Edited and re- uploaded since I could not stand looking at all the crappy punctuations and tense mistakes any longer.

Disclamer:I do not own Wolf's Rain or any of the characters that I write about.

AN: There is a slight swap of events in later chapters, so it doesn't follow canon precisely.

Kiba could feel himself flying through the air when the walrus finally managed to shake him off, only to moments later crash into a large iceberg. The impact sent shock-waves of pain through the back of his head and as he landed. He shook his head to try to free himself of the pain and dizziness taking over. However, before he had a chance to pull himself together, the beast attacked.

Given no chance to dodge, a gigantic tusk was forcibly rammed into his left thigh, piercing the muscle and digging itself deep into his leg.

Kiba's face contorted in pain and he let out a cry of anguish as blood seeped through his wound and soaked his jeans. Struggling to pull out the tusk, he fought to free himself of the beast but only managed to hold his enemy still for a few seconds.

"BASTARD!"

"KIBA!"

Tsume and Hige launched themselves at the giant walrus when they saw the attack on Kiba and tried to make the beast let go of him but to no use, their attacks made little difference to the colossal beast who swatted at them while remaining focused on taking down his main target, the injured one in the group.

Sitting on the ground a few meters away and taking in the whole nightmarish scene from afar, Toboe's whole body trembled in fear. Kiba, his strong and brave leader was injured, Toboe couldn't tell how badly, and Tsume's and Hige's futile attempts to stop the beast made no impact at all. When the ancient creature forced his tusk even deeper into Kiba's thigh, tearing apart the muscle, Kiba cried out in agony.

When hearing his friend's pain, something snapped inside the young wolf and Toboe threw himself directly at the beast. He sunk his sharp teeth into the beast's eye with his strong fangs, blinding the creature and sending him into a blood-coloured rage. The beast threw himself up in the air and then dived into the ice-cold, dark water once more in an attempt to shake off his attackers.

The movement released Kiba from the beast's tusk. Getting up on his feet and limping over to where the walrus had crushed the ice and went underwater, he scanned the surface, eyes darting across the shattered remains of the ice, trying to locate any movements that could provide him with a clue as to where his friends might have disappeared.

After a moment Hige and Tsume reached the surface, gasping for air but little Toboe never re-emerged from the cold darkness. The three older wolves watched as the monster broke the ice again and launched itself high in the air, trying to shake off the little wolf who still refused to let go, a fierce battle taking place right in front of their eyes.

It ended with Toboe being thrown away from the beast, landing on all four seemingly okay, albeit exhausted and soaked from top to bottom. Shaking violently in the cold, Toboe eyed the beast suspiciously to determine if he still represented a threat, before dropping down on the ground in exhaustion and disbelief of his own actions. His three friends rushed over to him to make sure that he was okay. Hige reached him first, Tsume right behind and Kiba limping behind them.

…ooo000ooo…

When Toboe, Hige, and Tsume started filling their empty bellies with the flesh of the beast, Kiba hesitated, suddenly the smell of raw meat and blood made his stomach twitch.

His head was pounding against his temples and he felt extremely nauseous. Swallowing hard to push the nausea down, he tried to ignore the sensation but it was a futile struggle. Breathing heavily from the strain, he soon abandoned the beast's corpse in favour of bending down behind a smaller ice block, barely having time to kneel before throwing up. His gut seemed determined to turn itself inside out even though there was nothing to expel, so he only dry-heaved up the last bit of water he had consumed a few hours ago.

Tsume was the only one that noticed kiba's hasty departure, the other two being way too happy stuffing their guts with the chewy meat to notice anything happening around them. He saw Kiba stepping away from the group and disappear in behind an ice-block. Tsume could not see what was happening but the sounds of someone being sick together with the splash of water against the ice painted quite a colourful picture on its own. He stopped eating and walked over to the spot where his pack-mate was currently busy throwing his guts up on the ice to find out what's wrong.

"Kiba, what's up?" The grey wolf asked, his voice, in typical Tsume fashion, contradicting the commonly assumed empathy of the question by its distinct lack of care. If anything he sounded irritated and bored.

Kiba, still being in the hold of the dry-heaving, ignored his friend until he was finally free of the nausea and could breathe some-what alright again. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and tried to stand up, only to be caught in another dizzy spell which forced him to take support from the ice-block with his free hand. Tsume stepped in and threw his hand around Kiba's back to keep him from crashing completely.

"Hey," Tsume queried in a slightly softer voice, "what's wrong?"

The younger wolf who finally caught his breath again, pushed Tsume away while muttering a short, "I'm fine, thanks." However, in reality he was far from fine, his head hurt, if possible even more than before, he could not put any support on his left leg without hissing in pain, and the nausea had drained his strength to the point where it was hard to even stand up. Not that he had any intention of letting the slightly older wolf know any of this.

In the mean-time, the two youngest members of the pack finished their meals and started to look for the remaining members. They located Kiba and Tsume and walked over to them.

"Hey guys, what's happening? Woah, what's wrong with you, Kiba?" Hige asked when noticing how pale Kiba was, and how he leaned heavily against the iceberg.

Kiba, obviously not the mood for sharing, muttered a short, "I'm fine," before speaking up a bit louder, "if you guys are finished eating, let's leave this place," and transform as he began to walk in the direction of Jagara's Keep, not waiting to see if the rest followed.

Tsume answered in Kiba's place upon seeing the unvoiced question in Hige's eyes. "He just threw up and has not eaten anything, but if he says he is fine…" shrugging to show his indifference to the health of the white wolf, he finished the sentence, "hell, I want to get out of this dump too."

They all let their human illusions drop before starting a light jog. Soon enough though, it became even more apparent that Kiba were not his usual self when he struggled to keep up the jog in front of the pack and soon started to lag behind. At this point they were all getting really worried and Tsume kept looking back over his shoulder to see how Kiba was coping.

…ooo000ooo…

It didn't take long until Kiba's injuries began to protest the pace and the pressure he put his body under by refusing to slow down. His head throbbed painfully and the nausea insisted on returning in waves, bringing with it an overwhelming dizziness that blurred his vision and made him stagger unsteadily. Still ignoring every sign his body were giving him to slow down, he kept walking. He couldn't hold up, not when Cheeza was waiting for him beyond these desolated lands. Saving her was his first and only priority, his own health having never even been a factor to account for.

Suddenly he slipped on a small, icy rock and fell down, shifting into his human illusion just in time to support himself with his hands, he landed on all four. Kiba tried to get up but his left leg gave in and he fell back on his knees as everything went dark…