Shoutout to vcj, who gave me some good advice which I totally intend to ignore. Ha, just joking. What they said, though, was a little out of my league of understanding. But it was helpful, nonetheless, so thank you. I greatly appreciate anything that helps me write a better story.
Zootopia belongs to Disney. Spider-Man belongs to Sony.
He hit enter and the message was sent out to the phone of every senior enforcer. Everyone, including the those at Department 1. Everyone, including John. The message was this: "D. Arcturus has exceeded third strike. Whoever completes the task will receive first dose when ready."
"Danny... Danny... wake up, bud."
Danny's eyes peeled open. He wiped them to get the blurriness out and looked up. Immediately, his eyes widened and his head tilted as he searched for the best angle of attack on the thick yarn hanging above his head.
His mouth opened as he swatted at it, both hands pawing at it like a baby kitten.
"Danny, Danny, get the yarn!" Sarah wiggled it in front of him, driving him from bed. Sarah fought to keep from laughing when she saw that he was still in his underwear. Yep, he was a little kid all right, especially when someone tempted him with this. Yarn, the simplest yet most effective toy.
Danny got up on all fours, his tail high up. He eyed the string with fiery passion. Ooh, he was going to swat the heck outta that thing!
"GET IT DANNY!" she yelled as she turned around and let it flow behind her shoulder. He leapt up and dove for it. His tongue hung out with a mad grin. The door slammed in his face. "Get dressed first!" Ten seconds later, he emerged fully dressed in a gray shirt and blue jeans. She was already on the move. Danny trailed behind her, pawing at the yarn as he ran right behind her. He purred and mewled as he did so.
He didn't realize what she was doing until they made it outside. She dropped the yarn onto the pavement, where he dove for it and proceeded to play with it, gnawing on it and nudging at it gently on the ground.
"I..." Sarah said as she examined her claws "...am good. I knew I'd get you outside, you cute widdle kitten!" She ruffled the fur on the top of his head.
He looked up at her, suddenly thinking lucidly for the first time since he opened his eyes that morning. "You set me up," he said, feigning anger despite the fact that he couldn't be more amused at the moment. He stood upright and aimed his wrist at her. "Careful, woman. I'm not afraid to use this. And I'm not cute, by the way."
"Oh yeth you are." She bat her eyelashes at him while clasping her hands beside her cheek. "You should see yourself when you sleep. The way you twitch and meow when you're dreaming is so adorable!"
He rolled his eyes and put his arm down. If she could see what his dreams (nightmares, rather) were, she wouldn't be saying that.
"Hey, once you're all big and manly and stupid, you'll wish you were all cuddly and fuzzy again!"
"So where we going?" he asked to change the subject as they turned onto the sidewalk from the dry field behind them.
"We... are going to Hill Plaza."
"Hill Plaza? What's that?"
"It's actually Rolling Hills shopping center, but everyone just calls it Hill Plaza. I still can't believe John's never taken you there. It's the place to be this week."
"What's so special about this week?"
"It's the anniversary of the end of the Nighthowler Crisis! Well, not today but this weekend."
"So?"
"So a bunch of mammals will be at Hill Plaza. There's plenty of things to do. You'll see. And on Saturday there'll be a big parade."
"Ok..." he said slowly.
After a while, they reached the busier part of the Savannah. Busier was an understatement. The sidewalk was overrun! Every species pushed their way past each other. It was nearly impossible to hear himself think over the incessant noise of everyday city life on steroids. The only ones who got any leeway were the porcupines and hedgehogs. Lucky, thought Danny. He paid close attention to make sure his fingers wouldn't stick to anything or anyone as they brushed past.
"Hey, watch it!" said a bear who pushed into him. The bear shoved him backward, causing him to lose sight of Sarah.
"Hey, hey wait! Sarah!" he shouted over the noises. "Sarah!"
He didn't hear any response. Shoot! Mammals kept bumping into him, turning him every which way until he couldn't tell which direction was which. He tried jumping, but he knocked into someone and landed right back down. Whoever it was cursed loudly and started demanding who smacked him. The resulting jostling pushed Danny around in the group of mammals trying to get by on the sidewalk. He saw tiny cars driving by on the edge of the street. Lucky little...
He was starting to get scared. What if she couldn't find him? Lost in an unfamiliar part of the city without a cell phone. Oh, this was a bad idea. He started to breathe heavily as he looked around for her.
"Hey, have you seen-? Wait, can you tell me if you see an ocel- hey!" No one would listen to him. He cursed to himself, more out of anxiety than anger.
He looked around a little more. Off to the side, just visible over the top of the wall of mammals was a wall of one of the buildings strafing the sidewalk, less than ten feet away.
