[PRP] The Dynamic Duo [Kamau + Naamini]

[FerretPrince]

As Naamini’s sibling, it was Kamau’s sacred duty to contradict her at every turn. Not just her sibling, but her twin. That made it doubly sacred. And, even worse, he was her brother. Arguments were bound to be around every corner, even if the boy was shy and quiet. He glanced down at the fluff of fur on his chest and glanced at his sister. Well, he had to admit; she wasn’t as fluffy as he was. But, but, but! That didn’t mean anything! She had her fluffy hair, after all. Her hair was more like Momma’s and Momma was, undoubtedly, the best fighter ever. So, clearly, Naamini would be the better fighter. “That’s a mere techic… technikalr… detail. Lions and lionesses are basically the same creature. More or less. And what if they want a lioness more than they want a lion? Then you’re in more danger. And wouldn’t more hair be a bad thing for fighting? I mean, there’s more to grab onto and stuff… it hurts when it’s pulled. You don’t have that problem.”

Kamau measured his sister’s current Look, which fully deserved the capital letter. Alright. So far, the world wasn’t in any danger of bursting into flame from the mere friction of her glare, but he was toeing the line here. Still, he plunged ahead anyway. The sacred duty of Contradicting One’s Sibling clearly overturned the fate of the world.

“Weeelll… if we’re going to get into a what-if situation… so… you really think that these rogues have no social skills and their king also has no social skills? Or they just think that it’s perfectly normal to kidnap cubs?” Now there was an avenue of thought he hadn’t explored before. What if the rogues themselves were kidnapped as cubs and that’s why they had funny thoughts? It probably wasn’t quite what Naamini had in mind, but it was interesting. “Waitwaitwait… rogues don’t have prides, right? That’s why they’re rogues, isn’t it? So they wouldn’t even have a king at all.”  

[Chibi Sheepcat]

What if they did want a lioness more than a lion? Naamini had to frown to think about that, but it was more of a pondering frown than an unhappy one. She wasn't sure what exactly would happen if they wanted her more than her brother, but she was going to answer anyways. The number one rule about arguments was to always have a comeback, even if it wasn't a very good one. "Yeah but the hair is like... like protection!" That sounded like a good idea. "So if you got bitten or attacked around the neck you would have lots of hair to protect you from being hurt too bad. Even if they pull it a little, it's not like being bitten. And they would never want a lioness more than a lion!" She was pretty sure of that one.

"Yeah, definitely! Why else would they want to kidnap cubs and stuff? If they're doing it just because they were bored or because they were really really mean then I guess they could be bad. But there's only a few of those types around and you can always spot them. They have a Nasty Look on their face." Yes, that was another capital letters look. Mind you, she had never seen one of these Nasty Looks, but she couldn't very well say they frowned a lot. Then she would have to be a really mean kidnapper, and she was definitely not going to put herself in that category.

His final questions made her blink, suddenly confused. Huh. He was right. Rogues probably didn't have kings. "They could still live in groups, just not big enough groups to be prides," she hedged, though that sounded like a weak argument. "And maybe... maybe they have pairs! And one of the pairs is the leader! So they call all the shots."
 

[FerretPrince]

It didn’t matter if the retort didn’t make any sense. The important thing was that there was one. That was another rule to being a sibling. Even one as shy and demure as Kamau understood that. Naamini had a point about the hair being all protective. But there was one big missing piece of the puzzle… “But… I’m not a fighter,” Kamau pointed out the obvious. “Between us, you’re more of a fighter. So, they’d want you more. And why wouldn’t they want a lioness more than a lion? What if… what if they want more cubs in the future and don’t want to kidnap any more? They’d need lionesses, right?” Thus far into his life, Kamau wasn’t sure what the exact… er… facts of life were. He was simply vaguely aware that only lionesses could have cubs. Perhaps birds brought them to her… either way, birds never brought cubs to males.

