Outpost #1

The Outpost

Cooper hurries along the path to the muffled sounds of the jungle.
"A feeble attempt to supply answers," he thought
For a moment the air clears along with his thoughts. Those years at corporate. What a joke in this mud, Passion for science? Drenching pain drives him up the hill.
"Strange bedfellows," he thought
His mind told him nothing was on the jungle trail now, not at this hour, in this rain. At least nothing that doesn't prowl.
“Opposable thumb,” he thought as he shook his soaked hands. This appendage allows him to climb to safety from the jungle floor? "Not tonight I hope," Cooper thought.

The sound of the hunter is silence. Genes answer the question, as if to break silences of unseen forces with eyes.
This jungle leaves no residue of death. At first light the evidence would be gone, as if death never happened, or birth for that matter. Survival of the fittest is just a manifestation, a dream, a temporary presentation like so many pharmaceutical sales pitches back home.
Cooper grips his rifle tight hurrying faster now. Tonight survival becomes personal.

Urges come as no surprise to Suzie. In nature there is a trigger...length of day for leaf abscission, circadian rhythms in insects. Suzie requires only the light of the day. The beauty in her face, the colors a simple manifestation of photovoltaic cells. The difference is in the heart of the sheen for Suzie. She feels no pressure building from within. No urge, feather light.
Suzie knew it as the directive of an ancient gene skillfully crafted by a long forgotten force that once visited. Their Genetic code, DNA double helix. Gene expression but not for Suzie.

The jungle is more beautiful at night. The cool dampness of the jungle floor. The lack of color. He knew all about what was hiding just above the jungle floor. Waiting for only him alone.