Snake in the Grass

[Nagaina]

((Sept 6th.  Open to anyone taking Nagaina's hunting class))


The big black cobra sat in a taller, uncut patch of grass on the very edge of the sports field.  She supposed she had to be thankful, at least, that she was allowed to teach her class outside.  It was a far better environment to teach the little ones to sneak, to chase and to strike.  Besides, the open grass was a good place to sun herself.  As it was a warm day, Nagaina's blood was flowing well and she was alert and fast - truly, a serpent at her most dangerous.  There was a note left on the door of her assigned classroom stating that lessons would be on the field.  Lacking hands, she was unable to write the note herself, but a staff member was kind enough to do her a favor...a wise choice, because she threatened to bite them if they did not comply.  Nagaina's students would soon find out that she very much believed in learning through practical methods.  Her students would be required to bring nothing but themselves and a hope that they leave the lesson unharmed.

Nagaina was hunkered down deep in the shady underbrush, hardly able to be seen.  That day, she had planned some stealth exercises for the younglings, so it was only fit that the cobra would be keeping herself hidden until class started.  Toxic green eyes glared out from under the snake's hood as she waited patiently for her apprentices to arrive.  She would watch them secretly for a while as to figure out their general strengths and weaknesses.  The children she was taking care of for this moment would be paired up in groups for the class.  Nagaina would assign who would be acting as "predator" or as "prey" in due time.

[Deleted]

Finally! This was a class that Vitani could excel at. She didn't need those stupid reading assignments or whatever it was the other classes believed she need. All she really needed was to hone her skills in battle and in hunting. Who cared that it was on the day following the fights? Even if it was on a Saturday, Vitani wasn't about to be deterred from her goal. The young lion bounded onto the field with the eagerness of one who had just been told they would be seeing the world for the first time. Nothing was about to dampen the blue-eyed girl's spirits. Not even the arrival of anyone she thought particularly annoying. Nuka would have been the only one who fit that particular bill, and it didn't look like the older lion was there... Yet. That may have changed with enough time allotted.

As soon as Vitani caught sight of Nagaina, though, she came to a stop and frowned for a moment. A snake? They were meant to be learning how to hunt from a snake? Vitani would have expected another lioness or maybe even another big cat in general. How was a ground crawling belly-dragger going to teach her about hunting? ...She shouldn't have been so quick to judge. For all she knew, Nagaina had the skills of even the best huntress on the savannah. This didn't mean Vitani wouldn't be a bit of a butt about the whole thing, though.

"You're our teacher?" Vitani decided to ask as she padded forward. She was unendingly grateful that she had decided not to wear a tie with her uniform. Everyone else might have worn it, but she only saw the thing as a nuisance. The rest of her red accessories did plenty to make it clear what circle she belonged to, anyway. ...Well, that and her attitude.

[Kiara]

"The mighty hunter has cornered her prey..."

Even knowing about the fights, even after the first round of them had played out, Kiara wasn't taking things entirely seriously. While it was true that she'd signed up for the hunting class in the hopes of accomplishing something important, after following the notice to the field and finding no sign of a teacher present - just Kovu's sister - Kiara had figured she'd just play while she waited, and the unsuspecting black snake made a handy target. The golden lioness crouched in the short grass - never mind that it hid her not at all - her butt wiggling slightly as she prepared to pounce. She took a moment to flick her tie out of the way of her paws, where she wouldn't tangle herself up in it, made ready to spring -

And only then caught Vitani's words as she addressed the snake. Kiara tried to stop herself, tumbled head-over-paws for a moment, and landed sprawled on her back between the other cub and the snake. The princess gave an awkward little giggle.

"I didn't realise you were the teacher. Oh." Rolling back to her paws, Kiara batted at her tie tip again for a moment, then flashed a grin at the lioness who wasn't wearing one. Even if Vitani seemed a bit rough around the edges for the royal feline's taste, she was still Kovu's sister and Kiara didn't see why they couldn't be friends too. Even if, just like with Kovu, she couldn't turn her back on her for some reason Daddy didn't want to tell her.

"Hi, Vitani! I didn't know you were going to be in this class. What do you think we'll be hunting?" Her whip-like tail swished behind her, its body language giving away her eagreness to start learning to hunt just as much as her tone of voice did.

