Zootopia - In the Days That Followed

by ayziks

Zootopia implied that Nick and Judy's friendship was more than being 'buddies'. This anthology of stories explores the growth of that relationship amidst societal prejudice against mixed species relationships. Pt. 1 is complete, and "The Waters of Atlantea" is the sequel. T rated (intimacy/violence). All characters property of Disney. Story image courtesy 'vivial' of Dev i ant Art.

26. Chapter 26

Chapter 26

Authors Notes: To begin your weekend reading pleasure early, here's the conclusion in its entirety, dear fans. (at 25000 words it might take a four day weekend to read…) No breaks. No more intentionally planned cliffhangers for maximum dramatic effect (this could have easily been a two-parter also). This chapter will bring my first Zootopia story to a conclusion that I do hope you all will find satisfying as I envisioned it two dozen chapters ago. I actually can't believe this is the end, dear readers… T for violence and mild swearing. Remember that T rated violence and profanity is like T rated intimacy. You can imagine it as graphic as you want with the limited descriptions and inferences, and all the f-bombs are substituted with milder words.

…Across the Assembly Hall Main Banquet Room…

"Fire! Fire! Run for your lives!"

Judy's words to run were still echoing around the ancient 50 foot tall vaulted ceiling of the enormous banquet room, and there was an instant turmoil – muttering, murmurs, confusion, shouts, panic, screams, and even doubt and disbelief among the audience. Someone even laughed, thinking it was part of the evening entertainment.

But a call to alarm for 'fire' from one of the principle honorees at a place and time which was only supposed to be fun and celebration was no laughing matter.

Over a thousand snouts and muzzles turned to figure out what to do and where to go. Many wondered the same thing: should they go or stay?

Mammal bumped against mammal looking for a direction to go or even to go anywhere at all. No one thought about an emergency escape on a celebration night like this - not even taking stock of where the exits were. Every stunned mammal was talking at once and in utter confusion while gaping at Judy, shocked at what she said, and they looked around for the fire that she surely must have seen, because Judy and Nick were always truthful.

Morley and Lourdes were speechless standing center stage, and had no idea what to do or say next and looked at Judy in aghast and in horror. The words on the teleprompter scrolling by that they should have been reading now meant nothing. This carefully scripted evening ceremony should have nearly concluded and been ready to dismiss for the night. The TV producers didn't know what to do either.

Morley and Lourdes thought the same thought: "Surely Judy didn't say that as a terrible joke. Hopefully there isn't a fire. Not tonight. Not on this night of all nights."

But there was a fire.

Morley blinked, shielded his eyes, and looked toward the rear of the banquet room. A giant bright orange wall of flame flared up across the bank of a dozen stoves in the catering kitchen. This was no entertainment special effect.

Morley and the entire head table then knew that Judy was right. There was a fire all right. A big fire!

The audience who faced the stage could feel the heat of the intense fire on their backs. Those facing the kitchen were blinded by the flames' intensity. Every mammal's head turned together in further shock to see the entire kitchen staff with chefs and sous chefs pouring out of the kitchen doors or leaping out of the serving window openings to get away from the fire. They directed the crowd to leave and motioned to the sets of doors at the back. There was not a panic among the staff, but there was a sense of urgency.

With nearly fifty cooking staff flooding out of the kitchen, the vast banquet room got even more crowded with mammals milling about. Several chefs' hats smoked. One was on fire and the water buffalo stomped out the flames with his hooves. Some staff clutched burned or singed arms or paws.

The Master Chef pulled the fire alarm, and the initial shock grew into palpable anxiety throughout the crowd. The emergency power lights went on immediately. Everyone could see the extent of the confusion and got more agitated and anxious, especially with a clear view of the kitchen aflame. The audience members wanted to leave right away, but as they were orderly - more like a fire drill. The front table was very concerned but calm and the other mammals could see that and draw from their example. The banquet room doors were a considerable distance from the seating area, because the banquet was a huge affair, and emptying the room would take a long time.

No one was more shocked than Judy and Nick that there really was a fire.

"Carrots? How did you know?" Nick shouted to Judy over the fire alarm blaring in their ears.

"I… I didn't know, Nick. It was a lie. To buy us time. From 'them'."

Judy subtly gestured for Nick to look out at the crowd now that the auxiliary emergency lights were on and the harsh spotlight was not blinding him. Nick finally saw the telltale signs of the fully armed server/assassins that blended into the crowd who were as confused as everyone else.

Nick whispered an aside to his police partner, "Someone who heard you shout just helped us."

Judy instantly knew who started the fire and prayed she was still alive. That was a big damn fire and getting bigger.

Nick looked around for some kind of improvised weapon to somehow ward off the attack they both knew was coming.

Equally shocked about the fire as Judy and Nick was Duke, quite a few tables further back from the head table than he had planned to be at this time, immersed in the standing and uncertain crowd with most of his comrades, at a time when everyone should have been seated and quietly attentive to the ceremony as their throats were to have been slit.

Duke had originally surmised that Judy was lying to buy time. But even a fire – a real but very suspicious fire - wasn't going to stop him from his task. He only had one chance at this, and fire or not, he had to stick with the original plan to kill the most prominent cross species mammals and the Mayor all at once for maximum political impact. The stealthy nature of plan was compromised by the emergency lights, but the overall confusion introduced by the fire would actually provide cover to help Duke accomplish the Society's goals more easily. No one would ever see this coming. He reminded himself that their victims should have been dead already.

Over the clatter of the Assembly Hall fire alarms, Duke's keen hearing could begin to discern the Zootopia Fire Department sirens approaching. That meant a lot more cops were coming too and would pose a threat, even with the barricaded doors. But inside the Assembly Hall, Duke and his mammals were armed to the teeth, and possessed superior strength to the paltry police security guard assigned for the evening. The audience was defenseless except for those who possessed their very own claws and teeth.

Although there was not much time, Duke and his mammals could still do their 'job' and get away. Duke's team was incentivized to defeat their foes with their great plan and perfected practice. As further support, Joe Camel had promised them all prosecutorial leniency when he got elected Mayor – assuming they ever got caught. There was still a very good chance they'd get away with it all cleanly and disappear forever into the night. Duke remembered that as the owner of CBS, the banquet TV sponsor, Joe could make any TV recordings of their dirty deeds disappear or appear to have a technical 'glitch' to obscure or eliminate the guilty faces if need be. Duke felt that he still had the upper hand.

But with each passing moment, it was getting more difficult for the Species Purity Society's murderous rampage to be successful. Not everyone of his team was with him anymore. The fire made several server/assassins extremely nervous, especially those with a strong instinctual fear of fire. On the far side of the head table, he watched as the assassins assigned to take out the City Council, the first row of honoree tables where Dr. Rocky and the science geeks, Gazelle and her tigers, and the other lesser cross species sympathizers had abandoned their dessert trays and weapons and were trying to escape the fire by exiting discreetly with the audience.

"Cowards!" he rasped under his breath.

The pro-cross species supporters on the City Council were weak and ineffectual anyway, and the geeks didn't matter. He would get even with the deserters later. The most important targets were right in front of him separated by 'only' a few rows of tables of other banquet guests.

Duke was pleased that despite this unexpected setback of deserters, the most loyal and most vicious of his team were still watching him intently for new direction. Like the normal servers, the dessert trays were abandoned, and his server/assassins looked vaguely like they intended to evacuate with the audience, but they still firmly wielded their weapons hidden in their server jackets or held low beside them. Once they finally got into place, on Duke's word, they were ready to strike.

The din of noise from the nervous crowd prevented Duke from giving the verbal signal to attack, so he pushed forward and hoped that most of his team would see him with this visual signal. Taking Duke's cue, the others tried to do the same, but most were hemmed in by the crowd filling the pathways between tables and aisles trying to go the opposite way to escape the fire. There were a lot of big mammals between them and their prey.

It was starting to get stiflingly hot and claustrophobic in the banquet room. The kitchen fire was generating a lot of radiant heat and the air conditioning was shut down - with a lot of hot lights – in a closed room full of more than a thousand nervous mammals.

As Duke pushed forward toward the head table more urgently, mammal guests began to press and shove back against him and his team, even though they were boxed in and going nowhere fast because of the huge crowd backing up behind them. The mass of 1000 mammal guests, over 100 servers, and 50 kitchen staff crammed the giant room. Many of the mammals in the audience were as big as Duke or bigger and were exerting too much pressure on Duke and his trained killers. The impatient audience started shoving back. They wanted out urgently.

"Hey idiot, watch who you're shoving," snapped the CEO of a major corporation, who pushed back on Duke, and added, "You're going the wrong way out."

"Get the hell out of my way," Duke snarled with a nasty look, waving his knife right at the hippo's snout, refraining from gutting the haughty, rich, obese CEO.

The hippo recoiled from Duke he exclaimed, "Good heavens!"

Duke's next steps were no less difficult. Every available space between tables was clogged by the crowd getting progressively more anxious to get to the exit doors in the back and get out. As impatience, panic, and anger mounted, some of the larger, stronger mammals tried to force their way past those weaker and smaller ones ahead of them, not caring who or what they climbed over. It was becoming a situation of all out survival of the fittest, the most savage of all instinctual emotions pent up in these civilized animals. Chairs were being knocked over, cluttering the aisles for those trying to flee, and two table legs collapsed as some mammals tried to bound their way over the tables. They sprawled on the floor, groaning with pain from twisted ankles, and someone else cried out because of a broken leg. Mammals stepped on these unfortunates and not over them, and they shrieked in anguish.

The head table on stage and the first row could see the mass of mammaldom boxed in and their panic mounted. The mayor and the VIPs and honorees stood tall and calm on stage and well-illuminated, setting the example. No matter what happened tonight, Judy and Nick knew they could be proud of their mayor until the end.

But remaining calm wasn't enough as the situation deteriorated. Leodore picked up the remote microphone at his dinner plate he hadn't used since the toast, and instructed in a very loud, booming voice that could be heard clearly, "Please, citizens, remain calm. Everyone, please take your turn and we'll get you all out safely if you go out in an orderly fashion!"

That helped calm everyone quite a bit. They all looked at the Mayor and the head table calmly waiting their turn. The evacuation returned to order.

Until the sprinklers went on.

That unnerved everyone. Some mammals hated water worse than fire, and both together real created panic in some. Mammals started yelling and shouting. Some feral calls of panic were uttered by others. Most were just angry and frustrated.

"Get it moving it up there!"

"Let us out!"

With the lights on, Morley and Lourdes finally saw the assassins' weapons drawn among the crowd and she said only loud enough for her able mates, "Oh no! We're going to all die."

"No we're not, not while I'm here," said a familiar voice, taking her hoof.

"I can always count on you, Raoul!" Lourdes exclaimed, and clutched their joined hooves against her heart. She smiled at her llama husband, who had been quietly seated next to her the entire night, since much of the festivities were her responsibility.

Morley was grateful Lourdes' microphone was off and for Raoul's calming effect on his wife.

…Above the banquet hall…

"Fire! Fire! Run for your lives!"

Airborne One squadron commander Major McDonnell couldn't believe the words he just heard from Officer Judy Wilde.

From their arrival at the final moments of the award presentation to Nick and Judy, to Judy's shocking declaration of a very real fire emergency, Airborne One had a very frustrating ring side seat to the decaying conditions in the banquet room. Though blocked from getting inside the vast room by the jammed ventilation grate in the high ceiling, the bats could see the approaching assailants better than anyone on the stage, who - like everyone else -stopped for a few moments to assess the situation. Major McDonnell was shocked that in spite of the fire, the assailants were determined to continue their attack, albeit slowly, working their way toward the VIPs slowly against the crowds.

Airborne One was powerless to do anything about it, trapped behind the ancient rusty heavy wrought iron ventilation grate.

McDonnell had to find a way to support his endangered officers and especially to protect the Mayor. He dreaded making the call 'Officers Down', or worse: 'Zootopia Prime down' - the code phrase for injury or the death of the Mayor.

But one thing Major McDonnell could do from the moment they arrived was to keep giving Bogo his only accurate 'sit rep' from the inside. Bogo and his officers watched the overhead TV monitors throughout the Assembly Hall, but the TV coverage was abysmal and only focused on close up shots of the VIPs and the awardees enjoying themselves and socializing.

Bogo asked impatiently, "Airborne One. What's happening now? Why did Judy call fire?"

McDonnell replied, "Chief, There is a fire in the kitchen and Officer Wilde called it first. Prepare for crowd panic and evacuation. We're still stuck in ceiling. The vent is jammed. Assailants are prosecuting their attack on head table and VIPs. We count… uh… twenty armed perps posing as food servers. Need officer assistance immediately."

And then the fire alarm went off.

…Main entrance corridor just outside banquet room…

Holding his sensitive ears from the deafening alarms reverberating in the corridor outside the barricaded banquet room, Bogo snapped in frustration, "Damn!"

More than a thousand mammals needed to get out and the doors were somehow jammed closed from the inside. Mammals would get hurt badly – or worse - with blocked exits. Plus, the police leader knew he had to arrest twenty or so criminals. He had no idea how to discern good servers from bad servers. The only good news in the bat's report was that twenty assailants were better than all one hundred food service mammals being conspirators.

Bogo keyed his microphone and broadcast to the force, "Let's get these doors open and get in there, Officers! There's a real fire in the kitchen. We have a mass exit underway, and suspects about to attack the Mayor and VIPs."

…

Every media outlet in the city that monitored police radio frequencies jumped all over that last statement. At the ZTV newroom, the VP in charge of the news department got on Peter Moosebridge's cell, and demanded, "Get over there. Now!"

And as much as it pained him, his next call was to CBS to get the rights to rebroadcast the inside-the-banquet-room video feed. This wasn't a ceremony anymore. It was a disaster. Adeline would approve, even though CBS was going to charge them a 'paw and a hindquarter' for the rights. But right now it didn't matter.

…

The ZPD Police Chief hoped the reinforcements from the surrounding Precincts would get here in a hurry. There were still less than two dozen regular police officers in the building. It was nearly an impossible task for that few to get a thousand citizens out safely and arrest 20 perps that were determined to do their crime and get away. At least there had been no real attacks on the Mayor and awardees yet, and Airborne One was literally right over the crime scene and actively looking for a way to thwart any attacks. The bats outnumbered the twenty or so conspirators, but Bogo knew that his team and his elite bat squadron were useless until they got inside the banquet room.

Bogo understood that his two best detectives were on the inside of the room, and despite being totally unarmed, had taken preemptive action already. He somehow knew that Judy and Nick had instigated this fire to buy time. He would have done the same. While the ploy was brilliant, the Chief of Police tried not to let his head hurt thinking how he'd have to explain to a judge and jury and a million inquiry boards that his Officers falsely declared a fire emergency, and then deliberately set the Assembly Hall ablaze specifically to protect the lives of the Mayor and the other VIPs.

But he couldn't think about that anymore. He more urgently pull-tested the second blocked door to no avail, while Officer Elisabeth took other officers others and rushed down the long corridor to the far side of the banquet room to the fourth and fifth set of doors.

At the third blocked door, the additional officers that had arrived on site were using a battering ram to force open one of the doors. Despite his armored headgear, the big mountain ram barely made a dent on the sturdy doors made decades before.

"Stop, guys! I can't do this. We're not getting through, and this hurts like hell," shouted the mountain ram Officer in painful desperation, holding up his hooves up in resignation.

His colleagues helped him stand up, but had to support him, because he was really woozy after butting the immovable door with his head more than a dozen times. All of his fellows were worried about a concussion.

The ram complained, "Damn, I need an aspirin."

The mountain mammal held and rubbed the base of his horns and his temples. There was a chip out of one of his impressive rack of curled horns.

