Life would never be the same for Veigar after the ooze had nearly taken his life. Though he was technically recovering - his body was no longer riddled with sickness, dripping with strange bright ooze - he was not completely healed. While the sun made its slow reappearance, he slowly began to realize that his hazy vision was not just a byproduct of the Ooze, nor the darkness that had plagued the land for so long. Some of his vision recovered, but it wasn't quite right. Everything was just slightly hazy enough to be noticeable. Perhaps it would fade, but he had a sneaking suspicion it wouldn't.

But that was a problem for another day. Slowly he padded along the base of Mount Volkan, his pace slow and careful. He still hadn't made much sense of everything that had happened recently. He'd heard his mother again, and he was sure it wasn't just his sickness, as Aryn had heard her too. And now she was gone too, nowhere to be found, and Veigar was alone again. He felt directionless, even more lost than when he'd been a small child. Soon he'd be a yearling and he felt no less sure of himself or where he belonged than he'd ever felt. Kicking at some rubble on the ground he stalked on, a frown tugging at his lips.

CAUSE YOU CAN'T GET INTO HEAVEN Sunset meant it was time to get out of the den, and explore. It didn't take too long for the pale child to come across a fresh scent trail, one that belonged to another Habari wolf. With a spring in his step and his ivory tipped tail waving gleefully over his hips, he meandered along the path until he noticed a few faint lights dancing along ahead of him. With a frown creasing his brow and tugging his cherry hued lips downward, he picked up the pace. No more fireflies were going to be messing with his pack if he had anything to say about it. Until the rest of the daylight had melted away into comfortable darkness, his vision on the left side wasn't as acute as it should be. Which meant that he found himself relying on his right eye, and tipping his head ever so slightly to the left so that he had a better field of vision. By the time he realized he was following another wolf, this one with scattered flecks of golden fur that were giving off a pale light, he was already invested in making the stranger his evening's entertainment. "Did the fireflies make ya glow like that? They made my brother's eyes glow." he said conversationally as he trotted up alongside the strange youngster, keeping him on his right side so he could see him better until the sun fully set. "" IF YOU HAVEN'T GOT A SOUL

Maybe some company wouldn't be such a bad thing after all this evening. Anything beat his own thoughts, tormenting him one after another. Upon hearing the approach of another he tilted his head to get a better view of the kid that approached him. It was one of Recluse's kids, not one he'd encountered before, but his eye markings were easy to discern no matter how hazy his vision might be. He gave the boy a slow nod of acknowledgment as he drew closer. His glow? Oh, right - it'd been awhile since he'd thought of that. The glow flared seemingly in tune with his moods. At night the glow was always visible, less so during the day, though lately he suspected it was flaring up more often than not. "Uh - no. I was born like this," he explained dismissively. "But, look." He parted his jaws slightly letting a thin stream of saliva drip from his jaws. It glowed a faint shade of neon green, another thing more obvious without sunlight getting in the way quite so much. Sucking it back in, he gave the kid a half-smirk. "I'm Veigar, by the way. Which kid are you?"

CAUSE YOU CAN'T GET INTO HEAVEN The larger boy commented that he had simply been born that way, which seemed reasonable. Ichor had come out with sharp teeth and a weird tongue, widow had her weird claws, and.. oh right. For just a moment the pale child glanced down at his own paws, which were decked out with unsettlingly long talons. Yes, it made sense that the unfamiliar boy simply glowed from the start. However, he looked up when the boy told him to look, and watched a string of glowing drool slide from between his teeth to dangle in the air. The sickly green tint was vaguely unsettling, and that in itself was delightful. A cackle escaped him, tail wagging even faster at the sight of the weird drool. "That's so gross! Do it again!" he giggled, thoughtlessly moving to jostle the other boy with a hearty bump of his little shoulder. His wide grin was met with a tiny smirk from the older kid, who introduced himself as Veigar. "I'm Viscera Klein, my mom is the Seraphim." he replied proudly, the corners of his eyes crinkling with that wide grin of his. "Are you happy that the sun came back? I'm not." he said absently as he kicked a stray volcanic stone to the side with an oversized paw. In typical kid fashion, he was oversharing with whatever popped into his mind. This was how one made friends, right? "The sun makes it hard to see." the complaint came with a small curl of his upper lip in a sneer of disdain, here and gone in a flash. "" IF YOU HAVEN'T GOT A SOUL

