All characters and content in this story are copyright© to Dale Robert Jenkins. (AKA Asalis to those who know him.) This story and its contents may not be edited and/or used without proper permission given.

The Ties that Bond
By Robert Jenkins

Chapter 1.

	He didn't know what was going on nor did he understand why. His father just wouldn't stop despite his plea's. They kept calling him stupid and worthless as he continued to beat the child within an inch of his life. With every blow struck he could feel the weight of  his fathers anger, his desperation. He knew that this wasn't who his father really was. On some deep level he could feel it.  With each pounding blow made came a wracking pain that filled his entire body. He kept wishing for it to stop but it didn't happen. He soon began praying that it would end soon.

	In a flash everything changed. His father was nowhere in sight yet it was his mother who was now standing over him. Her hands were wrapped around his throat tightly. He could see the frustration in her eyes. He immediately began gasping for air and found the task most difficult with each passing second. He struggled to break free but found the task futile with every attempt. That still didn't stop him from trying to break free. With each passing second he could feel himself slipping away. Eventually his strength gave way as he continued to gasp for more air. In the last few seconds before he was about to pass out he could hear a voice calling out his name. Suddenly it seemed as if time it's self was slowing down. All he could see now was a blinding light in front of his face. It continued to get brighter and brighter as the pain began to fade from him. It felt so good basking in its glow when suddenly there came a loud screeching sound that lasted for only a second then came  again a second later and again. It kept going and going until...

	SLAM!!!

	Groggily he picked up the digital clock under his limp hand. He had forgotten to turn the alarm off last night considering how today was supposed to be his day off. It's just as well he thought as he kicked off the sheets. He really didn't feel like going back to sleep any time soon. As he rubbed the sleep out of his eyes the memory of his nightmare quickly crept over him. He let out a slight groan as he tried to shake his head clear from the images that continued to haunt him, though it didn't seem to do much for him. He wondered why his parents did that to him.

	There came a knock at the door to his bedroom. “Toby, are you awake?” called a female voice from the other side. It was the other apartment's tenant Felicia. She was the first kind furson that Toby had met after his father threw him out. She had given him so much yet all he could do in return was pay his share of the rent. He knew she would only refuse anything else he offered anyway.

	“I'll be there in a minute Felicia.” Toby called back while fishing around the dresser top for his glasses. He still couldn't shake the effects of the dream. It wasn't long before his thoughts began to wander. When he first met the Vixen he was in very bad shape. He was about twenty years of age then. He had almost given up any form of hope in his life. However it seemed that someone was smiling down on him that night.

*      *      *

Six years ago.

	Some of the injuries he had were rather severe. They were given to him as a departing gift from his father just before he hit the curb face first. He had no way to take care of the injuries either. He didn't have a job or the experience needed to obtain one. In every sense he had nothing but the clothes on his back. He didn't know anything about the outside world beyond that which he experienced in his early life. It seemed hopeless to him now. He clutched tightly on to his left arm in an effort to stay warm in the ice cold of the night. He was just passing in front of a clinic when a voice called out to him.

	“Hey sir, are you alri....” a young female Red Fox gasped when she approached him, seeing the injuries inflicted on the young rabbit. Toby’s left arm was hanging limp on his side while his right arm desperately tried to brace it. His face was swelling in some places and the bruises on the exposed areas were obviously still fresh. Dried blood could be seen in various spots through his brown matted fur. Toby just looked at her with a cold indifferent stare. He could tell just by the way she was dressed that she worked at this clinic. He figured that she was just another furson who was too ashamed to even look at him. Why would she care about someone like me? He thought. Feeling he was just another lost cause, he didn't expect to get any help from her either. When she extended her hand he was surprised though betrayed no emotion. He looked over her welcoming hand with a skeptical look. He never trusted anyone, not even his grandparents, yet there was something about the vixen before him that he just couldn't ignore.

	Without saying a word he followed her into the clinic. He immediately noticed the smell of disinfectant alcohol in the air upon entering. He continued to watch the Vixen as she proceeded to alert a cheetah who was obviously the doctor on call. From what Toby could tell the place wasn't very busy tonight. The waiting room was completely empty though he didn't have the time to sit down before the doctor walked up to him and with a warm and welcoming voice with his hand held out he said, “Greetings, I'm Doctor Walker.” Toby just stood there looking at the doctor the best he could through his swollen face. 

	“Right,” Dr. Walker said wiping his hand nervously on his lab coat, “if you'll kindly follow me we'll see if we can take a look at some of those injuries.”