Oh! So they all had Nasty Looks? Naamini and Kamau had a unique ability. Few cubs had the miraculous ability to drop capital letters in the middle of sentences. Alright, so maybe it wasn’t as cool as being a Seer, but it was their talent. The fact that all these kidnapping lions had Nasty Looks cheered Kamau up significantly. At least then he and his sister would be able to avoid them with ease. “Maybe… maybe they want to kidnap cubs because they can’t have any cubs by themselves. Like what if they are all males?” He couldn’t really imagine a female kidnapping a cub. It just seemed… strange.

“How big does a group have to be to be a pride? I mean… are we a pride just by ourselves? Auntie Ficha, Momma, you and me? That’s a lot, you know.” It certainly felt like a lot whenever they were all in the den, anyway. Again Kamau paused to look around, taking stock of their surroundings. He put on his normal Worried Look, one that incited pity in just about any living thing. “Umm… Naamy? Where are we? I don’t recognize this place…”

It was far rockier than the other parts, with dry grass decorating the ground. The walls of the valley had a few old caves carved out of them, reminding Kamau of his mother’s words. Those caves… they could lead into the roguelands for all he knew. But… but there were still birds here. That calmed him down slightly. Birds always meant safety.  

[Chibi Sheepcat]

"Of course I know you're not a fighting," Naamini replied easily, "But they wouldn't know that, would they? They could take you and make you a fighter! That's why they would take you as a cub and not an adult 'cause when you're a cub you get taught things and you remember them. Adults forget." That was her explanation as to why you couldn't teach adults anything new. Anything you tried to teach them just fell out of their ears because all of their previous thoughts filled the space. Cubs still had space to collect new ideas. "And they can't make anybody have cubs, lioness or not. Lionesses can't just get cubs at any age anyways." She was positive that only adults could have cubs, which was why none of the younger members of the pride had any. Life facts were clearly not the strong point for these two.

Kamau's argument about not having cubs because they were male made significantly more sense than his others, and she was forced to nod along with him. If they were a group of all males than they probably would have a hard time finding cubs, so kidnapping would work. But it seemed weird for a group of males to want cubs. Perhaps some males liked that sort of thing. "Yeah sure, with just males they could steal cubs away. And a pride... a pride is a really, really big group. Like our family and everybody else related to us! But rogues live in groups. But even a group can have a King, 'cause somebody's gotta be in charge."

Her brother's Worried Look caused her expression to change to Mildly Disgruntled. That look of his was one of the only ones she was not immune to. Being his sister gave her some immunity to his looks, but there were some that still got the better of her. His question made her turn her attention back to the surroundings, and she couldn't help but grin when she looked around. "We're here! This is where we're exploring today. These old caves could have some neat stuff in them, c'mon!" She bounded forward again, making a beeline for the closest cave. She wanted to see what was in them!
 

[FerretPrince]

“They couldn’t make me into a fighter!” Kamau protested. “That would be like… like…” the cub floundered for the right word, something more emphatic than ‘impossible’, but found this a rather difficult task. “Well, it just couldn’t happen. I don’t even like fighting! It hurts!” And he simply wasn’t very good at it. Even at this young age, Kamau was shrinking back from activities that he wasn’t good at. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he was dimly aware that, if he never did anything, he’d never get better at it… but, he honestly didn’t want to get better at fighting. It was too violent, too hurtful, too… too damaging. “Aaanyway… they’d just keep you around until you can have cubs, right? That makes sense. Then they would have a better chance of getting more fighters. I’d only be one chance, right? You’d be more than one.”

Ah… now Naamini was making sense. Kamau nodded at her words, agreeing that there had to be a leader somewhere. Even between just two lions---like the twins---there was a leader, even if there was a certain amount of squabbling between them. “But it wouldn’t be a king. He couldn’t be called a king, ‘cause only prides have kings. He’d just be called a leader. That’s different.” He couldn’t put his paw on why it would be different. Ninety-nine percent of kingship was telling everyone else what to do, which was pretty much what a leader did.

