Foreword by the author:
So, after reading many tens of thousands of fanfics over the last twenty years I have finally gotten around to writing one of my own. Fair warning, I love my clichés and will not hesitate to use them. Also, after reading so many fics I am certainly doomed (DOOMED!) to steal someone elses ideas and/or characters. I will give credit where it is due if I remember it though. Whats more English is not my mother tongue and I don´t have a beta sooo , again, you have been warned.
Now for my first fic I have chosen Zootopia as the medium, having been inspired by many great predecessors such as (but not limited to):
Cimar of Turalis Wildehopps, DrekkDeina, sarsis, Bluelighthouse, VariableMammal, HawkTooth, MrFallenAngel, ayziks, MinscLovesBoo, Fox in the hen house, ScaraMedn, Zanrok, Nitemage256, GusTHeBear, Armae, WANMWAD, BoneyM, ADeadMissionary, and so on and so forth.
Before we start the story a few messages to some of my fellow writers:
To MinscLovesBoo: I fully intend to uphold the threat I once made in my PM in later chapters of this story. BWAAHAHAHA! #DCP
To sarsis: Rereading the whole of Guardian Blue for a fourth time seems kind of silly, please write more of it so we can avoid that. Even if you don´t use my idea ;).
Finally, to Zanrok: I hope you haven´t lost your taste for writing as your productivity has gone way down the last year or so. If not, its time to finish The Conspiracy and continue Derailment, One hundred boops and Old arrangements. Christmas is over Grinch, so get back to writing or no coffee for you! ….please?
Now just one more thing; Later chapters will assume the reader has some knowledge of the early draft of the movie, often referred to as Zystopia. If not, google or youtube is your friend. Here we go.
Rabbit karma Chapter one.
It was a beautiful day in Zootopia, the most modern, futuristic, accepting and in many ways simply best city on the face of the planet. "Where anyone can be anything" was nowadays no longer just a slogan but as close to the literal truth as you could reasonably ask.
Of course that had not just happened. No no, many many mammals had worked their tails off for nearly a century to make it so. Naturally some had worked harder and longer then others. This story is about the one mammal who topped that list by a huge margin.
To find the mammal in question we go now to the Zootopia town hall, a building so majestic that it regularly could be found on top-ten lists of impressive architecture around the world. Having been regularly upgraded to modern standards but still keeping in line with its cultural roots it had amazingly managed to not simply become garish but remain a true icon of the city, a fact many visitors found rather astonishing. And no, visiting dignitaries were not just jealous, no sir!
Anyway, this iconic building had just been the venue for a celebration of the citys most famous living resident, paying respect to her unparalleled contributions to Zootopias prosperity and, on several occasions, its very survival.
As the front door open wide out to the town hall square allowing the guests to exit and form two spreading lines down the sides of the entry's stairs, a hush spread across the assembled mammals. Then, walking besides the thin cougar that was mayor Arthur Sleekfur, a real-life living legend stepped from the building and out into the sun.
At one hundred and one years old, ZPD Chief Judith Laverne WildeHopps (retired) walked slowly but with a dignity that could best be described as a shroud of majesty to be greeted by the masses. The mayor had heard the saying that you should never meet your heroes because you would only be disappointed, but with this small bunny that was clearly false. Her sheer presence was enough to make him feel very young and foolish, insignificant even. How a mammal of such diminutive stature could seemingly cast a shadow over the whole city was beyond his understanding, but then again so was most of her many accomplishments. Where her fur had once been a silvery grey it had now turned mostly snow white with age. Once only flesh and blood she was now… more. Or less, some would say. She was, in fact, a cyborg. She had been lucky in that respect, just as cybernetics had reached a point of being truly viable she had for the first time needed some spare parts.
As the mayor walked beside his childhood hero he could not help but be aware of this, as for each step she took there was a quiet mechanical whirring coming from her legs. The soft sound made his spine tingle as he was almost forcefully reminded of why she was still his personal Hero with a capital H. She had in fact lost her original set of legs in her mid-forties when she had stopped a terrorist attack by an armoured vehicle. Somehow she had managed to destroy it with nothing but her standard duty equipment reducing the tracked monstrosity to a burning husk. Unfortunately her legs had been crushed beyond all hope in the fight. Which had still not stopped her from taking on the last surviving terrorist.