"Are you all right, Officer Geoffrey?" Bogo asked with concern, only slowing down a little in his rush to join the others moving to the far doors.

One of the most impressive things about Bogo, even to his detractors, is that he knew nearly everyone on the force on a first name basis, despite his normally gruff and incorrigible temper with all of them.

"I'm fine sir," the ram confessed, "My pride's a little hurt. I always can smash down doors."

"It's all right Officer, You tried. Doors were built to last back then," replied Bogo, and then keyed his mike with an idea, "Airborne One, did anyone bring a bolt cutter? I could sure use one out here."

Bogo, like the ram and the others, was utterly stymied. He couldn't figure how the criminals forced the doors shut that opened outward into the main corridor from the interior to allow emergency evacuations without trapping anyone inside.

"Negative, 'One. I'd be in there now if I did," the vampire bat replied.

Major McDonnell thought the Chief was crazy, as one bolt cutter was heavier than his entire squadron dripping wet.

But the squadron commander instantly got an idea.

"It sure can't get any worse," Bogo muttered as he raced after Officer Elisabeth's team.

But angrily he discovered that he was wrong again. At that instant the sprinklers started, and he just fumed and growled on a dead run.

…Inside the entrance/exit doors at the back of the banquet room…

"Fire! Fire! Run for your lives!"

Like every other mammal in the main banquet room, the server/assassins assigned to jam the doors from the inside were stunned at Judy's declaration, and looked across the room for guidance from Duke. They couldn't see him among the standing mass of mammals between them and their leader.

Up to the point of that stunning call of a fire emergency, the three server/assassins had worked quietly in the dark and unnoticed, while all eyes were focused on the ceremonies for all the awardees, ultimately leading to the standing ovation and video tribute to Nick and Judy. The criminals had just successfully jammed shut the main set of three main doors used by the banquet attendees to enter the room.

The process to block the doors was deceptively simple. The mammals carefully slid long metal bars that had been used as flag poles during the 'special' part of the opening ceremony through the 'push-to-open' cross bars on the doors. Next, they twisted and jammed the ends of the bars against the door frames so they couldn't unlatch from the inside, and couldn't be pulled open from the outside. So securely jammed were the doors that they weren't opening again unless the bars were pulled out, and that would take some effort. It was hard enough getting them in by the three big, strong mammals.

Having completed trapping the audience in the banquet room on this side, the three criminals were ready for the sign from Duke to kill the TV cameraman in the back of the room, and force the cameras to keep transmitting the massacre to all of Zootopia.

But there were supposed to be five server/assassins doing this task, not four.

The three saw their moose colleague across the room working on door #4, still struggling with two of the heavy steel bars. With the departure of the cowardly coyote, assigned to door #5, the moose had to do the work of two mammals. Despite his strength, he couldn't handle sliding two metal bars through the push bars and door frames like the others had done. He dropped one of the bars on the hard floor but the ringing metallic clatter it wasn't loud enough to be noticed.

"Nathan, I see Grant, but where's Alfred?" asked one conspirator to his fellows.

Nathan answered and tried to be funny, "I have no idea, Duane. Alfred was arguing with Duke. Heckuva time to have to go to the 'can'."

The other two chuckled, but Nathan suggested, "Stupid coyote. Maybe we should go help Grant. Now he has to do two doors by himself."

Duane disagreed, "Nah. It's his problem. We gotta go 'take out' some cameramen."

Nathan fretted, "Yeah, but when is Duke gonna tell us?"

The third member of the team worried even more, "I can't even see Duke right now."

Nathan wanted to take more definitive action, "I don't see no fire. Damn Duke's orders. We gotta go help Grant. There's something not right here."

Right after that, all three were further shocked turned to witness the fire ignite much closer to them than anyone else in the room, and the fire alarm went off soon after.

Duane was nearly panicked now, "Dammit, mammals, there is a fire! What the hell? What's going on?"

Shielding their eyes from the eruption of flames against the otherwise darkened room, Duane noticed movement that wasn't supposed to be happening.

Duane exclaimed, "Oh shit, here comes the crowd! Think of something fast."

With the crowd heading to the doors in a fairly orderly manner at first, a worried guest yelled ahead at the three fake servers, "Open the doors here. We need to get out! They told us to leave by the nearest exit. This is the nearest exit."

The flag carrier/server/assassins shouted and motioned the crowd of mammals to move to the doors on the other side. Duane lied and pointed across the room, "These doors are broken and being repaired. You'll have to get out over there by the moose. Those are open."

Even though they all knew all the doors would be blocked soon.

Someone in the audience shouted back at Duane frantically, standing before the three block doors, "Open the damn doors already. It's a freaking bad time to do that kind of shit right now!"

Nathan made excuses, "Sorry, mammal. The doors are broken. We just work here. You must go over there."

The crowds gave up in true aggravation and moved across to the other exits as directed like flocks of sheep. Fortunately, there were a lot of sheep, oxen, deer, goats, and other herd animals in this part of the crowd, who followed orders obediently.

Nathan said Duane, "Grant had better hurry. This is going to be his problem in a minute. Duke don't want anyone to leave no matter what."

"Even with the fire?" Duane observed.

Nathan scolded, "Orders are orders, mammal. Don't screw with what Duke says. That rhino has a long memory, and he gets even. He may want everyone to die here to make this the worst disaster ever for the mixed species lovers."

But Duane countered, "But I'm not going to die. I have a new kit at home. How do we get out then? And how does the fire get put out? We were supposed to leave out the kitchen back door after we 'offed' the cameramen."

No one was getting out through the blazing kitchen.

Nathan didn't have any time left to ponder the answer to that.

The banquet attendees in the back of the room were oblivious to what was happening at the head tables and didn't care about anything but getting out. That fire across all the banks of kitchen stoves was enormous and spreading. A couple of brave chefs were battling the blaze in the kitchen with fire extinguishers, but were nearly overcome by heat, had to retreat, and they themselves started toward the exits as they directed others.

Despite the orderly movement toward the doors, thanks to the calming words of the Mayor, the server/assassins could see the mounting concern on everyone's snouts as they pushed deliberately toward the doors.

Until the sprinklers went on, then all hell broke loose.

Water poured down on the audience in sheets, soaking all their finest clothing, and chaos turned into true panic. The orderly exit became a roaring and barking and growling multi-species stampede fleeing toward the exits like lemmings. In fact the three tables of lemming businessmen ran squealing toward the exits en masse.

All three back-room server assassins turned in horror seeing the wall of mammals rushing toward them now at full speed. The crowds galloped for the doors. Any doors. Even these blocked ones. Not one mammal ever thought the doors wouldn't be open in an emergency.

The three server/assassins realized far too late that they couldn't get out of the way of the hundreds of panicking mammals. Now they just wanted to stay alive from the crush of bodies heading their direction.

Nathan shouted to his fellows, "To hell what Duke said. Open the damn doors! Get out!"

The three server/assassins turned around to reverse their sabotage, and tried frantically to pull the metal bars out that they just jammed in, but were too late. The sprinklers created a slippery grip on the metal bars, and the saboteurs had no traction on the wet floor as they fought to undo what was difficult to do in the first place, and had not been intended to be undone.

The rushing mass of mammals smashed Duane, Nathan, and their colleague against the doors they had desperately tried to get back open, snapping their necks and spines against the hard bars and doors with the full weight of dozens of heavy mammals quickly piling up against them. The tile banquet floor was too slippery for hooves and paws no matter what the species, and the crushed server/assassins slipped beneath the mass of the crowd. Their muffled dying screams were not heard.

It was fortunate that the dead server/assassins provided a macabre cushion for more innocent mammals being pinned against the doors, and that the sprinkler water kept the others smashing in from behind from gaining traction to keep pushing. This inadvertently protected the banquet attendees from piling up more violently and meeting the same fate as the conspirators. At least for now.

Quickly the crowd discovered that the exit doors were barred and blocked. Mammals caught against the doors feared they would die as the crowds piled up on each other pushing.

Many screamed and yelled and shouted desperately, "Stop pushing! The doors are locked!" trumpeted an Asian elephant to everyone behind.

Adding to that, a very tall big brown bear yelled at the top of his lungs to the others, "You're all crushing us. Stop! Turn back! Go the other way!"

The elephant and bear's pleas helped a little, and the crowds mostly turned and moved away toward other doors. But many still slipped and fell. More were starting to get trampled by those behind.

One of the giraffe sous chefs trying to direct the crowd shouted over the heads of the entire crowd, "Over there. Like they said. Those doors are not locked. Let's go, mammals!"

With the weight of authority of the chef and his ability to shout over all the throng, the bulk of the crowd finally moved away from the immovable door. It was a living wave of mammaldom. While some remained pushing against the blocked doors, most of the crowd headed the other direction.

Grant was - like most moose - very poor-sighted. He was exhausted and task saturated, trying to deal with emplacing two metal bars in a race against time, the fire alarm, and now sprinkler water. He simply didn't see or hear the wave of panic-stricken mammals surging toward him. He was completely deafened by the fire alarm right beside him. Grant was entirely focused on the need to show Duke he could do the work of two mammals without any help, so he could move up in the violent underground part of the Species Purity Society organization. Handling smooth, wet, heavy metal bars was not a task a hoofed mammal should have accepted.

…Head table…

Not knowing of the frenzy in the back of the banquet room, and getting soaked to the skin by the sprinklers, the killer grizzly and Kodiak bears and Tony the Bengal tiger finally had enough of fighting their way politely through the mingling and slowly withdrawing crowd. They violently shoved mammal guests out of the way and finally faced Mr. Big at his front row table, right next to Joe Camel's table.

Duke saw his mammals initiate the required first attack, and finished making his way to just behind the rest of the first row of honorees tables and the head table. As huge as he was, he flanked and threatened several tables at once, and trapped the head table on the stage from exiting toward the main doors. He paused only until Mr. Big was under full attack.

Finally seeing the formidable nature of their attackers flanking them at every avenue of escape, no one moved. The entire head table and honorees tables were frozen in terror at the armed Bengal tiger, two huge bears, and the gigantic 12 foot tall rhino with an enormous meat cleaver gripped menacingly in his hoof.

The rhino seemed more intent on the Mayor and the fox and rabbit, so Morley tried to quietly move toward exit with Lourdes and Raoul and the City Council, "Come this way. Hurry."

They started to edge their way to get to the far end of the stage, but Tony the Bengal tiger deftly leaped on to the stage and the remaining way off stage was blocked by the nimble predator.

Lourdes quaked with fear, despite her husband's grip on her.

With the tiger blocking the stage entrance with a knife as big as a sword, and the rhino with his huge cleaver guarding any chance of the escape of the head table to the floor of the banquet room, all the VIPs and honorees were trapped and out of options. Morley and Lourdes pushed against the false wall erected behind the head table to shorten the stage, but now it also prevented them from escape. They didn't understand why the stage crew hadn't put up a simple opaque black scrim curtain that would have easily let them pass through and exit backstage to exit to the fire escapes back there. What none of them knew was that Joe Camel had made sure that the stage company subcontractor to CBS had erected a hard false wall behind the head table with no emergency doors to trap them during the final attack. Joe noticed their worry and smiled quietly. The camel knew it would be over soon.

The mammals occupying the first row of honorees tables on the banquet floor were waiting patiently to exit behind the throng ahead of them. They sensed more trouble than fire, given the worry they saw from the head table members, and no one descended from the stage to exit with them to safety. They turned to see the bears, tiger, and rhino now threatening them and the head table. There were more assailants approaching their tables from behind. They couldn't go anywhere either.

Seeing the massive number of killers assembled around them, Rocky's wife fainted into his arms, the science geeks screamed, and two of them hid under the table while still others tried to look for another way out. Joe Camel and his tablemates looked terrified at their table too.

The furthermost honorees' table that had the youth winner and entertainer of the year was empty. Since the server assassins who were assigned to that table fled in fear, Gazelle and her tigers had already departed with them, and were well along into the exiting crowd with the entertainer of the year close behind. Despite their buff look, Gazelle's tigers were 'fraidy cats'.

Even without the Amur Tigers and the other cowards that had disappeared, Duke and his small number of deadly mammals were ready, with no real defense for the victims.

…

Flanked by the grizzly and Kodiak bears, Mr. Big's polar bears body guards, who were always ready for any unexpected attack, pulled out their concealed weapons that overmatched the assassins' knives. The polar bears had truly enormous knives and the Kodiak and grizzly gulped at the magnitude of their task.

"We got you covered, boss," said one polar bear to Mr. Big, who glared at the approaching bears.

He stated to his bodyguards firmly, "You are like family to me. No matter what, your families are my family."

That promise was what always engendered loyalty to Mr. Big and why his mammals would gladly die for him. Mr. Big took care of widows and orphans of his crime empire operatives' family lavishly.

Joe faked looking as frightened and confused as the others, but barely could restrain his glee while trying to look as if he was cornered like the rest of the VIPs. He anticipated the attack on his leg, but wondered where the Amur Tigers were, and further wondered why Tony was trying to do their job keeping the Mayor, Adeline, Morley, the fox and rabbit, Lourdes and her husband, and the City Council trapped on stage. If Duke had changed the plan, then so much the better. He'd rather not have a broken leg anyway.

Duke had actually edged right by Joe earlier as if they'd never met, and the camel cowered when the rhino stared him down. That should look very convincing on TV. He was proud that Duke wasn't deterred by the fire. Whatever had caused the real fire didn't matter. His enemies would still be dead. One way or another.

…

The commotion at Mr. Big's table distracted the head table members, but they remained alert for the rhino and Bengal threatening them, while looking for some path off the stage and away from these would-be killers. Clearly the back wall offered no emergency exit. The water was now pouring on all of them and they were mostly soaked. The floor was wet and there were puddles in places. The females' dresses were ruined by the water, but that was the least of their worries.

Leodore said quietly to his colleagues rhetorically, "What are they waiting for?"

Adeline added, "I don't know. We're unarmed. And we have nowhere to go."

Judy added some gallows humor to keep them concentrating, "They're paralyzed in fear of my butter knife."

Nick added, "Yeah, right, Carrots. Maybe you could 'thong' them to death too?"

Under ordinary circumstances it would have been funny.

"Shut up fox," Judy chided, embarrassed that Adeline and the Mayor heard, but added, to avoid fighting among themselves, "At least I will die laughing at your bad jokes."

"I beg your pardon, Mrs. Wilde?" Nick faked being affronted but acknowledged the thought.

The rabbit thought about Nick's crude joke for about three seconds, "No, wait! Nickie, you're the smartest fox on the planet."

Nick was genuinely puzzled at his bride, "Huh? What?"

She reached under her gown hiding behind Nick so no one would see, grabbed his arm to steady herself, and removed her blue thong.

He gave her a sly look, and yanked her chain hard, "Carrots. Not here. Not now."

"Calm down fox. Jeez…" she rolled her eyes and gave him an annoyed look at his untimely teasing.

Unseen by their attackers, she grabbed a hand full of steel ball bearings and glass beads from the decorative centerpiece bowls. The glass and steel centerpieces matched the look and materials of each of the Leadership award trophies. She held the beads and bearings out of sight and prepared for an opening.

Noting his wife's action, he whispered, "Smart rabbit…"

Nick hefted the sharply pyramidal glass trophy they'd been presented behind his back, and thought about another kind of damage with steel and glass, and conjectured in his mind, "Just maybe we can win."

Duke saw that all was ready, turned to the head table, and shouted, "Die, abominations!"

That was the signal the Species Purity Society rehearsed for so long so perfectly, and was meant to be heard by a silent audience, but now Duke uttered the cue in desperation, and only his team and their intended victims even heard him shout out.

