(Chapter 37: Every moment had, is a moment lost)
(Several days later)
A small group of deer loomed over a small puddle of water, drinking what little there was of it in an area where it is usually plentiful. It had been completely cleared out due to the British troops plans on building another outpost in that area.
"Life was all fine and great, until those men shown up..." One of them groaned before lifting it's head up to look around it's environment.
"Maybe Shere Khan was right." A doe scoffed, this earned her suspicious looks from her peers and her mate, who was the buck, and the leader of this group of herbivores.
"About what? He brought the jungle against each other, and nearly destroyed it himself in his attempts to destroy the man-village." The buck asked.
"He was right about men ruining the jungle, this place used to have a watering hole, where several of us could drink. Now look at it, almost completely filled in. I saw it with my own eyes when they piled dirt into the water." The doe replied.
"You act like this is the only watering hole in these hills...there are plenty more that we can find." Another male deer added on, whose antlers had just started to emerge from his head.
"Where else have men not polluted our environment with their structures? I remember the stories my mother told me before the man-village was even built. How it was all jungle, and nothing else." The doe responded.
"There is a river by the man-village, how about we go drink from it?" The buck asked everyone that stood with him at the puddle.
"They'll hurl pointed sticks towards us, we'll end up being dinner to them if we aren't careful." A male deer replied.
"You see, there is another issue I have with man. They'll kill us for sport, we need something to take out the man-village again, or at least try to." The doe scoffed.
"Don't be so hateful, the leader of the Seeonee Hills stands a man. Mowgli." The buck responded.
"I cannot help my views, such are those that my mother and father taught me. They witnessed the mighty elephants, the builders of the jungle, get slaughtered, and have their tusks used for décor, like some kind of twisted trophy..." The doe groaned.
"Well, if you wish the man-village to be taken out, leave it to the predators. We stand no chance in the matter, we serve the purpose to be food for the predators and nothing more." Another male deer replied to the doe.
"Don't look at our lives like that." The buck said sternly.
"It's called the circle of life, it's a theory that comes from another continent. We all have a part to play, we eat the grass and the leaves that the dead predators leave behind when their body is absorbed by the ground we walk on, and the cycle continues. Every moment we'll all have will inevitably be a moment lost." The male deer replied.
"No need to sound like an oracle." Another doe spoke, the group of deer laughed heartedly, but then came the sound of wolves howling.
"Speaking of predators, here they come. That should be our cue to go." A male deer said before darting into the jungle, then came the sound of barking wolves that rapidly rushed towards their location!
The wolves chased the deer into the jungle along with Sundar Ek the tigress, and Mowgli!
Most of the deer were all taken down, but the buck was able to hide and rush towards Mowgli at full speed with his antlers out at his front with his head lowered down, ready to gore him with them as a means of self defense!
Mowgli was ready, and snagged the antlers into his hands! The force at which the buck rushed at him was enough to shove him back, the heels of his feet dug into the dry ground, tracking up dirt was he was about to get pushed against a rock...
Suddenly, Sundar Ek emerged from the shadows and tackled the buck, finishing it off with a swift bite to the neck!
"He took me by surprise!" Mowgli exclaimed, the tigress giggled at his words.
"Weren't you the one telling me that you should keep your eyes peeled!?" Sundar teased, Mowgli grinned at this as he approached the tigress.
"Nice one, you pay attention, unlike me." Mowgli chuckled, he noticed that the tigress was preparing to go ahead and start devouring the carcass of the buck, but he stopped her.
"Wait before you begin to eat, we look prey in the eye when we kill them, so that their soul may not depart alone, and as a sign of respect for their sacrifice for us." Mowgli told Sundar, the tigress nodded and she glanced down into the eyes of the sambhur buck as it's pupils dilated.
"Who taught you such manners?" The daughter of Shere Khan asked Mowgli.
"Bagheera, he told me that when I first began to hunt." Mowgli replied with a smile, gently patting the tigress on the top of her head.
"That panther teaches you everything, doesn't he?" Sundar asked playfully, Mowgli grinned.
"He taught me everything about combat, the hunting aspect of things, how to be stealthy, and to survive in the jungle. Basically how to survive in the jungle, Baloo is the one who taught me other things such as the laws of the jungle, the master words, and the bare necessities among other things." Mowgli replied.
"Part of me wonders where they got all of that knowledge." Sundar said, her voice filled with curiosity.
"Hathi, the mighty elephant taught them before he went mute. Some say he is the descendant of the creator of this jungle, Tha." Mowgli answered to the tigress.
