I was trying to fix a typo and accidently replaced this chapter with chapter 9 for a bit. Sorry to everyone who opened this chapter and went "wtf?"
AN ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~AN

Death in the Zoo
Chapter 13 - Operation Timebomb

"I suppose she's already told you everything." Maurice said slyly, continuing to stare at Skipper from where he stood.

"What's your problem, Maurice?" Skipper asked, anger filling his voice. Maelie took a few steps back, while Private and Kowalski could do nothing but stand in awe.

"You four," he said, and began to finger the blade on his knife. Skipper suddenly recognized it—it was his favorite swiss army knife. Did the lemur enjoy stealing weapons? "When I kill Maelie and frame Private once again, it'll be game over."

Skipper gasped. He turned his head to the shaking mammal cowering behind him, and noticed that the paws that covered her hands were covered in blood. He looked back and Maurice and his knife and saw that the blade was covered in red.

"You're not getting at her until you go through us!" Private said aggressively.

"I'm smart enough to know I can't take all three of you at once." Maurice said, rolling his eyes.

Skipper scowled deeply. "Why'd you kill Julien, Maurice?" he asked bluntly.

The lemur suddenly looked shocked, but he still had a nasty grin on his face. "Accusing me of killing my king? How could you do such a thing?" he said sarcastically. After he finished he let out a deep, dark laugh.

"We're going to tell the whole Zoo you killed Julien!" Private said, his eyes filled with hatred.

"Yeah, go for it. Go get pummeled by the gorillas." Maurice returned. "All of the animals in this zoo are arranging a mob as we speak. They plan to force Private out of the zoo, or kill him if he refuses." Private gasped. Skipper was taken aback. "They won't believe a word you say, anymore. And, Skipper, I'd suggest you abandon him now."

"I'd never abandon one of my teammates, mammal," defended Skipper.

"Your choice. The animals are going to throw you out too for defending a murder..."

"Private didn't kill Julien! You did!" Skipper spat.

"Oh? What makes you think so?"

Skipper began to explain. "You started by getting Private to show you our most dangerous weapon—one that we should only use in life or death situations. You took advantage of his strong feelings of family for our team and tricked him into showing you where it was to defend us.

When Julien decided to have a party for Maelie's arrival, you took advantage of the confusion. After we left for the party, you sneaked into HQ and took the Powerline. Then, at the party, you used some sort of alcohol to get Julien drunk so he would be defenseless. You used it to get Kowalski drunk as well so his observation skills would be impaired. When the thunderstorm started, you took advantage of the distraction and mayhem to kill Julien while he was most vulnerable.

Oh, you didn't stop there, though. You slammed private over the head with a rock and knocked him unconscious so you could get his feathers to plant at the crime scene. You figured Private's wound would make it look like Julien had defended himself with that crowbar—but the crowbar would have left a puncture wound, not a welt.

Everyone fell for it. There were no witnesses, and everything was set up perfectly. You thought you'd get away with it."

Maurice applauded insincerely. "Nice job. Did you figure all that out yourself?" Skipper felt burning hatred building up inside of him.

"Why'd you do it, Maurice?" Private asked again, his voice sounding shaky. "What did Julien do to you?"

"That's not important," Maurice said, pointing the knife at the penguins, "what's important is that my plan finishes without a hitch."

"Like Private said before," Kowalski spoke, "You'll have to go through us to get to Maelie."

"I expected this." said the heavy lemur, sounding serious. "You penguins are so predictable."

Skipper clenched his flippers into tight fists and felt ready to charge at the evil Maurice. He was held back by the sight of the knife—a direct attack would not be a good idea. Maurice continued.

"And that's why I'm going to go kill Mort instead," he said calmly. He acted as if killing was a game.

"You wouldn't!" Maelie spoke, although weakly. She was still standing behind Skipper, trying to stem the flow of blood from her gut.

"I would. I'll still frame Private and he'll get thrown out of the zoo all the same." Maurice laughed again after confessing his plans. Skipper was suddenly worried for Mort.

