Yay! This story got followed and favourited! And it got a review! Thank you very much to Pancake; I'm so glad you like Duman/Gantlos! They're my favourite couple!

'I'm starting to get the feeling that this cat has absolutely no idea where it's going,' Gantlos grumbled as the unlikely alliance wandered down what would likely turn out to be the twelfth dead-end street that day.

'As much as I hate to agree with Gantlos - and believe me, I really, truly hate to agree with Gantlos - I think he might be right,' Stella said. 'We've been wandering around the city for hours, and there's been no sign of Duman, smugglers, animals, or a decent latte!' Roxy rolled her eyes. Gantlos's friend was missing, so she could see why he might not be being super pleasant to be around, but Stella was just complaining, and it was kinda getting on her nerves. Apparently, she wasn't the only one.

'Are you serious?' Gantlos asked incredulously, and everyone tensed. Gantlos and Stella definitely did not get along, and it seemed that any time one of them opened their mouth, the other had something standoffish to say about it. 'A decent latte? Duman's missing and you're talking about coffee?' Anagan tried futilely to defuse the situation.

'Gantlos, don't overreact, she was just-' He was cut off by Stella.

'Yes, I am. Surprising as it may be, this is not how I planned on spending my Tuesday! And, by the way, you should just be grateful that we're helping you at all! Believe it or not, we're not an evil wizard search-and-rescue team!'

'Stella…' Flora tried, but Stella ignored her.

'Y'know, technically, Duman being out of play is actually in our favour!' That was the last straw for Gantlos, and the blonde wizard clenched his fists and prepared to knock Stella off her feet with seismic waves. Stella instantly transformed in response.

'Gantlos!' Anagan lunged forward and forcibly restrained his friend. 'Calm down!'

'Solar Sto-'

'Stella!' Flora grabbed the sun fairy's arm. 'Stop!' She glared at the two blondes. 'Both of you!'

'You guys seriously need to chill!' Musa ordered, stepping between Gantlos and Stella.

'He started it!' Stella protested.

'Stella,' Bloom said firmly. 'Transform back. Now.' Stella pouted, but changed back to her human form.

'Gantlos.' Ogron put a hand on Gantlos's shoulder. 'Relax. Dispel your magic.' Gantlos glared at his leader, and Anagan gently pushed his arm back down to his side.

'Gantlos, just take a deep breath and calm down. Like it or not, we're working with the Winx, and you need to not blast them.' Gantlos growled something in a language Roxy didn't know, but he took a few strained breaths through gritted teeth and dispelled his seismic waves.

'Fine.' Gantlos's tone and tense body-language indicated that it was decidedly not fine, but everyone breathed a sigh of relief nonetheless. The cub looked up at Roxy with big, confused eyes.

'Why are they fighting?' Roxy sighed and scooped the cub into her arms.

'It's complicated, little one.' She scratched his ears and the cub growled softly and nestled into her, his eyes falling shut.

'Ohh…no. No, no, no.' Gantlos folded his arms. 'Is that cat seriously taking a nap?' The cub opened his eyes and looked at Gantlos nervously.

'I'm tired…' Gantlos rolled his eyes.

'Yeah…With all the not-finding-Duman you've been doing, you must be exhausted.' Stella glared at him.

'As far as I know, you weren't doing any better at finding Duman. Maybe you should be a little more appreciative of the cub.' Gantlos scowled at Stella.

'Maybe you should shut up.' Stella gasped.

'How dare you!'

'Enough!' yelled Bloom. 'Quit it, the pair of you! You're acting like three-year-olds!' Stella and Gantlos both started to object, but Bloom held up a hand. 'I don't care! I have had it!' She turned to look at Gantlos. 'Gantlos, I know you're worried about Duman, but arguing with Stella is only going to delay finding him.' Gantlos looked away guiltily. Bloom turned to Stella. 'And you, Stella! You have been complaining this whole time! Yes, I'm aware that this isn't how we all planned on spending our day; I'm not sure anyone plans on spending a day wandering around a city following a tiger cub with an admittedly flawed sense of direction, but nobody else is complaining.' Stella looked down at the ground.

'Sorry, Bloom.'

'We've been at this for hours,' Flora said gently. 'We're all getting pretty tired, and, I don't know about the wizards, but none of us have eaten yet today. I suggest we head back to the loft, take stock of the situation, and get some food.' Tecna nodded.

'That's a good idea, Flora. I can use my computer to mark off areas of the city that we've already checked, and maybe we'll figure something out.' Gantlos looked incredulous.

'Seriously? That's our plan to find Duman? Check off some streets and hope?' Stella raised an eyebrow.

'Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't realise you had a better plan. Perhaps you'd like to enlight-' Stella was cut off as Musa prevented yet another Stella-Gantlos argument by putting her hand over her friend's mouth. The music fairy then turned her attention to Gantlos.

