This is a fic written for the amazing artist lelilelpop on tumblr during MadaChristmas Secret Santa 2019. I had such a blast writing this and can only hope I did the characters of AHKJ justice.

Homecoming

Clover felt herself grin as Julien's kingdom came into view. It had been several months since Julien had given her and Sage his blessing and allowed their marriage to be held at the waterfalls in the center of the kingdom. And while she had intended to visit sooner taking on the role of queen in a kingdom that was in the processing of recovering from years of war had proved difficult. She had a newfound respect for Julien ruling a kingdom alone. Even if he hadn't been truly alone with Maurice and herself at his side in (sometimes) full support, anything that went wrong fell on his shoulders. At least her and Sage were able to shoulder any blame together.

At the thought of her husband she felt a pang of sadness. Sage hadn't been able to make the trip with her due to some infrastructure issues that needed at least one of their full attentions. She had argued that she could wait another week or two so that they could visit Julien together, but he had insisted that she go without him than put the trip off any longer.

Of course, it didn't take much to convince her to make the trip alone. She had been wanting to return ever since she had heard rumors of strange outsiders arriving on the other side of the island. That had been the hardest part of transitioning from a guard to a queen. Julien had lost his kingdom before to outsiders and her instinct had been to rush in to defend his throne, but Julien was no longer her king and she had to worry about her own kingdom first.

"What do you think you're doing, showing your traitorous mug round these parts?" a familiar guff voice called.

"Pancho!" Clover grinned and broke out into a sprint as she spotted the member of the ringtail guard just ahead on the path.

"I didn't think you've ever be back." Pancho offered her a rare smile.

"For a while I thought the same," Clover explained. "The wars really did a number on the mountain tribes; its been challenging to adapt out of a solely militaristic kingdom."

Pancho snorted at the comment recalling some of the actions Clover had taken in order to keep Julien safe. He had once suspected that she'd become a dictator if given the chance. "And here I would have thought a militaristic kingdom would have been right up your alley."

"Don't get me wrong," Clover started, "I still believe in a strong military presence and strict security, but to abuse that power to expand your boarders is appalling. Especially when your own people are starving."

"Yeah that Koto was a feel piece of work," Pancho began to lead them towards the kingdom center. "Did you have rebellions to stomp down or was he a dictator everyone was happy to forget?"

"There was some resistance, although I think that just came from having power over so many other kingdoms." Clover held back a shudder at the memory of how blood thirsty some of the mountain lemurs had been. "Once Sage took the throne and started working towards forming proper infrastructure and trade between other kingdoms everyone was on board with not having to fight to survive."

Pancho grunted in discontent, "it really is an era of peace after all."

"There has to be some chaos." Clover remarked, rolling her eyes. She didn't recall many days when someone or something was threatening to kill Julien, take over the kingdom, or both. Not to mention the uncountable incidents where Julien was the one putting the kingdom or himself in direct danger.

"Yeah well, the most chaos we get is when Andy tries to sell scorpions again and I have to arrest him," Pancho explained not bothering to hide the amusement in his voice. Those were some of his favorite days in the kingdom, they always planned it so he was the one to do the arrest and that he was one who would be the guard on duty. "Or when I break him out of jail."

"Since when did you start referring to Fairfax as–" Clover froze in her tracks and felt her heart drop. "Where's Julien?" she asked softly looking up into the empty limbs of the tree that once held the plane Julien used as his throne room.

Pancho shrugged, "no clue. He's been gone for months."

"You mean to tell me that Julien is missing, and no one seems to care? Why aren't you looking for me? You're part of the Ringtail Guard!" Clover screeched her mind kicking into overdrive as she ran through a mental list of all of Julien's enemies. Perhaps Karl and Chauncey hadn't taken to retirement like had had believed they had. And of course, her sister, Crimson, had been suspiciously quiet. Only hanging around after the wedding long enough to give Clover and Sage a playful wink and tell then to call her once she had a niece or nephew to spoil.