'Well, taking on might be a bit much', the well-dressed feline thought. There was still video of the confrontation:
A white-tailed deer in his late teens had been lucky enough to just escape before the specially-made APC had gone up in flames. Staring in horrified disbelief the young stag could do nothing else as his dreams, such as they were, along with his comrades went up in flames. At least until a small form had crawled out from under the burning wreck on its elbows, violently shaking its head to put out the flames on its ears and back, and slowly locked eyes with him. When the still smouldering being had seemed to stare right into his soul through pools of eldritch amethyst fire, let out a hiss of fury and begun to crawl towards him with surprising speed he had done the only things he felt appropriate: Soil himself, scream in absolute terror, turn around and run like all the Hordes of Hell had come out to sodomize his ass. As he ran, a terrifying scream echoed behind him: "YEAH YOU BETTER RUN! IF I CATCH YOU I´LL BITE YOUR KNEES OFF!" Six miles away he simply passed out from exhaustion.
The mayor watched the small bunny from the corner of his eye, musing; 'She´d have done it, too.' Quite a few civilians hade lost their lives in the attack and the bunny had acted with extreme prejudice in ending it. In the aftermath the entire ZPD had fallen on the rest of the responsible organisation like the wrath of a heathen god in the name of their wounded chief, avidly cheered on by the mayor of the time. Considering the then-mayor hade been named Nicholas Piberius WildeHopps one might rightly claim bias on his part. It had not mattered, all of Zootopia had cheered when mayor WildeHopps had declared in a famous speech "Zootopia will not ever bend to terrorists!" and allotted a large sum of city funds to "get our finest officer back on her feet".
The 'getting her back on her feet' part had been expensive, time consuming and ultimately extremely successful, replacing everything below her upper thighs with cybernetics. For the next ten years Judy WildeHopps had been the single fastest landbound being to have ever been recorded, outstripping a cheetahs top speed by more than 10 mph and becoming a source of hope for handicapped mammals everywhere. (Fun fact: when a cheetah with similar enhancements to Judy had finally beaten her record for land speed he had raised his arms in victory and declared: "Yes! I did it! I beat that little… middle aged… bunny doe…" looking less and less triumphant as he spoke, finishing on nearly a whisper, eyes going glassy. Luckily his trainer had been present to smack him upside the head. A shout of "You just outran JUDY WILDEHOPPS you fool!" had the runner smiling like a… fool… again repeating his yell: "YES! I did it!")
Unfortunately the rise of cybernetics had proven to be a double edged sword. While they made life better for many mammals they also made Zootopia more dangerous over all due to the wide spread of such advanced tech, making it easily accessible for even the least discernible individuals. This was a fact shown clearly on the bunnys body. Her right paw had been bitten clean off below her elbow by a bear driven mad by faulty wetware in his head and replaced with a cybernetic one. Her left one had had extensive repairs done after being crushed by a rhino. Her entire torso was riddled with battle scars and replacement parts after being shot, stabbed and otherwise damaged during the longest career in the ZPD:s history. Fifty-two years as chief of precinct one was simply unprecedented, the many alloy ribs and artificial organs that made it possible was both the cost and the proof of it.
'And even that is not the end of it.' The mayor considered as the two stopped at the top of the stairs in front of the gathered crowd. No, the most noticeable damage was her ears. All but the two inches closest to her head where clearly artificial, made from a matt black substance with a network of softly glowing purple circuitry in them. Those had been necessitated by "The unsane samurai" as the news had dubbed him; a tiger with extensive cyber-enhancements of his own and armed with a katana. Declaring himself a symbol of true justice he had gone vigilante in Zootopias underworld, leaving a trail of blood and death in his wake. When the ZPD had protested his actions he decided that the police was a threat to his honour and needed to go. Unsane indeed. His attack on precinct one had left eight officers dead and five wounded before Judy got to him. She was over seventy years old then, which might explain why she miscalculated when she dodged the only sword swing the tiger got to make in her direction. The end result was a bunny with her chopped off ears held in her right paw and a tiger that would not walk under his own power for ten months, cybernetics or not. (Those where HER officers he cut down, dang it!) When an EMT had approached her she had held out her ears to him and calmly asked if he could do something about them. Him puking in the nearest waste-bin was taken as a no. Her simply dumping her own ears in the trash on the way to the precinct's cybernetics department to "Get something better installed" firmly established her moniker of "Chief Bamf-bunny" in the minds of her subordinates until the day she retired and beyond.
