It was late, somewhere after evening but before midnight. The moon hung full in the night above the pack, ominous and ghostly against the dark sky. He wasn’t sure what had woken him, but he had wiggled free of Hika and gently pulled an extra blanket over the white wolf. Ensuring he stayed warm without Mort’s heat by his side. Then, he had made his way to the border. Watching the little glints of fireflies as they appeared, danced, and puttered out around him. He had never seen Fireflies in the Armada territories before. Scrunching up his nose in thought, he cast his mind back the stories his father had told him as a child. How the Warlord believed his mutations - his wings - had come from the potions his Sire had taken at a strange one-of-a-kind event. An event centered somehow, around fireflies… He took a step forward over the border, before deciding he aught to take a buddy with him. Things seemed strange around him, another pair of eyes would aid him. He was just thinking about finding a wolf still awake, when he found Kotori watching him in the long grass. “Ko?” he asked, blinking in surprise. “Ko. Hey, couldn’t sleep either? Look, i’m going to do some investigating, you want to come?” "Mortis"

Kotori couldn’t say what had woken him, just a chill up his spine but was that so new? It was winter, so chill rather came with the season.  Either way it had got him up and out of the den for fresh air.  Kotori had done enough roaming to certainly have seen plenty of fireflies before but not here, and it wasn’t as if just one but numerous ones.  Fireflies don’t wake a wolf up though and he wrote it off as winters just being a strange time.

However Kotori did decide to take a walk now that he was awake.  The young wolf wanted to get a sort of unease out of his system.  What was it with winter that seemed to bring oddities with it?  He stopped when he spotted Mort just watching his older brother for a few moments before noticed.

“Sure,” considering he hadn’t seen much of Mort lately and Kotori wasn’t ready to go to bed yet it made sense he might as well.  Kotori’s eyes followed the flickering flight of one of the fireflies before asking as he moved to follow Mort, “Where too? Something bugging you?” Pun wasn’t intended but, too late to take back.  Hell, when was the last time he did anything with Mort?  This was exactly what was needed to get over that awkward wake up feeling.

Kotori Fatalis

 

Mortis yawned, and gave himself a shake, starting from his head until it was a full body shudder. Trying to chase out that vestige of sleep from his bones. He wasn’t due for patrols until the morning, but he knew his duty to the pack. If something was off, he investigated it. Having company would only be a good thing - and he was glad it was Kotori. He hadn’t spent enough time with the tawny younger wolf lately. Something he would happily correct. Mort offered a wry smile at the boy's question. His eyes glanced to the fireflies, and back to the younger wolf. “I’m not sure” he admitted, some of the mirth leaving him. “Just an odd feeling, and dad says to follow your gut. So… I guess we follow it?” It came out as a question, even though Kotori had already agreed. He shrugged, and started forward. "Mortis"

Kotori watched the larger wolf shake himself out even as another eye cast towards the fireflies. Kotori grinned at the logic of following your gut meaning following fireflies to wherever they led.  It both made sense and totally ridiculous at the same time, at least to him.  “Guess we have to.” Had to in the sense of joining in on an adventure.

Kotori would follow after Mort from their own lands to head towards the mangroves.  The moon reflected off of snow that lay scattered about in areas, and the shimmering of water along with the weird plants here seemed to have everything glowing.  

“Uh, ya know I never put much thought on it before but do fireflies breed in areas where everything glows?” Maybe the mangrove was a secret breeding ground of fireflies?  Even the moon seemed oddly brighter tonight.  Full moons do that but what caused the tint of blue to it?  Kotori pondered that and decided it must be something to do with clouds affecting it or something else that made sense.  Hey, maybe it was a trick of his eyes with everything else so lit up.  It was as if it was still just dusk here instead of night.

The fireflies looked happy?  Could fireflies be called happy? They flickered about this way and that. “I ate one once when I was a kid,” Kotori labeled himself as an adult at least.  Parents dying and coming back from the dead, parents being stabbed, dire beasts as pups.  He figured life experience wise he’d had enough to fit the bill, “they don’t taste very good.”  Then again now that he was bigger would such a tiny thing even register with a taste or just fly straight on down? Probably still yuck, no reason to find out.


Kotori Fatalis

 

“I haven’t given it much thought either” Mortis admitted, eyeing the mangroves with consideration. Had it always glowed this much? It seemed… off to him. A territory he knew well. It was a feeling like everything had been moved just a little to the left - it didn’t look different but it felt off. Mortis snorted in surprise at the strange admittance from Kotori, “If you eat one of these ones you might sprout wings.” Mortis huffed in amusement, before adding - just in case - “Or you might get a horrible case of stomach cramps and shit yourself to death” Hey, who knew what weird stuff was affecting these bugs? He glanced cautiously at Kotori. The last thing he wanted was to think of another brother dead. He shuddered at the memory. "Mortis"

Kotori had been here before at night but as far as he could recall only once.  Normally it was  a spot he visited in the day time with no other real reason than he normally slept at night.  He did remember it had a glow but had it been like this?  Two times wasn’t really much to go off of.

Mort changed Kotori’s line of thought though when he mentioned wings, grinning broadly, “you know, if you told me that last year I’d have tried finding a ton of them to eat.  I ate a feather once.  That didn’t work but when I found a dead baby bird on the ground I tried that.  As you can imagine it still didn’t work.”  Kotori’s gaze moved towards an old log that was half in and out of water where a few more fireflies seemed to be frolicking about, moving in closer with a curious gaze, “I still didn’t grow wings,”obviously but he was throwing out this fun tail after all.  "Fell from a few of those smaller tree’s trying to get birds..” Obviously he couldn’t climb a healthy tree but he’d found one with a large branch half broken off to try and climb up, the other was just a matter of jumping off of the back of Splash to try and scramble up a branch, “so yah, tried a few things before I decided to give up.  It all made perfectly good sense to me back then.”

Kotori quit looking at the log and fireflies to glance back up at the overly bright moon.  “ya know.  It just doesn’t feel, uh, normal.  Don’t ya think?” If Kotori had been alone he would of likely paid a lot more attention to being uneasy but he had Mort and somehow that made things a little safer.

Kotori Fatalis

 

Kotori

A chill dips into the air. You also find 2 mushrooms. Maybe these are worth keeping…

Mortis

A chill dips into the air. You also find 3 crystals. Maybe these are worth keeping…