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 Posted: Sat Aug 16, 2008 10:50 am
Everything had changed, his world had been flipped upside down and with the battle came a different world to which he was not used too.
Eyes wandering over his all too familiar home, stones, sand, the caves...all meshed with the smell of the rebels and the traditionalists...some small spatters of blood here and there that had dried in the sun and stained the stone. It almost frightened him to look at it.
Damu tottered over the desert, eye's sagged, ears drooped...he looked ragged and finally lay himself over a smooth rock to think over his current predicament.
The lion had joined the rebels because he hated slavery, he hated it eternally and the choices the old pride made...well they didn't seem right to him at all.
But his mother still stayed with the Traditionalist's....and he loved his mother so much.
She was his entire world.
And it was a terrible shock to him, laying there and letting his blue eyes wander over his home lazily as he thought to himself.
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Posted: Tue Aug 19, 2008 9:52 am
If anyone asked, he was on patrol. It wouldn't really have been lying, though Azarax was out on the sands more for his own purposes than to help protect the pride. It was both, he knew, but more that he was hoping - as he did day after day - that he might see lions on the border. Traditionalists. Not for revenge, but for a new life. Where Blood didn't matter, and where a lion was not judged purely by how red his coat was.
More than anything, though, he hoped he might see a familiar face, hovering tentatively at the border before stepping over. Wakia, maybe. Or Jua? Family, that was what. Of his mother, he expected nothing of the sort, though certainly he hoped she might be there one day. He could put that down to no more than wishful thinking, however, and in the life before this, he had learned to have fewer expectations. Less expectations, less things wanted, made life far easier, and it meant less heartbreak. It meant that it didn't matter, and nothing that happened could hurt him.
So he expected nothing of anyone.
Then he saw something. It was a shape. Nothing flaming red stood out clearly in his eyes, but it certainly looked like a Firekin. He paused. Perhaps...
It seemed a good idea to check the situation out. He made his way toward the other lion, draped over a rock.
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Posted: Wed Aug 20, 2008 9:55 am
For the moment, he was lost.
Lost in his mind, lost in his own little private world...lost in the quiet the sands offered to him and let out a throaty, dry breath across his paws and the rock he lay on.
So deep was he in his thoughts he momentarily didn't notice the young male heading towards him.
It was only when he turned his head and saw the sandy coloured lion, spurring him to his fee twith a little shocked snort and ears flattened back slightly.
He'd certainly come out of the blue hadn't he!?
Staring at the other for a moment as he tried to see if he knew him, or to determine whether he had good or bad intentions.
It was only after a few moments did he realise he'd seen the lion before...when the traditionalists had been over come...when the rebels had won.
His ears perked atop his head as he calmed, rump falling to sit upon the rock as he kept his eyes on him.
"You startled me." He said bluntly.
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Posted: Thu Aug 21, 2008 3:05 am
Azarax paused mid-stride as the other lion leapt to his paws. Better to stay a short distance away from a startled lion. That was obvious. "My apologies," He said with a small nod as the red lion - at least, he guessed the lion to be red, after all, the only shade of Firekin coat his eyes could not quite perceive was the darker red - settled and sat once more. He took a step closer. Well, they had met by now and it was too late to back out anyway. "I was just making sure, I was... patrolling." At least, now he was.
"I just thought it best to ensure you were alright," He added. After all, the lion had been lying on a rock in the middle of the desert. It was mildly concerning, though obviously now, Azarax realized it had been indicative of no injuries of any sort.
"My name is Azarax," He offered. "I assume you are one of us? Surely, if you were with the Traditionalists, you would have attacked me by now?" He added with a slight smile. A bad joke, yes, if it was even one, but he could hardly be blamed for it. After all, nobody had ever actually taught him how to make jokes.
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Posted: Thu Aug 21, 2008 9:38 am
Damu didn't really know what to make of the lio-...Azarax and just watched him for a few moments as his paws kneaded uncomfortably against the searing rock beneath him.
At the offer of his name he offered a small, weak smile before retreating from his rock and standing on the sand opposite the other.
"Damu..." He responded. "And yes...I'm one of you." He said, gulping every lump of regret he may of had a few minutes ago as he sat himself down.
Albeit he was a calm natured lion, Damu had grown very large as all Firekin males did, body well equipped to hunt, to kill and to fight.
Yet this male did nothing more but offer a kind smile and a weak, confused chuckle at Azarax's attempt at a joke before taking a deep breath.
Try and spark a conversation you big fool! He heard his inner thoughts yell.
"It's good that you're patrolling and keeping an eye out for us, Azarax."
