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Another peaceful day was beginning on the island. Already, a few villagers were emerging from their houses, starting their workout routines, living their best lives. Blathers took his post at the museum entrance, trying to convince himself that he'd stay awake to greet visitors this time around. Two pairs of siblings, one young and one old, started laying out the day's wares, preparing for the morning rush. All was well, and all was normal.
And hidden away from the rest of the fledgling town, a fox was taking a nap on a boat.
Redd had spent the past two days sailing from safehouse to safehouse, picking out some choice art pieces provided by his various...connections. It was time for a new start. No more fussing with tent poles. No more hurried exits in the middle of the night as angry townsfolk come with their torches and pitchforks. Just a boat on the sea, free to wander as it wishes in international waters. If anybody, the slightest person, tries to mess with him, all he has to do is raise anchor and leave.
But that could all wait. For now, he was taking a nap belowdecks. At least, he was until he heard someone walking up the gangplank, his ears twitching at the sound of paws on wood. In a second, he was on his paws, tying his apron around his waist and scuttling up the ladder to the storefront.
"Hey now, cousin, Jolly Redd's ain't open y-" Redd's words fell away from him as Tom Nook walked under the tarp he was using as a door. The tanuki looked around at the empty storefront, his tired face betraying nothing, as Redd skittered up the ladder and brushed off his apron.
"So...someone's eating well," said Redd, his snout twitching defensively. "Hard to work off that weight when your kits are doing your work for you, eh?" For the first time since he walked in, Tom looked at him, and Redd flinched.
"Almost twenty years since we've seen each other face to face, and that's the first thing you say to me?" Nook spoke the words slowly, as if he too had just woken up. Then, he chuckled as he patted his belly. "Well, you're not wrong, though I'm trying to change that. The new kid, Isabelle, she's got us both on this morning exercise kick. I'm worried about my cholesterol, and she's trying to nab herself a partner, though I'm surprised she's having trouble finding one."
"Well, we both know how hard it can be to find a good partner, eh Tom?" The tanuki just looked at Redd's questionable grin and shook his head.
"You still play Blackjack?" Tom started, pulling a pack of cards from his pocket.
"Does Sable sleep on her front?" responded Redd with a gleam in his eye.
In a few minutes, the two were down in the guts of the ship, taking turns dealing the cards. After the first round gave Redd a suspiciously perfect King-Ace blackjack, it became less about actually playing blackjack and more about stacking the deck in more and more ludicrous ways. Eventually, after Redd drew an Ace, four Twos and four Threes in a row, they both broke into laughter at the sheer improbability of it all. For a moment, they were back in that basement apartment in the city, younger, slimmer, ready to do whatever it'd take to make it.
"I see you kept your skills sharp, Redd," said Tom, still wheezing a bit from the laughter.
"Well, in the art business, clever paws are a must. Gotten a couple of paintings because I had three of a kind at just the right time. Plus this box of beauties." Redd pulled out a box of expensive-looking cigars from under the table, taking one for himself. "So, how's the island business going?" Tom took one and lit it with the oil lantern hanging above the table.
"DAL's support has been invaluable, and Wilbur and Orville have been indispensable, but I don't trust the suits above them. I have no idea how they can import construction materials at the rate they do, and at this point, I'm afraid to ask. At least back in the day, I only had to worry about the sneaky stuff I had to do in order to keep the lights on." Tom took a puff on the cigar as Redd shuffled the deck again. "That's the problem with making it big, Redd. Eventually you make it so big that you can't see all of it at the same time."
"I wouldn't exactly know myself." The statement had more venom than Redd expected. For a moment, he forgot exactly how differently their lives had turned out. Tom had the decency to look sheepish as he kept going.
"Don't cut yourself too short. Art dealing's a respectable career even if-"
"I sell forgeries sometimes," Redd interrupted. "Tom, please, even if you've forgotten what we used to do, I haven't. Don't tiptoe around me." More venom now, as Redd remembered that he was talking to Tom, the calculating retail kingpin on his mountain of bells, and not Tom, the bruiser, the dealer on the corner, the roommate who gets clingy and sings off-key if he gets drunk.
"Forgery's still respectable," Tom continued, quietly. "No quality assurance, no refunds...it's not exactly consumer friendly, but it's better than what both of us were doing back in the day. And I respect that." Tom looked at Redd as he takes a long drag on his cigar. "I'm trying to respect you."
"So, what, is that why you're here? To try and make up for twenty years of silence?" The fox's eyes looked over the tanuki warily, puffing on his own cigar.
