(AN/ Hey folks it's Garouge/Crewefox with a Broken Mirror for the late update between getting sunstroke and a having a big job interview, I got the job btw, I've been a little behind. It's been an amazing first week for this fanfic with over 2250 views, 62 reviews, 83 Faves and gaining 96 followers. Thank you all so much for the support for this fledgling threequel and I hope I don't disappoint you folks. On another note may I kindly request that you stop bothering Ziegelzeig, the TAS dev team and myself about the release of the Take a Stand Spin off 'Prey Upon', Zieg is a busy guy and it will be ready when it's ready! So without further ado let's get cracking with this chapter...)
Chapter 2- Hope.
Ever since Luna and Alice had wed, the two had transitioned comfortably into married life; Alice had becoming an integral part of the Wilde family, even though some of them knew of her dark past, the passion between the two mammals was still burning brightly like the early days of their relationship but most of all, the two had grown accustomed to sharing everything with one another. Luna had become more open about her mental health since they got hitched, with the vixen sharing both the good and bad moments with her wife, who was always there with love and support. There were times when Luna's hallucinations would creep up on her but Alice was the anchor that brought her back to reality. The couple usually went out on dates two or three times a week however, one of these dates were always while they were on patrol in their heroic personas.
Yurei and Andraste had just finished beating the snot out of gang of fifteen prey-supremacists who were attacking a badger owned all-night diner with Yurei dispatching foes on the ground while Andraste was perched up on cell phone tower and taking out the criminals with tranq arrows. Yurei was binding the wrists of a hare with cable ties when the sound of police sirens reached her ears, the ghostly rabbit looked at the relieved badgers and said "The police will take care of it from here, just hand over the security cam footage to them."
"Ok, thank you so much Yurei and thank Andraste for us please." One of the badgers, a waitress, smiled at Yurei, which was rare as most mammals were scared stiff of her.
Yurei noticed the other two badgers with the waitress were a little more apprehensive of her, which was to be expected. She nodded at the family before turning on her heel and walking across the street where Andraste was still on top of the cell tower, Yurei was about to use the grapple launcher imbedded in her cybernetic arm when Luna descended via the wires attached to her belt. The vixen was upside down when she caught the off guard doe with a kiss on the cheek "Sneak attack." Andraste teased, still upside down with her trademark hat gripped in her paw.
"You snuck on a master of ninjutsu, I am ashamed." Yurei hammed up, falsely shying away.
"Then how about you counterattack me?" Andraste flirted, reaching out and pulling down the skull print fabric that hid her beloved's lips.
Yurei obliged and leaned in and kissed the archer deeply, it felt different due to Andraste being suspended upside down, but the passion was still apparent as their tongues danced together. Yurei ended the kiss but was immediately scooped up in Andraste's arms and whizzed up to the top of the cell tower with laughter coming from both heroines. "It's nearly 5am, we should head home." Yurei commented, fixing her mask back over her mouth.
"Actually, I was thinking we could stay out and eat breakfast." Andraste suggested with a sly look in her amber eyes.
"I don't think that diner is going to be serving food for a while." Yurei replied, motioning towards the trashed diner where the badger family were chatting with the cops.
"I've got something else in mind." Andraste grinned.
Five minutes later Andraste had led Yurei to the roof of department store in Savannah central, where a large blanket was laid out with a picnic basket in the middle, soft multicoloured electric lanterns were dotted around the rooftop adding to the sense of romance. Yurei looked up at Andraste and spoke "This is amazing but I know what you're playing at."
"I have no idea what you're talking about." Andraste feigned innocence.
Yurei was smiling under her mask at her sneaky lover and walked over to the blanket and sat down while asking "If I didn't know any better I'd say my darling wife was trying to butter me up for information, no?"
"Maybe." Andraste half admitted, joining Yurei on the blanket, opening up the picnic basket and pulling out a thermos of coffee "But since I went to all this trouble you may as well tell me."
