The Fire Triangle, A Zootopia Fanfiction -- Part One: Fuel - 105

Disclaimer: Zootopia stories, characters, settings, and properties belong to the Walt Disney Co. This story is written under Fair Use Copyright laws.

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The Fire Triangle—A Zootopia Fanfiction

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Part One:

Fuel

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Chapter 12 –The Best Laid Plans

(Continued...Pt. 6)

This was not going to go well; she knew that almost without thinking. She had never met Mrs. Tichor before, and as for Mr. Tichor, well...

Judy had initially hoped he might at least find something familiar about the bunny-cop coming to talk to him. No such luck; at the moment, he looked like he wouldn't be able to recognize his own mother.

(Well-l-l, it wasn't as if Captain Lowe hadn't warned her...)

She and Swinton had found the two pigs sitting beneath an awning next to an emergency vehicle...where an EMT had just finished attending to Franklin's burned hoof. He wore a glassy, almost catatonic expression, while his spouse looked like she wanted to bite somebody. One look at her and Judy had been instantly brought up short...not because of the look on her face, but because of her size. Mrs. Tichor was a giant forest pig, the largest species of swine on the planet. Sweet cheez n' crackers, she literally towered over her husband; Benjamin Clawhauser's uniform would have fit her to a 'T'.

Steeling herself, Judy moved forward, offering a tentative greeting to the flower shop owner.

"Mr...Tichor?" (Whoa, she'd almost forgotten his name.)

The morose pig's head turned idly in her direction, a rusty weathervane in a shifting breeze. But then, to the doe bunny's amazement, he blinked and his gaze seemed to crystallize.

"Judy? Judy Hopps!" he said, and then he was on his feet and sticking out his uninjured hoof. "Marie, this is the bunny-cop I told you about, the one that caught the weasel, tried to rob us."

"Oh yes, Franklin told me all about you," his wife said, also extending a hoof. When Judy took it, her paw completely disappeared in the big sow's grip, and for a moment she wondered if she was going to get it back. Mrs. Tichor seemed nice enough...and yet, there was a forced quality about her that immediately put the doe-bunny on edge.

She shook it off; this was no time for fursonalities.

"And this is Officer Swinton," she said, indicating the pig-cop on her right. Again the greetings were as cordial as possible under the circumstances—in Marie's case, much more so than they'd been with her, (Judy couldn't help noticing.) Claire Swinton might almost have been a long, lost sister from the way the other sow was treating her,.

"Never mind, get on with the business at paw." she reminded herself.

"I'm really sorry for what happened," she told the couple; the standard police-condolence. (Meanwhile Swinton was getting out a notepad out and a pocket voice-recorder.) "And we hope to be able to catch whoever did this as soon..."

"Whoever?" Marie snapped, interrupting. "Whoever! Peh, are all you bunnies really that dumb? I already said MR. BIG did this!"

No, she hadn't...not to Judy at least. Ohhhh, was it too late for her and Nick to trade interviews? As any police officer can tell you, the worst kind of witness is the one with a chip on their shoulder, the ones with the attitude, 'Why are you pestering ME, instead of catching the crook that robbed my store?'

And this sow seemed to have a chip on her shoulder the size of a railroad-tie.

"Maybe you'd better just tell us the story from the beginning," Claire Swinton cut in, glancing uneasily in Judy's direction...and causing the doe-bunny to look away, embarrassed for a second. That should have been her question to ask—except she hadn't asked it, she had frozen.

"Dangit, Jude," she told herself," pull yourself together; do you want to make detective or NOT?"

"All right," Mrs. Tichor said, managing to calm down just a tiny bit, "Franklin and I came in early today; he had a new store-display he wanted to get installed..."

Predictably, she did most of the talking—practically all of it, in fact. The only time her husband spoke was when either Judy or Swinton asked him a question...and even then, his wife seemed determined to override him at every turn.

Well, she was at least straightforward about it, if nothing else. Franklin had just been about to open the door, she said, when something had crashed into the window shutter next to him. A terrible fight had ensued, and then shots had been fired through the door shutters.

"If Franklin hadn't ducked when he did..." Marie started to say, and now it was Judy's turn to interrupt.

"Wait a minute, they used those guns? Okay that makes this a LOT more serious."

The big sow gave her that look again.

"MORE serious? How could it be any more serious than this?"

"Because now it's not just arson," the doe-bunny informed her coolly, "it's assault with a deadly weapon—maybe even murder if the animal they found out back doesn't pull through."

