Redhawk Caldera Made in the dark

Phox stood on the edge of the lake that gave Redhawk Caldera part of its name. He had been splashing around in the water, making a big ol' mess, with Towhee not far off (as usual). Raven lay contentedly on the shore, lazily observing the pups but not looking concerned as they thrashed about in the water. Getting their feet wet was step one to learning how to swim, after all.

Suddenly, Phox caught a whiff of something interesting. Instinct kicked in, and he went off to investigate: nose glued to the ground, still dripping wet from traipsing through the water. Although he didn't know it, he was tracking a shrew.

She was sore following the spar with Hydra, physically and metaphorically. A few days later, Towhee's fatigue disappeared and her indignation morphed into sheepishness. She shouldn't have acted like such a sore loser. Although it rankled—as much as the youth had come to enjoy Hydra's company, she was still an outsider—she knew she owed the girl an apology and explanation. Hydra had won, fair and square, and deserved respect for her skills.

For the second time, her orange eyes scanned the trees from the edge of Bramblepoint, hoping Hydra was running amok in the brambly forest again. Raven lingered nearby, a bit to Towhee's embarrassment. She didn't necessarily want her older sister bearing witness to this. But the adults were growing weary of her wandering off on her own and insisted on escorting her beyond the borders. Towhee just did her best to ignore Raven, which was easy enough as long as she didn't glance over in the medic's direction and instead kept her eyes glued on the nearby woods.

Nobody ever showed, which sort of made sense; it would have been very serendipitous to run into the girl a third time. With a sigh, Towhee motioned for Raven to walk back with her. They returned to Redhawk territory and the rendezvous site in silence, with Raven padding off to find something to eat and a slightly moody Towhee following Phox's trail toward the caldera. She plopped to her haunches nearby and watched him, his boisterous behavior soon coaxing a smile back onto the Xi's lips, though she made no move to join him. She cast Raven a sidelong smile when the caretaker appeared nearby and flopped down to munch on a snack.

Only when he suddenly seemed to catch a whiff of something did Towhee straighten up and bound to her feet, finally trotting to Phox's side with a loud sniff. "What is it?"

"Dunno," he muttered, eyes still to the ground. It was unlikely that Towhee could even see his mouth moving, but he was ~in the moment~ and very, very interested in whatever this thing was that he was tracking. He had never smelled anything like it before, and curiosity had taken over his little pea brain. His pace was steady as he followed the trail, going zig-zagging around a tree, under a bush, and over a large boulder.

Here, though, the trail split off. Phox stopped, crunching up his forehead as he tried to figure out what to do. He could go right or left. He wasn't quite sure, but he thought maybe he had been tracking two of them the whole time. Whatever "they" were. "I go this way," he informed Towhee, turning to face her when he spoke this time. He hesitated a moment longer, then began to follow the scent trail that led to the left.

He didn't answer (that she saw), though Towhee didn't worry about it. She simply fell into step beside him, pausing when he reached a fork in the road. Although she rather enjoyed accompanying her partner in crime on his hunting ventures, she did not deign to become one herself. So rather than splitting up and trying to double their spoils, she simply flashed him a quick smile and continued bobbing along in his wake. Whenever they came across their prey—of what ilk, she didn't know—Towhee would be right beside him, ready to help him wring the life outta it.

He wasn't really sure if he had wanted her to follow the other trail, anyway. In fact, he enjoyed having Towhee around for these little hunting adventures. They were each other's shadows, and having her around meant a certain level of security for the adolescent. Together, they could take on the world. Apart, well... he wasn't sure about that, but he didn't attempt to imagine it.

He continued following the trail, and it got stronger. They had to be getting close! It cumulated in a small hole in the ground: the shrew's nest. Phox, of course, became animated upon discovering this. His tail wagged crazily back and forth, and he immediately stuck his nose into the tiny nest. But they were still too far back. Phox pulled his nose back, then he began to dig at the ground as quickly as he could, chunks of dirt spraying out under and behind him.

