Some days you eat the bear and some days the bear eats you

The long, beautiful summer was drawing to a close and autumn slowly enclosed the forest in her gentle embrace. Bees buzzed in the glades, storing their bounty for us all to enjoy while fawns and their bucks gamboled in the pines. Life was good in the Great Jellystone Forest until 'they' came. Grim two legged hairless bears with their guns. Damn them, damn them to hell! We had heard of these creatures from animals that had fled to our part of the forest from beyond. They had lived near the fringes of Jellystone adjoining the Barren Land where trees scarcely grow. They had been driven from their homes by the hairless bears, and now those monsters had followed them to our home.

Yogi in happier times

  My friend Yogi and I had lived here all of our lives in harmony with nature and at peace with the other animals. We had a comfortable den, good friends and a plentiful supply of nuts, berries, honey and salmon, supplemented by the occasional picnic basket that Yogi would pinch from the Barren Land. I would never have the nerve to do something like that but Yogi was never afraid of anything. I guess that's what did him in.

One morning we awoke to the frantic sounds of our neighbors fleeing the area. The Hairless Bears had come to a clearing near Yummy Salmon Stream and had set up a kind of flimsy den. There were too many of them to count and they had murder in their eyes. I begged Yogi to lay low until the strange creatures went away, but he wouldn't listen. He left the den intending to drive the intruders away or die trying.

The Hairless Bears

  He didn't have far to look because the Hairless Two Legged Bears were looking for him. Until they came Yogi's fangs and claws were the most awesome weapons in Jellystone, but these creatures brought weapons such as had never been seen in our paradise. I heard the battle but I was too afraid to leave the den. Later the squirrels told me Yogi had fought the invading hordes like a...well, like a bear but they were too many. As fast as he struck one down two would take his place. Finally the great bear fell to the invaders. I've been told these monsters make rugs for their dens out of their victims. I don't like to think about it. After their great crime the Hairless Bears left as quickly as they had come. The rest of us will go on the best we can but I don't think the Great Jellystone Forest will ever be the same.