The eulogy of the bastard bear

A primitive hunter walks through the forest as glimmers of sunset guided by leaves through the treetop canopy light his way like embers are guided by the campfire. As a nearby river rages, creating a gentle murmur, the hunter listens as robins and cardinals in the canopy tune their songs to it. The hunter carries nothing but clothes made from animal hides, a spear with which he catches his meals. And his next meal, a rabbit he caught earlier that day but hadn’t prepared to cook yet. He examines the forest floor for evidence of more animal life. As he's tracking he notices the footprints of a bear. The primitive man understands this and readies his spear.

He walks, following the tracks until the sun has almost vanished from the sky, leaving only the iridescent glow from the clouds, which began to unsettle the hunter, as he had not even begun to set up camp for the night. And as he switched his gaze from the canopy to the forest floor he began to lose the tracks from the bear which only served to unsettle him further. He decided to forget about the bear, assuming it had also laid down to rest.

He first built a fire, finding nearby kindling and using his spear's arrowhead and some nearby flint, he began to prepare the rabbit. He used a short firm grip on his spear to skin and debone the animal. All the while throwing the parts that he couldn't eat into the woods near his camp. Once he had prepared the rabbit and was skewering it on his spear, he heard rustling in the woods behind his fire. Assuming it was simply a fox or another rabbit he belts out a feral shout to ward off the small creature.

But just as he turns back to the fire and his dinner, the bear leaps out from the brush, ambushing the hunter. Naturally the hunter takes his spear and readies himself for combat while at the same time noticing the bear looks extraordinarily emaciated. The bear stands on its hind legs and raises his arms.

The hunter then notices the bear has a golden claw on his left paw, meanwhile the bear takes a lethargic swing at the hunters head. At which point the hunter sees his opportunity to strike. Sending the full force of his spears thrust directly into the left eye of the bear, permanently blinding it. The bear, disoriented, attempts another swing at the hunters head, but the hunter is hit with his paw rather than his claws, hitting him directly in the temple. Taken aback, the hunter stumbles. Although the bear is severely underweight, the blow to his head has left him dizzy and fighting for his consciousness. The hunter collapsed to the forest floor, simply watching as the bear retreats into the forest with a bloodied face and his rabbit meat before losing consciousness completely.

He awoke by his extinguished fire and he sat up to further assess the damage he sustained the night prior. As he examined his wounds he discovered he had become blinded in his left eye and a scabbed up slice running down from his left shoulder to his naval. Luckily the bear had only managed to get skin deep before he rolled to dodge the incoming strike. But the wound remained. Albeit sealed, it was still speckled with dirt and rocks.

Upon further investigation he noticed a piece of the bear's claw was lodged inside his upper left chest cavity aimed directly at his heart. This, the mark of the beast, is incapable of being retrieved without risking reopening the wound and possibly infecting it. As far as he could tell it was no more painful than the rest of the wounds so he ignored it. The hunter gathered his remaining senses and his spear and set off for the nearby river.

The hunter looks at himself in the water, looking at both of his eyes through only one, and curses the bear. He swears to get revenge on the bastard bear that stole his vision and left him scarred and starving. Then his chest becomes incredibly painful so he proceeds to thoroughly clean the wound in his chest avoiding only the area around the claw as that is the most painful. He uses a familiar plant growing by the river as a numbing agent for his chest. And gathers himself to begin his search for the bear.

Upon rising from the bank of the river to his feet he understands that he is in no shape to hunt let alone fight. So he spends the next week searching for tracks left by the bear in the surrounding area while trapping smaller animals and gaining his strength. Two more weeks go by with no new signs of the bear's existence. And while his wounds have begun to heal, the bear's claw is still sealed within his chest causing him increasing amounts of pain as the weeks drag on. As the hunter continues to use the familiar plant by the river bed to numb the pain, he seeks his revenge against the bear so he may ease the pain for good.

Autumn has now come to a close and the hunter decides to search for caves in the nearby area, first examining the foothills toward the sun. He camps out in the foothills patrolling and setting traps for the bastard bear who stole his sight. Patiently waiting for his time of revenge to come.

It has been six weeks since the original encounter with the bear and each day brings more suffering from the golden claw buried within the hunters chest. He has made progress only in knowing that the bear seems to be walking in a circle through the same areas in the foothills. So the hunter stops his patrol and waits in ambush for the bastard bear who stole his sight.

