L'EDgendary

by dobanochi

A few years since we last saw any of them, the Peach Creek Boys and the Merry Men run into one another at just the right time, working together to undermine an oppressive city government as well as their burgeoning insecurities. An action-comedy-drama character study about friendship, leadership, self-esteem, and the divide between who we're born as and who we choose to be.

4. First Contact

4. "First Contact"

Fruitland. The Fruit Belt. The Four Sisters. Cannery Row. Those were just a few of the nicknames put upon the four suburbs that wrapped around the city of Nottingham from its west-northwest to where the city limits met the Delaware Bay to the due north. Daisy-chained together in the narrow strip of land between the dense Sherwood Forest and the smaller pine thicket now known as the Georgetown Forest, Lemon Brook and Peach Creek were the first two to be independently settled and named in this fertile crescent, and when it was realized that they had both went with the fruit-and-waterway naming model (and when it was confirmed that this miraculous soil really could grow anything you planted in it), they filled in the southwestern half of the corridor with the towns of Cherry Stream and Apple River, with industrious orchards bridging each to its neighbors.

It was these suburbs which were imperative to the growth of the city of Nottingham, which made a killing off of the assorted fruits that grew just a few miles away. The city got enough money to sway the state of Delaware to make a canal to more easily connect the Indian River-Rehoboth Estuary to the rest of the ocean, and when shipping took off, so did the city that sat right where the Indian River widened into a bonafide bay. The city expanded north to Rehoboth Beach and south to the Great Cypress Swamp, and outward toward Sherwood Forest and the Four Sisters that had made Nottingham so prosperous. A village called Georgetown at the southeast edge of Sherwood was annexed in the expansion, but for their troubles it became the namesake of the smaller forest on the other side of the orchard towns.

Eventually, Nottingham's success in the agriculture sector allowed it to diversify its portfolio, and after the Second World War, it didn't need to rely upon the Fertile Crescent of Delmarva so badly. The towns never completely developed over their orchards, but they did forsake most of them, and now Apple Valley, Cherry Stream and Peach Creek have become more or less contiguous. Lemon Brook is not so much the ostracized Sister as she is the one who thinks she's better than the other three, and there is still a great gulf of space between Peach Creek and Lemon Brook, occupied by a few of Peach Creek's last remaining farms in the narrows where the two forests get as close as they ever would to making contact, before it opens up again where Sherwood takes a turn east and Georgetown simply ends. Indeed, the northern borders of the Georgetown and Sherwood Forests form the southwest and southeast city limits of Lemon Brook respectively, squeezing into the gap between the forests by the old abandoned cannery; looking at a map of the area that emphasises municipal borders, one may agree it looks like Lemon Brook is funnelling into a pipe occupied by Peach Creek, Cherry Stream and Apple River, and many of Lemon Brook's most civically self-impressed like to make crude jokes about flushing their waste into the plumbing system that is the other three occupants of the Crescent.

The other three Sisters are typically friendly to one another, but all three harbor a bitter jealousy toward Lemon Brook, especially Peach Creek, whose northern outskirts have to lay their eyes upon the great silhouette of the cannery off in the distance. The relationship is so strained that all modern thoroughfares between the two cut through one of the forests and wrap their way back around; the only direct connection are some old farm roads, some of which are still not paved.

Then again, all of the roads and streets in Peach Creek are a tad counterintuitive. Most of the town is legally on its own "south" side, which is actually the southwest side since the town's grid is crooked at a 45-degree angle to match up with the main thoroughfares from the city: the older Sherwood Forest Road, and the 1950s-built Georgetown-Millsboro Highway, a raised toll-road originating right near the center of Nottingham and heading almost perfectly straight northwest along the diminishing banks of the Indian River, cutting through Sherwood Forest, Peach Creek, and Georgetown Forest before surrendering itself to a toll-free surface-level divided highway on its way up to Dover. But because of the asymmetry of the Crescent, bisecting it perfectly wound up putting most of Peach Creek's residential area to the southwest of these highways. Peach Creek, however, respected its symbiotic relationship with the Big City, so when Sherwood Forest Road straightens out as it passes through the town (where it is labelled as Peachtree Parkway), that line was dubbed the official divider between north and south in the town.

That's how one may find the curious arrangement where the 200 North block of side streets - both of them, as this is where the Crescent gets suffocatingly narrow - is a couplet of cul-de-sacs which mark the temporary end of suburbia, abutting a trailer park and two junk yards before dissolving to the agrarian ways of old.

-IllI-

"Stop!"

Screeeeech.

"What!?"

"Were you goin'a turn right?"

"...Noooo."

"Why not!?"

"Why would I have?"

"Whadda you think!?"

"Are you seriously demanding that I be able read you mind, Chief?"

"You wouldn't have to read my mind if your mind was as smart as mine!"

"Then enlighten me, why would we turn right?"

"Because we're trying to stick close to the woods! If you turn right, we get closer to the woods!"

"It's a fucking cul-de-sac, it doesn't go anywhere."

"Do you not see the construction site at the end there? There's probably a million places in there that they could be hiding!"

"Even if they were, it's out of our jurisdiction."

"They don't know that!"

"They might."

"Then fuck it, we'll call in the local guys to nab 'em if we have to! Just turn right!"

"Why are we even doing this?"

"Because I can't wait any longer to catch 'em!"

"Yeah, clearly you can't; I meant why did you send everybody home to wait till tonight?"

"Can't have the rest of the city running wild while the entire force is looking for some hooligans. All we need is you and me."

"Yeah, a much smaller amount of people searching a much larger area. That makes sense."

"Well I've got twelve hours to kill till then, and I can't sleep until then knowing that I'm this close!"

"(God knows you've tried…)"

"What was that!?"

"I think you just want to be the guy to personally arrest them. Personally."

"So what if I do?"

"Yeah, it's not like the chief of police for a large city has anything better to do with his day."

"Goddammit, Nutsy, when we get back to the station, I'm gonna have 'em take your badge away for un-subordination!"

"Fine, do it."

"..."

"Do it."

"..."

"Nobody else wants to work under you, Ward."

"Hey! That's Chief to you, Deputy!"

"Then arrest me."

"..."

"Do it. I dare you."

Chief Woodland and Deputy Nutzinger found themselves in a staring contest in a halted police car which was nevertheless still in Drive blocking the (north-) westbound lane of Harris Street, two blocks north (-east) of Peachtree Parkway at the north edge of Peach Creek, which was indeed well out of their jurisdiction as members of Nottingham's Department, but Ward didn't care for the rules and his deputy George didn't have any power to tell him no.

Woodland didn't think that Nutzinger was right, per se, but he knew that for other reasons, getting Nutsy fired would be difficult. It was considered an extremely progressive move when they hired a squirrel to the force, although the cynics thought they just did it as a good PR move, and the pragmatists thought it was about damn time they got somebody who could work with the rodent community on their level, and Nutzinger himself believed both of these things were true because he had written the letter to the police department as part of his twelfth-grade English "write a persuasive letter to an authority figure" project telling them that they ought to make such a move for the above reasons, and when they actually replied saying that that would be a good idea and they could put him through the academy if he'd like to take a stab at it, he realized he didn't have any better plans for after high school. In any case, it would look even messier if they cut him loose now, especially to do so over something like putting the immensely unpopular Chief of Police in his place.

Woodland did not, however, know that Nutzinger was very much correct that nobody else on the Force would want to be his Deputy. Nutsy only got the job because it was the least-inconvenient situation for everybody else: nobody else would have to work directly under and with Woodland, the functionally useless squirrel would be allowed to move up into what was basically a clerical role, and the squirrel himself wouldn't have to deal as much with the disproportionate exposure to rigor mortis he was being dealt. Nowadays, he wasn't being called upon to do it nearly as much as he used to, but when he was new, they sent him to go deal with every homicide, suicide, and really-bad-accident call in the rodent community, and this penchant for winding up in close proximity to stiffs lead to his nickname among the other officers, "the Vulture"; nowadays they only made him tend to the recently deceased when they were in a rodent-sized building or structure that the rest of the Force couldn't physically access.

But he still wasn't too keen on it. Nutzinger may have been jaded, but he still wouldn't say that writing up reports about fresh corpses was preferable to his current situation of mirroring a glare coming from his commander while sitting behind the wheel of a squad car that was extensively (and expensively, thanks to the generous donations of the taxpayers of Nottingham) jerry-rigged so that an eleven-inch, nineteen-ounce squirrel could drive at the discretion of the six-foot-seven, four-hundred-pound wolf (although that second number might be outdated) barking directions from the passenger seat. The car's modifications were arranged as soon as Nutzinger was promoted to deputy, as Woodland detested driving for reasons unexplained, but when theorizing why that might be, Nutsy had conjured some grotesque visions of the Chief in the driver's seat and the steering wheel getting "lost," as it were. Or maybe the fat asshole just found it too exhausting. In some ways, George was glad he got stuck with the Chief, because it was the ultimate test to keep reminding himself that not all obese people were as slobbish and slovenly as this guy.

The tension was broken when Woodland actually had a pretty good idea for once. Without saying a word, he opened the glove compartment and pulled out a street atlas of the entire metropolitan area. He flipped it open and started leafing through to find right about where they were. Then he hit a bit of a wall.

"...Nutsy, help me find the page of the map we're on."

Nutzinger was spent for snappy comebacks, so he just hopped over to the atlas in hopes of getting this moment over with. He had some trouble turning the pages in the huge tome that was probably bigger than he was, but eventually he got to what seemed to be the correct page.

"Alright, so…" Nutzinger read the map carefully to double-check, "There's Peachtree, Bedford Street, Harris.. There's Rethink and here's-"

"Re-think? That's a dumb name for a street."

"Yeah, tell me about it."

"Wait… I think my sister lives somewhere around here. Huh. I ain't seen her in years."

