Chapter 16 Summary

Judy spend the morning helping her mother clean the house. Afterwards, Judy, Beth, and Cotton all hike to the Carrot Days festival. There Judy stands up for herself, hears a story about Gideon, and beats up some bullies. Along the way she makes a mistake that will haunt her for the rest of her life. Later, finding herself at odds with her father and mother, she decides to leave. Her sister Beth tries to get her to stay, but their encounter with each other only leads to pain and recrimination. After Judy leaves Bunny Burrow, Bonnie asks the rest of the family what they intend to do.

Flashback: 10 Years earlier In Bunny Burrow

It was a quiet mid-morning in the Hopps family farm house, a week after Judy's return to the fold. Rain was forecast for the next day, so the kits were all out with their hoes helping Stu deal with the budding weeds before the dry fields were turned into mud flats. Bonnie was finishing up drying the last few dishes left over from breakfast when she heard a slight sound behind her; a slow shuffle coming down the hallway. Ah, Judy is finally up, she thought as she smiled to herself.

She had been afraid a few days ago that they might have to hospitalize their poor daughter, but Doc Hase had managed to chart out a course of medications to help her, based in part on the bag of powder included with her release papers, some help from his fellow doctors at the Tri-Burrows Medical University, and no small bit of luck.

He had also prescribed plenty of rest for Judy, not to push her too much, and eventually she should recover physically. Mentally and emotionally, though, he wasn't yet ready to hazard a guess as to that timeline to that recovery. It was left to her parents to chart that course.

The current problem lay in the two different paths her parents were inclined to take in dealing with their daughter. Stu was still having trouble dealing with the fact she was back after nine years of being away, and his solution was to pretend that it never happened. This solution, being that it was in truth actually no solution, lead to a certain amount of friction between Judy and her father. Judy couldn't forget her years at Cliffside that easily and she absolutely wasn't nine anymore. Stu's solution of giving her a hoe and ordering her outside with the rest of the kits to do chores by the third day, all the while suffering psychotropic drug withdrawal, had not gone over well with her. Bonnie sighed. Her husband meant well, believing that hard work would distract Judy from her troubles, but his approach left a bit to be desired.

Bonnie chose instead to take a different route. The house was her domain, and as long as Judy stayed inside, she was Bonnie's responsibility, not Stu's. She had talked at length with Doc Hase, and she decided that a slow and steady reintroduction to normal life was in order for Judy. He believed that Judy's life at Cliffside would been very structured and regimented by the staff, with very little room for independent though or true dynamic social interaction, so expecting her to think for herself without any prior experience simply wasn't going to work.

Bonnie worked on providing her daughter that structure, and at the same time allowing her the time she needed to recover mentally and physically. She also knew that Judy also wasn't a kit anymore; she was a young doe who was trying to find her place in a world that had been turned on it's side with very little explanation or warning.

"Morning, mom." Judy stood in the kitchen doorway, rubbing her forehead. Her headache was tolerable this morning, she decided. She blearily looked up at her mother's back and asked, "Where is everyone?"

"They're outside hoeing before the rains come tomorrow," Bonnie turned her head to glance at her daughter and responded in a matter-of-fact tone before offering, "Would you like some breakfast?"

"Yes, please." Bonnie just pointed head of the table where a plate and cup still sat, and Judy sat down in the indicated chair. Bonnie reached into the sink beside her, and pulled out a handful of carrot-tops left over from breakfast, and put them on the plate in front of Judy. Her other kits would have turned their noses up at the bitter greens, but Judy happily enjoyed munching on them, with the little orange and purple bits of the roots at the end a pleasant treat.

Bonnie had been dismayed at what Judy had described as a typical breakfast at Cliffside, being regularly fed there what she would considered to be garbage scraps fit only for the compost pile. But when she had tried giving her daughter a hearty Bunny Burrow breakfast on the second day back, Judy had barely been able to hold it down before excusing herself to run to the bathroom and empty her protesting stomach. Since that time, Bonnie had been sure to keep the left over scraps from the breakfast prep for Judy when she eventually woke up.

Bonnie sat down next to her daughter with a cup of tea, and silent sat sipping it while Judy finished her leftover greens. "I have some chores to do today before the Carrot Days Festival this afternoon, including laundry and mopping the halls. Would you like to help me?"

"Yes, please," Judy nodded, pleased to be offered something to do out of the sunlight. She was finding she was prone to migraines in the bright Bunny Burrow sunlight after years spent indoors at Cliffside, so a chance to work inside with her mother was wonderful.

