FSE

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formerly SoFurry search engine

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Chapter Three

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When he woke up the next morning, Jacob's mood hadn't improved by much. He hauled himself off of the floor and took a moment to decide what to do with those damn clothes. He settled for shoving them into the closet, trying to bury them. All except the jocks, that is. He could still wear those without being humiliated, right? After all, it's not like he ever took his pants off around dudes anyways.

Today definitely called for a day spent at the bar. But not Crux. Better to avoid Robert's place until the shitstorm from his hustle blew over.

So he picked a place at random, some dive bar on the human side of town he didn't often visit. He headed in and sat down at the bar, ordering a bottle of the strongest light rum they had, needing a harsher kick today to help burn out the memories of last night. He kept his head down on the bar, doing his best to push it all away, and was three shots in when he started to breathe a little easier. Calming down slightly and rubbing his eyes with a deep sigh. Maybe today, being Sunday, he'd get a break.

There he went again, always giving the universe challenges he shouldn't.

Apparently his posture was less "I want to be left alone" as he hoped and more "Come and help this pathetic sap." A human sat down beside him and ordered two beers. He slid one bottle towards Jacob and gave him a little 'salute' with his own. "There you go buddy, looks like you could use one." He said, leaning back against the bar top and sipping his own as he looked out over the main floor.

Jacob looked from the beer to the bottle of rum and back, too exhausted to even be his usual confrontational self as he simply pushed the beer aside and said "I don't drink beer." His voice was soft and horse as he knocked back another shot.

The human just laughed and gave him a slight push, apparently trying to be friendly. "Aw; that's alright, my man. So what's got you lookin' so down? Lady troubles? Bit of trouble at the house?" he turned to face his "new friend" as he lowered his voice and leaned in, bringing up another option. "Maybe the bedroom? Can't get it like you used to? Hm? Come on, you can tell me!" His tone was light hearted and joking, but Jacob could hear the edge to it. It was one that every Anthro knew from humans: one that was more than just jealousy.

Choosing to ignore it, if only because he wasn't in the mood, Jacob kept his focus on the shot glass in front of him. "Look, I just want to be left alone, okay?" He made sure the words came out even and neutral, even as his skin started to squirm just under the surface.

He expected the sudden shove, having been on the giving end most of his life, so instead of falling off the stool as he was sure the guy wanted him to, he simply set his right leg down to catch himself. He tossed the shot glass back behind the bar, then started slugging straight from the bottle, his patience dwindling quicker now.

The display of which just made the human angrier. "The hell's wrong with you, eh? You come in here, looking like you been dragged behind a car for a couple-a miles, bringing the whole place down acting like a kicked puppy, and when a guy tries to be nice and friendly you blow him off like he's trash? You horses, man. I swear you're the worst of the bunch, all you animal shits.' His voice was loud enough to be heard throughout the whole bar, and some voices gave small cheers of agreement. "Think you can run around, do whatever you want. Just because you have all those rumors about you to coast off."

Things between Humans and Anthros had never been peaceful or easy, with periods of flat out war between them spanning centuries at some points. In more recent times, it was mostly subtle jabs or outright disdain. Speciesism had become the natural evolution of racism, it would seem. Stereotypes like the one mentioned just made things worse. And Jacob knew exactly which rumors he was talking about. Likely his girlfriend, or god forbid his wife, had held such things over him or even flat out left him for a horse. But he decided to play dumb and make sure anyways.

"Rumors?" he asked, voice carefully measured to sound bored and flat, so as not to stir the guy up and more, hopefully.

Evidently, however, he had chosen poorly as the man gave him a disgusted look and slammed his now empty beer down, drawing out the scene and attracting even more attention from the crowd.

"Don't play cute with me, glue stock!" he shouted, face turning even more red than it had been before. 'Glue stock' was one of the older, dumber slurs used to refer to horses by humans. It played off the old practice of using horses' teeth, hooves, and bones to make animal glue or gelatin, suggesting that their only purpose was being born to continue such methods. The man continued his rant. "We both know you probably glide on through life, workin' that old gem. Sleepin' your way clear of ever doin' an honest day's work your whole life, yeah?"

Jacob was never one to let a comment like that slide, even if normally he were the one making it to others and using the slurs. So; as he finished off the bottle, he turned and stood up to his full height, looming over the human as he looked down with a steel glare. Inches away as he spoke slow and quiet. "I told you: I just want to be left alone so I can drink in peace. I'm not here to start shit or get into any. Alright, pinky?" One of the lesser slurs, but still one that was considered pretty bad.

