A grey tail hung limp over a tree branch; lifeless, dull, and filled with inertia was the leopard who owned the tail. He breathed a sigh into the air, which turned into a visible ghostly image expelling from his mouth. He had been alone, once more, for quite some time. That was his life, and that was the way he expected it to be. And the only figure prominent enough to remember was a cheetah who looked just like the scenery in front of him...But what he saw in front of him was not as pretty.
With that thought in mind, he hopped from the branch he was using to rest onto the ground. His claws raked the leafy grass and dirt, and he felt peculiar; someone was right beside him, and he turned around to see...
"Foolish feline!" roared the dark brown hulk of a lion compared to the leopard that had fallen right before him."You would do well to watch whether you are encroaching on another's space, especially being such a low level of life form yourself," he said, snarling.
While angry, it was sudden, and he was aware that it was perhaps accidental as well. The leopard would live for another day without the wrath of his paw. But he had just barely escaped it...
"Leopards," he began to say, "So disgusting, you do not know the extent of what you have done. I am Akram'raja of the Ukuucha'Wafalme, and you invite scorn."
He remembered one of Achal's in the pride was a leopard. She was green, full of frivolous patterns across her coat, and produced no valuable offspring. It was a pity, for Achal had sense at least once when he brought forth Lililamuna's litter...
Black eyes widened at the lion that seemed to appear out of nowhere. He had thought something was wrong when he landed. He supposed he should have looked below at what was on the ground before actually falling down. Next thing he knew, a shouting lion was threatening him, and the lion was actually large and intimidating, and sounded intelligent enough to pursue such an endeavor.
"Akram'raja of the Ukuucha'Wafalme?" he asked, seeing it as an invitation to introduce himself, "I am... Goshi, a leopard that drifts through here and there."
His name and the place where he came from was rather wordy, Goshi thought. And the place didn't seem to like leopards very much, because his species was being insulted. He blinked and flicked his tail, looking at the sky instead of the lion before him. The lion would still be there when he looked back, anyways.
It was grey, clouds slowly moving across the blanket of white. And he hummed to himself slowly, movements very pronounced and heavy through this sluggish state.
"Didn't mean to hop on you, Akram'raja," he stated simply, swinging his tail calmly behind; he supposed it would have been pretty bad if he actually did, though, and felt a tad more remorse for the situation.
"Would have been pretty bad for the both of us."
Akram'raja snarled once more, taking the leopard's reply as a potential mockery. However, he could sense that the leopard was more stupid than witty and had just been responding. He thought, Good, there will be no blood spilled during this trial into the rogue lands.
As he observed the leopard, he noticed that the grey small form was rather... slothful in his movements and slurred in his speech. Perhaps he had run into a lower form of lower intelligence - perhaps this leopard was born with problems that prevented it from filling a regular leopard's capacity for living, and for that, Akram'raja felt at once like he should just leave. Time was ticking, after all, and the Ukuucha'Wafalme pads would be waiting... as well as his father, Vizier Tariq'ra'd. And if one of his brothers, especially Mirsajadi, had reached the pride before him, it would be something else Mirsajadi would find to use as an annoyance.
"Perhaps you are even less worthy than the kajira I have taken with me on this trip. Leopards like you shouldn't even be allowed to take a female to further spread the stupidity," he stated plain and calmly, raising his head to stare down at Goshi.
"You do not deserve to do such a thing as even cleaning the dirt from my paws."
Well, Goshi thought, This lion was either pretty mad or pretty harsh because I almost landed on him. Either way, Goshi was going to handle it as he felt: right now, he was vaguely apathetic to the situation. Perhaps that was better; if the two had gotten into a fight - and Goshi had gotten into several fights in his lifetime, none of which he could say was best remembered or received - the lion would definitely have been the victor.
"What are kajira?" Goshi decided to ask after Akram'raja's words.
That would definitely be a safe subject out of all he derived from the lion's speech.
