Chapter 13-

Judy had decided to have only one small drink for politeness's sake. She suspected Nick would have as well, had it not been for Barker insisting that he do so. Probably just to spite her- Nick still had a problem with authority- he'd allowed Bonnaire to get him a few more. Then he bought a few rounds to repay the favor.

Nick was now pretty sloshed. She kept an eye on him as he slowly swayed from side to side on the bar stool.

"So these fighters," he said eagerly. "How fast do they go?"

Bonnaire had gotten to talking about the starstrike craft again, primarily because Nick seemed remarkably interested in them. Judy sipped a glass of water, watching him curiously. She'd never imagined him taking an interest in something like that.

"Oh, fast," said Bonnaire, slurring the word very slightly. For a small woman, she could put away some liquor. "Like, lessee...what's the fastest plane on your planet?"

Nick frowned. "Probably the Blackhawk. I think it makes about three, four times the speed of sound."

"Okay," said Bonnaire. "That's variable, but we'll say, I don't know, six thousand klicks an hour. That's about 1.6 kilometers a second- sixteen hundred meters a second."

Barker raised her eyebrows. "Wow. That seems pretty fast."

"Uh-huh. Now, remember, we're in space. Nothing to slow you down. So if we accelerate at a paltry one gee- that's 32 meters a second- it would take, um, fifty seconds to hit that speed. A little less than a minute."

Nick looked impressed. "You can do that in your head?"

The pilot grinned. "While drunk, too. That's easy math. All right. Now one of our fighters- I can't give exact numbers, but with inertial compensation they can accelerate at a rate of about one hundred gees for a short period of time. That's 3200 meters per second, per second."

Judy blinked. Nick's eyes widened. "You mean, in one second, they go twice as fast as our fastest plane."

"And keep accelerating," confirmed Bonnaire. "They can't pull that off in atmo- in atmosphere, I mean. Still, if they could- and change their heading fast enough- after about twelve seconds or so of that kind of acceleration they could encircle Terra in one second. Though most of them aren't designed to enter atmosphere. Only the surface attack craft."

Barker and Judy exchanged uneasy looks. They had been okay with the talk of speed- it wasn't particularly warlike- but surface attack was a different matter.

Nick seemed unperturbed. In fact, he looked excited. "Wow! Hey, is there any chance I could go on a flight?"

Bonnaire looked surprised, then amused. "Maybe on one of our trainer craft. Not as fast, but I think you'd enjoy it. I'll run it by the XO- the executive officer," she explained.

Nick smiled at her. "That'd be great!" he enthused.

Barker leaned over to Judy. "Better be careful. Fly-girl there might steal your boyfriend," she said jokingly.

Judy rolled her eyes. "Are we going to have time for a- a space ride-along?" she wondered aloud. "I mean, I thought we were headed straight for AlphaCen."

Bonnaire looked at her. "It's about a week's journey," she said with a shrug. "I mean, I don't know if the captain will go for it-" she hesitated slightly- some of the comments she'd made indicated the captain was not at all fond of the Terrans, "-but there's no reason to think we couldn't otherwise. We'll be running CSP's all along our route, after all. It's procedure."

"CSP's?" asked Barker.

"Sorry. Fleet loves its TLA's- that's Three Letter Acronyms," said Bonnaire with a smile. "CSP is Combat Space Patrol."

Barker grinned. "Yeah, the police does something similar, except we like to MALLOW."

The human frowned. "MALLOW?"

"Make Acronyms Look Like Other Words."

Something Bonnaire had said just clicked in Judy's head. "Combat?" she said, alarmed. "You mean there might be fighting?"

"Oh, no," said the pilot reassuringly. "Closer to a drill, or practice. This is one of the safest parts of the Human Stars. What could possibly happen?"

Both Judy and Barker tensed. Bonnaire frowned. "What?"

The two cops looked around nervously. "Sorry," explained Barker. "It's just when you're a cop you learn not to say anything like that."

The human chuckled. "Oh, don't be ridiculous. Everything is fine."

"You say that," said Judy slowly, still looking around the bar. "But I have to wonder- where did Nick go?"

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Nick stumbled down a corridor, holding one paw out to steady himself against a nearby wall. Gradually, it dawned on him that he had been walking for far longer than he had expected. He stopped at yet another intersection. He had forgotten how many he had passed.

