Baa-Ram-Ewe!

by Darkonshadows

110. Rainforest Relaxation.

-Equus, Ponyville, Spike-

“So Kuril hit you with an ugly duck potion, yes I’m aware of what that is, but no… I can’t help you.” Cadence started quacking at me angrily. “I’m Spike, I’m stuck in Twilight’s body for the next five or so hours thanks to something involving a magical flower and tomato paste I was going to use for a pasta dinner tonight. Yeah, just the usual stuff that happens around Ponyville.”

Cadence started whining and quacking in a depressed manner.

“Just ride it out for however long Kuril quoted you Cadence.” I knew Kuril from the few times she visited us in Canterlot as mayor of Airship Mauled. “Twilight can’t help you even if she wanted to and she’s having fun quietly doing paperwork.”

Cadence just rolled her eyes.

As mayor, Kuril had a one hundred percent approval rating of the locals, which was normally though to be impossible by many who lived outside their town… up until you tasted Kuril’s cooking that is.

-Earth, a day later, Germany, Autobahn, Shanty-

I did not be knowing pirates could be found inland, much less on the ground. I be knowing a lot about sky pirates, the regular pirates you’d find in boats out on the water, but roadway pirates? That was being quite knew to me.

I leapt off of Dodo and kicked off the motorized bicyclist and back onto Dodo, the van was currently under attack and I was riding Dodo to keep them off of the Cooper Gang’s back. The person riding that thing be flopping into a mud pool.

“Dodo, jump!” I shouted, he be leaping straight up and landed on the front of a car. He quickly started running again as the rear of the car flipped upwards into the air and was soon skidding along on its top behind us. “Woohoo, you think you got anything on this pirate!”

-Mopsy-

“I swear, Shanty is going to give me a heart attack.” I stated watching as she and Dodo managed to force the various following vehicles off the road. That Dodo could run faster than the van could go was a good thing in this instance, but if Shanty hit the road going at these speeds… well I’m quite glad Dodo is protective of her and had machine reflexes.

“She’s doing fine Mops.” Mr. Cooper reassured me, I think this drive to China was going quite horribly at the moment. “So is her caretaker Pom from what we’ve been hearing, she’s made it to Zootopia in Wakanda.”

“I, the great road pirate Dan Karnage, am feeling like you are not taking me seriously enough!” The wolf dressed in green camouflage war gear stated from a loudspeaker inside a monster truck that was still keeping up with us. “You are sending a child to deal with a road pirate as great as me and… uwaaAAAHH!”

Dodo just slowed down immensely and popped a tire on the truck with a quick blast of energy from his beak. This sent the monster veering wildly off the road, where it struck a ditch wrong and flipped several times. It promptly exploded when it stopped, quite violently too!

Murray pulled the van to a stop as Shanty road up next to us looking back at the smashed twisted pile of metal.

“I, Dan Karnage, am only mildly inconvenienced by the fact that my panzerschreck ammunition has now gone kablooey!” Dan shouted from within the wreckage much to our surprise.

“Let’s just go.” After nodding to me, Murray hit the gas pedal and we sped down the road.

-Africa, Wakanda, Zootopia, Rainforest District, Dolly-

I woke up feeling comfortable and realized I was being snuggled by Pom on the bed we were sharing, I felt kind of awkward and started to gently shake Pom.

“Hey, wake up Pom.” She slowly came to at my wiggling. “Let me go, I need to go and why are you holding me like this?”

“You were crying in your sleep last night, you really miss your family huh?” Pom let me go and sat up while stretching out. “You know what? I should just teach you how to use a toilet. I toilet trained my dogs, might as well tell you all the things dogs just don’t understand about toilets.”

“What’s there to know?” If only I knew what I would learn from this.

-Ten minutes later-

“And that’s why dogs have misconceptions about toilets.”

Well my family would be as mortified as I currently was, but we tended to do our business outside in the back yard or at the park. Still, I can certainly see, understand and know absolutely why toilets existed now.

