Chapter 59: Impending Changes

Phone Recording 02241989-1953-TH

DOC: 24 FEB (Friday) 1989.

EXTRACTED: 01 JUN 1989.

-TRANSCRIPT START-

Corporal Nana Weston: General Blackwater's office, how can I assist?

Professor Utonium: Utonium here. Get me General Blackwater. Now.

Corporal Nana Weston: Yes sir, but before I do that… Thanks again. (Sincerely)

Professor Utonium: For what?

Corporal Nana Weston: For everything.

Professor Utonium: Can you be more specific?

Corporal Nana Weston: Transferring… now.

Professor Utonium: Nevermind, then.

(General beeping on the phone as the line is being transferred)

General Blackwater: General Blackwater here. What is it?

Professor Utonium: It's about the Girls, all four of them-

General Blackwater: What now, Utonium!? Unlike some people, we here in the security branch of the USDO don't have the luxury of dilly-dallying around playing house like some little schoolgirl!

Professor Utonium: I- (defeated sigh) I would like to request that Project Powerpuff be shut down tomorrow for a day.

General Blackwater: What for!? Did Bubbles go nuts again!? Keep that bitch on a leash! Aren't you supposed to be good at that!?

Professor Utonium: Uh- no. Please don't talk about my… daughter that way. We've been planning a wedding photoshoot. We were going to put it off until next week and then you showed up, asking to take Bunny away. I want the four of them present for the photos.

General Blackwater: Shit, two of you are really tying the knot huh?

Professor Utonium: Yes. It'll also be a bit of a send-off party for Bunny. You're… coming in the morning on Sunday, are you? You military types usually do it early.

General Blackwater: Haven't heard a compliment from you in a long time, Upton. Five in the morning, sharp. I've already sent Selicia a message about it. Get Bunny ready by then.

Professor Utonium: (mumbles discontentedly) Well, at least Bunny didn't need much sleep…

General Blackwater: Can you say again?

Professor Utonium: I discovered last night that she seems to need less sleep compared to baseline human beings. About four hours, more or less. I did this by monitoring the level of Melatonin production in her body when she woke me up at midnight. I suspected it right away - I've also-

General Blackwater: Okay, cut the crap. You got your permission. They're off the hook tomorrow. Just know that you're sacrificing lives - the lives of courageous heroes - for your selfish, inconsequential gains by doing this, Professor Utonium. Congratulations, by the way. (Hangs up loudly)

Professor Utonium: (Barking) Then why are you even agreeing to it!? It's not like I… (Pauses, before hanging up)

-TRANSCRIPT END-

The City of Townsville. Uptown. En route to Polaski's Bridal Emporium

25 FEB (Saturday) 1989. 1427.

Happiness. By the twenty-fifth of February, 1989, the only person in the family salon heading into Townsville's more reputable district who could still feel pure, unadulterated happiness was Bunny. Professor Utonium couldn't feel it without fearing that he would lose it. Sergeant Selicia, with Bubbles and Blossom in the same car as her, couldn't feel it in its entirety when she had doubts about certain members of her own family. Blossom and Bubbles had acquired one too many demons from their crime-fighting career, and their family life was hardly ideal. Buttercup was still unsure if she could indulge in her… obsessions. Too many times had she been caught and blocked from doing what she wished, just because people had some petty differences with her!

Bunny, on the other hand, was all smiles, and it was only mere hours ago that she could think of a cause to be happy about. The morning was one of those few times when she got to play with her sisters.

Despite jealousy mounting in Blossom and Buttercup, they were still able to put it aside and have fun with her. Bubbles, unlike her fellow elder sisters, couldn't find any reason against treating Bunny like either of her other sisters. Blossom thought that she was wrong to be jealous of Bunny - just that the feeling was nigh-impossible to fight off. The fun had served to distract her from it. Buttercup, on the other hand, needed another body for some play-wrestling - and Bunny provided more than a challenge. In due time, she thought Bunny would make a good punchbag in unarmed combat training, as Bubbles could no longer fill that role owing to her new-found confidence in fighting.

'Bunny loves Blossom!' she had declared while she was playing with blocks together with Blossom.

'I love you too,' Blossom had replied - and found it surprising that jealousy and love could co-exist side by side.

'Bunny loves Bubbles!' she would go on to declare further. 'Bunny loves Buttercup!'

'Oh brother…' Buttercup had mumbled to herself, as she didn't like mushy stuff like that, much less from someone who took Mom and Dad's attention away from her.

But most importantly, Blossom had tried to teach Bunny about pronouns - such as referring to oneself as 'I' and the other person as 'you'.

'Bunny loves Blossom!' Bunny would erupt in a fit of giggles again, with Blossom's lesson on grammar unheeded.

