Episode 2 - All Creatures Great & Small
"So you're saying that you've already taken care of any problems we'd have here?" The jester asked the masked fox.
"Indeed, I have." Kyuemon said back to Yabaiba. Earlier, a few hours ago, Kyuemon's plans of causing chaos had been complicated by the sudden appearance of two Rangers, who he had sent a monster to deal with quickly.
"There were only two of them?" The biker monster questioned, fiddling with his gun, "Heh, this place really is lame."
"They probably didn't even put up a fight!" The machine man laughed, clinking his spear against the ground.
The four villains, minus Long, who still sat at the table, unphased, broke into laughter. This world was theirs, and with any real threat out of the way, it would be very simple to destroy it.
"Shame we didn't get to fight them, though." Sambash said to himself out loud.
"I wouldn't be so sure of that." Said a voice from the nearby entrance.
All four turned from their cheering, and looked towards the entrance. It was Enter, returned to his human-like form, slowly walking forward, carrying what looked like a USB stick.
"Monsieur Kyuemon, are you entirely sure that's what happened?" He spoke directly to him, giving a piercing stare.
"What do you mean?" He questioned.
"Your monster was destroyed by those two Rangers, idiot."
The room went dead, the only movement being for all of the villains, including the apathetic Long, to look at the fox, who had just previously been boasting his undenied victory.
"But-" The Yokai was interrupted by Enter, who's tone turned from dour to upbeat.
"The good news about this is," He said, holding up the USB stick, "I've figured out who our two mystery Rangers are."
Suddenly, Enter had pulled out a silver laptop, with a long cord attached to it, ending in some sort of strange chip. He placed the chip against the table, and inserted the USB stick into the computer.
Suddenly, with a brief electrical burst, the table's screen glowed green, and two holographic images appeared. One was a small rabbit-creature, while the other resembled a fox. Having seen the two Rangers from before, Kyuemon could tell that they were definitely the same.
"Introducing a Madame Judy Hopps, and a Monsieur Nick Wilde, two police officers at this city's police department." Enter announced.
There was silence.
"Your monster got beaten by a rabbit?" Yabaiba said, breaking the silence.
There was a quiet round of giggling from the jester, robot, and biker, which quickly stopped when Kyuemon gave them a threatening glare.
"Now, now, I wouldn't take something like this lightly." Enter assured them, "The fact that these two, on their own, managed to defeat a monster that previously took five Rangers to beat, says something about their power."
"What does that mean?" Sambash asked.
With a metallic clink, Yogostein stepped forward, "What it means is that these two are somehow as strong as a full Sentai." He explained, "Perhaps it's something to do with their transformation devices."
"Bong bong!" Enter yelled cheerfully, pointing towards the robot, "We're dealing with very powerful enemies here, I say we need to come up with a plan to defeat them, quickly."
With the sound of armor clanging, they all turned to Long, who was now standing up from his chair, the first activity he had done in hours.
"Get rid of them, so early?" He questioned, "That would be dreadfully droll."
"But they're endangering the plan!" Yogostein yelled back to him, "If we don't destroy them, we won't be able to return to our world!"
"I don't exactly care." Long stated, incredibly directly, "This world, and those two, are far more interesting than anything on our Earth." He finished, heading towards the exit.
"Where exactly are you going?" Questioned Enter.
"I'm gonna go cause some chaos, isn't it obvious?" He turned his head to almost face Enter, holding up the small statue he was gifted earlier. With that, Long disappeared in a burst of flames.
There was stunned silence from the entire room. The fact that Long, a creature who appeared completely apathetic to the current situation, had done anything was enough to surprise them.
"What's that guy's deal, anyway?" Questioned Sambash.
"Seems like he's got a real chip on his shoulder." Yabaiba added.
Enter took a deep, aggravated breath. Clearly his plan was going to have to wait.
A day later, and the two officers were still bothered by what had happened the previous day.
With time to actually think about it, they realized how ridiculous this situation was, and, in turn, how terrifying it appeared to be. If something like that happened again, would they have to keep fighting those monsters? How dangerous would this be, exactly?
The apartment had been quiet for the whole night, but the two had obviously been restless. During the night, Judy had heard Nick pacing around in his room, and the rabbit herself had barely gotten any sleep last night. She spent the whole night wondering if she really was some kind of murderer.
When the two got up, it wasn't any better, the morning breakfast was quiet for the most part, the two barely touching either of their meals.
"Nick, do you think that Kruger guy is really from another dimension?" The rabbit asked the fox.
"I'd say he's just a weirdo pulling our leg, but the stuff that happened yesterday was..." Nick tried to complete his answer.
The room fell quiet again, the two obviously uncomfortable with talking about it.
In a short time, the two were ready and off to work, the unease still not lifting as they left the apartment's parking lot.
"Alright, everyone," Bogo said to the room of police officers in front of him, which was only half full, as the events of the past day had resulted in a large chunk of them being hospitalized, "I want you all searching for these three..." He finished, pressing a button on the remote he held, causing three blurry pictures that Nick and Judy recognized to flash on the whiteboard.
One was of the strange fox creature that had created the monster from the day before, and the other two were pictures of them in those strange suits they had fought in.
"But," He continued, "We also have reports of multiple assaults from across the city, and the description of the attacker matches our runaway vigilantes, so, we'll have everyone split into groups, and search for him. I've already sent you all the eye-witness sketch of the animal."
Judy quickly pulled out her phone to check her e-mails, and sure enough there was an email with the sketch... which looked nothing like either of them, instead depicting some kind of tall, knight thing instead of them. She let out a small sigh of relief.
"So, groups..." Just as Bogo was about to finish his statement, there was a knock on the door, and suddenly Clawhauser was peeking through.
"Uh, sir..." The chubby cheetah said meekly.
"What is it, Clawhauser?" The Chief snorted, "We're in the middle of assignments."
"Um, the mayor's here. He wants to talk to you, and he's REALLY mad."
Bogo's eyes opened wide, slamming the checklist he was holding onto his podium, as he then stormed out of the room, nearly pushing Clawhauser out of the way.
Sure enough, in the middle of the lobby stood Mayor Lionheart, impatiently looking at his wristwatch, waiting for Bogo to show up.
"Hello, Mayor Lionheart," Bogo greeted the lion, "What a pleasure to see you here."
"Cut the politeness, Bogo, because I'm not giving any to you today." The lion snapped back at the buffalo, "What the hell happened yesterday!? How did an entire street get almost entirely destroyed!?"
"Well, you see-"
"I know what happened, Bogo." Lionheart cut him off, sticking one of his claws directly into his snout, "What I mean is, why didn't you do anything to stop those criminals!? Your entire force stood around watching as millions of dollars in property damage was caused!"
"How did you know about that?" Bogo questioned.
"Do you really expect something like that to not get coverage on the news?" Lionheart responded, as Bogo internally facepawed.
"Well, Mayor, I was just about to send my officers to search the city for the criminals, before you arrived." Bogo tried to state calmly, but with anger still apaprent in his voice.
"If you don't figure out where those two went by the end of the day, you'll be sorry."
The lion stomped his way out of the building, as Bogo took a deep breath and rubbed his temples. The week had just started and already he was reaching his limit.
He walked back into the roll call room, and finished giving out assignments to the officers, more annoyed than he had been when he exited.