Veigar was beyond pleased that the boy seemed entertained by his strange new quirk. He hadn't paid a lot of mind to it either, assuming at first it was just some strange side effect of the sickness he'd been afflicted with, but.. it seemed to not be fading as time went on. It didn't matter much though, but apparently kids got a kick out of it, or at least this one kid did. Humoring him, he repeated what he'd done before, letting a longer trail of spit slide down from his teeth and toward the ground. This time he didn't bother to suck it back in, letting it drip from his chin and lifting a paw to wipe it away. Once it came in touch with anything the glow faded into nothingness.

"Cool," he replied to his greeting, the boy's name registering in his brain - and his voice. His face was recognizable even from a huge distance, but he wasn't hopeful his sight would get any better, though he was trying not to think too much about it. "Yeah, I mean I'm mostly happy." It was... hard to say for sure, and his voice betrayed some of that uncertainty. Being sick had been terrible - not just the physical symptoms, but the madness that had followed - but hearing his mother again had been worth it... hadn't it? She'd been real, he was sure of it, even though he knew he ought to rationalize that he'd just been sick and hearing things. If given the chance he'd trade his health for another chance to see her, to talk to her... but it wasn't like it was up to him.

"I'm having trouble seeing lately too," Veigar admitted after a long, awkward pause. Maybe admitting that wasn't a good idea, but Viscera had brought it up first and he wondered foolishly if he was suffering from something similar. "Everything is a little.. blurry, I guess. And it's not going anyway. Is it like that for you?" Expectantly he watched the younger boy, hoping he had some clarity for him.

CAUSE YOU CAN'T GET INTO HEAVEN The pallid youngster watched with unabashed delight as the other boy let another tendril of drool drip from between his teeth and then drop unceremoniously into the dirt. The movement of a paw coming up to wipe away the dampness on his muzzle registered in his peripheral, though the child was more interested in the slow fade of the glow from the little puddle of drool. It reminded him of the time he watched one of the crystals be knocked free from his mama's face, and slowly lose its light until it was no more than a translucent stone on the floor of the den. Weird! It was not entirely unexpected for Veigar to be happy to see the sun come back, though it was definitely not a point in the boy's favour. It was the "mostly" part of his statement that caught Viscera's attention, and he tipped his head curiously to one side as he scrutinized the glowing boy. When he didn't elaborate on it, the frown deepened for a fraction of a second before his features slackened and were complacent again. The awkward silence didn't really bother him, even as it stretched on for a moment or seven. His siblings were kind of terrible at communication, he just assumed that was par for the course of holding conversation at this point. He blinked curiously at Veigar as he mentioned his own difficulties seeing as well, curiosity renewed. This was his new best friend, no way around it. They were both kind of blind! When Veigar mentioned the details of his own difficulties with seeing, the slate dappled youth hummed thoughtfully. "Kinda?" he offered, rather unhelpfully. He frowned at his paws for a moment trying to remember how it had been explained to him. "Mom says that it's because one of my eyes is pink like this," one sharp taloned paw lifted towards his left cheek, and an obsidian dark claw alighted on the thin fur just below his cherry red optic. "it means it can't handle the daylight, so when it's bright out I only see like.. really dark shadows, and super vague blobs. At night the light isn't so bright, and it works just fine. I didn't even know about that until the sun came back, it was so weird." he explained, brows furrowed with the kind of intensity that could only be offered by a child who was very intent on explaining something he'd just learned, and was proud of knowing. He dropped his oversized forepaw back to the terra, and shrugged lightly. "My black eye is fine though, so I usually just turn my head a lot to see what's going on if I go outside when it's light out." the child offered up as an absent addition to his big spiel about his weird vision. When he realized that the older boy was looking at him with a bit more intensity than before, he found himself losing some of his usual bravado. A lopsided, bashful smile was the best he could muster up to offer the other child. "I don't know if that helps you though, huh?" he said after another awkward silence. Oopsies? "" IF YOU HAVEN'T GOT A SOUL

Feeling seen was basically his biggest motivator in life, and right now he felt like all of Viscera's attention was on him and him alone, and he was simply delighted. At least that was one perk of Recluse having more kids; that there were young kids now to look up to him. Otherwise he was convinced the cons heavily outweighed the pros, but it wasn't like he had any say in the matter and he definitely knew better than to make his opinion known.

