AN: Just an FYI, this chapter be be relatively short (barely over 2,000 words). The two after will be shorter. Then they'll be a bit longer to very long. While I can get my chapters out on a regular basis, I have much more trouble getting them all out to a regular size (case in point, the most recent chapter I sent off to my proof reader is 10x the length of the next one). On the bright side, It may be what finally pushes me above the 1 review per 1,000 word target that I've always coveted. That would be nice.
-StoryWriter and FeyFable: Thanks very much. I strongly advise you check out Wildburr's fluent over on Ao3 to get the original version that inspired this.
-Bandera: Your wait is over. In writing this story, the flashback chapters were the high-point. The things 'never mentioned' are things that I really did want to go into when writing this. I'm a bit of a romantic for the whole Civilization concept, the idea of creating something from the start. From the dust itself. The Prequel, Believe in me Baby, was prefaced by the final verse of Telegraph road, and I think that the past sections are well served by the first verse:
'A long time ago, came a man on a track,
Walking thirty miles with a sack on his back,
And he put down his load where he thought it was the best,
He made a home in the wilderness...'
I could add more, but it would be better if you (and any other readers) go out and listen to those fourteen minutes of musical glory (then followed by the rest of Love over Gold). Anyway, I think it's a bit poetic. Telegraph road was about the birth and rise of Detroit, and then its fall and one man gritting his teeth and fleeing. The Prequel is the end of that story, and this story is it starting over once more. Reborn.
As for blood spilt (sidenote, Fan-Fic doesn't register spilt as a word, wtf?), let me into a secret...
You're just a bloodthirsty bastard.
-Foxlover: There never really was a chapter order. It's gone present, past, diary,past,present,diary,past,present,past and now present. I wanted to go adorable with a lot of his childhood out in the village, and lets face it, a little Fox growing up on the first town of a new land... slowly exploring a learning. Unless this your a lovecraft obsessive, adorable is going to be the default setting.
As for the cute pencil sketch? This is a call to all artists reading, as long as you post a link up in a review you have my permission to go wild(e)!
-Arcana: Thanks a bunch. Good to see you and Nick agree on something. What about the humans who jump horses through fires? Now, I know that you may say that this is unadventurous, but just imagine what would happen if your horse decides to nope out just before it? Thanks for the grammar pointers, I think I fixed them (or I might be getting confused). You'll find I'm quite a culture vulture for vulture culture.
With the collars, I think that mammalian Pred-Prey relations were always very tense after the long winter. For a long time, you likely had de-facto segregation, with the only interaction taking place in defended trading areas. When urbanisation took off, Preds would likely be excluded at the start (contributing heavily to their disadvantaged position), though Pred only towns like Happytown would develop. There was likely something like the longitude prize in order to find a way of making Preds 'safe', which delivered the Tame Collar relatively early on (likely a century or so ago, around the time John's Grandfather was born). There would be a few objections from Prey who knew Preds, but they were few and far between. So the collars were introduced, eighty percent of the population saw it as a good thing and over time, the lie that they were needed was repeated enough to become a truth.
No plot, no conspiracy, just the ignorance and tyranny of the majority.
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Chapter 10:
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"Your name…"
Judy scowled slightly, impatiently awaiting the Fox's answer. Currently sitting across from him in a ZPD interrogation room, her foot was beginning to tap furiously as her charge remained resolute in his indifferent demeanour. Sure, he'd scowled slightly at the Mammal he'd apparently assaulted, but when locked in this room with her he'd merely taken the time to gently file and polish his claws as methodically as he could. His worryingly sharp… threateningly sharp… deadly sharp claws. Slowly getting ever sharper, all more poised to murder and maim.
As for Nick, he was just watching on with a coy smile. Looking up and down at the Bunny in blue, a warm feeling fluttering through his heart, knowing full well that he was irritating the hell out of her. To say this day had been frustrating and had not gone to plan was a severe understatement. But sitting here, looking on at 'the establishment' getting its tail in a twist over him, was enough to make it all better. He had some sympathy though for the little bunny, so after letting out a very long and exaggerated yawn he chose to show her some mercy.
"Mr Nicholas Tuc Vulpes," he said with a grin and a wink. "Though, as I like you, you can address me as Sir."
"… Mr Vulpes, why did you assault that Goat."
His eyes widening with the statement in mock surprise, the Fox chose this time to put every acting skill he had or learned to good use. He was going to get out of this scot free, he was going to wind this bigoted Fox-Away carrying Bunny up to the Nth degree and it was going to be epic.
"Why do you assault Mammals?" Nick asked, as innocently as he could. Judy coughed slightly, looking up and scowling at the Fox across from her, before he continued. "Or, as you would class it were the situation reversed, why do you defend yourself from mammals?"
