Heron Lake Plateau Ain't No Stopping Us Now

anyone wanna meet Lynx hop in

She was accepted within their ranks and she was determined to make her stay here enjoyable. The only thing now was to figure out how she could contribute. Lynx had never given much thought to what skills she possed and was eager to find out.

Screech had tried his best to find that nest of discarded eggs, but he had no luck. The swampiness of the plateau was getting on his nerves, and it was made worse by the afternoon rain. It wasn't the worst weather in the world — just a drizzle which had begun that morning — but it made everything slick and smelly. The smell of the ducks, geese, and herons was stronger with the rainfall and Screech was quick to give up his hunt for the lost eggs, assuming that they'd become too cold with the rain anyways, and likely spoiled in the few hours since he'd killed the mother duck. Huff.

As he traipsed through the tall grass, he thought he heard movement — so he stopped, one muddy paw raised almost to his chest (since he'd been carefully trying to plot a course through the muck). He looked almost like a hound dog on point. The moment passed as soon as he saw a dulled silver form moving beyond the grassland. Thinking it might've been Finley (who he was certainly eager to avoid) Screech ducked and tried to find a path out of the thick-set grass. He emerged just shy of the stranger's location and stumbled backwards, sinking his paws in to the thick mud he had been trying to avoid.

Aw, shit, he murmured, and looked down at the soil.

A males voice split through the silence and through the air. The female was suddenly pulled from her thoughts as she turned around. "Hello?" She called out not knowing exactly where the voice had originated from though she knew no one would be as dumb as to treepass, the silvery female kept her guard up as sge called out again. "Who's there?"

The feeling of sticky, wet, nasty mud between his toes was nothing to scoff at. When had he become such a priss? It wasn't being dirty that he disliked, just the tactile sensation of the mud coating his feet. It would be easy to fix. But as Screech realized this, he was distracted by an unfamiliar voice. He raised his attention from the dirt to the surrounding shadows, having briefly forgotten he had been trying to avoid the silver-coated figure he had glimpsed.

They knew he was here, and they didn't sound at all familiar — so obviously this wasn't Finley. It could've been one of her kids, but Screech wasn't sure. It was hard to keep all the Blackthorns straight. As he stepped out of the mud and in to the grass, he began to drag his heels across the dry reeds with the hope that it'd help clean off some of the bulky mud before it set. 

That was when he caught sight of her again. Screech didn't feel bad exactly, but he understood how it felt to be surprised by someone you weren't expecting, and felt a little sympathetic as she called out again. I'm over here, he called through the grass, and then decided to slink closer and make himself known. Sorry, he murmured as he emerged before her, streaked with brown and covered in bits of grass, I thought you were someone else so I was uh, hiding. That sounded lame but it was the truth.

By the looks of it, the male in front of her was a lot younger than she. "I apologize for the hostility, ams it's quite alright." With all the Blackthorn's around in the pack it was easy to confuse wolves at one time or another. "My name is Lynx and you are?" The female skipped to formalities and introduced herself.

Hostility? He quirked a brow at her comment, because the boy had seen a lot of actual hostility from people in his lifetime and what she'd displayed might've been a vague sort of concern, or a self-care in the face of a stranger, but not hostility. She went on to introduce herself and Screech was again perplexed; most of the pack knew of him (he was infamous among the Blackthorns and obviously well-known among the Redhawks since they were his kin). The fact she didn't know him meant she either lived under a rock, or she was new. 

He assumed that she was a newcomer, then, and decided to play nice. I'm Screech, one of the Redhawks. Have you met Towhee or Orca? They're my sisters. Although lately he didn't feel so connected to them, things were starting to get a little better between the three of them. Maybe eventually the rest of the pack would start seeing him for his real self too.