You're going to have to be faster than that

It was all too easy for Alastor to find himself smiling for genuine reasons with Manea instead of the maddened smile he wore all the time. She brought out something in him long thought dead, untouched in months, and perhaps some parts even longer. He wasn't sure what about what he had said had made her so damn happy all of a sudden, but he must have struck a nerve, because all of a sudden she was smiling brightly and murring and licking his chin affectionately. He chuckled and leaned closer to plant another lick on the end of her muzzle, this one much slower and more sensual than the teasing one he had before. Manea was infectious, a drug burning her way through his veins to reach every part of him and beyond. Her laughter, that musical sound, made his heart do flips in his chest and draw a laugh of his own, the husky sound devolving into murrs of physical delight when she started scratching around the back of his neck, finding more and more things about him that he liked as if she had a map to his body and had studied him for years. "Sounds delightful...! You know I'd be happy to share any finds with you as well, my celestial beauty..." That was easy enough. Neither of them would restrict one another's freedoms, and they were both free to enjoy the pleasures of the flesh as they chose—and now they would indulge in them together, and with as many "toys" as they chose to bring home to share and enjoy together.

But it seemed Manea was far from done laying out the terms and conditions of their potential relationship. Once more, Alastor snapped to attention, his smile fading just a bit while he focused his attention on his darling's beautiful features and sentimental words. It was hard to focus when her paws were doing wonderful things around his ears and neck and shoulders, but he did his best. The occasional husky murr would rumble inside his chest while she explained her beliefs to him and what those practices would mean in their lives. Alastor's initial reaction was one of atheistic indifference. She could believe in whatever higher powers she wanted—Lurid had been the same with her beliefs—but Alastor had seen the devil in flesh and knew that if any gods had once existed, they were long dead by now. No higher being would ever allow the fucked up shit that happened in the world to exist; no god would allow what happened to him to ever occur. He wasn't going to disparage her from her beliefs though; if she was trying to convert him, that would be an uphill battle for her. But when she mentioned the culling of pups from a litter, Alastor's face made a strained twinge. Despite her soft paw stroking his cheek, darkness flooded his already colorless eyes as vivid horrors flashed back to his mind. Pups were innocent; crimes and abuse and violence against them were the one thing he had never abided. But maybe it would have been better for him if he had been culled by his parents long ago...

"I have questions..." he interjected, blinking back into reality to fix her gaze with his own. He hadn't outright refused, but some things needed to be clarified before he could open his mind to her way of life. "When do you kill the pups...? Immediately after birth...? Within days or weeks...?" This was more important to Alastor than Manea would know. The timing mattered. Pups were innocent, but he could reason killing of a pup in their infancy before their lives had truly begun and their personalities had formed and bonds had been made. Killing a child, an innocent being bearing no crimes other than the misfortune of being born to shit parents, that he could not agree to. He remembered the screams and wails and cries of his siblings that all had their lives snuffed out slowly, one after the other. If he had been raised an only child, never meeting them... maybe then he wouldn't have ended up so fucked up in the head. As much as he would love all of his children, no matter how many there were, if this was important to Manea, he could try to work with it.


"Alastor"