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"Ma'am, please calm down, we're trying to help you."

Barbara Lewis glared at the officer in her living room. The middle-aged wolf's belly swelled each time he took a breath, his voice sounding like he wanted to be anywhere but where he was. He stood with a notepad in his hands, making scribbles as they talked, with the agitated bird suspecting that there were more bored doodles being put on the paper than anything else.

"I am being calm," she replied sharply. "But my son is missing."

It had taken Barbara some effort to drum up the courage to call the police. She put it off as long as she could, waiting by the phone in the hopes that she would get a call from Greenwood that he'd arrived. She even called them again at the end of the day, just praying it would turn out that he'd shown up and they'd simply forgotten to alert her.

No such luck.

By the time the next morning rolled around and she realized that not only was Marcus neither answering nor even reading her messages, Barbara Lewis knew she had to do something. The last thing she wanted was for her son to get into any more trouble than necessary, but it was beginning to feel like there was no way to avoid that. They could deal with the fallout later, all she cared about was finding him and getting him home.

"All right, so let's go over this again," Officer Hickson said, scratching at his silver-speckled neck.

"I told you, yesterday morning he left for school, but they said he never arrived. I haven't been able to get hold of him since," Barbara replied, fighting to make sure her voice stayed even as she answered his questions. It was a position she was unused to being in, and she was not a fan.

"Mm-hm," he said, tapping his pen against the page. "And you didn't have any indication that he was upset? That he might want to run off?"

"No! I mean... of course I knew he was upset," the diminutive bird corrected herself. "It was a stressful week, but he was coping with it well, he took ownership of his actions and was not arguing about what he had to do."

The wolf nodded, flipping a page on his pad. "Right. You said he got in a fight at school. Was that the first time he's had trouble with his classmates?"

Barbara's shoulders drooped, and she shifted in her seat, unable to get comfortable. She began to realize how much the couch she'd insisted they buy functioned more for form than function, because the firm cushion beneath her was making sure she couldn't even attempt to relax during what was feeling increasingly like an interrogation.

"No... no, it's not," she answered, her voice dropping, dejected. "He's always had a hard time getting along at school. I've given him all the help I can, but... it's difficult. You know how it is, don't you?"

The wolf nodded, though it seemed less one of understanding and more of simply acknowledging that she'd said something. "Yes ma'am, hybrids do have a hard time fitting in. Not uncommon for them to start acting out. Has he had any run ins with the law before?"

Barbara's browline creased, her head turning to look at Marcella in the kitchen, who was currently doing her best to pretend she couldn't hear what was going on, then back at the officer. She did not like his choice of words. "What do you mean before? He's not in trouble now, he's missing!"

"Ma'am, I'm just trying to get an idea for what we might be dealing with here," the heavyset lupine replied, holding one hand up to signal that he wanted her to calm down. "If he's got a criminal history, that's something I need to be aware of. Since he's a minor, it won't show up on a quick search."

Taking in a breath through her nostrils, Marcus's mother sat up as tall as she could, eyeing the officer in a vaguely accusatory fashion. "I fail to see why that's important."

The officer arched a brow at her, clearly unimpressed with her reluctance to answer the question. "Ma'am, I need to know if there's gonna be any danger in approaching him should we find him. If he's likely to get violent."

"He's not going to get violent!!" Barbara squawked, loudly enough that she even surprised herself.

Once again, the hand came up, palm outwards, and Barbara Lewis reluctantly sat back. She was feeling more on the defensive now than she cared to.

"Ma'am," the wolf repeated. He had so many different meanings that could be packed into that single word. In this instance, it was impatience. "I realize he's your boy and all, but I need to cover my bases. These hybrids can be more volatile than most, you already said he's gotten into fights at school more than once. So let's try this again. Has your son gotten in trouble with the law before?"

Barbara's entire body tensed up. She held her coffee cup between her hands, forcing herself to stay steady. She focused on the porcelain against her fingers, on her feet on the floor, the couch beneath her. She was calm. She was still in control. Yes, Marcus had been caught shoplifting in the past, but that had been dealt with, he hadn't been actually arrested. So it wasn't trouble with the law, per se. There was no need to bring it up. It didn't matter.

