"Take cover!" Karl cried as the four fanned out and Gladys's talons cut through the bark.
With her wing smacking him in the face, Julien lost balance, fell over, and desperately tried to cling to the branch.
"HEEEELP!" he screamed.
Mary Ann found herself in a similar predicament but she easily got a grip thanks to her claws.
"Keke!?" she blurted as she pulled herself up and saw the girl grabbing Julien's hand.
"I got you, Mr. Julien!" Keke thought she could pull him up.
Mary Ann's eyes widened. "No, no! Go hide right now-"
Keke yelped as Glady's foot slammed into her and pinned her down between her three toes, while Julien slipped back down.
"Gladys, p-please! Don't be such a hater!" Julien begged. "No h-harm, no foul. Right?"
"You're dead meat, lemur!" Gladys glowered down at Keke, when she heard a roar from behind her and got pounced by Mary Ann.
Keke got up and watched as the two predators rolled around locked in combat, screeching, roaring, and clawing at each other, with loose feathers flying everywhere.
"Someone help me!" Julien lost his grip but Karl managed to grab his hand, while sinking his own claws into the branch.
"No harm shall befall you under my watch, King Julien!" Karl announced. "I'll-"
Mary Ann and Gladys collided with the fanaloka, knocking both him and Julien off the tree. Screaming, the two plummeted towards the ground but someone caught Julien in their arms, while Karl crashed into the jungle floor.
"Oh, thank you, kind stranger…" Julien exhaled in relief before realizing that it was Bone-Fossa holding him and screamed.
Up in the tree, Keke saw the remaining fossa gathering around Julien and the flattened Karl while Gladys was flapping around wildly with Mary Ann holding onto the bird's tail feathers with her jaws. Gladys kept hitting the fossa in the head with her beak until the latter let go and Gladys flew towards Keke.
Keke tried to run but was quickly caught by the eagle's foot.
"No!" Mary Ann managed to grab Keke's tail with her paw, resulting in a tug-a-war between her and the raptor, with Keke getting stretched out like a rubber toy.
"Your dumb luck has finally run out, King Julien!" Bone-Fossa said as he was throttling Julien in front of his cheering subjects.
"Not so fast." The battered Karl got up and pulled out his plasma gun.
"Where do you keep that thing?" Julien croaked.
"It's fully loaded now." Karl aimed it at Bone-Fossa. "Release the king if you know what's good for you."
Bone-Fossa looked scared for a second before a sly grin crossed his features.
"Tell me, Karl? What happened to roach companion of yours?"
Hearing that question, Karl's grip on the gun loosened and he started whimpering and shaking.
"Chauncey…"
"Okay… that was low, even for you." Julien glared at the villain.
The sniveling Karl got struck in the head by a throwing stick and unceremoniously plopped to the ground.
"Bullseye!" Thrax pumped his fist.
"I know why you're mad at her!" Mary Ann implored the eagle. "But she's really a good kid!"
"Yes, good and dead!" Gladys tugged back. "Find your own prey!"
"She's my responsibility! You're a mother, surely you understand?" Mary Ann begged.
"Huh?" Gladys was taken aback.
"She's in foster care, don't judge!" the flustered Mary Ann pulled back.
"Just make your own instead of adopting hooligans, you weirdo!" Gladys scowled and pulled harder.
"Oh…cram it up your culo." Keke grabbed Gladys's foot and the latter felt a severe electric jolt.
Screeching, Gladys let Keke go and she collided with Mary Ann.
Shaking her head, the fossa saw Keke on her belly and gave her a bewildered look.
"Joy buzzer, remember?" Keke answered and showed it to her.
"Mary Ann!" they heard Julien crying. "Save your king!"
"Ughhh…just hold on tight." Mary Ann told the kinkajou before scaling down the tree head first.
"Woohoo!" Keke shouted, sitting on the fossa's head.
"Karl see his insect pet soon enough." Bone-Fossa smiled darkly as Manny lifted the fanaloka by his tail.
