“Pumbaa! Pumbaa where are you?!” Timon cried. He bit his lip in anxiety. As much as he tried to tell himself that Pumbaa was probably devoting his entire attention to catching a really tasty bug, Timon couldn’t shake the feeling that Pumbaa was in trouble. Timon listened to the sounds of the forest but he couldn’t hear anything, not even a chirp of a bird. This just freaked Timon out even more than he already was.
“Pumbaa! Tell me where you are right now or I’ll…eat the juicy beetle I just caught! I was going to save it for you because I’m full but if you don’t come out right now, I will find the room to eat it!” Timon yelled. Again Timon listened but again he didn’t hear sounds that belonged to his warthog friend. Timon kicked the nearby tree in frustration, which resulted in him crying out in pain and jump up and down while holding his injured foot. When the pain had resided, Timon closed his eyes and once again went over what had happened just a few minutes before.
Timon and Pumbaa were just walking in the forest, feasting on the many bugs that lived in the All World forest. Suddenly, they were attacked by the hyenas and they were forced to run for their lives. But during their flight, Pumbaa tripped on a root which sent Timon flying forwards a good number of feet. When Timon looked back, Pumbaa had disappeared. Timon had been looking for him ever since. Timon opened his eyes and groaned. No matter how much he went over what happened, he couldn’t figure out what in earth had happened to Pumbaa. He also couldn’t figure out what he was forgetting. It was very important, and it was at the front of the meerkat’s mind but he just couldn’t remember what it was.
“PUMBAA!!” Timon cried. Timon didn’t care if he alerted the hyenas to his location; he just wanted to find Pumbaa. Timon started walking again, looking around for any sign of Pumbaa.
“If anything happened to that guy, I’ll never...” Timon left his sentence hanging and he also stopped walking. He gasped. He finally remembered.
“Hang on, no one is allowed to fight, let alone attack anybody in the All World forest. And no one has ever broken that rule. The hyenas are stupid but they’re not stupid enough to break the most important rule of all. So why now?” Timon asked himself out loud.
“Because they fear no punishment,” answered a voice behind him. Timon froze in fear at the sound of the sinister voice. But slowly, Timon managed to gather whatever courage he had left and looked around. And who he saw made his heart beat skip a beat in shock and terror. Timon would have scream except for the fact that his voice was stuck in his throat. Timon would have run except that his feet were rooted to the ground. All Timon could do was to look at the green woman before him, and even though he personally had never met her, he knew who she was. It was Maleficent.
“It is rude to stare you know,” Maleficent stated with an evil smile.
“This…can’t be…you’re dead!” Timon pointed out, finally finding his voice.
“So?” asked Maleficent while arching one eyebrow.
“So?! Once Prince Phillip killed you, you immediately popped up in the Otherworld! And once there, no matter how powerful you are, you can’t break through the boundaries that divide the Otherworld and the rest of Cartoonland!”
“Yet here I am,” Maleficent stated calmly as she brushed some imaginary dirt off her staff. When she was done, she turned to Timon with another evil smile.
“It is true that despite my efforts to break that insolent boundary, I couldn’t break through to have my revenge. But then, someone who is very much alive broke the boundary completely,” Maleficent continued.
“What…but…who would do something like that?” asked Timon in disbelief.
“That is of no importance to you. All you need to know is that all the villains who had died is now loosed in the world of the living. We have banded together and every single one of us will have our revenge,” said Maleficent. Such dread and terror that Timon had never felt before filled his entire being. Timon gulped.
“Why are you telling me all this?” he asked quietly. Maleficent gave such a sinister smile that all of Timon’s fur stood on end.
“Because you are going to serve me,” she answered. Timon’s terror was quickly replaced with rage.
“Serve you?! I will never serve you!” Timon cried. Maleficent arched an eyebrow.
“Really? Not even to save your friend?” asked Maleficent. The rage evaporated and Timon’s blood ran cold. Timon felt the icy cold hand of fear and dread squeezed his heart.
“You’re…bluffing! You don’t have Pumbaa! In fact, I bet he’s home, waiting for me to come home, so if you excuse me…”
“You don’t believe me? Well feast your eyes on this my little merekat,” Maleficent said as she reached into her cloak and pulled out a mirror that looked like the Beast’s mirror. Timon only saw his reflection for a second before it got replaced by a green-yellow colored magic that swirled around in the mirror like smoke. Then the mirror cleared and instead of showing Timon’s terrified expression, it showed a terrified tied up Pumbaa with hyenas surrounding him.
“PUMBAA!!!!” Timon screamed as his heart moved up to his throat. Then the image on the mirror disappeared and Timon again saw himself, who looked even more terrified.
“Let him go! He’s done nothing to you!”
“I know. That what makes the idea of dumping him in the Dip so delightful,” Maleficent said sincerely. If Timon thought he couldn’t be even more afraid, he was wrong. He felt so much terror and horror that his heart stopped beating.
“That’s right Timon. We have the Dip and once your ugly looking friend is dipped, he will be no more. No popping up in the Lion King land after a few terrifying days, or even popping up in the Otherworld. He will be gone forever and you will never see him again,” Maleficent continued. Timon, whose heart was finally beating again, felt the strength leave his legs, causing him to fall to his knees and hands. Timon looked at the green luscious ground below him, his heart conflicted and his breaths slow. Timon didn’t know how long he looked at the ground, two facts popping up in his head again and again. One fact was that he didn’t want betray the others in Cartoonland, including Simba. But the other fact was that Timon couldn’t live without Pumbaa.
“Well, what is your answer? I am getting impatient,” Maleficent stated. Timon took a deep breath and looked at Maleficent right in the eyes.
“What do you want me to do?”