….Along the corridor to the entry doors at the same time…

Three doors were totally blocked, and Bogo knew he had more problems now. The thousand mammals couldn't get out of any of the three main exit doors and probably not the other two far side doors. The corridor outside the exit doors to the banquet room was being flooded with sixty more police rushing up from the five floors of steps, but they need to take action now.

Officer Elisabeth finally arrived at the fifth set of doors. Mongooses were not the swiftest runners. This was an enormous hall and it took forever to get around to the secondary set of doors. The sprinkler water slowed them considerably.

Bogo was close behind and got to the fourth set of doors. He could see they were partially bent on their hinges by something that was forcing the doors closed from the inside. Bogo pulled and mercifully the doors started to open. But they opened themselves. He was knocked aside by the huge body of a moose bellowing in pain that had just been smashed against the door from the inside, and then by waves of fleeing mammals of every size and shape stampeding through the door and into the corridor for safety.

Bogo watched helplessly as the moose writhed and screamed as he was trampled and gored by dozens of hooves and claws and pads. A stampeding elephant crushed the moose's chest. Bogo looked at the bloody and broken moose and could only hope it was a criminal caught in his own attack plan. The escaping crowd of mammals were in such a panic that they paid no regard that they were trampling anyone.

The police officers that were trying to gain entry into the banquet room stood helpless for a moment, but only because they had no chance of getting inside the room for awhile. They quickly changed from intervening with a crime in progress to crowd control and safety.

"Get out of the way, Elisabeth!" Bogo shouted in warning.

She saw what was happening, but the female mongoose didn't have to jump out of the way. The fifth set of exit doors that had not been tampered with at all. She just let them burst open and crowds poured out and into the corridor. Officer Elisabeth took control over the panicked mammals as she shouted directions on how to exit safely. Her team directed the crowds safely down the five flights of back stairs to the street. But she was scanning every snout and muzzle for the bad guys trying to escape too.

Bogo reminded his other officers over his radio, "To all units: arrest anything in white staff coats that comes out of doors #4 and #5. We'll sort it out later."

"Roger, ZPD One," came the response from Elisabeth for the other Officers.

One-by-one the officers stopped every white-jacketed mammal of the kitchen staff, and any exiting waiters. Some cooperated, but others they struggled, and the ZPD officers wrestled them to the wet floor by force and they were cuffed. Most of the ones who struggled were just panicked servers, but some were the server/assassins that deserted Duke. One had foolishly kept his kitchen knife and the mongoose disarmed him.

With a knee in the back of the downed bobcat, lined up next to nearly a half dozen other perps cuffed restrained by her colleagues, Elisabeth growled, "You're under arrest. Oh? This is interesting. What's this, mammal? A carving knife?"

"We were all gonna die. I needed it to defend myself all the bad guys in the room," lied the server/assassin.

"Really? That might be better for you if you had, mammal," Elisabeth sneered.

Seeing things well in control, Bogo then asked, "I need a dozen volunteers to help me get the main doors open so we can get in there. Mammals are getting hurt, and the Mayor is in danger."

Bogo and the dozen others peeled off back to the main exit doors.

Doors #1, #2, and #3 were definitely still a problem. Bogo could hear the sounds of scratching and clawing, screaming and moaning, and thumping of bodies being forced against the doors. Mammals were being crushed to death. Bogo had to get these doors open or it would be a true tragedy. Some blood seeped under one of the doors.

Bogo was desperate for a solution.

The doors were being pushed so hard that they rattled outward on their hinges.

"That's it!" Bogo exclaimed, and then spoke his radio, "Pull all those hinge pins at once and get those doors open!"

At all three jammed doors, the Officers followed Bogo's direction and all the police did the same task with their standard ZPD-issue multi-tool from their utility belts. At door #2, Bogo and three other Officers worked swiftly. With a couple of officers exerting pressure the opposite way on the doors, the other four pulled all four major hinge pins simultaneously, and stepped back. With no support from behind, with the pressure of the crowds, the huge door fell open and smashed down into the corridor with a tremendous impact noise against the tile floor.

Horribly, as the door fell, there was a waiter body grotesquely mangled against the push bar handle and constricting long metal bar.

"Nature help us," Bogo exclaimed at the grisly sight.

Some critically injured and trampled audience members fell with the body, but Bogo and his Officers quickly pulled the survivors from the stampeding crowd - who would have met the same fate as the waiter – away to safety. Officers with EMT skills escorted them away and tended to them immediately.

The trapped hundreds poured out of the room like a fully open fire hose. Some mammals tripped over the metal bar that had jammed the push bar and the push bar itself, but the Officers managed to help everyone climb over and get out. Other Officers directed the crowds out of the door and down the main lobby stairs. Safely out of the banquet room, the audience seemed calmer and more conducive to being directed.

The other two doors fell open the same way as the first and the full flow of trapped mammals exited to safety. Regrettably two more terribly crushed and disfigured servers were all but impaled against the bars of the doors that had opened and fallen.

One grateful coatimundi was in mild shock, with several broken ribs, a twisted leg, and punctured lung, but assisted by his wife and the police, he walked under his own power, and leaned against the corridor wall on the other side with an EMT by his side.

The coati said to Bogo, not realizing he was talking to the Chief of Police, "Thank goodness you guys got us out of there, Officer. We wouldn't have lasted another minute. Especially us little mammals."

Other mammals closest to the jam up at the doors were in similar shape, but it appeared only the server assassins were dead because of serious injuries. It could have easily been much worse. The mammals unfortunate enough to be up against the doors were saved by the wet floors, which greatly reduced the ability of the crowd to inadvertently crush their fellows in front of them.

With a lighter volume of evacuees coming out the doors, officers dragged one of the fallen doors out of the way altogether, and tried to divert crowd traffic to get the other doors removed.

Mammals were now completely free and poured out of the doors, but with the huge numbers still needing to exit, ZPD still couldn't get in to help the VIPs about to be under attack.

…Broadcast booth…

In the production booth, Producer Bob saw everything, thanks to his brave cameramen who'd dutifully stayed. He was very proud of them.

Seeing the banquet room doors finally open, he ordered, "Get out of there, now, guys."

"What about the cameras?" one of his operators asked.

"You heard me. Let the cameras roll to gather evidence for whatever happens after this. We've got all the other networks requesting that we rebroadcast the feeds to them too. Lock the pan/tilt and get out. Let the cameras record everything. Open every microphone in the hall. We might record something important. Let Zootopia see everything. The future of what the city believes may depend on what they see tonight. Damn the censors from the Zootopia Communications Commission."

"Yes sir!" the cameramen replied. They set up their cameras and sound system just the way Bogo asked and then they exited to safety with the rest of the crowd.

…Bunny Burrow…

Stu and Bonnie and Sandra and Melvin were clutching each other. They were staring in trepidation at their TV at the grim scene, where only minutes ago they all beamed with pride at Nick and Judy receiving their big award. The cameras showed the Judy's shout, the eruption of fire, the alarm and sprinklers, and the ensuing stampede. Now they were getting scenes of conspirators advancing while the emergency raged on around them. The two older couples were bonded in terrible fear for the young couple's safety trapped on stage facing huge foes.

Millions of Zootopians and mammals worldwide watched the same scene helplessly, but none of those millions had the same emotional connection to Nick and Judy as their family.

They saw the assailants corner the front table, and Bonnie pleaded weakly, "Oh, please no. Don't hurt them. They never did anything to bother you."

She and the other three older adults could hardly breathe.

The scene shifted to the news anchor Peter Moosebridge, who rushed to be on site to help with the news crisis. He looked tense covering the debacle from outside of the Assembly Hall on the street, getting more and more crowded with police, fire fighters, and evacuating mammals.

He spoke gravely into the homes of Zootopia, "Welcome to live ZTV new coverage at the annual Leadership Institute Awards ceremony that has now become a nightmare. We just viewed the chaos inside. We're on the street now as mammals escape the burning building. I can assure you that ZPD and ZFD are surrounding the Assembly Hall and getting inside to fight the fire and the crisis inside. But no one seemed prepared for what's happening inside."

Breaking away from Peter's 'talking head' image, cameras on the street zoomed their lens up the fifth floor with flames flickering out of the kitchen windows. Streams of water poured into the broken kitchen windows from the street hydrants and from nozzles attached to the ladder trucks raised up the windows.

Peter detained a fleeing survivor, "Excuse me, folks, but please, tell us: what's happening inside?"

A female opossum and her husband, nursing a broken arm, said in exhaustion, "There's a fire. We had to get out. Judy Wilde, bless her, saw it first and warned everyone just when she and her husband were getting their award, and so we got out quickly. But there's some kind of awful trouble in there, Peter. Someone's inside attacking the Mayor and the City Council and Officers Nick and Judy. Dear me, can't someone get more police in there to save them? The doors were blocked for a long time and we barely got out - thanks to ZPD. The Chief himself is in there trying to save every mammal."

While the distraught opossum gave her eyewitness account, the video scene cut away to the latest camera shots showing the approach of enormous mammals to attack the head table.

Bonnie gasped and balled her paws in terror under her snout as two bears shoved through the crowd and a tiger leaped on the far end of the stage blocking the escape path. A rhino with a huge cleaver was pacing in front of the stage looking for a clean line of attack. All of the other attackers had large sharp knives also. Nick and Judy, the Mayor, the emcee, and the Institute Director had their backs to the hard stage wall, trapped there with their friends. Nick and Judy were risking everything to protect the Mayor and his wife. It looked like the criminals were posing as waiters.

The images were somewhat obscured by the milling crowds and smoke and the drenching sprinkler water. The images were faltering because of water getting on and into the cameras.

Stu said more for his reassurance than for Bonnie's, "I'm sure they'll get out. They're smart."

The others just stared at the screen, and said nothing. Suddenly the live inside TV feed went blank, and quickly switched to the ZTV anchorman.

"Uh… we seem to have a problem with the image. We'll try to restore the feed as soon as we can," Peter stalled.

All Bonnie, Stu, Sandra, and Melvin could do was hope for a miracle.

A really big miracle.

…Banquet room. Head tables…

Mr. Big's table braced for the attack. Soaked to the skin, the Kodiak and Grizzly bear made their move. They thrust forward and sliced their knives at Mr. Big and Fru Fru, but were easily countered by the polar bears. Blades clanged together and sparks flew. The powerful polar bears shoved the smaller bears back a step with ferocious growls, and braced to defend Mr. Big again.

The grizzly and Kodiak dodged and feinted, looking for another killing blow, but they were at a standoff.

Mr. Big and Fru Fru backed up to the edge of their table. It was a long drop to the floor, and she whimpered, "Daddy I'm frightened."

Mr. Big smiled with a reassuring look at his daughter, "Do not be, dear one. There is always a means of escape for Mr. Big and his family."

He nodded to one of his polar bears.

That bear took out a metal-armored silver suitcase from under the table, opened it, and scooped Mr. Big and Fru Fru into the opening. It had four tiny chairs with very secure five point harnesses.

The body guard instructed, deflecting another attack from the woodlands bears' next volley, "Buckle up sir and ma'am. This could be a very rough ride."

Once safely inside the suitcase, the polar bear was going to bolt for the open doors in the back of the banquet room, no matter who he squashed along the way.

Protecting Mr. Big and Fru Fru infuriated the two server/assassin bears, but instead of charging the two polar bears again, they leaped out of the way quickly, and seeing the opening, the polar bears moved to escape with the crime kingpin and his daughter.

Before they could take one step beyond their table, the polar bear bodyguards caught a movement from behind and hidden by the ursine assassins.

Right in front of them, a bull African elephant dressed as a waiter - in full charge - had smashed its way through the crowed from a few tables behind literally flipping and tossing mammals aside. They screamed in pain as they were hit and thrown.

The elephant's furious eyes were set as he impaled both polar bears right through their chests with his enormous white tusks. The polar bears' eyes flew wide open in shock and pain for a moment as they howled and dropped their weapons. Their heads drooped and they slumped over the elephant's tusks. The killer elephant shook them off, and the two polar bears collapsed lifelessly to the banquet room floor. Red stains soaked their tuxedoes and white fur.

The armored suitcase that the dead polar bear had carried landed roughly in the middle of the banquet table and muffled high pitches shouts and cries could be heard from inside.

The elephant was now free of the polar bear bodies, and with no remaining protection for Mr. Big and his daughter, he reared back with his huge front feet high in the air. He dropped full force on the armored suitcase on the table. Terrible screams could be heard on the inside. The rampaging elephant flattened the table with the force of his smashing down on the case, but that deflected a lot of the impact on the case.

There was an elephant foot-shaped dent in the reinforced steel evacuation suitcase specially designed for the arctic vole and his family.

The elephant was even angrier that he hadn't yet delivered the killing blow, and prepared to rise up again and stomp the case for as long it took to completely flatten it. There was no one left who would challenge him.

Nick and Judy looked on in horror, and knew that the elephant, woodlands bears, tiger, and rhino would soon turn to them and the Mayor.

There was still no way past the rhino and the Bengal tiger, flanking any avenues of escape.

As the elephant was about to come down for another blow, he hesitated. His eyes were drawn to the ceiling of the banquet room in true puzzlement by a sizzling sound. Everyone else in the front of the room heard the odd noise and looked up as well. An enormous shower of molten metal and blinding electrical sparks fell from the ceiling, covering on the elephant and others nearby, singing their fur and burning their skin. The pachyderm moved back a little.

The huge ventilation grate suddenly gave way with an earsplitting metallic screeching and groaning sound, and it fell open. It swung from the ceiling by a single bolt.

Judy turned to Nick and watched movement from the grate, and she shouted, "Oh no! The fire is spreading."

Nick added, "There's so much smoke up there."

But it wasn't smoke.

It was a cloud.

But not a cloud of smoke.

It was a cloud of bats.

"Whoo hoo! Airborne One rules!" Judy exclaimed, grateful to see their tiny blue helmets vests and police badges swarming for an attack. Nick and Judy knew of this elite secretive unit but had never seen them in action.

Using his police radio in at full volume and combined the radio with bullhorn mode to intimidate the attackers instead of using sonar speech, Major McDonnell shouted, "ZPD Airborne One to all units: bogies engaged!"

'Bogies' was the not-so-complimentary term used by fighter pilots for heavily armed enemy targets, and it certainly applied to police work as well.

McDonnell did that so all of the regular ZPD officers and SWAT all over Assembly Hall would know that the police were going after the attackers, and attempt to comfort the audience that they were police. There was a collective cheer and fisted paw bump from the dozens of ZPD police all over the site.

Peter Moosebridge was utterly stymied, and wondered what was happening, now that the TV cameras had shorted out in the torrent of water. He'd only heard the audio call.

"Uh, there seems to be some kind of engagement between the police and criminals inside. We'll try to bring you more. Maybe a SWAT unit is inside now," Peter completely guessed.

Nick and Judy knew exactly what to do and ducked down to stay out of Airborne One's and motioned for the other VIPs followed their lead.

"Those bats are our bats," Nick shouted to their friends to assure them.

The VIPs and honorees fought their recoil instinct, but hearing Nick's reassurance, they all ducked and none of them were harmed by the vampire bats. No one had ever heard of this highly clandestine unit of ZPD that was actually helping them.

But to almost everyone else, especially the server/assassins, the vampire bats were their worst nightmare. The colony of Vampire Bats broke up into several smaller elements most of which instantly swarmed over every assailant in front, with pairs going after every other armed server/assassin they could identify from their perch. White jacketed waiters dropped all over the banquet hall with the fast acting tranquilizers, frightening the unknowing guests further.