He pushed his way through the wall of fur and frustration, knocking over several animals in the process. Many of them yelled as he drove through them like a bulldozer. They knocked into others and pushed them over like dominos. He didn't care. He just wanted to find Sarah.
He jumped high and latched onto the ledge of the first floor molding on the side of the building. He perched onto it and scanned the crowd.
A lot of pedestrians stared at him and called out to him, asking how he got up there. He saw some of them take out their phones and aim a camera lens at him but he paid no attention. He was just trying to find Sarah.
It was then that he realized... trying to find Sarah in this crowd was like looking for a needle in a stack of needles. It was impossible. He slumped. Oh please let me find her. They had walked practically halfway across the district. He didn't know how he'd get back.
A few minutes of fruitless scanning later... "Danny!" He looked down. There she was, looking up at him with a relieved look on her face, right below him. "Danny, lend me a rope!
Immediately, he cast silk from his wrist and attached it to the ledge so she could climb up. When she reached the ledge, she grabbed his shoulders and leaned down to look him in the eye. "Are you ok? I'm so sorry, I shouldn't have lost track of you like that."
"Yeah, I'm fine." He breathed a sigh of relief.
She huffed. "Come on." She was just about to climb down, but then... she looked up. Slowly, a smile creeped its way onto her face. "I got an idea." She pitched it to him, and he loved it! He took a single jump to the top of the building twenty feet up, then cast another web for her to climb. "Remember how I told about my parkour days?"
They soared from the top of one building to another, whooping as they went along. Another thing Danny had never done before. He'd missed out on so much! Well, Sarah was going to make sure that changed today. Screw her Boss, screw John, screw anyone who wanted him out of the picture. It was just her and him today.
Once they reached the area, Sarah stood before the Hill Plaza on the rooftop and raised her arms. "This is Rolling Hills Shopping Center!"
He began to look around in amazement at everything in the place. There were kiosks and restaurants everywhere, a basketball and tennis court, a... swimming pool?! Animals milled about everywhere. Of course, it wasn't as crowded as the sidewalk back there, since everyone was probably headed to work, but it was still enough to need to stay close to Sarah.
Danny climbed down a web and they entered the crowd. Sarah held his hand to keep from losing him. As far as anyone would be concerned, they were just adoptive mother taking her adoptive son out for a fun day. As they went through, Sarah asked him where he wanted to go first. Danny's attention was suddenly grasped by a whirring sound coming from something he didn't see until he looked up. A kind of flying disk floated in midair, hovering high above the crowd. It flipped and yawed periodically, causing Danny's eyes to widen in amazement.
That is so cool! he thought.
Danny suddenly let go of Sarah's hand and she turned around. But she didn't see him. "Danny? Danny! Where'd you go? Oh, not again..."
A couple of giraffes nearly stepped on her. Ugh, there was plenty of room to go around her! Rude!
"COOL!" she heard Danny's voice close by. Turning around, all she saw was a small gathering of mammals watching a horse on a raised platform controlling some flying contraption that was hovering about twenty or thirty feet in the air. A second later, a black figure flew high up and quickly swatted a kind of string attached to the bottom before coming back down. The gathering uttered gasps of amazement as he did it again. Danny had a very wide smile on his muzzle as he unwittingly showed off his acrobatics. Sarah crossed her arms and smiled. Finally, he was having some real fun.
Before long, a larger crowd had gathered to see this spectacle. Sarah heard a bunch of them wondering who he was and how he was able to jump so high. Sarah relished it.
Sarah's smile fell when he latched onto the string.
"What the!" cried the horse, looking between the boy and the disk. Danny climbed a ways up his web and began hovering around with the contraption.
"Hey Sarah, check this out!" laughed Danny as the disk carried him. Dozens of others called attention to the little boy hanging from the disk by the string.
"Danny, let it go!" she yelled. "Hey!"
"Please, man, don't... I'm gonna get in a lot of troub-!"
"I need to get one of these!" someone said, amongst other mammals who were swarming to by one of those flying disks.
"My son will love-!"
"How much-!"
"Do they come with the string-?"
The manager of the kiosk dropped the remote as he was swarmed with paying customers.
"Whooooaa!" Danny shouted before smacking onto his belly from a couple dozen feet up right in front of Sarah, followed by the disk. He looked up at her with a grin. "I gotta do that again!"
Sarah looked back at the kiosk and saw that it had sold out completely. The horse was dancing his hind legs off from the money he'd made. He'd be going home early today, it seemed.
She giggled to herself and thought she might need to take Danny around to more of these places so he could make more profit-inducing havoc.
