Samurai Roosters

Koa and Makaha were born to a school for feathered gladiators in a tiny clearing above the Haleiwa River.  Their eggs were hatched in a deep nest their mother Ikaika scratched among the Red Antheriums, Purple Orchids and Pink Ginger that crowded the foot path on the makai ocean side of the faded green stilt plantation house.  The school’s combat arenas and gray boxes where the gladiators lived were hidden on the mauka, mountain side from prying eyes in the elephant bamboo and  banana trees that covered the North Shore of Oahu’s red earth hills above Haleiwa and Waimea Bay.

Koa and Makaha traced their ancestry to Kaimana, Hawaii’s first Royal Rooster. The shining black Cock had finished his second molt when he was taken from the King’s farm on the Marquesa’s island of Nuka Hiva and caged aboard a seagoing canoe for the perilous voyage north.    A hundred crows after Mount Temetiu slowly slipped below the horizon, Kaimana was one of two chickens--one cock and one hen of the original three hundred that still survived.  The cold salt water had taken some, but most had fed the crew and settlers.  If a careless paddler had not left the gate ajar to the bamboo cage, Kaimana would have been sacrificed with the Tiki Club and eaten during the desperate, calm days of the late voyage.  By then, however, the crew was too weak to climb the sail.  Perched high on the top of the mast it was Kaimana who pointed the North Star, and it was Kaimana who crowed the sleeping crew awake when the distant Mona Kea was in danger of sliding by beneath a sunlit cloud on the northwest horizon.   When the canoe was turned and the islands slowly rose out of the waves, the first settlers honored the starving cock by naming him, Kaimana, or “Divine Power of the Sea.”

Kaimana’s grandsons stood with the noble Ali’i who greeted Captain Cook when the English explorer first landed on Hawaii.  His daughters were present when Kamehameha unified Hawaii at the battle of Nu’uanu Pali.  And both granddaughters and grandsons wept when the captive Queen Liliuokalani composed the sad “Aloha Oe" in the Iolani Palace.

Uncounted generations later, Koa and Makaha’s mother, the strong and powerful Ikaika, inherited Kaimana’s gloss black head, powerful wings and lean, muscled body.   Even before their egg teeth chipped the first flake from their shells, Koa and Makaha knew their mother.  They knew the warm, secure weight of her body as she settled on the nest. And while still in their eggs, they sensed she would fight to protect her unhatched brood.   

Other hens would later tell them of the night when the Mongoose crept out of the dense sugar cane and Ikaika raised the alarm. They scratched with admiration and cackled with fear as they described how she beat at the fierce catweasel with her wings and sharp claws until the Man turned on the light and the Mongoose retreated away from her eggs and back into the dense, green wall.

Koa and Makaha’s father was a hero when he returned from the Honolulu Wars.   He bore many scars from the battles he fought in Waiʻanae and inWaipahu near Kahualena Street during the humid nights of August.That week across the pali, bets placed on the young rooster made the Man rich.  To reward his courage and skill the Man set him free.  You are Palani, the Man said when he released the scarred rooster from his training cage into the cane field.  From then on his name was Palani, the Free Cock. 

Time heals many wounds and the other caged gladiators watched with aching envy as Palani slowly flew from the acacia, to the plumeria and finally to the guava trees at the edge of the cane. 

Freedom….freedom, they crowed with vast longing at first light. Palani’s wings and tail shined like the black obsidian glass that flowed from Mona Kea.  Clipped by the Man then scarred during the Wars, his bright red comb now paid homage to Pele’s fountaining lava.  The feathers that covered his head looked to be hammered from bright copper shields that flowed down to a thick, shining neck and finally onto his strong, black back. It was no wonder that one night Ikaika summoned Palani from the dark cane field to sire her brood

Koa and Makaha hatched on a day in August when the trade winds rolled the ocean into white-capped waves and filled the yard with the fragrance of plumeria, guava and pineapple.   The warm sun quickly dried Koa and Makaha’s thick black down. They had inherited their parents’ black beaks, black eyes and the small nubs of future spurs on their slender legs. There were seven chicks in Koa and Makaha’s brood, a lucky number in gambling that pleased the Man.  Ikaika appeared to the chicks first as a black shadow, quietly clucking encouragement as they struggled to break free of their shells.    From that point on, the seven black chicks never wandered more than a few feet beyond her wings.  Those that did, even for a second…Makana the Gift, Nahoa the Defiant, Kei the Dignified, Aikane the Friend and sadly, Leialoha the Beloved One, fell to the fierce Mongoose that lurked in the cane edge shadows.