"ZPD One. Copy Airborne One engaged," Bogo acknowledged and was grateful that finally someone was trying to defend Mayor and the front table VIPs. He hoped that McDonnell's squadron could put all the criminals to sleep before they could do their damage. In the corridors, Bogo and his officers had detained or arrested more than 50 of the 100 servers that were not taken down by Airborne One, and had them immobilized in the corridors as the rest evacuated, trying to sort out good waiters from bad waiters.

…

"Are you getting this?" asked the Producer to his show manager.

"No Bob, all the big cameras are shorted out, but I just turned on a mobile all weather, low resolution camera that we have as a backup on the light tower."

"I see it now. The cloud is… is like it's alive."

They could now see – and now also everyone in Zootopia - the weird brown and blue cloud. They watched it descend like it was alive on the bad guys.

"It is alive. Oh dear me. Bats! Nature help them."

"But they're police bats, sir. Look at their uniforms," the show manager said.

Moosebridge could think of nothing to say, and let the newly activated camera say it all. He was deathly afraid of bats, but blurted to the audience, hearing the producer's prompt, "Mammals, there are special bat police attacking the criminals. We'll… uh… try to get more for you…"

…

More than eight vampire bats swirled at breakneck speed around the rampaging elephant's head, biting at will and pricking the blood rich skin around his neck and ears and head and sensitive trunk. The pachyderm trumpeted in panic and pain and was completely freaked out. Trickles of blood flowed down his neck. He bellowed in searing pain, but tried to deflect the bats with his trunk. The tiny mammals were too fast and nimble and they just kept biting him.

The elephant's whole head felt like it was on fire from the bats' attacks.

The bears suffered the same fate, surrounded by smaller clouds of four to six bats each, and blood flowed oozed from their wounds, matting their fur. The Kodiak and grizzly were helplessly trying to fend the bats off them and growled in true terror. The bats' fast acting sedatives caused both bears to stagger a step or two and they fell hard against the tile floor and tables, further injuring themselves. With the bears down, Airborne One concentrated their attack mostly on the elephant, which was drugged but wouldn't go down, and the rhino.

Nick and Judy and the others stifled a cheer of hope.

Duke couldn't do anything to help his fellows or attack the head table because he was a target of the nasty bats too, and Tony was frozen in fear, afraid the bats would go for him next. The tiger could see his fellow server/assassins who were falling all over the banquet room to the bat's bites. "Rabies" was all he could think.

Because of the immediacy of the threat to Mr. Big's elephant attacker, a much smaller part of Airborne One went for Duke with the four already attacking him, driving him backwards because they were getting in his face and nostrils and ears, biting those sensitive places where blood vessels were, but Duke was much more agile than the elephant and he was fighting back very violently and effectively. There were too few bats with not enough sedatives to bring Duke down with his huge body mass. All he suffered was a kind of drug buzz.

Running out of tranquilizers, Airborne One knew they weren't designed to take down the largest land mammals on the planet with so few in number.

But the elephant slowed, wobbled on his feet, staggered a bit, drugged from multiple bites, even though he was not felled. He abandoned his assignment to finish smashing Mr. Big, and instead decided Duke for the final kills against the head table.

"Screw the vole, Duke. I probably killed him. The Amurs are a 'no show'. We have to take down the Mayor and the fox and rabbit," he slurred in a shout over the infuriating continuing fire alarm.

Duke agreed with the new plan, responded back to the elephant, "Are you all right? Can you fight?"

The elephant shrugged and almost stumbled over the debris of the smashed table, "I'm fine. Let's do this."

Airborne One was making a difference, but not enough of a difference. The head table knew that a combined rhino, tiger, and elephant attack would be the death of them.

But the elephant's world was spinning and he was seeing two Dukes and about four Judy's. He was too groggy to notice what was happening around him.

Or above him.

Fifty feet above the stage, the last ventilation bolt snapped with a sound like a bullet, and it fell like an ax blade.

McDonnell caught the motion from his sonar and squeaked in sonar speech to all of his squadron, "Zombies incoming! Scatter. Now!"

Zombies was 'pilot speak' for incoming defensive weapons and to maneuver hard away from the ventilation grate.

The cloud of bats caught the grate's rapid drop and flew quickly a safe distance from the elephant just as a sharp corner of the huge wrought iron grate sliced completely through his neck. Everyone turned away from the horrible sight, and Adeline screamed as the elephant's head came to rest on the floor below the stage right in front of her. There was an enormous pool of blood that mixed with the sprinkler water on the floor already. Lourdes lost her dinner on stage and buried her head into her mate's long white fur neck.

Impacting the banquet room tile floor after killing the elephant, the grate made a huge metallic crash, and broke a number of floor tiles. The grate fell over on the fully sedated bears, further pinning them to the floor.

The bats quickly turned from the morbid situation and continued their relentless attack on the bad guys.

"Splash one bogie, Major," bragged Lieutenant Dobson in pilot slang for a hard kill of a target.

"Maintain radio silence, Dobson. This is not war, Lieutenant. These are civilians. Even the bad guys are innocent until proven guilty. This guy lost that chance forever. Got it, Officer?"

"Yes sir. Sorry sir," the rookie apologized.

Appropriately chastised, brand new recruit Dobson rejoined his fellows. The remaining few bats assigned to attack the elephant joined the latest attack on the rhino. All of them were really frustrated, and couldn't bite through the armored hide of the rhino. Duke's reflexes were much faster, and swatted several off him and stomped on several more. He sliced a couple of bats in half with his cleaver. Squeals of intense pain could be heard, and they flopped on the floor. One was unfortunately Dobson.

McDonnell knew this was a terrible mismatch and squeaked in their sonic language, "Damn. Six officers down or dead. Withdraw and regroup. We can't bite through his armor. Go for the tiger."

Sergeant Igor replied in sonar speech also, "We're all 'Winchester' on tranquilizers sir."

Whenever a policeman went 'Winchester', another term borrowed from the Zootopia Self Defense Force, their weapons, in this case their sedatives, they were completely expended.

McDonnell was angry and swore, "Then just get in this fur and his ears and tail. Even his damn balls. Bite anything to stop him. We must protect the Mayor and VIPs at all costs."

Everyone knew what that meant.

On orders by McDonnell, most of bats peeled off from the rhino and headed straight for the Bengal tiger, who saw them coming in fast, went wide-eyed, and wailed, "Ooooohh, shiiit!"

Watching all of this from his crouched position, protecting himself from the nasty little police bats, Joe Camel was very worried. He hated bats about as much as cross species loving mammals, but his agitation and upset grew with each passing moment that the assassination operation was becoming an utter failure. Joe concluded that he hated bats that were cops worse than anything. He had no idea such things existed.

"Everything is going wrong!" Joe thought in great trepidation.

This operation was becoming a rout, recorded for all of mammaldom on his very own network TV. He wanted to pull the plug himself. This was supposed to be a record of a great victory for the cause of species purity. He looked around the room and saw all the fallen server/assassins. These bats had turned the tide against Duke's flawless plan.

Joe's failing final hope rested on the only two assailants – Duke and Tony - standing where there should have been an overwhelming force of ten.

Despite the pesky bats all around him, Tony continued to prevent the Mayor and Adeline from escaping off stage while Duke held them from escaping toward the open exit doors. The tiger fought off the bats, but mostly ignored their bites and nips after injuring or killing several more of them. He bled everywhere from their fang puncture wounds. He felt a little dizzy from being bitten by some bats who had some sedatives left.

The Bengal and Duke were trying to work out non-verbally a coordinated final attack to take out the remaining seven mammals trapped in front. Only four had real fighting abilities: the fox and the rabbit and the mayor and his wife. The rest were helpless prey.

Duke knew Adeline and Leodore could defend themselves from attack, and that is why he hesitated to take them on by himself. They'd severely injured Simon during the attempted robbery and murder at her apartment. Duke would have given anything to have the Amur tigers and the elephant back. Duke knew he could not expect Joe Camel to help, so the Bactrian camel could maintain his cover.

On the cramped stage, Adeline faced the criminal tiger in front of Leodore in a defensive crouch, and she hissed, "You are a disgrace to your species."

"Not from my point of view - you are the disgrace, lion lover," growled Tony, making a huge mistake of an overconfident inexperienced fighter by rolling his head back chortling in derisive laughter, which made his eyes close.

In that instant of lack of concentration, Adeline took full advantage of Tony by leaping at the young male Bengal, came down in mid-air and bowled him over on his backside. Both ripped and bit and clawed at each other. Tony gripped his knife in his paws and struck her in the shoulder and thigh with it. Blood sprayed from both tigers as they battled. She growled in pain, but slashed him across the face and chest, inflicting deep gashes, ripping one of his ears off. His shriek of pain made everyone else shiver.

The snarls and growls of Adeline and Tony fighting were deafening.

Duke wasn't really prepared to make his final charge, but because Adeline had made a completely unexpected preemptive attack of her own, the rhino had to go soon or completely loose the fight. He only feared Leodore, and had to somehow remove him from the terminal fight.

But a brown cloud surrounded him.

"Gaahh! Damn you!" Duke yelled, enveloped in bats again. In the single moment he didn't pay attention, they attacked him again.

All the remaining 19 bats of Airborne One were all over him, encouraged by the rhino's shout of frustration. Having disengaged from the tiger fight, this time more effectively after studying his defensive patterns, they concentrated their attacks just on his front hoof that held the cleaver. They swarmed so incessantly and so quickly that they caused a reflex action in his wrist tendons that forced him to drop his cleaver. Duke's front hoof and ears and face looked like a swelled up pin cushion from the fang bites. The bats were getting through his more sensitive thinner skin under his neck, and the hooves.

Airborne One knew there no hope of sedating the rhino and bringing him down, but they'd disarmed him. Distractions and delays were the key, hoping for a SWAT team to take a long range sniper taser shot at the rampaging rhino to finally bring him down before there could be a fight between the rhino with the Mayor and Nick and Judy and its deadly consequences.

But the bats were wearing out in the constant battle against the rhino and all the other criminals, and couldn't wait indefinitely for ZPD units to get into the fight. Flight for a bat was a huge expenditure of energy. Bats fed constantly in flight to renew their energy or flew in spurts. It was over 20 minutes of constant action for Airborne One since taking off from ZPD Headquarters, consuming nothing in the extreme stress of combat in dozens of attacks and re-attacks against the criminals. They were forbidden from drinking any mammal blood.

The short time since Judy's shout seemed like an eternity for everyone involved in this critical battle for the emotions and minds of Zootopia. Especially those mammals still in their places at the head tables.

While it was possible for the remaining honorees and VIPs to flee now, they didn't, even in the face of injury or death. They wanted to have rock-solid solidarity with the Mayor and the fox and rabbit who were clearly the targets of this attack.

This was their friends' fight too. These assassins meant to destroy everyone and everything in which the cross species community believed. If they were going to die in this blatant purge against cross-species unity, they'd all go down together, and perhaps another set of believers would rise stronger and prevail.

On stage, it continued to be a wrestle to the death for the two tigers. Leodore desperately attempted to get into the fight, but was afraid to hurt his wife. He managed a well-timed vicious claw swipe against Tony's armed paw. The knife flew out of the tiger's hands and across the front stage and rendered that paw mostly useless. That evened the odds. Leodore managed a few other glancing blows, but waited for a better opportunity.

Because Tony had stabbed Adeline twice, her strength was waning, and Tony finally pinned her. Before Tony could lunge and strike the killing blow across her throat with his own natural claws, Leodore saw his opening against the novice fighter. The Mayor leaped viciously on the male tiger immobilizing with all four clawed paws dug into his body, ripping him open, and crunched down hard on the tiger's neck with his wicked jaw full of razor sharp teeth. Tony the Bengal tiger cried out in horrible pain one last time, and he slumped on the beaten up, scratched, stabbed, and bleeding figure of Adeline. Seeing Tony dead, no longer a threat to Adeline, Leodore stood up, beat his chest, reared back his head, and roared deafeningly in his victory, immediately embarrassed by the ancient feral sound that echoed in the banquet room.

With Adeline injured and unable to move, Judy and Nick knew they weren't going anywhere, and this was now all about protecting the Mayor and his wife from injury or death. They were as ready for Duke as they could get against this 3000 pound behemoth, who would never retreat, as the bats had completely disengaged and withdrew for a rest and food. Most could barely fly at all.

Adeline fell back and kicked the male tiger's carcass further away in disgust with her powerful hind legs. Her chest was heaving, gasping, and fighting back the tears of pain from two deep wounds and many minor cuts and scratches. The sprinkler water that fell on all her lacerations stung mightily. Her gown was all but destroyed.

She clutched her husband, "Leodore, darling, you saved me… again!"

"You pretty much had things under control dear, but glad to help, Adeline. But you're hurt," Leodore observed, and tears of his own rolled down his eyes for her safety, momentarily ignoring Duke who was intimidated by Adeline's surprise battle and Leodore's fatal blow on Tony and the lion's prehistoric victory roar.

Adeline chided him playfully, "I'm just scratched, you big crybaby. You know I can take care of myself. I'll be all right, but I can't move my leg. You have to help Judy and Nick now. Lions are the only natural enemy of rhinos."

Observing in compassion the extent of her wounds in her shoulder and thigh, he stated, "You are the bravest tiger ever."

"You'd better say that! I'm your wife," she kidded.

He hugged her a moment, keeping a wary eye on Duke, who was trying to shake off the pain of the bats who were forced to disengage from him due to their total exhaustion.

Adeline noted, "Ouch. Everything hurts. But that made it much better."

"Mayor, I think you better be ready, sir," Nick warned in aside, sensing Duke's pending charge.

"OK, Nick, but I'm not leaving Adeline. I'll fight off the entire room of bad guys to keep them from her and our friends. Or die trying."

"'Love you," he informed his wife.

"Go get 'em, 'tiger'," she added.

He smiled at her joke, stood up, and faced the rhino with his friends with a very determined look. The beast was bigger than a half-dozen lions, Judy's, and Nick's. Unnaturally large for a rhino in fact.

…

The Captain of the SWAT team raced into the entrance doors to banquet hall, and from long range he ordered, "There he is, take down the rhino!"

The best sniper in all of ZPD kneeled, lined up his shot, held his breath, ignored the sprinkler water, and pulled the trigger of his rifle. The gun fizzed and sizzled, and he screamed as blue bolts arced all over the stock and barrels, and engulfed his forepaws.

The sniper dropped his weapon on the floor and caught fire in multiple blue arcs of electricity and flames in the water on the floor of the room.

The sharpshooter screamed with his extensive electrical burns, and buried his arms in a puddle of water that had filled an empty punch bowl to quell the pain. An EMT was on him in an instant.

The Captain and the team were totally surprised, "Sorry, Daniel."

"It's OK sir."

"Baker, you try."

Exactly the same thing happened as the taser destroyed itself in the sprinkler downpour, except that the second sniper dropped the malfunctioning weapon before it electrocuted him.

There was a fundamental design flaw in the new high-powered sniper rifles that they just discovered. They were not all-weather.

The dingo Captain barked, "Go to Plan B, Officers."

They threw their useless rifles down, pulled out their billy clubs, and rushed forward to engage the rhino. The ZPD SWAT team was absolutely ready to smash some bad guy muzzles.

But they might as well have been 1000 miles from the head table.

…

Duke tried to catch his despised foes off guard as the battle with Tony ended abruptly, the threesome focused on the care of Adeline's injuries, and the bats disappeared, freeing him to attack. It was all or nothing now or everything about tonight would be a vain sacrifice. Duke was focused on killing the fox and rabbit and the Mayor.

He charged.

Nothing was more chilling to other mammals than sight of a rhino charge, especially one this size. The banquet room floor shook under the thunder of his hooves. It was one rhino against a very tired and worried lion and six smaller mammals now. He was at full charge as he rushed up the stage steps, but was slowed considerably as the stairs partially collapsed under him as he climbed, because his weight was much more than combined weight of Gazelle and her tigers for whom the stairs were designed.

