Ch. 19: The Pack
Nick sat on the step of a laundry mat, managing to hear the thrum of washers and dryers inside the building. His junior ranger uniform felt hot on his fur, like an unwanted second skin.
On his knees sat his junior ranger guide, showing him everything to identifying tracks to tying the perfect knot. Everything he should've been learning with his other fellow rangers…but that wasn't going to happen. Not after the intention…not after the muzzle.
He shuddered at the memory, forcing back the tears that always accompanied it. That had been three weeks ago, three weeks since he had started lying to his parents, telling them it was going great, that he was making new friends and learning so much. Every week he would put on that uniform that he sometimes felt like setting on fire, forced a big smile, and ran out to hide somewhere in town for an hour or two before returning home, gushing about the information he had learned.
He was never going to tell his mother what had happened that night.
He was never going to tell anyone.
He was going to be a fox and lie, because that was what foxes were. They were filthy liars.
"Excuse me, son."
Nick glanced behind his shoulder to see an armadillo at the laundry mat door, unable to get on the street for Nick blocking his way. "You can't sit there."
"Sorry," he mumbled quietly, closing his book and standing up, walking away to stand next to an elephant sized trash can. He glanced around to see if there was another place to sit to wait the hour out.
There was a sudden crashing noise that made him jump and look to his right just in time to see a silver fox kit appear around the corner, holding a pack of sweets between his paws as he scurried down the street, heading right toward Nick. The red fox heard yelling and knew it was the angry store owner coming for the kit, before Nick even knew what he was doing he grabbed the other kit's paw as he passed by earning a startled look, and then Nick was dragging him behind the trashcan.
With their fur on end the two kits remained quiet as they heard the store owner's yells got louder and louder before gradually fading away as he passed them on the street and kept going.
The silver fox let out a loud breath that seemed to deflate his entire body, and then he grinned at Nick. "Thanks bud. I owe you one."
Nick found himself smiling back instantly, so glad to hear the word 'bud'. "No problem, I'm Nick."
"Ray Silver's the name, sneaking is my game," the kit answered with a happy wave of his tail.
Nick glanced at the box of candy in his paws, "You stole that?"
Ray let out an annoyed huff, "I didn't have any choice. That jerk of a store owner wouldn't sell anything to foxes."
Nick flinched at the words, making Ray peer at him. "I know what that feels like," he admitted.
Ray looked Nick up and down, "So, are you one of those junior rangers I've seen running around?"
Nick thought about lying, yes, he was a junior ranger, and needed to get back to his group…to his friends. But instead he was honest, and gave a sad shake of his head and spoke the bitter truth. "They didn't want me."
Ray was unsurprised by this, "Well, prey can be pretty uppity when they wanna be. But hey, you got nothing to do? Come hang out with me and my friends, Moriarty will love you. So will Ed, but she loves everybody so it doesn't really count."
Ray grabbed Nick's paw and led him down the street, passing through narrow allies and across road until they came upon a small patch of grass, a tightly packed group of trees decorating it. Ray didn't stop and led Nick farther into the miniature forest until they came upon an oak right smack dab in the middle, and on that oak was a tree house.
"This is our secret lair," Ray said, stopping to look Nick in the eye, his own gaze serious. "You can't tell a soul about it. You swear?"
He nodded, "I swear."
He followed the silver fox up the rope ladder and inside the makeshift house, once inside Nick noticed the piles of blankets and pillows strewn across the floor, along with books, action figures, empty food wrappers and cans, he even spotted a necklace. The walls were covered with posters of all kinds of things, to concert, to movies, to plays. Some were torn with claw marks.
And then Nick saw the other two mammals inside. A spotted hyena, playing a DS, her lips pulled back into an impossibly large grin showing off her teeth. And then a maned wolf older than the other three, leaning back against the wall with an unlit cigarette between his teeth. He opened one eye that was a green so dark it was almost black.
"Looks like Ray got more than candy on his trip."
Nick shriveled under the wolf's gaze; it wasn't hostile or annoyed, merely curious. And confident, a confidence Nick knew he would never have.
"This is Nick," Ray introduced, making himself comfortable on one of the pallets before opening the box of sweets, "He helped me hide from the store owner."
Ed closed her game and sat up, looking Nick over as she took in his uniform, "I thought junior rangers were for anti-stealing."
"He said he's not a junior ranger," Ray answered for the red fox. He tossed a couple of pieces of candy to Ed and Moriarty who both caught it with ease.
But the maned wolf kept his attention on the visitor, "Yet you have the uniform…"
"I-I tried to be a junior ranger," Nick explained, sitting down on the hard wood floor. "But it didn't work out."
"Care to give us some details?" Moriarty asked.
Nick swallowed painfully as the memories resurfaced; then again, they were never far from his mind, or his nightmares. "I was…I was the only predator there and they-they muzzled me." He was surprised by how easy the words came out, but he suspected he needed to tell someone, anyone, that wasn't his parents or an adult that would just brush it off as kids being kids.
Ed and Ray shared a shocked look but Moriarty didn't seem surprised in the least, though his already dark eyes seemed to turn darker.
