He had thought that once he was a properly established pad, with his strong beybanu and a soft souled banu to join him in the future, he would feel somehow stable. He might have even expected to be wiser, but neither seemed to be the case. All that had truly occurred was he found himself now sizable compared to his own father, a hefty body controlled by a still slightly immature mind. It was time for him to look to establishing his home, but he still wished to explore the world. It was a curious conflict, one which he chose to keep to himself. It would do Litho no good to worry about him. After all, she had already taken such care to ensure their home. He stood cautiously outside the den even now, surveying its carefully sculpted walls and clean swept floors. It was certainly changed from what she had begun with.
Carrying a lean hare back to her den with trotting footsteps, Lithophoro pointedly reminded herself not to look too brazen or get in the way of any males. It was irksome business, acting all submissive when around the others in the pride, and most of the time she tried to either stay at home or flee to the wilderness for digging. When she was forced into other lions' presence, she kept her mouth shut. She'd taken to holding a small rock hidden in her mouth, an old childhood habit, to remind herself not to jump into conversation.
At least home was a refuge, with Rasul never forcing new habits on her, and little Tasleem naturally timid and unimposing. She'd taken a delayed shine to the little girl, once the strangeness had worn off. She came padding up hoping that the juvenile might be around to share her hare with her, but instead she found her pad outside the den. Sidling up, she shoulder-nudged him affectionately, mouth too full to say hello.
He pushed back against her as she arrived, an unconscious smile lighting across his face. "Litho," he cooed, offering to take the kill from her, "I noticed your progress, it's astounding." He had always considered den building a bit of an art form, having failed miserably at his attempts before his journey. It was a truly skilled mind that could predict which walls could recede without causing instability. "Do you need me to find you anything?" he added, "Rocks or grasses, maybe even a little bird?" He had been trying his best to make their home a comfortable place, but his awkward nature had made his ideas a little off. His mother had cautioned him against changing too much without his beybanu's input. As such he had made a point to ask before doing, something his father didn't seem to approve of.
Litho's mind translated her pad's words as meaning her progress with the pride customs, and she grinned around her kill, before setting it down. "No, the rock I've been using is working fine. Nobody notices." She didn't know if holding grass in her mouth would get the same result, anyway. It might taste better, but she was so used to the taste of rocks and dirt that she barely noticed it anymore.
She didn't know what to think of the bird comment though. Why would she hold a bird in her mouth? Chuckling to herself, she licked Rasul across the cheek. How endearing her smart but often confusing mate was. She never knew if his stranger comments were from him being addle-brained, or her not being smart enough to understand him. "Have you eaten yet? It's not much of a kill, but I'm still getting the hang of the animals here."
"I," he paused, a bit embarrassed, "I sort of ate the lizards I was experimenting on today." His shoulders seemed to droop a bit but he quickly shrugged it off by making his way to the mouth of the den. He ran a paw along the edge where it met the ground. Just enough of an edge to keep tiny cubs on either side, but not so much that anyone would trip over it. She truly was something. He glanced back at her over his shoulder, a smile on his face now, "It's almost done isn't it?" He couldn't imagine it would need to be a whole lot bigger, unless of course she was planning on a mountain of cubs. That thought scared him a little. He could handle a few, but he'd seen some pads with more cubs than toes. The thought was overwhelming.
Litho smirked at his embarrassment, though she thought it was unneeded. She could still tease him about it though. "What were you testing, whether they tasted different? Or did you just get so caught up in your work that you forgot to eat, until you had to choose between knowledge and starvation?"
Her chest puffed right up at her mate's pride in her own work, and she came over to watch him inspect it, forgetting her hare where it lay. Her mind buzzed with the many plans she'd made as she dug, seriousness taking over. "It could always use improving with time, but I've got most of the basework done. I modeled it on some of the nicer dens in the area, although I don't think all of them were built appropriately for this dirt, if you ask me. Comes from bringing banu in that don't know the area. They try to dig like they did at home, and it doesn't always turn out right."
"They weren't proving useful, and the sun was high in the sky," he laughed, refocusing himself on observing the den as she described it. He brushed past her as he went to inspect the side walls, "I guess it's a good thing then that I chose a digger of many skills to bring home with me?" Something possessed him to lift a paw and test the strength, forgetting for a moment that his own weight had substantially increased over the passing months. At first nothing happened, the edge of the den wall simply pushed back against him. Then, suddenly, his paw slipped and a large crack appeared, tracing itself up the wall and out to the roof of the mouth of the den. He paused, backing up a few paces. "Litho," he said quietly, his face a worried mess, "Should we be moving out of the way?" Physics had never really been his specialty.
