Zootopia Short Stories: The Raven's Kittens

The following story is based on the characters in Zootopia: A Raccoon's Redemption. Nick and his best friend Jake have taken Jake's sons little Nicky and Freddie to see Santa Paws and they have stopped afterwards at Jake's old friend Meredith's apartment for lunch and a story.

Meredith's story is roughly based on an old story called the Swan Maidens. This story is Rated T because one of the characters is a former prostitute and alcohol is mentioned.

My story Zootopia Short Stories: Clawhauser's is on the Case? has been placed on temporary hiatus until I can work out how get from the latest chapter to the end of the story. You've got to love good old fashioned writer's block.

I do not own the rights to Zooptopia or any of its characters. This story was written solely for the reader's enjoyment and without any profitable purposes. The story, all names, characters, and incidents portrayed in this story are fictitious.


"Get out of those cookies you wee scamps!" the wildcat huffed as she herded the two giggling seven year old raccoon kits towards the kitchen table. "And that goes double for you fox!"

Nick looked over at the cat, who was just a little over half his height, with a smirk until he saw the very large wooden spoon she was menacing him with as she gave him a stare with her green eyes. The brownish grey and black tabby wildcat was dressed in a simple white blouse, abet it was a little low cut, and tight jeans.

"Busted bro!" an older raccoon in a green polo shirt and khakis laughed as he helped his sons into their seats around the kitchen table. Jake Runnel still maintained his lean but muscular physique even after eight very content years of marriage with his wife Marie and fatherhood. Being a former burglar and now the owner of his own security firm, he made a point to keep fit. The wildcat named Meredith was his onetime lover and still a close friend. They had meet years ago when the raccoon was unemployed, single and living down on River Street in an old seedy motel that served as a flop house. The wildcat was one of Mr. Big's girls and at the time was working the nearby street corner doing what she liked to call the Adult Personal Entertainment business, also known as a hooker.

"Jakie," the wildcat called out with a grin on her muzzle. "I thought you were going to take your mangy friend to your tailor to buy him some deceit clothes? Where did even find a sweater that color boyo?"

Nick picked at the sleeve of his lime green wool sweater and frowned. "At Moose Mart, where else?" he answered. "They give us cops a discount on the clearance items."

"Ach that explains a lot," the wildcat chuckled. "I thought your wee lass had more class then letting you out in public looking like that."

The fox's ears went flat. "Carrots likes my new sweater," he objected.

"Give it up bro," Jake snickered. "You haven't won an argument with Meredith since you met her. The kits are starving and so am I, so sit down!"

"Now we got good old fashioned yummy Cock-a-leekie soup and tattie scones for lunch, just like my mother used to make," the cat proclaimed as she sat the pot down on the table. "This will warm your innards better than those nasty Bugga Burgers you were planning to feed these scamps. After all my darlings, your mean old Da made you stand in line in that howling cold snow while waiting to see Santa Paws."

"It wasn't that cold," Jake objected as he reached over and served his son Freddie a scone. "And I like snow before Christmas."

After they finished their lunch and helped Meredith clean up, they all went into the living room and the little raccoons crawled up onto the sofa to snuggle near the wildcat.

"Mew Mew, can you tell us a story?" little Nicky asked as he pulled a blanket over himself and his brother.

Nick grinned at the nickname the kits had for Meredith, who but children would call a cat Mew Mew? He was sure that they had never heard the highland wildcat ever mewing or meowing, but the name stuck.

"Aye, I have just the story," she proclaimed as she smiled down at the little raccoon. "Since your Uncle Nick doesn't like the traditional holiday story of Pinocchio."

"Honest John is such a stereotype of us foxes," Nick grumbled. "You know shifty and dishonest."

"And sly," Jake chuckled. "Don't forget sly." The fox gave his friend a withering look.

"So my dears," the wildcat continued. "This is a very an old tale from the highlands called the Raven's Kitten."

Jake looked up from the photo he had just taken with his cell phone of the cat with the boys and shook his head with a smile as the she began her story.

