[Stryx] Scavenging | Noctia 1: Chapter 1

The forest would be dead silent, were it not for the chirps and chitters of the cicadas. The two large stryx present had sent all of the woodland residents into hiding, fearful of becoming dinner. But the harpias were not out for hunting -- not yet at any rate, the night was still young. The duo were shuffling around awkwardly on the ground, flipping over rocks and sticking their heads into bushes, sending clouds of fireflies into the air.

 

Both birds were dark shadows among the trees, illuminated only by the intermittent light of the moon above as clouds drifted across it. The smell of rain hung in the air, a storm brewing in the distance, but yet to approach the tall woodlands. Distant thunder could be heard as the clouds lit up with hints of lightning. Noctia’s feathers shimmered dully in the pale, scattered moonlight as she dug through the undergrowth, searching for anything that could be of use. Her long tail trailed out along the dry ground behind her, her feathers ruffling with each searched brush that turned up nothing.

 

Salvatrixs was a little lighter in color, her pale head easier to spot as she ducked in and out of the shadows of thick trunks, flipping over rocks and scratching through the dirt, also attempting to locate anything of value or use within the ground. On occasion, she would take to the air briefly to change locations, her wings a flash of green, red, and white. Upon landing she would immediately continue digging through the dirt, pulling up plants and roots from the dusty ground, gathering up bugs as they scurried to safety, and nabbing shiny rocks and bits that she found.

 

The collected spoils were gathered into a bag placed between the two of them. Whenever one of them moved, the bag would go with them, and the other would follow shortly after. In this manner, they leap-frogged through the forest, sending prey scattering to the far corners of the woods. Their haul steadily increased, a growing pile of potentially useless junk. Noctia always hovered near it possessively, and was far quicker to follow Salvatrixs when she moved than Salvatrixs was to follow her.

 

One time, though, when the iridescent Harpia’s back was turned, her companion gave her a sly look before nabbing the bag and flying a fair ways off, sneakily stowing it out of sight in a bush. When Noctia turned back to deposit a small clawful of plant matter into it and found it was missing, she let out a spiteful screech, taking off after Salvatrixs. Every beat of her shimmering wings was fueled by irritation, and upon her landing she immediately set about questioning the lighter Harpia. What followed was quite a loud argument -- any creature that didn’t already know they were there definitely did now -- but throughout it all, Salvatrixs managed to retain amusement in regards to the situation.

 

Finally, when it seemed things would come to blows, Salvatrixs swifty pulled the bag from its hiding place, making soothing gestures with her wings until Noctia finally started to calm down, though she was still hissing angrily. Salvatrixs went back to digging through the ground, but Noctia remained ruffled and angry, shuffling her weight between her feet before she finally went back to searching through bushes, picking out berries and sticks and dropping them in the bag. She never took her gaze off of her companion, though, not about to let their previous incident happen again.

 

Once all was said and done, and the bag was filled up, however, there was the matter of splitting up the haul in a manner that didn’t end poorly. One might reason that each taking what they found would be reasonable, then the other would argue that it would instead be more worth having worked together for them to split everything down the middle -- otherwise, they may as well have just gathered on their own. Finally, they came to a reasonable conclusion, each taking a large portion -- but not all -- of what they had gathered, but ultimately splitting the total haul up between the two of them.

 

When the two parted ways, Noctia was more than a little ruffled, clutching her spoils so tightly in her claws that she threatened to ruin them as she put as much space between her and the other bird as possible, while Salvatrixs was a little more settled about the whole affair, clicking her beak and almost grinning to herself in satisfaction as she flew off the other direction with her portion of the night’s haul just as rain started to fall from the sky, the patter of water against foliage soon loud enough to drown out the sound of wingbeats as they grew more and more distant.