Firestone Hot Springs Paper Faces on Parade
I AM WEASEL, HEAR ME ROAR
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Ooc — Bryndel
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#1
@Apple —apologies if this is hard to parse; I'm having extra difficulties getting posts written this evening, ack  >.<  In this post especially please let me know if and where I can help edit and clarify it!
And I thought that Firestone Hot Springs might make an interesting backdrop for the lightness of Apple's coat, meantime ;)

Her glittering black eyes were wide as, awed, they watched the softly hissing rising of the steam off the gently seething pools of water scattered across the landscape. They smelled hellishly strongly, and with the whispery steam befogging much of the air this obviously wasn’t too great a place to hunt anything quieter than a grumpy buffalo or smaller than a whitetail deer—neither of which were decent prey anyhow unless they had already gotten their fool selves killed elsewhere and saved little weasels the trouble of having to actually hunt them, in Nynka’s obviously completely-unbiased opinion—but the fascinating weirdness of the place was nonetheless enough to lure the little weasel into exploring it.
 
She skittered up through the misty air to the edge of the first pool. She craned her neck up and over, staring down into its depths as far as her eyes could penetrate…which wasn’t terribly far in this dank and nigh-opaque air. Nynka gave a quick, careless shrug, and instead started to skip her way impulsively across, bouncing from one stepping stone to another, with occasional interludes of grassy knolls or to stop and peer down into another of the breathily steaming springs.
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#2
Song by Allan Sherman.

Hello Muddah, hello Faddah,
Here I am at Camp Grenada.
Camp is very entertaining
And they say we'll have some fun if it stops raining.


An oldish, off-tune, unmelodic, but quite loud voice echoed in the valley, as the unappraised singer herself was walking gaily in the direction of the springs. She was on the smaller side of the spectrum, stout and pudgy with light yellowish-cream colored fur (save for the black stripe running down her back) and a merry face. All in all this she-wolf gave an impression of once being a true beauty, but age, experience and a little too much food had left their marks.

I went hiking with Joe Spivey.
He developed poison ivy.
You remember Leonard Skinner.
He got Ptomaine poisoning last night after dinner.


Another verse and then an abrupt pause, because someone had drawn the singing wolf's attention. A small animal that was moving quickly from one place to the other, appearing here or there in the cloud of steam. Once she had got close enough to be heard, she said to the little weasel: "Don't fall in there. You will go spoof!"
I AM WEASEL, HEAR ME ROAR
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Ooc — Bryndel
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#3
Been awhile since I heard that song, hee!  <3  Otoh, this is the third time I've started this post, lulz  e.e;;  My computer thinks Apples are especially tasty, apparently, whoops?  ;) This version is totally the best one, though, eliminating all the flaws of every prior incarnation to reward your quiet and patient awaiting of it. Noreally.  <.<  >.>

*sends her muse to go flick the bad little fat-shaming weasel on the nose in warning* You are a bad bad little beast and Santa Claus is skipping your burrow entirely this year, mark my words. ...Although really, with Nynka, if it wasn't that it would undoubtedly have been something else she'd find to mock, pfft.  :P

Nynka paused in her acrobatics and slowly turned to look up and down at the critter who'd addressed her. She oughta have known from the accent and timbre it was another of those interfering canines; she'd swear the Teekons held more of them than fleas, this year, really. Had she had a proper eyebrow it would have been very skeptically raised at the fat white poofball, who may have herself been made of a congealed ball of steam, from the coloration and cloudy roundness. Nynka resisted the temptation to go over and give her a good hard poke to see whether she really was made just of fur and skin and bones like everyone else, in order to instead reply: I will...go 'spoof'? She looked the canid up and down again with her weaselly whiskers quirked in intermingled disbelief and amusement both. Yeah, is that what happened to you? Or did you get, uh, 'ptomaine poisoning' and poison ivy and who knows what else?

