“He had passed the first test. He had learned the virtue of patience. In awe, he was. Of the wisdom portrayed by such a simple test. His ordeal, however, was not yet over. For the first time in many months. He moved. He appeared before the wisest Rasts. He had not yet received what he came for. He was ready for his next test. He bowed before it.”

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He didn’t know how long he’d enjoyed the scenery, but he knew it had to be a few hours at least. John had never felt so serene. He had at some point remembered what had happened, but it seemed solvable, so he didn’t worry too much.

He simply enjoyed the sunlight, and peacefully munching on the berries his companion had gathered for him. So very nice of him. He’d thanked him several times. John had never tasted berries that were as good. He felt close to the nature surrounding him.

Whilst John sat there, his companion, the Stoat, sauntered over to him and sat on his lap, watched him.

The stoat had surprisingly human expression. Or maybe he was just imagining it. He thought it quite funny that a stoat had human expression. Because the stoat shouldn’t have human expression. It was a stoat, after all. But if it had human expressions, then it looked like it was in some kind of pain. Regret perhaps, or maybe guilt. He couldn’t be certain. But why would it be in pain? He was petting it gently. Caressing from the head to the tail.

The scenery was so different compared to what he was used to. He’d just never had to spare energy to enjoy it. They had worked him to the bone, so when he finally sat down to simply enjoy the world, it felt amazing. The trees especially. They had tiny little markings on them; he was too far away to see exactly what the markings were, but he was sure they followed some sort of pattern.

Then were the boulders behind him. It looked as if it was a mixture of a barren battlefield and a burnt down forest. The combination of which created something truly beautiful, if also haunting.

He reluctantly stood up when he felt he’d finally rested enough. Longingly staring at the spot he’d just sat before. But then amusingly shaking his head at the butt shaped pattern in the dust.

Heading over to the 3 slaves, he calmly went to check how they were doing. They were breathing just fine. He blew the dust off their faces as the exploding boulders had covered them in it. Like he was, only he didn’t mind. He noticed they had leaked somewhat, for a lack of a nicer word.

So he went over to the edge of the forest to gather some leaves to clean them up. He’d never done this before, so he took quite some time and used quite a lot of leaves before he finally scrubbed them clean.

“Hello, my companion. Those berries were excellent. Could you perhaps gather some more? I think the people in our care are hungry and thirsty. We must take care to feed them properly.”

The stoat shook its head before quickly dashing into the underbrush to search for more berries.

John took care to remove the used leaves and drop them somewhere close to the edge of the clearing so they wouldn’t smell.

He went over to the minefield of rocks and boulders and looked for one he could use as a pillow. He’d missed having one during his stay. Since he had a great selection of rocks to choose from, he decided that now was a good time so see if he could find something suitable.

He hummed a tune he remembered from somewhere, while he searched for the perfect rock to use as a pillow.

Most of the rocks he picked up had nasty and uncomfortable protrusions, so he couldn’t use them even if he wanted.

“Ah-ha! I found one, this’ll do nicely.” He said as he picked up a rock that look like a squashed American football.

It had sandpaper like sides, and some sharp and rugged edges. It was obviously a piece from one of the exploded boulders, although he wasn’t worried. He was sure that they wouldn’t bother him too much as long he felt a comfortable position and adjusted the rock correctly.

When he returned to his patients, he saw the stoat had returned as well!

“Hello! Welcome back!” He said happily. “Did you find any berries that we can eat? Or any berries to feed them?” he gestured towards the slaves.

It nodded in a very humanlike manner.

Then it showed him two piles of berries! Two!

One pile was a familiar red berry, the one he’d eaten all day. The other pile had something that looked like a yellow strawberry.

It pointed towards the red berries and then him. Then the yellow strawberries and the slaves.

“So, the red berries are for me, and the yellow strawberries are for our patients?”

He thought for a moment, “Ah! Is it because they’re medicine? The yellow ones?” It hesitated for a moment, then nodded.

