"...They remain in the shadows hunting without remorse..."
-Zootopian Suburbs-
-...-
Midnight had yet again dawned upon the malevolent city of animals and yet the streets were nonetheless still bustling with life, but far from the ever so bright skyscrapers in a quiet neighborhood inside a lit up two-story suburban home, a lone cheetah cub could be seen kneeling on a small sized bed, while gazing out a window. The cub was hypnotized by the city's dazzling lights and with his curious blue eyes moving from the streams of hundreds of moving cars to the numerous airplanes passing over the city, he watched as spotlights appeared to manifest off the roofs of multiple skyscrapers and die out upon reaching for the darkened sky above.
There was a low knocking coming from behind the male cub, he turned and was met with the warm face of his smiling mother peaking through his door, "Tyler honey, it's time for bed." She said. The cub frowned and made puppy eyes towards his mother. Her blue eyes locked with his, as she let out a slight chuckle. "Tyler, you know that doesn't work on me."
"But mom..." The cub whined.
"No buts mister, it's late." She replied.
The cub known as Tyler frowned and lowered his head in dismay, he didn't want to go to sleep despite it being way past his bedtime, but like all juvenile animals he wanted to explore, he wanted to experience something new and different and he so desperately wanted to explore the utopia just beyond his window.
The female cheetah rolled her eyes and walked up next to her son's tiny bed and sat down on the edge just next to him and watched as he quickly moved into her welcoming arms. Her pink styled uniform emitted a delightful sugary scent that filled only the little cubs nostrils. "When is dad coming home?" He asked, glancing up at his mothers face.
She sighed and tightly wrapped her arm around Tyler, "Daddy is very busy, but I'm sure he'll be back soon."
"Why doesn't he take us to the city with him?" Tyler asked with a hint of sadness in his voice.
"Because then who'd take of-" The female cheetah reached for a stuffed animal laying comfortably on one of the pillows and brought it down to Tyler's saddened face. "Mister Speedy." She said, as she shook the stuffed cheetah in front of Tyler. He giggled and grabbed "Speedy" the stuffed cheetah and brought him into a tight embrace.
"We could bring him with us." Tyler suggested.
The female cheetah chuckled, "Trust me, Speedy likes it more here than the city."
"But Speedy misses daddy too." Tyler said.
"I bet he does, but I know what'll cheer you two right up."
"What?" Tyler asked.
"A bedtime story." Tyler's mom replied.
A smile grew on Tyler's muzzle to his mothers response and replied with a loud "Yay!".
"Let's get you nice and tucked in first." Tyler's mom said, as she stood up to allow the little cheetah to cover himself with his bedsheets. She tucked him in until he was nice and snug before sitting back down on the small childish bed. Tyler had personally designed his bed with blue bedsheets that has miniature red cars sewed on all over it's surface. "So what story shall I read you on this fine night?" She said, clapping her paws together. Tyler thought long and hard before coming to a decision.
"Can you me the story about the-"
*THUMP*
Tyler was unable to finish his sentence due to a loud thumping coming from the house's front door, his mom hushed him and was about to quietly leave the childish room to go investigate, but was stopped by Tyler saying, "who is it, mommy?"
"I don't know, just stay quiet." She replied, exiting the room leaving Tyler alone with his trusty stuffed animal, Mister Speedy, which he clung tightly onto. Since the house was a two-story, Tyler's mom needed to walk down a set of stairs to get to the front door, but that required a short venture down a hallway that had four doors with two being bedrooms and the other two being a guest room and a bathroom. As the female cheetah was making her way down the stairs the power to the house had suddenly gone out, leaving her in complete and utter darkness and stranded halfway down the stair.
"Mom!?" Tyler called from his room.
Tyler's Mom looked back and yelled, "everything is alright, honey! Just stay in bed." She slowly continued her way down the stairs and was fortunate enough not to trip down the rest of the steps. Another loud thud came front the front door and whoever it was meant business. She quickly made her past her living room and hid behind a sofa that was a few feet away from the front door, she slowly glanced at the door and noticed multiple dark figures standing just beyond the door's transparent window.
