It was exciting news that Acceleration hoped would usher in an exciting time. Judy Hopps had gotten into the Zootopia Police Academy! Acceleration was fleet of foot as his paws tore across the Celestial Realm. He was going to tell everyone, and he first started with Growth's Grove.
"Whoa, really?" Replied Growth, getting up from reclining with Phantasm.
"This should be a good story..." Phantasm said with quiet mirth, also rising.
The two saw a red flash as he made his way over to Fortitude's Bastion, where two other Celestials were hanging out. The two winced as they saw a blue blur.
"Acceleration!" Fervor exclaimed as he noticed the visitor, his arms out. The wolverine Fervor was the Chaos Celestial of passion, and his fiery-red and charcoal fur could come alight if he got worked up. He was known for flying about when this happened.
"Karma's exemplar has been enrolled into the Zootopia Police Academy!" Acceleration's smooth voice proclaimed with enthusiasm.
"No way!" Fervor pumped his fists, a single burst of flame gushing off of him. "That's incredible!"
"She'll have some big challenges to overcome!" Fortitude nodded, his deep, assured voice seeming to thrum through the air. Fortitude was a rather large rhino Celestial, and his hide was that of a silvery metallic alloy.
With that, Acceleration was off again. Turn by turn he told every Celestial.
"Wagh!" Serendipity was swept through the air by the burst of speed from the incoming cheetah. She rapidly pawed at the air to try to regain her balance as she went spiraling past Karma. The wolf-like celestial made a halfhearted attempt to snap her out of the air with her mouth, but she missed.
"Sorry! I thought you especially would like to know, Karma..." Acceleration had a big grin. "Judy Hopps is enrolled in the Zootopia Police Academy."
"Ooh!" Serendipity looked delighted, her eye-shines sparkling. Karma gave her a blank look, and her expression became more quizzical. "I mean, that seems... surprising!"
"So, her circle begins," Karma said, closing her eyes and smiling, then opening them with an intense look. "Let's see if she can complete it."
The Zootopia Police Academy's obstacle courses were clearly not built with an animal as small as a bunny in mind. Time after time, the young, spunky gray bunny failed each physical challenge thrown her way.
"Aie!" Fervor shook his claws as he saw Judy fall into the mud from an astral window. "Come on, bunny! Give it your all!"
"I think she is, Fervor," Drive looked down upon the scene with concern. "It really doesn't seem like her path has been cut out for her..."
"There are physical limits to what a rabbit can achieve," Fortitude said gravely. He shook his head. "I'm rooting for you, little bunny. You get up there and show them what you can do."
"There's no limit to the power of the spirit!" Fervor said, alighting himself and spiraling into the air. "Defy your physical limits!"
These three Celestials were especially interested in Judy's goal, and watched her progress, or lack thereof, with great intensity. She endured criticism after criticism, defeat after defeat.
"Don't give up, don't give in!" Fortitude bellowed his encouragement as a halfhearted punch from a mortal rhino threw Judy across a boxing ring.
"Her fire cannot be doused this easily!" Fervor shook his head in determination as Judy slipped into a toilet bowl that was far too large for her.
"I think you're being a little over-dramatic," Drive smirked. "Judy is set upon her path... I believe she just has to take a different byroad to get there."
"What do you mean?" Fortitude tilted his head up.
"Look at her," Drive said. "She's tiny. Comparatively weak, though strong for a bunny. She's near her physical limit; Judy will have to fight smarter, not better."
Judy barely even rested when the lights were off. She did physical drills and studied the police procedural material simultaneously.
"That's it, small one!" Fervor clenched a fist. "Knowledge is power, and you are powerful, girl!"
"Rise up, bunny," Fortitude stamped one foot solidly, causing a rumble. "Become the change you need to see yourself through to the end!"
Drive shook her head as she rolled her eyes with an affectionate smile. "I always get a headache when I hang out with you two."
The ability to defy expectations seemed burned into Judy Hopps from a young age, and even though she had the Celestials of goals, strength, and passion cheering her on, she still surprised them with how she was able to turn around her fortunes.
"Wow... I can barely believe it," Fortitude blinked. "She made valedictorian!"
"All that effort was not wasted," Drive smiled. "Karma must be proud... Judy is well on her way to achieving a deserved respect for small mammals."
Fervor, who looked about ready to burst, flew up into the air and did just that, exuding a flare of fiery energy. "Yes! You've done it, rabbit! Now, go!" He thrust one claw out. "Go to Zootopia and consume it with your fiery brand of justice!"
"Not literally, please," Drive added with a wink.
"Figuratively!" Fervor added with a hearty laugh. Fortitude and Drive did too. The bunny exemplar had enchanted many of the Celestials, and her future seemed very bright.
Karma found herself again in Serendipity's Parlor, sniffing around for the bunny Celestial in her piles of astral treasures. A mixture of worry and excitement flowed through Karma as she searched for Serendipity.
"Hiya!" Serendipity exclaimed, appearing with a poof right before Karma's eyes. She was rather purposefully wearing Judy Hopps' own colors.
"Hn!" Karma flinched. "Serendipity...!"
"Looking for me?" Serendipity said with a jovial flair, starting to float about.
"I was merely..." Karma looked about nervously. "I was merely admiring your astral treasure."
"Oh, yeah, right," Serendipity smirked, briefly changing into Karma's magenta colors and trying to lower her pitch to match Karma's. She folded her paws and made a 'holier-than-thou' expression. "'Pointless trinkets that have no worth in the Celestial Realm'!"
