Redhawk Caldera Misty mountain hop

All welcome! Using this for inspiration: http://seattletimes.com/html/localnews/2...esxml.html

So far, in the month that Elwood had lived at Redhawk Caldera, he had been up and down the mountainside countless times. He spent the majority of his time on the lower slopes, but he found himself venturing to the crater at the top of the peak more often. With time, he was becoming more skillful at navigating the rocky and sometimes treacherous terrain, especially now that there was usually a blanket of snow covering the ground. He was a wolf that had spent most of his life on flat ground until now, so becoming a mountain-dweller was certainly an adjustment.

He hadn't yet been in the mountain, however, and the thought hadn't really occurred to him -- at least, not until he came face to face with the entrance to a cavern. One one of his expeditions, traveling back down from the upper reaches, he followed a trail that he hadn't yet explored. It had led him to a crack in the stone, a fissure that -- as he drew closer -- he realized was big enough for a wolf to fit through. It wasn't a huge opening, and was kind of inconspicuous, given the snow and shrubbery at its entrance, but curiosity got the better of the Gamma as he peered down into its depths.

"Hello," he called out, and his voice bounced back to him. The air seeping out of the cavern was frigid, and his breath hung in droplets. With wide eyes, Elwood simply gaped, stunned into silence.

Anyone else who wanted to have it had three days to take it. I'll claim it now. Hope you aren't getting sick of me yet! :)

Somnia also preferred the lower slopes. It was easier to navigate while she too adjusted to dormant, topless-volcano climbing. Start small and work your way up, isn't that what they say? Somnia had no idea who 'they' were, but she didn't have to. It was just a saying, just like the first part of that sentence was a saying. Where did the word 'saying' originate from anyways? It was a weird word, for it was a noun that looked like it should be a verb. But nope, Somnia knew it was a noun. Actually, it was both a noun and a verb, depending on how you used it. But in this instance, it was a noun. Those pesky words were no match for the intelligent Somnia!

Thinking back to the topic on hand, Somnia had thought this morning about climbing the caldera for a little practice in the art of not clumsily falling on her butt. Whether on rugged slopes or flat land, she still had to un-master the skill of being clumsy. So, that morning's agenda consisted on climbing up without too much difficulty, besides trying to plow up through the snow, and trying to get down with much difficulty. The snow was not on her side this morning.

And thus, that was how Somnia came skidding down the mountain-side, (caldera-side?) her momentum gaining as she had to move faster to keep her balance. Finally, it became too much, and she fell into a snow-bank. Oddly, the snow-bank was speaking to her. "Hello," It called out to her. Except snow-banks didn't speak. After pondering it for a moment, Somnia realized that Elwood was on the other side of a few snow-covered bushes that blocked her view of him.

"Hi," She called as she trotted out from around the bushes. Somnia stopped for a moment to shake some of the snow out of her fur. "Dolores back again?"

Thanks for rescuing my lonely thread! :D

As Elwood's echo faded away, there was a nearby thump. The sound was loud enough to draw his attention away from the cave, and he craned his neck to see what had happened, thinking that perhaps a pile of snow had fallen from the treetops. Instead, he spotted his good friend Somnia extracting herself from a snowdrift, shaking the glittering white powder from her fur. She asked if he was talking to Dolores, and while anyone else in the pack likely would have been confused -- as there was no one in the caldera by that name! -- Elwood simply smirked at their inside joke.

"Nah, haven't seen her since we ran her out of the pack," he quipped, his tail waving behind him. Once Somnia was close enough, he reached out to touch his nose to hers, a nonverbal way to express his pleasure at her arrival. She was easily one of his closest companions, and he was always glad to see her. Turning his attention back to his discovery, his gestured to the crack in the rock with his snout. "Look at this. It looks like a tunnel, or something," he said, sticking his head just far enough into the entrance to see that the cavern was frosted with ice and that there was something of a path among the stalagmites.

