Sleep barely came to me. It was not for want of a tent or cot, nor that Wally gave me so much to digest.

My right side rests on the tile of the upper level, the rest of me fairly certain I just knew I wouldn't have been able to appreciate the tent I was given, when I allowed someone else to use it. Some lanky Vulpes Rueppellii guy I didn't catch the name of. Doesn't really matter at the moment, as I peer out under the rail to watch the morning sun push shadows further down the buildings. It would be a quiet moment, if my head wasn't back to going twenty over the speed limit.

"Hey Owen, you alright?"

Wally's voice. I roll on to my back to confirm it. Two coffees in his paw. Andrew must've gotten them for us in the break room.

"I don't look like it, do I?"

"Nah, you look like a ghost that saw another ghost." he tells me, moving to sit down with his back against rail, a styrofoam cup offered to make me shuffle to lean upright beside him.

"Sounds about right." I lament. Because I did.

"Talk to me fam."

I will: "I met a girl after that ramen shop fiasco... More like the night before, but a cop used my phone to text her where he left me after drugging me."

"WHAT?!" I threw something so wild at him that he jumps up to his feet to knock that coffee of his over. The action is enough to wake up more than myself, yet it doesn't sway my mood.

"It's a long story, anyway-" "Nah, male, nah, back it up, one time got you and didn't haul you off to jail and did what?! Why didn't you tell me this last night?!"

Because it was irrelevant then and it's irrelevant now, when I want to get out what I want to get out and don't have the mental state to tell him anything else.

"This story ain't about him, Wally. It's about me and a girl and a bunch of chaos. You wanna hear me out then hear me out."

He swears under his breath before letting it go. He knows me, and where I'm at, so he'll hold off 'til another time as he tells me "Alright, you're telling me later, but hit me with it." I collect myself for a moment and then...

"You know that second time the cops chased me? The night before this whole savage scat went down? Well that was the last time I saw her. Been worried sick ever since because she's the one. Except I saw her again yesterday, in a polecat lady that saw that her similarity had put me in a bad way. She smoothed it over, or I'd be in worse shape now than I already am."

A lot to take in, a little time to think on it before he says "You think she got busted? Ain't coming back if she didn't?" so I can relay that "No, that polecat taught me better."

"Alright, then why you twisted?"

"Because she's not here."

He gets where I'm coming from. Coyotes are more Wolf than Fox, but we share a similar need. When we love someone, we want them to last. Foxes moreso, but his kind still has a lot of it. "It's a waiting game, then."

And the worst kind, I tell him. So he squats down, locking his eyes on mine. "Alright. So let me hit you with this: Have you always felt the same way you feel now?"

"That I want someone?"

"No Owen, have you always had the exact same emotion?" A stupid question to anyone else. It's me he's talking to, though. "No." My familiarity with him letting me peek at a partially revealed endgame.

"You've felt everything. Pride, joy, fear, anger, hate, self loathing, and love."

All of it in spades lately, "Same as everyone else, Wally."

"Exactly, and just like everyone else, those emotions came and went."

I get it, but I'll let him pull the curtains back on this lesson because I trust him. "So I can't tell you to stop with what your feeling right now, because you can't. But I can tell you this much: You won't feel like this forever. And if you can get that, You'll have what you need so you can ride it out." I'm pretty sure he's paraphrasing a dead president, but the sentiment is on point.

"I'll ride it out, huh?" My genuine wry curious look, his hopping back on his feet with a wake up call behind his disbelief. "Boi, name one mo fugga 'sides yourself that's survived all the scat you've gone through! You outran the cops TWICE! TWO WHOLE TIMES!"

Too loud, "Lower yer dang azz voice, people are still sleeping up here!"

Too befuddled, but he hushes himself. "Alright! But you're an industrious azz, indefatigable azz, invincible azz survivor of the police state! I think you can survive a little dehydration is all I'm saying!"

It's the admiration in him that gets me buying in. Facts I shouldn't have ignored, so amazing that he still can't wrap his head around. So I'll put my frustration aside for now with a "Thanks, guy." as I get up with that coffee in my hand.

"...Oh yeah, you made me spill my coffee, I'm taking yours back." I was gonna protest, but he acted too soon. Now I wanna picket. Cocked right brow with a shocked smile and an impulse to gekker.

"You're welcome!" Sarcasm thrown back with a return to sender: "I ain't even shown you those vids of you on zootube yet." A flick of my wrist to go along with a silent Get The Fudge Outta Here.

"They got one set to Belly Hill music and everything."

Now I got to ask something that's always been on my mind, walking beside him to the escalator. "Wally how you know about Belly Hill anyway? Matter of fact, how you know about Johnny Squirrelson? I know you got Hey Oh from his show." It actually came from Ed McMare, but the point still stands that he's familiar with decades old media that's been out of broadcast circulation for eons.

"How You Know about Belly Hill and Johnny Squirrelson?"

Of course he'd put it back on me.

"I grew up with basic azz small town channels so you could answer my gat dang question!"

He relents, telling me that "All we had on the reservation was VHS tapes of old broadcasts. Nothing but bunk static recordings of 70s and 80s television. Commercials an everything."

Oh god. I pity and envy him at the same time. "Least you grew up with The Puppets?"

"Puppets? Nah, nah, scat like All in The Herd..."

Ah, no.

"...Little Mound on The Plains..."

Ah, nah.

"...Shirley Sheeple-" AH HECK NAH JUST "Stop right there, I can't take it!"

"And The One Ranger!"

