=--------------------------------------------------------------------------= ___ _ _ ___ ' | ` |__| |__` oooo | | | |__, .ooooo. o 88 ---------------------------------------------------- o8" `"o8 88 ooo oo888oo ooo ooo ooo oo ooo ooo ooo d8' " 88 8 ,8' `8. 8"8 8 8 o8' 8 8"8 8 d8 88 8 88 88 8 8 8 8o' 8 8 8 8 88 oooo 88 8 88 88 8 8 8 88o 8 8 8 8 88 di 88 ,o 8 `8. ,8' 8 8.8 8 `8. 8 8 8.8 `88. ,8i o88ooooo'o8o `"ooooo"' o8o o8o o8o `8o o8o o8oo o8 (c)"88oood' =--------------------------------------------------------------------------= The Lion King is copyright 1994 by the Walt Disney Company. This MUCK in no way constitutes a challenge to this copyright. =--------------------------------------------------------------------------= [ November 03 2005 ] _( The Pride Lands )________________________________/!\ UNDER RENOVATIONS /!\_ Water Hole Sometimes you gotta go where everyone knows your name... Welcome to the Water Hole, where all the inhabitants of the Pride Lands put aside their differences and meet amicably to have a cool refreshing drink and to talk and gossip--especially as the sun rises in the morning erasing the dark gloom of the night. The birds are starting to arrive again, and the animals that spent the long night safely asleep are stirring all around. The morning sky is partly cloudy, with windy winds out of the northwest. [N] Northern Border [E] Eastern Border [SE] Water Hole Stream [S] Meerkat Colony [W] West of the Water Hole You can see... [IC ] Anakharis Kwafeli Servals are lanky long past adolescence, even disproportionate: tall ears setting off a small head, long neck and slim body, with startlingly thin, lengthy legs, and a short tail to finish. Kwafeli takes this fact of species to an extreme. He is small for his kind, and lean enough to suggest that he was ill-nourished during some part of his youth; even his fur is less than sleek, thinned and whorled in small patches on his shoulders and flanks. His fur's base color is a deep copper, shading to sand and then to almost white on his loose-furred underside. Mottled over this is a pattern of black spots: regular on his flanks and legs, gathering into fractured stripes along his spine, then curling into bars on his black-tipped tail. Small black spots mottle his face, framing the thin lines of white above his black and amber eyes. Anakharis Eyes the color of sunlight, ringed in fur of burnished gold, peer evenly out from the dark cheetah's calm face. A dark cheetah he is, for his body-fur gleams like pure obsidian, his spots only barely visible as a deeper black against the rest of his fur. His tearlines are still quite plain, however, golden markings trailing down the sides of his muzzle, ending at the very corners of his mouth. A complex scar stands out high on his left shoulder, the crenellated pink skin almost blazing from the darkness of his fur. To those familiar with the cheetah clans or their ways, the mark is a brand, forever proclaiming him an outcast from his kind, never to walk the coalition territories under pain of death. Despite this, though, he carries himself with a thoughtful, almost serene demeanor, his sun-colored eyes warm and kind. His walk is slow and graceful, and he can usually be seen with his eyes turned toward the sky, as though searching the cloud-studded blue for signs of wisdom. Kwafeli slips through the grass, moving from the west, slow but purposefully towards the beckoning gleam of water. The is a certain amount of caution in the pattern of his steps, but the wind aids him, stirring and flattening the grasses along his path, so that he is most of the way concealed. Then the grasses fade under his paws, and the Serval is standing on the edge of bare ground, clearly visible. Anakharis is, at the moment, sunning himself by the water's edge, his eyes fixed on the far horizon. Perhaps he's watching the breeze play over the savannah, or perhaps lost in some private musing... Kwafeli casts the still, dark form a sideways glance, giving that patch of ground a wide berth as he moved to the water's edge, wading in--at least his front half, and to higher than those paws--as he drinks. He dabs at the water, making a series of minor splashing sounds, as he gives Anakharis another veiled glance, trying to make sense of what he sees. Anakharis's ear flicks, his tail tip lashing back and forth as he feels strange eyes upon him. Slowly his head turns, as he brings his internal ramblings out into the here and now. When his warm amber eyes find the young serval, he smiles, giving a low, amused chuff. "....I have long believed, young one, that if you do not ask questions, you will never learn anything..." Kwafeli is surprised to hear something like a teaching cadence, and only half-conceals his reaction. He isn't one to keep his expression blank from usual character, but only from necessity, and after a moment he shows the edge of a smile. "I didn't know Cheetahs were dark sometimes too," he says, making a statement that does not really sound complete. An eyeridge raises, and another chuff comes from deep within the dark cheetah's chest. "...To be honest, neither does anyone else. In all my memory, I can only recall a single other." His shoulders ripple in the barest approximation of a shrug. "Such, I suppose, is the way of life." "Perhaps," Kwafeli says, politely, and then, hesitant, "They might be elsewhere. There are families of dark Servals up in mountains, I've been told--" he cuts himself off, tail a-twitch behind fractionally-bunched hindquarters, not sure if he might offend, or simply be forward. Anakharis nods slowly. "Indeed they may... But I have long abandoned the quest to meet more like myself..." Golden tearlines ripple, as a brief smile comes to his muzzle. "..As I find it... silly... to abandon the company of other folk simply to chase the tail of a dream..." "Dreams stay ahead of you," Kwafeli says, a soft, thoughtful echoing. "Fade away in the morning and there you are still looking, and the sun's hot and your paws sore from walking." His tall ears angle to the sides, flagging his uncertainty even as he speaks, some thought that if he just keeps looking... but the Serval shakes himself, on the way to conviction that he's better off not trying to track down faded might-have-beens. Anakharis chuffs softly, shaking his head. "...Indeed. And while you chase after the dream, you pass by the world. And when your paws are sore and tired, it's much better to relax by a cool stream, then continue the hunt." His eye wander back over the horizon, and a paw comes up to gesture in the savannah's direction. "...Look there. See. See how the grasses move, like the savannah is no more than an oddly-colored lake?" Kwafeli squints in the direction that Anakharis has gestured, noding once. "I suppose," he says, though in fact he has little experience with lakes--being more familiar with mere trickles of water and stiller places such as this watering hole. "I should move out in to them," he says, close to off-hand; he doesn't want to seem eager to go, but there is a day to make use of, still. Anakharis's eyeridge twitches up, and he falls silent a moment, tailtip twitching. When he speaks again, his voice carries more than a little amusement. "Go, then. Enjoy yourself, young one, while you can." "Thank you," Kwafeli answers, with another nod, this one of acknowledgement. He shakes his front paws in turn, scattering droplets of water--but the intermitent sun along with the wind will dry them soon enough, and the Serval walks into the shifting grasses and away. =--------------------------------------------------------------------------=