Morning came late for two particular mammoths.
Manny was usually quite the early riser, normally roused by the grumblings of his stomach waiting to be fed. Often he'd get up the moment he would wake and stretch his rested muscles. But this time when he began to stir, he decided to lie there for a moment.
Last night, the herd had bedded down beneath a large rock overhang. Glancing around, he found that only Sid was there. The sloth was sawing logs; every now and then mumbling incoherent nothings. Typical. Diego was nowhere to be seen. Manny figured the saber was out looking for breakfast. It wasn't hard to pick out the faint sounds of the opossum brother's morning game of goodness-knew-what among the giant redwoods.
Turning his attention to the mammoth sleeping beside him, Manny's gaze softened. Instead of sleeping on her stomach, as she usually did, Ellie was sprawled out on her side.
Lifting his trunk, Manfred swept a piece of her wild hair out of her eyes with gentleness not oft seen in the large mammoth bull. He then began affectionately stroking her soft pelt. Slowly, his trunk brushed over her shoulder and side. However, he lingered at her swollen belly and heaved a contented sigh to the calf within.
He knew it wouldn't be long now. Not very long before he'd be a father…again.
You could have all that again, you know.
The sloth had been right, in a way. No, he could never have them back. That family was gone forever. But he could have a family again; the little calf growing in his mate's belly was proof enough of that. Manny had been granted another chance.
When Ellie had announced her pregnancy, Manfred had promised himself, in his heart, that history would not repeat itself. The horrors he had endured would not happen again and that he would not fail his family again.
Without warning, some tiny force from inside Ellie's stomach gave the tip of Manny's trunk a kick, yanking him out of his reverie. The bull pulled back instinctively, his ears cocked forwards in surprise.
A small laugh broke the morning silence.
Manny eyes flicked back to Ellie's, a warmhearted smile spreading across his face. Now that the mammoth female was awake, his trunk moved to fondly brush her cheek. "Good morning," he sighed in his low, rumbling tone.
Ellie returned the greeting and shifted her position slightly. "Two more months."
Manny couldn't help but grin. "Two more months," he repeated softly to himself.
"Squirt been doing a lot of kicking lately?" he inquired, his trunk tenderly finding its way back to the fur of Ellie's shoulder.
"You have no idea," she replied, giving a slight nod towards her stomach. "I think it's almost ready to come out itself," Ellie gave another quiet laugh, looking back up at her mate. "Feels like someone could wind up taking after their father."
"Let's hope not. I don't know if this world can handle more than one."
Both mammoths glanced up at the new voice, but looked around in confusion when there was no one to be found other than the still sleeping Sid.
"Up here, turtledoves."
Both mammoths lifted their eyes upwards, into the grinning face of tawny-furred saber-tooth tiger, who was crouched on the overhang. "Hola," he purred in amusement.
"Good morning, Diego," Ellie called up. "Why don't you come down here?"
"Sure thing." At first, the saber acted as though he was going to turn around, but then he paused, looking down at the two mammoth figures thoughtfully.
Manny noticed a sly grin crossing his saber friend's face. "Diego…?" the mammoth inquired hesitantly, his eyes narrowing, "What are you—
"Look out belooooooooooow!" roared an ocher blur as it flung itself from the overhang.
"OOMPH!" Manny grunted when four hundred pounds of saber landed heavily on his back. He groaned and thanked his lucky stars that Diego's claws hadn't sank into his thick skin.
"Hello, Ellie," Diego purred to the mammoth female.
"Hi there, Diego," she returned politely, her expression slightly worried.
"Diego," Manfred moaned through gritted teeth.
The saber-tooth bounded easily off Manny's back, a cool grin exposing all of his brilliantly white fangs. "Yeah?"
Manny slowly heaved himself to his feet, stretching his back and wincing. "Diego," he repeated. "Guess what today is?"
"What?"
The mammoth bull smiled mirthlessly. "It would just happen to be an unscheduled Day of the DEAD!"
Diego turned tail and fled as Manny charged, his trunk out to grab him. The saber-tooth darted between rocks and saplings, dodging Manny's trunk at every turn, but always being blocked by a tusk or a shaggy leg. Leaping onto a boulder, Diego bounded onto Manny's head and scampered down the mammoth's back. However, before he could leap off, a furry snake coiled around his back paw, rudely yanking him backwards.
