Banzai moved his legs hastily as his body involuntarily tried to copy the moves he was performing in his dream. Sadly, he wasn't going to catch his prey, not only because of the ironic nature of the world that parodied its every aspect in his dreams… but also because someone decided to wake him by tapping him repeatedly.

Strange is the way dreams are conceived and the connection between what unconscious body feels and how it visualizes in the head. In Banzai's dream, a fat warthog appeared and started throwing meerkats at him while Shenzi was laughing her head off at the sight.

"Go back ta sleep, Ed," he muttered, having awoken, but knowing he can get back to the image of Shenzi. In fact, he could already hear her voice already.

"Banzai, wake up."

He asked himself a quick question: a real Shenzi or a fake one? Nah, the dream can wait, he decided, opening his eyes slowly. He felt a mighty yawn coming and opened his mouth to relieve himself, but it was quickly covered with Shenzi's paw.

"Shh!" she said, looking at him confusedly as the accumulated yawn, forced to be kept inside, was threatening to blow his head.

"C'mon," she said when the attack was over and led him out of their skull.

"We're goin' over ta hunt in the Pridelands," she explained once they got outside. "With Ed sleepin' here I'll hafta worry 'bout one idiot less."

"Ya mean… we're gonna hunt without Ed because he's illiterate? That's discrimination!" Banzai objected.

"Banzai, honey… I won't ask ya how ya learnt those words, 'cause it's down to this: it's either huntin' without Ed or starvin' here with 'im. What'll it be then?"

"Fine."


Nala woke up and yawned loudly. Because it failed to end her mate's sleep, she decided to use more straightforward means and nudged him with her head. Simba opened his eyes with a start, looked around and calmed down. His yawn was even louder than Nala's, but it still failed to put a stop to the pride's slumber. Some instinct told Nala what will Simba's next move be unless she stops him, so she quickly suggested a morning walk "before everybody wakes up".

"Sure, why not," Simba consented. "I have just had a dream about it: green all the way to the horizon and blue everywhere else."

"What do you mean?" Nala asked as they quit their sleeping chamber situated at Pirderock and descended to the plains.

"You know I spent half my life in the jungle, Nala. It's not like I don't love this place, but would it really hurt to add a tree or a thousand? It's always the same here; out there, every day was a new adventure."

"Every land is beautiful in its own way," she answered as the grass surrounded them.


"Hey, you know why lions settled at Priderock?" Banzai asked Shenzi as they walked through the dew-covered fields. She just looked at him with little emotion, so he decided to cut to the chase.

"With a lion's intellect you need to be able to see your home from everywhere, otherwise you would'a sleep outside most of the time!" he ended and burst out laughing.

"Shh!" she said sharply, turning to him. "Are you trying to wake all the lions up?"

"Sorry," Banzai muttered. Shenzi sighed, annoyed.

"We better find somethin' before them big cats call it a day."

"Whaddaya say to a wildebeest?" he said, pointing to a herd behind Shenzi. She turned around to see a herd grazing and licking at the dew.

The duo smiled mischievously at each other and approached their would-be breakfast.

Little did they know, the Pridelands' royal couple was headed right towards them.


Not far from that place, a loud chanting out of tune could be heard. Perched atop a tree's branch, a well-known baboon was lying. He had sunglasses tightly pressed on his nose and an absent expression.

After he ran out of seemingly random words to sing, he slowly got up, chuckling to himself for no apparent reason. He reluctantly neared his turtle shell, almost fell off the tree during an attempt to crouch next to it and started mixing ingredients he didn't even look at. His head looked as though it would fall off if only given a chance.

Suddenly, he raised it and slowly took his glasses off, looking around himself with doubt written all over his face.

"Mufasa?" he asked. "Are you thea, my king?"

A wind blew past the primate, making him look up, towards the sky.

"Thea again? Well, I told ya it's gonna get you hiiiigh," he laughed heartily, then looked at the turtle shell. He smelled its contents, looked at it from different angles, then sighed and muttered to himself, "I have ta be more careful. Or one day I might'a create somethin' dangerous. A love poshyn, perhaps?"

Another rustle of wind seemed to call him from above. So he looked up, then started listening closely to the wind.

"This is interesting… carry on…" he mumbled as a mix of petals and various other small elements blew past his ear. He suddenly cringed, reached to his ear and got something out of it. "Could ya repeat the last part? A bug fell inta my ear."

The "conversation" continued for a while, after which the ape laid on his back and laughed loudly.

"Yeah! Yes! Mufasa, you old mischief-makah! This is gonna be GOOOOOOD!" he yelled towards the sky.

For the two passing-by lions the sounds were nothing new; every now and then old Rafiki tasted a bit too much of his suspiciously looking brews and freaked out. For the wildebeests the signal was even easier to understand: it was loud, it wasn't visible, the only logical option was to run.

For the two hyenas, the screams were just annoying – until they caused their breakfast to run away. Then a sudden temptation arose in them to turn those screams into ones of unendurable pain.

Shenzi cursed under her breath and turned towards the graveyard with an annoyed expression.

"Forget it, let's just go home," she said, starting to walk off.

Banzai took one last look at where the wildebeest herd was not long ago and followed her.

The two hyenas tried to sneak through the grass swiftly and quickly, knowing very well that lions will be getting up as soon as sun hits their eyes – which was about to happen. Fortunately, they only had to cover a few score meters through a small clearing to get home.

Unfortunately, for some reason Simba and Nala decided to take a similar route, perhaps forgetting all about the proximity of the graveyards.

All four of them emerged from the grass in the same moment, looked to the side and froze in their tracks, seeing whomever they've stumbled upon.