I'm done, I'm shoving him, and I'm taking back every last bit of envy while I hold off from losing my mind any further. We keep it up until we're down on the ground floor, a wolf doing security catching my eye.

"Hey let the Alphas know we need a janitor upstairs, this fool beside me spilled his coffee."

A look at him, and he comes back to me with "He's got a full cup."

One quick "Yeah, the punk took mine afterwards." to get him cracking up, Wally to shove me back for earlier.

"Alright, tell Kurt. Ralph is busy but they told us to bring you Kurt's way." Something major, I get the feeling off of him. "No trouble." He elaborates, "Just meet up with him. He should be in the break room."

I'm there in an instant, having left Wally with the one walking a beat for Kirk to address me with a "You!" that shakes me up. Surrounded by off-duty security, the breakroom table converted with laptops to form a social media hub.

"If you mess this up, it's yer tail and Andrew's." And that's why he was Woolsey's security head. Blunt and to the point. The warning before the assignment feeling less because I'm not a Wolf, more for the fact he's just familiar with and knows enough second hand knowledge to assume I need it.

I don't, but I'm not gonna argue. "I'm down but the heck am I being signed on for?"

He doesn't like it so much, he's gotta grimance before saying what it is. "Face time with the news. ZNN wants an interview with us."

Oh. In my mind, on my face, it's nothing but Oh.

"The commission thinks you're the best one for this and we need to get around to it. Word is already out you're here, you've already been on the news, none of us wants to put a target on our own kind."

Upgrade time: Oh. Fudge.

"Sooner we act, more control we got on public opinion. Ralph's arguments convinced the rest of them that you're the first pick." That resentful leer says it all though.

"...You like this about as much as I do, huh?"

"Oh, you think? Can your Fox self tell why I don't like it?"

"Yeah-"

"Because convenient as it is that you're used to being on the news by now you're the 2nd last mammal I'd have representing the preds here."

I was thinking more along the lines of just not having any experience with being a spokesmammal, but yeah, that too I guess. It's a fair point, yet for my sake, I got to tone the severity of this matter to cope. "...Who's first last?"

"Gazelle."

A Wolf behind a keyboard laughs, immediately set on typing his words out until Kurt snaps his claws to stop him. I'm torn somewhere between selfishness and selflessness. So I'll pry for a passive opting out with "...Do I got a choice in this?" to receive the threat of "Depends on how much you want to downgrade from upstairs to boiler room." to make me wide eyed at the fact I don't have much choice.

I took it harsher than he wanted me to, though. "You've done a lot for the pack. Don't get my tone twisted, I appreciate that. I wouldn't kick you out of the herd even if you were a freeloader but Do Not assume you're gonna leave this room with a clean slate if you don't accept this." His understanding out of the way, he affords himself a relenting. "I can kind of even see where Ralph's coming from, picking you. If ZNN tries something, we'll need a witty quick thinker to take back control."

I see the need for that. It's just that I'm stuck on something: "What makes Ralph think I'm the best mammal for that?"

He hesitates, thinking I should know and wondering why I don't. "...That elephant you scared out of here. Or how about that slogan you came up with on the roof, you think your wit wasn't gonna get noticed?"

No good comeback can go unpunished with me. My paw resting upon my temple to get him ordering "Own up to it fox, you're a smart azz."

"Yeesss..."

"Good. You keep that in mind because once you're on air you better keep it in check or I'm coming down on you harder than if you hadn't agreed to this."

I haven't agreed though. I tell him as much to get back a "Thanks for volunteering." Before I get the thing he's doing. Or trying to do.

"Your game can't compete with that bull cop's, though."

"Talk scat get splat. First warning, Only warning."

A yes sir later and I'm out.

Back to tell Kurt we need a janitor upstairs for spilled coffee, yelled at to go and gone again to charge San Juan Hill without much certainty I'll be coming back.

With laundry done and safe from yesterday's glassing, I'm left with options to stress over like I'm getting ready for a date. Wondering what I got myself into. Aware by the fact these articles weren't trashed that they're a reminder. I'm in favor, even if the position's precarious. After the fuss, I just opt to take the silk shirt off to put the floral moocci over the black jeans. I leave the washed cords with the embroidery by my tent. I still look too flashy, but a compromise is the best my limited wardrobe can give. The walk back down has me running into recognition. I had been, so it's nothing new. What is, is the consistency. Went from being stopped or second glance'd a couple of times before to now feeling the way up front is a backstage walk up to the stage.

But the hype feels misplaced. I don't want it. I'm not doing a gig, I'm going on a mission. To make it worse, I'm going in alone. Andrew and Wally are occupied. I have noone to reassure me or keep me in check but myself, coming to a stop beside the agreed landmark: Big Purr. Newly recruited for the front line. Someone so big and bright in his light tan fur that noone could miss him. The preds still coming gravitate towards him. I can feel that smile on him, it's presence great enough I think it's that and his confidence that's quelling me for a moment. Awhile later, they've caught sight of him. Out from the back of that ZNN news van comes a flurry. A Kudu and Pronghorn look to me in shocked recognition before going back to the rush. Some civet is on the roof, aligning the dish when he sees me. He can't believe it, then he realizes it.

Then he whistles, catches their attention to quietly tell the Kudu, the tallest of them, something I couldn't catch past two hundred bucks says. A You're On later, and some bet's been set in place. It wouldn't be my business if I didn't already know it concerns me, so it does. "Hey curly horns, what does the 200 bucks say?!" I ask.

"They say shut up before you jinx me!" He yells out, like I figured he would.

