Okay, a number of things here.

There was to be a dustup between Nick and Judy and some muggers in their stop in Vegas. Dang story would NOT let my write it in!

In the planned ending, Sharla was to pass away in her sleep before Judy got to visit her again. A semi(?)-tragic event that was to relate to the saying "You can't go home again." Not only would this chapter not "accept" that part, it "wrote" another one in its place.

Item: There wasn't SUPPOSED to be an Epilogue! The thing barged in when I had this playing as background music:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HVSRI27yWHE


I found an inflation/price adjustment calculator and did a price change comparison between 1958 and 2018. What cost $1.00 in '58 goes for something like $7.80 in 2018. Thus Judy being "shell shocked" by today's prices.


Judy and Nick arrive at Bunnyburrow in time for one of its festivals. Judy encounters more than a trip down "memory lane".


Chapter 9: BUSTED, Sorta’


Eyes closed, Judy took in the sounds that came in from all around her. The calls, laughing, and squealing of excited and happy kits, occasional admonishments from parents to behave (mostly ignored), the noises made by various country carnival games and rides. All of it punctuated now and then with an announcement of this or that activity being made over the ‘grounds’ speaker network. The gentle breeze wafted the aromas of all kinds of baked and cooked foods into her twitching seeking nose.

“Maker! It’s like I never left home!” she thought in wonder.

* * * * * * * * * * * *

The drive to the Tri-Burrows took eight days. They could have done it in three, but Nick insisted on making stops at Las Vegas (for two days and nights) and at three national parks to take drive through tours of. It was the first time she’d been to any of those places and she delighted at seeing them. And, for her, the start of their trip had a surprise of its own.

The scenery outside of the medium sized RV had not changed much in the first hundred miles of the trip. That was fine, as Judy found herself turning over in her head a conversation she had had just before they got started.

* * * * * * * * * * * *

Kay Dillon looked up just in time to see Judy walk into the main lab room. The fennec vixen was applying new data gained to do a rework of the sound recording of whatever had passed phone station 2309 over six decades ago. New data provided by the very rabbit woman coming towards her. Slipping off her oversized headset, Kay put it aside and got to her feet as Judy approached.

“I thought you were taking off on a vacation tour,” she said.

“We will be in about another hour,” Judy replied.

“So, what can I do for you?” asked the fennec.

“Kay, I did a short study on the microphones and speakers in telephone handsets and have a question to ask you,” Judy said.

“Ask away, I’m all ears,” Kay answered

“That’s supposed to be a bunny pun!” Judy said, with a pained expression on her face.

“When rabbits can seriously compete with we fennecs in our audio hearing range they can make claim to that one.”

“Careful what you wish for, Kay,” Judith thought.

“Now, your phone handset question,” Kay said.

“Yes. What I want to know is how you managed to overcome the single source problem. How, with just that one mouthpiece microphone, you’ve managed to figure out the direction of travel of the alien.”

The questioning look on Kay’s face puzzled Judy.

“You mean, they never told you?”

“Well, if they had I wouldn’t be asking the question.”

“That’s not…”

Kay stopped.

“Let’s go to the breakroom and sit for a bit,” she suggested.

After getting a couple of fruit juices from the vending machines, they settled at the table they had sat at during Judy’s last visit.

“Judy, do you know the difference between speakers and microphones?”

“One converts the waves of a caller’s voice into electrical waves or pulses and the other reconverts those waves or pulses back into audio sound waves,” the doe explained.

“Correct. Now, do you know what the real physical difference between the two of them is?”

Judy shook her head.

"None. Most every speaker makes a great microphone. All that is needed is to tap the speaker leads off to another microphone amp, then send the signal back separately.”

A confused look crosses Judy’s face.

“Why do that?”