There were so many things I wish I didn’t know now, at least I already knew what a bathtub was and how to use it.

Exiting the bathroom after doing my business and getting forcefully scrubbed down by Pom, we walked into the living room. We saw Gazelle out cold on the couch. She must have had a busy night, apparently she was famous pop star, wouldn’t know anything about her and that was more up my brother DJ’s alley than mine.

“I’ll get breakfast ready, want some of that kibble Dolly?” Pom moved to the kitchen and I followed after her. I hopped up onto the counter and looked out the nearby window.

“Yeah!” My brother has a tree house in the back yard back in Camden, said tree house didn’t compare to the ones in the Rainforest District of Zootopia.

There were vines everywhere, rope and wood bridges, it had the smell of being wild and looking like a giant park at the same time. Pom opened the window and I took a deep whiff of the air, so fresh and inviting… as was the smell of kibble Pom placed on the table and I was going to immediately be digging into that!

“Houba!” Yelping at Mars sudden appearance, I found myself face first on the floor having fallen from the counter. “You okay there Dolly, maybe I should be asking if the floor is…”

“Just peachy Mars…” The long tailed monkey dog thing freaked me out, I felt Pom’s concern and answered her question as her mouth moved to ask it. “My nose hurts, but I’m okay.”

“Well if you aren’t too badly hurt… hello Mars, here for breakfast?” Pom had set about making breakfast for herself and for Gazelle. Oatmeal, fruit, grits and she set out a box of cereal, she was also doing a little cleaning as she did all of this.

Pom was a lot like Dylan in some respects in being an awesome homemaker, but she was different in knowing how to throw down when needed!

“Sounds good to me. So we were looking about for more trouble, but it seems Zootopia is still respecting nature after that whole Night Howler thing and is not expanding beyond its limits. We were wondering how you were getting on without us and I came to check in on you.” Poking through the window on his tail lifting his entire body weight, Mars dropped onto the floor and started coiling and kinking his tail at his back. “My mate Mia doesn’t like the hustle and bustle of the city or more technological stuff, but she’s willing to enter the meadow and rainforest districts at least. She prefers living as naturally as possible and I can’t blame her, because I like living free to explore things personally too. She’s watching Maurice to make sure he doesn’t cause too much trouble aside from just eating bananas all day, I swear my buddy can cause a shortage within a week…”

“I have a question, are you magic?” It’s been bugging me that Mars was so unusual.

“If you’re referring to the fact that my people hatch from eggs and can start eating piranha to their bones five hours afterwards, then yeah, we’re pretty magical rare creatures.” Wait… what? Mars’s people hatched from eggs?! “I also like fruits and nuts, but we’re apparently natural predators to the piranha where my people come from.”

“That’s not exactly answering my question, but it does make me want to ask more.” That really long tail had to be magic, but I was going to try and stop thinking about it.

“Well you can come in and take a seat Mars, Dolly is already getting into her breakfast.” Yeah kibble and a side of water Pom, the usual breakfast for me.

Only… there wasn’t the sound of a lot of brothers and sisters making a fun mess and getting kibble all over the place.

Gazelle walked in looking sleepy and looked about as she stretched out, she seemed to overlook Mars at the table and noticed me eating. She gave me a fond look.

“How about you think about what you’re going to do from here, my home is your home as long as you need it Pom.” Gazelle stated with a yawn as she started walking out of the room and towards her bathroom. “We’ll talk when I’m more awake and after I’ve gotten a shower in.”

“Breakfast will be ready when you’re done.” She nodded at Pom’s words and waved at us. Pom turned to us. “She must have had a fun time last night, she’s so tired she missed Mars sitting at the table.”

“I know for a fact that some of the people around here certainly know how to party like animals!” Mars waited patiently and pointed out some of the things he wanted, Pom got him some of that stuff and he started eating alongside me.

