Alrighty then, I am glad to have gotten this finally written. Sorry for the delay, but my life has been a bit busy. Birthday gifts to deal with and extra hours at work to pay for them, as well as the bills too. haha. You know... that old cliched song and dance.
Anywho, with Dusted being done with its furst arc, I'll have more to put into this story for a while before starting up the second arc.
Now... do well to enjoy, fav, follow, review, and grab that strange snack. Mine today is Gatorade frozen into Pawpsicles. (No not those ones, but i couldn't resist using the pun. hehe)
A blanket of fog covered the landscape, painting the loamy forest floor with dew, as sunbeams broke through the thick canopy of the high rising various trees. Mist crept along the mossy ground as it swirled with the light breeze around roots and rocks. A paw stepped into the milky fume, disturbing it as the paw left the ground as quickly as it had stepped down.
"I thought you said we needed to divert their attention?" Judith yelled back to an irate fox.
"Mother said that actually… and she didn't mean for us to so directly engage them!" Nicholas fired back, leaping to dodge a rock thrown their direction.
After having left the then relatively safe confines mere hours earlier, the unconventional group dared to tread north, but not before trying to make their path known to the scouts trying to track them. If they believed the rabbits in question were not in Upendi, they wouldn't likely expend the resources or thought process to care about finding the underground city. It was working somewhat…
...until Judith misunderstood the whole plan and waved a scout over.
The doe thought it was a fantastic idea to wave one of the scouts that were spotted towards them. As a reflex action, the tod wrapped a paw over her muzzle and dragged her away to keep her quiet and hope they didn't notice. That hope failed. Instead, the scout saw the whole exchange and probably felt pretty bolstered with the idea that Judith was 'kitnapped'.
"Couldn't we knock him out?" came the optimistic reply of the shrugging bunny as the two ran. They had been left to their own devices to leave an obvious trail for the mercenaries to follow. After having supposedly left a trail, the teams would reconverge to travel further north, leading the forces trying to chase them away from Upendi. So, for now, the two were alone but running from a stray scout to rejoin the main group at a rendezvous position.
"Of course not," Nicholas belted out. "He hasn't even been able to let the others know. He might be the only one to have picked up on our trail." As if to spite the fox, a loud noise sounded as he looked back to see the ram chasing them blow into small metal horn, with similar sounds following only seconds later. The tod groaned to himself and averted his gaze from the smirking bunny doe, grumbling between them both, "NOW we can knock him out."
On a dime, both mammals turned down into a thick patch of brush, temporarily going on all fours to slink into and underneath it. They turned around under the brush, peering out from under it.
"Quick question," the grey rabbit whispered to her fox. "Why is this ram using a slingshot instead of a bow and arrow…?"
"Hooves aren't great for holding a bow and drawing a string, so mammals like him use slings to compensate," the red fox tod explained in short, then putting a digit to his mouth to shush his mate as hoof steps sounded, crunching leaves and twigs. In response, the doe pursed her lips and lowered her ears, hunkering down and waiting for the mammal to get close.
"Come on out," sounded the ram, tentatively closing in on them, but not exactly sure where they were, if his scanning head movements and tentative steps were anything to go by. "Lord Hopps wants his daughters back and you dead… So, if you hand over the rabbit, I'll pretend you're dead and I get the reward. Besides, I really don't like cleaning predator blood off my blade. Especially fox blood."
Judith's paws clenched as she withheld the bubbling rage within her at other's views towards her fox. Looking over to her mate with puffed up cheeks, the bunny saw Nicholas was as stoic as ever. Not a trace of insulting hurt nor furrowed anger lined his muzzle. How did he stay so neutral?
He turned to the rabbit, raising a brow at her expression but shaking it off. The tod made several gestures that Judith couldn't properly translate, but got the gist of once he finished. She nodded once, vaguely understanding flurry of signals as, When I give the signal, we both take him down.
They both watched with slow, steady breaths as the ram in question trotted slowly in their general direction, carrying a warhammer with a small head. It was probably meant for quick strikes instead of bashing armor, like the larger ones.
