Trevor hated spiders. He really, really hated spiders. It made him squeal like a piglet when a spider took him by surprise, and then he would yell "SPIDER! KILL IT! KILL IT!" The only thing he hated worse than spiders was his parents fighting. It would always start out as a "talk". They would walk away after one asked the other for a talk, and they would come back with cuts and bites. Granted, they were small marks; their parents always stopped before something really bad happened. It seems to kill Trevor and his siblings though.

After one of their fights Viridian would run off and cry, Dillon would curse under his breath, Payton would be Mr. Sunshine as usual and comfort Viridian, and Trevor would simply ignore it. It wasn't worth crying, cursing, anything really. It did get upsetting though; especially cense it was usually over Maria.

Ah, Maria. How Trevor missed his best friend Maria. How often he wished that spring would come early. The others were the same; Sid missed playing with the mini Diego, Manny and Ellie simply hoped that everything would go back to normal once she got back, Mina barely remembers her, the possum twins became scarily quiet when she left, and no one dares to bring it up in front of Nelida and Diego.

Truth was he'd rather have spiders all over him than have his parents fight. To him there was nothing to fight about, but he overheard them once…

"What's the matter with you?" his father yelled, "You never say anything! You knew we would have cubs, you knew one of them was going to see the future, and yet you wouldn't tell me a damn thing about it!"

"Why do I have to tell you everything?"

"I have a right to know! They're my cubs too!"

"Hardly! You don't even talk to them half of the time! Ever since Maria left--"

"She left because of your damn wolfs!"

"You don't own me, Diego! I'm not your personal crystal ball."

That's when Trevor ran for it. He never mentioned it, and tried to forget about it. It was hard for a family to stay together when they couldn't even look at each other without blowing up. Finally someone spilled. It wasn't him, it wasn't one of his brothers, or his sister, and it wasn't Manny, Sid, Ellie… It was little Mina.

It was another cold day, another day for Sid to start a beautiful fire. It was so calm, peaceful, and quiet. That was until roars and screams could be heard through the trees. At first it was ignored, but poor Mina could hold it in no longer. Silently, with an angry look on her face that would scare the living daylights out of a wolf, she stomped into the woods and into the clearing where Diego and Nelida were fighting.

Everyone followed; making sure Mina wasn't trying to commit suicide. The tigers stopped and looked up at Mina, who was now old enough to tower over them.

"What's wrong with you?!" she yelled. "Can't you see that this fight is STUPID? That you're tearing your own family apart from fighting over a small disagreement? Don't you ever see Viridian running away crying? Or how about Payton cutting himself? Dillon growing into an ass 'cause all he sees these days is you two being ass holes? Trevor having nightmares?"

Diego looked down guiltily, Nelida followed suit by looking away from the young shemmoth and tearing.

Mina took a deep breath and lowered her voice. "Look, whatever the problem is, don't take it out on each other. It's not worth fighting over."

That was it. It was done. They never fought again. Trevor thanked Mina about a thousand times, because now all he had to worry about were spiders.

The sky was dark. All there was in the sky tonight were tiny, crystal like stars, covering the darkness like a silver blanket. A shooting star ran across the sky, leaving a small trail behind it and then disappearing completely. A wolf howled in the distance, then another; a beautiful duet by two, completely in love, wolfs.

Nelida sighed, letting out a hot stream of air from her mouth. She enjoyed looking out into the sky at night, especially from the side of a cliff to see the darkened ground below. Her ear twitched as she heard snow crunch from behind her.

"I hope she's not completely mad at me." A sad thought said in her mind.

"I'm not." She whispered, even though she knew Diego couldn't hear her.

He came up beside her and cleared his throat awkwardly. Nelida smiled.

"No. I'm not completely mad at you." She said quietly. "Mina was right. It was a stupid fight. I'm sorry."

Diego nodded, "It was stupid. You shouldn't be apologizing, I should. I'm sorry Nell."

Nelida shook her head, "We were both acting stupid. I needed to apologize just as much as you did."

They were silent for a moment, taking in the beautiful night sky. Nelida placed her head on Diego's shoulder, sighing blissfully.

"It's beautiful isn't it?" she whispered.

"Yes you are." Diego said cheekily, receiving a chuckle from Nelida.

"You're so corny." She said, "I had a vision earlier." She admitted.

Diego nodded, "You don't have to tell me." He said quietly.

"I want to." Nelida said, "Maria's coming back in a few days. She and Avnar learned how to control fire, water, and plants."

"That's good." He said happily.

"That's not all though." She added gravely, "Someone's planning to kidnap her. Use her as bait and kill me."

Diego sighed, "You fortune tellers can't get out of trouble can you?"

"Apparently not. Fortunately I didn't see if his plan worked or not. So we might just win this." Nelida whispered.

He nodded, "Okay. We just need to make sure that Maria is watched over."

"Yeah." Nelida replied sleepily.

Diego smiled and nuzzled against the side of her head for a moment, she returned the favor and purred lightly. After a moment they separated.

"Come on. Let's head back." Nelida suggested.

Diego nodded, and together they returned to the cave. As they lay down together, Diego's head on top of Nelida's, Manny smiled thoughtfully. Thank God Mina was as smart as her mother.

I liked writing this chapter. Sad, angry, and romantic all in one chapter. Plus, I HATE SPIDERS! KILL IT! KILL IT! *running away from big spider my parents called Ted.*