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24/7! A Pink and Blue Diaperfur Adventure

Part One of Four

kitncub

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Four parts to be posted over the next several days if you want to read episodically. Whole thing will be up around next weekend, if you want to read it all at once, can wait until then.

If I owe you a cameo and you haven't heard from me, it will be in the _next_story! Not this one! Sorry! Meant to get to them sooner, but it turns out that I somehow have a life and stuff. Who knew? I _will_contact you at least when your cameo is posted (if not before to confirm details).

General Note: This is an 18+ story. So please be 18+, o gentle reader, or else return to studying very, very hard. It involves furs in diapers, who are not babies (physically), and furs in dresses, who are not girls (biologically). It is an adventure/romance story with these elements rather than a straight regression/sissification/sex piece, so it has an involved plot and stuff. It is part of the Pink and Blue diaperfur series, and may be hard to follow if you have not read any of the other stories. Yadda yadda, et cetera et cetera. Don't sue me for not saying any of these things, and don't sue me for anything else, either, because it would make me sad.

Author's Note on this Story: There are three big Pink and Blue stories left, including this one. I am calling them Season Two since they will lead directly into each other. 24/7 is written in a day-in-the-life, hour-by-hour format (a nod to the fact that this will be the last season of 24).

In brief: Rian is the lupine second-in-command of Baby Blue, a fraternity of AB/DL boys founded to create safe spaces for boyish behavior among the city's age players and protect them from the feminizing forces of the enemy pink team!

Rian has just made a lifestyle decision. This is the first 24 hours of his new life in diapers. Roger, his Labrador mentor, is the group's leader and daddy to many of the boys. He is on a secret mission of his own. This will be one of the longest-and crinkliest-days of their lives!

Other Stories in the Pink and Blue Series:

Will be listed above, or you can click on "Folder" on the upper right of the view to see the whole list

Season Two Opening: Character Recap

The Baby Blue Boys

Roger. The leader. This playful black Lab is founder of the team and daddy to the Baby Blue boys, and many of them look to him for guidance and emotional support. He has many good traits but one thing he's not is organized . . . usually. Likes: His boys. Water balloons. Squirt guns. Comic books. _Dislikes:_Girls. Telling furs what to do.

Rian. The fun one. Roger's sidekick, Baby Blue's co-founder and second-in-command, best friend to Dex, occasional big brother to Twitchy, and boyfriend to the sissy princess fox Serafina, with whom he is deeply in love. Although once shy about his odder preferences, as Roger's partner-in-crime the wolf has come into his own as a natural extrovert who is generous to a fault. The other boys are sure lucky they have Rian to lean on. Likes: Serafina. Diapers. Accessories. _Dislikes:_Schoolwork. Contests.

Dex. The serious one. A sensitive raccoon martial artist and the team's third-in-command and combat leader, Dex is in diapers not by choice but in the aftermath of a traumatic tournament injury, a secret known to only a few of the boys. Roger and Rian coaxed the once apathetic coon back out of his shell. Now he's dating Twitchy after coming to terms with his regressive tendencies during a mission to rescue the bunny. If only he could do something to pay back the furs who gave him a new lease on life. Likes: Sports. Being outdoors. Feeling useful._Dislikes:_Frills. Meat (he's a vegetarian). Bullies.

Twitchy. The smart one. The nervous, goggle-wearing bunny makes up BB's tech team at Hideout #4 together with his partner, the pocket-sized mouse and gadget engineer Squeak. The bunny is dating Dex after the raccoon stunned the team-and Twitchy-by coming through for him on a daring solo rescue mission. Twitch can fix anything broken . . . maybe. Likes: LEGOs. Computers. Magic tricks. _Dislikes:_Lin Lin. Being talked down to. Having to explain things more than once.

The Girl

Serafina. The naughty one. Once a member of Roger's boy's team, the red fox defected to the pink team long ago after an abortive tryst with Roger and has since become a feminized sissy who thinks of herself as a vixen first. Unlike some of her pink teammates, though, Serry is a sissy because she likes guys . . . a bit too much to be one herself. She teaches sex education at the sissy team's feminizing Academy for Special Boys. She's dating Rian-who treats her like a real princess-and just got a lead role in a local Shakespeare festival production. Likes: Boys in tight diapers. Flowers. Ribbons. Romances. Play-acting. Dislikes: Repression. Overly serious furs. Jealousy.

