FSE

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Rain pattered against the sidewalk as the lone wolf walked down the street with his arms huddled around slim, almost lanky frame. The dreary setting that was the city in which he lived, or rather, resided, since one needed an actual home in order to 'live' anywhere, was something that the lupine was using to trudging through ever since...

Ever since his pompous mother-in-law had thrown him out of his house!

Terrance had never liked the she-wolf that his now deceased father had been conned into marrying, and now the young lupine had good reason to hate the bitch.

It was the classic Cinderella story, only with a male wolf instead of a human woman in the protagonist role.

Terrance had grown up with it all: money, status, prestige, and a father who loved him more than words could describe. The gray and black wolf sobbed as he thought about how much he had lost. More than the rich friends, all of whom turned their back on him once it got out that he had been tossed onto the street; more than the fact that his bank account and trust fund had been taken from him by his mother-in-law for her three bratty Ivy League daughters; more than the fact that he had been forced to pick through the garbage just a few hours ago for a measly piece of molded and half eaten bread, was the fact that his father had upped and left him in the care of that woman after he had vehemently warned the older wolf that the she-wolf was no good.

Of course, being in love, his father had paid him no attention; reassuring Terrance that everything would be alright. The pure black wolf, a master of business and architecture with three construction companies under his belt, had told him that his step-mother, Sisilia, was a good woman who would do everything in her power to do right by him if something happened to him and that she would fill the gap in his heart for the mother who had died a few years after he was born.

Upon meeting the she-wolf, Terrance, for the first time in life, had wanted to argue with his father, roaring at the older man that he had seen something...almost evil in the wolfess, but he didn't.

Terrance was a good boy who did what he was told.

Never talking back, even when he felt he was in the right whenever Sisilia would try to place blame on him for something she, or her daughters, had done.

Never so much as raising his voice to anyone, despite the times his step-mother had shouted at him for some minor misdeed he had done, often by accident.

Never arguing - the thought of how many times he had to bit his tongue whenever his stepmother would question him about the things he did outside of the mansion where she, he and his father lived, even though it was none of her business, made Terrance want to gag. Or that might have been today's breakfast.

She never picked him up from soccer practice.

She never kissed him on the cheek when he made all A's on his report card.

She never even patted him on the head just for being a good boy, so nothing he did when he was not within her presence mattered, at least in Terrance's mind.

Now look where it got him.

Sisilia had planned everything perfect when she waited for him to graduate from high school before kicking him out of the house.

The fact that his father had died in that plane accident as he was coming from Costa Rica to see his only son get his diploma was something that would haunt Terrance for as long as he lived.

How many times the gray and black wolf wished that he had graduated some other day so that maybe his father might not have been in such a rush to come back and see him and taken that doomed flight home, Terrance actually couldn't count anymore.

The news that his father's flight, 186 from Costa Rica, had crashed midflight with no possibility of survivors had crushed the young wolf's heart, but then to have his stepmother come and dump his things outside of the home in which he had grown up had nearly drove Terrance to the brink of insanity as he felt the world in which he knew collapse down around him. Just the thought of what he was currently going through made the wolf's throat seize up and his chest ache something fierce; his mind torturing him with memories of better days when it was just him and his father. With every step he took Terrance felt like he was walking a thousand miles as the pouring rain beat down onto his backside, the cold moisture tearing through his red hoodie making the fur underneath lay flat against his already tired backside.

Stifling tears that threatened to run down his face with a heavy sob, the gray and black wolf felt himself take a misstep and began a short, painful trip down to the ground. His weary arms desperately tried to reach out to catch his lanky one hundred and forty pound weight before he could kiss the asphalt, but his body was just so tired, and his mind so fatigued, that Terrance could barely do anything before darkness swallowed him up.

"Whoops, careful there," A dark, but smooth voice said making Terrance gasp before pulling his face up to look at the person whose arms were wrapped solid around his soaked form. "Don't want you getting hurt now, do we," The smiling face of a cheerful looking black and white mephit greeted Terrance tired golden-green eyes making the wolf sob as he desperately pressed his face into the other man's smart business suit.

