Black Blood

Summary: In an argument when Skipper question's Julien's 'kingness', Julien mentions a Judith. A few days later a crate shows holding three lemurs, Judith, Madison and Mandy. While the rest of the zoo seemed to think Judith wants forgiveness, Private, Marlene and the lemurs are wary...

Okay this chapter is pretty much the reason why this was suppose to be a dark fic. WARNING IT HAS CHILD ABUSE IN IT. If you do not like that sort of this please do not flame me.

Ten

"It's...being a rather-y long story." Julien sidetracked the questioned, scratching his ear as he avoided the glazes.

Skipper glared at him, "One of my men and one of my friends is in her clutches right now. I think we need an explanation for it, don't you think?"

Julien fell silent not saying anything for awhile as he stared at the floor. Then just when Skipper was going to yell and Maurice was going to defend him, he shut his eyes tightly, clenching his paws and not lifting his head.

"Can we be moving to your habit-y-at? I am not wanting Judith to be listening." He whispered.

When the three penguins and the four lemurs were in the penguin habitat, they all turned back to Julien, waiting. Julien sat on the table, ignoring the stares as he pulled his knees into his chest and hugged them.

"Judith wasn't being always so evil-y, you know," Julien at last spoke. It was in such a quiet tone so at first no one actually heard it until Julien lifted his head and glanced over at them.

"What happened?" Kowalski asked. His face remain blank, a lot different from the usual cool calculating expression that he put on when he was questioning, and his notebook remained hidden.

"She was snapping." Julien murmured.

"Well with you I can see why-"

"Skipper, please!" Maurice snapped, "I know you're upset but right now isn't the time for your comments."

Skipper glared at the pout lemur, imitating him under his breath and scoffing. However he didn't speak aloud and Julien decided to continue.

"Are you knowing about ringtail lemur tradit-y-ions?" Julien asked.

It was Kowalski who answered that, "As far as I am aware ringtails lemurs are female dominant...but I had assumed it was different with you seeing as your kingdom back in Madagascar had a wide range of lemurs so I never asked about it..."

"You are being right," Julien said, "My mother was being the ruler before and Judith was suppose-y-ing to being queen."

"Wait...so Private and Marlene was kidnapped just because you took Judith place as being queen?" Skipper yelled.

"Don't you ever listen?"

Suddenly Julien was on his feet, towering over the penguin angrily, looking almost as feral as back in the gift shop. He jabbed Skipper with his finger.

"I was not stealing my throne! I was fighting to be protecting my kingdom. It was Judith who was stealing the throne!"

"What do you mean?"

Julien stopped. His tail returned to wrapping around himself and he wrapped his arms around his stomach, avoiding Skipper's glaze. He looked over to Maurice for help.

"Julien's mother...she wasn't the best of mothers." Maurice explained.

"What that got to do with any of this?" Skipper asked.

"Everything," Julien murmured, his breath quivering, "It is being the reasoning Judith was snapping."

Screaming and cries of pain rung out through the jungles of Madagascar.

Julien huddled up upon the aeroplane's pilot seat, whimpering as he covering his ears. He ignored the skeleton in front of him at the moment, wanting to block the cries out rather than have a conversation with it.

Quickly, he uncovered one ear and reached for an old radio. When the lemurs had moved locations in order to escape the Foosa, Prince Julien had discovered the aeroplane crashed in the trees above. He had found the radio in one of the storage cupboards. Not knowing what it was he had gotten a fright when suddenly music had burst out of it when he had started fiddling with it. However after overcoming the initial shock he became intrigued by the music would play and would constantly climb up to the plane to turn on the radio.

Now he fiddled with the knobs, desperately trying to find a station.

"Come on, come on," He said gritting his teeth.

A loud painful slap was heard and a loud cry. Julien whimpered then, at last, managed to find a station that didn't flicker as much.

Turning it up as far as it could go; he quickly retracted his hand back to his ear and tried to focus on the lyrics. He started to hum the song loudly, flinching every single time one of the screams reached over the music.

After awhile Julien couldn't here anymore screams. The music ended and then a guy started talking. Julien quickly shut the radio off, the silent deafening. He waited awhile before he jumped down of the chair and climbed out of the plane's window and into the hollow hole of the tree. There the royals had made a home, the other lemurs having to sleep outside on the trees branches.

