He is the biggest, baddest motherfucker in the whole of these woods. Wherever he goes, not another soul is to be seen or smelt or heard of. On that note, he always walks alone.

After all, who would walk with a beast? Not a being who shares the soil he walks upon would be so daring as to befriend him. He has been and always will be alone; by this assumption, he is just best alone.

Until, one day, he hears the strangled cry of pain, for once not incited by himself.

In his curiosity, he goes to find the source of the outbreak; a grey squirrel being attacked by what looked to be an albino python.

Perhaps he was bored or maybe he wished to be compassionate for such a small, hapless creature. With three swipes of his paw, the python is dead and the squirrel free of its clutches. Once he has killed the other beast, he studies the tiny herbivore that had been trapped so before his arrival.

The herbivore has large, round, obsidian eyes and almost reddish fur. The squirrel looks up at him, tiny frame quivering. He huffs, expecting it to be because the creature must feel that he had exchanged one evil for a worse evil. He leaves, bored already with whatever he had thought he had been doing.

He can smell him first and then he can hear his tiny scratchy noises and then he hears the song bird chirp of his voice.

"Thank you, thank you, Tiger, Tiger!" The same squirrel hangs from a tree above his head, smiling with glee down upon him. "You saved my life, saved my life, Tiger, Tiger!" He is still shaking, but now he has a better understand for why; a squirrel the herbivore was; a tiny form full of a hyperactive energy.

The little creature was not afraid in the least, but excited so dearly, his bushy tail trembled.

He had padded onward, ignorant as the squirrel followed him. He expected the herbivore to abandon him at some point, have his energy lead him abound, but the squirrel never left, and, if he did, it was never for long; only long enough that he came back with some berry or nut in hand.

Long months went by, but the squirrel never left; he always spoke to him in that strange, repetitive way he had, telling him everything and anything that happened ("The fox and the wolf! The fox and the wolf! Love, love, love, love! So cute, cute!") or came to mind ("Cloud looks like you, Tiger, Tiger! Looks just like you! You!").

It came to one night, he rested lazily at the side of the crystal clear pond near a small waterfall, and he turned to his ever chipper companion. "Why is it that you follow me, squirrel?" It was the first time he acknowledged the small creature and the squirrel reacted with absolute joy and adoration.

"Tiger, Tiger, can see me! See me! Tiger, Tiger, can see Lee!"

"Lee? Your name is Lee?" The critter nods frantically and so he nods in understanding. "My name is Gaara."

"Gaara! Gaara! Gaara! Tiger is Gaara, Tiger is Gaara!" Lee points from his ears to his muzzle as if to discern 'Tiger' from 'Gaara'. He smiles again and his tail curls around his hips; he giggles, and even that he repeats twice. "Lee loves Gaara Tiger, LOVES Gaara Tiger!" He throws his tiny arms wide and wiggles his tiny fingers as he leaps to embrace Gaara, but is just so small, he hugs one cheek only. "Lee will stay with Gaara Tiger for forever! For forever, Gaara Tiger! LOVE YOU!"

And he did; not once in Lee's life did he leave the tiger be, the predator of the woods, the danger to the other herbivores even other carnivores.

Upon one morning, he had been cleaning the squirrel, running his tongue over reddish fur, when it so occurred to him that he should wish to eat the slight mammal and that he should feel inadequate for it having never occurred to him. And, yet, for one reason or another, he still holds no desire to eat him.

A different sort of curiosity sneaks upon him; he can taste the nuts, the berries, and the new cut grass and he can feel the warmth beneath his fur. But the body is so tiny, all he would have to do is open his mouth wide and he could swallow Lee whole, maybe even do so by accident. A misplaced flick of a paw, a yawn, or a restless shift, and the squirrel could be annihilated without further a due.

A fruitless obsession it is to have over a squirrel; a creature not even as long as his tail or as tall as his breast. Alas, curiosity had sunk its claws into his mind and heart, and so, unable to use any other means, he teases the creature with his tongue, perhaps caressing rougher than usual, touching on places he had not touched before for safety reasons.

How the petite being squirmed and what erotic noises that left Lee's mouth as he gave himself completely over to his ministrations, not questioning its occurrence or begging him to stop – no, he begged for him to go faster, to go harder, to do something about the heat, the pleasure, and the pain.

Once done, he lapped the small body clean yet again and then settled Lee between his forelegs, resting against his clavicle; Lee was completely out, body still quivering and small, tiny, palms digging into his fur.

It is an impossible love, one that outranks the supposed friendship between that of the lion and the mouse, but it somehow does not seem that difficult. Somehow… there was nothing more right in his domain; not from the fox and the wolf to the shark and the weasel. Stranger are the creatures who live in his woods, and he has to accept that he is one among them instead of one apart from them.

Lee, this small bundle of fur and enthusiasm, which sleeps between his paws with an utter lack of fear and a completely lax posture, is irreplaceable to him.

To imagine that he would not always be alone, that he would have someone upon his shoulder or his head or in the branches above him that would watch over and adore him, was unbelievable even as it occurred. And so it was with his own brand of determination and loyalty that he threw himself into protecting and adoring the squirrel, just as the critter did him, only less openly and with monotone excitement.

"Love Gaara Tiger! LOVE Gaara Tiger!" And so Lee leaped upon his shoulders and then scurried down his body until he was in areas he would never had supposed that Lee knew of and is given the same gratification he had given to the squirrel not too long ago.

It is when he has spilled his own heat that Lee circles back to his head and kisses his nose. "LOVE Gaara Tiger! Love Gaara Tiger, more than love, MORE THAN LOVE!"

And so he licks Lee's back, the safest place to shower the fragile being with affection, and rumbles a deep purr in his belly. "And Tiger Gaara loves you as well."

Never could he have made Lee happier than in that moment.

Author's Note: Proof that I shall always be GaaLee, and something I have wanted to do for a very long time! Honestly, I originally thought about doing it the more classical way when they are humanoid pets, but it didn't turn out that way.

Reviews, please!