The Last Koala

• Tiana Sorensen, Grade 4, Rochedale State School
• Short Story
• 2014

Finalist in the 'The Text Generation 2014' competition

I peered across the horizon at all of the felled trees. Memories of the lush green forests came flooding back to me. I began to feel a little twinge of nervousness. Could this happen to my family? No. It couldn’t. As I continued to watch, I heard distant cries of distress. Wait! I’m sure there were trees there a second ago. I had heard tales of yellow monsters with steel chains taking away our homes. I had thought that the tales were told to make us stay near our families. As I watched in horror, the yellow monstrosities came over the mountains like villains. I shimmied down my tree and ran helter-skelter away from the nightmare unfolding in front of my eyes. Suddenly, I remembered my family. I had left them behind. I ran back the way I had come when, all of a sudden, I saw my family before me. They lay still, bleeding and dead. I saw a steel monster approaching me. That was all I remember...
When I awoke, newspaper and television cameras were clicking. I wondered in my stunned and grief-stricken state what the fuss was all about. And then I heard a human saying, “This is presumed to be the last koala.”
I later learned that they had named me Eucalypt. Try as I might, I couldn’t get the sight of my murdered family out of my head. I spent many nights crying. I knew that I was getting older and when I died, the entire koala population would be extinct. A few weeks later, my keeper was taking me out for a walk on the now dry and barren land, when we saw a Eucalyptus tree. It was only young and not very tall. However, it was what we saw next that excited us. In the fork of the tree, there were two koalas! I was quickly carried back to spread the exhilarating news. We returned to the tree laden with towels and everything we needed to capture the koalas so that they would be able to live and breed in safety. I was not the last koala after all.
It seems a long time ago. Now they understand and respect me.