[PRIVATE] A Loner's Pride

[XxRinaRoguexX]

The sound of crying and muffled sobs was enough to wake Zera up from her peaceful slumber, as well as feeling her paw hit the ground from lack of support from Sius' body. The lioness drifted her head up casually before she noticed that there was a bit of commotion outside thanks to the defensive Eeve, a concerned Taro, and worried Sius. What else could this have needed? Oh, of course Dakari had left Syira's side and was now trying to coax the cat in the tree down from a nervous breakdown. Honestly, was there any need for more drama at this point? Apparently so since Sius was confessing his manliness to the lioness in the tree up above him and raced off. Alright, that's when I have to step in; when the only level headed one here loses his mind, thought Zera before she sleepily launched herself up and over to where the male had run off. She didn't look at the scene with the other lions while she flew past them, but she did however hear the words exchanged by Taro and Eeve. It was almost enough to make her stop and stare, but there was no time for that since Sius was getting away and Zera was losing his trail but not his scent. She had learned everyones' smells by now and so she could create what seemed like colored patterns for them to track the growing pride quickly and painlessly. "Sius!" She was using a warning tone, but she couldn't hide the slight yawn accenting her vocals though she showed no signs of slowing down. And with him in sight, all she had to do was bound forward before she caught his tail in her mouth between the spaces of her teeth as to not harm the male. Thankfully it being enough to stop him, she cocked her neck back with a groan. "Are you insane? You could get yourself killed!" Her voice was muffled from being shut so tightly over his flesh, but it was enough to convey what she was saying to him. She wanted to let go but she was concerned his lost intelligence was enough to get him to run off again when she least expected it, "what happened to the 'we move out tomorrow' Sius? You know, the one who had a little more thinking involved as opposed to the 'let's run away from the pride that's backing me up so I could go in alone and maybe get myself killed' Sius that I don't want to bite?" She was of course being sarcastic, but as well as telling the truth. Zera, though she was a little more leveled than others, knew how to be a friend here and there. Finally she sighed, letting his tail drop to the ground for him to either pick up and move or lay flat on the ground as she slowly walked up to him and put her paw on his back like before in the cave, "this sucks, I know, but running into an unknown situation alone could get you into an even worse situation. Let's go back to the den, sleep the night off, and start fresh tomorrow". At this point, she was more pleading than asking-- she didn't know what he could get himself into and whatever it was, she wouldn't let him get into it alone. Now all she could do was wait for the worried lion to give her a reply that would hopefully be better thought out than running off in the middle of the night to where he didn't even know where to go and get into who knows what kind of trouble.

-----

Amazing, I've done it again, cackled the lioness in her mind. Since there was no one around any longer to see her facial features, she cracked a smirk and looked down at Syira. Maybe I'll get lucky and this lioness won't wake up for the others to hear her trying to prove me guilty of such devious things. Still though, she might get the word around to the others...especially that Zera lioness. She looked around the den where the lioness once lay and then hastily got up and went after her so called 'mate'. Well, maybe we'll just have to see if Zera wants to stick around when she figures out she's not wanted. The gears in her head were turning and surely a sound of cranking could be heard from around the cave.

The dark colored body of Chanya waved the dirt off before getting to her paws and walking out with the others. Game face on and acting skills locked and loaded, the lioness bounded out and met the scene the others did. Why must these lions insist of making sure this female is so well looked after? Who was she kidding? She knew she would either get herself or Wafu to take her out for good. None the less, her worried features washed over and the tears started up again as she came to Taro's side and looked at Eeve. Breaking down so quickly? How badly had she fallen for Sius already? With her ears flat to her head and her lip quivering in the same nature of depression as Eeve, Chanya hesitantly placed her paw on Eeve's. "Eeve, I didn't want you to cry. I thought you knew already and...oh this is all my fault" she tilted her head downwards with tears falling to add to the wetness of the ground. "Seeing you cry is making me cry as well...I just wish I could do something to make your pain go away". Or cause more of it, which is exactly what you're in for. This pride won't stand a chance.

[Harvs]

Moments before his take off, Sius felt a tugging on his tail and fell to the ground. It didn't come to any surprise in his mind that Zera had come after him though. He actually expected her much sooner. As he laid on the ground, many thoughts filled his mind. The obvious first thought in Sius' head was Kasi. Was it really so shocking that he was willing to risk his life for his only living relative? Did the others really expect anything less from a lion who had risked his life to save lions whom he had barely met? Did they really think him the kind of lion to just sit back and let his brother quite possibly die? No. He didn't seem like that kind of lion at all.

