Sunset's Isekai
Let's Gopher a Drink (Zootopia — Movie Pt. 6)
By Wanderer D
"Sorry, Sunset," Judy said, turning to face her. "But I think it's too early for a drink. Nick and I need to finish our shift and investigate a few things before we have the time for that."
"Listen," Sunset said, "I know a lot of stuff was said that made no sense—"
"It didn't!" Judy interrupted. "It was mumbo-jumbo! Ludicrous! You were talking about spirits and you made one of the most powerful animals in the whole of Zootopia tremble! And you claim to be a bartender! And people say you're royalty! I don't want a drink! I want the truth!"
"I could use a drink."
Sunset tried not to laugh at the look Judy gave Nick.
"Don't worry, I have non-alcoholic drinks too," she assured the rabbit. "Good selection of teas among other things… I'll make sure everything is compatible with your diet."
She could see Judy's indecision slowly crumble, beat by her invitation and her curiosity.
"Is this… going to make sense?" Judy finally asked.
"In a weird sort of way, yes, I hope," Sunset answered honestly as they stepped out of the police car. "It might just get a bit stranger before we get to the making-sense part."
"Joy."
Judy watched as Sunset pulled open her door and motioned for them to step in. But there was already a problem.
"You really have a bar."
"Yep!" Sunset replied, grinning.
"This area is not zoned for bars."
Sunset blinked, slightly baffled. "Okay? I'm… not really using it for business in this world."
Judy pretended that she hadn't heard that last part. "We'll have a talk about that when we're done talking about the main issue."
Sunset laughed uncertainly. "Um. Sure."
Having established a certain, reassuring normalcy to the situation, Judy stepped forth into the bar, and as she did, she slowly realized that there was no way this place should fit as it did between the other two houses unless some really weird architecture had gone into the development of the adjacent buildings too.
"Um… Carrots?"
She knew that tone of voice. That was the tone of voice Nick used when she was going to hear something she was not going to like. "What is it Nick?" she asked while Sunset made her way around the bar to pull out a couple of menus.
"You might want to take a look at this."
She closed her eyes and took a deep breath before turning around and looking at the wall that Nick was pointing at.
"Is that a horse?" Judy asked. "But… what's wrong with its body? Is that a horn?"
"That," Sunset's voice came from behind them, "is an anthro unicorn named Twilight Sparkle, she's a rock singer."
Judy's eyes slowly widened as she took in the different posters and pictures. More than once she saw a creature that had the same hairdo as Sunset. One was another unicorn, another was a cat, another was some sort of… demon, like out of a fantasy novel…
Slowly what she had put together while talking with others came together. She gulped, turning to look at the wolf, who was smiling at her. Suddenly that smile was less friendly in her eyes. "Y-you're not really a wolf, are you?"
Next to her, Nick slumped and sat on one of the tables. "Unicorn?" he managed to squeak out.
"Yep," Sunset replied. "Originally. Depending on the world, sometimes I change to fit better with the locals, but my original species was really a unicorn, and then I became a human full time."
"This is too much," Judy muttered, sitting across from Nick slowly, still taking the place in. It was calming in a way, with its design, but at the same time she could feel, deep inside, that this was not natural, that this was completely outside of her experience, and that being a cop didn't matter here.
She was completely out of her depth. Much more so than she had anticipated. They were basically at Sunset's mercy. On some level, she now understood what made Mr. Clawhorn so nervous around the wolf—unicorn.
The thought of their earlier encounter with the lawyer, reminded her of why she was here and she slowly felt her conviction return, even though she wouldn't be surprised if Nick and Sunset could smell her fear.
If she did, though, Sunset showed no sign, giving her one of the menus, and the other to Nick, who was pressed against the wall, ears back.
Judy forced herself to take a deep breath and look down at the list of beverages. She blinked. "Wait, you have carrot juice from Bunnyburrow?"
Sunset grinned. "Locally sourced!"
"How?" Judy asked, exasperated. "How can you possibly have carrots from there?"
"I have a system to support local businesses," Sunset said, sitting at the table. "It works through proxies that obtain the produce or products from local sources through a time-space discrepancy that allows my bar to compensate for unusual diets or if needs be, comfort foods." She smirked. "Some call it cheating; I call it convenient."
Judy dragged her paw down her face, before glaring up at the unicorn-turned-wolf. "A carrot juice, please."
Sunset nodded. "Nick?"