"You worship the elephants?" Sundar asked, this caused Mowgli to laugh some before answering her question.
"Yes, when the herd crosses our paths, we bow to them. They created this very jungle, Tha is said to be the very first elephant of the jungle. We believe it to be so thanks to Hathi, the one who is almost as old as the jungle itself. Where they made furrows with their tusks, the rivers ran. Where they blew with their trunks, the leaves fell, they made all that belongs here, the mountains, the trees, the birds in the trees...it is why we show them eternal gratitude." Mowgli replied, Sundar smiled sweetly.
"Let me guess, is that something Bagheera taught you as well?" The tigress asked, Mowgli smiled and nodded his head.
"That was Baloo's duty to teach me those things, about the elephants, and Tha. However, Bagheera recited the same thing he learned from Baloo during my first hunt in the jungle when the herd crossed our path." Mowgli said as he took his knife, and began to skin the sambhur buck as the wolves started to bring him the other carcasses.
"Did the elephants make you?" Sundar asked with a grin.
"No, the elephants didn't make me. I was made by a different creator, man was built by a different being. That different being made the elephants so that they could create the jungle. Everything is directed by the creator of creators, how everything works the way things do. I learned this in my time in the man-village. I was fascinated, to say the least." Mowgli answered happily.
After the tigress and Mowgli had a short conversation, he would continue to skin and cut the meat of the deer into cuts that several wolves could eat. The man stored the cuts into his quiver along with the several spears, and his bow with arrows. They would all return to their home close to Council Rock so that they could hold an evening feast.
(An hour later)
Mowgli sat at the den, sitting on top of a rock in the shade. He watched as the pack ate, Baloo scratching his back against a tree only to have Kaa lower down into view! The serpent wasn't one to hang out with all of them, the python favored her lair, but she would visit the den from time to time. Her sudden appearance caught him by surprise, it looked like Baloo and Kaa were having a conversation.
Mowgli raised an eyebrow as he noticed Baloo's facial expression change from pleasure due to his back scratching, to suddenly shocked, the shocked expression immediately turned into that of sadness, and the brown bear glanced at Mowgli with a tear running down his snout...
Baloo rarely cried, and when he did, it usually meant something bad had happened...
As Mowgli took a bite of cooked venison, he noticed that Hathi was also making an appearance, walking out of the tall brush and into view. As per usual, the man stood up, and went down to a knee to bow his head. Usually Hathi would trumpet in respect, but he remained silent this time.
Hathi was always silent, it was his nickname after all, but ever since Buldeo's death and Shere Khan's death, he had talked somewhat more than he used to. Lately though, he was consistently quiet just like his time before the deaths of his sworn enemies.
When Mowgli looked up again due to being confused he noticed that Hathi was holding what appeared to be Chupake in his trunk! Mowgli gasped, and darted towards the downed Asiatic cheetah.
"I-is he dead?" Mowgli asked as he looked up towards Hathi.
"Not dead, but out cold..." Kaa said as she slithered towards Mowgli and the spotted big cat.
The two examined his body, it was scarred up and bloody in some places. His fur was ruffled up, looking like he had gotten into a huge fight. Patches of flesh were revealed in some areas too, where he was seriously scratched up.
"What happened to him!? Where did you two find him!?" Mowgli asked loudly as he grabbed a piece of raw meat from close to the fire he had lit so he could cook his meat, shoving it near Chupake's nose so he would wake him up.
The Asiatic cheetah stirred back awake, looking around to the environment he hadn't been in for a long time. A peaceful smile came to his face before Mowgli gently slapped the sides of his face, which woke him up some more.
"Chupake, what brings you back to the hills?" Mowgli asked, Chupake shook his head to wake himself up completely now, and he had heard Mowgli's question...
He didn't know how he was going to deliver the tragic news of Bagheera's death, and what happened to the rest of the fighting force in which the panther had brought along with him, but the cheetah just knew that Mowgli would want answers, especially since the Dekkan Plateaus were so far away from the den.
"The Plateaus, the horror..." The Asiatic cheetah mumbled as he began to have flashbacks of what went down, every wolf around him was dying and getting picked apart...the sound of Bagheera's neck snapping, Gray Brother's whimper before he was knocked out.
"Can he speak?" Mowgli asked, sounding concerned, Kaa sighed and slithered forward where she began to tell Mowgli everything that happened according to her visions. She didn't want to hypnotize Mowgli, she didn't want him to feel comfortable when learning about this. She felt that Mowgli could use the pent up rage he would receive to bring an end to Bhediya Khan.
