Summary:

Called to the boss' office, Judy's thoughts drift back to her previous encounters with authority, and the consequences that ensued. Fifteen years ago, she was exiled to the far corners of the ZPD basement, toiling away to clear the accumulated detritus of police paperwork. Utter alone, she almost gave into despair, only to find that there were still mammals willing to help her.

Notes:

Yes! I'm still alive, just overworked! My boss retired, and I've been saddled with figuring out where he stood on all our various IT projects. Doesn't leave me a lot of time to write anymore, I'm sorry to say.

"HOPPS!"

Judy's instantaneous reaction was to cringe as the brass bellow echoed down the long hallways, thinking that perhaps she had either done something horribly wrong or that a certain cape buffalo needed somebody, anybody, to yell at this morning and she had drawn the short straw. "Swell," she muttered under her breath. "Just swell."

F uck. Well, it's not like I' ve had a chance to file any paperwork from yesterday, so he must just have a hornet up his ass over some stupid bullshit and he feels needs to share the sensation with a captive audience, and that audience is me today. Oh Joy! It's turning out to just be a wonderful fucking morning, and I haven't even had my coffee yet.

Pulling off her fedora in resignation to her fate, she tucked it under her arm and trundled down the hallway toward Bogo's office, acutely aware of every mammals eye watching her as she walked the long green mile to her execution. She reached his office, and paused with her paw on the panel. She could see the shadowy outlines of the cape buffalo's horns through the frosted glass, like some demonic creature stalking her in a cold fog, looking to devour her soul as it rends her flesh.

How many times have I stood here, dreading this very moment? She wondered. You would think that after the first time this happens, I would get used to getting yelled at by the bloody ox. Her mind still not fully focused from the lack of stimulating caffeine, her unbidden thoughts drifted back in time.

15 years earlier…

Judy trundled down the long dusty aisle in between the towering shelves filled with rows upon rows of dark brown boxes, the sound of her footfalls quickly swallowed by the cavernous expanse of the ZPD basement file room. A golden blur flicked across her sullen gaze, interrupting her contemplation of the layers of dust on the shelves in between the boxes. She glances up at the broad expanse of the portly Sargent as he lead her deeper into the concrete and steel abyss. He whistled cheerfully, completely off tune, causing her ears to twitch in annoyance.

"Wow, you must have really pissed off the Chief if he assigned you to the Cold Cases department!" Sargent Clawhauser blurted out, "And on your second day here, too!" He turned to look down on her with a grin, "That's a new record!"

She looked up in confusion at him and asked, "What? It's not a popular posting?"

The cheetah bobbed his head, his whiskers twitching in time to his spoken cadence, "Oh, not really. I mean, it's not as bad as say parking duty, cause that's really the worst, but it's not a place any mammal really wants to be. It's so dark, and dusty, and really lonely. Almost nobody ever comes down her if they can help it." He pointed to a steel mesh door set into the back wall, "Oh! We're here!"

He reached out with his paw and hooked his claws through the mesh on the face of the door. The door slowly squealed open, it's tortured hinges protesting their change in rotational inertia. He stepped inside and gestured for her to follow, "Anyway, here's your new office!"

Judy ducked in under his arms, and peered into the long room lit with dim flickering lights, only to recoil in horror at the multitude of wheeled bins that crowded into the space, overflowing with loose folders, their paper contents spilling out to cover what little floor space there was in between the bins. She dragged her gaze off the sea of files to look at the even more monstrous desk that crowded into a far corner, the edge of it's flat surface easily twice her height and filled from edge to edge with yet another mountain of files, threatening to collapse in an avalanche of triplicates and binder clips.

"What am I supposed to with all of this?" She squeaked, waving her paw at the mass of crowded files.

Sargent Clawhauser tapped his paws together as he looked at the forest of files, "I hadn't realize it had gotten so bad!" He turned to looked down at her, "Sargent Twiga usually stayed on top of all of this, but since he retired six months ago, nobody's been down here since." He looked down at her in sympathy, "You'll need to file of these files away in their proper boxes. Sargent Twiga had a very esoteric system for filing them, but I'm sure you'll figure it out. You were top of your class, weren't you?" He asked her.

