You are an animal and you are stalking your prey. Write a scene from the animal’s perspective.
The slender leaves rustle softly, lulling Lucy to sleep, inviting her to dream. Then a shadow passes over her eyes and the wind abruptly stops. More shadows creep across the grass and the sun disappears below the African plains. She snorts and wakes up with a start. She stretches her paws, examines her long pointy nails and preens her shaggy yellow coat. It’s time.
In the stillness of dusk, Lucy pricks up her ears, alert to any slight movement or noise. She pivots her head listening and waiting, her ears act like a radar catching every rustle, every broken twig. It’s a challenging time, that time between sunset and night, when the wind is non-existent and animal scents just linger and die in the air.
It’s not so much the smell or the noise that quickens Lucy’s pulse. It is more a sixth sense that something else is in her territory. She stretches again and nudges Maisy and Freda, her twin cubs who are just old enough to join in the hunt. They wake up and start to giggle. Lucy snarls, silently, but the message is clear. All three lions stand to attention. Lucy watches. The twins wait.
A herd of impala spring into action and dance across the plain.
“Wait” growls Lucy, “there’s plenty of time”.
The little animals jump over each other, playing leap frog then hop scotch. They run off towards the woods, then back again to feed on the lush green grass. After a while they stop cavorting and start grazing. It’s time.
“Down” growls Lucy, and all three lions spread themselves flat on the ground. They start to creep along on their tummys. Cleverly the grass barely moves as these huge cats just slither along like snakes in the grass. About 10 feet from the impala, the lions stop. No one moves a muscle. They are like statues, not even breathing. They know they only have one chance.
“Wait” Lucy says with her eyes. Maisy and Freda grin wickedly at each other. Lucy eye-balls them to be quiet.
Lucy is watching one particular impala. He seems to be grazing a few feet away from the rest of the herd and as he feeds he is becoming more and more alone. The lions silently strategize. Then they leap into action.
Maisy runs in between the loner and the main herd, attacking head on whilst Freda attacks from the side. Lucy leaps through the air, trips up the innocent animal from behind and brings it crashing to the ground in a muddle of long legs.
Maisy throws all her weight across the neck of the impala and quickly chomps through the neck and the jugular. Lucy drags and tears the leathery skin from the hind quarters and Freda is through the soft belly and half inside the carcass.
Then, Leo struts into the scene, his long mane swings majestically across his lean and angled face. He is in no hurry, he knows that the girls will leave the best of the impala for him.
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4 comments:
This is the story of a mother lion taking her cubs out for their first kill.
I like the images that you paint, the dusk that settles on the plains, the stillness, the male strutting in after all the work has been done. Nice touch having the lioness speak with her eyes to her cubs as they get close to their prey. Good graphic touches with the final kill. Not a childrens story for the wee ones.
For improvement maybe look at toughening up some of your nouns and verbs to be more appropriate to the strength and ferocity of lions. Drop "nails" and "tummys". Beasts that snarl, growl and strut have something else. And for God's sake don't have the cubs giggle. 5 year old girl humans giggle. Lion cubs that are about to rip apart an impala don't. (Maybe the impalas could giggle. They're cute and a bit lame)
Kerry says:
The story of a mother lion taking her cubs out for the hunt.
Beautiful imagery, Sue. Your opening two paragraphs set the scene on the African plain. I also loved your description of the impala which is brought down in a 'muddle of long legs'. I was amused by Leo showing up at the end.
THere was some confusion for me about which animals were playing leap-frog. I thought it was the cubs at first and that seemed incongruous with young lions about to go out on the hunt. Perhaps something more explicit like 'the impala jump over each other' would have eliminated the confusion.
You have really captured the hunt Sue. Terrific.
Heather says:
A lioness prepares for the hunt. Her two young, less experienced cubs join her in stalking, catching and killing an impala. The lion regally joins them after the hunt, to collect his dues.
I love the detail of the description. The shadow passing over her eyes, every broken twig. It puts me right there on the African plain.
Speaking of which, I think the story is strongest when the point of view is most strongly Lucy's. When you talk about "the African plains" or "radar", or describe the impala, it loses Lucy's perspective (and some strength, in my view). Also, I would have liked to have known how much experience the cubs have, as it would have brought them more to life for me. Seems like they've done this a few times, as they seem like a bit of a team already.
Powerful (though matter-of-fact) description of the kill.
A good read!
Mother lioness & cubs join up to stalk & kill an impala in a night hunt.
You did a good job of setting the scene, developing the characters, and getting them into action - the point of the story of being the hunt & kill. I smiled when the Father lion showed up for dinner. That's the reputation they have.
I got stopped in my reading a few times by the cuddly words or descriptions: giggles, leap frogs, hop scotch, tummys, grins, even the names of the cubs, Maisy & Freda. Why not use African names?
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