(AN/ Told ya' the next update would be quick, so without further ado let's get cracking with chapter 1...)
Chapter 1- The little hero.
Most mammals tolerate their jobs, some others despise their occupation and a very small percentage love their job, Robyn Wilde-Savage was one of those lucky few. While she did spend two or three nights a week patrolling Zootopia's streets as The Undying Scarlet her day job as a mechanic was therapeutic in comparison. The fact the she owned half of the auto shop was also a satisfying feeling. The other half belonging to her best friend and fellow super hero Kodi, as teenagers the two friends had been skilled in auto mechanics both as a hobby and as elective subject at high school and by the time they had graduated high school, they were versed in repairing both traditional engines and electric. Robyn and Kodi's grades were not enough to get them into college and neither really wanted to go anyway so when they heard that the old garage that Robin senior and Little John had worked at in their youth was up for sale, the two friends saw an opportunity. They got some start up money from Luna and Gazelle and bought the auto shop, which they renamed 'The Arrow Garage', in tribute to the departed archer and within a few months they were in profit and quickly paid back the start up money, three years later they were the most trusted garage in the Sherwood borough and they had hired three more mechanics to work under them.
Robyn had just finished taking a payment from a satisfied customer and was about to get to work on a van's brakes when a familiar voice came on the radio "Good morning Zootopia, this is Hannah Wilde-Savage and this 'Brunch Banter' on BarkFeed radio, where we talk about the current events from around the world." Robyn couldn't help but smile every time she heard her wife come on the radio, a job the striped hybrid had held for just a few months. Hannah went to college after graduation and majored in journalism while taking media production as a minor. Despite her blindness she graduated with honours and thanks to Sasha Jones, who was BarkFeed's top photojournalist, she was able to have an interview with the eccentric owner of BarkFeed; Alex Boehm, who was so impressed with Hannah he offered her the 11 – 1 spot on his fledgling talk radio station. Robyn would always take her tea break when Hannah's show began out of habit and it was nice to hear her voice, the ginger hybrid flicked on the kettle in the corner of the garage and listened to the radio "Coming up on the show we have renowned psychologist Dr. Thrash talking about his new book, Bianca and Bernard Gabor will be here talking about this year's Rescue Aid Society Christmas appeal but we open today's show on a sombre note. Even though it is the first week of December and everyone is getting into the Holiday spirit we need to spare a thought for those affected by the 'Purple Sky' incident. It is six months to the day when the skies above Zootopia turned purple and for half an hour the city was attacked by mysterious balls of mist, after all this time, the government will still not give the public answers. Add the fact that after the 'Purple Sky' incident reports of mammals with 'Powers' comparable to Team Ceartais, many blame this phenomenon as the cause. Even more worrying is that 17 mammals who have displayed signs of 'Powers' have vanished in mysterious and sometimes violent circumstances leading many to believe that the government is responsible for these disappearances. So I implore you, as you get ready for the Holidays spare a thought for the families affected by the 'Purple Sky' incident."
"You're hopeless, boss."A voice chuckled at Robyn. Robyn turned to face one of her employees, a Swedish Brown Bear called Oggie, he was the biggest mammal in the garage and tended to work on the larger vehicles. He was replacing a headlight on a jeep as he added "You still act like a newlywed even though you've been married five years, it's your wife's voice, get over it."
"You're only saying that because you don't have a romantic bone in your body." Robyn parried, pouring her and Oggie some tea.
"I am romantic when I need to be but you and your missus take it to a whole new level." Oggie replied, finishing with the headlight and stepping over to collect his mug of tea.
"Hannah's the more romantic one, really." Robyn shrugged "I mean do you remember on Valen-"
Suddenly an out of breath and shirtless Kodi came bursting into the garage, ran right past Robyn and Oggie, opened the trunk of the nearest car, dove in and closed it behind him. "What the hell?" Oggie mouthed, confused by the wolf's behaviour.
Robyn read the situation and went over, sat on the trunk and prompted the bear "Wait for it…"
A few seconds later an obese male wolf in his fifties came through the garage's entrance and angrily panted "Hey, did you see a black and white wolf run through here?"
Robyn then easily lied "Yeah, he just burst in here and ran out the back door."
"G-God damn it." The Angry Wolf wheezed, his paws on his knees.
"What did he do?" Oggie enquired.
"I caught that flea-ridden bastard in bed with my daughter." The furious father growled.
"Oh now I remember his face, that wolf has got a reputation." Robyn played.
"What kind of reputation?" The Angry Wolf asked back, still breathing heavily.