The mother and daughter spend the rest of the morning sweeping and mopping the extensive hallways in the Hopps family warren in comparative silence. Judy didn't have the cognition capacity in the morning for extensive dialog, usually because she was waiting for her post sleep headache to wear off, so her mother left her be during that time. But around lunch time, Bonnie could tell Judy was feeling better by the questions she started to ask about family and friends. Bonnie hoped that would be the case today as well, because today was going to be a bit different.

The Carrot-Day festival was today, and since it was supposed to rain tomorrow, the cloud should roll in in the afternoon and cut down the bright sunshine that Judy had trouble dealing with. Today would be a test of Judy's ability to handle socializing in a public surrounding while in the care and company of family, while at the same time giving her a quick escape route back home to safety should she become overwhelmed, particularly since she had an assigned lifeguard in the form of her younger sister.

Judy had bonded well with her fourteen year old sister Beth, who was patient beyond her years in dealing with a sister who was still have trouble coping emotionally with the stress of the daily life that Beth took for granted. Sometimes it was Judy who played the sage to a younger sister's impulses, and other times it was Beth who took that role, trading back and forth as needed. Usually accompanying them on their daily afternoon adventures, usually with some poor captured reptile in her little paws, was their niece Cotton, who had decided that Judy was now "Cool!" and therefore worthy of her attentions.

Later, after their chores were done, Beth and Cotton had stopped by the house to collect Judy for this afternoon's adventure. Together, the three female Hopps set off down the path by the river leading to the Bunny Burrow Fairgrounds. Cotton spent most of the time and a large portion of her energy trying to capture dragonflies with her bare paws, and mostly coming away frustrated, which amused Judy to no end, perhaps because she too had been that way at nine. Beth breathed a prayer of thanks for the presence of her little cousin, because her antics successfully distracted Judy from her usually maudlin moods as they approached the fairgrounds.

"AUNT JUDY," Cotton belted out her name from the end of the path, "THEY'VE GOT A GIANT WHEEL!" She came careening down the path to slam into her older aunt, "Can we ride it, please!?" she begged without a shred of dignity or poise.

"Maybe later, after dinner." Beth interjected, "We've got to go help set up the Hopps Farm Booth, and then we can play." She led her two female family members down the rows to find the booth.

As Judy walked behind her sister, she became aware of whispering voices all around her. Her ears began swiveling back and forth, as she sought to identify what was being said. The snippets she overheard had began innocently enough, but soon enough the meanings had became far uglier.

...is that her?...Oh My God!…when did she get out?...what are the Hopps' thinking, bringing her here?...hid the kits!...it's the Bunny Burrow Predator Killer!

The last one stopped her in her tracks. Is that what they truly think of her, here? While she admitted to herself that on the surface that it was true, she had never actually considered that she would singled out socially, to become the latest gossip buzzword. It certainly was never her plan to be shipped home so precipitously. But the gossip about her was inevitable, as rabbit society was built on the constraints of conformity, and any deviancy was to be excised before it threatened the strength and unity of the community.

Not actively, no, that's not how rabbits work. It would begin with the whispers, the innuendo, the gossip, rude stares, and eventually, social shunning. In many ways rabbit society was similar to certain very archaic religious orders that depended on a rigidly set structure of rules to maintain a narrowly defined social order.

And her parents had just shoved her into this. No… That's not fair. This isn't their fault. This was hers. She had chosen this path, and in doing so she had chosen the consequences. Just as she had faced justice, face forward and head on, so would face the condemnation of her social order for the sin of doing something they couldn't comprehend and that in turn she could never adequately explain.

She lifted her head, and turned to face her accusers, her slanderers, her gossipers, daring them to make eye contact with her. None could, for that too was a constraint of their social order. They were not a society that met their problems head on. They were prey. They hid. And when challenged, they ran. They only fought when cornered, and only as a means to escape. To face down that which threatened them, armed only with the courage of their conviction, was not a social expression that most rabbits could understood. They understood only fear, and cowering before running and hiding.

They didn't understand that courage was standing your ground against all dangers even when you were afraid. Especially when you were afraid. She turned in a slow circle, making eye contact with every rabbit who looked her way. They all turned away, as the whispers died, turning away and hiding from the intensity of her gaze. All save one.

Her mother. She stood like a rock, strong and tall against the flow of the river, other rabbits flowing down the path around her, none daring to stay long enough to block the gaze of pride she held for her wayward daughter, lest they be caught in between the set of those eyes.

She knew, Judy realized. She knew I could do this. This wasn't a test. This was a declaration! I am no Victim! I am the Victor! I survived the Hell that was Cliffside – face me if you dare!