Now, here goes . . .

The first two hours! 1:00 p.m.-3:00 p.m.

1:00 p.m.

"Somefur looks like a dog on a mission," the koala waiter remarked as he touched a pencil stub to his notepad. "So . . . pick a poison?"

The Labrador seated at a stool on the counter, who was wearing a black tee shirt and black jeans under a loose-fitting black windbreaker, wagged his tail and let his sunglasses slide down his muzzle as he looked up over the edge of the menu. He flipped it over in his paws, handed it to the waiter decisively, and rested his elbows on the counter.

"A root beer float, but," he said in a clipped tone, "with chocolate ice cream."

A pawful of customers had just begun to filter into the ice cream parlor in the warm spring afternoon; it had only opened at noon.

The koala blinked and he tilted his head, regarding his visitor curiously. "But . . ." the squat grey bear said carefully, as though responding to a prompt, "that will be all muddy."

"A little mess never stopped me." The Labrador nodded. "After all-boys are built for playing in the dirt."

The koala bit his lip and shook his head. "Sorry," he answered slowly. "We're all out of chocolate ice cream. I do have strawberry."

The dog's eyes flickered from the menu to the ice cream display case behind the counter, and scanned the list of flavors and the full canisters of ice cream it housed suspiciously.

Since chocolate ice cream was, of course, there, one might have expected the canine to protest. Instead, the dog wrinkled his nose, made a distasteful face, and pronounced, as he looked back up at the attendant, "Anything but pink!"

The bear now tilted his head to the opposite side. He could hear crinkling as the dog's tail wagged; most furs would have assumed it was his windbreaker. "Your name is . . . Roger?" the fuzzy grey counter attendant asked.

The Labrador's face lit up and he grinned playfully. "Hey!" Roger exclaimed, sounding genuinely surprised. "How did you know that?"

The bear set down his notepad and reached under the counter to press a button, abandoning any pretext of taking Roger's order. Then he motioned to the opposite end of the counter with his paw.

"Go around back, through the employee entrance," the bear said, nodding. "The manager is expecting you."

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

1:15 p.m.

The raccoon let out a disappointed sigh as he watched the last stragglers from an afternoon econ lecture filter out of the building.

He shouldered his backpack and turned to leave-only to stiffen in surprise as he found himself facing a tall, bony red fox wearing a loose-fitting green silk dress, with a small bow on a barette clipped behind one of her ears. She had been standing on the other side of the departing crowd, and her eyes sparkled as she suddenly noticed the raccoon, who was wearing a nondescript blue tee-shirt tucked into his black jeans.

"Dex!" Serafina said, smiling. "I almost didn't recognize you out of your karate uniform! I was hoping to catch Rian after class and wish him a good start today, since I can't make the party later on."

"Ditto," the raccoon said stiffly, blinking twice. "But it wouldn't be the first class he's cut." Dex shook his head and scanned Serafina. "So it's true. You two really are going 24/7 with your respective . . . things . . ."-the coon flicked a paw up at the fox, indicating her head-to-toe attire-"on the same day."

The sissy fox crossed the flagstone path between them looked around furtively, nodding. She was still a bit nervous about crossdressing on the street, but not overly so on campus-nofur at City College would have seen her any other way, anyhow. And she had foregone her diapers, for the time being-making it through the play as a full-time girl would be complicated enough.

"That was our decision. To show solidarity. Besides, yesterday was my last day at the stationery store," she said. "It never paid that well to begin with and now that the academy gig is pretty steady, between that and the play I'm going to be too busy for anything else anyway. Rehearsals start tonight. But I'm so glad to see you alone for once!"

She threw her arms around the raccoon, who shuddered involuntarily as she gave him a quick, tight squeeze. "Oh, relax," she said, letting him go and gesturing at the bow on her head. "It's not catching!"

Dex bit his lip and frowned, his eyes glinting. "What was that for?" he asked suspiciously.

