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Stories from the Verse
A Dozen Verses
Chapter 123: Cooper 113
Table of Contents
Previous chapter: Kondor 296
It occurred to Brian that this was the second time he saw a verser leave the world just as he was arriving. Of course, both times it was unexpected, and so he wasn’t really watching closely--but having been through it himself a couple times, he thought he was beginning to grasp the process.
It then occurred to him that the woman must have built the targets, and if she built the targets she had been here a while and probably had some sort of campsite near at hand. He decided it was time to explore.
The first thing he explored was clearly a natural structure, but in an entirely improbable configuration--a stream, a pool, a cave, but the stream poured into the pool which overflowed into the cave, down into the depths of the mountain where it was apparently heated and returned to become steam, billowing out of the cave but also condensing and dripping back into the pool, and also over an outer edge to create a small stream that flowed down to the shore. The water from the stream above was cool, while that in the pool was warm enough to bathe, and he thought the cave ahead might have temperatures suitable for a sauna, based on the amount of steam.
It had been quite a while since he’d had a good bath, or even a shower. Maybe God was giving him a bit of time off.
He moved on, climbing the slope until he saw a hollow. Descending into this he found a primitive structure constructed of palm boughs--not much more than a lean-to, but showing signs of having been built originally quite a long time ago and being repaired repeatedly over many years. Within there was an area that was slightly raised and padded with fresh ferns, flattened, or not so much flattened as compressed, showing a depression where a body had lain. This was a bed, the bedding having vanished just a while ago when its owner departed.
Just outside the lean-to were a few bunches of fruit, different types and incomplete bunches. This, he thought, must be food. It occurred to him that he should be careful about that conclusion. It was probable that most of it was food, but some might serve other purposes, such as medicine, kindling, intoxication, disinfecting--he was certain that there were a lot of potential uses for plants with which he was not familiar. The fact that his predecessor on this campground had stockpiled these fruits (stockpile was too big a word; there was enough for a few days, but being fruit it would probably spoil fairly quickly) only meant that it was useful. He should taste it, test it carefully.
Returning to the high ground, he found a campfire ring, along with bones which he guessed were avian. He wondered whether he had a way to hunt waterfowl, or indeed to catch fish, but for the moment there was fruit.
He decided to settle in for a stay here. There were no signs that a second person had lived here, but if there was someone else somewhere nearby, they might come to visit in the next few days, and if not he could decide what to do after that.
As to the old stories that have long been here:
