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 Posted: Thu Mar 08, 2007 1:37 am
The lioness shrugged as her gaze wandered after his toward the horizon, where the light from the sun sparkled brightly on the water's surface. "Yea," She said with a small nod. "I don't really remember my parents. Only that my mother was never around much, and my father wasn't a great parent." She thought back to her past, when she had been but a little cub wandering along after a big green lion whose eyes were as sharp and cold as granite. "I didn't learn much from them, so I learned myself. Hunting and all. I decided I didn't want to be like them, always so cold and serious. So I left and wandered alone."
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Posted: Sat Mar 10, 2007 2:53 pm
The male nodded his understanding. His own cubhood had feuled his want to find and join a pride. His brood would be raised far better than he had. Then again, he hadn't exactly turned out horrible, had he? Niether had Muujiza. "I never met my father... I'm not all that sure I want to. He wasn't a bad lion or anything, just not my type." He hadn't exactly been good-for-nothing. Supposedly, he had known Juke's mother for a while before the cub came along. They had split due to 'differences', although they did meet up a few more times as far as Juke knew. "My mother was almost always off on some hunting trip. We parted when I was a juvenile... probablly best for the both of us. Near the end of my stay with her, she was so tired looking all the time." A single rogue parent never has much time for sleep, much less eating. Almost all of it is spent tryng to care for her litter.
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Posted: Sat Mar 10, 2007 3:03 pm
She remembered all the hunting trips. Her father hadn't been an irresponsible lion, only she knew that he was uncomfortable around cubs and she had never quite blamed him for causing her worry. But every time he left, she would huddle in the grass and simply wonder if he was going to come back. And each time, just as she thought he had left for good, he would return with food for her, drop it and wander some distance off again. She had always felt guilty for leaving without ever telling him. As much as he acted detached and uncaring, she knew he did care somewhere deep down, and she didn't want to have been the cause of his worry. But it had probably been for the best, she reasoned, he didn't like having the burden of having to care for another.
"You're right," She said with a nod. Although she had never noticed her father had ever lacked sleep. Perhaps he hadn't... She never would know now.
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Posted: Sat Mar 10, 2007 3:49 pm
"I wouldn't want to raise a cub on my own," he mused quietly. Parenting seemed like a tough job; it didn't need to be any harder by taking on the task alone. No, he needed someone there with him. Though he was a joyful creature, he was at a complete loss when it came to little ones. The youngest lion he had ever interacted with was a juvenile who could easily care for himself. Muujiza seemed a fitting mother, though. That was for sure. It seemed that almost any female out there coud find a way to mother a brood. Males, however, lacked that basic instinct to care for and protect. Sure, there was an urge to gaurd... but that's about as far as that gene went. In Juke, it was even less than that. He had never really wanted to protect anything in his life. He was loyal, sure, but that only goes so far. In times of need, he would most certainly bare his teeth and unsheath his claws... but other than that, he was rather laid back.
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Posted: Sat Mar 10, 2007 4:00 pm
"Me neither," She nodded in agreement, thinking how hard it was on a single parent to care for cubs. Even one cub would be a heavy tax on the lion's health, let alone more. She shook her head slightly, lost in thought. Especially if they were rogue lions. She didn't like the thought. It reminded her so much of her childhood. And now, after so long of having detached herself from her old life, she was thinking more and more about her father again. Where was he? Was he still alive? Did he have more cubs? Questions roiled through her mind frmo every direction, even as she tried to shove them away and shut them up.
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Posted: Sat Mar 10, 2007 4:20 pm
Catching the change in mood, Juke let the lioness be for a few moments. Even if they were unhappy thoughts, he figured she'd want to think them on her own for just a little while before he stepped in to help her out a bit. After what seemed like an eternity for the male, he pushed off the sand into a sitting position and nudged the green lioness's neck softly. Pulling away, he looked into her eyes warmly, reflecting the pleseantly heated enviroment they were to soon be perminant residents of. "Something wrong, Jiza?" He wasn't sure when he had started calling her by the nickname, but it just seemed to fit. Muuji did, as well, but it just didn't stick as well as Jiza did. Juke and Jiza, he mused. It almost had a sing songy tone to it, didn't it? He could hear the gentle rhythm the two names gave as they were repeated in his mind. What a cute couple.
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Posted: Sat Mar 10, 2007 9:18 pm
"Oh, not... not really..." She said, her eyes widening ever so slightly as she found herself getting lost into Juke's eyes, seeing the beach behind her and everything else they had been through together reflected in them. "Just thinking about my dad. You know, if he's still... around." She hardly noticed he had shortened her name from Muujiza to simply Jiza, and if she did, she loved it. There was a wonderful ring to it, and now they both started with the same sound.
