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Tooniversity, also known as the Toontown Schoolhouse is the premiere university for Toons everywhere, located in Toontown Central. Here, Toons study the art of Cog busting by practising their eight Gag Tracks against dummy Desk Jockey Cogs. One of the students attending is Feliko the Fox, a foul-mouthed Toon whose studies have taken her almost all across Toontown, save for one neighbourhood in particular. Before the Cog invasion, this university actually had a graduate; a taller, dark-furred raccoon Toon named Robin Dynoberry. Robin used to be an athlete and loved soccer, but when the Cog invasion began, she recently returned to help her old school and city survive. However, through multiple unfortunate fights with the Pencil Pushers, Robin’s body suddenly gained the ability to fall apart and put itself back together, with her head being permanently detached after taking a critical hit of a Rub Out attack. Since then, Robin has hung up her cleats and instead became a card dealer at a local casino, using her stamina and newly-obtained head tricks to become quite a star employee. She decided to return to the school one day to see just how her former professor, a short tanuki named Lucki, was doing. What she discovered shamed her to no end. Lucki was out of shape, eating lots of Throw Gags while not doing much cardio in return, leading him to become a shut-in within his lab, perfecting his Sound-o-Matic 5000, which in all actuality, is just a glorified Sound Gag Track device.
One day, Robin had enough of Lucki’s laziness and she decided to do something about it! She had her sister Feliko sneak into Lucki’s lab and pin a note from the raccoon to his fridge that read:
“Private Track Meet
Today 7:30PM
DO NOT BE LATE”
It has become clear that Lucki is not willing to get into shape on his own, however, when the stated time came and went with no sign of the professor. This angered Robin and now it has come to a face-to-face confrontation.
The next day, Lucki entered the Gag Shop in Toontown Central, looking to buy more Throw Gags to eat instead of throwing at Cogs. However, he was met with a shop unusually empty, and only one of the counters had someone manning it. That someone was Robin – her head being on the counter while her body is behind it – and she was furious. Her beautiful blue eyes had fire lit in them while her body had her arms crossed. “Hello, Professor.” She stated calmly. “I hope you weren’t here for a snack, because you’re about to find anything BUT a snack.” This put the fear into the small tanuki, as he tried to run away, only for Robin’s body to pin him down against the wall. “I just want to help you get into shape. Let’s go for a run.”
Robin’s body picked up her head and dragged Lucki to a nearby running track, with the latter Toon screaming “NOOOOOOOOOO!!”, his voice laced with fear. The taller raccoon Toon only hoped her former professor would forgive her. He was not this out of shape in the past, and this is only being done out of a deep respect for who he once was when she was enrolled in the school.
***
Robin has dragged Lucki to the running track not far from the Toontown Central Playground, finding herself out of breath from dragging her professor the whole way there with the only arm she could free up since her head had to be carried by her other arm. Even someone like her was getting physically tired having to fight his thrashing – although it did stop when they reached the track. Lucki was obviously upset at Robin for this but it has to be done. “Please stop whining, Professor. I don’t want any Toons thinking I’m some Cog-like Toon causing you hardship.” Obviously, no one is really going to think of her as such due to all the good she’s done for Toons, but her heart couldn’t take the sheer thought of such.
“You’re really going to treat your old professor like this?!” Lucki complained. Robin could only facepalm and sigh, forcing herself to finally let go of the tanuki.
“I…kind of have to.” She responded. “I just can’t accept – and won’t accept that this lazy Toon I’ve brought here is the same professor that taught me all I know about Gags, about Cogs, about Toontown, and about the world outside of Toontown!” She was raising her voice near the end, since she felt so strongly about it. “Back then, you were an amazing Toon. Now though, you’re wrecking my memory of you. So, I have no choice but to get you back into shape!”
The shorter tanuki almost felt touched by that speech, but he was aware of how Feliko is, and he’s wondering if Robin is going to be just as hard on him. Though, running away really did nothing for him so even though he hates the very idea of it, he’ll at least try to cooperate for the sake of his star graduate. “Okay, okay! I’ll…try to take this seriously!” He says after a couple minutes of really mulling it over in his mind. Robin seemed very much relieved by that answer, letting out an audible sigh. “Okay, cool. Let me just get changed into more workout-suitable clothes. Oh, and take that jet pack off, it’s only going to weigh you down.” She left for the changing rooms while Lucky took off his jet pack and looked at it. It was a gift Feliko bought for him, alongside several pairs of shoes after a certain Toontown Central teleport access incident. Even though the jet pack isn’t actually real, it’s still a metal accessory he’s put on his back; metal that actually will weigh him down more than he’s actually willing to admit. With a heavy heart, he sets it aside on a safe part of the track where no one will trip on it.
