IP: 137.147.200.160
Posted on January 23, 2013 at 01:09:40 AM by amorak
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He remembered it - remembered the heat, the noise and the surge of adrenaline like he'd never felt before. He had been a fool to stay so long despite his mate's warning - despite his King's warning! - and yet some part of him needed to make sure the others were safe. Some years ago, he would have just left without a care in the world but Trenus had become his first real home. He'd had his Brooke there, his children and all the pack mates that had stood strong alongside him. He'd been given purpose and meaning and for that he wished to repay it - and repay he did. He'd not been able to find those that hid away within their dens or even those that had continued as if their days were not numbered - he'd been forced to leave and perhaps luck had been on his side that day for only days after he'd left did the impact occur. From his makeshift den he had heard the thunder and cracking of the world; he'd felt the blast of heat that dried his eyes and threatened to singe his fur. He'd stood in watch, almost in awe, as the world before him sunk and twisted into itself - fire, liquid stone and smoke poured from the earth. Even the nights had been illuminated by a red glow. He'd just been thankful he had not been able to hear the pained screams of the others - had their been any? He knew his Brooke had made it. He knew Malina and Tenshi had made it. Amuguaq and Kaltag had been gone for so long before the accident - they, too, were surely safe. But where were they?
For almost two years he had wandered as a loner once more - at one point, perhaps, he had banded together with a small collective of rogues. It had not been a simple life; thievery, brawls, nights spent completely and utterly alone in a barren landscape. Never had he forgotten the red land he had claimed as his home - never did he forget the nights spent beneath moonlight with his dearest Brooke. They had been there with him each and every night as he lay beneath the stars. He'd changed but perhaps not so much as he would have himself believed; he had become stronger, his mind set on finding the one thing he would have fled from so long ago - the prospect of his family. And for two years he did so, exhausting his body and soul until finally he rediscovered it... he rediscovered the land he had once known as Moladion. Heyel. Malina. Belinda. Even the bastard Tobias that had tried so long ago to take his eye - he found their scents distant and cold in the earth but there. He had followed them, all the scents that the deepest part of his mind recognised. Some were so foreign and yet so familiar - passing smells he had found in the old falls of Moladion or strewn across the clearing. He ignored the ache in his joints as he worked through the night, his nose taking him through new forests and strange outcrops. Each and every landmark thick with the scent of other wolves - he had found home, or at least a shadow of it. And there she was. She was as unfamiliar as anything, a strange silhouette within the sandy shoreline of the lake. He had been making his way through the underbrush, unconcerned for whether he was heard or not when he had spotted her; the first wolf he had found there in the new land. Instantly, he froze as his mismatched gaze settled on her black and white form. Slowly but surely, however, he began to emerge from the underbrush, allowing a short yip to escape his chest. Had she seen him at that point, she would have seen a wolf utter confused; eyes wide, head tilted slightly and movements slow... cautious. Eventually though, he came within yards of her, settling some distance away beside her in the sand - for a moment he simply starred out over the lake. So much like the old lake, it had been, that he found himself sighing in relief before he slowly turned to face the stranger. His movements were still somewhat stiff and a little awkward; the idea of socializing had always been a difficult one for him, but for so long he had been alone that now it seemed like some kind of grand challenge. "I'm sorry but do I know you? Your scent... I feel like I remember it somehow," he knew deep down they had never met - there had been so many that he'd never met and yet, he remembered so much of the old world. Perhaps at some point she had been a part of it? "Were you here... before it happened? I remember a lake so much like this one and yet, I know it's gone."  |
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