"No, officer, he has not," she said smartly, putting a nice hard snap of her beak on the final letter to punctuate the sentence. "I'm well aware of the difficulties he faces due to his genetics, and I've been very active in helping him learn how to deal with those issues. We have weekly sessions, discuss coping mechanisms, exercises he can do when he feels overwhelmed, and medication for emergencies. Just because some of you believe hybrids cannot function in society does not make it true."

There was no reply at first, just the sound of a pen nib traveling across paper as Officer Hickson took a flurry of notes.

"What, what are you writing? What was that?" Barbara immediately inquired.

The wolf shook his head, letting out a dry and faintly raspy chuckle. "Just making sure I got all of that. So you're his therapist as well as his mother, huh?"

The muscles in Barbara Lewis's jaw flexed, her beak pressing together extra firmly. "I am a therapist, and I'm his mother. I'm simply using my expertise to give him the kind of help he would not be able to get in other homes. And, I'll have you know, I'm highly experienced and respected in my field and we have been making strong progress."

"I'm sure you've been doing your best, but let's not forget he did assault a classmate and then go missing," the officer replied, his summary of events nearly making Barbara leap out of her seat at him. "Now, do you have any idea where he might have gone? Friends he might be staying with? Anything like that?"

Barbara's eyes dropped to her coffee. She thought that over, realizing she didn't know of too many places Marcus went. He didn't have a strong social life as far as she knew, and whenever he wasn't at school he was mostly out shopping or holed up in his bedroom. The only place he ever went otherwise was...

"He does have this friend, an older boy. A dog, I believe? His first name is Brian. I'm sorry, I don't recall his last name," she answered, apologetic.

Officer Hickson sighed. "Not really much to go on, there. You said he's older? How much older?"

Barbara thought, racking her brain. Marcus had mentioned him during their sessions, but never to any great detail. Mostly he just talked about enjoying the time experiencing what he believed a "normal life" was. Frankly, she felt like he was going out of his way to do so, like he wanted to make them feel guilty for providing so well for him.

"Five or six years? I know he has his own house. Marcus seems to romanticize lower-class life, heaven knows why. We give him everything he could possibly ask for and he goes running off to spend the night with Brian whenever he's upset."

"So he's done this before?"

Barbara froze in place, realizing too late that she'd shared more than she meant to. Her, of all people. Barbara Lewis, always so careful with her words, every sentence deliberately constructed to get exactly what she wanted to convey, and the stress was beginning to make her tongue slip. She had to get her composure back, and right the ship.

She let out a sharp breath. "No, officer. He has not. It's true, he has gone off to spend time with his friend after an argument at home, but this is different. I watched his GPS go all the way to school. I saw him arrive right at his dormitory. I thought everything was settled, and then I got a call from the principal that he was not there. I was tracking him, and then he was gone. Something must have happened after he arrived."

The wolf puffed his cheeks out as he exhaled. "Suppose I'll have to make a few phone calls with that school."

Barbara forced herself to take a drink of her coffee, swallowing hard in the hopes of alleviating the near painful dryness in her mouth and throat. "Please, just... tell me you'll be able to find him."

Officer Hickson closed his notepad, sticking it into his breast pocket along with the pen. "We can do our best, ma'am, but we don't really have the resources to do the kinda search you see on TV. If he's run off on his own, it's hard to know how far he might have gotten. I can put an alert out for a pretty big radius, send out copies of his picture and all that, but that's about the best I can do. On the plus side, a rabbit with antlers won't be easy to blend into a crowd, so we shouldn't have a hard time spotting him, y'know?"

He laughed. She didn't.

The wolf coughed awkwardly, "Well, if there's nothing else you think might help, I suppose that's all I need. I'll make sure we'll have as many eyeballs as possible on the lookout for him."

As the officer made his way back to the front door, Barbara Lewis quickly stood up and followed behind. "Wait!" she called out.

Officer Hickson stopped, just outside the house, turning. "Yes, ma'am?"

Barbara fidgeted, taking a moment to decide just how to phrase her question. "Have you dealt with cases like this before? Missing children, I mean."

The wolf scratched at the back of his neck, looking like he was flipping through a book of past cases in his head. "Runaways? Not a whole lot, but it's not unheard of. Most of the time they're just trying to prove a point, you know? They'll go hide somewhere for a few days and then come back on their own after they run outta money or miss sleeping in their own bed. This is a bit of a unique case, of course."

Once again, Barbara's eyes narrowed. "Unique?" she repeated.