Nicholas mouthed the word 'go' and leapt forward, when the ram turned his back to them, giving him a good kick to the back and trying to grab for his hammer, to keep him from properly being armed against them. Judith followed with a fairly good reaction speed, running up to the ram and getting a hold of his hammer, as her mate failed to get a grip on it when he kicked the mammal.
The male sheep went flying forward, retaining a grip on his hammer for the briefest of moments before feeling it get yanked back by the rabbit. He tumbled into a nearby tree, his head giving it a good 'thunk' before falling over.
"Now then," the red fox breathed slowly, pulling out his own sword and hefting the hammer to dual wield it, "let's shear a sheep…"
The grey doe pulled out her own short sword, taking a defensive stance that Nicholas had taught her. With her left foot forward and weight leaned back on the right, the stance allowed her to quickly dart backward from a strong opponent, when they delivered an attack, so she could bounce forward directly afterwards and deal a backlashing blow. It was one of her mate's lessons when facing larger foes. Let them deal a strike first, since they are slower, and use their time recovering to dole out your own strikes, wearing them down.
The ram got up pretty quick after his muzzle time with the tree, turning towards them and charging the two with the intent to spear them with curled tips of his horns. Both mammals dodged the attack that lacked any grace, rolling or bouncing off to the side.
"How are we supposed to knock out a ram?" the grey bunny inquired to the fox, readying her stance once more. With how the male sheep charged them, unrelenting and not stopping, it gave neither any real chance for instant retaliation. "He doesn't exactly look like a mammal that takes a bonk to the noggin to knock out effectively… or even five…"
Nicholas flicked a paw under his chin, tapping the jawline. The doe instantly got it and nodded vigorously.
"Right, but he tucks his chin down when he attacks…" Judith said in slight lamentation. Her mate pointed at the tree, then her, then into the higher branches. Just before the bunny was going to ask why he was being so non vocal, she almost face pawed in realization that the ram might hear. He was doing his 'Silence' thing by not talking when other unconcerned parties might hear.
Turning back to address her mate, Judith was slightly stunned to find the fox was nowhere within sight, having disappeared to parts unknown. She furrowed her brow and huffed in annoyance.
The doe didn't get much chance for reprieve, as the ram came after her once more, head down and hooves pounding the forest floor. She 'eeped' and turned tail towards the tree Nicholas pointed out before, standing at its base and looking around for help. At the last second, she jumped up as high as she could, underestimating the newfound strength in her legs she never had prior to this whole journey. She sailed past her primary target for a branch to grab onto but found purchase with her paws on another nearby branch. The whole tree vibrated ever so little as the rotund tree stood firm against the onslaught of a comparatively tiny mammal trying to make it move.
Judith looked down, sticking her tongue out at the male sheep, who looked up just in time to see her display and stare daggers at the rabbit. She smirked nervously, but quickly wore a stunned expression as the furious furry fist of Nicholas came up to meet the jaw of the ram, his padded and slightly armored paws protected from being harmed in the assault. She barely saw his skirt around from the other side of the tree with a speed that made him only look like a red and black blur, before planting a foot and delivering one sweet honey of a blow.
The uppercut didn't lift the ram very far upwards, but the resounding crunch told all that was needed as he rolled back and slumped to the mossy forest floor like a limp sack of vegetables.
"You set me up!" Judith seethed down at the triumphantly smirking fox.
"I gave you fair warning," he chided her in kind. "You've been pretty good at reading my paw signals til now, so I found it rightful to assume you would still understand well enough." A light chuckle from the tod gave the bunny doe, now climbing down from the tree, a pervading feeling of annoyance at her mate.
"Oh, now you talk?" the rabbit angrily asked. "I could've used with some vocalized warnings to my future predicament, because goodness forbid, you could let me know before you go off on your own and leave me to figure out what in blazes you had planned while a deranged ram tries to make me into a pancake against a tree!" Nicholas's mouth was slightly agape in sheer shock and confusion at how angry his mate was being towards him. Looking around, he could have tried to talk it out there, but other scouts or soldiers were sure to come looking for their comrade, seeing as he did blow a horn to call others to him.
