Althea bowed her head and backed up a few steps. She was still on guard and her ears where perked.

Skit heard Uru's howl and took off after telling Swordfern "Duty calls." and she got to Uru quickly. Lightning crackled in her eyes as she stood beside Uru, taking the order to stand down.

Shadow bounded up next to his Alpha, snarling defensively, then backing up at the stand down command.

Swordfern stared after Skit wide-eyed. "You think so?" She said to herself.

Ignotia and Desdemona froze at the echoing howl, their laughter dying off. They'd heard the call, obviously coming from a female, and were instantly on guard. They were familiar with it, as all wolves would be. After all, who could forget the rallying cry of an Alpha?

That could only mean one thing. Where an Alpha was, an entire pack wasn't far behind.

The pair were anxious, but for different reasons respectively. Desdemona, because of the old memories she'd wanted to leave behind, and Ignotia, because of the pain that still lingered in his chest heavily.

Desdemona couldn't help but shudder as an old voice overlaid the new one. The angry voice of her mother, disappointed in bearing a single, ill runt of a pup ran through her mind relentlessly. She remembered her aunts and other female pack mates looking down at her with contempt, furious that her mother had had an affair -with a rogue no less- that brought yet another mouth to feed into the pack when she knew that they couldn't afford it. It wasn't her fault -Ignotia had beaten that into her skull soon after they'd met, but that didn't stop the feeling of worthlessness from creeping through her already shattered heart.

Ignotia refused to acknowledge the feeling of despair running through him, as well as the bloody memories that went with it. Memories of sharp teeth and claws ripping through him, seeking the punish him for things he couldn't control. He gathered himself back up, numbing the pain that came with being a former Omega. He hadn't been the Omega for no reason, but not for the one most would think of. He could fight and hold his own, that was never a problem, but it was that he'd chosen not to fight. He'd loved his pack back then, hadn't wanted to hurt them, but that never stopped them. The Omega, who always took the brunt of the hostility in the pack and lay on the last rung of the social order, was the punching bag. He doubted the treatment from this pack would differ much from the rest.

Desdemona pulled herself back onto the hard surface snow, standing close to Ignotia's blind side so as to warn him if there were any other potential enemies that attempted to take him off-guard. Ignotia adopted a neutral posture, neither confident nor submissive, with his tail straight and his head parallel with his shoulders. His stance was loose, ready to grab Desdemona and run if need be. He couldn't protect her while fighting against a full pack if they decided to attack. They were already close enough to have an advantage if they pushed themselves at their top speeds.

How careless of him. He should have been more aware of their surroundings. One never knows how others are going to react to another's presence, they can only hope they have some semblance of mercy and or indifference.

Uru lifted her head. "Names?" she barked. She slowly and cautiously stepped toward them, her tail straight. She kept her eyes locked on the male. "We mean no harm if you mean no harm either!" she added.

Skit's eyes crackled with lightning again.

Ignotia answered her, his naturally low voice effortlessly thundering through the area, "I am Ignotia, and the pup beside me is Desdemona."

Desdemona didn't correct him this time, she knew that any interruption could be taken as a threat.

Shadow was growling under his breath. Why can't today be a little more normal? He thought.

Wepwawet suppressed a yelp as the herd of caribou began to panic. He sniffed the air, ducking back behind a scraggly bush. Suddenly, a soft rumble sounded from the clouds. The caribou bolted, yelping in surprise and fear. Wepwawet also ran, ducking around the herd he was trapped with. His presence wasn't helping the caribou calm down. He tried running uped the caribou to get out of the herd, but to no avail. Hooves were everywhere he looked.

A cold feeling started forming in his gut. I'm going to die. I'm going to be trampled and I'll die. He shook his head, dismissing the thought with a soft growl. He decided in a flash and rammed into a caribou, which did nothing to push it over, but did scare it enough to make it rear up and bellow. Wepwawet yelped, stopping and ducking under the snow. He heard thumping hooves and smelled fear. Whether it was from him or the caribou, he couldn't tell.

Uru heard the thundering of hooves. "Run!" she howled, hearing them get ever closer. "Stampede!!!" she screamed, turning 180 degrees and hightailing it out of there, praying everyone would follow her.

Skit was right behind Uru, running for her life, when she smelled a different wolf, and she turned towards the herd, running to and into it. She dodged raging hooves as she made it to a male wolf. "Come on, theres one coming you'll get trampled if you stay here!" she barked.

Ignotia had taken off as soon as he'd heard the stamping of hooves, Desdemona clenched tightly, but gently in his teeth by her scruff. He didn't follow the other wolves, running towards the side of the stampede instead of trying to outrun it. He hid himself and Desdemona behind one of the several massive chunks of ice that adorned the wide-open space just outside the frozen pine forest the pack most likely lived in.

Desdemona flinched as the large caribou roared passed their position, the large herd splitting around the hunk of ice.

They'd been seconds away from being trampled!