Chapter VIIII: The City...
"Friends are God's way of apologizing for our families."
The days flew by for Sam. It had been almost a month since he started training, and he quickly turned the average day's activities into sort of a routine. He would wake up, have breakfast with the Mune trio, and basically take orders. Day in and day out he did or tried to do everything that was asked of him. Most of the physical challenges we're almost too easy for him, but the real challenge for him came from studying the laws of this world and how to apply them.
Sam sat in the library doing just that, as a matter of fact, reading a history book of Zootopia's laws as Kat walked up to him and threw a large law dictionary down on the table. It made a noticeable thud as the hard back cover hit wood. She proceeded to make even more noise as she sat down and sighed heavily.
"You do realize that libraries are supposed to be quiet places, right?" He asked her without taking his eyes off of his study material.
"Who the fuck cares, am I right?"
"I do."
Kat scoffed as she opened up the book to somewhere in the middle and began to look for something.
"Pussy.", Kat called out.
"Look who's calling the kettle 'black', little kitty."
The soldier had a bit of a smile on his face as he started to poke fun at her. She laughed a bit at Sam's reply and she stopped flipping through the book asshe found what she was looking for.
"Ah, you got me… Hey Sam!"
He turned around to see Saratoga walk up to him with a smile on her face.
"Hey Sara, what's going on?"
"Nothing much, you doing anything tonight?"
"Not really… why?"
"Well today we're aloud to leave the facility and take a break. The boys and I were wondering if you wanted to go do something tonight!"
"Well… depends… what exactly are we gonna be doing tonight?" Sam asked
"Well we were just wondering if tonight you would like to walk around the city with the rest of us."
"Well who else is going?"
"Just me and the boys, but you can bring someone with you if you want!"
"Thanks Sara… I'll think about it."
"We'll be leaving at about five! Meet us by the front door if you wanna come."
"Sure thing."
The she-wolf bounded off happily as the two at the table exchanged smiles.
"She likes you." Kat said.
"I got that feeling… I don't know why people seem to like me all that much."
"Well maybe it's because you're cute!"
"What do you mean by 'cute'? There is nothing about me that's cute." Sam said with a hint of sarcasm.
"Well I mean you're a little smaller than most wolves I've met… and you're fit too. It's no wonder you have so many admirers."
"Don't tell me you've taken a fancy to me too."
She scoffed.
"With a little bitch like you! In your dreams!"
Sam chuckled and went back to his book as Kat stood up and stretched."
"Well I'm gonna go. See ya later."
With that, she strolled down the isle of books and out of sight.
At around five o'clock Sam made his way towards the front door. He had his best clothes on and had used the "Musk Mask" stuff he had bought a while ago to keep himself smelling nice. The sun had begun to turn the sky pick and a cool wind blew past the trees as he stood there while the Mune's were lingering around their car. It surprised the soldier to see Anna standing by the tree talking about something he couldn't make out.
"Well I'm not saying you shouldn't do what you want bu-" Saratoga stopped abruptly once she noticed that Sam was walking up to them. She put on a smile and waved at him Sam waved back.
"Oh! You decided to come?" Bane asked, obviously happy that Sam was here.
"Well I wasn't doing anything else today so I thought I might as well... Oh, and 'hey' Anna."
"Hi Sam. So they invited you too?"
"Apparently… though they didn't inform me that you would be coming as well." He said ,making sideways glances at the Munes while Saratoga tried to suppress her giddy smile.
"We figured you two would like to have a night out!" She said.
"It was mostly her idea." Markis stated.
"I see…" Anaa said while she leaned down and whispered into her ear.
Saratoga's face gave off an embarrassed sort of look as she waved her off and buffed up her chest.
"Well anyway! You guys ready for a night out!"
"I'm good to go." Bane said. "Come on, the city awaits!"
"City?" Sam asked.
"Yeah, we're going to Zootopia for the night. We got tomorrow off too and Sara wanted to spend the night in the city."
"I don't have that much cash ya know…" Sam said.