Judy and Nick had been assigned to Tundra Town, where a few reports of the attacker had been reported. Obviously it wasn't them, but their job stated they still had to ask questions. But of course, all replies ended up being some variation of "No", as it had seemed all the witnesses had already been at the police station.
"Hey, Carrots," Nick asked as they rounded a corner, "Isn't it funny how the entire precinct's basically out looking for us?"
"I wouldn't exactly call that funny, Nick." She replied back, before almost tripping on a loose piece of ice.
"Careful there, cottontail." Nick said, helping his partner adjust herself.
"Y'know, this whole thing might go a lot smoother if we knew what this attacker's MO was." Nick continued.
"What?" Judy questioned.
"I mean, he's gotta have some sort of MO going on. Generally random assaults don't just happen."
"So, you mean like, there's specific people he's targeting?"
"Maybe!" The fox shrugged, :If we could meet the witnesses then maybe it would be easy to figure out."
"Wait, why didn't we get to see any of the witnesses?" Judy asked herself.
"Bogo seemed pretty rushed, maybe he didn't have to have witnesses see anyone." Nick guessed, rubbing his paws for warmth.
Judy quickly stopped in her tracks, and turned around quickly, nearly falling over, and running back the way they came.
"C'MON!" She yelled to her partner.
"Wh-" Nick was briefly confused, but the realization hit him quickly, "Oh yeah, duh, the witnesses!" He conked himself on the head, and quickly followed after his partner as she ran back to the car, which was parked a few blocks away.
They quickly returned to the station, and dashed to Clawhauser's desk in the middle of the lobby.
"Clawhauser!" Judy said, out of breath, "We need to speak to one of the witnesses in this assault case!"
"Sorry, Judy, but we kinda let them all go a few hours ago." The cheetah told her, disappointedly.
Judy's ears drooped, but Nick suddenly stepped in, "Do you at least have names for them?" He asked.
"Uh, yeah, I could give you a list-" The cheetah tried to say before being cut off by the energetic rabbit.
"No, no no! We just need one name!" She said.
"Uh, alrighty." The cheetah said nervously, as he searched up the witnesses on his desktop. He quickly jotted down something on a note card, and handed it to the bunny.
"Here's the name and address of one of the witnesses." Clawhouser explained.
"Thanks! We owe you one." Nick replied, grabbing the card from the rabbit.
The two rushed back out the door, waving bye to their friend as they left, and practically leaped into the cruiser.
"Alright, so we have..." Nick looked at the note card closely, "Victoria Lupina, at 150, Oxenfree Drive, Downtown."
"Alright, got it." Judy said as she stepped on the gas, speeding the cruiser away.
Oxenfree street wasn't exactly what you'd call a pretty street, it was clearly one of the shadier parts of downtown. As they drove past they noticed the buildings, most of which were in disrepair, and the streets were full of litter. Basically what you'd picture when you hear "slum".
They stopped in front of a dingy apartment, marked 150. It looked like a worse version of Judy's old apartment, the front windows broken, and graffiti on every side. It was a mess.
Stepping in to the building itself, it wasn't much better. Roaches swarmed around, there was dirt basically fused to the floorboards due to years of neglect, and the smell of cigarettes floated through the air, which were mostly coming from a surly old sheep sitting at the counter.
"Um, hello." Judy said to the smoking sheep, who was busy not paying attention to them, mostly playing on her phone.
"Whaddya want?" She rudely replied, still not looking up from her phone.
"We're looking for a Ms. Lupina? Is she in?" Hopps asked, politely.
"Room 314, third floor." She replied, still not looking at the officers.
"Uh, thanks."
The two officers walked to the elevator, only get interrupted.
"Elevator's broken." The sheep told them.
"Guess we just have to use the stairs." Nick said, shrugging.
It took a while, but the two eventually made it to the third floor, not after trying to avoid some cockroaches, and dealing with some very unpleasant smells. Again, the hallways were not very well kept, the worst thing of note being the unusual stains on the carpeting.
"Why would anyone want to live here?" Nick asked.
"It's probably really cheap." Judy responded.
"I'd rather be homeless again than stay here." Nick said, causing the rabbit to look at him quizzically.
"There's her apartment, 314." Judy said, having finally reached the end of the hallway.
She knocked on the worn door, it clinking against both the hinges and the lock.
"Who's there!?" A female voice cried from the other side.
"It's Officers Hopps and Wilde, we're here to talk to you about the assault you saw last night." Judy said calmly to the woman on the other side of the door.
Quickly, she heard the sound of locks clinking, many, many locks. The door creaked open, and a middle-aged fox stuck her head out. She eyed the two officers, presumably making sure they were officers, and then ducked back into the apartment, before finally opening the door.
"Oh, come on in!" She said. She was dressed in very casual clothes, obviously not prepared for any visitors, but she invited them into her apartment anyway.
The apartment was much cleaner than the outside, in fact, it looked like a much higher class apartment than the cheap one it appeared to be from the outside. There was enough space for a bedroom, and a living room, and the place was meticulously cleaned.
"Sorry if the place is a bit of a mess, I wasn't expecting any guests today." She said, sounding a bit manic, "Please, take a seat, Officers." She continued, going to the kitchen and pulling out a chair at a very small dining table.
The two complied, thanking the fox for her hospitality, and took their seats at the table. Soon, the fox walked over and sat down herself, holding a cup of coffee.
"Ms. Lupina, we want to know what exactly happened when you were assaulted last night." Nick said, very bluntly.
Her hands were visibly shaking, the coffee swaying in her cup.
"Nick!" Hopps whisper yelled to her partner, "You can't just go right to a traumatizing event like that!"
"Oh no, it wasn't traumatizing," Lupina said, "It was just... very startling."
"So, what happened?" Nick asked
"I was on my way home from work, I'm a housekeeper, so it was very late, maybe around... ten-thirty?" She said, Judy making sure to take notes in her notepad.
"So, I was walking home, there was no one else around, and I heard a... a noise, it was a bunny, like you, Officer." She turned to Judy, who was still taking notes, but paying incredible attention.
"It was coming from an alley, so when I turned to look there was this... thing, standing there, holding the bunny by his neck." She continued.
"Was it strangling him?" Judy questioned.
"No, it was more like a very firm grip," She stated, "But after a minute, it dropped the bunny, and turned around. I tried to avoid being seen, but it saw me."
"I was petrified, I couldn't even run, and then it came up and grabbed me by the neck too." her voice was beginning to crack, clearly this event did hurt her somehow, "It lifted me up and stared at me, and then it dropped me, and when I looked up, there was nothing there. I could smell something burning, though."
"What did this... thing, look like, exactly?" Nick asked.
"It was around eight feet tall, I'd say, and it looked like some kind of knight? It was wearing golden armor, with weird, lizard decorations all over it. It didn't have a face, just this... horrible red glare."
"Nick, that matches up with the sketch they sent us." Judy said to her partner.
"Hmm." He nodded to her, "Is there anything else that you'd like to note?"
"Yes, it said something before it vanished, it was, uh..." She thought to herself for a second.
"'You're not the one'. That's all I have."
"Thank you, Ms. Lupina. We'd actually like to ask you a favor." Nick said, causing Judy to look up from her notes, a bit confused.
"We want you to take us to where you saw this 'knight'." He said, Judy understood what he was getting at, they'd go to the sight and search for any clues.