	Again without saying a single word he followed the doctor to a small room with an examination bed in the center of it. The doctor gestured for him to sit and politely asked for him to remove his shirt. Dr. Walker wasn't at all surprised to see the many bruises and cuts that seemed to cover his entire upper body. He had seen this many times before though this was the first time he seen it on a young adult male furson at this age. Felicia however didn't know what to make of it. She wondered why anyone could possibly do such a thing to a young fur. She tried to avoid staring as Dr. Walker continued to examine the hare.

	After he had finished his examination he helped Toby put his shirt back on then began to work on fixing the rabbits’ broken limb. Toby just gritted his teeth as the doctor began to set and splint the bones. Though despite all the pain Toby was in, he still refused to utter a sound. He was too afraid to scream. He was in a strange place with strange people. He didn't know what to do or what to even think of the situation he was in, though he refused to show any signs of this as Dr. Walker finished putting on the cast for the hares’ arm.
.
	“That finishes that.” Dr. Walker said as calmly as he could while helping the patient secure his arm in a sling. He was rather concerned given how young this fur looked. He was even more concerned as to who gave him these injuries in the first place, though his patient seemed rather reluctant to say anything at all. Hopping to try and pry some kind of answer out of the rabbit he ventured asking him for his name. The rabbit just dug into his shorts pocket and produced a near empty wallet with a driver’s license lodged in one of the plastic dividers.

	This was not quite what Dr Walker had in mind but he at least knew what to call him now. He let out a disappointed sigh as he proceeded to fill out a report. He stared at the license for moment thinking to himself. If Toby wasn't going to answer him then he had to get them from somewhere.

	“Felicia, please take care of his other wounds while I make a call?” Dr. Walker asked as he exited the small room and rounded the corner to the reception desk. There he picked up the phone and proceeded to dial the number he got from Toby' license. He hopped that he might be able to get some kind of answers from whoever was on the other end. There was a click on the other end followed by an older male voice that sounded to be in his early forties he sounded rather annoyed at the moment as he announced who he was.

	“Mr. Reynard I have a Toby J...” Dr. Walker started before he was interrupted by several irate screams from the other end. “Sir please calm down. He just wandered by my clinic and...” was interrupted once again by several more screams none of which sounded good for Toby. It was here that Dr. Walker made an assumption that he just felt he had to ask. “Mr. Reynard did are you the one responsible for Toby’s current circumstance?” to which he just got a confirming shout in reply. “That's all I needed to know” Dr. Walker growled before slamming the phone on the cradle and gave a sigh of resignation.

	It was obvious to him now what had happened. The problem now was to get Toby to admit it himself. “Easier said than done.” Dr. Walker muttered to himself as he looked at Toby' license in his hand. He proceeded to walk back to the room Toby was in and found Felicia working on cleaning the last of his wounds. He could see the gash in Toby' right foot had been stitched closed.

	Dr. Walker cleared his thought before addressing Toby. “I just got off the phone with your father, Toby.” He gauged Toby' reaction as the fur looked up at him for the first time since Felicia brought him in. His face was one of shock and fear which quickly changed to anger as he dropped his gaze back to his lap again. This is exactly what Dr. Walker had expected to see, Toby didn't have to say anything further.

	“I couldn't save her.” Toby finally said in a barely audible voice.

	“Who?” Felicia said looking up at the rabbit in surprise. “Who couldn't you save?”

	Toby' looked up to meet her gaze. He tried to fight back tears as he proceeded replied, “My sister, I couldn't save her from him this time.”

	“From who?” Dr Walker asked with even more concern upon hearing this. It wasn't just Toby that was in trouble. There was another at risk now and it went against everything he knew as a doctor to allow such a thing to continue. He immediately stormed out of the room to the front desk. Picking up the phone he dialed the police and started describing everything that had happened from Toby’s arrival. Toby on the other hand had clammed up again. He refused to say anything further despite Felicia's pleas. It seemed that no matter what she tried he just refused to say or do anything more.

	His fists gripped the edge of the bed cushion, no longer fighting back the tears he had been holding. It no longer mattered to him anymore. From his perspective he had nothing left. He felt that he had failed her. His sister was now at his father's mercy. He had failed to protect her when she needed him most this time. He could only imagine what she must think of him now. He had made a mistake this time. He had struck his father in anger in order to protect her. Before he just used to continually get right in his father's path until he got so angry he vented his anger out on him instead. Now he couldn't be there for her anymore. He was forbidden to ever return. He silently vowed that he would someday return again and against his father's wishes if he had too. He didn’t take notice that Dr. Walker was already taking steps to make it sooner rather than later.

