"Kion", two voices yelled and he looked back, seing Fuli and Bunga rushing towards him. Well, Fuli was limping, as fast as she could. Bunga was coughing a lot, most likely because of the smoke. Kion rushed towards them, glad, that they were still alive and took a look at Fulis leg.
"How are you holding up?", he asked them and Fuli gritted her teeth.
"Not too well, but I can rest, when this night is over."
"I'm good, but it's difficult to find out, where you are, where the outlanders are and where you're supposed to go", Bunga said, while looking around. "Have you seen the others anywhere?"

Kion looked down and then towards his friends. They needed to know this.
"Ono and Besthe are dead", he said quietly, before looking away, not being able to look at them. Both of them just stood there for a moment, taking a while to process these words, mouths agape and eyes wide open.
"They are what?", Fuli whispered shocked.
"Ono and B- Big B... are gone?", Bunga asked slowly, shaking in fear of having lost his friends.
"Yes, they are gone", Kion comfirmed, looking towards Pride Rock. He needed to go there, but he wasn't sure, if he could ask his friends to follow him there.

"Prince Kion", a new voice yelled and they all looked to the side, where some lionesses of the pride ran up to them. There were five of them, at least two of them were slightly wounded.
"Kifahari, what is going on?", Kion asked and stepped closer towards them. The lionesses stopped and were panting heavily.
"Zira and her lionesses attacked Pride Rock. They were to many, we had to flee", she answered.
"What about Mom, Dad and Kiara? Are they alright?", Kion wanted to know. The lionesses looked at each other, uncertain, until Kifahari answered.
"Prince Kion,... your father is dead."

Kion froze upon hearing this.
"He's dead?", he asked, hoping for a different answer than what he just heard. Kifahari just nodded slowly, not wanting to repeat the words. "What about Mom and Kiara?", he asked, looking at the lionesses with fear in his eyes.
"We don't know", another lioness, Mkali, spoke up. "They were inside Pride Rock, when the hyenas made their way towards the entrance."

Kion swallowed hard, then looked at everyone.
"I need to find them. You don't need to come with me, but I need to find them", he said and they all nodded.
"Of course we'll help you", Fuli said.
"Yeah", Bunga agreed and the lionesses nodded.
"We are by your side", Mkali stated without hesitation.

If the situation would have been different, Kion would have smiled at the support shown to him, but it currently wasn't the right time.
"Alright, thanks to all of you", he said and looked all of them in the eyes. "But if something goes wrong, either because we encounter outlanders or because you are separated, you don't have to keep searching and should retreat to the backlands instead. If this happens, tell all pridelanders you see, to do the same."

Before anyone could respond, laughter errupted from behind the lionesses and they spun around, while Kion, Fuli and Bunga quickly made their way besides them. Some outlanders had shown up, including some hyenas, jackals, lionesses and leopards, Janja and Reirei among them.
"Well, well, look who we have here", Janja said and grinned. They had just found what was probably the largest remaining group of dangerous pridelanders and they were outnumbered by the outlanders. If they could take them out, not much would stand in their way.

"Everybody, stay behind me", Kion quietly said and the others made some steps backwards. Janja realised, what Kion was planning to do and his ears fell down.
"Oh poop", he said and braced for the roar. Kion roared. But nothing happened. It was just his roar as well, no roar of the elders accompanied it. Everyone looked confused at each other, surprised, that the outlanders were still standing, where they were. Kion, confused, that his roar didn't work, roared a second time. Again, nothing happened.

Janja grinned and then laughed.
"Looks like your roar has let you down, Kion", he said and began approaching the pridelanders, the other outlanders following him.
"Ehrm, Kion?", Bunga asked his friend questioningly, as the outlanders picked up their pace.
"Hold on, I'm on it", Kion said and roared again, but as the two other times, there was no reaction. He didn't have time to try another time and both sides clashed, the pridelands lionesses charging forward. Kion pounced on a leopard, that was about to attack a lioness, that was busy dealing with another lioness. He then jumped on Cheezi and from him to Reirei. But he realized, that even when he would do his best, it wouldn't be enough. There were just to many outlanders.

"Go!", he yelled. "Separate from the fight and retreat to where I told you to go!" He jumped towards a lioness and clawed at her face to distract her for the moment, which alloud one of the pridelands lionesses to break off the fight and help another lioness. Kion meanwhile ran right into the enemy group, trying to get hits on as many outlanders as possible, to distract them and get their attention, as he ran towards Pride Rock. He had to find Kiara and his mother and while he was doing that, he could at least lure some of the outlanders away from his friends and pride.

His plan partially worked and some of the outlanders started to chase after him. Kion looked behind him and saw, that his pursuers were slowly gaining on him. He took a hard turn to the left and caught some of them offguard. But with the rest still hot on his tail, he had to figure out a way to get rid of them. He saw two patches of fire in front of him, which were closing in on each other. If he could pass in the middle, before they meet up, he would have fires between him and the outlanders. He tried to sprint even faster, heading for the path, that was about to be closed by the  two fires meeting up.

He noticed, that the two fires were faster, than he had anticipated and would close the gap, before he would reach it. Looking behind him for another time, he saw, that the outlanders were way to close for him to try something else. He looked at the fire again and was determined to execute his plan no matter what.

The flames just seemed to get higher, the closer he got to them, as if they were working against him, which maybe was actually the case. Scar could control fires to some extent after all. Ignoring this fact, Kion reached the flames and jumped.

01.08.21

I forgot to upload yesterday. Sorry for that. I'll upload twice today in that case. What's up with Kion's roar?

Mkali means sharp.