[PRP] The Dynamic Duo [Kamau + Naamini]

[Chibi Sheepcat]

Naamini, though more courageous than her brother, was not the type to just go wandering off into the wilderness unannounced. She had a good idea of what her mother would say to her if she did. Besides, exploring wasn't something she was going to do at random. The cub had a methodical way of doing things, especially when it came to exploring. She had already been down into the main pride lands, scouting out possible places where birds would gather. Yesterday she had tried to follow some of the huntresses to figure out where they were going. They were on to her though, and lead her on a wild goose chase until she finally gave up and went him. Today, however, she was going to explore a place that didn't move: the den site.

She had made up her mind that morning, as she stretched and fixed an errant tuft of fur. Den sites couldn't avoid being found, and they should hold lots of different sights and smells. She would start from the left side and work her way over. It didn't matter if it took her several days, but she wanted to be thorough. By the time she was all grown up she would know every speck of land in her pride. That way she would know if anything suspicious was going on. Destination in mind, Naamini gave one final look at the den before bounding off. Best to get started so that she could be back in time for dinner.  

[FerretPrince]

In order to get out of the den, Naamini had to step over her sleeping twin. At the moment, Kamau was curled up tightly, with his tail tuft just covering his nose. Against all common sense about bones---especially spines----the position was surprisingly comfortable for the small cub. But, alas, his nap had to be ended when his sister bounded out. Jerking awake with a snort, the male twin blinked blearily and glanced around the den. Oh. Naamini wasn’t here. Putting his head back down, he closed his eyes. They didn’t remain closed for long, opening wide as he really thought about it.

“Naamini!” jumping to his feet, he burst out of the den, nearly running over his sister in his panic to find her. “Naa—ooof…” he ran smack into her and tumbled briefly. Once the world stopped spinning, he shook his head to clear out the cobwebs before finally focusing on his twin. So alike in coloration, but complete opposites in personality. Kamau hated to be alone, even for a little while. “Where are you going? You know Momma hates it when either of us sneaks off without telling anyone.”

Just the other day, Momma had made it very clear to the cub that he was to never go away from the den without telling anyone. But… but then again, he was with Naamini. That changed things. She also made it clear that they weren’t to go anywhere near the border, which was an order Kamau was happy to comply with. Like Naamini, he wanted to know this land like the back of his paw before venturing out any further.  

[Chibi Sheepcat]

Naamini's ears swiveled back at the sound of her name, however she didn't slow. She supposed she should wait for her brother, but she was already on a mission. He could come with her if he could catch up with her. The cub had underestimated her brother's closeness, not expecting the second call of her name to come from much closer than the first. She had also not expected him to misjudge his distance and crash into her. Naamini gave a sharp "oof!" as she was hit, tumbling over and rolling several times before she came to a stop. With a quiet grumble she got back to her feet and gave her fur a good shake to get rid of the dust. It looked like Kamau was coming.

"I'm not sneaking off," she replied, nose crinkling at the idea. "I wasn't making the trip a secret or anything. And I would have told you if you weren't snoozing." Naamini frowned at her brother, the expression quite a common one on her face. Some might have said that it was strange for a cub to be so somber. She argued that she had lots of serious things to think about, and she didn't have time to be silly. It was her brother's job to do things like that.

"Well, I'll tell you and then you can say that I told somebody, alright?" Hopefully that would keep her out of trouble with their mother. No doubt she had probably lectured Kamau about sneaking off and adventuring. Naamini had a feeling that that lecture was coming her way very soon. "I'm going down to look in some of the old dens. Are you gonna come or are you gonna go back to sleep?"  

[FerretPrince]

Uh-oh… Naamini was making her Serious Face. She always meant business when she was making her Serious Face. It was one that was appearing more and more often these days, although Kamau did his best to cheer her up. Well, he tried anyway. He shook himself off, sending a small cloud of dust off of his pale fur. “You were too sneaking off! If you weren’t sneaking off, you would’ve woken me up!” Not that he hadn’t gone off while his sister was sleeping, now that he thought about it. Well, it didn’t matter. They were completely different situations.

“But Naamy…” he tried to interject, hoping to make his sister see reason so they could go back to the den and be nice and safe. But, of course, such a tactic rarely worked. Besides… Naamini had a good point. Momma had just said, ‘don’t go without telling someone’. And he certainly counted as ‘someone’, now didn’t he? Besides… the den was pretty boring, even to Kamau. He scratched one ear in thought before he came to a decision. “Alright. I’ll come with you.”

