The long and the short of it was that Renegade was in a life and death battle with a shrub. He knew the young eastern cedar sapling was no real use to their herb supply, it was just taking up room where a garden needed to be put in. He tried to pull it out at first, but the branches and the not quite needles were sharp. This was not a plant that would go easy into the dark night. The young prince lifted his lips to snarl at the unwanted baby tree, the gears in his mind working out exactly how he might be rid of the nuisance.

Renegade leaned back onto his haunches as he looked the shrub over once more. If he went at it with his mouth again he’d just cut up his lips and gums. He could theoretically dig it out, but then mom would be upset about all the dirt underneath his cat like claws. He was good at cleaning himself but not that good. With a frustrated ‘ugh’ he flopped down in front of the bush. He wasn’t defeated yet, but he was at his wits end.

"Renegade Klein"

Playing the role of father had been one of his most exciting and most exhausting jobs he'd ever taken on. But nothing could make Maverick regret even a single second of it! The tall dire wolf who had once been so nervous at the prospect of raising a band of puppies now reveled in every chance he got to make lasting memories with his little ones, whether it was in the adventures he took them on, the mischief he helped them find, or the rare times when important life lessons were imparted onto them. Today it seemed would be another day to share memories as the oversized sire wolf found himself walking amongst the dense foliage of Ashen's new home. He was still familiarizing himself with the lay of the land, putting his navigation skills to work as he learned every inch of land, tree, and water at the Empire's disposal. Passing by a cluster of snow-dusted saplings and growths, Mav heard the sounds of struggle coming from nearby. Instantly intrigued, he pushed forward through some brush with a rustle of bare branches to find his eldest child locked in mortal combat with... a cedar sapling.

Maverick stood to the side and watched for a moment with an ever growing grin spreading across his muzzle while Renegade tried to figure out a way to defeat his foe. A snicker pulled from the highly amused sire, followed by a chuckle and then a gentle laugh. Only once Ren had reached the threshold of frustration did Mav make his way over to his son, coming to flop back onto his haunches next to the pup while he studied the sturdy sapling. "Putting up a fight, is it?" he commented with another chuckle. His giant white paw lifted to bat at the sapling a few times, feeling the way its sturdy stem flexed and bowed with his touch, but never broke. It was indeed a worthy opponent for a pup fresh out of the den. Turning his teal gaze back down to his son, Mav leaned in closer and asked Ren, "Tell me what you've tried so far. Let's see if we can work the problem together."

"Maverick"

Ren was quite perplexed, but he wasn’t one to give up so easily. The tree had given him a glance the entirely wrong way. The young prince wasn’t concerned with making lifelong memories or thinking much about the future. All that mattered at this moment, which was all that mattered, was ridding the world of this dastardly tree. His lavender eyes crossed as he stared up at it in frustration.

Before he could just resort to digging the sound of a large body behind him had him up on his mismatched paws. His furrowed eyes were brought up to the sight of his father, which immediately changed his whole disposition. His cloud white tail wagged behind him, swinging his rump around as pink maw spread into a wide grin. He sat his wiggling rump again as Mav lowered himself to his haunches in front of Ren’s sworn enemy.

"Yes,” he grumbled in response to his father’s chuckle. He huffed as the tree bent against his father’s heavy paw but didn’t show signs of submission. "Well.” He started, bringing himself up as he puffed up his little star speckled chest. "When I bite it, it pokes my mouth. I wanted to dig it up… but Mom would scold me for being dirty.” He said, showing a decent amount of forethought for a young puppy. The prince just wanted to please his mother, but he also had enemies that needed defeating.

"Renegade Klein"

The sheer glee he saw on his eldest boy’s face and in his wiggly butt and tail sparked mirth and joy in the father wolf, almost laughing out loud were it not for his son’s obvious frustration at this insurmountable challenge he’d found himself facing. As Renegade related his tale of woe, Maverick pursed his lips and gazed down at the evergreen sapling with perplexity. Sure, he was big enough and could easily just rip the sapling out of the earth on his son’s behalf, but that wouldn’t do him any good. Ren had already demonstrated a predilection for problem solving and a tremendous level of intellect, so he would let the pup earn his victory here with a little bit of help.

Maverick hummed as he batted the sapling back and forth a couple of times, considering what Renegade had already tried and what methods had failed him thus far. "Hmmm, that is quite a dilemma we’re facing here…" he mused aloud. Bringing his large body down to lie on the grass and dirt without any sign of concern for the cleanliness of his coat, Mav leaned in closer to Ren’s side. "It seems to me that traditional warfare isn’t going to work for us against this foe. But we have something the tree doesn’t." Maverick playfully tapped his son’s temple with a cheeky grin. "We’re smarter than it is. So if we can’t bite it or knock it over, we'll go under it." Yes, that meant digging, and yes that meant they would both get dirty from it, but Maverick was about to teach his son an important life lesson with this seemingly innocuous cedar sprout. "Yeah, your mother's gonna be upset if we get all dirty, but it's easy to wash dirt out of fur. It's less easy to hide wounds if we get scraped or cut up by those needles."

Using his large paw to again bend the little defenseless sapling away from Renegade's face and paws, Mav gestured to his son to step up and face his opponent once again. "We'll tag team this one! I'll hold it back, you go low and aim for the roots." The sapling was still young and the roots wouldn't have been able to burrow very deep. Teaching his son the importance of facing an opponent smartly to exploit its vulnerabilities and weak spots was an important lesson, and he was willing to sacrifice a helpless plant for the cause. Plus what sort of father would he be if he didn't get up to a little mischief every now and then with his children?