“H-hey! Naaaaaaamy!” Kamau shot after his sister as she began bounding away, sprinting to catch up with her. “Alright… but we can’t go in too far, alright? I don’t want you to get kidnapped if these caves do end in the roguelands.” No matter what she said, Kamau was still stubbornly insisting that she was the one who was more likely to be kidnapped by these nefarious rogues. Once they were closer to the cave’s opening, Kamau took a small peek in and said, “It… looks dark. What do you really think we’ll find?”  

[Chibi Sheepcat]

Clearly Kamau had never been threatened before. Not that Naamini had been threatened, but she had done some threatening to get those mice to do what she wanted. Thus, she was quite aware that you could be forced to do something if someone told you it was going to hurt very much if you didn't do it. Regardless, her brother didn't need to know that one. She was pretty sure that nobody could make him into a good warrior anyways, but she was going to keep that thought to herself. "Well if you say they can't make you into a fighter then I say they couldn't make me have cubs. And that's that." Argument closed.

The younger twin scoffed a little when Kamau yelled after her about not getting kidnapped. Didn't they already decide that he was more likely to get kidnapped? Jeesh. "We're not going to go into the rogueland. We'll know if we're there because there are no birds." That was pretty obvious. There wouldn't be any large collection of birds in the sky if they left the pride lands. Or at least, that was what she assumed the rogue lands would look like. She'd never actually been there, like her brother, but she could pretend she knew what she was talking about. Pretending was half of the game.

Naamini paused with her brother to peek into the cave, before she sauntered bravely in. "Of course it's dark, it's a cave." She continued inward, letting her eyes adjust to the near-pitch darkness. "I dunno, maybe some old jewellery or bones or anything. Maybe even an old lion spirit!" Now that would be pretty cool. Though, it would probably scare poor Kamau, so she shouldn't hope they would find one. That would be mean.  

[FerretPrince]

In accordance to the Law of Arguments, Kamau opened his mouth to continue on before his neurons fired and made him shut up. Maybe Naamini was right… if they couldn’t make him into a fighter, then they couldn’t make her have cubs. But, if he continued to insist that they could make her have cubs, then she would insist they could make him into a fighter. It was quite a conundrum, although the cub didn’t even know what that word meant. Wisely, he decided to keep his mouth shut and simply followed his sister, eyeing the cave warily. His sister’s insistence that there wouldn’t be any birds was oddly comforting; at least one of them knew what the roguelands would look like, at least, so then they could turn back before Naamini could get herself kidnapped.

Because, clearly, she was still more likely to get kidnapped. Actually, Kamau supposed they were both likely to get kidnapped, at least until the rogues realized that neither of them was of any use. Then they would just… just… they would unkidnap the cubs.

“A sp-spirit?!” Now that scared Kamau as he fought to stay as close to his sister as possible. “Don’t say that sort of thing, Naamy. What if one hears you? And… and what if it’s a rogue spirit?” Could that even happen, he wondered idly. Well, he supposed it could. Anyone could become a spirit, right? His voice echoed off the walls, sending the cub into a rather ambivalent state as he tried to fight his natural instinct to hide and his natural instinct to protect his sister against all dangers, whether it be cubnapping rogues to mysterious echoes.

That is, until he realized it was just an echo. “Hey!” he tilted his head to one side, listening to the endless ageless echoes bouncing off the stone walls.  

[Chibi Sheepcat]

Most definitely anybody who kidnapped these two would very quickly unkidnap them. Between the pair of them, they could only really define looks in terms of capital letters and argue, which wasn't really an exclusive skill. Any pair of siblings could do that. It was true that they were twins, but there were other, more exciting twins in the pride, so they would most definitely be tossed back into the pride. Kidnapping must be like fishing. If you didn't catch what you wanted then you threw it back. Naamini was sure that she would be thrown back first, being the girl, but she wouldn't have said anything. That argument was Over, after all.