"Now," he said muzzily. "I know the bathroom- no, the head- was around here somewhere." He looked left, then right, then- more or less at random- decided to go right. Still leaning on the wall for support, he moved along.

Suddenly, the wall he had been using to keep his balance disappeared. The fox stumbled and fell, his head bouncing against the metal deck. "Ow," he said. Deciding that was insufficient for his needs, he elaborated. "Owww."

A human's face appeared over him. "Is dog," said the face. "Is orange dog. Hello, orange dog."

"Maxie, whaddaya talking 'bout?" Another face appeared, this one as dark as Hunter. It studied him as well. "I t'ought the captain said no more of them plush toys?"

Nick blinked at that. "I'm not a toy," he said.

Both faces moved closer, their expressions turning to surprise. "Is talking dog," said the first face- Maxie? "We should tell colonel, Mick."

"Naw, Maxie, it's a talkin' plush toy," said Mick. "See?" He poked Nick in the snout.

Nick, annoyed now, smacked away his hand. "Hey! Stop that!" He shakily rose to his feet, seeing the two humans a bit more clearly. Marines, he guessed- they were wearing the thingamajigs- battle dress uniforms. Working clothes, Bonnaire had said. "That's no way to treat a guest."

Both Marines took a step back. "Wait a minute," said Mick slowly. "This ain't no toy."

"And I heard Marines were stupid," said Nick, but the fall had sobered him enough that he said it under his breath.

"Is talking dog," said Maxie stubbornly.

"I'm a fox, dammit. Nick Wilde," said Nick. "Who're you? And where am I? And where's the bathroom?"

Mick pointed to himself. "PFC Mitchell Weatherly. This ugly galoot is Private Serafim Macksimov, Maxie to his friends. And also to me." He cocked his head, studying the fox. "You're a Terran, then?"

"Yup," said Nick. "So where's the bathroom?"

"You mean head?" asked Maksimov.

Nick peered at him, swaying slightly. "Do you want to stand there correcting me on Fleet terminology or tell me where the bathroom is before I just go on your floor?"

"Deck," said Maksimov.

"What?"

"Is called deck. Not floor."

Nick gave him a long, measuring look, then moved to the wall with his back facing them. He unzipped his pants.

"Wait, wait!" cried Weatherly. He pointed. "T'rough that door."

Nick zipped back up. "Thanks."

When he had finished washing his paws, he walked back out. The two Marines from before had turned into a dozen.

"See, Gunny? Is talking dog," said Maksimov, pointing to Nick.

A tall, older man peered at him. "It hasn't talked yet."

Nick was starting to get annoyed. "Don't they tell you guys anything? I'm a fox. And a Terran."

The older man leaned back. "Well, I'll be damned. What's your name, son?"

"Nick Wilde." He put out his paw. The Marine hesitated. "Oh, come on," said Nick impatiently. "I washed it."

Gingerly, the Marine shook his paw. "Sorry, wasn't sure of the protocol. We weren't expected to meet any of you guys. I'm Gunnery Sergeant Sadowski."

So was "Gunny" his rank? "Pleased to meet you." He looked around. "Well, I should get back to the bar."

"The bar?" said Sadowski, puzzled. "Oh, you mean the officer's club. How'd you get all the way down here from there?"

Nick shrugged. "Walked." He thought about it. "Staggered," he corrected.

"Well, if you really want to go," said Sadowski, seeming a bit disappointed. "But I'm sure the boys would like to meet you."

Nick hesitated. "Judy might be worried about me..."

"Oh, come on," said Sadowski. "We were just going to play a hand of poker."

The fox's ears quivered slightly. "Poker? What's that?"

The Marines blinked, then a few exchanged glances. Sadowski smiled. "It's a card game. We like to play with money, keep it interesting. You have any money?"

Nick reached into his pocket. "Not real sure about the value of human money versus ours. You think this will be enough?" He held out a wad of the odd, shiny human money, his entire allowance for the trip.

The gunnery sergeant's eyes gleamed with sudden avarice, and he swallowed. "Yeah, I think that might about do it."

"Gosh, sounds like fun." Nick smiled, his teeth glinting whitely in the light. "So how does this game work?"

