They Do Run Run

As you know, the wild woodland creatures have a race every few years to see who will rule the forest. The true rulers, however, rule from the shadows and do not change every few years. The two tree committees control the important decisions (it’s been alleged that sometimes they even help determine who the racers will be—but that’s just hearsay, for everyone knows that’s decided by vote). The tree committees are comprised of eagles, owls, a few hawks, and a leopard. Many feel the leopard should be ousted, though, because she wasn’t born in the forest at all but fled there when her family was threatened by a pack of hyenas.

Naturally, the previous winner of the race is always one of the contestants, being the one who had charge of the forest since the last race (except, of course, whenever any decision of his ran afoul of the eagles, owls, and hawks: if it did, they would overrule his decision while pretending he was still in charge). Of course, the charge of the forest position was, in their minds, a figurehead position, so oftentimes the committees would send someone to go inform the one they expected to effectively be their mouthpiece what decisions to make.

The other contestant is decided by vote, and the animals pile various leaves, twigs, rocks, acorns and the like in piles allocated to those who are contending for the other spot in the race. The squirrels judge the piles, although when one pile is heaped far above the others, anyone can see that. Other than that, they count the votes of acorns, rocks, twigs and leaves to determine the winner. [In the past, it’s been alleged that a certain hare promised favors to the squirrels given the task of counting, if they counted him as having more votes. Nonetheless, this was hearsay and there was likely nothing to it, since those contending to run stand in front of their piles of votes while the other animals bring their votes to the piles.]

The winner of the last race was the tortoise, despite him moving so slowly that time would stand still for anyone watching him. The committees liked him because he always did whatever anyone close to him told him to do. The important thing was to make sure a committee member stayed with him at all times, because, left to his own devices, there was no telling what he might do. 

He had raced against the hare, who had won the previous race. The hare might easily have won this last race too, had he not been distracted by a female bunny whom he romanced with all he had before promptly falling asleep during the race. The same female bunny was at this voting ceremony and claimed the hare should be disbarred from the race for failing to provide for the offspring which he had fathered during the last race, which he lost.

Moreover, many of the animals were sore with the hare because they had been forced to remain in their nests and burrows for weeks on end because of a scare that lions were raiding the forest. In fact, a lion had entered the forest, initially killing more than a hundred animals, returning nightly, killing more and more until he slew over three hundred and fifty of them. Though it felt like half the forest had fallen prey to him, the lion had actually claimed around six percent of the densely populated forest. The tree committees [in this case, mainly owls from one of the committees] claimed that one in three animals were slain but had counted all animal deaths as relating to the lion (even when they obviously weren’t lion-related, like baby birds falling out of their nest and being killed by the fall). 

Through the hare, the tree committees had claimed that not carrying on the normal daily activities of the forest would make the lion leave. [They had their point: with nothing to prey upon, the lion would likely leave for a better food source.] But many animals felt angry when the tree committees said that that method had succeeded and that staying in their respective habitats had made the lion leave. Most animals felt that he left on his own, not because they stayed in their nests and burrows. They remembered feeling hungry, not being allowed to hunt and not being able to provide for their fledglings, kits and cubs. It was said the committees were all behind the scheme, but the animals blamed the hare, nonetheless. He was the face of the forest and the one who relayed the orders to all the animals. The owls made him hop around and tell everyone the decision because they didn’t want the bad press. 

The other contenders who wanted to race the tortoise were a pretty female fox, a young alligator, and a jungle cat. Some said the jungle cat wasn’t native to the forest, but he staunchly insisted he was. 

Nonetheless, it seemed the hare was the most desperate to race the tortoise, because the loss of the last race chafed his mind. Perhaps the reason it grieved him so much was the dissonance between the fact that, deep down, he blamed himself, but, outwardly, he blamed everyone else, especially the bunny whom he said had framed him and was “hunting” him to stop him from racing. In fact, she was trying to stop him from running in the current race—so that much was true, despite the fact that he had done some serious romancing of that bunny.

The hare was primarily worried about the alligator, who was a great contender and had a lot of experience ruling the swamp at the edge of the forest. The hare insulted the alligator spitefully and told him he needed to stick to ruling the swamp, to which the alligator replied, “If you hadn’t fallen asleep, you’d have been ruling the forest today, but you did. I never fall asleep. No one would have that problem with me.”

