Zootopia by Jaxy Mono

Author:Jaxy Mono
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: animals, short stories, jk rowling, crow, zoo, mother earth, rudyard kipling, jorge luis borges, pan sapiens, zootopia
Publisher: Jaxy Mono

The Professor and Lola sat up on their hind paws, watching Nate through the window of the observation booth. Inside the isolation ward the apeman was now squatting on his haunches in his cage, staring suspiciously at the one-way mirror, as though he knew he was being scrutinized. Suddenly, he grinned slyly, defecated into his hands, and hurled his turds at the glass defiantly.

“Yes, I believe we have finally reached the adult form,” the Professor commented drily as Nate jumped up and down in triumph, and his sticky excrement slowly slid down the silvered glass.

“The adult form, Professor?” Lola questioned, her pink nose trembling with curiosity.

“Oh dear, how typical; you’ve been kept in the dark. Well, it’s not a secret anymore, and you’ve got a right to know what you were working on. Even though I say so myself, this little experiment really was a rather ingenious practical demonstration of our hypothesis. But, first, would you excuse me a moment?”

“Oh, of course, Professor; it’s an honour. You know you only have to ask,” Lola replied, amiably presenting her posterior to her supervisor.

The Professor climbed on Lola’s back, and swiftly mated her, trembling as he ejaculated. “Thank-you, that’s so much better, it’s always a load off my mind,” the Professor squeaked. “Now, where was I? O yes, adult forms. Are you familiar with an extraordinary creature called the axolotl?”

“The axo-what, Professor?” asked Lola, twisting round to wash her tail.

“The axolotl,” repeated the Professor. “It’s a salamander, from Mexico; its name means “water-monster” in Aztec. Axolotls have the most remarkable powers of regeneration: if you cut off one of their legs, or gouge out one of their eyes, they’ll grow back, without even a scar to show for the experience. They can even grow back parts of their hearts and their brains.”

“How peculiar.”

“Precisely. But the axolotl’s oddest property is that, although it grows old, it never grows up.”

“Professor?”

“You are familiar with the life cycle of a salamander?”

“They’re amphibians,” Lola answered smartly, like the swot she was. “Their eggs hatch in water into tadpoles, with feathery external gills. The tadpoles then metamorphose into adults, which breathe air through lungs. The adults feed on land, but return to water to lay and fertilize their eggs, and so the circle is complete.”

“Exactly!” exclaimed the Professor. “But the axolotl is no ordinary salamander. It matures sexually whilst it’s still a tadpole with gills, and it breeds in water in its juvenile form. It’s an example of what’s called neotony – the retention of childish traits into maturity. In the axolotl’s case our research revealed that its strange life cycle is caused by a hormone deficiency with a genetic origin. If you inject an axolotl with thyroid extract – thyroxine – then it will lose its gills, emerge onto land, and metamorphose into an adult form that doesn’t exist in nature.”

Lola stared at Nate, who was now sniffing his dirty fingers and wiping them clean on his fur. “How sad!” she suddenly exclaimed; “the poor creature must be so lonely.

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