Sabbia = Sea Green
Umuthi = Plain Text

She was slowly gaining confidence in meeting the other members of the pride. She was getting more and more comfortable in her own skin and accepting her mate's praises and trying to return them. So she still got embarrassed about that, it was no big deal. She was shy that way and probably always would remain so. Slowly, her mind was wandering to the thoughts of moving into his den. Yes, the pale green lioness still slept in her family den, much like many of her other siblings. Just, she was the only one with a mate, or that's what she gathered, anyway. None of the others spoke fondly of anyone.

With her new confidence, she made her way toward the beaches like she did every day, but this time, she moved closer to a group who'd all came to pay tribute to the Mother Ocean together. With her simple bracelet in tow, Sabbia offered the piece to the ocean and swelled with pride when it was greedily washed away. The ocean seemed so pleased with her offering! With childlike wonderment, Sabbia moved into the ocean up to her knees and just stayed there, feeling the waves lapping at her legs, knowing full well the water was freezing. Winter was here, but it had been gentle thus far. A gift from a very happy ocean.

Umu had already given her offering to the Mother Ocean, and it had tentatively took it from her. She wasn't sure if Mother Ocean was still getting used to her presence in the pride, or if like Umu, felt that the gorgeous flower she had found as an offering was far too precious to take from its place in the soil that usually was beneath her feet.

Currently Umu found her feet not beneath her on solid ground, but paddling about in the ocean's cold water. It didn't occur to Umu that the water was freezing cold. She spent so much of her time trying to find the little creatures inside it when she wasn't offering aid to the pride, that she had grown accustom to the gradual changes in the water's temperature. The funny thing was not her tolerance to the cold water, but her silly was of swimming. She paddled about like a dog, and thought some of the pride found it to be a little strange and would shake their heads at it, the notion didn't bother Umu.

Umu dunked her head down in the water, spotting a starfish floating about and tried to nudge it with her nose to get it to stick to her. She loved having her little friends about. Once she caught it with her nose her head surface again and she mrowled triumphantly, "Yay!"

A voice caused the lioness' head to snap around and she saw... another lioness with a starfish stuck on her nose. From her own experiance, it wasn't an unpleasent feeling, it just took some getting used to. But seeing how this lioness was beaming about it, Sabbia made no move to help her remove it. Instead, she slowly moved closer and called out.

"Hello there?" Sure, her voice was tiny and gentle, but the ocean was so calm today, her voice could actually be heard. "Seems ...It seems you've... you've got a friend on your nose." There was merriment in her voice. She wanted to be friendly, to get a new friend. She had Kiv, and Nohokai, but she was craving more. Like a cub getting their first bit of sweet fruit.

Umu heard the tiny gentle voice over the calm swaying of the ocean and switched her eye's focus from the starfish on her nose, which tickled as it slowly crept up to the bridge of it, to where it came from. When she saw the light green lioness she smiled. She knew of the lioness in the pride, not by name, but she had seen her around. Being a Mwani, Umu saw many people in a day, so she was always out and about doing something. She would pass by many of the pride members, but did not have as much time as she liked to get to know them all individually. The ones she frequented the most were the ones she knew well.

"Oh yes," Umu said cheerfully, a big grin spreading across her face, "He...She? Is a new friend of mine! I can tell. He/she has this dip in it's one tentacle. I've never seen a little friend with that before, so that's how I know he/she is new. Do you have little friends roaming across the ocean floor?"

She nodded a little. She had plenty of small friends that came from the ocean floor. They just weren't on the ocean floor right now. They were in tide pools. Which could be argued as the same thing. Still, she didn't feel like getting into that. She watched the starfish make it's way up the girl's nose and chuckled. "I've seen this one before. I had to get him/her off my crafting rock." She poked the starfish with her nose and then backed away when it crept toward her.

Sabbia smiled a bit more and laughed. "My name is Sabbia. I...I haven't seen you before." That was the truth. When she was with her family, her mate, or doing her crafting, she never paid attention to anything around her.

