They paused for a moment, out of breath and starting to reek of sweat. Flint released one hand from the limp body of their captive to twist the doorknob, and then used his hip to push the door open; a move Flame had trouble getting out of his mind.

"Follow me," Flint said, leading the way back into their apartment. They gingerly set the unconscious echidna down on the kitchen floor, Flint retreating into the bedroom and returning with a wooden chair and some rope.

"Set him on here." Flame grunted as he struggled with the awkward body that began to slip and slide through his arms as he lifted it into the chair. Flint gave him a hand, positioning the captive in as natural a seating position as they could manage before grabbing his hands and tying them behind his back. Using the same strand of rope, he connected his hands to his ankles, and then both of them to the chair. Bracing his foot on the chair as support, Flint tugged on the end of the rope until it was taut like a guitar string, giving it a satisfied strum after he had finished the final knot.

"That should keep him there until we can question him," Flint said, taking a position next to Flame and admiring his work with a satisfied smirk. The figure was hunched over himself and breathing lightly. At first glance, one might've assumed he was dead, his dark red locks shadowing his scuffed muzzle. "I want to quick stop by Laura's again tonight before she closes, see if we can't get any ID on this guy. Did you find anything on him?"

Flame shook his head. "Nothing but the pistol and some ammo." He knelt down and inspected the rope more closely. "What if this guy wakes up?"

"Well, I kicked him pretty hard back in the alley, but I guess just to make sure." Flint drew his fist back and connected with the captive's face, a spurt of blood flying poetically from his nose.

"This is bad."

He cringed, bringing his thumb up to his lips and nibbling on the tip. It was an anxious habit he had developed over the years; something he had tried to shake off but stuck like duct tape to his skin, every attempt to remove it more painful than the last. Sitting alone in a well-furnished chair, one leg crossed over the other and a pinch of flesh between his teeth, he took every accusation tossed at him as truth without bothering to consider the fact that maybe he had done all that he could do, and that today's events were simply out of his control.

"You fucked up."

I fucked up, he repeated to himself. A knife thrust into his side.

"We had a simple operation going. So simple, and yet you've managed to screw it up somehow."

I failed. A slash across the stomach.

"And now, we have released vital components of information that could cost us the whole operation!"

A bullet to the brain. Paint the walls red and pink.

He kept his gaze low, afraid to make eye contact. He could hear a tapping on the desk in front of him, counting the seconds until his untimely demise. Life is a winner's game; losers aren't allowed to play.

"Sir, I'm afraid our only course of action is to…"

"Affirmative." A heavy sigh, and the tapping stops. "I'm going to give you this chance to redeem yourself, so don't fuck it up. Mop up the mess you made and maybe I won't have to force you to resign, understood?"

"Understood, sir." He pulled his thumb out of his mouth, a small bead of blood beginning to form on its tip. He pressed the wound to his tongue, sucking up the salty fluid that stung its way down his throat.

Flame took a quick look over his shoulder into a sea of bodies. "I feel like we're being followed."

"You always feel like that," Flint snorted, pulling the front door to Laura's shop open. He took one step in and then turned to face his partner, who stood motionless at the doorway, hands thrust deep into his jacket pockets while his eyes gazed motionless into the crowds. "Come on, man, we don't have all day."

Flame nodded. "Yea, you're probably right."

Laura smiled from behind the counter as the two entered. "Hey you two, long time no see."

Flint shook his head, a small grin escaping as he rested one arm on the counter while he glanced through his sunglasses across the top of a sea of frosted donettes and dirty magazines towards the back of the shop. His eyes fixated on the back of a customer who was perusing the liquor selection with an intensity even Flint had to admire.

"This is about business, isn't it?"

Flint turned, receiving a tired, aggrivated look from the attractive store-owner. The door shut behind him, and he could feel Flame move behind him, pretending to browse the magazine rack while he kept an eye on the customer.