"Oh don't worry! We booked rooms!" Sara piped up.
Everyone looked at her curiously.
"You what?" Bane asked.
"Well… I booked us all some rooms, at least."
"With who's money…?" Markis asked.
"Dad's… but it doesn't matter! All that matters is that we have fun this weekend!"
"Well I'm down." Said Anna.
"Alright… Zootopia, huh? Never been. What's it like?"
"You've never been to Zootopia?" Markis asked.
"Na… I heard about it a lot but I've never actually been to the city."
"Oh it's this magical place where anyone can be anything!" Anna stated sarcastically. "Honestly though, it's only sorta okay."
"Why do you think that, Anna?" Saratoga asked.
"I used to live there before I moved to Philly County. My dad worked at a tailor shop in downtown. The city itself isn't too bad… it's the mammals."
"They treat you bad?" Sam asked with a bit of concern.
"No… but the mammal that my dad worked for had a son. Him and I would hang out and play all the time when we were little. Then he tried to join the mammal scouts. He came home crying because the others bullied him for being a fox… You can kinda understand why I'm not a huge fan of the mammals that live there now."
"Huh… that sucks." Bane stated. "Yeah I heard foxes get a bad rep over there."
"It's stupid… well are we gonna go or what?" Anna asked.
The trip took them about thirty minutes. Sam watched in awe when skyscrapers came into view as they passed the hills and valleys that dotted the northern-ish part of the country. It was huge to say the least. And not only that but it seemed to be divided by huge walls that sectioned the city into four seasons. There were huge snowy caps, a jungle, huge sand dunes, and in the middle of it all was a huge city. It looked familiar but Sam couldn't understand why.
They crossed the biggest bridge Sam had ever seen and they were in the city right as the sun was giving in for the night. The place was alive with lights and sounds alike as Saratoga easily bobbed and weaved through traffic that would have given Sam a panic attack. They finally found their way to the city center after seeing the desert area (which Sam couldn't believe was that close to a tundra) and drove around for a while.
"You like what you see, Sam?"
He turned around towards Anna, who was sitting besides him. Saratoga was the driver for tonight and Markis was sitting shotgun helping his sister navigate. As for Bane he had decided to ride in the trunk( Sam had realized earlier that month that it wasn't illegal for, some reason…).
"I'm… I have no words… how?"
He was completely awestruck at this point. Anna shrugged and turned back to her own window.
"Those walls are giant air-conditioners. They help regulate the temperature and humidity for each biome so all kinds of different species can call the city home. It took awhile to build and they almost constantly need maintenance, but I guess it's cool."
"Pun intended!" Bane piped up.
She sighed and looked out at the streets as cars and civilians passed by. Sam remembered the fact that she didn't care much for the city so he turned back to watch what would happen out of his window.
They eventually reached some sort of huge hotel complex. Sam followed the four inside and was greeted by a tiny fox squirrel wearing some sort of hotel bellhop suit.
"Welcome to Zoo-in! The best hotel in Zootopia! How can I help you?"
"Hello!" Saratoga started. "Two rooms for 'Mune'?"
The rodent nodded as he typed something onto his little pad he was carrying.
"Alright, follow me!"
The little guy started to walk off and everyone followed him. After a couple of minutes in the elevator they arrived at the top floor and the squirrel led them to the end of the hallway.
"You guys ordered the suite so you also get free room service and complimentary breakfast! If you need anything just call up the front desk and we'll send you whatever you ask for!"
"Thank you so much! Oh this is wonderful!" Saratoga's face was completely lit up… and it wasn't just because of all the lights coming from the ceiling.
"You're welcome!" He told her as he handed Anna the key.
And with that he walked off back into the elevator and was gone.
"He was too friendly…" Anna said.
Sam shrugged. "What I wanna know is why did you get two suites and not just three regular rooms?"
The Mune siblings looked over towards their sister with… Sam couldn't tell whether they were amazed at how unusual this all was or were just upset that their sister spent so much money without their permission. She tried to wave off their stares.
