Work Text:
Bambi’s hooves flattened against the earth. Above him, various birds had set to the sky, their cries striking alarm in the surrounding forest creatures.
Bambi, too stunned to move, watched in horror as his mother leapt across a fallen log in the meadow.
He desperately wants to run to her aide, to save her, but he can’t move. He’s stuck in place, useless.
His mother falls after a sickening crack in the sky.
“Bambi.”
Someone’s calling his name, but he can’t look away from her fallen body.
This was all his fault.
If he’d only gotten to her sooner…
“Bambi!”
The first thing he feels as he drifts awake, are the tears flowing down his face. It takes him a second longer to realize that the tears were his.
“Bambi! Oh for the love of the forest!”
Something hits him, hard, right on his back hind leg.
“Ow!” He protests, waking from his nightmare.
Groggily, he looks up at both his savior and nemesis.
“Ronno. I was sleeping.”
“No, you were whining like a little girl.”
“I was not!” Bambi protested, fully awake now.
He scrambled upright, annoyed at having been caught in such a vulnerable position. Bambi’s father had left for his usual patrol around the forest. To think that by next year the role would be passed onto him…Bambi didn’t want to think about it.
“Bambi! Are you okay?” Thumper hopped wildly into view.
That was when Bambi realized that he had been resting under the shade of a great oak tree. The summer heat had caused a sheen of sweat to coat his fur.
“I’m okay, thanks Thumper.”
The rabbit looked unconvinced, and his wife appeared by his side almost instantly, giving him an even more exasperated expression.
“Bambi! You mustn’t sleep without anyone to watch over you. What if something happened, hm? What if you became lost.”
Miss Bunny looked somewhere between cross and overwhelmed with concern. Out of everyone, she always seemed to know when something was wrong. She’d been giving him that same look for almost the whole summer season now, and it was the reason he avoided her and her all too knowing gaze. He wasn't ready to talk, he doesn't think he'll ever be.
“I’ll be more careful.” Even to his ears, the promise sounded empty, like he couldn’t care less for his own safety. He supposes it was true, to some extent.
“What are you even doing here?” He looked up at Ronno, who had stepped back to allow his friends to coddle Bambi. The dark stag rarely showed in this part of the forest. Lately, however, Bambi had been seeing more and more of him. Like a dark shadow that constantly followed him.
“I came across you squealing like a frightened little fawn, so, out of the goodness of my heart, I thought, ‘I better help the young Princess out’.”
“I’m a Prince, Ronno. I don’t know why you insist on calling me a Princess.”
“Somehow, it suits you more. Princess.” Bambi glared up at him, eyes defiant.
But in that mere second of shared eye contact, Bambi witnessed something truly confusing in the expression of the other. Etched within his usual playful gaze was something akin to distress.
Had he been genuinely worried for Bambi? Concerned for his well-being?
He huffed as he walked around the dark stag. Ronno wouldn’t care the slightest if something had happened to him.
Deep down, not even that deep down, he knew that was false. They'd grown to care for one another deeply, although, neither was prepared to admit it.
“While I wouldn’t say you were squealing, you were making sounds in your sleep, Bambi.” Miss Bunny bounced around his legs, effectively stopping him from making a run for it, which of course, she had seen through with his sudden maneuver around them.
“It was just a dream.” He responded, and he tore his eyes away from Miss Bunny, because he knew that the longer he looked, the more pity he’d find in her eyes.
His mother had passed four years ago, and still, they all tiptoed around him. Bambi had already accepted what had happened, what he couldn’t accept however, was how utterly pathetic and passive he’d been at the time.
Why didn’t he turn around and run to her? When she yelled at him to keep running, he should have stopped and fought off the humans.
The dark truth that no one, no one, not even his friends were prepared to hear, was that Bambi constantly wished that he had died that day instead of his mother.
Miss Bunny lets him go, and Bambi, with increasing determination, decides to disappear for a few days. Maybe he’ll go see the south side of the forest, he might visit Faline, who had settled there with other doe.
"I won't do something so reckless again. But I must be off now, I'll see you all sometime later this week!" He called, running from them as he seemed to do often lately.
A set of trotting hooves resonated on the ground, and before Bambi can evade Ronno, the dark deer is already beside him. He settles unreasonably close to Bambi, forcing them to walk hip-to-hip.
