Of the chapters I ve written so far for this project, this has definitely been one of the most interesting. I just want to give a quick explanation of one thing, and to keep it spoiler-free I ll just say to find out more about Vanya you can read Fox Dens and Rabbit Trails: Santa Clawed and/or No Stone Unturned: Something Stinks. All I ll say here and now is that to get it all clear, no. She is not in any way connected to Skye; in fact when I first came up with her character I had never even heard of Skye.
All set? Then happy reading, everyone!
A drum roll filled the air in the big top, setting the mood for the performance about to begin. Up in the very eaves of the massive tent, a pure white fox swung to and fro among metal bars doing a series of elaborate maneuvers. Flipping in the air, swinging hand over hand from one to another, or arching out on one to hook her knees on another, she pumped her arms, legs, and back tirelessly to build momentum smoothly from one move to the next. Her white tights, bedecked with light blue sequins in curling lines along her body, complimented to perfection her display of elegance and skill.
On a platform off to the side, a nearly identical miniature of her stood waiting with another bar clutched in her paws. Its rough, textured surface felt good under the kit's pads as she waited for her signal. This was her moment; her big chance. Across the line of trapezes, the other platform called to her like the mythical sirens of ancient legend.
At long last, her mother called to her from the second-nearest trapeze. "Come, Vanya!"
With a thrill of excitement in her chest, the fox kit kicked off and launched herself into empty space. Bracing herself for the exact moment to move, she whipped her legs forward and hooked them over the next bar, letting go with her paws so smoothly it was as if the last bar never knew she had left it. Tucking her arms against her chest to reduce wind resistance, she glided smoothly out towards her mother as her mother, in turn, swung to meet her.
"And let's hear it," called a voice below, "for the fearless Vanya Zarra!"
The timing was perfect. The moment was perfect. In exactly four seconds she would catch her mother's paws and swing on to the next trapeze past hers, executing two - maybe three somersaults before catching that one. She was going all the way across today. She could feel it!
As she reached out, her mind counted down the seconds. Four! Three! Two!
"Fall!"
Vanya's mind snapped out of its spell of assurance even as her paws mechanically ignored the command and grabbed her mother by the wrists, expecting her to do the same as they had done many other times. Fall? she thought. Again?! But I've got this. I've totally got this!
She looked up into her mother's face and saw the same calm look the vixen always wore in her act. "Fall, Vanya!" Catherine repeated, not clasping in turn.
In a moment of willfulness, the kit refused to let go. "No!" she shouted up, looking towards the coming bar. She could just reach it with her Catherine Zarra didn't give her daughter the chance. With a flick of her legs, she released the bar and the two of them plunged towards the circus ring fifty feet below.
"Mother!" yelled Vanya in annoyance. She'd almost had it this time! Her aim had been perfect.
Apparently, her mother had other plans. "Hang on!" she called, wrapping the kit up in her arms.
"I can fall on my own, Mom!" complained Vanya, trying to push away. To her chagrin, though, expert acrobats didn't get to be experts by being weak. Catherine Zarra had a grip like an octopus.
"Go limp!" she ordered, turning in mid-fall. A half-second later, her back hit the net.
Vanya waited as the net bent under them, then rebounded while they bounced and rolled about. It wasn't nearly as springy as a trampoline, but more akin to a water bed. For falls from that height, the whole idea of a net was to spread out the force of the impact and slow them, not throw them back up. Throwing too much force back into them could have broken some very important bones - like, say, the ones in the neck.
Of course, her main irritation had little to do with lack of fun.
"Are you alright, honey?" asked Catherine as they righted themselves and climbed across the net like two spiders.
Vanya shook herself. "I'm fine, mother," said she. She only used the longer moniker when she was annoyed - partly with her mother in this case, and partly with herself. "I could have done it."
"But I said not to," her mother countered simply. "An aerialist must learn to deal with the unexpected."
"And to follow instructions to the last jot and tittle," said her father, walking up. Like his wife and their daughter, he was an arctic fox. He had been the one play-announcing her act, or rather her rehearsal. "Just keep practicing. You'll get there."
Vanya reached the edge of the net. "I've been there," she protested, dropping to the ground and landing on bent knees as lithely as a cheetah. "I can do the stunt. I'm tired of practicing the old stuff."