"Don't do it, Maurice!" the leader penguin said firmly. "Poor Mort didn't do anything!" Maurice turned and started to leave, not responding to Skipper's words. He started slow at first and then moved fast. Skipper stood where he was until he heard the footsteps no longer.

"What are we going to do, Skippah?" Private asked, desperately. "We can't let him slaughter poor little Mort!"

"I know, Private." Skipper said, trying to calm down a little so he could think. "Kowalski, options."

"There's no time for that, Skipper!" Kowalski said, waving his flippers wildly. "We have to find Mort before Maurice does. It's his only hope!" Skipper nodded.

"What about Rico?" Private asked.

"No time for that!" Skipper said. "Private, you take Maelie to HQ and try to patch up her wounds. Kowalski, you and I will go to the lemur habitat and try to warn Mort." Kowalski nodded, moving for the exit.

Private wanted to go with Skipper and Kowalski, but he looked at Maelie, who was still bleeding profusely from her abdomen. He nodded, and grabbed the lemur's arm. Maelie flinched in pain, but he ignored it and pulled her toward the vent quickly. Skipper and Kowalski followed closely, and soon the group was outside.

The air outside was very still and chilly. It was cool on Skipper's face. The sky was illuminated in a fiery red explosion from a sunset on the western horizon. Between the buildings it was just visible, and it illuminated everything with an orange glow.

"Operation Save Mort is a-go!" Skipper declared, moving for an entrance to the tunnels beneath the zoo—the quickest way to get to the lemur habitat.

"Good luck, Skippah!" called Private as he and Kowalski slid away. Kowalski and Skipper saluted Private before they hopped into the tunnel. Private saluted back, and then began to lead the wounded Maelie to the penguin HQ.

They arrived shortly later, using a closer entrance to the tunnel system to get into the penguins' bunker. Maelie had trouble walking, and private could tell the pain she was feeling was excruciating. She winced with every step, and tensed with every breath. Her blood was now covering most of her abdomen and her legs—a sign that she had already lost a lot of blood. Private knew if he didn't stem the bleeding soon, she was going to loose consciousness.

"I'll be right back with some bandages." Private said as Maelie stumbled in and Private shut the door behind her. She nodded, then quickly took a seat against a wall near the door and began breathing deeply and slowly. to avoid the sharp, searing pain.

Private returned from another area of the HQ with some random pieces of cloth, fabric and a few safety pins. Maelie looked a bit confused.

"Sorry, but Rico has all of our medical supplies. This is all I could find." He explained.

"That's... OK..." the lemur wheezed, clearly showing that she was in a lot more pain now that her adrenaline had worn off.

"I'll have you patched up in a jiffy." assured Private. Maelie stood up. Private proceeded by first cleaning the wound and finding out that it wasn't very deep. It was deep enough to do some damage, but not nearly deep enough to hit any crucial organs. Next, he began wrapping Maelie's midsection with some of the old cloth, using the fabric to soak up blood and use as gauze. Each time Private touched the lemur's wound she winced or yelped, and Private swiftly apologized.

"Thank you so much for doing this, Private," Maelie said as Private continued to try to stop her bleeding.

"Just following orders, as all." Private commented.

"No, really." Maelie stated. Private looked up at her and stopped fumbling with the makeshift bandages. "I thought you might hate me for what I did."

"I never did." Private said, calmly. "You did the same thing I would have."

"Oh?" Maelie said, grunting as Private put pressure on her wound.

"Hold this here firmly." instructed Private. Maelie obeyed, holding a bundle of cloth to her wound to stem her bleeding. Private waited until he had finished her bandages by using the safety pins to fasten it in the back before he continued.

"If someone murdered Skippah, K'walski or Rico, and I didn't know who it was, I would have done the same thing. You suffered the loss of a really good friend, and you knew that he had been killed, you just wanted someone to blame."

Maelie looked uncomfortably at the ground. "Yeah... I guess so."

"You had a gap that needed to be filled." said Private deeply. "You needed someone to blame so you could be at peace with your best friend's passing." Private finished patching up Maelie as best as he could with what he had available. She looked a little strange, as the cloth Private used was multicolored. Some blood was already soaking through the fabric around her stomach.