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Judy paced her room, considering whether to contact the captain or not. Quite frankly, from a number of comments Bonnaire had let slip, and what she had seen, she wasn't particularly keen on dealing with that particular human. He seemed to hold a grudge against the Terrrans, though for what reason she couldn't fathom.

On the other paw, Nick had been missing for four hours. The ship was over a kilometer long, she had been told. He could be anywhere. Bonnaire had been unworried, assuring her that he couldn't end up anywhere too dangerous.

"Unless he wanders into the Marine barracks," she had said, her tone joking.

Judy looked up at the ceiling. "Room, what's the time?"

"I'm sorry, I don't have a dime. Is there something else I can help you with?"

"You're just messing with me now," grumbled Judy. She made a decision. She reached for the intercom-

The door slid open, and a bedraggled-looking fox stumbled in. He blinked at Judy. "Isn't this my room?"

"Yes," she said angrily. "I've been waiting for you to come back for hours!"

"Oh," he said. "Sorry." His speech was still slightly slurred. She sniffed the air.

"You weren't in the bar- were you still drinking?'

"Yup," he said, nodding. He mumbled something that sounded vaguely like "bed" in the general direction of the ceiling. Immediately, the bed folded out and he collapsed onto it. "Marines sure can put away a lot of beer," he said sleepily.

Judy glared at the ceiling. "Oh, you understand him, room? Do you only speak drunk?" Then she processed Nick's last comment. "Marines? What were you doing with Marines?" She moved closer and noticed his pockets.

They were stuffed with money. Disbelievingly, she started pulling out wads of cash. "Nick, where did you get this?"

"Marines," he said, eyes closed.

She did a rough count, then an even rougher conversion to Zootopian dollars. "Nick, this is close to five thousand dollars! What'd you do, rob them?"

"Nope. They gave it to me."

She frowned down at him. "Gave it to you?" she asked skeptically.

"What else do you call it? Don't they know the first rule of gambling? Never play with anyone who innocently says 'Gosh, sounds like fun' when you mention a game."

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Nick woke up with a thunderous headache. He let out a groan and blinked at the light. Why was the room light on?

As if in answer to his question, a gray-furred paw put a glass of water next to him on the fold-out table next to his bed. He looked up groggily. "Carrots? You can't let a fox sleep in a bit?"

"Captain's invited us to have lunch with him," she said. She looked pointedly at the fox. "You slept all morning."

He reached over and grabbed his cell phone, turning it on so he could check the time. "Oh." He grudgingly swung his legs over the edge of the bed and sipped at the water. He winced. "I thought the saying was 'liquor before beer, everything's clear'."

Judy raised an eyebrow. "I think if you have that much to drink, it doesn't matter what order you put it in."

There was a chiming sound and the room spoke. "There is someone waiting outside your room," said the room cheerfully. "Shall I open the door?"

Nick jumped up and hastily grabbed his pants. "No, no- don't open the door!"

The door slid open, revealing Colonel la Mancha, who raised an eyebrow at Nick. The fox, a bit unsteady and surprised, overbalanced with one leg in his pants, falling to the floor.

"It's my pleasure to obey," said the room happily.

"Then why don't you?" snarled Nick.

"I'm afraid I don't understand. Why don't I what?"

La Mancha sighed. "My apologies for the room AI. We never have quite worked out the bugs." He looked down at Nick, who had managed to get into his pants successfully, then to Judy. Immediately he bowed deeply. "Miss Hopps. You look lovely this morning." He took the surprised bunny's paw and raised it to his lips.

Judy and Nick exchanged surprised looks. "I- thank you," she said.

"Admittedly," continued the colonel, "I am unsure what the standards of beauty for a sapient bunny would be, but I find it is best to assure every female of whatever species that they look especially lovely when you see them."

"Next time," suggested Judy, "Just stop at 'you look lovely.'"

The colonel gave her a grave nod and pulled out a small, expensive-looking leather book with a lock on it from his back pocket, as well as a pen. He wrote carefully in it. "My diary," he said, seeing their puzzled looks. "I encourage all my Marines to keep one. Particularly in combat. Writing down your thoughts, feelings, and words of advice-" he nodded to Judy, "-can be soothing in times of trouble."