She smiled and holding her head and ears high, she strode to stand before her mother. "Hello, Mother."

"Hello, Judy. I see you have arrived." Bonnie looked her shorter daughter up and down, a brief ironic smile playing across her features.

"I have." Judy stood with her mother, like they were the only two mammals upon an empty field. Nothing else mattered to her, nothing but that look in Bonnie's eyes.

"Good!" She turned to Beth, "Beth, dear, Gideon needs some help setting up his pie racks. Could you please lend him a paw?" She inquired of her daughter.

"I'll help, I'll help!" Cotton waved her paw in the air, immediately volunteering herself. Beth just lifted her eyes heavenward, but she held out her paw for Cotton anyway. She headed back behind the Hopps' booth, a bouncing Cotton at her side.

"Gideon, huh! When did this happen?" Judy twitched an ear at her sisters' departing backs.

"Oh, well, it should be your father's tale to tell, but I'm afraid he's wimped out. He's probably hiding behind the booth, trying to avoid your wrath."

"Gah! That was 4 days ago, and I've gotten better since then. It's just what did he honestly expect to happen if he marched into my room at the crack of dawn, yanked off my covers, and ordered me out into the fields? I haven't hoed a field in nine years! He deserved to get screamed at for that."

"I know, dear, I know." Bonnie reached down to grab Judy's paw, and gripped with both of hers. "He just doesn't know how to relate, so he's regressing. Falling back on what he knows. He really doesn't understand what happened to you." She soothed her daughter's indignation.

Judy just grunted, "Hurmph… Well, if he had ever visited me at Cliffside, maybe he would know, instead ordering me around half the time and the other half avoiding me like the coward that he is." She wildly gestured with her other paw.

Bonnie gazed down at her agitated daughter, concern and sadness creeping back into her face. The irony of this situation was that father and daughter hadn't figured out how to communicate even before she had been sent away. Now they completely lacked the tools to do so.

Maybe if she told her daughter Gideon's story, Judy might soften her stance towards her father a bit. Bonnie waited a moment for Judy to finish her rant and look back at her before starting.

"Well, Gideon came to us about a year ago. He had just finished up his culinary school in Zootopia, earning an A.A. as a pastry chef, and he was trying to find a job in Bunny Burrow. His family is all here, so he wants to stay here, but he was having difficulty since nobody really wanted to hire a predator for what was traditionally a herbivore's job."

"Did he come to you for a job?" Judy was confused. The Hopps didn't own any bakeries or restaurants, did they?

"Oh, no. No, dear heart, he came to apologize to us. You see, he felt awful about the way he was as a kit, and about how he bullied and hit you when you were nine. He had convinced himself, over the years he had to stew on it, that you murdered Mr Latrans because of what he had done to you."

"Oh, Mom, no. I'm sorry, no. It's not his fault!" Her paws flew to her lips as Judy shook her vigorously.

"I know that, dear. So does your father. We might not completely understand why you killed Mr Latrans, but we do know you. Stu just pointed out to Gideon that you are a rabbit given to direct thoughts and direct actions. If you had been mad at Gideon, and wanted to kill him, you would have. It was as simple as that."

"I'm sorry, Mom, that I can't really give you a better answer. I shot Carl because I saw him as a threat to me and our family, and that's what made sense to me at the time." There was far more to the story, but Judy knew her mother could never understand or believe that part, about the Night-howlers and a black magic ritual leading to global genocide. Carl had to die, and her paw had been the only one that could bring that about.

"I know." Bonnie patted Judy's paw, "Anyway, Stu and I accepted his apology, not because we found him at fault, but because he needed to say it. He got up to leave, and as we were walking him to the door, Stu started to ask him about his plans, now that he had graduated. Imagine that, your father engaging in small talk with a large fox predator, inside his own warren. Instead of trying to shoo him out the door like you would expect, your father was trying to reach out to Gideon. It was precious to watch, so I hung back and didn't interfere." Bonnie smiled in memory, "Our pastor had been preaching at the time about need, about how when someone comes to your door with unspoken need that only you could answer, that you should know that it was the Creator that had shown them that door, and it was up to you to open it or not. It was your choice to help or not. And your father chose to help."

"Dad? I thought he hated predators."

