I spent all of the next morning grinding away at the would-be axe-head until it was actually an axe head. The axe was a priority because it would allow me to make other things all the more quicker.

I leaned back and sat on my heels. I was by the stream on the north side of Camp Rock holding the axe-head up to check my work. The edge was not sharp at all. Stone was just too brittle and would just break if it was sharp. The good thing about axes was that they didn't need to be sharp, they just needed to be in a wedge shape to work. Sure, a sharp metal axe would be preferable, but I was in the middle of the woods wearing nothing but torn pajama pants so there was no way I was anywhere close to working with metals... Not that I know how to do it anyways.

The stone edge was somewhere between a 70 and 80 degree angle. 75 degrees?... Ish? Is that good for a stone edge? I mean, I know that stone axes can't be sharp... Should I have gone for a solid 90 degrees?

It was as good as I could make it. Now I just needed to make the handle.

I looked around for a good solid branch and eventually found one. It was as long as my arm and was thick enough that I could dig in a slot for the stone head but not too thick that I couldn't wrap my hands around it. I brought the stick back to Camp Rock and sat down next to my campfire at the mouth of the cave. Setting the axe-head on the ground next to me, I got a wolf tooth out of my cloth bag and got to digging out a slot for the stone.

An hour later I had an axe. The stone axe head was triangular in shape, so I fitted the corner opposite of the “sharpened” edge into the slot. I didn’t think that I needed any sort of binding because once I actually used it, the stone head would be thoroughly jammed in place.

With the axe done, it was quick work cutting the large fallen branches down to size and soon I had four long wooden poles to form a teepee. Since the poles would form a teepee almost three times as tall as I was, I had to get Nora’s help. I had Nora lie down in the center of Camp Rock’s clearing, then I tied one end of two poles together on one side of her and lifted the tied end up onto her back. I went around to the other side of her and did the same thing so that Nora was holding up the pyramid of poles. I scrambled up Nora’s side to get on her back then used the last of my cordage to tie the two wooden V’s together.

“Alright, Nora!” I said, straddling her back, and gave her a pat on her shoulder. “You can stand up now.”

She woofed and slowly rose, not rising to her full height all at once in case things broke. But everything was looking good and soon I had a teepee... which still needed covering...

I took a break to eat lunch with Nora, then went and gathered more of those vines to make more cordage. Then a few hours later, after making a lot of cords, I went and tied a few long sticks between the poles of the teepee so that I could hang leaves and other covering on the side. Above head-height, but still within reach, I tied three long sticks to go across on the inside to hang the leather off of. With that done, I gathered fallen branches that still had all of their pine needles and leaves on them and hooked them onto the sides of the teepee. I had to get Nora’s help to reach the top of the teepee.

Two hours later, it was done. I had a teepee to smoke the leathers in. It was large enough to smoke all of the leathers at once and there was still room to smoke anything else I wanted as well... honestly, it was probably bigger than it needed to be, but what’s done is done.

I dusted my hands off on the tattered remains of my pajama pants and sighed. The day had been full of hard labor. Grinding down an axe-head, raising a teepee, making cordage, then finally covering the teepee. Man was I tired!

And I still got to get those leathers out of the stream... ugh. Three in the stream and three in the frames. That's six in total. How many should I make? One of those leathers probably won't make a full shirt or pants. So, I guess two each. One should be enough for both shoes. Let's say two for a good bag... I should probably make a blanket or sleeping bag or something, so... Four more? Eleven total? Wait, I should make some extras in case I mess up. Fifteen's a good number. Five batches. Easy-peasy.

<<<>>>

It wasn’t easy-peasy. Somehow, despite some spirit bear bringing a memory of my father’s words to mind in a dream, I still messed up. The first batch was hard in some spots and soft-ish in other spots, I didn’t know if I just sucked at spreading brain mush around or if it was because the first few brains were already super dried out when I got to braining the hides. Either way, I had to throw the first batch away because what was I even going to use them for? The second batch was okay. A little too stiff to make clothes out of but it would probably be okay to make a bag. It was the third batch that I was able to hit my groove with. The leather was soft.

