Whisper Marsh Stop Drop and Roll

The large man was slowly dabbling into the territories that this massive territory possessed. He traveled at his leisure, not really caring where he would end up. A small smile was placed upon his muzzle as he walked along. A previous hunt with a lovely woman had left him with a full stomach. Athena. His tail twitched in a happy manner, and he stopped, ears perking. A light honk sounded from a small mass of water, then another, and another. It sounded like a band of trumpets. Tilting his head, the man began to sneak forward now, body lowering to the ground in what appeared to be a hunting mode. He was not hunting, though- he knew what was hiding in the water, and he was to give it a scare. Tail lowering now, Tlarx continued forth, listening to the steady sound of his breathing. The soil moistened as he inched closer and closer to the water's edge. Knowing he was close, the gray-white wolf jerked himself upward, releasing an ear splitting bark into the air. Three geese took to the air, water lifting with them. The droplets randomized themselves within the air, landing back into the water and some upon Tlarx's fur. He released a hearty laugh, tossing his head back "Get outta here, you loud asses" he snarled in a playful manner. With a loud sigh, he allowed his rump to thump down against the moist soil.

Honk, honk, hoooiink "Hauuuuurrrkk..." Honk, honk "Hau hau hauuuukkkkk", the sounds of the water melody seemed to improvise perfectly with Skittles own unlikely song. Except that Skittles wasn't doing it intentionally. And that the goldenrod liquid proceeding out of his mouth hardly made for a pretty song. But it seemed to blend in with the lake music nontheless, with the waterfoul hardly concerned with their rogue instrument poluting the edge of their home. As he neared the last of his retching, he heard a bark and a voice. Skittles rolled back his eyes until he was finished, gazed at his mess in stern contemplation, and decided it would be good not to re-digest the stomach acid. Giving himself a shake, he made his way forwards, mowing whatever grass came within vicinity of his teeth along the way. It was a difficult task as his pointed teeth were clearly designed for ripping, tearing, shredding, and hardly had the flat surfaces needed to grind down the sharp ends. More often than not his yanks ended in the whole plant being uprooted, complete with a small cloud of dust to coat the end of his nose. "Mrrr mrmrf mrrf mrrffff ffrrmm mrf mrf?", he said, his voice garbled by his full mouth, grass sticking out various ends like some sort of foliage gift basket. Nonetheless, Skittles' tail managed to give a good-natured wag of greeting. He turned his head and paused to sneeze, unintentionally dropping a few blades of grass in the process. He continued to chew the best as he could, making a strained face that could only be likened to surprise mixed with constipation. #552002

THANK YOU JACCY

Tlarx turned his head, ears only picking up a bunch of garbling. What the hell? The pale wolf that approached seemed friendly enough- his tail waved slowly in friendly greeting. Tlarx's own tail swayed to and fro in greeting, and he dipped his head slowly. Chocolate gaze remained on the grass stuffed wolf. "I'm sorry, I don't understand gibberish" he said, releasing a light titter. After his chuckle was released, silence swept over him. He stepped forward toward Skittles now, large paws placing themselves gingerly upon the wet soil. Tlarx paused suddenly. A goose flew by, its honking shattering the silence that grasped the air. Blinking, the black saddled man tilted his head before speaking once more "Tlarx". Skittles seemed nice enough, judging him by his actions so far. Why not give out his name? The white wolf seemed to have an odd air about him, though. What kind of wolf walks around with blades of grass poking every which way out of his mouth?

