Chapter 2 - An Old-New World

A/N:

It was not until a few days ago that I've realized how our fandom decreased in number of members, and that's really sad. Sure, we are still active on some websites like Tumblr or here, ff, but that's simply not it. So I'll be dropping Deviantart, I never got any response from there anyway. Also, once again, I would like to thank everyone who has read my work and who are still (hopefully) reading it, especially who commented. Thank you, you mean the world for me. And if you didn't please do, say "have a nice day" or "it was good/boring/(insert adjective here)" just let me know you're there. I know, there were countless fics I've read through past years and didn't leave any kind of feedback because I thought it, or my opinion didn't matter. It matters!

I know I needed a small eternity to bring this chapter, bloody three months, and I'm sorry for that. I'm also sorry I must announce that the second update won't be before June - I'm studying for entrance exams for university and that's of the highest priority. Once it's settled down though, I'll try to have the fastest updates I've ever had and finish the whole fic this year. Twilight has around 10 chapters (two down, woohoo), and (try to guess the name of the second part) Night would have around 5. Can't wait to get to that. I'll try to have smaller chapters so they don't bore both me and you, plus, it would be faster.

Alright, I'm almost done with this long note, but I have one last comment, or more a remark to myself. You may have noticed my main characters are male and female of close age. But the story isn't tagged romance for a reason. Isn't that what everyone criticizes Zootopia about? "Why does every male-female relationship have to be romantic, blah blah?" So no, my main characters aren't going to be together.

(Is it just me or my writing improves drastically when there's dialogue?)

Lastly, disclaimer statement. I don't own Zootopia (obviously, I wouldn't be here if I did) nor do I own any concepts related to it, both old and new, they are all property of Disney. What I do claim are words below and OC's for whose inspiration I owe to some of my friends.

Then, on to it!

Oh well, a thought crossed his mind when he saw the light coming for him, ominous, swallowing everything in his sight. Happy birthday Will.

The dazzling light disappeared the same way it had come: out of nowhere and all at once, like after a press of an invisible switch. Similar to some strange, unnatural phenomenon which it indeed was, it distorted surrounding reality for the briefest of moments before leaving it alone, trembling but unmoving. Although unchanged, the reality had some novelties: two beings abandoned on the ground, left gasping for air.

The boy with wolf's face fell down to his knees and stayed that way, his back bent forward, staring in the semi-darkness in front of himself with eyes wide opened. There was a certain sense of freedom and, more importantly, relief that overwhelmed his shocked mind so the first sensation he could grasp a while later was some kind of dry and harsh, a bit artificial smell coming from all around him that reminded of lavender. Like he was on a lavender meadow. That it wasn't a meadow, he could tell once he was able to perceive things correctly. It was another room, in complete silence.

Then he noticed the second and far more important thing to him at that time, one that made him huddle and seek for something, anything he could use as a cover. He was naked. And logic and the orangish blur he saw with the corner of his eye told him his co-traveler was too. So before a light, almost undistinguishable blush could creep to his face he jumped in the side and towards the first object he could find, one he could only describe as moving and screeching. She had, apparently, done the same thing he had but to another direction so they both found themselves huddled behind short objects a few feet away from one another.

The boy who concealed his name in his thoughts finally had some time to look around the place he was at, without new surprises. Will now had no trouble recognizing the smell surrounding him - it was a smell of cloth conditioner and it was coming from all around the room because... he was in a cloth store. An empty one, though. Once he could tell things apart in the low light, he saw the shelves, racks, prices... Outside could have been either late afternoon or early morning: he could tell by the lazy sun rays on the floor and the overall brightness in the room. The air was light, sheer, and the only thing disturbing almost perfect silence was a wall clock ticking somewhere.

He found himself quite disappointed with the place he had traveled to, although he wasn't sure himself what he'd expected. But he decided to use the time and the opportunity he was given. So he started moving around, keeping his ears low, his back bent a bit, trying to muffle his footsteps even though he knew he stood no chance of going unnoticed in a silent room to ears of a bunny. He couldn't escape the feeling of exposure that followed him, not even when he had a pair of dark jeans and a sweatshirt on, so he started searching for a trench coat that, proving useful multiple times, was absolutely necessary. To his surprise, the store seemed to specialize in wearings for smaller mammals, but from what he knew, distribution on species was not characteristic of the time he was supposed to be in, even though the style of clothes alluded to some past time. That being said, he needed some time to find what he was looking for.

But eventually, he had been putting his paws in sleeves of his long, dark trench coat, when he heard faint steps from behind. Startled for a moment, he reached for his head. Good, he thought, he had the hood on.