Judy knew she was stretching it, but her words had the desired effect. Marie's eyes flared slightly and then narrowed...and then for the first time she began to regard her inquisitor with something approaching respect. Even she knew that a murder case would be investigated with a lot more vigor than simple arson.

"Do you recall how many shots were fired?" It was Claire Swinton asking.

The big sow looked thoughtful for a moment.

"Let's seeee...there were those two through the door and two more that I'm sure I heard. Other than that...Ahhh, I really can't say." She seemed to remember something, "I'm pretty sure one of them was a shotgun, though."

Judy's nose began to twitch, and when she glanced at Claire Swinton; the look on the pig-cop's face was a close match the one she was wearing. If Marie Tichor could tell a shotgun from a pawgun just by hearing it, she had to have a least a rudimentary knowledge of firearms...and the doe-bunny's instincts were telling her that it went a lot further than just rudimentary.

But then Marie seemed to shudder and tried to hug herself.

"That was when I heard a polar bear...a roar like...like ...Oh my God..."

Again Judy's nose began to twitch. How would she....?

"How did you know it was a polar bear?"

Marie spread her hooves and shrugged. "I know what a polar bear soun...looks like. I saw them running away afterwards, remember?"

"Oh, right." Judy said. Again Mrs. Tichor had said nothing of the kind, at least not to her...but there were more important considerations here. Had she just changed her story at the last second? It could be nothing; animals often became confused when talking to the police. Perhaps...and yet the notion Marie was holding out on her refused to go away.

"What about the other animals you heard inside of the store?" she asked, "Do you have any idea what species they were?"

That was good for another icy stare.

"What other animals? I never said...."

That, Judy decided, was all the guff she was going to take from this pig—victim or no victim.

"No, but you DID say heard a fight going on in there," she interrupted, pointing backwards at the flower shop, and at the same time, flattening her ears, "and I don't think those polar bears were fighting amongst themselves...so who else was in there?"

Caught off guard by the doe bunny's sudden vehemence, Marie's eyes flicked upwards and to the left for a second.

"I...don't know; between all that shooting and crashing and roaring, I couldn't hear anything else." Her eyes moved upwards again and then sideways, towards her husband—who quickly averted his gaze.

"You said you saw the bears leaving, what about the others? Did you see them at all?" It was Claire Swinton. And this time when Marie answered, her gaze remained steady.

"No," she said, pointing at the corner-end of the building, "When they came out of the alley back there they went the other way, towards Grass Street; we never saw them."

"But you did see the polar bears?" Judy prompted, and Marie Tichor's face turned baleful again.

"How could I miss them; they drove right past us with the back door open. I saw them both."

Judy lifted an ear. "Back door...open? All right, what were they driving?"

"A Minks armored car," Marie answered haughtily, "and yes I'm sure." The chip on her shoulder appeared to be firmly back in place.

"Did you by any chance get a look at the license-plate?" the doe-bunny asked, prepping herself for another sarcastic response.

She was wise to do so.

"What the heck would I need to do that for?" the big sow snorted, "I just said it was a Minks armored car! How many of THOSE can there, be running around Zootopia on a Sunday morning?"

"Zero," Judy thought but did not say, reminding herself once more that the animal she was talking to was a victim, not a suspect. It really didn't matter what the arsonists had been driving; by now they would have long since ditched it—but not before cleaning it up, or even torching it. According to what Captain Lowe had said, these animals were pros...and the more the doe-bunny heard, the more she had to agree with his assessment.

"And you say they had the back door open?" she asked.

"Yes," Marie answered, more calmly this time; even she seemed surprised by what she'd witnessed. "Then one of Mr. Big's Goombears grabbed it and slammed it shut as they went by us."

Judy's ear went up again. This sow was soooo certain Mr. Big had given the order to have her husband's shop burned down...and why, the doe-bunny had to wonder. His involvement in the recent spate of arson fires was a fact known only to the ZPD.

Or...was it?

These musings came to an abrupt halt when her radio crackled and an impatient voice spoke up. "Hopps, come in, this is Higgins; are you about finished over there? I need Swinton for something else, over."

"Just getting ready to wrap things up, Sergeant," Judy answered at once. (Actually she had a LOT more questions to ask, but she'd probably stayed here longer than she'd been instructed anyway.)

Signing off quickly, she stowed the radio and nodded at the Tichors.

"Okay, I think we're about done for now. There'll be some officers from Arson Division along shortly to talk to you in more detail about what happened. Are you all right to hold here for a while?"