"What, did you want to go say hi? Is that why I'm doing this?"

"Naw, I don't care that much. Just a nifty co-inky-dink. But this is the right page of the map?"

"Looks like it."

"Alright, and we are… here?"

"Mmhmm."

"Well then look at this." He pointed and the two leaned in to get a good look at the map. "So there's the construction site. That's part of Peach Creek."

"Alright, so it's out of our jurisdiction. Mystery solved."

"Hold on, hold on… look at this. Behind the construction site is a trailer park-"

"Which is also in Peach Creek."

"But what's behind the trailer park?"

Nutzinger followed Woodland's claw to a point that was along a creek, which wrapped around westward so it was practically behind the other cul-de-sac on Rethink Avenue.

"...A junkyard?"

"Mm-hmm. And what town is that a part of?"

Nutzinger looked. On the map, Peach Creek's incorporated territory was highlighted in a pale green and Lemon Brook's was light purple. The spot of the junkyard was just white.

"...oh."

"It's not in Peach Creek, is it?"

"No, it isn't."

"It's not in anything, is it?"

"It's in Nottingham County."

"It's unincorporated. That means it's fair game."

"No, it means it's under the county's jurisdic-"

"Or it means that it's fair game."

"...Okay…"

"So let's go hunting."

-IllI-

The second cul-de-sac, with the even more offbeat name of Reimagine Avenue, had a troubled history.

It was supposed to be Phase Two of the Peach Creek Estates Housing Development, with Phase One being the homes built on Rethink. The development started with its focus on Rethink, which had more available space for houses, since Reimagine Avenue's neck was already occupied by a playground built for the neighborhood on one side and Sherwood Forest on the other, leaving only space enough for four or five structures around the bulbous head of the street.

Phase One was finished up a little under fifteen years ago, and homes sold fast, especially to young families, many of whom were pleasantly surprised to find that their infant children were all born around the same time and would probably all be in the same grade together when they began school, and with any luck would all grow up to be the closest of friends. Everything seemed to be going well for the development company. The construction workers were getting ready to put up the extra five homes on Reimagine. But then the troubles began.

First came the discrimination lawsuit. It made regional news when they were found guilty of not wanting to sell one of the homes on Rethink to a family of skunks, and had to pay up a large sum of money which the skunk family used to buy an even bigger house in a neighborhood they felt was more tolerant. The house the skunks had tried to purchase wound up being the last one on the block to be sold, and eventually went to a wolf family relocating from the Northern Virginia area near DC, whose son was also the same age as most of the other boys and girls on the block, and even had a name homonymous with two of them.

The development company was badly beaten by this, but they weren't out of the game yet. No, what finished them off in this weakened state were those trashy people from the Park 'N' Flush trailer park.

The proper way to access the Park 'N' Flush is a way that even the most patient person would find poorly-designed and annoying. One is expected to go down around the Reimagine and Rethink cul-de-sacs to the road along Georgetown Forest at the west edge of town, hang a right toward Lemon Brook and the cannery, take another right down the dirt road toward the two junkyards on either side of the creek, then take another right down yet another dirt path between the east edge of the junkyard and the west edge of Sherwood Forest. But it wasn't always like this. What was eventually rechristened Reimagine Avenue was originally an asphalt-giving-way-to-gravel street, which provided a major shortcut to the trailer park through what was then public, unincorporated lands. Money is money, however, and the town of Peach Creek eventually sold some of that negative space to the developers who planned to build Peach Creek Estates.

The Park 'N' Flush residents really didn't care for going the long way to get out of their trailer park when they could just drive through the construction site, cross Harris Street, cross Bedford Street, arrive at Peachtree Parkway and boom, they were at a major thoroughfare that could connect them to the rest of civilization. So they did. The developers tried to tell them no, and the residents threatened to sue. The developers thought that they were bluffing, certain that people as broke as they were couldn't afford a decent lawyer let alone harbor a sufficient understanding of the law. The next thing that the developers knew, they were bankrupt and out of business, and all of the equipment at the construction site of Phase Two was left in its place because the owners didn't have enough money left in their personal accounts to thoroughly advertise that it was for sale, let alone money to pay to transport it if a potential buyer demand they did.

Today, people looking for a shortcut to the trailer park or the junkyard can just drive to the end of Reimagine Avenue, hop the curb, and meander through the dirt past rusty bulldozers and crusty concrete mixers and the skeletal frames of houses that will never become homes. These stillborn corpses were supposed to be where families celebrated Christmases and Hanukkahs and birthdays and anniversaries and high-school graduations, where sons and daughters would learn and where mothers and fathers would learn to teach, where people would feel safe and sound after a long day out in the world, where people would sleep and have dreams so wondrous that they would be sad when they woke because knew they would never witness them again, where loving couples would grow old together and where children would conquer their fear of the dark and discover the hidden secrets of the attic and run through backyards blinded by visions of their own breathtaking imaginations while stepping around lovingly-tended gardens and dodging wooden sheds forever stained with passionate sweat, where happy memories were supposed to be forged so strong that photographs would be unnecessary, and where people would learn to love and be loved by the people they would never trade for the world. But this would never come to be. To the passers-by, however, this implicit misery was lost on them. To them, all of it was just a reminder of that one time that some that some rich people got busted for being a buncha assholes.

The town of Peach Creek legally reclaimed the land with intentions to just get rid of the construction site and pave Reimagine Avenue (which would be renamed to Khouth Street to match the rest of the roadway on the other side of Harris Street) all the way through past the trailer park and connecting to the dirt road that straddles the border between the orchards and the forest. But the town council just sort of never got around to it (when your town is next to a place like Nottingham, it's going to pick up some bad habits), and in a pungent bit of irony, after almost a decade of cars getting flat tires and undercarriage scars from running over leftover construction tools and equipment, most of the residents of the trailer park now opt to go the long way around the construction site anyway.

But once in awhile somebody needs to get from civilization to the trailer park or the junkyard in a hurry and isn't in any mood to worry about their vehicle's long-term health. These people will cut right through the construction site anyway, and can range from a vengeful police officer in a furious hurry to a nostalgic motorist who doesn't want to dwell any longer on the fact that he's going to abandon his beloved old flames-on-purple van in the land of the forgotten, unaware that it might one day offer comfort and refuge to a party of troublemakers.

-IllI-

It was more spacious than they thought it would be in there, but that wasn't saying much. And it was getting stuffy fast. The fact that Double-D was hyperventilating and wasting all the air wasn't helping. Nor was it helping that that air was being replaced by fumes from the gasoline generators in the corner.

The curtains were drawn in the rear window, and the boys were lying down on the water bed to try to stay out of sight of the windows in the front. But the waterbed was listing toward Ed's side, so Eddy and Double-D were stuck at the bottom of the hill formed by the displaced water. Neither was particularly happy about this arrangement, but they had bigger concerns.

Ed, for his part, had no greater concern than eviscerating his fatigue. The idea of letting Big Ed sleep through this long wait seemed like a great idea on paper, but in practice was a bit of a problem because of his tendency to snore loudly and with an open mouth, and if the ungodly sound that was louder than Krakatoa exploding six inches from your ear didn't jeopardize them, the odor of his exhaled breath certainly would.

"Ed," Eddy implored, "Ed!"

"Hoouh… Yes, Eddy?"

"You're snoring louder than a bomb made out of lawn mowers!"

"Oh, I am sorry Eddy. Do you need help sleeping?"

"Wha-? No, I-"

Ed took the liberty of grabbing Eddy and holding him close like a child's plushie. "Don't worry, Eddy, I'll take you with me to Sleepy-Bye Land."

"Ed, get off me," Eddy growled through gritted teeth.

"Nighty-night!" Ed closed his eyes again and passed out almost instantaneously.

"Double-D! Help me out!"

Double-D was shaking too much to be described as paralyzed by fear, but he certainly was not responsive to the world outside of the dungeon of his own insurmountable fears. Catatonic was probably a better word.

"Ed! Wake up! Let me go!"

But Ed started snoring again, his snout right above Eddy's ears, and even Ed probably couldn't hear Eddy over the noise of his own making. Therefore drastic measures needed to be taken.

Wiggle, wiggle… CRUNCH.

"Gah!" the bear hollered as he threw his bitten hand up in the air, incidentally taking its vulpine occupant up with it.

Thunk. "Ooph!"

Eddy hit the ceiling of the van and fell down to the waterbed, which gladly broke his fall and absorbed his weight, sucking him into its abyss. But as all things must return to equilibrium, it soon after rejected its guest and ejected him back up with a swish of waves of water moving underneath its surface.

Thunk. Eddy again hit the ceiling, which was a much more cold and rigid host, and he fell once more into the bed, which gave an encore presentation of its impression of a trampoline.

Swish, swish… thunk! "Uph!" Swish, swish… thunk! "Gwah!" Swish, swish… thunk! "Pltt!" Swish, swish… thunk! "Ed!"

Ed's eyes followed the improvised gymnastics up and down; it wasn't quite the motion of a metronome turned sideways, but you could probably still keep a beat with it all the same. He reached his paw out toward the nifty sight, as if trying to physically capture the moment.

"Eddy, I wanna try…" Ed murmured sleepily.

Thunk. "Ed, no!" Swish, swish. Eddy's life flashed before his eyes when he imagined the idea of Ed getting up and trying to bounce up and down on the waterbed in the finite space of the van, the vehicle jumping loudly like a giant metal basketball and attracting all the fuzz within a ten mile radius of their hiding spot. Thunk. This time when Eddy came down, he sunk his claws into the surface of the mattress and damn near popped the thing as he dug in to get out of the cycle. Swish, swish…. Swish… And finally the momentum was broken.

"Ed, wait!" Eddy cried, only to see that Ed had passed out from sheer fatigue again. It would seem that Ed was going to have to settle for jumping on a bed in his dreams.