Duke struggled to climb to the top of the staircase, leaving it virtually useless behind him as a means of escape even if his victims could get by. Adeline wasn't going anywhere soon. He was face-to-face with the emcee and the Director of the Zootopia Leadership Institute and her husband.

The Mayor, Nick and Judy were on the other side of the stairs, but could do nothing that didn't endanger them.

"Oh no," Morley lamented and saw the blow coming.

Using the side of his horn, Duke swiped his massive head and tossed Morley aside against the back stage wall. His head smashed against the false wall and he collapsed unconscious on the stage.

Duke turned to face Nick and Judy and Leodore, ignoring the useless female llama. Lourdes got very angry in desperation at Morley being hurt, and she rushed the rhino with a hair pin she pulled from her fur coiffure. She stabbed Duke in the eye. Duke shrieked deafeningly, but the rhino turned instantaneously to face his unexpected attacker.

Lourdes' musician husband stood protectively in front of her as Duke lunged at Lourdes. Raoul shoved Lourdes aside and took the full brunt of the rhino's thrust.

Duke stabbed Lourdes' husband completely through his chest and abdomen, embedding his horn the false wall of the stage behind the male llama as he did. Raoul shouted out in anguish and collapsed on Duke's horn. The rhino quickly shook the Raoul's lifeless body vigorously and tossed him aside like rag doll that knocked Lourdes completely over. He turned to face Nick, Judy, and Leodore. There was blood on his horn. It was a brave but foolish move by Lourdes, but Duke was really hurt now. Yelling and bellowing in pain because of his destroyed eye, Duke kept his main targets in sight and held them at bay from more defensive attacks. Duke's vision was bad enough, but worse now. He remained focused on his intended victims.

The desire to fight was completely out of Lourdes. She gathered herself and prostrated herself across her dead husband.

She sobbed, "No, no, please, no. Don't die, Raoul. I'm so sorry. I should have never…"

She clutched and rocked in her bosom the lifeless body of her husband, and held the limp cleft hoof of the broken and bloody male llama.

Nick, Judy, Leodore, and Adeline were in utter disbelief. The rhino killed Lourdes' spouse effortlessly, despite her destroying his right eye. They worried about their combined chances as experienced police. They couldn't leave Leo and Adeline alone. Not the Mayor. It was etched in their souls: 'Preserve and protect'. This no different protecting the mammals than the bank, but had much greater consequences for the city.

Duke's attack was a much bigger shock for them. Duke had run Lourdes' husband through with his horn. The rhino had a bone horn. A real bone horn as sharp as spear, and up until now, disguised with make-up to appear like a normal rhino horn. No living rhino had anything more than fused and matted hair and keratin mixture that formed the horn that could be used as club like he used against Morley.

No wonder the rhino had no fear of attacking them outnumbered.

Nick and Judy realized it was like facing the porcupines. The rhino and the porcupines were not evolved as ZPD doctors had postulated.

They were bio-engineered. This rhino was one of 'them', or at least another genetic product of 'them'.

"This changes everything," Judy whispered to Nick.

Bio-engineered or not, the super-rhino was still a killer that had to be stopped somehow, even though he was bleeding down the side of his face from one useless eye. Snorting and shaking with pain, the rhino sized up his next attack on the narrow stage against his intended prey.

…

Seeing this ghastly sight on live TV through the fuzzy waterproof camera, Melvin said to Sandra, "This changes everything."

Bonnie and Stu remained frozen in their non-stop fear for Nick and Judy's lives.

…

Duke, hearing his enemies' words over his throbbing eye pain, he hissed, "No it doesn't. You won't live long enough to tell anyone about this."

Leodore flicked open his claws, and stretched his paws open to display them menacingly toward the rhino. He stood with Nick and Judy like a wall protecting Adeline, who tried desperately to at least crawl off and flee the now open escape off stage so they would be free to get away, but she laid back on the stage floor, and just moaned in terrible pain. Even if they could get off stage, even normal rhinos were twice their speed on a rundown, especially ten feet apart on a narrow stage, and if they did escape, he would just turn in kill their friends for revenge who watched and hoped helplessly nearby.

Leodore growled through clenched teeth, "You're the one going down, rhino. Cuffed to a stretcher."

As Mayor, he had to say that, but hoped the rhino would go out hooves first with a coroner's tag on one.

They were all ready for the facedown.

Duke sneered while trying to get aim on them with only one eye working, "You're wrong, Mayor. How convenient for me that all four of you get to die at once."

Nick responded, "You picked on the wrong fox and rabbit."

The fox got a better grip on his makeshift weapon.

Leodore smirked and added, "And the wrong lion and tiger."

Judy taunted, "But I'm so sorry, no bears, oh myyyyy."

Rhinos hated puns, especially her allusion to famous movie 'Wizard of Paws', and to annoy Duke that the bears were out cold.

Duke truly hated that the insufferable fox and rabbit were confident enough, even facing certain death, to joke about their coming deaths and ZPD destroying his plan.

Getting down on all fours like a prehistoric rhino, he scraped his hooves on the stage, steadying himself.

Leodore, with all his strength, overturned the tables in front of into the pathway off stage, to create a cluttered barrier to slow the rhino down. Nick helped.

While her male companions did that, Judy stated seriously to the rhino, with a warning gesture, "You're under arrest by ZPD. Stay where you are, sir. We are authorized to use deadly force. This is your only warning."

To Duke it was an empty warning, "The only deadly force in this room is me."

Incensed by their defiance, Duke bellowed and charged again.

Judy instantly took her hand full of metalized steel and glass beads and shot them using her thong in front of the charging rhino, scattering them in his path on the narrow stage even more cluttered with the tables, spilled food, and slippery with sprinkler water.

While his weight crushed the glass beads, Duke slipped on the stainless steel beads, and fell on his side. He crashed into the makeshift table barricade. It snapped Duke's bone horn off at the base of his snout and he screamed and writhed in pain, bleeding profusely, but the rhino started to get up for another killing charge just on his mass alone.

Before the rhino could drag himself up on his hooves again for the next charge, Nick leaped over the table barrier, and with every ounce of strength he had, the fox drove the heavy, spiked metal and glass trophy deep into the rhinoceros' enormous skull.

Bellowing in an earsplitting tone, with the crystal spike driven up to its base in his skull, Duke snorted and breathed his last.

Nick recoiled and held his paws up in horror. He'd been in a lot of fights in his life, but he'd never killed before. Judy rushed to him as he stood quaking and shaking and embraced as if they would never embrace again, just holding and crying together as the water of the sprinklers fell on them gently like a comforting cool rain.

Judy caressed his snout and ears, looking lovingly into his eyes for comfort and reassurance, "It's all right, Nick, you had to do that."

"Carrots… I… I'm not a murderer…"

"Shhh," she said softly, "Just be calm. It's OK."

The couple stepped over the carcass of the rhino, carefully making sure he was really dead, leaving Leodore to tend to Adeline, and went to comfort Lourdes.

She said to them with a heart heavy-laden, "I… I can't leave Raoul. Not now. Not like this."

Judy was completely at a loss for words. She'd never lost any loved ones to violence before, "Lourdes, we… uh…"

Lourdes smiled weakly, "It's OK. I know how you feel. Now go. Take care of your police business."

"OK, Lourdes. Mayor?" Nick turned around and inquired.

"Go. We'll be OK," urged Leodore and Adeline, with the Mayor doing some first aid on his wife's leg and shoulder. The Bengal had just missed an artery or she'd be dead already.

From the vantage point of the height of the stage, Nick and Judy sighed in mental and physical exhaustion through the emergency lights and rain of the sprinklers. They could see the police finally making way from the distant back of the banquet hall to the stage directed by Major McDonnell and squadron mates. There was a SWAT team near them. They were having a difficult time as the huge police mammals were slipping and sliding while making their way through the water and all the overturned or broken tables and chairs and debris from the banquet. But they were coming forward quickly to the VIPs.

Judy tried to indicate that they were all fine and wave them off, and to tend to the very large number of hurt citizens in the banquet hall and immobilized server/assassins.

Mercifully, someone finally shut off the fire alarm and the sprinklers, as the kitchen fire was out. The banquet room was totally trashed, and the overall water and fire damage was incalculable to the rest of Assembly Hall.

"Stop Officers. We're fine!" Judy and Nick shouted, "Tend to the others."

"What about the Mayor?" Bogo shouted.

Getting a look of affirmation from Adeline, the Mayor dismissed the SWAT police off and shouted back at them, "We're OK for now. There are mammals a lot worse off. Tend to your citizens, Officers."

That was so typical of the Mayor. So Bogo directed the SWAT team and a lot of other regular police and EMTs stopped along the way to tend to all the hurt citizens. And arrest all the sedated server/assassins that had not already been captured.

Nick and Judy picked their way carefully down the slippery and broken staircase. The air was acrid with fire and smoke, but it was largely out with ZPD expert techniques. The sedated bears were still unconscious and the heavy grate had them pinned anyway.

But the toll was high in front of the room. The rhino, tiger, elephant, Raoul, and the two polar bears were dead. Sadly there were nearly ten dead bats. Nick took a moment to cover the elephant's severed head with a soaked table cloth for some respect. There was an odd bashed in suitcase in the middle of a crushed table, and Mr. Big and Fru Fru were nowhere to be seen, and hopefully they got out already. They didn't have time to worry about that now. All the assailants were down, dead, or had fled and been detained outside.

Their friends finally safe enough to come to them and congratulate them with hugs and assurance of what they did was right, but Dr. Rocky quickly approached them, "Are you guys OK?"

Judy gave the raccoon a broad smile and a kiss on his cheek, "Oh! Doc! You stayed. Bless you."

He shrugged, holding his wife's paw, who smiled back at the fox and rabbit, "How could I – we – not?"

Mrs. Rocky added, "You're our friends."

"They would have killed you right along with us."

"But they didn't. How can we help?" the good doctor asked.

"Well. I think you have some patients up on the stage."

"Of course."

One EMT, a wolf with an emergency medical kit backpack, had run very nimbly to the front, "Folks, I'm here to help. Chief Bogo insisted. He said something about you all being very 'bull headed mammals'."

Nick joked and waved back at the Chief of Police who nodded at them, "That would be us, Med Tech Clancy, despite the fact we're clearly not bulls."

Dr. Rocky asked quickly, "Clancy, come with me. I'm an M.D. We need help up there."

"Yes sir, I know who you are. I'm here to help you, sir."

Dr. Rocky, stopped briefly with Morley, wrapping his head in a cold compress and medicated him, and with Lourdes, still crying over Raoul's body, and she asked, "Doctor is there anything you can do for my husband?"

He shook his head, "I wish I could, Lourdes. I can only provide care to you now, I'm afraid."

"I… I'll be OK. You go handle the Mayor's wife. She's in far worse shape."

…

Major McDonnell, refreshed with his squadron after devouring a tray full of sugar-laden cheesecake desserts that were never served, landed on Nick's shoulder.

Nick high fived the little bat, and praised him, "Hey Major. Good to see you. And thanks."

"That's what we're here for Detective."

Nick noted, "That was quite the dramatic entrance, Officer."

Judy added, "And timely, too."

McDonnell smiled, "Thanks. Believe me; we did try to get here earlier. Nice work, you two."

Nick sighed with the shock of his kill still in his head vividly, "I would never call killing anyone 'nice work', even stopping murderers."

"Sorry Detective. I know. No offense meant," the bat apologized.

"It's OK, Major. I doubt that we'd be standing here without you and the squadron."

"I'm sorry we couldn't get her sooner and more effectively. We didn't have enough bats available to sedate all of them."

Judy deflected his self-criticism, "Not to worry. You slowed them down enough. How did you finally get through the vent?"

"Tell you later Detectives. Go rest, you guys deserve it."

He flew off looking for more to do to help.

The fox and rabbit embraced at the foot of the destroyed staircase and kissed a long time.

Their friends headed to the exits now that there rest were safe leaving them alone to what would be the beginning of a huge amount of follow up police work, and a lot of embarrassing questions and inquiries.

…

At the Hopp's farm in Bunny Burrow, the older adults were all leaping about, hugging, and cheering in the TV room.

Millions more felt the same way across Zootopia. Some were devastated, having witnessing the live deaths of their loved ones and colleagues. Others were in total shock to realize that a family member was involved in this horrible crime and conspiracy.

…

Breaking from their embrace, Judy asked rhetorically, "Can we go home now? It's over."

They didn't care for a second all this was on metro wide TV.

A familiar, low, angry voice seethed and glared at them, "No. it's not over. Not 'til you're both dead."

It was Joe camel who spoke the words.

He was standing at his empty table. In all the confusion and relief of the disaster being done, no one had noticed Joe camel had neither been attacked, nor fled, nor been bitten.

Joe pulled the hidden knife from under his chair that had intended to make the sacrifice of the Bengal tiger after breaking his leg.

Nick and Judy were in complete shock, "Oh no! It was you all along."

Major McDonnell flew off to get the SWAT team and other officers, now dispersed all over the banquet room tending to others. Joe ignored the bat.

Judy pleaded with the camel, "Surrender Joe. Please. It's not worth it. You might just get life in prison for all of this. We won't hurt you."

Joe asserted, "I am never going to jail. Not while you two breathe."

There was a weird glittering look in Joe Camel's eyes was one step beyond sanity.

McDonnell told the SWAT team Captain and Bogo what was going on and they rushed toward them faster.

In the space of minutes, Joe Camel had seen all his dreams of victory over cross species movement and being the next unopposed mayor go up in smoke almost literally. The death of his ally Duke and all his mammal colleagues dead or arrested had pushed him over the edge. Everyone that could possibly help him was gone, and although he was safe from certain death with Mr. Big gone, he was incensed that the Mayor and the fox and rabbit and his traitorous ex were still alive. Joe knew Nemo would disavow any association with him again or maybe he would become the next victim on the elephant seal's death list himself.

All the money and prestige and power in Zootopia didn't matter anymore to Joe. He had snapped mentally. Only the extermination of his foes is what counted.

This was all happening too fast. Leodore couldn't help Nick and Judy, tending to his injured wife still on stage, which was too far away. All Nick and Judy's friends and associates could do was watch helplessly.

"Calm down, Joe. Violence isn't necessary," Nick said as he and Judy tried desperately to stall him long enough for SWAT to subdue and arrest him.

The SWAT team Captain shouted from behind in pursuit, "Sir, put your weapon down and put your… uh… hooves on your head."

Joe knew he had only seconds so he made his move, "Yes, violence is necessary, stupid fox, and now I have to do it all by myself."

Joe leaped forward in a surprisingly fast gait toward Nick and Judy, waving his knife at them menacingly.

Nick and Judy fled. This was going to be a race they couldn't win. Joe was a huge mammal, and one of his steps covered a dozen of theirs. Camels were much faster on a run than anyone expected the clumsy looking mammals to be.

The floor was still wet and Nick and Judy slipped on the glaze of water, dropped desserts, and other slimy detritus. Joe was pretty sure footed with his wide dual toe paws. It was like running on the loose sands of a desert sand dune to him.

The police were still too far in the back to do anything to stop this shocking final attack.

Joe was closing on them, and Nick, exhausted already, warned Judy, "I'm slowing you down. Run as fast as you can. I'm peeling off here."

"Nick! No!" she shrieked.

Judy knew that if she stopped or slowed down or headed to Nick, Joe would be on both of them. The SWAT team officers ran after them but were too slow and far too late. She'd be dead instantly when Joe caught up with them.

Nick quickly veered off, and leaped on the stage tower, loaded with a maze of cables and wires and lights of all kinds on the light stage overlooking the main stage, including the small TV recording everything that was happening even now.

