Genesis & Instinct: Ordinary Days
((September 27th, 2149))
Sleeping.
He first opened his eyes when the sky was dark, woken up by a nightmare (in which his father found his shelter and destroyed everything he had there). He stretched his legs, turned to lie on his left side and went back to sleep.
He woke up again later on, but the sky was still pitch black. He felt as if he had just had another nightmare, but, as soon as he woke, he forgot what it had been about. That was a good thing, though; remembering them did nothing except annoy him. He looked at the campfire that was burning near his bed. The flames seemed a little weak. He yawned, got up, put more pieces of wood in, and then he went back to bed. He lay down, curled up into a ball under his blanket, and he fell asleep.
When he woke up again (from a dreamless sleep for once), it was morning. The campfire was slowly burning out. The sun, on the other hand, was up and shining; the weather was quite warm, actually. He was grateful for that. He stretched himself, he rubbed his face, and he got up.
Morning routine.
He picked up a canteen, which held some leftover water from the previous night. He did not drink right out of it; instead, he poured the liquid into a wooden cup. There was really no reason for him to take that extra step, apart from the fact that it made him feel a little more civilized. He drank the water, then put the cup down.
He cleared his throat. "Good morning to me," he said out loud. "Good, good morning…" He listened to the sound of his voice and focused on the way his throat felt. After a brief evaluation, he nodded to himself. "Good enough."
He took off his jacket and put his holster on instead. Then he walked off to relieve himself; nature was calling. Once that was done, he brushed his teeth with a walnut twig.
Food.
He needed to try and find something to eat. His stomach was rumbling. He grabbed his bag and left the site of his shelter.
First, he decided to check the traps he had laid around the area. Something—an instinct, a sixth sense of some sort—was telling him that today would be the day he would find a good meal caught in one of them. A nice, tasty gallusaur, perhaps; he had seen those around. And besides, it had been a while since any animal had fallen victim to his trap; it wouldn't be fair if it didn't happen again soon, he thought.
He started with the nearest trap. Sadly, he was out of luck. Nothing was caught there. Oh, well! He had a few more to check; perhaps he would get lucky at the next one…
Nope. Big fat nothing again. He blamed his father for that. (Nobody could question his logic there, mainly because there was no logic to begin with.)
That nothing turned out to be the exact same nothing he found at the next trap. And all of the other traps in the area. His instinct must have been wrong. Actually, if he were being honest with himself, it was the third day in a row he believed a sixth sense was telling him he would find something there. The other two days had been fruitless as well. (Actually, if he were being really honest with himself, it was more of a wishful thinking than a sixth sense. Same difference.)
He did end up finding a bunch of grubs, though; not as good as a gallusaur would have been, but they were much, much better than nothing. He took them as well as fresh water to his shelter. Once he was back, he sat down onto a fallen tree's log. He poured some water in his cup and put the grubs in a wooden bowl. Again, he did not have to do that, but he liked doing it. He liked feeling like a civilized human being, not a primitive animal like all the creatures around him. Civilized humans drank from cups and glasses. Civilized humans ate from plates and bowls. And if civilized humans did it, so would he.
He proceeded to stuff all the grubs in his mouth with his hands.
After breakfast, he pulled his plex out of his bag.
Work.
He turned the plex on. He opened the file with the data he had collected from the portal a day earlier. Then he studied the numbers on the screen.
If someone had walked in on him, chances were they would have thought he was frozen. He was just sitting there, staring at the screen, not moving at all. (Okay, he did move occasionally to scroll to another page of the file. And to adjust his position if the one he was sitting in became uncomfortable. And to drink water when he was thirsty. And once to go relieve himself. Still, he was motionless longer than not.) His mind, however, was filled to the brim with action, movement and change. His mind processed all the numbers he was staring at and made them work for him.
He did that until his hunger came back and thoughts of food became too distracting.
Lunch break.
Actually, 'toilet' break first, lunch break later; his bladder needed emptying again (he had drunk a lot of water). Unfortunately, his lunch ended up being more meager than his breakfast. It did satisfy his stomach enough to let him focus, though.
Work.
Another break a couple of hours later.
Not because he was hungry, just because he was getting tired. He needed a rest. He worried that, if he were to continue, his head would start to hurt; thinking was not easy with a headache.
He considered doing something fun to relax, but then he looked up at the sky. The sun was really shining brightly that day. The weather was unusually warm for that part of the year, but he could feel wind blowing as well (not strongly, but he felt it). It was a great day for doing laundry; he had to take advantage of that. He packed up his plex, stuffed his blanket in the bag as well, grabbed his jacket, and then he set off.
