Too few, too late.

[hazlogs]

It is currently 10:02 Pacific Time on Sat Jan 17 2004.

Currently in Saint Claire, it is clear outside. The temperature is 42 degrees
      Fahrenheit (5 degrees Celsius). The wind is currently coming in from the 
      northeast at 9 mph. The barometric pressure reading is 30.03 and rising, 
      and the relative humidity is 43 percent. The dewpoint is 21 degrees 
      Fahrenheit (-6 degrees Celsius.)

Currently the moon is in the waning Crescent Moon phase (32% full).

Once again, it seems Stands-Up-To-Rage has taken up a sort of guard duty over
      her sleeping friend. Having left the den an hour ago, the tracks of her 
      pacing to and fro are seen as gullys in the snow. Standing with her back 
      to the wind, she looks down the slopes, absently snapping up a mouthful 
      of snow to wet her mouth and quench her small thirst.

Rain-Falls-Up chuffs a greeting as she wanders up, tail and head raised high.
      As usual, the Red Talon is in an energetic, chipper mood. Hungry, cub?

Faces-Rage does not seem quiet so bright-eyed as normal, having slept little.
      Still, she greets her lupus teacher warmly, her posture lowered out of 
      respect. Yes, is the reply, followed by a rumble of the cub's stomach - 
      keeping warm burns calories.

Rain-Falls-Up knows this, of course. She pads over to the den, taking a sniff
      inside, then turns back to the female cub and tells her to come and 
      follow. We will hunt mice.

Faces-Rage gives the den a glance before she sets in paws in the tracks of the
      Talon and follows along. Where will we find mice?

Under the snow, the Talon explains. She doesn't go far before stopping and
      sniffing the air. Then she looks over at Faces-Rage. The mice dig through 
      the snow and make tunnels. You cannot see them. You must smell them and 
      hear them. Then you pounce. Watch.

Faces-Rage pauses and waits, holding herself still so as not to make noise. She
      smells the snow, listening for sounds, and watches to learn how it is 
      done.

Rain-Falls-Up pads a few steps further away and then begins sniffing again,
      ears cocked forward, then swivelling. She takes a few more careful steps, 
      like a stalking cat, then abruptly springs into the air and brings both 
      her forepaws down. Snap-snap! The cub barely gets a glance at the small, 
      furry body before the Talon has gulped it down whole.

To the homid-reared Garou, the scents of the mice moving beneath the snow are
      faint at best and difficult to pin-point, and the sounds aren't easy, 
      either, especially if she (along with Karl) weren't able to follow Rain's 
      howl to its origen point a few days before. The Red Talon seems aware of 
      this, but urges the cub to try anyway.

Practice makes perfect, afterall, and Faces-Rage is determined to try. The cub
      has hunted mice before with success, but never under snow. She mimics the 
      other's motions, keeping her nose close to the snow, trying to pick up on 
      the faint scent through the crisp sharpness of the snow. Her keen ears 
      follow the faint scuffle of paws on frozen ground, losing it where the 
      snow becomes to deep. Then, one comes near and close, and her senses hone 
      in. Muscles tense, then release. She pounces swift and hard, but she 
      miscaculates. Out pops the mouse from between her paws like a squealing 
      daisy and bolts off across the snow, leaving the bewildered cub with a 
      faceful of snow.

Rain-Falls-Up lolls her tongue with amusement and encourages the cub to try
      again. She herself has had a good mouse-meal.

Faces-Rage shakes the snow from her muzzle and summons up her determination.
      She is hungry and wants to eat, but to eat she must succeed. Twice she 
      stalks the mice under the snow, and twice she misses. The first she 
      pounces on the wrong part of the tunnel. The second she manages to pin, 
      but it bites her paw with it's sharp teeth and flees. Not to be 
      discouraged, she tries again, biting back her homid impatience and 
      focusing close and careful on a mouse. She pounces and her jaws snap 
      down. The taste of mouse fills her mouth - crunchy and delicious.

Hot blood, the crunch of tiny bones, the tickle of fur and teeny paws.
      Delicious indeed, though only a mouthful. The Red Talon looks pleased. 
      Again! We do not eat only deer and rabbits. Mice are small, but food is 
      food.

Faces-Rage licks her jaws and savoring the taste that is a bit more mushroom
      than mammal. Food, she echoes, and sets about to find herself another. It 
      is a short amount of time before she focuses in on what smells and sounds 
      to be two mice in one of their tunnels. Feeling confident, she pounces, 
      paws wide as she comes down on both sides of the tunnel to block their 
      escapes. As presumed, the two burrow out to the surface, where the wolf's 
      jaws are waiting. She snaps them down hungrily, pleased at her own 
      cleverness.

Rain-Falls-Up scratches herself and then lies down to watch the cub practice
      (and get herself fed as well). Stop when you are satiated.

