The Story of Yaki Jaybird by Jill Gatsby and Gabriel Gocobachi
(I want to acknowledge that my 7 year old son presented this story to me and the arrowhead to go with it!)
TWISTED STORIES AND TWISTED STUFF
He was only seven years old, but he hunted like a mountain lion and climbed trees faster than a chimpanzee. His skin was as black as a shiny new bowling ball and his eyes were a shocking sacred blue. When he hunted, he pretended to be a mountain lion and crouched low and ready to attack. His name was Yaki Jaybird, but everyone called him Jaybird. His village had given him this name because every morning Yaki would awake from his bed and fly away from the village to go on some perilous adventure from which they were sure he would never return. His parents had tried to stop him so many times they finally succumbed to what they were sure was their son’s destiny; he would surely be devoured by some wild creature, and they could only hope that it would at least be some great beast that consumed him to make his death respectable.
This particular brisk and windy morning led Jaybird to the river’s edge of the Amazon River. He knew that the piranhas, and their mammoth cousins, the Paku swam in these waters and yet, little Jaybird was not afraid. He dreamed of catching the Paku and returning to his village a hero.
As he reached down to pick a pebble out from between his toes, the young boy noticed something sharp protruding from the mud by the river’s edge. He reached down and picked it up. It was a small, but perfectly formed and very sharp arrowhead. Proud of his find, he rushed back to his village to see the great Chief Mohair.
Chief Mohair had been the chief of the tribe since Jaybird’s grandmother was a child, but the old man hadn’t aged past thirty years in all that time. He had black hair as smooth and shiny as a crows feathers and his skin looked like fine worn leather. His eyes were gray, but they were not tired. They were full of delight.
The chief took Jaybird’s arrowhead in hand and had an epiphany. This is what the boy needed; an arrow to protect him on his adventures. He summoned the village’s most talented craftsman and commanded him to make the little Jaybird a spear of which he could catch the greatest of prey. When the spear had been made the chief presented it to Yaki Jaybird before the entire village and announced that one day this little Jaybird would save many lives. He had seen it in a vision.
That night while Jaybird slept close to his mother and father in their little hut we was awakened by a whisper. It was coming from the palm of his hand. He had fallen asleep with his new spear clutched in his fingers and now he was sure he’d heard the thing say something. As he uncurled his fingers he beheld the arrowhead was glowing. A light seemed to shine from within and it lit up the hut where Jaybird’s parents were sound asleep. As he leaned in closer to inspect this phenomena there came another whisper, but this time he heard it. “You are in danger.” Said the carved up rock!
An arrowhead that talks! Jaybird knew he’d really struck gold. He asked the arrowhead what was the danger he spoke of and the little arrowhead replied, “Behold, a great monster is coming. This thing that I speak of is called The Pakaru. It’s not to be confused with the big evil fish, the Paku, this is the Pakaru.” The arrowhead then went on to describe the terrifying and destructive monster as beholding three heads.
“It’s got three heads?” asked Jaybird. And the arrowhead glowed and replied, “Yes and they all look like bulldogs.”
“Are we going to kill these bulldogs?” asked Jaybrid.
“The spirit of the wind will help you on your journey to defeat this volatile creature and its master,” answered the arrowhead, “but we must leave quickly.”
Jaybird took the arrowhead, which glowed in the night and led him to the clearing beyond the Amazon River where the three-headed bulldog appeared on the horizon and reared its three ugly heads.
Its eyes were red as blood and its skin was the color of putrid urine three weeks old. Behind this evil monstrosity there stood a man. He made the devil look like Mini Mouse. He wore a long gray hooded coat that dropped down all the way to his feet. He carried a black twisted staff tall as himself, which was three feet tall. This was the Master and controller of the Pakaru and he was coming to take Yaki Jaybird’s village.
“Kill!” the evil master commanded of his beasts. But the three-headed bulldogs only frothed at the mouth. “Kill, I say” the master declared. One of the heads sniffed the air then let out a belch that would make any beer drinker proud. The master exhaled in disbelief and frustration as he yelled out to his minions, “Idiot deaf things! KILL I SAY!”
The dogs were indeed practically deaf and it did take a lot of yelling to get them to do anything, but now that they had heard the command of their master they went mad with their desire to fulfill their his wish.
The Pakaru charged across the horizon towards Yaki Jaybird, but not before trampling their master to the ground, peeing on him, then, leaving him behind in the dust.
“Bad dogs! BAD DOGS!” the master exclaimed, covered in three dogs piss. He scrambled to his feet and took off after the moronic beast.
When Jaybird saw the gargantuan creature with three slobbering heads racing straight for him he turned and took flight like his name. He soared across the flatlands with the three-headed bulldog quick on his tail. Before he knew it he’d come to the Amazon River where he was sure he only had one choice; he would have to jump in and hope that the monster followed. This is because the one thing that Yaki Jaybird knew was that bulldogs can’t swim.
He dove into the perilous waters of the Amazon just as the Pakaru was upon him. The imbecilic beast leaped through the air, once again pissing as it soared, then it hit the water with an ear breaking belly flop. The three-headed bulldog sunk immediately to the bottom of the Amazon River and wondered how it got there.
Meanwhile, their master, the three foot menace was having a temper tantrum at the river’s edge and screaming out every expletive he could muster.
“Now I have to go back to hell and get another one, you idiots! You Loafs! You Nitwits! You simpletons!” he spat out at the drowning monster.
Now while this was happening, the Paku, the cousin of the piranha, and a fish that no one in their right mind would ever want to encounter swam to the top of the Amazon, opened his mouth and swallowed Yaki Jaybird whole!
The three-foot menace screeched with delight and pulled out a fishing pole from underneath his long coat.
“I’ve got you now, boy!” he said and then he through the line in to the river to catch the Paku.
Meanwhile, Jaybird found himself crunched up in the belly of the biggest fish he’d ever seen. The arrowhead lit up and glowed in his hand once more and whispered, “This is where you make your claim to fame, boy.”
Yaki Jaybird took the spear and stabbed the Paku right out the anus! The Paku screamed and leapt out of the river. With its mouth wide open, it landed right on top of the evil little menace of a man who had come from hell with his three-headed bulldog to destroy Jaybird’s village, and most likely the rest of the world. Now the arrowhead, Yaki Jaybird and the damnable midget were all stuffed inside the fish.
Yaki crawled over the angry little fellow who was still alive and extremely vexed at finding himself inside this smelly and disgusting excuse for a fish. He tried to grab the boy by his ankle to prevent his escape, but the boy was covered in fish slime and he sleazed out of his grip, out of the fish’s mouth and onto the dry bank of the river.
It took two hands and all his might, but he rolled the Paku back into the river where its gills took a deep breath and then the animal swam away into the depths of the Amazon River with the little menace never to be heard from again.
When Yaki Jaybird returned to his village he was given a heroes welcome. Years later he would leave his village and travel the world.
I was in living in Paris at the time when our paths crossed. He was the bravest young man I’d ever met and so I wrote a song about him. He liked my song, although I don’t know if anyone else would, and in exchange for the song, Yaki Jaybird gave me his arrowhead. I have had this arrowhead for years and have never seen it glow, however, my son swears he’s seen it happen and he even told me that one night when he was sleeping under his covers he distinctly heard it call your name.
Yaki Jaybird’s Arrowhead is now up for Auction on Ebay. May the lucky winner have the same good fortune with this arrowhead that Yaki Jaybird had. And may you never have to come across the three-headed bulldog and their evil menacing midget of a master.
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