***Chapter 11***

***Plans***

Tanai looked at his team that stood before him. It hadn't taken him long to find them all and get them together. Now they waited patiently for him to explain why he had gathered them on such short notice. He was alone with the Outlanders; he was careful to pick a secluded spot that had given them poor chances of being overheard. Even Vitani had left; she might make his team a bit uncomfortable and besides, Tanai needed to get his father in on the plan. As the lioness went off in search of the older lion, Tanai contemplated how best to explain the situation to the others.

"Thanks for getting organized so quickly, guys." He began, stalling for time.

"No problem…" Hatra responded. "What's this all about?"

"We have- I have a mission of sorts."

Their eyes instantly widened with a mix of excitement and worry. "What does Zira want us to do?" Fila asked hesitantly.

"Is it about the Princess?" questioned Tint.

Tanai took a deep breath before speaking again. "It is about Kiara… but it's not from Zira. It's from me."

Mardok blinked. "You mean that Zira doesn't know about this?"

Tanai shook his head. "I mean that if Zira knew about this 'mission,' myself and a few others would be dead before nightfall." He stopped for a moment to analyze their expressions before continuing. "With that being said, anyone who doesn't want anything to do with this… you should leave now."

The Outlanders exchanged concerned glances, but didn't move. "Are we talking treason?" Hatra asked slowly.

Tanai nodded. "Full and complete treason."

Tanai had anticipated a lot of different things from his team, but the anger that crossed Hatra's face was not one of them. "What, you just got tired of this place so you figured you'd just go back to Priderock? Good god Tanai, you change your colors faster than a chameleon!"

"It may be hard to believe, but my allegiance has never changed. Priderock is my home and I would do anything, even make them think I was a traitor, in order to keep them safe."

"You're a spy?" Tint asked surprisedly. "You lied to us?"

"Let me explain…"

"Please do!" Hatra exclaimed, clearly distraught over the revelation.

Tanai frowned and took a deep breath before continuing. "I came here to find my friend, and I knew that I was going to have to do some things to make Zira believe that I had really turned on my family. I thought she was going to give me her best and most ruthless fighters to make this unit, but instead, Shakra gave me you all. As he thought, the worst he had to offer me.

Mardok glared at the ground, clearly not liking how the whole thing was going. The others were also not pleased with being reminded of their status as the 'lesser' fighters.

Tanai paused, unsure what to say next. "What he thought was weakness, was really strength, and I am proud to have been your leader. I didn't think that I was going to make any friends out here, but you changed my mind."

Tint snorted. "You may be our friend… but treason?" The others nodded in agreement; it was just too much.

"I want you all to think about this, it's your decision to make and yours alone." Tanai said calmly. "Personally, I think that you all deserve better than this. Shakra doesn't care about you, and neither does Zira. You are all superior to any other Outlander out here, both physically and morally. I'd want you on my team back at Priderock… that is, if you wanted to be."

The Outlanders were quiet as they contemplated the offer. "What if Simba doesn't accept us?" Hatra asked slowly.

"Simba is a good king. He will be fair and understanding to your situations."

The lion nodded and returned his gaze to the ground. Tint seemed to be satisfied, but hurt. "But… why did you lie to us?"

Tanai sighed, embarrassed at the question. "I didn't know until today how you all felt about me as your leader… I always thought that you would stay loyal to Zira. I feel bad for not trusting you, but I wasn't sure until now."

Her look of dismay was expected, but it still hurt Tanai to know that he had lied to them. After all, they had placed their complete trust in him, and he hadn't done the same back. "But you should know, I haven't been changing myself around you. I put a mask on for the rest of the pride, but here… Here, you are seeing me for who I really am."

They were all quiet again, each deep in their own thoughts. Tanai was just beginning to worry about their choice when Hatra raised his head from his downward gaze. He nodded slowly. "I don't like that you lied to us… but I meant what I said before. I fight for you, Tanai, not Zira, Shakra, or anyone else. What mission do you have for us?"

The other Outlanders' slowly lightened their expressions as they thought about Hatra's words. At the end of the day, though Tanai may have deceived them, he was still their leader and still better than anyone else in the Outlands. "We'll follow you." Tint said quietly. The others nodded in agreement.

Tanai smiled at their resolve, truly inspired by their loyalty. "Thank you… all of you." He said softly as he looked them over. They had come a long ways from the first day he had met them. "As I said before, this is about the Princess."

