The deeper the darkness becomes, the sharper Omega's very blood feels in his veins, all his senses focused and every nerve alert to the falling night.

This is his favorite time. Past twilight, when the shadows streak with moonlight or even when the clouds plunge the world into a dark so thick you could reach out and touch it. Their eyes are clear, and the scent of night is different from the day, and cooler. Omega shivers. It's been so long since the last time he went running across a landscape that couldn't stop him -- perhaps even longer since he hunted--

Which is too bad for a certain deer with spectacularly awful timing.

Blue may have lost a bit of steam over the last month, but the two of them are never out of sync in pursuit of prey. Their prehistoric blood takes over, and although the trees force them to weave back and forth, the deer also has to bound this way and that to avoid them, a difficult challenge made worse by the two hybrids flanking it and closing fast.

All it takes is a single break in the trees to the left. Omega leaps between them with a snarl and catches the deer by the neck mid-spring, and the two of them crash into the underbrush, hooves flailing.