Chapter 35: Kill Or Be Killed

June 1st, 2017, night time

Screams. That was all anyone could hear inside the station after a kid had learned about the accident. He wouldn't stop screaming no matter what anyone else tried to do to calm him down. The police informed the mother that he lost control of his car after having the tire popped unexpectedly at such a high speed, unfortunately the rails couldn't stop the car from going down the cliff. When they went down the cliff to scavenge the car and the mammal, they could already tell by the sights he was gone.

"Leave him be Mrs. Masto." An officer said. "It's only natural for a kid to react this way when learning about the loss of a parent. It just takes time is all."

"I'm not worried about that." Mrs. Masto said still in tears. "It's just that he's going to live the rest of his life without a father now… My husband loved him with all his heart. what am I supposed to tell him? I was a stay at home mother up until now, what am I supposed to do now financially for his future?!"

"Mrs. Masto, you need to take a few deep breaths and focus on what's in front of you." The officer suggested. "Your boy needs you now more than ever, so be there for him."

Mrs. Masto looked at the officer in complete devestation, as she fell onto her knees bursting into tears once more.

The funeral eventually came around as the soft and slow sounds of the bells were heard in the distance. Mrs. Masto got up from her chair and took her sons paw, as they walked over to the coffin and put a fresh rose on the top. But the boy kept his head down the entire time as he still didn't want to accept it. His father, the mammal who was always there for him and would always look up to, gone.

The only thing that kept him from lashing out were the continuing and smooth sound of the bells. "Ding… ding… ding… ding…"

"DING… DING… DING…!"

Finnick gasped as he had just awoken from the loud sounds of the large bell ringing at the bell tower just down the street. He groaned, as he got out of bed to close the window.

"I knew I was forgetting to do something before I got into bed tonight." Finnick thought, as he sighed. "I hate bad dreams..."

He thought the best way to go back to sleep would be getting a glass of water from the washroom. But even after getting his glass and taking a few sips, he realized it wasn't really doing much. He thought while he was taking the time trying to fall back asleep, he could take a closer look at some of Z's mammals with the files he stole from Judy's apartment.

"Who would have thought it'd be the rabbit to have all the information I need on these guys?" Finnick thought.

He began skimming through all of the files when he came across two which seemed to interest him. One was the boss of the criminal organization of weapon manufacturing Z, but more commonly known to the public as Zamiel stripes. The other one was a leopard with the name of Richard Panniston, which caught his eye seeing as he was the only one of the other mammals he looked at who was arrested already due to possessions of weaponry.

"Hmm, this Richard guy might be of pretty good use if I want to send a message to Z as well." Finnick thought. "And then we got Zamiel here who apparently has a used to be wife and a kid as well, who would have thought…"

"Who would have thought…" Finnick murmured.

June 12th, 2017, present time

Nick and Judy both remembered from last time they were in the abandoned office building that Finnick was keeping Francine on the fourth floor, so they thought it was as good of a place as any to start with. Once they made their way up to the fourth floor, they went over to the same room he kept her in as they immediately noticed it was closed.

"I wouldn't be surprised if Finnick had already locked it from the inside." Nick said.

"Looks like we're going to have to use force on this one then." Judy said. "On the count of three, I'll kick the door open and you run inside to lock onto the target."

"Got it."

"One…"

Nick and Judy began to get into their ready stances.

"Two…" Judy continued, as both of them took their guns out of their pockets and pointing it at the door. "THREE!" Judy shouted as she kicked the door wide open, only to see what both of them feared it wouldn't have to come down to. In front of them right now was Finnick himself behind the zebra Francine who was still tied to the chair, as he had his gun out already pointed at her head.

"ZPD, DROP THE WEAPON NOW!" Judy shouted.

"I'd prefer I didn't officer." Finnick replied with his voice changing collar and hoodie still on. "Oh I see, you two ratted me out to the cops didn't you?!"

"No it's nothing like that Finnick!" Nick shouted back. "It's just that we have a pretty good picture on what's going to happen if the swat team comes in to deal with your matter."

"Oh so now it's my matter now huh Nick, is that how this is supposed to be? Finnick questioned. "Because the last time I recall, Judy said we were all in this together and that we he to think of a way around all of this mess."

"That may very well be Finnick, but what you're doing here right now isn't justifiable to that claim whatsoever!" Judy disagreed. "You made the decision of shooting a mammal, as well as kidnapping another mammal without consulting with us in the first place!"

