Otter Creek striking a pose, smiling in photos without any reason with people that ill never know

Eventually, sometime after he's dry and Zephyr has moved away, the nameless stranger, @Daighre, loses his grip on consciousness. Zephyr takes the opportunity to slip away for a quick hunt, satisfying his own hunger before he miraculously finds the rabbit he'd lost when he'd heard the man's fall into the water. He makes short work of it this time, and brings it back to where he'd left his grumpy stranger. Best to feed him if he wants him to be of any use. He wonders, as he approaches the golden lump with rabbit dangling from his jaws, how he'll explain this to @Phillip and @Rosalie (tags for reference).

He slept—or rather, fell unconscious—like the dead.
 
It wasn’t until she returned, a rabbit dangling between her jaws, did he finally start to stir. And even then, it was slow going.
 
He parted his eyes, his head still and unmoving from where it rested on his forelegs and caught sight of the flash of grey that was the girl. Fucking bitch, he thought, briefly, quietly and internally, his lip curling up in a sneer. He curled up smaller, then, tighter, around himself, hips briefly raising to bring his other leg under him. His tail pressed tighter around his body, and he let his eyes drift back shut.
 
Maybe if he ignored her, she would get the fucking hint and leave.

He drops the rabbit near his apparent new ward, settling on his haunches a few feet away to watch him. A few moments pass in silence before he speaks. Having second thoughts about our agreement? He asks, though his tone makes it clear that it's non-negotiable either way. At least from his point of view. He's even more confident now that he could beat this guy in a fight; hopefully the golden stranger knows it, too, and won't try to cause any trouble.

Even with his eyes pressed shut, Daighre knew she was watching him.
 
He could feel her eyes on him, watching him, studying him, from where she sat, mere feet away. Pretending to sleep—playing dead—wasn’t working. Not that he expected it to.
 
He opened his eyes and found hers.
 
A rabbit laid nearby, dead, and its body still warm.
 
He ignored it.
 
(Fucking psychopath probably did something to it.)
 
‘Having second thoughts about our agreement?’
 
He sneered, tilted his head back to look down at her from over the bridge of his muzzle, the corner of his upper lip raised and peeled back, rows of white teeth on display. His hackles bristled.
 
“No.” No, he wasn’t having second thoughts about their agreement. He already knew his answer. And that answer was, he wasn’t her fucking bitch, and like fuck would he let her boss him around. He wasn’t a fucking thing to own and play with. And if she didn’t understand that?
 
Well, she must have been more fucked up than he already thought.

He's not oblivious to the hatred radiating from the golden boy, but he chooses to ignore it. There's a twisted sort of logic to this, a method to the madness that may never truly be revealed. After all, Zephyr rarely knows his own mind, and this case is no different. A defense mechanism, perhaps; how could he be blamed for such atrocious acts if he isn't truly aware of what he's doing? How could he be called pathetic when even he doesn't really know that somewhere deep down, he hopes that eventually the hatred will morph into something else, something closer to the look in Kratos's pale eyes when he looked at him?
Why are you so angry? He asks abruptly, forcing the question out to halt his racing thoughts. As long as they're talking, he doesn't have to think about why he's doing this. And as long as he can avoid that, he's safe.

‘Why are you so angry?’
 
“Fuck you.” Daighre snarled, abruptly, the hair along his shoulders and neck standing on edge as he launched himself to his feet on stiff legs. He was sick and fed up with her fucking bullshit. He was sick and fed up with everyone’s fucking bullshit. First his fucking hag of a mother decided to run him out the pack while his dad did fuck all to defend him. Then he met countless psycho after psycho, from the red-haired bitch he met in the woods to the fat-ass he met in the mountains, and now, her.
 
The wolf that would sooner let him drown if he didn’t promise her his fucking soul.
 
And she wanted to know why he was so fucking angry?
 
He snarled and stepped forward, his hackles bristling, and his tail raised high in the air behind him, his ears pinned back against his head and his teeth on display.
 
“Fuck you.” He repeated, at a characteristic loss for words. “Fuck you and your fucking bullshit.”
 
“I almost fucking drown—” Not that he needed her fucking help. Not when he was quickly realizing that he should’ve just drowned rather than accepting her fucking help.
 
“And your crazy fucking ass, instead of fucking helping me, like any normal fucking person would, instead goes on and on about how I have to promise to do as you say and follow you wherever you go—”
 
What the fuck was he? Property?
 
“And you wanna ask why I’m so fucking angry?”
 
The fuse was lit. The match was struck. And Daighre was beyond ready for whatever happened next.

Except it isn't as easy to keep his own thoughts out of his head as he'd like, especially when the stranger bites back and Zephyr finds the words mirroring his own thoughts. Unexpectedly, it hurts. The pain leads his thoughts to Kratos, to the conversations they'd had on the road; about freedom and its meaning, its importance to his mate. How could he have forgotten?
But he didn't forget, and he knows that. He'd been a victim himself, he'd experienced the helplessness and hopelessness of captivity. He knows what it is to have his decisions taken from him, his life bound in chains. It feels like having your skin peeled away bit by agonizing bit, like being crushed in a vice until all that's left of you is a battered husk. And here he is, doing it to someone else. The image in his mind, Kratos's loving golden gaze, twists into disgust and hatred — a mirror of the golden stranger. He stands abruptly, a delayed response to the aggression yet lacking any defensiveness.
You're right. This is fucked up, He says, voice low and rough with emotion. I'm sorry. I shouldn't have done this to you — or anyone. I just — His voice breaks, and then comes faster, emotion rising until he's bordering hysteria. I wanted someone to hurt the way I have, and then you were there, and beautiful, and I wanted you to like me and I hated it. I still hate it — maybe I am fucking crazy. I don't know. Is that what happens when the world fucks someone up too much?
He swallows hard, stepping back, and then the tears come. Fucking tears. Do whatever you want. I'm not going to try to force you to do anything, Pathetic, he thinks, and the thought is a cold knife through his chest. He always has been. His next words lack the edge of hysteria, tone turning colder, harder despite the fact that he's crying in front of this stranger whose pity he doesn't want or deserve. It's so — fucking stupid, I wanted you to like me — and instead I did this. You should just kill me — that's what I did. I killed them all, and then I became them.

“Whatever.” Daighre huffed. “Don’t fucking follow me.”
 
And as he turned to walk away, under his breath but pointed, barbed, and armed—
 
“Fucking psychopath.”