But Raidou wasn't a dog.

He woke instantly when a heavy weight crushed down on his shoulders and pinned his wrists to the floor. Sharp fangs pricked a double row of needle-points around his throat. Hot breath washed over his scar. It smelled like meat.

His eyes flared open and met the pale gaze of a demon.

He couldn't breathe.

As options went, panic seemed sensible.

Raidou gasped, forcing out a throttled choking sound, and tried to arch up. The demon was too heavy; he couldn't move. He twisted, thrashed, and wrenched sideways, trying to free an arm. The demon simply moved with him, teeth tight against his throat.

Raidou kicked up and hit nothing.

Its mouth was on his scar. A tongue like a slab of beef laved across his throat.

It was going to eat him.

He clawed at his chakra, ripping at the flaring coil of energy that slunk under his skin, and almost shredded it when his hands couldn't meet to make seals. Pain made his eyes water.

He couldn't breathe.

Kuromaru growled deep in his chest, filled with annoyance. He tightened his grip on the man's throat, cutting off air. Instinct told him to bite down; intelligence told him this was a pack member.

Tsume woke and rolled to her feet, grabbing a kunai from her holster and blinking sleep from her eyes. She took in the situation with one broad, sweeping glance. It made no sense. Her familiar was attacking her teammate. Except he wasn't; there was no scent of anger, no sinuous shifting of muscles that spoke of a fight. Just a hold, and the man scrabbling underneath.

The smell of fear clogged the room. She glanced at the cubs, still unconscious but starting to look more asleep than dead.

"Raidou! Kuromaru! Knock it off!" she snarled, hanging back. She didn't want to get in the middle and end up dog bitten or jutsu'd, but if she had to she knew a few dirty tricks.

Fighting animals hated water, for one, and there was a well under this bunker. Raidou would have a lot more drying to do.

If Raidou had had the air--or the focus--to speak, he would've protested being yelled at first. But he was far too busy trying not to asphyxiate. The jaws around his throat tightened. Breath went away.

He choked, mouth dropping open and eyes flying wide. Blood hammered in his ears. Panic exploded in his chest.

Under the demon's claws, his bloodless fingers clenched into numb fists. He threw himself up, using the muscles of his abdomen to try and break the monster's grip, and did nothing but make himself dizzy. It was too heavy. Its grip was too strong. He couldn't break it.

Its teeth were sinking into his scar.

Raidou saw red. Then he saw black.

As he finally stopped fighting, Kuromaru lessened his grip.

The flea-bite gasped and started to struggle again. With a growl, Kuromaru tightened his jaw. The struggling increased for a moment before once more Raidou weakened. Eventually, Kuromaru figured the human would smarten up and learn.

That was when Tsume bodyslammed them both.

"You stupid halfbreeds!" she snarled in a whisper, driving into them hard enough to knock them away from the sleeping children. "What is the matter with you?"

Kuromaru yanked his head away from Raidou's throat, twisting onto his feet. Tsume had already rolled and come up, half feral with her teeth bared and her hair in her face. Kuromaru growled at her. She growled back.

Raidou mostly gasped for a second. Then his body, aware his brain had gone on a panic-vacation, took charge. He rolled away and twisted up onto his feet. One hand clamped over his neck, shielding the scarred side, the other dove for his belt and pulled out two kunai.

His hand blurred, metal sang through the air.

And he saw Kuromaru.

Raidou gasped and jerked his wrist at the last second. The blades sheared through the air and landed point first between the toes of Kuromaru's front paws. They stood and quivered.

Raidou slammed back until his spine was against the wall, then he dropped low and crouched, ducking his chin to protect his throat. With his knees up and his elbows in, there was nothing that could touch him without crossing his vision first.

He sucked in a ragged breath and tried to think.

His scar rippled with ant-bite pain.

Kuromaru had bitten it.

Kuromaru wasn't a demon.

Raidou shuddered anyway, and dragged his gaze to Tsume. His voice stumbled out like a broken-winged crow's. "What--the--hell?"

Tsume glanced between the man and the canine, and shrugged. "I woke up and you were fighting."

"He had a nightmare," Kuromaru growled, pulling his foot away from the weapon with greatly offended dignity. "I was worried he'd wake up fighting, and the cubs were lying right there." He plopped his butt on the ground and lifted his paw, examining it closely.