The next thought to occupy his skull was of Eeve. She had been hurt... and it was all Sius' fault. He should have been more careful with who he slept with. And now the emotional stress sunk into Sius' heart as well as Eeve's. He knew he'd have to face her eventually. And the sooner, the better. It was the difficult truth that he knew he'd have to face with the new pride of his.

Finally, he thought of all the others in the pride. Sius had picked a fine group of friends: willing to risk their lives for Sius' brother whom they'd never even met. They were strong, considerate, friendly... what else could Sius have asked for? He felt stupid. As Zera's words of comfort placed themselves in Sius' ears, he couldn't help but smile. "I'm a fool" Sius said with a small chuckle. Zera wouldn't be able to deny it, and neither would Sius. He had had a great day: found friends, felt love... and he was so willing to throw his life away. What a waste.

He stood and looked at Zera. "I'm sorry Zera. I guess I let my emotions get the best of me." He said with a slim smile. What would Sius have done without Zera? Probably die? Well, it's not like Sius would tell her those exact words. She knew she was right, and he knew she was right. Best not to give her more reason to gloat. A quick hug would let Zera know that Sius had only acted out of rash thinking and stupid emotions. As the embrace ended, Sius started heading back to the den, tail between his legs. Words could not describe the mixed bag of emotions he felt right now, though his face would never show it. He turned back around to Zera and smiled. "We'd better hurry up. I've got something to tell Eeve."

---------------------------------------------

Far away from Sius' den, Kasi lay in hiding. He had lost the group of rogues in the canyon, but now they were in the jungle. Which left little room for Kasi to sprint should they find him. He continued to make small movements for a break in the jungle brush. If he could get out into the savanna again, he would be fine. Come on Ushujaa... hurry up and find Sius He thought desperately. Kasi was starting to get tired, and he couldn't afford to sleep now. He would just have to keep stalling until Sius and Ushujaa arrived.

The more Kasi thought about it, the more he wondered if him, his friend, and his brother would be able to take down six full grown males. *snap!* Something caught Kasi's eye. A twig had snapped not too far from him. Had the rogues found him. He started to panic, yet remained completely motionless. Two lions started to talk with each other. It was two of the rogues... but they had not seen Kasi. The conversation was far too quiet for Kasi to hear, though he did make out some of the words: "Simba... Pride Rock... Brother..."

Ushujaa, wherever you are, you'd better hurry

[zorayda]

As Taro patted Eeve's back comfortingly, the dark lioness from before had once again sauntered up to them, looking saddened and somewhat guilty. When she put her paw on Eeve's and said those words, Taro became confused.

"What do you mean, Chanya? What did you tell her?" He asked, wondering what could possibly make his best friend cry so badly. He'd always known that Eeve could be a little emotional, but something had to have set her off to make her so sad.

Eeve suddenly pulled away from Taro, her orange eyes shining with tears and with some other emotion--panic.

"N-no, it'll hurt you, too, Taro, I've seen how you look at her..." she looked desperately at Chanya, knowing that the golden lion would have to find out eventually...she might as well let Chanya tell the story. Her ears drooped and she sagged, sitting back on her haunches with her head down so low that it was nearly in between both of her front legs.

[XxRinaRoguexX]

Alright, he's out of the nervous break-down state. Good start, thought Zera while she breathed out slightly that she wasn't going to have to run after him again. She didn't mind running, but when she wanted to sleep there was hardly patience with her. She was doing better with this male while his words were soothing her nerves he was starting to perk. When he admitted to her out loud that he thought of himself as a fool she was so close to contributing but held her tongue where it most likely was better to be placed rather than speaking her mind. And her mind was saying, fool? More like complete moron.

The lioness tiredly smiled in a don't-mention-it manner when he apologized. Her eyes were starting to close on her and she was so close to sleeping like a giraffe that she hadn't even noticed that Sius had entered her personal space and brought her into a hug. That was a better wake up call than the crying and storming out of lions from the den a little while ago, but she simply allowed him to invade and then take himself away from her. Were they growing closer than she had thought? And it was so little time that they had spent with each other, not even one-on-one time, and already he was acting this way with her. Maybe he thought of her as a good friend as well? Probably, since the hug lasted a little while and then he pulled away with a fearful expression. Something was telling Zera that she was about to hear something about Eeve. And sure enough, there it was. He had to tell her something? Before he could get too far the lioness grasped his tail in her mouth like she did before and pulled him back so he was looking at her. "Yeah because you running off went so well the last time. How about we do each other a favor and tell what you're thinking so I know you're not going to endanger yourself again, and you're not going to have an outburst again". Though she hadn't known him long, he had a knack for getting himself into unnecessary drama that was not needed with what he already had on his plate. Still, she had a feeling it was going to be something along the lines of him admitting he liked Eeve a lot. She wasn't one for knowing what was going on in someone's head all the time just by looking at their faces, but it was clearly written all over his face that there was something going on with him and that little lioness Zera had spoken with and found quite charming.