Catherine sighed and shook her head, but she did it with a smile. "I can't let you do more than you're ready to do. You know that."
"But you were the reason I fell," the kit argued. "You let go, not me."
"Because you didn't listen," came the anticipated reasoning. "A circus performer must always listen, especially during dangerous stunts."
The scowl on Vanya's face could have curdled milk. "If you want me to be ready for danger, how come you wrapped me up like that?"
"Better than the two of you bouncing all over and crashing together," her father replied.
Catherine smiled at her daughter's bravado. Truly, she was the spirits of both her parents in one exceptional package. "Your father is right. Besides, what kind of mother would I be if I didn't catch you?"
"Maybe a circus acrobat training her future replacement?" Vanya suggested, propping her paws on her hips. She liked doing that pose, especially when she was dressed in tights like her mother's. True, her getup wasn't as fancy; fewer sparkles and more coverage. Her father wouldn't hear of his prepubescent daughter wearing anything too eye-catching, after all. Still, she felt that striking a dramatic pose in tights suited her as a future star.
Ivan - her father - mocked dismay. "Her replacement?" he asked. "I thought you would be taking over my knife-throwing act."
True as it was that Vanya enjoyed learning her father's art as well, she shook her head. "Not if you don't let me use the sharp ones," she said, folding her arms and turning back to her mother. "Come on, Mom, let's do it again."
Catherine shook her head. "Twenty tries a day is enough for practice," she said, patting her daughter between the ears. "You go clean up. Even if you master all our stunts you can't perform for years yet. You have time."
Vanya rolled her eyes. She knew her parents were right. She could do pirouettes on the tightrope and did alright on the trapezes (not perfectly, but who did?) even though most kits her age could barely pack their own lunches for school. Thanks to the laws on child labor and safety, though, about the only performance she could do at the moment was taking part in Rocky the kangaroo's foot-juggling act... as the ball. "Dumb rules," she complained.
"A-ha, someday you will feel different when you have little girl of your own," said her father, waving an index claw. "Especially if you are announcing her act from the ground instead of up there on the platform."
Catherine elbowed him. "You should talk, Ivan. Your voice is all wrong for an announcer; gets too high when you're excited."
"True," Ivan allowed, slipping a knife from his belt and tossing it in the air, "but my knives talk very eloquently at any pitch."
Vanya shook her head and walked off, leaving her parents' banter behind her. She was not long alone, though. A cut through the clowns' entrance - Clown Alley in circus lingo - brought her past a young elephant trying to balance on a ball. Spotting Vanya, the calf tumbled off in two senses of the word by falling forward into a roll and ending with a prodigious sprawling flop near the kit.
"Wow, Nangi," chuckled Vanya, clapping her paws. "I hope you meant to do that."
"I did," asserted the elephant only half-huffily as she got up. Her voice was simultaneously deep and nasal, which was perfect for her occupation. She was training to be a clown, or a joey as they called them in their line of work. Unlike Vanya she wasn't groomed much or in any kind of costume, but wore a simple T-shirt and denim overalls. Her line of work involved too many prat falls and too much time putting on makeup to do many dress rehearsals. Vanya, on the other paw, always wanted to be seen at her best and somehow never seemed to get messy, as if her body magically repelled all dirt.
Nangi paused to dust herself off with her trunk and take a long drink from a cup nearly large enough for Vanya to take a bath in. "Nice practice today," she added when she had done this.
Vanya shrugged. "Except for the last part," she admitted.
"Well, no one does it perfectly every time," Nangi admitted. "Remember the accident with your dad's act in the last town?"
At this the kit quickly raised a paw to her muzzle to keep from laughing. "I still think he took off the ringmaster's toupee on purpose," she confided. "Served him right too for not giving Dad a raise."
Nangi sighed. "I wish I could be a knife thrower," she admitted, "or a trapeze artist. It looks like so much fun up there."
"It is," Vanya admitted, "but my dad says if they had elephants up there they'd have to reinforce everything with tungsten and titanium just to keep the tent from collapsing. Besides, you make a good joey. Your act could put a smile on a piranha."
