Elba was no coward. He never liked to hide. That made it more difficult for him to refuse Chief Trunchbull's request.

Apparently, it started after a relative of Bonnie Hopps had arrived to pay for Stu's bail. Apparently rabbit and his wife had set out to their daughter's apartment as soon as they were released; barely half an hour passed before they came charging back through the rotating glass door demanding the whereabouts of Judy Hopps. The Precinct One receptionist had made the call to Chief Trunchbull, who then under intense duress had made the call to Commissioner Elba, the last mammal to see Hopps before she left the precinct.

"Are you sure you can't come back to sort this out?" Trunchbull sounded on the verge of begging as Bonnie and Stu railed in the background.

"No, I can't. I don't know where Officer Hopps went after she left the building, I'm sorry."

"You can't come back to personally tell this to her parents? Not even for five minutes?"

"The city is at war, Trunchbull! I can't just drop everything for pair of rabbits that don't know when to back off!"

"Would you like me to tell them that, sir?" Trunchbull did not appear to relish the prospect.

Elba pinched the bridge of his nose. "Tell them that's she's doing her part to help the city and police protocol prevents you from telling them what she's doing."

"And if they don't accept that answer?"

"Then remind them that this isn't just about their oversized family and show them the door!" Elba ended the call and slammed the phone on the table beside the couch.

He would regret his harshness later, he was sure, but he had been stuck in this luxurious panic room for nearly thirty-six hours, and his patience had almost run out.

He didn't know for certain what had prompted Mayor Swinton to summon Elba, Llamadeus and Pottermass to the lounge and order them to stay put until further notice, but he had a couple of theories. The first was that the losses of Dr. Lemming, Assistant Mayor Woolton and Mr. Bisoniing had Swinton worried about the rest of her little group. The second theory concerned the ZBI. The conspiracy to silence Dawn Bellwether's inflammatory accusations had came too late to prevent the ZBI's suspicions from being aroused, and Swinton had eventually received a tip that they were attempting to get a warrant to bring her and Pottermass in for questioning. But the Swintons were powerful, more powerful that most mammals realized, and so far the ZBI had been stonewalled. The fact that Elba and the others were being confined in the panic room, however, had the water buffalo wondering if Swinton felt that stonewalling wouldn't be enough.

There was a slurping sound across the Purrsian rug, as Pottermass sucked the last of his Horn Island Iced Tea through a silver straw. A nearby music player was quietly purring a ballad Elba didn't know but Pottermass seemed to enjoy. "The talk with the Bunnyburrow hicks went well, I take it?"

"I didn't talk to them. Trunchbull did." Elba said. "Otherwise, not at all. How's your head?"

Pottermass touched the bandage with a hand wet with condensation. The sleeve of his pink suit was damp, too. "Little sore. What do you think Llarry Longneck's doing over there?"

Llamadeus was sitting near the minibar in the corner, completely focused on the laptop Swinton had provided for him. It was pure black, almost as flat as an I-paw, and a model Elba wasn't familiar with.

Pottermass didn't say anything. Instead he took his empty glass and partly staggered over to the mini bar. He stared over the oblivious Llama's shoulder as he refilled his glass before returning to the couch opposite Elba. The buffalo scowled as he watched the hippo tilt the long glass over his massive jaws. The alcohol splashed over one of the thick, pointed tusks before settling on the tongue.

"Work." Pottermass said bluntly after draining half the glass. "Swinton's probably making 'im do work so the ZBI won't worry too much about 'im being gone."

Elba crossed the rug and prized the glass from Pottermass's grip. "I think you've had enough for one night. You're starting to slur."

Pottermass shrugged and turned his body so he was lying fully on the couch. Elba sat down and started sipping from what was left of the glass. He'd never had a Horn Island Iced Tea before, and he realized he liked it. Pottermass yawned, his mouth opened nearly one-hundred and eighty degrees, and Elba paused mid-sip. Not just from the urge to mimic the yawn, but from the four enormous tusks that once again drew his attention.

"Why do you file your tusks like that, Pottermass?"

"Huh?"

"Your tusks. You're the only hippo I know who files them pointed."

"That's 'cause I don't file them at all." Pottermass said. "Most other hippos file them into harmless little stumps, but not me. I keep my teeth short the natural way."

"Natural way?"

"My teeth file themselves. I mean each other. Keeps them nice and sharp. Makes my associates think twice about screwing me over."

"I'll say. They look like they could go right through your jaw with one wrong move."

Pottermass smirked. "Once upon a time we'd use these bad boys in dominance displays. Made the underground fight pits we have today look like dainty soirees. There's an old rumor in my family that my great, great, great, great, great, great, great, great…"

"Grandfather?"

