Hey Everyone!
I apologize for the sudden author's note, but there's a quick topic I'd like to put on the table for consideration. You guessed it: A music suggestion. This particular music piece, I would say, most efficiently fits in with the second scene in this chapter; The flashback. You'll know it when you see it, I assure you. That being said, I'd also like to extend a thank you to those who have read this far and stuck with me through the whole story, high and low. Thank you.
Here's the new music suggestion, for those who are interested: Nobody's Fine
That's pretty much it for now. As always, I hope that you all enjoy this latest chapter of When Instinct Falls, as always! :)
Do enjoy...
"Whatever the ramifications, the beginning and end are always there, and so the choice to choose your path." - Barry Unsworth
*BONUS QUOTE*
"Everything we do has consequence, be it good or bad. Make your choices wisely." - Dennis Potter
1:03 P.M
Both Nick and Judy respectively were all too familiar with the sound of police sirens.
In the past, they've meant a multitude of things to them. To Nick, long before he met his current partner, he associated the blaring, mechanical wail of a police cruiser with that of restriction, refinement, and corruption. He knew that if he were ever caught, the officers, most of them being prey mammals, would have had some sort of bias against him, perhaps fueled by some subconscious fear or hate. Being a predator himself, Nick had been subjugated and abused by the system of society before, but by then, he was more than used to it. With nearly twenty years of street-smarts and other rather unorthodox experiences beneath his belt, the disgust and disdain that came with his own personal viewing of police officers was just another part of the title, just another thought in his mind, and just another part of his life, it seemed, simple as it may have been or appeared.
Nothing new, nothing foreign, and nothing less than what he already expected.
Judy herself, on the other hand, had always associated the sound of the siren with that of hope and determination. Ever since she was a young little kit, she had had dreams of becoming a real police officer. In a world that saw her as meek, weak, and hopeless, she dared to stand out against the beliefs of her society and strive to obtain what she truly desired. In the end, she had accomplished her goals, and proven to all of those whom had doubted her that she really did have what it took, but even more importantly, she had proven to herself that she really did have what it took. To her, that was all that she needed in life: Her own approval, her own beliefs, and her very own set of goals and intents.
With both mammals compared, it was clear that they both possessed very differing mindsets. When put together, however, their objectives aligned, and so did themselves; After meeting Judy for the first time, and becoming a police office himself, the very thing that he had grown up to despise, Nick Wilde begun to hear the sound of sirens in a different way. From there on out, he related them to change, will, discovery, and resolution, the source of the sounds being a deciding factor in the tide of battle, with the mere noise of a siren being able to unearth an entirely new outcome. To Judy Hopps, whom had always grown up an excessive optimist, she soon developed an association of sirens to that of an unknown aftermath. Such neutral outlooks were required for her, as she never knew what kinds of horrors would await her at the very source of the loud, blaring police sirens.
Over the years, there had been far too many times when the rabbit would arrive to the scene of a grisly crime, where the only thing drowning out the screams of those around her were the near deafening police sirens, constantly wailing and flashing with multicolored light, all the while reflecting an unnerving sense of despair and anticipation upon her.
Yet, despite that, she still considered herself and her work to be a beacon of hope. It was not her nor her associates that were responsible for all of the destruction that they had witnessed over the many long, hard years, but those that she battled against: Those that fought to falter and eliminate her desire to make the world a better place. Judy had encountered plenty of such mammals in the past before, but much like her beloved husband, she never let them get to her. Although she knew that sometimes, what lied right beneath a siren was not always a very pretty sight to see, she would do her job, her duty, with the utmost care and contentment, all simply to make the world a better place.
But now, as Nick and Judy exited the warehouse and came to sight with the conglomeration of police-issued vehicles and beige-clad forest officers, the one sound, above all else, that pierced through the air and grabbed their attention, was not that of the cruiser's blaring siren, but instead that of their own voices, calling out to their fellow police officers.
"Hey! Is everyone alright?" Judy yelled. "There's a bunch of marsupial thugs running around the complex!"
One of the officers, a female musk deer, raised her head and locked eyes with the rabbit running towards her, all the while calmly stating;
"Understood. We have a few mammals on it right now, chasing them down. The chance of catching a crime-lord is definitely an exciting concept. Oh, and also to answer your question, we're all fine, yes, but we're all that's here right now. Five cruisers with eight officers, plus you two, puts our total numbers at ten. Urzo's on his way right now, too."
