LXVI
The bubble hummed around me like a heartbeat, its iridescent surface thinning. The wall that held me was stretching, straining. I could feel it weakening, the way a soap bubble feels right before it bursts. The hat man's cat form pressed against my ribs, claws kneading anxiously.
"Pet… you have seconds. Maybe less."
Below us, the hunters were already gathering around their kills—three megaloceros down, blood steaming in the cool post‑storm air. They worked with swift, practiced hands, cutting hide, checking wounds, murmuring to one another in a language older than any written word. Their spears glinted wet. Their atlatls hung at their sides like extensions of their arms.
They were stone‑age people, but not simple.
The tools in their hands were flint and bone, and their minds were sharp.
Their coordination was flawless; hunting strategy was ancient and effective.
These were the humans who survived long enough to become us.
The bubble dipped lower, brushing the tops of wet ferns. A thin crack shimmered across its surface, like a hairline fracture in glass.
I swallowed hard.
There were only two choices.
Run and hide, or don't.
Disappear into the dripping forest, hope the giants ignored me, hope the hunters never saw the strange woman who fell from the sky.
I would meet them. Step out of the bubble and face them.
Negotiate my own survival with people who had never seen metal, never seen magic, never seen anything like me.
The hunters were smart. Their tools were primitive, but their eyes were sharp. Their intelligence was enough to carry their descendants into the modern age. They would understand danger. They would understand opportunity. They would understand me if I didn't frighten them first.
The leader stood over the massive megaloceros, his shaggy beard dripping rainwater, his piercing eyes scanning the clearing. He paused. His gaze drifted upward, toward me.
The bubble cracked again. A soft, crystalline sound.
The hat man's tail puffed. "Choose quickly."
I looked at the hunters. Mud‑streaked early man, strong, clever, their spears still wet with blood. They were survivors. They were predators. They were human.
And the bubble around me was about to burst.
I drew a breath, tasting the damp air through the thinning magic.
I made my choice. I put my hands up and walked towards the group of early humans.
The bubble gave one last shiver with an imminent pop. It thinned like a soap film catching its final breath, and then it burst with a soft, crystalline pop. The iridescent sheen dissolved into the mist, leaving me standing alone in the clearing, mud sucking at my boots, rain dripping from the giant trees overhead.
I barely had time to inhale before they were on me.
They moved fast. Their thin forms ran faster than I expected, faster than any modern human could. Nearly a dozen hunters swept down the hill and surrounded me in a tightening ring. Their leather footwear, laced up their calves, made them nearly silent. Only the soft squelch of mud and the faint hiss of wet grass betrayed their approach.
Spears angled toward me. Atlatls hung ready in their hands.
Eyes sharp as flint studied every inch of me. I raise my hands slowly.
The hat man's cat form pressed against my ankle, tail puffed, ears flat.
The hunters were lean, rain‑slick, and alert. Their primitive tools proved their capacity to invent, not primitive in mind. Their faces were intelligent, calculating, reading my posture, my breathing, my lack of weapon. They had just taken down megaloceros the size of cars. They had coordinated like wolves. They had survived storms, giants, predators, and time itself. And now they were judging me.
One stepped closer a blonde man with braided hair and a scar across her cheek. He sniffed the air, eyes narrowing. Another tapped his spear against the mud, signaling to the leader. The tall, gaunt man with the shaggy beard approached, his gaze piercing, his posture cautious but curious. They didn't attack.
They circled tighter, forming a ring of bodies and weapons around me. Their movements were swift as wind, silent as shadows, precise as a pack closing in on something unknown.
I swallowed hard. I would never outrun them.
So I stood tall, mud soaking into my boots, rain dripping down my hair, and met the leader's gaze head‑on.
His eyes flicked to the hat man's cat form. Then back to me.
He lifted his spear, not to strike, but to point at my chest.
The blonde man's spear tip hovered inches from my chest, steady as a held breath. His eyes narrowed against the slant of sunlight breaking through the dripping canopy, studying me the way a wolf studies something strange, something that might be prey, or might be dangerous.
He spoke, voice rough and low, shaped by a language older than anything written.
"Orya uruba? Yoruba ya? Gal?"
The sounds rolled like gravel, clipped and cautious. Not a greeting. Not a threat. A question. His tone carried the weight of it. What are you? Where did you come from? Are you alone?
The hunters tightened their circle around me, silent as shadows. Their leather footwear laced up their legs made them nearly noiseless, even in the mud. Spears angled. Atlatls hung ready. Their eyes flicked between me and the cat‑shaped hat man at my feet, whose fur bristled in a tiny puff of indignation.
I swallowed, keeping my hands raised, palms open.
The leader stepped closer. His beard was soaked, dripping rainwater onto his chest. His gaze was sharp enough to cut through the mist. He repeated the last word, slower this time, as if testing whether I understood.
"Gal?"
The others murmured it too, soft, questioning.
The hat man's voice whispered at my ankle, barely audible.
"They're asking if you're a spirit… or a woman."
My heart thudded.
The leader tilted his head, spear lowering just a fraction—not trust, but curiosity. His eyes searched my face, my clothing, the strange shimmer still fading from the bubble's collapse.
He wasn't deciding whether to kill me.
He was deciding what I was.
I drew a slow breath, the damp forest air filling my lungs.
And I answered him, not in his language, but with the calmest voice I could manage, hoping tone mattered more than words.
"I'm not here to harm you."
The hunters didn't move.
The leader's eyes narrowed again, sunlight catching the amber flecks in them.
I drew a slow breath, the damp forest air filling my lungs.
"Gal!" I blurted, nodding so hard my hair slapped against my cheeks. "Definitely gal. Complete with the XX genes and everything."
My voice cracked on the last word—nerves, fear, and the absurdity of explaining chromosomes to stone‑age hunters all tangled together. I forced a shaky smile, hands raised, palms open, trying to look as harmless as a wet rabbit.
"Heh heh," I added weakly. "Just an innocent human woman. Very normal. Very… non‑threatening."
The blonde man's spear didn't waver.
But his eyes—those sharp, sun‑squinting eyes—shifted. Not softer, not kinder, but curious. The word I'd echoed back to him meant something to them. Something important. The hunters murmured among themselves, repeating it:
"Gal… gal… gal."
The circle tightened, but not in a killing way. More like they were closing in to inspect a strange animal that had wandered into their camp. Their leather footwear—laced up their legs with sinew—made them nearly silent even in the mud. They moved with the grace of predators, swift as wind, coordinated as wolves.
The leader stepped closer, spear lowering a fraction. His gaze swept over me—my clothes, my hair, the lingering shimmer of the bubble's collapse. He sniffed the air, brow furrowing, as if scent alone could tell him what kind of creature I was.
Behind him, a woman with braided hair tilted her head, studying me with the same intensity. Another hunter tapped his atlatl against his thigh, not threatening, just… thinking.
The hat man's cat form pressed against my ankle, tail puffed, whispering low.
"Good. They think you're a woman, not a spirit. Spirits are hunted differently."
My stomach dropped. The blonde man repeated the word again, slower, testing me.
"Gal."
I nodded fervently. "Yes. Gal. Very gal."
He lowered his spear another inch.
They understood what I claimed to be.
And for the first time since the bubble burst, I felt the tiniest sliver of hope that I might survive this encounter with the hunters who had mastered a world of giants.
.