Beneath the moon's silver gaze, Azure walked the beach that whispered of home. His stride took him effortlessly through loose sand and jagged stones, the familiar route drawing him forward almost without thought. A neglected footbridge lay in his path, it's swollen wooden planks heavily ensnared by wild growth. With a careful claw, Azure unpicked the weeds one by one, watching as each stem easily yielded to his touch and fell - sliding back into the sea. He worked with as much care and reverence as one might uncover a neglected tombstone, freeing the bridge's memory from its verdant shroud.

His gaze drifted, tracing the cliff's face to where both history and nature had conspired to erase the Armada's touch. For a Fatalis born of these sands, however, the remnants of his birth den were impossible to miss. Eyes closed, he summoned the specters of youth - puppies tumbling from the cavern's embrace.... a titan and his diminutive consort, watching with warmth and with pride. The memory lingered just long enough to soften the edges of his loss before Az cast it aside, eyes open, resolve hardened.

As he moved westward, each stride stirred up further repressed emotion and feeling. Amongst every thought, mention of one wolf stood out the brightest. She was not only his beacon of warmth and light, but was forever a distinct, and deniable presence in his life. Hanako was his hardest earned prize, and one that Az had come to value above all others. The magnitude of his feelings for her bordered on so intense that he couldn't even openly acknowledge them. At least, not while their bond was perpetually tainted by the dark silhouette of Sparrow. Azure fur bristled, muscles coiling with a primal fury, a tempest of vengeance unspent. He imagined her pack and her progeny reduced to mere whispers in the obsidian sands, their existence snuffed out by his unyielding claws.

His fury was an eruption that dissipated as quickly as it had boiled, the fiery hate unwillingly washed away by the chilling surge of deeper, more challenging feelings. A heavy discomfort settled in his gut and the taste of acid rose high in his throat. This shadow of regret wasn't for the violence he'd imagined (and inflicted) but for the aftermath. Their packs had near come to war. His family had been endangered. Hana's happiness was a ghost of what it once was and their relationship had been undeniably fractured. Unspoken doubts lingered, but Azure's grip on the koi wolf was unyielding - a silent vow, a staunch refusal of anything that might pry her from his side. Was it the thought of losing her that incited such deep-seated fear, or was it the broader, more pervasive terror of change itself that he was so fervently trying to outrun?

As emotions threatened to overwhelm him, Azure redirected his turmoil and hurled a forceful paw through the damp sand. With a heavy swing of his arm, he cast his turmoil toward the sea, watching as it dissolved into nothingness against the relentless tide.

"Speech"

Spider had been spending more and more time outside of the Armada borders. Something was taking the young wolf out in this general direction, but he lost his kids scent somewhere around the Soulless Forest. He turned the territory into a grid, and did what he could to pick the trail up once more.

As he spread his net a little wider, he moved closer to old Armada territories. He had spent more of his life now in the Col than he had here, but this place still held its memories. Here, his parents had been together, whole. His siblings had been here. Now he and Levi were all that was left, and the two brothers had never been very close.

He set his path perhaps a little closer to the Plains than he needed to, but all thoughts of Spider fled his mind as he caught a scent he had never expected to find again. A harsh breath pulled into his lungs, and anger clouded his vision. Is this where his Sire had been hiding? He had been certain that Azure was dead. He had searched everywhere for his father. Azure was the most powerful wolf he knew, and he knew that the only thing that would take Azure from them was death.

But he was wrong.

He had a brief, fleeting thought to walk away, to turn his back on the wolf that had clearly turned his back on all of them. Those months of searching, of worrying. Knocking on the doors of packs he had no interest in meeting. Yet here, of all places, would be where he would find the missing wolf.

No, he wouldn’t walk away.

He turned into the plains, and he followed the scent of his Sire. “You!” He snarled, as he walked up to Azure - and, good grief, Azure was so much shorter than him now - and he moved to shove the older wolf with a powerful motion of his paws, aiming for his shoulders. Anger bled into every aspect of him. From his body language, to his expression, to the heat pounding in his ears.


