Chapter XI: Raison d'être

"Judy?" Nick called, knocking on the apartment door loudly, echoing the ratta-tatta of the jackhammers outside her apartment. There'd been a lot of mice with safety vests and hard hats crawling over the area, and Nick was unsure which one of them, if any, was Rickey Mouse – their only lead to the case they'd officially been dropped from but which Nick had every intention of solving, if not for the peace of the city than for Judy's absolution. "Judy, you can't stay in that room forever."

It had been three days since they were let go from the police force and Nick was tired of sitting around doing nothing. He'd made sure that Judy made it home safely, getting a ride from Finnick to take them to her apartment that night. He'd stayed by her side until she woke up from the effects of the tranquilizer: a two milligram dose of etophine was enough to knock out a juvenile elephant for an hour – Judy had been unconscious for twelve. He stayed awake for all of it, welcoming her back into the world after the drug had worn off.

That first day had been hell. Judy had woken up in her bed and laid there, silent for hours on end. Whenever Nick had thought she'd gone back to sleep, he could see her – hear her – trembling. He'd held her for as long as he could, eventually passing out from exhaustion, waking again to find her in the same state. As he went to leave, she had finally sat up, reaching a paw out and retracting it just as quickly, her voice gone and her eyes averting his. She'd lost her raison d'être.

He'd stayed with her that second day, too, when she finally found it in herself to stand up, staring outside her window at the construction site below, staring at the mice coming to and from. She studied each and every one of them, learning their faces, their mannerisms, their favorite drink – she'd absorbed as much as she could from the neighborhood around her, learning whatever secrets she could from the safety of her window. It had taken Nick several tries just to get her to drink water. She still hadn't eaten.

On this third day, Nick had finally left her apartment, telling her that he was leaving to get food. He held a bag of fresh carrots and blueberries, canned coffee, and today's edition of the Zootopian Times, rapping on the door with a steady rhythm that, he was sure, was bound to annoy her to open the door. To his dismay, he'd been standing outside knocking for several minutes, with no end to the madness in sight.

"Hey, keep it down. If you're her boyfriend and she's not seeing you, she's just not interested!" he heard from the apartment next to Judy's.

"Yeah, buddy, other people live here, too, you know!"

"I'm not her boyfriend!" Nick shouted at the door. Raucous laughter and stomping hooves replied in mockery. He ruffled his face, more than a little annoyed at the slight.

"You spent two days in her apartment, guy! You went down to the corner bistro to get her some comfort food, didn't you?" the voice said. Nick looked down at the bag and wondered how they knew.

"We hear everything, by the way! Even your footsteps! These floors don't creak for nothing!"

Nick was just about done with the antics of whoever was on the other side of that door. Putting his bag down, he walked over to the neighbor's door, ready to start pounding on it, when he heard a deadbolt unlocking itself from where he had been. He saw Judy's door open out of the corner of his eye. Moving back over, he picked up the bag and let himself in her apartment. Judy sat at her desk, staring at the ceiling, a look of defeat on her face.

"So," Nick said, closing the door behind him. "Are you going to be like this forever or are we going to investigate this case?"

She looked over at him, her eyes puffy and red, tinged with heartache. "Nick," she said softly, barely able to mutter his name. Truth be told, that was the first time he'd heard her speak since they were fired. It wasn't much, but it was a start. "What case? We're not – I'm not a cop anymore. We can't help anybody. Not Mr. Bos. Not those victims. I can't even help myself," she said, allowing her head to float down to the desk, resting it on her arms. "How can we work on the case? What would it do?"

Nick took out the copy of the Times from the shopping bag, laying it down on the desk. Buried in the first page, in a short paragraph on the bottom right of the page was a headline he'd been dreading to read since that day in the cell.

