Chapter X

The sky was beginning to grow pale as the sun set behind Pride Rock. Kovu, Timon, Kopa and Vitani all walked together through the savannah grass in the direction of where Simba and the others were. Timon sat upon Kovu's back with his arms crossed, while Kopa and Vitani treaded beside the lion and the meerkat. And uncomfortable was no description at all for how they all felt. Some time before, Kopa and Vitani had finished doing what they were doing in the Water Hole, and had chosen to return to Pride Rock with the lion and the meerkat. Both of the heartfelt lovers were still soaking wet while their cheeks burned with embarrassment. Never before had they been walked in on like that, let alone by Kovu. The couple looked anxiously discomforted, while Kovu looked downright troubled.

The awkward silence between the four of them was unwisely broken by Timon, when he said to Kovu, "So then... you really thought someone was getting murdered, huh Kovu?"

Kovu growled at him angrily before he replied, "Shut up, Timon."

The meerkat shrugged, and chose to not give the lion any more trouble. He turned to Kopa and Vitani, who looked mildly uncomfortable being beside them. In a slightly sneery tone, Timon said to them, "Well if he thought that's what was going on, you guys must've had a hell of a time, huh?"

Kopa shot him a glare before saying, "I swear to God, Timon, if you start..."

The lion was cut off when Timon interrupted, "So run this by me again...why'd you guys decide to do that in the Water Hole? You do realize that animals have to drink from that, right?"

Vitani, who was already red with embarrassment, snapped at the meerkat. "We were upset about the smut we saw, Timon! We wanted a way to feel better about it!"

Timon uncrossed his arms as he scooted upwards closer to Kovu's neck, before replying to the lioness, "Alright, yeesh. Calm down, Vitani, it's not like I'm the one who walked in on you here."

That last part he said looking down to Kovu, which earned him a loud, annoyed groan from the lion. Kopa pushed away some of his wet brown mane out of his face while Kovu glanced over to him uneasily. Kovu thought about some things, taking advantage of the return of the awkward silence. Never once had he ever wanted to walk in on Kopa and Vitani doing such a thing, especially at a time when he was already mentally scarred at the images from before. Kovu thought about how awkward it was going to be explaining the situation to Simba and the others. However, despite these feelings, Kovu did feel some relief from the incident. He knew that Kopa and Vitani were to be the next ones to look up the smut for, and now that he had accidentally seen the real thing, he was now prepared to embrace what was to come from the Internet.

Kopa and Vitani's thoughts dwelt elsewhere. Even though Vitani was incredibly sheepish about having her own brother walk in on her at that time, she did have to admit that Kopa's intentions had worked. They did what they did to help feel better about what they had seen, and in fact she did feel as though she had mentally recovered thanks to such an amorous moment. She had always taken great pleasure in such acts with Kopa, and she supposed that this was no exception. The lioness had never regretted doing such things with the one she loved, despite how embarrassing it was to have Kovu walk in on them. Kopa felt exactly the same as his mate did at that moment.

However, their thoughts were abruptly and unpleasantly interrupted when they heard it. Coming from the direction of Pride Rock just ahead of them, they heard a high pitched, absolutely bloodcurdling scream that echoed through the hills around them. The abrupt nature of such an intense scream caught them all completely off guard. Kovu nearly jumped out of his fur, while Kopa and Vitani shuddered and staggered back a step each. Timon screamed cowardly as he fell backwards from shock, falling off of Kovu's back and onto the ground hard. All of their eyes widened.

"What the hell was that?!" Kovu exclaimed.

His own question was answered when, ahead at Pride Rock, each of them saw the strangest sight. Shenzi, Banzai and Ed were bolting out of Pride Rock's den as though running for their lives. None of them had ever run so fast before, and Kovu, Kopa, Vitani, and Timon all looked with blank stares as they watched the three hyenas fly across the savannah grounds to their left. Banzai was screaming alongside Shenzi while Ed was shouting illiterate drabble likw always, and it was so loud, it actually began to irritate their ears.

Kopa suddenly said in shock, "What're they doing back here?! Hyenas are forbidden in these lands!"

Timon glanced over to him before replying, "Yeah, it's a long story, kid."

Then, before any more words could be spoken, the group of four could see Simba suddenly run out to Pride Rock's edge from the den, looking absolutely proud of himself. With a few laughs clearly apparent in his voice, Simba shouted ahead of him, "Let this be a lesson to you three! Never enter these lands again!"

And then, they could see Simba absolutely collapse in laughter, having finally gotten back at his childhood enemies. If it were possible to die from choking with laughter, Simba would've done it right then and there.

Timon took a step forward, looking out to the hyenas darting away from Pride Rock, their shrill shrieks still echoing around the place. From above, he could hear Vitani remark, "Well whatever they're doing here, it looks like they won't be back again."

"They must've shown them the smut about themselves." Kopa playfully realized, which prompted Kovu to comment, "Now that's a good way to punish trespassers like them!"

Timon, however, was not so amused. He said loudly, "What? So then I missed their reactions?! Dammit! Dammit all!"

Kovu leaned down to him. "Come on Timon, you just saw them run away like hell, that should count for something."

