiction, this man and this beast that don’t belong in Hatuga, who broke reality somehow to come here; I was focused on rescuing a man in need. But I knew he was only thinking about those things, and was nearing some sort of absurd conclusion. It was possible he would crack, or it already happened a long time ago and he was becoming recognizant of it.

I held out my hand. Hewie eyed it suspiciously.

“You’ll have to jump onto my horse. I don’t think it can take both of us, but –“

“No.”

“…What?

“You heard me,” he sneered contemptuously and smacked my hand away. “I’m not getting down from this moose.”

“Please, sir. I think you know this is not the moose you thought it was.”

“No, you’re right about that. Because now I see clearly…”

Fresh sweat was collecting along his hairline. He grinned to reassure me, but I’m certain at that point everything was calculated to reassure himself.

“Yes, it has become a sign from Nature itself! What was once a moose, king of the hooved beasts, is now melting away because of what we, humans, are doing to his rightful kingdom! Taking and taking, gluttonous for what is not rightfully ours…well, now I can finally do something! I can make them hear.”

Hewie extended a leg while he spoke…and gently pressed his boot into my chest.

“You tell your Hatuga that the eternal Erlking rides at night, upon his faceless moose, ready to snatch up any kiddo or careless adult who raises their hand to this beautiful forest. Was it created for us? No, we don’t deserve to take anything from it. As for me, I shall do my part. I will educate our species in a way that I couldn’t do before. Now, people will listen to me! They will have no choice, and they will hear me loud and clear!”

The gaunt man tried to push me off my horse with his foot, but he was weak. The struggle irritated him, especially since I was a kid, and he grew angrier and angrier when I would not give way. With a final effort, recovering strength he had lost with the motivating power of humiliation, he shouted one last thing in that tongue I had never heard before:

“Verbeuge dich vor den Erlkönig!”

Hewie Chase dashed madly onwards atop his deformed beast, while I was dashed against the forest floor with a broken nose where his heel had met my face, and lost consciousness.

When I awoke, the air was new – it bit with the chill of winter. My horse was long gone, so I feebly walked the long miles of bright, human-less forest back to my tribe. The sun was gentle, muted, almost as if quietly showing me that there was nothing to fear. All the way, I could not help but notice the beauty of a Hatugan morning, full of life and sounds and…ah, but not smells, for my nose had been broken and all I could smell was blood. I knew I had not dreamed, for I was alone all the way out in the northern region of the forest, with plenty of hoofprints for a trail back. But the moose did not leave footprints, and I doubted what I saw that night, in the orange mists, all the way back to the sequoia.

Reaching home, dazed and confused with a knot in my skull, I told anyone I could of the adventure. They told their friends, their friends told their children, and, next autumnal Tabidmas, the myth of the Erlking only grew deeper, with varying interpretations as to where he came from and why, and what a moose actually looked like.

Can you imagine how distressed I was? To relate this disastrous omen, clear proof to me that the very fabric of our space may not be whole, only for those who “listened” to spin their own deviations of the event into fables. Fables, I might add, that did not address a singular problem, but were tailor-made to enforce whatever lesson the storyteller desired!

I was aghast. The only solution I could think to do next was gather a group of impressionable minds, and await the return of Hewie Chase atop his dissolving moose next cycle. We numbered about seven in total, and anticipated their arrival by the horse posts. If this wasn’t a true story, he would never have shown up again, and there would have been some lesson to learn about wishing for an event to break tradition or something – but he came! Stampeding along the exact path he had the year before, Hewie and the moose passed us, clear as day to my companions.

“Verbeuge dich vor den Erlkönig!” Hewie cried, even more overwrought with foliage now than when I last saw him, as he disappeared back into the mists.

And, would you believe it? The more eyewitnesses there were, year after year, the more fables were created! He became a new tradition, a staple of our harvest folklore. Over the years, I have witnessed that Erlking take all sorts of forms, all but one: that of Hewie Chase, the unfortunate vlogger from the hotel of Montana.