"Yeah, but..." she breathed out in despair.

He clapped his paws together, "Great! I'll leave you to it, then!" He shivered, "This place just gives me the creeps!" He quickly made his escape, darting back down the aisle as fast as his portly frame would allow.

Judy stared at his retreating back in disbelief. To think that the big cat was afraid of this place only momentarily distracted her from the herculean task before her. She was a rabbit, and dark underground caverns didn't bother her. Her father had produce barns just as big as this place on the family farm. It was just that those same barns were usually churning with rabbits hurrying about their tasks, boxing new produce to ship out to all the corners of the Tri-burrows area and beyond. Here she was utterly alone.

Squeeek…

Her ears perked up as she detected the sound of castor wheels approaching. Somebody was coming! She bounded to the door, grateful for the distraction, and maybe they could explain her job to her better than what the nervous cat had. She peered in the gloom with her lapin eyes as a white blob slowly resolved itself. It was another canvas wheelie bin, piled high with loose files, pushed by a large ram in an auxiliary police uniform. Judy stood up on her toes and waved at him, calling out, "Hi! Um… Hey, uh..."

He turned his sullen gaze to her small blue and gray form, his only response to her called greeting a low and disgusted grunt. He motioned her to get back out of the way while pushing the bin halfway through the door. Leaving it there, trapping her inside the room, he snorted and quickly trotted back the way he had come, his hooves tapping in quick step as he hastened to leave the basement room.

Judy was once again alone, surrounded on all sides by towering piles of paperwork, the only sound available to her ears being the squeal of a worn fan belt echoing down the ventilation ducting.

Three days later she lay on the floor of the warehouse, a banker box worth of files upended and spilled all over her, shedding it's contents like an avalanche of triplicate all over her prone form. She sniffed, tears leaking from her eyes, as she fought against the despair and humiliation of being given a job she could not easily do. The clouds of dust stirred up by the falling banker box didn't help either. She sneezed, the sound echoing through shelves. She wiped her nose with her sleeve, and struggle out from under the reams of paperwork piled on top of her.

"Hello?" A light baritone voice called out. Judy's ears perked up, searching for the voice. Some mammal had entered into the basement, but she had never even heard them approach. She cast her eyes to the sound of the voice, but as the mammal approached, Judy was forced to crane her neck back to stare up at the tall feline form clad in gold fur and ZPD blue approach her from down the dark aisle.

The large cat called out again, her large yellow eyes flashing in the overheat lights, "Do you need some help?

Judy felt a shiver chase down her spine, as she watched the large tigress pad silently up to her and kneel down. The cat reached out with her broad and powerful paws and gently started to remove the pile of folders that Judy lay buried under. She felt so helpless, laying there trapped, completely at the mercy of a far larger predator, but the big cat didn't look down at her in aggression or hunger, rather just quiet concern as she picked up the spilled paperwork and set it aside.

"Yes, Please? Thank you..." Judy replied in relief "Um..." She squinted as she tried to read the officer's name tag, "Um, thank you, Officer Fangmeyer." Freed of the pile of papers, Judy scooted backwards and struggled to stand up. Fangmeyer held out her paw to help and Judy took it, hoisting herself to her feet. She stood there for a moment, looking down at her tiny rabbit paw, dwarfed by the broad expanse that held her professed limb gently. She looked up at the large muzzle, golden eyes alight in the dark, and murmured, "Thank you."

"My pleasure," The larger cat rumbled, "Officer Hopps, is it?"

"Yup, that's me!" Judy replied brightly, finally glad that somebody here knew her name.

The feminine feline grinned back down at her spunk, "I'm pleased to finally meet you."

Judy clasped her other paw to the back of the tigress' large mitt and tried to shake it in thanks. It was like trying to move a twenty ton hydraulic press, but she gave it her best effort none the less. She replied brightly.

"Likewise!"