He went to a nearby waterfall. There was a rather shallow body of water at the bottom, a river going down from there and a small clearing around. At the edge of the clearing, close to the mountain the stream of water fell from, grew a number of bushes. He knew they held an edible kind of berries, but the last time he had taken a look at them, the berries had yet to ripen. He made a mental note to check them later while his clothes were drying off.
He put his bag down on the ground, and then he began doing his laundry. He started with the jacket; after washing it, he wrung it out and hung it on the branches of a nearby lonely tree. He took off his pants (those and the jacket took the longest to dry), washed them, wrung them out and hung them. Took off his shirt, washed, wrung and hung. Repeated the process with every piece of clothing until he was dressed in nothing but his birthday suit—the only thing left to clean. After washing himself (quite thoroughly, rubbing every part of his body until he was satisfied), he took his blanket and used it to dry himself up.
While waiting for his clothes to dry, he went to take a look at the berries. Most of them, he noted, were pink in color, but a few were the right shade of red they were supposed to be when ripe and ready to be eaten. Which was exactly what he did. He picked every single red berry he could find, then ate them one by one. The pink ones, he left those untouched; he would come back for them at a later date.
When there were no more ripe berries left, he went for his bag. He pulled out the plex and began to stare at his calculations once again.
Work.
He stood up sporadically to go and feel how wet his clothes were. They were drying gradually, but they were drying. In the beautiful, warm weather, he was sure it would be done before nightfall.
When the clothes felt dry enough to his touch, he put them on. Once he was dressed, he packed his plex and blanket, and he left.
Back to his shelter.
Back to work. (Actually, back to his designated water‑passing spot, then back to work.)
When he realized the sun would set soon, he put on his jacket.
Late day routine.
He left his shelter to go collect more wood and water and hopefully some food for dinner. He ended up finding a couple of rather large insects he knew to be edible. He caught them, killed them and took them back to the shelter to roast them over a campfire.
After dinner, he worked on his calculations for a while. Then he started to feel tired. He relieved himself for the last time that day. He brushed his teeth. He made sure to add plenty of wood to the fire. He stretched himself. He took off his jacket and his holster. He put the jacket back on. He put the hood over his head. He lay down in his bed. He curled up under the blanket. Then he fell asleep.
Sleeping.
The day was about to end. He had spent the majority of it by taking care of his basic physiological needs and working on his calculations. More importantly, he had spent the entirety of it outside and alone. And most importantly, that fact barely fazed him.
Really, it had been a completely ordinary day.
(_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_)
((September 28th, 2149))
He woke up three times that night: once from a dream in which his mother died in a fire, once from a dream in which his mother died by suddenly disappearing into thin air when he hugged her, once from a dream in which his father was trying to kill him or something. He wasn't even sure, he forgot most of those nightmares upon waking. He did, however, use each opportunity to make sure his campfire was still burning. Then he turned to lie on his other side and went back to sleep.
He got up in the morning, when the sun was up. The weather was a little colder than it had been the day before, but the sun was shining.
Morning routine.
He drank water, relieved himself and brushed his teeth.
He went to look for food, starting with his traps. He was not expecting anything, though. He did not want to get his hopes up again after the last three— oh, there was a gallusaur! A gallusaur! A juvenile one, and dead as a doornail. 'Yes! I knew it!' he thought happily. His instinct was finally proven right. (Never mind that he had not actually expected it. Who had said anything about not getting his hopes up? Not him.)
With a smile as bright as the sun, he proudly carried the meat to his shelter. He wished his father had been there so he could have shoved it in the old man's disgruntled face. ('Thought I'd die of hunger in the jungle, did you? Guess again!') He had enough food for the whole day—and what delicious food it was, too! There was no better meat he could think of than a nice, roasted gallusaur. (Which was one of the reasons he had built his shelter close to their territory; that and the fact that gallusaurs were not dangerous. Not only were they smaller than humans, they did not even hunt humans for food; they only fought when provoked, as he had learned from experience…)
After breakfast, he started to work.
Work.
Breaks for drinking water, roasting more meat when he was hungry and answering nature's calls whenever necessary. Other than that, he worked and worked and worked until he felt like he was getting a headache. He needed to take a real break.
He decided to have a wash. He did not do his laundry again, though. Even his body he washed less thoroughly than the day before, with much less rubbing involved (he was not really in the mood for the thorough wash).
When he was clean enough, he pulled out his plex. He stared at the numbers for all of ten seconds, and then he decided he needed a longer break. He wanted to do something for fun, not out of necessity.
What could he do for fun? He thought about his options for a moment. Talking to himself? Eh. Talking to a tree? Not much better. Puppet theater with sticks? Wasn't really in the mood for that. Whittling?