Soon, the fables were all that existed. Hatugans stopped staying awake to witness that eldritch banshee gallop across the forest, and for good reason. As the years passed…well, I’m not sure exactly what happened. That is, I don’t know what happened, because I don’t know how it happened. But, whatever it was, I watched it happen. Until the very end.

As the years passed, Hewie began to lose his form. I thought he was shrinking, growing more gaunt by the day, and I never would have realized his transformation if it had not been for the change in his beloved gibberish. I used to be able to tell it was a foreign tongue, but, one Tabidmas, it wasn’t. It was actual gibberish. He was spluttering, and his tongue wasn’t forming any letters. Noises were made, but no sense was made of them.

The next year, all I heard was muffled screaming. It chilled me to my bones, and I struck apace with him again, this time to force him from his mad ride. When I caught up with Hewie…God. Nothing I had seen or believed could have prepared me for what I saw. I fell off my horse in sheer terror and lost my harvest feast over a bed of mushrooms. The mists swallowed them whole, and I tried no more to follow.

I would feel disappointed in myself, but what point is the point in that? There was nothing I could do to save Hewie; the moose’s unfinished fibrous form had merged with him. He was reduced to a beating tumor on its back, squirming against what was now his own skin – a part of the moose, a part of him. Only his eyes were free, but that was just to the open air; the veins were dry, irises and pupils washed white. I don’t think he saw me, I don’t think he could see me…but I’m not sure. I’m not sure.

I avoided staying awake through Tabidmas Eve from then on out. I did not stop searching for Hewie’s strange land of Montana, or scouring the forest of Hatuga for more vloggers like him, or experimenting with herbs and the properties of the mist to explain what metamorphosis was overcoming that moose. And, no matter how high or low I looked, I never saw another moose again – whole or not.

I’m telling this true story again, after decades of silence, because I finally gathered the courage to see Hewie again, last night. Four decades have passed, so I don’t know what I was expecting…but what I saw was more than I would ever expect in eight decades.

Hewie and the moose, still joined together as one, had now merged with the mists. The wind now moved with them, like a gelatinous phantom – though you could still see the shape of that foolish Erlking atop his undead steed. The only hoofbeats that sounded now were like echoes from the past as the pair soared across Hatuga, going who-knows-where, for reasons that only the God of the forest knows.

I had worried for years, what tidings this phenomenon brought. What was I supposed to learn from Hewie and the moose, that I could warn my fellow Hatugans so we could prepare for the worst? Nothing, apparently – nothing came of it. Whether virus, or chemical, or magical, I also never understood what happened to Hewie, and why he and that malformed moose ended up in Hatuga from wherever they came. My first, and most outlandish, concern, was that their arrival harkened a spatial tear, one that might join our forest of Hatuga with that of a foreign, alien sphere. But our science is only so far along, that, even if that were the case, there is nothing we could do about it. The only mark I’ve got that shows I tried to do anything, is the grey mucous from when I tried to take hold of the moose by its horns. Whatever it was made of, it dried to my nails, weighing them down like stone, and I’ve never managed to peel it off.

Seeing Hewie like that last night, no more than a fleetingly solid figment of the mists, I can only presume he and his moose were an anomaly. They accidentally came to our forest by forbidden means, and now reality is snubbing them out. That is the only explanation I can think of, and it’s…disappointing. All these years, steeling myself for a world-shattering event, and I am only privy to a natural, albeit ethereal, occurrence that the forest is handling on its own. What were my years of fear for, then? Why did I disregard the importance of the fable, in addressing what we can, in fact, control? It wasn’t in an effort to help Hewie, that’s for sure – even as he refused help.

No, I can only help him in one way now. I can craft my own fable around these true events – one that speaks for him personally, for what he wanted to do, and keeps the spirit of that fading Erlking ever tangible. None of us would exist without stories, after all. Not one bit of us.

