by Tempe O'Kun
I know full well the lawbat hates when I make trouble in his town. Doubly so with this government bigwig around. I keep my paws clear of the glad-handing and guffawing by Blake and the doc foxes as they give him the town tour. Likewise avoid every drop of drink at the saloon. Take great pains not to cheat at the poker game.
Turning out being lucky makes folk think I’m cheating.
Just my luck.
“Good-for-nothin’ card-sharpin’ bunny!” The lynx yowls at me, slashing with chipped and dirty claws. “Quit yer bouncin’ around!”
Having no intention of heeding the kitty, I hop over the bar and swing by a rafter out the saloon doors. Don’t stop outside either—I bound up onto some fancy varnished carriage rolling past. From there, it’s an easy jump to the roof of the bar. Hot wind and hotter sun greet me. Panting through a grin, I chance a look down.
My feline pal prowls out, dagger-tipped ears pricked. Now I just have to wait on him to leave. I let my breaths unwind, heartbeat slowing.
Sheriff Blake flutters on over, lands at the steps of the saloon, and looks straight up at me.
Unlucky lynx follows his gaze. Right to me.
Curious how I’m so fond of a lawbat whose main joy in life is making mine not go smooth.
Lynxie snarls his way back into the saloon, demanding the proprietor get him somehow up here to join me. That old collie barkeep ought be able to deal with him, I hope.
A small crowd collects from the passersby, like pebbles falling in a creek.
Blake waves a wing at me. “Six, get down here—you’re causing a scene.”
I sigh. The boy never understands how much he complicates matters. Not even a bunny’s keen to jump off second stories, so I aim for a two-wheeled cart delivering spirits.
I land with a thump, spot-on, only to discover the cart not affixed to any pony. This small matter causes the cart to pitch forward; a number of casks to take flight. A barrage of whiskey barrels pummel the street and onto that duded-up carriage beside it. The cart’s owner, who had been securing his wares, wrings his naked tail in horror.
The lawbat watches like I just squashed his favorite sort of fruit.
“Sorry about that, squeaks. This oughta settle matters.” I press my poker winnings into the paws of a sputtering liquor salesrat, ambling over to the fruit bat with a swagger in my stride. “Buck up, sheriff.” I pat him on the wing. “Nobody got clobbered.”
From the wagon emerges a terrier, wringing the whiskey from his ace-high suit.
I hear the lynx scampering from the bar, so I spin and give him my mean look.
Kitty takes off running, bob tail bouncing as he skedaddles.
Pride swells in my chest. Not every bunny can stare down the rougher sort of feline. With a chuckle, I turn to see Blake wearing his serious face.
The chill of excitement clings to my chest, though my ears do their best to soak up sun. “What’re you all sour over, Sheriff?” I touch his wing with as much tenderness as is wise in public. “Ah paid for the damages and everything.”
Looking for the source of the drink, the gussied-up terrier sees to cussing up a tornado’s worth of profanity.
Blake presses a wing to his face. “You just soaked the territorial governor like a fruitcake.”
With a sigh, I present my wrists for shackling, having the feeling that I’ll be spending another night in the town jail.
Got to watch Blake explain how he’d arrested me—I did my best to make him sound all brave-like in his story—then he excused himself to take me somewhere I might be less of a threat to the territory’s terriers. Soon find myself in the familiar confines of the jail cell attached to Blake’s office. Out of the sun, I start to cool off, though I can’t say the same for Blake. He’s giving me a big talk about how it looks bad when a drizzle of the who-hit-johnny hits elected officials, like I’m not aware.
I sigh, leaning on the bars. “Lawbat, don’t ya reckon you’re makin’ a pity out of a peach pit?”
“You expect me to believe you’re innocent in all this?” Leaning against the bars from the other side, he refuses to look my way, leaving my very good attempt at batting my eyes for naught.
“Even ah’ve gotta be innocent once in a while.” I excuse myself from his handcuffs, slipping them back onto his belt. Blake’s never been good at making the law stick in matters of me.
