A/N: The song for this chapter - Metal is Forever by Primal Fear.
\m/
ust when Nick was preparing to leave, his hypersensitive ears has discerned a sound he would be able recognize anywhere. The sound of charging coils on a Mk-II Standard Magnetic Diskthrower Size 3. The low whining and humming of the imperfect capacitors of this outdated model was something he heard a lot when dealing with sub-medium sized species within and outside of Zootopia borders. This pattern of SMD (operating on a rail-propelling principle) and was as deadly and silent as any other and was mass produced during the Second Interspecies War roughly fifty years ago. Its capcacitor design though was slightly off, and due to that it had a tendency to overload and explode in the hands of those who were stupid enough to ignore the extremely fast pace at which the SMD would heat up. The Mk-III (a coil-propelling principle) was considered a much more safe model due to its new coil design, as well as improved conductive materials and coil isolation and production methods. But the new model's distribution was extremely regulated, so if you wanted to arm your thugs with something that was not under the nose of COW (Control and Origination of Weapons), you bought Mk-II. And even though he was no longer part of the Alistaja project, officially pardoned and in exchange exposed for the whole world to see and judge, Nick was not someone who would just up and leave a potential trouble alone to solve itself. Especially now that he did have a choice.
The fox entered the diminutive building that served as a sheriff's HQ in the Bunnyburrow and was met with an interesting sight. Three bunnies and a coyote were trying to get up the second floor through the only ladder passage, but each time someone tried to show his ugly muzz, he would receive a warning shot from upside.
The diskthrower used by the defender was, judging from the spin pattern and the whining of the disks, and the fact that they were unable to breach the sonic barrier, a police issued SMD Mk-III-p with coil charge regulator and a complex system that determined the needed charge to injure the victim and try not to kill it. There was another drawback with the police-issued SMD's. Unless authorized by a partner, or through an emergency dispatcher, they would fire only a limited amount of times. And judging by the boldness with which some of the bunnies were screaming their insults up the staircase, they knew it. Their adversary though, remained calm and collected, only snapping off shots that would deter their advances.
Nick knew not what was going on, but that was not needed. He saw enough.
- Attention. Mr. Josh Hidetail, Alastar, Roderick and Rotmeyer Prigoonski. You are charged with assault at a police HQ and armed assault of an officer of the law. Drop your SMDs and raise your hands in the air. - The fox had an element of surprise on his side, so he was able to finish his speech before the four thugs finally focused a beam from one of their lights on him. Nick didn't wear anything special. Maroon raincoat that reached his calves, black stretching jeans, black shirt and a bright red tie with a loose knot. He also wore, despite it being dark, a pair of aviator sunglasses. And since it was not a uniform, nor did the tod show any weapons, the four idiots did what they thought would be the smartest decision.
- Shoot the yiffer down! - Barked the coyote. It was an interesting thing he had to scream something at all, but apparently these bunnies were not really used to dealing with the suicidal sickos like the fox in front of them.
- You have ten seconds to comply. Officer, please stay back where you are, I've got the situation under control! - His second sentence Nick screamed, so that the assailed individual didn't get involved. As the last words left his muzzle, the first disk hit him square in the chest, bouncing back and not dealing any damage whatsoever.
- Five seconds remaining. Initiating Alistaja protocol. Directive 11. Under paragraph 13… - The failure of the first shot didn't dissuade the four attackers and they sent a hail of disks towards the fox. This time though, none even reached the target, being vaporized in the thin air by an invisible wall. Unfortunately for them, despite wearing low-light assisting glasses, the four, even combined, lacked the necessary computing power to comprehend what was happening.
- … after the ten seconds have elapsed, in case of compliance failure, the targets are to be eliminated. - With a large smile on his muzzle, the fox extracted out of the holsters on his hips his personal eight-charge bolt-throwers.
- Commence execution!
\m/
A/N: Who doesn't know, the SMD's are heavily inspired by Eldar shuriken catapults, with limitations implied by available modern technology. Or as far as I know about it. If we have a specialist on rail and coilguns, I would love to hear their thoughts on weaponry of such kind scaled for the MUCH smaller than us humans mammals.
Howleys.