One uncertain "uhm" came from behind. It was, however, so silent he just kept buttoning his coat, pretending he heard nothing.

"Mister?" another sound/word, this time louder. His plan to keep pretending he hadn't heard her was in vain when he snorted and gave himself away. He turned his head her way, what must've encouraged her to keep talking, although, he didn't miss slight tremble in her voice.

"Are you done?" she asked.

Respectful or timid, he wondered.

Fearful.

"You talk?" he chose to respond to her question with one of his own while turning, in what he could only hope was an elegant, movie-like 180 degrees turn. The bunny stepped back a little as he did so. And he found in front of himself one very young looking, but probably older than she seemed, orangish-cream colored bunny, he couldn't tell clearly from the darkness in which neither normal nor night sight worked. She had chosen, among so many wearings for small mammals, some straight pants one or two sizes bigger for her and a light shirt.

"I do..." she said after a few long moments that she spent throwing sporadic but intense glances at his paws. A frown had appeared on her face before it had been replaced by a look of genuine confusion. "I talked not so long ago... You heard me."

"No, that's not what... "

"Alright then," he was the first to break the uncomfortable, prolonged silence, his voice sharper from somewhat hurt pride. "Since you do talk, you can explain some things. Why didn't your... rabbit shepherd warn us on this?" He finished with gesturing around himself.

"My who?"

"Your friend." The answer didn't yet come, but that persistent puzzled look on her face told him he had to repeat his question. "Why couldn't she warn us on this?"

"On what?"

"For God's sake, we came without a stitch on!" he didn't have the intention to raise his voice but she apparently had her ways to annoy him.

Finally, understanding seemed to dawn on her face.

"She did, she said that inanimate things didn't travel."

"How does one pay attention to that?"

She raised her shoulders slowly without saying anything.

"So, who are you?" she asked, breaking the silence that settled once again, and his face got a sullen expression.

He put the leather gloves on, ones he had taken from the shelf by the cash register, stopping that way her unpleasant goggling. He concluded that she had been afraid of his paws, or his guns that he didn't know what had happened to, which was put on now a quite long list of the things that were bugging him. Afraid, or in visible distress, it was obvious to him. With a note of barely visible sorrow he noted for himself. She wasn't different from any other prey he had met his whole life: afraid of predators, and disgusted by differences.

"No one," he answered in low voice.

Forestalling her answer and more questions, if she had any, and if they weren't to fall in another silence, a sound came from the storefront, one that set an alarm in his mind the moment it reached his ears.

A pair of ears were up and two heads turned towards the front doors, as the sound changed from screeching to clicking, and the two bodies moved.

Will dashed through the store, a sound of panicked breathing behind him.

There had to be another way out.

With fast glances, he looked around, but all he saw was the sea of clothes and far walls. Finally, he found the light tray on the floor and his gaze followed it towards a high-positioned window, openable only from the inside.

"Hey, there's someone inside!"

But all they could spot was a blur of a mammal disappearing on the window frame.

"What are you waiting for? Run!" He shouted when he hit the ground.

They stopped when she couldn't run anymore, and after one last glance over his shoulder to make sure no one was running behind, Will decided he could use a break too. Nobody seemed to be after them at all, but nevertheless, he didn't want to stop until they entered the crowd that offered a certain feeling of safety.

They had entered an indeed unusual, but also very uniform crowd. Because what he had thought were just a few strange coincidences became a pattern - all mammals they were passing by were the same species. And now, when he raised his eyes from the ground, it met a crowd of bunnies.

It felt to him as if the time stopped. What set an alarm in his mind - a sight of so many members of the same species on one place like he was used to seeing before, soon became a soothing feeling when he saw the ambiance and understood. He was in Bunny Burrows. There could be no mistake in the rustic houses, narrow streets, and the cheerful murmur of its rabbit inhabitants in such early morning. Everything around him had an old-fashioned feel, to him like a black and white movie, or it was just been the village that lacked technology he had been used to. Even, on that matter, if not for cell phones here and there, and if he didn't know better, he would think he strayed to some older time.

"We evaded." Her statement interrupted his train of thoughts, yet he stared through his bunny companion for a few moments before he understood what she had said.

"We ran away," he answered finally, stressing ran away on purpose, and started to walk in some kind of promenade, or, as he noted later, open-air market.

"Can you at least share with me your name?" she asked when she caught up with him, politely.

"No, it's not important. Alright? Stop sticking your nose where it shouldn't be," he answered in a sharp tone, giving her an intense glare that made her stop in the place.

