Morto gazed about himself: he was in the thickest of the jungle, and the mosquitoes didn’t get any less, or more peaceable. One came at him from behind the neck, the other to the back of his right knee. No matter how many times he slapped or cursed, no amount of insects would simply let him be; he crunched through years and years of fallen leaves, avoiding large ant hills, and dodging heavy, randomly falling vine boughs, which slumped at times off their perches because of the weighting rain water that pattered and pushed them.

How many times had Morto been pushed when he didn’t want to?

He was like a blazing pin-cushion, for crying out loud; even in the schooling experiments it wasn’t just the teachers bullying him, oh no, it was the melee of school scoundrels that inhabited every opus of the damnable campuses.

If he ever said he liked art, he hated it after his institutionalization: they had him do art so much because he liked it a lot, and supposedly his work was good. When he found they were taking everything and selling it, he vowed: never again, never again.

Despite the beauty he saw in the world, nowadays it was easier to see the uglier things: he didn’t need to create anymore: he needed to survive.

A colored bird flapped its large wings as it passed through the streak of foggy, misty light in the clearing; somewhere, Morto heard a heavy grunt of an animal of immeasurable size, and its hooves as it stamped the earth with its long lasting, and painful signature.

Animals, thought Morto, shaking his head, and wiping his brow from the pouring sweat that came from the heated atmosphere, like living in a sauna.

Once he had a dog named Jeno. This pooch was a real gentleman—or was it a female?—he couldn’t really remember. He could hardly remember his own name if he wasn’t yelled at every now and again.

“Morto! clean these docks!”

“Morto! stab this man!”

“Morto! pay for this drink!”

Yeah, so he was a pushed around guy. Sure enough, though, he would push back, and finally make something of his life.

Crunching, underfoot: it wasn’t his foot either.

Cautiously, he peered through the jungle to see a slender shape outlined in harsh, green light. He saw the shape, and marveled at its detail in beauty. It was so darkened, that he saw outline, only an outline. It was like an animal, the way it lurked, bent to the stagnant pond to drain its liquid in outlined, beautifully outlined grasps.

He swallowed, wiped his brow, and would have gone over to her had he not felt a sharp, and painful blade at his unshaven throat.

“Easy there, angry wild man.”

“I’m not angry, and I’m hardly wild,” choked out Morto, whose eyes were following the blade, until it rested on human skin, and continued passing up the arm, to the neck, to the lips, and finally the feminine, fierce gaze that froze him instantly in any satisfaction. Eyes like those…untamed…couldn’t be trusted: he didn’t want to know her, he didn’t even want to look at her: he turned his head, to see the dark woman finally come into the light, and his breath nearly escaped him, not just because of her enchanting demeanor, but because he felt a thick sword handle plunge into his gut with unrelenting force.

“Stay there, on the ground, wild man.”

Morto watched the dirt, and scrambled foliage: occasionally a beetle, and many ants passed by his tired, and confused and frightened eyes.

No, he wasn’t frightened.

Defeated, but not frightened.

The sword-handler bent down and sniffed his unwashed hair. “You come from the city, don’t you?”

Morto made a grunt for a reply: he still held his stomach painfully.

“City boys…you know how we treat them? Not well, not well.”

“Chaadie, stop it. Why waste time talking to it. Just finish it.”

Morto looked up: he had wished for sweeter words from such a sweet mouth, and pursing lips that now were held in distaste over his fallen self.

I don’t need mercy anyway, Morto thought, reflecting on life and rolling over on his back to look up at the ceiling of the jungle, which swayed, chirped, and howled like many angry primates that would sooner cannibalize each other.

Is it true, he thought, are we just like them? Bounding through life with nothing but a tail and sharp teeth, ready to devour each other at any and every moment?

If I’m an animal then please, please crazy, jungle women, put me out of my misery, before I cause any more damage.

He heard a report, followed by another. One body fell backward, into some dense overgrowth, and the one that had drank the water while he watched simply lurched forward, and entangled her body amongst his: she kept howling in pain, convulsing, until finally she spit blood, and looking into his eyes in alarm, she passed.

He held her simply lovely face in his hands, and saw its youth, saw the life that was and now wasn’t: he’d have wept, but he’d never cried in his life, even when his parents died. Gently, and with great caution, he laid her aside on the earth, and watched as the face lay still, and different shadows from whipping, and waiving objects danced at her farewell.

Good-bye, and I’ve known you for how long?

He got to his feet, wiped some slime away and flicked off some bugs. As the hunter, with his great and proud hat and gleaming, smoking rifle came closer, he didn’t even pause to shake hands, but continued on his way.