Sun Mote Copse the jaws that bite, the claws that catch!

Someone had remembered to bring her cracked turtle shell from the den to the rendezvous site and it remained one of Sugar Glider's most prized possessions. Today, she was using it to scoop dried dung from near the sleeping area and then depositing it into the long grasses beyond the edges of the clearing. Every time she made a trip to the fringe, she gave the purple flowers growing there the evil eye. Every so often, she used them as target practice when flinging the shriveled turds.

When she finished cleaning, Sugar sought a patch of shade and sprawled, the shell tucked in between her outstretched forelegs. She scanned the rendezvous site, then glanced upward through the leafy branches and took note of the sky. The day had dawned clear and bright, though clouds were scudding in to block the sun now. There was an interesting scent on the air which sent her pink nose wriggling, though Sugar's entire body stilled at the first distant peal of thunder.

Title from "Jabberwocky" by Lewis Carroll.

Fig had been pretty uncertain about this little trip. The whole leaving the Strath thing was whatever--he was actually pretty excited about that. He was also pretty down with meeting new wolves in other packs, even though he would admit to being a bit nervous about that. He hadn't met too many strangers outside of his own pack before, but he was getting more used to them now that so many had joined them to establish the Grove. 

No, Figment didn't like being away from Fenn. But, he had agreed to the father son trip because, well.. It was hangout time with his dad. Fig had been full of eager smiles when they'd met Finley at the borders, who seemed super cool. She had lead them into the territory and here now to their rendezvous site where Figment had been told he could find some playmates, and oh look--there's one now.

The boy had pranced away from Fin and @Phox eagerly, but as soon as he came near enough to Sugar Glider to speak, he clammed up completely. He'd never met another pup before. He'd only ever known his sister, and they'd been born knowing each other. Was meeting children his own age different than meeting adults? What was he supposed to do? What should he say? Should he... should he.... pee on something?

He didn't, thank god, but he did stare at her with wide eyes and his jaw bobbing up and down wordlessly as his mind raced.

Loud noises didn't disturb her as badly as before, though she still wasn't a big fan. When another peal of thunder rumbled a few minutes later, a little louder this time, she pushed back onto her feet, prepared to tuck herself inside the den to avoid the cacophony. Only she stilled when she realized there was no den, not here. In lieu of that, she instinctively sought out one of the adults. She wasn't afraid of the storm, she just needed the reassurance of an authority figure while they rode out the loud bursts of sound that tended to come with thunderstorms. Heck, even a fellow youth would be a comfort.

But when faced with a total stranger, Sugar could only blink her beady black eyes. They stood still as statues, about two yards stretching between them, staring awkwardly at one another. She watched his jaw work as if he was getting ready to say something, though no sound escaped him. Her head tilted, forgetting all about the pending cloudburst as she regarded his dark, unfamiliar features, wondering who he was and what he was doing here.

"Who're you?" she eventually asked, the aloofness of surprise quickly giving way to amiable curiosity. Her tiny tail began to stir as she ventured a step closer, pink nose wriggling too.

I got a severe case of déjà vu while writing this post!

Figment was very close to turning around, running back to his father and telling him that this had been a bad idea and they should really just go home now. The other pup was looking at him with just as much uncertainty, which meant she probably wasn't a threat. She was small though, and Fig knew from experience with Fenn that small girls could be very dangerous and very unpredictable, so he wasn't about to let his guard down until she made a move one way or the other. Or until he was safe again under Phox's protection.

She made a move, though. She asked who he was, and for a minute, he wasn't sure. But then her tail began to wag and her nose began to wriggle--both very good signs. So, Fig relaxed a little and leaned towards her with the same pleasant curiosity. "I'm Fig, I'm a squire," he introduced himself with a proud little smile, the words causing him to shift to a slightly more confident stance, "Who're you?"

Her body went still as he introduced himself as a squirrel, of all things. At least, that's what she thought he meant, although the pronunciation wasn't quite right. She thought of Avery and her stutter, not to mention her own difficulties with certain words. Sugar wouldn't judge Fig, though it still gave her pause. He was clearly a wolf, after all.

Maybe it was a game? In that case, she was happy to play along. "Okay," she answered, "I'm Sugar! The dragon!" A third rumble of thunder followed her declaration, though right then and there, she decided that dragons didn't worry about storms. As a matter of fact... "D'you hear that? Those are t'other dragons!"