The alligator reminded all the animals that the lion had done no more damage to the swamp than the forest, and how he, the alligator, had protected it mightily, not restricting the animals who lived there. However, the lion had, in fact, eaten a great many marsh rabbits during his rampage. Yet it was true that the alligator hadn’t allowed the bunny to hop around the swamp with his orders and that he had allowed business to carry on as usual in the swamp.

The fox had experience ruling a group of ten foxes, though that was a smaller dominion than the alligator had. However, she had arbitrated disputes all through the forest and was smart, so she enjoyed good popularity among the animals. She also had powerful connections outside the forest (which could prove very useful to the forest), due to the fact that foxes roam widely, being known for skillful opportunism. Moreover, the fox was the most persistent contender, save for the hare.

On the other paw, the jungle cat could run twenty miles per hour. Nonetheless, it was generally conceded that one needn’t run that fast to beat the tortoise, who moved so slowly that time stood still if one watched him. Also, the jungle cat was mainly good at killing mice (though he was quite good at that), more so than negotiating with the committee and communicating with other forest animals.

No one might have objected to the hare running had he not been downright hateful to anyone who disagreed with him on any topic as well as having female bunny issues. Also, his large ears were more like head ornaments than ears because he never listened to anyone, especially the committee. Moreover, many of the animals just didn’t want to see the same exact race of the hare and the tortoise again. They were ready for some fresh faces.

Still, the hare (allegedly) felt that, if he could just somehow win the vote to race the tortoise, he would beat him, because, if one watched the tortoise, time would literally stand still for as long as one watched him. But the hare couldn’t just take votes from the other piles and add them to his pile. The only hope would be to bribe the squirrels somehow, unless the other animals voluntarily voted for him, but that wasn’t necessarily likely because he didn’t have the social graces for the front-animal position he sought. 

At any rate, the allegation arose that the hare had tried to bribe a squirrel, yet the allegation didn’t come from the squirrel, but from a chipmunk who was friends with the squirrel. Yet an owl from the tree committee publicly said the hare had asked him to back him up and discount the honesty of the chipmunk, which one might have thought to be enough to exclude the hare from the race by itself. For, if the hare were innocent, why he would need to persuade an owl to discount the honesty of a chipmunk he didn’t even know?

But, as it stood, that in no way prevented the hare from being a candidate. 

Then both the alligator and the cat quit and walked away before the votes were tallied. Only the fox remained.

So, the voting began, and the votes piled up significantly for the hare, although many of the animals placing those votes seemed unfamiliar and didn’t look as if they belonged to the forest. Come to think of it, most of the forest animals didn’t recognize the animals voting for the hare at all. But nobody challenged the hare.

Until the bunny returned, and with her a court of bunnies who convicted the hare in bunny court. It was ironic, considering that the hare had caused all the other animals to remain in their nests and burrows against their wills for such a long time when the lion was about. And now he was going to bunny jail.

Thus, the fox won by default and would be the one racing the tortoise. 

***

Rather, would have been the one racing the tortoise. For, the next day, as the animals noticed time standing still in the presence of the tortoise, they noticed time stood still longer than usual. In fact, for the tortoise, there was no more time to stand still, since he rolled over on his back and died. Many wondered if the lady turtle who had helped the tortoise implement forest policy during his term would take his place in the race.

But, in fact, by decision of the tree committees, while the other racer would be female, it would be an older chinchilla who had been the partner of a former chinchilla that ran the forest for the tree committees during a past term. She had also handled forest foreign relations for (as well as being an intermediary between) the tree committees and the white-tailed deer that had had charge of the forest prior to the hare beating said chinchilla running now. He had beaten her in the race prior to the one which the tortoise won.

Of course, it stood to reason that the hare had beaten the chinchilla, since hare do run faster than chinchillas. Yet, on the other paw, the hare was beaten by the tortoise, though he was so slow that time literally stood still if one watched him—proving one never can tell who will win based on natural ability alone. 

Thus, the race was between the fox and the chinchilla, being that the tortoise had finally fallen prey to his own time-freezing power which had caused time to stand still for others while watching him.

Many wondered whether some of the committee members had kind of a background shadow plan to help the chinchilla win, since she was highly favored by some of them (though the fox was the forest’s favorite). This was, of course, idle speculation.

When the day of the great race came, all the animals gathered to watch as they usually do. However, there wasn’t much to watch as the fox easily outdistanced the chinchilla from the get-go. If there were any shadow plans to cause the chinchilla to win, they were undone by the fox’s speed and the cheering of the forest animals for her. 

Thus, the fox won the race and they all lived happily ever after.