"Because it was cheaper just to rent the two suites they had instead of rooms for all of us."
"Well… okay… but who's gonna sleep where?" Bane asked.
"Well how about we let the girls stay together an- OW!"
Saratoga's elbow found Markis's side and gave it quite the love tap. He looked over towards her sister who was quietly shaking her head.
"How about I sleep with my brother's and you two can take the second room!"
Sam and Anna looked at each other, puzzled. Bane apparently got what her sister was trying to do and bobbed his head yes.
"Yeah I agree! It's hard for me to sleep without you two!" He said.
Markis saw the glare his sis was giving him and decided to keep whatever he was going to say to himself.
"Well… guess it's not too bad… it's a suite after all." Anna figured.
Sam walked into one of the rooms and he was actually surprised by how big it was. The front room was huge, and the floor to ceiling windows looking out onto the skyline of the city didn't help. There were tan white carpets covering both the front room and the hallway to the right that led into the bedroom and bathroom. The couch was shaped like an L and faced a huge flat screen TV with a small kitchen to the left.
"Yeah… it's a suite alright…" Sam said in awe. "And your dad can afford this?"
"Sure can! He's pretty big in the city!" Saratoga answered. "Well we're gonna leave you two alone and go see where we can go tomorrow! Night!"
She quickly ran herself and her siblings out of the room Sam had chosen and closed the door behind her, leaving both Sam and Anna to look at each other in confusion.
"She was acting kinda strange… well… stranger then usual." She said.
"I'll say…"
Anna took one look around the room as Sam wondered what they were up to… well more the she-wolf than anyone else.
"Well I'll take the couch and you can have the bed." Sam told his new roommate.
"I can't let you do that!"
He gestured to said couch.
"I've slept under bridges and a whole lot worse than that. I think I'll be fine."
Anna looked at him hesitantly.
"What can be worse then sleeping under a bridge?"
"Sleeping in a war zone" He thought.
"A bunch of things. I'll be fine though, don't worry."
"Well… okay… if you want…"
"Unless there are two beds in there?"
She walked in and came back shaking her head.
"No… just the one… but it's big enough for the both of us. If you want…"
"Really? No I couldn't do that."
"Why not?"
Sam honestly didn't really have any other answer, other than it wouldn't be gentleman like, but it was the only thing he could think of.
"It just wouldn't be right."
"Well… I'm fine with it…"
She looked down and held both her hooves together down near her… He didn't honestly know if he liked where this was going or not.
"Would you be uncomfortable… sleeping with me?" She asked as she turned away from his gaze slightly.
"... Well I guess I wouldn't mind. So long as you would want me to" He concluded.
He face lit up like the Chicago skyline once he said that.
"Really?"
"Yeah. Do you wanna go to bed now?"
She blushed a little when he asked that.
"No… we don't have to… we can watch TV if you want?"
"I'm fine with anything sweetheart." He said with a wink.
She giggled a little as she walked over to the couch and turned the television. He sat beside her and put his arms up on the backrest to stretch himself out a little. He was actually surprised when she leaned up against him as she flipped through the channels.
"Sorry if I seem weird." She said.
"Why's that?"
"Well… it's just I've never really… been good at… well…"
"Relationships?"
Sam saw she hung her head a bit to avoid his look again.
"What the hell is going on?!"
"I don't know. I wouldn't exactly call this a relationship…" She stated.
"Where did this come from exactly?"
"... I think Saratoga was right…"
"Right about 'what', exactly?"
"Well… me and her have been talking a lot about stuff lately and she thinks I like you… I don't know what to think honestly… it's just… the day you came by… I honestly didn't know what to make of you. I haven't really seen much of you after that though, and Saratoga has been talking about you… not in a bad way though! I think she's just trying to get us to be together more to… 'help'."
"That would explain why she's acting weird…" Sam concluded.
She chuckled.
"No wonder she only got two rooms and insisted that we sleep in the same one." He said.
"Probably…"
She sighed.
"Are you into it?"
"Into what?"