"… great, great grandfather disemboweled another hippo over a lady. Most think we're fat, goofy looking palookas who spend their days lounging around in a swamp, they don't know shit. I could come over their right now and crush that big melon of yours in one bite."

"Is that a threat?" Elba asked jokingly.

"Nope. Doesn't mean I wasn't kidding."

Elba drank some more Iced Tea and glanced at Llamadeus. He seemed to be engrossed with the laptop. Dear Lord, he must really be in Swinton's doghouse. I've never seen him so diligent.

"What about rabbits?" Elba asked. "Would you call them dangerous?"

"In their own way. Those claws and buck teeth aren't just for burrowing and munching carrots all day long." Pottermass paused. "Pigs have strong jaws, too. And they can eat meat."

"Meat?"

"Never mind, just a silly fact I got off the internet. It's probably not even fact."

The music player switched to another track, one with a prominent violin. "Nothing we've told the public lately is fact. That's what it feels like, at least." Elba said.

Pottermass rolled his eyes. "Christ, you're not still bummed about what happened with Bellwether, are you?"

"I'm not okay with it. The city will be better off without her inciting riots, but I will never be okay with what you did to her."

"Get off your soapbox, Elba, she brought that on herself."

Elba felt a sudden urge to throw the glass across the room. "Listen, you arrogant little-"

"Arrogant? Why? Because I'm telling it like it is?" Potter turned his head to look directly at Elba, one of his tusks shining between his lips. "May I remind you of what would have happened to the elephant minority had we told the people that the elephant that almost killed Bogo had been in musth? They would have been ostracized. A fox may bite, steal your wallet or con you out of your life savings, but as far as I can tell they can't trample you to death. Or crush your car like cardboard. Or skewer you like a barbecued corn cob. Elephants are tolerated because they don't eat meat or go savage or do anything a predator does. If musth becomes public knowledge, all that changes. The same goes for moose, deer, bisons, rhinos, boars, peccaries, even buffalos." Pottermass pointed a fat finger at Elba, specifically his horns. "The clincher is fear, Elba. Nine times out of ten, one reason to fear someone is all it takes. That is why we hide the truth."

"You're saying that Captain Bogo brought his impalement upon himself?"

"Of course not! The problem is that he doesn't seem to understand that sometimes the truth is dangerous."

"He does, Pottermass. It's the hypocrisy he can't stand." Elba said. "You and the others dedicate your lives and enterprises to upholding the TAME Collar laws, and yet you just listed at least nine prey mammals that can be just as dangerous as predators."

"Eleven. There are at least three types of buffalos I know about." Pottermass said. "And I haven't even gotten to the little guys yet."

Good God, he's still not finished. "Just how much have you had to drink tonight?" Elba asked.

"Hell if I know." Pottermass said. "As I was saying, the smaller citizens of Zootopia aren't to underestimated either. Did you know that some rodents in our city are venomous?"

"Really?" Elba had overseen enough Little Rodentia cases to have an idea of which rodents his tipsy companion was talking about. "I know the platypus had spurs in inflict intense pain. Shrews have toxic saliva, but not nearly potent enough to affect a mammal of our size."

"Ahhh, for mammals of their size or smaller, that's an entirely different matter." Pottermass said, grinning. "Moles are venomous, too. Like shrews, moles use their venom to paralyze something small and edible, like say, a worm, and store their prey alive for future consumption. I read about that during the Rodentia Ripper Case."

Elba grimaced. "I'd rather not talk about that case, Pottermass."

"Sorry. Anyway, imagine if that shrew or mole was the size of, let's say, a wolf. A lion, even. A bite or two could bring down a rhino."

"Okay, now I'm positive you are drunk. There is nothing on earth that could allow a shrew or mole to grow to that size." Elba paused and looked down at his glass. There was a sizeable amount of alcohol still. Pottermass was still sober enough to be coherent, but perhaps…

"You know what? I'm being selfish. Why don't I top this up and pour you another glass?"

The hippo shrugged. "Just do me a brandy. You may be a brilliant officer, but you're shit at cocktails."

Elba discreetly checked on Llamadeus again as he returned to the bar and fulfilled Pottermass's request. The llama was still completely focused on his laptop. Elba returned to the couches with two full glass and handed one to Pottermass. God forgive him for doing something so devious, but what he had to lose what too important.

"I think I know what you mean." Elba said, continuing the conversation while Pottermass drank. "Mammals can be so naïve about things that are different from them. Back when the Rainforest, Canals and Meadowland districts were first built, the designers used plants and flowers that were poisonous, but they picked them because they look good."