Tsume straightened, grabbing the blade out of the floor with barely concealed anger. Her blood sizzled, wanting a release more than ever now.

When they got back. She'd deal with it all when they got back.

"Are you both done, then?" she growled, low in her throat, standing between man and beast and glaring at both by turn.

Raidou stared at her, then Kuromaru, and very carefully slid to his feet. His hand stayed clamped over his throat. "Your dog bit me because I had a nightmare?" The words came out on a raspy growl.

He looked over at the children still sleeping peacefully, and felt anger slick its way up his spine. He'd fought for them. He'd damn near died for them. He'd even killed for them. And the dog didn't trust him.

Raidou's scar thrummed with an angry heartbeat. Blood seeped into bruises under wrecked skin. The demon still lurked at the edge of his vision, dragging delicate claws across his body. A tongue over his face.

He glared at Kuromaru, who was still checking his paw, then at Tsume, who was leaking annoyance to the entire room, and tried very hard not to combust on the spot.

"You can both go hang," he spat quietly, and moved like a hunting ninja towards the door.

Kuromaru's words slid into the dark bunker. "You didn't exactly prove me wrong now, did you?"

Raidou froze by the door, one hand on the jamb. Chakra lashed through his grip. Wood cracked with a splinter-shot sound. A long pale line split its way though the frame. Raidou jerked his hand away.

Aoi rolled over with a murmur. The boy didn't stir.

Raidou's teeth bared in the dark. "Just because you have no control, bastard mongrel, doesn't mean I attack the wrong people." He turned his head, glancing back over his shoulder. "But if you want a real fight, I'll be outside. If you want to snap teeth at more sleepers, I think the kids would be too terrified to protest." He opened the door and walked out, throwing back, "Or maybe you could just eat your mistress."

Kuromaru watched the man leave with disdain he didn't bother to hide.

Tsume growled and started toward the door.

"Where are you going?"

She whipped around to glare at him. "You," she snarled as low as she could, wary of waking children, "stop treating people like dogs. They aren't."

"I don't like him."

"I don't care!" There was no doubt in her mind Raidou could hear their conversation. That didn't bother her, either. At the moment, nothing bothered her more than the rush of fury, never totally cooled from earlier, and the sound of her heartbeat pounding in her ears. Her muscles still felt like jelly, her chakra was still low. There were still two children tucked into bed that would expect love and comforting and assurances when they woke. All of which took energy she didn't have.

"Let him stay out there. He can freeze," Kuromaru muttered. "I don't want him back in here with them. Or you."

Tsume snarled. Kuromaru snarled back. She lunged toward him; he responded. They met halfway across the room and she dove into his face, past the reach of his paws and nearly into his teeth. She grabbed under his jaw and shoved his mouth away with a quick jab, fingers burying in his ruff and twisting until the skin tightened and she could dig her nails into his windpipe. They landed in a tangle of flesh and fur, and while he struggled to regain his footing, she brought her knee up into his solar plexus. His air whooshed out. She tightened her grip and snarled in his face. "Back off!"

Kuromaru went limp.

Tsume shoved at him, dragging herself up to her feet and storming out the door after the other male.

The pre-dawn hours seemed colder still. Her skin prickled. She started talking as soon as she smelled the man, though she couldn't yet see him. "I hate to tell you this, you moon-blind idiot, but not all ninja wake from nightmares without attacking the bodies nearest them, and all Kuromaru knows of you is that you attacked him the first day out on the field." She paused, located Raidou, and stormed toward him. "Oh, yeah, and we had really awful sex. He remembers that, too."

She slid in the moldy oak tree refuse, caught her balance, and marched into Raidou's personal space. "And he snapped teeth in treating you like a dog, but you keep forgetting he's not a human. You're supposed to be a ninja; stop sulking and get back inside. Those cubs are going to need help, and you're not the only person struggling, here!"

For a long moment, nothing but silence happened. Raidou was too far past the line of pissed off that he didn't flinch when Tsume shoved herself in his face. Or, seeing as he had a good eight inches on her, his chest.

Then she said, in her charming, backhanded sort of way, that she needed help.

Raidou sighed, and stepped back, giving himself a little room. He held up the hand not splayed over his throat. "Firstly, little boss, he didn't just wake me up. He didn't even just sit on me. He bit me in the throat. I don't care if he doesn't play well with people, no one reacts well to getting bitten on a fucking trigger."