But the least either of the three could tell me is this: "Who's interviewing me, anyway?"

"Oh, almost forgot."

The pronghorn, remembering something as he grabs from the back of the van, and places in front of me... A portable flight of stairs. A small thing, built to the scale of what's typically a medium small rodent. I mutter Oh No to myself. Because the only reporter ZNN has that I'm aware of, that they assign to something as big as this, is the last mammal I wanted it to be. That Civet on the roof, he couldn't just let me tell myself otherwise. He had to go and shout "Don, get done in there, you're on in sixty!" to confirm that it's exactly who I thought. Don Lemming. climbing down another flight of stairs set on the van's bumper for him to wobble and scurry his way from the street, to the sidewalk, and then the stairs in front of me.

The platform has his beady little placid eyes just above my nose. They stare straight back into my own, and with absolutely zero sign of recognition in that soulless looking stare, I can piece together what that 200 buck bet was gonna say. Knowing how specist he is, seeing how clueless he is right now, and making that comparison between the rest of the crew's recognition and his lack of showing, that bet was gonna say whether or not he'd realize who he's interviewing. Silently looking at me before looking back down to adjust his tie, then back to me again with absolute apathy, it's got to either be the best poker face or exactly what it feels like. I'm trying to make my own to hide it, but I'm nervous. Because whatever hope I had for this to go smoothly, I already know it won't.

The crew behind him finally assembles with the Kudu on sound and the pronghorn on camera. They both kneel to his elevated height.

"Thirty!" the civet yells, grabbing hold the edge of the van's roof to swing himself inside.

Don grabs that little mic of his and it's about to start. "Sound check, sound check, can you hear me?"

Some female voice yells out "Sid's reading you clear, Don! Fifteen Seconds!" and it's familiar. I could pin a name on it if I wasn't grimacing.

"Fox, make a calm face." comes from the Kudu.

"Is this your first time on the news?" from Don gets the Tragelaphus behind him to make a silent nodding No with a leer.

I allow it and nod Yes.

"Ten Seconds, everyone!" from the female in the van again, the Antilocapra Americana looks away from the viewfinder.

"Plain face, come on." he tells me as he does a final check to confirm he's transmitting.

"Five!" and the Lemming makes one last adjustment of the of the mic in his right ear as it pipes in diction from the office.

I'm forcing this funeral look on myself. Scared, angry, with no prediction to give myself on what happens now. Why did Ralph have to vouch for me? I'm not TV material. I can't be formatted to fit a screen or edited for content. I know it. It's gonna go so terrible tha- "Yes Peter, I'm here with a representative of the predator group that have seized control of Zootopia Central Station, they have identified themselves through social media as The Herd and have declared that they are not dispersing until the city has met their demands."

I am struggling. There is a metric ton of force trying to compel these eyes of mine to roll, because it's that exact vernacular the lemming just used that's making what comes next so obvious.

"Now sir, sir, can you answer why you've disrupted millions of lives with such a hostile act?"

And that's the very kind of loaded question I knew was gonna come. That clinical use of plausibly deniable manipulation that'll fly under professionalism's radar.

"That's not our narrative." is the best thing I can pry out off my tongue when it's got a taste this bitter.

"Narrative? Can you explain what you mean by that?"

I can't stop this bitter look on me, but I can smooth it over as best I can.

"I mean that's not what we're setting out to do here. Whatever effect we've had on the rest of the city is unfortunate but we-" Nothing selfish, I remind myself, not a damned thing that could be misconstrued as selfish. "After the violent backlash we've received over these-" Don't say Savage. Just say "Attacks on prey individuals, we've been forced to withdraw from a society that's taking revenge on innocent mammals." "

Y-" I'm not done. "This is a refuge, Sir."

"Refuge?"

"What we set out to accomplish with the Herd was a shelter for innocent predators caught in crossfire." He's more blank than a brand new computer. He's fresh out of the box, his circuitry is running like his little ITM brain is starting up for the first time.

"An interesting take on your group's actions."

Perfectly infuriating deflection of objective narrative with subjective definition. I have to sigh about as neutrally as I can with him continuing.

"But would you also describe them as creating a Safe Haven, Sir?"

I just said...

Oh.

Oh.

If he's going to try his, he better complete that damned thought.

"Elaborate on what you mean, Sir."

That momentary downward twitch of his mouth, and it's clear that he's processing what I just did.

"Well there have been reports of your group creating a safe haven for Criminals and their activities such as O'Shea Fuch-"

The most terrible snortling ever recorded on television. It's just come out of my tightly pressed lips. I'm reeling. It's not even that he managed to get the first and last name wrong, it's that it's everything I can do to get back up because that just confirmed what that bet between the Kudu & Civet was. I don't even have to look at that ungulate and see the horrified look on his face. I also don't have to look at Don Lemming's stupid curious look of obliviousness, nor here that feminine cackling from the back of the van or the proceeding smack of a high five.

I shouldn't have, but I did, and it's taking every ounce of energy in me to barely keep it together for "I'm pretty sure as a fox, sir, that I would be able to recognize him-"

Another round of cackling from the van. Several lupines on security find themselves carefully walking away from the frontline before they lose it. I can feel the tension from Big Purr behind me.

"What's-"

No Don, let's keep this up.

"That I would be able to recognize him out of a line up, sir." He has no idea what I'm implying and it's so perfect. It's so good and he makes it worse by shooting out a quick, professionally upset "I understand you, sir." with just the slightest aftertaste of seething rage.

