A/N: Here we go, finally another chapter! Hope you enjoy and please review as things are starting to thicken.
This chapter was edited and co-written by uomoape
Chapter 9: Wayward Son
There was no doubt about the fact in her mind, or anyone else's for that matter, that Judy was one-hundred percent a morning mammal.
So understandably the front desk receptionist, Alejandro the ass, was quite shocked when the little grey bunny walked through the front doors looking like a zombie with her ears flaccid against her back, posture slouched, and heavily dragging her feet.
The donkey always imagined she was the kind of mammal that would spring out of bed full of energy and ready to start the day. That's what she always seemed to be like anyways. "Rough night out, little bunny?" he jeered with a wicked grin.
But as she kept on walking to the bullpen without the slightest sign of hearing him, his malicious grin fell into a disappointed scowl.
As she hopped up into her seat and plopped down, looking aimlessly into the distance with her eyes just barely open, a few of the mammals around her gave each other and the rabbit curious looks with whispers of "get some coffee into that bunny" floating around. Judy has truthfully never been the sort of mammal to need coffee in the morning. She also really disliked the idea of mammals depending on it... and she's admittedly never had some as growing up as a bunny caffeine was avoided like the plague, else she'd no doubt be bouncing off the walls.
The innocent curiosity of why Judy was so tired didn't last long however, and abruptly changed when someone Judy didn't recognize by voice crudely suggested, "Meh, she probably had a late night bangin' some buck for all he's worth! That's what bunnies do best, after all." This was received with a loud roar of laughter from the room.
In the blink of an eye, all the tiredness she was feeling was replaced by white hot rage. Slowly, she turned her head towards the first voice and spotted Bucksworth, a deer officer with which Judy never exchanged more than a 'Good Morning" with. How dare he make such comments on her integrity! Oh, she was gonna give him a piece of her mind! Judy made to stand from her seat, when another voice in the mix added, "Hey! Whatever she does off the clock it's none of our business!"
A spark of gratefulness grew in her chest with the words from her colleague, and she was about to thank him, but then he had more to say, "And I'm betting the sex wasn't even that great, that's why she's so glum!" With this, another round of roaring laughter echoed in the room, and even more officers shared their theories of how good or bad her "fun night" was. Judy felt a mix of anger and embarrassment swirl in her belly, but considering how tired she was, and how almost everyone in the room was making fun of her, she decided to settle on embarrassment alone. There was no point in arguing when no one would listen. So, with a decidedly red hued face she slunk back in her seat with a groan.
That completed her image of a zombie. And for some reason, as she writhed in embarrassment, an image of orange fur matched with emerald green eyes and a smug smile came into her mind's eye.
Judy let out a sardonic "ha" and pushed the image out of her mind for more important thoughts. There was too much to think about now for those kind of crazy… things.
Thinking, as it so happens, is the real reason she was so tired. Once she finally got home last night after the ordeal with Mr. Big, despite feeling exhausted, her mind was so abuzz with thought that she couldn't fall asleep for quite some time and only ended up getting about two hours of sleep. And now that she had slept on a mind full of thoughts, she had a whole new set of developed ones to chew on.
She hardly even noticed when Higgins called everyone to attention and didn't care in the slightest when Bogo entered and proceeded with his usual yelling at everyone to shut up and reading out his list of things on his docket.
After the morning roll-call was done with, the bunny sluggishly dragged her feet to her cubicle and logged on her computer. Or she tried to rather. Incorrect password, the computer silently said. With a grumble, she quickly retyped it but again, incorrect password. She then looked down at her hands on the keyboard and saw how incorrectly her fingers were placed.
"Back where you belong at last eh, rabbit?" Judy's ears flicked towards the voice at the entrance of her cubicle and she slowly turned her icy glare to see who it was. She didn't know his name, but there stood a sheep in an officer's uniform with a pair of glasses on him that looked better suited for a grandma.