“Judy, your era is notable for several things; two of those are, 1) a tremendous growth in scientific research and development and, 2) paranoia. The atomic bomb secrets were compromised as were who knows how many other things the military and national government were trying to keep from being secured by the Rus and other questionable to downright unfriendly governments. Up until the advent of the cell phone, and even after that, the way a mammal kept someone on the other end from hearing them talking to someone else in their physical presence or on another phone was to cover the mouth piece with their hand or press it against their body. In most cases, the earphone part was left uncovered. And, if wired right, anything said would be picked up by it and sent out.”

Kay saw the look of dawning realization on Judith’s face.

“And, most, if not all, of the phones in the complex were set up that way,” Judy murmured aloud to herself.

Kay nodded.

“So, you did have two sound pickups.”

“Their centers almost exactly seven point five inches apart and each curved at the same but opposing angles,” the vixen said. “And, as I said before, you literally could not have placed that handset in a better position.”

* * * * * * * * * * * *

They pulled off of the road into the lot of what Nick called a ‘truck stop’. After gassing up, Nick parked in front of the main building and escorted Judy inside. She was close to being awed, compared to the road side service stations of her own time this place was downright huge! And while those stations of old might have offered some cold drinks and, maybe, a few bagged snacks for sale, what was in this place could easily have fed her whole family of 89 for at least a week, more likely two. And that wasn’t all, there were mindboggling numbers of other items for sale, most of which she had no idea what they were for. Having picked out several snacks she wanted to try, Judy had started for the cash register desk when she pulled up short so fast that Nick almost tripped over her.

“Nick, I haven’t got any money to pay for this!” she said.

“No problem, I’ll cover it,” he replied.

“That’s kind but I should be doing that, not you.”

“Well, let me take care of it this one time,” he said as he took the items from her hands and set them on the counter.

The process of checking out was far different from her past experiences, no punching on cash register keys and hearing that ‘ching!” sound when it rang up. Instead, the cashier swept each item over a section of glass set in the counter, there was a “beep” sound, and the item amount (shockingly expensive, in her eyes), along with a total, appeared on a display that she could read. Less than a minute later, it was all done. Nick swiped a card through a slot in the side of a small box, tapped a few keys on the keypad, and then he picked up their purchases, in two small nonpaper bags, one for her items and the other for his, and they headed for the doors.

“Here you are, Fluff,” Nick said, handing over the bag with her items.

They climbed into the RV and, once in the driver’s seat, Nick pulled out one of his snacks, opened it, and began chewing on it. Judy selected a bag of alfalfa/clover sticks, opened it and pulled one out to gnaw on.

“I have to talk to Bogo about getting paid. With all that….”

“Already set up, Fluff. Ole Buffalo Cheeks is thick headed on some things but payroll is not one of them. You’ve been on salary since I brought you up from the complex.”

Reaching inside of his vest, Nick pulled out an envelope and handed it to Judy. She opened it up and extracted the contents; a batch of $20 bills ($600.00 worth) and three plastic cards. She picked one up to look it over.

“That is the debit card to your account. The pin number, a security number, is written on a piece of tape on the back. Let me know if you want to change it and I’ll walk you through how to do that.”

He explained to her how to use the card and said that on their next stop he’d show her how to use it to get cash out of an ATM. The other two cards, he explained, were loadable gift cards, each with $800.00 on it, that were good for any purchase up to that amount. Again, he promised to guide her through the procedure to get more money on them.

“I need to know how much is in the account,” she said.

Nick produced another envelope and handed it to her. Judy opened it and pulled out the single page within, unfolded it, and read it. Nick grinned at the growing look of confusion on her face.

“This…this can’t be right!” she exclaimed.

“Oh, why not?” he asked as he strapped on his six-point safety harness.

“It’s too much! I’ve only been back seven weeks! How can I have earned $147,623.00 in that time?!”

Firing up the engine, Nick got back out on the road.

“There’s no mistake, Miss Rip Van Winkle. And that’s not any ways near all of it.”

“Huh?”

“As you haven’t actually been dead all of those years and were on…in a government facility still owned by said government, Bogo arranged to have you back paid for all of those 61 years that you were in ‘time out’ mode. The Chief didn’t give me an exact dollar figure, but the amount, in the series of other accounts they’ve set up for you, including bonuses for all of the new information you’ve provided, comes to over six million dollars, and that is after taxes.”