She scowled and leant forward. Nick couldn't help but give a faint chuckle as he spotted her nose twitching in faint irritation. "Mr Vulpes, I have it on good authority…"
"Well, the authority of a mammal known to be a public health risk."
"Health risk!?" Judy shouted out incredulously, while Nick responded by slowly shaking his head and tutting.
"You do know what he was doing as a living, huh?"
"Street trading and…" Judy began to say, only to be cut off.
"I see he didn't fill you in, did you?"
"That's irrele…"
"If this situation were reversed, though if it were I could likely have several limbs missing and still be viewed as the de-facto instigator…"
Judy banged her fist on the table to cut him off and, with her hackles raised, she pointed an accusing finger at Nick while shedding any last shreds of her previous good cop persona. "Stop playing the Pred card here, Nick!"
"Whoa! Did I give you permission to go down to a first name basis?"
"Now you listen…"
"No, you listen!" the Fox calmly replied, holding his paw up in defiance. "First things first, I do believe that I asked you to call me Sir. Isn't that right?"
"Well yes, but…"
"But nothing, thanks for agreeing officer."
Judy blinked for a few seconds, trying to regain her bearings, before latching on to the last thing Nick had said and making her disagreement very clear. "That's junior detective!"
"Junior detective Hopps." Nick replied, smiling as he did so. He paused for a second or two, thinking about whether asking the Bunny in front of him whether her title meant she got one of those gold sticker badges, before deciding against it. "You see? Little bit of common courteously. Manners maketh the mammal. Now, getting back to our Goat…"
"Can you stop deflecting this?" Judy bitterly mumbled out, her half-lidded eyes getting even more so as she heard the reply.
"No. It's rather important you see. Because if it were a Fox that were assaulted, you'd be very interested in what he did for a living, huh?"
"Well…"
"Thanks for agreeing," Nick said, nodding his head as he did so. "Now, our friendly Goat was a public health hazard…"
"It wasn't like he was infested in Fleas or something!"
"Second degree public health hazard…" Nick replied without so much as a hint of a pause, adding in an innocent shrug to boot, before pausing as Judy slammed her fists into the table and shouted out incredulously.
"What!?"
"You have second degree murder, he was a second-degree public health hazard!"
"What on earth are you talking about, there's…"
"Let's say per chance if he went back to your place," Nick began to say, his temperament becoming much calmer as he held his paws out and slowly brought them down, signalling that if Judy was patient enough she'd understand everything. "Now, you seem like some Podunk…"
"I'm from Bunnyborough, sir, and…"
"Bunnyborough it is! Now, when was the last mixie pandemic?"
Judy paused for a second, lost in thought before she realised what her charge was talking about. "Myxymetois?" she mumbled, before quietly carrying on. "What has this got to do with anything? I'm not going to put up with any more distra…"
"I heard it could leave only one bunny out of a hundred alive. Isn't that right?"
"Yes… but listen here!"
"But no-one remembers it, because the vaccinations keep it under control, yes?"
"… Well yes, but…"
"You got your shots?"
Judy blinked a few times, lost in thought before answering Nick's question. "Yes… every year, and…"
"If our Goat had his way, none of your family would."
"… Wait what, that's absurd. I mean…"
"He was peddling 'Vaccine replacement pills', saying that the government was putting all sorts of stuff in the jabs."
"Wait… "Judy replied before pausing, truly lost for words. "What?"
"Now imagine if he got, let's say ten percent of your family to go unvaccinated. Then the Mixie comes around again…"
"…" For once, Judy had nothing to say. She was silent. Nick reclined back in his chair as he saw the colour drain from the Bunny's face. From her twitching eyes, he could tell that she was filtering through her loved ones. Imagining which ones would be gullible enough to fall for that gelding of an ungulate. Knowing he'd won, he leant forward to claim his victory.
"As I said, 'Second Degree public Health Hazard.' If I remember the law, you can defend yourself from murder and public health hazards, e.g. those infested with fleas. You can defend yourself from second degree murder as well, so I assume that a second-degree public health hazard is the same. Is it not?"
Silence…
Glorious silence…
He could almost think he saw a whiff of blue smoke puff up from her ears. He'd won the battle, but the war was still going on. He just had to keep up the momentum.
.
"I agree," Judy slowly continued, "that that Goat was certainly a less than stellar citizen. IF you are telling the truth, which I consider highly unlikely..."
"Oh, I wonder why?" Nick snarked back.
"BUT! It is still no excuse to carry around and spray mammals with pepper spray…"
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There was a pause.