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Posted: Sun Mar 11, 2007 5:57 am
In a boost of confidence, the male held her gaze for several moments, not saying anything. He searched her eyes, trying to get past that block of airy nothingness to see her thoughts. It worked with some lions; they wore their emotions and thoughts on their faces. Muujiza, on the other hand... There was always that air of mystery about her that Juke couldn't quite grasp. After several moments of trying in vain, he dropped her gaze to look back out at the horizon. "I'm sure he's still out there somewhere. I'm not so sure about my mother; she was never a very healthy girl." He didn't have the same attatchment to his parents that his dear friend seemed to be displaying now. It wasn't bitterness, it was simply a void. There was nothing between him and his only family. No emotion, no longing... pure nothingness. He wasn't particularly sad over it, either. He had left with no hard feelings, right? He wasn't really like her, anyway. The differences were so large, they hardly ever talked. Perhaps his own children would at least have the music in common. As far as he knew, mother dearest had never heard a single note. Looking back at the green lioness, he smiled a little. "I'm sure he's doing just fine."
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Posted: Sun Mar 11, 2007 7:14 am
"I never really got to know him that well," She said after a while. She had never been close to him, but she had always felt something within her that felt as if she should have at least attempted to get beyond the gruff surface before leaving. It had never sat well with her conscience to have left, because there was always something that felt like... loneliness... emanating from him that she had always felt but never quite identified.
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Posted: Sun Mar 11, 2007 7:22 am
It wasn't settling well with Juke that this topic was making Muujiza unhappy. If anything, he wanted her to have a bright smile on her face and a warm look in her eyes. This, however, was nearly the opposite. Perhaps it was time to turn around the conversation on something more pleasant and relaxing? The fish and the seaweed, for instance. Clearing his throat, he batted at a few bubbles on the rushing tide. "I saw a fish the other day. Have I told you about that yet?" He really had been meaning to tell her; it wasn't just some ploy to drag her out of a slump. The scaley creature had excited him greatly, as he had not seen any life on the beach save for a few lions up until that point. He hadn't tried to catch it, though he was getting on the hungry side. The only things he had eaten since comming here were small critters that made their way across the sands.
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Posted: Sun Mar 11, 2007 7:38 am
She gladly accepted the change of topic. "A fish?" She echoed, savory the word as it faded from her tongue. She tilted her head. A fish? It was ringing a bell somewhere in her mind but she couldn't quite place what it was. A fish... a fish... When nothing came to clarify, she shook her head. "What's a fish again?" She wondered if she would learn as much about the ocean as Leboya did once she and Juke settled down for sure. It would be a wonderful thing, being so knowledgable on one thing, she decided.
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Posted: Sun Mar 11, 2007 11:32 am
Juke's eyes widened in surprise. His jaw opened slightly, as if he was staring at a two-headed lion. "You've never seen a fish?" Even out in the savannah, Juke had seen them. Tiny ones, but fish none the less. The marine life here, though... it was so alien to him. "Well, they're little creatures that live in the water. The ones out here are big enough to eat, even!" He got a little excited at that. Seafood wasn't exactly the usual menu for a lion buffet, but at the Bahari'mtoto pride it apparently was. To think that he would be able to feed his cubs fish someday! "The one here was larger than my paw, Jiza. There has to be more..." He held up his left limb for emphasis.
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Posted: Mon Mar 12, 2007 3:40 am
"I might've," She felt oddly at a loss in this environment of water and strange marine creatures. After having lived so long in the savannah, the move to this place had been a drastic change, and she felt she had left everything she had known much about in a life long ago and come to a new one to learn. And as it was, she rather liked it that way. One should never stop learning, otherwise life was meaningless. She smiled as Juke chattered excitedly about fish. Large than his paw? She held out her own to consider it, finding that she wasn't quite sure whether this was large or small. But she had to assume it was rather large for a fish.
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Posted: Fri Mar 16, 2007 7:32 am
Of course... the largest fish in the ocean are far bigger than Juke's paw. If he had seen everything that lived off the coast of their new home, he would have an entirely knew perspective for size and life in general. For now, though, a fish simply a tad larger than his front paw was a miracle. With a content sigh, he looked over the green lioness, and then at himself. They fit this enviroment. His furs were the color of the seas, and hers the color of the exotic plant life that called the marine world their home. It was almost picture perfect. Except, of course, for the sand that was plastered to his side. He held in a chuckle, but smiled at that. "Why don't we go for a walk? I've yet to go inland... I'm curious as to what's up there." He nodded his head behind them, where the sand became grass and the gentle seabreezes were all that told of the land's end just a stroll away.
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Posted: Fri Mar 16, 2007 7:41 am
"A walk sounds great," She said with a nod, suddenly realizing that they almost always met on the beach. She seemed to perk up considerably at the thought of going inland. Not because she disliked the beach, but simply because the trees provided so much more of a home for her than a beach ever would, even if she did love the beauty of the sands and the rolling waves. She turned and started toward inland, pausing once to make sure Juke was coming along, and then strode confidently toward the foliage. And she walked with such energy that it seemed as if life at the moment were just as simple.
((Its kinda weird and not very ending-y, but we could end it here? 8D))
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