Moonspear ten thousand miles above the clouds

randomly, terance had some dumb song his sister used to sing stuck in his head. wraen had based it off of one of her mother's stories, and while she had a pretty voice, terance was not a fan of the song itself. in order to combat the obnoxious noise that rang in his ears, he chewed loudly on a bone. he'd just finished eating off of the leg of a deer from one of their caches, and was now gnawing away at the femur. it felt good against his teeth anyway, but the noise was louder than it needed to be.

he muttered something to himself in between bites, green eyes scanning the clearing before him in hopes of someone coming to talk his ear off-- even hydra would do-- anything the get this damn song off of his mind.

Mind if I nab a thread? Aries is in a slightly better mood without Hydra around lmao

It was the man. The one who had been there when he had bitten Hydra. As of right now, the ash pelted boy was undecided whether or not he liked the stranger. He had not spoken to the man specifically, he had simply been there before. Perhaps this wolf might be interesting to talk to - like Lyra. Maybe now that the darker girl, the one he didn't like (Hydra), was not here, he might be able to gain some sort of understanding about the man. Or perhaps he would be another boring soul who Aries cared naught for.

"Hu-llo." He said bluntly, watching from a few metres away. The Sigma was feeling alright today, despite the rules that had been enforced into his brain by his parents after the incident. Not that he would follow them all, anyhow. He had decided to allow respect to be given to the alphas, Charon and Amekzae (especially Amekaze as he prefered her out of the two), but not Hydra. He didn't like Hydra. But Lyra... he liked Lyra. She was nice!

terance's chewing eventually slowed as he noticed the dark child approaching. his head raised, tongue grazing his muzzle, and his green eyes narrowed. aries, he remembered, had been a bit of a problem child-- and terance had felt rather annoyed by him. but, today, he spoke, and offered a neutral stance that terance related to as the lowest rank in the pack-- not that the child was above him, or anything, rank just didn't really matter at this point.

"he speaks," terance expressed audibly, tail flicking, "what's up, aries?" his language relaxed, not feeling the urge to impress a child of the alphas or the alpha's himself. it was just a child-- one he could easily grab and take back to wherever he came from if agitation occured.

It was a rare sight, really, to see Aries in a mood such as this. No doubt, it would not last long. By tomorrow at the latest he'd be back to his normal self. He never spoke often, and when he did his sentences were short and lacked much interest. But, even so, he was talking, which was an improvement to their last encounter. The boy shrugged, glancing briefly to the ground at his side before looking up again. "Dunno." He stated, with a child-like flick of his tail. The Sigma might act silent and brooding, but he was still a child. Nothing more than a young soul who's life had barely begun.

"Got bored." He added, ears twitching atop his head. He was mildly curious about this wolf, whoever he might be. He did not show immediate signs of dominance, which was good. Aries liked that. He didn't like being forced to submit - especially to strangers. That, perhaps, was what had first sparked his hatred for Hydra.

he smiled a little, reminded of sarah. "bored?" he echoed with a wave of his tail, paws still gently holding on to the femur, "how can you be bored?" children were always bored-- he remembered. it wasn't until he'd annoyed the living crap out of his parents before osprey had begun to teach them how to tell their own stories-- weave their own tales. he and sarah and wraen used to bounce and play and make up the most ridiculous scenarios, but they were entertaining. he did it less now, as he'd grown out of his loud, bouncy, puppy body and into a stoic, respectable adult-- but he didn't forget.

with a small bit of hesitation, fearful that hydra would pop out and mock him, terance leaned forward, ears lowering. he had a secret, and aries would be the first to know. "have you seen the mountain dragons?" he whispered, brows furrowing.

Aries shrugged again, glancing back at Terence. How could he explain his boredom? He was just.... well, bored. That was all there was to it. He had wandered away from his family to try and find something to do - but also because he wanted to get away from them for a while again. His parents were still trying to get him to 'be nicer' to other wolves, and he really did not care. He did not want to.

The boy was certainly not expecting what came next. Mountain Dragons? Aries looked at him, half unbelieving, half startled. "What?" He questioned, blinking at the man. What on earth were Mountain Dragons?