The much-younger-than-his-guest mayor at last turned fully to the bunny, who calmly met his gaze. 'Geez, even her eyes…'
It was true, long after her retirement there had been attempts to give officers who lacked such, night vision. Now, the eye is one of the trickiest part of the body to manipulate; even the brain was not as difficult to get to grips with at this point. Then in her early nineties, Judy had volunteered as a test-subject for this experimental treatment because "I´m old, this might be the last time I can assist the ZPD in my life. Besides, if worse comes to worst its no big deal, its not like I need my eyes anymore." Strictly speaking that was true. She had interfaces directly into her brain allowing her to access any and all digital media, and the highly advanced sensor arrays that now replaced her ears gave her a perfect 360-degree awareness of the world around her in all light conditions. Amazingly the procedure had been a total success, giving her eyes both low-light and infrared abilities. The only cost was a far more intense eye-colour than ever before and the fact that her pupils would become slitted like an ancient feline (or a fox!) if she activated them. This cost was accepted with a "Meh" and a casual wave of the paw. (They would also give off a bit of a glow if powered up sufficiently. She had gotten a lot of mileage out of that, giving the occasional disbelieving/disrespectful youngster a deathglare with suddenly slitted and glowing eyes. Add in a little growl and she could make predators ten times her size wet themselves with disturbing regularity.)
"Meh" had been her standard answer to most threats to her life and limb (I´ll just get em replaced!) ever since she lost her husband of 23 years, sadly. After losing Nick she just could no longer be bothered to care as much. Paradoxically this allowed her to make decisions with an almost clinical detachment, quickly making correct assessments where others might have doubted themselves due to fear, thus letting her survive and succed where she should not have been able otherwise. Really, only her duty and her friends kept her going for so long, which was somehow even sadder since she had outlived so many of the latter. Mayor Nicholas Piberius WildeHopps had served in the ZPD beside her until she made Chief, and then two more years as her second-in-command until he finally decided that he was bored and needed new challenges. She had supported him wholeheartedly in his mayoral campaign and they made a formidable team as mayor and chief of precinct one; he knew intimately what the police and the city needed and the ZPD still saw him as one of them and backed him to the hilt. With Judy first in line, of course.
That was what got him killed in the end; his close ties to law enforcement and strong stand against terrorism made him a danger to certain extreme elements. Just before the ZPD mopped up the last of them they performed a hail Mary assassination attack that had manage to mortally wound the mayor, just allowing him enough time to say his last goodbyes in the hospital before his passing. Chief WildeHopps had later arrived to a deathly silent bull pen, given the whole precinct a thousand-yard-stare and said: "I want to grieve my husband. You know what to do. Dismissed." Every officer present had simply stood up and trooped out to do what was needed. Zootopia was declared terrorist-free within seventy-two hours in a show of brutally effective police-work that sent ripples across the globe. It was a testament to how popular the late mayor had been that the average Zootopian greeted any police officer they met with a simple nod and helped with whatever were asked of them for months after his death. Criminal activity was at an all time low for several years thereafter.
Mayor Sleekfur looked into those ancient pools of eldritch fire and could see nothing but an old, tired sadness, despite the kind smile displayed beneath them.
'Damn those fanatic bastards! They cost all the city so dearly, and for what? That manifesto they spread was little but a confusing word salad, not even professional linguists could make heads or tails of it! For crying out loud, not two of them seemed able to agree on what they were fighting for, just that the fight was critically important! Gah! Siiigh, that was before my time though, only thing I can do today is, well, this I guess.'
