Aurochs' body shifted down to it's "Human" form, pulling itself together and reuniting its components. His heart had remained undamaged and his brain was still intact, just enough to heal and keep him alive. At the moment, he was still looking like salsa, but he would live. Unconscious and unable to move, he laid there useless. He had an out of body experience, he was just standing there looking at himself on the ground. Aurochs saw his two wolf forms, they were there out of his body as well. They didn't seem to understand, they had all thought they were dead, and yet here they were, looking at the body they shared's attempt to repair itself. Aurochs held his paw out to his two wolf forms. His first wolf form put out his paw and rejoined Aurochs, but his second form simply shook his head. Aurochs was saddened by that, but he understood. Aurochs' second wolf form put his paw on Aurochs' body's chest. Slowly, Aurochs second shift faded away, and Aurochs was suddenly back in his body. He felt unimaginable pain as his body kept slowly healing. Most of his skin was gone and most of his muscle tissue was shredded. The cold wasn't helping, any available blood vessels were doing an endothermic reaction, contracting and keeping most of his blood in his vital organs. It was keeping him alive, but it was slowing his healing down even more than he already was. One of his eyes was usable again and his brain slowly began to register visual input. The night had come, and the stars were out. He closed his eye to shut out the world. Aurochs was ashamed and humiliated, the one time his pack needed him and he failed. Sure, killing other rouges and large predators was helpful, and his tributes were appreciated, but none of it was needed. And what happened when he was needed? What happened when his pack was depending on him? He failed so miserably that Wendell may as well have survived, it wouldn't have made a difference. Why did Aurochs even stay? He wasn't human enough to be accepted, but he clearly wasn't enough of a werewolf to protect what needed to be protected. Enough of his upper body had healed that he was recognizable, not that it mattered, no one that he knew had even seem him before, anyone to come across him wouldn't know what to do with him. An elk passed by him, almost taunting him, as if the elk knew it couldn't be hurt by the useless wolf. Aurochs was enraged by this insult. How dare this piece of prey saunter along as if he was no threat. How dare he let himself become useless. Aurochs snarled, but the pain was restricting him, he was indeed useless. He slipped back into unconsciousness as his body continued to heal, but it would be at least a week before he could get up, and that was only if he got assistance. If left how he was, assuredly he would die.<br/><br/>--<br/><br/>The pups played around and wrestled each other, but none could beat Aurochs. They weren't being malicious, it was all for fun. The Elder was watching over them, an aged man with scars over his entire body, and tattoos wherever there was room. The Elder called Aurochs aside and began to teach the pup something. Of course it went right over the toddler's head, but the memory sunk into his mind and buried itself. For all the hatred Aurochs revived, the Elder saw his true potential as a champion among wolves. It was almost as if the elder saw into the future and knew exactly how Aurochs' life would unfold, but he didn't like the outcome and planned to help the pup change it. The Elder instructed the pup to close him eyes and let everything go. All the pain, all the fear, all his instincts and simply exist in that moment. Nothing but that moment in time mattered, and nothing would matter without that moment in time. Aurochs was born more animal than human, and it was this unbalance that the Elder feared would end his life, this unbalance that would make him hated and cast out by all. Aurochs father wished to use this unbalance, unconcerned for what it might do to Aurochs, but the Elder knew that without a balance, Aurochs could never use his full potential. The Elder foresaw that Aurochs would come face to face with death and lose a great power within him, but in losing part of himself, he would unlock the key to all his potential. The Second wolf was a representation of what bottling up all his emotions would make him become, and to lose it, though saddening to lose something so familiar, would ultimately give him his true strength.<br/><br/>--<br/><br/>Aurochs was still unconscious and his body was running on fumes. He wasn't going to last long enough to be helped, he had to accept that he would die dishonored and disgraced. His mangled arm twitched as his hand tried to move to Rose. Aurochs was having a nightmare. The sky above him was dark and the forest around him was dead. He was in his second form, but he couldn't shift down, he was trapped as the feral beast, unable to control himself. Fury and loathing seethed from every pore in his body as he attacked anything and everything he could find. Eventually he found a woman walking through the wreckage. She had a soothing aura about her, her green hair swaying ever so gently in the breeze with her clothes. Her form was one of elegance and poise, but he could sense something inside her. Aurochs could sense her wolf, but both the woman and her inner wolf were scared. They both looked sad as they looked around the razed scene. Aurochs was suddenly enraged further and readied himself to attack her, then realized exactly what he was about to do. The woman was openly weeping and had begun to fade away. Aurochs reached for her, trying to keep her there but the closer he got the more she faded. Horrified of what he had done, Aurochs turned and fled. Running and running and running until his body couldn't take anymore and collapsed. The rage and hatred was killing him, eating at his destiny, until he would consume himself from the inside and live as a shell, only for the purpose of slaughter. Nothing could stop him, nothing could stop the pain, and that was the true deformity. Aurochs had never remembered his mother's love, or his Elder's kindness, only the fury and loathing. It was what made him cripplingly shy and forced him to bottle himself up. The pain gave birth to his darker shift. His instincts had tried to pull him back from the edge, but to no avail. Only experiencing something other than anger and disgust could fix the problem, but he knew that he would scare off anyone with his lack of a true human form, with his animal nature, and ultimately with inability to understand anything but hunting and killing.<br/><br/>A cold breeze carried the scent of a woman to him. Something about the scent sustained him and brought his heart rate up. He wasn't healed enough to move, massive slashes were all over his body, but he didn't look like salsa. A lone black wolf trotted over to him with a rabbit in it's jaws. The wolf dropped it and sat next to Aurochs. It seemed puzzled, why was a being like this just going to let himself die? Why not get up and try to fight again? Why not try to eat and thus fuel himself to heal and then try again? It seemed silly to the wolf. Digging into it's meal, the wolf was unconcerned with the rouges werewolves, or the werewolf pack they were attacking, he was content to simply ponder the wolf-man and eat his rabbit.