I do not own Zootopia, that belongs to Disney. This a fan work made solely for the sake of amusement.

"Let It Go, It's Happytown"

Chapter Five: What We All Want

By: Gabriel LaVedier

Sherlock's office was also his home, technically. Unlike the intentional action of having apartments over businesses in the Tri-Burrows, it was accidental in Happytown. Those businesses had been zoned, with storage space in a small attic and a second floor to have a second business. But most of those had been converted to living spaces, for a different fee from those that were two-business spaces. The narrow, tall nature of the business made it more comfortable to keep as much extraneous stuff out of the living space as possible. His living space was home to a bedroll, a hot plate, a basin and what other few personal possessions he wanted to hold.

He was still the same immigrant from a backwater nation, who had to do a lot of social catch-up with things that others knew intuitively from a lifetime of being immersed in their influence. Poverty and that limitation meant he was held back from certain things. Appliances and things had to be purchased from thrift shops or somehow gained through inexpensive or free methods.

With the digital nature of the modern era, Sherlock had bowed to pressure and purchased a dated but serviceable old desktop computer from a pawn shop, urged toward the choice by the slick polecat behind the counter assuring him it would continue being functional. So far, it at least worked. The thing was set up on his desk in his office, the jarring intrusion among old family heirlooms and cultural totems of his first home.

The strange thing was truly an anomaly. Among all the muted earth tones and austere shades of red and saffron the rectangle of plastic was a strange, very neon shade of green, with lots of white on other components and dull silvery steel to round out the off color palette. It seemed like a mistake, the color bordering on the sickly, though perhaps some action of time had warped the original color to what it was.

He felt awkward sitting behind it. It wasn't the usual method of gathering information, but Hermione often told him it was the way the world worked. For all the good his master's teachings had done for him, there were still other methods. Sherlock, of course, was not opposed to new things. Learning to deal with an expanded field of possibilities was one of the things that his lessons had instilled, helping him to make the transition somewhat more smoothly than his parents.

He still always mistrusted the overly bright thing of intended-to-be cheerful colors. It could have a mind of its own, and he still only knew what he knew because Hermione had kindly instructed him in the function of the contraption. He occasionally used it to organize case files, though the collection of filing cabinets behind him told the tale of what he actually did with most of his case reports. He also occasionally used it to play solitaire, a shameful habit he did his best to resist. But when the cases were thin and meditation or performing were not helping, the game was there for him.

His least used feature was the one that had engrossed him. Using the internet for research. The device wasn't very powerful, and struggled with many pages. He restricted himself as much as possible to raw text, looking through documents or simple news reports. In passing he found notice of Nick's wedding, as well as the joint wedding of some singer named Gazelle, and what it meant to the city. Echoes. Echoes he scarcely heard high on his mountain. He owed Nick, even if the Cheery Charlie case had been his version of repayment for simple mammalian kindness.

Very little was really being said regarding the case. It was purely a local matter, so far as he could see. What he could see of major news outlets it wasn't even worth mentioning, or warranted a tiny square of print, with a notice that it was suicide, just suicide. No suspicions of foul play, no uncertainty from sources within the ZPD, no notice that the investigation was ongoing. Simple. Neat. Wrapped up and served based on the mere appearance and nothing else. Journalistic integrity subverted to the higher ideal of the status quo and no one rocking the carefully balanced boat. Even if they had just overturned a major social matter, some taboos were still there, because they constituted accumulated guilt.

While individuals were not specifically to blame, they never bothered to change anything, and absorbed some small portion of the harm that resulted. They knew that it had always been wrong to treat Happytown as such, but didn't dare say so. It would have put blame on their family line, and on themselves. Nothing could be done about what the two weddings represented, but they could maintain a stubborn denial. They never did anything wrong if they pretended Happytown didn't exist. Sherlock suspected that was some portion of Mayor Mousawitz's motivation for his continual denial and deflection. Malice and bigotry were unneeded when cowardice and ignorance were fit to explain the whole matter. A minor but important lesson from his venerable master.