Only Koa the Bold, Brave and Fearless and Makaha the Fierce, Ferocious and Savage were alert and quick enough to dodge the catweasel’s sharp teeth as it exploded from the cane.   By their wits and speed alone, they survived to their first molt. Once their adult feathers fledged, it was clear the two young roosters were blessed with the strength of Ikaika, their mother, and the courage of Palani, their father.  Koa was pure black like his mother; Makaha was copper and black, like his father. 

It was during Koa and Makaha’s second molt, while the Man was away fighting the Honolulu Wars, that the three-foot Mongoose burst from the cane and raced across the yard, scattering the flock of hens and chicks.   Trying to protect her two sons, Ikaika stepped between the young roosters and the charging cat weasel.   Using her wings as shields and her beak as a spear, Ikaika fought to buy time.  “Run!” she ordered her sons.  The two brothers started to come to her aid but their mother’s warning crow left no room for disobedience.  “Fly to safety!” she crowed with all her might, the love of her sons clear in her last glance.  She then met the attacking cat weasel head on in a crash that filled the air with breast feathers and hair.  Safe in the acacia’s thorny branches, Koa and Makaha watched their mother, peck, fly, feint and lash out with her claws.  Ikaika’s last stand brought honor to the royal daughter of Kaimana. But, over the next half hour, the cat weasel’s weight and strength prevailed and she finally fell to the needle teeth and razor claws.

Without Palani to lead his soldiers, the Man lost the Honolulu Wars.  When the Man returned two days later with empty pockets and a bad nature, Ikaika was gone.  All that remained was a trail of black feathers leading into the cane.  From that day forward as a warning to his cocks, he called his gladiator school “Victory Or Death.”   It was not the first time the Man’s dark, hooded eyes came to rest on Koa and Makaha. It took him a week to catch the fleet roosters.  Chasing them was a waste of time.  Heeding their mother’s warning, they roosted high in the Acacia tree’s upper branches.   And so in the silent dark, before the first crow, he strung a fine filament fish net between the acacia and plumeria tree and when the young roosters flew down to feed, he chased them through the school into the unbreakable mesh.  From that day forward, their training in the art of close combat began in earnest.  He ran them on the treadmill until their legs were as hard as stone. To strengthen the chest muscles that powered their wings, when the long shadows crept across the school, he would fly them like kites on long tethers.  And seven crows before the Honolulu Wars he forced them to fight. The brothers never lost--not even to the old, scarred veterans who had seen the circular battlefields where the Honolulu Wars were fought.    Koa and Mahaka grew to be strong, quick and fearless.  And one day the Man looked from one to the other and showed his black teeth.

That night Palani glided from the acacia tree to the top of their cage.  Slipping his head through the wire, he charged them to listen carefully.  “Tomorrow the Man plans to match you in the fighting ring.  It makes no difference that he will not arm you with the killing spurs; I know neither of you will stop fighting until your last drop of strength stains the arena red.  If matched, it is in your blood to fight to the death. But also know now that while your destiny is to fight, you must never fight your brother.”

The two young roosters were honored and saddened by their father’s words.  

“You must leave!” Palani said.  “The time to crow is but a few hours distant.   The Man will fight you repeatedly in the Honolulu Wars for the sheafs of green paper he covets.   To capture that paper, he will do whatever it takes to bring you back. Remember one thing!  Move with speed and stealth down the river toward the ocean!”

Koa asked Palani what would happen to him with Ikaika and now his sons gone.   

“I am older now,” his scarred, copper colored head told them.   “My wounds from the Wars have stiffened my legs and the old spur cuts to my chest have weakened my wings.   It will not be long before my old enemy the catweasel catches me in the dark before the first crow.” Flying down to the gate, the wise bird opened the latch and pointed toward the ocean.   “Go that way,” he nodded down river.   “Eat insects where you can find them, grain if you can steal it, shoots of grass before you starve.  Roost in the high acacias during the night, use the thick palai huna ferns above the river to hide you when you travel.  Your journey will be long and hard.”  Then as he pushed them toward the river, he reached beneath his wing and gave them each a pair of steel fighting spurs. He had covered the blades with hollow bamboo and wrapped them with vines to protect them from cuts. 

