He had fought for a pack and won. He had faced down predators, chased prey along the side of a cliff, ran among buffalo as they stampeded, and none of it had scared him. But now, now he was scared shitless.

It was time to tell his dad that he was dropping a pack in Valen's favorite stomping grounds.

He didn't want to just show up with a pack of strangers at his back for that to be the first Valen heard of it, so he had travelled ahead alone except for his owls, who were perched on a leather pad on his hips and shoulders since their own tussle with Enrico's companion had broken enough feathers to make flying laborious for both of them. He paused within sight of his father's tractor, took a deep breath, squared his shoulders, and with a devil-may-care grin fixed on his face marched up towards the tractor. "Hey old man!" he hollered. "Its me, your favorite kid!"

Oh now what? Valentine didn't know what was worse, the grand kids who followed him around like ducklings or the kids who went out of their way to be a pain in his ass. Chaos and Angelus were both guilty of this, and while Rhyme hadn't been back long enough to get on his nerves no doubt he'd carve out a nerve for himself if given enough time. Even if it was well hidden by his mild Destruction nature, somewhere in Rhyme's blood lurked the inclination to harass and offend.

After rounding the tractor Valentine began to walk towards Chaos all the while making a show of looking around him in search of his favorite kid. "Where?"

Chaos gave an obvious and exaggerated roll of his eyes at his father's rejoinder, though his stomach gave a nervous lurch now that the time for THE CONVERSATION was here. "Hey, watch it old timer," he teased, making the effort to straighten despite the still-painful wounds and puff out his chest, striking a regal pose that, if you didn't know Chaos, might have actually come across as kingly instead of faintly silly. "You are talking to a bone fide alpha now. Found a pack of badasses in the north and challenged their alpha to one on one combat. Old school mafia type, all 'gentleman with a code of honor but cross him and he'll rip your throat out in cold blood' sort." Not that he knew that they were all badasses, since he only really knew Valdis, but the few that he'd been able to talk to one-on-one before now had seemed like useful sorts. He was babbling, he knew, to put off the major point that he had yet to bring up. He curved his gaze sideways towards Valentine to judge his reaction. "No big deal. I won, of course."

Their conversation took an unexpected turn and Valentine eyed his son skeptically as his story unfolded. While he had no doubt whatsoever that Chaos was capable of it, his son was a bit of a trickster so it wouldn't come as a surprise to him if there was a punchline at the end of his tale.

There wasn't. As soon as he realized this Valentine stopped in his tracks. His expression was unreadable as he slowly sank into a seated position, but his rump was barely on the ground when a smug smile began to tugged up the corners of his lips. He fixed Chaos with a pleased look and eyed him up and down, noting, this time with approval, his son's injuries.

"Well done," he said at last. Valentine's tone was warm and uncharacteristically soft. He was pleased that Chaos had taken this path. Too few of his children had gone that route - and a nagging belief that the fall of Imperium was to blame for that occasionally ate at the old king. Had he not gotten ill, had he not then stayed abroad in search of Rhythm and Rhyme, where would they be now? Would Boreas be filled with Imperialis kings and queens instead of just the scattered remnants of a once great family? He thought so and it saddened him.

His tone didn't stay soft and warm for long. Nope, the chance to snark was simply too tempting to resist. "So now what? Gonna take a victory lap around Boreas? Perhaps find something cute to celebrate with...or are you just gonna stand here and wait for your old man to give you an approving pat on the head?"

Valen sat back with a very satisfyingly surprised expression on his face, and Chaos gave a rather smug grin of his own. He had to suppress the little quiver of childish glee his father's approval, schooling his expression to a more 'independent adult' sort of expression. "Thanks, dad," he said casually, as though it wasn't a big deal.

Of course, the moment didn't last. Valen's voice went sly and snarky, immediately reminding Chaos of the second order of business. He coughed and carefully didn't meet Valen's eyes, looking everywhere but that slate-blue visage. "Well, I'm actually in the process of relocating them to their new pack lands. That is to say, well... here. Buffalo Knolls and uh... the Range."

Chaos' sudden squirrely demeanor immediately had Valentine's guard up. His eyes narrowed in instinctual suspicion and he lifted his chin so that he was looking down his nose at his son. It wasn't quite called for yet so he resisted the urge to irritably flick his tail around like a cat.