She let him go around to a few of the other shops, look around at everything. While he didn't do something like with the flying disk again, he definitely had a lot of fun. He'd never done this before. He'd always been so nervous about going outside. It was at this moment that Sarah, for the first time in years, saw Danny as he is, or as should be. He wasn't an enforcer, he wasn't an asset. He was just a normal little boy. Even if he was a god, he still needed to just grow up and be a kid.
He headed toward the basketball court, where a bunch of other kids were playing ball. Sarah and Danny looked at each other and smirked. She ran for the crowd and flipped over the group of players to snatch the ball from the hands of the tallest player as Danny ran around the side. Sarah tossed the ball upward toward the goal ten feet high, and Danny caught it midair and slam dunked it.
Needless to say, both teams ended up arguing about which team the two should be on. Despite the fact that her friend was in danger, she couldn't stop smiling out of joy that Danny was able to show off rather than always hide his power. She wished he'd been able to do things like this for him sooner rather than later. Took him seven years but... if the threat of his life was what it took... maybe it was worth it for once. As long as she could get him through alive, at least.
"Have fun?" asked an out-of-breath Sarah after the game.
"Sarah, we gotta come back here next time you're off work. This place is so awesome!" he called out, cupping his mouth with his hands.
She stood up. "We will. I promise." She looked at her phone. "Whew, I can't believe it's only ten in the morning! How about we get a snack? I'm starving." She led him toward a small parlor just down the street from the Plaza. Sarah pointed at the sign: Jumbeaux's cafe.
"I used to come to places like this all the time when I was your age."
"Were you ever my age?" he responded.
"Aw, shut it, you little kitten!" She shoved his face to the side playfully.
As they approached the parlor, Sarah's hand set itself on Danny's shoulder and stopped him. She led him to the corner of a building to stay hidden and leaned close to his ear.
"Do you see that baby there with the big ears? Beside the door." Danny looked around the entrance to the building and noticed the mammal she was referring to... a very small... something with massive ears, like bigger than its head. It was standing. Just... standing in front of the door with a downcast expression on its face. He snickered at what looked like a pacifier in its mouth. It seemed to be wearing a gray onesie with a hood.
"Yeah," he whispered back. "What is that?"
"That is a fennec fox. Native to the desert... they're very rare in Zootopia. He's the only one I've ever known - heck, the only one I've ever seen in the Savannah."
At that second, the door opened. He turned and seemed to be considering whether or not to go in, but he waited until the door closed and slumped his shoulders.
Sarah stood upright and walked forward. Danny followed.
"You think maybe he got lost?"
Sarah laughed. "You'll see."
She stopped in front of the baby.
"Well now, did someone woose their mommy and daddy?" she said in a baby voice.
His eyes still downcast, he took the pacifier out of his mouth. "Hey, Sarah."
"WHOA! WHAT THE!" yelled Danny, who flailed his arms and hugged himself in shock at the sound of the "baby's" baritone voice.
"What, kid, you ain't never seen a fennec fox before?"
"NO!" he said loudly.
"Hey, hey calm down, Danny. He's an old friend. This is Danny, by the way," she said to the tiny fox.
"Sup?"
"So what happened, Finnick, why are you just moping out here? Aren't you gonna get a popsicle like always?"
He groaned. "My partner got arrested. Now I ain't got any help. Again. Ever since my boy Nick went straight, work's been hell and high water."
Sarah winked at Danny. "Hey listen, how about we help you with this hustle real quick?"
"Oh, would you? That would make my day so much easier. I'll even do a little toot-toot for you!" They both laughed at that.
Danny looked between the two of them, failing to grasp the inside joke.
There was a pinging sound and Sarah pulled out her phone to see the message. Her face and ears suddenly fell. Her eyes widened and her shoulders shrugged subtly as she inhaled sharply.
"What's wrong?" asked Danny, turning to see what bothered her.
"Nothing, come on," she said quickly, putting her phone away and grabbing his shoulders to direct him into the parlor. They got in line. The message she'd seen... she'd expected it, or at least something from Boss. But the reality of it was just beginning to sink in. She tried to calm down. Danny didn't need to know about that. He was already under enough strain as it was. She got her head back in the game.
The line wasn't long, thankfully. She could tell Danny was eager to get back out there, to the point that he was beginning to play with a short web. It was something of a nervous tic of his. Being a cat, string was his weakness. She looked at the counter and thought of her old partnership with Finnick. The "Baby" act was his MO. It seemed, though, that Zootopia was starting to catch on to the fact that there was a con fox with immortal youth around these parts. He'd probably need a little help. She smiled widely. She knew exactly what to do. Being Nick and Finnick's old partner and cellmate on the latter's part, she realized that Finnick must have forgotten that he'd already hustled this place. He had told her after the hustle about the bunny who had bought Nick's sob story, hook, line, and stinker. She backed away from the line.
