BACKGROUND MUSIC:
1) Toshihiko Sahashi – "Procrastination" – from The Big O
2) Toshihiko Sahashi – "Perverse" – from The Big O
That next week wound up being rather dull. The nutty weather had gone away, and outrage over the tax hike had subsided, so the only deployment had to make turned out to be a false alarm – of sorts.
Apparently a possibly senile ox hadn't gotten the memo that his favorite department store was slated for the wrecking ball. It wasn't until Hylander and Judy drew their weapons on the Bullfrog assisting the demolition that the ZPD realized what had happened. The hapless badger piloting the Bullfrog had been scared out of his wits, but no real damage was done other than a knocked-over fire hydrant and some unplanned assistance in tearing down the building.
No further news of Joanna or the sloth suits came during that time. Everyone in Division 2 (except Judy oddly enough) tossed around a few more ideas every now and then, but nothing ever came of them.
However, at the end of that week, Captain Bogo called all of his Division down to the hangar, where they lined up beside one of the carriers. Behind Bogo, Camazotz's mechanics were carrying several objects toward them on carts.
"Before I say anything more, let me make one thing clear," said the Cape buffalo. "This was notmy idea. But Chief Mechanic Camazotz seems to think this'll get it into your heads that your Labors aren't toys, so I'll indulge her – if only to see if it works."
Camazotz herself then landed on the floor in front of Bogo. "These 'sloth suits' are designed to slow your movements," she explained. "The basic concept is that slowing your movements'll get ya to look before ya leap. Now both Forwards will be wearing these suits to see what happens, and since Backups have to be in sync with their Forwards, they'll be wearing them too."
Lee and Hylander grimaced. Nick glared at Judy, who just started in horror at the now mass-produced contraptions.
"Ah, don't be so modest, Wilde," Camazotz gave her 'serial killer grin.' "This was your idea, after all."
Now everyone glared at Nick.
[OST1]
"Can we all just agree that Hopps sucks us into weird situations?" said Nick, taking a very long time to raise his paw.
Judy tried to bury her head in her hands, but her suit prevented her hands from reaching her head in time.
"This was youridea, Wilde," snarled Hylander, sitting at his desk, trying to crane his neck to see Nick.
"Yeah…" Now Nick tried to cover his face with his hand, but his suit delayed that reaction as well.
Judy turned her head to face Lee's desk just as her hands touched her cheek. Since putting on her suit and returning to the Ready Room, the opossum had been eerily still as she sat at her desk. Judy couldn't tell if it was because of the suit or if she was just being that still. The fact that she was so quiet implied the latter.
"Lee?" Judy said, trying to shift herself out of the chair.
"Shh!" That was Beaverbrook, the only small mammal in Division 2 not wearing a sloth suit. "She's meditating."
Judy craned her neck to look at Lee before the rabbit and her suit landed on the floor with a 'clank.' Sure enough, Lee's eyes were closed.
"Why's she doing that?" Nick whispered.
"She told me it's her way of getting through the day without the suit bugging her," said Beaverbrook.
Nick and Judy began to amble their suit-delayed way towards Lee. It wound up being a minute before they made it to the other side of the room.
The opossum was as still as a statue as she faced the wall.
"Think I should hold a mirror in front of her to see if she's breathing?" said Nick, earning the fox a "SHHH!" from Judy and Beaverbrook.
As if to answer the fox's question, Judy's long, sensitive ears picked up the soft, steady sounds of breathing from Lee's chest.
"Wow," Judy muttered. "She's good."
"Ineed to learn how to do-" Nick was interrupted by a deep rumbling coming from Lee's mouth.
"Was that a snore?" muttered the fox.
Judy scowled. "She's not meditating – she's napping!"
"VENGER BEEEEEEEEAAAAM!"
The sudden shout from the opossum caused Beaverbrook to jump back into Judy, knocking them both over as Lee opened her eyes and took in her co-workers staring at her.
"Sorry," Lee said, yawning. "Must have fallen asleep. It's my first time actually meditating."
Judy wasn't sure whether to believe that or not as Beaverbrook hefted the combined bulk of the bunny and her sloth suit to her feet.
Lee's tail thrashed as she tried to turn her swivel chair around. "Honestly I have my doubts about this exercise."
"Just now?" Judy grumbled as she tried to adjust her footing so that it didn't resemble that of a badly posed action figure.
