The Lion King: Dawn of the Nations
Episode 55: Wavering
The night was warm, the moon and the stars adorned the dark blue sky that covered the Pride Lands. Kovu and Simba were drinking from a narrow river not too far away from Pride Rock, sitting next to each other as they quenched their thirst. "My father liked to drink from here." Simba chuckled softly with nostalgia. "After we played until exhaustion, we came here and shared moments just like this one, only peace and quietness, togetherness."
Kovu smiled while being hit by memories that weren't his, looking at his own reflection. "That sounds…beautiful." He looked at Simba with a smile.
"It truly was." Simba replied, also looking into his eyes with a tender smirk. "It's like if you've always been with us, my daughter lives in a dream, always smiling and laughing thanks to you." He noticed Kovu's distant and uncertain gaze. "I thought that look of yours was gone for good."
Kovu raised an eyebrow. "What look?"
"The one you have now, you bear such a great shame and sadness everywhere you go and your eyes betray you." Simba got closer to him, placing a paw on his back. "Drop this burden, my son." Kovu's heart felt an immeasurable warmth by Simba's words. "You are one of us and you will always be." Simba nuzzled his face with love, tears traveled slowly over Kovu's fur as he smiled with relief and appeasement.
Kovu was laying over the cold ground, in one of the dark and plant covered tunnels of Ungari, the sound of the waterfalls was his only company, he was silent but tears ran down his face. His ear twitched when hearing quick steps approaching, his nose recognized the scent of his little sons. "Daddy!" Keru exclaimed with happiness.
Kovu gasped. "Keru, my son!" He got onto his paws and rushed towards Keru, licking him and nuzzling him as he was the first to approach him.
"How are you, dad?" Keru asked caringly.
Kovu chuckled with a sudden bliss. "I'm…I'm alright."
Zale nuzzled his father as he stood on his hind legs and placed both paws on his chest. "We missed you, dad."
"I missed you too." Kovu looked at Kiara. "All of you." He was still too ashamed to even glare at Kion, who began to approach him.
"Kovu." Kion got close to him, Kovu focused his gaze on the scar he had made on Kion's face.
"Kion." Kovu lowered his head. "I…" He shook his head and sighed. "I'm sorry." He felt a lump in his throat. "What I did…it has no excuse. I betrayed you…I betrayed Simba." A tear ran down his face as his voice broke. "Your mother, who received me with so much love and care, I also betrayed her." Kovu sobbed. "Kion…forgive me. Please…forgive me."
Kion looked at him for a long moment, then he placed a paw on his shoulder. "You're my brother, Kovu. It's all that matters." Kion licked his forehead with a brotherly and tender feeling, full of love and understanding. "We are one." Kion started to cry while resting his forehead on his, Kovu burst into tears as well, tears of love, joy and hope. Kiara let out a gasp of happiness, Ari, Zale and Keru approached both of them and nuzzled them continuously, with a strong union and affection, being joined by Kiara afterwards, all having a beautiful and powerful moment.
On the meantime, Azaad, Ozel, Faeze and Emba had reunited with Koca and some young lion warriors. The cubs sat down between some of them, listening to Koca's words, Ozel and Azaad were standing at his sides. "You do seem like strong cubs, no one can deny that, but strong cubs worthy to fight as The Lion Guard, that is something very different. That mark on your shoulders means nothing if you're weak from the mind and the spirit, regardless of your robust and young bodies." Koca took a step at the front and glared away at a set of rocks, ponds and bushes that were not too far away from that spot. "Training will help with that, practice leads to mastery, and mastery leads to virtue, which is what The Lion Guard defends, the great virtue of balance that The Circle of Life brings, decreed by the White Lion in the very beginning, "Mzunguko wa maisha", as the first ancestors called it. Are you willing to achieve virtue, younglings?"
Emba and Faeze looked at each other for a moment, rather confused, then they looked at Koca with unsure nods. "Mhm" Faeze expressed.
"Absolutely, yeah." Emba said.
"Hm, alright then." Koca gestured at the training area. "Follow me, you all."
They went to the rocky and rough area, the warriors sat down in formation behind Koca, Ozel and Azaad, leaving Faeze and Emba standing on the edge of a small cliff. "Agility, inherent ability of a great warrior, to avoid danger and ensure advantage over his enemies. All you need to do is reach the top of that mound over there." He referred to a tall mound that was several meters away from them, with the uneven and treacherous rocky hills and paths getting in the way.
"Th…that's all?" Emba inquired, looking at Koca over his shoulder.
"Yes, that's all." Koca chuckled a bit.
Emba and Faeze looked at each other briefly, nodding and then focusing their gaze on the mound, studying the paths and hills for a moment, then they gave the first jump at the same time. Koca looked at his warriors, giving them a subtle nod. The young lions broke formation and began to scatter around, getting through the paths, the rocks and the slopping hills with great stealth. Emba and Faeze jumped from rock to rock, sloppily but yet with a natural grace. "I'm gonna get there way faster than you!" Emba looked at Faeze with a challenging smirk. Koca just shook his head after hearing Emba's cocky words.
Faeze let out an arrogant chuckle. "You know you're…" He gasped when landing on a sloping mound, barely as his hind legs tripped a bit on the edge, making some dirt and small rocks fall from it. "…challenging a cheetah, right?"
They kept jumping from rock to rock, mound to mound, and right when Emba landed his paws on a sloping grassy rock, a young lion appeared before him, having climbed the rock from the other side. "Woah!" Emba expressed with fright because of the unexpected event.
"Don't let them reach the goal!" Koca commanded.