"I just wanted..." she started again, catching up with him again, but abandoned her thought midair. "If we're going to be together, we should get to know each other," she said like drawing a conclusion, in a breathy voice that sounded like she was having trouble with pace when she hadn't even recovered from the lastest running tour.

But he wasn't fully listening to her again; he was occupied with watching bunnies who chatted, laughed and seemed to truly enjoy the company of sheep, pigs or even smaller predators here and there. It was so much of an odd sight to him, confusing to such an extent he temporarily forgot about the topic he had been talking about.

"If we're going to be together..." He repeated mechanically, mumbling for himself without putting his mind to it. The moment he realized the irritation, even bits of fear started to creep on his face. His attention wasn't wandering anymore. "No, no, no. Not happening."

I don't want to know you.

"I'm saying, we won't be together. Goodbye."

The market was dense with mammals, too dense for his liking. But there was no way he could have avoided it since he wasn't familiar with the town he found himself in. So he went on through it. He walked feeling more and more like intoxicated by the smells, the cacophony, less and less taking care not to run into something or someone. It was too much noise, too much... He just wanted to get out of it. Finally, the end was discerning. He sped up.

"Wait!" The bunny of soft orange fur shouted while doing a good job of keeping up even though she needed to almost run. "Tell me why? Why are you going, what's wrong?"

"You're wrong. Alright give me reasons me why I should stay," he demanded in an argumentative tone, but still attempting to keep himself in check.

"Because it's not right, to just leave," she said in a shrill voice, rather seriously looking although he thought for a moment she was joking. "After everything we've been through!"

"Everything we've been through..." He laughed bitterly once he understood she wasn't joking, looking in the side. "Everything we've been through? You don't happen to mean back then, in that shop. That's your everything? Next time it'll be just you and those wooden legs of yours"

"But we've come here to help the past remain the same!"

"Not in the contract I signed," he answered thoughtfully, and before she could ask what contract, as he thought she might do, added. "It said come, do it asap, done. Is that all?"

They were finally out of the sea of bunnies, came across a road that obstructed their way.

"But Yami sa-"

"Oh, spare me. Forget right and wrong for a second and ask yourself: can you take care of yourself for there is no one who is going to do that for you? Just, can you escape, flee, elude, call it whatever you want, so... to get away, and survive.

But can you, take care of yourself? - it could have just been his mind, he wasn't sure he saw her lips moving. It started him, but for a moment only.

"You know nothing, you don't even talk normally. Those ears seem to be just cute and not a tiny useful..."

Then he looked in her face to see what reaction he caused, but there was none -no protest, not even a hint of annoyance or offense which would be normal from a rabbit.

"I'm glad I'd be hundreds of miles away from you."

One moment, there were the two of them, the market in the back, the road in the front. The next moment he was gone.

He thought he could see from the truck he used as a temporary transportation vehicle the bunny in the crowd turning in all directions, a perplexed look on her face.

"Not right," he thought he heard her saying.

Nothing's fair.

Finding out that the fastest way to Zootopia was by Zootopia Express, after leaving the truck, Will headed through rabbits' village towards Bunny-Burrow Train Station, which was supposed to be a ten minutes walk through fields surrounding the town.

But he had lost so much time in a uniform village that must have looked like a labyrinth to everyone except to its rabbit inhabitants, that his journey has been multiple times longer than he thought would be. It had been frustrating at best because he wanted to get to Zootopia as fast as he could. But once on the road that, he had been sure, led towards the station, he calmed and managed to think. He passed fields in all their beauty - through greenness in the morning sun, fresh air, an earthy smell, yet he paid no intention to those things, his mind was already in Zootopia.

He didn't know what he would do once he arrived there. He was aware he knew very little about everything, and he was alone, but that was his choice. About leaving the bunny a few dozens of minutes ago he didn't think a lot; to him, it was over, done. He had his reasons for dumping her: to him she was not just a burden as he tried to convince her, but she also wanted to be a part of something that was awfully personal. Something he needed to do alone. Besides, she was in the den of rabbits, where else would be a better place to start over? That's why they were sent here and not in Zootopia, after all, he concluded peacefully.

Finally stepping through the double doors of the train station building shaped in a big, fat bunny to the pavement by the railroad, he took in the whole station with one glance. It was a rather small station compared to the number of residents of the town, with pinkish hall decorated with curved ornaments and eaves supported by carrot-shaped pillars. Aside from one large group of bunnies gathered together, the station was mainly empty, even though, according to the timetable, the train was supposed to pull in every minute. He had checked the time and date and was now tranquil - it said April 2016.

