It all threatened to be overwhelming--but Giggle's slow, gentle mannerisms helped to calm him somewhat. You don't need to be scared. That thought he clung to, but he had little time to really consider it before a string of food-names was being tossed his way. Also overwhelming, this--but in a new way.

Fruit? Bugs? What- and he shook himself hard, blinking. (His paws burned. Ouch.) "Not grass?" he tried, at last, looking up at her with the wide and glassy eyes of a child who was slowly gathering themselves from having been crying. He hadn't been, not quite, but his expression mirrored such a face. He hesitated, ears flicking. "Um. Don't know the rest." Fruit sounded sort of good. Meat he didn't understand the meaning of. Bugs-... his brain suggested that they were crunchy. Maybe a good snack-?

Giggle considered her child's exceedingly soft-spoken words--words so quiet she had to lean down a little to make them out.

"Well, let's find out," she suggested, trying to sound cheery. She pushed up, leaving the admittedly damp-looking cub behind for a moment. Her nose came up, nostrils twitching, and her magicka threaded out--not a backfire, this time, which was... good.

The only good thing about Mother's fungus being everywhere was that Giggle could use it. It was, in the end, a fungus--so tapping into its expansive web of fungal senses gave her a comprehensive view (so to speak) of the cave. Admittedly, the 'senses' a fungus carried was limited. She could sense temperature, humidity, health... to some extent touch. The heavy thud of a paw or the brush of feathers could be difficult to differentiate, but it helped to narrow down when she already knew what lived where in the cave. The gentle movement, for example, of something against the fungus down and to the bottom of a low rise coincided with where she knew a rat's nest was hidden away--so she started off that way. "Come with me, all right? There's a lot I'm going to teach you, but we'll start easy." Again, the positive, lighthearted tone, though her dark eyes scoured the caves for any sign of Order.

Omen was winging about somewhere off ahead, aware of where Giggle was heading and diligently watching for signs of the Hive. Giggle hid the tenseness of her muscles as best she could, trying to keep a pleasant mood. "I think you'll probably be a meat-eater, but we'll find out. If you are, though, you'll have to hunt your food. That means killing sh-... stuff. But we don't let it suffer," she added, glancing back. "If you take too long on a kill, then the... rat, or whatever, feels the way you did before. Afraid. And that's not good, right?" She waited for the faintest nod. She wasn't sure he understood, but it was important to say it, nonetheless. Giggle then turned back ahead, continuing both conversation and travel. "Never eat anything that can talk, either. We don't eat each other. Just the rats and things." Questionable morality, she'd always thought--but it was that, or starve.

He hurried forward, sticking close to Giggle's flank. His entire body broadcasted uncertainty: a lowered head, eyes (which would've been rolling white if they weren't glowing green) that stayed round and wide and darted every which way, a tail tucked between his haunches. Now and then he snuck a glance to her, as if to ensure that she was still close by his side.

And all the while... every step hurt. Not terribly, but the burned paws hurt to walk on. He found himself wincing, pitter-pattering awkwardly as if to try and avoid stepping on every paw at once. Her words, at least, were a distraction--but the pain and fear distracted from them in turn, so it was hard to concentrate on anything in particular.

He heard words like 'meat,' 'food,' 'sh-stuff' (whatever that meant), and a warning not to kill talking creatures. He tried to make note, even though it was starting to frustrate him--all these rules he had to learn. It wasn't that he wanted to disobey them; he wouldn't have known enough about the world and eating and hunting and all of that, to even want such a thing. It was just-... a lot to remember, that was all.

Content Warning
This post contains potentially sensitive material:

minor details in Lesser killing

Giggle drew up to the den, and paused, head coming up and nostrils working. The bad thing about hunting, now, in Canis was that far too much of her usual prey was tainted by the fungus. She could clear it from them, even after killing--but sometimes they were too far gone. It was a waste of food, and life, so that she'd even taken to hunting outside the cave from time to time.

"There's white stuff all over the cave--you see this, here?" she asked, glancing down at him. "Don't eat it. I'll teach you about it later, but it... it'll make you very sick." I should've brought him out of Canis. Maybe I still will. She mulled this thought over. A Hive-infested shithole was no place to raise a child--not a good place for a young cub to explore the world, to make new friends, to learn about life. That said, it probably won't be long before the whole damn caves are overrun. That wry thought she pushed aside.

"That also goes for the rats and stuff. If you start to eat one, and you find out it has white-? You come straight to me. You might have weird thoughts, promises or feelings--ignore them. They're dangerous, okay? Come to me, and I'll fix it." They'd be lucky if he made it to adulthood without at least one accidental poisoning. "In the meantime, you can destroy this stuff if you need a safe place to eat or drink. Use your fire--but practice only when I'm around, for now. Fire's dangerous too." ...Really, way too much shit's dangerous, she thought, a little despairingly. Poor kid. Been alive fifteen minutes and he's just getting horror after horror thrown at him. "And if you do destroy it, make sure nothing's watching. I'll explain that later, too. For now! Let's get some food, huh?" she added, raising her voice back into forced, jubilant enthusiasm.

