Chapter 3

  The Choice

  Max looked at the stars and began to remember. His mother had taught him. The Creator had gifted them, the animals who spoke. He wanted them to trust him. But if there was a creator, someone who had a plan for them, why was he here? Why was he alone? Why did the tree have to hit him? And remind him of how he came here. A wave of sadness and fear came over him. And for a moment, it seemed like all the world around him grew silent, making Max feel even more alone than he had before. He shivered not from sickness but in fear and uncertainty. Where should he go? What should he do, and did he have to do this alone?

  Max looked into the sky and remembered the words of his father. "Max, the creato,r will help you, but you have to be willing to do what you can." At the time, Max had been trying to do something that wasn't working. And he wanted to give up and was complaining how hard it was. He asked his father, why didn't the creator just give him the answers? But Max knew why, and his father confirmed it. He hadn't really been trying.

  Max thought, yes, he was alone. But he wasn't. He wasn't, because there was a herd of elephants out there who had adopted him, who thought he had died. There was a family that, if he could find would welcome him home. Max was alone, but he realized that only if he stayed here. The Creator would help him, but he had to do what he could. Yes, he was alone, but he wouldn't stay alone.

  Max realized that he was very, very thirsty. He tried to stand, but a wave of dizziness caused him to stumble for a moment. He fell back onto his tail but then forced himself up again. The world spun around him. He decided to make his way toward where he knew the stream would be to get a drink.

  As Max walked forward, his feet became unstable. He couldn’t walk in a straight line toward the stream, but veered off to one side and then another. He wished that he had someone to lean against. He tried to steady himself, spreading his legs out a little bit, but the world around him still spun. Max wasn't sur,e but he guessed this was a result of being hit on the head by one of the very large branches that were on the tree that he pushed over.

  Even if the herd looked at him as an adult now, Max didn’t think it was worth feeling like this. He changed his mind when he thought about his parents. No, Max told himself, getting my memories of them was worth it.

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  Max took a few more steps and paused again. The world around him seemed to just keep moving back and forth. It was like the world was throbbing. He realized that was the throb of his heart. Every thump, the world seemed to move forward and then back. Forward and then back.

  Unable to control himself, Max threw up. There wasn't a lot in his stomach. But what little was there came out, mostly through his trunk. And after it came out, Max was both relieved and felt worse. His stomach was no longer nauseous, and the queasy feeling was gone, but now his head throbbed worse.

  The pain caused Max to fall onto his side. Max stayed down only for a minute. He wouldn't let the pain keep him from his goal. The first goal was that he needed to get some water.

  He moved, knowing just lying there could be dangerous. Predators who would normally leave an elephant alone might try to do something that they might not normally do if they saw weakness, so Max kept moving.

  After 100 feet, Max realized that the pain wasn't quite as bad as it was. The pain in his head wasn’t as intense. So, he opened his eyes a little wider. He was grateful that it was still mostly dark, but was also grateful that the first rays of the sun came over the mountains. He had to strain, but it did give some light to where he was traveling. In just a moment, he recognized a path that his herd had normally taken and began following it. He noticed he was moving with steadier strides, but chose to move no faster than before.

  Finally, as the sun just started over the horizon, Max reached the stream. A place like this was usually filled with animals early in the morning, but as Max walked forward and was getting his drink, nothing was around him. The watering area was empty, eerily so. Max was thirsty, so at first he did not question why he felt spooked.

  He went to the water and took a long drink. After the first drink, Max began rinsing out his mouth to get the taste of the bile that was left in his mouth after throwing up. Once that was done, he took another drink. He splashed himself, hoping that it would help the pain, and it did. And Max was starting to feel better, but now this feeling of wariness was becoming stronger, and Max looked around. First around at the stream, and then he turned completely around and realized that this place that was typically filled with elephants from many herds had no elephants.

  Max was confused. They should be here. In fact, off in the distance, Max thought he saw a lion. He also noted there were only a few small creatures, but nothing else, no elephants.

  Max stared at the ground and saw signs that there had been elephants recently. He could see the marks of them moving across the ground and the marks of other animals. But there was no sign of his herd, no other sign of any herd of elephants nearby.