Judith remained in stunned silence for many a mile.

* * * * * * * * * * * *

Their stop in Vegas came close to being a full sensory overload for Judy. Colorful and, literally, flashy facades and display signs declared the names of the hotel/casinos along the main roads through the city (not to mention those, usually smaller, ones on the outskirts).

“In 1958, there were five hotel/casino complexes in Vegas,” Nick told her. “Today, there are 106 with several more under construction, and more in the planning and licensing stage.”

Their reservations, two adjacent rooms, were at the “Excalibur”, a “Legends of King Arthur” themed place. Once in their rooms, fox and rabbit napped until the evening then dressed semi-formal and went out to tour the ‘Strip’. If Judy thought those light displays in daytime were something, they completely paled in colorful brilliance to what they were at night! Add in shooting fountain displays where water, for all intents and purposes, ‘danced’ around in them and, in some, shot 100+ feet into the air. Nick wore his sunglasses and when he saw Judy rubbing her eyes he produced a pair from a pocket and handed them to her.

“Thanks,” she said after slipping them on. “Never thought I would see the time I would need to wear these during the night.”

“Bad as it is for you, think of what it’s like for us nocturnal types,” he said.

Judy was glad for her fox’s presence. She’d be utterly lost in this place without him. Over the time they spent in “Sin City” the pair took in a couple of Broadway shows playing there, toured some of the local sightseeing spots, and ‘contributed’ at least several hundreds of dollars to the local economy through slot machines, blackjack playing, and some time spent at a Craps table.

“Whew, what would mom think of me if she could see me now,” Judy thought as she readied to launch the pair of dice in her paw once again.

The trip tours through the parklands were much more sedate and a lot less costly than their time in Vegas. To Judy’s surprise, they were not staying at a hotel in Bunnyburrow. Instead, Nick had rented a house at the edge of town. After putting away their clothing and other items in their respective rooms, the pair took a stroll into town. Not surprisingly, the place had changed some over the decades. New houses, many with underlying burrows, lined the edge of town. While rabbits and hares were still predominating, there was a noticeable growth in the populations of non-lapin species. Trees she remembered, and had climbed, were taller and though most of the streets were still there, they had undergone changes, mainly to do with widening them. When they got to the opposite side of the burrow Judy saw activity going on there.

“Oh, I forgot, it’s time for the midsummer harvest festival,” she recalled.

“Yes, it starts tomorrow and goes for two weeks,” Nick responded.

Judy looked to him.

“You made those side trips so that we’d arrive just in time for it,” she concluded.

“Fox stands guilty as charged!” Nick said. “So, file away that quantum mind part of yourself and be just a farm girl having a good time.”

Back at the house, Judith had some trouble getting to sleep. The anticipation of tomorrow had her as excited as when she was a kit. The day did not disappoint, the weather was good and stayed that way well into the night. Wearing a checkered dark pink colored long sleeved shirt, a pair of comfortable jeans, and broad brimmed woven straw hat, she wondered around the festival, letting her senses take in all of it.

“Sixty years have passed but this, this is still the same,” she thought.

Even the sales of tickets and items were done the ways she had known from so long ago; cash traded hands and was put into a box or, amazingly, even an old vintage, for these days, analog cash register here and there. However, the modern day still intruded, in the way of the pervasive presence of those smartphones and the occasional electronic tablet. Nick was with her, of course; her ever present guardian whose company garnered a lot of questioning to puzzled looks from those around them. The fox turned his paw to several carnival skill games, won some prizes, and handed them over to her.

“Prizes for the violet eyed bunny,” he said with a grin that caused her ears to heat and redden.

They were exiting one of the carnival rides when Judy spotted someone and stopped in her tracks.

“It can’t be,” she said.

“What?” questioned Nick as he followed the direction she looked.

His eyes picked out the one mammal that stood out. That was because of her fleece. Instead of the usual cream to almost white colorings….

