A FOX OF FRIENDSHIP

by Fanficteller

In a post-ice age North America. After her father is killed in the fight with a fox, Judy kills it in revenge, only to be transformed into a fox herself. To change back to bunny, Judy starts a dangerous journey to the mystical mountain, accompanied by her own worst enemy, a fox cub named Nick, who shows her the true side of the foxes in a way she'd never imagined.

7. Chapter 7: First Dawn as the Fox

FOX OF FRIENDSHIP CHAPTER 7: FIRST DAWN AS THE FOX

ENJOY THE READING

As the daylight started to rise upon the forest, the warm and bright light beams hit to Judy's eyes.

Because of its brightness, it was a bit difficult for her to open her eyes and she raised her paw between of her and the light streams to protect her eyes.

And then, after her eyes get used to the bright daylight, Judy opened her eyes.

She felt of course a bit dizzy, as everything she was able to see, she saw as fuzzy.

But when her eyes seemed to get a bit more clearer, even though not quite completely and her eyes seemed to open and shut by themselves, Judy turned her head to the right and to the left to see that where she was.

She seemed to be in some strange area of the fresh coniferous forest terrain, where the high red-brown and green conifers were growing all around of her in the fresh colors of the daylight.

Right next to also seemed to flow slowly and calmly flowing small river creek and a small distance away there was a small waterfall, whose flowing and falling waters humming was able to be heard even from this distance.

The morning air was fresh and the morning itself beautiful even and and she heard the birdsong in the air...

...Judy even saw the great bald eagle resting in the branch of the coniferous tree, staring down at her with its big eyes. However, the eagle did not stayed in place long and it immediately took flight and disappeared from sight...

...but as soon as she woke up, the various questions came like the hammering wave in her mind about the strange events last night.

Where she was at the moment?

How did she ended here?

What happened to her in the last night?

And first and foremost of all, what was all of that in the last night back in the peak of that mountain?

Judy groaned in pain for a couple times.

Her head was hammered by the fiery headache and sore bruises, as if she had hit her head hard into something, although she did not remember that to what she had hit her head.

Plus, her limbs felt stiff and that's why sore, causing the light pain as she tried to move her limbs.

Then, suddenly, she felt something wet and liquid on her forehead.

It could not be rain, because the morning sky was clear and bright and there was no any sign of dark rain clouds in the sky.

And then, she felt again something wet was carefully placed on her forehead, which appeared to be a wet piece of fabric.

Because Judy did not remember to put that wet piece of fabric on her forehead by herself, she did not even know that where it came from, Judy realized that wherever she was...

...She wasn't alone. There was someone else with her.

And then, out of nowhere and completely unexpectedly...

"So, Judith, my dear. Have you decided to join back the living again?" Heard the very familiar voice to speaking with the motherly, plus with humorously asking, tone.

"Ooh-ho-ho. That's quite a bump you've got, my dear child." The figure chuckled.

Urged by the hearing of that very familiar voice, Judy slowly opened her eyes again and, much to her surprise, she saw the very familiar figure of the grey-furred rabbit doe with the familiar purple eyes and white polar bear fur.

The figure brought from the river the another wet piece of fabric after squeezing excess water from it and replaced it with the old one on Judy's forehead.

"That must have been one heck of a ride down the rapids, but that's what you get if you raft that kind of rapids without canoe." The figure said and returned back to the river.

"Mother?" Judy whispered with the confused tone, after seeing now more clearly and spotted her mother, Bonnie Hopps, with her.

Hod did her mother managed to find her in middle of nowhere?

Slowly and groaning in pain, Judy sat up, straightened her sore limbs and rubbing her bruised head.

Then, her eyes opened to wide...

She had something very unbelievable to tell to her mother.

"M-m-mother, Y-y-you won't never believe this but I saw a very weird dream. I was at the top of the small mountain, and all of a sudden..."

When Judy tried to explain the last night events to her mother, but she was so confused and amazed about the last night's events that she explained everything too quickly and hastily that Bonnie did not understand a syllable of what she was saying.

In addition, the weird canine-like snarls, growls and barks which escaped out of her daughter's mouth while explaining, made her explanations even a more complicated in Bonnie's ears.

"Judy, honey. Shh-shh-shh." Bonnie said gently as she placed her paw on Judy's lips to silent her.

