I am Brian Joseph Johns and this is Shhhh! Digital Media at https://www.shhhhdigital.com or https://www.shhhhdigital.ca in Toronto, Ontario, Canada at 200 Sherbourne Street Suite 701.
For National Truth And Reconciliation Day!
Chapters
- Broken Trail (Finished September 29, 2025)
- Coffee And Donuts (Finished September 30, 2025)
- Into The Rough (Finished October 2, 2025)
- The Living Wild (Finished October 3, 2025)
- Cattails, Swamp Grass And A Miracle (Finished October 7, 2025)
- The Fall Of Lawana (Finished October 7, 2025)
- Vision Quest (Finished October 8, 2025)
- A Meeting Place (Finished October 8, 2025)
- Showdown (Finished October 10, 2025)
- The Rising Bear (Finished October 12, 2025)
- Thanksgiving Day (Finished October, 2025)
This content is produced by the artists indicated on the site, including
myself, Brian Joseph Johns.
I, under no circumstance will trade, barter or otherwise swap my own
identity for that of another person and I protect the same right for those
who've contributed their artwork to the various projects under my management at
Shhhh! Digital Media, my own company, no matter the colour symbolism involved.
These rights are protected by law under the
Charter Of Rights And Freedoms
under
section 7.
Also, FYI, I don't reverse or alter the polarity or context
of my expression (sometimes referred to as "blove" by some people). I say what I
mean and mean what I say, and generally only joke or am sarcastic with people I
really know very well.
If you enjoy reading the content on this
website, then please consider making a donation to one of the following
charities below, or by the purchase of merchandise on our shop at
https://shop.shhhhdigital.com.
Support Charity
Please support education and information access where you can in addition
to these charities:
Help research that provides cures and support treatment for sick
children.
David Suzuki FoundationThrough evidence-based research, education and policy analysis,
we work to conserve and protect the natural environment, and help
create a sustainable Canada. We regularly collaborate with non-profit
and community organizations, all levels of government, businesses and
individuals.
Donate directly to FireAid today to help us start rebuilding our
community. Direct donations will be distributed under the advisement of
the Annenberg Foundation and will be distributed for short-term relief
efforts and long-term initiatives to prevent future fire disasters
throughout Southern California.
United Nations FundUnited Way Worldwide
Two organizations whose contribution of expertise, human and financial
resources and volunteer efforts provide humanitarian solutions to real
world problems the entire world over. These charities operate
worldwide. The United Nations Fund supports the various programs part
of the United Nations' global mandate, as much a foundation as it is a
roof around the world.
I'd like to point out that it was the incredible
Gary Sinese Foundation that brought the issue of Veteran's rights to my attention.
I've always had little respect for those who'd forget the great
contribution made by those who've risked life and limb to defend those
values that so many of us espouse. Perhaps the true measure of one's
principles are by that for which they'd risk their life.
"None can speak more eloquently for peace than those who have
fought in war."
Ralph Bunche, Nobel Peace Prize 1950
The Reeve Foundation provides programs for research, uniting
Scientists and Specialists from many different fields to find
treatments for spinal cord injury translating them into therapies and
support programs.
For over 60 years, Heart & Stroke has been dedicated to fighting
heart disease and stroke. Our work has saved thousands of lives and
improved the lives of millions of others.
The ALS Society Of BCALS (also known as Lou Gehrig's Disease) is a progressive
neuromuscular disease in which nerve cells die and leave voluntary
muscles paralyzed. The ALS society provides a variety of programs to
combat this disease and help those with it to survive.
Muscular Dystrophy CanadaMuscular Dystrophy Canada’s mission is to enhance the lives of
those affected by neuromuscular disorders by continually working to
provide ongoing support and resources while relentlessly searching for a
cure through well-funded research.
Humane Society InternationalThe Humane Society protects the health, lives and rights of
animals the world over, ensuring that they too have a voice in this
world. We are interdependent upon the complex web of life this entire
planet over for our mutual survival. This is a world wide charity.
The Global Foodbanking NetworkEnsuring that people the world over have enough food day to day
in order to survive and lead healthy lives. In this challenging day and
age services like this are becoming more and more essential. This is a
world wide charity.
The Edgar Allan Poe MuseumBecause Barris told me to put it here. If I didn't, he said he'd
walk. Geez. Stardom really gets to some people's heads. Maybe I could
kill him and bury his
heart beneath the floor boards! Or I could encase him in behind a brick
and mortar wall, for shaming my family name of
Amantillado!
In all truth, there's a good chance that thanks to the works of Edgar
Allan Poe, Samuel Clemens (Mark Twain), William Shakespeare, Jane
Austen, Jonathan Swift, Mary Shelley, Robert Louis Stevenson, Herbert
George Wells, Jules Verne, Dr. Seuss, Stephen King, Clive Barker and
Pierre Burton (for
The Secret World Of Og and his ground breaking interview of Bruce Lee) that all of us
are literate. Actually that goes back much farther to the Phoenecians
and their first 22 character system of symbols. Literacy is important.
Really it is.
Literally. It allows us to approach our
employer at the end of the week (with a big club) and ask:
where my money?! Math important too. It help us count our thirteen fingers and
toes.WikipediaThe model for what may become the
Encyclopedia Galactica, a complete reference and record of history, events and knowledge of
humanity and its journey beyond. It is the encyclopedia of all that we
know, what we surmise that we've known and will learn in the future.
Yes, Wikipedia is a charitable organization of great importance. If you
enjoy what I am doing here then please take the time to donate to
Wikipedia. Surprisingly only 1% of Wikipedia's users donate yet the site
serves pages to millions every day.
Humble BundleA video gaming storefront benefiting a vast variety of different
Charities in the United States and United Kingdom (hopefully soon to be
expanded to include other areas of the world?). By software their
software bundles and choose which Charity your money benefits and how
much of your money benefits that Charity. See? Gamers can do their part
too.
Multiple Sclerosis is a degenerative disease currently affecting an
estimated 2.3 million world wide. By donating you are contributing to
effective research in finding a cure and tipping the scales of MS
research to change lives forever.
Other Ways To Help Using Your Computer
Donate your idle computer time to
science! Join the World Community Grid by clicking on one of the links below
and follow the instructions for how to participate:
Thank you for your support
Shhhh! Digital Media
Brian Joseph Johns
Introduction
This new series from Shhhh! Digital Media is all about exploring the worlds of
Shhhh! Digital Media through a variety of sometimes unconnected stories, each
involving characters both unknown and unfamiliar, and those well known through
every series, book or short story that has appear in a Shhhh! Digital Media
story, novella or book.
You'll read (and listen to via our new audiobook format) a new story as often
as I can pound them out, each exploring aspects of the tapestry woven here
throughout the existing story lines, and new stories yet to have been written.
This includes other series such as We Who Stand On Guard and Night Boat, as
well as the more familiar fare of Butterfly Dragon and Tales of the Sanctum.
When I say variety, I mean to the extremes and even beyond, though in any
case, I will always provide a warning when the content is explicit in one way
or another. Believe me, we'll be exploring a wide variety of existentialism
and other edges of the universe I've yet to delve into with this episodic
journey.
I hope that the cover art isn't too misleading as this series won't
necessarily be focused on what's depicts in it. There will be every extreme
and everything in between. Hopefully, you'll be surprised in some way by every
new story in this series.
So strap yourselves in and enjoy the ride.
In this first story, the more astute of you might recognize the intro to this
one from an unfinished from many years ago and you'd be absolutely correct in
your assumption. This is a sub-plot story I've always wanted to continue, but
given the demand for other content and the time constraints and pressure upon
producing that content, never could. So I've adapted it to a stand alone
story, that involves the two protagonists, who embark together upon a unique
journey that is a tribute to the Indigenous people of North America and
specifically those here in my home country of Canada.
I hope that you enjoy it.
Brian Joseph Johns
Dedicated to the peoples of the First Nations. We as Canadians truly hope that
they can find reconciliation in the fact that like Askuwheteau, they are the
scouts of our nation's future. A future that includes us all.
I must add however, that this story is also dedicated to the late Graham
Greene, who inspired in many ways, the vision of the character Askuwheteau.
There's a great clip of Costner's work with Greene, and it really sets up the tone for what I envisioned of Greene as he'd have played the character Askuwheteau in my stories, though with his additional flare for humour and improv. Think of Askuwheteau as a pre-modern Indigenous fellow, with all of the sensibilities of his ancestral wisdom, but with the trappings of a man in his fifties adjusting to the modern world.
Shhhh! Digital Media Presents:
Grand Tapestry Of Moments 01 - Paskus Maskwa: Rising Bear
Broken Trail
Pasky (a nickname given to him by his coworkers) sat behind a large oak desk,
an open laptop before him. Behind him the vast Calgary skyline stretched out
into the distance, the heights pocked with office towers, each reaching for
its piece of the sky like totems in the wind.
As he carefully typed, he looked to a family photograph on his desk. His wife,
Felicia stood poignantly by his side, their two children Sandra and Gordon
before them.
"...and to let you know how essential you've been in the success of this
project..." he spoke aloud as he typed.
He'd met Felicia ten years earlier at a convention in Toronto. The firm for
whom he worked now had been presenting a number of lectures in their mutual
field. At that time he'd been working in the office, mostly in research and
fact gathering for one of the senior consultants. They'd brought him to show
him the ropes and to have a gopher at their disposal. He'd been humble about
the whole affair, understanding fully well that he had to start from the
bottom and work his way up.
Felicia was still a student at that time, working part-time for the convention
center while she studied her way to a Bachelor's degree while living in the
Roncesvale district of Toronto. They met by a series of bizarre
coincidences that had begun with one of the senior consultants having realized
he'd forgotten all of the ID badges for his employees back in Calgary.
Pasky had been sent to clean up the situation and to get them a replacement
set of badges so as to prevent there from being any embarrassing moments
during the convention. Security was reasonably tight and provided by a third
party that was known for its strictness. Also, given the nature of what their
firm actually did, security was of great importance for them as well. Their
firm was responsible for the geological and environmental impact assessments
for the resource extraction projects of their clients. Their activities tended
to draw a lot of attention from environmentalists, hence security was of a
high priority.
So he first found his way to the security office where they directed him to
the clerks of the convention center. From there he was directed up the chain
of command until he'd eventually found the office of the person who could most
directly help him. When he arrived at the door, he found a written note
claiming that the person whose office this was would be away on sick leave
until a week in the future.
Felicia just happened to be at her cubicle in the office, on the phone with
one of the clients for the convention, handling one of their issues when she
sighted Pasky. She was immediately taken by him, and how cute he looked in his
shirt and tie, both of which were somewhat crooked on his large First Nations
frame. She quickly talked her way through the client's problem and was off the
phone before Pasky had a chance to slip away.
"Can I help you?" she yelled to him as he was about to disappear from her life
out through the office front door.
Pasky looked confused for a moment, looking around and then saw Felicia
looking over the top of her cubicle. She had long auburn hair and piercing
deep brown eyes and though she was barely made up, her lips and features stood
out even from across the room. Her lips and eyes contrasting her fair skin.
"...uhhh... hi? I need a full set of security badges for my staff... One of
our consultants seems to have forgotten them back home..." he said, looking
between her and his paperwork as he approached, perhaps shyly trying to hide
behind it.
"Let me see..." she said accepting his paperwork.
She quickly found the letterhead and searched the client database for that
company name. A moment later she had their records up on her screen, and his
his face was amongst the pictures for their security records.
"Looks like you're good. Unless you're a shape changer?" she asked him
playfully.
"Me. No. Something a part of my father's folklore, but certainly not mine..."
he winked at her, trying to distance himself from his ancestry.
"You too eh?" Felicia asked him, catching him off guard.
"What do you mean?" he asked her curiously, a smile on his face.
"Well my parents wanted me to go the whole nine yards with religion and
everything. They weren't too happy about my seeking an education, or to find
out that I was working as a nude model for sculptors, painters and other
artists... to pay for my school supplies of course..." she blurted out
purposely attempting to make him blush.
"That certainly... would have been something to see... so what happened?" he
responded nervously adjusting his tie.
"With my parents or my modeling?" Felicia asked him.
"Both?" he asked her, sincerely interested.
"I got this job, and I still model on occasion," she replied.
"And your parents?" he asked her.
"That one's going to cost you a dinner," she responded as she clicked her
mouse, sending the print job for the security badges to the server queue.
"Alright. How about seven tonight? You pick where, I'll pick you up," Pasky
asked her.
"Let me think about it... Uhhhh, alright. That's a date. There's a little
restaurant not far from here just off Airport Road. They have a good mix of
different food. Should be a good start. I'm Felicia by the way," she responded
to him.
"Felicia? Nice name and nice to meet you. I'm Paskus... actually just call me
Pasky," he reached over the office barrier and shook her hand.
"Here's your badges Pasky, don't be late tonight," she smiled at him handing
him a stack of freshly printed badges and plastic sleeves.
"No need to worry about that. I'll be very early if anything. Should I bring a
paint brush and a canvas...?" he smiled and blushed as she watched his
departure.
"We'll cross that bridge when we come to it," she responded as he turned to
her and waved goodbye.
He'd returned from his past memories and was once again writing his
correspondence letter to the office staff when his phone rang. He quickly
found his phone beside the laptop and answered it.
"Pasky here," he answered firmly.
"You'd better go down to the front of the building..." his receptionist Nadine
advised him.
"Are you kidding me?" Pasky confirmed with her.
"He just got here. If you hurry you might avoid a scene like last time,"
Nadine urged him to take care of it.
"Alright, I'm on it but this is the absolute last time I deal with this
situation. That man can be sooo unreasonable at times!" He stood with the
phone still to his face, talking to her as he strode out of his office and by
her receptionist station.
He ran out through the front door of their business and to the foyer by
elevators. He jumped into the first one on its way down and descended the
thirty floors to the main lobby and the street.
He ran as fast as he could, despite his large frame and found his way to the
revolving doors. After negotiating them he was outside and running to the
bicycle stands where a familiar face stood awaiting him.
"I thought I told you! You can't tie your horse here!" Pasky scolded the older
man.
"Why not?" Askuwheteau asked his son.
"Because this isn't for horses! Its for bikes!" Pasky responded, his arms
waving wildly as he spoke.
"One rides bikes as they do horses..." Askuwheteau responded with sound logic.
"Yes, but bicycles don't poop!" Pasky shot back at his father.
"What about that one!" Askuwheteau pointed out one of the bikes, a hybrid
electric that was leaking oil onto the polished granite flooring surrounding
the building.
"That's not poo. That's oil. There's a big difference," Pasky responded.
"I know. We can grow food in poo, but not oil," Askuwheteau reasoned soundly.
"Look, I don't want to get into this with you again. We'll talk right here.
What do you want today?" asked Pasky of his estranged father.
"A place to tie and water my horse," Askuwheteau replied.
"...and after that?" Pasky continued, condescending the older man.
"I wanted to talk with my son, Rising Bear," Askuwheteau looked around without
looking directly at Pasky.
"I'm right here. So talk!" Pasky stood his ground.
"You're not Rising Bear. You sound like him. You even look like him. But
you're not him," Askuwheteau replied to his son.
"You're right! I'm Pasky! Your damned son! You just can't accept that I've
gone my own path, dad!" Pasky responded honestly, his voice becoming slightly
louder and more pronounced to his father for the first time in a long time.
A smile crossed Askuwheteau's face.
"Now that's my son. Rising Bear," Askuwheteau held up his hands,
extending his fingers like the claws of a great bear, a mean grimace stretched
across his face.
"Ok, we can talk," Askuwheteau, nudged Otaa Dabun with his elbow as if there
were some kind of inside joke between the two.
Otaa Dabun whinnied, rubbing his snout on Askuwheteau's shoulder afterward.
"What do you want?!" Pasky asked his father.
"We need Rising Bear to get us knowledge. Knowledge of the ground and rocks
beneath our feet. Knowledge of the weather patterns too. Knowledge of how they
relate to one another with recent disasters. Can Rising Bear do this for us?"
Askuwheteau asked his son.
"Stop calling me that!" Pasky insisted to his father.
"Why?" asked Askuwheteau.
"That's not my name! I'm Pasku, Pasku Mathews," his son responded.
"That only sounds like your name, but it isn't your name. Your name is Paskus
Maskwa: Rising Bear! You are Paskus Maskwa! Seer into the knowledge. Medicine man of the Pikwàkanagàn Algonquins. My
son," Askuwheteau plucked at the petals of his son's mind and heart.
"Look dad, the best I can do is tell you that I'm Pasky first, and Rising
Bear sometimes. My wife, your daughter-in-law even jokes about that. She
tells me I have breath like a Rising Bear first thing in the morning," Pasku
admitted to his father.
Otaa Dabun whinnied again, laughing at Pascal's joke, and then became silent
when Askuwheteau didn't follow suit.
"We'll start with the knowledge. We need that knowledge. You know as well as
do I that something big is happening. You must feel it in your ancestry, for
it is a legacy you cannot deny. Your world is calling you, Rising Bear. We need you. I will return in three days time with Otaa Dabun. We
will come directly to your office looking for the knowledge," Askuwheteau
told him as he mounted Otaa Dabun.
"Don't even attempt to bring the horse inside of the building..." Pascal
yelled to his father as he trotted away.
Otaa Dabun then turned around allowing Askuwheteau to face his son from
horseback.
"Then meet me here. Three days. Eleven in the morning. Bring coffee and
donuts. And water for Otaa Dabun. If wife says Rising Bear has bad breath,
remember to brush teeth before bed," Askuwheteau coaxed Otaa Dabun around
and rode off onto across the and into an alley, disappearing from sight.
When Pasky went to return to his office, one of the security guards arrived
with a shovel and pail before he got to the revolving doors, handing it to
him.
"What's that for?" asked Pascal.
"That!" the security guard pointed to a pile of horse poop just beside the
bike stands.
"Just like always. The younger generation cleaning up the damned shhhi...
er... poop of the older generation..." Pasky set about shoveling the horse
manure into the pail.
Coffee and Donuts
In the large bedroom inside of a modest suburban home, the clutter accumulated
as it had every week until cleaning day in the household. A day where the
occupants spent the better part of the day doing all the cleaning they'd
require to stave off the clutter for another week. Despite their home being
much more than what many had, the occupants had worked many hours to
accumulate enough for the down payment, leaving little time for each
other.
Thankfully however, their invested time had paid off, for the mortgage they'd
acquired left them with much smaller monthly installments and consequently,
more time for each other. Both were career minded and motivated, and in their
early thirties. As professionals in their field, they were on the front
doorstep to upper management positions in their respective companies of
employ.
Felicia had gone on to get her degree and was now an administrator at GeoStat
Global, a subsidiary of GeoEx Global, the company which employed Pasky. She'd
managed their massive data center for the last six years and had quickly risen
to the position of senior administrator, with only a management position left
to achieve in her career path. She, like her husband, was making good income
despite the trying economic climate that currently affected the country, but
as it was with all challenges, the two had taken on the difficulties directly
and had come out on top.
Their children Sandra and Gordon had recently gradutated from kindergarten, an
event that Felicia and Pasky had celebrated with them by holding a
mini-graduation party. Come September, they'd be starting grade school,
attending a local public school where they'd begin a much different journey
than the one their father had taken to achieve his acumen and standing in
society.
