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After her meeting with Feo, Memetuka was feeling a bit better and was making her very best effort to be more social. Since then, she'd walked by a couple times and not seen him out there dwelling, so she was getting out more- but aside from the occasional trip around pride rock, she was also being a bit less elusive around her den. Instead of hiding away inside, she was out and away from the mouth of her den, enjoying the sun. Today, with a lot of help from Mnyama, she had even managed to coax the worrywart hare Cheshi from the den. They all were enjoying the sunshine together.

Mnyama was feeling very cheerful, having finally succeeded in getting her mother out of the den- though she knew that part of it was because Meme was out and about now too. They were a lot alike, Mn noticed, though Meme didn't seem quite as worried as her mother! In such a good mood, Mnyama was doing her best to keep everyone smiling and having fun. At this particular moment she was standing on Memetuka's back, pacing.

Plan A was to see if the lioness was ticklish, but Mnyama was smart enough to know not to do that first if she wanted to stay where she was. So she decided to go with her Plan B first- count all the spots on the lioness. Wobbling a bit, she hopped along the lioness's back and flopped down by her back end, where she had the only spots not on her face.

"One, two, three," she started to count.

Cheshi was not looking as healthy as she had looked before the birth of her daughters. She loved them very much, but she couldn't help but worry about them almost all the time- and so far no one had really been able to get through to her that they would be OK, especially while they were here with them. She had, however, allowed herself to come out of the den to lay in the sun with Meme and Mnyama- though she stuck close by her lion friend, mostly just trying to rest and enjoy the sunshine.

Memetuka was the first to notice the hares rushing towards them, and normally she wouldn't have given them much attention if it weren't so out of character for Sungura to rushing along like he had. She wondered momentarily if something was after them, but a quick glance behind them was enough to tell her they weren't- not now anyway. Meme had hoped the pride would know better than to attack defenseless hares in the middle of the pride's lands. And if something was after them, Meme was sure that Cheshi's worst fears would be as good as confirmed and the poor hare wouldn't last very long.

She didn't get a chance to speak though, as Kutulia rushed forward to greet her mother. The small one didn't look as concerned as her father, so hopefully that meant that everything was just fine.

"Nineteen, twenty! Twenty-one," Mnyama continued to count cheerfully, tapping each of the spots as she went, "Twenty-tw--" She was cut off by the sounds of her father and sister coming towards them, mostly indicated by Tulia's crying out for their mother. The small hare smiled brightly at her family, before she realized she lost count.

"Tw-twenty?" she struggled to recall, "Tuli, you made me lose count!"

Trying her best not to freak out, Cheshi was the last one to realize that her mate and daughter had returned home- but as soon as she heard her smallest girl call out for her, her pink eyes blinked open and she was wide-awake and alert. The delight in Kutulia's voice drew a smile from the hare, it was the best reason for being outside- so long as they remained safe, which Cheshi was trusting Memetuka with.

"Yes, I'm outside," she agreed.

Meme noticed that Sungura did not quite look as cheerful as his daughter, and wondered what on earth could be wrong. As soon as he saw Cheshi, though, she noticed he looked a bit less concerned- he definitely knew better than to worry Cheshi needlessly, if they had been chased by something or something equally worrying. Memetuka had absolutely no idea that this was about her and not them. When Kutulia came over to her side, the lioness looked over her shoulder at them brightly.

They were very cute.

"I was counting Meme's spots!" Mnyama announced brightly, patting the spotty side of the lioness she'd been counting on, "I've always wondered how many there are, so I decided I was going to count them! She doesn't mind, she's the one who let me up here."

The dark hare nodded proudly, and couldn't hide a small grin. If Memetuka wasn't staring right at them, she would have told her sister about what she wanted to do when she'd finished counting all the spots.

Cheshi watched Kutulia, frowning herself at how sad her daughter suddenly got at Mn's accusing her of causing a miscount. However, she didn't know if there was a good way to reprimand her darker daughter- after all, Mnyama probably wasn't too serious. By the time she looked back at Sungura, she had quite fortunately missed seeing the worried and flustered look on his face.

"I-it was a team effort," she said carefully with a shrug. It had taken both of them to get her outside, that was the truth.

Mnyama nodded brightly at Tuli's offer to help her out, and she flopped over onto her stomach to help her sister climb up- she was definitely more interested in her own little task than she was in whatever was going on with her parents. She wriggled down just to where Meme's folded leg met her side, which proved to be a good anchor for the bunny, and a good place to reach down.

"Get on her foot, and I'll help you up," Mnyama said, stretching out her arms to help Tuli climb up.

Cheshi was happy to know that her being outside made her family so happy, it was the most encouraging part of the whole ordeal- though she was rather anxious. She was not sitting far from Meme to begin with, and Sunny going to say hi to Meme seemed to confuse her- it was almost like asking to talk privately with her. Of course, Cheshi thought she might be best off letting them do so, but she really didn't want to.

So she hopped after him, though it really only took a step or two.

