Starglow Basin Feel Good Inc

He trailed South, seeking longer days and warmer sunlight. As carefully as he had moved, the mesa had not been a friendly scale; he skidded, tumbled, grabbed hold of whatever roots he could in order to keep himself from falling over a drop. By nightfall, his muscles burned, but he reached a flat, green patch of land, punctuated by two pools of water. He slid down the bank and landed with a splash in the cool, still water. He drank his fill, scrambled up the bank, and fell fast asleep there. 

In the middle of the night, he woke up. Gazing down into the pool, he saw the bioluminescent glow, and wondered if he was hallucinating. Perhaps something in the water...

He continued in the morning, feeling slightly sick. He knew that vibrant blue-green algae might certainly spell death for him- but he'd never seen it glow in the dark. In the daylight, the pools were jet black; deeper than he had expected. He might survive, he thought; blue-green algae would have been more visible. 

His stomach's upset faded as he basked in the sun's warmth, turning his half-masked face so that the light side could gleam in the light. He shut his eyes, and breathed in air that was dry, dusty. The earth beneath his paws was sun-baked, and became sandy. He had heard tell of succulents, but had never seen them with his own eyes. He investigated the shrubs and yellowed grasses as he went, sampling where he felt it was safe, taking note of what plants existed in such a habitat. 

But before he could go far into the basin, the scent of boundary markings warded him off. Wolves had passed nearby, pissing on the shrubs. Normal for pack animals, except-

he stopped to sniff-

-for the scent of something green in the chemistry of their urine.

Who’re you?

Tierra confronted him with a hostility that was immediately, and apparently, without teeth.  She’d already been sick once on this walk, and tremors ran through her even while she stared at him.  But she’d gotten restless, laying there all day, and a walk had taken her past him.  If he was some kind of spy then he’d come to the wrong place.

She would’ve found him attractive, once.  Some part of her still did, but there was no interest in her accusatory look.  Just a demand for an answer.  What was left of the fur at her neck prickled, pulling uncomfortably at the healing mess around it. This only gave even more of an edge to her impatience.

Medicines ingested had tells- learning to detect traces of it in bodily fluids informed him of what systems handled the drug, and how it came out in waste. Haruto did not recognize the scent of what tainted the pack's urine, but he could tell it must be something herbal in their diet. The cacti, perhaps? The succulents? His first hypothesis was that the wolves in the desert turned to vegetation to supplement their diet, if prey was not easily found- but he realized a moment later that it could also be where they sought hydration. 

But something about the scent, didn't simply smell like plant, it smelled like-

The study abruptly finished, and he shook his head to bring himself back to reality. Had he been that lost in his thoughts, or had the scent in the urine caused him to lose awareness of his surroundings? 

Backwards he stumbled, hocks smacking together as he spun up a small cloud of dust. He flinched as he barely brushed against a jumping cholla, and let out a small cry as a barbed fruit dug its hooked spines into his flank, pulled from the spiny plant. He grimaced as he glanced at it, and then back to the woman who had surprised him, flattening his ears and shrinking toward the ground, squinting as the prickly fruit pulled at his skin. 

H-H-H- He stuttered, before he came to the assumption that she wouldn't care what his name was. His name meant little, now, especially given the destruction of his family. N-Nobody, He murmured quietly.

Pathetic. It was a mean thought but she clung to it. Mean was all she wanted to be right now, and even if the thought was hypocritical, she wasn’t about to self reflect.

You make a lot of noise for nobody, she replied, her ears tilting back as she glared at him. He’d be better off getting lost. With what happened before, this guy didn’t stand half a chance here.

Skulking pretty close to our borders too. You looking to disappear? Or are you just stupid? It didn’t feel good to say, and something in Tierra rebelled. But she stamped it down and ignored it. She was doing him a favor, showing him how fucked this place was. If he was smart he’d get lost and forget he ever saw it.

