Blacktail Deer Plateau fly away

He'd been more withdrawn from the front lines of the pack than usual. Hawkeye's altercation with the Neverwinter was an incident that he was certain would soon come to a rolling boil...but also the weather, which was cruel to his southern roots, had put its toll on him. This rough season had confirmed with him an eternal love for summer; he was loathe to see another snowflake drifting from the heavens. But on this day, when he finally woke and peeked outside, he was delighted by the coy whisper of a warm breeze tangling his ruff. Spring would come, he realized, if only he expressed enough patience.

The sound of earth being flung into the foliage nearby piqued his interest enough to investigate. He was a bit wobbly from his self imposed hibernation - the jitters in his knees made him groan in regret - but he pursued his goal nonetheless. It was, fortunately, a short journey.

The culprit behind the disturbance was nothing more than a stray rabbit hulling out a tunnel...presumably to launch a breeding campaign in a new den. His belly wasn't presently as full as it had been in the recent weeks but to claim hunger would have been a touch dramatic. Captivated by the twitchy movements of his potential neighbor the wolf made a move neither forward nor backward...the lazy flick of his plume subdued to stillness lest he startle the little mammal and send it skittering away.

set by Emy

My boss is sitting behind me loudly eating and drinking and it's making me homicidal. It's hard to focus, so pardon errors, haha. In other news: HALLO!

With the scent of rabbit thick in his nose, Peregrine trotted along a worn deer tail in search of its source, eagerly licking his chops with every brisk step. He felt quite a bit better now, though he imagined he would always sport a small cleft in his nose where the she-wolf's fang had snagged and torn the flesh. It didn't bother him and certainly didn't affect his sense of smell.

When he came close enough to his prey to hear its little paws scrabbling about in the dirt—his black ears twitched independently of one another, giving his hearing a bit of a surround sound effect—he also noticed the scent of another wolf. Rounding a bend in the path, he suddenly came upon his pack mate's rear. Well beyond the white male, the rabbit toiled in the wintry earth.

Figuring his pack mate was waiting to spring upon the unsuspecting hare, Peregrine glided alongside him. They'd never met but any wolf that carried Hawkeye's scent was accepted without question. They were from the same pack, so every effort each made to benefit the pack—such as slaying rabbits for the stockpiles—was a collaborative effort with mutual advantage.

HAI! Omg that would drive me crazy xD But my greatest irk with eating is when people smack their lips and I can see the food being chewed in their mouths -cringe-

It was not without effort that the creme colored male kept quiet when an apparition suddenly appeared beside him. His eyes widened to convey his silent startling, the minute clench of his jaw squelching a grunt, and when he strayed his eyes from the rabbit to observe the unknown pack mate he knew immediately that a hunt was on the agenda. To which Ariston had only a single thought.

Fuck!

He was irrationally desperate to impress this guy he'd never so much as laid eyes on before. Left to himself Ax would've let the little rabbit dig to his heart's content. Chasing him was useless...he would've had better luck trying to bottle his farts. But strangely it was as if he'd been thrust into a "cool kids" initiation. He knew he was a poor hunter - a bad reflection of the male gender it seemed - and yet he was wild with the hope that perhaps JUST this once he would find a miracle.

Ariston nodded and coiled...all too eager to make a fool of himself at the other's signal.

set by Emy

He smirked slightly when he noticed his pack mate's reaction: a silent but dramatic twitch. Peregrine waved his tail once to communicate his lack of ill intention. He then thrust his muzzle in the rabbit's direction and gave his paler counterpart a questioning look.

Peregrine observed his companion's jerky, overeager movements with dusky eyes, wondering if his presence made the other male nervous. His tail twitched as he stepped back, allowing the rabbit's original spotter to make chase. Meanwhile, Peregrine readied to leap to his aid should the hare dart in his direction; he would be happy to carry out the execution in that case.

I'm not sure why this made me laugh the way it did xD

Oh me first then? his expression asked meekly as his pack mate generously gave the go ahead for him to begin. He'd really been hoping that Peregrine would initiate the chase and Ariston could fake competency on his coat tails until the matter was done with. But he had no way of conveying such a complex idea with his face alone...and so with a little butt wiggle (one that was certain to give Peregrine a foreboding feeling about how well things were about to go) he exploded out of the background like a greyhound launching from the chute.

It was pure, dumb luck that the oblivious herbivore had ducked his head into a little premade tunnel the moment Ax made his clumsy - yet in its own way impressive - debut into the open. He hadn't the common sense to close a bit of the distance between predator and prey by stalking nearer...so he knew he had to cover that gap as quickly as possible. The result was a springing, bounding sort of gallop that made it appear he was hopping in a field of lilacs.

However...a miracle happened.

