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Bentley Pringle ffox was not enjoying himself.

Shivering at the side of the pitch as the spectators yelled and stamped their feet around him, he had little interest in the game playing out before his eyes. As the crowd yelled, whooped and waved their rattles, Bentley gave a half-hearted cheer so as not to look out of place. The whole college had turned out to watch the match; he had tried hiding in the library, but his friend Jo had dragged him out and now he was stuck here. Jo had pushed off almost immediately in search of pints, and Bentley hadn't seen him since.

"Hello, Benty. Enjoying the match?" The bulldog might only have come up to Bentley's shoulder, but his squat, white body was bulging with muscle and menace. Little, pink-rimmed eyes sized the fox up and found him wanting.

"Rather!" said Bentley, with a nervous grin. "Love a spot of footer. Come on, Trinity!" The whirring rattles clicked and clacked in his ears.

"Enjoying the spectacle? Fine sight? Lots of young men in shorts, showing off their bodies?"

"Yes, absolutely- No! No, Lockjaw, dear God, no!"

"You nancy." The words came out as a low rumble from deep within the bulldog's barrel chest. He shoved Bentley hard, so his feet slipped in the mud and he fell. As he struggled to rise, the other spectators closed round him in a circle and began to kick. The rattling rose to a roar. Now here came the players, both teams, twenty-two of them in their studded boots...

He woke half-out of his bunk, his body going into action before his brain was fully awake. The ghastly rattling from his dream still ringing in his head, he squinted at the figure in the dugout doorway. He saw a long black snout and thought for one delirious moment that it was Wills, not dead after all, then he smelled dog and recognised Pinch the beagle, his muzzle rammed into a gas mask. And the rattles - they were real, but they weren't football rattles, they meant -

"Gas! Sir!" Pinch snuffled through his helmet. He had already grabbed Bentley's own mask from beside the bed and was sliding it out of its case. Bentley took it and strapped it securely behind his ears. The world went blurry.

Fox and hound scrambled from the dugout together. Bentley scanned the length of the trench. Padfield was at the lookout post, still twirling the gas rattle. Sleepy souls with nightmare faces, all snout and round, birdlike eyes, crawled out from their berths to report in.

Bentley did a quick head count. Who was missing? Ah - the new chap, what was his name now...

"Fisher! Fisher, hold still, for Christ's sake!"

A young otter was staggering up and down while his friends tried to hold him. Blinded by the mask which sat crooked on his forehead, he tugged desperately at the straps as tears poured down his cheeks. As Bentley watched, the first grey-green waves of gas rolled into the trench like an incoming tide.

Bentley reached the otter in three strides, arms going around the lithe waist and pinning his short forearms behind his back.

"Help! Sir! I can't do it!"

"Close your eyes and hold your breath," Bentley snapped. He tore his greatcoat open, several buttons flying off, and pressed Fisher's head against his chest. "Don't breathe, I said!"

"He can hold his breath for ages underwater, course he can! Silly sod."

"Thank you, Barrie, that will do," Bentley said. His voice was a muffled, nasal boom, but it had the desired effect. He wrapped the folds of his coat around Fisher's head to shield him from the gas, which could burn and blister furless areas like the lips and nose in an instant, and tucked the straps of the mask around the otter's small ears.

Fisher was still writhing in an absolute panic. As the long and limber body wriggled against him, Bentley felt his silk drawers bulge and rub against his regulation trousers. Oh for heaven's sake, he thought, now is not the time! It's never the time!

Gripping Fisher by the shoulders, he stepped back. The otter stilled and stared at Bentley. His eyes, even behind the round glass windows of the mask, were very bright and brown. He reached up to his face, felt the mask, knew that he was safe. His body relaxed. Bentley let him go.

They sat out the gas attack, noisily breathing the sour filtered air with its rubbery taint. When Bentley judged that the cloud had dispersed he removed his own mask first, gave a cautious sniff, then nodded to the rest of the platoon. Ears were shaken free of the masks, while muzzles and snouts of all shapes and sizes took grateful snuffs of fresh air.

"Dismiss. Back to sleep, if you can," Bentley advised, looking at his watch. The men dispersed, laughing or grumbling about the attack according to their nature. Not much time remained until dawn, but most of them had the knack by now of taking naps whenever the opportunity arose. Not just the cats, either.

