Hello, and welcome to a brand new story! This is an adaptation of H.G. Wells' classic science fiction novel, The War of The Worlds, as a retelling through the lens of Zootopia. Judy serves as the narrator of this story, similar to how Nick does in Futures Past, but unlike that fiction, this will be told entirely in first person.
Another fun fact that actually helped me to decide to write this in a certain way was learning that The War Of The Worlds has been in the public domain for the past 7 years. Don't expect me to just have changed names, because I still have to make this work with the characters, but that knowledge will certainly have influenced some of my creative decisions.
I also want to say a big thank you to the readers of the Zootopian Author's Association Discord server for going over these.
Disclaimer: Zootopia belongs to Disney. Based on and inspired by The War of the Worlds, written by H.G. Wells.
ZOOTOPIA: THE WAR OF THE WORLDS
ACT 1: THE COMING OF THE MARTIANS
CHAPTER 1: THE EVE OF THE WAR
Who would have thought that mammalkind was being watched from afar by an intelligence far colder and more calculating than any on Earth? That we were being examined as a scientist might examine something under a microscope. The mammals in our world went about their lives, sure that they were the most intelligent life. If you asked anybody about the possibility of life on other worlds, they would dismiss it as fiction. Or you would find the one mammal who would agree with the idea that aliens were coming to invade Earth. Those ones would usually spend the night in a cell. But their ramblings were not unjustified. And yet, across the vastness of space, envious eyes watched, unfeeling, unsympathetic. And soon, they began to draw their plans against us.
Who would have thought that the threat would come from our neighbour planet, Mars? For many years, we had been told that Mars was a dead world, a dust ball. Totally incapable of sustaining life. And yet, it was from Mars that proof would come that we were truly not alone in the universe. We weren't even alone in our own solar system.
As for who I am, and where I was before they came? I'm Judy Hopps, a rabbit. I was born in Bunnyburrow, and I moved to Zootopia to pursue my dream of making the world a better place, by becoming a police officer. By now, you all have heard that story many times, but you may not know what happened in the years since. My partner on the ZPD, a cunning, smart and sometimes-devious fox named Nick Wilde, became my life partner. It wasn't easy – some still frown on a predator and prey union – but things were about to happen that made our union a much less important issue.
Everybody remembers where they were the night that things changed forever. I was in Bunnyburrow, visiting my family. Nick couldn't come with me, since he had used up all his vacation time, but I had barely touched mine, so Chief Bogo made me take some leave. It was Nick's idea to go visit Mom and Dad and all my brothers and sisters. I remember that I was standing on the front veranda of our family home, looking out at the stars. I did miss the view – you don't get to see the stars shine so bright in Zootopia, with all its artificial light. And I did like the quiet that came with it. Even at night, Zootopia was moving. Out in Bunnyburrow, you could make out several of our neighbouring planets, from the biggest, such as Saturn and Jupiter, to the smallest, like Mercury and Mars.
Astronomy was both the career and a passion of Sharla, an old school friend of mine. When we were children, she had participated in one of my Carrot Days plays. Back then, she had said she would one day be an astronaut, and while she had not yet been selected to undertake a mission to space, she was still in ZASA (Zootopia Aeronautics and Space Administration). She showed me how to look for those planets in the night sky when we were teenagers. Back then, I didn't really appreciate the peace I got looking at the stars of an unpolluted sky. I guess I didn't really appreciate it until I moved to Zootopia. I didn't need to have it all the time, but it was nice on occasions like this.
That night, I could see Mars shining bright in the clear, night sky. At first, I didn't think anything of it. Maybe it was just a trick of the light, but then something seemed to flare from it, as if something was erupting from its surface. I was curious: what would cause that to happen? Meteor strike? A reflection of light from somewhere else? Or was it something else entirely? I resolved to ask Sharla, who had come back to town the previous day, about it in the morning. She would surely know if what I had seen meant anything.
The next morning, I visited Sharla's family home, across the other side of Bunnyburrow. I was welcomed in by her mother, and I found Sharla in her study, at her desk, writing. A telescope pointed out of the window. At this time of day, it was pretty much useless, but at night, Sharla would gaze upon the stars. Maybe she was dreaming of one day being in space. She had told me not long before that she was a while away from her goal.
"Hi, Judy," Sharla greeted me in her country drawl, looking up from whatever she was writing.
"Hi, Sharla! It's been a while!" I stepped forward, opening my arms slightly in an offer of a friendly hug.
"Sure has, hon," Sharla got up out of her chair and accepted my offer. "You enjoying being back home?"
"Yeah, as much as I love the city, it's nice to have some peace and quiet for a while," I replied, with a small laugh.
"Bet Nick's missin' you, though."
"I miss him too, but he did use all of his vacation, and my boss kinda made me go."
"No fun sittin' in that apartment all alone while your fox works, huh?"
"Guilty as charged. Coming out here for a few days was his idea. Bogo's got him working a few small cases while I'm gone, and we call each other every night."
Sharla nodded in understanding, and I decided to move to the topic that had caught my curiosity last night.
"Anyway, I was watching the stars last night," I led in to the topic. "And… I saw the strangest thing."
"Mars flashing?" Sharla raised an eyebrow.
"Yeah."
"Well, I saw it through my telescope," Sharla indicated to the instrument at her window. "It wasn't just flashin'. And ZASA said their spectrograms were pickin' somethin' up from the atmosphere."
"What was it?" I asked, growing more curious.
"A green mist, burstin' from the surface. I was actually loggin' down my observations when you turned up."
"A green mist? Maybe something there is signalling us?"
I made the suggestion in jest, but Sharla was versed enough to have encountered mammals who genuinely thought we were going to be invaded by some alien force from the stars.
