When Nick Wilde was still a young kit, his father took him fishing the afternoon before his eighth birthday. The spot he had been taken to was the same spot that his father had been taken to when he was a young boy, a small but quiet creek where a little wooden dock jetted out to the water.

There wasn't much to little untouched land a good drive away from the city, but from his father had told him, there was some pretty neat fish to be caught.

The dock was the perfect size for the two of them to set up some chairs and cast their rods out to water, and the father and son sat and patiently awaited for something to take interest in the lures they had floating in the water that didn't go so deep where they were.

"Dad?" the young Nick asked his father.

"Yes, Nicky?" replied his dad, calling him by the name he always used.

"The fish aren't biting," sighed Nick with frustration. "You said there'd be a lot of 'em."

"Oh, there are lots of 'em. You just wait for the perfect one to swim by."

The kit admitted, "Thought they come up to us much faster, like on my game."

Nick's father chuckled at this. One of his sons favorite games on the console he had back home (one of the few he owned since some of them were quite pricy even then) was one were you got to fish. The fish in the game, though, came up to the bait as soon as you casted your line, which was somewhat unrealistic compared to the time it sometimes took for fish in real life to bite.

"Not quite," he replied to his son. "Maybe you just need to try out the ol' fishing technique that my dad showed me when I was a little boy."

Nick turned his head to his dad. "What's that?"

"Well, the first thing you oughta do is start moving your rod a little like this." His father started to slowly move the pole in his paws in a little circular motion. "That way the lure in the water looks like another fish that's moving. The fish'll want to come up to it if they think it's moving away, but not if it's just laying on the bottom of the water."

"Oh," Nick replied simply, watching his dad closely before starting to do the same thing as he was being shown.

"Now you gotta call 'em."

Nick was suddenly confused by this. "Call them?"

"You know how some folks learn how to do bird calls?" his dad explained. "Well, just because fish aren't the same as birds doesn't mean they can't be called."

"How do we do that, Dad? Fish don't make any noises."

Smirking widely, his father looked down at the water and, in a higher voice, called out, "Fish! Fish!"

Nick started to giggle at this antic. "That don't bring them here," he insisted despite finding it a bit funny.

"Well, when my dad and I went fishing that's what he said always brought the biggest catches up to his line. Just try it out."

It felt rather silly to the kit, but he figured he might as well try what his father said to. After all, his parents never steered him wrong when they told him to give something a shot. "Fish!" he exclaimed out into the silent spot on the lake.

He tried it a second time, keeping a close eye on the bobber in the water and a tight grip on his rod. Well, he thought, I guess it don't work.

Just when the young fox kit thought it was to no avail, he felt something starting to tug at the line. The bobber bounced downward in the water. The rod bent down and he felt like something was now on the line. Whatever it was happened to be larger fish, as he was starting to have a little bit of a struggle reeling it in.

"Need some help?" his father asked.

"I got it," Nick said with determination, continuing to reel it in with all his might.

A few seconds went by and he saw what he had caught on his rod, flapping back and forth and splashing the surface of the water as he brought it closer. What he had gotten was an olive color and was around the size of a bass, something that neither of them had expected to catch on this little fishing trip.

Nick's eyes were widened in surprise, and he looked back at his dad with the biggest smile. "It worked!" he exclaimed. "Your trick worked, Dad! Look what I caught!"

"I see," his father chuckled. "That's a pretty big one. I think that's a smallmouth."

"Cool," replied Nick, though he, being only a kit, didn't possess too much knowledge on the many types of fish that occupied the riverine waters of the world.

"There's that smile. I take it you like this little fishin' spot now that ya reeled that nice fish in."

"It's awesome!" said the ecstatic kit. "Maybe we can reel in that 'Behemoth Bass' grandpa was telling me about now."

Seeing the smile on his face made his father happy as well, and he got up from his seat to help him in getting the fish unhooked and back into the water. "That was just another one of his tall tales from when he used to held out to the lake," informed his dad. "Was probably just a bass that was bigger than usual and he decided to make a far-fetched story about it. The hunt for somethin' like that'll have to wai, though. The sun's just startin' to go down and that means we oughta get going."

"Aww," mumbled a disappointed Nick, sad that they now had to go after such a good time he was now having.

"But I'm sure you'll reel in an even better one than the ones we caught today next time we head out here, don't ya think?"

"Yeah," responded the kit with certainty.

"What do you say we do this next year, son? Just you and me at this spot, fishing together."

"Sounds like a plan, dad..."

The next year came around, but the plan that sounded great didn't get fulfilled as it was first thought. That following year had been the time that Nick had experienced one of the worst things he had felt in his life, the day he had been bullied by the Ranger Scouts he sought to join.

That remaining summer up until his birthday, he found himself wanting to spend more of his time alone, the sadness he had felt from such a terrible thing being what consumed his previously joyful state. When the time came for his father to ask if he wanted to head to that spot by the lake again and fish, his immediate response was a declining of the offer. He didn't feel up for such a thing then.

The same came about when he was going to turn ten years old, and he answered by saying no to the request to head to the lake. It was that time he was asked by his father, however, that he wished he would have answered him with a yes.

It turned out that his father's illness that year, the one he thought he previously had beat, had come back, and the doctors didn't have good news when it came to that. Nick wished so much that he had spent more time with him during those months leading up to his passing. He wished so greatly that he hadn't made what could have been a good time together with his father into an imposition.

