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 Posted: Wed Dec 08, 2010 1:44 pm
Naja was so sick of her family. They could get so annoying, and sometimes her mama just didn't know how to deal with it all. As if her own family wasn't enough to handle, Pumzi was often watching after Sutala's pups and while Naja didn't mind the pups, she did mind the noise that everyone made when they were grouped up together.
So Naja did what she usually did when she found herself getting overwhelmed.
Naja worked out.
Now, she didn't 'work out' in the sense that she was getting some sort of cardiovascular thumping, but she did like to push herself. She'd started with smaller stones, shoving them along. When that became easier, she moved onto larger stones. Stones her size. Naja had seen the Shifters in the pride move the large stones, and Naja very much wanted to do that when she grew up. Practicing when she was young was very important.
When she tired of pushing around the little boulder she'd been working on, Naja decided to seek out the Shifters. Maybe they could help her become stronger so that someday she could move big rocks like they could.
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Posted: Wed Dec 08, 2010 9:47 pm
One of the main duties of the Shifters, aside from putting up new shrines, was to clear out rocks and make space for them. Ishekhesi was clearing out a small grotto near the stream, soon to be used for a shrine. So far, he had had some luck with shoving the boulders to just above the stream, then rolling them down. They tended to land somewhere in the middle, piling to create a path across it, and damming the stream enough to make a slightly deeper pool. He thought both would be handy for the pride at large.
He was almost done, too. He put his shoulder against one of the larger rocks. He wasn't sure if he would be able to move this one without getting into his vine harness, but it was worth a shot.
To his surprise, the rock shifted quite easily. Maybe the other rocks he had moved let this one shift? The rock was moving, and that's what mattered.
Ishekhesi pushed the rock to the bank of the stream, and just as he shoved it down, a small lion cub came trotting along the bank.
He tried to shout a warning, but his throat didn't allow him to. What actually came out was, "Watch out!" in a voice quieter then the average lion's speaking voice.
He would never forgive himself if he flattened a cub with his negligence.
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Posted: Thu Dec 09, 2010 8:19 am
Naja didn't really hear the lion call out a warning to her. What she did hear was the large boulder tumbling down the small hill towards her. In a split second a few things took place: Naja tilted her head at the boulder first, then swiftly leapt out of the way and almost calmly watched it tumble past before it stopped with a dull thud-splash.
Pale silver eyes shot back towards the large green lion. She knew that he was a shifter. She'd seen him plenty before but had never had a chance to stop and make conversation (read: annoy) with him. Naja had many questions that she wanted to ask him, like how often he trained, what kind of strength exercises he did, what he ate and drank to stay bulked up so that he could perform the tasks that he did.
"Hey," she called to him, completely unfazed by her near-death experience, "I'm Naja."
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Posted: Thu Dec 09, 2010 12:13 pm
Nevermind that the little cub was ok and didn't even seemed bothered by nearly being squashed flat by a rolling boulder, Ishekhesi was panicking. Cubs were scary -so tiny and breakable and easily overlooked. He rushed down the hill to look the little cub over.
"Are you ok, Naja? I didn't even see you, you're alright, right? The rock missed you, but you might be in shock. Are you in shock?"
As gently as the giant lion could, he nosed her just to make sure she wasn't secretly gushing blood. Of course, he was strong enough that this about knocked her over. It took him a few minutes to calm down, after he was satisfied she was really alright.
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Posted: Mon Dec 13, 2010 8:57 am
Naja frowned slightly at the large shifter. In shock? "No, I'm okay. What's shock?" He was awful worried for being such a big brawny shifter. That was okay, she supposed, but it was a little weird that he seemed so worried about her being in a shock, or being in shock, that she felt a little bad for him.
"Are you in a shock?" The question was posed carefully and she pursed her lips when she was finished asking. She stumbled a bit when he nosed her, scowling now. "Hey! Watch it, guy!" Righting herself, she thwapped at him with a paw. "Stop being so pushy!"
Man, and her siblings thought SHE was annoying?!
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Posted: Mon Dec 13, 2010 7:57 pm
Ishekhesi backed off after the little cub hit him. He wasn't used to that at all.
"I'm sorry, Naja, for pushing you. I don't know my own strength. I was just so worried I might have hurt you. It's very easy to hurt people when you're as big as I am. Even by accident."
He sat back to eye the cub. She seemed ok. Ok enough to be snappish, anyway. Jeez, he didn't even understand tiny barely grown females.