Marie threw her arms wide, as if to embrace the wind.

"Where the heck ELSE are we supposed to go?"

"Right, let's head on back," Judy said to Swinton, and then the two of them turned to leave.

After giving it five extra yards (to make sure they were out of earshot,) she fired a brief, sideways glance at the pig-cop.

"Did you see Mrs. Tichor's eyes when I asked her about the other animals inside the flower shop?"

"I did," Swinton answered, pursing her lips into a small frown, "She lied to you."

Judy chewed her own lip, and felt her nose begin to twitch.

"That's right...and then she shut her husband down, to make sure he wouldn't say tell us anything. Only why, for heaven's sake?"

The pig-cop's frown deepened, and she grunted apprehensively.

"I don't know, Hopps...but even that wasn't the most, erm, 'interesting' thing I heard her say."

Judy stopped and turned to face her; she was in no mood for riddles this morning. "All right, what was?"

Claire Swinton looked sideways for a second, tapping her cheek with a finger. "She called those polar bears 'Goombears'. I haven't heard that expression since back when I was working corrections."

"So?" Judy lifted an ear.

"So," Swinton replied, "the only animals I ever heard using it were the Red Pig's guys."

"Hrmmm," Judy grumbled, glancing backwards over her shoulder in direction of the flower-shop owner and his wife. A lot of what was going on here made about as much sense as a car-wash in the Rainforest District.

She wondered for a moment if Nick was having any better luck.

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"Can you show me exactly where you found him?"

The EMTs had gone now, taking the injured Razorback with them. Nick, however, still had some unfinished business to attend to. No sooner had the ambulance departed than he'd buttonholed Kwame again.

Now the pangolin was pointing into the alleyway, at a spot just left of the wrecked back door of the flower shop—which lay miserably scrunched up against the wall opposite.

"Thet's it," he said, adding hastily, "Don't go in there."

"Wasn't going to," the fox replied, slightly irritated. He remembered what Captain Lowe said—not only his warning to stay out of that place, but his description of what would happen if the shop's front shutters went.

He pulled out a pair of pocket binoculars, zeroing in on the spot where Kwame had been pointing.

But then he stopped. That door...

He angled the lenses upwards.

The door's top edge was curled backwards, like a half-open sardine can, and where the knob should have been, there was nothing but a ragged, U-shaped hole. Lying at the foot of the door were the destroyed remnants of a padlock and a steel bar, bent nearly....holy foxtrot that was a deadbolt, a deadbolt nearly as thick as a two-by four.

What the heck could have bent it back like that? Hmmm, maybe it wasn't solid steel? No way to tell from here, dangit!

He swung right with the binoculars, rolling the focus knob as he went.

The door's upper hinge was twisted like a garlic knot...and so was the other one.

"So THAT's how you did it," The red fox muttered to himself.

"Did what?" said a voice from beside him; he'd nearly forgotten about Kwame.

Nick passed him binoculars.

"Look there; see how the top edge is peeled back like a fruit roll-up? That door didn't blow out in the fire; it was torn off by the hinges and thrown out."

The pangolin thumbed the focus knob for a second, and then slowly lowered the binoculars.

"Ai, yeah...and there's no scorch marks on it either."

"I know, right?" Nick said, nodding. Actually he hadn't noticed the lack of burn-marks until Kwame mentioned it. (Never mind; it only served to reinforce his theory.)

"And see that hole, in the other side there?" He pointed again, "That's right where the door handle should be...and see that smashed-up padlock, on the ground there? Someone—I'm guessing that Razorback and his buddies—ran out of that place in a big hurry, and then threw the deadbolt behind them and locked it."

He gave Kwame a moment to examine the evidence, and then went on.

"To pull that off so quickly, they'd have needed at least a halfway decent idea of the layout inside that place." He pointed towards the pall of smoke, swirling upwards from the shop's rear entrance. "And I don't think they had a whole lot of time to study it after they got here."

Kwame lowered the binoculars and looked at him.

"But then what heppened to the door?"

Nick scratched at his cheek for a second, and then began to spell out his theory.

"First, whoever was trapped behind it tried to get through by tearing out the handle and smashing the padlock. It should have worked...except they somehow managed to bend the deadbolt out of shape; couldn't get it to slide open. So what they did instead was peel the top of the door back to get a better grip, and then tear it off by the hinges; see how twisted they are? And I'll bet...I'll just bet there's a couple of holes in the wall over there, right where they used to be." (That part of the doorway wasn't visible from his and Kwame's angle; dangit again.)

