Mudminnow River rock my world

At the river's edge, she poised.

Green eyes watched the dart of catfish beneath the surface as she crouched to drink, being careful to angle her shadow away from the water so as not to startle them. Her stomach growled - a pertinent reminder of her solitude. The lack of company did not bother Leifa, but the absence of her brothers and friends made hunting large game almost impossible. And so, she had resorted to fishing.

When one swam lazily too close to shore, she struck quickly, awkwardly - and missed. Spluttering and coughing to rid her throat of riverwater, the girl soon lost her footing on the slippery mud. Which way was up? She couldn't tell. In the confusion, her head sailed on a collision course for an ill-placed rock, movements almost in slow motion until her jaw met granite with a loud crack.

Her ears rang, vision blurred and swirled until all she could see was darkness.

"GYAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!"

The laughter roared throughout the entirety of the valley, it seemed. If there were any fish that woke up on the wrong side of the bed and stuck by Leifa's side even after her plunge they were long gone by now after the mockery that stained the poor tyke's now shattered pride. But, who could blame him? Watching a kiddo take a cold plunge into river water of all things was beyond entertaining! Such fine entertainment, in fact, that once the rumbles of joy rolled their way to a silent stop Cassian found himself still watching.

Brown, murky eyes that took into frame the younger wolf. A female, it seemed. One that failed at fishing, no less, and failed even worse at swimming their way out of it. Striding up to the edge of the bank of water, the wolf peered over. She wasn't making her way back up. Why was that? Raising a single paw closer to his maw, the wolf took in a deep breath, and then poured forth the strength that came with it into his next proclamation.

"HELLOOOOOOOO!? YOU GUNNA SWIM OUT? YOU CAN'T EXACTLY STAY THERE FOREVER."

Silence. Birds chirping. The rushing water doing watery things by still flowing.

Well, this wasn't good.

For a split second, he did contemplate saving her life or letting her die. Unfortunately, today he was a good, kind soul and dove in a few yards down after sprinting. Glimpses of her fur were caught, and then a rock. Oh, an awfully placed rock, at that, and when the crack was heard?

He cringed.

He cringed, because Cassian hated the frigid rushing waters! Upon entry, the wolf found sight of her up ahead by only a few meager yards. Aimlessly, but also narrowly, he escaped the rock that decked her.

"Hang on! I'm a comin'! Really, you should learn how to fish better, you chum munchin' buffoon!"

Chastising, which would get neither of them anywhere. The rushing waters did a bit of the legwork in closing the distance between them, though. Before long, the sun-kissed wolf clamped onto the scruff of her neck, hoisted her up, tossed her to the side onto some warm, unsuspecting grass, and then he clamped onto the side with his own paws. It was a bit of a struggle, but eventually Cassian climbed out, too!

"Hey. Hey, kid. You awake? Come onnnnn...don't burden me with having to drag your sorry corpse around. That rock got you good. Like, real good. I've seen buffalo that have clocked other pack animals with less force than how that sucker nailed you. If you die, I hope you know I'm not actually going to carry your corpse around. I'll just toss you back in the river, haha! Easy enough, you know? No hard feelings, of course!"

<3! slight warning for swearing

In her mind, Leifa was floating.

Her eyes flickered open to a blue haze. Bubbles rose around her, shimmering brilliantly in the spring sun as she sunk deeper and deeper...and deeper into the abyss. Colours began to fade from vibrant teal to a mud-dulled swampy green. Okay, gross. Where was she? Around her, shadows warped and stretched until they merged to form what looked like a giant catfish. Now things were getting weird. Was it here to torment her? To bring her to a watery grave?

Instead, the mouth of the beast cracked open and unleashed a torrent of sounds reminiscent of words. It was speaking. The fish was speaking to her. The girl's surprise quickly morphed into annoyance as it went on and on, the vibrations of its voice sending shockwaves of pain through her head that only got worse and worse until - 

"What...the fuck," Leifa came to on the grass she had been deposited on, taking a moment to survey her surroundings before her eyes came to rest on a wolf. "You talk a lot," she groaned. It felt like her jaw was on fire; she shakily raised a paw to wipe a stream of blood that had begun to drip from the corner of her mouth.

"Do I? I feel like I talk juuuuuust enough, haha! Ooo, that's some nasty blood you got going there from the corner of your mouth. Honestly, I'm impressed YOU can talk! The way that boulder tapped ya on the jaw? I figured it'd be broken! Ah, such are the whimsies of youth, huh? You can take just about anything when you're but a tyke! At least, that's what I've heard anyways. It's not like I remember those days!"

Gone were the memories of any days, really. For Cassian, there lay only the here and the now. Anything beyond the world simply appearing one day in that peaceful enclosure that life spat him out upon was wrought in nothing but the black abyss. Sometimes, the wolf's body reacted with the instinct of a beast that was not his own, but save from that it may as well have been that Cassian was no more insightful than this child before him. Except in a key few areas, of course.

