Summary: Zootopia part 2

Our teens battle paperwork, heartless, and poor communication skills

Officer Hopps let her team know she'd be gone for a moment, then radioed ahead letting an Officer Clawhauser know she was on the way. She drove them to Police Plaza and walked them inside.

"Hey Officer Hopps! Always a pleasure to see your c-" The cheetah caught himself and plowed on, "capable, adorable, capadorable face! What'd you need?"

She gave a shake of her head, but she was smiling. "I've got three 'capadorable' exterminators that I'd like to get weapons registration for. Class E, blades. I'd also like to get them hired as consultants on our shadow creatures cases. They know what they are and are here to take care of them. They're from Kiji so you might need a few extra forms. You three have your passports, right?" She turned to look at them.

Sora was rubbing the back of his neck sheepishly, Riku was looking up and to the left (clearly thinking). Kairi beat them both to a response, tucking her arms behind her back as she did so.

"We lost ours," she said, "during the trip. But we'd be happy to fill out whatever forms you need."

Sora nodded, embellishing, "Yeah, the heartless took them."

"Heartless?" Officer Hopps asked.

"That's what we call them," Sora explained.

Riku added, "That's what they are."

"Well, at least now we have a name," she replied, giving Clawhauser a sideways glance. He shrugged at her, then began digging for paperwork.

—

Several hours and a large order of take-out later, they were almost done with the paperwork. There was a lot of it, but they also continuously got interrupted as Clawhauser got distracted or as people came in to the precinct. They had heard every Gazelle song in existence (whether Riku liked it or not) and learned a fair bit about Zootopia in the process.

Kairi just hoped all their paperwork would check out, considering they weren't actually citizens of the country they were pretending to be from and had completely made up their identification numbers. Some more cleverly than others - Sora just did variations on the number 13 because "that was Roxas's number, so it's my number too" and Kairi included a few 8s, in honor of Lea.

Riku had nudged Sora, who was sitting cross-legged on top of the table they were at, and said in a quiet voice, "Do a 14 for Xion too."

"Oh, right!"

Kairi had looked up at the way Riku said it, and while he couldn't hide his eyes behind bangs in this world, his face was unreadable as ever as he bent over their forms. Eventually she went back to working on her own.

A little bit later, Riku was glancing over their identification forms and consulting contracts while Sora and Kairi finished their weapons registration paperwork. As they worked, another call came through dispatch. Clawhauser answered it, and out of the corner of her eye Kairi saw his tail go rigid, and slowly start to fluff out. She felt her own fur stiffen in response. The rotund cheetah turned to them.

"You might want to hurry up and finish those forms. Those weird shadow creatures are at the party."

They did hurry up and finish the forms, just in time too, as the officers Clawhauser contacted to provide back-up were just heading out the front doors.

"Wait," Clawhauser called to them, "Take these three with you. They're consultants for the ZPD - they know about the creatures." The wolf and rhino sized the three animals up, looked at Clawhauser, then at each other.

"C'mon," the rhino said brusquely. Riku, Sora, and Kairi didn't need to be told twice.

The ride to the club where the party was being held was quiet and fast, aside from occasional radio chatter. They passed the last stragglers of the protest, and then a few blocks later, people running in the opposite direction. The club was a brick building decorated with neon in the windows and a mural sweeping up the front around the door. Several cop cars were already there, and the teens saw Officer Hopps escorting a group of animals from the scene. They also saw heartless in the street - some Neoshadows and two Satyrs. Shadows crawled out the door and some of the windows, while a platoon of Aerial Knockers was striking at the glass. There were also some kangaroo-like emblem heartless that they had never seen before. (Sora later dubbed them "Heartless Hoppers" which got shortened to "Hoppers" almost immediately.) They were swarming around a single massive heartless moving down the street towards the club. It resembled an elephant in principle, with large ears and golden tusks, but it had only one glowing eye in the center of its face. It walked on two thick legs, with four arms and two pairs of wings sprouting from its torso. Though it was approaching them quickly, its limbs looked slow, as if it was moving underwater.

The car barely had a chance to park before Sora and Riku were tumbling out of it, Kairi at their heels. ZPD officers were everywhere, swinging at heartless with whatever was at hand. A few had been issued police batons which were proving marginally more effective. For the most part, though, the heartless ignored them.

The three teens ran up, keyblades drawn, and there was a noticeable shift in the dark creatures. Most of them immediately turned to hone in on the heroes of light, though a few remained fixated on the building. From the street, Riku pulled in a few of the more stubborn Aerial Knockers in with a magnera spell, finishing them off with a burst of lightning. Sora darted in, going for the Shadows still plaguing the building, but he was quickly forced to skid to a halt. A pair of Shadows stood in front of him, easily as tall as he was. One swiped its claws dangerously close to his face, forcing him back a step, but with two quick hits from the Kingdom Key it was done for. He cut through the other Shadow with equal ease, then sprinted onward.