"Sorry, today's an off day, I suppose," Goshi added, glancing back up to the clouds.
He partially noticed his unusual laconic current temper. But it didn't matter; he felt what he felt, and he was handling the lion as good as he felt. He probably should have been threatened to some extent - and he was - but he was disinclined to act out of that. In fact, he felt so relaxed that he began to sit down in front of Akram'raja even though it was clear that the lion found himself to be unpleasant and an aggravation.
"But we leopards need to keep up a history of future leopards, don't we?" Goshi posed, tilting his head as if he was baffled by the idea.
Akram'raja did not need to explain issues to the leopard before him, but he thought of something just then. Perhaps this could be a way to reach out and teach others outside of his pride so that more rogues and outsiders could reach a higher form of being. Perhaps his lessons would spread to others, and thus influence the lands outside of the Ukuucha'Wafalme. While he was sure something would not come out of the leopard in front of him, it was a start at least.
Showing others his power would indeed be a noteworthy cause. Thus, he felt better about lingering for a while longer to please the leopard's questions.
"Kajira are female in our pride who do not have a place as a banu. Banu belong to respected males - males who have raised a respectable family. I am on my way to the Ukuucha'Wafalme to start my own legacy with the banu I have captured out in these lands. As well, I have found a kajira who will soon learn her place."
He took a while to let the words sink in as well as think quickly to himself on his last sentence, and then added, "I know my power has heightened through this journey because I have caught a kajira and taught her to willingly come with me as a kajira. Just think!"
He was mostly talking to himself now, "I will be one of the few to bring home this many banu in addition to a kajira I can offer after this passage to adulthood trial."
All of what came from Akram'raja's mouth sounded like lions from a pride came out into the land of rogues to bring back... ladies? They captured female to their pride to imprison them, or keep them for value or something. Goshi did not like the sound of that. Female should be kept free, like the many females he had encountered and let go without another word.
He wouldn't have liked if a female felt obligated to stay with him, either, and would have felt uncomfortable if someone like... If someone like Poromoko had continued to follow him. It wasn't like the two had anything that connected the two as a couple...
So he had let her go happily.
"You foolish leopard would do well to listen to me," Akram'raja growled when he realized the leopard was simply lying there, eyes glazed over while he happily shook his tail.
He snorted. Well, if his audience in these lands were generally going to be like this...
"If only leopards had a hint of intelligence to comprehend the excellence the Ukuucha'Wafalme has called for..."
"Oh," Goshi said, just snapping out of the trance-like laze into which he had settled.
"I was listening to you, you know," he attempted at a reassurance, and then actually thought about it; had he been listening?
But he had been. He had thoughts, but felt that it would have been better to remain silent, else appear antagonistic in the face of this threatening lion.
"It sounds like there's no equality where you're from," he stated, the most clear sentence he had managed through this encounter, "And you're trying to be something you shouldn't be. Or maybe you are something you shouldn't be."
Goshi looked at Akram'raja, and all the muscles the lion had despite his already abnormally large physique. There was a brain to the brawn, but Akram'raja's intellect went to a place in which he could not operate on a compassionate level. This was the thing that turned the prides of lions against each other in wars. This was the arrogance that caused injustice throughout the savanna.
But Goshi was as listless as the weather, and said no more.
"I am as I have made, and it is something by which you are honored, leopard," Akram'raja said in a snarl, "And there is a reason why some are to be respected over others. The unworthy should not rise, else the world fall in pieces."
He sighed irritably, giving up on the leopard. There was nothing else to be gained from this encounter, and he wondered why he had lingered to talk to a rogue male creature. This was yet another lesson to be learned; if only his visions had foretold him of what to expect.
"I am getting back to my females, leopard, and you would be wise to stay away from them if you do not want to further spread the idiocy of these rogue lands," Akram'raja said his parting words as he brought his large mass off the grounds, and back to the direction of where his future banu and kajira were stationed.
