Chapter Text
The Meadowlands District; A part of Zootopia that runs along the mountainous northwestern coast of the great lake where Zootopia connects to the mainland, and through several tunnels, stretches into the great hilly and grassy plains beyond the mountain range… A place that due to its more forgiving temperate climate is full of Sheep and Goats and Horses and other such herd mammals, as well as the largest population in the region of the species who are referred to as the “Domestic” species.
It is a place that never quite manages to make it onto any postcards, or onto anyone’s list of “must-see” destinations when they travel to Zootopia in search of a good time… A place where the most exciting thing to happen to it is usually the occasional tourist who accidentally stumbles in after getting lost in the Rainforest District…
However, the Meadowlands District, for all its lack of anything memorable or mind-blowingly special, is actually a nice little place to raise a family... Crime is lower, life is slower, and most of the mammals there, despite a certain strangeness in their disposition, are actually decent folk… Even most Sheep, many of whom had supported Bellwether during her three-month Mayorship, had actually been surprised by the extent of her specist policies, and had been quick to go back to friendly terms with their predator neighbors once the famous Rabbit Officer Judy Hopps and her Fox companion Nick Wilde exposed the conspiracy of Bellwether and her accomplices.
Despite all its problems, there is no place in all of Zootopia that is QUITE as peaceful as the Meadowlands generally are…
If only that peace could be FELT by one little Russian Blue Cat who lives in a tiny blue house beyond the mountain range, in one of the larger suburbs of the Meadowlands District known as “Elkmore”, and who’s every day was filled with the exact OPPOSITE of peace…
A little something that her life CHOICES had given her, for better, and SO much worse…
A TERRIBLE little something called…
FAMILY.
… … …
... ... ...
‘It was a day like any other… By which I mean just as terrible as the rest.’ Thought the Russian Blue Cat as she narrated to herself the misery of her day in an effort to distract herself from all the stresses that she was under…
And Nicole Watterson was a VERY stressed Cat.
She was a Queen* who worked six days a week, had to be up at six thirty, shower, get ready, and be to work in the big city by nine… Through rush-hour traffic through TWO large tunnels, through the Rainforest District and its winding canopy roads, and then across the city’s west side to the Rainbow Inc. Factory in Zootopia’s Industrial Park… There to spend all the nice hours of the day at a desk without bathroom breaks or paid overtime, writing reports and taking telephone and Zmail complaints either from clients trying to get their money back, locals complaining about how the factory was polluting the entire region WAY past any levels of sanity, or her bosses who insisted that the factory was not producing enough when they slowed production to squeak past inspection… All of them YELLING at HER as if there was anything SHE could do about it ANYWAYS…
(*Queen = Female Cat who has had Kittens.)
But such was her burden for being stuck in the complaints department. It was a vicious cycle, and no one ever won… But it always somehow managed to feel like she had still LOST…
However, Nicole was a tough cookie, and had that been the extent of it, she would have been ok… Not HAPPY, but manageable. She had dealt with work and the stresses involved for many years now, because she HAD to…
The PROBLEM, then, was if all THAT wasn’t bad enough, she was ALSO a WIFE and MOTHER in a household that shuddered in dread at the thought of a quiet night in, apparently.
“WE-WANT-FOOD!!! WE-WANT-FOOD!!!”
“WE-WANT-FOOD!!! WE-WANT-FOOD!!!”
“WE-WANT-FOOD!!! WE-WANT-FOOD!!!” came the battle-chants of the three little gremlins that were her children as they beat their cutlery against the table like drummers inciting the slaves of an ancient Trireme to row at war-speed. It seemed to have the same effect too, as she found her arm stirring the soup she was making at the same breakneck pace as the beating of her “Kitten’s” forks and knives.
‘All I wanted was for us to behave like a NORMAL, CIVILIZED family at mealtimes…’
“WE-WANT-FOOD!!! WE-WANT-FOOD!!!”
“WE-WANT-FOOD!!! WE-WANT-FOOD!!!”
“WE-WANT-FOOD!!! WE-WANT-FOOD!!!”
