Chapter Text
~ Foreword ~
Scion of Hunger is a deeply experimental story that I stumbled upon the concept for after deciding to critique many tropes and concepts I’d witnessed which I felt were not done justice, and at times were even done disservices. The story eventually evolved into what it is today: something that tries to stand entirely on its own while establishing a parable targeting ‘outside context,’ the difficulties of found family, and especially the hardships surrounding doing evil and learning better.
This is a tale of false foundations, making mistakes, and living with them, rather than by them. The protagonist is a flawed character with great potential thrown into a new experience she must learn to adapt to, no matter how many times she stumbles, falls, and hurts those around her. Those mistakes and the lessons extracted from them are the central premise and promise of this story, and I can unfortunately guarantee that this story won’t be for everyone.
The void is as complete as the depthless compression around my blasted frame. My prize is torn from my grip during an immeasurable time-beyond-time, and my eyelids fly gaping. Flashes of nothing yet everything assault every sense available and notes of PAIN fight to their deaths for transmission up choked nerves.
What happened? Where am I?!
My eyes reflexively shoot closed again with a gasp of lost air and I tighten with the world to try and keep my everything in and together. While the isolative overload continues to try and drown me too many questions assault from within, yet the only thought I can cling to is that I must surely be dead or dying, devoured by my would-be target’s creation.
Yet too soon and too late a vast light sears through my clenched eyes, and-
PAIN.
Sound.
Sensation!
Greedy gulps resuscitate me but any thought of conscious movement must battle beyond the hordes of blessed sensation. Absolutely everything hurts--even things that none ever knew to teach me the existence of, and I have nothing to show for it now that I’ve lost my prize. Slowly and with great caution I blink once more, building up the strength to view my new surroundings.
Around me is a jungle, yet not one I’ve ever seen or even heard of before. Gazing behind me, it’s no wonder I hurt all over… I’m laying on my side at the end of a me-sized trench in a clearing of yellowing grass. If not for my armor absorbing the impact and taking the toss on my back, I would surely be nothing but paste.
Introspection continues with a shudderingly raised leg. Odd burns baste dented keratin and bruised scales, the strange eruptions nearly total but for whatever that strange void was denied access to. In places they almost seem similar to the wounds of the invaders’ weapons, if they were to blast gales of sand at murderous speeds. Yet in spite of all this I know I hadn’t been shot, or I’d certainly have died.
The furthest pains from my tail and scythe-limbs finally reach beyond the subconscious and I groan at the sight of the crunched appendages. My tail is at least largely intact, but my weapons are in terrible shape. With still certainty I can at least I know in the deepest pit of my being that all will be repaired and regrown, all may be better and stronger...
My acknowledged agonies recede with shock into a background of full-body aches, but my hunger does not--t only grows worse, now that I know my sheer state.
A cracking blast slices across the distant landscape heralding further rumbles from beyond. Thunder and lightning? On a clear day? This is… not normal. None of this is. And I can smell… something. Not a single smell is remotely familiar. The trees not only look different, they smell different. The air itself feels… less? As if I were to eat five small meals, but retain only the sustenance of four.
The jungle around me is thicker than what I’m used to, yet far less... lush. Yellowed spikes lay beneath tall yet thin trunks while dehydrated bushes desperately claw at the dead air. Rain has abandoned this place for some time, and the foliage clearly suffers under the uncaring sun. Everything, from the struggling trees to dying foliage carries a sense of being sharp. Few mushrooms and growths have yet to set upon the struggling landscape, and where the mosses aren’t, stubby knives of grass are many.
The plants aren’t the only thing strange about this new place. Not only is it practically mid-day despite us attacking at night, the powerful sun blasts down over a rolling valley flanked by angular hills. I certainly don’t recall passing out--it’s almost as if the world took me and spat me out somewhere else entirely an unknowable span later and further.
Any confusion and desperate questions are buried beneath another, more desperate need: I must find food and shelter, or else I will never heal. After gathering my wits I finally set out into this new place, trotting warily past baked brush and into the trees beyond. Their sight and shape aren’t the only things alien about all of this, either; a shaky sniff and even a cautious taste of leaves and branches here and there leave more questions than answers. The only things familiar are the basic tastes of plant and wood. They would make terrible meals for my sort, but I can’t help sampling whatever I come across so long as it doesn’t smell or appear too strange.
The sheer novelty is a taste all of its own, and if such simple things are toxic then it isn’t like there’s much I could do anyway but find out the hard way. Poisonous trees? Just to be safe I avoid the one with stabbing needles.
