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 Posted: Wed Jan 23, 2019 9:21 pm
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"W-wait for me!"
Kaumi was marching along in the grass, a prized stick in her maw as she led her sisters around. She wanted to play a game of being a hero, and certainly carrying around a pretty looking stick was the first step. The next step would be...to find some bad guys? The Mwezi'Johari was such a quiet pride in their short lives, she didn't really know what 'bad' guys were. But she would have to save her sisters from something to become a hero....so they were on the prowl for something to fulfill that need.
She was marching a bit faster than Azura wanted to walk, and the white cub was trailing a bit behind Kaumi and Kamira. She enjoyed the games that Kamui came up with, but there were many times that she wished her sister would just slow down a little bit.
---
Noticing them marching around from a bit off, Umduno stood next to his brother, bright green eyes analyzing the girls. For once, their mother let them wander off, her overprotection due to the Great Lion's disappearance during their birth finally beginning to ease up. The looks thrown at them from some of the higher classes were easily ignored, youthful vigor more focused on getting into trouble, making friends, and learning about life in general kept his attention more than stuffy adults. "Hey, hey, let's go say hi!" he said to his spitting image. Their sister was more than likely still hanging with their mother. |
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Posted: Wed Jan 23, 2019 9:46 pm
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Kamira was caught between Kamui and Azura, pulled three ways between keeping up with Kamui, letting her take the lead and making sure Azura didn't get left behind. It would certainly be fun to join Kamui in attempting to be a hero but it was a lot of fun having her fuss over them, too. Giggling to herself, she slowed down and circled back around Azura to push her forward.
"Come on, Azura!" she said brightly, "We can't lose Kamui."
Ubani was standing nervously at his brother's side, watching the strange parade of colorful girls with a mixture of fear and longing. Umdumo sounded much more confident than Ubani himself felt about the whole thing, but he wasn't against the idea of having more friends.. it was just easier sticking with his brother and sister. And they all matched so they belonged together! Easy.
And being cursed wasn't so bad around them. They were cursed, too.
"OK..."
He paused.
"You go first." |
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Posted: Wed Jan 23, 2019 10:02 pm
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"Mmmph!" Kaumi tried to communicate with the stick still fully in her jaws, but nothing more than muffled whining seemed to escape her mouth. She paused, looking over her shoulder as she looked at where Kamira was inching a bit closer towards Azura. Kamui didn't want to drop the stick out of her mouth, but the concern that she began to show for Azura wrinkled her nose as she dropped the beloved stick on her paws. "Are you ok, Azura? Am I moving too fast for you right now?"
The white cub shook her head, but found herself drawing a bit closer to Kamira at the moment. "No, no, I can catch up. I just didn't expect you to march...everywhere. Do you really think there's anything 'bad' around here? Mother says that we are safe as long as we are within the pride borders...." And she knew that Kamui wasn't going to skirt the border, not with how thick the guard patrol could be.
"No, but I'm sure we can find something....right? Even if we just have to make it up!" Kaumi said brightly, her eyes shining. "Pretend works just as well. Let's go find a rock or something to pretend its meeean."
--
"Ok! Stick close to me, Ubani; we got this." He bundled up his nerves and threw them to the sky, trotting over towards the girls with a bright smile on his face. He wasn't able to hear much of what they were doing, but if someone was carrying a stick, maybe they were playing follow the leader? The one girl seemed to be playing primary leader at the moment, but hopefully when they introduced themselves, the brothers could tag along too. It wasn't easy making friends when the Great Lion closed his eyes on you.
"Hi! Can....can we join you?" Umdumo asked, sounding quite confident in his greeting, and then getting ever so quieter and unsteady as he spoke to the girls. He didn't know them, and they didn't seem to have any recognizable markings, but he was certain that they seemed nice enough...right?
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Posted: Wed Jan 23, 2019 10:54 pm
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Kamira pouted when she heard Kamui pause her march, but turned quickly back to Azura with a smile. The idea of actually finding something bad was ridiculous, of course they would play pretend! They just had to make sure they could all keep up..
