The First Ones

by Michael Weinberger

  The Sun said, “Don’t be sad little world, for I shall shine upon you each day, and warm you with my glowing light.”

  And the Moon said, “Don’t be afraid little world, for I will keep you company every night when the sun goes to sleep and your skies grow dark.”

  The world looked up to the Sun and the Moon, and thanked them for their kindness. For the first time the world felt happy, so it once again sang to the stars and, this time, the song was filled with joy. Every star and Being in the universe turned to listen to the little sphere that had become the new Blue World.

  It wasn’t long after this moment that the First Ones arrived.

  No one knew who they were, or why they came, but it has always been believed that they were spirits traveling through the heavens. When they heard the songs of the little Blue World they were compelled to seek it out. Overwhelmed by the immense beauty of the Blue World the First Ones asked, “Why is there no life within the oceans, or across the lands?”

  Confused, because by now there was an abundance of life in the trees and plants thriving all over her surface and within her seas, the little Blue World asked in return, “What do you mean by ‘Life?’”

  And the First Ones, by manner of an explanation, created the Ancients. The Ancients were originally Spirit forms, now given flesh and manifest as everlasting creatures. Some lived in the oceans, some lived upon the lands, while others did both, and even others took to the air. The Blue World became overjoyed, as the Ancients swam through her seas, ran across her planes and flew in her skies.

  As time went on, millenniums came and went, and the First Ones and the Blue World began to grow very close to each other, until one day they realized that they were inseparable. Together they celebrated their union with the creation of mortal “New-Life” upon the Blue World, which included the beloved tribes of the “First Men,” destined to become the caretakers of the world and the creatures upon it.

  Initially, the Ancients lived among their mortal kind, helping them to adapt, grow and thrive, but unbeknownst to the First Ones, or the Blue World, there was an Ancient, known as Kaylanna, who had begun to corrupt some of the New-Life beings. Kaylanna was a powerful Ancient who deeply loved the Blue World and grew very jealous of the tribes of the First Men. She wanted all of the Blue World’s love only for herself.

  Kaylanna recruited the Red Dog as an ally, choosing the New-Life predator because of its enormous size, strength, speed and highly keen senses. So efficient was the predator, that when hunting in packs it had no equal. The Ancient wanted an army that would also possess a high intellect, so the Ancient assumed the form of a human female and mated with the Red Dog’s Alpha male. The litter that sprung from this union produced ten offspring called the Akhlut. Five were powerful and vicious beasts that walked the world as enormous half-man/half-dog creatures, but the remaining five were misshapen monstrosities without any true form. It was thought that these remaining five were the pure embodiment of Kaylanna’s evil, given flesh, and the Blue World shivered when it felt their bodies first touch her soil.

  The Akhlut and the Red Dog pack, led by Kaylanna, began their slaughter on any and all New-Life, eradicating several species of New-Life from the surface of the world before the First Ones realized what the Ancient was doing. The First Ones gathered the Ancients from every corner of the Blue World and sent them into battle against Kaylanna and her brood. Many were killed by Kaylanna’s offspring, who proved too strong and clever even for many of the Ancients.

  For the briefest of moments, it appeared as though Kaylanna would prevail, and so it might have been if not for the actions of four brave Ancients, who managed to turn the tide against her. These Ancients, specifically the Spirit Bears, did the one thing that Kaylanna had never expected. They asked the First Ones if they could give up their Spirits in exchange for the ability to assume human form.

  The First Ones were initially reluctant, but eventually relented, and each of the four Spirit Bear’s traveled over the surface of the world, recruiting the First Men to their cause along their way. Each taught the First Men how to use fire and how to make special weapons that could kill Kaylanna and her offspring. It took nearly ten years for the humans to learn those lessons, but as the lessons ended all of the tribes of First Men were ready for the final battle against Kaylanna. They gathered in the North for the fight and the casualties were heavy for both sides, but in the end the Red Dogs were completely wiped out of existence and Kaylanna, along with those of her evil offspring that survived, were sent scurrying away in a fearful retreat.