*THUMP THUMP THUMP*
The female cheetah had glanced away from the door and had begun to panic. She knew whoever is behind the front door to her house wasn't your average friendly neighborhood neighbors asking for sugar. Oh no, they wanted in and she knew it. The best course of action that she had decided upon was to call the police, so she reached for her pockets for her cellphone. Unfortunately, upon reaching into her pockets she was unable to locate her phone, she swore under breath and remembered how she put it on her nightstand next to her bed. Fortunately, she remembered the home phone located in the kitchen and quietly made her way towards it, as the unknown figures continued banging on her front door, which echoed throughout the two-story house and frightening Tyler even more as he laid in darkness.
Upon reaching the home phone, the panicking cheetah picked up the receiver and dialed the police, but quickly noticed the phone wasn't working; it was as if someone had cut the landline. She shrieked at the sound of the front door being kicked down, pieces of shattered glass flew all over the floor as the kicked in door made impact with the ground causing the transparent glass window to shatter into a million pieces before two cylindrical canisters were rolled inside the house, which began releasing a whitish colored smoke that burned the panicking cheetah's throat and eyes, but despite these extremely painful sensations, she rushed through the blinding cloud and up the stairs.
"Tyler!" She coughed. "TYLER!" She yelled once more, before coughing violently. Her vision was blurry and the darkness wasn't helping her cause, but she was determined to find her kin. She entered what she thought was his room, but Tyler's bed was empty and the little cub was no where to be found and it was at this time when she was able to hear sobbing coming from somewhere in the room and by using her hearing managed to follow the the cry and locate her frightened and sobbing son, who was hiding inside his closet. She opened the closet door and rushed to Tyler's side hugging him tightly, as he sat on the closet floor.
"M-Mom, I-I'm scared." Tyler stuttered.
"Me too, sweetheart... Listen, I need to go get my phone from my room so I can call the police." Tyler's mother replied, as she wiped away Tyler's tears with her palm.
Tyler stared up the his mother with his beady eyes, "Don't leave me alone."
Tyler's mother grasped onto her weeping son's shoulders and stared back down at his eyes, "Tyler, I need you to be strong just like daddy. Can you do that for me?" She asked. Tyler simply nodded his head in response. "Okay, I need you to hide here in your closet and keep as quiet as possible while I go get my phone."
"Will you be back?" Tyler asked.
Tyler's mother smiled and hugged her little cub once more, "I'll be back, I promise." She whispered into his round ear, before standing up and leaving the little cub alone in his dark lonely closet. She hated to doing this, but she knew it was the only way to keep him safe and out of danger. She quietly proceeded to leave Tyler's room and make her way to her own bedroom, which was just across from his. Unfortunately, as she was about to step out of Tyler's room, she saw a dark dressed mammal walking up the stairs leading into her floor. Fortunately, for her the figure never saw her and made his/her way to a closed door on her bedroom's side of the hallway. She briefly peeked her head around the door and saw that the figure was facing the door and visibly had a long cat like tail and had a seemingly unnatural breathing almost as if the mysterious figure was wearing a mask of some sort, she also noted that he/she was holding a red laser sighted taser.
The dark dressed figure reached the doorknob, while keeping the taser firmly gripped with their other paw, and twisted it, pushing it open and entering with heavy footsteps. The female cheetah took the opportunity to quickly rush into her bedroom and quietly close and lock the door behind her. She rushed to her nightstand and quickly picked up her smartphone dialing "911" and waited impatiently for a dispatcher to answer.
Heavy footsteps approached the locked door leading into the female cheetah's bedroom, which seemed to catch her attention as her round ears perked to the sound. The began to shake as the mammal behind the door tried to open it.
"Shit!" The female cheetah swore loudly.
"One of the targets has been located on the second floor." A muffled male's voice came from behind the locked door.
After what seemed like a eternity, a police dispatcher had finally picked up, "911, what is your emergency?"
"I NEED A POLICE OFFICER AT MY HOUSE RIGHT NOW!" The female cheetah yelled into her smartphone, as the door to her room shook violently.