The lazy wind finally turns and with it comes even more intangibles to take in. Pheromonal markers of unknown origin and purpose, mild chirps from hopefully undersized birds I stalk beneath, and distant, more musky stenches of larger beasts. Here and there within the branches above are isolated and disorganized nests featuring birds that are hopefully adults rather than singular unattended juveniles. The avians of this place are either so vast that they lay few and care not for the safety of said offspring, or it is a season of preparation and I have little to worry about.
Birds are nothing new, but never like this. There is no community to speak of for such small and vulnerable things, and despite my doubtlessly noisy arrival I’ve not been set upon by any swarming flocks.
The changing wind brings something else, too; something smaller, more basic, and with a base hint of death.
I carefully remain down-wind of the entity whilst stalking forward. Small herbivore, likely mammalian from the smell, and given the biome it would probably be a climber. It has no idea what is coming, and even if it could sense me it would have no warning of what I truly am.
Dead leaves and needles make for a slow and difficult hunt through this alien jungle, over divot and around thick foliage, yet a decade of experience as a fully-fledged hunter carries me silently. Were I still a mere broodling only able to charge and hope, then circumstances would be different and--if my predictions are accurate--probably then see me charging a little more vertically not long after such an attempt.
Rounding one of these strange trees, I finally spot it.
There you are, little pest. It roots around among the dead beneath a different, stouter tree for old seeds, roots, and fungus to munch on, gorging upon it all into its expanding cheeks. Its coloration is a duller greyish-brown than my young hue, its fluffy fur obviously no match for my thick carapace but likely useful for colder times. Its mouth seems able to function as a storage crop of sorts, possibly indicating another brooding creature.
My approach continues as stealthily as possible. It would be a bother to have to haul myself up whichever of the surrounding trees it decides to flee to, especially if it were dextrous enough to leap between them. Despite all my skill it still looks up, curious after finally being able to catch my lingering scent. But it is too late. Far too late.
It disappears along with a bite of ground down to my depths, no tasting necessary in my desperation. A source of water to wash the foul leaves down would be nice, though...
My meandering lasts hours, sensing out and finding more small creatures, and soon the sun has moved enough for me to identify direction: the valley runs from north to south. Gradually, dark clouds have thickened, and the sky has turned a particularly concerning shade of yellow. New winds bring facts verified by sight: to the south are the flames of a growing wildfire. Definitely not going that way, then--even after nature deems it shall end there will be nothing there for me. North it is, along the valley.
Aside from becoming separated and losing my prize, today has been almost... pleasant. A break from the routine that was following Mother’s orders and hunting the great enemy. New sights, new sounds, new things to eat, and for better or worse I don’t even have to share.
...Now if only this jungle actually had any fruits. At least it seems far less hazardous than home was. That devourer of seeds didn’t choose its diet; it simply filled a niche, and the various cones and acorns don’t make for good eating to me.
This land’s meals have been paltry so far. Too small and too fast, demanding far too much energy to truly be worth it in my healing state. Each hunt is, however, a welcome distraction and enjoyable puzzle. Consumption is not just a necessity of life, it is the way of life. To devour the weaker, to cultivate one’s strength, and become worthy of Other to rut and make many with. Some gorge foolishly and earn their strength fast, but it is Mother’s teaching that great things come to those who wait, prepare, and build upon a solid foundation.
For that reason, I have always been the runt of my family. The only one to follow in her footsteps and heed that advice, the slowest to mature, the youngest in body of all. We had intended to have victory within the raid be my signal for adulthood. For this, a prisoner of war--taken to be mine to do with as I would, or traded away to a favored man in our glorious flower war of revenge.
...Yet I was denied that. Denied all of it. The concept that I may never marry does not even cross my mind at this moment, for certainly Mother in her youth encountered many strange lands. This one I too shall conquer and return from and court whomever I please! The prey may so far be weak, but Mother’s tales spoke only of lands similar to this, and a new place free of the invaders would be glorious to bring news of.
Anticipation overrides lingering pain, and I feel the absolute need to prove myself. Playing around in the leaves with these small specimens will get me nowhere... I need something larger. Something that could put up a fight, without being overwhelming in my injured state. An uncomfortable shift brings a dangling scythe into view of an eye, and I study the staining blood of my would-be capture.
Irritating. So close, yet so far. But anger and petulance will also get me nowhere. Food first, shelter second, exploration third. Healing... eventually.
Breathing techniques relax and restrain my pent-up anger and stress, processing and burying the distractions. Focus. Focus. Food. Fight. Focus. I scent the air and find precisely what I’m looking for: a trail. Close, though a little old and not immediately noticeable. Either a single creature or multiple of the same. Definitely large, and upon closer inspection, tracks would indicate a lone wanderer. Its feet are hooved, not unlike those of the invaders, though much simpler in nature and probably less dangerous.