"SAHARA SQUARE – The alleged culprit behind Thursday's robbery attempt at the All Mammal Credit Union was found dead in his cell overnight from an apparent suicide. Officers at the ninth precinct discovered the suspect, Duke Weaselton, dead in his cell shortly after midnight. He was found hanging in his cell by the relief officer after a change in shifts. The mayor's office has condemned the police department's inability to stop the preventable death, calling Mr. Weaselton's demise "a blow to justice and accountability in a city rife with instability". CONTINUED ON PAGE A-15"

Judy stared at the article, moving her paw to the paper. Nick wasn't sure how she would react. He moved behind her and sat down on her bed, staring out her window and she struggled to find words to express herself. After an eternity of silence, Nick finally spoke up – the anger and anxiety within him boiling over.

"They're still killing animals," he said, clutching his paws. "There are still animals in danger. That's why we need to be out there."

"If only we knew who 'they' are," Judy said, her voice fading in and out between a whisper. "Nick, you know we can't do this alone."

"That's fine. We're not alone," he said. "If you think we've gotten this far on our own, Carrots, you have way too much faith in our abilities as cops. Sorry, ex-cops," he said, correcting himself, earning a pained glare from Judy. Sure, the comment was in bad taste, but if she could stab him with her eyes, she was on the road back to being her old self. Nick smiled at his indiscretion.

"So, he's dead then?" Judy asked, as if late to the party, seemingly just grasping what she'd read and what he'd said. "He's dead, the yak's killers are still out there, and we're the only ones who can possibly piece the picture together?"

"Sure seems like it," Nick said, placing the rest of the bag's contents on the floor by the bed, tapping the space next to him. In a fluid motion, Judy seemed to fall from her chair onto the bed, half-collapsing onto her mattress and into Nick. She embraced him, burying her face into his chest. If nothing else, they were each others' only constancy over the last two years. She needed to hold onto him; to remind herself of who she was – what she was – and what she was fighting to protect.

"Nick?" she said, still clinging to him. He simply grunted, leaning back on the bed, taking her with him. "Where are we going to start? We have no resources, no authority, no weapons, we've got nothing."

"I've had nothing before," he said, bringing his arm around her, staring at the ceiling. "You'd be surprised at how far it gets you. Nothing to rely on but your grit and your will to survive. And now it's actual survival. If I'd thought my introduction to The Game would be this violent I would've stayed a hustler," he said, only half-joking. Life was simply when he was hustling: his friends didn't seem to die as often and his partners weren't wracked with anguish. He didn't feel the need to put his muzzle close to the danger and he didn't feel like he was flying too close to the sun, about to burn up and take his world with him. Now, however, the bodies were real, and they'd were inaugurated into the game in blood.

They laid there in silence, much like they had on the first day, except Judy was much more animated, her paws finding his, positioning her head to fit under his muzzle, into his neck. There were worse fates than being kicked off the force, she had decided. Technically speaking, she still had her partner. Judging from the way her phone had been blowing up from messages from officers at the precinct, she still had her colleagues, as well. They watched the shadows move across her room, tracking the sun as the day went by, listening to the din of the construction site die off into silence as the last workers went home. As evening fell on Zootopia, she finally broke the silence, leaning up and looking him in the eyes.

"Where are we going to start?" she asked, a new determination in her voice.

"I thought you'd never ask," Nick said, untangling himself from her grip and sitting back up on the bed. "Luckily, I know just the animals." Standing up, he offered her the carrots that had been in the bag, eagerly taking the blueberries for himself. "Come on, let's go – you can eat on the way," he said. Judy happily obliged, taking a few carrots and stuffing them into her pockets, eating one as they left the apartment. She hailed a taxi coming down the avenue, allowing Nick to dictate where they went.

It wasn't long before they found themselves back among abandoned factories and warehouses, the dull neon glow of St. Bernard's Alehouse greeted them as they stepped out of the car.

"This dingy bar again?" Judy asked, wondering why in the world Nick had brought them back here.