Bambi sighs. He wasn’t in the mood for his antics and belittlement.
“Off to see Faline?” Ronno asked, and his voice did not betray any hint of emotion. But as Bambi glanced at him, side-eye, he discovered something truly foreign on his face.
Ronno looked…apprehensive, as though the prospect of Bambi visiting his long-time friend were something unbearable or even agonizing for the other stag. He decided not to give the strange expression any thought. Ronno had been acting odd for the last month, Bambi would simply attribute it to that.
“If you must know, then yes. I am going to visit Faline.”
Ronno’s steps faltered for a mere moment before he was back in pace with Bambi. The dark stag did not converse further, simply following beside Bambi as though it were his one true purpose in life.
Bambi reflected on the day when Ronno had gone from his bully to his bully with friendship-like qualities. The dark stag had gotten his antlers caught in some branches. When Bambi had quite literally stumbled across him, Ronno had initially threatened the young Prince to stay away and that he didn’t need any help, especially from a Princess.
Bambi didn’t see a future in which Ronno would escape, unscathed, without assistance from someone. Bambi had the decency not to laugh at Ronno's predicament, which he knew wouldn’t be reciprocated if their positions had been reversed, but his mother had taught him well. He decided to help.
Bambi hoisted himself onto Ronno’s back that day last Summer, causing the slightly older stag to yelp, likely from surprise, as Bambi used his own growing antlers to tug the branches free.
When he’d successfully extracted Ronno, he didn’t wait around for any ‘thanks’ or more likely, curses and threats to keep what had happened between them a secret. But instead, Ronno began following him, and ever since that day, the stag has gone everywhere Bambi had.
Except for Winter that year, when Bambi had assisted Faline in her journey to the south side of the forest.
“Are you going to follow me? It’ll be a three day journey, maybe even longer.” Bambi didn’t stop, simply kept to his track.
Ronno was silent for a moment before he finally spoke.
“I- So, Faline…”
Bambi’s arched an eyebrow at him. It wasn’t like Ronno to be so… uncertain. He seemed like the type that went for everything ad anything he wanted, his confidence never staggering.
But now he could barely form a coherent sentence.
“Yes?” Bambi urged on, hoping that whatever insult that was coming would be weak enough for Bambi to simply ignore. If Ronno talked ill of Faline he’d have no choice but to fight him, which would tire him further. Bambi hadn’t been sleeping well since, well, ever since his mother was killed, after all. He was plagued by nightmares that only eased whenever someone else slept beside him.
That someone had been Ronno on occasion.
“The deer mating season!” Ronno burst out, looking surprised by his own loud voice, “It’s coming soon, isn’t it?” Ronno concluded, hiding his face from Bambi’s view as they started to descend a steep hill.
Why was Ronno talking about the mating season? With Bambi too, of all stags. If he wanted to discuss strategies, he would find better advice among those in their age group who have actually participated in the mating seasons. Better yet, with those who had been successful in finding a mate.
“Is it soon?” Bambi hadn’t participated, even when his father had encouraged him to. Mostly out of fear of disappointing his potential partner, but also because he simply hadn’t found the right doe. Faline was amazing, a truly incredible friend, but that was all she was. Bambi’s closest friend of his own kind.
It also didn’t help that the very thought of mating made Bambi feel queasy, which he decided was not normal when one of the purposes of his life was to produce an heir, the next Young Prince once he became the Great Prince.
Bambi sighed deeply.
Thumper, of course, was his best friend, as was Flower. But the two had their schedule’s almost entirely filled daily, and with their married status, they couldn’t relate to Bambi anymore, at least, not in terms of being a bachelor.
Flower, for instance, was currently busy as his mate had just given birth to triplets. When Flower had shared the news, he’d looked nauseous, as though he were the one that had given birth. But he was happy, they all were, except for Bambi. Because Bambi couldn’t move on. He couldn’t enter the next cycle of his life.
Something was wrong with him.
“Isn’t that why you’re seeking out Faline?” Ronno’s voice cuts through his quiet thoughts.
Bambi stops mid-step, flabbergasted by Ronno’s assumption, which of course was his first mistake because they were already on a steep incline, and with his sudden stop, Ronno all but collides into his behind.