"Next!" said the African elephant.
"What does this stuff taste like?" Danny asked. Getting no response, he looked around and realized... Sarah wasn't there.
Aw geez, seriously? Sarah, where did you go?
He looked around but didn't see her. Oh well, she probably went to the bathroom or something. Bad timing though, considering she and Finnick were supposed to pull a hustle. He'd looked forward to it, too. Looked like it was up to him. He gulped.
"Next in line." That was them. He suddenly felt very much put on the spot. Finnick looked up at him with two big baby eyes. He was fully in character. He was a very good actor. If he hadn't met him five minutes ago, he would never give thought to the fact that this is actually a grown man in an elephant costume for toddlers. The thought that he might be wearing a diaper made Danny have to hold back giggles.
"What you gettin', kid?" said the elephant to Danny.
"A, uh..." what did she call it? "A popsicle? The big one there?" He pointed at the picture in the window counter.
"15.75."
"Uh-huh?" said Danny with an awkward smile, trying to stall. Come on Sarah, where'd you go? This is about to blow up any second...!
"Well? 15.75. Either pay for the Jumbo Pop or get outta line."
While Danny tried to think of a way to keep the pleasant conversation going, the elephant finally noticed Finnick, who just stood there looking cute.
"'Ey, haven't I seen you somewhere before?" he asked. The "kid" didn't even flinch.
The elephant leaned on the counter and looked closely at Finnick. Less than a second later, his eyes widened. "You know, I have seen you here before! Hey guys, come look at this!" A few of the workers went up to the counter to see the "baby."
Danny wondered exactly why he hadn't broken character yet. The hustle was already blown to smithereens. He'd never hustled anyone before and realized - shocker - he sucked at that too!
"You all remember this guy don't ya, what with that red fox and meter maid bunny cop a while back?" He chuckled spitefully. "Ain't got any backup now, eh?"
Well, that just shows how much I suck, thought Danny. Whole thing's a bust.
Finnick just tilted his head toward the clock.
"Ah, get outta here before I call the cops on you." The pair of the customers behind them were whispering to each other about the fact that Finnick was no baby. It sounded like they were aware of Finnick's methods. They were, however, beginning to grumble at the elephant and to scold him and the "baby" to get out of line.
It was then that the fox turned to see the time from the clock on the wall again. And then he... headed for the door. Just walked away, having not said a single word for the fifty seconds or so that they had been at the counter. Danny shook his head and lifted his arms in confusion. He followed the fennec out to the sidewalk and then to the side of the building. He wondered exactly where he was going. He wondered if maybe he was coming here to moan about how much of a fluke the hustle was. He rolled his eyes at the thought. Ugh, he blew it, he really did; he'd waited too long for Sarah to come back but she didn't. Finnick stopped beside a dumpster, where Danny finally opened his mouth "What was that?!" he said quietly. "You didn't even do anything; how were you supposed to get-"
"A Jumbo Pop?" a voice cut him off. Danny looked up to see Sarah standing right there. "Or how about three Jumbo Pops?" Indeed, she was holding three massive popsicles, all still in their wrappers. They seemed a little hard for her to carry but she managed well enough. She handed one to Danny, one to Finnick, and kept the last one for herself.
"Thank you very much, Say-girl." He held out his fist and she gave him a pound with hers. "A promise is a promise. He pulled his hood over his head, donning a hysterical elephantine costume."
The nose extended and made two high-pitched tooting sounds, causing Danny to double over in laughter. Finnick seemed to take it in stride. "Y'all take care. I got some business to take care of."
Getting himself under control, Danny turned toward Sarah, who had gotten part of the wrapper off and was already licking her Jumbo Pop fervently. She met his eyes, giving him a wide, gleeful smile with her tongue sticking out from between her lips.
"So while I was making myself look like a complete idiot you snuck to the back and smuggled three Jumbo Pops out."
"Hey, don't get judgmental; I know about those packs of liquor Duane had you nick; he told me."
"No, no! I'm just saying, how did you do it?"
"Well..."
Danny listened to her story as they enjoyed their oversized treats and walked down the street back toward the coffee shop she and her friends met at every week.
"Ugh! Look at that!" Sarah exclaimed. Stopping in front of one of the stores of a strip mall they were passing by, she glared at the poster beside the door.
