"That's not a philosophy, that's a celebration of irresponsibility!"



The savannah sun was beating down mercilessly, and so the five intrepid guardsmen had decided that the best place to find evil was, conveniently, in the shade. As a result, they soon found themselves traveling along the foot of a cliff that, unfortunately, did have the side effect of blocking half their view.

Fuli, who had moved ahead of the rest of the team with her cheetah speed, glanced around at the vast and empty plains once more. "So, remind me again: What is it we do, exactly?"

"Fight evil!" Bunga the badger bounced along the side off the cliff with inexhaustible energy. Presumably he leached it from the people who had to put up with him. "We're here to fight bad guys and protect the Pridelands from harm, as heroes always do. Isn't that right, Kion?"

"Actually…" Ono swooped down from the sky, not even bothering to inform them that no, he had found no sign of trouble either. "The Lion Guard is only supposed to 'fight evil' when the Pridelands are under attack, or if there's a rogue lion or something nearby. In times of peace we're supposed to help out with floods, resolve conflicts between neighbours, find missing cubs and other, you know… stuff."

"That's not so bad," said Beshti, who seemed quite cheerful now that he was out of the blistering sun and could cool his great grey back. "My dad always says that hard work never hurt anybody. Of course, there was that one time when my uncle worked too hard on the hippo lanes and then he dried out from the sun and died of thirst, but I'm pretty sure that only happened once."

Bunga immediately hopped closer to the cliff, seeking refuge in the shade. Apparently hard work was the only thing that frightened the Pridelands' bravest. "Yech. Well, if the forces of evil won't come to us, let's just go to them! The Outlands are chock-full of bad guys whose tails are just waiting to be kicked. We can call it one of them whatchamacallits – punitive actions or the like."

Ono glared at him, flying low just so he could better look down his beak at the honey badger. "Are you a moron? The Outlands don't fall under our jurisdiction. We could start a war if we did something like that."

Bunga waved his clawed paws in a lazy arc. "Eh. It's not like the hyenas aren't invading our territory all the time already. It's only fair if we get to attack them back every once in a while."

"I'm not quite sure my father would approve," said Kion. He squinted against the sun, trying to see if the distant herd of wildebeests was panicking or just resettling themselves. In truth he did not mind the quiet so much, but there was a strange heaviness in his gut – as if there was something he was supposed to be doing that he had been putting off for a very long time. It would go a long way to putting his mind at ease if he could just figure out what it was.

"Hey Kion." He glanced up to find Fuli staring at him. "No offense to your dad, but this is taking a bit too long for me, and I'm getting hungry. If it's all the same to you I'll go and catch me one of those gazelles we talked to earlier. You want me to get you anything while I'm there?"

"No, that's all right," he said. There was that sinking feeling again, stronger than before.

"Guys! I found an evil-doer!" They turned and saw that Bunga was enthusiastically waving a red snake around. He pointed to the bulge in the snake's centre. "Look, it's swallowed an innocent Pridelander! Don't worry; I know just what to do." As they watched, he pushed the bulge upwards with both paws, until finally the increasingly nauseous-looking snake vomited the bundle onto the grassy dirt.

The misshapen form of a mouse hurled onto the ground with a wet splat, still covered in yellow stomach acid. It stuck one trembling paw in Kion's direction. "K-kill meeeee…."

"What are you fools doing?" The snake coiled upwards to shoot Bunga a death glare. "I'm a Pridelander, same as you! You should be protecting me, not robbing me of my meal while I'm having a nap!"

"Oops," said Bunga. He idly speared the half-digested mouse with his claws and proffered it back to the snake. "Looks like you lost your lunch sir, but I found it again!" No sooner did the cobra snag back the mouse or Bunga tossed the snake away again, prey and all. "Eh, at least we did the mouse a favour. I think that counts as a win for the Lion Guard."

Fuli was staring at Bunga with an increasingly green expression. "You know Kion, I gotta take back that offer to bring you gazelle. I'm not that hungry anymore."

"Yeah," said Kion. He was not sure he would ever feel hungry again. "Me neither."

"Ah, relax you guys!" Bunga hopped over to Kion and put a paw on his shoulder, though he had to stand on tiptoes to do so. "Zuka Zama! Life's too short to worry about stuff like that."

Beshti leaned in closer, his great grey head taking up most of Kion's vision. "Zuka Zama? What's that mean, little B?"

Bunga jumped up before either of them could stop him. "I'm glad you asked, big B! It's my personal philosophy, just like my fathers' Hakuna Matata – the art of not giving a shit. It means that life is too much fun to let yourself be chafed by silly rules or restrictions or anything like that."

Ono's eye twitched. "That's not a philosophy, that's a celebration of irresponsibility! Didn't your adoptive parents ever teach you about the ant and the grasshopper?"

"Sure they did, Ono." He put on his best story-telling voice. "Once upon a time there was an ant and a grasshopper. The ant worked hard all throughout the summer, while the grasshopper did nothing but play and have fun. A hundred years later they were both dead. The end."

