Even though Judy had a pretty good idea of who the voice belonged to considering the insufferably smug tone that came with it, she quickly turned around only to find that it was in fact Dawn Bellwether standing in front of the doorway, a small gun that she recognized as the one used to fire the Night Howler pellets trained on the three of them.

As Nick and Eric turned around as well to see who got the jump on them, Bellwether smiled before taking a few steps forwards so that she was now fully visible thanks to the light from a nearby window.

"Well, well…look who we have here…a couple of dirty thieves who think that they could steal my Night Howler suitcase and bring me down. I'd like to say nice try, but that would be giving you too much credit."

Judy's eyes immediately widened, not expecting Bellwether to have guessed their plans to the letter.

"How did you know?"

"Lucky guess…although admittedly you were kind of predictable. I had a feeling that you two would try to get the case back after I snuck it out of the Natural History Museum. Frankly, I expected something a little more original out of you two, especially after that stunt you two pulled trying to record me confessing," she said, pointing towards Nick and Judy as she spoke.

As for Nick, he finally managed to find his words after registering what was going on.

"So, what are you going to do with that, then? Shoot me?" he asked, gesturing towards the pellet gun in her hoof.

"Well, yes. That was the idea," said Bellwether, acting like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

Before Nick could say anything more, Bellwether pointed the gun towards him and fired a shot. However, since she had already telegraphed the fact that she was going to do it, Nick was prepared, ducking as the pellet flew harmlessly over his head.

Bellwether only managed to get a few more shots off, which thankfully all missed, before Nick managed to duck behind her desk, crouching as low as he could to avoid exposing any part of his body.

"Did you really think my desk would protect you? I can easily just walk over a few feet and you're exposed again. God, you're dense," said Bellwether, chuckling as she began walking just as she said she would.

In her haste to dart Nick, though, Bellwether ended up completely forgetting about Judy and Eric. While the latter was focusing more on avoiding getting hit himself (considering he was also a predator), the former was more worried about Nick, having remembered how close Nick came to getting darted himself back in the museum.

After pulling herself out of her stunned state, Judy rushed forwards just as Bellwether was beginning to reload, going down on to all fours and shoulder tackling her.

While Bellwether was a little surprised by the brazen attack from Judy, it didn't take long before she was subdued, Judy pulling her tranquilizer gun out of her holster and pointing it right at Bellwether's face.

"You're under arrest, Bellwether. Don't even try to struggle. We still outnumber you three to one."

Rather than curse her luck at getting caught so easily, Bellwether instead chuckled evilly, catching Judy off guard as she didn't expect her to act this way.

"Oh no, I'm afraid you're quite wrong on the whole 'being outnumbered' thing. As a matter of fact, I have a bit of a backup plan."

"What are you talking about?" asked Judy forcefully, pressing the tranq gun against Bellwether.

"Oh, you'll see. They're on their way right now."

The pressure of the tranq gun on Bellwether's face lessened as Judy tried to figure out just what she meant. It didn't take very long for her question to be answered, though, but not in the way she expected.

"Carrots, look out!"

Judy barely had any time to look over and see that it was Nick who had yelled, his paw pointing towards the office door before she was sent flying, crashing into Nick as she bounced off of Bellwether's desk.

Thankfully, the cushioned landing meant that she didn't suffer any bad injuries, so after picking herself up, she came around the desk to find Bellwether on her feet, surrounded by three massive warthogs in riot gear, all three of them brandishing police batons while other weapons were strapped to their backs, making them look incredibly imposing.

As Judy, Nick and Eric looked on in shock, Bellwether smiled before finally speaking.

"I'd like you to meet the Razorbacks, my elite force of trained bodyguards."

It was then that Bellwether lifted the hoof not holding the gun, revealing a bracelet with a small box attached to it, a small red button glowing brightly on said box.

"Anytime I press this button right here, they come straight here to defend me with everything they have."

"Why haven't we heard about these guys before then? Don't you think that at least someone would have a problem with how you're using the city's funds?" asked Judy.

"Hey, what mammals don't know won't hurt them," said Bellwether, shrugging.