His internet explorations grew deeper than usual. He seldom used the thing very long, being the type who preferred to hoof it around the area. It was the most effective thing he knew and it worked for him. His closed cases spoke to the merit in his traditional method. The computer was still useful in an electronic world, but not too much in the company of the poor and disenfranchised, who did things in person, more often than not.

Some folks of Happytown did have an electronic presence, small though it was. They were the involved types, perhaps too involved. While most reasonably concluded that Charlie had been killed by someone, some of them proposed a grand conspiracy arching so far it looped around to blame it on the deposed Dawn Bellwether and her ovine conspiracy. The truth may have been somewhere in the middle. Disentangling truth from speculation was a matter of fineness, peering closely, pulling gossamer thread by gossamer thread, finding the facts amid strings of text. Just like the ancient scrolls, some of it was of the koan variety, some of it was genuine wisdom for all the ages. Mammals were mammals, and puzzling out the general case was part of successfully solving the mammal condition.

Random violence was not unheard of in Happytown, of course. It was part of the culture that had sadly grown up around being abandoned and left to a savage environment where the perpetrators feared no police. But with the clues he had seen, the careful steps and the calculated method for making it look like a sloppily obvious suicide it was clear some kind of conspiracy was involved. Even if only a conspiracy of one insane mammal, it was a careful setup.

The notion of someone disliking Charlie's work was very believable. He had critics even while alive. The gangs regarded him with a confused mix of emotions based on the intelligence and forethought level of the particular reprobate. As he had heard, from those like the thoughtless wolves he had backed away from Officer Wulfberg he was a simple joke, or just another mammal to squeeze. The brighter leaders and middle enforcers knew that his brand of quiet agitation was unlikely to make much direct impact, but could very well make enough noise to bring actual attention onto the place. They didn't want police actually caring. They could have banked on indifference, but the gang way was very rarely so subtle. They would also be loath to hire a prey contract killer, particularly one as meticulous as the one seen.

Larger entities had personal stake in the state of Happytown. Mousawitz, certainly. He considered the whole place a headache, a political hot potato that he had no one to toss it away to. Charlie had been making a lot of loud and potentially embarrassing overtures to the rest of the city, with a receptive ear in Councilor Seedsworth. Getting rid of him ended the problem. And gave him whole new headaches, more focus, and a louder, more daring Seedsworth pushing the issue all the harder. That would be a dead end for sure.

Something in the middle was the way to go, as it often was. Master Bajja had made certain that he remembered the middle way in all things. Someone outside, but interested in Happytown, someone threatened by anything that Charlie could do to bring attention to the place, to clean it up and make it more stable and safe. There was something there. Something to examine.

He had to keep going.

o o o

Afternoon didn't linger that long in Happytown, with the high buildings catching much of the sunlight, all the tight packing leaving it shaded. They were a place of shadows, living in the shade of the larger city, loomed over and made to endure the darkness. The dark space was the right color for Sherlock's mind as he mulled over his considerations.

The first thing that caught his eye as he was walking along was a liquor store on a corner. Small, dark, almost completely covered up by signs advertising the things within. All classes of cheap liquor, cheap snacks and the legal kinds of things that were smoked or chewed. The door occasionally opened, to show the dingy interior, and admit or release someone seeking something.

There was one of those every street or so. Selling the same things, offering the same quick and easy satiation of some hunger or another. The aura of Happytown was strong, and sapped the body. It needed a real solution. In the absence of actual solutions to the systematic problems, illusory temporary solutions abounded and were eagerly consumed. He knew it.

His parents didn't give in to them. Having lived without the structure and focus of the monastery they took on the new life with a kind of stoic ease. They had come to wise decisions without needing the teaching of great masters. That was a lesson that Sherlock could have used.

Without the structure and the presence of Master Bajja, Sherlock slowly lost himself in the unstructured world, filled with disdain. The fear of gangs, the power they supposedly represented, those who moved so freely and smoothly in the terrible circumstance made it all too much.

