10/13/2025, 2:38 PM
too young to have felt the rich heat of summer or the green warmth of springtime, pup’s present was soaked and wet, his tenuous connection to consciousness bound only by the beat of sekka’s heart.
slowly he began to fade in and out of charcoal mists, new brain playing out a choreograph of sounds and smells, those first indentations that in time might become memory. pup had no ability to conceptualize time nor measure it; the sum of his seconds were marked by the sound of claws on stone, of muscles tensing where he was not able to see, of breaths held deep in sekka’s belly, of the way air puffed out around him on raw exhalation when not-oba slid or had to clutch for extra purchase.
home had been a peninsula, a little collection of lodges and a people who hunted the sea creatures. pup would not have known most of these descriptive words; he would remember the sound of waves, the taste of salt tangled in another’s fur, the hint of copper which would always hang with oba’s own smell. he would remember the glow of a full moon upon the ocean and how it had made him feel to see sun over sea for the first time.
beneath the onslaught of senses, these things were losing their color.
ama’s fur had smelled like – like her, milk and meat and things outside. his tormented mind reconnected sekka to that first scent of herbs, then to the man himself.
the going was an ouroboros unto itself, but pup struggled to keep his blurring eyes open on the crags and slopes and hollows passing below his feet.
when the path seemed to beckon smoothness, the boy blinked. there were stars under him, stars above. a darkness broken by light.
sekka’s heartbeat was more even. his breaths were not scared. these things reassured pup enough to surrender, and he fainted, stress and hunger and chill exacting its second toll from the child.
the stars flew up and he rose with them. the time of forgetting eased the ache in his chest, and he raised his arms to fill with beautiful light.
slowly he began to fade in and out of charcoal mists, new brain playing out a choreograph of sounds and smells, those first indentations that in time might become memory. pup had no ability to conceptualize time nor measure it; the sum of his seconds were marked by the sound of claws on stone, of muscles tensing where he was not able to see, of breaths held deep in sekka’s belly, of the way air puffed out around him on raw exhalation when not-oba slid or had to clutch for extra purchase.
home had been a peninsula, a little collection of lodges and a people who hunted the sea creatures. pup would not have known most of these descriptive words; he would remember the sound of waves, the taste of salt tangled in another’s fur, the hint of copper which would always hang with oba’s own smell. he would remember the glow of a full moon upon the ocean and how it had made him feel to see sun over sea for the first time.
beneath the onslaught of senses, these things were losing their color.
ama’s fur had smelled like – like her, milk and meat and things outside. his tormented mind reconnected sekka to that first scent of herbs, then to the man himself.
the going was an ouroboros unto itself, but pup struggled to keep his blurring eyes open on the crags and slopes and hollows passing below his feet.
when the path seemed to beckon smoothness, the boy blinked. there were stars under him, stars above. a darkness broken by light.
sekka’s heartbeat was more even. his breaths were not scared. these things reassured pup enough to surrender, and he fainted, stress and hunger and chill exacting its second toll from the child.
the stars flew up and he rose with them. the time of forgetting eased the ache in his chest, and he raised his arms to fill with beautiful light.