"I never saw a point in asking." Finnick admitted. "I knew exactly what your answers would have been. 'Oh Finnick, you shouldn't be doing any of that stuff because it's illegal and it's not the right thing to do'." He said mimicking the voice of Judy. "It's the same stuff I've been hearing from you guys ALL THE TIME, AND IT'S STILL NEVER GOTTEN US ANYWHERE!"

"Enough Finnick, drop the weapon now or we'll have no choice but to send in the swat team." Nick threatened.

"You better not." Finnick warned. "If either of you speak with anyone on that radio of yours, you won't have to worry about sending Francine out of here alive."

"Then I guess we won't have to worry about thinking the same for you." Judy said. "You know how this is going to play out Finnick, if you shoot her then we're going to have to shoot at you."

"Well then maybe I'll just have to take you up on that offer." Finnick said. "Sure I may die and if there really is a hell I'll probably be going there, but at least I'll be taking a piece of Z with me!"

"Come on Finnick, you know inside that this isn't what you want." Nick said, still trying to convince Finnick. "If you can just come back to the station and plead your case with Z and his entire crew, you can get out of this. We can all get out of this I can promise you that, and Z will be rotting away his remaining years in jail."

Finnick thought about it. "What if I don't want to do that Nick?" He asked. "I've lost enough already in my life and this zebra just takes the last bit of it away. My father died from a car accident when I was little, and now I hear my mother has now been killed by a criminal organization I'm forced to work for and they expect me to just accept it?! I'm not interested in going to the police for this Nick, not until I've evened the score."

"Look Finnick, we get how much you want to see Z pay for what he has done to you and all of us, but wanting something too badly can change you into something you're not." Judy explained.

"You're the one to talk Judy." Finnick shot back. "You yourself have caused nothing but problems to all of us. It's because of you your neighbor Bucky, Nick's mother, and Clawhauser are all dead! You know why? BECAUSE YOU NEVER THINK! You just act out something thinking it's going to work when really you have no idea what you're up against."

"We've all had our shares of mistakes Finnick, don't start pointing fingers at Judy as if she's really the bad mammal in the room right now." Nick said, defending Judy.

"Tch." Finnick said trying to shrug it off. "That reminds me actually Nick, if this all somehow does work out and I let Francine here go while being taken into custody, and telling the ZPD every line of information about Z and his crew, do you even realize what that means?"

"What are you getting at now Finnick?" Judy asked.

"Well if I were to tell them, that doesn't mean I can just leave you guys and Danny out of it all either." Finnick replied. "I'd have to tell them what all of us, yes including Clawhauser, have done with this business. Now I have a pretty good feeling you guys have already had this thought before and know what will also happen to us all once I tell them."

Judy and Nick then looked at each other with concerned faces.

"Well then I suppose we're just going to have to face the consequences then aren't we?" Judy asked.

"You just don't get it do you Judy?" Finnick asked. "It doesn't matter where we go or what happens to us after this. Z will always get what he wants. Take that tiger Damien for example. He survived the Cliffside Asylum ambush and was put into witness protection, but Z still ended up silencing him anyways. I mean if that's true, then how do we know he won't know a few mammals to get us while we're in or out of prison?"

"What are you saying then Finnick?" Nick asked. "You think you can just easily walk away from this? We're all out of options and the swat team is about to come through the doors any minute now!"

Just then, sudden movements started coming from the unconscious Francine who was still tied up on the chair.

"Wha… what is this…?" Francine mumbled. "W-wait a minute, you two again?!" She said shouting at Nick and Judy. "HELP, HELP SOMEONE GET ME OUT OF HERE!"

"Ma'am, ma'am it's okay we're with the ZPD this time!" Judy shouted trying to calm Francine down. "If you can just stay still and say nothing, I promise we will get you out of there in no time."

"Oh is that so?" Finnick asked. "You seem to be filled with over-confidence at the moment if that's what you think Judy."

"No, I'm just pointing out with clear-cut instructions on how to not get out of this place in a damn body bag!" Judy yelled back.

Francine continued breathing heavily while realizing she had a gun pointed right behind her head. "I… I just want to see my little girl one more time…"

"Don't you go on saying that like it's inevitable Francine!" Nick shouted, as he was trying to keep her from losing hope. "Now listen Finnick, for like the billionth time now, can you please just lower the gun from her head?"