Timon groaned beneath his breath, annoyed he couldn't have been there to see it start. After a moment of watching the hyenas run away like babies against the pale, dusk sky, Kopa finally said, "Come on... let's get this over with."

Everyone knew he was referring to the fact that they still needed to look up the smut for him and Vitani. He feared to God what it was he was going to find, as did Vitani.

While they neared the slope that led up to pride Rock's den, they could all start to pick up the hysterical, almost maniacal laughter coming from Nala and Kiara, and from the edge of Pride Rock, Simba could barely pick himself up off the ground with how out of breath he was. All of them were laughing harder than the hyenas ever did, in fact.

Kovu sighed as he thought to himself, And I thought I had a dysfunctional family growing up...

When the group of four had reached the mouth of the cave, they saw Nala and Kiara slowly pushing themselves up off the ground, trying desperately to catch their breath. Simba had began to walk towards where they were from outside, and Pumbaa still sat in front of the laptop, clicking around on a few things.

Running over to him, Timon asked his friend, "Hey! What'd I miss, you said I'd get to see their reactions!"

Little did the meerkat know that at that precise moment in time, Pumbaa had hidden the dirty Shenzi/Timon material behind a fresh search window just in time so that he wouldn't see it. Pumbaa grinned deviously as he did so, ready to pull it back up when the time was right, just as Kiara had planned. The warthog looked down to Timon.

"Oh, sorry, Timon." He said. "Looks like you guys got Kopa and Vitani back."

he glanced up to them. "How're you guys feeling now?"

Kopa flashed Vitani a smile before the lioness replied, "Well... we're definitely better than we were."

Pumbaa nodded. Kovu was heard groaning softly as Vitani said this, not wanting to think about the incident from before. Ignoring it, Kovu went up to Kiara, who had just finished catching her breath. Taking notice of her mate, the two nuzzled closely for a moment before Kovu said to her, "Looks like I missed one hell of a party here."

Kiara nodded. "You should've seen them. It was priceless."

At that moment, Simba stepped back into the den, taking several deep breaths while he did. Looking upon the whole scene, he said, "That should show them a thing or two!"

Nala chuckled. "They certainly deserved it." She remarked.

Simba took notice of Kopa and Vitani's return, and he greeted them calmly now. The king did not ask what they were doing at the Water Hole, and for the both of them, that was for the better.

"So", said Simba, looking back down to the laptop's screen. "Are we all calmed down now?"

Kiara and Nala nodded, and Simba took one last deep breath as the two lionesses fully stood back up once more. After taking a bit to collect themselves, Simba looked down to Timon. "Sorry you didn't get to see it, Timon. It was Kiara's idea to show them their art."

Timon shrugged. "Eh, I saw 'em run off out there. but damn, can they scream."

Simba nodded in agreement. A few more moments passed. Eventually, the group of three lions and three lionesses had settled down, and they were all gathered around the laptop once more, staring intently down at the blank search bar. Simba looked up to the sky, where the first of the stars could now be seen.

"We should get this over with now." He said. "It's getting late, and the hunting party will be back any minute now."

Timon motioned for Pumbaa to scoot over, which he did. Stepping in front of the keyboard, Timon cracked his fingers and said, "So then, I guess Kopa and Vitani are going next?"

Kopa replied, "I don't know about you, but I'm going to sleep after this. I've already had a long day." Vitani nodded in approval, looking out to the pale blue sky of late dusk like Simba did. And with that, everyone's previously humurous tone had returned to what it was before the hyenas had arrived. Simba and Nala felt extremely uncomfortable about seeing their son exploited on the internet, and Kiara felt the same about her brother. But they knew that this would be the last time for the night that they would have to endure such images.

"Okay, this is it, then." Kovu said softly and fearfully. "Just one more... just one more..."

"Let's get this over with so we can just go to sleep." Kiara added, trying not to yawn. Vitani gave her a glance. "Yeah, good luck trying to have clean dreams tonight, Kiara."

The lioness smirked at her sister-in-law. "Funny, I was just about to say the same thing to you, Vitani."

Neither of the two lionesses said anything else on the matter after that. Simba crossed his paws, looking anxiously now at the screen, having had his share of fun for the day. "It's almost over." He muttered.

Not wanting to waste any time, and also wanting to get through this as much as the others did, he typed in what he needed to in the search bar. He clicked 'search' for the final time that night.

Author's Note- To begin with, I can announce that the next chapter will be the last one involving any kind of dirty art, because even I can only take so much of that. Plus if I keep going like this, I would basically be writing the same chapter over and over again, and I want this to go in a different direction than that. Plus I want to move on to the written fanfics as much as my readers do, so be on the lookout for that.

Once again, I apologize if this seems a bit rushed. My computer issues haven't been getting any better lately, plus my school schedule has been getting rough. Also, I didn't want to have to keep my readers waiting too long for the next chapter, so I did what I could here. I might revise this chapter later on when my technical issues are resolved, please tell me in the reviews if you think I should. Parts of this I typed on my iPod, so I just prey to God that AutoCorrect doesn't botch this up.