"But what do you have to say as a representative of this group..." Again with the Group, again with that not-too-obvious but insidiously manipulative subconscious effort of comparing us with terrorists. "...That you are creating a Safe Haven for criminals?"

Gloves off. Subtlety is extinct and this is now bareknuckle boxing.

"Noone is a criminal in there, sir." I'm not telling him, I'm telling everyone else as I point behind me.

A Forward Jab: "We are obeying all the same laws in there that we would out here. We're united-"

Block: "Yes, point taken, but have you not been told by authorities to disperse and are disobeying the direct orders of law enforcement?"

Uppercut. On the upswing and aimed at my jaw.

"This is a peaceful assembly in protest of the violence we've endured for being born with the wrong teeth." I'm showing too much, but I've dodged the blow.

The slowest downward rolling of the lids over his eyes. That quiet, half buried leer in him. "Moving forward, the Daily Wail..." ...He's gonna cite That Freakan Rag? "...recently revealed in a survey that six percent of predators..." He's really doing this while representing the largest news network... "...said they support the Savage attacks, would you describe those Predators as extremists?"

I have to pause for a moment, because there's something else going on when I can't even tell what he just did. "Six percent of predator-"

"Identify as being in support of the savage attacks, would you call them extremists?"

It's so rhetorical, such a forceful attempt to make me say his own answer, I must think but I know he won't let me. Whatever I'm about to say, I must let it out deathly quick and hope to god it doesn't spring his trap.

"I think, I mean by definition when someone identifies their beliefs as being out of the boundaries of normal or agreeable, it's kind of immediately acceptable to pin that label on someone and I'm not really sure you could expect otherwise, now that said, you are talking about a small percentage of an already small population and I'm not, I'm not expecting you or other prey mammals to go on tv to condemn the actions of prey supremacist groups but, you've got to admit, there's a double stan-"

"Point taken I understand where you're going with this but I just wanted to get a more specific answer from you, Again Six Percent of Predators surveyed said they support the Savage attacks, would you describe those predators as extremists?"

"w-"

"Do you support the savage attacks?"

And now, rocked to my core, I know what he did.

It's so clear.

The coward made an attempt to knee me below the belt and now, Now that he's done it a second time, with all his commitment, I feel it. I feel that terrible wound of ignorance. That phantom pain to reaffirm how little he understands me, or understands preds like me, or understands the reality of the relationship of our kind with his. All those times I thought him specist, I had made an error. I know it now, that I had mistakenly assumed there was thought to it. That he knew enough to have made a judgement, however wrong it was, on preds as a whole. It's not even hate, it's just an absolute ignorance. I'm looking to him in shock and my god, I see it so clearly. He doesn't even recognize me as a mammal, as sentient, as intelligent. I am a roach and he doesn't even know what he did.

There is no inkling of recognition in his face to what he's done. He's confused, curious, he's staring at me so much like an open book, I can read that thought. Why isn't the predator working? Why is it not responding to my stimuli? Why is it acting offended? And there is nothing I can say or do to make him see I'm a real live boy. Even if I had the will, I am beyond the help he doesn't deserve. I am a predator, and predators are turning savages. Predators support savage predators because they are predators, and because I am a predator, I am guilty of supporting prey mammals being mauled to death or near death by others like me, I am guilty of being likely to become savage and attempting to maul other mammals, I am guilty, guilty, guilty until proven innocent in a court that will never be held to prove I am innocent and I am a predator...

And now, now that I have realized that like I never have before?

This damned despicable prey has used up the last ounce of control he had over me.

"You're fake news."

"Answer-" "No," "Answ-" "I'm not-" "Ok, tel-" "Done." " Tell me what abou-" "You want real-" "Don't interu-" "YOU WANT REAL NEWS, DON?!"

His eyes bulge. "Ok cut the-"

"I CAN'T CALL YOU A PUSSY BECAUSE YOU DON'T HAVE THE WARMTH OR THE FLAVOR," Whooping and hollering. Before anyone can act to stop me, I reach out. I pinch the end of that microphone, tug it out of his timid grip. "I CAN'T CALL YOU AN ASSHOLE FOR WANT OF DEPTH AND PLEASURE," Crazed Laughter. I bring the little filth covered thing to my mouth so that it'll be known just who's bringing the news now. "I CAN'T CALL YOU A DICK BECAUSE YOU DON'T FILL," hysterical cackling. I'm not done. "AN YOU AIN'T A PRICK 'CAUSE YOU'RE NOT SENSITIVE!" Big Purr is bellowing over me. "YOU'RE SO SHALLOW AN UNAPPETIZING THAT THERE'S NOTHIN' ABOUT YOU I CAN APPRECIATE AND I CAN'T TELL YOU TO GO FUCK YOURSELF BECAUSE YOU'RE SO DAMNED UNDESERVING!"

A delirious scream, a mad giggle. I am being pushed around in everyone else's amusement. That mic is trembling from the fury coming out of my paw. "SO REALLY? REALLY, THERE'S NOTHIN' I CAN CALL YOU, AND THERE IS NOTHING I CAN TELL YOU TO DO OR GET DONE TO YOU." The schadenfreude that I have unleashed, the celebration I've caused, please god, let no mammal ever make a bomb that could compare to me because this shockwave is gonna be felt around the entire globe. "AND EVEN IF I DID SUPPORT SAVAGE ATTACKS, IF I OR ANYONE ELSE WERE TO GO SAVAGE RIGHT FUCKING NOW, THE LAST PERSON ANY MAMMAL WOULD GOBBLE UP IS SOMETHING SO NOTHING AS YOU SO MAKE LIKE YOU AREN'T ANY GOD DAMNED THING AND STOP EXISTING!"

