Wapun Meadow Fluttermice

Looking for some dogs for my bat to play with, please!

Dark fell some hours prior and #97, who had gorged himself on crickets in the cave (the only insects to be found in this unseasonable warmth which had roused the whole colony from their hibernation), was winging over the Rising Sun Valley with agile beats of his leathery wings. Though he could barely see the rolling grey hills passing below him, each screech he sent out painted a brilliant silvery image in his mind of the passing land. Being one of the fastest bats in his colony, the tiny #97 reached the meadow long before midnight.

There was almost nowhere to roost comfortably, so the daring bat fluttered to the ground. Gorilla-esque, he bounced through the snow, screeching every other step to refresh the mental image he had of the place. His huge ears twitched every which way as he went, minding his own business... but fully capable of escaping in the nick of time if something else happened to come along.

Outlaw was exploring the nearby area, despite his injury and weakened state, or any possible warning words from Dogmeat. He was a curious teenager, and didn't like not knowing things. Thoughts of Railroad, memories of their times together, filled his head. He was angry that his best friend was just dead. Mad at whatever made their van flip. If it hadn't, he and Railroad would probably be chilling somewhere right now together. Outlaw sniffed a little flower in front of him. It had been so long since everything seemed so natural. SycamoreLabs wasn't exactly a park. Meanwhile the sleepless teen was unaware of #97 nearby.

This is how I imagine him walking, lmao.

With small leaps, the myotis propelled himself along the ground with his ears fluttering this way and that for the slightest sign of interruption. It was uncommon for a bat to allow itself to be so vulnerable, but he lacked some of the danger instincts others of his kind had in abundance. Many of those he made nice with thought he was a luntatic. They weren't far off; he was a mutant for sure, to lack such essential things.

#97 was brought back to reality by the sudden loud snuffling of a much larger animal. He spread his thin wings wide and pounded his way skyward, away from the threat of death posed by Outlaw. Tilting his body, the small bat wheeled overhead, mouth agape as he mapped out an echo image of the beast that surely would've eaten him. Smaller than the wild dogs of this area, but with a strange smell...

Deciding there was nothing else to do for the night and knowing that hunting could only occur within the caves, #97 angled his wings and fluttered lower, coming to rest atop the dog's crown as some sort of intrusive bug might've done. He was poised and ready to flee at a moment's notice if the dog took unkindly to his presence, but couldn't resist hooking his little claws into the dog's fur and screeching, "giddyup!" even though there was no chance the dog would even properly hear the frequency of his voice, let alone comprehend his words.

Outlww felt something land on his head. A loud and high pitched noise came from the thing that he couldn't understand. He growled in frustration. Outlaw didn't know what the annoying little thing was, but his dirty white paw reached up and tried to bat at the little thing. "Get offa me!" He growled, his brown eyes stormy. Not only was something sitting on your head annoying, this little thing's noise was really freakin' annoying. It was so high pitched- he didn't like it. And nobody got to annoy the king of cool.

#97 truly believed he was capable of escaping from any danger, but the reality was that he was as vulnerable as any other bat in his colony. When the dog's paw came up to bat him off, the little bat managed to avoid his wings being touched, but a blunt claw landed on his tail membrane and pulled it sharply.

"Yow!" squealed #97, now flying quickly and erratically above Outlaw's head. He screeched in his annoying little way, spinning a web of echoes around himself and bringing the world into sharp, immediate clarity. The dog said something, but all #97 could hear was a slow, impossibly low woof, woof sort of sound that he couldn't piece into words.

"Hey, what the hell, man!" he practically shouted at the dog, fluttering in agile and accurate swoops and dips that translated into a completely random bouncy motion in midair. "That hurt!" He flipped his hind claws up under him and tilted his snout down to examine his tail membrane, which was thankfully not ripped. The dog had just yanked it, that's all. No permanent damage, except to #97's pride!

Outlaw's brow raised in confusion as the little thing, which seemed to be a strange squirrel, flew and flapped around in crazy motions in the air. A bird squirrel? Outlaw had never seen anything like it. It made a few more high pitched noises, squeaky chattering. The little thing checked out it's tail, which was fine. He sighed, followed by a chuckle at the creature's strange movements. "Please don't sit on my head." He said, unaware that just like him, the little bat could not understand him.

The larger mammal again made those slow, impossibly deep sounds that #97 couldn't comprehend. He strained his long ears forward in a valiant effort to understand, but the species barrier was too vast. "You'll have to talk a lot faster," the myotis mumbled as he tilted a wing and careened toward the ground.

He landed with a soft thud and brought his wings tight around his sides, balancing precariously on his front and hind claws. This was suicide according to the other bats of the colony, but #97 found fearing this odd creature impossible. Maybe Outlaw would make an effort to eat him, and in that case he would depart as swiftly as he'd come. Somehow, the tiny bat didn't think a dog would make noises at him if it intended to eat him.

Outlaw listened as the bat made some more high pitched noises. He couldn't make out words, maybe a syllable here and there, but that was it. It swooped down and he was surprised at it's bravery. "Aren't you afraid of me?" He asked, even though he knew it probably wouldn't understand. Outlaw was still suspicious of wild food, unsure whether to taste it yet, so he didn't go after #97, not yet.