"A-alright, I just need to get ready first, I'll be down in a few minutes, you can go wait for me." She said.
Soon, the two were outside, waiting for her to come down. This is, of course, when Nick decided to spark a conversation.
"I didn't realize that sketch was accurate," He said, "I thought it was just a really bad drawing of what we were supposed to look like when we were in those suits."
"Yeah, I didn't know what it was supposed to be either." Judy replied with a bit of a laugh, but a thought suddenly crossed her head, "What if it's another one of those monsters?"
"It could very well be that, Carrots."
They heard steps from inside the building, and soon enough, Lupina was there, standing next to them. She hadn't exactly changed much, but it seemed like she at least had a shower before leaving.
"Alright, let's get going." She said, rather halfhearted.
Soon the three were strapped into the police cruiser, and were off.
It certainly was an alley, exactly what you'd expect from a slum, dumpster, trash littering the ground, one hundred percent definitely an alleyway.
"So, this is where it happened?" Judy asked Lupina.
"Yes, right..." She turned and pointed to just behind the dumpster that was leaning against the building next to it.
Nick walked over to the spot, and leaned down, and then took a smell, which he quickly regretted, clutching his nose.
After a bit of choking, he managed to say something, "Ugh, yep, definitely some kind of fire here. Seems like the smell of the fire mixed with the smell of the garbage."
"That's very odd." Judy said, writing in her note pad. She looked up, and hopped to the middle of the alley, looking down on the ground, "Rabbit hairs!" She cried, picking up a few strands of white-grey fur.
"So, how exactly is this gonna help with the investigation?" The female fox asked the officers, who quickly glanced at each other.
What exactly was this going to help with? They already knew that none of the witnesses were killed, and Lupina's description lined up with the sketch they had already gotten. In all their pretend detectiving, they hadn't gotten anywhere.
"Uh..." They both groaned.
"I guess we got so wrapped up in this excitement that we forgot to ask anything actually important, huh." Nick said dryly.
"Alright Lupina," Judy said, her ears drooping a bit, "We were trying to find out what exactly this guy was trying to accomplish, but I suppose we kind of overshot it."
"What do you mean?" She asked.
"We mean like," Nick continued, "What kind of people this guy was after."
"That's easy, he was only attacking foxes and rabbits. Weren't you two there when they gathered in all the witnesses?" She chuckled, with the two officers going wide-eyed, "It was like a farm in there."
They felt like idiots.
"Well, that's pretty helpful information, Lupina," Nick said, trying to regain some composure, "Do you want us to drive you home, or..." He paused, looking around.
"Do you guys smell something burning?"
The burning smell became more apparent, as even Judy's much weaker nose was able to pick it up after a few seconds. Was there a fire? What was...
"FOUND YOU."
From behind them came a very intimidating voice, alongside the sound of fire crackling. While they couldn't see the person himself, they could see Lupina, who's eyes widened as she tried to step back.
They turned around, and sure enough, there was the figure Lupina had described, gold armor and all. They didn't realize how piercing his red, eyeless stare would have been.
"I didn't expect it to take this long to find you," The figure said, "Guess I misjudged how similar all of you animals look."
"Who are you!?" Judy yeleld to the monster.
"I am the Infinity Dragon, Long." He introduced, "I've been wanting to meet people like you for years."
"Question," Nick said calmly, raising his hand and stepping forward, "Do you know a, uh, Kooeymon?"
"You mean Kyuemon?" Long said back to the fox, "You could consider us partners."
"Well, do you know what happened to his last partner?" Jud boasted, crossing her arms.
"Yes, and I know who you two are, so there's no point in playing games anymore." Long coldly stated, suddenly flinging a fast fireball at them.
"GET DOWN!" Nick dived for Lupina, getting her out of the way of the surprisingly large blast of fire the fireball had created. With that, Lupina was knocked out.
Nick and Judy banded back together, holding up their wrists devices.
"YES! DO IT!" Long yelled to the two, spreading his arms, "GIVE ME THE CHALLENGE I HAVE BEEN WAITING 10 LONG YEARS FOR!"
"You want it!? You're gonna get it!" Judy yelled to the armored beast.
"ZOO ON!" The two yelled, slamming their hands onto the buttons, transforming them into their armor-clad alter egos.
The two charged at Long, their weapons suddenly appearing in their hands.
"Weapons, hmm?" Long mocked.
As soon as the two started attempting to strike him, they found every strike being blocked effortlessly by the dragon, every slice of Nick's sword caugh and turned against him, and every stab by Judy knocked away fro his armored hide.
Inn a quick flash of flaming fists, they found themselves knocked towards the opposite walls of the buildings, rubble surrounding them as they slid to the ground. All the while, Long hadn't moved from where he stood.
"Maybe I overestimated you." He glanced at the two, currently trying to get up from their injuries, "Perhaps I'll play fair this one time." He stretched his arms out, leaving himself vulnerable.
"GIVE ME YOUR BEST SHOT!"
"You asked for it!" Nick yelled, as the two closed in from both sides of the dragon, as they sliced his midsection with their weapons, causing a massive amount of sparks to burst from both sides of him.
They turned back to him, expecting to see him lying on the ground, but instead, the armored dragon was still standing proud.
"What the-" Judy said quietly.
"I guess I did, hmm." Long said to himself, "Clearly you two aren't ready to confront me one on one, shame, it would have been entertaining."
Long stepped forward, ignoring the two stunned heroes, walking towards the unconscious fox on the ground. He picked up her limp body, and stared at it for a second, before pulling out something.
"But you know what, I'll leave you two a special gift..." He held up the small object, which Judy recognized as some sort of small statue, looking specifically like a parying mantis.
With a swift motion, Long slammed the statue onto the fox's forehead, where it disappeared into her, causing her to let out an awful screech of pain. Long then dropped her to the ground, letting it writhe in pain for a few seconds.
Soon enough, the body on the ground started glowing, shifting into a nearly unrecognizable shape, growing and twisting, with horrible crunching sounds emanating with each movement. Soon, where there was once a fox, there was now a monster.
The monster, appropriately to the statue, resembled a mantis, with two large, orange shoulder pads resembling a mantis' eyes, and its arms ending in two long scythes, which, much like the previous monster, were lined with sharp blades. Even it's head was tipped with many, many sharp looking protrusions.
"Mantis Fist Master, Makirika!" It cried, it's voice not resembling Lupina's in any way, and performing an odd pose.
"I think you could use some extra company, too." Long laughed to himself, snapping his fingers.
Soon enough, the ground began to shake, as four sets of hands broke through the solid concrete ground, and slowly crawled their way out.
These new creatures looked like nothing the two had ever seen before, not like any mammal, or even possible an animal wearing a costume. The only parts of them uncovered were their hands and the bottoms of their faces, which had an eerie smooth, pale quality to them, like corpses. They wore brown shirts, with what appeared to be black undercoat. On their chest was a strange symbol, presumably not meaning anything, especially not to the two officers.
"What did you do to her!?" Judy yelled at the armored monster.
"Heh, who knows? Maybe if you destroy him, you'll find out." He told them mockingly, "But what if you do something you regret? How will you feel then?" He snapped his fingers, and disappeared into a burst of flame.
"Blue, what did he mean by that?" Nick asked his partner, who was equally confused.
"Rinshi!" The mantis creature yelled, causing the four undead monsters to begin hopping towards them. Literally hopping, as they jumped up and down, carrying long spears in both of their hands as they pointed them forwards.
