Vitani’s Guard

Somewhere in Big Ravine, Kiara and the Guard were rescuing Kifupi, a resident cheetah cub, who had gotten stuck in mud when crossing the river. The Guard noticed Kiara had been an exceptionally great communicator. Calming the poor cheetah cub as he shook from fear... and the cold water.

“Th-Thank you, Princess Kiara…” the cheetah cub stammered.

“No problem, kiddo!” Kiara beamed, “And you can just call me Kiara. Y’know… just a little easier to remember, heh…”

“Oh…” Kifupi glanced to the side.

“Besides,” Kiara turned to the Guard, “they’re the ones to thank for all the hard work. They’re just awesome,right?”

“Um, Kiara…”

“Yes, sweetie?”

“Aren’t you and the Guard gonna do something about that boulder?”

Kiara whipped her head back, “What bould- Oh!… Oh, wow…”

“It’s okay, guys. It’s moving away from us, actually.” Tazama observed with her exceptional vision, "Hard to tell from far away. Parallax makes it a little hard to tell, I know."

Tazama cut herself off from infodumping. She loved to observe vast escapes, especially in the night. As much as she picked up that Kiara loved her ramblings, she knew to keep it brief during a mission.

“Aren’t there herds over there? Kiara looked to the Guard, “What if it might hit someone?”

“Nah,” began Imara, “nothing over there, you’d have to be totally lost.”

____

“Welp, we’re totally lost.” Vitani scoffed.

"You say that like it's my fault..." Kovu mumbled.

"Well, did I send us floating down the stream?" Vitani promptly shook her leg dry as it was soaked from the aforementioned event.

"No, your idea was to sneak past the baboons' territory." Kovu grimaced as he plucked a piece of thrown fruit from his mane.

"I thought they wouldn't throw anything this time!--"

"Oh, come on. You--"

The siblings' voices overlapped as they each tried to get a word in edgewise, making unnecessary points and throwing insults and vulgar names at each other.

"Look," Kovu firmly cut Vitani off, "we're WAY off the path Simba and Nala left us at. I'm beginning to think they went home! I... I don't even wanna do this, anymore! Tired of being stuck with you..."

"That seems to be a recurring theme with you..."

Kovu stopped in his tracks, "...What?'

Vitani tilted her head in feigned deep thought, "Oh, you know... Brooding inside Pride Rock all day. Ignoring me whenever I bring up things we used to do together. Not leaving without Kiara by you at all times..."

"What are you trying to say?"

"You're always giving up. Always running from your problems thinking they'll go away, but they just get worse..."

"I-"

"It's your giving up that got half our family killed, come to think of it." Vitani didn't notice herself smiling maniacally.

Those words pierced Kovu's chest. He suddenly felt hot.

"Really! Nuka wouldn't have even thought of going after Simba, but you gave him a chance. Mother wouldn't have totally lost it in the end." she continued mercilessly.

Kovu found it harder and harder to breathe as his sister's words dug further and further into his mind. He heaved as frustrated tears formed in his eyes. His muscles tensed as his claws dug through the earth.

"Half of our family is dead and you don't even care. You know why you don't care? Because you just couldn'ttake your eyes off the one lion who controls you, now..."

She asked for it.

Kovu yelled as he lunged for Vitani, pushing her over with full force. Thudding hard against the ground with her back, Vitani painfully rolled over and pushed herself up.

"Ho-hoh... Now, we're talking! This is the Kovu I know!" she said with a sardonic grin. An unexplainable insanity and lust for expressing rage came over her.

Pretty soon, the savannah filled with leonine snarls and battle cries. Ears were cuffed, clumps of fur flew around them, and bites and cuts made their way across each of their bodies. They fought as they'd been training their whole lives for.

____

"That was... kinda fun in a way." Kiara smiled at the Guard, "Dangerous, but fun."

Shabaha spoke up, "Yeah... it's like you notice some kind of emotion part, like, something I never even noticed about people before..."

"Imagine that..." Imara mumbled to herself, recounting Shabaha's tendency to miss social cues.

"Yeah, you were on fire, girl!" Kasi praised.

"Heh, yeah. Guess I really can be trusted in more involved duties..."

"KIARA!"

The princess knew that voice, she winced and turned to the source of the noise. Of course it was her father. Her mother, too. Looks like word got out that she'd left home. Thanks, Zazu.

"Kiara!" Nala scampered to her daughter, "Baby, where have you been? Are you hurt?--"

"Mom... Mom,  I'm fine, really!" Kiara watched her father approach, "I know what you're thinking, Dad, but we saved this cheetah, and--"

"I thought you were staying inside Pride Rock."

