The cold, marble steps stared at the men trotting down them. The younger man, a healthy native descendant, was about thirty and was trotting furiously down the steps not waiting for the older man who was eighty four years old, but was hardly showing it.
“How could they do this?” exclaimed the frustrated younger man. “That is our land that has been in our possession for hundreds of years! Have they no minds or common sense? Mallard Lake becoming polluted is a natural disaster. They should be the ones paying for it, not us! How do they not realize we have nothing to do with this? Why can’t they be decent?”
“Calm down, John.” The old man stated so calmly, it seemed unnatural.
“How can you tell me to calm down uncle? We are being forced to choose between spending money we don’t have to fix something that is a natural disaster and giving up our family land so it can be sold to build houses! What are we supposed to do? Grin and bear it?”
“Why are you asking so many questions?” His uncle smirked. His raspy voice made whatever he said sound wise and powerful. “Let fate decide what happens tomorrow.”
They got into their truck and drove off on the lively streets of Victoria eventually making it to the highway that takes them home to Nanaimo. The highways are one of the greatest spots to see creatures of the forest adapting to the invasion of human productivity. There are nests containing crows squatting on luscious trees next to the roadways so that a crow can easily swoop down and eat a critter after it has been hit by a car. Coyotes and wolves tend to be seen sneaking around the sides of the roads at night waiting for a deer to meet its three ton killer then dragging it off and devouring its flesh. However, not all the animals you see are using the roadways for a life source. There are giant eagles soaring in the skies above and making their nests on the trees that were too hard to tear down. One might see a daring deer, who wants to cross the road to eat its favorite flower, risking being struck by a most likely imminent death.
Gripping the wheel so hard his knuckles were displaying an eggshell white color, John, struggled to stay awake. The day had been long, arduous, and exhausting, especially since after all the time he spent in court nothing had been resolved. His vision started to fade at the edges as his eye lids gradually began to drop. His uncle was already snoring next to him, twitching randomly, restless in his slumber. A bend in the road was nearing the truck; the yellow reflectors were beaming back at them like tiny warning signs. John slowly began to turn the corner when all of a sudden two dark shapes bounded over the median. Swerving abruptly, the truck skidded out of control making the corner but, skidding off the road kicking up dirt behind the tires like a tree shredder. John slammed on his brake straightening the truck which didn’t stop it from smashing into a gnarly tree.
Both John and his uncle were alright, though very awake now. Looking back in the darkness, John strained his eyes scanning for what they almost hit. He couldn’t see anything so, he grabbed his flashlight and began to step out of the truck when his uncle grabbed his arm.
“Be careful.” His uncle cautioned though he seemed happy.
John slammed the door of his truck behind him and inspected the damage to his truck. One of the headlights was smashed in but, other than that there was minimal damage. Flakes from the arbutus tree that he hit clustered on his hood along with a few twisted foot long branches.
Sloshing in the mud which he stepped upon, he began to walk towards the road which was a few short meters away. His breathe could faintly be seen billowing out from his chapped mouth when he heard multiple gentle grunts projecting from only a meters away. He spun quickly dropping his flashlight on the ground. As he went to pick it up he discovered the two large creatures he had just missed by looking at their feet. Standing only shoulder width apart, sauntering down the side of the road was a buck and a black bear. They paid no attention to John who carefully was rising up trying not to startle them. They both seemed completely comfortable with each other’s presence and after a few grunts and whinny’s it was obvious they were communicating.
John slunk back to his truck still gawking at the peculiar couple when he pointed them out to his uncle.
“Is that deer walking with a bear?” He said confused.
“Is that another question?” laughed his uncle.
John backed up and drove onto the road dodging the pair of unlikely companions. His mind was racing with thoughts of how a situation like that would occur but, he was at a loss for logical explanations. After about a minute of driving John and his uncle could both see through the one headlight that birds were gliding around the road up ahead. They were all flying low and were carrying as much stuff as they could with their talons. Some carried a plethora of berries while others carried full nests and they were all going the same direction the deer and the bear were going. The truck continued getting closer to the flock but, they did not scatter as birds normally would. Instead they cleared a path for the truck to drive through and continued with their odd tasks.
Suddenly, the truck arrived at a car jam full of curious and raging drivers. All John and his uncle could see was a red minivan with a teen boy taking a video with his phone of something blurry ahead of them and a furious semi-truck driver waving his fist in the air. John focused on the teen’s phone screen trying to make out what he was filming when suddenly he saw something unbelievable. John pulled onto the grass shoulder and drove ahead of the van discovering an even longer line up of vehicles. Parading across the road far in the distance at the front of the line was a cluster of deer stretching longer than the lineup of cars heading straight through the traffic. There were hundreds of them weaving in between cars and ducking beneath trucks. Some were even transporting slow animals like possums on their backs as they paraded through the stretch of honking vehicles.
The deer were now surrounding their truck, barely paying attention to the threatening yells John was emitting about further damaging his already scratched paint job.
John heard rustling in the bushes next to him and spun around to stare right into the face of a Vancouver Island Wolf. He immediately began to panic for the natural thing for deer to do in this situation would be to flee causing a stampede that could potentially lead to someone having a hoof smash though their windshield. However, to John’s surprise the deer were undisturbed by the wolves presence. Seconds later the wolf pack arrived, travelling with their young, and joined the deer’s march to wherever they were heading.
The truck driver was still blaring on his horn a couple cars back from where John’s truck was now and in the rear view mirror John could see the driver reaching for a shotgun. The furious truck driver loaded the gun and hopped out of his truck just in time to be standing right in front of the pack of wolves. His face went from mad to terrified in a blink of an eye. He jumped back into his truck and sat the rest of the wait quietly, gripping his shotgun for protection.
John glanced at his uncle who looked up patiently waiting for his nephew’s next question.