But even though it wouldn't be as loud as a giant metal cage crashing in place in the junkyard, Eddy still didn't want to risk attracting the wrong crowd with the sound of Ed's unholy snoring. Thinking quickly, he grabbed a spool of extension cords and fashioned a nice little bow around Ed's snout. He could still snore loud enough through his nose to annoy Eddy, but it probably wouldn't be a siren song for the authorities to come and bust them.

Eddy took a seat on the water hump away from Ed and Double-D. The three of them had been in there for a few hours, but the wolf was actually getting more nervous with the passage of time. Being alone with his thoughts had simply made Double-D more claustrophobic and nervous that every passing minute meant that they would soon be found, and with Ed being asleep and Eddy staring at the roof of the van to forget that he was bored out of his mind, it wasn't like Double-D had anybody to tell him reassuring things.

Eddy, it should be noted, was not so much anxious himself as he was nervous by proxy from having to watch Double-D lose his mind, not unlike earlier when he was suffocated by Double-D's fears until they started to infect him too. That part of him wanted to stay here for safety, while the other part of him wanted to split a long time ago when it had seemed like the heat had long since died down. But he stuck around anyway since his loyal lackeys were in no condition to move, and for all he knew they'd be too disoriented by fear and fatigue to think to find him at his house later on if he were to leave by himself. Now it was Eddy who was alone with his thoughts. At least it was much quieter now with Ed's snoring taken out of the equation.

"Hey, maybe they're in here."

Well, then.

The first thing Eddy did was look at Double-D to see if he had heard it too. If he had, he couldn't tell. Double-D seemed to still be in his own little personal purgatory and wasn't showing any outward response to stimuli.

"Well, one of them's supposed to be a grizzly bear, could he fit in something this big?"

Okay, hold on, how did they know about that? This second voice sounded quieter, but also somehow closer, as if coming from a smaller creature. It was much different than the first voice, which had a very discernable Southern accent. Heh, for a second Eddy considered that it might be Double-D's hick uncle, and the idea of such an absurd coincidence transpiring actually amused him enough for a fraction of a smirk to crack his face amid the tension. But Eddy knew that it was incredibly unlikely that of all the cops in the metropolitan area that they'd ever run into him even once, assuming that he hadn't been removed from the Force already like Double-D's family suspected. But the possibility stayed on his mind and the small grimace quickly evaporated.

"Eh, that's a good point, but it's not that small of a van."

Ah, yes, back to the question of how they knew Ed was in here. What the hell? Were they seen? Did they have details on all three of them, or just Ed, who was very hard to miss and could probably be seen around the curvature of the earth?

"Big enough for a grizzly with room to spare for a fox?"

Eddy heard that and came very close to giving a second meaning to the phrase "waterbed."

"I'd say s- God, damn it!" hollered the Southern voice. A small thud followed shortly thereafter.

"Aw, god-! What happened, Chief?"

"I stubbed my damn toe on this box."

"Well this is why I don't like riding on your shoulder."

"Well, hey, Nutsy, I didn't mean to knock ya off, but this box is way heavier than it looks!"

…'Box'?

"Well, what's inside it? Cinder-blocks?"

Eddy looked around the van.

"Might as well take a look."

The ironing board was behind him along the wall.

"I'll laugh my ass off if we just stumbled upon, like, a brick of cocaine or something."

The generators and extension cords were tucked behind the front seats.

"Well I'm sure the boys would enjoy that."

Eddy couldn't see anything else.

"Eh, I know a few who wouldn't, Chief."

Eddy got up and scrambled over Ed's sleeping mass to see if there was any chance Ed was just laying on top of it. But it was nowhere to be found.

"Aw, it's a bunch of, um… sheets of plastic."

"Goddammit, Ed," Eddy mumbled.

"That's it? That's what's so heavy?"

"Wait, I think there's something else at the bottom."

Eddy looked at Double-D again. The wolf had stopped shaking and was either breathing calmly or wasn't breathing at all. He was just sitting perfectly still, staring at the wall, contemplating crime and punishment and the fires of hell.

"There's some plastic sheets in here, too," the Southerner discovered.

"What, to make IDs or something?"

"To make IDs-? To make IDs! I bet that's what they were doin', Nutsy!"

Now Eddy wanted to hide within the hiding spot. He rushed over to the front seats to hide in the nook under the steering column.

"Oh, look. The shipping label is still on it. Dumbass."

"Man Guy, 201 Rethink Avenue."

Eddy could still see the daylight pouring in through the windows from under the dashboard, so he made his way back over the seats. He was going to gamble on a different strategy.

"That's probably a fake name, but that's gotta be a real address. You wanna pay 'em a visit, Chief?"

"Nah, that's the PCPD's problem. Besides, we can't prove nothin'. That address sounds familiar, though…"

'That address sounds familiar'? To the Chief of Police? He couldn't have… no, could he?

Eddy was over the seats now and saw that Double-D now had his head turned right at the rear doors of the van, listening patiently and placidly.

"But y'know what? I bet we could use these ourselves!"

Eddy heard that one in his heart.

"Yeah!" the Southerner continued, "We can probably figure out how to make our own fake IDs and sell them ourselves! Or at least sell them to someone who knows how to do that."

"Do I get a cut, Chief?"

Eddy lifted up Ed's massive arm and tucked himself back in there, not for the comfort of either of them, but for one to disappear under one who was already dead to the world.

"Oh, Nutsy, I'm not evil…"

A grunt was heard as the Chief of Police presumably picked up the box of materials that formed the crux of Eddy's brilliant plan, which was now in severe jeopardy of being delayed, if it were ever to come to fruition at all. The plan was not to make any mistakes, but Eddy reasoned with himself that this was not a mistake he had made. He didn't willfully allow his creation to fall into the hands of some corrupt officers who were going to flip his goods for private profit. But he didn't do all he could to prevent it, either, and he knew it. For a few moments, these conflicting feelings of blame and guilt managed to take the spotlight in the mental theater of anguish.

Then this happened:

Squeak! "Chief Woodland, Chief Woodland, do you copy?" A voice squawked over a police radio.

Eddy turned to Double-D again. Double-D didn't move a muscle, but Eddy had a funny feeling that he had heard that all the same.

"This is Chief Woodland, whaddaya need?"

"Are you in the middle of something, Chief? Because we need you downtown ASAP."

"Uh, um… Y-yes, Deputy Nutzinger and I were, uh… helping an old lady cross the street!"

Eddy was a bit surprised by the timid manner of his answer.

"Well when you're done, try to get to City Hall as soon as possible. The mayor wants to talk to you. Preferably Nutzinger, too."

"He does?"

"Yes, Chief. What's your current location? Do you have an ETA?"

"Uh, yeah, uh, um… We're just in Georgetown gettin' back from the Forest, we were taking surface streets. We'll be there soon!"

"10-4, I'll let him know." That was the last Eddy heard of the dispatcher.

"You shoulda just told him we were trying to get the forest bandits," the one called Nutsy insisted. "How else are we goin'a explain a couple of criminals in the backseat?"

'Forest Bandits'? Eddy wondered, Is that what they're calling us?

"Nutsy, there's this thing called 'shoot on sight,' have ya heard of it? In a place like this, nobody's gonna notice."

Once again, Eddy was glad that he hadn't consumed even a drop of water since last night. Double-D was still as steadfast as a statue. Ed was none the wiser.

"Oh, right, like nobody'll hear a gunshot in the the trailer park next door. Or the subdivision across the creek. And heaven forbid you don't connect on the first try and you have to shoot them more than once apiece." Eddy, eyes pursed shut, was hoping this deputy character could somehow convince his superior of this, not just for the sake of the boys' lives, but also for the Chief's sake, since this Nutsy fellow made a very good point.

"You're a little asshole, do you know that?"

"I'm your better half, Ward," was the smarmy response.

Ward? Eddy asked himself, What the fuck kind of name is-? Wait…

"Well, tell me this, Nutsy: how would they know it's not just some kids testing out their playthings?"

"Chief, do you seriously want to take any risk of getting caught? I don't know about you, Chief, but I need this job. To live and pay bills and shit. And if we get fired, we're probably not employable anywhere else."

"That's why you don't get caught, Nutsy!"

These two were an unstoppable force and an immovable object. Eddy was half-seriously debating sticking his head out and telling them to quit bickering because the back-and-forth was driving him crazy. Luckily, he wasn't the only person who was getting sick of the unresolved conflict.

"Okay, fuck it!" Nutsy exclaimed, and then there was a sound of a slight struggle with some rustled garments.

"Hey! What're you- My gun!"

Eddy thought he was going to hear a loud bang and a hearty thud, but instead he heard some rustling running under the van. Was there a snake or something moving down there? How big was this Nutsy guy, anyway? Wait, what didn't he mention something about riding on the Chief's shoulder?

The sound went to the front of the van up against the trash heap, paused for a second, and went out the right side.

"Why the hell did you do that!?"

"Looks like you're gonna need a new gun from the station, Chief."

"Do you know how bad that's going to make me look!?"

"Yeah: less bad than shooting some people outside of your jurisdiction. Now c'mon, The Prince is waiting!" The voice seemed to get quieter as the statement went on.

"Goddammit, Nutsy!" And then the ride began. The van started shaking left and right to the rhythm of some grunts coming from the front right side. Some more muttering and swearing under breath was peppered in there, and as well as some strained breathing. Eddy wrapped his arms around Ed's to hang on during the rollercoaster ride, fully aware that the shaking could cause Ed to roll onto him and crush him, but trying not to think about it. Somewhere below his sideways line of vision, he heard Double-D fall forward softly onto the mattress, seemingly forced out of his paralysis.

The shaking stopped and more grunting was heard as the Chief must have abandoned his quest to retrieve his weapon. "Nutsy, get back here and get me my gun!"

