SEASON 1 CHAPTER 2
Morning came in the form of a kick to Raza’s side causing him to grunt and slowly wake up.
“Get up!” came a voice all too familiar to him. The alpha of the pack, Malik. Raza groans and closes his eyes again.
“Gimme 5 more minutes” he says as he curls back up into a ball. No sooner does he do this he is met with a much harder kick.
“GET UP AND HUNT YOU USLESS SHIT! DON’T EVEN THINK ABOUT STARTING THE DAY LIKE THIS!” Malik hisses through clenched teeth, trying not to wake up the rest of the pack.
“Ugh fine!” Raza says. He carefully removes Jahzara who is curled up on his back. He then does a stretch and shake, looking out at the view of the mountains from the den entrance whiles the sun was only just peeking through the trees. He looks down at his sleeping sister who’s curled up in a ball. He leans down and nuzzles her before looking at Malik again.
“Just remember what will happen if you fail me” Malik hisses.
“Yeah, yeah you beat the shit out of me and then I got to hunt in the evening to make up for it” Raza laments, giving off a yawn.
“Drop the attitude and get going!” the alpha says sternly before going back inside.
Upon stepping outside Raza takes a deep breath of fresh air. The cool air filling his lungs and waking him up. After doing a few more stretches he sets off into the morning sunrise. His orange fur even more orange in the early morning sunlight. Malik watching him from his spot in the den before going back to sleep himself.
About an hour into his hunt and a few miles from the den, Raza can't shake the feeling of being followed. Every now and then he hears an occasional twig snap or leaf rustle. He was about to turn around to see what it was but in front of him was something much more interesting. A small type of antelope, a dik-dik to be precise, is standing there minding its own business eating some grass. Raza poked his head up and looked around “Perfect!” he whispered in triumph “it’s all alone! if I bring this back, Malik will be so impressed and I’ll finally gain his respect!” After getting downwind of the dik-dik he loweres his body and moves forward towards his unexpecting prey. Getting about five feet from the dik-dik and using the long grass as cover, he freezes and takes some deep breaths, his eyes narrowing to slits. Tensing up, he lunges full force towards the dik-dik, going in for the kill. Unfortunately, he isn't met with the small antelope’s body, but instead, an orange ball of fur. Both Raza and the ball of orange fur collide into each other, headbutting and rolling a few feet away from the Dik-dk.
Groaning and with a headache, Raza opens his eyes and watches with double vison as his scared prey takes off into the long wavy grass and out of site. After catching his breath and waiting for his vison to return to normal he shakes his head and gets into a sitting position to look at just what exactly was responsible for making him loose his prey.
He looks to the side and sees a sight that makes him horrified, angry and confused. In front of him is none other than Jahzara, his little sister. After a moment, she wakes up and looked around before getting into a sitting position just like Raza, rubbing her head.
“JAHZARA?!?” Raza cries out both in shock and disbelief “what are you doing here? You should be back at the den!”
“Hi Raza!” she replies cheerily “did you see how good I was! I almost got it! I did what you told me to do! Stay quiet, no giggling and I almost had it! I-” she stops when she sees the disapproving glare from her brother. Raza giving her the same look a parent would give to their child when they misbehave. “Did I do something wrong?” she said quietly, her ears slowly going down flat against her head and her tail going in between her legs. She’d made plenty of mistake in the past, but she’s never seen her brother like this. The most he’s ever done is calmly tell her not to do this again but this? This was a side to Raza she’s never seen before. “I’m not in trouble… right?”
“Jahzara…” Raza replied unusually calmly. The tension in the air was so thick it could be cut with a knife. “What in Africa were you thinking?!”
“I… I wanted to hunt something like you do!” she replies, tears in her eyes. “I wanted to show you what I can do.”
“I told you time and time again I would personally take you on your first hunt when you were ready!”
“I’m sor-”
“DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA WHAT YOU’VE DONE?” Raza furiously shouts at her, forgetting he is shouting at his sister “At no point did I tell you, you could come with me hunting! At no point did I say you’re ready to hunt live prey! At no point did I say you could hunt by yourself-”
“But I’m not by myself!” She replies with a smile, attempting to lighten the mood “I’m with you!”
“That doesn’t make any different Jahzara!” Raza replies, his voice softening a little “I had no idea you were following me. What if you got attacked or lost! What would you have done then huh? What if a leopard tried to eat you, or an eagle, or dare I say a human! What if one of them took you away and you and you never saw me again? I also lost my prey because of you!”
Jahzara starts to cry again “I’m sorry! I just wanted to make you proud of me!”
“Well I’m not!” He replies flatly “I’m very disappointed in you Jahzara. This isn’t how I brought you up is it?”
“No…”
“Well…” Raza replies, taking a deep breath and calming down “are you hurt?” he replies softly as he approaches his sister and starts checking her over. The only damage being a headache and dirty fur
“No” his sister replies.
“Good. Let’s get home”
Both siblings shake their pelts before slowly making their way home.
A few hours later about half a mile from the den Raza turns to his sister “Malik doesn’t know you escaped does he…”
“No…” she replies “When you’re not around, no one seems to notice me so I sneak out more often than you think” she gives a smirk to her brother “I’m quite skilled in sneaking out. I bet I’m better then you”
Raza simply lets out a sigh “Zara… now isn’t the time for being smart”
“But your smart all the time!”
