THE LION KING: RANI'S MAGICAL STORY

CHAPTER I: THE PREMONITION

Rani Haruka Williams was dreaming. Often times, she had dreamt of becoming an actress and a Broadway star like her father once was, before he gave it up to take care of her and her siblings after a series of medical mishaps and dangers.

But this dream was a whole lot different than the ones she had before, and it was a bit fuzzy. In it, her father was in a distant land with a powerful lion behind him. He was dressed in robes she had guessed were very important. He gestured to her, and in his right hand was a golden stick...and the stick was glowing. Was it glowing? Rani couldn't tell. She reached out for the glowing golden stick...

"Rani!"

Immediately, the dream subsided as her father's voice called to her. She yawned and stretched, and sat up, rubbing the sleep from her cream brown cheeks and lively jade green eyes.

"Rani, breakfast is ready! Time to get up for school!" Her father called.

"Coming, Daddy!" Rani answered as she sprang out of bed and got ready and dressed.

At 7 years old, Rani could already brush and braid her long black wavy/curly hair or put it in a ponytail or two. She couldn't do a Dutch braid or a French braid, at least not yet...but her father could.

When she was ready, she hurried downstairs. Her elder quintuplet sisters were at the table already digging into their breakfast. They were having toast and jam, eggs and sausage. Her five eldest sisters, a set of triplets, and a set of twins, adopted, were already at school, she had already noticed. Her breakfast was already out and prepared. On her plate, she had gluten free waffles, eggs and sausage. Reason being, she had an allergy to wheat and others as they had made her stomach hurt.

"Morning!" Rani greeted her sisters.

"Good morning, baby sis!" Kimiya answered, her brown eyes twinkling as her fair face smiled. The eldest quintuple's brown hair was in a perfect Dutch braid down past her shoulders.

"Hey, Ra!" Krishna, the second eldest had her tightly coiled dark hair in a half-ponytail down to the middle of her back. Her brown face was adorned with freckles as her dark brown eyes shone in familiarity.

"Morning, Rani-bun!" Kamala, the third oldest quintuple greeted, brushing back her dark brown hair down to her shoulders, and her blue eyes much like their other father twinkled. She had olive skin.

"Hey, Rani! Did you sleep well?" Katia, the second youngest, asked cheerfully.  She had black hair, biracial skin and dark eyes.

"Rani! Good morning!" Rani's cousin, Mei greeted, her piercing blue eyes smiled, and so did her fair alabaster face. Her naturally curly hair was in a half ponytail.

Rani sat down and started to eat as her father came into the dining room, still in his pajamas. Behind him, his doctor and uncle, Eli, joined him.

Joshua Williams sat down among them, his dark eyes full of love for his daughters and he smiled, a beard framing his face. His cream brown and rail thin frame took a smaller portion of a gluten free waffle, an egg and some fruit, sharing the same gluten allergies as Rani. His long past-the-shoulder length black hair was still in a messy ponytail for sleep. His husband, Victor came over and gently brushed his hair while lovingly greeting his daughters.

"Morning, Daddy! Hi, Dada!" The girls chorused.

Victor was from London, England, and he was lean and athletic, with black hair, blue eyes and pale skin, and a clean shaven face.

Eli, Joshua's uncle, was slim-built and had a bit of gray showing on his temples. His fair hand ruffled Rani's hair as his brown eyes twinkled with love and humor. Whenever Rani and her siblings would see him, he would always be wearing his scrubs and his lab coat with his name sewn on the left side, and he would also wear a priest's collar. Rani was also familiar with the things her great uncle had, like how he would always have a stethoscope on hand, plus their father's medical bed, in case of any trouble with his heart.

"Your dad might not be able to take you to school today, but your uncle Liam will be here in less than ten minutes." Eli said.

"Dad, did you have another one?" Kimiya asked, worried.

Of course, Rani had always known, as did everyone else in her family, what "another one" meant. She had telepathically felt it ever since she was still a baby. She had felt it last night and she could hardly sleep a wink the first few hours after she had gone to bed last night and just cried herself tired.

Joshua also knew, and those painful symptoms and episodes he had had with his heart were nothing new. At the tender age of three, he had been diagnosed with a heart defect, and since then, he had been unable to do anything strenuous like running and carrying heavy objects, or using his telepathic powers and his mastery in the Mystic Arts for a long period of time. Any misstep, he and his family knew, would be fatal unless a few gulps of water could revive him along with some much needed bed rest. Any missteps of any kind would send his heart into shock, and within minutes, he could die.

"I'm afraid so." Joshua just simply nodded, not wanting to hide the truth, and yet...he didn't want them all to worry about him so much.

"Daddy..." Rani looked on at her father in fear for him, as did her siblings.

"I'll be fine, really!" Joshua gave them all a reassuring smile. "Don't you guys have any tests to take today?"

Oh, of course, Rani remembered, as did the others. They had a spelling test, a test on times tables in math, a pop quiz in science, and a social studies test. Every Friday in school was a test day, and they were getting very close to the end of the school year. Rani and her siblings, and Mei, would be going into third grade once she passed those tests.

"Yep." Krishna and Katia piped.

"We have one in all of our classes today except gym." Mei said. "We all made sure we studied last night before we went to sleep."

"Focus on your tests, baby girls, and then you can worry about your Dad." Victor said gently.

"Okay, Dada." Rani nodded in agreement, as did her sisters.

Pretty soon after their dishes were cleared from the table, a car horn honked. Their uncle Liam was at the house to pick them up. Liam was slim built and had short dark brown hair slicked back, a fair face and hazel eyes. In his car was the girls' cousins, blonde haired blue eyed, fair faced Elizabeth, named Lizzie for short, and fraternal twins Brooklyn and Bianca. Rani and her sisters all waved goodbye to their father, great uncle and Victor.

A few hours later after Joshua had rested some more after doing some yoga...a mystic portal appeared with something written on a leaf from a palm tree, and it was addressed to Joshua and his friends and family. As soon as Joshua read it, his smile widened.

"It looks like I have an old friend to greet." Joshua said. "But first...I need a shower."

"Okey-dokey! Let's get right on it!" Eli said.