Makuu soon learned to hate not only his prison, but his jailers as well.
The two-legs never uttered a word, but they were visibly cruel, sometimes they taunted their captives with unreachable food for entertainment; but they taunted him more frequently, often throwing his food out of reach to spite him, or poking him with long wooden sticks to provoke him into a rage. When it came to water, the two-legs splashed him and Kiburi with cold water from buckets.
During the time they spent here, however, he and the other animals got to know each other a bit. They talked about how they were captured, or discussed a way to escape, or chat about their lives before being captured. The little elephant, though, didn't talk no matter how much the others tried to get him to say his name at the very least. He didn't sob as much anymore, though, and now his ears spread out whenever they talked, which showed he did listen to what they talked about.
And Kiburi still refused to eat.
Against his better judgment, Makuu offered Kiburi his own meat, but received no reply other than an indifferent grunt. Despite his attempts not to worry about him, now Makuu was certain something had happened. This was not like Kiburi at all. He didn't even annoy him as much anymore, only occasionally and when he was in a 'good mood', but most of the time he was silent, cold and unresponsive to anything that happened around him.
Then he started wondering... did Kiburi's float stay behind in the Outlands? Was this the reason he was so... down? That he missed...? No, it couldn't be that, Kiburi cared for no one but himself.
Makuu, on the other hand, missed his float terribly. Akina was the one he missed the most; what if he never saw her again? Would she move on and find another? She was always very faithful, but deep down he knew she would eventually have to consider it... if she did he hoped that lucky crocodile would give her the family she always wanted and he could never give her out of his selfishness...
Makuu shook the thought off his head. He'd get out of here and return to her, to the float, to the Pride Lands...
Kitwana's whereabouts were still tormenting him, however. Not knowing if he was okay, or even alive, was eating him from the inside, made the guilt from before intensify tenfold.
That night (Makuu counted it had been six days since he was brought here), he couldn't sleep. He stared at the dark, but starry sky, from the window up above, the only connection to the outside world. He longed for his freedom, and for Akina's warmth, fervently.
"I'll return to you, Akina," he whispered, almost inaudibly. "I promise."
He heard Kiburi's snicker from behind. "Looks like you haven't learned not to make promises you can't actually keep."
Right, he was wondering when he'd hear Kiburi's dry comment of the day. "Perhaps, but at the very best I try my best to fulfill them, something you have never done."
"You know nothing about me, Makuu." Kiburi said bitterly.
"You seem to forget we grew up together, Kiburi."
"That's what makes it even worse. You never truly knew me, nor did you ever truly know her."
Makuu frowned when he realized who he was talking about. "Leave Akina out of this, she has nothing to do with the issue." He growled menacingly.
"She has everything to do with the issue. None of this would have ever happened if she had chosen me."
"Would you get over it already?! How many times are you going to play the victim just because Akina preferred me?!"
Kiburi turned to his rival, his eyes full of hate. "Preferred you? In case you forgot, you never gave neither of us a choice. You challenged me to the Upenduwa for her affections, and beat me."
"Don't blame me for that-!"
"Oh, really? You couldn't bear that she and I were happy and you decided to challenge me to strip me of the right to being her mate!"
Makuu felt his stomach twisting at the accusation, knowing it wasn't a complete lie. "I was interested in her-!"
"As if! What did you want her for? You never wanted kids, and you were never interested in her before you noticed I was! In fact, you only noticed her once you realized everyone in the float wanted her as a mate!" Kiburi hissed, baring his teeth. "You didn't want a mate, you wanted a trophy!"
"That was before, I changed-!"
"Please, Makuu, we both know that's a lie! You tried to force her into being your mate, and this time I could do nothing to defend her from you because you were both the leader and the winner of the Upenduwa!"
The reminder of what he had done back then, in his troublemaking days, stung Makuu. However, he did not let Kiburi notice. "I admit I did things wrong in the beginning, but then I realized the error of my ways! I realized I didn't know Akina enough to figure out why she always rejected my advances! I had to go ask Puawhy, and you have no idea how hard it was for me to swallow my pride to do so!"
"Right, our dear old Pua. I always knew he was the reason you 'metamorphosed' overnight. I wouldn't have minded if you had actually realized that Akina and I were meant to be together and allow us to be happy, but you stole her from me anyway!" By then, there was despair in Kiburi's voice.