"Well, I'm actually in the process of relocating them to their new pack lands."

"Uh huh," he growled warily.

"That is to say, well..."

Valentine's eyes narrowed to slits and he ground out, "Uh huh...you ain't too big to be spanked, you know..."

"...here."

The old king huffed. If he could have clutched at his chest or his pearls he would have for no other reason (probably) than to be dramatic. "I see," he said coolly. The tip of his tail began to swipe irritably from side to side.

He waited just long enough to make Chaos sweat before saying, "Well, I'd rather you have it over some interloper. But I ain't leaving unless you pry my cold dead paws off that heap of metal back there, so get used to seeing me, punk."

A long moment of increasing tension grated on Chaos, who had never been particularly known for being a patient person to begin with. Valen's tail was twitching in a rather alarming way, and Chaos winced internally, waiting for the moment when he got his ass kicked.

But Valen's words brought a grin of sheer relief to the new alpha's face for more reasons than one. "I was really hoping you'd say that," he admitted, relief making him candid rather than teasing. "It'd be really nice to have you around. You and mom were always my heroes, and well..." He paused, thinking back to his mother, "Mom was never really the uhm... the alpha type. So if you were willing to stick around, even though it's Imperium... I wouldn't ask you to join if you don't want to," he added hastily. "I wouldn't want you to leave your home even if you don't want to be a member."

He gave himself a mental slap. Enough of the uncomfortable, sappy, emotional crap. Valen would be just as uncomfortable with that nonsense as Chaos himself was. So he just gave his dad an urchin grin, one with more than a hint of bloodthirstiness to it. "Having a group of warriors already trained and ready for a fight will give us a base of operations for wiping those slaver bastards off the face of the earth. Think about it, you won't have to worry about Rhythm while we're off tracking those assholes down, they'll be able to secure our backtrail, and if another group is stupid enough to try getting revenge, they'll have to go through a fighting pack to get it." And this time they'd damn well be ready for slavers sneaking in to grab helpless pups and mothers.

It occurred to him then, that if Valen was serious about wanting to stay in pack lands, that there was another problem that hadn't occurred to him. Valen was hardly the only loner in these lands, and more specifically, he had a mate now that he would undoubtedly not want to leave his side. Chaos' face fell into a puzzled frown. Would she want to go back to Abaven? Would she remain as a loner in pack lands as well, or if he joined, would she want to as well?He could hardly deny his father's mate if she wanted to stay with him, but at the same time he couldn't really see Rhythm approving of anything that Chaos would put together as a pack either. But he also couldn't see Valen being ok with her being far away from his protection either, after everything.

He didn't really want to cause Valen any more problems that Valen already had, but he also wasn't going to cater to the Destructions on Rhythm's behalf either so if it came down to it, that was just what was going to happen. At least Valen was getting laid for his association with the Abaven wolves. Even if he wanted her, even if Rhythm was putting out for anyone but Valen, he would imagine that banging the old woman would definitely get Valen looking for blood - he gave an entirely mental chuckle of amusement at the idea of that whole bizarre scenario - so what would he get out of playing nice with them? And that was bound to cause trouble. Well, he'd cross that bridge when he came to it, really, and Valen hadn't even brought Rhythm up yet so that could go any way, couldn't it?

Man, this had gotten complicated quick.

Valentine allowed a hint of a smile to break through his wry facade as Chaos' relief became apparent. Once he got over the shock he really was quite pleased with his son's decision. The old Imperium lands would be in good hands.

Chaos was right. His words did make his father a bit uncomfortable. He found himself shaking his head as Chaos spoke and barely managed to keep quiet until his son was done speaking. "I'm not going anywhere," he said firmly. That much he was sure of. As for the rest...

Valentine was on the verge of speaking again when he caught himself. He frowned, his expression broody, and dropped his chin as his thoughts consumed him. After a beat he lifted his head and sought Chaos' gaze. "I chafe under authority." Even though his choice of words was a bit comical his tone was serious. "But..." Great, they were now stuck in some kind of sappy loop, weren't they? Nice going, Chaos. "You know I would do anything for you. For our family. And I think you'll be a great alpha."

He delivered his words slowly and with the same amount of care one might give a venomous snake they found blocking their path. "So if you can tolerate having someone in your pack who will probably not listen to you...ever...and maybe pick fights with your members, and kick your ass if you deserve it..." He shrugged.