"Yesss," the pangolin finally said, lowering the binoculars and offering them back to Nick, "But...what kind of enimal could do such a thing?"

"No idea," the fox admitted, shrugging as he took back the binoculars, "But SOMEBODY did it." He raised them again, focusing on his original target, the spot where they'd found the injured warthog. He frowned slightly. There was something here even more bizarre than the stated of that door—but he'd take it up with Judy where he saw her. Wait hold it, what was that, lying there next to where Kwame had been pointing?

He rolled the focus knob and squinted. It was a tac-vest; mil-spec by the look of it, done up in urban camouflage. Only...what the heck, it looked like it had been...

Nick put the binoculars away, sucked a hiss of air in, between his teeth. What he did next wasn't quite clear, even to him...not until he heard Kwame's desperate cry.

"Fox what you doing? Come BACK!"

He ignored the pangolin, dropping onto all fours and kicking it into high gear, zeroing in on the discarded tac-vest like a heat seeking missile.

And then he was there...and what do you know? He'd been right; there were two holes in the wall where the door hinges had been...and no, the dead-bolt wasn't solid metal, more like a section of rectangular pipe. Okay, put that aside for later. Now where was that tac-vest? There it was, and bingo, he'd been right again; very good, but save it for when you're out of here, fox. He grabbed the vest by a shoulder strap and sniffed, wrinkling his nose at the strong odor of warthog; yep again, it had been his. He tightened his grip and turned to run.

At once, he felt himself being yanked backwards, landing on his backside when his feet skidded out from under him. The vest's other strap was caught fast in a big pile of rebar.

Nick reflected for a second that it was a good thing Carrots wasn't here; she wouldn't know whether to laugh or wring his neck. He pulled again, harder; the vest still refused to move, even by a millimeter; he pulled harder still, this time with both paws and bracing with his feet. Again, it wouldn't budge.

At the entrance to the alley, he could see Kwame barely restraining himself from dashing to the rescue. All right, only one thing to do; he pulled out his tactical knife and began sawing at the entangled strap. It felt like he was trying to cut through a baseball bat with an unsharpened jackknife. But he was cutting through...and now, more than ever this vest was an important clue.

Behind him Kwame continued to shout, "Wilde, stoppit. Get out of there!"

Nick might have paid more attention to the pangolin had he known what was about to go down, (literally!) on the front side of the flower shop..

"We're losing that left-side window shutter!"

"Dangit get more water on it!"

But even Judy could see it was hopeless. Charred and weakened by the flames, the window frame was no longer capable of supporting the weight of so much steel.

"I just hope Nick is staying the heck out of that alleyway," the doe bunny thought to herself—and then immediately dismissed the idea, "Nahhh, even he's not THAT much of a dumb fox."

Her musings ended swiftly as the shutter made a groaning noise, and fell smoking and clattering to the sidewalk below.

In response, several things happened very quickly. The first was a rush of air in the direction of the window where the shutter had been. Second, fed by the fresh load of oxygen, the flames inside the shop intensified rapidly, going from red to an almost incandescent orange-white in the blink of an eye, a fire so bright that Judy grabbed instinctively for her sun-shades.

And now, propelled by the inrush of air from the front, the blaze went roaring through the flower shop in the direction of the rear door.

...And the alleyway beyond.

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"Almost got it...THERE!"

Nick felt the last of the strap give way, stowed the knife, grabbed the vest and bolted for the exit. Ahead of him, Kwame was waving his paws like a track-coach.

And then he heard it, a sound that was half a roar and half a howl.

It was coming from inside the flower shop...and intensifying fast in both volume and pitch.

Ohhh, foxtrot! Nick stuffed the tac-vest in his mouth and dropped down on all fours again, legs churning and heart hammering. In front of him, the alley seemed to be telescoping out to twice its length—somebody up there had a sick sense of humor.

And then from behind him, he heard a whoosh and felt a surge of heat.

Nick tried to run faster but he was already flooring it. Come on...come ONNNNN!

He was almost there, just about there, but now the heat had become scorching; he could smell his tail-fur beginning to crisp and blacken. He wasn't going to make, he wasn't going to...

Someone grabbed him by the paw and pulled, yanking him out of the alley and around the corner, just as the swell of superhot air burst out into the street.

Nick felt the heat but no burn, Kwame was using his scaly body to shield them both.

And then a split-instant later, the heat was gone. The pangolin firefighter gave it another second and then uncurled himself from around the fox.

"What, you crazy?" he demanded, breathing hard and pressing a paw to his throat.