"Come here, Red," he said all of a sudden.
Realizing he meant Nick the fox walked over, stepping over the books and trash, to stand before the maned wolf. Moriarty patted the space beside him and Nick sat next to him.
"When I was five a group of older prey, I think they were middle-school kids, attacked me and collared me to a pole just outside of school. It was dark; the only adult who saw me was the janitor when he was locking up. You know what he did when saw that little pup tied to a pole?"
Nick shook his head.
"He left me there. He was a prey, a sheep. And he left me there just because I was a predator."
Nick's eyes widened in horror, "That's awful."
"Yes it is," the wolf agreed, "But I'm telling you that to show you, you aren't alone. And so that you know one thing about prey: they're pathetic. And they fear us, no matter how we act or what we do, they hate us."
Nick's ears drooped at the words that sounded too true. He swallowed again.
"They told you they couldn't trust you, didn't they?" Ray spoke up, "Because you're a fox."
"Yeah," Nick replied, he would never forget those words.
"Been there done that," the silver fox snorted.
Ed spoke, "My classmates keep calling me insane because I laugh all the time."
"I'm sorry," Nick told her, his voice quiet.
"Well, I do laugh a lot," she replied, and then to emphasis her point she threw her head back and chortled, the sound rough and loud.
Moriarty placed a paw on Nick's shoulder, gaining the red fox's attention once again. "The world will only see us in one way, Red." He grinned; it was mischievous and almost mad. "Why don't you help us give them what they're asking for?"
.
Nick finally had a pack, a pack that respected him, treated him so good, talked to him and listened to him, making him want to get up in the morning.
Ray was clever, slick even, always stealing snacks and accessories, pulling off their many heists with natural ease and teaching Nick how to be just as clever as himself if not more so.
Edith Giggle (Ed for short) was hilarious. Always ready with a joke, and always willing to laugh at Nick's puns even if the others just groaned. And she was an expert at lightening the mood, whenever Nick couldn't help but feel gloomy she always did whatever it took to make him laugh.
Then there was Moriarty, the big brother of the group, strong and smart and always ready to lend a paw to his friends. He was the main reason Nick got out of his depression, constantly telling Nick that he was more than those prey could ever dream of being, always affectionately calling him Red, and making sure he was just as good a con-artist as himself and the others. Nick was happy, he was loved.
He should've known it would only last so long.
That length being six years, he was fifteen when he fully realized what he had become. The four changed their hide out from the tree house to an old abandoned house that only had one bedroom. Nick was constantly away from home these days, easily weaving lies to his parents these days, before going off and nabbing whatever items catch his fancy from stores and stands. Ready to make up new cons with his friends to get bigger and better things, and once in a while getting revenge on mammals that crossed him such as store owners and some of the high-class citizens, the store owners would get smashed windows and the high-class would find their wallets missing.
Then one night, just like any other, the four were strolling aimlessly through town. Ed and Ray were arguing over the latest issue of a comic they were both fans of while Nick licked a pawpsicle, his eyes on Moriarty who walked ahead of him, waiting for the wolf to come up with something fun to do.
Nick glanced around the street, it was getting dark and the streets were empty, the windows of the houses dark as if they were only mammals on earth. And then he heard the laughter. Very, very, familiar laughter.
He stopped in his tracks, making Ray and Ed stumble to halt to keep from crashing into them, Moriarty stopped and looked at the three over his shoulder with a question in his eyes.
Nick was staring across the street were a group of mammals walked out a diner, laughing uproariously. Even though they were older, even though they weren't wearing their uniforms, he still recognized them.
Fear clogged his throat and Nick couldn't breath, he was suddenly a nine year old kit again, being laughed at and mocked with a muzzle heavy and cold on his face.
"Nick?" Ray spoke, shaking his shoulder. "What's up?"
Moriarty already had his eyes on the prey across the street; he glanced back at Nick and stepped forward, blocking the view of them from Nick. He forced his eyes to look up at the maned wolf.
"It's them," he breathed, his voice cracking. "It's them."
He didn't have to explain who 'them' was, the three canines' eyes narrowed in hostility. Ed and Ray glared at the prey, their teeth already bare.
"Red," Moriarty spoke quietly. Convenient because red was exactly what Nick was seeing right now.
"Did you deserve what they did to you?"
Nick shook his head, no, he didn't. He didn't! He had just been a kid! He hadn't wanted to hurt anyone! He just wanted to be a junior ranger scout but all he got was a muzzle just because he was a fox!
"No," Nick growled in a voice so vicious he hardly recognized it as his own.
Moriarty broke into a grin and stepped back, the prey were still in their sights, going down the deserted street where they couldn't be seen by any source of authority. "Exactly, but you know what they deserve? Exactly what they expect from us, and what do they expect from us?"
His grin widened, revealing his white fangs, "To bite."
.
