Author's Note: Thanks to www.lionking.org for confirming the script. I have taken bits out, et cetera, but that's fanfic for you! (I can recount most of the script though! I only wanted to verify some words!)
Summary: Mist, the recently widowed Lion King tells his son a story of the old times, when Simba was the king. Will his son believe?
***
Stars
Mist smiled as he watched Solo gaze thoughtfully at the stars. The little cub was a vivid yellow, very much unlike the pale Mist and Rain.
Rain, sighed Mist sadly, and momentarily shut his eyes. He and Rain had everything, until one day she had lost it all. Her watery eyes, her dark, moody fur still threw Mist into chaos of sadness that he could hardly bear. Rain was beautiful. Rain was no longer with him.
"Papa," said a small voice, full of energy despite the late hours, "Papa, what are the stars made of?"
Mist tore from his memories to look at his inquisitive son. Solo was gazing at his father in awe, for Mist was a wise lion, and surely knew everything that there was to know.
Mist shrugged.
"I don't know. They just are."
Solo suddenly felt unwanted, and he chocked back a cry. Guilt bit into Mist painfully, and he at once turned to coax the cub.
"I apologise, Solo. No, don't cry. Big lions don't cry." That was hypocritical of him. All lions cry. He remembered finding Rain. Telling Solo. Watching Solo say goodbye to his mother, but she was long gone by then. Her liquid eyes stared blankly, unseeing, and Solo was too ignorant to notice the red-stained grass.
"Don't cry, my son. Would you like to know what the stars are made from?"
Solo sniffed, and looked up to Mist with a hopeful air.
"What my father once told me was that the Great Kings of the past are those stars. They will always guide you, and even though you may feel lonely, they will be with you forever."
"Is Mama a star too?"
"Yes. All the great lions that had to go away are stars, to eternally watch over their loved ones."
Solo tilted his head far back, and vigorously scanned the sky.
"Where? Which star is she?"
Now Mist tipped his head back, and searched the heavens with his grey, intense eyes.
"That one over there. Yes, that's right. That bright star, the one that just twinkled. That's your mother."
Solo smiled satisfactorily, and then doubt crossed his mind.
"Are you telling me the truth, Papa? Are the stars really lions? Is Mama really up there?"
"Of course," Mist reassured.
"How do you know?" Solo was a very curious cub.
Mist sighed, and thought back to a time when he was Solo's age. The time of carefree days, when his father and mother looked after him, when he played with the other cubs in the pride. At night, his father used to tell him stories about the old times, before the Humans settled in the vicinity.
"Do you remember of me telling you the story of King Simba?" asked Mist, recalling a favourite tale of his childhood.
"Yes," nodded Solo affirmatively, and crawled up onto his father's warm back.
"Have I ever told you what it was that made Simba return home?"
The yellow cub furrowed his brows in thought.
"Was is the Queen Nala who had come to tell him that he was needed?" guessed Solo.
Mist shook his head for no, and his magnificent mane fell about his face.
"Let me tell you what it was that Simba saw that made him return. Maybe then you shall see for yourself whether or not Great Kings of the past are really up on the stars.
Simba had just come away storming after an argument with Nala. She told him he had to go back, but how could he? He was responsible for the death of his father. He was banished from the Pridelands. He could never set foot in there again. It would mean facing his pride. His mother. He was not capable of doing that at all…"
"She thinks she can just show up and tell me what to do!" paced Simba angrily under the dark sky. "She's wrong. I can't go back."
The lion's thoughts switched to his days at his home, when his father was alive. On a night such as this, Mufasa had told his son that he would be with him forever, as the stars.
"You said you'd always be there for me!" he yelled angrily to the deserted sky, half expecting a reply. A beat. Another. "But you're not…"
Admitting defeat, Simba lowered his head in shame and pain.
"And it's because of me. It's my fault…"
His mane tumbled down in waves of grief.
"It's my fault…"
Tears cascaded down his face, and one by one they fell into the grass carpeting the ground.
Asante sana!
Squash banana!
We we nugu,
Mi mi apana!
Simba sighed, annoyed, at not being left alone to grieve on his own. He shifted his body into a standing position, and stalked away from the irritating sound.
Finally finding a suitable place, a log bridging a pool of water, the rightful King flopped down onto the beam, exhausted, and gazed sadly at his own reflection. The reflection of the killer.
A stone shattered the liquid mirror, and crystal droplets scattered unevenly around the sombre lion. He snapped his head back to see what was going on.
Asante sana!
Squash banana!
We we nugu,
Mi mi apana!
"Cut it out, enough already!" Simba breathed angrily. Now was not a good time for anyone to bother him.
The intruder was a monkey. A baboon, to be exact.
"Can't cut it out. It'll grow right back! Ha ha ha!"
Simba realised he was dealing with a deranged animal. He rolled his eyes, and began to softly pad away. The baboon followed, humming the chant under his breath.
"Creepy little monkey," barked Simba, "Will you stop following me? Who are you?"
The baboon seemed undeterred, and in an instant he reversed the role.
"The question is: Who are you?"
Simba was taken aback by the primate's foolishness. "I thought I knew," he formulated, "Now I'm not so sure."
The monkey leaned in close to the lion's ear, "I know who you are. It is a secret Asante sana! Squash banana!"
Simba's patience wore thin, and he was not in the best of moods.
"What is that supposed to mean?"
The monkey smiled mischievously.
"It means you are a baboon, and I'm not!"
The golden lion turned his back to the baboon, and once more attempted to move away.
"I think you're a little confused."