The rest of the day went by uneventfully - they went to the studio of the bridal emporium, got dressed and took photos. The dressing up bit took the better part of an hour, especially on the part of the girls - adult and children - due to the bridal gown for Selicia and the make-up for all of them. The photography took even longer, as the session wasn't restricted to the backdrop available in the emporium's photography studio. They went all around Townsville for the best locales, much to Buttercup's irritation. Bunny got a little cranky - she was too young to understand what was going on, too young to understand the significance of the traveling and picture snapping. Unlike Buttercup, however, Bunny was easily placated by finger games and learning new words from the professor's educational card set.

Townsville Tribune Extract 25 FEB 1989

TOWNSVILLE SLUM MASSACRE

The Townsville slums is the city's shameful underbelly of civil neglect and crime. It is a dirty place full of drugs and illicit activities, where people go to get murdered, where criminals go to murder. This has been a reality for over a decade, and for over a decade, the police have ceased patrolling the district as their fatality rate and casualties couldn't justify what little effect they have in preserving law and order in the area. Crime has since largely gone unreported in the area.

But when it is, it has to be done in person, and it tends to be big. 24 February, Friday (yesterday) was one of those days when it happened. At approximately 9:50am yesterday, four officers on guard duty by a road leading into the slums were approached by a stranger, who was later identified as one of the Slum's more upstanding denizens (his name is withheld to protect his identity).

Townsville's very own Robin Hood and his merry band are dead. Don Exposito and eight others, which includes his closest lieutenants and advisors, were reported to have been shot dead in their own den, a dilapidated apartment building not too far from one of the roads leading into the shinier parts of Townsville.

While he was the leader of one of over two hundred criminal gangs operating in Townsville, the Exposito Crime Family, Don Exposito, is also known to be unusually divisive a personality where other crime bosses usually inspire hatred and fear from the more law-abiding citizens of Townsville. This is due to his modus operandi - which involves highly complex, intelligent and well-thought-out white-collar crimes, extortion rackets aimed at large corporations and drugs targeting the richer demography in the region. His murder victims consist mainly of people who are said to deserve death - rival gang members, corrupt city and law enforcement officials, and street criminals with loose morals.

Part of the reason why his death had, and has, inspired an outpouring of sympathy was due to where a significant fraction of his earnings go to - it is by no coincidence that, although his headquarter is situated in the slums, he rarely subjects the inhabitants of the slum to his unlawful activities. Quite the opposite, he is well known for organizing charity buffets, putting up shelters and inviting medical professionals, sometimes pro bono and sometimes paid out of his pockets, into the slums to treat the people there. Even Mayor Wilford, the current incumbent of the city, had shared a few kind words about him, despite their stark differences and positions on the law and order spectrum.

However, Don Exposito is not without his detractors. Numerous experts believe that he is simply a more capable hypocrite than others of his ilk and that his charity work serves merely as smoke and mirrors to his criminal enterprise. By providing for his immediate community, he is bribing Townsville for moral capital, winning supporters among the poor in the Slums, and ensuring that people become dependent on him such that the idea of getting rid of him becomes unthinkable. It is possible that he owes the continued existence of his gang - which still numbers dozens strong - to this tactic.

Whatever the case may be, it didn't last. The police have occupied the Exposito headquarters in force to conduct an investigation. Their spokesperson has revealed that the Exposito top members were killed by gunshots - making it likely that a rival gang has dispatched them. Due to the nature of the Slums, witnesses are not forthcoming, and as far as they know, everyone at the scene has been killed - even the harmless women and children, who were gunned down outside the apartment building where Don Exposito and his top men were killed.

A funeral is currently being organized by relatives of the Exposito family, with hundreds said to have already accepted the invitation.

The City of Townsville. Suburbs. The House.

25 FEB (Saturday) 1989. 2041.

Bunny was standing next to the railing of the House's balcony, staring out into the vast world, taking in the suburbia. It was all new to her - just a day earlier, she wouldn't even have known that there was a world outside the House. Back then, the world was just the House and her family, and that was more than enough.

And now… Now she knew that the world was a much bigger place, but it wasn't all good, not like the House and her family. Her Dad had told her what was going to happen tomorrow, and she didn't want any part of it. All she ever wanted - all she ever needed, was to stay in the House, with her family.

Ten minutes ago, Professor Utonium had brought her into his office alone to speak to her about this. They were seated around the lounging area where Psychiatrist Alice would usually counsel her elder sisters.

'Bunny, I'll be blunt about this,' he had said to her after making sure she was listening. 'Someone's coming to take you away tomorrow, Bunny.'

'Bunny going out tomorrow?' Bunny had tried her best to explain what she understood - which was little. The only reason she was ever brought out of the House thus far was to get new things or do something with her family.

'No, Bunny, I'm afraid not,' the professor tried again to explain. It was agonizing enough the first time; he didn't know how he could take trying to tell his fourth daughter about something as serious and terrible as this. 'You're leaving this place tomorrow, Bunny.'