Judy turned to face the fox, but found her voice fading when she saw the white-haired glowing head that had emerged from under and through the table.
"Hey, it's the fuzzy fuzz."
"Dani, please don't scare my guests, they're… overly stressed as it is," Sunset said, completely unperturbed as the creature emerged fully, floating above them.
"Hey, sorry, Sunny. I just forgot something in my room and came back to get it. I'll use one of the backdoors."
And just like that, it flew through the "Employee's Only" door.
"What…"
"That was Danielle Phantom," Sunset said. "Long story, perhaps better left for another occasion."
"Was that a g-gh—" Nick stammered. "A guh-guh.."
"Ghost."
"No." Judy said firmly. "No it was not! It was a hologram. A trick."
"It's the Cell games all over again," Sunset muttered under her breath, although Judy's sensitive ears caught it regardless. "Nick, what would you like to drink?" their host asked in a normal tone of voice.
The poor fox simply shook his head.
"Alright, I'll make you tea. You need to relax," Sunset decided, heading over to the bar.
"Carrots, we need to get out of here," Nick whispered the moment Sunset was on the other side of the bar. "No case is worth this!"
For once, Judy was inclined to agree… but as she gazed around the room, and looked at the pictures of smiling… creatures… she could feel herself calming down. "Nick… look around… I know this is really weird but, does this seem like the type of place where we'd really be in danger?"
She could see his eyes wander around. The pictures spoke of amazing stories behind them, and Judy felt her fear be replaced by honest curiosity. There was a picture nearby where Sunset, in one of her other forms, stood right next to another creature that resembled Rarity. A winged unicorn was with them, and some sort of giant rat creature with strange clothes. Dani was there too, and so was some sort of duck. Birds in her world—it felt so strange to even say that—were not evolved. They hadn't developed into society, much like fish and a few other beings. But in that picture that one was dressed and obviously sentient.
Creatures that looked like reptiles, creatures that looked metallic, or dressing like normal animals, but just a different species. Old. Young. Male, female. Some wore disguises that seemed like out of a comic book and she found herself wondering if they were superheroes from another world.
Nick was calmer too now, having stepped off from the table to look at even more pictures. The whole place had so much to tell. One table had flowers growing on it, another a sign that read "Captain's Table, reserved for Wednesday whenever I get to it". The bar itself was covered in bottles of all shapes, sizes, and colors. A neon sign close to the entrance to the restrooms read "Sunset's Isekai".
It wasn't in her language.
But she could understand it.
There was so much she didn't understand still… but she had never backed down from a challenge. Never given up the chance to learn and get to the bottom of things. And today was not going to be that day.
Her thoughts were interrupted by Sunset placing a large glass of carrot juice in front of her. Judy hesitated just a little before leaning in and sipping the straw. Soon her tongue was flooded by the familiar flavor of carrots. It felt like home. "It's real. This whole thing…" she whispered in awe.
"Welcome to Sunset's Isekai," Sunset said, setting down a cup of tea across from her and waving Nick over back to the table. "This is my little bar in the multiverse. I wasn't going to involve you guys in any of this, by the way, I'm supposed to be taking a vacation—but I guess I should have known better than to deny adventure."
"So you're telling me that these, all of these… are people that you have met?" Nick asked as he sat down and took a careful sniff of the tea before nodding in appreciation at the smell.
"Correct," Sunset said. "Most of them are my personal guests, but some are essentially my family," she said, nodding at the picture that Judy had seen before. "You met Dani and Rarity already. That's my apprentice, Lena, and that's Freya, and that's my mentor and mother-figure, Princess Celestia."
"So… you really are royalty?" Nick asked.
"Mother-figure, Nick," Sunset said. "Close, but not quite."
"Ah." He didn't sound convinced, and neither was Judy for that matter. There was a lot to take in, and a lot to ask, but more importantly, it seemed that Sunset was now willing to tell them everything they needed to know about the case.
"So Sunset," Judy spoke up. "How about we talk about the case?"
"Really, Carrots?" Nick asked. "The case? With—" he waved a paw around "—all of this?"
"Nick, if we don't concentrate on the topic, we're going to end up here for eternity."
"Right, right," Nick muttered, coughing. "Sorry."
"Okay," Sunset said, nodding. "Ask away."
"So let's start with the box," Judy said, pulling out her notebook. "Mr. Clawhorn said that it was obtained by his firm some time ago. He made it sound like they were saving it, rather than intending to use it."
