The early spring day dawned clear and bright. The sun slowly started its daily climb of the powder-blue sky. The pack awoke, coming out of their dens one-by-one and two-by-two, starting their daily routines, blissfully unaware of the turmoil about to engulf them.
Lucky came out of the family den to greet the day. She smiled, looking at the beautiful sky, her head held high in anticipation of her day's adventures. Suddenly, something dove at her face, seemingly from out of nowhere, shrieking in a high-pitched chirp, narrowly missing her eyes. Then many other somethings joined the first. The flutter of small wings surrounded her. "Oh, no!" she cried out, cowering to the ground, her amber eyes wide with fear, "Not them!" She'd heard the story as a puppy, but she'd never believed it. Like the other stories, it was only to scare and entertain, not something that could actually happen! She darted back into the den, with the things close after her. They stopped, fluttering just outside the den entrance, just waiting for her or anyone else to attempt to come out. "Mom! Swift!" she skidded to a stop as she cried out, in a near-panic, "They're here! Mom, they're here! What do we do?!"
"Who's here, sweetheart? What could you possibly be so afraid of?" Joan came walking up from the back of the den, ears, head, and tail up, a look of concern in her emerald-green eyes. She tilted her head, narrowed her eyes, and frowned.
Lucky raised a shaking right front paw and pointed to the entrance in fear. "THAT!" Lucky ducked behind her mother.
Joan looked to where Lucky was pointing. What she saw made her stop dead in her tracks, her mouth agape, her green eyes wide, not wanting to believe what she was seeing. "Holy . . . " she started to say.
"Bluebirds!" Lucky blurted out, cowering down again, covering her head with her paws.
The rest of the pack, meanwhile, were having similar experiences all over the Den Area. Fortunately, everyone had made it back into their dens safely. The problem was that no one seemed to know what to do next. There had never been an invasion of this magnitude in living memory. There had only been the story, one of many told in the dens to the pups in the evenings. No one had ever thought it could possibly be true.
How could anyone possibly deal with a Bluebird invasion like this? There were far too many to simply start trying to snap them out of the sky. For every one that fell, there would be ten or more to take their place, all fluttering and swooping at whoever was foolish enough to try to take them out.
How could the pack live if no one dared leave their den to hunt? The psychotic Bluebirds showed no sign of being ready to leave anytime soon. They could eat in shifts, some leaving to eat while the others kept the wolves pinned down in their dens. At night, they could sleep in shifts. They could even rest in the trees in shifts during the day. There were more than enough birds there for that.
Then Joan remembered the story told by her mother and father to her and her sister Lucy when they were puppies. The same one she'd told Lucky and Swift when they were puppies. She remembered that the story had never explained the sudden appearance of such a huge amount of Bluebirds or why they had turned aggressive, but she also remembered that in the story, there was one who could save the pack. One who made a noise so horrible that the Bluebirds were simply stunned out of the sky. When the birds came to, they were so frightened that they flew away and dispersed, not to return in such numbers until many wolf generations had passed. But who was the one who would save the Southern Pack?
Just then "Clumsy" came shuffling up from the back of the den, still half-asleep. He'd been asleep when the commotion of Lucky's outburst had awoken him.
He yawned, and the sound that came out of his mouth dropped all the Bluebirds at the den entrance, although he was still a good twenty-five feet away.
He stood, mouth hanging open, nearly as stunned as the now shell-shocked birds. He'd never made a noise like that before in his life! His howl was passable, if not the best, but never as God-awful as this! This was like the sound that you'd imagine coming from a coyote scraping it's nails across a flat rock while screeching. It was almost enough to make your ears bleed.
Lucky and Joan's heads whipped around, and they both just stared at him, mouths agape, eyes wide, absolutely bewildered. Had that horrid sound just come out of him?
He stepped up to the entrance, gazing down in amazement at all the dizzy-looking birds on the ground outside. He'd done this? He felt almost sorry for the little ones, but he also knew that many of them in one place was downright dangerous, what with their sharp little beaks and claws. A wolf could easily lose an eye or worse, both eyes. The story had told of much worse. He shuddered as he remembered. No. They had to go. It was as simple as that.
As he went to the next nearest den, he tried to remember how he'd made the sound that had dropped the birds the first time. It took him several unsuccessful tries once he got there. The Bluebirds left the entrance and surrounded him, swooping, screeching, fluttering, and diving. He had to duck several times to avoid being hit in the face. A few birds even snagged their little talons in his head-fur, pulling painfully. Then, he finally hit the right tone and Bluebirds dropped like rocks from the air around him, each with a soft "thud" and sharp "Eeep!" as it hit the ground. The stunned ones still in his head-fur fell out when he shook his head. He silently padded from den to den, stopping just behind the cloud of Bluebirds outside of each one, letting go with the same sound that had dropped the others before.
Soon, the entrance to each den was littered with little birds, all dazed and confused. Then it began. It started with the entrance to the den where his mother, sister, and he lived. The birds began to come to, fluttering weakly at first, then more and more strongly, until they were back up in the air. Then they flew off in a panic, back up into the sky from where they'd come. Den entrance by den entrance, they all did the same. Soon enough, there wasn't a single Bluebird in sight. A few would come back, but not in the numbers they'd just been here in. Just the normal amount. No more than a dozen or so in a single flock. Nothing to be afraid of again, at least for the foreseeable future.
The Southern Pack was safe again for many wolf generations.
Swift was "the One." He'd saved the pack. He finally earned his real name back. No one in the Southern Pack ever called him "Clumsy" again. The "Swift move, there!" joke was a thing of the past. He was still an Omega, and he always would be. But from now on, he was going to be treated better by everyone in the pack. He would have at least some respect.