FFoZ S1E15

Size Matters.

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AN: Welcome back. I'm very happy that so many of you enjoyed Skye's Fall, interested that none of you (seemed) to have picked up on a monstrous twist revealed in it, and I hope you enjoy this too. The Fox family baby shower is coming up soon, but first is a double shot featuring Basil and Dave. Many thanks to Dancou-Maryuu, my ever thorough proof reader.

Oh, and also...

WE'RE OVER 200,000!

I'm really excited to pass that milestone, and it won't be long before we pass Embers of the Past to make this my longest fic.

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"Alright mates, 'G'day's' aside, I'm pretty sure that ya-don't like me and I'm very sure that I don't like you, but I may or may not have the one thing you want more than anything else in the world. That means we can come together for a little trade talk. You see, I like to think of myself as an opportunist. Heck, if it weren't for me being kidnapped and press-ganged by that cult back there, that could have been why I would hang around that old bunch; I wouldn't be there for the cause and the wacky politics, I'd be there to scam a bunch of moolah from the dipsticks. Heck, I was able to…"

"-I would advise you exercise your right to remain silent!" a rather worried lawyer barked out to his client.

Sitting on his metal chair, the orange jumpsuit-clad kangaroo snorted and gave him a look that wouldn't look out of place on a grumpy teenager. Slouching back down a little, he pulled his arms up to cross them, only to flinch as the cuffs attaching them to the table pulled tight. "Dammit," he hissed, his Outback accent really flaring up. "Could you maybe get some longer chains or somethin'? This is a major crimp in my style, you know?"

Standing across from him, a cheetah in blue narrowed her eyes, her tail swishing and flicking hard behind her, almost like a whip winding up ready to crack. She looked down to her side of the table and spoke. "Could we get this loudmouth some shorter chains?" She gave a brief glance up at him, before looking down at her superior. "Or a muzzle?"

Below her sat Detective Basil Dawson, the mouse confused as he looked up at her. "Why, he doesn't seem like a biter?"

Catano blinked a few times, before sighing. "It wasn't for biting, it…"

"-Ah, so maybe it was in case he spat," Basil mused on, rapping his finger against his muzzle.

"I was…"

"-Indeed, I've seen muzzles used on plenty of llamas and alpacas who've made use of that nasty habit…"

"Detective, I…"

"But why you'd suggest it when he hasn't…"

"-Please stop."

The mouse did just that, looking up at Catano before his eyes widened. "Ah, you were making an intimidating threat as you didn't like him. That makes sense now!"

Both were cut off though by the chuckling of their prisoner, who looked at them as he lay back on his chair, one leg crossing over the other. "Please, don't stop for me."

Basil paused, before looking up. "I think you'll find that we will. We want a chat with you."

"You know," he began slowly, "if you did, you didn't need to keep me waiting for so long." There was a pause as he gave a long yawn. "You know, I said I could help out with your little case on my first day here… and my second… and my third…"

"Given how we busted your terrorist cult," Catano began harshly, "we've been rather busy. Besides, I'm rather inclined to make mammals like you wait."

"Oh, so you're happy letting the remaining bad boys go about doing their bad boy stuff for longer, just so you can make some little victim of the machine wait a little. If that's your game, be my guest. They'll probably enjoy it, especially the extra time they have for horticulture. I heard purple flowers are back in fashion, though you wouldn't want to hear about that, would you?"

"We rather would," Basil cut in. "You said you could help us with furthering this case, and we want to hear how."

"Oh, it's very simple," he replied. "As I said before, I had no real philosophical attachment to those guys. Heck, it was my bad luck I was caught there on that day. -Kidnapped victim, remember…"

"Yeah," Catano huffed. "Right."

"Tchhh, they pull you out of your cell, give you a stick and ask you to fight, and now nobody believes you! I'm just glad you weren't alive to welcome back the Jonestown survivors, or any ones from that other crazy commune that went the same way in Bunnyburrow. Sadly, none of them take too well to desertion, otherwise I'd make like chocolate fondue." He smiled at them, waving his paws around in the limited way that he could. "If I weren't a victim, as I was saying, I'd be there to benefit off of them and their ways; in ways that may or may not have been legal but, if they weren't, I cannot say as that apparently it harms my legality. Heck knows why? I'd be a guy hurting terrorists!"

"Well," Basil huffed. "Regardless of who whether your blatant cover story is a lie or not, theft against any mammal is still a crime, and, secondly, you will not use a modified Glomar response on me!"