"We're going to get her out of here, aren't we?" Mardok asked, a grin creeping across his face.

Tanai nodded. "Yes, she's very important to a lot of good people, and Zira is only going to hurt her."

Tint giggled. "You like her, don't you!"

"More than she knows, but that's beside the point." He said with a grin.

A look of fear crossed Hatra's face while Tanai was in mid-sentence. "Uh, Sir!" he said urgently as he gestured to an area behind his leader.

Tanai looked back, fearful of an eavesdropper, only to see Vitani and his father approaching. "Don't worry," he explained to his team as the two others came to sit at his side. "They're both going to help us… I hope." He said hopefully as he looked to his father.

Tarun smiled at his son. "I can't fight, but I'll do whatever you need me to do."

Tanai nodded appreciatively. "Thanks, Dad."

"Okay, guys, this is very heartwarming, but can we get on with this plan?" Vitani asked impatiently.

Tanai smiled and nodded at her bluntness. "Alright then, let's get down to work. Vitani, you're kind of in charge of Kiara's security aren't you?"

The lioness nodded. "I've been setting up the guard shifts and some other stuff."

"Can you get us to be the guards?"

"Yes… but I think it would be a bit suspicious if you were one of them, Tanai. I could probably pull it off by saying that you wanted your team to get some experience with prisoner control or something."

Tanai nodded, somewhat disappointedly. He wanted to be there when they got Kiara out; but she was right, it was too suspicious. "Okay. There's four guards total right? Can you schedule Hatra, Tint, Mardok, and Fila for tonight?"

"The shifts last for two and a half hours, so I can probably put them on for around midnight to two in the morning."

"Does that sound good to you guys?" Tanai asked his team.

The Outlanders nodded in agreement. "Should we just get her out as soon as we get in there?" Hatra asked.

"No…" Vitani replied slowly, thinking it through as she went. "Wait a little while, just to make sure that no one is coming back." She turned to Tarun as if she had another idea. "Tarun, you're an advisor…"

The older lion nodded. "Yes, I am. What did you have in mind?"

"You could be kind of our lookout and stop anyone that might be passing by. Since you're one of my Mother's advisors, they would have to listen to you…"

Tarun nodded. "I could distract them with a job or something."

"Something to get them away from us while we're getting out." Tanai added. "Once we actually get Kiara out of the prison caves, we're going to need to get past the sentries on the perimeter."

"Do you want to take them out?" Fila asked quizzically.

"Not if we don't have to." Tanai responded. "Father, do you think you could lure some of them away with something?"

Tarun grinned and nodded. He seemed to already have something figured out.

"Once we're in the Pridelands, we should be home free." Tanai continued. "We'll probably be found by a patrol before we get to Priderock, but that's our goal. If anyone gets separated, head for Priderock and we'll meet up there. Questions?"

The Outlanders all shook their heads; it was a pretty simple plan in theory. Time alone would prove its true simplicity.

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Kiara stared at the wall from the cold stone floor, her mind buzzed with countless emotions that swirled around her head in an indescribable feeling. She was scared out of her mind about being a prisoner; she knew it was only a matter of time before Zira decided to do something with her. But besides that, she was unbelievably relieved to know that Tanai wasn't really the traitor that everyone thought he was. Whether or not he would be able to help her was another thing completely.

She sighed deeply and rolled onto her side. Being a prisoner was not what she had expected it to be. There was way more waiting than she had thought there would be. The not-knowing was killing her, as was the boredom. There was no sense of time in the cave, but she judged from the guards' attitudes that it was getting late. They were yawning a lot and occasionally complaining to each other about their tiredness. It was annoying, she thought bitterly. If she was to be held here against her will, the least they could do is whine less when they were around her.

She lay there on the cold ground for a long while, alone with her thoughts and emotions. She was just nodding off to sleep when the guards changed out with a new pair of lions. At least these ones weren't as chatty.

Her dream was anxious to say the least. She kept thinking that Zira was coming for her, but when she looked up with half conscious eyes, she saw the guards just where they were when she had last check. The dream kept recurring over and over again until the poor lioness just gave up on trying to sleep. She looked over at the guards' post a final time, expecting them to be where they had been all night. To her horror, they were approaching her quickly. Kiara rose to her feet in a flash, not really knowing what she was going to do. If they were going to take her to Zira, there wasn't much she was going to be able to do.