---

---

It is an indisputable fact that the forest of Hatuga is very much a forest. If there was ever a standard by which forests were defined, there is no doubt that Hatuga would be said standard. True, there is much to associate with a name, much you could expect from a “forest”…but not all of those expectations might be true. Hatuga, you see, is a forest filled with many types of everything – a little bit of this, a dash of that, and a whole helping of whatever you never expect. Sometimes the biggest surprise, when faced with a this or a that, is something you don’t expect to find in yourself. That expectation is the hardest to control, for it can change when you least expect it. Meanwhile, the rest of Hatuga remains as it has always remained.

Here is one thing you might not expect: in the eastern middle of the forest, at the edge of a small clearing amidst a grove of mangos, buried hundreds of feet beneath a canopy of tropical trees, protrudes a dome. There is not one hint of civilization besides that dome, sitting atop an untouched field of Zoysia grass and daisies. Beset on all curves by translucent glass, light from the sun gently pierces the foliage to glaze off its fragile armour – one would think it was for show only, if they allowed themselves to be blinded a first glance. But there is a way inside –
the only entrance into this tropical igloo – through a cedar door of smallish height sitting at the end of a tunnel. One can see a shape inside bustling about, so let us enter to greet it.

The eye is promptly overwhelmed with shelves upon shelves towering tall as houses, stocked with ancient tomes and vast records of knowledge from all across the globe. These are scaffolded across uneven floors, connected by woven ladders, cradling volumes in pristine shape evidenced by leathery pheromones freshening the air – a greenhouse curating literature.

This dome was, in fact, a library. No one knows who built it or for whom, but it came to be there all the same, and one can get the gist as to whom the intended audience was: There is not much fiction besides classic novels, there are no comics, there is no technology; only the stores of objective scientific fact and subjective theories that comprise the epistemological system of man’s meaning-making faculties. In other words, just a bunch of big books with big words on big subjects for big boys and girls. It is a house for expanding understanding.

The curator, though, was neither a big boy nor a big girl. He was an orangutan, a relatively young one (about two-hundred and thirty-two years old in a month), who took up residency within the glass library. He had given himself the name Wswiasage Panatok-Unteras, an ancient name from the language of the Faded Civilization. Those who visited the library simply addressed him as “Mr. Sage.” He insisted upon it, for familiarity’s sake.

Normally, the library was filled with readers, scholars, and the generally curious. But today was a Sunday, a day Mr. Sage closed his doors upon, so that he might have a break from research to participate in recreational occupations. One can only expand their mind so much, before the brain grows tired and needs to discharge before leaping back into the page. That is why Mr. Sage always looked forward to Sundays as a necessity.

This Sunday, however, was more than any regular Sunday. This Sunday, Mr. Sage was in an especially jovial mood. A hospitable mood. It couldn’t be anything other than hospitable, after all, since the reason this Sunday was so special had something to do with a guest coming to tea that afternoon. And there is nothing a civilized ape enjoys more than a jolly-good, old-fashioned tea party.

Flipping out of a hammock strung between the “O” Section (a knowing coincidence on the orangutan’s part), Mr. Sage daintily plucked up a comb to brush his coarse coat thrice over. Snatching the chain of his bronze pocketwatch, he glanced the time just as the library clock chimed nine. An hour left for preparations.

Hurrying on his knuckles, Mr. Sage scaled the spiral staircase to a small enclave, hidden on a beam near the roof. In that enclave was stashed his dashing wardrobe, hung with threads of different eras and hats of every genre. Classical was the theme today, and that simian librarian had the perfect outfit picked out. He threw on a velvet vest and powdered wig, topped it with a bowler hat, lowered the pocketwatch into his coat, and slid on a pair of white gloves. There was no need for pants or shoes, since the party would be held indoors. He almost forgot his bowtie in the hurry.

When he had finished, the orangutan beheld himself in the mirror. He was a gangly mammal, but long arms and short legs are very becoming on his species.

“There are great apes,” said Mr. Sage, complimenting his reflection, “and then there are grand apes. You, my handsome chap, are the grandest ape there is.”