He lingered for a moment longer as the guy stayed quiet, visibly shaking as he glared back up at Jacob until the horse sat back down. He was in the middle of ordering another bottle, happy with himself for having shut the guy up and settled that so easily when the fist slammed into the left side of his jaw, throwing him for a loop and knocking him off his chair. The guy let out a laugh and the bar erupted into jeers for the big stallion having been taken down so easily by a sucker punch from a much smaller human.

And that was all it took. What had been just a smoldering cinder in his gut for days suddenly roared into a wildfire as some emotional dam deep inside finally broke, flooding his system with white fuel. He could feel the heat rolling off his skin and boiling behind his eyes as he stood back up, muscles working themselves loose, hands itching for a fight.

In one fluid motion, his left arm snapped out and grabbed the back of the human's head, pulling it down and slamming it into the bar top with a rather impressive thud. The crowd that had gathered around them during their argument gave a collective 'Ooohhh' of sympathy as they watched.

Another fist shooting out of that same crowd had Jacob swaying back and grabbing it, swinging the owner into the edge of the bar to wind him as Jacob grabbed the empty bottle of rum and smashed it over his head. The following screaming and stumbling from the man caused the rest of the crowd to pause for a moment, but Jacob was riled and in no mood to go quietly. As the first man finally recovered from his daze and stumbled back up, the horse kicked him hard in the chest and turned to face the rest.

"Let's go, you fuckin' pussies!"

In the movies and on television, bar fights are fast paced and impressive shows. Violent, brutal, chaotic, and yet somehow well ordered; and having a quick mouth or hiding behind a table will almost certainly ensure you walk away without a scratch at best, some bruises and a split lip at worst.

Hollywood is, as always, full of shit. Real bar fights start out slowly, one or two people usually. Security steps in, throws them out if the cops don't get called first, everyone goes on with their night with a mild chuckle. Luckily for Jacob, however, this wasn't that typical type of bar. This was a bar for those wannabe Hollywood cowboy types.

So, when given the challenge, the chance to indulge their lust for violence and act out all those urges they oh-so-desperately craved, the crowd went apeshit, and all hell broke loose.

A massive growler went sailing past Jacob's head to smash against the bottles on the shelves as he caught another punch. Getting an elbow in the ribs for his troubles.

He growled and swung the current body in his grip to collide with Mr. Elbow, then let out a 'Hrk!' as a smaller woman used a stool for a spring pad and leaped onto his shoulders, locking a choke hold around his neck. He tried to break her grip, but she hung on tight, like a drowning swimmer to a buoy. As his air began to run out, he stumbled a bit onto the main floor and saw his chance to unlatch her.

Which took the form of a pool cue being swung at him with very impressive force. He ducked and twisted as best he could, causing the cue to crash against his unwanted passenger and send her to the ground, stunned and clutching her back. He hauled her up and threw her over the bar, clearing that little nuisance off the board before he turned back to the bigger woman wielding the cue. Just as it came swinging back, colliding with his snout and breaking the cartilage.

As the blood burst forth and poured down his muzzle, he roared and launched himself at her, spearing her across the stomach and throwing them both over a table. He tumbled ass over teakettle, landing hard and driving the wind out of himself. Making it even more of a chore to try and breathe.

With her weapon gone, the woman started to swing at him with downward fists, but she was no back alley scrapper. The hammer blows had no follow through to them, no real power behind them. So while they stung briefly, they did no real damage except maybe to her ego. Jacob sealed that damage with a right cross straight to her jaw, just as he had gotten in the first place, knocking her out cold.

He got his feet under him and was in a crouch on his way back up when a chair clipped him as it flew past, causing him to land back on the floor as the world tumbled. The last place anyone wanted to be in a fight, he waited for a second to recollect himself and then scrambled up. Spitting blood and coughing at the mucus built up in his throat.

What he needed was space, so he pushed through the crowd, avoiding oncoming attacks and flying objects, Taking advantage of small pockets when they formed, he made his way over to a small square relatively free of debris. He thanked the stars along the way that he had been born with hooves and chosen to get shod, otherwise the broken glass and broken people on the floor may have been an issue.

He had a few moments to recover and wipe his face before three men on the 'fridge' side of the size scale appeared and started moving towards him, backing him into a corner.

At least they didn't seem to be armed, unlike the maelstrom behind them. Anything that could be pried up quick enough without being exposed to attack was being used by the mob. From bar stools to pool cues, knives and fists, even shoes. Someone had managed to get their hands on a length of pipe somehow, and one scrappy little shit had resorted to using his belt as a multi-use whip, trap and garrote.