When that time came that he was to say goodbye to him, he found himself unable to say anything. When he saw the grave condition of his father during his final time, he simply ran out of the room with tears in his eyes. The feeling of wanting to be left alone had multiplied after losing him, and he most certainly had no want to go back to that spot by the water.

But as he grew up and became much wiser over time, he found himself, during his trip back to see his hometown, suddenly struck by the idea of heading back to that spot. This time when he decided to go back to that very place, he was accompanied by three other mammals that walked behind him: His mother, his rabbit companion, and his son Noah.

Nick, with his beloved bunny in tow, stepped out of the car and made the walk to the spot in the heart of the park he hadn't been to in so long. His mother shortly exited her own car and walked over to the trunk and lifted it open, and Noah walked away from Nick and Judy before heading to where his grandmother was to see if he could the helper he always tried to be.

"Seems like such a nice place," Judy remarked as she got a good look around.

Nick sighed as he slipped his paws into the pockets of his coat. "It really is," he said in agreement. "I don't know why I haven't been back here sooner."

"I'll get the fishing rods out," Judy said to him as she walked back up towards the car.

"Actually," Nick's mom chimed as she retrieved something from the trunk of her car, "I've got something I thought my Nicky would like to see."

"What's that?" Nick inquired as he turned around, seeing what she was talking about for himself.

In the left paw of the vixen was a fishing pole that was a dark blue color, and seeing this caught him by surprise. This was the exact pole that his father had used every time that he went out to fish.

"Your father," his mother said to him, "would've wanted you to cast a line out with this. And I always had a feeling that you'd come back here someday to this spot he took you to, so I held onto it for a day like this."

Nick found himself becoming a little emotional as he took the pole from his mom and held it in his grasp. The pole had some wear from the many years it had been used, and it definitely looked like it needed some fixing up before he could safely say he could put some bait on the hook and try it out. He had no idea that she had been keeping it.

In that moment, though, all he could do was respond with a simple "Thanks, Mom."

His mother smiled back and they made their way to the dock, everything being as tranquil as it always seemed to be.

The little wooden dock looked like it had been frozen in time, never having changed since the time he set his chair there and casted his line when he was only eight. There might have been some weathering in the wood from storms that swept this part of the land, as well as etching left into the wooden railing to the sides (two initials in a heart, probably left by young mammals experiencing love for each other, as well as some other words and such left by others), it looked exactly the same.

Within a few minutes, everybody was in the chairs they had brought with them. As Judy started to catch up with Nick's mom since the last time they had been around to see her, Nick and Noah started to cast their lines out into the water.

Nick could feel that sense of positive deja vu sitting to the left of his son. Noah, matter of factly, would be celebrating his birthday in only a few days as well. It almost felt as if the fox was helping make a fun memory for his kit the same way his father had did for him prior to his own eighth birthday.

"Having any fun, Noah?" Nick inquired a short while.

"Yep," Noah answered with the smile that he always wore no matter what kind of day it was. "It's reel-y fun."

This got a pure chuckle to come out of the vulpine. "I see you've inherited my skills at finding the perfect puns," he remarked. "Not to brag but you learned that from a master. Anyway, I hear somebody's gonna be celebrating their birthday pretty soon."

"I sure am," replied the kit.

"Well, it was gonna be a surprise, but I think I'll let ya know where we're gonna be celebrating." Looking back at Judy sitting behind him, he added, "What do you say, Carrots?"

Judy smiled back and let Noah know about the big surprise they had planned. "What do you say we have a big birthday celebration at... Pizza Planet?"

Noah gasped out of excitement, more chipper in spirits than he already was. The restaurant and arcade his mom had mentioned always looked so cool, and heading there for his birthday was the greatest surprise in the world to him. "Are you serious?" he said with disbelief.

"Yep," answered Nick simply.

Several minutes has past with no nibbles on the kit's rod. Noah reeled his line that his father had put bait on for him back in before casting it another time, this time to the opposite side a little further out.

Hearing the sigh come from his frustrated son, Nick turned over and looked at him. "Nothing, huh?"

"No..." sighed Noah as he shook his head, still keeping a close eye on his bobber. "You know, this would even more fun if I could catch a big fish."

"Same here, son," replied Nick. "But I think I have a way we can change that."

"Really?" Noah looked back at his father, now all ears to hear about his plan. "How?"

"Well, a very wise fox, your grandfather, once taught me a trick to bring them right to you," the fox said to his son.

Nick looked up at the sunny skies above him, imagining that his father was smiling down at how he was now showing his son what he had been shown during his first fishing trip at the creek.

He remembered that, even though the fact that the "trick" his dad had devised worked was just coincidental for him, it made that time with his dad that more fun, and now he was bestowing the memory that Noah would one day look back on and remember when he grew older.

Author's Note: Hey there, everyone! I know it's been awhile since I've written another one of these stories, but I had been struggling with a very bad case of writer's block that I just couldn't shake. On top of that, I've had some other stuff come up that made me put some of writing on hold for a good bit of time.

That being said, the idea for another story involving the concept of fishing came about one day after watching a fishing show om TV and I got to work on it. After I finished writing this one out, I overcame that dreaded writer's block. And thank goodness for that! :)

But anyway, I hope you all enjoy this little story of mine. Not really the best writing I could do since it was written out rather quickly, but I hope you still enjoyed it anyhow. As always, let me know what your thoughts are on this. Your feedback, whether good or bad, is gladly appreciated.

'Til next time! :)