"Bagheera and the rest of the alliance went from the unforgiving mountains all the way South to the Dekkan Plateaus, scoring decisive victory after decisive victory... Each victory would come at a cost, for each battle meant that more wolves would be slain in exchange for the several hundred more dholes that would be inevitably brought down..." Kaa began, Mowgli raised an eyebrow, wondering what was so bad about the Plateaus...
"Bhediya wished to abandon the war, but there lays no land if you head further South beyond the Plateaus, only endless water. His legions had to take a stand, as well as every single dhole in which was capable of fighting. While the wolf, Alcibie distracted Bagheera's Alliance with her remaining dholes, this allowed Bhediya and the rest to sneak up on them, and..." The snake's voice began to break as she was fighting back the urge to cry in front of Mowgli. She knew how he would react...
"And what!?" Mowgli exclaimed, his voice was filled with concern.
"When the dhole swarm fell upon them, they didn't stand a chance. Gray Brother was knocked out, and is being kept as their prisoner as well as any other wolves that survived the battle. Bagheera was..." Kaa couldn't finish it, so Hathi did it for her..
"Bagheera fell in battle, at the mercy of the dire wolf..." Hathi replied, and everything at the den fell silent.
Mowgli had the thousand yard stare in his eyes as he was completely silent, it was like a mental flashbang as several memories with Bagheera played in his head at a high speed. Every moment they had together, every laugh, every smile, every lesson. He even had some memories of the times where they didn't seem to get along with each other.
All eyes were on Mowgli, every single pup, mother, and adult wolf at the den were staring at Mowgli with a look of worry, they felt bad for their leader. Kaa wept silently, Hathi hung his head in disbelief.
Mowgli stood on his knees with that thousand yard stare for only around thirty seconds, but to Mowgli, those seconds were just as long as years...
Why was everything being taken from him? From Mother Wolf to Father Wolf, to Rikki-Tikki-Tavi, to Teddy, to Divya, and the others he had lost in the course of this war and the events before the war even began. Why did Bagheera have to have his life cut short...?
Bagheera was starting to show signs of aging, his movements weren't as swift as before, he wasn't as fast as he used to be, but he still had the old magic, albeit it wasn't as perfect as it used to be, his voice had also gotten rougher. The panther certainly wouldn't be living another eighteen years, but Mowgli wanted Bagheera to live his life and die peacefully instead of being killed at the mercy of their enemy.
Mowgli looked towards Baloo, and the other wolves of his pack, then he looked to Chupake, Hathi, and Kaa. He started to fear for them, if the mighty Bagheera could fall in battle, then whose to say the others couldn't...?
Mowgli then looked back to the ground, and he collapsed on all fours. His body just wanting to let him keel over, and he would just cry his worries away...but his will remained strong and he held himself up as he gritted his teeth, his right eye began to twitch as he was overwhelmed by pure rage and sadness.
He couldn't contain everything that was bubbling up within him, and he let out a furious scream at the top of his lungs before slamming his fists into the rocky ground as hard as he could. Blood begin to pool out from beneath his fists, which only made him scream more, now due to a mixture of rage, and both physical and mental agony...
"SON OF A JACKAL!" Mowgli cried as his face was red hot with rage and despair as tears rushed down his cheeks, splashing into the small splotches of blood from where his fists had been partially cut open by the dry ground close to the cave.
Everyone was weeping now for the loss of Bagheera, hearing Mowgli's wails of sorrow and anguished cries only made the situation worse. They all mourned well into the night, but not a single word was spoken, the rest of the day was entirely silent. How fitting, as torrential rainfall fell upon the Seeonee Hills...
(That night...)
When the rain cleared up into a simple drizzle, the moon was high in the sky, Mowgli sat on the edge of the cliff in which overlooked the rest of the hills, and the man-village. Tears freely rolled down his cheeks as he continued to think about Bagheera, he had fallen into a depression...
"Tha, why did this have to happen?" Mowgli asked, praying to the creator of the jungle. He just needed answers, he needed time to breathe.
"Why did you have to take Bagheera away from me, he had a life to live...and you robbed him of it!" He continued, screaming into the night.
Sundar Ek slowly approached him from behind, she had been listening to Mowgli talk to himself, and speak to Tha, wherever he might be. The tigress sighed, she wanted to make a difference, but she didn't know how...
"Mowgli, I'm sorry for what's happened." Sundar said softly.
