Foxtrot
Jareth watched his wife sitting on the bed and staring at the fox, who was in turn staring at a piece of lint floating around the room.
"What are you doing?" He asked her, making her start.
"Oh, hey," she said, smiling at him. "I was just trying to think of a name for him."
Jareth grinned. Now here was something he actually knew about. He was good at naming things. Just take some of the goblins, for example. There was Luerk, Pug, Pilch and Volbe, not to mention Bakarbobs Karnobissica. All fine names, to be sure. He had even spoken to Toby on this matter and found out some good dog names, so all in all, he was fairly confidant in his abilities. "Excellent," he replied. "I have been thinking of some names myself."
"Oh?" Sarah was not sure whether to be worried or amused. She settled for half way between both. "Okay, hit me." When Jareth frowned and opened his mouth unsurely she said, "No, I mean, tell me," with a roll of her eyes.
"Oh." Humans were odd sometimes. Why say 'hit me,' when they did not actually wish to be hit? That was just asking for trouble. Putting that aside, he said proudly, "Rover."
Sarah coughed slightly, almost seeming to choke and she repeated, "Rover?"
"Rover is a fine dog's name," Jareth said.
"It's a bit cliché," Sarah said, trying not to laugh. "And I've told you before, it's not a dog."
"I see," Jareth said with a frown. "What about Bingo?" Sarah raised her eyebrows at him and he continued, "Pooch?"
"Where did you even here those names?" Sarah asked with a laugh.
Jareth hesitated before he said, "I may have mentioned to Toby that we now have a dog…"
"You asked for Toby's advice?" She asked, her surprise showing. Then something else occurred to her. "He's going to want to come and see it now…"
"That could be arranged," Jareth said, moving to sit beside her. He patted the fox on the head. "He was very excited when I told him about it. He said that dogs are his favourite animal."
"For the last time, it's not a dog!" Sarah said, rolling her eyes.
"If it is not a dog, then what is it?" He said, clearly not believing her. If it looked like a dog, walked like a dog and sounded like a dog…
"It's a fox," she said. "I told you that before."
He frowned. "When?" He asked suspiciously.
"Just after we first got it," She told him. At his blank look she continued, "You know, just before we went to bed, and you started kissing my neck and I said then, and you said, 'Oh really…'" She looked at him and said, "Is this ringing any bells?"
'Hmm, the bit about kissing your neck does…" He said thoughtfully. She sighed and he said, "Really, Sarah, you do not expect me to pay attention to what you are saying when-" He abruptly cut off, seeing the sharp look in her eye. "Ah, I mean… My mind was on other things…"
"Obviously," she tutted. Mentally she filed away the fact that Jareth did not listen to her when otherwise engaged, knowing that at some point that would come in useful.
"Well what names did you have in mind?" He asked, changing the subject.
Sarah thought about arguing her point, but she decided to let it go. For now. She mulled the question over in her mind, looking at the kit. It really did remind her of a smaller version of Sir Didymus. Little Didymus, she thought in amusement. But no. "How about Sir Bedivere?" She said, with a small smile.
Jareth frowned. "Was that not a ship?"
Sarah raised an eyebrow and said, "He was a knight of the round table…"
"Oh. I do not think Sir Bedivere is really fitting for a do- a fox." Her eyes narrowed at the mistake he nearly made, but he pretended not to notice.
"Okay… What about Arthur?"
"What about Arthur?"
"For a name, for the fox," she sighed.
"As in King Arthur?" He asked. She nodded and he said, "I am not sure naming a fox after a royal is such a good idea."
Sarah sighed and looked at the fox. It had yawned most adorably a moment ago and just curled up. She leaned back against her husband, letting his arms encircle her. "Jareth?"
She felt the rumble of his response in his chest. "Hmm?"
"Are you sure it's a boy?"
"I did not say it was a boy," he replied.
She turned to face him and said, "What?"
"I did not say it was a boy. How am I supposed to know?" He quirked one brow at her.
