Like Water and Rain (Chapter 20)

It was a beautiful...monday, was it?

Yes, it’s monday…

I was at The Termite Mounds in order to retrieve supplies from there that Rafiki told me about and, considering I know those mounds inside and out, he suggested I do it...when I asked if I should bring Vitani, he shook his head no, inciting a shrug.

I entered the main mound, where Zira, Kovu, Nuka and Vitani would always sleep. The mounds were dirty and disgusting as ever, made worse by inactivity. True, I haven’t entered The Termite Mounds since Zira’s ambush, so I haven’t had a proper chance to see what became of it.

What did Rafiki need, exactly? Rafiki said that there was a particular kind of bug there that he needed one of it’s dry branches for a project, so I didn’t care and went to get him it, since I now think of Rafiki of sort of a mentor.

Anyway, here it is. One of the only remaining branches that haven’t been bitten into disrepair. Time to get it and g-

‘’Hey..you!’’

Blinking, I looked around. ‘’Show yourself!’’

The voice giggled. ‘’Relax, silly, i’m not going to attack!’’

The voice stopped and brown eyes glowed in the darkness. Backing away, I growled. ‘’Who are you?’’

‘’Oh, is this darkness creeping you out? Jeez, I really need to stop doing that..’’

The figure walked out and it was a teenage lioness with fur that was light peach, bordering on white, but the lioness did look a bit younger than Kiara and I. ‘’Armani, at your service!’’

‘’Uh...hello, Armani.’’ I blinked again. ‘’Name’s Shujaa.’’

‘’Cool!’’ She grinned, shaking one of my paws violently. ‘’Are you new here?!’’

‘’Well..not really.’’

‘’Oh, so you’ve been here?’’

‘’I lived here for a while..’’

Wrong choice, Connor!

Suddenly, Armani grinned a bright white as she hugged me. ‘’Oh, you’ve lived here too!? For how long?!’’

‘’Wait, you lived here, Armani?’’

‘’Yeah…’’ What the? Armani’s ears went down. ‘’I was here in the months leading to Zira’s plan.’’

‘’But...I never saw you here..’’ I breathed. ‘’I met every single lioness in The Outlands, but never met you..’’

‘’That’s because Zira ended up shutting me in The Mounds!’’ She cried. ‘’I didn’t like to fight, unlike you and the others, so she shut me away and never let me see the outside world...only letting me stay in here for months and months…’’

I..don’t understand...I would have known about her if I asked the others, but Zira did always seem hesitant on asking about other pride members outside of Kovu, Vitani and Nuka...so I guess it makes sense.

The tears leaking from her face caused me to have a determined look. ‘’Don’t cry.’’

‘’Huh?’’

I wrapped an arm around the lioness. ‘’You’ve never been shown the outside world since Zira shut you away, am I right?’’

‘’Yeah...why?’’

‘’Questions later, my friend! We’re going to take you to The Pridelands!’’

--

‘’Whoa…’’

I smiled at Armani’s look and breath of awe at the sight of The Pridelands. ‘’Welcome to my home...and if we’re lucky...your NEW home…’’

Tears of joy and relief appeared on Armani before she wiped them away. ‘’Well...anything’s better than that dump!’’

‘’Thatta girl!’’

‘’But are you sure Simba will accept me? I mean, because of my past and all?’’

‘’Why wouldn’t he? He accepted me and i’m far from your...typical Pridelander. Besides, Simba is rather easily accepting of youngsters.’’

‘’From what you told me, i’m only 2 years younger than you are…’’

‘’Details, Armani...details.’’

Can’t believe we’re doing this for a lost lioness…

It’s the right thing to do, Scar…

‘’I guess.’’ She shrugged, but grinned again. ‘’Maybe if I get in, you and I can spend LOTS of time together! Oh, it’ll be SOOO EXCITING!’’

‘’Heh…’’ I smiled at her giddiness.

This was something mankind needed. This level of excitement. It’s all war and hatred where I come from.

‘’How many lionesses are there?!’’ She asked as I blinked. ‘’There must be A LOT!’’

Huh...how many were there?

I counted forty..

FORTY?!

‘’Uh..forty.’’

‘’Really…?!’’

‘’Yeah, but it’s not that big of a dea-’’

‘’THAT’S SO COOL!’’

--

As I rolled my eyes in amusement at Armani’s excited squeals, we approached Pride Rock, where the pride was eating.

Sitting next to Kiara, I raised an eyebrow.

‘’What’s all this?’’ I asked her as Armani came behind me.

‘’It’s Thanksgiving!’’ Kiara beamed.

Wait...they have Thanksgiving on this world?

This world also has Christmas, so I wouldn’t be surprised if they put in Thanksgiving as a tradition.

‘’How nice.’’ I nuzzled Kiara. ‘’A Thanksgiving with the royal family.’’

‘’Connor, i’m not the only one from my famil-’’

‘’Indeed, you are not.’’ I put a paw on her muzzle with a smirk. ‘’But you’re the most precious of them.’’

