The Enchanted Stars

"Heh... yeah, I get it," Kopa answered. He didn't know if he agreed that it was a clever name, but he didn't want to quash Gurri's hopes and dreams. She'd called him and the other kids there for a reason. What that reason was escaped the youngest of Simba's cubs, though. All he knew was that his grandfather had called the adults together to discuss something. No one had clued him in to what that was, though, so he was in the dark on both counts. The thought was shaken from his mind, though, as he padded in further and came to sit down beside Gurri. He knew he wasn't anything special compared to his brother and sister, but he was Gurri's friend and he wanted to support her in... whatever endeavor this was.

"What's going on, anyway? How come we're all getting together?" His head was tilted to the side and his big greenish-blue eyes were blinked a couple of times. So far, he wasn't thinking anything it would be anything dangerous. Why would a bunch of kids rush in to a fight without any idea of what they were doing, after all? Kopa did know that Gurri could be a brazen young fawn, though. Knowing her? Whatever she had cooked up was going to be interesting.

From the corner of his eye, he caught a glimpse of Fuli entering the scene as well. He only tipped his head down in a light nod to acknowledge her before he saw her take a seat nearby. Kopa still didn't know that much about Fuli. All he knew was that she was a friend of Kion's and that she was a bit on the older side. Back to the matter at hand, though. Kopa continued to mull over what Gurri could have cooked up. Maybe an adventure into the depths of the Great Forest? That could be fun. Maybe it would even help boost the spirits of their fellow Suns.

Then again, Kopa thought, she had given them a new name. The Enchanted Stars. That could have meant that the endeavor in question being anything under the sun. Maybe even something sneaky.

Honestly? Kopa kind of hoped that whatever they were planning wasn't dangerous. That was all that mattered to him.

"What's the kerbubble, Gurri?"

Beshte nearly echoed Kopa's sentiment as he trotted into the clearing. He had arrived a few strides behind the others, though he could practically hear the forest princess's proclamation from a mile away. It had been a little while since they'd met together, though she was never short on energy, it seemed. The faintest sense of nervousness began to brew in the calf's belly, but a good-natured hippo smile was enough to mask it for now.

From one look at her, the determined twinkle in the fawn's eye spoke volumes about the tone of the meeting.

His nerves were eased seeing Kion and Fuli at the edge of the clearing, as well as Kopa engaging with Gurri more directly. He settled neared his fellow Pridelanders, giving an acknowledging grin and ear-wiggle to the felines. Kion looked about as nervous as he felt. Though they weren't close friends, he could tell the cub's stoicism was a little out-of-the-ordinary. And it wasn't unfounded -- though Beshte was interested in the plan Gurri was cooking up, he knew that it could get all kinds of wild really quickly if they weren't careful.

He silently watched Kion's reactions before shifting his attention to the fawn's address. The Enchanted Stars was a fun name for their little group. Yet he couldn't help but worry, just the tiniest bit, about how serious Gurri was about her plan. It almost sounded like a name for a game of make-believe. But she seemed really determined to see it through. And with attitude like that, it was hard not to admire it -- even if she had the tendency to bite off more than she could chew.

”Y’knowww, some stars are actually the afterburners of giant alien spaceships blasting off billions of planet systems away.” Lilo’s matter-of-fact voice was loud and, she didn’t care, but a little know-it-all-ish. But so? She did know it all. About space and stuff anyway. And if she was going to make friends here, all these other kids should know it, first.

Lilo had been kinda nervous about coming to this meeting. The only time Myrtle ever called her to a meeting was to boss everybody around or tell her she wasn’t invited to the next meeting. But these animals might be way better friends than her hula school classmates. One of them was a real hippo, which was already much cooler than any of Kokaua Town’s usual wildlife. Speaking of which.

The Pelekai child unslung her bag from her shoulder and sat down in the grass, criss-cross applesauce. She pulled out her camera and focused it on Beshte—well, wait. The 10 year-old paused with a blank expression of concentration, lowered the camera, scooted back a few scoots, and then raised it again. There we go, he fit in the frame.

