(Photo: "Male Lion on Rock" by William Warby)
Once there was a mouse and a lion. The mouse and the lion were best friends. The lion was in charge of all of the other animals in the land, except for the rats. The rats were the ultimate enemy. The mice were essentially the “guards” and were supposed to fight the rats when necessary. There had been an ongoing war for years, and the rats would never surrender. Although it seems silly that the land relied on the mice to protect them, the lion trusted the mice because they had really big hearts.
One day, the mouse and the lion were napping in the forest, and the rats were setting up traps to catch both the lion and the mouse. A few hours later, the rats had finished setting up the traps, and the lion and the mouse woke up. They were taking a stroll by the main river where they usually did, and SNAP- they were caught by the traps. The rats were planning to take the lion and the mouse to their lair. The lion and the mouse were scared, but did not show an ounce of fear, for they had hope that everything would be okay in the end.
The fish in the river saw what had happened and they started telling the turtles. The turtles told the snakes and the snakes told the birds and the birds told the wolves and the wolves told the bunnies. All of the animals in the land came together to search for the rat lair.
In a deep cave, the lion and the mouse were trying to negotiate their way out of the rat lair.
“Why are you filled with so much hate?” asked the mouse.
“It is so much easier to hate than it is to love. Us animals aren’t meant to get along. A lion isn’t supposed to be friends with a little mouse,” said one of the rats.
“If you put your hatred aside, we could all be friends,” said the lion.
And just as the lion had said this, all of the animals in the land had found the lair. The rats were taken aback by all of the animals willing to sacrifice their lives for the lion and the mouse.
“See? All of the other animals in the land are friends. No matter how big or small they are, they all have big hearts,” said the lion.
The rats were amazed at how easy it was for all of the other animals to look past their differences and be friends. The rats released the lion and the mouse, and decided to put aside their hatred once and for all.
And from that moment on, the lion, the mouse, the rats, and the animals were all friends and the land was finally at peace.
Author's note: My story was based off of the fable, "The Lion The Mouse," where there is a lion who says that a mouse would never be able to save the lion, but actually does when the lion is captured. My spinoff was basically just making the lion and mouse friends, the rats the enemy, and love being the ultimate solution.
Bibliography: "The Lion The Mouse" from the Fables of Aesop by Joseph Jacobs (Web Source)
It was interesting how you wrote the relationship of the mouse and lion. It was nice for him to see the mouse’s importance in the beginning, unlike realizing its importance after a major incident like the original story. Also, since lions are carnivores, it was delightful to see them in harmony. The part that I especially liked was how you wrote about the news traveling so quickly. It made me remember a part of Signing Time, the show that my niece likes to watch.
ReplyDeleteI wonder why the mice were solely chosen to be guards. To the rats, the mice may be able to handle them. However, it would be difficult for them to fight off other, bigger enemies. It would be beneficial to the kingdom for some other animals to assist the mice.
You didn’t really add details as to which animal found the pair, so I was wondering what if a flying animal found the lion and mouse, and relayed the message like earlier when they were captured.
Your story was a little overwhelming. It had a lot of mouse, lion, lion rats. Cut down on the usage of characters. Set up your characters at the beginning after that there is no reason to reintroduce us, unless you want to do it periodically. You could actually just leave it out since the title already states the characters that we will be seeing and if you want to give the character a more personal appeal, give them a name. For example, at the beginning you can say “There was once a mouse named Templeton and a lion named Simba. Then on out all we need are the names every so often. Also the ending “…the lion, the mouse, the rats, and the animals…” Just poof all that. The animals were all friends and the land (was) finally at peace. One very important question needs to be answered, why couldn’t the animals be friends? What was preventing them? Was it their species? Their size? Seeing as it’s a folktale it could easily be something silly.
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