Borrowed Time - Chapter 2 (part 2) (Patreon)

 A continued collaboration between myself, and my dear friend Firefox!

Written by Firefox 

Illustrated by Me

Reaching the shopping mall, Loretta meets some interesting characters, to say the least~ 

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The group made an attempt to cross the freshly salted parking lot long before Loretta had squeezed out of the minivan. Genevieve acted as an anchor, waiting patiently while the others milled around ahead of her. Loretta panted softly as she steadied herself. Although she would have liked to wait and catch her breath, she didn’t want to risk upsetting anyone by further delaying them. Her feet and legs ached as she waddled after them, never quite catching up.

The winter and holiday themed decorations were out in full force and the glass panes that made up the main entrance of the mall were adorned with enormous, glittering snow flakes and candy canes and blinking, multi-colored lights. In sharp contrast, an unpleasant surprise waited for her just beyond the glass double doors. An “Out of Order” sign had been taped to the dormant railing of the upward escalator. Kyle had already begun the climb, with Chloe not far behind. Genevieve lingered by the landing with her boyfriend, glancing between Loretta and Jake as he frowned and nodded up the stairs. Even Genevieve’s patience had limits.

“It’s okay,” Loretta said, forcing herself to smile. “I’ll meet you at Hot Topic?”

Genevieve nodded and let Jake lead her up the stairs, occasionally glancing back at Loretta until she disappeared onto the floor above. 

Loretta sighed as she made her way to the elevator. She didn’t blame them for not wanting to wait. She couldn’t. Not when she knew how slow and out of shape she was. It would have taken her much longer to climb those steps, and she dreaded the thought of inconveniencing the few people that would bear her presence even more than she dreaded the exhaustion such an effort would cause. The panel above the elevator door lit up, and with a soft chime, the doors slid open.

It was already occupied.

Three women stood inside the elevator car; a rat, a tiger, and a fox. They looked to one another, then back at Loretta. Loretta turned her eyes toward the floor and began to shuffle aside, but they didn’t step out. She glanced up to find that they were still looking at her.

“Going up?” the tiger asked, smirking and raising a brow.

“Ye— N-no, it’s okay. I’ll wait.”

“Are you sure?” asked the fox. “There’s plenty of room.”

The fox glanced to the others, smiling, and the three of them stepped to one side of the car. Loretta furrowed her brow in disbelief, her beak hanging open as she struggled to process what she was witnessing. She knew how cramped that elevator was supposed to be, barely able to hold a group of six, but now it somehow seemed like there was enough space inside for twice as many. 

The rat chuckled. “Euclid was a joke. Don’t sweat it.”

Loretta closed her beak and hesitantly stepped into the elevator, backing into the far side of the car. The door rolled closed, and the car shook softly as it began to ascend. The trio remained where they stood, but they turned toward one another, practically huddling. She could hear them talking, but they spoke so softly that she couldn’t make anything out. Anxiety suggested that she was the subject of their hushed conversation because every now and then, one of them would glance over at her, and then go back to snickering and talking amongst themselves. 

Cautiously, Loretta surveyed the the trio, noting that they all had hair of a varying shades of red, and that two of the three were very heavyset, to the point that the rat and the tiger came close to rivaling her in terms of girth. 

While Loretta was fatter by a visible margin, the tiger stood a bit taller. She had her hair in a high, flowing ponytail, her brilliantly green eyes framed by a few loose locks, and her abundant curves highlighted by ankle length tights and a cami that revealed the strawberry blonde fur of her arms and legs, and didn’t even attempt to cover her striped midriff. 

The rat’s diminutive stature made her appear proportionally just as fat, which was somewhat remarkable to Loretta given that the rat barely reached the height of the her chest. Her baggy sweatshirt hung nearly to the knees of her grubby jeans, her rust-red eyes peering out from a mop of short, messy, wiry hair that hid most of the fur of her cloud grey face. 

The fox was by no means rail-thin, but next to her companions, she was dramatically thinner. She stood a bit shorter than Loretta, her skirt and blouse flowing with the slightest movements, accentuating her curvy, bottom-heavy figure. She wore a wide-brimmed sun hat, her charcoal black ears sprouting from above it, her shoulder length hair spilling out from beneath it. There was something else about the fox that Loretta couldn’t quite place. Something strangely familiar. 

For an instant, the vixen locked eyes with her, their squint betraying her gleeful smile, so vibrantly green that they almost seemed to glow.

The elevator shuddered as it came to a stop.

“But let’s try to show a bit of tact, alright?” she heard the fox say as the three of them turned toward the elevator door.

The tiger shot Loretta a little grin in passing as she said, “I’ll try, but no promises.” The tiger then met the fox’s disapproving stare with a shrug. “Whatever happens… happens.”

“Tact is for supplicants,” said the rat as they stepped off the elevator. “Why would you insist on holding yourself back—” The rest was lost under the idle chatter of the food court.

Loretta blinked, and the elevator car suddenly felt a lot smaller. Her eyelids fluttered as she looked around in a daze, startled to find the walls a lot closer together than they had been in the previous instant. A pair of hyenas peered into the car, waiting to board until Loretta had waddled out.

Breakfast, and the snack Loretta had eaten just after breakfast, were still sitting heavy in her belly as she made her way through the food court. She didn’t feel hungry, but the sights and smells of the various fast food chains and near-identical Chinese counters beckoned, compelling her to eat. Samples were accepted and gobbled up, but she resisted the temptation to stop and stuff her face in the interest of reaching her destination.