[PRP] the places you go... [Foxy / Shush]

[Maxx D]

"Food is unconscionably delicious when you're hungry," she griped, as if she was unhappy to be devouring an entire bush, berries, flowers, leaves and stalk. "What have we eaten, Shush? So many berries. So many fruit. So many flowers. So very, very many leaves."

It would help if she could recall exactly what they were, but even though they had run a lot, they had also feasted a lot. She wasn't quite sure whether Shush had opinions about the time they were taking, but Foxy was a practical doe, and there was no point running on empty when there was so far to go. Since she'd gotten used to Eyes, Foxy occasionally sent the fennec over to check on her, when there was some distance between them. Now that they were still, she leaned over and gently nuzzled her hair.

"We've eaten so many things. Which was your favourite, Shush my dear?" Habituating this doe was probably a good idea. Whatever she could coax out of her, she would.  

[Jun D]

It would be a lie to say that Shush hadn't noticed the doe ate a lot. She stopped to eat as much as she stopped to drink - perhaps more, and sometimes she didn't have to stop at all. But then, she was - as she had learnt since, since the first time, when she had only known Kiokote and Kimeti, and only heard whispers of more - a Totoma, and Totomas were strong. This, she had heard, and had also felt, from the many brushes that the doe had trampled underfoot. Strong Kin needed to eat. A ghost did not.

And, yet, she ate. How could she not? When the strong doe - the kind doe - pushed over a sprig of berries, nosed her over to sweet grass? Even a ghost must eat, to wander. Even a ghost, to be polite. So she ate, a sprig of berries, sweet grass, proffered flowers. The occasional hunt, for the kind doe was very strong.

Food was like water – it grew with the water through it – food was like water and tasted different, from the sea to the mountains. Shush wondered if – she supposed – she too tasted different now, with the food she had eaten as they'd moved, the water she had drunk.

But what was her favourite? She had never thought of it thus. She was a ghost, and a ghost did not eat, except to drift, and be polite.

"I...don't know," she said.  

[Maxx D]

"Berries are a popular choice," she said, savouring the round in her mouth before popping it and licking the dribble down her lip, "but there's something reliable and sturdy about grasses and greens, I have an especial fondness for them from the mountains. Evergreens! What a texture." She was a very solid doe with two tails and three other mouths to feed, after all. "But I've noticed, that you look really charming when you eat flowers."

She laughed heartily.

"You eat them so delicately! Nibbling through the petals and their folds. You look like a flower yourself, pale and delicate, flowing features. You wilt a little, sometimes," a slightly chiding tone, "but you're still here. Yet the strongest flower I have ever had the pleasure to see. This one's overripe," and she carefully put a little sprig of three on her hooves. "See if you like the flavour."  

[Jun D]

The doe said kind things that Shush could not reply to. She didn't have the words.

Instead, she put her head down, and ate the little berries.

END