"Where?" Mango shouted exitedly, immidiatley squirming around in all manner of strange bodily contortions, trying to see the back of her own neck.

Finally giving up she flopped back down and stared at Todds gem instead. "Why do we have them?" she asked, nosing his paw slightly. It was slightly cold, so she winkled her nose a bit.

Her belly suddenly made a rather loud sound. Surprised, Mango looked down at herself. It acutally kind hurt...

@Todd

"Speech" @Mango

"It's on your back!" Todd responded, just as excitedly. "Almost there, almost there... aaahh! ...Nope." Soon Mango gave up, but Todd was still ever hopeful. "Maybe you can get it someday!" he encouraged, wagging his tail.

Why they possessed these things was a question that Todd had never really considered before. It'd always been there, and he'd sort of taken it for granted. He gave a small shrug and left his paw where it was as he felt her wet nose against it. "'Cause they look pretty on us," he answered after a long time of consideration. The more trained eye might have known otherwise, but to Todd it simply seemed to make sense.

Todd seemed to get a shock, and tensed up, as the smaller fox's stomach gave a disproportionately loud rumble. "Oh, oh! I know what that means! Means you wanna get things in your mouth!" he gave a little demonstration by closing his jaws on the air.

"But I can't see my pretty." Mango sighed sadly. "Whats the point then..."

Watching Todd snapping at air, Mango copied him, opening and closing her mouth with a little jerk of the head each time. She cocked her head. "Nothings happening..." she muttered, just as her belly rumbled again.

Looking around she saw something small and round on the groung nearby. Maybe that was what Todd meant by 'things'. She sniffed it closely for a moment, but couldn't tell anything, so she put her jaws around it and snapped them shut, just like Todd had done.

Pain lanced through her mouth. The thing was hard! Spitting it back out with a startled "Ow!" she glared at it crossly. It didn't have to hurt her!


@Todd

"Speech" @Mango

Todd considered for a moment. "I can see it," Todd said with a small nod. "And, I like it, too. So... That doesn't matter, right?" He asked slowly, uncertainly.

Todd watched Mango for a while longer before he giggled happily. "That's funny!" He said, lifting each of his paws in turn. "I'll show you what things are best. They run around and they're fun to chase! Someone said you can eat the green stuff too but I don't like it very much..." Todd slowly rose onto all four paws with some difficulty, his wounded legs shaking with the weight, before he began to amble around, raising his nose to sniff out something yummy.

"You can come! I'll help it feel better!" He cried excitedly.

Mango turned her scowl on Todd. It was funny that her mouth hurt?

A moment later though she was hpoing around him as he made his slow way forwards.
"Where are we going? What runs around? And whats chasing? What do you mean by green stuff? Why don't you like it? Who told you that? Wh-" but her tirade of questions was cut short as she toppled sideways, back paw caught in a tangle of grasses. Scrambling back to her feet, shaking leaves from her fur, she hurried after Todd, somehow managing to bump into a fallen log in the process.

"Why do you walk funny?" she asked when she was finally beside him again.

@Todd

"Speech" @Mango

Pausing, sniffing the air, Todd knew he had something, and somethimg delicious. Even though his legs trembled, just barely keeping him standing, he wasn't giving up anytime soon, and his tail flicked quickly from side to side, showing his eagerness. Had he had functioning legs, he probably would have chased the other fox, but as it was he could only really wiggle his body and give little hops on his front paws.

"Small things! Like dumb, tasty versions of us!" It didn't pass Todd's mind that that might not be the best description... "It's all over the ground and on stalks." He cut off as she fell over, noticed the grasses clinging to her and bristled. "That's the green stuff!" He said. "What's it doing to you?!" He moved forward and looked fearful. But then she was free, and the fear passed like water from a duck's back.

"Walk funny? Whatcha mean?" Todd asked as he limped forward, having seemingly forgotten where they were going in the first place.

"Well you're very slow and it looks funny." She tried to copy it, but couldn't quite get the back legs right. Instead she paused to nibble at some of the stalks she had just tripped over. They tasted strange, but not really bad.

Seeing Todd sniffing the air, she did so too, noticing something that did in fact smell rather good. Was this what Todd meant by tasty versions of themselves? She wriggled slightly, then charged off in the direction of the smell, completelly forgetting Todd untill she slipped on a low hanging fern leaf and lurched sideways again.