"Ma'am, I need you to calm down and please explain to me what your emergency is." The dispatcher responded.
"No goddammit! Mammals broke into my house and they're outside my bedroom door!" She yelled.
"Alright, Ma'am, Im going to suggest that you barricade yourself inside your room and hide"
"O-Okay." She replied, as she placed her smartphone on speaker and placed herself behind a wooden dresser and struggled to move it in front of her door.
"Are you still with me, Ma'am?" The dispatcher asked.
"Yes," She grunted, managing to move the heavy dresser an inch closer to her door.
"Alright, I have dispatched officers to your location, they'll be there in a few minutes."
"Oh my god thank you!" She replied with a sigh of relief followed by another loud pound that sent one of the metal hinges flying off the door. The cheetah noticed this and abandoned all hope of moving the dresser in time, so she decided to open up a window located inside her room and quickly dropped down next her bed and crawl underneath. She hoped whoever was outside her door would think she jumped from her window and somehow miraculously survived the drop and ran off for help.
*CRASH*
With one final well placed kick to the cheetah's bedroom door the sound of final hinge snapped due to the sheer force followed by the door falling flat onto the ground with a heavy black boot standing over it.
The female cheetah quietly watched the unknown mammal pace around her room, investigateing every single inch it, with the sheer sound of the mammal's masked breathing sent chills down her spine, until finally the mammal came before the open window. There was a moment of silence, as the mammal investigated the window and possibly checking if anyone was down below.
The mysterious mammal let out an annoyed sigh. "One of the targets appears to have leaped from a window located on the second floor and is nowhere in site, over." The mammal said into possibly a Walkie-Talkie.
A staticky "beep" came in response before a voice started speaking. "Roger, continue your search for the prime target, over." Once the voice ended it's sentence a "boop" was heard.
"Roger, continuing my search, out."
"Prime target?" The female cheetah questioned mentally, as the mammal's feet turned to leave.
"Hello? Ma'am are you still with me?"
The female cheetah felt her heart skip a beat as the dispatcher's voice spoke out on speaker.
The unknown mammal stopped dead in his tracks and turned towards her bed.
"Ma'am, officers are a minute away from your location. Are you still alright?" The dispatcher questioned loudly, as the female cheetah desperately scrambled for her smartphone, but her efforts were to no avail; her presence was now known to the mammal.
The bed was abruptly flipped over exposing the helpless cheetah cowering underneath. She helplessly surrendered her paws up to the mammal, as he aimed his stun gun down upon her.
"Hello, gorgeous!" The mammal sneered, before reaching down and grabbing her by the collar, while he held the taser to her back. "Stand the hell up." He said, as he painfully tugged up on her collar.
"No, please!" She begged, as she unwillingly stood up.
"Where's the phone?" The mammal asked in his masked voice.
"Don't hurt m- AHH!" The female cheetah yelled, as she was forcefully thrusted towards the ground, as the male mammal turned back to locate her smartphone, which he soon found it to be laying in the same place her had found the female cheetah hiding. He picked it up and threw it against a wall with the sheer force of a Major League Baseball pitcher and once the phone had shattered into a million pieces the mammal once again approached and reached down to grasp onto the female cheetah with his black gloved paws. The female cheetah had actually managed to crawl her way out into the hallway, before ending up back in the mammal's painful grasp.
"You're quite the slippery one, aren't you?" The mammal said, as he brought the now sobbing cheetah up to her feet. The mammal holstered his stun gun and reached for a radio receiver located over his right shoulder. "Secondary target has been subdued." He said into the radio receiver.
"Copy that, regroup in the living room, over."
"Roger that, heading down, out." The mammal now lead the frightened cheetah through the darkness of the house and upon reaching the living room, she was greeted by another darkly dressed mammal, she was thrown before that mammal by her captor, she looked up and noticed that mysterious mammal was kneeling down before her. She was able to somewhat identify the mammal kneeling before her with what little moonlight was seeping through numerous window shades to be a male white-eared wolf, who also appeared to be wearing black military styled clothing that included black body armor, black protective pads, black helmet, which had white wolf's ears protruding from, and a black long snouted gas mask that had dark tinted visors that made it practically impossible for her to get a clear image of her captor's eyes, but what had really creeped her out was the fact that this white-eared wolf had a white wolf skull painted over his gas mask.