"Calm down, Judy. And, if you please, don't speak... or should I say... snarl, growl or bark so loud. Unless you want to everybody nearby to hear us and start to wonder that what the such of old and defenseless-looking rabbit doe like me is doing this close to the fox." Bonnie said.

The word "this close to the fox" confused Judy greatly.

"What are you talking about, mother? What do you mean with "this close to the fox?" There's not any foxes even nearby." Judy said with the confused tone.

"Are you that sure, Judy dear?" Bonnie asked, again with the gentle but humorous tone, making her daughter even more confused that about what her mother was speaking of.

"You seems to be thirsty. I'm sorry Judy but I did not remember to take a waterskin with me. It seems that you have to take the drink from the river. And don't worry. It is clean and fresh." Bonnie urged her daughter.

Judy only shrugged her shoulders and slowly stood up.

In fact, Judy found out that her mother got the point with that one, that she indeed was thirsty. She did not know neither remember that to where she left her own waterskin while hunting down the fox the last night.

Judy walked to the beach of the river and was about to pour some water to her to bowl formed paws to drink...

...until she saw her own reflection in the water surface.

Judy saw from it the gray-furred and purple-eyed fox-like canine in her reflection, instead of her normal bunny form.

She looked at her paws and noticed that there was a dark-grayed canine-like limbs with the long claws instead of bunny paws.

Judy gasped in shock and jumped upright.

Then he began to examine her bare but more fluffy body and much to her shock and horror...

Judy noticed that she was much larger by the size from the normal bunny size.

Judy started to palpate her head and face with her oddly long-clawed paws and noticed that she had the canine-like pointed ears and a long canine snout instead of her long bunny ears and small bunny snout... with the canine-like fangs in his mouth.

Judy also noticed that she had a long canine-like lower limbs instead of her bunny-like lower limbs.

"No. No, no, no, no! No! What has happened to me?! What is this?! Am I...?! Am I...?!" Judy panicked as she wobbled and jumped around and ripped the hair out of her fur and checked in panic the every last part of this a strange, horrible and inexplicable metamorphosis in her body.

Including...

"AM I...?!" Judy shouted in panic, as she turned her head to watch over her shoulder and, much to her horror, she realized that in the place of her bunny tail was instead a long and furry fox tail.

"FOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOX!"

Judy's cry of desperation and horror echoed in the air over a large area that it startled dozens of birds in every tree inside of her cry's range, making them to take the flight, and catching the attention of every animal inside of the range.

"All right! All right! Aaaa-a-a-a! All right! Would you settle down? Settle down!" Bonnie said trying to calm down her daughter.

However, such of surprise like this had came to Judy as a big surprise and as deep shock and horror, that her ears had gone deaf to anything else in the nearby or in the presence, including her mother's attempts to calm her down.

Judy only rushed loudly growling and barking hither and thither, that she once even lost her balance and fell on her nose to the ground, but kept going by crawling in the ground and pushing herself forward with her lower limbs.

In deep panic and disbelief that SHE was totally physically fox, Judy desperately hoped that this was all just a bad dream and that she would soon wake up from it. She tried to "awaken" herself by tweaking herself and slap herself into her faces, whack her head to the tree or jumping to the river, hoping that the cold water would wake her up in the seconds.

However, much to her agony, nothing did happen, no matter how many times she slapped herself in the face and tweaked (even clawed) herself.

"Judy! Judy... Judy, listed to me! Judy! Judy!" Bonnie called her daughter's name various to get her attention so that she would be able to calm her panicking daughter down before she would hurt herself in any way.

However, her calls fell to the panicked bunny's deaf fox ears.

"Ugh! This isn't going to work." Bonnie sighed in frustration after realizing that getting her panicking daughter's attention, so that she could calm her down, wasn't working by the words.

Even though Bonnie deeply hated such of idea, she dug from a fabric sack she was carrying with her the large turnip and raised it above of her head.

Judy wasn't aware of what her mother was about to do. She only continued rushing in panic all around and loudly growling and barking/lamenting in agony of such of fate of hers.

"MOTHER, PLEASE! WAKE ME UP FROM THIS NIGHTMARE!" Judy loudly pleaded/growled in panic, until she felt something hard to hit her in the right side of her head, knocking her to the ground and ending her panicking around... plus silencing her.

