Chapter 9: Queue

Once Nick had managed to transcribe the number plate he saw no further point in sitting at the documents in the dark of night. He had obtained the information he needed for that moment, he was satisfied with what he had found that night. After transcribing the number plates, he closed the catalogues and stacked them neatly into the folders they were tucked away in. After tidying up his desk, Nick changed into his night clothes and then went to bed. On the one hand he already had a plan which he would follow for tomorrow, but on the other he felt stressed and anxious. He knew that he had very limited time. He has three days, four tops to find the culprit who shot Judy. He had no time to make mistakes in this case, any false clues could end up in him not being able to complete his task in time, which he had decided for himself.

However, he could not worry about this all the time, after a few minutes he finally fell asleep and drifted off into a deep sleep.

The next day, when the early alarm started ringing (at 6.00 a.m.) Nick immediately woke up by turning off the alarm immediately, which only irritated him. He slid the blinds down from the window to admire that beautiful sunrise. The sun was still rising on the horizon, but it was already high enough for him to admire nature, which was extremely beautiful and rich in plants on his neighbour's garden. The neighbour's orchard was full of plants such as red roses, colourful tulips, fruit trees of various kinds, and purple crocuses. The latter reminded Nick of Judy, the girl had the same colour of eyes which always made the fox optimistic and for some unknown reason the fox felt much better seeing her eyes. Nick himself didn't grow a lot of plants, lived rather modestly and had no plans to make a big castle at his place, which his neighbour had. He did not mind that his garden was rather poor in plants. After a short observation Nick walked around the flat to open all the blinds from the windows, his house was still dark through the curtained windows. Immediately the house was bright with sunlight.

"Instantly better" thought Nick as he saw the warm rays of the sun illuminate his home. He turned on the radio and then began to prepare his breakfast.

During breakfast Nick listened to the news that was on the radio. They were somehow not particularly interesting to the fox, he didn't care too much about what was flying on the radio, he enjoyed his breakfast and at the same time wondered what he would do when he got the exact location address of the car he was supposed to locate. He wondered if he would need the Pistol. On the one hand he didn't want to take it, it always aroused impulses of anger and aggression which he found hard to control, but on the other hand the man he was looking for was in prison and had been involved in a bank robbery, so he expected it would not be a rather calm conversation with the man.

"All in all, in case I can take..." He acknowledged with a little confusion as Nick finished his breakfast.

After breakfast, Nick dressed in his classic outfit that he wore every day. The green patterned shirt, tie and grey short shorts were perfect for the weather, which promised high temperatures first thing in the morning. Fox could not wear his police uniform, if someone found out, if someone saw him dressed as a policeman he would have a hard time at the police station, especially with chief Bogo, who would shout at him for several minutes and most probably give him some kind of punishment for insubordination. After changing his clothes, Nick took some documents, a piece of paper with the registration of the car he wanted to track down, and a police badge. Without it, he wouldn't be able to ask to find the car by registration. He paused over the desk and thought for a moment if he was sure he wanted to take the gun. Maybe there was some chance that they would get along without a problem after all and there would be no need to use force.

"Ah, what's the harm," decided Nick. He slid out a desk drawer, then tucked the secured gun into his deep pocket. He was ready to begin the second phase of the plan.

An hour later Nick was already standing outside the vehicle inspection office. He was surprised to find dozens of cars already parked in the car park despite the early hour, which was undoubtedly still ( and it was 8 a.m.), and even more people in the queue knowing that there were lazy people there. This didn't comfort Nick much, who didn't want to waste time, but what could he do. All he could afford to do now was wait patiently in line. Fearfully he opened the door to the centre of the great hall and to his disappointment he was right. Inside, there was a huge queue of people waiting for their turn to all the stands. Like last time, there was the smallest queue for Flash, so the fox lined up to it and waited patiently waited.

The fox when he stood in line had no better occupation than staring at the clock on the wall, which made a distinctive tapping sound every second, or staring at his turn, which didn't budge for the next five minutes. Nick was boggled by this, but not surprised. He knew it would put his patience to a real test.

2 hours later

The hour equal to 10.00 a.m. was striking, when Nick was able to approach the window at which Flash was co-ordinating. During the time he had been waiting in line, the fox had managed to fix his fur on his head several times, smooth his tie to such a flat level that it would appear to be ironed, and count several times whether he had all the buttons on his shirt. As Nick approached the window, he handed over a piece of paper with registration numbers on it as a greeting.

"Hello Flash, please see who these numbers belong to...please" Nick asked quickly. Fox followed by taking his badge out of his pocket to show that he was a police officer. In theory he didn't need to do that, Flash knew perfectly well who Nick was (having stopped him).

Sloth took the piece of paper in a slow motion and nodded also in a slow motion turning his gaze to the computer monitor. Instinctively, the fox began nervously tapping his fingers on the desk top and looking at the letters that popped up every few seconds on the screen. If he could, the fox would have written the data himself and found the information himself, but culture and the law held him back. He had to wait patiently for Flash to do his work.

Once Flash was in the middle of typing in the license plates and it would seem that he was about to finish he stopped putting his hands down on the desk top.

"Oh, what now?" Thought Nick puzzled by his behaviour.

"I want to thank you that...I was able to..."

"Ah..." Sighing Nick heard the first part of the sentence, he guessed what he meant. When he had stopped him with Judy, the rabbit had already wanted to arrest him and take him to the police station to serve his sentence, but the fox had stood up for his friend, and asked Judy to let him alone, and in the end it had only ended with a warning. In theory they had as much grounds as possible to lock up the fox, but Nick, it would be hard on his heart if he had to lock Flash up.

"No need to thank me, no problem. Now can you get back to writing, please?" Asked Nick as earnestly as he could, but already nerves were starting to take over in him. He wasn't too surprised when the flash continued his thanks. Fox nodded with a smile on his face as Sloth thanked him, but deep down he was already slowly getting out of himself.

After more than an hour's wait, Nick lived to see his printout with the information about the car he'd indentified in the photos.

"Here you go," said Flash pulling out a printout. Nick immediately grabbed the card he got from the lazy man, thanked him for it and with a tired smile on his face walked out of the room. It had been really long hours. Three hours of standing practically still and doing nothing really made the fox feel mentally exhausted. Paying no attention to it, Nick read the information on the card. Stopping by the car, he wanted to lean against it, but the car's black paint made the bodywork so hot that Nick immediately took his hand off the roof.

"OUCH! Hot..." Stammered Nick taking his hand away. When the burning sensation passed, Nick straightened the card he had received about began to read the information on it.

"Rain Forest...car registered to James Catt, house number 55...that's where I need to go" thought Nick once he was standing by the car.