"I'm guessing I just did that," he gloated slyly. "So, screw you, Mr Victim-blamer. Now, back to the interesting story. Hypothetically speaking, let's say I wasn't a poor innocent roo that got kidnapped by the death cult and forced to fight at the last minute, ending up brutalised by the attacking police and held here under what, I think we can all agree, is a very sad miscarriage of justice. Let's say instead that I met them, decided that they were a little crazy, but decided that them being crazy meant plenty of chances to enrich myself off of them. Now, as you can see…"

The kangaroo prisoner paused a little before smirking. "Forgive me if I forget to clarify that this is all a what-if scenario moving forward," he said. "Tired, kept here for a long time in stressful conditions, I can be prone to slight verbal omissions, isn't that right Mr Lawyer?"

He nodded, before the prisoner carried on.

"I'm a very smart individual, and a very smart individual can recognise a high-risk operation when he sees one. Now, when faced with a high-risk operation, many smart mammals employ a little insurance, so I chose to go about getting some. I figured that, or rather would figure that, I need some beef on these guys. As a result, I may or may not of followed the various drops that they did, redistributing the night howler bulbs and refined pellets or whatever."

Basil nodded. "Right then. So, you know where Kazar's mammals were taking their foul produce. Now, if you give us this information, we can negotiate a reduced sentence…"

"-I think you mean a fully reduced sentence," he clarified.

Catano's hackles raised up at the suggestion. "You really have the gall to demand that?!"

"Well," he smirked back. "The way I see it, I'm a victim of circumstance."

"Listen here," she scolded. "Detective Dawson may have been a bit too polite to call you out on your fictious little sob story, but I know the truth and I'm not afraid of calling it out. So, drop the act, and get ready for a slightly less very long stay behind bars!"

"You're really sure I'm a bad boy?" he mocked.

This time, Basil replied. "Don't let my formerly nice cop act deceive you, the chances of you deceiving us were quite simply a billion to one. We certainly know that you were involved in them, and you will pay the price for it!"

The kangaroo paused, before shrugging. "If you can prove your little story over mine in a court of law," he said, a little grin growing on his muzzle. "After all, I didn't confess to anything here, did I? Tell me, what overwhelming evidence is there that proves your truth over my truth."

Basil opened his mouth to speak, only to freeze, silent. Catano took over. "You really think a jury would be so gullible, you practically have 'GUILTY' written on your forehead."

"So, I'll ask for a judge to try my case," he said, smiling a little. "Or, if hypothetically I was involved and may be able to provide information, then I'd merely ask for the same level of freedom if I handed it over. I think that that's a win for everyone. You see, I'm quite a reasonable mammal when you get to know me."

Catano scowled. "We'll find evidence to prove your guilt," she warned. "Then, whether you go in front of a jury or not, you'll be spending a few dozen years in an even uglier uniform than that one. All you'll be able to do is take a few years off of that, if you talk to us next time."

"Next time?" he asked.

"Yeah," she said. "I think you can wait a bit longer, we're done here. Isn't that right?" she asked, looking down to her side.

Basil paused a few seconds, before nodding. "Yes," he added, staring back at the kangaroo. "We'll meet again."

He nodded and then smiled. "Yeah, sure. Maybe after the next round of savages hit our city."

…

"Tell me," he said, smirking at Basil. The mouse paused, looking back at him. "How long until you send me to trial, how long until all this is sorted. How long for those mammals to make their new batch, and the batch after that, and the batch after that, and the batch after that…"

…

"Or, we could settle it today, and I can be on my way."

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Two hours later the interview room door finally opened, an angry cheetah walking out. The mouse on her shoulder spent half the time trying to hold onto her, the other half trying to calm her down. "Listen! I know it's not quite what you had in mind, and I know you take justice seriously…"

"He's going free," she muttered.

"He's getting a very long suspended sentence."

"He's going free…"

"With some quite severe requirements. It's practically house arrest for the next decade…"

"Is he going to jail?" she asked rhetorically, her voice harsh as she stared down at Basil.

"I… -Well, certainly, if he messes any of those rules up, he will be."

"So, no then," she snapped, harshly. "A member of a howler stealing, police attacking, anarchist murder cult… And Zootopian justice lets him walk."

"If… If it makes you feel better, he was actively scamming them from the inside," Basil offered weakly.