"Judy! Judy, calm down and listen to me, my daughter. This may look strange, which I'll give you that too, but this is not the dream, this is a real." Bonnie said calmly as she quickly hurried to her daughter's side before she starts to panic again.

"And besides everything, it was your father who did this." Bonnie added as she briefly pointed with her finger at the sky. Judy followed her mother's finger looking up to the sky and then she lowered her head down to look at her mother.

This knowledge "her father did this" drew Judy to confusion.

She remembered having seen her father, or more likely the Spiritual figure of her father, coming to her from the Northern Lights back in the peak of the mountain, and that her father had suddenly took her in the form of spiritual eagle in middle of the lights and then she had saw the bright light wrapping itself around of her... that was all she clearly remembered, nothing else.

"My father? But... but... w-why?" Judy asked with the whispering tone in confusion.

However, Bonnie had no idea why.

"That's a very good question, my dear." Bonnie answered apologetically to her daughter.

However, Judy's new form as the fox, who had still her rabbit daughter Judy's eyes and fur-color despite such of change, began to quite a lot interest her.

As Judy was about to ask from her mother that how did she in the world found her in the middle of nowhere, Bonnie started to circle around of her daughter's fox form examining her.

"Hmm, this is strange. Spirits don't usually make these kind of changes." Bonnie said.

Suddenly, she grabbed from Judy's canine jaws and opened them to see her daughters canine fangs a bit closer.

"Oh! Oh, my, my, my, my. I sense that your father must have something really big planned for you Judy. Yep, yep, yep." Bonnie said as she released Judy's jaws and then she started to examine Judy's canine arms, paws and claws.

"In fact, I knew that you were gonna get something as a payback from the Spirits... and I was expecting something the way of worse. No offense, of course, my dear, but I actually never believed it coming in this way." Bonnie said.

"But instead, you are going to get a whole new perspective on things." Bonnie added, to Judy's confusion and made her to ask from herself in her mind that what her mother was talking about.

Suddenly, Bonnie grabbed from Judy's face and pulled with her fingers the skin, flesh and fur aside around of Judy's right eye.

"Oh! And because the canines are usually the color blind, tell me Judy, do you see everything in black and white or in colors?" Bonnie asked quite humorously.

As Bonnie let go of Judy's face, Judy rubbed with her fox paw the area around of her right eye and turned to her mother a bit annoyed look on her face.

"Mom, enough of this stupid examining! Let's just get back to the village." Judy said in annoyed.

However, Bonnie shook her head apologetically.

"I'm sorry, Judy, but from two of us only I am able to go back to our village, not you, not especially in that current form of yours. You know very well that what our people thinks about the foxes and they'll never believe that you're actually one of us but in the skin of our natural enemies. Who knows if one of them err to believe you as the fox too much that one would make even the canopy above of the doorway of his burrow from your furry fox skin? Is that what you want, my dear daughter?" Bonnie said with the warning tone.

"BUT MOM...!" Judy tried to protest, nearly threatening her mother like the fox does when it's cornered its prey (bunnies) in the corner with no escape.

"NO BUTS, young lady!" Bonnie said as she unexpectedly and lightly painfully pressed her finger against Judy's fox nose, causing Judy to yelp in pain and back off.

"You see Judith? Both me and your big sister tried to warn you about this, or something like this, but the certain stubborn daughter didn't paid any attention to reason told to her by her own family. And now look at yourself, and know that you got yourself into this mess." Bonnie said with the scolding tone at her daughter as Judy rubbed with her lightly sore nose with her fox paw.

"I have no power to change you back, but someone, who led me here to you after you washed ashore the last night, has that kind of power. So, Judy my dear, if you want to change back to bunny, take it up with your father's Spirit." Bonnie said as she waved with her paw gently to the sky.

Judy looked at the sky, not seeing any sight of her father neither the lights she saw the last night and she lowered her head and desperate look in her face down and looked at her mother.

"But how, mother? The Lights appear only at nighttime and now it's the middle of day. Besides, He's the Spirit and I'm the mortal... and the fox." Judy lamented with the disgust turned desperate tone.

Bonnie then referred her to follow her paw, as she knelt down to the ground and drew with her fingers a picture of the ground the three-pointed Mountain on top of which was two slithering lines like Northern Lights. The last time when Judy had seen the such of pic was during of her ceremony back in the cave near of her village.

