White Buffalo (standard:travel stories, 2132 words)
Author: Austen Brauker	Added: Oct 05 2010	Views/Reads: 3064/2104	Story vote: 0.00 (0 votes)
Ottawa Indian radicals kidnap a white buffalo from a Michigan farmer and attempt to take it to South Dakota to set it free.

Click here to read the first 75 lines of the story


Under the blanket, Dog and Penny started to talk for the first time.
They had spent most of the two days they'd known each other naked. Not 
much conversation had occurred. This was the very reason why he claimed 
he was called ‘Dog'. He would hump any leg he could. 

“So, how old are you, really?” Dog was finally curious. 

“You won't be mad?” She clasped her bra. 

“No. You can tell me now. We're already in this whole thing together.”
He waved his arm, either meaning the world at large or the immediate 
caper they were currently tangled in. 

“I'm fifteen,” she shrugged. 

“Fifteen!” he choked a bit. 

“How old are you?” Her voice was unapologetic. He couldn't tell if she
cared or not. 

“I'm twenty,” he stated. “Old enough to go to jail for you.” 

Dog pulled the blanket from over their heads. His hair shot in electric
directions from the static. 

“And you're from Traverse? My uncle was from there,” he probed her,
deciding to let her tell a little of her story. 

“Oh yeah,” she was still nonchalant. “What's his name?” 

“Amos.” 

“That's funny, that's my dad's name!” 

All of a sudden it hit them. 

They both froze, eyes locked, then threw off the covers. They jumped
from the truck and straightened their clothes. Dog spit a few times on 
the ground. 

“Fucking cousins!” she yelled at him. 

“Not again!” grumbled Dog. 

“Uh, yeah, we're here to bring in a hurt buffalo. We called earlier. He
got hurt loading up in the trailer. His leg.” 

Crazy Bob looked at the Veterinarian and said no more. 

She waited for a moment, making sure he was done. 

“Okay, then,” she would've sighed but the look on the assistant's face
was fresh in her mind. “Let's have a look. Bring the trailer over to 
these side doors,” she pointed to the large slider, which entered into 
a corral. 

Jale slid the door open and Turd backed the trailer in. “Go ahead,”
Shelly said. “Open it up.” 

A buffalo, unlike any Jale had ever seen, charged into the corral. The
animal ran around two or three times with a three-legged gait, limping. 
He was obviously damaged, but compensated well enough with the 
uninjured limbs. It snorted a few more times and began to calm down. 
The animal was covered with beautiful white fur. 

“Oh, my God!” exclaimed Shelly. She took a step back. 

“That's right,” one of the Indians behind her said. 

“Lets not use the chute,” the doctor decided, her heart racing. “We're
going to have to tranq him, Jale, get the darts ready and set the 
charge at about, hmmmmm...” Shelly looked over at the buffalo. How much 
did the thing weigh? 

“1500 lbs.?” The boy estimated. 

“Sounds about right,” she nodded in approval. 

The veterinarian handed Jale the gun. Her hands were shaking. She hated
the things. Even though it was only for tranquilizer darts, it looked 
real enough a weapon to her. 

Jale beaded down on the rear quarter, keenly aware of the Indian eyes
watching him. It felt funny to shoot at a buffalo with them staring in 
the background. The dart smacked into the beast's ass, exploded the 
dose under its thick skin and hung limp, imbedded by a barb on the tip. 


Jale and Shelly went to work.  They quickly reset the bone, not speaking
the whole time. The white buffalo slept through the entire procedure. 

None of the Indians said a word while the vets labored. When it was
over, they all helped drag the animal back into the trailer, using a 
heavy canvas. 

Two more Indians had appeared, a couple. Jale mentally noted that there
had been six today. 

“How much do we owe you?” asked the crazy man who spoke earlier. 

“That's a very rare animal indeed,” Dr. Shelly finally commented on the
albinism, cleaning her hands on a rough towel. “Where did you say you 
were from again?” She looked inquisitively at the man. 

Crazy Bob grew uncomfortable. He shuffled between feet, avoiding her
stare. “How much?” he asked, ignoring her question. 

“150 bucks,” she stated flatly, understanding she had been given all the
information she ever would. 

