‘Yes I am now thanks to you.’

It was a set of sweet sopranos that rang out from her mouth as her body wriggled off from the top of him. Her words set his heart bounding, pouncing, galloping against his chest. It felt like he was going too slow, moving at a pace that was inadequate. She turned to face him, and suddenly, Hondo felt very self-conscious considering he was covered in mud himself. He peered down at himself and scowled. Gone was his ivory band, and gone too were his patches of white, which normally gave him dimension and attraction. Instead, he was brown mixed with brown, and to add in some variety, more brown. He looked a mess and it would take five to six baths to scrub all of the dirt from in between his hairs.

“Oh, shit!”

The swear slipped from his mouth before he had a chance to stop it. Not that he normally would want to - he liked pushing his father’s limits and seeing how far he could go, but he wanted to be on his best behavior around this lass. He almost felt… shy around her. Now, although some would claim that who they were as a pup was not anything like who they were as an adult, Hondo would be exactly like this as an adult. He was cocky, careless, and always looked out for numero uno before anything else or anyone else. And, of course true to his stereotype, he would always be seen as the dangerous bad boy that was so attractive to other females. He would not know this now, but Missandei would influence him for the rest of his life - this first interaction with a female who he was not related to would give him an inflated ego, mold him into a womanizer. But back to the present…

‘Thank you. My name is Missandei. Who are you? You’re a hero you know! I could have been stuck there forever.’

Hondo cocked his head to the side, forgetting about his vanity, and instead focused upon that single one word. Hero. He liked it being applied to him. A slow smile slid across his facade until it was a gallant grin. And despite the love swelling in his heart, he could not change what he was at his core – rotten. “It would have been worse, so much worse than that. You would not have been stuck there forever, you would have died. And I would have so dearly hated to have the world lost such an angel as you.” He reached out with a paw to smudge some mud across one of her cheeks, then the other. “Now you can be camoflauged in the mud and mirk and mire here and you don’t have to rush through here.” He looked about and sighed – where was here anyway? “Anyway, Missandei, my name is Hondo. Hondo Obataiye. Um… Do you know where we are? I’ve been away from home for a few days and I should probably get turned about so I know where I should go to get back.” Regret immediately filled him and he shook his head. “I don’t mean that I want to leave you. I don’t… but… I don’t know how to hunt yet. And I assume you don’t either, unless your parents are cooler than my single one is.”

All Hondo wanted to do was to grow up so that he could be self-sufficient, so that he could survive on his own and flee from whoever he didn’t like. Not flee… not run. No – he was not a coward and would never succumb to that tactic. And so until he could reach that goal, he would sulk. Although… spending time with Missandei would… lessen the depth of his wallows.