"Hate? No, never hate. Fear them, yes, but never hate. Your father took Gideon's apology, and his unspoken need for acceptance, and offered him a chance. Your Aunt Bettie needed a part time delivery driver for her Bagels and Breads business, and somebody tall who could help her with the maintenance on her ovens. It wasn't precisely a chef's job, but it was a foot in the door. Stu helped set them up together. She was hesitant at first, but after giving Gideon a trial run, she was impressed with his work ethic, and after a couple of months she had him baking pastries for her business as well. Her current agreement with him is that he can bake his pies before the bakery opens, and deliver them in the afternoon when his shift is done. That's how you came to meet him earlier this week, while he was out on his delivery rounds."

"That so neat, mom! Image Dad, getting a predator a job. Who would have thought of it?" Judy smiled at the thought of her Dad being so brave and kind.

Bonnie nodded, "Gideon puts in a lot of hours, but they are hours filled with the love of what he does and it shows, especially to your father. Stu goes in often to visit him at work, and the two of them have been talking with your older brother about expanding the pie baking business, making it a joint business with the Hopps' berry farms and Manny's fruit orchards."

"Oh, wow!" Judy couldn't believe that her father could be that flexible, even to the point of considering a partnership with a fox. Good for him! Maybe she had miss judged him?

Bonnie watched the play of emotions across her daughter's face, the sense of joy and wonder chasing across her features. Good, it's a start.

"AIIIIEEEEEE!" A kit's scream of pain echoed across the grounds, and every adult rabbit in earshot came to an immediate halt, their ears locking in on the sound.

"COTTON!" Bonnie yelled, recognizing that voice. Judy was already moving, down on all fours, sprinting around the Hopps' stand towards the sound of the scream. It came from Gideon's deliver van. On the ground beside it was Cotton, her arms raise to protect herself as a larger rabbit pulled back his fist to deliver another punch. Behind him were two more rabbits, teenage bucks by the looks of it, their arms filled with stolen pies, and stupid grins on their muzzles. They were slow, to slow to realize the danger that they were in, but Judy wasn't about to point out their mistake to them. Vermin… NO ONE threatened her family!

The buck standing over Cotton turned his head barely in time to catch Judy running full tilt at him. But instead of tackling him, she planted both fore paws in the dirt before her as a pivot and swung her hips around in an arc towards him. Kicking out with both rear legs, she delivered a thunderous blow to his rib cage, knocking him back into his fellow thieves, causing them and their ill gotten pies to go flying backwards.

She landed over Cotton, covering her protectively while other adults came running. Looking down, she assessed Cotton's injuries. It looked like she had taken a punch to the face, cutting her cheek, and her eye was beginning to swell shut. It would probably turn into a black eye, and she might even need stitches for the cut, but knowing Cotton as Judy did, she knew that wouldn't even slow her niece down. She'd wear the scar with pride. Since Cotton wasn't in danger, and the adults would soon be here to take care of her, Judy turned her stony gaze to the other two bucks picking themselves up.

The one she had hit was out for the count, holding onto his side and wheezing. He might complain later that she fought dirty, but she had no compassion for a buck who would hit a kit. Cliffside had taught her far dirtier ways to fight, so he should count his blessings she only cracked his ribs. She could have kicked him in the head.

But the other two, they were still a danger to her family and she couldn't let that stand. They stood up and caught sight of her furious face, rage mounting by the moment, and they choose to run rather than stand and face a rabbit that they knew killed to protect her own. They bolted, down on all fours, trusting their greater stride and strength would win out against the smaller female.

"What are you doing to my pies! Y'all stop that!" Gideon yelled as he came running up being the wave of rabbits closing in.

Gideon was here? He could protect his pies. She was going after those bucks, and she was going to teach them the meaning of pain. She took off after them and as she did she could hear Beth yelling her name.

They were being hunted. There was no other word for what was happening, thought the two bucks as they charged through the Carrot-Days fairgrounds trying to escape an enraged Judy. But it was true. Every turn they made, she cut faster and gained ground on them, and eventually they knew she would catch them. They couldn't even stop and gang up on her to buy themselves time to escape, because behind her they could see a second white doe, smaller but just as fast, gaining on them as well. If they stopped, they knew they would face the Bunny Burrow Predator Killer and her teenage sidekick. It was looking grim for them.

No, they would have to cut through the barns, and try to loose the does in the park cars out the fields.

They didn't make it.

Judy saw them try to cut between the barns. Idiots! They would have been better off just giving themselves up to the Sheriff. He would have just sent them off to juvie. But Judy? Not her! When she caught them, she was going to break bones. Threaten her niece, will they! Stand over her laughing while another buck punched her? Oh, no, Judy could not let such an insult stand! They were going down and going down hard.