"I'm Umuthi'johari," Umu said sweetly, "But you can call me Umu. I see you all over the place!"

Umu smiled to Sabbia and gave a small giggle. Her starfish friend's moving was becoming more than she could bear, what with her being very ticklish. She dipped her head back into the ocean and shook it a little, causing ripples to form around her and Sabbia as she waited for the starfish to finally let go and float back down to the bottom of the ocean floor. She didn't really want to let her friend go, but with being ticklish and all she thought it best that she be able to hold a conversation with Sabbia without giggling like a nut every couple minutes.

"You are usually with the green male when I pass by on rounds," Umu said, a silly 'matter of fact' tone in her voice, so if it were incontestable truth. Granted, it probably was incontestable truth, since Sabbia didn't spend much time with many people like Umu did.

"I probably would have met you one way or another, Sabbbbbbbia," Umu said with a smile, a childish tease in her voice as she grinned to Sabbia, "If you ever got sick, chances were you'd see me!"

She giggled when Umu dipped her head in the water to let their mutual friend go and Sabbia waved to it as it floated to the floor. "Bye bye, starfish!" She felt a little silly talking to it like she usually did at the tide pools. She'd often been by herself when she talked to the ocean creatures. "..Maybe when I was younger. I know I had a cold when I was a baby.." As she got older, her immune system was pretty good.

"So you see.... me with my mate, Nohokai." She did spend a major portion of her days with him. She'd only just started talking to others. With a nod, she flicked her tail and bit down on her bottom lip. "....I don't think I would forget if I ever saw you for an illness...." Unless, like she said, she was really little.

"Oh, I've only been here for a little while," Umu said quietly, feeling a little embarrassed by not making sure to mention that fact. She was so used to being in the Bahari now that the concept of never being here was beginning to become foreign to her. The only thing that kept her in tact with her Rogue Land roots were when she went to go see her mother, Coryth, or her surrogate mother, Bia. Bia had decided not to stay with Umu, but she did make sure not to venture too far from the pride's general vicinity. Bia, being a waterbuck, was a little more than freaked by the giant mass of water by the Bahari, and felt much safer away from it.

"I used to live on the Rogue Lands when I was little," Umu said plainly, neither remembering the days there fondly or unfondly, "When I became an adolescent I came here. It was such a pretty place, and lucky for me they had healer positions, though I think the other pride members refer to someone like me as a Mwani?"

She nodded at that. It wasn't the first non-pride born she had seen. So it didn't really surprise her. "I.... still can't think of any pride being as good as this one," she confessed with pink cheeks. "Woah, wait. You grew up without a pride?" How did she live? It made no sense. The pride helped raise cubs, made sure everyone was taken care of and any illness treated... It was unimaginable!

"Yes, A Mwani." She smiled, glad to be getting back on a much more realistic topic for the young lioness. In all honesty, she didn't really wait for a reply to the no pride question before going off on her Mwani words. Her ears flickered as she laughed and thought a moment. Just when she opened her mouth to say something else, she heard a familar voice calling to her. Turning her head to look, she saw her mate by her rock and smiling. "Oop... That's him.. I'm... going to go, Umu.. But! I'm... I'm hoping to see you around the pride more!" With that goodbye, the pale green lioness darted out of the water and to her mate.

Umu nodded to Sabbia's statement and began to explain how she grew up in the Rogue Lands when she heard the voice of a man calling out, speaking to Sabbia. It was the male she was with constantly, her mate Nohokai. It looked like he was waiting for her and she seemed to get an itching to return to him.

Umu's suspicion was confirmed when Sabbia went to excuse herself.

Umu simply smiled as Sabbia said her parting words, "I hope to see you too, Sabbia! I'll tell you about the Rogue Lands net time we can chat! Bye now!"



With that Umu watched as Sabbia headed back to her mate and she smiled. Hopefully one day she'd have that kind of love also, but of course she could only hope at this point. She seemed far too busy to even find what Sabbia had.


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