“So what are we doing Pom, where are we going from here?” She gave me a confused look.

“Aren’t we going to get a plane ticket back to…” Pom started and I cut her off.

“No Pom, we’re going to look around for your friends, my family can handle itself just fine without me.” Dylan was there and I trusted him to always be there for them. “It always has…”

If neither of us were there to watch the pups, then I would do just about anything just to get back to them immediately. I can already feel that Pom would help me with that no questions asked.

“We have no idea where to look though.” Well Pom, I had a plan for that.

“I have an idea on what to do for that… we just need to keep doing heroic stuff to attract attention to ourselves. If they are as capable as you, they’ll find us!” That and maybe find the nearest skating competition, I was itching to get into animalistic and biped competition for once and maybe Pom could aid in that. I’m willing and ready to stop hiding the fact that I’m not just any regular everyday dog! “In fact… can you ask Gazelle if Zootopia has any skate parks nearby for me?”

“Why can’t you ask her yourself?” Mars asked plainly between chewing on some nuts.

“You do realize that I’m barking right, Gazelle doesn’t understand animals.” My speech may be animal, but us Dalmatians were quite far from dumb.

“Oh… I get it now!” Mars gave us a quirky smile and two raised thumbs, then he pointed to Pom. “Wait, she speaks animal?”

“No, I specifically speak dog , I know someone that speaks animal though… and she’s kindness personified.” Pom stated with a faint smile as she turned to me from cleaning things. “I’ll ask her for you Dolly.”

Yes!

-A few hours after breakfast, Pom-

The air here was amazingly refreshing and the giant trees reminded me of some places in Equus. We finally made our way down the stairs to the skate park on the ground.

The rope bridges between giant trees could use a few more guard rails and could be far sturdier. This was apparently a high bachelor district for people who wanted peace and quiet. People usually moved to Savanna Central, Meadowlands or Sahara Square if they started families in Zootopia.

That didn’t mean that kids weren’t around, it’s just that the tree top homes weren’t as safe for them and there were likely regulations about needing a home on the ground when it came to caring for kids. Nobody wanted to see a kid fall from that high up.

Gazelle had seemed a little surprised to see Mars when she was more aware, but she seemed to be alright with his presence. When asked, she gave us directions to the nearest skate park and was coming along with us to watch Dolly do her thing.

“So that’s how the Bunny Burrows were created in the south.” It was a fascinating story as was the Night Howler incident, rare African flowers that can drive any creature utterly berserk. Gazelle explain the predator and prey thing going on in animalistic circles around here, so I should try to be friendly towards predator animalistic. Bipeds didn’t have this problem, they had entirely different issues. “And here we are… not all districts have a skate park like this one. Now what can Dolly really do on her skateboard?”

“Rainforest Rollers Skate Park?” I read off the sign, we went in and found the skate park was mildly occupied. A few kids were hanging around and skating, just enjoying themselves. “You know Dolly, you could have gotten stuck with an even sillier moniker like Roller Rover.”

Dolly growled aggressively at me.

“So Dolly does like the Caper Canine sidekick name.” Gazelle was helpful in helping us find the skate park.

Dolly gave Gazelle a defeated stare. Mars, the Marsupilami, was swinging around above our heads and looking about for something interesting to do.

“I do not, Roller Rover just sounds as bad as Caper Canine!” Complained Dolly as she carried her skateboard towards the halfpipe nearby, she had a smile on her face and a wagging tail as she climbed up to the top of the right side of the half pipe. “Oh yeah, it’s my time to light this halfpipe up!”

“She seems excited.” Gazelle stated.

“She really likes skateboarding and she’s quite good at it.” I was about to see that personally for the first time. “I’m pretty sure I could enter her in a competition or could even hire her out to birthday parties for money, if she felt like playing along.”

“She’s that good?” Questioned Gazelle, she apparently wore light clothing and was bare hoof at the moment. She didn’t like shoes and only wore some while on a stage.