Jacob was almost about to consider himself lucky and get ready for a bit of good old fashioned fisticuffs in the middle of this street rumble. That is, until his luck gave him the finger yet again and all three of the men pulled out matching sets of brass knuckles.

Of course. Of all the psychos in the place, of course he would end up with the Terror Triplets. His hand dropped to his right hoof as it raised once more, this time no one to stop him from finally getting to his ace in the hole.

In his younger days, when beating kids up with his fists had led to them packing weapons, Jacob had decided to pack a little something himself. He started out using pencils, graduated to basic shanks and razor blades, packing knives and getting caught with them before finally learning the art of making the humble shiv. Throughout the years, he had made plenty, testing out different metals, edges, and shapes. And he had gotten good at it, finally landing on the perfect combination of balance and weight for himself.

It was that blade he kept hidden between his hoof and the shoe, the one he called his lucky girl, Veronica. And when he called, she sang. Just as she did now, as one of the triplets came in with an uppercut aimed at his gut. The whistle she made through the air, slicing into his cheek and causing crimson to splash on ebony flesh sounding to Jacob for all the world like a moan of ecstasy.

That one fell back, the cut having taken him by surprise, and one of his friends quickly rushed to take his place. An upper class looking white guy, he tried a haymaker. Useless once the shiv stabbed into the meat of his arm, causing him to drop his knuckles and retreat. The third one came up, ready for the weapon as he kept his guard up. Bobbing and weaving as he looked for an opening. This one had obviously been in knife fights before.

Each move by Jacob was answered in kind, a nick to the arm replied to with a rap against the ribs. A shot to the belly with one against his knee. Only the fact that Jacob had done this dance for years let him avoid anything too harsh for more than a few minutes. Tit-for-tat, again and again. Finally, the big guy stepped back, onto his friend and stumbled, letting Jacob trip him and land on top of him.

He was about to sink Veronica right into the guys' eye, teach him a lesson, when the air around the bar exploded with the sudden noise of a shot being fired. The owner had finally made it out to the floor, and from under the bar he had pulled out a sawed off coach gun. He looked at the bleeding, sweating, panting crowd and with one slug still in the breach, gave a single growled command: "Everyone get the fuck out of my bar."

Jacob huffed and flicked Veronica in his grip so he could slide her back into her hiding place. He leaned in and hissed out "You got lucky." He was just about to get up and leave when he felt the fire scream through his left side, just under his ribs. He looked down and saw the dark wooden hilt of a boot knife sticking out of him.

The other man laughed and spit blood into his face, wheezing out "Thought you were the only one with tricks, slick?"

And those would be the last words he heard before the brass knuckles slammed into his vision and the world turned black.

--Later--

The familiar oil-slick darkness slipping in and around him as he came to, mind running in fast-forward and yet slow motion all at once. Painkillers. Which meant-

He tried to sit up as he opened his eyes, but the stinging yank of tubes held him back. After a few blinks, the muted and sterile colors of his surroundings confirmed his guess.

He was in the hospital, patched up and wired. Surprisingly, he wasn't cuffed to the gurney. So either they thought he was too weak to try anything, or they hadn't put him under arrest. Huh. Almost a first, really.

After the initial disorientation, he rubbed his eyes and took stock. His nose was still broken, obviously, though the fist and knuckles seemed to have done more damage to it. The all-too-familiar wrapping they used for damaged ribs, yay. Extra padding where he'd been stabbed. Well; time to call the nurse.

He found the button and hit it, adjusting to the most comfortable position he could as he waited. It took a mild amount of effort to ignore his first instinct to get up and walk, but he'd been in enough times to stop himself when it hit. Never knew what surprises the drugs were hiding. Or when you'd been in for days and they cath'd you while you were out.

All of that he knew. Expected, to a point. What he did not expect was the woman entering his room in full vintage nurse attire. Heels, hat, apron, stockings, the works. He blinked a couple more times, then coughed before speaking. The thing about painkillers most people gloss over, or simply don't know, is that in addition to blocking pain receptors, they also remove any filter between your brain and your mouth.

So while he may have flirted, or made a joke normally, what came out of his mouth was not a witty "Oh, lucky me!" but instead the first thing that came to mind.

"I didn't hit the stripper button."

To her credit, the vixen didn't miss a beat as she checked her clipboard and cross-referenced his vitals. "Oh my, looks like there's more damage to your jaw than we first thought. I'll have to make a note to the doctor suggesting wiring it shut.' Her honey-gold eyes met his as she gave him a wink. "It's a ceremony thing. Welcoming some new nurses and doing a thing for the kids in the extended care ward."