Meanwhile, Kairi was standing on the edge of the battle. Having cleared a space around herself, she was sizing up the remaining heartless in the sky. Pointing Destiny's Embrace upwards, she called out a spell that sent pillars of light piercing through the remaining Aerial Knockers. Instantly, they disintegrated. Nodding to herself in a satisfied way, she held her keyblade in front of her, parallel with her body, and began to whisper another spell. The end of her keyblade glowed white, and she began to run, slashing the tip of her keyblade down so that it dragged along the ground as she ran. A glowing white trail stayed where she had drawn it.

"Bring them in towards the center!" She called out. Riku made eye-contact with her and nodded, but she had a hard time finding Sora. His umber fur blended into the pavement in the dark, despite the streetlights and cop cars. Adding to the difficulty, he was bounding all over the place, moving through the heartless almost wildly. She only spotted him at all by following his voice as he called out, "You got it!" Still, he was pushing his way towards the giant elephantine heartless rather than herding in stragglers.

As Riku batted Neoshadows towards the street and dodged a running Satyr, he saw Sora dash around him. Though he was half of his normal height, Sora didn't seem to notice, going toe to toe with the Satyr Riku had just dodged. He brought his keyblade up just in time to catch the full impact of the Satyr's charge as it shoved him backwards several yards. Teeth bared, Sora forced the creature back. Continuing his momentum, he hacked forward with the Kingdom Key, leaving the Satyr no room to start running again. He finished it off with a blizzara spell.

Beating back another heartless trying to cross over Kairi's line, Riku took stock - Kairi was almost back to where her circle started, and the remaining heartless were squarely inside it, gathering loosely around the Cyclops in the center of the street. He turned and began carving his way towards the giant heartless, combining big swings of Braveheart with bursts of thunder and ice spells. Sora was also cutting his way through the melee, so Riku angled his path towards his friend.

Ears pulled back against his head, Sora ducked under a Hopper's swing. He'd been cut off by a group of them, all punching and kicking. Sora leapt high and smashed the Kingdom Key straight into one Hopper's face as Riku reached his side. Another punch, however, caught him in the ribs, sending him tumbling. He managed to get his feet under him before he landed, sliding sideways. Riku cut in between him and the Hoppers, forcing them backwards. He glanced back at Sora, who was glaring through the surrounding heartless at the giant one.

Dropping to one knee, Riku called, "Sora!" That was all he had to say. With a grin, Sora raced over, running up Riku's back and jumping off of his shoulders, bringing his keyblade down on one of Hopper's heads. It vanished, but before Sora even landed, he spun himself around, cutting deep into the final Hopper's side. Riku was right behind him, finishing it with two swift swipes.

As they finished the Hoppers off, Kairi reached where she had started, completing the circle. The line flared brightly, then shot upwards as a clear dome encircled the heartless in the middle of the street. Outside of the glowing protective barrier, ZPD officers and by-standers safely watched the swarm of heartless and the three animals fighting them. Kairi noticed in particular that Officer Hopps had her hands on it, testing if she could get in and help. She couldn't, unfortunately, but it wasn't lost on Kairi that she was trying. She remembered all too well how it felt to be on the other side of that fence.

But the heartless didn't leave much time for reminiscing. A Satyr charged straight at her, barely giving Kairi time to put up her keyblade and block. She hissed a fire spell through her teeth, and the ensuing blast shot the heartless back a few paces. Kairi pressed her advantage, finishing it off with a brutal stab in the stomach.

Meanwhile, Sora was still clambering around the field, fighting his way towards the Cyclops heartless in the center. Neoshadows and Hoppers kept blocking his path, and he was getting more and more reckless as he tried to break through them. Again and again, he just barely missed getting hit, sometimes blocking their swings, but mostly just rolling or twisting out of the way at the last second. Riku kept pace, covering his back as the reckless rabbit darted through the fray. Then Sora reached the Cyclops. It towered over him, more than four times his size, its tusks thicker than Sora's entire body. He didn't even hesitate. With a cry, he jumped, keyblade a swishing blur as he brought it down over and over again on the shoulders and chest of the elephantine heartless. It swung one tree-trunk sized arm, then the other at the rabbit practically defying gravity in front of it. Sora twisted out of the way, only to be swatted by a wing and sent sprawling, flying past Riku, who reached out for him anyway.

From across the field, Kairi heard Sora bellow and followed the sound to find him. She looked up just in time to see him get swatted past Riku by the Cyclops's wing. She ran, knocking a Neoshadow out of her way, but she reached Sora just a beat too late. Her arms closed on air as he bounced off of her, and the force bowled her over. They both landed hard, rolling, and were instantly beset by Neoshadows and one of the last two Hoppers. Riku rushed over, swatting away a Neoshadow seconds before it latched onto Kairi. He'd no sooner done that than Sora was back on his feet, offering her a paw up.