He stopped, took a breath, and forced himself to stop speaking in italics.

"Secondly, he needs to get over that bodyslam. He bit me back, I figure we're square. Thirdly, I'll come back inside when the brats wake up and need me, but not until I stop needing to stamp on your mutt's head. Fourthly, I'm not sulking. And... whichever number-ly, what the hell does 'snapped teeth' as a noun mean?"

He took another breath, settling now that he'd talked some of it out, and took a good look at the small woman in front of him. Tsume was practically vibrating with tension. It was in the curl of her hands, the ravaged gleam of her eyes. The line of her mouth that wanted to be a snarl.

Struggling, Raidou thought slowly, and made a few connections. Other than the demon, she hadn't killed anyone. She'd shifted nose-first through a villageful of deception, anger, fear, and death, but she'd made no marks of her own. She hadn't worked it off like he had.

Raidou eyed her thoughtfully, glanced around for her dog, and then made a snap decision.

He hit her very precisely in the mouth, and danced back a step.

"Tag, boss-lady. You're it."

If they were lucky, it'd be good for both of them.

There were many things she could have responded to, could have argued with, if her brain wasn't still hazed with red.

And then he hit her.

Tsume snarled openly and lunged for him, discarding ninja grace for sheer animal fury. Which didn't mean she was anything other than a ninja. As he braced for an attack she slammed her bare foot onto his thigh, using him to vault upward and over his shoulder. One arm looped around his neck as she twisted behind him, the other hand burying in his hair and yanking his head back with the weight of her leap. As her hips fell, she threw a leg around his waist. Her heel dug in just over his pelvis.

It left his throat at mouth-level. She growled.

Some things are hard-wired. Raidou grunted, readjusted his weight, and went with it. She was pulling him backwards, so he fell backwards. The fall was just enough of a surprise that he managed to rip his head forwards--losing a clump of hair in the process--and shove his chin down. The blade of bone caught under her elbow, buying him some breathing space.

Then he hit the ground.

Actually, Tsume hit the ground. Raidou mostly hit Tsume.

He felt rather than heard the breath woosh out of her, and helped by planting his elbow solidly in her gut. His other hand jerked up to block her teeth sinking into his neck. He felt canines tear at his wrist, but he was already pulling up and away.

Her heel dug into his hip. He knocked it away, jerking sideways to cantilever the movement.

Then he kawarimi'd.

From the nearest tree, he watched the log smash down next to Tsume, and whistled softly. "You're still it, little boss. Try again!"

Being annoying was something of an artform. He'd learned a lot being an older brother.

She scrambled up to her feet, whipping around to follow the sound of his voice. It was focusing on sounds that had her catching the slide of wood over oak leaves as the safe house door opened. A kunai fell into her hand as she spun, whipping the blade up and releasing it just as Kuromaru stepped over the bunker's threshold. "Back off!" she snarled at him.

He growled, whined, and ducked back inside.

Tsume barely looked where she was going before she flung herself up the tree, chakra forcing her feet to stick. She grabbed Raidou's ankle and swung, the branch at her chest as she pivoted around it, feet coming up from underneath. She didn't try to kick him; she wrenched her body around and stuck her soles between his, releasing his ankle and snapping her body up. She was facing away from him; it didn't matter. As she caught her balance almost between his legs, her arms whipped up and back. Both elbows slammed back and into the heavy muscle on his thighs--knocking him off balance, forcing muscles to cramp. She didn't really care.

Raidou grunted, wincing, as the sharp points of her elbows pickaxed into his legs, and fell backwards. Tsume was still crouched on thetree branch , held in place by chakra. Raidou did the same--slamming energy into his feet so that he pivoted under the branch and came up neatly beneath her.

She snarled at him. He smiled back and grabbed her, arms flashing past claws to wrap around her whipcord body. She was barely thinking, he was planning every move.

Admittedly not well, he thought dryly, as he ripped his chakra back and dropped, pulling Tsume with him. A sharp jab of energy to her coils--made easy by the fact he was grabbing her--was enough to disrupt her own chakra. He ripped her away.

The forest floor rose up to meet them.

"Still your tag!" Raidou yelled, and twisted to slam down on his side. The leaves cushioned the fall a little. Will-power did the rest. He coughed, rolled them both over onto his back, and shoved Tsume into a neat headlock.