"Right." Sunset sipped her own tea, before growling. "There are… interdimensional beings that sell things they obtain from other worlds. Sometimes it's inconsequential stuff. Like here… bottles of wine, common food items, etc. Other times it's… dangerous items, like cursed grimoires, or weapons. And sometimes it's actual beings they have trapped somehow. Sometimes really dangerous ones, and sometimes innocent ones. It seems from what Mr. Clawhorn said that this is one of the latter. And one pure enough that they feared it hanging around the law offices could eventually corrupt it."
"So," Nick spoke up, "when you asked why it needed to be taken away instead of just sealed…"
Sunset shrugged. "It's just unusual to find such a creature that would require that level of care. Mr. Clawhorn's ancestors were probably more versed in the multiverse if they felt that was necessary." Her brow darkened. "But that's not all. He said it was from a Deprived world."
Judy felt a chill creeping up her bones when Sunset said that. "I'm sorry, but what does that even mean?"
Sunset took a deep breath and leaned back, glancing at the pictures in thought. "Some worlds have integral beings in them. Creatures that define them. Or that have a unique role in them. It doesn't necessarily mean they're good, but they are definitely pivotal to that world's destiny and fate. A Deprived world is when that is taken away from them by someone from another universe, stripping them away from something so essential that the world… sometimes even the universe they're from originally just can't go on, and ceases to exist completely. Its past and future are just gone, and obviously everyone that lived in them."
"That's horrible!" Judy gasped.
"It's thankfully very rare," the wolf said softly. "Very few universes have something so important in them distilled into a single creature or object. Most of the multiverse simply keeps on going because we are essentially unimportant. It's just that the multiverse is such a wonderful thing, anything is possible—even a whole universe owing its existence to one single thing."
"And that's what was inside that box?" Nick asked.
Sunset nodded. "Which is why it was good that they got it and hid it away." She licked her lips. "I wonder if the poor creature inside of it is even aware of where it is now or what happened to its world."
Judy frowned and took a drink from her juice. The fate of the creature was horrible, but it didn't explain why the museum had been set on fire, or why anyone would have tried to steal it in the first place. "How would they have known that it was in there?"
Sunset shook her head. "That, I don't know. But the report said that nothing else was damaged prior to the fire, right? So it seems that whoever went in there was hoping to just get that one box."
"That means that whoever went there… definitely knew it was there, but if Mr. Clawhorn is right, if it was anyone from Clawhorn and Hoof, all they would have needed to do was step in and get them. It's their property, after all."
"So, how are we going to find them?" Judy asked.
Sunset thought for a moment. "I think… we need to first find our missing misplaced creature. It's probably still around the Museum, and that's why some things are phased out."
Judy had a sudden thought. "Was it… is it possible to store more than one creature like that?"
Sunset shrugged. "Sometimes, but it wouldn't have been the case with this one." She grimaced. "Too important."
Judy smiled. "Then I think I have an idea."
End Part 6
So... only one more week of torturous waiting for the next chapter of this lovely and wonderful arc? Cannot wait to see it's conclusion!
You should make more multi parts like this I love it
And the secret's out! I must say Judy has taken it pretty well, she's got a good head on her shoulders.
Hm.
If you take any one of the Mane 6 from Equestria, would it be Deprived?
Disrupting their relationships had some bad effects in 'The Cutie Re-Mark!' after all...
Ooof, poor matters, but this was a lovely reveal for minds being blown.
Still, glad to see this go up. Thanks for writing it.
A delight as always. Definitely looking forward to more, and extremely curious to find out which creature was kept sealed away. I thought I had some small idea, but I'm not even 30% confident in my deductions, which makes me even more curious for the reveal.
Absolutely loving this. A Deprived World? Is that from something, a video game or RPG?
I'm surprised Nick didn't want hard liquor after what happened.
I have to admit, having independent mostly unconnected stories in the series is nice, but I really like this kind of story as well. I hope you keep mixing it up a bit by switching between the two styles.
10267162
Not one of the girls. The tree.
10267162
Possibly, but imagine it being Celestia, especially if she killed NMM. Nothing to control the sun or moon? That'd fit the description of a deprived world pretty well.
10267162
Exactly, or for other example, killing or removing the He-Man form any of the He-Man universes will leave the power of Grayskull up for grabs, and the world deprived until a replacement is found, if it's found
great update!