The compliment and reasoning mollified Nangi, and she smiled. "Well, it's nice to see you guys up there anyway."
Vanya shook her head. Nice to see my parents up there, she thought with annoyance. It would be years before they let her join the act; years before she got a chance to shine in front of the crowds. It wasn't fair.
That night, Vanya lay awake thinking that someone must have waylaid Mr. Sandmammal. Not even the soft night breeze through her open window, scented with the aroma of imminent rain, could put her under. Deprived of slumber, she fumed over the frustration of that day's non-success. She had been so close she could taste it. She knew if her parents would just let her, she could own the bigger stunts. What did a few flops matter anyway?
Turning over in bed, she cocked an ear towards the sounds of low conversation from her parents' room. Only one wall separated them, but it was insulated enough to keep her from picking up much or at least it would have been.
One advantage of traveling a lot and being home-schooled was that one tended to do an awful lot of reading. One particular book she'd read a few years back detailed the adventures of a trio of boys more than a hundred years ago, and particularly their uncommonly shrewd middle brother. She had picked up a trick or two from that book, much as she now picked up an empty water glass which sat on her table. Holding it to her ear and pressing it against the wall, she closed her eyes to focus on the sounds of her parents' voices.
"... certainly talented enough," she heard her father remark.
"More than enough," answered her mother. "She's twice the acrobat I was at that age, but I'm worried she might get overconfident. Pride goes before the fall, as they say."
"Yes, it's true," her father agreed. "Like I did losing my grip in that incident with the ringmaster. We might have been fired for that."
So it was an accident, thought Vanya, somewhat disappointed in her father for not sniping the fat old panda on purpose. Their discussion about her, though, was far more important.
"Then we're agreed?" asked Catherine.
"Yes. She has years enough ahead of her that the delayed practice will not hurt her future. We should make her wait until she proves herself."
Vanya was outraged. She'd been annoyed enough thinking her parents simply didn't think she had what it took, but now it turned out they knew her abilities and were holding her back on purpose!
She lay there in the dark, stewing in indignation until she heard them snoring. Then she sat up with resolution. She could go solo. She would go solo, right then when no one could stop her.
Slipping out of bed, she flicked on the lights and hastily arranged several items in her bed to imitate her own shape. Next she changed out of her periwinkle pajamas into the most covering black clothes she could find. Finally, for good measure she pulled out a dark blue bed sheet. Her parents preferred white clothes, as they looked good in the spotlight and made loose fur less obvious, but when she was on her own Vanya enjoyed dark colors. It made her fur stand out more; struck a nice contrast. She liked to be noticed but tonight the dark clothes would serve another purpose.
Circuses always had night guards on duty, and theirs was no exception. The guards, of course, were to prevent gillies - non-circus mammals - from sneaking in to steal things or cause trouble. A kit out past her bedtime, though, would also draw their attention if they could see her. Wrapping the sheet around herself, she paused at the sight of herself in a mirror. She looked like a burglar or a vampiress. Both thoughts made her giggle.
"Tonight, Contessa Transylvanya will fly on the wings of the shadows," she intoned, trying not to laugh too loudly. It wasn't bad. Maybe she'd suggest it to the ringmaster as an act. They had done a couple of Halloween circuses like that, where the joeys all wore black and white makeup and her mother dressed as the Grim Reaper on the high wire. She turned off the lights and cracked open the door to her bedroom. Pricking her ears to ensure that nothing had changed, she stole slowly out of the room and across the main room of her family's small trailer.
Slipping through the dark, she darted from one shadow to the next feeling like a ninja. From the shade of her own trailer to the lee of an acrobatics stand under repairs, she made her way along as quietly as possible. A heaviness in the air told her it would rain soon, as did the unusually black night. With a little luck it would hold off until she did her thing and got back to the trailer.
Suddenly, she froze at the sound of an approaching, rather tuneless whistle. Ducking back into the shade of the stand, she yanked the sheet around herself and watched in absolute silence as Pablo Yote, a hairless old coyote who often dressed as a mythic chupacabra for side shows, passed by.
Just keep going, she thought, instinctively holding her breath. Just keeeeep going.
Her heart sped up when he stopped and sniffed.