"The fuck are you gonna do, shoot me?" The voice was very small and distant now.

"We ain't even checked out this van yet!"

"They'd've made a noise by now if there was anybody in there!"

More nonverbal cursing and grumbling was heard, punctuated by a sudden shattering of glass. Eddy shifted his eyes toward the sliver of negative space where he could see to the passenger's side window. He didn't get much of a complete picture, but he could have swore he saw a short, wide blue sleeve over a flabby gray-furred arm, a bent elbow retreating from the space where a window once was.

"Hell, now I'm bleeding." There was no more muffling of voices; it was all loud and clear. The sound of spitting could be heard, and then of frustrated footsteps taking their leave.

Eddy could feel behind him that Ed was stirring. Eddy wiggled his way out of the crook of Ed's arm.

"Hrrmmrhrhrrm?" Ed said through a tethered snout.

"Shh!" begged Eddy as he went over to the victim who was most affected. "Uh… Double-D? How ya holding up?"

Double-D was sitting upright again against Ed's stomach, legs crossed neatly and his hands on his legs. If not for the distress in his eyes, one might think he were meditating. Eddy approached him. Even sitting down, the wolf, who was barely averaged-sized for his own species at his age, had to look down upon the dwarfish fox standing next to him. Eddy noticed this; in this strange moment, he didn't care.

"Doub- uh… Double-D, you know a lot of… stuff, right? Um… do you know if your mom's maiden name is, uh… really common?"

For a second, Double-D just stared at him with a look like he had just seen innocence incarnate murdered and violated by a mob in the street. Then he opened his mouth and said:

"I am prepared for death at any moment, Eddy."

"Wh- What?"

The footsteps returned, and the boys turned to face the direction from which they came. Without a word, the heavy stomping made its way to the back of the truck, stopped to make way for a grunt, and disappeared again.

Double-D turned back to Eddy, who knew he was going to have to spend another few hours in here while his friends emotionally recuperated. At least it wasn't as stuffy with the window open.

"I am prepared for death at any moment."

-IllI-

The sun was now high in the sky and it was starting to get hot in there.

"Jeez, I guess your parents really don't keep up with the guy."

"I recall that when he first started, he was almost invariably put on night shifts, so my parents used his odd hours to to justify never attempting to contact him, seeing as he'd never be awake at the same time they would be." It had taken awhile, but he had come back up to Earth.

"Well, when did they promote him?"

"I don't know, Eddy. After they came to their rationale for never having reason to call him on the phone, that was the last we'd heard of him. I believe my parents assumed that he would soon be fired and that we would one day receive a call asking if he could seek refuge from homelessness in our house. But that call never came, and I always assumed he was simply busy with his line of work, remaining as a low-level officer. I'm sure that if I questioned my parents, they would tell me that they assumed he had shamefully returned to my grandparents' home in Virginia without saying a word to my mother or father."

"But you do think that was him, though, right?"

"His speech patterns and accent do certainly match the uncle I last encountered when I was eight. I do suppose that living in such close proximity to his place of work would have made encountering him on-duty an inevitability if given enough time."

"I just can't believe it."

"I share your disbelief, Eddy, but perhaps our beliefs flew in the face of logical deduction."

"And I still can't believe you're related to a guy like that."

"That's the thing, Eddy…"

"What?"

Double-D was looking down at his folded hands, trying to piece together what was not completely clear to him either. "I confess that I harbor a strong distaste for this man, but as I heard his voice again, I began to wonder whether I only resent him because of what are informed flaws."

"Eddy, Double-D's using big words again, and it's making me feel like my head is lifting off of my body to blast off into space fight the bad guys from Rejects of an Alien World 2."

"That's 'cause you're sitting too close to the gas fumes, Ed."

"Ed, what I mean is that as much as I heard aggression and malice in his voice, it reminded me of all the times I actually interacted with him, and I must say that the personality I remember is very incongruous with what I heard outside those doors. I'm starting to wonder if I ever really witnessed him engage in anything evil. I do remember that he was rather uncouth and-"

"Huh?"

"...He was rather improper in demeanor."

"Like how?"

"Like you heard, constantly swearing and showing complete disregard for formal pronunciation or grammar. Furthermore, he would often leave abhorrent messes about and wore clothes with holes in them and ate as would a savage, and even as a child I noticed this. I know for certain my parents noticed this, and after we stopped seeing him around, my parents told me about shameful and unscrupulous things he had done in his life, ranging from that which is embarrassing to the downright despicable."

"Double-D, it ain't just Ed bein' Ed, I'm lost. Where are you going with this?"

Double-D sighed and looked up again to match Eddy's gaze. "As simply as I can put it Eddy, I think I've had an epiphany that I once knew my uncle as a man who, despite his poor manners, was actually rather kind-hearted, at least toward me. I think that I had only begun to hate him when my parent's cautionary tales of his misdeeds began to outweigh the positive memories I recall of him. Does that make sense?"

Eddy held his hand out and tilted it side to side while putting on a confused wince. Ed simply cocked his head.

Double-D sighed and gave it another go. "I… think… I used to think… that he - my uncle Ward - I used to think - when I was a little kid, I mean - I used to think he was a 'cool' uncle. But my parents didn't like him. So when we stopped seeing him, they… they told me all the bad things they could about him… until I believed them. And if that was indeed him out there, perhaps they were right. About his being a bad man. Was that… can you comprehend that?"

"Double-D, don't talk to us like you think we're stupid."

"Oh, for the love of-!" But he bit his tongue. "Do you get what I'm saying or not, Eddy?"

"Double-D, chill out, I get it. He was your favorite uncle until your parents brainwashed you."

"But also-"

Gasp! "Double-D's been brainwashed!"

"Ed, no."

"That's not the whole picture, Ed-"

"We must un-cleanse him!"

"Ed, calm down."

"'Un-cleanse me'!?"

"I will sop the bleach from your head, Double-D!"

"Ed, shush!"

"Ed, what do you-!? Aah!"

Sluuuurp.

"Ed!"

"Ed, unhand me!"

Shluuur-urp!

"Goddammit, Ed!"

"This is disgusting!"

Slurrrp.

"AAARGH!"

"Both of you, shut up, you're gonna get us all killed!"

"I can feel his saliva in my ear canal!"

"Do you hear voices?" asked a peculiarly British accent from far away, with a tinge of an echo; at least that was their best guess at what was said, as it was a bit hard to hear.

Silence returned to the van. The three of them disengaged from their struggle and turned toward the open window.

"Not really," asked a much more American voice, also distorted by distance and topography.

"Of course, now that I ask, I can't hear them anymore," Robin lamented. No longer seeing the need to stay still and attentive, he kept making his way around the mound of trash.

"Maybe they heard us?" Little John posited as he bagan following again, adjusting the quarterstaff with bindles so it rested more comfortably on his shoulder.

"Perhaps, perhaps not. If there's anybody here, we have our wits and our weapons about us."

"And if they have a shotgun or something?"

"Our wits and our weapons are stronger than the sum of their parts, Johnny. Have some faith in yourself."

"I'm telling ya, Rob, if it's just gonna be the two of us, we ought to invest in a firearm."

"Johnny, my boy, when did you develop such a bloodlust?"

"I meant just to have. For emergencies. Which we keep winding up in." Little John squeezed past a washing machine that was smack dab in the middle of the valley between the two mountains.

"Oh, you Americans and your guns…" Robin stopped to look at a pile of cans to see if any contained something they could use. They didn't.

"Hey, Rob, you don't know my people like I know my people."

"But am I not one of your people now?"

"I dunno, Rob, do you wanna pull over and remind yourself how long ago your green card expired?"

"Oh, piss off, Little John," was Robin's friendly scoff. "I've been here for, what?... Eleven years now? I'll take the citizenship test in front of their eyes if they want me to. I'm qualified."

"I thought you already took the test and failed," Little John said with a smirk.

"I didn't fail, Little John, I just didn't stick around long enough to find out if I passed," Robin corrected with confidence as he stepped over an old bicycle in his way.

"Yeah," Little John chuckled. "Alright. Sure you did."

"Quiz me then!" Robin was nearing the clearing at the exit of the valley.

"Alright, fine. Uh…" Little John tried to think of a good one as he picked up the bicycle with his free hand and tossed it onto the mound with a muffled crash. "Okay, here's an easy one. Who was president the year you were born?"

"That would be- Oh, Lord."

"Nope! It was Nixon, you limey bastard! And you said you-"

Little John caught up to Robin and saw what had inspired his remark. It looked as though the center of one of the mountains could not hold and now there was a bunch of junk splayed all over the place. It didn't quite look like a bomb went off, but the scene certainly could bring that old idiom into one's mind.

"...Oh," muttered Little John. "For the record, I thought you said 'Ford.'"

"What? Oh, that. No, no, no. Ford wasn't inaugurated until Nixon resigned the summer after I was born."

"Huh. Well, alright then."

"So evidently… these piles can just collapse at any time."

"I was afraid there were other people in here with weapons and you basically called me a pussy; now you're afraid of a little bit of structural un-integrity after living in a tree for seven years?"

"I'm not afraid, but I am apprehensive. I'm sure that another collapse like this isn't likely, but I just had a thought that it would be ridiculous if after all we've been through, we died in an avalanche of garbage."

Little John took his own assessment of the damage from his higher vantage point. He saw something way off to the right, around a bend almost hidden behind the slope of the same mountain that they were just working their way around.

"Maybe we could stay in there?" he pointed.

"Where?"

"There."

"I don't see anything, John."

Little John gave Robin a look of frustration, and as he looked down at him, he realized that because of the slope of the mound, its base was thicker at Robin's eye-level and he genuinely couldn't see what he was pointing at. Little John put down his staff and grabbed Robin under the armpits, and before the fox could protest, Little John lifted him up and thrust him in the direction of his discovery.

