se lse abt the kirk!Introducing……………Wee
Kirky
Within the walls of a church on the Isle of Brandon, four feet hang in the air above a wee furry body attached to a long curling tail. In seconds the body turns, the eyes are alert and the four tiny feet are ready to move into action if needed.
Wee Kirky is the kirk mouse, the only mouse who
lives in that cold unheated place. He has avoided the bluefood
tempting him to join his ancestors in mouse heaven, and continues to enjoy life
to the full, sustaining himself on Sunday offerings and the occasional foray to
places around the building that he has chosen as his home. Life is simple and
carefree until one day another mouse moves into his place and threatens his
space.
Wee Kirky Click the play button to hear Auntie Ray read the chapter or read it for yourself below.
Chapter One The Sunday Offering
A
nose and whiskers poked through the tiny gap between two large stones.
This was Wee Kirky’s look-out spot. He sniffed, wiggled his nose and
ruffled his whiskers. It was cold out there in the bigspace
today. He could smell the cold. It made his nostrils tingle. He pulled
his head back in and scooted behind the gap in the skirting board. With
careful footwork, he pulled his fluffy little body up the cable and
onto the pieceofwood that served as his home. It had been
rather bare and skelfy when he’d found it, but now it was cosy and
warm-his little nook to curl up in and snooze for as long as he liked.
He’d furnished it with some lovely pieces of kitchen roll, a small
piece of cloth and lots of paper shreddings. He’d found all of these in
the place behind the wall. That was where the bighumans
went and disturbed his snoozing. They made noises with their mouths and
clattered about a lot. But they didn’t come too much at the minute.
They didn’t like the cold and waited for the bigheat to come before they came into the place more often. It was great when they weren’t around to disturb him.
Wee
Kirky lay back in his snug little nest and closed his eyes. In moments
his tiny body relaxed and he began to dream. No sooner had the dream
started than it ended. A loud bang opened one eye in alarm. Four little
feet scuttled down the cable and out through the gap in the skirting.
Wee Kirky poked his nose out of his look-out and drummed his feet on
the ground behind him. He’d forgotten all about them. They had begun to
arrive. He had to hurry or it’d be too late. He needed to be in the
right place or his whole week would be in jeopardy. This was his chance
to gather and store, but he had to be quick. He shot back to his nest,
scrabbled around under the shavings and emerged with a broken pencil
lead in his mouth and a piece of paper scrap in one of his front paws.
Carefully he slid down the cable, pushed past the hole in the skirting
and was on his way slithering under doors; taking a short-cut through
gaps in walls, until eventually he was on the bigclimb. This
was the dangerous part. He had to get up there without being seen or
causing alarm. One day last year, he’d been spotted. He’d caused such
an uproar that his ears wouldn’t hear properly for days afterwards. He
hadn’t got his supply that day and had suffered in the week ahead. He’d
had to carefully avoid the temptation to eat the blue food left in
inviting corners for him. He knew what that would do. His friend
Minnie, bless her, had eaten some of that and been stone cold dead in
an hour after that particular little lunch. No he wasn’t going to be
tempted!
Wee Kirky watched as bigfeet passed back and forwards. He knew the drill. All this activity, then there would be a quiet time when bigfeet went away up to the back. That would be his chance. He waited. He watched. Sure enough the bigfeet
disappeared into the back spaces. Wee Kirky looked around, sniffed the
air then shot up the stairs as fast as his three legs would take him.
He gasped for breath as he laid down the lead and paper scrap. Then he
stretched himself flat and took up his watch. He was as high as he
could be, right above the place where the blackhuman came to
stand and make noises to the other humans. That was when the others
just sat. That was when he watched them ever so carefully. Sometimes
there weren’t too many of them. Wee Kirky didn’t like that. His
gathering would be poor then. He liked it best when there were lots,
especially when there were weebighumans. He got a good gathering when they were about.
Wee
Kirky’s ears pricked up. It was time to lie really low. He pulled
himself back from his watching spot and slid behind a panel. There he
waited as the bighumans came in. He couldn’t see them, but he
could hear them. The door opened and closed. They came in, made mouth
noises, then sat on one of the shiny seats. At least they used to be
shiny. Now they had soft cloth on them. Wee Kirky had liked them better
when they’d been shiny. He used to run along, get up a bit of speed,
then flip onto his back and slide right to the end. It had been GREAT
fun.
“Oh! Oh!” thought Wee Kirky,” Time to cover up!” His paws pulled down his eartips. He had heard the bigroofnoise begin. He pressed his eartips harder and waited for the REALbignoise to begin. He closed his eyes tight to try to help shut it out. He HATED this bit. The bighumans made mouth noises along with the bigroofnoise.
The noise deafened his wee sensitive ears. Even when it stopped, he
couldn’t hear a thing. He was only beginning to hear a little again
when it started AGAIN and AGAIN and AGAIN. And that was when he crept
out with his lead and his paper. The blackhuman was making
noise. All the others were quiet. He scanned their faces, starting at
the back. Just as well his eyes weren’t buzzing like his ears were.
