"Wet Wool" by PseudoFox - 1.3 Version - TT (Zootopia)

"Aquatic Aardwolf n' Wet Wool" by PseudoFox - 1.3 Version - Thematic Thursday Concept

S.S. Scallywag sounded like the kind of name that a sleep-deprived fourth-grader might blurt out in the middle of drawing his own comic book. At least, that's how a motley group of predators and one prey that had embarked on the ship thought. Yet they'd come quite a ways already out of Pack Street, every single mammal packing into a gigantic van ordered from ZOOber and ferried across Zootopia. Walking up the gangplank into the gigantic, shimmering white boat, they had an opportunity for some serious relaxation— it would've run up into the four figures if they'd had to buy their own tickets.

As the hours went by, exploring inch after inch of the S.S. Scallywag, the group felt as if their cares and worries had melted away. The various mammals in seductive outfits constantly walking in and out of the many pools had helped quite a bit. So had the friendly bears in matching striped outfits serving fried salmon sandwiches as pleasant pop music flowed up from the cruise's huge ballroom. The group had split up and come back together several times— each time, they'd greeted each other with more of a spring to their steps.

They all had... except for one particular sheep.

"I want to try playing pool again," Remmy Cormo muttered, sliding along his long plastic chair. The formerly cool breeze had petered out across the top of the ship. The ram's scowl had only grown wider and wider over the past several minutes.

"Alright, yarnball, go back to trying to grip those hooves around something long and hard," Betty remarked.

A small chorus of chuckles burst out from the row of mammals. A variety of fruity colors shone out in the bright sun from the wolf's gigantic drink. She took a sip as she locked eyes with the ram. He'd stuck out part of his jaw in the oddest way— looking like his mind was a computer facing a blue screen of death.

"Hey, come on, you guys have been giving me crap the whole trip," Remmy groused, standing up straight.

"Relax," Marty said. The stoat peeked up above his science magazine; his face grinned right above the title reading: 'A Psychoanalysis of Fur Fighters Lyrics: Hidden Brilliance?' "It's honestly the least we could do. What with you being the one suggesting Al throw away the sweepstakes ticket—"

"It was just a little pink piece of paper!" Remmy hopped to his hooves. "Come on!" He ram grew ever more animated, waving his arms at the row of relaxing predators, as a few cruise-goers below their deck started to stare. "How was I supposed to know that a little tag stapled to the edge of a BugBurga receipt would actually—"

"Remmy, you need to learn to put the 'kay' in 'vacation'," Al chimed in. He remained perfectly still alongside the edge of the row of cabins, though, soaking up the wonderful scent of fish tacos wafting out of the dining area above him. "Seriously."

"What does that even mean?"

"You don't have to argue about every little detail. You've done it all day. Announcing things to us like you're a lawyer billing us hourly, sending over status reports of 'going to eat', 'going to try swimming', 'going to try pool', and God knows what else. Over analyzing every little thing that you spy the guys working here doing." Marty sighed as he took off his huge sun-visor. "Why don't you just go 'okay' to mammals and do what feels natural?"

"Natural," the ram repeated. He brushed a hoof against his skinny, bright pink shirt. It was one of the few gifts from his cousins over the past years that he hadn't thrown away on the spot, and it wound up being the only kind of 'beach body' type top that he had found in his closet. "Well, I just..."

"Can't believe that I'm saying this, but I mean it: listen to Marty for a change," Betty added.

It didn't, Remmy thought, feel that 'natural' to act differently. Neither did anything in that whole situation. The ram didn't get how just being on the high seas had transformed so many mammals.

Strangers that likely would've fought like petulant children if they'd met any other way acted all lovely-dovey to each other. Only a few martinis kept elderly bison from hitting the dance floor. Only a few cheesy pick-up lines kept pool-bound teenage hyenas from French kissing on the spot. Card games between predator and prey might have ended in brawls would up just leading to back slaps instead. And all that happened because, at heart, every single one of them was just several layers of metal away from drowning.

"Why don't you see what the twins are up to?" Ozzy interjected. Eyes floated over to his spot. Stretched between two separate sets of deck chairs, the hyena lay so flat and so still on his front side that it looked to Remmy like he was dead.

"I'll," Remmy began, "try to—" He paused as a beach ball nearly smacked into his side. Instead, the big piece of plastic bounced off of a gigantic Zootopian fan and ricocheted back down to the pool below. "Yeah... okay." Thick as he might act around that group of quasi-friends, Remmy thought, he had at least gotten a better sense of proportion.