Seeming not to notice the unpleasant glare being sent his way, the officer nodded. "Mm-hm. Ma'am, let's be honest. Kids like him aren't like everyone else. I'm not trying to insult your parenting skills, but it's an uphill battle with a hybrid. I've tussled with them before, it's always a bigger headache than a normal case." The wolf gestured vaguely, holding up fingers as he counted off what he considered to be issues with the case. "You said he's been getting into fights at school, this isn't his first time running off, you're giving him therapy sessions, he's medicated..."

The breath caught inside the small bird's chest. Said all in a row, that did sound rather dire. Was that really who her son was? She refused to acknowledge the possibility. Marcus was a good boy. He had his troubles, yes, but she'd been making strides with him. Their sessions were going well. She had his problems under control. At least she thought she did.

"Officer, please. Just... promise me you'll do your best to find him and get him back."

The middle-aged wolf let out a small chuckle. He nodded, his voice slowing down as he spoke, like he was talking to a child. "Like I said, we'll do our best to keep a lookout for him. Keep the light on, don't get confrontational with him. Fingers crossed, we'll get him home before he does anything reckless. And Mrs. Lewis?"

The bird quirked. "Yes?"

"Don't look at all this like a failure on your part. Some things just can't be changed. Hybrids ain't wired like us. I'm sure you did your best with him but, well, there's only so much you can do when the problem's at the genetic level."

Barbara Lewis did not feel placated by the officer's words. She eyed him a moment, seeing that he genuinely thought he was being comforting by it. It was a failure on her part. When they adopted Marcus, everyone told her it would be an uphill battle. She insisted she could handle it. Handle him. She'd helped burned out actors get off drugs and suicidal musicians see the light again, she'd helped athletes with violent pasts open themselves up. Why hadn't she been able to help Marcus?

"Yes, well... thank you."

The wolf nodded. "We'll be in touch. Have a nice day."

As she walked back inside, that question kept buzzing about in her head. What had she done wrong? Was Officer Hickson right? Had it been doomed from the beginning? And even if they did get Marcus back, what would happen when he moved out, and she wasn't able to keep him close by for their sessions, to make sure he was behaved?

"Marcella, I'm gonna need you to make me a drink," Barbara Lewis said, sitting heavily upon one of the stools at the large kitchen island.

"Of course, Mrs. Lewis," the squirrel replied, her voice soft. "The normal espresso?"

Barbara shook her head, all the weight on her shoulders that she'd been forcing herself to ignore coming down heavily. Her whole body sagged, and her voice shed any attempts to sound proper. "No... I think I need something stronger than that."

Marcella nodded, going into a separate cabinet where the alcohol was kept. Pulling out a bottle of vodka and one of a coffee liqueur, she quickly mixed the pair with espresso in a martini glass, and took it over to Barbara.

"I'm sure he's fine, Mrs. Lewis," she said. "He's had a hard week."

Barbara nodded, taking the glass and sipping carefully from it, making sure not to chip the glass with her beak. "Thank you."

The frazzled avian took a breath as the alcohol hit her belly, closing her eyes and forcing her mind not to immediately run to a worst case scenario. Marcus would be fine. He wasn't going to do anything stupid. Not her boy. She'd raised him better than that.

---

Autumn was beginning to arrive. Leaves were turning new colors and the air was more crisp, and Greenwood Academy was buzzing with activity. The rumors started spreading late in the morning, but by midday they'd all been confirmed, and naturally all of the students were happy to make sure there wasn't a soul on campus who hadn't heard.

"What's going on?" a slim skunk asked his raccoon friend.

"The police are looking for that weird kid!" came the reply.

"I wonder if he finally snapped."

"You think we'll see him on TV in big chase with the cops?"

"I bet he killed his parents and now he's on the run."

"I always knew he wasn't right."

Corey Benton had just left his last class for the morning. A calculus exam was never his favorite way to spend an hour and a half, but at least he had some time where everyone around him was just... quiet. As soon as word got out that Marcus Lewis was missing and the cops were on the search, Corey turned into a secondary suspect of sorts, and he'd become more aware than ever of the comments around him.

He blamed himself, in truth. After all, Corey was the one who'd gone to the administration to tell them Marcus was gone. He'd thought about keeping it to himself, it wasn't like the teachers hadn't noticed that the kid didn't show up for any of his classes, but couldn't. Corey was usually willing to cover for Marcus, but not this time. Not when he might be in real trouble. Besides, if he got asked later, he'd have to explain why he never thought to bring up that Marcus had completely cleared out from the dorm.