"Now then?" he resumed trying to throttle Julien, when he was pounced by Mary Ann.
Julien was dropped and Mary Ann leaped off Bone-Fossa. "Find a log and set sail!" she barked.
"On it, capitana!" Keke saluted her as she jumped down and helped Julien up. "Come on!"
But no sooner was Julien up, they were confronted by a snarling fossa. Mary Ann lunged and tackled him while the other fossa attacked Julien and Keke, chasing them in different directions.
Managing to grab a wafting eagle feather, Karl started tickling Manny under his armpit.
Laughing uncontrollably, the wall-eyed fossa let him go and Karl scrambled to find his gun.
Getting up and seeing the ensuing pandemonium, Bone-Fossa yelled, "Fossa, seize plasma gun!"
Karl almost reached it only for a fossa to pick it up instead.
"Fossa got it!" the dimwit looked into the barrel and accidentally pulled the trigger.
Karl cringed as the ensuing blast melted all the flesh off the fossa's head, leaving just a blackened, smoking skull and the lifeless creature fell over, dropping the gun.
"Confounded it all!" Karl grabbed it, knowing it wouldn't reload for another five minutes.
A roaring fossa lunged at him but Karl bludgeoned him in the face with the gun.
"Such a crude method of offense, but I have to improvise!" he lamented and ran into battle, while Keke ran past him, chased by a fossa.
She jumped behind a log and the fossa looked over but saw no sign of her. He tilted his head in confusion, when Keke appeared on his head and zapped him on the temple with her joy buzzer, making him shake uncontrollably.
"Serves you right!" Keke mocked him and jumped on the log as the fossa stumbled around and she realized what she had found.
"Hey!" she cupped her mouth. "I found our raft!"
"Karl! Mary Ann!" Julien cried as he was chased up a banana tree by a fossa.
"Excellent! This will work nicely." Karl joined Keke and clubbed an attacking fossa before pushing the log toward the river. "Help me push it! Mary Ann, assist King Julien!"
"I'm kinda busy!" Mary Ann yelled while being pinned down and pummeled by Bone-Fossa, Thrax, and Manny.
"Take this, traitor!" Bone-Fossa gave her a left hook. Julien, meanwhile, was running out of room to climb and the fossa was zeroing in on him.
"Come on, come on!" Karl banged on his gun, which still wasn't fully loaded.
"CAW!" he and Keke looked up and saw a ruffled and extremely pissed-off Gladys flying towards them.
"Duck!" Karl took cover behind the log while Keke ran off, pursued by the eagle.
Stuck on top of the banana tree, King Julien wound up clinging to a leaf as the fossa swiped and snapped his jaws at him, and their combined weight caused the tree to lean down.
With Julien hanging from the leaf, it was gently plucked off and the fossa got catapulted into the air.
Getting up, Julien laughed. "Ha! You fell for my brilliant trap!"
He looked at the large leaf in his hand and smiled.
"Hey, hey, guys! I got us a sail-" Keke tackled him from behind just as razor-sharp talons flew past him.
As he and his two cronies were beating on Mary Ann, Bone-Fossa noticed the ringtail lying just ten yards away from him and Gladys flying back towards him.
"Eagle stay out of this!" Bone-Fossa growled and abandoned the Mary Ann pummeling. "King Julien mine!"
With Gladys on one side and Bone-Fossa charging at them from another, Julien and Keke split up and the predators collided with each other.
Keke giggled. "That never gets old!"
Flying up and shaking her head, Gladys glared at Bone-Fossa.
"Mind your own business, pal!"
"King Julien mine to kill!"
"You can have him." Gladys shrugged. "But I want his little accomplice's head!"
Keke gulped and made a mad dash as the eagle swooped after her.
"Fair enough." Bone-Fossa happily agreed and grinned as he turned to the frightened Julien before lunging at him.
Julien barely managed to dodge the attack and ran like a headless chicken, with Bone-Fossa giving chase.
Karl got up and saw that his gun had fully recharged.