Remmy slipped his sunglasses off and walked down a set of stairs. He leaned up against a railing and blankly stared straight ahead. As attractive as the batch of young, toned otters playing hopscotch along the deck looked, he wound up glancing past them at the distant horizon of blank open sea. It rested silently below the layers upon layers of small, fluffy clouds. He clearly, Remmy thought, needed to find some particular thing on the ship to truly make him relax.

A burst of dance pop sounded off below him. Remmy pulled himself closer against the metal bars, sighing. It was the third time that afternoon. Bubbling electronic noises flowed beneath some young mammal's passionately yelled lyrics. Remmy didn't hear the slightest hint of proper pitch, tone, or anything of the sort.

A second set of vocals joined in seconds later. However he might have complained about her warped sense of personal space, lack of limits, or whatever else, Remmy admitted that Anneke had a great set of pipes. She managed to coo loud enough that the whole starboard side of the ship could probably hear it. Yet she fluttered her voice around the bleeping instrumentals in such a slippery way— it all felt oddly intimate.

The lyrics may've been inane. That's popular music, Remmy thought, ever since Gazelle wannabe's had popped up like daises. Still, the ram pushed himself off of the railing and stepped along a long amp toward the sounds.

"What!" Anneke suddenly screamed in the distance, bringing the music to a halt.

Remmy froze. He heard a shriek of audio feedback followed by pure silence. A couple of angry scuffling noises popped up— several mammals had apparently began running around.

"Oh," Anneke loudly groused, "I can't believe that this motherfuc—" The aardwolf cut the curse short, quickly softening her voice. "Oh, don't worry Ms. Scamper, I can fix this in no-time."

Remmy took in a deep breath and moved down the edge of the ramp, coming up to a half-open door and stepping inside. Only a few mammals remained in that particular ballroom. Signs on the nearby wall indicated that some kind of a shuffleboard competition had started just outside. The ram watched as a family of antelope, all of them wearing matching outfits in bright red stripes, bantered among themselves. The tallest one of them looked something like a mutated peppermint candy.

The ram watched for a moment as a shorter, fatter antelope bantered about audio science with a pair of gruff yet grinning foxes. A familiar aardwolf in a tight-fitting red dress fiddled with a microphone stand right beside them all. Remmy turned, straightening himself, and stepped across the golden-colored floor to a set of pool tables. It's not like he knew the slightest thing about a/v stuff, Remmy thought, and he didn't want to get in the way.

"Aw, come on, really?" Remmy's eyes narrowed. About half of the items in that whole little area had disappeared. "Shouldn't be surprised that somebody nicked those nice chairs," the ram muttered to himself. He circled across the biggest table, eyeing every spare nook and cranny that he could see. "What about the pool cube? And where's all the—"

"Let me guess," Anneke interjected, popping up right behind the ram's shoulder, "you're missing your balls."

"Yes," Remmy mouthed, not even looking back.

"I take it that you also don't want just any set," Anneke went on, reaching with an arm over Remmy's shoulder. Her warm fur slipped along his warmer wool in a way that made his eyes grow wide. "You need firm balls. Large, round ones."

"Are you interested in playing with me?" Remmy blurted out, the words coming out without even the slightest bit of thought.

"Oh, well," Anneke began, sliding herself against the edge of the pool table and leaning above the wood. "If you insist."

"I didn't ask— really— I didn't mean that in the aardwolf way! I asked in the regular way! But then with the other way, it's not that— truly, it's not intentional— so, well," Remmy stammered, sweating a bit. He shut his mouth as he turned to face Anneke.

As beautiful as she normally looked, the touches of makeup across her face and slinky dress running along her smooth curves— something that the ram hadn't even noticed until half an hour after walking about the cruise ship— were something else. As deserted as the ballroom was, she seemed all dressed up for something where she'd be able to deliver guys to her room like pizza. Remmy had unintnetionally kept his distance from both of the twins over the past several days of work, barely even talking to either of them that morning, and the sight made him sweat even harder.

"Let me start over," Remmy murmured.

"Alright," Anneke replied. She held a paw against her mouth, trying hard not to giggle.

"If the kareoke stuff over there is busted," Remmy said, pointing over to the side, "then, well, I'm totally up for us playing pool together. If you want."

"Nice of you to ask," Anneke responded, leaning herself over the table, "but I don't see how the hell you'd even begin to play all... well, neutered like this. Without any balls."

"Uhh..."

"I guess I could always grab another stick and the two of us fight like dueling Jedi or something," the aardwolf went on. She finally let herself giggle. "The super-sweet, super-bratty kids over there would probably get a kick out of the sight."

"Oh, well," Remmy muttered, scratching all along the side of his face. He tried to think back at how many fancy drinks he'd had. At least half of them had to have had some kind of alcohol. He knew, though, that the way that Anneke was making him feel came from way more than just some liquid courage. "There's always—"