"Speech"

The assault on the silence was as abrupt as it was brazen. His son, grown and evidently seething with a year's worth of turmoil, stood before him - anger personified.

“You!” The snarl, laced with anger and accusation, reached Azure before his son’s towering form did, but it was the action that followed which sparked the father's wrath. The younger wolf - now grown even beyond the imposing stature of his sire- had dared to lay paws on him with an impudent shove.

Azure’s reaction was immediate and fierce; beginning with a deliberate step to reclaim the distance his son's push had created, and ending with the swift, retaliatory precision of a seasoned warrior. His movement was a blur. The embodiment of might, the authority of an alpha, and the discipline of a father all rolled into one. A single, powerful blow was aimed to unbalance and admonish the boy - a clear display of supremacy and a warning against further insolence.

The air itself seemed to tremble around them, charged with the tension of the moment. The ocean’s roar a muted backdrop to the discord unfolding on the shore. In physical size Azure might have been overshadowed, but in presence... Basilisk had a lot to learn.

"Forgotten your place, pup?" Azure's voice boomed, each word a measured strike. "Has your growth in stature diminished your sense?" His stance was a potent visual promise of violent reprimand - tattered ears flat against his skull, lips drawn back in a snarl, hackles standing in stark defiance. Hot in his veins his aggression boiled, but remained for the moment controlled.

"If you want to lash out, you’ll find I’m not quite the prey you take me for. I have survived more than you could imagine, weathered more storms than you have chased moons." The words rolled off his tongue like thunder. "Make your next move carefully, boy, for I will not be struck without consequence."

His challenging gaze, unflinching, met that of his son's. The air hung heavy around them, charged with potential and passion. What would come next was up to Basilisk, whether it would be further aggression or a tense understanding.

"Speech"

The old basilisk has worshipped the ground Azure had stepped on. He'd given everything for a moment praise from his sire. He'd moulded his life around his father's image. That was before Azure had left. Had abandoned them. Before Basilisk had fallen in love, proposed to Hazel, and adopted a child. This child wouldn't bow so easily to Azure, nor did he think the older man deserved it. He had left them. HE HAD LEFT THEM.


But it was no easy thing to stand up to the man he had feared and adored in equal measures. It was a crossroads that came and went in a blink of an eye. He could stand down and fall to attention before his former Alpha, or he could grab hold of this path he forged for himself. The Azure he knew wouldn't approve of his fiance, of his tiny child. He would never, ever, give them up.


It was clear by azures manner that he had two choices; submit and fall into place, or challenge him. If there had been a third option, a middle ground, he might have taken it. Instead, the colossal giant of a wolf peeled his lips back over his teeth in a challenge. Egging his father on. "I'm not 'your boy' any longer father." he said, as he attempted to catch the paw his father raised to strike him

The audacity of the move, his son's jaws snapping at the air where Azure’s paw had been moments before, spoke volumes of the boldness - or perhaps the desperation - that had taken root in the boy's heart. Azure’s paw had retracted just in time, the precision of his own movements a testament to the seasoned warrior's finely honed reflexes.

“Trying to bite the paw that raised you?” Azure's voice thundered, a clear note of mockery threading through his growl. He moved then; a deliberate, predatory step forward to bring the men close enough together where Basilisk's hot breath could be felt between his whiskers. His son was taller, yes, but Azure carried the weight of years and the scars of countless battles - each one a visual reminder of the hardships he had experienced and overcome.

"Is this to be your moment of redeeming glory, son?"  Azure's words were like daggers, aimed to pierce through the veil of Basilisk's overinflated confidence. To force the jaws of rebellion to relinquish the respect the Fatalis man felt he deserved. "You may have outgrown my shadow, but have you outpaced your legacy of defeat?"

Az's voice did soften then, a dangerous lull in the storm, but his eyes remained as hard as steel. "Know this. No matter the breadth of your stride or the ferocity of your snarl, you will always be 'my boy.'" His lips peeled back in turn, revealing the formidable weaponry of his lineage. "But never has that shielded you from the consequences of defiance before, and it will not now."