Finnick began to run out of ideas on convincing them to let him go, which made Judy and Nick react more mad towards his delayed thinking.

"Anytime now Finnick." Judy asked.

Nick knew he wasn't going to put the gun down unless he did something drastic. "That's it Finnick, I didn't want it to come to this, but you leave me no choice. I'm giving you to the count of three, otherwise we have to put you down!"

Finnick now began to panic in his mind. "DON'T YOU DARE NICK!"

"3!" Nick shouted ignoring Finnick's request. "2!"

"O-okay hold on a second, just give me some time to process this for a moment at the very least!" Finnick requested.

"1!" Nick continued.

Finnick knew now he had no choice but to drop the gun. He understood how hard it was for someone like him to surrender and obey Nick's commands, but at the same time it just wasn't worth it. As he was about to lower his gun, a voice on Nick's radio suddenly came in.

"Wilde this is Bogo, why haven't you reported in yet about what's inside?" Bogo asked on the radio.

Nick took out the radio from his pocket while still keeping his gun locked on Finnick. "Bogo this is Nick, we were still looking until we came across something you might want to see."

"We'll be sending in the swat team then immediately." Bogo said. "It's been ten minutes first of all, and secondly if what you say is true then I would want some backup in there to take a look at it just in case."

"Oh shoot, they're coming in…" Nick thought. "Wait listen Bogo, that won't be necessary because we've already got-!" Nick said before realizing Bogo turned his radio off. "Do you hear that Finnick? They're coming, which mean you need to drop the gun now and get on your knees, or they won't be taking it as lightly as we are right now!"

Judy's ears began to twitch as she started hearing footsteps coming from the entrance door. "They're coming inside the building as we speak now Finnick, it's only a matter of time before they begin to check this floor now."

Finnick was still speechless as his mind was now going crazy through the thought of tasting multiple pieces of lead possibly going through his body from the ZPD. But aside from that and still continuing to, he didn't want to give in to letting Z carry on with his life of hell to the city without losing something personal himself. Back and forth he slightly moved his gun up and down still torn between the two decisions he had to make in fast timing.

"It sounds like most of them are only right under this floor now Finnick, so lower the gun right now before things get too ugly." Judy stated.

Just then, they heard the door to the stairs on their floor smash open.

"Finnick this is the last time I'm going to ask you this, Put down the gun." Nick ordered once more, as they heard the swat closing in on the room. "FINNICK FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, JUST LOWER THE GUN ALREADY!" He shouted.

"LOWER THE GUN NOW FINNICK!" Judy shouted with Nick.

But by the time they finished their shouting at Finnick, the SWAT team was only a few steps away from the door. Once they were right behind Nick and Judy's feet, both of them understood now there was nothing more they could do. Whatever happens next, it's going to be Finnick's choice for what is on the line with himself.

"Freeze, put your paws up in the air and get on the ground, or we won't hesitate to shoot!" A SWAT mammal said with his helmet and mask on. "This is your only warning sir, lower the gun off your hostage or we will shoot you!"

Finnick began to shake now as if he was covered in nothing but snakes slithering around him.

"DROP THE WEAPON NOW!" The SWAT mammal said still trying to force him to drop it.

Finnick had been shaking non-stop for the last minute until he oddly make a sudden stop. Without shaking anymore, he turned his head towards Nick and sighed.

"I've said this before… and this is the last time I will say it." Finnick said calmly. "It's either us… or Z."

Finnick then raised his gun toward Francines head as Nick's eyes widened. "NO WAIT DON'T DO IT-!"

"BANG!"

Blood then sprayed over the walls and towards Nick and Judy after witnessing Finnick shoot Francine straight in the head. Finnick then finally dropped his gun and took a big exhale after knowing what was about to come next.

"FIRE!" The SWAT mammal commanded.

"BAMBAMBAMBAMBAMBAMBAMBAMBAM!"

All rifles were then shot at the same time towards the same mammal, as Finnick had been shot multiple times throughout his entire body until he dropped to the floor still. Both Nick and Judy were in shock after what they had just witnessed before them. They may have seen similar sightings with Z and his crew, but this was something they were never going to get used to.

Nick seemed to have more of a shock than anyone else in the room. Finnick, one of his best friends in the whole world ever since he was a young teen, shoots a mammal in the head and is then returned the favour by getting shot at himself right in front of him. He thought he could be able to convince his own friend into not pulling the trigger, but after seeing a gruesome sight such as that he started to question if he really knew anyone at all the same way.

