[PRP] welcome to the jungle (Unzu and Haji)

[Leipir]

Unzu never claimed he was a good father. It wasn't that he didn't try, mostly it was that he just didn't care. He was a little selfish and headstrong by nature and he hadn't expected to meet Akinyi and take her as his mate. They'd done the best they could with their first litter, and now the cubs were getting old enough to choose their own paths in life. They couldn't induct the kids into the pride-- they had to make the decision themselves. One son had gone to stay with family, a daughter had run off to follow. One had wandered off entirely.

He sighed, wondering why his thoughts always seemed to drift back to those bratty cubs at moments when he least needed to be depressed. He hadn't seen a few of them in quite some time, and it was better when he just didn't think about it. The black lion shook himself, climbing up a fallen log to get a better vantage point of the swamps, folding his forepaws and yawning a little in the afternoon sun. It was too early in the day to hunt, so he had some free time.  

[Ameh]

It took him almost all morning, but he think he had it. The scent! It was so close, so familiar, and so... welcoming.

It was after one full night of pondering that the tan and black young lion decided he wanted to set off, away from his siblings. He didn't say goodbye, either; even if he did, perhaps no one would care. That was how the family was since the beginning, really. Sure, there were natural ties and bonds - but really, who really cared, especially with parents that just went off at sporadic moments like Unzu and Akinyi?

He loved his parents, and he supposed all of his parents' children did, but not enough to follow them to the ends of the world. However close he was getting from this journey, however, wasn't exactly for that - it was more out of curiosity than love that he traced his father's paw prints, going deeper and deeper into the swamps that was so close to where they initially lived.

Noon had come by the time he was close to Unzu. He could almost sense that nonchalant, don't-give-a-damn presence through the feel of the woods and trampled grasses. And there he saw him - on a log, his silhouette beaming at him through the sun behind him.

He didn't envision this moment to be so dramatic or heroic as he currently perceived. But it was his father. And his father was yawning.

"Unzu," he called out, perhaps voice a little too distant to hear.

He padded quickly over to where his father was, heterochromia eyes latching onto the form as he spoke again, "Dad!"