1
It was a cold, winter morning. Mother was in her bed, sick from something that wouldn't let go. My brothers and I did not know what to do. She had been coughing nonstop for the past two days. Her skin was turning blue, her eyes becoming gray. We tried treating her with the only medicine available in the village, Pig Potion, a bottle of some liquid that is supposed to help any pig who is sickly. It did not work this time. My mother was only growing sicker. She was dying and we could not do anything.
There were four of us pigs: my two brothers, my mother, and of course me. I was the oldest of the children. My youngest brother, Timmy, was not very bright. In fact, he was quite stupid. He never made good choices, and was always very stubborn. I would always tell him that he needs to grow up and be more responsible, but he never listened. The second oldest was my brother Arnie. Sometimes Arnie would remind me of the younger Timmy, but he has shown growth in his personality recently. Arnie isn't very smart but he does use common sense. Timmy, on the other hand, lost his common sense soon after being born, if not before. I was the smart one. I had the best grades in school. I won the seventeen academic awards for being so intelligent. I was the one always getting my brothers out of trouble. I don't think that will ever change.
Now I had to help my mother no matter what it takes. How? I had not thought of that yet. Our village consisted of no hospitals, no doctors, and no medicine other than the local Pig Potion. We had only one more option, but it was far too dangerous.
All the pigs in the village have heard about the Medicine Pig in the woods. He is somewhere deep in the woods and supposedly has treatments for everything. When others are sick, brave pigs would try to go find him. None have ever returned. Not one has outsmarted the Wolf who lurks in those woods, waiting for any pig to try to get through. Once he sees the pig, he devours it immediately. But even when he eats pig after pig, the Wolf is never satisfied. He never lets a single pig escape. We don't even know if the Medicine Pig exists. We don't know if he is still alive. But we will never know unless someone could survive the Wolf long enough to meet him. But just saying his name was scary enough to make one shiver.
"Charlie," said my brother Timmy. "What are we going to do? The Pig Potion does not work. We've tried it again and again. Soup, hot tea, nothing works. What are we going to do?"
"I don't know," I confessed. "There's nothing we can do."
"What do you mean, Charlie?" said Arnie angrily. "There is something we can do. We can go to the Medicine Pig. He will know what to do. He will have the cure."
I shook my head. "We can't do that, Arnie. The Medicine Pig is too far in the woods to get anything from. No one has gone for him and came back alive. No one can escape the Wolf."
"We can," said Arnie. "There's three of us. He can't kill us all."
"Yeah," agreed Timmy. "We can team up on him."
I had to admit it. They were being brave. But they were still blinding themselves from the danger. If the hundreds of pigs before us could not do it, what made them think we could. This was not a game we could just start over. Once a pig is dead, it is forever. We were not cats. We did not have nine lives to spare. We were mortal pigs who were not very physically fit. What match were we against the ferocious Wolf?
"You both are out of your minds," I told them. "We can't go. How are we going to defend ourselves? Oink at him to scare him away? We are too slow, we are too small, and we are not nearly enough pigs to fight a battle like that."
"But we have to," said Arnie. "What about mother? We can't just let her die. I do not want to deal with the Wolf either, but we have to help mother. Perhaps we will be first to defeat the Wolf and see the Medicine Pig. We have to try, Charlie."
The thought of having to face the horrible, menacing Wolf seemed to be the worst thing in the world. We all have heard the stories of how viscous this wolf can be, and how he can rip apart an innocent little pig in seconds. I did not think we could do it. It was a suicide mission. I was not convinced.
My mother, who was busy sleeping on her bed, quietly awoke. She opened her eyes to see us over her. She struggled to talk, coming out with very raspy words. "My sons, your faces are so gloomy. I assume that you still have found nothing to cure me. Sadly to say, I do not think I will last much longer."
"Don't say that, mother," said Arnie. "You will live. Be optimistic."
"You are in denial, Arnie," said Mother. "I am dying. It will be soon too. I can feel it. It could be less than a week before I pass."
"What should we do, Mother?" I asked. "Nothing is working. The Pig Potion does nothing and there is no other medicine in this entire village."
"There is only one thing to do," said Mother. "If I am to live, you three must go to the Medicine Pig and retrieve a cure. That is my only hope."
"But mother," I said. "What about the Wolf? He has killed every pig who has gone into those woods. How will we survive?"
"You must listen to me," responded Mother faintly. "I believe in you three. If all of you stick together to the end, you will survive this. If there is no teamwork, you will die and so will I." She coughed several times and continued. "I don't have much time. You only have a few days to do this."
"But what if we don't make it to the Medicine Pig by nightfall?" I asked. "The Wolf will eat us in our sleep."
"You must build a house," said Mother. "You must build a strong, sturdy house that will keep you safe through the night. Whenever you are in trouble, you can run back to your safe house."
