Summary:
Fennick tries to pull a prank on Judy, only to find that the joke's on him. His mate helps him understand his place in this drama as Judy reconnects with a long lost lover.
Notes:
Back to SkyeHopps land! Yay! This chapter picks up right were Chapter 17 left off.
Current Day: Wednesday afternoon in Savanah Center
Judy heard the rumbling first; the distinctively smooth sound of a pair of balanced 90 degree V-twin engines, slowing down to idle as their owners coasted to a stop in front of Crazy Steve's restaurant. She would recognize that sound anywhere. When she had started modeling as a bike babe for Jack, one of the first things she learned was that, like diesel tractor engines, motorcycle engines had distinctive operating sounds, from the pop-pop sound of single cylinder two-strokes to the deep bass pulsing rumble of a '56 v-twin pan-head.
She looked out the restaurant window next to the booth that she shared with Fennick, but because of the angle of the sun shining in through the window, she could only see the two motorcycle. The details of their riders, clad in black alligator leather, was lost in the glare. The first bike was obviously a custom chopper, all chrome and black paint with an extended front fork and long handle bars. A small black bullet shaped side car rode in close formation to the chopper, a shark's mouth and teeth painted on the front. That must be where Fennick rides, she thought, And that means the long legged rider is his girlfriend.
The other rider was somewhat shorter, but Judy couldn't figure out what species they were yet. They pulled up on the other side of the chopper, partially hidden from view, but what Judy could see of their motorcycle thrilled her and depressed her at the same time. What thrilled her was the possibility that it was a classic Gold Coast Pale Rider 250V, and one of the few classic gas motorcycles she could actually comfortably ride. The part that depressed her was that she had first learned to ride on a Pale Rider over 8 years ago; what saddened her was not so much the length of time, but who her riding instructor had been. She still missed that vixen, even after this time.
She looked glumly down at the table, a frown beginning to play across her muzzle. Fennick looked across the table at her with a bit of concern, misreading her frown for trepidation. He tried to reassure her, "It's cool, rabbit. Nothing to worry about, I promise you. You're gonna like Marilyn's mechanic, and I thinks she's gonna like you!" He grinned across the table.
Judy locked her eyes on the little fox's. He looked so pleased with himself that she was instantly suspicious of his motives. "She?" Judy asked him with a scowl, afraid that some joke was about to be played out at her expense. He nodded as his gaze drifted to the door, and behind the back of her booth seat she could hear the sound of it opening, it's door bells momentarily masking the murmur of conversation the two mammals were having.
Judy's ears twitched on her head as she identified one of the voice as canine, a light soprano but with the same Amazonia accent that Hugo presented. The other canine voice, though, was softer and more alto, with hints of west coast and something else, something tantilizingly familiar and much more... northern. Judy's head went back in shock as she recognized that voice and her mouth dropped open. Her gray ears lept to their full extension, swiveling up and over the back of the booth to lock on to that voice. She heard just one word barely whispered when she did, but that one word was enough for her to know without a doubt who the speaker was.
"Tukisinangitok..."
Judy shoved down hard on the table with her paws as she lept to her feet, water sloshing out of the glasses on the table and drenching Fennick in the process, as she twisted back around to face the mammals by the door. She locked her eyes on the smaller of the two, and her shriek brought the entire restaurant to a stand-still.
"SKYE!"
Marilyn pulled her helmet off, and shook her head. She waited until her fellow canine rider pulled up next to her and turned off her grumbling beast before she asked her question, "So what is it with you and rabbits, anyway?"
The white furred vixen laughed as she unbuckled her own helmet. "I don't know. I've always had a fascination for them, especially as a kit. My grandmother would tell me stories, legends actually, about them and how our two species would interact. My favorite one was about how a buck and a vixen got married."