"Geez, Clover, scream a little louder, I don't think they heard you on the other side of the island." A grating voice called overhead.

"Xixi!" Clover turned her anger on the small toucan that just landed. "Why aren't you reporting this?"

"Julien's old news," Xixi rolled her eyes, "he left months ago with those New York Giants."

"New York giants?" The name sounded odd on Cover's tongue and her mind latched onto the word giants. "Are you referring to the outsiders reported a few months ago?" Clover was already kicking herself for not investigating sooner. Julien always managed to get himself into trouble, why did she expect otherwise upon outsiders arriving near his kingdom?

"One and the same, great sky spirits that had to be one of the craziest news weeks of my life," Xixi added wistfully. "Now everything is so boring like total Snoozeville. I think the most exciting thing I've reported on other than your visit was this grump face's divorce. Which reminds me, Pancho, are the rumors of your engagement true? And if so when can we expect to hear those wedding bells?"

The semi-reformed criminal rolled his eyes and crossed his arms in-front of his chest defensively. "No comment. Now quit being a pest and go deliver the news that Clover's here before I charge you for slander."

"Ugh, fine. I guess I can always go pester Andy if you don't feel like sharing. After I deliver the news of course," the toucan turned her attention to Clover, "I'll catch up with you later so you can tell me if the mountainside rumors, I've been hearing are true. It'd be such a boost to my ratings if I had the first scoop on the new royal baby."

" Xixi—" Clover started feeling her face grow hot at the implications, but the nosy toucan had already taken off to spread the news of her arrival.

"While a lot has changed, some things never change, do they?" Pancho asked but his voice lacked its earlier bite.

"I don't understand," Clover looked around her and realized for the first time since entering the kingdom that there was a certain calm that hadn't been there before. The usual stirrings of chaos weren't seen or heard anywhere. No complaints from Hector, no screams of terror from Willie, or explosions from the direction of Timo's lab. Everything was calm- almost boring.

"Like I said it's an era of peace." Pancho replied patiently, after all he had had time to adjust to the mundaneness that had fallen over the kingdom in Julien's absence. Although if it hadn't been for Andy he probably would have lost his mind some time ago.

"That I understand and something that this kingdom has needed for some time, but I don't understand why Julien left." Clover suddenly felt small and unsure of herself. "He'd never leave his kingdom, not willingly. I mean, he fought to keep it and when he did lose it, he fought to get it back. It meant everything to him."

"I won't pretend to understand him, after Maurice, you'd be the lemur to know him best. But I don't think the kingdom was what he cared about the most." Pancho extended a letter towards Clover, "Julien asked me to give this to you, if you came for a visit after he left."

Clover took the letter and turned it over in her hands unsure if she should open it in front of him or not.

Pancho seemed to take the hint and started toward the waterfall. "You know your way around the kingdom and I'm sure you'll want to check on Willie, so I'll leave you to it. Welcome back Clover."

Once Pancho was out of sight she tore the letter open and began to read:

My dearest Clo-Clo,

I know you must be like so totally bummed out that I'm not there to great you, but I promise its for a totally mega awesome reason. These giant freaks showed up and told me all about this place called New York, apparently one of these giants was king of this place. He didn't seem very kingly to me, but whatevs. This New York sounded amazing and I had to find out for myself it was as great as they said it was so I decided to leave Stevie in charge and take Momo with me.

I'm sure that right now you're totally freaking out about me leaving, but I don't want you to worry about me. If anything, I think these last few years have proven that I am a totally awesome strong guy who can take care of myself and if I can't, Momo is still with me.

Now I need to be 100% real for a moment. Remember when I told you that I love you and just want you to be happy? I hoped that you want the same for me and to be honest with you, I have not been as happy in the kingdom since you left. That's why I have decided to leave. I miss having crazy adventures and meeting new people. I miss you. But Madagascar is my home and it always will be, I'm just following the adventure.

With love,

Julien