Chapter 25: Dark Tidings

"Nothing is as far away as one minute ago." - Jim Bishop.

Sometimes things don't go the way you want them to go!

Present Day

The thin agent wearily sat down in a hospital chair, trying not to look at the large white cast that covered his left arm. Across the room, the fox named Nick Wilde was back in a hospital bed again, this time with his leg now held up in traction since the break had to be reset after his kitnapping. "What is all this junk which Mister Big kept saying about a watch and time traveling?" the fox asked in a somewhat dazed voice. He was back on pain medication and was much chattier then before. "If I could have gone back in time, I'd go to the night I tried to join the scouts and talk myself out of it. Then I would go into the church and kick those little bastards' tails for good measure."

"Wilde, life gives us choices and we have to live with the ones we make," the Jack sighed as he lowered his good arm to his side and flexed it in frustration. He had caught himself reaching for the handkerchief again and realized that it was a bad habit he had gotten into lately, habits like that got agents killed. Unlike the fox, he had refused any pain medication because he wanted his wits about him. "I've made plenty of bad choices in my life, but it does no good regretting what you've done in the past."

"You mean choices, like blowing up your dear partner's car?" a voice added as a suave looking cat in a black suit entered the room and gave the hare an amused look. "Q-Branch said to tell you that they have your DB 10 all fixed and ready, but I've been told they are keeping the keys until you take another drivers test."

"Sorry about that," Jack chuckled. "The explosion was rather magnificent, so Q-Branch should be somewhat proud."

"It killed the jaguar, two of the polar bears, and the shrew," the cat named Minos said as plopped into the seat next to Jack. "The bigger bear…ah, Koslov…he barely survived the explosion, but still managed to get to his feet and even draw his gun when the guys entered the burning garage. They said it took three shotgun rounds to drop him for good."

"So Mister Big and Koslov are both dead?" Nick asked as he tried to scratch inside his cast. "Good, maybe I won't have to keep looking over my shoulder all the time!"

"Speaking of time, is this supposed to be the guy?" Minos asked as he looked over at the fox. Jack caught a that his partner's voice was somewhat strained, a small inflection in his verbiage which only someone who had worked with the cat for as long as he had would have caught. "He sure doesn't look or act anything like the real Nicholas P. Wilde, you know the dead rich guy."

"Hey! What is that supposed to mean?" the fox slurred out as he tried to sit up. His eyes were dilated and he was beginning to pant.

"It means that you are now worthless to our investigation and know too much," the cat replied with a deep sigh. "Sorry Wilde."

Jack glanced over at Nick with concern. He had just saved the poor guy's life at his own personal risk and now he feared what was happening. "No!" he protested as he watched the fox begin to spasm and gasp. The heart monitor alarm went off, yet no one in the medical team came running. He watched the cat stand up, cross the room and with a flick of his paw, turned the machine off.

"The Agency said no witnesses to this investigation, it would cause too many headaches if the press or any politicians ever found out that time travel might be real," Minos replied with a shrug as he dug into his pocket for a pistachio. "You know the rules Jack."

Jack Savage frowned as he looked at the dead fox's body.

"Another unpleasant task has been taken care of," the cat continued. He appeared unconcerned about what had just happened as he slowly munched on the nut. "We have a lead on who leaked the information to Big and I'm supposed to meet one of Big's former associates over in the Big Dune section of Sahara Square. You are welcome to come along, but I'm doing the driving this time."

1925

Nick sat in the booth inside of the small mixed species coffee shop they had found and looked warily over at the rabbit doe, her appearance and voice was just like Judy's and yet she didn't act exactly like her. "We can't just sit here and drink coffee all night, I've got to save Carrots…I mean Judy!" he protested.

"You are in no condition to save anyone," the rabbit doe replied. She had gently put her paw on his, but he quickly yanked his away. "Rubin and Zachariah will find out where she is and then we will save her."

Nick frowned as he watched her, all those years of being a hustler and then a cop made him realize that there was something in her mannerism which set her apart from his Judy. "You never became a real cop!" he suddenly blurted out when he realized what it was. "Why didn't you become a cop?"