"Um," The skunk replied somewhat lamely as he reached a hand back to rub his head somewhat confusedly as he stood there in the pouring rain, the wolf in his arms quaking as though he were having a mini seizure. "Maybe...I could...take you out for coffee?" The skunk didn't know what to say as he noticed the growing number of eyes honing in on him and the...very strange wolf in his arms.

Ten minutes later found Terrance and the skunk, whose name was Jeff, age thirty-four, sipping on two cups of hot, steaming java inside of the local coffee shop just two blocks from where they had been standing.

"I'm...really sorry to hear that," Jeff apologize with some honest sincerity as he listened to the story of how screwed up Terrance's life had become. "If your father was the businessman that you say he was," The skunk began, pulling Terrance's face away from his half empty mug, "Then he probably had a number of bank accounts with which you could get access to being his legal heir." The mephit grumbled as his mind turned over several people he knew who he could put the wolf in contact to get him both some financial, as well as legal aid. "You still have you driver's license on you, right?" Terrance nodded and began reaching for his wallet.

Somewhere in heaven, the wolf was sure that his father was looking out for him as Sisilia had tossed him out without checking over his things too carefully.

"Then keep that and let me make a few calls first," Jeff reached for his pocket and pulled out his cellphone right as a crackle of lightning cut the power for the coffee house. "Or, maybe I should wait until after the storm's passed." The mephit chuckled somewhat nervously as he casually took his hand out of his pocket.

Having grown up hearing the stories of what happened when lighting passed through telephones, the skunk had no interest in having his brain fried by calling on his cells right then. Of course, since it wasn't technically a landline and lightning probably couldn't travel the airways into his phone to shock him, the odds of something like that happening were rather moot, but Jeff's nervous mind refused to even calculate the risk. The voice of his grandmother echoing inside of the skunk's head telling him to, put that phone down and let God do his work, firmed his resolve somewhat irrationally so.

"Do you have someplace to stay while I take care of this?" Terrance shook his head before swallowing a building sob trying to escape his throat. "Dumb question, sorry," The gray and black wolf nodded before tipping the cup clenched in his paw up to his lips to take his next swallow.

Silence passed between the two, as well as the rest of the building, as no one was sure what to say as they listened to the rumble of thunder tear through the ashen gray sky. Outside, the streetlights were darker than the sky at midnight while the lights from various cars blinked blue and white as people honked while trying to get traffic, which had come to a standstill, to move along.

"Well, listen," Terrance pulled his head up to look into the blue eyes of the mephit in front of him, curiosity making the younger male tilt his head to the side in that cute, puppyish way canids were know for," "I know someone, a friend, who lives close by you can stay with until we can get your situation straightened out," The skunk said and Terrance instantly felt his tail begin to wag as he thought of... "But there's a catch," Instantly hoped died a lone, solemn death.

Jeff reached back to rub his neck somewhat uncomfortably, Terrance's natural nocturnal vision gave him the ability to see every minute detail of the older mephit's form as the other rolled his shoulders back and forth in an obvious sign of nervousness, "This guy, a good friend mind you, he's...he's kinda rough." Instantly thoughts of a pot bellied bear smoking a cigar and wearing leather chaps slipped into Terrance's mind; his father had always warned him to watch out for bears who like to smoke and wear leather, though Terrance could never figure out why.

"I-is," Terrance began, his voice locking up somewhat from his growing fear, "Is he...a bear?"

It took Jeff a minute to process what had just been said, the hand the skunk had been using to rub along his neck coming down to lay flat onto the table, his manicured nails clenching into the cherry wood tabletop somewhat...angrily?

"No, he's not. Do you have a problem with bears?" The hint of steel within the mephit's voice made Terrance lower his ears down onto his the top of his head and his tail curl slightly into his lower end.

"N-no, I just...heard bears are...rough," It was the honestly more than the words that the building anger Jeff was feeling dissipate.

"Well, my friend, he's...rough, but not a bear, he's another skunk, like me," Terrance let some of his fear drain as he looked over the mephit sitting across from him while trying to piece together just what this unknown skunk looked like.