"Yes!" he exclaimed and saw Keke run and dive into the thicket as Gladys pursued her, Mary Ann fighting with Thrax and Manny, and Julien being chased up the baobab tree by Bone-Fossa. It was a no-brainer whose life he had to prioritize.
"A second chance to prove myself!" he announced overdramatically and aimed at Bone-Fossa. "Today, my name goes down in Madagascar history!"
Of course, Karl couldn't hit a still target to save his life, so him missing a moving one by a wide margin was no shocker. Instead, he cut through a large branch.
Mary Ann managed to slug Manny in the face and was left tussling with Thrax. As he nursed his aching snout, Manny only had two seconds to register the falling branch before it flattened him.
"Rrrrrrrr!" Karl was beyond frustrated. "I…I meant to do that too!"
Grabbing Thrax in a headlock, Mary Ann slammed his face into a boulder repeatedly before hearing Keke scream and saw Glady tearing a bush apart.
Pressed against the branches, Keke tried to evade the eagle's talons for as long as possible until she had nowhere left to hide.
"Nowhere to run now!" Gladys smiled before Thrax was slammed into her, hurling them both into a tree and they got buried under tons of coconuts.
Relieved, Keke jumped out of the mangled bush and ran up to Mary Ann, who was bruised and sporting a black eye while trying to catch her breath.
"Increíble, I didn't know you could brawl like that!" the girl said in awe as Karl joined them.
"That's all the fossa taken care of, except for one!"
Above them, Julien was cornered on a branch with Bone-Fossa advancing toward him, cackling and unleashing his claws.
Roaring, he was ready to strike the ringtail when Mary Ann jumped up and sunk her teeth and claws into his torso. Bone-Fossa yowled in pain as they both plummeted to the floor, creating a huge dust cloud.
Her head aching, Mary Ann was grabbed by the shoulder and hoisted up before getting socked in the face, and slamming into the trunk.
"You can't hit a lady!" Julien gasped from above. "Have you fossa never heard of chivalry?"
"No, we haven't." Bone-Fossa laughed at him only to get blindsided by Mary Ann, but he kicked her off him and rose up.
"Die, miserable usurper!" he swiped at her, only to get sucker punched in the jaw.
"I was a better ruler than you could ever hope to be!" Mary Ann declared with pent-up frustration as she grabbed him by the neck and punched him in the gut. "We were making progress but you ruined it all!"
Bone-Fossa gave her a right hook and stepped back, chuckling.
"Boo-hoo, you just want that to cozy up with lemur, sicko!" he retorted mockingly before charging, pinning her down and sinking his teeth into Mary Ann's arm, as Keke jumped out of their way and saw Julien and Karl pushing the log toward the river.
"There you are, Keke!" Julien smiled as the kinkajou ran up to him. "Please help us with the pushing."
"But what about Mary Ann?"
"Who now?" Karl asked as they pushed the log towards the shallows before hearing the sound of fighting. "Oh, her…"
"Why aren't you helping her? It's just one villano!" Keke lamented.
"Umm…" Julien fidgeted. "Fighting's more of Clover's thing, my mad skills lie in sitting on a thrown and ruling."
"And I'm an unparalleled genius, no bloody warrior." Karl pointed at himself before jerking back as the fighting fossa rolled past them and splashed into the shallows, biting and clawing each other.
Karl heard a "ping" and realized his gun had reloaded, making him grin.
"Though being a genius has many perks in battle." He pointed his gun at Bone-Fossa, who was on top of Mary Ann and pressing her head beneath the surface, trying to drown her.
"No, your aim stinks." Julien pushed the gun down. "And if you somehow hit him, you'll hit Mary Ann too!"
"Ughh…you're hopeless!" an exasperated Keke decided to take matters into her own paws.
"You weak ruler, and weak fighter!" Bone-Fossa gloated.
"This day mine-" he roared as Keke jumped on his head and bit his ear, forcing him to release Mary Ann and flail around.
Coughing up water, Mary Ann got up and saw Keke holding up her joy buzzer.
