The Bane

[05.20.01] » by Negative Creep

There is no sound in nature as positively irritating as the whining of a small child.

There may be no scientific data to back up these claims, no theory, but it's one of those simple facts that really needs no explanation. Ask any mother, or better yet, any sibling. The shrill voice of an annoyed urchin is enough to turn the most mild-mannered person into a homicidal maniac within 5 minutes flat.

So it was no surprise that little Jamie's mother, confronted with either letting her child out to play or keeping him inside against his exceedingly strong will, chose the former option, and fast.

Oh, she acted like any concerned, caring mother at first, to be sure. Her son begged to go out and play, and she told him no. The temperature hadn't risen above the 20s for a month - why would he want to go out and play? Much better to stay in beside the nice, warm fire with Mommy.

This Jamie disagreed with. Loudly.

"IwannagooutIwannagooutIwannagoooooooouuuuut!!"

Jamie's mother was a strong woman. She had been in need of strength these past few weeks too; the cold and the famine had been rough on the entire town. Food was increasingly scarce. The men of the town had taken to hunting the few remaining wild chocobos for food, something virtually unheard of before this point in time.

That was where Jamie's father was - his father coincidentally being the only person Jamie bothered to obey.

So, being faced with bitter cold, famine, and a screaming 6 year old hellion, the poor beleagured woman had very quickly become strong as iron. But even iron has a breaking point.

All morning long the little boy had been asking the same question, and his mother had been giving him the same answer. She idly wondered at his persistence; he had never done this before in the past few weeks. Maybe it was because the sun was out or something. But she stuck to her guns, never budging an inch.

"Can I go outside and play, Mommy?"

Simple enough reply. But when Jamie saw that his nice, polite needling wasn't having an effect, he decided to switch tactics.

Friendly Mode : Off

Screaming, Fit-Throwing Mode : On

Thus the aforementioned "Iwannagoooooooouuuuut!!"

Not only did he do this, but he threw himself down on the hardwood floor and gave a good impression of a beached sea turtle -- if sea turtles had fists to strike with and feet to kick, that is.

His mother had been patient, very patient. Anyone who can stay inside a house with a 6-year old boy for more than a month has to be lauded at least once. But she had reached the end of her tether.

"FINE. Go outside and play. I do not care. Just.....get.......out."

The little boy stopped his ill-treatment of the floor. Very quietly and very carefully he grabbed a woolen cap and went outside, closing the door quietly behind him. He knew when his mother had been pushed too far -- as do most children. Call it a sixth sense; it keeps us alive until adulthood.

Back in the hut his mother put her face in her hands.

God I need a valium.

Jamie thankfully wasn't burdened by such petty adult thoughts. All he cared about was frolicking in the snow with his friends, most of which had gotten outdoors the same way he had. Cold never really bothers the very young - if they're enjoying themselves, that is. And the little huddle of children on the outskirts of Icicle Inn were, very much so.

The name of the game this particular day was hide-and-seek. Anna Kowalski was the seeker, and Jamie and his assorted chums were her prey. The fresh layer of snow made it particularly hard to hide well, as the hiders left tiny trails of footprints wherever they went. Good for Anna, bad for them.

Jamie was smarter than this, however. Not for nothing was his father one of the finest chocobo trackers in the village; his old man had taught him many a secret about the nature of footprints. When the counting began and the other children scattered through the snow, Jamie stood where he was and very quickly devised a plan.

The idea was very complicated to a six year old mind. It involved a very large pile of boulders right outside town, a snowdrift, and backtracking. There was no way she'd ever find him with this one. Chuckling gleefully, the little boy scuttled off to put his plan into motion.

Anna, meanwhile, had finished her count and was busy seeking the other children, most of which were almost pitifully easy to catch. Soon enough she had neatly rounded up all 4 of the others, and was on the trail of one Jamie Stallie.

The trick he had devised almost worked. Anna wandered right past his hiding place in the snow and didn't even see him. And that was where Jamie made his first mistake - he giggled.

Anna turned to the snowdrift and prepared to pounce.

"I see you in there, Jamie! Come on out!!"

The next few seconds were the longest of Anna's life. She'd be recounting them quite a bit in therapy, as a matter of fact.

As Jamie rose up out of the snow to turn himself in, a shaggy gray-and tan catapult launched itself over the boulder pile and right onto the child's back. There was a strangled squeal, a low growl, and a crunch as the big monster snapped Jamie's neck with one twist of it's jaws. Then, as quickly as it appeared, it left, loping over the snow carrying the boy's body in it's mouth.

Anna stood alone in the snow, stunned. For a few moments no sound came from the girl's mouth. Then her eyes widened, and she ran screaming all the way back to where her other friends were.

"A monster! A monster got Jamie!!"

Pandemonium. Every child in the group ran screaming home in fear. The word 'monster' was enough to make every boy and girl present burst into tears, fearing that they would be next.

They needn't have worried, though. The predator had already got what it came for.

***

The bandersnatch didn't stop running until he reached the safety of his den, some twenty miles away from the village. Bandersnatches generally made their lairs as far away from human habitation as possible, but in a time of famine such as this, drastic measures were called for.

