Disclaimer: I do not own Watership Down
This chapter was inspired by where I live. I see rabbits and squirrels laden the whole backyard and thought it would be fun to write a chapter where the main characters explore it.
Blackcurrant and Ebony, two hlessi's, went long miles to get the kitten Tacca out of danger, but eventually they had to put him down. The scenery changed from a boreal forest to a forest cliff, a good view of Frith from here.
Both buck's had an upclose look at how tired they were when Tacco awoke antsy and fidgety. He shook his legs at the two bucks.
"You left my grandfather to be eaten!"
Ebony calmly leaned his right cheek against the kitten until he was smothered and lying on his side, and then all that aggravation in his system mellowed down.
"I know you've known your grandfather a long time and we are strangers to you, but it is not fine for you to travel alone."
"It's much farther than an Inlé." Tacca said in a subdued way.
"You are a young kitten who has never travelled far out of your warren. Me and Blackcurrant have been moving for days in elil laden woods managing to stay alive."
"We can't promise you everyday you'll have a nice flayrah of sow thistle, but it's better with us than by yourself." Ebony explained, his attention veering to the right side of the forest.
His nose fluttered from the smell of something burning. There was only one elil who would burn something near here: humans.
Ebony had a crazy idea; he must be completely tharn.
"Let's head down east."
Blackcurrant sniffed the air in the direction Ebony raised his paw to.
"That way? There are humans down there."
"I know. But I have the feeling that whatever is making this singe smell is distracting the humans from us. There will be grass for us to eat and places to bury ourselves in."
"And what if these humans keep any of our enemies as their companions? We can't risk the life of a kitten just to have some flay."
"Grass and some sow thistle. A bunny has never lived until they have tasted the sweetness of sow thistle."
Life and death were too innocuous when the mention of sow thistle was used to wheedle a hungry rabbit. With a sigh he twitched his whiskers before lopping his back legs towards Tacca.
The kitten was distracted and unknowing of what was going to happen next. On the left side Ebony hopped almost battered into the small rabbit. With Tacca sandwiched between two bigger rabbits, he was trapped and squeezed up on the backs of the two rabbits.
"You can't move a kitten like this!" Tacca exclaimed. "Grandpa would carry me in his teeth."
"We are not your grandfather; we don't know where you two have been. We don't want the taste of fleas in our maws." said Ebony.
Instead of just going downhill hopping or moving their paws one step at a time, the two bucks twirled around heading down the hill. It was dizzying, it was unorthodox, and it made Tacca so scared he could only crouch down and quiver as the spinning continued.
The hill was the size of three warrens. It was a good thing the spinning was not continuous as Blackcurrant stopped and just started walking, Ebony following his friend.
They managed to avoid fallen trees, cluster of sticks, and made it to the human sprawled village without seeing or hearing a homba.
The first thing they saw was human blue tarp stretched over a hole. The tarp was etched into the ground, grass completely riddled with acorns and sticks, and brown splinters making a flowerbed with large lettuce plants and a tree.
"You can open your eyes now." Blackcurrant said to the kitten.
Tacca opened his eyes to see the human den. It was one home bigger than two warrens but less than five humans lived in it instead of the two dozens most warrens sheaf.
"Okay, we are in the humans' warren." Blackcurrant spoke up. "Now what do we do now, Ebony-Rah?"
"We get some grass, I think there is some sow thistle in this silf."
They hopped the path to find something to eat, they found lots of grass and a flowerbed that actually had sow thistle. It looked good...
A little too good to be true.
The three rabbits started nibbling on the grass.
The taste was foul, almost like it came from a laburnum, but what did they expect in a human neighborhood. They keep their grass sort using their machines running on poison expelling grass. What their eyes affixed on was the sow thistle. Tacca was young and should get the first nibble of it, but Frith help him if he didn't leave any left for the rest in their trio.
Tacca finally moved, and then he flinched in fear.
"What's wrong?" Ebony asked.
"I think it's best we leave right now."
Ebony hopped up to the kitten. He saw what he was so afraid of, humans.
