A/N: I don't own Grimm Fairy Tales Presents: The Jungle Book.
Chapter 4
"Stand still." Bomani ordered as he once again tried to strike the irritating monkey-boy with his claw-glove, but Dewan ducked quickly before jumping to another branch.
"This is no way to fight! Fight me!" the naked tiger-boy yelled at the snickering Dewan. Dewan then kicked him into the chin. He then tried to quickly escape, only for Bomani to quickly return the favor by kicking into the hips. Although hurt, Dewan jumped onto Bomani and began hitting his head.
"My plaything." He muttered as Bomani yelled in pain, but that wasn't the end of it. Still in pain, Bomani didn't notice when Dewan grabbed a liana and wrapped it around the tiger-boy's neck before choking him.
"Hoo-whoo!" the naked auburn-haired boy hooted as he also chuckled maniacally, choking the poor Bomani. Using all his strength, Bomani brought his claw glove to the liana and managed to cut it, freeing him.
"You… kaff. You are a most foul creature," Bomani told the monkey-boy who fell to a tree trunk. "I would do this entire jungle a service to tear you to shreds!"
"Lil' teye-grr be my plaything?" Dewan muttered, grinning mischievously just as Bomani grabbed him and smashed the naked auburn-haired boy against the tree trunk.
"Take pride, jester of the jungle," Bomani growled at the boy, who was still grinning. "Your death is delivered by the king of the…"
He failed to finish when Bomani blew some powder onto his face. Bomani immediately began to feel dizziness as he collapsed to the ground, the feet no longer able to hold his teenage muscular body. The last thing he heard was Dewan's laughing as everything went dark.
The first thing Akili saw once she opened her eyes was Hathi, the young elephant she rescued before the attack of the tigers.
"Are you alive?" he asked.
"AGH! I wish I was not. What happened?" the naked dirty-blonde girl asked as she grunted from the pain on her head.
"You took a nasty fall. I… pulled you back here, away from the battle," Hathi told her. "I was… I was… frightened and hiding back here until the battle was over. Please, Akili, do not tell the elephants of my cowardice. My father wants me to be courageous."
Akili just sighed before smiling. She approached the young elephant and patted his head.
"Trunkling," she said to him. "I learned long ago from someone special to me, courage is not always a roar. Sometimes courage is that little voice that guides us away, so we can live as long as the tomorrows go. A little fear is a good thing when you are small."
Genuinely smiling, Hathi followed the dirty-blonde girl as they returned to the river, the site of the brutal battle, filled with corpses or elephants and tigers, and their lungs and blood spilled out. So much blood, that both the ground and the water in the river became red. Disturbed with this scene, Akili regained her composure once she saw Baloo, Bagheera and a wolf at the riverbank.
"My eyes tire of seeing the jungle soaked in blood." Bagheera spoke as she observed what was left of the bloodbath.
"The Shere attacked unprovoked. They were led by one of those human cubs." An elephant, potentially Radha's successor, told the panther. "You were told nothing but trouble would follow them."
"The wolf cub, Mowglii. Was she here?" Bagheera desperately asked him.
"I know not and care. I have a tribe to put back together." The elephant told her. Baloo meanwhile approached the river, trying to catch the girl's sense, but he was instead greeted with a high smell of blood.
"She was here. We left her right here." Baloo recalled.
"There was a struggle. Some kind of ruckus, but the prints are bigger than Mowglii's." Grey Brother added as he observed the nearby footprints. "Where is she?"
"Gone."
The three animals turned their head and saw Hathi and a naked Akili standing.
Mowglii almost screamed as the water was entering her lungs. She desperately closed her mouth as she and that teenage silver fox Tobaqui were floating down the river underwater. A tiger, crushed by an elephant's massive body tried to reach her, but she and Tobaqui began swimming away. It was intensively hard due to the river's strong current. After some time of hard effort, the two managed to reach the surface.
Tobaqui was the first to emerge as he coughed the water out before reaching the shore and collapsing onto the ground, exhausted. Jus then, the naked girl followed as she gasped for air before also reaching the shore. Both of them were soaking as Tobaqui stood up and approached Mowglii as she lied naked on her back.
