As mentioned before there are few rules in the wasteland, but one of them is "beware of meerkats", this is true especially when traveling through the tall grass areas. Stories are told of entire caravans vanishing without a trace after venturing through these areas and foolishly deciding to take a shortcut by cuttign through a stretch of grassland.

These once timid people who would scurry at the first sign of danger have been changed into something quite the opposite, some even show mutations such as longer fangs and claws, more hunched posture and a few show more extreme mutations hardly even resembling a meerkat anymore.

In general meerkats have become feral minded and bloodthirsty, attacking the larger people who venture into their territory from ambush using the tall grass as cover, or burrowing underground and dragging their victims down into their tunnels likely to never be seen again. though groups that do survive an attack unscathed find many of their small possessions and trinkets missing for it seems that as much as the meerkats love food, they like shiny things just a slight bit more. The reasons why are up to debate, perhaps just because shiny things appeal to their simple minds. Another theory is that the males offer these shiny trinkets to the few females within their colony to gein their favor.

Few observations have been made of the meerkats, but what little information there is seems to suggest that these groups of meerkats which typically seems to be around 20 to 40 individuals, are aparently led by at least one female. Some claim they have seen a lone female watching a battle from a distance away, sometimes in silence and unmoving, other times calling out and making gestures of unknown meaning. it's thought that the female are actually commanding the battle and giving orders, which seems plausible as they have been observed to show a higher intelligence than the males and as far as is known they do not show much if any signs of mutation, plus they seem to wear more adornments and are the only ones ever seen holding any kind of tool aside from weapons.

Now not all meerkats are the same, there are perfectly healthy and sane ones but they are only found within the city and those hardly ever leave the safety of the walls for fear of turning feral themselves. There are accounts of some that did come in contact with their feral cousins and survived but if found out those individuals are either not allowed back in or exiled from the city for the safety of the public. What is of note though is that these meerkats, and even some males of other species whom survived, tell tales of them being dragged down into the burrows and left alone before one or more females. Though it appears that whatever happened down there...let's just say there are a lot of tall tales going round which are probably false anyway...

Artwork by  Foxena
Characters/setting belong to me  Chakat_Blackwater