If An Aardvark And A Komodo Dragon Were Actually To Decide To Engage In Combat, It Almost Certainly Would Not Go Like This, But, Then, Maybe It Would As There Are Many Things About

8/12/2019 If An Aardvark And A Komodo Dragon Were Actually To Decide To Engage In Combat, It Almost Certainly Would N

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If An Aardvark And A Komodo Dragon Were

Actually To Decide To Engage In Combat, It

Almost Certainly Would Not Go Like This, But,Then, Maybe It Would As There Are Many

Things About The Natural World We Do Not

Yet Understand.

An aardvark and a komodo dragon ran into each other one day, an unlikely prospect as one ofthem lives in its region, and another lives in its own region, and it does not seem as though those

regions would overlap. Do not expect, though, more specifics than that about which region each

lived in, for what good would it do to tell you that the aardvark roams the savannahs of the

southern African continent (if that is what it does, and where it does it, also unlikely, asaardvarks do not seem the type to roam, but more the type to stroll leisurely, or perhaps stand

and ruminate for lengthy periods of time)? What good would it do? It is not central to the story,

whereas the fact that these two happened to meet, at all, is, in fact, central to the story, as it led toa battle to the death, as so often meetings do.

Here is how they met, these two previously-unknown-to-each-other now-mortal-enemies.

aardvark was standing in line outside a coffeeshop when komodo dragon happened by. It may

surprise you that neither aardvark nor komodo dragon has a name, not even a first name, not

even a nickname, but then, that is the way of the animal world. They know how to tell eachother apart, animals do, without the use of names. Their languages do not work the way ours do,

involving many more scents and bodily motions than we would ever utilize to communicate,

even subconsciously, and they live in cultures where the individual is not as important, as, say,survival, and so they rarely worry about individuality because they are so often worried about

survival.

That is true of many animals, if not all, excluding the "human animal" as we like to style

ourselves. We worry very little about survival and worry a great deal about who is on televisionthat night, and so we have the time to devise names and then shorten those names and then make

puns on those names. You will never see a group of salamanders, for example, sitting around

calling each other "Gary Larry Bobarry Banana Fana Fo Farry."

They don't go in for that.


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When aardvark saw komodo dragon he did not immediately react and that might have been

enough to make komodo dragon react in return, for who can tell how these things start?

"I would like to eat you," komodo dragon told aardvark, suddenly, and it should be noted that

they did not speak english. This is a translation, and a loose one at that, but the essence is being

conveyed.

"I should like you to not," answered aardvark back, firmly, and he moved forward in the line for

his coffee.

"Then we are at an impasse," komodo dragon reasoned, and aardvark nodded, a little.

"Yes," he agreed. "Yes we are."

"But I am hungry," continued komodo dragon, and he opened his mouth wide to show how

empty his belly was and how hungry that made him, but aardvark noted also that the gesture

emphasized komodo dragon's teeth, and he felt in his own mouth his own feeble teeth, moresuited to eating tiny insects than other larger animals.

"There is a fine restaurant around the corner, one that serves steaks. You could have them

prepare it rare, if you'd like, although I understand they frequently warn against the consumptionof undercooked meat, these days." aardvark pointed hopefully, and added, "I, myself, am rather

undercooked, as well."

"The thing is," komodo dragon pointed out, "I do not have a reservation. And I am a komodo

dragon."

"The restaurant is not likely to discriminate." aardvark had reached the counter and ordered amedium coffee. It was not what he had wanted. He had been planning to order something

frothy, something whipped, something chilled, perhaps, but komodo dragon was distracting him

and, it must be admitted, worrying him.

"I propose..." komodo dragon said, and paused for dramatic effect, "A series of contests."

Aardvark sipped his coffee. It was hot and bitter. He considered.

"Go on," he said.

* * * * * *

komodo dragon: 0 aardvark: 0

* * * * * *

"FOR THIS CHALLENGE" shouted komodo dragon, in his Russian accent, or

perhaps Russian accent? Probably Eastern European at any rate, aardvark thought but

he was not an expert on accents,per se, and listened as komodo dragon shouted over


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the wind "WE MUST EACH PARACHUTE OUT OF THIS SMALL AIRPLANE

AND SEE WHO CAN COME CLOSEST TO THE TARGET DOWN THERE."

aardvark had surmised as much, when they got on the small airplane, but that did not

overcome a minor fear of heights as he stared out the open door, watching as komodo

dragon strapped on his parachute. He himself had never parachuted before, the veryidea being ludicrous! He is a ground animal, an earth-pig, and should not be up in the

air. But he could not falter, as he did not want to be eaten, not by this reptilian giant,

not by anything. He had always thought of himself as near the top of the food

pyramid. There were animals above him, those who he could expect to fear and

perhaps meet in a moment of unguardedness, but he was careful, and fast, and

smart. He worked out. He read all the latest magazines. He was going to be

unpredatored and at best be food for carrion-eaters.