"Speech"

“I don’t want glory” he snarled angrily at Azure. “I wanted my Dad. I hunted for you for months I knocked on pack doors, I searched everywhere. I searched the longest. I believed in you. But you were gone. The pack was devastated by a flood. Wolves died. Mum, my littermates. Everyone but Levi left Because you weren’t there!” he yelled.

All his father cared about was glory. He seemed so puffed up and self important, as if he hadn’t abandoned his family for a year. As if he hadn’t been gone for almost half Basilisk’ life now. His fancy words did nothing but further ignite the anger seething in Basilisk’s gut. He thought if his father ever returned home, the homecoming would be something spectacular. He didn’t account for his rage, his hopelessness. He had given up on Azure. He had known in his heart of hearts, that his Sire was dead. He had mourned for Azure.


"Speech"

Azure’s fierce exterior cracked for a moment, revealing a flash of the raw pain beneath. The pack had endured losses in his absence. Who? His mind raced to Hanako and a sudden surge of nausea threatened to choke him. Bas's littermates? Did he mean they died? The questions clawed at him, a rising tide of guilt and regret that he quickly dammed. With a hardened resolve, he shoved those thoughts aside, the turmoil within reflected in his cold, crazed eyes.

"What do you want me to say, Basilisk!?" The outburst tore from his throat, raw and laden with an anger that was as much a shield as it was a weapon. He turned from his son sharply, pacing with a restless energy, the embodiment of a volcanic eruption contained within flesh and fur. "You think I didn't know my absence would have consequences!?" He slammed his bear-like paws into the sand, sending cascades of it into the wind. "I did it for myself!" Again and again his claws raked wet furrows into the beach, a futile attempt to release the festering rage that threatened to consume him.  An inanimate target for the aggression he couldn't direct at Basilisk. "I've bled for every soul in this pack, sacrificed pieces of myself for the sake of everyone fucking else.!"

Azure's breaths came in heavy snorts, each exhale a cloud of heated frustration in the cool night time air. His scars - normally worn as badges of honor - now seemed like open wounds once more. "I know where my responsibilities lie. I'm the shield, I'm the sword - I'm the Warlord's Champion. But when I needed to heal, to grieve, where was my respite?" As he paced, his massive form seemed to wrestle with invisible foes, his movements betraying a conflict he couldn't articulate. His tail lashed, his muzzle wrinkled in hate, growls surged forth from the depths of his throat, each one more menacing than the last. Azure was the picture of a wolf on the brink of war, fighting for his life against the surge of feelings he could neither accept nor understand. "I was suffocating!"  His one good ear lay flat against his skull as he paced, each thunderous step a deliberate effort to control the maelstrom within. "I wore the scars for others, bled for others, and when I needed to bleed for myself, there was nothing left. I had to leave, to find a way to breathe again."

Azure spun back to face his son, eyes ablaze with a fierce energy that bordered on desperation. "You think you know loss? You think you know what it is to mourn?" His laugh was harsh, a grating sound devoid of humor. "The fury inside me would have destroyed us. Destroyed everything I’ve fought so hard to protect. Trust me Bas, you may think you know me, but you don't. Nobody does. You all know my mask, and you have no idea from what carnage it protects." His voice was a low growl, a threatening promise. He stopped and stood straight, his eyes burning with a fierce light, the sand around him scarred by his claws. "Now I'm back, not for glory, not for praise, but because this is my goddamn duty! And you have the audacity to stand there and accuse me, you ungrateful whelp!"

His snarl was a dangerous thing, full of teeth and promise and beginning to crescendo into a roar. "So, what’s it going to be, son? Do you think you can shoulder the burden, bear the scars, spill the blood I have and still stand tall?" Azure’s challenge was both an inferno of rage and an unspoken plea; a father's heart beneath the armor of the alpha, confronting the son who mirrored the tumult he'd fought to contain.