Julien passed a servant. The girl had her hands clenching tightly on the large plate of fruit, her knuckles going white through her fur but she continued like she hadn't heard a thing. It was all routine here.

Judith, Julien's older sister, was the next in line for the throne. And because of that Julien's mother had pressured her daughter. She wanted everything to be done perfectly. But Judith didn't want to do that. She wanted to be queen but she didn't want to have to follow the same rules her mother did. Arguments had broken out. Then their mother had started beating her daughter.

Julien paused at the door of his mother's room. His breath hitched as he slowly open the door. Even through he was a male and not in line for the throne, he still got hit if he so happen to get in his mother's way. He knew that if it wasn't for the Foosa forcing whole clans of lemurs together under the rules of the ringtails he would have been forced to leave already like other ringtail males.

No sign of his mother. Julien sighed of relief and then started to look for his sister.

After her beating Julien would always go to find her. When he was little he would climb into Judith's arms and she would comfort him, soothing herself as well as him. When he caught up with Judith's height the two of them would comfort each other, both hugging each other. It was something both siblings had come to rely on and only if Julien was either force to keep away or wasn't aware of the beating, did he ever not go to Judith to comfort her.

Through lately Judith had started to rant quietly under her breath about their mother during these sessions. Julien had done his best to ignore it, knowing his older sister was hurt, but still he didn't exactly like the things he overheard even if that woman did deserve what Judith cursed about.

Julien expected Judith to be either lying on the floor or already huddle in a corner. However instead she was stood right in the middle of the room, her back turned to Julien. She was shaking, but from the way she posed, it didn't look like she was shaking from tears or pain.

"Judith?"

Judith didn't reply. However her fists seemed to clench, making Julien step back slightly as he had begun to approach her.

"Judith?" Julien asked again, a little warier this time.

"What's it like Julien?" Judith suddenly asked, startling Julien slightly.

"What is what being like?" Julien asked, confused.

A strange laugh escaped the older lemur's lip. Julien had never heard his sister laugh like that before and it made him nervous. It sounded more how their mother would laugh during a violent fit. Sinister.

"Not having Mother constantly beating you just because you don't agree how the place is run here. Not having to pressure on becoming the future queen? What's it like, eh?" Judith asked mirth in her voice.

"Judith?"

Slowly Julien reached out to touch Judith's shoulder.

"Don't touch me!" Judith yelled.

Suddenly Julien found himself crashing into the wall, his hand going up to his cheek as he felt blood ooze out from where Judith had struck him.

Immediately the anger in her eyes faded and she regain a normal position. However there was still a darkness in her eyes, the caring and compassion that usually filled them when she looked at her younger brother gone.

She walked over and crouched down to his level. Julien flinched, expecting her to strike him again. She laughed.

"Aw, are you scared, little brother?" She taunted and Julien stared at her. Of course she had taunted him in the past when she had stolen one of his toys and was holding it up out of his reach but that was just messing around and she would give the toy back after a couple of seconds, saying she was joking. Now though, Julien knew that this was different. She wasn't about to return to her normal self in a couple of seconds.

Judith cupped his cheek, smirking at him.

"Don't worry, I'm not gonna hurt you." She said. Then her smile thinned and she muttered, "You're not the one I want to hurt."

Julien frowned slightly in confusion. Judith blinked and quickly cough when she saw, letting go of his cheek.

"Don't tell anyone about this okay, little brother?" She said, her voice actually sounding normal. Julien blinked. Maybe he was wrong about her not snapping back to normal in a couple of seconds.

He nodded, not wanting her to change back.

She beamed merrily, "Good." Then standing up, she pulled Julien to his feet, "You should get that cheek seen to."

Then she turned and walk away leaving Julien utterly confused.

"The queen is dead! THE QUEEN IS DEAD!"

Julien awoke to cries of alarm. Rubbing the tiredness out of his eyes quickly he got up and hurried over to the queen's chambers.

A huge crowd had surrounded the doorway. As Julien shove his way through, saying he was the prince when people didn't budge at first he found Maurice's father standing in front of the door, helping the bodyguards try to stop the onlookers from getting in.

