Disclaimer: I do not own All Hail King Julien or any of its characters. I do own Emily, Patch, Weasel, Lilian, Elizabeth, and the fossa with names, and the idea for this story

The mountain lemur stepped out of the bush. "Greetings, Clover," he said to her. Then he turned to the aye-aye. "Greetings, Maurice." He glanced at Patch. "Greetings, lemur I don't know."

"My name is..." Patch hesitated, about to call himself Elliot. "I'm Patch," he finally said.

Maurice smiled. "Brother to the king," he announced cheerfully despite the dangers the kingdom was in. Patch glanced at him guilty.

He wouldn't introduce me so happily if he knew the truth about me, Patch thought miserably.

"Sage, I'm glad you're here," Clover said to him in a hurry. "We need your help!"

"Don't we all need help in this crazy world?" Sage responded with a faraway look in his eyes. "Sometimes we need help asking for help. Sometimes help comes in on the wing—"

"Sage," the orange lemur tried to interrupt, but the mountain lemur continued, talking complete nonsense about the word help and how it comes in on the wing of a bird sometimes. Patch shared a confused look with Maurice.

"Sage!" Clover shouted, snapping him out of it. "The Kingdom is in trouble! The fossa took everyone, including King Julien, and now we need to rescue them! Will you help us?"

Sage opened his mouth to answer, but his voice was replaced by a deep- throated growl. Patch listened, recognizing Sander's snarl. "Where did he go?" the fossa grumbled.

"They are looking for me," Patch whispered to the others. "We need to hide. And quick!"

"To the trees!" Maurice responded, and he and everyone else climbed the nearest tree, even Clover, who seemed eager to fight but still had enough sense to know when the odds were against her. Nobody dared breathed as they watched the fossa stalk below them. Suddenly Patch remembered hiding in a tree with his brother when he was a baby. He had lost his balance and fell right in the paws of the fossa, who took him and raised him to do evil.

Anger pulsed through him. All his life he thought Mac was his friend and that the fossa was all he had. He strongly believed that he was one of them. But it was all just a huge lie. They had been using him to get to his brother and the lemur Kingdom.

Suddenly Sander froze and sniffed deeply. Patch's heart started beating faster. The fossa looked up, gaze locking with the ringtail's. Then he let out a howl that summoned the rest of his patrol. They stood around the tree, growling up at the lemurs and trying desperately to reach them.

"What do we do?" Patch stared at the others, hoping one of them had a plan. It was difficult for a lemur to fight off one fossa, let alone a whole pack of them, and even with Sage here they were still horribly outnumbered. Sage may be huge with muscles, but Patch knew he couldn't possibly beat all the fossa even with the others' help.

Clover was glancing around. "Climb higher," she said as she pushed herself upwards. The others followed her.

Sander circled the tree, lashing his tail. Suddenly Patch remembered something. "He can't reach us if we stay up here," he told them.

"What makes you think that?" Clover demanded.

"Look." Patch pointed at Sander. "His tail is too short, which means he can't balance well. We'd probably be in danger if we had stayed low," he added hesitantly," but he won't risk falling from this height."

The others realized this made sense, but then Maurice said," But what about them?" He pointed to the rest of the patrol who were crouching low to jump onto the nearest branch.

Patch gulped. He forgot about them.

Before they could climb the tree, Sander blocked their way. "I don't think so," he growled.

They looked at him, surprise. "But Sander," one of them objected," Mac wants these lemurs."

"Nobody is stealing my credit," Sander insisted. "I'll be the one who gets them and brings them to Mac."

"But Sander—" another fossa tried to say, but Sander growled at them.

"Enough! You can't stay up there forever!" he scowled up at the lemurs. He snapped around and stalked away. His patrol hesitated for a moment or two, then reluctantly followed him.

Patch watched them go, frowning. Sander was never nice to him, but Mac always stepped in before things turned nasty. But now Mac sent Sander after him. He was utterly alone. He doubted, if they got through this, that his brother would welcome him back after what he did to him.

He shook his head. Thinking about all that depressed him, and he had more important things to worry about at the moment, like not being captured by the fossa and turned into a slave. "What now?" he asked.

At first nobody answered him. Maurice and Sage shared an uncertain glance, while Clover looked around. "We keep to the trees," she finally decided.

"But what about when we get closer to fossa territory?" Maurice questioned. "There's hardly any trees around there. We'd have to walk the rest of the way, and if they see us we are goners!"