"If you truly believe I have failed you, then step forward. Show me the strength of your conviction. Prove to me - prove to the blood of our blood that you are more than just talk, more than just height and heated glares. Prove that you can wield the power that comes with our name, prove that you can stand in the storm and not be broken." He stood formidable, an immovable force, daring his son to step into the ring of fury he'd drawn around them in the sand.

Azure's challenge was a gauntlet thrown down, an invitation to a clash that was as much about venting his pent-up wrath as it was about reestablishing his place in not just the Armada, but in the eyes of his heir.

"Speech"

They were yelling now. Pent up frustration and stale fear spilling over. "So you-you what. Gave everything up and ran away?" He'd gone away to heal? He'd abandoned them without a word or warning. Coward. The word thrummed through Basilisk. You went to family to heal, you didn't slink away. You did that to die.


"You bled for yourself! For your ambitions! That's what drove you to go higher, to push further. Don't suddenly pretend it was heroic" he snarled angrily, confused by this version of his father. 


His father wanted someone to fight? Fine! "Prove you aren't a coward then!" He snarled at his father, leaping forward.

Azure's frustration peaked, his thoughts a whirlwind of incredulity and ire. How could Basilisk, his own flesh and blood, be so blind to the line that he had crossed? The very idea of retreat was abhorrent to Azure; his towering pride left no room for such weakness. Stand down? Never; no matter how much he might want to. Not while his son's defiance remained, poking and prodding at his very essence. With every word, every insolent gesture that Basilisk dared to display, he only solidified Azure's resolve. There would be no yielding, no surrender. Azure's authority was absolute, and now he would be forced to reaffirm it with tooth and claw.

His anger erupted, voice raw as he confronted his son with a torrent of unfiltered truths. "A coward?" Azure's offended roar was thunderous, a primal sound of fury and pain intermingled. "You stand there judging me, ignorant of the sacrifices I've made. Allow me to educate you."

As Basilisk launched forward, Azure sidestepped with a warrior's grace. His massive frame was still agile, battle-hardened muscles responding with instinctive precision. There was more his son needed to know and understand. It was the closest Azure could come to anything resembling an apology; an explanation.

"My ambition," He growled, his body hunkering low as he began to prowl in a calculated circle around his son, each step measured and deliberate. "morphed into something greater a long time ago. If power was my sole desire, I would've challenged your grandfather, claimed his title instead of the consolation prize of Champion."

With a swift motion, Azure lashed out, his powerful claws slicing through the air where Basilisk had been moments before. It was a warning, a display of the deadly force he wielded. "And when I finally held the crown? Did I cling to it with desperation, beg my father to retire? No, you stupid pup I relinquished it." He gave a bark of a laugh, but where there should have been humor instead was contempt - a sardonic chuckle that seemed to say, "You fool," without uttering a word.

A fleeting emotion passed over Azure's face, swiftly masked by a fierce snarl. "And if all I craved was ambition, Venom's offer would've been irresistible," Azure's chest rose and fell with what might have been a sigh. "She was my first love, not your mother. And she wanted me as her Emperor." No, not wanted. Needed, Venom had said. "I still remember the way she felt beneath me. The vulnerability in her eyes, the skip of her pulse as my fangs brushed past her ear." The fur along his spine felt a shudder and Azure laughed once more - feeling the weight of this secret crumble from his shoulders. This was information that he had not told a soul, and sharing it now was catharsis. Yes, son, I pinned our Empress to the ground of her den, and her body quickened in reply. She was ready to give herself to me and in turn to give me the world. And fuck, I wanted it." His tone carried a quality of manic desperation that did not reach his eyes - there in his gaze was only pain.

"But claiming that throne meant betraying everything else - abandoning the Armada, forsaking your mother, and breaking the pledge I had made to see her set free." Azure's voice broke, his muzzle wrinkling in disgust and self-loathing. "Hana was so much more than a slave. I saw her strength where no one else did, but in choosing her I lost my Empress. Everything changed."