"It isn't your fault, Sundar, it's mine. I should have been there with Bagheera, I should have been the one to rescue him..." The man said, his voice soft and shaky before burying his face into his hands as he wept some.
"You would have likely perished too, dear, they outnumbered Bagheera's Alliance. Remember that they were in the Dekkan Plateaus, I wouldn't be surprised if all of the male dholes came in for a fight." Sundar replied, trying to tell Mowgli that it wouldn't have been a good idea to head to the Plateaus.
"If I was to perish, then I would be there with him. I've stood by his side for years, I've come too far to abandon him, but now it's too late." Mowgli sighed.
"I've come to bring you good news, Mowgli." Sundar tried to say, the man turned to face her with a look of confusion.
"There is no good news now, those dholes will wait for us now that our morale is low. They will simply wait, they know we have lower numbers here. They will take advantage, our fighting force is all but gone now..." Mowgli retorted, Sundar sighed and looked down at a small puddle of water as the rain hit it.
"I want you to look at your reflection, and look very carefully." The tigress said as she looked into the puddle to see her reflection, as she focused her gaze into her own eyes, her reflection became that of Shere Khan's, and then his image slowly shifted into her mother's image...
Mowgli didn't see this, only Sundar could, so he was confused.
"When you've lost someone close, you can still connect with them after their soul has moved on. Others may say it may be a hallucination, when your mind plays tricks. However, I've seen my mother and father when I stare into the reflection. I see their image, when in reality, it should be me who is in the puddle." Sundar explained with a sweet smile on her face as she looked up at Mowgli.
"What's your point?" Mowgli asked as he wiped away a tear from his cheeks, his lips quivering as he still thought about how he would never get to see Bagheera in person ever again...
"The point is, Mowgli. They never truly leave you, they watch over you in your good and bad times. They exist in your heart, they exist in you." Sundar explained, Mowgli raised an eyebrow as he looked down at his reflection. He squinted his eyes and got his face real close to it, but nothing seemed to happen...until...
"Take a breath, and close your eyes for a moment." Sundar advised, Mowgli did as was told as he tried to take a deep breath, but his breath was shaky as a few tears were squeezed out of his closed eyes.
"Now open them, and be amazed." Sundar explained, and Mowgli did just that, and his mind was blown...
He saw Bagheera staring right at him, he was emotionless, just a simple stare! Mowgli's mouth widened in shock and awe, but it curved upwards as he was very happy to see some sort of semblance of his friend that was now passed on.
When Mowgli blinked again, it was Mother Wolf, Raksha!
Mowgli began to tear up again as his hands covered his mouth and worked their way up to his head, he couldn't believe what he was seeing. Sundar smiled as a few tears left her eyes out of joy to see Mowgli so happy after he was depressed throughout the entire day.
"Oh...oh Tha..." Mowgli said in awe as he blinked again, to see Rama, Father Wolf!
Mowgli continued to blink, and he would see Divya, who was Shanti's mother, then he would see Rikki-Tikki-Tavi, Teddy, and then he would see Akela, then Phao!
All who he had lost that were personal to him, that he loved dearly as either friends or mentors or loved ones...but then he saw a reflection that he didn't expect to show up.
When he blinked again, Shere Khan was staring up at him...
"Shere Khan?" Mowgli asked himself, Sundar smiled as she gently placed her paw on his shoulder.
"He forgives you." The tigress explained.
A couple tears dropped from Mowgli's eyes as he silently began to weep again, Shere Khan, once a menace to the jungle, but also once a gentle soul who just wanted what was best for the jungle, forgiven him!
Mowgli never expected Shere Khan to forgive him, after all that they had put each other through. Although his heart was greatly warmed, he was confused. When he began to ask why, Sundar was quick to answer him.
"He's rooting for you, Mowgli. To take down Bhediya Khan, and save the jungle once and for all. They're all rooting for you." Sundar said, Mowgli's joyful expression then shifted into a serious one as he looked up.
"Then it's time we drive that old fossil of Bhediya Khan to extinction, I'm ready to bring all of our force onto him as much as possible." Mowgli replied...
The man was no longer afraid of the overwhelming odds, he was no longer afraid of the superior number of the dholes. The only thing on his mind was getting revenge on Bhediya Khan, no matter what it would take. If this was to be a final stand, then so be it, one last push to defeat the dire wolf once and for all...
A/N: I got one question for all of you? Are you ready for Mowgli and his allies last push to defeat Bhediya Khan!? I know I am ;) That old wolf has no idea of what he is getting into. We are within the last three chapters of this arc before it closes out, the end is in sight everyone!