With that last depressing thought, Arthur Sleekfur gave the citys greatest hero his best smile.
"Are you ready for this, Mrs WildHopps?"
That old, tired smile wavered not one iota.
"As I´ll ever be, Arthur."
"Mmmm, very well then."
With that, the mayor turned to the square, where mammals had begun to whisper excitedly to each other, parents pointing out Judy to their young, cameras and phones at the ready.
To this, the mayor raised his paws and spoke loudly into a conveniently placed microphone.
"Ladies and gentle-mammals, I give you Judith Laverne WildeHopps! As of today, she is officially declared as the Grand Hero of Zootopia!"
Judy took a step forth as the mayor turned to her and hung a large, ornate, golden medal around her neck.
The cheers where booming and seemingly never ending.
-RK-
Several hours later a rabbit in non-descript dark grey pants and hoodie walked slowly along Old Sequia street, a heavy golden object weighing down one of her pockets. She had eventually felt forced to utilize her long unused but still remembered undercover skills and a set of dress blues made from programable fibers to slink away from her own celebration. A few seconds out of sight and her old resplendent uniform as if by magic turned into something completely forgettable. Then she simply faded into the background and left, internally giving thanks to her long lost foxy husband for insisting that all officers should have the ability to go undercover at a moments notice and damn the cost. Those uniforms where not cheap, but in the end almost the entire ZPD had been issued the new fabric. It had been a smash hit out in the streets.
'Sweet cheese and crackers, kitten, you know I love you like a grandson but when your age hit triple digits you loose a little bit of stamina! A five hour street party after a two hour official reception is just a little bit much.' Such was the tired bunnys thoughts. She could not help smiling a bit at the thought of the ruling mayor, though.
'Oh, he was sooo cute the first time I met him! He was shorter than even me back then! Just a little ball of hyper fluff, all eager and happy to see the big hero cop. Can´t believe he became mayor because of me.'
Thinking back, that had been around the time she finally retired. She had been walking home from work when a four year old cougar cub had seen her and immediately slunk away from his parents to run up to his hero, a hundred questions spilling from his mouth. Long used to dealing with the public in all manner of ways, the aging doe simply smiled at the exuberant youth and waited for his already approaching, and not looking entirely happy, mother to collect him. However, just as the larger feline came up to them, the cub stated a question that hit close to the rabbits heart:
"Can I become a police officer just like you, and make the world a better place?"
A gasp from his mother made Judy look up into her eyes; her face a mask of terror. Understandable, as the last twenty to thirty years had seen much of the civilised world pioneering a whole lot of advanced technology, not just cybernetics but everything else needed for it: New materials, new power sources, new and better everything really. An exciting time to be alive, for sure, but pioneers living on the border lived dangerously. May you live in interesting times was a curse, after all. By now society had begun to adapt and stabilise, calming down, but for the likes of the cubs mother it probably seemed like the citys public servants had always been in need of the sort of medical miracles that kept Judy on her feet, being constantly in physical danger. She had most likely grown up never knowing anything else.
Understanding this, Judy wanted to calm the worried mother. She had just the solution too.
Taking a knee in front of the cub, she smiled as gently as she could. Grabbing an ear in her left paw and wiggling the fingers on her right she clearly showed off their artificial nature.
"Being an officer just like me is not really something I can recommend. If you want to make the world a better place I suggest you do it like my husband instead, he truly made some lasting changes."
The poor mother was visibly sagging with relief as the cub curiously observed the bunny. Confused, the cub had an important quiestion:
"How do I become Mayor, ma´am?"
Still sporting her kindest smile the old doe began to lay out a lengthy path of what education, knowledge, backing, liquid assets and so on one would need to become mayor and to be a good one at that. The cub listens quietly the whole time, carefully burning every word of his hero into memory. Once she had finished both cub and mother had thanked her profusely, the female cougar was especially happy that her beloved cub had been shown a far less risky path in life. Contact information had been exchanged, calls and messages had been sent back and forth in the following months, Judy had somehow ended up cub-sitting several times, and the cub had never ever wavered from the path he´d been sat upon.