She trotted forward, pushing her mind for the rat's nest, focused keenly on it. "You have to find something to eat--these rats are fine. Then you have to flush it out, and bite it. Hard. Bite its head, or back, then shake it--hard and fast--until it's not moving. Then you can eat it."

With abrupt violence she dove for the sound of scratching beneath the rock. Head and shoulders vanished into the shadows there, and for a moment she scrabbled and fought--and then she pulled out, turning swiftly toward Ravage so he could see the rather grim process. A red rat was clenched in her teeth, held firmly by head and neck--and it scrabbled in panic only briefly before the hyena shook it, hard. The body was flung this way and that, quickly going limp.

She dropped it, and pushed her magic for it--and quickly ascertained that here, at least, was one rat uninfected. She nudged it toward Ravage. "Here you go. It's clean," she added. "Bite it, and taste it. See if you like it."

He was trying to follow along, and his faint fear and pain continued to mingle with confusion. Frustration fought with that fear--half of him wanted to lash out at all of this, and the other half was too afraid to make a sound. Adding to this, piling on like a weight, were all the warnings his mother was imparting to him.

Lessers: possibly dangerous. Fungus: dangerous. His own damn magic: yup, dangerous. A sharp sigh escaped his nostrils.

His opportunity to let some of that out came at last when Giggle went off beneath the rock. His gaze fell briefly on a clot of white near one paw, and impulsively, he wished that it would burn--the way his paws had, the way Giggle had said he could do it. Glowing eyes narrowed, and he stuck out a paw with that same violent impulse, as if pushing back at the world as a whole and all the unfairness it was heaping at him.

Smoke plumed up, the burn's agony hitting a moment later--but the white mold beneath his paw quickly melted away into black ash. A sharp, but stifled-quiet chitter of pain escaped him, and he glanced up in time to see his mother scrabbling back with the rat in her mouth.

Alarmed, Ravage scrambled back. He hesitated but then the scent of blood, however faint, reached him--and he scrambled forward, instinct taking over. He didn't quite register or remember the next few second, past the crunch of bone and taste of warm meat. But he knew that it was the first thing in life that was satisfying, and he found himself tearing at it with all the enthusiasm and utter clumsiness of inexperienced youth, his burned paws forgotten in favor of this delicious taste.

Giggle snorted as the kid scampered over and dug right in. A cursory lick to his head, one of affection and approval, was followed by her dropping heavily to her rump and just sitting, waiting while he ate. She kept an idle watch on their surroundings, augmented by Omen's patrolling. After a moment of crunching bones and licking lips, she glanced down at her son and quirked a lip in amusement. "...Meat it is, huh. Good?" she asked, then considered.

A glimmer of magic accompanied her impulse, a little plop sounding as a plump, ripe banana dropped to the floor out of midair before her. She bit it open with a careful press of powerful jaws, then pushed it toward the cub.

"This is fruit. But it's magic fruit--so it should taste good, either way. It'll make ya sparkle, though," she added, with playful humor. "If you want, you can have that too." She'd teach the kid about please and thank you, but... later. When he wasn't busy being cheek-deep in breakfast.

He wolfed most of the rat--and when the banana made an appearance, he switched to it with only a moment's hesitation. Fruit was munched down, and he found he liked this, too. Whether it was the effect of its magic he didn't know. But within moments he was feeling the impact of a newly full belly and all the excitement he'd had so far.

Suddenly drowsy, he dropped to his haunches and yawned expansively, exposing the glowing green of his maw. He didn't know what being tired meant, or what to do about it, so he just sat there struggling to keep his eyes open as they continually drifted shut.

Ravage made, even, a heroic attempt at conversation, though his words were slow and slurred. "Both foods... good. Liked them. I liked them," he corrected himself, looking up at Giggle. The pain in his paws was still there--a steady throb--but he found that the cool stone beneath them was soothing.

Only belatedly, as the cub half-dozed, did she realize the acrid odor of smoke and burning that was striking her nostrils was fresh. She followed the scent and blinked to find a blackened spot--fungus? I think so. Interesting. "Nice work, cub," she praised, soft but cheerful, padding to his side. (Caves, he was huge. His potbellied pup shape seemed so incongruous with his height.) "Don't destroy the mushrooms back in my den, right? We'll head back there now and sleep." She looked him up and down, amused. "I think you need it."

