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Out in the rough Rougelands was the young Mapenzi, sitting beside a watering hole and starting down into it. Her eyes seemingly glossed over and lost to the reflective view of herself. For as long as she could remember, most of her life had been a daze and the reoccuring memory of her past seemed to keep her brain off the subject of reality, surroundings, and others that may be around. Most of the time, this wasn't a problem at all... unless a Lion were to appear on the scene, in which she would crouch low and cower from the male. Nice or mean, it didn't matter about the temperment most of the time. The fact that the Lion was a GUY scared her. this came to be quite problematic as she got older. She was soon to be a full grown lioness. What would she do then?

"I don't even remember what I was suppose to do today..." Mapenzi thought aloud.

After a bit of deep thought, Mapenzi snapped back to her original surroundings. She wasn't fully aware of where she had wandered or what she was about to do before fazing out, but she shrugged it off. Looking down into the pool of a wet, clear reflection she blinked curiously,

"Oh! Water! ...When did I come across water?" Again, Mapenzi seemed to have forgotten how she even dragged herself to the current location. Either way, water was a welcoming sight for dry mouths on a hot day like this out in the Rogue Lands. She dipped her head down and lapped, her ears not picking up on the sound of a approaching wanderer nearing her spot.

It was a little late for Mapenzi to do anything as her ears tilted to the low sounding greeting, her tongue still lapping at the water and leaving ripples bouncing on it's surface as her eyes shifted to the side to see a lion saunter up. Darkened pupils shrunk slightly at the sight, and her drinking pace slowed to a halt, with her large tongue dipped halfway out from her jaws. Mid-lap, you could call it. She wasn't sure how to respond to his greeting, but the tuft of fur on the end of her striped tail fluffed as if she were a spooked kitten.

Her eyes steadily watched the male for some time, before she slowly started to pull her neck away from the water, crouching low near the edge and watching him with side glances. Was he one of those rude and dominant males? She couldn't tell by looks alone. But his overall appearance sure seemed gruff and roughed.

"Calm down, I'm sure he's just here to drink water. E-Everyone needs to drink..." The young lioness thought to herself. Though her eyes kept glancing elsewhere besides at the lion beside her a bit.

"Everything is... f-fine sir." Mapenzi stuttered out softly, eyes glancing over, noticing he's sitting there and looking over at her. What was he going to do? The young lioness ould only think of bad scenarios; but that's just because she was basing him off his look. He did indeed look rough and tough, and gruff. but of course she was just judging a book by it's cover at this point.

Crouching low she kept her ears laid back and herself close and cuddled up. "I-I just came to drink water, l-l-l-like y-you." When Mapenzi was scared, she stuttered a LOT.

As the large male groomed himself for a bit, he then turned and walked away. Mapenzi raised her head, watching him wander off on his way. so he really had just come to drink water, phew! But... something bothered her about him. He had said 'nice to meet you' though they had not introduced themselves. Why would anyone say that without knowing whom they met? Perking her ears in interest she got up slowly and started to follow at a distance.

Mapenzi really was no good at trying to stay silent as the dried out gras brushed past her lowly slunkened form. It's as if she was stalkign her prey, though more in curiousity than anything. She hadn't noticed the large males ear listening to her pad slowly behind him. The lion confused her. Despite his large and rather scary looks, he seemed... nice. At least respectful in a sense.

"He's nice. He doesn't SEEM nice, but he was nice..." the young lioness thought to herself as she crawled low. Soon enough though she stepped ona old, dried up twig, which snapped under her paw. "Eek!!"

Taking in a quick breath to try to recompose herself from the spook, the young lioness sucked in a breath of air and tried to look brave. but her scared and nervous eyes gave away her supposed bluff. "U-Um... b-b-back at the watering h-hole... you said it was n-nice t-t-t-to meet you w-whe-when you didn't even kn-know my name..." Mapenzi stuttered out those words. Whenever she was nervous; especially around male lions, this awful habit of a stutter and mutter would take over her ability to talk.

"W-Why d-d-dit you say th-that...?" She tilted her head, low and crouched to the ground.