Title: Not Cute
Universe: Wolf's Rain
Theme/Topic: Cute
Rating: PG
Character/Pairing/s: Tsume, Toboe
Warnings/Spoilers: None I can imagine. TONS of OOC.
Word Count: 1,435
Summary: You give an inch, and they take a mile.
Dedication: tokkichan's request.
A/N: Haha another challenging request, but I feel like I haven't written these guys in forever and ever, so it's worth a shot. If it sucks horribly I can also use that as my excuse. XD
Disclaimer: Not mine, though I wish constantly.
Distribution: Just lemme know.

---

He awoke to the smell of fish guts, pond water, and musty fur, a tongue particularly fish-scented lapping excitedly at his face. "Tsume! Tsume! There's fish! Wake up!" Toboe barked, as if the fact wasn't already obvious from his breath all over Tsume's face.

The older wolf simply blinked blearily and made a face as he woke, snarling on instinct and pulling away from the cold, wet nose rubbing insistently against his cheek.

Toboe looked back at him with a big smile when he saw Tsume was awake, scales and fish bones stuck in the pup's whiskers. Decidedly not cute.

"You stink," Tsume grunted, and sat up slowly, stretching inch by inch.

The pup pouted at that, which made Tsume smirk by rote—maybe that was a little bit cuter.

"It's just fish," Toboe huffed, and licked his chops self-consciously. "There's lots, but if you don't hurry Hige's gonna try and eat them all!"

Tsume snorted. "He's a fatass, but I doubt he could eat a whole lake's worth of fish on his own," he drawled, reluctant to leave his patch in the sun for the time being. It had been so quiet just now, with the other three off hunting. Peaceful. And he'd been warm and content and having good dreams, which, when he thought about it some, had probably the runt's cue to come up and shove a muzzle full of fish guts right into the older wolf's face in the first place. Toboe could never leave well enough alone, after all.

"Even still, c'mon! Just come with me already, will ya? It's good, I promise!" Toboe whined, nudging Tsume's shoulder with his nose. Again, not cute. "And we can have a swim, and then go hunt rabbits later and play tag and…"

Tsume groaned and wondered when the idiot had gotten so bold as to come up to the grey wolf and just shove and prod and poke him as he very well pleased. Once again, not very cute. And when a pup stopped being cute, he also stopped being a pup, which meant there was soon going to be (or should be, anyway) a whole lot less the idiot could get away with when it came to shoving and prodding and poking Tsume. Truth be told, a large part of Tsume wouldn't mind wrestling Toboe to the ground and pinning him by the throat one of these days. Would do the kid good to learn some humility.

But as appealing as the image was, he wasn't really in the mood and so he flomped back down onto the grass instead, ignoring Toboe's whimpered protests about the fish and the lake and bunnies. Tsume sighed and closed his eyes again while the kid whined in his ear; the older wolf unable to help but wonder exactly what sort of sign it was he'd given (however inadvertently) to the brat that Toboe thought it was okay to act this way around the older wolf. Really…letting the brat bunk next to him once had clearly been a mistake. But to be fair, he hadn't known that this was how it was going to turn out, and at the time the kid had been in 'cute' territory so Tsume hadn't thought it would pose a problem. Oh, if only he'd known. Tsume knew he ought to give the kid a sharp nip right on the nose to dissolve those illusions and get the idiot to back off and learn his boundaries again—to respect his elders and leave them be when they wanted to be left alone, for example— but truth be told, it wasn't in Tsume to care very much at this point, given that Toboe had already proved himself (time and time again) entirely too stupid to stay back, even when severely warned with a low growl or a smack to the head.

Hige laughed and said it was because the kid was persistent.

Tsume was rather of the opinion that it was because the kid had a death wish. Why he never actually killed him, he'd never know.

Though right now, Tsume had to admit the brat was trying his patience.

He twitched as teeth nipped at his ear, very clearly pulling. Yet another action that Tsume was going to tally into the 'not cute' category of the younger wolf's behavior. "Tsume, aren't you hungry?" Toboe urged, and danced around the other wolf's larger form impatiently. Tsume growled low in his throat and cracked a single eye open.

"You just want to play in the water, don't you?" he muttered, long-suffering.

Toboe's tail wagged a little. "It's really nice!"

Tsume surprised himself a little when he didn't snap at the kid and head butt him away like he should have (boundaries, after all), but sighed instead, and rolled a bit onto his side, looking up at the kid blearily. "Maybe later."

Toboe's answering smile was almost brighter than the sunlight from up above. Maybe Tsume could admit it was swinging back into something kind of cute. "Really?" the pup breathed in elation, and crouched down lower on his front legs so he could look Tsume properly in the eye. His tail was wagging faster now, and his breath was tickling the fur on Tsume's cheek. "Really, really?"

And right back to not cute again.

Tsume grunted and let his eye slide shut. "I already said so, didn't I? Now shut up and lemme finish napping," he rumbled, low in his throat.

"Oh! Sorry!" Toboe responded hastily, and sat back on his haunches, tail brushing the ground a few more times before he calmed enough to stop it.

Silence.

But then, Tsume realized he could still smell fish guts.

He growled, warningly.

Toboe just sat there—completely clueless. Either that or completely unafraid.

Either option was not cute. Not cute at all.

After another few minutes, Tsume cracked his eye back open and glared. Toboe beamed back at him (his tail also started wagging some more), and the grey wolf couldn't help but wonder—a bit dumbly—when exactly, he'd become so completely unthreatening that the stupid idiot could sit there grinning at him like that while he was growling in warning. Once again, not cute.

"Are you just gonna sit there like an idiot the whole time?" he muttered, and tried to give the kid a push in the right direction. I big old blaring hint, so to speak.

Toboe blinked. "Um… oh! Oh!" he started hastily after a moment, and looked sheepish. "Sorry, Tsume!"

That was more like it. Kid was slow, but at least he wasn't completely oblivious. Most of the time.

Tsume closed his eyes again, and sighed.

A sigh that promptly turned into a surprised "oof!" when an oversized fuzz-ball suddenly flumped down—right on top of him.

His eyes bugged. "What the hell?!" he snarled, and tipped sideways, dislodging Toboe's weight from off of his back quickly.

The younger wolf laughed and rolled off to the side, still much—much— too close to Tsume's body for the older wolf's comfort. Not cute at all. He growled, which was ignored when Toboe yawned and stretched, burying his nose into the long fur under the gray wolf's jaw and making himself right at home. "Night, Tsume! Wake me up when you're hungry, 'kay?"

Tsume stared down at him, disbelieving. Did he just…was he… the older wolf blinked.

Toboe cuddled closer, looking absolutely, perfectly, unquestionably content with the world and everything in it, at least for the moment.

Tsume watched him—still dumbfounded— and couldn't decide if it was cute or not. Perhaps even more unsettling was the fact that he couldn't pick between the two, because under normal circumstances he definitely, definitely should have. Under normal circumstances he probably would have ripped open the kid's jugular too.

At least he could tell that that part was definitely not cute. At all.

He glared down at the smiling-content muzzle buried in his fur.

Toboe sighed—cutely.

Tsume clenched his teeth and averted his eyes. Inched away.

Toboe just snuggled close again, made a content noise in the back of his throat.

Tsume's shoulder slumped. Cute. Definitely cute this time. Frustratingly so, even.

The older wolf sighed in resignation and laid his head down between his forelegs, supposing to himself that he could always rip open the kid's jugular later— after half a dozen or so trout and maybe a nice bath.

Either that or he could take out his annoyance on the innocent bunny rabbits. Apparently there were a couple of those around here as well.

Or so he'd heard.

END