"Take this!" she pressed it against Bone-Fossa's head and all of a sudden, the villain was assaulted by a powerful surge of electricity, screaming in pain.
Keke got electrocuted as well and was shot back like a bullet, but Julien caught her. Mary Ann watched in disbelief as the dazed and steaming Bone-Fossa stumbled towards deeper water, with small bolts of electricity discharging from his charred body.
Losing consciousness, he disappeared beneath the waves, with his paw sticking out as he was carried off by the current, before sinking down as well.
In Julien's arm, Keke had turned into a steaming puffball and produced sparks of her own as she shook her head and glanced at her joy buzzer.
"Keke…that was amazing!" Julien laughed in astonishment.
"…I didn't know it could pack a punch like that?" Keke mumbled.
"I think that thing might have aided you?" Karl pointed at a serpentine fish that swam by Mary Ann, who stepped back as it sparked with electricity.
"An electric eel?" Keke recognized it. "Oh, now it makes sense."
"Splendid, more invasive species." Karl massaged his forehead.
"Hurray for dumb luck!" Julien pumped his fist into the air. "I told you guys I have plenty of that to spare!"
Breathing heavily, Mary Ann snatched Keke from Julien. "Are you alright?" she asked worriedly.
"I'm fine…" Keke laughed it off before twitching with sparks and coughing up some smoke. "Jus' got zapped by 800 volts of electricity."
They heard growls and crashing of vegetation in the distance.
"We shouldn't squander our stroke of luck." Karl said as he jumped onto the log. "Their lack of brain allows them to quickly recover from any injury."
After tying down the large leaf to the branch at the front of the log, Karl held it up himself, and Julien was stuck rowing with a stick, while Keke and Mary Ann sat at the back, with the latter using her long tail to fish for breakfast along the way.
"We're heading home, it's smooth sailing from here on." The fanaloka said self-assuredly.
"Don't jinx it." Keke warned him when the log started slowing down.
"Come on, King Julien. You have to stroke." Karl urged him.
"Ughhh…I'm gonna be having a stroke if I keep doing this." Julien whined. "This sort of menial grunt work is Mort's duty, but the little misshapen hangnail is still a no-show."
"Didn't we see him yesterday and you told him that you didn't want to see him?" Keke pointed out, much to the sulky ringtail's annoyance.
"King Julien, the sooner we get home, the sooner you'll be reunited with your crown." Karl tried to motivate him, and the ringtail begrudgingly resumed rowing.
He panted. "Mary Ann? Could you please be lending a helping paw? You have plenty of muscle to spare?"
The bruised fossa rolled her eyes. "I have to catch breakfast, I haven't eaten anything in 24 hours because of your escapade. Or do you want to risk me having an episode, like Mr. Alex did?"
Julien shuddered. "N-never mind, I'm good."
"You know, when I saw that Mort…" Keke cleared her throat "…I kicked him in the cajones, just like you told me."
The exhausted Mary Ann just gave her a gentle pat on the head. "Glad to see you heeding some of my advice, but I know what you're trying to do."
Keke grew flustered. "I'm not trying to sweet-talk you, honest."
Mary Ann suddenly winced and lifted her already gnawed and bent-up tail to reveal another piranha clinging to it.
She picked it up as it snapped its jaws viciously. "They are nippy little things, but they do taste good."
The fish widened its eyes before it was scarfed down in one go.
"And while we're here, King Julien, you might as well think about how to explain your pranking rampage to your subjects…" Karl advised the ringtail "…surely they are more than a little cross about it, though Maurice is probably already working on a PR campaign. Assuming he wasn't too crippled with worry to function properly, we all know he's a very emotional aye-aye."
Julien lowered his ears shamefully. "I didn't mean to worry him or my parents with my disappearance…"
Karl rolled his eyes upon the mention of the latter.
"…I was just bummed that they didn't want to spend time with me, and even more that Clover wouldn't show up for my surprise birthday party that I'm not supposed to know about."