"Well-l-l-l, you know how it is with us foxes," Nick replied, in a lame attempt to deflect his rescuer's anger with a bit of humor. It didn't work, Kwame only eyed him darkly.

So he shifted to sincerity instead.

"Thanks," he said, and finally the pangolin's expression softened a touch.

But he was still far from satisfied.

"What on earth d'joo do THET for then?" he demanded, in something like a snarl.

Nick held up exhibit 'A', the tac-vest.

"I had to get this," he said, "Look, I know it was dangerous...."

"Dengerous? Dengerous!" Kwame was nearly beside himself. "Suicidal's what thet was!"

"All right, suicidal," the red fox answered; anything to avoid an argument. Then, he remembered something. Oh Lord, if she found out... "Look, will you do me one favor? If you see my partner Officer Hopps, please don't tell her about this."

"Tell me about what?" said a voice from behind him.

Nick's eyes and mouth compressed as if he'd just stepped on a bee, and he turned to see Judy standing there, arms crossed and foot thumping. Ohhh, joy! (From the corner of an eye he could see a certain pangolin-firefighter, loving every second of this.)

"Tell me what, Slick?" she demanded again, thumping her foot even harder.

Nick felt himself sagging. There was no point in denying or trying to hedge; by now Judy was all too adept at this game. The only thing to do was come clean, (although he did have one small card to play.)

He held up the tac-vest again. It felt puny now, as if it had shriveled from the heat.

"I had to get this, Carrots, so I went into the alley and grabbed it."

There was a lot more to the story, of course—but if Nick knew his partner, he also knew she wouldn't allow him to get in another word edgewise.

No, she wouldn't...

"You did WHAT?" Judy was staring at him flabbergasted. "Of all the crazy, lame-brained, reckless stunts...after you were TOLD to stay...! What the heck were you thinking?"

"Says the bunny who jumped off a hangar and onto an airplane," Nick retorted, throwing down his hole card. It was enough to make her hesitate, but only for a moment. A moment, however, was all he needed. He held up the vest again

"Carrots, this thing could be the key to figuring out what happened here. Please...give me a chance to explain."

"All right," she said, paws on hips and waiting...

Nick cleared his throat; this was not going to be easy.

"Forgive me if this sounds like a dodge; it's not, I swear. But before I can tell you anything, I need to know what you found out from the victims.

If looks could kill, the one he got from Judy right then would have been good for life without parole...but then she let out a grumbling sigh and related what she'd heard from the Tichors; the fight, the gunshots, the noises from inside the shop—and then the fire.

"Captain Lowe said this is a really tough environment for setting an arson fire," she told him, concluding with a change of subjects.

"Thet's right," Kwame concurred from behind her, "Very moist inside a floweh shop."

Nick didn't care; he'd heard enough...and also what he needed to hear.

"Okay, my turn," he said, "the animal they found out back wasn't a bear; he was a warthog, a pig—and not just any pig, a Razorback."

Judy gasped and her paw flew up to her mouth, put off her stride for the first time since her arrival. Nick knew why; he'd heard the story. She had known that name since her third week at the Academy.

"Razorback attack! You're DEAD, long-ears!"

(It was the only exercise none of her class had survived on the first try)

"You're...sure?" she said, looking up with her nose twitching.

"Yeah," Nick responded, for once without looking all smug and superior, "He had the tattoo, I saw it. And believe me; nobody who isn't an actual member of that crew gets one of those things...not unless they want to have it removed the hard way."

He gestured backwards, towards the alleyway entrance.

"But putting that together with what you told me Carrots, I think I know what happened here. I have no idea how he figured it out, but when those polar bears showed up to torch this place, the Red Pig had some of his Razorbacks here waiting for them."

Judy thumped her foot again, but wearily this time.

"Nick, you're not telling me anything I haven't already figured out for myself."

He was ready for that one.

"Yeah...well what about this, Carrots? The bears WON that fight; they chased the Razorbacks right out through the back of the shop, and then managed to set it on fire anyway. Not only that, the Razorbacks locked the door behind them when they ran...but somehow the polar bears got through it; tore the door right off the hinges, I saw it. And now you say there were only two of them?"

"Only two that anyone saw," the doe bunny pointed out—but Nick could tell she was wavering.

He went on.

"Even if there were more than two of those polar-bears, the Razorbacks never travel in herds of less than six, usually eight or ten...and they're not supposed to be afraid of anything. But that one pig, that warthog they found—whoa you should have seen him, Carrots. He wasn't just scared, he was terrified; I've never seen anyone so frightened in all my life," (except once, but not until they were alone.) "I swear to God, he was crying for his Nanny."