With renewed conviction he shot forward once more, aiming his jaws in a swift lunge for his boy's cheek, but primed to recoil away from his son's retaliation should his bite miss.


"Speech"

His father had always driven him not to turn his back on a fight. Pushing forward had been rewarded, standing down punished. But now Azure didn't seem to want fight him for real, intent on telling him of old dalliance. He avoided Bas' first strike, and his son let him. So long as Azure avoided falling into a proper fight, Bas wouldn't push the offensive. He hated his father, but he loved him too.


He fell into a rhythm, stalking in opposite motions to his father, as Azure turned his energy into prowling. Bas grimaced as his father spoke of pinning venom down. Not something he wished to hear. But he saw the pain in his father too. He still didn't understand why his father had left. Why he'd given it all up to walk away. He didn't care about the abstract side-stepping his father did. Why did it seem that Azure wanted to tell him everything except why?


As Azure struck, Bas called his bluff. He didn't engage, but watched as the motion struck the air where he had been. Still, Azure avoided a full entanglement. 

"Was it worth it?" He asked softly instead. "Walking away, and losing mum. My siblings?" His voice was a whisper, without that first surge of rage to power it.


When Azure struck again, Basilisk misplaced it for another faint, and was punished with his father's fangs in his cheek. He snarled with rage, and unexpected pain as he aimed to hook a spurred leg behind his father's, in an attempt to catch his father's flesh on the spike.

Azure saw the conflict in Basilisk's eyes, the war between love and hatred, respect and rebellion. "Was it worth it?" The words hit harder than any physical blow could. They were an echo of the doubts that had haunted his every step since his departure.

The pain in Basilisk's voice yanked at the raw edges of his own buried emotions. "Worth it?" Azure's reply was a growl, tinged with a bitterness that came from a place of deep-seated regret.

As Basilisk's snarl morphed into a tangible threat, his leg arcing with the intent to wound, Azure recognized the precariousness of his position. Retreating was not an option; the spur was like a blade held to his flesh, promising deeper pain with any backward movement.

With grim resolve, Azure accepted the painful cost of engagement. The only way out was through. Resolutely, he bore the bite of Basilisk's spur and reared up, the movement dragging a painful path along his arm, leaving a raw, jagged laceration in its wake. Once his forelimbs were fully extended, he rose above the pain, towering to his full height, his arm now free from the spur's sting.

Positioned now in close quarters, Azure's formidable claws sought purchase, his bleeding arm thrown overtop his son's withers in an attempt to staunch the wound and force a grapple.

"Yes," he growled, the word forced from him amidst the clash of bodies and wills.


"Speech"

Azure had abandoned them. He had given them up, and showed no guilt for the pain he had caused in those he supposedly loved. Perhaps his Sire had never understood the meaning of the word. His father ignored his strike on his leg, his teeth cutting deep into the blue wolf’s cheek. His sire raised a paw, throwing it over him. Basilisk truly believed that in a grapple of strength, he would win. But he had forgotten the meaty size of his fathers bear-like paws. They slammed down on him, and his knees buckled.

In that moment of weakness, Azure pressed his advantage, and shoved Basilisk to the ground. He couldn’t remember the last time any one had overpowered him. His knees hit the cold earth, and pain pulsed through his body. Starting in his torn cheek, moving through his bleeding sides, and ending in his bruised and quaking knees. He lowered his head, sides breathing hard for the effort he had made in attempting to keep Azure at bay. “Bastard.” He whispered, voice angry and desolate.


"Speech"

Basilisk's resistance crumbled under Azure's unyielding force, his body sinking to the ground. Azure's jaws locked onto his son's scruff as he fell; a clear claim of authority - control regained. The victory, however, was hollow and echoed with unease. This harsh homecoming was not the one Azure had pictured.

His paw, quivering with suppressed fury, lifted momentarily, then thundered down into the sand beside Basilisk's head - not striking flesh, but further bloodying the sands regardless. The spray of his blood flung into the night air, splattering droplets upon his son's marked face. "Fuck!" Azure thundered, his voice ripping through the quiet of the beach in a release of pent-up frustration.