"Oh, don't gimme that look. You tried your luck chasin' down the one fox that none of us could get, what'd ya expect? Now you're doing stuff you should, theoretically, be able to handle." The fluffy sheep goaded with a grin that told her he was quite amused with himself. Judy didn't respond and just turned back to her computer knowing he'd go away in a moment.
"Come to think of it, why'd you ever become a cop in the first place if you're not going to be able to handle anything larger than the size of your monitor?"
Her lips curled in anger as that reminded her of the trains of thoughts that her parents would have. Though the temptation of calling him out and saying something along the lines of 'I am sure I could handle your fluffy ass just fine in a sparring ring' was strong, she knew that it would only escalate things. So, with renewed anger, she ground her teeth to silence herself, and with more force than necessary, she pounded in her password for a third time. Once more, she got a red message in response, incorrect password, two attempts remaining.
Slamming both her paws onto her keyboard she stood up so quick that her chair went flying back and slammed against the wall of her cubicle making the sheep currently draping on her door recoil in fright. With a furious exhale that briefly reminded her of Bogo, she stomped her way down the hall into the lounge to get some coffee without noticing, or perhaps simply not caring, about more than a few curious heads poking out of their respective cubicles to see what the noise was about.
'It's official.' Judy inwardly snarled. 'I hate this place.'
A few hours later, also known as a much more agreeable time for a non-morning mammal, also known as nearly noon, a small bell signaled Nick walking into a pawnshop on the other side of town from Judy. As he walked in and looked around, a wave of familiarity washed over him from all the time he once spent in here. Putting his hands on his hips and loftily looked around at the decently large -considering who it was run by- shop, he saw that quite a lot had changed. Both the left and the right walls were covered with rows and rows of shelves full of any kind of stuff. From stuffed animals to chainsaws. The counter had an embedded glass case, with carefully displayed jewelry, and behind another row of shelves, this time filled with musical instruments.
As he strolled up to the counter he put on his best smile for in a moment or two- yup, there he is.
Behind the counter stood up a brown bear wearing an open brown plaid workshirt. At the sight of Nick, he broke into a large smile and called out, "Niiiiiccckkk wazzzuuupppp? Long time no see my brother from another mother. How's business?"
Casually looking around the shop once more as he spoke, Nick said, "Oooh it's going alright Brutus. Just usual business for predators as I'm sure you know," he said turning to him with a sly grin and a small wink.
Brutus heartily chuckled and spread his arms wide open, "Hey woah there Mr. Fox, I got no idea what you're talkin' about. However,with that in mind, can I help you find anything?"
"Yes, actually you can," Nick began as he saddled up closer to Brutus to speak more quietly. "I'm trying to find some good... let's say... traders to possibly help me start up my own place like this."
Brutus again laughed. He loved these kinds of conversations. They made him feel sneaky like he was some kind of undercover agent. "Really? I never woulda expected you to settle down for that sort of... business. Why the sudden change from your usual technique?"
"Well, to be honest with you, the movements of our mutual friends have caused the ZPD to have a bit more presence in some of my favorite areas. Perhaps if I settled down I might be a bit less conspicuous." Nick said with an overly grave voice that Judy would've had a laughing fit over.
Upon the mention of their mutual friends, Nick knew Brutus caught onto who he meant as he then looked remorseful. "Ah... well, I'm... sorry to hear that." The brown bear murmured while avoiding eye contact with Nick. "I didn't know there were really any... downsides. Um, here, I think I might have something that will prove quite useful."
As the brown bear turned to get something behind him Nick's smile faltered for a second but quickly returned when Brutus turned back around and handed him a small business card.
"The fox's den?" Nick asked feigning incredulity and hurt. "I'm actually insulted. Why haven't I heard about this place?"
"Oh, well, I'm once again sorry there my friend, but we do our best to keep it on a need-to-know basis. And you're not too far behind in news anyways, they only created it a few months ago."
Without missing a beat about the slip of information there, Nick thanked him and after a little bit more of meaningless and awkward small talk, said his goodbye.
