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 Posted: Sun Jul 15, 2018 5:14 pm
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Her laughter was drowned by the crash of waves against the side of the cliffs. Tears pricked at the corners of the young lioness' eyes as her cackling laughter diminished into amused chuckles. Lifting a dark paw to her face, she wiped away the tears from her eyes. At her feet lay the source of her amusement, a poor creature that had been abandoned by its family because its parents likely knew that it would not make it. Abandoned at the cliffs here, perhaps hoping that in its delirium it would walk over the edge and put a quick end to its suffering.
Cowardly parents, nothing like her own mother and father who were undoubtedly the strongest lions in the pride. They had not wanted the responsibility of mercy-killing their own cub, so they had let nature run its beautiful course. Not that Mitama did not appreciate the sight - there was something so refreshing about death that made her feel so alive. She was growing up in this famine, with death surrounding her like a warm, comforting pelt.
She sniffed the air, only smelling the rain and fresh ocean water. What a lucky cub, to die where its death would not stink up the place! She hoped death treated it well. Picking up the corpse, she lifted it to the sky, laughing a sort of celebration for the loss of life. The sky was alight even in the night, almost as if it were cracking! Beautiful and perfect, the best time to die!
"Rest, little one! Rest and tell me all that you see now!"
The world was going to s**t, and the little body in her grasp now was free from all of it. Lucky! Mitama did not want to go yet, there was still much to life and death that she had yet to embrace. |
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Posted: Sun Jul 15, 2018 5:24 pm
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K'i was on her way back to Datura's, when she heard what sounded like laughter coming from the cliffs. It was almost masked by the sound of the crashing waters against the rocky ledge. Her eyes narrowed, shifting the priestess pouch on her neck to be behind her as she followed the sound. Who was out here in the time of the famine?
The white priestess stuck out like a sore thumb against otherwise dark land. On the contrary to the form who saw on the edge, which seemed to fit the darkness the pride was experiencing. The markings of the female seemed familiar too, but K'i would leave that for later.
What caught her attention, was what was held in her paws. A cub. A very small, very dead cub!
The kirin had not seen death yet, but she knew there would be days she would. She just...didn't expect it to be of a babe.
"What do you think you are doing?!" K'i-lin shouted, as she moved towards the dark lioness. Either Mitama had killed the cub, or she had found it and now was playing with it. Either option wasn't the greatest.
"Put that down!" She was disgracing the dead by holding it in the air. |
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Posted: Sun Jul 15, 2018 5:34 pm
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She had not expected an interruption, and her response to K'i-lin was quite delayed. It was as if the white lioness' words took a while to process in her head, or perhaps it was that K'i-lin's concern mattered little to the dark lioness. She looked over her shoulder, her braid hanging over her right eye. Had death called to this one as well? Mitama smiled a greeting, as if there was absolutely nothing wrong with what she was doing.
The cub was already dead, it could not feel injustice now, not in the way that Mitama or K'i-lin would expect to experience it. No, this cub was experiencing a whole different type of world. Mitama was so envious of it! "I am seeing if... if it knows the way!" Her eyes sparkled underneath the moonlight, the sky surprisingly clear that evening. In there swirled inspiration, or perhaps madness. She was not unsound, however. Mitama was just.. different.
"No, I will not," Mitama told the pale lioness. The cub was dead, no one had claim over it now. "It was abandoned here to die, I should be the one to hold it now. Only I want to know what it's going through..." her words trailed off into mumbling, a sweet, soft, almost loving purr as she pulled the body tight against her chest. She cradled it in a mockingly motherly gesture.
She would not have cared for the cub if it were alive, but in death she cared deeply for it.
"Tell me, is it not beautiful?"
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Posted: Sun Jul 15, 2018 5:56 pm
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"I don't know!" Mitama answered enthusiastically, laughter lightening her voice. She was a pretty female, but something was definitely off with her that would keep anyone at bay. The only ones that seemed to stick by her side were her own family. "But it does! If only it would tell me. I thought maybe it would want to go up. Up, up, up! The sky is cracking, ready to receive it. Don't you see?"
The kirin female had so many questions, but Mitama did not mind it. Questions were good. How did one conquer the unknown if one was too afraid to ask the unknown what it was? "I know nothing - how exhilarating! Life must mean knowing little, thus death must have the answer to everything else!" There was enthusiasm and passion in her voice. A mind hungry for answers clawed at her skull, making it impossible to ignore her own curiosities.
"Tell me, little one, am I disrespecting you? How can I know if you do not answer!" Mitama asked the corpse within her arms, all the while making her point clear. The dead had not told anyone what they wanted. Sure, there were traditions and those should be respected. But how would they ever find out the truth without straying from tradition a little?
"Because it is dead, it is beautiful!" Mitama countered with a wicked grin.
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Posted: Sun Jul 15, 2018 6:16 pm
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K'i-lin shook her head. What was with this adolescent? Was she all there? Her actions said otherwise.
