Written for basketballpoetsociety 's Challenge 86 - Special Request Round, filling takaomine's request #3 - "AoKise monsterboy (e.g. ghoul/vampire/werewolf/etc) where Kise's the monster".

Everyone knew you were supposed to stay indoors on full moon nights.

Even Daiki knew that, actually.

It wasn't like he'd meant to doze off at the basketball court, and not wake up until it was full dark out and the moon was up. He'd even forgotten the moon cycles, since he was rarely anywhere but sleeping at school or at home, and it hadn't been til he was looking at the sky and specifically at the moon that he'd felt his blood freeze in sudden realisation.

He knew that the worst thing to do was run, since the sound of running prey could attract wolves. So instead he was walking quickly as he could; it was eerie, being out on full moon nights, where the streets were more abandoned than they ever would be on any night which wasn't a full moon. Daiki would love it, if he wasn't actually freaking the fuck out that he'd become one of those statistics they told you about in school, victims of werewolf attacks who were too stupid or irresponsible to stay safe.

The worst part was that he knew if he was going to get attacked, he wouldn't know until it was too late to do anything about it. All the things they taught you, things that adult werewolves came in and patiently explained once a year until you were old enough for the lesson to stick, was how quiet they were on the prowl, how you were lucky if you were only turned instead of killed. They said that you could be smelled from a great distance and a pack could track for ages without being detected by humans.

Daiki checked his phone; according to his call log, Satsuki had been ringing relentlessly until around the time the sun would have set, at which point he assumed she'd stopped as not to draw attention to his stupid, sleeping body.

He was only a few blocks from home and starting to relax a little when he heard the padding noise of paws.

He was running before he knew it, and he was fairly certain he could hear a howl behind him, and shit fuck why am I such an idiot I'm so close to home shit

He chanced a look behind him – there were two. They were big mean looking things, rapidly gaining on him.

When he turned back to face in front of him, there was another one, even bigger than the other two, and he almost stopped in horror, but something in him – perhaps his sleeping animal instincts – told him this one wasn't part of the same pack as the two chasing him, and it bounded right past him, snarling behind him as he continued to run.

He looked back again when he realised he was no longer being followed, and saw the larger one had started fighting with the pair that had been chasing him, but it really wasn't any of his business, so he didn't stop running until he reached home.

He was never sleeping outside anywhere but school ever again.

That was the first time Daiki encountered the wolf, but it wasn't the last. Satsuki scolded him something shocking the next morning before school for being so stupid, but she hadn't ratted him out to either of their parents, so all was well that ended well, Daiki guessed.

The next time he saw the wolf, he was just running a little bit late home over the summer break. He'd gotten caught up looking at a magazine of Mai-chan, and the clerk at the convenience store had asked if he would need to wait for a lift home, since they were closing and it was almost dark.

The moon had only risen a little bit ago – he wasn't that far away from home, a five minute run at best – when the beast slunk out of the alley next to him.

Daiki froze.

He didn't know average wolf sizes, but now that he was getting a good look at this one, he realised it was huge, grey and golden-brown fur and yellow eyes that were staring… disapprovingly?

What the hell.

The wolf moved closer, sniffing at him, and he leapt away – he was not looking to get bitten and turned, thank you.

The beast huffed and growled, but it wasn't aggressive the way Daiki had heard it last time when the wolf had saved him, so he tried to calm his heart.

It whined and flattened its ears at him as he stood there, and somehow he got the message.

"Yeah, yeah, I'm going home already. You scared the shit out of me, what do you expect?"

It lowered and then butted its head against his leg, and he wasn't dumb enough to swat at it and provoke it, but Daiki was very unsettled by this werewolf's behaviour as it trotted beside him on the way home.

He almost wasn't surprised when it turned up on his doorstep in the middle of that winter.

Daiki was home alone that night – his parents were overseas – and he'd been flicking through channels on the TV when he heard a scratching and whining at the door.

It was probably a really dumb idea to go answer the door and let it in, but then, Daiki had never been very smart, and when he looked out the window and recognised the werewolf on his porch, he kind of figured that it'd already had two chances to kill him, so it probably wasn't going to.

It was limping, was the first thing he noticed as it padded past him. Had it gotten into a fight? It wasn't bleeding…

He closed the door after it with a sigh and returned to the boredom of lying on the couch. The werewolf followed him, alarmingly puppy-like even with its limp. Daiki could only hope it didn't have the urge to chew on everything like puppies did.

The beast's heavy head came to rest on his stomach, and looked at him piteously.

"What do you want?" Daiki grumbled. "I don't even know who you are."

It looked sulky as it got off him and curled up on the floor. Daiki found its concentrated gaze on the television screen weird. He'd brushed up on his werewolf knowledge since he'd last run into this strange one, and all of the standard education materials usually said werewolves in their wolf form were pretty instinct based, with very little, if any, human thought remaining.

Having said that, standard werewolf education didn't cover any of the behaviours this particular beast had displayed so Daiki was pretty damn lost.

It was hard not to think of it as an overly large and friendly dog, with the way it was curled up quietly on his floor, occasionally licking at the injured leg. Daiki gave into the desire to pat it about half an hour after it arrived, and for one heart-stopping moment when it jumped in surprise, he was sure it was about to accidentally bite him in its fright. But then it settled back down and closed its eyes. Its fur was surprisingly soft to the touch.

