Stories For Another Time: Loth-wolf And The Porglets
Once upon a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away…
There lived a mother porg who was independent, strong and resourceful. Of course, being a single mother raising seven porglets of her own, she had to be all that and then some. One day, her children were crying something fierce — they were ravenous and not a crumb remained in their cliff-side dwelling. The mother had to venture forth in the dead of night in search of food. Before leaving her young, she sang a song in a deep voice — a tone only used in emergencies. She warned them of a loth-wolf that had recently been spotted in the area. With twin moons rising, the predator would certainly be on the hunt tonight.
The mother porg changed tones and sang in a faster rhythm, giving her porglets explicit directions. They were to remain silent and leave the nest door closed tightly. Should the loth-wolf pretend to be their mother, the porglets were to sing their favorite song — a call and response lullaby only known to their right-knit family.
And so, mother porg left the home and quickly searched the cliffs high and low, but not a creature was stirring at such a ghastly hour, not even the dreaded loth-wolf. Next she turned to the ocean, diving 50 feet into the water in search of fish.
Meanwhile, the porglets remained as calm as can be, but not much could silence their bellies that growled with hunger. And that’s all the big bad loth-wolf needed to pinpoint their location.
It howled at the twin moons, then leapt down from the cliff top onto its side, scrambling to catch its footing. The loth-wolf spied the nest door, made of hair and various sticks, but decided to use trickery instead of simply tearing into the porg home.
“Let me in kiddies, your mother has a gift for you,” said the villain. His own hunger betrayed him, however, and his impersonation of a woman’s voice was interrupted by a decidedly wolf-like howl. The porglets realized what the intruder outside must be, so they froze in place.
Disappointed but not yet defeated, the loth-wolf climbed down the cliffside in search of something to soothe his voice. As luck would have it, the predator spotted a bottle of green thala-siren milk left willy-nilly on the side of the stone pathway.
Before long the porglets hear another voice — sweeter and more high-pitched than the last — near their door. “Let me in kiddies, your mother has a gift for you.”
The smallest porglet approached the nest door and made a small peep hole in the web of hair, by the floor of their nest. The baby of the family nearly jumped out of its skin when it saw four big, grey paws where a pair of yellow claws should have been.
Upon sensing imminent danger, the porglets tapped into the Force and caused several large boulders to levitate and begin reinforcing their doorway.
At wit’s end, the loth-wolf jumped down from the cliff once more. Lo and behold, on the horizon stood a stone hut with a light on and its door wide open. The loth-wolf found the hut empty of life forms, yet fully stocked in terms of wardrobe. The villain stole a long brown robe and a pair of yellow rain boots.
Once more, the loth-wolf returned to the cliff-side home of the porg family. Having learned from its previous attempts, the creature stood up on its hind legs to approximate human form
“Let me in kiddies. Your mother has a gift for you.” The porglets used the Force to remove the boulder and carefully peek through the window in their doorway. At last, they saw a flash of yellow by the floor. Convinced this was their mother, six of the seven porglets peck at the hair and sticks to open the door. Before they could process what happened, the small creatures were all swallowed whole by the loth-wolf in disguise. The lone survivor managed to hide behind their stone bed.
20 minutes passed before the real mother porg returned to the scene, with several fish in its beak. She was devastated to find six of her seven children missing. After comforting the one remaining porglet, the mother porg questioned her child to understand what happened.
Aah, the loth-wolf, but maybe there was still time to exact revenge. The mother porg darted out of the home, flying straight to the top of the cliffside. From the highest point on the island, she surveyed the landscape… it didn’t take long to find the murderous loth-wolf. There he was, sleeping under the giant Force tree. Having satiated his hunger, the creature snored loudly.
The mother porg whistled to her only surviving porglet to bring the laser sword hidden in the floor of their nest, along with a needle and some thread. Properly equipped, the porg tiptoed her way to the loth-wolf. She ignited the blue blade and the energy beam cut open the loth-wolf’s belly, revealing her six other porglets, who flew out unharmed. The children then used the force to fill the wolf’s stomach with stones before the mother sewed the villain’s stomach back up. Amazingly, the villain slept through the entire ordeal!
Upon finally waking, the loth-wolf was parched. So he headed to the island’s edge for a drink, but fell in, dragged by the weight of the stones in its stomach. The loth-wolf drowned just as the suns rose, and the porgs lived happily ever after.
-Maz Kanata
