Mouseusian
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"Hey, let me stroke under…"
You slap the paw away, forcing it out from beneath the hard band of plastic. You can't stand it, you can't stand that it, they, treat you like this! Even those on 'your side', who say it's unfair and stand by you, comfort you, even with something as simple as a gentle paw stroke under your collar.
You hate how it makes you seem like a freak, an outcast, a thing to be observed and talked about as if you're not there, not belonging in modern society. You never asked for this or wanted this, you were a good mammal on their side once but that counts for nothing anymore! Because, even as you feel the heavy shock unit pull back down and the electrodes pinch back in, you hate how everyone else sees this as a win, a good thing, even more. And you hate how your love was never on that side, never the one that needed convincing, but acts like their actions can simply undo and fix everything. You hate the overcompensation, you hate how demeaned you feel every single day, you hate how you're marked as an other and you hate, hate, hate how everyone you once helped to serve and protect has turned against you.
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"Listen," Nick spoke, paws up. "We need you to calm down. Nobody wants to go home hungry tonight, and fighting isn't going to help anyone."
Judy nodded, surveying the scene in front of her. She'd never experienced food shortages before, and it was something that she never wanted to experience again. In front of her were hordes of angry mammals, prey and grazers, mostly smaller ones but a few larger ones too. A pair of elephants dominated the room, their ration cards held out and their tensions burning after a whole day of queuing. She thanked her lucky stars that her family could still send her food packages from their bountiful fields.
"I don't care!" a sheep shouted. "You have it easy, you preds still have the fish markets. You don't know what it's like."
Nick bit his tongue. Though his habits led to jokes that he was vegetarian, the truth was he'd grown up poor, and his mother's job at a school cafeteria meant there were plenty of leftovers, most of them for a ninety percent prey clientele. His omnivority had been pushed to it fullest, and years after it still felt awkward eating a meal with more than one third meat or fish. Needs must as the devil drove though. With plants and grains running low, and even the leftovers sent to bug farms now sold as mixed forage, all fishing restrictions had been lifted, and he'd had to adapt to a fully marine diet. Still, he was smart enough to know that complaining about that to a room full of mammals with empty stomachs was a bad move. "No, I don't," he spoke. "We'll just have to split it all further so that we all get some."
They all looked at him furiously.
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You're sorry. You lashed out. You hold on tighter and the emotions begin to come out, and before you know it a horrid beep emerges. You try and stop yourself, clear your wrong-think, but it's too late. The electric shock doesn't last long, it isn't designed to have you writhing on the floor. It's over in a screaming, pain saturated moment, and you hear a scream as your claws dig in hard to the one trying to comfort you. You kick off, running away, hating yourself even more as you lock yourself in the bathroom. You just want to remain strong, but it's too much. You're down, leaning on the toilet lid and whacking your head against the cistern over and over. It's just… it's just… it's just not fair!
And you hate the one biggest fact out there more than any other.
The fact that so many think it is fair.
More than that.
It's your just desserts, so long overdue.
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"I'm sick of it!" a marmot yelled. "I haven't eaten in two days! Neither have my pups. We don't have a garden! We even filled our rooms with lettuce plants, but they've run out too! We're starving, I've been told a store is out after hours of queuing for the last week! We deserve our full portion!"
He held up his book and a flock of shouts and calls were yelled out. Nick looked around, not sure how to react and just hoping that the anger would fizzle out. Judy knew it wouldn't. Everyone had been given growing pots, soil and lettuce seeds, it had held out over summer but now, in early February, the new growth hadn't yet started and the reserves were almost gone. The only temporary reprieve they'd be getting would be when the new shoots began to emerge.
"Listen," the clerk said, trying to take control. He looked up at the elephant family apologetically. "I'm sorry."
"What?" one of them gasped. "Oh no, not this."
"Listen, your portion is enough to feed everyone else."
"Don't you dare!" she yelled, marching forward. Nick and Judy had their paws on their tranq's, arms out as they called at her to calm down. "No!" she yelled, tears in her eyes. "Everyone keeps turning us away, 'we eat too much', 'we eat too much'. Well, we pay the most for food, don't we! We have rights too!"