"It doesn't," she groaned, as she returned to his office. Dave Dawson was already there, working on his computer as Catano put down the other mouse with a distinct lack of feline grace. She stepped back a bit, before pinching the bridge of her nose and letting out a calming breath. "Those mammals prey on the weak, they helped put this city through hell, helped put me and my family through hell again and what do we get to do back to them? We just set them free…"

"We set him free," Basil said, breathing in. He stood up, finding his voice, and spoke out. "One out of a hundred goes free, Catano. One out of a hundred, and maybe we do sacrifice a bit of justice, but we do it for an even greater cause. The truth! The truth as to who's behind this, who this mysterious benefactor is and, thanks to sacrificing a bit of justice, we found another vital link in the chain!"

Catano looked at them, suddenly looking too tired to argue. "Yep," she shrugged. "We found that Kazar's boys dropped little baggies off in certain locations, in the middle of a jam cam desert, which mammals from a different organisation then picked up, moving them to a different drop location, where another mammal would pick them up… A mammal who our guy then lost on the metro. All we got from that was a set of non-descript photographs. -If you can follow that chain, then fair enough." She paused, before shrugging. "Still, I suppose it's something, given that the 'Petey' search only found us a mad Honey Badger. Anyway… good luck, I guess." And, with that, she dismissed herself and left.

Basil was left alone, holding himself tall and resolute, not that it was lasting long. He slumped down a bit, disappointment filling him, though it was allayed a bit as a set of paws touched his shoulder. "There, there," Dave said, as he guided his husband back to a waiting seat. "She'd just a bit emotional, that's all…" Basil's tail touched down, as Dave came in and gave him a little peck on the cheek.

…

"Oh my, that isn't working. This must be a most serious one then. Righty-oh!" and, with that, the larger mouse pulled the thinner one into a tight bear hug.

"HHHYYYUUUCCCKKKKK…. KAAAAA….. KHAAAAA…. KAAANNN'TTT BREEEAAAA…."

Dave let him go and brushed himself down, watching as Basil took a few pants in. "Feeling better?"

"I'm feeling… quite distracted… from the matter at paw…" he said, before flopping down again. "So, thanks, I guess."

"Oh, it's always a pleasure," Basil dismissed, cosying up next to him. "Now, let's see the fruits of our labour." He turned over to his miniature screen and typed in, loading up the pictures that had been forwarded to them. His computer monitor was a repurposed smart phone touch screen, big enough for him to lie on if he wanted, so he used his paws to easily skim through it all.

The snapshots showed a whole mix of mammals: pred and prey, young and old, fat and thin and everything in-between. "Hmmm," Dave said, as he looked through. "Could that be a missing member of Dawn's cabal?"

"Or it could just be an ordinary sheep," Basil noted. "I can't make out any facial features, or anything else with those baggy clothes."

"Sadly, neither can I. Though it is a smaller sheep, white and no horns, just like her," Dave noted, before cycling on. Another mammal, brown furred and species unclear, pictured far off and looking back at them suspiciously, not that they could get a good facial recognition on him. It didn't help that he was surrounded by brown bricked buildings, the unfocussed camera almost merging him in.

The next one was obviously taken when said mammal had taken off, the kangaroo hopping after him. As a result, they only got a brown wiry tail and a foot paw.

"I say, our marsupial friend was not the best photographer," Dave muttered, as he cycled on and paused. "Why, you poor kit."

Basil nodded, looking on and spotting a very wiry looking wolf cub in the picture. "He looks tiny," he commented, pausing as he saw noticed his old clothes and the slightly feral look in his eyes. "And quite hard done by."

"Certainly," Dave nodded. "These mammals likely don't even know what they're doing. They're just middle-mammals. And the poor and kits at that, what kind of mammal would do such a thing?"

…

"Basil, dear?" the thicker mouse asked, the concern growing in his voice.

"You know exactly who," the thinner mouse replied, darkly. "We know exactly who.

Dave looked at him for a second or two before sighing. "Given that interview and Hopps' finding, it's… -it's a small possibility, certainly."

"It would be right up his alley, and I bet he's enjoying himself right now, running circles around us," Basil replied, as he walked over to his own computer. He quickly loaded it up, starting to search through his documents. "The thing is, I know how he operates and how he works, so I took the liberty of doing some side-research."

"Side research?" Dave asked.

Basil looked back and nodded. "I don't believe in coincidences," he said. "I have a suspicion, which I was able to get Catano to look at a while ago. Now, come here and look at this."

Dave did so, and looked on as Basil explained his reasoning and began looking through the documents they had.

It didn't take long for them to back off, looking at each other with worried looks.

"It all lines up," Basil said.

Dave nodded. "Indeed, it does… Too many coincidences. There's only one thing for it. We tell the chief."

"That we do," Basil announced, and off they went.

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"I hear you have a suspect?" Bogo asked as he settled down at his desk. He looked at the two mice in front of him, his expression unreadable.