Once he was outside, the minor pang of guilt that Nick was feeling earlier for subtly interrogating an old friend was vaporized as he processed all the information he'd gotten out of him. Brutus was clearly in league with The Surge given how he reacted to Nick's "news" and the knowledge that The Fox's Den was created by them. Cracking a wide smile, he couldn't resist saying, "Et tu brute?"
Even though his destination was also in the Savannah District, it took a surprisingly long time to get across due to an increased number of ZPD patrols and avoiding members of The Surge. Thus, more than an hour later Nick found himself walking across a parking lot to such an obvious place for a black market that he wanted to slap himself.
An Amazon warehouse.
Standing on the outskirts of the place, Nick felt admittedly nervous. He'd really have to work his foxy skills in there. But one good point of comfort was that while he stood outside and observed, he saw a good number of predators walking around so it'd at least be easier for him to fit in.
He was still not 100% sure about doing this however. True, Mr. Big himself pointed out that it would be beneficial to their "investigations" if they checked this place out, but that didn't mean it made him more confident about his task. A great number of things could go wrong, and he was sure that if anyone from The Surge got wind of what he was doing, he was done for.
So then why wasn't he just walking away? Why was he still casing the place? As if to answer these questions, a faint image of vibrantly amethyst eyes flashed in his mind, and words echoed in his ears "You're a good mammal Nick... what chance does Zootopia have if the good mammals do nothing?"
With renewed vigor towards his mission and taking a deep breath, Nick began marching forward to an open area that was devoted to loading and unloading trucks, if the number of trucks lined up in row and all the mammals buzzing around was any indication.
Before he got there however, some workers standing around and talking to each other on some picnic tables caught his attention. Walking closely behind them and looking around as if he was simply looking for something he misplaced, he had no difficulty going unnoticed by them. That is why when a hardhat went missing, nobody thought to ask the random fox walking around about it.
Walking into the enormous warehouse, he was hit with yet another wave of uncertainty as he saw how large the place was. What exactly was he looking for? Pulling out the business card that Brutus gave him and reading it again, he saw nothing of use that he hadn't noticed before.
'Well might as well pull over and ask for directions then.' Choosing at random, Nick spotted a honey badger walking around and walked up to him. Or what he thought was a "him" at least, he was never good at identifying their gender from a distance. "Excuse me, uh, sir, could you help me find-"
"Just go to section 9 and three quarters, fox." Said a very definite female voice without even looking up from her clipboard.
Nick's mouth stayed open for a beat as he felt a rare flush of heat in his already red face and walked stiffly and quickly away. Now he had to figure out where his destination was and how sections were labeled. Seeing a forklift that was turned off with its polar bear worker still nearby, Nick quickly hopped up into it and snatched the clipboard before walking off again.
After flipping through many pages, he finally found one that resembled a map and key of the different sections. Most of them were labeled with incongruous things like S-117, A113, and NCC-1701, but over in the top left corner he found ones labeled 914 and T-1000; it must be in between those two.
With his destination somewhat clearer, Nick ambled towards the inner parts of the warehouse. Looking around as he walked, all he could see were towering industrial shelves filled with merchandise. It almost seemed like a redundant theme today. Only these shelves weren't full of random stuff like the ones in Brutus' shop. Each section was labeled, and had only one type of product in it.
It took a bit of frustrated wandering and backtracking but he finally located himself on the border between 914 and T-1000, only to stand there looking confused. On both sides of him were walls of wooden crates stacked nearly as high as a giraffe with little to no indication of the sections they were in between. He was rather thrown by this and walked a few paces back to where they were labeled 914 and then walked forward and counted four columns of crates with labels on them that didn't seem to belong here until he hit ones labeled T-1000 again.
His eyes darted to and from as he thought about what to do next and was about to try something when- "Just push open the third from the ninth section on ground level you noob." Nick nearly jumped out of his fur at the voice and turned to see a lion walking by without a care in the world.
