Obviously the rest of the apes observed the event, watching the proceedings either not knowing what what going on or curious about the outcome. Unsurprisingly the display of might from their leader left a peculiar effect on the females of the tribe. Deeply impressed, several of them as casually as possible moved closer to the patriarch putting their butts on a nice display.
At first the big guy didn’t notice the advances, but when he caught the weary look Leo sent towards the sides, he realized there were some precious spectators around. With streams of adrenaline and testosterone pumping through his veins, the patriarch grabbed the nearest female and began humping her while still angrily staring at the boy high up the bamboo tree and barking ‘U’s!’ from time to time towards the criminal.
During the first days on the island Leo thought this was the process of punishment and later came to a conclusion that it was only some weird exercise, all in all he didn’t pay much attention to it. But now he had the front row seat and saw everything in detail – how the patriarch’s thing suddenly enlarged to an unbelievable size, how he stuck it inside the poor whimpering female ape and how he began to hump her.
The shouts directed towards Leo obviously meant that he was the next in line and after getting this realization the boy almost fell down the tree.
‘So this is what sailors meant by calling someone ‘mother tucker’!’ Leo finally understood, but his train of thought was interrupted by a meteor soundlessly plunging down right next to him.
Strangely enough that meteor didn’t actually hit the ground, but suddenly spread its wings stopping in an instant and sunk its claws in the respective backs of the patriarch and the female ape he was currently humping. The next flap of the wings caused a small storm in the surroundings and broke a few bamboo trees, including the one Leo was currently on.
It all happened in a blink of an eye and no one, including the patriarch, managed to react to the attack. These were not the first two apes the eagle caught, but this time one of them was the largest and heaviest of the bunch. In addition, it was the most experienced and while it technically was no match for the rank six eagle, it could still put up a fight.
The pain hadn’t even registered in his brain when the patriarch roared in anger and spun around at the same time sending his two fists towards the eagle’s side. Eagle’s talons were stuck in patriarch’s back like huge sickles made of the finest steel and the ape’s maneuver tore them out along with large chunks of flesh.
But this sacrifice allowed the two enormous fists reach their target and the sound of bones breaking in the eagle’s rib cage surpassed even that of the trees falling. Eagle let out a loud cry full of pain and the next flap of wings propelled it more than fifteen yards upwards. Of course, the fact that it dropped the eight hundred pound prey made the take off much easier.
The attack and the instinctive retaliation happened almost in an instant and only after few moments the involved parties realized what had transpired. The ape patriarch roared to the sky in pain promising to pay back one day and the huge eagle replied with a shrill cry telling it’ll soon return. The female ape that got caught was still convulsing in agony, but it’s fate was already sealed while the rest of the tribe slowly returned after running away in all directions in a complete panic earlier.
The only one who couldn’t now wrap his head around where he was and what was going on was Leo. After falling from the tree he landed on something soft, but from the impact he still got dazed. All he could see now was the blue sky, but soon he noticed his eyes began to water up from the sudden strong wind.
He sat up in confusion and to his great horror realized he was on top of the huge eagle, high above the treetops and a couple moments later, above the ocean. Eagle also only now registered he had been carrying a stowaway and immediately tried to shake Leo off. The maneuver was a success, but caused a lot of pain and in addition the hateful passenger managed to grab it by the broken leg and kept screaming in annoyingly high pitched voice.
The eagle would’ve gladly pecked the boy to the death, but the damage caused by the silver-back patriarch turned out to be much worse than it initially thought. Right now it realized it had barely the strength to return to its nest therefore it decided to spare every little bit of energy and consider the human, that currently dangled from its broken leg, a second prey.
Leo, on the other hand, was scared out of his mind. The height and the incredible speed the eagle was flying at already made him pee himself, but he didn’t even notice it. He couldn’t let go the eagle’s talon he was currently hanging from, but he also didn’t intend to accompany the humongous bird home.
Another problem was that the eagle’s talon was covered in blood and was slippery and Leo realized it was only a matter of time until he fell off. Fortunately, after throwing him off its back, the bird seemed to have forgotten about his existence and Leo didn’t intend to do anything to remind it.
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While dangling in the wind, he carefully crawled on top of the female ape that was hanging dead in eagle’s other four talons. Then he hugged the bird’s leg with all his fours and began organizing his thoughts.
The first conclusion he came to was that under no circumstances he was allowed to take too much of other people’s stuff. The recent events clearly showed that otherwise sooner or later he would be found out. This had to be added to his short rule list.
But either having only three rules was too little of for some other reason the next thing he thought of was another rule – never loose vigilance while humping anyone and better do it fast! Leo himself was not completely clear what that meant, but it kind of made sense if he learned from the silver-back patriarch's painful experience.