"Oh, I know we never run into each other except at group things, but two things I've wanted to tell you," the fox said. "One, congratulations on your acceptances. I'm sure you'll just go across town to Twitchy's school, but it's cool to have choices, right? And two," she blushed slightly, and hesitated for a moment before adding, "thank you. Rian tells me you've been a good friend to us. I'm sure that can't have been easy with your teammates. I know, maybe better than you think, how boys can be about this sort of thing. Even Rog, sometimes. So I really appreciate it."

"A good friend to him, you mean," Dex corrected her, softly but with a tinge of sternness entering his voice. "I'm Rian's friend. Let's not get confused about whose friend I am."

The sissy fox's smile faded and she eyed Dex curiously, one of her ears twitching. "Rian's best friend is my friend too, Dex. I want to prove that to you. You're so tense. Is everything okay with you and Twitchy?" she asked, sounding concerned. She noticed, when most furs wouldn't, the blue fabric pet collar peeking out from under the raccoon's shirt. That would mean Dex was on bottom. That seemed odd. Especially with someone topping who was probably even less experienced than he was. She took a deep breath.

"I know you two just started," she said carefully, "but if you ever need to talk to somefur, you know . . . off team . . . about anything that might not be, well, things you want the other boys to hear about . . . I troubleshoot all kinds of things with my academy students. I know everyone's different and, well, it's not easy, getting started. Sometimes it's awful, the first couple times. It wasn't pretty for me. It can still be wonderful after that, though." She smiled at him. "Really."

The raccoon's eyes widened in horror and he stood rooted to the ground, his backpack still hanging loosely over one shoulder and his other paw holding the opposite strap, for a split second that felt to him like five long minutes. Then his eyes narrowed to steely slits.

"Let's rewind and pretend none of that was said," he snapped. "I'm glad to see you too. There's something I've been meaning to tell you as well. Congrats on your own thing. How long does the play run?"

Serafina frowned and looked down at her footpaws, answering simply, "Through the summer."

"Sounds like a big commitment," the raccoon remarked as he settled the loose strap of his backpack over his other shoulder and his posture slackened a bit. "I hope you're serious about it."

Serry tugged on her skirt and wrinkled her face up. "What are you getting at, Dex?" she asked distastefully. "What do you think you're doing?"

The raccoon snorted. "Rebalancing the scales. I heard that you ran out on Roger, when you switched teams, ages ago."

The fox bristled. "That's . . . not what happened. There was never any relationship there. More like a misunderstanding. Just ask Rog. He doesn't hold a grudge."

"Then someone has to," the raccoon shot back, the corner of his lip turning up in the start of a scowl, "right?"

Serry glared at Dex, both her paws tightening their grip on the green silk, and said nothing.

The raccoon shook his head. "Well try not to do a repeat performance. Rian's not the total goofball he'd like everyfur to think he is," Dex said gravely. "He's a lot more sensitive than he lets on. I hope you know that. If he wants some alone time before the party it's probably because he's getting in touch with his serious side right now. I know you two have an unusually . . . open relationship. But for whatever reason he's put his whole soul into it. And I for one am sick and tired of hearing him worry about whether he's good enough for you. You're the one who ought to prove yourself to him."

The sissy fox rolled her eyes. "Great," she said, sighing. "Macho posturing. You really are the bluest boy over there, aren't you?"

Dex turned to leave. "Have to run," he said curtly. "If you do see Rian tell him I said good luck and if he needs to reach me I'm tied up until tonight. Male bonding with Ace."

"Good," Serry said, relaxing. "Talk things out with your friend. Talk about me, too. You'll feel better."

"Ace and I don't talk," the raccoon, already walking away, corrected her without turning around.

"Then have fun doing whatever it is you two budding psychotherapists do instead," she replied dismissively, waving a paw after him.

Dex looked back at the vixen over his shoulder and said matter-of-factly before marching off, "Standing notice: Break my best friend's heart, and you'll find out. Full-time or not, you're still a boy under that dress, by prevailing standards."

Serry released her grip on her skirt and chewed on her lip, staring after the vanishing coon thoughtfully. "Somefur," she muttered, "is having more trouble in bed than I thought."

