Simba and Nala looked down at the baby – who they had now named Kopa – and watched as he continued to cry. Nala looked up at Simba, an eyebrow raised. "What now, Dad?"

Simba shrugged and chuckled. "I think the mother can take care of the crying," he replied, handing Kopa over to Nala.

She frowned in response. Oh, so now Simba was going to try and make her take care of the baby? "How come I have to take care of Kopa while he's crying? I've got a lot of other things to do today! You can't expect me to look after the baby all the time!"

"I figured you'd need some time to get to know each other," Simba told her. "You might want to stop him crying first, though."

"But how do I stop him crying?" Nala asked, rocking Kopa gently back and forth in her paws. "I don't know what he wants!"

"Moms are supposed to know everything the baby needs," Simba informed her. Nala didn't look very impressed.

"Well, sorry, Simba, but I haven't exactly ever had a baby before!" she exclaimed. "If you're so smart then why can't you take care of him?"

Simba rolled his eyes in response. "Look, we just need to find out what's making him cry. It shouldn't take too long to figure something like that out. Give him here." Simba took Kopa from Nala and looked him over. "He looks fine. Maybe he's just… hungry?"

"Hungry?" said Nala. "If he's hungry, then what are we going to feed him with?"

"There's only one thing we can do," Simba replied. "I'll stay here and look after Kopa, while you run off and hunt some food for him to eat."

"Simba, it may have escaped your notice that I'm a cub, and don't exactly have the strength to take down some antelope for Kopa to eat!" she exclaimed angrily. "Maybe you could, you know, think of something that actually makes sense!"

"Okay, okay. Just get him some leaves or something," Simba muttered, causing Nala's eyes to go wide in disbelief.

"Are you serious?" Nala said exasperatedly. "We can't feed him leaves!"

"Why not?" Simba replied, confused. "What's wrong with leaves? He needs to eat healthy food if he wants to grow up to be big and strong like me."

"Simba, there are two problems with your suggestion. One: you hate anything that's the littlest bit healthy. And two: you're not big or strong, and you're only eight months old. How does that make you grown up?"

"It's still food," Simba pointed out. "Or do you want him to keep crying for the rest of the day? You don't want to make poor little Kopa upset, do you? Just think of what his real mother will say when she finds out how poorly you've treated her baby. She might even feed you to him as a punishment."

Nala sighed. "Fine. He can eat some leaves. If we're lucky then there might even be some fruit lying around the place."

Simba gagged, disgusted. "Please don't mention fruit in front of me. It makes me feel sick."

"So much for all that 'healthy eating' talk," Nala remarked as she walked away. "I'll be back in about five minutes. Don't go anywhere."

"Believe me, I won't," Simba assured her. "It's my mission to look after our adoptive son!" Simba watched Nala leave, and then looked down at Kopa. "I don't suppose you'll stop crying, by any chance, huh?"

Kopa cried even harder.

"That's what I thought."

Having wandered around the Pride Lands for the last ten minutes, Nala finally found a suitable tree she could take some leaves from. It was a tree with low branches protruding from it, all of them with leaves. Nala plucked a few clean-looking ones from a branch and looked them over. "This should do," she said, before turning around and heading back towards the water hole, where Simba was looking after baby Kopa.

At least, that was what she hoped.

When Nala returned to the water hole, the worst thing that could have possibly happened… happened.

Simba looked very nervous and upset, and Nala could see just by looking at him that he had been crying. Kopa was nowhere to seen, and Nala suspected that Simba had something to do with this. "Simba, dear, where's our darling little son?" she asked him, smiling innocently.

Simba chuckled skittishly. "Well… it's funny you should ask about little Kopa, because…"

Nala frowned. Okay, now she was sure that Simba had something to do with this. Well, that was just great! "Simba…" she said, glaring at him.

Simba suddenly began to break down, not even bothering to use an excuse now. "I couldn't help it, Nala! As soon as you left Kopa started to cry even louder, and then I tripped over, and he stopped crying, but then I got up, and he started crying again, and then he walked off, and now I'm crying!" Simba burst into tears, sobbing.

"Simba, control yourself!" Nala exclaimed, slapping him hard on the face. He immediately stopped crying, his eyes wide.

"Yes, ma'am," Simba obeyed, giving Nala a salute. "What is your first order?"

"Simba, what happened to the baby?" Nala asked.

"I can't find him!" Simba exclaimed in distress. "I looked all over the water hole, but he's not here! He's probably wandered off to the Outlands, where he'll be…" Simba gasped in horror. "Eaten by crocodiles. Really hungry ones, too."

"Why couldn't you just keep the baby in your sights until I got back, Simba?" she asked. Did he always have to overcomplicate things all the time? He just couldn't leave the baby to cry for a few minutes, could he?