'I know that doesn't sound like a great plan, and, admittedly, it's not, but otherwise we're just following the cub around and waiting for you and Stella to finally get all over each other's last nerves and level the city, which feels like a worse plan.'

'If you know where Duman went on patrols, we might be able to figure out where the cub saw him, then retrace the cub's path back to the smugglers,' Tecna piped up. Ogron frowned.

'He didn't have a specific route, but I might be able to narrow things down a bit.'

'Great.' Bloom smiled tiredly. 'Let's go back to the loft.' Gantlos looked like he wanted to argue, but Musa had made a pretty good point, and the cub seemed to have fallen asleep in Roxy's arms, so they would likely accomplish little by continuing to wander the streets.

Gantlos felt very uncomfortable being in his enemies' home, shifting uncomfortably in his position leaning against the furthest wall from the Winx.

'Have you guys eaten yet today?' Flora asked, looking to him and his friends as she walked into the kitchen area. Anagan shook his head.

'No, we headed out to look for Duman at five, and then we ran into you.' Stella snorted.

'That's an interesting way of looking at our encounter.'

'Stella,' Flora warned, opening the fridge. 'Anything you don't eat?'

'Gantlos is vegetarian,' Anagan supplied. 'Ogron and I are good with most things.' Stella raised an eyebrow.

'You're vegetarian?' Gantlos folded his arms.

'Do my eating habits have something to do with finding Duman?' Stella looked confused.

'Um, no…'

'Then mind your own business,' Gantlos replied, a little more sharply than he had perhaps intended. He could apologise, but the idea of apologising to his enemies made him feel far too uncomfortable and vulnerable, so he just looked away and pulled his hat down to cover his eyes. His hat served many purposes, but one of his favourites was its use for blocking other people's gazes. Gantlos wasn't great with people. His friends, yes, Duman, always, but other people made him uncomfortable and, more often than not, snappy and standoffish, especially when he was already stressed. And it would honestly have been difficult for him to be more stressed than he was then; every moment brought with it a new terrifying possibility of what could be happening to Duman, and all he wanted to do was tear through the city until he found his boyfriend and had him safe in his arms, or, in the case of that being impossible, curl up in a ball and panic.

Unfortunately, he could do neither of those things, so he settled for leaning against the wall, watching Ogron look at Tecna's map of the city and darting glances at the tiger cub that was seemingly his only way to find Duman napping on Roxy's lap.

'Okay, everyone. I've made some food,' Flora announced, and Stella immediately beelined for the counter.

'Yay! Thanks, Flora.' Flora smiled and handed Stella a plate.

'No problem.' Flora flicked her finger and the rest of the plates floated over to the room's other occupants. Gantlos held out a hand and took his, throwing Flora a curt nod. He ate the food quickly, not really tasting it, too preoccupied with worrying about Duman.

'Hmm…' Ogron mused, inspecting the map. 'I know Duman usually covered these areas on patrol…' Tecna sighed.

'Gardenia looks way bigger when you're trying to find a single person.' She tapped a few keys and several areas of the city were greyed out. 'We've only searched a tenth of the city.' Gantlos's head shot up.

'You're kidding.' Tecna shook her head.

'No.'

'We searched for hours, and we've still got to check ninety percent of the city?!'

'I'm afraid so.'

'Then why are we just sitting around?' Gantlos burst out, his worry and stress starting to reach his limits. 'Has your 'check off streets' plan worked at all?' Tecna sighed.

'I'm afraid not. I was hoping we'd have some obvious next locations, but it'll still take hours to check everywhere.'

Now would have probably been a good time for Gantlos to take a few deep breaths. Instead, he tensed up and snapped, 'This is a complete waste of time!' Anagan got up and walked over, putting his hand on Gantlos's shoulder.

'Gantlos… Calm down.' Gantlos shook his friend's hand off.

'No! Do not tell me to calm down! Duman is missing, and we are no closer to having him back now than we were this morning! And this whole 'work with the Winx' plan is completely useless!'

'Hey!' Stella snapped. 'We're trying to help you!'

'But you haven't!' Gantlos bit back. 'We should just have kept looking for Duman on our own!'

'Gantlos,' Ogron said calmly. 'Stop.' Gantlos completely ignored him and scowled at Stella.

'We're just trying to help, Gantlos!' Stella said hotly. 'Why on Solaria are you acting like this?! Just calm down!' Gantlos was well and truly sick of people telling him to calm down.

'Would you be able to calm down if Brandon was missing?!' he spat, and a look of confusion painted itself across Stella's face.

'Huh?' Gantlos flinched as he realised what he'd just said. 'What do you mean?'

'I…nothing. Forget it.' He turned away, intending to leave the room before…well, he wasn't really sure what was going to happen, but he got the feeling that it wouldn't be good.

