"There you go Nathan, you're getting better at it. Now if I could just get this darn thing to work," Nick was trying his best to capture a video of Nathan and Sophia crawling on his phone, but the latest software update was causing him problems. "Okay got it, now Nathan get closer to your sister so I can get both of you at once." Nathan looked up at Nick, then to his sister, before letting out a big smile and laugh and crawling in the opposite direction.
"What are you doing Nick?" Judy walked around the counter separating the living room and kitchen with two travel mugs of coffee to see Nick trying to corral the kits, which brought more laughter from her. Sophia had managed to crawl under a chair and was munching on something she found on the floor and Nathan had wrapped himself up in a phone charging cable and was chewing on the connector.
"I want to get a video of them to put up on Furbook but they are not cooperating with me."
Judy sighed and glared at Nick, "You know how I feel about you posting all these pictures and videos of our kits on there. There still are the crazies out there who think our lifestyle is unnatural."
"I know carrots, I just can't help posting things about them. But I have it set to only share with our friends so I think we'll be safe." Nick finally managed to untangle Nathan and was now wrestling out whatever Sophia had in her mouth.
Judy just shook her head and set Nicks coffee down on the table by the couch, "Well hurry up, we need to get them to daycare and get ourselves to work."
"Okay, Carrots." Nick took the piece of paper from Sophia's mouth and placed her in a bouncer so he could finish getting ready for work. A short time later with the kits dropped off at daycare they pulled into the precinct parking lot.
"Ooooo Niiiiiick," the familiar sound of Clawhouser's voice echoed across the atrium of the precinct, "that video of Nathan and Sophia is just precious." Judy smiled and patted Nick's arm as she continued on to the bullpen.
"Thank you, Ben. The are very precious to us, I wouldn't give them up for the world." Nick was smiling from ear to ear. He never expected to be in his position but his kits truly did mean the world to him.
"I bet, you are so lucky. Maybe someday I'll get to experience that joy." Ben placed his head in his paws looking down at Nick.
Nick jumped up and snagged a donut from the box on the table, "You will one day buddy. We'll help find you someone special." He hopped down and made his way to the bullpen, climbing up into his seat just as Bogo walked in.
"Officers Wilde, you'll be patrolling Tundratown today. We've had a lot of reports of mix species couples being targeted over there, so I want you two to be extra vigilant." Bogo lowered his glasses giving the two a stern but concerned look.
"Yes sir, we will." Nick took the folder marking their patrol route and jumped down, followed closely by Judy. They went to their office before heading on patrol as they had an hour before it started. Judy went through their e-mails as Nick hopped on to Furbook.
"Hey, Carrots your parents and a lot of your family are liking and commenting on the video of the kits. They can't believe they are crawling already. We really need to bring them down and visit them again, it's been a while." Nick thought about it and the last time they went to the farm was last year for Christmas so hardly any of the extended family had seen them personally.
"Well we have some time off we need to use, why don't we make plans for next month to go home." Judy was almost done answering all the e-mails when Wolford popped his head in.
"Hey you two, cute video of the kits. I've seen it pop up a few times and mammals are really liking it."
Judy looked over at Nick as he thanked Wolford for the compliment. "Nick I thought you said it would only be shared with our friends? Why was Wolford saying he saw it multiple times."
Nick looked over at the concerned face Judy was giving him, "Probably mammals just sharing the video, it's nothing carrots."
Judy came off her chair and walked over to him, "Nick, no more on Furbook please. Who knows who could all be looking at what is getting shared outside our friends."
Nick melted in the pleading eyes Judy was giving him, those bright amethyst eyes on the verge of crying. He took her head in his paws, dropping the joking tone he had earlier. "Okay Judy. I promise nothing else will go up unless you say it's okay. I don't want to worry you."
With him using her actual name and not one of the normal pet names Judy knew he would keep his word. "Thank you, now let's get going. Those streets aren't going to patrol themselves."
Judy walked out of the office as Nick turned to shut down his computer. He took a quick glance at the video and his jaw dropped, "Oh no." Twelve thousand. Twelve thousand shares and climbing rapidly with even more comments. Nick closed his eyes, "Shit, maybe she was right." He shook the thought from his head and finished powering down the computer.
