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 Posted: Sun May 22, 2011 9:42 pm
 Clean and tidy, Azibo peaked his nose out of the den where he slept with his Father, his Mother, and his six siblings. Somehow, he had been the last one his father rounded up for their weekly baths, and the rest of his siblings had made their escape already. For his part, he just wanted to get out of the den as quickly as possible. Mom and Dad were cuddling with each other already and he had had enough lovey dovey for the day. It was hard to escape Orad and Ampalaya being lovey dovey - except when one of their cubs had done something wrong. Then they were very strict.
Azibo made his way out of the temple and toward the river - the place he thought he would be least likely to get dirty again and have to suffer another bath. After all, there was lots of water there. It would be hard to get dirty with all that water around.
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Posted: Tue May 24, 2011 4:25 pm
 It was not hard to get dirty around the river, despite all the water around. Kerer was proof of that. Amplaya and Orad's beloved frog had a knack for finding water which was almost occult, and with water he usually managed to find mud and ways to get it all over himself, which made his mother's task spectacularly challenging when it was his turn to be bathed. He also tended to be bathed more frequently than his siblings because of this, but that didn't much bother him. It was easier than trying to get the dried mud and silt off himself.
He had escaped to the river shortly after his parentally-imposed bath, pleased not to have the gritty feeling of dried mud on his fur, but eager to get back to his beloved riverbank. It was his favorite place in the pride, particularly in the mornings, while it was still cool enough for a cub as dark as he to go about without melting under the sun's unrelenting rays. He was still there, but not really particularly dirty - yet. He was just dangling his paws in the water, letting the damp sand beneath his tummy leech some of the heat from him.
Kerer looked up when he saw Azibo though, and grinned as he greeted his brother, observing, "You look very clean."
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Posted: Tue May 24, 2011 10:02 pm
"Mom just finished cleaning me," Azibo told Merit-Kerer glumly, "and then her and dad got all cuddly so I left real quick."
Azibo stood at the top of the bank, and looked down at his younger brother, sitting on the sand with his paws in the water. He looked at home here, and comfortable. Azibo wondered why - Mom was constantly warning them about the dangers of the river, like hippos and crocodiles and really big fish, but he suspected she was overreacting. She was very overprotective, Mom was.
"Mom's gonna give you another bath when she sees you. You're paws have got all sandy already."
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Posted: Wed May 25, 2011 8:24 am
Kerer grimaced mostly because he knew it was expected. His siblings all seemed to take issue with their parents' assiduous cleaning. He didn't. But then, he was also the only one who really seemed to need it by the time it was his turn, so maybe that was part of it. But he knew from experience that it was yucky to have to try to lick the mud off for himself, no matter whether it was moist or dried.
"Do you think other parents are as cuddly as ours are?" he asked, flexing his claws beneath the water to admire the way the liquid seemed to magnify them. "I think they probably are."
He had no way of knowing for sure, though, since he had not had a great deal of experience with others' parents so far in his short life. Mostly all of his playing was done with his siblings, and when he wasn't with them he was stalking cool places or in lessons with all his agemates. The fact that he knew other cubs from his lessons didn't mean he knew their parents after all. He liked to meet new people, though, so he'd have to get around to meeting them at some point.
"Hm," he said, acknowledging his brother's prediction regarding his sandy state. "Probably. Sand isn't so bad though. I think they maybe worry a little too much about keeping us clean."
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Posted: Sun May 29, 2011 4:34 pm
Azibo nodded. "'Specially the girls. Nub-Nofre is never, ever dirty but mom scrubs her just like she scrubs you. And you're always the dirtiest."
Azibo padded out a spot for him to sit above his brother on the bank, close enough to talk but not close enough to get generously muddy. "I dunno. I guess they are. You have to be kind of cuddly to want cubs, cause when we're really little we need lots and lots of cuddling, right?"
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Posted: Tue May 31, 2011 6:18 am
"Well, girls are kind of silly," Kerer observed. "I mean, I don't really think Nub-Nofre actually minds being cleaned all the time, and she doesn't even need it. Like you said."
Kerer didn't mind either, but for his own reasons, which he figured made his not-minding far more logical and reasonable than Nub-Nofre's. Girls were a mystery to the dark-coated lion and he had yet to make the decision that he wanted to try to puzzle them out. That would come later in life, probably, though if one was to ask him about the possibility he would laugh and tell them he preferred frogs and fish to girls.
"I hadn't thought of that," Kerer admitted. It was a very sensible theory, he thought. He definitely remembered needing a lot of cuddling when he was younger, and how nice that had been, though he didn't really miss it or long for it now. Another thought occurred to him which brought him some concern, however.
"You don't think they're keeping in practice because they want more cubs, do you? There are already a lot of us in the den." The thought alarmed him somewhat.