“These  blades were made by the master samurai sword smith, Amakuni and his son, Amakura,”  Palanitold them.  “It is said that the great Amakuni and his son locked themselves at the forge where they prayed for seven days and seven nights to Japanese Shinto gods of war. Amakuni searched for the best iron ore in Japan.  Father and son used fire, water, anvil and hammer to fold the steel back upon itself until it was both strong and flexible.  The two committed their souls for thirty days without rest to the task. The Tachi blade was half finished when the kissaki tip broke back to the yokote.   For two days father and son were so saddened by the broken blade they could not work.  It was Amakura who finally decided the broken Tachi was a sign from the gods.  The blade had been too long to please the Samurai spirits.   Night’s silver eye was shining brightly when they returned to the forge.   That night, a strong black Phoenix Cock with a fire-red comb appeared at the forge.  Lit by the burning coal, your great uncle refused to run even when the heavy hammer rang the sword steel against the anvil and the hot sparks flew.  Both the Tachi and its broken kissaki would live again.    When Amakuni and his son emerged from the steaming shed, they held a single-edged curved sword and four glistening fighting spurs.  The other sword smiths laughed and called them crazy but Amakuni and Amakura ground and polished the new sword and spurs until they achieved a sharpness never achieved before or since. The sword was forged for the Emperor; the spurs for the black rooster.  Amakuni named your uncle Raidon, after the god of thunder.”

Palani paused then told Koa and Makaha, “I cannot say when you will need these terrible weapons, but I know one day you will be forced to use them.”   Then he added the last words both would live by …… “remember how proud your mother and I have been to call you sons.” 

Heads down, strong legs racing, the two young roosters crossed the open yard like two fleeing shadows. Beating his wings Palani then slowly labored up into the acacia and watched them follow the Man’s path above river until they disappeared into the dark beyond the distant bend. 

When their father warned that the journey to the sea would be long he could not know of the dangers beyond the fighting school. Koa and Makaha quickly learned there was not a single Mongoose to fear, but hundreds.   Palani had not told them of the wild cats or mongrel dogs or the ‘Io Hawaiian Hawk, or at night the pueo owl.  He could not know of the wild black pigs’ tusks or other strange Men who would gladly kill a wild chicken for a single meal.  Koa and Makaha had fled from the Man’s enormous red cow with round legs, but they did not know that thousands more filled the wide, black Man paths that blocked their way to the ocean.  After dodging a dozen bellowing cows, after the first crow they learned to cross at night when the shining eyes looked the other way.  

Two crows turned to three, three turned to six, six to sixteen.  Ikaika had taught her sons to count one wing feather for each crow, then to start again when night’s shining silver eye blinked shut.  In that way they counted through six silver eyes.   One wing through the seventh silver eye they ran out of luck.  The insects had been driven deep under ground by the desperate heat.  No grain or seeds remained.   Even the grass had shriveled and died.   And weakened by days without food, they made a mistake.  They did not see the black-muzzled dog hiding in the tall yellow grass. He was a chicken killer that killed for sport, not food.  Using his nose to locate the exhausted brothers, he slowly crept forward.

Camouflaged by the grass, the Pitbull burst upon Koa and Makaha.   It did not matter that the roosters were born to fight and trained to win, the dog had killed many chickens and knew to clamp down on the body and shake.   But the young fighting cocks were not egg laying Leghorn hens that scattered in terror when the ferocious dog burst upon them.  Instinctively they slipped like bullfighters around the onrushing fangs.   The dog’s powerful teeth clamped onto one of Koa’s tail feathers a second before its square head ripped upward.   The brothers turned to fly but the Pitbull was fast and cut Koa off.  Recognizing his brother’s peril, Makaha, lept into the air.  A second later the rooster’s bone spur pierced the dog’s ear.  Turning like a cat, the Pitbull caught Makaha by the wing. In a second the dog would improve his bite and Makaha would join his mother,Ikaika, and Makana, Nahoa , Kei and Leialoha in the great hall beyond the setting sun.  Calling upon his noble ancestry and honored name, Makaha drove his beak deep into the Pitbull’s nose.  The dog howled in pain and for one second loosened his grip.  It was just enough for Makaha to free his wing.  A second later, Koa’s slashing spurs swept across the Pitbull’s eyes leaving the dog momentarily blinded and terrified of what next would appear out of the dark.