That way, if anyone tried to take Naamini away, he could stop them. Somehow, along the path of his short life, Kamau had gotten the idea that his role was to protect his twin sister. Wherever he had gotten this idea was anyone’s guess, but it was firmly engrained in the cub’s brain now. “But we can’t go too far! Momma says that some of the old caves lead to the roguelands. And we’re not allowed to go out there because there are bad guys out there.” More or less. Besides, he knew that his sister didn’t want to go out until everything in had been explored. She was very thorough like that.  

[Chibi Sheepcat]

Naamini's frown deepened at her brother's exclamation. Just because she got up without telling him made it a secret? That wasn't very fair. "I didn't wake you because you were sleeping," she replied, as though it was the most obvious thing in the world. Was she not allowed to go out on her own adventures from time to time? Did everything have to include him? Perhaps it was just a brother thing to not want to be so independent. That was why he was so sure she was deserting him. As silly as she may have thought he was, Kamau was still her brother. And family was very important to her.

Upon hearing Kamau start on his "but Naamy" routine, she couldn't help but press her ears back against her head. She was wasting valuable time here waiting for him to make up his mind. Luckily for her, he seemed to reach his decision quite quickly. The cub's frown returned to a neutral expression when Kamau said he was coming, and she gave him a curt nod. "Right. Let's go then!" She had already started moving when Kamau began talking again, but that hardly stopped her. They could talk while they walked.

"I'm not gonna go outside pride territory, I'm not stupid." The frown was back on her face at that thought, though she knew better than to be angry. Kamau wasn't the type to call her names, so she knew he wasn't insinuating she was dumb. But she still had to say it out loud, just so he knew. "And what kind of bad guys? I never heard nothing about bad guys."  

[FerretPrince]

“But if you had woken me up, I wouldn’t have been sleeping any more. And then you could have told me instead of trying to sneak off on your own!” Alright, so Kamau had another reason for wanting to be by his sister, besides his own insistence that he was supposed to protect her. There was also the fact that he hated to be alone. It terrified him. When he was alone, even the most simplistic of things seemed all the more terrifying and being with his sister, his twin, made things seem… safer. He trotted after her quickly as she began moving, pleased that she wasn’t insisting that he stay behind. It wouldn’t have worked anyway. There were manatees whacked out on codeine that were more aggressive and assertive than Kamau, but he had his moments.

“What kind of bad guys?” he repeated, thinking it over, thinking back to what Momma had said about them. “Momma called them ‘rogues’,” he said, putting on his own Serious Face. Because this was srs buzines. “She says that they’ll lurk around the edges of the pride, just waiting to snatch away or hurt voonerable members. And I guess we count.” They were just little cubs, after all. While Kamau had unlimited faith in Hisia and Ficha’s abilities to keep him and Naamini safe, he knew that they couldn’t keep the twins safe if they weren’t in the same place.

“Momma says that… that they think they’re good guys and we’re the bad guys,” he went on, trying to remember every word that Hisia had told him just a day or two ago. “I don’t get it. How can they call themselves good and then do bad things like hurt others?” And, of course, good would always overcome evil. The world simply wouldn’t have it any other way.  

[Chibi Sheepcat]

Dealing with Kamau's logic wasn't high on Naamini's list of things to do, so she chose to ignore his comments about not informing him. Maybe when he was older he wouldn't care so much about knowing what she was doing. It was completely irrelevant that she always had to know what he was doing. They were two completely different cubs – despite being twins – and so there were subject to different rules. Naamini had to know what her brother was doing simply because he could get himself lost or hurt without really meaning too. Kamau didn't have to know what Naamini was doing because everything she did was on purpose. It was a very big difference.

Naamini slowed her pace a little to better focus on her brother, listening to him explain what their mother had told him. His Serious Face made the corners of her mouth twitch up into a small smile, unable to help but be amused. There was something rather funny about the way Kamau tried to be serious. "Why would these 'rogues' spend their time waiting around pride borders to steal pride members? That doesn't sound very smart to me. And how are we voonerable? I am definitely not voonerable." She didn't have the slightest idea what that meant but she was sure it didn't apply to her.