"Well I've heard wolf customers complain about him before; apparently he's slept with most of the she-wolves in the city leaving the clap and gonorrhoea in his wake." Robyn stirred playing with the magnifying goggles on her head, taking delight in the ever growing anger on the frustrated wolf's face.
"That fleabag has STDs!?" The Angry Wolf exclaimed.
"Yeah, he's a real piece a shit." Robyn feigned disgust "You should tell your daughter to get tested."
The Angry Wolf didn't say another word, he just turned around and walked out of the garage while letting a yell of frustration. After twenty or so seconds, Robyn and Oggie were satisfied the rageful dad was gone and opened the trunk that Kodi was hiding in. "STDs, really?" Kodi asked with a annoyed tone that matched his expression.
"I think the words you're looking for are 'Thank you both for saving my worthless ass'." Robyn smirked.
"And knowing you, you're probably riddled with the clap." Oggie sniped, watching the shirtless wolf clamber out of the trunk.
"I am not…anyway, thanks for having my back." Kodi thanked, going over to his locker and pulling out a spare vest.
"So who was this girl?" Robyn smiled slyly.
"Some barmaid I got talking to last night, Rebecca? Or was it Rachel? Wait was it Rina?" Kodi racked his brain.
"You know I would lecture and caution you about you player lifestyle, but I've been doing that for years and that hasn't worked, so go forth and bone to your heart's content." Robyn joked, hoping deep down that one day Kodi would find a girl who would change his outlook on romance.
000
Every member of Team Ceartais had a job outside of their roles as superheroes, Robyn and Kodi were mechanics, Hannah was a talk radio host, Kion worked as a handyman at the properties his partner Jasiri owned, Olivia was an engineer and CEO of Dawson tech. and Luna was a surgeon. These jobs helped keep up the pantomime that all these mammals were regular working folk and had no possible time to be crimefighters. But there was one team member who could not adjust to a normal working life; Alice Wilde was never normal in the first place, the former assassin and enemy of Team Ceartais had only known a life of combat and even though she was highly intelligent and could speak a dozen languages she had no formal education or qualifications to speak of so applying for jobs was problematic. Alice also lacked most social skills that mammals master growing up, having spent most of her formative years in service of a Yakuza clan the bunny find it hard to connect with strangers. There were exceptions to this rule of course; her best friend Jasiri always made her feel at ease and even though it had taken a few years she felt that every member of Team Ceartais was a true friend, even her former arch enemy Robyn.
To the outside world Alice appeared as the awkward and quiet wife of the well known surgeon and rich socialite Dr. Luna Wilde, who ran an anime and videogame reaction channel on youtube as her 'Job'. But in reality she thrust herself into the work of Team Ceartais, when Luna went for a shift at the hospital Alice would head down to the bunker and maintain and repair any weapons or equipment as quartermaster, prepare new training regimes and chase down leads online with the help of the team's AI Bella. However since the 'Purple sky' incident six months ago her daytime workload had increased exponentially since now Team Ceartais was working with the Major Crimes Bureau to help track down and detain criminals who were displaying 'Powers'. Since the emergence of these superpowered criminals, Team Ceartais and the MCB had captured 22 of them but more and more were appearing each and every day, and on this December morning Alice was working with a friend to catch number 23.
"Stop!" Yurei bellowed as she chased down a Pronghorn through the docklands of Tundratown.
"Get away from me, freak!" The Pronghorn shouted back, leaping over some frost covered pallets, genuinely fearing the white rabbit.
"You're only making me angrier!" Yurei warned, bounding over the pallets with a well timed jump.
The Pronghorn ran into the rows of shipping containers, hoping to lose the creepy heroine in the narrow and maze like space but try as he might he couldn't shake Yurei. He had enough and decided to use his power, he turned around quickly took a deep breath before a 13 foot plume of fire erupted from his mouth towards Yurei. The heroine reacted by swiftly raising her cybernetic arm and firing the built in grapple launcher, it hooked onto a nearby crane and she shot up into the sky while also throwing a shuriken into the Pronghorn's shoulder. The fire breather halted his flames and replaced with a scream of pain before scurrying away, Yurei smirked and spoke into her comm "The idiot's heading right for you."
The Pronghorn kept on looking behind to see if Yurei was still chasing after him, he was frightened and distracted that he didn't notice that he had ran out into a clearing where a half dozen MCB agents were waiting for him with tranq guns levelled at his chest, in the split second he noticed their presence a single tranq dart hit him in the centre of his chest. The Pronghorn collapsed to the ground in an unconscious heap while a silver furred fox stood over him with a disgusted look on his muzzle "Sweet dreams, you bastard." Aleks Rojek growled.