Emba raised an eyebrow, looking at Koca over his shoulder. "What?" Emba received a blow from the young lion, who had purposely hit him without his claws out, Emba groaned and fell from the rock, falling into a large, muddy pond, getting out of it while coughing and shaking, grunting with annoyance. "What's happening?!"
Faeze saw his friend from a tall rock, Emba was standing up as the young warrior and other two approached him. Faeze jumped down to a lower mound and then got on the ground from there with another agile jump, rushing towards one of the lions and jumping towards him, tackling him and growling, hitting him on the face with his paw while laying on top of him to immobilize him. Emba growled at the two lion warriors as they approached him with menacing looks, he waited until one of them jumped towards him with the intention of tackling him, but Emba reacted soon enough to evade the attack, the lion hit the rocky wall with his head and fell to the ground almost unconscious, groaning by the pain, generating a grin of approval on Koca who was watching the whole thing from his spot. Emba then jumped towards the remaining one and threw a strong blow at his face, making him groan, then Emba attacked again, biting his modest mane and throwing him, making him hit a mound so strongly that it fell apart in several chunks of dirt and rocks over the warrior, who managed to get out of the debris after a while.
Emba chuckled with pride and arrogance, then he jumped on several small mounds until getting on a tall one, then he continued jumping towards the main goal.
Faeze was still brawling with the warrior he had tackled, they were both throwing blows and bites at each other. All of a sudden, another pair of warriors appeared, the three lions surrounded Faeze and began to approach him. "Emba! I need some help here!" Faeze exclaimed as he switched his gaze between his rivals' constantly.
"No can do, Faeze! I'm gonna win!" Emba ignored him and just kept running and jumping, Koca let out a sigh of great disappointment. Suddenly, when being two mounds away from the goal, the last lion he had fought with tackled him and made him fall all the way to the ground again, the warrior got his paws on Emba's chest, applying a lot of pressure, another lion then arrived and did the same, growling warningly at Emba.
"Alright, exercise's over…Lion Guard." Koca said while jumping down a rocky path and heading where Emba and Faeze, followed by Ozel and Azaad. "You failed."
Emba let out a growl of anger, moving violently over the ground and managing to escape the warriors' grasp. "You never told us about that! These guys attacking us made it impossible!" Emba rushed towards Koca and then stood before him with a frown.
"Oh, I didn't tell you." Koca replied mockingly. "And now you tell me, Emba, are your enemies going to 'tell you' when you go out there and defend the Pride Lands?" Emba just stood quiet, keeping his gaze of anger locked on Koca's eyes.
Faeze walked towards them, followed by the three lion warriors that had him surrounded moments ago. "You could've helped me over there, Emba." He approached his friend with a frown on his face.
"There was no time for that! I had to reach th…" Emba got interrupted.
"Not 'you', Emba." Koca corrected. "Both of you had to, together, Faeze and you. I thought you had assumed that…as you are a team, this was not a competition."
Emba sighed. "But…I know but…"
"You'll try again tomorrow." Koca said firmly and then turned, walking away from them, followed by his young warriors.
Emba lowered his head, sitting down, his frown became a face of sadness and disappointment, he was trembling as he was all wet and muddy. Ozel, Azaad and Faeze approached him. "It was your first try." Azaad said, getting no reply from Emba.
"Emb…" Faeze had tried to place a paw on his back, but Emba quickly pushed it away, hitting it with his paw.
"Get off me!" Emba expressed with rage and a broken voice, also with tears on his eyes.
"Hey!" Azaad warned. "Come, we should get you home already."
Emba stood silent and with his head lowered for a long moment, then he let out a sigh. "Faeze." He looked at his friend with instant repentance. "Sorry." A tear ran down his face as he shook his head, still sitting down with great disappointment. "I'm sorry." His voice broke even more.
Faeze approached him again, placing his paw on his back and stroking it with understanding. "We'll try again tomorrow."
Emba sobbed. "Mhm." He looked at him with a spontaneous yet subtle smirk.
Azaad got moved for a moment, seeing that pure and immaculate union that tends to grow in the friendship of the young hearts, one that can forget in the blink of an eye. "Let's take you to Pride R…" He got interrupted by Kion's arrival.
"How was your first day of training?" Kion asked while sitting down between Azaad and Ozel.
Emba shook his head. "Terrible."
"We just weren't prepared." Faeze said. "We got ambushed."
"Hm." Kion let out a nostalgic and relieving chuckle. "Maybe you'll do better tomorrow." He winked at them, then Koca joined the conversation
"My king." Koca bowed his head at him. "The training was fruitful, I'll get them…" Ozel pretended to cough. "Sorry…we'll get them in shape in no time."
"We'll start with a speed test early in the morning, just as a warm-up." Ozel said arrogantly.
"Very well." Kion nodded. "Any more reports, Koca?"
"Yes, I'm about to take the cubs to the Hakuna Matata Falls as you requested." Koca responded.
"Uhm?" Faeze inquired.
"Other cubs." Koca clarified.
"Oh, but can we go with you? It sounds like a fun place to be, at least guessing by what mom has told me." Faeze requested.
Emba looked at his father. "Can we go dad?" He asked with a hopeful tone, recovering from the previous events.
Kion looked into his pleading eyes for a bit then looked at Azaad. "What do you think?"
"I say it's alright." Faeze smiled at his son.
"Yes!" Faeze and Emba both celebrated at the same time.
"I'll take good care of them." Koca told Emba and Azaad.
"I know you will." Kion nodded at him with a smirk then glared back into the cubs' eyes. "Have fun, you two. You deserve a good time of rest."