The boy who ran with wolves

Crouching on the bent metal running over charred concrete, hiding under cover in the alleyways and where the paving is cracked and jagged. Licking his wounds and having his wounds licked and cowering in the cold moonlight; only a brief howling to dispel the deep bone chill; howling with the pack at the moon. Running and scampering at the break of dawn alternating between two legs and four. Jumping over fallen masonry and stopping to examine strange objects, their usage lost to he who could not fashion even savage tools.
Camping on a hillside huddled for warmth.

Strange whimpers as the wind changed direction giving scent of prey, his tongue could form no words; it had never been schooled to do so. He sniffed the wind, and his heart rate jumped; this would be a good day for the hunt. His keen sense of smell and sharp eyesight combined with fleetness of limb made him a prime asset to the pack amongst its chief hunters and guardians. At the edge of the barren city there is a small lake. He looked down into the waters where he has come to lap. For a moment there in dim recognition, he's not like the rest of the pack -this is not the life he was meant for?

Smiles and sensations of such sweetness, half remembered words, the flash of a camera bulb and the words “First day of school, I'm so proud, James is only three, be his turn next!” only remembered in his first waking from dreams, waiting for the lights to change whilst holding mother's hand. Looking up into a vast sky inhabited by buildings and huge people. The chatter, the noise, and the clamber of the city all lost now, all forgotten. In the quiet of a suburban garden taking his first steps into a strange discontented Eden.

Picking up the dirt with his hands which he used more like claws sniffing at the air in the morning, was that prey nearby? In twisting and writhing in half remembered dreams, he remembers back several years. He was underground in a deep cellar though he did not know the word. He was clothed and there were others there. In dreams he remembers how they talked, gathered together in small groups staring up at the cracked ceiling praying in disbelief and remorse. He knew his mother was not there with them but where was she? What was a mother; he knew nothing of other human beings only of the dynamics of the pack the rough-and-tumble of their ways.

The blaring of sirens, the running of many feet, the stumbling, a falling half gathered mass of people, trapped in the dimness of some subterranean would-be abattoir. The baroness of the walls and a lack of colour, wailing and crying in the gnashing of teeth, the cursing of the gods and the damnation of fate and the trembling of the ground reverberating with the impact up above.
The silence of a tomb engrained upon his early memory. For days with restlessness only broken by incoherent babbling and worn out frustrations. As the months go by and the food runs low men’s vigour runs to weakness, thoughts turned to cannibalism but horror and resignation soon banished such aberrations and all but one lie down to die. As weeks turn into months strange scratching is heard on the surface - something clawing to get in. Do they smell decaying flesh or sense another animal in peril? A small child the last survivor of this unhappy scene crawls his way into a changed world.

The leader of the pack would sniff at recent kills. Baring her razor teeth until her belly was filled. Often she would snarl over some discovered half desiccated corpse and walk away. This was a signal to the pack not of her ownership of the prize, but of its inedibility. She would gently gnaw at young pups ears that refused warning, her way of disciplining the tribe to keep its' civilised manner. Other packs may have eaten this meat and died slow deaths; weakened and unable to hunt through dysentery, as she had witnessed so long ago. There were many such events when the city was full of the bodies of the strange creatures that lived there. Half charred bodies encased in metal and stone impossible to get at, and for a time so pungent none dared venture into the city streets.
She was a wise old wolf who had felt her paws upon the earth many years. She knew the difference between life and decay by its very smell and through the ravaged hues of dead flesh and half ripped bone. She licked and nuzzled to all the members of the pack in turn, her extended family and legacy upon the earth. Her days now seemed to stretch in length and effort. The coldness and keen darting quality had gone out of her eyes and all restlessness for wondering had vanished. She spent more days tending to the sick of her brood as others scrambled to lead the hunt; she pays little regard. One day age took her into a strange melancholy state of mind and she wandered off from her brood to die in peace.