Maelie still looked at the ground. Private noticed that she seemed to still be full of guilt. The lemur spoke first after a few seconds passed.

"Hey, thanks again for doing this. I didn't know how long I would have left if I kept bleeding like that!" she said. " How'd you learn to do this, anyway?" Private arched a brow at her suddenly changing the subject.

"Skippah was training me to be the team medic a while ago, but we didn't go very far with it." he explained. "Is something still bothering you?

Maelie sighed. "Well... I need to tell you what really happened. The whole story. Start to finish." Private's eyes expanded and he was filled with intrigue.

"Alright, go on then," he said eagerly. Maelie opened her mouth to begin, but another voice cut in before she could.
"That won't be necessary, Maelie." the deep voice said sternly. Both Private and Maelie whipped there heads around to see Maurice standing in the doorway

"Alright, we're almost to the lemur exhibit now." Kowalski said, navigating the tunnels. Skipper nodded, and proceeded to use his momentum to slide on his belly for a distance. When he saw the familiar storm drain letting light into the dark tunnel system, he stopped and waddled to it as fast as his short legs could. Time was of the essence if they wanted to save Mort.

"Skipper... how do we know if Mort is in the lemur exhibit?" Kowalski said suddenly, making Skipper stop and turn around.

"We don't. But that's the most likely place, don't you think?" He returned, then continued toward the lemur exit. Kowalski followed.

Skipper really did hope Mort was in the Lemur exhibit; he couldn't let the little ringtail die. He couldn't let the deranged predator get to his pray. The little lemur didn't deserve to die... and not for the reasons that Maurice was going to kill him for.

Skippered waddled closer, looking at the ladder. Kowalski followed closely. When they were nearly directly under the storm drain, a figure suddenly became slightly visible deeper down the tunnel.

"Maurice!" Skipper shouted, although he was barely able to see the figure's outline in the faint light. They had not caught up with the lemur on the way to their destination, and Skipper figured the deranged mammal had took another route. He knew the tunnels were the quickest way around the zoo, and he figured the ringtail would not be able to navigate the tunnel system to Kowalski's ability. Getting to Mort first was Skipper's first idea, but now stopping Maurice before he even got to Mort was a better idea.

The figure turned around, looking at the two penguins standing by the storm drain.

"Kowalski," Skipper said quietly to his taller teammate. "Get ready to charge on the count of three. Kowalski nodded.

"One. Two. Three!" Skipper charged, closely followed by his comrade. He let out a cry of rage as he felt the adrenaline flow through his veins. That bastard was going to pay for what he did!

Skipper thought he had him. He lunged, thinking he caught the mammal off guard. He was in for a surprise when his face met a hard surface. The penguin fell to the floor, dazed. He rubbed his beak; the wall hadn't been there a second ago. Kowalski gasped and Skipper looked around at him. The penguin had obviously seen the obstacle before Skipper and stopped. The one wall didn't make Kowalski gasp though—it was the fact that they were walled in on all four sides now.

"What in the name of—we've been trapped!" said the leader penguin, frustrated. His face was throbbing after slamming into the wall at full speed. Someone had dropped a heavy plastic crate on them when they got under it. Skipper now saw that it wasn't completely solid, but it was made of a sort of lattice work.

"Maurice!" He said under his breath, frustrated.

"Skipper, help me lift this thing up!" Kowalski was already posed on one side of the crate and was ready to attempt to heave it off of the pair. Skipper got up and walked over to same wall.

The two heaved several times, their grunts filling the stale sewer air. It was no use, though; they couldn't get the crate to move more than an inch even with their combined efforts.

"It's no use, Kowalski!" Skipper cried, throwing up his flippers. Kowalski put a flipper to his beak, trying to think.

"Uhh!" an all too familiar, low, raspy voice spoke. Skipper looked up at the figure he forgot was still there, and was awestruck with surprise. "No team!"

AN ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ AN

Thanks for all the reviews! It seems that the last chapter sparked reviews from quite a few readers =) I love to hear what you think, so keep R&Ring!

I've had this chapter finished for about two days but havn't been able to post it because fanfiction kept giving me errors when i tried to upload it. Sorry!