Chapter 6 Exploration The gray cub spent a lot of time alone while his mother went hunting.
He still had not gone beyond the mouth of the cave.
As a matter of fact, he did not even know it was an opening.
In his mind, it was just another cave wall, except that his mother could walk through it.
The wolf cub thought his mother could do anything.
His father had left that way and had never come back.
If the cub ever wandered too close to the entrance, his mother would nudge him back, sometimes with a soft growl, as a warning.
The cub always did as his mother wished.
He knew that she was worried something might happen to him if he went too close to the entryway.
Although he had never known danger, he knew fear.
It was a part of his heritage.
It was a part of the wild.
Fear would teach the wolf cub many valuable lessons.
A wolf does not think like a human.
The cub did not look at the cave opening and wonder what was out there.
It did not even occur to him.
He knew only the world around him.
But every day after his mother left in search of food, he moved closer to the exit.
He smelled and heard new things with each step.
Just as fear was a part of his heritage, so was the need to wander and hunt.
When the day finally came that the white wall dissolved into colors trees, the sky, a stream running through the woods, he stepped bravely outside.
The cub blinked his eyes against the bright sunlight.
What was this place?
Suddenly a great fear came upon him.
He crouched down on the lip of the cave and gazed out into the unknown, unfriendly world.
The hair along his back stood up on end, his lips wrinkled weakly in an attempt at a fierce snarl.
But then nothing happened.
The cub looked over the green trees into the blue sky.
He watched a bird float above the trees, then dive into the woods.
It disappeared as it passed into the trees, and the cub wondered what happened to it.
He watched clouds move slowly across the sky.
He felt a soft breeze on his muzzle while he explored this new world becoming more and more curious.
He forgot to snarl.
He also forgot to be afraid.
So he stepped boldly from the cave door and fell forward, hitting his nose on the earth as he tumbled down the hill.
He did not understand what it meant to fall.
He rolled down the slope over and over.
He was in a panic.
The unknown had caught him at last.
He stopped rolling when he reached the bottom of the slope.
The gray cub sat up, confused and frightened.
He licked his fur clean of mud and dirt.
He was not hurt, only scared.
He had broken through the wall of the world outside and survived.
He looked at the grass beneath him, stuck his nose in the bushes and lifted his head high to feel the breeze.
A squirrel running around a tree almost ran into him.
It gave him a great fright.
This was the first animal he had ever seen aside from his family.
The cub cowered down and snarled, but the squirrel was just as scared.
It ran up a tree.
From that point of safety, it chattered back fiercely.
This boosted the cub's confidence.
Even though he was startled by more things.
As he walked along a woodpecker, a branch that struck him in the face, the sound of a strange animal in the distance, he didn't shy away.
He felt so brave, in fact, that when a moose bird hopped up to him, he reached out with a playful paw.
The bird responded with a sharp peck on the end of the cub's nose.
He yelped in pain, and the bird quickly flew off.
The cub was learning.
His mind was starting to sort this new world into different, useful groups.
There were live things, like the bird and the squirrel, that he should be careful around.
Then there were things not alive, like the cave and rocks that remain in one place.
The live things moved about, and there was no telling what they might do.
He must always be prepared.
He walked very clumsily.
He ran into bushes and shrubs, tripped over rocks, and stumbled into trees.
But with every step he was learning more, and with every step he was more curious.
This also led to more surprises.
He followed a strange sound through the leaves and came upon a stream.
He stuck his paw in the water.
It was wet and cool and entirely new.
He put another paw in, then all four.
The gray cub felt the current move around him.
It was just like taking his first steps from the cave.
Suddenly the ground below him disappeared and, crying with fear, he went down once again into the unknown.
He lifted his head out of the water, and, as if he had been doing it all his life, he began to swim.
He tried to turn around and head back to shore, but the current got hold of him and took him downstream.
He was both terrified and excited by this new adventure.
Everything was new and everything was scary.
When the current brought him close to some rocks, he pulled himself up.
The gray cub crawled to shore and shook himself to dry off.
He had no idea where he was or how to get home.
He thought of his mother.
He wanted her more than anything else in the world.
He wondered how he would ever find her again.
He started off, hoping he was walking in the right direction.
Just then, a flash of yellow zipped past him.
It was a weasel, swiftly leaping out of his way.
He was not afraid, only shocked and curious.
He noticed an even smaller live thing, a baby weasel, very nearby.
He leaned in to sniff this new creature and gently nudged it with his paw.
Maybe this baby weasel would play with him.
Suddenly, the mother weasel came back.
She was at the cub's side and quickly knocked him down.
The gray cub yelped.
The mother weasel made a terrible and frightening noise as she stood over him.
She swiped at him and tried to bite him in the neck.
She did not understand that the gray cub meant no harm.
She only thought about protecting her baby.
The gray cub would have died right then and there would have been no story to write about him, had not the red dog come bounding through the bushes.
The weasel turned to face this new threat, but the red dog was too quick.
She grabbed the weasel with her teeth and shook violently.
The dog then tossed the weasel back into the trees far away from her pup.
Her joy at finding the gray cub seemed greater even than his joy at being found.
She nuzzled him and caressed him and licked the wounds made in the weasel's attack.
The gray cub whimpered and softly growled a sweet low rumbling in his throat as he snuggled into his mother.
He felt safe and happy at last.