10267262
That too, though since for a long time the Tree acted through the girls, getting one of them would have more or less the same effect.
10267162
Depends on the universe. This story's multiverse is semi-canonically the Songs of the Spheres multiverse, and Ka takes care of everything in that setting. So you would have worlds where an intervention from another universe doesn't really change anything and is easily fixable, and universes that implode and disappear in a puff of logic if you do anything due to order being imposed by a strict Pantheon, or them having fragile power systems and possible unstable time-loops.
Just take a look at the Oversaturated world -series here on fimfic. The entire thing falls apart if Sunset isn't there.
10267299
And to add to that, a Deprived world isn’t one that has bad things happen if one of the required beings/objects is removed but, as Sunset said, one that is destroyed by such an action. Like if you removed God from a universe that has one as the creator and maintainer and it therefore ceased to exist completely.
I'm just imagining the good bye scene where;
Judy; "And remember to set up the bar within the correct city zone next time!"
Nick - snickers in the background as
Judy; "I never dreamed I had to tell someone they illegally parked a bar!"
🦊
Dont you mean bit not but?
Hehe welcome to the multiverse, leave your sanity at the door
As expected from Judy, she walked down the rabbit hole like a pro. Wait, she is a pro, isn't she?
Mmmmm. I love me some universe-to-universe chit-chats.
10267162
I'd imagine it would be closer to taking away one or several of the gods from Discworld, such as Fate, Luck, DEATH and so on since they are the aspects of fundamental parts of reality there.
Only one more? Darn. This has definitely been my favourite chapter by far.
Judy confirmed as Mr. Satan!
10267263
Hmm, that would just return the duty of controlling the celestial cycle back to the unicorns though. Damaging to the timeline, yes, and you'd definitely end up with an unrecognizable Equestria, but there would still be an Equestria.
Reminds me of Penrose Voids or Pearls. With one, you can rigidly enforce quasiperiodic tiling over infinity, without it, the structure breaks down and you get faults and glitches no matter how far you go.
The question Judy didnt ask, probably for very good reason, was that did Sunset set up the companies to sources the carrot juice immediately after Judy asked for it, or once all the current problems were over?
Now Im waiting for Judy, at some later time, to start towards yet another illegally parked bar, only for a reptiloid male with a bad wig and a long multicoloured scarf to shove a bowl of petunias in her arms before chasing after a runaway suitcase with a toaster stuck on one end.
10267296
That doesn't make sense. By that argument, when Luna was sealed away the world was deprived. It wasn't. The bearers are just a conduit, there can be others if one goes away.
if the tree goes, it's gone.
I like this line, because the speaker doesn't realize how possible it is for that to happen literally.
10267535
Well, after Luna there wasn't really any need to actively use the Elements of Harmony, but a millennia later in Twilight's age there was a surge of villains that required the Mane 6 to deal with. So yeah, the world would would have a chance of becoming deprived by the Mane 6 being disrupted provided it's during the period Friendship is Magic covers, while the Tree is essential since ancient times.
Say what you will about Mr. Satan's glory hogging, but I imagine he does tip well.
Good, Nick's already learned of the important lessons of the multiverse: The things are also people.
And we have a Cosmic Keystone in a box. Dang. Still, even with the magnitude of the loot, crime is crime, and Judy Hopps is very good at what she does.
10267299
Even the Oversaturated World isn't quite as fragile as one that can be Deprived. Yes, without its Sunset holding the place together, it will quickly collapse under the strain of the existential damage, but that collapse won't retroactively wipe out its past, and that fragility won't always be the case. As far as I can tell, the sort of universe Isekai-Sunset's discussing here did, does, and always will depend on whatever's holding it together, with no chance of repair or reinforcement.
Are you suggesting that you use the prior container or something?
10267667
Yeah, we're looking at cosmic entities in the vein of Azathoth or Haruhi here: beings whom their respective universes rely on in their entirety, and significant disruptions of whom will cause that universe to simply cease.
10267628
That argument actually makes a great deal of sense, if you consider the episodes where Starlight Glimmer was messing with history. My take on it was fundamentally like the one advanced in Flashpoint Paradox. Basically, take a valley full of glass mannequins, and run across the middle at the speed of sound. Every mannequin right beside you shatters horribly, but the damage spreads out a fair distance. But it peters out eventually. Unless... you keep zipping back and forth across that valley, compounding the damage each time.