"You were right," Yurei opened, appearing from the container corridor "he was stupid enough to be corralled into an ambush."
"Thanks for the assist, Yurei. I appreciate it." Aleks thanked, shaking paws with the ghostly bunny, while the other MCB agents kept a wary distance of the 'Dead' heroine.
"What did this mortal do?" Yurei asked, keeping up the pretence of being a spirit.
"His name's Alister Grazer, his ex-wife divorced him last year on the grounds of domestic abuse and the judge slapped a restraining order on him for good measure. Anyway couple of days ago he shows up at his ex-wife's house and tries to take the kids, the cops are called and when they try to arrest him he suddenly breathes fire at them, one of the cops was burned pretty bad, then he breathed fire at this ex's house, nearly killed her and the kids." Aleks answered with distain, watching as his fellow MCB agents dragged the wife beater away.
"Connard." Yurei cursed in her mother tongue "I should've toyed with him a little more."
"Don't worry, he's going away for a long time." Aleks assured. The silver fox was the head of the MCB's 'Powers Taskforce', an initiative that monitored powered individuals and detained those who used their powers to commit crimes, he had been selected due to being the direct liaison between the Bureau and Team Ceartais and also he had more experience with powered mammals than anyone else. "Come on, I'll give you a lift back to the bunker."
A few minutes later Aleks was standing outside an MCB truck waiting for Yurei to get changed back into her civilian clothes while texting his wife, Zoe, about what she wanted for dinner tonight. Aleks had married to US army corporal four years ago and the pair already had a set of rambunctious twins named Felix and Rhiannon. Despite the heavy work demands of each parent the twins were always at the heart of everything Aleks and Zoe did and they were never without love. "So are you and Zoe still free for that double date on Friday?" Alice enquired from inside the truck.
"Yeah, the babysitter's arranged and we're not working the day after so we can have a drink." Aleks replied "Anyway back to business, I need Team Ceartais to look into a possible powered mammal."
"I thought observation was the MCB's job?" Alice asked back, taking out her 'blackout' contact lenses.
"Usually yes, but this case is delicate." Aleks answered, sounding a little uncomfortable.
"Delicate? In what way?" Alice probed, removing her combat cybernetic arm and replacing it with her everyday robotic prosthetic,
"We think there's a powered child at a children's home." Aleks expanded "Rumours have come to me that there was a 'Incident' at this orphanage last week, now the guys who run the place say the rumours are false but we want to make sure. We're not going to do anything to the kid, we just like to keep tabs on mammals with powers."
"And you don't want to frighten a bunch of kids by sending government agents into investigate them." Alice assumed, opening the van door and hopping out, the lapin was dressed a dark purple sweater, a dorky kitted hat with a dragonball on it and some black jeans.
"Correct, it'd be cruel to put those children through that." Aleks confirmed, looking down at his former enemy.
"So what do you propose?" Alice asked, her golden eyes adjusting to the mid-morning sun.
"That two married teammates go in and ask about adopting a child, get a tour and have a quick look round to make sure everything's fine." Aleks explained.
"That sounds crueller, getting the children's hopes up like that." Alice criticised, putting her paws on her hips
"It's the lesser of two evils." Aleks replied pragmatically "I can organise a meeting for this afternoon."
"So what? You expect me and Luna to go along with this?" Alice asked, not happy with the ethics of the plan.
"Actually, Luna's too high profile, I was thinking maybe Robyn and Hannah could take care of this." Aleks suggested with an awkward smile.
Alice sighed and shook her head "Robyn's going to hate this."
000
It was just before 5pm when Robyn stopped her car in front of the Brother Bear Children's Home, she turned off the engine and groaned "This is so wrong." Before banging her head on the steering wheel.
Hannah, who was in the passenger seat, reach out and stroked the fur atop Robyn's head and soothed "But we're doing it for the right reason, this kid may have powers but they still need protecting."
"But all those kids are going to look at us and think 'Wow, are those our new Moms?' and we're going to lie to them and spy on them…We're going to hell for this." Robyn lamented.
"I know this is hard, I feel bad too, but it's our job to look out for mammals like us." Hannah persuaded.
Robyn let out a frustrated grunt before submitting with "Screw it, let go in there."
The couple exited their car and Robyn walked around and offered her arm to Hannah who had just unfolded her cane, as they linked arms Hannah could feel her love tense up upon hearing the happy sounds of children over the wall "It'll be ok, it's just going to be for half an hour and then we can leave."