“I know but I’m older and I can take more hits than you. You’re lucky I’m not beating you up for following me”
“You… you wouldn’t…. Right?” Raza could see the fear in his sister’s eyes.
“Never” he replies “I’d never intentionally hurt you Jahzara, you know that. Unless it’s during a game obviously” he gives a little smirk and a playful nudge before going serious again “You can’t keep going round breaking rules and sneaking off. I know I sound like a hypocrite for saying this, but while I do throw the smart comeback every now and then, I don’t intentionally put myself in danger and break rules. We all have jobs in the pack, and we all need to do them. My job is to hunt for the pack. Yours is to learn how to be part of a pack and work as a team as well as learn how to hunt when you go out for your lessons. Your job isn’t to sneak off and get hurt. If you want to go out somewhere, just tell someone so they know where you are. You know just as well as well as I do how rare and endangered we are. Like it or not, you are the future of our species.”
“Sorry Raz” Jahzara replies, still looking guilty but listening to her brothers every word. “Guess we will both be getting chewed out by Malik”
“Yep” he replies with a big sigh “I’ll get it worse since I failed to get breakfast for everyone. You’ll probably only get a time out”
Upon reaching the den, Malik is once again at the entrance, surprisingly not as aggressive as yesterday. “Please tell me you got us breakfast Raza” he asks, obviously hungry and irritated.
“Ok I got you all breakfast” Raza replies.
“You didn’t did you...”
Raza lets out a big frustrated sigh as he walks up to him “do you see me carrying breakfast? No! Do you think I tried to get breakfast? Yes! Do you think I saw breakfast and was about to get it but was interrupted by my sister who snuck out and went for the animal I was going for causing us to collide and the animal to run off? Yes it did!” Whiles Raza talks, Jahzara keeps her eyes glued to the floor, avoiding Malik's glare.
“Watch your tone young wolf! Now get inside and tell everyone they will be going hungry today!”
“Yes sir” he grumbles before making his way to the den. As Jahzara goes past Malik, he stops her.
“Just to let you know, your brother will be getting double today. If you so much as step out of line again, he’ll get triple. Got it? The only reason I’m not beating you too is because you are a female and you are the future of this pack and our species. It may not look like it sometimes, but I do have standards. One of them is to not hit females unless necessary”
“Yes alpha” she replies, still avoiding his gaze and follows Raza into the den, her brother having waited for her.
“LISTEN UP!” Malik’s voice booms in the den, waking everyone up from their slumber “Raza has some important news he’d like to share with you all!”
The den goes silent, and all eyes focus on Raza. He takes a deep breath “I failed to get breakfast today. It's my fault and I take full responsibility and have no excuse. I’m sorry”
A series of angry growls and remarks are made.
“HOWEVER!” Raza says, raising his voice above the noise causing all the pack to quiet down again “I will head out shortly and come back with double to make up for my mistake”
Malik comes next to Raza and pats him hard on the back hard causing Raza to grunt “There you have it! You will all get food today but thank Raza for making you all hungry in the first place”
All the wolves including Jahzara leave the den and go about their daily lives. Once the den is empty, Malik pushes Raza to the floor, pinning him down and getting close to his ear “just because you’re going out hunting later doesn’t mean I’m impressed! I’m far from it! The only reason I’m not beating the shit out of you is because I’m not stupid and know if I break you, you can’t hunt and if you can’t hunt, we starve. You better be thankful for small mercies!”
On leaving the den, Jahzara goes over to her friends
“So, what was it like hunting?”
“Did you go?”
“Did Raza catch you?”
“Guys calm down!” Jahzara replies, chuckling “it was fun, yes and yes. I’ve never seen him so angry before though” she shudders at the memory
“You gonna do it again?” One pup asks
“Am I an Ethiopian wolf? Probably. If I don’t get caught that is. Even if I do, I know Raza won’t kill me”
“What about Malik?” another replies “will he chew you out?”
“What about him? I don’t care about him. He’s just an old miserable fu-” she notices the pups looking like they’ve seen a ghost. She turns around and comes face to face with Malik’s glare.
“Continue that sentence young wolf!”
“Uh… I was… just… telling my friends what a fantastic leader you are!” she chuckles nervously “right guys?” she looks at her friends for help.
“Yep!”
“One hundred percent!”
“Absolutely!”
Malik glares at all three of them before walking off. Once he gets out of earshot, all 4 pups burst out laughing
“You should have seen your face Jahzara it was priceless!” one pup says.
“Yeah yeah whatever!” she replies, getting up and heading over to Raza who is about to leave again for the hunt “Hey Raz” she says as she nuzzles him.
“Hey Zara” he returns the nuzzle “please stay here this time.”
“Yeah yeah I will” she replies.
Raza gives her a look “Jahzara I’m serious!”
“Fine I’ll stay!” she says with a grin “but only if you get a mate before me!”
“You cheeky wolf!” Raza replies with a knowing smirk “you and I both know that won’t happen for a while. Tell you what. I’ll go hunt and when I come back we can go look at the stars together tonight. Sound good?”
“Promise?”
“promise!”
They share one final nuzzle before Raza heads back out to the hunting areas he knows like the back of his paw. Looking back at the figure of his sister on a rock, he gives a wave before heading into the long grass.
