Wolf and Hunter in the night (Clayton)

Clayton's snares he often considered to be his best friends. Well, actually more of a creation as he made every single one of them with his bare, hard hands. Traps that were homemade were more sturdy, reliable, and longer-lasting than those found at the general store. They could get the job done, catching food and then some. Clayton had seen a gigantic cat caught in one of his nooses one time. It was a mousy brown-gray and its calls were spine-tingling, sounding almost like those of a woman in pain and distress. It had filled him with a rush of excitement to kill it and put it out of its misery. Someday, he would go and roam the woods, looking to hunt and stalk another one.

But the elusive cat would not be his prey tonight. No, he thought, as he grabbed his trusty shotgun and slung it over his shoulder. He was going out to check the traps, and check the traps only. That was the train of thought that had gotten him going about the snares in the first place.
Sidling out the door, closing it softly behind him so he wouldn't wake Helen, Clayton started off toward the woods. The night was calm and peaceful for a while, the stars and the moon shone brightly overhead; certainly some little animals would be roaming around, as well as bigger game that could be shot, taxidermied, and prized.
It didn't take long for the quiet to be broken by a howl of pain and suffering. Indeed, Clayton could identify the wail of a hurt animal. He was a hunter, after all, so he had to be skilled in that kind of thing. But there was also a feral instinct, that he knew came from somewhere deep inside of him. He also knew, somehow, that before his memory wall, he had used that instinct and capitalized on it greatly. However, he could not remember how or to what degree he was successful, if at all.

He followed the howls to one of the snares nestled deepest in the woods, and got there just in time to see a dark-haired man cut the dog free. It bounded away. Clayton was overtaken by a sudden fit of rage. Who would be daring enough--let alone brave enough--to free an animal from a trap? He tramped through the brush, not caring if he was silent, and rashly confronted the stranger-man. "Excuse me, what are you doing here?"

At the moment Clayton didn't care that it was obvious he was a hunter. Even when he didn't have his shotgun on him, people asked if he shot and killed things for a living. To most he would say, 'yes, I'm the game warden'; a position so amazingly suited for him that he wouldn't quit even if he was offered a million dollars higher salary a year to take another job.
"Well aren't you being the good Samaritan?" The immediate and vengeful rage in the other man's countenance got Clayton riled up, too. Oh, so he thought he was doing the wolves a favor by setting them free and that it really would matter if Clayton put a few out of their miserable lives? That was a whole bunch of bullcrap. "Yeah, I hunt them for sport. But why do you care? Were you raised by them?" He sneered, clenching a fist. Hunting the most dangerous animals was the best kind of hunting. Because he actually got satisfaction out of it. Rabbits? Mice? Squirrels for God's sake?!? No, small game was not as satisfying as seeing the life-light flicker out of a dangerous animal's eyes.

Clayton was serious, too. He met Lupin's gaze evenly, intensely. Things were about to go down.

Ha. Fun (and Clayton told himself that very sarcastically). The other man was matching his spirit perfectly. It had been a while since he had gotten himself into an argument like this.
So now he was personifying the animals. That was great. Everyone knew that creatures like that had no feelings. They just did what they could to keep themselves and their species alive. They didn't care like a human could. There was a reason that man was given dominion over them.
Ooh. Then he compared Clayton to a toad. And then a rat. The villain's jaw stiffened, but he didn't let his anger get the best of him yet. A rash villain was not the best one. "Well if I'm a rat, you're a weasel!" Clayton recalled from-somewhere? school, perhaps?- that the two were both rodents, but rats were just mean, nasty, and dirty, but weasels were mean, nasty, dirty, and had a sharp set of teeth that they used with deadly force. Not to mention their reputation for being clever and cunning, in a bad way. "I'm entitled to my catch. You're a coward for standing up for them. They don't matter anyway."

Lupin didn't have to worry about Clayton's gun, the hunter wouldn't shoot unless it was a deadly game. No fun in murdering anyone face-to-face anyway.

Clayton blew Lupin off, waving his hand. None of the things this... wolfman said bothered him in the slightest. Yes, he was a brute who indeed trampled everything in his path; it was his pleasure. He probably had less feelings than the wolves themselves, and hurting others was the whole purpose of his existence. Yes, he also recognized that it probably was best that the wolves not be hunted, as the balance between man and nature was delicate and the canines were a huge part of that cycle. But did he care? Nope. Not a lick. "It's not like I'm hunting down whole packs and slaughtering them." Clayton stuck to his guns and kept parrying back at Lupin. "I think one or two won't completely make this world go to the dogs. Pardon my puns." He smiled wryly.
At first this had been a huge joke, but now things were quickly starting to go downhill. The general atmosphere of the conversation was getting more and more intense. Why was he still standing here? He was going to get nowhere with this wolf-lover.
Wolfman. The name came back to him again suddenly. Yes, that was what he would tell Wonderland. He was a wolfman. It wouldn't be lying. Those boring people could use a little exaggeration, though.

Initially, Clayton was not wary at all as Lupin got up and moved towards him. Sometimes people wanted to get all up in his face and chew him out. Well, actually that happened quite frequently; there seemed to be a bunch of animal sympathizers in Wonderland, and when some do-gooder caught wind of what he really did at work (when he was supposed to be protecting the animals that weren't in/were never in season) they often came into his office, irate. By now he was used to feeling others' hot breath on his face. It just felt downright natural, sometimes; was it because of his mom and dad? He couldn't remember them at all, but he had a feeling that one or both of them yelled at him like that.

Clayton would have replied to Lupin's criticism, which he thought was actually pretty theoretical, but suddenly found that he couldn't as he got a knuckle sandwich right in the eye and side of the nose. The realization swept through him rather quickly that the wolfman had worked up the audacity to lash out. Clayton's pain was quickly replaced with adrenaline; his rising anger finally got the best of him.
Retaliating, he tried a left hook. He was tall, and wide, but that might not necessarily mean he had the advantage. Lupin was obviously strong and wily. This might go one way or the other.