"Ehm, e-excuse me?"

Both Nick and Judy turned as Kwame cleared his throat again.

"I...eh, heard him too. It wasn't 'Nanny' he was saying, it was 'Nandi'." To make sure they understood, he repeated the word a second time, enunciating the syllables. "Nan...Di."

Nick felt his ears beginning to work back and forth.

"Wha...? Are you sure?"

"Positive," the pangolin replied, his mouth set in a grim smile, (as much as was possible for his species.) "He was warthog, remembeh? He'd know thet name; near all Afuricans know it."

That was it, apparently, for Judy Hopps.

"Okay...okayyy, so what IS a Nandi?"

Kwame was only too happy to unpack it for her.

"It's mythical beast." He explained, leaning back to prop himself against a light-pole, "A monsteh...like the Sesquatch or Yeti, or Bunnyip." He winked, "But a lot nastier, eh? It's supposed to eat the brains of its victims, like zombie."

"Ewww," Judy wrinkled her nose and grimaced.

"Oh it's not real animal." Kwame assured her, waving a scaly paw. "But most every Afurican knows the story. When I was kit and I was bad, my mum would always say to me, 'Behave child...or do you want the Nandi to come and take you?'" He threw back his head and enjoyed a quick laugh. "It neveh worked."

Nick Wilde was NOT laughing. He was thinking and thinking hard ...thinking about the tac vest in his paw, and about the door, ripped clean off of its frame.

And about something Judy Hopps told him recently...but again that was for her ears only.

"Yeah, I know what you mean." He said, and then apparently as an afterthought he asked, "Just out of curiosity, what's a Nandi supposed to look like anyway?"

He expected a long, detailed, and cryptic answer. But the response from the pangolin was short and sweet.

"It's like bear, Officeh Wilde, a great bear, with big, huge shoulders and great, big mouth."

To demonstrate, he hunched his shoulders and lowered his head, but then he seemed to get a better idea, and pulled out his cell-phone.

"Ectually I think I may hev picture of one here." He said scrolling down the screen with an index-finger. "There used to be rugby club in Molepole called the Nan...ah, here 'tis."

He turned the cell around for Nick and Judy to see, and the fox felt his jaws compressing.

There, on the screen was the image of a bear-from-hell, sickle claws, slavering jaws, and shoulders like a suspension bridge; he had expected something like that.

What he hadn't expected was that a Nandi-bear would have WHITE fur.

But that was something else for later. Right now, he needed to get this train of conversation back on its original track.

"Nandi, polar bear, whatever it was, here's what I think happened next. After the razorbacks escaped from the store, that wart-hog the ZFD found got his tac-vest caught in some rebar. He managed to slip out of it, but by then his buds had already gone off and left him."

Judy chewed her lip and looked off to the side for a second. "Uhmmmm, that's another thing that's fairly obvious," she said, trying to put it as tactfully as possible.

She might just as well have thrown it in Nick's face.

"No, Carrots, you don't understand," he said, waving a frustrated paw. "The Razorbacks never do that; it's strictly against their code to leave one of their own behind. I know; that's one of the few things Mr. Big ever admired about them. And when PECCARI finds out what they did...whoa, I wouldn't want to be in their hide. He got his start as a Razorback, don't forget."

Judy nodded slowly, and Nick could see that she was finally beginning to get it. Something inside that store had managed to terrorize a crew of the most dreaded street enforcers in Zootopia—scared them to the point of running for their lives. So afraid had they been of what was pursuing them, they'd left a member of their crew behind...knowing full well it would bring down their boss's wrath.

That was Nick's cue to scratch at an ear with his thumb; his and Judy's coded signal that they needed to talk privately.

She caught it at once.

"Nick, we should tell Sergeant Higgins about this, right away."

"Higgins is in charge?" the fox answered, raising a surprised ear—and somehow managing to keep a straight face. Assuming he hadn't already been supplanted, that hippo wouldn't be running things for very much longer.

"Yes, and he'll be looking for us." Judy answered, taking the ball and running with it.

"Then, we'd better go brief him ASAP," Nick said, and then to Kwame, "Thanks again for all the help."

"Hakuna Matata," the pangolin answered, waving farewell over a forced expression of goodwill. (He still hadn't forgotten Nick's mad alleyway dash.)