"There."

"...Do you mean the van?"

"I mean the van."

"I don't see why not. Let's check it out!"

Little John put Robin back down gently. "There ya go, little guy."

Robin picked up the bow he dropped during the sudden altitude change. "Hey now, I'm not the one with little in his name, now am I, Little John?" he ribbed a bit loudly.

"What can I say?" Little John picked up his staff and placed it back on his shoulder. "I come from a long line of bears with a great sense of humor," he proclaimed proudly. They both knew that wasn't a completely accurate explanation of the etymological quirk, but if Little John were ever to be in the mood to discuss it, it certainly wasn't going to be now.

"Okay, so now we know one of them's a bear, and I think his name is... 'Little John'?" Eddy whispered to his boys, breaking the silence; those last few sentences were the first they could truly hear clearly. "That's a stupid name, but… Ed, would you be able to do the talking to this guy if he gels with you?"

"But what if he's mean like Dad is!?"

"That's why you'd be doing the talking." They were whispering just loudly enough that the voices of the two outsiders were obscured, even as they did get closer.

"While I will concede that this 'Little John' character seems like he may be an aggressive personality, judging purely by his voice," Double-D observed, "it also seems like he is being fairly jovial to this other fellow - did I hear 'Ron' or 'Bob'? But I have to ask, Eddy, do you really think that Ed would be the best ambassador to his ursine brethren?"

"People like talking to people who look like them, Double-D. When you grow up, you'll realize that."

"Would you rather speak to fox you didn't know than a stranger of any other persuasion?"

"Yeah, absolutely. Now hush, I think they're getting clo-"

"Well, the window's open!" remarked Ron-Bob the British Person. "If it's locked, we can at least open it from the inside!"

"It actually looks like somebody broke it," noted Little John the Presumably-American Bear. "See the jagged little pieces sticking up from the bottom?"

"Ah, good eye, Johnny."

Then they saw him. A distinctly canine head welcomed itself in, craning into the window frame and looking straight down at the glass in the passenger's seat. Nothing registered in his peripheral vision in the brief moment between his head entering the van and when the seat's headrest began to block the beings in the corner from his line of vision.

"Remind me not to sit in the passenger seat!"

"Eddy! He looks just like you!"

Ed was wrong. Despite being members of the same species, they looked noticeably dissimilar. This guy had fur that was almost blood red with dirty-snow grayish-white, whereas Eddy and his kin had a mix light tan on a rustier, almost-orange red. Furthermore, Eddy thought there was something strange about how this fox was just leaning into the window of a truck this large; was he standing on something? But Robin didn't know about the inaccuracy of the comparison yet when he jumped from surprise and turned toward the sound of the voice.

"Oh! I, uh… a thousand apologies, gentlemen! I didn't see you there!"

Eddy and Double-D were too shocked and confused to say a word. Ed was disoriented by the big words again and decided to sit this round out.

"Wait, Rob, there's people in there!?" The boys could hear Little John right outside the window but they still couldn't see him.

"Er- Excuse me for a moment, lads." Robin pulled his head out and addressed Little John. "Put these under the van for a second," they heard him whisper from out-of-sight.

"Wait, why?" Little John asked at full volume.

"Shh! I think they're just kids, we don't need to scare them."

"Do they not wish to scare us so they can make us feel comfortable before they do harm to us?" Double-D pondered softly. Eddy and Ed had no good answers to that.

Some shuffling was heard of objects being shoved under the vehicle. Robin stuck his head back in and went to place his hands on the windowsill, forgetting that it was not quite suitable for resting his palms.

"Sorry about that; now do you boys live he- gah! Bloody… fucking hell!"

"What did I miss now?" asked the bear.

"I forgot about the bloody glass!" Robin pulled himself away from the window to show Little John, who was just now standing back up.

"Jeez, Rob, how do you forget about broken glass two seconds after you pointed it out?"

"I'm tired and my mind is wandering, Little- fuck, that actually does hurt!"

"Robin," Little John whispered mindfully this time, "you run from bullets on a regular basis and you can't take a few cuts?"

The Eds didn't hear that, thinking instead there was a lamentful silence between the two strangers. Ed was still silent, fascinated by this man who he would have swore looked just like Eddy, and Eddy himself was still trying to make heads or tails of whether these two were friendly or fiend-ly. Double-D, meanwhile, was trying to assess this situation in the context of everything they'd been through that morning.

"Rob, stop squeezing your hands, you're just drawing more blood out," Little John insisted as he continued trying to account for the damage. Before Robin could answer, however, there was a voice the two of them had never heard.

"E-excuse me, Mister… 'Rob,' is it?"

Robin perked up and leaned back toward the van. "Did someone say my name?"

"Y-yes, I do apologize, we couldn't help but overhear your conversations, and we picked up on recurring names along the way. B-b-but, uh, more to the point: are you in need of first aid assistance?"

"Double-D, what are you doing!?" whispered Eddy.

"I don't want to take Eddy's long-lost cousin to the doctor, Double-D! The doctor is scary and his lollipops taste like apricots!" whispered Ed.

"Oh, no thank you, I don't think we need any help, young man, we - aah! - we've some supplies in our-"

"Robin!" barked Little John as silently as he could, "You just said you wanted to hide the weapons! The supplies are tied to my staff!"

"Oh, how will they even know it's supposed to be a weapon?"

"Well if you draw attention to the staff, the bow's right next to it! And they'll wonder why our shit's under their van when we just got here!"

"I'm sorry, I didn't quite hear that," said Double-D.

"Er, uh…" Robin leaned back into the window and craned his neck to see around the headrest. "C-come to think of it, we've misplaced our medical kit, so if you have something that - g'shah! - something that could help, I'd much appreciate it!"

"You know what, Mr. Rob? For your comfort, I invite you to come to the back of the van. We'll open the doors for you."

"What!?" gasped Eddy.

"Oh, that would be splendid, thank - ghee-yah! - thank you, my boy."

This Robin fellow pulled his head out and disappeared toward the rear of the truck. Double-D took a deep breath as he stood, and he walked slowly toward the front of the van to maintain his footing on the waterbed mattress. Eddy thought Double-D was being paranoid when he stocked first-aid supplies in the van's glove compartment just in case they'd ever need it, but now it was finally being made useful, and in what great timing as well. Double-D had worked his whole life to be a model citizen, student, and son, and now some unwitting misadventures with his associates had landed him an arrest warrant and likely a criminal record, possibly to be carried out by his maybe-good, maybe-evil uncle. If these men were dangerous, it was worth the risk to serve them, to do good as an act of penance for his misdeeds. The opportunity for redemption was well worth the price of any harm these strangers could inflict upon him. After all, he was prepared for death at any moment.

Double-D leaned over to the glove compartment, careful not to fall into the bed of glass shards on the seat cushion. He grabbed the little red-and-white pouch and made his way back to the rear doors. At this point, if there was no dangerous excitement to be had when those floodgates were opened, he would actually be kind of disappointed.

"Are you seriously going to help these guys?" Eddy interrogated in vexed disbelief.

"I'm going to try to be a good person, Eddy, and if you don't wish to help me in that, then stay out of my way."

Click, grind… squeeeeak.

"Thank you, good sir," said the gentleman fox, "Pleasure to finally get a good look at you boys."

Next to him was the bear the Eds had heard so much about, leaning sideways to be able to see into the back of the van. "Do him a favor and don't read too much into that, alright?" Seeing his face work in conjunction with his voice did nothing to help the boys discern whether this bear was being dryly playful or coolly threatening.

Eddy had the most visceral reaction to seeing them. For one thing, there was another bit of strangeness about this Rob fellow's appearance: he didn't seem to have any 'gloves.' Not real winter-wear, of course, as it was damn-nigh the height of June, but rather the distinct discoloration around the hands and feet and tail sported by every fox Eddy had ever seen. Some, like those in Eddy's family, had black gloves, others white, and some just a slightly lighter or darker shade than the rest of their coat, but this dude's hands were just plain red - bloodstains notwithstanding. Eddy would later make a mental note to try to see if this guy had anything going around his feet or tail, without being too weird or obvious that he was looking for demarcations in such odd places.

But never mind all of that: just as Eddy had feared when he saw him in the window, this guy was fucking huge. Granted, his shins were out of frame underneath the bumper, but Eddy could extrapolate that he was probably the tallest fox he'd ever seen in his entire life, and Eddy really didn't want to see such a creature. Being cripplingly paranoid with height, Eddy knew four numbers: 3-foot-2, which was how tall his mom was, and which was the average height for a female adult red fox in the United States, and which was the bare-ass minimum Eddy would allow himself to be as an adult without blowing his brains out; 3-foot-4 was the average height for an adult male of his species; his brother was 3-7 or 3-8 and his dad was considered fox-tall at 3-foot-9 (a potential fifth relevant number Eddy knew was four feet even, which is what his brother and father put when prompted for their height on documents and such, since they assumed - correctly - that nobody would correct them, and that the taller mammals that ran everything couldn't perceive a four inch difference from up on high). Eddy had done his research, because of course he did, and for that reason he also knew that red foxes were a species with a notably wide height range; but just as it didn't comfort him knowing that there were some poor fucks out there who were shorter as adults than even him as a stunted teenager, he did not feel very self-confident in the presence of a man who surely must have been a head taller than Eddy's own dad and brother.

And yet - and yet - here was this brown bear that this giant was hanging out with that paradoxically make the fox look tiny at the same time. While doing his research, Eddy had seen that bears were also on the list of species with a wide range of plausible adult heights, and this "Little John" was certainly not the tallest specimen Eddy had seen or heard of, but just by eyeballing him, Eddy could guestimate that he was still significantly taller than Ed or Ed's father (the last time Eddy checked, those two were roughly the same height, much to Mr. Browne's chagrin). And yet again, this bear didn't look particularly huge - he didn't look stretched out and his head didn't look disproportionately small on his body. If not for the van for reference, Eddy might guess that this guy looked a foot or more shorter from far away. That, in turn, made the fox look even smaller, even though Eddy knew he wasn't, so if you just focused your eyes on the fox and treated his bear bud as a background object, the fox would look tall again, but then you remember the bear isn't just a piece of the scenery and that dangling elbow roughly level to the fox's ear belongs to a sapient being and now you're not so sure about anything...