"Right, right." Robyn muttered, walking with Hannah to the main entrance of the children's home "So we're looking for a koala kid, right?"
"According to Aleks' intel, yeah. Details are sketchy though." Hannah replied, feeling nervous herself.
Robyn opened the door to the red brick building to find a Kodiak bear in his early thirties sat at the front desk typing away at a computer, he looked up at the sound of the door opening and instantly smiled "You must be the Wilde-Savages." Getting up from his seat and walking over.
"That's us, thank you for letting us drop by." Hannah responded, extending her paw.
The bear crouched down shook Hannah's paw and happily replied "Well it's not everyday a couple's application gets fast tracked by social services, you must've really impressed during the interview stage."
"I-I hope we don't disappoint." Robyn reacted, figuring that Aleks' MCB connections made the successful application appear out of thin air.
"Well let's get introductions out of the way, I'm Kenai and who's who out of you two?" Kenai queried.
"I'm Hannah and this is Robyn." Hannah introduced in a chipper manner, keeping up the act.
"So let me tell you a little about what's going to happen today, at the moment the kids have got back from school and they're playing outside, you'll go out there and just chat to any of the kids, of course there are going to be other social workers out there to observe but you can talk and play with any child that's comfortable talking to you." Kenai elaborated.
"So does this happen often, like potential parents visiting?" Robyn asked, trying to elevate her guilt.
"We get about two visits a week and in most cases these meetings lead to adoption." Kenai answered before taking note of Robyn's nervous demeanour and saying "It's ok to be jittery."
"…Sorry, just this is a little overwhelming." Robyn danced around the truth.
Hannah kissed her wife on the cheek and cooed "It'll be fine."
"So are you ready to meet the kids?" Kenai asked, used to nervous mammals in this situation.
"Y-yeah." Robyn answered before being led through the clean and modern building and out into the back yard, where thirty or so kids of varying species were playing on a large jungle gym complete with slide and ball pit.
Robyn's ears went droopy when some of the kids looked at them with curiosity, the sense of guilt was welling up in her chest. There were three other social workers playing with the kids and they gave a small wave to Kenai who said "As you can tell, these kids have boundless energy even after a full day at school."
"They all seem to get along." Robyn made small talk while looking among the kids for a koala.
Hannah's sense were getting overloaded with all sounds and scents around the playground but her ears focused on the slow creaking of a swing chain, she used her pulse ability to detect the shape of a small mammal alone on a swing set with no other kids within fifteen feet of him. "Um, excuse me but do my ears hear a swing set?" Hannah alerted Robyn, nudging her wife.
Robyn turned to see a small koala boy, no older than five, sitting alone on a swing looking at a toy triceratops with a sad look on his face. Robyn's heart ached, realising she would have to deceive an already sad child but she soldiered on and said "Aww, poor little guy, why's he on his own?"
"Oh, little Aaron?" Kenai reacted, a bit flustered "I hate to admit it but some of the other kids pick on him sometimes, we try to help him but he just likes to sit by himself when it happens."
"Would it be ok if we talk to him? It seems like he needs cheering up." Hannah asked, facing towards the downtrodden boy.
"Um, sure, if he's comfortable with you guys." Kenai answered, wondering how the blind hybrid knew where to look.
Kenai brought Hannah and Robyn over to the swings, the little Koala hadn't even noticed the three adults approach, he only looked up when Kenai gently greeted "Hey Aaron, how you doing buddy?"
Aaron looked up and fibbed "I'm ok." Before tilting his head and looking at Robyn and Hannah with puzzlement and asking cautiously "Who are those ladies?"
"Well this is Hannah and Robyn, they were just wondering if it's ok to have a friendly chat? I bet if you ask nicely, they'll even push you on the swing." Kenai gave a reassuring smile to the timid five year old.
Hannah stepped forward first and extended her paw "It's nice to meet you Aaron, I'm Hannah."
Aaron looked at her paw for a moment before shaking it, suddenly Aaron's expression changed, gone was the shrinking violet being replaced with his chocolate brown eyes lighting up and an excited smile appearing on his face "Nice to meet you, Hannah!" He beamed.
"Well now ain't that something, I've never seen him so friendly with strangers." Kenai breathed, stunned by the boy's sudden change in personality.
"Hannah has that effect on mammals." Robyn chipped in, trying to push her guilt to the back of her mind.
"So Aaron, is it ok if these nice ladies talk and play with you for a little bit?" Kenai asked once more, wanting to make sure the child was comfortable.