-----

Don't mind if I do you fool, thought Chanya without change in her facial expressions. The tears fell harder like the mood of the conversation and she soon figured out the perfect words to mold a perfect deceiving web of deceit. Soon, it would turn into hate and pain for the others, leaving only Chanya to partake in satisfaction of past and current events of her doing. "Taro, it's just...Sius and Zera, they...they..." she gulped down her lack there of lump in her throat before looking back up at him, "they've been lying to you this whole time. They have both been leading you two on to only break your hearts in the end". But she had to have a story to back up this serious fact of knowledge she had, and the perfect idea came to mind. It was too easy; it would work for herself, and if Syira woke up and remembered what was going on, she could blame Syira's eaves dropping on a conversation that Sius and Zera were having and her mind was simply too tired to remember that it was Wafu and herself. "I heard them talking with each other..." it was best not to point out Syira as there would be pointless questioning involved when it came down to her being involved as well. "I feel terrible for eaves dropping, but I couldn't turn away knowing that my friends would get hurt" she used friends loosely, unknowing of how the lions would react to her calling them that. "I'm so sorry" she tucked her ears behind her head and peered over to the still broken down lioness Taro held.

Hold on...didn't Zera just go after Sius? It's like she's telling this lie herself. Chanya turned her head to the direction the two 'lovers' had run off to and opened her mouth for a moment before the right words came to mind. "Maybe this is a misunderstanding. This can't end this way, with two lions so hurt and upset. I saw the two of them run off this way so maybe we should go and talk to them. I'm sure everything is going to be alright, come on!" The lioness found a new light to place in her eyes to give the duo a little bit of hope before she would crush it all over again. With that thought hopefully burning brightly in their systems, she raced off only to let the others follow behind and see what had become of Zera and Sius.

Lucky for her she had come to the point where her vision spotted the two lions locked in an embrace-- Sius more so taking hold of Zera than she was of him-- but it was too late by the time anyone else would have gotten there. The only thing that could even give a slight hint to them MAYBE being a couple was that Zera was tugging on Suis' tail while waiting for some information from him, and they clearly didn't notice that she had seen the past events. "Why were you two hugging?"

Zera looked over to Chanya with a raised eyebrow. It was more so the lioness now getting on her last nerve that it was the male beside her, not letting go of his tail and looking down at the female in front of her. Zera could have had an easy answer for why they were hugging if her pride wasn't so bold as to get her into more of a hole than she had already had dug for her by the lioness in front of her. "Why does it matter to you?" She retorted, sarcastic and agitated all in one.

[Nukascar101]

Wafu stayed a good distance from the cave just observing what was happening with his usual blank expression. 'I wonder why she's crying' he thought to himself before grunting.
"Bunch of softies" he muttered to himself and then his attention was peeked when he saw Chanya join them. 'Oh it must be one of her brilliant plans' he thought to himself now smirking as he continued to watch. He just watched at they raced off, not bothering to follow he decided to stay back.
"Maybe I can check out the den" Wafu said to himself slowly making his way to the den.

(Sorry for the short post, just a little lost)

[Harvs]

As he started heading back to the den, Sius felt another tug on his tail. The first one didn't feel pleasant, so what made Zera think that this one would feel any better? He knew she was just trying to get his attention, but there had to be a better... generally less painful way. He turned around and sarcastically glared at her. "Do you enjoy the taste of my tail or something?" He was of course returning her sarcasm with some sarcasm of his own. After listening to her words, he stared at her for a little while. He knew what he had to tell Eeve. He had to tell her that what she saw was a misunderstanding and... that he wanted to be more than friends. But he couldn't tell Zera. She'd laugh at him. She laughed at him already when he wasn't telling her embarrassing secrets about his love life. But on the other paw, it would be easier to tell Eeve if he told Zera first and at least practiced a bit.

