Chapter 2: An unwanted visitor
(This takes place after The Lion King II: Simba's Pride)
It was a typical day in the Pridelands. Bright, lively and a great place to live (at least for the lions that is). Food was abundant and was a near paradise (especially when compared to the Outlands). No more worries about Scar and his army of weird hyenas, especially his three right hand hyenas who have never been seen for ages. Zira and her pride of lions moved to some far away territory, so there's no worries about them.
Simba was starting to show some signs of aging (he's about two years older than his father Mufasa was when he died). Kiara and Kovu had twins, a male and a female cub together, and they were smiling ear to ear when this happened. They later started arguing over what their names should be. But later that day, a surprise visitor was in the Pridelands.
"You know," said Simba, "I must be going senile from my age because I think I see a hyena wandering around on the Prideland territory boundary."
Immediately, all heads turned and looked in the direction Simba was looking, and sure enough, there was indeed a hyena that's walking across the plains like it owned the place.
"That hyena could be a scout or a spy," Simba said frantically, "we have to stop it before it returns to the Outlands."
Simba and the other lions sprung up and were ready to charge towards the hyena. But before they did, Kiara stopped him.
"Father, this could be dangerous. I don't want to risk you getting hurt especially at your age."
Simba made a short, quick laugh. "What makes you think that one measly hyena stands a chance against me, or all of us?"
Kiara had a strong look of concern on her face. "Well, this could be a trap or an ambush. Therefore I can't risk you being involved in this."
"Look," Simba answered with a firm tone, "I may be aging, I'm even living longer than my own father was (of course it wasn't a natural death), but I know that I can still defend myself and even defend you or the other lions if necessary. Besides, with all of us together, there shouldn't be any trouble. Instead, I want you to stay here and watch over your children. They're our future you know." Kiara made a long sigh of defeat and agreed. Immediately, Simba and the other lions ran off to face the wandering hyena that already was near Rafiki's tree.
Meanwhile, Rafiki was cleaning his tree after a large flock of birds flew overhead that morning and made quite a mess on his tree. "You know," said Rafiki to himself, "if this keeps up every year, I may need to build a giant umbrella over my tree. This is getting rather annoying and disgusting." He took a break from his chores and noticed someone passing by near his tree. He looked down and was so shocked that he nearly fell out of his tree.
"A hyena," Rafiki said to himself with a shocked and puzzled look, "what's a hyena doing here and now, there's no way it could survive with all the lions around. I guess it must be suicidal. But something about it seems strangely familiar. However, I've never seen this hyena,..... or have I?"
He noticed the hyena lying down in the shade of his tree, seemingly unaware of the large group of lions charging towards it. Rafiki decided to make a quick, but cautious investigation of the hyena. He brought his staff along for defense and crept carefully towards the stranger. He made note that the lions are now less than half a mile away which gives him less than a minute to investigate.
The first thing Rafiki noticed is the unusual size of the hyena. Hyenas normally are only about half the size of a full-grown lion. This particular hyena is easily as big as a lioness, though not quite as big as a male lion. It also had impressive muscle mass that easily bulged through its thick, coarse fur. He got closer, only a few feet away from its face. He had to make certain about a strong feeling he had. He noticed that it had long mane fur and fairly long head fur (the head fur has a similar design to Shenzi, but slightly longer), and had a couple small bangs sticking out. The head fur and bangs blocked a clear view of its face.
He felt inclined to retreat and let the lions deal with the hyena, but he just needed to do one more risky but important action.