"We-we are alive." Mowglii panted.
"The fall would have killed a heavier animal." Tobaqui grumbled. "It appears we were spared the fate of that elephant and the tiger pinned under it. No thanks to you, of course."
As Mowglii finally stood up, she immediately noticed that it was dark. She looked around and understood why; the two washed up in what seemed to be a cave with a small waterfall. It would have been silent if not for a rumbling sound filling the cave.
"Is that the battle above or the water's fall? I cannot tell." Mowglii spoke again, but Tobaqui just ignored him, mumbling in annoyance.
"How do we get out of here?" the naked brunette girl asked. The silver fox answered this time.
"Leave it to me. Mine is the best nose in the jungle. Just… just follow me and do not do anything foolish." Tobaqui answered bitterly. Mowglii noticed this. They walked together through the cave tunnels for about fifteen minutes until Mowglii lost her patience.
"You don't like me very much, do you, Tobaqui?" she asked the teenage fox who did not hesitate to confess it.
"No, I do not."
"But I have never done anything you." Mowglii argued, only for Tobaqui to ignore her. "Akili seems to like me."
She then noticed that Tobaqui was even more frustrated once she mentioned the naked dirty-blonde.
"I do not wish to... WHUPP!" Tobaqui yelped in the dark.
"What? What do not wish to… WHUP?" Mowglii yelped as she fell right into a tunnel with water streaming down. She followed Tobaqui in falling down a pool of water with a huge splash in the end of the tunnel. Soaking once again, the two swam towards the shore.
"I have had enough of all this water." Tobaqui coughed.
"Some tracker you are." Mowglii told him in a grumpy tone. The two quickly began shaking off the water from them.
"What dark calamity have you gotten us now?" Tobaqui asked when he saw that Mowglii found something. Joining her, the teenage silver fox found what was it and gulped, feeling uneasy just as the naked girl. On the stone walls of the cave were marks. Marks carved from sharp claws of a beast or multiple beasts.
"These marks are deep in the stone, but it is uncertain how fresh they are." Tobaqui fearfully whispered. "Either the cave was inhabited long ago, or we are not alone down here."
As if to confirm his words, a figure was lurking in the dark. The figure wasn't seen, but its eyes were glowing deadly yellow…
Time in the Sun
Years ago
"Fear is not a precious gem, rarely seen." Badur yelled as he wore a necklace of Tavi heads around his neck while his paws were in blood. "Fear is a vast commodity to be spread out across the jungle and upon all its creatures. We are not the fastest, or the deadliest, or the most powerful. We are the faster, the deadliest and powerful! WE ARE FEAR!"
All the bears roared in agreement, all except for Baloo as he walked around the jungle that was filled with corpses of the animals from various tribes. That included the tigers and elephants. Baloo feared for tomorrow. He had always thought it would be bright and illuminated by the laws of the jungle, where even though the animals battled, it was always for honor, never earthly spoils. That was before Badur, before his greed and bloodlust, before he corrupted the Bada Dar. Only a few of the jungle's creatures remembered the beginning of the Great War. But this moment, this period that happened, this was not a war.
Baloo grumbled in anger as many of the Bada Dar have lost their lives to stupidity and pride, but the bear knew that the greatest tragedy of all was how many battles the bears of Badur were winning.
"Baloo! Look! Do you like my trophy?" a bear cub asked as he was wearing a necklace made of meerkat heads, just like the one Badur had. In a second, Baloo teared the necklace off the cub's neck swiftly and with rage.
"You break the law of the jungle! HONOUR THE DEAD!" Baloo raged at the cub, who cowered in fear.
"I thought you would be proud. It was you who taught us to fight." The bear cub whimpered.
Baloo sighed as the cub was somewhat right. It was all that he taught them, just the fight. It was all Baloo was ever given the chance to. Reverence is a lesson that only comes with age. These cubs were plucked too soon. Baloo knew that to a child, death was a fantasy, not a finality. It was not their fault.
