div style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;"span style="font-size: large;"strongspan style="text-decoration: underline;"An Honest Fox/span/strong/span/div
div style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;"emby iamcave76 (reddit) - CDNCrow (AO3) - Canadian Crow ( )/em/div
div style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /div
div style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;"
p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0px 0px 12pt;"span style="color: #000000;"span style="font-size: 9pt; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"Tucking her phone away, Judy ruminated on the short – and somewhat one-sided – conversation she'd just had with the chief./spanspan style="font-size: 9pt; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;" Moving to stand beside her partner, they both watched as the badly-beaten drug dealer was loaded into the waiting ambulance. "Bogo wants you to report to his office as soon as we get back."/span/span/p
p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0px 0px 12pt;"span style="font-size: 9pt; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"span style="color: #000000;"The fox nodded silently, slowly flexing his paws and wincing when the action re-opened his recently split knuckles./span/span/p
p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0px 0px 12pt;"span style="color: #000000;"span style="font-size: 9pt; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"This wasn't a surprise, as much as she wished otherwise. Since his first day in uniform, /spanspan style="font-size: 9pt; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"Nick's crusade against the illegal drug trade in Zootopia had made her own devotion to the law seem like a passing interest. It had stood entirely at odds with his otherwise laid-back nature and he pursued it with a fierceness that had given her pause on more than one occasion. But today.../span/span/p
p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0px 0px 12pt;"span style="font-size: 9pt; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"span style="color: #000000;"Today, she'd seen her partner – her best friend – beat some low-level punk dealing nip in a schoolyard within an inch of his life. Today, he'd actually emsnapped his teeth/em at her when she tried to pull him away. She'd very nearly had to deploy her taser just to keep her partner from killing someone, and although he'd come to his senses and ended the assault on his own, the fox would be hard-pressed to avoid the undoubtedly severe consequences to come. /span/span/p
p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0px 0px 12pt;"span style="font-size: 9pt; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"span style="color: #000000;" "Nick..." She looked up at him, frowning when the fox tried to avoid eye contact. "What emwas/em that?"/span/span/p
p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0px 0px 12pt;"span style="font-size: 9pt; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"span style="color: #000000;""I dunno." He muttered. "One less dealer?"/span/span/p
p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0px 0px 12pt;"span style="font-size: 9pt; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"span style="color: #000000;""Don't do that, Nick. Talk to me." She placed a gentle paw on his arm and led him to a nearby bench. He momentarily stiffened at the contact, then seemed to deflate before her eyes./span/span/p
p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0px 0px 12pt;"span style="font-size: 9pt; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"span style="color: #000000;""He was..." Hesitantly, he turned to meet her gaze. "He was a good father. And an honest fox." Her partner let out a shuddering sigh. "He ran a tailor shop over on 43rd Ave - a pretty successful one, too – and every day seemed to live his life in contrast to every negative fox stereotype..."/span/span/p
p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0px 0px 12pt;"span style="font-size: 9pt; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"span style="color: #000000;"ooooo/span/span/p
p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0px 0px 12pt;"strongspan style="font-size: 9pt; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"span style="color: #000000;"Everyone in our neighborhood knew Dad, and they all respected him. No small achievement, especially for a fox. Mammals from all over Zootopia would come to his shop to have work done./span/span/strong/p
p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0px 0px 12pt;"strongspan style="font-size: 9pt; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"span style="color: #000000;"I remember when one customer – a moose, I think – said that it was surprising to see a fox using those nimble paws for something better than petty theft. Dad just smiled and reminded him that he hadn't seen the bill yet. The moose laughed, and ended up becoming a regular. Dad was just like that; you couldn't help but like him. But the universe can be cruel, sometimes for no good reason at all./span/span/strong/p
p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0px 0px 12pt;"strongspan style="font-size: 9pt; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"span style="color: #000000;"Rheumatoid arthritis doesn't emsound/em like a life-ending disease, unless your livelihood depends on having steady paws. It was manageable for a time, but eventually his condition started to show in his work. A loose button here, a crooked stitch there. Before long, mammals started to take their business elsewhere. On the street they'd give him pitying smiles and pats on the shoulder, offer their sympathies and best wishes. They'd ask if there was anything they could do and he'd thank them politely, not commenting on their newly tailored clothing./span/span/strong/p
