Episode Guide

Episode #4: Scar of the Wilderness

** Opening Sequence **

Heavy snowfall at night.  Wolf tracks in the snow.  The four wolves run across a snowy landscape, beginning their journey to find paradise.  For four days they run across the snowy tundra and lifeless sandy desert lands.  The wolves stop to rest in a rocky cave during a particularly bad snowstorm.  Toboe and Hige complain about being hungry, to be silenced by an equally hungry-weary Tsume.  The ever-alert Kiba chimes in, telling them that he has lived without food for over a month, surviving only on moonlight.  Tsume jokes about eating Hige and Toboe, to the disgust of the latter two.  While Toboe tries to get Tsume to stop the bickering, Hige scents something in the air, and darts out of the cave.  The other three, startled by his sudden outburst, eventually catch up to him, to find a decomposing deer carcass.  Kiba, Toboe and Hige feast on the carcass, while Tsume looks on in disgust.  He gets edgy when the others start to discuss finding paradise, and storms off.  Of course, Toboe runs off after him, and is knocked down by Tsume, who tells him not to follow him.  But you know how well that works.

Tsume walks along the desert sands at sunset alone.  He is surrounded by what looks like the ruins of an old military base.  Dilapidated buildings and broken down military equipment litter the place.  In the distance, Toboe calls for Tsume.  While walking around the ruins, Toboe steps on something in the ground that makes a sharp metallic sound.  He ignores it and continues on.  Tsume, in the meantime, is inside one of the buildings.  He finally hears Toboe's calls, but chooses not to answer him.  Further back, that thing Toboe stepped on has begun to activate, and come out of the ground.  It is some sort of robot warrior, that had been dormant for who knows how many years.  Its scope activates and searches the horizon.  It locks its sights on Toboe, and moves in silently among the debris.  Luckily, Tsume spots the reflection from the robot, and grows suspicious.  Not until he sees the gun extend from it that he realizes that it has a bead on Toboe.  He rushes out of the building onto the cliff that Toboe is standing on.  We hear gunfire, and the camera pans skyward.

Meanwhile, back in the domed city they left behind, Hubb and Cher talk over a meal at a fancy restaurant.  He is happy, but she seems less than enthusiastic.  She interrupts his one-sided conversation abruptly when she hands him the key to her house and asks him to water her plants while she is away.  She proclaims she is taking a vacation, but doesn't say where, and gets up to leave when Hubb starts talking about the wolves.  She gets into a car waiting for her outside, and Hubb is able to leave the restaurant just in time to see the car pull away.

Back in the desert, it is now night time.  Tusme stumbles along, obviously injured, with Toboe following closely behind.  They come to the edge of a broken street, when the robot find them and follows them to the edge.  With no other choice, Tsume grabs Toboe's hand and leaps off the edge, injuring himself further.  A quick look around the place reveals that it was once a battle zone; human skulls and weapons are littered about the broken machinery.

Hige and Kiba are laying down beneath the full moon.  They are debating about whether or not to go after the others.  Kiba defends Tsume, even though Hige distrusts him.  Kiba reminisces, and in it we see the lunar flower, and a native person sitting by the fire with a wolf, chanting. 

Toboe and Tsume are struggling to get away from the mad robot.  They are fired upon, causing the ice below them to collapse, sending them hurtling down into a cavern. 

Hige and Kiba faintly hear the sounds of crashing and gunfire, and can smell the scent of gunpowder.  Hige discovers that the place was an old military base, and they both decide to try to find their missing companions.

Tsume wakes up in a cave.  He must have been dragged there by Toboe, who had been nursing Tsume's wounds while he had been unconscious.  Their rest is short-lived, as the robot soon finds them in their hideout.  Toboe offers himself as the bait to give Tsume the chance to run away.  It backfires, however, and Tsume is caught anyway.  Just as the robot is about to fire upon him again, the white wolf Kiba appears and thrashes the machine, leading it away from the downed Tsume.  It chases Kiba across the mountains, firing upon him.  None of the shots reaches him, fortunately.  In a free chance, Kiba jams a large icicle into one of the robot's gun barrels, causing it to explode.  But the thing won't give up, and continues to chase him.  Eventually, the robot runs out of ammunition, and all the noise and vibration it created caused an avalanche, which buried it.  The wolves were able to get away, and the following morning, after regrouping, they continue on their journey.

** Ending Sequence **