I would look through that old fairytale book I loaned you, many of those involve animals and many of them are not very well known. There's also another book of the same downstairs on that square table display thing. Even if you don't use any of the stories contained therein outright, they might feed your subconscious, especially as it applies to using animals as figures in what are, quintessentially, morality plays.

Bonus points for the fact that most of those fairy tales are public domain, although the specific translations in those books are copyrighted.

The first thing that comes to mind is the story "The Little Match Girl", in the Andersen's book, it's a story about a poor little girl who freezes to death in the snow on Christmas while dreaming about having a family and a home. It's a powerful story, and one that you could easily create an animal version of the little girl, perhaps a scruffy looking alley kitten.

I think the older fairy tales have much more powerful imagery than the new ones, much as I loved An American Tail and the such like.

If you are lazy, here: http://www.andersen.sdu.dk/vaerk/he.....tchGirl_e.html

Thanks for the link, I'll give it a read at some point.

Hmm... as I love cheetahs so much I do write stories with them as protagonists. Like the story of two cheetah brothers, being watched by a young African boy, who lost his legs due to cancer and has to wear prosthesises instead. So this boy loves cheetahs for the way they can run, he admires them and often leaves his grandparents house at night to visit the two brothers. So he tries hard to help save them and becomes a gamekeeper. He still visits them as often as possible. They give him hope. One night he hears the sound of a rifle being loaded. He attacks the poacher and manages to keep him busy for the cheetahs to flee, but he gets shot. Still he fights on and the poacher turns tail and runs. The moon shining above the scene, the guy, Tamanio, rests himself against a treetrunk. The cheetah brothers come back and keep him company, consolingly licking him, until he finally dies. Since that time the name "Tamanio" is still known in the cheetah population. It means "hope".

(I think one of these days I should translate it).

There are two more stories with cheetahs in. One is the story of Khisa, and it starts with the words "Once upon a time", telling my version of the story how cheetahs got their spots and tear marks. Most people told me it's a lovely story. Khisa does not feel human very much but deeply attached to all the wild animals. One day she finds a duma giving birth to a litter. She starts visiting them daily. But the cheetahess does not find enough food, so one of the cubs, the girl, dies. Khisa steels the arrows and and the slingshot of her brother (the story is set around 10,000 years ago) and starts hunting for them. The mother does accept and so the two male cubs survive. Khisa has to learn to do her dailies, she's forced by her mother and kept at home and in company with the other children until she behaves better. Then she's allowed to be free again. Her grandmother already says she's not like the others. After a while the mother leaves and never returns, making it just the two brothers. The stronger one finally dies after a fast hunt, his heart was too weak. And it's the beautiful cheetah to remain alive, and Khisa spends her days and soon even her nights with him, they drink and hunt and cuddle (nothing more, no). The moon likes the couple and both of them long for Khisa to become a cheetahess. As the moon is seperated by the night from his own love, the sun, he shows his mercy and fulfills their wish, warning them for his jealous wife, the sun, they shall never see her again as she'd burn the first one to ashes. They promise to keep to the night and so it goes. When Khisa finally is in heat they do celebrate life and do not recognise the signs of the early sunrise. When they do, it's too late and Khisa's love covers her with his body, being burnt to ashes. So she's all black and flees into the cave where they've spent the days. After three days she leaves again, needing to drink as she's pregnant. She has to survive. She visits the black spot where the accident happened. Khisa's not bound to the night anymore. She loves her cheetah so much, her heart is all broken and she starts to cry. The moon, their best friend, looks right into her heart and is touched by her love and pain and accompanies her, silent tears falling down from heaven as well. After a while she gets up to drink at the pool and realises that the wind has blown away the black ashes, but where her tears streamed down and the tears of the moon touched her fur, the ashes remained. She tries to rub the spots and marks away, but she does not succeed. From this day on cheetahs have those markings and show the deep love of this lad for his cheetahess.

If you'd like to hear some more of my stories in short form, just tell me ^^ - they are all written in German, otherwise I had them linked to you. Damn, I'm translating so much stuff for others and don't manage to work on my own stories. ;)

Erm, actually I wrote several cheetah stories, but those seem especially suitable. There is still one, I could post, but I don't want to bore you.