"Cross species?"
Sam thought about what that might mean for a minute and then understood what that meant. He thought about it for a minute while she sat up and looked at him hesitantly.
"I… I guess? I don't think I would be against that… I've never really heard of it before though…"
"... Wait… really?"
"No… but yeah I wouldn't have a problem with it… honestly."
She sighed in relief.
"So you wouldn't think I'm weird for saying I might like you?"
"On that level? No. Though I don't know what you find in me that's so appealing!" He chuckled.
There was truth in his statement. Since he was human by nature he kinda already figured his options were drastically limited if he would look for a partner from the same species.
"Well, I like your smile…" She was blushing by this point, Sam could swear it.
"You like my smile?... Huh… interesting…"
"Is that a weird thing to say!?" She got up and looked at him with a bit of panic.
"No! Nonono, it's okay!... Actually that's about the nicest thing I've heard about me in a while!" He chuckled.
"Oh… well… I do…"
"Well on that level I think the way you're twitching right now is cute." He said while his cheeks started to feel a bit hot."
"What's going on?!" Bane whispered to his sister.
"Well I can't hear anything if you don't shut up!" She replied
"You both should just leave them alone…They are fully functioning adults and you shouldn't try to manipulate them. They can take care of themselves."
"But if I don't help them who will!"
Markis sighed and began to say something but Saratoga raised her paw. She was listening to the two through the wall' using a glass cup to amplify the sound.
"Well I think the way you're twitching right now is cute…"
"... Oh my God…" She exclaimed.
"Shut up, Bane!"
"I swear it's like highschool all over again…" Markis sighed.
"Well if you didn't step in i would have had Mick and Lye married by now!" She told her older brother.
"Yeah… and Mick would be beating Lye right now if i didn't step in. Come on Sara… You knew Mick was a bully!"
"But everyone needs love in their life!"
"In Micks case… that's debatable…"
"Hey… I think I hear something!"
That grabbed the she-wolf's attention quickly a she honed in on the conversation happening on the other side of the wall.
"So… you uh…. Wanna go have sex?"
"Absolutely! Come on mister wolf… Defile me!"
The two eavesdroppers jaws hit the floor...
It took all of Sam's will not to burst out laughing. And by looking at Anna he thought she felt the same. He had become aware that the three in the room next to them were listening in one their conversation and was able to allert Anna to it too without alerting the three next to them. They had silently agreed to fuck with them in about three seconds, an it seemed to be doing the job. He didn't hear anything.
The next line would be priceless, he thought.
"Oh I'm going to fuck you so hard that it will make the Germans invasion of Poland look like foreplay…"
She stared at him a bit with a puzzled look and it took all of his will not to burst out laughing. And when Saratoga's shrieks ensued he finally cracked, and so did Anna.
Not two seconds later the three of them burst into their room to find the two on the floor rolling round trying to suck as much breath as they could from the air around them. When they collected themselves the wolf sibling's expressions made them lose it again.
"HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!, You three should see your faces!" Anna tried to say as she was laughing her side out.
"I… er… wha… THAT WASN'T FUNNY!" Saratoga tried to say.
"Oh… I doubt that, sweetheart!" Sam chuckled.
"... Just so you guys know, I had no part in this." Markis said with an amused look on his face.
"How did you guys know we were listening to you?" Bane asked.
"You guys did see the vent near the ceiling, right?' Sam asked.
They all turned to the wall that separated the two rooms that was on the left of the front door to see a small vent which light was seeping through from the other side. The three siblings and Anna looked at it with a bit of surprise while Sam smiled slyly.
"Wow… Even I didn't see that…" Said Anna.
"Welp… it pays to be attentive."
"... And you heard us through… that…" Saratoga asked.
"Yes."
She sighed.
"Well, at least now I know you're not just some supermammal."
He laughed.
"Oh you have no idea!"
"Well I think we all should get some rest. It's been a long day and we have an even longer weekend ahead of us. Come on you two, let's leave them be."
