Den

Pairing: Tsume/Toboe
Archive: Just ask.
Disclaimer: I can wish all I want, as often as I want. That still don’t make it official. In other words: Not Mine!

To Hige, it was just another day. He was cold, he was tired, but mostly he was hungry. On a regular day, any combination of these would leave him with a slightly less than average tolerance. Tonight, he was down right snappish.

Kiba was laying off to the side, head resting contentedly in Cheza’s lap. Hige was sure he was already asleep, and if not, he was on his way there. It wasn’t as if it were hard anyway. Not with the way Cheza could lull them. Still, there were far too many things wrong for Hige to admit it was time to bed down.

Sighing, he looked around again. Hoping to perhaps find a stray bird, maybe a gopher.

Nothing.

Tsume wasn’t all that far away, sitting and staring out over the dark horizon. Hige would give his left ear to be able to even sort of understand that one. He was always so quiet and reserved. As if calculating the exact moment for the ideal opportunity, and well…Hige really didn’t want to know what it was.

It wasn’t that he was afraid, just vaguely uneasy. Kiba ignored Tsume’s attitude, and he did his best to mimic that, with unfortunately half the confidence and even less of the stamina. Speaking of stamina…

“Toboe…What are you doing?”

The pup looked up from a half-dug hole, dusty and preoccupied.

“I’m just…you know…”

He promptly returned to digging.

Glancing sideways, Hige could tell that Tsume was paying attention. He was always paying attention where the pup was concerned. The gray wolf’s head cocking to one side just so.

Hige sighed. Well…at least it was entertainment. After hunger and exhaustion, boredom pretty much rounded out his days lately. He stretched and got up, padding over to the hole.

“No, I don’t know. What are you doing?”

“I’m digging,” grunted Toboe, not bothering to pause between swipes to answer.

“I can see that,” Hige drawled, leaning forward. “Why are you digging?”

Toboe paused, taking a moment to process the question, before shrugging.

“You don’t know?”

The pup went back to digging,

“Well, that’s always a good excuse to do something, I guess…”

After a while – who knows when or for what reason – Hige found himself helping Toboe dig. He wasn’t sure what they were digging, but he could feel the contours take shape. Deep inside, he knew just when to stop and how sharp a curve, and where an angle was needed.

Tsume had made his way over in the same amount of time, he supposed, because now he was sitting at the edge – which was really more of an opening – and staring down at them. Watching their progress and neither commenting, nor offering to explain.

After a while, the project felt comfy, and Hige followed Toboe around it, stepping the loosened dirt into nice, soft underfoot. Toboe made a few trips back and forth across from the hole, and past some bushes. Soon there was a nice, comfortable place to stretch out and feel safe in.

Naturally, Hige took advantage of the feeling, hoping to perhaps get some sleep, if anything. He felt as if he’d accomplished something, and his soul felt appeased. A strange feeling, to be sure, but he wasn’t about to question it, given the relaxation seeping through his limbs.

Getting comfortable, he closed his eyes.


Through the haze, he could make out soft sounds. Some rustling of leaves, and the shifting of dirt. But there were other sounds too. Sounds he was somehow familiar with, even if he couldn’t place them. Something akin to a whimper, long and drawn out. Toboe’s voice, stretching, straining, and angled. Little sounds that made something odd stir in Hige’s belly. Nothing he needed to wake for, but interesting all the same.

He caught random scents, familiar, recycled, and new. There was a sort of homogeneous quality to them. A fluidity that he’d rarely encountered. As if he’d be able to decipher each transpierced bit if given enough time.

Through his closed lids, shadows cast. Still nothing alarming, but interesting enough to open them for, surely. Instead, he stayed in his half awake state. Drinking in a half-witnessed experience, committing to lost memory some half-composed tale.

A lower, gruffer voice rumbled under Toboe’s heightening pitch. Whimpers that weren’t from pain, and whines that begged for something more than pity. Attention maybe, but a different kind than Hige was used to addressing. The deeper sounds weren’t the pup. The answers supplied by someone else.

Hige had a moment of clarity before drifting again. Someone had to be explaining something. And if it wasn’t him, and Kiba hadn’t moved, than it was fairly obvious who was instructing. If that was in fact what was occurring. Hige couldn’t be sure.

He knew as he drifted deeper that this newfound peace of mind from Toboe’s restlessness was a gift. He knew that the pup’s precocity was something they were all adapting to readily enough. That of all of them, Toboe had the most to gain. But, sometimes, it seemed he had the most to give. If just from the wellspring of innocence harbored in the kid.

“Have to make it-Oh…”

“It’s fine.”

“Deeper…”

Taking Toboe under their wings – so to speak – Hige figured they could do him the favor of having all the bad experiences first. When they’d first met him, he could barely feed himself. Yet after spending only a few days with them, Toboe proved to be a quick study.

Observant, if not often clever. He accomplished most of his tasks by mimicking them. Hige didn’t share his feeling with the others, but it honestly gave magnificent ego boosts, just being around him. Toboe could do that to anyone. Make them feel special. Like Cheza, with less directness.

“Couldn’t…help it…”

“Shh…”

Hige rather looked forward to the feeling.

“Had to…just had to…Mmm…”

“Hold still.”

And couldn’t find it in himself to feel the guilt over that.

“Like-like…”

“Toboe.”

“Ohhh!”

Toboe was still just a kid after all.

His ears twitched at the howls, but he only sagged deeper into the Toboe made bedding, and sighed.


Stretching always felt wonderful first thing in the morning, and Hige couldn’t help but exhale animatedly. He felt wonderful! Best sleep he’d gotten in weeks.

Blinking, he smiled up at Cheza, who was perched by the entrance of the hole. She smiled back brightly.

“Morning.”

Hige scratched at his ear and hopped out into the open.

“Morning. Wow, I feel great!”

Kiba joined them, sitting beside Cheza and getting a pat to the head for it.

“Sleep well?” he commented.

“Very well. Hey, Toboe!”

Toboe stopped, turning to look at him.

Hige, whom was about to compliment him, couldn’t help but notice he looked completely exhausted, and promptly forgot all the kind words buzzing on his tongue. “Should have stopped digging when I did,” he said. “Hole was a good idea, but you shouldn’t waste more time digging it than using it.”

Toboe flushed, and he mumbled an amazingly complex, “Yea…” before passing him, with a wide berth.

“Geez…” He padded over to Kiba, whom was inspecting the hole without moving. “Kid gets a bright idea, but-”

“It’s not a hole.”

“Hmm?”

“It’s a den, not a hole.”

“A what now?”

“And he did use it.”

Hige watched Kiba leave, wondering over a few foggy memories of the night. His stomach gave a loud growl and he rubbed at it with a laugh. Yea...breakfast would be nice about now.