The younger twin scoffed at her brother, especially when she said that a rogue spirit would find them. "Rogue spirits wouldn't be in here. Spirits can only wander in the place that they died, or something like that, and no rogues would have died on pride lands. We would have found them and taken them in!" Her mother would have probably taken in any rogues. That, or the other mothering lioness. She was always talking about feeding the cubs and fattening them up. It was like she was going to eat them or something.

"I thought you said you didn't want to wake the spirits," Naamini teased, however she couldn't resist giving her own little mini-roar to echo off the cave walls. It was really, really neat in here. She took a couple of steps and felt something touch her leg. In an instant she jumped away, turning to look at whatever had touched her. "Hey Kamau, what do you suppose this is?" She poked the object with a claw.
 

[FerretPrince]

At first, Kamau was relieved and comforted by Naamini’s words, trusting them completely. And then he really thought about them, running them over in his mind. His tail swished anxiously behind him and he hesitantly asked, “Umm… how do you know? How do you know spirits can’t move around? I mean if they stayed in one place, they wouldn’t be very threatening. But, since they are scary, they must be able to move around… and how do we know that none died here? What if they died before they could reach our lands?”

Kamau’s grasp of history was only little better than his knowledge of where babies came from. He was vaguely aware that ‘something bad’ had happened some time before he and his twin were born and there were many tragedies during that time. He figured that someone must’ve gotten lost. That was easily the worst thing that could possibly ever happen. But! They had been found again and there was much rejoicing and a merry time was had by all.

“Wh-what?! Something touched you?!” Once again, Kamau went into pure panic mode, where he tried to run away and protect Naamini at the same time. Since these were conflicting signals, his brain melted and he ended up staying right where he was, all terrified-like. But… but, thoughts slowly lit up the neurons in his brain, reminding him that his sister wouldn’t be so calm if it was a spirit or something dangerous. “Umm…” he slowly walked up next to his sister and poked the object, trying to dislodge it from the wall. It was stuck fast.

“I dunno… feels shiny,” he said eventually, running one paw over it. Smooth, like. Kinda pointy in places too. He blinked a couple of more times, waiting for his eyes to adjust more to the darkness before he could look at the small crystal outgrowth clearly. “It’s pretty. Really shiny. I wonder if there are more in here… maybe bigger ones!”  

[Chibi Sheepcat]

Naamini paused at her brother’s words, turning a little so she could look at them. How did she know that spirits didn’t wander far? That was a bit of a hard one. It was a good thing she and Kamau had such frequent discussions. It made it easier to come up with things off the top of her head very quickly. “Well, see, spirits can’t exactly just start wandering around wherever they liked. If they stay as spirits and don’t disappear, then they must have something that they’re waiting for. So why would they wait for something and also move around so whatever they were waiting for couldn’t find them?” The argument sounded fairly logical, so she let it be. “And we don’t know if any died here, but if they did die and they’re waiting then they shouldn’t be waiting for us. We’ve never done anything.”

That was quite true, though like her twin she too was aware of the dark times before her birth. Bad things had happened to the pride, and though no one would bring it up she had a feeling whatever happened had not been pretty. Though she wasn’t sure if she played a role in it, she was more aware than Kamau of the whispered conversations that seemed to crop up every time they were around. She had yet to figure out why they were being whispered about, so she was not sure it had anything to do with the dark times. But it was likely, and thus Naamini kept her ears open. One day she would find out about the pride’s troubles. For now, however, she would spend her time with her brother. It was probably better that way.

“It feels shiny?” She repeated, squinting down at the thing she had accidentally touched. Naamini had never seen anything quite like it. “It is very pretty.” She scratched at it with a claw, however nothing seemed to happen. “Should we dig it up? If there’s a big one we could bring it back to Mom!”  