She accepted his title with ease, but no apparent awe. Fig frowned a little at that, but she distracted him soon enough from his disappointment with her own pronouncement. She apparently was a dragon! If only he knew what a dragon was, otherwise he would've realized how perfectly fitting it was for he, a squire, to engage in battle with she, a dragon. It was a damn fairytale.

But! He didn't get it at all. But that didn't matter. She seemed playful, and he liked to play. Grinning, he nodded. He too heard the thunder, though he wasn't alarmed by it even when he wasn't pretending to be something other than himself. "Is there lots of you?" he asked, readying himself for a fight, "Or are they enimmy draggins?" He still pronounced it "enemy dragons". I'm just entertaining myself.

When prompted about how many the dragons numbered, Sugar's tail gave a lash. Dragons were fierce, she knew, and fearsome too. Yet Fig didn't seem afraid. Perhaps he didn't realize that she and the rest of the pack were his foes! Her lips skinned back from her teeth in what she hoped was a ferocious leer worthy of a dragon, though her black eyes danced playfully.

"We're all anemones!" she declared with another switch of her little tail. As if to punctuate this exclamation, the thunder rolled and the first bolt of lightning flashed. In its wake, the day suddenly seemed much darker, and the wind picked up in the trees, rustling the leaves.

Bouncing closer to Fig, Sugar said, "D'you hear that? They has wings!" Another flash of lightning pulsed. "And fur!" She meant "fire," although this was technically more accurate. Sucking in a breath, she warned, "They're comin'! You better run!" And with a quiet giggle, she leaped at him.

Fig didn’t bat an eye at her misstep. It sounded enough like the right word to his young ears for him to get the idea. He grinned, his tail wagging eagerly as she came closer, though he froze when she began to pretend they were coming for them. He hadn’t minded the storm at all, but once he caught on that the sounds it was making were actually signs of the other dragons, he began to react to them for the sake of the game.

Sugar told him to run, but he shook his head determinedly. ”Squires don’t run from noth—“ he began, but was cut off as she leaped onto him. He yipped softly as he fell beneath her, but it turned shortly into a playful growl as he attempted to roll and grab her in his forearms so he could hold her still while he gave her a chomp.

There was something satisfying about felling her prey, even in play, though Fig wasn't going down without a fight. Sugar squealed softly as he easily rolled her and tightened his forelegs, pinning her to the ground. He snapped his teeth at her and Sugar instinctively thrust out her own forelimb, white toes mashing against Fig's cheek even as she laughed again and then slipped out from beneath him like a particularly adorable eel.

But she wasn't an eel, nor a wolf cub, not at this moment; she was a dragon! "Rwar!" she said loudly (because Sugar rarely truly raised her voice), her black eyes glittering when a thunderclap punctuated her statement. The lightning followed, popping like the flashbulb on an old-fashioned camera and lighting up the blustery forest like a negative. In its wake, Sugar found she was mostly blind, the brightness having affected her sensitive eyes.

"Hey, I canna see!" she said in mild alarm even as the first few raindrops began to splatter all around her. "Wh—" Now spots began to swim in her vision. Or were those raindrops? Sugar blinked rapidly, her sight clearing up just in time for the whole process to repeat: a crackle of thunder, followed by a blinding sizzle of lightning.

Fig was feeling mighty triumphant when he managed to snake his arms around the enemy dragon, but before he could proceed to chomping, she had managed to stick her arms out and push his head away. The feeling of her toes on his cheek was not wholly unpleasant. In fact, it kind of tickled. He began to giggle as he squirmed to get away from her, his grip slipping as he did so.

Fortunately for Figlet, his eyes were pointed away when lightning struck and a blast of light flickered in the sky. He would've ignored the storm entirely were it not for Sugar's reaction, which instantly mollified his attack. He loosened his grip on her entirely then, blinking with curiosity as she proclaimed that she couldn't see with some concern. Blindness was nothing new to Fig, of course. But he remembered how Fenn had been when she'd started losing her sight, so the boy switched instantly from slaying-dragons-knight to shining-armor-knight.

