Sunspire Mountains macrotus

@Malrok

Her day had been filled with sleeping, peeing, snacking, and cleaning as well as feeding her cubs. This day, sleeping was her preferred task. At the present moment, sunlight crept into the very entrance of the den, enabling the woman to know it was morning when she opened crusty eyes to assess what time it was. It was only the eighth hour of them being born. An ear twitched as she heard a sound nearby, and as the rustling came again she lifted her head and snarled ominously. Her mate nosed to her some food, and she rose to grab at it and chow down swiftly, gobbling the small creature down to bone before returning to her post. She lay sidelong to her babes, who would now have to redirect themselves to her.

Could they do it, or were they totally useless? She was not sure what worked and what did not, what they were capable of and what was impossible for them. The new mother stared at them, not doing them any favors, waiting to see what the balls of flesh would do.

Malrok did not know his name yet, but he would learn it in time. The warm, milk-giving entity that was his mother pulled away from them, and Malrok snuggled close with his brothers. He knew the routine now. When she left, he would squeeze himself as close as possible to his siblings, using them for warmth just as they used him. When she returned, they would awaken, and then they would fight to eat. Well, "fighting," was a rather loose term for what their little paws did to one another. One day, though, they would scrap amongst each other and leave bruises and cuts.

The mother returned, and with her, milk. But she did not position herself as closely this time. Malrok's little instinctual brain was puzzled, but he did not cry out. It was a challenge, and one that he was eager to overcome. His tiny, rounded body was pushed along at an agonizingly slow speed as he made his way toward the source of nourishment. If his brothers had started making their way in the same direction, he did not know it.

Her eyes were trained upon the alien looking things. It was Malrok who responded first to the challenge. Following him in ground-breaking seconds was Sitamat, who was perpetually hungry, and then Atuaserk. The third-born presently snoozed although was now beginning to rouse, but her eyes remained upon Malrok. Their routine was becoming a set one... but she wondered if they understood change yet, or what to do about it. It seemed that they could. But their pace was too slow, and instinctively, she reached for the second-born. He stiffened automatically in response, making it easier... and she placed him near her warmth, and sustenance. Already they were cool; she learned, then, that they could not yet regulate their own temperature. So she collected the others, too.

She exhaled a warm breath of air unto their backs. Pingasut settled and did not yet eat, but he had eaten plenty enough for her to not goad him into doing so. Instead her attentions turned back to Malrok. They were both boring and interesting. Tonravik attempted to discern who they would become, but any personality traits they had she had yet to identify.

The entity lifted him, and his instincts took care of making sure that he did not interfere with her actions. He felt the ground touch him, the warmth of his mother, and he sought out food once more. The others were placed around him, adding to his warmth, and he felt comfort again. He latched for a moment, perhaps two, before he was pushed out of the way by one of the nameless entities that were approximately his own size. He was disappointed, but not defeated.

Malrok's head wobbled unsteadily on his neck. The muscles there were still weak, tender, vulnerable. His eyes were unseeing. His ears unhearing. Malrok's front paws clawed at the air around him, and he lost his balance, rolling off of his three siblings and tumbling to the dirt floor. He stayed there, unmoving for a moment, before the contents of his stomach emptied onto the floor through his mouth. He opened and closed his jaws several times, attempting to clear his throat and mouth.

Tonravik watched as Sitamat bullied his way over his brother, and then Atuaserk did the same as they went for the precise spot Malrok had. Sitamat lost this time to his elder brother, but he was the next one suckling. Her eyes turned to her second-born in time to watch him fall sick. Tonravik was quick to sweep up the contents with her tongue and then to lick at his face to cleanse him, thinking nothing of it.

And then she left him to his own devices. The dark, bear of a wolf still observed him. He was near the rear-ends of his brothers. Pingasut slept soundly through it all, even when a stray paw of Sitamat pressed upon his wrinkly forehead.

Warm, wet, and comforting, the large entity's tongue swept over his face and cleared his airway. Saliva mixed with half-digested milk still dribbled from his mouth, but at least he was able to breathe. Another sensation bubbled in his belly. Or rather, his lungs. A quick intake of air that was nothing like breathing at all. He practically bounced as his diaphragm spasmed. His first hiccup, though he knew not what the word meant. A few heartbeats passed before it spasmed again and he bounced. It wasn't fun at all, and he began to mewl cries for help, interrupted by the occasional "hic!"

As he breathed again, she watched her other sons for a brief moment. They were all well. The attentive mother looked sharply to the second-born when he erupted with a strange sound. Moments later, he did so again, hiccuping loudly. She was not sure how to stop this, and so she began to lick at his back again, wondering if this would be the cure. And, if not this, then what? As he wailed, Tonravik's ears flattened helplessly atop her head. Was her assistance of any help at all to this?