"You did well, my cub. Let us go back to the Mouth and celebrate another victory with the clan." Baloo told the bear cub more softly. With that, the two returned to the cave. As he walked through the tunnels, Baloo finally found his mate Sahrad resting, only to be disturbed by a pile of wild dog corpses nearby.
"You work too hard, my darling Sahrad." Baloo told her.
"It is Badur's will, my mate. Look at all we have now!" Sahrad answered, her belly swollen, obviously counting the corpses as trophies, spoils of war.
"There is barely anywhere to sleep, and you will need more space once our fist cub comes. Baloo is razing the jungle, and for what?" Baloo argued.
"Badur is our leader, Baloo." Sahrad argued back. "Why can you not be content like the rest of the Bada Dar? We have never lived so well. He has given us more than ever before. You train the cubs all day, a noble role, an important role, but he gives all what you could not!"
"But at what cost, Sahrad?"
"He is the leader of Bada Dur!" the she-bear exclaimed. "And while you are gone training the young to fight this war you abhor, he gives up everything!"
"Our leader is a tyrant, a monster." Baloo protested.
"Yes, he may be. But he is still leader," Sahrad told him. "And father of this child! Badur honors us all with his royal legacy! And you, my dear, dear Baloo, you train them all."
Awed, Baloo left his mate in anger. His strolling led him to the great hall of the bears' cave, watching as Badur, standing on a lion with his necklace, roars with his bloody paws, surrounded by the roaring bears and corpses of various animals.
"Gorge on the spoils of war you great leader has given you, my fearsome Bada Dur! What we want is ours, and we take what we want!" Badur exclaimed, with the bears starting to feed on the corpses. Baloo left the feast in disgust as he retreated to his own thoughts. There was a reason he trained the young. He knew more than any how to feed his claws with crimson. How to tear through thick hide with his jaws. Badur was larger, Badur was stronger. Badur was royalty. And so, Baloo decided that Badur would fall by his tooth and claw for the perverse path he led the Bada Dar down.
Baloo wondered how far his once proud, noble and just tribe fell in such a short time under Badur's leadership. He recalled that there was an age when the Bada Dar was a respected tribe only trying to survive, never to rule. That memory was shared with none of the bears now.
Baloo approached Badur who was sleeping among female bears, including Sahrad, sometime after the bloody feast. The bear rose his face, ready to strike and kill the bloodthirsty Badur, but it hit him that killing Badur would do nothing but another to rise up in his place.
"In order to uphold of what the Bada Dar was, I must become not Bada Dar." Baloo muttered to himself and left, just as Badur woke up and saw him leaving. Baloo knew that his has tribe has grown battle hard, but moral soft as the number of victories grew. A foolish mixture of bravado and paranoia had Badur command all Bada Dar to sleep deep in the caves together as a tribe. Arrogance hindered Badur from thinking another way out was necessary. Baloo soon approached the passageway between the cave and surface, the only one. It was in the form of a bear with an opened mouth, with the passageway supported by numerous rock pillars. The bear knew that though strong, the jaws of the Great Mouth of the bears' den could be loosened, given the right strength and the knowledge of where to apply it.
"The caves of Kipling run deep and pitch," Baloo thought. "Perhaps the Bada Dar will understand my actions and see the unnecessary slaughter they have brought upon this jungle through the darkness of the caves below."
Standing between the pillars, Baloo rose on his two feet and roared as he broke the pillars. He then quickly ran to the forest as the rocks standing on the pillars collapsed, blocking the passageway. Badur, who followed the bear, managed to see Baloo and was filled with rage.
"Baloo! I see you, betrayer! Break of the Bada Dur!" Badur cursed, but the rocks blocked his path, trapping him along with the rest. As the jaws of the cave devoured his tribe below forever, Baloo also wished that one day he would see his brothers and sisters again. Though, another part of him feared the same thing. With a guilt that would be buried deep and one he hoped would never come to surface again, Baloo left the trapped cave into the jungle, starting his life as a lone bear.
