No Title - A story I wrote for a freshmen college course from the first-person perspective of a wolf
I awoke as the sun was beginning to set. It was almost time to move again. Thoughts of where and what I used to be seemed like distant memories now. As I got to my feet the usual pangs of hunger came flooding to my consciousness, in fact, I couldn’t even remember the last time I had eaten. I quickly circled the clearing I had found before I decided to lay down, no food as usual.
I started off into the woods to continue my journey. I wasn’t quite sure where I was going, all I knew was that I had to move as far as I could away from where I used to be. As I moved, I was always scanning my surroundings, trying to take it all in. I couldn’t afford to miss a chance at food if it happened to wander along.
I think that darkness is the safest way to travel because it keeps me hidden from those that are like me. On a few occasions I have heard groups howling in the night, but I don’t dare return their calls. I must stay hidden, I must move quickly. While they are howling, they are probably not paying as much attention to their surroundings which provides me with a secure time to move.
I was walking rather slowly when I saw something dart quickly in the corner of my eye. I immediately stopped dead in my tracks and turned my head to see what it was. I saw a long bushy tail connected to a somewhat slender body. I recognized this animal and knew them to have great speed on the ground. I began to creep forward towards the animal, but it must have caught a glimpse of me and immediately started darting across the forest floor. I started to chase it, but this area was obviously its home. It was moving with such speed that I could hardly keep up with and I quickly lost the animal when it darted up a tree. It sat upon a limb in its tree and began to make noises at me, it was obvious it had won and I began to move along.
As the woods began to thin, I noticed the smell of blood in the air. I started to search the area around me until I came upon the source of the smell. It was a type of creature I had seen before. It looked similar to me but smaller. Whenever my old companions and I would howl, sometimes these animals in the surrounding would get furious and let out a series of squeals and yips. The pains of hunger were terribly strong at this point and I knew I had to eat. I noticed something strange about the body. The body had a small amount of blood on one side and a slightly larger amount of blood on the other. It looked as though no other animals had eaten from this one and I wasn’t sure why, but I didn’t really care.
I could only pick up on one other distinct scent in the air besides the scent of the animal laying before me. I had smelled scents similar to the one I could smell, but I had never been able to associate it with an animal, and this case was no different. Before I could feel comfortable enough to eat, I felt that I had to mark the immediate area with my scent. It’s more of an impulse than a choice really, but I didn’t want any other animal’s trying to steal from me, as I hadn’t eaten in so long.
After I had marked the area, I began to drag the carcass into a denser part of the forest, for protection I guess. I felt all was in order and began to eat. At first, I only took small bites, trying to pace my self. I soon however lost control and I began to ravenously feast on the animal taking in bite after bite of its flesh. Soon there after the animal had been reduced to nothing more than blood and its bare bones.
By the time I had finished eating, it was nearly dark. I checked the surrounding area to make sure that it seemed clear and then I found a place to sleep. The place I chose was near a patch of thick bushes at the base of a tree, I thought that it would keep me safe from the wind. I wasn’t awoken at all while I slept; it was nice having a full stomach for once. When I woke up, it was just before dawn and the sun had not yet come up.
I searched the area near the carcass one more time before I continued my journey, and as before the only scent I could smell was the peculiar one. It seemed to me that this scent was stronger than yesterday, which I thought was strange. However, I didn’t think there was any danger about, so I moved along. I traveled as I normally did, scanning my surroundings as I went. One thing was different though, I wasn’t so hungry this time.
I hadn’t been moving long before I noticed the strange scent growing, and I could also smell another scent similar to the animal’s that I had eaten yesterday. Up ahead, I saw a clearing and decided to check it out. As I came upon the edge of the forest, I saw another carcass. I continued to move towards the carcass, but I did so cautiously, something did not seem right about these animals.
Everything seemed exactly the same as before, the same amounts of blood on both sides of the animal, everything. I began to search and mark the area surrounding the carcass just as I had done the first time. I wasn’t extremely hungry, but I knew that I couldn’t stay here and that it may be a very long time before I eat again. I dragged the carcass out of the clearing and picked a thick spot in the forest to begin eating.
I didn’t even attempt to pace myself when I ate this time because I wanted to get done as quickly as possible. Shortly after I started eating I heard a faint noise in the distance, but its loudness was growing with each passing moment. I could tell that the noise was coming from the direction of the clearing where I found the carcass. For some reason, I was very curious as to what was making this noise so I moved to a spot where I could remain hidden on the edge of the clearing.
