Way back in the long ago, a man killed another man with a rock.
The dead man’s name was Austral.
Austral’s manbrother killed him with a rock just as a person might kill an animal with a rock.
Animals were everywhere and rocks were everywhere. Killing animals was easy. The hard part was biting through the fur, the feathers, and the tough skin to get to the meat inside.
On a different day in the long ago, a snake raised its head to show a man its fangs. The man threw a rock onto the head of the snake. That man’s name was Habilis.
Habilis was his name.
A rockflake split off from the rock as it crushed the snake on the rocks below.
The rockflake was smaller than the hand of Habilis.
The rockflake sliced his finger when he picked it up.
He looked at his finger, then he looked at the flake. He did this again and again.
And then he raised his eyebrows.
Grasping the flat sides of the rockflake between his thumb and bloody finger, Habilis sliced open the snake, pulled the skin away from the meat and flung the entrails to some birds that had been watching from a distance.
When Habilis returned to the group with the snakeskin tied around his forehead and the sharp rockflake held between his bloody fingers, the people treated him with respect.
They treated him with respect.