Short Stories

The Kind Creature

Slowly it walked, it's long arms dragging behind it on the ground. Its pale skin sagged from years of standing. It was relieved to be moving after such a long sleep. The creature waddled out of it's old sleeping chambers, which was a small cave barely big enough for it to fit in. It stayed there for the past century for it's regular hibernation, but now it was feeling hungry. It needed something to eat. So it searched the forest for it's favourite food, but none could be found. It gave up the search and walked around the forest for a bit, feeling lonely. The tall and hungry creature lumbered past trees and scanned for food with it's beady eyes. It's mouth was pulled back into a slight smile that resembled a thin jagged line. It was feeling happy, it found a baby fox.

It bent down and watched the fox cub stumble around. The cub was still quite young and the creature felt a slight concern for the fox cub. The creature did what it does best, it backed into the shadows and blended in with the background. It watched the fox silently despite it's need for something to quench it's hunger. It was waiting for the cub's mother. A day passed and the cub lay still, no mother to be seen. The creature took this as a sign that the cub was lost and walked over to the fox, it's eyes barely open. It bent over and slowly reached out for the fox, but then, a cry was heard. Not to far away, the call of a vixen. The creature looked in the direction of the sound and then back at the cub.

Gently picking up the fox, it hobbled over to the direction of the cries. Spotting the mother franticly searching and stopped in front of her. She ceased her search and looked up at the creature, fearless. The creature carefully placed the cub down for the mother. She picked up her cub by the scruff of his neck and began trotting away before one last appreciative look at the kind creature. The creature was happier than before, it felt good to have helped the mother reunite with her cub. The kind giant began to look for it's favourite food again. Unfortunately, it couldn't find any raspberries. It felt sad for not being able to eat, but the memory of the foxes cheered it up a little.

A few days later the creature was once again walking through the forest in search of raspberries when it spotted a clearing. It could smell raspberries from the clearing and made it's way over, there in the clearing was a campsite. The creature knew that humans didn't like seeing it, but it was hungry and so it had to try. It saw the raspberries in a bowl on a picnic table and no humans around. So, it snuck up to the bowl and began taking raspberries. The creature was sure not to take too many, it didn't want to be rude to the humans. It couldn't help a large smile from forming upon it's lips, it was so happy. But then the happiness faded as it heard shouts and screams. Almost too soon the sound of a hunting rifle pierced through the air and a bullet hit the creature right in the hand, knocking out all the berries.

In alarm, the creature tried to run, but it's long arms were cumbersome and left it no time to hide. It heard footsteps and barks, it was being chased. Hastily it wobbled to it's cave, passing by the foxes home in the process. Unfortunately, the creature didn't make it to the cave in time and the humans caught up to it. They stood for a moment facing each other, the creature bore a frightened expression and the humans mirrored with horror and surprise in their eyes. The creature raised it's hands slowly to show no harm, but the humans took that gesture as a threat and began shooting nonstop at the creature. In the end, the creature was a bloody mess and the humans had fled from the scene. The last thing the creature saw were the two foxes making theirway to the creature's side and dropping a few raspberries on the ground next to it. That simple act made the creature smile, and then it's eyes closed and the gentle creature passed away with the image of two little foxes standing guard next to it.