Yeah, whittling sounded good. Even though he had no use for the product, the process was entertaining and relaxing. A perfect activity when he wanted to have a lazy day and rest.
It did not take long before he found a large, thick twig he was sure would serve his purpose well. He brought it with him to the shelter. He sat down on a fallen tree's log, pulled out his knife, then looked at the twig. What could he whittle from it? An image of a monkey popped into his head. It was actually the animal he whittled most often, but that did not mean he could not do it again. With a shape in mind, he firmly gripped the knife and made the first, long cut.
He whittled for a while, but he did not finish making his desired animal that day. Once he felt relaxed enough, his threatening headache nowhere in sight, he put the piece of wood away and went back to work.
He spent the rest of the day working, drinking water, eating roasted gallusaur meat and relieving himself whenever necessary. When he started to feel tired, he brushed his teeth and went to bed.
Another ordinary day had passed by. And he knew the next one would not be different.
(_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_)
((September 29th, 2149))
He woke up only once in the middle of the night, from a nightmare in which he was chased by a nykoraptor. In the morning, he dreamed that his father was berating him. Harshly. Touching all the raw nerves.
When he got up, he looked up at the sky. It was more cloudy that morning than it had been over the past couple of days. The wind had picked up, too. It would rain later on, he could feel it in his bones. He frowned, then went to relieve himself and brush his teeth.
Eating, drinking, then working.
Working, eating, drinking, answering nature's calls, that was the majority of his day. He had a quick wash in the afternoon like the day before. He whittled for a while when he started getting sick of spending the whole day staring at numbers. Then back to working, eating, drinking and answering nature's calls.
It hadn't started raining yet, but the clouds were getting darker.
When he was getting ready to go to sleep, as he was brushing his teeth, the first raindrops of the day hit the treetops above him. He sighed. There it was…
Raining buckets, lighting striking left and right, and the wind grew stronger than he had anticipated.
At the end of the day, he was sitting on the bed. He was hugging his legs and had a blanket wrapped around his body, but he still shivered like a lap dog on the street. He sat there, and he thought about late 2137, the coldest days he had ever experienced. Even though he hated being cold, he wanted to go back to that time. He wanted it because, no matter how cold it had been outside, no matter how much snow had been on the ground, he'd had the chance hide from that at home. In a room with four walls—a room with central heating—, where his mother would make him hot tea and give him a warm, loving embrace whenever he needed one. Alas, he did not have that anymore. He was stuck alone, sad and cold. Shivering.
His shelter provided a simple roof, but it was nothing compared to sturdy structures of actual houses. Houses like the ones Terra Novans had in their stupid, little colony. Oh, he thought about the colony then, and he thought about his father. He pictured the old man sitting in his home, all comfy on the couch with a cup of tea in his hands, looking out the window and gloating at the idea of Lucas being miserable in the cold. He pictured that scene—and as he did, the anger that rose from his chest made him feel a little bit warmer.
When the rain thinned, he lay down and managed to fall asleep.
(_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_)
((September 30th, 2149))
KRACHKchrkch!
He was awoken by the sound (a dead man would have been awoken—the lightning must have struck close) and grumpily noted that the storm had picked up once again. He gripped the blanket tight and curled up into an even smaller ball than was usual when he slept. He would have preferred waking from a nightmare…
Which was exactly what happened in the morning (when had he fallen back asleep? he honestly didn't know). This time, it was a nightmare in which his father locked him up in an old, abandoned factory and threatened to keep him there for the rest of his life. (Wasn't too bad for a nightmare, actually. At least the factory had walls.)
The rain had stopped by then, a fact he was quite happy about. As he got up, he cleared his throat, then said out loud. "Good morning to me." He frowned; his voice sounded a little raspy. He drank some water and cleared his throat again. "How about now? Still rusty? How do I sound? Yeah, still rusty. I need to speak more. Did I speak at all yesterday? I need to speak. I have a voice; I need to use it." He also needed to relieve himself, though. He decided to take care of that first.
After doing so and after brushing his teeth, he let out a deep breath. "Okay, what now? Gotta look for something to eat. Get some work done after that. The sky seems clear, not gonna rain anymore. That's good, that's very good. Maybe I could play later, too. I'm in a mood to play. And I gotta look at my nails. They're too long. Gotta shorten them. But first I gotta eat. Get me some energy to get through another day in this place. Yeah, that's what I'm gonna do today."
And that was exactly what he did.