Haruto only spared the corner of his eye for the woman, though he was tempted to cast her a glance and take better note of her features. Autumnal browns wrapped her in a coat, highlighted with strands of ochre likely lightened by the sun. A darker face, where hot, day's-end sunlight eyes glared at him and scorched him with their touch. His skin prickled and heated beneath her gaze, and he felt like a meal being heated up for consumption.

His brow furrowed lightly; had he been noisy? Perhaps he had been muttering to himself, but it was not a habit he allowed to manifest these days. He wasn't the type to hum absent-mindedly, nor were there dry leaves beneath his feet to crackle and give him away. He wondered if she was bluffing. He wondered if she had big ears- and if desert wolves had a keener sense of hearing. 

He wondered if the scent of herb on her breath made her more sensitive- and it made him curious. 

The cactus fruit remained embedded in his pelt; with every breath, he felt it dig in, scratching its many quills into his skin. 

One word caused his ears to flick forward, and for some of the tension in his crouch to relax; there was a light quiver to her voice, which he realized now came from her tremors. Disappear, He repeated, quietly. He turned his muzzle toward her- head still low and gaze averted- but a calm questioning in his expression begged for her to explain how one might disappear in the desert here. Fever? He asked, something empathetic in his tone that budded even in the wake of being watched so carefully, and spoken to with disdain.

Damn it. He reminded her of Sybol.

Tierra regretted approaching him the moment he expressed sympathy. If there was one thing she definitely couldn’t handle right now it was that. She couldn’t focus on anything, everything ached, and she wanted a fix so bad that sometimes she forgot she hadn’t had any, she fantasized so clearly. The only thing stopping her from giving in was remembering. Then, suddenly, the pain of not having it was preferable.

Disappear. Yeah. She retorted aggressively, though she no longer met his eyes. That’s what they do here. Nice guy like you wouldn’t want to mess with this. You won’t last five days. Her bravado was wearing thin, replaced with a tired finality. Trust me. She was doing him a favor, warning him.

He flinched at the harshness of her words, at the percussive sound of her breath. Like a lighthouse beam drifting off into distant waters, her gaze slid away from him, and at that moment his, like the darkest horizon at dusk, rose to look at her. 

What youth should have been in her features had been bled out of her by abuse, starvation and neglect- some of which may have been self-inflicted. She had a toothpick-like thinness to her, which would only increase to a dehydrated wither if winter came and she did not mend her diet. The whites of her eyes should be brighter. Combined with the tremors, her symptoms pointed to a couple of things- the most apparent one was withdrawal. 

All this he took from a glance- a lofty assumption at best. She could have a blood parasite, she could also be suffering from infection. It was the trace of something in the urine that marked the borders that made him rush to the unusual conclusion. 

She'd warned him- but it had for the most part gone over his head, and he was careful not to allow his gaze to linger for more than a moment, hoping she might not notice. His paws crept closer together. 

I can come back tonight. he said. With medicine. It would take him some time to locate, collect and prepare- but she looked as if she might not last five days without care.

She laughed, but it came out wrong. Stilted, and really, she wanted to cry. What, he thought he could help her? She didn’t want it. She didn’t need it. And he needed to get the hell out of here before Soto got his claws into him too.

Don’t bother. I don’t need your help. You should leave before they drag you into all this too. Her voice held no conviction, though, and as she spoke she sank to sitting. Whatever he did, she wasn’t in any position to stop him. All she could do was give the warning.

Medicine. It was so tempting to ask what kind. She wouldn’t know the name if he gave it, but if it helped her to forget it might be worth it. Might be worth him. She hated that she thought it. It was selfish even for her.

Laughter did not mean joy, and like the pealing of tin cans tied to the back of a moving vehicle, it was hardly a celebratory sound. What he'd noticed were symptoms, and he now believed the cause not to be a physical ailment, but trauma. Some might pity her, for who she had become. Haruto was a doctor. Pity was useless- medicine and treatment were what healed. 