And then she spotted the boys coming their way. With a gasp, she hurried to confront them first, looking suspiciously at the boys and wondering why they matched so perfectly.. apparently forgetting that her own mother was a twin. Plain white and moony one was one thing, this was dark eyes and green hair and legs and stripes and..
"Wait! Nobody gets to my sisters unless I say it's OK," she said, giving a pointed look at the boys before glancing back to Kamui for judgement.
Ubani was close beside his brother when he bravely approached and asked if they could join in-- and was immediately put off by the purple one marching forward to yell at them. Her suspicion was annoying but normal enough, whether or not they actually got these kinds of looks a lot didn't change Ubani's perception of it.. but Umdumo was trying so hard.
"We're Umdumo and Ubani," he said, loudly introducing himself (and his brother) hoping it might help, "We just wanna play."
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Posted: Sat Jan 26, 2019 3:07 pm
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Kaumi rolled her eyes when Kamira got super protective, but Azura greatly appreciated it. The white cub found herself instinctively tucking herself against Kamira's hind legs, peering around the purple tufted girl as she peered at the boys. Kamui sat down next to Kamira, looking far more interested than Azura. She had great respect for Kamira, and allowed her to take control of the situation for the moment.
To be truthful, Umdumo didn't quite expect his brother to pipe up and speak for him. It made him...proud? Excited? Like everything was going to work out.
"Yeah! It looked like you all were having fun, and we were hoping you'd let us join in. Pleeeeease?" He didn't want to whine much, but he really did want to start making friends that may not judge him and his siblings against the fact that the Great Lion had straight up disappeared when they were born. Mother was always reassuring, but it was futile in the storm of judgement that other, older lions seemed to think they hid well enough.
Kamui glanced between the boys, back to Azura, and then finally to Kamira. "What....what do you think?" she asked, uncertainty nipping at her mind.
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Posted: Sat Jan 26, 2019 5:50 pm
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Posted: Sat Jan 26, 2019 6:21 pm
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Posted: Sat Jan 26, 2019 6:32 pm
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Umdumo's response was enough to encourage Ubani to try to match his confidence, but it was a clumsy follow-up to his question. He mentally berated himself for not being any good at just saying yes, whatever game he thought the girls might be playing, this wasn't it. He wouldn't know where to look for bad guys, but.. at least protecting those that need to be protected sounded good. He was small and cursed, what could he do?
Was he someone that needed to be protected? If he was, did Umdumo? If Umdumo needed someone to protect him, Ubani would do it! But.. he was so small and confused.
Kamira watched as one twin puffed out his chest and the other tried but devolved right back into confused glances around the group of them. She grinned at Kamui's praise and decided she liked these two strangers.
"OK, you're in," she said, "I'm Kamira. This is Kamui and Azura!"
Ubani looked back and forth between the sisters at the introduction, nodding.
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Posted: Sat Jan 26, 2019 6:45 pm
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The moment that they were accepted, Umdumo threw his forelegs down onto the ground, rump in the air. His tail was swaying playfully, and he was ready to get down to business. "Alright!" he yelled, excitement vibrating through his body. He hadn't even registered Ubani's nervousness, and just wanted to charge right through into whatever hunt this was going to be.
"What's the first step?" he asked with anticipation.
"First...we find bad guys! Trouble! Things that are wrong! And we chase them away from our families." Kamui bounded off to find her stick again, scooping it up and proudly showing it off with her teeth wrapped around it. "Mmph!" she exclaimed with a proud stomp of her paw, oblivious to the fact that her words were back down to muffled sounds.
"Kamui leads the way, Kamira keeps us safe, and I keep everyone's spirits up," Azura said quietly, finally emerging from behind Kamira to expose herself more. "You guys can be the side to Kamira's strength...maybe...?" Her blue eyes glanced between her sisters, not sure what position the boys could take up.
Kamui's eyes widened as an idea came to her. Her mouth shot open, stick falling right out and onto the grass before her. "Scouts! Maybe...? We don't go close to the border; we're lookin' for things that maybe already snuck in!" As if the guards were ever poor at their job, especially lately. Not that a cub would know that.