"No, we agreed that I wanted to get to know the new Lion Guard better. You never said I was staying home."

Simba was eerily silent. He positively despised that logic, but little did he know, she very much got it from him.

"She held her own really well, sir." Imara began, "We can vouch."

Kasi spoke up, "She was amazing, sir. She led us in a way we've never been led before. Telling us to be careful with the cheetah and all.

"We wouldn't have found that cub had it not been for her curiosity." Tazama added.

"Man... Being sheltered fuels you..." Shabaha mumbled.

Simba listened intently, and smiled.

"Well... I can't argue with that. You have to get to know the land you'll someday rule. I guess this was how you'd learn. You'll be possibly the most prepared Queen the Pridelands ever knew." he threw his head down onto hers in a nuzzle.

Kiara returned the affection, "By the way. Are Kovu and Vitani with you? Are they catching up?"

"Oh, Great Kings..." Nala's eyes widened, "Simba, we left them completely alone!"

"We'll check Pride Rock first," Simba started marching, "then we'll go where we saw them last."

____

Kovu had Vitani pinned, a massive paw to his sister’s equal-in-size face. In the corner of her eye, Vitani found herself on the edge of a cliff. The Gorge, in fact. She swiftly grappled Kovu’s mane with her claws and forced herself to plunge into the dam, taking Kovu down with her.

Before she knew it, Vitani was now dangling from loose logs. Her senseless fighting led her to slip in a near-critical clumsy move.

Fear filled Vitani. She was suddenly in a memory she’d tried her best to block out. Nuka was being crushed over and over again in her head. Her mother unfairly projected her delusions onto Kovu. Vitani was losing Kovu due to her brainwashed distrust in him over and over again. She saw now why he ran away. He wasn’t running for a girl who corrupted him, he ran because no one trusted him. No one in the Pridelands did, still…

Kovu, once blinded by rage, was now pulled from his locked tunnel vision as he swore he heard whispers in the zephyr that circled around his head. A familiar voice whispered reason and purpose to him. He launched his paw towards his sister.

“Vitani, come on!” he frantically yelled.

Vitani snapped into reality, “H-Huh?!”

“Come on, take my paw! The boulder’s gonna crush us! You gotta jump NOW!”

Vitani wordlessly complied. The two scrambled, claws sliding and grabbing every direction as if they were frightened cats. Technically, they were.

The two panted as they glanced back at the danger they'd narrowly avoided. The boulder smashed into the dam, shattering every log. The logs making a grotesquely similar sound to snapping bones, which would've been theirs.

"You saved me..." Vitani turned to her brother, "why did you do that?"

"Because... I would never want to give up on family." Kovu choked, "I never did..."

Suddenly, without words, Vitani rushed over to embrace Kovu. She sobbed into his mane.

"You know, of all the animals who were giving up on family, it was me." Vitani sniffed, "I got you all wrong, I used Kiara against you. Our family may have broke, but you found us another one... I'm really happy for you, brother. It's just that... this transition has just been so hard. I really thought I was gonna be all alone in it. I really thought I was gonna lose the only family I had left. Especially just now..."

"I was scared, too." Kovu teared up, "I felt alone too. I should've spoken to you at all, but I was too afraid to say anything. It's hard to have opinions when you're on a pedestal. It's plagued me all my life..."

"I'm so sorry..."

"I'm sorry, too..."

Kovu glanced up at the stars, "You know, Kiara told me about the stars. How those gone are still with you. They're up in the stars."

Vitani felt a zephyr caress her face. She knew that voice. She knew for sure his spirit was there. Few animals knew why that was.

"Yeah... I can imagine that..."

___

Hours passed. The search team was run ragged looking for the siblings. They checked Pride Rock when the two were lost by the Gorge. They followed their scent to the Gorge, but couldn't find them by the time they got there. They miserably trekked back in hopes to find them.

To their surprise -- and relief --, they did. And they seemed to have... literally caught a bite to eat? It was a colorful guineafowl. One that wandered too far in the outskirts of the Pridelands, unlucky as it found itself between the paws of a lion and the teeth of a lioness.

"Care to join us?" asked Vitani.

"Looks like you finally found Udugu." Simba said proudly.

The siblings exchanged confused looks, not understanding how they found it. Was it the bird? Was that the tradition? There was much explaining needed.

"Ever the literal thinkers, you two." Nala chuckled.

"Yeah, yeah, happy endings and whatnot." Shabaha killed the touching moment, "I'm starved!"

The pride chuckled as they each chose their favorite part of the poultry.