Skittles froze for a moment at the man's reply, his face a statue. A second ticked by. Two. Three. Suddenly the boundaries of his wrinkles were stretched upwards in ceremonious joy. He had realized that it was a joke, and it was very funny. So funny that he began to laugh aloud, a few more blades of grass freeing themselves, his voice like a sputtering engine too stubborn to turn over. In history, doggish things like scent rolling, panting heavily, and gastrointestinal events, noises, and smells, had rarely failed to scare away whomever he attempted to acquaintance himself with. But today it seemed that fate had brought him to a man who appeared unphased. A man's man. A large gulp pushed his adam's apple down with the appropriate noise as he swallowed the last of his mouthful. He dare not try to speak with his mouth full but now that it was empty, he was happy to try again. In fact, the stranger could have pulled the 'deaf' prank on him and asked him twenty times over what he'd said and Skittles would have happily complied each time, his patience both a gift and a grave annoyance. "That's okay, me neither.", he added apologetically, revealing tidbits of undigested green in his teeth. "Skittles.", he added after the man's introduction. "Are you trying to eat them?", he nodded his head towards the sky where the last of the waterfoul migrated temporarily away. "I can't jump that high. Someone got one earlier and left some, you want to see?", he indicated where he had been standing before. In truth, the creature that he'd saw wasn't a wolf but a wild cat of some sort, and hadn't left any carcass at all, only feathers. A few of them were strewn about the site, down and pointy pinions alike. "There's plenty for us both, we can share.", he assured his surely new bestest friend in the whole wide world. #552002

THANK YOU JACCY

Tlarx laughed as Skittles spoke. That's ok, me neither. So it seemed this wolf had a bit of a sense of humore. With a sly smirk slithering across his muzzle, the gray-white man nodded to the pale one before him. "Sure, sounds good to me. Haven't had goose in awhile." He stepped forth carefully toward this stranger, his tail swaying as to show a friendly demeanor. Large paws pressed down upon the sponge-like land, leaving light imprints until the earth soaked them up like it did the water. Within a few steps of Skittles now, Tlarx's chocolate gaze flickered around. "Let's go, Skittles." He said, attempting a small smile. Little did he know there would be no goose. Oh, how his tastebuds and stomach would be unsatisfied. The man may take it as a prank, or perhaps he would grow angry about it. What were they to do, play with the feathers? Unsheath the pinfeathers and watch the wax paper-like coverings scatter about?

As Tlarx's happy comment about geese sank in, Skittles gave a smile and complimentary wag. After a moment or two had passed by, he echoed his own thoughts half-mindedly. "I like geese.", his thoughts were swimmingly filled with them, in every which direction, he daydreamed enough geese to put the must stubborn sheep-counter to sleep if only they counted the fowl. He gave another grin with the thought that he had eaten some already. It wasn't exactly the choicest of parts, but where a rumbling stomach was concerned, any frenzied effort that got the food-complainer organ to shut up was worth while. "Over here.", his voice was steady and devoid of emotion as he trotted forwards, back to where he was standing when Tlarx had originally appeared. Standing at the spot, he waved his tail and looked down, as if to encourage the man that he should come and do the same. There in the grass were no normally edible bird meat or delicious wings or breast or even innards but instead a scattered pile of white down and ivory pinions. Snatching up a father, he began to levigate it between his teeth, chewing, gnawing, crunching as fast as he could. A swallow followed, an awkward smile, and then a coarse cough as it tickled his throat on its way down. Quickly, Skittles went back to grazing, feeling desperate again for some stomach-calming green stuff. "Don'tcha want some?", his eyebrows arched in sheer confusion. Life as a loner was never easy, and it appeared that Skittles' standards had fallen so far below any normal notion of edible that he had begun to make himself sick with his choices. It wasn't so much that he was unintelligent as that he was hungry. His ribs happily peeked out of his skin like a wet tee-shirt party. In fact, he wasn't just hungry, he was starving to death. #552002

THANK YOU JACCY

Tlarx willingly followed behind Skittles. Not long that they began to walk, they had stopped. The gray-white man blinked in confusion. There, before him, was a generous amount of scattered feathers. He watched in silence as Skittles began to levigate one of the feathers. The bizarre beast happily swallowed it down, asking if Tlarx would like any. "Oh, no. I don't like the taste of feathers, unfortunately." He said, frowning. He did not let the bewilderment that his mind was expressing show up on his face. Instead, he remained stoic, watching Skittles in interest. "Would you like to catch something together?" He asked lightly, eyes following the visible ribs that poked from the pale wolf's sides. The flesh was thin on them; so thin they could be played like a xylophone. Tlarx turned his head and snorted as the geese he had chased off returned to the small body of water. Shaking his head and returning his gaze toward Skittles, he shrugged his shoulders. "Maybe catch one of them? Ya gotta be sneaky, though." He released a small chuckle, soon shushing himself before awaiting the odd wolf's reply.