"I thought we were leaving it until we had the final test results in writing." Yurei pointed out, looking in the picnic basket and was delighted to see carrot cake style muffins, she immediately took one out and began to gorge on it.
"I'm just excited that's all, I know the doctor would've told you the results today, I know how doctors work remember." Andraste persuaded, pouring out two cups of coffee.
"Really? Do all doctors moonlight as crime fighters?" Yurei poked, with a mouthful of muffin.
"Oh come on, just tell me." Andraste whined, passing Alice a cup.
"You tell me how it went your check up first." Yurei bargained.
"Ugh fine." Andraste huffed "My test results came back all clear, no signs of pancreatic or any other cancer, I have to have another test in six months like always." The heroine was well aware of her biological mother's bloodline to have cancer as the prime cause of death, she had been encouraged by Nick and Judy in her teenage years to get tested regularly for the hereditary disease.
"That's good to hear." Yurei replied while sipping her coffee, it was always a relief to hear her wife's tests were all clear.
"So how did it go with Dr. Gazi? What did she say?" Andraste asked anxiously.
"Well she says I'm in perfect health to have my first litter." Yurei revealed, setting her cup down.
Andraste gave an excited yip then dived at Yurei, tackling her with a hug, Yurei had expected this reaction and chuckled at her overly giddy love. Andraste hugged Yurei tighter and pressed "So what else did she say?"
"She said we can select a sperm donor next week and my eggs can be inseminated a few days later," Yurei explained, stroking the soft ginger fur of Andraste's face and adding "we're going to be parents."
"There's so much to do and so little time, rabbit pregnancy is only thirty days. We'll have to buy clothes, decorate the nursery, choose names." Andraste gushed, already picturing holding the tiny rabbit kits, the vixen was hoping for a large litter.
"Let's not get ahead of ourselves, Dr. Gazi said the first attempt at artificial insemination doesn't always work, let's make sure I'm pregnant first before we buy a crib." Yurei cautioned.
"But we can tell my family right? That we're trying for a litter?" Andraste asked with a small pout.
"Sure, although I'm sure Judy will have a more excited reaction than you." Yurei replied with a smile, feeling at peace in her wife's arms.
000
A tradition had formed over the last few years between the Wilde and Savage families; every Sunday afternoon both families would get together for a traditional Sunday lunch, it gave the close knit mammals a chance to catch up with one another and chill out after a stressful week. And to keep the cooking duties fair, the venue of the lunch would change each week, rotating between Nick and Judy's apartment, Luna and Alice's penthouse, Robyn and Hannah's house and on this Sunday, it was the turn of Jack and Skye. But all through the three course lunch, Robyn and Hannah were feeling a mix of excitement and nervousness due to the news they wanted to share with their loved ones; the young couple wanted to share their news about Aaron. The two hybrids had visited the little Koala twice more since their initial meeting, one at the children's home and another was a supervised visit to the park, Robyn and Hannah already had a place in their hearts for the loveable little boy and treasured every moment with him and if their application for adoption was successful there would be many more treasured moments for years to come.
"I'm stuffed." Nick gave a happy sigh, pushing away his plate which had been home to a roast chicken dinner.
"That's a shame because it's blueberry crumble and custard for dessert." Jack baited, knowing his best friend's affinity for delicious berry.
"Blueberry crumble? Screw it, if I get stomach ache it'll be worth it." Nick grinned, patting his stomach.
"You better not be whining later." Judy warned as Jack got up from his chair and began collecting everyone's empty plates.
"Like the first time you took me to Bunnyburrow and Grandma fed him that stack of blueberry pancakes?" Luna remembered with a smile.
"It was her peace offering for the whole anti-inter thing, what was I supposed to do? Refuse her?" Nick justified, hardly believing that incident happened over two decades ago.
"Refuse Bonnie?" Skye scoffed, with a glass of red wine in her hand "That's a death wish."
"Is Bonnie really that formidable?" Alice asked, tilting her hear slightly "She's always seemed like such a placid doe to me."