"I saw you trying to fish earlier. Then, you decided to swim with the fishes, if you get what I'm saying! Dang near would have, too, if I hadn't gone on ahead and saved you! Now, don't get it twisted, I'm not exactly a good guy. I just felt like I owed you for making my day! Say, since you suck so much at fishing, why don't I go on ahead and teach you? That sound okay?"

Now, the wolf was lying down flat on the grass. Head tilted to the side, ears flopping down, and tail wagging at a staggeringly excited rate. The idea was vastly entertaining to one such as he, after all! Sharing experiences, making new memories, well...it was all Cassian viewed as valuable at the given moment. To make up for...lost time? Was that even the right selection of words?

"Oh! And the name's Cassian, if and you wanted to know! Even if you didn't, you sure do know now!"

A huff escaped Leifa's nose. Was this wolf so stupid that he couldn't take a hint? She sighed deeply, gathered her thoughts, and put her rational thinking cap on. It wasn't his fault she had tripped and it certainly wasn't his fault that a splitting headache had soured her mood. She managed a small smile and tried to listen as best she could to his rambling.

"It's not broken - I think. I mean, I can talk and all." Drawing her tongue across her muzzle to ensure everything was still intact revealed a sharp shard of...something? She quickly spat it out and gazed down at the grass where a half-broken tooth now lay bloodied and white against the green. "Well, that can't be good," she remarked, more to herself than to him as surprise coloured her expression.

Oh god, what had she done? A sudden wave of nausea overcame her. "Sorry, I think I'm gonna-" The girl didn't have time to finish her sentence before she heaved up the contents of her stomach into a sad puddle of riverwater and blood. "You, um, you can fish. If you like. I'll just...lay over here." Her stomach growled, but she could not fathom eating anything despite her hunger.  

Flopping on her side allowed her to gaze at Cassian without moving her head too much. "Thank you for saving me, Cassian, you're definitely a good guy to me. Sorry, I'm such a mess. I would love for you to teach me but, y'know, I think if I even smell anything fishy right now I'm gonna hurl again."

"I'm Leifa, by the way. Leifa Cairn."

Thank you so much for your patience, I've been ill as of late!

"Oh! Well, that's a bit of a shame! I think it would have been cool if you hadn't have been able to talk. We could have worked out a system, you know? You'd paw at the ground and I'd listen in and then we could've made magic happen! Maybe another time though, right? There's always next time!"

Cassian wore a shameless grin whilst he spoke. A part of him was overjoyed that she was okay, yes, but there was another part of him that reveled in the simple aspect of what could've been! Oh, there were just so many joyous wonders that this simple conversation could've stemmed off into! There was still some fun to it at the end of the day, though. The tyke spat something out and it immediately caught the sun-kissed wolf's attention. Tilting his head to the left, and then to the right, and to the left once more Cassian reached forward with his left paw to poke at the speckled tooth.

"Oof, that's a rough one, haha! I'd say you should keep it, buuuuuut you don't really need to! You've got the other half on you and that's memory enough, I think!"

Mere seconds later, she vomited. Nausea built up within Cassian and then a heave, a ho, and....

Well, now the man's breakfast was swimming in her puddle!

Following her suit, Cassian flopped onto his own side, gaze clashing with hers as he was given thanks. Why, if he could blush, he certainly would! When was the last time ANYBODY thanked him for anything? Thinking, thinking, thinking....

Never! This was his first accolade! Oh, what wondrous joy! A warmth unlike none other washed over the man's body!

"Awww, stop it! You're going to make me dig a hole into the ground and bury myself in it! Don't worry about the hole teaching thing, I'm not feeling too good myself, either. I'm blaming it on you, though, haha! Leifa....Ca.....Caaaaooooooorn......Corn! Leifa Corn! Woohoo! Okay, Leifa, you said anything fishy right now would make you hurl again so we'll skip the whole eating thing for now. What brings you out here? I mean, besides having a death wish. What you just did was really super duper awesome looking, but also pretty super duper dumb, too! Which is fine, you lived! Yay! Leifa lived! Leifa lived! Leifa lived!"

With each proclamation of her extended longevity, Cassian pawed eagerly at the air with a small "punching" motion. She was alive! Hooray!

feel better soon!

Slowly, she began to enjoy the quirks of his humour, offering a playful quip here and there as they discussed what could have been. She wholeheartedly disagreed with him there, arguing that she needed her voice for so many things! 

But, then there came the issue of the tooth. It was hard to imagine that something so small could cause this much pain, not to mention it had come from inside her. That's what really set her guts churning. Her lips curled as Cassian soon suffered the same fate. They were a pathetic pair, really - Leifa could not help but laugh until she quickly realised that laughing made it so much worse. "Would you.. would you help me give it a proper send-off?" she came to say eventually, sheepishly drawing the tooth closer to her body and away from the man's grabbing paws. It sounded silly, but it seemed fitting to give the fragment a proper, Viking-style funeral.