Eddy's brain processed all of these thoughts in the span of a few milliseconds. Between the paradoxical height, abnormal color scheme to his fur, and the supremely out-of-place British accent, Eddy wondered if he was actually having a horrible nightmare and these figurants were monsters, or perhaps he'd been gravely wounded by a cop's bullet and these were demons come to torment him as he lay dying. But all Eddy really cared about was that he wouldn't have to stand next to this Englishman and find out how he measured up. He'd rather it be a mystery.

Double-D, by virtue of not sharing Eddy's deep-seated size paranoia, was able to take a much more empirical assessment of these guests, and draw educated conclusions accordingly. He did still note the above-average physical frames in front of him, but shrugged it off as a weird quirk, thinking that between these two and his friend-cum-foe uncle, whom he also recalled being notably taller than his parents, Double-D hadn't witnessed this many incidentally freakishly tall characters in rapid succession since he finished reading that 1100-page novel over Spring Break by an author who evidently had even more of an obsession with tall and short people than Eddy did; but Double-D simply dismissed this as a bizarre coincidence, albeit one compounded by the fact that this same novel was also the source for his newfound fatalistic mantra.

He was more focused on the fact that the Englishman was rather well-dressed with a lincoln-green polo shirt, and while his American associate was not quite as buttoned-up, he did not look by any means disheveled in his forest-green jacket; he did notice the bear's jacket had slightly-darker spots that suggested the letters "J", "E", "T", and "S" were once emblazoned on the jacket, and Double-D barely recalled that to be the name of some sports team from New York (God help him if he could remember which sport they played), but he wrote this off as the bear either being reasonably thrifty and continuing to wear a fully-functional coat after its decals had fallen off, or perhaps he peeled them off himself if he shared Double-D's disdain for sports.

A fox and a bear. Double-D was the first to make the connection. But curiously, he consciously told himself that these couldn't be the two suspects being sought by law enforcement; this fox was simply too eloquent to be on the wrong side of the law, and this bear surely must be an upright fellow to make his gentlemanly acquaintance, and after all, why would a British national come all the way across the ocean just to turn to a life of crime?

Poor Double-D didn't even notice that the letters expunged from the bear's jacket, as if to allow its wearer to hide more easily among greenery and have fewer unique details about him when standing in a crowd, these details sitting right in front of his nose, were a major clue that his conclusion was off-base. If you told him that he also neglected to realize that green clothes would best blend into a forest's leaves, Double-D might have just dropped dead from sheer embarrassment.

As for Ed, he only saw one logical response to laying eyes upon them.

"Eddy! It's you and me from the future!"

"Oh, c'mon, Ed…" grumbled Eddy.

"Cool! You turn into one of those people with funny accents!"

Upon seeing such a chipper young man excited by his own imagination, Robin couldn't help but smile. Little John would normally join in the joviality, but he was tired, frustrated and thoroughly confused, so he just looked unimpressed.

"Gasp! But where's Double-D!?" worried Ed.

"Oh, don't you worry about me, Ed, I-"

Afraid for his friend, Ed grabbed him and hugged him tightly. "Poor Double-D! He was torn apart by mutant robots in the Mecha-Apocalypse! Huh! No! He was devoured by the reanimated cadaver of the Giant Peruvian Tapeworm from Hunger from Another Hemisphere! Nonono, I know what happened! His brain exploded from being too smart!"

"Uh, Ed-" Double-D choked out, "you're embarrassing me in front of our guests." In the close contact, Double-D could almost feel the salt from Ed's delusional tears sting in his own eyes.

Robin chuckled. "Heh, have we interrupted a special mome-?"

"You boys see the man's hands bleeding all over the place, right?" Little John cut in.

"Oh!" Ed realized, "Double-D, you need to help heal Future Eddy!" He finally let go of the wolf and Double-D wheezed as his lungs regained full functionality. "Otherwise I'll be all alone to fight the robo-mutants myself!"

"Of course, Ed," Double-D conceded. He made a point to wait a few seconds before making eye contact with the adults for lack of wanting to have to answer for Ed's antics. Instead he made his way over to the fox's outheld hands and took a seat at on the edge of the bumper.

"May I examine the wounds, Mr. Rob?" Double-D didn't grab the bleeding paws yet, but didn't wait for an answer to start looking at them hands-free.

"Young man, I beg you not call me 'Mr. Rob,' 'Robin' is just fine." He gave a playful glance up at Little John. "Or just 'Rob' if you really can't be bothered with a second syllable." Little John didn't even acknowledge that Robin said that. "And yes, do with them as you must."

"Oh, but I would feel so insolent if I were to address an adult by their given name." Double-D grabbed the paws in his face and looked at the depth and frequency of cuts.

"Well then, you were raised well. But luckily for you, my given name is actually Robert; 'Robin' was a family nickname that everybody prefered; I often wonder if my parents had buyers' remorse with the name they bestowed on me. 'Robin' actually started out as an nickname for 'Robert,' did you know?"

"Is that so? How intriguing!" Double-D would have thought it incredibly rude to point out that he did, in fact, already know that.

"Robin's a girls' name, but okay," muttered a cynical Eddy, but nobody had anything to say to that, so they all acted like he said nothing at all. Eddy was still glad he said it, however, as he felt it legitimized a leg up he had on this tall guy.

"Now, Mister, uh…" Double-D struggled for the correct title.

"My good man, if you absolutely insist, you can call me Mr. Hood."

Little John nudged Robin in annoyance. "Jeez, Rob, just hand him a copy of your life's memoirs, it might save us some time."

Eddy, who was trying really hard not to focus on his boiling jealousy, found himself agreeing with that statement. He was liking this Little John guy's responses to everything.

"Splendid, Mr. Hood," Double-D continued. "Now, it seems that your cuts are not too deep at all, but they are quite numerous, so common adhesive strips likely would not get the job done. With your permission, may I apply some gauze and bandages?"

"Be my guest!"

As Double-D went searching in his pouch for the relevant supplies, Robin made a point to exchange friendly smiles with the other two boys, who were being incredibly quiet in all this. He decided that if he was going to be a guest in their space, and ultimate ask if they could borrow this space, that he might as well try to make the atmosphere more amicable.

"So unless my ears deceive me," ventured Robin, "I'm the guest of both an 'Ed' and an 'Eddy'? Both short for 'Edward,' I presume?"

Ed was still reeling in the presence of future iterations of himself and his buddy, while Eddy's mind was halfway to elsewhere trying not to perish in a spiraling hole of self-pity.

"Uh… yeah, that's right," Eddy coughed out.

"A fine English name! And my caretaker, I hear they call you 'Double-D'. What might that stand for?"

"I'll bet a quarter it's something boring like 'David Daniel'," Little John offered. This was another sentence from the adult bear that the young fox was intrigued by.

'Actually, it's also short for 'Edward,' but with three d's, with two consecutively after the initial E; it's an old family tradition from my mother's side," Double-D clarified.

"Heh, pay up," Eddy chuckled nervously. The bear returned the weak chuckle but showed no indication of actually producing currency. Eddy was starting to have second thoughts about warming up to this guy.

"Now, Mr. Hood, is it alright if I apply some hydrogen peroxide to reduce the risk of infection?"

"Surely." As Double-D poured some antiseptic onto a cotton ball, Robin went to further bridge the gap. "So I'm in the presence of three young men all named Edward, am I? I wasn't going to mention this, but-"

Double-D applied the peroxide to the cuts, swabbing liberally to spread the moisture as well as to mop up the blood. Robin seethed and tried not to seem to emasculated by the penetrating stinging.

"Hhhhhhhhh!... As I was saying, I should have no problem remembering your names, since Edward's my middle name as well! Funny how things work out!"

"Hm. Really!" Double-D said, genuinely fascinated by this coincidence, assuming that it wasn't all just a ruse to gain their trust.

"And our friend Little John over here is just barely locked out of our club; his mid- Hhhhh!" Robin hissed as Double-D started cleaning the other hand with a fresh cotton swab.

"For the record, Rob, I didn't consent to you airing out all my personal details," Little John grumbled.

"Why, what on earth are you talking about, John Edmund Little?" Robin chuckled.

"Eddy, can you write those names down?" Ed asked. "We need to make sure we don't mess up our future selves when we change our names, or we might irreparably destroy the future!"

Eddy just shot him a dirty look; it was the best he could do, since he probably couldn't get a word out from the embarrassment of not knowing what irreparably meant if even Ed did.

Robin chuckled affably again, and not just to be polite; he was seriously getting a kick out of watching these kids and their bizarre dynamics. "Well, if you didn't know our names before now, there will be little need for you to know them them after we part. This will all just be a pleasant encounter." But someone among them perceived some arrogance in that statement, and felt the need to challenge it.

"Wait," Eddy spoke up, "why would we already know your names? Are you famous or something?"

"Er… in some circles, perhaps. But aren't we all?"

"So Mr. Robert Edward Hood, is it?" asked Double-D as he unwound the spool of bandages. "Well! For history's sake, it's probably a good thing your last name isn't Lee!"

"Now why would it be a good thing that that isn't my last name?" Robin asked. Hearing this, Double-D tried to hide a look of disappointment on his face; this gentleman had proven himself to be so learned before this bump in the road, and Double-D shamefully confessed to himself that this passing moment of fallibility was deflating his opinion of the stranger.