His contented smile eroded away at his new friend's emotionless face, who didn't really seem to want any. Things like this had happened before, er, technically, they had happened often, this time no exception. Grass, poop, bark, pine needles, it seemed that others simply didn't care for the garbage that he scrounged up. Unlike the human world, eating such junk food made him skinnier, not fatter. "Okay", he replied slowly as an afterthought, his answer ambiguous. His ears and eyes had already fixated on a rather plump geese that had landed some ways away from them, just on the shore. A plan too had begun to sketch itself out in Skittle's mind, the blueprints of a real meal already making his mouth salivate. Surprisingly, the extra moistness in his mouth made it a little easier to chomp and grind the feathers down to a nicer size to travel his windpipe. "You stay here, I'll have him run towards you.", he mumbled, picking up some feathers in his mouth. He began to trot away from the duck, stopping midway to cough and hack, letting the feathers he'd carried drop out. The wary goose seemed relieved that apparently Karma had delivered a swift kick in the balls to Skittles, and paid little more mind as he arched around and found himself in back of it. It seemed like the perfect set-up. With skittles directly behind it, and his friend directly in front, it was three points on a straight line. Without warning, he burst into a run. The goose caught on and began to fly forwards, straight towards Tlarx... #552002

THANK YOU JACCY

Oh, good! So this wolf would actually hunt! Now he could get some meat on him instead of feathers in him. With a small smirk upon his face, Tlarx nodded to the ivory man and watched him lope away. The large wolf lowered himself down, creeping forward as he waited for Skittles to chase the goose from hiding. Within moments, he heard the flapping of wings, and that ever annoying honking. With a flick of his tail, the beast watched as the avian creature emerged from the long grasses. Skittles had successfully flushed it out of hiding. The moment of truth. This was to determine whether or not there would be food settling in their stomachs. Gulping down saliva, Tlarx bounded forth, running head first toward the large goose. With one great push, he allowed his hind legs to fling him at the winged animal. Jaws opening, his ivory fangs waited to meet flesh. Tlarx's chest slammed into the goose as his jaws settled around the base of the animal's neck. Landing hard on the ground, the large wolf quickly recovered, sliding his grip upward as to crush the bird's windpipe. Within moments it was limp in his jaws; Tlarx grinned through a mouthful of feathers. He dropped the bird, tail wagging as he spat out some of the plumage. "Great work, Skittles" he praised, nodding lightly. Looking down at the carcass, he shrugged "You want the first bite?"

When he couldn't keep up with the bird, he slowed and stopped to catch his breath. It seemed that whenever he moved, his stomach started growling, this time no exception. But now it was his friend's turn to seal the deal and he did, impressively soaring through the air much like the goose. It all seemed effortless and he wore a grin of awe. The thought of actually eating the bird had never occurred to him, so when Tlarx offered a bite, Skittles froze up in surprise. The alpha always ate first but he wasn't the alpha. But what if there was an alpha? What if the alpha demanded he eat first? Wouldn't that be weird? What if he took a bite and the alpha got angry and killed him and then told all the other wolves to eat him? What if the alpha got angry and crushed his most private parts? What if he wasn't supposed to eat anything but feathers? What if... Skittles thoughts spiraled into a paranoia and began to pulsate in his brain. He closed his eyes for a moment to give his head a small rest. For the purpose of ending all the new-found trauma, he quickly jogged over, grabbed a wing, and pulled. It separated with some popping bones. Wing in mouth, he found a dry spot to lay and began to eat, not letting the feathers go to waste either. He breathed a sigh of relief that the conundrum was solved. "Why are you a loner. You're big and strong.", he inquired between bites. #552002

THANK YOU JACCY