*sigh* ‘I might as well have wished for it to rain PANCAKES…’ she thought as she had to make a physical effort to break her arm out of rhythm of the “Kitten’s” beating war drums… The soup was splashing everywhere as it was, and if she didn’t stop now they wouldn’t be HAVING soup tonight… Goodness knew the REST of tonight’s meal was ruined, thanks to a CERTAIN unhelpful---
A pancake suddenly slapped the top of her head, jolting her from her thoughts and her stirring as it slid halfway down her face, and after a moment of completely blanking out at the absurdity of a PANCAKE falling from the ceiling, she looked up, and realized that it was just another Friday.
‘And NOT just the ones the Kittens made for breakfast…’ she thought despondently.
The “Kittens” were so poorly supervised at home that she sometimes imagined that nothing would change if she were a SINGLE mother…
“WE-WANT-FOOD!!! WE-WANT-FOOD!!!”
“WE-WANT-FOOD!!! WE-WANT-FOOD!!!”
“WE-WANT-FOOD!!! WE-WANT-FOOD!!!” the chanting continued unrelenting, causing a CERTAIN feeling to begin building in her gut… A feeling that, when expressed through Nicole Watterson, tended to leave others quaking in fear, holding their loved ones desperately, and praying that she would pass over them alive…
She needed a break.
“KITS, PLEASE!” came a high-pitched shout from her MUCH larger husband, Richard, a Flemish Giant Rabbit with pinkish-white fur, and about as tall as a Fox. (And probably as heavy as a Pig…) He leaned heavily over the little bar that separated the tiny kitchen from the tiny dining room, glaring at his unruly children, and they all went silent in fear of reprimanding.
Feeling a touch of relief at the sudden silence, she began stirring her soup again, and was about to thank her mate for his help…
But then he opened his mouth again…
“It needs to be way louder to have any effect.” He explained to the “Kittens” before he began slamming his huge fists against the bar and shouting loudly, “WE-WANT-FOOD!!!!!!!!”
“WE-WANT-FOOD!!! WE-WANT-FOOD!!!!!!”
“WE-WANT-FOOD!!! WE-WANT-FOOD!!!!!!”
“WE-WANT-FOOD!!! WE-WANT-FOOD!!!!!!” Resumed the battle-chants as her three “Kittens”, Zachary “GUMBALL” Watterson, the only true “Kitten” in the family, Darwin Watterson, the orphaned Harp Seal Pup they had adopted as a baby, and Anais Watterson, the Bunny “Kit” that she had somehow given birth to without hardly a trace of Cat in her, all began following the awful example of their father.
One of her Indigo eyes twitched.
“Is that REALLY NECESSARY?” Nicole demanded as her ears pinned behind her head and her tail flicked about, her paw stirring the soup as aggressively as if to vent her frustration on IT rather than her family as that hot, unpleasant feeling slowly clawed up at the bottom of her stomach.
Her huge husband turned around with a confused look. “But you work BETTER under pressure.” He said in that aggravating tone that told her he genuinely believed that. (It didn’t help that it was a BIT true, but STILL.)
“Anyway, I helped.” He added proudly with a dumb smile.
That unpleasant feeling suddenly jumped and wrapped around her stomach. She turned to her mate with a frown and began counting on the paw that wasn’t exacting vengeance on the soup; “You were SUPPOSED to SALT the potatoes, BOIL the carrots, and TENDERIZE the meat. But INSTEAD---” she finished with a raised voice as she stopped stirring her soup, threw open the oven, and gestured to tenderized POTATOES, (Meat tenderizer included…) CARROTS that sat in a pot without any water IN THE OVEN, and the TURKEY MEAT that had a mountain of salt baking right in the middle, not even spread around at LEAST!!!
He could be such a MORON sometimes!
The large Rabbit Buck looked inside the oven at his handiwork, and gave an innocent shrug. “It’s ok if it’s not perfect, honey.” He said in what was MEANT to be a placating voice. “It’s just nice to eat together for once.”