The lapin was stunned by the sudden attack in such a way that he was rendered immobile for the precious seconds of Ariston's approach. He jerked, then made a move to zip off into the shrubs, but the heavy slam of the wolf's paw against his back came with such force that its spine was snapped right in the middle. Front legs are hardly useful without their rear counterparts, and so it was that Ariston's jaws descended and made a quick end to the animal that was hereby remember as his first ever kill on land.

"I fucking DID IT!" he roared in triumph before taking the little heap of flesh and whipping his head back to send it airborne in a celebratory toss. Unfortunately he'd not noticed the low hanging branches just above him...at least not until his prize got tangled in the branches. It dangled like a macabre pinata and swayed gently as a breeze whistled past in the deathly quiet preceding an understandable outburst of indignation.

"..no! NOOOOO!" he screeched in anguish as he whirled in tight, concentric circles beneath his now out of reach success story.

set by Emy

He waited, oblivious to the silent cues that betrayed his comrade's ineptitude. Peregrine's entire body stiffened when the other wolf sprang forth, covering the gap between himself and the rabbit in a single impressive bound. As the swarthy Sigma looked on, his body began to quiver with excitement and he licked his chops, his rear legs coiling in preparation.

His pack mate managed to smash the hare to the ground and dispatch it without any assistance. Peregrine barked and leaped to join him even as his companion gave a celebratory toss of his head—and subsequently threw the rabbit's limp body into the air, where it snagged on a bough overhead.

Stunned by this development, Peregrine halted and gazed up at the unattainable meat. His dusky blue-green gaze dropped once to look questioningly at the other wolf, then he simply bunched his haunches, hunkered down, and sprang straight up in midair. His teeth clicked together on the empty air well below the tree branch, yet still Peregrine did not admit defeat. He tried again once, twice and three times.

When it became clear he simply couldn't reach it, Peregrine grunted and whined, running in energetic circles and occasionally bumping into his pack mate. All the while, he stared up at the dead rabbit, ropes of drool dangling from his dark muzzle.

Peregrine didn't seem to have any choice words for the ludicrous situation and that in itself made Ariston's internal panic a bit easier to digest. The frantic jabbering fell into the quiet murmurs of whining; the shine of wildness in his eyes sloughed off the natural glow of intelligent gold. He stilled even when the other joined in on the pacing, his plume's tip twitching in agitation, until an idea came to mind. "Hey!" he called out to the now statuesque pack mate.

The wolf's footsteps brought him a bit to the side beneath the dangling tidbit and he locked himself in a wide stance. "Springboard," he explained with a sly grin.

set by Emy

Truthfully, Peregrine forgot all about his counterpart in his quest to spring at the rabbit. When his pack mate shouted at him, he froze, ears sliding backward. "You're very loud," he remarked dryly. His dark ears pricked again when the white wolf prostrated himself directly beneath the dangling hare and declared himself a springboard.

Peregrine stared for a long moment, nonplussed. "I'll break your back," he protested. "I'd rather find another rabbit than snap you in half." Finally, he began to calm, putting the unreachable delicacy out of his mind. Aloud, he encouraged his companion to follow suit: "It's not worth it. Forget about it."

Licking his jowls, Peregrine sighed through his nose and moved closer to the other male, sniffing noses with him. "I'm Peregrine by the way. Do you have a name or should I just refer to you as the loudmouth who tosses hares into trees?"

The playfulness in his expression sobered up when it became apparent his companion wasn't in the mood to carry out the game plan. "I wasn't aware you were so sensitive," he countered back at the other's remark. It wasn't a sentiment that carried malice so much as it possessed a thin veil of wariness; he'd run into nothing but stand offish pack mates these past few days and was currently concerned that here before him he'd found yet another.

He sighed and craned his head back to look at his prize. "That was my first land kill," he lamented.

Ax permitted the nose sniff with caution...though his plume wavered with a token of good intentions despite the tentative nature of their first impressions with one another. "It might take you a long time to call for me in an emergency," he retorted with a lax grin. "Ariston might be easier to shout in case someone upsets your delicate senses."

set by Emy

Peregrine didn't understand the male's first comment, so he simply ignored it. When he revealed that it was his first kill, the Sigma stared at him openly. Born and bred to be a masterful hunter, Peregrine couldn't imagine how a full-grown wolf had never before made a successful kill. Before he could say anything about it, he introduced himself as Ariston, his good nature and witty retort relaying his shamelessness over his immediately previous admission.

"You can't be serious," Peregrine said. "You've never killed anything until today?" He simply couldn't wrap his mind around it. "How have you survived?" he pressed, unaware that Ariston might find his aloof nature and blunt questions rather unpalatable. Just as they were opposites in appearance, they possessed wholly different temperaments and it showed.