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Posted: Sat Jan 26, 2019 7:10 pm
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Posted: Sat Jan 26, 2019 7:31 pm
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"Yeah!" Umdumo echoed his brother's words, nodding in agreement with what Ubani said. They were rather good at it. It didn't seem to matter who their mother was to some of the high class lions, they were somehow 'cursed' regardless of the heritage. So learning how to be sneaky to avoid awkward looks had begun to be rather easy for them.
"So we just need to report back what we find, right?" It sounded like a lot of running, but Umdumo was ready to make a friend, no matter what. "We got this."
"Yeah!" Kamui blurted out, not totally sure what task a scout did other than watch things, but she figured that the boys would figure it out. "As soon as you find a bad looking thing, let us know!"
Azura still wasn't convinced this was the best game to play with so many of them, but... a bigger group probably meant that the adults would leave them be, loud and rambunctious and easy to keep track of. "Even if something looks out of place," the white cub added on. "Then Kamira and Kamui can come in and investigate."
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Posted: Sat Jan 26, 2019 7:46 pm
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"That means we have to plan ahead," Kamira said, looking at Kamui, "Should we all head in the same direction or look around and meet back here?"
Having scouts would be very useful for their adventures, but waiting around for them sounded boring.. she definitely wasn't going to let them have all the fun just because they were the ones who were supposed to find the things for her and Kamui to beat!
"Um, um, um.."
Ubani didn't have any immediate ideas, but he didn't want to slow them down now either. If there was going to be any bad guys, they'd have to be outside the pride or just barely inside so heading toward the borders seemed like the surest bet.. but they would get caught and Ubani didn't want to actually get into trouble.. the waterhole was a busy place, if evil was going to sneak in then that would be a good place to hide..
"The waterhole!" he squeaked suddenly, "I heard the grownups talking about something bad happening there."
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Posted: Sat Jan 26, 2019 9:47 pm
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"Really?"
Kamui never paid too much attention to whatever the adults said; her mother kept them a bit apart from the other adults, though she had never said why. Juexing wasn't a seer, but she did have a deep intuition for unsettling things, and as such did her best to shelter her daughters from the cruelest bits of being in the lower-middle class. As a high class lioness herself, they wouldn't say anything around her, and so Juexing did her best to extend that sort of 'shelter' when she let the girls run off to play.
"Well....I guess we could meet up there." Kamui felt like she was the leader of this little group, though in truth it was a bit more like Kamira guided them when things got a little off-kilter.
Azura pipped up. "Well, why don't we head that way together, and split up just a bit once we get closer? That way we don't look too imposing."
Umdumo liked the sound of being 'imposing'. It was very opposite of what he was used to feeling like. It gave him a better sense of self-worth, just hanging out with these girls for as short of at time as they had been. "We got this, right Ubani? We'll show you guys how good we can be at sneaking around!"
Plus, if they were headed in a supposedly bad area, it was going to guarantee some level of adventure, right?! He couldn't wait!
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Posted: Sat Jan 26, 2019 11:06 pm
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Kamira hesitated at the presentation of actual information about something bad happening. They'd just assured Azura that it was all a game.. but how bad could the waterhole be? Everybody went there.. but as long as everybody wanted to go, she would.
She didn't like Kamui's hesitation but she would wait to comment when the boys were gone. In the meantime..
"That's a good idea," she said, walking over to Kamui and picking up the stick she had dropped. Shaking it off a bit, she held it out for her sister to take from her-- with her mouth full, she couldn't say anything (not clearly) but she obviously wanted Kamui to know she was still the leader.
Ubani was proud of himself for actually remembering something useful. Like Kamira, he was sure the waterhole couldn't be actually dangerous. And it wasn't likely that they would be entirely alone. It was a good idea, that's why they were going with it.
"Yeah!" he exclaimed, looking at Umdumo, "Let's lead the way!"
That's what scouts did, right?
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Posted: Mon Jan 28, 2019 5:23 pm
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