Chapter 37: Deadly Rock

"Rock sliding?" Dark said, confused. "What are you talking about?"

"Just follow me, I'll show you." Clous said, and started trotting toward the backside of Pride Rock.

Dark stayed put. Malowa started to follow, but stopped when he noticed Dark hadn't moved.

"Come on, Dark. It sounds kinda fun! We'll see what Clous is talking about then we'll go right back, okay?"

Dark sighed. "Fine… I'm only coming along to keep you two from hurting yourselves." Dark conceded, then began to follow Clous.

Dark and Malowa trotted faster to catch up with the orange cub.

"Where are we going?" Dark asked.

"The rock part of the back of Pride Rock. Hush, we have to be quiet, there's lionesses lying around in this area."

"Good thing we're pretty small, we can duck right into the grass." Malowa whispered.

The three ducked into a low position and were stealthily trotting. It was harder for Dark to do since he was a little bigger than the other two cubs.

The trio successfully passed a couple resting lionesses, and snuck into the back of Pride Rock. This is where the Pride buried their royal or honored dead. Far above that, there was a tall cliff that opened to a small cave. This place was where Scar used to reside before he took the throne. Often he would hang his limbs off the edge of the mouth while he relaxed.

Now, age had crumbled the cliff. It looked more like a large rubble pile than a cliff. There were a lot of large and medium size rocks at the top of the pile, while the bottom was mostly small rocks and pebbles.

"Up here, follow me." Clous said, bouncing up the side of the rubble pile. As he scrambled up, some small rocks were sent down. After a minute of climbing, Clous made it to the top of the ledge, albeit ungracefully.

"Come on, it's easy! Just do what I did." Clous called down to his friends.

"Do we have to do it just like that?" Dark said quietly to Malowa, mocking Clous's clumsy ascent. Malowa laughed loudly.

Dark took a deep breath, and climbed up the side of the pile as nimbly as he could. He only sent a couple rocks falling.

"You made it look easy…" Malowa muttered. He gathered himself and more or less tried to copy Dark's movements.

When all three boys had made it to the top of the ledge, they stood upon the largest rock and looked down. The drop wasn't sheer. If one of the boys had fallen off, they would have tumbled down and landed in a pile of rocks. The cub would probably have been bruised but not seriously injured. The drop was more like a slope, going down at an angle.

"This is something I've always wanted to do, but mother would never let me." Clous said.

"What, just stand here?" Dark said sarcastically.

"No! Just watch."

Malowa and Dark watched as Clous looked around at the ground. He found a rock that was rather flat, and had enough surface area for him to stand on. It was not imbedded, but sat loosely on other small rocks. There were many other rocks like this around in varying sizes.

Once Clous decided this was the rock he needed, he backed up a few paces. He steadied his legs, almost in a pre-pounce pose.

"And this, my friends, is Rock Sliding." the orange cub said, and launched himself forward. Dark and Malowa watched in awe as Clous jumped upon his flat rock, and then surfed down the pile of rocks and pebbles. He grinned hugely as he quickly descended. Near the bottom of the pile, Clous jumped off his rock and landed gracefully on his feet.

"Woah!" Malowa called down. "That was so cool!"

Dark's eyes were wide. "That looked dangerous."

"Come on guys!" Clous called up at them. "Your turn!"

"Yeah, me next!" Malowa said and looked for a rock as Clous had. He found one, but had to nudge it into a better position with his paws and muzzle.

"Are you sure you want to do this?" Dark said coming over to Malowa's side. "I think Clous has done this before, despite what he says about his mother."

"Relax. The worse that could happen is that we fall on our butt and then Clous will laugh. That's it." the dark peach cub said as if that would dismiss any and all doubts Dark had. Before Dark could say anything else, Malowa launched himself. "Here I goooo!" Malowa jumped on his rock and slid down the pile.

"Woah, woah!" Malowa had a little trouble keeping his balance on the rock. Near the end of the pile, he tried to jump off as cloud has done, but he ended up tripping over his legs, tumbled a couple of times then landed on his side. He quickly leapt up with a giant smile. "Wow, that was awesome!"

Clous laughed. "You fell on your butt!"

"Yeah! I did!" Malowa said, excited, then yelled up to Dark. "See, Dark? The worst thing that could happen happened, and we're all still okay. That didn't hurt at all. It's your turn!"

