Blue snapped his head back and glared at Eivind when the older male came stomping up behind him, the wolf's fit body tense and lips curled into a snarl. He gave his lover a firm, hard look and shook his head at him. "Eivind, that's enough," he said, his voice rigid and unyielding. "He isn't doing anything. Settle down." His partner was very agitated, and Blue understood why to a degree. Blue's history of being violated by wolves most likely weighed heavily on Eivind, and their relationship had been little more than Eivind constantly having to fend off threat after threat to keep Blue safe. But Sig was very small; even with Blue's thin and svelte frame, he would look gigantic standing next to the foreign wolf, who was probably a good seven or eight inches shorter than he was. When Eivind had attacked him, Sig had immediately submitted, his body having gone limp in response to Eivind's aggressive. Blue had never seen that from a wolf before. Even Garlan, who had been smaller and scrappier than many of the other wolves in Lofgren's pack, put up a fight when provoked. Although Blue was grateful for Eivind's desire to protect him, there were times when such hostility wasn't merited, and Blue suspected that this was one of those times.<br/><br/>When Sig spoke again, Blue tore his attention away from his posturing mate and shrugged his shoulders, smiling awkwardly. "No, Blue is my name," he replied quickly, dabbing at Sig's wounds some more before rubbing the excess cream off in the grass. "He doesn't have a cute nick name for me," he laughed, blushing slightly as he recapped the tube of antibiotic cream and collected all of the garbage, shoving it into an empty pocket in their supply bag before returning and sitting down on the ground in front of Sigrun. Blue had never thought of nick names before, but it was certainly something couples did with one another, wasn't it? When he was growing up, his father had often stuck to the basics when speaking to his mother: honey, sweetheart, darling, all the usual ones that reflected sentimentality but lacked creativity. His mother had responded with the same, for the most part, sometimes throwing in a stud or papa bear when she thought the kids weren't listening, though they always were. Blue wondered if Eivind would ever pick a pet name for him to mildly demonstrate their romantic connection, but the wolf just seemed far too serious for all that. He wasn't even sure if Eivind had even had a serious relationship before him; the way he spoke didn't make it seem like that was something Eivind had ever been interested in. It would be nice, Blue thought. It would give him the same warm feeling in his chest he had received when Eivind had called him beautiful. But those sentiments most likely weren't ones that Eivind gave out easily.<br/><br/>He was completely enthralled when Sig spoke of the various couples he had met. Some lived with the wolf's packs, some struck out on their own and lived in human society. Why hadn't Blue ever considered that before? Was that something tangible for Eivind and him? Could they live together like a domestic couple in the suburbs, a little house with a yard and a fence and a garage? Or perhaps a flat in the city in some high rise, where they would have a fabulous view of the sun as it descended every night over the dizzying skyline. But . . . no, how could they get either of those things? Blue didn't have any money. When he was taken, he was still going to school, still being supported by his parents. He had wanted to get a part time job, but his mother had insisted he focus on his studies and graduate before throwing himself into the workforce, although his father hadn't been very fond of that idea. He had been fed and housed but didn't really have the freedom to do much else, and he didn't have the means to offer any financial support if he and Eivind wanted to live somewhere that wasn't in Eivind's cabin or out in the woods.<i>I'll just have to find a job, that's all</i>, Blue mused, half-listening to Sig as he continued to talk.<i>Anything would help, I guess. Would Eivind want that? Would he want to live with humans instead of with his pack? </i><br/><br/>Blue was surprised when Eivind spoke; he jerked his head up and looked at his mate, monitoring the unsmiling look on his face and ensuring it didn't change into anything too threatening. Blue reached up and placed a hand gently on the wolf's leg, reminding him that he was there, and he was okay.<br/><br/>Sig went into his small explanation about genetics, and Blue cocked his head to the side as the ideas wrestled around in his head. "Genetics? Are you saying that being mated to humans is some kind of recessive gene? Like blonde hair or blue eyes or something?" Blue vaguely remembered the basic genetics lesson all thirteen year olds received in seventh grade biology, the one talking about Gregor Mendel and his pea plants and the study of dominant and recessive traits. He remembered drawing out those Punnett squares to determine the probability of two brunette parents having a blonde child, or examining a parent with attached earlobes versus another with unattached lobes. It had all been very basic, of course, and genetics was far more complicated than a simple box could ever show, but Blue wasn't butting into the conversation without<i>some </i>idea of what Sig was talking about.<br/><br/>At the mention of Eivind's mother, Blue looked up to the wolf to examine the expression on his face, but he couldn't pinpoint anything other than perhaps a mild confusion, though Eivind's face did seem to twist into something more contemplative after Sig suggested looking into his mother's history. Blue knew that Eivind didn't know much about his mother, and with her dead he was unsure of what information would be available to Eivind. Perhaps there were older wolves back among Eivind's pack that knew something, wolves Eivind had never felt compelled to speak to about his wandering parent's history. Perhaps there was bitterness there, deep down, resentment that she didn't stay. Or maybe a quiet longing for more information about his mother that Eivind didn't wish to make known. It was impossible to say; Eivind was so incredibly difficult to read sometimes. As he was sure Eivind had no desire to let Sig know about his family, Blue demanded Sig's attention by barraging him with more questions.<br/><br/>"Sig, do you know anything about how mated pairs work? Like, in the traditional way? As a human, I don't think I feel things in the same way you guys do. I know that when I'm near Eivind, I feel calmer, or sometimes not so calm," he added quickly, his face flushing again as his fingers lightly dug into Eivind's skin. "I feel like I just fit well with him, if that makes any sense. I'm very attracted to him, and I want to be with him often, if not all the time. I know sometimes humans can feel this way about other humans, but it's always called just a simple infatuation, and oftentimes it runs its course and that's it. But it doesn't seem like it's that way with wolves. You talk about genetics with wolves, but what about with humans? Do you know if anyone has ever studied that before? Whether some humans are just . . . made to be with wolves? And might be more attractive to wolves as a result?"