Everything had been a blur, Nick had only seen red, had only heard those awful words, as he and his friends attacked the former rangers, hitting, scratching, and biting. The prey obviously had underestimated them, not calling for help. They quickly regretted that but by then they were bleeding. And Nick didn't think that recognized them, which only fueled his fury. But in the midst of the attack sirens could be heard in the distance and Moriarty had dragged Nick, kicking snarling, away, hiding in a narrow alley where they caught their breath while the police picked up the prey's unconscious bloody bodies.
"Think they'd be able to identify us to the cops?" Ray asked, wiping some blood off his lip, unsure if the blood was his own or not.
"Nah," Ed said, "It was too dark."
Nick was on his paws and knees, still catching his breath as his mind caught up to what they had just done.
The hyena suddenly broke into laughter, "Oh wow! That was awesome!"
Ray joined the laughter, "Wasn't it though? The looks on their faces! We should do that more often."
Moriarty smiled proudly at them, "You all did excellent. Especially you, Red."
"Yeah, he nearly ripped their limbs off," Ed chortled.
But Nick had stopped listening to them, he was staring down at the dirty cement, mainly on his paws that were now sticky with drying blood. The words of his junior ranger scout oath playing over and over in his head: I, Nicholas Wilde, promise to be brave, loyal, helpful, and trustworthy.
That Nicholas Wilde wouldn't have just attacked those prey, no matter how awful they had been, he wouldn't have scratched at their eyes and dug his teeth into their flesh until he tasted blood, blood that now stained his teeth. He had wanted to kill them. His anger, his sadness, it had turned him into the thing they had accused him of being, into something that deserved to be muzzled.
Nick felt sick.
"Red?" Moriarty spoke, "What's wrong?"
"We shouldn't have done that," he rose onto shaky legs, "We shouldn't have done that."
"What are you talking about?" Ray asked while the maned wolf's eyes narrowed. "They deserved it."
"But that…that's not who I am," Nick insisted. "That's not who we are."
"Uh…that's exactly who we are," Ed told him. "We're giving the prey what they assume, remember?"
Nick's throat grew tight, "But…but we nearly killed them."
"We know," Moriarty replied, his voice flat.
"We can't do that!" Nick snapped desperately, not liking the impassive looks on his friends' faces. "That's not the kind of mammal I am! I'm not what they called me!"
Moriarty chuckled; it was low and dark and sent a shiver down Nick's spine. "Says the fox whose been stealing and tricking mammals for years now, whose destroyed private property…who's lied to his own parents."
Nick's throat clenched up as Moriarty continued with a nasty grin, "Says the fox we had to pull back before he went for another mammal's throat."
Nick took a step back, then another, looking at his friends in a new light, and wondering if they had always been like this. They were criminals, they were dangerous, and he had let them drag him down with them. Make him something he didn't want to be. Now he was covered in blood with a boulder in his chest, he wanted to run home but couldn't, he couldn't let his parents see him like this, couldn't let them know what he did. He couldn't let anyone know what he did. But he had to run either way, he had to get away from these predators that he suddenly realized were crazy.
He turned and raced off, ignoring the yells of his formers friends as they tried to call him back. Nick ran and ran and ran, finally stopped when the temperature dropped and he realized he was in Tundra Town.
He stopped as a stitch stabbed his side and looked around; spotting a large pile of snow he dove into it, relishing the cold against his hot skin as he used the snow to wipe off the blood on his paws and fur. He chewed some of the snow to try and get the blood off his teeth, feeling the salty tang Nick finally vomited, coughing and hacking as hot tears burned his eyes.
He fell into the cold snow and decided he'd stay there, for the rest of his life he'd stay there. Because if he got back up he knew he'd go right back to making terrible situations, he was no longer the young junior ranger scout, he was a con-artist.
"Grandmamma," a voice spoke up, "Don't go near him."
Nick kept his eyes closed, sure the voices were just in his head; it would go well with his misery.
But then he felt a small paw placed against his snout and his eyes popped open. Before him was an elderly arctic shrew, standing behind her was a polar bear who held a younger shrew resting on his paw. The elderly shrew was looking at him with warm eyes, a tenderness that had Nick's eyes overflowing again.
"Oh, honestly son," the shrew sent a quick glare to the other shrew. "I raised you better than that, we don't ignore a mammal in need, especially when he's basically a kit." She turned her kind eyes back to Nick and offered a sweet smile, "Don't you worry, sweetie. Your grandmamma is here and she's going to take care of you now."
I feel like this chapter is so disappointing compared to the buildup.
Okay important update guys, I'm taking a break from It Takes Three. Don't worry I don't plan on giving up or trashing the story. It's just…I have the plot points out, I have the big evil plan all set out and the climax and the ending (which is going to wonderful by the way if I could I'd write that right now and post it), I just don't like how I plan to deliver these plot points. It all feels so clunky to me and I feel like I'll dig myself into a hole I can't get out of and I want to do better than that. So I'm just going to not worry about this and focus on St. Zoo, some upcoming one-shots, and an upcoming crossover (all of which I'm very passionate about right now), and hope a way to make the story flow smoother comes to me. And if it doesn't…I'll just write it how I originally planned and pray it isn't TOO clunky. So until then, sorry about this guys and hope you'll be patient/enjoying my other fics.