Judy made a mental note of this new revelation before making a move towards her. However, before she could even take a few steps, one of the Razorbacks whipped out a shotgun, forcing her to freeze as the warthog ratcheted it to show he meant business.

"You'll never get away with this."

Judy gave Bellwether the darkest glare she could muster but, just like during their conversation in Chief Bogo's office, the mayor was unimpressed.

Snapping her hooves together, the Razorbacks gathered around Bellwether as they waited for her orders.

"Arrest those three for treason. Feel free to get physical if you need, but I want them all alive, especially the otter in the back."

Eric nearly jumped, not expecting to have been brought into the conversation like this.

"Oh yes, I know who you are. Everyone's going to love me when they find out that I've captured one of the most notorious thieves in Zootopia."

Eric barely had enough time to react once Bellwether signaled for the Razorbacks to make the arrest. Panicking as he noticed the warthog heading for him brandishing a police baton, the otter made a run for it, thankfully not having to worry about a collar getting in the way.

The Razorback was a lot smarter than he thought, though, as he went to cut him off. However, being that otters were incredibly slippery, Eric managed to dodge through the warthog's attempted grab, not even waiting a second before he rocketed towards the door.

As the warthog gave chase to Eric, both Nick and Judy were still dealing with their own problems, mainly having their own Razorbacks creeping closer to them by the second.

Judy, having been trained to deal with these types of situations, quickly formulated a plan before putting it into action.

Just as the warthog she was trying to get around was about to make the grab, Judy bounced upwards, using the nearby desk to springboard over the larger mammal before making a run for it.

Nick, however, wasn't so lucky.

While he did try his best to remain as healthy as possible, he was nowhere near as athletic as Judy, so he had to take a different approach to escape his captor.

Using his shifty nature to his advantage, Nick attempted to fake the warthog out, waiting for the right moment to slip past him and make his escape.

The warthog wasn't fooled, however.

Just as Nick tried to slip by him, the fox was met with a hard shot in the stomach from the police baton in the warthog's hoof, knocking the wind out of him.

The Razorback then quickly cracked him over the head as Nick bent over, sending him down to the floor.

"Nick!"

Still conscious, Nick lifted his head to find that Judy had returned to the room, having heard the thwack that the baton gave.

"Judy, run!" Nick yelled before grunting in pain as the Razorback that took him down kicked him hard in the ribs.

Judy barely had time to register the fact that Nick was essentially sacrificing himself before the Razorback she'd managed to slip past caught up to her, picking her up and holding her to his chest.

What the warthog failed to take into account, though, was that Judy's head was right in front of his, and she took immediate advantage of this error, swinging her head back as she head butted the warthog in the snout as hard as she could.

As the warthog's hooves went to his injured snout, Judy landed on her feet as she attempted to make a move to save Nick. However, she stopped when she noticed Nick desperately trying to wave her off with his paws.

"Judy, no! Save yourself and run!"

This earned the fox another few kicks in the ribs from the nearby Razorback.

As Nick clutched at his side in pain, Judy desperately tried to will herself into rushing forwards and saving Nick from the beating he was getting, but she was unable to resist turning around and running, the sound of Nick's cries of pain (as well as the telltale crackle of electricity) ringing through her ears as she made her way towards the front door, not caring enough to make a subtle escape.

Thankfully, Judy was able to use the time that the Razorback was stunned to her advantage, slipping away from City Hall as she made her way over to where the getaway was supposed to be.

Luckily, the van was still there, but it was only a small comfort to Judy, as when she managed to pull herself inside and close the door, she was met with looks from both Finnick and Eric, who apparently had managed to give his own Razorback the slip.

"What happened to Nick? Why isn't he with you?" asked Finnick, looking like he was desperate for good news.

It was at that point that the adrenaline of her narrow escape wore off, and it finally hit her what had just happened.

"They have him…" she said quietly.

"What?" asked Finnick, confused.

"I tried to save him, but they were just too powerful."