The rioting around me has reached a fever pitch and now that I am finally done, that little mic pinched between my thumb and index digits is held sideways, then released. Dropped to the floor of his little pedestal. Down to his feet. So squarely put in his place, he's gonna need therapy. Good. God damn him. God damn the fact he brought me to this point. But I'm through with the poison already out of my blood. I'll think for a moment on how bad I've messed up while trying to appreciate the entertainment I've rendered on the bystanders. I turn around, laughing along a little nervously with everyone else to know how good I got him. That misstep, future consequence, a final dance before the storm looming overhead.

Loud conversations happening all at once, I can't pick or choose between the ones directed at me to join in on. I can only yell out "I have no idea what I just did but DAYUM it felt good!"

Even as one of the security wolves start to berate me, he's laughing. I'm throwing fake punches that don't connect to get him playing along like he's getting shook left and right before he finally gets it out. "Boy, you messed up so bad, the commission's gonna have yer azz and Andy's for it."

They will, I'm just trying not to think about it, but they will. The reminder is making this afterglow fade quick, but I'm trying to hold on.

"I can't believe it..." that female voice again. What was muffled inside the van is closer now. It's my left and distinctly educated in it's diction. With worry starting to settle in, I look in it's direction to see it's owner. Fabienne Growley.

"You're really OC Fuchs." She says. Amused, curious, and just as shocked that it's me as I am it's her.

"Wait!" Don, finally starting to put something together with what sounded like what he called me. "I was interviewing O'Shea?! Kathir and Darrel get set up again I can't miss this opportun-"

"What opportunity, Don?" comes from her before I get around to it.

"Imagine the ratings if I get to interview the bandit that terrorized the city before predators starting becoming savage, we can put him back on the news cycle an-"

"Go find a trashcan, lemon." Seeths out of her as I look at "It's Lemming-" in disbelief of the things coming out of him, until she bends over him to look him straight in the eyes with quiet contempt.

"You are done here, you rotten little lemon. If I get my say when we get back to the office, you'll be done there too. So before you make me reveal any more of my temper you will do what I say and find yourself a trashcan to rot in."

Bant so sophisticated, it pours a cup of Earl Gray on Etiquette's grave.

We're laughing again, Don so nervous and defeated in his shuffle back into the van that he's like a sad little puppywolf. Straightening back into proper posture, She's affording herself a brief and polite non-predatory grin. Even with that tarnish of expected conduct, I have to marvel at how good felines look when smug.

"Darrel, save that recording for me. I absolutely need that for my collection." No need to look in his direction, so she puts her eyes back on me.

"Sure thing, Ma'am!"

"And you, Owen." she addresses me. "I am terribly..."

I have to stop her. Smiling with understanding and a raised paw to signal my interjection. "Sorry is a useless word. Even moreso when saying it over others."

A nervous smile, but it's genuine and bordering on relieved. She acknowledges it, yet there is still work to be done here. "What can I do to make this right?"

I can't tell her what would make amends here. I wouldn't know.

All I can think of is how I'm going to break what happened to the Alphas.

"You'll think of something, just hang tight... I gotta tell my people what happened." That said, I'm looking to the security lining back up after their recovery to catch one with a "Radio, anybody got one?"

An Indian, a back and forth later and I got a walkie talkie with Ralph on the horn. "You there?"

"Yes I'm here, we just got done seeing you lose it on him!"

They know, already. To my horror.

"Owen, what the hell did you call him after they cut you off?!"

"I didn't call him anything!"

This would be so much funnier to me at any other given moment than right freakan now.

"I swear to god Owen, you're dead if you don't tell me the truth!"

"I'm technically not lying!"

"Technically!? Hand the radio back to the frontline guard and hope to god he technically says the same thing!"

I obey, returning it to the guard. "Srimaan, I am here."

"Did that ginger runt call him anything?!"

"You may not like it but I can tell you that he called him nothing."

"Whatever! Long as he didn't call him anything, we might be able to salvage this. Give it back, I'm not done with his azz."

Once in my hand, I hit the send button again with "Here, Ralph."

"I trusted you to represent the Herd and dammit, you were on a roll! Why did you have to lose it the the savage question!?"

"Do you support the savage attacks?"

"What kind of question is that?"

"Exactly!"

"No Owen, Kurt told you what kind of play we needed and you fumbled the ball ten yards to touchdown!"

"I tried, Ralph! I'm not exactly a house pet!"

A tap on my shoulder, and whatever Ralph is yelling gets drowned out. My attention diverted to that Snow Leopard with a paw gesture to give the radio to her.

"Ralph, hang on, I'm handing it over someone else but it's important."

As he tells me not to, it goes into her extended paw and she gets to work. "This is Fabienne Growley, I'm with ZNN..." as she walks away.

I just stand there. Left to think on my sin. However much I can excuse it, a moot point. I doesn't matter that I was cut off before letting out all that vulgarity. I still failed. I lost it.

"You feeling guilty, down there?" Big Purr's booming voice from above. Sounding like he wants me to cheer up, but he needs to back it.

"Big, if I snapped that bad at a club you bounced, what'd you do to me?"

"If you went that turnt?"

Yes, I nod.

"Boy. If you went that turnt... I'd be throwing the other guy out back."

Exactly what I thought he'd say, exactly what I'd deserve to have... "...Wait, what?" I couldn't have heard him right.

"Then I'd slappin' yo digits for the entertainment 'fore I escorted you to VIP. Bottle service on me."