One, Two, Three. He looked at each face for the sign. Four. Yes four
was a hit. He made it a bigger dot with his lead. Next row. One,
Two,
Three, Four, Five. Nothing there. Next row. One. Yes that was a hit.
Two, Three. Next row. One,yes, Two,yes, Three,yes, Four,yes. Good haul
there. Back to the top again on the other side. One, Two. Yes, that was
a hit. Three. No. Noisy one three. The eyes were closed and there was
noise coming from above the mouth. Four, Five, Six. Next row.
Wee
Kirky worked his way down the rows making notes with his piece of lead.
Just in time, he shot back behind the panel and pressed his eartips
hard against his head. The REALbignoise had started again. But this one was the last one. Soon the noise would finish, the bigfeet
would go away and he’d be able to collect his store. And so he did.
When all was quiet, Wee Kirky checked the rows of seats. Sure enough,
he found a crumb here, and a morsel there. Carefully placing each piece
inside his cheeks, he gathered and gathered more. The offering had been
good today. It would see him over the next week and a bit more too.
After a final scurry along each seat, he scampered back to his cosy
nest, buried his lead, placed the paper scrap amongst his bedding and
prepared to empty his cheeks. A few sweet crumbs, a tiny flake of
chocolate and a whole mint fell into his treat corner. He looked at his
store and smiled to himself.
“Good
takings today!” he thought. The mint would give him weeks of licks
before he was able to crunch it into bitesize little pieces. He tried a
lick just to make sure. “Mm. Too good! Too good!” he thought to himself
before curling up in his cosy corner for a well-earned rest.
Chapter Two Something new in the space behind his
place
It was quiet, just the way Wee Kirky liked it to be. He stretched his body and tail to its
full extent and turned over on his back, wiggling his paws in the air. Back on
all fours again, he hooked his tail around the top of a nail and let his body
fall below to do his early morning swings. He had to keep fit and his morning
routine helped. He slid down the cable, and in an instant, all four feet and his
tail were scurrying out from behind the skirting, under a door, and out into the
bigspace beyond. Once there, Wee Kirky stopped to breathe in lungfulls of lovely fresh air. The sun was just beginning to
warm the bigspace and it felt good.
Wee Kirky looked all around before running into
the open. It was a dangerous place to be, out here. Sometimes there were bigshinies waiting to pounce on a mouse that wasn’t
careful. You’d hear them whir and drone, then suddenly they would move. They
were worse down below on the stickyhardland.
They appeared in seconds and moved so fast that it was difficult to get out of
their way. Wee Kirky double-checked. No bigshinies were around today. He scampered at
full-speed this way and that all over the place. He liked this. It made him
stop and start and change direction very quickly. He
was actually quite a skilful mover, and he knew that this daily routine helped
to keep him that way.
After a few minutes he stopped to catch his breath, then scooted round the corner of the bigwall. In front of him was a piece of broken pipe
resting on a drain. He stepped inside, placed his two paws as high as they could
go, and was soon walking the pipe round and round and round. It didn’t go
anywhere, for the drain below held it. All it did was go round and round and round. Wee Kirky felt his muscles become firm and strong. This was a
great way to make him feel at his best. After a couple of minutes, he returned
to the safety of his nest, had a couple of licks of his mint, then curled himself up to have a little bit of shut-eye. This
was his mousenap time. It only lasted for a
couple of minutes, but it let his wee body rest after all its earlier exertions.
His eyes closed. His body relaxed. Everything was quiet. Wee Kirky began to doze off.
Suddenly, Wee Kirky was jolted awake by a HUGEbignoise, even louder than the REALbignoise that had deafened him the other time
when the blackhuman had been around. Something
was happening on the other side of his wall. He pulled his eartips hard against his head and waited for it to stop.
The HUGEbignoise happened again and again.
Despite the hurt to his ears, Wee Kirky was curious.
He had to see what was going on. He slid down his cable and very carefully edged
his nose beyond the skirting. He saw three pairs of bigfeet moving around. Alarm filled him as a bigpieceofwood slid past his nose almost pulling one
of his whiskers with it. After a moment it stopped sliding. Wee Kirky was worried. The bigpieceofwood was now right against his mousehole. He couldn’t get out. He pushed himself as
far as possible, but only his front legs and head were out. The rest of him was
behind the skirting. He drummed his legs on the ground. There was only one thing
to do- he’d have to use his emergency exit. He was contemplating just when to
make his way there when another HUGEbignoise began to happen. Just as well his
nose was inside this time, for the bigpieceofwood slid past at whisker-slicing speed.
This time, however, it went beyond his mousehole and came to a stop. Two big feet banged
against it and then banged it again. Wee Kirky held
his eartips tight against his head. Why did bighumans always have to make such noise? It made his
head ache.
He waited. The HUGEbignoises had
stopped. He waited again. He popped his nose carefully out of his mousehole and waited again. There was no noise, none
at all. He sniffed the air. It didn’t smell as if the bighumans were still about. He edged his body forward
and was soon completely out of his hole, pressed against the bigpieceofwood. He slithered forward, keeked round the end of the bigpieceofwood and satisfied himself that the bighumans had gone.