"The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few," the marmot spoke. "There's a hundred of us, two of you, I'm sorry."
She snapped around. "Oh no you're not!"
"I am! I just want my pups fed!"
"And I don't!?"
"Do you have any?"
"No! But that doesn't mean I should starve, does it?"
"We don't want to starve either," a squirrel said.
"Oh shut up," someone else shouted. "You have acorns…"
"They're gone, ages ago," she cried out. "Everyone's eating everything!"
"Maybe you should have just hibernated and left more for everyone else."
"I can't! We couldn't get our stores together," she screamed. "And I hate it, I feel terrible, I…"
"Oh boo-hoo."
"Shut up!"
"No, you shut up. Now get lost with the elephants so we can be fed!"
"You sizeist little jerk!"
"You want a fight, huh, I'll give you a…"
"EVERYONE! SHUT UP!"
They all turned, spotting Judy on the counter, tears in her eyes. "Please. We're Zootopians. All mammals, together. Yes, I know it's rough, I know it's horrible, but if we start tearing ourselves apart over this, that's it. That's the end. Yes, we're all going to suffer. But we'll suffer together. And we'll get through this, together."
There was a long pause, a tiny smile growing on her face; she'd done it. They were going to get through this.
A goat marched out. "You can hardly take the high ground."
She blinked, "huh…"
"Don't huh me! You're the reason we're in this mess."
Judy scowled. "No I'm not, it's…"
"It's all you bunnies breeding and breeding," someone shouted. "There's no food left for the rest of us."
"Hey, my family grows tons of food."
"Yeah, for their millions of kits," someone yelled.
"Stupid breeders."
"Food hoarders!"
"Leave some for the rest of us, you sex addicts."
That did it for a certain fox. "Hey, leave her alone!" he shouted, marching in to defend Judy. He was met with a wave of angry calls, but he stood tall throughout. "This is nobodies' fault, bad stuff happens, that's life…"
"We don't have crazy families, that's life!"
"Who even needs a thousand kids."
"She doesn't have any," Nick spoke, hissing.
"Yeah," she added, finding her resolve again. "And my parents only have three hundred and twenty."
Her assurances though only angered the angry shoppers. "See! You don't even think about it!" "Selfish!" "Food hoarders!"
They surged forward, no longer after the food anymore. Judy felt her stomach drop through the floor as she realised they were after her, their hunger now a thirst for revenge. She retreated, firing off some darts with Nick as they fled. Not before a chunk of shelf was thrown their way. Nick shielded her, taking the hit direct to the muzzle, because of course he would, the dumb fox.
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You softly stroke along his long, sleek muzzle, pausing as you hear the warning beep come on. You hate it, you push away, you bury your face in the pillow. "Judy," he says. You don't answer. It didn't pick up at first, maybe because everyone was too busy scrounging and surviving. But, as the crops began growing and summer came around, prey mammals, in between eating every last scrap and picking the new grass and leaves from the parks, began thinking the same way. That winter had been close, it was only going to get worse, even for the preds when the current overfishing caught up. Something had to be done.
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"I mean the thing is we didn't have a bad harvest that year." They watched an investigative report. "A little lower than normal, but nothing serious. Indeed, come next year, now that restrictions on chemical use, environmental protections and the banning of organic production have come into play, it could be a bumper year. That's not including the massive expansion of home growing. Inefficient, yes, but better than nothing. The reason for the famine was not supply, it was demand. He switched to another chart, Nick choking on his drink. It seemed practically vertical. Last year, the country saw a growth rate of fifty percent. Over 150 million new mammals. This entire growth was confined to just one species."
"No," Judy scowled, scanning for the remote.
"One who controls much of the agricultural sector. Indeed, while total harvests were solid, the amount being sold to private retailers was reduced by eighty percent, as bunnies kept their own food or redistributed it to their own species."
"No!" She yelled again, Nick having to grab her as she leapt to the screen. "You speciesist…" She trailed on with a string of bunny profanities that would have her mother trying to work out how to stick her mouth in the dishwasher.
"This is nothing new," he spoke, shaking his head. "Thomas Mouseus warned that exactly this situation would come in the 16th Century! Once the mixxie vaccine was completed, it was inevitable, and though unpalatable we as a society are facing a reckoning. Bunnies, or the rest of us. Oppression for one or starvation for all."
