7 miles from the sun -- open!

[Paint]

and Mamma, I've been crying, 'cos things ain't how they used to be
she said the battle's almost won, and we're only 7 miles from the sun

They were running. The sun beat down on the forest, dappling light over the agile bodies as they sped through the undergrowth. Esmerelda and Oberon were hunting. The tawny female was faster, there was almost no doubt about that, but she wasn't as precise in her steps as Oberon was. The bronze male utter a gruff instruction and she pulled off to one side, pausing as he did and stopping to breathe.

"I'm not sure where they've gone, they were grazing here recently," Oberon whispered, gently easing himself over a fallen tree. Ahead the Sunlit Clearing was open in the beaming sunlight, and a herd of deer were feeding. A large stag was facing in their direction, ears swivelling to listen. They may have to wait a while.

"What happened to the others?" Esmerelda asked, green eyes turning back to search the forest behind them. They'd vaguely announced the idea of going for a hunt and they were sure that they would be joined by some other soon. They'd need more than two of them, even to pick off a young'un. These deer knew there were wolves around, but thanks to a distinct lack of loners they'd been lulled into a false sense of security in No Man's Land. Still, they would need more wolves to surround and divide the deer. Oberon hoped they would be quiet on their approach.

[[Midnight]]

Slick black nostrils flared as the scent of elk and wolves infected olfactory senses. The breeze was not too wild, but it was strong and consistent. The gold and mottled she-wolf instinctively kept her face against the breeze, knowing from common sense that the wind would blow her scent away from anything ahead. And she herself was already tracking the mingled smells caught with the wind. One scent she had learned by heart. It was the first smell she'd been familiarized with since the moment she was born. She was chasing it with puppish carelessness, her tongue lolling from her jaws.

When her emerald gaze caught sight of Oberon and Esmerelda, Akiko took to hiding in the underbrush. She observed them for a long while while they ran together, swerving in and out, left to right, pausing and then continuing. She was really itching to learn how to hunt, to make her first kill. She felt her confidence rising as she watched the adults and studied their movements. They seemed to be searching for prey. No, wait. Not only were they keeping to still now, but they were staring forward.

Akiko swept her gaze across the clearing, her eyes glistening intensely. It took her a while to spot it - the stag actually belnded in well with the dehydrated grasses and the backdrop of trees. She could almost have mistaken his antlers for tree branches. She'd never seen a stag before, and the antlers were far bigger than she'd expected. But his legs looked so thin, and his neck was so long and vulnerable. Her pulse quickened and her eyes about dialated at the idea of the animal being easy prey. She wanted to leap at the creature and go for the kill. Surely, however, the distance was too great and the large animal would spot her and bolt before she got close at all.

She really had no clue how to get closer without scaring it, but her mouth was salivating the longer she stared. Maybe she could skirt around the deer and scare it towards her mother. She had heard her mom was quite swift. She had to be, she had lived as a loner once and had to catch all her own food! Thinking of that made her want try harder. Trying to stay hidden, she kept low to the ground and began trailing a wide circle around the targeted prey. Her paws were rather heavy, though, and the grass was moving wildly behind her.