I was one of the last ones to hear about it. "It's like the berries, but better! And wet!" That was all I knew about the thing when Skert came to tell me, eager and hurrying me along. "You've just got to try some!" he exclaimed, stumbling over a nut in his haste to turn around.
We dashed through the grass, Skert in the lead. "We were watching the little human, when it just fell from the sky! The short one was making all sorts of noises, stomping like it wanted to kill us! Then one of thee bigger ones came, and took the baby away. It's just sitting there, ours for the taking! Hurry up, before it's gone!" With that, Skert put on an extra burst of speed, and took off ahead. I had some close encounters with a few rocks as I tried to keep up.
"Wait till you see it!" Skert called from up ahead, plowing roughly through the grass and leaving an easy to follow trail behind him. "It's like... like snow! But orange! And so good... You'll see!" He glanced over his shoulder at me, panting wildly and nearly tripping.
"Just up here...!" And with that, he nearly belly flopped out of the grass, onto a large patch of bare ground. I could see something that looked orange through the grass.
Plunging forward and out of my way, Skert rushed over to a giant orange blob, melting in the sun, and with large holes in it where my siblings had already been eating it. Large puddles of the melted goop were strewn about, and everyone was licking, biting, and pawing the sticky thing.
"What is it?" I asked. "Who knows? Who cares? It tastes great!" Skert scooped out a pawful of the stuff, stuffing it noisily into his mouth. "Try some!" I watched one of my brothers pressing his face into the blob, my nose twitching. It did smell good. I went to one of the puddles, tasting it carefully.
"Woah!" "Yeah, I know!" "That's amazing!" I shoved my mouth into the puddle, eating as much as possible. The taste! The flavor was overwhelming, like a hundred berries were in my mouth at once! I'd never had anything like it! The puddle simply wasn't enough. I scrambled over to the glob of half-eaten, melting, delicious goop. Only this didn't feel like the goop from the puddle. It was cold! Stinging, biting sensations filled my mouth, expanding through my whole face! My whole head!
Gasping, I wrenched my head face away from it. "It hurts!" I exclaimed. "You'll get used to it, just try some more," Skert said unconcernedly. I turned back to the blob of goop, bracing myself this time.
Before I could try it again, though, someone shoved my to the side. "Hey!" My brother Anyoo glanced at me, his entire head and shoulders covered in the stuff, whiskers dripping with it. "Sorry, I didn't see you," he lied casually before continuing on. I glared after him. I wonder where he was headed looking like that, I thought. But I would not be distracted for long. Though it was already half the size it was when I'd first seen it, the orange blob called out to my nose with it's wonderful scent, and I pressed my face eagerly into the sticky mass.
Again, the flavor erupted inside my mouth, along with the biting coldness, but I braced myself and waited, half of my face submerged in it, until feeling returned to my mouth. I don't know how long I ate, following the more frozen parts that lasted longer, my stomach rumbling with the onslaught of the icy orange goodness.
I knew Skert and the others were still there, but I paid them no mind. I was busy. It was because of this, I'm sure, that I somehow missed the vibrations. Something big was coming, and I just stood there with the front half of my face buried in the creamy blob of flavor. I first noticed that my siblings were leaving when one of them scrambled hurriedly past me, stumbling on my tail accidentally.
"Watch it!" I called, annoyed. Then I felt someone else run into my rear. "Where are you going so fast?" I asked. "It's still here, don't you want some mo-" I'd just noticed their faces. They were all panicked, looking for a place to hide.
"Move!" Skert slammed into me, sending us both tumbling. That's when I finally saw the human. The colossal, petrifying, lumbering human. Skert seized me around the middle, and practically threw me away from the man. Regaining my senses, I ran under my own power.
Maybe it was the mind numbing effects of the freezing orange blob, but I couldn't think right. I knew the man was behind us, I could feel him advancing quicker and quicker, could hear one of my sisters screaming, could hear her scream fading as the man lifted her into the air, but I couldn't understand what it meant. Couldn't grasp the fact that he was right behind me and Skert, that he could snatch us up and take us away, too. I knew it all, but it didn't make any sense.
As I struggled to think, my body sped along, but I wasn't in control. I began feeling slightly detached. I watched from behind my own eyes as the grass swept by me, as Skert scrambled along next to me at top speed, eyes bulging in fear. I knew my mouth was hanging open, and I was letting out little whining squeaks in my panic, but I couldn't think about it. My brain wasn't functioning in a way that would connect me to my body.
I was more perceptive than normal, noticing every tiny detail of things that I would normally have been too distracted to note. I saw, as though in slow motion, the thick blades of grass hitting my face. I felt the man's presence as he made a snatch for Skert, his enormous hand swinging through the air as Skert dodged to the side. I could hear the gigantic human's labored breathing, his lungs impossibly big, his breaths too long, too far apart to be normal. My mind seemed to be floating around inside my head, barely connected but perceiving the events taking place around me none-the-less. It was an incredibly frustrating feeling.
I knew everything that was going on. And I saw the roots portuding through the earth ahead of me, but try as I might, I couldn't tell my body they were there. I tripped. My belly hit the ground, and in some remote part of me, that hurt. My legs had splayed out, but were already scrambling to push me forward, to send me away from the human, without even trying to stand up properly first. I fell again, this time on my head. My body gasped for breath as I lay there, telling myself to move and getting no response. Get up! I thought to myself. Move!
The breath was knocked out of me once again, this time by enormous fingers that reached underneath my belly, wrapping around my entire body and lifting me into the air. They pressed down on the top of my head, and into the underside of my jaw, effectively closing my jaws and preventing me from biting him. His grip was hard, and I felt my legs thrashing, my claws trying to scratch him, hurt him, make him release me. I couldn't think of anything else to do, which was just as well, because I'd never have been able to tell my body to do it.
My senses were becoming duller, my mind more disconnected than ever. I felt wind rushing past me as he carried me through the air, and then a plunging sensation in my stomach as he let go. I felt myself stop almost immediately, however. He'd put me into a very small space, and now he was closing the ceiling, trapping me.
Groggily, I looked around. I could still see the ground rushing past, could feel myself being tossed about as the human ran. Everything in here was yellow. Everything outside looked yellow. I was still purple and white, though. And orange. I still had that sticky stuff on my face and whiskers.
I licked one of them clean slowly, trying to taste it, but it was getting difficult to feel anything. I couldn't see my paw anymore. It was just purple. And yellow. I couldn't think at all. Skert was running below me. The man hadn't caught him yet, then. I wondered how he got all the way down there. I wondered where Mother was. I missed her. If she came to save me, would she be yellow like Skert and the rest of the world? Did the orange stuff taste yellow now? If the man grabbed me right then, I don't think I could have fought him. Maybe he'd give me back to Mother.
I wondered if I was turning into a flower. I fainted.