Judy, Nick, Skye and Luna all burst out laughing at Alice's words, with Jack's laughter echoing from the kitchen "Bonnie placid? Oh god Frenchie, that's good." Nick laughed, slamming his fist on the dining table.
"I love Grandma but damn she can be the devil herself when she wants to be." Luna chuckled down at her perplexed looking wife.
"Remember the time my mom and Marian first met? I thought they were going to tear each other apart." Judy reminisced.
Skye was laughing along with her old friends when she noticed that the two youngest mammals at the table were oddly silent, she read the expressions on Robyn and Hannah's faces and queried "You two ok?"
"Oh yeah, we're fine Mom." Hannah brushed off.
"Yeah Skye, we're chill." Robyn dodged.
Skye arched an eyebrow and said "Well that seems like the shit side of bullshit."
Judy looked at the two and asked in a disappointed tone "Did you two have a fight?"
"Who's had a fight?" Jack asked, walking back into the dining room holding a tray with eight bowels of blueberry crumble and a jug of custard resting upon it.
"We haven't had a fight." Hannah reiterated.
"Well what's going on then? Usually we can't shut you two up." Nick smirked, smelling a secret as well as the delicious crumble.
"Says the mayor who makes speeches for a living yet can't zip it on his day off." Robyn barbed back.
"Oooh, nice comeback." Nick had to admire as he took the crumble of Jack's tray.
"Seriously though, you guys ok?" Luna asked, sounding concerned.
"Look we're fine, we just have something to tell you all." Hannah caved.
"We're all ears." Judy offered, pouring some custard over her baked treat.
"Didn't Alice and Luna say they had some news?" Hannah responded, trying to swerve the conversation.
"Youngest first," Alice insisted "you have us all curious."
The two hybrids shared a sigh before Robyn reached out and took hold of Hannah's paw for courage, she gathered her grit and began "So you know we had that recon mission at the beginning of the week, at the children's home?"
"Yeah, Rojek told me about it. He wanted you to keep tabs on some powered kid?" Skye answered and asked.
"Aaron, his name is Aaron." Hannah corrected "…Well we kind of went back there."
"Was there a problem with the child?" Jack asked, oblivious to where the conversation was heading but Skye and Judy were already smiling, hoping that their inklings were right.
"Nothing like that," Robyn eased "we just wanted to visit, we wanted to make sure he was doing ok."
"We took the little hero to the park on Friday, even though he's a koala he has the speed of a bunny." Hannah smiled, remembering the young marsupial's laughter when they took him to the Sherwood park's play area.
"Little hero? That's a cute nickname." Nick commented, as oblivious as his best friend Jack while Judy and Skye expectations grew in silent excitement.
"But we were kinda' thinking it could be more of a permanent thing, us taking care of Aaron I mean." Robyn said, gripping Hannah's paw just a little tighter.
"Permanent?" Nick mused after taking a bite of the blueberry crumble.
Before Robyn and Hannah could explain any further Judy burst out with joy "You're adopting!"
"Damn Mom, spoilers." Robyn couldn't help but laugh.
Both Judy and Skye shot out of their chairs and wrapped their arms around their respective daughters with Skye shrilling "I'm going to be a grandmother!"
"Finally!" Judy expressed, hugging tightly onto Robyn.
"Hold up, what?!" Nick exclaimed, suddenly blueberry crumble seemed a lot less important.
"Me and Hannah are going to adopt Aaron, if everything goes well with the application." Robyn stipulated.
"A grandson…" Jack muttered, he had always hoped for a grandchild but never wanted to pressure Hannah into having kids.
Alice got up from her seat and wrapped a hug around her sister in law Robyn and congratulated "I'm so happy for you two."
"I'm going to be an Aunt!" Luna celebrated, rushing over and kissing both Hannah and Robyn on the cheek.
"…So when will this actually happen?" Nick asked, stunned by the news.