But then a chance encounter outside a coffee shop and he was in it now.

komodo dragon pulled down his goggles and watched aardvark do the same. Start

toughhis grandfather had always taught him. Someday you will take over the

business and you do notstart with little challenges. That lets the prey gain

confidence, and later rounds will be harder. Start with the toughest thing you can

imagine.

komodo dragon was not sure this was it, or that this was a good idea. He had asked

then, that day: "What if prey wins the first challenge? Will it not get more confident

even then?"

Grandpa had spit to his right and looked at the sun they basked in, then scratched the

hard-as-rock dirt ground they lay in, the riverbed that in rainy season would be

thrashing with water and downed trees and drowning animals, easy pickings for

komodo dragons who wished to fish half-sodden food out of it. Grandpa and komodo

dragon eschewed that route for meals:Not for us! grandpa had taught komodo

dragon. We hunt. We challenge.

"Win the first one," grandpa had told him.

And komodo dragon launched himself out of the doorway, aardvark shortly after him,

the wind whipping more ferociously at him, now, from two directions, the strong wind

that pushed back against the plane and now shoved him violently to his left and

underneath aardvark, and the fake wind that was the air pushing at him as he fell

through it, the buffeting force of air particles that he ordinarily moved through with no

difficulty but which now fought him as he fell through them, fought him as


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ineffectively (he hoped!) as aardvark would. He had never tasted aardvark. He hoped

it did not taste like chicken.

The air did not hold him up but he tired of fighting it and sinuously laid his large

limbs alongside his bulky body, pulling his tail straight and dropping like a dart,

faster, fasterfasterfasterfastershooting through the air, angling himself towards thetarget.

Having never been skydiving before, he wondered how long he could wait to pull his

chute.

aardvark tumbled and rolled, blinded, his goggles askew, the wind causing his eyes to

tear up, his mouth opened in an 0of panic, and he saw a green giant blur below him as

komodo dragon shot past, back towards the target. In his mind he knew he should

count to 10 but he couldn't wait and his little hand-claws pawed furiously at the

ripcord. He heard billowing, puffing, flowing, and he felt a jerk and a tug. The

parachute spread above him and all feeling of falling stopped. He was floating,

dangling at the bottom of a series of cords that held him to his savior, that sheet of

nylon spread gloriously and brightly above him.

Below him, komodo dragon rocketed back, a thin green line now, lower and lower

and lowerlowerloweruntil aardvark held his breath in suspense: would he fail to open

his chute in time? But a small red dot ballooned into a crimsonfloweryexplosion and

komodo dragon was floating down serenely, thousands of feet below him.

And headed in the right direction.

* * * * * *

komodo dragon 1 aardvark 0

* * * * * *

aardvark waited patiently for the timer to click down. There were still twenty minutes

remaining in the time allotted, and his souffle would be ready in 10. All he had to do

was bide his time.

"No komodo dragon will be able to cook," he had gambled, and he might have been

righter than he knew. komodo dragon's station was a mess, a slather of raw meat still

on the counter, blood on the floor, powder on his nose and his apron a bedraggled

mess.


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I'd give the second off to time

And bid you longer days.

With one wish in my pocket

And you still standing near

I'd wish away all evil harmSo that you'd never fear.

I'd then have no more wishes

And need no more, my dear.

With your life safe and long and lit

My conscience would be clear.

"How did you ever get him to judge these, anyway?" asked aardvark, laying down his

pen and looking at komodo dragon.

komodo dragon waved him away, scratching out a word on his own pad.

"Time!" said Robert Frost, the poet.

"SHHH!" said the librarian, and pointed to a sign on the wall, which said

LIBRARY RULES:

1. ABSOLUTE SILENCE.2. NO HUNTING.

3. POETS ARE NOT EXCUSED FROM RULE 1 BUT ARE EXCUSED FROM

RULE 2.

"Understood," said Robert Frost, the poet.

The three of them walked out into the hallway, Robert Frost bringing up the rear and

closing the door behind them, and made their way to the library steps. Once there, out

on the street in the fine fall afternoon, the sun streaming down to hit the sidewalk

across the street but leaving them in a cool shadow, the poet turned to them.

"Okay," he instructed them. "Read."

"Right here?" asked komodo dragon, eyeing the crowds walking past. A few stopped

and watched, and he felt self-conscious.


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"A poet never fears the public," Robert Frost, the poet, told them.