Thinking about the crowned lemur made Julien smile a bit with nostalgia. "Man, if Clover had come, this little misadventure would have been over in no time. She would have whooped those fossa and that mean ol' eagle like it was nobody's business."
Karl grew visibly annoyed. "Oh, for pity's sake…will you stop longing for her?"
Julien looked at him oddly. "All this time, it's been "Clover this" and "Clover that", I'm honestly sick to death of that name. Will you just accept that she's out of your life? She's the queen of the mountain lemurs, meaning her kingdom is her top priority now, not her former king."
Julien wilted and whimpered. Seeing his reaction, Karl eased up a bit but remained stern. "It's been seven months now, it's better if you cease being so hung up about the past and move on with your life. The rest of us have."
"Who is this Clover he keeps talking about?" Keke whispered to Mary Ann, though this hardly went unnoticed by Julien just two feet away.
Sighing, the fossa started, "She was his royal bodyguard for years, they along with Maurice and Mort were inseparable and went on countless crazy adventures, but then she got hitched to a musclebound hippie who turned out to be the rightful heir to another, faraway kingdom, and well…"
"So she dumped you for a superior hombre who is both a king and has bigger músculos?" Keke looked at Julien sympathetically. "Uhhhh…that's rough."
Julien slapped his forehead in annoyance. Why did people always assume he and Clover had a thing? Fortunately, Mary Ann voiced his objections for him.
"That's not quite it, dear. They are just friends. A boy and a girl can be friends and nothing more, it's nothing unusual."
"Yeah, and I like Sage a lot." Julien added. "He's a swell dude… if not too bright, and his zen hippie ways helped Clover chill out a bit, while her stalwart bossiness helped him be less of a responsibility-shirking bum. Guess their marriage is like that ying and yan stuff…but…eh…."
Julien whipped a tear. "Guys… can we please stop recounting those vintage six seasons, it really isn't helping me miss Clover any less." He buried his hands into his arms and sobbed, while Karl just awkwardly patted him on the back.
"Oookay…" Keke didn't push on and turned to Mary Ann "…but what about you?"
"What about me?" Mary Ann raised an eyebrow.
"What's your historia with that Bonehead Fossa? What was all that talk about you being a traitor, and giving up power for love, and you saying you were a better ruler?"
Once more, Mary Ann blushed with embarrassment. "Umm…I…it's really not that interesting…"
"Oh, but it is." Julien got better and chuckled, once more distracted with nostalgia. "It's a crazy tale. See, after Mary Ann got captured in one of our fossa traps, I decided to enlighten her and help her rise above her kin's mindlessly savage ways, and it worked."
Mary Ann covered her face in embarrassment, as Julien's face fell a bit and he waved his hand. "Though she did semi-relapse for a while, and tried to cook us in a hot tub, and her relationship with Horst took a hit. She also stole Bonehead Fossa's position as ruler of the fossa clan and tried to take over the world."
"You tried to do that?" Keke asked in disbelief, while Mary Ann couldn't dare to look at her. "No way, you're way too boring to even think of that?"
"Yeah, I know." Julien agreed. "But she wasn't such a bore back then. Though her world domination plans never got off the ground cuz the other fossa, as you just saw, are a bunch of brainless dummy-dums, and then there was the War of the Beast, a thrilling story I'll elaborate on later, and among many other things, it helped Horst and Mary Ann rekindle their relationship, leading to a brief truce."
"Things were going so well, that I allowed Clover, my head of security, to get hitched and leave the kingdom unprotected, but then that jerkface Bonehead Fossa staged a coup and Mary Ann had to flee and seek asylum in my kingdom, cuz that jerkface really knows how to hold a grudge."
"Correction, King Julien." Karl pointed out. "Bone-Fossa staged his coup before Clover got married and left the kingdom. I wasn't there at the time, but even I know that."
"Alright, alright, you naggy nitpicker." Julien groaned and gave him a peeved look. "I was embellishing a bit so I wouldn't look like a total moron. Sheesh."