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Posted: Tue May 31, 2011 6:58 pm
Azibo didn't like the thought of that at all - the den was quite cozy already with seven cubs and two adults. But Mom and Dad were always cuddling - always. They cuddled before the went about their duties and between times; they cuddled before meals and before bed. Azibo could only imagine that all that cuddling was probably the source of cubs - and there would certainly be more following if that was the case.
Azibo's quickly thought about how little room their was in the den now, and decided that they couldn't go on like that. He needed some space.
"We have to find a way to stop them, then. There just isn't any room for more cubs in there."
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Posted: Fri Jun 03, 2011 5:22 am
Kerer blinked. That had not been the progression of his thoughts, but now that Azibo mentioned it...it really was the only logical conclusion. There really wasn't room in the den for more cubs, and he wasn't sure he wanted more brothers and sisters around anyway. He loved the ones he had, but there were a lot of them and people still mixed up their names because they all looked alike and their names sounded similar for the most part. He wasn't very fond of that, and with more siblings the problem could only get worse.
"I think you're right," he said slowly. It wasn't something he was thrilled to admit, since any plan to stop their parents from cuddling would probably involve leaving the nice, cool riverbank and venturing across the scorching hot sands until they reached the temple. The temple was fine, with its shaded areas and all, but getting there...Kerer wanted to give up at just the thought.
Reluctantly he suggested, "We could both get really muddy, and then they'd have to clean us. They can't be cuddly while they're bathing us. And the mud will keep us cooler on the way home."
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Posted: Sat Jun 04, 2011 8:56 am
Azibo's mind started racing ahead. "That will work for now. But baths only take so long. We'll need to find a better solution."
He got up and started pacing around at the top of the embankment.
"There are seven of us, so we can take shifts. I'm sure it will take a lot longer for the cubs to appear because they're already busy with us but we'll have to slow them down more. We'll just need to keep them busy. Getting muddy, getting them to play, whatever works."
He slid down and into the water, squelching around a little. It was nice and cool, Merit-Kerer was right. But the girl's wouldn't go for this, they'd need too figure out other ways to distract their parents.
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Posted: Sun Jun 05, 2011 7:04 am
Kerer nodded. Azibo was correct, of course, but what Kerer had proposed was only a stopgap, a temporary measure until something more permanent could be set into action.
"We should ask the others what ideas they might have, too," he said as he watched his brother pace. "Otherwise mom and dad will wonder why all of us are suddenly so very interested in the river."
Kerer couldn't remember a time before he found the river fascinating and compelling, but he knew most of his siblings didn't share his passion for it, or his need to keep cool. It might be a bit of a sell to convince their parents that they had all changed their minds. Especially the girls, who tended to be a lot cleaner, and probably would neither like getting muddy nor be able to convincingly tell their parents it was something they'd enjoyed doing.
"We could hide from them, so they have to spend time looking for us before bedtime, and whenever one of them comes back, another could sneak away." Kerer didn't think about how much it would probably upset their parents to have their cubs slipping away and vanishing right before bedtime. He was still too young to have developed very much in the way of empathy.
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Posted: Sun Jun 05, 2011 2:41 pm
"Maybe not all the time, because eventually they'd get mad and catch on. Maybe we could just tire them out so when it's bedtime they just fall right to sleep. I think Dad'll get angry if we do that all the time."
Their parents were rarely angry, but they were strict. He didn't think they'd put up with a lot of shenanigans like not being able to get all their cubs in the den for long, so they would have to find ways to keep their parents busy that didn't look like misbehaving.
"As long as it doesn't LOOK like we're being bad, though, we should be ok."
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Posted: Mon Jun 13, 2011 7:15 am
"Mm. Yeah. Besides, I don't like being in trouble." Not that anyone did, but Kerer thought it was an important point to make here. "So if we don't seem to be being bad, I think that would be better. Besides, I bet the girls wouldn't go along with anything that would get them in trouble."
Kerer really had nothing against his sisters, or girls in general. He just felt that they were far too concerned with unimportant things like cleanliness. Personally, Kerer was more interested in what a person had to say than how they looked (or smelled) while saying it. It would take something pretty spectacular to change his mind about the importance of such things, too, and in his limited experience there had so far been nothing so spectacular.
"Well, maybe you'd better go spread the word?" Kerer suggested. He didn't offer to go himself because he was quite happy where he was, thankyouverymuch. "If anyone comes by here, I'll be sure to let them know what's going on."
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Posted: Mon Jun 13, 2011 7:41 am
"Alright - I'll start talking to the rest of them. I'm sure they'll think of some good ideas."
Azibo squelched out of the mud and up the river bank,knowing that soon his legs would have a shell of baked-on mud, and that tonight Mom would be after him for another bath. Keep them busy, that was the ticket. Getting muddy all the time would definitely be worth that.
"I'll see you later."
Azibo headed off, deciding to check for his sisters around the temple first. He'd find his the other three brothers afterwards.
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