After a few minutes, Robin returned wearing a long-sleeved tracksuit. She also has her red bandana she bought from the GUMBALL machine. Ordinarily, she would wear this on her neck to allow her head to sit very loosely on her neck stump, but that’s not what she’s going for today. Instead, she will be using it as a finish line of sorts, held by a cardboard cut out of Flippy. She places it about halfway across the full 500-meter track, meaning she’s expecting Lucki at some point to actually do 250 meters of running without tiring out. Is she expecting that of him out of the gate? Obviously not! However, she hopes that this will help Lucki eventually reach this goal.
Once the cut out with her bandana was placed, the raccoon puts her head somewhere where she can see the entire field before her body runs over beside Lucki at the starting line. “All right! Get ready, Lucki!” Her head calls out before her body gets into a runner’s stance: crouched, hands touching the ground, legs on the metal foot stoppers, tail raised in the air, ready to run. “Okay, Lucki…we’ve both changed significantly in various ways. Maybe some of it isn’t what we’d like to admit, either. However, I’m looking forward to helping you get back on track.” Lucki looked at Robin’s body beside him as she’s speaking, so he tries to copy her stance. It’s a sloppy form of it, but it’ll have to do for now. “Okay! Ready, set…GO!!” As soon as she yells go, Robin takes off running. It felt good to run again, even if she can never really do it like she used to again, given the new challenges with her head. However, she’s just as fast and as healthy as she’s ever been, so she’s able to easily close her eyes and listen to her body run down the track, around the corner, and feel the wind of her bandana pass her body indicating she’s finished.
“Ahh…that felt good. Now, let’s see how Lucki’s do–” She opens her eyes to find out that the tanuki had collapsed at around the 75-meter mark.
“OH, COME ON!! SERIOUSLY?!” She could hardly believe it. Lucki is more out of shape than she thought he was! The raccoon makes a mental note to herself that this could take a while…
***
That night, Robin thought it necessary to go to Lucki’s lab to see if he’s stuffing his face or not. She didn’t bother to call him beforehand because odds are, he’d try to be sneaky about it after this morning. As she was walking towards Lucki’s house, the raccoon looked over his best records from the day. He only managed to get 100 meters at best, which admittedly is an improvement over that 75 meter disappointment from earlier but the problem is two-fold; it took all day to reach that point, and he would collapse after reaching it. He’s getting better, sure, but she thinks the tanuki has a long way to go. Robin enters Lucki’s house and enters his lab as she has both a spare key to his house and the access code to his lab. Once she input the code to the keypad, the raccoon enters the lab that resides within the basement. She enters the main room and what does she lay her eyes on? Lucki stuffing himself with Throw Gags. Again.
“Oh. Hi Robin.” He said with his mouth full. Robin. Was. FURIOUS! She was so mad that if one was perceptive enough, one could see an aura of flame radiating from her body. “What. In the world. Do you think you’re doing…?” She asked him coldly. Lucki swallowed and looked at her blankly. Lucki was not perceptive enough to see the aura.
“Want one?” He offers a cupcake. Robin didn’t want it. In fact, her eyes were twitching. She wanted nothing more than to yell at him. However, instead of lashing out at him, she puts her head down on the table, clipboard down beside it, and takes all of his Throw Gags! “Whoa, hey! Robin, what are you doing?”
She doesn’t turn to face Lucki. “I’m taking all of this, and bringing it to Travis.”
“The trash cat?!” Lucki was shocked that his graduate would even consider that!
“Yeah. You’re done.” was all Robin had to say in response as her body went to grab a bag.
“No no no, hey, Robin, you don’t have to go that far. You had me run all day! Why don’t we…?” He tries to touch Robin’s body, only for her to pull away.