Karl was about to retort when he noticed that they were nearing a fork in the river, and he shoved the makeshift paddle back into Julien's hands, while grabbing one of his own.
"Quickly, we have to steer our raft to the left." He said urgently. "The other path leads to some very turbulent waters."
While the two were distracted rowing, Keke turned to Mary Ann.
"So you did all of that, and you're giving me a hard time for playing pranks and punching a jerk in the nose?" the girl huffed and put her paws on her hips.
"Look…" Mary Ann blurted. "I was young and foolish back then, okay? I made mistakes and paid the price for them. I don't want you to go through the same ordeal."
"I never tried to take over the world." Keke shrugged while the fossa tried to compose herself. "But I can't believe you have your own nemesis who wants you dead, that's so cool."
"There's nothing "cool" about that!" the irate Mary Ann retorted but Keke didn't seem to be listening.
"You think I made one myself with Gladys?" Keke wondered. "I did almost cause an abortion with her egg?"
"You can count on it, brat!" As if on cue, the raptor appeared, talons spread wide.
Julien and Karl screamed and flinched while Mary Ann roared and lashed out at the attacking eagle.
"Oh, come on!" Julien complained as Gladys flew away and made a sharp U-turn toward them. "That woman seriously needs a hobby!"
Mary Ann braced herself for another brawl, but Gladys instead flew towards the branch holding the limp sail, and grabbed it with her foot, forcing the rocking raft to make a sharp turn towards the right.
"Oh, no…" Karl gulped as they were heading off course and Gladys flew up, meeting up with three fluffy chicks flapping their tiny wings.
"And that, children, is how you enact terrible revenge on prey animals that refuse to be prey animals. By sending them down the river." The mother eagle explained before they took off.
Julien's pupils shrank with fear as he watched them go. "Um…Karl?" he grabbed the fanaloka's shoulder. "What was it you said about rough waters being ahead?"
"Way to jinx it, I told you something bad could happen." Keke complained.
"I jinxed it?!" Karl asked indignantly. "You're the one who enraged that freaking eagle!"
"Sí… saving your king that you love so much." Keke smirked and crossed her arms.
"She's got you there." Julien elbowed Karl when a paw erupted from the water and sunk its claws into the wood, making Mary Ann grab Keke and back away in fright as Bone-Fossa hauled himself from the water.
"You kidding me? He's still alive?" Julien stepped back in disbelief.
"Great job, you double-jinxed us." Keke glared at Karl.
"You won't escape me that easily!" Bone-Fossa growled and advanced toward them.
"I'll take care of this!" Karl pulled his plasma gun out of hammerspace. "Third time's the charm!"
"We're doomed." Julien clutched his head, his voice rising in pitch.
"Bone-Fossa, this isn't the time for fighting!" Mary Ann tried to warn him but he laughed it off.
"I won't fall for your bluff a second time!" Bone-Fossa insisted and got ready to pounce, but then his face dropped and his eyes bugged out.
Mary Ann and the others looked over their shoulders and saw that they were heading downhill toward roaring whitewater with sharp rocks sticking out everywhere, and their raft was picking up momentum.
Julien screamed like a little girl and hugged Karl tightly while Mary Ann and Bone-Fossa dug their claws into and hugged the log as they were all in for a wild ride.
The adults screamed in sheer terror as the log sped downwards while Keke, climbing atop Mary Ann's head, whooped with exuberance and swung her arms. Like a rollercoaster ride, they went up and down, all while grazing or barely missing various sharp rocks.
"For the love of Frank, DO SOMETHING!" Julien screamed into Karl's ear.
"I will if you let me go!" Karl ranted, pulled one arm free, and grabbed the branch as the log headed straight toward a large, jagged boulder.
Pulling the branch like a joystick, Karl got the log to make a sharp turn away from the rock.
"I'm not dying before I avenge Chauncey!" Karl said with crazed determination and steered the log away from another boulder, while Julien screamed and covered his eyes.