"Damn it, what the hell happened in here between you two and this hooded freak?!" The SWAT mammal asked Nick and Judy while taking his helmet and mask off, as they were still frozen in shock. "Bogo said you would be coming in here to look for any danger and why didn't you even radio us in earlier?!"

"He- he threatened to shoot her if we radioed in anything to any of the officers outside. "Nick replied jittering. "W-we couldn't risk it. I mean we tried to stall him until you guys got here but…"

"Jesus…" The SWAT mammal mumbled. "Alright, let's just get out of here and let the paramedics take the bodies away. There doesn't seem to be a point in checking for a pulse anymore."

"Yes sir officer Mchorn." Another SWAT mammal replied, as most of them began walking out of the room.

Judy eventually got out of her shocked state, but she noticed Nick still being unable to keep his eye off of Finnick's body. "Nick…" Judy said holding onto his arm. "We need to get out of here, we don't want to make it seem any more suspicious on us than it already is. Remember, nobody still knows who's behind that hood yet."

Nick then slowly turned his head around with his eyes glued to the floor, as he slowly nodded to Judy.

All the animals in the building then walked out of the door of the abandoned building after finding no other traces of other mammals inside it. Forensics and paramedics immediately came swarming into the building after getting the all clear sign from the SWAT, while a few of them stayed behind to make sure they, including Nick and Judy were not harmed from the gunshot sounds heard from outside.

"Here, take this." A doe paramedic said to Judy and Nick who were sitting on the back of an ambulance van, as she was handing each of them a wet rag to wipe the spray of blood off their fur.

"Thanks." Judy said silently, as she took one the rags and began cleaning herself with Nick doing the same. Judy looked beside Nick and sure enough, he seemed to be looking down as well. "There wasn't anything else we could have done Nick."

"I know." Nick said with his head still down. "But even for some mammals when knowing that fact, they still can't help but feel like there really was something they could've done. It's only natural to think about it like that really."

"Yea." Judy said nodding.

"It's just his last words though that got to me." Nick brought up. "'It's either us or Z'."

"What do you think it meant?"

"I don't know, but I assume he was just saying it like one of those 'only one will remain in the end', or 'kill or be killed' kind of deals." Nick replied. "But I don't know, he might not be wrong."

Judy got a bit of chills when she heard Nick say that. "W-what do you mean Nick?"

Nick turned his head to face Judy, only to see the fear in her eyes after what he said. Nick decided the best way to move on from this was thinking good thoughts, not any thoughts which would most likely haunt someone in their sleep.

"Y-you know what, it's probably nothing." Nick said. "But you know Finnick… Finnick made his decision, and yea you're right there really was nothing we could have done about it. It's not like we choose who gets to live or die."

"Listen Nick, if you need to leave, just leave." Judy suggested. "I know how much of a friend Finnick was to you all these years and not that I'm a psychologist or anything, but if you show too much emotion already then some may seem to find it weird. Well, not that it's odd or anything considering most mammals would probably be in that state when they see someone get-"

"I get it, I get it Judy." Nick assured. "I mean hell, if I could I would be smashing things all over the place and raining, not dripping, RAINING tears everywhere. But you're probably right, staying in this state for both of us will only get more unnecessary trouble on us than we've already got. We should catch the next train and try to close our eyes tonight if we can when we get back."

"Sounds like a-"

"HOPPS, WILDE!" A voice shouted in the distance.

Both Nick and Judy turned their heads to see who was shouting at them and sure enough, it was Bogo. "What should we do?" Judy whispered to Nick.

"Just play it cool like we always do." Nick whispered back.

"What in god's name happened in that building?" Bogo asked. "I ordered you both to do a quick check of the building just to make sure there's nothing up someone's sleeve, but what happens? We get a fennec fox who shoots one of the only possible witnesses we got on this case, and then himself by the swat. We have nobody to bring in for questioning now on for of this!"

"I hate to disagree with you sir, but we tried to talk the fennec out of lowering the gun on the hostage until the swat team came in." Judy explained. "He or she must have been pressured into doing what they wanted to do, so they must have done it before we could get to them."

"What about this fennec, did he or she say anything to you that may have been useful?" Bogo asked.