"Don't worry, I'm not going to get myself killed just yet. I just have to tell Eeve... how I really feel about her." What am I doing?! Eeve is so beautiful and I'm... I'm just an old fart. She'd never go for a guy like me. Sius thought about this for a moment. But it was too late to take back his words. They had already been said. If Sius didn't tell Eeve, Zera definitely would. He might as well tell Zera more of why he was falling for a lioness whom he had barely had time to really get to know. "As weird as it sounds... Eeve reminds me a lot of my sister." His sister had long since passed away. She met some rather unfriendly rogues and paid the ultimate price. Sius and Kasi both fought bravely to save her... but they were too late.

I need to stop reminiscing about the past. It's gone, finished, done. Move on. He had left Zera alone to wonder what Sius was thinking. He really had to stop doing that. "I have to tell Eeve, that I-" His sentence was interrupted by Chanya's interruption. And her word choice couldn't have been more than less than good. She had seen them hugging. Sius' immediate thought was to explain what was happening. "We... I-I mean... It was just- just a..." Luckily for Sius, Zera stepped in with her own explanation. And sweet salvation was it a good explanation... to an extent. It would buy them some time to properly explain the situation.

[zorayda]

Taro dropped his paw from Eeve's shoulders as Chanya spoke to him, her voice hesitant and guilty-sounding. No, it couldn't be... Zera wouldn't lie to him! She was kind, and sweet, and fair... how did he know Chanya spoke the truth, anyway? He looked into Eeve's orange eyes.

"Eeve, I don't believe that for a second," he said strongly, putting a paw under her chin. "Tell me, Chanya, why they would be so malicious to two new pride members? There isn't any reason for them to do that."

But then...it happened. Chanya looked behind them, and Taro followed her gaze, to see Sius and Zera embracing. It could have been a friendly embrace, or something more, it was hard to tell... but now his heart faltered. Were the two of them really fooling Taro and Eeve? Did they want them to leave, and never come back? Why would they deliberately break their hearts this way?

Eeve's face turned into a contorted growl at the sight of Zera. Jealousy and heartbreak took over her mind, and all she saw was red. All she saw was the lioness who had betrayed her. The lioness who was stealing away Sius. The lioness who was all over Sius right now.

"YOU! How could you? Why would you do this to me?" Hot, angry tears came to her eyes, unbidden. "And YOU!" She snarled, looking at Sius. "Did you think this was funny? I bet you had a good laugh! Poor, stupid Eeve! Ha ha ha!" She was tensed, claws out and teeth bared at the Zera again.

Alarms went off in Taro's head and he jumped in front of Eeve before she could do something stupid in her emotional state. "Calm down before you do something stupid," he said, none too gently. She snarled and relaxed a tiny bit, still glaring at Zera and Sius.

He turned his face to Zera.

"Zera... please be honest with me. Why are you always with Sius? Why did you run after him just now, and why were you two embracing? Please... just tell us the truth." There was a glimmer of hope in his gaze as he spoke, reaching out for some small piece of truth that was not seeing Sius and Zera as a couple.

[TheWhistlerify]

Dakari found himself sitting completely still through the entire thing. When they were all gone he shook his head, "So much drama..." he sighed and decided to go back to the den and hopefully wake up to a normal morning. Once he got to the den he saw Wafu going inside. When he was inside as well he noticed Syira was still there, but he looked at Wafu, "Hey there. Looks like we're both new here huh?" he asked with a yawn and settled down, hoping to get some rest. He had absolutely no idea who just cheated on who, who told what to he, and he didn't really want to get himself involved in other's personnal issues.

[Nukascar101]

Wafu stopped and stared at Dakari, trying to see what he could tell from the lion by his looks. He didn't seem that tough and by the way he greeted him rather than running him out Dakari seemed like an okay lion.
"Yeah, looks like it" Wafu said and then began trying to formulate a plan, he walked over to Dakari and gave him as close to a friendly smile as he could muster but it came out more like a sly smirk. This was really the friendliest smile Wafu could give to someone other than Chanya for now.
"And you know how lion prides are, the king may want us around for now to help him but has he really accepted us" he spoke as he circled Dakari his plan to try and get this lion to doubt the others and think he and Wafu where the same.
"Who's to say they won't just kick us out, in fact only a while ago the king told me I could stay and I bet it's because he needs some help. So tell me, is there any trouble right now?" he sat down infront of the other lion and looked him right in the eye.

[TheWhistlerify]

Dakari sighed, "I've been kicked out of so many prides that it doesn't matter." they seemed like a really nice group, but if it ended like it did with his last 'prides', then he would probably continue on his own like he did in the past year. He shook his head, "Well Sius' brother is in trouble, but Sius said I could stay here if I want." he didn't know that he just said the excuse that spoiled Wafu's plan. He looked at Syira suddenly, "What's up with her anyways?"