Following the lion's curt suggestion, he walked up to the wall on the right and pushed on the third crate at ground level which was so small that even Judy would've needed to crawl through. Nothing happened. Pushing a few more times with more strength still bared no response.
Maybe he meant the other side.
Walking over to the other wall, and finding the corresponding crate which was coincidentally exactly as tall as he was, Nick pushed with a moderate amount of force and it begrudgingly swung open.
After looking around to make sure no one was looking (interestingly none of the workers that he could see in the aisle were looking his way) he stepped in and closed the door behind him.
Once he walked out of the empty box, Nick stood in an area about as wide as his living room. Which was surprising already, but what surprised him even more was realizing that the entire space, that stretched out until the end of the aisle behind the boxes he came in from, was hollowed out from other similar boxes. The ceiling and walls were all made from parts of shipping crates nailed and screwed together. The space was dimly lit by a chain of low hanging light bulbs much like one would see in an old-fashioned mine. All in all, the setting was almost creepy, which did not ease the vulpine one bit.
Looking around some more, he spotted smaller crates and boxed with the top open filled with anything a mammal could buy. There were boxes full of computer parts, office supplies, clothes, yard maintenance items, book and just about anything else you could get on Amazon.
One small crate that wasn't open and was seated between two other open ones piqued his curiosity. Approaching the crate, he read the parcel that was taped on top of it. "Deliver to: The Duke of Weaselton." Nick snorted and shook his head, "This is his inside source?" he questioned out loud.
He almost moved on, when a mischievous grin split his muzzle. Turning to the crate again, and producing a pen from his pocket, he made a small correction to the parcel. "We can't have the wrong mammal get your goods now, can we Wezzelton?" he said before walking away with a very smug smile on his muzzle.
Getting back to business, Nick started to walk around and scan the various boxes for something of interest. Why did Mr. Big suggest he come here if it's just a standard black market with tons of various goods up for grabs? This would be quite the catch for a police raid but other than that, this didn't seem-
Then he saw it, further down the aisle a bit. It was the front end of a metal shipping container. 'What's that thing doing in here?'
Cautiously walking up to it, he saw a lazily drawn paper sign on one of the dual doors that read, "Off limits to ALL personnel, including foxes."
Now Nick's interest was piqued, especially since this was clearly meant to be off the market but after trying to open the dual doors, he saw that it was padlocked. Well that wasn't going to stop him, so he pulled out his lock picking kit. Surprising even himself, in only a couple minutes, with a small click the lock became disengaged. Without a care in the world, he unlatched it and tossed it over his head and heard a consequent crash. "And he called me a noob. Can't even secure their goods properly."
After his small rant to the void, he opened the doors and stepped inside the container. After he let his night vision adjust to the even darker interior, his ears flattened and his eyes widened.
"Oooohhh sh-"
"Sweet cheese and crackers." Judy mumbled as she scrolled through another list of Google results from a newly refined search of "Scandals about predators in Zootopia twenty years ago." Unsurprisingly Google had quite a few articles in response to that inquiry, and they were not happy tales.
As Judy skimmed through a few she saw that the majority of them had to do with a savage attack but there were also, sadly, a number of other cases where it was reportedly predators lashing out at prey, but Judy figured that they were most likely provoked in those cases. She's witnessed enough times prey provoking and harassing predators to the point they would attack out of anger. But here she was getting distracted, again.
For the past couple of hours, she'd been searching the internet for what Mr. Big alluded she should find out about to varying degrees of success. She originally started with searches on both Google and the ZPD server as vague as "what happened in Zootopia twenty years ago?" which of course was far too broad and didn't yield relevant information.
After getting distracted numerous times and refining her searches over a couple hours, Google finally figured out what this idiot was looking for. Apparently, what she was looking for all along fit under something called the ZGate conspiracies which spurred an (apparently) well known ZBI investigation upon the ZPD and Zootopia's City Hall. There were an innumerable number of sites dedicated to different versions of the conspiracies and surrounding speculations. There were so many different articles and blogs written about them and the investigation that it blew Judy's mind she hadn't heard about either of them before.
