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It was all Ellie’s fault.
Diego loved the mammoth like a sister, but as he panted while the horned-face deer he’d been chasing pranced smugly around him, he gave serious reconsideration to his current situation.
This was not sustainable.
It wasn’t just about his failure today (his species wasn’t built for the long chase, okay? It was get in fast, pin the prey down, bite – and supper was served), though it certainly didn’t help matters.
Sure, being the lone carnivore living with a herd of herbivores had its fair share of challenges, but it had been easy enough while they traveled for Diego to slip off and hunt whenever he needed to.
But then Ellie got pregnant and she and Manny decided to ‘settle down’ – as much as two mammoths with matching appetites could be said to settle down in one spot – and suddenly she was all Diego, you can’t eat the neighbours; Diego, you can’t hunt in the neighbourhood; and Diego, Mrs. Anteater said Johnny saw you cache food by the school and it gave him nightmares.
All of which meant he was having to range further and further away for food, sometimes staying away for up to days at a time.
Diego knew the guys didn’t like it; that they saw it as him deliberately distancing himself instead of, you know, having to put in actual effort to feed himself.
After all, it wasn’t like he could just walk around eating whatever was growing out of the ground.
And the balancing act he’d been trying to pull between not staying away too long and not going feral from hunger was getting harder and harder to pull off.
It hadn’t gotten dangerous – yet; he figured he was safe as long as Sid didn’t start looking edible – but Ellie was due any day now, and Diego really didn’t want to risk, well, anything.
He thought he’d gotten lucky today; a traveling herd of elk had passed by practically on their doorstep, with one young buck too stupid or arrogant to stay with the herd.
But as he watched said buck scamper victoriously off, Diego was finally forced to face an unwelcome truth: he had to leave.
Dreading the conversation he turned towards home with a sigh; maybe he could hunt a couple not-really-neighbours along the way, at least enough to take the edge off.
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