Oh, no. Pablo might look strange, and in Vanya's view he wasn't terribly bright, but he was notorious for his uncannily sharp sense of smell. He could easily wade into a whole crowd of mammals and find, in moments, the one mammal who'd had Pepper Jack on their sandwich an hour ago, or tell the flavor and brand of gum a kid was chewing at twenty paces if the wind was right. As for Vanya well, she was meticulously groomed, but foxes tended to have a rather distinctive scent.
Vanya's mind shot straight into overdrive. Pablo had been a tad congested lately, but that was nothing to bank on. Sure enough, he turned in her direction and began to sniff more rapidly. He could probably already judge her age, and might have half a guess of her exact identity. If he didn't, she needed to buy time any way she could. If she were caught in this getup Pablo would definitely know she was sneaking around, even if she made up some story about going to the outhouses - which, come to think of it, were in the other direction anyway. Excuse was impossible, and parental interrogation would be inescapable.
Thinking fast, she pawed at the stand's exposed infrastructure and quickly found what she was after. A wing nut, still loose from one of the technicians working on it, easily came off in her paw. As Pablo came towards her, weaving his nose this way and that like some kind of airborne metal detector, she drew back her paw and hurled the nut towards a tent full of the circus' mechanical equipment.
For the brief moment the nut was airborne, Vanya held her breath. Her trepidation turned to triumph when a loud clang sounded from the tent, and Pablo whirled around pointing his flashlight toward the sound.
Quick as a shot, Vanya dashed away from the coyote and ducked under the nearest trailer. Taking advantage of her small size, she slipped in among the wheels, scurried along its length, and slipped out the other side. Stopping to prick up her ears, she could hear Pablo's voice calling out to his quarry to "Come on outta there nice and easy" and "don't be any trouble."
Uh-uh, thought Vanya, racing across an open space and under another trailer. She had to think fast. Her trick of taking shortcuts where Pablo would have to go around wouldn't slow him down much. Buying enough time to try the trapezes in the big top would be a definite no-go unless she found some way to stop him completely.
Think think think think think, her mind yammered as she cast about frantically for an out. She might have just owned up to Pablo and gotten off with a warning and a shooing back to her trailer, but giving in was not an option as far as she was concerned.
Suddenly she spotted the food storage and her mind lit up like a spotlight. Dashing to the trailer, she slipped quietly inside and began hastily scanning the shelves. It was almost pitch black in there, even with her eyes adjusted already to the very faint light outside. Using her nose, however, she quickly found what she was after. Opening the desired jar, she poured a fistful into her paw and scrambled back towards the door. She had just clambered up the shelves to Pablo's head height when the door opened to frame his black silhouette against the darkness.
For a mere moment Vanya froze. In the black of night he really did look like some legendary monster. Then she caught herself and flung the powder into his face. Pablo staggered back, fell off the one step leading into the trailer, and sneezed violently.
Vanya's heart soared with triumph. Being in a circus was a lot like being part of a very large and close-knit family. That, in turn, meant knowing handy little details about one another like the fact that someone was very, very much allergic to oregano.
"Who who whoooACHOO!" hollered Pablo. "Who's theh theh theheeeaaCHOO!"
Vanya knew it wouldn't be long before all the yelling drew attention, so she grabbed a jar of ground pepper and beat a hasty retreat, scattering the sharp-scented powder behind her as she fled. Anyone who tried to track her scent in that trailer would soon be in the same shape as Pablo.
As she ducked out the back door, she couldn't help laughing.
Ditching the jar a distance from the storage unit, the kit returned to her zig-zagging course for the big top. As mammals chattered and flashed lights a couple of hundred yards away, she slipped into the massive tent and looked around in the glow of security lights. The hubbub had had a pleasant side effect: anyone watching over the equipment in there had deserted to tend their stricken fellow.
Stashing the bed sheet behind some bleachers, she scampered up a series of ladder rungs set in one of the main poles of the tent. This swiftly brought her up to the platform where, earlier that afternoon, she had practiced so many times with her mother.
Just one trip across, she thought to herself. It would be as easy as taking candy from a baby shrew.