“Provided she’s not overly nervous or distracted.” She was good at learning martial arts as I taught them to her, Dolly wasn’t one for boring lectures and was better at paws on learning and actively doing things. “Hey kids, want to see a skateboarding dog? She really likes to put on a show!”

The various kids came over, a leopard, a few tigers, a fluffle, a skulk and even an older adult panther who was present to make sure the kids were playing safely, there was also this jaguar with a bit of scarring over his right eye.

“Aw yeah, an audience, thanks Pom!” It wasn’t hard to figure out that Dolly was the type to show off and loved attention, so I just helped her with that. “Bow-Wacka-Wow!”

Dolly kicked off the edge and went down the ramp, she reached the other edge and grinded her board along it before twisting around and going back down towards the right ramp, where she went up in the air spun twice and came down to go shooting up off the left side.

Watching Dolly perform a twisting backflip, I was smiling at how joyous she seemed to be just doing tricks. She went down the ramp, kicked off the board making it flip underneath her and she landed to go up the right ramp.

“She’s amazing.” Gazelle stated with obvious awe. “How did you train her to do all that?”

Dolly went a bit high off the right ramp, spun around once and then popped herself to the back of the board. She did a single paw stand while spreading her other paw out for balance after landing the skateboard directly on its round nose.

“She just needed a little encouragement to learn how to do these things.” I answered as I watched Dolly continue to balance the front tip of the board right next to the edge of the ramp. “She has always had a fascination with skateboarding, she really enjoyed learning new tricks from watching other skateboarders and started trying to mimic them. She’s flopped on her face a lot, but that didn’t stop her in the slightest.”

“I bet it was hard to get her to stop once she got started.” It was amusing that the pop star like Gazelle was mystified by a skateboarding dog when she's seen quite a few weird things already. “I’ve never seen a dog do this before.”

I’m pretty sure that’s because dogs kept their close to animalistic natures in this world hidden, they preferred to be seen as animals even if they did have a level of intelligence that puts them above other more average animals.

“Dolly is, 'kind of', one of a kind.” We watched as Dolly continued her paw stand for a few more seconds before she flicked her board backwards and kicked off with her left hind leg to go down the ramp. “Hey, do a twister!”

Dolly looked towards me as she shot up the left ramp, she barked in response and as she went up she hopped to grab the back end of her board and swung it around four times horizontally before pulling it beneath her. The same maneuver she used to save me from that gorilla robot and she even managed to land it.

“Whoa, that’s one seriously cool dog!” One of the kids stated as they watched her zip down the ramp she reach the other edge and propped the front of her board on it and then kicked up and off the board.

Dolly somersaulted forward several times as she went backwards, her board followed underneath her while flipping in the opposite direction. She landed on the board as it hits the center of the halfpipe. She quickly slammed the rear of her board down as she skidded backwards from her momentum and came to quick stop before she could go up the left ramp backwards.

Getting off of her board, Dolly propped it up with her left leg. To anyone else, it looked like she just barked a few times in my direction. To me, it was another day where I can learn to understand my new friend.

“Was I good or what Pom?” Asked Dolly with a smile and wagging tail.

“Come on Dolly, come here girl.” I said innocently, Dolly gave me a suspicious look and did as I asked. I pulled her into a hug. I started to rub her back. “That last trick looked pretty dangerous, anyway… for the sake of keeping up appearances… good girl!”

“Hey, the Dizzy Drop is one of my best tricks, don’t worry about me… I’ve landed on my face enough times to… say, could you move your left hoof a little to the left and up a bit, I’ve got an itch… yeah right there. Oh yeah, that feels nice.” Dolly nuzzled against me as I got a particularly itchy spot on her back. “I’ve failed that trick enough times to know how to do it right, it’s kind of my signature move now. Don’t worry about me, I’ve only broken my leg once doing it. That will only happen if I misaligned my plant and launch, I’m definitely not making that mistake twice.”

