Seganku

SEGANKU
Other colloquial name(s): poison devil, stinkbeast
Genus & species: Mephitis cacodorous
Meaning of: Bad smelling, VERY bad smelling
Ancestral creature: Striped skunk Mephitis mephitis

A highly unusual ambush predator which evolved from the striped skunk. In overall it is badger-like in size and shape, larger and with stronger jaws than the ancestral animal, reflecting a more carnivorous diet. The most striking differences are that the tail has been reduced to a bob and the coat is a patchy camouflage of reds, yellows, browns and creams that shed out to grays, white and buff in the winter. Without the black-and-white stripes and fluffy tail of its ancestor, the seganku hardly resembles a skunk at all . . . Until one gets a whiff of its musky secret weapon.

During the arduous era of mass extinctions, the hungry proto-seganku developed the habit of turning on the animals they had blinded with squirts of bad-smelling secretions and devouring them. Now this has become the creature's main hunting technique.

A single seganku will lurk in the underbrush near a trail, watering hole, or some other area where prey is bound to pass by. Its scent does not give it away, as it is normally faint and almost floral in small concentrations (recall that musk is the base for perfume!). When a victim approaches, the seganku hits it with a deadly accurate noxious spray, usually right in the eyes. It then leaps out to dispatch the incapacitated prey.

A seganku is capable of killing quite large animals with this technique, and eat the carrion over several days at its leisure as even scavengers have trouble bringing themselves to go near prey killed by a seganku.