"We do," Basil announced. "I'm afraid that I have a hypothesis as to who Kazar's mystery sponsor was."

"Why would you be afraid," the Chief asked. "If you have a theory, we can check it out, interviewing this mammal as a suspect."

"Well, that's the trouble," Dave said, fumbling a little. "This is not a mammal that we could interview, or hold accountable…"

"Why?" Bogo snorted. "Diplomatic immunity? -Who even are we talking about here?"

There was a pregnant pause, the two mice looking at each other before Basil stepped forwards. "The mammal in question is one of the most vicious and unscrupulous mammals that I have ever had the displeasure of encountering. For much of my professional life, he has been my bane and my nemesis, and I am, or was, continually appalled by each increasing act of villainy, despite promising myself that this time I would be ready for it. Indeed, part of his villainy is why you haven't heard of him, given that Interpol feared his crimes were so dreadful that it was better to censor them so as to protect the public."

Bogo held up a hoof. "Before I became Chief," he said slowly, "I was aware of at least one classified case like that, one that I was never involved in so I never knew the details. All I know is that Interpol's Director, Inspector Barkley himself, came over to help. That badger classified it as one of their 'Fiendish Files'."

"An apt moniker, and I shouldn't be surprised if it was our case," Dave noted, as Basil carried on.

"We previously stopped him from acts of kitnapping, fraudulent impersonations of others and multiple attempts at murder, not limited to literal regicide."

"Regicide?"

"If you don't believe us, we can call King Iorek Byrnison of Svalbard and he can tell you how we saved him. Sadly, there are likely tens, if not hundreds, of murders that I have likely failed to stop him at. Over a decade ago he went silent, vanishing off the face of the earth. After all this time I thought he was gone, but clues that have been cropping up since Kazar's fall suggest that he may be back, hiding in the shadows and pulling the strings. We are talking about a relentless and truly despicable international criminal here, Chief Bogo. I believe that these events are all being driven by the return of Professor Padriach Rattigan!"

Both mice shivered at the name, acting as if a dreadful flash of lightning and thunderclap had ripped through the room. Bogo, meanwhile, looked down at them, his mouth twisting up to the side a little. "Rattigan?" He pondered. "I've heard that name a few times before, but mostly by mammals talking about him like he's some monster under the bed. I thought that he was a children's story or something."

"Then you should count yourself lucky," Basil said.

Dave nodded, before stepping forwards, solemnly taking his glasses off. Bringing out a bit of cloth, he cleaned them to calm himself down a little, speaking as he did so. "Kazar's testimony suggests a dangerous, egomaniacal mammal in charge, and one who can inspire many to his side. Rattigan, during his times in Little Rodentia and beyond, had many under his sway. Larger mammals would walk past our little district, completely oblivious to the goings on in there. Functionally it was formerly a very separate place, politically at least. Combined with the classified nature, I'm not surprised if all you heard was heresy."

Bogo nodded slightly, listening on as Basil took over. "But when I heard Kazar's speech…. On that day I received a grim reminder of that old fiend, and the dark and despicable entourage that followed him. The most infamous was his lover, Felicity Pawker; a Pallas cat who acted as his head torturer, executioner and evidence disposer, all rooted in her status as a notorious cannibal." He gulped a little, shaking his head. "Many missing mice or rodents may have met their end in her kitchen, either given mercy before then or being alive for the whole process. I remember her once swallowing a live shrew whole…"

Bogo coughed a few times, his eyes widening.

"-But, more relevant to this case!" Basil announced. "-Was his dogsbody, a strange individual by the name of 'Fidget', an insectivorous bat. The very same bat, if I'm right, who Hopps saw on the jam cams stealing the night howlers!"

"We last encountered them over ten years ago," Basil explained. "We'd been following a report of him taking an airship cruise, touring the North Purrcific Ring of Fire along the Cascades, the Aleutians, and the Kamchatkan volcanic range. We tried to intercept him during the return stopover at Pawaii. We caught a glimpse of him but he eluded us at Howlulu. Not long after we tracked down his main lab only to find him gone. Bar some potential travel leads and such, there was nothing… He'd vanished! Over time, we became complacent and assumed he'd gone, though it seems that we may be terribly, terribly wrong."

…

Silence filled the room, the two mice looking up at the Chief. He remained silent, looking between them, before sinking down, his head resting in his hooves. "A cannibal…" he muttered.

"An infamous one," Basil stated, only to break off as Bogo chuckled a little.