Corey's conversation with Mr. McGee was awkward. The usually verbose and amiable beaver was oddly short with his sentences. Corey expected him to panic, to say they needed to do something right now, but no. That didn't happen. Instead, Timothy McGee sat with his hands folded, listening to Corey talk, nodding now and again, but stayed silent until Corey had told him everything.

"Well, that's certainly concerning," the portly administrator said after a pause. "Thank you for letting me know, Corey. We'll do what we can from here, and I would request that you keep this conversation between us, mm? No sense in causing a ruckus with the other students."

That was it. That was all he got out of the principal of Greenwood. Corey had left the office feeling no less anxious about his friend, but did his best to go about his day.

The next morning, the cops showed up. Corey got stopped outside the arts building by a rail-thin lemur and a burly black bear in uniform, who said they had a few questions for him. Oh, they started out innocently enough, asking when the last time he'd talked to Marcus was, anywhere he might have gone, that kind of thing. It seemed like normal missing persons fare, but then they took something of a turn. The two started alternating questions, using the bull in a game of ping pong between them, making it hard to keep up.

"Has he ever gotten aggressive with you?"

"How many times have you seen him get in fights with other students?"

"Do you know if he's broken the law before?"

"Do you think he's prone to violence?"

"Have you ever felt unsafe near him?"

Corey waded through the barrage, telling the officers that no, he never had any of those problems with Marcus that he could think of, and that he wasn't the one who started fights. As far as he knew, Marcus had never broken the law, and for that matter aside from the scrap he'd gotten into the week prior he barely even broke school rules. The answers didn't seem to satisfy either officer, but once they'd gotten all they could out of him, the bull was free to go about his day.

A few hours later, there he sat, eating his lunch at one of the tables at the Greenwood quadrangle. He felt like everyone was looking at him as they walked by. Corey Benton, the link to the missing Marcus Lewis. As though because they were roommates it meant he had to know something he wasn't telling them. That he had to have some kind of connection to the jackalope. They were horn bros, right? Obviously if Marcus suddenly vanished, Corey was in on it somehow.

"...so this is what he was talking about," he thought to himself, realizing just how uncomfortable it was to feel like he was under the world's microscope.

Just when Corey was beginning to enjoy the quiet, some extra loud chattering caught his ear and he turned to find the source. Over at one of the nearby tables, a group had just sat down and were carrying on, laughing extra loudly. The bull was tempted to ignore them, but that was when he noticed who it was that seemed to be leading the discussion. Eli.

"Right? I mean, holy fuck, I think we're all lucky he didn't come back and start shooting the school up," the cheetah cackled, taking a big bite out of a burger.

One of Eli's friends, a stubby-limbed ferret, snorted in amusement. "You think he'd even know how to use a gun?"

The feline laughed again, "Hell no, the only guns he's ever shot are in those shitty game streams he used to do. He'd blow his toes off and cry to Principal McGee that it was everyone else's fault and the fat fuck would probably believe him."

Corey found himself unable to look away from the group. Ever since he moved in with Marcus, he'd gotten more aware of any comments other students made about the jackalope. It wasn't that they were constant, but there were enough to drift along and make their way into his ears that he was more aware of the barbs. For a situation like this, coming from the one who started the whole thing, the bull started to feel a knot in his stomach.

"Hey! What are you lookin' so pissy about?" Eli called over, having noticed the bull's attention. "You'd probably be safe! Unless you broke up with him and that's why he left!"

Another round of laughter. Corey stayed silent, not moving a muscle, just keeping his gaze on the jeering clique.

"By the way, I been meaning to ask, which one of you's the top and who's the bottom? Or do you switch?"

Finally, Corey Benton had enough. He picked up his tray and walked it to the nearby trash can, then calmly strode his way over towards Eli and his group of friends.

"Oh! Oh! Look out, Marcus's boyfriend is mad, he's gonna start charging!" the cheetah mocked, still putting on the act for his friends.

By the time Corey arrived, though, Eli's confidence had rather faded, and the laughter from the others quieted down. From a distance, it was easy for all of them to forget the bull's stature. He stood a head taller than any of them and was nearly as broad, making his looming presence more than a little intimidating. He stood, unmoving, his mop of hair obscuring his eyes. Even with that, everyone knew exactly who he was looking at.