"You ok, Kairi?" he asked. Nodding, she reached up, taking his paw. His hand was barely bigger than her thumb here, she noticed, but he still put forth the effort to help her stand up. She barely reached her feet before she had to block a Hopper's punch. Sora finished it off, while Riku got a Neoshadow at their back.

"I'm ok," she confirmed. "Are you?"

"Of course!" He flashed an almost cheeky grin at her before darting off so quickly it was like he'd disappeared. Kairi shot a glance at Riku, whose eyebrows were furrowed as he watched Sora take off. Feeling her gaze, he looked back at Kairi.

"We should follow him," she said, frowning. Riku nodded, and they both took off after the heedless rabbit.

As they ran, the elephant heartless in the center raised its wings, folding one pair of arms above its head and the other in front of its chest. Plunging its trunk into the ground, it formed a pool of darkness around its feet. Neoshadows came staggering out of it, replacing the numbers it had lost to the three keyblade wielders.

Riku and Kairi skidded to a stop at the edge of the pool, mobbed by Neoshadows. Reflexively, they moved to fight back to back. "Know any fire spells?" Kairi called out over the fight.

Riku scoffed, but he was grinning. "I know a few. What did you have in mind?"

"Shoot a firaga spell upwards!"

He nodded, then pointed Braveheart towards the sky. Kairi did the same with Destiny's Embrace. Together they shouted, and two large fireballs hurled upwards from the tips of their keyblades, merging at the top of the barrier. Immediately, Kairi, leapt up, striking the fireball and causing it to splinter into a rain of fiery projectiles. These cleared out swaths of the smaller heartless and thundered down on the Cyclops's head. As Kairi landed, they heard Sora cheer, and spotted him on the opposite side of the dark pool.

Eyes steely, Riku dove forward, blasting heartless with spells and banishing them with practiced thrusts of his keyblade. Kairi covered his back, the inky darkness disintegrating under her feet, then filling back in behind her. Sora charged towards them from the other side.

As they met in the middle, all three teens brought their full power against the Cyclops. Its eight limbs kept them busy, protecting the trunk which was still pumping darkness into the ground. It was hard to get many hits in as they ducked, wove, and jumped around its flailing arms and wings, constantly fending off attacks from the Neoshadows being summoned around them. After a few fruitless moments, Sora got an idea.

"Kairi, throw me!" he called, running up to her. She gave him a startled look, then sized up the heartless and nodded. Grabbing his left hand and his right wrist, she spun, lifting Sora off the ground and letting go to hurl him at the Cyclops. Unfortunately, she wasn't quite used to how much power her lion limbs gave her, and Sora went sailing right past their intended target, skidding to a stop but keeping his feet.

"Sorry!" she called. Sora waved, then darted back in. He ducked under a thrashing wing, the tips of its primary feathers brushing the spiky fur on his head. Catching a blow from the heartless's second left arm on his keyblade, he was practically shoved into a Neoshadow behind him. Spinning, he sliced it in two, then continued the motion to get close to the Cyclops's side once more. With a wild cry, Sora threw himself at the massive heartless, stabbing his keyblade into its hip. He twisted, kicking off of the Cyclops's side to pull the Kingdom Key back out, then spun to try to hit the creature again. But its upper arm swatted him down, and he landed on his side in the pool of darkness. He didn't stay down long though, hopping up and rolling out of the way as the Cyclops tried to step on him.

While Sora fought his way back around to the front, Riku and Kairi were dealing with the Cyclops's other limbs as they tried to get to its trunk. Side by side, they parried and blocked, fending off swipes, slaps, and punches while also taking out the Neoshadows swarming around them. Working together they were unscathed, but they weren't making much headway and they couldn't keep it up forever.

"Think you have another big spell in you?" Riku asked over his shoulder.

Kairi nodded, swatting down a heartless with a grunt. "Just one, so we'd better make it good."

"If you shoot light at that thing, I can take the shadows it makes and hold it off," he suggested. She nodded, and started summoning her last drops of magic- only to see Sora get slammed into the ground by the Cyclops's fist.

"Sora!" Kairi yelped, sprinting forward. Riku turned, quickly out-pacing her as they raced towards their friend. The Cyclops picked Sora up, raising its fist to slam him down again. Riku jumped, stabbing his keyblade into its wrist. The heartless howled in pain, stopping its swing. Riku pulled himself up onto its arm, yanking Braveheart out. As he did, Sora wriggled his arms out of the heartless's grasp. Riku scrambled to reach Sora as the heartless began bringing another arm down to swat them.

"Stopra!" Kairi shouted, keyblade pointed straight ahead. The Cyclops froze, allowing Riku to reach Sora and pull him out. They jumped safely down, landing in front of Kairi.

