The Great Green North

Ice Babies

The humans sat in their cave listening to Elder Rune tell stories of the before. Young and old they sat cross-legged on the damp cave floor, the cold piercing their skin like thousands of tiny needles, how unfair this was, for the animals are permitted to sit all day under the comforting, hot rays of the sun. The humans craved this life, lying all day next to a flowing blue waterfall, warm, comfortable, happy, free of anxiety, nail biting, world collapsing fear, not that you'd be next, but that those you love would be. Stripped away at any moment, without a seconds notice, no goodbye. To hear the animals dancing and singing around a warm fire as someone you love is being slowly lowered in, the animals sacrifice to the planet as a promise it will never be destroyed so brutally ever again.

Hana had heard that enough times, her brother was first, she sat at the back of the cave with her mother collapsed in her arms. Trying to comfort a woman who could hear her dying sons screams, that never left her the poor girl. Her mothers pale face stained red as her bloodshot eyes, black hair shiny, wet with tears. Slouched over a boulder looking up straight into her daughters eyes, the girl had never seen her mother cry before and she surely never wanted to see it again. She only ever had to once again, the day her mother was killed. 

This time Hana sat at the cave entrance for as long as she could before she was ushered away by Elder Rune. With neither having any family left Elder Rune took her in as her own, for she'd always prayed for a daughter. It was her lifelong dream to have children but her husband died in the middle. She always told the tale of his death so beautifully and with such accuracy it almost seemed he was in her brain telling her every tiny detail. Hana enjoyed imagining him like that for Elder Rune was not the best of drawers, her art was her stories and words and what a gift it was though it didn't help Hana's imagination to much when it came to curating a picture of the man. They looked as though they could be family, Elder Rune and Hana, both with the same long wavy black hair as Hana's mother, their long pointed noses symbolised their strength, the thin point curved inwards. It could be compared to one of a witch, but they were none of the sort, more like a ships bow standing confidently and ready to strike their ocean eyes in two. Their blue eyes that could only be compared to the wide ocean, striped with whites, turquoises, teals, greens, the four eyes stared at each other as Elder Rune finished her story.

Elder Rune's stories were incredible to Hana and her fellow ice babies, tales of a green colour that once coated the world. Green trees, bushes, grass, mountains, hills, flowers, if they would've just been more careful that could've been the life of freedom and colour Hana could have lived. She longed for some colour other than the greyish brown that coated the cave walls or the orange sand that acted as a natural carpet to the kingdoms floor. No some true colour, like how Elder Rune describes, bright, electrifying, red, yellow, purple, pink. Green.

 The humans were greedy in the before, destroying this stunning colour and replacing it with grey. Grey buildings, houses, roads, cars, clothes, phones, money. For life to them was all about money, you couldn't get out of it. This constant cycle of destroying all of the beautiful colours transferred to their brains too, they became robots, obliterating any sense of creativity, individually. Sure the rare few wrote, drew, painted, spoke about their feelings, thoughts and the important matters but most of that was stamped out like a match all for the cause of being accepted, socially but also themselves. They were so caught up in achievements, success that they forgot to live. And in turn the planet did too.  

Hi! This is my first story, it's not the best but I'm learning  xxxx