The sky was falling. And damn, it hurt.

"Owww-wuhhhh," Datura whined suddenly as a shower of dirt and pebbles descended upon him. One struck him in the eye, and another right across his nose. The cloud of dust fell about him and dimmed the radiance of his gold coat and stung his golden eyes. Wildly he flailed his head and shuffled backwards amongst the rocks on the narrow path that wound up the mountain. Tears stung his eyes, and he thought he could feel a lump rising on the bridge of his muzzle. His beautiful nose! To think that his beautiful nose would be marred by some unseemly bump, made him want to cry.

With vengeance known only to the bitter and wronged, he threw a glare skywards as if to accuse the mountain. Instead, he saw some disheveled silhouette standing directly above him, not even ten yards away, leaning carelessly into the sky. Outrage boiled in the pit of his stomach. They appeared to be staring at some stupid bird. But just as Datura opened his mouth to shout something nasty at this lanky shadow, it suddenly turned away and vanished.

"HEY," he bellowed after the stranger, "Come back, coward!"

Mind racing, Datura looked around him, looking for some way to get up to that stupid-face who had broken his beautiful nose. Well adapted eyes easily found a path through the nearly vertical cliff-face. Not wishing for this stranger to get away before he gave him a piece of his mind, Datura wasted no time scaling the rough, wind-cut stone. "Don't you dare move! Or I'll, I'll," he paused to take in a gulp of air, admittedly he was a bit winded, "I'll hurt you! I can hurt you real bad." And with one final heave he pulled himself up to the small plateau on which the stranger stood. The Aquila boy's normally handsome, golden face was stretched in an ugly snarl. Meanness, it is true, is often ugly and unbecoming — but with Datura it was even more true. His face was utterly changed by this expression of hostility. His eyes of gold were more like hot coals that scorched the earth, finding the black wolf in one swift pan.

But what he saw softened his snarl into a sneer — and his face became uglier still. The black wolf appeared to be about his age... but it was so hard to tell, it was just so skinny. It was rail thin travel worn. Just pitiful. Datura snorted, as if suddenly he found this whole thing very funny. "Actually nevermind," he drawled, taking several steps towards this lanky, malnourished youngster, "I don't think I'll hurt you." Decisively, he plopped his rump down and flashed the boy an inviting, yet imperceptibly insulting smile. He waited for the conversation to begin.

But the conversation didn't begin right away. In fact, the stranger seemed to just... zone out entirely. He just sat there warily while the scawny shadow scrutinized him, his discomfort growing with every passing second. Well, this was awkward. Unsure of what to do or how to make up for this violently disruptive faux pas, the golden boy shuffled his paws. Datura was, in every sense of the word, a very social wolf, he was a pack wolf, a family wolf. He liked to be surrounded by the presence of others, to laugh with them and learn from them, to be a part of things. But this creature before him... he was too quiet and his eyes were too critical. From Datura's perspective, he appeared to be lacking in something, deficient in some way that he just couldn't seem to name. To be deficient, to Datura, was to be evil in some sense. Nonconformity, difference, anything that threw a wrench in the golden boy's tightly wound, glimmering brass machine had to be rehabilitated or stopped— destroyed if necessary.

His anxiety was reaching towards a dangerous climax just as the black wallflower spat out a few syllables. Datura cringed visibly to hear him stutter. But then the unthinkable happened. "Who are you?" The young Aquila's body straightened as if he had been struck by lightening. "That's not how you start a conversation, kid." Nevermind that they were the same age. "You can't just demand someone reveal their identity. What if I was undercover and you just spoiled everything?" To be honest, he wasn't actually sure that this was the reason that conversations didn't begin this way and why it was rude to asks someone's name without volunteering one's own... He had simply internalized the norms of his own society as they had appeared to him. He had been civilized. There had never been a reason to think of why, but it felt necessary to supply one — and so he made his reasons up.

"But obviously you're not from around here," he said with a lazy sigh, leaning back as he relented, "So I'll let it slide." Carelessly he tossed his head to the side as if he found the horizon so very intriguing like he had seen the others do before he lightly flicked his attention back to this stranger. "Anyway, my name is Datura. But next time, give your name first. It's not so rude that way."

The sigh that billowed from his lips was so heavy it sounded as if Datura was so much older than four month. "No I'm not spy," he grumbled impatiently, eyes rolling as he tossed his head again, "That was just an example." The irony in the other boy's voice flew well over his head. "You wouldn't know if I was a spy. I wouldn't have just told you so easily." Honestly, the idea that this boy believed he could be a spy was hilariously pathetic. The golden child threw his head back in a sudden and hearty laugh, then tilted his head back down at the strange boy and drew his lips back to reveal something between a smile of camaraderie or a sneer of disdain. Datura looked very ugly indeed, wearing a haughty expression as he listened to the other introduce himself.

"I'm new here. We're looking for our pack.You're a spy, right? — "

"I said I'm not a spy! I — " Suddenly, though, Datura caught the smile and realized this boy — Adonis— was toying with him. He would not yield the upper hand to this rude stranger, this runt. Quickly he swallowed his frustration and was once more the picture of silky golden composure. A pack? "I don't know, it depends on what you're looking for. And what you have to offer in return for my information." His smile hardened and turned mean again. After all, he couldn't just go around telling people where Poison Path was — if that was even what Adonis was looking for. He had heard that a few years ago there had been another pack in the mountains by the plateau, Adonis could be very well looking for that one. Too bad it was gone.

Slowly he leaned in, his voice an intimate, dangerous purr, "You can pay me with a secret."

• i'm a butt. datura's a butt. we're all butts here. feel free to smack :C
  

  psst also is adonis going to be like YO MAH BRUTHA HOMEY? becu said that you would take over in that department

Now that Datura had regained his composure, he was not going to let it out of his sight again. This runt wasn't going to phase him. Datura, after all, was a very willful pup, and he would bend words, thoughts, mountains in order to make reality conform to his understanding of what was right and good. Easily he warped the clever teasing of this stranger into the pathetic attempt to continue a joke that was so five minutes ago. Disinterested now, the amusement fell from Datura's golden features. Hoping that Adonis was wathcing, the young pup shrugged his shoulders made an exaggerated attempt to turn away so that the other boy wouldn't see him yawn with boredom. Turning back, the corners of his lips flickered as if he were appreciating the humor of the black stranger while simultaneously saying, Lame. "Alright then, Adonis. You do that."

With secret glee he watched the black wolf straighten and mimic Datura's posturings. Good. Although these prideful gestures were laughably pathetic —cute even— on this scrawny little nobody, it was a good sign. Even as uncivilized as he was, learning was not, apparently, beyond him. That was promising... though, Datura had to ask himself why he cared. This lost whelp was not his responsibility. Adonis was welcomed to continue on in his savagery for all that the golden boy cared, for this wretched pup's manners could not reflect poorly on his own.

Or could they?

Datura had no idea what terrible game he was playing.

As the conversation returned to secrets, Datura allowed his ears to lift in mild interest. Inside he writhed with curiousity, but he would not allow himself to rise to Adonis' goadings. Tell it, tell it, tell it! he longed to yip. But that would be uncouth. "It's a good one, though." Oh just tell it already! But he held himself together. He did not let a hair move out of place. His face was a mask. "Well, then, why don't we see? You tell it to me, and we'll see if I can handle it." A dangerous grin played on his face. One step in the wrong direction, and you're toast.

Oh what a dangerous game they played.

• yeah. idunno. i mean at this point i've just gone about assuming he's learned in this thread. you're free to go about it... however? (alsoyaybrothertables)