“*gggrrrrowwwwlll*” came Nicole’s response as she put her paws on her hips, her tail flicking angrily as her frown grew sharper by several notches. That unpleasant feeling slowly clawed up at the bottom of her diaphragm.
“WE-WANT-FOOD!!! WE-WANT-FOOD!!!!!!”
“WE-WANT-FOOD!!! WE-WANT-FOOD!!!!!!”
“WE-WANT-FOOD!!! WE-WANT-FOOD!!!!!!”
She glared at her husband for a good five seconds, his dumb, uncomprehending smile slowly being replaced by doubt as he began wondering what he had done wrong this time… He wasn’t the smartest mammal in the world, not by a city MILE, but she could usually count on him realizing he had messed up if she got angry enough… And at THIS rate, it wouldn’t be that long…
She was a bit surprised though when Richard began sniffing the air, a confused look on his flabby face as he turned around and began looking up at the ceiling for something. “Hmm… Something’s burning…” he said as he scratched the back of his now drooped ears.
Nicole felt her gaze zero in DIRECTLY at the back of that huge head that she sometimes felt was completely empty except for a few spare stomachs. ‘Oh, something’s burning alright…’ she thought with an internal growl, ‘It’s big, pink, is named Richard, and it’s going to be served on a plate with an apple in its mouth instead of tenderized potatoes unless it grows up and starts actually HELPING me for once…’
The fat Rabbit that she had for SOME reason been crazy enough to choose as her life-mate kept sniffing for a moment, before he began scratching the spot behind his head she was glaring at, almost as if he could feel a prick of heat where her eyes bored into him silently demanding that he start behaving like a grown-up.
“OH! It’s just your eyes burning a hole in the back of my head!” he said as he turned around to look at her again, looking proud of himself for grasping the direness of his position with her like a Kitten figuring out that two plus two is NOT twenty-two.
She didn’t move, but she glared harder at him.
She was so focused on her retarded husband that she didn’t notice the smoke that was starting to billow from somewhere behind her… But Richard noticed.
“Well, scratch that.” He said as he seemed to almost lose interest in the discussion. “It’s your pot catching fire because I distracted you.”
‘… My… What?!?’
It was at that moment that the fire alarm began beeping loudly as smoke filled the room. Nicole turned around with a start, and gasped as she saw her soup going up in flames like a pot of straight oil… (Which, to be fair, was close enough to the truth to make SOME sense… It was the end of the month, and money was tight.) As if it had been waiting to be noticed, the fire within the pot let out a breath of straight flame, eating away what little was left of the dinner that had NOT been ruined by Richard, and Nicole had to shield her eyes as the fire sent heat and little droplets of burning oil everywhere in the tiny kitchen. ‘No-no-no!!!!’ she thought in a panic as she began trying to think of a solution to this completely unforeseen disaster. ‘If I hadn’t been so distracted---!!!’
“DON’T PANIC!” came a voice as her firstborn son, Zach, (Or, as he had insisted on being called since he was two, “Gumball”…) leapt over the bar into the kitchen, the little Russian Blue Kitten finally done with his war-chant now that something exciting was happening.
Pointing to his mom and dad, he shouted, “In case of fire, you should STOP, DROP, AND ROLL!!!”
“OK!!!” Richard agreed to his son.
‘What?!?’ Nicole thought distracted.
The two boys dropped onto their sides right in the middle of the kitchen floor and began rolling back and forth as the fire grew larger.
Nicole watched for a full second in complete shock at what she was seeing… Could they be any MORE UNHELPFUL?!?
“What the??? Somebody get a blanket!” she shouted as the fire’s golden glow began to light up the whole kitchen. They HAD to smother it before it got out of control.
“LEAVE IT TO ME!!!” Her fat husband shouted with an imperious voice as he leapt to his feet with surprising agility before speeding around the pillar into the dining room.
Through the open wall over the bar she saw Richard jump beside the table, causing the little ears of her Bunny daughter Anais to fly up in surprise, before he leaned over and grabbed the edge of the tablecloth as if to pull it out from under the glasses and plates like a stunt artist… And instead lifted the entire table above his head as the cloth and all the utensils and glasses of beverages fell to the floor in a great crash.
