Call of the Wild

[Tenzin]

The subway car was half empty. Unsurprising given the hour.

Tenzin’s knee bounced. She’d scrubbed herself clean at the safe house, but she could still scent the faint tang of blood on her skin. Little worry circled Amy Pond’s fate; she trusted Jacinda’s leadership implicitly enough to know the woman would do whatever was best. She didn’t need Tenzin for that. And it was fortunate, really, for when Silver had bitten her from the dream, Tenzin’s usual calm evaporated. She couldn’t sit still. She couldn’t stay caged in human walls.

Only there was nowhere to go.

She could almost hear the whine seeking escape from her throat. The agitation itched up her skin with the need to run, far and fast, like her legs might eat up the miles and ocean between her and her pack; to find thick fur and wet noses and home. They had been the ones to nudge her in the direction of Moscow in the first place. She had a purpose here, and meaning, even if those things had yet to become clear. Trust was easy. Following direction was easy.

But why must she do it alone?

Restless fingers found the bracelets at her wrist, instinct reaching for the Silver’s fang. But of course the memory had found new purpose. Tenzin regretted nothing of the gift; the human company was valued, and undeniably things had been easier since Jacinda. But it was not enough either. Not without the wolfdream too.

She left the city’s transport tunnels when the moon was still high, drowned out by human light and stink. Long legs roamed a route to the surface. Tenzin loped through ever quieter streets until she didn’t know where she was. Suburban lights had faded, the city smells a lighter touch. Humanity itself a lighter touch. Then she ran. Ran like brushfire chased her from the den, thoughts reaching wide and desperate and confused. Reaching out to nowhere.

[Nox]

Chasing Butterflies was running through the fields, not chasing butterflies as she once did, but because she needed alone time. The pack wasn't completely happy with her decision to let three of the pups go. But the world was changing, and the two-leggeds would need their help, and the pups were best sent out. She'd do it again. They had a fresh new litter now, and each one of them was brighter and than the next and the pack would grow string. The older pups, some of them wanted to leave too. They wanted to run free in the cities of men. Chase didn't understand, but that was pups.

Running felt good. It cleared her head of all the pack problems. The memories and the dreams brought with them rumors. Great things were happening and they were to be part of it. Prophecy and dreams were crashing together like waves on a never seen before ocean - water so vast Chase couldn't even imagine.

The weather was warm and the grass was finally high enough to brush against the bottom of her coat. It was a glorious run, but soon she'd have to return to the pack, return to doing wihat Dawn Wind had always done - she missed him with all her heart. Needed him but he was gone. Lost to the dream. Run was all that Chase felt at the moment, it was that was on her mind - run.

[Tenzin]

She'd never been beyond the city. Her chest heaved, air ribboning past her cheeks until the ground beneath her paws shifted from the asphalt of the road to the softer give of dirt. A laugh left her lips, but it was a desperate sound, whipped up and lost to the wind. Tenzin hit the ground, grasping fistfuls of grass and breathing deep. Her head rocked forward, eyes squeezed tight against a sob as the earthy scent filled her nose.

Why?! Why had the pack rejected her?

She couldn’t do this on her own.

She couldn’t be so very far from home; not without those last tenuous links.

A second and then she was up again. The running pounded something instinctual into her mind, but it was less like the monastery's calm and more like flight. She thought of the mountains and wide valleys of her home, projecting them out like a long and mournful cry. I am lost, she told the night.

[Nox]

Chase ran and ran until she got a call. A cry, lost. A pup, a two-legged - lost. It wasn't hard to find the lost soul. Chase sent a message. I'm coming. She asked for a location. Showed the stars by night, the streams near by, the trees in the sky.

The pack was far off, the world was open and the two legs were becoming more and more around - specially the kin, the ones who came to them with golden eyes and their dreams.

Chase ran towards the lost one.

[Tenzin]

When she had been at her most feral, the monks had locked her away. The memories all clouded now, but some things still pierced through: the stories they had read to soothe the tatters of her humanity, even when she raged her fingers to bloody stumps scratching at the walls. Until one day something changed. That epiphany was like this one now; the brush of an answer soft against her mind, and suddenly the night was no longer lonely.

Tenzin had spent months in the city and never once considered that wolves might call its outskirts home.

It felt like the comforting nuzzle of a mother, and Tenzin reacted in kind, sending images of a pup's wriggling excitement welcoming that mother back to the den after the first night's hunt away, when the darkness stretched so long it seemed as though she might never return. The relief was so overwhelming; such confused and desperate joy, it took a moment to answer the directions with any clarity.

She scanned the dark horizon of an unfamiliar landscape, and picked out the stars and landmarks. Her eyes itched to remove the contacts, but she couldn't afford to lose them out here. As she finally slowed and stopped to wait, Tenzin scrubbed her palms against her wet cheeks and stooped to her knees. Her breaths still came fast from the exertion, though her ears were pricked waiting.