Crazy Bob flung his hair to the side, shaking his head, and dug inside
his jacket, producing a wad of hundred dollar bills. He peeled two of 
them from the outer layer of the roll. 

“Keep the change, for the kid,” the Indian motioned toward Jale and put
on his sunglasses. “I thought it'd be more.” 

Jale had read stories about the mystical white buffalo while studying
social science. He was almost sure that Dr. Shelly knew nothing about 
the legend, because she was only slightly surprised when it first 
emerged from the trailer. She had just appeared curious at the Indians, 
who seemed to be frightened, almost in awe, of the animal. 

In truth, it was the first time any of the buffalo-nappers had seen the
sacred beast in the light of day. The eyes in each Indian face revealed 
their reverence. A silent prayer passed between them. They were 
standing in front of a living expression of god, as taught by their 
pan-Indian traditions. Any arguments for having stolen it were obvious 
to them now. 

The truck and trailer returned to the road. The sacred cargo had
awakened and was feeling refreshed. 

It truly was a rescue mission. 

The overnight radicals were back on the righteous high horse. How could
they let that white farmer exploit such a creature, sell tickets and 
trinkets, make it dance for the news cameras? 

“What these brothers did was an act of liberation!” Crazy Bob intoned as
if he were a host to their own celebration banquet. “This buffalo can 
live in honor and his teachings be shared among the people. The white 
messenger will walk the rolling Black Hills that were meant to be his 
grounds. Freedom for the enslaved brother!” 

They chanted songs and whooped their way down the road, resisting the
temptation to stop at reservations they were passing through, to show 
it off. This gift would be shared with the people soon enough. The 
liberators smiled big raccoon grins at each other, while Turd and Crazy 
Bob made up songs about the raid and rescue. 

They passed Manistee and continued to Ludington, intent on boarding The
Badger, the ferry that traversed Lake Michigan to Manitowoc, Wisconsin. 
No one would ever suspect them of taking the boat! If anything, it was 
more dangerous to cross the Macinac Bridge. Few arteries passed through 
the U.P. If somebody had recorded their license plate number, the State 
Police would arrest them right away. The old man at the buffalo farm 
hadn't been able to help the police, though. 

“They looked like Indians,” was the best description he could muster.
“You know, like in the movies. Except no horses or feathers.” 

The Buffalo Liberation Team secured their tickets and waited to board
the ferry. 

Turd had created the name, an achronism for his favorite sandwich. He
thought about the bacon, lettuce and tomato in silent reverie. Bacon. 
Especially the bacon. 

The team tried to act cool, to not draw attention. They all put on
shades and leaned back, listening to a Pow-Wow tape. 

John Boy stared at the endless expanse of water. 

Crazy Bob made his own cigarettes, placing tobacco from blue pouches
into rolling papers. An untrained eye would think they looked like big 
marijuana doobies. 

A security guard tapped at the window. 

“Okay guys, who's smoking pot?” 

He tapped the window again. 

Turd rolled down the glass on his side. 

“Not us, Officer. It's just tobacco.” 

Crazy Bob offered the lit cigarette to the armed rent-a-cop. 

The cop grabbed the spliff with authority and sniffed at it lightly.
Harmless, he thought and handed the cigarette back to Crazy Bob. He 
started to go, but caught whiff of something else, something sweeter 
and probably illegal. He puffed his chest, noticing a suspicious 
plastic bag on the dashboard. 

The team had burned some sage earlier, leaving the bundle in plain
sight. A slight tinge of the gentle, aromatic herb remained in the air. 
The cop misidentified the package, and the smell, as Mary Jane, a.k.a. 
reefer, and immediately pulled his side arm. 

“Everybody out of the car!” he commanded, leveling the .38, ready to
shoot if anyone so much as moved. 

The five bandits acquiesced and exited, standing against the side of the
truck with their arms spread, visible above their head's, fingers 
interlocked, exactly as they were ordered to do. 

The guard kicked their feet apart as he frisked them, trying to be as
rough as he could, so they knew he meant business. 

“What's this thing, then? Huh?” He held up a sacred pipe made of red
catlinite stone, that he had found in a leather pouch in Crazy Bob's 
jacket. “Is this just for tobacco too?” 

The team sighed, collectively. 

In fact, it was. 


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