Pairing: Marty/Alex. SLASH. Martex!

~Natty.

Must of Hurt, huh?

~M~

The sun in Africa was pretty nice. It beat down on you all day and if you laid perfectly spread out underneath it you could get a pretty good tan!

So that's how Alex the lion was spending his day today, tanning under the African sun drowned in relaxation and a little bit of sweat. His arms folded behind his head as he let out a sigh of content with a huge smile as he shut his eyes. "Nothing can ruin this…"

"Must of hurt, huh Alex?" Marty's voice was suddenly above him.

The lion's eyes shot open to find his best friend over his head, looking upside down. He sighed and shut his blue eyes again as he answered. "What hurt, Marty?"

"Oh you know, all those darts you keep getting and all."

Alex opened his eyes, rolling them as he sat up. Well there's goes his tanning day. His poor paling and neglected fur color! He couldn't even dye his fur here! "Of course they hurt, they're needles going into me. What do you think?"

The two friends started to walk through the shorter grass.

"I think you trippin' ." Marty answered honestly. How many times had the lion been shot with a dart or tried to be shot at? The zebra had lost count. Man his feline friend had some mighty bad luck!

The lion reassured. "I'm fine, Marty. That was years ago."

"Yeah but you got it in your system. You KNOW you can't get that stuff out your system once you start!"

"It was just a sleeping dart." Alex laughed at something so ridiculous. What did the zebra think he was radioactive now or something?

"That's how its starts! Next thing ya know you're doped up sittin' on the F train and it's not even runnin'!"

"What?" Alex questioned, not knowing at all what his best friend was talking about. He snorted. "Marty, c'mon don't you think you're overreacting just a little bit? Or are going completely insane?"

"Hmmm..." The monochromatic animal pretended to think, rubbing his chin with his hoof until he used the same one to poke the cat along with giving his answer. "Neither! I'm just worried about you!"

Alex shrugged, not understanding. "Worried? Why would you be worried?"

"Who knows what you got in you now." Marty shrugged. "I sure don't wanna get it with all them things people keep on shooting into you! I'm gonna have to stop our contact! So don't be hugging up on me anymore."

"So I can't hug you huh?" Alex smirked deviously.

He swore his friend just set him up for it! He knew Marty didn't really want their hugs to stop or to keep him on quarantine. Even IF he had some type of contagious poisoning or something, they wouldn't stay away from each other. They were best friends and stuck together through anything no matter what. It also seemed that that bond between them had been getting stronger as of late. That had been a bit of a struggle for Alex. Let's face it here if you spend long enough with someone you love….you end up loving them. Yeah, he liked Marty…he just didn't know if the zebra liked him.

"You better not hug me." The zebra took the lead in their walk, hopping up on a rock in front of a large hill. He intended on going up it.

"Hey Marty," Alex neared the zebra slowly with an evil look. "C'mere..."

Marty raised a brow and turned his head. "Come there?"

"Yeah."

"Well why I gotta come over there for?"

"Maaaarty..." Alex sang, nearing the steed.

The zebra blinked. "What, Al?"

The lion started slowly moving closer. "I'm thinking of a gesture..."

Marty shook his head in confusion. His friend sounded nuts. "I told you you're tripping Alex! Stop tripping!"

"A gesture." The lion repeated, advancing on the monochromatic animal. He wouldn't eat him or try anything of course, he just wanted to mess around with the zebra that's all.

"Uh-uh! I don't want none of what you got! Back it up!"

"Maybe…I don't want to back up." the lion grinned with a shrug. He still approached his buddy, not really knowing what he was doing but hey it was fun!

"Maybe I'll kick your butt if you don't, now BACK IT UP!"

"Sticks and stones, Marty." Alex said, reminding the zebra of the saying.

Marty narrowed his eyes. "I'll show ya sticks and stones alright!"

Alex scoffed in amusement. "Go ahead." He'd like to see what the zebra can really d-

Marty scowled before tackling the cat down, the two of them tumbling down the hill he hadn't realized they'd gotten to the top of already. He gave a yell as they went down. It was kind of painful but not too much. When it wasn't his turn to land on his back in the tumbling, he was landing on Alex and this repeated until they came to a halt.

Alex huffed as they landed finally at the bottom of the hill with him underneath the steed. The dust cleared and he looked up straight into the other's face, into the green eyes. He thought for a moment in that following silence that he stopped breathing but that couldn't be the case.

The two frozen friends felt each other's breathing on their faces.

The cat didn't know what came over him next because he pushed his head forward with closed blue eyes, kissing his best friend for a while. He was surprised that the zebra actually kissed him back and they kissed for a long time until the heat overcame both of them.

The next thing they remembered was being in hours of deep passion the two didn't even know they could ever have possibly accomplished.

When it was all over they lay panting under the African sunset and the zebra only had one thing to say in humor.

"Must of hurt…" Marty smirked as he panted in the cat's ear. "…huh Alex?"