There was a way to get inside the caldera?! What could be in there? Well, besides igneous rocks formed from the molten lava that had existed in the caldera long ago. The chances of any animals living in their were unlikely, except for the special occasion of bats. After all, prey had their own preferred dens, and if a predator had chosen to take residence in the cave someone would've noticed the scent of them in the territory and drove them out by now.

Not knowing what was inside fueled Somnia's curiosity. "I wanna see!" She whined. Determined to get a view of the caldera's inside, Somnia got down on the ground and crawled under Elwood, sticking her face through the tight gap below Elwood's head.

Once he pointed out the unexpected entrance, Somnia became just as eager as Elwood to explore the inside of the mountain. She crawled between his legs and he laughed, lifting a foreleg and stepping to the side to allow her more room. "Well, since there's two of us, it should be safe to explore, right? That way, if something happens, there's someone to go get help," he said, reverting back to his logical and methodical way of thinking. Even an adventure such as this one set the gears in his mind spinning.

"But I'm sure it'll be fine," he then added in the next breath, not wanting to psych himself out. If he worried about it too much, he would probably decide not to enter the cave at all, and he wanted to do it while his confidence was still high. "Go ahead, I'll follow you," he urged, nudging Somnia gently with his snout.

Somnia was also one to usually harbor logical thinking. But, all the mysteries that the caldera's insides could hold.... All the possibilities and the need to know more left no room in Somnia's mind for thinking logically. So when Elwood suggested that she go in first, Somnia quickly obliged with a quick wave of her tail.

Somnia followed the so-called path between the stalagmites. The ground was a bit slippery, and also cold, but the snow outside was even colder. Somnia could see the frost clinging to everything. The ground, the roof of the tunnel, and the stalagmites. Stalagmites, those were one of the things Somnia knew little to nothing about. "What do you know about stalagmites?" She asked her fellow explorer.

Once Somnia took the first steps into the cave, Elwood followed. He was especially careful about where he placed his paws, not wanting to slip and fall. The inside of the tunnel seemed to be mostly icy; everything was cold and frosty and beautiful, in an unconventional way. The small opening led into a cavern that expanded around them, with icicles hanging from the ceiling and jutting from the floor.

Somnia's voice came back to him as an echo as she asked a question, and he shook his head as he responded. "Next to nothing," he replied, pausing to examine the rocky wall to his left. He did briefly look back over his shoulder towards the entrance, making sure that he could still see sunlight streaming in behind them. "What about you?" he asked, hopeful that Somnia would have more knowledge than he did.

Turned out the Elwood knew nothing about the stalagmites, and the question was even reflected back at her. "Well, the stalagmites on the ceiling are called stalactites, which means they aren't stalagmites at all, even when they look like the same thing. Maybe they have a different name because they form differently?" Somnia added her input. She glanced back at Elwood to judge by his facial expression whether he understood and agreed, or if he was lost and didn't have a clue, for Somnia had encountered wolves that didn't seem to understand basic things. She doubted Elwood was one of them, but it was pretty much an involuntary reaction by now.

After that, Somnia continued to talk. "Plus, I can make some observations to help give me information. For one, not all of them are the same exact size. They're a blue-ish gray color, and covered in frost." Somnia then turned to face one, her nose almost touching it. She sniffed it, pressed her nose to it, then licked it with a slobbery tongue, the slobber intentional, for she didn't want to get her tongue stuck. "It smells frost covered rock, feels cold and rough, and tastes like stone." She reported.

Elwood studied the stalagmites and stalactites as Somnia spoke, sharing what little information she had about the formations. They came in all shapes and sizes, he noted: some were long and thin, while others were much shorter. There were sharp edges as well as rounded edges, although the one thing they did seem to have in common was that it appeared that they had formed slowly over time. The stalactites hanging from the ceiling resembled icicles that had dripped until they froze. All of the crystallized rock glittered in the limited light that came from the entrance, giving everything an ethereal glow.