But where it converges on the Deprived theory is that removing the elements of harmony over and over at the same moment in time eventually created an event wave which compounded on itself so often that the end result was the utter destruction of the whole world. The only way to prevent that is to undo the causal event.
That also opens another can of worms, of course. It means that depending on who is affected by the final rewrite, the people responsible haven't actually done anything yet, and thus, you can't exactly hold them accountable for an action you prevented them from even attempting. That would not be a fun conversation to have if you were one of the people who remembered everything.
And I got to, and enjoyed, the chapter. :)
Only one left in this arc, though? Well, mixed feelings: on the one hand, as I mentioned, I've been liking this arc, but on the other, I'm also interested to see where the bar goes/what it's visited by next! :D
I expect I'll keep enjoying it, though. :)
10267437
If we're playing by Songs of the Spheres rules here, then even the gods and anthropomorphic personifications of the Discworld aren't quite keystone enough for removing one or more to make it Deprived. Hogfather shows that it can compensate when one is... missing, and then when SotS rolls around the Collector goes and changes the rules so that there aren't even any gaps.
I'm actually having trouble coming up with any universe that is reliant enough on any one thing to be able to be made Deprived. Even taking the Doctor out of the Doctor Who universe is only almost that bad.
10269360
Not SotS rules tho.
10269369
In that case, I'm sticking with Hogfather and Reaper Man and saying that the Disc has ways to cope with the loss of, say, Death. So Depriving a world is worse than that.
I just had a thought: Since the bar can alter Sunset's appearance could she use that to alter the appearance of her guests? Like say temporarily change Nick and Judy into human forms.
10269360
Hmm. Remember in Name of the Doctor, when the Great Intelligence forces the Doctor to Trenzalore? He adds himself to the Doctor's timeline, and undoes every decent thing he did. You see the universe outside, and entire star clusters are exploding, as the results of his actions being unmade. It's pretty clear that he's made so much of an impression on the universe that removing him could very well unmake all of history and reality. He's pretty close to being such a unique creature, and probably the only example I can think of offhand.
Edit: It also just occurred to me that if you factor in The Big Bang, removing the Doctor actually would unmake his universe, since he's the reason it survived an implosion.
10269682
A lot of what he fixed, he also caused, especially Big Bang 2.0; yes, removing him would be varying degrees of devastating, depending on when you removed him from, but the Time Lords can fix some of the damage (again, depending on timing); the universe as a whole would mostly survive in some form, unless you picked your moment deliberately. If we're talking "delete the Doctor from the timestream before the series starts", for example, then a lot of the timeline collapses for various reasons, although the only part of that I've looked at in detail is "never went to Skaro, never met the Daleks, never inspired them to leave Skaro, anything involving Daleks and Time War falls apart". The Great Intelligence's attack was a lot more extensive, because it kept the Doctor's timeline mostly intact; he still had all those adventures, merely the outcomes were changed.
Sorry, I didn't mean to go into lecture mode.
10270706
I'm wondering now... If someone actually tried to do that to the Doctor, would the Daleks, Cybermen, and Sontarans stage the most impossible rescue in all of history, to bring the Doctor back and restore their existence to the universe? That would be both scary/tragic and funny/awesome at the same time.
A quick edit here to avoid spamming the site with posts. I read that to suggest Sunset was holding the table for Wednesday Addams.
Would now be a bad time to tell then the bar can control how much times passes in the outside world?
For someone whose job is to find the truth, she sure has a hard time accepting it.
10278508
Sure do.
2 tablespoons sweet ground chocolate
1/2 cup dark cocoa
3/8 teaspoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon dark instant coffee crystals, ground to powder
Small pinch of nutmeg
2-4 teaspoons of the mix per cup of boiling water. The result should be thick, much like hot cocoa.
I cant help but think they are forgetting something/someone. The initial blast was caused by a blowtorch which had to be held by someone, and if no remains were found then they might be ethereal as well.
"Well, technically... only my door is really in any city zone."
That reaction is absolutely perfect
Oh no. That pun
But do you know what "isekai" means?
Woah woah hold up. It being from a Deprived world doesn't mean it is that world's cornerstone though, does it? I interpreted it as meaning the creature just had nowhere to go back to because its world had been destroyed since it was taken out of it.
Remarks and corrections:
> It might just get a but stranger
a [bit] stranger
> "What is it Nick?" she asked
Needs a comma before "Nick".
10267349
beat me to it XD