For the next couple of days I had my schedule and Nora had hers. We would wake up and I would have a quick breakfast of jerky and berries. Nora would leave for a quick patrol around the camp, come back to check on me, then leave to hunt. After breakfast and taking care of business behind a bush, I would work on moving a batch of skins to its next phase. I would first work on the skins that were soaking in the brain mush; scrape the dried brain off of the skin and stretch it as best as I could and then place them in the smoker to smoke throughout the day. After getting the smoker going, I would go to the stream and pull out the batch of leather that was soaking in the water. I would wring out the water as best as I could, really working at the leather to make sure it is pliable and soft. Once the skins were dry, I would get to work making brain mush to smear on the skins. One brain goes in the pot with as much water as the pot could fit, and once the brain fully dissolved I would empty the pot on one of the skins, making sure not to get any onto the fur. Then repeat until the whole batch is brained. After that, I would carefully fold the skins and set them just inside of the cave entrance, they couldn’t get wet during that stage. Then I would move to the frames and scrape the dried skins thin. After scraping I would cut the skins out of the frames; cutting off the edges of the skins that were now full of holes. I would fold the rawhide and put them in the stream to soak, weighing them down with rocks.

Once I was done with that, I would stop for lunch of jerky and berries. Nora usually came back as I finished eating, dropping three camo rabbits at my skinning station. I would skin the rabbits, set the brain aside, and hang the skins on the frames. Nora would eat a couple rabbits and whatever was left I'd either smoke or toss far into the woods. I'd then work on the framed skins, scraping the fats and bits of meat off. Of course, throughout the day I was also keeping the smoker going, so by the time I was done with the framed skins the leathers would be done smoking. I would gather the finished leather and stack it in the back of the cave. With that done, I was done with leather making for the day. A batch of three leathers a day wasn’t too bad.

This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it

With leather out of the way, the next thing on my schedule was wood gathering for cooking and the next day's smoking and also berry picking. At that point I had about four to five hours of daylight left, which I would spend practicing with my atlatl. When my right arm got tired I switched to my left arm. When my left arm got tired, I sat down and made thin cordage. Well... as thin as I could with the vine fibers I collected. The vine fibers that I had been using were pretty strong so I didn't have a problem. Obviously, the thinner cordage was a bit weaker than the cordage I had made previously, but it was plenty strong enough to sew with. I would braid cordage until the sunset, where I would make a campfire and eat jerky and berries, then I would snuggle against Nora and sleep.

That was my schedule. Pretty boring if you ask me but what else is there to do in the middle of a giant forest? Not much... not much indeed.

For three days I followed that schedule. Day in and day out it was the same thing. On the fourth day there was a change up... it rained. Hard.

That day Nora and I just stayed in the cave. She napped and I tried my hand at sewing. I had the leather from the third batch that was pretty good, so I decided to make some pants. I didn't exactly know how to make pants so I did my best to logic out what needed to happen. I cut the leather with a wolf tooth and tried to sew... The leather was a pain to stick the "needle" through. I ended up having to use a rock and one of the steelthorns to punch small holes along where I wanted to sew and then go through with my "needle" and "thread" to sew the leather together. What resulted was a poorly sewn pair of furry camo pants that were way too small.

"How the fluff did the pants come out so small!?" I shouted, holding the so-called pants in front of me. "I measured and everything!"

Nora snorted awake and groggily looked over at me. She blinked, shrugged, then laid her head back down.

It was outrageous. That was two whole leathers wasted. What could I do with it? Just throw it away?

Oh! Maybe I could try to make moccasins. One moccasin per pant leg... maybe.

So I got to work undoing my sewing and laying the pieces out flat. It took awhile but eventually I cut out new pieces, punched holes, and sewed. On the bottom of the moccasins I used two layers for extra protection.

The moccasins turned out alright and we're actually pretty comfy, especially since I made it so the fur was on the inside... You know, since I don’t have socks... or maybe it was just comfy because I was glad I had something besides cloth scraps to protect my feet. Either way, I was happy with the shoes.

I also made myself a new bag. It was just like the crappy cloth bag, just a bit bigger and it didn't feel as flimsy. It was also camouflaged, with the fur on the outside, and had two wide, flat shoulder straps like a backpack. I’d have to be careful to remember where I set it down. After making the bag, I only had two whole leathers left and some scraps. I didn't know what else to do with the scraps, so I chucked them into the woods.