“Excellent, then you’ll gather red berries for me, and yellow strawberries for them. If you need help, I-.“ It quickly shook its head, a very clear no. “Oh, okay then, but don’t forget to gather more yellow strawberries. They’re three people and I’m only one.”

He sat down to think. “Now, how do we feed them the berries? I suppose they can’t chew, so we’ll have to crush the berries so they can swallow them, right?” He said to the stoat sitting opposite him.

He mulled deeply over the problem whilst munching on a red berry. “How do I crush the berries and keep the juice from going everywhere? Hmm…”

“Wait! I got it! We just need to make a bowl! And crush the berries in there, that way the juice can’t spill onto the ground!” He smiled brightly and rose to celebrate. He did it! But then he suddenly frowned and sat back down.

“But how are we going to make a bowl? Hmm… We could carve one out of wood?” He said questioningly to the stoat. It shook its head.

“No, I don’t think so either, they’ll die of thirst before we make one.”

“Maybe…Maybe there’s a bowl-shaped rock amongst the rocks! They’re shattered in so many ways that we could probably find one that is usable.” He confidently stood up and started walked over to the rocks and shattered boulders.

He motioned to the stoat. “You come on too, you can help me look. Oh! Since they shattered so easily, maybe we can find one that’s almost good enough and then break a few pieces off, so that it’ll be perfect! Yeah, that sounds like a good idea.”

He skipped all the way over to the minefield of rocks. Thinking of happy times whilst searching for the perfect or almost perfect rock.

Once again, he was mesmerised by the landscape. Every rock and boulder was covered in dust. Most of not all of them were roughly shaped, what you’d expect from explosion-formed rocks. All of them had jagged or sharp edges. John could easily cut himself if he wasn’t careful. Once in a while he felt stepped on a sharp stone hidden by the dust and yelped in pain.

None of them cut too deeply, barely past his thick skin, so he was fine, only the occasional sting hurting him slightly. The pain seemed to melt away whenever he stopped focusing on it and focused more on the task at hand.

Whilst he was looking, picking up stones before dismissing them, the nice stoat occasionally came to him with some red berries.

They tasted really nice.

He searched for a few hours, each time the rock was too flat or had an unfortunate deformity made it impossible to shape.

John eventually gave up, as he’d searched basically the entire minefield and didn’t find a single one that was usable. He assumed rocks shaped like bowls were a rarity.

He once again sat down to mull over the issue.

“There’s got to be a way. The only problem is having something to temporarily hold the juice whilst I pour it down into their mouths.”

“Wait! If I just had a bowl-shaped leaf, the stoat could hold it while I crushed the berries with my hand! Yeah, that could work!”

He quickly called to see if the stoat was nearby. It promptly appeared from the minefield, covered in dust. It probably had also been searching for the perfect rock.

“I don’t think we can find the perfect bowl-shaped rock, so I wanted to ask you if there are any leaves that can hold water. You see, then you could hold the leaf up while I crush the berries with my fists, then we slowly pour it into their mouths. Do you think that could work?”

He smiled looking at the stoat looked so cute when it was thinking. It nodded and rushed into the forest to search for a bowl-shaped leaf, if it could find one.

He sat down on one of the larger boulders and watched as the sun set. It was a beautiful sunset, the sun becoming more and more red as it slowly disappeared from view beneath the treeline.

The view reminded him of a particular memory. Their whole family sat on a quiet beach. A warm tropical climate. They were on a holiday. He couldn’t remember where. Cuba perhaps? No, it didn’t matter.

He remembered they weren’t much older than 9 or 10 years old. They’d spent the entire day playing in and around the water. Throwing frisbees, playing volleyball, eating delicious ice cream. The best part of the day were the pranks. They had a prank war that day. Finding new and creative ways to surprise and annoy each other. Eventually, they teamed up to prank their parents. They sorely underestimated them.

Their parents blocked every prank they could come up with and often counterattacked with their own, always outwitting and outdoing whatever he and Cary could come up with. They had access to money, after all. They could buy stuff, whilst he and Cary had to make do with whatever was in the hotel room.

