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A RABBIT GOLD, A HUNTER OLD by Tilak Tkkch-Paektu (.. from a bamboo parchment tacked to a wall with a large bristly thorn. Bold, prominent letters spell out "HUMANITY" ..) I am an old man now, and with age comes wisdom. Growing up, I was inclined to be a lone-wolf, a survivalist. I was not exactly a people-person. I knew more about the beasts of the wilderness - it might be called both a vast expanse and a great unknown. I was especially wary of the dangers and the threats that came with choosing to live in the wild. Death could come at any day at the hands of a merciless predator. The golden rabbit is one of the harshest beasts in the wilderness. I heard a village elder say once it was introduced into our habitat by demons. The golden rabbits deceive the young with their endearing and fluffy appearence but upon approaching one they will kill you instantly. They do so in a foul manner -- they leap for your heart, rip it out of your chest.. and.. well, it is not a pretty picture. But one day, when I was about the age of twenty-two I was darting around, looking for a place to set up camp amidst a filthy storm. I heard a small squeaking noise coming from beneath some undergrowth, and I removed my dagger promptly and excavated the brush. I saw a tiny, squeaking little thing. It was a baby golden rabbit. I did not know at the time it would become my first and only companion throughout all my life, and as I write this my hands are shaking from the toll nature takes on one from old-age. "G.B." (that's what I named her) is looking after me. G.B. will be here long after I am gone, for golden rabbits live well into their hundreds. Oh! The days we shared together! There were trying days.. there were close-calls. Once we collided with a group of bandits who tried to kill us or hold us captive. I do not know what their intent would have been had they succeeded. But my craftiness with the dagger and G.B.'s strong mandibles managed to overwhelm the entire group. G.B. is not evil or vengeful. She just looks after her own. G.B. protects herself, G.B. protects me.. she protects us. As I lay here on a bed dying -- it is she that keeps me alive. She playfully bounces out of camp to go meet my shaman and get my medicines and concotions. G.B. fetches me my soup. It sounds outrageous, but that little rabbit is an excellent cook. I can smell the soup boiling now.. mmm! It will be quite delicious. I never knew much about people, and it looks like I'll go to my grave without ever knowing. But G.B. teaches me what humanity might be like if, in some different life, society would have me as a member. People who look after our own. People who help each other in need. People who never leave the companions they hold most dear -- fighting on to the bitter end. ... but sometimes the end is not so bitter. Not when you've spent it on grand adventures, over hills and in forestry canopies. Leaping off cliffsides and dancing on treetops. Drinking from the fountains of nature's harmony and eating from the nourishment of nature's song. Some choose to go exploring. Some.. sail on. | |