She leaned the bike on it's kickstand, and slid off the seat. She put her helmet and gloves into her saddle bag, and turned to follow the wolf to the restaurant door, continuing with, "Of course, the moral of the story was about staying inside your tribe to marry, but the impossibility of it always struck a romantic cord with me."
Marilyn paused with her paw on the door handle, "You? Romantic? Skye, I've never seen you have a steady relationship, much less a romantic one! We'd go to a bar, you'd pick up some vixen, and the next day when I'd ask you about it, you can't even tell me their name!"
Skye stood up straight with indignation, placing her paw over her heart, "I can too be romantic! Really! I even managed to have a rabbit for a girlfriend some eight years ago, before we had to break up after six months. We lost track of each other after that, which is kinda sad."
Marilyn pulled the door open so that they could enter, "Really? How the hell did you manage that without her running off the moment you smiled and said 'Hello'?"
Skye followed her inside, "Oh, no, she didn't run away when we first meet. I was the nervous one, not her. Hell, she asked me out first, if you can believe that!" She smiled at her friend.
Marilyn stopped and turned to look at the snow vixen in disbelief. Skye just grinned back, and as she did she breathed in the particular aroma that was Crazy Steve's. She could smell the mouth watering scent of fish poaching in the kitchen. She could smell Fennick's musky scent among the customers, stronger than the aftertaste that always clung to Marilyn's clothes. She could also smell the earthy scent of rabbit, a scent somewhat misplaced in an omnivore place like this.
She turned her nose toward the scent, and she inhaled deeply, tasting the tang of her favorite scent. Her nose told her it was an eastern cottontail, a female even. But Skye's breath caught her throat as the rabbit's ears lifted up. They were gray with black tips…
"Tukisinangitok..." Skye whispered in disbelief. She fell back against the wall as the doe rocketed up out of her seat, turning and twisting to face her. Skye's jaw dropped open as she gazed back at eyes the color of vibrant heather, eyes she had only ever seen once before on a rabbit doe. She whispered that rabbit's name as she slid to her knees, only have it drowned out as the rabbit shrieked out hers.
"Judy..." She didn't even see the gray blur coming straight at her before she was slammed up against the wall by a sobbing, shrieking doe, her own arms reflexively catching the smaller mammal and crushing her up against her chest as they both wept with joy.
Marilyn looked down in bemusement at the two females clutching each other. Seeing that they were going to spend some time getting reaquinted with each other, she made her way over to the booth, where Fennick stood on the seat, soaking wet. "Oh Baby," she exclaimed, grabbing a napkin from the table and using it to sop up her poor drenched fennec tod. "What happened to you?" She asked him.
"What happened? Crazy-ass rabbit, that's what happened! She jumped up on the table as soon as you two came in, knocking the water glasses all over me, before rocketing off!" He plucked at his shirt as Marilyn tried to dry it with the cloth napkin, "What are they doing right now?" He swiveled his ears, trying to listen to their mutual sobbing.
Marilyn leaned out to look around the booth, "They're just locked in an embrace." She smiled as she sat back up, "I don't think we're going to separate the two of them any time soon, at least not without a crowbar." She put the damp napkin down on the table, and grabbed another to use on his pants, "Where did you find her?" she asked her diminutive Tod.
"Oh, I didn't find her." Fennick shook his head, "Hugo came in this afternoon and asked me to babysit her and then he took off, which surprised the hell of me, considering how long he's been looking for this particular stray. I wouldn't imagine that he'd let go of her after just finding her a couple of nights ago." He gestured at the far wall, half in amazement, half in frustration.
Marilyn sat up straight, the damp napkin in her paw momentarily forgotten, "You mean, that's… that's..." She pointed at the rabbit.
"Yeah. That's Judy Hopps. His long lost star pupil from Cliffside, some thirteen years ago." Fennick scowled in the rabbit's direction.
Marilyn was struck silent in amazement. She turned back to see Skye stand up with the rabbit still in her arms and walk out door. The vixen turned and walked down the street, away from the restaurant, and out of view. She turned back to look at Fennick, as he gestured out the door.