"And thank you, Pinch," Bentley added. The beagle's tail thrashed wildly, but his salute was solemn.

"Not at all, Sir. Good job with young Fisher, Sir."

"Not at all, Pinch. Not at all." Their eyes met, both aware that ffox was teasing. Then each retired to his dugout.

Bentley pulled the khaki blanket around his shoulders and closed his eyes. A twitch in his left foot, starting up every time he began to nod off, kept him awake for a few minutes, but at last he felt himself slipping into blissful rest.

A furtive movement in the doorway of the dugout. Bentley's ears flicked and flattened, but he could not ignore it. The Commanding Officer's work was never done. Wondering who had come to him, and with what problem, he rolled over and sat up.

"Fisher? Are you all right, lad? Not feeling ill?" Had the gas got to him after all?

"No, Sir, I'm fine. I just wanted to thank you."

"It's quite all right, Fisher. Off to bed with you, now."

Instead of leaving, Fisher advanced and perched on Bentley's bunk.

"Dash it all, I didn't mean my bed!"

"I wanted to thank you properly, Sir."

The otter reached his short arms out and clasped the back of Bentley's neck before planting a kiss on his lips. His mouth was small and sharp. Bentley received a not unpleasant fishy taste as the foreign muzzle nudged his own; otters received an extra ration of sardines to keep them healthy, he found himself remembering

When Fisher pulled away, Bentley wasn't sure if he was glad or sorry.

"Fisher, I don't know what they've told you, but there's no need for all this."

"But do you mind?"

The bright, beady eyes fixed on him, enquiring, pleading. "To be honest, Fisher...no. But are you sure?"

For answer, Fisher lifted the blanket and climbed astride him.

"You saved my life," he said. "I thought I was going to die, and then you were holding me so tight, and I was...happy. For the first time since I came out here, I was happy." His webbed paw with its blunt claws went to Bentley's groin. Bentley felt the flesh rise towards the otter's palm, just as it had risen in the trench as the gas swept down.

"Don't do anything you'll regret - " he warned as Fisher began to unbutton his breeches. When the silk shorts slipped down his thighs, he hoped the warning had sunk in since he no longer felt capable of stopping this.

"No regrets. Not for neither of us." Fisher's left paw reached out and clasped Bentley's. As the claws found the hollows between his knuckles, Bentley opened his mouth to correct the otter's horrible grammar. But the only sound to escape was a squeak of surprise and pleasure.

Fisher's pointed mouth was occupied, but his paw squeezed Bentley's harder.

A pulsing warmth spread through his groin as the otter's tongue and teeth went to work. Fisher was agile, playful, as if reeling in a fish. He went in a flash from delicate nibbling to greedy gulps that made Bentley realise his mouth was bigger than he'd thought. Sometimes the pressure from the ring of white teeth was almost too much to bear, and Bentley arched his back up from the bunk. When he did, Fisher gripped his paw harder, sucked faster.

"Fisher I'm...Fisher, stop. No, don't!" Bentley's tail squirmed beneath him, his hips convulsed, and he held the otter's paw as if it was the only thing keeping him from falling off a cliff. Fisher swallowed and poked out his tongue to lick his whiskers. He rolled onto his back and pushed himself up the bed with his feet, twining his neck across Bentley's. Asking for a kiss. Bentley hesitated, obliged, tasted fish and salt and a faint sweetness.

"Thank you," he said, and, on impulse, licked the otter's large, black nose. A paw brushed his cheek.

"Thank you," Bentley heard, before Fisher curled up beside him in the narrow bunk, his head on the fox's chest, and fell instantly asleep. Bentley stroked the soft, oily fur at the back of his neck, and laid a gentle kiss between the little ears. Fisher's whiskers trembled, and his paw flexed among the fur of Bentley's stomach.

Bentley sighed and stared at the ceiling. In the morning, the otter would creep back to his own dugout. Neither officer nor enlisted man would speak again of this grey dawn, to each other or anyone else. But for now, Bentley Pringle ffox resisted sleep so he could enjoy every moment of their strange meeting.