Another of the officers, a male black bear, cleared his throat and pointed towards an approaching cruiser. "Better change that last sentence. He's here now." He muttered.
Glancing towards one another, Nick and Judy both nodded in unison, their mind's aligned, before making their way towards the cruiser, watching as the passenger door opened.
Approaching their grizzly bear superior, Chief Urzo, from the behind, they noticed the towering mammal turn around and spot them himself after the female white-tailed deer police officer that has been driving pointed towards Nick and Judy. The grizzly bear himself shooed off the deer officer before crossing his arms and looking down at Judy, saying;
"No more than twenty four hours on the case, and you've already disrupted a major criminal gathering. Reckless, perhaps, but I'm not undermining the effects of this."
"Just doing our jobs, sir." The rabbit replied swiftly. She couldn't tell whether Urzo was angry at them or not. "We're lucky that this happened in an enclosed area, though."
"Speaking of which, my officers say that shots were fired in that warehouse over there." He continued, gesturing towards the old, dilapidated building. "Is that claim true?"
Judy nodded her head once in acknowledgement. "Yes sir. The bad guys, these marsupials from Outback-Island working with Iluka Rombahe, had guns. Real guns." She told him.
"You know, the bullet kind that usually results in someone-" Nick started, but trailed off when his wife cleared her throat loudly, and continued her own explanation;
"It's clear that the enemy, these marsupial thugs, are both armed and dangerous."
Chief Urzo stroked at his scruffy chin in thought.
"Weapons like that can only be purchased in restricted gun shops, or on the black market. Zootopia may have very low murder rates, real firearms being as hard to obtain as they are, but it's no surprise to me that mammals working directly beneath a crime-lord would have access to them. Bogo was right: You two really are effective at this stuff."
"Aw, did he really say that about us?" Nick teasingly swooned.
"Don't press your luck, Wilde. This incident may have been a close call, but the paperwork is going to be keeping me up all night, and I have you to thank for that."
"You're welcome, Chief." The fox stated with a salute, to which Urzo just sighed tediously.
"Is there anything else you wish to report here?" He asked flatly.
Judy momentarily thought back to the events that had unfolded in the warehouse, and one bit in particular stuck out to her.
"Sir, there was a nasty little vampire bat from the warehouse saying something about a fire at Precinct One..." Judy mentioned to her superior. "Have you heard about this?"
The grizzly bear's shaggy brown face went slack with a seeming sense of angst and despair. He soon found his words, and told both Nick and Judy everything that he knew;
"Yes. Just an hour ago, there was an act of arson there. Somehow, someone managed to sneak into the building, locate the archive there, and set fire to it. I've just recently spoken with Chief Bogo over the phone, and although he told me that no one was hurt in the incident, a considerable amount of damage had been done to the archive itself."
"That's horrible!" Judy exclaimed anxiously. "Thank goodness that no one was hurt, but... To think that they might have..."
She trailed off with a chilling shiver that caused her body to slightly shake. Concurrently, Chief Urzo continued his grim explanation;
"It is a blessing that there were no casualties or injuries. The mammals there managed to extinguish the fire before it had a chance to spread very far, but the damage had been done: Vast portions of the archive, years of work, have been destroyed. Most importantly, however, the ZPD's latest little treasure trove of evidence has been incinerated, too."
"What do you mean?" Judy questioned with curiosity, causing her grizzly superior to sigh out loud with a long and hearty exhale straight from his maw. He then stated calmly;
"Just the other week, the media mogul Grygorri Ratsputin was killed, and the ZPD acquired a lot of stuff from his home, apparently. Helpful stuff. He was a blackmailer, yes, and the officers there uncovered a massive stash of rather compromising extortion information, though a lot of it was lost in the fire from this afternoon. Some of it survived, though what little did is in bad condition. The officers at Precinct One should still be able to get some use of what's left, though it's clear that a great opportunity for us all has been lost."
"Ugh, I knew it... As soon as I saw that bat with the sword, I knew something wasn't right." Nick grumbled, clearly upset over the loss of the archive that he had helped create.
"You two keep mentioning this supposed vampire bat." Urzo took note. "Who are you referring to?"
The lapin and vulpine both exchanged a thoughtful glance with one another before turning back to their superior. Nick stepped forward and told Urzo of their earlier endeavors;
"In the warehouse, the marsupials were doing business with a vampire bat named Lucy. She brought Iluka a sword, but not just any sword: Grygorri Ratsputin's sword. This proves that she was in the building during the time of the fire, and is likely the one that started it too. Heck, she even bragged herself about torching the place. We don't know why she took the sword in the first place, but I'd bet my tail that she burnt the archive because Ratsputin had something on her. With the evidence all gone, there's nothing to worry about for anyone that that nasty old rat ever had dirt on. They're in the clear. She spotted us as we were spying on her, though we did manage to get some recordings."