Her lips quirked in a smile at his apparent shyness and exaggerated celebrations. It was endearing in, a way. "You said it wrong, silly. Leifa Caaaiiiirn. Cairn." She spent a moment correcting his mistake before her brows knitted into a frown. "I didn't exactly plan to almost drown. Actually, I came back to see my parents, though it's proven to be a bit tricky to find them on my own. I usually have my brothers with me, y'know. And my friends."

"You want me to...send off a tooth?"

There was a moment of incredulous wonder. Was Cassian perhaps mocking Leifa? One certainly could've taken it that way, but the wolf's motives were not so twisted. No, instead, there was a sparkling array of wonder that shone presently with a profound radiance within the man's eyes. Send off a tooth?! He'd never done that before! Oh, that sounded like oh so much fun! What was the proper way to do it? She seemed educated on this kind of thing so Cassian was sure she'd be able to humor him with following whatever steps needed to be done!

"Haha, sure! I'd love to! You'll have to teach me, though!"

Cairn.

A bit of a quirk name, if anything else, but names were names and they weren't something that Cassian really had much of a say over when it came to poking fun at them. His last name was Nevuma! A bit of a tricky one to say. So much so that the wolf rarely ever gave it out! Cassian was a lot easier to toss out!

"Well, I would hope you didn't plan on drowning. You kind of sucked at it, GYAHAHAHAHA!"

Laughter rang true once more, warm and from the wolf's deepest corner of his stomach before dying down seconds later.

Parents. Brothers. What was that like? A festering, acidic pit began to broil from within the sun-kissed wolf, but unaware of exactly why Cassian opted to simply let it tide over. Maybe he was feeling nauseous again?

"Huh! Parents and brothers, yeah? What's that like? Oh, and why do you even want to find them in the first place? Your friends, too! Man, it seems like your circle is a big one, huh! Why don't we walk and talk a bit? Do we do anything special for the send off? Like, uh, do I have to rip out one of my own teeth, too? It might hurt, but I'll do it!"

"I mean- it sounds stupid," now she was really flustered, cheeks burning scarlet. The seconds seemed to drag on and Leifa was about to open her mouth and apologise for her ridiculous idea before Cassian - surprisingly - agreed. Her expression lit up, tail buffeting the ground. "Let's gather some supplies. I'll need a big leaf... maybe a chunk of food." Prodding her stomach with her paw, she was glad when the queasy feeling no longer returned. "And I hope you've also got some good lungs!" 

Placing the tooth on a flat rock nearby, the yearling rose clumsily to her feet as she got to work. "You're a real clump of nettles, aren't you," she retorted half-heartedly at his insult. He wasn't wrong - Leifa sucked at a lot of things, including drowning. But that didn't mean she wanted to be reminded of her ineptitude.

He asked of her family then and she paused for a moment. What was it like? "Annoying. I love them, but they're worse than you sometimes." As were all siblings, right? "We were looking for my brother, Nazair, but after a while we sorta went our own ways. I guess, I want to find my parents because I miss them. It's been a while." It was an unusual stab of vulnerability and one she quickly moved on from with a clear of her throat and a shake of her head at his offer to sacrifice his tooth in solidarity.

"You don't have to do anything, Cassian. Tell me more about yourself, though. What're your folks like?"

“Big leaf and food! Okay!”

She made a comment about having good lungs, but it didn’t quite click with Cassian. What did she mean by that? Was she going to go swimming again in order to send this thing off? If it was him…well, actually, maybe it was GOOD that it wasn’t him. Cassian would’ve just jumped right back in even after such a harrowing, near death experience! There wasn’t much that actually shook this man to his core. It was as if fear didn’t really exist within the sun-kissed wolf’s body, at least in the conventional way that it did for most others.

To be quite honest, Cassian wasn’t even sure why he bothered saving her in the first place. His body had simply taken over and the man’s mind went completely, utterly blank save for the sole objective of getting this child out of the gushing waters and out back onto the warm, firm ground she belonged on.

Their conversation continued while Cassian’s gaze lifted up to a tree. There, a branch lay. It was on its last hinges and there was also a squirrel on it, too. An oblivious, fat one without so much as a second thought going through its head. Taking a step back, Cassian ran headfirst to the tree's center and then…

THUMP

Down came the branch and before the pain could settle in Cassian’s maw snapped to the right, catching the squirrel mere seconds after it hit the ground and turning it from a loafer into lunch!

“A clump of nettles? What’s a nettle?”

He spoke with the squirrel in his mouth before setting it down, picking up the branch full of leaves, and then carrying both back in his maw. When he returned to Leifa’s side, Cassian plopped both things down onto the ground and listened to her words. Siblings were annoying, worse than him apparently. The horror! Nazair, what an odd name. Then, she asked about him.

“What you see with me is what you get! My folks, huh? I don’t really have any. None that I can remember, anyways, haha! Hey, here’s the branch and a dead, fat, plump squirrel ripe for the picking. Why don’t you go on ahead and eat and tell me if the leaves are big enough?”