"I told you last time we were here, Carrots – Saint is a veteran of the game. There's only two animals in this city who can help us get a lead on this case without access to the police database and Saint is one of them." Nick held the door open for her as they went inside, the smell of whiskey and cigarettes hitting her as hard as the first time she'd been there. Sitting alone at the bar was a short fennec fox, talking wistfully to Saint, the massive, rotund St. Bernard. Part-time bartender, part-time hustler: the jobs weren't always mutually exclusive.

"Saint, the usual!" Nick called as he followed Judy inside. Without hesitation, Saint began preparing a Fox Poison, setting it down on the bar as Nick took a seat next to Finnic.

"You finally got her to see the light of day. I'm impressed – I thought you'd lost your damn mind when you joined the fuzz," Finnic said, raising a glass and toasting Nick as he downed his drink with vigor. "I take it you heard about Duke?" Finnic asked. Saint leaned over the bar, lighting a cigarette under the bar's no smoking sign, waiting for a response.

"Yeah. I think I know who did it, too," Nick said, piquing both animals' interests. When he saw their ears pop up, he began his story, Judy dutifully chiming in to fill in details that Nick glossed over or missed. They talked about the incident at the train station and the missing evidence and witnesses; Mr. Bos's murder and subsequent cover-up; they talked about visiting Mr. Big and ZNN and how neither avenue led to anything but their demise at ZPD and about the business card left in the yak's wallet and how it led them to the All Mammal Credit Union and Duke Weaselton. Duke's tearful confession in his holding cell, coupled with their disbarment from the force and the weasel's untimely demise, seemed all too perfectly orchestrated. Finnick and Saint nodded their heads occasionally, indicating that they were listening intently. As Nick wrapped up, he ordered another drink, knocking it down before concluding.

"And that's basically how we got to here," Nick said.

"First things first: you're not a cop anymore, correct? This is accurate?" Saint asked, looking Nick dead in the eyes.

"No, why?"

"Good, which means I don't have to call anybody, which also means I can do this," Saint said, grabbing Nick by the collar with one paw and punching him with the other. Nick stumbled backward, falling over by the door.

"No, no yeah. I deserved that," he said, standing up and rubbing his muzzle.

"Oh you deserve more than that, Nicky. It just so happens that her being caught up in all this is all the punishment your idiot ass needs," Finnick said. "Did you forget all your street smarts in your two years with the fuzz? Or were you just born stupid?"

"That's also fair," Nick said.

"You two flew too close to the sun, it seems," Saint said to Judy, nowhere near as hostile as he was to Nick. "You, I can forgive – you haven't been in this game long enough to understand these things. Nicky, on the other hand," Saint gestured between Nick and Finnick, allowing the fennec to take over.

"Rickey Mouse. I can't believe he's still in the game," Finnick said. Judy seemed confused, taking out her notebook to reference this conversation later.

"Who exactly is Rickey Mouse?" Duke seemed terrified of the animal."

"For good reason. He's a psychopath. Easily the most violent union boss in Zootopia. And the greediest, too. If Rickey's involved, you best believe there's big, big money behind your killings," Finnick said. "And the last time Rickey started going berserk, a lot of animals got hurt. Listen when I tell you, kid, he's not an animal you investigate. He's an animal you either bring down at once or take out for good. There's no middle ground."

"But why would he get involved in some random assault case? Or the murder of Mr. Bos for that matter?" Judy asked. Nick had apparently gotten over the punch, sitting back down next to her at the bar. "What's his motive?"

"Money, power, vengeance – could be anything, really. The animal is unhinged. He kidnapped a family of cats thirty or so years ago because a group of pure-carnivore tourist alligators wanted to taste them," Saint said, lighting another cigarette, the smoke dancing between his nostrils.

"And the ZPD hasn't put him away?" Judy asked, incredulous. "How is that possible?"

"The eighties were a different time, bunny," Finnick said. "You could get away with a lot, especially with friends in the right places. And when you control a union with major voting power in every district in the city – especially Little Rodentia – well," Finnick trailed off, allowing Judy to use her imagination.

"It was acceptable in the eighties," Saint said. "Money, drugs, and power were practically a religion. How do you think your partner over here learned to make so much money in so short a time?"