"You'll find him on the three-pointed Mountain, where the Lights touch the earth." Bonnie said as she stoop upright after drawing the pic to the ground.

"He'll help you make up for what you've done wrong." She added, which draw Judy to confusion again.

What her mother was talking about with that "done wrong?"

"But... I-I-I didn't do anything wrong." Judy tried to protest as lightly shook her head as disagreement and she raised her head to look at her mother.

Only to find the place where her mother was standing the second ago.

Confused about this, Judy hastily looked around of her trying to find her mother with her eyes.

However, Bonnie was completely disappeared from the scene... inexplicably and unexpectedly.

"Mother? Mother! Mother, wait! Mother! I-I didn't do anything wrong!" Judy yelled in the air, hoping that her mother would still hear her.

However, there was not response to be heard.

Judy sighed in defeat.

She realized that she was now on her own in middle of the wilderness... and with her was only the knowledge about the place where she would change back into the bunny she was still yesterday.

But the real question was... where it was?

Judy sighed again in frustration.

"She should have tell me that from where I can find that mountain... at least even advise that how to get there." She said to herself.

Suddenly, she heard some voices behind of the nearby rock. Something which sounded like there was fierce argument going on.

"What happened to them?" Asked the first voice from someone else, with quite annoyed and demanding tone.

"I don't know." Said another voice, more likely mumbling that Judy did not get clear from the speaker's words... as though the speaker had something in his mouth.

"But they were right here. How they could have to disappear just like that?" The first voice said again.

"Yeah, that's pretty weird." Mumbled the another voice again.

"But I left them under of your guard and I was gone only for ten minutes... and now they're gone. So, you gotta know what happened to them." the first voice said.

"I already told you, I've not idea where they went. They were right under of my watching eye but after I turned my back, they weren't here." Mumbled another voice yet again.

Judy walked to the rock the behind of which the voices came from and carefully peeked to behind of the boulder to see what was going on there.

Judy noticed two red-brown furred chipmunks, one of which is quite a bulging cheeks, squabbling with each others right next to the rock, unaware of the fact that Judy was at the moment looking down at them.

"So you're telling me you didn't eat them and you have no idea WHERE THEY ARE?!" One of them asked from the another one greatly frustrated.

"Uh-uh." Was the mumbling chipmunk's only answer to that.

Then, Judy opened her mouth to ask some guidance from the chipmunks for her upcoming journey to the three-pointed mountain.

"Uh, excuse me, guys." Judy said, catching the chipmunks attention to herself.

"I'm sorry to disturb you, but may I ask from you something?" Judy asked friendly.

However...

One of the chipmunks, the one who had spoke at first from two, took the expression of hate on his face and pointed at Judy with his finger accusingly... much to Judy's confusion and shock.

"Aha! We got the fox in here! I could swear that that sneaky and mean thief stole our acorns while I was gone and you turned your back to them!" Chipmunk said accusingly and scolding to his friend.

Judy stared at the chipmunks both confused and shocked.

"Where's our acorns, thief?! What have you done to them?!" The first chipmunk angrily demanded as he picked some tiny little rocks into his paw.

Such of loud demanding caused Judy to back off lightly, until she started to wonder in her mind about what the chipmunks were talking about.

Was that chipmunk accusing her for theft? Judy asked from herself in her mind.

Judy knew that to get forward in her case, she had to explain to chipmunks that she never knew about the presence of the chipmunks and she has not stole nothing from them because she found herself from lying here unconscious for almost half an hour ago.

"I think that you've misunderstood, but..." Judy tried to explain, until something hard hit her into her nose, causing her to let out the light yelp and turn away from the chipmunks.

"Tell us what have you done to our acorns, you filthy thief!" The chipmunk demanded more angrily and threw another small rock at Judy.

The rock hit her in the forehead as Judy turned back to the duo.

"Hey! OUCH! Please, stop! OUCH! I don't even-OUH! Even know what you-OUCH! You're talking about. I didn't-OUH! Stole anything-OUCH! From you two. I'm only-UH! I'm only asking-OUCH! Asking from you-OUCH! A direction-OUCH! To the three-OUCH! Three-pointed Mount-OUCH-tain!" Judy tried to explain between of the painful hits from the rocks thrown by the chipmunk.

Another chipmunk with the wide ball-like cheeks was lightly shaking in horror at the sight of the predator mammal over them, which was none else than the red fox... strangely with the gray fur for which she could be mistaken for a wolf.