"I fell in love with her," Makuu said simply. "The more I got to know her, properly this time, the more I became attached to her, and eventually I came to love the way she was; her fighting spirit, her strong will, her warmth heart..." he spoke with reverence as he described her.
Kiburi looked away indignantly. "I still can't understand what she saw in you that she pushed me aside overnight to be with you."
"She never pushed you aside, you grew apart from her yourself!" Makuu snapped. "Or will you blame that on her, like you tend to do?!"
The other animals were worried of the tone and volume both crocodiles were gaining as they continued to argue, but they dare not interfere. Sure, they were chained to the wall, but it was never a good idea to be in the crossfire between two fighting crocs.
"This is the low point, Kiburi! What's next, you will also blame me for you being banished?!" Makuu snapped.
"You PUSHED ME ASIDE, Makuu!" Kiburi yelled. "You claimed we were 'friends', but you wouldn't even listen to my opinion and instead you preferred to listen to the lion cub, even though he was the reason we were awakened before time!"
Makuu sighed, exasperated. "It was the Dry Season, Kiburi! The last thing we needed was to start a fight with the other animals and get in trouble with King Simba again!"
Kiburi scoffed. "Since when did you care about what anyone thought?"
"Ever since...!" Makuu stopped himself. He nearly said that he started caring ever since Akina stood up to him and made him see the error of his ways, knowing it would only add more salt to the wound. "I had to think of the whole float's survival before anything else, Kiburi. And the best way to do that was to start acting like a real leader; when I went to the Savannah Summit for the firs time, nobody trusted me. No one. Kion thought I was going to cause trouble, Twiga and Vuruga-Vuruga plotted to humiliate me and Bupu denied me any chance to come to an agreement regarding a place to hibernate. You know why? Because I was finally harvesting what I sowed."
Kiburi scoffed. "You did what any crocodile would have done! Back then I did have your back, even if I resented you for robbing me of Akina's affections. You had to ruin it, though, when you stooped low enough to actually ask for help after you had previously stated crocodiles could take whatever they wanted!"
"That was not the way, and I admit I learned it too late, but I did! Can you say the same, Kiburi?! Where's yourfloat now, huh?! Did you abandon them when they were of no more use to you? Or did they become a burden in the Outlands!"
Umoja lifted his ears in alarm when Makuu started talking about the float, particularly when he noticed Kiburi stiffening. "M-Makuu, don't-!"
Makuu didn't hear. "They were good crocodiles, Kiburi, and they looked up to you! And you took advantage of that admiration to sway them into your little plot, and got them banished as well when the whole thing was your idea! Or perhaps they saw how you really are and abandoned you-!"
That struck a nerve. Something in Kiburi's brain snapped.
Makuu could not react when his rival lunged at him, but the chain was long enough to allow him to attack. The crocodiles started fighting, digging their teeth into one another, but eventually and much to Makuu's shock, Kiburi pinned him to the ground by the throat. This had never happened before.
But what shocked him the most was the expression of pure grief and the sorrowful rage he saw in Kiburi's tearful eyes.
"YOU DON'T KNOW ANYTHING!" he roared. "YOU THINK YOU HAD IT HARD DURING THE DRY SEASON!? WHAT DO YOU THINK I FELT WHEN THESE MONSTERS BROUGHT ME ALONG WITH MY FLOAT HERE! HOW DO YOU THINK I FELT WHEN THEY TOOK THEM ONE BY ONE, WHILE I COULD DO NOTHING TO SAVE THEM?!"
Makuu stared at him in shock, processing what he just heard. His float was... gone? Did this mean...?
Kiburi stepped off Makuu and turned his back on him, panting heavily. "Tamka was the first to be taken, then they came for Neema... until it was just me and Nduli left. He was the youngest of all of us, maybe that's what saved him up to that point... We didn't know what they were doing to the others, but we heard their screams and their pleas before everything came silent..."
"Nduli was terrified, I had never seen him like that. Even in our current situation he looked up to me for guidance, or something to do. I promised him I wouldn't let them take him, but..." his voice shook with regret. "When they came again, the restraint kept me from protecting him, they had chained him feet away from me..." Kiburi closed his eyes shut in deep pain. "I could only watch as he was taken... I still can hear him pleading me to save him, his terrified eyes and screams haunt me... All of theirs..."