"Well with the fast track adoption measures you enacted after the wave we could officially be Aaron's parents in two weeks." Hannah answered, she was referring to legislation that Nick had put through city hall due to the high number of orphans resulting for the natural disaster five years earlier.
"Christmas week, we'll give the little guy the best Christmas ever." Robyn answered with warmth in her heart.
"A grandson for Christmas!" Judy cheered, thumping her foot on the carpet with glee. After a few minutes everyone had calmed down even after they fawned over the photos on Robyn's phone of the koala, when everyone had finished their desert Judy suddenly remembered "Wait, didn't you two have something to tell us as well?" looking at Luna and Alice.
"Well…it can wait." Alice played down.
"No, no, come on, tell us." Nick encouraged while taking a sip of wine, figuring that it couldn't be a bigger bombshell than Robyn and Hannah's news.
Luna and Alice shared a knowingly sly look before the vixen revealed "Me and Alice are trying for a litter."
Nick instantly spat out his wine before coughing "W-what!?"
"I'm going to be pregnant soon, we're selecting a sperm donor next week." Alice smiled, looking forward to becoming a mother.
"More grandchildren!" Judy yipped, jumping for joy before skipping to the other side of the table and tackling both her eldest child and daughter-in-law in a hug "This is the greatest day of my life!" Judy cried tears of joy.
Nick was reeling from the double whammy of news and got to his shaky feet with the help of a grinning Robyn before stumbling over to Luna and Alice and breathing "A litter?"
"Well that's what we're hoping for, the obstetrician says Alice is in perfect health to have a litter." Luna replied giddily, loving the awestruck look on her father's face.
"Why didn't you say something sooner?" Hannah asked with glee.
"We we're waiting until the end of dinner but then you dropped your good news and we didn't want to rain on your parade." Alice answered in an overly polite manner.
Hannah and Robyn walked over to Luna and Alice and embraced them both, "You haven't rained on anything, you've made this day even better." Hannah corrected.
"Yeah, our clan just grew like a Bunnyburrow family." Robyn joked.
"I'm betting there will be five kits in Alice's litter." Judy chimed, binkying with joy.
"What makes you say that?" Skye asked in a happy tone, going over to the liquor cabinet and grabbing a bottle of thirty year old bourbon she was saving for a special occasion like this.
"Back during the whole Drowned crisis me and Nick went to a fortune teller who told us we'd have six grandkids." Judy informed "Aaron will be the first and then Alice will give us five more little miracles."
"No pressure or anything." Nick had to joke at the golden eyed doe.
"Pressure made me what I am." Alice smiled back at her father in law, more grateful than ever that she was part of such a loving family.
An hour or so later as the conversations moved onto the names, living arrangements and now organizing a Christmas with kits in the picture and during this time Robyn nipped to the bathroom. She had just finished up her business and was washing her paws at the sink when she glanced at the mirror only to gasp and stagger back in horror, she saw a tall pale figure where she should be; this strange creature had ginger fur only on top of it's head and it's nose was oddly shaped, it's clothes were similar to Robyn's and so was the eye colour but that's where the similarity ended, this creature looked alien to the spooked hybrid. Robyn blinked her navy eyes and the figure was gone from the mirror, only seeing her true reflection. That had been the seventh time she had seen the odd creature since the 'Purple sky' incident and each time it grew more and more creepy, she had told no one about it, not even Hannah and that's the way she way she wanted to keep it, as far as Robyn was concerned what she saw wasn't real. "It's all in your head." The ginger furred hybrid whispered to herself.
000
Monday morning and it was lashing rain in the rainforest district as normal, it was just after six am and Team Ceartais were gathered at the abandoned gym where the MCB and Camelot had been on guard since Judy alerted her allies to the discovery of the mysterious purple cloud. The Mage was not accustomed to be awake at this ungodly hour, since he usually got up at eight am to open the garage or was in bed sound asleep after a night on patrol "Dudes, why are we even here? We should be in bed." The wolf complained, looking at the anomaly with unease.