I did hear him right, and I can't understand, "I messed up, why would you do that?" I'm looking up to the peak of dead serious mountain with a powerful, gentle calming smile.

"Because I said so. Let's start there. Second is you didn't start it. Third, you ended it. Forth you made me laugh and fifth? F that ignant prey boy."

Excellent reasons, if they weren't null and void to the reality of how bad I've let everyone down.

"I-"

"Lemme explain something O'Shea, were you reading everyone behind you?"

A cheeky grin and sure, I've got to laugh but... "I mean I read everyone around me all the time, but I was busy just keeping up with Don."

He comes back so quick, it's almost interrupting. "An it's my job to read crowds, I did it for a living before coming here and don't think your better at it than I am. I'll tell you the same thing I'm gonna tell the Wolves when I get back there. The truth. If you hadn't gotten us laughing so hard, we'd've torn him apart. I nearly grabbed him and if I had then his little azz would be halfway to the moon. You kept us from going off, don't you think you for a minute you didn't do the right thing."

I can believe it, maybe I should, it's just that it's enough of a bombshell I have to doubt it before soaking it in. "...You're saying I defused something that was about to turn violent?"

He's surprised. Then follows up with the realtalk I gotta dismiss as horsehockey.

"Boy, after all this is done, you better march up to ZPD an demand a job as popo negotiator."

The absurdity gets me laughing, has me saying "Fox cop? You kidding me?" before the memory of Espada strikes me, opening me up enough to not really question what comes next.

"They hired a bunny, didn't they?" The two of us crack up at it, but now that he's gotten it across? I believe him. My kind and rapsheet aside, he's so certain of his words, how could he not be, that it's making me think it's not that absurd after all.

"An if I don't apply, what then?"

"Then I'm making sure yer azz gets into ZC's stand-up circuit."

Me. Onstage. Joking.

They don't go together in a sentence and I know he isn't joking, but I'd vouch for him being the comedian here before ever vouching for myself.

"I ain't a comedian though." I tell him to get him firing back with "Next joke you tell me gets a noogie." for me to nervously laugh.

"Eyes front and center." he tells me. I swivel back forward to face Fabienne, her open paw extended to return the radio back to me.

"What'd you tell him?"

"The truth. Go ahead, take it."

I do, hitting the send button and coming back to Ralph with "Here again."

"You got one chance to make this right. Forget that Don made this mess, you're cleaning up after him. This situation better be spotless or Andrew and Wally is going down with you." The ultimatum in a saving grace in a shot at redemption. No, maybe Big Purr is right that I saved things from getting worse, maybe I did the best I could and the liability falls to someone else. But the point has been made resoundingly clear. I am excused, so long as I can mend this fence.

"Just tell me what I gotta do, Ralph."

She's going in, he tells me. I'm going to escort her through the station, granting ZNN's proxy the kind of access that'll show the world we're not criminals or terrorists. Make it known that our newfound factionism, if we must be known by that, is through no fault but the cards held by prey that've been stacked against us. I will be interviewed throughout the process, but I have full say in the questions I do and don't answer. Just let the outside world know we're not violent, he tells me.

"...You will have it. Ok, we're going in."

With the radio back to that Lupus Pallipes, I turn to Fabienne once more. "You ready?"

"I am."

"This is gonna be good..." That pronghorn cameramammal. Everybody's looking at that giddy prey guy, confused and bewildered. Checking his massive camera again, hitting record and walking forward like- Yeah, I should have thought about this but he's forgetting something so basic, as a Lupus Arabs extends an arm to pause him midway into entering the station.

"No, no no, you are forgetting something."

"What?"

Fabienne breaks it to him. "Darrel, have you looked at your teeth lately? What about your feet?"

On cue, he looks down, putting it together as he looks at the Wolf's as well.

"You're not joining me in there."

"But we need a camera!" he reminds her.

Her reply comes in the form of gently, quickly seizing it from him. "Solves that problem, doesn't it Darrel? This should do nicely. Kazi, fetch a collar mic for Owen."

"Got it boss."

"Fabe, you know to work it?"

"I'm a bit rusty Darrel but I'd like to think I remember enough from university to work it out. Red means recording, yeah?" half lidded leering with the fainted gleam of canines in her faintly open grin. It's like we're already rubbing off on her.

As they go over the newer model NVC, that Kudu sets me up begrudgingly handing me a hundred in smaller bucks. That civet only wanted a hundred for himself, it seems. That or he took pity.

Awhile later, and I'm back in the fold with her. Those towering doors open to the right of us, and I swing around to a backwards walk to watch her quietly let out that fantastic shock and awe of the scene engulfing her. And so crowded, so impressive, that I still can't get over it. it's like a page from Where's Waldo. Lions, Tigers, Bears, it's... Everything. It's everything but the tighter knit varieties. No Spotted Hyenas yet, nor African Wild Dogs. I know some of us that know a few have reached out, but no word. A fact that leaves me thinking they live in the same manner these wolves used to, and if it's being discussed by their leaderships about whether to join us or not. But I put it aside. My attention is on her on everything happening all around her.

"This is..." "Kind of a big deal?" "...Thousands of thousands. Do you know how many?"

"I'm not the one keeping a headcount, but it's about a congregation and a half, ain't it?"

She's so unprofessionally lost for words, I've got to snicker.

"This is the greatest mass of predators recorded in recent memory."

I twirl back forward to watch where I'm going. Catching sight of that Todd Crevan fellow I signed up as he gives me an extended fist I bump without skipping a beat.