Pasky's path had been a difficult one, despite society's advances with regard
to confronting the ignorance and stigmas often associated with his heritage. A
heritage that he'd been running from for his entire life. His mother, while
she had been alive was a respected member of the
Pikwàkanagàn Algonquins, where she held a position in the tribal council as well as a clerical
management position during the era of its modernization.
His father however was a very different story and one that Pasky had done his
best from which to distance himself. His father had abandoned him and his
mother, for a life of the ongoing party. For a life of alcohol consumption and
constant drunkedness. A life of pursuits of immediate gratification. He'd
never laid roots in any one place for long, for when people had come to know
him, he'd often be sent from the place in flight and never allowed to return.
This is the father that Pasky had known despite his only ever having met him
few times over the course of his life. It was an ill repute that influenced
every decision in Pasky's life and his effort to distance himself from his own
ancestry from the moment of his mother's death.
Pasky lay in bed now, a television remote in his hand as he flicked through
the channels in search of something to watch, while beside him, Felicia sat
reading author Mona Awad on her tablet. A calm night in their community
despite it being the same Friday that Askuwheteau had shown up to embarass
Pasky at his workplace. Come the upcoming Monday, Pasky would have to meet the
man again despite his not having made up his mind as to whether to share the
data requested of him.
"How's the book?" asked Pasky of his wife.
"Its good. Very different," she responded, suddenly drawn out of the fantasy
world in her consumption of fiction and to the fantasy world of the dream life
she'd found with her life partner.
Pasky didn't respond, but instead changed the channel a few more times.
"Something wrong?" Felicia asked him, suddenly aware of her partner's tension.
"No. Just channel surfing..." he lied, another few minutes of silence between
them.
"So what was it like?" he continued, very obviously digging at her for
something, though at the same time drawing more of her into himself, perhaps
to help him with his internal struggle.
"What? What was what like?" she asked him as she continued to read.
"You know. To be naked. In front of everyone. For them to see you as you are?"
Pasky asked her thoughtfully.
"Hmmm. Well that's a deep question for a calm Friday night in front of the
television," she smiled, turning to face him as she lowered her tablet.
"Seriously. What's it like?" he turned to her, and she could see in his eyes
that something was bothering him.
"Well. For one thing, they're artists and most have a very focused and
objective attitude towards their subject, but a subjective attitude towards
their canvas," she replied to him, and he seemed somewhat puzzled by her
response.
"Care to elaborate on that?" he asked her with a beleagered smile on his face.
"Sure, but I think you got that intuitively, but I'll explain it if you'd
like?" she responded.
"Could you? I think I need to hear what you're saying, as much as I need to
hear your voice," Pasky replied thoughtfully.
"Fair enough. They're not looking at me. They're looking at my form,
and this took me a little bit of getting used to, but the two are very
different. One is like an outer shell. One percent of me. While the other is
the whole, hidden behind the shell. Most artists focus on the posture and
especially the eyes, because that's where they get the clues about the
ninety-nine percent of the whole, which is what inspires the interpretive
nature of subject driven art," Felicia explained to him in the manner of a
woman completely comfortable with her nudity and her body.
"So the eyes are the easy way to that ninety-nine percent...?" asked Pasky
astutely.
"Absolutely. Its the most obvious way there. But the more courageous? They
focus on other cues about that nature, and the real artistic masters can paint
the most alluring and daring paintings without the eyes appearing in the
painting at all. Van Gogh? Monet? Rembrandt? They did so many times. So, what
I'm saying is, that when you're in front of students of art, you're rarely
fully exposed even though you're completely naked," Felicia explained to her
husband.
There was another minute of silence between them as they lay there in bed
together. An unfinished page of her reading on her laptop on the tablet that
lay on her lap. The remote between them now as Pasky's hands found their way
behind his head as he pondered his wife's words.
"So what's bothering you?" Felicia continued.
"Him," he responded.
"Your dad?" she asked him.
"He showed up at work today. It was embarassing, not to mention it undermined
my credibility significantly with my staff," Pasky spoke, looking off in the
direction of nothing in particular but his recall of the day.
"I take it he brought his horse?" confirmed Felicia.
"I had to shovel horse poop from the front of the building in front of the
entirety of the security staff. I was the laughing stock of the day," Pasky
recalled, shuddering at his memory thereof.
"So what did he want?" Felicia asked him, turning over onto the side of her
hips as she leaned back against the headboard of their bed.
"Data," Pasky replied.
"Like, data, data? People? Identity data?" she confirmed with him, as that was
a constant threat risk in her field.
"No. Survey data. Geological mostly, but a large swatch of data connected to a
biome of wild land just east of
Bracebridge. A wild park of all things.
Bigwind Lake Provincial Park. If I share it with him, that'd be enough grounds to get me fired," Pasky
responded to Felicia.
"He's doing this for activists?" she confirmed with him.
"Who knows. He'd do anything to get the money for another bottle, including
sell out the environment and his own son. He's the entire reason there is a
stigma against the Indigenous peoples. Men like him drink. Other outcast men
and women like him are into destructive
narcotics. Ĉiᐧpayaᐧpoᐧsw. Evil spirits that infest the body. They're
a disgrace. To everyone," Pasky responded.
"Was he drunk when he came to your workplace?" asked Felicia.
"No. I couldn't smell anything on him, but that might be a sign that he's out
of money and is looking for a way to get some to pay for it. Booze I mean,"
Pasky responded.
"So what are you going to do about his request?" asked Felicia of him, trying
to diffuse the issue she saw as the most potentially damaging one to his life
and future.
"I don't know. What do you think I should do. I'm not asking you because I
want to make you responsible for my choices. I'm asking you because I trust
you. I trust that instinct and wisdom you seem to possess in droves. I mean, I
didn't only marry you because of your curves, which are very tasty I might
add," Pasky said to her tactfully.
"I know. We'll get to that. But first, you need to make a choice about this
data. Do you share it with him, or do you deny him of it? There is a third
choice however," she reminded him, having been actively involved in the
security of her company's data since her employ.
"You're a genius. I never thought of that. If he's being so indiscriminant as
to use me to pay for his habit, then why shouldn't I use him to get
intelligence about the problem?" Pasky suddenly realized the solution to his
dilemma thanks to his wife.
"Feed him false data to protect your company's interest, while examining the
data he's requesting to learn more about what he's looking for. You're saving
everyone and any situation where everyone wins in one form or another, is a
good thing," Felicia smiled as she responded.
"You know, I've got a brilliant wife," Pasky rolled over with his large frame
and peered at his wife, who batted her eye lashes at him most flirtatiously.
"What are nude model wives for other than solving their family's challenges?"
Felicia asked of him, shimmying closer to him as she remained on her side, the
two of them focused upon each other.
"So tell me. Was there ever an artist when you were a nude model that truly
found that real ninety-nine percent of you?" he asked her.
"I hate to admit it, but yes... there was," she responded, looking
despondently off into the distance.
"Who?" Pasky asked her, a slight hint of uncertainty in his eyes.
"A rather charismatic and cute pick-up artist," she replied, returning her
gaze to his.
"Who?!!!" Pasky pressed her.
"You," she smiled at him as she moved towards him.
The two of them moved closer and their lips met in a kiss they'd not
experienced since they'd first met.
...
The weekend had passed quickly, especially given Pasky's newly found resolve.
For him it was a family weekend and one that they'd spent together, even
visiting a nearby mini-putt and a Sunday dinner at a nearby restaurant and
that was just their Saturday.
Later that same Saturday they as a family cleaned their home from top to
bottom before Sandra and Gordon retired for the night, tired from their
adventurous day with their family.
On Sunday, Pasky logged into the GeoEx Global intranet and began compiling the
data that his father had requested, studying it very carefully as he did. When
he was finished this process, he created a fake dataset, based upon what he'd
read and then stored it upon a flash drive which he intended to give to his
father.
However, his pursuit of this situation did not stop there. He now had a chance
to earn credibility within his company of employ, for with his knowledge of
this plot, he could pro-actively act as an outside operative for the company
and gain valuable intelligence against whatever activist group was attempting
to compromise his company's infrastructure. He could use his own father as a
weapon against the enemy, as much so as they'd obviously been using his
dependency upon alcohol against him for their purposes.
When Monday morning came around, he arrived at his work place and immediately
set about gathering and analyzing the data his father had requested, even
using the company AI to help him digest it all though even that did little to
help him understand its significance. He wasn't a geologist or biologist for
that matter, as he'd focused on developing his business management skills
earlier in life, always having had his sights set on a corner office in the
corporate division.
The data itself consisted of focused geological and environmental maps
concentrated on the Bigwind Lake region just east of the town of Bracebridge.
There was also data that included a breakdown of mineral deposits in the area
and their corresponding percentages and densities. Most of this data was used
by the company for analysis of potential extraction sites, based upon the
value of such minerals.
He himself knew that the company had no future plans for the region, though
that might change if a potentially valuable source of minerals were located by
prospectors. They too would heavily rely upon this kind of data in order to
know where to look for such minerals, such as nickel, copper, silver and gold.
He exported the data and put it on his phone. Afterwards, he had the AI
synthesize artificial data of the region, which he then exported to a company
tablet, which he'd purchase himself from the accounting department and have it
removed from fixed assets. That tablet would be what he'd give his father, and
with it they could track his location via GPS if it came to that. Pasky wanted
to know what his father wanted with this data and so his plan was to accompany
the man to its point of delivery. He told his secretary that he'd be out of
the office for the day on important company business.
He'd packed a bag with a change of casual clothes and a pair of designer boots
he assumed he might need if they were venturing into the out back. Perhaps, by
the day's end, he'd get to the bottom of this mystery and be a company hero to
boot.
At eleven o'clock, he was waiting outside of the building. There he stood with
a tray of two Timmy's coffees and a box of Timbits in one hand, and his
utility bag in the other.
Into The Rough
Pasky had been standing out front of the office tower off of Bay Street and
Grosvenor Street, watching and listening for any tell tale signs of his
father's approach. He'd long since put the bag down on the polished granite
walkway and checked his watch many times since his father's tardiness has
surpassed the half-hour mark.
Just when he was ready to give up and return to his office, he heard the man's
familiar voice from behind him.
"What took you so long Rising Bear? If I'd have had to wait another minute, I
might have left on my own. Left it to the great spirits of the sky to find a
way," Askuwheteau spoke from behind Pasky, who then turned to face his father
who was now seated at one of the benches that lined the pillars just out front
of the tower.
"I've been here since ten forty-five, and I did not see you anywhere. You
can't live your life like that, dad. Being late for everything?" Pasky spoke
firmly, walking over to where Askuwheteau was seated, offering him one of the
coffees, which was now slightly warm at best.
"Timmy's? Mmmm. Timbits too. Good city food, but we're going deep into the
rough," Askuwheteau replied, accepting the coffee, taking the tab from its top
and sipping it back in much the same way that one might have done so with a
can of beer.
Pasky sat beside his father, passing him the bag of Timbits.
"So. Did you bring it?" asked Askuwheteau.
"The data? Yep. Its all right here," Pasky handed him a tablet computer.
"Is it written on this place mat? I don't seem to see any writing on it,"
Askuwheteau examined the thin tablet, looking for any sign of writing on it.
When he came up empty, he casually placed it on the bench beside him.
"Not good to me without the data," he responded to his son.
"Are you kidding me? That's a computer. A tablet dad! Not a place mat. It has
all of the data inside of it. Open the lid like this..." Pasky grabbed the
tablet and showed his father, opening the tablet lid and scrolling the display
with his fingers through a set of maps and the corresponding data he'd
synthesized.
"Like toilet paper. That's a long roll hidden inside of there to keep all of
that tatanka caca there like that," Askuwheteau responded, almost as if he was
calling Pasky's bluff.
"Its not toilet paper dad. Its your data!" Pasky pushed the bluff, backing it
entirely until his father apparently bought it.
"The sign of a good son. A timid bear, good at getting lots of writing into
small places. A good skill to have. We'll need it there. The data you managed
to fit in this thing with your tiny writing," Askuwheteau calmly closed the
lid on the tablet and slid the device into one of the various pouches that
lined his outfit.
"Where? Where are you taking this data?" Pasky asked his father, taking the
final sip of his coffee.
"Into the rough," Askuwheteau replied, sipping the last of his coffee too,
then standing from the bench with the bag of Timbits.
"Do you mind?" Askuwheteau gestured to the last Timbit in the bag.
"Its yours dad," Pasky responded.
"Good. I'll need it. Good sweet energy," Askuwheteau responded, taking their
refuse over to the nearby recycling area and sorting it out and putting it in
its corresponding bin.
"So when are we leaving?" asked Pasky, now anxious to leave and have done with
this job, already feeling repugnant of spending so much time with the man.
"Soon. We're just waiting for some people," Askuwheteau explained to Pasky as
he sorted the recycling.
"Who? Your environmentalist friends?" asked Pasky.
Their conversation was interrupted by a long and horrendous skidding sound as
two large utility vehicles screeched around the corner and just out front the
building. A group of men clad in designer suits and brandishing submachine
guns poured out of the vehicles, both charging in the direction of Askuwheteau
and his son.
One of them leveled his firearm at Pasky, pulling the trigger and
releasing a spray of bullets in the younger man's direction.
Askuwheteau immediately pushed Pasky's head aside, as the rounds plunged into
the granite tile lining the pillars behind them. He quickly pulled the tablet
from his belt pouch and used it to shield his son's head from the debris
flying from the shattered tiles.
"Here they are. I think they're a little upset seeing as I stood them up,"
Askuwheteau informed Pasky.
"How the heck are we getting out of this?" asked Pasky, now panicked and on
his feet, looking for a direction in which to flee.
"Like this," Askuwheteau said calmly, whistling with his index finger and
thumb thrice in high- pitched succession.
A large horse came speeding from around the corner, its brilliant white mane
flowing in the morning sun as it came sliding to a stop before Pasky and his
father.
In one swift motion, Askuwheteau was upon the beast's back and with reigns in
hand. Just as another of the suited men opened fire on his son, he offered his
weathered hand, and the two grasped as he pulled his son upon the rear of his
steed Otaa Dabun, another blanket of rounds plunging themselves into the wall
in front of which Pasky had just been standing.
"Sorry about the damage to your company's totem," Askwheteau gestured to the
pillar, as he coaxed Otaa Dabun westward, before forcing his heels into the
horse's side and spurring him to leap forward out onto Wellesley Avenue and
into the early mid-day traffic.
The men in suits quickly poured into their heavy utility vehicles and sped
after Askuwheteau, Pasky and their mount, Otaa Dabun.
"You can't do this dad!" Pasky yelled at his father.
"Son. I hate to tell you this, but I already am," Askuwheteau responded, the
horse's hooves digging deep into the asphalt as it ploughed forward through
the centerline of the road along Grosvenor and towards the upcoming
intersection at Queen's Park Crescent East.
Behind them the utility vans sped in their direction, swurving and avoiding
oncoming traffick as they struggled to catch up with their quarry.
"Take 'em down! Quick! Before they get away!" ordered a man in the front
passenger seat of the lead utility van.
Three of the men with submachine guns immediately leaned out of their windows,
seated on the ledge of their doors, aiming their weapons in broad daylight as
they opened fire on the rider, passenger and horse alike.
At that exact moment, Askuwheteau coaxed the horse into a hard right hand
turn, Otaa Dabun digging his horse shoes deep into the asphalt and forcing
them all into a sharp lean to their right. The rounds from the gunfire plunged
into a tree on the opposite side of the intersection, just around the corner
from Queen's Park, in which direction the horse fled.
The utility vans sped, skidding across the intersection and unwilling to make
the same turn into oncoming traffick that Askuwheteau, Pasky and Otaa Dabun
had just made, instead continued with the flow of traffick in a clockwise
direction to where they'd attempt to catch Askuwheteau on the other side of
Queen's Park.
"Where the heck are you going?!!!" Pasky demanded to know of his father.
"Away from the fire sticks of those men! You like that plan?" Askuwheteau
responded, then confirming with his son just as a slew of rounds barely missed
his head.
"Great plan! I'm with ya on that! Totally!" Pasky responded, looking over to
the utility vans which disappeared on the far side of Queen's Park Crescent as
Askuwheteau guided Otaa Dabun head on into the direction of oncoming traffick.
The horse suddenly leapt upward, and over an oncoming vehicle. A convertible
sports car whose driver watched as Otaa Dabun flew overhead, landing just
behind it and then dodging sharply to the left as the trio made their way onto
the grounds of Queen's Park and into the brush.
Several people walking the paved path into Queen's Park along which they rode
dove out of the way. Students and a jogger or two, all of them off to the side
and into the grass to avoid a collision with the agile Indigenous draft horse
whose muscles flexed as it ran them all to safety.
They came to a central focal point in the path, where Askuwheteau coaxed Otaa
Dabun to a sliding stop right before a large statue of a man similarly riding
a horse.
"Aaniin!" Askuwheteau declared in respect to the statue rider and his mount,
Pasky immediately noticing the King Edward Plaque before the monument.
"Isn't he the enemy?" asked Pasky from behind Askuwheteau.
"Any man who is a horse friend, and has not been thrown from the beast, is
probably a good man. As a horse, you learn a lot about the men whose weight
you carry on your back. Good horse. Good judge of character," Askuwheteau
responded.
"What about them?!!!" Pasky pointed to the men in the utility vans, who'd just
pulled up into the park grounds and were now speeding towards them regardless
of what lay in their way.
"They were thrown from horse's back a long time ago. That's why they
drive horseless carriages. We need to flee. Here. Sniff this. It will help you
to know the lies from hidden truth," Askuwheteau handed him a pouch of what
appeared to be snuff.
Pasky took the pouch, opening it and having no hand free to grab a pinch, he
shoved the opening to his face and sniffed deeply until...
The Living Wild
Pasky's perception was a haze of fog and a crowd of memories all fighting for
the front lines of his awareness. He could not be certain as to whether he was
dreaming or on the brink of awakening, the sharp pungent scent of the snuff
his father had given him still fresh in his nasal cavities and sinuses. Enough
so that water pooled in the corners of his eyes as he leaned up to peer at his
surroundings.
As he leaned up, the sharp end of an old dried branch fallen from the trees
surrounding him, poked into his side and for the first time since his waking,
he realized that he was naked upon the forest floor.
"Dad?" Pasky cried aloud, cupping his hands over his member and family jewels
as he struggled to get to his feet.
When there was no answer, he smirked and spat at the ground.
"That's just great! He stripped me of everything just to pay for another
bottle, leaving me to die of exposure out here. Why didn't I see this coming!" he
cursed aloud, as he walked cautiously around the side of the nearest tree,
keeping his backside to the trunk as he did.
"Hey! Watch it!" a tiny gruff voice emerged from behind him.
Pasky quickly spun around to see a tiny black bear cub, leaning against the
tree, a branch held precariously in one of its paws.
Pasky looked at the animal for a second, which returned his glance innocently
enough, flaring its nostrils once or twice as it did.
"Couldn't have been..." Pasky shook his head, and then leaned from side to
side, trying to see if someone was hiding on the other side of the tree.
