"Soo... whats with the Alpha thing?"
It was
weird to speak with him like this. Weird to talk to him in this body. Everything was weird and now that the excitement wore off he mostly felt strange. Following his exhaustion the day before, he'd gone straight to his room and promptly passed out, sleeping through most of the morning.
When he'd finally woken up he'd been too tired to try and hang out with the other Wayfarers, so he had taken Anubis to a secluded spot so they could catch up. It'd taken him a good hour or two to try and cover everything that'd happened in the past months. Recounting it, it felt like an absurd story more than reality still. Finally though, he'd managed to explain the whole situation to Anubis, enough so he didn't seem confused.
Which left Koa with one question that nagged at him ceaselessly. Namely, Anubis' choice of title for him.
Anubis cocked his head. "You're the team's Alpha. I am their Alpha. You are Alpha."
Leader. He knew Anubis must see him as team leader, but being called Alpha felt weird. He poked at the dusty earth with a paw. "Can you just... call me Koa?"
Anubis narrowed his eyes and snorted. "Why?"
"It's... weird. I mean, I call you Anubis. Not like... beta. Or Alpha."
Anubis's tail flicked to the side, and Koa could sense he wasn't keen. "Your name is Alpha to me. I don’t ask you to call me Houndour."
Koa frowned. "That's not a name."
Anubis snorted a puff of smoke. "For you. Echo is barely a name, is it? It is a term. Hazard is a term. Why shouldn’t I pick one for you?"
"What's wrong with Koa?" he growled, feeling a mild prickle of irritation.
"That is
already your name, is it not? Your human one?" Anubis stared at him evenly.
"Yes, and I like it. Everyone calls me Koa. Not Koamaru, Koa." An edge colored his tone, and he forced his hackles to lie flat. Anubis was his friend, he didn't want to fight him on his first proper day back.
"Then why should I?" Anubis sniffed disdainfully. "Am I common, that I should use a common name?"
Koa rose to his paws. He curbed the annoyance in his tone, but it was hard to not sound clipped. "No, you're my
friend so you should address me like one." Why was this such an issue? Of all the things he expected to have problems with, this had never once occurred to him.
Anubis’ brow furrowed. "I am." The tension in Anubis's tone caught Koa off guard. In the blink of an eye the Houndoom had risen to his paws as well, and thrust his snout into Koa's. Fire crackled in his jaws.
Indignant defiance surged through Koa from ears to tail tip, his canine instincts rising to the challenge. He felt his hackles rise instinctively, his legs stiffening as he stared up at the Houndour (evolution could
not come soon enough).
A mischievous glimmer flared in Anubis's gaze. "Very well, Alpha. Then prove yourself."
Koa wasn't prepared for the Houndour's attack. It was swift and strong, bowling him off his paws before spitting embers that singed his fur. They sparked harmlessly into the dusty ground.
Summong electricity, Koa retaliated with a bolt to stun him before springing at Anubis with his paws outstretched. The first few blows were coordinated, calculated, testing. Despite his weakness, Anubis combat instincts let him dodge a good few blows. In a few seconds however he gave up and let his instincts take over, jumping at the larger canine and rolling and barking and pawing.
It wasn't until several seconds in he realized how weak both his and Anubis's strikes were. They were wrestling and nipping more like puppies than a serious match. They tore up grass and pebbles as they scuffled, rolling all about.
Finally Anubis managed to get a good tap upside Koa's head and roll him onto his back, standing over him with a triumphant grin, one paw pinning him. "I have to say, Alpha, you're not such a bad fighter here. I think this body suits you." He stepped off of Koa, a playful triumph in his eyes.
Warmth filled Koa at the compliment as he got up, shaking out his fur. "Guess I still have a few things to learn," he said, laughing. He felt light and excited, invigorated by the fight. Even if he could have won in a few blows, this had felt... nice. No wonder pokemon fought all the time.
In hindsight, it made perfect sense, he'd just missed it. Alpha was Anubis's
nickname for him. Not just a title. He'd probably hurt him by trying to force him to choose another... But the name still felt weird.
“So you’ll pick another nickname?” He felt sure now that Alpha wasn’t what Anubis called him simply because he was Anubis’ trainer. It was Anubis nickname for him, same as Flurry or Scrapper.
Anubis laid down and began to lick his fur smooth. “No.”
“But...”