“Black as the inside of an unlighted coal mine at midnight, as they say,” Nick thought.

He put the ewe’s age around 16 to 18 and she wore a short sleeved shirt that sported alternating white and dark pink horizontal stripes and a pair of magenta colored cargo shorts. Judy snagged his paw.

“Come on, Nick!” she said as the bunny pulled him towards the sheep.

“Miss, miss!” Judy called as they approached.

The ewe looked at Judy with a curious expression on her face.

“Yes?”

“I’m sorry to intrude but, would you tell me your name?” Judy asked.

“I’m Sheela Woolverson,” came the answer.

The bunny paused for a few heartbeats.

“You wouldn’t happen to know of a Sharla Gibson, would you?” she asked.

“Yes, she is my great-great-grandmother.”

Judy’s ears perked up as she noted the present tense, and was about to ask another question when a fast approaching sound claimed her attention. She barely got turned around towards it when a pair of starving anacondas wrapped around her and she found herself hugged crushingly hard against someone.

“Judy!! It’s you! Your alive! Ohhhh, they told us you died but I never really believed it! And here you are!” a voice that was so joyful that its sound made the bunny forget that she couldn’t breathe.

“Ahem, madam, would you please loosen your hold on my colleague so that she may breathe properly,” intruded Nick’s voice.

That hold loosened and, next, Judy found herself held at arm’s length. She raised her eyes to see who it was. The sight that greeted her stirred astonishment within her. Never in her remembered life had she seen a sheep face that was as aged as this one. More crow’s-feet wrinkles than she thought were possible dominated the corners of the eyes, eyes that….

“Wh…who are y…you?” Judith stammered out.

There was just a second of confusion in the elderly ewe’s face, then…

“Judy, it’s me, Sharla,” came the answer.

All of a sudden, Judy knew the real meaning of the term “poleaxed”. Her mind just locked up, unable, at this time, to take in that revelation.

“Miss Sharla, I’m Nicholas Wilde, and my friend does go by the name of Judy, full name Judith Leslie Hobson,” Nick said.

The fox’s voice jarred Judy out of her paralysis and she looked in his direction as she was set on her feet on the ground.

“Driver’s license,” she saw him mouth.

With trembling fingers, she dug her billfold out of her back pocket, opened it up, and pulled out her license. Wanting to keep her initials, and first name, they had settled on this one as her public identity.

“Here,” she said as she handed the card to Sharla.

While the New Mexxally license ‘said’ that it had been issued seven months ago, it, and the picture of her on it, were barely two weeks old. The date of birth read “7 March, 1993”.

“Have to admit that it would be interesting to see the look on some cop’s face if your original date of birth was on it,” she remembered Nick saying in amusement when he had handed it to her.

Sharla scrutinized the license, looked to Judy, then back to the card.

“Sharp old bird, maybe too sharp,” Nick thought.

As Sharla did her examination, Judy looked her once best friend over. The fleece not covered by the short sleeved blouse and her just about the knees length skirt showed not one bit of the black from long ago. Instead, just about all of it looked like spun silver with a slight darkening towards gray in a few small areas.

“My apologies,” the elder ewe said, at last, as she handed the card back to Judy. “But, you are the very image, a veritable clone, of my friend when she was your age.”

“No apologies needed, you just startled me…” Judy began.

“Nana Sharla, you dropped your canes,” Sheela interrupted as she handed them over.

Taking one in each hand, the elderly sheep looked back at the bunny and the fox who, now, stood close behind and a little to one side of the rabbit doe.

“You two enjoy the festival,” she said, then shambled away.

Judy didn’t know what to think. After all these years, her best friend still lived. That was something of a major miracle in its own right. But to see her so aged…

“Miss Hobson.”

Tearing her eyes from the receding elder, Judy looked to Sheela.

“Do you happen to be an astronomer?” she asked.

“No, I’m afraid not.”

Sheela nodded and then headed off to follow Sharla. Judy’s mind worked furiously; for Maker’s sake, to find her best friend still alive. She wanted more than a “ships passing in the night” contact with her, at least a little more.