Little John nudged Robin again and stood up straight so the boys couldn't read his lips above the doorway. "There's no way you would have passed that citizenship test," he whispered. Robin was puzzled for a second, but he ultimately got the reference.

Robin turned back to Double-D, who was wrapping up the fox's left paw. Robin looked past him and saw an ironing board along the side of the mattress and some generators and extension cords pushed toward the front, and figured there was no time like the present to pop the relevant question.

"So you had these medical supplies in the van ready to go. May I ask, do you boys live here? Are you in need of any help?"

Eddy looked confused; Double-D looked embarrassed; Ed looked at a fly crawling on the wall.

"Uh-" Double-D sputtered, "Why, I-"

"Oh, Christ, no, we don't live here!" said Eddy, "This is just a place we hang out sometimes. Do we look like we're homeless to you?"

Robin admired the kid's spunk but didn't care for his snark. "Oh, I do apologize if it seemed like I was making assumptions; between this and the power source, I was a bit thrown-off."

"'Power source,' what now?" Little John bent over further to get a good look at the interior; from his high angle of view, he hadn't been able to see much deeper into the van past the boys.

"Oh, that's just for, uh…" Double-D squirmed as he conjured up a worthy fib. "...um, for diversionary activities! Yes!"

Robin was debating whether he could mine any relevant information from asking what kind of activities?, but Eddy had a more urgent question.

"Hey! Are you guys cops or something!?" Eddy's fear of getting busted on the first day of his new operation was no match for the desire to defy the ones who dared suggest that he, Eddy the Inevitable Future Millionaire, were a homeless person.

"Eddy!" barked an embarrassed Double-D.

"I beg your pardon?" demanded an offended Little John.

Robin was also taken aback by the outburst, but he was certain that cooler heads would prevail, so he forced another chuckle out. "Oh, my lad, - Eddy, is it? - I wouldn't have moved across the ocean just to join a police force."

"Wait, where're you from that's across the ocean? I thought you were British or something."

Robin couldn't even pretend to be amused by that one. He shot Little John an unimpressed look, which John returned with a look of Hey, this kid doesn't represent me. Double-D forced himself to focus more closely on wrapping up the injured paw, trying desperately to disappear in plain sight.

"Why, do you got sumpthin' to hide, kid?" asked Little John.

"Uh- no!" coughed Eddy.

"Y-you'll have to forgive Eddy, Mister, um, Little, is it? He's, uh, just… very private about his procection. D'no! I mean… protective about his privacy."

"I'll say," mumbled Little John; he just wanted to go to bed at this point. "Can we cut to the chase?"

"The chase?" pressed Eddy, "What chase?"

"Did you want to play tag!?" Ed proposed, then leaned over to the older bear and laid a hand on his forearm. "Tag! You're-!"

"Nope," was all Little John replied, cowing Ed into retreating and acting like their exchange never happened..

"What Little John means is-" started Robin, but Little John wasn't in any mood to have anybody speak on his behalf.

"Can we borrow this place for a few nights?" Little John spat. "...And days?"

"You really must excuse Little John; he's really usually much more affable than this when things are going well. But right now? Things are all but well at the moment," Robin took the reins again and tried to exercise his charm for some damage control. "You see, we - oh, I don't want to upset you with our problems, but - our apartment caught fire, and-"

"Oh, my, I'm so sorry to hear that!" Double-D interjected.

"You two live together?" Eddy asked in a way that sounded more malicious than genuinely confused.

"Ah, yes, it's not the greatest arrangement, but we are struggling actors, trying to cut our teeth in the Nottingham theatre scene so we can work our way up to Hollywood one day."

"Yeah, so you don't have to worry about us defiling your personal space, kid," Little John said with eyes locked on Eddy, "if that is what you were asking."

Eddy tried his best not to look intimidated.

"So imagine our dejection when our microwave caught fire last night while we were cooking dinner!" Robin continued. "Silly me, I left a shard of aluminium foil on the edge of the bowl! The fire wasn't too bad, and we were very lucky that most of our possessions were unharmed, but the damage was done and our landlord said it would be a few days until our flat would be liveable again. And broke as we are, we can't just go to a hotel and rent a room. So we went looking for some cheap real estate to tide us over."

"Oh, my," Double-D repeated, as it was the politest, most inoffensive response he knew. "That sounds downright dreadful! What a poor streak of fortune!"

"So you live in the city, and now you're looking for a place to stay in a junkyard in the suburbs?" Eddy was skeptical.

"We-"

"It was a long night," Little John growled. Looking at Eddy again, that certainly got the point across.

"Indeed it was," finished Robin, "and so we were hoping we could seek shelter in this old van, and then we met you fine lads. We were going to leave it be since we thought this was your own dwelling, but if you have other homes to go back to, I'll admit, we're curious if we could work something out." He was looking right into Double-D's eyes, trying to appeal to the obvious smart one in the group, and Double-D looked back into the eyes of the master of bullshitting extemporaneously, from whom he could stand to learn a few lessons.

"Are we gonna have a sleepover!?" ventured Ed.

"Shit, works for me," said Little John.

"Oh, get the fuck outta here!" hollered Eddy. "We've been taking care of this old rustbox for, what? Two years now? Just like it was a second home. This is our house! Finders, keepers; losers, get lost!"

"The little shit's got moxie, I'll give him that," mumbled Little John, who was fading fast.

"Easy for you to say, Mister Fucking Beluga Whale! You wouldn't last two days if you were my size!"

A couple of mispronounced syllables in that phrase rattled some unpleasant memories in Little John, but they were so deeply embedded in that sentence that even Robin didn't pick up on them. Little John really wanted to pick this kid up and dropkick him to the moon, but he knew that Robin would never see him as a good man again if he took out his frustrations on a child, so he came up with the most composed and concise reply he could think of:

"You…. don't know shit… about my life."

"Oh, you really must pardon my pal Johnny, he really is not being himself today," Robin jumped in. "I only wish you could have met us when we were fully rested so you could see the man I know as almost like a brother to me."

"You stay out of this, Rob."

"Not to worry, Mr. Hood, I've not seen him instigating any conflict here," Double-D reassured. "If anything, I'd ask if you were interested in a trade for Eddy!"

"You son of a bitch, Double-D! Back me up!"

"Now, while my fellow foxes might chastise me for abandoning one of our own," Robin said, "I would still be interested in a negotiation. We can't afford a hotel room, but we can probably afford to pay you a little something for your hospitality."

A shockwave rang out through the air, one that only Eddy could perceive.

"Pay?"

"Oh, I do believe you've just said one of Eddy's favorite words!" remarked Double-D.

"Hm. Is that so?" Robin was starting to have second thoughts about the other fox - and the other two boys for associating with him. But he wasn't writing them off just yet.

"What can I say? I'm a fan of economics," Eddy insisted slyly.

"Ah, macro- or micro-?" Robin quizzed him playfully.

"Uh… what?"

"Mr. Hood, please disregard him," Double-D implored of the Englishman, "He's not been on his best behavior today, and he doesn't deserve any type of financial reward for his conduct."

"Double-D, what the hell are you talking about!?"

"I'm trying to do the right thing, Eddy."

"And I admire your noble quest to do what you think is right, but are you certain we can't give you anything?" Robin turned to Little John, whose head was invisible above the roof of the van. "Little John, don't you have twenty dollars on you?"

"TWENTY FUCKING DOLLARS!?" Eddy screamed at the top of his lungs.

Little John wasn't responding. Robin nudged his arm while looking up and realized he couldn't see his head. "Joh-Johnny? You alright, lad?"

"Hm?" Little John woke up groggily. Restraining himself toward Eddy had drained his remaining energy and he had promptly rested his chin on the roof of the van and fell asleep.

"Johnny, do you have a twenty spot on you?"

Elsewhere, Eddy was drowning in his own saliva.

"Hm. Oh, yeah. Why?"

"Because we're negotiating," - a wink in the eye on the side of his head which the Eds couldn't see - "with our friend Eddy for room and board."

"Oh, sure, fine by me," Little John said sloppily as he fished in his jacket pocket and produced a Jackson.

"Money!" cried out the only one of the five who could be reasonably expected to cry that out.

Eddy went for the piece of paper in Little John's hand, but the bear boredly held it up to the roof, out of Eddy's reach. The tiny fox jumped on the edge of the water bed trying to get the leverage to reach the outheld dollar, whimpering in money-lust the whole time, until after a half a dozen bounces he arced too far forward and fell out of the van between Little John and Robin, landing in the dirt with a thump.

"I insist," insisted Double-D, "keep the money. After hearing what you've been through, I wouldn't be able to sleep at night knowing I extorted money out of you in exchange for basic decency. I only hope this humble abode sufficiently suits your needs."

"Please don't say 'sleep,'" Little John murmured lazily, eyes struggling to stay open. Then they burst open with the feeling of an unwelcome touch and a now-familiar sound of whimpering. "He-hey! Get the hell off me, kid!"

Eddy was trying to do the equivalent of climbing Mount Everest during an earthquake as he clambered up the squirming bear, trying to get the legal tender at the end of his arm.

"Eddy, get down from there!" scolded Double-D.

"You have to respect his resilience," noted Robin.

Little John wiggled violently and Eddy lost his footing; another few shakes and he was splayed on the ground again.

"Goddamn, kid..." Little John said incredulously.

"Aw, c'mon!" Eddy growled as soon as he got back up. "I'm not giving up my property without proper reimbursement!"

"Eddy, we wouldn't be able to split twenty dollars three ways anyway."

"Sure you can! Ten, ten, and fifteen! Now cough up the dough!"

"Oh-! Mr. Hood, you'll have to trust me that Eddy is not an accurate representation of the average product of the American schooling system!"

"It's quite alright, my boy," Robin reassured. Neither of them believed what Double-D said.