Finding a place to talk privately in the middle of fighting a structure fire should have been about as easy as threading a needle while blindfolded. Instead Nick spotted an ideal location almost immediately. The ZFD had one of their pumper-trucks parked directly in front of a nearby movie theater, creating a hidden alcove.

He slipped behind it with Judy following closely in his wake.

"All right Nick, what else?" she said, trying not to thump her foot again.

He responded by holding up the tac-vest again, but this time turning it around to show the other side...where it was gouged by a trio of deep, jagged slashes.

Judy's nose began to twitch. "What the...? What the heck could do that to a tac-vest?"

Nick took a short breath to tamp down his irritation; she was completely missing the point.

Nonetheless, he went with it. "I don't know Carrots, but it took me nearly half a minute to cut through the other strap with a tactical knife. But now listen to..."

But now she was motioning for him to pass her the vest. He gave it over reluctantly, hoping she'd finally see what he'd seen.

No such luck; she began to minutely examine the slashes.

"Hmmm...look here, Nick; see how ragged they are? That tells me whatever made those cuts wasn't particularly sharp, but it had a great deal of force behind..."

"Carrots, NEVER MIND!" Nick exploded, his exasperation finally getting the better of him. Judy Hopps was no dumb bunny—nobody knew that better than him—but when she got sidetracked, she really got sidetracked.

"Nick, what?" she said, staring in bewilderment. It had been a long time since he'd raised his voice like that to her.

"Sorry....sorry," he said, lifting his paws in a placating gesture, "But Carrots, those aren't just cuts, they're claw-marks—and we've seen this before, remember? Think, bunny, THINK!"

Judy studied the vest again, this time with her brow furrowed and her nose twitching. But then, all at once her eyes went wide and she looked up with a horrified expression.

"Oh, sweet cheez n' crackers, that time in the Cliffside sanitarium. There were marks just like this, all over the floor."

"And in the back of Mr. Big's limo," the fox reminded her, pointing at the vest with a crooked finger. "Now you know why I took such a risk to get it." Before she could respond to this, he added, quickly, "And there's more deja-vu where that came from. Ever hear something like this before?" He raised his voice into a half-baked facsimile of a pig's squeal. "Help me...help me! Don't let them get me!"

This time, Judy picked up on it immediately.

"That hippo...the one from the Rafaj Brother's Jewelry sting; he said almost the same thing."

"Yep" the fox responded, growling, "Not only practically the same words as that Razorback, but the same type of setting too, right outside an alleyway...and by the way, same look on both their faces, and the same SMELL too, the smell of fear." He tapped at the side of his nose. "It was like it was pouring out of them."

He took out his cell phone and showed it to her; on the screen was one of the pics he'd taken of the injured warthog. "And look at this, Carrots."

It took the doe bunny even less time to make the connection than before, "Oh, my God."

The slashes and cuts all over the Razorback were bigger and more widely spaced than what they'd seen on that hippo...but other than that, they could have been carbon copies.

Nick watched as she stared with her nose twitching. But then she looked at him sharply, and raised an eyebrow.

"When I told you about that wolf I saw behind Rafaj Brothers, you didn't believe me."

"No, I didn't," the fox admitted, without a hint of apology, "But at the time, that was an isolated incident." He shook his head, "Not any more, it isn't."

"All right, fair enough," the doe bunny conceded, understanding that this matter was too important to argue over. She stared at the ground, thumped her foot, and then looked up at him again. "Nick, something like this...I think we need to take it directly to Chief Bogo."

"What, go over the heads of the Arson Squad?" Nick could feel the blood draining from his ears; just what they needed, more trouble. "I-I don't know if that's such a good idea, Carrots."

Too little, and too late, Judy was already on a roll.

"Nick, Rafaj Jewelers wasn't an arson case; and even if it had been, what happened to that Razorback—and that hippo—is something totally different."

Of course she knew the real reason he was stalling; both of them did. Taking the direct route to Big Chief Buffalo Nickel was always a risky proposition at best. He might be grateful for the information and commend them on their initiative—or else they might end up on Parking Duty for the rest of the summer.

Even so, Nick knew she was right...what they'd discovered was both too important and too sensitive to be passed up the chain of command. (Doing that would bring it to Bogo's attention in two days at the earliest.)

"Okay Carrots, we'll ask to see him as soon as we get back to the precinct. Now come on let's get out of here.

There are small choices that we make in our lives—little, insignificant things we don't even stop to think about; not at the time, but then afterwards, we can't stop thinking about them. 'If only I hadn't ...'

