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Tisiphone was, in Heyoka's estimation, nothing more than a worry-wort.

Also, her obsession with finding a pack was just short of ridiculous. Who needed a pack? They already were a pack -- a pack of four, and that was all a wolf really needed. Just enough to bring down big prey, enough for someone to stand guard, enough to fight just about anybody who messed with them. Honestly. It was all pretty silly.

Still, silliness had never been something Heyoka shied away from. In her own way she embraced it. The absurd was often very close to the dangerous, and Heyoka liked dangerous things. She liked them a lot.

Grinning her usual lopsided, slightly manic grin, she darted ahead, moving swiftly on her paws. She was younger than the others and it showed, both in her slim figure and her youthful, reckless air -- although she would probably never grow out of it, no matter what her companions wished.

"Other wolves," she nearly crooned, and let out an odd sort of tension-filled giggle. Was she off her rocker? Well, maybe. Or maybe it was just an act she kept up to throw the others off the scent of that deep-seated melancholy, the apathetic emptiness in her heart. "A whole pack of 'em. Oh man, I hope they want a fight." She circled back, coming up even with the others, and threw herself at Captain, nipping his ear playfully. "How 'bout it old man? You ready for a fight?"

Tis snarled and snapped at Zanza’jin, though her fangs only closed on air. He might be infuriating beyond reason, but she did not actually want to hurt him…yet. “Zanza,” she growled, “quit calling me that, and don’t give Heyoka any more ideas. You know she’d actually do it, if she could find a bear.”

Her ears swiveled forward as she re-gained her focus, doing her best to ignore the antics of her band. The scent of the native pack was much stronger, now, and she was able to differentiate between the individual wolves. There were a lot of them, a fact that should worry her, but somehow did not. One particular scent stood out above all the others, stronger, fresher, and quite distracting. It was rich and heady and purely male.

Tisiphone snorted and shook herself out again. Distractions were not what she needed. She needed a clear head. Still, her decision was made.

“We will try these lands,” she announced. There would be no skirting the boundaries here. They would meet this pack and make their intent known, if she judged them worthy. And something told her that they would be. That pull that she felt, the edginess that had kept her from settling anywhere else was singing to her, now, making her feel almost as giddy as Heyoka, though the reservations in her mind kept her from showing it.

Zanza sniffed, licking his paw and swiping it over his face. He always looked presentable! He was a grade A stud after all, and he frowned whenever he was lumped in with Heyoka. He wasn't a nut job; he simply liked to have a good time, which usually involved him flirting with a girl, not jumping off some cliff into a pack of coyotes. (epic foreshadowing)

"Dey could be comin' at any time, Captain. Why get all huffy 'bout it now? I'm sure we be smellin' em' before dey pounce on us. Da two big'uns be pretty easy to track," Zanza said, wrinkling his nose. He'd seen the paw prints back at the border. His own foot had drowned in them, and it made him wonder what kind of beasts lived in these heights.

His nose was the best of the bunch, and for the moment, nothing came to his sensitive nostrils, so he stayed relaxed, turning back to bump into Captain, pushing Heyoka aside so he could walk side by side with the brown and black male.

"We be good fo' now. Dun worry, brudda. Zanza will let ya know when trouble be comin'!"

The bear roared as it charged them, pupils red-rimmed in her rage. She was hungry, injured, and mourning, three perfect catalysts for her current near-berserker rage. The wolves had gotten too close, their smell enough to trigger her simmering anger. Why couldn't she just lick her wounds in peace? Mourn her cubs without anymore interruption?!

"You have poor timing this day, canines. My rage need be quenched, and your blood shall be what I drink," she snarled, slamming her front paws into the ground, sending dirt clods flying.

Zanza'jin's ears flattened to his skull and he took a few steps back, looking side-long at Captain. "I was jus' kiddin', mon! I swear! Ya see? Dis be what happens when ya mess wit da voodoo. Ya don' mess wit da voodoo!" He shook his head and jumped in front of Heyoka, knowing how eager she would be now that his challenge to her could truly be carried out.

"You! Don' ya be tinkin' 'bout harassin' dat bear. She'd gulp ya down fasta den a bird wit a worm."

Facing down an enraged she-bear was nowhere on Tis’s list of expectations for the day. All she had been worried about was the local pack, but then, she doubted that it was on anyone’s list. Except for her foundling’s, perhaps.

“Heyoka,” Tisiphone growled in warning. It would not do to instigate the bear until she knew just what they were going to do about her.

The she-bear was heavily injured and, despite her rage, did not look like she was in any state to be fighting. They could probably outrun her easily enough, but the midnight-black female had never been one to back down from a fight. Her instincts told her to attack. Besides, if they could deal with a threat right outside the locals’ territory, they might be more inclined to accept her little band into their fold. What better way to prove their worth than to kill a bear?

Tis battled with her own desires and thought rationally about their safety. Protecting her wolves came first. Anything else was just a bonus.

Thanks to the already poor state of the bear, taking her down without committing suicide should be possible, as long as Heyoka could refrain from doing anything too rash. Although the emotion would lend extra strength, an enraged creature did not think clearly. It made stupid decisions and was easy to exploit. Outmaneuvering the bear would be a simple matter for a group of hunters that had been working together for as long hers has; however, it was still a risk. A bear was still a bear, and it could always get lucky. Despite the fact that her own fury was rapidly surfacing at the threat to her wolves, neither did she want to set them against the threat only to get them maimed that way. That left one option: negotiation. Assuming that the bear could manage to see through her rage well enough to think relatively straight. But if that beast made one wrong move, Tisiphone would strike, no hesitation.

All of these thoughts had flickered through her mind and been categorized almost before the last of the growl left her throat.

“Ursine,” she returned, “we are no easy prey. You might get lucky and take one of us down, but I guarantee you would not survive the encounter. I suggest you take your bloodlust elsewhere.”

There. Would it not be even more impressive if they could talk a bear down? Anyone can kill something, but how many wolves could say that they had managed such a feat as that? Certainly, Captain would appreciate her efforts. Zanza’jin might, too.

Tis’s ear twitched.

Who was she kidding? It would be much more satisfying to kill the bear, but she had made her decision. Depending on that of the bear, she might get her chance anyway. Then wouldn’t Heyoka be pleased.

Zanza's ears flattened to his skull and he looked chagrined. "Can't win 'em all, brudda. I blame Heyoka fo' distractin' meh, so direct ya anger at her. I be innocent."

The bear's eyes narrowed as she stomped her paws into the ground again. Blood dripped freely from her wounds, soaking into the thirsty soil. For all her injury, she did not limp, nor did she hold herself as if she were in pain. The she-bear had truly fallen into a berserker state, her pain over-taken by rage and forgotten.

"Who says I wish to survive, wolf?" With that, she charged, a thunderous roar falling from her wide-spread maw. The huge fangs glistened and she angled for Heyoka first, moving faster than her injuries should have let her.