Nick took a brief moment to take a short inhalation before letting loose a slight chuckle to himself, thinking back on the crazy turn of events that had happened earlier.
"Also, Judy got in a fight with her, but she managed to escape the building before you guys arrived." Nick said. "You wouldn't have happened to have spotted her, would ya?"
Chief Urzo shook his large head from side to side. "I'm afraid not." He claimed broodingly, as if he were disappointed in himself.
"Alright, uh, did you catch anyone?"
Upon detecting this next question, however, Chief Urzo straightened himself out and spoke with more of a tinge of pride and determination in that deep voice of his.
"Of all the marsupial that took part in this event here, we only managed to apprehended a single one: A male, middle-aged platypus that my officers just recently found running around behind the complex where the firefight took place. They're bringing him here as we speak, and from there, we'll have him shipped off to Precinct Seven for interrogation."
"Great! One is better than none, amiright?" Nick quipped, raising his forearms.
"Right." The grizzly bear grumbled lowly. "Well, as for this supposed vampire bat of yours, I'll be sure to have my boys put out a search warrant for her as soon as we can."
Judy nodded. "Sounds like a good plan." She agreed. "We'll have to show you the recordings that we took sometime later. Right now, Nick and I need to go to Precinct One!"
"What? Oh no you're not!" Chief Urzo interjected. "You two aren't going back anywhere without my approval, and right now, Precinct Seven needs you here in the woodlands."
The rabbit faltered, and despite bearing an expression that suggested that she was preparing to talk back to her superior, she instead bit back her feelings and sighed longingly.
"Fine, we'll stay here, then." The bunny officer submitted quietly, to which the nearby grizzly bear nodded in agreement.
Although Nick and Judy both longed to return to their home at Precinct One in Savannah-Central, if only to check up on their friends and associates, including Clawhauser, Chief Bogo, and others, they knew that they could not. Despite the seriousness of the situation at hand, Chief Urzo himself would not allow them to leave yet, regardless of just how much they wanted to on the inside. It was a rather bitter pill to swallow, knowing that they could not help their old friends, especially for Judy, but in the end, she and her husband both knew that they were needed here in the Deciduous-District: Something seemingly sinister was on the horizon, and their talents were to be put to use to stop it.
"We have work to do, Nick." The rabbit claimed sternly. "Those marsupials are behind all this chaos, one way or another. We have to stop them before they do any more damage!"
Judy then stepped forward toward the direction of she and her husband's assigned police cruiser, but was promptly halted when Chief Urzo placed one of his paws in front of her.
"Before you two continue with your investigation, I have a request: I want you both to assist in the interrogation of the suspect that we detained earlier." The bear told them.
From there, Urzo then gestured off in a direction directly behind the two smaller officers, whom turned around and followed his instructions.
Glancing over to where the grizzly bear pointed, Nick and Judy both took in the sight of a timber wolf police officer leading a handcuffed platypus towards a nearby cruiser. The fox recognized the marsupial as being the same one from back in the warehouse, what with the ratty leather jacket and scarred face, looking quite intimidating despite his small size. Judy herself noticed that the platypus's legs were also cuffed close together, restricting the creature's movement and forcing it to shuffle to be able to move. It didn't really surprise her, as she was well aware that all male platypuses had venomous barbs jutting out from their hind legs, and so the cuffs were a necessity when dealing with them.
"Sir, you have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you in court." The timber wolf stated officially, though the platypus just hissed and spat;
"You want me tah cut ya?" The platypus growled in that ridiculous cockney accent of his. "Cuz I'll cut ya this way an' that, you'll look like a waffle!" He snarled, kicking at the air.
The wolfish officer frowned in disapproval. "Tell it to the judge, buddy." He retorted flatly before pushing the platypus into the back of his cruiser and slamming the door shut.
"See what I mean?" Urzo muttered wearily, jabbing a thumb towards the scene behind him. "Precinct Seven needs some real headstrong cops like you to get that guy to crack."
"Hold up now, did you just compliment us?" Nick found himself asking to his superior, his russet eyebrows raised and his mouth grinning in a cocky sort of facial expression.
"Don't get used to it, Wilde." The grizzly bear grumbled broodingly, straightening himself out and rising to his full height.