That was where Nick and Judy were headed. Had they chosen to leave their hidden sanctum via the same route by which they had entered, probably no one would have noticed.

But they didn't take that route, they exited by way of the opposite end of the fire truck...and immediately a voice called out, "Hey look, it's them!"

That, in itself, was none too significant. But then someone else called, "Boooooooo!"

Nick and Judy turned...and saw that they had exited in full view of the crowd gathered at the barricades.

Or, that is to say, they had just been spotted leaving a private, cozy nook...by a rapidly swelling crowd of animals, whose mood was just as rapidly turning ugly.

(And it didn't help that Nick's uniform was all in disarray; a souvenir of his game of tag with that fire-flash.)

"Booooo!"

"Shame!"

"Hey what were you doing back there?"

"You're a disgrace."

"BOOOO!"

"I can't believe...you have to do that NOW?"

"My mommy says she wishes you were dead," a young voice called...and when Nick looked, he saw a young rhino, maybe three years old standing with his mother.

She was wearing a Rock Hardesty T-shirt.

So, in fact, were several of the onlookers.

"Why don't stay with your own species, FOX?" A she-wolf in a khaki work suit demanded.

"Or at least with another predator!" a gopher chittered from atop a barrier.

"BOOOOO!"

"What's your problem, cutie?" a chunky rabbit demanded through cupped paws, "Your own kind not good enough for you?"

"BOOOOOOOOO!"

Nick could feel his ears pulling backwards...along with his lips. But then Judy's voice was in his ear.

"Let's just get out of here."

They turned and began to head for their cruiser. As anyone might have surmised, that only served to further incite the 'boo-birds'.

"Hey, look, they're running away.

"RUN, weirdos."

"You two should be fired."

"BOOOOOOOO!"

"Preds and prey don't belong together."

"Yeah, they should keep away from each other."

That...was it. At once, the last two catcalls merged to become a chant.

"Preds and prey...should keep away!"

More of the spectators quickly took up the mantra, honing and refining it as they went along.

"Pred and prey...Keep away! Pred and prey...Keep away!"

It began to swell in volume, spreading virally through the crowd.

"Pred and prey...Keep away! Pred and prey...Keep away! Pred and prey...Keep away!"

...Until the crowd became an angry mob.

"PRED AND PREY – KEEP AWAY! PRED AND PREY – KEEP AWAY! PRED AND PREY – KEEP AWAY! PRED AND PREY – KEEP AWAY!"

Nick felt Judy grab his arm. "Just ignore them."

He hurriedly pulled away from her...too late.

"Hey, aren't you gonna KISS her again?" a jeering voice called.

"PRED AND PREY – KEEP AWAY! PRED AND PREY – KEEP AWAY!"

"Just ignore..."

"I heard you, Carrots!"

He threw his arms around his head as if stumbling through a blizzard. The cruiser seemed to stretch away into the distance, mocking him and Judy. It was the alley behind the flower-shop all over again, only this time in super slo-mo. And now the crowd began clapping along with their chant.

"PRED AND PREY – KEEP AWAY! PRED AND PREY – KEEP AWAY!"

"Oh, NO!" Nick heard Judy groan. He followed her gaze and saw that one of the animals chanting with the others was a plus-size sow pig, with a smaller pig standing beside her...also chanting, though not as loudly He wondered for a second who that could be. That was when he spotted someone else joining the chorus, a mammal he DID know; the firefighter gerenuk who had met them at the...

"Hopps! Wilde!"

They swung around in unison. Even over the din of the mob, Chief Bogo's basso profundo voice was unmistakable.

And here he came, hurrying towards them on thundering hooves. Yes, of course he would be here.

They quickly altered course in his direction.

"Chief," Judy called, as soon as they were within earshot, "Thank goodness. We..."

That was all he allowed her.

"What the devil d'you two think you're DOING, Hopps?" he belled, voice swelling to nearly a roar. "Get out of here before yer start a riot!"

"But Chief..." the doe-bunny started to say.

Bogo stabbed a finger in the direction of their cruiser.

"Just GO!"

It was the closest thing to a scream Nick had ever heard from him.

"We're going, we're going!" the red fox cried, and then almost reached for Judy's paw, stopping only at the last instant.

It seemed to take forever to reach Old Reliable...like pushing their way through heated molasses. But even after Nick and Judy had driven well out of hearing range, the chant of the crowd stayed with them, ringing in their ears like the tolling of some demonic cathedral bell.

"PRED AND PREY – KEEP AWAY! PRED AND PREY – KEEP AWAY!"