“I’ve got to find out more about her life. Find out what she’s done since I’ve been gone. But how without making folks here….”

Her ears perked up.

“Nick, does that smartphone of yours work here?”

“Oh yeah. The whole area is wired with wi-fi and the signals are five bar,” he said.

“Okay, let’s find an unoccupied table. I want to see if this Net has information I want.”

On what?”

“Not what, who,” she said as she headed off.

“As in ‘Who’s on firs…”

WHOA!! Who knew a bunny could growl like a hacked off wolf?!



“That’s her,” Judy said when Nick brought up the file.

The picture attached to the file was taken a few years after Judy last saw her. It was accompanied by another one showing a cream fleeced ram.

“That’s Roy Woolverson, Sharla was sweet on him in college,” Judy said.

“Well, they were more than sweet on each other. ‘Married in September of 1959. Five kids, three rams and two ewes. Extensive works in fields of astronomy and astrophysics’,” Nick read aloud.

He scrolled downwards and something caught his eye.

“Judy, look at this.

She scooted closer in order to see the screen better.

“’In 1983, the team of Sharla Gibson and Roy Woolverson published a paper that suggested that by taking into account the new inflation theory and some new red shift data that it was theoretically possible that there were objects, such as galaxies, and even whole clusters of them, that were not only traveling at the speed of light, but, in some cases, anywhere up to as much as 54 to 57 percent beyond the speed of light. While no one was able to find fault with the data and calculations made, most of the astronomical community dismissed the findings as “impossible”’.”

A claw tip scrolled down more to stop at another section.

“’After extensive and exhaustive evaluation of the 1995 Humble space telescope long exposure photo of a supposedly utterly empty area of space had, instead, a minimum of 2,500 galaxies in the view, the measurements revealed something utterly astonishing. Most of these objects were traveling at tremendous speeds; at least 70% of the speed of light. Further evaluation over the years showed something even more incredible, that almost a third of the objects were, indeed, moving at or above the speed of light! Some at the 50+ percent speeds as suggested in the original Gibson/Woolverson paper of 1983! These findings, checked and rechecked, have forced virtually all fields of physics and space sciences to rethink every law and theory based on the speed of light being the ultimate ‘speed limit’.”

“Wow, bet a lot of Sharla and Roy’s detractors ended up consuming vast amounts of crow after that!” Judy said.

“Well, Sharla may have served said bird up to them but not her mate.”

“Huh?”

Nick pointed to a single line in the file.

“In March of 1991, Roy Woolverson lost his battle with liver cancer and died.”

* * * * * * * * * * * *

Sheela Woolverson answered the knock at the front door and found Judy and Nick standing outside.

“Would it be alright if we visited with Sharla?” the doe asked.

“Oh Maker, what am I DOING?!” she thought as she awaited an answer. “What can I say that won’t give things away? That would make the remotest sense while keeping what’s happened to me secret?”

She had not the slightest idea, all she knew was, against Nick’s advice, she had to see her old friend again.

“Sheela, who’s that at the door?” called a voice from within the house.

“It’s the bunny and fox we met at the festival, grandma.”

“Bring them in,” the voice said, after a second’s pause.

“Grandmother! We don’t….”

“I said…bring…them…in!”

“Now that’s the Sharla I know!” Judy thought as she followed the younger ewe into the house.

The silver fleeced elder sat in a comfortably padded chair in the large living room. She wore a pink colored long sleeved blouse and a light blanket covered her legs. The ewe’s eyes locked onto Judy and Nick the instant they entered the room and Judy got that “they are seeing more than just the surface” feeling.

“Please, be seated,” Sharla said, indicating the chairs on either side of her.

Judy took the one at her left side. Nick positioned himself where he stood behind and a little to one side of where Judy sat. Sharla’s eyes missed none of it.

“Sheela, go to the festival and enjoy yourself,” she said.

“Granma! We…you don’t know these mammals. It’s not safe….”

