Do de de de doooh…
Flash-forward time change swirly thingie!
…
Just read…
We spent the next few days doing all that typical human infants would do.
We slept.
We ate.
We… spent our time learning all about the world around us.
We were fascinated with each new discovery within our tiny den. For example, we discovered that our tail splits as we grew older. We spent (I'm guessing here) a whole week in the dark. Brother and I constantly stayed near each other. It was as if each of us was joined to the same tail. We rarely spoke unless we were spoken to. Brother and I didn't really need to speak to each other then. We were too busy playing games. Brother's favorite game was wrestling. We both loved that game. However, Mother never let us play it unless Conleth was around. My favorite game was similar to what you humans would call 'hide and seek'. I'd always win. I didn't know why then. Guess now, it's blatantly obvious.
Mother nursed us, just like any normal Ninetales mother would do.
However, I was rarely satisfied by the amounts she would let me have.
It really wasn't fair that Brother filled up so much faster than I did.
That day while nursing us, Mother yelped.
Now something tasted funny about the milk she was giving us. I didn't like the taste, so I spat it out.
Absentminded about the noise Mother made, Brother kept on nibbling at her.
Mother continued to yelp.
"OW! Let go of me!"
She then knocked Brother off of her. Brother either didn't understand that Mother was in pain or he didn't care. He pawed his way back under her.
Mother yelled again, "Let go of me you, YIN!"
Mother hit Brother away from her again. Mother stood up fully now, dripping red somethings from three places. Mother's red eyes pierced the dark to look at me. She thought that I was the one that did it.
I dropped my head in apology, Brother stood up next to me and did the same.
"Topaz are you alright," Conleth came running, "I heard screaming."
"It… they bit me."
"We're sorry," I said, "we didn't mean to hurt Mama."
Neither one of us wanted to say what had happened. Mother didn't have the same problem that we did.
"She bit me and then she came back to bite me again."
Knowing who really did what, Brother lowered his head further.
Only Conleth and I noticed that he had done so.
Conleth then looked at the damage that we had caused.
"It doesn't look that bad," Conleth caused a fire to appear under mother's belly. Even in the dark, I could see that the wounds as they vanished entirely.
"So they're finally teething," he smiled.
"Doesn't that seem a little bit fast to you?"
"Nonsense," Conleth sighed, "another day or two and they'll be able to have their first Rattata."
"You better start with something with less blood," Mother growled, "I can't bare to do that again."
"Sweet Topaz, Arceus knows if I could feed them myself, I would," Conleth licked behind her ear, "please bare with the pain for just a little while longer."
"No, I can't, not even for…," Mother stopped talking. Them having wordless conversations happened so often that we thought of it as the norm.
"If you wont, then you collect the berries instead," Conleth cooed as a joke.
Unfortunately, Mother took him up on his offer.
"I'll be back soon then," Mother left us alone with Conleth.
He turned to us in a way that made us feel like he was bored.
"So you're both teething now?"
As usual, we didn't answer him.
"Well, if you two want to play, go ahead," Conleth laid down next to the wall, "I wont stop you."
He obviously wanted us to wrestle each other. Brother liked to fight, but I really wasn't in the mood for it.
"Leave me alone Brother. I'm too hungry."
"I'm hungry too, Yin."
"What did you say," Conleth snapped his head up. Brother and I only stared at him, too scared to speak to him.
"Answer me for once," Conleth's red eyes pierced the darkness, "Did I hear you call her something?"
For the first time in our short lives, I wanted to go back to the egg.
"Did your mother name you that?"
"No…"
"Then where did you hear that ter…," Coneth turned his head towards the exit, "that Backbite. How dare she do that." Coneth stood up to leave.
"Leave Mama alone," I ran to tackle Conleth.
Brother followed my lead.
Despite how Mother treated us, we never liked how Conleth spoke to her.
Conleth must have thought that what we were doing was cute or something.
He laughed at us, "you two are a lifetime too early to face me in battle."
He was right, we had caused more damage to ourselves than we did to him.
Already given up, I teared up to cry. Brother wasn't done, but he didn't like it when I cried.
He already walked up to me to give me a comforting lick and nuzzle.
"You both need a lot more practice," Conleth was teasing us, "but since you're both so determined then I'll stay here. Go ahead and attack me with all you've got."
We continued to stare at him.
"Don't worry, I wont fight back unless I have to."
"Too strong," I whined.
"As I said, don't worry," Conleth laid back down, "I love Topaz and you both too much to cause you unnecessary harm."
Brother nudged me to go to the other side of the den.
I followed him and we laid down for a nap before mother got back.
Brother took a few moments to lick me in that loving way that Conleth did for Mother.
"I've got a plan," he whispered into my ear.
"Wont work," I said flat and blunt.
"But you haven't even heard it yet."
"But if you tell me then he'll hear it too," I said quietly, knowing full well it didn't matter how loudly I spoke, "we're in the whispering spot."
"What's a whispering spot," Brother whispered.
"It's an area were one will be able to hear even the slightest of whispering from all the way across the den," Conleth whispered causing Brother's headfur to rise out of fright.
I chuckled because he looked silly.
"That's not funny," Brother yelled at me or Conleth (I couldn't tell), "how long have you known about the whispering spot, Sis?"
"It's how I beat you in (hide 'n seek)," I wagged my twin tails.
"No fair! It's hard enough to find you with your fur so dark!"
"But you're bigger than me when we wrestle."
"Is that true?" Conleth had interrupted our argument.
We gave him our usual response. Conleth stood up and shortened the distance that was between him and us. He lowered his face just outside of my reach.
"You are oddly smaller than your brother. Haven't you been eating enough?"
We both glared at him at the mentioning of food.
"Has Topaz been starving you too?"
"Of course Mama hasn't," Brother spoke out of turn.
Conleth didn't even acknowledge that he said anything.
He continued to stare at me, waiting for my answer.
Instead of saying anything, I curled myself up away from Conleth.
"I can still see you," Conleth grinned.
"Don't care. I'm tired."
"Well then, I'm satisfied," Conleth chuckled, "I've gotten four words out of each of you."
Both of us realized that we had spoken directly to him.
We stared at each other again, our eyes cursing that we slipped.
"Your mother should be back soon," Conleth looked at the exit, "Until then, why don't we all curl up and have a nice nap together, like a normal fami…"
We had already disappeared from his sight.
"How did they do that…?"
Was the last thing that we heard after a long silence and before falling into a deep sleep.
It's as if we knew this was going to be the last good nap that we'd have for a long, long while.
Well, loosing the kits on the first day of babysitting is not a sign of good parenting skills.
You can go to the next chapter if you like.
Or Review.
Or both.