"I just wanted to stop him crying," Simba responded. "I thought it would have made things a little better."

"So I collected all these leaves for nothing!" Nala exclaimed, throwing all the leaves she collected from the tree to the ground. "We have to find the baby, Simba. Because if we don't, then his mother's gonna ask us some pretty searching questions when she finds her son lying face down in a river somewhere."

"Yeah…" Simba said, a worried look appearing on his face. "She might beat us up."

"And cut our bodies into a thousand different pieces," Nala said, horrified.

"And skin us alive," Simba continued, wide-eyed with fear.

"Yes, and then put on our skins!" Nala exclaimed.

"Yeah, and slowly rip apart our still twitching corpses."

"And eat our livers!"

"And drink our blood! Yeah, and then do weird sort of dancing, flapping our skins around the place, and smearing the walls of caves with our throbbing disintegrating brains!"

There was a long moment of silence between the two cubs.

"Not much of an option really, is it?" said Nala.

"Not really, no. We'd better find Kopa, and fast! His mother could arrive here looking for him any minute now!" Simba paced back and forth, thinking. "Now if I were a baby, where would I go?"

"Somewhere exciting," Nala concluded. "At least, somewhere exciting to a baby. Simba, when you were a baby, where was the one place you always wanted to go?"

Simba grinned. "Oh, I always wanted to climb up to the top of Pride Rock and jump off."

Nala laughed back at him. "Well, that would have been a stupid thing to do! That would have killed you! You'd go splat! as soon as you hit the ground!"

Simba joined in with the laughter, and they continued to laugh in amusement for a few more seconds. That was when they realised something quite horrific.

Nala's eyes widened in horror, and she slowly turned to look at Simba. "You don't think…?" she said in a worried tone.

"That Kopa might want to climb to the top of Pride Rock and jump off?" Simba finished for her.

Nala slowly nodded. "Yes."

There was another moment of silence, before Simba called out at the top of his voice. "Don't worry, Kopa! Daddy's coming!"

Simba sprinted off away from the water hole, leaving Nala standing there on her own, her eyes narrowed. "Simba!" she called after him.

Simba skidded to a halt and turned around. "What?" he called back.

"Pride Rock's that way," she said, pointing to the left.

Simba frowned and ran back towards Nala, unable to believe that he'd made such a silly mistake. Why was it when lives were at stake Simba suddenly got stupider?

"Come on!" he shouted as he pulled Nala along. "We have to get to Kopa before… Well, you know."

"Splat?" Nala finished for him, a concerned expression on her face.

Simba nodded. "That's right," he said. "Splat."

"Tojo, you can stop thanking me," Tama told Tojo as they made their way towards the den at Pride Rock. All he seemed to do now was thank her for freeing him. What did he think she was going to do? Make him her slave again if he didn't? It didn't work like that. Their business was concluded now. They were just partners, and nothing more.

"I can't help it!" Tojo exclaimed, overjoyed that he was no longer Tama's obedient slave. "I've never felt so happy in my entire life! I'm free again!"

"And why are you so happy?" Tama wondered. Surely she couldn't have been that bad when Tojo was her slave. The only she made him do was… everything. Actually, come to think of it, she had overworked the poor cub.

"All my life I've had nothing but bad luck, Tama," Tojo explained. "First my whole pride burns to the ground, then I become your slave, and you make me do everything you wanted me to. But now everything's gonna change!" he exclaimed, a happy grin forming on his face. "Things are finally looking up!"

"Out of the way!" a voice called as Tojo was knocked to the ground, grunting in pain. "This is an emergency!"

"Hi, Simba," Tama called in a dreamy voice as he rushed past her with Nala. "Ooh, he's so cute! Don't you think so, too, Tojo?"

Tojo sat up, a dazed expression on his face. He couldn't see anything but stars spinning around. "Did anyone see that stampeding wildebeest?" he said before fainting.

"This way!" Simba called to Nala, as he ran up Pride Rock, diving onto the edge of the famous rock structure and looking down to see if Kopa had been curious enough to climb up there. "Oh, no," Simba said in a worried tone, looking back at Nala.

Nala gulped, picking up on the worry. "Let me guess," she said. "Splat?"

Simba shook his head. "No. He's not there."

Nala breathed a sigh of relief. "Phew. That was a close one! For a second there I thought he'd fallen from the edge!"

"Yeah, but we still don't know where he is!" Simba exclaimed worriedly. "There are hundreds of cliffs around here! He could have jumped off any one of them!" Simba clutched his chest, breathing heavily. "I think I'm having a heart attack… Yep, I was right!"

Simba collapsed onto his back, taking deep breaths in and out. He couldn't take this anymore! Taking care of a baby was just too stressful for him! It was better to leave the childcare to responsible adults!

"Aw… who's a cute little baby?"