The idea of Rasul slurping up his test subjects after exhausting their uses amused Litho terribly. She could only imagine what sort of things might've been going on in the poor lizards' minds, assuming they had them. What would they think of a lion toying with his food so very elaborately?
She almost missed Rasul putting his feet up on the wall, but as soon as his paw hit dirt, her senses sparked up tingling with a warning. Instinctively she knew he shouldn't do that, but it took a moment for her brain to catch up and tell her why: because that was the weak load bearing section she'd been fussing over, and had planned to fortify with wood or bones just in case. "No, don't..." she trailed off, because it was already too late. The cracks that appeared made her wince, and she backed out of the denmouth quickly. "Yes, move now, bad thing to do what you did," she babbled nervously.
In an unexpected reflex he bit down on her fur as he passed, dragging her back a little further than she had gone herself. As he did the side wall collapsed inward, taking with it a significant chunk of the inside of the roof. The sound was deafening, but nothing more so than the screaming inside his head. She would hate him for this, he'd ruined something she worked so hard on. He froze for a moment, letting go of her fur as he lifted his head up to survey the mess. It seemed intact beyond the small collapse, but the front would have to be cleared and rebuilt before anything else could be done. He cringed, glancing down at her with an apology in his eyes. "Litho..." he trailed off, looking back at the damage, "I'm so sorry, I didn't know it would..."
Litho yelped at the bite that landed on her, and felt herself dragged backwards. Which was probably a good thing, because her mind was warring between the natural instinct of running and the less sensible instinct to protect her many days' worth of effort, which was now crumbling behind her. Clear of everything except the dust cloud that was kicked up, Litho's jaw hung loose as she watched the whole thing collapsing inward. It would almost impressive, the sheer scale of what the simple act had wrought, if it wasn't so upsetting.
When things had settled, she stepped gingerly over the scattered debris to get a better look at the result. She cursed herself inwardly, glaring at what remained of the supporting beam. How could she have waited so long to shore the thing up? If she'd just worked a little longer instead of going for food... She glanced over at Rasul, eyes wide with the shock of it all. "We are so lucky we don't have cubs yet," she muttered. "They would've been right there."
She was right. A sudden terror came over him and for a moment he thought to look. But they didn't have any cubs, no one was injured. "Litho," he said softly, moving to stand beside her, "I'll help you fix it, it's my fault. I forgot." That I'm not a kid anymore. He had really screwed up this time, and he wasn't sure how he'd be able to make up for it. He sighed, inwardly slapping himself. "I'll start clearing it out."
She scoffed, angry at the whole thing, and maybe a little at Rasul, but mostly at herself. "Forgot what, did I tell you not to touch the central column because it wasn't supported? No I didn't, because I was too busy not shoring it up like a... like a lioness who doesn't know the first thing about digging!" Snarling, she raked the remains of the column, but it stubbornly decided to be sturdy for the moment. Frustrated, she headbutted it, and got a shower of sand for her trouble, but the damage had been done. It was now doing a very splendid job of supporting the collapse.
Deflated, she sat down amidst the damage and just stared. "I think some of the bone collection got buried," she said absently. She couldn't really think what to do next. Did she try to rebuild it, or did she start over from scratch? She knew she'd be able to handle either, but she'd just been so proud of it all.
Rasul slouched, his chest seeming to cave inward as he moved past her to begin pushing the rubble down from the inside. He was stronger than her now, something he wasn't quite used to, and after a little effort he managed to clear the troublesome column and push a large chunk of the mess out over the threshold. "We'll find them," he assured her, offering a weak smile, "If it was anyone's fault it was mine for throwing my big clumsy self around." He tried to laugh, hoping to see a bit of a return from her. Anything but upset would be nice. To be honest he was a little frightened, thinking she might storm off.
Rasul broke through her daze with his laugh, and Litho remembered why she liked him so much. This wasn't a disaster, this was just Rasul being yet again adorable in a disastrous way. Suddenly the cave-in was very funny, and she chuckled along with him, and licked his ears to soothe his nerves. "You just love making more work for your beybanu, don't you?" she teased. She thrilled a little in the title. She was first, because she could take it.
"I'm going to eat first," she declared, "and then maybe take a swim. You'll just have to sleep outside tonight, because I'm not touching those rocks until I'm rested." Which would probably be after the swim; the digger in her just wouldn't let it sit there. And she'd make it better and grander too. Thoughts of crushed cubs made her determined that her den wouldn't just be the flashiest, but the sturdiest and safest in the pride as well. Goodness knows it would have to be, with Rasul trying to knock it down!