His curiosity about what plants lived in this region provided an ulterior motive, one she wouldn't have to know about unless he was granted safe passage. She seemed keen to ward him off, but at the same time, he felt her dismissal was almost a cry for help. Her body language was more inviting than anything, and she hadn't bared her teeth. He wondered if this engagement was wearing her out by the minute. 

What's -'all this'-? He asked. What you've been dragged into; He clarified. What is it? Whether she'd intended to do so or not, she had piqued his curiosity by trying to push him away. And who are 'they'?

Soto. She shivered, then shook her head. Not just him. There was another. Is. She forgot what the old one’s name was. She hadn’t met the new. Or were they the same? Honestly, outside of the two she knew, it was all a blur.

I don’t know. But they want us dead. They… killed him. She couldn’t finish. Her head dropped as her breath hitched. Her heart felt like it was beating in double time. For a moment she couldn’t hear anything else. Don't think about it. Don’t.

Was it dread, or were her tremors caused by her condition? The name seemed to rattle her, like wind causing loose shutters to bang against the siding. If a name summoned such a reaction, he wondered what Soto's face must look like; and how it was that he and one other gave the woman the impression that they were powerful or dangerous enough to merit the warning she had given him. 

It was all dreadful- but it was also terribly interesting. 

If he was right about his hypothesis regarding her altered state, and the possibility that she might either be under the influence of something or going through withdrawal, then there was a chance that this all came from her mind...He shook that notion aside; she was wounded. Someone had done that to her. The placement of the wounds at the back of her neck suggested enough. 

She caved in, lowering her head, revealing more of the healing wounds. If she thought these men were so dangerous, she wouldn't take the suggestion of why don't you just leave? If she wasn't tethered here for a reason, she'd have already split. The best she could do was a half-hearted attempt at trying to get him to avoid making the same mistake. 

Maybe the one good thing she could do, at this point, was shelter him from suffering the same fate. 

But that smell...

I can smell something in your markings. He said. Whatever it is...It might be effecting your thinking process, and your actions...And your physical ability. Something once beaten down was easier to beat down again if it was subdued. He didn't want to tell her that they probably weren't coming, because they likely didn't exist- but he wanted to know how fiercely she believed it- and if it was the truth, or some remnant of this drug-induced haze.

Despite it being absolutely true, Tierra was offended by the implication. She could feel that everything was slower. She didn’t know if it was because of the effects or because things seemed so quick on the drugs. It didn’t matter. He didn’t have the right to talk to her like that.

Her fur spiked again as she growled, pain rippling through her neck as she lifted her head to glare at him. Save it. I said I don’t want your help.

Stick around and find out. I don’t care. Just don’t pretend like I didn’t warn you. Fear was gone, swapped out immediately with defensive anger. She didn’t feel up for his questions anymore, so to the best of her ability, she turned and stalked away. She might not look as imposing as she wanted but at least it meant she could exit this conversation.

He’d find out soon enough, if he did stay. And when he died too, she wasn’t about to give a fuck about his ghost. He had the same choice she did and, apparently, was just as stupid too.

For all she'd been through, whatever it was, she still had fight left in her. Not enough, he supposed, to pack up and leave- but he'd seen the grip of opioids before. His heart fluttered as he realized he was slowly losing the opportunity to find out more. She no longer forbade him from being here- but he suspected that she was probably the safest wolf to talk to, if Soto and his accomplice were as dangerous as she said they were. 

Of course she didn't want help; she was still swimming. Most of those who drowned tread water for a good while before they succumbed. 

She turned. He did not make to follow- she had not invited him, after all. 

I'll come back, tonight. He called after her, and as he turned, he continued speaking over his shoulder. With something better than what you've had.

The piebald man loped off into the midday sun.

She made no sign that she’d heard him, and decided already that she didn’t want anything to do with him. She convinced herself of that as she walked away, continued to do so as she returned to her bed, exhausted.

But when he showed up that night, she wouldn’t be able to resist. The green was a drug that sharpened everything to unnatural clarity. She’d had other drugs that wiped things away. If there was even a chance this was what he was offering, there was no way she would let that pass.