"Uh-huh." Aaron sounded, nodding his head.
"All right then," Kenai smiled broadly "I'll just be over here if you guys need anything." The tall Kodiak bear then walked across the yard to another social worker.
Robyn steeled her nerves to talk to the adorable little koala, being from bunny family gave her an advantage when talking to kids, she even had a few ice breakers that she picked up over the years. She eyed the toy triceratops in Aaron's hands and asked in a friendly way "So what's your dinosaur's name?"
"It's Trix and she knows a secret." Aaron replied with a slightly mischievous voice.
"Oh? And what's that?" Robyn asked back, charmed by the boy's playful nature.
Aaron looked around to make sure no one else was in earshot before leaning in towards Hannah and Robyn and revealing with a whisper "That you two are The Undying Scarlet and Bullet."
Hannah tensed up and Robyn's eyes went wide as they let the words echo in their ears and their brains tried to figure out how this little orphan knew their secret. Hannah quickly tried to derail the boy's theory "Oh such an imagination, yes I guess I do have some resemblance to Bullet but it'd be a bit hard for me to fight bad guys while I'm blind."
"That's where your pulse power comes in, you can sense stuff around you. It's ok, I won't tell." Aaron grinned excitedly.
Normally Robyn would freak out and turn the air blue with swears but she restrained herself due to being around a child "How in the world do you know that?"
"Cos' I've got super powers too and when I grow up I want to be a superhero, just like you two." Aaron answered giddily, thrilled to be in the presence of real superheroes.
Even though the boy was excited Hannah could tell the boy was being honest when he said he wouldn't tell anyone "You can read minds, can't you?" she guessed.
"Sorta', I have to touch someone to see their memories." Aaron shrugged "That's why I knew you two were super nice when I shook your hand."
"Clever little guy." Robyn gave an impressed smiled "So I'm going to guess you know why we're here?"
"You want to lookout for mammals with super powers like me and protecting us from mean bullies." Aaron answered, summing up what he had read from Hannah's mind, these words made the married couple's guilt ease significantly.
"That's right. We superheroes have got to look out for one another, even if you're not old enough to fight crime yet." Hannah spoke as she down on the swing next to Aaron, she wanted to make the koala feel safe.
"Is it ok if we ask how you got these powers?" Robyn bridged.
Aaron nodded before answering "It was recess at school when that big purple storm happened, my teacher was shouting for us to get inside when I got knocked down by a weird foggy thing."
"That must've been scary, you must be really brave." Hannah praised.
"I wasn't scared," Aaron blustered, puffing his chest up "when I started seeing mammal's memories I knew I was a superhero like in cartoons."
"Mind reading is a really cool power." Robyn complimented the little koala "So when do you figure out you could do it?"
"I moved things first before I could see memories." Aaron corrected.
"Move things?" Hannah questioned.
Aaron quickly looked to see if anyone was looking his way before letting go of his toy triceratops and letting it float a few inches above his open palm "See?" He grinned.
"Whoa, telekinesis." Robyn gawped.
"…At least you two think it's cool." Aaron said, his tone mellowing.
"What happened?" Robyn asked in a caring tone, hating to see such a cute face sad.
"It's stupid." Aaron tried to brush off.
Hannah put a gentle paw on Aaron's pow and gently stroked one of his very fluffy ears and urged "You know I used to get picked on when I was little too, it feels good to talk about it with someone, even strangers like us."
Aaron treasured the endearing touch of the heroine, it felt new and made his heart feel warm, he already knew he could trust Hannah and Robyn but this cemented the fact. "Last week we were playing soccer out here," Aaron began "Lauren kicked the ball over the fence by accident and everyone started shouting at her, I tried to be a superhero and used my powers to lift the ball back over the fence, I thought they would like it but they called me nasty names." Aaron's brown eyes then became watery.
"Hey, hey, it's ok. You did a really nice thing, I think you're a hero." Robyn encouraged, before offering her paw and saying "And if you don't believe me, read my mind."
Aaron put is small paw onto Robyn's and he said "You think I'm a hero…and that I'm cute." Before taking his paw back.
Robyn let out a chuckle and confirmed "Yeah, I do."
"Listen Aaron, sometimes mammals say mean things because they're scared, you've got to show them that there is nothing to be afraid of, you're a sweet little guy and once you start playing with them again they'll forget all about what happened with the soccer ball." Hannah advised and even though she couldn't see she knew Aaron was smiling at her.