"Shock is when you're not really hurt but you're so scared you don't act normal. So no, I'm not in shock."
He looked over to the rock, which had fortunately landed near where it should have anyway. That would be easy to fix.
"What brings you out here anyway, Naja? There's nothing out here except the stream."
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Posted: Tue Dec 14, 2010 2:46 pm
Naja waved a paw, dismissing his apology. "S'okay, man. You know, you are a big lion. Real muscly." She gave an approving nod as she said that, making a quick trot-hop around him. "Yeah! Someday I'm going to be just like you, man. I'm gonna be a shifter, even if my stupid brother says that it's dumb. I work out every day. Important to exercise, yanno."
She suddenly realized that he hadn't told her his name. That would be swiftly remedied.
"Hey what's your name, huh?"
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Posted: Wed Dec 15, 2010 9:26 am
This little cub was very demanding. Were all cubs like this?
"I'm Ishekhesi. Um, I'm glad you want to be a shifter. We could use some help."
Ishekhesi wasn't sure how she stacked up against other cubs, but she looked like a big cub to him. He couldn't really tell - he didn't talk to a lot of cubs.
"Well, um, is there anything you need me to show you? To help you out?"
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Posted: Tue Dec 28, 2010 8:23 am
"Ishekhesi, huh? That's a neat name. My brother says I'm stupid for wanting to be a shifter but he's just a little sissy. Our papa was a big lion but he doesn't live with us, he is a Viking or something so he had to go back home but I think that's okay, I like it here." While Naja tried to come off as being a little hardass, she really did love her mama with all of her little heart.
"Hey, so yeah, why don't you tell me about how you got such big muscles? I'm trying to train every day to make my muscles bigger but mama gets mad when I lift rocks that are too big so I've just started trying to push rocks around. Not big rocks like you can," she paused to admire his muscles again, "but, you know, just rocks my size."
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Posted: Tue Dec 28, 2010 8:58 am
"Well, you probably won't get big muscles the way I did. It's pretty hard."
Ishekhesi wasn't going to go tell the little cub that his best work out had always come from going around and beating up other lions - especially a Shrinekeeper cub. He was pretty sure that would be frowned upon by all involved.
"But you're already pretty big, for a cub, so that bodes well. If you keep working at it every day you'll keep your muscles well developed. But not just moving rocks around, you want to run and jump and swim to get all of your muscles working."
He looked back at the grotto he was working at. "Do you want to help me clear this out so you can help me get some work done? You just need to follow directions."
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Posted: Mon Jan 17, 2011 9:15 am
Naja's eyes brightened considerably when he asked her if she'd like to help. She couldn't very well turn him down, and if Egil or her mama happened by she would just have to explain that the Shifter had asked for a little bit of help and she couldn't very well turn him down, right?! Right.
"I can follow directions," Naja said hurriedly, swiftly moving over to Ishekhesi. "I can follow them real good," she added on. She didn't want him to change his mind, and figured the best way to get in on some shifting action was to keep repeating how good she was at following directions.
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Posted: Mon Jan 17, 2011 9:24 pm
Ishekhesi was happy she consented to follow direction that quickly. He wasn't up for a long discussion to persuade her to listen.
"Ok, I have four more big boulders to shift. I'm going to start digging out around them - I want you to clear out any of the smaller rocks between the boulder and the stream. And when I say, you have to come and stand behind me so I know the rocks won't hit you, ok?"
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Posted: Tue Jan 18, 2011 8:35 am
Naja sent him a long sideways glance. Small rocks? Really? She huffed softly to herself. It wouldn't do much good to argue with him now, not after she'd already convinced him that she could listen real good.
"I can move," she grumped. She thought for sure that he'd ask her to move big rocks, but he hadn't. She waited for his lead and she would do what he asked, but she couldn't promise that she wouldn't complain about it.
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Posted: Tue Jan 18, 2011 8:21 pm
Ishekhesi caught the look Naja sent him.
"I don't mean pebbles. Small rocks for me is different from small rocks for you. Let me show you what I mean."
He looked around the grotto and finally rolled a rock that was about as high as his knee out in front of Naja. It was almost up to her throat.
"As you get bigger, the rocks you move will get bigger. But for right now, trying to move rocks that are too big will hurt you more than help you. Start with ones this size, and we'll both dig out the pebbles and the little rocks. If you're doing fine with them, we'll see how you do with the bigger ones."
Ishekhesi turned his attention to the next boulder, and started digging around the base of it, trusting Naja to get to work.
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