He forgot. That was the most terrible thing of all, when he fell into the trap Happytown gave. When he fell for the easy solutions and false promises, the worst thing of all was he forgot. The new world had blinded him with bright lights and deafened him with a million voices and an endless sea of machines. Without eyes and ears he reached for the first thing that offered a line. And on that line, a hook.

Vices always started small. One little sip. One little chew. Illicit because of so many reasons, not the least of which being merely having it was unlawful. But those little, cramped and tired stores needed to make money. Nobody saw, nobody told. In theory the city would punish them. But the city didn't care, and he knew it only too well.

It was a time he could scarcely remember. His parents were upset, but he hardly recalled. It was all a long haze. Lost weekend was hardly how he would have phrased it, at the time or after. He knew that something had happened then. He still had the information that he learned at the time, and he didn't just have a big, black gap of nothingness there. It was merely a mist, a shameful haze that took him.

In taking him, the haze also took him away. In that time he could see why the lost and hopeless mammals of Happytown did what they did with false promises and easy false solutions. For a pittance they could chew something or drink something and forget they lived in Happytown. Just like the wolf had said of Gazelle's tigers, but writ large and repeatedly. He walked by any number of half-conscious zombies. He had been a half-conscious zombie, surviving in bliss, in an imitation Shambhala built of lies and chemicals. His mind was sanctuary and prison, stunned and stupefied into that unreality.

In forgetting his old master he was lured to his false satori at the bottom of every bottle and every pinch of his preferred vice. He had, at that bottom, considered other things. Things not sold in the dark shops. Things that were even less controlled, and even more terrible. The forgetting had made him fall, but one remembering stopped his descent.

In the midst of the haze of one bad day, in the mist from his intoxication, he was faced by a shadowy form, flowing and flapping in an unfelt wind. The looming figure was unmistakable. "Master Bajja! You... you're here? How? Why would you ever leave the monastery, venerable master?"

The shadow approached, moving without seeming to do anything but float through the mist. It came nearer and nearer, the shaded face still managing to pierce deep into Sherlock's soul. His speed was as tremendous as ever. A swift motion slapped the old, familiar wooden-braced paper fan against Sherlock's head. "I am not here, my young disciple. You are calling me up because you truly understand what you need."

"Tell me, master, what is it I require?"

"You know it all. When in the monastery you were attached to it, but detached from the concerns around you. You do not have me there, but you have my wisdom. Why does that not suffice you, young yak?"

"I-it becomes easy to forget. Without the structure, the walls of the monastery and the hold of it, the order... I need them, venerable master. I need to seek them, and have them."

"Walls? Walls? Nothing could be less real than walls," the vision said, the fan once more finding the contrite Sherlock's head. "Life is only real if you face it. You live where you do and make your way with clarity. You have order, you have structure, you have wisdom. Why don't you ever use it?"

"This place..." Sherlock began.

Another strike silenced the prevarication. "Terrible as it is there are ways to survive. You see others make their way along with unbowed heads. Your own parents could instruct you in the way of humble motion, letting the place wash over you like the wind you learned to let gently blow across your back. Think of it like those freezing winds. Be cut by them, stung and sliced and pushed down to be buried in snow, or let them flow off your form, along your body, lifting you, letting you rise against the wind. Remember, a kite rises when confronted, not when left alone."

Sherlock knelt there, in his mind, in his room, surrounded by the tokens of his shame. The image of Master Bajja was gone, never there, but always there. The walls were an illusion. Happytown was an illusion. The whole world was an illusion, but he had to exist within the illusion. Until he could escape the cycle of desire he needed to persevere to reach that final ideal.

Seeing the truth was always easy. Grasping the truth was always painful. Whether by freezing, straining to remain awake, knocks to the head or some other means, there was always pain. Even if the body was only an image it fought hard to be seen as real. The pain of nature inserted itself into the mind, and made everyone suffer. Escaping suffering was the goal, he knew that. But to escape it, he had to pass through it.