Someone who would of course had been the source of the voice he'd just heard.
When he was satisfied that there was nobody around, he stopped and fell
backwards onto his rump once again, looking at the bear cub, a bewildered look
on his face.
"Want some?" asked the bear cub, offering a sampling of the blue berries still
hanging on to the branch from which he was plucking them in bundles of two and
three.
"Come on... You've got to be joking," Pasky said aloud, still looking for
another source for the little bear's voice.
"Alright. They're good you know. Season's end. When they're the freshest and
most plump. Very sweet too," the little bear cub nibbled a few more from the
same branch, then once again extending the branch in offer to Pasky.
"He drugged me..." Pasky responded.
"Who?" asked the bear cub.
"My father. He drugged me, left me here hallucinating while he sped off on his
horse to get himself a bottle," Pasky responded to the bear cub.
"That doesn't sound like a very fatherly thing to do. So the question is, why
would he do that, and on the other side of the river from that question, why
would you believe he'd do that?" asked the bear cub as it continued to nibble
at the last of the berries.
"Are you some kind of psychoactive figment of my imagination? Maybe like a
therapist or some other illusion of persona I'm projecting onto you?" asked
Pasky, shaking his head a couple of times to be sure.
"Avoiding the questions altogether. So this is something you'd rather not
face, because no matter the answer, you'll never be happy with the result. The
solution therefore, is to answer both questions honestly, and then find the real
true answers and face them with a heart full of courage," the bear cub
stripped the last of the berries from the branch and discarded it.
"Huh. Therapy from a bear cub while naked in the middle of a forest... I'm
definitely due for a visit to do some couch surfing with my counselor..."
Pasky pondered as he felt a tap on his shoulder from behind him.
He turned to face the source of the interruption, and was greeted with the
face of a large black bear, its eyes dark and fierce as its exposed canine
teeth joined in the snarl directed at him.
...
Pasky woke up a second time, stifling a scream as he did. He was fully clothed in his same work blazer and tie and
slacks, though his shoes were removed and drying near a camp fire. As far as
he could tell, they were in the middle of a darkened forest, the smell of a
nearby bog leaving its pungent mark upon his senses.
As he leaned upward, a sharp pain worked its way through his side and then up
to his throbbing head.
"You're awake? Good to see. I thought you might be dead. In a coma. I was
readying my tools to bury you," Askuwheteau turned to face his son, a half
assembled hand trowel still in his grip as he sat by the fire.
"Thanks... I think? What happened?" asked Pasky.
"You snuffed too much, and as we vacated the vicinity of Queen's Park, you
fell from the horse and hit your head on a trunk," Askuwheteau told his son.
"Where are we?" asked Pasky.
"We're deep into the rough just east of Bracebridge," Askuwheteau repied, as
he began unscrewing the trowel head from its arm.
"That's at least two hundred clicks from where we were. How the heck did we get here so quick?" confirmed Pasky.
"I took a short cut. Come, there is still much to do before we camp for the night. We must
check the water of a nearby bog, and then we must secure our camp site. Be
certain it remains hidden. We'll be leaving tomorrow before the Sun arrives,
where we will meet with our friends," Askuwheteau told Pasky as he stood up
and returned his trowel kit to Otaa Dabun's saddle bags.
Pasky spied the bag of snuff his father had given him. While Askuwheteau was
distracted by Otaa Dabun and tending to his saddle bags, Pasky grabbed a
sample of the snuff and threw it into a baggie he found in his coat pocket. He
figured that he'd have it tested when they got back to see if his father had
drugged him or not.
"So who were those men chasing us? Are you in trouble?" asked Pasky.
"No. Not at all. Isn't everyone shot at by men in three piece suits? Its like
black flies attracted to the camp fire. When you sit too close to the fire,
they find you better. Easier. I guess I got too close," Askuwheteau responded
blandly.
"So they aren't Police?" confirmed Pasky.
"No. I paid all of Otaa Dabun's parking tickets last month," Askuewheteau
replied.
"They're not government agents, are they?" Pasky continued with his line of
questioning.
"No. They have nothing to do with the government," Askuwheteau responded,
returning from Otaa Dabun and taking a seat in front of the fire.
"Are you in trouble with any gangs?" asked Pasky.
"No. They aren't from gangs. Not the kind you're thinking," Askuwheteau pulled
a tuft of something from his vest pocket, and tossed it into the fire.
The fire momentarily sparkled and fizzled in multiple colours and then
returned to its regular colour and texture. This time, far less smoke emerged
from it and the smoke that did, had barely any scent at all.
"You need to get your shoes, we're going to take a look for something in a
bog," Askuwheteau looked deep into the fire and then to his son Paskus Maskwa.
"Alright. I'll try out those new boots I brought," Pasky replied.
"They're in your pack near the horse's ass," Askuwheteau directed him.
"Are we taking Otaa Dabun...?" asked Pasky.
"No. We'll go on foot. Quickly, before the Sun falls. I'll wait while you put your boots on," Askuwheteau said as he took another pinch from his pocket, and threw it into the fire.
The flames fizzled and shrunk until there was only tiny pieces of glowing embers.
Pasky struggled to get his boots on, even using Otaa Dabun to balance himself as he stood on one foot, but every time he leaned on the horse, it stepped away from him and then watched him fall over, even whinnying as if laughing at him.
"There goes my suit. Its going to cost me a fortune to get this cleaned," Pasky griped as he stood from the mud.
"You think that suit makes you something, do you?" asked Askuwheteau of his son.
"Yes. Where I work, back in civilization, two hundred clicks from out-house country here, when I wear this suit, I'm a real somebody. See this? Its my power tie!" Pasky fumbled with his tie as he put his foot to the ground after using a nearby tree to put his second boot on.
Askuwheteau nodded affirmatively, a slight look of calm skepticism on his face as he walked over to his son.
He reached out and grabbed the tie by its end, and began pulling his son, leading him forward like a dog on a leash.
"Yes. There is lots of power in this tie. The power to lead you where ever I want. Its not a power tie. Its a leash. A harness," Askuwheteau said to Pasky calmly, then letting go of his tie.
Otaa Dabun at that moment scoffed at Askuwheteau, blowing air from his nostrils in disgust at Askuwheteau. Otaa Dabun then glared at him, perhaps looking right through him.
"You see? When two or more of you figure that out at the same time, then we'll have labour problems," Askuwheteau responded wisely to them.
Askuwheteau walked over to Otaa Dabun and pulled an small shiny red apple from one of the saddle bags. He then fed it to his friend, who happily consumed it core and all, barely chewing it. Askuwheteau patted Otaa Dabun's neck gently, as if to let his friend know that he meant no ill by his words, and the horse immediately understood him.
"When you both realize that its you who wield the harness, then balance will be returned to the nature of things," Askuwheteau paused.
"Until then, I'll hold your harnesses," Askuwheteau turned and led Pasky on their journey into the bog.
Cattails, Swamp Grass And A Miracle
Askuwheteau walked ahead of his son, his foot always falling in exactly the right place and as such, he neither sank into the muck nor found himself in the tangle of stinging nettles or poison ivy. His step was confident, without pause and yet barely attended by him. As if he and nature both were managing his safe progression.
Pasky on the other hand, was struggling to keep up, his foot constantly sinking into the soft clay and water permeated mud, a horrible sucking sound echoing forth as he lifted his feet at every step. His boots too were being put to the test, though nature was winning that battle for his boots were designed to give the impression of one who delved into the wild, but in truth had never been there. To Pasky, his boots were merely an extension of his denial of his heritage. He wore it when it could potentially get him ahead, giving him an edge against others competitively, but the moment after, discarding it in the shame of his ignorance of it and his father.
He was so caught up in the immense effort of walking in the bog that he'd barely noticed his father's ease and grace of step, and therefore had neither the example nor inclination to learn from it.
Askuwheteau suddenly lowered himself to a squatting position, his rump just barely above the mud and his eyes just above the line of swamp grass that surrounded them. He put his finger to his lips and shushed his son:
"Shhhh!" the sound came from his lips, perhaps like leaking swamp gas.
"What?" Pasky spoke so quietly he could barely be heard.
Askuwheteau pointed to a outcropping of land, a small island in the depth of the water to where a tiny tree had somehow managed to grow from this small patch of land.
Pasky watched it, wondering if his father wasn't hallucinating from his snuff mixture and the withdrawal of alcohol Pasky had imagined to be an issue of his father's life.
They sat there quietly, watching this tree in the middle of the bog, and then something miraculous happened. It moved.
A pointed oriface suddenly emerged from its trunk, like a protractor opening and it quickly became apparent that this was not a tree at all, but a significally large bird. The patients and grace of its motion was almost unimaginable, and yet the remainder of its body perfectly still. As if a tree and bird had somehow merged.
The motion of its head suddenly stopped, its long beak and the soft skin of its chin and neck very much apparent, and then without equal of effort, it moved so fast that to both Askuwheteau and his son, it could be said that it didn't move at all.
The fish it had caught, just appeared there, struggling to free itself from the vice grip of its beak. The rest of the bird's body remained perfectly still as the fish fought with all of its strength for its life. The bird stood motionless as the fish flailed, and then like a master chef flipping a pan full of delicately cooked eel, the bird flipped the fish in the air, catching it perfected elongated in the exact direction it needed to in order to consume it nearly in one gulp. And that was it.
The bird then took to the air just as quickly and in those short few moments, Pasky had felt like he'd witnessed a miracle.
"She's feeding her young. She'll cough up bits of the fish for her chicks, and soon there will be more of them doing the same when they're big enough. The chewed parts from the fish, the bird guano, and the fallen feathers, all of it will fall to the bog, and become part of the great cycle," Askuwheteau explained to his son.
"The forest and jungles of the world are the lungs of nature, breathing in the air harmful to us, and exhaling good air for us to breath. The bog, is nature's organs and guts. Cleaning the water and the soil. The fish, the Large Mouth Bass, and the bird, the Great Heron, they both play their part," Askuwheteau explained to his son.
"You'd never see that in the city!" Pasky responded, quietly in awe.
"No my son. That's where you're wrong. Different place. Concrete forest. Horseless carriages that cough soot. Its all around you, everywhere. You just choose not to see it. The pidgeons. The squirrels and chipmunks. The raccoons. The swallows. The warblers. They too are a part of their biome in the city, and every day this happens right in front you, in plain sight. But you refuse to see it, and because of this, we might someday lose it all," Askuwheteau replied to his son.
"Why do you always find something to criticize about me dad?!!! Something about me that pushes me down!" Pasky challenged his father.
"You look down upon me, and ask why I'm trying my best to push you up? You think that its the people who tell you what you want to hear that are helping you? You are Rising Bear. You are not give no thoughts, words, or efforts for the future, nor are you not give two cares about the world around you Mediocre Bear. I will not be here soon forever, and I want you my son, to know. To live, the best of what you mean to your wife. Yourself. Your tribe. This world. If I cannot help you find this, then I have failed as a father," Askuwheteau said to Pasky most poingnantly and yet without condescension or despair.
"Look. Why don't we just get this over with! Lets get this done, whatever damned reason you dragged me out here into Ontario's natural toilet, so I can get home and continue my life of forgetting you altogether like the shame I always knew you were," Pasky responded.
"Your words don't hurt, for they're not truth. You paid nothing for the gift of your life, and to waste it is to spit in the face of Gitchi Manitou. You're just working to avoid the weight of your own ignorance, dumping your shame upon others who'd shoulder it as part of a farcical economy of illusion and scam. Lets go where we need to, take a reading of the water, and be returned back to camp so that I may return you to your life of false purpose. Where suits are status and ties are symbols of power, which are really just another piece of a grand lie," Askuwheteau responded standing up and resuming his steps further into the bog until they'd arrived at a point someone had marked earlier with a green ribbon wrapped around an outcropping of cattails.
"Who marked this place?" asked Pasky.
"I did. Three weeks ago," Askuwheteau responded, pulling a tiny empty jar from his pouch and dipping it into the water until it was full.
He then found another bottle from a pocket on his vest, and pulled forth a capsule from within, and dropped one of them into the water he'd just sampled from the swamp. He shook the bottle and then pocketed it, taking another empty bottle and filling it with more of the bog water, after which he dropped a piece of litmus paper into it, measuring the water for its alkilinity.
As Askuwheteau went through the tasks at hand, Pasky noticed a canteen dangling from his father's side. He grabbed it, and asked his father a question.
"What's in this?!!!" Pasky asked accusingly.
"Alcohol," Askuwheteau responded dryly.
"So you are drinking, aren't you?" Pasky accused him.
"Every day," Askuwheteau replied honestly.
"I knew it! How long as this been a problem?!!!" Pasky demanded to know of his father.
"My entire life," Askuwheteau responded.
"Damn! You're exactly what I thought! You give such a bad name to our people!" Pasky came back at his father, perhaps resenting what his father had revealed about his own life.
"What? You think water is bad?" asked Askuwheteau.
"This is alcohol!" Pasky ripped the canteen from his father's shoulder.
"It is. For wounds and disinfection. Not for drinking. I drink. Water. Lots of it too. It is the nectar of life. Sometimes as much so as a good cold beer, but I never put beer ahead of water or food," Askuwheteau responded.
"So let me get this straight. You mean that the drinking problem you've had for your whole life is water? And yet you openly admit to drinking beer?" asked Pasky of him skeptically.
"You said drinking water for my whole life was a problem. Not me. As far as beer or liquor, I drink very seldom. Not as a need, but as a treat," Askuwheteau admitted to his son.
"So you do admit it!" Pasky accused him once again.
"And you don't?" asked Askuwheteau.
"...this isn't about me!" Pasky suddenly found himself on the defensive.
"Answer the question. You don't?" asked Askuwheteau, once again pressing the issue.
"Felicia and I enjoy a bottle of wine together with every Sunday meal, and I have a few beers on Saturday. I mean I've worked hard throughout the week. I deserve it, and you..." Pasky was about to accuse his father of something he'd only recently realized would be a lie if the words left his lips.
"And you believe that I don't work hard. That I'm just a wandering drunk, doing nothing but looking for a way to pay for another bottle. Correct?" confirmed Askuwheteau.
Before Pasky could respond, Askuwheteau continued.
"When you do it, it isn't wrong. When others do it, its wrong. On this day, I only know you as Disgraceful, Disrespectful and Dishonest Bear. You judge before you know. I'm done here. We will return to camp, and stay the night. After tomorrow's meeting with my trusted friends, you are free to go and to never return. I will bother you no more," Askuwheteau pocketed the two samples of water he'd collected, and stepped past Pasky without making a sound.
As his father's steps were slight and gracefully forward, Pasky's boots for the entire return trip to the camp, were a constant source of restraint and suction, holding him in place, almost as much so as his attitude had for his entire life.
Evening at camp was quiet as no words were exchanged between the two men. Their dinner was silent as the darkness advanced upon their camp fire, with only the hollow and echoing sounds of the wildlife surrounding them to keep them company.
When they'd eaten their respective dinners, Pasky having eaten a frozen dinner he'd taken from his deep freeze back home, and Askuwheteau having had a generous piece of his pimîhkân, the two men settled in on opposite sides of the camp fire. Askuwheteau sat tending to the fire while listening to nature's conversation around him. Pasky on the other hand had little to do without access to the internet and poor phone reception, so he dug up an old field manual for a photocopier he'd had stored on his company tablet. Despite it being part operations manual and part field service manual, it turned out to be a good source of distraction for Pasky, if not rather dry. When he'd noticed that the battery on the tablet had only fifty percent of its life left, he put the tablet aside and got up to sit across the fire from his father.
"Dad. Can I ask you something?" Pasky started, his tone a bit softer and more inviting this time.
"You just did," Askuwheteau replied, tossing another log in the fire.
Pasky smirked, quickly witholding a biting response he'd lined up before it left his lips and instead opting for a more reasonable approach.
"Why don't you ever talk about my mom?" Pasky asked him.
"Why did you never ask?" Askuwheteau replied with his own question.
"Why did you leave her? Why did you leave us? Why did you leave me to be taken by the people from child welfare, only to end up in a care home?" asked Pasky, getting right to the point.
"Don't you say that about her. She never left you. She always looked after you. She put you ahead of herself. Ahead of her career with the tribal administration. There was never a day you spent without baby formula or clean diapers. Without food when you were hungry and medicine when you were sick," Askuwheteau's face eased in tension the more he spoke about his wife. Paskus Maskwa's mother.
"Then why... why do I remember her only in a haze. Lost memories? And yet I don't remember you at all when I was young?" asked Paskus of his father.
There was a long thought filled pause before Askuwheteau's response.
"In life, there are values that we choose to uphold. To hold them dear. To protect. Not unlike the women we come to love and the children we bear. They are what draws two people together to become one. But sometimes these values, their protection becomes a great risk, especially to a strong and wise, but vulnerable woman and her child. And so a man who upholds these values, chooses to in the name of protection, remain scarce, and watch protectfully from a distance. The truth is son, that I never left either of you. I was always close, but never close enough to put you or your mother in danger, and yet never far enough away that I could not be with you if the need arose. Your mother never left you either. However, she was taken from you. Taken from us both..." Askuwheteau explained to his son as the night crept in ever darkening, as the Moon rose in the sky and listened in on their campfire story over their shoulders.
The Fall Of Lawana
Lawana, your mother. Her hair was long. Very long. Some say she had the longest hair of all in the tribe. So long in fact that it was as long as the Algonquin people's history. It went forever, on back to the beginning of our people it was so long.
A woman of immense beauty stood before her bathroom mirror, finalizing the last touch of makeup she wore on her pale complexion. Her face was naturally colourful in the right places, contrasting the natural paleness of her skin. She enjoyed applying it, however sparingly she did for it gave exercise to her artist's spirit, even though she was employed as a an administrator for the Pikwàkanagàn Algonquin tribal council.
A few feet away from her in another room, a tiny baby lay in a crib in a fresh diaper, for changing it had been her first order of the day. Now the little boy lay writhing and giggling while his mother braided her hair into a tightly woven bun atop of her head. She stepped out of the bathroom and slipped into her trousers, a loose fitting tribal design of various shapes and colours, while her top was a duotone of contrast, again light fitting and designed for comfort.
She quickly scooped up a cloth bag she'd earlier filled with basic baby care of food and supplies, and in her sandaled feet was out the door of her single bedroom apartment by eight thirty in the morning.
It was a warm day, despite being early October and the sun shone brightly as she made her way down the main street towards the Tribal Council Hall building two blocks further ahead of them, Paskus Maskwa's happy little face smiling at her as she carried him in her baby pouch, along her chest and just beneath her face.
"Lawana! Great article in the Algonquin Voice Gazette! You should be a writer!" one of the residents of the reserve walked by her, waving to her as she passed.
"If you read it, doesn't that mean I already am?" she responded in a friendly voice.
"How true it is. Can I get an autographed copy of your first article?" he stopped long enough to ask her.
"Bring it by the Council Hall. Stop in and have a
Labrador Tea with me and I'll sign it for you there," she smiled back at him and continued on her way to work.
"I've got a busy day at the lumber mill today. I'll try to make it tomorrow. I'll see you then," he continued on his way.