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Posted: Fri Aug 22, 2008 5:48 am
He regarded the other lion curiously. Damu seemed quite a bit like him - at least as Azarax's first impression told him. He seemed somewhat unused to meeting strangers, talking. It was something that Azarax himself was becoming better and better at, but it was still a change from what he was used to. As a cub, he had rarely talked, preferring more to simply sit and take in everything that happened around him.
"Well," He said with a small smile. "Somebody has to, right? And I just figured, while everyone's rankings have yet to be ironed out, it would be a good idea to have some lions patrolling on their own time, especially with the pride still unstable as it is."
Without the proper guards and warriors assigned within the pride, they were all too vulnerable to attack - namely by vengeful Traditionalists - and it was always better to take extra precautions than fall short. If, indeed, they were attacked at a time like this, it could be devastating to their newly formed pride.
With nobody to ward off these attacks, or to defend the pride as a unit, they could easily fall to an invasion. That was the last thing Azarax, and indeed he was sure everyone else, wanted.
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Posted: Fri Sep 05, 2008 10:14 am
The lion agreed with all the young male had to say, sitting himself infront of him as his blue eyes filled with a mild, nervous curiosity that came with one meeting a new person. It was almost automatic for Damu now to take the more passive, submissive role in the conversation as he listened.
Words of ranks dwelled in the red giants mind for a few seconds before he let out a half hearted chuckle.
"Knowing me, I probably won't get a very high rank..." He started, paws padding nervously against the sand as he pushed himself to stand up.
"I'm not the most strongest of lions so I'll probably be given a low rank like cub sitter or something."
The thought of himself looking after cubs was an odd picture that almost made him smile, in five minutes he'd probably be begging for mercy from them.
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Posted: Mon Sep 08, 2008 2:10 am
"Nothing's for certain," Azarax said with a small smile. Open displays of emotion did not generally come naturally for him, but he was learning. He knew that slowly, but surely, the days of his sitting alone to think, the days of moving to purposefully avoid chance meetings with others, the days of staring stonefaced into space as another's words filled his ears with endless buzzing, were leaving him. He was beginning to realize that there was more to life than simply being, that there was more to find for himself, and that, above all, anything was possible.
That much he had learned, long ago when he had first found out who Ripuka was. Who he was. Then the rebellion, and everything that had followed it simply reinforced that idea. Anyone could be anything in a world without slavery, it was only up to them to try. To fight for it, and if they believed in themselves, they could scale the highest mountains.
"Though, I suppose, there's nothing wrong with watching the cubs." He added. He should know. Any rank, any rank at all, was still a rank and a title that was not "slave," and while some of those that had been up within the ranks of the old Firekin might find it hard to understand, Azarax had always known what it was like to embrace whatever he could reach.
His expectations had always been set lower, because otherwise, he might simply have gone mad for not being able to achieve anything. The littlest triumphs meant the world to him, and he cherished every single one.
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Posted: Sat Sep 20, 2008 10:44 am
Damu was taking a shine to this younger male, offering a big, friendly smile that hadn't found his maw since his days of being a cub blossoming into a strong young lion and nodded to him.
"No, nothing wrong at all with them....been ages since I've seen on around though." He said truthfully.
He had never been the 'casual Firekin', as he'd heard his mother mutter sometimes to herself he was a little bit of a disapointment where personality was concerned.
But as long as his mother loved him he couldn't have cared less.
Now with no motherly love, even at the size he was he didn't really know what to do with himself.
Maybe watching cubs would make him a touch more independant and responsible than he was before.
One could only hope, the lazy fat body of fur and unused muscle that he was.
Shaking himself from his thoughts with a small shrug to his earlier words.
"Well, maybe time will change that and we'll see more little ones around." He then gave out a small chuckle. "Might even have some of my own."
Oh lord would that be a sight, he thought, being the child he was now with children....it'd be like the blind leading the blind.
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Posted: Sun Sep 28, 2008 6:10 pm
He was right, Azarax realized. He had never been one to pay very much attention to the Firekin themselves. Long ago, he had withdrawn from them, paying no attention to their comings and goings, so he had little idea how long it had been since cubs had been around. But down in the slave dens, there had been a few younger than himself. Yin, for one. The thought of the lioness brought a small smile flitting momentarily across his muzzle, before he quelled it. No, it was rude to drift during a conversation.
"Certainly, that's the hope," He said in agreement. After all, cubs were the future of the pride. Though perhaps times were a tad trying at the moment for new life to be brought in. With the pride's foundations still being secured, at the threat of revenge on the part of the Traditionalist Firekin still rather imminent, it wasn't yet a wise idea for there to be cubs around.
He chuckled. "That doesn't sound like a half bad idea, does it?" He said with a nod. Though where he was concerned, the idea of having cubs was somewhat frightening. He had no idea what being a parent entailed, having never been raised by what he could call true parents, and the thought that any cubs he might have might suffer bad childhoods turned him away from the thought of having them.
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