[Deleted]

Oh-Hoooo... The crown princess of the Pridelands in the same hunting class as her? This was going to be interesting. Vitani had been undergoing a fair amount of training ever since she and her adopted family had to go to the Outlands, so she was fairly confident in her ability to outclass her sister. ...Not that Kiara knew that much. As far as the golden cub was concerned, Vitani was probably just some Outlander who happened to be Kovu's sister. How were Kovu and Kiara even getting on? ...Wait, no. Vitani didn't care about that much. All she cared about at the moment was showing up her sister in this hunting class.

"Didn't expect to see you here, Kiara," Vitani remarked. Even though there was a smile on her face, her tone still held that sort of haughtiness in it. Vitani wasn't about to just start behaving all friendly-like just because they were in the same class. No, she wanted to keep being herself. That meant trying to prove that she was the better of the two lioness cubs present. Speaking of which, where in the name of the great kings was the rest of the class? It couldn't have just been her and Kiara, could it? Thinking about it, though, Vitani almost wished it was just the two of them. Then they really could see for themselves which of the pair was the better huntress. As for what they would be hunting, Vitani had her own hopes about that much.

"Whatever we're hunting has to be better than those crummy field mice Nuka keeps trying to impress mother with back home. They're puny and not even that meaty," Vitani said. The scruffy cub stuck her tongue out at the mere thought of it. Nuka was pathetic when it came to hunting and all he could really bring back were those lousy mice. If only they hadn't been banished from the Pridelands... Then maybe they could practice with antelope or gazelles or... Anything but mice!

"Maybe they've got a meerkat or something. Or birds! Something really tricky to catch!" she enthused.

[Kiara]

"Well, I'm gonna be a hunter too someday!" Kiara returned, a touch defensively. Did Vitani think that just because she was a Pridelander, she wasn't going to ever learn to hunt? Kiara may not have wanted to be queen, but she was all for the idea of being a good huntress, just like every other lioness in the pride. Her mother and - so she was told - both grandmothers were all great hunters, and Kiara had every intention of following in their pawprints.

Or would have, if she ever took the process at all seriously.

"That would be fun!" As Vitani suggested the teacher might have a meerkat for them to practice on, Kiara gave a small chuckle. In her attempts back home, Kiara hadn't quite reached the part where hunting was fatal to the victim yet, and she was reminded of the one time she'd hidden from her two babysitters, kept reeeeeally still, and then used Timon for pouncing practice when he'd been apart from Pumbaa. Once the meerkat had stopped freaking out enough to realise who had pounced him, Kiara had taken quite the scolding; but the memory of it was still one that amused her. Not that she was going to confess the source of her amusement to Vitani; the tougher lioness would simply sneer at the fact that her father thought she still needed babysitters at all.

Well, this class would be her chance to prove that she could be just as good as Vitani, wouldn't it? Imagine if she beat the tough outsider at... whatever it was they were hunting! Whether that was likely or not was another matter entirely; but since she'd proven more or less an equal match for Kovu when they'd been escaping the crocodiles, Kiara didn't think it was too far outside the realms of possibility.

"Are any more students coming, or are we the only ones?" she wondered momentarily.

[Nagaina]

Nagaina brought her chin off the ground, easing her neck back and closer to her coils.  A black, forked tongue trembled in the air briefly as she scented the two new students.  While "impressed" wouldn't have been the correct word, Nagaina did take notice of Vitani finding her.  The cobra had not hidden herself well, as she was very dark while the grass was very bright green.  Still, it was something that the cub actually looked.  Perceptiveness was a virtue, but even more-so when one wishes to learn the art of the catch and the kill.  However, Nagaina still found that the first cub was insolent.  The second cub, Kiara, was a bit too headstrong for the snake's liking, but insolence was higher up on her list of pet peeves.

Nagaina spoke coldly, although she did not sound angry, "Even the biggest of tigers and elephants will jump back when a cobra lifts its head suddenly from the brush.  There is a deep instinct engraved in most animals to fear us.  Few dare to pit themselves against such deadly venom."

She rocked back, briefly stretching her jaws, allowing her long, needle-point fangs to flick out for a second.  Nagaina slowly turned herself to have a better look around.  Once more, she scented the air.

"I should hope that more will come, or this shall be most uninteresting indeed," She hissed.