"Alright… alright," the fox said, trying to wave her down. "I get it, but can we have this conversation later, when we're away from danger. The rest of the group is waiting and we need to go before we get surrounded…"
The tod waited with tentative patience as Judith bit her lip, anger still seeping from her glare, then nodded curtly. Her feet padded heavily, leading the way, as she did not want to look at him right now. She didn't dare to turn as she ran, but knew his more silent footfalls were directly behind her, eyes probably contemplative and jaw sternly clenched. She understood his vow of silence, she really did, but sometimes he would need to break it in order to get a point across, which he has done on rare occasions.
With both of their sensitive ears, they could hear the encroaching scouts closing in on their previous general location, likely going to be surprised a comrade was taken out. In response, the two went into a full on sprint, hoping the trail they left would be enough to point them in their direction but wouldn't outright give them a clear cut path to apprehend them… or worse.
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Returning to the group was a simple, though lengthy, task, denoting a zigzagging trip through the forest to throw off any trails left by their paw prints or scent, not that there was much prey around with a track worthy sense of smell, but still a precautionary measure.
Judith stomped off, away from her mate, towards the forefront of the group. With some thirty odd mammals, instead of the group before, it felt like everyone was keeping a much better pace.
Once again, Bogo and Honey led the group, with Gazelle lagging behind them. Contrary to her previous gentle demeanor, the bovid was now geared for battle. Aside from the more aggressive attire, dark and slimmer fitting as opposed to the casual dress she wore before, she was sporting a long curved sword and small buckler shield attached to either side of her hips. A battle skirt flowed evenly down her rear, being cut high in the front and ending in a tapered point near the back of her knees.
The rabbit made a mental note that she would have to ask about that later on. It looked rather cute to her.
Nicholas hung back, sulking slightly and mulling over a multitude of ways to try striking up a conversation with his mate to smooth things over. He kept throwing out ideas as soon as his line of thought began to stray towards more manipulative methods to a quick resolution. He knew he screwed up and, in the moment, he probably should have pledged more than a second's thought towards his ends. In this case, it did not justify the means. Honesty and facing up to his mistakes seemed the most appropriate options but so unsavory.
Besides, his main obstacle was his own reservations about…
"You look depressive enough to bring down a dank bar, Little Red" a soft, rolling voice spoke from next to the fox. He looked up to see the snow leopard walking at a brisk pace next to him. Something he missed noting before, that slightly amused him now, was that Penny was pretty small for her species. She appeared to be fully mature and grown, if her voice and mannerisms were any indication.
"Not sure what you mean," the red fox deflected, following up with, "and why 'Little Red'? I'm rather tall for a fox." the feline smirked knowingly, irking the tod, as she rested a paw on his shoulder.
"Just call that my name for you, like it or not," she divulged cryptically, drawing out a huff from Nicholas. "And don't skirt the issue. I saw your cute bunny heading off in a rather unstable state herself. What did you do to draw her ire?" The fox raised a brow to Penny and twisted his head to avoid her inquisitive gaze, her mismatched eyes boring into him.
"She wouldn't like you calling her cute and I didn't know you… went that direction."
Penny scoffed a laugh at him.
"Of course not," she mused, ruffling the fur on Nicholas's head with a paw, "but I can observe and see why males find her attractive. Doesn't have to mean I actually find her attractive." The tod shrugged and sighed.
"I guess…"
"Now, back to my original inquiry, what happened?" the snow leopard pursued. "Normally a female being just plain angry might mean giving you a glare or accusing stare. Maybe even berating you some. If I had to guess… you scared her or worried her and she can't look you in the eyes right now."
The red fox tod scowled at her with thoughtful eyes, replying, "You might be right. By the way, how are this good at reading mammals?"
Penny winked and smirked, saying, "A bar is full of many faces. I learned to read as much as I can from them. Some want to drink in private and some want an ear to complain into. You figure out the difference and also gain insight to many problems one might not experience on one's own. Now stop deflecting and tell me."
Heaving a languid sigh, full of a day's misgivings, the tod finally relented in full.
"I've taken this vow of silence to reflect my new moniker," Nicholas began, "and left my mate with a mild understanding of a plan using crude paw signals. She was chased by a ram scout and likely didn't know where I had gone off to. In the end, we knocked out the scout and she was quite furious that I didn't break my silence to give her a better understanding… I think."