"That does it," said Ono, "I'm going back to scouting before he makes me puke." The white egret flew up into the sky, quickly becoming little more than a dot.

Bunga gave him a cheerful wave. "Okay, Mister Flappiest of Flight!"

"That's not my title!"

Fuli gave Kion a dubious look. "Remind me why you invited him into the Guard, again?"

"Yeah, I was really confused about that too," said Bunga, scratching his head.

"He's my friend," Kion said defensively. "Friends have to stick together. Also, it's really useful to have someone around who's willing to do literally anything you ask of him. Plus he nagged me about it. A lot."

Bunga grinned. "If at first you don't succeed, keep at it until everybody else relents from exhaustion – that's my motto!" He paused. "Well, that and Zuka Zama, I guess."

Beshti was also giving Bunga a doubtful look. "Well… I guess he is the bravest of the Pridelands. I mean, you saw how he handled that cobra. It's like he's not afraid of anything."

"He's not brave," said Fuli, "he's fearless. There's a difference. Courage is when you overcome fear."

"No it isn't," said Bunga. "Courage is the opposite of cowardice. Cowardice is when you're afraid of everything, so courage is when you're afraid of nothing. That's called logic, Fuli."

The cheetah rolled her eyes. "Can we just go back to doing… whatever it is we're supposed to be doing?"

"We could go help out my dad," Beshti suggested. "There's always a need for honest folks willing to do hard labour at the hippo lanes."

"That's… a nice thought, Beshti," said Kion. "We'll be sure to think about it. How about you, Fuli? Any suggestions?"

She hesitated. "Well…"

"Guys! Everybody!" They all looked up to where Ono was shouting, hovering above them and flapping frantically in the air. "Hyenas, in the Pridelands! They're attacking the Wildebeests!"

Kion cursed under his breath. It seemed that their movement on the plains had been the onset of panic after all – or perhaps that was just a coincidence. "Fuli, move ahead and try to draw the hyenas away from the Wildebeests," he ordered. "Ono, scout the area and make sure the herd doesn't trample anyone underfoot. Beshti, Bunga – you're with me."

"Alright!" Bunga was already moving, charging along with Kion and Beshti and somehow managing to keep up despite his tiny legs. "Till the Prideland's end… let's kick some hyena tail!"

The three of them ran onwards, Fuli and Ono already disappearing from sight ahead of them while a great cloud dust rose up behind them from Beshti's furious charge. Soon the hyenas could be seen darting in and out between the panicked wildebeests, trying to draw the weaker ones away from the herd. Fuli was rounding them up, snapping at each of the hyenas until they broke off in a panic, and then moving just as quickly on to the next. Soon the hyenas were starting to cluster together for protection, and Kion and the others seized the opportunity to position themselves between them and the herd.

"In the name of King Simba and all who came before him," Kion shouted, "charge!"

They rushed at the hyenas as one. The thunderous form of Beshti smashed apart their centre while the remainder gave way in a cacophony of screams and frightened yelps. Fuli pounced one, Bunga leaped on top of another while Ono swooped down and pecked at the eyes of a third, and Kion… Kion barely needed to do anything at all. The hyenas scattered and ran all the way to the edge of the outlands, only their leader holding his ground at the edge of the steep ridge that marked the end of their territory.

The adolescent hyena shot them all a dirty look from atop the massive flat rock that sat at the peak of the ridge. "Well, well, if it isn't prince Kion, the lion cub. What an honour, to be chased away by royalty."

Bunga stepped forward. "Beat it, Janja! This is our turf. You and your pack don't belong here."

"Oh? And where do we belong then, Bunga the Boneheaded? In the Outlands? In the elephant graveyard, where we can break our teeth on old bones in the hopes of finding some marrow?" His eyes narrowed dangerously. "We have to eat too, you know. If you force us to live out here, it's the same as sentencing us to death."

"You and your kind should've thought of that before you decided to break the law," Fuli said coldly. "If you can't eat, then stop mating. At least you wouldn't be creating any more misery for your own kind."

"And you must be Fuli the Fickle, in the flesh. You haven't even done anything and already you're one of the Pridelands' most famous heroes." He snorted derisively. "You're a fool if you think we're just going to lay down and die for you. If you want us dead, you should at least have the courage to do it yourselves."

"Oh, I have the courage all right," said Bunga, advancing slowly. "Or the fearlessness, if you prefer."

"Enough!" Kion stepped forward. "Janja, I don't really know about your situation or what happened with your clan, but you can't just come here and kill innocent Pridelanders. They are our people and they're under our protection, got it?"

Janja sneered at him, his eyes flashing with a dangerous light. "Your people? Your food, you mean. What do you think those lovely chunks of venison are made of? You're the same as us, Your Highness. You just want to keep all the power and food to yourself, but we'll get what's ours… one way or another."