'Gantlos?' Stella asked quietly, and he paused at her tentative tone. 'Are…you and Duman together?' Gantlos was silent for a moment, then he sighed deeply.

'…Yes.'

'Oh.' There was a minute of silence, before Stella spoke quietly. '…I'm sorry.' Gantlos turned around in surprise. 'I didn't know Duman was your boyfriend; you're right, if Brandon was missing, I'd be tearing Gardenia apart to find him.' Of all the things Gantlos had expected Stella to do in response to the information that he and Duman were together, apologising had not been one of them.

'…Thank you.' He gave Stella the ghost of a smile, and she smiled awkwardly back. He took a deep breath, knowing what he needed to do next, though it made him incredibly uncomfortable.

'I…I'm sorry. Everyone.' He took a shaky breath and crossed his arms uncomfortably. 'I…I'm really worried about Duman, and I'm taking it out on everyone else, and I'm sorry.' Everyone appeared to be trying not to gape at his apology, and he looked away, really wishing they'd all turn their attention elsewhere. He felt a gentle squeeze on his shoulder, and looked up to see Anagan smiling warmly at him.

'Apology accepted.'

'Same here,' Bloom jumped in. The cub meowed loudly, having been woken up from his nap by Gantlos's yelling.

'He says he accepts your apology too,' Roxy translated, and the cub leapt off her lap and promptly began rubbing himself against Gantlos's legs, making the blonde wizard back up a little. Roxy smiled. 'He likes you.'

'…Great…' Gantlos said, regarding the tiger with apprehension. The cub sat back on his hind legs and stared up at Gantlos with wide amber eyes, meowing.

'He wants you to pet him,' Roxy relayed, unable to keep from smiling in amusement. Gantlos looked at her.

'…No.' The cub nudged him, mewling insistently, and he rolled his eyes. '…Fine.' He knelt down and stroked the cub's head awkwardly, straightening up quickly. The cub mewed, and Roxy grinned.

'All is forgiven.'

'Aw…' Gantlos gave Stella a look.

Tecna laughed and turned back to her computer, examining the map in more detail.

'Roxy, where did you first find the cub?'

'One of the docks, just here.' Roxy got up and pointed to a spot on the map. Tecna clicked on the location, and an image of shipping crates and boats appeared. Tecna moved across the image, scanning over a picture of a large ship. Suddenly, the cub yowled and leapt up onto the desk, pawing at the screen.

'What in the-' Tecna quickly pulled the cub away from her computer before he could destroy the device. 'What's wrong?' The cub yowled again and snarled at the screen, and Roxy scooped him into her arms.

'Hey, hey… What's wrong?' The cub growled, and Roxy's eyes widened. 'What?'

'Roxy?' Bloom asked. 'What is it? What's going on with the cub?'

'It was the ship,' Roxy explained. 'He says he escaped from 'one of those big things'.' The cub yowled and clawed in the direction of the ship, and Roxy stroked his ears reassuringly. 'Shh, it's okay…'

'Seriously?' Stella exclaimed incredulously. 'Why didn't he just say he was on a ship earlier?' Roxy rolled her eyes.

'He's a tiger cub, Stella. How would he know what a ship is?'

'So, the smugglers must be at a dock…' Tecna mused. Bloom sighed.

'Gardenia's on the coast; we have a bunch of docks. And we've only checked a few of them.'

'Yes, but now that I know what I'm looking for, I can do this,' Tecna replied, clicking on a location on the screen. 'Roxy, can you make sure the cub is paying attention?'

'Sure…Why?'

'I'm going to bring up digital images of the different ports in the city; the cub will probably react similarly to seeing the dock as he did to seeing the ship.' Tecna clicked through several images, and, on the sixth picture, the cub yowled and tried to scramble away.

'Whoa, whoa!' Roxy exclaimed, struggling to keep the cub calm. 'It's okay! It's just a picture!'

'Tecna, where is that?' Bloom asked urgently.

'Hold on…It's a dock in the far north of the city. Unfortunately, it's pretty big.'

'Don't worry, Tecna,' Roxy said, having finally calmed the cub down. 'Once I'm close enough, I should be able to sense the trapped animals.'

'…Why didn't you do that earlier?' Stella asked.

'Because, Fairy of Animals or no, I still only transformed a week ago, and I'm not good enough to sense animals across a city, Stella.' Tecna smiled.

'It doesn't matter; we've finally got a location.' Gantlos's heart leapt at the news. They were going to find Duman! Bloom grinned.

'Then let's get over there and save Duman and the animals.'

And here we go! They've got a location on the smugglers!

Hope everyone found Gantlos's little moment with the cub as cute as I did: I had the idea and just couldn't resist. If anyone thinks the cub should have a name, I'm happy to take suggestions in a review (but not if the next chapter is already published when you're reading this).

And again to Pancake: sorry, no kiss yet, but I promise you'll get one. ;)