They go tumbling down for the rest of the short distance to the valley below. Bambi rolled over several times, protecting his head from hitting the ground when finally, they came to a stop. His body ached, but nothing was broken.
Bambi had landed on something hard yet contrarily soft simultaneously. As he groaned, his eyes opened to find that opposite to his belief, he had not landed on a surprisingly fluffy rock, but instead, on Ronno, who was staring up at him with wide dark eyes.
Their snouts were dreadfully close. If Bambi were to dart his tongue out, the muscle would lick Ronno’s nose. He felt strangely tempted to, maybe just to see how the other would react.
“I, um.” Bambi started, unsure of what to do. The natural reaction would be to scramble off of Ronno and stand upright, but as he looked into the stag’s eyes, something stopped him.
There was uncertainty, sure, but within Ronno’s gaze was something akin to fondness, a softness Bambi had never witnessed once before from the male. He was looking at Bambi like how some of the other stag’s looked at doe’s. It made him squirm.
“Your eyes…” Ronno’s voice was deeper, deeper than Bambi had ever heard it before, “I can see the forest reflected in your eyes. It’s beautiful.” He breathed, and Bambi suddenly felt all too flustered. Why was he blushing!
The second mistake Bambi made was moving just when Ronno prepared to shift, which brought their two snouts together in a gentle kiss.
Bambi stared, wide-eyed, directly at Ronno, who returned it with an unsure expression. He was searching Bambi’s eyes, for what, Bambi didn’t know, but Ronno must not have found it because he sighs, looking away with a pained face. The kiss was too short to be considered anything important, right?
They separate after that, wordlessly, like neither was willing to discuss what had just transpired.
“I-” Bambi started, but he didn’t know what to say.
What do you say to an accidental kiss?
‘Sorry’ seemed inappropriate, like the act had somehow meant something when Bambi knew that it hadn’t. It hadn’t meant anything, right?
Ronno twisted and heaved himself upright. Bambi, for the first time, took note of their considerable size difference. Bambi was average in height, his antlers a little shorter than most. It was the color of his coat that varied from the norm, with it’s light fawn color, not so dissimilar to that of a doe’s. But Ronno was the prime example of a stag. He was taller, darker, and his antlers reached further to the sky than any other stag their age.
Bambi swallowed thickly, because in that moment, Ronno truly did look handsome and beautiful. And what an odd thought to have about another stag.
“Are you okay?” Ronno is the first to break their tenuous silence.
Bambi nods his head, unable to form words presently. He couldn’t meet Ronno’s intense gaze, especially not after what he had said.
He saw the forest in Bambi’s eyes! It would make any doe swoon to hear such sentiments. Bambi shook himself, the leaves and dirt that had clung to him fall to the ground. Ronno mimics him, and they continue on their journey, shared it seems, because Ronno is keen to follow Bambi even after…well, that.
“Are you-?” Bambi cringes at the high octave of his voice.
“Am I?” Ronno pressed, trotting slightly to re-attach to Bambi’s hip. He found it less annoying this time around, he might even admit that he had missed the warmth of Ronno against him despite the summer heat.
“Are you okay?” Bambi manages, still refusing to look anywhere near Ronno.
“Of course. I’m a strong stag, Bambi. I’m not delicate like you.”
Bambi scoffed and levelled his gaze on Ronno with one of pure offence. How dare he start a fight not one moment after their fall! It was just like him to rile Bambi up.
“I’m a strong stag too, Ronno.” Bambi reminded him, annoyed when the dark male turns towards him and offers his smuggest smirk, the one reserved for Bambi.
“Strong? I doubt it. Stag? Well, that’s debatable.”
Bambi did stop then.
He has had enough of Ronno’s constant teasing and disrespectful attitude. It seemed Ronno was only satisfied if Bambi was seething at the mouth. If that’s what he hoped to achieve, well, he better be prepared to face the consequences.
“Why do you insist on calling me a girl? Why do constantly berate and antagonize me? It almost feels like you want me to be a girl, Ronno.” Bambi huffed, quickening his pace until Ronno fell slightly behind. The dark stag doesn’t catch up with him.
Instead, he stops. With a roll of his own eyes, Bambi stops too.
“I don’t want you to be a girl, Bambi.”
“Then why?” Bambi all but emphasised, his brows impossibly high on his head.