The day ended calmly. Both groups had a tacit agreement on when to stop. It was when evening arrived and the sun was setting. Everyone had calmed down, and they strolled down to the beach to watch it be swallowed be the beautiful sea. He’d never felt so content in his life.

He almost matched the feeling of contentment watching an entirely different sun set beneath a treeline. Surrounded by ash-like dust and a mystical forest, he felt content.

The quiet and relaxed atmosphere made him drowsy. Even more so when the moon rose.

The sky was as clear as could be. He could see the stars glow in the sky. Twinkling.

The moon shone brightly; he could see clearly, even though the sun had disappeared.

His eyes tracked the stoat as it appeared from the forest, carrying something in its mouth.

It beelined straight towards him. He smiled when he saw what it carried.

A cone shaped leaf. Much like a wine pouring spout, only a lot larger. The things you put on fancy wine bottles, so make sure they don’t spill, and the wine pours out in a smooth pattern.

He gratefully accepted it. “Thank you. This is perfect. Could you please hold it while I crush the berries?”

The stoat took the leaf and held it upright, whilst John squeezed as best he could to get the juice out of the yellow strawberries.

It worked brilliantly. Usually, berries were composed of 70% to 90% water, and that seemed to be the case as here as well, so each of the yellow strawberries provided plenty of water. He only needed to squeeze 5 before the leaf was almost full.

He carefully took one of his patients, the teenage girl, and placed her head on his lap so the juice would smoothly flow down their throat.

It didn’t work exactly as intended, as they started coughing the moment he started pouring.

He kept at it, hoping at least some of the juice would go down. When he’d emptied the leaf, he felt moderately satisfied. Less juice was coughed up than swallowed.

He was quite unsure how much liquid a person needed, especially when they were in a coma and didn’t do much besides breathing and excreting, so he estimated it to be 4 or 5 leaves worth of berry juice. About 2 or 3 cups, he couldn’t be certain.

Experimenting slightly with every try, he discovered that massaging their throat seemed to help and had less juice be coughed back in his face with every attempt.

“That’s one down, two to go.” He proceeded to help with the other two. Gently pouring it into their mouths. stopping whenever they started coughing and resuming when their breathing normalised.

When he’d finished, he nodded, satisfied with the fact that his plan worked. They’d live, he would make sure of it.

He yawned. He supposed it had been a busy day, so he went to his rock-pillow and fell into a deep sleep.

John didn’t notice that his companion, the stoat, looked at him worryingly, before sighing, turning around and disappearing into the forest.

While it ran, the stoat grew larger. It grew from a slightly larger stoat to something that was bigger than a wolf.

Its claws and fangs grew in size and sharpness. A perfect fit for a predator. Its eyes turned an ominous blue, glowing softly in the dim light. The tribal tattoos on its body grew larger and more obvious.

It would not let any other predators, animal or otherwise get near this area. It had sworn a bond, and it was going to honour it.

This was now its territory, and it was going to mark it in blood.

John slept deeply; no doubt exhausted from the day’s work. Tomorrow, perhaps, he’d figure out what to do, now that they had abandoned him in a forest, and was technically free to do whatever he wanted.

But tonight, he’d have pleasant dreams. If he were awake, he would have no doubt heard the occasional roar of anger, or cry of pain. Noises seemed to fill the quiet forest. That night, not a single animal or Rasts had a moment of peace. Those who survived were those who fled in terror. Not a single being that didn’t flee survived. The seemingly harmless stoat ripped all those who dared to face it to pieces.

Then, all was quiet.

A single stoat, no bigger than 40 centimetres from head to tail, strolled from the forest, limping slightly.

It sauntered over to the sleeping boy. The snoring child that rested his head on a coarse rock, so he could sleep on his side.

The stoat stealthily crept over to him, staring for a moment, and curled up beside his head.

It glanced at the moon one last time, before it too went to sleep.

Despite it being the middle of the night, the boy felt warm, like little fire kept him heated whilst he slept.