Will glanced at the rabbit assembly once, and finding them everything but interesting for the town he was in, let his mind and gaze wander again. That was, until a sudden, bright flash drew his attention back on them, or on the subgroup that was a few steps away from the rest. He watched with new interest the three figures who backed away from the mentioned flare.

He watched until his legs cut off and his normally grey face paled in color. Weak in his knees but at the same time feeling a rush of excitement in his chest he was now staring with his mouth opened, unable to move. Finally, after a few seconds he moved, or better stuttered backward without taking his eyes off of the group, and, hitting the rabbit-shaped pillar with his back, hid behind it.

Will didn't feel like trusting his eyes at that and dozens of moments later, but they weren't betraying him. Neither was his mind that found a familiar face in the group, what he was never expecting to happen. He started brainstorming everything he knew, and found the year familiar - 2016, when some of the most important things happened. He should have known. He was still trying to convince himself it was some sort of a mistake, but he knew there wasn't. There could be no mistake in that slender figure, so different than in other bunnies, bright grey fur and vibrant eyes or energetic moves. Judith... Judith Wilde, or as he remembered later, at that time still Hopps.

His eyes followed her every move, she was putting her paw in a bag, took out a small pink something.

"Terrific, everyone wins!"

The train entered the station.

"You didn't let me say anything!"

If he didn't jump out of his skin or died of a heart attack that very moment, he was sure he wouldn't ever. When he looked down he realized that the one calling out to him was no one else but an orange-furred bunny, the doe he said farewell to and hoped to never meet again.

"Just where did you come from? How did you find me?" he asked when he found his voice, and realizing he was sort of hugging a giant carrot pillar, let go of it, shamefacedly. Tables turned, his voice was the one trembling now.

"I thought you implied you were going to Zootopia," she answered, looking as if she was on a verge to say something. "Besides, the first time we met in Zootopia."

"Yes, now what do you want?"

The train was in the station now, the first call to the passengers could be heard. Middle-sized doors were opened, but no one was coming out.

He was starting to panic.

"I've been thinking," the rabbit beside him wouldn't stop talking, at length, as if they had all the time in the world. "And what you said back then wasn't right and completely true. And you didn't let me say a word..."

Not now! He started finally moved from the pillar, turning around from the bunny and to the train. Then looking for the source of his earlier turmoil, and saw Judith hugging her parents, and hopping to the train. One more call to the passengers, last one. His steps turned fast. The doors were closing.

"It's not true that you don't need me."

Leaned to the closed doors, taking a deep breath of relief, Will heard a calm, familiar voice speaking again; Dana was beside him.

"It's not true you don't need me, because I know things you don't, for instance, where that... cat would come and when... he would come. On the other paw, I don't know what to do, and where to stay..." she hung her head.

"So you figured you could attach yourself to me in exchange for that information..." he finished easily, watching her now with full attention.

Smart, he thought, but wouldn't give her that out loud. He found himself quite surprised she managed to find him in the first place, and to even bring up a deal.

The option of letting her go was unimaginable now that he found out she had a piece of valuable information that could help him so much, but he had one last card yet to play. And he was, in all honesty, very interested to know what she would do.

"You thought it all out nicely, but you haven't thought of one thing. What if I grab your throat and make you spit it out this very moment," he said, cornering her and leaning in her personal space, best he could to intimidate her.

"I'll scream," she answered with a twitching nose under two wide eyes, clenched, looking as if she would indeed scream. "And you don't want that."

He followed her eyes and, turning around, looked at a few mammals behind his back. A pair of zebras in front and a few more mammals in the back immediately looked away from them and in side as he did so.

"Fine," with one fast move he was out of her personal space. "We have an agreement. You stay with me until the time comes, then I'm done with him and you're off my back for good."

"Alright."

"Without unnecessary questions," he added.

He didn't get to see her nodding because he moved away and headed towards an empty seat by the window, exhausted more than he was willing to show. It had been far too long day for him. And it was morning!

The impression from meeting the infamous Judy hadn't vanished yet, but the initial excitement he felt did, and he replaced it, let other emotion in its place, piece by piece. The hatred that was more common among mammals from his time.

What was he doing at the same time with her, he wondered. He had known that the year sounded familiar to him when he had heard it, but it never came to this. This meeting must've been a pure coincidence. The cat's wish to come to this time was also a coincidence, he concluded, convinced, because going into motives of his enemy was the last thing he wanted to do.

So he put in his now gloves paws his head that started aching, as he tried not to think about the presence of former, or better say yet-to-be hero of Zootopia with him on the train.