Well she thought she hadn't heard of them at least. As she started to read, several of the conspiracies Judy imagined were the ludicrous theories that Nick spoke of earlier, as some of them were incredibly ridiculous and irrational. Aliens. Ancient artifacts. A secret group of people controlling the city with plants and advanced Biochemistry (that admittedly went well over her head). Pffft, yeah right. She scoffed upon reading that one. As if this could all ultimately be blamed on a flower.
But one of them finally struck a bit of a nerve.
It was a theory based off biology and evolution. Something Judy had learned in school was how predators used to "survive off their aggressive hunting instincts" and it was theorized that predators were returning to their primitive savage ways for reasons outside of a contagious pathogen. As one such blog suggested, some sort of sociological phenomenon could be the cause.
But then Judy was reminded of Moliere's theorizing there wasn't an outside cause. Which as it turns out was quite a hot topic among experts and conspiracy theorists.
As she continued to scour the internet for information, the theory that predators were returning to their primitive ways remained in the forefront of her mind. She wasn't the only one who couldn't drop that line of thinking however. That theory came up many times in more credible sources like The Guardian, and was even referenced by the mayor in a press conference at the end of the whole debacle when the case was announced cold and was dropped. Which, another credible news article pointed out, could have had a lot to do with the implication of the TAME system.
That theory seemed to be the most popular one and, if it were alone in the blame, it almost single handedly caused Zootopia to become so paranoid and afraid of predators that they were to be forever prejudiced and subjugated via the TAME system... Was all this what Mr. Big wanted her to know about?
Judy was brought out of her musing by her desk phone ringing. Without looking away from the screen she picked it up and answered with a hollow, "Hello?"
"Hey Judy, it's Ben from downstairs," said a chipper and a slightly higher than normal pitched male voice. She immediately lit up so much it was as if she'd drank several cups of coffee at once.
She had called him a couple hours ago in response to learning about the investigation the ZBI conducted. There had to have been dozens of reports filed during and after the case had ended from both the ZBI's investigations and the ZPD's internal affairs. But when Judy did a quick search on her computer for specifically the ZGate conspiracy, nothing came up, which was more than a bit conspicuous.
In a stroke of intuition, Judy surmised that even if there were no digital copies of the report, there could still be physical ones. And if her hunch was correct, and some higher-grade mammal decided to hide the investigation, 'Looking at you, Chief Bogo', then the copies would be buried in some box under a rug down in records. Coincidentally, that's where the only mammal working at the ZPD that she considered a friend was posted. Funny how life works, huh?
"Oh, hey Ben. Did you find anything?" Judy chirped back.
"Well, I got a strange hunk of information for ya Judy." He paused and Judy could hear him talking to someone in the background along with the sound of shuffling papers. She shifted in her chair in anticipation. "Sorry about that hun. Anyways. So, what's weird is that there was a hard copy of a whole bunch of documents pertaining to the ZGate conspiracies, but they no longer exist."
Judy frowned and furrowed her brows. "Well then how do you know they did exist?"
"Cause we keep logs of everything. But don't despair, for I have found a locked pdf file containing one or, heck, maybe all of the original documents. What it was doing on its own private server-network-thingy I have no idea, but it requires the credentials of an Officer so I can't view it. I'll send you a link for it to your email."
"Oh, thank you so much Benji, you're a hero!"
He laughed bashfully. "Heh, yeah, just...glad I could help for once. Keep in touch Jude."
After she hung up, she opened her email, and double-clicked on the only one she hasn't checked yet. Once she clicked on the link she was then asked by the computer to enter in her officer's credentials like her badge number, name, date of birth etc. After the computer chewed on it for a few agonizingly long moments, she was let in and she widened her eyes at how large the document was. It was over a hundred pages!
Getting over her initial shock for the size of the file, she started scrolling through it, trying to find the most important parts, rather than reading the whole file. That would take hours, and her patience was already worn thin from the countless searches on the internet. After the initial protocol jumble regarding the case flew by, her attention was caught by the two sigils cresting the next page shoulder to shoulder. The ZPD shield and the ZBI crest were prominent on the head of the page.