The need he had grown for that falsehood was like the pain of attachment to the world concentrated and made enormous and inescapable. His very blood burned for that. One chew. One swallow. He ached with need, and put it aside with his memories. Those years of study, those years learning to resist pain, need and the world itself. Those were his only means of survival. He had no other choice. He had to let the poison work its way out of his system, while he endured it. It hurt. It hurt like nothing in his life had ever hurt, because the pain was coming from inside, his own body was turning against him, and he had to outlast it.

And with Master Bajja's wisdom, he did.

His contemplative walk had led him to a small area, filled with those who would have happily fed his illusions, had he finally given in. They weren't as blatant as cheap media and ignorant depictions showed, but they feared no police, no real retaliation from anyone of any power.

"My bull, my bull, my bull, you know you need a little something to take the edge off the day. It's never a good day in Happytown, and we all need a little something to get along," a deep-voiced wolf said, following Sherlock as he went by. He wanted to look like he belonged, but Sherlock could just feel that he was wrong. He didn't belong. He was there to make a quick buck at someone's behest, as it ever was.

"Not a tin or corn. You don't belong here, and we both know it," Sherlock casually said.

The wolf grunted and narrowed his eyes at Sherlock. "What are you sayin'? Get out of here with that! Just giving you some good quality happiness, just getting..."

"I can tell. Your clothes are too crisply ruined, your attitude too rehearsed. You have the air of a bad actor pretending your district. Someone hired you to suck money out of Happytown like a leech sucking blood out of an ailing body. At the very, very least, our local peddlers of illusory Shangri-La keep their money inside the district. They destroy us much more slowly," Sherlock casually noted, still walking on.

The wolf snarled and turned away. "Moon-cursed PIs! You idiots should wear signs! At least those eclipsed cops wear those stupid uniforms!"

"Respect them, even if they oppose you," Sherlock casually said as he strolled past.

The area where the pushers stood was near one of the many 'floating' locations that served as a congregation point for many of the professional dates of Happytown. No amount of living in Happytown could destroy the natural beauty of the mammalian form, but they tried to augment it with as much cheap makeup as they could, skewing their features in odd directions. In trying too hard they made clear the desperation that came of living in a desperate situation with a lack of proper job opportunities.

The scanty clothing of the ones offering themselves gave every indication they intended to shed them as soon as possible. Those that could wore shoes, heels that reminded Sherlock uncomfortably of Hermione. One bad influence, one missed opportunity and the job prospects for even a brilliant stoat like her would turn to a market that was not yet saturated. With all the blown kisses and leg-showing come-ons, there still were not too many of them.

"Ladies... I know you have little enough reason to care but if you know anything about Charlie... I need some kind of lead," Sherlock said, taking out his notebook and preparing to write.

"Hey, hey, no broke PIs. Pay up to get something, haystack," a leggy wolf in a mini skirt and halter top said, puffing on a cigarette that reeked of cloves.

"Shut it, Roxy! You know what Charlie meant to this cesspool," a coyote snapped, smoothing out her sheath dress. "He never bought a date, but he bought me dinner more times than I can remember. He cared. Look... I want to help. But I don't know anything. He talked about his plans for Happytown, but he never said anyone was after him."

"'After him' my flanks. He killed himself. You know he killed himself. Why are you fooling yourself?" A zebra asked, snorting softly after speaking and reflexively rubbing an arm.

"No, he did not. He was murdered, and the police know it. I was there when it was proved. They just cannot say anything because the official story is stamped and sealed. But he did not kill himself. Are you sure? No one said anything?" Sherlock asked.

"Nothing. He was just too happy about everything. He loved this place, for some reason, and all his plans for what he was going to do with it. I like that he helped with the prices. Nice not thinking I'm out on my tail if I can't get enough dates in a week," the coyote said with a soft chuckle that turned into a cough.

"I promise you, I plan to do everything I can to prove someone killed him, who did it and why. I can only guess at it all," Sherlock sighed.

