Coconut Grove i. ashore

with the early morning tide came a new offering to the coconut grove on the sequoia coast of the teekon wilds. a golden slip of a thing, a woman washed ashore with nothing to her name but her own salt-sodden fur. hours passed, and in time she woke, coughing and sore but intact. alive.

how had she gotten here?

the coyote called fox could only lay there, still in the spot where the sea had placed her on the sands, staring around her in awe and wonder. the trees... she'd never seen anything like them before.

Kiir had never been one for travel. For all their short life, they'd wanted nothing more than a warm place to nap in the sun and sand of their oasis home, far away in a desert long behind them. Yet, at nearly three years old, fully in their prime, a sudden urge to travel had overwhelmed them. Wanderlust. Whatever one wanted to call it.

And it was all her fault.

Fox. The only one back at the Oasis who had made Kiir feel... anything. Fox had made them question their own life, their personality, their identity. And then she had left. Because she'd wanted to "see the world." And Kiir had fallen back into their old, lazy ways, ones that had existed since birth.

Yet here they were now, traveling so far through the Teekon Wilds that they'd hit ocean. And now there was nowhere left to go. Kiir sighed and sat down amid the coconut trees, too bothered to take in the beauty of the place. They swept their gaze around, taking in the sea, the sky... the bit of glow-y golden-red fur near the shoreline.

"Sun and Moon..." Kiir murmured, and approached the drenched form of wet fur, wondering if they were about to stumble upon a dead body.

she wasn't alone. the sound of paws on sand stirred fox from her awed survey of her new surroundings, and she sat up shakily to see who, or what, it was.

wait. what the fuck —

kiir? fox would recognize him anywhere. he was incredibly generic-looking for a coyote compared to her, of course, but she'd known him for too long to miss the little things that made him distinct. it was definitely him, in all his lazy ass glory. but what was he doing here? and what was she doing here? you're pretty far from home.

and then of course she had to have a big dramatic coughing fit.

Kiir stopped short the moment the ragged wet-furred head lifted and they saw who it was.

"W-What... what is... How..." They shook their head, staring open-mouthed, and fell back onto their rump, sitting in the sand.

The moment Fox began coughing horrendously, however, Kiir sprang to their paws. "Is This One all right?" they asked, inching closer, as if afraid that Fox might whoop their ass if they got too close. "Fox does not look so good... Too much seawater?"