[FerretPrince]

Naamini’s words made sense, so long as Kamau didn’t think about them, but he just wouldn’t be himself if he didn’t think hard about everything. He stopped in mid-nod and his brows furrowed slightly, making his Worried Face even more Worried. Perhaps it went into the realm of Anxious Face. “Umm… umm… how do they know that what they’re looking for will come by the place they died? I mean… what if they’re after something that moves around? Then it doesn’t make sense to stay in one place.”

Yep. The Law of Argumentative Siblings struck again. Even a sibling as timid as Kamau had to obey his instincts. Besides, what sort of spirit would just stay in one place? That would be boring! They stayed around forever, right? So, that meant an eternity in one place all the time! That would be like… weeks in one place! Maybe even months! And why would spirits have rules anyway? They were spirits! Who was going to tell them what they could and couldn’t do? Kamau whined a little, but took comfort in his sister’s last sentence; they hadn’t been around for very long and, if anything had died here, then it wouldn’t be after them. No matter how funny others looked at him and Naamini…

At least there were shiny things here to distract them! Shiny things fixed everything! Kamau pawed at the crystal a few more times, trying to knock it loose or at least elicit some sort of response from it. Mostly, it just stood there in a very non-threatening fashion. “I dunno… I think it’s attached to the rock. But, I bet there are others that aren’t! We just… have to go deeper…” he trailed off as he realized what he was suggesting, that they actually go deeper into the Creepy Cave of Doom, Gloom, and other Oom words.  

[Chibi Sheepcat]

Naamini's expression moved to Exasperated when Kamau continued to question her. Seriously, why couldn't he just accept her explanation as the most logical thing? Probably because of the Rule of Arguments, but sometimes that had to just be dropped. Now would be a really good time, but the younger twin wasn't going to mention that. Instead, she settled for, "Well if you find a spirit why don't you ask them all these questions?" There. That way she didn't have to admit she was wrong. She knew that Kamau would surely flee from any sort of spooky ghost, so her answer was still the most correct. Who said that victories couldn't be subtle?

Personally, she was sure that spirits could move around a little bit, but she had picked her stance and she had to stay in it. It was only if Kamau changed his argument could she subtly change hers until they had switched sides. He was pretty adamant about this one, however, and Naamini was more interested in exploring than arguing. Besides, who cared what spirits did or didn't do? It wasn't like she really even believed in spirits anyways. Spirits were only a scaredy cat's way of trying to sound brave when they had actually ran from nothing. Naamini was onto those scaredy cats.

The younger twin watched as Kamau attempted to get the shiny rock out, mentally trying to figure out how they should go about getting it. When Kamau made a suggestion to go deeper into the cave her expression turned to Quite Surprised, before it quickly returned to Serious. "Yeah... that sounds like a pretty good idea. We'll go deep enough so we can still see, okay?" Naamini didn't want to totally traumatize her brother, after all. She started off, heading deeper into the cave. This whole adventuring thing was very exciting.
 

[FerretPrince]

“Alright, I will!” Kamau blustered, once again speaking before thinking. “Just you wait, Naamy! When I see a spirit, I will ask them everything!” After he spoke these words and heard them echoing around, Kamau deflated a little, as if every single cell in his body had just said ‘oh dear’ to itself very quietly. “Umm… so long as they aren’t too scary…” Yeah. He would show Naamini! He would find the safest, least dangerous spirit ever and ask them everything! Since there was nothing more to be said about this topic, he fled from it, retreating to the slightly safer conversation of what to do next. Like going into the Creepy Cave, for example.

His worried eyes glanced into the shadows, which seemed quite a good deal fuller of Doom and Gloom than they had just a few seconds ago. What if a spirit had heard him and was ready to take him up on the challenge?! Ohh… he should have thought about that before saying anything at all! What if a rogue spirit was here to steal cubs?! That could happen, right?! In his mind, rogues had pretty much one purpose in life: to kidnap little cubs who went too far from Momma, so a rogue spirit would have the same thing, right? Naamini had even said that they were only here because they had a mission they couldn’t accomplish in life…

But, Naamini was determined to go in further, and Kamau was not about to let her go alone! No, he was NOT frightened for himself! … … well, alright, he was. A little! But, he was far more frightened for Naamini’s sake.

