The sun baking down on the desert was a familiar feeling. But for some reason or another, Bodaway was feeling it much more than usual. Perhaps it was age, perhaps he was under the weather. Whatever the reason, he felt it. Cresting a dune, the old lion's eyes narrowed against the sun. His sight was getting worse... But it was still good enough to see the mop of red moving across the sand. What a blending coat that was... Letting out a grunt, the red lion headed for it.
"Grandpappy told my pappy, 'Back in my day, son, a man had to answer for the wicked thing he done! Take all the rope in Texas, find a tall oak tree, round up all them bad boys and hang 'em high in the street! For all the people to see...'" Treking across the sand wasn't easy, but singing certainly made it feel that way. Tlaloc wasn't sure why he hadn't picked up his sister's past time sooner. Climbing a dune, he jumped down the other side, sliding down it. "And justice is the one thing you should always find, you gotta saddle up your boys, you gotta draw a haqrd line! When the gun smoke settles, we'll sing a victory tune, and we'll all meet back at the local saloon!" Nevermind he'd never actually SEEN this 'saloon,' he'd just heard the humans refer to it.
This was a curious sight. A singing lion... A singing GOLD lion. Was he a Pridelander? If he was, he was a very STUPID one. The Firekin crept down the dune, eyes narrowed and ears back. For as much as he ached with age, his paw steps were careful, not betraying him or sending him down the dune in a jumbled mess. The sand muffled the sound of his approach, until he was padding along right behind the strange lion. Upon closer inspection, he indeed looked like a Pridelander. The song was catchy for him, though, and it was soon absorbed in his mind.
"And we'll raise up our glasses, against evil forces, singin' 'Whiskey for my men, and beer for my horses!'" He'd probably spent too much time around those humans... Granted, they thought he was possibly the most docile wild lion they'd ever met, but their words and phrases were catchy. "We got too many gangsters, doing dirty deeds, too much corruption and crime in the streets... It's time the long arm of the law put a few more in the ground, send them all to their Maker and he'll set them on down! You can bet, he'll set 'em down..."
Who knew what the other lion was even TALKING about... But the music was so catchy... He nodded a bit in time with the music, starting to get lost in it. "Cause justice is the one thing, you should always find, you gotta saddle up your boys, you gotta draw a hard line..." The singing was infectious, that was certain!
"When the gunsmoke settles, we'll sing a victory tune! And we'll all meet back at the local saloon... And we'll raise up our glasses against evil forces, singing..." Tlaloc stopped, eyes going wide. He had been singing alone... And suddenly had another voice singing WITH him. He whirled around, finding possibly THE biggest lion he'd ever seen that WASN'T Ganon. He'd grown up used to Ganon, but this lion... Was NOT something he was used to seeing. Ears dropping back, the male instinctively tried to make himself smaller, all sound ceasing from his throat.
There it was... That abject fear that being a Firekin once instilled on a lion Bodaway had so missed. The aging lion smiled dangerously at the intruding rogue. "Who might you be, wandering into the Firekin lands? Do you know what we... Do... With intruders...?" He stepped closer, using a large paw to knock the stunned lion over, pinning him with it. "Tell me what we do... And I might let you live through this encounter."
Tlaloc stuttered a bit, letting out a slight grunt at the paw knocking and pinning him down. The first thing to come to his mind was impending death... Something he didn't want. The gold lion swallowed, struggling a bit to get away. All he succeeded in was sinking into the sand. "F-F-F-Firekin...?" The name didn't escape him - A few old lions from the pride's heyday had educated him and his sisters VERY well on the fiersome pride of the desert. He could tell from looking at this lion, he was one, and he very well REMEMBERED those days of long ago. "Y-y-you beat intruders, k-k-kill them, and the unlucky ones are e-e-enslaved..." Death was a mercy compared to slavery. He knew that very well from home.
He knew of how the Firekin used to be.. Bodaway cocked his head a bit, watching the green-eyed lion. After a moment, he lifted his paw up, stepping to the side. "You speak of the past. We no longer keep slaves." He nodded with his head towards the inner lands. "Kidondo, the son of our last king, overthrew everything and reworked it all. Now we just beat and kill intruders." He touched a paw to his mouth, letting out a fiegned gasp. "Oh, like you!" He put his paw down, grinning viciously. "Run, boy, run FAST and you might LIVE"!
The lion struggled to his paws, managing to slide on the sand a bit. He soon found his footing, though, and shot off across the sand. Most other lions wandering the desert would try to go up and down the dunes, but Tlaloc had grown up in a desert area similar to the Firekin desert. Weaving between the dunes, the lion headed for the border, or where he HOPED the border was. He could see the grasses of the desert's edge, signalling that he was getting close. Claws suddenly sank into his rump, sending him crashing to the sand, mere feet from safety. "NO!" A paw reached out, as if the action would help him.
Pulling the other lion back, Bodaway grinned, sides heaving a bit. "Gotcha!" As he had long-ago been taught, he gave the lion a few hard hits. He didn't kill him, though - This was only a warning. When he'd sufficiently beaten the dirt out of him, the red lion glared down at the lion. "However far you go, keep it in mind that you should be wary about what prides you tread into. You might not live to tell the tale." He turned and walked off, ears back in his mane. When he reached the top of a dune, the old lion stopped to watch and make sure the stranger left, never to return.
Struggling back to his paws, Tlaloc hurried off, this time limping and trailing blood. When he reached the safety of the grasses, he looked back, eyes still wide. There was no going back north now, not with THAT in his way! If a lion that looked as old as that one did had beat him up this bad... It made him shudder to wonder what would happen if he met a younger lion. Swallowing, the red-maned lion took off, running as best he could.