"We can figure that out later," Clover replied, and she jumped into the next tree. Maurice and Sage followed her. For a moment Patch stayed behind.

"Should I tell them?" he muttered to himself. "No," he decided. "If they knew I was just with the fossa not long ago, they'd chase me off and then I couldn't help my brother." Confident that he was doing the right thing by keeping his betrayal a secret, he followed the other lemurs.

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King Julien refused to look or talk to anyone. He was wrapped up in his own self misery. I should never have trusted him, he thought, sighing deeply, which drew the attention of the female lemur sitting beside him.

"You can't keep blaming yourself for Patch's betrayal," Emily told him, but still he said nothing, and she also sighed.

"He'll come around," he heard someone whisper to her.

Nearby the fossa named Mac was having a meeting with five or six other fossa. They spoke in quiet voices, but Julien strained to listen.

"Do you think Sander will be able to catch Elliot?" one of them questioned.

"Sander is powerful and skilled at tracking," Mac answered. "I'm sure he'll find him." Despite his words, the tip of his tail was twitching as if he didn't believe himself.

Another fossa opened his mouth, but before it could get a word out, a howl sounded above. Fossa and lemurs turned to see Sander's patrol returning. They hopped down the cliffs and padded over to Mac, who waited for them.

"Well?" he pressed as Sander came to a halt in front of him. "Did you find him?"

"We found him," Sander replied, and cheers from the fossa broke out, while dread washed over Julien. Oh no! "But," the fossa went on, silencing the noise with a flick of his tail. "We couldn't reach him."

"Awww," the fossa groaned in unison.

"However," Sander continued, raising his voice. "We also found the missing lemurs, and you were right, Mac. They seemed to be heading this way to save their friends. All we have to do is wait and jump them when they get here. Then we'd have every single lemur!"

Alarm shot through Julien. I can't believe this is happening again! My Kingdom... turned into prisoners and slaves once more... What kind of king am I?

"Simon!"

The fossa started at Mac's call and ran over to him. "It's time."

Simon nodded and dashed off, disappearing over the cliff. Julien watched him go, wondering where he was going, but he was distracted from Simon when his gaze landed on his subjects. They were all looking miserable. He turned to Emily, frowning when he saw that she was on the edge of crying. He was about to reach out to her and pull her into a hug, but Mac started calling to his pack.

"Adain, Soren, Damon, Eric, Liam!"

The five fossa circled around Mac, waiting for orders. "Go to the top of the cliff," Mac told them. "Hide and wait for the lemurs to appear. Then capture them and bring them down here with the rest of them. Got it?"

They all nodded and hurriedly got into position.

Mac turned to the cages and padded over. He opened the door, growling when a couple of lemurs tried making a run for it. They retreated in fear. Then Mac narrowed his eyes at King Julien. "You, follow me."

Julien stood up, breathing in and out to calm himself. Before he even took a step toward the open door, he was yanked back down. Surprised, he turned to Emily. "You can't follow him," she said, fear in her eyes. "What if he—" She didn't finish her sentence, but Julien knew what she was going to say.

What if he kills me? the king thought. He was scared, but as king he needed to do whatever he had to so that his subjects wouldn't get hurt. He'd follow Mac and try to negotiate with him. Maybe there's a way of saving his kingdom even if he can't save himself. "I'll be fine," he murmured to Emily, hoping she didn't notice that he didn't believe that.

He squeezed her hand affectionately and then let go. He walked out of the cage and blinked up at Mac, who turned around with an ill-tempered grunt, flicking his tail. Realizing it was a signal for Julien to follow him, he hurried after him, keeping pace with him as they climbed the cliff. After awhile Julien finally decided to break the silence. "So," he started, but Mac shot him a glare and Julien sighed, keeping quiet again.

They entered the jungle and walked for a long time until finally Mac stopped. "Okay, stay here," he growled at Julien, and then stalked away.

Julien widened his eyes. Did Mac really just leave him alone? He took a few steps toward freedom but froze. Suddenly he felt like he was being watched. Could it just be Mac? "H-Hello?" he called out.

"Hello," a voice answered. A familiar voice. Julien was trying to figure out where he's heard that voice before when he noticed someone running by him. He turned to see who was there. Nothing. When he turned back around, he came face to face with someone he hasn't seen in such a long time.

He gasped. "Karl!"

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