"What do you want?" she hissed as they came to a stop a few feet in front of her.

The guard exchanged glances with the lioness at his side. "We're here to get you out." He said quietly.

The princess blinked. "Sorry, but could you say that again?"

The Outlander smiled. "My name is Hatra, this is Fila. We're going to go meet up with Tint, Mardok, Tanai, Vitani, and Tarun and get out of here. Was that clear enough for you?"

Kiara remained skeptical. "How do you know Tanai?"

"He's our team leader." He said concisely. "Now let's go." The supposed guards turned their backs and started towards the cave's exit as Kiara just watched with a blank stare. "Are you coming or not?" Hatra whispered over his shoulder at the frozen lioness.

Kiara shook the doubts from her head and trotted off behind the Outlanders. It felt weird for her to simply walk out of the prison so… easily. She had at least expected some sort of resistance; a fight or something. But then again, she knew Tanai, and he would never just rush into a situation like this without a plan.

They stopped at the final guard post before completely exiting the tunnel. The two other guards looked around for a moment before waving them on.

Fila turned to Kiara. "We're going to have to move fast over to those boulders." She said as she gestured to a rocky outcrop not too far away. "From there we'll explain things a little more."

Kiara nodded and got ready to move. At the signal of the other two guards, Kiara, Hatra, and Fila rushed silently across the ground and into the protection offered by the rocks. They dove behind the nearest stone and almost ran headfirst into Tanai and Vitani.

"Tanai!" Kiara whispered excitedly as she lunged forward to nuzzle him under the chin.

Fila giggled as Tanai returned the affection with a lick before pulling away. "Are you alright?" he asked worriedly.

She nodded. "Fine, just a little stiff from lying down all day. How are we going to get out of here? And what is she doing here?" she asked as she took notice of Vitani.

Tanai looked embarrassed, but the Outlander just grinned. "She's helping us, don't worry."

"She's Zira's daughter!"

Vitani shrugged. "Not by choice, I assure you."

Kiara shook her head irritably but did not press the issue further. "What do we do now?"

"Now we have to make it past the sentries, and after that we should be able to get into the Pridelands without any problem."

"Well then what are we waiting for?"

"The signal."

"From who?"

Hatra looked over to her from his position on the edge of the outcrop. "From him." he said as he pointed to an old lion standing out in rather plain sight. As Kiara watched he nodded his head. "That's the signal, we're good to go."

Tanai nodded. "Then let's go." With that, the group headed silently off towards the river that separated the Outlands from the Pridelands. They stuck to the shadows and the low areas, using the environment as natural camouflage. It was slow and tedious movement, but it kept them out of sight. Occasionally an outlander would walk past them, but all they had to do was to freeze in place. Once the threat had left, they continued on.

Eventually, after much tension and stealth, the united group of Outlanders and Pridelanders found their way to the border. The log bridge that fell across the river was guarded by a pair of lions who looked extremely bored.

"How are we going to deal with them?" Kiara whispered.

"Just wait and see." Vitani answered quietly.

Within a few moments, Tarun emerged from the brush and approached the two sentries. Immediately the lions stood a little straighter and tried to look a bit more… professional.

"Hello sir." They said politely.

Tarun nodded, but otherwise ignored their greeting. "There were some signs of possible intruders on the other side of the termite mounds. I'm moving you from here to over there just to be safe."

"But sir…" protested the first lion. "What about here?"

Tarun shook his head irritably as if it was a stupid question. "I'll stay here for now. There's another shift coming soon and I'll pass it off to them."

The outlanders nodded begrudgingly and headed off into the darkness, clearly annoyed with being transferred. Tarun watched them leave and made sure they were gone before waving towards the bushes where they were hiding.

Tanai nodded to his team and they emerged from the foliage and made their way towards the log bridge.

"Well that went pretty well." Whipered Vitani. "I doubt anyone has even noticed that we've left."

Tanai nodded. "If Mardok and Tint stayed at their post for a while, no one should have thought anything different."

"They are coming with us, aren't they?" the lioness asked slowly.

"Of course. They're just staying at the mouth for a little while so no one looks to the cave and sees no guards. Actually, they should be meeting up with us any moment now." As if on cue, the two Outlanders emerged from a bush to the side.

"Good to see you, we were starting to worry." Vitani said quietly as they started to cross the bridge into the Pridelands.