The white-eared wolf chuckled and ran his gloved paw up her jaw, "You're prettier up close." He said in a Russian accent, which prompted a quick recoil of her head to get his paws off her.
"Keep your filthy paws off me." She growled. "Who are you and what do you want with me?" She demanded.
The wolf scoffed, "Well, who we are isn't important, but what is important to you is your child's safety," He smirked underneath his dark mask. "Unless you value your life more than his."
"You son of a bit-" The female cheetah had her snout held shut by the wolf in front of her, as he leaned ever so slightly in towards her.
"Look, it's either we leave with both you and your son Tyler, or we leave with him and a body bag fit for an adult female cheetah, because with that option I can assure you that at the end of this ordeal he'll end up an orphan." He slowly released his gasp around the cheetah's snout. "So, what it going to be Allison?"
"How do you know my name? How do you know my son's?" She questioned, being visibly baffled by the wolf's knowledge of her and her son's names, which the wolf ignored.
"Where is he?" The he asked, this time growing slightly aggressive. "Either you tell me now, or I'll start making you."
The female cheetah dropped her head and sobbed quietly, she would do anything to protect her son even if it meant taking a bullet for him, but she knew they'd eventually find him and she wasn't quite fond with the agonizing thought of him growing up without a mother.
"Humph, I hoped it didn't have to come to this, but my patience has run out." The wolf stood up and made a signal towards the mammal responsible for her capture and after a few seconds, she felt her muscles suddenly contract, as she hit the ground in a stiffened state; 50,000 volts of electricity were suddenly rushed into her body without any warning.
"AHHHH!" The cheetah cried, as the still unknown figure behind her held down the trigger to a taser.
"Don't stop unless she talks, I don't care if it kills her." The white-eared wolf said sadistically.
"With absolute pleasure, sir." The masked voice of the mammal behind the cheetah replied, as he mercilessly tasered her to death.
When all hope had seemed lost for the female cheetah, she prayed for her son's safety and for there to be another way, but unknown to her and her strange captors there stood just a few feet behind them a confident posed cheetah cub with a stuffed animal held tightly in his right paw.
"LEAVE MY MOMMY ALONE!" Tyler roared with all the might his tiny body could provide him with.
The mammal tasering the female cheetah had immediately stopped and a trio of heads had turned to face Tyler.
"Run, Tyler!" The female cheetah desperately cried, before being kicked in the gut by the white-eared wolf.
"I won't leave without you Mom!" Tyler replied to his distressed mother. "Dad wouldn't!"
"Tyler... please."
The white-eared wolf reached for a radio receiver located over his shoulder and silently murmured a command to regroup, before stepping over the weakened female cheetah and patting his colleague on the shoulder. The still unknown mammal turned and began to restrain the female cheetah, while the white eared wolf passed him up to face the young cub straight on.
"Hello, Tyler." The white-eared wolf said softly. "We aren't here to hurt you." He continued saying, as he continued approaching the cub, while he extended his gloved paws towards him; ready to snatch him upon reaching a close enough proximity.
Tyler backed up and bared his teeth menacingly towards the still advancing wolf. "Stay back!" Tyler snarled.
"Look, kid, I don't have time for this." The wolf said.
"I'm warning you!" Tyler replied.
The wolf scoffed, "What do I have to fear from a little cub like you?"
"I'll bite you." Tyler scowled.
The wolf obviously held in a storm of laughter, but kept the cub distracted long enough for two other darkly dressed mammals to quietly enter the room and surrounded the cub.
"Nice one kid, but we really gotta get going." The wolf made a hand signal with one of his paws. Tyler suddenly cried out in surprise, as he felt a painful prick on his neck and almost immediately afterwards fell onto the ground in a limp heap.
"Tyler!" Tyler's mother screamed, before having her head abruptly bagged by the unknown mammal that had captured her.