p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0px 0px 12pt;"strongspan style="font-size: 9pt; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"span style="color: #000000;"As the pain got worse, he needed more and more medication to steady his paws and keep working. We had health insurance, but foxes don't have the best immune systems to begin with and the premiums for our species are pretty steep. It wasn't long before he and Mom just couldn't afford it anymore. To make matters worse, some speciest bastard at Zootopia General Hospital flagged him as a drug-seeker, and after that he couldn't find a doctor willing to write him a prescription. I guess even Dad couldn't outrun the "shifty fox" reputation forever./span/span/strong/p
p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0px 0px 12pt;"strongspan style="font-size: 9pt; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"span style="color: #000000;"I can't really imagine what kind of headspace he was in - maybe I just don't want to – but I guess when faced with going out of business and failing his family, he took the only path left to him./span/span/strong/p
p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0px 0px 12pt;"strongspan style="font-size: 9pt; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"span style="color: #000000;"I was just a kit. I didn't understand what was going on. I just know that Mom and Dad were sad, that they argued more and more. I might have asked why Dad stopped going to work in the shop. Then I came home from school one day and found Mom was standing in the kitchen, staring silently out the window. I had to shout to get her attention./span/span/strong/p
p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0px 0px 12pt;"strongspan style="font-size: 9pt; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"span style="color: #000000;"She wrapped her arms around me and just started to cry. She told me that dad had left us, but he'd given her a message for me, that he said I needed to be brave. She told me that Dad had to go on a trip and she didn't know how long he'd be away./span/span/strong/p
p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0px 0px 12pt;"strongspan style="font-size: 9pt; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"span style="color: #000000;"I believed that for so much longer than I should have./span/span/strong/p
p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0px 0px 12pt;"strongspan style="font-size: 9pt; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"span style="color: #000000;"After that, life went on and eventually we learned to smile again. Things were actually pretty good - right up until the Junior Ranger Scouts, at least. I came home in tears that night, and told Mom what had happened. She hugged me and comforted me, said all the right words. But it felt like something inside me had broken./span/span/strong/p
p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0px 0px 12pt;"strongspan style="font-size: 9pt; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"span style="color: #000000;"Over the next few years, I started acting out and getting in trouble. One day I got into a particular nasty scrap with some kits at school. It was stupid kit stuff – teasing and name-calling– but just like that the claws were out. I'd like to say I gave as good as I got, but I honestly don't remember. She came and picked me up, apologizing to the principal for my behavior and nodding quietly at suspension. As we drove she talked about how we had to be brave, not to show the mammals saying cruel things that their words hurt us./span/span/strong/p
p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0px 0px 12pt;"strongspan style="font-size: 9pt; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"span style="color: #000000;"I was so angry at the world, in that way only a young mammal can be. I felt persecuted and indignant and suddenly I was yelling at her. I called her a coward that never stood up for herself emor/em her species. An Uncle Tod, always smiling at the mammals that spat on us. I told her that Dad must've left because he'd been ashamed of her. I don't think I'll ever forget the look on her face when I said that./span/span/strong/p
p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0px 0px 12pt;"strongspan style="font-size: 9pt; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"span style="color: #000000;"Mom emnever/em yelled, no matter how much trouble I got into. There were a few stern talking-tos, but she never yelled at me. This one time, I wish she had. I wish she'd smacked me upside the head and told me to smarten up. Instead she pulled the car over and did the most terrible thing she could./span/span/strong/p
p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0px 0px 12pt;"strongspan style="font-size: 9pt; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"span style="color: #000000;"She finally told me the truth./span/span/strong/p
p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0px 0px 12pt;"strongspan style="font-size: 9pt; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"span style="color: #000000;"Dad hadn't gone on some trip. After the doctors cut him off, Dad decided to get his pain relief from another source. The kind of source you find in an alley in this part of town. At first, the dealer supplied the same kind of pills he'd been prescribed, but you know how expensive pharmacy-grade painkillers are on the street. Eventually he compromised with something a little more affordable. Then something else./span/span/strong/p
