Post by Azoto on Jul 4, 2011 15:02:44 GMT -5
It was night.
Or was it day?
Anoki couldn't tell anymore; except that it was dark in the hole, and the cougar kitten he'd met there was asleep, and they'd both had an... adequate dinner of a fat hare. But it still wasn't the same as dinner with his family, where everyone would be standing around, talking, and laughing, and goodness knows the cold dirt wasn't the same as laying next to his mum, however listless and sick she might be anymore. He missed her, and was afraid she would leave before he saw her again. He didn't want that. And yet he knew, a niggling part of him knew.. time was slipping away.
In frustration of this horrible trick played on him -- now he knew why his family had always said to never talk to strangers -- he took to digging. Furtive, perhaps futile digging. His little paws were hurting, but he kept going at the earth. When roots got in the way, he'd chew at them, somehow suspecting that the occasional stray one he found would eventually lead to trouble. But he kept digging.
In the first two days, he had managed to make the nook at the back of the den a bit bigger. By now though, he was starting to lose hope
But he kept at it. Scraping slowly with painfully sore paws.
And when he struck solid rock, he cried out in pain and surprise.
And even while the pit in his stomach wrenched from the sight of this rock before him, he resumed trying to dig. He scratched and scraped, and his little claws dulled on the stone, and his pads became raw and painful, and eventually he collapsed, huffing, and panting, forepaws bleeding from cracks and blisters in the pads.
He closed his eyes, he tried to ease the pain in his paws by licking them like his mother would.
And he quietly began to cry.
Or was it day?
Anoki couldn't tell anymore; except that it was dark in the hole, and the cougar kitten he'd met there was asleep, and they'd both had an... adequate dinner of a fat hare. But it still wasn't the same as dinner with his family, where everyone would be standing around, talking, and laughing, and goodness knows the cold dirt wasn't the same as laying next to his mum, however listless and sick she might be anymore. He missed her, and was afraid she would leave before he saw her again. He didn't want that. And yet he knew, a niggling part of him knew.. time was slipping away.
In frustration of this horrible trick played on him -- now he knew why his family had always said to never talk to strangers -- he took to digging. Furtive, perhaps futile digging. His little paws were hurting, but he kept going at the earth. When roots got in the way, he'd chew at them, somehow suspecting that the occasional stray one he found would eventually lead to trouble. But he kept digging.
In the first two days, he had managed to make the nook at the back of the den a bit bigger. By now though, he was starting to lose hope
But he kept at it. Scraping slowly with painfully sore paws.
And when he struck solid rock, he cried out in pain and surprise.
And even while the pit in his stomach wrenched from the sight of this rock before him, he resumed trying to dig. He scratched and scraped, and his little claws dulled on the stone, and his pads became raw and painful, and eventually he collapsed, huffing, and panting, forepaws bleeding from cracks and blisters in the pads.
He closed his eyes, he tried to ease the pain in his paws by licking them like his mother would.
And he quietly began to cry.