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

1:30 p.m.

Rian looked down into the hefty white plastic garbage bag full of pale blue briefs and brightly patterned boxers. The words "CLOTHES DONATION" were written on the garbage bag with permanent marker, in a childish block print. He stuck his tongue out at the sack's contents right before he pulled the drawstrings shut with a flourish. "So long to all of you!" the cubby gray wolf remarked, before turning his back on the bag.

He stripped off his shirt and, leaving it on the floor, plopped down onto the twin bed in his small apartment wearing nothing except two diapers and a pair of blue socks with puffy clouds printed on them. He heard himself crinkle as he did, and smiled up at the green and white wrapping of the unopened pack of X-Plus diapers that stood next to his pillow.

"And hello to you, my friends!" he remarked exuberantly, grabbing the bag and squeezing it to his chest as tight as he could. "My diapers!" he said with satisfaction.

The comforter of his bed had been pulled back, and Rian lay there for a moment on the sheets with his eyes closed. He had sprinkled baby powder copiously over the bed linens after diapering himself, and he let the smell wash over him, hugging the bag of diapers in a fetal position and rocking back and forth.

"Oh, crinklies!" He said to the bag, rubbing the tip of his nose against it and listening to the sounds it made, "I love you so much! You can do anything. Thanks to you I met my wonderful daddy and my beautiful girlfriend and my brave best friend and my smart little brother and all the boys! If I could I would wear six of you and waddle everywhere! If I could I would-I would-" the wolf fidgeted and giggled as he felt his stiffening weewee press outwards against the cushioned inner layer of the pair of diapers he was wearing. "I would wear ten of you and crawl everywhere! Don't worry about being bundled up though, friends!" he continued excitedly and slowly began to rock his hips back and forth, humping sideways against the air. "I promise I will still use each and every one of you with love!"

He stopped himself, releasing the bag and scooting backwards up onto his knees, and looked all around the room furtively. It was a spartan place, except for the closet and the dresser and overflow wardrobe next to it that contained all of his clothes and cub gear.

Rian was not the sort of fur who spent very much time at home-at least, he hadn't been ever since he had met Roger and they had founded Baby Blue, a fraternity of diaper-loving boys devoted to promoting boyish behavior among the city's ageplayers and protecting them from unwilling sissification by the enemy pink team, currently headquartered at Empress Calliope's feminizing Academy for Special Boys.

If the wolf wasn't in class-and, let's face it, that was pretty often-he was usually visiting Roger or one of the boys, supervising a Baby Blue team, organizing a party, combing the mall and thrift stores for cub gear and team supplies, or, increasingly, spending time with the one sissy he loved, and thought of without hesitation, boy parts under her panties or no, as a vixen and his girlfriend, Serafina.

"It's okay," Rian whispered to the bag of diapers, his eyes darting from wall to wall and ceiling to floor, as he ripped it open, his excitement mounting. "We're all alone. Let's have our own little pre-party!"

He began removing diapers from the bag and kicked his pillows off the bed. They fell to the floor with a soft thud. Rian carefully laid out and unfolded one diaper after another, scooting backwards to make more space as he completed each row. Soon he reached the foot of his bed, and hopped backwards on to the floor.

Rian grinned at the surface of the mattress, which was now entirely overlaid with a layer of soft, absorbent cushioning, and reached down next to his dresser to snatch up another full bag of diapers. He tossed it gently to where the pillows had been. Then, from the top of his dresser, he took one bottle of powder in each paw, and, walking around the bed, shook both bottles vigorously, liberally powdering all the unfolded diapers and sending clouds of sweet-smelling talcum up into the air. The cubby wolf shut his eyes, blissfully taking in the scent, and, the diapers he was wearing drawn taut, dove onto the bed.

Rian kept his eyes closed and heard the whole surface crinkle as he landed on it. More powder wafted up into the air around him, and he rolled back and forth on his bed, flattening his ears and listening to the magnifying crinkling of his own diapers and the unfolded rows he rolled over. He felt like he was riding on a cloud, far above the world-a soft, cottony, protected place where nofur could see anything he did.

"Can't move wiffout crinkling!" he said to himself with a giggle.