"Don't they, you know, have other things to do during combat?" asked Nick warily. "Like, I don't know, fighting?"

"Well, certainly," said the colonel. "But there are always lulls. And if there aren't, I encourage them to make them."

"Make them?" Nick had finished dressing and was now trying to flatten down a bit of his fur that was standing up.

"Yes. By killing the enemy around them. Not only does that generally assist in achieving their objective, but it also allows them time to write," said la Mancha, showing every indication of seriousness. "But I digress. I have come to escort you to the captain's table. As well as to the food on it, I presume. The captain did not specify."

Nick gave up on the errant tuft of hair with a sigh. "Right. Well, let's go, then."

As he started forward, a wad of cash fell from his pants pocket. Judy snatched it up and shoved it back in his pocket, glancing up to see la Mancha's reaction. He just waited patiently and gestured for them to follow him.

She breathed a sigh of relief as they followed the colonel down the corridor. "Nick," she said quietly. "You had better keep from flashing that money around."

"Why?" he asked, still a bit bleary-eyed. "Won it fair and square."

"Do I really have to explain it to you?" she whispered. She gestured to la Mancha. "Those are his Marines!"

He squinted at the colonel's back. "So?" he asked.

"Miss Hopps fears that I will be upset with you for taking money from my Marines during your poker game last night," said la Mancha over his shoulder.

There was a short pause. "Are you?" asked Nick in a small voice.

La Mancha turned, so suddenly that Nick found himself very close to the human. He leaned down. "I fear you have made a grave tactical error, young Master Wilde."

Nick looked up at the human's grey eyes and gulped. He felt Judy tense next to him.

The colonel nodded. "Indeed. You see, it is not wise to have Marines owe you money."

"How'd you know- wait, why not?"

"If you ever get in trouble, they may not rescue you," said la Mancha. "It is far better to owe them money. Then they have incentive."

Nick blinked. "Huh. Am I likely to need rescuing?"

"If my Marines owe you money?" La Mancha started walking again. "Quite possibly."

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Tavi found Hunter, quite to her surprise, on the Academy running track. He waved as he saw her. Sweating, he slowed to a walk as he approached. "Hey, rookie."

"Zach?" She looked around, but there was no sign of anyone in authority. "Are they still making you run? Didn't you have a concussion?"

He put a finger to his lips. "Not so loud, Tavi." He cautiously looked around. "I'm not supposed to be out here."

"Wait." She frowned. "Don't tell me you're only running on the track because they told you not to."

"No, no." He picked up a bottle of water and took a long swig. "I just realized I needed a bit more exercise than I had been getting. And I feel fine. Not the first time I've been knocked loopy."

They were interrupted by a warthog, who ran up waving a piece of paper. "Mr. Hunter! I think I know why you lost the fight with McHorn." He held up the paper. "I did these calculations, see, and-"

Hunter squinted at the paper, which was filled with equations and numbers. "You know, when I became a police officer, I was told there would be no math."

"But-"

"I lost the fight, Tibbs, because he outweighs me by about a ton or more." Hunter shrugged. "It is what it is."

"I've got an idea how you can beat him, though," said the warthog, looking disconsolate.

"So do I. It involves a tire iron and a dark alley," said Hunter.

"Um..."

"So what's up, Anila?" asked Hunter, transferring his attention to the mongoose. "Are Nick and Judy okay? I guess they won't be able to send email until they're off the Nike."

"As far as I know," said Tavi. "No, I came by to see if you were feeling well enough to help me out."

"What with?"

Tavi held up some photos. "These are some of the leaders of the local Fellowship of Terra churches," she said. "I've been trying to get someone to do surveillance on them. See where they go, who they talk to."

Hunter took the photos. "I know him," he said, pointing to one. "He came around my apartment, begging for an autograph or something."

Tavi nodded. "Yeah, remember, they think you're a god or saint or something."

Hunter frowned, then looked at Tibbs, whose eyes were wide. "You didn't hear that." He looked back at Tavi. "Tibbs is a good kid, but we need to be careful where we spread this around, okay?"

"Sorry," she said, ears lying flat. "I didn't think."

"It's okay, rookie." He sat down on a nearby bench and looked through the photos again. "So when did they start the surveillance."