"Nick, I tried…I really did. I…I was even the valedictorian of my class at the Police Academy, but Chief Bogo wouldn't let me do anything but parking duty," the rabbit answered as she looked down and gave a soft sniffle. "Then one day I was writing tickets and…and…well, there was a weasel who stole bulbs from a flower shop."

"Weaselton," Nick added. "His name is Duke Weaselton and you caught him, right?"

"No, I chased in him into Little Rodentia and he kicked a large display doughnut at me. It missed me, but killed a civilian," Judy sniffled. "In the confusion, he escaped."

"Her name is Fru Fru and you didn't miss, you caught it and saved her!" Nick objected as he looked at her with concern. "She's now your…I mean Judy's, best friend."

"She may be your Judy's best friend," the rabbit replied. She looked at him with tears forming in her amethyst eyes. "But I…I failed to protect her and she was killed because of my mistake!"

Nick tensed up, he had seen that look before and it was the one thing that hurt him the most to see. He just could not stand seeing Judy cry, even if this wasn't his Judy. Instinctively he reached over and squeezed the rabbit's paw. "I'm sorry that happened," he almost whispered. "It was after we had first met, after I was so…so, belittling and mean to you about wanting to be a cop."

The rabbit doe looked up at him with curiosity and wiped her eyes, before she replied, "You and I have never met before."

"Really?" Nick replied with a smile. "We, well I mean my Judy and I first met when I was working with my then partner Finn and we were doing the Pawpsicle scam. I was trying to get a huge jumbo pop in an elephant owned ice cream parlor and I almost failed, when you…I mean my Judy…came in and I conned her into not only getting the guy to sell me the over sized popsicle, but I also got her to pay for it too!"

"You're kidding me!" Miss Judy giggled. "She was really that naive?

"Of course you were...I mean she was," Nick replied with a laugh. "Of course what set me off was when you…I mean Judy...earnestly told me that I was a great dad and even called me a real articulate fella."

"Gods, how condescending of her, to say that!" Miss Judy laughed. "That was very patronizing to say that to any fox!"

"Yeah, Carrots is one of a kind!" the fox laughed. He stiffened as he looked over at the other Judy. "Well, maybe two of a kind?"

"I wish I had met you Nick," the rabbit doe added. "It sounds like you turned her life around."

"Yep, that I did and she did the same for me!" Nick proudly replied. "We solved both the Missing Mammals Case and the Night Howlers Case, bringing Bellwether to justice. She even talked me into even become a police officer too!"

"Mayor Bellwether?" Miss Judy quickly replied as she sat up, her ears had shot up in surprise. "Are you saying that Mayor Dawn Bellwether is behind all those predators going savage?"

"Yeah, she had a group were making a chemical from the Midnicampum holy-something-or-other!" the fox answered. "We call them Night Howlers and she had a group of rams shooting their victims to make them go savage. Judy and I got the gun and pellets from her stooges and then hustled Bellwether into confessing what she did on that little carrot shaped tape recorder pen that Carrots carries. Are you saying that the case was never solved?"

"No, we figured it was something inherently biological and then after they impeached Lionheart, Mayor Bellwether had the most dangerous predators detained and imprisoned until they can figure it out. Some of the other lesser predators are still free to roam around, but have been outfitted shock collars to keep them from hurting others." Miss Judy answered. Her nose was twitching and Nick could not help but simile, because it the same way his Judy acted when she was frustrated with something happening. After a few moments, she smiled at him and added. "So you really became a police officer! I can't believe that they let a fox become a cop!"

"Judy and I are partners!" Nick laughed as he picked up his cup of coffee. "If you don't believe It, I'll have to prove it by ordering one of those doughnuts to prove I'm a cop. You know what they say about doughnuts and cops!"

"Ughh!" Don't mention doughnuts around me please!" Miss Judy replied with a small smile. "I can't believe where you are from, that they let a rabbit and a fox become real cops. I'll bet they put you on parking duty."

"Only when Chief Bogo gets mad at me for something I may have said," Nick shrugged. "Old Buffalo Butt just makes the jokes come out too easy."