"You mean it could be Guinevere and not Arthur?"
"Please stop with the knights of the round table names. It is not going to happen," he said resolutely.
Sarah pouted and said, "I think my point still stands. We should find out and see if it's a boy or a girl."
"How do you propose we do that?" He folded his arms, raising both eyebrows this time.
"Well," she motioned towards it, "have a look."
Jareth bristled. "I sincerely hope you are not suggesting what I think you are suggesting." At her silence he said, "I am a king. I do not 'look' at animals intimate areas to see what gender they are!"
"If you don't then I could call it Jezebel," she pointed out. He scowl deepened but he remained unmoved. "Or perhaps I'll go for a non-gender specific name, like… Joey."
"Is that not a name for a kangaroo?"
She let out a frustrated sigh and said, "How can you be so clueless about some things and yet you know random things like that?"
"I am not clueless," he said defensively.
She pointed a finger at the fox. "You still think that's a dog!"
"It looks like a dog to me." He did not even bother trying to deny it.
"It's a fox!" She exclaimed, throwing her arms up in frustration. "I know they look similar to dogs, but trust me, it's a fox."
"Then why call it a name for a kangaroo?" Jareth asked, feeling utterly lost.
Sarah growled in frustration. "Okay, fine. How about you look at it and tell me the first name that comes to mind," Sarah suggested.
He looked round her at the fox, which had rolled over slightly and was kicking its leg out in its sleep. "Red," he said.
Sarah crumpled slightly, letting out a moan. "God help us when we have kids," Sarah muttered, pinching the bridge of her nose.
Jareth frowned for a moment thinking, why would we have infant goats? Then he realised and said haughtily, "Please. Our children will have fine, noble names befitting of their royal status."
"Like Jareth?" Sarah said, her voice perfectly innocent. Too innocent…
"What is wrong with Jareth?" He demanded to know.
"I often ask myself the same thing," Sarah commented dryly, before smiling at him. "There's nothing wrong with it, it's just, well, royal names where I'm from are names like Elizabeth, or Charles, or Louis…" She grinned at the fox and said, "What about Louis?"
"No," Jareth said. "I'll have you know that Jareth is a very strong name."
"Yes dear," Sarah replied, resisting the urge to roll her eyes.
"And," Jareth continued, his eyes narrowing on his wife, "Our son, should we have one, will be named Jareth the Second." That got Sarah's attention. She stared at him with wide eyes, stunned into silence. "After myself, of course."
"You can't honestly think that we'll call our son 'Jareth the Second?'" She said in a strained voice.
He regarded her for a moment before answering, "Of course not." She sighed with relief. "We will just call him Jareth. Everyone else will be required to address him as Jareth the Second."
"Jareth!"
"Yes?"
She glared at him. "We are not going to name our son Jareth the Second!"
"Why not?" He said, tone low and dangerous. Sarah was not quelled, though.
"Because that would just be mean!"
"Mean? In what way?" He pressed, folding his arms.
Sarah and stood to face him. "You can stop that right now. We haven't even had a child yet, let alone a son, so why are we even talking about this?"
"You were the one who said-"
"I know what I said!" She snapped. She took a few deep, calming breaths and said, "All I mean is that we don't need to worry about naming our children yet, since we haven't had any, so this argument is pointless right now." Jareth quirked a brow, indicating for her to continue. "What I'm saying is, right now we should worry about naming our pet and we pick this argument back up if and/or when we have children. Agreed?"
Jareth pursed his lips as he mulled it over. "Agreed," he finally said.
She sighed, feeling very weary. "We still don't know if it's a boy or a girl," she pointed out.
"I told you-"
"Yes, I know," she said, cutting him off. "Fine, I'll do it."
She edged over to the fox, hesitant to wake it when it looked so peaceful… She moved its leg gently, peering at the space in between.
"Well?"
She huffed. "Give me a chance!" She looked carefully and declared, "It's a boy."