(_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_)
((October 1st, 2149))
Physiological needs (searching for food took him particularly long that day), working (he did that just for a little while—his struggle to find something to eat ruined his mood and he was not able to focus) and whittling. Also, at one point, an argument with a tree (an actual yelling‑and‑waving‑his‑arms‑like‑a‑madman kind of argument).
"Nothing," he muttered under his breath while foraging, "can't find anything. This is his fault. He's the one who sent me here. I bet he knows. He knows I'm looking right now. He knows I can't find anything. Bet that makes him real happy. But I'm gonna find something. I am." He looked up at a random tree in front of him and said out loud, "Friend, do you have any idea where I could find some food?"
Silence.
"You know, when I said 'food,' I meant food for humans. Something I could eat."
Silence.
"I can't eat that, that's poisonous."
Silence.
"What do you mean, 'exactly'?!"
Silence.
"Wh-why would you say such a thing to me? What did I ever do to you?"
Silence.
"I am not!"
Silence.
"How would you know? You've never even talked to me before."
Silence.
"That's not true! I was just… playing around. Like I'm doing now. Nothing wrong with that."
Silence.
"Well, I happen to enjoy it."
Silence.
"I care."
Silence.
"Wha— Don't you say that to me! Take that back! You take that back right now!"
Silence.
"You wanna bet?"
Silence.
"Am not!"
Silence.
"No, you are!"
Silence.
"Oh, o-kay. Well, you know what? I hope someone chops you down and turns you into a campfire."
Silence.
"Oh, maybe I will!"
Silence.
"You think I won't?"
Silence.
"Yeah, tell you what, I'll remember you, and soon as I get an axe, I'm coming here and I'm taking you down."
Silence.
"You wanna try me?"
Silence.
"Oh, say that again. Say that again to me, I dare you."
Silence.
He gasped and raised his hands defensively. "Okay, now you took it too far. Waaay too far. Take that back!"
Silence.
"I said take it back!"
Silence.
"Take it back now!"
Silence.
"Oh, you won't huh?" he said calmly all of sudden, slowly walking closer to the tree. "Well, how about I do this then?" With his left hand, he reached for a branch above his head, pulling it down. With his right hand, he grasped one of the leaves that grew on it. "Would you like me to rip this off?" he asked while the knuckles of his left hand turned white.
Silence.
"Well, then maybe I should do it."
Silence.
"Fine." And he ripped the little leaf off and tossed it away. He did not let go of the branch just yet, though. "How about now? Will you take it back? And keep in mind, Mr. Tree, you have plenty more leaves for me to rip. I can do this aaall day…"
Silence.
"Oh, don't be so stubborn!"
Silence.
"I know. That's what I hate about you trees. You're all like this."
Silence.
"Come on, I'm not asking that much of you. You could budge a little."
Silence.
"I just want you to apologize."
Silence.
"No, you have to say it."
Silence.
"Say it, or I'll rip off another leaf!" he threatened, raising his voice again.
Silence.
He sighed. "Well, it's not as good as I hoped, but you're a tree. I suppose this is the best I'll get out of you, huh?"
Silence.
"Fine. But I'm only doing this 'cause I'm so generous, not because you deserve it." He let go of the branch, and it whipped up and nearly hit his face. He ignored that and said, "Now if you'll excuse me, I'll get back to looking for something to eat—something not poisonous." He turned around and started walking away.
Silence.
He took a few steps, and then he yelled over his shoulder, "Yeah, okay! I still hope you'll get chopped down!" After that, he left, stomping out of there and fuming.
When he turned around and saw the tree was out of his sight, his scowl turned into a smile. He giggled and said to himself, "That was fun!"
(_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_)
((October 2nd, 2149))
A sunny day. Calm and quiet. Just physiological needs, working and whittling. He finally completed his monkey that day. He whittled for quite a while, longer than the break from work was needed. He could tell it was practically done (the monkey, not the equation—that would, much to his sadness, require a lot more time), and he wanted to complete this job before returning focus to his real one. Once he was content with the monkey's shape, he put it down on the ground next to him. Then he went back to thinking about his calculations.
He picked up the monkey again at night, when he decided to go to bed. He stared at it, then frowned and pulled out his knife. Even though he had thought it was finished, a second look revealed a couple of imperfections he wanted to smooth out. The ears were a little large for his liking, and the arms seemed a bit asymmetrical.
Once he dealt with those imperfections, he took another close look at the product of his handiwork. It looked good, very good, he thought. Not the best monkey he had ever whittled out, but definitely one of the best. He smiled a satisfied smile, happy with the result.
Then he threw the monkey into the campfire, stood up and went to bed.
He really had no use for the product. At least this way it would contribute to keeping him warm.