Then he noogied her.

Tsume had a lot of male cousins. She grunted--knuckles hurt--and used the leverage of the headlock and her free legs to swing her lower body up, coiling clear to her shoulders, then tuck her legs and bring her heels straight down.

If he hadn't twisted, she'd have nailed his balls. As it was she got a thigh instead, and a moment later his knee in her back. She curled up again, continuing the roll this time. It wrenched her neck and dragged her head against him, but it forced the headlock to release. Her knees hit the ground above his skull and she reared upward. A hand pulled back. She had to remind herself to make a fist, not a claw, and she punched at his face.

At the last minute she pulled it and hit him in the sternum instead, a great deal harder than she'd have hit his teeth.

She didn't mind it being her 'tag.' It meant she got to pound him.

Raidou coughed, losing his breath in the shock of impact, and felt something satisfied curl down his spine. She'd pulled the punch--not much, but at least she hadn't tried to break his nose--and she was a good opponent; fast, flexible, and strong for her size. She'd be even better once she started to think properly.

He grinned around the bright bloom of pain, and grabbed her wrist before she could yank it back. Long practice with Genma stopped him from going for her hand. He heaved, using her moment of off-balance to yank himself upright, and twisted onto his feet.

Tsume came with him.

Raidou stepped fast and used his grip to shove her arm up her back. Solid muscle fought him, but in a contest of strength, he had her beat hands down.

Tsume tried to donkey-kick him. He snapped sideways, dragging her with him.

"You fight dirty for a ninja," he muttered, with more than a little approval, and used his free hand to flick her ear. "Tag!"

He let her go and fled.

The urge to chase rose from somewhere deep inside her, some predator instinct that wasn't quite human. She followed it and followed Raidou a dozen feet before her mind kicked in again.

And then she melted into the shadows on one side of his trail, going still and silent, using her ears to track movements that would have been too quiet for most people to hear. When he slowed she began to run, leaping from tree to tree, making as little noise as possible. She'd grown up with people who could hear better than anyone; as little noise as possible was little noise, indeed.

Then he was there, up ahead, listening. A few feet from where she needed to jump she forgot running silent, and simply ran. She was above him when she leaped. He'd already turned toward her, bracing, but her fling started too close; he didn't have time to counteract. She tucked her legs and slammed into his chest knees-first, sending him staggering off-balance. The fact that he didn't crumple was impressive. While he caught himself, she reached out and slapped the unscarred side of his face hard enough to sting. "Tag back." And then she vaulted, springing away from him, landing on her hands and flipping up to her feet.

She could have run. Instead she crouched, and waited for him to bring the fight to her.

Raidou barked a laugh and rubbed the red side of his face. "You girl," he teased, and ignored the way the second word wobbled a little. Her hit to his chest had been a hard one--he was going to have knee-shaped bruises in the morning. He breathed hard through his nose, catching his breath again.

She was waiting for him.

Raidou grinned, eyeing the mesh of predator and ninja crouched in front of him, and flicked through a few quick mental options.

Fight fast.

Fight hard.

Fight well.

Have fun.

He vaulted onto his hands, armourless body stretched in a black-clad bow, and flipped gracefully towards her. Feet first.

"Catch!"

Tsume dove out of the way. "Nice try. I don't fetch, either!" She whipped around, dropping into a crouch as he landed. One foot flashed out to snag his ankle; he dodged too quick. She closed on him rapidly, trying to keep him off balance. Her strengths were her speed and her jutsu; she wasn't using the one, but the other was always an option.

More so when she hadn't exhausted herself earlier with high-level taijutsu and running back and forth from a village, but hopefully it would be enough.

As she dove for him, she tucked her head and shoulders, swinging around at his hip-level in a move she didn't often use, but had learned fighting older--bigger--boys. She'd always been little. At some point, you just had to learn to embrace it.

Her shoulder connected with the joint of hip and thigh, and she threw her weight behind the strike to drive him off balance and down. And if that weren't enough, she wrapped one arm behind his knee and held on.

Raidou might have caught the move, if he wasn't too busy flinching from what looked like an impending crotch-strike. He was wearing a cup--every male ninja wore a cup--butinstinct was instinct.

Then she got him in the hip instead.