"Well, most of the talk between us was just persuading and threatening back and forth." Nick answered. "But an interesting thing he did say before he pulled the trigger was, 'it's either us or Z'."

"Z?" Bogo wondered. "Who is this 'Z' mammal he spoke of?"

Nick and Judy shrugged. "We don't know, but other than that chief that's all we could clearly understand from the incident." Nick said. "If you're looking for more insight on it, you should probably ask Mchorn since he and his guys were there when it went down."

"Perhaps it's one thing to look into, along with the odd mention of this Z character." Bogo said. "However, I'm more concerned at the moment about you two. I sent you in there to do a quick sweep of possible things to stay cautious of, but what do I get? Two more mammals shot dead like we don't have enough of those as it is."

"Sir, there wasn't anything we could have done which would've stopped that fennec from pulling the trigger." Judy said defensively. "It wasn't possible to shoot from our position even if we wanted to either since we didn't want to risk the chance of accidentally shooting the hostage."

"You should have called for backup then before getting into things you both are not capable of doing alone so it seems." Bogo said. "Jeez, I mean what do you think Mayor Lionheart will have to say about all this? He's already got enough of the press on his tail for incidents such as this. Do you have any idea now how the city is going to react because of what happened here?"

"We're sorry it turned out this way, but we had no control over this guy in any possible way, and neither could the swat team have for that matter." Judy claimed.

Just then, more shouting was heard from the distance as it seems someone was trying to call to Bogo. "I'll discuss this with you both on a better occasion than this." He said, as he walked away and over to the officer shouting his name. "What have you got for me Snarlov?"

"Officers and paramedics just finished up with taking the bodies out of the building, but they did come across some things you might want to take a look at." Snarlov replied. "Follow me."

Snarlov and Bogo then walked over to the plastic bags where evidence from the scene was being kept. Snarlov took one of the bags from the bin and opened it, showing the hoodie Finnick was wearing.

"So it's a hoodie, what about it?" Bogo asked.

"It's not just any hoodie chief." Snarlov said. "Take a closer look at the fabric used for this hoodie, as well as the drawing on it. Not only that, this one appears to be a faced up hoodie as well."

It only took a moment for Bogo to remember the similarities from another incident. "Hold on a minute, isn't this the same type of hoodie we found when we searched Clawhauser's apartment?"

"Precisely sir." Snarlov said. "To only prove it more, we seem to have found a collar on him only matching the same collar we found in his apartment at well."

"So are you saying it's safe to assume this fennec fox was also a part of the mysterious five?"

"Well, the evidence pointing to it is substantial so yes, as of now we're suspecting he was."

"Oh so it was a he." Bogo realized. "Do we have a positive ID yet on who this fennec fox was?"

"Not yet, but forensics will most likely have an ID from the fur by tomorrow."

"So if what you're saying is true, then that means there's only three of them left now." Bogo said. "We already know Clawhauser was one of them, and now this fennec fox responsible for this seems to be another. Did you find anything else at the scene that may relate to any of the three we still don't know of yet?"

"Not yet Chief." Snarlov replied. "All we know are rumors on the streets saying the drawings on their hoodies were a headset, a carrot and a pawpsicle. I do believe when the rumor started, they said something about a pizza slice being another one of them, which is in fact the same drawing on the hoodie the mammal was wearing."

"Hmm." Bogo said thinking about it. "Well not much more we can do from here now, It's time we packed up for the night. We can discuss more on what we found here tomorrow but in the meantime, let's get some rest."

Later that night

"Woah, woah hang on a second, huh?" Danny asked, as Nick was talking with him on the phone back at his apartment. "What do you mean Finnick is dead?!"

"I know Danny, I'm sorry you had to hear it this way from me but yes it's true." Nick said. "We tried to talk him out of shooting her, but things just didn't seem to have gone in our favour this time."

"You do realize how Z is going to take this don't you?" Danny asked. "He's going to rip our guts out for this!"

"No, I don't think so." Nick disagreed. "And if he plans to, whenever he wants to kidnap us or follow his guys not on our own will, me and Judy will explain the situation and how it went down. He may still want to be ticked about it, but it's not like he'll pick up his revolver and shoot another one of us… At least not to my knowledge of him."

"But still though, Finnick…" Danny said saddened. "We've already lost Clawhauser, but now losing Finnick is just going to make it more complicated for us. So now what then, is it just us three left to do the deals?"