I could see something coming towards the clearing. It was large and loud, but it seemed to glide into the clearing. All at once the object stopped and stopped making noise as well. I had never seen or heard anything like this before, but I could smell that strange scent in the air. Something on the side of the object began to move and then something else climbed down away from it. It looked like some sort of strange animal. It had four outstretching, like the legs of other animals, but it only walked on two of them. It had some sort of strange covering on most of its body that looked neither like hair nor feathers, but it did have some hair on top of what seemed to be its head.
The creature began to move around to the back of the object it got out of. I could hear some loud noises after it had moved out of view, but I had no idea what was going on. After a short while, it emerged again and it was carrying what looked to be one of the animals I had been finding and eating recently. As the creature placed the animal it was carrying on the ground, I could tell that the animal was dead and that it appeared to be very similar to the other two I had found. After the creature finished placing the animal on the ground it began to do something with the carcass but I couldn’t see what it was doing. I didn’t understand why this creature would kill the animal but not eat, guard, or burry the carcass.
The creature finally stood up again and moved away from the carcass. It moved towards the object it had arrived from and climbed back up and inside while making loud noises. Just before the object started gliding away, the noise that had originally drawn me back to the clearing began again. The object moved away with great speed in the same direction from which it had came and was soon out of sight.
Before I began examining this fresh carcass, I wanted to finish eating the one I had already started on. I didn’t want to take the risk of losing my meals. I moved back to where the partially eaten carcass was and began to eat as quickly as I could. It did not take me long to finish eating what I had started before. After I was done, I moved back towards the clearing, sweeping all the way around the perimeter making sure the coast was clear.
The carcass was exactly the same as the first two in every way. I flipped it over to check the other side as I had done with the first two and stepped around to check how much blood was on it. That was when I heard and incredible snapping noise. Before I even had time to comprehend what had happened, my mind and body was flooded with absolute pain. I tried to run, but that only brought a greater amount of pain as I fell, muzzle first, into the ground. After a few moments I could finally feel where the pain was coming from. It was my left back leg.
I began to panic as I struggled to pull myself away from whatever was holding me there. I didn’t want to look back because I was afraid of what had me. After I struggled for a short while longer I began to calm down. Why was this thing still holding onto my leg? I finally turned to look at what had me. I expected something large, some sort of animal. I had no idea what the thing that was holding me in place was. It was small, and came up a short way on my leg. However, it had very large black teeth that seemed as if their only purpose was to hold my twisted, mangled, and bleeding leg in place. No animal had ever ripped through my fur and flesh the way that this thing did, not even my own brethren whenever we used to compete among ourselves.
Dark red blood was steadily escaping from my wound. The flow slowed only slightly as more time passed. I viewed this substance as life. Whenever we would hunt our prey, they would lose great amounts of this before they would succumb to our attacks. I knew it was only a matter of time before I too would succumb to the force of this beastly trap. There was no way that I could sit there doing nothing so I began to gnaw at my leg and the teeth holding it in place. I tried pulling my leg out. I tried everything, but the teeth just held tight.
The sun was beginning to go down and the air started to cool. I could see areas of darkness forming in the skies. The wind began to blow as water started to fall from the sky. It was somewhat refreshing at first, taking my mind away from the pain stemming from my leg. As I began to lay down, the rain seemed to slow, but in fact, it was just turning into the white substance that our kind loves to play in so much.
I laid there as the sun slid all the way out of the sky thinking, again, of what I was before all this. Everything seemed to flow so freely in my mind as I recalled all of my old brothers, my young ones, my mate, and all that I was forced to leave behind. I was never sure why they forced me to leave my spot, but I didn’t care now, I felt free of everything.
I could feel the cold begin to pierce my body. Somehow, I didn’t really care that much, I felt light and calm. I didn’t blame the creature for what was happening to me. I should have known well enough to stay away from this last carcass, but I let my curiosity get the best of me. My eyelids began to get heavy as I got colder. The area around me seemed to disappear as I slid into what I knew would be my final sleep. As I closed my eyes I could see a light approaching from the distance and hear that same rumble I heard before. By the time it arrived, my curiosity was gone, as was I.