"I'll be quick; you won't even remember I was here, ok?" He tilted his head to eye the cigarette rack behind her. "And I might just buy a pack while I'm here. Would that make up for the trouble?"

Laura's lip curled into a smile. "You're a piece of work, you know that? So what do you guys need from lil' old me?"

Flint leaned forward onto the counter, letting his sunglasses slide to the edge of his muzzle. "Did someone come into the store yesterday, about as tall as me, trench coat, dark-red fur…"

A few moments of thoughtful silence; Flint used the precious time to admire the way that apron accentuated her figure just enough to…

"There was one guy, if I remember correctly. He had the coat, but he had blue fur, I think. Yes, blue fur."

"What'd he buy?"

"Just some porn and cigarettes. Probably a real creep."

He decided to not press the issue much further.

"Anything else unusual about him?"

Laura stood in silence for a moment, eyeing the floor and shifting her feet in thought. "Yea, he was a hedgehog."

Flint raised an eyebrow. "That's not so weird."

"Yea, but, hold on a second." She reached under the counter and pulled out a reciept deposit box, pulling a small key form her apron and unlocking it. Inside were only a bout a dozen reciepts, and none of them were very long. Flint couldn't help but a feel a small pang of sorrow for her situation, partially because he was helping the people who had caused her shop to go to shit. She sifted through the reciepts with intense scrutiny until one caught her eye. "Aha!" She pulled it out and scanned it with her finger, a look of satisfaction brightening her face as she tapped the reciept with a knuckle. "He got a military discount."

Even Flame turned to eye her in surprise. "A what?"

"I thought the EST only hired certain species? How could he have a proper ID?"

"That's what I thought, but I put it through every scanner I have and it was definitely legit." She secured the reciept back in the case and put it away. "And I'm really not in the position to press the matter further, you know?"

Flint sighed. "Well, ok then." He eyed the customer across the store, who still seemed to be analyzing the bottles and cans with unnatural fervor. His movements still seemed natural, though. "One last thing. How do we get to Green Row?"

Laura raised an eyebrow. "Why would you want to go there?"

"We're meeting someone there," Flint replied calmly, still eyeing the customer along with Flame, who had replaced the magazine on the rack and now busied himself with watching the crowds flow by through the glass doors. "Is it far?"

"Just a few blocks down. Go to the southwest corner of the square and make a right. You can't miss the expensive houses, you know?"

Flint nodded, slipping his shades back over his eyes. "Thanks, Laura, I owe you one."

"You owe me a lot of shit. I've got quite a list going."

"How about I take you to dinner sometime? Would that cover it?"

"Doubt it. You'd have to do a lot more than that."

Flint grinned. "Wouldn't be too much of a problem. Thanks again." A quick wave and he followed Flame out the door. Laura watched them disappear into the crowds until she heard the customer in the back begin shuffling towards the counter.

"Evening," she said jovially. The black-furred echidna smiled back, unloading the items and organizing them on the counter.

"Doing the weekly shopping I see?" Laura struggled to make small talk.

The man snickered. "Not my choice, I can tell you that." He placed a box of children's cereal on the counter, which Laura rung up, eyeing him with interest.

"Aren't you a little old to be eating this stuff?"

The man laughed, growing a little red under his dark fur. "Yea, that's for my kid; refuses to eat anything else. Drives us both crazy."

"How old is your…"

"Son," the man filled in. "My son's six, turning seven in a month."

Laura smiled, ringing up the last of the items and pulling out some paper bags.

"Those two who were just here, are they friends of yours?"

Laura paused for a minute, then continued to bag the groceries. "You could say that. They stop in regularly to buy some things."

The man nodded. "They seem like pretty rough guys."

"Yea, they can be a handful if you're not careful." She bagged the last of the items and punched the sale into the register. "All right, you total is…"

"Here you go," the man said, putting two bills on the counter, grabbing his groceries and heading towards the door.

"Oh, um, sir, your change," she called after him.

"Just keep it," the man shouted just before the door shut behind him.