Dark rolled his eyes. "I guess he has a point." he muttered to himself. He dragged himself over near the edge, and looked for a rock.

"Hurry! It's fun!" Clous called up to him.

"I'm coming, I'm coming." Dark said as he found a suitable rock to use. He moved it into position, backed up and readied himself.

"Here goes nothing…"

Dark dashed forward and leapt upon his rock and it propelled him down the pile. A feeling of exhilaration came over him and he couldn't help but grin. He jumped off at the right time and managed on to land on his feet.

"You did it!" Malowa exclaimed.

"It took me several tries to get it to look that good!" Clous said. "You're a natural! It's fun isn't it?"

"Yeah, it was." Dark admitted, still smiling.

"Let's go again!" Malowa said, already heading toward the side of the pile where they climbed before. Dark and Clous quickly followed him.

The boys slid down a few more times each. Sometimes one of them landed ungracefully on their side or back, but they never really hurt themselves. After a few times, the boys were pros.

"I should bring Jayden and Dayya to come try this." Dark said.

"No! No girls." Clous said.

"Why? Jayden is pretty cool." Dark defended.

"Jayden is cool, but Dayya talks too much." Malowa said. Dark and Clous looked at each other and tried not to laugh. Clous quickly changed the subject.

"Hey guys, I have an idea! Let's all three of us try to ride that big rock at the same time." Clous gestured with his head toward the big rock the three boys had stood upon when they had first arrived. It had just enough surface area for all three to stand upon and was rather tall. It probably weighed as much as the three boys combined.

"Do you think we can move it?" Malowa asked. "It's almost as tall as Dark."

"It's worth a try. We just all have to jump on it at the same time, and it should move easily!" Clous said, already envisioning the three of them surfing down the pile on the large rock. The others were convinced, and moved into position. On the count of three, they ran and jumped onto the rock. It didn't budge.

"It's too heavy." Dark said.

"Let's try again." Malowa said.

The three stepped off, the rock and tried again. It moved very slightly this time.

"It moved! Let's try again." Clous said, becoming excited. The cubs tried again, but ended up with the same result: a small budge.

"We don't have enough force." Dark said.

"Maybe if we keep jumping on it…" Clous suggested, not ready to give up yet.

"I don't want to keep jumping on it. I'm getting tired." Malowa complained.

"My mom might be coming to pick me up soon. I haven't been keeping track of time." Dark said. "We should get back before they notice we're not really with Kivu."

"Yeah, I wanna get back to my mom soon." Malowa said.

"Ugh, fine, you babies. But I want to rock slide one more time." Clous said, setting up one of the last appropriately sized rocks. He set it up next to the large rock that they couldn't get to move. He backed up, and then launched himself. Before he could jump on the rock, a loud voice came from behind the boys, and startled Clous.

"WHAT are you boys doing?"

Clous turned his head in mid-run and immediately recognized the new arrival. "Mom!"

Suddenly, Clous completely lost his footing, and while trying to regain his balance, rammed head and shoulder first into the large rock. It moved a bit more than it had before and seemed almost ready to fall. Clous still hadn't caught his footing, and gravity took over. The cub started tumbling down the pile. He rolled head over feet several times. Kiara gasped and moved quickly to where Clous had fallen.

"Clous!" she called. Dark and Malowa joined her side. Clous landed in a heap at the bottom of the pile. He didn't move, but he had his eyes open. He was breathing fast.

"Clous!" Kiara called desperately. Clous blinked his eyes a few times, but didn't get up. He was too stunned.

Kiara looked for the best way to get down the pile. Since having Clous, Kiara tired easily so she was apprehensive about running down the pile. She thought she would fall.

Before she could move, something else did. The large rock had finally been dislodged and gravity took over once again. It began to fall.

"Clous, look out!" Dark yelled. Kiara gasped again, horror taking over her.

Clous was still too dazed to move, and his friends and mother lost sight of him when the large rock landed on the cub.

"CLOUS!" Kiara screamed. This time she did not hesitate, she dashed down the rocks as fast as she could. She stumbled, twisting her paw, but she didn't notice. On her way down, she screamed Kovu's name, hoping he was near enough to hear.

He could save Clous. That is, if it wasn't already too late.