"Esto es divertido!" Keke told the mortified Mary Ann as they avoided a third boulder, when Bone-Fossa rose behind her, grinning wickedly.
He body-slammed Mary Ann, knocking her off the log while Keke fell onto it. Mary Ann managed to hold on to the back of the log with her claws, but soon found Bone-Fossa looming over her.
"See ya!" he was ready to strike her when Keke snatched the bird skull off his head.
"My crown!" he roared and swiped at her. "Give it back!"
"Mr. Julien! Think fast!" Keke threw it at the ringtail and Bone-Fossa charged at him.
Acting fast, Julien slid the skull between the fossa's leg and they proceeded to play "keep away" with the villain while Karl steered the vessel and Mary Ann struggled to pull herself up.
"Ha!" Julien caught the skull and threw it past Bone-Fossa again. "Now you know what's it like to be crownless!"
"Give me that!"
"You want it!" Keke taunted him with it before throwing it between his legs and back to Julien.
"Come and get it, sucker!" Julien was starting to enjoy himself, but then he heard Karl gasping.
"We have a problem!"
They all saw that they were heading towards a steep waterfall and the log flew off it, with the five finding themselves plummeting toward the ground.
Keke landed on a tree branch, Julien, Mary Ann and Bone-Fossa all crashed onto the beach, and Karl fell into a patch of cacti.
"Wow, that was one loco ride!" Keke shook with adrenaline before realizing the others didn't have as comfy of a landing.
Groaning, Mary Ann was lying on the beach, with Julien not far ahead. Getting up and rubbing his sore head, the ringtail realized where he was and was overjoyed.
Tears welled up in his eyes as he dropped to the ground, trying to embrace the sand and kissed it madly. "The beach! The beautiful, sunny, sandy beach! Oh, how much I have missed you!"
Mary Ann tried propping herself up, only for Bone-Fossa to deliberately walk over her, and he grabbed the oblivious King Julien by the neck.
"I'll deal with you another day!" Bone-Fossa sent the trampled female a death glare as he took off with the captured Julien and ran behind a pile of boulders.
The crownless Bone-Fossa cackled maliciously at his captive and unsheathed his claws. "Cut off the head, and whole lemur kingdom goes by-by!"
Julien whimpered. "Umm…you don't just mean this as a figure of the speech, do you?"
Grinning, Bone-Fossa was ready to deliver the coup de grâce, when he stepped on something soft and plushy.
"What the devil?" he looked down and saw a life-sized fossa dummy with stitches and button eyes.
"Well, if you really insist." The two heard a familiar voice and a large paw came down and seized Bone-Fossa by the head, hoisting him up and freeing Julien in the process.
Panting and rubbing his neck, Julien glanced up and saw none other than Alex, who was presenting Bone-Fossa to a huge audience of cheering lemurs, as well as the other zoo animals in the back and Xixi in the front with a mike in her wing.
"Holy smokes, such a life-like prop?" Ted said to Dorothy.
"I will gladly demonstrate my signature move when vanquishing the evil fossa!" Alex stated while stretching out his "prop", almost making his eyes pop out.
"One has to improvise with what they got, so I grab the nearest fossa…" He started swinging Bone-Fossa around like a pair of nunchucks
"…and I do a little bit of this!" Alex splintered a bunch of crudely-drawn fossa cutouts with Bone-Fossa's head.
"And a little bit of that! HI-YAH!" he destroyed some more before tossing Bone-Fossa high into the air.
"Then I discard my weapon!" Alex bowed, eliciting more cheering and a standing ovation.
Mary Ann watched and smiled as Bone-Fossa flew through the air and fell into the river.
Bone-Fossa surfaced and shook his head before sending her and Julien a venomous glare.
"You haven't seen the last of me! I'll have the last-YAHHHH!?"
He jumped up with dozens of piranhas biting into his tail and rump and proceeded to run away on top of the water.
"Nah, the last laugh is definitely ours." Keke laughed as she joined Mary Ann's side, who looked back worriedly as they were just twenty yards away from the entire kingdom, while Julien wholeheartedly ran towards the crowd.
