Quitetly, Quiggly stepped into the darkness as he stealthily approached and steeled himself for the pain of her venom sting. An instant later, he was back in the middle of the road. He rubbed his hand over his face and his upper body, then took several deep breaths to help calm himself. Then he realized that something was different and that he felt good. Quiggly got up slowly and looked at his hand, watching as the swelling began to go down, but something strange was happening. The poison did not just go away. It seemed to be disappearing. He looked down at his hand. The swelling had disappeared entirely, and the skin looked almost normal again. Quiggly felt the anger come up in him like a volcano erupting. "No wonder you have to put it on with a needle," he said angrily. "Do you have any idea how much it hurt me to hit the ground so hard?" He shook his head and looked down at his boots. They were covered with cobwebs and he noticed that they had actually glowed yellow. "And _I_ put some boots on you, I just don't know how," he said. "I had to keep them on for weeks and the cobwebs you walked through to get out of here aren't even in good shape. So, you got what you deserved, you ugly monster!" Quiggly looked up at the sky, then wiped his hand on his pants. "You are going back to your mistress and I am going home to get some sleep," he said. "Go back to your evil mistress, and I am going back to bed." Then he lifted the stick off the ground and pointed it at the spider and said, "Go home." Quiggly made his way through the forest slowly as he thought of all that had just happened. He was furious. In truth, he was filled with hate for the spider, but he realized that it was his own rage that caused him to want to hurt her. He felt that he had done nothing wrong, and that he had every right to be angry. Quiggly tried to put his thoughts into some sort of order. "Of course, if it makes you feel better to stab me with the cobra spider's poison, do so," he whispered to himself. Then he heard the unmistakable sound of breaking twigs and saw the yellow eyes of a raccoon sitting on a branch about ten feet away. The creature was sitting perfectly still and was watching Quiggly. Quiggly felt very vulnerable with a stick in his hand and the cobra spider's poison in his heart. "Don't worry, raccoon. I have no intention of harming you or that cute little baby. Go ahead and jump down, but leave that little one alone." He could hear the raccoon sniffing in the air and then he heard it clear its throat before it started making a low growling sound. "Is that some sort of sign of respect?" Quiggly asked. "I mean, I know that raccoons can be as nasty as any creature in the forest." He walked over and put his hand on the trunk of a tree and leaned against it. "Well, good night to you," he said. "Oh, and if you like, next time you want to talk to me, you can try a higher branch." As soon as Quiggly moved away from the tree, he could hear the sound of breaking sticks and falling leaves. He did not have to turn around to see that he was being stalked by one of the largest raccoons he had ever seen. "Hey, raccoon, I'm a little scared. What's your problem?" The raccoon answered with a loud whine. "Okay, raccoon. I guess I can tell you how it feels. You know, when I was coming out of a cave and I got hit on the head by that rock, and then I was bitten by an ogre and poisoned? I didn't think I'd ever be able to get away. I had to crawl like a spider just to get away. And then I was chased by the biggest black bear I had ever seen. So, I guess I know how you feel." The raccoon was standing about five feet from Quiggly, and Quiggly looked at the raccoon in disbelief. This was the first time he had ever seen a raccoon up close, and he was shocked at how big it was. He was also amazed at the raccoon's softness. He had a very delicate kind of lightness to its build. "And you know something else?" he asked the raccoon. "I thought I knew about all the things in the forest that you have to beware of. I never knew that bears had long noses or that they could sniff you out from a long way away. I guess you just show up here and then surprise the daylights out of me. It's just like you know, even though I think I know everything about the forest, you go ahead and surprise me." Quiggly had felt a lot of fear during the raccoon's long pursuit, and that had kept his anger and anger at the raccoon simmering, but now his fear was gone. All that was left was the hurt and the anger, and that made him want to lash out at anything that stood between him and home. He was angry at the raccoon for scaring him, angry at the spider for stinging him, and angry at himself for feeling fear. And angry at everything. He was beginning to feel something different in his chest. It was getting harder to breathe. He felt light headed and noticed his hand was actually tingling. He felt dizzy. "The raccoon almost got me," he said. "I mean, just looking at you makes me weak in the knees. How did I ever get this far?" He leaned over against a tree and tried to catch his breath. He took several deep breaths and his heart began to slow down, but he could hear the sound of snapping branches to his left, and his whole body felt as if it was being sucked down to a place deep inside him. "This is different," he thought. He took several more deep breaths and started laughing. "This is funny," he said. "The raccoon almost got me, but you had to go and get me in the chest." He rubbed his chest and noticed that his heart felt like it was moving again. His body seemed to be moving even faster than it had when he was swimming in the stream on his way back from the lake. "Well, that's some relief," he said. "My chest feels like it weighs a million pounds." He shook his head and could tell that he was having trouble balancing. "I mean, I think I might be starting to like being out of breath. I like it a lot." He started to laugh again and this time he was laughing so hard, he could not breathe. The raccoon took one look at the laughing man, backed up, and then ran off into the forest as fast as it could go. Quiggly rubbed his chest and tried to catch his breath, then smiled and thought about how he would be saying, "I could really use a drink." He walked on through the forest and looked around at everything. The light was getting brighter and he knew he could tell the moon and the stars apart. "You know, I could swear that tree wasn't there when I first came out of the cave," he said. "I mean, I can really tell it's getting lighter. I guess I could tell the trees were getting bigger. But then, if it gets much lighter, I don't think the raccoon's going to be safe. He started to laugh and laugh and laughed. "There, now I really feel good. I can't even stop laughing." He looked up at the stars and felt very small in the universe, and then he looked at the sky. "Hey, if I don't get home soon, I am going to sleep right here." And with that, he threw his arms out to his sides and slept as he walked. He never stopped laughing or smiling, but he was having such a good time that the raccoon did not run into him. And that was the last thing Quiggly remembered. ## About the Author **Lorenzo Quain,** a native of Brazil, has always had a fascination with strange, beautiful, and creepy animals. When he was a boy, he used to catch and tame fireflies and put them in a bottle for a few hours, then spend the night watching them flicker their tiny lights. He spent much of his youth trying to escape his childhood home in Brazil. He lived on a large farm in Uruguay for a while and worked on his father's family plantation in Brazil for a year. Now he lives in the mountains of Oregon. He does not own a television, and his only regular companion is a dog named Carioca. He writes because he believes that good characters and characters you can't put down are worth writing about. He believes he must be a masochist to do what he loves for a