She waved to a few more people she saw on the last leg of her walk, and then stepped in through the front doors of the Tribal Council Hall building and past reception to the great spiral staircase behind it.
"Good morning Dahlonega!" Lawana smiled as she passed the receptionist.
"How's our little Rising Bear this morning?" Dahlonega asked as she thumbed through the contents of a thick binder.
"Oh he's been a happy little fellow this morning. Very grouchy last night, but happy and healthy today," Lawana said as she made her way up the stairs.
"You should go on a date or something. Its wrong that your man never comes home, you know. If you need a man, my brother would make a fine husband. He's got a good job. Gets out of bed on time, and even cleans up around the house. I can arrange it if you'd like, and I'd even be willing to be your baby sitter when and if you do," Dahlonega, acting as her brother's promotional agent, offered to Lawana.
"Ha! Now that's an awefully big offer, but my man has three loves in his life, and his work always seems to come first," Lawana answered protectively but honestly.
"That ain't right you know. Just sayin'" Dahlonega responded.
"If I find a suitable bachlorette for your brother, you'll be the first to know," Lawana replied as she reached the top step.
"Good. Just foward all potentials to my email inbox and I'll invite you for a party when he's sleeping somewhere else and not on my couch anymore," Dahlonega replied, spurring a short burst of laughter from Lawana.
She turned down the hall and found her way into an office whose door was marked with the sign:
Office Of Resource Management.
She stepped through the door and through the reception area around to her desk as the administrator/receptionist for the office.
"Look who it is. The life of the party has arrived. A good morning to you," an elderly man with long grey hair addressed Lawana from a desk behind hers.
"Your words are sometimes just a little bit too sweet for this undeserving girl. And how is Itawi on this fine October morning?" asked Lawana, placing Paskus Maskwa safely in a crib affixed to her desk, and her supplies on the desk beside her.
"If the water flows, and the food keeps moving through my body at this age, every day is a good day," Itawi's wrinkled face greeted her with wisdom and a ready smile.
"Then a Labrador Tea might be just what you need? Or maybe some Yopon Holly?" asked Lawana of Itawi.
"Let me think on that, and when you're going for one for yourself, I'll tell you then," Itawi responded.
Lawana checked a stack of notices on Itawi's desk, reading them one by one until she found one labeled regulatory measure: water acidity table - notice of increase in acidity. Please be advised and check matter for further investigation.
"I'll get down to the water treatment facility later and go over that with Masaac. I need to rest my leg. Bad hip socket again," Itawi explained to Lawana.
"No need Itawi. I've got it. Can I get you some tea first?" asked Lawana, grabbing up the notice and two other bulletins related to water table monitoring and pocketing them in her belt pouch.
"If you can get to the water treatment facility, I can definitely get to my tea. Even a sore and grumpy old man needs exercise. Bring Paskus Maskwa to Dahlonega or Pikawewa, and they'll keep him safe and cared for. Besides, this is good practice for you for when you're seated in my chair, and I am gone to the Great Manitou," Itawi said to her.
"Grumpy? Not applicable. Sore, most likely, but the tea will definitely help your joints. Oh I don't think you'll be leaving us anytime soon. Especially on that hip of yours, but I appreciate your thoughts of our future. Paskus' and I. I'll return soon and let you know how it went," Lawana grabbed up Paskus Maskwa and left the office, making her way to Pikawewa's office and peeking her head in.
"Good morning. Could you mind Paskus for me? I'll be about half an hour," Lawana asked Pikawewa, a young woman with a sparkling smile in her mid to late twenties.
"Oh please? Though Gomo won't be too happy about it when he hears about it," Pikawewa responded, helping Lawana remove her baby harness, then putting it onto herself where she could keep a close eye on baby Paskus.
"You know men. They often talk like a fierce mountain lion, but when faced with the prospect of a baby and a family, they become like little crying babies themselves," Lawana replied astutely.
"That's certainly Gomo, for sure. But he can't stop me from what I do at work now, can he?" Pikawewa responded, enjoying very much the opportunity to play mother.
"I'll be back soon. About half an hour. Forty-five minutes at most," Lawana bid Pikawewa farewell and made her way downstairs to the reception.
"I'm going over to the water treatment facility. I left Paskus with Pikawewa if you need a baby fix," Lawana said to Dahlonega.
"Traitor!" Dahlonega smirked at Lawana with a half smile.
"Smile girl! You're at the front of the line now, Dahlonega. Bye. See you soon," Lawana smiled as she strode out the door.
Lawana, your mother, in her early thirties was a remarkably active and fit woman, who spent little time at her desk despite her administrative and reception position. She was a ball of energy, and often ran errands for the office for the walk and the exercise, and the efficiency she could bring to such matters as well.
Your mother was also a great rider. In fact, I first met her whilest riding, but that's another story for another day. On this day, and of great importance to her was getting to the water treatment plant, for a water advisory of this particular kind, indicated that the tribe's entire water supply might be at risk.
So she made her way over to the water treatment facility with great haste, and found the facility to be a great flurry of activity.
Lawana stepped into the large industrial facility, quickly making her way through the front offices and towards the processing facility to where the intake readings were recorded and handled by the technicians.
"Where's Masaac?" Lawana asked one of the technicians.
"He's in doing something with the chemical mixture intake. There's something up," the technician told Lawana, knowing who she was already.
"I've got to speak to him!" Lawana said firmly, grabbing a hard hat and a lab coat from a hook on the wall.
"You'd better get going then, because things only seem to be getting worse," the technician responded to her as he began adjusting one of the intake valves.
Lawana quickly donned the hard hat and the lab coat and ran up the stairs to the second level of the facility, and into the chemical mixture intake facility to where Masaac, a tall clean shaven man with long dark hair was busy adjusting for the changing conditions of the intake water.
"So you know already? Why didn't take the time to tell us?" asked Masaac, clearly frustrated with the situation.
"We didn't know. I still don't know. So bring me up to speed. What's going on?" Lawana asked him firmly but patiently.
"We started registering a sharp increase in the acidity level on the intake valves. Not enough to prevent us from balancing its pH levels, but the acidity has been steadily growing. If it continues, it will become undrinkable, not to mention it will damage the equipment and facility pipes and valves and what not. It could shut down the entire reserve and put us in a state of emergency," Masaac explained to Lawana.
"What could be the source of the problem?" asked Lawana.
"There are two sources nearby, one being the lake, which is replenished by the natural glaciation and water cycles. The second source is from the bog. It sits atop a thin layer of crust that could be hiding a source of acidity. A mineral or metal of some form," Masaac explained to Lawana, who was already well versed in chemistry.
"Like H2SO4?" she confirmed with him.
"Sulphuric acid? Yeah, it could be. That's a good point, or H2SO3. Sulphurous acid. If there's a source nearby and both are strong enough in mixture and ratio in the water, it could spell disaster for the drinking water, if not destroy the water treatment equipment and potentially cost millions to fix and restore the facility," Masaac explained to Lawana.
"Alright. I'll get out to the bog and see what I can do about finding the problem. Have one of your technicians call Dahlonega at the Tribal Council Hall and have her contact the other council members and notify them that there could be a potential situation related to the water supply," Lawana urged Masaac.
"Alright sister. You be safe out there. You can take one of our two service trucks if you'd like..." Masaac advised her.
"No. I'm going to take a horse. I might need the good company, and a friend to watch over me," Lawana assured him as she turned and made her way back to the exit of the facility.
She returned the hard hat and lab coat before she left, and made her way outside of the facility and continued along a path into the light brush surrounding the facility. When she was far enough away, and into the brush, she whistled three times, each whistle increasing in pitch as she did.
Some distance into the brush and forest, there arose what sounded like the clap of thunder, and then an eerie silence, followed by the sound of the heavy hooves of a draft horse of mythic preportions as it galloped through the field in her direction. The magnificent beast quickly arrived by her side, and she greeted him, petting his nose and checking his saddle bags for any signs of a treat. When she'd found a juicy red apple, she retrieved it for him and fed it to him core and all. The horse devoured it quickly and happily.
"At least he still knows how to care for his horse. I wish he could care the same for his family every once in a while," she said to Otaa Dabun.
She was then in one swift motion, up and upon his back, the reigns in her hands. She quickly coaxed Otaa Dabun first into a trot and then a gallop, running the horse into the rough along a soft trail in the direction of the bog.
...
She rode for the better part of twenty minutes before she'd found a region of the swamp that was unlike the other areas of the swamp, for it had a greenish-yellowish haze floating just slightly above the water, the smell of rotten eggs and scorching hot peppers in the air.
Otaa Dabun suddenly halted his progression forward, stopping and backing up in the water, grunting and groaning as he did.
"Where water meets fire..." Lawana said aloud, as if witnessing a prophecy of some form.
"I have to check the water here. For the tribe. I won't be but a minute," she said to Otaa Dabun, who grunted with disapproval to her.
She lifted her right leg over the left side of the horse, and slid down from his back into the bog with a splash.
She could already feel the itchy stinging of the acidic water. She dug through her belt pouch and found a water test kit. She opened it, and took a sample of the water where they were, a distance from the water that had vapourous clouds floating above it.
As she sampled the litmus paper, and waited for it to develop, she took a sample of the water in a test tube and returned it to her pouch.
"Its about three, approaching two pH... That's pretty acidic," she said to herself then turning back to Otaa Dabun and addressing him.
"I'm going to try to get closer to the acidic cloud and take another reading. You're going to stay here and wait for me, alright?" asked Lawana of Otaa Dabun, who grunted once again disapprovingly.
"I'll be fine. I've got a Rising Bear to take care of and feed you know, not to mention a husband who can never come home," Lawana assured Otaa Dabun, who remained in place awaiting her return.
Otaa Dabun splashed his front left hoof twice in the water.
"Thank you, but I'll be fine," Lawana said as she moved closer to the vapourous cloud.
,,,
I wasn't far from where your mother was, for I had been keeping a close eye on the situation, but from a very different angle and for a very different friendly tribe who call themselves the Sanctum Seclorum.
I too had been checking the water nearby, when I'd noticed that my horse was no longer to be found.
Askuwheteau stood in water whose depth was near the top of his boots as he pocketed the results of the tests he'd just conducted. His face was much younger, but still lined with the stresses and joys of his pursuits, his clothing clean but dusty from his adventures in the wild.
He whistled once, and waited where he was for Otaa Dabun to come to him. When he did not hear the sound of hooves or the splashing of water, he looked around.
"What has gotten into that darned beast?" he said aloud, puzzled by his mount's sudden absence.
...
Otaa Dabun watched Lawana protectively as she got closer to the vapourous clouds just above the water. She found a small patch of dirt and earth protruding up from the water and climbed onto it, to examine her feet and lower legs. Where her legs had been exposed to the water, her skin was slightly reddened, with a few tiny blisters forming on the surface.
She looked over to Otaa Dabun and then to his legs, worried for the poor beast.
"I'll get this done quick and then be right over to you," Lawana promised Otaa Dabun, who despite his stinging legs, held his vigil over her.
In the distance, Otaa Dabun heard another familiar whistle. The whistle of Askuwheteau. He turned to face its direction, but his eyes nor senses could not make out any sign of the man who just called him. He'd returned to facing Lawana when he heard a second whistle.
By that point, Lawana had already finished the litmus test and was no taking a pair of samples in separate bottles.
"Something got you spooked?" she asked Otaa Dabun, who grunted, somewhat confused by the situation.
...
In the other direction from where Askuwheteau was situated, with Lawana and Otaa Dabun in between, a third group had been hidden and were monitoring Lawana's progress.
"She's too close. We can't blow it now. It'll kill her," one of three men spoke, an older man with a weathered and suntanned face addressing the other two.
"The whole process has already started, Dreyfuss. We can't just stop now. It'll mess up the contract," a reddish-blonde haired man with a thick moustache responded.
"Look Dean. We've got to do something. There's too much riding on this already. We're talking forty million in contracts. That's enough to keep this company going for thirty years, and that doesn't even take into consideration growth from other legit contracts. This is the big one. We've got to go for it.," Undner interjected.
"We can't just kill her like that. That wasn't part of the deal. Nobody will get hurt, but a lot of us will get rich. Remember?" Dreyfuss pressed the issue.
"Think of the jobs this will create for the native reserve. They can earn a living and raise their families in unprecedented growth in an industry and market we've got cornered. We're talking decades to clean up, and all of it paid for out of the treasury. That's our tax money by the way. We've been paying into it since our first paycheques. We're only taking back what was ours in the first place," Dean urged the other two.
"I can't do it," Dreyfuss removed his hands from the detonator.
"What about you. Have you made your choice?" asked Dean of Undner.
"I can't do it. Not with her in the way. It just ain't right," Undner responded.
"Alright. I guess we'll just get back to the van then. Lets go," Dean got up carefully, remaining hidden, as did the other two men.
"After you," Dean gestured in the direction of the truck, which was back towards a service road a kilometer away.
Dreyfuss went first and then Undner, and when both men were ahead of Dean, he withdrew a silenced handgun from his vest. There were two shots fired from the gun, and two deaths immediately thereafter.
Dean then returned to the detonator and prepared to finish the job he'd started.
...
Askuwheteau had proceeded in the direction of Otaa Dabun, an innate empathic ability that he and his wife Lawana both possessed. When he'd come to the clearing and the open sky had lit the scene for him to see, he spied Otaa Dabun and Lawana not ten meters from the horse's position.
"Lawana!" Askuwheteau yelled to her.
She looked up from the water and in his direction, immediately recognizing his voice.
"Asku?" she responded getting to her feet atop of the mini island.
"Its dangerous here! We need to leave!" Askuwheteau began jogging in her direction, through the bog water.
Lawana whistled three times for Otaa Dabun, who began running in her direction.
Dean, who saw her about to flee, took up the detonator in his hand and turned the plunger on the device, unlocking it and then plunging it once, generating enough current which flowed through the waterproof line to the explosive pack they'd planted on another small island just ten meters from Lawana's current position.
The bubble burst and the fireball appeared as time seemed to stand still.
Otaa Dabun's finely tuned senses and mystical awareness allowed him to summon his spirit beast portal, which opened up before him at a point halfway to Lawana and himself, as Askuwheteau now watched in horror as the scene unfolded.
Lawana dove in the direction of the portal without even realizing she had done so to evade a growing shockwave that had erupted from the basin in the bog. Both Otaa Dabun and Lawana flew at the portal in an attempt to escape the deadly blast.
The shockwave hit Lawana, throwing her in an unseen direction as Otaa Dabun hit the portal from the other side, disappearing into it as the shockwave crossed through it.
An exit portal immediately opened just behind Askuwheteau as he hit the water, to avoid the shockwave and blast. The shockwave as had the fireball, spread above him, knocking the air from his lungs whilst he was under water. He struggled to find his bearings and then was upon his feet, his ears ringing, water pouring from his soaked body and hair.
He turned to see Otaa Dabun exit the portal, with only light burns and scratches on his hide. The portal remained open for some time, but nobody else emerged.
I searched high and low for your mother, Lawana, but found no sign of her anywhere. Nothing to let me know that she might still be alive, and nothing to confirm to me that she was dead.
Askuwheteau made his way to hard land not just a hundred meters away, Otaa Dabun walking just behind him and when they arrived, Askuwheteau started tending to their wounds from his kit.
"We've got to get ourselves fixed up and warn the reserve..." Askuwheteau began cleaning Otaa Dabun's wounds first, when he heard the click of the cocking mechanism on a pistol.
"You're not going anywhere. Who are you?" asked Dean, keeping his gun to Askuwheteau's head.
"A scavenger. I was looking for recently dead carcusses to scavenge for fur. You can make a good living and buy a bottle every once in a while too," Askuwheteau improvised.
"Does anyone else know you're out here?" asked Dean.
"My Uncle, if he's not already a few sheets into the wind. My brother too. Look, why don't we have a drink and talk this over. There's enough for us both out here," Askuwheteau slowly turned around and faced the man.
"Whoa! Stop right there! Where'd you get this horse?" asked Dean.
"I won him on a bet. A feisty rancher who bet me I couldn't drink a forty pounder of whiskey in one guzzle. I won, but what a hangover that was," Askuwheteau continued his improvisation.
"Alright. This conversation is at an end, and I hate to say it, but so are you," as Dean was about to pull the trigger, Otaa Dabun kicked him hard with both back hooves, launching the man fifteen feet into the air and throwing him against a nearby tree, where he fell to the ground with a thud, dazed but still very much conscious and a danger to them both.
Askuwheteau was upon Otaa Dabun's back in one swift jump and they fled, speeding off into the distance as the man leveled his pistol and fired upon them.
I rode for half an hour, running Otaa Dabun to the point of exhaustion to get to the reserve. I told the tribal council about what had befallen your mother, and that a calamity with the water was on its way, that the water would be undrinkable in three days time.
They were grateful for my report, but also judgemental about my absence in caring for my Lawana and you, and so they banished me from the tribe, never knowing that I had been secretly protecting both of you and them all along. I accepted their judgement, for it is wrong to fail in your responsibilities as a father to your wife and children, and though my reasons were just, they did not excuse me for that crime. However, if I had stayed with your mother, then her departure would have only come sooner.
The Child Welfare agency took you into their care, and you were placed in a foster home, and raised under a very different set of values from those of our people. I don't blame your foster family anymore than I blame you for my choices, but your mother did not die because of me, and she never abandoned either of us. We have always been her two men. She has always cared for us, even in her absence and as much so as she did in life.
My hope was that I could find a strand at the end of her hair, and follow it back to her. I never did.
Pasky listened as his father's voice reached the end of his recollection, although when the storyteller's journey of words had ended, Pasky said nothing.
He simply slid away from the campfire on his rump and over to his sleeping bag, where he covered himself and fell into a slumber under the forest canopy and the stars beyond.
Vision Quest
Pasky awoke within the vivid colours of a dream he'd recognized from earlier. It was the dream of the bear cub who could speak words like a shaman.
He checked himself and found that once again, he was entirely naked, though the elements of a warm and especially colourful autumn caused him no discomfort or harm. He merely noted the presence of the air and its gentle movement through the trees. He also realized that the bear cub and he were now equals, he being without his clothing and tools. The masks that separated humanity from the natural world.
The bear cub was already there, seated at the base of the same tree, only this time, it was a bit larger. Perhaps an adolescent more so than a cub. The bear looked over to Paskus.
"It seems there is space for more knowledge within, or perhaps you came here to pester me again?" asked the bear of Paskus.
"I don't know. I don't remember even coming here or wanting to for that matter, but I am sorry for treating you like a figment of my imagination, despite the evidence that supports that assumption," Pasky did his best to offer an apology to the bear, within his limited but growing understanding of humility and empathy.
"That is certainly progress. So tell me, did you ever find out about whether your father drugged you and left you here to die of exposure, or if it was merely your interpretation of much different circumstances?" the bear asked of Paskus.
"Well. I'm here now again so that leaves little to support my earlier assumptions..." Pasky rather than admit to the cynicism of his own worst assumptions, instead offered the bear a bit of his reasoning.