He shook his head from side to side to try to clear the noise from it,
and decided to have a look-see. Something had changed in this space. It wasn’t
like it used to be. There were things in it. Wee Kirky
darted about exploring here and there. More bigpiecesofwood were in other parts of the space. He
sniffed the air. He loved the smell of wood. He loved the TASTE of wood! Feeling
a bit peckish, he nibbled at the corner of the bigpieceofwood nearest to him. He chewed the
grains thoughtfully and closed his eyes. The taste was of the big trees a long
way off. As he chewed he could smell them. He thought it might be time to visit
there again soon. But it wouldn’t be today. He needed to stay from dark to light
when he went that far. It was too late to go now.
Wee Kirky stopped chewing, carefully placed the
grains in one of his cheeks and looked about himself. In front of him, rising
high above him, was one of those different pieces of
big wood. He’d seen one of these before. He had climbed one of these before.
You’d think it had been made for a mouse for there were tailholds to help you climb right up to the top of
it. Wee Kirky felt like a climb. He pulled himself up
onto the first tailhold, wrapped his tail around it then pulled
himself up to the next one. Soon he had climbed to the very last tailhold. He looked down and felt a bit dizzy. He was
a long way up, a VERY long way up. Just as well that he had those tailholds for it was a long way to fall. A mouse
could get hurt! Resting on the last tailhold he
stretched his front paws up as high as they could go and pulled his nose and
head right to the top. It was just as well that his tail was tightly gripping
its tailhold, for Wee Kirky couldn’t quite believe what he was seeing with his
very own beady little eyes. There was a mouse on the top of the bigpieceofwood. It was a BIG mouse with the longest
tail he had ever seen. Very slowly Wee Kirky uncurled
his tail and pulled himself onto the top of the bigpieceofwood.
He slithered closer to the BIG mouse and
stopped. It wasn’t moving. He crept closer and closer and closer and stopped. He
stretched out a paw to touch it. Still it didn’t move. Was it dead? Wee Kirky crept all around it examining it with care. It was big
and it was a mouse, but it didn’t have any fur. He looked closer, stretched out
his paw and touched its side. He heard a click and immediately, light filled the
BIG mouse’s body startling Wee Kirky with its sudden
brightness. He jumped back and saw that the mouse was now moving ever so
slightly. It was turning towards him. Its eyes were glowing red and its body was
bright green. Wee Kirky couldn’t move. He was
mesmerised by what was happening in front of him. The BIG mouse edged closer
until its red eyes glared directly into Wee Kirky’s.
And then it began to
speak.
Chapter
Three Speaking Cybermouse
He
listened and made appropriate squeaks as the BIG mouse told him about himself
and his life. He certainly had a lot to say. Wee Kirky couldn’t get a bite in
anywhere. The BIG mouse spoke in megabites and even gigabites. How he managed
to breathe and talk was a bit beyond Wee Kirky. But of course he was a
cybermouse, and cybermice don’t need to breathe. The only thing that stops them
is if their battery is flat or their cable is cut off from the power supply.
Wee Kirky suddenly wished that he could unplug this BIG mouse. He was getting a
bit tired of listening to him droning on. He was almost asleep behind his open
eyes, and had to keep flinching to keep himself awake. As if some higher power
had heard his thoughts, the BIG mouse stopped in mid-bite. His body light went
off and his eyes lost their red glow. Wee Kirky waited to be sure, then lost no
time in escaping back down the bigpieceofwood that he had so recently climbed
up. He did want to speak to the BIG mouse, but today had been busy and he was
famished. He needed to be at his best the next time they met, so that he could
get a word in sideways. He knew that he could learn a lot from the BIG mouse,
he was a cybermouse after all, and cybermice knew so much. They could even
communicate with the bighumans. They could speak their language. He would like
to speak to humans. It would be fun to learn their strange language, but one
thing he didn’t want to do was learn how to make that awful mouthnoise that
they made every week when he was trying to gather his store. Now if he could
learn how to STOP their mouthnoise, that would be different altogether.
Wee Kirky shot off into his mousehole and up
to his place. He remembered the bits of wood nibblings in his cheek and put
them in his treat corner. Then he decided what was for eating and began
munching and chewing his way through what he had selected. He lay back and
munched, and when he’d had his fill, rolled over onto his back and took up his
favourite after-dinner-position, all four paws in the air with his tail curled
neatly under him.
He thought about the day and the day before.
He loved living here in this bigplace. It was his place, and his place alone.
Not another mouse lived here, at least not until today, when he’d discovered
the cybermouse. But that wasn’t a REAL mouse. He was a REAL mouse, a fit mouse
and a clever mouse. He’d managed to live here even with the blue food as a
temptation.
It wasn’t the best place he’d ever lived in,
but it was the quietest. Wee Kirky liked quiet. He loved the peacefulness and
stillness of this bigplace. He sometimes wished it were warmer, but you can’t
have everything. Bigplaces can be cold. They are BIG after all. He turned over
and curled himself up amongst his paper shreddings. It was cosy in his little
place, he’d made it like that, and he loved ever corner of it. In an instant,
he was fast asleep, dreaming of chocolate cybermice and piles of wood shavings.