Nick turned to Judy and elbowed her shoulder. "I'm pretty sure he just complimented us." He told her.
"Quit it, you, you're just pushing our luck." The rabbit replied chidingly, though not without a slight grin edging at the corners of her lips.
"Well, we did kinda-" Nick began, but was promptly cut off when the nearby grizzly bear interrupted him mid sentence with his own statement.
"Okay, okay, enough of that, now." Chief Urzo demanded, though in a calm and almost fatherly tone of voice. "Anything else you have to say?"
"More serious question now, sir..." The fox started with a single finger raised in inquiry. "Why do you want us to interview that guy, exactly? We have some other work to do."
Chief Urzo nodded his head in understanding, though quickly recomposed himself before explaining;
"Since you two were the ones that witnessed the incident in the first place, I think it would be best if you were to take part in the interrogation." He claimed.
"Guess that makes sense." Judy murmured to herself before throwing up a precise and respectful salute to her larger superior. "We won't disappoint you, sir!"
"I would hope not. You both are dismissed, officers. Just be sure to report back to the station before you continue with your investigation, since we'll be needing your help. From there, you will give a report to me about the happenings that you witnessed with the marsupials in that little excursion of yours. After that, I will be done with you for the day."
"You got it, boss bear." The vulpine claimed, shooting a pair of double finger guns towards Urzo, whom simply blew a stream of air out through his thick nostrils.
Tipping his wide-brimmed deputy hat in a sign of farewell, Chief Urzo then folded his paws behind his muscular back and lumbered off towards the warehouse, no doubt intent on continuing with the clean-up and analyzation of the scene of the crime at the warehouse. Once he was far out of sight, Nick turned to Judy and promptly looked her in the eyes.
"So, that was fun." He claimed cheerily, placing his paws on his utility belt, all the while smiling wide at his wife. "Think we should stop and get some gas before we go to work?"
"Good idea, Slick. The cruiser probably needs some more juice in it after today's run-abouts. We can also call back Clawhauser on the way there. Let's go!"
With the concept of acquiring more gasoline for their vehicle fresh on his mind, Nick thought back to what that vampire bat had mentioned about a fire back in the warehouse.
"How do you think she did it?" He found himself asking his mate.
"Who did what now?" Judy rebutted, clearly confused.
"That vampire bat, Lucy." Nick clarified calmly. "How do you think she managed to get into the archive at Precinct One?"
"I have no idea. I'm sure we'll find out soon enough, though."
At that, the two tiny officers made way to their police cruiser, intent on putting together the next few pieces of the puzzle that was their adventure in the Deciduous-District.
1 Hour Earlier; Precinct One, Savannah-Central...
Another day's work, as it were.
Being a considerably seasoned sneak, Lucy Sang considered her current assignment to be just another walk in the park for her. All that she had to do was sneak into the air-ducts of the very building whose roof she was standing upon, and destroy the archive within, though not before snatching that rat's sword for her patron, of course, whom was expecting her to pull off the minor heist without damaging the package in question. Compared to some other jobs from her past, this particular outing seemed surprisingly simple.
However, there was still something that was slightly itching at her. She reasoned it to be the fact that the setting of her mission was none other than the very head-quarters of the Zootopia Police Department, Precinct One, located directly in the heart of Savannah-Central. The place would be crawling with police officers both day and night, so in the far end, it mattered not when she initiated her personal operation; She would have just as much chance of getting caught in the afternoon as she would have in the dead of night.
The risk of getting discovered and caught red-handed during her undertaking was high, yet still she was excited: She loved it when a degree of danger was involved with her work.
But there was no more time to waste. Steeling her nerves for the mission ahead of her, the vampire bat lept forward and plunged into the air filter opening that jutted out from the very top of the building's roof, and descended into the chilling darkness. The first thing that she noticed was the sudden change in temperature: Compared to the sweltering sun of the savanna beaming down upon her from the outside, the interior of the air-ducts was an understandably cooler location. The second thing that the bat noticed was the cramped space of the metal ducts; A tight fit at first, but quickly spacing out into a surprisingly roomy network of shiny shafts. Aside from those factors, there was little to sense.
Lucy had no idea where she was going, but fortunately had a secret little ability thanks to her species's long history of living in dark, cramped spaces such as this: Echolocation.