‘Alright!’ Leo thought to himself in delight, ‘Now the Renaud clan has already four main rules!’
While his father often mentioned the many rules of his own, to his disappointment Leo had forgotten almost all of them except the one forbidding him to cry and the one about the auspicious days. The former was self explanatory and he didn’t think it was important enough to include in his new rule list, but the latter he gladly added as to the number one and intended to follow it to the end. He remembered well the tragic event as if it happened yesterday and it was obvious that the reason for Lyam’s demise was not following the rule he set right before his death.
‘There are no auspicious days! Everyone who claims otherwise brings bad luck and has to die!’ Leo whispered to himself, soundlessly moving lips.
Obviously the eagle clearly knew it was still carrying two preys, but Leo was oblivious to the fact. In fear that the bird would notice him again he didn’t dare to move a muscle and sat still while hugging eagle’s leg and silently stared to the front. He had no idea how long they flew, but at some point he spotted weird darkish clouds suddenly appearing in the distance.
At first he didn’t think much of them other than wondered how the eagle would fly if it’s feathers got wet, but then he noticed the hateful lightning flashes appearing between the clouds from time to time. That, of course, wasn’t the worst lightning of all, the purple one, but seeing ‘a lightning’ made Leo’s hair stand on end.
Either the eagle didn’t notice Leo shuddering or just ignored him, but the boy’s back was already covered in cold sweat when memories of getting electrocuted resurfaced. During that stormy night he passed out and woke up multiple times, but despite that he remembered very well the purple lightning continuously striking the ship and him alongside it.
The fear of a torture made Leo even consider whether directly jumping off into the ocean was a good idea, but there was no land nearby and he was not that good of a swimmer, and the perspective of simply drowning was also not that enticing.
Fortunately he didn’t have to struggle for too long. The eagle soon dived into the clouds and few breaths later came out on the other side, where could Leo heave a sigh of relief. Unfortunately the next moment he was forced to realize he was anything but safe. They were approaching some kind of an island and somewhere around here was the eagle’s nest! And that meant he had to leave his carrier as soon as possible!
The island was covered in a thick mist that didn’t allow Leo to clearly see where he was brought to. All he managed to discern was that there were no sandy beaches like they had on the ape island and the ocean waves here clashed against tall cliffs instead.
For a few moments they were still flying up high, but when the eagle suddenly began to descend at a pace of a falling rock, Leo began to panic. The hot and moist air didn’t prevent his feet and then the whole body grow cold at the sight of the fast approaching treetops. At some point he noticed a small pond and started to consider if he should jump off, trying to fall in the water, but in a heartbeat the pond was already left far behind.
The next moment to his great horror Leo noticed the eagle suddenly fly up and away while he himself was still in a free fall. He was certain that just now he was hugging the eagle’s leg, but somehow the bird simply shook him off and left while the only thing Leo could do was scream and hug the dead female ape’s head in panic.
The next part happened even faster. The ape and Leo on top of it landed on a large, round platform and, while the ape’s corpse smacked to the ground and after rolling a few yards became still, the boy bounced off the ape and shouting ‘Ouch … ouch … ouch!’ rolled couple dozen yards, his naked body getting bruised all over. Fortunately he didn’t break any bones and possibly didn’t even get a concussion, but even if he got one of those it wouldn’t make much difference since during the past six months he had countless head injuries constantly falling from trees.
In daze Leo didn’t notice the eagle letting out a soft cry that was met with another one, but much louder and deeper and then followed by a roar that actually shook the ground.
The eagle, of course, couldn’t care less for Leo’s problems. It had barely managed to return and even though it usually brought two apes, there were actually two preys there, albeit one was small and thin. How to split the meal was the problem of those two monsters, but the eagle itself had to return to its nest and recuperate for at least half a year. Not only the damage the damned ape dealt was too heavy, the flight back worsened its condition considerably.
“That mother tucker!” Leo cursed while trying to sit up.
His whole body ached and all he saw was a blur, but at least he was alive. During the past months while staying with the apes he experienced the downside of being butt naked or lacking a thick hide, but being a human had other perks.
Of course, the sensory abilities were not among them. The ground continued to slightly shake since the moment Leo and the dead ape were dropped on the platform, but the boy still hadn’t noticed it. Only when a being in a size of a house appeared right in front of him, Leo realized he should’ve never flown away from the ape island.
Compared to the creature in front of him, the eagle seemed to be in a size of a pigeon, to not speak about the previously imposing silver-back patriarch. Besides the size Leo couldn’t discern the features of the monstrous beast, but it somehow resembled a dog or a cat.
Be as it may, he was not capable of analyzing anything. The primal instincts kicked in and if at first they made him freeze on the spot, the next moment with a loud yelp Leo dashed towards the opposite direction only to realize there was another monster of a similar size staring back at him.