  What happened to Kaylanna, and how many of her offspring might have survived the final battle is still not known.

  ***

  By the time his grandfather had finished speaking the boy was shifting uncomfortably on the rock. His legs had been tingling uncomfortably throughout the tale and had now gone numb beneath him.

  “So whatcha think boy?” his grandfather asked after a moments pause.

  What the boy thought in that moment was how if he started to teeter in any way, then he might not be able to stop himself from falling off the rock. Instead, he just said, “I don’t think I see the lesson I was supposed to see.”

  His grandfather nodded, “That’s okay, let it mull around in your head for a while. Do you have any questions?”

  The boy thought for a moment, “What happened to the Spirit Bears after the battle?”

  “That, my boy, is a story for another night. Now how about you come down from there and we’ll get them s’mores going?”

  “Yay!” The boy shifted excitedly before the pain reminded him about the situation with his legs, “Could you help me Grandpa George? My legs are gone.”

  Chapter 7: The Ranger

  “I’m on my way home Nadine,” Jethro “Jet” Carle spoke quickly into the radio without bothering to hide the exasperation in his voice to the dispatcher on the other end. “Can’t you find anyone else to do it?”

  Nadine’s voice had a pleading yet conciliatory tone that the speakers couldn’t muffle when she responded, “Sorry Jet, but Kurt and Tom are clear on the other side of the park tonight, mopping up the scene of a Winnebago that hit a deer before the driver lost control and ran it off the road.”

  Jet winced inwardly from the mental image accompanying the “mopping up” comment and its potential literal meaning. He was about to say as much to Nadine when her voice rang out through the speakers again.

  “I’m getting a bunch of calls saying there was some kind of explosion near Mother Earth’s Fingers and I need someone to check it out.”

  “Really Nadine?” Jet’s voice still dripped of frustration, “How credible could these witnesses be? The park is closed, so who’s out there to have seen anything?”

  “The calls are coming from as far away as Lascerton,” she responded.

  That caught Jet’s attention.

  Lascerton was a small town nearly fifty miles away from the park, sitting at an elevation above the forest, and giving the town a decent view of the landscape below.

  Nadine voice continued, “Although a few of the calls are saying that it was just lightning.”

  “Well, there you go then, it was probably just…” Jet looked out the window of his Dodge Ram and peered at the clear, apparently cloudless, evening sky, “…just, lightning?”

  “Lightning on a night like this?” Nadine’s indignant voice grew very calm, “Jet, lightning or not it’s too dark to see any smoke on the horizon, so I need someone to get out there and give me a visual report. That way I’ll know whether or not I need to call in the Park’s fire brigade.”

  Jet pressed his lips together in frustration. He had just come off of a twelve-hour shift and dammed if he wasn’t ready for some sleep.

  “Please Jet, it’s on your way home,” Nadine’s voice pleaded in an adorable manner, making Jet feel as though he couldn’t say no.

  “All right Nadine, I’ll do a quick drive by.”

  Nadine’s voice brightened
on the other end, “Thank you Jet. You know you’re my hero, right?”

  “Yeah, well I’m going to warn you now, if there is a fire I’m not going to hang around. I’ll call it in and you can send up the alarm, but after that it’s going to be Kurt and Tom’s barbeque. Deal?”

  “You got it Chief.”

  Jet chuckled at being called “Chief,” and if anyone but Nadine had made a crack indicating his Native American background, he would not have found it so amusing.

  Smiling Jet said in his best mock-stern voice. “Why Nadine, I believe that I may have a racial harassment claim against you for saying such a thing.”

  “Oh?” Nadine replied sweetly, “Well, if you’re still awake when I get off work I can see to it that you also have a really good sexual harassment suit against me.”

  Jet laughed outright at that, and his tired body seemed to get a little bit more life in it.