He turned slowly, taking it all in, then shuffled towards Somnia just as she reached out to lick one of the stalagmites. Elwood watched, then he, too, leaned out and gave it a lick. She was right; it was rough and cold, and though it looked like ice, it tasted like rock. "How did you learn about stalagmites and stalactites?" he asked, careful to pronounce the terms correctly. Though she had simply made some inferences and educated guesses, she seemed to have a least a little bit of background knowledge on the subject. He was beginning to feel braver, so he edged forward a bit, rounding a blind corner that he couldn't see past. On the other side, he was met with a pile of frozen earth and crumbled stone that seemed to have fallen from the ceiling, effectively blocking their path.

How had she learned about stalagmites and stalactites? She had to think for a moment before the memory arose. Oh yeah! How could Somnia forget that?! "My old pack, we lived in a valley at the edge of a mountain. My brother brought me to a cave he found, and it had stalagmites and stalactites in it. When my mother showed up, she told me what they were called when I kept calling them 'pointy-rock thingies'." A few parts of the story were left out, such as that the cave wasn't in her territory, her brother had left her there while she didn't know the way back, and she had got punished because of it, but that wasn't crucial in knowing how she learned about stalagmites and stalactites.

Elwood then disappeared around a corner. Curious, Somnia followed him. A pile of frozen earth and crumbled stone met her. "Whoa." That was a large pile of debris. "I wonder what caused it, and if it would further collapse if I tried to dig some of it out of the way." Somnia put a paw on the debris, not to dig yet, but to see how firmly packed the frozen earth and crumbled stone was. If it was loosely held together in a heap, it would most likely be new and unsafe to at least try to clear it. If it was in a well-packed pile, then it would most likely be a bit older, as the debris would've had more time to settle if it was older. If they did manage to clear it, the cavern could still collapse on them later down the road, but it would be less likely.

"I think I like 'pointy-rock thingies' better than stalagmites and stalactites," Elwood joked, glancing back over his shoulder as Somnia rounded the corner. He was interested to hear that she hailed from a pack that lived near a mountain range. Everyone had a different history, and that's what made each wolf interesting.

They then both focused their attention on the obstruction in front of them. The thought of trying to shift the rocks made Elwood feel a bit nervous. "Be careful," he said preemptively, though as he spoke he stepped a bit closer to examine the frozen pile. He certainly didn't want to take a chance and wind up trapped inside the mountain -- though if he was going to be trapped with anyone, Somnia would be one of his top choices! -- so he backed up and then pivoted, heading back around the bend.

"I wonder if there's another entrance somewhere," he said, pausing to wait for Somnia before emerging back out into the sunlight.

Somnia paused in investigating the blocked passage to listen to Elwood. She let out a chuckle as he claimed he like the term 'pointy rock-thingies' better than the actual names. He also warned her, but also let his curiosity take over for a moment. Somnia barked in agreement at finding another entrance, and followed him out.

"What if we split up and go in different directions and can call to each other if one of us finds something?" The greyscale wolf suggested. Brashly, without really waiting for an answer, Somnia started walking around away from the hole to look for another hole.

"That's a good idea, but be careful," Elwood replied, reiterating his concern, but even as he spoke Somnia was already moving away from him. He didn't want to be a damper on their adventure, but he really did worry about what could happen if something went wrong within one of the caverns.

Since Somnia was searching for a nearby entrance, Elwood re-entered the tunnel they had been in previously. Maybe she would find her way to the other side of the icy blockage. He approached the pile of frozen rocks again, this time rearing up on his hind legs and placing his forepaws on the mound. "Can you hear me?" he called out, unsure if Somnia was even back inside the mountain yet. His voice reverberated back to him and he smiled.

Do you already know what the other side is going to look like? I don't mind Somnia finding an entrance, but I don't know if you already have plans for the thread.