"Okay, first things first," Judy stated, rearing her blades, "Get rid of the dead meat first."
The two rushed towards the four spear-carrying things, pulling out their weapons once again to attack them. They were a lot faster than they looked, as Nick tried to slice one, but it quickly blocked with its spear, stopping the sword entirely in its tracks, but the thing wasn't strong enough to completely turn the swipe back onto the fox.
Judy, meanwhile, was having a much easier time, as when the thing attempted to block, she swung underneath the spear with her second dagger, jabbing it into the thing's stomach.
It dropped the spear and toddled backwards, disappearing, much like the stone creatures from before, into a burst of smoke, this time black.
Seeing her partner struggling, Judy swiftly leaped over to the Rinshi he was dealing with, striking it with both of her knives, knocking it backwards, destroying it as well.
"These guys," Nick said with a puff, "Definitely fast, but not nearly as tough."
It was true, they took a lot less damage before being destroyed than the ones from the other day, but their speed became apparent, as the two remaining Rinshi hopped over to them, and very quickly jabbed their spears into where the two stood, with the heroes only managing to get out of the way just in time.
"Let's deal with these two chumps together." Judy said to her partner, who nodded in agreement.
The two rushed at the monsters, each facing a different one, but both standing back to back, both locked weapon to weapon with the one they had chosen to fight. As the four clashed, Nick gave Judy a sign, tapping her on the back with his tail.
On that cue, she leaped from her own fight, directly into the air, spinning around, and threw her one of her daggers directly into the Rinshi's face, instantly defeating it. Meanwhile, a split second after Judy had begun her jump, Nick had quickly ducked away from the Rinshi he was fighting, sliding his sword across the ground, and slashing at the monster behind him's feet, causing it to topple over and explode into black smoke.
After that spectacular feat, the two banded back together, facing the human turned monster before them, their weapons bared.
"Guess that was kinda impressive." It mocked, "But is it as impressive as this?"
The monster began moaning, crossing its arms, pointing the blades at the end of them outwards, "MANTIS ARTS..."
"HILL-CUTTING FIST!"
With that cry, the beast swung it's arms outward again, causing a what sounded like a sonic boom, as a large burst of air to be produced, which traveled forward so quickly that the two barely managed to duck under it.
When they looked up from their close cut, they turned around, seeing not only the building behind them begin to crumble, but the two next to them as well.
"HAH!" It laughed, "Impressed by my Mantis-Fist Style?"
"Well..." Nick murmured, "The guy from yesterday kinda did that too."
"What!?" The mantis cried in disbelief.
"I mean," Judy continued, "Yours was a lot more impressive, it's just not something, y'know, new."
They could tell the insect was getting angry, "How could somebody steal my fighting style!?" He looked up, his composure suddenly regained as he stared into the two with his beady red eyes.
"You two'll pay for insulting me!" It yelled to them, pointing to them with its large bladed hands.
"Oh!" Judy exclaimed, "Wait, before we fight, can I ask you a question?" She pulled out a otepad and pen.
"What!?" Both the monster and Nick cried.
"Yeah, yesterday the fox guy called his monster a, uh..." She said, thinking, "A Yohkee? Yohkay?"
"You mean a Yokai?" The mantis corrected her.
"Yeah, that, and I was wondering," She continued, "Are you also a Yokai?"
"Once a cop, always a cop, huh Blue?" Nick joked.
The thing grunted in disbelief, before answering her question reluctantly "I am a Predatory Beast Man!" He attempted to boast, "A master of Wild Ki, able to covert my own energy into fathomless power! I trained for years in order to be a master of the Mantis Fist!"
"Wait, but you were made, like, 10 minutes ago." Nick questioned, crossing his arms, "How can you have trained for years when you've barely existed?"
"MANTIS FLASH-CUT!" The thing, clearly tired of the questions, abruptly leaped forward, swinging his blade-arm in their general direction.
The two dodged, but the resulting slice into the earth created a quite clearly visible crack in the concrete, even larger than the clean slices the weasel monster had made from before.
"Alright, clearly you don't want to go onto the final round." Nick quipped to the beast, wiping some dust off his suit, before dashing towards the monster with his sword.
The sword and organic blades crashed, with the monster knocking Nick away, before rushing back to the fox himself, only to get a quick slice on the back from Judy.
"So, you wanna do it like this, huh?" It mocked, as it swiftly twisted and turned, striking both of them at the same time with different arms, causing them to spark and be thrown back in pain.
Nick covered his arm, checking to see if there was any wound, fortunately there wasn't, which means he had time for a joke.
"If it makes you feel better, you are stronger than the guy from before." He jokingly complimented, getting to his feet, "Not by much, but still."
The mantis roared in anger, and, compared to his rather precise movements from before, sloppily charged at the fox, who managed to dodge out of the way as he slammed his blade-arm into the ground, creating another large crack.
Nick slid over to his partner, who was also managing to get up, and seemed displeased with him.
"Red, what are you doing!?" She questioned.
"Relax, Blue, I figured out this guy's deal." He calmly said, watching the mantis try to get his arm out of the ground, "He's got a fragile ego, he's getting more sloppy as we insult him." He explained, "His Mantis whatever style also better at close quarters combat, so if we get him out somewhere open, we might have an easier time."
"Wow, Red, didn't know you were a combat expert." Judy said, impressed.
"Oh, I'm not, I'm just really good at observing things," He continued, "Not like this guy is super hard to figure out."
After a bit of struggling, the mantis had finally gotten unstuck from the ground, and turned around to face the two.
"Right now, I say we better get that plan started." She said to the fox, as they began to run out of the alleyway.
"What!?" The mantis yelled, watching the two run away, "Come back, cowards!" As they exited the alley and ran, the mantis leaped into the air, landing on a nearby building.
The two continued running as the mantis monster quickly jumped from the roof, and slammed into the street beside them.
"HILL-SPLITTING FIST!" It cried again, performing another, much weaker, version of it's slicing attack, which the two, again, barely managed to avoid as they continued running.
"So, Mr. Strategy," Jusy asked between breaths, "Where are we headed?"
"There's a park nearby," Nick panted, "If we can get there, it'll be easier to beat him."
"A park!?" Judy yelled, nearly stopping in hr tracks, before realizing her life was depending on her swift motion, "What about the people there!?"
"Yeah, that could be a problem."
They continued running towards the park, Makirika still leaping after them and attempting to cut them down with his attacks. Eventually, after a few blocks, they had made it.
It was certainly a fairly normal park, a small playground, and a large water fountain in the middle of it, shaped like a pig holding an urn, which sprayed water forward. Of course, the main problem was the large amount of animals that were there, including many children.
Judy ran forward to the fountain, and leaped on top of it, taking a deep breath, "EVERYONE!" She yelled out, perhaps the loudest she could, which caught the attention of a number of mammals, "YOU ARE ALL IN DANGER! EVACUATE THE AREA IMMEDIATELY!"
In return, a number of animals stared at her, judging, perhaps for her climbing onto the fountain, or perhaps for her... strange outfit. Either way, it was apparent nobody was believing her.
Her heart sunk, as she hopped down from the fountain. However, her ears perked when she heard a loud crash.
Turning around, there was Makirika, who had landed on, and subsequently crushed, a bench, "She's right, you fools!" He yelled to the surrounding animals, who were now beginning to panic.