Kion stared back at the hyena, an inexplicable anger welling up inside of him. There was a tension, like a line from his stomach drawing taut. "You'll get what's yours alright," he said, "if I ever see you here again. Now be gone!" As he spoke the last word he felt something give way, and the sound came out as a thunderous roar, as all the heavens shook with his voice. His raw desire for Janja to go away was made manifest into a hurricane of wind that whipped overhead and crashed into the hyena, hurling him over the edge and sending him rolling and tumbling all the way back into the outlands.

Slowly Kion picked himself up again, not even realizing that he had thrown himself to the ground once the hurricane started. What was… was that the Roar of the Elders? That's just… too much.

Bunga lifted his paws from the ears as the wind died away, then jumped up and broke into a grin. "That was amazing! Wow, did you guys see him fly? Come on Kion, do it again!"

"I'll admit that was pretty satisfying," Ono said carefully, "but all the same I'd prefer it if you didn't do it again. Those winds almost blew me away!"

"Yeah," said Beshti, "I felt like that roar was going to blow me away. Poa…"

Fuli stared at Kion without saying a word, though every one of her hairs stood on end. He felt like he was being examined somehow; as if she was trying to evaluate whether a particularly foul-natured elephant was about to charge at her or not. As if for the first time, she was seeing him as a predator rather than a friend.

"Sorry about that, guys," he said, brushing his tuft of red hair back in place. "I had no idea that was going to happen. The king warned me that the Roar could be… volatile, like that."

Ono nodded, straightening out his feathers. "You ought to be careful with that gift, Kion. Something like that could do a heck of a lot more harm than good. Especially if you can't control it."

"Are you kidding me?" Bunga looked at them as though they were mad. "You could use that to reduce the whole Outlands to a ruined wreck! Well, more ruined than it already is, I mean." He tapped a clawed paw against his cheek. "Hey, do you think that's the reason why the place looks like such a dump? That King Ahadi or someone used the Roar against the hyenas out there back when we were still at war?"

Fuli stretched and started moving back to where the Wildebeests had gathered. "Sometimes a wasteland is just a wasteland, Bunga. Not every place is as beautiful as the Pridelands or your oasis in the desert." Slowly, her hairs started to smooth back down, but the watchful look in her eyes remained.

"I'm just saying it would explain a lot," Bunga protested. "Uncle Timon and Pumba used to say that Rafiki always told them that back at the secret lair of the Lion Guard at Pride Rock, which I guess is ours now, that there are all these old paintings showing our history, and some of them would show…"

Kion let their words wash over him as he walked – his thoughts were with the Roar, and how he had just used its power without meaning to. Simba had warned him that might happen: He had told him of how he himself had lost control once, and how his grandfather Ahadi had possessed him as a result, in his fight against Scar. The fight which had split the peak of Pride Rock in two, and left the Lair of the Lion Guard as little more than a crater…

"Forgive you? You killed my dad and seduced my mum!"

"Look around you! Look at what your rage has wrought. All throughout the kingdom your subjects are dying of hunger and thirst, and your own family – your own son is forced to pay the price!"

"How dare you bring up my son, when it was you who killed him!"

"Kion? Are you alright?"

He shook his head. "I'm fine, Beshti. I'm just a little distracted, that's all." Where had those thoughts come from, just now? He was pretty sure his father had not described those events in that much detail.

They arrived at the plains where the wildebeests had gathered, the fear still plain to see in their eyes. Their leader bowed anxiously, sinking through his front legs. "Thank you… Prince Kion. We thank you…"

"That's… that's all right," he said, eying the horned beasts apprehensively. What was that Janja had said? What do you think those lovely chunks of venison are made of?

"Great," said Ono, coughing awkwardly. "Okay then, now that that's taken care off… shall we?"

"Right," said Kion, still staring at the wildebeests. "I guess so."

The five of them moved on in silence, wandering without any apparent purpose, each with their own thoughts in mind – except Bunga, whose excited babbling was largely ignored by the rest. After a while, Kion moved ahead to were Fuli made up the vanguard, as had become her habit.

"How do you do it?" he asked, in a voice that was barely above a whisper. "You don't have anybody to hunt your food for you. So how do you do it?"

"You just do," she said. "You sneak up on them from behind. You pounce and kill them before they have a chance to scream. And whatever you do, you don't let them talk."

Kion nodded. He would have to talk about it with his mother, or his grandmother perhaps. It would not be long before his sister would have to hunt for him too, he realized with a shock. Kiara. He was not sure whether he should feel grateful about that or not.

There was another minute of silence as they walked together, and then they heard Ono's voice.

"Hapana! It's the wildebeests – the hyenas are back!"

"What? Are you serious?" Kion turned and ran back with the rest of the group, while Fuli rushed ahead just as she had done before. By the time they arrived the hyenas were already running back to the Outlands, leaving the corpses of three half-eaten wildebeests behind.