Maybe he was bigger than Jeff's own five foot eight inch height with a lot of muscles?

Or maybe he was one of those short, yappy kind of guys whose bark was worse than their bite?

Or maybe...?

"Look, before we get too far ahead of ourselves, let me just ask you straight," Jeff leaned over the table so he could get a good look at Terrance, his own eyes not used to the dark, no thanks in part to his mephit heritage, "Do you have a problem with gays?"

The wolf blinked.

"No," Terrance had been raised to be as accepting of others as they were of him, his father teaching him that tolerance went a long way in making it in the business world, and keeping employees from filing lawsuits.

"Good," Jeff sat back with a nod, "cause this friend of mine, he's queer and he likes...some kinky stuff." The skunk let his words soak into the wolf's mind before continuing. "If you need a place to stay, then I can set you up with him, but I'm warning you now, he likes to bring home a lot of one night stands. If you have a problem with any of this then let me know now so I can get you a hotel or something."

"No, I'm good with that," Terrance said, his voice having gained strength once again as he looked up to the skunk in front of him a shy smile pulling at the edge of his face.

"That's good to know," Jeff replied.

An hour later found Terrance being pulled out a cab, Jeff having taken him shopping for some extra clothes and few other accessories just to give the wolf some semblance of personal possessions once again, and then led up into a condo situated right on the outskirts of the city. The two walked in silence as they traveled up the darkened stairs of the building's fire escape, the power in the city was still off in this area, though not back along the west side of town where they had went shopping, and then,

"Derrick, open up, it's me," Jeff said as he used his knuckles to knock on painted white door in front of him.

"Hold on!" The deep, yet smooth voice of the unknown skunk called out from behind the wood barrier making a chill run along Terrance's spine.

A second later, after various locks and bolts had come undone from the other side, a white stripped head popped out to look Jeff square in the eye.

"Nice to see you again," The tone of the other man's words seem somewhat contradictory to the greeting, but Terrance wasn't really sure.

When the same said head turned to look at him, Terrance froze as steel gray eyes looked him up and down before returning to his face.

"This the fresh meat you brought me?" Jeff sighed as he lifted his head to the ceiling before muttering something underneath his breath.

"No, this is a young man who I'm helping to get his life in order, not a toy for you to break in two days, Derrick!" Jeff challenged after Derrick turned his head away from Terrance to look his...friend?...in the eye.

"Right," A toothy grin made Terrance wonder if he would have been better off asking for that hotel room, "You did tell him that I was fuckin' fag, didn't you?" If Jeff could have seen as well within the darkness as Terrance could he would have been hard-pressed not to notice the way a dark pink tint began to run along the length the wolf's gray ears.

A sigh met Terrance's ears causing them to perk upwards, "Yes, I told him you were gay and that you were a slut," The rumbling growl that came from the other mephit made a tight knot form inside of Terrance's stomach, though whether it was from fear or the need to answer the primal call with one of his own, his lupine nature eager to assert itself from all of the ill fortune that had taken over his life, the wolf wasn't sure.

"I am not a slut!!" Derrick said as he stepped out from his condo to glare down at his shorter friend.

'He's...tall," Terrance thought as he watched the other mephit loom over the much shorter Jeff by at least a good foot and a half. 'He must have been squatting so as not to dwarf his friend,' Terrance thought as he looked over the muscular form of the other man who obviously worked out for a living.

"Oh please," Terrance's inspection of Derrick was brought to a halt as he turned his head to watch Jeff throw his head up in exaggerated exasperation. "You whore yourself around like a hooker at every bar you go to, and you know it!" Jeff curled his arms together in front of his chest while holding his head up somewhat haughtily in front of the other man.

"Hey, I don't _whore_anything," Derrick raised his arms up to stretch with some obvious exaggeration of his muscular physique. "I just show off what I've worked for and let others enjoy the fruits of my efforts," The larger skunk struck a pose that ended with his impossibly fluffy tail pressed flush up against Jeff's torso, the other male squawking somewhat indignantly from behind the wall of black and white fur. "Maybe if you tried working out more than twice a month, others would notice you too, Jeff," Derrick began to laugh as he thought of something which only he and his partner could relate to before a startled gasp ripped itself free from the larger mephit's muzzle.