The trail takes me up the valley’s western slope through much of the remaining day, with slow progress and steady healing. I suffer few distractions along the way but devote more effort toward keeping myself calm and collected. It was rage and ambition which led me here, and while they have their time and place, I must keep myself in check.
All of the little aches and pains slowly recede but the worst of them only grow stronger. Bones may be shifting and flesh may be sealing, but any fight will tear everything apart again, so it must earn me resources. The sensation of bone extricating from muscle is a horrendous one and it’s the most common of them all.
My carapace heals slowest, but that is fine. It is my armor, and while it is dented, painful, and burned as if melted, it is not necessary for my survival outside of a brawl. It is wise that my body heal my scythes and my legs first, for how could I hunt otherwise?
It is along a spring’s emaciated stream that I take a moment to refresh myself for my continued journey. While food is important, water is far more essential, and the distant fires are no help to the day’s relentless sun. To no shock the water is clean and clear, but there is precious little of it--nowhere near enough for a bath. Thankfully this does leave me with the occasional guttered puddle, and with the aid of that very same sun I examine the extent of my injuries and admire my form.
My head is long and wedge-shaped with a solid piece of chitin protecting my brain and sloping down to my snout. From the sides peek my four eyes: two on the front and another two at an angle behind the main ones, each with yellow sclera and cunningly slit green pupils. My night-eyes lazily track for contrasting movements in the too-bright day, far more useful if I can’t find my target before sunfall.
Unfortunately: I look like a complete mess. Foreign dirt sullies my scales and plates, worst of all over my back but there exists stains of darker sorts. Rising up onto my hind-legs further shows two shoulder-width smears of dried, alien blood from my apparently relinquished death-hug.
Despite the weathered state of things I preen over the rest of my near-perfect form, so close to full physical maturity in spite of my long, self-stunted years. Further self-examination begins with my arms and hands--that which separates Kin from prey. At the ends of my suitably-lengthed fore-legs are four dextrous toes and their thumbs, each digit themselves disproportionately long so as to better grab with. Each has a carefully maintained claw which will almost certainly need sharpening later, so that their tips may pierce and their lengths rend. Calloused leather precedes them to better texture any grasps.
Past my armored hips strain my digitigrade hind-legs; all the better for sprints and pounces, as is the standard according to Mother for any sort of ground-form. On each lay three toes with even harsher blades jutting forward from a trio of joints, opposite a larger one pointing back stabbed into the earth.
With the utmost care given both to my balance and any breaks stiffening it, I bring my tail around and feel barely at its tip. Ultimate to my tail’s tapering plates is a double-sided weapon that dwarfs all before, only equalled by my badly beaten scythes. I give in to the ground’s pull and fall back to all fours, said fifth and sixth limbs falling with my shoulders in a wincing clatter.
While my tail’s weapon makes for powerful slashes, those are entirely for opportunistic stabbing--and securing struggling targets. Unfortunately--despite their success against my would-be prize--they’ve been completely pulped during my awful arrival and look more like shattered and bruised tentacles than anything conceivably endoskeletal.
The armor coating my form is much the same, though the bones themselves have been spared. My back is almost certainly a mess of cracks and crevices beneath the grit, but I can’t exactly get a good look as I am. My keel-plated chest and scaled belly are quite intact, and it’s rather fortunate that my instinctive curl prevented the much more vulnerable scales from being chafed by the world’s objections to my apparent slide.
All of this and more will be solved through finding a good meal and gorging to my heart’s content, stunting be damned. The armor may grow back weaker if I rush the healing, but while it would be ideal to cultivate a strong foundation I do not have that luxury any more. With that and myself assessed, I move on.
Onward I go, northwest and up, nearing the ridge before veering back through a creek and down its slope. Along a scraggly clifftop a flash of unique color blazes to a night-eye; oranges and reds worryingly crest a ridge. Gargantuan flames have overtaken the far valley to my southwest, thankfully blocked from this one by the equally massive earthen wall. The ashen cover clouding the sky has only increased, and the only reason I’m not choking is likely thanks to the distance I have on my own valley’s spread and a thankfully south-heading wind.
From so far away, it’s... almost beautiful. But... I can’t help but shudder from knowing exactly what it’s like to be amid that. Soon, everything will be ashes until the rains deem otherwise.
My pace picks up despite the multiplied aches this brings and I don’t let it stop me from scooping up the occasional still-wriggling forest critter. Being injured and on the move is all the more reason to eat as much as I can. Who knows where I’ve ended up, but I shall certainly conquer it! Food so far seems abundant yet weak, and if the war is lost then we could certainly retreat here... but for that, I will need to find that lucky little man and get him to bring us back.
