“You!” the lioness gasped in anger as she recognized the other lioness’ voice, “How dare you, backstabbing rat! Does your a fought valiantly and ruthlessly, but it was of no use: more hyenas reached him with each passing second, among them a one eyed hyena that Kovu somehow seemed to recognize, though he couldn’t tell from when or where. By the time the three Pridelanders that had broken loose from the pride made it to the fight, Simba had already been surrounded, and the lionesses couldn’t even breach the outer pack of opponents. Pretty soon, they too were engulfed in enemies. Kovu found it hard to tell exactly how much enemies Simba was able to slay: he hit and bit a lot of foes, but never seemed to have enough time to focus on one particular hyena. His kills could probably be counted on the toes of one (perhaps two) paws, for the barrage of bites he was subjected to quickly brought the mighty king down: in mere moments, he disappeared below a mass of enemies. Kovu respectfully bowed his head, fearing the worst. Then, suddenly, he heard the most awful of roars, one that sent a shiver through Kovu’s entire body. He looked up again, just in time to see Simba rise up out of the flood of opponents once again.

“Kovu!” the king roared. For a split second, both lions seemed to be looking each other right in the eyes. Staring at Simba’s blood-stained face, Kovu imagined he saw signs of acceptance: as the king looked at his most likely successor, he finally realized that no help was coming, no charge of Outlanders would save him, and no Kings of Old would descent from the heavens to come to his aid; they’d probably only be waiting for him to join them any time now. And as Kovu saw that Simba had accepted his course of action, he could only pray that the king understood it as well. He hoped Simba realized just why Kovu could not come to his aid, and even barred others from trying.

It had not been an easy decision to make, far from it, make no mistake about it: standing and waiting while his king got butchered had not been easier on Kovu than it had been on anyone else. The only difference with other lions (save for a few extremely bright and pragmatic lionesses) had been that Kovu knew why he did what it was he did; he did it out of pure necessity. Cold and calculated necessity. Of course, Kovu’s one true desire at the time hadn’t differentiated that much from that of the lionesses around him: he too had wanted nothing more than to storm down in one last heroic charge to safeguard his king. But he realized that would have been foolish, despite all it’s heroism. True, a dedicated lion-charge might have momentarily saved Simba. But then what? Their entire pride would become embroiled in a slaughter without precedent, another clash with the same hyenas that had only days before scored a historic victory over the lions. The ensuing battle would have been one they could not have won. And even if, by some slim chance, the lions would have defeated the enemy, too few lions would have been left to claim victory. Was that what Kovu wanted, yet another bloodbath to claim the lives of so many fine lionesses, a bloodbath that would destroy their pride, even in victory? No. He couldn’t let that pass, ever. He was not about to sacrifice the pride simply because it would be the honorable thing to do, even though doing what was honorable would have been so much easier to do, and so much more easier to accept for his pride. Indeed, sometimes it takes a lion more courage to be a coward than it would take him to become a hero. That knowledge did little to soothe Kovu’s enormous feeling of guilt, though, for choosing not to give in to the urge for heroism had also meant sacrificing Simba. One could state Simba’s downfall had been the king’s own doing and his own fault, but he to claim such thing would have been wrong, for Simba befell no blame for what Kovu was concerned. Simba had always been a just and merciful king, and he had always done what was right in his eyes and based on his knowledge. His minor shortcomings, like his sporadic impulsiveness, did nothing to change that. Even his harsh stance for what concerned the hyenas could not really be blamed upon him: that had only been the logical consequence of his course of life and thus lay beyond his will. In effect, Simba was just another victim of the tragedy called war. And the thought of voluntarily leaving Simba to die made Kovu sick to his stomach.

As she realized her life partner could not possibly be saved anymore, Nala inevitably burst out in tears (not unlike most other lionesses, even Outlanders, who bowed their heads and wept in silence as Simba’s fate became sealed), but not before venting her thoughts about Kovu one last time.

“Kovu, you monster! You left Simba to die, you heartless bastard! You couldn’t care less, you let all this pass just so you could call yourself a king!”

Kovu slowly turned his eyes away from the battlefield, towards Nala, not knowing whether he should burst out in anger or in tears. It became anger.

“My sister is out there!” he shouted at the still heartbroken Nala, whilst ostentatiously pointing at the fight behind him, “How dare you even consider I would just leave her to her fate? I wouldn’t even give that as much as a thought, even if it would make me the lord and master over all the plains of Africa. What I do here, I do for you, all of you! I do this for our pride! Don’t you think I too feel grief at what is happening to our poor king?”

For the first time in days, he was able to pronounce the words ‘our king’ without a distinct ironic taste to it whilst referring to Simba.

“But as much as my sister and Simba’s fate troubles me, I have no choice but to accept it. If they are what it takes to save all of you, our pride, than so be it! Such is a choice no-one should ever be forced to make… but I was, and I have chosen my path. You may scold me all you like for making the decision I made, I deserve no better, but don’t you dare even suggest I did this for personal gain, or for the mere title of ‘king’!”

***

How strange a thing that, even though their coming had been aimed at saving him, none of the hyenas seemed to care for Vincent as soon as they reached the scene: they immediately went after Simba, who stood over their leader’s body, poised to deliver a finishing bite. As he lay suffocating on the ground, losing parts of consciousness at rapid pace, it didn’t take him long to realize his hours were numbered, regardless of his clanmates’ intervention. Realizing you will never again be able to look upon the stunning grace of an African sunrise, the simple joy of a young pup messing around or the soothing smile on a loved one’s face is not at all agreeable, nor is bleeding to death and choking at the same time. But for all the things he stood to lose forever, there was still one joy Vincent could live before darkness were to take him. With the little strength he had left in his broken and mangled body, he slowly dragged himself towards where Simba had just been standing. Meanwhile, the fight with the lion king raged on relentlessly, with fellow hyenas crashing down in the sand all around Vincent. A few of them never got up again. As he got closer to his target, Vincent felt the pain in his chest and throat intensifying beyond what he had thought tolerable, whilst most other sensory perceptions started whittling down and even disappearing altogether. His vision blurred rapidly, and even his memory started to fade, forgetting all that was happening around him. There was only one thought left that still dominated his mind and actions.

Almost… just give me those few second to get that bit further…

Then, finally, after what had seemed to be an endless ordeal (but was in fact jut traversing no more than two meters), he made it: by extending is right left paw, Vincent’s toe-tips touched one of the unconscious Vitani’s stretched-out paws. In that one last touch lay all the courage and comfort Vincent needed to let go… so he did.

*

After and endless stream of bites and scratches, Simba finally disappeared out of sigh, collapsing because of pain, blood-loss and who knows what else. Kovu lost sight of him as he collapsed and seemed to become covered in hyenas. This was the end for the lion king. About simultaneously with their king, two of the Pridelanders to have come to his aid were defeated as well; one had her neck broken between hyena-jaws, the other her entire forepaw torn off, after which she quickly succumbed because of her massive bleeding. The third one, however, seeing as how her king was gone, her allies killed and no help was coming, was able to, in a desperate rush, break through the hyena lines. As soon as she had broken free, getting severely wounded whilst she did, she tried sprinting towards the riverbank upon which sat Kovu and his pride. This was something the black-maned lion had not been expecting: if the lioness made it back to his riverbank, they’d have to engage the handful of hyenas that were pursuing her, and the battle he had so desperately been avoiding would still take place. But this time around, the hyenas themselves solved the problem, and by that I did not mean the hunted down the lioness: from somewhere within the mass of hyenas, a single order resounded.

“No, stop this! No