A story I got an idea for the other day. A bit cheesy but well worth reading. Enjoy!

A band of ten human hunters were on the look-out for an animal. But it wasn't just any ice age creature. It had to be the most putrid, fungus-covered, vile smelling sloth they could find.

To the tribe these people belonged to, sloths were a sacred animal. Every winter they would capture and kill one. The meat would be cooked and eaten to prevent famine and the fur hung up around their camp to ward off evil spirits. However, the nauseating scent of dead sloths was more likely scare off predators and than spirits (unless ghosts have a nose).

The group of hunters were homo-sapiens. However, that didn't mean they were brighter than the Neanderthals roaming around, nor that the ice age animals could understand them.

The group of seven men and three women set out from camp at sunrise. It was mid-fall and the bi-annual migration was under way. Red and yellow leaves still clung to the trees and the first winter snow would be due soon.

The hunters hadn't been searching long when one of their dogs barked. It wagged its tail vigorously while covering its nose with a paw, signaling it had caught the scent of a sloth.

Shouts and yells of excitement rippled through the group. All of them ran in the sloth's direction.

Silence fell on them when they saw the creature's footprints. The prints were round, wide, and had skid-marks beside them. The skid marks indicated the animal waddled along as it walked, and that it was indeed a sloth.

The humans spotted the owner of the prints. A chubby sloth was eating berries in a barren area of the forest surrounded by dense brush. The hunters observed, sitting as quiet as a cave lion in ambush.

Just then, a muscular male smilodon came into view.

"Now we will have to compete with this cat for our kill." a young hunter whispered to his comrades. They nodded in silent agreement.

Three hunters snuck toward the saber, concealing themselves in the wide bushes. They would scare off the huge feline when they attacked the sloth.

But the youngest and most mischievous hunter, a girl, decided to play a joke on their to-be-dinner.

She poked the bent over sloth on the rear with her blunt spear.

"Ow! Hey!" he yelled.

But to the humans it sounded like, "Uffa, muuuuuhhh!" Despite Sid's actual high pitched voice, it sounded deep and throaty to the humans.

"That's a sign it's about to go to sleep." the leader of the group announced. All ten readied themselves to spike, waiting for the foul-smelling creature to fall asleep. Meanwhile, they each wondered to themselves why sloth hadn't noticed the saber-toothed tiger in its presence yet.

But the sloth, actually Sid, just kept on munching on berries. He looked slightly nervous but pretty much unfazed. Unknown to his pursuers, the smilodon that was near him was his friend Diego. Sid's animal instincts were more honed in on detecting dangers such the hunters lurking just him than any those his predatory friend might bring. To Sid, the saber-toothed was just a wuss in a predator's body.

"Mmmm." he said happily, rubbing his claws together as he plucked a particularly delicious berry into his mouth.

"Ugggaaahaaahhhmmmph." The same low sound was heard by the humans from Sid. To them, the sloth's movement had seemed to them like the animal eating and itching its claws.

Diego was lying down in the sun and hadn't noticed any sign of danger yet. The humans were completely downwind of him and he wasn't much on the look-out for anything much today. The cat's main goal for the moment was to get a restful nap.

One of the possums in Sid's herd, Eddie, unknowingly walked through the bushes right where the hunters were. He realized what exactly he had passed when he came into the clearing where Diego was.

Eddie dropped to the ground with a quick scream. His tongue fell out of his mouth and his eyes closed. True to his possum nature, he was playing dead.

"Gagagaggubuuuuhh!" was what the humans heard.

"It's a sign from the gods!" one of the women in the band yelled, referring to the possum walking past them and fainting. This was considered an omen of good luck to the tribe for some odd reason.

All ten of them burst out of the bushes with tremendous force, their three wolf-like dogs sprinting out from behind them.

Sid screamed which sounded low to the human's ears. He hyperventilated as he blindly ran through the wall of humans. The cavemen dumbly didn't notice their quarry was heading the opposite direction. Sid ran for what felt like hours (actually three minutes). He found a high standing rock and hid behind it, collapsing in exhaustion.

Diego let out a roar and snatched Eddie by the tail. Half of the humans raced after him, forgetting their main goal.

One of Diego's pursuers, an amateur hunter, threw his spear at him. It landed in the tiger's tail, creating a superficial injury.

Just then, a lake came up. The humans watched in awe as the smilodon jumped off a ledge into it. Diego swam away with speed, the Eddie still in his mouth.

The four other people turned on the man who shot Diego with a spear.

"You wounded a god!" they screamed at him. Their faces flushed red and they balled their fists. "You know what that means!"

The targeted hunter looked at the poison oak and poison ivy his fellow tribesmen took out. He cringed and started to itch his back profusely at the thought of the treatment he was about to go through.

The other five hunters were still running on with endless energy. They didn't know the obstacle they would soon face nor did the mammoth that would be fighting them know what they were capable of.

How was it? R & R!