"I brought her along, figuring that I could tweak his prim little feline nose a bit for dumping her on me by introducing her to Skye, but that just completely and totally backfired on me. It looks like she's already friends with the vixen, which is weird. You'd think, with the way that Skye's always obsessing about rabbits, that she'd have mentioned Judy at some point to us."
Marilyn shook her head, "Fennick, you didn't see them embrace. They weren't just friends, they were lovers." Fennick stared back up at her in disbelief. Marilyn nodded, "Yes, for about half a year; almost eight years ago, she said. I would guess just before her mother died, since she really doesn't like to talk about that time. She said that time in her life was filled with too much heartbreak for her to really want to talk about it."
"Shit..." He put his paws on the table, and scowled. Eight years ago? Why was that important? Suddenly he remembered and his eyes snapped up to Marilyn's, "Eight years ago Judy was in Gateway Bay City, at least according to Hugo. Didn't Skye have a shop there for several years?"
She nodded, "Yeah, Skye Cycles, before she sold it. She was making custom electric bikes." She scowled at him, "How did Hugo know the rabbit was there?"
Fennick waved his paw in the air, "He had his other Cliffside students out looking out for her. Apparently Mork, the porcupine in his group of strays, saw her purely by chance at some art school out there that he was attending, and reported it to Hugo. The Cat was so overjoyed he wouldn't stop babbling about it to me. Mork managed to track down where she worked for him, but before he could talk to her, she ended up having a screaming match with two customers, and she got fired on the spot by the manager. They stormed out of the restaurant crying bloody murder, and she ran off faster than than poor Mork could waddle out after her." Fennick shook his head.
He frowned across the table before continuing, "Hugo had flown out there on a whim, trying to meet up with her, but she was gone by the time he got there. He managed to get the restaurant manager to cough up her home address, but when he got there she was already moved out. She didn't leave a forwarding address, so he had no way to find her. He scoured the city, but he just came up empty. He was so bummed when came back to Zootopia." He turned back to look at his she-wolf and froze as something went CLICK! in his head. OH SHIT!
She looked down at him in worry, "What?" She asked him.
He looked back at her in shock, "I just realized something, that I should have put together before now, but I never did! Oh my God, that's why she was so upset!"
"Who? Who was upset?" Marilyn demanded to know.
"Cheryl! Our Cheryl!" He took a breath before explaining, "This was before your time, and Hell, even before Hugo ever met her, but she had gone out to the west coast to do the touristy thing with her girlfriend some eight years back. They had left so happy, but by the time they got back they were all upset and arguing with each other, but Cheryl never told me why. I figure they had some spat or something, but I don't think so now."
He thumped his fist on the table, "Mork reported to Hugo that Judy had been arguing with two cream colored canines, who were yelling about bloody murder, and that it somehow got Judy fired. Now, which canines do we know, personally, that are cream colored, and have cause to yell at a rabbit about murder?"
Marilyn leaned back and whispered, "Catherine..."
Fennick nodded vigorously, "Yeah! Catherine Latrans! And her girlfriend, our very own Cheryl!" He stopped for a moment, puzzlement playing across his features, "Except that Hugo was flying out to Gateway Bay that very day, to meet up with her." He grabbed her arm, "Marilyn, Hugo flew in to meet her, but before he could, Catherine and Cheryl showed up to chase her off! That's too many damn coincidences!"
Marilyn cocked her head, thinking, "It's as if something, or perhaps someone, didn't want her to be found by him."
Fennick nodded, "Yeah, and it's not just him, either! Hugo wasn't the only one looking for her, oh no. Nick is too."
Marilyn asked him, "What? Why?"
Fennick gestured out the door with his jaw, "Judy Hopps' other name, her street name, is Jessica Lapin. Ever hear of that?"