Simba's eyes widened when he heard that voice. Getting to his paws and looking back towards the den, Simba saw something very, very odd.

"No way…" Simba said in amazement as he bounded back down Pride Rock and towards the den opening.

Nala followed his gaze, and her mouth dropped open in surprise. "That's just… crazy!" she exclaimed, following after Simba.

Simba skidded to a halt in the den, and he was so surprised that his mouth could have dropped to the ground!

Kopa was in the den, all right. That wasn't what surprised Simba. What surprised him was that Kopa was being rocked back and forth gently in the paws of Shenzi, with Banzai sitting right beside her.

"What a cute little guy!" Banzai exclaimed, ruffling the top of Kopa's head. The baby cub giggled in response.

Simba cleared his throat loudly. "Excuse me, but I think you'll find that's our baby!" he said, snatching Kopa away from the two hyenas. "Come on, Nala. Let's get out of here!"

Simba put Kopa on his back and stormed off. Nala shrugged at Shenzi and Banzai before following after him. "I was enjoying that," Banzai said, disappointed.

"We could always try for a baby?" Shenzi suggested, earning a grin from Banzai in response.

"You're on."

"I don't believe it!" Simba exclaimed as he and Nala sat by the water hole again, watching Kopa roll around on the floor attentively. They weren't letting him out of their sight, they had decided. Not until his mother came back to collect him. "I can't believe those hyenas stole him!"

"It could have been worse," Nala told him, thinking optimistically. "I mean, they could have eaten him."

"At least we've got him back," Simba said, gathering up Kopa in his paws and cuddling him. "I don't know what we would have done otherwise."

Someone cleared their throat from behind the two cubs, and they turned around to find themselves looking at a friendly lioness with tanned fur and blue eyes. "Excuse me, but I think you have my baby."

Simba grinned. "Please tell me you're his mother! Please!" he begged. He'd had enough stress for one day!

The lioness nodded. "I'm Kirafiki, and that's my son, Kidogo," she told them, pointing at her son. "He wandered off while we were walking through the jungle. He always likes exploring places. I'm so glad I've found him!"

Simba held up the baby for Kirafiki to take. She cradled the baby gently in her paws. "There, there, Kidogo. Mommy's here for you." She looked at Simba and Nala, smiling warmly. "Did you two look after him?"

Simba grinned and nodded. "Yeah! We looked after him all day!"

"I hope he wasn't any trouble."

"Well—" Simba was about to speak, when Nala nudged him hard.

"No," she interrupted, grinning innocently. "No trouble at all. He was a little angel."

"Well… thank you," she told the two. "I can't express how grateful I am! Kidogo is all I have. I don't know what I would have done if I lost him."

"We're happy to help," Simba said, pleased with himself that he'd managed to look after the child.

"Thanks again. I think you two will grow up to be excellent parents one day," she told them, before turning around and heading away, placing her cub on her back.

Simba looked at Nala and smiled, putting his paw around her shoulder as they watched the two leave. Kidogo popped up and grinned at the two cubs. "Bye, Mommy and Daddy!" he called to the two.

Simba and Nala looked at each other, stunned. "I think he just said his first words," Nala said, amazed.

Simba smiled back at her, hugging her close to him. "Our little man is growing up."

"Simba?" said Nala, looking up at him. "Do you think we'll ever have a cub of our own one day?"

"Maybe," Simba replied, a little grin forming in his face. "I'll remember that name," he told her.

"Name?" Nala narrowed her eyes in confusion. "What name?"

"Kiara," Simba replied. "We might need to use it someday, if we ever do… have a cub."

Nala nuzzled his chest affectionately. Oh, I'm counting on it, Simba, she thought to herself. I most certainly am.

"So, did I die?" Tojo asked Tama, having finally woken up from being knocked unconscious by Simba earlier that afternoon.

"No, but you were unconscious for seven hours," Tama informed him, gesturing towards the den entrance. Pale moonlight shone through into the den. "See? It's the middle of the night."

"Great," Tojo mumbled. "There wasn't really much point in me waking up. I might as well go back to sleep now." He sighed, collapsed onto his back in the little corner of the den he slept in, and closed his eyes. Tama lay beside him, and closed her own eyes to go to sleep.

"Hey, Tama?" Tojo called, opening his eyes and rolling over to look at her.

"Yes, Tojo?" she replied, looking back at him,

"We're friends, aren't we?"

"Huh?"

"Are we friends?"

Tama rolled her eyes. "I suppose so," she said, trying to sound annoyed.

"Oh. Good." Tojo closed his eyes again.

"Why?" Tama enquired, curious.

"No reason," he replied quickly. "I was just… wondering, that's all."

"Don't expect me to like it," she told him, closing her eyes. Even though I do… kind of like it. Not that I'd tell you that, though.