João's Things to Come: 2009

Tuesday, December 29, 2009

Things to Come – Part 5 – Apocalypse for One

It wasn’t going at all well.

Arvico had decided to take her brother Loganoh’s advice and experience being alone all by herself. This struck her as an absolutely ludicrous thing to do, but she had an adventurous spirit and needed little prompting to try anything at least once. She had only been alone long enough to stray out of sight from the herd and all she had to show for it was a nauseous feeling.

“This is utterly awful.” She thought and wondered how Loganoh could stand it. But she persisted and soon enough she found something to take her mind off her uneasy stomach.

“What is that horrible smell?” Arvico was not one to let her curiosity go unanswered, so she followed the smell despite the fact that it got worse.

She discovered the source. It was a gull. It lay motionless on the ground with one of its wings up in an awkward position. The gull smelled almost like it was dead… but not quite. Arvico approached the gull.

“Being you rat?” said the gull in its thick gull accent. Until it had spoken Arvico had trouble discerning where in the pile of feathers the head was located.

“No.” said Arvico.

“Being you eating me?” asked the gull. Its voice was very frail.

“Ew!” thought Arvico. “No.” she said.

“Being you wanting what?” moaned the gull.

“Are you alright?” Arvico asked.

“Being you eating me not, then being you leaving. Am dying and am wanting dying in quiet and peace. Being you go!” snapped the gull.

“You smell bad, but I don’t think you’re dying. What are you doing?” She rounded the gull to look into his face.

The gull leapt to its feet in a flurry of feathers, dust and stink. Arvico winced and the gust of foul air.

“Being you very rude! Being you bothering why? Being you keeping away predators. Foxes, rats, owls, stoats, skua! Being you here, being they not!” said the gull, his energy and posture greatly improved.

“You should be thankful I found you first. Any of those things might have eaten you alive!”

“Am wanting that! Being you stupid!” The gull heaved his chest.

Arvico paused a moment wondering if she had heard the gull correctly. “But that’s crazy. Why would you want to die? You’re crazy.” She concluded and approached the gull.

The gull hopped backwards, confounded by Arvico’s fearlessness.

“Being you minding matters your own!” The gull stammered.

“And you talk funny too.”

The gull was truly insulted now. “Bah! Ech! Cho! Ga!” Frustration choked the bird.

“I don’t think those were even words.” Said Arvico. “Not even bird words!”

The gull seethed silently and stared at the bold little female lemming. Instead of saying anything further the gull flapped its wings and flew away, leaving Arvico with a fresh gust of his terrible smell. Only after she had recovered, did she realize that she was alone again.