There were people on the beach. Two, a man and a woman, standing hand in hand, watching the sunrise.
Guy and his adopted family stood just at the edge of the tree line, watching the strangers warily. Guy wasn't sure how to feel. He had hoped that others had found their way here, that he and the Croods weren't the last people left in the whole world, but Guy's instincts had not gone so silent that he did not recognize a potential threat to his territory when he saw one. They would need to handle this carefully. He felt Grug shift behind him and knew the caveman was thinking the same.
But there were only two of them. How much trouble could they be? And if there were more than two, better to start with the small group than wait until whatever friends they had brought along showed up.
"Well," Grug said grudgingly, apparently reaching the same conclusion. "I guess we better go say hello. Everybody stay close." He glanced down at Guy, who looked up at him and nodded. The two of them went first, the rest of the family trailing in a close knot behind them.
As they got closer, Guy sucked in a breath between his teeth. "Grug," he said in a low voice. "Let me do the talking?"
"Yeah," Grug said, taking in the stripes that the newcomers wore painted on their bodies. "Be careful."
Guy moved a step or two ahead, and opened his mouth to call a greeting.
Then the newcomers turned, and he stopped dead in his tracks. His throat worked, but no sound came out.
"Guy?" Grug muttered. Eep pushed her way to the front and touched his arm.
The strangers began to move closer to them, and Guy's heart beat harder in his throat as he looked at the woman. She was slender and rather tall, with prominent cheekbones in a narrow face and eyes so dark they looked black. As they drew near, she frowned, her head tilting to the side, looking confused.
"Mom?" he whispered. Distantly he heard Eep gasp, felt her hand tighten around his arm, but all of his attention was focused on the face he hadn't seen in so many years.
The woman's eyes widened slightly, and she suddenly lunged forward. Grug caught Eep by the arm just in time to stop her from leaping in front of Guy. The woman who looked like his mother took Guy's face in her hands, and they stared at each other, both seeking, both disbelieving.
"Guy?" the woman whispered at last.
"Mom?" his voice cracked and trembled like a little boy's.
His mother burst into tears and threw her arms around him, suddenly real and warm and alive. He could feel her pulse in her throat where it pressed against his cheek.
Shaking from head to toe, Guy looked over her shoulder at the man who stood behind her, bare to the waist, his chest crossed with dyed stripes. His eyes were alert and he had a wide mouth with full lips. He wore a feathered pouch on his hip. His shoulders were broad over a narrow waist and long legs.
"Dad?" Guy asked, his hands raising numbly to his sobbing mother's back.
"Hello, son," his father said, his voice thick with emotion. "It's been a long time."
"I don't...understand," Guy said faintly, and then he was falling.
AN: I'll be first to admit this is kind of a weird idea, and it really doesn't make that much sense, but I couldn't get the idea out of my head. If you can suspend belief long enough to accept the premise, I'll try to make it a fun ride.