As was fairly usual when the trapezes weren't in use, a thin cable connected the closest one to the platform, looped over the trapeze, and doubled back to a ring on the platform where it was held by a carabiner clip. Gazing around at the floor below her, she stooped and undid the clip, then drew the cord in to draw the trapeze up until it was in reach.
Because the trapeze was set for mammals considerably larger, it wasn't easy for Vanya to hold onto it. She had to stand on tip-toe, leaning slightly forward and using the other paw to pull the cord free of the trapeze. Normally the process was much shorter and more fluid. A pair of bats would pull on the trapeze to keep in in reach while someone on the platform drew in the cord. If no bats were available, one mammal - often her mother - would loosen the cable and tug it almost free before jumping out to grab the trapeze. If it was needful for her to wait on the platform another mammal would stand behind to pull her back to secure footing on the return swing. Doing the whole thing herself, and at a much smaller size, was harder than she had expected.
While she was working the cord, disaster struck when her paws slipped off the platform. A tiny shriek escaped her muzzle, echoing with startling volume in the open space as she swung out over the emptiness. The cord slipped from her grasp as she frantically grabbed for the bar with both paws, hanging slack until she swung out to the end.
Now Vanya had a problem; several problems, in fact. First, there was the fact that she was swinging unprepared, and her concentration was history. Second, the carabiner hooked briefly on the bar before flipping up over it, snagging her momentum and hitting her in the shoulder. Actually, she'd gotten lucky on that one since only a quick jerk of her head saved her from taking a hit to the face. Third, it was entirely possible that her shriek had been heard and the mammals out looking for their intruder could be on their way. Fourth and perhaps most severely, she had forgotten that there was no one on the next trapeze bringing it her way! The bar hung far out of reach, utterly impassive to her needing it where she was - and fast.
She almost got far enough, but at the last moment halted and swung away, back towards the platform but not nearly far enough to even think about jumping to it. By gradual loss of momentum, she began to wind down a hundred feet above the net.
Her stomach sank. The height didn't worry her; not with her level of experience. It was the prospect of being stuck up there all night and caught in the morning that really posed a problem. Her parents would have a fit, and she'd be in for at least a dozen rounds of that irksome tune, 'I told you this would happen.' She could bear almost anything but the lectures.
For an instant she thought about letting go, falling to the net and making her escape. If she jumped now, she could hopefully retrieve her sheet and make a dash for it. Instinct told her loud and clear that her chances of that were a lot better than her chances of pulling off the stunt on her first real try with such a bad start.
On the other paw, her pride told her just as plainly that giving up now was most definitely not an option. Pumping her legs as if on a swing set, she checked the swiveling of her bar and pushed her swings out, higher and higher, pressing even farther than on the practices with her mother. She had to, after all. Here in the quiet there was no one to bring the trapezes towards her; no waiting paws to catch and extend her leverage in a performance where success and failure could be separated by a hair's breadth.
She had, of course, never learned the exact distance to swing on a solo act. She had seen her mother do it many times, but it was another thing to experience it. Every acrobat, though, learned an instinctive set of physics; a network of equations felt rather than thought. The distance swung, the difference made by another mammal's height, the space in which to release between falling short and overshooting. Every aerialist was a mathematician, not of the mind, but of the soul.
There was no countdown for Vanya; no period of bracing herself for the leap. As she swung out further and further, there was simply a voice within her that whispered now,' and she let go.
Out into space she tumbled, eyes fixed on the aluminum bar ahead. Now there was a countdown as adrenaline flooded her mind.
Grab!
Like steel traps, her paws slammed shut on the textured metal, briefly wrenching her arms even as her momentum carried her forward.
I did it! she thought to herself, her heart pounding and her smile widening as she once again began to pump her legs. Compared to juggling her father's knives, this was nothing; nothing at all. Her next leap came sooner, her catch smoother. On the third she flipped around and caught with her legs for a thrill before reaching up with her paws to grab the bar and let her feet down. The distance below her was like the water that time she had gone for a ride in a clear-bottomed boat, stretching out below like some other world altogether. The net was irrelevant; all that mattered to her was the air and the trapezes. She was her mother's daughter; her father's daughter. Their skill, their strength, and their resolve all flowed through her like a force of nature.
Then, like an alarm clock in the middle of a good dream, came a problem even she could not best. The farthest trapeze was still tied up for the night, far out of reach.