Well.. maybe this kid would be better to have around than the others, if he really was having issues with his sight. It made him feel marginally less shit, at least for a second. His pale eyes lit up with interest as the boy spoke, explaining that his sight was kinda like what Veigar had said but also not really. He gestured to his eye and Veigar nodded, deciding all at once that his issues were probably not like his own. His own issues weren't related to the sunlight or darkness - in fact, things were generally easier for him to see in the daylight. Night was no doubt the worst of all for him.

"So it's not… like, getting worse? It's kind of just how it is?" Yeah, Veigar was sure that his issue was something completely different. His sight was worsening.. slowly, very slowly, but noticeably. "It's different for me. Since the sun came back, everything is just getting more and more blurry. I thought I was imagining at first but I know I'm not now." He paused then, considering what he'd just said. "Don't tell anyone though, alright? Seriously. I don't need anyone… I don't know, feeling sorry for me or whatever," he explained quickly, though pity wasn't really what he feared. Rejection and disappointment, though, definitely scared the shit out of him. The last thing he wanted was to let anyone down, to seem lesser because of whatever was happening to his sight. Part of him still hoped he was just making the the whole thing up.

CAUSE YOU CAN'T GET INTO HEAVEN There was an edge of anxiety in Veigar's tone when he spoke up next that did not go unnoticed by the curious pup, though he didn't make a point to mention it. It made sense that the boy would be concerned about losing his vision, especially if it wasn't just half of his vision like Viscera struggled with. Slate marked auds perked as he readily absorbed all of the information that the older pup was willing to part with, and the explanation that his vision was slowly fading was met with a furrow of his pale brow. He wasn't sure what to make of this information, and that bothered him more than the young wolf's loss of vision did. He hadn't known that it was even possible for someone's sight to just... go away. That alarmed him a little, because his one eye was already weak, and now there was a chance that it could degrade more as he grew. His attention returned to the conversation at hand when Veigar looked at him quite intensely, and practically demanded that he keep his mouth shut. His immediate instinct was to balk at the sudden demands of someone he didn't know that well. To curl his lip and say something snide. But.. Veigar was cool. He had funny drool tricks, and they were both kind of blind. He liked Veigar, as much as he could possibly like someone else he had just met. Instead of being a little shit, the slate dappled youngster shrugged heavily and bobbed his head a little. "Yeah, alright." he drawled, glancing down at his paws to kick a particularly notable pebble aside. When he looked back up at the older pup, his expression was lax, and a little blank. The slate was wiped clean, as far as confessions went. Back to more interesting matters. "Wanna go kill something with me? Last time I went to the nook I found a badger, I wanna see what else there is." he offered it with the languid kind of tone that one might use to ask a friend about a 7-11 run at 3am, like it didn't particularly matter if it happened, but don't you kinda want to go? His mismatched gaze roved from Veigar's gold dusted features towards the lenghtening shadows that seemed to wreath the grove in the darkening twilight. "" IF YOU HAVEN'T GOT A SOUL

Veigar had confessed what he thought might quickly become his greatest weakness abruptly, and the conversation tapered off just as quickly. He made Viscera promise he wouldn't tell anyone and he just hoped he took it seriously enough. He didn't want to have to threaten this kid with silence, since he seemed pretty cool and he wasn't sure how such a thing would go over with Recluse if she found out. He figured he'd most likely forget it unless Veigar brought it up again, or at least that was what he was hoping.

When Viscera spoke again he seemed like he'd left his little confession behind and promptly moved on to different matters, as kids tended to do. Perfect. "Yeah, sure, let's go see what we can find," Veigar agreed easily. Maybe taking his frustration out on something much smaller than them both would give him some relief from the anxiety that was beginning to well up at his slowly worsening sight. With that he set off toward the nook, sure Viscera would be close behind him.