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Bugs had never been the most amiable of toons, he acted like it when he had to sure, but most people bored him too much for him to really try. It didn't take him long to figure out how people worked and since then he played it to his advantage, using it to always win against his adversaries or get people's admiration. It was like a game, only it grew old fast and started getting too predictable for his liking. But what could he do about it? If he acted ungrateful things would stop working to his advantage, so, he let himself succumb to the monotony.
Still, there was some part of him that longed for something... more. Different. Something that was anything else.
Working at Warners Brothers was supposed to be that, his costars were made to be zany! But that quickly got predictable too. His whole life was predictable and he couldn't stand it so he put up a mask. He pretended like he was fine with everything when he wasn't, he listened as his costars droned on about their lives even if he couldn't care less, he acted like the well-mannered, inviting mascot he was supposed to be.
And he hated every moment of it.
But the mask couldn't slip, the facade couldn't fade, the show had to go on even when there was no show going on. Everything would end, then who would he be? If his life being predictable meant he was something then... he would stay. He would feel stuck, trapped, cornered -as long as he could be something. But he would put up his walls, he wouldn't get close to anyone- too convinced they were all the same.
Besides, he had been alone his whole life- even from the point of his creation, he was used to solitude. He reveled in it. No, the problem wasn't that, it was that everything was the same. A pattern. A rut. If there was one thing he had in common with other toons it was that they hated ruts. Bugs hated even more when he couldn't get out of one.
What he hated the most was that his whole life was one.
So he put his all into his role, he let himself get lost in the admiration, because if he didn't have to think about the rut then it wasn't there. Because he wasn't the type for introspection and looking at himself brought up some things he'd rather not think about. Because he knew what he was supposed to be, what other people wanted him to be. Because he knew how to win.
Which, got him a few enemies. Toons- coworkers who hated him on set as well as off. Ones who were just dying for a chance to knock him down a peg. But that wasn't how he was written. And after consecutive win after consecutive win he was once again in a rut. He threw himself even more into his role.
And so the cycle continued.
Still, sometimes he wondered what it'd be like if he got out of it, if he did something different, but was he the problem or everyone else? If everyone else wasn't like everyone else, if they played a different game, would everything still be predictable? Or was he just supposed to play their game?
So he tried, he tried doing things like everyone else, he tried to become just as monotonous as they were. It made his costars really like him at least, he tried to tell himself that mattered. It didn't stick. Even if the other toons had a sort of friendship off set Bugs never was interested in any of it, he preferred to do things solo,
And then along came Daffy.
Or rather Daffy was there first and Bugs happened to finally run into him. He didn't know how they had never crossed paths in the eleven years Bugs had been at Warners (thirteen really, but he didn't think about those years) but he had heard about Daffy. Of course he had, Daffy was their golden star before he came along. Needless to say he had been... intrigued. If there was someone who was playing a different game it was Daffy Duck.
Daffy was zany, and stubborn, and try as might Bugs could not figure him out during their first short. It made things interesting. It made him consider things he never had before. It made him want more.
For the first time in his life, Bugs Bunny actually liked someone.
So he requested to be paired with Daffy more and because he was who he was it was granted. They became friends, of sorts- he knew Daffy didn't exactly like him but they got along well enough. Better than either of them did with their costars at least. It was fun, more fun than Bugs could ever remember having. But it brought some stuff with it.
Daffy challenged him- his view of himself, the role he had to play. Daffy saw through all his masks and facades and demanded to see the real Bugs, all without saying a word. And it was refreshing, no one ever wanted to knock him down like that, not even his enemies. It made him feel something he had never felt before and something he wasn't written to understand. And that came with its own problems.
He didn't like being outside his parameters, being put in situations he didn't know how to deal with. No toon did. But there was something about Daffy that made it bearable. There was something about Daffy that made it okay to think about the stuff he hated to think about, that made him want to think about it. All of that was as terrifying as it was exhilarating. It made him want to put up even more walls, to push Daffy away, but he couldn't. He couldn't go back to before, not when he knew how much better this was.
He was a selfish toon, even at his own expense.
But he just didn't know how to be anything else, it was how he was drawn. Even past the masks and the walls down to his very core- he was selfish. That was the central part of his being. And truthfully, he didn't want it any other way. He just wished he didn't get in his own way sometimes. It would be easier better to part ways with Daffy but Bugs just liked him too much to ever do that. He liked him too much to ignore just how terrifying he could be.
Of course, since he was Bugs Bunny he never showed he was terrified. There was a lot he never showed when it came to Daffy. He was more than content to let everyone assume he was nothing other than amused by him. And for the most part that was true. The part of him that held those negative feelings was small, infinitesimal really. But it was a part that was always in the back of his mind.
But the more they hung out the less those feelings existed. The more Bugs realized Daffy had his own masks and facades, his own walls that were getting dropped around Bugs. The more he realized they had a lot in common. And more than that, that they understood each other. They never said any of this of course, but it was always unspoken. Always lingering in the air, along with something he didn't have a name for. If he was regularly introspective he probably would but just because Daffy made him want to think about things didn't mean he would. Besides, things were fine the way they were, there was no need to complicate them with stuff like that.
Things were so fine that they even started going on vacations together. And it was fun, Daffy away from the studio was different than Daffy at the studio. When he didn't have a reason to despise Bugs he was lighter, carefree. Like the old Daffy. But with parts of the Daffy he knew mixed in.
He sure was an interesting one, that duck.
That wasn't the only reason he enjoyed their vacations, however. It was nice to get away from everything- from the studio, the paparazzi, his costars. It was nice to be somewhere where he didn't have to worry about being Bugs Bunny. Of course, since he had been Bugs Bunny his whole life he didn't know how to be anything else. But when other people weren't around he didn't have to be Bugs Bunny, the Mascot. He had long stopped trying to be that when it was just him and Daffy.
Instead he could be Bugs Bunny, the... Bugs Bunny. But like Daffy he was different away from the studio. Freer, less restrained. Even when they got themselves into trouble he had more fun than he did in the shorts. He was written to win, sure, but real life was different than vague scripts and he liked having to think on his feet to get to that outcome. He knew how to win against Elmer and Sam, and even Marvin, he didn't know how to win against abombinable snowmen. It was exciting, and with Daffy there things were guaranteed to be chaotic. And once the trouble was done and they could actually relax he still had fun. Daffy kept things interesting, even when they weren't supposed to be.
They spent a lot of time together, him and Daffy, and for someone who didn't care for others he was surprisingly okay with that. He still didn't like other people, still found them boring and monotonous. Getting close to Daffy hadn't changed that. And that was fine with him, he never needed people like that, never wanted to need people like that. But Daffy just might be the exception to that, the exception to a lot of things.
What was that supposed to mean?