"Bag the cub." The wolf said to the other new mysterious mammals, as he reached for his radio receiver. "Deathwatch, to Site Alpha. Targets have been bagged, over"
After a long minute of silence an extremely deep accented individual replied over the radio in a menacing tone. "Acknowledged Deathwatch, return to base immediately, out."
"You heard them, let's get moving." The wolf said, as he approached the cub's unconscious body, kneeling down to pull out a dart attached to the side of his neck, but just as he was gonna kneel back up, his keen sense of hearing picked up the sound of police sirens approaching from the distance. He growled in announce, "I'll take the cub," he turned to face the mammal closet to Tyler's mother. "McCarthy, you take the bitch," he then turned to face the two remaining unknown operatives; one having the silhouette of a female and the other a male. "You two take point."
"Yes, sir!" Both operatives replied in complete unison.
The unknown militarized operatives now added up to four, and they were now visibly seen leaving the residence. Unfortunately for them, two police cruisers arrived on scene and were pulled up in front of the house effectively stopping the operatives dead in their tracks. The flashing lights of the police cars lit up the neighborhood and the white-eared wolf knew it was only a matter of time before they gained too much attention from the locals.
Two blue uniformed officers jumped out of each of cruisers and immediately aimed tasers towards the four operatives. "Freeze!" One officer yelled, "Put your paws in the air right now!" The officers consisted of a males and were a zebra, tiger, a deer, and a light gray wolf with the zebra and the tiger being partners and the wolf and deer being partners with each other.
The operatives stared coldly at the officers, the white-eared wolf was holding the unconscious cub over his shoulder, while the operative known as McCarthy held tightly onto the female cheetah's arm. The other two unknown operatives stood their ground between the police officers and their objective, but with a quick command from the white eared wolf, they immediately reached for a weapon strapped to their backs and brought forward black colored heavily modified M416's that could intimidate even the biggest of ZPD officers.
Sights were trained over the outgunned officers, and with a simple flick of the safety the rifles were ready to draw first bloody and with a grim expression coming form white-eared wolf, he made the "kill" order. Bullets flew out of the rifles in fiery balls of fire that lit up the night and left the poor officers with no chance of escape.
With the operatives precise aiming, they were able to eliminate every officer, or so they thought... blood filled moans came from behind one of the police cruisers. The group of operatives moved forward past the police cruisers and one of the armed operatives trained their rifle over a injured deer, who was leaning against the side of his police cruiser with a bloody hoof over his abdomen. The white-ear wolf lowered the operative's rifle and passed him up until he was standing over the dying officer. He reached for the handle of his sidearm holstered to his thigh with his free paw and aimed the barrel towards the center of the deer's forehead.
"P-please..." The deer pleaded, as he shakily held up hoof to shield his face, as he coughed up blood.
No sense of remorse came from the wolf, as he pulled the trigger that ended the officer's life, but that of satisfaction. "Pathetic" He scorned.
More police sirens approached from the distance and houses lit up, as mammals awoke to all the commotion, yet operatives quickly jogged across the street, until they had come across a parked black SUV that had a matte black steel grille guard, off-road tries, fog lights just above the windshield, and black tint covering every window except the windshield, which had a lighter shade of black.
The two armed operatives entered the vehicle, while the white-eared wolf and the operative known as McCarthy popped the hatchback open. "Let my son go you monsters!" Tyler's mother snarled underneath the bag covering her head, but her snarles were only ignored by the operatives, as she was forced into the hatchback of the SUV. Tyler was also placed in the hatchback and upon having a slimmer of his unconscious body come into contact with his mother, she immediately scrambled in her restraints until she was laying next to him and so desperately tried to wake him up, but her efforts were met to no avail.
Once the remaining operatives entered the vehicle, they immediately drove their way out of the area, since that area would soon be crawling with police.
"Where are you taking us!?" Tyler's mother demanded from the trunk of the SUV.
There was a sort silence, before the white-eared wolf's voice replied. "You'll find out soon enough. I'd suggest you join in on your son's little nap, because this is going to be quite the drive."
"You won't get away with this..." She growled, as she comforted her unconscious cub.