The stark contrast of the other was taken in stride; Peregrine's intentions did not seem entirely bent on opposition but rather influenced by lesser social standards than the pale vagabond himself. "I said land kill," he corrected mildly. "I'm a master fisherman. The slippery buggers are surprisingly nutritional and a lot dumber than most mammals that you would chase." Still...he'd been pretty pumped to find himself at the successful end of an earth bound pursuit. His eyes wandered woefully to the subject of their conversation before returning to the canine companion before him. "But fish are hard to come by in the winter...so I joined this pack to get by food wise until then."

Realizing it sounded as if he was free loading he grinned and added, "But I earn that food with my own personal skills in the meantime."

set by Emy

Peregrine's ears twitched at the correction and he canted his head, listening interestedly as Ariston described his fishing mastery. "I've never fished before," the Sigma readily admitted. "Maybe you could teach me. And I could teach you how to hunt land food."

The white male's comment made Peregrine's nostrils flare in the slightest show of disapproval, yet Ariston quickly followed it up with a peculiar remark. "What skills are those?" he asked. "The hare toss?" he added without missing a beat, snorting quietly.

@_@ Gawd I hate taking an entire week off. It takes me such a long time to get back on track.

"It started off as a game when I was a pup but I got really good at it over my first summer," he explained to help support any reason why Peregrine might've not participated in fishing before. It wasn't a common skill really...just one that was haplessly stumbled upon by most canines. Fortunately it was easy to teach. "When the waters thaw and don't freeze my nut sack off I would love to," he said with a wry grin. His vulgarity, a piece of him that had been quiet in the presence of non family, was apparently being drawn to the surface by the other's personality.

"Hey!" he exclaimed softly with a feigned snort of dissatisfaction. "The hare toss is a noble tradition passed down by generations of royal families." He chuckled then and shook his head to answer the inquiry with more seriousness. "I use my words to first formulate and then promote healthy, friendly relationships between pack members. A pack can be filled with the fastest, strongest warriors...but it will still crumble if those warriors consider themselves rivals rather than comrades."

set by Emy

Peregrine smirked appreciatively at Ariston's vulgar language. Not many in the pack spoke the way he and his brothers did, so he enjoyed it when it did happen. This factor, combined with Ariston's goofy demeanor, was starting to win him over. When Ariston mentioned relationships, Peregrine feared he might say something about building rapport between packs but he mentioned only fostering relationships between the members within the pack.

"Well, that's good, though I'm not sure that procuring sunshine and rainbows between pack mates can be compared to putting a nice slab of fresh meat on the supper table," he replied rather generically, quirking a brow at his comrade and smiling smugly. He then added, "For a second, I was afraid you were going to go off on some tangent about the importance of building relationships with outside packs. That's something I've never understood whatsoever. Why bother with other packs at all?" His dusky eyes looked to Ariston's face, wondering where he stood on this issue.

True story: I had someone do this to me once upon meeting them and it TOTALLY threw me off haha!

"Well consider it a joint effort," he reasoned with a casual shrug of his shoulders. "If the wolves of a pack are too busy hacking and slashing at one another then no one gets the fresh meat." But it was not in his nature to argue who had the more important job...he was content to take the more submissive role.

On the issue of other packs the blanche wolf looked speculatively in a direction where he imagined one of the other packs roamed in the distance. "Maintaining neutrality between packs is important," he finally answered, "but I'm not someone who would proactively bring fruit baskets to a foreign pack and declare us BFFs. It's easier to keep the peace if both groups stay on their own side of the fence." He couldn't help but think back to Hawkeye's faux pas from the weeks before and wondered how Peregrine would feel about their alpha's misstep in the Neverwinter Forest.

"So did I answer to your satisfaction?" he asked with a sudden directness that conveyed in the twisting of his head and the solid gaze upon Peregrine's face. "Were my answers good enough that you might consider me a friend of yours? You were fishing for our compatibility as companions yes...?" Ariston was evidently tired of playing coy with the darker colored male.

set by Emy

He grunted. We could eat each other, he wanted to point out, though he realized how silly that was, so he didn't. Instead, Peregrine shrugged, letting it go. Anyway, he was more interested in hearing Ariston's take on interactions between packs. Peregrine wouldn't necessarily dislike him if he disagreed, though he always valued an opportunity to opine on something about which he felt strongly.

Peregrine rolled his eyes and ignored Ariston's fishing remarks, saying instead, "Actually, I'd like to pick your brain about it. You say that maintaining neutrality is important. Why?" he pressed.

"Because I'd prefer to live in a home rather than a warzone," he answered with a light huff once he realized Peregrine was dodging the issue. He refrained from digging into things and focused on the trail ahead...matching his stride to Peregrine's own. "You seem like someone who makes a lot of hot headed decisions," he commented with an idle flick of his ears. To prevent his companion from thinking that his observations were fruitless ones he continued with, "Imagine that your most precious pack mate angered the pack next door and was punished for it. You, in understandable retribution, push back and make matters worse. They, with an equal sense of justice, come back even harder. And the cycle continues onward."