"You know what I mean," said Lee. "All we're doing is messing around with these suits. It's amusing, but I'm not seeing any real progression in our skills. I still think we should have gone with another sparring match using Bogo's rules. Then we could tell what works and what doesn't."
Nick's brows shot up. "Oh god."
"What?" said Judy.
"I just had another stupid idea."
An hour-and-a-half later (much of it spent getting the four sloth-suited mammals down the stairs), Division 2 was looking over an octagon marked in green masking tape on the hangar floor, with pop cans and water bottles placed randomly all over it.
"All things considered, I see your logic, Wilde," said Lee. "When you think about it, these suits are somewhat like Labors, so doing a scaled-down version of the barrel fight makes sense."
"Still not sure this'll work," said Nick, wishing he could reach up to scratch the itch developing between his ears. "But it's worth a try."
"So who goes first?" said Beaverbrook.
"I will," said Judy, eager to pass the time in Nick's walking torture chamber somehow.
"And me," said Hylander, earning a sigh of relief from Lee.
After Beaverbook put Judy and Hylander's crash helmets on for them, the rabbit and the hyrax were set on opposite sides of the octagon.
"I'll tryto go easy on you, Hopps, but no promises." said Hylander, an odious smile on his muzzle. "I take no pleasure hurting a lady."
Judy returned the grin. "Feeling's mutual."
Nick looked from one to the other of the Forwards. "Alright, three, two, one, go!"
[OST2]
No sooner had Nick uttered the word 'go' than everyone knew what would happen next as Judy and Hylander strained their suits' systems trying to dash at each other. The combatants found themselves gritting their teeth as they tried to overcome their restraints. After a few moments, Judy felt like she'd lost three pounds since the match started.
"Wait! Hopps! Hopps! Hopps!" Beaverbrook yelled.
Too late, Judy heard a noise next to her foot. She craned her neck down to notice that her foot was touching one of the empty water bottles.
"Does that count as a penalty?" said Nick.
"She didn't knock it over," said Clawhauser. "Just nudged it a bit."
Lee frowned. "I think it is. Bogo's rules mentioned touching the barrels counted as a penalty if I remember rightly."
"So that's a penalty right out the gate for Carrots," Nick sighed.
Suddenly there was a scream as Hylander fell face-first, crushing a soda can under the brow of his crash helmet.
Nick rolled his eyes. "…and one for Blunderbuss."
"This blasted contraption took too long to adjust my footing," grumbled Hylander, somehow perfectly balanced between one of his feet and the can under his helmet.
Lee tried – and failed – to bring her hand to her muzzle in thought. "Come to think of it, you sometimes have trouble balancing Unit 2 properly in close-quarters."
"Hey, this wasa good idea," said Clawhauser, grinning.
"So Carrots needs to work on her awareness, and Blunderbuss needs to work on his posture," said Nick.
"I'll have you know, Wilde, that- ah!" Hylander tried to push himself up, but the change in weight distribution was faster than his slowed-down reflexes, and he fell on his side, knocking over a bottle in the process.
Clawhauser scratched his head. "Is thata penalty?"
Lee's eyebrow twitched. "Let's reset the stage and try again. Clawhauser, get Hylander back on his feet."
As Clawhauser helped the hyrax up, Beaverbrook stepped in and righted the water bottle Hylander had knocked over.
"I just realized something," said Nick. "A 'pin' would probably take a minute at least in these suits."
"That's a good point," said Lee.
"What about tagging them out?" suggested Clawhauser.
Lee considered it, but shook her head. "It'd have to be a certain area of the suit – like the back. It depends on where the Labors' batteries are."
"I've got it," said Beaverbrook, running off, then coming back with a roll of masking tape. The beaver tore off two long strips, folding their sticky sides in on themselves while leaving a small bit of adhesive exposed, then attached one of them each on the backs of Judy and Hylander's sloth suits.
"Like flag football," said Beaverbrook. "You pull the tape off and you win."
Lee thought about it. "Not ideal, but I can't think of anything better, so let's try it out."
This time, Judy and Hylander met with better luck, but the fight still dragged on much longer than either of them would have liked. Both of them were more careful to avoid the bottles and cans, but that only made the match even slower. From whenever she glanced at the sidelines, Judy could swear she saw Nick nodding off.
Still, when the two finally made contact after three minutes, it felt odd for Judy to see her and Hylander's moves in slow motion. Anticipating each other felt hard, mainly because even they didn't know how to make a move themselves with the sloth suits fighting back.