"The Mighty Oid," Danny read off of the poster. "Isn't... isn't he that..."
"Unbelievable," she said before continuing her walk. Her jumbo pop was now melting at a rapid rate, but she had ceased her fervent slurping. It was starting to drip onto her shoulder and down her back, but she didn't seem to notice.
"Sarah, wait for me! What's with the poster? I mean, why's that a bad thing? I think it's kinda cool."
Cool! You can't be serious... she thought, but kept from expressing that verbally. Danny was ignorant. He just didn't know. Calm down, Sarah. Calm down. You're not here to prove something, you're trying to get him away from Boss. Figure out how to do that or he's dead!
"Yeah, unbelievably cool!" she said in a voice just above monotone.
"Yeah..." he said skeptically. "I mean, you don't have to like it. Just cool to think about, you know?"
"Anyway... oh!" she exclaimed as she looked at her pop. "I'm getting this stuff all over me!"
That group message stayed at the back of her mind and threatened to take center stage in her frontal lobe. But this time she let it. She hoped all this would blow over and Danny wouldn't have to find out about the Boss's intentions. All she and John had to do was help him pay off what he owed and protect him along the way. Then maybe Boss would be appeased and they could get on with their lives. But all that was wishful thinking at best. The Shark was not known to change his mind as easily as Mr. Big or Zsander Lukagi. She'd find a way. She just had to protect him and convince him not to go back to the compound.
They soon finished their pops - though most of it ended up on the ground and on them. They had to stop and get wet naps to get washed up from all the sticky popsicle goo. The fur on the top of Danny's head jutted out at several angles when they were finished. It made Sarah snicker at how adorable it was. She licked her palm and patted it down, much to his annoyance.
After they were cleaned up, they continued their walk. "Can we go back and play some more basketball after this?!" asked Danny excitedly and widening his eyes. She could not say no to those- how could she say no to those eyes?! She fought it back for just this once.
"Sure, bud. Why not?" She put her arm around his damp neck.
John stared down at the phone with the ten numbers punched in. One button away from connecting with her phone.
He tried to lift his thumb to push the button - such a simple act. Just one movement and it'll call. But his thumb, his whole hand, his whole body, felt a thousand pounds heavier.
Do it.
Just do it.
No matter what she says to you, you'll be there for her like you should have always been.
Using this thought to give himself strength, he lifted the thousand pound weight and pushed the call button. He had to. To keep her safe.
The phone rang once.
Twice.
Three times.
A part of him hoped that she wouldn't answer.
"You know what I'll do while you're gone?" she'd asked her father the night before he left for boot camp.
"..." he barely looked up as he researched what his experience in the armed forces would be like.
"Dad, you know what I'll do?... Dad!"
"What?!" he said shortly, looking up finally.
"When you're gone..." she had reached up and acted out scooping something from thin air and hugging it close "...I'll get the stars and keep them for you till you come back."
"You know what I could use when you come back?" he'd asked.
"What?"
"A nice, big bottle o'whiskey! Cause hoof! If I go to war, I'll be needing that when I come back!"
John cringed audibly at the memory. Why, why, why did he say that? Why did he not pick her up and twirl her around and thank her and tell her how much he loved her? If he could go back to that one moment, he would've said... anything but that!
"Hello?" came an adult female voice, snapping him out of his thoughts. Her voice. John felt a powerful wave sweep from his chest to the rest of his body.
It was her. The first time he'd heard her voice in fourteen long, cold years.
The very sound of her voice made his mouth open silently as heavy, unrelenting emotion overwhelmed him. He held his fist to his mouth and descended into a silent sob. His bottom lip quivered and water filled his eyes. Come on, say something, John... just one word.
"Hello?... Who is this?"
He was so close to answering her - now was his chance to tell her what he should have said all those years ago - but his eyes squeezed shut at the memories flashing through his mind. It stung. It stung too much. He couldn't do it.
He hung up. He let out the breath he had been holding before laying his head on his forearm and taking a deep breath to replenish his oxygen.
He just couldn't do it.
Fourteen years, and he still couldn't do it. He didn't care at the time, but now... what he wouldn't give just to see her face and tell her how much he hated himself for abandoning her. For failing her, just like he was failing Danny now.
How he yearned to tell her over and over again how much he loved her.
There were very few things that John Serpiento truly feared. But one thing that terrified him to the darkest depths of his spirit was the possibility that his daughter might suffer any more because of him, his mistakes, his lifestyle, his stupidity. He couldn't allow her to be drawn into this. He wasn't going to let Jefe touch her. She had nothing to do with this.
He had to reach out to her. He had to if he was going to protect her.
If only he had the strength to face her.