A conceited notion, perhaps, but not if you consider just how learned Mr. Sage really is. Truly, he had read every book in that library, front to back, becoming a walking, talking library himself. No one was more pleased than Mr. Sage to impart wisdom upon his companions, today especially. For it was today that he would reunite with an old friend, one whom he had not seen in ages. Last time they met, she was but a little girl. He, an uneducated monkey. They would play in the trees together, cracking open coconuts to wear as hats while feasting on the tender sweetness of the Honey Globe. Rolling around the forest on top of thick Hami, child and monkey spent their youth in the pleasant distraction of dreams. The stars were maps of their future, and they would trace the lines together in the cool midmorning.

They might still be but children in age, for Hatugans grow at a very slow rate, but their desires do not remain so static. Mr. Sage was excited to see, over their newfound tradition of tea, which constellation his old friend’s interests had spied and pursued. And he had a surprise for her in relation to their stargazing hobby; a surprise that he could hardly wait any longer to share.

Not long after the table had been set, arrangements prepared…a knock at the door! With a hop and a skip and a shamble, Mr. Sage swung as fast as he could towards the sound. He landed with a lumber towards the entrance, flicked up the latch, and gave a bow upon flinging open the hatch.

“You rang-utan?”

Mr. Sage chuckled at this little lame joke and glanced up to see his guest’s reaction.

What stood before him came as a shock. Surely this was not the same girl he gazed up at the stars with, all those years ago? Yet, despite being quite aged now, she is dressed in the same plaid jumper and frilled shirt she wore as a child. But he marked that jumper unraveled at the hem, that blouse yellowed from white, both held together more by mud than thread. Her face and hair were just as filthy, the latter frayed and knotted and the former clogged to the pores. She bared her rotten teeth and inflamed gums at him, trying to smile, but lacking the muscle-memory for it.

Mr. Sage wasn’t simply aghast; he was seriously debating whether or not he should let such a swamp creature into his treasured library. But he was a gentleman, and no Grand Ape would turn away an honored guest – no matter how seemingly undeserving of honor they appeared. Had he not read so many stories preaching, “Don’t judge a book by its cover?” So the host stepped aside, beckoned his guest in, and asked politely, “Would you like to freshen up first?” He had not even finished his offer when the girl ducked down, grabbed a palmful of mud and smeared it enthusiastically across her neck. This answered any further attempts Mr. Sage could take to preserve his tidy environment.

Not to be put down by a disappointment, Mr. Sage led his old friend into the atrium.

“Let me first say, it is a singular pleasure to see you again after all these years. I was not sure my invitation would find you, given the current state of carrier pigeons, but it looks as though my doubts are unfounded! If you would be so obliging, I would be pleased to show you the full extent of this –“

Mr. Sage turned just in time to see his guest tugging on both ends of a volume of “Principles of Hematology,” trying her best to tear it in half. The poor orangutan was so rattled that he hooted (a no-no in his self-education to be more man than monkey) and snatched it out of her grubby hands.

“Why do you do this?”

The girl shrieked like a chimpanzee and crouched down on her knuckles. This shocked Mr. Sage out of anger. Afraid he had offended, he recomposed himself and tried again.

“My apologies, old friend. I don’t mean to be forceful, but please respect my efforts in amassing this accumulation of literature! Every volume was sought for a reason, and I’d hate to see vandalism come to even one.”

Still leering with suspicious eyes, the girl straightened back up and redirected her focus to the mud on her forearm. She went to work, gnawing at it distractedly. Mr. Sage continued the tour – though he couldn’t quite tell if his guest comprehended a single explanation. Or, at the very least, harbored a shred of interest. As they weaved on through trees formed of stacked books, Mr. Sage assumed it was the latter. Concerned about his capabilities as a host, he decided to skip forward in the schedule. Only for her benefit, of course.

“What do you think,” he urged, “about breaking for tea?”

The proposition passed unmarked over the earthy girl’s head, and so Mr. Sage determined that the break would be for his own peace of mind, if not for hers.