It was good, to, to know he liked the food; this she greeted with a nod and vague sound of affirmation. But the taste and scents of meat had gotten to her, and her stomach rumbled, sharply. She'd have to hunt for herself (and she cast a glance longingly back at the rat's nest--but they'd be hiding, now, for awhile)--but for now, she summoned up a second fat banana. This one, after she'd pulled the peel away, she gulped up herself. "I'm hungry, too," she explained, amused--but Ravage looked half-asleep, showing no signs of jealousy or desire for the fruit.

She then padded back to him--and paused. She'd intended to pick him up by the scruff of his neck and carry him back. An instinctive thing, really. But of course she couldn't do that; he was the size of a horse foal. She huffed in soft amusement. "Come on, see if we can get back to the den before you fall asleep, hm? If you can't, it's okay. We'll find a spot. But this is too open." She glanced around, then turned, angling back for the den--glancing to ensure that Ravage followed.

Ravaged forced open bleary eyes, and stumbled to his feet. The exhaustion that came on the tail end of eating was unexpected--but so was everything, to one with no experience of the world. He stumbled along behind Giggle, paws scuffing as they half-dragged on dusty stone, his head hanging low. Now and then he almost fell as his eyes slid shut of their own accord. Once or twice, a massive yawn split his jaws wide.

"Tired," he murmured sleepily, hardly able to articulate himself. Any rebellion or violence or fear or anything else had been totally subsumed by the overpowering need to sleep, and it was difficult just to make it back.

He wanted to sit--to just rest for a minute--but instinct warned him he'd fall asleep in seconds. Instead, in that half-asleep haze, he followed his mother back to the den. He wouldn't remember anything of the walk, by the time he awoke. He barely registered the change in scenery--from open rock and white-swathed bones to enclosed den, pool of stagnant water, and far more carefully curated 'shelves' of mushrooms. He didn't really notice when his mother--murmuring warm and gentle words he didn't hear--nudged him into a worn patch of long, harsh grass to sleep. Instead he at once dropped, curling up, eyes closing--and lost himself to dreams.

She gave him a nudge, now and then. Or a lick of encouragement, or a gentle bump when he seemed to be trailing off into sleep while walking. But mostly she kept an eye out for danger as they walked. She didn't want them to be caught out like this--not with a new-hatched cub half-asleep and walking on singed paws. Fighting without getting him hurt in the crossfire would be... hard, so she walked quietly and kept her head down.

Her magic spread like fingers across the cave out before her--again turning Mother's ever-present mess into a useful tool. Nothing, she thought, with some relief--and Omen, circling back in the other direction now, repeated this thought back. Emotions of calm and safety, a sense of empty rock, were sent back to Giggle with a thought that might've translated into language as it is safe, Mother-sister. (The bird's relationship to her, in Omen's own mind, was blurred and dual in nature.) She thanked her along the link, and then at last--some long, trudging minutes later--threaded her way into the den.

It was a relatively hidden spot, tucked into an alcove near the west wall: a sharp downward slope and curve leaning to her fungal garden and a tiny water source. Her bone pit was not far off it, but she wasn't about to take this poor pup on a grand tour just yet. Let him sleep, first, and then I'll tackle other things. There would be many life lessons to impart as quickly as she could, to ensure he was self-sufficient enough to survive if something happened. Magic and how to use it; who could be trusted and who could not; the variations in the caves.

For now, she ensured (via harder, but still gentle pushes of her snout) that he was tucked into long grass, which would hide him; then she sat back near the water's edge, licking her jaws clean as she had another look around. She herself wasn't sleepy, just yet, and she didn't want to wake him; but she'd stay close, for now.

Omen drifted down like a falling leaf, a soft flutter of black wings audible as they closed. The Caller--like a crow with a single red eye--croaked and hopped over to her, and she offered her a nudge and a lick of affection. Ahh--and apology, as she realized-... "I didn't bring you back any food. I'll hunt, a bit later, and we can both eat," she assured the bird--sending the meaning of her words along the link. It came as an apology, and then intention to hunt and eat, and warm promise--and the bird's bobbing head and hoarse croak showed that Omen understood, and was enthusiastic about such a prize.

Giggle turned, glancing off toward where her cub now slept. "...I think he's gonna be okay, don't you?"

Omen's red eye turned toward the curled pile of hyena pup, and she let out a low, harsh croak--like a laugh. And in her mind's eye, Giggle saw for a moment the bird's idea of Giggle herself: a wandering mother, with her paws dipped into every situation that passed through Canis, often in trouble of some kind or another.

She snorted. "Are you saying he'll take after his mother-? Bones, I hope not. I'd rather he live a nice but very boring life." Better than the alternative, at least.

She padded over to lay beside him, noting that Omen followed--and after a moment all three were napping, content among the bones.

exit both