"My money!" Eddy screamed while pounding on the ground on which he sat, looking not unlike a toddler in more ways than usual.

"Mr. Hood, Mr. Little, you're going to have to forgive my two associates for leaving without saying goodbye." With that, Double-D pulled out the ace up his sleeve. He stepped out of the van and took a spot next to Robin to clear the exit. "Oh, Ed? Isn't there a movie marathon on the Sci-Fi Channel this afternoon?"

Ed perked up. "Movie marathon?"

"And I'm sure that Eddy would hate to miss it, too!"

"Uh… Double-D?" Eddy whimpered.

"Monster movies!" Ed hollered as he sat up straight from his semi-reclining position - and promptly hit his head on the roof of the van. Undeterred, he twisted himself out of the van, forced his way past Double-D and the strangers, picked up Eddy, threw him over his shoulder, and ran off toward home.

"Ed!" Eddy shrieked, "There's a marathon on every weekend! Calm down! Double-D, don't you want jawbreakers!?"

Ed screeched to a halt. "Wait. Something is missing." Ed turned back to the three by the van. "Double-D, aren't you coming, too?"

"I'll be right behind you, Ed! I'm just seeing off our new friends!"

"OKAY!" Ed cheered as he ran off. "More monster movie for Ed and Eddy!"

"Ed!" cried Eddy. And then they were gone.

The other three just stood there watching, horrified, amused, and astounded.

"...Welp!" Little John broke the silence. "Thanks for the room! G'night!" He offered a two-finger temple salute before starting to crawl into the van.

"Little John, we haven't said our goodbyes yet!" Robin corrected.

"Well, for fuck's sakes, Mom, aren't you tired, too?" Little John backed out and took a seat on the dirt, leaning lazily against the van. He still towered over the fox and the wolf from his seated position.

"Absolutely exhausted," Robin clarified and turned to the young wolf, whom all three found was curiously still a solid few inches taller than Robin. "Eddward, I cannot thank you enough for your help. Little John and I are indebted to you. We may move some of your stuff around for comfort's sake, but I assure you, this van will be as pristine as you left it."

"And we'll be gone as soon as we have somewhere else to go," Little John added, "With any luck, we might be gone by morning."

"Oh, good sirs, it's a pleasure to be able to aid you in your time of need. If you'd like, I can stop by periodically to check in on how you're doing. Perhaps I can provide you with some supplies. Some toiletries, perhaps?"

"Eddward, you needn't worry about us. We've been through tougher hardships than this; we'll be just fine."

"Oh, but I insist! Can I at least fetch you some hand sanitizer? Or perhaps I can take down the number of your landlord and call to ask for updates on the situation of the-?"

"Eddward, Eddward, Eddward. You've assisted us in being able to live our lives; now we ask that you not let us impede you in living yours. Would you do that for us?"

Double-D thought for a moment. "Well, Mr. Hood, I offered our place to you because I wanted to do the right thing… I suppose heeding your well-wishing would be the next logical step toward that end."

"Attaboy, lad! I hope your parents know they raised a good boy."

Double-D's cheeks grew hot with this affirmation of his goodness.

"Mr. Hood, it's been a pleasure to meet you and I certainly do hope to see you again before you depart. And to you, Mister-" Double-D glanced at Little John dozing against the van. "Oh, he's fallen asleep again."

"Just because my eyes are closed and I'm not talking or moving doesn't mean I'm asleep," Little John corrected.

"Oh! My apologies, Mr. Little!"

"No, kid, listen… Jesus, I- I'm sorry I've been such a… well, a bear to you and your friends, but seriously, I'm really fucking tired. But you helped us out big here, kid. I appreciate it. Hey," Little John said as he placed a big paw on Double-D's shoulder. "You seem like a good guy. Saying you wanna do what's right. I like that. Don't lose that." Then he said something that he couldn't decide if it would be nice to say or just odd, but he decided to say it anyway on the grounds that he didn't know if he'd ever get a chance to say it again. "You kinda remind me of myself when I was your age… except you seem a lot fucking smarter."

"Well it seems that Little John's blabbering in his fatigue, so maybe it really is best we finally retire for the night," Robin said, the fatigue finally starting to get to him as well. "...or, the day, rather. And it seems like you'd best be getting back to your friends. Who knows where they'll wind up without their leader?"

Leader? Double-D's face lit up like a Christmas tree when he heard that. He had fancied himself many things, but this was never among them. And he was liking the idea of it.

"Uh- yes, sir, Mr. Hood! I won't let you down!" And off he went to seek his fortune as a leader of men. Robin and John watched with tired smiles as he ran off until he was out of sight.

"Jesus fuck, I'm going to sleep now," Little John bellowed as soon as the strange young wolf was gone, and started crawling back into the van..

"Johnny, if you bring out their generators and such, I'll move them around the side."

"You're lucky I don't want to breathe in gasoline fumes," John grumbled as he started extracting the goods.

"And after that, can you retrieve our weapons and put them in the front seat?"

"I suppose I could."

"And can you sweep the glass out of there while you're in the neighborhood?"

"Robin, I'm going to fucking kill you."

"No, you won't."

"Yeah, you're probably right."

Little John got the obstacles out and went around the side to reach for the bow, arrow, staff and supplies under the van.

"Those kids were weird," Little John noted.

"I can't disagree, but they had their charms. But I'm glad we didn't give them the money. The look of greed in that fox lad's eyes told me he wouldn't be spending it in a worthwhile way. But I could be wrong."

"Hey, I was asleep for half of that," Little John said from under the vehicle. "And you've used the word 'lad' more today than I've heard from you in years. I thought I did a good enough job infecting you with the Americanism!"

"Honestly, John, I think I was forcing it, especially since it seemed to be winning over that wolf boy. He clearly equated my accent and dialect to intelligence, regardless of how much slang I used."

Little John barely heard half of that, partially because his hearing was muffled, and partially because he was distracted by something he found under the van that didn't belong to either of them, but which he had been thinking they could use. "Oh, hello…"

"What was that?"

"Erm- I was just thinking, could that wolf kid ever start a sentence without 'oh'? Was he even capable of it?"

"I was thinking more about that bear that really did seem to think that we were him and his friend from the future. And you thought poor Martin had issues…" Robin's voice seemed to have a different auditory quality to it now, as if coming from a different place.

Little John was listening just enough to carry the conversation as he inspected his treasure. "Martin wasn't talking, whereas this kid was using big words out of nowhere every so often. He's definitely got something going on, but he's not retarded." The identification number was still intact, so he'd have to do something about that, and while he didn't want to make a noise by unloading the cartridge, he could estimate from the weight that it was probably loaded. But with any luck, he'd never need to find out.

"I never said he was, now did I?"

"Yeah, well you insinuated it." Little John opened the passenger's side door to put his new security blanket in the glove compartment. "Hey, you're already laying down!?"

"I needed to stake my claim, or your big arse would have bumped me out!"

Little John very quietly opened the glove box and put the piece inside. "Haven't you Brits staked your claim on enough?"

"Your Manifest Destiny has nothing on the English Empire!"

He needed something to cover it with, just in case. "Hey, whatever happened to that first-aid pouch thing?"

"Oh, of course!" Robin tossed it over the front seats without looking and it smacked off the dashboard and landed on the glass-covered seat. "There ya go!"

"Hey, c'mon, Rob, it landed right in the glass!"

"Well, there're Band-Aids in there if you cut yourself!"

Little John used the pouch to sweep as much glass as he could out of the seat and off the floor out of the van. "We ought to at least put a plastic bag over this window to repay them."

"Good idea! First thing in the morning… or the evening!"

Sweep, sweep, sweep.

"Now you got me thinking about if those kids were our past selves."

"In your timeline, do I become English later in life, or am I just always American?"

"I mean, honestly, a little part of me is thinking about how I fucking wish I was that kid's size at his age. Hell, I didn't even catch their ages, and I know I wasn't his size at his age. That guy's gonna be fucking huge. And that fox would probably kill to be as tall as you."

"It really is a little part of you that's thinking about this, isn't it?"

"Oh, shut up. But more than that, I'm thinking… what if we were friends when we were kids? Ignore the transatlantic shit; really, would we stick together as adults? Would we be doing… this?"

"I sure hope we'd stick together. But who would our wolf friend be?"

"Fuck, I dunno, Woodland?"

"Heh. Don't make me laugh, Little John. I don't have the energy."

"Well, then, we'd be three Eds, too, now wouldn't we be?" Little John got all the glass out as he could and put the first-aid pouch in the glove compartment, trying to conceal the contraband.

"That is a strange coincidence, but it is a rather common name."

"Not as much as it was in our parents' generation. And it definitely ain't as common as John or Robert. But I digress…" Little John slammed the door and made his way to the rear doors, ready to collapse. "Move over," he said as he opened the gateway to the land of slumber.

"I'll be telling you the same thing in five minutes."

Little John crawled in, surprised by the surface of the mattress. "Hey, I didn't know this was a waterbed! This is cool! These went out of style over a decade ago! I've never actually been on one of these!"

"And you may never have if you didn't choose this life. Just don't pop it."

The waterbed shifted under Little John's weight as he made his way in. "You're gonna have to close the doors, Rob; I don't think there's enough space for me to turn around and reach them."

Robin got up and stumbled over to the doors to close them. "Little John, the world doesn't have enough space for you."

"Preferable to the opposite problem. I say this as an expert authority." Little John found a comfortable spot and collapsed. "Alright, goodnight."

With the doors closed, Robin turned and found that his original spot had indeed been annexed by the grizzly, so he just collapsed in his place and closed his eyes. He had enough energy for one more remark: "You know, between you and I, we really do bicker like an old married couple sometimes."

Robin could barely hear Little John's muttered response: "Heh, I guess we might as well adopt three kids."

*A.N.* Not much to say besides tell me whatcha think. I appreciate ya. -D