The werewolf probably hadn't intended to fall asleep on his floor; but then, Daiki hadn't intended to fall asleep on his couch instead of in his bed that night, either.

He woke to the frantic muttering of a familiar voice, and blinked his eyes open to the sight of a very pink and very naked Kise sitting on the floor of his living room.

There was a long moment where Daiki's sleep-addled brain didn't put the pieces together, and he asked, "Where's the wolf?"

Kise looked like he didn't know whether to laugh or cry, and that was when Daiki's brain caught up and he jerked wide awake.

"What the fuck?"

Kise curled his knees into his chest. "I would prefer not to have this conversation naked if it's all the same to you, Aominecchi."

Almost thoughtlessly, Daiki's gaze flicked downward.

"That was a hint to get me clothes to borrow, Aominecchi, not for you to look at my junk."

That was a really good excuse to escape before Kise noticed he'd gone a bit pink in the face.

Fifteen minutes later they were sitting across from each other at the table. Kise seemed to have recovered; well, he'd never had much body-shame in the first place, but Daiki still felt flustered.

"I would have thought you'd have questions," Kise finally said.

"You're a werewolf."

"Not a question, but I'll take it. Yes, I'm a werewolf."

"Have you always been a werewolf?" There might have been a tinge of hysteria in that question. Kise pouted.

"Of course I haven't always been a werewolf; I was bitten like everyone else. Come on, even you know that, Aominecchi."

"No, I mean, like, at junior high!"

"Oh." Kise paused. "Well, yeah. I'm pretty sure everyone else knew? At least, I know it's on my medical records, so the coaches knew, and Akashicchi knew because he's Akashicchi, and Midorimacchi and Momocchi figured it out real quick, and I think Kurokocchi figured it out but he never said anything."

Daiki stared at him.

"But…"

He shook his head. "Okay, wait, so. Why are you here?"

Kise shrugged. "The pack left me behind last night because I was injured so I guess I must have decided to come and keep the rest of the pack company?"

That's right, Kise's leg was fucked up at the Winter Cup, and the wolf last night had been limping—

"Okay, wait; we'll come back to that weird pack thing because I'm so confused, but after I get the tape."

"Ah, no, it's okay; I'll just do it when I get home."

"Fuck off Kise, you're not walking home on an untaped injury."

Kise slumped over the table. "Can we please finish this first? My leg can wait while I'm sitting down."

"I'll forget if I wait," Daiki muttered on his way to the bathroom. He always had tape in there.

He chucked it at Kise's face when he returned. "Okay, explain this pack thing."

Kise caught it and busied himself with it, rolling up the sweatpants that Daiki had lent him to get at his leg. "Oh, I don't really know when or how it happened, but sometime at Teikou everyone started smelling like pack, which was kind of cool, because it makes you safe from me, I guess. And wolves are pack animals and I probably got lonely without them last night, so since the wolf knows how to get here now, because I had to keep coming over here to look after your stupid ass – by the way, now that you're aware, what the fuck were you thinking, sleeping outside on a full moon night, Aominecchi?"

"This isn't about me!"

Kise rolled his eyes and sat up straight, abandoning the taping job on his leg to look him in the eye. "Seriously, Aominecchi. What would you have done if Momocchi hadn't called me to tell me she thought you were asleep somewhere unsafe? What if I hadn't been able to get close enough before I changed to be able to smell you out? Those wolves I fought off were looking for a kill, not a packmate."

"But you were there, so it's fine, right? I'm not so dumb as to make the same mistake twice."

Kise huffed and turned back to his leg. "Whatever."

Daiki wished he had something to throw at Kise. "Not like you're that much smarter than me, idiot."

You got bitten hung awkwardly on the end of his sentence. Kise sighed and continued taping.

"I was young," was all he said. "It was an accident. I was a very energetic child and my sisters were also a handful. My parents have never stopped blaming themselves for not keeping a closer eye on me."

He tore at the end of the tape and looked his leg over. Then he chucked the roll back at Daiki. "Any other questions?"

Probably most of Daiki's questions were inappropriate; things like have you ever bitten or killed someone accidentally?

"…if you're a werewolf, why don't you have animal instincts?"

For a moment, Kise looked startled. Then he started to laugh, tipping his head back and relaxing against the chair.

"It's always about basketball in the end with you, isn't it?" He looked at Daiki, one of his genuine smiles spread across his face. It'd been a while since he'd seen it, Daiki realised. It still made him reel back, overpowering in its magnetism. "Most people ask about killing and fighting and biting and mating, but no, Aominecchi asks why don't you have animal instincts in basketball."

Daiki threw the roll of tape back at Kise's face; it hit him this time, but Daiki was fairly certain that Kise had let it hit him, and that just made him feel grumpier.

"I'm not really sure why," Kise finally answered. "I've never thought about it." He stood then, testing out his leg. "I should go home. My parents will worry if I don't come back soon."

Daiki stood up too, then and followed Kise to the door. They simultaneously realised he had no shoes.

"…bring them back," Daiki muttered, nudging his trainers at Kise.

A few days later Kise came back with his clothes, shoes and some of his own clothes.

"Just in case," was his reasoning but somehow Daiki had a feeling the clothes were probably going to be more necessary than Kise was letting on.