Pressing her tongue against the back of her gullet, she then swiftly thrusted it forward against the roof of her mouth, opening her fanged jaws slightly while doing so, effectively creating a sharp and sudden clicking noise that traveled throughout the maze of metal before her. Crawling forward a few more feet, she repeated the action once again, the increased range giving her a better idea of the path that she had to take to reach the archive. In her mind's eye, she was able to formulate a mental picture of her destination.
She smiled, and knew exactly where she needed to go.
Breathing out so as to prepare herself for the endeavor ahead of her, Lucy then began to squirm her way forward, the depths of the air ducts enveloping her in even more black shadows as she strayed away farther and farther from the entrance, the streams of luminous yellow light emanating from the behind of her gradually fading away until none remained, save for the occasional grated opening that she came across on her journey into the very heart of the building, where pools of artificial light poured through with ease.
With her, she carried a few small incendiary grenades strapped to her back, but she knew that those alone simply would not be enough to destroy the whole archive. First, she would need to dismantle the sprinkler system within the archive room, so as to prevent any bursts of concentrated water from dousing her arson attempt. From there, she then intended on using the matches and tiny gasoline canister that she had brought with her to ignite a small starting fire before finally letting loose and detonating her incendiaries.
Continuing to click her tongue against her jaws so as to prevent herself from forgetting where she was headed, the female vampire bat eventually managed to come across what she deemed to be the exit from the air ducts that would put her as close as possible to her final destination. Using her echolocation, she reasoned that the room below her was filled with rows upon rows of shelves and other means of containment; The perfect place to store vast amounts of compromising knowledge and other bits of secret intelligence.
The only thing that kept her from barging right in was the lone guard standing near the entrance.
From her hiding place in the duct above, Lucy could see through the tiny bars in the grated opening and make out the appearance of her mammalian obstacle; A hippopotamus police officer, she deduced him to be. Being as large as he was, the vampire bat figured that there would be no possible way for her to fight her way past him, not in a million years. Instead, she knew that she would have to rely on some other method to be able to get through and into the archive. Weighing her options, she considered the concept of searching for another entrance into the archive, perhaps through some sort of air-duct, but judging from what she had made out earlier with her echolocation, this was the only viable one. To get inside, Lucy needed some sort of distraction... Something that would temporarily remove that pesky guard so that she would be able to access the archive...
But what?
Pursing her lips in thought, the vampire bat ultimately decided that she'd simply have to wait the hippo out. It was practically lunchtime, and if this particular hippo had as big of an appetite as virtually every other one, then he would likely go off to find something to eat sooner rather than later. After a few more minutes of patient waiting, Lucy smiled at the sight of the guard exiting the vicinity and lumbering away, undoubtedly for lunch. With the guard finally gone, it was at last time for Lucy to act the next phase of her plan.
Dismantling the grated opening with haste, Lucy promptly dropped down into the room below her, and took in the sight of the towering bookshelves filled with boxes, evidence, and other supplies. It was definitely not a place meant for smaller mammals like her. Given its sheer size, it would be difficult to burn down entirely, but there was one factor that Lucy was relying on in her favor: Paper, and lots of it. She knew that paper burned incredibly easily, and in an office-like environment such as this, there was tons of it.
Snickering slightly beneath her breath, the vampire bat flapped around and began to tear chunks of paper from the many folders and piles of material around her, throwing bits of the stuff in the air, and sprinkling it along the ground and shelves. She planted both individual sheets and piles of paper in strategic locations, allowing for maximum amounts of burning potential. Five minutes had passed since she had first entered the archive, and she had a bad feeling in her gut that the guard would be coming back sooner or later.
Hastily finishing with the paper, Lucy then lept into the air and flew towards the roof high above her, where she began to bite and claw at the sprinkler heads implanted into the ceiling, intent on tampering with them just enough so that their destruction wasn't noticed, at first, but also still didn't function properly. She bent them, broke them, and even stuffed tiny bits of cloth into them. Whatever it took to minimize the amount of water that would flood into the room the second that those pesky fire alarms went off.
Once the sprinklers were all dealt with as best she could, the bat then used the tiny vile of gasoline that she had brought with her; Pouring doses of it upon strategic locations that would allow the imminent fire of hers to burn more efficiently. From there, she begun to search for her secondary objective: The sword of Grygorri Ratsputin, of which she had been personally instructed to retrieve by the tasmanian devil crime-lord of Outback-Island, Iluka Rombahe. She didn't care for him, nor did she know why he wanted the blade for himself, but she didn't question it. Her job was to get the sword, burn the archive, and get out. That was all she needed to know, and that all she hoped to do.
