Tony and Karl

“Well,” Tony replied, “I dunno. It still seems a little fresh to me.”

“That’s what I was thinking. I can’t even smell it yet," Karl affirmed.

“We are pretty high up," he offered. There was one big branch below them that would take both their weight.

“Nah! It’s nice and hot.” He lifted up the tip of his wing and gave it a little lick. His black tongue disappeared inside his boney, white beak. He turned his wing this way and that. “Wind’s still good.” He gave a little sniff. “You smell that?"

“Oh, yeah I do!” Tony said, lasciviously. He stifled his urge to rub his wings together. He had arthritis and a crick in his left elbow. It hurt like the dickens when it popped. Instead, he savoured a long, slow whiff; his neck undulated and his eyes went dreamy. “I just love me a slow roasting.” He turned his head up to Karl. “I have a question.”

“Shoot,” Karl said.

“Why you think he came all the way out here?”

“Now, that’s a good question.”

“Right? Nothing’s ever out here.”

“Maybe that’s it. Maybe he just came out here to die.”

“You think so?”

“He was pretty old and if he comes way out here, he won’t get ripped apart,” Karl reasoned.

“Yeah, but dying of thirst? We’ve seen it happen. It’s horrible.” Tony shuddered and a cloud of dust and flies appeared around him like an infected halo. The flies tucked back under his feathers, hundreds of little black things, as if they were attached by teeny, invisible rubber bands.

"This is very true, but,” he stopped in mid-sentence. He closed his eyes and breathed in the delicious feast to come, his head completing a tight semi-circle. He opened his eyes. “It’s coming along now, pally!” The afternoon desert sun was doing its job. He continued his argument. “But. To my point - to be eaten alive like that? By any o’ those host of carnivores? Give me a good old-fashioned die-of-thirst in the middle of the desert any day.“

“Yeah, I guess you’re right. You remember when the lions were teaching their little ones to execute a kill?”

“I do.” Karl surveyed the savannah.

“That was bloody awful,” Tony grimaced. “It must’ve taken them an hour to do the poor thing in.”

“The whole herd was watching it happen.”

“They was just on the other side of the river. You catch anything of what they were sayin’?”

“No, not really. Never really bothered to learn gazelle.”

“Me either. Got to hand it to her though. Through it all, she never made a peep.” He looked at Karl, hopefully. “Smells almost done.”

He gave a perfunctory sniff. “Almost.”

“Karl?”

“Yeah, Tony?”

He looked straight at Karl. “This’ll be the biggest meal I ever had.”

Karl looked down at the carcass. “It should last us for a month out here,“ he said. “Unless we get interlopers.”

“I hate interlopers.” He looked over the desert plain. There was nothing but shimmering waves of beige. He surveyed the sky – only the heat pressing sun. “You ever had a meal like this?”

“No,” he said.

“Me either.”

They sat there waiting for their meal to ripen. Once again, Tony broke the silence. “It just don’t add up, Karl.”

“What doesn’t add up, Tony?”

“You know – coming all the way out here.” He paused and thought for a bit. “The old ones sacrifice themselves for the herd, right?”

“Yeah.”

“You and I seen that lots. They got that, um, whaddyacallit?”

“Herd mentality.”

“Right! Herd mentality. How does coming way out here, by his self and starving to death help the herd survive?” Tony’s vexation with his lack of understanding furrowed his craggy brow. His eyes implored Karl to answer.

“Maybe, they’re trying something new,” Karl suggested.

“Whaddya mean, new?”

“I don’t know. Like a sacrifice, maybe.”

“A sacrifice? To who?”

I don’t know.” That was not true, for Karl had been quietly thinking about the same thing, He ventured his answer like a supposition. “God?”

“There’s no God out here,” Tony scoffed.

“You know that. And I know that. But what do they know?”

“That’s true enough,” Tony conceded. ”Everyone’s gotta believe in something, I guess.” He bowed to his friend, spreading his huge wings wide. “Oh, powerful God, Karl!” he mocked.“Your sacrifice awaits below.”

“I accept, equally powerful God, Tony!” Karl boomed in his deepest voice, joining in the fun as they flapped down onto the rotting gazelle.

“Look!” said Karl, the pitch of his voice excitedly higher. “The maggots are ready!”

“Oh, yes!” Tony gleamed as he tucked into to his feast. “My favorite.”