"You didn't kill the scout?" Penny asked, perking up. The red fox shook his head in the negative. She sighed. "Why go through the trouble of knocking him out? We left a good trail to follow, just enough to pull them towards us but not catch us. Knocking them out won't do much except give them further reason to track you down to exact their own personal vengeance." A look or realization passed across the feline's muzzle. "Or… oh… dear Judith hasn't seen you kill another mammal, has she?"
The tod's tucking of his chin to his chest was all the confirmation Penny needed.
"I wish you would stop that…" he replied meekly. "Starting to feel a little exposed here." Nicholas's eyes scanned the ground, watching his own paws tread the ground, as he contemplated what to do or say next. "I planned to kill him… ducked behind a tree to let Judith pull him in and go up into the branches. I couldn't quell one single fear though… what would she think of me?..."
Unbeknownst to the fox, Penny had subtly guided him away from the main group, allowing them a semblance of privacy that was out of earshot, even if not out of sight. When he looked up to realize this, he was silently thankful, though said nothing to that effect, simply taking solace in the fact that it was.
"I spent what felt like an eternity in my own mind, trying to find the balance I usually had to when on the battlefield," Nicholas continued. "I'm sure you know… it's that mindset you try to attain to make sure you don't take pleasure in killing, knowing that you did it in the name of something else or to protect someone dear. But… I couldn't get her eyes out of my mind. The potential look of horrifying realization on her face that I am the same as any other mammal with a blade. We can kill. So… I dropped my weapons and gave the ram a good uppercut to the jaw."
"You know you can't protect her from that forever," the snow leopard chided him gently. "From everything I've heard of your journeys thus far, Meeko is quite a chatterbox when he isn't eating, you've been very fortunate. I'm not saying it won't last… but you can't go on expecting it to."
"I know," the fox tod sighed, "but how do i tell her that? How do I make her understand without taking some other meaning from it that could drive a wedge between us?"
There was a permeating silence between the two, occasionally tainted by the sound of paws or hooves cracking twigs and crunching leaves underfoot. Both mammals were absorbed in their own thoughts, slowly breathing and contemplating their next words carefully. It was Penny who took a deep breath, vented it out, then turned her sharp gaze to the despondent fox.
"Let me talk to her a bit," she breathed. Nicholas perked his head and ears back up from a less than optimistic display. "I'll see if I can't open her up to your problems, then let you come in and explain yourself in full…"
Tempering his slight relief with cautious optimism, the fox asked, "Why would you do that for us? You've known us for… a day." the feline shrugged.
"I'm a big supporter of romance," she simply stated. "Why do you think I made my way into a city literally named for love? Aside from all that though, I have a belief passed down from my father that I pass off to any who need this little bit of wisdom… Let live the love that lives no lie." The tod flicked his gaze over her and a few mammals in the distance, mulling over the phrase. It made some sense to him, but didn't mean he still wasn't fearful of Judith's reaction to everything he needed to talk over with her.
Let live the love that lives no lie.
If he forestalled his explanations or even simply hid them from her, then that would still mean his love lived some sort of lie. His paw reached up to scratch the back of his neck, claws unsheathed to dig in a little.
"I'll accept your offer at help then," the red fox finally relented.
At that, Penny began to walk faster, not wasting any time in letting this estrangement fester like an open wound. Nicholas stuttered some form of incoherent objections, which were swiftly ignored, as the feline made her way to find Judith. The tod settled for grumbling a bit and resigning himself to waiting with a strained sense of apprehension after seeing that his objections fell flat in the leopard's ears.
Penny smiled to herself, striding a bit faster to the rabbit ahead of her, ears down and head lowered.
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Judith slicked her ears back for what felt like the hundredth time since making her way to the front of the group. Luckily, for her own privacy, no one appeared to pay her much mind, or possibly saw she was in no mood and let her be. Either way, she got the solitude she wanted for now, trapped alone with her own thoughts. Not ideal, but still something better than inadvertently snapping at someone else just because she didn't want to talk.
A paw tapped her shoulder gently, causing the doe to withhold a groan and turn to meet the green and blue eyes of Penny.
"Mind if we talk?" she asked softly. Judith looked down and ran a paw over an ear, nodding with a slow blink. "Great! Forgive me if I seem blunt, but you appear to be having a disagreement with how Nicholas did something recently?" The mention of her mate made a few emotions swirl on her face, though having another intrude on their problem by proxy made her outward appearance most reflect anger.
