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 Posted: Sat Feb 23, 2008 3:57 pm
-- AIM Rp between Radi and Taika ((Ume & DFA)) Radi'Utengo, the name meant "thunder shelter". But he was feeling very much... out of sorts. He had come used to living with lions and was even struggling with that fact. They should be the scum of the earth. Hadn't he run away from one who had "enslaved" him? And now he was here with Taiku in lion country learning how to be a good male waterbuck - although he wasn't quite sure how that was going on - and now surrounded by babies. BABIES. He did NOT want to end up being a babysitter again. Her name meant magic. Surely it was proof he had some sort of spell on him, especially with the way he couldn't help but follow her around, rarely letting himself be pulled from her side out of fear.
Sitting by the waterhole, he looked at his reflection, so different now that it was covered with markings. Just how different had he become? He frowned and batted at the water as if it were its fault.
Taika was amused; the sight of the babies was a rather amusing one, to say the least. She loved watching the small things tumble and fall and whine, needy... calling for their mother whom never seemed to be more than a whole meter away from them.
She found the scene fascinating; such small creatures, whom would in time grow up to become large beasts capable of hunting down even the largest buffalos in the savvanah if given the chance. It was.... an interesting view; for now, Taika found they were so small, so needy, that surely it'd be magic for them to turn into predators. It was the way nature worked; it truly was magical.
No more so amusing, however, than the male waterbuck whom travelled with them. An ear flicked at the thought of Radi, and Taika lifted her nose, inhaling to capture his scent, turning away from the family to follow it; he also amused her. It was evident he was getting used to the surroundings, and yet... he was in denial about it. She wondered, what it was he wanted; what it was he truly NEEDED, for as far as she was concerned, she herself, had all what she could have ever wanted right here; family, friends and protection. What else could she want?
"Oi," the brown female settled herself at his side, a brow arched in question, "You look forlong, don't you? Why the long face?"He looked up at her, wrinkling his nose. "Don't you find this all weird? Living among lions. We aren't meant for it." He grumbled. His distrust and dislike of dominant females was fading out of necessity but that of lions was too heavily engrained to be too far gone from his mind. She too was covered with the markings of this pride and bore them proudly. Her love of it all was apparently and unlike he, she clearly enjoyed her life. He shook his head, almost angrily, frustrated. "What's it like to be you?" he grumbled. Because it's a little frustrating to be me.
"Nope!" it was chirped rather happily, "As far as I know, I've got protection here; not only do the smaller predators stay away, but other lions too. I am safe..." she lifted her head to watch the fluffy clouds pass by, a small, true smile tugging at her lips, "My mother was killed by a lioness when I was still young. I want fall that way. My mother told me there was magic in this world," she turned to him as she spoke, "I'm going to take that magic, and use it. I'm going to live my life happy, and safe. If you can't beat them.... join them."
Strange words for a beast of prey, but they'd worked for her. As he spoke, she leaned in and nudged his side with her nose, just a poke, almost a prod, "Being me... was lonely at first," she told him, "I was.... diferent. They wouldn't have me," by they, she obviously meant the herds, "Before Tsi'hilu, there was nothing, and now... there's family. And friends. Now... it's nice to be me," after a pause she settled for glancing at the water, "What's it like to be you?"So she wasn't too different from him. Like him, she had been rejected by the herds. He had to think of it that way. Because as she had told him, they had breeding grounds. That they had made a new one without even coming to look for him. They hadn't bothered to find that he was still alive. He had been.... abandoned.
"Being me... well you probably wouldn't want to be me. The savannah errupted into a wildfire which killed my mother. Nobody even came to see if I was alive. Luckily we're not like them," he gestured to the lion cubs playing nearby. "They need meat to live, need their parents to feed them. We can live on grass and survive much easier. But they never came to find me. And I was bullied by a monkey almost daily." He couldn't remember how long the monkey had taken residence in his tree. "And then I was enslaved by this .....pathetic lioness and made to babysit her child. I only managed to escape when I met you." Yea and look at him now. Look at where he was. Back to square one. Lions made him nervous.
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Posted: Sat Feb 23, 2008 3:59 pm
Not too diferent, all in all; diferent ways of seeing the same life, really, as far as she was concerned. She kept her thoughts to herself though, hving reached the conclusion that perhaps Radi needed his denial... needed it all, to keep himself sane. Acceptance of a fact as strange as living with lions was hard at best, for a beast of prey, and Taika herself had always been amused by the way she'd been able to asimilate it so easily.
"They move on;" she told him, "The herds, I mean," a pause followed, "I don't blame them; not really. It's their ways. I go fo the breeding grounds when the season opens... they let me in. Continuing the species, they say. But I don't like what I see. S'why I always come back emptyhanded," turning away from the water, she offered Radi a smile, "Except this time; I came with you. It's been fun here with you. You've been amusing, entertaining, but..." she turned to glance at the cubs as they whined and tugged and stumbled for their parents' attention.
The lions were too ocupied, as it was, to pay the buck much mind, "But," she repeated again, "I'll take you to Them, if you want, now," again she turned to the male, "You're probably the only male in the grounds that can boast having lived with a lion; you smell like one by now. They'll flock to mate you."