"-An infamous cannibal," he said, his words cutting deep as he looked up. "Who, oddly enough, I haven't heard of." He opened up his computer and began typing in. "Now, the mythical Rattigan being someone who's overblown reputation preceded him I can understand. In a way, I can almost understand why Interpol classified the case. But still, you're telling me that, in my city, we've had a horrific rodent eating mass murderer who's operated for the last few decades, yet no legal action has been taken?"

"Most of the time, people who knew them were either on his side or didn't live to tell the tale," Basil stated, crossing his arms.

"Except you." Bogo noted, before looking down at his computer. "And no non-classified records of her, not even a parking ticket. How interesting."

Basil blinked a few times, before marching forwards. "Are you saying I'm lying?"

"I'm saying that I'm finding this very hard to believe," Bogo interrupted, looking down at his computer. "There are few vague references to a Rattigan in here, though in most cases it could be brushed off as a bad mammal using his name. I'll request access to the Interpol files, but even if he does exist I want something solid. If you want me to believe you, if you want me to believe that there's a rat supervillain in my city with a mass murdering cannibal at his side, then you better explain why he's got about as much on his as the Boogeymammal."

Dave stepped forwards. "Because he's not like a large mammal or a normal criminal; rodentcrime operates under a different set rules to regular crime. These mammals have no fixed abode, no records, most mammals don't even know that they exist. They can operate in the darkest shadows, moving from place to place and sneaking about under larger mammals' noses! Because they are small, and that's their strength. And, using it, they cause great tyranny and evil!"

"Really," Bogo scoffed. "Surely I'd have heard of it. Surely, we'd have heard of all the murders that you say took place, regardless of how hard those super-cops try and airbrush it out. In any case, I still have a hard time believing that a rodent, a rat I guess, was behind it all. This crime king of your little mouse town."

"Yes, our little mouse town," Basil said, marching up to Bogo. "A separate part of the city that most mammals don't think about, because it's full of little mice getting on with their lives happily. They think of it as a little place where not much goes on, whereas in fact it's one of the most populous districts of the city. When mammals think of criminals, they think of big mammals or medium ones with guns, not mice. Sure, you have a few robberies and murders in there, but if they hear that there's some mysterious tyrant in there then they think it's a joke. I'm not blaming you, Rattigan lived in and cultivated his infamy and the disbelief it caused. His body count was terrible, but simultaneously drowned out given the overall size of the rodent community. It didn't help that he had much of the local press paid off and bad things happened to those who tried to speak."

"And yet you fought him," Bogo said. "You defeated him, and lived, and here you are, finally talking about him years after he went. Why now? Why now, and not then…"

Dave sighed. "We did, a few times. I'm getting some strong Deja-vu to those situations right now."

"Quite elementary really," Basil added. "Because of the inaction and disbelief by some in the ZPD, we felt it best to handle it ourselves at first. This was all part of his plan you see, his refuge in audacity. To most mammals, it doesn't make any sense. After all, what harm can rats or mice really do? Well, because mammals think that, they don't see what the powerful could do in there, or out of there. His crimes inside the District were just the tip of his criminal iceberg. Surely you at least know that the vast majority of fraud and white-collar crime is done by smaller mammals, especially rodents."

Bogo paused and nodded. "I will give you that."

"That's because there are more rodents sized holes, tunnels and gaps in this city, in every city, than you can count! If I looked close enough, I could probably find a hole in this building and work myself over to Tundratown before emerging again. And, it's in places like these that Rattigan and his crew, scrubbed from the records and drifting by themselves, could fester! Could plot, and scheme, and do their wicked ways. Mice didn't get murdered, Bogo, they went missing, and were never found again. The murder rate back in Little Rodentia back then might be low, but look at the missing mammal's rate!"

The cape buffalo did some more searching and the mice looked on. The Chief scanned through the records, only for his eyes to widen, and he slid back from the computer, his face even paler than before. "Maybe I had the wrong ideas about you," he noted quietly. "What I just saw there was certainly shocking, though the significant fall, which oddly enough coincided with you two starting out, at least gives me hope. Excuse me for a moment."

The pair of mice looked on as he stood up and opened up a small locked drawer, pulling out a brandy decanter. Her poured a glass and took a healthy gulp of it, before settling himself back down. He then looked up, darkly. "There's no smoke without a fire, and what I just saw left me choking there. I knew that the lack of police presence in Little Rodentia was bad in those days, but not… -Why didn't we know back then? Why didn't I know?"

"Because mice like us were scared," Dave said solemnly, "and mammals like you thought the best of us."