"Aw, darn it," she uttered under her breath, still pumping as she gauged the distance. She'd like nothing better than to pull off an impossible stunt, but for once that night discretion got the best of her at last. There was no reaching that trapeze. Even if she did she couldn't do a proper swing on it, and she knew from experience that sliding down a thin steel cable was a sure recipe for pain and bleeding paws.
For several swings she gazed longingly at the last bar and the platform beyond. She could make it. She could absolutely make it if it wasn't for that stupid tether.
Then her frustration gave way to a satisfied smile. Okay, so she forgot to release the other end. All in all, though, since when did it matter? She'd made her point. She'd bested the forbidden act, just like her parents knew she could do.
Too bad they weren't here to see me do it, she thought ironically.
Turning around one paw after the other, she eyed the other pendulums still swinging from her passing and began the trip back to the platform. Now she had to hurry up and get out of there. Pablo could only stay sneezing and undiscovered for just so long, and once word got out that there was an "intruder" on the fairgrounds, it was only a matter of time before they thought to look in the big top.
She slipped out the far side with her sheet just as a half-dozen mammals came in the other side.
Getting back to the trailer was a lot harder than going out had been. Mammals were everywhere, searching madly for any sign of whomever had attacked Pablo. Everywhere that anything valuable was kept - cash, pricey equipment, and even fuel - was being searched, and Vanya was nearly caught nine or ten times. They might have come after her by scent, but it was starting to drizzle now and tracking was becoming increasingly difficult. That actually posed another problem, forcing her to go by grassy or paved areas whenever possible and duck under vehicles to hide her tracks. To make matters still more unpleasant, claps of thunder had begun to join the rain, and in the distance she could see lightning leaping from cloud to cloud.
She was pretty wet by the time she got back to the trailer, and her stomach sank when she noticed the lights on inside. It climbed back up a little when she observed that they were only on in her parents' room and the living room. Her own room was undisturbed, which meant she still had a chance to get away with this little scheme.
Built onto the outside of the Zarras' trailer was a small bat house; little more than a box fixed to the wall, but it was sturdy. Its sole occupant was Frieda, a female leaf-nosed bat who worked as one of the technicians. She would be out searching for the troublemaker now, and her house was attached quite firmly.
Twisting the bed sheet into a rope, Vanya got a running start with both ends in paw as if she were going to skip rope. With a determined leap, she vaulted up and threw the loop over the bat house, catching herself and stopping silently against the side of the trailer. She paused to catch her breath. This was actually going to work!
As if whatever gods there might be had decided she'd used up her good luck, she felt a sudden creak from the lodging overhead. Her stomach lurched as she saw the bat house beginning to tilt away from the outside wall. She uttered a word her mother would have grounded her for saying, and pushed out from the wall just as the box came loose, its crash-landing muffled by a clap of thunder.
Vanya tumbled to the ground clear of the landing and gazed at the damage. The bat house was mostly intact, having been built better than it was moored, but there was no way Vanya would ever get it back in place and Frieda was sure to have a fit about her heirloom china.
Darn it, darn it, darn it, thought Vanya, biting her lip and gazing up at her window. The little house would make enough of a step stool to reach it, but what good was that if everyone figured out she had broken it, dusted Pablo, and sent the circus into an uproar in the middle of the night? Even Medwing the Miraculous, the circus' flying fox illusionist, couldn't conjure his way out of this mess.
Wait a second, she thought, her heart rising. She'd helped Medwing - Marvin Medwing, to use his full name - with several of his acts, and knew how most of his tricks worked. Nine times out of ten it all came down to one word: misdirection.
She had to work fast. Heaving the bat house over to just below her window, she climbed up on top and squeezed into the trailer. Dropping quietly onto her bed, she swiftly changed out of her soaked clothes and stashed them and the sheet under the bed. Throwing her night clothes back on, she crept onto the bed and screamed at the top of her lungs.
"AIIEEEEE!" she shrieked. "Who are you?! Get out of here! HELP!"
The effect was instantaneous. Despite being braced for it, Vanya barely had time to act as her mother bolted in like her tail was on fire. Springing to the windowsill, Vanya stuck herself halfway out.