The rest, as they say, is history.
Lost in her memories, the slightly smiling lagomorph was taken aback when she looked around and realized she had walked on auto-pilot for several blocks and had now arrived into a rather different part of the city. The buildings seemed softer here, built as they were with gentle curves and pastel colours. The roads were empty of heavy traffic as all such had been relegated to a system of monorails that hung far above street level, thus freeing the streets for pedestrians and light vehicles. It was also far quieter here than a normal busy street, as all vehicles and the monorail were al-electrical and whisper-quiet. As such the most noise came from mammals speaking, walking and doing all the things that made a city.
This was The New Town.
As Judy looked up to see a monorail-car passing above her as it hung suspended under the specialized rail, she could not help feeling her eyes moisten. This part of Zootopia had been razed almost to the ground during the terrorist attacks and had been rebuilt to its current form as the brainchild of the ruling mayor of the day, Nicholas Piberius WildeHopps.
The Grand Hero of Zootopia felt a single tear run down her cheek as the never forgotten pain of losing her mate stabbed through her once more, however the thought of him in this place brought up another, far more cheerful, memory.
Suddenly our dear rabbit has to cover her face with her paws to hold back her laughter, shoulders quivering in helpless mirth.
Flashback, half a century earlier:
"Nick, I´m home!"
SLAM!
"In here, Carrots! Come look at this!"
Having properly presented her return from yet another day in precinct one and kicking the door to their home shut behind her, Chief WildeHopps follows her mates exited voice through the mayoral residence to his home office.
"I´m here Nick, now what got you in such high spirits?"
Her beloved old fox was standing in the middle of the room surrounded by a number of large covered, freestanding picture frames. His tail was wagging rapidly with excited happiness and had he been a rabbit Judy was convinced he´d be binkying right now. She found it amazing how little the years had left their mark on him, if he were to hide the grey fur on his muzzle with some fur-dye he would probably be believed if he claimed to be twenty-five.
'Nah, that left eye of his would give him away. There isn´t a mammal in Zootopia who doesn´t know their mayor from that!'
Nicks left eye was not so much an eye as a small camera mounted in his skull, miraculously the only cybernetic the fox had needed in spite of a long, dangerous police career. It had taken him months to teach himself to see out of it, eyes were just hard that way. It was a feature of his face that had actually served him well in his campaign for mayor, his appearance instantly recognisable with his one green natural eye and one artificial, red-glowing one. The younger generation loved it, he was clearly the coolest mayor ever. (The red light was not a strictly necessary function, no matter how much the fox insisted it was so, but rather just an optional extra for appearance sake. His wife had rolled her eyes hard when she learned about that.)
"The plans for rebuilding the part of Zootopia that were lost in the fire are finalized at last! These here… " The fox places his paw on the covering on one of the stands… "…are an artist's rendition of how it´ll look. Voilá!" So saying, he yanks the covering off in a classic magician´s reveal.
"So, what do you think?"
Under her fox´s expectant watch the doe takes a close gander of the now visible street view. It depicts two rows of buildings with strange hanging railcars in two lines between them. The houses are in seemingly random shades of pastel colours and shaped in smooth curves and organic lines. It seems like a very friendly place, nice and soft and so very, very…
The rabbit tilts her head like a curious canine, or perhaps rather a vulpine. So many years married to a fox has left its mark.
…familiar.
'Okay, what's up with this feeling of déjà vu, its not like I´ve ever seen something like thi…'
Suddenly her eyes snaps open, her mouth forming an 'O', and then…
"Snrrk… hehe… pffft… hehehhahahahHAHAHAHAHHAAAHAHHAHHHHAAHAHAAAHHAHAHHHHAA!"
…she is overcome with such hilarity that she ends up performing a good old fashioned ROFL.
Nick is understandably shocked at first, but as his bunny seems intent on staying on the floor for the foreseeable future he soon switches to annoyance. Arms crossed, tail stiff and ears back. And of course, right foot tapping a staccato on the floor. So many years married to a rabbit has left its mark.