He glowers at the far wall. “He thinks my town is in chaos. If I hadn’t pawned him off on the foxes, White Rock would be looking for a new sheriff about now.”
“Oh Blake, it all worked out.” I chuckle, then rest my chin on his shoulder through the bars. “No harm, no fowl, as the birdhounds say.”
He ignores me, but doesn’t shrug me off either. “I know several birdhounds who’d dispute that.”
“Hush with your lawyerin’ a moment. Ah’m trying to think up a way to set things right for ya.” My claws trace the etchings on my father’s gun at my hip, my other paw fiddling with the blued replacement at my other. I reckon Blake disarms other criminals he throws in here. “Ah could go committin’ some crimes and pin them on folk we know are criminals anyhow—”
The lawbat tugs his hat low against the baking sun streaming in through his office window. “No, Six.”
I tip a finger his way. “A bun could steal enough gold to make an plaque in the shape of the territory and—”
His muzzle touches mine, just a little. It’s soft, like his softening tone. “Are you fully incapable of abiding by the law?”
“Not fully…” I shrug, my paws wrapping his waist. “Ah’m abidin’ by a number of laws this very moment.”
He sighs, slacking against the bars. “I can’t let you out while the governor’s still in town.”
“Reckon that’s reasonable.” I kiss him under the jaw. “But how’s a bun supposed to make this up to you?”
He moans, unaware I’m borrowing his keys. Handcuffs are one thing, but the heavy iron lock on the cell door would make a corkscrew of the lockpick I keep in my boot. Lawbat turns, and for a moment I think he’s caught me red-pawed, but then he just cups my face in his wings. “Don’t stir up more trouble. Please? Governor Terrence will roll out of here at sunup.” Those pretty brown eyes sparkle in afternoon sunshine. “We’ll talk later.”
I smile an innocent bunny smile as his lips press to mine. For a moment, I consider hanging the key ring from my tail, but tuck the keys into my gun belt instead. Idle wings are less likely to find it there.
Blake breezes out of the office, launches off the porch rail, and flutters into the evening sky.
Swinging the keys around my finger, I ponder sitting in the cell until he returns. Could stay here and not make the situation any worse. But I reckon I could make it better faster out there. Never have been one for waiting around.
I unlock the cell.
Well aware the bat could spy me from above, I slink out his bedroom window and down an alley. I find the governor in a change of clothes and in conversation with the foxes. The good sheriff flutters in with a string of apologies, then swoops down beside them. From a distance, I watch as they yammer and yap for a while, but Blake’s duties catch up to him: the local collie barkeep and the liquor rat come to him with some manner of dispute. They drag him off, leaving just the medical foxes to finish the tour.
With the fruit bat once more out of sight, I meander on past the babbling vulpines and set my plan into motion.
An hour later, out the saloon window, I see the lawbat swoop down next to Deputy Harding. He lands, sweeping out a circle of dust in the lantern light. The bloodhound sniffs his way up to the front door and points me out. That foxy face pops up through the merrymakers, ears up. He casts a gaze over the crowd to get an idea of what’s going on.
The terrier’s too short to
see, but his glance sticks on my ears like a cocklebur—and is about as prickly.
I raise a shotglass at him. His key ring dangles from my paw. “Here’s to our dear lawbat! The only sheriff who coulda reformed me in a few scant hours.”
A general cheer arises.
Grumbling, he weaves his way inside, no doubt intending to give me an earful of undiluted opinion. As he arrives at the bar, though, his wing is clasped by eager paws.
The governor stands before me, all four and half feet of him. “Sheriff Blake! I must say, I had some real reservations about the job you were doing. But your dear friend Mister Shooter has explained this whole misunderstanding.”
“S—” He forces a cough. “He did?”
“Oh yes.” The little grey dog nods, wire-hair whiskers angled by a grin. “A finer gentleman I couldn’t hope to meet.”
“Now there’s a subject for debate...” He levels a gaze on me.
“Tracked me down just to buy me a drink and apologize. I had no idea he was seeing to a leak in this very roof.” He points a grey paw up.
