Redhawk Caldera No matter how much it hurts, no matter how hard it gets, you gotta keep grinding.

She refused to touch the stockpiles lately. Whatever sparse food remained in them belonged to the Alphas, their pups and those who provided the meat in the first place. Towhee tried to contribute here and there but she simply wasn't the greatest hunter, and even small game bested her most of the time. On the rare occasion she did manage to capture something, she usually took it directly to the pups, only saving a scrap for herself.

Some might call it selfless, others stupid. Towhee didn't really think about it much. If she had, she might remember that she was technically still a puppy herself. She might notice that she was shrinking rather than growing. She might realize that she could walk right up to @Lagan and point out that she was living proof that there wasn't enough food to go around and that she hoped that stupid old man was worth the price.

She wasn't to the point of starving yet, though she was certainly getting weaker. Today, she found she couldn't finish her patrol without getting fatigued. She decided to take a break and slumped beneath the shade of a tree. Her stomach pinched but she ignored it, like usual. Her orange eyes slowly closed as she tried to summon the strength to continue. When they reopened, there was a strange cast to the sky that made her fur prickle apprehensively.