Ankyra Sound Find table space to say your social graces

With the dust of birth settling about their frail shoulders, the three cubs of Lusca and Saltwinter fell into a sort of tentative truce with one another. They were unused to each other, of course. Tiny Wylla had no interest in her brothers in the early hours of her life, but they were in her way more often than not, especially the larger Lycaon, and she had to jostle with the best of them for purchase on Lusca's bounty. Her grip was often gentle and fleeting, as if she sympathized with the mother whose tenderest of spots was likely already chafed and cracking from the efforts of her newborns. The truth was that she often had to feed quickly, lest one of her brothers roll over on top of her.

But now Wylla was hungry. Her tummy rumbled with an insistence previously known and the child's lips cracked into an upset grimace. She whined and whimpered as she shuffled among the bodies amassed at Lusca's side, blindly seeking a teat whilst attempting to dodge the flailing of Lycaon. In the process she found her way atop the more sickly form of @Ingram, and which of the two was truly smaller was a toss-up. Probably her, in terms of proportions and length, but she was currently bulkier as well. She seemed to bounce in place as she made a grab for Lusca, and in the process her leg slipped and she bopped her poor runty brother in the snout.

She was unapologetic and unaware.

He was a strong feeder, and if all one paid attention to was the manner in which he suckled, they may not think him weak at all. But the boy was. He scarcely made a sound and the sounds he did make were incredibly quiet; he was a mouse. He did not stir much, not even when he was bumped, jabbed or jostled. He complained, softly, only if his feeding was interrupted, and otherwise slept like the dead, allowing himself to be squashed and moved by those around him.

His sister's foot bopping him in the snout was met with no more than an involuntary sneeze, squeaky as it was. His dainty paws rubbed feebly at his nose, the lingering tickle of that sneeze uncomfortable, but he made no effort to remove himself out from beneath her nor retaliate. He wriggled just a bit, settling into the warmth and pressure of her body. Meanwhile, his tiny pink tongue poked out to gingerly probe her foot.

The soft lump of puppy pudge beneath Wylla's slender bottom did little more than stir at her obnoxious motions, but when her paw bopped its wet nose without her consciousness, it shuddered with the force of a sneeze. Startled, the single female of the litter slid off Ingram's back, but not before Ingram's tongue could find the sensitive pad of her foot. She snatched it away with an indignant cry, followed by a sudden bout of baby spit-up that projected from her lips without warning, directly onto Ingram's snout.

She smacked her tiny lips thoughtfully, making ponderous noises all the while, then grunted and flailed about in the blind and useless manner of a newborn of any species. Her tail shuffled back and forth with frantic wriggles and her nose wrinkled as the pungent aroma of her own vomit broke through her noseblindness just enough to tickle her conscience.

Ingram was startled by the sudden feel of puke on his snout. It caused him to writhe and shriek as he pawed at his face, as if the spit-up was some horror from another realm that he must be rid of immediately. Even the smell bothered him. The entirety of being smacked with something so novel just did not sit right with the small boy, who hauled tried to haul himself away from the offense. But, it was smeared across his muzzle; there was no escaping it, and he spun in circles in a futile search for a safe way to go. He wailed, and cried, and sobbed, and pressed his nose into his sister's ribs as he bumped into her, proceeding to rub his face against her.

Though the aroma was stomach-churning in its foulness, a soupy mix of stomach acid and curdled mother's milk, Wylla's snout snaked toward it curiously and she unbalanced herself. Slipping from atop Ingram, the sooty pup collapsed on the den floor with an indignant squawk, righted herself, and sought once more the vile scent of her own secretion.

Even as Ingram prodded into her ribs and smeared her own spit-up across her side, the girl attempted to turn, drawing her thin and frail limbs wide in futile sweeping motions that likely hit her brother at least once or twice. She could not find the ground to grip it and haul herself, and soon she floundered, frustrated, while the sensitive and ticklish flesh over her ribcage jumped and shivered from Ingram's offending brushes. Cries came unbidden to her lips, as yet unable to form a laugh, and she gurgled out a sound like a sailor drowning as even more spit-up graced the den floor in front of her.

Unlike the previous bout that was beginning to spike and dry in Ingram's fur, this was within reach and she ungracefully shoved her nose right into it, only to recoil in horror straight into Ingram as it found its way into her nostrils.

He had sought comfort, reassurance, respite from the fearful thing that had spooked him. Instead his sister buffeted him with her flailing limbs several times. Yet oddly, he found a sort of comfort in this. It was a sensation he was used to, it was something he associated with warm, snug normalcy, and his sobs quieted to whimpers, and then he was silent.

His sister seemed to pull away from him, and he went unaware of the new pile of horror, unable to detect it through the smell of the old that still wreathed his nose. It was not until she recoiled into him that he stirred himself, sensing something amiss with her and wonder what the fuss was about. He soon found out as he turned and stuck out a paw, shoving it her newest mess.

This sent him reeling all over, and he picked up his wails even louder before. Suddenly, the den had become a minefield, and he squirreled himself away as tight against his mother's abdomen as he could, and still he pawed at her and tried to go further, but as he could not go forward, upward or down, sideways it was, until he was clamoring over his sister.

The ruckus between the two cubs was enough to rouse even the deepest of sleepers, as it no doubt roused Lusca, but Wylla was completely oblivious to all of that. She was aware only of the wetness of sick on her face and the rank odour of it as it assaulted her nostrils. Her attempt to push away from it ended in disappointment, for Ingram, small and fearful as he may be even at this tender age, was an effective roadblock for his sister.

She didn't know he'd stuck his paw in her mess, but soon Wylla's roadblock was moving. Not only was it moving, but it was climbing, and she wailed loudly as she clambered atop her. Ingram wasn't heavy, but he was uncomfortable, and his jostling against the back of her head caused her chin to sink back into the damp puddle of vomit. She struggled against his weight, flailing hither and thither in a great effort to unseat him from her back so that she could retreat from the horrendous, stinking wetness on the floor.