The cub pounces four more times, though she only catches two mice. Not perfect,
      but improved, she has managed to take the edge off her hunger. Faces-Rage 
      swallows down the last of her nutty-tasting meal, licking the last 
      spittles of blood from her jaws. I am finished.

Rain-Falls-Up thumps her tail a couple of times against the ground. Did you
      like?

It is challenging, but rewarding. Faces-Rage wags her tail slowly. I have
      hunted mice before, but not in snow.

Rain-Falls-Up is pleased that your elders have not neglected your wolf skills
      and gets up to sniff over the cub curiously. Have you been told about her 
      tribe? The Red Talons?

Faces-Rage has only been told a little. You are all born of wolf, and dislike
      those who are human-born. Yet you accepted to teach Whispers and myself. 
      Why?

Rain-Falls-Up shakes herself. All Garou should learn wolf ways, she states
      plainly. And she does not dislike you for being born to humans, because 
      there is still wolf in you.

Faces-Rage splays her ears slightly, muzzle tilted in uncertainty. She has
      heard that many children of Griffin wish for man to be bit out of the 
      world like an infection is bit from the skin. Is this truth?

Rain-Falls-Up sits down, looking wistful. She affirms that what the cub speaks
      is true, though she _herself_ does not believe _all_ should be culled. 
      Many, though... many-many, and they should be brought back under the 
      guidance of Garou. They need this.

Faces-Rage is a child of the mother, and does not believe that man should be
      culled because he is ignorant. He should be taught, as a cub is taught, 
      for one can not be born knowing what is right and wrong. They must be 
      taught.

Rain-Falls-Up agrees, but there is sickness in them, too, in them and around
      them. They must be taken from the sickness, and the Garou are too few to 
      teach them as they are. Nor will many humans give up their sickness. They 
      are past saving.

Faces-Rage flattens her ears in discontent. Can man not be cured? Is there no
      way to make them see the truth without violence? Man is a violent thing. 
      Will killing them not just make them want to destroy more?

Rain-Falls-Up huffs in frustration. Cull the weak and sick from the herd, then
      the rest can grow and breed strong. This is the way of Gaia. Only, with 
      humans, the weak and sick are _many_.

Faces-Rage was born human, and has difficulty seeing the world from a wolf's
      eyes. If man has grown so sick, what caused them to be so?

For that, the Red Talon points her muzzle at the sky and howls, long and slow,
      her voice rising and falling. Mother, Mother, Mother! she calls. The 
      ground, the sky, the beasts, the green things. The howl fades away and 
      comes back again, mournfully. Weaver's greed, Wyrm's jealousy, the 
      two-legged apes who gain gifts they were not made for, gifts they cannot 
      understand. Tragedy, tragedy -- prey becomes predator! Those that breed 
      and breed kill the ones to feed on them, kill and kill, breed and breed.

Faces-Rage seems to shrink down under the heavy sorrow of the lupus, and her
      spirit is torn in two. Her human's mind is repulsed and horrified, and 
      thinks to itself: If Gaia had not wished man to grow strong and many, 
      could she not have prevented it? Her wolf's heart aches with the pain of 
      the Talon, mourning the loss of the wild places and the ruination of 
      Gaia. The cub throws back her head and howls loud and and wavering, her 
      voice wracked with confusion as she, a creature of two world, is pulled 
      in two very different directions.

Rain-Falls-Up's howl fades away again. She looks at the cub sadly. Gaia told
      the Garou to watch over the humans. She knew they needed guidance. But 
      the Garou became too close to the humans and stopped. And now the humans 
      kill Gaia and themselves.

Her cry ends roughly, the young Garou's body low and sullen. Must there be
      killing? So many die now and the Wyrm grows fat on sorrow and misery. So 
      many more will die as the Apocalypse nears. Must we, who are few, kill 
      man, who is many? Will that not just feed the Wyrm?

Rain-Falls-Up sighs softly, her ears lowered. She howls again in misery, and
      when the funerael wolfsong is done, she tells the cub somberly that it is 
      now too late for human culling. Too few, too late. It is all our strength 
      to protect the wild places and the caerns, to protect what wolves are 
      left. Too few, too late.

Faces-Rage lets out a long, slow breath, the hot air fogging around the end of
      her muzzle. She is silent for a long moment, looking out on the 
      snow-covered mountains that now seem just a beautiful illusion, a cage 
      who's bars are the cities. Finally, the cub asks of the older wolf if 
      there is any way for Gaia to be saved?

Rain-Falls-Up sniffs the air, then sneezes. If there is, I do not know. Go see
      to the other cub.

She starts loping off without further word.

Faces-Rage lowers her ears and her head sinks between her shoulders. Silent and
      saddened, she turns away from the Talon and begins to walk away and back 
      towards the den.