Mardok smiled. "It was a little tough to catch up with you, but we managed fine."

Tanai watched as his friends crossed the bridge one by one. Everything was going flawlessly; far better than what he had feared. He looked to Kiara, who only smiled to him before she went across. Tanai smiled back and followed suit.

Once on the other side, the group just went straight forward across the dark savannah. They all had a sense of pure jubilation and the air seemed to be alive with electricity. They were free! Tanai stole a backwards glance at the Outlands, hardly fifty yards away, but still. It was away, they were in the Pridelands! It was a liberating feeling that seemed to lift Tanai up so he was merely floating above the ground. All the pain, all the hardships, everything… it was over. He looked over to Kiara and remembered how he had wished that he had spent more time with her while he had been able to. He silently vowed to not make the same mistake again.

"Kiara?" he said softly enough to remain unnoticed from the others.

"Yes?" she answered in an equally quiet tone.

He took a deep breath before continuing. "I think we made a mistake before."

She blinked. "What? Being together?"

"No, putting off being together. While I was in the Outlands, the thing I regretted most was not having spent more time with you."

Kiara smiled and nodded. "You want to get back together?"

Tanai couldn't help but smile. "I think we were already kind of back together, but… Kiara, I think I love you."

The princess blinked surprisedly and stared at him for a moment in silence.

Tanai got nervous for a moment. "Well? Say something…" he begged her.

Kiara smiled. "I love you too." She said quietly. "I just never really realized it until now."

The Pridelander grinned widely and leaned into hid love to nuzzle her. She purred softly and returned the affection with a lick to his cheek.

"Tanai!" hissed Vitani from the front of the group.

Tanai looked up sharply to see the others frozen with fear. Up ahead in the silver moonlight, Tanai could see the shapes of a group of lions. At first he thought them to be Pridelanders, but he soon noticed their somewhat ragged appearance. Slightly malnourished, unmotivated, and just sinister in general; they were clearly outlanders.

"Hello everyone." A familiar voice hissed. Tanai looked to see Zira emerging slowly from the ranks of her followers. "Taking a midnight stroll are we?"

Tanai stared in shock. "How did you find us?" he asked astonishedly; the plan had been executed flawlessly, how had Zira found out?

The evil lioness smiled unpleasantly. "Please! You think that I would leave my most valuable prisoner under the supervision of only four guards? I had more eyes on her than you know, and they saw everything." She started to pace back and forth on the ground irritably. "I have to say, I was not expecting this, at least not from all of you… especially not from some of you." She seemed to direct her last comment at Vitani who only stared back with focused eyes. "But what can I say? You all tried to leave… and now you will all die."

Tanai looked over the situation briefly before making a decision. There were too many Outlanders for them to fight through, they had only one option if they wanted to get out. He turned to his friends. "Run." He told them calmly and quietly. "Double back and get around her."

"What about you?" Vitani asked sharply.

"I'll buy you some time and then I'll catch up with you, now go!"

Vitani swore aloud and turned away to head back where they had come. His team and father followed her, though somewhat reluctantly. Kiara almost didn't leave; she just stared at Tanai with pleading eyes that begged him not to stay.

The Pridelander stared back, wishing that he could go, but knowing that he couldn't. He had a duty to fulfill, and she was it. Eventually, Tint managed to get Kiara to follow them, though she left begrudgingly.

Once they had disappeared into the night, Tanai looked back to the Outlanders. "Well?" he asked.

Zira just smiled her unsettling smile and sat there. To her side sat Shakra who smiled an equally unnerving grin. Something was wrong, but he couldn't figure out what it was. They weren't attacking… they were only waiting... for something, though Tanai hadn't the slightest idea as to what it could be.

A loud roar behind him seemed to answer his unasked question. Tanai turned in horror as he identified the roar as Hatra's. Somewhere, not too far away, his friends had met another group of Outlanders. He could hear the sounds of combat all the way from where he stood. He whirled around in anger at Zira and Shakra. "You planned this!" he yelled.

The evil lioness only smiled. "As I said before… the price of treachery, is death!"

***Author's Note***

Again, I am terribly sorry for the tremendous wait, but I think it was worth it. I'm nearing the end of this story, and I actually posted the Prologue to my next one, "Path of a Rogue Warrior". Hope you all check it out. COMMENT AND REVIEW!

-Ben