Never Come Between Us

Her mother laughed while she explained that this was her tree and that she had collected all of these bones. Satira gazed around at the collection of bones with wide-eyed wonder, her meal mostly forgotten when Asla reached into a pile and produced a weathered fox skull. Tira, face covered in bloody splotches, lifted herself up on her back legs to rest her tiny paws on the skull, marveling at its smooth surfaces. She looked over the delicate curves that shaped the bone, wondering if this was what everything looked like on the inside. She giggled when Asla tossed the skull away with a clatter and had been about to ask her mother why she liked bones so much when a much louder clattering of bones took both wolves' attention.

The next thing Satira knew, she was being hurled away by her mother, squealing in shocked fright as she tumbled to the ground, unharmed but definitely taken by surprise. She heard the hiss, but her young brain didn't make the connection between the sound and the creature until she saw the giant snake lunging for her snarling mother. Tira watched with huge, fearful eyes while Asla dodged and ducked the snake's lightning fast strikes, sinking her teeth into the reptile that aimed to make them both its lunch. The snake repositioned itself and her mother moved between her and the snake, taking its attention while she danced around it. Satira desperately looked around for something to do. She could back up, run and hide, let her mother protect them both. But something inside her nagged at her, chiding her for wanting to give in to fear. She was a Fatalis, dammit! Fatalis wolves didn't run.

Steeling herself with a point glare, Satira sprung to her paws and ran backwards around the snake while her mother distracted it. The head was dangerous with those sharp teeth and gaping maw. So instead, Tira ran for the snake's thick tail, growling as she lunged for the fleshy end of the snake's body. Tiny needles of puppy teeth bit at the snake's skin, but were unable to pierce the dense scales protecting the snake, and Tira ended up just gnawing uselessly at the reptile's tail. Unfortunately for the little girl the snake was highly perceptive, and as soon as it felt the nibbling at its tail, the snake moved with motions so fast that within the blink of an eye, the giant snake had darted around in a loop and surrounded Satira's small body in a tight coil before turning back to face off with Asla.

Satira gave a squeal of fright, but the sound was immediately cut off when the snake's muscular body squeezed the puppy within its coils so tight that she was totally immobilized. Trapped in the reptilian death grip, Tira was startled to find she couldn't breathe at all, her chest compressed to the point where she couldn't inflate her lungs and the pressure of the snake's squeezes constricting her tiny body so hard that it was impossible for her heart to keep beating properly. Satira felt frozen, staring blankly up at the dense canopy of leaves overhead while she asphyxiated, her vision a swirl of color and starting to go black rapidly, her body struggling with all its might to hold onto consciousness and not give in to death. She wanted to cry for help, to scream for her mother, but all she could do was quietly watch as her vision blacked out and her body began to shut down in the snake's lethal embrace.

"Satira Fatalis"