When they reached the dining table, tucked away above hundreds of winding rope stairs to a sequestered nook where a towering window filtered dawn’s faint rays as a greenish-blue hue all across the library, the guest was imbued with newfound energy. She hooted and screeched, hobbled over to the window, bunched up her nose against the tempered glass – completely missing the artistic array of finger sandwiches. Was it for the cool of the touch, or the view outside? Mr. Sage grew weary trying to figure out this backwards puzzle, but at least there was hope in the new excitement animating her movements.

He successfully leads her back to the table, with much coaxing, and – lo and behold! She sits properly in the chair! Somewhere in there, buried beneath a layer of grime, the friend Mr. Sage once knew must have retained a sliver of memory for their teatime tradition. Oh, he was ecstatic!

“Wait right here. Help yourself to some sandwiches. I’ll be back with the tea, tout suite!”

Mr. Sage left his guest at the table, unaccompanied, and clambered across a rope to his kitchen. The jade teakettle whistled atop its flaming perch, right on time – Up it was plucked with the delicacy of a savant, guiding the marinated water into two porcelain teacups by the dipping of smooth, furry hands. As the Orangutan poured, his expectations rising, he could not help thinking – for, how could he? – about what nature of change had befallen his past companion.

“It is peculiar…” he mused, “that she would specifically degenerate her behavior to that of an ape. Which is of course, what I happen to be by nature. Is this some sort of retribution to me, for having not reached out to her sooner? Is she secretly mocking how far I have come in self-betterment? Or have I advanced my intelligence so far that now she sounds like little more than a beast?”

Mr. Sage twirled his orange beard and chose not to think too hard on these skepticisms. Remember: do not judge a book by its cover! The girl chose to act this way for reasons known by her alone – Mr. Sage had no claim to control over her. But, perhaps, she would see how he is – his patience for her sake – and it would move her to be a smidge more considerate. All this modest ape desired was a smidge of human goodwill from her, so that there would be reason for continued human goodwill from him.

A clatter announced the tea tray’s flight across the ladder back to the long table where the girl sat, bewilderingly without any signs of an upset while Mr. Sage was away. She seemed mesmerized by the distorted world outside the window; peaceably, in that vignette, she appeared of contemplative intelligence and measured emotion. Her host looked out the window, towards whatever she could be staring at, but it was no use – the only view beyond the glass were faint outlines of existence outside the library, and a swirl of pale hues born from green. The orangutan swung into his seat, then slid one of the teacups across to his old friend.

The girl broke from her trance to catch the gift. She eyed Mr. Sage, still suspicious, as he raised his own teacup: a toast! She hooted softly, raised the teacup, took a loud slurp.

Mr. Sage nearly falls out of his chair from fright as something whizzes past his ear and shatters behind him! Their false peace broken again by the girl, who had hurled her teacup at the grand ape! A terrible shot she is, though Mr. Sage wished she had hit him instead – that would give him a reason to toss her out, and spare his collection. But she is a terrible shot, so now the cookbooks behind him are cursed, cursed with the odor of eternally staling Earl Grey.

The girl screeched and clapped wildly with delight. She leapt onto the table, seized with the throes of a manic dance. Sandwiches are punted over the balcony, butter is smeared into the silk doilies, and the tea party is, in effect, indisputably ruined.

Oh, distressing day! Mr. Sage mourns the broken serenity of this, the only haven he has ever known, and for a split second considers tossing his guest out the window by the hem of her grungy jumper, assault or not. He opted instead for a heated lecturing.

“What is your grievance with me, miss?” lamented the generally calm gentle-ape. “I invited you here to share the riches of my gorgeous library, and you have responded with offended shrieks and unwarranted violence! Yes, I suppose you might argue, I own none of these books – but this reality makes it all the more outrageous. Why would you to so irreparably spurn that which I share with your fellow Hatugans?”

A wild series of hoots was the answer – response that could only be interpreted as drowning his reprimands out. But it did succeed in halting her jaunty dance. Mr. Sage did not cower, despite his self-judgment as a prejudicial villain, but continued.