"MANTIS FLASH-CUT!"
In a quick motion, the mantis leaped forward towards the fountain, and sliced with one of his blade hands, chopping the pig statue cleanly in two, causing it to crumble, and water to begin spewing out.
This had gotten most of the animal's attention, and they were now running off in fear.
Nick stepped up to the mantis, his sword drawn, "You know, I thought you were a praying mantis, not a grasshopper."
"Hah, I eat grasshoppers for breakfast." It laughed, slicing multiple times at the fox, who blocked every slice with his sword, before they entered a stalemate.
As they struggled, Makirika leaned in to the fox, close enough to hear the thing's deep breathing, "Literally." It whispered menacingly.
Suddenly, the mantis felt a sharp pain it his back, breaking his struggle with the fox, who struck him in the stomach with his blade.
Makirika turned around, seeing the rabbit, twirling her daggers, "Huh, didn't know you were a cannibal." She quipped to the angry insect.
The mantis began to charge at the rabbit, only for another sharp pain to strike his back, the fox hitting him with his sword.
The mantis growled, looking back to the fox, and then back to the rabbit, "CRAP!" It yelled, before hopping off, gaining some distance from the two.
He wasn't exactly build for two on one combat, if he kept this up, he would be destroyed quickly. That wouldn't do, he had just come back to life. He needed something to distract them with...
What did his boss say before he left?
"I say we finish this now!" Nick yelled, pulling his sword above his head, ready to perform his finishing move.
"WAIT!" The mantis yelled, as Nick began to lower his sword, stopping him, and confusing the two heroes.
"Are you two sure you want to do that?" The mantis laughed.
"Uh, yeah, pretty sure." Nick nonchalantly answered.
"Well," The insect continued, "I am currently using your friend as a vessel." He tapped on his chest with his blade-hand, indicating to something inside him.
"If you destroy me, what will happen to her?" It asked, gesturing towards them, "What if, when you kill me, you kill her as well?"
This stopped the two dead in their tracks.
"Do you two really want the death of an innocent on your hands?" It asked.
Judy nervously stepped backwards, the word from the other day ringing in her ears, murder, if she killed this monster, she would be a murderer, wouldn't she. She nearly collapsed under her own thoughts.
Nick just stared forward, his fists trembling, clearly enraged at what the monster had just said.
"MMM!" The insect moaned in pleasure, "The fear... the despair... I can feel my power growing!" An unearthly purple energy began to surround him, swirling and whipping around, before absorbing into the creature's body.
"RINSHI! RISE!" He cried. Suddenly, the ground shook, as dozens of hands began to burst from the ground, revealing an army of the undead minions, who began hopping up in down.
"See you suckers later!" The insect mocked to the two, leaping away from the park, as the army of Rinshi hopped off on their own, following their master.
"Blue, we need to go after them." Nick said to his partner, anger rising in his voice. No response.
"Blue?"
He turned around, his partner was laying on the ground, motionless. There was the faint sound of crying.
"Judy?"
It was a few hours later, and the two officers had returned to their apartment. Nick had to call in to headquarters, making up an excuse about how they had gotten into a chase that had ended with Judy being injured, and they had to return home.
Somehow, it worked. The station was having a bit of a confused day, after all.
Not that the mood in the apartment was any better, Judy had gone into her room, and promptly begun having a panic attack. Nick couldn't really do anything, he wasn't particularly good with supporting people, and this was the first time he had seen her actively break down, so he did the only thing he could think of.
Watch TV.
Specifically, the news, and it wasn't a very pretty sight. Reports on Makirika's rampage were everywhere, and it was horrific.
The monster was destroying building left and right, no remorse in it's actions. The police were trying to do something about it, but it had about as well as the other day, even worse, maybe, due to how many officers were missing due to yesterday's events.
This entire thing was turning out to be a real mess.
He needed to do something. THEY needed to do something. What was happening was their fault in a way. Maybe it was his fault, he was the one who brought Lupina along, basically the reason why the monster was even here.
Great, now he was feeling depressed.
He switched the TV off, and headed for Judy's bedroom door, which he knocked on.
"Judy?" He asked softly from in front of the door. No response.
"How you doing?" He sighed, still no response from her.
He twisted the knob, it was unlocked at least, so he peeked into the room. it was, thankfully, clean, Hopps was never one to mess up her room, even under stress. The only thing unchanged from the night before was a large blanket covered lump laying in the middle of her bed.
He walked into the room, and poked the lump, which groaned at him. At least she was still alive. He sat on the edge of the bed, putting his paw over her her, trying to comfort her.
"Judy," He said solemnly to his wrapped up partner, "It's getting really bad out there, I think we need to..."
She let out another groan, trying to shake his paw away from her. He lifted it away himself, not wanting to bother her that much.
"I don't want to hurt anyone." She squeaked.
"I know, but..." Nick tried to come up with the right words, "But, if we don't who knows how many more people will die?"
This didn't help, as she curled up even more beneath the blankets.
He sighed, nothing he said was going to help.
"Alright," He said, standing up from the bed, "II'll go deal with this myself."
The rabbit finally stuck her head out from the blankets, "What!?" She exclaimed, turning to her partner, who was leaving the room.
"This entire thing is my fault, I'm going to go deal with it." He said, an air of seriousness in his voice, "You just stay here, I don't want you to feel any worse."
"But-" Before she could finish, the fox had dashed out of the apartment.
She sighed, and went into the living room, switching the TV on to the news.
"MANTIS FLASH-CUT!" The monster yelled, leaping towards a building. In a brief moment, the building was sliced in two, collapsing to the ground.
The mantis landed, looking at his handiwork, "These animals are so lame!" He boasted, "Can't even come up with something good to fight!"
He turned, looking across the plaza he had invaded, most of the buildings were totaled, but he was most impressed at the number of mammals running from his army of Rinshi, panic and fear emanating from them, which Makirika could feel absorbing into his body.
"Mmmm," He moaned, "At least they give me a good meal."
However, in the blink of an eye, a lighting fast burst of flame struck the area in front of him, destroying a large amount of the Rinshi he had summoned.
"Why don't you chew on this?" A voice yelled to him.
It was the fox from before, "I thought you would have packed it in by now!" The mantis responded back, "Clearly this is too much for you two."
Then he noticed something. There was only one there, the rabbit was nowhere to be seen.
"Oh ho," He chuckled, "Looks like your partner couldn't take it, huh?"
"Just you and me," Nick snarled to the monster, "One on one, mammal a... mantis... thing."
"You really need to work on your jokes." The mantis told him.
"Look, I'm trying, alright!?
The fox charged towards the monster, gripping his blade tight in his paws. With a swing, he struck the mantis in the stomach, which barely phased it, as Nick felt a quick strike to his stomach, knocking him away.
The fox stopped his landing by jabbing his blade into the ground, causing it to spark and leave a deep cut in the ground.
Gaining his equilibrium back, the fox rushed at the monster once again.
"An interesting development seems to have appeared at the site of the attack." The reporter, a porcupine, said from his helicopter, the camera shifting from his face to the plaza, where two small figures were fighting.
Judy gripped to the couch, she was hoping it wasn't who she thought it was.
It zoomed in, and it was definitely who she thought it was.