He could not know it would be Mama Malama’s broom.   A thick handled, acacia thorn-tipped weapon, Mama’s broom was good for sweeping Centipedes and chicken-killing Pitbulls from her stone walled yard. The broom descended like a Hawaiian Eli’i’s war club, knocked the dog silly and allowed Koa and Makaha a second to fly over Mama Malama’s lava stone wall and into the cool refuge of her sheltered yard. 

Yellow bananas, orange guavas, mangos, pineapples, sweet white ginger, plumeria and orchid flowers surrounded Mama’s faded green plantation house.  Rare birds, the native bright crimson, curved beak I'iwi and the golden‘Akiapola‘au, sought shelter among the fruit, flowers and broad leaves of Mama Malama’s refuge.  These birds should not have been able to live at the low elevations next to the ocean. Near the breaking surf, Mosquitos carried diseases Hawaii’s endangered birds could not resist.  But something was killing the mosquitos.

There were other game fowl in Mama’s yard. Brightly fledged Bantams, gray Japanese Silkys, White Crested Chinese, Blue Andalusians, Golden Campines, Egyptian Fayoumis, three White Faced Black Spanish an ancient Phoenix and a short tempered Rhode Island Red. When Koa and Makaha flew over the wall, the Red rushed in to start the pecking ritual.  Tradition demanded that the flock peck the newcomers until it was decided who would lead and who would follow.  But as soon as the Red faced the brothers, he stopped.  None could mistake their royal breeding. The battered Roosters studied the surrounding flock then scratched at the hard soil in an expression of goodwill and peace.  After that, none in the flock needed to peck.

Koa and Makaha had been living in the cane and pineapple fields, sleeping in the acacias and dodging the Mongoose, dogs and cats for six and a half months and now knew how danger felt, smelled and looked before it rushed upon them.  Something was wrong in Mama Malama’s shadowy front yard and it did not take long to discover a name for it.  

“Beware the legged worms,” the fearful Aracuna crowed.    

The brothers did not know the term.

“The worms,” the Aracuna repeated, the fear clear in his soft crow and the terror that lived in the Bantam, Andalusian, Spanish and Chinese eyes.   “The worms with legs,” they fearfully glanced toward the thick banana plants that crowded the lava boulder wall.  “They come from the large hole between the rocks--many, many worms.”  

It was Makaha who first realized the flock feared Centipedes...the ferocious, stinging insects that their ancestors had fought since before the dawn of time.  Legends told how the first Fighting Cock had befriended the first Centipede.  For a time they peacefully shared the forest and fields.  But the lone Centipede turned into three Centipedes, then a dozen, then a hundred. The Fighting Cock tried to reason with the many-legged worms.   He warned that if their numbers continued to expand into the green jungles, clear streams and vast savannahs, they would soon leave no room for roosters and their hens and chicks.

“We Centipedes require only a hundred brothers and sisters,” the King Centipede had hissed, “to do the work of building a nest, no more.”   But the numbers increased to two hundred, then a thousand, until one day as the first cock followed the path that led to the grain field, thousands of Centipedes attacked him from the jungle edge.    He barely avoided the squirming thicket of poison tipped fangs but his sister and mother were not as swift or strong.  Both ended their time, fluttering on the ground as the Centipedes stung again and again.   From that moment on Fighting Cocks and Centipedes were mortal enemies. 

The brothers had gladly destroyed every Centipede they met in their journey from the fighting school to Mama Malama’s. The fierce Makaha had been stung, but only once.  The poisonous bite on the wing badly wounded Makaha.  A second bite from the twelve-inch insect would have finished the copper colored brother.

“Who among you have been attacked?” Koa asked.

The Bantam replied, “only one.” The flock parted to show a small Dominique hen that had been stung before her first molt.   She now could not stand for more than a few seconds without her wings extended to brace her balance.  Her mind was gone and only Mama Malama was kind enough to care for the damaged Dominique.

“There are many……many and many in the wall” the exotic  but wise Sumatra rooster warned.  “Mama Malama has been stung.  Twice.  If she is stung once more, she will end her days of moving.”  

“Who will feed us then,” the handsome but silly Araucana wondered.  

At that moment the kind Mama Malama appeared and scattered grain in front of the starving brothers.  Shooing the rest of the flock away, she let Koa and Makaha eat until they could hold no more, and then gave them clean water.   She showed them a high place to roost in the fragrant plumeria tree that embraced her small farm home. The old house sat on the beach, just beyond the soft curl of breaking waves, beneath a hundred coconut trees. The house had been owned for three generations of Malamas and a thousand generations of ground termites.   It was a small house on a big piece of land and though developers had offered Mama a new house in Honolulu and enough money for a new car and a life without worry, she shook her large gray haired head.