"Wh... what? Huh? You think you're a tough guy? Trying to scare me?" Eli spat, his voice wobbling even as he tried to keep himself sounding as cocksure as he'd been when there had been more space between himself and the bovine.

Not a word from Corey.

"What? You gonna say so-HEY!"

Corey's thick-fingered hand grabbed Eli by the front of his shirt, hauling the alarmed feline up onto his feet, pulling him away from the bench. The bull held him there for a few moments, letting him know that this was a very different predicament than squaring off with a jackalope.

Eli leaned back as far as he could, making the fabric on his shirt stretch, nearly beginning to pop some of the threads. He looked up at Corey, seeing no hint of emotion on the huge highland's face. His eyes were still hidden beneath his hair, and his mouth was unmoving. The cheetah nearly disappeared in Corey's shadow. A single snort from the bull's nostrils made him flinch and his ears flutter from the breeze.

"You shouldn't talk like that about him," Corey said simply, putting a touch of extra bass into his voice. He leaned in further, watching the frozen feline's eyes go wide. "It's not nice."

For a few seconds, neither Eli nor anyone around him knew what to do. Everyone was waiting, braced for impact...

...and then Corey dropped him, letting the cheetah fall right back down on his bench. Without another word, the bull walked away to his next class. He'd heard enough from them for one day.

There was a decent break between Corey's next two classes, and for a moment he considered going back to the dormitories to lie down for a bit, but quickly nixed it. Going back to that room left him with a heavy feeling in his stomach. The quiet was too quiet. Marcus may not have been a chatterbox, but his absence chilled the air. Trying to get to sleep the previous night had been difficult, with Corey staring up at the ceiling, his mind fighting an instinct to go into a worst case scenario spiral.

"Maybe he actually got expelled," the bull's brain told him.

"Maybe he dropped out and went to a new school," it followed up.

"Maybe he went on one of those road trips you see in movies to get away from it all."

"Maybe he drove off a cliff."

No attempt at drowning the thoughts out with music helped, so Corey made sure to spend as little time back there as possible. No hurrying back from classes, no grabbing food and eating in the room, and if he had to do any classwork, he'd do it in the school library. Studying, too. Until they found out what happened to Marcus, the dorm room would be sleeping only.

It was a solid plan, and it did help the rest of his school day pass by without any incident beyond having to tell his friends that no, he actually had no idea where the jackalope had run off to. He went so far as to show them his cell phone, with the string of unanswered messages. That was enough to get them to stop needling him for information, but the cloud still loomed overhead. Fortunately, incoming exams in English and History kept his mind occupied until the sun went down and it was time to go back to the dorms.

"Hey, hornbo," the broad bovine said dejectedly as he came in through the door. His words echoed off of bare walls, sounding just as hollow as the words had felt on their way out.

Corey Benton dropped his bag on the floor next to his bed, then dropped himself onto it. It wasn't late enough to sleep, but he was hoping he could trick his body into thinking it was, just to get the day over with. He turned on the TV, picking a random station and kept the volume just high enough to fill the void, but low enough that he couldn't really make out the words. As futile as it was, the bull even tried to get Marcus again, tapping a message out that sat untouched in a stack of them.

[hey dude i hope ur ok FYI the cops are here asking questions]

He laid back, on top of his covers, and tried to will himself to tire out. No such luck. So Corey did what he always did when he couldn't sleep: He decided to get some food.

At that late hour, none of the campus restaurants would be open, and he really didn't feel like getting takeout, which just left the option of the mini-fridge and the Snackbox. Neither of them had anything that could really be considered a meal, but Corey figured he could at least pile enough of what they did have to make do. Half were Marcus's, half were his, and he got a laugh out of seeing how each were marketed. Hare food to give you energy, bovine to make you strong. Fortunately there, was enough to keep his stomach from causing a ruckus.

Then he heard a noise.

A buzzing noise.

Corey quickly forgot his makeshift meal and darted back to the bed to pick up his phone. A notification. A message from Marcus.

[what did you tell them??]

Corey blinked, staring at his screen. He tapped out a reply as quickly as his thick fingers would let him.

[i didn't have anything to tell them! where the fuck are u?]

He waited, praying he would get an answer, though he had no idea what he might do once he did.