A/N: I am sorry it's taken me a bit long to post this chapter up! I've just been very busy lately, but today I have the chance to continue the legacy of Roxie Bunny.
I grunted in discomfort as the baby began to yank on my ears while we walked. "Let go!" I hissed, trying to pry his hands off as my ears suddenly began tom ring from the amount of pressure, plus the amount of time, he had on it.
Once I finally got his tiny fist off my ear, he began to whimper before he burst into tears, making me yelp and take him to the nearest pair of arms, in this case, it was Sid. "Yeah...I don't do infants, sorry." I began to massage my ears to dull the pain as we kept walking, the baby not ceasing his crying.
It was about an hour later that the loud screams from the baby were finally getting to us. "Oh, you've gotta make it stop; I can't take it anymore!"
"I've eaten things that haven't complained this much!" Diego shouted.
"If I asked you to eat me now as an option to escape this monstrosity of a human being, would you promise to make it quick?" I asked as I enclosed my paws around my ears gently to try and block out the noise.
"He won't stop squirming!" Sid shouted, turning my attention to him, who was holding the baby upside down.
"You're holding it wrong!"
"Watch its head!"
"Let's just dump it in the river and don't say nothing to nobody!"
Manny and Diego looked at me with a lazy glare. "What?" I asked, before sighing and saying with a slight whine, "Just put it down, Sid!"
Sid obeyed, mocking us all under his breath. I shoved him out of the way. "They say a female is the best at child care!" I shrugged, before thinking. "Let's try a lullaby!"
"Yeah, because him wanting to hear your whiny voice is just what's gonna make him stop crying," Diego rolled his eyes, making me round on him.
"Hey! I've just had about enough of you! You're only hear as our guide, nothing more! I suggest to hold your tongue, Tiger!" I formed a fist with my tiny paw, which wasn't that much of an intimidation, considering he was a fully grown saber toothed tiger.
"Hey, lovebirds, he's wearing one of those baby things!" Manny said.
"Baby things?" I asked, tilting my head.
"So when he poops, rabbit, where does it go?" Diego asked, looking at me with a half smirk, making my eyes widen and quickly back up.
"Actually, I was wrong, females aren't that good with infants. Let's see if one of you can - uh - fix him." I smiled crookedly, my buck teeth showing.
"Okay, you," Manny said, pointing at Sid, "Check for poop."
"Hey, why am I the poop checker?"
"Because returning the runt was yours and the bunny's idea, because you're small and insignifigant, and because I'll pummel you if you don't." Manny threatened, getting up close enough to Sid to almost touch nose-to-trunk.
"What else?" Sid grunted.
"Now, Sid!" Manny yelled, his voice echoing.
Sid sidestepped away from the mammoth and approached the baby with a disgusted expression, beginning to remove the 'baby thing' from him.
"Have any advice on that type of intimidation?" I asked casually, leaning on Manny's trunk with a wry grin. He glared and moved his trunk so I'd fall. "Ah! Right...asking too much." Stumbling back to my hind legs, I watched Sid.
"Ew! Yuck! Ew!" Sid grimaced, before pausing, "I mean, my goodness." He lifted the baby thing. "Alright, look out, look out, coming through." He began to swing it around carelessly, almost hitting Manny.
"Hey, watch out!" he protested, before Sid swung at me.
"Ew, Sid, quit it!" I yelled, shielding myself from behind my paws.
"Stop waving that thing around!" Diego yelled, who was the next victim.
"Ooh! Ooh! I'm gonna slip!" Sid warned, but I thought I saw the hint of a grin. The baby thing slipped from his hands and landed straight forth on Manny's trunk, who panicked and quickly tossed it off in disgust.
"It's clean!" Sid laughed. "Got ya!"
Out of anger, Manny knocked him upside the head. The baby quickly stopped his crying to laugh, but once he saw Sid was okay, he began to cry again.
"Hey, do that again!" Diego said. "He likes it!"
Smirking, I lifted a fist and socked Sid across the nose. The baby laughed again,
"It's making me feel better, too!" Manny smiled.
I gasped and smiled joyfully. "Acceptance!" I was still trying to earn the friendship of Manny throughout this whole wacky adventure, but it proved to be very difficult because he seemed to not like to get close to anybody.
"Here, you hold him," Sid offered the baby to Diego, who hit him next. The baby laughed again and tried to hit Sid himself, but the sloth caught his hand in his to prevent it, starting the crying again.
"Here, turn him towards me!" Diego said as Sid sat him back onto the rock he had changed him on. He covered his eyes with his paws, "Where's the baby? There he is!" He bared his teeth, before doing it again. "Where's the baby? THERE HE IS!" The baby full out sobbed now, obviously terrified,
"Stop it, you're scaring him!" Manny said, pushing Diego off.
We were all interrupted by a growl that seemed to be coming from the baby's stomach. "I bet he's hungry!" Sid smiled.
"How 'bout some milk?" Manny suggested.
"Oh, I'd love some!" Sid exclaimed, making me glare.
"Not you, the baby!" I hissed, hitting Sid upside the head, making him round onto me.
"Well, I'm not exactly lactating all much, pal!" Sid said.
Diego quickly came to my defense, surprisingly so. He got up close to Sid instead, placing me to the side. "You're a little low on the food chain to be mouthing off!"
"ENOUGH!" Manny stopped all the arguing. We were silent until the sound of something hitting the ground caught our attention. Off to the side, we spotted a melon sitting on the side of a bush.