p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0px 0px 12pt;"strongspan style="font-size: 9pt; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"span style="color: #000000;"His behavior started getting erratic. He got short-tempered, his work became shoddy at best. He was losing customers, and started over-charging the ones that stayed to make up the difference. Over time, less and less of that money made it home./span/span/strong/p
p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0px 0px 12pt;"strongspan style="font-size: 9pt; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"span style="color: #000000;"After a while, the shop had closed; even mammals he'd called his friends didn't go there anymore. He'd stay home all day and vanished off to who knew where at night. Sometimes he'd be gone for days and Mom would tell me he had gone on business trips; I'd always believe her, even when she was crying./span/span/strong/p
p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0px 0px 12pt;"strongspan style="font-size: 9pt; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"span style="color: #000000;"One day she'd come home to an unusually quiet house and found him on the bathroom floor. She called an ambulance, but it'd been much too late. He'd died like a junkie, in a puddle of vomit with a needle in his arm./span/span/strong/p
p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0px 0px 12pt;"strongspan style="font-size: 9pt; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"span style="color: #000000;"In an instant, she'd torn away all the lies and it was like I suddenly emremembered/em Dad. All the vague, shiny memories I'd clutched to my heart fell apart and I could see how he'd looked near the end - gaunt face, matted fur, and desperate...emshifty/em...eyes./span/span/strong/p
p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0px 0px 12pt;"strongspan style="font-size: 9pt; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"span style="color: #000000;"It felt like the world was falling apart. I couldn't handle it, so I just jumped out of the car in a panic. Even though I could hear her calling my name, I never looked back. Maybe she was trying to apologize, but I just didn't look back./span/span/strong/p
p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0px 0px 12pt;"strongspan style="font-size: 9pt; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"span style="color: #000000;"The next couple of years weren't easy, but I was lucky that I ended up meeting Finnick. The little jerk probably saved my life. I was almost eighteen when I found out that my Mom had died. She got Lyme disease and just couldn't shake it. I didn't go to her funeral – I wasn't the only one – but I try to take a measure of comfort that at least she got one. I've spent years searching the city's cemeteries, but I still don't know where either of my parents are buried./span/span/strong/p
p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0px 0px 12pt;"strongspan style="font-size: 9pt; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"span style="color: #000000;"My family was torn apart because my father was desperate to keep us together. In that desperation, he turned to some lying mammal offering the worst possible solution. A mammal who took Dad's money even as he watched an innocent fox destroy himself, and who probably barely noticed the difference when he died. The drugs way have killed my Dad, but they still managed to destroy three lives in the process. /span/span/strong/p
p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0px 0px 12pt;"span style="font-size: 9pt; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"span style="color: #000000;"ooooo/span/span/p
p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0px 0px 12pt;"span style="font-size: 9pt; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"span style="color: #000000;"Several minutes of silence passed after Nick finished his story. Judy desperately wanted to offer some kind of comfort to her closest friend, but had no idea what to say./span/span/p
p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0px 0px 12pt;"span style="font-size: 9pt; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"span style="color: #000000;""There are predators, and then there are empredators/em." Nick suddenly added, angrily clenching his injured paw. "Lions and tigers, wolves and foxes – we're called predators because thousands of years ago we killed to survive. Dealers prey on the weak and desperate - not because they emneed /emto, but because they emcan/em."/span/span/p
p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0px 0px 12pt;"span style="font-size: 9pt; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"span style="color: #000000;"Nick stood and began to make his way back to their parked cruiser. Judy fell into step beside him as they made their way back to their cruiser. "I'm so sorry, Nick. I don't... I mean..."/span/span/p
p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0px 0px 12pt;"span style="font-size: 9pt; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"span style="color: #000000;""It's okay, Carrots. I know what you mean." He sighed. "I think that, misguided or not, he went down that road out of love. That he was trying to be the mammal that his family needed and walked into a world he didn't understand until it was too late to get out. Maybe that's naïve, but it's what I choose to believe. And it's how I choose to remember Dad."/span/span/p
p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0px 0px 12pt;"span style="font-size: 9pt; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"span style="color: #000000;"He gave her a faint, sad smile. "As a good father. And an honest fox."/span/span/p
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