Reaching down, he pulled out the front of the diapers he wore and lowered them just a bit, letting his erect yiffer pop out over the top, without taking them off. Ah, that was a relief. It had been getting hot and sweaty, and a tiny bit sticky with precum, in there.

The wolf slid the unopened bag of diapers he had substituted for his pillow under his chest and rested his torso on it and his left paw next to it, keeping himself elevated a few inches over the bed. The base of his cock rubbed against the waistbands of the diapers he was wearing, and its tip just brushed against the soft cushioning of the diapers on the bed as he moved it back and forth. Each time it did, he felt a tingle under his fur. His right paw made its way to the base of his shaft and gripped his weewee loosely, gently and skillfully applying, and then withdrawing, pressure, as he began humping.

His nose also inclined downward to the bed and brushed against the soft cushioning of another diaper, and he started snuffling involuntarily at the overwhelming scent of powder. "I love you I love you I love you I love you," he kept whispering into the diaper near his muzzle as he pumped away. "Would wear five of you ten of you twelve of you twenny of you thirty of you . . ."

Then he exploded. His whole body shook and a thick, warm, sticky white puddle poured out of the tip of his cock into the comfortable, welcoming cushioning of an unfolded bulky diaper. He flopped over on to his side, shivering, and hugged the unopened bag of diapers into his chest, whimpering, "I love you!" into it. He lay there trembling for several minutes. Eventually, his cock feeling shorter, but still stiff, he repositioned the diaper bag-support, resting on it to crouch over another open diaper-and began the process again, except this time, feeling hardly able to string words together, he just whined joyously until, after what might have been fifteen or twenty minutes, he really wasn't sure, he achieved a second release, and opened his eyes, looking sideways across the room, panting. Everything looked fuzzy. He couldn't make out the time on his clock.

With his vision blurry and his sense of smell dulled by the clouds of powder that his humping had thrown up into the air, the wolf's hearing was momentarily sharpened. He could hear every crinkle, every creak in his hallway. He heard a nervous tapping from right outside, then there was a cautious knock on the door. He smiled softly and rolled off the bed, making no effort to clean anything up, got to his feet, and tucked his slackening yiffer back into the front of his diapers. A thin layer of talcum adhered to his fur. "Just a . . . minute," he called out, his voice wavering. He opened his closet, pulled out the first bathrobe he found and slipped his arms into it, letting it hang open loosely as he staggered to the door. It was a white terrycloth robe covered with colorful blue and brown pawprints.

Rian unlocked the door, cracking it open and tilting his head as he smiled up at the bunny in the hallway. He opened it wide and motioned for him to come in. "What's up," the wolf asked unsteadily, "Twitch?"

The white rabbit fidgeted with the safety goggles settled on his forehead as he hopped into the room. His large ears flicked. "Commander?" he said uncertainly. "I . . . umm . . . got your e-mail . . . and I wanted to talk to you before the party. Not on the phone. But is this a good time?" Twitchy looked around the room quizzically. "Is Serry in the bathroom? I heard a lot of voices and . . . stuff . . . and I thought maybe I should just go . . ."

He sneezed at the onslaught of powder and his eyes flicked from the bed to Rian. The wolf had a dazed smile on his face and rested one paw on Twitchy's shoulder as he pushed the door shut behind the rabbit with the other. "That's sweet," the wolf said dreamily. "You're a good friend."

Twitchy, who spent most of his time outside Baby Blue in labs, disassembling electronic devices, or doing homework, pawed a good deal less than most of the boys, but he could certainly recognize that his friend was in the afterglow of multiple orgasms.

"Umm. . . Rian," Twitchy bit his lip and phrased his question euphemistically as he stared at the bed. "Were you . . . talking to . . . your diapers?"

Rian laughed and hugged the bunny tight. "Aww, don't worry, Twitchy!" he said happily, reaching behind the rabbit with one paw and patting the bunny's cushioned rear, which crinkled slightly, beneath his cottonball tail. He concluded reassuringly, "I'm sure yours are cute too!"

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

2:05 p.m.