Getting off his rocky pedestal, Alex started scratching autographs into chunks of bark, when Julien jumped in and waved his arms to gain attention.
"Hey, eyes on the king, everyone!" he shouted before turning to Alex. "Not that I'm not eternally grateful to you for accidentally saving my life, Mr. Alex…"
"What now?" the lion made a face when Julien addressed the crowd.
"…but I wish to now be the one getting showered with the love and adoration of my devoted subjects cuz your king is back!"
Most of the crowd watched blankly.
"We…didn't know that you went on a vacation, King Julien?" Dorothy noted when Maurice pushed past her and Ted.
"King Julien! You're alive!" the tearful aye-aye glomped Julien and knocked him to the ground, holding on to him like there was no tomorrow.
"Don't you EVER do this to me again, ya hear!" Maurice sobbed. "I can only take you being presumed dead so many times!"
"There, there, Mo-Mo." Julien gently patted his back. "What matters is that we…eh, I mean I am alive and well, and my peoples won't have to spend the rest of their lives unable to bask in my kingly glory."
"Wait, you mean you were in danger?" a shocked Ted asked, causing murmuring among the crowd.
"Pffftt… it was no biggie." Julien waved his hand. "I was just caught by a crowned eagle and carried off to feed her chicks…"
The other lemurs gasped collectively and Willie fainted.
"…but as you can see, I made it out without a single scratch." Julien gestured at himself, when Karl caught up with him, covered in thorns and holding his arms up because he was stuck to a cactus.
"Yes, and I personally went to search for him, unassisted, and escorted him back home!" the fanaloka bragged as he pried the cactus off him.
"That's where you went off to?" Maurice's eyes widened before scowling. "Why would you do that, man!? You knew King Julien was in trouble but ya didn't tell the rest of us!?"
"No need to cause panic when things were in my more-than-capable paws." Karl insisted.
Mary Ann didn't know if Karl was covering for her, or just stroking his ego but she didn't care. An out was still an out, and she turned to Keke, who seemed to have the same idea.
"I think we should get out of here while we can." The kinkajou's ears dropped.
"Yes. We finally agree on something..." Mary Ann nodded and the two tried to slink away while all eyes were on Julien and Karl.
"There she is!" they came to a screeching halt as they saw Tammy pointing at them.
"Well, well, look who finally decided to show her meat-eating mug." The portly lemur huffed, accompanied by her usual friends, sans two.
Mary Ann's blood turned cold and she noticed the crowd turning to her and Keke.
"Tammy…" Karl grumbled and facepalmed while Julien remained oblivious and hugged his crown, which had been brought back to him by Masikura.
"Oh, thank you, thank you, thank you so much, Masikura!" the tearful ringtail put it back on his head. "I felt so indecent without it! Welcome back, old friend."
Everyone else was staring at Mary Ann, slowly realizing that the kingdom's token fossa citizen was weirdly absent for some 24 hours, as was their marooned visitor.
Mary Ann chuckled nervously. "I can explain…"
Phew…I hope this made up for the lost time while this fic was on another hiatus. While this side-story took longer to conclude than I thought, I'm very pleased with how it turned out. It allowed Keke to gain some appreciation for Mary Ann, ironically after witnessing the fossa showing her savage side and learning about her less-than-clean past, Mary Ann and Bone-Fossa finally got to duke it out after the former fled from her old clan back in Marooned in Madagascar, and it further highlighted how Karl is overzealous to gain Julien's approval (and find self-validation in the process), and might be a wee bit envious of Julien constantly singing the praises of his predecessor Clover.
Of course, while she did earn some respect from Keke, things turned out pretty badly for Mary Ann in the end, as not only does she have to explain herself in front of a very judgmental crowd, but Bone-Fossa now knows that there's more than one way to get to his old rival besides having Horst for dinner, though that won't be focused on in this story, since we still have to deal with the mystery Guatemalan predator that's eating lemurs XD