'Bunny leave?' she hinted at some level of understanding, but at this rate, she was already what normal people would consider shockingly intelligent for someone born a few days ago. As it slowly dawned on her what the professor meant, her eyes grew wide and her face had screwed up in sadness as she was about to cry.

'Yes, I'm afraid so. But it'll only be for three days… and you'll meet some new people…' the professor tried to make it sound better, even though he knew that there was little good in what was in store for Bunny next.

'Bunny wanna stay…' the physically eight-year-old said anxiously. She could feel it in her guts - an almost painful sensation, drowning her. A sense of helplessness, a perversion of the security she felt with her Dad.

'I'm afraid that's not possible,' the professor had said, shaking his head. He looked upset, and Bunny knew what it meant - if her Dad was so clearly upset, it could only mean there were bad things. He then looked up at her, forcing him to smile, but Bunny had become quite adept at reading human expressions. 'You'll meet new people and learn new things. You're going to become like Blossom, Bubbles, and Buttercup. You remember them, do you? How cool they look when they're going out to help people? You're going to be as good as they are, and even better.'

'No! Bunny wanna stay!' Bunny had screamed so shrilly, her voice had gone from low to relatively high-pitched. The professor had to cover his ears, and even then, there was ringing in it after Bunny's outburst. And she wasn't stopping: 'Bunny wanna stay! Bunny WANNA STAY!'

Bunny had started crying unrestrained, melting down dangerously and her couch was already feeling it as she was pounding on it.

'Bunny, it's not going to be that bad - you have to trust Dad!' the professor got off his couch and reached out for her only for Bunny to slap his hand away and scramble over her couch and to the door. She'd run, and that was how she ended up at the balcony, winning herself some time to be alone, and imagine that her Dad's plan did not exist.

It took Professor Utonium some time to find her. Five minutes to ten, all the while afraid that she had run off, which would make things a whole lot worse for everyone.

"Bunny, you really shouldn't run off like that," the professor said to her while he was stepping into the balcony, trying to keep his tone as far away from reprimanding as possible. It wasn't something Bunny needed nor deserved. "You know how much slower I am, so I can't hope to catch up with you." The professor laughed briefly after that, remembering that even the industrial treadmill in the lab - meant for testing vehicles - couldn't keep up with her.

Bunny, however, remained stubbornly unresponsive, sulking at the railing of the balcony as she looked out into the horizon. The professor put a hand on her shoulder. At first, she seemed to shrink away from his touch but undid her action shortly after that. The professor took a peek at her from the side; she was crying, predictably but understandably. The impending change would have reduced anyone to tears, part of the reason why forced military service was lifted in most countries, except the ones that cared little for human rights.

"Bunny wants to stay," Bunny uttered with her arms crossed. Everything she knew - her entire life - had been The House and her family, and she knew nothing but joy here. Anything with a big unknown in it couldn't compare to this. Change was bad if one was in paradise.

"I know, I want you to stay too," the professor said. He understood exactly why she would react this way if her joy earlier today was any indication. They had a farewell dinner for Bunny before this, not that Bunny knew that it was a farewell dinner. They had ordered whatever they wanted, and it didn't matter if there was too much food. For someone who hadn't experienced a wide variety of culinary creations, it was just as much a time for gastronomic exploration.

They had presents for her too. The professor had given her a massive illustrated encyclopedia - it was a good thing weight was not an issue for Bunny. Selicia got her a set of replica guns (no doubt to secretly desensitize her to the real thing, and get her to learn a little about how they function before her training began in earnest). Even her elder sisters were in on it. Blossom gave Bunny her favorite fairy tale picture book, while Buttercup gave up her boxing gloves (with much convincing from Blossom), not that she had been using those anymore. Bubbles had actually reached a new peak in her artistic pursuits for her sake, sewing up a big carrot pillow for her. Though it was crude compared to manufactured pillows, Bunny really liked it, and it'd made the origin of her name a talking point during the farewell party.

"I want you to stay… so much, Bunny," the professor repeated. As much as he disagreed with General Blackwater and the USDO's methods, he remembered his own stakes in the creation of his fourth adopted daughter. It had to be done. "But you need to go. Your sisters need your help, and the people you're going to meet tomorrow will teach you everything you need to know to help them."

"Bunny knows…" the enhanced girl said, her voice cracking. She then hugged her Dad, and Dad hugged her back. "Bunny scared…"

"Mom will be there with you," the professor comforted her. "She'll be there for you."

"But Bunny wants Daddy," she said. The professor thought it disconcerting that she had shown a preference for him over Selicia, but in light of Bunny's crisis in the huge, impending change in her life, he couldn't bear to bring it up.

"Mom will take care of you," he simply said.