"It was a very long time ago and in the very heart of the bonnie highlands that there lived a clan of cats, they were great hunters and trackers. The greatest of all the cats was Finn MacClaw and he was a braw lad, tall and strong with a great spear tipped with a silver blade. Like all the cats in his clan, he had a thick coat of brownish grey fur. It was early in the spring, just before the year's last frost, when he had gone hunting. This was always a very tough time of the year for the clan, the lean days before the crops could be planted and before the wild herbs and spring greens had emerged. The clan was in need of fresh food and Finn was determined to bring back some birds for their stew pots.

Meredith stopped and shifted the two kits back into a pillow before continuing. "Now Finn had traveled far from his clan's lands, seeking the best of the birds and his travels had taken him into a glen at the foot of the Dark Mountain itself. As he slipped through the bracken and amongst the trees, he heard the sound of birds flapping near a pond. Slowly he crept through the trees, treading softly so not to be heard as he stalked closer to the pond. Peering around a tree, he saw a sight unlike any he had seen before."

The wildcat cleared her throat before asking, "Jakie, would you be a darling and pour me a wee dram?"

The older raccoon gave a soft chuckle as he went back into the kitchen to get three glasses and a bottle of Scotch. "Hey Meredith!" he called out. "Did you already finish that bottle of Skyfall I gave you?"

"It's under the cabinet and you owe me a new bottle," she replied.

"Mew Mew, the story!" little Freddie yawned. "What did Finn see?"

"Ach sorry darling," she laughed. "Well Finn had crept slowly up on three huge black birds that had landed by the pool of water and just before he pounced, he was amazed when they began removing their feathers like they were cloaks and from underneath them stepped the most bonnie naked black female cats he had ever seen!"

"This is a children's story?" Nick interjected, giving the wildcat one of his infamous smirks. "These two rascals are only seven."

"Don't call my kits rascals, you sly fox!" Jake called out from the kitchen. "It's like calling Judy cute."

"Mew Mew, the story!" little Nicky now whined. "The girl cats had no clothes on, so weren't they cold?"

The older raccoon came in with three glasses of whiskey. "Now Meredith, my sons are only seven."

"I don't understand," Freddie complained as he sat up. "So the girls didn't have clothes on, I see my best friend Chery without her clothes on all the time and she's a girl."

The older raccoon almost dropped is drink as he looked over at his son. Chery and Freddie had always been close friends ever since they were toddlers and you rarely saw the little raccoon without his coyfox friend by his side.

"Oh boy!" Nick sighed as he looked up at the older raccoon.

"Freddie, you really shouldn't run around with Chery naked…," Jake began.

"Why is it because she's a girl and doesn't have a little tail up front?" Freddie asked in an innocent voice.

"Yep, that pretty well sums it up buddy," the now embarrassed raccoon replied. "It's just not…ah proper. Let's have this conversation later on after I have a talk with your mother."

"The story Mew Mew," Nicky protested. "Tell us the rest of the story."

"Then back to the story," the wildcat said after sipping her drink. "So Finn, the great hunter, watched the three pretty cats as they played in the pool."

"Why weren't they cold?" Nicky asked.

"They were cold," the cat sighed. "Now lay down and be quite so I can finish this story."

"Okay," Nicky replied as he snuggled back under the blanket.

"So Finn saw the girls playing and he fell in love with the youngest of the three sisters, she was a very bonnie cat with pure black fur. But he was afraid that if he revealed himself they would grab their feather cloaks and fly away, so he took the youngest's cloak and hid it in the bushes so she couldn't find it. Then he pounced out to the pool's edge…"

"I hid something of Chery's once and she tickled me until I told her where it was," Freddie yawned.

"She always tickles you," Nicky added. "I think you like it when she does."

Nick grinned as he looked over at his best friend and Jake was pawpalming himself and sighing.

"Now our hero Finn pounced out of the woods and to the pool's edge, startling the bonnie lasses who were in the water, they were surprised at the sight of such a braw laddie."

"What does braw mean?" little Nicky asked as his eyes were blinking as he fought to stay awake.

"Strong and handsome, just like you my wee one," the cat answered as she tucked the blanked under his chin. "Now our hero wanted to know who they were and why they were there. We are the daughters of the night, they told him."

"They're asleep," Jake observed.

"Aye, so they are," the wildcat chuckled. "So they are."

The adults sat looking down at the two cute slumbering raccoon kits for a few moments before the fox whined, "You're not going to finish your story?"