Krunk knew very little and that was good.  It kept him alive.  Krunk knew where to eat, poop and sleep.  Like every surviving animal, Krunk knew the basics and the basics kept him alive.  Run when there is danger.  Chase in packs when the hunger comes gnawing.

Krunk searched for food one day and came up empty.  All of the spots that should’ve had plenty for him and his pack seemed bare.  It was a strange day indeed.  The sun beat down on him as he passed through pastures littered with cow dung.  Still warm between his toes, Krunk knew the cows lived somewhere nearby.  He couldn’t find them though. 

As he stepped in pile after pile, Krunk began to notice that some of the piles sort of crunched rather than just squishing.  He looked down to see a tiny mushroom of many colors.  Ohlong had once brought mushrooms back to the pack.  They tasted good and filled their bellies, but the mushrooms lived within random patterns.  The primal mind could not predict where next the mushroom might nest, so the pack paid them no mind after Ohlong’s discovery.

Also, the elder spoke of times before Ohlong.  The times lurked ominous indeed, because a bunch of mushrooms had killed off the biggest and strongest male elders.  The elders had eaten greedily and the mushrooms punished them by causing their insides to pour out of them like blood.  The elders turned green as the sun rose and set.  They could not move from the spot where they lay and the stench of death eventually drove the pack away from them.

Krunk had not been there when these things took place.  He only had the word of the elder to know that this was the truth, but Ohlong’s mushrooms tasted good.  They filled his belly that day.

With that thought in mind, Krunk began to look at the ground around him.  He saw a field of multi-colored mushrooms as far as he could see.  The rainbows grew out from the cow feces.  Krunk, being a smart ape, tasted a small piece of one mushroom first.  It didn’t taste bad.  Krunk wondered at the elder’s tale and heeding the text of the narrative he chose to slowly eat this field of mushrooms.  He truly believed the mushrooms had punished the male elders for eating greedily.

Krunk ate this field of mushrooms, one at a time, slowly but surely.  By the time he stopped his fingers were numb and his vision blurred.  He thought for sure he might die.  Krunk lay down in the field of rainbows and looked at the sky.  Krunk noticed the clouds for the first time.  He recognized in one of the clouds his mate Sura.  Sura floated across the sky eating a skunk.  Krunk thought about this for a moment and sudden gasps of breath and sound escaped his mouth.

On this day, Krunk discovered laughter.