"You're both really nice." Aaron replied honestly "I can show you one more thing that I can do, but I've only done it by accident when Kenai was reading us a bedtime story."
"What is it?" Hannah queried.
"Give me your paws." Aaron asked Hannah. The striped hybrid obeyed and held out both her paws, Aaron took hold of them before taking a deep breath. In a heartbeat Hannah's senses went into overload; in her mind she saw herself in a pale blue shirt and dark jeans sitting on the swing that when she realised and babbled "I-I can see, I can see through your eyes."
"Cool, huh?" Aaron chimed, happy to a joyous look on Hannah's face.
"Wait, you can see!?" Robyn gasped, noticing her wife was trembling with shock.
"I can see whatever Aaron's looking at, I can see me…whoa I've aged." Hannah spoke, close to tears of joy "Aaron, can you turn and look at Robyn please?"
"Sure." Aaron replied, before looking at the dumbfounded Robyn.
"Oh my gosh…Princess. You look more beautiful than I could ever imagine." Hannah gushed, overcome with blissful emotions.
"You can really see me?" Robyn spoke, unable to comprehend how Hannah must be feeling.
"Wait, Aaron, I want to look at you!" Hannah said suddenly.
"Um, I can't look at myself." Aaron replied.
"Hang on." Robyn cut in, rummaging her jacket pocket and selecting selfie mode on her phone then holding it in front of Aaron, the image of adorable little boy appearing on screen.
"Aaron…you're so cute and handsome." Hannah spoke, determined not cry and attract the attention of the social workers.
"Thanks…" Aaron replied shyly "But it only works when I hold hands with someone, I'm sorry."
Hannah let go of Aaron's paws and her world was dark again but it didn't matter, this treasure of a child had given her one of the greatest moments of her life "Don't you apologise, that was one of the nicest things anyone has ever done for me, thank you, you're my little hero."
Over the next thirty minutes Hannah and Robyn played with Aaron; pushing him on the swing, giving him piggyback rides and playing hide and seek. Soon enough Kenai came over and said the children had to go inside for dinner but just as they were about to leave Robyn had the sudden urge to ask "Um, would it be ok if we could give Aaron a hug?"
Kenai smiled at the young couple then looked at Aaron and asked "Is it ok if these ladies give you a goodbye hug, buddy?"
"Yeah!" Aaron answered brightly, throwing his arms open for a hug.
Robyn and Hannah both crouched down and hugged the five year old with heart. "See you around, Aaron." Robyn spoke, not wanting to say goodbye.
"You're my little hero." Hannah whispered into his ear, before letting him go.
Robyn and Hannah walked back to their car in silence, got in and were silent for a moment before Robyn let out "What the hell was that!?"
"I don't know, I don't know." Hannah expressed, hugging onto her tail.
"We go in there for a recon mission and then boom! Feels explosion." Robyn confessed, slamming her head on the steering wheel for the second time in an hour "My heart hurts, my actual heart hurts."
"He's just too damn sweet." Hannah concurred.
"And cute. I mean I don't get it, my guilt is gone and now it's replaced with whatever this is." Robyn tried to convey.
"When you hugged him did you not want to let go?" Hannah asked, revealing how she felt.
"Yes...Babe, I think…No, no, no. It's just my emotions talking." Robyn tried to shake off the affection she was feeling for the child.
"I think I know what you're thinking." Hannah smiled nervously.
"Y-you do?" Robyn reacted, pulling at her ears.
Hannah grabbed Robyn's paw and willed "We'll say it together…3,2,1…"
"I WANT TO ADOPT HIM!" The two hybrids said in stressed unison.
They let the words sink in for a few seconds before Robyn said "I know we're young, but we've been married for five years…Ok I've been thinking about us being Moms for a while."
"Really? Oh, princess." Hannah sang, hugging her lover and peppering her face with kisses.
"Look we're both hybrids which means we're sterile, we can never go down the sperm donor route and after today maybe it's fate or whatever." Robyn reasoned before berating herself with "And I can't believe I feel this way for a kid I met less than an hour ago."
"Maybe it is fate. Any other mammals would be scared of his abilities but we know what it's like to have powers, we can help him, we could be Aaron's Moms." Hannah said happily "And even though Aleks used his connections to fast track an adoption application for spying it doesn't mean we can't use it for good."
Robyn fixed her fur and stated "We're going to do this."
"We are?" Hannah asked with hope.
"Yeah," Robyn replied before opening the car door and getting out "I'm going to ask Kenai is we can visit again this week."