Nynka sat back on her haunches and folded her forepaws neatly in front of her, relaxing and, once the next extra-thick burst of steam that puffed up between them had dissipated, examining the rotund and noisy creature afresh. Nynka never was afraid of wolves, but this one she was even more certain she could outrun without even really trying. Though the creature obviously must have kept herself pretty decently fed in one way or another; the weasel wondered just what it was she managed to catch so much of, to be in that shape. Was she preparing to try and hibernate, like a bear? And if so, did that then mean that whatever hunting ground she frequented were about to become, hmmm, available for an enterprising young mustelid, perhaps, let us say? Nynka certainly wouldn't mind sharing in a supply of food as steady as this beast had been selfishly enjoying, that was for certain.
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#4
The weasel was rude and amusing at the same time. Had it been any of her kids and grand-kids and other "grand"s they would have got a good boxing on the ear to remind them good manners. Since the white mustelid was small and fragile enough to be dead at the end of the lesson, she decided not to apply the same measures of punishment. Plus, Nanny never struck anyone, who did not belong to her species and was smaller. 

"Yup," Nanny Apple nodded and watched, how a different geyser went "spoof" in the distance. "I've seen happen this before. A weasel just like you dropped in, then went up a minute later and rained down in form of fur, pieces of bones and innards. Nasty sight, indeed, therefore I always take care of warning," she said in a perfectly earnest voice, waht technically was a lie. But in her opinion - lie was not a lie, if you had good intentions behind it. 

"But, naturally, you can do this. It is a free country, after all, and free will of yours. Had all the children you want? Settled your last will?" she asked, disregarding the other questions the weasel had asked her.
I AM WEASEL, HEAR ME ROAR
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Ooc — Bryndel
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#5
This fluffball of a wolf had a pretty good poker face, but somehow Nynka still wasn't quite buying it. She had to tamp down her smirk of amusement as she tilted her head at the canine. But what happens to wolves? Have you ever seen one of your kind go 'spoofing,' lady? Rather than make her any more cautious, however, Nynka heard rain of fur, pieces of bones and innards and couldn't suppress a quick little lick of the lips, never mind that it was supposedly some fellow weasel of which the canid spoke. Manna from heaven, that would be: was there even the slightest possible sliver of truth to the tale being told, here? If Nynka hung out around these geysers long enough, would unwary rabbits and overcurious birds come 'spoofing' up out of the steaming holes pre-dissected? She could only hope. Or was that in fact how this canine had kept her figure so well-filled out? Nynka gave the fluffy white beast a disbelieving once-over again. ...Surely not...but then how could one explain the extra blubber? This was a dilemma that bore investigating, certainly.

She had to snort after a moment as the other's words penetrated her distractedness. No kits running about, and no one running about worth having them with, she said with more than a hint of scorn. ...Maybe this fat wolf had eaten all of her own young, and that explained the rotund waist? No, that seemed pretty unlikely. Or was that just Nynka's wishful thinking, wanting there to be some better, more weaselishly-accessible source further outside the wolf's own self? And no one deserving any willing of anything of mine, either. ...Or maybe that was my own last dear child you so callously watched go spoof, hmmm? Nynka bared her teeth in a mock-grin at the other, though inside she genuinely was enjoying this intruiging exchange and bit of a mystery to wrestle with. How would I fulfill such a will if you can't tell me just where all those 'spoofy' bits have gone, anyhow? If there was any possibility a clever little weasel had gotten spoofed, after all, then surely there would be other, much more savory and interesting tidbits of other "spoofed" creatures about.
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#6
"Wolves, in my experience, are sentient beings that find their foolish ends with other means," Apple replied, thinking about her first mate Alastair, who had been more fond of getting in scuffles with others than offer a tender and loving care to his young wife. He was probably dead, people, who lacked survival instinct so severely, just could not last long in the world.

"Well, weasels are not my top choice on the delicacies list," she said, wondering, how had this conversation gone from a simple warning to her eating boiled and dismembered weasels in the geyser area. "Fury, bony and leaves bad taste in your mouth. Yuck," she shuddered at the very thought of eating them, the logic being - why take sour milk, if you could have a strawberry cake as an alternative.
I AM WEASEL, HEAR ME ROAR
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Ooc — Bryndel
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The implication that weasels were not proper and respectably sentient creatures did not escape Nynka, but she let it pass her by, figuring that she had other, much more important and interesting considerations here. Besides, she liked this strange old fluffball of a wolf, even if she was (like all the rest of her species) obviously quite wrongheaded about many things. At least this one managed to be both entertaining and wrong right now.

