Horizon Ridge whiz-bang attitude

for any HR kids

Edy yawned and stretched. His time spent with Horizon Ridge had so far been reasonably uneventful. He'd met a couple of his pack-mates, but beyond that, not much had happened. Of course, it was not like he had gone out of his way to make things happen, either. Today, though, he had decided it was time for a hunt. Nothing too terribly spectacular, but he was hoping to fill some caches and perhaps explore his home a little bit more. Scratching the snowy ground with his back feet twice, Kennedy trotted toward a wooded area, hoping to find some rabbit or squirrel.

The Theta put his nose to work, sniffing this way and that for anything that smelled remotely of live prey. Each footstep produced a soft crunching sound upon the snow, but since he had yet to catch the trail of anything, he was not worried. It was only after about an hour that his olfactory senses alerted him to food in the vicinity. With his black tail wagging excitedly, he began bounding along the scent trail of what he suspected was a rabbit.

ooc: hello again!

Pump's days in the Horizon ridge had been pretty uneventful. She had heard the news that Pied had made her recovery, but hadn't gone to visit her. There had been some new additions to the ranks, but she hadn't cared to go and get to know them. The wolf-dog was fine on her own, kept herself fed with her own sea-lion meat stashes and did not crave for company.

However pack life dictated rules and today she was up and going through the lands, having nothing particular on her mind, but open to any opportunities. After a while she spotted a familiar black figure not far off - she recalled the awkward and shy lad, whom she had taught the art of scavenging (at least tried to do so). From what she could tell, he was up to something.

Curious - she closed the distance between them and began to run parallel him. "What's up?" she woofed to him.

“Rabbit,” he replied quietly. Edy was so concentrated on the task at hand, that it took him a moment to realize who he was responding to. It was Pump, the wolf-dog once plagued by famine in a past life. His eyes did not move from the ground, though, for he was far too focused on what he was doing to make small-talk at this point. If there was one thing he took seriously, it was finding food (despite his carefree attitude that it would always be there). Hunting took an immense amount of concentration and physical prowess, and Kennedy liked to think that he had a decent amount of both aspects.

He knew that he was getting close, because the trail became stronger and stronger with each step. Soon enough, he could make out the visible trail of the rabbit. Without paying much mind to what Pump was doing or saying (if she was doing or saying anything at all), he flushed the rabbit out of its hiding place quite suddenly. He took a few long strides with his teeth flashing in the afternoon sunlight, but it seemed the floppy-eared mammal was not meant to be for him. The small thing burrowed into its tiny (and quite likely warm and comfortable) home, and Kennedy was left with nothing.

“Not to worry,” he mused to himself, “Only the first attempt of the day.” He had forgotten that he was not completely alone, and curved his neck to look around for Pump. Spotting her, he spoke in a friendly tone. “Sorry for being short,” he said, apologizing, “Sometimes I just get into it, you know?”

Pump was not dense and she soon realized that Kennedy wasn't frolicking in the forest for no reason. She spotted the rabbit, but, since she had had a decent meal not too long ago, was not interested in hunting and let the older packmate deal with it. He did seem very excited in doing this. Determination was an admirable trait - one that the wolf-dog had an on/off relationship with - but it seemed that her packmate had plenty of it.

However the critter was faster than the hunter and the attempt to kill it was doomed to a failure. He apologized for not paying enough attention to her and this made Pump frown. It appeared that this guy suffered from a incessant desire to please others no matter of the circumstances. And remembering their last encounter, she had no desire to relive those awkward moments. "'tis nothing," she brushed it off and hoped that he would not get all weird and feel guilty more than neccessary.

"Missed it by a whisker," she continued and then decided to compliment him, just in case he misunderstood her words. "You look like a skilled hunter."

It was true that Kennedy often tried to hard to please everybody. Unfortunately, he had not learned that age old lesson: You can please some individuals some of the time, but you can't please everybody all the time. One would have thought that he would have picked up on that during his near five years of existence. Nobody had ever called him out on it, so he had just gone on doing what he was doing. Which is to say, he apologized far too much.

Pump gave him a compliment, and Edy grinned and wagged his tail. “Thank you,” he replied, “I’ve found that failure is often the best way to learn how to do something.” After failing again and again to obtain a family or anything meaningful in his birthplace, Edy had finally learned that he was going to get nowhere there. Which had been his exact reason for moving on and seeking out greener pastures, so to speak.