In her stunned state, she did end up failing to mention that she never actually made an attempt to save him considering she was too frightened with what was going on. However, Finn was more concerned with what had happened to his friend to really dwell on that fact.

The van fell silent as both Judy and Eric watched Finnick register the fact that Nick was now in Bellwether's clutches. His muzzle crinkled up as it began to look like he was trying his best not to cry, but they were both surprised when instead of actually doing so, he loudly swore, banging his fists on the steering wheel repeatedly.

This caused his collar to go off once more, but thankfully it wasn't as bad of a shock as the last time, so the fennec still had all of his senses going once the shock died down.

"Do you want one of us to drive?" asked Judy, worried about the emotional state the tiny fox was in.

To her surprise, though, he shook his head vigorously.

"I'll be fine. We should probably be going anyway before they find us here."

Without waiting for a reply, Finnick pulled the van out of its hiding spot, refusing to look at either of his fellow passengers as he retraced the path he took to get here in the first place.

However, the silence didn't last very long, as Judy voiced a concern that they were most likely all thinking.

"Where are we going to go, though?"

Both Eric and Finnick gave her confused looks, the latter through the rear view mirror. Thankfully, Judy clearly noticed them, so she at least was able to get a general idea of what they were asking and explain herself.

"We're essentially fugitives now. There's no doubt that Bellwether's going to have our faces plastered all over the news in the morning, so we're going to need to find a place to hide out so that the police don't find us."

Judy soon fell silent, but her expression quickly changed once something else clicked in her mind. It didn't take very long for the depression to hit once she realized what she'd done, knowing that going back to what her life was before was going to be almost impossible now that she had a criminal record.

Unfortunately, with Nick not being there, Finnick and Eric were the only ones left to try and cheer her up, and neither of them were really the type to actually do that kind of stuff.

Still, Finnick wanted nothing more than to not have to deal with a depressed Judy, so he sighed heavily before speaking, hoping that things would work out.

"Look, uh…there's a lot of jobs out here in the city. It's not the end of the world if you happen to lose your job as a cop thanks to this. Heck, once we figure out a way to bust Nick out, I'm sure he'd love to have you around hustling other mammals. Having someone of the opposite sex would be great to help us pull off some more jobs."

Finnick didn't exactly know what else he could say, so he fell silent, waiting to see what Judy would do.

"I don't know if I'm cut out for that kind of work, Finn. I'm from Bunnyburrow, remember?"

Finnick never really recalled her or Nick ever mentioning where she was actually from, but she did always have that country bumpkin air about her ever since they met, so he let that go in favor of taking another approach to convince her of the viability of his work.

"So?"

He could see her eyebrows rise in curiosity, so he quickly elaborated after knowing he had her interested.

"Nick and I are pros at this. All we have to do is teach you the basics, and you'd be running cons within the week. Just imagine the amount of money you could make!"

Judy could see an uncharacteristic smile poking out from the bottom of the rear-view mirror, and she couldn't help but smile herself, knowing how much it was unlike the normally surly fennec fox to act like that.

"I'll think about it," she said, mostly in an attempt to placate Finnick. She spent so much time out of her life wanting to realize her dream of becoming a cop that even thinking about getting into that line of work left a deep pit in her stomach.

Finnick couldn't resist chuckling a bit at the playful tone that Judy had as she mentioned her parents. However, he never really had a chance to delve into that offhanded comment, as Eric suddenly spoke up, surprising the both of them considering he's spent most of the ride silent.

"You guys can hide out in my apartment building. I'm sure Ben would love to let you guys stay in his place."

While Judy would have definitely agreed with the fact that Clawhauser would have been more than happy to have some friends to spend time with, she was still a little wary.

"Are you sure that's a good idea?"

"Yeah, I do. They may know what I look like, but they still don't know where I live. Besides, we've got Mr. Big looking over us, remember?"

Judy soon realized that what Eric said was true, and she could imagine that Mr. Big would be open to keeping the godmother to his daughter's baby safe, at least once he was notified.

"Sounds good. Let's go."

Shrugging, Finnick continued on his way, all three of them eager to find a way to fix this setback and find a way to get Nick back.