He lowered his head then, seeking to press his forehead firmly against that of his son's. The silence was oppressive, steadily eroding Azure's resolve as he searched for words that danced just beyond his reach. How could he voice regret without conceding defeat? His pride, too formidable a force, barred the way. Azure's teeth gritted, a growl brewing deep in his chest. Slowly his domineering posture began to fade, his shoulders starting to sag; the weariness in his spirit reflected plainly in his stance. He stepped back, creating distance to allow his son to stand.

"Hate me if you must," He relinquished. "I am tired of fighting to keep those who do not wish to be kept. Cast aside my name, my blood, my protection - you would not be the first to forsake me. Not even upon these very sands." Azure's gaze held the cold acceptance of one who had weathered abandonment before; remembering those who had once turned their backs on him, their presence as palpable as the early morning mist that had begun to curl around their feet.

"Speech"

As Basilisk reluctantly submitted to his father, he felt the older wolf press his crown against his own. The larger wolf let out a soft, pained sigh. A gush of air that brushed through the cool night. His cheek was ripped open, and bleed freely. He could feel the wound pulling any time his expression subtly shifted. Thewounds on his back were lesser, or at least more easily ignored.

“I don’t hate you” He whispered, his voice started out as a quiet thing. But it grew to a normal volume as he continued. “That would be easier, I think.” He didn’t look at his father. He didn’t want to know what he would see there. What pride Azure put before his family. ”I hate that you're not remorseful. That you don’t regret it. That you left when I needed you.” He had just been a child, who had barely stepped into the responsibilities of heir. Who was still learning who he was, when his father had vanished without a trace.

"Speech"

"I don't hate you," Basilisk had said, and it was like a punch to the gut, simple and direct. Azure grunted in acknowledgment, the sound rumbling deep in his throat.

"Regret is a poison," Azure muttered, his voice laced with a harsh tang of bitterness. "It gnaws at your insides, saps at your strength. I cannot - will not - let it bring me to heel." A slight twitch of his muzzle betrayed his inner turmoil, yet his jaws remained stoically set, a bulwark against the tide of emotions threatening to spill. "... But that doesn’t mean I’m blind to the losses."

"The moments lost... They're like scars," He paused, reaching into a small pouch strapped around his hind leg. From it's meagre depths Azure pulled a single bandage - a practical tool for a wound destined to become yet another scar. He began to wrap it tightly around the gash, each turn of the cloth a physical manifestation of his resolve to endure. "Most of the time they are silent, but there are moments when they pull at you, a reminder that they’re as much a part of you as your fur and your teeth." He continued, eyes on the task, voice steady. "Each day I stayed away, each notch on my hide, it's another moment that time won’t let me forget. Not always painful, but permanently etched."

With the bandage secured, Azure flexed his arm, testing the tightness of the wrap. "If I am to bear these scars, then I accept them as they are - not as regrets to wallow in, but as marks of a life lived." His paw returned to the sand and he exhaled, a sound that carried the weight of his exhaustion. "They are the marks of survival, of battles faced, and a life that continues despite them."

"Speech"

Basilisk couldn’t deny the frustration he felt at the twists and turns of his fathers words. The Azure he remembered had been straightforward. Whatever his father had been through, it had changed him. All he wanted was answers, and what few he had managed to pry lose were grim. His father did not regret the loss of Hana, or his siblings. Basilisk did and he wasn’t sure that they could reconcile with this gaping difference in opinion between them.

“Then why did you leave, Dad? What kept you away?” He asked, voice quiet. More subdued now that Azure had beaten him down. He had come to think of himself as stronger. The size he had grown into had given him a sense of strength that his father had immediately denied. Quieter still, Basilisk asked the most important question of them all. “What now?”


"Speech"

The conversation seemed to spin endlessly, a frustrating loop that Azure might have resented if he hadn't understood the depths of Basilisk's confusion. His son sought clear-cut answers from a wolf who was simply not equipped to offer them. "I've explained myself as much as I intend to." Azure's voice was terse, a growl underlining each word. The corner of his scarred lip curled slightly in warning. How could Basilisk not see? His actions over the year before he'd left... they had threatened to tear the pack apart.