Markis then proceeded to grab the two by the ears and dragged them both off with heavy prontest from Saratoga and a lot of whining from Bane. The two left in the room had smiles on their faces so bright they could have lit up the dark side of the moon.
Sam sat down on the couch with a sigh and Anna joined him, laying her head on his lap as he took his hand and ran it through her long, blonde hair between her ears. Now that he thought about it… he could see how pretty she was. To him, she almost looked… human…
"What did you mean?"
"Huh?"
"About that thing you mentioned… About those two places… Poland and Germany?"
"Oh…"
He tried to think about how to go around this. At this point he didn't want to lose what he had just found by telling her the truth. So he went with the story that he had been brewing for this exact situation. Well not this exact situation but a situation similar to this.
"Well… I'm from up north… way north. Up there are a few large villages that usually coexist with each other, but one day a settlement called "Germany" went crazy and started taking land by force. They started out by taking back land that used to belong to them that they had to give up because of a past conflict that happened only twenty some years ago. Then they got greedy and started to Take land from other neighboring villages. The first he took that wasn't his wascalled "Poland". They, along with another group of p-... mammals… called Russia took the land by storm."
"What about the villages that you said used to belong to Germany?"
"They welcomed the Germans with open arms."
"What about Poland?"
"Them?... Not so much… There's this story that has been repeated by just about everyone that talks about the start of the war about a troop of Poland calvary sent to stop the Germans from raging through the country. THe story takes place in the small town of Korjanty. They sent around two hundred and fifty soldiers to delay the advance of the German armor division during the first few weeks of the invasion… honestly from there history kinda blurs. They say the soldiers were slaughtered by the German armor but the actual story is a bit less dramatic than that. Some will tell you that the two hundred and fifty charged at the armor like they were suicidal but in reality what happened was that they came upon a small German infantry division and took them by surprise. It ended up being a victory for the Polish while they hit them hard and scattered the infantry and only lost eleven of their own mammals as well as leaving them with nine the myth started was when after the battle a German armored car squad found them in the open like the Polish found the Germans in the open and cut them down. Though it was a lost battle the Polish actually achieved the goal of halting the Germans… at least for a little while."
"So, wait… mammals… died?"
Sam sighed.
"Yep… A lot of mammals died… and are still dying now, I would think… This war has been raging for… six years now… I think."
She sat up slowly.
"That's horrible! Why!? Why would you fight like that!?"
"Well… it's probably got something to do with shame. After the first war happened the German people were thrown into chaos. The last war left them with almost nothing and they called for vengeance. Or at least some of them did. And the ones that did got someone into power. His name is Adolf Hitler. He's the uncontested leader of Germany right now."
She looked away slowly and stared at the wall for a minute.
"What about you?"
"What do you mean?"
"What did you think of this… war?"
He figured it was now or never and he should probably come clean with this.
"... I fought in it… yes…I was on Poland's side. I fought under my country's flag, The United States of America."
"... When?"
"Well… about four years ago. I joined as a field medic… My job was to help the wounded and get them to safety while my friends fought."
"Did you ever have to kill someone?"
"Well not officially but there were a couple where i had to defend myself. To be honest though the enemy was never aloud to shoot at me but it happened sometimes…"
"Shoot? Like as in a tranquilizer?"
"That's a discussion for a whole other day… I'll tell you some other time what we used to fight but I think you know enough to get the jist of everything."
"Well… okay… but Sam?"
They turned to each other.
"If it helps… I don't blame you… If you had to fight to stay alive i can understand that…"
"... Thanks…"
Oh my God I'm SO glad I'm done with this! HA HA! This has been on my mind for God knows how long and I'm finally DONE with this chapter! With moving out of my parent's house along with trying to find a job so I can pay rent along with writer's block and general laziness I am pleased to bring to you, dear reader, the ninth chapter of Name to Forget, Face to Remember! I'll be working on it more, don't worry, but for now I'm gonna call it a day. I have two places I need to be today after I hand this over to Red who'll take it from here. Until next time everyone! Vi!