  “Nadine, we both know if I were to ever take you up on that offer you’d most likely eat me alive.”

  There was a long slow sigh from the radio before Nadine spoke again, “Mmmmm… and then some, my dear. In the meantime, I guess we should get back to work. Call me when you know the situation.”

  “Copy that, I’m out.” Jet finished, returned the hand mic to his lapel and glanced at the navigation system on his dashboard. The turn-off for the road leading to Mother Earth’s Fingers was less than a quarter of a mile away, and he began scanning the area for any signs that a fire may have started. He deliberately ignored whatever ‘information’ the ‘witnesses’ might have seen because nine times out of ten they’d be incorrect. Well intentioned, but incorrect.

  Jet wished he could see the trees, it would have helped to keep him awake. The kind of beauty and majesty of the California Redwood Forest is beyond measure, nor can someone who hasn’t experienced it actually understand how the trees can stir and renew your very soul, much less weary eyes. For nearly one hundred years travelers have made a trek across various continents in order to witness the spectacle of the Redwoods, but no one really understood the reason for an ancient forest to be such a psychological draw for all of mankind.

  On the other hand, being “Native” meant that Jet had been taught the reason this land was more than just some fashioned and named tourist attraction. The Ancient Arboretum was already grown when humanity’s ancestors came into being, making the Redwood forest one of the few remaining direct ties to our origins upon this planet. Something ancient, majestic and nurturing emanates from within every tree and no one could escape sensing the power within the forest to at least some degree.

  Near the center of the forest, in a near perfect semi-circle, stood five trees taller than the rest and are considered by the various botanists of the day as being the eldest trees in the world. Dubbed “Mother Earth’s Fingers” by some State Public Relations official nearly a decade ago have become a North American version of the United Kingdom’s Stonehenge. The National Forest Service took it upon itself to create a clearing inside the concave aspect of the trees in order that the multitudes of tourists frequenting the site could utilize. This way the people could experience the sight in its full glory and truly comprehend the natural wonder.

  All of this splendor needed to be cared for and the entire National Park is under the care of its assigned Forest Rangers, who enforce the few rules that visitors should abide by during their time within the park. Unfortunately, due to government cutbacks, only a bare minimum of the Rangers could be available at any given hour to cover the immense area, making a proper supervision of the entire park nearly impossible.

  So it came to be how Jet found himself working overtime again and studying night the sky for any tell-tale signs of an orange glow that might indicate a fire. A few seconds after he made the turn onto the two-lane road, just past the sign reading, “Mother Earth’s Fingers 3mi.,” Jet couldn’t help but think, each time he saw the sign, just how misleading it was. While it was indeed only three miles to the landmark as the crow flies, the road was winding with twists and turns that forced all of the Drivers to slow their vehicles to such a degree that it seemed like it was a much further distance away.

  Jet had traveled about a mile, and had just finished driving on the only straight section of the road on his route to the “Fingers”, when he saw another pair of headlights coming toward him from the dark beyond his own headlight beams. Confused he lifted the microphone and called in to Nadine.

  “Hey Nadine, is… I mean, I thought you said that Kurt and Tom were on the opposite side of the park?”

  “Yep,” Nadine’s voice answered immediately, “as a matter of fact they just checked in.”

  Jet looked at the headlights in the distance. “That’s weird. I’m on that stretch just past the one mile mark in from the turnoff, and I can see a pair of headlights headed my way.”

  “Really?” He could hear Nadine clicking away on her keyboard, “Well be careful, I don’t think it’s one of our guys, and that means that they shouldn’t be there.”

  Nodding to himself at that bit of wisdom, Jet said, “Okay thanks, I’ll…JESUS!!!”

  Jet swore, hitting his brakes as he watched the oncoming headlights suddenly swerve wildly once across the road, and then back again, before coming to a rest along the dirt shoulder around sixty yards away from his vehicle.

  “Jet?” Nadine’s voice called from the speakers, “What’s happening?!”