The young ewe halted at the look of steel her elder gave her.

“Sheela, for reasons you won’t understand, I am safer with these two than I would be with most of the residents of Bunnyburrow, and even some members of my own family. Now, skedaddle!”

Defeated, she left. Sharla returned her attention to her guests. Judy first, then her eyes shifted to the standing Nick.

“Mr. Wilde, do you ever relax from your guardianship of Judith?” she asked.

All she got in answer was a soft smile. Judy saw those turquoise blue eyes come back to her. Eyes that were as sharp and clear as they had been more than six decades ago. Eyes that looked deep, and missed nothing.

“I don’t know how it’s happened but you are Judith Lavern Hopps, my closest friend,” she said at last.

“Miss….” the doe started.

“Judy, stop. While I have rather enjoyed your tale of how you are not who you are, there is one thing that you have over looked, the one thing that proclaims who you really are,” Sharla said.

“Wh…what’s that?”

Those blue eyes shifted just a little to one side.

“Gideon’s claw marks,” the ewe answered.

Without thinking, Judy brought her left hand up to a place on her left cheek. Beneath the fur she could just feel the old scar marks forever branded there.

“While the white marks of the fur covering them have pretty much faded away, I can see them as clearly as when they were new.”

The ensuing silence was decidedly deafening.

“Busted,” Judy heard Nick say only loud enough for her amped up ears to hear.


Sheela Woolverson was not happy. Though ordered by her great-great-grandmother to leave the house and her with the unknown bunny and fox still there, it wasn’t setting well with the 17-year-old ewe. As such, enjoying the festival was something difficult for her to do. More and more fears were playing about in her mind. The only thing preventing her from outright returning was nana Sharla’s well-deserved reputation for verbally stripping fleece, fur, hide, and pelt off of those who displeased her. Still, she could sneak back and check on things on the sly. Upon arriving back at the house, Sheela was about to slip around to one of the living room’s side windows to peep in when the front door opened and out came Sharla and the bunny. Both laughed at something the bunny said and that’s when the fox appeared. He leaned against one side of the doorframe and the teenaged ewe could see the indulgent smile on the vulpine’s face as he watched the two fems go on chatting and giggling. Then, Sheela saw something else, something she hadn’t seen in years; nana Sharla wasn’t using a cane or her walker to help her stand. She stood there, shaking with mirth at something the fox said, as straight backed and steady as if she were years, many years, younger. Sheela shook her head in mystified wonder and went back to the festival.

Epilogue:

Sheela wondered just what she may have gotten herself into. She rode in the front “shotgun” seat of the RV that Nick, the red fox, and Judy, the rabbit, traveled in. Behind her and Nick, seated and strapped into a pair of captain’s chairs, were her great-great-grandmother, Sharla, and the afore mentioned bunny. Both were chatting quietly.

“Maker, I don’t think they’ve stopped, except to sleep and eat, since the first visit to the house!” the 17-year-old ewe thought.

That was eight days ago.

“You’d think they were old long lost friends rather than mammals with some matching interests...and a president for horrid jokes and puns.”

Not that Mr. Wilde was any slouch at either of the last two, she had come to know. If anything, he could outdo both the elder sheep and his rabbit companion, combined, paws down. In those ensuing days, Sheela lost count of how many curious residents of the Burrow asked her who the mystery pair were.

“They are from New Mexxally and they are on vacation. They’re here so they can see pretty much nothing but green all around versus scrub brush brown. After doing some image research of New Mexxally, I can understand their desire,” she’d told many a questioner.

More than a few had inquired on the question as to whether the vulpine and bunny might be/were lovers.

“Honestly, I don’t know,” she’d say. “And before you ask, I don’t think they are.”

“At present,” she would mentally add.

Though still young, Sheela sensed that there was something about those two that ‘said’ that they belonged together. She’d said so, once, to Sharla.

“My dear, you show a shrewdness beyond your years in that…’seeing’ of those two,” the elder ewe said in response.