"Are you sure this will work mother?" I asked. "We are just three ordinary pigs."
"Yes, I'm sure. I would not send you to do this if I did not think you could do it. You are smart young pigs. No, actually Charlie is the only smart one out of you three. But if you follow his guidance and each of you cooperate with each other, you will come back unharmed. Be alert at all times. And I must tell you this again, do not split up. If you split up, at least one of you will die. Three is a better match against the Wolf than one or two. You must stick together throughout this entire thing."
"We will, Mother," said Arnie. "We won't let you down."
How could Arnie say that? It was the Wolf we were talking about. How can he guarantee her that everything will be all right? Did my mother really believe we could do this? I didn't know the answers. But Mother gave us an order, so that was what we had to do.
"Get what is most important to take with you," said Mother. "But don't forget the ax in the shed and your baseball bat. Those will be your protection."
So we did as she told us and gathered up what we most needed. We got blankets to sleep in, pillows, a flashlight, some food, and the baseball bat and ax Mother told us to bring.
When we were all done, we joined again in my mother's bedroom. "We are all ready," said Timmy. "Here is some food and some bottles of water if you need them." He placed the provisions on the table next to the bed.
"Thank you," Mother said. "You must move quickly and build quickly. Once the Wolf spots you, there is almost no stopping him. Many pigs have died from this beast. Don't be another victim."
"We will do our best," I said. "We will take care of each other to the very end."
"That's my boy," she said. "You must not wait. You must leave now. The longer you wait, the sooner nightfall will come. You don't want to be walking around the woods at night. That is when the Wolf kills the most."
"We understand," I said. "We will see you in a couple of days."
"We will find the Medicine Pig and you will be cured," added Arnie. "Everything will be fine."
We all hugged Mother and said our good-byes. Now it was time for us to do what we agreed to do. We all were terrified of the Wolf, but it was only me who would admit it. I opened the door and we walked out.
I took one last look at our village. Pigs walked around happily as if nothing was wrong. Well, nothing was wrong for them. For us, our lives were at stake. We could be dead before the day was over.
We walked down the streets, past our old school, past our only supermarket, past my favorite library, and past our best friends' house; I noticed my friend coming outside and stopped.
"Hey you guys!" yelled our friend Frank. He was a rather chubby pig and didn't move very fast. He rushed over to us. When he caught his breath he asked, "What are you guys doing over on this part of town? Were you planning on giving me a surprise visit?"
"No," I said. "We were leaving."
"Leaving? Leaving to where?"
"We are going through the woods to see the Medicine Pig," I told him.
"What? You can't be going there. The Wolf will kill you. He will rip you apart like he did all the other pigs who went into those woods."
"We believe otherwise," said Arnie. "We will make it back alive and you will see that pigs like us can outsmart the Wolf. That big, bad Wolf isn't as tough as he think he is."
"So I guess we should get going," I said. "We have to build a safe house in the woods. That could take a while."
"Wait," said Frank. "Let me go with you."
"Go with us? You can't go with us."
"Why not?" questioned Frank.
"This is not your battle, it's ours," I said. "You may be killed."
"Four pigs is better than three."
"You're fat," I told him. "You don't run fast, and you would be the most likely to get killed."
"I will not be killed," he argued. "That big, bad Wolf does not scare me. I can help you guys."
"You're not coming!" I yelled. "You need to stay here."
"Please let me come," Frank begged. "I can bring food. We have lots of food at my house."
Food? I couldn't resist. We didn't bring a lot of food with us, and if we were to shop for food, we might not have enough to buy from the Medicine Pig.
"Fine," I said. "You can come if you bring a basket full of food."
"Thank you!" Frank said. He rushed into his house. About a minute later, he came out with a picnic basket with a lid. He showed us what was in it and we were definitely satisfied. There was enough food to last possibly two weeks in the woods.
We continued our travel through the village and neared the woods. The closer I got, the more I was afraid. In the woods was a huge, ferocious beast, waiting for any little pig to come into his territory.
We were at the edge of the woods now. The only ones who were there besides us was a salesman with sold three things: straw, sticks, and bricks.
"Going to try and reach the Medicine Pig, are you?" asked the salesman. "You may need some supplies."
"He's right," said Frank. "We need to build a safe house, right? We can buy everything we need from right here."
"I think we should find a good spot first," I said. "There's no reason to carry a bunch of stuff around before we even know where we are going. We can come back in an hour or so, when we find a good spot. Let's go."
We continued walking into the woods.
"Wait," said the salesman. "I hope you four know what you are getting into. This isn't a rat we are talking about here. This is the Wolf. He is extremely dangerous. Are you sure you want to do this?"
"We're sure," said Arnie. "We have to do this."
"Okay," said the salesman. "But by the time you come back to get your supplies, I don't think you'll feel the same way."