The chipmunk even stepped slowly back after seeing Judy's bared canine-teeth for once as she bared them in pain due to hits from the rocks that his friend threw at her.

However, unlike his friend, noticed that all what Judy, even though he did not knew her name, wanted was just ask something from them.

He felt quite awkward and seemingly even a little strangely penitent, when none was watching towards him, at the sight of someone suffering from the false charges, particularly the one which he or they both were not seen in the presence of the entire morning.

So, in order to not cause the fox go in rage which would led it to eat them in high dudgeon, the chipmunk walked to next to his friend and tried to stop him from throwing the rocks at the gray fox. He managed to grab from his friends wrist before he managed to throw the next rock at the fox.

"C'mon, buddy. Knock it off. That fox probably does not have anything to do with this. Maybe she just ran into us by accident. Moreover, it appears that she may have something to ask from us. Let's hear what she wants so she leaves and leaves us alone." The chipmunk mumbled.

However, the chipmunk pulled his wrist out of his friend's grab.

"Are you saying that that fox is an innocent?! No way! He stole our acorns! That's what the foxes are! All of them! They're sneaky, they're cunning, they're selfish, they're dishonest, they're liars, they're untrustworthy ones, they're savages, dumb predators. I mean, they're..." Chipmunk listed as he threw the last rock at Judy.

It nearly hit straight to Judy's right eye, making her yelp loudly in pain.

"OUCH! HEY, YOU DAMNED RODDENT!" Judy barked with the loud, annoyed and venomous tone as the hardened and an agry look appeared on her face.

Judy even bared her canine-teeth at the chipmunks as she growled at them in annoyance and staring them her purple eyes in the venomous look.

Both chipmunks startled in horror to Judy's canine-like bark, growling and teeth and jumped backwards, before they began to back away... reeeeaally slowly, step by step, staring the fox in horror and stretching out their paws forward as a sign "Please, don't!"

"O-okay... m-m-maybe that was a b-bit... t-t-too m-much. So... w-what if... we j-j-just... l-l-leave f-from here." The chipmunk whispered in horror.

Judy's expression on her face softened immediately as she realized that what these poor chipmunks were afraid... they were afraid of her, or at least her form of fox.

"W-what? Huh? No. N-n-no, no, no, no! W-Wait, wait! Guys, wait! Please, I-I just wanted to ask from you one thing, please, wait!" Judy pleaded desperately, causing her to step hastily forward towards the chipmunks and bare her teeth more in the desperation.

This was too much for another chipmunk. The sudden shock and horror caused him eventually to spit two Judy's rabbit form's fist-sized and slimy acorns, which had to be the certain acorns his friend was looking for, out of his mouth, which both of them hit his friends head.

The sudden shock and horror filled his friend as well and both chipmunks suddenly let out the scream in horror and fled from the scene.

"Liar! I knew you had them!" One of them yelled to another as they disappeared from Judy's sight into the woods... much to Judy's desperation.

Plus, to her annoyance, because that chipmunk did not bother to apologize his offensive words - the same offensive words about the foxes which she remembered ironically having said herself, when she openly explained her thoughts about the foxes to her father after she received her totem from her mother back in her home village a long before this entire mess - and his false believe her as the thief.

Judy did not bother to go after them, because she knew that the chipmunks would never even bother to listen to what she had to ask from them.

"Are we there yet?" Suddenly asked the teen-like voice with the deeply bored and impatient tone from high above of her... and the trees.

Judy raised her head to the direction of the source of the voice and spotted the goose flock flying in the sky in the formation... right above of her.

"This is my very last warning to you, young lady. Don't make me turn this formation around!" Said back the father-like voice with the very annoyed and impatient tone.

Because these were gooses, and ability to fly in the air and the long distances, Judy started to jump around and wave her paws to get the departing gooses attention, so she could ask from them the direction to the tree-pointed mountain.

"HEY! HEY! HEY! HEY! WAIT! COME BACK! I NEED TO ASK FROM YOU SOMETHING! COME BACK! PLEASE!" Judy pleaded as she waved her paws hastily.

The flock was, much to her great and deep desperation, getting far away from her... too far away for them to spot the gray-furred fox in the woods who needed so badly their help and waved her paws in the air to get their attention, until...

however, One of the gooses suddenly turned around and flied towards her... much to Judy's relief.

