The Benevolent Bee
The Benevolent Bee was like no other among his community. While his friends and family rapidly flapped their wings to travel across dangerous predatory land to obtain the nectar needed to produce their food and income, the Benevolent Bee chose a different path.
His friends often shamed him for his actions, claiming it is an act of cowardice to turn his back on their ways of life just to pursue an alternative path that did not express the true bravery of the bees. Oh, but how could he follow in his ancestors’ footsteps when he could vividly see that his community needed something else?
He knew the fate of his kind would be in his fuzzy, little hands the moment he watched Grandpa Bee get killed when Benevolent Bee was only a trainee. Grandpa Bee was performing his daily tasks, where he’d strive to obtain the nectar to bring back to the busy cooks that create the honey. As he buzzed his way towards a beautifully striking red flower, a human obliviously thundered past him, unaware of Grandpa Bee’s small-spaced presence in the world, and unintentionally knocked him over, causing him to topple off the flower and plummet against a thorn bush.
Benevolent Bee, just in his training session supervised by his Grandpa, was horrified upon witnessing his grandfather being wounded.
“Grandpa!” He cried in anguish, his arm outstretched for him, longing to be in his grandfather’s protective embrace once more. He buzzed his way towards the thorn bush and called out for him again.
“Young bee, I’m here.” Grandpa Bee hoarsely called out to his grandson.
“I can’t see you.” Benevolent Bee sobbed helplessly. “Where are you?”
“It’s okay, little one. It’s okay.” His grandfather attempted to soothe him, but to no avail.
“Where are you?” The young bee continued to cry as he desperately searched for his nowhere to be seen Grandpa.
“My dear boy, please stop. Please return home. Please stay away from the dangers of this world. I beg you.”
Benevolent Bee, now grown up, finally understood the underlying message his dying Grandpa was trying to send him. He finally uncovered the horrifying truth of the world they live in. The bitter truth is that if you are a bee, you are going to sacrifice your life to do your job. How could Benevolent Bee accept this truth? How could he stand by and watch everyone he knew risk their lives every single minute they are out of their beehive and not have a safe space to recover?
No, Benevolent Bee would not have it. And so, he strived to work as best as he could to completely comprehend the anatomy of their kind, and taught himself how to make healing remedies and surgeries of recovery. Before he knew it, Benevolent Bee was the beehive’s surgeon. He saved infinite lives of his people every single day just because he chose to follow a different path than the one everyone else took. He chose to ignore his friends’ ridiculing remarks along the way, discarding them in a pile he never explored, and placed his sole focus on becoming their beehive’s saviour.
Had he not accompanied his grandfather that one morbid afternoon and watched his own family die, Benevolent Bee would not have gotten his name describing his benevolence. He would have never fought to create a space to heal his people. Bees live a tough life trying to produce a delicious substance known as nature’s production of medicine — honey. The death of his grandfather drove him to become who he is today, and every day he saved another bee’s life, he would be honouring his grandfather.
Different is good. The world needs it in order for it to survive, and Benevolent Bee swore to always follow what his heart believed in — saving the lives of his hardworking community of bees, by being the best doctor the world of bees has ever seen.