"Well, I have said that before, and I still- well, it's still true," Karma tried not to meet the color copycat's eyes. "However..." Karma looked over the piles of treasures, crowns, scepters, cups, gems and coins. "They are nice to look at."
"And here I thought we could never understand each other," Serendipity took on Judy's colors again, kicking back in the air by Karma's line of sight.
"...Just checking to make sure you were still here," Karma said with a quiet sincerity.
"Whatcha mean...?" Serendipity's colors washed out and she became white.
"You know," Karma said distantly. "Those 'worries' I shared with you."
"Oh, right," Serendipity nodded. "Yup, still here..." The bunny giggled faintly.
"Judy will shortly be leaving for Zootopia," Karma said, the statuesque canid standing tall on all fours, looking official. "Fortune seems to have favored her."
"I swear I haven't done anything else," Serendipity gave a meek, toothy grin, shrugging her shoulders.
"I believe you," Karma smirked. "Maybe there's something to bunnies being born lucky after all. I suppose we shall soon see if the Mammal Inclusion Initiative will protect her from the harsh realities of Zootopia."
"Harsh realities?" Serendipity repeated, her face becoming quizzical. "Zootopia's the most acceptin' place in the whole world!"
"And yet still plagued with injustice," Karma sighed, opening some astral windows to view a few instances of bullying that were happening right that moment. "I don't dare to hope that Judy will bring the change that could bring that justice to Zootopia."
"Why not?" Serendipity blinked. "As your exemplar-"
"-She's still a mortal, and still has the limitations inherent with being a bunny," Karma explained solidly. "Lionheart's mandate will not save her from prejudice or injustice. I... with what happened with Nick... I expect injustice to find her, and swiftly."
"Really..." Serendipity considered with a note of wonder. "Well... maybe everything'll be okay anyway. Wanna rub my feet for luck?" Serendipity kicked back again and wiggled her feet and toes.
"As far as 'luck' goes, Serendipity..." Karma scoffed with a wry grin, tossing her head back at her as she left the parlor, "you shouldn't push yours."
"Aw," Serendipity clicked her tongue and slashed a paw through the air.
Surrender's Sanctum, despite being in the Celestial Realm, appeared much like the sky. It was slowly, but constantly changing color to reflect the different natures of the sky, both in the day and night time. Surrender himself was often found here, his eyes closed in thought, meditation, or rest. It was often hard to tell which. The ram Order Celestial's "wool" looked ethereal and cloud-like. Wisps of it came loose as he sensed Acceleration zoom into his home.
"Hey, Surrender!" Acceleration said. "Got some news for you."
"Go on," Surrender said sleepily, opening his eyes. Again, this was hard to tell; his pupils were so flat, and his face fur so white, that it looked like his eyes were closed even when they were open.
"Judy Hopps is heading to Zootopia today!" Acceleration said cheerfully. "Soon she will be a part of the Zootopia Police Department!"
"...Interesting," Surrender replied in his tired, gentle-sounding voice. He stood up on his four feet, and his golden spiral horns vibrated with a dull ring, opening an astral window. He saw the train carrying Judy Hopps moving toward the large city of Zootopia. "A third exemplar moves to Zootopia. Three is the completion, it is the binding, as Karma would say."
"That's right," Acceleration nodded. "...Uh, does that mean anything important?"
"Karma's own exemplar," Surrender observed. "The avatar of justice moves to Zootopia. Will she meet with the avatar of happenstance? Will they be enough?"
"Enough for what?" Acceleration wondered.
Surrender did not reply, and instead merely closed the astral window he was peering through.
Acceleration's colorful pupils made an ellipses pattern across his eyes as he waited to either be explained to or dismissed. When neither happened, his tail whipped in impatience. "Ah, I don't know if you've ever really said who your own exemplar was."
Surrender turned to face Acceleration, looking up at the larger Celestial. He seemed to consider seriously before answering, although it also looked like he was spacing out.
"...Exemplars," Surrender said finally. "I've often wondered what their purpose was. I can accept their existence, as I can accept anything given enough time and information." Surrender's cloudy wool flowed more turbulently and started to darken, as if a storm cloud. "I have begun to wonder if the exemplars are meant to challenge us."
"The Celestials?" Acceleration returned. "What do you mean?"
"Exemplars are capable of anything a mortal can do," Surrender blinked slowly. "However, when they do what they are driven to do, they underscore just how vastly they can differentiate themselves from us. They can climb the highest mountain, yet they have just as far to fall."
"If I could actually read you, I'd say you were getting worked up," Acceleration's pupils drew question marks in his eyes.
"...I'm finding it difficult to accept my exemplar in this life, Acceleration," Surrender said calmly, though his wool started to boom with thunder. "I'm being tested."
"All right?" Acceleration laughed nervously. "Anything I can do to help?"
"I don't believe so," Surrender replied, laying down again. Slowly, his wool started to look fluffy and white again. "I will be at peace with the nature of things. What will be will be. Karma's exemplar is there. Serendipity's exemplar is there. The pieces are taking their positions on the board."
"For what, though?" Acceleration was intensely curious.
"Through fortunate occurrence, justice will be done," Surrender let out a long, focused breath. "Maybe then, acceptance will fall back into its ordered place in Zootopia. This I will hope for, and this will bring me placation."
"I guess that's all I'm getting out of you today, huh?" Acceleration's heart yearned for more information, but Surrender fell quiet, closing his eyes. The cheetah celestial sped off, and little wisps of white cloudy wool seemed to flit after him as Surrender attempted once more to find peace.