"The truth is that you never left. You've always been here. However, or so I've learned, every time we speak, you're a little bit different than you were before," the bear looked to either side of the tree, and upon spotting another berry bush, immediately hobbled over on four paws and retrieved two branches from the bush, wielding them in one paw and using the other three to return to his place in front of Paskus before any more words were exchanged.
"Did you mean that I'm a different person every time you see me?" confirmed Pasky.
The bear leaned forward, offering one of the two berry bush branches to Paskus. Pasky accepted it, and sat before the bear, examining the branch for berries and finding inner peace for the first time in that moment.
"In the sense that you are no longer exactly the same as you were before, but hardly a completely different person... or bear..." the bear answered Paskus.
"Did you know my mother? My father?" asked Pasky of the bear.
"Only in the same way that you know yourself when you look in the mirror. I notice the same things that you did, and not more or less, though I see them from a very different perspective than do you," the bear replied.
"I was wrong about my father, if what he told me was the truth," Pasky said to the bear, and to himself.
"Then all that remains is for you to decide whether you accept his account of things or not. You could just discard it all, and continue with your life as it was. Turning you back on your father, and your people and their place in this world... never having known any better or worse as a result," the bear offered him.
"Or I could give him a chance, and come to learn more, and maybe even understand and respect him and the difficult choices he had to make to protect us, and what he believed in," Pasky contemplated aloud, again, both for the bear and more so, himself.
"Keeping your distance from a spirit mate to protect her can't be an easy choice to make, let alone to live with once that choice is made. I'm certain that he wanted more than anything in his heart to be with her, and most certainly with the two of you. Together," the bear picked a few berries from the branch and consumed them, chewing them with a diagonally side to side motion of his jaw.
"I can't imagine having had to make that choice with Felicia and our children. I think that he deserves a chance," Pasky agreed with himself.
"A choice that sounds to me like it might be the more adventurous of the two, not to mention it might lead you to places that you'd have never come to know otherwise, with regard to your mother, your father and the traditions of your people. Thank you," the bear said to Paskus.
"For what? I should be thanking you!" Pasky asked the bear, looking to the creature in puzzlement.
"If you would have made the other choice, then I'd no longer exist. I am not just a figment of your imagination, but an extension of you and your connection to the tradition of your people. If you'd have turned yout back on him, your father I mean, then I'd no longer exist, and I must say that growing into you has been a wonderful experience so far, not to mention you've some very tasty berries in here," the bear did its best to smile, and that effort was not lost upon Paskus.
"However, there remains between us but one matter left," the bear added.
"What matter is that?" asked Pasky.
"That," the bear pointed its paw directly behind Paskus.
He turned to see what the bear had pointed out, and saw an enormous bear on its hind legs, its paws raised in the air ready to strike out at Paskus.
He screamed but nothing but air escaped his paralyzed body as terror set in.
"...I said there's hot water if you'd like a coffee," Askuwheteau repeated to his son as he sat in front of the campfire under the light of the early morning sun.
Pasky sat up, looking around to make sure there were no signs of the bear he'd seen in his vision.
Once he'd gotten his bearings, he moved over to the camp fire with his cup, and some coffee and poured himself hot water from the kettle balanced on the coals.
"Thanks for telling me about what happened. About what really happened between you and my mom. I can't say that it fixes everything about the way I feel towards you, but it certainly changed it a great deal for the better to know," Pasky told his father honestly.
"Then the thanks are mine as well, and to you. That was a great weight upon my spirit. It is lightened considerably, without losing the importance of its meaning. Now finish your coffee and get cleaned up. We're leaving to meet my friends in ten minutes. I'm going to tend to Otaa Dabun," Askuwheteau lied.
Pasky leaned over and grabbed the bag of toiletries that contained the trowel and some toilet paper.
"Here! I think you forgot something," Pasky said to his father, throwing him the bag.
Askuwheteau caught it with one hand and smiled.
"Like father, like son," Askuwheteau turned, walking past Otaa Dabun to find a place in the woods for a moment of peace and silence.
And the call of the wild.
A Meeting Place
 |
| Magenta's my triple-spired head, but my roar can be heard through my name... What am I? |
A blonde haired woman with shoulder length hair, adorned in an elaborately ornate beige peacoat sat on a large log that lay horizontally across two spans of land that sat poised within the bog. She wore a burgundy cashmere top and her favourite black jeans, which hugged her figure comfortably. Her
witchy boot covered feet dangled, just above the ground, as she contemplated one of the challenges her students had given her in their nature's game.
"Let me go over your clue, which was quite poetic I might add: Magenta's my triple-spired head, but my roar can be heard through my name," Nelony replayed the clue one of her two students had given her moments earlier.
She looked about her surroundings for any signs of the source of this mystery, while Athelbra did her best not to look in the direction of the mystery she'd created.
"Yep. That's a pretty good one. They'd really like that one back in Copenhagen," Dandelbraden agreed.
"Got it! Its an Orchid. A... Dragon's Mouth!" Nelony pointed in the direction of a flower she'd spied a good distance from them, where a patch of four or five such similar plants grew close to one another.
"Yes! You got it Miss Ardbloem. That was so quick!" Athelbra responded, laughing hysterically, nearly losing the fashionably colourful yet modest hijab wrapped around her head.
"Still, I had to think about it. That was a very creative use of words in your clue," Nelony smiled at her students, rather enjoying the experience.
"Alright. Can I go next?" asked Dandelbraden enthusiastically.
"Ohhhh, alright. Ask away, and Athelbra and I will try to guess. Right?" Nelony looked to Athelbra, who nodded affirmatively.
"Right," she smiled, nearly to point of blushing.
"Ok. Here goes: It behooves me to fly, in my riderless sky. And yet from the air, I've plucked mosquitos who'd dare... what am I?" Dandelbraden asked Athelbra and Nelony.
"A flying devil? Maybe a dragon fly?" asked Athelbra, trying to piece the clues together with her imagination.
"Good guess. That's what I was going to say for certain!" Nelony added, backing up Athelbra.
"Its a horse fly!" Askuwheteau popped up from behind them, startling them all three as he laughed, having figured out Dandelbraden's clues.
"You finally made it. I was beginning to think you'd be a no show," Nelony hopped down from the log, as did Dandelbraden, who then turned to help Athelbra down onto her feet.
"Speaking of horse flies, my son is running a little bit behind me, with Otaa Dabun," Askuwheteau told Nelony.
"Glad to hear he was able to make it. Was he able to get the data we're looking for?" asked Nelony of Askuwheteau.
"He most certainly did," Askuwheteau assured them.
"That should make this much easier then, though we still have to ensure that they haven't tampered with the bog yet. I haven't the resources or the power to stand them off alone. We have to beat them by preventing them from repeating the same history they did thirty years ago," Nelony reminded Askuwheteau.
"With the data, and a bit of help from our allies, that should be as readily achievable as the wind across the reeds," Askuwheteau responded, turning to face Paskus as he arrived on Otaa Dabun's back.
"Did you have any problems placing the markers like I told you?" asked Askuwheteau of Paskus.
"Not at all. They're well hidden to others, but we'll find them easily," Pasky replied to his father.
"Miss Nelony Ardbloem, this is my son Paskus Maskwa," Askuwheteau introduced his son to the original nature wytch.
"Its an honour to meet you Miss Ardbloem," Paskus extended his hand.
"The honour is all mine, though I have to admit I've shaken hands with bears more than a few times," Nelony admitted truthfully.
"Oh. How rude of me. These are my students. This is Athelbra, a student from the University of Jordan," Nelony introduced Athelbra to both Paskus and Askuwheteau.
"An honour to make your acquaintance," Askuwheteau greeted her.
"Same," Paskus agreed with a smile and a hand shake.
"And this is Dandelbraden from the University of Copenhagen," Nelony continued her introduction.
"Pleased to meet you," Dandelbraden shook both of their hands.
"I'm Askuwheteau, and this is my son Paskus Maskwa, at your service, though today, you're most gratefully in ours," Askuwheteau introduced them.
"Now lets not waste another second, and get to the important matters at hand of protecting this fragile biome from the kind of exploitation your nemeses have planned. Your father was saying that you were able to get the data we requested?" Nelony asked of Paskus.
"Yes, I have it right..." Pasky paused, suddenly realizing that he'd downloaded synthetic data into the tablet.
"What? Don't get stage fright on us now," Nelony joked with Paskus.
"What is it son?" Askuwheteau turned Paskus to face him.
"I... I downloaded synthetic data. That was before, when I didn't know what I know now, in my heart. I thought I was going to be the hero of my company, and catch some potentially damaging activists during some attempted act of terror, but I got you all wrong. First I got my father wrong, and then all of you. So I downloaded synthetic data to protect my company. I can't believe that I did that, but the fact remains that I did," Paskus explained to them, the weight of shame coming down upon him.
"That changes things significantly and for the worse I fear," Nelony thought carefully about how their plan would have to adapt to this new setback.
"I'm sorry dad. I'm sorry to all of you. Really, I am. I was a very different person when I downloaded that synthetic data," Paskus admitted to them.
"Son. I can no longer call you my boy, for you have become a man. You chose to let us know this, and that has despite this setback, given us another chance. I am very saddened by this fact, but I am also very proud of you on this day. Your mother too would have been proud were she here," Askuwheteau said to his son.
"Who are these people that did that to the land?" asked Paskus, suddenly realizing that he could be more helpful than they'd all known.
"Dean Eddmane was his name. I've been tracking him for thirty years since that time..." Askuwheteau told Paskus.
"The Dean Eddmane?" confirmed Paskus.
"That's what I said," Askuewheteau repeated himself.
"He's the CEO of EBA (pronounced eeba), a company that specializes in cleaning up environmental disasters. Specifically those that involve acidification or basification of an essential water source. Those relied upon by water treatment facilities or particularly fragile biomes. The government pays lucrative contracts out to companies that safeguard and manage these water sources, and for the most part, those companies that do are very honourable and trustworthy, but I've heard a lot of bad things from my professional colleagues who've dealt with EBA. They're a customer of the company for whom I'm employed, buying swaths of data about water supply and local geology," Paskus explained to them.
"Then these were the men in suits shooting at us yesterday. Men of EBA," Askuwheteau explained to Paskus and Nelony.
"So this Dean Eddmane person founded a hundred million dollar company by sabotaging the environment?" confirmed Nelony of Askuwheteau and Paskus.
"He was the one who detonated the explosives to open up and expose pockets of sulphuric and sulphurous acid, introducing it into the water supply, so that his company could collect contract money to clean these problems up. They take decades to clean and rebalance the water systems of regional habitats, including those of human populations. That is why he bombed the bog, and at the same time, took Lawana from us," Askuwheteau explained what he knew.
"This is the kind of thing that the company I work for would never do, nor would I ever allow them to do," Paskus explained to them.
"A tribe is only as good as its members. As much so, a company is only as good as the people that make up its workforce," Askwuwheteau reminded them.
"Look. It took fifteen years for a man named Walton Norler to bring the words responsibility and trust back home to business, and as a result, people's confidence and trust in business has never been better. People like this Dean Eddmane and his employees, are destroying that, and our future. If we can stop him and his company, we'll be heroes of the environment, and I'll be the hero of my company, but not by catching activists, but by supporting them in their protection of the environment. I have a copy of the real data, however, its on my phone, not the tablet. Its a lot harder to work with it like that, but it might be enough," Paskus pulled his phone and opened up the data excursion app his company had developed as an interface to their data packages.
He then handed his phone to Nelony, who accepted it, looking at the screen.
"You truly trust me with this, do you?" she asked him honestly.
"A day or two ago, I'd have never have trusted you. Today however and since my father told me the truth of what really happened, more than you know," Paskus responded.
"I can see from this data that it indicates that there are two large cavernous pockets of sulphurous and sulphuric acid close to the surface, here and here," Nelony pointed to a couple of data points on a geographic map on the screen of Paskus' phone.
"I'd be willing to bet that they're going to detonate explosives at these two points to ensure that their company survives for another thirty years by acidifying the water supply and charging the government to clean it up," Askuwheteau realized the entirety of what they'd been doing all along.
"That sulphuric acid cavern's over thirty kilometers away. We can't get to that one in time to stop them. I can't portal into land or territory I haven't already been to before and I've never been here before in this part of your province," Nelony explained to them.
"Leave that one to Paskus and I. We'll get to them and stop them in time," Askuwheteau looked to his son.
"Its as my dad said. We'll stop them. Together," Paskus stood firmly, standing by his father.
"How on Aerth are you going to get there fast enough?" asked Nelony.
Askuwheteau whistled once, a loud shrill shriek.
A second later, a portal opened ten meters away, and Otaa Dabun, who'd disappeared during their introductions, leapt out of the portal, his mane flowing in the wind created by the air pressure differential between where he'd been and where he was now.
"Alright. That's one we can hope will be prevented from being detonated. Athelbra, Dandelbraden and I will protect the other one, and if we should fail, I've got an idea for a little insurance plan that will require the help of a few of our friends from the wild here," Nelony explained to them.
"We're on the first one. We'll meet back here in an hour, after we've dealt with both problems," Askuwheteau leapt up onto Otaa Dabun's back and then offered his hand to his son.
Paskus accepted it, and pulled himself up onto the mount from behind.
"Wait! Wait! Wait! Could you take a quick photo of my dad and I on the horse?" asked Paskus of Nelony.
"This is an imperative mission and responsibility and time is of the essence!" She smirked at him.
"I know! I know! I just want my wife and kids to know what heroes their grandfather and father are. In case we don't make it," Paskus responded to her.
"Alright. Smile!" Nelony said as she lined up the photo of the two of them on the back of Otaa Dabun.
She clicked the button several times and then threw the phone back to Paskus.
"There. That should keep your wife and kids amused. We should be good from here without your phone. You might need it more than us," Nelony said to them as another portal opened up ten meters away in front of Otaa Dabun this time.
"I marked the geological weak points with artificial Yellow Orchids. They're indistinguishable from real orchids, but as you probably already know, they're not indigenous to the region. You should have no problem finding them, while your adversaries at EBA will likely never notice them," Paskus explained to Nelony.
"Alright. Like the wind across the red plains, we're off!" Askuwheteau waved, and then coaxed Otaa Dabun forward, leaping into the portal and disappearing into the unknown.
"Now you two go find the markers, and be stealthy. Remember those tricks with the weave that I taught you, but most of all, if you need help, then ask nature for it. She'll do her best every time," Nelony smiled at her students.
"Alright Miss Ardbloem. We'll see you soon," Athelbra said to Nelony.
"We've got this," Dandelbraden assured her.
"I'll see you in a bit," Nelony extended her arms and floated off into the air, southward where she searched for a particular group of natural denizens of the region.
To the south, several utility vans pulled up and a small army of armed men in suits and galoshes pulled up over their trousers stepped out into the bog, a pair of them hauling a crate with the explosives they'd need to breach the cavernous deposit of sulphuric acid in order to damage the regional biome and water supply.
Showdown
Athelbra and Dandelbraden found the markers Paskus Maskwa had placed earlier, and went about practicing the skills they'd acquired through Nelony's tutelage.
Their first order of the day was to secure the area sufficiently with traps, nonlethal of course, but enough to persuade a potentially dangerous group to vacate the region.
Dandelbraden focused on the traps themselves, while Athelbra spent her effort coming up with ways to camouflage them using the great and secret weave.
Over the twenty minutes they had before the advancing men of EBA had tripped the perimeter warning signal (which caused a local flock of birds to fly skywards, squawking for their entire flight), they'd managed to quickly set numerous traps focused upon the two key soft spots that Paskus had marked.
From that point, they retreated to a safe distance where they once again used the weave to camouflage themselves from where they remained in wait in a safe and dry place.
...
Askuwheteau and Paskus emerged from their exit portal nearly thirty kilometers north of the Biglake region, in a marsh just south of Huntsville and one that acted directly upon the local water supply. It was all an interconnected biome of lakes within marshes and bogs and more lakes. Water system all dependent upon combined natural and man made treatment facilities. The swamps and bogs were of the natural variety, while the local treatment plants were those created according to humankind's specifications. Nature did most of the heavy lifting, while the smaller treatment plants and pumping stations took the water the rest of the way to service our needs.
What made this entire system so fragile was that nearly every living thing relied upon water to survive, and with many of those living things being essential parts of the clean water system themselves, even slight alterations to the water chemistry could have disastrous consequences for entire fragile biomes. Biomes that provided for the lives of not only these creatures of the wild who were all essential to its healthy functioning, but to hundreds of thousands, perhaps a million or more who lived in rural communities reliant upon the biomes of the connected natural water systems.
It was a harmony well understood by the Indigenous, and one that those whose homes, cottages and workplaces occupied the populated spaces between these lands were coming to fully understand and appreciate. It was all a synergy between humanity and the rest of the natural world. Without these natural water systems cleaning the water, there would be no life. As Askuwheteau had pointed out earlier, they were the organs and guts of the land. The Kidneys. The Liver. The Pancreas and the Intestines all rolled up into one, the refuse becoming the nutrients that kept fertile soil and decomposers abundant for the next generation of plants. Plants that fed countless fish and herbivores, some of whom became food to local carnivores (including humanity), their bones and carcuses becoming food for the land, decomposed and broken down in the swamps where the water too was cleaned.
Dean Eddmane, a rather aggressive business man with a rudimentary understanding of the sciences, had in the early days taken notice of the Government's growing interest in environmental cleaning and geo-engineering solutions. Technologies they were promoting that could eventually be employed as tools in the face of environmental disaster. The grants and bursaries they'd been offering at the time were enormous given the interest and focus on the challenges, and Dean saw this as an opportunity. Using their money (rather unscrupulously which was very rare in his field of interest), he could with a minimal outlay create technological solutions to problems that he could, using the same money, find a way to create. He knew that having full control of the problem, and the solution was one of the many paths to multi-million, if not billion dollar equity and assets in company holdings.
He and his more scrupulous associates, Holden Dreyfuss and Philip Undner, both of whom provided the scientific and engineering expertise to create their particular solution, had come up with a way to rapidly (within about two human generations) reconstitute water biomes that had suffered large scale damage from acidification (becoming dangerously acidic) and basification (becoming dangerously alkaline).
The process was a costly one and involved a combination of microbial engineering and management, and chemical engineering to create the solution that stimulated the microbes into a repetitive cycle that led to their rapid spread into acidified or basified waters, where they would consume and metabolize the pH components that were greater than or less than seven pH. That would over the course of about twenty to thirty years, neutralize the solution to become chemically clean water. The microbes would then naturally die off, and become the food that lured the return of the natural decomposers and microbes that thrived before such a disaster had befalled such a biome.
Dean, having organized the entire project, paid his associates well from the Government bursaries and grants, and gave himself a fat salary as well, but when they'd achieved their solution, that was it. The money dried up, as did their lucrative salaries and that was the end of that.
They'd pooled their resources and started marketing to a variety of Nature related monthlies, including National Geographic, but the kinds of problems their solution solved just didn't happen quickly enough and often enough to support them, despite their having spent nearly a million in advertising over the course of two years, until they considered filing for bankruptcy. However, Dean was not the kind of man to give up so easily, and when facilitated by his lack of scruples, he came up with a plan to create the problem their solution could solve.