"Is that a saying or something?" komodo dragon asked.

"Read," Robert Frost, the poet, commanded.

"Yeah! Read!" yelled an antelope from up the street, one of the ones from inside who

had followed them out. komodo dragon looked at him, and he scampered a few feet

further back, near the E bus stop.

"I will go first," aardvark volunteered, and without further preparation he read his

poem, pronouncing the syllables crisply and not pausing at the end of the rhymes but

instead reading it through as though spoken, the correct way.

"Excellent," said Robert Frost, the poet.

"Bravo!" yelled the antelope at the bus stop. A few of the onlookers nodded

appreciatively. It was a fine poem, exactly the sort of love poem the challenge called

for.

"Your turn," aardvark told komodo dragon, who riffled his papers nervously. "This is

for the contest, after all."

komodo dragon cleared his throat, and looked at Robert Frost.

"A poet never hesitates," Robert Frost, the poet, said.

"Seriously, are these actual sayings?" komodo dragon asked.

The E bus came and went, the antelope declining to get on. Now all the waiting had

raised an expectancy in the crowd and the relative quiet after the bus pulled away

seemed almost a silence, although a city of that size is never silent at that time of day

(3:18 p.m., on a Wednesday, as it happens.)

komodo dragon held up his paper.

The crowd watched, not really a crowd, about 7 people counting the antelope as a

person and counting Robert Frost, the poet, as a person as well.

komodo dragon looked at them all.


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"My love poem," he said.

And he dropped the papers and grabbed the aardvark and ran off.

Behind him, Robert Frost, the poet, picked up the papers. Most of them were

blank. Some had scratched out words on them. The one komodo dragon had beenholding had written at the top

Their once was a lady komodo dragon from Nantucket

Robert Frost, the poet, smiled slyly and tucked that paper into his pocket.

"A poet," he told an old woman carrying an onion who stood next to him, "Gets his

inspiration from many sources."

* * * * * *

komodo dragon 1 aardvark, technically, 2

* * * * * *

aardvark struggled only momentariliy before deciding komodo dragon was too strong

for him to wrestle away from.

The antelope hadn't even tried to help.

Circle of life.

As komodo dragon ran down the street, his mind raced. Where should he go? Traffic

was busy, but who was chasing him? Maybe nobody? He looked over his shoulder,

saw that nobody was paying any attention. He slowed to a brisk stride, keeping a good

grip on aardvark.

"We had a deal," aardvark mumbled from under his grasp.

"Had," komodo dragon said. "I am a predator. You are prey. This is the way it was

always going to end."

"Did you always plan to cheat?"

komodo dragon looked surprised.


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"I am not cheating," he said. He stopped, held aardvark up in front of himself. "Why

would you think I am cheating?"

"The contest. I won."

"So?"

"So you should not eat me."

"I am a predator. You are prey."

"Then why the contest?"

"I gave you a chance at life."

"And took it away."

"No, you misunderstand. When you were standing in line in that coffeeshop, you

were doomed. Whether or not I walked by, whether or not I gave you a sporting

chance, whether or not you prevailed in the contest, even before you and I knew the

other existed, before our lives crossed, you were doomed. You were always going to

die, and all that remained was the manner in which your life ended. And when I saw

you, that, even, was no longer in doubt. You were going to be my prey. But I gave

you an opportunity, before the end, to live one last bit."

aardvark remembered how many afternoons he had spent, slumped in a chair,

thumbing through copies of The Atlanticand wondering if perhaps he should not get a

job, or get married. A tear formed in his eye.

"Skydiving was wonderful, wasn't it?" he asked komodo dragon, who grinned

fiercely.

"You were terrified," he said.

"I was," aardvark agreed, without regret or shame.

Then he wriggled free and began running himself.

komodo dragon immediately took after him, of course, and the chase lasted only a

block, past the shoe store and the wedding dress store and the bakery, to end in the


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corner bodega, aardvark standing in the candy aisle, komodo dragon looming in the

doorway. There were three aisles to the store, and the door at the back was

locked. aardvark picked up a handful ofMilky Ways, brandished them at komodo

dragon.

"Really," komodo dragon said, his accent barely audible as he hissed. Thestorekeeper watched them boredly. "Is this a better way to end it? It will end, and it

will end with you as prey, me as predator. But my way had dignity. You were given

a chance tofly, tostar, to teach the world of love via your poem. And you chose not

to leave on that note, but to die in a dirty bodega..."

"...Hey!" interrupted the shopkeeper. komodo dragon ignored him.

"With a handful of candy bars as your ludicrous defense."

"I don't want to be prey," said aardvark.

