"I thought you'd never come. Come in." Lance opened the door after waiting for several hours, the rising sun over the snowy mountain out of the window. Vera extremely irritated walked in and sat on the dinner table, sweat visible all over her head.
"I had to walk here, no buses this late in night." Vera still out of breath, pulling a chair to sit down.
"What's the problem?" Lance asked, sitting across the table. "Isn't the news reporting it?" Vera looking at the muted TV. Firefighters putting out the fire and cleaning the dust and pieces of metal off the road. "I know, it blew up, what does it have to do with you?"
Vera took a deep breath. "My old friend is involved, I think I can do something to stop whatever they are planning to do."
"You have no clue where they are." Lance argued. "That will be dangerous anyways, we should prepare of what's coming."
"That's too general, there's too much to be covered, we don't have enough hands. I bet Bogo thinks that too." Vera said. "So, your house is empty, mind if I stay here until they rebuild a bridge?"
"Why not? You make great coffee." Before Lance could say something about other mammals in the house, Lucy came down from upstairs, yawning and scratching the side of her head. Vera gasped and giggled. "You two! When was this a thing?" Lance smiled in awkward, "Calm down Vera, you're not the only one who's homeless." Vera frowned "You two will be cute dating, besides we could go on double date!" Vera was about to say more, but Lucy is signing her to stop, and then she hurried into the kitchen. Lance watching them two having their little silence conversation. "Back to the topic, why would she tell you this?" Vera sat lazy, letting herself to be comfortable. "I don't know, maybe she is seeking help? She told me I can stop whatever is coming."
"And she didn't tell you what to stop?" Lance pursued
"No." Vera shakes her head "This seems like a cold case to me." Vera pinched lightly between her eyes. "I'm really tired right now, can I just lay down on a bed or something?"
"Upstairs, third room down the hall on the right." Vera stood up shaking, "Thanks." and then slowly made her way upstairs.
"So? Anything?" Lucy came out after seeing Vera going upstairs, holding a cup of coffee.
"No." Lance sighed and unmuted the tv. "Today on the news: Preditors gone bad again? A murder case was uncovered today, the victim had multiple deep claw wound on his body. More on that, secretary Jenlina will defend mayor Lionheart."
The news crew surrounded her, "What's your option on the mayor hiring only predators after the nighthowler incident?"
Jenlina raised her eyebrow, the question seems to be bit of a surprise to her, as the crowd began to silence, she started to speak. "We will look into it, we believe in equality between preys and predators. I'm sorry but this conference is over, we must investigate in this situation." Jenlina turned the corner, with security blocking the journalist to follow her.
"Wow, this was a thing?" Lucy sipped her coffee and commented. "Our government is pretty bad, hiding secrets from their own people."
"She's apparently new, you can tell she haven't done this before, her voice is trembling, first sign of nervous." Lance said. "And now she doesn't know what to do, because she don't know what to believe anymore." Lucy respond while stretching.
"Outrages." Jenlina pushed aside the guards and bumped opened the door to the major's office and also mayor Lionheart. "What the heck was that?" He said furiously. "What else have you been lying to us?" Jenlina to him face to face, the tension in the air rises. "You're fired!" Lionheart didn't want to continue this conversation, nor does he want Jenlina to work for him. "Good!" Jenlina smiled. "Cause now I can run against you." Lionheart was shocked, he turned around, but she was long gone, a little dot at the end of the hallway. He clenched his fists, then picked up the phone. "Do it, we can't let her find out what is behind all of this."
Jenlina walked down hall, the messy noisy thoughts need to be organized or cleared away and the unrestingly crowd of interviewer definitely doesn't help. She took a detour to the back door, the road that leads straight down to the central park. Wasn't a lot of mammals in the park, she can see the mammal-made waterfall smacking down at the quite surface that is now covered with thousands of uneven waves. A large noise got caught in her ear, her ears twitched as she identified the location. A large crowd was surrounding something, a tiny growl came out occasionally. "What is this?" She moved her eyes off the smoothing view of a waterfall and made her way into the crowd. Some mammals identified her from the tv interview. "Hey! Aren't supported to be-"Jenlina cut him off while watching a little goat, just eating the grass off the park's ground, anymore got anywhere close her was attacked. Jenlina pulled the goat off the floor. "That's not healthy for you." The goat seemed old enough to talk but the goat chooses not to speak, just looking back at the field of grass she was eating on and back to Jenlina. "What's your name?" The goat looked down. "I don't know." Jenlina was surprised, "What about your parents?" The goat didn't hastate, "dead. Somewhere I can't remember." Jenlina put a paw on her head." You're living with me now, you're not going to wander around the city no more. "I had a home, around the river in the jungle, but mammals came, and the bridge is gone." The bridge incident, she might have clues about it. "Either way, you're coming with me, alright?" The goat rolled her eyes, seems not very trusting Jenlina, but she decided to look anyway. "Taxi!" Jenlina requested and waved her hand at the parks entrance. "I'm not sure about this." The goat looked away. "I promise you won't regret it." Jenlina keeping her smile up "You need a name, how about Velvet?" The goat looked up at Jenlina for a second and smirked, "Yeah, yeah, I like that." Jenlina opened the door and let Velvet to get in first. "I always wanted to ride one of these." Velvet said, "You'll get a lot more chance to enjoy this, but now we got some work to do." Jenlina replied while reading news off her phone.
Hours later, Vera woke up, the house was quiet, Lance and Lucy have left for work. She checked her phone, there was no hundreds of missed calls from Chief Bogo, so seem like Lucy or Lance have told him that she needs a day off. She decides to call Serain. "Hey dar," she was still lying on the bed, almost half a day without drinking any water made her voice sounded deep and discontinues. "Vera, where are you?" Serain said with a hurry, "I stayed a night with Lucy and Lance, they moved in together. Oh, and the road to my home blew up." Vera rolled over on her back and sit up, scratching her messed up fur. "At least you're still alive." Vera smiled and stood up, getting dressed. "When isn't a good time to be alive?"Serain scramble a few gears on his table, assembling into a trigger for a gun, slightly disappointed of the look and then disassembled it. "So, met you somewhere?" Vera exited the house and locked the door behind her. "Same café, let's hope there's still seats left there."
Vera squeezed off the bus, it was the lunch hour rush, as she expected, there was no seat left, the line seemed like she isn't getting a coffee anytime soon. Well, got nothing better to do. She though and joined the line. Vera took the time to look around, most people are chatting with their friends, reading their books and doing something on their laptop, but one mammal in the corner is just listening to music with their hoodle on, half a cup of coffee placed in front and eating a apple with a pocket knife. Most important, there is a seat across the table that where she is sitting, and no one seem to be interested in it. Vera finally got her coffee, it took around an hour to get it, but Serain still didn't arrive. Most mammals have left the cafe, but the mammal with the hoodle on is still there, just without the apple. Vera grew interest in the mammal, she grabbed her coffee and went sit aside the mammal. The gold ring and black fur on that mammal's ear, she looked at her face, the mammal smiled at her. "Well, fancy seeing you here Vera."