“Good, because I don’t want you getting hurt, there might be some ‘questions’ if I try to take you to a vet.” I was saying this because I doubted Dolly has been to a biped or animalistic run vet in years judging by the way she shivered.

Her step mother had been taking care of most of her injuries and I could do it unofficially, but I would prefer a professional opinion depending on dire situations.

“Hey, I’ll be careful Pom, don’t worry about me.” Dolly then slapped my nose with her tongue and I let her go.

“Hey I think I recognize that dog… is that Caper Canine and… Leap Lamb?!” One of the kids shouted excitedly and we looked up from sharing a moment as the kids came forward asking a lot of questions.

“Well at least I’m not on the receiving end of the crowd for once.” We both looked at Gazelle. “What, do you think celebrities like getting mobbed?”

“Oh Gazelle too!” One of the kids said joyfully, but they crowded around Dolly.

“How did she do that last trick?” They were clamoring for how Dolly did that last one and since Dolly couldn’t talk I may as well explain what I saw.

“Well it would be hard to do on two legs, because it’s a four legged trick.” Having received a look that I was on the right track, Dolly barked and wagged her tail with a stealthy nod. “She leapt backwards using her hind legs and forced her front legs downwards to start doing the forward flips and she hit the skateboard to send it flipping backwards and bounced herself upwards. It is her hardest to do trick, I’m quite proud of her.”

“What’s it like being a super hero?” One of the kids ask.

I winced audibly. The present male adults noticed my reaction, they gave me pitying looks and Gazelle just was giving me a weak smile.

“It’s not exactly an easy life kids, and I really don’t like the idea of being called a super hero. In fact I would suggest learning some survival skills like camping and foraging, that’s saved my life on many occasions. I’m not going to lie, the things I actually get up to are not glamourous or exciting, it’s in fact seriously dangerous and I’m usually scared out of my mind most of the time. Don’t get me wrong, I've saved a lot of people!” Being a reserve guard and the head of my own division with a desk job was supposed to be simple, but no, I had to prove I could be capable of doing the physical duties as much as what was mentally required of me as a Guard of Huoshan. At least I was putting that training to good use. Dolly barked in a friendly manner for the kids as she nuzzled up to my legs. Seeing the kids were all giving me sad looks, I decided to bring the mood around to more pleasant subjects. “Dolly here is amazing on a skateboard isn’t she? I have seen plenty of incredible things when it comes to helping people, the world is much weirder than you can ever truly believe and it is a very beautiful place. Did you know that I’m trying to learn how to fly with my meager abilities? I think I’ll get my wings someday even if I will still need to leap to get in the air.”

“Meager abilities? You can leap like... really high, over a building high!” An exaggeration from one of the kids, but I could get up to the top of buildings easily enough. “That you can fly is totally amazing!”

“I guess, I just know some incredible people. I can’t truly fly yet, but I will be able to one day.” I stated as I looked to Dolly, Gazelle and Mars hanging out in a tree using his tail as a makeshift hammock, then looked to the sky. “Just keep looking and you'll eventually see something truly amazing..."

-Zootopia PD, Benjamin Clawhauser-

"Leap Lamb hasn't actually done anything illegal, sir." I didn't want her in trouble with Chief Bogo.

Author's Note:

An Extremely Goofy Movie reference, Dolly does one of Max's tricks.

Comments

[Herald of Opera]

Oatmeal, fruit, grits

Emphasis mine. While there is a difference between those two things, it's small enough to question why you'd bother with both.

[Darkonshadows]

10919815

Oatmeal is more akin to cereal.

Grits and Oatmeal are two different things entirely.

Oatmeal is in general sweeter, made with oats, berries and some nuts.

Grits is basically corn porridge that can be served with a variety of other flavors, likes bacon and cheese.

They are very different things texture and flavor wise.

As for why both? Well there's two people eating and Pom is giving the persons she's cooking for options.