Judy was exhausted trying to run in a gown.

Joe was gaining on her and he was able to spit at her and force her in the direction he wanted. Camel spit was so slimy that she had to dodge it. If not, she would surely slip on the spit and he would overtake her in a heartbeat. From the angle of pursuit he was trying to trap her in a corner as far away from the pursuing police as possible, where he could crush her just as surely as Duke was going to try to run her and Nick through.

Judy had to do something else, so she ran faster, and felt the seams ripping on her gown. She had lost almost all her jewelry as she fled which was a good thing as the baubles were just extra weight slowing her down.

On one side of the banquet room were the crowd entrances and the other side of the room was lined with beautiful architecture and full floor to ceiling windows 40 feet tall with long drapes that could cover the windows. In the daytime there was a spectacular view of the skyline and the mountains in the distance. At night, it was equally impressive with the lights of the many skyscrapers.

She knew from her romantic, lazy stroll around the building earlier today with Nick that on the other side of those windows was an alleyway that separated Assembly Hall from a low rise three or four story office building with a flat roof. The alley must have been about twenty feet wide.

Judy gulped and made a fateful decision rather than be cornered and smashed by Joe Camel.

Hopping and bounding at full speed, the rabbit rationalized that she could leap through the windows cleanly across that alley chasm to the other side. If she did, maybe - just maybe - she could get away, and she hoped that whatever Nick was doing was equally successful. She was after all a rabbit and could leap long distances like that.

She thought more or less confidently, "Twenty feet is a cinch. Well… at least in ZPD P.T. drills… During the day… When it wasn't raining indoors."

Judy steeled her resolve and refused to think of anything less than a successful jump across the alley, and hoped she wouldn't be so scarred that she would be pretty enough for Nick to still love her.

…

In millions of home TVs across Zootopia, the audience held their breaths watching the true horror of Joe Camel chasing down Nick and Judy brandishing his vicious looking knife. This confirmed what so many mammals already believed: the rich camel was a fraud, a fake, a hypocrite and - for many - was at the very center of this conspiracy against cross species relationships.

The verdict in everyone's minds was '25 years to life' in prison for Joe Camel. His few remaining Species Purity Society supporters watched in total disgust as 'the plan' had become 'utter chaos', and they had tragically lost friends and spouses and kin in this abject failure. If the movement survived at all, it would go deep underground, and most feared that the remainder of the organization would be arrested and jailed for years for conspiracy to commit mass murder.

Other eyes around the world watched too. And were not pleased.

…

In Bunny Burrow, one particular home was much more concerned about the outcome of this unexpected latest violent turn of events.

"Judy, no!" Bonnie screamed at the TV knowing her daughter could not hear her. Stu shut his eyes and looked away from the screen at the imminent death of their oldest daughter on live TV. They'd already forced the other siblings watching to leave.

Bonnie buried her eyes in her paws, seeing Judy sizing up the leap as she raced full tilt. It was the same look When Judy was a little girl when she tried to leap across a wide but shallow stream.

Then, she didn't make it, and came home covered in mud and had nursed a broken leg the entire rest of the summer.

This time, if she missed, there was going to be a lot more than a broken leg and an uncomfortable cast that lasted all summer.

There would be a police funeral.

…

Judy hunched down as she ran, tossed her award medal aside to lighten herself further and minimize being strangled on something. At the last second, from her running crouch, Judy pushed off with both legs just as hard as she could. She twisted a quarter turn in mid air to smash through the window panes with her shoulder, covered her face and eyes with her arms to minimize the cut and scars that would surely come, and flattened her ears hoping neither would be severed.

The rabbit sailed high into the air and felt like she was approaching the huge multi-faceted window in slow motion. She peeked to see the panes of glass and frames, the lights of the building beyond, and the open street below loom large.

The lagomorph braced for impact, pulling every extremity up into a tight ball like doing a cannonball in the mountain lake in which Nick and Judy loved to swim. She was very frightened but absolutely committed.

She forced her eyes shut, just as she landed right in the middle of the strong grip of Nick's forepaw and chest. The fox had swung unseen from the light tower on a suspension cable on an intercept course, swooping in like the bob on the end of a gigantic pendulum at 90 degrees to her leap trajectory, parallel with the giant window.

Without thinking, Joe Camel leaped toward Judy, focused on tackling the rabbit from behind and bringing her down, and not the window she had just been heading directly toward.

The sudden high speed impact of Nick going the other way with Judy was bone-jarring, and their combined momentum grazed the edge of the window sill and knocked the wind out of both of them, but Nick firmly kept his grip on his beloved wife and they swung past the window and up into the light tower.

Nick had a silly grin on his face.

"Boo!" he said.

"Nick!" she shouted, as her eyes flew open in shock.

"Hold on tight," Nick cautioned, as the cable swung to the top of its arc, far away from the window, and back up into the rungs of the stage tower.

"I am! I am, Jungle Fox," she exclaimed.

Nick fought the urge to utter the classic jungle yell like the great ancient black and white film star Jonny Weaselmuller, who immortalized the novel of an orphaned wolf kit born of civilized parents, growing up in the jungle with a feral pride of lions, raised as one of their own by a childless lioness, and authored by the famous rodent novelist Edgar Mice Burrows.

…

In mid-leap, Joe Camel watched in horror as Nick caught Judy and swung her away from the huge window to safety from his pursuit.

Joe was alone sailing into the glass. He covered his face but it too late.

"Oh shi…"

He hit the glass snout first and he went through the huge window at full force. He took out several ancient wooden frames and his face and snout went through it ripping it to shreds, and it felt like an ear was severed. He hoped he could save his eyes.

Awkwardly Joe's neck and front hooves crashed through dozens of other panes of glass and he his fur and skin were sliced to pieces.

Joe barely saw the safe landing zone on the roof on other side of the alley, and prayed he could get up and run away from the police, minimizing the trail of blood, and somehow smuggle himself to Atlantea to beg forgiveness from the elephant seal. At least he didn't have answer to Mr. Big.

But he felt his humps catch on a much bigger and stronger window cross piece. Not only did it send him into a tumbling and flipping spin that made him instantly sick…

…it slowed him down.

Joe convinced himself that he would continue to sail across the alley to the safety of the other side, and he could run down the rooftop staircase. He was more than half way across to his escape.

But instead, a floor above the roof top, he began to drop faster than he was going forward. He reached out to try to catch the edge of the roof, but it was still a good ten feet away. He fell even with the fourth floor rooftop, and then all he saw were the four stories of window and brick walls. He hoped he could survive crashing through an office window on the other side or maybe grab a window frame or sill.

Too late, Joe realized he want going any further forward.

He was going straight down and falling to his death.

The street below was really far away but coming up really fast. He deeply groaned in the alarm call of camels because below him was only the rock hard pavement.

Occupying the alleyway were a couple of ZPD SUVs with a dozen couple of ZPD cops, who looked up to hear Joe's crash through the fifth story window, the camel's screams, and they watched helplessly his final fall that ended with a horrible crunching and squishing sound that left big cracks in the concrete. A puddle of red seeped from every part of the camel.

The cops had to look away from the unrecognizable tan and brown and red pulp that was Joe camel after he impacted.

One of the police instantly transmitted a radio message with a very shaky voice, "ZPD One. A camel has fallen from the fifth floor banquet room main window. Civilian. It… it… uh… doesn't look good, sir. Um… there was nothing we could do sir. I'm sorry."

…

Bogo noted, looked out the windows above down to their location and the location of Joe's impact, "Roger, Officer. Not your fault, mammal. Sending EMTs now."

Judy was tightly clutched in Nick's arms and he was letting the momentum of swinging cable above the banquet room dampen out. The fox was talking to the rabbit softly to soothe and to calm her. She was gasping for breath from her sprint as well as the fear of almost what happened to her that did happen to Joe camel. Both knew he never made it to the other side. Her eyes puddled with adoration for her husband, and she didn't care about their peers flooding the room with police cover for them.

She pecked him on the snout briefly in unspoken gratitude.

"You're OK now Judy. We escaped."

"Not without you, Nick."

Nick smiled, kissed her forehead, and reassured her, "Isn't that how we always do things, Carrots?"

Supported by his upbeat wit, she regained her composure, smiled, and fist bumped him, stating in her usual confident, professional tone, "'Got that right, partner."

Nick wasn't sure if she meant police partner or life partner, but frankly it didn't matter.

The cable stopped its swing and Nick let go of her gently on to the floor of the room, behind a wall of their more massive colleagues now circling them for protection. Bogo was taking nothing to chance any more tonight.

"Are you OK, Officers?" asked the SWAT team leader who tried to help them first. The banquet room was now crawling with SWAT police and regular Officers.

"Well… so far. Carry on Officer Dennis."

They saw Bogo approaching and the coming lecture from him might be worse than Joe Camel and Duke threats put together.

ZPD offices surrounded them in a flanking circle, and faced outward toward the crowd, looking constantly for anyone else foolish enough to take on Nick and Judy with two fully armed SWAT teams now protecting them, and a third around the Mayor and his bride on stage with Dr. Rocky and the wolf EMT.

Judy looked at her husband, and kissed him.

"I love you, Nicholas P. Wilde."

"I love you too, Judy Hopps Wilde."

Right on network TV, their kiss and their words came loud and clear through the network of microphones and the mini TV camera that the Producer had turned on high zoom and high gain to capture the rescue and aftermath.

…

In Bunny Burrow, Bonnie fainted at she leaped toward the window, but Stu held her and gently rocked her to awaken her, "They're OK dear. Judy's OK. Nick saved her. Joe Camel is dead."

In a completely drained mental and emotional fog, Judy's mother said, "Oh dear me, Stuart. How can they keep taking these constant attempts on their lives?"

"They're cops dear. They get paid to do this."

Bonnie chastised her glib husband, "Stuart Anderson Hopps, you could never pay me enough to do any of that."

"That and the fact that nature has blessed this couple and wants something much more important yet to happen in their lives," noted Sandra philosophically with a relieved smile.

And that just about summed it all up.

…

Dr. Rocky had stopped a moment to helplessly witness the final treachery of Joe Camel, the near death of Judy, and Joe's fatal fall, but immediately turned back to begin care for Zootopia's First Lady.

"Are you OK, ma'am? I'm a doctor, you know," he grinned in his famous bedside manner, "I'm here to patch you up."

"Sure you can, Dr. Rocky, but please don't wear any white coats around us right now, please," she laughed but instantly groaned in pain from a likely cracked rib.

"Right," Rocky smiled. That was actually pretty funny now.

The SWAT team rushed to protect the Mayor and his wife, while the EMT assigned to Dr. Rocky assisted in her treatment.

"Are you all right, sir and ma'am?"

Adeline assured them, "We're fine, Captain."

"We're here to protect you," the SWAT leader offered, more than a bit embarrassed.

"We could have used you a few minutes earlier," the Mayor half-scolded.

"Uh… very sorry, sir."

Adeline tried to cool the temper of her own personal savage beast, "It's all right, Officer. We're not mad. We got other police help that worked out just fine."

"Airborne One, ma'am?"

"Yes, Officer. They sure are mighty for being so small," Adeline observed, but also thought, "And a lot scarier."

"Yes, ma'am. That they are. We're all proud of them. They're heroes."

Everyone already knew they were heroes, but at a terrible cost: ten dead and most of the rest wounded in some way. One thing was for certain: Airborne One bought Nick and Judy and the Mayor and his wife enough time to defeat the assailants by themselves.

Adeline asked, "Yes Officer, we agree, but could you give my husband and me a minute alone? Dr. Rocky, please, a little privacy?"

Dr. Rocky cleared his throat anxiously, crossed his arms, and fluffy tail twitched impatiently. He was not having any of this. The Mayor had no idea what she wanted. Being affectionate on metro-wide TV made him a little nervous.

Adeline replied, "I don't think I'm going to bleed to death any time soon, Doctor. I haven't yet, anyway. I need some private time with my husband. We kinda saw our lives flash before our eyes."

Rocky was still quite reluctant to delay treatment any longer, "Yes, ma'am but those wounds really need some stitches and dressing. I especially don't like the looks of that thigh wound."

"Just one minute, Doctor. Please. Mayor's wife's privilege," Adeline begged.

Rocky and the Mayor had never heard of any rule like that, but the raccoon withdrew in deference to the Mayor's wife out of earshot.

Adeline was a mix of many emotions, but she just gazed in admiration at Leodore a moment and caressed his mane.

"We are on TV you know," the Mayor grinned, glancing at the remote TV on the light tower overlooking them from above with its staring red 'on air' light aglow.

"I don't care, Leodore. Let them watch a love story for a minute, not a horror movie."

The Mayor grinned at his wife's irony, "Touche, but be quick, dear, I don't know what's more important than getting you fixed up. The Doctor needs to give you some tranquilizers and some anesthetics so he can sew you up. We can talk after you get treated."

"It has to be right now, Leodore."

He sighed, she was being stubborn, "All right dear, what did you want to talk to me so much about that it can't wait 'til later?"

She explained, "Dr. Rocky can sew me up all right but no drugs and no sedatives. If I faint, you have to tell him."

The Mayor was very confused, "Tell him what? Why? You've been through so much pain. We need to reduce that pain. Look at you."

She rolled her eyes, "Oh gee. Thanks, husband. You just told your wife and four million mammals on TV she looks like shit."

They both laughed, but the TV Producer growled and 'bleeped' her last word as it was transmitted to the masses.

Adeline insisted, "Leodore, dear, you have to tell Rocky that I can't have sedatives right now."

"Allergic?" he speculated.

Adeline said softly, looking shyly away, "Well. Sort of. Tranquilizers might hurt our… um… cub."

He stammered, "Our cub? That means you're… you're…!"

"The word is pregnant, Leodore, darling," she beamed.

Leodore's smile went all the way across his snout, "The heck you are! When – exactly - were you going to get around to telling me about this wonderful news?"

Adeline was a bit embarrassed, but ecstatic at his happy reaction, "Yes dear. I was going to tell you later tonight. In bed. After we… uh… you know… But things changed and I kinda hafta tell you right now."

His smile just got broader and broader to Adeline's great amusement, and he really wasn't listening to her. He was giddy in happy shock, "We're going to have a cub? A little lion… uh… no… a little tiger. No. A lion-tiger. Err… a tiger-lion? Auggh! Seriously, Adeline, I have no idea what we're having."

They couldn't be more joyful. Nor could 99% of everyone watching.

"Our 'offspring', Leodore, darling. And we're having at least one. I'm a tiger. We usually have 3 or 4 in a litter."

He fell over backward as he fainted away with the shockingly happy news.

The SWAT Team and Rocky looked at the unconscious Mayor with alarm.

Adeline dismissed them and grinned, "He's OK, Officer. I just… uh… surprised him with some really good news. Doc, bring the smelling salts."

Rocky came over, and started to revive him with the smelling salts. The big lion was really 'out', and asked her, "What's wrong?"

"I just told him I'm pregnant."

Dr. Rocky was not surprised. From his own quiet research, He was certain that hybrid mammals were possible, and even desirable for a lot of genetic sustainability reasons. Tigers and lions were very similar kinds of felines.

The raccoon physician wondered in amusement, "Let me guess. He's really happy about this and he told you're expecting a litter?"

Adeline grinned, "Very happy, obviously. I'm not sure yet, but it's likely that it's a litter. How'd you guess that?"

Rocky shrugged, "I'm a pediatrician. That happens to fathers a lot when their wives tell them the good news. Most mammal parents don't have 'only's'."

Adeline grinned, "Your bedside manners are impeccable, Doctor. No wonder you won the big medical award."