"In any case, recording equipment and such was dreadfully hard to come by in rodent sizes back then," Basil explained. "He could get it, but the average mammal couldn't. He ruled by fear, and had the town's papers and reporters paid off. And, as I said before, Little Rodentia was just a fraction of his crime empire. Most of his criminal enterprises were done by full on large mammal gangs."

"Then why didn't I hear of those?" Bogo asked. "If they commanded larger mammals like Mr Big did, then why was that shrew infamous and your rat unknown?!"

"Because Mr Big enjoyed being the public face of everything. Rattigan's modus operandi is different." Basil paused, thinking for a second. "Not long before he vanished, we were following him in England and, while there, there was a terrible scare!"

Dave nodded, clearing his throat. "The linchpin of the country's rail network is controlled via a key signal box at Bullingham Gnu Street Station and on that day it was attacked and occupied by a local equine gang known as the Peaky Blinkers. No-one knows why but, before the police could react, they were all distracted by something much larger. All trains across the region had been halted, including a small three car freight train. One engine at the front, one at the back, and in the centre there was a single truck, carrying a large yellow box."

"Now, why the panic over that box?" Basil continued. "Elementary. That yellow box was a nuclear flask, transporting the last of the fuel from the recently decommissioned magnox reactors at Donkeyness to the reprocessing centre up north. There were reports of gangs attacking it, naturally getting a massive police response, but by the time they got there the perpetrators were gone. The same just so happened to be true for a massive quantity of cash being transported on a separate train in the local area, the real target! I interviewed the leader of the Blinkers not long after. He and his family didn't want to do that, but they had no choice. Rattigan had completely blackmailed them into performing his criminal masterwork! Now you see how he works, now you see why he's invisible. He blackmails and conspires, putting others in the limelight while he's back in the shadows. And now he's doing just that. He's returned back to our city, staying out of sight, but we're out here starting to see the shadows of his plans rippling in the light!"

"I…" Bogo began, before shaking his head. "This is all too much..."

"Ah, no Chief. It's quite eleme…"

"-If you finish that word, you're on two months parking duty," Bogo interrupted. "Believe me, I can find a way."

There was a pause, the mice staying silent as he rubbed his temples.

"You talk of this rat blackmailing other, much larger, mammals into doing his bidding," he began wearily. "Why don't they rebel? Why can't one of them just walk up and give him a whack with a bat? I mean even a fennec could off him, probably quite gruesomely. I'm not going to lie, from the sound of it there may well have been some terrible crime lord like this in the past, in Little Rodentia." He paused, his eyes staring at his laptop for a second or two before he reached for his glass, taking another large drink. "We may have failed an enormous number of innocent lives. If you believe and have evidence that this rat exists, that he's present, you can come to me and present it and I'll believe it. But right now, you're suggesting that, on the sole basis of an unidentified bat being involved, this mythical mammal has returned to Zootopia, that's he's operating, and that he was pulling the strings for Kazar of all mammals? One who openly scoffed at weaker mammals? One who could have ground your rat under his hoof? I've seen a lot in my time on the force, don't get me wrong. But this just feels too far out of there. If your rat worked by ticking off larger mammals, he could easily be a pancake right now. Big only avoided that fate by being an excellent, -or, given recent events, appearing to be an excellent business mammal and paying well."

"Rattigan helped Kazar by working out how to distil the howlers," Basil pointed out, "and he supplied them."

"Rattigan could blackmail, he was also a genius and a diplomat," Dave added. "He knew that sometimes you needed fear and sometimes loyalty."

Bogo paused, shaking his head. "Yes okay… But now Kazar is gone, so what now? It's not as if this Rattigan can get a new army, is it?"

Basil walked forwards grimly. "If my theory is correct, and I sincerely hope it isn't, he should be halfway there already."

Bogo groaned. "This should be good."

"Don't you think it's odd that Mr Big fell right now?" Basil asked. "I talked to him and he claimed that he kept his taxes in order. In fact, he's not being charged with tax evasion by the ZRCS anymore, though given the murder charges that isn't much comfort. It was hard getting in contact with him, but apparently his own ledgers aren't showing the discrepancy. I even had Catano ask the tax firm he used and do you know what? The incriminating document doesn't line up with the company's ones."

"You can check it yourself," Dave added. "We bored right into their deep data files and found nothing saved there. Instead, one worker claims she received the email from her boss, which we know he didn't actually send, and after finding the issue chose to report it."

