The Last Wolevrine

He ran along the prairies confident and fearless. The world was his playground, the air his friend, the pine cones his playmates.

The moon looked down upon him and smiled. They were friends too. When on full moon nights, she rose with all her grandeur, even he would stop tearing apart the carcass of a deer and look up to greet her. When she was covered with her own demons, he bared his fangs and leapt at them and they slowly gave way and vanished.

Yet they always came back.

The moon was moody to say the least. She hid on occasions behind her veil of clouds and as he grew older he realized that the moon was selfish too. They were born just a few hours apart. He knew he was born during the day when the gold disc was high in the sky and then as he played with his siblings, the gold disc dipped behind the mountains and the moon was born. Since then he had taken care of her. She was his responsibility.

Then one day they came. Hairless apes riding on Monsters, tearing down tree after tree. Trees that were older than the mountain itself were uprooted and thrown away. The green faded from the valley. The mountain shook and there were gaping holes left in his side. The mighty hills were pierced and though it did not bleed, everyone but the apes could hear it cry.

The moon too was covered in a strange new mist. It was not the fog of the pine cones in winter. It was dark, smelling of the black water that one could not drink and he growled and growled and it did not go away. Then one day, he attacked one of the apes. Easier than the ones on trees, they only had a piece of branch that lit a spark with a deafening sound and threw a stone. They never could hit him with the stone. He was too fast for it. He killed and killed till the monsters stopped barking and the mountains were still.

But he had misjudged the apes. One day as he slept, he felt something pierce his body and then all went dark.

They pulled him towards the burning stake. He tugged at his chains and realized that they were unbreakable.

He looked at the moon for one last time and howled in an ecstatic delirium. The apes crossed their hearts.

The mountains died with the last wolverine and legends say a new star was born beside the moon.

(The piece is loosely based on movies, folk tales, news reports and my own reality. Sometimes the dividing lines between myth, legends and realities merge.)