Knowing she'd found what she was looking for, Judy started reading more attentively. The entire internet wasn't lying, an investigation had in fact been conducted by the ZBI regarding both the ZPD and City Hall. And the fact a government agency got involved in this so-called conspiracy made Judy very cautious about what she was reading.
Reading further in, she discovered that the investigation was led by two agents identified only by their initials: Agent J and Agent R. She scoffed lightly at that. 'What, do they think this is some kind of spy movie?' Moving on from her little inside joke, she discovered that the two agents were apparently held at high regard. Spotless field record and countless solved cases that were deemed impossible to crack by their colleagues made for an impressive curriculum, and the reason they were appointed to this case; they were undoubtedly the best of their time. Judy had to wonder how on earth this case managed to go cold with them on it.
Skimming through a number of "case files" reported by J&R detailing what they were doing and why, she came across a rather light-hearted section detailing some dialogue of a night after they got off from J's point of view. Why it was included she had no idea, but she read on with a smile.
"Ha, man, remember when we were in Zoo York a few years back and you briefly dated that vixen with that red dress... what was her name? Jasmine... Bella?" I had asked joyfully as I admittedly had a few drinks in me.
"McKenna." He said despondently looking off into the distance. I struggled to keep smiling, but I knew it'd pay off if I kept it up. It always did.
"Yeah well forget about her man," I said clapping him on the back. "You know it wasn't a good match, and since when would you be one for settling down? Need I mention Mar-"
"Oh, don't you dare." He said with a chuckle finally escaping and reaching out to sip on the drink I slid in front of him ages ago. "Should I start calling you what that one badger did?"
I laughed loudly. And he was back! "Touché mate." We both chuckled and a few peaceful moments passed during which I drank and he sipped.
Then he said what I feared was on his mind and the cause of his downer mood. "No, I don't plan on settling down mate you know me better than that, but... this case." I lowered my drink and sent him a warning look that went unnoticed. "I think there's something… much more here than we're giving it-"
"Oh, give it a rest." I interrupted, doing my best to dismiss it once more. This was perhaps the fifth time that he'd-
The report went onto an analyzation of the conversation and why it was mentioned but Judy moved on to more important sections. As she scrolled, she went past several interviews and questionings, fiber and DNA tests, past a... wait what? A joint ZPD-ZBI raid on the Cliffside Hospital?! Judy furrowed her brow and returned her full attention to the document.
Reading on, after the raid yielded no results, it was followed by J&R led accusations of Bogo tipping off their opponents. Followed by reports from multiple sources of tensions rising between the ZBI and ZPD. Bogo and the ZBI director having a few rows. J&R having disagreements that were becoming increasingly heated, both at work and outside... The whole thing was going to hell!
Judy was about three quarters of the way through the file and her heart was pounding in her chest when she saw a report from the ZBI director himself. It apparently all came to a crescendo when they got a tip off from an anonymous source regarding-
Please Enter your Officer Credentials:
The red pop-up flashed on her screen. Judy scowled at the computer for its horrendous timing and shrugged off the oddity of why it was asking her to do so again, typing in her information once more.
Authentication Error: You are not authorized to view this document
"What?! Urgg you STUPID computer. Since when!?" Judy screamed at the mutinous monitor.
"Since one minute ago," responded a friendly sounding female voice emanating from her computer speakers.
Judy immediately froze and sat there dumbfounded. The computer just responded to her. A few moments passed where all she heard was her still heavily beating heart and other officers typing away or on calls. Finally regaining her bearings Judy slowly asked, "Whu- Why did you just respond?" feeling immensely silly for talking to a computer.
"Protocol. Upon emphasis of the word 'computer' or 'Cortana,' I listen and wait for your command."
"So... the mic is always on then if you can hear me when I say that?"