He yelped, surprised, and felt her hand snap around his knee as her weight drove forwards. He overbalanced and gravity snatched at him. His arms windmilled. Chakra flashed. Gravity wo

For the third time in less than ten minutes, Raidou hit the ground.

Tsume landed neatly on top of him, apparently with all available joints. He grunted, felt the breath get knocked from his lungs again, and saw a delicate little whirl of stars.

"Ow," he gasped belatedly. Tsume lunged up. Raidou flicked her in the nose--"Tag!"--yanked his hand back before she could bite it off, and flashed a few seals to get himself out of there.

He landed in a nearby tree with his head still ringing from her final punch.

Then the branch snapped.

Tsume's head tipped as she watched him come down in a tangle of bark and leaves. Before he could recover she bolted forward, planted one foot on his chest to vault over him, and kept running. "Tag!" The word was more snarl than spoken; the anger she'd been burying was flooding through muscles and blood, pouring more and more into her as her mind linked fighting now with fighting earlier, and released all the pent-up rage.

They'd sacrificed their own children. A growl boiled free. She heard Raidou moving behind her, chasing her. She poured on the speed, leapt, scissoring her legs forward as she flew through seals.

A log took her place. More importantly, she took its place, momentum flinging her through space as her trajectory and position in the forest changed completely. She hit Raidou feet-first, and her legs almost crumpled under her own impact. Her muscles were wearing down fast.

No--her muscles were already worn down, and the chakra that had been fueling them was running low. She didn't care.

Raidou grunted as Tsume rebounded off his chest, sweeping one leg back to brace himself. "Hey," he coughed, ducking low to avoid a punch. "That was my tag!"

He didn't really need to keep up the pretence of a game to draw her out. She was already out and swinging. Raidou caught a glimpse of bared fangs and slicing tattoos, and prepared himself for a few more bruises.

She was wobbly, though. Her balance not-quite-perfect. Her stance was off. She wasn't hitting as hard as she could, and he knew she wanted to hit...

Raidou twitched a little mental shrug; he'd throw the fight if he had to. It was more important for her to burn off some rage.

She struck. He jerked to one side and caught her arm at the elbow. A snarl answered him, choked and a little desperate. He smiled grimly and dropped down, using the grip to heave her up and over his shoulders. At the apex of her swing, he let go, flinging her into a pile of leaves.

Foliage exploded everywhere. Raidou hesitated a moment. Attack or run?

He gathered himself and stood. Then he leaned against a tree. "Need a soldier pill, little boss?" he grinned and hooked a thumb into his belt, snapping out the pouches that still hung there. "You'll have to tag first."

She dragged herself up out of the wet slime beneath the leaves and shook hard. "If I wanted a solider pill," she growled, "I'd take my own." A solider pill would have helped in a real fight; given her a boost she'd need to win, kept her awake and moving. She'd probably take one in the morning, for the run back to the village. But taking one tonight would be foolish; load chakra that wasn't real into pathways that would struggle with it. She didn't need to punish herself for a spar.

Not that much of that fled consciously through her mind; she growled her response without stopping to analyze why and flung herself at Raidou again, pushing to move faster. She had one last kunai in a pouch on her hip. She didn't bother to grab it. Twisting, she spun and struck first with a heel at his stomach, and when he blocked that, a fist to his face. He ducked. She jumped up and hammered an elbow into the back of his neck, other hand grabbing his hair and shoving down. Her knee rose, but he stopped the blow, one big hand grasping her leg and hauling her off-balance.

She grabbed his shirt for leverage, used his hand to brace herself, swung the other leg up, and tried to knock him in the head with her free knee. The world spun upside down with the move; she closed her eyes and followed instinct.

Raidou swore when Tsume's claws dug in and ripped his shirt. "You pain in the--!" he snapped, and took a knee to the cheekbone. Everything lurched as he staggered sideways, hands yanking up automatically to grab for Tsume. She was already ripping away.

With his shirt.

He used the grip on her leg to pull her close, winced as cloth shredded, and dropped on her. The ground rushed up. Raidou slammed an elbow carefully down by Tsume's head to stop from slamming her body with his full weight. He didn't want to crush her.

"Clothes are off limits!"

He was suddenly very close. Close enough to bite. She did.