Ronno looked to the ground, as though he might find the answer there. When he doesn’t, he looks back up at Bambi.
“I don’t wish you were a girl, but sometimes I wish I was.” The words are spoken quietly. So quietly, in fact, that Bambi barely manages to hear them. He strains his ears for fear of missing a single syllable.
Ronno wishes he was a girl? That hardly made any sense, given just how a moment ago he was boasting about his male prowess and about how much stronger he was compared to Bambi.
“Why would you say that?” Bambi tried to understand, but nothing was feasible or even slightly reasonable. Bambi imagined that Ronno might want to perhaps escape the pressures associated with being a male, such as settling down and providing. Although Bambi thinks that that wouldn’t be an issue at all for Ronno. He was resourceful and intelligent, he would make a wonderful mate and an even greater father. Bambi imagines that he’ll overcompensate for the lack of a father figure in his own life.
Somehow that made Bambi feel annoyed. The thought, the very picture of Ronno with a mate had his blood boiling, which was strange, because absolutely nothing warranted the feeling. Ronno was his friend/nemesis and Bambi was a stag, a male.
They would never be anything more than that.
“Because maybe if I was a girl you’d finally look at me.” His voice is uncharacteristically vulnerable, revealing the fear hidden there. Why was Ronno looking at him so…cautiously? As though Bambi were holding his heart, and Ronno was waiting for him to crush it under his hoof.
“I look at you almost every day, Ronno. You follow me around everywhere.” Bambi reminded him, as though he were speaking to a child. But something in Bambi recognized what Ronno was saying, he was simply in disbelief, maybe even shock.
It couldn’t be, could it?
Ronno took several steps closer, closing the gap until their snouts were impossibly close, almost as close as they had been before with the accidental kiss. Bambi’s heart fluttered dangerously in his chest, and his eyes darted between Ronno’s mouth and his eyes, trying to find meaning there.
“No one is as oblivious as you, Bambi.” Ronno whispered between them, and Bambi’s eyes locked on Ronno’s nose. Was it darker than Bambi’s? But he couldn’t quite decide because suddenly Ronno was stepping even closer, closing the final inch of space between them and pressing his mouth against Bambi’s.
An excited thrill shot down his spine at the repeated contact. Bambi knew right then and there that the kiss before had definitely meant something, because Ronno was trying to make Bambi understand through this kiss. He could feel it, the uncertainty, the desperation, and all the anguish that came with unrequited love.
He knew it like it was his own.
Bambi stepped back after failing to breathe for several moments. Ronno lets him go, watching with an all-consuming gaze.
Whenever Bambi had imagined kissing Faline, he felt uncomfortable, somewhat disgusted even. But with Ronno? It felt right. That was the only word for it. Like they were fallen petals from the same flower. They were connected in a way Bambi had never conceived possible.
Was this was his father had meant when he knew that Bambi’s mother had been his mate? Because of how beautifully perfect and right it felt?
“If I was a girl, you might become my mate.” Ronno finished.
It was cemented with that single statement, and Bambi wasn’t as surprised as he might have thought he’d be, that if Ronno was a girl, than he probably wouldn’t be interested in him. But Ronno was strong and powerful, and that attracted him more than any feminine quality could.
“Don’t just stare at me like that! Say something.” Ronno pleaded, almost desperately.
“I…you like me?”
“Yes! You fool, I’ve liked you since our second year. I’ve liked you since before Faline became your friend, I’ve liked you through everything.” Ronno must be referring to that one time when he’d caught Bambi having one of his worst panic attacks. They had been young, but Ronno, unlike his usual character, had actually helped Bambi through it. He had leant Bambi his shoulder and ear, and had listened all night, even as Bambi had cried into his fur.
“I’m a stag, Ronno. A male.” Bambi felt it necessary to repeat the obvious. “I’m not a girl, I can’t give you children. I’m feminine, but-”
“Bambi, I know you’re a boy.”
They look at each other again, and this time Bambi can see. He can see the years’ worth of adoration and fondness in Ronno’s eyes, he can see the tender way his eyes caress him, the way he tried to make himself look bigger in front of Bambi just so that Bambi would notice…
It had always been Ronno, hadn’t it?
“I’m not expecting you to reciprocate my feelings. I’ve come to terms with it. But I’m asking you not to mate with Faline, I know its selfish, but at least not this season. My heart just needs a bit more time to-”
Bambi cut him short with a kiss of his own.