"Julien, I think it would be best if you stay out here." He said frantically, trying to block the prince from entering.

Julien frowned and barged his way past, ignoring Maurice's father's cries. Then he froze.

Surrounding their mother's bed was Judith and the royals' doctor. Judith was crying. The doctor was just covering their mother with a white sheet.

On the bed, their mother lied with a knife stabbed into her chest.

Someone place a hand on Julien's shoulder, guiding him to a seat near the bed. The doctor and Judith looked up as the sheet covered their mother, through it did not cover the image in Julien's mind.

"Julien," Judith said softly, rushing over. She pulled her brother into a hug, letting his head rest against her chest as she rubbed his back soothingly.

"Do you know who did this?" Asked Maurice's father, who had been the one to lead Julien to the chair leaving the bodyguards to deal with the crowd.

Judith shrugged.

"Assassins, grudge holders, people who want to steal the throne, I don't know!" She sobbed, "Mother did make quite a lot of enemies. You knew what she was like."

Maurice's father nodded. The doctor came over.

"It would appear that she had been asleep when she was murdered." The doctor said, rubbing his eyes, "I doubt she even saw who did it."

"Weren't the bodyguards suppose to be guarding her door?" Judith asked.

Maurice's father coughed, "They appeared to had been drugged when we arrived. The assassin must have slipped something in their drinks then snuck in when they had fallen asleep."

"Then the murderer could still be here!" Judith cried, hugging Julien tighter.

"We'll search high and low to find who did this, Judith, don't worry." Maurice's father said, placing a comforting hand on her shoulder. She nodded, smiling through her tears at him.

"In the meanwhile, it seems that now our ruler is gone..." The doctor said. He stared at Judith intentionally.

Judith blinked.

"Me?" She asked, "But I'm still not ready. At least that was what Mother always said."

"I think you know what you need to know, Judith." Maurice's father said, his smile thin. He had never liked the way her mother had forced the rules of ruling onto her even if she was the queen.

After awhile of looking at the two older lemurs slightly anxiously she nodded slowly.

"Alright. I'll take the throne."

The doctor smiled, "Splendid. Now I believe the bodyguards have gotten rid of that crowd outside so we can leave..."

"What about Mother?" Judith asked.

"The bodyguards will see to the queen." Maurice's father explained, softly. He looked over to Julien who hadn't said a word. "While I wish to over see things, I think we should get Julien back to bed."

Judith helped her brother up. Julien shook his head when Maurice's father offered to help him when Judith let go, wanting to walk back by himself. Understandingly, Maurice's father patted the prince's shoulder.

"Can I stay?" Judith asked when they were about to leave. "I...Mother never really treated us well and...I know I shouldn't care after what she's done to me lately but...she was my mother."

Maurice's father smiled gently and nodded at her. Throwing him a sad smile Judith returned to her place besides her mother's bed.

"Come on, Julien." Maurice's father whispered and Julien started to follow the two lemurs out.

However when he got to the door he stopped. Making sure the other two hadn't noticed, he turned to look back.

Judith was standing over the bed her face dry. She lifted the sheet off her mother, just so she could see the stab wound again.

"Pity," She sneered at the body, "I was hoping to see to see the fear in your eyes."

She let the sheets fall back down. Just as she lifted her head up, Julien quickly hid behind the door, breathing quickly, his eyes widened in shock.

Judith had killed their mother.

Before anyone disagree in what I wrote, please let me explain. I never been abused myself so I don't know if this is accurate. I am not saying all children abuse will snap like Judith has just done but from the information I collect they can sometimes and they can also end up abusers as this was the only thing they learnt as a child through that's not in all cases.

Seeing as I failed at making this dark in earlier chapters I'm not sure if this fits now but I didn't want to change the idea I had for the story. It's the reason why Julien feels scared yet didn't want to go to Skipper for help and why Madison stuck by Judith until last chapter. Julien is frigtened over Judith's change and plus right now is unsure if she evil for killing their abusive mother. And Madison was hoping Judith would change back to the way she was. It's explain more in the next chapter.

I didn't put ilatics for the flashback because it continues in the beginning of the next chapter and I didn't really want that to start it ilatics.

Please review.