She cut in through the barn, knowing that it should have a door open on the side that she could use as a shortcut. She was right, as she came charging through the door and body slammed them both up against the other barn. They tried to right themselves so they could turn and fight the smaller doe, but they were exhausted. They had just tried to outrun Cliffside's resident escape artist. Judy stood up and was ready to fight long before they were, prepared by years of fighting the Cliffside orderlies, mammals far larger and meaner than these two idiots.

But before Judy could kick both of them repeatedly in their laughing faces, Beth came up behind her gasping out her name, "Judy, stop!" Judy turned, and distracted for a spit second by her winded sister, she took her eyes off the bucks. They used that moment to their advantage, one kicking dirt and dust into Judy's face, while the other took a small metal object from his back pocket and hurl it with all his might at her head.

Momentarily blinded by the dust, her ears turned to pick up the sound of the strange object as it sped through the air causing her her head to turn as well, and she caught the object square between her eyes with a muted thunk.

"OWW!" She sat back and held her forehead and muzzle in pain. She tried to shake it off and get her eyes to focus, but between the dust and the migraine level pain in her face, she couldn't concentrate.

"Judy, everybody saw who they are, and they're covered in berry juice anyway. They can't hide. It's okay, you don't have to chase them. The deputies will find them." Even as she panted and tried to get her breath back, Beth tried to calm her older sister down. She lay in the dirt on her back, and patted her older sister's leg, "It's okay. Cotton's okay, you're okay, and I'm wiped out. Damn it, sis, you're hard to keep up with." Beth pointed out.

Judy just grimaced in pain, pinching the bridge of her muzzle, as she nodded. Yeah, she was. Nine years of practicing escape tactics at a mental asylum, and years of police evasion training in another life, yeah, she knew how to run. What she didn't know was what she was going to do with all the rage that she was feeling. It was all bottled up inside of her, and something like this, just three juvie delinquents being thieves and jerks, had caused her to go almost savage with rage. She was going have to think about this. Maybe everybody else in Bunny Burrow was right, and she didn't belong her after all.

But as she looked back down at her sister, as Beth patted her leg, Judy knew that she couldn't just betray Beth or Cotton's trust by running away. She had to stay and try to work this out.

"Okay," she told her sister. She stood up, and helped Beth stand as well. Beth stood with her hands on her knees, still trying catch her breath while Judy stretched and blinked. The pain was finally starting to fade into a dull throb. Maybe, if she was lucky, she'd end up with a matching shiner to compliment Cotton's. Judy knew that her niece would like that.

Beth looked down at their feed, and saw a curved metal square laying in the dirt. She picked up, and held it out to Judy, "What's this?" It sloshed with a hollow, tinny sound.

Judy took it from her grasp, "It's a hip flask. That must be what they threw at me." She shook it, and it gurgled. Opening the cap, she took a sniff. Odd, the scent of it reminded her of something else, something familiar, tickling at the back of her brain. Trying to figure that out, she sipped a mouthful and sloshed it around a couple of times, carefully considering the tastes and feel of the liquid when it hit her.

OH GOD - THE BURNING! She spit out her mouthful on to the ground, and wiped her muzzle with the back of her paw. "Oh, that's awful!"

"What is it?" Beth scrunched her brows together as she tried to smell.

"Don't! It's moonshine. Really bad home brewed moonshine. Nasty shit." Judy took the flask, and upended it over the dirt, draining out the rest of the fluid. "Manny used to brew something like this when I was a kit, and he called it 'Liquid Courage' back then. I swallowed a mouth-full when I was a kit on a dare during one of my cousins birthday parties, and God did it make me sick." She turned and looked down the alley way that the bucks had disappeared down, "No wonder those idiots were being stupid, if they were drunk on this stuff." She tossed the flask back onto the puddle melting into the dirt. She certainly didn't want to keep it, but it never occurred to her to give it to the deputies.

She turned back to Beth, "Come on, let's go check up on Cotton. She's probably already embellishing the story. We need to make sure the facts get told correctly." They walked back down the alley, back towards the fair, leaving the flask behind in the mud, it's poisonous contents leaching into the dirt.

All the lessons that Judy had learned this afternoon had just been undone by a simple mouthful of drink that she should never have taken. A mouthful of a substance poorly named 'Liquid Courage'. For it wasn't that, not even to the bucks that deceived themselves into brewing and consuming it. Poorly brewed, for they had little understanding of the poisons that they added in their masculine potion of strength: ethanol, death's cap, wormwood, ergot, and most insidious of all, the dried flower petals of an innocent little plant called Midnicampum holicithias.

Night-howler.