"It's probably just impacts from a meteor strike on the surface of the planet," Sharla had said to me, in reassurance. "All ZASA's probes have ever found is evidence of it bein' a dead planet. The chances of anythin' livin' on Mars are a million to one."
Sharla turned away from me and looked out of the window.
"Then again, we did lose two rovers recently," she continued. "Which would make sense if they got caught in meteor strikes."
Sharla turned back to her desk, opened a drawer, fished out a small, paw-held telescope and passed it to me.
"Um… thanks?" I said, uncertain of why she was giving this to me. I liked to look at the night sky, but that hardly made me a celestial cartographer.
"We could wait until tonight and look through my telescope, but I've got a report to write so I wouldn't be much company," Sharla said. "At least you can see it for yourself with that."
"Thank you," I said, sincerely meaning it this time.
Curiosity brought me back out to the veranda that night, gazing once again at the stars. And, once again, I saw flashes of something from Mars. Sharla's gift to me was in my paws. It certainly wasn't as powerful as the one she had in her room, but it would be enough to take a closer look at whatever was out there. I focused on Mars, and I could see it for myself: a green mist coming from the planet's surface, streaking across the sky.
The first night it happened, I just set it aside as some strange thing. But then it happened again the next night.
Every night, for four nights straight, the surface of Mars flared brightly for a moment, like something was erupting from its surface. And what followed that flare was the green mist, flying across the sky, but also towards Earth. Towards us. It was beautiful, in a really haunting kind of way. I wondered if this could even be seen from the city.
On the fifth night, my thoughts turned to Nick – in my curiosity to see just what was in the night sky, I hadn't called him that day at all, nor had I talked to him about what I was seeing. So, I put the telescope down and fished my cellphone from my jeans pocket. Unlocking it, I took a moment to admire the background picture I had chosen – it was of me and Nick following the ceremony where he officially became a member of the ZPD. I flicked through my contacts and found the one I was looking for – 'Slick' – and hit the call button. For a few seconds, the sound of the ringback tone broke the sound of the night time silence. Then the screen changed and Nick's face appeared.
"Hey, honeybun," he greeted me with his usual sly grin. "Calling kind of late, aren't you? I was beginning to think something had happened, like a carrot-related accident."
"Har-har," I answered back. "Been lonely without me?"
"Nah, I got this to keep me company," Nick hoisted up a plush rabbit that was wearing a makeshift ZPD uniform. "She's a great listener, but she doesn't talk much."
"I guess she's not a perfect replacement," I grinned lightly.
"That she isn't, Carrots."
"So, any… uh… weird ones while I'm away?"
"You called just to talk shop? And here I thought you wanted to see my handsome face. You wound me, Carrots."
"Har-har."
"Just the usual, you know. Why do you ask?"
"Oh, just… something in the skies over here."
"Oh yeah. I forgot you liked to look at the stars when you're visiting there. What are we talking? Aliens?"
"Something from Mars, definitely. Probably nothing. Sharla says – you remember Sharla, right? Anyway, she says it's probably just debris from a meteor strike."
"Then that's probably all it is, but I appreciate the warning. If anybody here sees that, we'll have a few crazies pop up screaming about alien invasions and the end of the world. You know how it is."
"Sure do."
Despite my assurances, I was sure that Nick knew I couldn't help but feel that something was up.
"Hey, Carrots? You okay?"
"Uh, yeah. I'm fine. Probably just tired. I should get some sleep. I'll call you in the morning."
"You sure?"
"I'm fine, Nick. Really. I'll call tomorrow."
"Night, then, Carrots."
"Night, Nick."
That foreboding feeling didn't cease. I wanted everything to be okay, but I knew that the green flares from Mars meant something, and that it probably wasn't anything good.
For the next five nights, the same thing happened again, and again. A green flare shot out from Mars every night. Even the news was starting to pick up on it. ZNN were broadcasting images of the green flares sent in by viewers, captured on their own devices. Luckily, they had come to their own conclusions – instead of imminent alien invasion, these were just the effects of previously-unknown volcanoes on Mars, belching their rocks into space. ZASA had issued statements cautioning against drawing conclusions before they could properly investigate, but when has that ever stopped anybody?
On one of those nights, I walked around Bunnyburrow with my parents. We weren't the only ones who were out that night. They walked about, carefree, likely not even thinking about the strange things in the sky. The train that ran from Podunk through Bunnyburrow, Ottershaw, Badgerburrow and then on to Zootopia, trundled on as usual. The skies had mostly returned to their undisturbed state, though that night, cloud had obscured the stars and the approaching green mists. It was a warm night. As we returned home, we saw windows of many homes lit up, their occupants carrying on as they would usually. It seemed so normal, so safe, so peaceful.
After the tenth night, those flares stopped. Nobody knew why. ZNN speculated that whatever volcanic activity had been occurring had finally ceased.
And that ends the first chapter of Zootopia: The War Of The Worlds! What do you guys think? Be sure to let me know by leaving a review.
To avoid confusion here, while I do take some inspiration from Jeff Wayne's musical version, more than the lion's share of this is based directly upon the novel. The roles are based directly upon the novel thus:
-Judy, analogous to the narrator
-Nick, analogous to the narrator's spouse
-Sharla, analogous to Ogilvy the astronomer
The other analogues will become clearer when future chapters are posted.
I'll be aiming to post the next chapter soon, likely within the next week as I work on the chapters following on, as at the time of this posting I'm currently writing chapter 4. I'll be updating this story in a different manner to my other stories, with a buffer of chapters between the one I'm writing and the one that's posted. My aim is to post in a manner so that I'm no less than two chapters ahead, and I'll be adopting a weekly schedule within that. With that out of the way, I'll see you next week!