"Why does it matter to you?" the grey bunny led with a small amount of venom in her tone. "Did Nicholas put you up to this?"
"I'm here because I think a third party could do you two some good in establishing something like… a line of communication," Penny explained. "And no, he didn't put me up to anything. Little Red actually seemed very keen on not telling me anything in the first place, much less having me intervene, but I like the two of you and want this to work out. So…"
"So?" the rabbit incited with a paw wave.
"So, what's the problem you have?" the feline continued. "I already got a good feel of Red's end of the problem but want to know your side so i can compare."
"He just…" Judith started, clenching her paws, "...it was… I can't… UGH! He gave me vague paw signals and left me to face the ram on my own, for as brief a time as it was. I didn't know where he went or what he was doing and there was no communication from him. I was scared… of what would happen to him, to me, to us…" Penny nodded in understanding.
"I think I get what you mean," the snow leopard spoke with a small smile. "Would you believe he was having his own conflicting crisis at the time?" Judith tensed slightly at that, unsure how to respond but concern for her fox surfacing all the same.
"What are you talking about?" she simply asked.
"How do you feel about killing a mammal? In self defense of course…" the feline let the question hang in the air, waiting for either an answer or some form of recognition from the bunny.
"I… I guess I don't like it," the doe started, "but I know it happens."
"Yes," replied Penny, "but what if Nicholas killed the ram? What would have been your take on that?"
"There's no need to think about that, since we were going to knock him out and did," Judith quickly fired back. "Killing him wouldn't have served any purpose."
"Don't deflect," the leopard chastised the grey doe. "Little Red already did that to me and I still got him to talk, and he's far more emotionally closed off than you." The bunny grumbled something unintelligible, then let her ears stand up, growing a little more comfortable talking to Penny.
"I guess I don't like to think about that… sorry. I know Nicholas said he's killed before, but I don't want to think about if it happens in front of me… because then… it becomes real. In my defense or not… he will have taken a life."
"He told me he planned on killing the ram," divulged the feline, "but stayed his blade because he was fearful what you would think of him. He values your view of him more than you realize. That's what he was mulling over before. I would explain further, but he should have a chance to do that himself. Would that be ok?"
Judith gave a single nod, but was still processing that statement. Nicholas planned to kill the ram… he wasn't going to knock him out? And the fearless warrior… was afraid of her thoughts concerning him? If he had killed before, what would her opinion now matter to him?
She felt a pit in her heart beginning to ache.
Penny guided the bunny doe back, letting their pace slow to lag back and allow the fox to catch up.
"Try to give him a little leeway," the snow leopard offered with a smile. "He doesn't seem like one for emotional moments and might take a chance to run or deflect if he can… But… if all goes well, come back to me and we'll get to teaching you how to wield a bow. Alright?"
The grey bunny smiled earnestly, with a slight notation of trepidation, saying, "Sounds great."
Don't worry... this conversation gets finished. I wanted to bring back a little angst and just a smidge of drama. been missing for a little while. XD
REVIEWS!:
judithwildehopps: Lol. It's good to see that you love to hate Stu. and i would very much scarf those down if Pb and J reese's cups were a thing.
ShadowRaven27: Well... let's hold off on the fluff. and thank you very much. I'd like to think my fluff is satisfying when it shows up.
GusTheBear: I'm so happy to bring Penny in here. She was a wonderful villain (in the way that i had fun writing her) but I couldnt let her be gone as an OC forever. I hope to make people love her in a different manner this time round. And thank you. i try to make good fluff.
Leon Banz: You have fun with that. I'm sure it'll be gruesome. haha.
jkirby8249aol.c: I promise that's coming. My thinking is some stuff like that doens't always get addressed right away in real life, so I am sometimes sporadic with things like that. Thank you for your interest.
Thebestbunny75: Thank you so much. i'm glad i have entertained you and will do my best to continue doing so.
DONE!
Now, I'm going to crash on my couch, under the cooling air vents, sip some sprite, and play a game or two to calm my nerves from the long day. XD
Until next time, It's been a hustle, Sweethearts.