"But that is the way of it," said komodo dragon.

aardvark dropped theMilky Ways, dropped to all fours.

"Let me ask you something," komodo dragon said.

"Why not?" aardvark said.

"Did you write the poem about someone in particular?"

aardvark shook his head, but he was lying, and komodo dragon knew it.

"Who was she?"

aardvark shrugged.

"Do you wantto tell her?" komodo dragon whispered.

* * * * * *

game over

* * * * * *

komodo dragon hoisted aardvark up to the countertop. The shopkeeper handed the


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phone to aardvark, who stood on the counter next to the beef jerky and the lottery

tickets and cigarettes and fliers for missing cats, and dialed the number. It had

beenfive years!

Five years!

komodo dragon watched aardvark's paws shake a little as he held the receiver in one

and toyed with the cord in the other.

The phone on the other end rang once.

Twice.

Thrice.

It was picked up and he heard her voice, greeting him.

He couldn't talk at first and she asked if someone was there, who it might be.

"Go on," komodo dragon whispered.

"Yeah, go on, talk, man!" the shopkeeper said.

aardvark mumbled, "Hi, it's me," into the phone, and there was a silence on the other

end of the line that only he could hear. komodo dragon and the shopkeeper had toguess what was going on. After a long time, aardvark heard the voice ask if it was

him.

"It's me," he said.

More silence. komodo dragon wished it was on speaker phone. Was she talking?

What was she saying?

"I'm sorry I left you," aardvark said into the silence.

"I was scared," he added.

The other end of the phone was still silent.

"But I'm not anymore," aardvark said.


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Then he heard crying on the other end of the phone, crying so loud that even komodo

dragon and the shopkeeper could hear it.

"What..." aardvark said, because he knew that crying was expected but was not sure

why she wascrying, whether it was new sadness or old sadness or both, leftovers

made to look new.

She told him that the gypsy had promised her that aardvark would call her, once,

before he died.

aardvark began crying, too.

"Prophecies are slippery," he said between tears. But below him, komodo dragon's

bright eyes glowed and his teeth were sharp and he still stood between aardvark and

the door.

How else could this end?he thought, but he was not thinking, at that moment, of

komodo dragon's teeth, only of the day he had walked out the door.

"I flew, sort of," he said into the phone, and she began crying again.

* * * * * *

aardvark flies, again* * * * * *

In times of greatest danger, there are ways to bend the laws, if you really, really want

to do so and muster all your energy.

Here is what happened. It was not too extraordinary, but it was somewhere

between ordinaryand extra-ordinary.

aardvark shouted "I always loved you!" into the phone.

The shopkeeper clapped and laughed.

komodo dragon, sensing what was afoot, lunged and snapped together his terrible

jaws.

aardvark had jumped as high and far as he could, using all of his might, to go straight

up in the air, but as he was below the cigarette rack in the bodegahe bumped into it


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and rolled to the side and crashed into komodo dragon's sensitive nose, falling to the

floor and leaving komodo dragon gnashing his teeth onto his own tongue.

They all three froze for just a millionth of a second, until aardvark bolted out the door.

komodo dragon sighed.

"Aren't you going to get him? Or are you letting him go?" the shopkeeper asked

incredulously.

"Neither. And both," komodo dragon said. "I am predator, he is prey."

The sunlight, outside, hit that particular part of a fall afternoon that makes you

remember that once it was summer but it will not be again for some time.

"I can be patient," said komodo dragon.


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If you liked this story,

Check out lit, a place for stories, athttp://www.nonsportsman.com . There are more stories like this,

and also, lit will pay to publish yourstories!

For more short stories like this, look for my upcoming book Short Stories With Long Titles, and until

that comes out, take a look at Just Exactly How Life Looks:

The short stories here will introduce

unforgettable people living remarkable lives.

Cowboys wander in a timeless desert. Scientists

meet in secret to plot a new way to get

attention, and money, from people. A man and

his would-be lover try to find lions on safari,

and more. The people and places in this book

spring to life fully-formed and full of anxiety

and imagination. They worry about the time

they have had and the time they have left.

They bury their loved ones and look for new

friends. They talk and laugh and hope and cry

and die, while their friends and family and

enemies and Gods watch them, seeing, in their faces and actions and fears, a

portrait of just exactly how life looks.

Very imaginative and some are quite thought provoking.Amazon reviewer.
http://www.nonsportsman.com/http://www.nonsportsman.com/http://www.nonsportsman.com/http://www.nonsportsman.com/

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If An Aardvark And A Komodo Dragon Were Actually To Decide To Engage In Combat, It Almost Certainly Would Not Go Like This, But, Then, Maybe It Would As There Are Many Things About