"Now, why would all this happen," Basil asked. "Why? Well, it's elementary. Someone who didn't like Big, working in the limo service or tax firm, sent or hacked in that dodgy document which allowed the first investigation. It wouldn't go anywhere by itself, but it wasn't meant to! It just cracked the hard shell and let the investigators see the first few dodgy areas. The ZPD could then pull the thread until Big's whole empire unravelled! And what happens when Big is deposed? What happens to his polar bears? What happens to the rest of his operation? I'll tell you, Rattigan takes over! They don't even know he dispatched their old boss, but he takes over like before. He likely set this up to hedge his bets in case Kazar proved unstable or was captured! That is how dangerous he is!"

There was a silence for a second or two, before the cape buffalo shook his head. "I had an interesting talk recently with the ZPD's resident therapist. He's a nice mammal, and he happens to have a colleague at the Central Mental Hospitall. He talked about how she had a patient who believed that the whole world was run by evil sheep, and had built an entire worldview around it. Every new bit of evidence or new development that she found, she viewed through this lens, working out how it fitted into her grand 'Cudspiracy'. 'Cognitive dissonance,' they call it; everything, even if it might pull away from that theory, was thus turned into a bit of evidence that made the whole thing stronger and stronger, harder to refute. That only made this patient look harder and leap further when incorporating more news in the future. What I've seen here is firm evidence that dangerous stuff was going on in Little Rodentia, stuff that you, no doubt heroically, helped to stop. I'm not denying the existence of your Rattigan, or his crew, even if they're not on any currently unclassified record, but I am questioning what you're suggesting now. Because it seems pretty crazy to me that this rat, who could easily be dispatched by any of the mammals he's slighted, is out in Zootopia. That he's behind the recent howler scare, that he's Kazar's mammal, that he toppled Big and so forth. After all, what do you have? A hunch? A feeling? All based on a mad-mammal's ramblings and a blurry picture of a bat? I need more than that, far more. Dismissed."

The two mice paused, looking at each other, before Basil stepped forwards. "But Chief…"

"-If you truly believe that this Rattigan mammal is up to this, and can find the evidence to prove it, then I will believe you. I advise you make good use of the time I'm providing you with."

"If you knew him, you'd be scared," Basil warned.

"If I knew him, I'd probably do what any mammal would do and take him down," Bogo stated. "After all, he may be a rodent crime lord, but there's nothing he can do against me."

"You'd think that, but he'd find a way to blackmail you."

Bogo snorted. "The day a rodent blackmails me is even less likely than a day when Wilde isn't irritating."

Basil blinked a few times, before whispering to Dave. "I didn't know he was that much of a sceptic."

"-I heard that," the Chief replied. "Maybe when I am blackmailed by a rodent, I'll let you go off chasing this rat around the world on the flimsiest of evidence. Until then, we follow things with firm evidence behind them. Understood?"

"Yes sir," the mice replied.

"Then you're dismissed. Again."

They nodded and left, both in a rather depressed mood.

.

.

.

…

"What if he's right."

"Pardon, dear?"

"What if he's right," Basil said again. The pair had found a hidden little alcove near the showers in which to settle down and process everything, something that wasn't going very well. "I mean, what if I am seeing Rattigan in everything? Everywhere."

"Well, given our past experience with him, wouldn't that be quite natural? We know what he can do."

"Yes, we do," Basil said out loud. "And we thought, or to be honest I thought, the same thing when the missing mammal case and the nighthowler scare came around. We started prepping, looking around, and trying to figure out if our evil rat had returned. But no, it turned out to be the mayor! -And then the next one!"

"Lots of people were fooled, it wasn't that bad."

"Wasn't that bad?"

"Well, for you more than I. After all, I was the one who voted for them!"

"Tchhh, waste of time, voting," Basil mumbled.

"As you oft repeat."

"You're missing the point here Dave, I'm pretty useless as a detective if every unknown is met with the fear that it's you know who!"

"Yes, particularly seeing as we know Voldemort's quite deceased."

…

Basil gave his husband a slight look out of the corner of his eye, a single chuckle escaped his mouth. He then relaxed a bit, before sighing. "In all seriousness, is my obsession with him limiting me, as a detective?"

"I wouldn't say that…"

"But what if it is?" he repeated, biting his lip slightly and looking away as he did so. "What if it is. My duty is to search for the truth, to find it in the tightest corners and pull it out of the smallest and deepest holes. It's a singular thing that I strive towards, that I always strive towards, aiming to uncover it whatever the cost… But while I'm certain that I can decipher and follow any and every clue, what if my own biases mislead me? What if that memory of the rat is always harming me…? I don't know where he is, Dave; he just up and vanished all those years ago. But maybe he planned it that way, his final victory. Because he may be free of me, but I will never, ever, be free of him."