"Hey!" the lion next to Roger in the elevator snapped as Roger pressed the floor 12 and floor 14 buttons at the same time. "Make up your mind where you're going! Some of us have meetings to get to."

"Ooo!" the Labrador remarked as the elevator doors slid shut. "I have one of those too!" He glanced at his watch, frowning. "And I think I might be late for it. Little hand is minutes. . ." he bit his lip and calculated in his head, then nodded decisively. "Yup," he concluded. "I'm five minutes late."

The cat raised an eyebrow. "Umm," he asked tentatively, "do you know which company it's at? Maybe I can tell you which floor it's on and save you a little time."

"Huh?" Roger asked as the elevator carriage lifted, then glanced from the panel to the business-suited lion. "Oh, you don't know! Don't worry! It will only stop once!"

The lion blinked as the number on the floor counter blinked past 12 and settled on 13 and the doors slid open with a ding. His eyes widened as Roger stepped out of the elevator on to the floor that, officially, didn't exist.

The Labrador turned around to look back the puzzled cat, grinning, as the elevator doors began to shut.

"Don't tell anyone though!" Roger added good-naturedly, pushing his sunglasses back up his muzzle with one finger, right before he vanished from sight. "I think it's supposed to be a secret!"

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

2:10 p.m.

Serafina sat on the edge of the stage and swung her feet idly as the tabby cat playing Orsino struggled to get on his not-yet-broken-in leather boots.

She was watching a beaver and a white opossum curiously as their paws flew about and they conducted a rapid, incomprehensible argument. Eventually, the beaver cocked the beret on his head triumphantly, and the marsupial settled into a despairing posture, burying his face into his forepaws and shaking his head. He trudged along behind the beaver, emitting loud sighs periodically, as both approached the scattered crew of half-dressed actors. The beaver, whose shirt pocket was stuffed with pencils, withdrew one and began chewing on it thoughtfully as he surveyed the stage.

"What's the deal with those two anyway?" she whispered to the tabby cat. "Are they always together? Who are we supposed to listen to?"

The feline blinked. "Oh right," the actor said, smiling. "I forgot! You're a newbie. Well, Marty"-he gestured at the beaver-"is the director and Woody"-he gestured at the opossum-" is the producer, but he's sort of like a sidekick, I guess. Woody will actually spend most of the rehearsals looking tortured and muttering into his paws just like that. But at some point Marty will get too carried away and there will be some insurmountable problem with money or staging, something technical, and he'll snap into action. This is my fourth show with them and it's always the same thing." He shrugged and smiled. "They're good guys, really. I'd do all my work with them if it paid better."

Serry bit her lip and eyed the beaver. With a start, she realized that the tabby cat was reaching over her legs for a canteen on the other side of her, and she jerked herself backward, one paw reaching up to shield the chest padding under her dress.

The orange cat raised an eyebrow. "Honey," he said with a laugh, shaking his head as he picked up the canteen and leaned back, "Relax. Unless it's in the script, I never touch girls with my paws. Don't worry that anyone around here is going to feel you up or anything. Well, maybe the tigress playing Olivia. She's a strange one. Now if you were a boy," he added with a sparkle in his eye, "you might have a spot of trouble."

Serafina bit her lip and scanned the crew nervously. The beaver spread his arms wide. The opossum peeked out from between his fingers.

"Okay, gents, and-" Marty looked over the actors already on stage, noting Serafina - "lady. I asked you few to come early because this is the first day on board for you lot. For technical reasons we were only working on the Malvolio plot yesterday. Now some of you know Woody and me and some of you don't-yet-so the first thing I want to say is congratulations and-" He grinned broadly and thumped his tail against the floor as the spotlights on the opposite side of the auditorium clicked on, momentarily blinding all the furs on stage. "Welcome to the family!"

The beaver reached into his jacket pocket and withdrew a pair of sunglasses, which he unfolded carefully and put on with one paw as he kept chewing on his pencil.

"Umm . . ." Serafina asked cautiously as her eyes adjusted to the light. "What are you doing with those? We're indoors."