Marilyn froze for a moment, think back to the days when she worked the poles, "Wait, I know that name. I saw it once or twice on the west coast circuit, back when I was still stripping. She was a big name for while, if you were into really crazy performances. That was her, too?" She looked at Fennick, her brow furrowed.
"I didn't know about the stripping, but I guess that makes sense considering the rest. She was a porn star for a while, into doing extreme porn." Fennick just shook his head, "But that's not what interested Nick in her. He was more interested in what she was doing three years ago, here in Zootopia." He turned to look at his mate, "Not the prostitution she was doing, per se. She was working the casino district, and it's legal there. No, Nick is interested in her because of her relationship with Dawn Bellwether."
Marilyn put her paw to her lips, "She was a Prey First member?"
Fennick muzzle split in an ironic grin, "With the way she talks about Hugo, or what we just saw happen with Skye? No way in Hell!" He laughed, "Naw. It turns out she was Nick's CI deep inside the PF organization."
"She was?" Marilyn looked back at him in amazement.
Fennick nodded. "Yeah, after Bewether's death, she grabbed all of their laptops and documents, and gave them to Nick. That's how he broke the case. It was from that info that Hugo's medical team manged to make an antidote and cure the savage predators that crazy Bellwether's gang had attacked."
She was confused again, "But if that's the case, than Hugo should have talked her then, right? He wouldn't have still been looking for her if he knew, but I even talked to him about it last year, and he said he despaired that he would never find her alive again." She waved her paws in the air.
"He doesn't know, because Nick never told him. The stupid fox scrubbed the data, and removed any reference about Judy or gray rabbits from it so that Hugo wouldn't find out. He said he was trying to protect Hugo. From what, I don't know. The knowledge that she was a prostitute who had been working the Zootopia streets for years, just under Hugo's nose? Or that she was in deep with some crazy-assed organization that was trying to outlaw predators? I don't know." Fennick sat down, "What I do know is that Nick said she had gotten infected with night-howler at the same time that Bellwether died, and she had run off. He believed that she had died out on the streets, probably from terror induced exhaustion like some off the lost predators had."
He pointed out the door, "Except that's obviously not the case. She's certainly not dead yet, as we can see!"
"Yet?" Marilyn warily asked him, "What do you mean by yet, Fenni?"
"Oh! This is where it gets really weird!" He turned back to her, "Cheryl's been bugging me about this crazy dream she's been having, but she won't talk about it with Nick, or Hugo, or hell even her own wife for that matter. Cheryl Silverheels, noted coyote scholar of the mystic arts, is calling me of all mammals to talk about a dream she doesn't understand."
Fennick pointed out the door, "She's been having this dream for the past month about a dead gray rabbit lying frozen in a snowbank. In the middle of the Tundra Town central square at night and she swears that the rabbit is Judy Hopps! She's all worked up about this cause she can barely sleep before she gets hit with it and she wakes up screaming Judy's name! Luckily, her wife is out of town, or she would be having domestic screaming matches over the contents of her own dreams right now." He ran down.
Marilyn eyes were boring into Fennick's, "There's more to that, isn't there? More than just her dreams that you aren't telling me?"
He nodded, "Yeah. Cause in her dream, she was Clawhauser. It was Clawhauser that was supposed to find her dead in the snow. Except that it never happened, cause I figure that Hugo found her first. After ten years of searching, and never finding her, being actively blocked even, he stumbles on her in the dead of night in the middle of his own Goddamn backyard; Tundra Town no less! So instead of being dead in the snow on a cold Monday night, she's now staying with Hugo with nothing to show for her recent brush with death except for a case of pneumonia." He tossed his paws up. Crazy Steve, the dingo proprietor of the restaurant, thinking that they needed service, started to walk toward their table. Fennick just waved him off.