Any further thoughts of domination are curbed by a milestone. The trail has taken me further north, along the ridge rather than over it, and finally back down into the valley. Ahead is a stunted opening in the needled canopy where bushes have prospered and my quarry has clearly stopped. Abundant leavings trace the place and the surroundings have been ravaged by a predator of another sort. The bushes have been mauled, mushrooms have been munched, leaves have been devoured, and the yellowed grass has been trampled. The stench of the beast lingers here, as if it had bedded for a night. All of this together paints the picture of a type of creature which devours the greenery and moves slowly yet steadily.
Perfect prey animals, though by no means weak for that reason alone, and the consumed shrooms point to a measure of safety regarding them. These beasts are very unlike the scavengers I’ve so far encountered and seem content to fulfill their role as a larger part of the bottom. Mundane, perhaps even boring at times, yet still the perfect prey animal. Even the most powerful and respected of my siblings must still hunt such targets once in a while; food is food. Mother may have deemed me mature and ready to take and taste in the great hunts against the intruders, but that honor has since been denied and must wait.
Time and scenery pass me by, and with a few hours more I’m finally nearing my prey as evening approaches. Perhaps it is resting? The ridge is long behind us with the track arriving at the bottom of this strange overgrown valley; down here it is just as beautiful, just as green, just as brown, and of course: just as yellow.
The scent grows stronger and finally it enters the next stage. I creep closer towards a grassy patch and there it lies, resting opposite me. Quick and silent maneuvers bring me tighter from downwind--a good habit to maintain. Beyond the thickest of the undergrowths lay finally my quarry: closer to the upwind side of the opening in the treeline than where I am approaching from, which is perfect. Perfect, at least, so long as I don’t linger, staring and salivating.
My conclusions were accurate, of course: definitely a larger creature. It’s actually decently bigger than I am, though where I am longer and lower to the ground, it has bony legs beneath a thick neck and great horns. Where I was right about its size, I was wrong about its strength. It is seated so I may not to tell its height, but I can see its feet and it is clear it has no claws. Its mouth appears more suited to biting at the environment than an enemy, and even if it has powerful teeth my carapace would surely stop them.
Its horns are impressive and must be its primary--and only--weapon, probably defensive or ritualistic in nature only. Still: without care, they may actually be able to break through one’s carapace! It may be strong, but it does not make me invincible, especially shattered as it is now. Mother’s thicker plates would be able to turn them away or at the least lodge them in place.
Its head lifts, revealing an eye on each side gazing vacantly into the jungle. Their location is akin to my night eyes, but this creature has no front-facing ones, so they must not be special like mine are. This, too, is nothing new: most prey creatures back at home have eyes like this, though they are usually larger and stronger than whatever this thing is.
Its ears twitch and its eyes search. I’ve spent too long observing and considering this creature, and it has scented me. Well, time to earn my dinner; the sun is going down soon.
I maneuver around directly to its rear as stealthily as I can and enter the clearing.
Tactics. Even though it already knows that I am here, tactics are a necessity. Having even a moment longer before it can realize that it is in grave danger and bolts is just that little bit closer which I may approach. Besides, I am no fool--this is no time for risks without first testing and toying. Years ago, a sister of mine died making the mistake of underestimating a well-placed horn. The distraction did make it easier to fell the beast that ended her, and her flesh was both one less mouth to feed, one less competitor, and part of the bounty of the trip.
The weak are eaten. The strong get stronger.
She returned to Mother, as is tradition, so that she may be reborn into the next generation. Father’s last brood, before the fires took him.
Focusing back on my target has me continue creeping toward it around the occasional burrow or patch of dying flowers amid the trees. It knows that something is wrong, and turns its head, quickly spotting my approach.
Instantly it bolts upright, trying to turn to face me, but I pounce! As my claws dig into its side it lets out a bray and attempts to flee. Too late! I have you! Two lines of slash marks mar its dark brown hide, pouring its blood to the jungle floor. Falling back to all fours, I jump back and assess.
It has completed its turn to me, and has backed up to the edge of the space, leaning slightly forward with its head down. A charge, then. Unsurprising. If I was hunting with a sister, now would be a good time for her to burst from the opposite treeline and repeat my attack, all so that it may be brought down now instead of waiting for bloodloss to take hold. On a more dangerous beast such a thing may be essential... but here? No.