"They didn't," said Tavi angrily. "They won't listen to me."

Hunter paused, looked down at her. "These photos are clearly surveillance photos- dammit, Tavi!"

"What?" She put her paws on her hips and scowled up at the human. "If they won't do it, then I will."

"You could have gotten hurt-"

"I'm a cop, Zach!" said Tavi. "It's my job to take risks!"

"Not while I'm not around to keep you safe!"

"You can't be around all the time, Zach. And I've still got a job to do."

Both of them were ignoring Tibbs, who, glancing between them with wide eyes, decided it was a good time to make himself scarce. He backed off and headed towards the barracks.

"Tavi, you just- I can't-" Hunter avoided her eyes.

The mongoose's anger evaporated. "Hunter?"

He covered his eyes.

She hopped up onto the bench and cautiously touched his shoulder with her paw. "Zach."

He took a deep breath and looked at her. "Anila. Listen. This is a big deal. This Prometheus character- whoever he is- means business." He held her gaze. "And for whatever reason, he's interested in me. And that means he might come after those who are close to me. I'm not-" he looked away. "I'm not strong enough to lose anyone else," he said, in a voice almost too low to hear.

She hugged him. "I'll be okay."

He sighed and looked up at the sky. "Rookies always think that." There was a wistful tone in his voice. "Tavi, listen. I had a rookie, once, named Katie Warner. She was a great kid. Smart, motivated, and dedicated to the job. She used to run rings around me when I was training her."

His eyes were unfocused, as if he were looking into the past. "Katie cleared the field training program with flying colors. You know those awards I got copies of, the ones my rookies won? Three of those are hers." He looked down at his hands. "The last one was posthumous."

Tavi blinked back tears as she heard the heartbreak in his voice. "What happened?" she asked quietly.

"There was a robbery. A major crew- they were connected to a terrorist group, used bank robberies to finance the cause. They decided to start shooting hostages, and she put together an entry team from the officers that had arrived and went in." He shook his head. "They got all but one of the bad guys, but she took three bullets. Katie died before I could even get there."

"It doesn't sound like she had a choice," said Tavi.

He looked up at Tavi. "I'm not trying to criticize her, Tavi. But she was overconfident. In another five minutes I would have been there, along with who knows how many other officers."

"It could have been you that died, then, Zach."

His next words were a whisper. "Sometimes I wish it had been."

She felt her heart skip a beat. "Zach-"

He held up a hand. "I don't mean I'm suicidal, Anila. I just mean- if I could have taken those bullets instead of Katie Warner- if I could switch places with her right now- I would." He shook his head. "So listen to me, rookie. Don't go off on your own on this one. Let me help, at least."

Slowly, Tavi nodded. "All right, Zach. I won't."

"So what's your plan?"

She picked up the photos, held them up. "Well, they think you're a saint, right?"

"Yeah?"

"Would you lie to a saint?"

He blinked. "Would I? Me?"

"Okay," said Tavi, rolling her eyes. "Would most people lie to a saint?"

"No-o-o," said Hunter, thinking it over. "Oh. Wait, your brilliant plan is-"

"To ask them what's going on. It's sheer genius in its simplicity."

Hunter eyed her. "That's definitely one way to put it."

Author's Note: To any Marines who might be reading this- I'm joking! It's all in good fun! Please don't find me in a dark alley!

Don't worry, I'm going to make it up to you. The Marines will be awesome, as is their wont.

I should point out, by the way, that I'm about 50,000 words into this and I've pretty much just set up the main plot. I figure stuff will really start happening over the next 50,000 words or so, and I'll wrap it up in 50,000 more. That's just a very rough estimate, but it gives you an idea how long this will be. I've been really in the groove as far as writing, putting down something like 4000 words in three or four hours, so I don't expect it to take all that long to write. Maybe be done by the end of the month if all goes well.

And someone (Erinnyes01, of course) noticed at the end of Hunter and Hunted that there was an "Arewing" fighter. Was I setting up a Starfox reference? Of course! Nick will be getting behind the stick of one of those somewhere, I promise. Expect copious Starfox references. One of my favorite games as a kid- and I played the hell out of Starfox 64 when it came out, too.

I really enjoyed this chapter, particularly the first part. Hope you folks like it too.