"And Clawhauser? He's now in the hospital, attacked by some patient of Hugo's. The same patient that Hugo had to go see, but he couldn't take Judy in with him, so he dumps her on my lap. The coincidences have gotten just absolutely ridiculous, so much so that this has to be some crazy drama plot being written by a daytime soap opera hack! Argh!"
"Fenni, love, you always say that you don't believe in coincidences." She gently reminded him.
"No, I don't, I really don't. Except that it's all there. I swear, the only thing that would turn this all into one of those telanovellas that you like to watch is if Judy there was some kind of time traveling cop from the future who's been sent back in time to prevent the apocalypse from happening. But along the way there's going to be this really crazy love triangle between her, an obsessed asexual cross-bred cat doctor, and a motorcycle racing lesbian from the far north. Oh, let's not forget Nick naming his daughter after this rabbit, so it's just gonna have to blow up his marriage with Miki now, too!"
"Cop, why a cop? Why not a soldier from the cyborg future?" Marilyn teased him.
"Oh, definitely a cop." He nodded, "When I told her about Clawhauser getting hurt, the first thing she wanted to know was if Nick was okay. I never even mentioned Nick. So she's gotta know him enough to care deeply about him, especially since she obviously sent him all that info in the first place. And she asked about Clawhauser by his first name, not his title. She's somehow on a first name basis with these ZPD mammals, but they'd swear up one wall and down the other they've never even met her. Except that they all want to talk to me about her! I'm the damn mammal in the middle on this, being kicked around like a bloody soccer ball!"
He finally wound down his rant, "Babe, I don't know what to do here, I really don't." He shook his head.
She took his tiny paw in hers, and she gently squeezed. She leaned over and kissed him on his head before starting, "A very wise mammal I know once told me, when I was just getting started with my own counseling career, is that we don't get to pick who walks in through our doors. We just get to choose who to help. So I have to ask, are we going to help her?"
"Us?" Fennick exclaimed, "I don't want in on this! This promises to be a complete and absolute shit-storm! I don't want any part of this rabbit or her problems!" He shook his head.
"Except that we are a part of this. You said it yourself; you're the mammal in the middle. They are all your friends, and they have all brought this problem to you. They trust your judgment, so you can't abandon that trust, no matter how hard the situation might be on you. And you're not alone in this, my little Zorro! I am here too, to aid you in this quest that has been given unto you by the Espíritus Santos." She stroked his ears as she explained this to him.
"You? Why are you now dragged into this?" He asked.
"She's an ex-sex worker, yes? That means she's meant to be my client. And we just saw that Skye is meant to help with her as well." She assured him, "Your other friends, well, they are your responsibility. You know how best to get them to work together for the needs of this rabbit and her purpose."
"What purpose!?" Fennick exclaimed, "The only thing I see that connects them all together is the whole night-howler thing, except that Dawn's been dead for three years, and Carl Latrans! What does a coyote astronaut who's been dead for nearly twenty years have to do with night-howlers? Dawn was a Prey First fanatic, and Carl was a predator in the public space program! I don't see the connection! What possible purpose could that crazy little rabbit have?!" He demanded to know.
She leaned back and looked down at him, "You said she was supposed to die, according to Cheryl, yes? But she didn't, no? That you believe that something was actively blocking Hugo from finding her for over a decade, but now all of a sudden she is in his care? Well, in my opinion, the only reason that I can think of, is that she didn't die because she was give some work, some holy mission, by the Espíritus Santos, and it is not yet done!" She poked a claw at his chest.
"And now you are now part of this work, not just because Hugo dumped her on you today, but because you have been a part of this since it began. You are the center, whether you want to or not, because you understand who the players are and what you are supposed to do for them, even if you don't understand why!"
"But I don't want to be any part of this, I really don't!" Fennick desperately whined. "There's got to be somebody else who can do this!"
She leaned back and a stared down at him, "Alright, then, who? Who else has figured this all out? Who else knows all these mammals? Who else do you know that they all trust?" She cocked her head as she considered her little mate. He ground his teeth for a moment, before he dropped his gaze, and nodded his head.
