OOC: Is the morning after the flood thread alright for timing?

The storm and the flood had rattled him to his core. Mithras wouldn't lie, he'd been scared shitless but he wasn't about to admit it out loud. He'd spent the entire night sleeping in spurts and roaming around his lands whenever he couldn't fall back asleep, and when the sun rose again he was weary down to his bones but the astral brute couldn't in good conscience rest. There was too much work to be done.

The river was littered with debris, as was the shoreline. Swollen well beyond it's boundaries, its bank was peppered with tree limbs and fragments of all sizes, washed from somewhere farther north. He passed the bloating carcasses of animals caught and drowned in the raging tempest. He was choked by the fear that he'd come across a face he recognized sooner or later, but so far it had been smaller animals washed from their dens, he'd guess. He saw nothing but groundhogs and squirrels and field mice, but all the same he could not leave its length unchecked. On weary, aching paws he walked on, and worried over his melancholy heart.

With a jerk Gabriel sat up straight. He'd almost fallen on his face again. It was really hard to stay awake. His eyelids were really heavy and they kept trying to close. No matter how hard he fought it they just kept trying and every once in a while, without him realizing it, they succeeded. Now his chin was all scratched up. It was just as well. His chin had been one of the few things that didn't really get hurt when the water washed them away so now it just kind of matched the rest of him. He shivered and wiggled closer to Wyndelin. His fur was still pretty wet, but beginning to dry in places. There were clumps and spikes of mud and silt scattered across his coat. Perhaps the most annoying clump was inside his right ear. Because of it all he could hear in it was the ocean. It also itched fiercely, but he was too tired to mess with it. He was too tired for anything. Too tired to walk away from the river, too tired to talk to Wyndelin, and too tired to think right. He was also too scared of the water coming again to let himself fall asleep. The sound of pawsteps caused his gritty, red-rimmed eyes - which he hadn't realized were closed - to pop open. Immediately they fixed on the huge brute who was walking nearby. Gabriel blinked rapidly in confusion; he'd never seen anyone like that man before. He was far too bright to be real, the boy decided. So what was he then? A dream? Did Wynde see him too? "Wynde." Gabriel stirred and nudged his brother with his shoulder. "Hey, Wynde, do you see that bright guy?" "Talk" "You" Think

Wyndelin lay there twitching, eyes still wide open but not really seeing anything. "I can't… believe… we survived that…..GABE WE ARE SO AWESO-" Wynd couldn't finish before he started a coughing fit that resulted in him retching up more water. Ow, ow ow. Wynde winched. His chest hurt, his head hurt, he hurt everywhere and moved to snuggle closer to his brother to try and escape the shivering that wracked his body. He was caked with mud but suddenly he grinned and turned to his brother. "Betcha wish you had brown fur now, huh? Can't tell I've got mud." Wynde beamed at Gabriel who was staring off in the distance. He was just about to say something when Gabriel asked him if he saw a bright guy? Huh what where? Wyndelin turned to see….. his head tilted to the side. What. Was. That. "I see it Gabe…. what what do you think he is?" He looked like he was cut out of the stars, the heavens…oh no. Oh no, oh no, oh no. Tears suddenly started to sting Wyndelin's eyes. "Gaaaabeeee… Gabe we're dead aren't we?" "Talk" "You" Think

Mithras almost didn't notice the two boys until he was right on top of them and he certainly didn't realize they were pups until they began to move. (The pale boy had been easy to see but his earthy companion had taken quite a bit longer on top of it.) At first the words they spoke didn't register, because why on earth would strange lumps be speaking? When he finally put two and two together the colossal man gasped and froze. He didn't want to scare the boys, he knew how off putting his look could be, but what on earth was going on? He wracked his brain. None of the females in Argead had mentioned pups, he hadn't scented anyone knew in the area, yet here they were! Granted they were still quite close to the border. "Are you alright?" he asked, first and foremost. Pleasantries could wait until he was certain they were unharmed. He didn't see any blood from where he stood, but he still wanted a better look. "Is it okay if I come a bit closer? I promise I won't hurt you."  Gods, a small part of him was glad his girls weren't here, but perhaps if they were the four of them could just herd them home for a proper inspection. He chalked it up to food for thought. "Talk" "You" Think

While not as brown as his brother Gabriel was, thanks to the mud, no longer silver. He wasn't even predominately silver. Currently the boy was a kind of bland beige randomly blotched with darker bits of debris and lighter patches of gray where his natural color shone through. With Wyndelin's natural blotches and Gabriel's mud blotches the pair now more than ever looked like brothers. Well, that and scruffy ragamuffins...but they were now clearly a related set of ragamuffins! For a brief moment the ethereal man was forgotten as Wyndelin's words registered. Gabriel turned wide eyes on his brother and his mouth opened to speak but he couldn't think of anything to say. They weren't dead! ...were they? Slowly his mouth closed. What if they were dead? What did that mean exactly? He knew less about being dead than he knew about living - and he didn't know a whole lot about living! "Um..." The man's voice startled the boy and immediately drew his gaze away from Wyndelin. Were they alright? The answer was definitely no, but the severity of the 'no' depended largely on whether or not they were dead. If they were dead the answer was a big NO, but if they were alive then it was just a sucky little no. Gabriel sniffled indecisively and snuck a peek at Wyndelin. He didn't want to scare him by asking the million dollar question. "I think we're okay..." His gaze quickly returned to the man and he frowned thoughtfully. At the very least the man was a huge and unusual stranger. If they were dead he had to be a spirit of some kind. "No..." "Talk" "You" Think

Wyndelin shivered and stared at his brother, waiting for an answer though it suddenly occurred to him that if he was dead… would he really be feeling cold or sore? Wynde whimpered as his brother turned wide staring eyes to him. He felt his stomach drop at his brother's expression and he started to cry. They were dead weren't they? "W-what are we gon-", he sniffed sharply, "gonna d-do now?" He didn't know what dead wolves were supposed to do. Mother never really told them about death. Wynde jumped at the star man's voice and swiftly fell silent, seeking to press closer to his brother, his paws shifting nervously. He turned to try and bury his face in his brothers shoulder. He didn't want to talk to the stranger! Wynd pulled back to gaze at Gabe as his brother said he thought they were okay. Were they? Wynde burst out in tears. "N-no we're not! W-we're DEAD!" "Talk" "You" Think

The two boys seemed just as distraught as he suspected, one of them even began to wail out that they had died. Mithras' gut winged and he winced, stepping forward quickly hoping to be able to offer some kind of comfort. "Ssh, no, wait! You're not dead. Or at least, if you are I am too, and I don't remember dying." He tried to smile at them."My name is Mithras," he said, "And I lead the pack that lives in these lands. Would you boys like something to eat? You must be starving." Perhaps it was the way water and mud clung to them, but they looked thin and scraggily. Plus, if Faria would be able to take a look that them he wasn't going to complain. "Were you washed away in the flood? Do you need help getting home?" Wherever the boys had come from, he was sure their parents must have been missing them terribly. He couldn't even imagine if he'd lost his girls in the the storm, the panic... Simply seeing Faria pinned under the tree would haunt him for months to come, he was sure. Mithras looked to the horizon, hoping in vain to see some sort of figure already hunting the boys down. - Mithras