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[h3]The Hatching of Kortek[/h3][/center]

The club looked heavy in older brother Kortek's hand. Heavier than it had ever been to Boki. Kortek could not stop looking at it. It was as if this thing he had known from his past could take him away from today. It was not that today looked unwelcoming; the warm sunrise over the grassy field they stood in was peaceful. It was a clear day, dry and portentous of heat. Kortek would travel out with father Sago all the same. Boki, father Retuk, and uncle Teknak would be staying behind to construct a couple of rawhide tents and gather food.

Boki was thoroughly confused by the whole affair; all four of them could fit in just one tent. Even then, there were plenty of huts back at home. Why were her brother and father hunting for a bunch of bugs?

"My son," father Sago spoke from his position standing opposite Kortek, "With the nightmares you have been having lately, the world calls out for the man within your child's shell." Sago knocked upon Kortek's chest, "It pips with your courage." Father Sago took him by the shoulders. "A man does not fear the patterns. A man knows that fear is brushed away when he pulls off his final child shell. This day, you begin to hatch into a man. You know what we must do. What you must do."

Kortek kept his mouth ajar to keep his teeth from clicking together, but chattering sounded whenever he spoke too slowly. "Travel upriver, find the spike flies, bring some back dead." Kortek's teeth chattered as he swallowed unconsciously, "I remember, father Sago."

"Good." Father Sago spoke, stepping back. "Today is where we shall start. It will be the hardest day, but remember. You will always be my son."

Boki was one of the younger of her siblings and had never witnessed this ritual before, however much it was spoken of. It all made Boki ponder. While Kortek hugged uncle Teknak with a ceramic clink, she wondered why their short, half-day hunting trip sounded like it would take longer than the trip from home. As Kortek took Boki's hand, it seemed so strange that these spike flies - whatever they were - held such importance in becoming a man. Did they have a venom that would take away Kortek's nightmares? Were they spirits that took away fear?

Finally, father Retuk gave Kortek words that just seemed to confuse Boki further. "Trust your instinct, not your fears."

What sense did that make?

Kortek hefted the club over his shoulder, gave one last nod to his family, and set off with father Sago. Boki's eyes narrowed at their departure. Kortek seemed so scared.

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It was late afternoon by the time they returned. Boki's fingers were red with the blackberries she had found and filled her reed bag with. They would still be eating the dried meat that they had on the way here, but with the berries and a clay dusting, they would have a tasty dinner tonight.

"They're back!" Uncle Teknak called out. As soon as Boki saw her father Sago and brother Kortek again, she dropped her task and ran out to see what they had found. It was not quite what Boki expected. Both Kortek and Father Sago had black scratches on their arms and dark splotches on their fingers. Tucked under their arms were what looked like dark stalks of grass, but were tipped with mangled wings of all different shapes and sizes.

"Are those spike flies, brother?" Boki asked excitedly.

Kortek took two steps without laying eyes on Boki before the hain girl realised that Kortek no longer looked quite as fearful. He looked wide-eyed, hyper-aware almost, yet at the same time, he seemed unnaturally withdrawn.

Father Sago, careful to keep the points of the spike flies away from Boki, responded instead. "Let your brother go, Boki. He has been waiting to do this ever since he saw the first fly."

Father Sago's voice held a foreboding tone that superceded any questions that Boki had. She simply watched her brother as he stepped into the second tent and tied the flaps shut. Boki looked to her fathers and uncles, but they seemed to regard the situation with none of the  confusion that she did. The apparent rift between the reality she perceived and the way others reacted made her uncomfortable.

Boki's unease only increased through the rest of the day, as she swore she could hear soft sobbing from within Kortek's tent. Kortek did not come out for anything, even to eat. The others poked their arms into Kortek's tent to offer him his food and there was never any exchange of words.

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That night, Boki had trouble sleeping. She shared the second tent with her uncle and fathers, but she could still hear Kortek crying. No matter how many times she had asked what was going on, her fathers and uncle would give the same answer: "Your brother is well. He is still hatching."

To clear her head, Boki carefully ventured out of the tent and into the cold moonlight. She thought that sitting by the fire and staring at the embers would make her feel less afraid. As she held her knees to the underside of her beak, she wished she could have been more correct. Her thoughts spun around and repeated, always Kortek was crying. Why? And then she raised her head in realisation.

Why had the crying stopped just now?

A rustling in the grass nearby made Boki gasp. The source of the sound was a hain-shaped silhouette a short distance away. It was Kortek, urinating against a tree.

In her naivete, Boki figured that she could take this midnight opportunity to ask Kortek what was going on. She was forbidden to talk with him by her elders, but they were all asleep now. Boki took up a thick stick from the fire to use as a dim torch and began creeping such that she didn't wake her elders. Kortek didn't notice her approach either. That was until she came close enough for the torch to spread an orange light over his white shell.