"What´s so funny, bunny? You know how long I´ve worked on this, and… will you quit laughing!"
"Haahaaheee.. sorry Nick…*snort* gimme a moment…hehehehe…okay I´m good now."
"…"
" …funnybunny *snort* "…hihehe.."
"…"
"Okay for real this time!"
Finally getting herself under nominal control and with a minimum of snickers Judy gets to her feet to face her less then happy husband.
"Explain, Carrots!"
Somewhat sheepishly, not really wanting to antagonize her mate further, Judy points to the far wall and activates a big wall-mounted screen with her built in wetware-systems.
"Let me show you, ´kay?"
With a mere thought, she connects to the houses Wi-fi and performs a picture search. Barely a second later the screen lights up with the pic she wants.
The fox´s eyes snaps open, his mouth forming an 'O', (many, MANY years of marriage) and then his snout rapidly tracks several times between his picture and the one Judy brought up. Same colour palette, same organic lines, same friendly feeling, less high-tech for sure, but…
Poor fox can only stare at his grinning mate in silent wonder.
"Congratulations, Mayor WildeHopps! Thanks to you, Zootopia will soon, finally, start catching up to us truly civilized mammals! BWAAAHAAAHAAAHAAA!"
…aaand she´s off again.
An exasperated fox looks down on his literary floored wife and then up on his big office screen with a tired sigh. He can´t help but read the terrible caption on the bottom again, just to make sure;
Nope, still reads: Zoogle street view: MAIN STREET, BUNNYBURROW.
Flashback end.
Softly cackling to herself, Judy continues on her way in far higher spirits.
'Of course, when he got asked on that talk show about the resemblance of New Town and Bunnyburrow he put his paws under his chin, gave them his best puppy eyes and implied it was all for me! Everyone went "Daaawww" and he climbed two percentage points in the popularity ratings! Damn tricky foxes!'
Thwip!
Ka-klunk!
…vrrrrrt.
"YAAHOOO!"
It's a good thing Judy's heart is a bit more durable than mere flesh and muscle, or the sudden shout could have given the distracted old doe problems. As it is, she leaps a good two foot straight off the street in shock.
'WHAT IN TARNATION…oh…'
Realizing she has reached the edge of New Town and is just passing a small school, she spots the source of her scare; As young mammals of all types are leaving for the day by whatever means, be it walking, cycling, skateboarding or other, some are using the unique for New Town transportation: the pogo-ped. The vehicle in itself was deceptively simple as it looks like little more than a futuristic hockey-stick with a large bulb on the top. It was never-the-less a combination of very advanced technologies that allowed it to work at all. First, you needed a device, like a smartphone, to connect to the pogo-ped and input your destination. Secondly, you required a pair of nano-fibre pants, so that when you pressed the angled part of the stick to the outside of your thigh it would adhere firmly and cause the pants to stiffen and form a seat. Thirdly, the shaft of the stick was just a tubular housing for a singular strand of hyper-elastic, artificial muscle fibre. Fourthly, the 'knob' was a compact wheel-assembly with a track-sensor. Lastly, and most importantly, you had to have access to New Towns special up-side-down monorail.
No matter how complicated it sounds, using it was kits-play.
1. Connect to the pogo-ped by Wi-fi and input your destination. You can have any number of pre-planned destinations saved in it like contacts in a phone.
2. Press the stick against your leg until it confirms a solid connection, or it will not activate.
3. Stand under the monorail and slowly sweep the stick past it. When the rail-sensor picks up that the stick is pointed directly at the rail the artificial muscle will automatically extend and launch the wheel-assembly up into it, locking in place. It will then immediately take off down the track as the muscle contracts, lifting its user up and away.
That up and away-part was always exhilarating, which naturally made the whole thing a hit with the youngsters. The fact that a kit hanging alone so far up was pretty much untouchable to any ne'er-do-wells that might assail them on their way to and from school, made the pogo-ped a most attractive gift from many a worried parent. The completely unobstructed view from so high up also made it a smash hit amongst the more adventurous tourists. The monorail was rapidly spreading across the rest of Zootopia and Judy herself could not wait to see the old ground-bound cars go the way of the dinosaur.