Nicole wanted to say SOMETHING… To bemoan the disaster this evening was turning into… But all that came out was a sad sigh as her head dropped in defeat… Dinner was in SHAMBLES!!!
And it was beginning to feel like it was all ONE particular mammal’s fault.
“Gumball! Grab the tablecloth!” she heard Richard shout as that unpleasant little feeling suddenly began feeling like a burning in her chest… A burning that was beginning to feel like it would burst into flame like the fire behind her if things didn’t calm down in a couple moments…
And things were about to get worse…
Her son Gumball grabbed the tablecloth and dragged it around the corner into the kitchen, leaving shards of glass and spilled water all over the floor. He lifted the tablecloth over his head, and for a second Nicole felt the tiniest hope that at least her SON would do something to HELP her deal with the situation…
But she had forgotten who was the one who TOUGHT her son at home while she was at work…
The brave but foolish little Kitten began waving the tablecloth like a giant fan at the fire, feeding it great gusts of air that only FUELED its flames and caused the whole room to glow brighter as it began to burn out of control, causing Nicole to duck her head to avoid getting singed.
“IT’S GETTING WORSE!!!” Her little daughter Anais shouted helplessly as she ran into the kitchen, her little nose twitching in fear as her brother kept fanning, and their father standing back against the bar, all of them looking like they were on the verge of complete panic.
Even her PRODIGY DAUGHTER wasn’t going to do anything to help her, and her adopted son, the Seal Pup Darwin was nowhere to be seen… Gumball had only made it worse, and goodness knew her HUSBAND was of no help…
Everything was on her, like ALWAYS!
‘Quick! How do I deal with the fire?’ she asked herself, the only mammal she could rely on.
‘Smother the fire.’ Said her rational mind simply as it tried to work quickly under her exhausted and strained state.
‘How?’ She asked back quickly.
‘Put a lid on the pot…’
‘…’
It was as simple as that, and a frustrated growl left her throat as she berated herself for not having thought of it sooner… ‘Stupid CAT…’ She thought as she grabbed a dirty pot lid from the sink and SLAMMED it on top of the firepot with a loud *”TANG!!!”*…
And just like that, it was all over, the fire was out…
But there was still ANOTHER fire burning that needed to be put out, and Nicole would do so, just as soon as her family had received a THOROUGH and SEVERE reprimanding…
Or, she WOULD have if she had the STRENGTH to reprimand them, anyways…
But Nicole was tired beyond tired, having just been through a whole day of miserable work, and hours of awful city traffic, AND household chores and cooking atop all that, and trying to be a wife and mother in the meantime…
She just felt wiped out.
So instead, she slowly turned around, glaring at the two Rabbits and the Kitten who had piled into the kitchen behind her… She had no strength to voice any words, so she opted for the OTHER option that worked… The “Look of Utter Disapproval”.
No one said anything as Richard, Gumball, and Anais all looked away in shame from the angry mother Cat who stood glaring at them, one paw on the pot lid, the other on her hip as she let them know without words how disappointed in them all she was.
She had raised them all SMARTER than this, and they KNEW IT.
But as the seconds ticked on, her exhaustion drained even the strength behind her disapproving glare…
She was too tired for this…
‘You know what… I think they get the idea.’ She finally decided. ‘Let’s just try to figure out how to fix whatever’s LEFT of dinner into something EDIBLE that will last until Monday, and then we can---’
“I GOT THIS!!!” screamed the Seal Pup Darwin as he leapt blindly over the bar into the kitchen, a can of whip-cream he had gotten from somewhere in his flippers aimed at where the fire had been a moment ago…
Right where NICOLE was now standing…
She closed her eyes just in time as a stream of whip-cream covered her face. She stiffened like an I-beam as the sweet stickiness worked its way into her fur as Darwin emptied the entire can of whip-cream on her, completely oblivious of what he was doing, as was usual for the silly Seal Pup.