"It appears that some... masked hero has arrived to try and defeat this monster!" The reporter continued, as the camera focused in on Nick and the monster fighting.
He was having trouble, as Nick himself had said earlier, Makirika was made for one on one combat, he was ignoring one of the few strategic things he had come up with for the monster.
It was even worse when the other monsters were there, as they kept distracting him from the main monster itself, who who would use that as a chance to strike.
It was looking bad, and Judy was feeling very tense. Watching her partner get knocked around like that, it brought her to a boiling point.
She jumped down from the couch, and headed for the door, but something on the ground, right by the door, caught her attention.
It was an envelope, but the design matched the card from the other day. It had the SPD logo embroidered on it, and the only things breaking up the black of it were the white and red lines going across it.
She picked it up, and felt it in her paws, there was an object in there, it was thick, but also flat. There was a message on the back of it, "Use These. - D.K." is all it read.
She went to the table, and grabbed a pair of scissors from a drawer, and cut the letter open, and dumped it onto the table.
It wasn't one object, but two objects, resembling metal tags, but without the chains, but they were also different colors, red and blue, and both showed, instead of names and information, drawings of what looked like motorcycles. She flipped them over, revealing a series of tabs, different on both of them.
Something else also came out as well. A sheet of paper, folded up into fours, which depicted what appeared to be instructions for the tags, written in script that she had never seen before, it appeared to be a language.
The page showed a paw sticking the tag into her device, and then pressing the button, which appeared to summon a bike, somehow.
She looked at the small tag, confused by its existence, before stuffing it into her pocket. She then checked the device, and sure enough, there was a small hole, just large enough to fit the tag in, guess she and Nick just never noticed it.
She grabbed the blue tag, putting it in her pocket, before she rushed out the door, and around to the back.
Catching her breath from her quick sprint, she pulled the tag out of her pocket and looked at it again. She could probably trust Kruger, he seemed to have good intentions, but...
How exactly would this work?
"Guess I don't really have a choice." She stuck the tag into device, and then slammed the button with her fist.
The eyes on the device began to glow a bright blue, as loud animal noises began to play from it. Suddenly, the device began to yell out.
"ROAR OF THE WILD!
ROAR OF THE ENGINE!
DO YOU HEAR IT?
USAGIDER!"
She opened her eyes from the suddenly light, and standing in front of her, as she should've expected, was a motorcycle, around her size.
It was blue, of course, and had a stylized rabbit head on the front, with the ears forming the handles, and a tail forming the back of the seat, two paws grasping onto the wheels on the front, and two gripping the back wheels.
She hopped onto it, noticing it didn't have a revving engine, it seemed you just needed to hold the gas to get it moving.
Judy was ready, she supposed, so she yelled the code word, and slammed the button, transforming into her armored form. She held the gas, and was off towards the plaza she saw on the news.
Back at the plaza, Nick was still fighting the monsters. The Rinshi were surrounding him, his energy was being drained every second.
Maybe he shouldn't have ran here.
The monster laughed at him, as he began to collapse from exhaustion, the Rinshi beginning to surround him prepping their spears. This was it, he was gonna die here, without being able to say goodbye to all the people he cared about, like...
Well, he didn't really have many people in his life, did he?
Either way, dying was gonna suck a whole lot, especially under the current circumstances, filled with anger, regret, awful feelings that probably wouldn't do him well in the afterlife.
Suddenly, he heard a noise. A motorcycle?
It caught the monster's attention too, as they turned to see who it was. This distraction gave Nick a chance to strike back, he grabbed his sword, and spun around, slicing the ring of Rinshis in their legs destroying them.
He then saw what was getting their attention.
It was Hopps, riding a strange motorcycle, charging towards an army of Rinshi slowly hopping towards her. Quickly, she pushed one of the handle, causing the bike to skid, before she quickly leaped off, the bike crashing into the group of Rinshi, destroying them, with Hopps landing safely in front of the bike.
Makirika looked at the rabbit, standing so proudly. He was going to crush that spirit.
"Heh, I thought you'd lost your nerve, bunny rabbit." The mantis mocked.
"Hey, Insect," She said to the beast, ignoring his insult.
The bug grunted, letting the rabbit have her word before he made his final strike.
"Why are you doing this?" She asked, sudden compassion filling her voice, "Why are you destroying everything? What's the point?"
"The point!?" The mantis yelled with anger, "The point is none of your concern, rodent!"
"Why keep doing it, though!?" She yelled back, "You could be anything here, but you choose to destroy any chances you have!"
The monster looked at her, his stare piercing her heart, "I keep doing it, rabbit..." He paused.
There was a long silence, suddenly broken by the mantis chuckling to himself.
"BECAUSE ITS FUN!" Suddenly, the monster sliced forward, shooting a burst of air. Quickly, Judy dodged, only for the burst to continue upwards behind her, striking the corner of a nearby building, causing it to fall off.
"I was afraid you'd say that." Judy said sadly, standing back up.
"So, rabbit, I'll give you two options." He said to the rabbit, who continued staring at the ground.
"Option one," It said, holding up one of his blades, "You fight me, and kill the innocent, little civilian inside."
Judy clutched her fist.
"Option two," It continued, holding up its other claw, "You leave, and I kill your friend over there." It gestured to Nick, who was currently trying to fend off a group of Rinshi.
Judy continued staring at the ground, her fists clenched with anger. The mantis laughed to himself. He had her on the ropes.
"Well, what'll it be, bunny?"
"I choose..." She whispered, the mantis walked closer to hear.
"Spit it out!" It yelled at her.
"I choose neither!"
Quickly, Judy tossed both of her knives at the mantis, lodging them directly in its chest, knocking it back.
"What!?" It screamed in disbelief, "I thought I had you broken!"
"Something as awful as you doesn't deserve to be in this city." She scolded, "So, I'm gonna save Lupina, and Red, whether you like it or not!"
The mantis rose, roaring, causing the knives to free themselves from its chest, "How, exactly, do you expect to do that!?" It yelled.
"I dunno, but I'm gonna."
She rushed towards the monster, grabbing her daggers off the ground, and sliding under his legs, and then quickly turning around, slashing the beast's legs, causing it to yell in pain. After, she began running towards her partner in danger.
"Don't worry Red, I'm coming!" She yelled to him.
She jumped into the air, aiming herself towards two Rinshi that were closing in on the fox, and then dived into them knives first, causing them to explode into dark smoke.
The fox sighed in relief, "Thanks for the rescue, Blue," He thanked, "Coulda come sooner, though."
She gave him a glare, which pierced through her helmet.
"Sorry, bad joke." He apologized, still catching his breath, "Alright, lets go finish these guys off."
"Hang on," Judy interrupted, reaching behind her, pulling out one of the tags from before, "Use this."
"What is this, some kinda tag?" He took it from her, and stared at it, "Not really my fashion sense."
"Listen," She said, frustrated, "Put it in the wrist thingy, and slam the button."
"Alright, I'll give it a shot." Nick said with some reluctance, sliding the tag into the hole in the device he had just noticed, and then slamming the button.
A bright flash, jungle noises, and finally, a shrill call in somewhat garbled english.
"ROAR OF THE WILD!
ROAR OF THE ENGINE!
CAN YOU HEAR IT?
KITSUNIDER!"
He opened his eyes, and sure enough, a motorcycle, much like the one Judy had ridden in on, but this one red, and more shaped like a fox.