"I like to think part of it was my innate skill at conning animals," Nick said, earning a laugh from Finnick.

"Nicky, you're good, but you didn't start that good. You didn't even know what cards were when you walked in here, let alone how to count them," Finnick said. Saint was the one laughing this time, pointing at Nick.

"Do you remember the time he thought he could beat Big Billy at pool for twenty bucks? Tell your bunny friend about how that worked out!"

Nick blushed, hiding his face in his shoulder, while Judy smiled and punched him in the arm, egging him on. The four of them enjoyed themselves under a cloud of smoke and aging florescent lights, Saint pouring them rounds of bourbon from the top shelf – on the house, if Judy could keep up. It was a half past ten before Judy could steer the conversation back on track.

"Nick said you'd be able to help us look for evidence – try to find the missing pieces to the Bos murder."

"Yeah, you'd be able to. There's really only two ways you can find that missing footage of yours – either in the central archives of the Center for Information Security, which you already know, or find the animals responsible for physically accessing those cameras and getting the algorithm from them themselves," Saint said.

"You seem fairly knowledgeable on technology, Saint, especially for such an old critter," Judy said. Perhaps she'd imbibed a little too much bourbon tonight.

"You can hustle online, too, sweetheart," the dog bellowed. "No one said you can't teach an old dog new tricks," he said, winking at her.

Judy looked over her notebook – pages upon pages of new information on Rickey Mouse and his unions, a history of Zootopia in the 1980s, and more than a few doodles of Nick. She'd have her night cut out for her if she wanted to sort through it all.

"Alright, guys, I'd better head home," Judy said, putting her notebook back in her pocket. "Based on everything you've told me, I've got a lot of research to do tonight. We still have a case to solve, and there's too many moving parts to sift through it at a bar."

Her announcement drew protests from Finnick and Saint, before the latter agreed to call her a taxi. Nick escorted her outside as she waited.

"Research, huh? Nick said, looking down at her, his hands in his pockets.

"Yeah. We've got a dead executive from Goldman Yaks going nuts at a train station, missing witnesses, a dead suspect at the ninth precinct, and absolutely no hard evidence of it all – and it all points back to one animal," Judy said, going over the relationships in her mind. What did all of these events have in common? There had to be some grand string tying them all together somehow, she was sure of it. She just had to muscle through and find it.

Seeing the taxi pull up to the bar, she hugged Nick goodnight while he stayed in the doorway. As she opened the car door, he called out to her. "Hey Carrots, follow the money! Once we find out who's paying for all this, we'll find out who Mouse is working for!"

She hesitated before getting into the taxi, nodding in agreement: follow the money – it would've been a lot easier when they still had their badges. She got in the car and drove off, pulling her notebook back out as the cabbie tried to make conversation. Duke Weaselton was tied to the credit union, which was tied to Mouse, and all of them were tied to the dead yak. What did Mr. Bos want to buy the credit union for? And for whom? And who was Mouse working for? If there was a criminal network at play in Zootopia, then the money trail had to be long – and it had to be massive: there'd be more information at the Center for Information Security. As the taxi pulled into the border tunnel separating her district from this one, she resolved to go there with Nick once they were open tomorrow. Surely there would lie the answer.

As Judy's taxi pulled away, Nick stood back, waving goodbye. Heading back inside the bar, he sat back down and ordered another Fox Poison, laughing with the two friends all the while. He caught a glimpse of a red flash in the corner of his eye and saw the nightly news at eleven come on the television, Mayor Felis's form coming into view as she organized yet another press conference for the city. Next to her, ZNN displayed the pictures of Duke Weaselton and Chief Bogo, their headline for the night lighting up Nick's eyes, forcing fear into his heart:

"Chief Bogo sought in the death of Sahara Square suspect. ZPD's future questioned amid Twentynine Palms panic."

The cat took the stage, laying out a new vision for Zootopia's future, the ZPD wholly absent from the equation.