"I thought they'd come for me soon, but they never took me; apparently they had other things in mind for me. I have been truly alone ever since... they never brought any more crocodiles until you came along."
He glared at Makuu with bloodshot eyes, but he had no more tears to shed by then. "Accuse me of whatever you want, call me a liar, a backstabbing traitor, an hypocrite, but don't you ever dare say that I didn't care for them. They were all I had when I was banished, the only true friends I ever had... I told them they didn't have to tag along with me because it was my fault they were banished, but they chose to stick by my side. Now that they're all gone, I have no more reason to live."
Makuu felt a shiver down his spine. Now he understood why he never ate and why he was so apathetic, why his fighting spirit was broken; as the guilt started to consume him, this time he made no attempt to bottle it up or get rid of it.
"K-Kiburi..." He uttered some words he never thought he'd say to him, "I'm sorry, I didn't..."
Kiburi said nothing else, not bothering to argue any further, and sulked away from Makuu and towards a corner, as away from him as possible. There, he curled up with his back turned on him. He made one last dry comment. "I don't want your pity."
Makuu just stared at him, shocked, and feeling terrible for the things he had said. He would have never taunted him like that if he had known what had happened here... he glanced at the other animals, and noted they were silent, staring at Kiburi with compassion, but there was a particular look of guilty coming from Usian and Umoja.
He recalled the latter had told him to stop when he started talking about Kiburi's float, while the former had not finished a sentence a few days ago when Kiburi glanced at him.
"You two knew..." he growled at them in frustration.
"We were brought here before it happened." Umoja said, ashamed.
"Don't you think you could have warned me about it before I technically poured both salt and lemon on his wounds?!" Makuu snapped in frustration.
"We didn't want to bring him more painful memories, and you two didn't seem to be on good terms, so we assumed he wouldn't want you to know about it." Usian explained.
"Well, thank you very much!" Makuu snapped sarcastically, and then thought to himself in worry. "Kitwana, wherever you are, I hope you are faring better than me, my boy."
"Owowow..." Kitwana rubbed the tip of his beak painfully, wincing every time it stung.
"You have to be careful." Jiji explained. "One wrong turn in there could break the tip of your beak."
"Don't tell me!" Kitwana said, dipping his beak into the cool water of his bowl.
Jiji had brought him a padlock, and inserted his claw in it, then gave a few turns, all the while explaining Kitwana how to do so.
"You make it look so easy..." Kitwana commented.
"Are you kidding? Even I have to take care not to break my claw." Jiji said, shivering in dismay.
"But if I learn how to open this one, then I can open any?"
"Yes, as long as it's not a safe you can get the hang of it with almost any lock. We can take a break, though, if your beak hurts too much..."
"Yeah, I think for now I'll let my poor beak a break before it cracks..."
Thank heaven! Jiji stretched himself, and went over to his own plate, where he started drinking his milk (Kitwana felt awkward everytime he saw him drink milk from another mammal) with his tongue.
"For how long have these poachers been around?" Kitwana asked him from a few steps away.
"Since always, I guess; I only arrived here about two years ago with my mistress. From what I've heard, though, the poaches are going further into Tanzania to avoid patrols."
"And they reached the Pride Lands..." Kitwana concluded gravely. It explained why none of the Pride Landers had ever seen a human before; they had never gotten that far inland, but now that they had, the Pride Landers were all healthy and good-looking (as Jiji put it) and were targeted because of that.
"So, what's your plan, kiddo?" Jiji asked as he left his milk bowl alone for the time being and turned towards Kitwana.
"I'm going to find the poachers' lair and release whoever they still have in there." Kitwana said.
"I heard it the first time, but how will you find it? And if you do find it, how will you free them without getting caught yourself?"
"Oh..." Kitwana hadn't thought of that possibility. "I kind of have to think about it yet, but I won't get to that part if I can't find their lair."
"Well, good luck on that. Poachers are very good at hiding and covering their tracks. Not to mention that their bullets will finish you off before you can say 'don't shoot!'"