Eventually, the first penalty came after the first ten minutes when Hylander exposed his back to Judy. Judy reached out for the tape, but she found herself falling over onto two cans when her fingers were less than half an inch from their target.
"At least now we know what we're doing," Nick muttered to Lee before turning back to the octagon. "Remember, Blunderbuss, penalties count against both of you."
Both Judy and Hylander groaned as Clawhauser tiptoed into the octagon to set Judy upright again, stopping only to right a bottle the cheetah had knocked over with his tail.
The match continued, with Hylander earning the second penalty of the match when knocking over a bottle while adjusting his footing. By this point, the bout had lasted almost forty minutes. Beaverbrook had returned to his copy of Karl Barx: Greatness and Illusionby the sidelines. Clawhauser had stepped out to help restock Ready Room 2's fridge, then came back. Two officers of Division 1 and a handful of morbidly fascinated mechanics stopped by every now and again to ask how the slow-motion sparring session was progressing – sometimes staying a short while to see if anything actually happened – then continued on their way.
For the combatants themselves, it was hard to tell if they should be bored or energized, unsure if the sloth suits would outright stop them if they kept moving. Under the suits, their fur began to mat as their bodies heated up from exertion.
Finally, the match seemed about to end when Judy left her back open for a split-ten-minutes, allowing Hylander to reach for her tape strip.
But then Nick craned his head forward and called out "Time."
"What?" said Hylander.
"Our shift's over. We get to go home now," said Nick.
Judy and Hylander's jaws dropped. Judy wasn't sure if this was good news or bad, but she didn't protest as her sloth suit was switched off and stepped out.
"I feel like I've been put in fast-forward," muttered Hylander as he got out of his own suit. Judy felt jittery as well as she took her first free steps since putting the contraption on.
Judy was still mulling over the day of sloth-suited misery when she got home. It felt like just about all of her fights since joining Division 2 left her dissatisfied – with the possible exception of that Bullfrog at the paint factory, and even that had been followed up with countless buckets of paint thinner. Still, the bizarre events of the octagon were better than what had happened at Okavango Road at any rate.
The sound of Judy's MuzzleTime ringtone interrupted her pondering.
The rabbit put on her best Cheshire Cat face. "Oh hi! It's my parents!"
"Hey there, Jude-the-Dude," said Stu Hopps, his expression chipper. Bonnie Hopps stood next to him. "Things going okay in the big city?"
"So far, so good," said Judy. "Not much happening lately." That's right – get their minds off her job…
Still, Judy wasn't sure whether to be mad or glad when her parents sighed on the other end.
From there, the conversation was pretty much standard for these calls.
"You eating well?"
"Yes."
"You getting along well with the others?"
"Yes."
"Nothing broken?"
"No."
"Find any nice bucks in the city?"
"No."
"The city everything you hoped?"
"Sure."
Then came a curveball. "Your father and I have some news for you," said Bonnie.
"Oh?" Usually when her parents adopted this tone of voice, it meant Judy was going to get another litter of nieces and nephews – or more rearely these days, of brothers and sisters.
"I may be cutting a deal with Camelty Organic Foods soon," said Stu. "So I'm coming down to Zootopia to seal the deal in a couple weeks and we thought, why not come 'round and see how you were doing?"
"Oh!" Judy smiled.
"Yeah," said Bonnie. "We haven't been in the city for a while, so you'll have to give us the grand tour."
Judy made a mental note to plan tour routes – ideally as far away from SV2 as possible.
The next day brought another few painful hours in the sloth suits for Division 2's Forwards and Backups. This time the match was more of a success, and it went better for Judy to boot; while she scored incurred both of the match's two penalties, she just barely managed to snag the tape off Hylander's back.
After the match, no one was up for Round 2, and it had been almost four hours already, so the four sloth-suited officers made their agonizing way back up to Ready Room 2.
No sooner had they all made it there than an announcement came over the PA system.
"Now hear this. Now hear this. All Division 2 Officers are to report to the Captains' office. All Division 2 Officers to the Captains' office."
The suited Officers groaned before another announcement rang out.
"And yes, you can take those contraptions off first."
The next sound from Division 2 was a sigh of relief.
After Division 2 had gotten their suits off, they lined up in the Captains' office in front of Captain Bogo.
"Over the last three weeks, four businesses in the Canal District have been hit with ram-raids," said the buffalo.
