The lively and beautiful melodies proudly sung by Altaria in the summer had been muted to slower, more quiet tones as autumn set in over route 14. The plentiful waterfalls now threw up cold mists that were unpleasant, rather than refreshing, as they crashed down into the rivers below. A very faint fog was present that morning. So faint, in fact, that neither Cutlass nor Damascus bothered to take notice of it as they stalked through the lush plant life atop a remarkably high cliff.

 Quickly, but silently, they made their way through the deciduous trees, advancing toward the largest one on the cliff. This tree towered over the rest quite egregiously, so it was not at all difficult to locate. Watching the skies vigilantly had taught the siblings that a Tropius nest was in or near that tree, most likely at its roots, and that one particular inhabitant of that nest was very young. It was likely no more than a year old, judging by its size and inexperience. As such, it would make an easy target, granted its parents were out of the way.

 To ensure themselves this advantage, the pair of Dark-types had awoken remarkably early, as they'd previously observed that this was the time when the father left the nest to east. There was, however, the issue of the mother remaining in the nest to guard her fledgling. With the power of an entire pack, overtaking her by force wouldn't have been an issue. Unfortunately, the siblings no longer had that luxury. They would have to rely on strategy and their own wits, rather than the strength of large numbers, to hunt.

 They stopped moving the moment they could scent the fruit that grew under the base of the Tropius' jaws. The large beasts were not yet in sight, and therefore wouldn't be able to spot the Pawniard. Given the Grass-types had a much stronger scent than their hunters, and the fog dampened the already motionless air, it was highly unlikely they would catch the scent of their attackers before it was too late.

 Using only hand signals, Damascus explained to his younger sister exactly how they would go about doing this. He pointed first to himself, then up at a high angle, and proceeded to make a sweeping motion with his arm that started directly before him, and ended perpendicularly. This meant he would distract the mother and lead her away from the nest, in the same direction he moved his arm. Next, he pointed to her, then up at a much lower angle, and passed to sharp ens of his blade over his throat. This told her to kill the young Tropius as quickly and silently as possible. Finally, he pointed back to himself, then to her, and made a sweeping motion in the opposite direction of his previous one, punctuated with two stabs at the end. This meant they would carry their victim back to the hollow in the cliff they'd made their home, and they would have to place urgency on speed whilst doing so.

 Cutlass nodded to confirm her understanding of the plan, and held her position while Damascus left for the nest. Once the the large roots of the tree above-ground were within sight, he he took less care to remain quiet, and instead focused on moving faster. This strategy required him to catch the attention of the mother Tropius anyway, so it didn't matter how much noise he made.

 Damascus stepped out of the rustling tall grass to see very faint movement within the pitch-dark "cave" formed by the base of the partially-uprooted tree. He took this as a sign that the mother was now aware of his presence. He approached the nest as if he owned it, making no effort to hide himself, and quickly raised both blades, taking on a position that suggested he was about to strike.

 That was enough to get a violent reaction out of the adult reptile. She gave a piercing hiss and stomped one huge foot after another until she was out in the open before him, wings outstretched, tail lashing.

 From where Cutlass had stayed, she could see the head, neck, and body of the beast emerge from the nest, though the grass was too tall for her to catch sight of anything shorter, including her brother. She held her ground and waited until she saw the quadruped stomp off through the foliage, striking with her long neck at the object of her pursuit.

 Though the reptile clearly had her full attention on Damascus, Cutlass dared not move until the Tropius was nearly out of sight, lest the Flying-type should somehow notice her. Once she was sure it was safe, the Pawniard made haste toward the nest.

 Peering inside, Cutlass's pupils dilated extensively to make out the shape of the fledgling she was hunting. It was huddled at the very back of the nest, cowering. Though it was roughly twice her size, the youngling still panicked when it saw her. It thrashed about wildly and called for its mother with an obnoxious, grainy sort of noise that was typical of vocal reptiles.

 With some difficulty, the Pawniard managed to corner the Grass-type and topple it onto its back, putting its vulnerable underbelly within reach. She leaptforth and thrust both of her blades down into her prey's chest, making a lucky guess at where its heart was located. To follow this up and silence the young Tropius, she quickly and forcefully slit the base of its lengthy throat. Blood spurted from the open gash as the Pokemon gurgled helplessly, its struggling soon being mitigated to the occasional twitch of its limbs. She had to use a great deal of strength to haul the dying fledgling out into the open, where Damascus would be most able to give her quick and effective assistance in transporting it once he'd returned.

 Letting her eyes adjust once more to block out more light, Cutlass could see movement in the distance of the same direction her brother had led the mother Tropius away. The silhouette of the beast moved in a chaotic and ungraceful manner. Her neck whipped around in every direction, as if she'd lost sight of what threatened her. She stomped her feet and hissed furiously, loud enough that even Cutlass could hear at such a distance, with her helmet on.