"Very wise..." Pump agreed - she had had plenty of situations in her life, to which she didn't want to return to. One could say that she ran by the same principle Edy did. "But the wise learns not only from his own mistakes but from mistakes of others too," she shone in a rare moment of intelligence. "Never consider a porcupine an easy kill, for example," she remembered her ordeal with quills in her muzzle and the painful days that had followed after that.

"So - are you occupied with anything useful now or you could be a dear and help out in a scavenger hunt?" she asked, thinking already about all of the good spots, where food could lie around.

Kennedy winced when she mentioned porcupine. He had seen a wolf or two get injured by them. One had even died from the infection. Several others had endured rather ugly recoveries, often coming out disfigured in the end. Thankfully, Edy's father had taught him early on to avoid the things, and Kennedy had never thought to disobey him and seek one out. Edy had always been a rather compliant son, always doing his best to follow his parents' orders and carry them out as requested. Not that he always did, but he was good enough at it. They were gone, now, but Kennedy still remembered the many lessons they had taught him.

“I can only promise to be a wolf,” he jested, substituting "dear" for "deer" in his mind. “But I will certainly help.” Wagging his tail, Edy found himself at-ease with Pump today. Briefly, he wondered what had changed, but he brushed it aside and decided to forget about it for now.

Pump could sigh in relief, because it seemed that this fellow was in a better mood today and was not acting the way he had in their previous meeting. She had not wanted to give him an impression that she was going to be his best friend, but then again she was no enemy either. She loved to have a certain control and power over others, but in reasonable amounts. As long as it did not interfere with the chance of having a normal conversation with them.

"Excellent!" Pump offered Edy a small smile and then beckoned for him to follow. "Let's go - that way," she told him. "I caught sight of a lot of crows earlier and you know, what they say - were there are those thieves, there are corpses."

Happy to be on Pump's good side (or at least it appeared that way), Kennedy followed her obediently. He had known of the black birds' affection for rotting food, so it was not a stretch to believe that they had found something for the wolves to eat. Edy could only hope that whatever they found was not so far gone that it was poison to canines. It seemed birds could dine on even the most rotting flesh and not die from it. Perhaps they did die, and they were just too stupid to realize that it was going to kill them.

Edy briefly wondered if his time in Horizon Ridge would pan out. There were times when he liked the calm quiet nature of this pack, but there were other times he felt bored. He figured he was mostly to blame for the boredom, considering there was plenty to be done and enough pack-mates to socialize with. Maybe it would come in time that he would feel more accepted and more at one with the ridge's members.

Edy followed her like an obedient puppy, which was nice, because Pump did not have to stop and check, whether he was paying attention or not. The silence between them was also comfortable for a change. She hadn't done anything to make the fellow feel awkward and therefore didn't feel forced to make things up or try to convince that everything was alright. She walked in a straight line, being pretty sure, where the exact location of the corpse would be and time from time she slowed her pace to sniff the ground or cast her glance at the sky to search for markers.

"How have you been lately?" she asked, when one of the stops turned from brief to a bit longer. Scents were mixed together and she needed time to tell them apart.

Pump asked how he was doing when they paused for a break, and Edy had to search a moment for an answer. “Well enough,” he replied. He enjoyed the slow pace of Horizon Ridge for the most part, though he knew that such things rarely lasted long. Often, Edy found himself feeling disconnected from the wolves here. His conversations seemed to come to a skidding halt, leaving him with no more to say and nothing to connect with. It was a shame, considering he had nothing against any of them.

“How about you?” he asked. Again, he felt the disconnect. Edy did not feel like he knew any of his pack-mates particularly well, including Pump. It was even the same way with Pied, a very warm and inviting wolf. Perhaps there was something wrong with him that was making him feel this way. But he would put on his best face and make the most of it. It was not like he had some other place where he belonged any more than the ridge.

Pump had lived in this life long enough to sense that all was not exactly as fine with her pack-mate as he stated. Did he feel similar doubts about his place in the pack? Because she had thought a lot about this issue. Her expectations in the Horizon ridge were not met, she felt a little disappointed and more than once had contemplated leaving. What was the use of the pack, if she did not benefit from it?

She stopped and turned around to eye Kennedy: "Are you sure?" He was free to answer this question honestly. She wouldn't tell anyone, because again - she did not benefit from that. "It depends, how you look at it. Yes and no."