"Yeah, but then tell my why you have such a revolving door to your home, which, most of the time, flips back and forth for people you bring home from various clubs, oh ye who refuses to wear underwear."

Terrance didn't know what to think as he eyed Jeff's hand stuck up inside of Derrick's shorts almost up to his wrist, the smaller mephit's fingers flexing inside of the cotton material and touching places best left alone.

"Uhhh, you...ahhh..." Derrick tried to form words, but it was a lost cause as the larger male bucked into place from where he stood as he felt his long time friend rub along his slightly sticky pucker.

The few minutes he had taken to try and clean himself up after having thrown his 'company' out just thirty minutes ago had not left skunk much time to properly take care of the evidence of his...playtime.

"Whatever," Jeff pulled his hand back, quickly rubbing it onto the side of his pants before looking at the larger Derrick. When the other mephit turned around to glare at him, Jeff merely waved him off before turning to look at the blushing Terrance, "Look, I just need you to watch over the pup for a few days until I get some things straightened out," The larger skunk turned to look at Terrance who was watching him with a strange look on his gray tipped muzzle, "Can do you that without corrupting him, Der, or should I get him that hotel I offered before?" The question was directed more towards Terrance as the nervously lupine wriggled in place while the taller skunk eyed him up and down once again.

"I-I'll be ok," Terrance whispered, his mind instantly filling his mental vision with depraved pictures of himself underneath the somewhat gargantuan male in front of him.

"Yeah, he'll be fine," Derrick snickered before turning to look back at his unimpressed friend, "You have his number, right, kid?" Terrance nodded before remembering that it was still dark inside of the building,

"Y-yes, I do,"

"Good." And with that, Derrick turned and walked away from the two men to return inside of his den, "If you feel like you don't want to be here, just call ol' sourpuss to get the hell outta my place at any time you like."

Terrance tried to find the words that would match his feelings, but it was a hard thing to do since his mind wasn't sure just what he should think about the rather brusque choice he had just been given.

"Please, don't let him worry you," Jeff's voice cut through the haze that had settled across the wolf's head as Terrance turned to look at him somewhat perplexedly. "He's an asshole, a whore, and a good guy rolled all into one, so you can trust him," Jeff patted Terrance on the arm before continuing, "Just ignore him for the most part and keep your phone charged while I sort things out for you, ok?"

"Ok," Terrance replied in his usual soft manner before watching as his new friend turned and walked away to leave him standing alone before the darkened void in front of him.

"Hey," The wolf jumped as he heard a voice call out from the dim. "Are you gonna come in, or not, cause you're wastin' my heat,"

"Uh, coming," Terrance said as he hurriedly walked inside, the wolf just barely missing the sight of Jeff shutting the fire escape door to head down the stairs to the first floor of the condo.

"Not yet you ain't, but give me about an hour," Terrance blinked just as he shut the door to the apartment.

"W-what?!"

"Hehe, you're worse off than what Derrick said," The large skunk chuckled as he made his way through the dark to the large, plush sofa situated directly in the center of the living room opposite of the wall separating the front from the kitchenette. "Look," Derrick said, his words losing their playfulness as he waved for the slightly nervous Terrance to come over to him.

Several tense seconds later found the gray and black wolf seated onto the same couch with the mephit, though a good deal of space in between the both of them.

"I'm not gonna hurt you, or rape you, or whatever it is you've got going on in that little head of yours," Terrance swallowed nervously as he tried to dispel the vision he was having of the larger skunk tying him down and repeatedly...

"Will you stop zoning for a second, I'm trying to be sincere here," Terrance shook his head before blinking at the darken silhouette that was Derrick, "Sorry," The large skunk hissed between his teeth as he listened to the short hitch in the wolf's breathing before continuing, "I know...you've had it rough; believe me when I say that Jeff doesn't just invite anyone over to my place, my sexual preferences notwithstanding." The mephit tried to convey as much sympathy as he could for the wolf through his words, but the lack of practice made him rather awkward in his attempts.

