THE BLUE FEATHER
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them. The rest of their body has a brown coat of short hair.
Their nearest living relative is the giraffe. She had never seen any
of these mammals before, only pictures in the set of books called
the World Nature Encyclopedia.
“I wonder what it would be like to ride one of those Okapi?”
Ronú asked.
“All you’ll have to do is catch one and try to tame it first,”
Viviana said.
“Look over there by the lake at one o’clock,” Tital said over
the ICOM radio, “There is a leopard lying up in that large black
walnut tree. It looks like that family of giant forest pigs are what
it’s hunting. Anyone for roasted, barbeque pork ribs for dinner?”
At first, it looked like a group of small black dots in a sea of
bright green on the ground. But, as they flew closer Jonathan
announced, “Down there, the group of gorillas are screaming the
alert. They probably think the Gigantoraptors they see are
hunting them.”
Viviana came over the radio and translated for Moka as he
told the crew, “That group, down on the ground, are my tribes
big cousins. Honn is the big male’s name, the one who leads the
group. He is always very good to us, when we meet his group in
the jungle. Gorillas never try to hurt smaller monkeys. It’s the
baboons that we have to watch out for, they try to kill us and eat
us. You can’t trust a baboon, even when you’re looking at him.”
“What kind of trees are those tall ones that we are flying
over?” Kuó wanted to know.
“We call them Niangon trees, the wood is both beautiful and
strong,” Ronú reported over the radio.