Then, she saw the strangest of expressions cross her long lived elder’s face.

“And I hope to live to see the day when they will well and truly rattle this world to its core.”

The day before the Summer Festival was to end, Nick told Sheela that he was going to take Judy and Sharla out in the countryside for a surprise he had put together for them.

“I know you still have a few reservations about us so I’m asking that you accompany us as assistant and chaperon,” he told her. “Also, I think you’ll enjoy what it is, as well.”

He was correct in his view of her family having concerns. Hers had mostly faded by now and his invite to her made what was left trickle away some more.

“I’ll be happy to come along,” she accepted.

It was close to 10:00 PM. A waxing quarter moon hung above the horizon and every star in the cloudless night sky shown sharp and clear. Sheela was familiar with the territory they moved through. It was part of a nature preserve that was a mix of forests, clearings, hills, and low mountains. She was surprised when the night guard at the gate they stop at passes them on through after seeing Nick’s ID. The place was closed to the public after 6:00 PM. They drove a couple of more miles towards those mountains and then Nick stopped the vehicle and put it in park.

“Okay Ladies, time for fox of mystery to be properly mysterious,” he said as he rummaged through a bag set between his and Sheela’s seats.

From it, he pulled a pair of silk sleeping masks and then handed one to Sharla and the other one to Judy.

“For the next couple of hours, your main sense will be your hearing.”

Sheep and bunny looked over their respective masks, each sized for them.

“Is he this enigmatic often?” Sharla inquired as she slipped hers on.

“So far, this is his first time,” Judy replied as she donned her own mask.

Both masks cover their wearer from below their eyes to the upper part of their foreheads. Nick put the RV back in gear and headed down the road. He made a left turn a moment later, drove about another mile, then stopped and shut off the engine.

“We’re here,” he announced as he bailed out of the door.

“Here” was a place that Sheela recognized as she and others had been in attendance to a once a year event held at this location. Opening the side entrance door, Nick and Sheela carefully guided their respective charges out of the RV, then Nick, his hand holding one of Judy’s, led the way. Some hundred odd fox paces later, he stopped and set Judy down on a surprisingly comfortable lounge chair whose back was set at a 55 (+ or –) degree angle. Sheela got Sharla settled on a similarly comfortable lounge chair of her own, its back set at the same angle as Judy’s. There was, perhaps, about a foot of space between the two.

“Relax, my Ladies, and enjoy,” he said, softly.

With that, he flagged the one other mammal present. The badger, the fur on the right and left sides of his head trimmed almost down to the hide beneath, nodded and began his “magic”. A long low sounding tone emitted from the speakers. Even in the dim lighting, Sheela recognized the badger, he was Cordell Madis, one of the best synthesizer musicians in the country. His equipment was set up in a natural rock amphitheater and those lounge chairs were laid out in the best position for the coming music to be most effective.

“Nick is so right, there is no way I would want to miss this!” the teen ewe thought as the long low mysterious sounding music wave rolled lazily over them.

Nick stepped behind the black woolen teen, she had positioned herself behind and between the two chairs.

“Close your eyes, Sheela. Listen and feel. Ride the music so it takes you places you have barely dreamed of,” she heard him say.

She closed her eyes, and abandon all thought.

That wave repeated and an oddly sounding echo accompanied it. Slowly, ever so slowly, the repeating wave had other notes and tones added to it. As it went on, it seemed to Sheela that, in its beginning, it ‘spoke’ of a world coming to a slow and gentle end. Then, it gradually picked up in pace, telling the listeners of a new world coming.

“Things end, things begin.” was the quote that slipped through the teenage ewe’s mind as the music went on.

“By all the Great Makers deeds!” Sharla whispered to herself at the sensations that rolled through her.

She felt a hand take her own and was happy for the contact with the life friend she knew so well. The one who, long thought dead, had somehow returned into her life when she needed her the most.

The one badger concert went on, it’s music promising intriguing mysteries, astonishing wonders, and great deeds to be done for those with the courage and desire to see and grasp them.