The warm and wet thing from the entity came to him again, but it did nothing to stop his current predicament. He let out another "hic!" and mewled louder. His legs flailed about, thrashing wildly at the air, at his mother's tongue, upset with the unpleasant sensation every time he was interrupted by another "hic!" The small, worm-like tail that extended from his behind stiffened. Unpleasantness was not his friend. "Hic!" Malrok continued to fuss, whimpering and whining and doing anything instincts told him to do to make this better. "Hic!"

No. Not working. She switched gears. Her child fussing was aggravating, and she only wanted it to end for selfish reasons. Like, so she could now nap, perhaps. Tonravik put her throat over the babe and rumbled lowly, hovering there, trying to perhaps startle the babe into silence like she could others with a growl. She was unsure if this tactic would work either... but she would try anything she could. In the meantime, another cub of hers squirmed. Tonravik nosed them into becoming still again, her ears still perked as she listened for Malrok.

Something strange happened. The giant entity put vibrations on him, and he quieted. She moved, and he remained quiet, his protesting on hold. The only sounds that permeated through the den were breathing and shuffling of fur on dirt.

"Hic!"

The protesting began again, and the boy wailed louder than he had before. He would not—could not—rest until this unpleasant sensation stopped. Back legs began to kick at the dirt, thrashing. He managed to turn himself upside-down, belly facing up toward the ceiling of his home, and this only made him wail louder. His body writhed, and he choked for a moment on his own saliva, causing him more distress.

"Hic!"

As he flipped and began to choke, Tonravik righted him and licked again at his face to coax what troubled him out. She nosed his back and began to pat at it, poking and prodding. Her mind had flipped to an instant where she had seen someone burp and cease a sound louder to this, but similar... the belch had been unseemly, but efficient. And so the leader sought to force him to do that, pep pep pep, wondering if what was happening now was the same thing she had seen long ago in the wilds outside of this place.

He squirmed, was flipped right-side up, and thought forgot about the unpleasantness for a brief moment. But it returned with a vengeance. "Hic!" The great beast patted his back, which was almost as unpleasant as the spasms. He cried loudly in protest, trying to worm himself away from whatever it was she was trying to accomplish. His front legs propelled him along as his back ones only dragged the ground. They were all but useless at this point in his (admittedly short) life.

"Hic!"

Malrok whined again, exhaustion added to the mix of unpleasantries he was presently sensing. He was not meant to be awake this long. The boy wanted peace and comfort. Not spasms that caused him mild pain. He wormed his way along, bumping into his mother's foreleg and stopping there, startled.

"Hic!"

She continued to pat at his back, even despite his squirming, and then shifted into nudging. Could one nudge out a burp? Push out air to excel? It was a peculiar instinct that guided her along now... but she obeyed it despite his protests. It was then she paused in all she did to let out a mighty sneeze that startled the rest of her cubs into movement, the eldest moving to crawl on top of Malrok for warmth. She snorted to clear her own nostrils, and then licked the mucus off of her cubs.

She continued to pat his back, but Malrok would have none of it. The second-born son (though he did not know his birth order) squirmed to get away from her attempts to soothe him. She sneezed, sending a spray of snot blasting through the den. "Hic!" A brother crawled on top of him, and Malrok continued to fuss. He did so more vigorously now, swatting at the sibling on top of him, lashing his tail back and forth, squirming in order to get out from underneath his competition.

Mother licked them clean. "Hic!" He quieted then, the only indication of his unrest the occasional pulse of his body as his diaphragm spasmed again and again. He whimpered, but cried no longer. Instead, he began to move toward his mother's teat, eager to latch on and refill his belly with the food he had lost prior. Only then did his stomach calm, allowing him to drift into a food-induced sleep.

Tonravik withdrew and then decided to watch. She could not help this, it would seem. His fussing aggravated her more than worried her. She would frequently forget how young they were. Handle yourself, whelp—would be the most frequent thought of hers for each of them when something caused them to be so noisy. But their sounds alerted her enough to at the very least try something to aid them. She was most oft right, fortunately... but grew agitated when she was wrong and the noise persisted. That, too, caused her to humor eating them. No more noise. Presently, she wondered: would she need to devour another babe...? Would he die of this noise? His whining made her fear for his mortality, that he might perish from it... but, it would appear not. Her tail twitched as she watched him latch onto her and quiet down entirely at last. A gentle flick of her tongue was cast upon his head, an odd sort of pride welling in her chest for no reason at all. You did it, the mother thought to herself. He had figured out the cure all by himself. And now, she could sleep. So she moved her wedgelike snout to rest behind the cubs, and closed her eyes, hoping to fall into the beginnings of sleep.