The saber swung limply for a moment, dangling like a fish on some human line, looking upside-down at the smug expression of a mammoth. But Manny wasn't the only mammal with tricks up his sleeve (figuratively speaking). Twisting around, Diego parted his jaws and let a deafening roar right down Manny's ear.
Cringing and wanting to get the earsplitting noise away from his head, Manny flung the saber upwards into a tree.
Twigs and branches slapped and whacked Diego as he flew into the arms of a small redwood covered in creeping vines. He arched up and over a limb and was about to go crashing downwards, when he caught sight of a vine and snapped his powerful jaws around it. Diego jerked to a grinding halt when the strong vine went taught. Down below there came a loud BOOM and he felt the tree shudder. A muted groan floated up soon after.
Ungracefully, the saber-tooth clawed his way onto the branch to peer down at the confusing spectacle below.
One of Manny's front legs was pulled painfully underneath him. The other one was out by his side, while he was on his knees in the back end, causing him to be pushed onto his chest in a most uncomfortable (not to mention undignified) way. When Diego noticed the vine trailing out from underneath his mammoth friend, he followed it with his eyes as it looped around several branches and then understood what had happened when the vine came to wrap around the branch he was now precariously perched on. It all made pleasing sense. Obviously, when Diego had grabbed the vine, a part of it had coiled around Manny's ankle and unexpectedly snatched it underneath him.
"Whooooo-hooooo! Do it again!"
"Encore! Encore!"
Diego lifted his head to the sounds of Crash and Eddie clapping and cheering. The saber gave a brilliant smile of triumph to his applauding spectators.
Slowly, Diego made his way down to the ground. He landed close to Manny and padded over to the mammoth's head, still grinning victoriously—again showing his vivid pearly-whites. "What's today, Manny?"
Manfred cracked his light brown eyes open and glared at Diego. "It's gotta' be a Monday, the way things are going." Just about every morning, Manny and Diego would go through this. One or the other would start a mock brawl.
It had started out as just a slight debate. Manny and Diego had differed on weather a single saber could take down a mammoth. Of course, Manfred argued that a loner would have zero chance against a full-grown mammoth's fury. But Diego was positive if one was clever enough, they could get the job done. Usually Manny would retort: Yeah, if kitty-kitty was clever enough to bring his buddies along.
Now it had turned into an experiment—a test. Whoever came out top would be anyone's guess, seeing as Manny was never lacking in brawn and Diego had plenty of the brains. Lately Manfred had been doing all the winning, but now his streak was definitely broken and Diego's theory wasn't entire junk.
Diego rolled his yellow-green eyes at the mammoth. "Ah, c'mon. Be a sport. You serve my butt to me eight days in a row and now you can't take a loss."
Just as he was about to spit back a characteristically witty retort, Manny was interrupted.
"If the fight of the day is over, could one of you strapping males help me up?" called Ellie. The mammoth female had managed to roll herself onto her stomach, but getting herself and her belly up onto her legs was a different can of worms.
Diego watched Manny hoist himself up and shake his foot loose of the offending vine faster than he thought the mammoth (albeit bruised and scraped) was naturally capable of, and limp to Ellie's side.
After a moment of pushing and gentle nudging from Manny's tusks, Ellie was leaning into his sturdy shoulder, catching her breath.
Diego took this moment to do a bit of grooming. The saber-tooth gave his chest a few swift licks, removing needles and bark from his fur and then moved onto his golden hindquarters. However, he was still watching the mammoth couple from the corners of his sharp eyes, secretly grinning.
Ever since the little calf in Ellie's stomach had started to show itself, Manny had fussed over her like no other. Now that her belly was enormous, he had tripled his attentiveness. It wasn't too hard to imagine why. Every time he saw her, Manny's usually firm gaze would soften and Diego could practically hear his mammoth friend's chest thump with each tender embrace. Simply put, the mammoth bull loved her with everything he had.
It was also apparent that Ellie felt the same way about Manfred. Diego suspected it was because of his utter devotion to her and his herd, and the fact that underneath all that gruffness was a surprisingly kind heart. She probably found him charming and most likely handsome…in his own mammoth way.
Suddenly, a loud yawning interrupted Diego's thoughts. "Morning, fungus-butt," she saber called without even looking up.