Rocky suggested, "I've got opening for a few more patients in about… uh… three and half months. If you're interested. I'd kind of like having a new challenge like this, if you guys trust me with your special cubs. And I have a good OBGYN recommendation too, if you don't have one. She's like us."

He wanted to provide medical care to hybrid kits and cubs. And another newlywed couple's kits in particular.

Adeline blushed, "You got a deal, Doc. I would trust no one more than you with a lion-tiger litter. And I like the idea of a female OBGYN."

At that point, Leodore sputtered awake from the salts and snorted.

The Mayor shouted, totally disoriented, "I'm OK. I'm OK. Let's get this done. Wait. What happened?"

And then he looked at his wife, saw her radiant smile, and remembered. He hoped that no one saw him faint on metro TV. That was far too late, but that simple reaction boosted his ratings to see him act like a normal, real mammal father-to-be.

The Mayor stammered, "Uh Doc, Adeline just told me… uh… that… uh…"

"Yes Mayor I know. Mrs. Mayor told me all about it. Congratulations."

"Uh… Yeah… Thanks Doc!"

Adeline was impatient with the males' chat, "Um… excuse me, but I hate to interrupt our little post banquet baby announcement party, but I am getting kind of sore now. Can you brace me, darling, or are you gonna faint seeing my blood too? I need to squeeze your arm when Dr. Rocky stitches me up."

"I'll be fine. Very fine," Leodore kissed Adeline on camera, "I love you, dear."

"'Love you too," she cooed, though she immediately winced with the first needle punctured her hip and her claws reflexively dug into him.

"Ow!" Leodore flinched.

"Hey, that's my line," Adeline faked a complaint.

"Sorry," Rocky apologized.

"Not to worry Doc. I refused the sedatives."

The doctor continued his repair work, and turned her attention back to Leodore to distract the pain, "My dear husband, what are we going to call this new critter growing inside me?"

He joked, "I was always partial to 'Leodore Junior' if he's a male."

"No silly. What we call this new kind of mammal. We have plenty of time to figure out birth names."

Leodore pondered for a moment, "How about… uh… 'tigon'?"

Adeline chuckled, "I don't know. That kind of sounds like the emperor of a race of video game aliens."

Leodore suggested, "I kinda like 'liger'."

"I do too! Liger it is, darling," she replied and kissed him again.

Millions of mammals watching this tender, if not truly amazing and almost unbelievable story, liked the hybrid moniker 'liger' too.

…

In a nearby suburb, a teen lynx turned to her mother. Both were riveted to the TV during this latest happy development from the crisis at Assembly Hall, and said, "This is way better than reality TV, Mom!"

…

The reporter of a local news media following the Assembly Hall action on their overhead TV in the news room was furiously writing his morning story about the Mayor and his wife's shocking pregnancy, and complained to his editor, "I keep getting a 'spell check' on 'liger', boss."

The editor grinned, "Override it Don; that one is gonna be around for a very long time."

…

Over by the destroyed window, Judy kept a constant theme, "Nick. Can't we just sneak out of here and go home?"

"I sincerely doubt it. Here comes Bogo. He'll have a lot of questions. This could be all night. What's left of it anyway."

She sighed.

As he stood before them sternly with arms crossed, stared them down in the way only he could, and asked very mean-sounding, "Well, Officers Wilde? What do you have to say for yourselves?"

Behind Bogo, Nick and Judy could see the coroner and EMTs going to all the places where there were dead and dying and injured mammals. As they went, Officers arrested and cuffed those server/assassins who were just unconscious to haul them off to jail later. This was all ultimately her handiwork.

Judy swallowed hard and steeled herself in front of her boss, saluted, and admitted to the Chief, "I caused this. I shouted 'fire' in a dark, crowded room. Any deaths are on me. I should resign. If I had my badge right now, I'd give it to you."

Bogo's angry expression softened, "Resignation denied. Are you guys nuts? If you hadn't called fire, there'd be dozens of innocents dead. Including you and Nick and the Mayor and Adeline and all your associates. We've haven't had a single innocent fatality, just the conspirators, but a lot of hurt mammals."

"Well, three citizen fatalities: Raoul and Mr. Big's bodyguards… and too many of Airborne One."

Bogo's countenance got really sad, "Yeah, I know. Sorry guys."

Judy's eyes got wide looking back toward the kitchen, "Wait. Look!"

Bogo stopped, kneeled, and pulled his hand taser. He saw that an EMT and an Officer slowly escorting a female server toward them. She was cuffed and her paws were heavily rapped in bandages.

The EMT apologized, "Sorry Chief. Sorry Officers Wilde. We didn't mean to startle you. This waitress insisted in talking to you. She seems to be normal. But don't try anything, ma'am."

Before the kangaroo could answer, Judy interrupted with a supportive smile, "It's all right, Officer. This one is fine. This is Ida. She saved our lives. Please let her go."

The arresting Officer looked with alarm at Bogo, but the Chief nodded agreement with Judy, and he unlocked the cuffs. The Officer stepped back with his taser drawn, wary of any sudden moves.

Ida stuttered, "M-M- Mrs. … err… Officer Wilde?"

"Judy, please, Ida."

Ida stated tentatively, "I won't hurt them, officers. I wouldn't ever think of doing so."

Judy insisted, "Gentlemen, this needs to be just me and Nick and Ida."

"Yes, Detective," all the males agreed.

Bogo, the EMT, and the arresting officer withdrew and watched.

Judy gushed and hugged the kangaroo carefully, "Thank you so much for giving me that note. You, dear Ida, singlehandedly saved our lives, the Mayor and his wife's lives, and who knows how many others."

Ida explained, obviously still in pain, "Judy. When you yelled 'fire'… well… I knew no one would believe you and then you'd be disgraced and those awful mammals would have killed you anyway. I… I'm sorry if innocent mammals got hurt or worse. I started the fire. You need to arrest me. Mammals died because of me. All those brave bats… oh dear. It's so sad…"

Judy corrected her, "Mammals died because I called fire, Ida. We don't know how many yet, but it seems that all but three were bad guys. A lot of terrible mammals were stopped or arrested today because you did so well, Ida. If ever a fire was meant to be set for the good of Zottopia, you did it, Ida. You're a hero, Ida. You deserve a medal."

"Or ours," Nick added.

Judy squeezed him. That was a very kind – and accurate - thought.

Ida just cast her eyes to the floor and shoot her head in doubt, "I don't feel like a hero. Will I get arrested?"

"I don't know, Ida. I don't even know if we will be arrested or relieved or suspended. You will certainly be a witness."

Ida smiled a little, "Oh. That's OK. I always tell the truth."

Nick added with a smirk, "Creatively. With ketchup. Do you do birthday cakes?"

They all laughed with Nick's light-hearted humor. The females hugged.

Judy asked Ida with great concern, "Are you gonna be OK?"

She examined her extensive bandages, "I think so. I lost a fair bit of fur. I have several first degree and second degree burns, so nothing really bad. It's certain that I'm not serving again for awhile. I don't normally turn vats of boiling frying grease over open flames."

All three just looked at each other. This was going to be a long story for later in the investigations testimonies that would clearly happen next.

"I'll bet," Nick noted.

Bogo approached, "That's enough, mammals. The EMT's need to take Ida and a couple of other legitimate food workers to the hospital and I need to talk with you two."

Nick looked for assurance, "You'll put a protective guard on Ida, right, sir? I'm very worried that tonight is not over and there might be more reprisals."

Bogo was thinking way ahead of Nick and Judy, "Of course. You have my word Officer. And speaking of more trouble, you know I have to put you both on precautionary administrative leave for falsely yelling fire. There's a law against that you know."

Judy asserted, "There actually was a fire, boss."

He growled, "Don't be difficult, Officer."

Nick reflected, "So this is a first. Two police win the biggest public service award in all of Zootopia, and go on administrative leave the next day for inciting a riot."

"And arson," Judy quipped.

Bogo gave them both an annoyed look, and hoped that the microphones weren't picking all this up, and scowled, "You both know this turns out OK, but we just have to go through the procedures by the book. Four million mammals want to give you another medal tonight according to the latest ZTV polls."

Nick kidded, "Cashing in four million gold medals, we can both retire."

Bogo just gave them an indignant eye roll, but he added, "Besides, if I do put you on administrative leave you two actually get to go home tonight. We'll be here 24/7 for days investigating evidence and countless leads on the perps and their conspiracy. I know you two will think of something to do with that time 'off', while I have to clean up all the messes here that you started."

"Chief!" they both blushed, embarrassed.

He ordered: "So here's the deal: All the questions starts at eight tomorrow, got it? You're not even in uniform tonight. Nick, that ruined ZPD tux does come out of your uniform allowance, Officer. Not to mention most of your medals are destroyed too. Replacements are on your own nickel. Plus damaging police property. I'm not sure not sure yet."

Both Wilde's were wide-eyed in surprise.

Bogo winked, "'Kidding, guys. Today, you made us at ZPD and the whole city proud. You showed millions on live TV why you earned that award. This looks like an 'all or nothing' attempt on all the cross-species community in an attempt to eliminate all of you - all of us and change Zootopia forever with the attempted assassination of the Mayor. We'll figure out how to replace everything for you guys, including tonight's awards."

One of which was now buried up to its base in Duke's brain and their individual medals were lost and soiled somewhere in the room.

He saluted both of them smartly and then gave each a hearty handshake.

They said together, "Thank you sir."

"I'll give you a few minutes alone. Stay nearby. I have some other orders. For the time being, we're going to keep all you 'high value targets' safe for the time being."

Bogo whirled and departed. Judy sighed at Nick. Judy's gown was in tatters to the point of being almost indecent, and she lamented, "Some gorgeous date I am for you fox. I'll never wear this beautiful dress again. It's destroyed. 'High value target' indeed."

Nick quipped, "It was worth the one time showing, because only I know you aren't wearing anything underneath, Mrs. Wilde."

Judy's jaw dropped and she smacked him less than playfully, and hoped that four million viewers didn't know that fact now, which would be an incorrect assumption.

Nick rubbed his arm, "That dress and jewelry can be replaced, Carrots. You can't."

"Neither can you, husband."

He whispered in her ear so that only she could hear, "That bath is gonna feel so good, Nick."

She just smiled and winked.

Bogo came back, and had several of others gathered with him. Adeline was in a wheel chair with Leodore pushing. Dr. Rocky, Morely, Lourdes, and several others were with Bogo. He gave the 'kill sign' to the Producer and the TV and audio finally stopped.

Once he got confirmation of that action from Bob, Bogo sounded very serious, "Sorry, mammals, but we've decided that none of you are going home tonight. You're being put in witness protection at the JW Mammaliott. It's a lot easier to put a lot of guards to protect you if you'll all in one place."

Judy's eyes got huge, "What?"

Adeline suppressed a smile and a got a twinkle in her eye.

Bogo continued absolutely seriously, "Don't think of this as special treatment or anything. We're putting all of you there and as soon as Ida is out of the ER, we're bringing her back here, and posting a triple guard on everyone indefinitely. I'm sorry, but you could be several days' confinement in a five star hotel."

Nick inquired, "Why, Chief? Not that we mind being barricaded in the JW."

They all laughed.

But Bogo instantly lectured his fellows, "Officer, isn't it obvious? We're worried about our unknown enemy retaliating against you. My bet is that you really pissed someone off that's a lot nastier than Joe Camel. They have a lot of resources to do something like this and keep it secret. For example: who the hell is that rhino – not to mention what - and why haven't we noticed him before?"

"Now that you mention it…" Nick reflected.

"So. No arguments here from any one of you. We're confining you, just in case there's someone out there that still thinks they can take down the toughest cops and Mayor in all of Zootopia with our guard down. Look what happened after you guys took down the rhino - Joe Camel showed his true colors."

"Good point Chief," Judy added.

He continued, "You aren't safe in your homes, though later I'm putting guards there too, even with you not there, in case someone tries to torch them and hurt other innocents. When we feel like we have all these jerks rounded up and locked up, I finally might let you all go home. With protection."

The Mayor tried to object, "Chief, uh… those kinds of measures are really not needed. Who's going to break into Adeline's place?"

Bogo was getting frustrated with his boss, "In a word, Mayor: 'Simon'."

"Oh… but still…" Leodore stood corrected.

Bogo interrupted and overruled him, "Trust me, sir, in these sorts of matters to protect the Mayor and his family, I can overrule you."

"Damn that Zootopia Constitution anyway," Leodore grinned at his long time friend, and looked at her injured pregnant spouse who looked a great deal more comfortable.

"Adeline? What do you think?"

She replied kindly, "Chief Bogo knows what's best for all of us over the next few days. Let's go."

She took his paw in hers from her wheelchair.

Before they left, Rocky readjusted a loose bandage over her stitches, "Mrs. Mayor, that's about as good as I can do right now. Even if I took you to an ER."

She kidded the raccoon, "Other than looking a little like The Bride of Frankentiger, you did just fine, Doc."

He heard muffled high pitched squealing and thumping sound from the stage area, "Guys, do you hear that?"

The suitcase was rocking.

"Omigosh," Dr. Rocky and the others rushed to the front.

Nick complained, "I can't get it open."

Bogo suggested, "We have to get a pry bar."

The SWAT team member at that end of the room offered, "I have a 'paws of life' tool."

The Officer gave the device to Dr. Rocky, and he said,"Even better."

Carefully they separated the partially crushed suitcase hinges. Inside and nearly asphyxiated were Fru Fru and Mr. Big. The elder arctic vole looked terrible, but Fru Fru seemed only bruised.

Fru Fru immediately asked, "Oh, thank goodness you saved us. Daddy's really hurt. You have to help him."

The crime kingpin explained weakly and in great pain, "Mr. Big is unable move his lower extremities and has no feeling in them."

Dr. Rocky was very worried the arctic vole had multiple fractures on his legs and possibly his spine, and worked instantly on immobilizing the crime lord.

The EMT informed everyone, "There are three ambulances outside built for small mammals."

Dr. Rocky ordered the medic, "Mr. Big is going on the next one, with you."

"Yes sir."

They all waited while Dr. Rocky worked feverishly to stabilize Mr. Big and Judy calmed Fru Fru. Rocky was qualified to work on small mammals but he couldn't afford to make any mistakes with the biggest crime boss in town. Bogo arranged an armed escort for the crime boss' ambulance. Tonight, he was a citizen of Zootopia and entitled to every protection under the law.

"You are a good mammal and a talented physician, Dr. Rocky. Mr. Big will always remember you in the kindest manner, even if I can never walk again," the injured criminal kingpin said graciously to the nervous and drained raccoon after his treatment as they departed in a special ambulance with the EMT. A big limo pulled up and followed them closely, with bear shaped silhouettes seen in the blacked out windows.

Dr. Rocky chattered on the phone a number of pre-op instructions with the best spinal specialist in the city at the hospital they were transporting Mr. Big. Rocky hung up, took a very deep sigh, then he rejoined the others, but remained 'on call'. The group of friends was standing around, but ready to leave with the armed escort for the short walk to the JW Mammaliott, when Major McDonnell flew in from the open broken window.

His appearance was so sudden they all actually took a defensive stance. Everyone was going to be on edge for weeks at the slightest noise or sudden movement.

"Oh, no. Not something else," Judy mildly complained rhetorically.

The squadron leader exclaimed in his squeaky voice, "Quick! Officers Nick and Judy. You have to come to the street."

"About what, Major?"exclaimed Nick, totally drained.

McDonnell exclaimed, "It's Joe Camel."

"What about Joe Camel?" Nick growled warily.

"He's still alive. Barely. He wants to talk to you, Nick and Judy. No one but you. Hurry. He's about gone."

They looked at each other, and with armed protection, rushed down the back staircase and approached what was left of Joe very cautiously. A dozen taser rifles were trained on the Bactrian camel.