Eventually, after another two minutes of digging around throughout the depths of the archive, she came across a pole-like object stuffed in the corner of the room, of which she deduced to be some sort of cane. With her time limit as stretched as it already was, Lucy knew that any more rummaging around would be a waste, so she then grabbed the item in her clawed feet before flapping up to the still-open air-duct, where she perched before unstrapping the grenades from the belt around her, and pulling out the matches.
Igniting the tiny match sticks before tossing them to the ground far below her, Lucy then pulled all of the pins on all of the incendiaries at once before dropping them and quickly scampering back into the safety of the air-duct. Below her, she heard the tiny grenades plop onto the ground with a slight thud, having entered the room successfully.
The vampire bat stuffed her fingers into her ear canals. "Fire in the hole." She whispered darkly to herself, smiling all the while.
In a loud flash of heat and noise, the room bellow her rattled from the force of the explosion. She began to feel the air-duct that she was hiding in heat up, and that's when she realized that she couldn't stay here: She had to flee, and make her escape. Using her echolocation abilities once more, she clicked her tongue again and again, gradually leading down the path that she came before finally reaching the ventilation filter protruding from the roof of the building. Gasping aloud, she immediately took to the air.
Quickly flapping to a higher altitude so as to distance herself from the building, Lucy's sensitive ears detected the blaring noise of the fire alarms below her. She smiled to herself, recognizing a job well done. Now, all that was left to do was to take the old cane-sword back to Iluka. However, having realized the fact that the ZPD's collection of compromising evidence against the various crime-lords of the city had at last been destroyed (Or most of it, at the very least, she hoped), Lucy figured that it wouldn't hurt to make a quick lil' phone call before continuing her endeavor. After flapping around for another few minutes, she eventually found refuge inside a grimy highway billboard, the dark space providing a decent place to rest and to hide from the authorities while she made her brief little call. The back of the billboard smelled like rusted metal and rot.
It wasn't the most conventional of places to take a break, but it would just have to do.
Setting down the cane, she unzipped her bodysuit and reached inside, fondling around her chest for a moment before pulling out her mobile device. Scrolling through her list of personal contacts, she eventually came upon a single mammal that she had dubbed as 'Vladdy-Daddy' in the corresponding contact profile, along with a few little emoticon heart shapes next to the name. Lucy smiled, biting her lower lip as she promptly selected the aforementioned contact and brought the mobile device up to one of her large ears.
The flat, buzzing tone of the device continued for a few short seconds before stopping, and being promptly replaced by a voice that she knew all to well, by now.
"Hello?" The voice of Lucy's fellow vampire bat associate, Vladzotz Fangpyre, questioned with a curious tone. "Is that you, Lucy?"
Lucy smiled to herself. "Yes, it's me, Vladdy. Hi!" She started. "I just wanted to quickly call you to let ya know that the job is done. I did it!"
"You destroyed the archive? Excellent work, my dear! I simply cannot thank you enough for your courage."
"I can think of a few ways you can, honestly." The female claimed in a sultry voice. "But we'll save that for later... I need to get this cane-shank to your tazzy friend, pronto."
From the other side of the line, Lucy detected Vladzotz make a deep and resonating hmm sort of sound beneath his breath. He soon found his words and spoke out;
"Understood. I wish you only the very best of luck, my dear. Stay safe out there."
"You're such a worrywart sometimes, Vladdy." Lucy stated. "I'll be fine, I promise. I'll see you back at the safehouse, hon."
At that, the female vampire bat leaned into the phone and made a quick clicking sound with her lips, imitating the sound of a brief kiss, before promptly ending the call.
"Hmm... Guess I'd better call the tazzy now, too." She then muttered to herself, thinking it best to alert Iluka Rombahe of her successful mission before she tried to find him.
From there, she glided through her contact list once again, soon coming across another contact labeled as 'Anger Issues'. She selected it, and brought the phone to her ears.
Almost instantly, the tasmanian devil picked up. "You'd better have good news for me, bat!" He roared from his side of the line.
Lucy's large ears pulled back from the phone due to the sheer volume and force of the devil's cries. Rolling her emerald-colored eyes, she hissed back to him;
"Don't get your pouch in a wad, tazzy. The job's done, and I got you your cane-shank, too. I'm heading out to the rendezvous point right now, as we speak."
2:10 P.M, Present time; Precinct Seven, Deciduous-District...
No time to waste.
