Shadowwyn Moor Hey, how about that!

He took Kero's cue, and like the red wolf, he settled himself lower to wait. He watched the rat-like creature as it walked. His eyes never left it, but he was acutely aware of his hunting partner, monitoring him from his periphery, and when Kero sprang to rush it, Luke was quick to mirror him.

The sprint was short lived; true to its reputation, the opossum froze on the spot. The blue-nosed wolf stopped several paces behind his friend, surprised despite knowing that this could happen, and he wrinkled his nose as he caught his first whiff of foul musk. It then toppled over it, stiff as a board.

"Come check this out," the red wolf called. Luke padded forward to inspect their "kill". He looked it over for a moment, undisturbed by the smell, and completely curious about this charade. His tail started to wag again, and his mouth broke into a wide grin. "Well that's the damndest thing I ever did see," he laughed. "How long does he stay like this? Do we just... eat him?" He looked a bit sheepish. It seemed simple enough and yet, it was so just weird.

Luke was quick to join him with the opossum. They were pretty darn interesting, weren't they? "See that? Jaws slightly open? Foaming at the mouth? Makes them look pretty unappetizing, doesn't it?" Normally, this sort of thing would have been a deterrent from eating any other animal. It was his head that was overriding natural instinct which was telling him to leave it alone. Knowing better, was reason enough to overlook a few things, even though it did smell something awful.

Kero prodded the body. It was frozen in place, only moving as a corpse naturally would though he knew the opossum was still very much alive. "They can keep this up for hours at a time," he said. "I would probably kill it for real before eating it though, just so it doesn't accidentally wake up when you're halfway through the contents of its stomach." Something like that sounded all kinds of cruel.

He turned his eyes back to the opossum, and he had to agree that his friend was right. It was an easy meal, and easy meals were few and far between in the wild, but what was laid before them hardly looked like a meal worth eating. He chuffed in amusement. Though he could see how other's might be persuaded to turn away, he remained undeterred, and eager to taste something new.

"Pretty amazing, really," he said as he, too, shoved a paw forward to poke the creature. But enough was enough. He stepped forward and in one swift motion, his muzzle descended to marsupial's neck, and with a jerk of his head he was rewarded with the clean snap! of a quick and merciful kill. Kero was right: no sense putting the creature through the torment of being eaten alive.

He looked to his friend with a grin. "Which half do you want?"

Iqniq spared a smile. Was the fainting trick amazing? A little bit. It was an excellent survival tactic, that was for sure. Staring down at the opossum who was slightly foaming at the mouth and smelling to the high heavens? Yeah... there wasn't anything he wanted to do with that creature right now. Except technically he knew it was still edible, so as long as he kept telling himself it was okay and curbed back his gag reflex he'd be alright.

Luke killed it. He was thankful the white wolf ended it so he didn't have to get too close. Now it was just a matter of deciding who got what half. Iqniq shrugged. Luke hadn't had opossum before. "Eat you're fill first and I'll take the rest." It would be easier that way. In the mean time, Iqniq seated himself and waited for his turn.

Kero offered him the first few bites, and he took the offer with a grin and a nod before he settled to his stomach and pulled the malodorous meal toward him. He tore off a strip from the opossum's flank, and held on his tongue as he sampled its unique flavor for the first time. Rolling it in his mouth, he found that this, like most other foods, was quite acceptable to him. Not his favorite and not something he would likely seek out too often, but good enough to him. "Nom nom nom!" he grinned at Kero.

When he had finished, he had stripped one entire side of the opossum of all that was inedible, including the bones of its legs and a mouthful of its internal organs; quite literally leaving the other half of the creature for Kero. With a blue-padded paw, he shoved the remainder toward his friend. "Down the hatch!" he encouraged.

Luke tried it. Kero watched, searching the wolf's face for his reaction. He stole a bite and seemed to contemplate it a bit as he chewed before following with a few words Kero was not expecting. The smile on his muzzle fell into a full-fledged laugh as he replied. "Glad it tastes better than it smells" That was something he'd found out the hard way too, but the smell was a bit hard to get past, which didn't make an opossum a frequent meal.

By the time the white wolf had finished (quite literally consuming half of the creature) the fainting smells from the opossum had faded. Kero cleared his nose, lowering it into a patch of freshly fallen leaves before he neared the corpse. He flipped it over and dined on the remains. Definitely not nearly as bad now that the major scents had faded. Almost enjoyable. Almost.

Finished, Kero licked his chops and glanced towards the wolf. A glance at the sky told him he'd been out here long enough and it was past time for him to head back. He'd seen this place. Luke filled him in on a little more. He'd had a decent dinner. Overall, he considered this trip a success. "I hate to eat and run, but it's getting late. See ya around, blue nose." With that, Kero excused himself and returned home.

-Kero exits-

He allowed his friend to eat his half of their kill in peace, enjoying the company in silence. In a blink, it seemed he had finished and was excusing himself. Luke dipped his head, feeling that he ought to find himself a place to rest. "Later!" he called with a wave of his tail, and watched Kero leave before turning to make his way north. In an hour or so, he would find himself a comfortable bush to lay beneath, and would rest peacefully and contentedly after a successful hunt and time spent in the company of a friend.