"Owen, I don't mean to interview you but tell me, what was your life like before you joined the Herd?"

"Before or after the APB?" gets her smiling.

A quiet downward roll of her head with a squint. "Both, I suppose."

I only hesitate for a second, weighing on whether or not I should open up like that. But I'm here already, aren't I? My past life so perfectly taken from me, there's no point in holding back. So I don't, aware that I'm already not holding punches back.

"Well, I had it alright at first. Could've been better, could've been worse. I was getting by, sleeping in tents and dumpster diving."

"...You were homeless, before this?" That shock, it telegraphs how good she must have had it and the stark contrast between us.

"Not really? When I first came to the city yeah, I stayed in a homeless shelter, met a friend there, but afterward I moved out to squat where-ever I could. Tried abandoned buildings first, but that didn't exactly work out." The stories I could tell her that we don't have time for.

"Did you have a job? Could you have afforded to rent an apartment?"

I'm timid to tell the truth yet confident to be so defiant as to declare with a look to the camera "Well... Noone ever said the struggle was over, did they?"

Yes, your honor. As a matter of fact I did just say that. Do you want an apology? Cause you ain't getting one. She's not caught off guard, anyway. She's got affirmation out of me, with no nevermind of how good she's had it, because we've all gotten the raw deal.

"So you really lived in tents, before we reported on you." I can feel some guilt by association in her, but I won't have it.

"Before your employer did?" to take it off her as I follow up. "Don't feel bad. I made getting by by the skin of my teeth work, didn't I?" She wouldn't know, sure. But I got this far and that should say it all. That I didn't really know any other way to live, and I made it work.

"And during the mammalhunt?" I really survived that, I guess.

Her reminder, my reply that won't divulge all the details. "I lived off favors high and low to do right by my friends after the fact. Best as I could at least."

"And after?" is the line I've got to draw.

"This isn't about me, though. It's about everyone else. You can interview me when we've moved out of here."

She would like that, she tells me. Yes, absolutely, let's get back to topic she says, following up with a question I'm sure she already knows the universal answer to.

"You are all seeming very well entrenched, here. When do you think that'll be, when you'll surrender Zootopia Central back to the city?"

I turn right around the cheeky mature grin of someone's elder, and "Whenever it grows up." catches her so off guard that it throws me off.

Remember, I'm trying to save face here on everyone's behalf. So "Scratch that. How about... Whenever we feel it's safe to try co-existence, again. Because we're not trying to step on anyone's toes. When the city becomes reinhabitable, hospitable, put it like you want... Whenever they make it known that we got an equal share of their city, we'll return."

"I think that sounds right." she tells me, as I come to a stop by the clock, over that arrival board between the platform escalators. Such shamelessly unprofessional conduct, coaching me like that. That smile like a referee giving the red corner a quiet wink to know she's got my back. "There are of course many that've have pointed out that the actions taken here have crippled Zootopia's Transit Authority." she tells me. It doesn't sweat me. We're both in on the game, as she maintains that facade of just doing her job.

So knowing that she's invested, "We did what we had to, and yeah it's not ideal, but we had our paws forced."

"And what about those saying you've disrupted the city's public transportation network?" Would've invited anger if it was anyone else.

But we both know better, to make me at peace when I tell the city, not her, "Well... To heck with their problems. Our problems supersede any prey's concerns."

"So everyone here is in dire straights? Every mammal here had nowhere else to go, before the station became a shelter?"

Wolves like Andrew living in communes. Wally having to join a group that stayed underground. Eva having to stay in a cargo container. Foxes like me, surely, having to pitch tents among others. However anyone else with sharp teeth lived before this. Let it not come from my mouth alone.

"Say, you got a moment there Mellivora Capensis?" immediately catches the attention of a male Honey Badger. Surprised at the Vulpes Vulpes looking back at him. "Been a hot minute since someone called me that." he tells me. Amazed smile. A hint of gratitude that someone knows that knows his real taxonomy, the one to supersede his stigmatic taxonomy.

I point my right thumb to the camera lens for a hint as I ask "What's your birth name, fam?" and he doesn't hesitate to look straight back at a future audience.

"Idir, Chapelle."

"Idir, why you here?" has him open up with a little hurt that "My landlord wouldn't let me back in the apartment building." for me to give him a shot at vindication. "Tell the city what he told you."

That rightful anger to compliment "He told me I wasn't gonna be able to pay rent after I lost my job anyway."

I'm looking to Fabienne, and she's horrified. We all know what that landlord did was illegal. Now, to elaborate.

"Why'd you lose your job?"

"Mammal resources said I scared customers."

We all know the answer to "Did you ever try to?" before he replies with his own question: "Why would I?"

Fabienne shakes her head in disbelief at the circumstance. I'm not done. "You, Neofelis Diardi. Sunda Clouded Leopard, what did your parents name you?"

Not when I have thousands upon thousands of cards up my sleeve. "Guntur. Why?"

I am taking the house outside for every cent. "Did you have much of a say in coming here, Guntur?"

I will prove the point until I shut every specist up. "No, I was given two weeks by my boss, and my landlady 30 days."

A "What did she tell you?" later and I get it out of him that "She said it would be better for the other tenants if I found a more predator friendly part of town to move to."

My lord, she mouths out. That cat looks to her in shame as she puts it together that it could've been her.

"You, Ursus Maritimus..."