Exhaling in preparation, the bunny turned the handle on the door before pushing against it, opening the interior of the space to their bodies, of which promptly set foot within before closing the door behind them. Eyeing over the room, neither of the two tiny officers were expecting to see very much, for interrogation rooms like this one were almost always devoid of anything more than a bare metal table and a few simple chairs on each side of it. Sure enough, at the table, sitting down with his ankles cuffed to the legs of the chair and his wrists tied together in restriction as well, the platypus that had been caught by the Precinct Seven officers earlier that day, was patiently awaiting his inquiry.
Sparing a quick glance over the peculiar-looking marsupial's position, Judy stepped forward and approached the table without hesitation. As she did, she recalled facts about the suspect's identity and criminal record, of which had been supplied to her earlier by the officers that were managing the interrogation and everything surrounding it as well. The rabbit dubbed the platypus as Oliver Orthin, a citizen of Outback-Island whom was associated with the criminal syndicate there that was run by the crime-lord Iluka Rombahe.
"Hello, Mister Orthin." She started calmly. "We're just going to ask you a few questions, alright?"
"Aye then, ya best get to it, ya bloody lil' tossers. I've already been sittin' sound 'ere long enough." The platypus grumbled thickly.
"Is it okay if we call you Oliver?" Nick asked in an almost teasing tone of voice. "That is your first name, isn't it?"
"Don't you call me that, fox!"
"Okay then, Oliver..." The fox began nonchalantly, purposefully emphasizing the platypus's true name. "First question: What exactly was going on back there in the compound?"
The platypus snarled a watery grumble. "Jus' personal business there, lad. Nothin' ya blue heelers should be worryin' 'bout." He claimed, his thick accent slurring out loud.
"Personal business?" Judy interjected, her attention having been snagged by that particular word.
"Aye. Iluka's on anotha' one o' his barmy lil' treasure hunts. This time, he's after somethin' a bit different than the usual marsupial rubbish ova' on Outback-Island."
"And just what is he after, exactly?" Nick questioned with raised russet eyebrows.
"New odds and ends." Oliver mumbled flatly, as if the answer was obvious. "Thas' all I'm sayin', foxy."
"If that's all that your gonna say, then why bother telling us in the first place?" Judy found herself asking.
The platypus turned towards the rabbit with a smile on his face. "Because thas' stuff ya already know, sheila. Ain't it obvious? I'm just 'ere for the laughs." He claimed.
Oliver began to chuckle watery-sounding snickers beneath his breath. Furrowing his brow, Nick stepped forward and grabbed Judy's arm, pulling her away and into the nearby corner of the room, farther away from the giggling platypus. Once settled in a secure position, he released his hold on the bunny's forearm before turning towards her dutifully.
"Carrots, we aren't gonna get anything out of him like this. I used to work with mammals like this bozo, and if there's one thing I learned from any of 'em, it's that they don't listen to reason, and they don't give in to anyone. This guy is just a run-down thug trying to act tough, and we all know it, even him. But that persona makes him hard to crack, and if we want to walk out of this room with something other than a stress migraine, I suggest we change tactics. I'll start off with some personal questions, you follow my lead."
Nodding in agreement, Judy paced away from her husband and towards the other side of the table. She noticed that Oliver was still giggling in his seat like a seeming maniac, though now that Nick had pointed it out, she saw through his facade with ease: He really was scared, and was truly doing all that he could to keep himself from showing his fear.
Alongside the cuts on his face and missing patches of fur, the platypus's bill seemed to be slightly cracked around the edges, Nick took note of. Given the irate mammal's rather tough-guy sort of attitude, the fox reasoned that those wounds must've been the marks of old tussles and brawls. He decided to use this deduction to his advantage, hoping that if he got Oliver to talk a little bit about himself, that he could then loop around back to the original topic at hand, and maybe get the platypus to let slip on something important.
"Say there, what happened to your bill?" The fox asked, gesturing to Oliver's fractured mandible.
The platypus sneered, growling lowly to himself before spitting to the side and glaring at Nick with hate.
"I got in a fight with a big, stupid wolf." Oliver hissed. "He lost."
Nick snorted a slight chuckle through his nostrils before leaning over on to the metal table and musing aloud;
"Tough guy, huh? I can respect that, though your type is usually the kind that ends up cracking the quickest, believe it or not... Always so predictable and short-minded..."
The fox's grin grew even wider with amusement. He continued his scornful statement;
"You, on the other hand, are being exceptionally stubborn."
"I'll cut ya, foxy!" Oliver threatened angrily.
"Enough of that!" Judy suddenly demanded with a stern, startling voice, clearing having lost her patience with the platypus's uncooperative demeanor. "No more games!"
