Regrettable, the Gift of Intelligence

"Snake Basket" image by Roger Raupp, who, as near as I can tell, is also called Rudy Didier Rauben

© Wizards of the Coast 1999

And then one day, the snakes made their escape. The charmer went to go buy some bread and meat for lunch, and the snakes rocked the basket until it fell over on its side. They slithered out, and as they did, people began to watch them, thinking them as tame as they normally were during he performance, until they bit someone. It was a vendor who sold birds, and though he would be missed, it would likely be by few. Snakes are usually solitary creatures, but these moved in a group, with purpose, startling and scaring the people in their path. The snakes pushed forward, and as they did, someone came up with a sword to challenge them. They continued moving towards him, and although snakes are not fast, the armed man was unnerved by the determination he perceived in them. As he missed his first blow, one of them coiled, and as he missed his second, one of them jumped and bit. The man, terrified and knowing the result of a cobra bite, ran off seeking antivenom, and the snakes moved towards the alley. 

Guessing what an animal wants is usually not an easy plan to carry out. They may have non-human motivations, or lack the sophistication of thought that humans attribute them. Other creatures have (or often seem to have) different ideas about things like teamwork, loyalty, and happiness. When, however, animals act contrary to their nature in a way that makes them more similar to humans, there is something to be worried about -- some force acting on them or something wrong within their brains. These snakes were grouped together and attacking like people. There were eighteen of them, all venomous, and they attacked in rotation. The same snake never struck twice until all had struck. They seemed to have a leader, though which snake was the leader seemed to be related to the order they had bit people in, so the leadership rotated. 

They moved, as a group, towards the nearest safe place, which for them was a grate that served as an entrance to the sewers. It was several blocks away (this portion of the city had terrible drainage,) and they knew it was a long way to slither causing a disturbance, but they also knew that if they made it, they would be free, and if they did not, it was very likely they would simply be returned to the snake charmer, who had friends in the city's royalty. Those friends enjoyed the snakes' shows, and would do what they could to keep the snakes from being killed. This was, at least, what the snakes believed.

Another threat, people had blockaded the alleyway ahead of them, and the boxes they had used to do it were between eighteen and twenty four inches high. Questionable whether all of them could jump, and only a couple of them would fit through the cracks at the bottom of the blockade. The humans had acted with surprising speed. One of the snake charmer's rivals had set this up as an attempt to rob the snake charmer of his glory. He had made the snakes smarter, given them man-like thoughts, and organized the blockade with the intention of killing them. But often those who give intelligence and knowledge regret that they have done so, and so it was with the rival entertainer. The two thirds of the snakes who could jump did, but instead of avoiding the people standing behind the barricade, they jumped straight for them. The people, out of reflex and fear of being bit, dodged the flying snakes. Some of them attempted to catch a snake, but only one did, and he caught one with venom left. He was a practical man, and after being bitten he killed the snake before running off looking for a doctor. 

The other 17 snakes moved on, harassed by blades falling and knives being thrown, but by this point, they could see the grate. Twelve of them had used their venom now, and shortly a good many of those people they had injected with venom would be dead, for charming non-venomous snakes is not nearly as impressive, and before they had gained intelligence, the snakes had been very well behaved and responded quite well to the pipe and the charmer's other tools. The people were coming solely from behind now, and some of them had sticks, to keep the snakes trapped but away. Four snakes were caught in upside down boxes or barrels, and three were hit, whether with swords or hammers or thrown knives or anything else anyone could find. However, that does mean that when they reached the grate, ten of the snakes were yet free, and slipped into the sewers unscathed.

"Regrettable, the Gift of Intelligence" Flash Fiction © Ben Clardy V

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.