He paused to stare at Koa. “I like Alpha just fine. And you can’t make me.” There was a playful twinkle in his eyes that revealed it was a joke, but Koa couldn’t shake his own lingering frustration.
“I wouldn’t nickname you something you didn’t like,” he grumbled. “Why do you get to decide?”
Rather annoyingly, Anubis seemed utterly unbothered by Koa’s own annoyance. “I’ve been calling you Alpha for months, not my fault you didn’t notice.” He poked Koa with his snout and gave a canine grin, tongue hanging out.
Koa turned away, stifling a faint growl. He felt Anubis’ gaze on him, then saw his demeanor change, his playfulness fading as he grew serious.
Eventually he spoke. “Do you know
why I call you Alpha?”
“Yeah. I do.” He spoke forcefully, then regretted it. “It’s your nickname. Like how I call you Anubis or Echo... Echo.” he gestured vaguely with his paw. Too bad Echo wasn’t here, he bet that the Crobat would address him as Koa.
Before he finished speaking, Anubis shook his head. “But you don’t call me Anubis for no reason, do you? It
means something. You told me it means the guardian of lost souls. You named me, all of us, for a reason.”
Koa nodded slowly, trying to figure out what Anubis was getting at and trying not to feel stupid.
“Do you know what Alpha means?”
He blinked dumbly at Anubis for a moment. What kind of a question was that? Of
course he did-
“You humans seem to think that it's like... leader? As in the one in charge and above everyone, or the strongest? But Alpha is different, for Houndoom packs. It is...” he growled to himself, then huffed, searching for the word. “It’s not like that. It doesn’t translate to ‘leader’ for us, not exactly. It is more like... ‘The one we look to’.”
All Koa could muster was a blank stare. He wondered if something was lost in translation from Betel, but usually they were always accurate, so he didn’t think so.
“When a pack is in danger, or when there is a fight or a threat or even a simple hunt.
Alpha is the one who we look to. Alpha watches our backs and in return we give him our ear, our strength, our loyalty. Our lives. When we are divided or uncertain, when we are lost in the dark; we turn to Alpha.” He punctuated each word firmly. “Alpha is one who walked beside us, not above us or beyond us.”
His gaze burned as he gazed down at Koa and a fierce growl accentuated his words. “I did not call you Alpha back home because you were stronger than us. You were not. And not because you were our trainer. I call you Alpha because
you were the one I looked to. The one who had my back. The one I chose to give my ear and my strength. My trust.”
A lump formed in Koa’s throat as Anubis spoke, each word hammering into his chest. Instinctively he wanted to protest. Tell Anubis he
shouldn’t trust him, that he’d failed too many times, that he wasn’t worthy. But he couldn’t bear to speak the words, not when Anubis spoke with such conviction. “.. O-Oh...” he said softly, unable to manage anything else.
Anubis stretched out his snout to lick the top of Koa’s head, then drew back with an easy grin. “You might be a pokemon here, and stronger than me now, but you will always be Alpha to me.” His grin faded and he sighed. “But I guess I... would be willing to consider another nickname.”
Despite the grudging attitude Koa could sense Anubis would be perfectly willing to do it for him. And yet...
The one I look to. Alpha meant trust. He swallowed past the lump, then nodded. Anubis trusted him, and he'd do the same in turn then. “No... It’s fine actually, you can keep it.”
Anubis’ grin returned and his tail wagged. “Good, because I wasn’t actually going to. As I recall I beat you just now, which means I can call you whatever I want.”
Koa crouched, then sprang at Anubis, this time with force, bowling him over and briefly pinning him. “Only because I was going easy on you!” he crowed triumphantly. Anubis did some kind of writhing twist under him, and a moment later he found himself on his back once more, with Anubis holding him down.
“I think you need to work on your technique a little more.”
Koa pushed his paw off. “Cheater,” he said with a smirk. “You were
born with four legs. It's easy for you.”
Anubis shoved his shoulder playfully with his snout. “What is it your white-furred friend always said? Skill issue?”
Laughing, Koa shoved him back. “Yeah yeah. How about I show you some real power then? Get you up to speed?”
At that, Anubis’ ears perked up and he gave an eager bounce. “That would be great! I can't say I like being a Houndour again.”
"Let's see if we can do something about that." As Koa started toward a more secluded place to train, Anubis by his side, his spirit felt lighter.
Alpha. Yeah, he could get used to that.
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