"Curaga," Riku cast, keyblade pointing to Sora, then said, "We're finishing this." His friends nodded, leaning into their fighting stances.

"I'll go for the eye. You two keep it distracted," Sora stated. He didn't give them time to respond before dashing off. Riku swore under his breath before darting after him, Kairi on their heels. As they dashed forward, the stopra spell wore off and the Cyclops began moving again.

Using his height to his advantage, Sora dodged around the massive creature's hands, ears pinned back against his head. He got in too close too quickly for Riku and Kairi to follow, as both of them were forced to block swipes of the Cyclops's arms. Practically snarling, Sora leapt up, aiming to jump off of its stomach to get closer to its face. But the Cyclops bent, scything at him with a thick golden tusk. Sora yelped, narrowly twisting away and landing at the creature's feet. Riku pushed through, right behind him. Kairi was still fending off both of the heartless's right hands. All out of magic and quickly running out of strength, she staggered a little as she held up Destiny's Embrace for block after block.

Meanwhile, the boys were harrying the Cyclops, batting at its trunk with all their might. Half of its arms busy with Kairi, and with its head tethered to the ground, it had a harder time fending off the manic rabbit and determined wolf. Finally, it lifted its trunk, swatting at Riku. Sora jumped in front of him, keyblade up, and caught the blow just in time. Not that Riku had needed it - he already had Braveheart up and at the ready. Sora's leap forced him backwards, and he had barely gotten balanced again when Sora jumped up once more, lunging at the heartless's stomach.

Kairi had managed to push her way through the arms, and she dashed to Riku's side as Sora jumped again. Back to back, she and Riku fought off the last few Neoshadows while the darkness faded from under their feet. Meanwhile, Sora never landed his hit, as the Cyclops swung its trunk at him. He dodged, flipping in the air and landing a short distance from his friends.

"Sora!" Riku called, "Together!"

"Right!" Sora yelled back. He rushed over, and Riku started running to meet him. When they reached each other, Sora sprang into the air, expecting Riku to boost him up. That was not what Riku had planned - he shouted out a spell, thinking Sora would add to it. Instead, a burst of ice shot straight past the Cyclops as Sora accidentally tackled Riku to the ground. The massive heartless brought a leg up to step on the two heroes tangled on the ground, but Kairi was ready. She dove forward, slamming her full weight into the heartless's gut, leading with her elbow. The creature stumbled, staggering backwards and nearly falling.

The force of their collision sent Kairi tripping backwards, straight into Riku as he stood up. He caught her with his free hand. Growling, Kairi resumed a fighting stance. She and Sora both charged forward at the same time, and with a yell brought their blades down to slash at the Cyclops. Sora's blade caught the creature in the knees, while Kairi cut deep into its belly. Riku followed behind them, fending off arms with quick bursts of fire. Swing completed, Kairi turned, holding out her hand to Sora.

"Get ready to jump!" she told him. He nodded, grabbing onto her wrist. She threw him straight up managing to get him clear just as the trunk swiped at her, catching her in the shoulder and throwing her to the ground.

"Kairi!" Sora and Riku called simultaneously. Riku fought his way over to her side, shielding her as she got up, but Sora was still in the air. Gritting his teeth, he angled his body, bringing the Kingdom Key down with all of his force into the Cyclops's eye. As the metal bore through, the heartless disintegrated - bursting into fragments of light that vanished as they swept upwards. A crystalline heart passed through the top of the barrier, rising to the sky before fading out of sight.

Sora landed by his friends, searching both of their faces with worried eyes and furrowed brows. Riku had a hand on Kairi's back, steadying her. Her arms hung limply at her sides, keyblade already dismissed. Now that the danger was passed, she murmured something under her breath, and the barrier slowly faded away.

Shifting his feet uneasily, Sora rubbed the back of his neck and grinned at his friends. "Well… at least we did it, right?" His smile fell as he took in Riku's expression - his gaze was narrow, mouth pressed into a thin line. His ears were flicked back, but not pinned to his head. He watched Sora steadily until Sora dropped his gaze to the cement.

"Sorry…" he trailed off, ears drooping. "Are you two alright?" he looked back up at them, glancing back and forth worriedly. Riku nodded.

"I'm ok," Kairi replied, "just tired."

"Just try to be more careful next time," Riku chided. The tail end of his words was drowned out as the animals that had been watching began to cheer. Officer Hopps ran up to the three teens, skidding to a stop in front of them.

"Wow, am I glad I ran into you three!" she enthused. "Are you all ok?"

"We're fine, thanks," Riku said warmly. Judy nodded, looking over the three of them.

"Still up for a little party? The protest organizers still want to celebrate, despite everything."

Riku looked between his two friends. "Yeah, a party would probably do us some good."