Chapter Seven

It has been about two hours since the start of this morning session of interviewing the students and, Nick and Judy were still in the investigation with the interpreter, Kate Mason, and a student who is a rabbit.

Nick was questioning the student when Judy began to hear something odd due to her sensitive rabbit ears. She looked around, searching for the source. After a short awhile, Nick noticed Judy's odd behaviors.

"Is everything okay, Carrots?" Nick asked. Kate and the student looked at her.

"I am not sure," Judy answered, "I hear something odd but it's faint and I cannot make it out because I have never heard that kind of sound before as I'm a country girl and I wasn't raised in the big city."

"Really? What does it sound like?" Nick asked

"Well, hard to say but it's kind of like a tiny fan or something."

"Tiny fan? Tiny –" Nick pondered, a realization came to him, turned and looked out the window. He spotted it as the object came toward the window quickly, his eyes widen. "Quick! Get under the table now!" he yelled.

Judy was not sure what he saw but followed his command while Kate grabbed the confused kid and went under the table.

Suddenly there was a crash that broke the window, then there was an explosion did the most damage to the room closest to the window while the group hid under the table, protecting them from the explosion. However, the table legs nearest the window gave away and collapsed on Nick's tail. He screamed in pain.

"Nick!" Judy exclaimed. "Are you okay?"

"Damn!" Nick grunted as he pulled his tail away from the end of the table. "My tail got crushed by that end of the table."

At that moment, the door burst open by the other officers.

Officer Husky knelt down next to Judy while Wile went to the damaged window to see if he could find someone there.

"Are you all right, Officer Hopps?" Husky asked as he pulled Judy from under the table. Judy nodded, "I'm fine but Ni- I mean Officer Wilde's tail got injured."

Nick got out from under the table as Officer Wile joined him at his side. The other two officers from the next room came in.

"See anyone there?" Nick asked. Wile shook his head.

"Nick," Judy walked over to Nick, "What was that you saw?"

"That was a drone, carrying a bomb, Carrots," Nick answered as he cleans off the dust and debris off his shirt.

"A drone?" Judy and Wile asked simultaneously. The other officers and Kate looked at him in shock.

"Yes, Carrots," Nick said, "Now, you know that sound so you can recognize it and warn us sooner next time."

"Of course," she said as she crossed her arms. "That's something I will never forget. Anyway, how's your tail?"

Nick groaned at the question, he brought up his tail, inspected it with his paws. He yelped as he touched the injured part.

"Right, you need to get that tail to the urgent care soon, Nick," Judy commented.

"But…"Nick began but Judy interrupted, "No but, Shasta and Chewhauser are here so they can take it from here while I take you to the clinic for that tail."

"We have to come with you, Officer Hopps," Husky said.

"Of course, you do," Judy said as she put her paws on her hip. "You can tag along and keep your eyes out for any drones or runaway cars coming our way."

"What about –"Nick began but Judy elbowed his rib, knowing what he was going to say.

"Don't worry, Nick, I am sure Bogo will assign someone else and Kate will stay with them for the rest of the day. So let's get your poor fluffy foxy tail to the 'tail mending joint' so they can fix it back up to good old foxy self."

The other officers giggled at Nick, who growled lightly at Judy as she grabbed his arm and lead him out of the room. She turned to her best friend and whispered, "This is the payback for that pirate thing at the station this morning, dumb fox!"

"Sly bunny!" Nick growled quietly and she giggled.

Judy and Nick walked to the car while Husky and Wile walked behind them. As they arrived at their car, Husky walked swiftly and gently grabbed both Judy and Nick's arm.

"What –" Nick began but Husky hushed him, "There's something funny. I can smell it."

Judy and Nick looked at each other and then at Husky, knowing the wolf's sensitive nose could pick up something faint that rabbit or fox cannot.

Suddenly, Judy heard something from the bush on the other side of the parking lot, turned to Nick and Husky, and whispered, "Husky, I heard something now. It's coming from that bush at the far end of the lot. Act naturally." The canines nodded and Nick got an idea, and whispered to Judy, "Time to hustle, sweetheart."

Husky was confused by Nick's comment and was going to say something but Judy stopped him, "Trust us, I know what he's planning. Just play along," Judy ordered quietly.

The group continued walking toward the patrol car as if nothing's happened while Judy listened for any new sounds.

"Oh! That reminds me, Carrots," Nick began loudly. "A friend of mine told me about the activity called geocaching and he mentioned that he had hidden several of his caches near this school because he lives nearby. He showed me few times when we hang out sometimes and it was very interesting but I never had the desire to join in the geocaching stuff. I was wondering if y'all doing any geocaching or not. No? Anyway, he said that he hide something funny here in this parking lot after he gotten permission to hide it from the school office. So, one day, he showed it to me, it was so funny, and I almost had serious thought about joining the geocaching stuff. Anyway, I forgot about it until now. Let's see if I can remember where it is cuz I wanna show it to y'all as y'all need a good laugh after what happened there few minutes ago."

Judy was not sure exactly what geocaching is even though she had heard the term before but could not recall where she heard it. However, she and the others need to play along to keep whoever behind the bush from getting suspected and runs away so they can catch the culprit. She decided to play it along.

"I have heard the term but I forgot exactly what geocaching is, Nick," Judy asked loudly while keeping her ears focused on the sound, "Can you tell more about it?"

"Excellent question, Carrots!" Nick smiled, "It's like a scavenger hunt with the assistance of satellite's GPS reception. Oh, I just remember now! There is an app for it on smartphone… Let me check if it's still there on my phone," Nick took out his phone and searched for it. He found it.

"Ah ha!" he exclaimed, "Here it is! You just open this app and click this "Find nearby Geocaches" button and it will show you either a list or a map of closest geocaches. You click on the one that is the closest, like this," He pushed some images on his phone and it showed the information about caches. Judy and others looked at it while Judy kept her ears open. The geocache that Nick had picked was pretty far from the parking lot but Judy and others knew it was his hustle to fool someone in the bush into thinking that there was a cache close by.

"Now, this app tells you how far you are from the cache," Nick continued as the group walked toward the suspicious bush. "See? It said that we are about a hundred and 15 feet away from the cache but let me warn you that some caches are small that you would have to look for it for few minutes but luckily for me, my friend showed where it is so I know exactly where it is now thanks to this app. Are you ready to see this funny cache?"

That was the cue for Judy and others to jump and apprehended the hidden person behind the bush. It was a young gray fox, who tried to run away but Judy and Husky were too quick for him and caught him without trouble.

"Well, well, I'll be damned," Nick smiled. Judy looked at him as Husky handcuffed the struggling grey fox.

"You know him, Nick?" Judy asked.

"Oh yes, I do and I wish that I had not found him in this situation," Nick answered. "He is the nephew of my old classmate, Alex. His name is Edward."

Author's note: I am a geocacher and if you are interested or curious about the geocaching - yes, it is real, you can check it out at .com