'Parking duty go bye-bye!'
Not that such a thing as parking-duty had worried her in many a year, it had been something that she had inflicted on others for the longest time, but still! Then again, she was partial to the pogo-ped herself, using it almost daily and it had nothing to do with her late husbands' role in its conception.
…almost nothing.
She had even convinced her cousin Hannah Leapsson to try when she had come to visit some years ago. It had not been easy, Hannah had been most reluctant, no matter how much Judy had insisted that "its easier then using a ski-lift" and "school-kits use 'em every day" or "it's perfectly safe", she had not been impressed. Only when an elderly armadillo gentle-mammal had come in for a perfect landing, placed his pogo-ped on his shoulder and tipped his hat to the two cousins before slowly walking off like a boss, had the visiting doe huffed a "fine!" and hefted her own stick against the rail.
The loud "WHEEEEEEE" the eighty-six-year-old doe had let out as she took off down the street had made it all worth it. Judy had teased her with that for the rest of her natural life.
All these old memories came to Judy as she stood and watched as the kids dispersed from the school.
One of the last mammals to leave was a little otter girl, pogo-ped on her right shoulder and happily chattering with a small mammal on her other shoulder. Curious, Judy used her advanced eyes to zoom in on the two and smiled. A small male vole was eagerly waving his little paws as he had a lively conversation with his otter friend/ride. It always warmed the bunny's heart to see friends of different species getting along like that. She followed them with her eyes as the otter lined up her pogo-ped and headed for the edge of New Town where the monorail passed across an old fashioned high-way.
The two had just left the ground when disaster struck. With a loud twang their upwards motion abruptly halted as most of the line hoisting them upwards suddenly snapped. They were still hanging about five feet above the street and now moving at full tilt towards heavy highway traffic. The little otter was screaming in terror while desperately jabbing the controls of her stick, to no avail. The poor vole could only hold on for dear life.
Judy was already accelerating past 40mph in hot pursuit.
'That's impossible! The lifting fibre is ONE fibre, it should be either whole or not! The safety systems should have shut down the pogo-ped the moment that fibre was compromised! Unless…DAMN CHEAP FOREIGN KNOCK-OFFS!'
The now furious rabbit reached top speed and allowed her cybernetics to do their thing. The world around her seemed to slow to a crawl as her thoughts and perception was overclocked to their limits, allowing her to assess the situation in a timely manner, pun intended. Her built in Wi-fi connected smoothly to traffic-control, letting her have complete awareness of every vehicle on the crossing highway. Her sensors calculated the speeds and positions of her, the kids and any vehicles on a collision course, and…
...and Judy WildeHopps knew despair.
She was already at top speed, there was nothing she could do! Before she could catch up, the kids would reach the highway, the lifting fibre would hit the edge of the plexiglas safety-roof above it and snap, tossing the kids across two lanes until that truck would intersect with their path at 88mph. She could see it in her mind, clear as day and calculated to within inches and milliseconds. She could do absolutely NOTHING.
NO.
Judy WildeHopps blurred.
The pavement under her feet rent and shattered as she retook her title as the worlds fastest mammal for about two seconds. Her legs visibly glowed as every component in them were stressed far passed their technical specs. Her core temperature reached decidedly unhealthy levels almost instantly as raw power was shunted through every moving part of her body. The moment she reached the end of New town she planted her feet for an instant and jumped. As she sored away from the half-foot-deep crater she left in the road behind her she watched the fibre break and fling the kids into highway traffic!
'Now for the tricky part!'
Angling herself just so, the old bunny reached out and wrapped herself around the little otter and the vole just as she attempted to body tackle them past their destined Death-By-Truck-Splat.
She was mostly successful.
The front corner of the truck smashed into her back as she had interposed herself between it and the little ones, sending them all spinning over the rest of the road to land in a heap on the other side. She managed to take that hit too.
Laying there, her arms wrapped around her precious ones, Judy looked up at an almost completely blue sky in a daze. For but a moment though, she had important things to do. Raising her ears and her head, she focused every sense and sensor she had on the little ones she had given everything to save.
