A hyena can play both parts. They can scavenge, waiting for tertiary consumers to finish eating, or they can be the tertiary consumer themself, the hunter. The most common species is the Spotted Hyena, and they roam the grasslands and savannas of Africa in packs called clans, which are led by females. They will eat anything, merciless beasts with hearts of hunger, driven by pure survival. If they do not know their next meal, they will simply kill one of their own. But in my opinion, the most distinguishing and by far the most deadly trait Hyenas possess? They have teeth strong enough to crush bones.

A friend’s family and my own had traveled to South Africa to go view the wildlife. On our first Game Drive (when you go animal spotting), I witnessed a hyena eat the hip bone of a buffalo, the strongest bone in the entire body. The Land Rover had been turned off by the Park Ranger, and everybody inside the vehicle stared in awe as the hyena swaggered to the buffalo, lowered its head, and took a bite of the bone. The crunch was audible even from our distance from the kill site. At that moment, the Hyena asserted its dominance amongst both the scavenger hierarchy and the predator hierarchy. They outranked vultures by severalfold, and whilst they were smart enough to keep peace with animals like the King of the Jungle - the Lion - they are completely capable of taking one on in a duel. The hyena did not pause after the first bite. Two others from the small pack joined the lone one and they feasted on the buffalo, reducing it to nothing but bloody horns.

Towards the end of our final game drive, the Rover cleared into an opening   It was a rather odd site, but it was a refreshing view compared to the never-ending forest. There were Rover tracks from other vehicles that had already driven through the clearing, and water from the recent downpour had collected in the treads. The sky was a hue of light and dark grey. The atmosphere smelled fresh and natural - like Mother Earth had taken a much-needed shower and now radiated the scents of a crisp air, wet soil, and dark green plants.

“It’s clear.” stated the Park Ranger who sat at the very tip of the vehicle.

The Rover accelerated from its position on the edge of the clearing, entering the opening and temporarily claiming it as its own. And then, to everyone’s surprise, the Rover stopped moving. The driver revved the engine over and over, trying to break free from the mud, but the tires would not budge.

“We’re stuck.” the Driver announced.

This was not the first time that the Rover had fallen to trenches of treads, so everybody onboard knew the protocol: disembark and wait for another Rover to come and get us out.

As I took my first few steps, it felt good to get the blood flowing in my legs. We had been sitting for nearly 4 hours. I stretched my whole body, before taking a few deep breaths with my eyelids shut. When I opened them, I froze

In the distance, maybe fifty meters away, stood a small pack of hyenas. Slowly advancing. Four of them. My eyes locked with each one for a few seconds. Every time I was greeted with black, glossy marbles. Marbles that had nothing inside.  All you could see in those eyes were several white circles, reflecting the light of the sky, each circle’s radius decreasing, each circle’s opacity decreasing. Emptiness. For a moment, I felt a connection with one of the hyenas. I assumed he was a young male, still learning how to hunt. He was slightly thinner than the others, perhaps an indication that he had to wait for higher-status hyenas to finish eating meals before he could.At the same time, I thought he was one of the more agile and ruthless members. Maybe he was eager to please the clan, or maybe that was just who he was. Our connection only lasted a nanosecond, but it felt like a millenia. In that period of time,  I traveled into the driver’s seat of the hyena. I was sitting in his brain, controlling him like a Sith Lord controls the Death Star. Every neuron in my body felt like they had been electrified with an immense voltage. My senses were on fire, smelling things almost a kilometer away. Every lesson my parents had taught me about being a kind and caring person poofed like magic, and all I felt was an incomprehensible desire to kill and survive. Filled with ruthless aggression, the world felt like my playground, and with my fast legs, focused mentality, and possibly the most dangerous set of teeth in the world, I felt like the bully on the block. Inhuman, and alive.

Although I am very pessimistic about this possibility, the hyena may have connected with me as well. His eyes clearly didn’t hint that at all, but something tells me in my heart that he was different, and had some soul. I don’t know what the hyena learned or saw when our eyes aligned. Perchance, for that nanosecond, his senses diminished, he was no longer a beast, and he walked on two limbs instead of four. His brain exploded with never-experienced feelings and sensations. His intelligence rocketed through the roof, but his olfactory glands dwindled. Perhaps the hyena’s brain has developed only as far as to survive, and emotions do not exist in his life. I do not know, I do not know. . .

This supernatural moment in time made me think of the life of a hyena. Rise, Hunt, Eat, Sleep. Rise, Hunt, Eat, Sleep. Repeat. Day in and day out. Their genetic code has evolved around this barbaric and remorseless mantra. They have no mercy for your prey, and hey had no mercy for the buffalo, just like how the expectations of the world have no mercy for me. The buffalo must survive the hyena, just like how I must survive the bar the world has placed so high. Just like how the buffalo sees emptiness in the eyes of hyena, I see that same blank slate in the eyes of my expectations. A hyena is ruthless, aggressive, and merciless, so is the pressure to succeed. Every tooth of a hyena’s teeth symbolizes an expectation: Grades, SAT scores, Parents, College, Social Life. When the beast finally catches its prey, it sinks its teeth in, slowly. As the buffalo wales in agony, I deteriorate, every expectation slowly snapping me.