“Guess what, Lucki? You stuff yourself on these Gags, and we’ll be right back to where we started this morning! No, I’m not going to tolerate this any longer, and you’re not changing my mind on this! No more eating Throw Gags until you’re back in shape! Even when you are, I don’t want you getting out of shape again!” Her body takes the bag full of pies, cupcakes, and birthday cakes she just tied up and promptly left, leaving a rift between the relationship of the two Toons. Lucki looked at her head she left behind, feeling rather dejected. He managed to go and upset his star graduate who looked up to him so much…and now her face plainly says to him that she’s no longer in the mood to talk. It’s only now that he realized he let her down to the point where she has taken drastic action against him. Maybe she was right. Maybe he HAS let himself go. He walks up to her head and he could tell the raccoon was trying very hard not to make eye contact with him…but her body isn’t here, so she doesn’t really have a choice. She sighs. “What? What is it, Professor?” The pain in her voice indicates she’s still angry.
“Look…I’m sorry, Robin. I’ve been a fool. I couldn’t see that you held me in such high regard and I’ve ruined that. So, from tomorrow on, I’ll keep running on that track until I’m able to run past that cut out and give you your bandana back without getting so exhausted. It’s going to take time though and I’m…not giving up on Throw Gags fully.”
Robin looked into Lucki’s eyes. He’s being genuine. He’s really telling her what he couldn’t see. Although, she couldn’t help but give him a blank stare and a frown upon mentioning the Gags again, but…maybe he really can’t go without. “Okay, well, I’m still banning you from eating them until you’re back in shape but after that, so long as you don’t return to this point, I can’t really stop you from eating them either.” Lucki gave her a small smile. “You gotta promise me on this though. I don’t want to be let down like this again.” She added. Lucki nodded. “It’s a deal then. Remember, Lucki, you promised, so you’re gonna put in the work.”
Lucki nods again before realizing that her head is still here while her body is not. “Oh, uh…do you want me to…?” Robin sighs.
“Forget it for now. Without my bandana, it won’t make a lick of difference anyway.” Robin reminded him. Lucki was still upset by that, but nothing else worked so he’s in no position to argue about it.
“I just hope other Toons don’t discover your body and get scared.”
“Even if they do, I’ll apologize to them later. You’re my priority right now.”
***
Over the next few weeks, Lucki would push himself to running the track and trying to get Robin’s bandana. He’s still not able to finish without collapsing, but after a month, he’s able to reach 200 meters as his best record. His body was getting somewhat slimmer as well. All of this pleased Robin, but he’s still not ready to retrieve her bandana yet. By now, a lot of Toons have seen Robin’s body either without her head entirely or seen carrying it. Some were fine with it after seeing something similar with Feliko, others seemed a little nervous about it. However, they all still like the raccoon as a Toon, despite her changes. This was making Robin nervous, however. She wanted her bandana back soon, hoping that Lucki will be able to complete that 250-meter goal and retrieve it within the next month or two. He’s got all summer, after all, so maybe her worries are unfounded.
Robin did decide she wanted to watch Lucki’s training with Feliko one time. The fox seemed skeptical. “Sis. Be straight with me. Do you actually think my professor’s gonna keep his word?” Feliko asked Robin, who frowned. She knew her sister wasn’t very trusting, but even this seemed a bit much even for the fox.
“I actually don’t know, but I hope he will. He promised me.” Robin stated bluntly, knowing the fox wouldn’t take any half-answers. “I just have a feeling that maybe this time, he’ll listen to me.”
“I ring ding doubt it.” Feliko replied.
“Do you happen to have faith in anyone, sis?”
“I have faith in you.”
“Flattery won’t get you far, Feliko. You’re not coming with me to a casino.”
“I know.”
A few more weeks went by and Lucki is actually able to reach the 250-meter mark! However, he’s still too tired to retrieve Robin’s bandana. This is a great milestone, however, so he keeps at it for one more week and a half…until one Sunday night, Lucki knocks on Robin’s door. Her body answers it with her head listening on the couch.
“Hey Robin…I finally did it. I got your bandana back.” He gives it to her body. She blushes but takes it and puts it back on her neck.
“It’s late…did you really have to–?”
“Yes, because I care about my graduate and my students!” Lucki interrupted her just so he could answer a question he seemed to know was coming. Feeling somewhat impressed and knowing he’s tired from his voice, she lets him in. “Let’s have a sleepover. You look great, by the way.” He goes in and gets to have a sleepover. Oh, and Robin allows him ONE cupcake as a reward. Hopefully, from here on out, Lucki the Tanuki will learn to not be so reckless anymore.