"So, what do I do with this?" He asked.
"Use it to defeat those hopping weirdos," She explained, "This fight's gonna be personal." She finished, gripping her daggers, looking at the mantis monster.
"Alright, Bunny Commando." He joked, hopping onto the cycle, starting it up.
He drove off, pulling out his sword as he did. Driving directly into the middle of a group of Rinshi, he pressed the brake, causing the bike to spin around as he stuck his sword out, destroying an entire group of them in only a few seconds.
"Yeah, I gues sthis is pretty cool." He drove off again, ready to go deal with the few remaining zombies.
"Damn Rinshi!" The mantis yelled, watching his minions get slaughtered, "You guys are even more worthless than I remember!"
"The only worthless thing here," A voice said from behind him, he turned around, seeing the blue rabbit, "IS YOU!" She yelled at him.
The mantis laughed, "Let's get this over with already." He put up his blades, and the two charged at each other.
The two clashed, both of Judy's knives to both of Makirika's blade-arms, Judy managing to successfully push them out of the way, and then jabbing her knives into the monster's stomach as many times as she possibly could, before jumping upwards, slicing him with both blades as she went up, the creature sparking and writhing as she did.
Finally, she kicked the mantis in the face with both of her large rabbit feet, causing the dazzed monster to fly back farther than it reasonably should have, landing on its back and struggling to get up.
The monster grunted as it got up, "Are you a Rabbit Fist Master?" The insect asked, "I've never seen someone who wasn't use knives like that!"
"Nope!" She answered cheerfully, "Never used a knife like that a day in my life." She charged back at the bug, preparing to strike again.
Realizing this, Makirika lifted his arm, " MANTIS FLASH-CUT!" In an abrupt motion, he swung it down, attempting to cut the rabbit in half, only for her to deftly dodge out of the way.
As soon as the realization hit the beast, he felt a swift kick to his side, launching him off again. The rabbit had gained more spirit than ever before, it was humiliating!
"You know," Judy said to the mantis, throwing her dagger upwards and catching it, "I think you need a declawing!"
Quickly, she threw both of her daggers, directly into Makirika's prized blades, which soon fell to the ground with a loud clink.
He lifted his hands up, seeing them now end with unimposing stumps, before a flash of pain stirred in him, "MY HANDS!" It yelled in agonizing pain, "MY PRECIOUS HANDS!"
"Time to finish this!" Judy yelled, racing over to get her daggers from the now rather unthreatening monster.
She slid away from the bug as it attempted to strike at her as she ran past and grabbed her blades.
"FULL MOON SLICE!" She yelled, an echo emanating from her voice.
Judy began spinning around, quickly turning into a whirling tornado, with blades instead of wind. She began approaching the beast at in incredibly fast rate, barely giving Makirika enough time to move, before she sliced directly through his midsection.
She stopped, and turned around to admire her handiwork as the creature stumbled around.
It was laughing.
"YOU FAILED, RABBIT!" It yelled, pointing to her with his stump hand, "YOU COULDN'T SAVE THEM BOTH! YOU'RE A..." It slowed down, "A... a... grrk!"
The creature began to bubble, its skin rippling, causing it obvious pain, and soon enough a large bubble began forming on it's chest.
"No...!" It quietly stated, as the bubble burst open, causing a small fox to fly out from it at very high speeds.
Sure enough, Nick sped by on his bike, managing to stop the fox from landing on the concrete and getting even more hurt. Unfortunately, he blocked her with his body, causing him, and the bike, to topple to the ground, with a young fox laying on top of them.
"Ugh, that was a bad idea." He groaned.
Judy looked to the safe, alive civilian, and then back to the monster, who stared on in disbelief.
"What am I?" She said to the fidgeting mantis, "I'm a hero."
She turned around, as the bug fell to the ground, exploding into a large ball of fire, the only remnant being the small mantis statue, which flew from it and fell to the ground, cracking in two.
Judy rushed over to the unconscious fox, who was currently laying on top of a struggling Nick.
"Blue, help me get her off." He said weakly, "She's heavier than she looks."
"Good thing you didn't say that while she was awake." Judy retorted back.
"Har har."
Judy helped lift the unconscious Lupina back to her her feet, Nick holding her up as the rabbit attempted to wake her up.
"Lupina? You can open your eyes now," She said softly, "Everything's fine now."
The fox wearily opened her eyes, "Whuh? Huh?" She said, confused, "Where am I? Who are you?" She stumbled from the fox that was holding her, and turned to both of them.
Judy was a bit flummoxed with the question, they didn't really have any answers to it.
"We're, uh..."
"Wait!" Lupina interrupted, excitedly, "Are you two Zoo Rangers?"
"What?" The two said to each other.
"You two look EXACTLY like this show I used to watch when I was a kid!" She continued.
Before they could continue, a loud sound pierced their ears, the sound of a helicopter landing.
"HOLD IT!" Yelled the porcupine reporter, as he and his tapir cameraman exited the chopper, walking up to the two.
"Charles Spiketon, reporter for ZNN," He stated, the tapir focusing his camera uncomfortably close on the two heroes.
"How does it feel having saved the whole of Zootopia from a horrible monster!?" The intense porcupine posed to the rabbit, sticking a microphone in her face.
"Uh, well-" Judy was quickly interrupted, with Nick taking control of the mike.
"Well, Charles," He said smoothly, putting on a faux-deep voice, "It feels pretty good! Nothing starts a day like destroying an evil monster, y'know?"
"Well, I personally wouldn't," The porcupine started, "But that was an amazing feat of action and skill from you both! Is there anything we can call you by?"
Lupina quickly grabbed the mike from the reporter, who looked fairly offended by this abrupt action, "They're the Zoo Rangers!" She answered.
She gave the remote back to Nick, who tried to continue from where she left off, "Uh, yeah, we're the Zoo Rangers, and we have to return to our..." He paused for a second, "Secret underground base, in case there are any other monster attacks."
He lifted up the knocked over motorcycle, and then hopped on, "Come on, Blue," he said to his stunned partner, still putting on the deeper voice, "We have to go."
Judy shook her head, trying to parse what had just happened, "Give me a second," She ran over to where her bike was parked, currently surrounded by a dozen burnt marks from the Rinshi it had destroyed, "Just gotta get my bike."
As she got on her bike, she noticed something. Mammals of all kinds, revealing themselves after all the commotion. They began cheering. For them. This made Judy's heart flutter, as she drove her cycle over to her partner's.
"Alright, Red, let's go." She said proudly, as they drove off, hundreds of animals cheering for them as they did.
A few hours later, and the two were back at their apartment, watching the news.
"A truly strange event has happened today in Zootopia," Said the moose anchor, "After a bizarre series of attacks by a large, bug-like creature of unknown origins, two equally mysterious heroes arrived, and managed to defeat it before it could cause any real harm."
"People have started calling these two the 'Zoo Rangers'," Continued the snow leopard anchor, "After the children's show from the mid-nineties, of which they suspiciously resemble."
"Think there might be any legal disputes over this, Joanna?" The moose followed up.
"After seeing that, I wouldn't want to get on their bad side, Peter." the leopard answered.
"Either way, Zootopia seems to have a genuine pair of Superheroes protecting it!" The moose stated, "And we look forward to seeing them in action."
The TV switched off, and Judy looked next to her to see Nick smiling, perhaps the largest he'd ever smiled in his life.