Kitwana gulped at the idea of facing one of those 'guns' face-to-face. "Hey, in case one of those bullets doesgo into an animal, is there any way to save him?"
Jiji thought for a moment. "Well, if you want the wound to heal well, you must find a way to bring the bullet out of it, and then try to stop the bleeding. Usually only humans with advanced medical experience for animals know how to do so properly, though."
Kitwana sighed in dismay. "I'm going to take a walk and see if I can think of anything."
"Don't forget to return before sundown! Besides, you're yet to open the padlock!"
"Okay."
Man, now Jiji was sounding like Makuu... Kitwana felt a feeling in his gut when he thought of his adoptive father. He thought he shouldn't miss him after he made it clear he didn't care for him, but he did. Kitwana spread out his wings-he could open then more than before, but it would be a while before he could fully open them- and stretched out, letting out a yawn. As he walked close to the water hole, he spotted Zumberi's flock still there, most of them napping. Zumberi, as vigilant as ever, spotted him and went towards the younger chick.
"Kitwana, what brings you around here?" he asked in his usual amiable tone.
"I was practicing opening padlocks with Jiji, but my beak started to hurt." Kitwana explained.
"You're still determined to find the evil men?"
Kitwana nodded energetically. "I don't want to go back to the Pride Lands knowing I could have done something to help the prisoners still there and I didn't."
Zumberi smiled. "Well, looks like you're quite the brave fledgling, Kitwana. That Makuu guy surely taught you well."
Kitwana became uncomfortable at the mention of the crocodile, and looked down in dismay.
"Come on, Kitwana, you shouldn't be mad at him forever." Zumberi said when he noted his expression.
"I'm not mad, it's just..." Kitwana sighed as he went to the edge of the water, seeing his reflection. He recalled how he'd wonder why he was so different from his 'father' and the other crocodiles, and how many times Makuu had been present and said nothing about it. "I know he probably did it for my wellbeing, but it still hurts that he gave me away just like that, it felt as if he wanted to get rid of me as soon as possible."
"You must know this, Kitwana, but crocodiles have a quite... different way to show they care about someone. Sometimes the things they do might seem heartless, but they have the best interests at heart."
"But why did he have to be so... cruel?"
"Well, would you have listened to him if he had 'been nice' and told you to go to the egret flock on your own account?"
"No..." Kitwana said quietly, getting the point.
"I can't judge him since I didn't know the crocodile, but from what you've told me I can tell he did care about you his own way." Zumberi said. "Now, do you think you have any right to judge him? Do you know why he is the way he is, and take that into consideration before just making a conclusion?"
Now he felt terrible. "No."
"If you ever see him again try to talk about how you feel, and who knows? Perhaps he'll open up eventually."
Kitwana listened to the older ibis's words intently. Would that be the case? There were certain topics Makuu had never liked to talk about, such as his family when he was a hatchling... he only asked once, but Makuu didn't respond. He found an excuse to send Kitwana off to play with Hodari that time, which let the chick know he didn't want to talk about it; being naïve at that age, Kitwana resolved to never ask again.
Now, however, he felt curious.
Kitwana had an idea, realizing Zumberi must know the area around here if his flock passed around here every year. "Hey, Zumberi, for how long have you passed through this place?"
"About five years, I believe."
"Have you seen any... strange lairs?"
"What do you mean?" Zumberi inquired curiously.
"Some place humans could be living in... or someplace humans could use to keep imprisoned animals?"
"Why do you ask?"
"Before I go back to the Pride Lands, I want to save any animals that might be held captive by the poachers."
Zumberi was actually surprised he was so determined to go through with it. "Kitwana, you do realize that is risky, right? If you get caught-"
"I won't." Kitwana replied, sure of himself. "I'll go in there and free the animals!"
The older ibis couldn't contain a small, impressed grin. "You're very headstrong, aren't you?"
"So? Have you seen any suspicious human lair?"
Zumberi thought for a moment, trying to recall if he had seen any human-made structures other than this one. Knowing those sneaky humans, probably they settled somewhere far from here, but close to wherever they were capturing animals from. He recalled when a few months ago, before they were shot from the sky and dispersed, they had flown over a dry, arid area in the edge of a desert... and he thought he saw some humans coming in and out of an old, dilapidated structure, often taking animals with them...
"There is one."