Judy had thought herself safe from any toxic effects by spiting the noxious brew out, but she failed to understand that her body was already under assault the moment the liquid had come into contact with the soft tissues of her mouth, clinging and coating the surfaces, remaining bonded even after she had spit the rest out. What remained wasn't enough to kill her, that was true. Not even enough to drive her truly mad, not as she understood madness as no other rabbit in Bunny Burrow could.

But what was left was enough. Enough remained to work it's dark, ancient, and evil magic upon her soul and her psyche, worming it's way into her mind. While she had faced this evil before and won and would face it again in her future, each time she had, it in turn had exacted a terrible price upon her being, just as it did now, for in what should be the moment of her greatest triumph, she had already lost the battle.

For Night-howler had claimed her once more.

A week later, Judy sat alone in the dark of night, sobbing her heart out. She tried, oh dear God, she tried, but it was so hard. She still couldn't cope with being home. She had dreamed for 9 years of coming home, coming home to escape the nightmare of asylum life, only to discover that coming home was the beginning of the true nightmare. At least at Cliffside she had drugs to numb the pain. But here, at home, she had nothing to hold on to. Everything grated against her, like steel on a live nerve.

She still fought every day with her father. He couldn't accept that she had grown up without him, and she couldn't accept that he just wanted his kit back. Nor had she forgiven him for abandoning her at Cliffside, while he still refused to talk to her about that time. She didn't understand what he was afraid of. Neither of them could accept the other, and their fights were leading to further tension in the household.

If the tension rose to the point that rest of the household couldn't function, Bonnie would step in and put her foot down. Rabbit families were matrilineal, ruled by the oldest female, and they decided who stayed in the family and who had to go. While Judy loathed the thought of loosing her mother as her principle ally, Bonnie would never take Judy's side in any argument with her father. Stu was her husband, and he was here to stay, as this was his farm and his family. Judy was just the kit who grew up and didn't belong anymore.

She had to leave before Bonnie kicked her out. If it came to that, she would be exiled from the Hopps Warren and never be allowed to return. No rabbit family in Bunny Burrow would take her in, not even as an adopted bride. Not that any buck in his right mind would take a murderous ex-mental patient with rage issues. What kind of mother would she make? Could she even trust herself with kits?

She had tried to find a job outside of the farm, one that would get her father off her back, and make her mother feel like she was contributing, but no one would hire her. She had applied at a dozen places, but nobody returned her messages. She even went to two of the shops that had 'Now Hiring' signs in the windows only to be told that they weren't actually hiring. What they meant was that they weren't hiring her.

No, she had to leave, before she had no other choice. Go some place where no one knew her name; she accepted that. That wasn't what was making her sob tonight, alone in the dark of a strange bedroom not her own. It was the letter she was holding in her paw. The final straw that broke her back and crushed what dreams she had left. What she didn't understand was how she had gotten it.

She had gotten it in the mail, that was obvious to even her, but she couldn't recall actually applying for the position. But by looking at the post-date, and the dates at the top of the letter, she worked out that it had to have been on the second or third day she had been back, when she had been in the height of her drug withdrawal delirium. Somehow, she must have found their website, and successfully filled out their form. That would have been ordinarily been a cause for celebration, except that she had lied in the process of doing it.

The mammals that sent her the letter acknowledging her request would have held that to be the far greater sin, more so than all the sins of her past combined. Because for them, once you accepted their terms and they accepted you, it was your integrity that mattered most. Not your strength, not your speed, not your wit or brilliance or dogged determination. No, it was integrity that was their benchmark. With out that, you were nothing in their eyes.

She could image the pudgy cheetah sitting at his terminal, filling out the form, and clicking on which rejection was to be included in the letter that he got to send out on a regularly depressing basis. He hated doing that, telling somebody that they weren't worthy of the same organization that had taken him in, but it was his duty, even as that duty tore his heart in two.

Just as he had, when he created the letter she held in her paw. And what had it cost him, seeing the reason for the rejection? Sending a notice to a felon that they couldn't be trusted to uphold the very laws that they had run afoul of.

That hurt. But it was sufficiently distant that it didn't break her down. What reduced her to tears was the written note that graced the back of the form letter. She could just imaging the big black water buffalo staring at the sheet, forming his reply in his mind before committing to it, and then taking the time to actually write it out.

Miss Hopps,

It is with great reluctance that I write to you, but I must be honest. I am afraid there can be no place for you here. Not because of what you did so many years ago, for no matter how heinous your crime, you have served you time, and have been legally released. You have paid your debt, in time, blood, and all honor, as far as I am concerned.