"Hey, haystack, you don't have to ask why," Roxy growled, spitting out dark colored phlegm and taking another drag from her cig. "This is Happytown. They don't need a reason why. They just need us dead and out of the way."

o o o

Sherlock was never one to give up, but all the thousand worm trails on the internet were a swirling mass of confusion. They clarified and clouded in almost equal measure. Every conspiracy theory alleged that it was true and evident but always ended up a mass of speculation or a collection of disparate facts cobbled together with no indication of what did the heavy lifting of connection. Abject and overt skyhookery.

He took up his pipe-burner and a small collection of stone jars sealed with cork. Each jar contained a quantity of dully colored paste, each of which he carefully sniffed. Using a small metal hook he dug out some amount of paste and scraped it onto a cupped area in the pipe's bowl. Once a large enough mass of it had been built up he scraped a flint chunk with the other side of his metal hook until the sparks ignited the small lump, setting it to smolder. A few quick pumps of the button on the side had it pouring with a sweetly scented smoke precisely designed to match and shift his mood from frustrated to centered.

He breathed deeply, letting the familiar melange envelop him. His vice was small, and gentle, and ancient. He set the pipe on a small stand and gave it another pump, getting a good cloud of smoke around his face. He picked up a rather plain deep copper bowl, and a polished quartz rod with one end wrapped with cork. A small tap made the bowl resonate with a deep, low tone, which he turned into a ringing, sustained note by running the cork against the rim of the metal. He adjusted the tone, louder and softer with the varying speed of rubbing the edge.

After some time of manipulating the tone and clearing his head he opened his mouth wide and let out a low, moaning noise, a guttural tone that emerged from deep within him and almost rang in time with the low tones of his bowl. He worked a simple tune, one that he recalled from one of the other acolytes who had come from a distant land and taught him the strange but fascinating technique.

The rhythmic humming of the bowl combined with the two-toned throat singing, bouncing around the office, practically ringing off the various metal bowls, small gongs and chimes that populated his collection of shelves. He surrounded himself with the trappings of the old world, with things that reminded him of an old home he had hardly ever lived in. His life had been one of ascetic detachment, lacking possessions as a matter of course. But in a new life and a new world all those old things that represented the empty monastery and poorly furnished home meant everything. Being surrounded by them represented continuity, maintaining the connection to that place and those times.

His neighbors had never complained about the frequent, impromptu performances of singing bowl and throat singing, leaving Sherlock impressed with the soundproofing of the cheap construction. It was either accidental quality or it was stuffed with toxic components slowly killing them all. His singing almost stopped as a soft chuckle threatened to emerge. Hermione's dark realism was rubbing off on him.

Though each portion of the tune was essentially cyclical he wound it down slowly, his head cleared and mood improved. The bowl was set back aside and he slowly made his way out of the office, carrying his smoking pipe-burner. He was prepared to say he was going out but recalled Hermione had already gone home for the day. He had seen the writing on the wall, that nothing of substance would get done. A dark pall fell as he left the office and locked the door behind him.

The sun was low again. Being an office-bound type who spent a lot of time meditating while the sun shone it always seemed to be dark. Coming down to the office early in the morning and going back up or out to shop at vesper markets. On the sacred mother, even in the height of summer, the whipping wind and freezing mist shrouded the courtyard, which was seldom visited. Home was always dark, by nature of by the imposition of the hateful surrounding them.

"Charlie... I wish you had given us more of an indication," Sherlock sighed, bringing the smoke closer to his snout to take a long, slow inhale of the calming scent. His mind swam with all the theories that he had found, threads snaking between each, connecting and dissolving as the tenuous links failed in their ability to hold together. The lines didn't connect.

Another sniff was interrupted by an unexpected acrid note and a sound that he seldom heard. A siren screamed in the growing evening, echoing wildly around the tight-packed buildings. Emergency services were rare in Happytown. They weren't disallowed. Half was a reluctance to serve the area, half a reluctance for the mistreated to actually use them, even if their taxes paid for them. His trained ears picked out the rough location and specific type of siren. That particular whining tone belonged to an engine of the ZFD, denoting a real emergency not far from his building.