'Two heartbeats, fast but strong, no blood, no broken bones, a few bumps and scrapes but nothing apparently serious. Amazing, a bit worse for wear but apart from the scare of a lifetime they'll be fine.'
The tick-tick-tick of cooling metal and the fact that her left arm suddenly gave up the ghost and fell to her side finally reminded her of her own condition.
'Okay lets see, system diagnostic, lets see… legs, total write off, so much scrap metal… power systems overloaded until fubar, only 12% functional and 0,037% energy left… sever injury to spine and left side of my back, thus no control of my left arm… and of course, the heatsinks were completely overloaded so all organic tissue left below my neck got cooked to medium rare. Even my supplementary logic processor got fried, so diagnostics can only run on backup wetware. Fantastic. My head is mostly OK and my right arm still works... mostly. Does this mean I´m done?'
As if to answer her, a notification popped up in front of her mind's eye.
"ALERT! ALERT! ALERT! Total systems shut down in 78 seconds! ALERT!"
The old doe lets herself relax as a small smile graces her lips.
'Yeah, okay. I´m done.'
"Are you okay, ma'am?"
Opening her eyes, Judy looks up into the face of a young otter and her little vole friend, still perched on her shoulder. The thought that they are alive because of her, even if she has to pay with her own life, fills her with satisfaction.
"No, little ones, I´m afraid I´m really not. But that's okay, I´m way past my warranty anyway."
As she speaks, she notices that quite a few other mammals have gathered around them, but completely contrary to what is normal in a situation like this they are silent and keeping at a respectful distance.
'What's up with that? It´s the opposite to what I´ve seen mammals do at the place of an incident, ever. Bah, don´t look a horse in the mouth when he´s giving you a gift, an all that.'
The girl is not happy with this, however. "But, aren´t you the Grand hero of Zootopia? You can´t just die! Not for us!" Her little vole friend says nothing but nods rapidly.
Realising her time is almost up, Judy decides to set this straight right now.
"Now you listen to me and you listen good, for I´m not long for this world. I am a very, very old rabbit, I´m tired and worn and almost all my friends and family are long gone. Above all my husband left me almost half a century ago and I miss him most of all. As for me not dying for you? My life, my choice. Besides, two younglings for the price of an ancient cyborg like me? Meh. It's a steal. Now, promise me you two are gonna live your lives to the best of your abilities, be the best you can be and not cry too much for me, then I can leave this world in peace." Steely eyed, she raises her fist. "Promise?"
Hesitantly, the otter slowly puts her paws on Judy's. "I… I promise." Then, as if Judy's determination had seeped into her by quick osmosis, her eyes sharpen and her voice gains composure. "I promise!" The young vole suddenly scampers down the girls arm and places his tiny paws on top of Judy's fist also. His small black eyes showing nothing but determination, he speaks the first word Judy ever heard him say: "Promise!"
"Good." The rabbit lowers her arm and smiles one last time. "Now off with you, I´m going to my well-earned rest and my mate."
"ALERT! ALERT! ALERT! Total systems shut down imminent! ALERT!"
'Finally.'
The tired old bunny reaches her paw towards the blue sky.
"I´m coming, Nick!"
-RK-
There were many cameras on site to record the last moments of Judy WildeHopps that day, they recorded her every word and her dying breath. In doing so, they created a great mystery and added to the legend of the Grand Hero of Zootopia. For you see, at the moment of her death, every mammal present staggered away from her, some shouted in surprise and many raised their paws to cover their eyes. Strangely, no camera captured anything other unusual, no sound or light of any kind.
Everyone who were present, however, would swear to their dying day that at the moment of her passing Judy WildeHopps lit up in an intense golden light for an instance, before it shot straight up into the heavens with a sound that could only be felt in your spine.
-RK-
This is the end of the first chapter of Rabbit Karma.
It´s a long, rambling infodump of a chapter but it had to be done for the setup.
Next chapter is going to be much shorter whenever I get around to it.
But Judy just died, you say?
Next chapter: The afterlife!