"Ram-raids, sir?" said Beaverbrook. "I thought half the Canal District banned cars and trucks."
"Who said anything about cars and trucks?" said Bogo, brandishing a file. "According to CCTV footage and forensic evidence, the 'ramming' was done by a Labor – yes, aLabor. Precinct 19 thinks this was the work of one gang with one Labor. Either way, it's a job for us now, so the City's sending barges to get our Ingrowls around the District. Still, we're giving your machines some quick waterproofing before we ship out. The barges arrive in four hours; I want you ready to load up our Labors by then. Dismissed."
Several hours later, Division 2 was riding two City Maintenance motor-barges northward up Big Bayou Bay. The barges were rusted hulks, obviously used to carrying Labors for underwater maintenance. They were both catamarans with platforms between the hulls that acted like a Labor-carrier's payload bay; only instead of tilting upward, they tipped down into the water. Bogo had ordered that the Ingrowls be covered with tarpaulins to avoid attracting attention lest the ram-raiders pack up and scatter.
The crew of the barges hardly said a word to the officers, except a note before they departed Sv2 that the Zeeplabors were notthe most unusual cargo they'd carried. Judy had tried to ask what their most unusual cargo had been, but the engine of the barge had started up at that moment, and the sea otter she'd been talking to was drowned out by the din. Judy didn't bother repeating the question. Frith almighty, it was a miracle that otter wasn't deaf from working near that engine for so long.
The rest of the journey to the Canal District passed uneventfully, but Judy was able to get a good view of northeast Savanna Central. Most of it was more docks and warehouses – even a container port. Then the barges passed Jean Bisondale International Airport. Judy had to shield her ears as an airliner passed over them to come in for a landing. Finally, they proceeded past the quiet, wooded outskirts of the Canal District. Some of the shore was filled with small-to-medium size buildings atop wooden or concrete pillars. Houseboats were also moored at various points.
The barges turned into one of the inlets of the Angel River Delta until they reached the actual canals, where the buildings became larger. Here and there, they passed a hippopotamus wading by, sometimes with a chain of baskets in tow. The waterways were also increasingly choked with boats of various shapes and sizes – a ZTA Aquabus here, a Boxer on another Labor barge there, and so on.
Eventually, the two barges were moored beside a small dry-dock. From there, Division 2 was met by two ZPD officers and a hippopotamus in a Police Captain's uniform.
After alighting the barge, Captain Bogo walked up to the hippo. "Higgins," he said with a nod. "Congratulations on the promotion."
The hippo shrugged. "Eh, still doesn't feel right without ya. I'm still getting used to being back in the Canal District. Anyway, we're setting a hotel a few blocks north to accommodate your shorties. We can cover the rest at P19."
"The County Fusion Center's done just about all the heavy lifting for us," said Captain Mick Higgins as he handed Captain Bogo a cup of coffee in the hippo's sparsely decorated office at the Precinct 19 building, two aquablocks from the dry-dock. "They did a bit of networking with our boys, but that was mostly just the actual crime scene stuff. Forensics has our mystery Labor pinned down. It's a Frogmammal – the kind used for underwater cable maintenance, that sorta thing."
Higgins sighed. "'Course you probably know more about this Labor crud than me now that you're workin' with 'em and all."
"Don't give me that much credit, Higgins," Bogo snorted. "We both know I wasn't put there 'cos I was a techie."
"Sorry, sir-" Higgins broke off and grimaced. "Guess I shouldn't call you 'sir' anymore, huh?"
"You'll grow into it," said Bogo. "Anyway, Buckminster sent us out here. Wasn't too clear on what we were supposed to do, but knowing 'Bucknabster'…"
Higgins chuckled. "He still hasn't caught on?"
Bogo grunted. "If he couldcatch on, he wouldn't act so damn proud of having the most useless position on the force. "
"Fair 'nuff," said Higgins. "Think he'll do the usual?"
"Yep," sighed Bogo. "Pass the 'buck' if we fail, 'nab' the credit if we succeed. Surprised he hasn't gone into politics yet – he'd fit right in."
"What can ya do?" said Higgins. "Anywho, I got my bullpen ready for your guys. Shall we?"
Bogo and Higgins made their way to Precinct 19's briefing room. Normally the two tables in the front row would seat five or six of Higgins' officers. Now one table had five of Bogo's subordinates perching on two chairs while Clawhauser sat on a third right next to them. A small handful of Precinct 19 Officers were seated throughout the room.