  He watched, waiting for a few seconds, before he took his foot off the brake and slowly began to idle toward the stopped vehicle, “Sorry Nadine. It looks as though the vehicle lost control for a second, but I think the Driver made it safely to the shoulder and stopped.”

  “How far away are you?” she asked.

  “I’ll be there in a matter of seconds.”

  “Want me to alert the sheriff?”

  He thought about that. It didn’t look like there had been any collision, and the vehicle was safely stopped at the side of the road, so he answered, “Not yet. Let me see what’s going on first. Just stay near the radio in case I need back-up or an ambulance.”

  “Ok, but keep your radio on you when you leave your truck, just in case.”

  “Roger that,” Jet knew how hastily calling the sheriff would extend his shift, even if the situation turned out to be nothing. Besides, it was late and the sheriff wouldn’t want to be getting any calls at this hour unless it was absolutely necessary.

  Jet stopped at least thirty feet from the vehicle and, from the safety of his driver’s seat, he turned on the powerful halogen floodlight mounted just outside his window, rotating it toward the shoulder of the road. The white beam blazed through the darkness like the spotlight it was, illuminating the entire vehicle and the area immediately around it.

  “Hmm, Range Rover, impressive,” he thought to himself, as he identified the make of the SUV that sat idling on the far side of the road. Inching his truck forward he noticed that no one appeared to be in the SUV. All of the doors were closed and the windows were all still intact, which could only mean that the passengers were thrown about the interior of the SUV’s cabin, or that they had left the vehicle.

  Jet cursed under his breath at the thought that whoever had been in the Range Rover was now running around the park. It meant that he would in fact, have to call the sheriff and wait for him to arrive on the scene. That would take time. Time that he would much rather spend re-introducing himself to his pillow, eating a hot meal in front of the T.V. or even sacrificing himself to the ministrations of the notorious Nadine, the dreaded saber-toothed, man-eater of the National Forestry service.

  Jet awoke from his little daydream to see an angry looking dent in the Driver’s front fender with bright red streaks of blood appearing to have been splashed onto the fender by the bucketful and trailing back the entire length of the SUV.

  “Aw crap, did they hit a deer?” Jet asked himself silently as thoughts of what his colleagues were dealing with on the other side of the park again ran through his mind
. Re-directing the vehicle’s spotlight past the SUV and onto the lump further down the road where, lying in a heap about sixty yards away, was the limp and twitching form of a deer.

  The spotlight was very powerful at close range but it was less than ideal for any distance beyond about 40 yards. Still, Jet thought he could make out the silhouette of the deer… or maybe it was a cow elk, as it was both rather large for a deer and without antlers. Unfortunately, he could also tell that the animal was still alive as well as likely mortally wounded and suffering, which meant that he’d have to be the one to put it down.

  “God, I hate this part,” he muttered, pulling his gun belt from the seat next to him. The gun belt held his .44 Magnum Smith and Wesson 4” barreled, stainless steel revolver, in its belt holster, along with some extra bullets, safely stored in a couple of speed loaders, located in pouches on the other side of the belt for easy access. As Jet climbed out of the vehicle he fastened the belt around his waist, pulled the Magnum out and checked it, just to be certain that there were cartridges in the gun’s cylinder. Forest Rangers were required to carry firearms while enforcing the laws of the National Parks, but their weapons were more often utilized to euthanize mortally injured animals hit by cars or damaged by predators, as opposed to participating in any sort of gunfight with criminals, or for other personal self-defense instances. The poor creatures were to be rapidly and mercifully put down, and then quickly removed from the road, so that no inattentive, sightseeing drivers would be endangered by the possibility of colliding with the corpse. Few people can understand the enormous amount of damage to a vehicle, and possible injury to the occupants, even a medium speed collision with a deer or an elk can create. The importance of this service, clearing the road of any animal created obstructions, could not be underestimated nor ignored.