While it has long and thin legs built for running straight, mine are powerful and omnidirectional; multipurpose. It begins its charge, and in return so do I. It lowers its head, and just before it would skewer me, I juke, missing it by a foot in a leftward launch! The beast thunders by yet cries out in pain, a quick turn to assess it revealing its additional failure: a shallow rend from my bladed tail running down its side, hastening the inevitable--if not for its sloppiness.
The wound itself is suboptimal, intended to have been a deeper slash than it was, my strength not yet known in this odd place. It was otherwise a classic technique for dealing with charging prey--when performed precisely. It was the same technique which my sister tried and failed, for she misjudged her own speed and took a horn to the collarbone for it, dodging too late or without enough power. The opposite of my mistake, one that carries fatal consequences rather than a missed opportunity.
The beast balks and bleats in a panic and attempts to turn after finishing its unwitting joust but it’s just too late. While my second strike may not have inflicted much damage, I’ll correct for my third. Turning around for another charge sees it build up momentum but my target is slightly slower from the pain of its wounds. Luck may see it stumble over a root or step in one of the many burrows in the jungle’s floor. Once more it comes pounding towards me, head down, horns ready, and once more I dodge, this time to the right, leaving a much deeper matching slice on this side too.
Rather than turn once more and prepare for a third charge, I continue my own sprint and make for the trees. I have won, and while it has only slowed, I will not risk making stupid mistakes for little gain. This was fun, but... it’s not the challenge that I seek. This was refreshing and I did enjoy it but it’s not the same as back home. There exists no sense playing with it right now; I just want to end it and eat.
Peeking from around a tree, safe from a charge, I see my prey once more. Its flanks rain red with its blood, and while it seems to be wanting to charge again, it knows that it can’t, and not just because I’m hiding where it can’t run me down. It attempts to back away, turning to the woods to flee. Conserving my energy I follow it through the jungle, its blood staining the dirt, the ferns, the rocks, all in its path.
The patient and slow hunter will always win over the quick and dead one. I have the luxury to be patient and slow here, and it has paid off.
Letting out one final mournful bray, I hear it collapse. I pick up the pace, eager, finding it at the base of a boulder.
With timely haste I move in to finish my hunt and get my feast. Approaching from behind its back, I grasp its head with one claw and support myself with the other as I tear out its throat by my teeth, swallowing my first taste of victory, simple as it was.
It is over.
One day, I will be big and strong like Mother, able to simply run down my prey. She would have ended it with her first pounce, although she would also have been seen or heard first; the price of strength.
For now, I tear into its side. This is the first true meal I’ve had here that I’ve been able to taste. The meat is lean, with little fat, and doesn’t have much gameyness to it. I crunch through its ribs, devouring all I come across. There is simply no way that I could eat all of this, even injured and metabolizing faster. This should be enough to heal me however. If I had my scythes I could drag it with me, but as it is, I am not yet strong enough to do so efficiently; I would be slowed too much.
It is after one particular crunch that another ailing makes itself clear. A throbbing ache pierces my jaw, and an attempted flex sees incisors drop to the carcass beneath me. Certainly a sign more of stress than physical trauma, for I certainly do not remember taking a hit to the head.
Not that I would remember, anyway. My violent gorging must have finished whatever job it was anyway.
I grin anyway and feel at what remains. My fore-teeth are as sharp and triangular as my head, with four fangs peeking above the rest: two in the front at the top, two in the bottom to match. These flank a similar pair of incisors both top and bottom, and yet another falls free when I flex my gums even more. The rest of them pull away, recessing for alternative forms of consumption where tearing is less necessary. Behind them sit lines of chewing blunts, nice and out of the way for any larger consumption but perfect for pulping and savoring.
The damaged teeth are no issue. They have done their job, and are merely one more consideration upon my long path to recovery.
For now I will just have to leverage the benefits of a prodigious throat and gape down larger chunks with a lesser, more humble taste... assuming a lack of savaging it otherwise first. To heal all the faster, downing food whole and struggling is an efficiency which I will need to make the best use of. After all: intact food takes longer to process, therefore being more nutritious, of course. Living flesh is the easiest of all to incorporate, often trading difficulty of acquisition for experience in triumph.
The only restriction is width, not height--and such things are interchangeable, anyway.
When I am done, a quarter of the elk is gone and I am overfull, left with a potbelly. Great appetites require great capacity, of course... so long as it is not disabling. I am unsure why I have seen no other animal with such form, but regardless, I trudge off--belly happy and sated with flesh, high on the pleasure of a good hunt, and pleased with my day in spite of all things.
Night is approaching, and despite having woken up a few hours prior to our attack half a day ago, the stresses and pains of whatever this all is are getting to me.
I find a nice sheltered divot in the terrain, and fall asleep.