"It seems like it." Nick replied. "It doesn't matter if there's even one of us left. As long as there's still someone around to deliver, Z won't care."

"Oh great, just another reason to not think about sleeping tonight."

"Look, I just came back from cleaning the rest of the blood off my face if you think you won't be having a good sleep tonight." Nick said, as he hung up the phone.

"This is becoming a recurring thing for you to be coming back this late Nick." Amber said coming from the kitchen. "The weird thing is your shifts end during the evening, not three in the morning. Need a sip of water?"

"Pass." Nick replied depressingly.

Amber sighed. "Look I don't mean to eavesdrop, but I heard what you were talking about with your friend on the phone just now.

Nick rolled his eyes. "It doesn't matter really, you would have heard about it on the news in the morning anyways."

"No, not in that kind of way." Amber corrected. "What I meant was, how are you holding up from it?"

"How does it look like I'm holding up from it Amber?" Nick asked aggravated.

"I've seen attitude like that from you before Nick." Amber mentioned. "Let me just say for the record, it has done diddily squat for you in the past, not to mention you always get so crabby about it."

"You still continue to make it sound like you've known me for years Amber, well you know what you just haven't." Nick argued.

"It's hard not to notice when you're around Nick!" Amber shouted. "It's been like this non-stop the way I've seen it ever since I've stepped foot into here."

"Well some mammals like yourselves would always use that psychology trick on me when they want to win an argument." Nick said. "But guess what Amber? You don't know anything about me or my life, you haven't seen what has happened to me in the past or even the fact that you've never asked, and you don't know what it's like to see a friend from your childhood get taken away from you!"

"Yes I do." Amber countered, as Nick stayed silent. "I remember one of my best friends, an antelope named Chad. I knew him ever since both of us were three, mostly because we lived next to each other at the time. We don't exactly seem like the kind of animals who would get along, but trust me our friendship was a bond that was unbreakable. We shared everything together, we played together, and we were always there for each other. Time went on, and both of us might not have made the smartest decisions in life, one of them was joining Lenny's gang. And sooner or later the time came when we met up with you five and lost most of his gang, but to me they were also good friends the time I knew them for. The next time came when you made us flee the city just in case if Z was going to find and kill us. Do you remember when I told you I heard about the disappearances of my friends in the newspaper?"

"Yes…" Nick said silently.

"I lied." Amber admitted, leaving Nick with a surprised face. "I ended up going with Chad on that one because he was one of the only mammals left I could trust out there in the world. Both of us stayed together in a safe house not too far from a small town in Carminton. After a while both of us actually considered making a life in that house. It was nice, peaceful and we wouldn't have to worry about any danger approaching us. Heh we… we even considered marriage before sharing a kiss that time also and you know what, I was actually going to do it."

"But then… I'm guessing Z's mammals-"

"Yes." Amber interrupted. "It was almost midnight when I heard the sounds of glass breaking from the windows. Chad went downstairs to take a look, but then a few moments later it seemed like a fight was happening downstairs. I went down there to check on him, but only to see him die right in front of me as the tiger slit his throat… I remember looking back at that and seeing him mumble the word 'run' to me. Luckily the tiger hadn't seen me yet, so I grabbed my emergency backpack and jumped out the window to jump inside one of the trucks driving on the highway until I was far enough from the house. But Nick my point is, don't act like you're the only mammal who's been through hell and back because you're not." She said walking away from him.

"Amber…" Nick said feeling guilty now, as Amber stopped to look at Nick. Nick then went over to her and put his arms around her, hugging her. "I'm sorry." He said silently.

Amber chuckled. "Well at least you admit it Wilde."

"But you know it's just…"

"I get it Nick, you need some time to think about it and really, I don't blame you." Amber said. "But I would prefer it if you didn't end up lashing out on me whenever it happens."

"I'll keep that in mind."

Amber nodded back. "Well I think I'll just watch a bit more TV before I fall asleep again, so try to get as much sleep as you can." She said as she was walking back towards the couch.

"Well I'll do what I can." Nick said, as he began walking towards the door to his bedroom. But as he was about to open it, he couldn't help but feel like something was wrong in his mind, aside from losing another one of his friends to what Z's put them through. Nick then walked back over towards the couch Amber was resting on curious about something. "Hey um… So what was it exactly you were planning to watch?" He asked rubbing his neck.

Next week: Chapter 36, Dishonest But Not Disloyal