000
The next day came and while Robyn and Hannah were oddly quiet about their recon mission at the orphanage Kion Priderock was focused on something else. He was set to meet with Spitfire in the rainforest district in less than half an hour, apparently she had found something big and she wanted another Ceartais member with her when she clued the authorities in. But first he had a more important task to take care of; dropping his son off at school.
Mufasa Priderock was a hybrid and even though he was half lion, the five year old absolutely had his hyena mother's confidence and wit. Mufasa had the height of a lion cub and also the face but his fur, mane, paws, tail and fangs were all traits from his hyena heritage. The family of three lived in the apartment building Jasiri owned and it was only a five minute walk from the local elementary school where Mufasa attended. Kion had always walked his son to school since his first day and it warmed the lion's heart to see how much his energetic son would be excited for a new school day. "Field trip! Field trip! Field trip!" Mufasa chanted, hopping with joy down the street "I can't wait to see the aquarium!"
"Just don't jump in the shark tank." Kion joked with his fearless son.
"A shark's no match for me." Mufasa said with a hyena like laugh, before holding up his arms and flexing muscles no five year old should have.
The muscles were an unintentional gift from Kion, due to his elixir pump that made body transforming drugs course through his bloodstream, some of the strength enhancing abilities had been passed onto Mufasa. This only came to light when Mufasa was one and lifted up a sofa to retrieve his favourite toy "What's the rule about your powers?" Kion reminded in a very parental manner.
"Only at home or in an emergency." Mufasa groaned before adding "But I bet I could beat a shark."
"I'm sure you could, cub." Kion smiled, ruffling Mufasa's hyena-esque mane. Soon enough they had arrived at the school, Kion gave his son a hug and watched his son skip to class.
Now that important job was taken care of, it was time to meet up with Spitfire. The lion took the sky tram to the rainforest district and walked through the wet and vine covered streets to a disused gym, which looked like it hadn't been opened in over a decade. Kion knocked on the back door, as per Spitfire's instructions, a few seconds later the hulking mech opened the door for her friend. "Sup', big fella." Spitfire greeted, stepping aside so the feline could enter.
"Hey." He responded, walking in out of the rain quickly and shaking some of the rainwater off his mane "I was a little surprised by your text this morning, it's not like you to keep things hush hush."
Spitfire closed the door and led Kion through the damp smelling gym "Well after you see what Judy's uncovered, you'll know why."
"What's Judy got to do with this?" Kion wondered, looking around at the dust covered gym equipment.
"One of her cops found it, she's swore her to secrecy before calling me, the MCB and Camelot." Spitfire hastily explained "They're all waiting in the next room." The mech guided Kion to what looked like a reception area where Chief Judy Wilde, MCB regional director Skye Savage and Camelot operative Ray Kamino were waiting.
"Kion." Ray smiled, going over and shaking the paw of his brother in law.
"Ray? Last I heard you were in Ukraine." Kion replied, shocked to see the white tiger.
"I got called back because of this." Ray shrugged.
"What exactly is 'This'?" Skye questioned, she was in the dark as much as Kion.
"It'd be better if I just show you." Judy grimaced, taking some keys out of her pocket and going over to a padlocked double door labelled 'Workout studio'. Judy unlocked the padlock and Spitfire used her strength to open the heavy studio doors.
There was collective gasp between Skye, Ray and Kion. In the centre of the darkened room was a ball of purple and black mist that was fifteen feet tall and easily the same across. "Oh my god." Skye mumbled.
"Now I see why the head honchos wanted me on this." Ray commented, wary of the strange phenomenon.
"It's so much bigger than the one that hit Robyn." Kion commented before hastily asking "No one's touched it have they?"
"No, when one of my cops called it in I came straight over and padlocked the door yesterday before calling Olivia." Judy explained "It gave my officer the fright of her life."
Olivia had opened up the chest cavity of the Spitfire mech so she could talk to everyone without using the machines synthesised voice, Kion offered his paw to his teammate and she hopped out of the cockpit onto the lion's paw. "So how did your cop find this? it's not like it's got a flashing sign saying 'Scary purple cloud' on the front of the building."Olivia asked, running up Kion's arm and perching on his shoulder.
"Yesterday there was a pretty heavy rainstorm outside and one of my cops was on foot patrol, anyway she saw 'something' moving at high speed through the canopy." Judy began.
"What kind of something?" Skye asked, knowing the answer would likely be cryptic.
"The only description was that it was like a machine and it flew but it was carrying someone that was screaming." Judy continued.
"I don't like where this is going." Kion commented, spotting a smashed skylight above the purple cloud.