 Out of the corner of her eye, cutlass caught sight of her brother's shining blue armor just before he burst forth from the grass, surprisingly from a completely different direction than where he'd diverted the mother Tropius to. The urgency in his ice blue eyes compensated for his wordlessness as he hoisted the hind end of the dead reptile up. Cutlass did the same with the front end, and the siblings began the hike back to their hollow, where they would skin and smoke their catch to preserve it for at least a few days.

XXXXX

 The Pawniard shared the task of preparing their food, as this usually required at least three Pawniard, and would take the rest of the day. Cutlass went a little further west, where the forest was the most lush, and the trees grew impossibly tall. There, she could search for herbs and berries to cook the Tropius with at her own leisure. The inhabitants of the forest there were incredibly weak. They had to need for strength or knowledge of battling or defense, as there was already far too much edible plant life to be eaten. There was no competition over the food supply, with so much of it to go around.

 This left Damascus with the tedious and uneventful job of turning the meat as it smoked on a stake set up over a controlled fire. This was just as well for him; he needed the rest after the hunt, not to mention the hike back to safety.

 He'd smoked his meals so many times since he was young that, by now, he didn't even have to give it a thought. Instead, his troubled mind went to his sister, as it often did when he had nothing else to occupy his thoughts. They relied on one another now more than ever, and were rarely apart. Though he normally hated being separated from her, lately, he'd been dreading having to be near her so much. 

Well, maybe it wasn't Cutlass that bothered him so much as it was himself. Yes, that was a better way to put it: He just didn't trust himself around her anymore.

 Summer was well over with, and already most of the trees and plant life in Route 14 were half-bare. He'd learned from his father—no, Rapier, he reminded himself—that this was roughly the time when mating season among their subspecies started, and would last until the harshest part of winter set in. Though Pawniard belonging to packs—with the exception of leaders' chosen heirs—did not have the required rank to be allowed to breed, all Pawniard still had the natural ability and drive to do so. As such, female Pawniard and Bisharp alike would go into heat during this time, provided they were of age.

 Cutlass had become of age just a few moons ago, in spring.

 Damascus stared disconnectedly at the crackling fire. He remembered the time a few years ago when he'd caught the scent of a Pawniard's heat. He'd been gathering firewood at the edge of what was supposed to become his territory when he came across it by chance.

 The smell was overpowering—not in an offensive way, but quite the opposite. It startled him even years later how enticed he'd been by it. He had taken as much of it unto his lungs as he could, breath after breath, having forgotten the task at hand entirely. Only in retrospect did he realize how hazy his mind had been, how much the scent aroused him. He only stopped and left when he'd caught himself poking out of his sheath.

 If that was how drastically the smell affected him at a distance, and coming from the female of an enemy pack, then how bad would it be coming from Cutlass? And on top of that, a female's first heat cycle was almost guaranteed to be the most potent!

 He swallowed nervously, turning the stake as his mouth went dry. You didn't have to be Cutlass's lifelong friend and family to tell that she acted on emotion more than reason. Anyone who was informed enough could tell that just by looking at her. Rapier's pack hadn't fought in a war since before he was even the leader of it, before any of its current members had even been born. The pack never had to defend the borders it had won in that war by using force, either. Only rarely would a Pawniard belonging to a pack be badly wounded by hunting even the most powerful of prey.

 Yet, because she was so quick to fight over the small things, she constantly had battle wounds ruining what he thought could have been a beautiful body otherwise.

 Knowing that much about her, Damascus could very well guess how she would act once she went into heat. Her urges would be even stronger than his, and she had no plausible way to relieve herself without a partner. She no longer belonged to a pack, nor the rules that governed one. There was nothing that really stopped her from mating, if she wanted to.

 That alone wasn't what bothered Damascus. She was old enough to make that choice for herself, and he knew full and well that he couldn't stop her if he wanted to. He'd already come to terms with the inevitable fact that she would never think of him that way, and that she would one day find another male to be her mate. He didn't mind as long as she was happy—or at least, he tried forcing himself to believe that.

 The problem was that she wouldn't be able to find someone else now.

 The siblings were the only two Pawniard withing half a moon's traveling distance, if not more. Unlike many other species, Pawniard and Bisharp scarcely mated outside of their own subspecies, and even then only if they belonged to humans. More than that, wild Pokemon NEVER mated within families, as the offspring this produced were often unfit to survive.

 The mating process wasn't always just a way to make babies, either. Among the more intelligent subspecies of Pokemon, such as the one Damascus belonged to, it was a very intimate commitment. Many Pokemon subspecies kept the same mates for life, and his was no exception. In many cases, mated Bisharp would even live together, and the packs they rules would be forged into one.

 He'd already tried so hard not to love her. He'd tried to see only her faults, only her shortcomings. She was stubborn. She was insolent, irrational, unreasonable, a slave to her own emotions, as he was. She was spiteful. She held a tremendous grudge. She was easily upsettable. She took more insult and less compliments than she was given. Her only outlet for the hate she held onto for being born an outcast was violence.