Eventually, I dropped the scientific names. I needed to prove I was articulate, but selfish as it was, there's hardly a quicker way to catch the attention of someone than to call them out so personally. A baker's dozen faces interviewed on the fly, and we've gathered a crowd within the crowd. All coming forward without being prompted. All of them telling her the same thing: The only thing separating her from them is her money and her well-to-do condominium. Something that surely she already knew but now must fully realize. "Thank you... All of you, truly. You have all been so brave to tell me your circumstances, I'm just..." We have become the wrecking ball to her dam. She's will break, now. Trying to remain professional when everything inside her screams how wrong this is.

It can't be ignored and now it will come to a head and force it's way out of her eyes. "Bloody hell, not now." she condemns those tears with.

"Should we stop?"

"No, No Owen, let me fight through it." She tells me. Courage and duty swelling in her to fight that guilt and sorrow. I will not question it. I and everyone around her will let her stare past her soaked muzzle with a sense of purpose as she asks me "What does the Herd need, Owen? Anything you can think of, name it."

She's not a reporter anymore. She is the messenger. And I will not argue against her dereliction of duty as I tell her the truth. "We need more tents and more food. We have enough food for now but tents? We got more mammals coming in everyday. If we could buy every last tent from every sports or outdoor shop in the city, I don't think it'd be enough."

She nods to her acknowledgement. She's got one last thing on her mind, if I'm reading that wet face rightly. "Do you have a message you wish to tell anyone?"

A panicked whistle, and it all comes to a stop.

Alfredo Morena charges through the crowd in tizzy so dire it's like he's been slapped in the face by a ghost.

There's no time to finish "Alfred wh-" for him, because "Owen you're ocupado but we got a situation up front and scat's so dire cops are about to get involved!"

Fabienne's journalistic side takes the best of her, making her turn immediately to get back front as I ask "Tell the alpha-" and "No, it's you! This crazy Chica is screaming your name like -"

Her, it's her, it could only be her, I grab Alfredo by his shirt with delirium, shouting "WHAT'S HER NAME?!" with every fiber of my shaking body, terrifying him to the point he stutters and no, I will not allow it, tell me, let it out, tell me, "SAY IT!"

"EVA! EV-" I'm running faster than I've ever run before I even know I'm running, and I'm running on all fours without a damned care. Between a bear's legs. B-lining it at a breakneck speed, and darting through every empty space, around the blurred shapes of the masses I'm running too fast for them to dodge. I am an arrow soaring through the forest with mammals like trunks. I have aimed for the rolling field beyond it all and I am going to bulls eye straight into the sunset I've been careening toward since that dreaded Sunday night. I am nearing the edge of the treeline. I am looking at the light at the end of this woodland. Her figure is so bright, from how far away I am, that it's blinding. I'm looking at it, I'm looking at her from so great a distance and I can see it for what it is, the promise regaining my breath for me, bathing my body in more energy to keep me going and she sees me. She's looking at me, looking at her, and time grows weak. The fear on her face caving in to her little heart I can nearly see lighting up like a taser. I've cleared the crowds and the security. I'm not slowing down, I'm speeding up. She jumps, arched back, eyes and smile as big as they can get. My front paws make contact with the ground. Then my hindpaws. My claws are out like they're gonna dig in to this hard surface as the legs they're attached to catapult me forward. I am a raving, mach 9 airborne ball of fire. Of Joy. Of relief. Of love. Our chests collide. We are proof of the Big Bang theory. We explode like we're making a brand new plane of existence as my force against her sends us spinning in mid air to have us land in a perfect roll against my back. I'm screaming, she's screaming, we're screaming at the top of our little lungs and I'm touching her, she's alive, we're rolling off the ground, I'm coveting her, she's alright, we're clutching at each other so hard we're pulling at each other's cloths, I'm choking up on these tears like I'm never gonna get another chance to cry, she's holding on to me for dear life and it burns, it feels so good to burn, we're like bodies of lightening bouncing off of each other as we hold on to each other for dear life while we ricochet off the ground like a basketball and the tears are streaming down our faces as we're pressing them in, tasting them and we're getting drunk off them like June Bugs all the while we're rubbing ourselves off each other and oh god, oh my christ, we're here, she's here, I'm here and I'm ravishing her like she's been away from me for centuries when we needed was each other like heads and hands need each other, this perfectly formed ball is the heart that mediates between them and our tears have littered the wasteland like morning dew promising new growth. We fall one last time, our legs have given up, we can't jump and hop and dook and pounce any more, we've wiped this world clean like a slate and there's nothing left now but our eyes gazing into each other, our muzzles pressed against the other, as our firm grip reminds us of how much we have to hold onto.

Somewhere in a galaxy far, far away, there's an onlooking crowd of shocked, bewildered spectators trying to make sense of what they're witnessing from millions of lightyears away. Cops have stopped dead in their tracks to watch a meteor shower, a solar eclipse and an Aurora Australis happen at the same time, above a flying saucer landing in front of them. A snow leopard looks through a lens to watch two red giants collide with force incalculable.

But there is nothing for them to make sense of.

I cannot stop because I cannot begin.

Because Love is stupid, and it is drunk, and our love is too loud to make out, and it is too bright to see the details of, and like the ocean, it is too deep to see to it's end, and like space, it is too vast for their minds to know it's full scope.

Love is like God.

It cannot be known.

It cannot be studied.

It cannot be defined.

It can only be felt.

Because love is a gift from a superior state of existence that this one will never grow to appreciate.

And in this moment,

with our tears washed over each other,

her rolling us onto her back and me,

pressing our lips together,

to divide them like Noah divided the sea, and our tastes colliding trains,

head on,

I feel more love than anyone has felt before me.