"PROWLER! BURGLAR!" she yelled for all the world to hear. Slipping out just ahead of her mother's frantic paws, she rushed into the night towards the outskirts of the campground.
Mammals came running from every direction, chasing after Vanya's imaginary assailant. Vanya ran long enough to keep them suspicious, then dropped to the ground and started crying on cue - a trick she had learned from one of the mimes. With how hard the rain was coming down now she didn't even have to manage the tears; no one could have seen or smelled them anyway.
"Vanya!" cried her father, dashing up and catching her with paternal fervor. "What in Heaven's name-?!"
"He was climbing in my window!" she blubbered, pointing off into the darkness. "I woke up when he dripped on me, and I "There there, settle down," urged Medwing, flying in and landing on her father's back to shelter them both with his wings. "Let's get the child inside before she catches her death in this downpour."
Once safely warmed and dried, Vanya repeated her simple tale of how she had woken up to find a dark figure trying to get in. She'd screamed, then chased after whoever it was until he got too far ahead. Then she started crying because she was scared and cold.
The next day all the circus turned out to search for any trace of the fugitive, but of course the rain had blotted out any trace. Most decided it had been a chance intrusion; perhaps a homeless mammal who spotted the open window and tore Frieda's home loose to climb on. Others felt it must be an inside job, since no stranger would know to incapacitate Pablo with oregano. A few even ventured to guess it was two or more mammals: one from the circus who had been out for a tryst, perhaps, and one wandering through who had broken in on Vanya. No one, at least, supposed Vanya was the culprit. It was true that the kit felt some regret over Frieda's damaged home and belongings, but that soon passed when she learned that what Frieda had not insured was mostly covered by the circus itself. Besides, it was hard to be despondent when so many commended her for being so brave and quick-thinking as to chase after her assailant.
Vanya learned two lessons from that incident which would serve her long into her life. One was that luck is made, not simply found. The other was that a mammal sharp and skilled enough to make their own luck could get away with just about anything, no matter who or what stood in their way.
I had an interesting time writing this chapter, and that for several reasons. One was that Vanya is a very distinct character even as a cub, and to reflect that I wanted to give her a start you would never expect for a villain. To create a beginning for someone who would grow up to be a ruthless criminal, I had to develop a kind of inverse morality tale: a fable teaching an immoral, rather than a moral. I can't honestly say I enjoyed that very much, but Vanya is well, Vanya. It would have been untrue to her character and her role to have her learn a positive lesson, so here we are.
The other great challenge was that outside of a trip to Barnum and Bailey when I was less than ten, my knowledge of circuses is virtually nil, and unlike with police work I did not have any professionals to consult. Most of my more intimate knowledge on the topic comes through an Adventures in Oddysey episode about a circus mystery, wherein I picked up such tidbits as the circus slang used here (clowns being called "joeys," outsiders being called "gillies," and the clowns' entrance being called "clown alley"). Having never taken a close look at actual circus equipment, I based my guesses there on what I had seen in gymnasiums to keep climbing ropes and such out of the way when not in use. The inclusion of bats was a rather enjoyable twist, and I have to say if a circus did employ bats (decently treated, of course), I'd be the first in line for tickets.
Concerning the design of Frieda's house, those familiar with bat houses may be confused as to how such a house could work and/or how possessions would be kept in it. Obviously the kind of bat houses we find in our world wouldn t do at all, but in an animal world like Zootopia it's not hard to imagine bats living in houses more like ours, save that they would be entered perhaps by an opening underneath like our bat houses. On a side note, I might add that building bat houses which I did a great deal in high school is something everyone ought to try at least once in their life. Please consult your local wildlife organization for recommendations of design and placement, and avoid using treated lumber as it may poison the bats (cedar, though pricey, is probably your best bet).
One last note worth mentioning: since Vanya's further stories are unlikely to overlap or parallel the other OC Albums, I may be releasing her further chapters ahead of the rest. Only time will tell, though, so keep your eyes peeled.
That's all for now, and happy reading!
Easter Eggs:
Unleash your dark side with Danny Phantom
A late-night lament from Calvin and Hobbes
And for the fun of it, let's see who can tell me which book gave Vanya the idea for the drinking glass trick