He carried the child between his jaws carefully, never once taking a mouthful of the fleshy morsel for himself. The temptation was great, though; it had been over two weeks since the bandersnatch had eaten anything at all, and saliva dripped from the great jaws in little beads. Still, he did not break. For the sake of his brood, the hunter could fast a little longer.

At long last the windfall where his clan dwelt came into view. The wolf-like creature slowed down from his swift run to a choppy trot, and from the trot to a stiff-necked walk, half-carrying half-dragging the limp- necked child towards the entrance. The body was quite heavy to carry nearly twenty miles in one's fangs; it was a relief to merely drag it the few yards that remained.

A chorus of exited puppy whimpers greeted the old male as he dragged his prize into the darkness of the windfall nest. The hungry bander-pups, four strong, had been living on their mother's ever-decreasing milk since the moment they were born. Now it was time for them to get their first real taste of meat.

The puppies, who had been clambering all over their scarred sire since he entered, had shown no real interest in the limp carcass their father had produced. It smelled rank enough, to be sure, but it didn't look edible. That was all that mattered in their tiny thought synapses at the moment -- that and roughhousing, of course.

As of late, though, there hadn't been enough energy in any of them for rambunctious play. The famine had been as hard on them as anyone, and the tiny bodies, usually so pudgy in puppyhood, had become thin and scrawny. It was hard to tell, though; the blunt little snouts, floppy ears, and downy fur of extreme youth still made them all look rather stocky.

That would change as they got older, of course. Their legs would lengthen out, the fluffy down would be replaced with thick pelts of grey fur, and the short snouts would get longer and more elegant. In a short time they would be predators, capable of catching their own meals with no help from the sire and dam.

If they survived the famine, that was. And that was just what the body of the human child would help them do.

The bandersnatch's mate, a nervous-looking, emaciated female, came forward and snatched the prey from the male's jaws. She was a pitiful sight, more of a walking skin than a living, breathing lupine. Her dugs hung stretched and empty, victim of her brood's ever-growing need for milk. This food had come just in time, if not for her, at least for the puppies.

Holding the body carefully between her paws, the bandersnatch mother began to rend and tear at the clothing that encased the child's body, soon reaching the pale flesh underneath. When she had made a large enough rent in the carcass, the female called her pups together with a low whine.

The quartet of bander-pups had been watching their mother with some interest. None of them could guess what she was doing, but it must have something to do with food. The adults always had food. True, that hadn't been the case these past few weeks, but the puppies never lost faith.

One of the bolder puppies approached the gaping body cautiously. She had never tasted flesh or blood, but the smell had piqued her interest - and her appetite.

She gave the bloody meat a tentative lick. It tasted odd, not at all like her mother's milk, but there was something about it that appealed to her senses. With a ravening little squeak of hunger, the bander-pup settled in to the feast, chewing at the tattered flesh experimentally with her milk teeth.

The other cubs cocked their heads in curiosity. The female was the unacknowledged alpha of their little puppy hierarchy, and what she did they all did. So, carefully, the others slipped down to the body and nibbled at the warm flesh. All found it exceedingly pleasing, and before long the pups were gnawing like gluttons, filling bellies that had not been full for most of their lives.

The old male watched the scene for a moment, then slipped out of the windfall unnoticed, trotting off to the west at a steady lope. The child's body would not last the cubs and their starved dam for long; it was back to the hunger-trail for the hunter if he and the rest of his family were to stay alive for much longer.

***

The first thing most travellers noticed when they entered Icicle Inn was the solitude. The isolated little village had very few residents most of the year, the only exception being during the ski season, when people from as far away as Mideel came to test their mettle on the icy slopes of the North Range.

The crowd gathering in the center of the town that morning, however, was not there to snowboard, nor were the three weary travellers who came from the west. There were much more pressing problems afoot, the least of which concerned the weather that threatened to erupt overhead.

Cloud Strife was tired. The little group had been travelling since the night before, which had witnessed a fateful encounter with Sephiroth. He had come out of it alive; Aeris, however, had not. Now the only emotions he felt were revenge and an overwhelming sense of weariness. The two were having a mighty battle at the moment -- for the sake of revenge, he wanted to continue on; Sephiroth couldn't be far ahead, after all, and the sooner Cloud could sink his blade into the hated one's back the better.

On the other hand, though, Cloud desperately wanted to rest in an inn. If he was broken down from exhaustion, he would not fight well, after all. Neither would his friends, both of which looked like they could use a long vacation at the Costa Del Sol.

Red actually didn't seem too bad; but Cloud suspected he would have kept that proud expression on his face if tortured with red-hot pokers. Tifa, however, looked a little beaten up. It was much worse than he knew or she would say, though. Their crossing of the snow fields had witnessed several battles with starving snow bunnies, and one frightening incident where a Malborough had ambushed them.

The exhausted party had managed to escape, but not before Tifa had been hit by one of the ugly monster's flying tentacles. Cloud hadn't seen the move, and she hadn't spoken a word about it, not wanting to slow the party down. She feared she might have been poisoned; every step she trudged through the snow made her a little weaker.

Still, it wouldn't do to tell Cloud. She had been enough of a burden on him as it was..... or so she thought.

It had been a relief to all when the village had appeared on the horizon. It glowed warmly in the morning light, promising food, shelter, and sweet, sweet rest.

At the least they would be able to enjoy their lives. Life goes on, regardless.