Oh, wait. Animals here talked. Couldn’t be rude. Lilo tilted her head and a lock of black hair fell past her shoulder. One pudgy brown hand lifted to wave. ”Hi! I’m Lilo.” There was a meeting going on, and she heard Geno start talking, so she got up and shifted around to stand next to the big animal. ”Wow, you’re really fat. Like a bunch of gray doughnut holes stuck together. You’re gonna look great in my scrapbook!” This last part was whispered confidentially. Stitch’s best friend patted her bag while sliding the camera back in.

This whole making new friends thing was off to a great start.

“How exactly are we supposed to get back at them?” The teenager’s tone was curious despite herself as she stealthily slid out from behind a tree. The question was meant to be a challenge, one to which the fawn would respond with some grandiose and dangerous plan to get revenge on the Thorns which Violet would then shoot down for being too risky. At least that’s how this usually went with Dash, and then he did it anyway and Violet would have to chase him down to ensure she didn’t get blamed for whatever happened. That’s why she was there, right?

Violet had heard the whispered calls for a meeting of the younger members of the Suns, one that was conveniently happening while all the important adults were busy with their own thing – probably about the attack on the Suns that happened not too long ago. It didn’t take a genius to figure out that whatever was happening in the forest was going to lead to some mischief or another, and that instinct ingrained in the psyche of every eldest sibling was what drove the super-powered youth to scope things out.

Her original intention had been to come and make sure whatever mischief it was that happened was kept at a manageable level. There was, of course, a chance that she was overreacting – after all how much trouble could a group of children get into? Non-superpowered children, that is. Maybe all that would come of this meeting was a genuinely deep conversation about what had happened and what they could do to help – within the rules – in which case Violet would want to be present anyway.

Any thoughts of that went out the window and the loud fawn’s intense proclamation of her desire to “get back” at the Thorns. That didn’t sound good, or safe, and every logical part of Violet – especially her big sister instinct - screamed at her that she couldn’t let whatever asinine idea this was come to fruition. But the part of her that had been present for the attack, been scared for her life and the lives of her comrades, and gotten her face marred by a raging lion? That Violet was extremely interested.

Vi wasn’t an idiot. She knew damn well whatever retaliation the Suns had in mind – if they had any at all – wasn’t going to include her. And yeah, okay, she’d done this song and dance with her parents a million times: putting children in the line of fire was bad. If they didn’t have to fight, they shouldn’t. She got it. But she had been there. She was one of the victims – though she hated thinking of herself as such – shouldn’t she at least get some sort of a say? Maybe it wasn’t fair to think she should be the exception to the rule but dammit she did.

And it was for that reason that she decided she was going to hear the fawn out. Sometimes kids could get things done – after all where the hell would Metroville be if she and her brothers hadn’t bent the rules and put themselves in danger once or twice? And hadn’t the fawn said something about “behind the scenes”? Surely that guaranteed a measure of safety, right?

Still, she had enough sense about her to make sure that whatever the deer had in mind wasn’t going to get them all killed before she signed up for anything. “I mean, wouldn’t that be dangerous?” She asked quietly, her hand twitching slightly as she fought the instinct to push her hair out of her face – she’d stopped wearing headbands while the marks on her face healed and she was still stupidly self-conscious about people seeing them.

She took a moment to take in the group of kids and realized she was unfamiliar with most of them. She could pick out a couple of familiar faces but that was it. Well, she supposed there was no time like the present when it came to making friends.

“Gurriii,” Worried Geno out of the side of his small mouth, ears twirling backward. “Mother said not to say ‘skunkhead’ anymore, remember?” He remembered. Not just because he loved the rules. Because she’d called him a skunkhead last time. And why? Because he was trying to keep her from jumping up and down on the frozen lake. Something about how much the ice could take before it cracked.

Gurri was cracked, and Geno wondered if he would ever stop having to hold her together. Why had he thought this time would be different? No matter how many unique kids had shown up, and no matter how nice the name was, his tail hadn’t stopped drooping since she’d predicted him turning it to run away. Well. He wasn’t going to. He imagined fitting his budding antlers into the ruts made by the great rack of Grandfather. He matched his posture to the mental reflection of the lordly deer, too. It always made him feel braver.

Bravery was what they needed after the attack where even a puppy like Angel and powerful creatures like Man had gotten hurt. He wasn’t sure sometimes if Gurri was brave or what Grandfather called ‘reckless.’ He’d have to ask what the difference was next time he saw Father. Anyway, Geno tried to keep his head up and his legs firm even as Violet and Fuli asked the real, scary questions.