[Deleted]

"You sure your daddy's gonna let you be a hunter?" Vitani asked. If nothing else, Kovu had given her an idea of how Simba had reacted to his being with precious little Kiara. From the sound of it, her father was rather protective of Kiara still. That much was to be expected, though, with everything that had happened taken into consideration. The answer didn't come, at least not right away, because Nagaina had spoken up as well. Vitani's tail flicked from side to side and a soft snort followed. Of course, Vitani should have known better than to underestimate someone based on appearances. Brash little thing that she was, though, Vitani decided not to apologize. Why should she bother? It wasn't as if it would make much of a difference.

"Well, it looks like it's just the three of us. What're we supposed to do?" she asked. Who cared if it was just her and Kiara? She could hunt circles around the golden lioness whether she liked it or not. The problem, though, was that it seemed like a rather small class. How were they supposed to get anything accomplished if it was such a small group of kids to teach? For that matter, what had Nagaina even had in mind? All that could be done was wait until the answer was given.

[Kiara]

Kiara couldn't help it; she winced at that. How Vitani knew that her father was so stifflingly sheltering, the princess didn't know - maybe Kovu had told her - but being reminded of that fact still stung. As much as she loved him, at times Kiara felt sure that Daddy would, indeed, keep coddling and sheltering her forever and never let her do even normal things like hunting, and Vitani seemed to latch straight onto that fear. Kiara's ears flattened for a moment, and she looked away; then quickly decided that she wasn't going to give the other lioness the satisfaction of knowing she'd got to her.

"He let me come here, didn't he?" she retorted, sounding rather more defensive than she had really intended. Admittedly, if her father knew what the school entailed, Kiara was sure he would have pulled her out of it without a moment's thought; which only made her all the more determined not to tell him anything. While she was still intimidated by the idea of the fights, and hadn't really got on top of a lot of the human things, Kiara was having fun here, spending time with others her age - Kovu foremost amongst them, even if she hadn't seen him around as much as she would have liked - and had no intention of leaving to go back to being just 'daddy's little girl'.

She shook herself free of that thought as their snake-teacher spoke up again, and tilted her head quizzically. She knew snakes could be dangerous, of course - the young princess was sure she had recieved multiple warnings of every danger ever by this point, from Daddy, from Zazu, and from Timon, and it was all old news to her by this point - but it hadn't really occured to her when she'd set up to use the animal for pouncing practice. Maybe it should have; however at least neither of the others seemed inclined to point out that she could have been making a fatal mistake there. Instead of running the risk of calling their attention back to that, Kiara instead batted at her dangling tie yet again, then addressed the snake's latter words.

"Why would it be uninteresting? We can still hunt in a pack of two, right?" She glanced at Vitani for confirmation. Admittedly, she didn't think the other lioness would be all that keen on working alongside her, given what she'd seen of the way Vitani's spoke to her; but Kiara was confident that they could still work together fairly well. She glanced around once again, looking for what there might be for their victim; seeing nothing, she turned again to Nagaina.

"What have you got for us to hunt?" she asked after a moment, unable to contain her excitement much longer. She was agtually going to learn to be a really real huntress, just like every other lioness in the pride, and Kiara couldn't wait for the lesson to get started. Never mind that it was just her and Vitani; impatient cub was impatient to get underway.

[Nagaina]

Nagaina let the pair of felines chat for a little bit.  As she waited, her snake eyes scanned the field.  For the time being, it looked as if no one else would be coming.  Her tongue flicked out briefly before she glided a bit closer to the ground, slithering a small ways through the grass.

"It would appear at present you two felines are the only ones who care to participate, unfortunately," rasped the king cobra.

Nagaina reared up a bit taller and looked towards one of the stands of bleachers that had been on either side of the sport's field.  The skull marking her back flashed as she spread her hood wider.

"We will begin our first lesson posthaste," Nagaina hissed, "You will notice the rows of seats across the grass.  That will serve as the grounds in which we will be hunting.  It is not as good as a jungle or a garden, but it shall have to do.  If you will follow me..."

The cobra's long, black form weaved through the tall grass.  As she moved toward the bleachers, she did not seem to be checking back on her students.  She trusted they would participate, lest they face swift punishment.  The brighter-colored cub in particular seemed eager to get things started anyway.  Nagaina doubted she would have any problems in getting them started.  Nagaina stopped several meters away from the large rows of bleachers.