Stepping forward and slamming both of her paws onto the metal table before her, she then leaned threateningly towards Oliver with narrowed eyes and bared buck-teeth.
"Listen here, you little ruffian, because I'm only going to say this once, you understand me? Just two days ago, there was a robbery and a murder at a historical museum here, and we know that you and your little pouch-pack friends are the ones behind it! We have recordings of you mentioning the crime at the warehouse on us right now, and we are not afraid to bring them up in a courthouse if we have to, so I suggest that you drop the bad attitude, bite back your childish insults, and tell us what we need to know already!"
As Judy concluded her final few words, a sudden silence filled the room, as if her last breath had sucked all of the oxygen right from it. Breaking the moment of quietude, the platypus seated at the table broke out in a wheezing string of laughter that left him pounding his balled fists on the metal table in seeming hysteria and amusement. This went on for a few more seconds before he leaned back in his seat, and with a wheezing grunt, glanced towards the rabbit with a look of what almost looked like pity across his muzzle.
"Is all that supposed to scare me?" He muttered in question. "Please. I've done time before, rabbit. And speaking of time, you're wastin' yours. Go chase a carrot, or something."
The bunny's mouth dropped in disbelief, and her facial expression quickly contorted into that of frustration and anger. She seemed just about to pipe out in rebuttal, but instead chose to silence herself and back away from the table before turning around and exiting the room, slamming the metal-coated door behind her as she left the immediate vicinity.
Come on, Whiskers... You're stronger than that. I guess it's just a bad day for her. I'll need to do something about that later on. This bloke's a waste, anyways... Nick thought.
Sparing a final glance at the platypus cuffed to the table in the center of the room, the fox then turned tail and followed his mate outside, closing the door shut behind him much more carefully than how the rabbit had just moments before. Staring down the hallway before him, he quickly caught sight of Judy leaning against a nearby wall with her arms crossed against her chest, and one of her feet thumping rapidly against the carpet floor beneath their toes. Nick figured that she must've been pretty mad, given her looks.
"Hey, you alright there, fluff-butt?" He asked her calmly, his paws stuffed subtly in his pockets. Judy sighed aloud before responding.
"I just don't want to deal with mammals that don't want to cooperate. That platypus is right: We were just wasting our time. Urzo and the others can take over from now on."
"That's a good philosophy to have, it really is. But sometimes, it's worth keeping in mind that rolling up your sleeves and charging in head first is another workable alternative."
At the fox's comment, the bunny smiled slightly, and the former felt his heart flutter, knowing that he had managed to calm her down at least somewhat, for the moment.
"Yeah, I guess you're right. I went in there thinking we would get the whole picture lickety-split, like we did with Shahaz all those months ago. Not so clear-cut now, is it?"
She sighed once more, taking a momentary pause to catch her breath before continuing her previous statement;
"I think I'm just done for today, though. After walking around Beaverdam for six hours and getting in a firefight all in the same afternoon, well-"
"Least they could do is cut us some slack, eh?" Nick finished his partner's sentence, his own grin widening by the second. "Before we go, we gotta stop by Urzo's first, remember?"
"Uh-huh, I remember. I may be a dumb-bunny sometimes, but I'm not that forgetful."
"I'd argue against that, considering the fact that you forgot your own birthday this year."
"I was under a lot of stress then, okay?" Judy retorted. "It was the least of my concerns, at the time."
"Whatever you say."
Judy smiled wide.
"Alright, Slick, let's go and check in with Chief Urzo, shall we?" The rabbit started with perked ears and eyes shining with anticipation. "We still have more work to do here."
Hey Everyone!
Man, this was a fun chapter! Despite the sudden revelation on the fire at Precinct One, I admit that I had a considerable amount of enjoyment writing this particular chapter up for you lot, what with the new scenes, new dialogue, and new characters, although I reckon we won't be seeing that platypus again, eh? Regardless, I thank you all for reading this chapter, and implore you to leave a nice review detailing your thoughts on it! I do love me my reviews, of course. Alongside that, if you haven't already, do feel free to favorite and/or follow this story, as each and every single one is very, very highly appreciated.
Next announcement: On my Tumblr and Deviantart accounts, you can find some new fan-art to take a gander at, if you so choose. Just lettin' ya'll know.
Anyhow, that's pretty much all that I got to say for now. As always, thanks for reading this latest update of ours, and do stay tuned for the next one! :)
'Till next time...
Peace!