"Just me." He finally admitted.
Skye became aware that every mammal in the restaurant was watching them, as the conversations around her stilled. Still holding on to the sobbing rabbit in her arms, she stood against the wall. Turning to the door, and without a backwards glance, she walked outside with Judy clinging to her neck.
She turned to walk along the sidewalk, and she was struck by how light her former lover was. Skye looked down at the fur on Judy's skull, and she could see the patchiness of the fur, and she could smell the scent of medicated body wash. Overlaying that scent was the powerful musk of a male jaguar, mixed in with something else she didn't quite recognize. Spying a bench by the road, she angled over to it. Settling down on it, she arranged Judy's patched coat to hang over her knees. Leaning back, she stroked her paw down Judy's ears, calming the poor rabbit.
Judy's hiccuping sobs slowed in time, and turned into little whines as she slid down to nestle into Skye's chest. Skye hummed a nameless tune as she continued to stroke her paws over Judy's head and down her spine. Skye's sensitive paws traced over the bumps of the skinny rabbit's vertebrate. She wasn't sure what had happened to her little rabbit, but the vixen was certain that she had almost starved to death. Rabbits weren't supposed to be this skinny. She must have been homeless or abused, which would explain why she was in Fennick's care, she thought. Her arms wrapped back around the little cottontail and gently squeezed.
They sat that way for a bit, until Judy's breathing became regular.
Judy spoke first, her tone gently accusing, "You stopped writing back to my letters, and eventually they all came back to me with a big 'Return to Sender' stamped on them. I always wondered who you must have found up there that took my place." She stroked her paw down the slick vest, feeling for the heartbeat under the leather.
"I'm sorry," Skye murmured back, "My father was intercepting my mail while I was taking care of Mom. He had finally figured out who you were after he opened one of your letters. Since he didn't approve of my relationship with you, he took it upon himself to change it. He hid my letters to you on his boat, and sent all of yours back, which I didn't find out about until after Mom died. She held on for two more years, but finally she passed on, freed from her pain."
"After she died, he tried to convince me to help him on his boat again, and I tried to one last time. I really did, but the sea still terrified me, and he still didn't care. We didn't catch anything that day, so instead he cracked open a bottle while we were still at sea, and made me pilot the boat back in. I suppose he felt that jumping off the deep end was the only way to learn how to swim, but I still hated him for it."
She sighed before she continued, "I managed to pilot the pitching boat all the back to our wharf without puking or curling up in a ball. I was in the process of shutting it all down and putting the maps away when I discovered all my letters to you, along with a few of yours, rubber banded together and hidden in the map box. He never threw them out, the lazy bastard. Just kept them, as trophies I suppose. I had never been more angry with him, so when he came into the boathouse, drunk as a skunk, to bitch at me about my sea handling skills, I punched him as hard as I could right in the nose. I was packed up and gone from the house before he came too. Took the first flight out of our town to the providence capital and I never looked back."
Judy pushed back, the look on her face unsure, her eyes searching Skye's for the truth. She wanted to believe, but the pain was too real, even after eight years. Skye put her finger on Judy's lips to still any questions before unbuttoning her vest and reaching inside it. She pulled out a slim wallet from an inner pocket, and upon opening it she pulled out a well worn photo, creased and feathered. She handed to the photo to Judy.
Judy took it from the vixen's paw. It was a photo of Judy standing on a beach next to her short board, soaking wet and grinning like a loon. She turned it over, and written on the back in Skye's neat script was 'Light Of My Heart'. She turned back to look at Skye, who quietly breathed, "I've always kept you close to my heart, littlest rabbit."
Bereft of words at this simple gesture, Judy did the next best thing she knew of to do by grabbing both sides of Skye's muzzle and crushing her lips to the vixen's in a very belated kiss, only eight years late.