(_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_)
((October 3rd, 2149))
A bleak day. A bleak day indeed. The weather was not nice. Colder than the day before, and it kept raining on and off (not heavily, but still). Even worse than that, however, was the fact that he did not get to take care of his physiological needs. While hunger was nothing new to him, this day was one of those days when he ended up going to bed with no dinner at all. He'd had a meager breakfast and an equally meager lunch, but he just didn't manage to find anything edible after that. Nothing, not even a single grub.
As he lay in bed, trying to fall asleep, he thought about his father. It was, after all, the commander's fault that his stomach was empty. The commander had been the one who had banished him from the colony and deprived him of its plentiful food. In fact, there had been occasions (albeit not many of them) even before that event when he had gone to sleep hungry because of his father—occasions in his teenage years, when his father had punished him for perceived misdeeds by sending him to his room without dinner. As if that would make him repent his actions… All it ever did was make him even angrier than he had been before.
He hated living in the jungle. He hated it. He hated being hungry and cold and scared and alone. But he did not regret his attempts to make the portal go both ways. He did not regret working against the colony. He did not regret fighting his father. The only thing he regretted in that moment was not fighting harder when his father had found out.
And he was determined not to make the same mistake again.
(_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_)
((October 4th, 2149))
It was a nice day, a very nice day, actually (at least compared to most other days in the jungle). The weather had cleared, he managed to find enough food—but the best part of the day was a little trip he took.
He decided to go to the Snakehead Falls. He was not entirely sure what day it was, but it must have been about two weeks since he had last carved equations on the rocks there. He wanted to know if his father had seen them yet. He had already checked once, a day before the tenth pilgrimage, but—much to his disappointment—the remains of a campfire he had left behind had been untouched. As he walked to that place, all he could think about was how much he hoped that would not be the case again.
When he arrived to the area, he headed straight to the spot where he had last carved his calculations. "Please, be lined up," he spoke to himself. "Please, be lined up. Please, be lined up. Please, be lined up. Yes!" And his wish came true. "Yes, yes, yes."
He grinned at the sight in front of him. Not the sight of his math (even though he considered that to be a most beautiful sight), but the sight of wood. Pieces of wood, ones he had left there two weeks earlier. He had left them there in the same formation in which he had set them up to light a campfire. They were no longer in that formation, however; instead, they were neatly lined up on the ground. Lined up, one next to another, with rocks on both sides that prevented them from rolling away. That was his father's way of saying 'I've been here. I've seen the equation. I acknowledge that you're still alive and still making progress in your work.' (And even though it was not explicit, he liked to imagine his father saying so in a very frustrated tone, one he could gloat over.)
There were no words spelled out from rocks, no letter on paper (the father had tried both before and learned it was pointless), but this sign of acknowledgement was enough for the young physicist. Because it meant his father knew. Knew that, one day, Lucas would fight him. That, one day, Lucas might actually beat him. And that was all the madman wanted.
Pieces of wood lined up. Such a simple sight, and yet the most beautiful one of them all.
"Yes."
Then he took the sight apart, putting the stones and wood away. That was his way of saying 'Message received. Now leave me alone (until I carve more calculations here, after which I'll need you to come back and give me another acknowledgement or I'll go crazy).'
He briefly considered carving some of the equations he had worked on over the week, but he decided not to. After all, it had only been about two weeks since the last time he had done so. More importantly, it had only been one week (or maybe less) since the last time his father had come there. Chances were the commander would not return for a while, and Lucas did not like waiting. The longer he had to wait for a response, the more anxious he felt. He was not going to put himself through another three‑month disaster; he had never been closer to giving up than at the end of that nightmare (which, admittedly, had not been caused by carving too soon, but still). No, he would wait. Once he reached the conclusion (based on experience) that his father was bound to go to the Falls soon, he would carve more calculations then. And if he turned out to be right, he would only have to wait for a week or two. A week or two, that was fine in his book.
Before leaving, he took advantage of the plentiful water there to have a wash (a thorough one again). After that, he walked back to his shelter.
Really, it had been a completely ordinary week.
Author's note
Hello again! I hope you liked this joint chapter for episodes 2 and 3 of the show. Sorry it took a while. I'm a slow writer, and other things kept getting in the way. A big thanks for the kind reviews and message I received; those always make my day. :)
Have you ever wondered what song would make a good theme for a show centered around Lucas Taylor? Well, wonder no more because I have the answer: Trixie Trotter's "Rage." :D Look it up on YouTube. It's actually a song from Back to the Future: The Game, but it made me think of Lucas as soon as I heard it. It's perfect for him. Consider it this fan fiction's theme song. :D