Azure did not make a habit of repeating himself, but to end the discussion now, he would make an exception. "If I had not made space between myself and the pack... I would have destroyed it. Have your eyes been closed, all this time?" Disappointment seeped into his tone, a bitter substitute for the guilt Basilisk seemed to crave. "The feud between the Armada and the Pirates had nothing to do with your grandfather - Sparrow may have lit the fuse, but I fanned those flames." His curved claw raked a hasty line through the wet, coagulated sands.

"I trespassed upon their lands not once, but twice. I justified my actions as protective measures - a preemptive strike, wielded as a shield - when they were anything but. They was reckless provocation. If my actions brought them back upon our doorstep? Good; another excuse to bloody their shore." Drawing another line in the sand, he continued.

"My hate for my youngest siblings was intensifying by the day. After all, it was in giving them life that your grandmother began to lose hers." His sneer deepened as he recalled the disdain he had felt for his mother's last litter, the resentment that had festered like a wound. The line he drew this time was deeper, more aggressive. "Half a litter of broken, useless brats, unworthy of the Fatalis name. I wished them dead - I still do." Kite had been lucky that all he broke the day that she challenged him was her toes.

"And then there was Mojito." Azure's tone hardened, the memory of the fight still vivid and raw. "I realized my mistake too late, we were already trading blows. A healer, a loyal member of our pack, and I would have seen him shackled." A scornful, self-deprecating chuckle slipped from his lips. How foolish he had been. "The father of Asla's child, and I sought to grind him beneath my paw. In that moment, it became clear -  I was not acting in the interest of the Armada."

Azure’s gaze fixated on the lines etched in the sand, his grimace growing more pronounced as he contemplated just how many more sins he could lay bare across this sandy canvas. He had consciously avoided mentioning his sporadic bouts with alcohol or the desperate, insecure choice he had made to drug his mate. These were not secrets withheld due to Basilisk's maturity or their relationship as father and son, but rather because of the uncomfortable light they shed on Azure himself. Violence was something he could admit quite easily; it was nothing new to Basilisk. Weaknesses, however, were much harder to confess to.

After a moment of heavy silence, Azure realized it was time to steer the conversation towards its end. He cleared his throat, his voice emerging rough yet resolute. "We could stand here all night tallying my faults, but it won’t change the past. It won’t erase the scars, mine or yours."

He took a deep breath, steeling himself, his eyes briefly meeting Basilisk's before turning away to gaze out towards the sea. "I’ve given you as much an explanation as you are owed. Accept it, or don't." Azure's word was firm, a clear sign that his willingness to continue the topic had been thoroughly drained. "It is my turn for questions. Tell me of the flood." Basilisk had only touched on the topic, had only given his father enough of a description to be able to assume the worst. "Wolves died. Mum, my littermates."

"Speech"

He hadn't known the full extent of his father's exports. He had not been privy to much of that information, but he was not entirely surprised to hear it. “One of the youngest siblings left Armads to join them. It was… messy.” He said softly, knowing his father would be out of the loop for much of it. In fact; “Sparrow stepped down, the pack is called Raiders Hallow now.” He didn't know too much about why. Maybe something to do with Recluse… “I think something about Recluse's death affected her” his grandfather had said that they both wanted revenge.


He startled as Azure mentioned the siblings being the course of his grandmother's death. He'd heard no such thing! “...what do you mean?” He asked. Was Azure placing the blame on them, or had he spilled a secret the rest weren't privy to? His father owning up to his mistakes was also surprising, but also… comforting. It wasn't an apology, but perhaps it was close enough to one. “I accept it, and thank you. I'll try to catch you up as best I can… sir.” He said, letting himself at last fall back into the role of dutiful son. Perhaps forgiveness was coming to him. “There were rains, I don't know the full details but I believe they melted snow further up the mountains. Suddenly, it was washing down on the pack. A lot of wolves were injured. Ruga, Keahi, they died. Mum… took it as a chance to leave. I spoke to her about it” he has also lied to the Warlord about it. “My siblings have been missing for a while, other than Levi. Sirius has been trying to fill your position for a while, he's been feeling… old. He found a new mate. I… I have a mate and a kid now, too.” it felt hard to share that last secret with Azure.