Kortek had finished relieving himself at that point and had replaced his loincloth. He firstly turned his head to Boki, revealing eyes that were raw with further evidence of his crying. He spoke in a strained groan, "Little sister? You should not be out here."

Boki breathed in to speak, but as Kortek turned his body around, she shrieked in genuine terror and stumbled back. Any semblance of curiosity she had was overtaken in her mind by a pure aversion to what she beheld. She turned and ran, screaming as she did.

Sago, Teknak, and Retuk were all up and armed with clubs and spears by the time Boki sprinted into their arms. Sago took the torch from her and knelt down. "What is it, Boki?" He demanded, "What did you see?"

"It was Kortek..." Boki said as she began to cry into Sago's shoulder, "He...his arm, it's..."

"There, there, child. He is back in his tent now." Sago said comfortingly. He was much calmer now that the alarm proved to be false. "You mustn't wander during the night."

"It was...I cannot say what it was, I don't know. His arm had marks...and. What were they?" Boki continued.

"It was the cracks in his egg," Sago explained. "Just as a hatchling screams when it sees the gap in its eggshell, the same terror afflicts those that reach adulthood. For a child such as yourself, to see the cracks this far from when you come of age is difficult."

"But why?" Boki squeaked. "It looked so...unnatural."

"So do the many complexities of adulthood. Do not concern yourself overmuch, Boki. When your brother has finished marking the visions of the cracks of his shell, then you must brace yourself."

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Boki could not help but brace herself as much as she could, given what she had seen.

They stayed in their camp for three and a half weeks straight. There was plenty to hunt in the area, but Kortek never helped. He simply stayed in his tent and continued to cry. Thankfully, the sound of crying tapered off after a few days, but it was replaced by the sound of shivering and chattering teeth.

Boki never did wander out to try and talk with Kortek again. But he could be heard emerging in the darkness to refill his waterskin or pass waste. Each time, Boki stayed awake and curled up until he went back into his tent. His arm seemed to writhe and warp in her memories. And it spread. Whenever she pictured his arm, the shapes spread through the image and threatened to eat her mind.

A number of times, Boki asked to return home with one of her fathers. Each time, she was turned down. Kortek was always 'almost done hatching.'

The day finally came when Boki heard Kortek speak again. From inside of the tent, his muffled voice rang out. "Fathers? Uncle? Boki? I..." he hesitated as his voice became laced with fear, "There is no more room. I think I am done."

Again, there was a dissonance in what Boki percieved. Her elders faced the tent and raised their palms warmly while Boki felt her heart begin to race. Her head flitted from one side to another, quickly spotting the second tent to hide behind. She breathed quickly and shakily, unable to face what her imagination could not even picture. Moments passed as she listened.

"You have finished? Good, come out. We want to see you." Uncle Teknak's voice had no fear whatsoever.

Kortek's response tried to reflect the joyous tone with his words, but he was clearly still fearful. "Uncle, I...It is not..."

"Trust your instinct! Not your fear!" Father Sago reminded, "Come out, we have all seen the same thing on ourselves."

There was a rustling of fur and hide that was followed by a pair of careful footsteps, and then silence. A silence that lasted so long that Boki thought that her elders had all left and Kortek was going to step around the tent and turn her body into what his arm was.

"You are always my son." Sago's voice was like a stone dropped into a silent lake.

Then, there was a dull clink. The unmistakable sound of hain embracing. At that point, a crying that was different from before sounded from Kortek. It was not a fearful and ashamed crying, but a loud, relieved weeping.

"My son. You have done well," Sago said as the weeping continued. "The shell will moult off, given time, but your adulthood will stay with you forever. I am proud of you."

The sound of so much emotion being poured forth brought down Boki's defences somewhat. Out of curiosity, she silently leant to one side to see around the tent. She anticipated the same raw fright she had when suddenly confronted with Kortek's arm, but her curiosity was too great. She braced herself as the blackened form that held onto father Sago came into view. She exhaled and narrowed one eye, very curiously.

It was revolting, certainly. The twisting and repeating shapes made Boki want to retch, but it was not what she was expecting. The strange thing was that Kortek's final body-art was so complex and saturated that it didn't appear to hold any perceivable patterns to Boki. She had thought that the pattern on his arm was going to be repeated such that his entire body would imprint a memory stronger than the glimpse she had before. However, it was so noisy that it was the visual equivalent of listening to a crowd rather than simply one, disturbing voice. A strange, suspicious relief washed over her.

With Kortek painted and the camp packed up, the group made their way back home. Kortek returned a man grown. Every day until his painted shell moulted he was instructed in the responsibilities of a man. Boki was thanked for her help and was rewarded with the first pick of the berries, but she had also grown a little herself. Life went on apparently as normal.

Still, the memory of Kortek's arm remained. She remembered what she saw with vivid detail until they were similarly laid upon her own shell, by her own hand, five winters later.