"Are you sure?" Jareth asked, glancing over her shoulder, despite his earlier assertions.
"Yep," she replied. "Definitely a boy. That's that settled, at least."
"Name?" Jareth prompted.
Sarah scooted back to lean against him and looked at the small fox, who was blinking wearily around, no doubt wondering what had just been touching him. "How about Artemis? Arty for short."
"Artemis was a Greek goddess," Jareth pointed out.
"Okay, seriously. Where are you getting all this random information?" She twisted slightly in her husband's arms to look up at him.
Jareth said, "Since it has now been established that the do- fox is indeed male, do you not think it would be inappropriate to name it so?"
Sarah frowned, noticing he had not answered the question – whether deliberately or not – but said, "I was thinking Artemis Fowl, actually."
"Who?"
"Finally, something you don't know," she muttered, turning away from him slightly. "What about Tod?" She looked back at Jareth who raised a brow. "For the fox, Tod."
"Oh." Jareth looked at the fox and said after a moment's consideration, "I do not think Tod suits it."
"Obviously you've never seen the Fox and the Hound," Sarah commented, before quickly adding at her husband's confused look, "Never mind. Your turn."
Jareth sighed. This was turning out to be harder than he thought. "Toby?"
"We can't call our pet Toby," Sarah said, rolling her eyes. "For one thing it would get really confusing." She hummed a moment before saying, "Bootsy?"
"If you think I am going to call our pet such a ridiculous name you are sorely mistaken," Jareth informed her. She pouted slightly, but let it go. "Sebastian?" Jareth added.
She wrinkled her nose. "It's not much of a pets name… Jude?"
Jareth considered it and finally said, "I don't think so. What about Maximillian?"
Sarah laughed and said, "It's a bit of a mouthful. How about Max?"
"Max," Jareth said thoughtfully. "Max…"
"Are we actually agreeing on a name?" Sarah said in mock disbelief.
"You know, I believe we are," Jareth said, smiling at her.
She sighed happily and looked at the fox. "Max…"
Max yawned and stood, padding his way over to her and resting his head on her knee. She scratched him behind the ear, melting inside at the absolute adorableness of him.
Jareth kissed her cheek and stood, stretching. "Well, I am glad we have that sorted."
Sarah smiled and said, "Now all we have to do is train him."
Jareth paused and said, "Train?"
"Yeah, like we need to teach him not to do his business indoors, how to fetch, sit, stay, that sort of thing." Sarah looked around at him. "It'll be fun!"
Jareth inwardly groaned. Should have kept the panther.
Incredibly sorry about the lateness. It would have been out earlier if not for two things. One was that I was attempting to write a chapter for Easter, but it really was not doing what I wanted it to. It started out okay, but it was getting so long (think of the Christmas chapters earlier on…) that I was trying to cut down on what was being written and it's really suffered for it. I've abandoned it for now, but hopefully, if this is still going next year, I can have it posted then, maybe. Or maybe I'll carry on working on it and you'll just have a late Easter present next week. The other reason was university work. There was a lot of it, and still is. I'm trying to get on top of it all, but Easter eggs were distracting me. And crème eggs. I have no idea whether you have those in America-land, but they are an essential part of Easter here and bring me no greater joy. I think it's all the sugar. I hear you have marshmallow things called Peeps – good for you. You have fluffy sugary things, I'll have runny sugary things encased in chocolate…
Other than that, thank you to everyone who suggested a name. I tried to include them all here, so I'm incredibly sorry if I missed one. Max kind of won with two votes. I was going to go for Jake, but meh. No one suggested it, so never mind.
There are a few references, for lack of a better word, that I picked up from various places. If something looks familiar, that might be why. Also, the goblins names (apart from Volbe remember Volbe? Anyone?) were ones I got from the Wikipedia entry on the Labyrinth.
And finally, I hope you enjoyed this chapter. As always, please take the time to review as I'd like to know what you think, even if you thought it could be better.