*      *      *

	Toby finished drying of the last of his wet fur and quickly got dressed. He could smell the aroma of breakfast in the air. He couldn't thank Felicia enough for all that she had done for him. It had been six years since that day when they fist met. Toby had changed so much since then. He was working part time at a warehouse handling incoming and outgoing shipments on a daily basis. The rest of the time he was attending classes at a trade school to get a degree in his new found passion, which was sitting on the a desk in a corner of the apartments living room. The screen saver was busy cycling through a few images from Felicia's photo album. It was of a summer vacation in Mexico that she had gone on with her family last year. It pained Toby that he didn't have such memories like that to share about his family.

	“Thought you didn't have to work today?” Felicia called from the kitchen sprinkling a little pepper on the mess of eggs she was busy preparing.

	“I don't.” Toby replied back “I forgot to turn off my alarm clock.”

	“Well since your up, how would you like your eggs?” She called once again.

	“Scrambled if that’s alright?” Toby said taking a seat on the couch.

	When he was just about to turn on the TV the phone began to ring. Picking up the receiver he was surprised to hear his sister Jessica on the other end.

	“Hey bro,” she said in her usual perky tone, “So what cha doin?”

	“Nothing much sis, just about to watch some TV is all.” Toby said clicking the remote on. I thought you were supposed to be on spring vacation for college.”

	“Good then you’re gonna love this.” Came a rather giddy reply that made Toby a little wary but before he could ask Jessica what she meant she gave him a channel to turn to. His eyes grew wide upon seeing the sight on the TV station his sister had directed him to.

	“Your on spring break in Mexico!” the rabbit screamed. “Does gramma know?”

	“Oh course she does what do you take me for?” Jennifer said back then taking notice that the camera was on her.

	“What do you think your doing!?” Toby roared upon watching his sisters silly antics with the top piece of her bikini in hand. “Wait let me guess, You just told gramma you were going on vacation but not to where didn’t you?” His sister just gave a confirming hum.

	“Well I've got news for ya lil sis,” Toby said with as a grin spread across his face. “Gramma watches this channel too. I know this because it has some of her favorite shows on it.” He let out a slight chuckle as he saw the look of shock and horror cross his twin sisters face mouthing the words gramma. The news anchor covering also seemed to think it amusing to see. “Thats right,” Toby continued not bothering to hide his delight in seeing his sister try to hide her face from the camera. “And you can bet that she won’t be pleased when you get back home. Later sis.” and with that he hung up counting to five. Sure enough the phone rang once again. Toby didn't have to guess who was on the other end.

	“Hey gramma, listen before you start I just wanted to let you know that I just got off the phone with her.” He held his arm out as a flurry of shouts burst out from the receiver. “Now gramma I had no idea she was there either.” He gulped “She called me just now and told me where she was.”

	“What am I going to do with her? She's really going to get it when she gets back, i'll see to that.” Toby’s grandmother fumed.

	“Now gramma, don't be too hard on her. She is still young and after what dad did to her, this is a good sign that....”

	“Don't give me that, you’re both the same age!” Toby' grandmother argued, “You know what I meant.”

	“Yeah, I do.” he groaned, “Well I got to go. We'll talk about this later, and tell my younger brother I said hi?” and with that he hung up the phone, turned off the TV, and went to help Felicia finish setting up the table.

	“I take it your grandmother isn't pleased with the development.” Felicia said in the middle of setting the table.  Toby just gave her an annoyed stare in reply. “That bad, huh? Well it’s not like your sister is going to do something stupid. She is a grown woman after all.”

	“That’s what worries me.” Toby groaned as he proceeded to dig into his eggs.

	Later, after Felicia had gone to work Toby had decided to try out some of the new upgrades he bought for his computer, and was having a hard time getting them to work properly. Tossing the manual he had been using aside he had decided to try a few tricks of his own. Someone at his computer classes had shown him what to do when the manual fails. Opening up the explorer program he had proceeded to try a manual install, and surprisingly enough it worked. Now all Toby had to do was install the hardware that went with it. Looking at the many parts in the box he groaned as he got up to find the manual he had tossed across the room.

	“Why can’t they just make it simple just this once.” he said to no one in particular.

	After retrieving the manual he immediately began assembling the modem and hooked it up to his computer. He couldn't wait to try it out. It was meant to be an upgrade that Toby felt he desperately needed. Yet when he got an error message from the computer he wasn't the least bit surprised. Reinserting the disk he began the arduous task of looking for the files he needed in order for this machine to work right. An hour later he managed to get it working the way it was supposed to. Now all he had to do was alert his new DSL provider to activate his account, they had previously been using Dial-up.

	After finally getting his account ready and registered Toby was finally ready to start surfing the net again, but first he wanted to check his e mail. Deleting the unnecessary Spam he eventually came across one very interesting message. It was from his lawyer. Upon opening it a wide grin spread across his face. 

	“They found him.” was all he said before quickly typing up his reply.