The sound of glasses hitting tables and chatter filled the room, mammals coming and going, food and drink orders being called out, the general busyness of a bar in Tundratown at noontime. The white snowshoe hare sat quietly in the corner drinking his beer and browsing on his phone for his next hook up later that night. A message brought his attention away from the list of potential mates and nearly made him spit out his beer.
"Take a look at this disgusting shit. Why do they think this is okay?"
He clicked the link which brought him to a Furbook page that was showing a video of two hybrid kits trying to crawl. He nearly threw his phone after hearing how happy whoever it was filming them. The disgusting look they had, clearly they were supposed to be a rabbit and fox, but they were so deformed. The rabbit's ears were significantly shorter than they should have been and the foxes muzzle was short with more of the round rabbit nose than the triangular shape. The more he looked the more pissed he got. He chugged down his beer and slammed it onto the table.
"They think this is so cute, I'll show them." He shared the video on another page and began to type furiously on every share of the video he could find. "They'll wish they had never been born, can't stand them. All these damn hybrids coming out now, they should all be destroyed."
"So next month we go home to visit the farm?" Nick took a drink from his coffee that the had refilled at lunch and absentmindedly looked out the window for anything of interest.
"That sounds good, we just need to request the time off when we get back from patrol. So why are you so excited about going back, aren't you a city fox after all?" Judy had her eyes darting around looking for anything to break up the monotony of just driving around.
"Well yes I was born and raised here, but the few times we've been out there I can really see retiring and getting a small plot of land out there for us. Who knows, maybe open up a pawpsicle stand." Nick looked over at Judy with a mischievous grin.
"Really Nick," Judy looked over at him, "I thought you had given up all of that. I really don't want to have to explain to our kits why you know so much about…"
"JUDY, STOP!" Nick yelled out, grabbing onto the dash in front of him. She slammed on the brakes, causing the cruiser to start to skid on the snowy road. Luckily she kept it under control and stopped just short of flattening a snowshoe hare who was stumbling across the street.
The hare looked up in surprise at the screeching then shot them the single finger salute, "Watch where you're going you damn cops, you could've killed me!"
Judy rolled down the window, "Sorry sir, are you okay?"
The hare just stared at Judy through his wobbling then his eyes shot wide open at the realization of who it was, "You! You're the sick freak, burn in hell!" He continued across the street and down the sidewalk stumbling as he went having trouble staying upright.
Nick looked over at Judy and her shock at what the hare had said to her. "Carrots… Carrots… Judy!" She blinked and turned to look at Nick. "You're blocking the road, let's pull over there and talk."
Judy didn't say anything, she just got the cruiser moving and over to the side of the road and parked it. Not a word was said for a while, both of them just stared out the windows as the snow began to fall.
"Do you want to talk about what happened Judy?" Nick finally broke the silence trying to get her attention back.
"I… I… just can't believe what he said." Judy had a tight grip on the wheel, her breathing was slow and heavy, tears had started to form in her eyes.
Nick unbuckled her seatbelt and pulled her into him as she broke down, wetting the front of Nicks uniform. "There, there Judy. It's okay, just let it all out." Nick did his best to comfort the rabbit breaking down in his lap, but it seemed like nothing could console her.
They sat in the patrol car for nearly a half hour before Judy was calm enough to continue their patrol. Not much else was said and luckily there were no more incidents. They made their way back to the precinct and changed to head home.
The were riding in the car in silence again when Judy finally spoke, "I am going to hold both of them so close when we get home. I knew there were mammals who didn't care for our lifestyle but this is the first time I have actually seen it myself."
"I'm sorry you had to see it, Judy. It's something I've had to deal with my whole life as a fox." Nick's mind went back to the night at the junior ranger scouts and the subsequent events of his life leading to this event. "We will work through it. Remember what you said, some mammals just won't be able to be changed."
"I know Nick, I just hope things won't be so bad when our kids are older." They pulled into the daycare and Judy rushed in and did exactly as she said. Throwing open the door she saw Nathan and Sophia laying on the floor fighting over a toy but upon seeing their mom both put their paws into the air and started squealing with joy. She ran over and scooped up both of them in her paws and planted kisses all over them, enticing even more laughter and giggling from them.