The amber-eyed dawn locked gazes with Kion again uneasily. He liked it when his fiery cousin was near. Kion wasn’t bossy like Kiara could sometimes be, and he didn’t match Gurri’s adventurousness like Kopa always did either. He was somewhere in the middle of sensible and scary, just like Geno wished her were himself.

The young buck borrowed a little more courage from looking at the second-born lion. He’d kind of been hoping Gurri would just plan and plan and plan and not actually do anything really frightful. But if the cheetah and skinny Manling were going to ask her, what if she actually had an answer? Bambi’s eldest was certain he wouldn’t like whatever it was.

"Wait, shouldn't Kiara be here?"

The voice to pipe up was one of the youngest present; a little green-eyed cub who, so far, hadn't made her presence known. This wasn't Tiifu's usual group to hang out with, and her discomfort showed in her manner, in the way she kept her head down and didn't speak up much. The young cub felt as bold as anything when she was on one side of Kiara, and Zuri was on the other; but on her own, even around other kids, she felt uncomfortably out of place.

Still, Gurri had included her in the invitation to this meeting. Tiifu didn't know the fawn well, only that her family and Kiara's family were friends; but because of that, she'd sort of assumed that meant that Kiara at least, and probably Zuri too, would be here as well. But while she knew Kiara's brothers, and recognised a couple of Kion's friends, Kiara was conspicuous only by her absence; and that fact sat ill with Tiifu until finally she had piped up.

"She's the future queen; you can't just make important plans without her being part of it too."

At least, that was Tiifu's point of view. Perhaps the others saw the matter differently; but Tiifu, unlike many of the others, tended to see Kiara as less of 'just another kid like them' and more as The Single Most Important one of their number, due both to her future monarch status and to her being Tiifu's friend specifically. Kiara was the one whose opinion simply mattered most, she was the one who was practically infallible in the younger cub's eyes.

Was Kiara not here because she hadn't thought it worth her time? Or because Gurri had 'forgotten' to invite her too? Tiifu didn't much like the latter thought, which implied that the fawn didn't have proper respect for her future queen; but she shouldn't jump to that conclusion, Tiifu supposed.

"Maybe I should be Kiara's official representative, if she doesn't show up? I can speak for her, I'm one of her royal advisors."

Would Kiara herself ever have agreed to that arrangement? Perhaps not; not even Tiifu could be oblivious to the fact that the young royal's priorities often seemed vastly different from her own, and that she perhaps wasn't the best person to represent them. But it wasn't like there were any other viable options present, was it? And someone, surely, had to be Kiara's voice in this very important meeting.

“Centipedes! In their dens!” Shouted a thick young voice. As was his pattern, Taiwo’s body followed his words. He came down with a shower of leaves from one of the lower-hanging branches of the clearing’s tree canopy. That was what was nice about being off the savannah. More trees to climb.

The bulky lion cub plunked to the ground next to Tiifu. Almost on top of her, actually. His excitedly wide eyes bopped from Gurri and Geno at the heart of this gathering to the girl cub. He smiled and nodded at her several times, as if she were in on his suggestion. “Right? Huh? Centipedes! They’re fun to tickle-fight with but the worst snuggle buddies. I would know. My brother pranked me with them once and it was awful. Got him back though. Rolled a beehive into his zebra hide. I got stung, but totally worth it. Hey, we could do that too!”

There were twigs stuck in his head of unruly fur and his orange-tipped tail slapped the ground mischievously. Tiifu was one of the other kids he’d been acquainted with before the war, back when Jaribu and he had stayed a few days with Mufasa’s kingdom at Pride Rock and then wandered on. He thought Tiifu was pretty, with her green eyes and freckles. He also thought she was kind of snobby, always focused on Kiara and all that Royal stuff that Pride-member lions crammed their brains with. Which was why he’d been about to drop a few leaves on her from above while everybody else went on with their meeting. Just to see how many he could land between her ears before anyone noticed.

Then Gurri had asked for ideas and BAM! He’d suddenly realized he was interested in this stuff. The war was weird and big and kind of seemed like a rhinoceros horn up everbody’s tails. He wasn’t really involved; just waiting here for Jaribu to come back. But this part sounded fun. That Gurri was kind of great.