Meme couldn't really help the small hares scale her now, not with one already on top of her- so she just had to watch and make sure they didn't get hurt trying to do it, or that they didn't accidentally hurt her and end up thrown off accidentally. She was distracted, though, when Sungura came over, looking worried again.

"What's wrong?" she asked, looking at the dark hare with concern, "You can tell me anything.."

Mnyama bit her lip, stretching out as best she could to help her sister up. She didn't really care how silly she looked, it didn't even cross her mind. All that mattered was getting Tuli up here with her, so they could count all the spots. Maybe they'd get it done faster, and then they could find out how ticklish the lioness was sooner. The idea made Mnyama grin.

"Come on!" she said once her sister was with her, scrambling back into position, "Let's count."

Cheshi hopped over, and leaned against Memetuka curiously, listening to her mate as he spoke, absentmindedly holding her breath. She realized it and let out a small gasp just when Sunny assured her they were in a safe place when they were out.. when he suddenly brought up Shiri, and seemed to not know exactly who she was, Cheshi looked alarmed. The pale hare remembered the meeting as well, except it seemed she remembered how it ended better than Sungura.

"She's her daughter," she squeaked suddenly in explanation, "Remember?"

Meme listened attentively to Sunny's story, wondering what part of this story had had him so worked up- especially when it wouldn't be so odd to see a pair of lionesses out having a chat. She wasn't sure where he was going until he described the yellow lioness, it was very clearly Shiri- and this was the first point in the story that she looked alarmed. But when Sunny went on to ask all of his questions and offer to go and get the queen, Meme quickly calmed down- she had to if she was going to calm him down.

"No, she's not dangerous," she said, "Calm down."

So Shiri was in the Pridelands, she was really in here now. How much longer could Meme go without being face-to-face with her again? Would she be able to keep up the lie? Meme wasn't even sure she could remember the name she had given when they met before..

Mnyama scrambled closer to Memetuka's tail, and turned herself around so that she faced Meme's head and her sister. With a smile, she put a paw on one side of Meme's spotty back, "You count this side, and I'll count this side." She switched over which side she was touching when indicating where she would count.

"Ok? Go!" she giggled, and started counting again, "One, two, three, four..."

Cheshi was now watching Memetuka carefully as well, seeming much more her old self now that her focus was on something other than just her family and where they were that very moment. She hopped over to Meme's front, and put a comforting paw on one of Meme's much larger paws. She didn't say anything, but let Meme and Sunny do all the talking.

The lioness could feel her heart begin to race as she thought more about what happened and what was inevitably going to happen from here. Part of her panic was trying to remember whatever the name was she had used with Shiri that time, she knew it had started with A.. and was something similar to what her real name, meaning-wise. Surely lying to her daughter that time was going to make things even worse. But then, what if Shiri never found out, never realized? Could Meme live with that? Would that be what Shiri wanted..?

When Sungura asked if this was good news or not, Meme's purple eyes looked back to him sadly. She didn't know a good answer to this, exactly.

"Good news," she said finally, though something in her voice made it a bit hard to believe. Her tone was from her own worries at being confronted, not from just what she truly believed was best for Shiri, "She's somewhere safe and happy, and this is really.. where she belongs.."

"Five, six, s-se- three?" Mnyama stammered as Kutilia joined in the counting outloud, and she followed her mix up with a frustrated sigh, "We can't both counts outloud, Tuli! We'll get all mixed up!" She seemed to completely ignore the fact that by talking to her sister, she would be mixing her up as well.

With that Mnyama went back to first spot on her side, then looked back up, "Let's both count in our heads, kay? Then we won't get mixed up!" And with that, she started counting again, at first murmuring the numbers aloud and then slowly moving it all to her mind.

Meme could see in Sungura's smile that now was the time to explain the whole story to the pair of them. She glanced over her shoulder to the two small hares, happy to see that they were busy and wouldn't have to hear her little story. She supposed it was not one that they should hear.

"I was born here, this was my home when I was young," she started off into a little personal history lesson for her two friends, "Shortly after I hit adolescence, I met a rogue near the borders. I was so sure we were meant to be together forever, that I left my family here and went to live as a rogue with him."

She sighed, recalling her past actions. She had many regrets, but she couldn't really say that Shiri was one of them- Shiri was alive, she was healthy, she could hardly be a regret. And accident was not a mistake. She glanced over her shoulder again to make sure she hadn't attracted the bunnies' attention now.

"It wasn't long before I got pregnant," Meme said finally with a sad sigh, "And I panicked. After Shiri was born I left, both of them. I didn't come right back here, either. I was too ashamed of myself, a-and I still am. Shiri grew up without her mother because I couldn't face the consequences of my choices, because I panicked at the last minute.."

Cheshi could sense a long explanation was coming, and kept her paw on Meme's as she listened attentively. She was startled to hear what Meme said about panicking and abandoning her family- it just was not something that she could imagine their good friend and protector doing. But then, it explained an awful lot. Cheshi frowned and looked over at Sungura.