The skin over his biceps was warm and whole. She left it whole; it took more force than she could currently summon to get fairly blunt human teeth through skin. Her eyeteeth were sharp; normally they could have punctured, but every muscle in her body was protesting.

She scrabbled underneath him, jabbing little rabbit punches into his ribs, trying to get a leg up so she could kick at him, too. She could have kawarimi'ed out, but this was no threat--not a Pack challenge, not a real fight, he even kept calling her 'boss' (even if he also called her 'little'). There was no real reason to try and win, not when just hitting felt so much better.

She was biting.

Raidou yelped theatrically. "Skin is off limits, too!" Her knuckles drove a pattern of half-bite bruises into his skin, rattling down his ribs and flank. He let her have them, focusing instead on not getting bucked off.

Something distant muttered about not pinning the lady he'd hurt. But she wasn't exactly protesting--not in a way that he needed to listen to--and he had complete control over himself. He knew he wasn't going to hurt her. Not again.

Unless she took another strip out of his shirt, anyway,

Tsume cracked him hard with a heel in his lower back. He grunted, pulled a face at her, and whipped them both over until she was sitting on top.

"You have leaves in your hair," he informed her solemnly, and yanked her down into a headlock.

Moonlight and darkness, sitting on top of a man she'd smelled before, bloodlust curling a different sort of arousal in her gut--

It might have been enough to startle her still, if he hadn't commented about leaves and stuffed her in a headlock. She didn't bother trying to break it. Instead, she opened her mouth and sank her teeth into the shoulder he'd kindly just presented. And then, while he was yelling about skin and biting, she wrenched her legs around and kneed him in the thigh, fists pummeling his ribs again.

She almost hoped he kept her in the headlock.

Ye gods, was she made of joints?

And teeth. Couldn't forget the teeth.

Raidou yelled something uncomplimentary about her heritage as she ripped through his shirt again, and yanked a knee up to tangle it with hers. Aches pulled up little ripples of pain through his muscles, but he grinned behind the sting. As fights went, it wasn't much of one on his side, but it had done what he wanted.

Now, if she would stop hitting him...

He used the lock on Tsume's head to yank her back a little, and grabbed her nose with his free hand, pinching her nostrils closed. "Let go, muttface. Or I'll scruff all your hair off."

He couldn't quite stop the laugh as he said it.

Rage was slowly bleeding away, replaced by a wash of exhaustion. The keyword, however, was slowly.

Pale blue, almost white eyes narrowed when he clamped his hand on her nose. She wrenched her head around. Teeth clacked shut millimeters from his fingers. "Your mother was a Hyuuga," she muttered automatically, giving him two more quick punches before she realized the fight had leeched out of her bones. Some of the tension was still there, would be there forever, but the rage that had been dogging her steps was gone.

And she was exhausted. Tsume collapsed on top of him, hands trembling slightly with overwork. If she didn't use any chakra, she could barely twitch. She slapped his ribs, grumbling, "Get me out of this pus-infected headlock," but not otherwise moving to make him.

Sure, she could kawarimi, but it would take more chakra still. She was definitely going to need a solider pill in the morning. In the meantime, she laid sprawled across Raidou's chest and breathed sweat and trees and tried not to think about everything that had come before.

Raidou dropped the hold and patted Tsume semi-gently on her limp shoulder. "You have the weirdest curses I've ever heard," he informed her, amused. "And your father was an Uchiha."

She looked beat, but she wasn't leaking barely-restrained killing intent anymore. A little relief settled down by his bones. Now he just had to get her back to the cabin and let her sleep the rest off.

And maybe put something on his bruises, too. Raidou winced very faintly as various nerve endings pointed out exactly how stupid the last thirty minutes had been.

Worth it, he told them. So shut up.

Tsume was trembling faintly against him. He could feel the ripple of gentle shivers through his torn shirt. He wondered vaguely how hard she'd bite him if he picked her up.

Also worth it, he decided, and looped an arm around her waist.

"C'mon, little boss. Your monster dog is probably waiting." He gathered his legs, found his balance, and clambered to his feet. Before Tsume could protest or catch her own balance, he tossed her over his shoulder. Pain clawed a new hold through his battered muscles. He gave it the same shut up lecture. "And no biting. I'm already going to have to come up with something clever to tell people when we get home."