She finally found the remote and slammed the off button at the TV. It turned off and she fumed, she complained, and Nick listened. She called her parents, who were mad too. How dare they tell them what to do with their farm. How dare they!
Besides, all mammals would see through this, wouldn't they?
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You hate how they didn't. You remember the stares at first, then the slurs, then finding that your care packages were being stolen. No, 'redistributed'. One day you walked out to see the whole floor picking through it, taking your carrots for themselves. You demanded them back, saying you were a cop, expecting some laughter and ridicule.
Instead you got hate.
A week later, a state of emergency was declared. 'Bunny breeding has to stop!' A law was put out, one that made you and your family mad. All new bunny pregnancies were illegal, they'd be aborted, families who tried to bypass that would be thrown into prison. It was wrong, it was sick, you stood up in front of the bullpen and said what should have been obvious. Your brothers in blue would defend you, wouldn't they?
It broke your heart as they said sorry… 'Sorry', it had to be done. 'Sorry', one species couldn't just take all the food. 'Sorry', bunnies should stop being such crazy breeders…
You were broken, you almost quit then but the Chief gave you a week off. By the time you were back, you were hearing about raids and check-ups, seeing pictures of crying bunnies being forced into the clinics. You threw your badge down in disgust. Nick did too, saying you weren't going to be alone through this.
That was the first time you were truly mad at him. He should be doing it because it was wrong, it was clear that it was wrong! Didn't he see how wrong it was? He said he saw, but he couldn't think of another way. And that hurt you as, that night, fuming and angry, you couldn't.
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"While heavily depressed, the population is still going up too fast. Bunnies are still breeding in secret…"
"Having families in secret," she spat. "As you want to kill them."
"And will not consent to reduction procedures and fixing."
She hated those terms too. It was thinning out the litters while zygotes still in utero to only two kits, then tearing the parents sex organs so that was that. She may be unique, a career driven bunny, but… But she got those instincts, mixed in with those that cared, and loved. It was what made her a mammal!
"Even with the farms nationalised, their occupants stopped from ration dodging, a truly deadly famine could hit within the next decade…" Yeah, they took over her parents farm too. They were keeping their food in protest of the evil treatment. They stole the farm in return, forcing them to work their own land, while for the 'survival of all other species', a minority now, bunnies had been stripped of the vote to stop any chance of reversing it. She was officially a second class citizen.
"Consequently, it has been decided that a terrible thing must be done." Judy froze, her nose twitching. "For the survival of all mammal kind, bunnies' uncontrolled sexual instincts must be tamed. As a result, by the end of the year, all un-fixed bunnies over the age of twelve will be fitted with a Taming Collar."
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It's late, and you look at the heavy thing, tied around your neck and glowing green. It's meant to control your lust and libido, but in your kind, that's so mixed up with caring and love… It all triggers it. And outside, they all see it on you, your badge of shame, and they knock you around or dismiss you. It's for society's own good, it's for your own good, now go back to your place… And getting fixed and going without… Back at the precinct, half the workload is now collar enforcement, half of that bare-necks being falsely accused. A good few are 'rightfully' accused, forging documents or dodging the rollout, and they're now filling up the prisons. Ten of your family are now behind bars for a decade or more, with two young orphan litters in your parent's care, though you can see the light has gone out of their eyes.
You hate the collars, you hate the world, you hate Zootopia, you hate the mammals who labelled your species the problem, and deserving of this, and… and… You break down crying, Nick's hugs doing nothing.
You hate your species, you hate yourself, and you hate the scenes in the livestream. They're looking at the Bunnyburrow sign, waiting for something they had to check it could even do. The counter slows down to a stop and then, painfully slowly, ticks back one, to a roar of applause. You hate the fireworks going off at the news that the birth rate is under control. Strict rationing will be a part of life for decades to come, the collars far longer, but the food shortage is over.
Things for everyone else are going to be alright.
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A plot bunny I had and wrote in one day. Kudos to Berserker88 for suggesting the scene with the BB sign. Sorry for all the darkness as of late. I'll post a few more (lighter) commission stories up next.