The yawner would be Sid—who had just woken up on his bed of old redwood needles and bark, and had sat up to scratch his tail. "Morning, Diego," the sloth called back, waving his blunt claws. Sid slowly hoisted himself to his stubby legs and stretched. "Morning everybody. Hi Ellie, how's the kid?"
Ellie nodded, smiling at the friendly sloth. "Oh, good. It was kicking on and off through the night and a little this morning, but all's well." The mammoth female leaned off Manny's shoulder and stood by herself. She noticed that still, her mate was watching her with caring eyes and forward ears. "You alright this morning?" she heard him ask. Ellie gave his shoulder a reassuring flick with her trunk. "Sure, stop worrying 'bout me. I'm fine." When his expression didn't change into something a bit less concerned, she changed the subject. "So, where are we going today?"
Manny shrugged. "I thought we'd just continue going east until we got out of this forest. I'm kinda' sick of the woods, it's starting to make me feel claustrophobic."
"I'm up for a change of scenery too," Diego put in. "Hunting in the forest isn't much of a picnic. I keep snagging my fur on branches."
Ellie gave her pelt a slight shake, dusting a stubborn bunch of needles off her shoulder. "I think we ought to go northeast instead of straight east," she declared.
Everyone turned to the mammoth female. "What makes you say that?" Diego questioned, tilting his head to the side.
In answer, Ellie pointed forward with her trunk. "Crash and Eddie scouted ahead and found a deep ravine due east. But it stops about a couple of miles to the north. They figure if we set out northeast from here we should hit the end of it and save time."
Silence.
"What?" she inquired, feeling a little nervous under their shocked expressions.
"Nothing," Manny replied honestly, "I just can't believe those two knot-heads had the initiative to scout ahead."
"No joke," Sid put it.
Diego's eyebrows were merely raised in surprise.
It was at that moment that said 'possum brothers chose to show up. They emerged from the top of the overhang, vaulted off in tandem, landed on Manny's head and leaped to their sister's quickly (so that her mate wouldn't have the chance to get irked about being used as a springboard).
"Sheesh," Crash snorted, giving their fellow male herd members an indignant look. Eddie, who was equally offended, crossed his arms. "It's like you guys expect us to be complete idiotic goof-offs with no thought of safety for the rest of our herd."
"As a matter of fact," Diego answered coolly, "we do."
Crash faked a hurt expression. "Oh, I see how you are," he sobbed.
"Yeah, man," Eddie continued for him, mimicking his brother's (sad) expression. "That hurts, right here,—" the 'possum thumped a fist over his heart—"right here."
Diego rolled his eyes. "Oh come off it." In a fluid motion that could only come from a predator, he rose and began walking northeast. "If you two are so sure that northeast is the way to go, I guess northeast it is."
"Wait a minute," Sid scurried off after his saber friend. "Aren't you an' Manny gonna' give each other the ole' one two?" the sloth inquired, swinging his fists.
"'Fraid you missed it this morning, Sid," Diego called back over his shoulder. "You slept right through it. Though how I don't know, seeing as Manny hit the ground so hard."
Now it was Manny's turn to roll his eyes as Sid gaped at the mammoth bull.
"He beat you, Manny?"
"Yeah," Eddie laughed, "he fell flat on his face." Crash nodded emphatically.
Sid couldn't contain his shock. "Diego beat you?"
Manfred rumbled under his breath, his pride obviously wounded and limping. "Diego got lucky…really lucky, that's all."
"Sure, whatever you want to call it, Manny," Diego hollered, a smirk on his face.
The mammoth grumbled a little louder. "It was nothing but pure luck, an' you know it."
"Whatever."
Ellie shook her head and wrapped the end of her trunk around Manny's before he had his chance to do any more growling. She head Manny give a slight grunt of surprise and after a moment a sigh as he began to relax into step with her. "There's always tomorrow," Ellie whispered in his ear. She met his gaze when his eyes flicked towards her.
"Yeah…tomorrow I'll kick Diego's furry can," Manny grinned.
Rolling her eyes good naturedly, she nudged his cheek with hers.
And so, the small band of mix-matched travelers set off northeast with the intent of trading the leafy canopy of the great redwoods for the high dome of the lofty blue sky. But leaving these ancient woods would turn out to be more difficult that anyone could imagine.
A/N: Don't you just love writing those lines that a dramatic: dun, dun, daaaaaaaaaaaaaa! could come after? I know I do!