 Yet, for all her faults, he only loved her more. In all her weaknesses, there was strength. She was stubborn, but that only meant she pursued what she wanted without giving up, even when it was hopeless. She gave in to her emotions, but he admired her for doing that rather than trying to escape or deny them the way he did. She was easily insulted and quick to fight, but didn't that mean that she stood up for herself, rather than taking abuse? What kind of world did he live in, when he was expected to think any less of someone like her than he did?

 Even though he loved Cutlass more than she was likely to know, she was still his sister. He knew how wrong it was that he felt the way he did about her. He'd known it for years. Sometimes he even hated himself for it. More often that that, he was unsure what to think of it. Did it make any sense to berate himself so much over something he had no control over? Should he just be happy that she was a part of his life, and that they didn't bicker the way most siblings did? Or should he wish they hadn't been related at all, so he could be free to be captivated by her boldness, her vitality, her persistence, her mercilessness, her defiance?

 And then he would remind himself that it didn't matter what he thought of his own unwanted emotions. Regardless of what he thought of his love for her, or how innocent his affections toward her were intended to be, it was still wrong. Horribly wrong. Unthinkably wrong. Wrong, wrong, wrong...

 "Is the ground really pretty, or are you falling asleep?"

 Damascus jumped a little at the unexpected question, and his head shot up. Cutlass was hovering over his shoulder, and beside her lay a sizable pile of berries and herbs to flavor the Tropius with. How long had she been standing there?!!

 "Wha—I was just thinking again, that's—that's all," he stammered a little, averting his eyes from her, and turning the Tropius over again.

 "I think you think a little bit too much," she smirked knowingly. "So what was it this time?" She found a smooth part of the rock wall that formed the outside of their hollow to lean back against. She used her foot to scoot her helmet into the shelter. She crossed her legs and folded her arms with finality, awaiting his answer. He could tell she didn't want a lie this time.

 If there was ever anything close to a good time to tell her the truth, it would have to be now, before she pieced it together herself when mating season set in and he started acting differently around her. He didn't know how he would make her understand something he himself didn't, but he had to try. If she hated him, then so be it. She deserved to know.

 His mouth went dry again, and he took a deep breath before answering. He swallowed his self-loathing and forced himself to look at her.

 "You."

 She raised an eyebrow at him. "You're worrying about me again, huh?"

 "Well... that's part of it, yes," he allowed himself. "I mean... you could go into heat any day now, and I don't know what to do about it."

 She gave him a condescending smirk. "How about we let ME worry about that?" Normally, she would have been absolutely right. After all, it was her body, not his. But his was going to be affected, too.

 "That's not all of it, though," the shiny insisted. He took a brief moment to turn the Tropius again before continuing, trying to gather the right words. "Cutlass... You know I love you more than anything, right?" He searched her eyes, afraid of what he would find.

 "Of course," she nodded indifferently.

 "...A little more than I'm supposed to, even?"

 "What do you mean by that?" she inclined her head just so.

 He tried to swallow again, but had a very unfortunate lack of anything to swallow.

 "I wish I knew how to tell you this..." he started, painfully aware of how much his voice was shaking. Still he met her eyes, in spite of himself. "I guess a good way to put it is... I don't love you. I'm in love with you." He braced himself for her reaction as soon as he'd said it.

 There was a moment of tense silence. The air between them grew thick. Neither Pawniard moved, but their eyes remained locked for what felt like years. Damascus fought panic that began to rise within him, but for once, refused to look away from her.

 Finally, she tore her eyes away from his and shook her head. What was she supposed to say to that? What was she suppsed to think? It explained so much! It explained everything!

 "Damascus, I... You can't... That's so wrong...!"

 "I know it is," he conceded, "and I don't expect you to feel the same way about me. It's better that you don't." There was a poorly concealed wistfulness in his words that kept Cutlass from believing he really meant them. She suspected that this went back even farther than she'd guessed before.

 "I was never going to act on it," he tried to explain, halfheartedly fighting back tears. "Before we left the pack, I was never even going to tell you or anyone else. I was just going to try to be the best friend and brother I could be for you, because you deserve at least that much. But, now..." he trailed off, but she knew what he was hinting at.

 She would go into heat any day now, and there was no one within a reasonable distance to relieve her of it. She would stay in heat until the middle of winter, and meanwhile, it would bother him just as much as herself.

 "I just thought it was better that you found out this way instead," he mumbled solemnly. "I'm sorry that I lied to you for so long, Cutlass. You're all I ever had. I didn't want to lose you..." he stopped, becoming aware of how pathetic he must have sounded to her. He dragged his attention back to the Tropius. He turned it again, and wiped his other arm across his face, already sensing a gap forming between him and his sister. She always used to embrace him until the tears stopped, but she didn't this time. She probably never would again, knowing what she did now.

 With a heavy presence of words left unsaid and questions left unasked, the two Pawniard ate in uncomfortable silence.