His memories skimmed over the legends of packs his parents had told him tales of back in his whelping days. "Without neutralization, without peace, the home you love will eventually become the cage you hate. You wouldn't even find solace in the unclaimed territories. Sleuths, assassins, and all manner of treachery would follow you. You might even lose that most precious pack mate that you were trying to protect in the first place."

He let the prattling of his voice simmer into a brooding silence before shaking his head with empathy toward the past lives lost. "I'd prefer to live watching everyone's backs than be stuck with just my own."

set by Emy

Lots of dialogue here 'cause I'm exploring Perry's views on these things. He's gonna have a bad time trying to mesh some of these views with Hawkeye's, methinks. xD

Although Ariston's observation rubbed Peregrine the wrong way, causing the muscles in his jaw to tense, he let him finish speaking before saying, "Why is my pack mate even mingling with this 'pack next door'?" he refuted. "We are wolves; we do not associate with those outside of our pack on friendly terms. We are all inherently one another's competition. If my pack mate trespassed or did wrong against another pack, he deserves whatever punishment he gets. I'm not going to wage war on his behalf. And if a stranger trespasses on my lands, it's my right to execute him. It's not pretty but it's the way of the wild."

The more Ariston talked, the more Peregrine realized how much their ideals clashed. "I don't leave the pack land ever unless absolutely necessary. I don't view it as a cage, nor do I need to 'seek solace in neutral territories.' I am happy with my home, content to remain here at all times and defend it. I guess I just don't understand those who think it's normal to go adventuring all over the place, making nice with strangers. It goes against our very nature. And sleuths? Assassins? We are wild fucking wolves," he repeated, shaking his head, dark ears splaying.

Looking Ariston full in the face and trying to catch his eye, Peregrine said, "Do you see this tear in my nose? I got it when a she-wolf came too close to our borders. I beat the ever-living shit out of her and sent her on her way with her tail between her legs. Did I go after her beyond that? Did I drag her entire pack into war? Fuck no. That would blow everything out of proportion for starters and it would just be a moronic waste of time. My issue with her ended as soon as she fucked off to wherever she came from," the swarthy male finished with a slight bit of heat in his voice.

Ariston out! We'll have to have an updated thread soon =D Lots of developments!

He listened to the tangent with a blankness to his features at first...but gradually, as Peregrine went on, a lithe little smirk drew onto his lips. A straight forward chuckle dribbled between them as the final stamp of the other wolf's voice drowned out the drone of his ongoing dribble; he turned his head away to politely gather his senses once silence spread between them. "I see," he retorted with a softness that was in stark contrast with his companion's choice of tone. "You're not the kind to make hot headed decisions at all then."

He'd had enough. It wasn't that he felt irritated that he and the pack mate were at different ends of the spectrum but he found their conflicting opinions to be headache inducing...if he could've rubbed his temples in exasperation he most certainly would have. "You might want to have a talk to Hawkeye about all those views you have," he advised with a wry lift of his brows. He was on the verge of ratting out their alpha with her prior shenanigans but decided against it. He did want a peaceful packland after all.

Ariston clacked his teeth together and broke free of Peregrine's side to lope a few yards in a different direction. "Don't worry," he called over his shoulder during a brief pause for farewell. "I'll still be your friend even if you're a hot head!" Laughing to himself and not particularly caring if Peregrine had more bones to pick the ex-vagabond turned back and disappeared into the foliage for an afternoon of quiet reflection.

set by Emy

Fo sho!

The black Sigma found it incredibly annoying that Ariston wouldn't even engage any of his points, which he felt were valid, and instead dismissed him with a chuckle. Again, the muscles in his jaw clenched. He'd honestly wanted to pick his pack mate's brain and, sure, he'd ranted a little bit... but the guy couldn't even give him the time of day?

Well, fuck you, then, he thought coldly, eyes flashing when Ariston mentioned their Alpha by name. He didn't get a chance to say it out loud—if he even intended to do so—because the paler male suddenly pranced off into the trees, not only clearly dismissing Peregrine's points without any acknowledgement whatsoever but very clearly dismissing the male himself.

"Way to bitch out," he said loudly at the other male's back, his onyx tail giving an agitated lash. "Fucking airhead," he muttered to himself, deciding Ariston was friendly but rather dim and weak-willed if he couldn't even stand here and discuss their differences like men.

Clicking his teeth together, the swarthy Sigma made a point to turn and prowl off in the opposite direction, rather indifferent as to whether he and the hare-tossing male ever crossed paths again.