Jacob nodded and gave his jaw an absent-minded rub. "So, what's the damage? What am I looking at this time?"

Her vulpine ears twitched as she checked the chart again, clucking her tongue and gave a low whistle. "'This time' indeed. You've got quite a track record, Mr. Stantz. I'm sure the doctor will have a field day navigating all this."

As if on cue, the doctor appeared. A tan furred tigress with a mothers' air. "How's he lookin?" she asked.

"Looks lucky, to be honest. But all in all, I'd say he looks pretty decent vitals-wise. Considering his condition and how he was admitted." The nurse handed over the chart with her notes as she made to leave. "Might want to watch his jaw though. He seems to have to be having trouble with it coming loose."

The tigress laughed, nodding as she reviewed and moved to Jacob's bedside. "So, Mr. Stantz. I hear you tried to take on a whole bar by yourself."

Jacob couldn't help but laugh, even with the pain. "What can I say? I'm a sucker for the free beer challenges." He gave a small half-shrug and immediately regretted it.

"It must be a hell of a deal, since you seem to have done it multiple times. Wanna tell me about all these old injuries?" she inquired.

Scratching the back of his head, Jacob looked away. "Where did you want to start?"

"Let's start at...13. That seems to be when the real fun starts." Her tone made it clear she had seen the notes that had been there since those days.

"When I was 13, I was admitted for a collapsed lung, broken leg and a fractured ankle. All within one year."

Before the tigress could speak, he waved her words off. "The records have a note that the doctor suspected abuse, because he didn't buy my story that I was playing football."As he took a breath, the tigress took her turn.

"I can see why those are all common injuries, even in pee wee football, but it doesn't explain the bruising, black eyes, the bones not healing property or the..." She trailed off.

Jacob picked it up. "Continuing signs of physical trauma, including indicators of restraint." He recited in monotone, remembering the notation perfectly. "Yeah. Well, my dad never laid a finger on me. My mom's a saint, and there were no creepy uncles or guys in vans offering candy." He turned his eyes to her, noticing in the mirror behind her that his left eye's sclera had turned red from hemorrhaging. He was worse off than he thought. "What I didn't tell them, for obvious reasons, was that I was getting beat up by the other kids cuz of my mouth." he shrugged. "People seem to think I'm an asshole. They just don't realize I'm amazing."

You could almost hear the strain of the doctor holding back laughter before she composed herself. "And at 14 you started playing in high school, I see. Barely passed your physical, still showed worrying signs, apparently."

Jacob nodded. "Yeah. Ran a concussion a year, too. High school, let's see. Broken elbow, four dislocated shoulders, fractured wrist, and a torn ligament in my knee which thankfully didn't in my run on the team. He sighed and ran his hands through his trimmed mane.

"Let's not forget the torn rotator cuff, broken collarbone, 3 cracked teeth, 6 broken fingers, annnnd...perforated spleen?" The doctor supplemented, incredulous.

Another nod, then Jacob continued. "Plus the 4 fractured ribs, partially ruptured testicle, and burst appendix all happening Senior Year. Yeah."

By this point, the tigress was looking at him as if he had two heads. "People really don't like you, do they?" recovering her professional mannerism, she sat down in a chair beneath the window. "Let's go over those in detail, hm?"

Another sarcastic laugh from Jacob as he laid back. "The ribs were at Homecoming. I was supposed to play in that game. Every newspaper in town was writing to see what would happen when I had to play without my friend. He was our star lineman, and we were inseparable." His skin crawled as he said that, the words of Coach and the police Captain echoing in his ears relentlessly as he painted himself as the hero again. 'Useless'. 'Disgrace.' 'Bully.' But he pushed on anyways. "I was all fired up, had just had a bit of fun with a girl, and was coming into the parking lot to get ready. Apparently her boyfriend didn't like the pics and video I sent him of a hero player showing his girl a good time. He and a few of his friends ambushed me like the pussies they were. Few minutes and some kicks from a group of steel-toed boots and shod hooves, and I was laying on the asphalt with said ribs screaming bloody murder until a parent found me and called an ambulance."

The look on the doctor's face didn't escape him. As if she had discovered a particularly large and foul smelling pile of dung. "I see." She said. "And I assume the others happened under similar circumstances?"

Jacob adjusted his position and curled up slightly. "Not quite. The testicle was Prom. Naturally, I tried to find a girl worthy of going with me, being the star player."