"No prey has been provided for you.  You will be pitted against your fellow students for this lesson; in groups of two, one shall first act as the prey and the other as hunter.  Once the student acting as prey has been effectively caught, the time will come to switch roles.  You will once more be pitted against each-other in a later lesson, to see how you have improved," hissed the cobra, "Hunt and hide in any way you see most effective.  These seats and the surrounding area will be your hunting grounds.  I shall hide when the game begins, but I will be watching you."

Nagaina briefly looked over the cubs, "As you are the only two currently here, you have no choice but to be partners.  For the first hunting game, Vitani will be our hunter.  You, Kiara, shall be her prey; I'll extend you the kindness of allowing a few moments for you to hide."

[Kiara]

"Aw, what? That's not fair!" Kiara's ears pressed back flat against her skull, her amber eyes registering disappointment as she stared at the teacher. At least they'd get to switch roles when she got caught - so it was maybe kind of like a more serious game of tag? - but the golden lioness still didn't like that she'd got picked as first prey. Though she didn't much care for the title, shouldn't the fact that she was the princess at least give her the benefit of being huntress first?

One look at Vitani's face convinced her not to mention that. If she used her being a princess to pull rank, Kiara just knew that Vitani would never let her hear the end of it. Better to just grin and bear it until they got to switch roles. The younger lioness pawed at her tie for a moment more, glanced at the teacher momentarily, and then took off sprinting. Nagaina had mentioned the seats and stands, and Kiara was sure there was some way she could use them to her advantage. Maybe she could even hide, catch Vitani by surprise, and turn the hunter into the hunted? That idea held a lot of appeal.

Her tie whipped over her shoulder as Kiara, reaching the bleachers, leapt up onto them. She struggled for a moment on the unfamiliar surface, but swiftly regained her footing and began to pad her way up the stand. Where she could hide or lay ambush up here, though, Kiara didn't have a clue; what had looked like a rather promising landscape feature from the bottom looked rather empty of anything useful now that she was getting closer the top. But Vitani would be on her tail at any moment, and she had to do something more than just give the other lioness easy prey.

But what?

For lack of any better ideas, Kiara simply crouched behind one of the topmost seats. It wasn't very good cover anyway, and the way her tail twitched behind her would almost certainly act as a dead give-away - the young lioness hastily sat on the appendage to still it - but it might buy her a few moments to turn the tables on Vitani. The princess squinted through the gap between the seats, watching for the moment her opponent would get close enough for her to make a move of some kind.

[Bold]

Bold had been late apparently. The fox cub was still getting used to this place since it wasn't anything like White Deer Park, the buildings baffled him. A den in the ground was something that worked very well in his opinion but there was nothing he could do about it. So being late it was for Bold, course the cub was fine with that. Soon, his gaze landed upon two forms and one of the odd structures that was around this place. Going from a fast walk to running, the red fox headed toward the hunting lesson and came to a skidding halt soon enough.

"Sorry I be late, but this place is much like a maze." Bold said as he took a seat. "What's going on?"

Ears perked and twitched as he arrived just in time to watch Kiara climbing up the bleachers. Well clearly class had started but there was nothing he could do about that now. He'd just have to wait for this lesson to be over and partake in the next one probably. Not everyone had taught as his mother had though he didn't take her teaching seriously. Since he did take the pine cone away from her while she wasn't looking.

[Deleted]

She got to be the hunter first! Yes! The young lioness grinned smugly at the fact that she would actually be hunting her sister - though the cub in question didn't know that much - and prepared herself for the hunt. It was at that very moment that Kiara had gone off to find a place to be the prey. Vitani crouched herself down in the grass, following the mental advice of staying low to the ground, and waited for just the right moment to begin. As soon as she was ready, Vitani started to stalk forward and tried to scent where Kiara had gone. The unfamiliar scents of things around the field were actually succeeding in throwing her off a little bit, so she had to use her eyes as well. That wasn't a problem, though. Vitani was keen enough to realize that one sense alone wasn't going to help with hunting.

Vitani only belatedly caught Bold's words, and she decided to answer.

"Hunting lessons. You gotta wait to be the hunter or the prey, though," she sneered. Since there were only three students, it stood to reason that Bold would need to wait until after Kiara and Vitani were done with their attempted hunting practice. Speaking of, where had the golden-furred princess gone off to? Where...?

Blue eyes darted up to the stands, and she soon saw Kiara's tufted tail waving about like a banner. That wasn't the best move, Vitani realized. It was like Kiara was purposefully trying to give herself away. That may not have been the case, granted, but Vitani could see her clear as day. This just made it all the easier for her to work out where she needed to go.

