Kids - #AtoZChallenge

 

Sasha scratched her back on a tree, watching Trion pull a fish out of the river. She rolled her furry back to a different part of the trunk with a patch of rougher bark. Her long sharp claws just couldn't reach the spot in the middle of her spine. 

With her itch fully scratched, the big bear dropped back to all fours and lumbered off to join Trion in the river. This was a great spot - shade trees, clear water, ample fish - it would do for now. After a healthy lunch of fish, the pair of bears rested in the shade until raised voices pricked into Sasha's ears. She kicked at Trion and woke him to join her. 

The humans in the town below were making a lot of noise. Alert, the bears rose to their feet and moved slowly in the direction of the sound. People were not typically their concern, but something lured them closer. At a break in the trees, they looked out at a crowd of young people harassing one of the venerated elders. 

Quite a large crowd of young people seemed to have gathered around the old man. The human words made no sense to the bears. They could only watch the old man trying to break out of the crowd of younger, stronger, male humans. It wasn't a fair fight. Then again, they didn't really seem to be fighting, just making noise.

The old man struggled through to the edge of the ring of people, and turned around and shouted something at them. His hand was raised, palm to the sky as he spoke words Sasha and Trion could not decipher, then turned and walked away. 

Sasha felt a stirring inside, in her belly and her heart. A strange fire seemed to burn within. She looked to Trion, who was looking at her with the same fire reflecting in his own eyes. As one unit, the bears ran out of the woods and attacked the crowd of youths, who tried to scatter away from the fierce claws and jaws. Some fought back, but most collapsed in self-protecting balls of flesh.

After mauling 42 of these humans, the fire in the bears faded. They looked around, surprised at themselves, and stalked back to the comfort of the woods for a long nap.

Reference: This story is based on a brief mention in the book of  II Kings, chapter 2, verses 23-24. Some youths were taunting the prophet Elisha and he called down a curse on them, after which two bears came out and mauled 42 of them. Crazy! It's like in Star Wars when a Jedi knight uses the Force for his own personal gain. I don't quite know how to take this story, but to me it is just one of the little gems within the Bible that smacks of being so HUMAN - What do you think?