Pebbles Saved My Life

It's a hot sunny day, bout 90 degrees. I'm on my way back from China, with my backpack slung over one shoulder and no other pieces of carry on luggage. No one else is with me. In fact, I'm not sure I even exited the plane with other passengers. Maybe two, three? I'm walking through the ramp that would usually connect me from the plane to the airport but instead of the airport, I step off the ramp and onto solid ground. I am outside and it's so hot that everything in a small distance is blurred to me, like heat waves everywhere. I had exited onto some construction site...in the middle of the desert. Slowly, I let my eyes get adjusted to the sun directly above me. I look around, I am alone.

A thought pops into my head, REST. I see the nearest scaffolding of some sort, and decide to sit down and lean against it for support. My eyes close...open...close...open. I don't know how many times I blinked until I saw it, about a foot away from my left hand: A scorpion, yellow, almost camouflaged into the sandy ground. I retracted my hand violently and almost automatically. The sudden motion only made the hideous creature speed up its crawl towards me. I jump up, again almost automatically. My muscles have taken over and they seem to have chosen flight. Unfortunately for me, the scorpion seems to have chosen fight. I am backing away as he advances, I really don't know why I didn't just turn around and run. My muscles were performing, but too slowly, as if too tense from fear to actually react semi productively.

The scorpion and I were caught in some kind of a predatory dance, where I back up and he advances. Our performance was interrupted with a sudden hissing noise. I look down to my left, and Pebbles was crouched low, baring all her teeth. The hissing turns into a low growl, and then loud cat snarling as she pounces towards the scorpion, every muscle in attack mode. She picks at the scorpion with her paws, her teeth, retracting defensively every once in a while to avoid being stung. There was nothing domestic about her then. They both did the attack and retract dance for a couple of minutes until my cat finally went in for the kill. She tore into the enemy for what seemed like a couple of seconds. I couldn't even see...with her teeth? with her paws? All I know is that when the sand that flew up around them subsided, when Pebbles' loud howling died down, (and I'm sure if the scorpion could make noise it would be hissing or something), my cat stood victorious...still picking at a disgusting pile of...dead scorpion. Juices, instestines, and all...literally, the spoils. She looked up at me, licking her mouth, her paws, her tail, like she usually does after she eats or sleeps. I reach down to pet her and congratulate her, who needs a dog when you have Pebbles? Together we walk away, relieved, happy...

We had been walking for 5 minutes when I realized that Pebbles was no longer next to me. I had been crazily jabbering to myself, as opposed to crazily jabbering to my cat. I turn around and there she was, lying on the ground, writhing. A low moan escapes her throat, the kind that never sounds unless she is in some serious discomfort. I rush over to her and realize that instead of her usually orange and white fur, there is a massive patch of black running from her lower back down to her stomach. She starts to do tumbles, still writhing. Right then, I don't think I had ever seen anything alive, not a human, not an animal, in so much pain. Her left paw began to do this awful twitch and she couldn't even lift her head off the ground, the black patch was spreading...

My phone alarm went off, so promptly. I sat up in bed and was overcome with grief. It was one of those dreams that carried into reality. Well at least my tears did.