Or so he told himself. He bounded after her, keeping close to his younger twin. “Yeah. But, if we can’t see, we’re turning back…” he sounded more like he was trying to reassure himself than giving an actual order. The deeper the cubs went into the caves, the louder the echoes seemed. Soon, every little step echoed for miles and miles down the stone tunnels. Even a kicked stone would reverberate. And they weren’t alone…

In accordance to the Laws of Narrative, where there were caves, there were bats. Kamau’s nose wrinkled. “It smells funny,” he complained. This was actually the third time he had said that in the last few moments, each time referring to a different smell. Mildew, fungi, and now this.  

[Chibi Sheepcat]

Naamini had to resist the urge to roll her eyes. Her brother may be brave with his words, but his actions were another story entirely. She definitely didn't believe he would go and search out a spirit in order to prove her wrong, which suited her just fine. The more he went off on dangerous quests like that the more time she had to spend trailing after him to make sure he didn't get lost or hurt. It went back to the whole 'who was more likely to be kidnapped' argument, especially since Kamau could be such a scaredy cat. He could probably get lost in his own den, get "attacked" by some falling rocks (i.e. back into them), and then run wailing back to their mother without even having to go two feet from their den. That was why Naamini had to keep both her eyes on her brother. He was a walking disaster, and one that didn't need to get himself into more trouble looking for spirits. Him being a coward suited her just fine.

"Yeah, 'course we will," the younger twin promised idly, as she poked around the cave floor looking for more shines. So far her luck wasn't as good as she would have liked. "If we can't see, nobody'll be able to see us so we'd have to turn back." She shrugged, though wondered afterwards if that was a wise thing to say. After all, she wasn't trying to terrify her brother, who had so bravely accompanied her into the Dark Cave. She sometimes forgot that just because she thought things through logically that that same logic could be perceived differently by her brother's imagination. Oh well. If he started shaking she would go back. She could always come back on her own later.

An ear turned back when her brother spoke, and Naamini gave a soft sniff. "Not really. Just smells like stuff that doesn't live in the outside world, that's all. We're in their home, so we probably smell funny to them." The light was dimmer now, and it was harder to see if there were any shinies. She idly kicked a pebble near her foot and watched it skitter down into the darkness. A soft 'clink' as it hit something other than rock caught her attention, and she grinned at Kamau. "I think we found something!"
 

[FerretPrince]

Kamau wasn’t quite to the shaking-in-fear point, but he was getting closer. Every step he took lowered his body even further to the ground and he glanced around apprehensively, half-expecting to be attacked by owls or possibly beetles at any moment. More than anything, he wanted to be back at the den, safe and sound, perhaps all snuggled up against Momma or Auntie Ficha. Or Naamini, of course, since she was his best friend, even if she was a butt sometimes. And, yet, despite these urgent wishes of his, he stayed by his sister anyway; someone needed to look after Naamini, to remind her of the dangers of the world. That, and he was curious about stuff, even if he was a coward.

“Stuff that doesn’t live outside? Like what?” he asked, sounding more interested than afraid for once. That probably wouldn’t last long. Once again, he looked around, trying to imagine a creature that could live in a place like this. Hopefully nothing like spiders… he shuddered at the memory of that time he’d come across a spider in the den. Actually, he’d mostly just cowered behind a convenient rock and waited for the spider to go away or for someone to kill it. The ‘clink’ certainly helped distract him. Ears perked up once more, he ventured closer until he found the clinked object.

“I can’t see if… but, I think it’s a shiny,” he said, poking it with a paw. “And it’s loose, so we can take it home to Momma!” a smile came across his face, temporarily brightening everything at least metaphorically. “Um… should we get one for Auntie Ficha too?”