"I'll let you do the honors," chuckled Higgins.
Bogo gave a snort at his former subordinate, but he had to admit it felt good standing behind a podium again.
"Right, here's what we know," he said as Higgins turned off the lights and switched on a projector, which showed images of two smashed-in storefronts. "Over the past three weeks, four businesses in the Canal District were raided in the dead of night – two 24-hour ATMs, a jewelry store, and an antique dealer. After smashing their fronts in with a Labor, the perps walked right in, grabbed all the money and valuables they could, and ran off. At first, there was little we could find on these thieves, as the Labor made an effort to smash every camera it could, but with the jewelry store, it missed this one."
The projector now showed black-and-white footage of what looked like the rear end of a jewelry store. The tip of a three-fingered, spindly robotic arm became visible as the lights of the store went out. Then four mammals – all wearing masks – made their way across the debris, smashing the glass cabinets containing the jewels, and throwing everything they could into bulky-looking bags, and dashing back out. From the look of things, the thieves were two otters, a rather small hippo, and a very large rodent with no tail and a blunt snout.
"We don't know for certain who these thieves are," said Bogo as the camera footage came to an end. "Just that they're two otters, a capybara, a pygmy hippopotamus, and a fifth mammal piloting the Labor. Their MO seems to be that the four mammals in the footage hide somewhere while the Labor snuck up and opened a way in for them. No suspicious mammals of those species were seen in advance of these robberies, so either the Labor's pilot cased the joints beforehand, or a sixth mammal did it for them.
"Forensic evidence suggests that the same Labor was used in all four jobs," Bogo continued, as the screen shifted to an image of a Labor. "An M135 Frogmammal built by Ondatra Manufacturing – made for underwater construction work."
The Frogmammal looked like an old-fashioned diving suit for non-aquatic mammals; it had a head with multiple windows, as well as large, flat, flipper-like feet, a bulky backpack, the same spindly, three-fingered hands that had appeared in the footage.
"Canal District ZPD have been monitoring all Labors of this type going into and out of the Borough, and all those that have done so seem to have alibis for the days of the crimes," said Bogo. "Which would indicate that the Labor we want hasn't left the Canal District since at least the first job. Now, the Canal District force has been tracking down any Frogmammals that have stayed in the Borough in that time, and cross-referencing them with the city registry. So far, we're down to three suspect Labors, all belonging to local construction companies where it's the only Labor they own. All three of these companies claim their Frogmammals were with them the whole time, but their alibis either can't be verified, or could easily be faked. So someone's been telling lies."
The projector now showed a map of the Canal District with seven points marked on it – four green points for the robbery sites, and three red ones where the suspect Labors were kept.
"Trouble is," Bogo remarked. "The only way to know for sure if one these Labors did it is if we had a search warrant, and we don't have enough against them to put before a judge. Luckily, we've had a breakthrough."
The screen now showed a mugshot of a hippo. "This is Darren Potts," Bogo explained. "He's a pygmy hippo who's recently served six years for armed robbery. He was recently seen talking to a coypu that had been seen at the jewelry store and one of the ATMs shortly before they were smashed. The coypu hasn't been identified, and we haven't definitively tied Potts to any of the three construction companies, but we're not looking into the possibility that Potts is the hippo in the footage, and the coypu was casing the places for him and the rest of the gang. And what's more, their spree might not be over."
Now the projector showed the map again, this time with a yellow dot marking another location. "The coypu was seen again, loitering around another jewelry store marked here." Bogo pointed to the yellow dot. "All this indicates that four jobs weren't enough for our gang, so they're going to try again. That's where wecome in."
The map now showed two numbers – 1 and 2 – roughly in the middle of the map, each a few aquablocks in opposite directions from the yellow dot. "The plan is to station Units 1 and 2 in barges on Rio Mangrove here and here." Bogo pointed to the two numbers.
"You lot…" Bogo gestured to the larger Precinct 19 officers. "…will be watching the jewelry store, but some from other Precincts will also be keeping an eye out for any unusual Labor movements anywhere in the Canal District in case they've decided to try anywhere else. The moment we hear of any suspicious activity, Division 2's barges will move in and confront the Frogmammal if he shows up.
"Now then, for Division 2; the Fleabags Hotel has generously offered you accommodation while we wait for nightfall. I suggest that until this operation, you use what time you can to get some sleep. We're gonna be in for some long nights."