Her offer sounded so.... promising. Above all, it meant she'd bring him to the waterbucks. It meant he'd be with his own kind. But one phrase stuck out to him the most, a phrase that made him pause. They'll flock to mate to you. But was that what he wanted? Did he come to get a mate, to get action? After living with lions, did he even have the courage to go to them. And then, what would he tell them? I've been here, afraid of lions all this time? I found a waterbuck among them who accepted me and my oddities? Really he was too ashamed to return to them. Because, thinking about it, he realized he was a coward. And all he wanted was... "I just want to be accepted..." he muttered. He frowned. "No. No, don't take me." And it was the most unpredictable decision he had ever made.
It came down to her erlier question; what was it that Radi wanted? What was it he needed? Truly and honestly needed? Taika wasn't sure, and more often than not, she'd spent her time puzzling over the answer; when she couldn't sleep, she'd recline her form against Tsi'hilu's, or Nyota's and would think as she stared at Radi's form, just a bit aways from them.
He was always... alone.
He seemed to keep to himself; it was a rare occurence to see him smile truthfuly, and Taika had wondered why this was so. What was his need for building a wall around himself? Around his emotions?
She was staring at the water again, watching the way it ripped when an insect landed on it's surface, and the way it moved against the wind when he answered. A pause from the female, an ear swirling to face him before she offered him a confused glance, "I thought you wanted a herd? Females?" she asked honestly, almost naively, "Herds... are simpleminded organisms. They accept the fact everyone's going to die. They accept we're liabilities. They don't care... but lions," she turned to glance at the family, her eyes softening, "They fight for their own, and keep them protected. THey do not accept those they love are going to die," facing him again, she offered him a chipper smile, "That's what I want for myself, that's what I thought, long ago."
She'd caught his other words, a murmur, perhaps not meant for her to be heard, but she addressed it anyways, "You know, it's hard to be accepted... unless you accept yourself, first."
He nearly choked at her words. What was that supposed to mean? Didn't he love himself and care for himself? Didn't he protect himself from predators? Yes, he had a rather over-protective nature but wasn't that just because he loved himself? Her words made him think, rather against his will when he'd rather be content with his beliefs. Was his over-protective nature because he was afraid of what others would see? Because he was afraid no one would want to see him? That he was ugly, ugly inside? He had been rejected and left beside his mother's dead body. A chain of events that put him where he was now.
But then, if he hadn't accepted himself already, how was he? He wrinkled his nose, feeling no better than before if not even a bit worse. "And how do you accomplish that?" he asked almost snidely out of anger at himself and perhaps a bit at her for bringing it up.
"Hmmm...." she paused too as if pondering her own words, then wrinkled her nose, "That, is the question everyone would like to hear an answer for," she turned to offer him a smile, "No one'd be lost if we knew the answer; I guess you just follow your heart?" she shrugged slightly, a roll of her shoulders before she swished her tail, "You just live life, and hope you're not living a lie... hope that how you act, is not a mask. That it's really you underneath."
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Posted: Fri Mar 14, 2008 10:52 am
Radi thought to himself about how much more easy life would be if one was just oblivious to everything and didn't have to think. But to be oblivious meant submitting oneself completely to chance and fate, as though one existed without a brain. As a prey animal living that way, it was an easy way to die and an occupation he clearly couldn't pick for himself. But to be told he had to do something and at the same time not told how was extremely frustrating especially with her answer. He did not think that living with everything exposed could be a way to accept oneself. It was a foolish thing. "If everyone can know everything about someone by looking at them, it makes them more vulnerable." And vulnerability also leads to a quicker death. "To protect yourself and not leave everything out in the open means you live longer. You don't die like a fool." But of course, she probably didn't understand that living here where lions didn't try to eat her.
"True, that, but that's not always the case with friends, or loved ones," she was still looking at him, her head tilted to one side, as if by doing so, she could read him better... reach into him and drag out the answers she wanted, "Not everyone would see it as weakness, nor would everyone use it to harm you. That's the diference," finally turning away, she aimeda smile to the sky.
Taika did understand, it was clear by the sad smile she aimed at the sky, "That's... such a lonely, lonely fate though. I wanted to change my own."
Radi wrinkled his nose. He could not logically refute what she said. But he also could not apply it to himself. "I have been alone all my life. To one who only knows that sort of fate, it is not lonely. Those stuck alone must rise to overcome it, to not let it kill them." Yes, if it was as terrible as she made it sound then he had survived - passed with flying colors. The loneliness she spoke of seemed to more closely resemble the loneliness one can feel in a crowded room rather than the loneliness of being by oneself. He had never felt it, just the resentment of one who felt abandoned. He had never been so lonely as he had vindicated. And Radi certainly didn't see it as being alone in the sense of deprivation. So maybe his statement was hypocritical in that he had no real experience to draw from just her words mixed with his past which wasn't much proof at all.
He went back to her first statement. "But friends? Where am I to find friends who would care what happens to me? Who wants to care about me, see the real me?" His voice hinted a bit of bitterness, as though the world had been fashioned against him. In his mind, he had no one, but Taika who surely just brought him here because of his insecurities but who he could not leave because he knew no where else to go. In his mind, no one wanted to care about him
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