It felt different, when he initiated it. Bambi felt powerful as he dominated the kiss. Their tongues fought for dominance, and naturally, Ronno won. But the fight had been enjoyable, unlike their other small fights. This time it felt right to submit, to yield to Ronno as he deepened the kiss.
His tail flutters and Ronno releases a short laugh.
“Did you really think I was visiting Faline to mate with her?” Bambi asked, amused when Ronno groans annoyedly in response. Bambi hadn’t realized that he was the jealous type, though as he recalls all their shared interactions with Bambi's other friends, he’d been a fool not to see it sooner. All the times Ronno had pushed Faline out of the way just to sit next to Bambi, or when he had intentionally dobbed Thumper in with his mother just so that he’d be grounded for a week, leaving Bambi free for him…how could he be this oblivious!
“It was the natural assumption to make, with mating season around the corner.”
“You do know that she’s already mated, right?”
Ronno looked at him, dumbfounded.
“What?”
“Yeah, she settled in the South because his family lives there. The doe’s? Those are his sisters.” Bambi laughed, delighted, when Ronno’s face reddened from embarrassment.
“Then why visit her?” Ronno questioned, playfully nudging against Bambi with his shoulder.
“Because she’s my friend and I miss her.” Bambi replied and he could finally pick up on the slight nostril flaring and downturn of Ronno’s mouth that indicated that he was very much jealous. Oh great mother of the forest, how had he not noticed before?
“Does this mean that you like me back?” Ronno asked, referring to their close proximity.
“I don’t kiss just anyone, idiot.”
Ronno smiled, briefly glancing away to hide his expression again. Bambi felt happy for the first time in a long time. All these years of denying himself of the truth…that he liked stag’s instead of doe’s just to appease his father…would he even mind? His father was rather open-minded these days, and Bambi would still protect the forest, he vowed to, but he wouldn’t be able to produce an heir. But perhaps it was time for a change in leadership anyway.
“Wait, is that why you haven’t participated in a mating season before? Because you like stag’s?” Bambi asked, turning to Ronno with lightening speed. The other stag rolled his eyes, sighing deeply as though he had just asked the most stupid question. Bambi was about to defend himself when Ronno darted forward again, giving him a quick lick on his snout.
“You could say that. But I was actually waiting to confess to the stag I liked, which was you, idiot. I didn’t participate because I already liked someone. You.” Ronno emphasised, as though now the roles were reversed and he were talking to a child.
“What if I didn’t return your feelings?” Bambi asked out of curiosity. Ronno hummed under his breath, giving him that classic smug smile.
“I would have persisted until you did.”
Bambi gasped, shocked at the audacity to admit such a thing.
“Would you have found me some nice flowers? Courted me like a doe?” Bambi purposefully fluttered his eyelashes, causing the other stag to laugh. But his laugh gave way to an expression Bambi could only describe as seductive, and his heart skipped several beats as Ronno crowded him.
“Something like that. But maybe I would have pushed you up against a tree one day, after a while, just to try to make you see how perfect we are together.” He whispered into his ear, and Bambi shivered from the intensity of those eyes.
“You’re very dominating.”
“You like that about me.”
Bambi pretended to give it some thought, which earned him a nip at his ear. Laughing, he turned to Ronno.
“I do. I like how you’re always there for me, how you supported me, saw me.”
“The forest really is beautiful in your eyes.” Ronno whispered, affectionately rubbing his head against Bambi’s neck. Ronno spread his scent there, marking his territory. Bambi would laugh if it wasn’t so true and swoon-worthy.
“Like the reflection of it?” Bambi confirmed, but his mind was wandering elsewhere as Ronno stepped even closer.
“No, it’s the way you see the forest. You don’t look at it like everyone else. Everyone sees the beauty it has to offer, the life in everything. But you also see the danger in it, life’s opposite. Death. You know its fragile, and that makes you appreciate it more. It’s beautiful, Bambi, how clear your eyes are.”
Bambi’s breath caught in his throat. He snuggled against Ronno as they took to lying down on the forest floor. He gazed at the beautiful stag before him, smiling contentedly. This was what he was missing, and it had been beside him all along.
Someone who understood him and loved him, flaws and all.