Edy sighed when she asked if that was really the whole story to his answer. He was not quite sure he wanted to dump his heart out, but at the same time, he was curious to know if she felt the same way about things. Then again, she had been here longer, so maybe it was just a matter of time before things got a little more cozy and comfortable. “I just feel…” he trailed off, searching for the right words, “Like I don’t quite belong. I lived in my birth pack for over four years before coming here, so that probably contributes to that feeling.”

It seemed that Pump was having conflicting thoughts on her own life as well. “What’s the ‘yes’ and what’s the ‘no’?” he asked. It felt better to know that he was not the only one who was not all kittens and rainbows.

It was odd, how the fate played people sometimes. Here and then she found out that she had more in common with Edy than with the rest of the wolves here. He also had lived in a pack for most of his life, he didn't feel like he fit in. Wow. Now let's sit down and shed tears together. Ok, not quite that, but, while listening to him, Pump felt a strange tug in her heart. An emotion, empathy - the feeling was unfamiliar to her and she didn't quite know, how to react to it.

"Well... I am alive, that is good thing and the sole purpose of living," she began on a bit humorous note. "But not really satisfied with the life here. It feels like I am not needed. I can fare very well on my own and I don't gain anything by staying here."

Edy gave a light smile when she noted that just being alive was the good part. He certainly had to agree with that, although it was something he all too often took for granted. Since coming here and being surrounded by wolves of all different backgrounds, though, he felt he had gained more appreciation for the life he had been living back home. Things there had been easy, unlike some of the stories he had heard from others.

Pump's second answer caused mixed emotions to float within the Delta. On one hand, it was comforting to know that he was not the only one who felt like Horizon Ridge was not working out quite so well. On the other, he was saddened to see that it was not only him. Clearly, something was not quite clicking with the pack.

“Then why do we stay?” he asked. It was a blunt question, but she had given a blunt answer. Was it out of some hope that things would get better? Was it because staying was easier than leaving and seeking out something else? Were they just floating because it was convenient?

"The place is not bad at all," Pump returned. She didn't have to look far from an answer, because she had contemplated this quite a lot too. In the following days she would do a bit travelling around and meeting other wolves, hearing opinions, but in the end she would return. Because, while the pack life had failed her in some aspects, the land had not. There was plenty of prey, plenty places to scavenge. One could have an easy life here and it would be foolish to throw it away.

"I mean... I have experienced hard times before and this is the first winter, which has almost been... effortless?" she mused. "So yeah... I am fond of the place and no other lures me that much."

Edy gave her a shrug and a nod, though he still could not help thinking that things could be better. He had lived all his life in mediocrity (at best), and it grew tiring. Perhaps this was much better than where Pump had been before, but for Edy, it was just a different kind of frustrating. Instead of being constantly compared to his brother, he sometimes felt as if he was being ignored completely. That wasn't the case, of course, but it sure did feel that way a lot of the time.

When the call of a crow captured his attention, Kennedy looked upward. The thing was heading toward a group of its friends, which could only mean one thing: a scavenging opportunity. “Are those the crows you were talking about?” he asked, tabling their other conversation for the time being. Kennedy did not have much else to say on the matter, and he figured they could continue talking about it after they had picked up some not-so-fresh meat.

Pump didn't mind to be ignored - she enjoyed her solitude for most of the time. Finding new friends or purpose in life hadn't been her top priorities, when she had joined the pack, therefore she didn't feel frustration of any kind. If she was well, then the rest of the world could crumble and she wouldn't budge. But that was a story for another time.

Kennedy was quick to spot the crow, Pump also stopped and lifted her muzzle to see. "You have got a good eye," she remarked approvingly. For one reason or another she began to like Kennedy - a bit weird, that was for sure, but useful. "Let's go and show those scoundrels, who is the boss," she woofed and set off in the direction of the possibly rotten prey.

I'm going to go ahead and fade this one out since there's a lot of new stuff going on with HR. Thanks for the thread!

Edy loped after her, a bark of excitement resonating in the air for a brief moment. Happy to oblige Pump's suggestion, he rushed forward toward the place where the crows were lingering, ready to dine on whatever they could find. If there was enough to go around, Kennedy would also take some back and fill the caches. That, of course, was provided it was not all rotted beyond edibility.