Wahed stretched as he moved from the den that Saidia, the strange, schedule oriented lion, had let him and his God companion Uzembe stay in that night. He let Uzembe sleep in, since the God was not used to walking around so much and while he could endure a lot more physical drain than the wild dog could, he was also injured and this was all very new to him. A little bit of extra sleep would be good for him, and really, Wahed was not in a hurry to leave despite how strange Saidia was. He was just a bit quirky, and not a mean or untrustworthy lion by any means. That meant more of a curiosity for Wahed, and he was determined to figure out what made Saidia tick.

Saidia, for his part, was up with the sun, as he was every morning. He had a routine that he liked to stick to, and part of that included the simple task of greeting the morning. He felt like saying hello to the sun by watching it rise would help him to have a good day and, if he were honest, he needed a little help in that area. Things had been so weird, he just wanted to return to what he knew. The further out of his depth he got, the more lost he felt. He was just not sure how to handle the oddness.

The wild dog padded up to him, seeing him sitting on a rock and looking off into the horizon. He sat down next to the lion and looked out as well, frowning and not seeing anything worth looking at. Just the sun rise, he supposed. It was fairly nice, if he were honest, and he noted to himself that usually he was not up and about in time to see the morning sun coming up. He wagged his tail as he watched it quietly for a moment, then looked at Saidia.

“So, what’s the plan for the morning, huh?”

Saidia glanced at Wahed after a moment, as if he was not sure how to answer. Or maybe if he wanted to answer at all. He took a slow breath, though, not wanting to be rude even if he was not really familiar with how to talk to others. He was not exactly a social butterfly, and he did not spend a lot of his time ‘hanging out’ with anyone at all. He was quiet, by nature and design.

“I suppose I… I don’t know…” he was strained to say it. His usual routine would not work with them there, and he was not sure he could just leave them alone and not talk to them or hang out with them for a little while at the very least. And doing that would through everything off anyway, because he did not build socialization into his day. Maybe that was a sign to adjust his schedule a bit, to account for things like this, but it was a hard way to learn it was needed. Today, he was going to do something completely different.

He was not going to have a plan. He was going to… wing it.

He stared at Wahed blankly for a long moment, not sure how to even begin going about something so foreign to him. The Wild dog blinked in confusion, waiting for something to happen, but nothing did. He was under the impression that Saidia always had a plan, but it seemed that, today at least, there was none. He smiled and wagged his tail, standing up and padding around in a small, anxious circle. He was eager to get his day started, and he wanted to see this lion was up to some fun.

Probably not, but hey.

“How about you show me around the borders, here? I don’t need to go into the pride if that’s too much, but since you live out here every day, on your own presumably, then why don’t you show me your favorite spots? You’ve got to like this place to stay here, right?” He smiled and Saidia nodded his head. It sounded like a plan, and he could build a schedule around that, somehow, by mapping out the day in his head and sticking to that plan. It helped make things not feel as different.

“Alright, I can do that. Do you want to wait for your friend to wake up?”

“I don’t think he’s going to wake up any time soon. He was pretty wiped out. But we can hang around until he’s up, if you want. He would like to look around, too, I think. Did you know he is a God? I guess the wings made it a little obvious. His domain is Negligence, he says, and that’s like… what he rules over, or something. But he doesn’t seem Negligent to me, he’s a nice guy. Just a little clumsy sometimes.”

“I’ve never met a god before,” Saidia said honestly, shaking his head. “It seems interesting. Have you… have you known him for a while? Are you a god too?”

Wahed had to laugh at that. What would he be the god of? And he did not know if there were any wild dog gods out there, but then, he had not known there was such a thing as lion gods before just recently, so he supposed what he did or did not know was irrelevant. He was absolutely certain that he was nothing more than a usual wild dog, though.

“I’m nothing. We just met a few days ago after he was attacked. I’ve been taking care of him and keeping an eye on him, but he’s healing really fast and probably doesn’t really need me any more. But I mean. I did not have much of a purpose before, so I kind of want to stick with him as long as I can.”

“I understand that,” Saidia said honestly. He nodded his head and felt a little spark of respect for the wild dog. Maybe they had more in common than he thought. He nodded back toward the dens, getting up and moving slowly from his rock. “Come on, then. Let’s go wake him up.”


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