"It's okay, my sister can't see and she's okay," Fig informed her as he stood and aligned himself alongside her, "You can use your ears and your nose instead, and I can help guide you by walking close. Fenny and I do it all the time!" He didn't realize that Sugar's blindness was temporary, of course. But nor did he realize the complications of what he'd offered if she was blind forever. In his head, this was all quite simple--she'd just have to come home to the Strath with them and he'd spend the rest of his life with two blind girls bumbling along at his sides. He was down.

This time, her vision dimmed so that everything was cast in a thick gray pall. Sugar gulped, her heart fluttering in her chest. But then she heard Fig speak from nearby, reassuring her. She turned her snout toward the sound of his voice, blinking rapidly without even being aware of it, and felt several more cool raindrops on her face. A few hit her in the eyes, forcing her to shut them.

"Kin you guide me to some swelter?" she asked, in her unease bungling the word "shelter." She took a tentative step forward and felt her pink nose press into soft fur. She wasn't scared, per se, just ill at ease without her sight. And as she heard another crack of thunder, she knew another bright burst of lightning would follow it shortly, so she squeezed her eyes even more tightly closed.

Fig watched her carefully as she adjusted to her new life as a blind wolf. When she turned her head, he reached to tap his nose against hers to make sure she was correctly aware of where he stood. He gave a shake as his fur grew too damp for comfort, but otherwise was still until she made her request, at which he puffed his chest out proudly and lifted his chin. 

"Yeah! Jus' stay close and follow me," Fig said, oblivious to the amused looks they were getting from Fin and Phox who had decided to just see how this all played out. He glanced around quickly to absorb his surroundings, trying to determine where to find some swelter for the pair of them.

After a few seconds, he spotted a little space between where a few larger rocks were resting against the trunks of a cluster of trees with some brush reaching across them to form a little canopy. He bumped his hip gently against Sugar before he began to lead her towards it, taking care to ensure that she remained at his side and also that he avoided walking her across anything she might trip on.

Sugar stumbled Fig as he expertly guided her toward some cover. By the time they reached the cozy little niche between the base of a tree and some large rocks (a place she would have to remember for the future), she could open her eyes and even see again. Everything was still dark, especially when the rain picked up and began falling in billowing sheets.

By then, the two pups were safely tucked away. Sugar's vision adjusted and she peered out at the rainstorm, wondering what had become of the adults; she could not see them through the deluge. But she felt safe enough with Fig by her side. She turned toward him, smiling in the dim.

"Thanks, Fig," she said quietly before turning her attention back to the weather. Lightning still pulsed every now and then, though it and the thunder were already beginning to subside into the distance. The rain showed no signs of stopping anytime soon though. The soft rush of it was nearly as loud as the thunder, though not nearly so jarring.

"Where's the rain come from?" Sugar mused as she continued to observe. For that matter, what about the lightning and thunder? She could come up with a fictional source (dragons, naturally) but what was the real explanation behind these natural phenomena?

Fig didn't falter a bit as Sugar stumbled along at his side. He was too used to doing this with Fenn for it to concern him at all. His sister did get around better these days than his new friend was currently, but he was confident that the longer Sugar remained blind, the more skilled she would become at moving around, just like Fenn.

"Yep," Fig answered when thanked, not bothering to nod his head--another quirk he'd picked up on from living with Fennec. She couldn't see him nod, so he ofen wouldn't either when it was just the two of them. He poked around their little alcove for a few seconds, making sure they were tucked safely into the shrubbery before he settled down at the entrance to stand watch over her--another quirk that came as naturally to the Redhawk as breathing.

He glanced back at her when she asked about the rain. "I don't know," he answered thoughtfully, "I bet my dad would, though. My dad knows everything!" Fig wagged his tail, looking proud and confident in his ascertion.

Fig didn't know, though he said his dad probably would. Sugar's lips pursed. Who was his dad? Had she met him? She hadn't been paying much attention to the adults, though logically she knew Fig hadn't just appeared here all by himself. Whenever the rain cleared and they could search for them, Sugar would be sure to introduce herself and question him (and anyone else who might know) about the origin of storms.

The rain still pounded relentlessly, its rhythmic rush lulling Sugar into a drowse. She felt very cozy, tucked in this cocoon of leaves and twigs with her new friend. She curled into a ball, tucking her pink nose beneath the tip of her tail, and pretended she was a baby dragon inside of an egg. When she woke up, she would hatch. For now, it was time to incubate.

Feel free to wrap up or just archive!