Nick walked in more calmly, if not more clumsily after toting the car seats in. He stood to watch Judy with the kids and smiled as an attendant came up to him. "They behaved very well today and their crawling is getting so much better. Even from the video this morning despite what mammals are saying. "
Nick looked perplexed at the porcupine "What do you mean by what other mammals are saying?"
"Well... most comments on the video I've seen are sweet and carrying. However, a lot of them are starting to pop up really mean and, quite frankly, disgusting." The porcupine shuddered at the thought of what she had seen. "I dare not repeat some of the things that were said, some are very troubling."
Judy came over with the kits and started buckling them into their car seats, "What's going on nick." She was concerned about the look he was giving the attendant.
"Nothing Carrots, Stacie was just telling me that one of the other kits hit Nathan in the face fairly hard with a toy so we should watch out if he starts whining or rubbing it." Nick tried his best to make up a lie for her sake.
Judy turned back down to Nathan and lightly rubbed his face, "Oh my poor baby, mommy will take you home and make sure you're alright." She picked up his car seat and thanked Stacie before carrying him out to the car.
"Thank you, Stacie, for not saying anything to her. It's my fault for posting that video, now I have to figure out a way to contain it." Nick picked up Sophia and carried her out to the car. They were nearly home when Judy got a muzzle time call from her mom.
"Oh hey mom, to what do I owe this surprise?" Judy's smile was finally back on her face, her true smile.
"I just wanted to call and see what is going on with the video of the kits from this morning." Bonnie had a very concerned look on her face, "The things we are seeing about it is starting to scare us."
"What do you mean they were scaring you, I thought the comments were positive?" Judy quickly opened up Furbook and the first post she saw shocked her. It was an anti mix species page and the video of her kits was posted on the top with several hundred comments about it. Comments on how they should all be destroyed and look how deformed they looked were near the top. She scrolled through several of the comments before she closed the app, sick to her stomach.
"Judy, Judy are you okay?" Bonnie was now very concerned about her daughter.
Tears were pouring from her face now, "Mom… I will call you… later." She quickly hung up the phone as they pulled into the driveway.
"Nick. I Want that Furbook account deleted NOW!" Judy got out of the car and slammed the door before grabbing Nathan's car seat from the back and stormed inside.
Nick hung his head, "What have I done?" He got out and grabbed Sophia's car seat, thankfully she had fallen asleep on the way home. As Nick entered the home he saw Nathan's car seat was empty and heard soft cries coming from their bedroom. He walked in and saw Judy holding Nathan tight laying on the bed crying. Nathan had a puzzled look on his face wondering why his mommy was crying.
Nick placed Sophia in her crib and crawled next to Judy wrapping himself around her. She scooted back into him holding Nathan a bit tighter. "I'm so sorry Judy. It was so stupid of me to put that video up without thinking what others would say about it. I deleted the account and promise I will never do something like that again."
Judy rolled over and placed Nathan in-between them, "Look at him, Nick. He's beautiful, they both are. Now mammals want them dead. Some of those comments went as far as to how they would do it. They are just kits, Nick! Who would say such things?!"
"Mammals who are very sick in the head Judy, that's who. I promise you I would never let anything happen to our kits. God help any mammal who does and who gets in my way, I won't have to pretend to go savage."
Judy saw the fire in Nicks' eyes as he said that and she knew that he would do anything in his power to keep them safe. He had risked his life more than once to save hers already. "I believe you Nick, but there has to be something we can do about this."
"Right now Judy there's nothing we can do, so far all they have done is make comments behind a keyboard. If they were to threaten us directly then we could, but right now we can't do anything. I will talk to Bogo about it tomorrow though, and we'll see legal as well." Nick was lightly rubbing her back and ears trying to calm her down.
Judy looked down at Nathan who was all smiles and playing with the front of her shirt. "Sounds good Nick. For now, though, let's get some food and try to forget about this." She got up and walked slowly towards the kitchen as Nick placed Nathan into his crib.
He leaned down and kissed his forehead, Nathan reached up and pulled lightly on Nick's whiskers. "I promise you, buddy, I will never let anything happen to you, your sister, or your mommy. Nothing." He kissed him again and went to join Judy in the kitchen.