As the goose, female goose, finally reached to her... she, however, remained in the air out of her reach, floating and circling her in the air instead of coming completely down.

"I heard you calling for us. What do you want, fox?" The goose asked while she was floating in the air above of Judy.

Judy sighed deeply in relief.

"Praise be! Uh... yes. I have a small distress. You would not happen to know that where..."

As Judy was about to ask what she wanted to ask from the goose, she suddenly felt her neck starting a little bit ache.

It certainly was due to the fact that Judy had looked up at the sky after the flock of geese a bit too long so that her neck began to ache. And the aches got slightly worse as she rolled hear head in the circle as she followed the goose's floating in the circle above of her with her eyes.

She even felt herself a bit dizzy after following the goose with her eyes.

The goose herself noticed this as well... and maybe it was her intention or something.

As Judy lowered her head carefully down, her neck felt even more rigid and aches were even more painful. Judy moaned loudly in the light pain as she rubbed her aching neck with her clawed canine-paw.

"Uh... can you come down here, so... UH... so we can talk... OW... personally in the same... OUCH...evel with each others. OW! Please, my neck... UH... aches. UH. OUCH. Can you stop... OW... stop flying the circle... OUCH... over me like that and come down to... OW... speak with me personally? Judy asked while moaning in pain and rubbing her neck between of her words and the waves of pain in her neck.

However, the goose did not lowered on the ground. She only kept floating and circling Judy in the air.

"And why I would do that. You're a fox and I'm a goose and foxes eat the geese." The goose asked, apparently hesitating the idea of landing to the ground with the fox, because the geese and the foxes were natural enemies... as well as were the bunnies and the foxes.

Judy sighed in frustration, but she knew that the goose was right... and for reason because of her being stuck in the fur of the fox.

"Hey, there's... UH... nothing need to be worry about... OW. I may look... OUCH... like a fox but I'm not... OW... I'm not gonna... AH... not gonna harm you... OUCH... in any way." Judy said, struggling with her annoying neck aches.

However, despite Judy's sweet, polite and kind tone of voice, the goose was still greatly hesitant to land on the ground with the fox.

Because of this, Judy started to wonder that was this goose lost sometime ago someone very close to her to the teeth of the fox and was due to that loss very wary with the foxes like most of the mammals.

"How do I know that you do not attack me, snap off my neck and eat me very soon if I land to the ground? How do I know if that what you call "neck aches" and speaking so kindly with the silver tongue aren't just a trick to get me to feel pity for you and come down as the easy prey for you?" The goose asked with clearly apparent mistrust.

Judy was slowly losing her patience but hardly struggled to keep her cool. She knew that if she wanted some necessary information what she wanted, she had to convince the goose that there was no reason to be afraid of her in order to gain the goose's trust and get her to open to her.

"Look, I'm just needing your help, that's all what I want. I don't want to bring any harm on anybody. I don't even eat meat despite the fact I may look the fox and the canine predator. I know that you may see me as disgusting, cunning and untrustworthy fox as many others do, but I'm not asking for your trust. I just need some information that are very important to me. If you only would help an animal in distress, even the fox, I don't bother you any more after that. Let me just ask from you something and whatever your answer is, I promise that I'll let you go in peace. Please... please... please..." Judy pleaded and began to beg on her knees for help from the goose like the poor and the wretched beggar and trying at the same time to look a pitiful fox puppy, even though

After hearing Judy, the goose seemed to be struggling with herself emotionally... between of feeling pity for the pitiful rox like Judy's fox-form and being wary of her because she was the fox. She had also a touch of the urge to turning her back at the fox, turn around and take off, leaving the pitiful "but possibly dishonest and opportunity-to-attack waiting" fox behind with her "possible fake" despair.

However, Goose was seemingly giving up to her feeling pity for Judy and, with the reluctant snort, reluctantly began to lower the high between of her and the ground, much to Judy's relief after she realized that what the goose was doing.

The wide smile appeared to Judy's lips as she followed with her eyes the goose's landing on the top of the rock.

"Alright, I will listen to you and help you if I can, fox. But you must promise me that you stay an over five meters away from me that you cannot gain any opportunity to break your word and attack me undetected after we've done with this. Deal?" Goose demanded.

Without hesitation or objection, Judy immediately swore to do as the goose demanded with the smile on her face and the spark of hope in her heart.

