Lion Dream
from Adam
–
There were three of us in a tree. Much of our time out in the savannah was spent in this tree. Most often, the savannah was plain and empty or dotted with harmless herbivores. Occasionally there was the pride of lions, however. One male and three or four females. We would keep our distance and remain in the tree when they prowled. One time as I recall, I was down foraging the savannah when I noticed the pride, absent its patriarch, back and to the left. Warily I watched them as I moved to the tree. I knew that if I took my eyes off them for more than a moment, they would begin to stalk and I would be pounced. My fear impelled me a run and I noticed one of the females beginning to lurk low and towards me.
I made the tree. My companions and I surveyed the approaching pride with great apprehension. Of course they could scale trees, better than we in fact. Our only hope was that we were foreigners here on the savannah and our strange appearance would deter them from feeling we were easy prey, as with the sharks.
Their final approach and arrival. Three or four female lionesses sit eyeing us in our dendriform refuge. All parties are aware of the futility of our position; they could reach us with a feline’s leap, no need for scaling. We produce a cacophony of primal hoots and hollers in the hopes of frightening them. To no avail. In derision, they echo and amplify our calls. Sensing an impending massacre, I try to reason with them. “If you kill us, they will kill you. They will kill all of you.”
The matriarch alone shows any concern for my remark. They all understand what I have said. There is always a demand for retribution among those that feel it is in them to mete out justice. Disregard the messiness of morality. Punish the perpetrators and their kin. Atrocities will not be suffered in grief alone, but in vengeance. The matriarch tempers her excitement for an anthropic feast. The others remain eager.
“They will kill all of you. What good would that do you? Needless bloodshed.”
They are not convinced. The desire to take flight, but nowhere to fly.
“We are your advocates.” A half-formed notion. Half bargain, half principle. “There are so many of them that would let you pass, but we are your advocates.”
They know it is true. Here a victory, but inevitably total defeat. Before in the long before a victory, an act of survival without reprisal, but now things had changed. 
The great assent had reversed much of the law. Now was a time for diplomacy, even for those who once reigned absolutist kings and queens. They relent in their siege. We are their advocates, frightened in a tree.