'Star'. More like 'gimmick'. The papers, the town, even the rival teams all adored Crush and respected the rest of the Raiders, but Jacob? He found out he was more infamous than he was famous. People knew him for his reputation of bullying kids, beating them up, attacking rival players, sleeping around with both single and other men's women, and generally throwing whatever weight he thought he had around to make other people's lives hell and manipulate weaker students.

They never came to see him play, they came to see everyone else. And if they did come to see Jacob Stantz? It was too see how badly karma had sodomized him. He kept talking. "Oddly, I couldn't find a single girl to go with. So I ended up going stag. I figured I could always pick one up on the way, or maybe I'd find one I missed when I got there who didn't have a date. So, I got there, and I hung around the drinks for awhile."

He would have spiked them, if there hadn't been a teacher keeping annoyingly close to them and chatting up several female members of the administrative staff.

"I saw a couple girls that didn't have any dates-"

They did.

"And I went up to say hello, politely asked if they wanted to dance."

His exact words had been: "Hey! Two of my favorite whores and their little cucks! How about you boys let your dates have a good time tonight, let them hang out with me. Stop dragging them down by being such cowards."

"One of them called her friend over. This mountain of a gorilla, you know? Kid must have been juicing since he was a baby. And he just goes nuts, starts wailing on me for no reason at all!"

It was the girls who had done it, actually. After they kneed him in the groin and punched him, they got him on the ground and took off their heels, using them as clubs. One of those heels had punctured through his sac and done the deed.

When he had finished recounting his lie; a grand and heroic tale of the hulking primate vs. innocent stallion wherein his jewel had been cracked after he grabbed the gorilla's leg to stop an assuredly deadly kick, only for the dirty ape to cheat and cheap shot him with an improbably large table leg, the doctor rubbed the bridge of her nose and blinked.

"Right. Well. We wanted to make sure we were all on the same page, with all these old injuries and scars." She busied herself with pulling on some gloves and moving to check Jacob's eye with a penlight. "It seems you can add a hemorrhagic retina, 3 more broken ribs, and fractured orbital socket to your resumé. You're going to have to take it easy for awhile."

Jacob paused for a moment before he asked "What about work? And can I get these out now?" He tugged at one of the lines before pulling his sheets up to check for any other connections.

The tigress gave his thigh a pat "No cath, don't worry about that. I'll send in the nurse to unhook you and you can head down to the desk for discharge. As for work, as I said, I'm putting you on super light duty."

Jacob nodded along, rubbing next to his bleeding eye "Are you going to cast this up?"

The doctor shook her head. "It's just a hairline fracture. Should heal just fine on it's own. If you're worried about the eye, I can give you a patch, but it should clear up in a couple days."

At his laugh, the doctor noted his declination of looking like a cheap pirate. When he stood up and gripped the pole to start moving past her, she held out a hand and steadied him as he swayed. "Where you headed, buddy?"

When the vertigo and slight stomach rumble of the drugs passed, Jacob continued his shuffle. "I need to piss. Why, you wanna give me a hand and make sure everything works?" He snapped at her.

The blank look on her face sold her reaction perfectly as she simply deadpanned: "I could, if you like."

Jacob froze for half a second before his brain caught up. "You're fucking with me. You can't actually do that."

The tigress grinned and tossed him a small container. "Catch on quick, don't you? But I do want a urine sample. Based on your history of drug use on record, and your medical history in general, I want to make sure there's no problems or underlying issues we need to worry about. I'll wait here."

Catching the bottle and rolling his eyes, her patient turned back to the bathroom. "Ha ha. I'll get you your sample." He called back, before slamming the door shut.

There were sounds of cursing, the IV pole being smacked on things, the lid and seat of the toilet hitting the tank, more cursing as the horse tried to figure out the robe, and finally the sash of liquid hitting plastic.

After a few seconds that was replaced by the ubiquitous sound of a man standing to urinate. During all this, the doctor checked her watch, did a round of the room, triple checked her chart, and went over her schedule in her head.

As the deluge continued to resonate through the door, she began to daydream. She went through a few scenarios and had just sat down to tea with the Queen, discussing the deficit of the kingdom's budget, strife in the war torn nations, and the corruptive influence of Judaeo-Christian Puritan standards on world government when Jacob finally emerged.

She checked her watch again. "If you were going for the world record, you're a minute and a half short. Longest continuous urination is 8 and a half minutes." She said flatly, giving him a half smirk and taking the sample container. "Once the drugs wear off, you can change and check yourself out. I'll contact you in a few days with your results."

Leaning on the IV pole, Jacob watched her leave before sitting on the bed and sighing heavily. Another glorious day in his life.