To get to go one step forward on her path towards of being bunny again, there was no power in the world that could not get Judy to break her promise, because then she would lose her opportunity to get the information she needed so badly to find that mountain.

"Alright, and keep your word then." Goose reminded.

Even though the goose had granted to Judy the chance to ask from her something, she remained alert and ready to take flight if the things do not go as she and Judy had agreed.

"Well, then, What did you exactly wanted to ask me at all?"

Judy's smile widened even more, thanks to the long fox snout, that she immediately stretched her paws forward and opened her mouth to explain her problem from the beginning to the end before her the main question.

However, before she managed to get a single word out of her mouth...

"CHARGE!"

All of a sudden, Judy felt a strong and heavy strike unexpectedly hitting her in the right side of her head. The strike was strong and heavy enough to toss Judy roughly to the ground.

This surprised badly both of her and the goose.

Suddenly, before Judy had a time to recover from the sudden attack, Judy felt another similar heavy strike against her left flank, which tossed her roughly aside and caused her roughly collide against the large trunk of tree.

Judy fell down from the trunk and landed roughly against the rock.

Judy tried to slowly get back on her feet, during of which she gritted her canine teeth in pain and rubbed her stomach with her right paw due to fact that her stomach had took the rough impact against the rock and caused to her such of pain and feeling which almost made her to vomit.

Then, she felt again the hard strike which hit her under of her lower canine jaw. The impact hauled her roughly upright on her feet and nearly caused her to fall off the top of rock. But before she could, she felt yet again the hard impact to her already sore stomach, which tossed her off the rock to the pile of tons and tons of mud near the river.

There was heard the big SPLATS as Judy roughly landed to the mud.

And after the splat, it was followed by the mean and mocking laughter from someone... or rather, someones from the near.

Covered by a thick layer of the wet and slightly sticky mud, gritting her teeth in pain Judy stood up on her all fours and shook as much mud off her as she was able to and nearly let out the angry growl and loud angry bark at anyone who had attacked her and was now laughing at her like that. But instead of wondering that who had attacked her and considering to fight back, Judy tried to wipe the mud, which was running down her faces bothering her eyes, off from her head and face to see better.

She was now both blind and unable to defend herself.

"Hey! Stop! Enough!" Judy heard the same goose shouting to her attackers, trying to beg them to stop this unnecessary beating.

However, it apparently felt to the deaf ears.

Judy then felt another strike impacting to her stomach... yet again... sending her roughly into the air and causing her to splats into the tributary.

The cold river water helped Judy to wipe off the rest of the mud off from her fox fur, but it did not helped to her severe and three times increased pain in the stomach, forcing Judy to fall down on her kneels holding with her paws her aching stomach and gritting her teeth due to strong waves of pain, which caused her to feel dizzy and nearly caused her to vomit to the river.

After the last mud were wiped off from Judy's face and she was able to see again, she noticed the entire flock of geese, the same flock she saw in the sky and to which the first goose belonged, standing on the top of the rock before of her. The largest one of them, the leader and possibly the teen goose's father, was standing in front of the flock and surrounded from behind by the five a slightly smaller male geese, probably his teen children, who were all starring at Judy with either angry, disgusted or maliciously grinning look on their faces... telling to Judy that it was them who a moment ago had attacked her like that.

Only their father was apparently purely furious... only because he was probably filled overly full with the misunderstanding about the situation he saw between of Judy's gray-furred fox form and her own daughter, whom he had probably noticed of missing from the flock.

On top of that, his misunderstanding about the situation was seemingly breed by his apparently overprotective towards his daughter... plus... the strong prejudice against the predators... especially the goose-eating predators like the foxes.

"Let that be the life lesson to you what happens if you ever again try to wrap your filthy fingers around of my daughter's neck, you... you... you-you-you filthy flea-coat savage!" The goose father said highly harshly and with the emotionally stabbing venom in the voice.

"Get out of here to snap your filthy teeth around of mammoths tails. Hopefully you got trampled under of their feet if you managed to cause the stampede." The goose father added as he and his sons, still mocking Judy, turned around and prepared to take off.