"I..." Terrance began, his voice fighting hard to not crack, "I'm sorry that I'm being a...imposition to you," The gray and black wolf huddled into himself when a crack of lightning flashed across the room illuminating all. "I-I'll try not to be a bigger bother, so you can just ignore me, if you want." Having gone through being abandoned by just about everybody he once called friend, Terrance was learning just how much his presence really didn't matter to the rest of the world.

A few silent seconds passed with neither Derrick nor Terrance saying much of anything before movement caught the wolf's hearing,

"You must really have had some shit friends if your self-esteem is this low, pup," Derrick's meaty arms twined themselves around the younger male's shoulder, drawing the startled Terrance into an impossibly firm hold. "I mean, really? If I thought you were going to be an 'imposition', I wouldn't have let you into the front door; believe me, a long list of girlfriends I used to date will tell you that about me." Terrance felt the chuckle that came from the skunk more than he heard it as he was rocked in time with the strong vibrations coming from the mephit's chest. "There was this one girlfriend I had - loved to be a drama queen - would come around fussing, cussing, yelling, and drunk of her ass after we 'broke up', we had this on again off again thing going on, and so one day she and I spent well over an hour yelling at each other with my door in between us. When the cops came because of the 'public disturbance' she cussed and fussed all the way until they dragged her ass out of the building, so believe me, I'm used to impositions." Terrance wasn't sure what to think over that story, but as he looked up to see the darkened muzzle belonging to the skunk trembling in mirth the gray and black wolf couldn't help but chuckle some as the warmth of Derrick's amusement settled throughout his body more than any real humor at the very sad story he had just been told.

"There you go," Terrance gasped as he found two piercing gray eyes looking back at him, the light from the dancing thunder illuminated the skunk's dark orbs in such a way that the wolf felt a coil of something dark and primal snake its way down into his belly. "You're really cute when you smile, you know that?" Derrick smiled, a full show of almost perfectly white incisors, before poking his nose into the side of Terrance's cheek.

"Th-thank you very much,"

"Heh, why don't you do yourself a favor and actually talk with me for a while. You might find that it'll help you loosen up if I knew every 'dark' little secret about you," Terrance gulped and tried to slide away from the now purring other man before realizing that he was still caught within Derrick's unyielding embrace.

"And don't worry, Jeff's told me that if I so much as let a finger stray down into your pants, that he'd neuter me." Derrick said, his tone seeming to hint that he might not be joking.

"Oh, ok," Terrance missed the slightly sour look that crossed over his skunk host's face as Derrick noted the relief that resonated within his voice.

The next few minutes were spent going over various topics, most of which centered around Terrance's likes and hobbies, Derrick didn't seem to offer much about himself other than he worked in retail at a sporting store and that he practice Tai Chi in his spare time. The most important thing, however, was what the wolf wanted to do with himself after he got some money in his pocket,

"I think I want to get away from everything for a while," Terrance sighed as he let his head drift back into Derrick's warm chest, the two had found themselves sitting parallel onto the sofa with the wolf casually lying across the mephit's front.

"Have you ever been outta state before?" Derrick was honestly curious as he asked this.

"Yeah, dad used to take me on his trips out of town with him. That was how he met..." The pregnant pause made Derrick cock his head to the side before he noticed a tell-tale whimper coming from his companion.

"Ahh, I see, well, at least you know what NOT to look for if you decided to leave the country," The skunk reached up to rub the side of Terrance's muzzle, a stray tear following the path of his index finger to the floor. "From the way you talk, you sound like you have the business sense that your old man did, though just not the experience under your belt," Derrick made a humming noise in the back of his throat as he thought of something, "What was his name again, cause I don't think I caught your last name,"

"Aresth. Jason Aresth,"

Everything seemed to freeze as Terrance felt Derrick's body go stock-still for a moment,

"Wait a minute," Derrick rolled his body around so that he could stare pointedly at Terrance, "Jason Aresth, six foot four, two hundred and seventy something pounds, owned the only three construction companies within the tri-state area. That Jason Aresth?!"