A blush came from her cheeks. ‘’You flatter me…’’

‘’Isn’t that my job?’’

‘’Your job is for protection.’’

‘’What fun would that be without knowing the lion i’m protecting?’’

‘’I mean..that’s true, but…’’

‘’Are you two like...hooked?’’ We heard Armani ask. ‘’Because it’s really cute.’’

Now a blush came from me.

‘’Hello there...who are you?’’ Kiara asked.

‘’Name’s Armani!’’ She then zipped over to Kiara like they would in cartoons and put an arm around her. ‘’How ya doin’?’’

‘’Good…’’ Kiara replied with a nervous chuckle.

‘’So what all are we having, Princess?’’ I asked the cream-colored lioness, who huffed.

‘’Well, we ended up getting some buffalo.’’

‘’You actually caught something in a hunt? Congrats on slight improvement, Kiara.’’

‘’Oh, haha!’’

“Ah, so the great Shujaa has returned from his trip to barbaric lands.” I heard as Tashi and Ni approachsd us, the former smirking and the latter smiling. “Have fun going back to biting the dust of The Outlands?”

“What he means to say is welcome back.” Ni coughed as Tashi looked at him, annoyed. “I trust your quest went well?”

“Yeah, it went great.” I huffed. “Only positive is that I found Armani over here.”

“Hmm…” Tashi raised an eyebrow. “Doesn't seem special.”

“Sometimes the least expected make the most happen.”

At that, Armani grinned and came up next to me as Kiara did the same.

“Sure...why not?” Tashi scoffed before walking away. “I'm going for a drink.”

“Have fun with that!”

When he was out of sight, I looked to Kiara with a smile. “So...why don't you say we introduce her to everyone?”

Kiara nodded as Armani laughed nervously.

--

Later in the evening, I was watching the sunset with Kiara on a large rock by Big Springs, Basi, the father of Beshte, and the other hippos doing their own work.

“So what did you go to The Outlands for, exactly. You told me you'd never go back.”

I looked down. “I was called by Rafiki to do a task. Originally, I turned it down, never wanting to return...but knew that if I didn't then I won't conquer all fears…”

“But that's the thing. You CAN'T conquer all of your fears. You have a fear of losing me and your family, correct?”

“More than either of us know, Kiara…”

“Then that's something you can't get past. Your fear of loss drives you to try to prevent things you can't. You wanted to protect me from harm, leaving me in the dark of situations to try to keep me away from danger during your mission from Zira-”

“And look where that got us. Neither you nor your dad are fully recovered from the ambush...and it was because of me.”

Suddenly, she nuzzled me. “There was nothing you could have done.”

“But this...Scar being known to you, Tashi and Ni, my family…it's all-”

“Too much? You're meaning to tell me that you, someone that got bit by a monitor lizard, blasted head first into a cliff by the roar, made threats to Janja, got struck by a zebra stampede, saved me from an elephant one and charged into a fire to do the same...and you call THIS too much?”

Her giggle made me smile a bit. “Well, nobody's perfect.”

We suddenly heard a slight ‘mew', causing us to look at each other before I sniffed the ground. “A scent...a LION’s scent..and a small one.’’

I listened where all the small, squeaky mewing came from, snapping my attention to a particular bush. ‘’There.’’

‘’Are you sure?’’

‘’Certainly.’’

I walked over to where the bush was and looked inside...a small cub who’s height was no more than a hyrax was sitting there, mewing. ‘’Hey, little guy…’’

‘’Sheesh, assuming gender already?’’

‘’Don’t see you doing anything.’’

‘’What?! Why you dirty human!’’

‘’Love you too, Kiara.’’

Kiara blushed a dark red at that, causing me to chuckle. I looked back at the cub.

‘’Hmm…’’ I raised an eyebrow before grabbing the cub with my paw and putting it between us. As I further scanned the cub, I blinked in horror. ‘’It’s a girl…’’

‘’What’s wrong with us lionesses?’’

‘’You and Zuri aren’t really good examples.’’

A stuck-out tongue before Kiara looked at the cub. ‘’So what should we call her?’’

I thought for a moment...Sarabi is one of the biggest lionesses in my life at the moment...I want to do something to honor her.

It’s simple…

Oh hey, good evening, Scar.

'''Yeah, whatever. Why not you take away the last two letters?'''

Sara?

Mhm.

Meaning ‘soul’ in indian?

If you put it that way…

‘’Okay, so, Scar and I just managed to figure out a possible name you might like.’’ I told the Princess, who looked at me curiously. ‘’Sara. Take away Sarabi’s last two letters and you get it.’’

‘’Beautiful…’’

‘’Thanks…’’

I raised the cub up in my paw, looking at her. ‘’Welcome to The Pridelands…’’

‘’Sara…’’

NOTE: Took me ages to complete….but i’m finally done!

 

'''NEXT: PARENTING! With Shujaa and Kiara made Sara’s unofficial adopted parents, the two recruit the help of Nala in order to care for her. But will everything go well? I THINK NOT!'''