Outside the evening air was beginning to cool, the sky that perculiar orange-purple that only a sunset can create. Spotting a nearby bench, Adrian set his groceries down and dug inside his pant pocket for a moment before pulling out a cell phone. As the phone rang, he took a moment to eye the crowds around him, undoing the top button in his shirt just as the other end picked up.

"Sir, it's me…yes, I was calling to report in, just as you requested…right now? Well, I'm in the square…yes, I know that, but…" He took one last cautious look over his shoulder. "…You'll never guess who I met."

The cushioned metal stock pressed against the top of his shoulder, weighing him down like a pallbearer carrying a casket. He could almost feel his bones ache as he rested his cheek on the rifle, taking a slow, calculated breath as he peered down the telescopic sight at a dead front door on a dead house in a dead neighborhood. Five stories up and two blocks out, he had perched for the last six hours like a hulking gargoyle, put on high alert from the CO after a supposed security leak. Behind him, his spotter was busy cleaning the lenses on his binoculars, slumped up against a ventilation shaft whistling an angsty tune.

He grunted, releasing his tedious grip on the trigger and checking his watch.

"It's almost 1845," he grunted, resuming his vigil. "It's about time you relieved me, don't you think?"

"You seem to be doing just fine," the spotter snickered, looking down his binoculars and eyeing another speck of dust on the right lens.

"Yea? Well I feel like my fucking arm's gonna snap off. This hunk of shit weighs a ton."

"Well that's what you get for buying rifles off the black market, you know?"

"For the last time, it wasn't black market. The guy's a legitimate arms dealer. I saw his fucking license, for Christ's sake."

"He could've forged it."

He removed the rifle from his shoulder and rubbed at his aching joint with a grimace. "You're way too cynical, you know that? It's not healthy."

"Either way, they standard issue scoped rifles at the armory."

"Yea, like I'm going to use those pieces of shit? You could fire them up a virgin's cunt and still not pop her. Not worth my time."

"Whatever. Just don't come crawling to me when you're getting a citation from command for posession of contraband."

The sniper brought the rifle back onto his shoulder with a grunt, peering down the scope to see two figures standing in his target refrence.

He sneered. "Well well well, look who decided to show up?"

"This is Blu...yes, I'm aware of the situation. In fact, I'm calling to inform you...yes, that's correct...no, you...no, there's no need for any worry. In fact, a situation has just unfolded which may allow us to fix these problems...One of my men just called in and...around 10 minutes ago...yes, strictly recon...I figured you would have something planned...yes, I'll leave it in your hands."
Flint eyed the home with an immediate contempt for the owner, whoever it may be. A modest, two-story building, bone-white blinds covering the windows, the stench of fresh varnish on the front door, deep green vines crawling up all angles of the walls as if the planet were trying to devour this monument to the upper-middle class. He pressed his knuckle against the doorbell and shoved his hand back into his jacket with a frown.

"Nervous?"

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"You're shifting your weight a lot. You usually do that when you're nervous."

"You study me all the time?"

Flame shifted the pistol he had pressed into his waistline. "I start to pick up on some habits, yea."

Flint went silent for a moment, trying to peer through the blinds to see if anyone was bothering to answer the door. "Well I hate dealing with upper-middle class shits like this."

"I used to be one of them, too, you know."

"Yea, but you're different."

"How so?"

Flint's gaze slipped downward.

The door creaked open, a middle-aged echidna with dirty-orange fur studying his two visitors through clouded reading glasses that sat precariously on his muzzle. The two young men stood transfixed as if someone has just pressed shotguns against their necks.

"Are...are you," Flame stuttered. "Are you Constable Grey?"

The man removed his glasses and began wiping them with a soft handkerchief. "And you are?"

"That's the situation thus far. Do you understand?...no, he's to remain unharmed...Both of them, yes...Yes, I want this quick and clean...as clean as possible, yes...you've got it completely...they've done their part...and now it's time for us to do ours...Call me when you've finished."