He first approached his associates with the idea, over dinner and drinks. The three of them discussing the idea and how it was great that the Government had these grants and bursaries for initial investment into research, but that there was no lifeline beyond that to sustain these companies or their technologies, retaining them much the same way that a community retains fire fighters. Fires don't happen often, but their potential for loss and devastation far outweighs the cost of not having them when you need them. If fire fighting had somehow become privatized, then Dean Eddmane would have been the man who set fires to improve business. And so it was that he did just that in order to keep their company and their technology and more so than anything else, their lavish homes and the salaries that paid for them.
The plan was simple. They'd obtain geological survey data from one of the various companies that provided details chemical and geological analysis of the bedrock just under the soil layer of the Earth's crust. They would use this survey data to find cavernous sulpherous and sulphuric acid deposits close enough to the surface that they could use explosives to open them up, and contaminate the water. The alarm would be raised, and the Government would of course come to them for the solution, and pay handsomely for it. To the tune of tens of millions and in the worst of disasters, hundreds of millions of dollars. Over the course of thirty years, that would provide the ones managing such a solution with a very comfortable life style and the means to grow their portfolio even further. There was just one problem. Neither Dreyfuss nor Undner went for it.
Frustrated by their lack of motivation, Dean had a friend of his at the bank begin the process of foreclosing on Dreyfuss' mortgage, which of course frightened his wife and family, to the point that Dreyfuss quickly contacted Dean and opted in on his plan.
Undner was a bit more difficult, for he'd lived a different lifestyle. One that didn't include family or a circle of friends outside of those of his professional peers. He instead liked to gamble, and often spent much of his spare time in Casinos, living precariously between the brink of poverty and riches. His knowledge of gambling effectively kept his bankroll considerably healthy. Enough to survive from day to day without much worry, but not quite enough to invest in real estate or secure an asset like a home.
Dean's solution to coax Undner, came in a different form, and one that involved similarly principled friends of his rig Undner's favourite slot machine, and his favourite card table. When in one night, Undner lost everything, including his luxurious hotel room residence, he immediately called Dean collect, and assured Dean that he was in, after which he then asked Dean for a loan of several thousand dollars. Dean having gotten what he'd wanted, gave the loan to his associate, knowing fully well that once again, he was the one in charge.
When the day came that they'd put their plan into action, they hadn't anticipated that anyone might be near the sight they'd selected, but as circumstances often do present obstacles, there she was, a woman and her horse poking around near their selected detonation site.
Dean had never connected the woman and the horse to the man and the horse he'd later encountered, after having murdered both Dreyfuss and Undner for their inability to comply with the detonation. At the moment they did, he'd known they were dead, for he could not risk their conscience betraying his future and comfort.
Dean, now sixty three years old, a bit heavier and huskier than he'd been thirty years earlier, walked with his men, armed with his same silenced pistol should he need to deal with potential difficulties, such as the man and the horse they'd pursued in Toronto.
As much so as Askuwheteau had been tracking Dean, so had Dean been tracking Askuwheteau.
Dean's phone rang as he hiked with his men from the utility vans into the bog just south of Huntsville.
"What is it?" answered Dean.
"I found the son's house. The kids are at school. The wife's at work. What do you want me to do?" asked the man who'd called him.
"I want you to fix the front door. It keeps making a very loud noise when you open it. Do you get what I'm saying?" asked Dean.
"How loud?" asked the man of Dean.
"Very loud. Loud enough to wake the entire community," Dean responded.
"Alright. I'll fix it. But its going to cost you extra," the man replied.
"Don't you worry about a thing. The money is practically already in the bank," Dean responded to the man.
"I'll do the work now, but have the money in the bank in one hour. If not, the deal's off and I'll tie up all loose ends. Understood?" the man asserted himself to Dean, who was uncomfortable dealing with such a man.
"One hour. It'll happen," Dean assured him.
"Good. Then we have a deal," responded Foller, who then hung up.
Dean pocketed the phone and looked nervously to the men surrounding him, counting them and doing some rough math in his head.
It would be close, but he had enough finances to cover everything.
...
Askuwheteau led Otaa Dabun through a trail towards the bog and as they approached the waterline, Paskus addressed him.
"So what's the plan dad? How are we going to pull this off?" he asked his father.
"Tricks. Traps. Totems," Askuwheteau said to his son.
"And where do I fit in?" asked Paskus.
"You're going to keep watch, in a tree. I'm going to lay some tricks, traps and a few totems. You see that group of tall White Birches there?" Askuwheteau pointed to a group of three trees whose trunks rose nearly a hundred feet into the air.
"Yeah. What about them?" asked Paskus.
"You're going to climb one of them and hide yourself in the branches. Say about thirty feet up. When you see trouble coming, you're going to whistle caw like a crow," Askuwheteau explained to Paskus, who looked at him in bewilderment.
"I'm not going to climb that tree. I'll wait near the bottom and when I see trouble coming, I'll caw like a crow and run for it. How's that?" asked Paskus, offering what he thought to be a better solution.
"You're going to climb that tree, like a Rising Bear. Bears, especially black bears are very good climbers. You're a very good climber, you just don't know it yet, Rising Bear," Askuwheteau encouraged his son.
'Alright. I'm focused. I'm a bear and I'm going to climb that tree!" Paskus ran at the tree and scampered up it like a pro, until he got to the twenty foot mark that is.
He fell with just enough time to yell on his way and land with a sudden thud.
"Bears fall from trees too. See? You are more and more like Rising Bear every day," Askuwheteau encouraged his son some more, and surprisingly enough, rather than admit defeat, Paskus recalled the ferocious bear from his vision quest.
He snarled a few times, and held his hands out as if he had great sharp claws. Askuwheteau had positioned himself near the base of the tree and was holding his hands cupped, from which Paskus could use as a step up to launch himself at the tree.
Paskus howled like a bear (with confidence issues), and ran at the tree, stepping into his father's cupped hands which then launched him up the trunk as Askuwheteau stood. The momentum carried Paskus up the tree while his ferocious climbing and animal grunts got him the rest of the way there, to the first branches at the thirty foot mark. From that point, he found the thickest branch and stretched himself across it, from where he lay in wait.
"I got it dad! I got it! Like a bear!" Paskus waved down to his father.
"That you did. Now don't forget. If you see anyone approaching, caw like a crow! Otaa Dabun and I have to set some traps now," Askuwheteau whistled once, and Otaa Dabun once again galloped into sight and approched him.
He mounted his horse and the two rode off into the bog to setup their tricks, traps and totems.
...
Athelbra and Dandelbraden sat huddled a few meters from each other, well hidden beneath the veil of their aetheric woven camouflage, Athelbra keeping an eye on the east marker, while Dandelbraden kept his eye on the west marker.
"Maybe they're not coming?" Athelbra whispered to Dandelbraden, starting to feel her leg cramp as a result of their inactivity.
"Miss Ardbloem said the Seers of the Sanctum were ninety-five percent certain that they'd make their move on this very day, and that if they didn't, that the signs in the Ephemeral Heavens, the I Ching and the Tarot were that with the passage of time thereafter, the likelihood of them making such a move would decrease by half every nine days, as they ran afoul of their investors and resources," Dandelbraden reminded Athelbra of what they'd learned before they'd agreed to accompany Nelony on this so called field trip.
"Shhhh! I just heard someone talking! Deep voices... like men. They were joking about something..." Athelbra warned Dandelbraden, who turned his head from his focus upon her and spotted a small group of five men in close grouping, one of them laughing as she'd stated.
They were advancing into the bog and had just stepped off of the hard soil and into the swamp. Their pacing changed dramatically.
"Damn! I just got these boots and they're already flooded!" one of the men griped.
"Quit your whining and lets just get the job done. You heard the boss. We get these packs in place and blow them, and we're guaranteed thirty years and a pension to die for," one of the other men put him in his place.
"These are the hard ones... You know? Like the ones who force their way through life... elbows and fists first..." Athelbra lowered her voice in fear of their brashness and confidence.
"There are those whose will forces its way to pronounce the good too my friend. Don't let their brashness be an example for all those whose force of will is used for good. Its the just the difference between how..." Dandelbraden started explaining the concept to a girl who had become his best friend.
"...how women and men project the power of their essence... their aether..." Athelbra suddenly understood.
"Their version of the weave, though men like them would never grasp that power in its truth. A force for virtue, a force for prosperity, but not entirely for their own selfish gain!" Dandelbraden added to Athelbra's sudden understanding of the ways that people wielded the great and secret weave without ever knowing they were.
At that very moment, as if to underline the difference of these men wielding their version of the weave so disrespectfully and irresponsibly, one of them stepped in the wrong place, and as a result, one of Athelbra's and Dandelbraden's traps were sprung.
"Oooh! I don't feel so good..." the man who'd been scolding the other about griping over his boots suddenly stopped in place in the middle of the swamp, about two thirds of the way to the east marker.
"Seevers, get Malinders to solid land and check him out. The rest of you, continue on to your targets," one of the men ordered another to guide the afflicted man back towards the dry land.
"Which trap was that?" asked Athelbra of Dandelbraden.
"I can't remember. We set so many. I only hope they know the difference between us and them..." Dandelbraden suddenly realized that Athelbra had asked the fundamental question regarding the defensive use of the weave.
How to know one's own enemies from one's own friends and to be able to weave that understanding into the detection mechanisms of a weave trap.
One of the men suddenly like a pre-loaded spring, was launched into the air, their arms and legs flailing until they landed almost perfectly squatted in the midst of the murky waters of the swamp, about twenty meters from the east marker.
When a large dragonfly flew too close to that paricular man's mouth, he suddenly lunged at it with nearly impossible agility, and caught it in his mouth. He then, much to the horror of his fellows in the swamp, consumed the dragonfly, chewing it in purposeful motion, a glazed look over his eyes until he'd swallowed it, at which point he'd extended his neck, as if that would somehow would have made it more tenable, and then settled into the swamp at eye height, watching everything around him.
"That was definitely your frog trap," Athelbra remarked to Dandelbraden, moving close enough to him to lock their pinkies in a shake.
"I can't believe it worked so well!" Dandelbraden watched the man, as he basically sat with his eyes just above the waterline in the swamp like a real frog. Looking, searching for his next bug meal.
"What happened to Marty?" one of the others approaching the east marker pointed to the man/frog in the middle of the swamp.
"Its BZ gas. I've heard about this experimental gas that the CIA used for their psyops programs..." one of the other security specialists came up with an impromptu explanation.
"What are you talking about? What the heck would the CIA be doing in the middle of a swamp in Canada in Biglake Provincial Park?" one of the other security specialists responded his theory.
"Making frogmen? Maybe?" another man responded, pointing to Marty, who'd just caught the tadpole of a competing frog in his territory in his mouth, and had just swallowed it whole.
The first crew had reached the west marker and was now priming their exposive pack and preparing it for the first detonation, when Dandelbraden stood from his place, exposing himself entirely.
"Hey! You big nature bully! Why don't yeou pick on someone yeour own size?!!!" he yelled when he was a distance away from Athelbra and far enough to draw their attention away from her.
"Get him! I'll get the pack in place," one of the men ordered, directing several men to pursue Dandelbraden as he ran across the short patch of land upon which Athelbra and he had chosen to hide.
"What'll we do when we catch him?" asked one of the men.
"I don't know. Lead him from the property and back to the service road leading here and cuff him there. Tell him there's a swamp leak, like the official cover story we were trained to use in this situation," a response came, before it was suddenly interrupted.
"Lookout! Trassels just joined Marty in frog mode!" another one of the men screamed.
Now, there were two of their former men, both hunting like giant man/frogs in the swamp.
"This place is cursed!" yelled another man, fleeing from his position on their flank and making his way back to the vehicles.
"Oh dear. I'm so sorry," Athelbra mouthed, noting that the second frog trap might have been hers.
"If anyone else decides to vacate like Rilker just did, they're getting tasered in the back and cuffed to a stump!! Now get those packs in place so we can blow them and call it a day!! Any volunteers to gather Marty and Trassels?" their crew Chief yelled at them.
When nobody was forthcoming to volunteer, he chose two of the men himself and ordered them to capture Marty and Trassels, and bring them back to the shore and to restrain them there if necessary. With four of his men carrying the two explosive packs, and another three of them in pursuit of the young man who'd just erupted from the bushes, he only had another six to keep cover for the operation including himself.
As Minks and Domney were approaching the east marker with their pack, Athelbra manually triggered one of her nearby weave traps. A cloud of green fumes suddenly erupted from within the swamp and encompassed Minks, who dropped his end of the explosive pack and began sneezing profusely, completely incapacitated.
"You've gotta love sternuation. The forceful, involuntary, evacuation of air from the sternum. One of the many ways that a human being can be made to lose control..." Athelbra's words were lost on the Domney, who was too busy struggling to drag the case the remaining five meters before his GPS sensor and direction finder would give him the green light.
Minks continued to sneeze uncontrollably as Domney found the energy within himself to drag the two hundred pound pack (most of that weight being the metal used to make the condensor chamber of the explosive device). When Minks had reached the soft spot, an LED clipped to his breast pocket began flashing bright green, and he set the pack down in the water, its receiver antennae poking out of the water.
"Pack two is in place!" yelled Domney to the crew Chief.
Domney then turned to face Athelbra, who suddenly found herself vulnerable and alone and unsure of what to do.
Athelbra had been a gentle and peaceful person for her entire life, and the thought of having to defend herself or hurt another human being completely horrified her.
She backed away from Domney, who smiled a devious yet grim smile.
"Come here, little girl. Heh heh. You've been oh so bad," Domney said as he ran for her.
She turned and fled, an instinctual and justified reaction despite the fact that her lack of confidence was at that point her only real weakness. The land upon which she'd hidden herself quickly disappeared and she found herself having to bound into the bog itself, which slowed her progress away from her would be captor to a near crawl.
Domney bounded his way through the bog, leaving Minks to his sneezing fit (which was still going full force), quickly catching up with Athelbra. He reached out and grabbed one of her wrists as she fled, and she turned, struggling to free herself of his grip.
"Let her go or my friend will deal with you!" Nelony spoke loud and with the confidence Athelbra needed.
"Who? Looks like you're outnumbered, not to mention a long way from home, Brittany?" Domney held fast to Athelbra, whose face lit up when she saw Nelony floating in the air above the bog just aside of them and ten meters away.
The sound of galloping hooves suddenly erupted from the bog, followed by a few grunts and then the impact of the antlers of a mature male moose, whose impact of force launched Domney a clear twenty feet into the air to collide with Minks. The both of them were plunged into the bog, and got up, soaking wet.
"That's for manhandling my friend, and for calling me Brittany. Oh, and by the way, the Commonwealth, is my home, but we'd gladly assist good neighbours and allies alike. Come on Athelbra. We've got work to do. I brought some friends. Lets go give Dandelbraden a hand," Nelony floated over to the moose and landed on his back, gaining a firm hold of his antlers with one hand and extending her other to Athelbra.
"Trust me. Just grab hold and I'll heft you up here," Nelony extended her hand to Athelbra, who looked to where Domney and Minks were now both situated in the bog and in a sneezing fit, and then back to the beast of a moose who'd put him there.
"Not bad," Athelbra smiled at the beast and then grabbed hold of Nelony's hand.
Nelony hauled her up and onto the beast's back with her.
"They're quite peaceful actually. However, get between a moose and her calf and you've got a problem. Always best to keep an eye out for such things in the outback. I should let you know that its an immense honour to be allowed to ride the back of a male moose and that you should under any circumstances, never try it yourself. Just so you understand what this particular moose is affording you in terms of undemonstrated friendship," Nelony said to Athelbra.
"Thank you Mr. Moose," Athelbra patted the sides of the moose, and he grunted back to her in acknowledgement.
"Now, lets go get Dandelbraden. Shall we?" Nelony coaxed the moose, using its antlers to indicate the direction she'd prefer, with the word prefer being the key word in any situation involving riding a moose, as any direction was entirely at the moose's disposal whether the rider liked it or not.
If it were otherwise, then humankind would have evolved with both horses and moose as their load bearers and there'd have been history books littered with accounts of Knights mounted on moose. As it stood, moose were well... sort of grumpy and independent and better off left to their own wanderings unless you were like Nelony and could speak Moosian. In that case, you'd probably have a good friend in just about any situation in the out back of Canada, let alone North America.
...
Dean Eddmane led his men towards their target, which was only a hundred meters away. Two men, Cavvers and Dawson carried the only explosive pack they'd needed in this location, while the sixteen men kept watch for anyone who'd wandered into their area of interest.
Paskus lay across the branch un the upper thirty feet of a paper birch, when he had to squint to see that some men had just come into view, having emerged from the forest bordering the bog. He felt his heart jump at that moment, and found himself ready to signal his father.
"Alright. I got this..." Paskus went to signal his father with the sound of a...
Of a...?
"What was I supposed to sound like?" he asked himself.
"Ahhh! I remember. It was a... muskrat!" Paskus said aloud.
"What the hell does a muskrat sound like? <squeek!> <squeek!> <squeek!>" Paskus tried squeaking but found that it wasn't loud enough.
"No! He wouldn't have suggested something like that. He'd have suggested something that was easy to do, and loud enough for him to hear it. Wait! It was a bird! Uhhh... an Owl! <Whooooo!> <whooooo!> <whoooo!>" Paskus did his best and though the sound was much louder, it still didn't fit the bill.
"A warbler maybe? A pidgeon? A sparrow? No! It was a crow!" Paskus suddenly remembered.
"<Caw!> <Caw!> <Caw!>" Paskus voice emerged, sounding almost identical to that of a real crow.
So real in fact, that a crow flew over and perched itself on the branch beside him, and began pecking at his hands as they held onto the branch.
"No! Not you! I meant someone else!" Paskus flailed at the crow, who hopped aside at his attempts to shew the bird.
"<Caw!> <Caw!>" Paskus once again tried to signal his father, but only caught the attention of the bird, who then flew onto his shoulders and began pecking at his head.
"Dammit! Leave me alone! I'm just coming to terms with my ancestry! Now go!" Paskus pleaded with the bird, not realizing that his voice was rising in volume.
"Cover Dawson and Cavvers. Somebody check out what that noise was..." Dean ordered his men.
"See what you did! Now we're both going to buy it because of you!" Paskus scolded the bird as quietly as he could.
The crow suddenly flew into the air and when it was a distance from the same tree that held Paskus, it began to caw very loudly.
"It was a bird..." one of Dean's men pointed to the sky, as the crow flew off away from Paskus, drawing their attention in an entirely different direction.
Meanwhile, a short distance away, as Askuwheteau finished urinating, he heard the sound of a crow cawwing loudly.
"That's my boy! He did that perfectly! Must run in the family," Askuwheteau said as he tied his fly.
Otaa Dabun grunted in response.
"No. That wasn't a real crow. That was my son. I know my son's voice when I hear it, and he has the heart of the wild in him. He can immitate any animal spirit," Askuwheteau responded to Otaa Dabun.
"All done. Now lets see if we can't stop another big bad loud wind from taking the water of the land," Askuwheteau mounted Otaa Dabun and was off in the direction of the crow's call.
...
"There's nearly thirty men down there. I can't do this by myself... Come on dad!" Paskus said to himself.