Somnia heard Elwood's voice. It was faint, and it seemed to come from underneath her. Was he back in the tunnel. "What?!?!" She bellowed, for she couldn't pick apart the words in the muted sound. While she waited for him to reply, she tried to pinpoint how it had got to her if he was underground. Somnia was far enough from the entrance that it would be unlikely that if came from there. Maybe another entrance was nearby?!

With an excited tail wag, Somnia started to search faster.

Nope, you can make up whatever you want! :)

"Hello?" Elwood called; Somnia's cry of "What?!" had only barely reached his ears, as the sound had leaked in from the entrance to the tunnel. It was apparent that she hadn't yet found another entrance, and Elwood considered retreating again and heading back out into the daylight. It was cold inside the cavern, and he didn't particularly like the darkness; he was a wolf that preferred the sun and open air.

He pawed at the rubble, causing a few stray rocks to break free and tumble down next to him. The miniature landslide caused him a bit of concern, so he backed up, his ears splayed to either side. "Somnia?" he yelled, turning and peering back towards the mouth of the cave.

Elwood's second call was a bit more audible. "Yes?!" Somnia called back. She probably should've gone back to talk to him, but looking for an entrance was her current focus. After a moment, Somnia decided it would probably be best to go to him to see what he wanted in case he found something. Starting to walk towards the first entrance, she slipped on an icy patch of, well, ice. All four legs splayed outwards, her face was ground level. A hole covered by a bush was visible. "Hey! I found something!" She announced as she struggled to stand back up without falling again.

She replied twice as Elwood was making his way back out of the cave, the second exclamation being that she had stumbled onto something interesting. This was enough to encourage him to move a bit quicker, and he squeezed out of the tunnel at a trot. Once he emerged back into the sunlight he slowed, giving his eyes a moment to adjust to the brightness before glancing around for Somnia.

His friend was nearby, lying on her belly near a bush. Elwood canted his head to one side, wondering what in the world she was doing, but on closer investigation he realized that she had found the auxiliary entrance they had been looking for. "Oh, cool," he murmured as he approached her carefully, placing his paws cautiously on the slippery ground so as not to fall like she did.

Once Elwood appeared, Somnia managed to get on her feet. She got closer to the bush and spotted the hole through the leafless branches. The hole was too big to be a creature-made den of some sort, so Somnia assumed it to be the entrance she was looking for.

Only problem was that it wasn't accessible with the bush in the way. There was a solution to that problem. Somnia started biting through the largest branches that were near the base, as they split into the tons of smaller ones. Eventually, the entrance was exposed to the world. Without a second thought, Somnia entered it.

I'll let you describe this one! :)

Once he reached Somnia's side, Elwood began helping her disassemble the shrubbery that stood in the way of their exploration. He, too, grabbed at the spindly, dry branches with his teeth, pulling them off and depositing them in the snow at his feet. Eventually, they had cleared enough of the limbs and leaves that they could more clearly see into the new tunnel.

While Elwood lingered for a moment, surveying the opening from the outside, Somnia wasted no time. She stepped right in, and her grey tail soon disappeared into the darkness. After only a few seconds of hesitation, Elwood followed her, his yellow gaze taking in the icy cavern.

This section of the tunnel didn't seem much different from the other one. There were stalagmites littering the icy, frost-covered floor. There wasn't too much of a difference, besides one thing that stood out. While the other side had led to a dead end and nothing more, this side split into two tunnels.

Somnia took a few steps forward to peer down the left tunnel. "This side leads to the collapsed pile of rocks and dirt!" She informed Elwood before looking into the right tunnel. "This one goes on. Where do you think it leads to?" Somnia asked Elwood as she backed up to stand alongside him.

He was surprised and not surprised at the same time to discover that this tunnel was nearly identical to the other one. The structure was similar, with stalagmites and stalactites all around, and he felt the same chill that he had felt on the other side. This cavern, however, led to a fork; one path led to the left, and the other to the right. Elwood followed Somnia, then paused as she did a bit of exploration.