"You hear that, Carrots?" He turned to her, looking her directly in the eyes, clearly overly excited, "They called us Superheroes!" His eyes were nearly shining.
"I mean, we are, but..." Hopps leaned back into the sofa, she felt that something was wrong, "I didn't want to get this stuff out there like this."
"You mean you wanted us to be like The Bat," Nick guessed, "Secret, spoken of only in the whispers of criminals?"
"That would have been preferrable to us getting media attention immediately." She admitted.
"Where'd the fun in that be, Carrots?" The fox smugly said, "It'd be like if Super Mammal had to hide himself, when you're dealing with powerful monsters like that Mamakaraka guy, it's hard to keep secret!"
"Nick, I didn't know you knew so much about comics." Judy mused.
"Hey, I was a kid once too, y'know." He answered back.
She chuckled at his enthusiasm, this was the happiest she'd seen him since the day he became a cop.
"Oh yeah, I kinda told Bogo that you had an injury, so we're probably not going to work tomorrow." The fox admitted.
"WHAT!?"
Meanwhile, back at the station itself, Bogo was sitting in his office, doing the loads and loads of paperwork he had accumulated from the last two days alone. Buildings in ruins, tons of officers hospitalized, three criminals on the run, it was turning into a real wreck of a week.
So, as a bit of a break, he decided to turn on the radio.
"A truly strange event has happened today in Zootopia," the voice on the radio crackled, "After a bizarre series of attacks by a large, bug-like creature of unknown origins, two equally mysterious heroes arrived,"
"What?" The buffalo said to himself, it couldn't be, were those two from the other day being considered heroes now? Or were there even MORE vigilantes than he had assumed.
He slammed his head on his desk, causing some paper to fly around, as he turned the radio off.
Suddenly, a knock at the door.
Bogo lifted his head up, "Come in." He said, anger rising in his voice.
The door opened wide, it was Mayor Lionheart. Just what he needed.
"Bogo, how's the hunt for those two masked vigilante's coming along?" The lion questioned.
"Not well, Mayor, after today, we barely have any officers left to-" The buffalo was quickly interrupted by the lion.
"Well, if you don't manage to find out who those two are soon, you're going to be in trouble!" He roared.
"Yes, yes, I know-" Again, interrupted.
"No, you don't! I need you to find those two, fast!" The lion slammed his hands against the table.
"Yes, they've been causing a lot of trouble recently, we'll arrest them-" For a third time, interrupted by the Mayor.
"Arrest them!?" He said, flabbergasted, "You're not going to arrest them!"
The buffalo looked at the lion with a mix of confusion and irritation.
"I need you to find out WHO they are, so I can thank them for saving the city!" He explained to the police chief, "It'll be a great boost to both morale, and publicity!"
The buffalo snorted and sighed at the same time, "Alright, Lionheart, we'll get on it as soon as possible." Bogo said, absolutely defeated.
"Good," The lion said, exiting the room, "And don't forget, do it fast!" He slammed the door.
The buffalo sighed, and slumped into his seat, only to be surprised when the door opened up again, revealing Lionheart, again.
"Remember, I'll have your job if you don't do this soon!" He reiterated, slamming the door again.
Bogo slumped back down into his chair, placing his hooves against his face and sighing.
What in the world was happening?
The sound of metal clanged along the metallic ground, as Long returned to the base, greeted by the 5 other strange creatures he was now working with.
Clearly, they had saw what Makirika had accomplished, as they looked on at him with both disbelief and awe.
"Hey, man," Yabaiba said cheerfully, giving him the thumbs up, "You did pretty good out there!"
"Eh," Sambash grunted, "I could have done better."
"I doubt that." Long stated coldly, causing the punk creature to scoff at him.
Long sat down at his seat, suddenly feeling a cold air behind him, which, while he noticed, didn't entirely feel.
"That was an admirable outing," The voice behind him said, clearly Kyuemon, "The way your monster manipulated them was close to working." He complimented.
Long didn't reply.
"But," he said, placing a hand on the dragon warrior's shoulder, "Makirika didn't cause that much destruction, did he? He mostly just destroyed a plaza, how simple."
"Better than you did, fox." Long replied.
Kyuemon backed off, offended, only to hear some chuckling coming from beside him.
"He's got a point, your monster did way less than dragon boy's did." Yabaiba mocked.
"How dare you, you-" Kyuemon was quickly interrupted, as a pulse of energy shook the room.
"ENOUGH" It cried.
"LONG" Another pulse shot through the room, shaking everyone but Long himself, "YOUR MONSTER PERFORMED EXCELLENTLY, AND BROUGHT IN ENOUGH CHAOTIC ENERGY THAT I HAVE BEEN ABLE TO WORK ON THE NEXT PHASE OF THE PLAN"
"Thank you, Omnipotence, but I was simply doing what I felt like." Long admitted.
"KYUEMON" The pulse shocked the room again, this time causing Kyuemon to nearly fall over, "YOUR MONSTER, ON THE OTHER HAND, PERFORMED POORLY, AND BARELY BROUGHT IN ANY ENERGY"
"But, your Omnipotence-"
"QUIET" The fox Yokai quieted immediately, "I AM BEGINNING TO WONDER IF BRINGING YOU BACK WAS TRULY SUCH A GOOD IDEA, IF YOU PERFORM AS MISERABLY AS THAT, I WILL HAVE NO CHOICE BUT TO DESTROY YOU FOR GOOD"
Kyuemon grunted, "It won't happen again, your Omnipotence." The fox walked away, the other villains, minus Long and Yogostein, who had mysteriously vanished, laughing at his embarrassment.
However, someone watched him from the corner, not mocking or deriding him. Enter stood, looking at the Yokai, smiling.
"He could be useful."
And that's it for Episode 2! Wait, who am I, you ask? I'm the author! I'm here to give you occasional extra story information, the kind that's not super important, but worth mentioning somewhere, as well as behind the scenes info on my writing process.
Basically, you can skip this part if you want.
But, if you want to learn some neat stuff, stick around! Let's get started, shall we?
First of all, the design of the changers, which we won't know the name of for a bit still, was specifically based around the Sly Cooper logo, dunno if anyone managed to guess that, but I feel i described it accurately enough.
Second, the tags were sort of a late addition, I mostly included them because of how limited the changer was, I was goin' for a sort of simple Megaranger/In Space or Ohranger/Zeo changer kind of style, a simple deisgn used mostly for the transformation. Then I realized I needed a way to summon the... well, you'll see, so I added in a bit of a toy gimmick.
Speaking of, it was hard to figure out what to call the tags, since I doubt they'd call them "dog tags" in Zootopia.
Third, I specifically imagine the changer's voice being that of Tomokazu Seki, doing his best attempt at english, but you can think of it as whatever you like.
Finally, the Rinshi are certainly easy to take care of here, huh? In gekiranger, the Rinshi are said to be dead bodies that are given temporary life, and on such short notice, it'd probably be hard for Long, or any monster, to find corpses to reanimate. There's also probably not 50 dead bodies buried under a park.
Basically, the Rinshi here are more "ghosts" than "zombies", manifested evil spirits that can basically be taken out with a punch, which is why they can be slaughtered in droves.
That's it for this Author's Corner! Next episode, cloudy days are ahead, and Nick and Judy have to deal with a mysterious, annoying visitor.