April Catch-all

[firealone]

Who: Firepaw and all his various friends (including an open prompt!)
What: Quests, training, feelings jams, etc etc etc
Where: All over the place!
When: April
Warnings: References to cat injury/death in the Exhaustion prompt

(This is a fake cut, there's prompts below!)

Comments

[firealone]

Firepaw watches the gathered Pokemon carefully, focusing especially on the Rookidees he sees. But none of them smell familiar, and the newcomers haven't had much luck befriending wild Pokemon anyway. The rest of the Pokemon will scatter once they move forward - that would be intimidating for him, but chaos seems to be part of the dog hunting strategy.

Plus, he spots a few Duckletts, which should be easy for Laios to catch.

Once he feels satisfied, he glances back at Laios and twitches his tail purposefully.

cw animal death, blood

[dunchies]

The anticipation swells as he scans the area. His heart is still pounding, the urge to give chase growing at the sight of small Pokémon in front of him. Laios could feel the instinct start to kick-in, but he has enough willpower to wait for Firepaw's signal. Only then does he finally make his move, dashing forward quickly. The smaller rodents spot him first, darting away from view. A few of the birds are next, flying up and away as he gets close. Then, he begins to bark, loudly and deliberately, to scare off the rest.

Luckily, most of the Duckletts take to the water, but he sets his eyes on one straggler just as it gets into the pond. He jumps forward, teeth barred and aiming for the neck, only for the Ducklett to turn toward him with a Wing Attack. He startles, unable to stop the motion as he bites down onto its wing, the crunch of it making him wince.

The Ducklett thrashes against him in the water, desperate to pull itself away from his grip. Laios, meanwhile, whips it around with a few uncoordinated splashes, unable to hold the Pokémon hold down for long with his paws. As it starts to spray him with Water Gun, he can only bite down harder. The squawking starts to grow louder, and he responds back with frustrated snarling. Don't let go. You can't let go. You're so close. Then, as if tapping into instinct, his body starts to spark, emitting a soft glow of light followed by a bright burst of electricity.

Suddenly, his jaw loosens, enough for the Ducklett to slip out in a daze. It stumbles slowly away from Laios, too weak now to do much else before the shock wears off on him. As he comes back to himself, he immediately lunges again with another bite, this time hitting exactly where he first intended. Teeth sinking into the Ducklett's neck, he lets the warm taste of copper fill his mouth before letting his prey drive take over. He shakes his head side to side until the Pokémon's body goes limp, the exhilaration of it all finally hitting its peak.

His ears twitch as he quickly looks back toward Firepaw's direction. Suddenly, his eyes grow wide as he feels that same urge he did at that start, only this time, he stops to let it pass with a few deep breaths. Then, his tail starts to wag, and he begins to trot over, excited to show off his catch. It takes another moment before he's willing to drop it to speak, though. "H-how's that? Now you can finally try it!"

[firealone]

Firepaw flinches again when Laios makes impact, although it is exciting to watch. He hasn't been able to convince anyone else to hunt with him, so there's something satisfying about getting a front-row seat to something that feels somewhat unique to his old life. Even if the danger signals from watching a dog hunt are going to take a while to get used to.

But he bounds over once Laios seems to have calmed back down, tail held high and twitching eagerly at the tip.

"That was great!" He cheers, "You looked like a natural out there. How does it taste?"

[dunchies]

"You really think so?" Laios asks, ears perking up almost immediately. That's certainly high praise, and from an actual hunter no less. It's almost too hard to fully contain himself at the mere thought, but somehow he manages to channel it all into wagging his tail, which somehow seems to be going even faster than before. Then, all at once, his eyes grow wide at the sudden realization.

"—oh! I got so caught up in the moment, I didn't even think about that!" His ears go flat in slight embarrassment; that is one of the main reasons they're here, after all. Still, he licks his lips slowly, savoring whatever remnants might have gotten stuck in his teeth. "It's... tangy! Maybe even a little sour, but not in a bad way."

"The breast should have an even richer flavor, though." As he says this, he flips over the Ducklett onto its back with his paw, but he seems hesitant to dig right in first. In the dungeon, this would be where the prep work started, a crucial step for any human now rendered unnecessary to a dog and cat. "Do you want to try a bite?"