The beaver thumped his tail against the floor again and tilted the beret on his head back. "What am I doing?" Marty asked rhetorically. "Why, the same thing as all of you. Getting into character!" He glowered at Serry, trying to appear villainous. "Hope you're resting up, young lady! Because after this you'll be on your feet until I'm convinced you know your lines backwards and forwards!" He nibbled on his eraser, then added, "And sideways!"

Woody the opossum, still next to him, lowered his head again and let out a contemptuous groan.

The tabby cat chuckled and leaned over to Serafina's shoulder. "I hope you're ready too!" he whispered in good-humored warning. "Marty runs quite a show, but he is one of a kind."

The sissy fox looked up at the beaver as his beady eyes as he raised his pencil into the air and began motioning to the lighting crew energetically.

"Actually," she mused, as much to herself as to the tabby cat, her eyes fixed on the beaver, "this all feels a bit familiar."

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

2:15 p.m.

"Umm, don't sit on that one!" Rian warned Twitchy as he slid one of the sticky diapers off his bed into his wastebasket. "There you go! Make yourself comfortable." The rabbit didn't move, except to fidget in place. "Twitch?" Rian asked, tilting his head and looking up into his friend's face as he felt himself drop down a little closer to earth. "Is everything all right?"

The rabbit bit his lip and remained silent, but his foot began tapping as he thought about what, and how much, to say.

"This isn't about Kyle, is it?" Rian asked sternly, collecting himself and waving a paw at the bunny.

"What? No!" Twitchy answered, then let out a sigh. "Although to be honest having him hanging around at Hideout #4 doesn't help. He can't do anything without step-by-step instructions! And I don't even keep the user manuals to most things. Engineering requires a little bit more . . . thought and flexibility than that."

"Look," Rian said, crossing his arms seriously. "I already told you, you asked for him to stay posted there. So he's with you until he asks for a new assignment, and you'll find stuff for him to do. I know he's not a rocket scientist. Just find a way to make him feel important. It's bad enough he knows that Ace wanted him off the combat team. That happened when I was gone or it would have been handled better. We are not having a last fur picked situation. Not on my team. No one is being frozen out like that. We've all had it hard enough, outside."

Twitchy's foot stopped tapping. "We all have, huh?" he asked pointedly, then pressed ahead without explaining himself. "Don't worry about K. I'll figure something out. And stop changing the subject! You know perfectly well what I came here to talk about. I want to know why it's so important that I make sure Dex goes to your party."

Rian frowned. "He's my best friend! And our third-in-command. It would be weird if he wasn't there."

Twitchy tapped his foot. "Well he may be your friend but he's my . . ." the rabbit bit his lip, as though unsure what word to use next. "Well he and I are dating," he concluded lamely after a moment's hesitation. "Dex doesn't have a choice about those-" the rabbit pointed to all the diapers spread out on Rian's bed-"like the rest of us do. And he bends over backwards to make sure not everyfur knows that, because he doesn't want the whole team to feel sorry for him. Did you think the occasion of your party might be a little weird for him, maybe?"

The wolf sighed. "Yes," he admitted. "That's why I asked you to make sure he didn't make an excuse and slink off to the dojo or something. But it won't be awkward once you just get him there."

He grabbed the rabbit's paws anxiously. "I promise! He needs to be there. Or else it just won't be the same." A sneaky twinkle entered his eyes. "Just tell him I need his support. That will get him to come. This is a big decision for me, you know. It's as important to me to know that Dex is on board with it as Serry and Rog, and you. I don't want him to feel like his approval doesn't matter, or to be weirded out about it and start avoiding me."

Twitchy eyed his friend warily. "Is that really all? You aren't going to give him anything super expensive in front of everyfur or anything like that, are you?"

"Huh?" Rian blinked, knotting his paws together behind his back nervously. "What makes you think that?"

The rabbit let out a long breath and looked down at his feet. "You're very generous, Commander, to me as much as anyone, but to speak freely, I wish you'd think more about the effect your gestures can have on people."

Rian stared at the rabbit, perplexed. "What's this about, Twitch?" he asked. "Is this why you've been avoiding me since spring break? I didn't want to say anything, I mean I thought you were just miffed after I said you couldn't transfer Kyle." He furrowed his brow thoughtfully. "And come to think of it I haven't changed you in forever, have I? Are we okay?"

