I finally have reviews! Yay! Time for more smackdown in Hoboken then.

Chapter 4: A Plot

Hans was sitting in the only flower bed in the zoo. Or what used to be the only flower bed in the zoo. He had picked some flowers for Clarice as a gift, but of course she wouldn't accept them. And in the end he ended up getting punched in the face for his troubles.

So it entered into his head to do the old "Loves-me-Loves-me-not" with the remaining flowers. Each flower he pulled up and plucked all ended at "Loves me not". It was very frustrating. He was still sitting there when Clemson came walking up.

"Why are you sitting in the flower bed? I didn't know you liked gardening," the lemur said with a smirk. This made the rejected suitor angry. He stood up and suddenly grabbed the wanna-be king be the throat.

"Why do you care? Don't you have anything else better to do than make fun of others?"

"No," Clemson managed to choke out. He was still smirking. That just made Hans suspicious.

"What's with the smile," he asked, his eyes narrowing.

"Oh, it's just that I might be able to help you out. For a price."

Hans let go, and Clemson dropped to the ground gasping. He was still suspicious, but he really did want to win over Clarice. A lonely guy has needs, and isn't always very picky.

"You are sure can help me?"

"Yeah. But like I said, my help isn't free. Nothing is free if you want to get technical about it. Well, maybe air is. Although sometimes I'm not so sure about that."

The puffin was used to those kinds of ramblings, so he let it go and focused on the main issue.

"What is your price?"

Clemson smiled in that creepy way he had before answering.

"I want you to help me get rid of Julien so I can be king of the lemurs."

Hans should have figured that it would have been something like that. But whatever. If it helped him with his romance troubles, then he'd gladly help. He didn't particularly like the idiotic ringtail lemur anyway.

"So how should we do this?"

Clemson started whispering his plan to his cohort. Meanwhile, Clarice was hiding nearby listening in on all of this. She had been following Clemson since he had left his habitat earlier that day. She had made it her job to prevent the criminals of the zoo from doing anything bad, so she had to keep an eye on all of them if she could. But it was hard since there were multiple bad guys, and just her to stop them. She would do her best though.

So she overheard the plan the two were making to get rid of some other lemur in a different zoo. The plan was simple. Get them transferred to the Central Park Zoo for a while, kill Julien while there.

Clarice remembered being told that the penguin Hans had framed in Denmark was living at the Central Park Zoo along with his team. They could definitely stop the assassination plot. But she rather that it not come to that. She'd prefer it if the penguins didn't have to get involved at all. So she had to figure out a way to stop the transfer.

Late that night, after everyone was supposed to be asleep, Clemson and Hans broke into the zookeeper's office. Gaining access to the computer and animal transfer system was a simple thing. It didn't take long for the whole thing to be set up. Tomorrow they'd be transferred to the Central Park Zoo.

"Finally. Clemson shall reign and all the lemurs will bow before me. Except for Julien of course. You know, 'cause he'll be dead. But all the others will be bowing."

Hans rolled his eyes at that.

"Ja. So, how did I win Clarice's heart?"

"I'm not going to tell you yet. Once I'm king THEN I'll tell you."

Hans grumbled at this, but decided not to comment. He was looking forward to tomorrow. He'd have his answer, and could finally have a girlfriend. And maybe if he were lucky, he could get rid of Skipper while he was at the Central Park Zoo.

The two animals left the building. They didn't notice when someone else slipped inside a few minutes after they had left.

Clarice typed furiously. Computers were not her strong point. She knew how to surf the Internet; that was easy. Working programs wasn't. She had always needed help from Gerard for things like that. She had to be careful, or she end up accidentally shipping them off to China.

"Why didn't I learn computers?" she grumbled to herself.

Finally she managed to figure out how to work the animal transfer system, and cancelled the transfer. With a sigh of relief, she quickly cut off the machine and started running back to the habitat. She slowed down and started to tip-toe as she reached the lemur habitat. She peeked inside. There was Clemson, fast asleep and with a smug grin on his face; as if he were already king.

She resumed her return at a brisk trot. As she reached there, she peered around. No sign of Hans. Clarice started to worry. If he had returned and found her gone, he might start to suspect something. She contemplated looking for him, when she heard footsteps approaching. As fast a possible she entered the habitat and hopped up to the top of the cement outcrop.

Just in time too. It was Hans, returning from somewhere else in the zoo. Clarice laid down and pretended to be asleep. She hoped that he didn't know she had been gone. He too entered the enclosure and hopped to the top of the outcrop. But he didn't lay down. He just stood there. Clarice risked a peek. Hans was staring up at the sky with a faraway expression on his face. Then with a huge sigh, he laid down and went to sleep.

The next morning was filled with tension. Hans and Clemson kept looking around for the zookeeper. Clarice kept silently praying that she had typed in everything correctly. The morning slowly wore away to afternoon with no sign of anyone coming to collect the animals for transfer. The zoo closed with Clemson and Hans still there.

That night the two animals met up secretly in the souvenir shop to discuss what had happened. Or rather what hadn't happened.

"Did you type in something wrong? I'm pretty sure you typed in something wrong. I probably should have done it and not you."

"What?! If you think like that, then maybe you should have just done the whole thing by yourself instead of trying to get me involved in the first place!"

"But I thought you wanted to know how to win over that girl you live with."

That stopped Hans from arguing. He had wanted to know. He still did want to know. But he didn't want to go through all that again. Then something crossed his mind. He looked cannily at the lemur.

"Do you really know a way that I can romance Clarice, or were you lying?"

Clemson's eyes shifted quickly back and forth, and he began to fidget. He didn't want to answer. But when he got kicked across the room, he felt compelled to answer.

"Well, actually…no. I don't. But how hard can it be to win over a girl anyway? Maybe you're doing it wrong. That's probably it. You're doing it wrong."

Hans glared in anger. Before the lemur could make a break for it, the puffin attacked him and started to give him a sound beating. Clarice watched all this from one of the windows. She smiled to herself, glad that she had managed to do some good. And glad that the overly talkative mammal was getting what he deserved.

Well, that was slightly different. But still ends in violence. Please review!