[Nox]

The lost one was near the city that kept encroaching on their home, taking the grass and the trees, covering the dirt and earth with hardness and metal towers. One day there would be no room left for them. None. And it was a loss that Chase hoped she'd never see, and her children, but that was likely not possible. The world was changing faster than they could. Than anyone could.

Chase called out to the lost one. I'm here. She said as warning as she crouched down in the grasses and stalked closer. Even a kin could be dangerous. They could use their skills to lure wolves for pelts. Men with their fire and metal skinning them. If only they could do something about the predators. Traitors. Betrayers. So Chase was careful.

Chase sent a message again into the mind of the two legged lost pup. Who are you? Chase sent her name, a pup chasing butterflies in a field of flowers. It was a long time ago, but names were such things. And she was Chasing Butterflies.

[Tenzin]

Tenzin sat in the grass, palms resting flush over her knees. She finally found room through the panic to allow meditation a chance to smooth away all those frantic edges, which made the fluid wolfspeak easier to understand and send back. Caution coloured the greeting, but wariness was to be expected. The city loomed large in the distance behind her shoulder, and she knew from her own pack that the ancient connection between her brothers and sisters was a newly born thing. Flashes of wolf skin and man’s bloody hands turned her stomach, but also roused a protective snarl for those that would dare do such a thing.

She sent a nuzzle of greeting to the wolf that introduced herself as Chasing Butterflies. Tenzin was a conciliatory pack member, quick to soothe and ease conflict. I am she who is the light keeping the darkness at bay. It was how her pack understood the tattoo on her arm and the life that called to her; to hunt through the shadows, nimble and fearless. Star Dancer. Pride bloomed as she sent images of her own pack too, so very far away in the mountains of another world. They had a keen sense for true evil, and knew when to leave alone the creatures that were simply different. The camaraderie was strong, which only made the pang of loneliness stronger. But sometimes one must hunt alone. Her wolves could not cross the ocean.

They sent me here to nip at the heels of the Destroyer, she said. I did not expect to find a sister so close to the city! With that admission rolled relief, though curiosity too. Are you alone here, sister?

[Nox]

Chase was curious as to this one. Another like Silent Fang, the mark usually meant danger to their kind, but to be be a wolf in the flock. It could be interesting. Times were changing and Chase nuzzled the woman offering comfort and warm in the cooling night.

The pack watches the Destoryer, but we are never alone. Even in the rock paths and metal of your birth right. The image of pack and home and dreams were never far away. All the lost one needed was to send her self to them. The pack was accepting - even forgiving of the two legs who spoke to them with their wolf eyes and their strange ways.

Chase trotted away and turned back to look at Star Dancer and sent images to indicate to follow. Pack wasn't far and the lost one could return in the morning. Chase trotted again in the direction of the pack. Run with me Star Dancer. Run home.

[[ assuming most wolves know of the Destroyer and that the pack outside Moscow was watching, I can change that if that is the wrong assumption ]]

[Tenzin]

The scent of wolf musk blanketed her in the comfort of home and belonging, a feeling of such absolute rightness she had no words to define it. 

Chasing Butterflies’ reply tilted her head with new consideration, and all of a sudden Tenzin felt like the foolish pup who thought to use her eyes before her nose. She sent a rolling image of the place she had come from; its vastness, and its isolation -- especially compared to Moscow. We were so few there a howl might find no answer. I did not even think to look when my paws touched this new land. A little bashfulness accompanied as she continued to relay how she had been depending on the dream to run with pack, and how Silver had chased her away this very night. The confusion and pain of rejection settled into the certainty of a lesson learned, now. Of course Silver knew. Wolves taught bluntly.

How had she not realised there would be wolves here, watching the Destroyer as Tenzin’s own pack had urged her to do?

She needed no encouragement as Chasing Butterflies paused from her trot to glance back; she was already loping back to her feet. A smile glinted, the joy of acceptance bursting wild. Her thoughts reeled out to feel the comforting truth of it as she met pace with the she-wolf. Home.

[Nox]

A pup indeed. Chase thought to herself.

It wasn't far between there and the pack. Chase never wandered far. Though her pup had gone with the last set of two legs, she still had others to attend to. It was her pack now that Dawn Wind was gone. There was a fresh kill when she arrived and the rest of the pack was eager to speak with Star Dancer. Two Legs pups were a novelty, but Star Dancer smelled different. Of other pack, and of distance. It was a new novelty.

Chase made introductions, and as always the littlest ones were the quickest to go up to the new comer. Tentative at first and then slowly after their mothers or fathers said it was alright. The older pups were more arrogant though, like they thought they new better and would crowd the youngest out.

Chase laid down with her head on her paws and watched as the pack greeted Star Dancer. After enough initial contact Chase told the pack Star Dancer's intentions Star Dancer is here to nip at the heels of the Destroyer. There was a howl of acceptance. And a new tidal wave of information flowed through the pack wanting to know more or offering up information.