The bunny fidgeted with the goggles on his forehead and avoided the question. "Look, he might be your best friend still, and I'd never want to get in the way of that, but just don't give Dex anything big and expensive in front of everyfur at the party. It would be weird. I know you don't realize it, but it's like you're always throwing around how much more money you have than the rest of us. With your outfits, and all your diapers." He gestured at the bed. "I mean, Byron had three jobs until last night. Dex works at the dojo, he doesn't just train there. I'm on a merit scholarship. You just - do school, sort of, and Baby Blue stuff."

"Hey!" Rian puffed himself up. "How do you know I'm not on a merit thingamajig too?"

Twitchy raised an eyebrow and stared at his friend without saying anything.

Rian let the air out of his chest and waved a paw dismissively. "Yeah, all right, I'm not," he admitted, with a giggle. "Allowance, boarding school, City College - My dad would write a check for any amount sooner than say more than hello and goodbye to me. I've spent more time with Rog in the last couple years than I have with him in my entire life."

Twitchy frowned and started to say something, but Rian cut him off cheerily. "Anyway," the wolf said, grinning, "stop being so paranoid! I promise I didn't buy him anything. The reason you need to get Dex to my party is just because-" the wolf threw his arms wide and bounced up and down on his heels as he concluded in a self-satisfied tone, "it is going to rock!"

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

2:45 p.m.

"And all those sayings will I overswear," said the sissy fox, with a nervous tinge in her voice, looking back over her shoulder, then back to the tabby cat dressed as a Duke, biting her lip nervously. "And those swearings keep as true in soul, As doth that orbed continent the fire, That severs day from night."

She shifted her weight from one footpaw to the other and looked up at the orange feline expectantly.

The tabby cat threw his paws up and moaned theatrically.

"Cut!" The beaver, chewing on his second pencil, shouted and raised a paw in the air. "What's the problem now?" he asked. "Why did you stop?"

"I just don't think she should keep looking over her shoulder at Sebastian," the tabby cat said to Marty petulantly, flicking a paw at Serafina and straightening his doublet. "It's distracting me. She finds him, hugs him, whatever, then she moves on and leaves with me at the end of the play. I'm supposed to make a love speech to her when she's looking at another guy? It's weird."

The beaver tilted his beret on his head and looked down at the pocket-sized notepad in his paw, flipping between two pages and wrinkling his nose. "Looking back wasn't in my notes," he said musingly. "And she does go off with Orsino. Serry? Is there something with the lights, or with Sebastian's costume?"

The fox bit her lip. "What, is she supposed to forget about him?" she asked the tabby cat directly, sounding annoyed. "Sebastian's her brother! It's not like Orsino's going to be the only man she ever speaks to from now on."

"Of course not," the feline crossed his arms, "but focus on the scene, will you? This is a love story! And I'm the lover! The spotlight is going to be on the two of us."

The cross-dressing fox shook her head. "It's not a story about one kind of love," she said. "It never is. You'd think gay guys might understand women a little better, but without fail you're even worse than the straight ones. Besides," she said, her eyes narrowing, "this is Viola we're talking about. She has options if she wants them. You shouldn't carry yourself as so sure of yourself from the minute you say 'I love you' to her. You should be a little bit nervous, too, maybe."

The beaver returned his notepad to his shirt pocket. "That's different than any staging I've seen," he said, beginning to chew on his pencil. The opossum standing next to him stood on his tiptoes and whispered something inaudible, which the beaver leaned over to hear.

"That's what I'm saying," whined the tabby cat. " I'm not taking rewrites from some amateur. Say something, Marty. You're the director!"

"That's right! I am!" The beaver remarked happily, twirling his chewed-up pencil a few circles in his right paw. He eyed Serafina appraisingly and fidgeted with his beret for a moment. Then he smiled at her and added, "But she's the girl!"

The surprised fox, who had been bracing herself for a reprimand, smiled back at him-and blushed.

Next time: 3:00 p.m.-Nightfall: In the final hours before Rian's party, Roger is thrown off schedule, Serry squirms when her cover is blown, Twitchy faces an unexpected challenge, and the wolf completes a very important mission!

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