"You tease Chief Bogo!" the rabbit laughed as she gave the fox a smile. "No one teases Bogo!"

"He actually has a bit of a sense of humor," Nick objected before he took another sip of his coffee. "I think he is really going to miss me, despite what he will claim."

"He doesn't know you, at least not as a cop." Miss Judy said with a frown. "The only Nicholas P Wilde we know of is deceased, but he was rather rich and the founder of Foxcon. He was the one who sent me the watch, or at least his attorneys had it delivered to me years after he died."

"Well if that is me and I'm thirty-five this year, I would have to be to have been well over a hundred years old," Nick scoffed as he pawed his coffee and took a sip.

"One hundred and twenty-eight," Miss Judy replied. "Hey, we rabbits are good at multiplying!" she sarcastically added.

Nick choked on his coffee and wheezed. She had taken him by surprise when she said that in the same tone and with the same look which his Judy had given him that day on the street. Judy had said that to him the day she hustled him into helping her with her investigation. "So I've heard," he finally choked out.

"Ah reckon ya'll have been having a good time while me and old Rubin have been a beating the bushes, trying to find yer rabbit!" Zachariah chuckled as he slid into the booth next to Nick.

"We found her!" Rubin quickly added as he sat next to Judy and put his paw around her shoulder. He was frowning and looked scared. "I just don't know how we are going to rescue her from HIM?"

Across town Judy found herself shoved into an elegant bedroom, where a black sequenced dress was laying on the bed. "You want me to wear that!" she said in disbelief to the lion, who gave her a bored look.

"That's the dress, put it on and then get your tail out there. You need to start serving drinks to the guests," Lucky replied as he sat down in a chair and stared at her.

"A girl needs her privacy," the rabbit said as she frowned at the large cat. He didn't budge an inch but sat there watching.

"Too bad toots," he finally said with a grin. "I'm staying put so you don't sneak out of the window. Just get dressed and hurry up about it."

Judy sighed as she slowly stripped off her dress, trying to cover herself from the watching lion. Finally, she slipped on the new dress and gave it a shake, pulling it down to release her tail from its confines. "Satisfied?" she snapped at the big cat.

"Not a bad body for a thumper," he laughed. "Don't worry sweetheart, you're much too small for my tastes. Look cottontail, Bugsy promised you a good time and that you won't get hurt. Besides, I'm not a prey chaser so get that tail hopping and start serving drinks!"

"You kitnapped me just to serve drinks?" Judy snapped back in surprise at the larger gangster.

"The boss likes his bunnies, but he's already got a girl tonight," the lion shrugged. "So you can just serve drinks instead."

"What if I say no?" she replied as she stamped her right foot in anger.

"I'm not giving you a choice," the lion yawned out as he stretched and as if to prove his point, he unsheathed his claws.

"So much for Bugsy's promise!" Judy huffed out. "He also said that Clawhauser would be here, I guessing he isn't?"

"Oh good old Tommy will be here sooner or later, once the boys find him. The boss ain't too happy with that nosy cat," the lion chuckled. "Now enough of this blabbering and get to work."

Judy opened the door and tentatively stepped out into the full room. She was surprised to see a crowd of very well dressed mammals of all kinds, some she recognized from the Crime Museum as being infamous gangsters. Someone was at the piano playing ragtime and her ears shot up when she recognized the familiar voice, it was Fatts! The plump fox was grinning and singing, putting on a show as if he didn't have a care in the world.

"Play another tune Fatts, another one for little Molly!" an authoritarian voice called out and Judy looked over at the chubby jaguar in a tuxedo, the cat's arms were wrapped around a scared looking young white-tailed deer doe who was also dressed in a black sequenced dress. The rabbit's eyes widened in both fear and awe when she realized who the big cat was...it was Al Catpone!

There is a story that the jazz legend Fats Waller, whom Fatts Wily is based upon, was actually kidnapped at gun point in 1926 and was delivered as a "present" from "the boys" to Al Capone for his birthday party. He was the gangster's "guest" at the Hawthorne Inn in East Cicero near Chicago for three days before he was returned unharmed with thousands of dollars stuffed in his pockets and supposedly a taste for fine Champagne.