In the crows that followed, Mama Malama loved the two fighting cocks like her two sons who had long since moved to Honolulu where they owned six lei stands.Grain and water appeared in the morning, the trade winds in the afternoon, the soft off shore breezes that carried the distant smell of pineapple fields to Mama Malama’s dirt yard.In the evening she would sit on the porch swing and with the flock gathered around her would sing of the old voyages, songs that calmed Koa and Makaha and summoned visions of rolling seas, creaking masts and distant clouds.

Twenty crows after Koa and Makaha were saved by Mama Malama, the Centipedes came.  Not one, or two, but three at a time.   Then five then a hundred and a thousand of the many legged stinging worms until the ground shivered with their numbers.   The two fighting brothers were awakened by the alarmed squawk of the Araucana.   The handsome but foolish fowl had roosted on the ground.  He had been stung in his sleep and now lay flopping in the yard as the Centipedes swarmed over him.  The bright cock soon shivered and lay still.   A moment later, the light exploded above the slithering, twisting mass.  Ignoring the danger, Mama Malama stomped into the yard.  Using her powerful arms, she swept the stinging worms from her path with the spined, acacia-thorned broom.   She reached the dying Araucana and gently picked up the black, red and golden rooster.

It was a mistake.  The Centipedes closed around her and four pairs of sharp fangs punctured the toes on her right foot as six more found the ankle on her right.  Mama Malama screamed and gathering the rooster staggered back into the house.   But the damage had been done.  Soon a screaming cow with flashing eyes stopped in front of the house.  It took eight Men to carry Mama Malama from the house to the screaming cow which swallowed her and roared off into the dark. 

The terrified flock ran in circles around the house.  Only Koa and Makaha knew what they must do. Palani, their father, had warned of this day. Their ancestors from before the beginning of time had fought this battle a thousand upon a thousand times. And against this moment, the two fighters scratched open the vault where they had buried Amakuni and Amakura’s beautiful spurs. With the spurs laid on a sacred stone, they started the purification rite.   In the morning, when the stinging worms had returned to the wall, Koa and Makaha refused the grain that remained in the feeder.   They did not dust to kill the mites that sought refuge in their wing feathers.  Instead they crossed the beach to the ocean where they stood on the sand, let the waves touch their feet, and committed their spirits to Kaimana, the Divine Power of the Sea.  Dipping their heads in the foamy salt water, they honored the courage and strength of Ikaika, their mother.  Then, wading fully into the breaking waves, they called upon their father Palani’s fierce fighting spirit and love of freedom.

As the morning trades dried their feathers, they climbed back across the sand and flew onto Mama Malama’s clothesline.  There they unclipped her white lace blouse and using their claws, cut it into long strips, which they then wound around their muscled bodies and powerful legs.  When the last wrappings were tied off, they silently removed the bamboo sheaths from Raidon’s killing spurs and carefully mounted them to their own bone spurs. The blades were razor sharp.  Even the soft, trade wind moaned as the perfect edge divided it from itself   Offering a last thanks to their ancestors Kaimana, Ikaika, Palani, their sisters and brothers Makana, Nahoa , Kei and Leialoha,  they strutted across the yard to the lava wall where two Centipedes stood guard. The brothers could not know and did not care that these ancient insects were the honor guard, twelve inches long, an inch thick, with two-inch long fangs that held the poison.  Behind them a black hole, polished to a glassy shine by the passage of millions of Centipedes, led to the dark underworld below the lava wall.

 The two brothers closed the distance in balanced strides, steady, alert--and braced for the attack they knew would come.  As the stinging worms opened their fangs and rushed toward Koa and Makaha, the razor spurs flashed in the bright morning sun and the advance honor guard was reduced to a dozen wiggling segments.   Their end was swift, but not swift enough to prevent the dying Centipedes from raising the alarm.    

 In seconds, two more huge, many-legged soldiers wriggled from the hole.  Again Koa and Makaha’s glistening spurs flashed and the sting worms were cut to pieces. Two more appeared at the hole and the brothers bent to the battle.  As the fangs snapped open to poison Koa and Makaha their blades flashed again and the worm segments clattered to the ground.  Koa’s fighting ancestors spoke to his heart.   He knew if he and Makaha could fight the attacking worms at the entrance hole, they could even the odds.  He could not know of the legends of the Spartan’s heroic battle at Thermopylaewhen three hundred determined warriors fought against fifty thousand invading Persians.