The rainstorm ended sometime that night and I got to work... or tried too. The braining skins had gotten too humid and had hardened. The skins that were in the stream had vanished, washed away by all that rain water. The skins in the frames were still wet and needed to dry out again. So, after throwing the ruined brained skins away, I spent the day hunting with Nora.

What sucked was that despite all the practice that I had with the atlatl, I was still unable to hit anything besides trees and bushes. I was either too loud and my target ran off before I could launch a spear or I just flat out missed because I wasn't used to moving targets. In both cases it was clear that I needed more practice. So I kept at it, stalking alongside Nora and doing my best. Eventually, we got three of the camo rabbits... by 'we' I mean Nora.

We returned to camp and I got to work skinning the rabbits and separating the brains. By now the skins in the frame were dry so I scraped them smooth and thin. Once done, I cut the rawhide out of the frames and placed them in the stream under a bigger rock and then stretched the new skins into the frames.

With new skins in the works, I was able to settle back into my schedule and I was producing leathers again. Or are they called furs, because they still have fur on them? I don’t know... I guess it doesn’t really matter.

After a few days I had a nice pile of leather... furs... whatever. So, I made myself a simple shirt. It turned out decent... for my first try. Honestly, I didn’t care at that point and was just glad not to be all nakey anymore. But by the next day I hated it. The shirt was way too hot to be working in. Is there a way to remove the fur? I mean, I really liked the idea of the camo fur for some camouflage, but it’s too hot... and it does look kinda silly to be honest. Besides, leather is brown-ish and there’s enough brown in the forest so it’s camo-y enough... So, do I just scrape the fur off or something? Let’s try it.

The next batch of leathers I tried to remove the fur. I ended up punching holes in a few leathers before I got the hang of it. I tried to sew the holes but I just ended up making it worse, so I had to throw those skins away. Eventually, I was producing furless leather, which I used to make myself another shirt and some pants. The furs I had already made were turned into a blanket. I turned the leather scraps, the furless ones, into strips of cordage. Could never have too much cordage.

Days passed as I prepared myself to explore this world. I didn’t give up on finding civilization, but if what Nora said was true, then wherever it was it would be far from here. I had a long journey ahead of me. And so, I prepared.

I also got better at using the atlatl. After a couple of hunting trips with Nora, I was finally able to score a kill of my own. After spending all my evenings practicing, it was a relief to know that it wasn’t all a waste of time. Nora was also happy for me, at least that what I assumed when she bowled me to the ground and licked my face all over. That wasn’t the only thing I worked on of course. I also worked on my crafting skills; making all the things that I thought I would need for my survival.

I now had a long sleeve shirt, some pants, moccasins, a sturdy backpack, four new throwing spears, a stone axe, loads of jerky and berries, a leather waterskin, a few steelthorns, lots of vine and leather cordage, a fur blanket, a clay pot, and two spare leathers for repairs. I was ready. Ready to explore.

After packing everything into my backpack, I sighed and looked over Camp Rock. For almost two weeks, this place had been my home, a safe-ish place for me to prepare myself. The smoking teepee was still there, as well as the three frames and the ring of stones for the campfire. I decided that if I could be randomly portaled into the middle of these woods then so could someone else. I left Camp Rock as it was in case someone else stumbled upon it, so they could use it. I had also taken the time to scratch leather-making instructions into a clay tablet, which I baked into ceramic and left inside the cave. It was very unlikely that any of what I made would last very long, but as I looked over the camp, I felt some hope that if someone were to be placed in the situation I was in then maybe I could help them in some way. But now, I had to focus on my own future.

What was going to come next? What am I going to find? Nora seems to think that there isn’t anyone else out there, that there is no civilization to find... But I can’t give up hope before I even started.

I took a deep breath and looked up at the stars, vibrant and plentiful in the unpolluted air.

I will find civilization again. They’re out there. Nora hasn’t explored to the south yet, so that’s where we’ll go.

“Come on, Nora. Let’s get some sleep. We have a long journey ahead of us in the morning.”

She barked softly and plopped herself down. I wrapped my fur blanket around myself and lay down next to her.