THE FOREST OF FATE

Once upon a time in the Forest of Fate, some little furry

animals; and some winged ones, and scaled too; gathered to hear

some other animals of great reknown for their music put on a

spectacular show.  And a spectacular show it was, as while these

animal musicians were unheard of among humans, they were better

than almost all of the human musicians and were well loved and

respected among the furry, feathered, and scaled denziens of the

Forest of Fate.

One of the animals to travel from the other end of the forest to

see the show was Rick van Racoon.  Rick  ran a theater in the

part of the forest that was known for its actors and he was very

successful in his business, but he worked very hard at it and

decided to take a break for a few days to see these great animal

musicians he loved, and pay a visit to his older brother who had

his burrow not far from where the show would be held.  Rick

telegraphed his friend J.T. the turtle, who also lived near the

show, and they both bought tickets and made plans to hook up,

chill, and talk music at this great spectacle.

Rick van Racoon was also friends with a musician worshipped by

all in attendence at the show, and this musician; Yar Redla the

Rabbit; decided to join Rick on his journey across the Forest of

Fate to see these spectacular animal bands.  Yar knew he would

be recognized everywhere he went at the show, much unlike when

he travelled amongst humans; it would be the same as if Lars

Ulrich had taken an interest in the animals' music and decided

to show up.  But Rick assured Yar that these animals, who he had

spoken with through the forsest's great telegraph system, would

react like mature adult animals when confronted by the wonderful

surpise of Yar coming to the show.

However, while many of the animals did react just this way,

saying hi to Yar and speaking briefly with him about how much

they loved his music, several of the animals were less mature. 

Initially they were awestruck when they saw Yar walk in, and

then they wanted his autograph.  They wanted him to autograph

*every* album he'd ever released.  They wanted to get their

pictures taken with him, they wanted interviews for the

magazines they edited.  While some of this was understandable,

the massive requests for multiple autographs and pictures had

Yar swamped for the first twenty minutes after he walked into

the clearing where the show was to be held.  After he finally

made it to the creek for a much needed drink, Rick hid Yar off

to one side of the log stage that had been erected so he could

relax and enjoy the animals' music.

Over the course of the next two days, Yar was incredibly nice to

everyone.  Everyone loved the show, and departed to their

sections of the forest to write and send their reviews on the

forest's telegraph system.  One of the animals, Jorge the Gecko,

included something in his review he shouldn't have.  While the

last of the animal bands had played, Jorge had seen Yar talking

to some of the other animals and Jorge witnessed some body

language from Yar that could have meant a lot of things.  But

Jorge assumed that Yar had meant to insult the animal band that

was playing, and he reported this in his review.  Some of the

other animals on the telegraph system; some who had been at the

show, and some who hadn't; assumed that Jorge's reports were

true and began saying things in telegraph messages that they had

no way of knowing to be true or false.  Some of these bad

animals had been at the show, and knew Yar to be the incredibly

nice rabbit that he was, yet they assumed that what Jorge said

was true; *wasn't that how all animal musicians acted?* they

thought, forgetting in less than 48 hours how nice Yar had been

to them.  The other bad animals hadn't been there and had no

idea what they were talking about.

Yar sent out a telegraph message, explaining that he hadn't made

any gestures of disrespect toward the last animal band to play. 

Ba-Boom the opossum, who hadn't been there, responded with a

message calling Yar a liar; he said all animal musicians were

like that.  He took this remark back, but while an irresponsible

animal might be forgiven these words had they been in response

to Jorge's telegraph, to tell Yar this after he'd explained what

had happened?

Rick was furious at these developments; he had told Yar what

intelligent, mature animals would be in attendance, as he had

talked with them a great deal on the telegraph network.  Several

of the animals, however, turned out to be the exact opposite. 

Rick wrote a very angry but clear and intelligent telegraph, in

which he praised the majority of the telegraph users for their

intelligent telegraphs and friendship, but explained that he

wouldn't be using the telegraph any more because of what the bad

animals had done.  He explained how incredibly nice Yar had been

to the other animals, and how several of them had betray his

friendliness toward them.

Yar Redla the Rabbit and J.T. the Turtle, disguised as humans.

Up until this point J.T. the turtle, while he understood why

Rick should be so angry, still planned on using the telegraph

system; why let a few bad apples (or whatever it is that turtles

eat) spoil the whole bunch? he asked.  But then J.T. read the

telegraphs in response to Rick's message.  One animal said "good

ridance" to Rick, chalking the whole thing up as a minor

disagreement.  "Can't you handle a disagreement?" he asked.  At

this J.T. almost flew into a fit.  He had been on the telegraph

system; several different telegraph systems; with Rick for six

and a half years, and knew that if ANYONE could handle a

disagreement, it was Rick van Racoon.  What this animal was

somehow unable to see was the issue of honor, betrayal, and

slandering someone about a supposed incident you know nothing

about.  Another animal said, "Relax!  95% of the telegraphs have

been in Yar's defense."  This animal, too, failed to see the

damage 5% can do by slandering someone, like Jorge and the other

bad animals had done.  J.T. immediately took this particular

telegraph system off of the wall where he did his telegraphing.

The moral of this story is: Nice guys finish last, you might as

well be an asshole.  Just do as I say, not as I do...  Maybe I

should take a class. <sigh>

ACTUNG: What you just read is the first true story to be printed

in The Cut Out Bin.  Sad, ain't it?