Joe was sickening to look at. Everything on his body was broken and misshapen, and what was left of his body was more blood than fur. Parts were missing, and stuff that was supposed to on the inside of a camel was poking outside of him now.

He rasped, spitting blood, and barely able to breathe, "Come here, Officers."

Nick and Judy were very reluctant.

He urged, "Come closer, please. I must give you something… something important before I go."

"Don't try anything," warned Nick. Neither of them could fathom Joe Camel doing anything nice for them.

"Don't worry. There is… uhhh… there's nothing I can do to ever hurt you again… uhhh…"

Judy demanded suspiciously, "What do you want?"

His speech was getting weaker, more broken, and slower by the second, "Something I have to give you… On a gold chain… a key… under my neck fur. Yours now… take it…"

Judy reached to his long neck and worried about her paw being bitten by mouthful of broken and bloody teeth in his displaced and cracked jawbone.

One of the SWAT team scanned the object she retrieved for hidden needles or acid or explosives.

"It's OK," he confirmed.

"What is it?" Judy held in her paw and asked, tracing the outline. It was a stylized golden capital "A", with the cross bar and serif being a crashing wave. It was shaped almost like a volcano. It was beautiful.

Joe rasped, "It's a… key. You will… know… where to use it. The answers… to everything…. are in… Atlantea."

Before the fox and rabbit could ask any more questions, Joe took a very long final exhale, his head sagged and the light went out of his eyes. His gaze of death stared off into infinity.

Rocky checked the camel's pulse, "He's gone, guys."

Nick responded, fighting an urge to cheer, but felt media cameras on them from 200 feet away, whispering only to Judy, "Clean up on Aisle #3."

She pursed her lips at her husband, and squeezed her paw holding the key against his. Their nightmare antagonist and would-be killer from the day they started dating was dead.

…

The small group of mammals walked through the Assembly Hall corridors, skyway, and into the lobby of JW Mammaliot flanked by heavily armed escorts, keeping every other citizen at bay, especially any press. The key was safely out of sight in Nick's tux pants pocket.

Dr. Rocky remarked as they strolled a little more lightheartedly, "Nick and Judy, I'm amazed that you got through this without a scratch. I hear that's not like you."

Judy quipped back, "Oh there are plenty of those and a whole bunch of bruises too. I'm surprised at you Doc. You wanted us hurt?"

"By all means no," the doctor assured them.

"Our threshold for pain is pretty low these days," Nick shot back as well.

"Fancy that. Those quills sort of cured you," the raccoon snickered.

"It was actually the medical removal process that cured us Doc," Nick retorted, "Although the mandatory convalescent nudity was a pretty darn good prescription for us, Doc."

"Mandatory what? Mrs. Rocky asked in shock, holding the raccoon physician's paw.

"Later dear. Before we go to bed," he promised. He hadn't told her that story yet. And wondered if he could legally self-prescribe that for himself and his wife.

They were all just glad to be alive to actually joke about this predicament.

Once the mammal entourage made it to the hotel lobby, they obtained their keys and were ready to head upstairs, and took the elevator to the top floor of suites. They stood looking at each other before everyone went their separate ways for the evening. The corridor was lined with heavily armed police.

Adeline took the fox and rabbit's paws, "Nick. Judy. Chief. You saved Leodore and me. You saved Zootopia from a terrible tragedy and taking a devastating turn tonight. You never left us, stayed to the bitter end, even in the face of certain death, you figured out how to defeat them after a complete surprise."

Bogo rejected her praise, "That's just it. Let's not forget, Mrs. Lionheart, that you had to defend yourself and the Mayor too, quite effectively I might add. There never should have been a surprise, and you never should have been without protection. ZPD failed you terribly, my friends. I personally let down Lourdes and the families of all the… umm… departed conspirators. I'll resign in the morning."

Leodore emphatically corrected his friend, "No, Adrian, you didn't. This was a complete surprise by subversives bent on keeping this a surprise. I refuse to accept your resignation. You are my Police Chief no matter what. You did admirably on next to nothing. That was a helluva a plan they had. It should have worked."

"I'm just glad it didn't", Mrs. Rocky stated.

Morley joked, for the first time saying much of anything since the ambush on stage. "You know all this was on the program, right?"

"What?" asked a totally stunned Lourdes.

"Sure. You didn't read the fine print on the award? I bet you all didn't realize that part of winning this award was that you'd have to demonstrate your skills as a part of the awards ceremony."

For the first time in hours, everyone chuckled heartily, even poor Lourdes. This is why everyone loved Morley.

"You still win first prize, Nick and Judy," Morely teased, but meant the heartfelt praise.

"Amen to that," Rocky was quick to respond.

"Seriously," the Mayor added.

"Thanks everyone," Judy said as both she and her fox blushed.

Nick observed, "Well, I sure wish we didn't have to. And I think Airborne One needs 'Honorable Mention' tonight."

"And Ida," Lourdes added, reserved and sad until now. Everyone vigorously agreed with that.

…

Nick and Judy found themselves in the honeymoon suite soaked, grimy, wearing their tattered and soaked formal clothing, and caked in the detritus of the fight.

They looked around the sprawling suite they were in, "I smell Adeline's work here."

Judy and Nick took all their damaged clothes off and put on some luxury robes from the closet, but were still wet, covered in soot and smoke and scratches of all kinds, and their fur was matted.

Nick stated, "We look terrible; we're not going to bed like this. They'd have to burn the sheets in the morning."

"I have the answer, Nick, dear," Judy answered and picked up the phone, "Room service? I'd like to order some bubble bath and some candles for our suite."

The concierge replied, "Right away ma'am, but your guards will search us."

"It's OK. Take your time," she answered and hung up.

But they responded very promptly. Nick answered the knock and took the items from the porter.

He walked over to the master bedroom bathroom where Judy stood with her jaw dropped.

"Oh my gosh, fox, just look at this bath tub. There's enough room in their for ten of us."

"Only room for us two, Carrots. If you'd like, I'll chase you around the tub by the candlelight."

"Just a little, Nickie. I want to be caught," she turned and kissed her husband, "Are you going to be all right… after that rhino?"

"Yes Carrots. Never 'righter'."

Nick smiled, gathered her in an embrace, and their robes dropped together on the hotel bathroom floor.

…ZPD Headquarters…

Late at night in the Cyber Crimes lab, Sheldon turned off the CBS and ZPD news feeds that were just repeating the story of the night for the twelfth time, overanalyzing it to death already, and blaming various organizations and mammals for the debacle at Assembly Hall.

He toiled over his codebreaking.

Sheldon was not going to let the coded 'base e' machine language beat him one more night. Now more than ever he had to have answers to when the 'shit hit the fan' tomorrow morning regarding the identity of the mammals that nearly annihilated all of Zootopia's leadership at one single event. He postulated that this was the last ever assemblage of all those leaders all at once at one time ever again.

Now more than ever, Sheldon thought there was a connection to this machine language mystery and the source of the conspiracy. He'd never admit that his 'gut' was telling him that. He needed hard cold facts.

The cold eye of his computer monitor spelled out the flashing message: 'translation complete'.

"Bazinga!" he shouted to himself, and then his cell rang.

He looked down at his display that had the familiar opening theme from his favorite "Paw Trek" sci fi show. It was Amy Ferret Prowler, his equally geeky live-in fiancé, worried about another late night by herself, and she had texted him 'conjecturing with concern about Sheldon's hypothetical probability of a recurring extracurricular activity with another female'.

He frowned, immediately took a selfie against the bank of servers and monitors around him to verify his current location, with GPS coordinates embedded in the image, then attached the selfie with the following rebuttal in a text reply to her contention:

"Amy: Rejecting your hypothesis as an infinitesimal probability of occurrence, given the current level of my hormonal dependency on your pheromones and precise anatomical attraction features. Returning to our domicile in 27.3 minutes and I would like to be able to directly view and tactilly examine your aforementioned features immediately upon arrival.

The text response back from Amy was immediate and simply a 'winking smiley snout' emogie followed by several 'heart' emogies.

Sheldon sighed, "Gosh I hate it when she is so randomly compliant with immature contemporary norms of social behavior!"

He removed the translation from the ZPD supercomputer. The 50 pages condensed to about 28 with the translation. He was profoundly disappointed. He was hoping for a madman's confession or the complete manifesto of the unknown subversive organization that Nick and Judy and the elite of ZPD had defeated tonight.

The 28 pages were a stack of purchase orders from one company over a three year period from many chemical and biological firms in Zootopia and other mammalian cities around the world.

Recipient names were listed, which was what they first saw. He was hoping for company delivery address, but there was only a mail drop box in Atlantea. There was not a name for the organization doing the ordering, but at least there was something to go on. The logo on the company masthead requesting each order displayed an odd golden colored capital "A", stylized with the cross bar in the letter and serifs being a crashing wave. It was almost shaped like a volcano peak. At the end of every order was the purchaser's name: 'Xobar', another name they had noticed from the beginning. Xobar appeared to be the purchasing agent for all those nasty chemicals and bio-agents. He did wonder what kind of proper name 'Xobar' was for a mammal and wondered what kind of video games the mammal's parents were playing at the time.

Xobar used a lot of repeated words in his cover emails, and he must have been a mammal with a limited vocabulary. There were a large number of repeated simple words.

And then it struck Sheldon. This was a deliberately repeated pattern. Nick and Judy had told him enough about the case to know that Xobar was possibly being held against his will.

He did a quick word search for the most common repeated words.

The display showed: "The answers to everything are in Atlantea – Xobar."

Sheldon couldn't wait for staff meeting in the morning. He saved everything, locked up the hard copies of the purchase orders and emails in the evidence safe, shut down for the night, and headed home to Amy.

…

Cynthia was still pacing all around their apartment. Her long tail twitched uncontrollably as it always did when she was worried. She was well past worry - beside herself with fear. She hadn't heard from Ed in hours by cell or taxi radio. Nothing. It was bad enough that the city was turned upside down from the attack on her friends at their finest hour and she'd experienced an entire lifetime of ups and downs of emotions in one night watching the TV coverage.

She speculated, "Was Ed caught up in all this, or hurt?"

She second guessed herself that she should have ridden with Ed all night, because at least whatever he was facing they'd have at least faced it together – just like Nick and Judy did and prevailed.

The lock rattled and the door opened.

It was Ed. He looked terrible, but he joked, exhausted, "Honey! I'm home! And… I'm sorry."

"You big jerk!" she shouted in relief.

They rushed together and wouldn't let go.

Smothering each other in kisses, the echidna and kangaroo rat broke for a few moments, as Cynthia half-scolded, "Where in nature's good name have you been? You look awful."

"You should have seen the other mammal," he joked, but added seriously, "Have you watched the news tonight?"

"Yes, of course. How could I have not seen the news? Oh my gosh! You were in all that?"

"Yes, sweetheart. I think that I kinda helped Nick and Judy not get killed."

Very anxiously she guided him to sit on the sofa together with her, "Tell me, please. Let's start from the beginning."

Unsteadily the small mammal agreed, "OK. But it will take awhile."

She caressed his tiny, narrow snout and smiled lovingly at him, "It's OK. When we go to bed, I have something good to show you too, to make you sleep better, Ed."

The taxi driver remembered their original plans, but doubted either one of them had any energy or were in the mood to follow through. She was actually in her brand new negligee as they embraced.

…

Hundreds of miles away, deep in Nemo's secret laboratory main office, his pinniped assistants kept way from him. The vicious elephant seal was yelling and screaming and tossing objects and things everywhere. He trumpeted in anger, frustration, remorse, and pain.

He smashed the glass paperweight on his desk, "Idiot Camel. Outfoxed again. Good fricking riddance. And now Duke is gone, our best eyes and ears into the city. And he was our best specimen. Zootopia geneticists are going to know this was no accident – just like the porcupines. Arrghh!"

Naaman dared to inquire, "Questions are gonna be asked sir. Someone is gonna talk. They are going to find out."

"No. they won't. The answers to everything are not always in Atlantea."

He flipped up a safety cover on some kind of handheld unit that resembled a TV remote, and pushed a single, centrally-mounted red button.

In Zootopia, at the secret Atlantean submarine pen below the wharf of Zootopia riverfront port, multiple charges went off, portals opened hydraulically and ten million gallons of murky river water poured in, drowning the mammals which were using the training area. They had gathered for a hastily called secret meeting of what was left of the Species Purity Society to figure out what to do next seeing their leaders' and members annihilation and arrests at Assembly Hall. The torrential water swept them and all the tables and chair away as well as the standing blackboard. More underwater charges went off, burying it all in rubble, returning it to the underwater natural cave it once was.

The late shift dock authority several buildings away felt the rumble.

"What the hell was that?" one mammal asked his colleague.

"Probably a little tremor. There's a weak fault line nearby. I've felt dozens of them over the years."

At the Atlantean lab, Nemo assured his colleagues, "Now, there will be no evidence to discover. No one left to talk. Are you sure you'll take care of Duke's people?"

"Yes sir. Our operatives in the city will get to the all the Species Purity Society members in the hospitals, at their homes, and even in jail. Everything will look like heart attacks, toxic shock, or strokes, or seizures. There will be no one left to talk in 36 hours or less. We have social media ready to blame the deaths to a reaction to the damn vampire bats' bites. Bogo will have his hands full with that. Not us."

Nemo smiled, "Satisfactory, Naaman. At least I can still trust you to do your job."

Naaman bit his lip standing by his leader, who closed and tossed the controller into a trash compactor.

Nemo turned to his main assistant and asked, "Where's Xobar?"

"In his cell, sir."

Nemo ordered, "Beat him again. No wait… I want to do it this time. I'll be there in five minutes."

"Are we going to kill him this time?" inquired Naaman.

The huge elephant seal answered, "No. But he's going to wish we had. I have a new plan. A lot better than that bastard Joe Camel's plan because it will work. Dismissed."

"Yes sir."

Alone with his thoughts, Nemo put head in flippers, "I sure hope I can unscrew the mess you left and the damage you did, Joe Camel. Oh Duke, my dear friend, I will avenge you."

…THE END of Part 1...

Author's Notes: So there you go! There were a lot of Easter eggs and tributes in names and species given to my OCs in these past several chapters. I had fun with the names of a famous hotel chain, Disney's "Tarzan" movie, and "The Wizard of Oz", and more on Sheldon. Morley the ceremony emcee is named in honor of Morley Safer, CBS 60 Minutes show investigative reporter who recently passed away. Tony the tiger in my story was inspired from the mascot for Kellogg's Frosted Flakes cereal. I bet you'll never eat that cereal again the same way! In case you hadn't ever realized it, my inspiration for my OC Joe Camel was the cartoon spokesman for one of the biggest cigarette companies – Camel brand - when cigarette companies were allowed to advertise. Joe Camel was a 'cool dude'. And the OC Rocky Raccoon whom many of you wanted to see more about and so developed into a major OC was inspired by the 1960s Beatles song: "Rocky Raccoon".

And by the way - ligers exist in real life and are very viable hybrids. Look it up. :)

My first Zootopia story now becomes Part I of an anthology. My Part 2 installment will be published right here, entitled: "The Waters of Atlantea". You'll have to wait a few weeks before it starts. I want to have written more chapters ahead, not just one or two as I did with this story, especially with some plot ideas that need further development before final copy. Oh yes. I do know how it ends. Sorry this last chapter took 2.5 weeks, due to family issues, vacation, and work. And to the extraordinary fan base for this story: Thank you, thank you for the astonishing acceptance and popularity of this Zootopia 'tail' and the overwhelmingly positive things all you mammal-lovers have said about and responded to about the story. I've never gotten this kind of reaction to anything I've ever written.

So long for just a little while, dear fans!