The collie barkeep stops examining a shiny gold coin and slides another drink the governor’s way, avoiding my eyes.
The terrier takes it, wincing as he attempts to down it.
My ears swivel. One paw drops to my sliver gun. An instant later, I remember to set my other paw on the blue steel one as well.
Tension grips him. Lawbat’s eyes follow mine.
A lynx leaps in from the side. His black claws streak toward me. “I’ll show you, bunny!”
Blake lashes out with a hind paw, grips the feline’s ankle, and yanks. With legs in two very different directions, the cat collides with a table, then the floor. The resulting wallop hits the lynx in the diaphragm. He coughs a blast of cheap whiskey over the floorboards, then crumples. Still holding on, he twists the cat’s leg out of kick range.
The lynx yowls a string of profanity colorful as a peacock’s plumage and twice as lurid.
The governor yips through the last of his drink. His dainty hind paws skitter on the wood floor beside the collapsed cat, his ears erect. “Good heavens!”
“See, governor? Ah was tellin’ you about how this lynx is always causin’ trouble. Can’t get a moment’s peace in this town.” I smile over my glass. “Thank goodness for Sheriff Blake.”
The terrier nods, appeased, and lifts his glass. “I’ll drink to that!”
The lawbat buries his face in a wing, only to have it dragged down by the governor. He flashes everyone a pained smile, still holding the struggling feline by the ankle. With a sigh, he draws his handcuffs and snaps them in place with his wing fingers. He allows me one round of libation in honor of my own cleverness before conscripting me to help carry the profane feline to my now-vacant jail cell.
I help the lawbat throw our feline friend into the lockup. My fruit bat remains sour, of course, even as I talk him into the bedroom. Once there, he dangles from a rafter like an unripe kiwifruit.
Certain time will sweeten him, I sit on the bed, just to be at eye-level, legs crossed.
He crosses his wings, candlelight flickering on chocolate pelt. “You’re pleased with yourself.”
I lean on my knees, flashing him a coy look. “Who’d ‘a thought a little more whiskey was all the governor needed?”
His look stays a trifle bitter. Those powerful hind paws clamped on the rafter.
My ears drop. I sigh and stand, knowing it’s time to shoot straight. “I’m sorry, Jordan. You know trouble follows me like a cocklebur. Figured the least I could do was get it out of your fur.”
“You caused all the trouble in the first place.” He flickers amusement my way, dangling at my waist. “This makes us even?”
“No...” I pad over, laying a paw on his crotch. Our eyes meet and he gives me more tingles than a mountain of mirror ore. “...but this might.”
He looks up at me. Lawbat always has the best surprised looks.
While his brain’s still catching up, my fingers dance through the buttons of his fly. I part the fabric, letting his bits flop down, then nuzzle down his shaft. My paw closes around his base, guiding him into my lips.
Blake gasps as I breath on him some.
Bending down a little, I take him in my mouth. My lips close over the warm head of his erection. My eager tongue traces into his sheath, playing along that shapely head. He’s so warm, and getting warmed up, swelling bigger with every heartbeat. I suckle him deeper, stroking his delicate wings.
The sheriff moans, nuzzling my thigh, a little creak coming from above as he digs into the rafter. The head pulses, hot on my tongue. “Oh Six...”
“Mmmmm...” His taste, all sweet and musky, tempts me deeper onto him. I find myself drooling more than’s ladylike as his shaft slides past my lips. My ears burn with bashful lust, swinging back and forth against his stomach.
Lost in his flavor, I scarely notice as he undoes my belt. Wing thumbs hook my pants, dragging them down. His slim muzzle noses into my undergarments, long lovely tongue tracing my folds like the most tender fruit.
I squeak around his shaft, then hurry my pants off my ankles. With a wider stance, I spread wide enough for him to slip inside. I shudder, feeling him swirl inside me, before I remember where my muzzle is.
He licks deeper, bottom lip rubbing my clit. Pleasure catches like wildfire, raising a haze of pleasure across my mind. Fruit bats have unfair advantages in these matters. I’m getting wetter than a mad hen down there, and he’s just getting started.