"In my time as a detective, do you know what I've come to realise?" Dave asked. "I've to come realise that, often or not, the most important trait is self-doubt. You have to be able to realise you were wrong, and turn around on a moment's notice. All those times you feared him, you were able to do something different as soon as you found something harder and firmer to hold on to. So, tell me, is there anything like that for this case?"

"No, not that I can think of," Basil replied.

"Then, for now, I don't think you're a fool for fearing him. You might be feeling a fool now, but I'm quite certain that the case where you bar yourself from looking for him will naturally be the one where he returns."

"Oh, quite certainly."

"Most naturally indeed," Dave replied.

"So, now what?"

"Well, what do you think?"

"Well, I think that we redouble our efforts. Triple them! Find every little tit-bit we can, whether it's evidence of him or not!"

"And if it isn't, we pursue that new truth!"

"And if it is…" Basil continued, before pausing. "If it is, what then? I mean, it's not like he's well known, though given the terrible things he did I feel that's a good thing in a way. But Bogo doesn't know what he's dealing with, not even getting back in contact with the old Chief or the head of Interpol might be able to help with that. He doesn't even consider rodent criminals much of a threat."

"Well, we'll have to, shall we say, burn that bridge when we get to it."

Basil nodded grimly, and the pair stood up ready to leave, only to pause as they heard a slight commotion coming their way.

"-I'm sorry, I didn't mean to, but it's too late now…" Nick Wilde.

"Come on Slick, you can stop joking." And Judy.

"I'm not joking. I've got the ball and chain, I'm hitched, I am now a married fox!"

"Hah-Hah…"

"I'm surprised you're taking this so well. Though maybe it's because you acknowledge what a fabulous lady Rebecca, or should I say Mrs Wilde, is now."

"Wouldn't it be Mrs Oshiro," she pointed out, as they both came into the view of the mice. Judy looked perfectly ordinary, dressed up in her usual police issue gear. Nick meanwhile had a bath towel wrapped around him, while the front of his face was completely white.

"Oh goodness," Dave remarked, the bunny and fox pausing to look at them.

"If I'm not mistaken," Basil began, "I smell a distinct odour similar to that of certain kinds of chalk in the air, suggesting that it's either that calcium carbonate mineral or talcum. Given the recent lull in activity, it's not too unreasonable that you were put back on one of your cub abuse cases, in doing do ending up with baby powder on your face as we see here."

"Yup," Nick noted. "Fitted in another, interesting, investigation."

"Take down any bad mammals again?" Dave asked.

Nick shook his head. "Turns out that that place, or rather one of the nurses, turns out to be an excellent embodiment of Hanlon's Razor."

"Ah, I see," Dave replied. "That explains the…" he began, before gesturing at his face.

"Yup. I didn't even know it was that hard to mess up a diaper change."

Basil blinked. "But I thought your cover didn't…"

Nick cleared his throat, interrupting him. "What did I say the sentence before last?"

"Ah, I see," he noted, Nick giving a strong nod in response. The mice detectives looked at each other, before Basil suddenly had an idea. "Say, a quick question…"

"-No, I am not."

"Actually, it's about the Chief. You two have had much more experience with him, so you might be able to help us. How can we convince him of something that he stubbornly doesn't believe?"

The bunny and fox looked at each other nervously. "He tends to ignore words," Judy began, "but if you give him firm evidence, he'll accept it."

Nick nodded. "Yup. And of course, if some stubborn big mammal has given you a way of eating his own words you should always make them eat them. I can also attest to large scale complex practical demonstrations also working very well."

"Don't give them bad ideas," Judy half-heartedly scolded. "Now go on, get showered up."

"Hey, you're not my wife," he jibed, the bunny rolling his eyes. He then turned to the mouse and smirked. "While there, a rather cute painted dog cub decided she loved me and wanted to marry me, proposing with a playdoh ring. I'm afraid I couldn't say no."

"Come on," Judy said, rolling her eyes as she began to push him in.

"-If it's any consolation, I was trying to sign the heck out of it."

"Keep moving."

"You're just jealous because she had the bigger bum."

"That was probably helped by her diaper…"

"Excuses excuses…"

…

The bunny and fox duo left the two mice, who looked at each other. "Are you thinking what I'm thinking?" Basil asked.

"I'm thinking that if we want to use that old disguise again, we need more white fur dye."

"No, no, no…" he said. "Didn't Bogo say that 'maybe when I am blackmailed, I'll let you go off chasing this rat around the world on the flimsiest of evidence.'"

"Yes he did, and I think I know where you're going with this."

"And I think you're onboard with it."

"And I think I am."