"I can't even see them..." Paskus said, moving a little further out onto the extent of the branch until the men came into view again.
As one of the men approached a nearby tree in the bog, it suddenly began rumble, causing growing ripples to emanate in the water around it.
"We've got a problem here..." the man nearest the tree stepped back from the tree, nearly tripping on some reeds as he did.
One of the other men retreating from the tree was suddenly sucked down into the water, as if something had pulled him under.
"There's something in here with us!" another man yelled, bringing his SMG around to bear.
The man who'd been pulled under, was suddenly catapulted from the water, into the air, upwards until he reached a height of sixty feet, screaming the entire way, falling in a perfect arc to land upon a soft tundra near the shore with a thud.
"Its got tentacles! Its... Its...! Arrrgh!" the same man got to his feet and began rambling incoherently until he finally turned and ran towards the road and vehicles, screaming the entire distance.
"Alright. Nobody step there!" Dean pointed to the where the man had gone under.
"Duh!?" one of his men responded, having turned his back on the rumbling tree.
Behind the man, the tree had suddenly righted itself to become fully and vertically erect, all of the branches falling from the tree into the bog water, which still rippled in motion with the tree.
"What? You guys look like you've seen a ghost?" that same man echoed back at them as he backed towards the same rumbling tree, unknowingly.
Paskus saw what was happening and found himself encoured by the situation.
"Way to go dad! We're going to..." at that exact moment, with his added motion, the branch upon which he was poised, cracked once, and only once.
The men who kept watch over the evolving situation suddenly turned when a large man and a much larger branch suddenly fell from one of the trees nearest them.
There was a loud splash as Paskus and the branch hit the water.
"I think that was a bear that just fell from the tree..." one of the men stepped back from the impact zone, when a large man emerged from the water, gasping and coughing.
"...uhhh. Did anyone see a large black bird around here?" Paskus asked them, catching his breath.
"So you're a bird watcher...?" asked one of the men, lowering his SMG.
"Not really. I'm just one of the weird ones, who had a fetish for lying on the high branches of trees at break-neck heights," Paskus responded wiping his face, suddenly seeing what was becoming of the tree causing all of the ripples in the bog water.
"So you're a smart-ass too?" asked the same man.
"No. I'm a Native of this land, and a protector thereof. Just like my friend there behind you," Paskus faced the man full of courage, even more so when he saw what the tree behind the man had become.
"Get that pack in place!" Dean saw the tree too, and suddenly realized what was happening.
The very land had become alive against them, and was pursuing the will of his Indigenous enemy: Askuwheteau. Superstition was quickly setting in amongst the remaining men with the arrival of this...
The man who with a number of his peers had confronted Paskus, turned to see what Paskus and the others were looking at. When he saw what had become of the tree, he tried to scream, but his efforts to do so were stifled quickly and suddenly.
The tree was no longer as much, but more so a tall phantom of wild shapes trying to break free from within the fiber of the tree itself. Its outer shell had transformed to become synchronized with this effort of spirits, the tree itself having become a living representation of the life within the bog at every level. From the blue of the water to the blue of the sky, all of it was now directed at those invading its habitat.
A new set of branches emerged from the newly born totem, and then reaching out for all who were within its grasping distance. The first man (the one whose screams were first stifled), was quickly grasped within the clutch of one, pushing his air out quickly so as to prevent him from making any sound before the totem had clutched several more of the men within its grasp.
"Get that charge in place! I'll deal with this!" Dean ordered Cavvers and Dawson.
Dean charged at the totem, which was now fully alive and incapacitating his entire force.
As we went to fire his SMG at the totem, Otaa Dabun slammed into him, Askuwheteau leaping from the horse to attack the man who'd taken his wife from him.
As Otaa Dabun ran into the man, Askuwheteau grasped at Dean's shoulder, leaping from the horse and the two of them fell into the bog together.
Askuwheteau was up and onto his feet first, but Dean pulled his legs out from under him, and jumped onto him, holding his head under the water.
Askuwheteau struggled against Dean, who then punched him several times before Askuwheteau was able to break free for his life, gasping for the vital breath of air.
Dean tried to reach his silenced pistol, but Askuwheteau's hands found it at the same time, and the two struggled over control of the weapon before they both lost clutch of it. It fell into bog, quickly hitting bottom, from where it was grabbed by the very same totem's branches against which the remainder of Dean's forces struggled for their capacity.
"You took my wife from me!"Askuwheteau exclaimed as he grabbed Dean by his vest.
"She was in the wrong place at the wrong time! She took herself!" Dean spat at Askuwheteau.
"Just like you're in the wrong place at the wrong time!" Askuwheteau said, holding Dean in place as the totem got hold of him and pulled him into its trunk, the fanged mouth of its biting head unable to finish what Askuwheteau had started.
Instead, Dean just dangled from the totem in a state where he was on the precipice of death, yet able to partially participate in the fate of those still living.
With the help of his totem, Askuwheteau quickly fought his way through Dean's men to his son.
"Is Rising Bear still with us?" Askuwheteau asked Paskus, who turned to face his father, startled and frightened given what had transpired already.
"Dad? Yeah, I'm still here. Have we beat them yet?" asked Paskus.
At that exact moment, one of the remaining men in Dean's security force fired his weapon at Paskus, but at that exact moment, Askwuwheteau, who had been keeping watch for such calamity, pushed his son out of the way, and the rounds instead impacted his body.
At that moment, the man who'd fired the shot was drawn into the totem by one of its branches and held in place with the others, his weapon now fallen into the swamp below.
"Dad!" Paskus grasped at his father's limp body as it fell to the bog.
"This forever, is not truly forever. However, I will be with you at the next forever, my son," Askuwheteau proclaimed as he fell to the bog, Dean who was still held in place by the totem, laughed aloud at the fallen scout of the Pikwàkanagàn Algonquins.
"You're not going to leave me! Or my family! Or your grandchildren dammit!" Paskus cried at his father.
"No my son. I am saying goodbye to you all, and hello to my Lawana in the next life. It is certain. That is what must happen, and you will carry on our legacy my son," Askuwheteau's eyes closed and his breath ceased in his son's arms.
Askuwheteau's lifeless and breathless face and body sunk into the bog under a rain of Paskus Maskwa's tears.
The Rising Bear
"Dad?!!!" Paskus shook his father's lifeless body.
"Dad!!!" Paskus' tears fell even harder as he pounded his father's lifeless chest, which promptly sunk into the bog as the last air of his lungs evacuated his cavity.
And at that moment, he found himself once again in the dream of the bear cub, though this time, the cub was on longer an adolescent bear, but on the brink of adulthood. The bear had a much larger frame and long claws protruded from his paws. However, the one thing that hadn't changed was his peaceful and contemplative nature.
He'd already harvested several branches from another berry bush, and when Paskus had arrived, he handed three of them to him. He accepted them gratefully, wiping his tears from his eyes with his other hand. He then sat himself down cross-legged before the bear, who'd observed his emotional state.
"A loss of some form perhaps?" asked the bear.
"My father. Right in front of me. He pushed me out of the way to save me," Paskus told the bear about what had happened only moments earlier.
"Life has its other side you know. That great mytery from which we emerge when we're born, and the same mystery into which we venture when we die. The one thing that every living creature in all of creation shares, is that we're all most certainly guaranteed to experience both. Even creation itself has its own cycles, and similarly in terms of metaphor, so to speak. Your father was part of just such a cycle, and you are too," the bear explained to Paskus.
"But I thought that if I made the choice that I wanted him to be a part of my life, that he'd be with me and my family to stay. Wasn't that what was supposed to happen?" asked Paskus of the bear.
"Regret is the point that you arrive at when you realize that you made a choice before you fully understood the consequences, or in your case, that you've been delaying making that choice for your entire life. When you finally made the choice however, by that time it might have not been soon enough for you to appreciate," the bear said, grasping at the branches and stripping a pawful of berries, which he then shoved into his mouth and began chewing.
"But that's not fair! I didn't know what he'd gone through to protect my mother and I! Instead I was fed a bunch of lies about how he was a drunk and that his day to day life was simply looking for his next bottle," Paskus replied, very frustrated over the fact that he'd been misled about his father from a young age.
"What if that was the case, would it have made things any different? After all, he is your father, and he had a direct hand in raising you, even though he didn't really come into your life until you were six years old. Would it have made a difference if he was a drunk on a bus, following your foster family in order to get a look at his own son, or a man who was secretly an agent protecting the world and the environment as part of a Sanctum Seclorum?" asked the bear of Paskus.
"He didn't come into my life at all. He hid from us," Paskus responded.
"No. He didn't. He had a hand in everything that affected your life, and every opportunity you threw away, and every opportunity you took. He even had a hand in your meeting Felicia. Not all things are coincidence, and so what if the secret guide of your life, was a drunken bum, or a secret agent of the Sanctum Seclorum. Look at where the opportunities he afforded you took you. That poor lonely drunk you see on the sidewalk, he had a life at one time. Who's to say that he still doesn't? That he isn't secretly pulling the levers and pullies in someone else's life? His own child maybe? The issue isn't truly about what your father did in life, though your father accomplished some great things, that most people will never know about simply because of choices he made not to wear the mantle of his own efforts. The agent or the drunk, they still have within them the capacity for great things. It all comes down to you realizing that everyone who's journey doesn't eventually end up in a suburban home with a mortgage and 2.5 kids isn't a failure you know. The fate of the world has been changed by the impoverished as much so as it has been by those of the worldcraft and leadership of nations, and there within, each side of that scale has its own drunks too. So once again, do you truly miss your father now because you finally found out what motivated him, and because he wasn't in fact what you saw as a failure. Maybe its where you set your bar for others versus yourself that's the real problem," the bear looked at him thoughtfully, and Paskus suddenly realized the error and lack of empathy of his perspective.
What would he do if down the road, when his son was in his twenties and suddenly fell into poverty, and became dependent upon liquor or some other lure of vice? Would he still love his son and do his best to remedy him? And if he couldn't, would he still love him despite his vice? Or, would he as he'd almost planned with his father, simply discard him, and do away with his memory of his son? Rid himself of the ties and the connection and have done with him.
Most of the situations that led to the greatest opportunities that he'd had in life, came from his own father secretly pulling the strings, and then him proving himself beyond the shadow of a doubt to be worthy of them, for few truly know the value of that which just falls into their lap, and those who do, only know its value by having lost it a few times.
Regardless of what his father had chosen to do in life, he had demonstrated that he was a man worthy of his son's respect, and that regardless of what he'd done in life, he was a man worthy of his son's love, in the same way that he loved his own son, assuming that neither went to extremes to sabotage that love or their connection. Something his father had never done to him, so why would he have ever considered doing it to him?
"I think that you are ready to face the rest of your life. I can only hope that you've gained something from our little escapes to this place. I should let you know that you are Paskus Maskwa.
"How do you know? Have I graduated?" asked Paskus.
The bear and the tree disappeared, and Paskus was now looking into the face of a full grown black bear, with ferocious yet distant eyes that held onto both wisdom and the pain of acquiring it. It was the same bear that had finished every one of his dreams with the bear cub. Except for one thing. Paskus wasn't looking outward at another being. He was bent over the water, looking at his own reflection, ripples spreading from the water where droplets had fallen from his face. He was just getting up from the water, and he recalled that it was a few moments before...
Askuwheteau was up and onto his feet first, but Dean pulled his legs out from under him, and jumped onto him, holding his head under the water.
Askuwheteau struggled against Dean, who then punched him several times before Askuwheteau was able to break free for his life, gasping for the vital breath of air, for he even knew that water was the lifegiver, but it could also be the lifetaker.
Dean tried to reach his silenced pistol, but Askuwheteau's hands found it at the same time, and the two struggled over control of the weapon before they both lost clutch of it. It fell into bog, quickly hitting bottom, from where it was grabbed by the very same totem's branches against which the remainder of Dean's forces struggled for their capacity.
"You took my wife from me!"Askuwheteau exclaimed as he grabbed Dean by his vest.
"She was in the wrong place at the wrong time! She took herself!" Dean spat at Askuwheteau.
"Just like you're in the wrong place at the wrong time!" Askuwheteau said, holding Dean in place as the totem got hold of him and pulled him into its trunk, the fanged mouth of its biting head unable to reach Dean's throat and finish what Askuwheteau had started.
Instead, Dean just dangled from the totem in a state where he was on the precipice of death, yet able to partially participate in the fate of those still living.
With the help of his totem, Askuwheteau quickly fought his way through Dean's men to his son.
"Is Rising Bear still with us?" Askuwheteau asked Paskus, who turned to face his father, startled and frightened given what had transpired already.
"Arrrrrrrgh!!!" Paskus screamed, raising his fists like clawed paws as he charged at a man a short distance away who'd just started to turn so he could fire a burst at Paskus and his father.
He pulled the trigger just as Paskus bashed the weapon aside, the gunfire burst into the water harmlessly, as Paskus head butted the man. He then picked the man up over his head and ran at the Askuwheteau's totem, throwing the man at it. The totem caught the man with its tentacle-like branches, trapping him beside Dean.
"Rising Bear! Its you!" Askuwheteau ran over to his son.
"The one and only! Paskus Maskwa and Askuwheteau ride again!" Paskus exclaimed, grabbing his father in a bear hug and lifting him out of the water.
"Alright now son, we still have lots to do! Get a grip of yourself!" Askuwheteau scolded him.
"I'm just so glad that you're here!" Paskus added.
"Now come on. Lets this done first. Then we can pat each others' backs," Askuwheteau urged Paskus.
The two of them turned to see that all of the men were now either fleeing, or being held in place, restrained by Askuwheteau's totem.
At that moment, Dean pulled the detonator from his pack.
"Looks like I won this round," Dean said to Paskus and Askuwheteau as he swiveled the plunger, and then pressed it down with the swift force of his hand.
...
Nelony and Athelbra rode the moose, who galloped through the swamp like a seasoned professional (it was one of their natural habitats after all), when they spotted Dandelbraden still being pursued by three of the remaining men from the assault upon the bog.
As they roade, Athelbra out of the side of her eyes saw what appeared to be an army of large rodents, somewhat like Otters, but with a shorter snout. There were hundreds of the these creatures, if not thousands of them.
"What are those?" asked Athelbra of Nelony.
"Our insurance policy," Nelony smiled.
Nelony closed in on the first of the EBA security specialists. When heard felt the ground thumping behind him, he turned to see an enormous moose in hot pursuit, he screamed and split off from the other three men, trying to lead the moose and its riders away from the group.
Nelony turned to face Athelbra.
"Take the reigns... errr I mean antlers. A little pressure on the left to go left, a little pressure on the right to go right. Pressure on both to stop," Nelony ordered Athelbra.
"Where are you going?" asked Athelbra.
"To get Dandelbraden out of a mess. Meet up with me once you've taken him down, but be careful not to severely injure him or the moose, or yourself," Nelony said to Athelbra, and with that she was in the air, floating off of the moose and in the direction of the group still in pursuit of Dandelbraden.
Athelbra struggled with keeping the moose on track, and following their quarry, even passing him once to his right, at which point the EBA security specialist turned an ran the other way. When Athelbra finally had the moose turned around, and had lined up with her quarry, she kicked with both of her heels into the moose's side, and the moose sped up, quickly catching up with the man.
The moose then scooped him up onto his antlers, the man tangled in a mess of his arms and legs as he did his best to get his balance and bearings. When he saw that he was in reach of Athelbra, he extended his hand at her trying to grasp at first, her hijab, and then when Athelbra had managed to dodge him, her shoulder. At that exact moment, Athelbra remembered how to stop the moose, and she applied a firm pressure on both sides of the antlers. The moose immediately came to a sliding stop, and the man in his antlers kept going.
He fell into a tree just ahead of them, caught in the branches and clearly dazed. Athelbra then recalled another one of the tricks Nelony had taught them. She used her hands to weave the aether in the swamp, careful not to spook the moose, then casting it at the tree. The tree's branches came to life, wrapping around and holding the man in place.
"Now don't you try to leaf without saying goodbye..." Athelbra said jokingly, even giggling as she coaxed the moose to contine on in the direction Nelony had gone.
Nelony's flight was actually quite fast, considering that she was navigating a heavily wooded swamp. She steered around tree after tree, until she'd spotted the running group, Dandelbraden loosing steam as were his pursuers, all three of them gasping heavily for air in the densely moist swamp.
Nelony reached out with her arm and directed aether she'd previously woven and held in her womb, casting it in the direction of the swamp water just ahead of one of the men.
Immediately upon impact, a wet slimey strand of seaweed and lotus leaves wrapped around the man's legs, stopping him dead in his tracks as he fell forward into the water. Nelony gestured with her arms, and once again the seaweed lifted him out of the water and held him in place just above it, keeping him from drowing. Whenever his struggling became too much however, the seawood would once again submerge him, coaxing him to calm, after which it would lift him out again.
"Rinse and repeat, rinse and repeat..." Nelony joked as she continued her flight in pursuit of the last man.
She looked around for any way she could use the environment to her advantage to stop the man, quickly finding a means to improvisation there within, when she spied a family of Raccoons in a nearby tree.
"Shickt-chikt-chiktu-tukt-tukt-tukt!" She quickly yelled in Raccoonese.
The youngsters (who were actually quite sizeable themselves), jumped onto their mother's back, all six of them and when the last man passed under the tree they were perched within, the mother leapt onto his back. The children jump off of her one by one, scaling his body from his shoulders to his ears, where they began nibbling at his lobes rather aggressively.
When the man realized what was happening, he let out a shrill scream, stopping his pursuit in sheer terror as he flailed trying to get the raccoons off of him. They hung on tight and although they biting him fairly hard, none of their bites broke his skin. They were a severe agitation, but by no means a threat to his life. However, his sanity was on the brink as his terror peaked, and he plunged himself into the swamp, trying to coax them off of him.
He was even further horrified when they clung to him, even using him as a boat, always finding the dryest spot atop of him (which at this point was the top of the thinning hair on his head). He continued to scream and they continued to shriek, mocking him until he finally stood up and raised his hands.
"I give up! I give up!" Nelony watched as the man stood motionless with his hands in the air, upon his face a maniacal rictus of sheer horror.
Nelony pointed at the swamp water, and another batch of seaweed wrapped itself around the man's legs. and arms. She then hovered close to him, extending her arms for the raccoons, who filed off of the man's body, and onto Nelony's shoulders, the children still clinging to their mother.
"Now you be a good man, and don't cause any trouble and my seaweed friends here promise to keep you dry!" Nelony scolded him.
...
Domney and Minks had finally managed to break free of the sneeze trap and were now ashore a good distance from the swamp, exhausted from their experience.
Trassels and Marty were nowhere to be seen, and the last time either Domney or Minks saw them, they were venturing deeper into the swamp, perhaps in search of their own territory for their new lives as frogmen.
Domney pulled his portable radio from his vest and radioed, the crew Chief.
"Chamvers? You there? Over. Chamvers? You reading this? Over," Domney spoke into the radio a few times, finally giving up.
"What's up?" asked Minks.
"Chamvers gave me the detonator, but I need his go ahead," Domney explained to Minks.