"It is no different than your phone or any other device capable of receiving voice commands, if you are worried about your privacy," the voice, or Cortana rather, aptly responded in a chipper voice.
Judy hmm-ed and thought for a moment. Despite the computer's assurance her privacy was no different, Judy was still thankful she hadn't had any private conversations in here.
Pushing those thoughts to the side, Judy spoke up again. "Computer. Who last made changes to the security settings of this file?"
"Adrian Bogo, Chief of Police in Precinct One. Would you like to contact him?"
"...No." Judy quietly answered. She had somewhat expected him to be the culprit and even before she got her paws on this document she dreadfully anticipated he'd interfere, but that coming to reality was still a bit of a shock. She had the right to view this! So why w-... before she even fully formulated the question in her mind, she answered herself.
Of course Bogo wouldn't want her to know about this if he was in on the corruption!
As if her private musing summoned him, her desk phone started ringing again, and Judy had already an idea of who was calling her. Her brows forming a straight line, and her mouth pursed in annoyance, Judy picked up the receiver and kept it a reasonable distance from her sensitive ears. Chief Bogo's voice echoed through her cubicle the entire floor. "HOPPS! Get in my office! NOW!"
Suppressing an angry sigh, Judy heaved herself from her chair, and ambled towards her destination. Knocking more out of habit than out of respect for her boss, the gruff voice of the buffalo urged her to enter.
Now inside his office, Judy could see just how angry he was. For the first time since working here his stare didn't faze her, and she responded with a glare of her own. "Sit," ordered Bogo.
She did so without breaking eye contact, never once dispelling her icy glare. "You are not allowed to view that document Hopps as that contains confidential information regarding both the ZBI and the ZPD."
"And many other things that I'm sure you wouldn't want to be known," retorted Judy icily.
A vein had started pulsating on the buffalo temple. "Don't test my patience Hopps. It would take little effort for me to change the deal we made from transferred to FIRED!" the Chief threatened.
Judy didn't even flinch at the threat and she remained to be stoic. Behind her stone face, the possibility of actually getting fired was being processed in earnest though. Surprisingly, the idea didn't affect her as much as she would've thought an hour ago. In a couple of brief seconds, all the months she'd spent at the precinct came to mind. All the snide comments, the sexist and speciest insinuations, the fact that no one in there really believed she could be an officer, the general displeasure she'd experienced being here. Realizing all this, she concluded that being fired might not be such a big deal to her anymore.
Her lack of response was a bit of a surprise for Bogo too. He waited for her to flinch, to try to douse the fire or even rile it up like how their arguments usually unfolded. But this time, she just sat there with such a dark glare on her miniature bunny features he was drawn into it so much he forgot how small she was. Why did she look so...? Not upset but... Bogo couldn't place his finger on it. Disappointed? Disapproving? Scornful?
He had to admit, it made him feel uneasy and his glare was turned down a noticeable notch or two.
For quite some time, the two glared at each other and a silent war between ice and fire was fought. (Maybe a song should be written about it) But for once, it was Bogo's will that was starting to crack. He hated being looked at like... that.
Finally, a small change in her body language alerted him that she was about to speak. "Why did you change the security clearance for that file?" she asked, her voice stiff and emotionless.
"I told you already Hopps, there is sensitive information in there that a normal officer shouldn't have access to. If that information got out again, we would be in a sea of trouble."
"Again?" the bunny asked with a raised eyebrow. Bogo grumbled for a moment at the slip up. 'Damn detail oriented bunny...'
"When the whole mess started, a newly recruited officer, just like you, was stupid enough to blabber about it to his girlfriend at the time. The next day, the precinct was surrounded by the press asking about what was happening. I am not risking something similar happening again. I don't need the ZBI sticking their noses up my tail in these chaotic times after one of my officers made classified information public knowledge. So you best keep your cute little tail out of things you know nothing about Hopps."
'Well of course I know nothing about it, you want to keep it that way,' Judy bitterly thought.