Ten minutes passed in the fierce battle with the stinging worms that continued to wriggle from the polished volcanic entry. The decapitated worms piled up around the two warriors and they scratched them back.  Soon they were surrounded by the twitching segments. And still the Centipedes poured out of the polished black gates to the underworld.

The day grew hot, the trades died and the brothers were tested by the hard, searing battle.   There was no water or food in front of that grim hole and they slashed and scratched, pecked and feinted away from the poisonous fangs.  The terrified flock crowed their support from the high roosts but they were never born to fight and could not fly down to help.  As morning turned to afternoon and the long shadows crossed the battlefield, the brothers’ dry throats wished only for a sip of water.  When the worms fell, one after another, the brothers did not crow in triumph but continued their deadly work in silence.   Mama Malama’s lace wrappings were now stained with the yellow poison and green blood of the sting worms.  And still the brothers fought, slashing at the suicidal worms until piles of the dead, segmented bodies surrounded them.  

And then a scratching that had occupied the late afternoon hours grew and suddenly a new hole burst open further down the wall and dozens of Centipedes poured into the yard.  Closing to protect their backs, the brothers fought with new fury.  The flashing spurs ripped holes in the ranks of the attacking worms.  Still the brothers were pressed back by the numbers.

It was late afternoon and the brothers were exhausted when Makaha dropped his wings for a split second.  Slipping between his defenses, a huge worm’s grasping fangs found their mark.  The fierce Makaha took the sting on his leg, high above the spur. The brave rooster knew the poison would slowly climb to his heart.  His time was limited and forgetting his thirst, aching muscles and burning lungs, he fought with his father’s courage and his mother’s strength. The worms paid the price for that lone blow.  Hundreds died in the next minutes as the light faded.  And as the flock shivered at the carnage from the acacia tree, the numbers of worms seemed to hesitate, then slow.  Not all at once but gradually, the hundreds thinned to fifty, to twenty, to ten until the brothers stood alone, exhausted, surrounded by piles of segmented, twitching sting worms.

Makaha could feel the poison creep up his thigh and knew it was only minutes before his leg collapsed and he would tumble helplessly to the ground.  It was then, as both brothers’ wings were drooping to the red earth, something moved in the dark shadows behind the gates to the underground.   The rocks splintered and from the darkness one last, enormous Centipede slithered from the wall.  No scientific explanation could account for the size of the giant insect. Four feet long, three pounds in weight, four inches thick with twelve-inch fangs, it had been born in the time before time when Roosters and Centipedes lived in peace.  Now, the gigantic worm advanced on the brothers. Koa looked at Makaha and realized the poison had taken his leg.  The paralyzed Fighting Cock now lay on his side.  He could offer no help.   Reaching deep within his feathered chest for courage, Koa alone faced the hissing King of the Centipedes.  

The battle in the shadows of Mama Malama’s yard would be clucked and crowed over for a thousand generations to come.  Somewhere, in the distant hall of ancestors, Kaimana watched his grandson fight the King Centipede.  Other Warriors, now passed onto the higher world, gathered around Kaimana and crowed his fearless grandson’s power, courage and unwavering determination.

The King Centipede’s exoskeleton was as thick as plate steel and instead of cutting, only sparks flew from Koa’s slashing spurs.  For more than an hour Koa’s beating wings and feinting head kept the massive worm at bay but the weight of the huge Centipede slowly began to wear Koa down.  As the wounded Makaha lay shivering on the ground, Koa slashed and feinted.  His steel spurs and powerful legs scarred and dented the thick carapace but the huge worm kept attacking.   Each time the deadly fangs closed near Koa’s body, the distance was closer.  The huge head rose more than two feet above Koa’s wings and the King Centipede slowly pressed the courageous warrior into the ground.  