What Nynka herself said was: Ah, and you have tried many such delicacies roasted by these geysers, have you? She shot another look at Apple's rotund middle. Is there anything available on the menu you would recommend? To hell with manners and respect, when there might be a feast somewhere at hand...! But where would this wolf have hidden such a smorgasboard (besides inside her belly, that is)? Could she really have gotten herself fattened up so just from a geyser-boiled diet? Nynka had a sneaking suspicion still there must be some other valuable secret this canid was concealing.
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#8
"Well, naturally - how else would I have gotten this much flesh on my bones?" Nanny Apple replied, having no shame in the fact that she was far from from the young and dainty beauty of her youth. If you were in the wilds, being fat was actually a sign of achievement not something you should lament. 

"Too bad I encounter you this late - there was plenty of roasted food just before I ate it all," she decided to play on the weasel's nerves just a little more. "But my personal favorite is a crow. The heat makes the feathers fall off easily and gives an exotic taste to the flesh," she lied fluently without so much as blinking the eye. "Mice are excellent too, but they - for some reason - do not hang around here that often."
I AM WEASEL, HEAR ME ROAR
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Ooc — Bryndel
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Nynka brightened, but tried not to look too obviously overeager as the canine casually dropped the information that why, yes, it was the bounty of the geysers that had fattened her up so. Nynka sternly kept ahold of her tongue lest it dart out to lick at her whiskers in anticipation. Oh, this could be very good, especially with winter coming on soon and all. If these geysers really did offer such an ample meaty harvest...

Her expression fell, however, her tiny ears flattening grumpily out from her skull as Apple admitted to having scarfed it all. She narrowed her eyes suspiciously at the canine, examining its face minutely for signs of trickery. You have got to be kidding me, she had to burst out however at the canid's mention of delicious crow. This wolf had one hell of a poker face though, if that was so! But...crow?! Crows are thin and tough, unless you managed to find one as thick and fat as you are! But mice... now, that sounded more promising. Promising enough that Nynka's little pink tonguetip darted out to catch at her whiskers for one quick instant after all. Too promising a possiblity to just turn and walk away from, even if the part about the crows was making Nynka very suspicious that she was not getting anything like the full story from this strangest and most entertaining of canines.
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"Well, I don't know, what kind of weakling crows you have been feeding on, but the ones I ate just hours before I met you were juicy and fat," Apple did not let the little weasel's insults get her off the track. But, of course, Nynka was correct. She was kidding. She had never tasted crow in her life. Not here by the geysers, not anywhere else.

"All you have to do is to sit, tip your head up and open your mouth, and wait until that roasted piece of food falls inside," she instructed. "I would like to spend more time with you, but I have to go. Good luck with your lunch," she said with a wink and mischievous smile, and left.

Thanks!
I AM WEASEL, HEAR ME ROAR
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Ooc — Bryndel
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Thank you, once again! Just sticking a final post in here before archiving this.

Nynka could hardly even envision a deliciously fat and juicy crow; all the ones she had seen had always been miserably scrawny shadows, not toothsome at all and quite the racket-makers to boot. She had to admit even just the possibility was tempting, though... and something surely had to have thickened this white wolfcreature up so. But if she was lying about these geyers and ther gourmet meals of fat and sassy crow they had served up to her, then...what else could have made her so?

With a cheeky final wish of "good luck with your lunch!" the canine beat a suspiciously abrupt retreat. Nynka didn't bother to chase after her very long or hard or far, instead falling back and looking all around with narrowed gaze to try and figure out where among these mysterious mists these bulked-up crows and the like might be hiding. Faugh, she muttered, though the departing canid likely couldn't hear her over another nearby burst of steam anyway. But she certainly wasn't going to go quite far enough as to stand there as advised with her head tipped back and mouth open like some kind of idiot—not only might that look immensely foolish and leave her wide open for the next predator to swoop down looking for a steamed meal, just as importantly it sounded horrendously boring—but she did cast eyes and nose about for some sign of these roided-out crows or any other edible beastie unwary enough to get themselves cooked and served up on a platter for hungry weasels. It was useless, though; in the span of less than an hour the increasingly impatient Nynka's stomach was growling loud enough to scare off prey all by itself, and she was irritated, damp all over, and still empty-mouthed. Time to depart for greener pastures... but the weasel made a note of the area just the same, to come back and check it again at some time that big fat white wolf might not have swallowed up all its bounty.