"Maverick"

Ren watched amazedly as his sire batted the vile tree back and forth with his bare paws. The pup peered curiously, wondering if perhaps Mav was showing a brave face and was actually starting to bleed on his pads. It didn’t occur to him that Maverick’s soles were calloused and built up heavily after his many years. Renegade’s pink toes were still soft and vulnerable to the sharp poking plant. Not only were the needles vile, but the trunk had small spines as well.

Maverick hummed in consideration as Renegade gave his father the run down of the dilemma thus far. There were rules that needed to be followed, but as Maverick slowly explained to him. Ren would realize there were rules, there were rules of law, and then there was bending the rules. Ren’s eyes widened in wonder as Mav went on to explain, washing dirt would be easier than hiding red cuts and scrapes on his face.

A devious grin appeared over his innocent maw, a fun mix of Klein smirk and his father’s feral expressions. Renegade knew what this meant, this was time to dig and this was the moment to grasp his victory. With a jovial ‘yah!’ the pale prince leapt at the earth beneath the devilish branches his father was holding back. The instant he even thought of digging Ren’s white coat turned dingy and by the time he was tearing through grass and soil it was hard to distinguish him as a Klein prince. He looked more akin to a mud puddle reflecting the night’s sky now.

Renegade fought against the earth and tore at roots before he had beheaded the plant completely. There would be no regrowth here, that was certain. The boy wiped a filthy paw over his forehead, making sure his white mask was equally marked with the damp smelling soil. Proud of himself and the accomplishment he puffed his chest again, excited about having shown his father exactly what he could do.


"Renegade Klein"

As Maverick watched the perfect little blend of himself and his darling Venom slowly begin to grasp what he was telling him to do, a mischievous grin of his own appeared on the sire wolf's muzzle. Realization dawned on Renegade's face and Mav gave a slow, almost wicked nod of approval, silently confirming his boy's hunch and giving his wordless consent to misbehave. Of course Maverick wanted to instill all the best life lessons into his children that he could, but there were times for being the serious parent to educate his children and times to let them learn by having fun. Showing Ren that some rules could be bent or skirted more easily than others might not have been the most pragmatic lesson, but it was the most real. Real life was messy, real life existed in shades of gray. Besides, skirting and bending rules had been how the dire brute had met his beautiful wife-to-be and made this perfect family with her. How bad could they possible be?

A barking laugh erupted from the older male as his son yapped in glee and began to tear at the sapling's roots with feral savagery. He could see that pristine white coat of his son's turning browner and browner as it was stained with dirt and sod, even some of Maverick's white toes getting caught in the crossfire and turning green and brown in the mayhem, but he couldn't care less. Renegade was having fun and learning an important life lesson about seizing every advantage and opportunity he could to do things the easiest and most efficient way. "There ya go, Ren! Show that plant who's the alpha wolf here!" he cheered his boy on, keeping those thorny branches held out of the way of the manic paws of the pup. The more he dug, the looser and looser the sapling began to feel as its roots were torn out beneath it. "It's getting there, you've almost got it!"

The sapling buckled and bent under the dire wolf's paw, losing its strength as it was torn from the ground by the father-son duo. Not long after, the ground underneath the sapling crumbled away at Renegade's paws, and the plant buckled completely, now pinned flat to the ground under Mav's paw as Ren decapitated it, leaving torn up roots and unearthed soil in his wake. Maverick gave a whooping cheer to his son's success, lifting the slain plant up between two toes to show off the trophy to Ren. "Whew, look at that! You took its head clean off!" Mav exclaimed with a laugh, then passed the sapling over to Ren to claim. "Congratulations, little plant killer, you defeated your greatest foe yet!" Renegade was positively filthy now and it made Maverick grin with barely contained humor. Oh, Venom was so going to kill him if she found out about this! "Let's get a little more war paint on you, mighty warrior." Grinning his roguish smile, Mav lifted his own soiled paw to paint a stripe of dirt straight down Ren's alabaster muzzle from forehead to nose, then gave the pink padded nose a little boop for good measure, speckling it brown with mud. "Ha! If we keep this up, you might start looking like Rampage!" Maverick teased, a flash of playfulness in his teal eyes as that same giant, muddy paw went to dance his toes along his son's sides to tickle him and further muck up his handsome coat.

"Maverick"

Having a father who was so understanding and supportive was a blessing Renegade didn’t know he couldn’t do without. Mav was there to help him learn how to navigate life and its obstacles, and sometimes that meant getting your paws dirty when you knew your mother would scold you. Ren didn’t hesitate at all after his father gave him the final go ahead, holding the tree upright as he dug like he was heading to china. His sharp little cat claws were immediately filled with dirt as much as his pale pelt was becoming more and more earthen. His little rump remained slightly slate, but with his exuberant digging it was everywhere.

Maverick continued to encourage him onward, which helped him continue when he really reached the roots. Puppies got tired quickly, but Ren ignored the fatigue. His father boosted his confidence as he got to the struggle of the roots that were clasping the ground. The prince was panting as he worked hard to remove tree from root system, and Mav’s words helped him the whole way. Then finally the tree was toppled from its rooted crown.

"Ah ha!” He joined in his father’s cries of victory before he happily collapsed into the hole he had just dug, covering the last bits of him in dirt for good measure. He grinned in complete joy as his father handed over his kill, the cedar sapling was no more. The boy didn’t know it yet, but since the bush was full removed of its greenery it would not be growing back. Ren almost put his pale paw over the tree victoriously, but he didn’t want to get poked. That was the whole reason he had killed it.

Mav looked down proudly at his pup as Ren looked up to his father as war paint was pushed into the pale mask on his face and Mav booped his dirt stained pink nose. Renegade giggled as he thought about looking more like Ram. "Mom will never know I’m not Ram,” He schemed innocently, still tired and plopped down in the hole. Not that he would ever admit how much effort he’d expended on the mission.

"Renegade Klein"