"Y-yeah,"

"How are you not loaded with Swiss Bank account?!" Derrick let the second thing that slipped from his mind come out of his muzzle as the first thing might have,

"My...Sisila found the accounts and changed everything without dad noticing." Terrance closed his amber eyes as he recalled the shock he felt at finding the personal account his father had set up for him closed.

"And you don't have any relatives or anyone to go to for help?" Terrance shook his head. "Not even someone of the men who worked for your father? I mean, he had to have a business partner, if not two or three," Suddenly, Derrick didn't like how all this sounded as it seemed like...

"Dad's only business partner hasn't returned any of my phone calls since I got kicked out of the house." Terrance tried not to sob as thought about how many messages, text and e-mails he had sent to his father's longtime friend and business associate.

"Huh, really. Well, I think there's a couple of things that are going to break for you soon, pup, especially if your old man is the same one I knew," Derrick cursed when he felt the body on top of him jerk.

"You knew my dad?!" Derrick hadn't meant to let the slip, especially not after looking into wide golden eyes being overcastted by flickering shadows.

The skunk sighed as he tried to figure out the right way to say what he wanted to say, "Yeah," Terrance's tail immediately began to thump against the older mephit's torso, "But not the way you think," Instantly the tail's motions subsided. "Jason Aresth, he..."

The sudden ringing of a cell phone made both males jump, sadly for Terrance this ended with him tossed onto the floor somewhat haphazardly,

Derrick was quick to recover as he shook his head and then listened to where the vibrating noise was coming from,

"I think your pocket is ringing," Terrance blinked and then reached his hand down to slip his fingers into the folds of his jeans. Pulling out his humming cellular device, the gray and black wolf looked to see that it was Jeff calling him,"

"You might want to answer it," Derrick said as he tried to wrestle with his own turbulent thoughts.

Flipping open the cell, Terrance brought it to one of his triangular ears and then, "Hello?"

"Hey, Terrance, would you do me a favor and put Derrick on the line?" Terrance nodded, not that the other mephit could see him, and then handed his phone over to the taller male. "Um, it's Jeff. He says he wants to talk to you?" The statement came out more as a question, but it served its purpose as the larger skunk reached out and took the phone before,

"Hey, Jeff," Terrance began before going silent for a few seconds. "Yeah, I know. He just told me." Terrance tilted his head to the side as he tried to catch the other end of the conversation. "Yeah, I'll watch out for him, and no, I don't think he's going to getting away anytime soon," The context of the words spoken was not lost on Terrance, but their meaning was obscured to him. "Yeah, I'll keep him safe. Ok. Good bye." When Derrick flipped the cell phone closed he lowered his head to his chest, took in a deep breath, and then...

"Terrance, listen to me really, really carefully," The wolf had to take a step back when he noticed the icy glare that covered the mephit's face as Derrick snapped his head up to look at him, "You're father was not who you think,"

"Excuse me,"

"Jason Aresth was a professional mercenary who had gotten out of the business about twenty years ago, I know this because both I and Jeff worked with him for a couple of years before he retired." Terrance felt the world suddenly flip upside as he tried to make sense of what he had just been told. "The construction companions he owned are actually agencies where mercs are sourced for contracts." Terrance could feel something rising up inside of his stomach. "And, uh, well, Jason was also known for...well...did he ever show you his gun collection?" Terrance could only nod, his voice having locked up to keep bile from spilling out from his throat. "Well, Jason had a hard time getting away from what he knew, and often took on 'side jobs' as a hobby." Derrick could tell that Terrance was on the edge of having a nervous breakdown, but he had to finish this.

"The plan crash that took his life," The skunk licked his lips as he looked down into the gray and black wolf's amber orbs. "It was a hit put out on him,"

At that, Terrance felt his world grow dim right before he fainted, though firm arms caught him just before he could hit the floor.

The fact that the lights flickered on a second later was completely lost to the unconscious wolf.

"This would probably be a bad time to tell you that there's a hit out on you, isn't it?" Derrick asked as he winced ever so slightly.