His ears pricked as she announced that one trail led back to the landslide they had previously discovered. The other one, however, did not have a definite end in sight. He stepped towards it, nostrils flaring as he sniffed; but all he could smell was the cold. "I dunno; should we try and find out? Maybe we would come out somewhere else on the mountain," he said. There was a chance that the tunnel was relatively short, and there would be no danger in store for the wolves; but he also worried that they could get lost within the labyrinth.

"Definitely." Somnia responded, already taking steps towards the right tunnel. If she didn't find out what lay at its end, she would wonder. If Somnia wondered long enough, she would be driven to come back to figure it out, possibly on her own. Disappearing in tunnels to never be seen again wasn't an appealing way to die.

Somnia led the way into the tunnel. It was getting darker as they got further away from the entrance. Their eyes could see in the dark, but not complete darkness. The tunnel quickly got narrower, as well as shorter. Pitch darkness stared back at Somnia. If they continued, they would have to walk single file without vision to guide them. "Any objections on continuing?" She asked Elwood.

She was a lot more daring than he was, and he appreciated her bravery. So when she proposed that she wanted to check out the tunnel, he didn't object. "Let's do this," Elwood quipped, taking a deep breath before following her down the path.

The cavern walls seemed to close in around them quickly, and he shifted to walk directly behind Somnia, his nose nearly brushing against her tail. He also stooped his head as the ceiling got lower and lower, his ears swiveling nervously. Elwood paused as Somnia asked if he wanted to keep going, considering their options before replying. "We might as well, right? We've come this far," he said with a shrug of his shoulders; he was feeling a little anxious, but Somnia's confidence was contagious.

"Alright, I was just making sure you weren't scared." Somnia teased with emphasis on the word scared. "After all, we don't know what sort of bears could be hibernating in here." More attempting to scare Elwood with playful intentions. There weren't bears in here though. Somnia could be sure of that much for two reasons. One, they would've scented the bear long ago. Two, the bear wouldn't have been able to fit.

Somnia continued walking, using the walls brushing along the side of her fur to guide her. Her ears touched the ceiling, but she was small enough to not need to stoop her head. What was only minutes seemed to be hours. Finally....

"Uumph!" Somnia had tripped over something. Luckily, the tunnel came to a dead end about an inch past where her nose had been before tripping, so she didn't fall far. There was also a slight air current. Probably a hole too small to fit through. "Dead end, we won't be able to go any further. But, I tripped over something. Back up a bit so I can find it." After they both backed up, Somnia lowered herself to the ground and felt around. Finally, she found it, but couldn't figure out what it was. It was cold and rough, roughly the size of one of her paws. "Found it, but I don't know what it is. Wanna head back and I'll take it with us?"

"Me? Scared? Never," Elwood scoffed, though that certainly was a stretch of the imagination. He wasn't a scaredy-cat, necessarily, but he had always tended to be more cautious than not. He was a wolf that didn't like to take risks without good reason, so this was a bit outside of his comfort zone. At the mention of bears, his thoughts naturally drifted to Finley -- if they were to come face to face with a bear inside the mountain's tunnel system, he would have preferred to have the resident bear-fighter with them. That wasn't the case, however, so he convinced himself that he and Somnia would be able to handle it without the precocious Beta.

Suddenly, Somnia sounded as though the wind had been knocked out of her, and Elwood drew up just in time to avoid colliding with her rear end. He peered around her as she gathered herself, blinking in the darkness. They had reached a dead end, which Somnia soon pointed out, though she wanted to back up anyway and see what she had tripped over. Elwood obliged, throwing it in reverse until there was enough room for her to examine the object that had caused her to lose her balance. She couldn't tell what it was, and neither could he in the darkness, so he readily agreed when she suggested they retreat and she would bring the item with her. "Yeah, I'll try and turn around here," he said, taking a few more steps backward until the tunnel was wide enough for him to do a 180. He then led the way out, following the pinpricks of light that he could see radiating from the entrance.