"mountain dragons!" terance repeated, hiding his inner amusement. jesus christ, no, there was no such thing as a dragon. but osprey taught him a lot about wonder and mystery, and dragons seemed to offer that to a boy who bit the alpha's son in the leg. carefully, he nosed aries to turn around, avoiding the kids sharp milk teeth. "look," he whispered, his green eyes floating to a tiny green skink that wandered by. the mountain was covered in little lizards, roaming free. they did no harm, as far as terance was concerned, so he didn't mind telling aries they were here to destroy-wolf kind and he should be on a mission to destroy them first.

"that there is a mountain dragon. it's disguised itself as a cute and innocent creature-- but it's not," he paused, eyeing the kid to gauge his reaction (and interest) to this story. "there are hundreds of 'em, all over the mountain. one day they're all gonna shift into fire breathing beasts and destroy us all! we gotta get to them first." was that too deep? too dark? terance wasn't sure... maybe this was a story for older pups. whoops. "what do you say?"

Aries was not convinced at first, not until Terence told him to look. He did, and his eyes widened in shock as a tiny green creature wandered past. His head turned to the man, gaze holding more questions than he knew how to ask. Instead he said nothing, eyes sharply searching for the creature again. It had gone.

Terence spoke of them growing to be dangerous fire-breathing beasts that would destroy everyone, and Aries pinned his ears to the back of his head. Then his gaze narrowed, and he lashed his tail. "Kill." he said in eerie calmness, replying to the wolf's question. He must rid this land of the beasts! He couldn't allow them to destroy his family!

a little dark, terance thought, but fine. "good," he said with a wave of his tail. "now you have a mission, something to do." subtle terance, good job. he eyed the ground again, gaze searching for more of the harmless little creatures. there was one off to their right-- likely the same one-- and it's little tongue licked at it's pointed little snout. he eyes aries, curious if the boy noticed.

He had a mission, now. Aries nodded solemly, eyes staring into the distance where the creature had previously been. His gaze, however, soon fixated on the creature to his right. He stared hard at it for a moment (almost as if he was willing for it to die on the spot) before leaping over to it. He did not land on it, but as it darted away he chased after it. His size, in this case, was useful, as he could fit into little spaces as he ran.

He disappeared into the undergrowth for a while, and for a moment there was silence. Then he returned, with a blank expression and a skink in his jaws. He lowered his head and set it on the ground, then, without glancing at Terence, scanned the area for more.

now that aries had been distracted, terance moved on to continue his bone chewing. thankfully, he'd long forgotten about the damn song and was now merely watching the dark child at work. aries managed to catch one, kill it, and deposit it in what terance assumed would be a large pile, and then set out for more. he'd completely ignored him, and terance was fine and dandy with that. honestly, terance was the world's best babysitter. the redlead-disarinno boy made back to gnawing away, lapping at some of the marrow through an exposed opening in the bone. life was good without that damn song stuck on repeat in his head.

Aries lowered his muzzle to the ground, hoping to catch a whiff of the scent he had discovered when catching the first creature. However it was unneeded, as the boy saw a flicker of movement in the corner of his baby-blue eyes, and turned to face it. He momentarily glimpsed another one of the tiny beasts before jumping back into the undergrowth to chase it.

When he returned, the skink was dangling from his jaws, similar to the previous one. Except this time, it was not dead. Only when he approached Terence and his beginnings of a pile did he realise that the creature was still breathing, and he bit down hard. A barely audible crunch could be heard and Aries swiftly dropped the lifeless body of the skink on top of the other one, unfazed by the sound it had made as he killed it.

terance watched with half interest as the child brought back another skink. if this kept him entertained, he really didn't care what happened. he paid little attention to what was going on as he gnawed on his bone. the child was occupied, and that was all that mattered-- well, that and the fact that that song was no longer in his head.

content with his work, terance stood, picked up his bone, and decided to see if he could find lyra. it was a pretty damn good bone, maybe she'd be interested in sharing it with him. "later kid, keep up the good work," he told the child, and with a flick of his white-tipped tail, terance peaced out.