The cub was quiet for a moment after Kamau's final words, mulling them over. They thought they were the good guys, and the pride was the bad guys. Huh. "Well I guess they just serve a different person who they think is right. Like when two ants from different hills meet. They both think they're defending their Queens from attack but who's really good or bad?"  

[FerretPrince]

Yes, if Naamini ever got lost, at least it would be on purpose. That made being lost a completely different ordeal than if Kamau got lost by accident. Actually, if Kamau got lost, everyone would know about it, simply because he would wail loudly enough to wake the dead. Naamini would just put on her Serious Face and deal with the problem as best she could without any undue wailing. Still! The male didn’t want his twin to be lost at all, either by accident or purpose. It would mean that he would be left alone without her. As different as they were, he still considered her his best friend.

“I dunno. I guess they’re really bored. Or lonely, maybe. And they’ve got no social skills,” Kamau said slowly, trying to figure out why someone would want to kidnap a pride member. The only reason he could think of was because they wanted someone with them. Anyone with social skills wouldn’t need to kidnap someone for a friend. “And we’re voonerable because we’re… you know… little cubs. And we don’t have birds yet.” Not that he really knew what a bird could do against a full grown lion. In his mind, rogue lions were a good deal larger and more vicious than the pride lions. Tentacles were possibly involved, and they trailed shadows of darkness. “If you were trying to kidnap someone, you’d want to kidnap someone tiny, right? Easier to drag around and stuff.”

Ants, huh? “Well, that’s because ants are stupid. And… and we’re not. We know we’re right because we do good things. And we know they’re bad because they do bad things, like hurt others. You’re just anthropo… antho… you’re making ants seem smarter than they really are. Besides… if it were that easy, the queens could just meet up and make peace, right? ‘Cause peace is always better than fighting, isn’t it?”  

[Chibi Sheepcat]

Indeed, if Naamini ever got lost (which would most definitely be on purpose) she would put on her Serious Face and deal with the problem. There was nothing wrong with getting lost. It helped one achieve a sense of direction as well as encouraged survival skills and independence. Therefore, getting lost on purpose was like a self-inflicted challenge. If she wasn't so sure Kamau would just sit down and cry until he was found she would encourage him to get lost on purpose as well. It would make him a more independent cub. Perhaps she would try this method when he got older.

"I wouldn't try taking other people if I was bored," the cub replied as though that meant everyone else should feel the same way. "And if they have no social skills then they should go find some instead of trying to make people be their friends. Would you be a rogue's friend if they didn't have any social skills?" She knew that she wouldn't be friends with someone like that. Her frown deepened when Kamau said that she was voonerable, for two reasons that she didn't enjoy at all. "Well we can't help that we're small," she protested, "Or that we don't have birds yet. When we have birds, we won't be voonerable right?" She should focus on that then. She didn't want to be voonerable. "And I wouldn't be dragged around." Especially not by shadowy tentacles.

When Kamau disagreed with her example, Naamini simply shrugged. "We're not that different from ants and other stuff. There's only ever room for one queen, you just gotta pick which side you're going to be on. Things have to fight or else how would you know who was better? If they can't come in here than we're better than them. That's all that's important."
 

[FerretPrince]

“I never said you would. I know you wouldn’t. You’ve never tried kidnapping me.” Unless you considered the one or two times when Naamini insisted on going out and wanted her brother to go along with her, but that probably didn’t count. And, if it did count, then Kamau was equally if not more guilty, since he was the one who was more likely to insist on having his sister accompany him everywhere, on the threat of whining. “I think that kidnapping would probably cancel out any hopes of friendship. Kidnapping is not a trait I look for in friends. I look more for shared interests.” Actually, he would probably feel more sorry for a rogue who didn’t have any social skills. It wasn’t their fault, right? But… but there were some basic lion social skills that he felt everyone should have. These included, ‘don’t kidnap someone just because they won’t be your friend’.

“Well… I guess so. I guess we won’t be voonerable once we get birds. Less voonerable, anyway. She said that we can explore the border once we’re older.” At least, that was how he was interpreting Hisia’s words. The only question was ‘how much older was ‘older’?’ Kamau felt that, once they had birds, they would be ‘old enough’.