There they were clamored together on the road with their big four legged tables filled with a variety of different narns. Some of which were vegetables, but others were the skewered meats of other animals unfortunate enough to be tangled with humans.
The sight of them didn't deter Tacca from edging closer to the sow thistle. He finally got close enough to get a whiff of the sweet smell of the sow thistle. All he wanted was a nibble of its leaf's.
He took a few bites out of the leaves when a guttural sound roared from inside their home.
That sound was coming from a ravenous dog. They could hear his thunderous paws as he sped towards them.
Tacca flinched. Ebony and Blackcurrant were resolute rabbits. They knew the dog wasn't outside, or else it could devour them where they stood. The dog was still locked inside the confides of his masters' home.
What did make Ebony a little daunted was a two legged human with a hat, a small kitten of the bigger humans, sauntering up their glistening black road towards the house.
"Tacca, it's time for us to go." Ebony urged.
"Hey, hey," the human prompted. "Your not allowed outside, Cher. Our neighbors are at the pot luck right now."
But when a dog was bloodthirsty it always goes after its prey—so was the way of the elil. The rabbits scampered uphill as the dog came swerving in. The rabbits had a head start but the dog going headlong towards them was catching up to them.
Suddenly, a small dark red furred blur scampered in the way of the dog as it stopped. The pure brown furred dog was confused on which animal it should go after.
It wasn't a rabbit. It was moving in a straight line where a bunny would zigzag when it moves to try to shimmy away from gaping jaws at the last second.
"Cher!" The dog's owner shouted. "Get back here!"
The dog seemed to be indolent in its listening skills as it still tried chasing the little furry animal that got in its path. He was moving so fast he could near clench his fangs into the fuzzy tail on its rear, if it didn't get distracted by a landslide of acorns raining down from the high rocks the three bunnies swerved through.
Ebony had a good look at their savior, a black squirrel. A big black eyed squirrel with a few non-visible unless you can see things from afar like a rabbit.
The three rabbits scampered straight to a messy, grubby big pile of twigs and leaves with green objects connected to wood the length of those pillars Ebony was brainless about. They made a big mistake heading this way; there was sprawled aspen's in the way with a bunch of prickly twigs with maybe a few more under the leaves littered all over the dirt.
They couldn't zigzag right, too many big green things in the way and an uphill on the left filled with a giant pile of clamored leaves.
Ebony needled his eyes to the other two bunnies, curled up.
"If you two can hop over the branches you'll be able to escape."
Blackcurrant and Tacca looked at each other. Without any planning, the light gray rabbit squeezed in between the gap of Ebony and a sprawled aspen.
"He can't leap like us, and if your going to sacrifice yourself might as well be the one to sacrifice myself if your too ugly to be that dog's meat."
Ebony wasn't insulted by the closet bunny he had to a friend's speech. He had a warm feeling in his whiskers as his nose made a trilling sound twitching.
"And I'll bite the paws of the zorn dog if it goes after you."
Ebony and Blackcurrant waited for Tacca to climb on their backs and attempt to get over the wall of aspen, but all that kitten did was sit. He twitched his nose making the same trilling sounds Ebony made.
"I think I hear the dog's owner."
Ebony and Blackcurrant listened for that.
"Get back inside, I can't have you running down the road and disturbing the potluck."
The rabbits were confused. They were still alive and breathing, their escape seemed like an end of a weird dream. They didn't believe it was over until they heard the slam of something big and heavy stumbling.
"Is that just the wind?" Blackcurrant asked.
"It isn't the wind, it is what humans can do to dogs. Their the ones you have to look out for around here."
All three turned simultaneously in the direction of the animal speaking to them, the black squirrel. It was a female squirrel and she was older than she looked.
Once the two bucks were done crouching in a queer way to help a kitten live, they approached the smaller animal. She didn't flinch not seeing the two bigger buck's as elil looming over her.
Ebony kneeled his front legs before her. "You have my thanks."
"Don't mention it. I just didn't want you two to die the same way my husband died just last week. My name is Mingle."
"Ebony."
"Blackcurrant." He spoke up. "And the kitten behind us is Tacca. If it's alright with you we'll be leaving now."