"My officer saw the 'Thing' dive through the skylight, then suddenly the screaming stopped, she came into the gym to investigate when she found this." Judy answered, motioning towards the cloud.
"So what you're saying is that the metal 'something' took a screaming mammal into that cloud, like it's some sort of portal or something?" Ray theorised.
"I know it sounds like the plot of a sci-fi movie but I found some evidence that might support this fact." Judy revealed, taking out a piece of paper from her pocket and unfolding it "there was some blood and hair on the broken glass of the skylight, I got Basil to run some tests on it and he came up with this."
Judy handed the piece of paper over to sky, on the paper were the results of a DNA test which indicated the blood and the hair belonged to a Horse mare named Regina Lowell "Holy crap," Skye gasped "she's one of the missing mammals."
"Wait, what?" Olivia asked, wanting an explanation.
"Regina Holly Lowell, 18, a rich kid from the Meadowlands who went missing five weeks ago after showing signs of 'Powers' in public. She's one of the seventeen mammals that have vanished since the purple sky incident." Judy clarified.
"So all those mammals were dragged into that?" Kion asked, sounding horrified.
"It's possible, but we can't be sure." Judy answered "Either way I called it into the MCB and the NSA, so it's best if you guys explain your orders."
"Right, my director called me last night and said that this links to the missing 17 case, I've been ordered to secure the building with agents and make sure no civilians get in, Camelot will also been on guard in case any foreign sources try to infiltrate this operation." Skye relayed "I've also been asked to formally ask Team Ceartais for a protection team seeing as we don't know what threat we're dealing with but we know it's linked to 'Powers'."
"You got it." Olivia concurred "But how are we going to figure out what this thing actually is?"
"Well my bosses were hoping you could help with that Olivia, seeing as you're one of the brightest minds in the world." Ray answered.
"Doesn't the government have their own scientists? I'm surprised they're not crawling all over this already." Olivia reacted in a snarky manner.
"That's exactly why we need you, my bosses can't rule out that some aspect of the US government is responsible for this, if evidence comes to light that America or its allies were involved in the creation of this phenomenon we need to bring them to justice before it can be covered up." Ray explained.
"Which is the real reason Camelot is here." Kion figured to which the white tiger nodded.
"Look I can help protection wise but in terms of science, not a chance. I'm an engineer not a physicist…hang on, I know someone who could help, she's an award winning physicist, she has a lab at Zootopia Metropolitan University." Olivia remembered.
"If you can convince this scientist to get on board, I can get her security clearance." Skye replied.
Judy look once again at the purple cloud and sighed "One of my cops, Knight, went missing not long after the purple sky incident. He's a good cop, I picked him for my team myself. If this leads to finding Knight then we need to get started ASAP."
000
There was rough neighbourhoods in every corner of Zootopia but there was none more rough than Bridge street, the three mile long stretch of the canal district that was away from the well policed suburbs and industrial areas. Bridge street had a reputation for dive bars, crumbling tenements and pickpockets. Mammals who lived around her kept to themselves and never pried into anyone else's business at the risk of getting dragged into something nefarious, making Bridge street a great place to hide. It was getting close to sunset and a hooded figure made his way down the street carrying a few bags of canned food and bottled water, making sure not to make eye contact with anyone he passed. The hooded mammal scurried into a back alley and went to the service door of an abandoned furniture store, he knocked it in a coded fashion before an overlay anxious pig opened it. "Quick get inside." The Pig insisted, the hooded mammal obeyed and the pig closed the door behind him before bolting the door. Inside the store were half a dozen mammals of varying species, huddled together around an electric heater and looking at the figure with relief. The mammal pulled down his hood and looked at the mammals with sadness in his eyes "I'm sorry, there's no sign of Regina anywhere." Arthur Knight revealed, the former cop now dressed in dirty rags and his once dark fur was closer to blue.
"That dumb girl shouldn't of ran off, she knew she'd get caught." The Pig, Earl, groused. Unloading the shopping bags and handing out water to the other mammals.
"She was stressed and scared." Arthur justified.
"We're all stressed and scared Arthur, but none of us are dumb enough to head outside, not with those 'Machines' around." Earl countered "We're sitting ducks, the moment we step outside those things will grab us."
"As long as we stick together and don't use our powers we'll be fine," Arthur assured in a sombre voice "we've already lost too many of us."
(AN/ So what did you think? PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE Review! Next time on The Broken Mirror; Luna and Alice have a fun 'Date night', Nick and Judy get some happy news and Robyn gets spooked. Please review and C YA SOON...)