"Food!" we chanted happily. Manny lifted it up, but a bird yelled and fell from the bush, yanking the melon back and squawking at him, before scurrying off.
"Hey, get back here!" I yelled, settling on all fours to chase after him.
"Roxie!" the boys yelled, taking the baby up to follow. I stopped at the edge of a cliff where I lost him. Manny, Diego, and Sid caught up.
"Give a warning next time you're gonna chase after some dodo!" Manny said, hitting me upside the head with his trunk.
"Noted," I groaned, rubbing where he hit.
Looking back below, I gasped. Many dodos were below like some sort of army and chanting things at the same time. "I lost the dodo melon stealer..."
"Prepare for the ice age!"
"Protect the dodo way of life!"
"Separate the dodos from the beasts!"
"Prepare for the ice age!"
"Ice age?" Sid asked.
"I've heard of these crackpots..." Diego mumbled.
"I like them! It seems like they've got their way of life sorted out!" I grinned, before pointing. "Hey, there's our melon! Be right back!" I tumbled down the cliff, ignoring them calling my name again.
"Will she stop running off?" Diego sighed. It looked like they were following me.
I smiled as I neared a rock with about three melons. This meant the lot of us could eat. Well, me, Sid, the baby, and Manny. Diego wouldn't probably say yes to anything unless it were meat. Reaching forward, I went to grab one, but yelped as a dodo attacked my paw by pecking it and squawking, making me fly back.
"Hey!" Diego shouted angrily at the bird as I rubbed my paw in both a bit of pain and confusion. "Where'd he get you?"
"Uh..."
"Intruders!" the dodo shouted, running toward more of his buddies. "Intruders! Intr-AH!" He fell into what looked to be a tar pit.
The dodos finally noticed us and began to approach.
"Hey, can we have our melon back?" Manny asked, before pointing at the baby. "Junior's hungry, and uh..."
"No way! This is our private stock pile for the ice age! Some arctic fortress will force us underground for a billion, billion years!" a dodo said.
"So you have three melons?" Manny asked sarcastically.
"HA!" I pointed joyfully, before putting a paw up for a highfive, but Manny rolled his eyes and ignored me. Flushing in embarrassment, I slowly put my paw down.
"If you weren't smart enough to plan ahead, then doom on you!"
"Doom on you...doom on you..." the birds began to crowd around us.
"Get away from me," Manny glared.
"No! No!" one of the dodos shouted as a melon fell from the rock and into the baby's arms. "Uh...tai-kwan-dodos! Attack!" Three dodos appeared, making very exaggerated fighting noises as they kicked each other until they got the melon and tried to pass it around, but they managed to stupidly throw it over a cliff.
"The melon!" Several dodos jumped to retrieve it, but it was obvious what their fate was.
Sid snuck from our side to get to the remaining two melons. I lifted the baby up instead, holding him close, but made sure he had no access to my ears.
Sid grabbed one of the melons and smiled, showing it to us. However, the dodos weren't having it and went to attack him, managing to get it once more, but accidentally throwing it into the tar pit, along with three more dodos. I snickered.
"Only you would laugh in the face of death," Manny said, looking down at me dully.
"Well, considering our circumstances, yeah I'm definitely gonna laugh."
"The last melon..." the dodos brought me back to the rock where Sid was holding it.
"He's dead," I sighed. "He had a good run, though..." The dodos attacked him and shooed off the melon, but Manny was able to lift it up with his trunk, holding it above their heads, but one of them got him from behind in parts I shouldn't mention.
To catch you off of that note, he threw the melon out of surprise in pain high into the air in the direction of Sid.
"Sid, go long!" I shouted.
He caught it, but now all of the dodos had their attention on him and were making threatening steps. Sid looked at us, then the baby, and finally got his courage in check and began running, shoving any and all birds away with one hand and holding the melon in the other until finally he dived into the air to make it to us, patting on the ground, but keeping the melon safe.
The baby cheered, causing Manny, Diego, and me to cheer, too. I raised the baby in the air. Sid began dancing what seemed to be a victory roll, until he threw the melon down, destroying it.
"Ah, Sid, now we've gotta find more food!" Diego said as I set the baby down and watched him crawl to the melon, eating the remains from the ground.
"Hey, I think he likes it!" I smiled.
The dodos had piled on each other in a big tower as a defese mechanism, but couldn't handle it and fell over the cliff next.
"Hey, look at that, dinner and a show," Manny joked.
I giggled and ate a piece of the melon before watching as Manny announced we'd camp out here for the night.
As he left with the baby and Sid went who knows where, I grinned and shuffled to Diego.
"So," I started nonchalantly, "you sure did come to my aid a few times today, despite our 'oh, so amazing' introduction this morning." He glared at me.
"The only reason is because without you, Manny and I would have to deal with Sid alone, that's it," Diego glared, his ears falling back.
"Nah, I think you've grown fond of me! You consider me your friend!" I giggled, poking at his cheek.
"I do not!"
"You do so, you do think I'm your friend! And quite quickly, too, may I add. Am I that contagiously friendly and funny?" I asked, my ears falling in a mocking way as I moved closer.
Finally done, he bit at my paw quickly, but not hard enough to bleed, before joining Manny. I yelled and began to whine, "Manny, he bit me!"
"Diego, don't bite the rabbit," Manny sighed tiredly. I grinned and made my way to Manny's side, finding a good spot to open a hole for my burrow. I think I was actually beginning to get on these guy's good sides. I dunno, but I've never felt more at home than I do now.
But I knew if Mother saw me, I'd be in a worser state than being caught with a predator.