"Tell them you had wild and crazy sex with grateful villagers," she mumbled, planting both hands on his back and pushing herself upright. "Villagers who like to bite. Villagers with strange kinks. The thought'll drive Genma mad with jealousy." She twisted to look at where they were going, mostly to make sure she wasn't about to hit a tree branch.

Blood rushing to her head or tree branch... it was a hard choice. She remained upright, locking her elbows against shaking. "And I do not have strange curses. You people just have boring ones." She could barely keep two thoughts in her head at the same time.

"Black-faced wolf." She squirmed, sliding until she could loop an arm around Raidou's shoulders, ribs still spilling over his back but no longer bent at the waist. "The kids'll be waking up soon." She took a deep breath and twisted to let her head flop against the nape of his neck.

"Quit squirming, woman," Raidou grumbled, adjusting his grip. "You're not exactly light, you know." Tsume was small, but she was also apparently carved from solid muscle. And possibly lead bones. He turned his head to try and catch her eye, but she'd somehow contrived to wrap herself around his shoulders and plant her nose against his spine. He felt her breath flutter against his skin. "And Genma can get his own weird villagers with kinks."

In the dark, the space where the cabin should be loomed into view. Raidou gave it an annoyed look. "Hang on," he muttered, and let go of her long enough to slap his hands together for seals. Chakra dragged painfully through his pathways. He kicked it into shape and glared at the not-cabin until it shimmered into view. "About time."

Six steps and only a few staggers put them at the door. Raidou tossed the handle a vengeful look. "If the kids wake up, your monster dog can deal with them. Or we can knock them out again. We're in no rush to get home." And she really needed to sleep.

Tsume looked back at the handle, shifted one leg to kick the lever with her foot, and let Raidou shove it open.

Kuromaru leapt up, ears straining upward. "What happened?"

"Nothing," Tsume muttered. She heard a low growl and pushed herself upright again, twisting to rip a snarl out of her chest. "I said nothing!"

Kuromaru's ears tucked back and he turned, glowering at them over his shoulder before he laid down between the two cubs.

"Black-faced wolf, sometimes familiars are more trouble than they're worth," she muttered, flopping back over Raidou's shoulder.

Kuromaru grumbled something similar, the words muffled in his fur. Tsume pretended not to hear.

Raidou glanced from one Inuzuka to the other, and snorted. "Married couple," he said to the world at large, and staggered into the cabin. The children were still asleep. Kuromaru was still a furry pain in the rump. Tsume was growling to herself.

All was right with the world.

Raidou headed over to the children and let Tsume slide off his shoulders. He caught her carefully before she faceplanted and let her pour herself over the floor. She landed in a limp, slightly disgruntled-looking puddle and gave him a look. Raidou hitched a grin at her, and summoned up the energy to go blanket hunting. Safe houses were usually pretty well stocked...

He found something that looked like bear fur under the rice barrels, and stared at it disbelievingly.

"Right," he said finally, crossed back to drop it over Tsume's head. Then he went to stoke up the fire. "Need anything while I'm up?" Because once he crashed, he had no intention of moving for anything short of a landslide. And maybe not even then.

Tsume flailed until the blanket was off her face and arranged somewhat over herself and both kids. "Not that I can think of." She pillowed her head on her arm, letting her eyes fall closed and listening to the sounds of Raidou moving around, the open-mouthed breathing of the cubs, Kuromaru's soft in- and exhalations. Her muscles were shaking. Tomorrow's run was going to be miserable, and the night might involve painkillers. Still, she'd get through everything.

Most of them were still alive.

Her jaw cracked when she yawned. She breathed through her nose and smelled nothing like fear. It was pleasant. She could almost ignore the lingering traces of blood, and let herself drift off to sleep.

Raidou glanced at the furry heap of Inuzuka and children, and smiled. "My kingdom for a camera," he murmured softly, and finished settling things in the cabin.

Then he realized the kids still had his blanket.

Raidou glanced down at his clawed shirt, and muttered something that made Kuromaru's ears twitch. He headed for his pack to dig out a minuscule sewing kit, and slouched down to lean his back against the wall. By his right elbow, slow sleepy sounds whispered through the air. In the distance, the first fingers of dawn light were beginning to stroke their way over the treetops.

Raidou yawned, rubbed his eyes with the heel of one hand, and focused on not stabbing himself to death with a needle. He would sleep when he was certain Kuromaru wasn't watching.