"Well maybe he's one of those frog things now, for all we know. They said there's a bonus in it for us is we accomplish the mission. A big one. Fifty grand each, for the mean at each site. The way I see it, why not detonate the pack. I mean we got it into place. We should get that money, and the only way to get that bonus is by detonating it!" Minks reasoned with Domney.
Domney looked to the detonator, and then back to the swamp.
"Maybe this is a sign. You know? Like maybe its time for us to stop disrespecting nature like this? For the money? We're still alive, but who knows about the rest of them. Yesterday, I was totally into this, but today, after seeing the place and realizing what a marvel of life it is, I'm just not into this anymore. No matter how much money there is in doing it. Not this way. We've gotta work with the environment, especially when we're taking from it. If this were a mine, and we were using explosives to break rock, then alright. But we're cheating nature, and every time we've done that, we end up cheating ourselves," Domney said to Minks.
"Yeah. You're right. You know what?" Minks asked Domney.
"What?" Domney smiled, feeling quite contented with having made his stand.
"Finders keepers, losers weepers," Minks pulled his weapon and shot Domney in the chest.
He then took the detonator from him.
"I'm sorry man, but I need that fifty grand, and the nice salary we'll be getting after that more than anything right now," Minks said to Domney as he twisted the plunger to the side, and pressed as hard as he could.
The explosion was immediate and loud, the shockwave arriving quickly and pushing Minks' hair back, not to mention nearly knocking him off of his feet.
He watched as the swamp water fell back into the swamp, and odour of life and decay that had once permeated the area, was replaced with the acidy smell of rotting eggs and hot peppers.
...
"How's Dandelbraden?" asked Nelony of her student as she arrived at his location, where he was leaning against a tree in the swamp.
"Winded. Tired as can be, but feeling very much alive..." Dandelbraden's breath was deep and heavy as he spoke.
The moose's trot could be heard, a rhymic series of splashes and slollops as the large beast carried Athelbra towards them.
"You fared well I take it?" asked Nelony of Athelbra.
"Yes. We did. I'd say he'll be safe where he is for another couple of hours. And you two?" Athelbra responded.
"We did fine. You both did fine. In fact, so fine, I'm going to be grading you for the level of Adept," Nelony smiled at them.
"Well... that's certainly good news. Does that mean that instead of swamps, its sunny beaches and what not?" asked Dandelbraden, causing Athelbra to laugh.
"Yes. I too would prefer sunny beaches," Athelbra agreed, laughing and nodding.
"No. Not quite. We go where we're needed, regardless of comfort, but I'll keep an eye out for any environmental crises at sunny beaches, just so you can try out another different extreme. You've earned it," Nelony smiled at them.
The explosion and shockwave moved quickly through the swamp.
"Athelbra, take Dandelbraden and be careful!" Nelony floated above the bog and began floating in the direction of the explosion.
Athelbra did her best to help Dandelbraden up onto the back of the moose, which he did remarkably well considering that he'd never ridden a moose in his life. Athelbra, now a expert moose rider, coaxed the beast into a quick trot, then when she was certain that Dandelbraden had a good hold on her, a gallop.
When Nelony arrived at the site of the explosion, it was very easy to see that they'd succeeded. The sulphuric acid gas was floating on the top of the water and the telltale smell of rotten eggs was in the air.
"Hey! Floaty lady? I'd say that we won this round!" Minks yelled to the Nelony as she assessed the damage.
She immediately turned to face the man, gesturing towards the swamp grass, which immediately grew into thick tangle of fibery plant tendrils which wrapped themselves around Minks' arms and legs, his cigar left where it rested in his lips.
"Can't a man enjoy a good cigar?" Minks asked her, now restrained where he stood.
"I'm not stopping you, but I love to tell you this, because you lost," Nelony said to him with a smug assuredness.
"Is it me, or can't you smell that oh so wonderful smell of sulphuric acid! This water connects directly up with the same water system that Huntsville and countless other villages and communities rely upon. Its going to take decades to clean this water and restore the ecosystem it encompasses, and EBA will be right there doing it, for a cool ten million year. We won," Minks smiled at Nelony through the cigar in his mouth.
Athelbra and Dandelbraden arrived on the back of the moose.
"Athelbra. Dandelbraden. Take a look at the man lying on the ground behind him," Nelony ordered her students.
One at a time, they dismounted the moose, who Nelony then directed back into the wild. The moose let cry a call to her new friends before it left. Athelbra and Dandelbraden waved as the beast left them, before turning to tend to the man on the ground.
"He's breathing shallow and there's severe trauma to the chest. Looks like he's been shot," Athelbra explained to Nelony.
"Tend to his wounds as best you can, Athel. You're the Doctor in training at University after all," Nelony then turned her attention to Minks.
"You shot your own coworker," Nelony said to Minks accusingly.
"Well, its a dog eat dog world. Sometimes when opportunity presents itself, you have to take the reigns. It seems my friend Domney here didn't want to finish the job, and was promptly fired. At point blank range. Me on the other hand, I was promoted, from the moment I pressed the plunger on that detonator," Minks said coldly and with a thick smile on his face.
"Did you get all of that Dandelbraden?" asked Nelony.
"Yes. I think so. The microphone on my phone is pretty sensitive," Dandelbraden smiled at Minks, whose face went from an expression of one of triumph to one of vengeance.
"Well, I'll still get the bonus for finishing the job!" Minks turned his attention back to Nelony.
"Oh no you won't. You see, I took out a little insurance policy just in case you actually succeeded. So I invited my friends here to the party. Several thousand of them. You see, they're Beavers, nature's natural engineers, and they built a dam around your hole, so the problem of contaminating water is now contained and crews will be able to easily fix the damage and return the biome to normal. Within say two weeks? Around the same time you'll be in a court house to make a trial date," Nelony smiled at Minks.
"I see," Minks said calmly, and then all at once was hit with an intense rage, which he used in attempt to break himself free, without success.
Meanwhile, the beavers made their way onto shore, splashing their tails in the water several times upon seeing Minks.
"I'd say we're done here. Now we've just to wait for Askuwheteau and Paskus.
...
They were only ten meters from ground zero, and as the explosive shockwave arrived at Paskus' and Askuwheteau's position, a portal opened up and they were quickly pulled in by someone who'd pulled them in from behind.
"Otaa Dabun?" Askuwheteau said as he got to his feet.
He heard the horse's response as Otaa Dabun did indeed step out of the shadows.
"Well I'll be! This is the first time that Otaa's had such impeccable timing..." Askuwheteau said as he walked over to his horse and patted his neck.
"Dad? I think you need to get over here," Paskus said from the other side of the horse.
"Alright. Now what could be so different on that side of the horse..." Askuwheteau came walking around and was greeted with a face he'd not seen in years.
Decades in fact.
Thanksgiving Day
"Sandra, could you be a sweetie and take this tray of cranberry sauce out to the table?" Paskus asked his daughter.
"Ok daddy," Sandra walked over to where her father was by the kitchen counter, and he handed her the tray which contained a dish full of cranberry sauce.
She quickly ran it out to the dining room table, which had nine place settings. She found a space near the head of the table, careful to leave room for the turkey.
" Felicia? Could you get everyone from the deck and tell them dinner is being served?!" Paskus yelled as he donned the oven mitts and withdrew the turkey from the oven, preparing the bird to be transferred to a large plate, and for the juice to be used to make the gravy.
"I'm already on it honey!" Felicia responded, heading out the back sliding door to the deck, where their guests were seated, having a few drinks and beverages amongst their banter.
"Alright people, dinner is now being served if you'd just like to file into the dining room in an orderly manner, and take your places at the table," Felicia invited their guests into the house.
"Its really a nice place. I really love what you've done with the backyard," Nelony said as she stepped inside just behind Felicia.
"We put a lot work into that last year. Next summer, we're looking into intalling an inground pool, but that's still up in the air," Felicia replied.
"Yay! A pool!" Gordon clapped his hands together.
"Its a maybe Gordon, not for sure. We'll see next year," Felicia responded.
"We'll have you up to the reserve next summer, and you and Sandra can go swimming in one of the cleanest lakes around," Askuwheteau promised Gordon.
"Yay! Can we catch frogs too?" Gordon asked excitedly.
"Yes, for a short time, but we have to put them back," Askuwheteau replied.
"That's right. You wouldn't like it if someone took you from your home, so make sure you keep the frogs in theirs," Nelony added.
"I've got this seat," Dandelbraden claimed a seat beside Athelbra, pulling her seat out for her.
"Where's Grandma?" asked Sandra.
"Let me go check," Askuwheteau left the dining room, and wandered upstairs to the guest bedroom to the corner where the terrarium had been setup.
There was Lawana, as she leaned over the terrarium with a plate of chopped shrimp. She took a piece and gently fed it to a tiny turtle, who beside his sister, were trying to reach the tasty morsel.
Askwheteau came up behind her and wrapped his arms around her as she stood. He kissed the back of her neck, and she turned to face him.
"Its Thanksgiving Day for them too, don't forget," Lawana said to him, laying a kiss gently on his lips.
"They have a lot to be thankful for. Bright and colourful shells. A nice home. A healthy diet. And a goddess that feeds them every day..." Askuwheteau said to her in a soft and seductive voice.
"A goddess? Who are you? You've been having a goddess in here?" asked Lawana of him.
"For about three days. She arrived at the same time as us, but she only shows up every once in a while. When there's nobody around but me. That's when she comes," Askuwheteau continued his tale.
"And then what does she do?" asked Lawana, who very much seemed to be liking this game.
"She kisses me... on my cheek," Askuwheteau told Lawana, and Lawana kissed his cheek.
"And then what does she do?" Lawana asked him.
"And then she kisses my nose," Askuwheteau's voice got even quieter and more intimate.
Lawana gently slid her lips over his face until she reached his nose, where she planted an ever so delicate kiss on the end of his nose.
"And then what does she do?" Lawana asked him, throwing both of her arms around his neck as they stood nose to nose, she on her tippy toes.
"Mom! Dad! Come on! Dinner's on the table!" Paskus yelled up the stairs, clearly a little bit anxious over their absence.
"Sounds like Rising Bear has arrived," Lawana said jokingly.
"He certainly did, and what a fine boy we raised," Askuwheteau laid another kiss on her lips, and she pulled him by his hand down the stairs and to the dining room.
Epilogue
For the first time in his life, Paskus Maskwa, the Great Rising Bear, was truly grateful, for this was the first Thanksgiving ever he'd spent with his entire family. His mother. His father. His wife. His two children. And his new friends and contacts, those whose future work he and his company would assist when and where they could be of help. He received a promotion and now has his own corner office with the big feathers, where the plaque on the front door of his office is labeled: RISING BEAR.
Felicia Maskwa was promoted and now runs the entire IT Security Group for her company's global presence. She has made a number of strides with regard to computer and IT security, the most notable being the first integration of Quantum networking, which allows for a much higher standard of information security and encryption.
Sandra and Gordon Maskwa are starting their first year of high school, with Sandra wanting to become an Astronaut and Geo-Engineering Specialist, while Gordon is looking at a career as a Tradework Technological Specialist, integrating advanced technologies into the workflow of many common trades such as CNC machining, Printing, Carpentry, Plumbing and even Bricklaying.
What happened to EBA? Well, they were forcibly closed and later filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy, selling their technological portfolio to the Government, who contracted several universities and engineering firms to turn their renewal technology into a freely available framework that any Environmental or Geo-engineering company could use to reconstitute any habitats damaged by basification or acidification. During these projects, the universities were able to reduce the overhead cost from ten million per year, to five hundred thousand per year, and the total time to reconstitute a biome from thirty to five years for 250 acres.
Domney was acquitted on all charges, and now works for GeoX Global, Paskus Maskwa's company of employ.
Minks was found guilty on all charges, and is currently doing time in Penetanguishene Correctional Center.
Dean Eddmane's payment to Foller did not go through, and as such, he is currently on the run from one of the deadliest hitmen in the market, though in all truth, Foller was actually secretly part of a sting operation against Eddmane, though his choice to take Eddmane out is personal.
Dahlonega retired from her work at the Tribal Council Hall, but keeps herself busy as part of the arts and crafts cultural center of the Pikwàkanagàn Algonquins.
Dahlonega's brother eventually moved off of Dahlonega's couch, and met a wife. The two settled down and had a family, where his other brother now sleeps on his couch, as he's between jobs.
Pikawewa and Gomo eventually tied the knot, and had three children together, both having very successful careers within the reserve and eventually expanding their vocation to include work outside of the reserve. They are rumoured to be getting into politics.
Athelbra and Dandelbraden were both advanced in their level of study in the Sanctum Seclorum to the level of Adept, but are still waiting for the mission that takes place on a sunny beach. Both balance spending time on their Sanctum studies and university studies.
Nelony Ardbloem is the highest ranking Wytch of the Order of the Aerth Sisters (some of you will note that she changed the name of the order). She is currently the order's only instructor, but with a class of fifteen currently under her tutelage, she hopes to secure the future of the order and to engender hope for the future of the environment and the natural world under the protection of her Wytch-kind the Aerth Sisters.
Lawana and Askuwheteau are using their second chance together and have bought a new home where they are for the first time, living together. Lawana was brought on board to the Sanctum Seclorum and often goes on missions with Askuwheteau, where their work acts in the interest of protecting the environment and the natural world in accordance with their mandate.
...
"And then what does she do? This goddess you keep talking about?" Lawana asked him as she lay beside him in bed, running her fingers along his chest.
"...then she turns out the light and says good night!" Askuwheteau turned out the light and turned over, pretending to be asleep.
"That wasn't a very nice story!" Lawana slapped him on the back.
"...and then he turns over and..." Askuwheteau began tickling her until she could no longer contain her laughter.
Happy Thanksgiving Day
For Graham Greene (1952 - 2025) and for the Pikwàkanagàn Algonquins.
May the spirit of the Indigenous people the world over be a guide for the future of our environmental policy and how they're implemented.
We are of the water and the land that bore us. Without their continued health, we are no more.
However distant we are, family were our starting point. Where we go from there, is in our hands alone.
The End
Written by Brian Joseph Johns
Credits and attribution:
Thank you to
Ontario GeoHub, a sight for research of various GIS related datasets throughout Ontario.
Thank you to the
Pikwàkanagàn Algonquins for their incredible web site, which was a grand reference into the
history of their culture and its importance throughout Canada.
I collaborated with
Google Gemini,
Grok and
DeepSeek AI to come
up with the title to this brand new episodic content, and all three
contributed to the process, yet
DeepSeek somehow
managed to do it ever so poetically and with the mind of an artist and
writer. We need more poetic thinkers in AI. Think Jodie Foster's enigmatic
scene in the movie adaption of Carl Sagan's and Anne Druyan's Contact and
you'll know exactly what I mean. In fact, watch the entire movie! The world
needs that right now!
Special Thanks To Rocket Fuel Lakeshore Blvd West, perhaps the best
place in history to get a coffee, circa 2001-2004. Miss you all very
much.
Tools: Daz3D, Corel Painter, Adobe Photoshop, Lightwave 3D, Blender, Stable Diffusion (Easy Diffusion distribution), InstantID, Sadtalker, Google Colaboratory, Microsoft Copilot (Windows 11), Hitfilm, PhotoPea (a great web based Photoshop stand-in if you're on a low budget or in a pinch), Deepai.org, Google AI Studio, Borderline
Obsession...
DeepSeek AI for suggestions on exercises to improve aspects of describing
scene and settings with a more sensory focused grammar.
InstantID by: Wang, Qixun and Bai, Xu and Wang, Haofan and Qin, Zekui and Chen,
Anthony. Research Paper Title: InstantID - Zero-shot Identity-Preserving Generation in
Seconds.
Sadtalker by: Zhang, Wenxuan and Cun, Xiaodong and Wang, Xuan and Zhang, Yong and
Shen, Xi and Guo, Yu and Shan, Ying and Wang, Fei.
Research Paper Title: SadTalker: Learning Realistic 3D Motion Coefficients for Stylized
Audio-Driven Single Image Talking Face Animation.
Gratitude: Our Mentors, Senseis, Sifus, Sebomnims, lifetime
inspirations, family, friends, the Nomads (ask Stanton about that
one), the Music, the Movies, the Theatre, the Arts, ASMR,
(both YouTube and Bilibili and the many other creators on those platforms), the Gaming
and Developer communities and of course, the audience.
Martial Arts (in the words of real experts and
at least one comedian): https://brucelee.com (home of the real Dragon and an entire
family of inspirations), http://iwco.online International Wing Chun Organization (International
presence of a very scalable intensity martial
art, protected and developed by Shaolin Nun Ng Mui) and the alma mater of Jinn Hua's own specialized variation
thereof, https://iogkf.com International Okinawan Goju-Ryu Karatedo Federation (even
Hanshi had his teachers), https://itftkd.sport International Taekwondo Federation (Here there be
Taegers), https://tangsoodoworld.com Tang Soo Do World (the path of Grandmaster Chuck
Norris), https://www.aikido-international.org International Aikido Federation (how else would Navy Chef
Steven Seagal liberate a Nimitz Class Aircraft Carrier from a team
of hijackers?), https://www.stqitoronto.com Shaolin Temple Quanfa Institute (The City Of Toronto's own
Shaolin Temple), https://www.enterthedojoshow.com Master Ken's Ameri-Te-Do presence (If we can't laugh at
ourselves, then we can at least laugh the loudest at others, and
other Zen)
Magic (performance, illusion and perhaps the real thing): Magic Week Archive (I'm currently growing this section so stay tuned)
Special thanks to Aitrepreneur, Mickmumpitz, Hugging Face and the YouTube educational content producers, including those catering to the AI content production pipeline and of course AlphaSignal.
Shi Heng Yi Shaolin Training For Self Mastery
A reknowned Sifu under whose tutelage you can study the
theory and practical applications of the Shaolin Arts for health,
physical and mental wellbeing in every day life
Shi Heng Yi Shaolin Training For Self Mastery
A reknowned Sifu under whose tutelage you can study the
theory and practical applications of the Shaolin Arts for health,
physical and mental wellbeing in every day life
Jesse Enkamp: Karate Nerd
Jesse, a reknowned Sensei who runs his own dojo, explores the
world of Martial Arts, traveling to many exotic locations to meet
practitioners of a variety of different arts
Sensei Rokas: Martial Arts Journey
A reknowned Sensei of Aikido who in seeking to understand the
roots of Aikido and its applications, seeks to stress test its
effectiveness in a number of real world situations while studying
its history
Seamus O'Dowd
An extensive growing archive Katas, Techniques and Waza
(mostly Shotokan)
Iaido: Train For Katana Mastery Like Samurai
The original weapons focused curriculum under which
Samurai became masters of their art
Tapp Brothers Exercise For Better Motion
Extensive courses for calisthenics and body strength,
stamina and flexibility
Special thanks to Canva for inspiring other creators and giving them the tools
Special thanks to Captain Crunch and his wonderful sister!
Special thanks to Bandcamp for giving indie music artists a home under one roof
Something to give you perspective: The very first teacher had no formal education, didn't graduate
and was self taught, but only because they had no other choice. We
do.
This content is entirely produced in Toronto, Ontario, Canada at 200
Sherbourne Street Suite 701 under the Shhhh! Digital Media banner.
Brian Joseph Johns