.
Then Nick giggled.
.
Then he descended into a full on roaring laugh. He flailed about, one of his paws banging on the table several times before pointing it straight at his interrogator. All this time, he still kept on laughing, louder and louder, while his outstretched finger pointed directly at a cowering Judy. The Bunny was suddenly feeling very scared. All through her life, grown Predators had been nice and safe. Quiet, gentle, their violent instincts held back, to the extent that they hardly needed their collars. But here, this Fox was doing something that she'd assume would send him onto the floor in a fit of electric spasms.
But his collar stayed a stalwart green throughout.
Reaching down, she hovered her paw over the little bottle of Fox-Away she'd stashed on her utility belt and, as she did so, the Fox composed himself and gave off the most irritating, overly smug smirk she'd ever seen.
"What are you doing, J D Hopps?" Nick asked, shrugging as he did so. "Don't you know there's NO excuse to carry around and spray mammals with pepper spray…"
"This… This isn't…"
"AH, it's not pepper spray, is it? It's Fox-Rep? May I ask, how is that actually any different…"
"It's…"
"It's exactly the same if not worse. So very glad you could agree with me on that. I mean, a triple strength ultra-irritating bottle of filth that specifically says 'Foxes are irredeemably evil, hurt them' isn't the epitome of Predator and Prey coming together around a campfire and singing Kumbaya is it?"
"…" Judy tried to say, only to pause mid breath, well and truly speechless once more.
"And considering I have to wear one of these," Nick announced, grabbing and tugging his collar with his paws. Nestling them beneath the shocker, the anti-tamping unit protested and an orange light came on, to which Nick dutifully ceased his fiddling. "Surely there's no need to spray me with that, is there?"
"Well…" Judy began, "what if…"
"Ever heard of a feedback loop Fluff," Nick asked, "well, imagine spraying someone with an emotion detecting torture device around their neck with a bottle of literal hell spawn. Have you ever seen a sprayed Predator having a convulsion fit on the floor? I'll say one thing, it isn't nice…"
.
"Can't you…"
"Defend myself with my claws, teeth and natural irrepressible savage instincts? Instincts which you insist exist, despite not really being 'the final authority' on these matters?" Nick queried. Spotting an incredibly small nod from his captor, Nick smiled and carried on. "Well, firstly I really don't like the idea of getting myself covered in blood and gloop. Really…. Icky. Also, Mr Collar here will send me into a spasm on the floor long before I get to defend myself, or the ones I love, via traditional means. I mean, when I was being strangled by a Rhino as a Kit and experienced my first shock, my father was so horrified and distraught that he was given a good six second session on the ground. Sounds fun, doesn't it? Finally, talking about Rhino's, if a big mammal decides that he wants one less Pred on the street, I can be turned into a Vulpine pancake faster than you can say maple syrup please. Don't you think I have a right to defense…?"
.
The room was silent.
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Judy slipped down her Fox away and looked up, twiddling her thumbs.
.
"Very well. I'll let you off with a written warning this time. BUT, I want to test your collar."
Nick's eyes raised at the statement, and he watch on silently as Judy brought out both a collar reader and, from a small safe, a collar remote. Raising the former up to his collar, she clicked it and silently nodded as she read what it said.
"This is going to hurt a bit, Mr Vulpes," she quietly warned, as she brought out the remote and pressed it.
ZAP!
Nick flinched down from the shock, electricity arcing from his collar and through his fur to reach the skin below. Groaning in pain through his clenched teeth, he shuddered and shook in his chair, riding out the agony until, finally, it was over.
"Sorry about that. Come with me, and we can get this over with."
"That… would be appreciated," Nick groaned as he stood up, his fingers still twitching from his ordeal. His first shock in over two decades. "I've got some errands I want to make." And so, two hours later, Nick left the ZPD with just a written warning and a promise, Junior Ranger Scouts honour mind you, to never ever do it again. As he left behind the building, and the irritating Bunny, he felt his collar again. The shock had been nasty, but he was glad to know that he was away from any collar remotes. It was just him, and a collar with a sabotaged heart rate monitor.
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AN: Sweet mother Marian, I did a Catweasel didn't I? Almost 1/3 of this chapter is authors notes. Well, to be fair, I did chose this strategy when thinking of ways to boost my review count...
Speaking of which, Vulpes is the Fox surname equivalent of Smith, but can anyone guess why I gave Nick that fake middle name?
Anyway, this chapter was short, because it didn't need to be wrong. It was also fun to write. Very fun. However, I don't think Judy had the same view, did she?
Who knows what was going through that racist cinnamon bun's head?
Well, tune in sometime on Wednesday to find out.