It is about honesty that I write. Had you been honest with me, I too would have been honest with you. While there might not have been a place here under my auspices for you, a place would have been found where you could serve, for there is no greater penance than to serve, body and soul, the mammals that make up our great city. You would have found purpose and honor, but that cannot be now.

You lied, Miss Hopps. You lied to the system, you lied to the society, and you lied to me. And I cannot forgive that lie.

Your petition for consideration of employment with the ZPD is hereby denied, and should you petition again, you will face charges of perjury. Please don't make me do that. You have survived an experience that no mammal should have endured, and that alone stays my hand in this. But I am a mammal of the law, bound to uphold my oath no matter my feelings on those laws. So while I can be lenient once, I cannot be twice.

With Regret,

Acting Chief of Police,

Bogo

What broke her completely down was that he actually took the time to write all that for her, and had she not done something that she actually couldn't remember doing, she might have had a slice of her dream. Not a big piece, but a piece none the less. She could have had a chance to serve a city she loved more that anything else, save a single red fox, and even that she might have had a chance with as well. She knew he was a cop, as she had seen him on the news, his contributions to the ZPD in the Cliffside debacle well televised even in Bunny Burrow. It had afforded him a promotion to Corporal, and had set him on the ZPD career path. But it couldn't be, now.

No, that future was denied to her as well. Zootopia could not be her home anymore than Bunny Burrow could. She had to go elsewhere, but where?

And with what money? She knew little of the greater world outside of Bunny Burrow, having spent the last 9 years in a mental institution, but she knew that she still needed money. Since she couldn't work for it, she would have to steal it, which was a particularly loathsome thought to her.

She knew of one source of cash she could steal, and while it would come with additional consequences by making the mammal owning that cash very angry with her, she really didn't know how her father could get any angrier with her. So she stood up from her bed, gathered her backpack and her coat, and leaving the letter on the bed, she slipped out of a room that wasn't hers and into the night.

Her passage did not go unnoticed.

Under the glow of an ancient overhead florescent lamp in the tractor shop, Judy rummaged around back of her dad's beer fridge. She knew he kept a tall can of project tractor money in the back, where he would save his spare cash from the week. He could have used a bank's savings account, but that's not what he chose to do. She could only guess why that was, cause he never said, but it was the largest source of cash she could get her paws on tonight.

Where was it? Ah, found it! She pulled out the old can of potato chips, and popped off the lid. She shook the contents out on the bench, and started to count the bundle of bills. Damn, Dad! This isn't pocket change, this is some serious money. Nearly $17,000 worth. What were you keeping this for?

She had another momentary pang of guilt. She could could put it back, and nobody would be the wiser right? She could go back to bed, and what? Get up in the morning and have another fight with Dad? Drive Mom to tears? What future did she have here, anyway?

Screw it! She dumped the money back into the can, and shoved it into her backpack. Time to leave. She turned off the work light, and turned to walk out the shed, except that she couldn't. Her way was blocked by a white rabbit, standing in the door, dressed only in her shorts and a frown.

Beth.

Dammit! Judy didn't have time for this. She had to get away before sunrise, or her family might come looking for her, or even worse, sic the sheriff on her. She tried to push past her sister, but she simply pushed back.

"It's not yours! Put it back!" Beth ordered.

"No shit, it's not mine. That's why it's called stealing, you dumb bunny." Judy tried to make her mad, because a level headed Beth might just break down her resolve, and prevent her from going. She couldn't have that.

"What did you call me?"

"Dumb bunny. Would you prefer stupid bunny? Now get out of my way!"

"No! And calling me names won't make me move either! Put it back!"

"Dammit Beth, I can't stay, so move!"

"NO! Mom says we're Hopps, and that we love each other, no matter what! Put that back, and lets talk about this."

"Talk about what? You mean scream about it, like the happy little family that we are? That's all that ever happens around here, yelling and screaming. And I've had enough, and I'm leaving!" Judy finally pushed past her little sister, who instead of pushing against Judy's chest latched onto the backpack.

"Goddamn it, Beth! Let go!"

"Never!"

"I said LET GO!" Judy screamed at her.

"NO!" Beth screamed back.

What happened next was the oddest thing, at least in Judy's mind. She watched as her right fist appeared in her peripheral vision and accelerated towards Beth's muzzle. She hadn't given that command to her arm or her paw. Beth wouldn't see it coming, as she had her eyes closed as she to pulled with all her might on the backpack. So it was equally surprising to both of them when Judy's fist connected with her sister's face with a loud WOCK sound.

Beth went flying back to land on her rump, her paw going up to her eye, as she bit back tears of pain. Judy hadn't held back on that punch, and it really hurt.