Within three days of the hunter laying in wait, the pain felt from the golden claw became unbearable. He is forced to use his spear to reopen the wound in his chest, in an attempt to retrieve the piece of the bear that continues to force him to suffer. He grips his spear with a short grip and bites down on some animal hide while he uses the spear to split the now sealed wound on his chest. The stinging pain surges deep and seemingly white hot into the very soul of the hunter. He lets out a guttural scream before putting down his spear and profusely hyperventilating. As tears roll down his dirt smeared cheeks and blood begins to drip from his rekindled wound, he prepares his mind, takes three full deep breaths and proceeds to plunge his index and middle fingers directly into his chest cavity. At first screeching in pure unbridled bain and anguish, but after moments realizing the strain on his chest only makes this impromptu surgery even less likely to succeed, he forces silence upon himself.

The hunter begins to navigate his hand to the portion of his chest where the golden claw resides. He then uses his full strength to grip the claw, and with all of his spirit behind him, proceeds to tear the claw out of his chest. After Seeing the claw in his hand and letting out a great roar of victory, the hunter notices that the claw has now tripled in size since his battle. The claw had seemingly been growing in his chest as he ignored the pain and used the familiar plant to ease it. After tending to his wound, the hunter decides to fix the bear claw to the end of a stick he had been whittling to pass the time. After forging his bear claw dagger, the hunter sets up camp and readies his body to heal for his coming battle against the bastard bear who stole his sight.

Weeks pass and the hunter is now fully able to move, now that his chest wound has resealed. Even more uplifting is the hunter's eyesight returning in his left eye after tearing the claw from his chest. The hunter is now seemingly on the path to full recovery.

Having used the majority of the morning to create a net woven from plant fibers, the sun is now high in the sky. The hunter lies in wait under the canopy listening to the birds singing that all too familiar tune. The same tune they were singing the day of his first encounter with the bear. The river also seemingly provides the same mystical murmuring that so hypnotically harmonizes with the birds in the canopy.

But through the music of the forest the hunter hears scurrying in the nearby brush and as he turns to look, he sees none other than the bastard bear himself. The same bear that had caused him so much pain and heartache, taken his vision from him, and left him a shell of his former self. As the bear gets closer the hunter notices that similarly to himself the bear has gained considerable strength since the last encounter. Seemingly rejuvenated the bear casually strolls through the forest with little worry. Meanwhile the hunter conceals himself in the nearby foliage with the net, his spear and the golden dagger ready to attack at a moment's notice. He then sees the bears missing eye and sees a vision of the night he and the bear last met in battle. It is then he realized what he must do.

When the bear is almost passed his hidden apse in the foliage, the hunter lets out a war shout and pounces on the bear from the left side stabbing him once in the side with his spear and tossing the net onto the bears back, tangling it in a web of plant matter. The bear, noticeably startled, stumbles to the right and begins to shred the net to pieces. The bear then orients himself toward the hunter. Before he has time to prepare, the bear charges him, knocking him to the ground and knocking his spear out of reach. The bear sees this opportunity and pins the hunter into the dirt. Scraping the hunters face repeatedly with his razor sharp claws.

Just as the hunter's eyes are beginning to fill with blood and he can hear his heart beating in his ears, he reaches for the dagger attached to his hide clothes. With one arm defending what's left of his face from the bear's endless onslaught of slashes, he delivers one final thrust with the other arm, in one fluid motion directly through the bottom jaw and into the skull of the unrelenting beast. After a few moments of the bear writhing over top of the hunter in pain dealt from the same claw that had delivered such sorrow to his enemies, the bear finally collapsed on the forest floor. The forest fell silent for a few moments before the birds began to sing the eulogy of the bastard bear aided only by the river's gentle murmur and the heavy breathing of the hunter.

The hunter, bloodied and worn from the battle, made for the river to tend to his new wounds. And as he washed his face in the water he noticed that his eyesight had completely returned to him, and that the wound on his chest had resealed. He was healed. The only pain he still felt was the cathartic pain that comes from the sore limbs of a victorious battle. And as he rose to his feet, he took a deep sigh of relief for he knew that when he returned to camp that bastard bear would warm and nourish him for he would waste no part of that animal having paid dearly already to learn that very lesson.

The End.