His retort to his sister’s words was prompt and succinct. “Nuh-huh! We are too different from ants. I mean… well… for one thing, we’ve got a king, don’t we? And we don’t have a queen. So there’s a difference. And… and we get to choose what side we’re on. Ants don’t. They’re born into it, right?” his brow furrowed as he considered this carefully, remembering that time when he and Naamini had come across two different tribes of ants. One was black and one was red, he remembered that. That was proof that they were born like that, wasn’t it? “So… so we’ve got higher mental stuff. We get to choose. And stuff,” he finished weakly, realizing that this argument probably wouldn’t make a dent in his sister’s notions.

He paused for a moment and glanced around. “Are we still going the right way? Are you sure this is the way to the old dens?”  

[Chibi Sheepcat]

Naamini couldn't help but roll her eyes at her brother. Of course she had never tried to kidnap him. Even if she had wanted to, he was much too easy to kidnap. All she would have to do was say "come with me" and he would come on whatever adventure she would take him on. Of course, if they got beyond the pride borders he might put up a fuss, but how would he know where they were? That thought made her scowl, but she pushed it aside. Kamau was still talking and she had to pay attention in order to answer him. "I'm glad you don't want a kidnapper as a friend. You make sure you never make friends with rogues that look like they could kidnap you, though, even if they do share interests with you. Mom won't like that very much." That made it sound authoritative, she decided. Hopefully Kamau would take the advice to heart.

"Well if we can explore when we're older and have birds, that's fine. I don't want you to be kidnapped or anything." The cub, too, considered having a bird to be 'old enough'. If she had a bird then she was a full member of the pride and could do whatever she wanted. Having a bird would also prove that she was more like her mother, and less like this mysterious father character that the pride whispered about. Personally, she didn't want to have anything to do with him, but the pride seemed quite fixed on it. Bonding to a bird would show them though.

She moved from her Serious Face to a full out frown when Kamau continued to argue with her. "King, Queen, it's all the same. If our king had a mate than she would be the Queen. What does it matter what word you use?" When Kamau insisted that being born into a side made all the difference, her expression turned momentarily thoughtful. "Yeah but... aren't we born into our side like the ants? We don't turn on our king because we trust him, like they don't turn on their king because they trust him. We're a lot like ants."

Kamau's questions caused her to end that train of thought, and she paused to look around. "Yeah, obviously. I know the way to the old dens." The scenery was slightly strange to her, but she knew where she was going. After all, she would only get lost on purpose.
 

[FerretPrince]

“I’ll be sure to instruct all rogues that kidnap cubs to wear signs. That way, it’ll be easy to tell them apart from other rogues. Not all rogues are evil, right?” They couldn’t be, because there were some pride members who used to be rogues. Kamau wasn’t sure who they were, but he vaguely remembered Auntie Ficha and Momma talking about how nice it was to have new members to help with the hunting and stuff. Especially the ‘stuff’ since there were all these cubs to look after. Hopefully, he would one day meet these other cubs, so long as they weren’t kidnappers. Now that he had made his promise to Naamini, he wasn’t going to break it.

Waitaminute… Kamau’s own Serious Face returned as he suddenly realized that Naamini was worried about him. Pfft… now that was just silly! Why would anyone want to kidnap him? He was a crybaby, a coward, a tiny little cub, and a great many other C-words. Admittedly, Naamini was a cub too, but at least she was the brave one of the pair. She was the one who would go on to do great things while her brother would be left behind. So, clearly, she needed protection more than he did. “Naamy…” he complained. “I’m not going to get kidnapped! If either of us ever gets kidnapped, then it would be you! Why would someone ever want to kidnap me?” He wasn’t sure he had ever been baffled before, but now he was right and properly baffled. At a championship level, even.

He would have Naamini to keep him safe. His sister only had him. And their birds too, once they were older, he supposed, although he didn’t think a great deal about that. Momma didn’t have a bird… he’d have to ask about that one day.

“I don’t think I would trust the king if he told me something like, ‘oh, by the way, it’d be jolly good of you to go run by the valley and kidnap a couple of cubs for me, what ho’ or something.” In mimicking the king, the young cub puffed himself up and tried to make his voice deeper. “If he tells them to kidnap cubs, then he clearly has bad social skills. I wouldn’t trust someone like that.”  

[Chibi Sheepcat]

Naamini paused before she answered Kamau's question about rogues, not sure exactly how to reply. The comment about making all kidnapping rogues wear signs had temporarily displaced her intellect. "Well... I don't think all rogues are bad. Some of them probably are lost or want to join our pride. But I guess you never really know. You just have to be careful and don't go wandering off with rogues who offer you things like food or friendship." She fixed him with the Stern Look at those words, as though he was supposed to take those words especially seriously. A Serious Face wouldn't cover it. She had to take it to the next level.

