Now that the Valle pups were old enough to have been moved from the birthing den to a few different meeting areas, Khalon was enjoying and exploiting this new freedom. Adults often left them for a few hours at a time which meant he was often able to sneak off without being caught. Not that he ever got far before getting tired and heading back, but it felt thrilling. In reality it was more than likely the adults knew about his short little jaunts and were letting him push the boundaries. To him he felt like some kind of genius mastermind.

The tawny child had been on one of these explorations when he heard a shriek of…fear? From a voice he didn’t recognize. The cousins had yet to be formally introduced but had seen each other from afar so when the child rounded the corner to see his dark cousin screaming he tilted his head curiously. The turtle had long since let go and retreated at all the noise going on, so Khalon was left to ask, ”what?” Why was this other boy yelling like that? He sat down, not aware the turtle was coming back for revenge, coming dangerously close to his tail.

Instead of giving the tawny boy an answer the other kid just started whimpering and wailing which was less than ideal. Khalon gave him a look that he hoped came across as what is your problem and wrinkled his nose. He didn’t like cry babies. There didn’t even really seem to be a reason to cry about and the child was about to leave when he heard a strange rustling behind him.

Khalon looked just in time to gasp and scramble out of the way of the snapping turtle that had snuck up behind him. It seemed huge to the cub who yelped and came to move beside Dacian. That seem to appease the creature a little, who clicked it’s mouth closed with a snap and regarded the children warily. Kahlon blinked back at it in surprise, ”You know it?” It was kind of cool looking now that he had put some space between them, all scaly and shiny and hard looking like it was made of rock or something.

The child had been so enthusiastically involved in looking the turtle over intently that he did not see the shove coming. Paws connected with his side and knocked him off balance, tumbling into the dirt with an oof as the wind was knocked out of him. In fact, he was so surprised that when he fell on the slight slope he rolled once or twice before coming to a stop. Directly in front of the now even angrier turtle.

The snapper reared back and lunged forward, its beak just barely skimming past Khalon’s ear as the Valle boy had enough smarts to duck. Scrambling on his belly out of the way of danger, his whole body trembled. First with fear at the near miss, then adrenaline, and then following closely behind that was anger like he had never felt before. It boiled deep in his belly and threatened to erupt and rip him open.

A long, low, growl built in his chest before he got to his paws with a scream of rage, sprinting towards Dacian. He wanted to knock him down, wanted to rub his face in the dirt. And if that didn’t make him grovel, he would feed him to the turtle.

The child was surprised to see his cousin not cowering in fear, but charging him back, effectively creating a game of puppy chicken. Not willing to be intimidated, Khalon let out another yell and ran faster towards Dacian, surely now he would back off. But, he didn’t. The turtle saw the two children focus their attention of each other and promptly lost interested, turning and lumbering off towards the nearest water source.

When they collided, Khalon reared onto his back legs in an attempt to shove Dacian down with his front paws. Unfortunately, this left him open to attack and he felt sharp teeth sink down into his right leg. Screaming in response, he ripped his leg away and felt the teeth slip down his fur, leaving behind quite the scrape.

Learning from his mistake, he launched forward not with his legs, rather he started trying to bite Dacian anywhere he could reach. His teeth flashed and clicked together as he attempted to alligator gnash on his cousin.