It had been a good year. It mattered not that more people seemed bent on seeking them out and confronting them; it was good sport, a refreshing workout and bit of excitement over the usual, mundane routine of slaying monsters while embarking on this seemingly endless hunt they shared between them.

And such was it that the hunt led them through the Giza Plains. It rained now, as it was prone to doing with such regularity. The nomads had left for the mountains once again, and in their place emerged the stronger monsters, though the taste and texture of their meat and blood was not much worth the effort of slaying them. Still, he welcomed the exercise, and as he crossed the rain-sodden grounds of the plains, he found the one he knew would be there.

Not a nomad – even the nomads found this one peculiar – but a stranger. A loner. He never sheltered from the rains, always sitting on this one large rock and soaking himself with little care. Perhaps it was his intention to soak, for he never seemed as relaxed and at peace when the weather was dry. He had seen this stranger fight, but only when he had to and only for the sake of survival; his purpose did not lie in hunting.

That is, if he had a purpose at all for sitting out in the rain and indulging in its cold, wet company.

He approached the stranger once more, sniffing to pick up a peculiar scent of dried spices that was starting to wash out. Once he was close enough, he kicked his feet off the ground, hopping onto the lowest perch he could find on the slick rock surface. Each foot careful, he made his way upward, until he was side by side with the stranger. The stranger had never taken the initiative to greet him before, and so without prompting he stuck his head just beneath the man's elbow and bumped the underside of his forearm.

In response, the hand moved slowly, reaching up to his head and scratching at his ears. Without looking at him, the man spoke his usual greeting.

"Hello, Enkidu."

His objective achieved, he continued to sit by this stranger's side, enjoying the minimal but at least voluntary petting that the man was doing in a haze of distraction before it stopped. He had never seen the man alert or fully aware before, not even when he killed the beasts that dared attack him. Instead, it was as though he always had something to focus his attention on – something that had no form to see, no voice to hear, no scent to smell, no flesh to touch.

Whatever this strange thing was, only the stranger alone seemed plagued by it. The stranger seemed troubled by it. And though he did not know what it was that haunted this man, he had an idea what it might be.

It takes a changed wolf to know another.

Sometimes, sitting next to the stranger so lost in his thoughts, he wondered how long it had been since this one lost his partner. He wondered if one day, that would be him sitting alone on a rock and mourning the stubborn old ass who had somehow become his rival, his partner… and his friend.

Then he heard the high pitched whine that slipped through the patter of rain in a whisper of wind. That crazy old fool was calling to him, summoning him back. He stood up on the rock, hopped back to the soggy ground below his feet. The stranger made no move to stop him, neither did the stranger watch as he shook himself down and jogged away.

No sense dwelling too much on those thoughts. So long as that day was not upon him yet.

The desire to learn is the desire to understand. The desire to understand is the desire to communicate. The desire to communicate is the desire to interact, to be with another. No one was created with the base purpose of being alone. All may not actively seek companionship, but eventually, companionship finds its way to those who interact and communicate with one another.

The wolf has learned. The wolf understands what the man tells him, and he thinks about what the man wants. He understands what the man is trying to say. He understands what makes the man, what makes him strong and, more importantly, what makes him weak.

The wolf loves this man because he is vulnerable. He loves the man because someone has to love him.

And when the man accepts the love and gives love back, the man gives with it all of his trust to the wolf.

Out of love, he lets the wolf go.

Out of love, the wolf stays.