Vitani made her way over to the stands and leaped up onto them. The odd material making them up made her footing a bit strange at first, but it hardly deterred her. She was going to try and make her way up to reach Kiara. What Kiara did from there would be interesting no matter how things went down. The scruffy young lioness was looking all too forward to seeing how things would go from there as she started to make her way up.

[Kiara]

Here she came... Kiara was aware that her breathing was becoming heavier with anticipation, and she willed herself to keep it closer to normal. Vitani surely knew exactly where she was anyway, but the last thing Kiara wanted was to sound like a total amature by being given away by simply breathing too hard. Admittedly, she was pretty much an amature, but the other lioness didn't need to know that.

Closer still, she came... Kiara worried her lip nervously. She'd never tried pouncing on something that could fight back before - butterflies and Uncle Timon were about the full extent of her practice targets - and Kiara was well aware that a lot more things could possibly go wrong when her target had teeth and claws of her own. Still, she wasn't about to just be nice and play prey for Vitani; Kiara had every intention of, if not turning the tables, then at least not just rolling over for the other lioness.

And closer... closer...

Close enough, the princess decided.

As soon as Vitani neared her hiding place, Kiara burst forward, didn't quite trip over the seat in front of her, and bowled herself into Vitani paws-first. An ill-thought out strategy; if the more experienced huntress moved aside, Kiara would go tumbling straight back down the steps to the foot of the bleachers. If she was lucky enough to actually hit Vitani, then both of them would be knocked down instead of just her. Either way, the feline princess was almsot guaranteed a tumble straight back down to the ground level, unless Vitani did something really unexpected.

But at least it was somewhat better than just running until the hunter in their little game caught up to her.

[Nagaina]

Nagaina began to grin as sheed watch Kiara run off into the rows of seats.  The snake turned her head at about the same time Vitani curtly addressed the fox cub.  Nagaina remained where she was as Vitani went off after the "prey".  Nagaina quickly looked over the little canine-creature with her poisonous green eyes.  A long, shiny, black tongue fluttered out from her closed jaws as she scented the fox.  She briefly nodded at Bold, after she finished sizing him up.  Ah, a new student to teach; at that, one that would probably turn out to be a competent hunter.  Nagaina didn't believe lions or foxes would ever live up to the abilities of a king cobra such as herself.  But even without fatal venom, she could see opportunity in the future of her students so far.  She swiveled her head back around to look up at the bleachers.

"There is currently an excessive in progress.  I will doubt it will last long.  Once it is over, then you will have a chance to show me your ability.  Consider this your first test - I shall see how you improve from this," Nagaina hissed, "I can only hope that there is improvement."

Nagaina was counting on at least one more student to show up.  Now that she had an odd number of students, she would need to change the rules of the next activity.  Nagaina had considered this situation before class began and she decided, if she needed to make a group of three, the two would act as "prey" and the "hunter" would need to catch both.  It would be a little more hard to evaluate each student that way, but if it came to it, Nagaina would have the lesson play out as such.  Now, she observed keenly.  It seemed that Kiara planned on turning the tables on the other cub; Nagaina was expecting something like this to happen eventually, but not quite so early in the game.

[Bold]

"Hunting eh? This should be interesting." Bold replied to Vitania's sneer.

The fox cub didn't catch the sneer, really he was only paying attention to the words. He remembered when his mother was trying to teach them all how to hunt. Well...if anything she was teaching them how to pounce. It was fun to take away the pine cone of choice while she was busy taking note of Dreamer. Dreamer....well....no. He didn't have time to dwell on his deceased sister. Ears perked to the sound of another voice, a snake to be exact. How odd. She didn't look like Adder even though they were both snakes. So a different kind of snake then? Hm...would make sense. Since there were Blue and red foxes, surely there would be snakes that weren't like Adder in appearance.

"Oh. Alrighty then." Bold said more to himself to Nagaina's words.

Being taught by a snake? Well Mother did say Adder saved her life once. So perhaps being taught by one will be for the better eh? Bold thought to himself. Though this strange thing will get in the way.

The uniform would certainly make anyone screw up. Course a strange extra thing of.... really thin fur wasn't going to stop him from giving it his all. His gaze left Nagaina and went back to the two lioness cubs, curious to see what would happen.