The cub's Stern Look turned to a scowl when Kamau said that he wasn't going to get kidnapped, only to morph into somewhere between confused and irritated when he continued on. "Of course they would want to kidnap you! You're a lion, so you could get really big and be their body guard! I don't see why they would want to kidnap me when they could have you as their protector. It's like why would you kidnap the worker ant when you could have one of the soldiers?" It seemed stupid to be arguing about who was more likely to get kidnapped, but Naamini had always been a pawn of her emotions. There was no way that Kamau could convince her that she was the better target.

Kamau's king voice made Naamini grin, though she tried to keep her mind on topic. They were having a serious discussion. She couldn't lose her side over her brother fluffing up like a bird. "Well what if since you were a little cub you got told that kidnapping was good because then you would have a friend? Would you trust him then?" She wasn't sure she would trust a king that said 'jolly good' but that was a moot point.  

[FerretPrince]

Kamau opened his mouth to protest. Oh, come on! He wouldn’t idly wander after a rogue stranger just because they offered him sweets! Hadn’t Momma always taught them ‘Stranger danger’ and all that? But, his protests absolutely wilted under the power of Naamini’s Stern Look. You did not mess with her Stern Look. One mouse had messed with it, and no one had ever found his body and now his whole family had been eaten. This was probably more of a product of living in a lion’s den with two growing cubs, but… you never knew. And, when it came to the Stern Look, you wanted to play it on the safe side. “Alright. I promise, I won’t run off with any rogues who offer me stuff.”

The male twin’s own features turned from that supreme bafflement to mere surprise, which was very much like bafflement, only with a different spelling. “Nuh-huh. They would go after you! You’re a lion too. And you always win our fights.” This was probably mostly because Kamau was a push-over, but it could have been because Naamini was simply stronger. Naturally, the male thought it was because his sister was simply stronger. “You’re younger than me. By three whole minutes! And… and you’re a girl. It’s always the girl who gets kidnapped,” he said in a tone of wisdom, thinking back to the stories Hisia had always told them, brave tales of warriors who went off to rescue the love of their lives who always seemed to get into some sort of trouble. Of course, Naamini wasn’t really the typical damsel in distress. Anyone who tried to distress her would meet the full force of her Stern Look and maybe even her Angry Face.

Nothing withstood the power of her Angry Face.

Kamau stopped fluffing up at his sister’s words and considered them carefully. “Well… then I would wonder why I have to kidnap them. We just decided that anyone who needs to kidnap friends has no social skills, right? So… so if I had to kidnap someone for friends, then I would have no social skills. Besides. There are other cubs here…” although he hadn’t met any of them yet.  

[Chibi Sheepcat]

Those mice had been a serious problem. They refused to leave her alone when she was sleeping, always running over her toes and waking her up. When her mother had told her to just ignore them, Naamini instead had gone straight to the closest mouse and told them to leave her alone. When the mouse hadn't told its friends she had been forced to pull out the Stern Look. That, and she had threatened to catch and eat them all. When they said they didn't believe her, she had reminded them that there were birds attached to every single lion on this pride and they would enjoy having mice for dinner. That had caused them to clear out pretty fast.

Naamini couldn't help but scoff when her twin started arguing with her again about who would be kidnapped. Did he have to contradict everything she said? One day he would see that she had a good head on her shoulders and she knew what she was talking about. Maybe on that day food would rain from the sky. "I'm not a lion, I'm a lioness!" She protested, frown back on her face. "There's a difference. Lions get bigger and then their hair gets bigger. Lionesses get bigger with no hair. You have more hair so you can fight better." Or something like that. She wasn't exactly sure how that worked, but she had heard it. "And I'm not going to get kidnapped just because I'm a girl!" The angry face was coming, but so far she was only at the Dark Scowl. So far, the world was still safe.

"Yeah but if you had no social skills and you wanted a friend, then you would have to kidnap one. So if your king had no social skills, you'd have none too so you could kidnap other cubs without thinking it was wrong. And what if you didn't have any cubs in your pride?" This was beginning to be a 'what if' battle but Naamini didn't mind. It was a fairly interesting argument.