“Does our past mean nothing? Memories of catching fireflies near the Gnuggin River? Plucking fresh fruit from Waffletripe trees, so refreshing under the hot noonday sun! When I think back to the constellations in those summer skies – how crabulous Cancer inspired hunger, how haughty Hercules inspired awe – I can only mark how the you I knew then has faded away, as those bright celestial patterns! And what once was fills me with deep despair.”

Mr. Sage was so caught up in his lamentations, too busy dabbing his eyes with the tablecloth, that he did not realize how his woe touched the jungle child. She stopped hooting, staring simply at him, perplexed. Her eyes lowered from his wrinkled brow, began searching for something among the rubble of deli and spreads.

Her eyes lit up at a paper napkin. Dexterously, the girl set to work – folding this way and that, with a crease here and a cut there – so absorbed that even Mr. Sage was pulled from dismay into curiosity. Eventually, the girl crept forward, head bowed, and offered the finished product to her host.

Behold, though it be shabby and without finesse, a modest origami crab. A tender gift, not expected from the likes of this unrestrained jungle child.

Hope! The enlightening feeling that filled Mr. Sage with energy and compassion could only be attributed as such. He gingerly took it, as though it might be deception, and studied the form.

Mr. Sage hooted in excitement. The girl perked up. She hooted as well. Soon, the two were screeching happily together, jigging atop the table arm-in-arm. To think, language was the only barrier between the present and the past. Mr. Sage lowered his restrain, and now they were equals once more. These two opposites, man and monkey, enjoyed an afternoon filled with feats of daring, abusing the library’s isolationist approach of staggered alphabetizing to leap off ledges and bound across bookshelves.

They laughed when the sun set, plopping down in exhaustion between the X section. There, they lay a while, and Mr. Sage was certain; his old friend was ready to see his surprise. Humming softly, he helped the girl to her feet. She seemed so tired that she might crawl onto one of the shelves and sleep, but curiosity lured her along like a somnambulist. That, and Mr. Sage’s impromptu excitement to see her reaction to what he had to offer.

Up, up, up the winding stairs into another loft. Further up a ladder into the top of the glass dome Mr. Sage led her, oil lantern in hand – an observatory. There was little up this high but a clear view in all directions, still not high enough to breach the canopy. In the center of this sacred space was an artifact of an older time, Mr. Sage’s true treasure: a rusted telescope.

He placed the oil lantern on a table near the door. Ushering his guest towards the telescope, the orangutan mimed for her to peer into the eyepiece. She was wary at first, but so tired that her eye eventually rested on it for support.

Oh, Heavens! There they were, in all their spatial splendor, a glittering refraction for worlds light-years away! The girl appeared to be struck speechless, and Mr. Sage pointed out the fragments of constellations they used to watch, whose environment had long since changed and reduced those ancient heroes and beasts to stardust. But one still remained visible as a point of reference. That old crab, Cancer, whose pincers had only grown longer and shell had only hardened, remained firmly rooted in his spot among the stars. He surveyed the remains of his comrades from below, buried beneath the refuse of new planets and the bones of the old, untouched by time and dislight.

Yawning, the jungle girl moved away from the telescope and curled into a ball on the hand-woven rug, woven by Mr. Sage himself to mirror the night sky. She completely ignored the two lawn chairs he had set up for them – another pair of antiques from the old world that the grand ape had acquired – but he chuckled good-naturedly to himself and let her be. Why impose on what makes her comfortable, as uncomfortable as it might seem to him? There are those who prefer to lounge in lawn chairs, and there are those who prefer the rug. In fact, given that he wove it himself, he was flattered a little – perhaps his guest did appreciate his hospitality, after all.

Mr. Sage settled into one of the lawn chairs, smiling and relieved that he had found his old friend again, buried deep beneath mud and aversion to decency. He was so happy, so content, that he drifted into a lullaby that they had once composed together during sleepless nights. Their Cosmic Lullaby:

“A veil of peace covers Earth –
A cloak of darkness smothers mirth –
In the black expanse of space, comets keep their pace
To the sound of stars’ sweet symphony.