SHIT SHIT SHIT SHIT! Judy was struck immediately by the juxtaposition of Cotton and Beth in her mind's eye. I just involuntarily punched my SISTER! Shit! She was now as much a danger to her own family as that bully had been to Cotton. She had to leave now.

Beth looked up from where she lay on the ground at the look of horror on her sister's face. Judy hadn't meant to do that, she knew, and if she stayed they could talk it out, and forgive each other… No, no, no, don't run!

Judy ran into the night as her sister screamed out her name.

"JUDY!"

They found her sobbing on the dirt in front of the tractor shed, holding on to her swelling eye. Bonnie rushed over to her asking, "Who did this to you, sweetheart?"

Beth, in between sobs, answered, "Judy."

"What?!" An indignant Stu puffed himself up, "Where is she? I'll give her a piece of my mind!" He spun around, trying to spot where she might be hiding.

Bonnie and Beth both turned to stare at him. Giving Judy a piece of his mind was all he had been doing for the past two weeks. They turned to look at each other before Beth dropped her gaze. Bonnie gently asked her daughter the next question, already knowing the answer, "Beth, where is Judy?"'

"Gone." Beth waved off into the darkness with a despondent paw. The tears had stopped, but the anguish would continue for a long time to come.

"Gone? What do you mean gone?" Stu was flabbergasted.

"I mean she ran away, and with your tractor money too. That's what we were fighting about. I tried to stop her from stealing it, and she popped me one."

"My tractor money?"

Bonnie rolled her eyes. She loved her husband, she really did, but sometimes he could be denser that a rabbit shaped lump of lead his height.

"Yes, she gone, and she took your tractor project money. She's going to need it if she's going to survive on the road. The real question, Stu, is what you are going to do about it?" Bonnie stood before him, wrapping her shawl around her shoulders. His next answers would determine the course for this family, so she couldn't force him. He had to arrive at this himself.

"Why, go after her, of course!" He sputtered indignantly.

Manny, late to this party, let down his daughter Cotton so that she could rush over to her other favorite aunt. With a look at his mother and the expression on her face, he decided to played his part in this little drama, turning back to his father, "Why? She just stole your money. Call the sheriff if you want the money back."

"I DON'T CARE ABOUT THE MONEY!" Stu hollered! "Don't you understand that?"

"No, Stu, we don't." Bonnie replied, and then asked him again, "What do you want?"

"I want my daughter back! Can't you all see that?" Stu started to beg.

"You had a funny way of showing it, dear." Bonnie played hardball, regretting not doing this a week ago.

"Don't you understand, she's my daughter! What happened to her was because of me! It was my gun! It was my responsibility!" Stu was fully worked up now, tears streaming down his face, "She was just a kit, and Cliffside broke her! It should have been me, in that awful place, not her!" He fell to his knees before his wife, clutching her skirt and sobbing, "It should have been me..."

Manny met his mother's eyes, "We weren't prepared for this, were we?"

She met his gaze, and replied, "No, we were not. But that doesn't absolve us our responsibilities, as your father has just pointed out. We're Hopps..."

"We love each other, no matter what." Beth finished as she stood.

Bonnie held her sobbing husband's head to her chest and nodded, "When she runs out of money, and comes back, what will we do?" She looked at each one in turn.

"Forgive," Manny stated for the record, not that he had anything to forgive. Judy's defense of his daughter had set all those doubts aside.

"Forgive," said Beth, nodding, having already forgiven her sister after seeing the look of horror on her face after she had completed the punch.

Bonnie turned to down to gaze at her husband, "Stu?"

"Forgive." He nodded as he answered.

"Forgive." And in so stating, Bonnie set the position of the Hopps Family on their errant daughter. When she returned home, after running out of money, she would be welcomed. And they would try this again.

"Manny, help your father up." Bonnie directed her eldest son. As he did so, she directed her next question at Stu, "Stu, honey, have much money was in that can, anyway?"

"Oh, I don't know? Maybe a thousand or so? It can't be that much." Stu actually had no idea. He just stuffed the money in, but never counted it.

"Well, that should last her a month or so. We'll see her in a few weeks then."

What Bonnie couldn't realize at the time is that her optimistic estimate of just a few weeks would stretch to over a decade of waiting before they would hear from their lost daughter Judy again.

Somewhere else

And so it begins...

The stage is set...

She has crossed the Threshold...

And thus begins her Road of Trials…

…

Will it be enough?

Outside Bunny Burrow

Judy walked alongside a quiet country road as the sun rose behind her, a smile on her face and a spring in her step.