"Quit your bitching," Spitfire dismissed "we're dealing with a unknown space time phenomenon and you're complaining cos' you're sleepy, grow up will ya'?"
"We've known about this cloud thing for five days, so why are we all gathered now?" Mage griped.
"Because we've finally got a someone qualified to figure this thing out," Roar reasoned "with her help maybe we can get the missing 17 home safe."
"Fine." Mage tisked, wishing he grabbed a snarlbucks before he came to the dilapidated building.
"Grouchy pup, aren't you?" A voice teased from above. The team looked up to see the Camelot Corporal Zoe Nightfall-Rojek sitting on a support beam, sipping her morning cup of tea while her three armed drones whirled around her.
"Zoe!" Yurei beamed, delighted to see her old friend.
The large bat swooped down with grace and landed on Spitfire's shoulder while commenting "Glad you guys have showed up, guard duty is a total snore, this mission is such a drag."
"But it is our mission." A stern voice came from behind, the group turned to see Kamino coming towards them, the lioness was docked in her one-of-a-kind back and leg brace developed by Dawson tech that helped the paraplegic walk "And I intend for Camelot to complete to the best of their ability."
"Yes Ma'am." Zoe groaned, giving a small salute. The lioness then went up to her little brother Roar and punched him in the arm playfully.
"So who's this expert you got on board?" Scarlet asked Spitfire.
"She's one of the talents I granted a scholarship to, she was a grade skipper like me and Luna, their scholarship paid off because now she's a professor of physics at Zootopia Met." Spitfire explained.
"Wait are you talking about Professor Bloom?" Bullet piped up.
"You know her?" Spitfire asked back, sounding surprised.
"Yeah, when I was at Zootopia met she was the faculty liaison for the LGBTQ society, she always helped us organise events for Pride." Hannah elaborated.
"Sounds like Clara, she does like a party." Spitfire commented.
At that moment the double doors guarded by Camelot operatives opened and in walked Aleks and Ray with a figure between them that made Kodi's breath catch in his throat. The figure was a wolf with sandy blonde fur, a tuft of styled fur rested between her ears, her inquisitive brown eyes were hid behind a pair of black designer glasses. The wolf paid no mind to the superheroes in the room and went straight over the giant purple cloud where she purred "Now isn't this beautiful."
"Professor Clara Bloom," Spitfire opened, the mech stepped over and extended it's bulky mechanical hand to the physicist "it's a real pleasure to have you on this project."
Clara eyed Spitfire with suspicion, shook the mech's hand and replied "Charmed I'm sure, but make no mistake I'm not trusting of government types, the only reasons I'm here is because one; that thing is a mystery and two; Olivia Dawson convinced me."
"Well in that case…" Spitfire gave a low laugh before opening up the chest cavity of the mech causing the startled wolf to step back a little, the chest plate slid up and the cheeky face of Olivia Dawson was revealed "…I'm glad you accepted my invitation."
"Olivia!?" Clara gasped, her brown eyes transfixed on the mouse.
"Surprised?" Olivia questioned, taking off her neural link helmet.
"Just a little." Clara garbled with a flummoxed expression on her muzzle.
"Well since you're already surprised I may as well get this out of the way." Bullet spoke while taking off her domino mask.
"Hannah!?" Clara half laughed, half shrilled "B-But you're blind!? And where's your stripes?"
"There is more than one way to see and I've got fur dye spray covering my stripes." Bullet glossed over before fixing her mask back in place.
"Holy crap." Clara gave an awkward laugh before shaking off her dizzying thoughts and addressing Olivia "So what the hell are you working with these government stooges for? Doesn't seem like you."
Aleks gave an annoyed grunt before responding "These government 'Stooges' are trying to rescue 17 missing mammals, Professor."
"Oh chill out, Foxy. She's a bit of a rebel, like Spitfire." Zoe eased, flying over to her husband and teasingly poking his stomach.
"I assure you, Agent Rojek that I want to see the missing 17 home safe as well but given the circumstances of their disappearances even you have to admit this stinks of government spooks." Clara parried.