Phox led the way toward a place where the scent was more concentrated than elsewhere. It looked like a nest of some sort. Towhee eyed it, then took a step back as her brother prepared to dig. He seemed quite happy to do the work, though she felt a little useless hanging out back here, doing nothing.

-Do you want some help?- she asked, then rolled her eyes at herself and tried again in a way Phox might actually notice. "You want some help?"

He had been so focused on the task at hand, he hadn't thought about whether or not Towhee would get bored. It wasn't until she audibly spoke to him that he paused, turned to her, and nodded. -They live here,- he signaled, stating what was probably obvious to her anyway. -You can help. We need to dig them up.- He didn't need her help, as he felt perfectly capable of doing this on his own, but if she offered, he wasn't going to turn it her down.

With a grin, he went back to digging, claws uprooting more and more of the earth. The smell grew stronger, and eventually he found what he was looking for. Here, beneath all the dirt, was a batch of delicacies: tiny, pink, baby shrews. There were about twenty of them, and he looked to Towhee. -Jackpot!- The made tiny soft noises, the small babies, and their parents were nowhere to be found. It wasn't exactly a feast, but it was something yummy!

Phox accepted her offer and Towhee moved in beside him, their elbows bumping together every so often as they swiped at the soil like a pair of synchronized swimmers. It wasn't long before their joint effort unveiled quite a delicious prize: a pile of squirming baby rodents. The Xi peered down at them and licked her lips as saliva began to pool in her mouth.

She blinked at her brother's exclamation, momentarily forgetting what on earth that particular sign meant. Then it clicked and she smiled. Towhee began to lower her head to gobble up some of the little pink delicacies but she hesitated at the last second, brassy orange eyes glancing up at Phox. He was the aspiring hunter, so perhaps he wanted to do the honors?

Towhee paused, looking at him, and since she seemed to want him to go first, he did just that. In one sweep, he shoveled roughly half of the squirming pink rodents into his mouth, chewed them nice and slow, then swallowed the mashed up mass in one gulp. It was really disgusting (to the writer), but absolutely delicious to Phox. They didn't have crunchy bones like the bigger animals.

Figuring the shrews would probably (and stupidly) come back here at some point, Phox made a mental note of where they were so he could come back for another round in... well, however long it took for these weird little creatures to produce more pink fleshy offspring.

She gazed at Phox curiously as he scooped about half of the tiny shrews into his mouth and began to chew. Her ears flicked as if she could hear the squelchy noises he made, though of course Towhee couldn't. But she could smell the blood on his breath and it wasn't long before she ducked down after all and essentially inhaled the remaining babies. She barely chewed them at all, likely even swallowing several of them alive.

Smacking her lips, she gave her brother a thumbs up with her nonexistent thumb (maybe her dewclaw or something), then signed, -That was good but too easy. We should hunt something a little harder if you wanna practice.-

Fidget rolled his eyes at her remark. Next time, he'd come back here without her and not share the easy spoils. Not everything had to be hard, did it? Besides, they were really, really yummy. And he could come back for more whenever he wanted. He thought so, anyway. Maybe the parents would never return to this location. But it was at least worth checking, wasn't it?

-Nah. Going back to play in the water,- he replied. That's what he'd been doing before this, and it was only the scent of the shrew that had pulled him away. His coat was still damp, and maybe he would try and get in a little deeper this time.

He merely rolled his eyes and dismissed her. Towhee laughed, then playfully shoved him. -You're not gonna be a very good hunter then,- she teased good-naturedly. She didn't even have to ask if she could come with him. She knew she was always welcome with Phox.

She took a few steps back in the water's direction before pivoting suddenly and tapping his damp shoulder. "Tag, you're it!" she crowed before spinning again and laughing like a drunken donkey with no volume control as she zipped toward the caldera.

He made a fake-offended face, but it broke in a matter of milliseconds. A second later, she was racing off. As always, Fidget wasn't far behind, rushing toward the lake as fast as he could. They would likely be neck-and-neck by the time they got there, seeing as they were fairly equally matched physically. Sure, Fidget was a little bit tubby, but he could still keep up with his sister.