Betelgeuse orchestrates –
Sirius bright illuminates –
Radiating tempo, collision course crescendo,
With the sound of stars’ sweet symphony.

Pirouette, Rond de jambe,
Pirouette, Rond de jambe
Twirls Nehtor, cosmic dancer.
Chasse, whisk,
Chasse, wing,
Leading on clumsy Cancer.
A beacon of light as they waltz through the night
And lull the universe to rest.

Musicians of the void
Plucking passing asteroids –
Watch the galactic, climactic, unfold.
With every tuneful tinkle those time-old trumpets twinkle
And another starry serenade grows cold.“

His friend snored, very loud and without reserve. This vulnerability pleased the Grand Ape, and made the mess they left across his library almost agreeable. A worthy sacrifice, to get her to know him again! The knowledge to reach and reconnect to another’s heart, against all forces of nature, is very rare to come by; rarer than most of the literature Mr. Sage possessed.

Mr. Sage’s consciousness drifted away into that river above them as it flowed on through the tunnel of time, from dimensions and into dimensions that existed far beyond their own little place in space. He was slow to sleep.

But he was quick to wake, when a clatter startled him back to his head. Mr. Sage rolled around in his chair, eyes already well adjusted to darkness. But his heart was not adjusted enough to see his rediscovered friend, his guest, the jungle girl, with telescope tucked under her arm. There was animalistic fear in her dilated eyes, directed at him. Mr. Sage held his palms outstretched, showing he meant no harm. There was a pause in time, the only observers of the moment those unfeeling gaseous denizens above.

The jungle girl fled, knocking the oil lamp near the door. It teetered for a second, spilling its rank insides onto the table and the rug, then dashed to flames amidst the spill. Mr. Sage was stalled for a minute as he got tangled up in the lawn chair, snapping it at the hinges. Without a second to spare, he rolled up the carpet he had crafted himself, a work of art in its own right, and smothered the flames as best he could. But the damage had been done.

But the girl, in her mad dash, tracked the oil down, down the winding stairs, between the aisles, over the sociable coffee bar and under the ambient art pieces. Each footprint was matched by flames, carried by the wind and their own nature. Mr. Sage scrambled down the ladder, round and round the stairs, but it was too late. He arrived to see his books burning beneath a sky of fire, histories caught up in speedy deterioration as they were licked and chewed and finally devoured by thousands of ravenous tongues. Shelves tumbled into crumbling heaps, pages swirled in a whirlwind unclassified by leather bindings, and the smell of dying tomes was almost enough to strangle the sky. Those grubby flames reached for Mr. Sage, too, but he tore himself away from his terrified stupor and ran for the exit. He managed to salvage a cookbook and a cosmic atlas, one under each arm, as he ducked and dodged the collapsing ceiling. Mr. Sage plunged into the cool purgatory between midnight and dawn just before the fire. Behind him, the library’s glass dome swelled and burst. The books he saved protected him with their thick coats as glass rained down and settled like fresh dew on the grass.

Mr. Sage heaved the books off of his singed body. Tears from smoke and years wasted clouded his vision. He heard rustling in the undergrowth nearby, and could just make out his guest fleeing into the morning, his rusted telescope – meant to be shared as a mutual gift – still lodged under her arm. She limped away with wild abandon, and the ape knew he would never see her again. He did not want to ever see her again. She did not belong in his world, and he did not belong in hers. Their friction would only create the sparks of all-encompassing loss.

Mr. Sage lay back on the bed of grassy glass, feeling not much of anything. He tried to remind himself that he was a Grand Ape, and could rebuild. Hatuga needed his knowledge, after all. But he could not help second-guessing his assurances, and even his understanding of the forest, as the library reached further, further towards the heavens as a tower of fire. Mr. Sage’s sanctuary burned all night, witnessed across all Hatuga over the canopy of trees that once sheltered it.

Under the smoke and the light of the pyre, Mr. Sage stretched out on the jungle floor. He tried to return to sleep – he tried very hard. But he had lost sight of the stars.

---