The Third Dawn- Realistic Wolf Novel (Another Poll, C4!)

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Bump!

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To whoever voted... thank you! I'm working on the Death List and need some input.
I'm so sorry about the temporary delay. I have had depression stemming from the book for a few months and had to take a break. I'm starting with a rough draft of the epilogue, but I'll work on 5 soon, I promise!

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Everyone voting for Holly 13
Does anyone have any suggestions for Chapter Five? What should happen during Snow's fighter ceremony?

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Never mind, got a cool idea c:
Thanks so much to all the fans! I luffs you all <33333 Your suggestions and ideas are always welcome!

[hirokas]

Okay, sorry for the delay on Chapter 5. I got hit with depression, a rabbit, and a boyfriend all at the same time, and had difficulties. Now there's a whole nerdy issue with switching the wifi USB from two different computers and emailing stuff- we have a new computer and half the files for C5 are on the old one. It will be coming soon, so here's a small bit of 5, narrarated by our dear friend, the Commander.

Chapter 5- Sparrow
The day hadn’t gone well for Sparrow, but then again, did any day go well for him? He had a history of bad days- you only had to look at the charred remains of his family to know that.
Hawk and Holly had sort of stumbled back to their dens the night before, making it easy for Sparrow to leave yet again, and that’s what he was doing. No one had noticed, as it was still dark out when he’d left, and even Starsky wasn’t awake yet; she usually woke up early to get all the other wolves to wake up. According to Hawk, this was successful “because it is usually highly improbable that our species should fall asleep again, or retain sleep.” Sparrow had snorted, since it wasn’t really as scientific as Hawk said if it was obvious. But it was usually a good idea to not ask Hawk questions, lest you wanted a full, grammatically correct rant about how whatever he was talking about. They never made sense, either. Even so, it was good that Starsky wasn’t up yet; she’d have the whole pack up if she was. Sometimes it was good. Usually not, though, if you were Sparrow. Starsky’d probably earned some sleep: she had a trainee, pups and a pack to lead, along with normal duties. Really, what was she thinking? She couldn’t handle all those things at once. But, of course, she had a commander. She could dump everything one him. So while Starsky led a pack, taught a trainee and hunted, Sparrow became a commander-babysitter.
This did not amount to much fun.
On another subject, Cloud and Moon had been trainees for only ten dawns and were already crazy. Both were ecstatic with what they’d learned, and practiced nonstop. For a mouse, they used basically anyone’s tail. They fought in the stupidest places. The dens, the forest, in the prey pile, in the river. Any place was fair game. So now Sparrow was the much-abused sitter of Moss, Bird and Heron, and he couldn’t get any sleep because of the crazed trainees.
This also was not fun.
There was also one tiny, really annoying detail that Starsky had “forgotten” to tell him was that the puppies had opened their eyes. Unlike Willow, Feather and Starsky, Sparrow did not welcome this news with open arms. Sure, the pups were cute, what with Heron and Bird’s bright blue eyes and Moss’s dark green, but that also meant that they explored the densite every dawn without fail, and they knew how to attack Sparrow’s ears, which were now ragged and achy. To top it off, Heron had decided that he hadn’t fully attacked Sparrow at the time of the gray pup’s birth, and he now abused Sparrow with a vengeance. Sparrow would have felt sympathetic for mothers, except that it was a mother who dumped the pups on him and he was pretty sure that puppies actually liked their mothers.
There were some upsides, though. Since Sparrow was doing the work of a mother- the pups were being weaned and rarely required a nursing female- he got to eat without hunting and didn’t have to train at all. Of course, this also meant that Holly teased him relentlessly. But she did look envious when Sparrow ate.
The pups were now about three quarters of a moonsky old, so that meant that Starsky had another excuse in her arsenal: her pups needed to get used to being without their mother. The pups, of course, whined and cried. Sparrow wondered how Starsky was actually helping at all, since she wasn’t doing any pup-related work at all, and why she needed to “sever her bond” with the pups if she rarely saw them and didn’t have much of a bond with them anyway. She was not very helpful, period.
The only respite that Sparrow got was nights at the rock where the fire started. As soon as the moon came, in about twelve dawns, he was leaving. He couldn’t stay with the pack for much longer; he’d been there for three years, far longer than he’d planned. But maybe it was a good thing. He could exhaust his options if he moved too quickly. He was just barely four, and had a good eight years left to live. So if he continued moving every three years- actually, he’d better make it two. So if he continued moving every two years, he would have to find four groups of wolves that had absolutely no contact with each other or the pack, lived close to the rock so that Sparrow’s annoying melodrama and depression could be kept at bay.
He couldn’t think of anyone, anything, or any place that fit those criteria. Except maybe the captive wolves, but there was only one group of those, they’d probably be scared of him, and he’d rather be alone than with them anyway.
But maybe that was a good idea. Maybe he’d be better off without anyone else. He could give his insanity full rein, and he would have significantly lower chances of killing anyone. Hawk, Holly and Starsky might miss him, maybe even those squirrelish, annoying pups. It wouldn’t be that hard, really. Just disappear.
Poor Sparrow. And he was never seen again.

[hirokas]

Chapter 5 is done! It'll be posted very soon, I have some work to do on Chapter 6.
I've gotten into a writing streak. I'm actually getting about 1-3 pages of binder paper (read: 3/4 of a page- 2 1/2 pages) a day. It might be done before the week is out.