Pottermass's eyes lit up suddenly. "Jurassic Park made that same mistake. Serenna Veriformans, it was. I zoogled it after I read the book, but it turns out the author made it up."

"Intriguing. Anyway, it took a few deaths for the designers to realize their blunder and fix it. It's why those districts are so green, nowadays. Maybe that's why the Red Queen and those other terrorists are doing all this. To make us realize that the TAME Collar is a blunder that need to be fixed. They do appear to cause more incidents than prevent them."

"It needs upgradin'." Pottermass said with a noticeable slur. "That's not the same as fixin'."

"You're talking about the new collar, right? You still haven't told me what it does."

"It's a helluva lot more effective than shocking, I'll say that much."

Elba leaned forward. "What else can you say?"

"It eliminates the need to shock a pred at all. Why worry about them getting angry and causing trouble when you can use the collar to tell them not to get angry or cause trouble? That's what the collar does, Ellie. It makes a predator behave the way we want it to."

Mind control? He cannot be serious. "Forgive me if I say that's crazy, because it is."

"Yeah, I know it's sci-fi-funky shit. But this guy, some genius engineer called Cogswart or whatever, pulled it off a few years back. He's dead now, but Swinton's got another squint tweaking out the flaws until it's ready for Zoocell to mass-produce."

"You mean Slothfeld, right?" Pottermass nodded. "I don't understand why he'd be leading the project. His field is chemistry."

"Yeah, I don't know all that much about it either. Apparently, the collars make predators a bit too zombieish, so Slothfeld's working on a little extra something to fix that."

Elba took a long drink of brandy. If Pottermass confirmed what he was beginning to fear, he was going to need it. "And just how did Slothfeld discover this crucial flaw?"

"Same way my company finds flaws in all its products. Testing."

"On what?"

"Predators. What else?"

Elba's mind went blank. He managed to pull himself together enough to be quiet as he growled, "You bastards."

Pottermass's ear flicked upward. "Pardon?"

"Nothing." Elba said quickly, feeling momentarily relieved that Llamadeus didn't appear to have heard him either. "This wouldn't have anything to do with our missing mammal cases, would it?"

Pottermass nodded. Elba sent another prayer to God. "You don't mind if I ask about a couple of missing mammals that aren't on the ZPD's list?"

"Knock yourself out."

"Starlight Foxtrot and Gabriel Mossberg. They're tourists that were reported missing almost a year ago."

Pottermass stroked the rim of his glass, thinking. "Yeah, they're on Slothfeld's list. Cunninghorn took 'em 'cause we found out they're spies."

Elba almost choked on his brandy. "Cunninghorn?!"

"Yeah, I thought he seemed a bit too loco to be in on our little conspiracy. Turned out we were both right. It's like Ol' Theo learned nothing from Roarcadia."

Elba need a minute to cool off his anger, not just at Cunninghorn but also himself. He'd heard to police brutality reports going missing, and the already miniscule effort to find the missing predators turning up zero leads. He'd known that Cunninghorn wasn't fit to run a fight club, let alone a TUSK squad.

That son of a bitch! How could I not have realized?!

"Tilda… the mayor told me this whole thing was her father's idea." Elba said, pushing a calm manner through expertly suppressed rage.

"Yeah. He and his grandfather had this whole thing planned when they took over Roarcadia. All hush-hush and zipped lips, but I do know that they had planned to eventually make that island an independent country."

That was news to Elba. "Isn't that supposed to be impossible?"

"Nearly impossible, but nothing's impossible for a Swinton."

Elba believed that. "Why would they go to so much trouble?"
"Now that, I don't know." Pottermass finished his glass and dropped it onto the rug. "But whatever it is, Theodore started it up again here in Zootopia. New and improved, he called it. I'm not allowed to tell anyone about it. Not even Merry." Pottermass became morose, seeming to sink slightly into the couch with the weight of his grief.

"You still miss her, don't you?" Elba asked.

"I hate it when I sweat. Fucking hate it. Have I told you that?" Pottermass spat. "When I get that red shit all over me, I think of what that fucking accident did to her. Fucking cheetahs."

"The Clawhausers weren't responsible, you know that."

"Makes me feel a little better that they're dead, too. I wouldn't cope if they lived. I just couldn't."
"Pottermass, that's a terrible thing to say. They were innocent mammals, just like your wife, and now they're gone."

Pottermass stared up at the ceiling, eyes hardening even through the drunken haze clouding them. "Not all of them."