"I made my choices in the city. So did you. No going back from that. But there's no point in keeping a grudge for twenty years, not when there's bells being left on the table. I'm here to offer you the chance to go legit." Redd raised an eyebrow as Tom continued. "I've been catching up with Sable recently and she talked me into it. We have a rotating system of merchants for the residents. You pay a small fee and you can set up shop on the island instead of hiding out here behind the island. If you really want, I can even give you a permanent storefront here. You don't have to do this by yourself anymore."
"Tom, I always knew you were cunning, but I didn't expect you to be taken in by your own grift." Redd cackled, coldly, right in Tom's face. "You want me to go legit? Let me lay out your current plan for you." Redd takes the deck and shuffles it, drawing a card with each new point.
"You've scammed a dozen or so villagers, tricked them into moving into your little personal fiefdom." Eight of Spades.
"You've got some young kid doing the hard work of actually running the place. With your 'travelling salesman' system, I bet you barely have to lift a finger." Six of Clubs.
"And you're relying on DAL, a company you don't trust, and your...what is it called, 'Nook Stop'? I know you don't do computers, so someone else probably developed it. How well do you trust them?" Four of Hearts.
"And you're hoping all of this doesn't blow up in your face while you rack up all those bells. And I'm supposed to be the crook here." Two of Diamonds.
Red draws a Joker and waggles it in front of Tom's nose, mocking the stormy expression on the tanuki's face. "You have a backup plan if it turns out some dodo-brain was embezzling from DAL and the company goes under? Or were you just going to save yourself and leave everyone else to clean up your mess?"
Tom leapt to his feet, slamming a fist on the table and knocking the deck of cards over. Redd fell back in his chair, his cigar scattering across the floor, and briefly recalled who was the enforcer between the two of them back in the day. But Nook took a deep breath and sat down again.
"I am not the same raccoon who left you in the city." he spoke.
"Yeah, you're not. He was slimmer. And he wouldn't have given me that bull about going straight." Redd took a long drag on his own cigar as Tom scowled at him. "My answer's no. Working with the black market's exhausting, but you can't go 'legit' without putting your life in someone else's paws, and that's not going to be yours. Not today. Not again."
Nook stared down Redd until, defeated, he put the deck back together and shuffled. After this, there were no more stacking the deck, no sleight of hand. Just two middle-aged men playing blackjack together.
"You're still in love with me?" said Nook as he stood on a 16. Redd paused, a blush rising to his cheeks, before hitting on a 15.
"Yeah. Don't think about it every day, but yeah, some days. You always had a better head for numbers, a face that made people believe in you, a good arm to hang onto. I wanted to be like you, be with you. Heck, you look good fat. Shouldn't have pestered you about it." Redd revealed the Four of Clubs, a winning card.
"Remember the first night we met?" Nook started as Redd started shuffling again. "Bank had just foreclosed on my shop. Rent was due the next day and I wasn't anywhere close to paying it. And then, on my way home, I run into a fox getting hassled by this giant bulldog, and I try to stop him because, silly me, I thought he was the bad guy." Tom grunted, rubbing the eye that had been blackened on that cloudy day in the city an age ago. "Next thing I know, I'm coming to in your apartment, and you're already working me into some extortion scheme to get back at him. I moved in the next day." Nook took the deck from Redd, who looked at him curiously, questioning where this was going.
"I don't miss those days. Watching out for the cops, constantly getting into fights, not being able to tell my friends back home what I was doing to pay the bills. I'll take the Cranny over that any day. But I miss you." Tom let that hang in the air. Redd was suddenly deeply interested in his cigar. "And I am sorry, you know. About everything." Still no reaction from Redd, even as his tail twitched behind him and his ears began to redden.
"I'll take it," Redd finally mumbled. "Don't expect me to say sorry back. Everybody got burned on that deal. But...I'm glad you came by." Redd got up, stretched his back. "That's enough blackjack. I've got a dozen other islands to stop by before the sun sets. Gotta make sure people know how to find me."
"Yeah. Isabelle's going to give me an earful about missing her calisthenics." Tom got up and extended a paw to Redd. "We can do this again, if you want. I could invite Sable too." Red squinted at the paw and looked up to Tom's face.
"Not if you give me a pawshake. Pawshakes are for business partners, and we're never going to be that ever again." And then, a smile under his whiskers. "But we might be friends again, and friends get hugs." Tom snorted and pulled the fox into a backbreaking bear hug.
A few minutes later, Tom Nook was already heading back to Residential Services and Redd was pulling up the gangplank and planning his route through the seas to his next destination. He battened down the hatches, raised anchor, and sailed off, even as his heart remained on the shore.