Not keen to be outdone, I collect my dangling ears. I rub the shaft, feeling the give of his skin as my ears slide over it. His warmth clings to my night-chilled ears. His balls bounce off one side of my ears, our wetness collecting on the other.
The lawbat’s groan shivers into my loins. His tongue twirls like a twister, sweeping joy into my every little fold. His lips wiggle against my slit, setting a tingle to my clit and a shiver to my spine.
Gripping his cock for support, I gasp around the head. Each heartbeat chases the last, every breath catching the next. My muscles clench on his slick efforts. I shudder.
My muscles flutter along his tongue as I call out his name. Might have come out a trifle clearer without his penis in my mouth, but I reckon he got the message. Hare juice floods my passage, dripping down his muzzle, which my hips seem trying to bury. All patient and smug, Blake dangles, swinging with the force of my climax, that tongue still wiggling all four sides of a square dance inside me whenever his nose bumps my slit. Quivering from the inside out, I clutch him close with desperate elbows, unwilling to let go of his shaft, too fond of how it feels wrapped in my ears.
When at last my pleasure starts to fade, he draws free of my tender bunny burrow. I collapse onto the bed, slipping off him with a slurp so loud and so lewd that I’m sure the lynx in the clink must have heard it, if not the whole town. My ears sweep back, trying to hide their blush.
The lawbat grins and wipes his mouth, reaching to the rafter with one wing before swinging down on it. That firm length bobs all the while. Can’t blame a bun for staring, what with it being so pretty and bouncy. It glistens in the flickering light, wet all down the sheath as he comes close. As if that weren’t worth the price of admission, his hind paws do the trick of pulling off his trousers. He stands before me, so fond and still firm.
I take him in my paws, feeling the blush creep up my cheeks as he dribbles a little from the tip. Stroking his sheath over the throbbing flesh, I look up into those coffee-brown eyes, the eyes that keep me awake nights. Drunk on the feelings still squishing through my slippery folds, I kiss the top, rubbing him, craving his release.
Those tender wings rest on my shoulders, hips jerking forward and bumping inside my open muzzle. My tongue wiggles of its own accord and, though I’m no fruit bat, I must have done something right.
> The sheriff shudders, wing digits gripping tight. His length pulses hot, rich salty-sweet juice into my waiting mouth. I smile at the taste, lapping it up with greed that’d fluster a prospector. Another shot, then another, then a small series of dribbles. I suck, trying to encourage them, but a whimper from the lawbat stops me. Letting him slip free, I give him a few spare licks and a look up.
He cups my cheek in his wing, like he’s real fond of me. I smile like a dope, then come to realize some of his juice just dripped from my smile onto him. He doesn’t mind, though, just kisses me like we’re right proper and falls into bed with me.
As warm wings draw me toward sleep, just like I’ve been dreaming of all these weeks, I reckon being lucky’s not so bad.
Lawbat’ll take any occasion to dress up. He’s got raspberry-red trousers under a orange vest I’ve never seen before; it shimmers with some manner of leaf pattern, gleaming in the sunshine.
We’re standing at the side of the little stage. The governor yips and yaps his way through a speech about how we’re the Frontier’s engine of progress. I half-listen, wondering just how he thinks this bunny-shaped cog fits in.
Half the town’s turned out, shading themselves with parasols and fluffing their fur with fans. Must be a couple dozen of them in a clump before the stage, with more standing under shop awnings to either side of the street. White Rock seems to be making a day of it, to the point that even a swindler or two has shown up to relieve them of their hard-earned dinero. I watch the snake-oil hawker with particular interest, as he might need a taste of his own medicine.
Charlotte and Doc Richards stand to either side, fur copper and postures mayoral. The governor calls us up from his podium, taller than I remember. The foxes leave to make room for us. As I bound up the steps to the platform, I can see a wooden crate’s been provided to elevate him above the common folk. My boots clatter along the dry boards, carrying me to a spot a little behind and to one side of the canine in a tailored coat.