Azure was exceedingly thankful that his son did not push further. He exhaled sharply, a terse breath that helped dispel some of the tension that had accumulated. The return of Basilisk’s respect had allowed Azure to reclaim his familiar mantle of authority. He nodded slightly, slowly settling his haunches into the sand - the gesture one of a leader preparing to absorb vital information, much like he would from a trusted advisor. His thoughts briefly wandered to the role of diplomat. Who held it now, if not Hana?

Basilisk did not hold back nor cushion the facts, beginning with hard truth that one of Azure's own family members had defected. He blinked, feeling the knowledge like yet another scar upon his hide. How had Sirius had allowed this? The assault of information continued - Recluse was dead, Sparrow stepped down from her role. When he heard about the transformation of the Pirates into Raiders, a bitter thought crossed his mind. "Maybe I shouldn't have left — perhaps I should have let my fury run its course." His lip curled in a mix of regret and residual anger. "Which one was it?" he asked, his voice a low growl. Inwardly, he suspected Kite, considering her departure wouldn’t be much of a loss. Azure had to know which of his newest litter of siblings no longer had the right to call him brother.

At his son's hesitant confusion, Azure's massive head shook in disappointment once more. "Had it not occurred to you?" He probed, fixing his son with a penetrating stare. "Did you not wonder about the coincidence of her death not two seasons after their birth? They either broke her body or they broke her mind - they were the death of her, one way or another." He shook out his pelt, as if to physically cast off the anger that surged at the mention of his mother's passing and the role his hated siblings surely had in it.

As Basilisk recounted the flood, Azure's imagination conjured harrowing images. He envisioned the raging waters cascading down the mountain, a torrential deluge invading the valley they called home. He pictured the familiar terrain transformed, becoming a battleground where water clashed with earth. He could almost hear the frantic yelps of wolves caught unawares, their desperate attempts to find footing against the relentless push of the flood. Wolves being slammed against rocks, the panic and terror palpable in their eyes. The coldness of the water seemed to seep into his bones, a phantom sensation that made his fur stand on end.

"I should have been there." he found himself murmuring, the words slipping out like a confession. It was as close to an admission of fault as Azure could muster.

Basilisk did not let up, barely giving Azure a moment to absorb one devastating detail before moving onto the next. The news of Sirius replacing their mother struck a raw nerve, bringing Azure’s resolve to instantly harden. He was thankful that Basilisk had used the topic to express a related secret of his own, one that caught him so off guard that Az had great reason to not acknowledge the mention of Sirius nor his betrayal. "You? A mate? A kid? Already?" The words tumbled out, his tone gruff, an attempt to mask his surprise and the turmoil of emotions stirred by the succession of disclosures.

"Speech"

“Dread” Basilisk said. He didn’t know the boy very well, but his betrayal didn’t sit right with him. It had certainly come out of the left field. It sounded to Bas as if Azure wasn’t certain about Zee’s death, and was placing the blame on siblings he did not want. He could understand it, in a roundabout way. It was hard not to place blame where he could find it when he had lost Azure. When he had thought his father was dead.

I should have been there Basilisk did not… disagree. It seemed safer not to comment, considering him and Azure were finally speaking cordially now. He didn’t want to ruin it so soon. “The rebuilding is well on its way” He said instead.

“...Yes.” Basilisk said, still hesitant. Weary of his fathers judgement. “Hazel. She’s been moving up in the world, pulling her weight. She’s turned into quite a fighter” He said, a little defensively. “My kid is called Spider Fatalis.” and despite adopting the kid not being his idea, he had grown protective of the child.


"Speech"