"If the information in those files is so important, why was there a copy that any officer could access?" she asked, seeing a fault in his reasoning.
"There wasn't." Bogo growled. "You somehow managed to find the only existent copy. At some point, shortly after the case was dropped against us and City Hall, there was a security breach in our systems and not only were all the physical copies regarding the case destroyed, but so were any digital ones. The only reason that file still exists is due to the ZBI having backup copies that we transcribed into our database and kept as a separate and hidden file for precaution."
Bogo's stare now became accusing, "Which begs the question: How the hell did you manage to find it? It was in its own private server for heaven's sake!"
Even if her face didn't change from her seemingly permanent glare, her body language betrayed a slight hesitation on her part. That was a very pertinent question, one that she couldn't answer without throwing Ben under the bus. If it was any other officer, she wouldn't have thought twice about it, but Ben was the only thing resembling a friend in this place.
Just as she was about to open her mouth to try and somehow dodge the question, her left butt cheek started vibrating. For a tense few moments, they both listened to the phone violently vibrating vying for her attention.
When it finally subsided, and after clearing her throat she started talking with as much strength as she could muster so her voice didn't shake. "Well, you see Sir, I-"
Once again, her phone interrupted her and started vibrating. Sparing it a few thoughts, she was becoming curious who that was. It couldn't be her parents as it wasn't night, unless it was an emergency of course... Or maybe it was-
Her eyes slightly widened as she realized who it probably was. "Sorry sir, but permission to take that call? It's likely related to the Wilde case."
Bogo's left ear flicked. Her phone was surely about to be on the last buzz. She really needed an answer about right now. Then he subtly nodded towards her pocket.
She quickly and gratefully whipped the phone out of her pocket and hit the green Accept button without even looking at who it really was and made to stand up and walk out. But before either end could speak Bogo grunted, "Stay in this room. I'm not done with you yet."
Somehow whoever was on the other end knew not to speak yet and Judy sent him a hateful look for the indecency. Not taking her eyes off him, she spoke into the phone. "Hello?"
"Carrots," Nick whispered urgently, "There you are, you have got to hear what I just found."
"N-Nathan," Judy sighed as she gripped her face, finally breaking eye contact. Her eyes were gonna become sore at this rate from the lack of blinking. "This isn't really the best time." A long pregnant pause passed then as Nick was likely figuring out why she called him Nathan.
"Ok, well uh, you need to hear it anyways, this is really crucial. I delved into what our mutual friend hinted for me to, and I found the supposed Fox's Den within an Amazon warehouse. This would be one heck of a crime bust... but anyways, that's not what's important.
"There's like an entire container filled with riot gear for the ZPDhere. Gas grenades, riot shields, armor, the whole shebang." Judy stiffened and turned to head of the ZPD with wide eyes, who shot her a curious look with a slight head tilt in response.
"Hopps," Nick spoke even softer than before and as if reading her mind said, "This stuff is not going to you guys. It'll most likely end up in The Surge's paws unless we do something. How did they even get all this stuff?"
Again, Judy couldn't fathom a response and sat there absolutely stunned with her mouth slightly agape. "Judy, something big is going on here," Nick added.
"Just...hold on one second, Ni-Nathan," she finally said, then looked at Bogo. "Chief, can we continue this later? Something important just came up."
Bogo was immensely curious why Hopps suddenly looked like she saw a ghost, but if it had to do with catching that blasted fox...
"Fine. Get out." She happily obliged.
After the door clicked shut, Bogo stood up and looked out the window that overlooked the park where he could see a group of predators congregating for what he strongly hoped, even if in vain, wouldn't be a protest right in front of the ZPD building.
Shaking his head at the all the chaos going on these days, he turned back to his desk again. Sitting down in his chair with a grunt, the Chief picked up the receiver of his phone and punched in an all too familiar number. After two ring tones, whoever was at the other side of the call picked up, but remained silent.
Heaving a heavy sigh and gripping his face, much like Hopps did a few minutes earlier, Bogo lowly spoke, "We got a problem."