After a full ten seconds, the sound of spraying whip-cream finally stopped, only sputtering a few last droplets of the desert topping, and Nicole still stood completely stiff in a mix of shock and growing anger as the creamy stickiness dripped down her entire front side… Down her shirt, her skirt, her legs…
‘…’
‘…’
‘…’
That was IT…
That unpleasant feeling that had been burning in her chest turned to ACID.
This was the FINAL STRAW!!!
All she had wanted was a nice dinner with her family after a crummy day at work and another one tomorrow, and they had RUINED it with their ridiculous behavior!
Nicole Watterson SNAPPED.
She lifted a paw, wiping the whip-cream from one of her indigo eyes as it sought the mammals RESPONSIBLE for this.
Her eye turned as sharp as a spear as it sighted the four cowering mammals before her, her whip-cream filled ears catching a muffled gasp of terror as they all stepped back…
They KNEW what was coming now…
They had MADE… MOM… MAD.
Her rational mind screamed and leapt under a desk as her fiery rage took the controls, grabbed the yokes hard enough to snap one of them, and plunged them forward to attack!
The mammals before her tried their best to protect themselves and each other in vain…
A rising attack-growl escaped Nicole’s throat as she prepared to unleash her FURY!
SOMEONE would pay for this… They would ALL pay!!!
‘…’
But… Something wasn’t right here.
‘…’
Time seemed to come to a complete stop as she looked into the wide eyes of her terrified “Kittens”, her sons Gumball and Darwin, and her daughter Anais all falling backwards over each other as they tried to dodge whatever horrible vengeance they feared from her…
Her “Kittens” were TERRIFIED of her…
THAT wasn’t right!
She had ALWAYS been the disciplinarian of the family, and though she always wore a skirt, it FELT like she wore the PANTS too… (Figuratively)
But… Her Kittens shouldn’t have been AFRAID of her like THIS!!! This was the sort of fear she had always had for HER parents at that age…
So much for a nice evening together as a FAMILY!!!
That was the moment that she asked herself; ‘How did it COME to this? Where did I go WRONG???’
Nicole had always had it drilled into her head that the choices she made when she was young would affect her life forever, and that if she made GOOD choices, she would BENEFIT from them forever…
Her parents had planned her entire life out for her from the moment she was born… They had laid the groundwork for her to become the most driven, most successful, most wealthy Domestic Cat to have lived since the ancient queen Cleopawtra… Even at the expense of her mental and emotional well-being…
They had forced her into every extracurricular program the schools had to offer, (Even if some of them happened at the same time, making for some VERY busy days…) they had pushed the idea of SUCCESS into every aspect of her life by grading EVERYTHING she did, from her posture and how she ate to how long she spent in the bathroom or how long she slept, and even though they had at TIMES shown her some normal parental affection, it had only been on special occasions, and the rest of the time she had to EARN their love by going above and beyond…
All the steps were taken to ensure she WON, at ANY COST… WINNING was all that mattered.
But her life had had a funny way of slipping AROUND even the best plans her parents, and even she HERSELF had laid down, and she had ended up living a life that was exactly OPPOSITE of what she and her parents had planned for her… A life that was hard, and often thankless… A life of borderline poverty, seventeen hour days, and very little leisure.
That was the life her CHOICES had dealt her…
And no choices she had made in her life had been as PIVOTAL as the choices she had made that day that she had met the biggest LOSER in all of Elkmore on the most stressful day of her life…
Her spearing gaze met her husband’s, the huge, fat, brainless BUNNY RABBIT she had been so STUPID as to choose all those years ago… The male she had CHOSEN as her mate… The male she had CHOSEN to give her entire LIFE to…
‘THAT’S it…’ she thought with a venomous internal snarl. ‘It was the day I met HIM…’
So long ago now… Almost twenty-six years ago…
It had been such an unexpected way to meet her future husband too… She had been on the way to the karate tournament with her mom and dad…
A whole lifetime ago… And yet she still remembered that day like it was yesterday…