The huge fangs struck a final time, circled Koa’s feathered neck and slammed the warrior into the dirt.  Koa knew the end was near and gathering his last strength, vowed to die well.  Watching from the trees above, the Flock cackled with fear and from the distant hall, Kaimana braced himself for his grandson’s end.   The King of the Centipedes pressed down on Koa, taking the fearless Cock’s last breath.  Fighting to the last, Koa drove upward with Raidon’s spurs.   Razor sharp they scratched but did not penetrate the Centipede’s thick belly plates.   Koa’s vision started to blacken from the outside in.  He was grateful for this final chance to honor those that had come before.  Slashing with his ancient spurs and last breath, he prepared to meet his mother, brothers, sisters, Kaimana, and the thousand of ancestors who had brought honor to his flock. In a second more, the King Centipede fangs would release their hold on Koa’s powerful neck, then stab deeply into his body.  The poison would course through Koa’s heart and he would shiver his life away.  

Koa said goodbye to the light.  With the last of his fading vision, he saw a faint movement then a shadow sweep across the setting sun that pointed the way to the great hall. Something sparkled, some sharp thing that made the wind cry.  A second later the Centipede’s crushing weight lifted as the huge worm snapped into a defensive ball.  Summoning the will of a thousand upon a thousand generations, Makaha had fought through the poison.  The last of his power flowed into his wings and he lifted off the ground.  Dragging his paralyzed leg, the copper colored Rooster slashed at the King Centipede.   A foot long antenna crashed to the ground.  A second later, the other dangled uselessly from the massive head. Releasing his grip on Koa, the powerful insect attacked Makaha slamming the wounded bird to the ground.  

Its antenae now useless, the King used its dim vision to search the ground for the wounded warrior.  At that moment, Koa’s breath came clean and clear and in a flash the courageous rooster vaulted off the ground and drove Raidon’s left spur deep into the Centipede’s eye.  Perhaps it was the spirits of Kaimana and Ikaika that guided the sharp point to the King’s tiny, primitive brain.  The terrible insect hissed in agony then began to squirm, twist and shiver.  Green blood streamed over the golden carapace, the hundred legs ran without rhythm and after an hour, the massive, poisonous King grew still.   

Surrounded by the dead and dying Centipedes, the exhausted warriors collapsed on the ground where they lay without moving until the flock finally lost their fear and flew down to bring them water.  That evening as the sun slipped beneath the distant horizon, a green flash filled the sky, a tribute from the distant hall where Kaimana, Ikaika and the ten thousand ancestors between, honored the courage of the two Heroes.  

It was the next morning when Mama Malama returned.  The doctors had treated her stings with an antidote.  They told her that a second later and the antivenom would not have worked.  The swelling subsided and though she would limp for a month, she would recover.  All stared in disbelief at the terrible battleground that covered the dirt yard.  Tens of thousands of Centipede soldiers lay around the poisonous King.  The newspaper came to take photos of the carnage as scientists from the University of Hawaii arrived to take the King Centipede back to Honolulu for study.   

Soothed by Mama Malama’s loving care, Koa and Makaha slowly healed.  Koa’s bruised throat and torn wings regained volume and strength.   Makaha’s poisoned leg gradually regained feeling and in two weeks he was able to walk again.  He would always bear a slight limp as a remainder of the ferocious battle but would fight again.  

One day a Man beat loudly on Mama Malama’s gate. When she opened it, the Man from the Victory or Death fighting school said he read the newspaper.  He knew Mama had his roosters.  No doubt.  He wanted them back.  Now. He tried to push into the yard but Mama’s enormous flowered Mumu blocked the way. 

She told him she didn’t know about two roosters. Her flock had always been her flock and would stay her flock.   Once in the flock she didn’t know strangers.  All she knew was the flock.  With that she slammed the gate.

“Those Roosters are my property!” the Man yelled. “I’ll be back with the Police! We’ll see who owns them and who doesn’t!!!!” 

Palani had warned Koa and Makaha that the Man coveted the green paper and the two warriors knew he would be back.  Even though their wounds had not healed sufficiently to travel, they bid goodbye to Mama Malama’s safe yard, the rich grain and pure water and the flock that now honored the terrible battle they fought.  Mama Malama was wise in the ways of the world and while she tried to persuade the two young roosters to stay until their wounds were fully healed, she understood their destiny lay somewhere down the road.  

Koa and Makaha returned Amakuni and Amakura’sspurs to the bamboo sheaths and tucked them under their wings.  Then pausing at the gate they crowed their thanks to Mama Malama and promised the flock if they were ever needed again, they only needed to crow and their cry would be picked up by other cocks until it reached them wherever they might be.  And as Mama Malama and the flock waved goodbye, the two brothers followed the twisted bougainvillea vines toward the distant, high cloud covered mountains.