Aleks was about to respond with an equally thorny retort when Scarlet cut in "Look, you two can do the he said/she said shit on your own time, can we just get on with the briefing?"
"Fine by me." Clara replied briskly, shooting a pair of evil eyes at Aleks.
The Camelot commanding officer, Ray, cleared his throat and stepped forward and said "From today onwards Professor Bloom will be working here from the hours of 7am until 5pm with Camelot and MCB operatives guarding the anomaly, however Professor Bloom has insisted that a member of Team Ceartais be present as a third party while she conducts her research due to her mistrust of government forces."
"I can't blame her, seeing as Camelot once stole my tech, twice." Olivia backed up Clara's reasoning.
Kiara rolled her eyes and muttered "You're never going to let me live that one down."
"So we'll need at least two Ceartais team members here daily, any volunteers for today?" Ray asked, looking at the heroes.
Mage immediately shot his paw up and said way to quickly "I'll do it." Which caused some dubious looks from the team, Mage wasn't the type to volunteer for anything especially something tedious as guard duty.
"You will?" Roar asked, voicing his confusion.
"Yeah, I mean I may as well get my shift out of the way." Mage back peddled, avoiding the gaze of the attractive professor.
Scarlet then connected the dots and taunted "Sure thing, you perv."
"Dude!" Mage quietly hissed at his friend.
Clara read the situation, rolled her eyes and sighed "That's all I need when I working, some jerk checking me out." Which triggered a round of sniggers around the room and flustered look to appear on the Mage's face. Clara Bloom was beautiful as her namesake but she was not a delicate flower.
000
Arthur Knight had begrudgingly got used to sleeping in the abandoned furniture store, where the smell of damp and the presence of cockroaches had become all too familiar. The ex-cop usually stayed awake at night to watch over the five powered mammals he was protecting, there used to be three others but they had been reckless and used their powers and wound up getting captured by the mysterious machines that were tracking them. Arthur was no longer a cop but he still believed in protecting those in danger and that's what he vowed to do, he had only been asleep a few hours when he felt someone shake his shoulder. Arthur woke with a start but relaxed when he saw Jason, a young caracal boy under his protection, staring back at him "Jason?" Arthur asked in a sleepy haze.
"There's something wrong with Earl!" The twelve year old babbled with a panicky voice.
"What?" Arthur replied, suddenly feeling a lot more awake, he got to his feet and saw the others crowded around the pig who was lying on a shabby sofa, gripping his tummy and moaning in pain.
"Earl!" Arthur panicked, rushing over and kneeling next to the sixty something swine "What's wrong?"
"It's nothing, it'll p-pass." Earl lied, wincing in pain.
"He was complaining of stomach aches last night but it's got worse, it could be appendicitis." Brenda thought aloud, the worried donkey sounded fretful.
"Or i-it could be gas." Earl dismissed.
"That doesn't look like gas." Arthur dashed "Earl we need to get you to a doctor."
"No! No d-doctors! Those machines will find me the moment I set f-foot in the ER!" Earl insisted through his agony.
Arthur knew the pig was right, the others had been captured when they were heading to crowded places or tried to get help from the authorities but the wolf had lost too many mammals to see a good pig suffer like this, he racked his brain for a solution and could only come up with one; he knew Chief Judy Wilde's daughter was a surgeon, maybe he could convince his former chief to bring her daughter to Earl's aid. His paw nervously fiddled with the odd shield shaped pendant around his neck as doubt crept into Arthur's mind, he couldn't rule out that it was the government rounding the powered mammals up and Judy by extension worked for the government, going to her would be a gamble but he didn't have many options available to him "I might now someone who can help." Arthur said in a shaky voice.
(AN/ What did you guys think? PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE Review! Next time on The Broken Mirror; Robyn confides in someone about the creature in the mirror, Kodi tries to talk to Clara and Arthur reaches out to Judy. Please review and c ya soon...)