"They will not receive a body. Only what is from it. They have probably already gotten it, therefore you are only playing and mocking what short life it had." The kirin frowned. "Perhaps when you see Death, you can find out the answers to everything you wish to know."
She stared at the other as she spoke to the cub again. Really?
"You are just a bit morbid, aren't you?" The female asked, finding herself rising to her feet as she approached Gatito's sister again. "Give me the cub." K'i-lin would see to the body and take care of it. "You are no priestess, you have no right to continue to play with this young creature." She scolded. "Now, hand it over." The inclination towards the darker female should have been enough. K'i, although not a fully trained priestess, was higher ranked than she was. Therefore, she could use that to her advantage in getting what she wanted. |
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Posted: Sun Jul 15, 2018 6:33 pm
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"But the world will not know if I am dead and cannot communicate it to them!" Mitama gasped, shocked that K'i-lin could not see her dilemma. For a moment, her prize dropped to the ground, forgotten in Mitama's eagerness to explain herself. She finally had someone to listen to her! Her siblings usually ignored her or tried to re-direct the conversation with her. Mitama was not stupid - she knew exactly what they were all doing. "How do you know? How do you know that the body does not play an essential part in death and all that comes after it?"
She stepped over the body, approaching K'i-lin with wide, intense blue eyes. Mitama put herself directly in K'i-lin's path, blocking her completely from the deceased cub. She would not hand over her prize so readily. "I am curious, that is all. I want to know. Death has been so hungry lately, so eager. Look at all the death that surrounds us now! Do you not wish to understand it better?" Mitama frowned, concerned for a moment that K'i-lin truly did not have enough curiosity about the world around her.
"No, I can't!" Mitama protested vehemently. "I know I am no priestess, but should that be my limitation? I am not a priestess, so I cannot try to understand my world, the one I live in? The cub is dead, its parents have left it here to die. It is still very soft, and very important to me. Do not make me give it up, not when I can learn so much from it."
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Posted: Sun Jul 15, 2018 6:46 pm
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"If the body played a more essential role, wouldn't you think it would be more malleable in your arms. It wouldn't be stiff as a tree branch. It would mold and move with you. Look at it! Soon, the fur will fall out, and the skin fall off. It will be nothing but small bones fall apart. And then what do you have? Absolutely nothing."
The Kirin stood her ground as Mitama approached her. "We can not understand death. Might I recommend you understand the dying. The ones that can see the darkness, yet still speak to our world. Try them before you play with the actual dead." Maybe she could get the body that way. Convince the female to find those on the path to death.
"It should. If I had to become an apprentice to learn the care for the dead, you should too." She growled. "Learn from the next dying victim, when you successfully have ranked up. Until then, stand down, and give me that cub." Maybe K'i-lin had an herb or something she could make the other consume to knock her out, and then she could properly dispose of the deceased. |
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Posted: Sun Jul 15, 2018 7:23 pm
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"No, no, you are not understanding," Mitama whispered sadly, looking down at the corpse at her feet. "You're not opening yourself up to the possibility that death is not all that it seems! We only see one version of it, one side of it, but there could be so many aspects we have yet to understand." Her words tumbled freely from her lips, quick and rapid but not without thought. Though Mitama seemed to be on the edge of what was socially acceptable, she was a smart lioness. She knew exactly what she was talking about, even if the world was yet to understand her.
Mitama frowned, determined in that moment to prove that she was unlike K'i-lin and would listen. The lioness did have an interesting idea, even if Mitama was not ready to give up on death just yet. "Oh, do you think it is possible that just before death claims them, they know of it? What if they find a small piece of the puzzle that we have been missing? Oh, that would be amazing!" One could almost believe that Mitama had been convinced towards murder. But, she would not take another's life carelessly. Death came for those that were ready, Mitama could not rush the process or she would taint it.
"Perhaps I will, and then you cannot stop me from claiming the next dead, okay? I will find out everything I need to know," she promised the female. Then, she stepped away from the body, wet but still underneath the onslaught of the rain.
"If you see death calling, please come find me," she told the pale lioness before disappearing back into the night.
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Posted: Mon Jul 16, 2018 2:40 pm
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No, no, no. You’re not understanding. K’i-lin found herself thinking as she shook her head. Mitama’s words were crazy to say the very least. However her brain was set, it wasn’t the same frequency as a normal lions was.
“I say that only way to find out is to test it. Look at this famine all around, there are lions starting to die off. Perhaps go test the theory with them, and then report back to see what they say. Compare their reactions, their recollections, and then ultimately decide. Death will never reveal its ugly face to you until you are in it. And then who can you tell from there? No one. Like this poor cub can’t.” She eyed the small form by her feet, ear flickering as Mitama claimed she couldn’t stop her with the next one.
“Become a Priestess, and I will have no say on your claim to the next one.” The lioness said with a frown. Maybe she shouldn’t have said that. From this small experience, she didn’t want to see Mitama again.
“Sure thing…” and tell Gatito I said hi… she added silently. |
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