It was then when his daughter flied on the scene and gasped after seeing how her own family had treated Judy. She didn't in fact loved the foxes, but seeing wet and bruised Judy struggling under the pain and all those emotionally hurting mocks his brothers shot out from their beaks upon of Judy, after she had treated her and spoke to her so politely and kindly and even promised to not hurt her in any way despite being the fox, made her to feel greatly pity for the poor thing and it caused her to turn to her father.

"Father, that was cruel and unnecessary towards that poor thing. That fox only wanted to ask me for some help in her problem and she had no intention to harm me in any way. She even gave me her word to stay over five meters away from me. There's no way she could have wrap her fingers around my neck due of me being far away from her reach. She did not seem to have even the intent to hurt me. She even seemed to be the honest, friendly and no-harm-meaning despite her species. You would have given her even a chance." The goose exclaimed with the scolding tone to her father.

However, her father was immediately disagree with his daughter's claims.

"My dear, There's no way we should trust to that beast, which is on top of all the goose-eater. What if her "problem" was just a fake? What if she really intended to break her "word not to harm you in any way" treacherously very soon as you turn your back to her? Plus, the foxes are not just cunning but also fast. You have still the problems with the perfect take off, my dear. What if she really intend to run you down and wrap her filthy fingers... or worse, her teeth... around of your neck into the deadly squeeze? Besides, what if you would have happened the very same accident that happened to your cousin, and why, because he trusted too much to one of those filthy sneaky goose-eaters and which cost him his and his family's life? Tell me that." The goose father fired back.

Hearing that, both Judy and the goose daughter found themselves dumbfounded.

Goose daughter was immediately unable to protest about the apparent difference on Judy's fox form, but Judy found herself internally shocked after hearing that that goose's cousins along with his or hers family had paid a high price with their lives for trusting to the foxes too much.

"Besides, that's what the foxes are, my dear. All of them. They're sneaky, cunning, selfish, dishonest, liars, untrustworthy ones, thieves, savages and dumb goose-eathers. It's in their nature, and they do not change in any way." The goose father added and refused to listed her daughter's objections about the reality of the recent situation.

Hearing what that goose father had just said about the foxes, including herself in this hideous form of fox, Judy lowered her fox-ears and her head down and sighed in the frustration and slightly in thee sadness, because she knew that that goose father meant with all foxes her as well at the moment. Judy also remembered that she had said herself all those things what the others think about the foxes back in the Bunnyburrow village before this entire mess.

"Take off, kids. We're out of here." The goose father said to his children before he took off.

The goose children shout out from their beaks the last mocking words and their spits with a contemptuous look on their faces upon Judy before they took off one by one after their father.

Only the goose girl stayed behind for a short time looking at Judy, as she slowly and mentally half-broken crawled her way back to the riverside.

The goose felt pity for Judy's fox form and felt the urge to help her, but she was forced to take off after she heard her father calling her.

"I'm sorry, foxy. I really am." The goose girl said with the sympathy and bitter for herself before shortly after that she took off after her family.

As Judy saw the goose girl taking off and nearly disappearing into the branches, and into the sky, the huge wave of desperation took her over, causing her to jump from the water and rush desperately after the departing goose, ignoring the all pain in her stomach.

"NO! NO-NO-NO! DON'T GO! WAIT! PLEASE! PLEASE, WAIT! COME BACK! PLEASE, COME BACK! DON'T LEAVE! YOU MUST HELP ME! PLEASE! PLEASE, HELP ME!" Judy yelled after the geese, pleading for their help, but the geese were already disappeared.

Eventually, Judy gave up from pointlessly chasing the geese and leaned in the deep desperation against the nearby tree. She was so much filled with the despair that she almost burst into tears.

"Please, I'm trying to find the tree-pointed Mountain where the Lights..." Judy said with the desperation and sobbing filled tone.

Suddenly, Judy snapped from her desperation and sobbing after she heard a new voices speaking from somewhere near.

Even though she was the fox, her the sensitive sense of hearing was still with her, and following up the voices for a small distance, she eventually found the source of the voices.

There was a couple of moose standing a small distance away from her next to, nearly beneath of the large fallen tree... and both of them were looking at her with the mocking-looking expressions on their faces and with the mocking-sounding chuckle.

'Moose. Why it had to be moose?' Judy asked from herself in her mind.

To be continue...

I hope you enjoyed of reading this chapter.

I hoped that you prepared to feel sorry for Judy in her fox form, now when she gets painfully to know how the other animals react to the foxes in the fox's perspective.