Rafiki raised an eyebrow. "Wrong. I am not the one who's confused, you don't even know who you are!"
"I suppose you do…" muttered Simba sarcastically.
"You're Mufasa's boy," smiled the baboon, and took off.
Simba froze in shock. Did this mean that the monkey knew who he was? Did he know that it was all Simba's fault? The lion speedily chased after the visitor.
Rafiki was meditating upon a rock when Simba finally caught up. "You knew my father?" he panted.
"Correction – I know your father."
Sadness wrapped Simba in its grey blanket. "I hate to tell you this," he revealed, "But he died. A long time ago."
Rafiki had shifted, and looked at Simba. "No. He's alive, and I will show him to you. You follow old Rafiki," the baboon told the bewildered lion, "He knows the way! Come on!"
Simba found himself running after the surprisingly agile monkey through the undergrowth. His father, alive? How could that be? Suddenly, Rafiki stopped, and motioned for Simba to do the same. They had come out into the still air now, and Simba felt more and more anxious with each second.
The baboon parted some reeds and pointed ahead. "Look down there."
The strong, brave lion named Simba found himself shivering. He took a deep, filling breath, and walked to the edge of the bank. What met him was a lion, with a full mane, and large, anticipative eyes.
Simba's small smile fell, and the lion copied it. It was all a lie.
"That's not my father, it's just my reflection."
"No," disagreed Rafiki, and touched the surface of the water with his index finger, "Look harder."
To Simba's surprise, it was no longer his mirror image in the pool, but that of a majestic, proud lion.
His father.
"You see," explained the shaman, "He lives in you."
The rising wind blew Simba's mane away from his face, and his eyes got bigger, and his mouth was ajar. In the heavens, the clouds moved to produce his father, gracefully stepping from the starry multitude, looking down at Simba with a slight air of disappointment. Mufasa was ghostly, made up from the soft cloud, shaded in grey and pale melancholy tones. The vision moved closer to the child he never really got to know.
"Simba…"
"Father?" Water prickled the young lion's eyes, he felt as though he was still a cub, safe in his home. He could not believe the fact that he did not believe that Mufasa was still with him.
"Simba, you have forgotten me."
Denial. That was not true. There was not a single day the lion would not pine over the death of his father. The pain seemed to dull, but at this instant it was brought up again.
"No!" he answered the Great King, "How could I?"
"You have forgotten who you are, and so you have forgotten me. Look inside yourself Simba, you are more than what you have become." The image of Mufasa regained colour, and the Great King's mane swirled with the haze in the midnight blue as his fur radiated with the most dazzling sunlight. The dead King lying ever still in the dust of the gorge was nothing like the might of this regal beast.
"You must take your place in the Circle of Life."
His father's teaching of the delicate balance that each king must respect. They die and become grass, and the antelope devour the grass. They are all connected, and yet Simba could not confront his past.
"How can I go back?" pleaded the son of the Great King. In a smaller voice he admitted, "I'm not who I used to be."
"Remember who you are," thundered his father, and Simba realised what it was that he had been running from. His heritage. His responsibility. He felt a pang of guilt as he recalled arguing with Nala. What have I done? The lion thought painfully. What have I done?
"You are my son, and the one true king," echoed Mufasa's ghost in the roaring atmosphere. The peak of the vision was over, and the powerful lion who was afraid of nothing but losing his son was fading rapidly into the clouds, sky and stars. The light shone no more.
Simba was shaken: how could his father just leave him, after so long?
"No, please, stay with me!"
He rushed into the dark green fields in a futile attempt to chase the near gone image.
"Remember…"
Simba slowed to a stop. "Father!" he exclaimed in one last attempt to make the image stay.
"Remember…" The wind fell to a silent stillness.
The skies rumbled, and the lonely lion was left gazing solemnly at the heavens, speckled with glittering stars. His father was always with him, every step of the way, guiding him from those stars. He was always there, as long as Simba lived. The memory of the Great King would forever live in him, and his mother… Simba wanted to see Sarabi again. He missed his home, and the feeling grew until he could no longer contain it within his mighty stature. Scar… Scar had ruined everything Simba held dear.
The lion's mind was made up. He was returning. He was going back.
"…And so it was that the King Simba returned, to take back what was rightfully his. What do you think, Solo?"
Solo contemplated the story. It seemed plausible enough. He descended from his father's pale back, and sat to face Mist. "Well," he began, "I suppose it's true, then. But why have I not seen Mama? Why has she not come forward from the stars?"
Mist sighed, "I don't know, Solo. Perhaps she will, someday, but I just don't know."
The two lions, a young father who was unsure of how to raise a cub, and his son, the inquisitive lively Solo, flattened the grass around them and settled sown to sleep.
A beam of light crossed the sleeping felines, and grew dull. A lioness stood, admiring her mate and her child. She was Rain, and her fur glittered as the droplets from the sky themselves.
"Oh Gods, I love you both," she sighed, and shut her watery ashen eyes, which whirled with dark, overcast grey. They were what earned her her name. The ghost nuzzled in turn Mist, and then Solo. "We shall meet, but ere that time I will council you. Both of you." She gazed at them for the last time that night, in the form of the creature that she used to be. "Until we meet again…"
Rain grew fainter, until she was not there anymore. She watched over her family from the stars, and she was pleased, in a bittersweet way, that her son knew she would be with them forever.
The lions on earth had calm dreams that night, where Rain was with them once more.
Only the stars glistened in the above, fireflies, stuck to that big, dark, blue thing. Only the stars.
***