"Nick?" Judy's voice interrupted her partner, who had been going on and on with speculation and thoughts about the case for most of the trip. The fox had been so caught up in his own words, he never noticed they were falling on deaf ears. The police station was not terribly far from the Cooper gang's hideout, but there was no way they could take a cruiser without drawing suspicion from Bogo. Or at least that's what they thought, the paranoia involved with lying to the Chief had begun to cloud the officers' judgement. Judy especially was having second thoughts, the bus ride and walk through the quiet back streets were no help to the situation. She had plenty of time to think things over, and the only thing on her mind was what happened the night before.
"What's up carrots?" Nick replied in his usual, smug tone as they crossed the border into Sahara Square.
"Why are we still working with the Cooper gang?" Nick was taken aback by this, the seriousness in the rabbit's quiet voice stuck out from the casual delivery.
A slight tilt of the head and raising one eyebrow was his response, queuing Judy to rephrase.
"I mean, why this case? We know who the suspect is, we know his location…we know what he's done… We should hand this one over to Interpol, let Carmelita take care of him before he hurts anyone else."
At this, Nick stopped, an undertone of concern visible on his face as he looked down to the sand quietly blowing across the sidewalk. He understood exactly what she was saying, clearly taking a moment to put a lot of thought into his reply.
"Let me be clear," He spoke after taking a deep breath, "I agree with you. Is handing this over the smart thing to do? Yes. But it's not the right thing to do."
Judy opened her mouth to voice a rebuttal but quickly stopped herself, noticing the fox was simply looking for the right way to phrase something.
"We decided to work with Sly, they help us, we help them. Now, you have to understand, anyone on that side of the law lives by a code. There is a certain honor among thieves. If we give up this case, and Interpol rushes in their while Sly is pulling his job, we are not only betraying his trust, but he risks getting caught as well. I'm all for ending this thing as quickly as possible, but we have to get Cooper's approval first."
Silence fell as the two looked to each other briefly before continuing the walk, without even thinking about it. This time with Judy mulling over Nick's words.
"Okay." She said after the two had ventured a good distance down the road.
The rest of the walk passed quietly. Both parties deep in thought, about the case, the Cooper gang, each other and everything in between. It was surprisingly peaceful, the sun slowly setting, its bright golden rays becoming lost in the rolling dunes of Sahara Square, on another occasion it could even be considered romantic. The relative calm of the still evening faded with the sun as their destination drew closer. Reality set in once the hideout became visible under the train bridge. Judy and Nick both knew exactly what this meeting was going to decide.
"Hey." Sly greeted the two as they entered the hideout. The raccoon was laying casually on the couch, his cane leaning against the side.
"Hi Nick! Hi Judy!" Murray called from where he stood next to Bentley, helping with one of the many gadgets on the table at the other end.
"How's it going big guy?" Nick replied to the enthusiastic hippo, jumping right back to himself with a grin on his face.
"Afternoon you two." Bentley sat back in his wheelchair in an effort to direct his attention towards the officers.
"Oh, hey Bentley, I need your help with something." Nick said as he started walking over to where the turtle was.
"Should've expected that. No 'hi' for me, just 'I need help'."
"Come on, no one said hi to me either." Sly commented as well, both of them using a playful tone, teasing Judy and Nick the second they entered the hideout.
"Fine, hi you two." Judy spoke up, forcing a smile onto her face. It was clear the serious talk would have to wait, at least for a little bit.
"So," Nick continued as he rounded the table, coming up next to Bentley, "that computer of yours, you said it was only connected to other criminals, right?"
"Something like that." The turtle responded tentatively, unsure of the cop's intentions.
"Think you can run some names for me, see if they pop up anywhere in there?"
"You don't actually think a network for active criminals would have any link to their true identities?"
"Well, I mean, maybe not all…"
"That said, I do like to keep a list of possible contacts in any area we work in, so there's a chance you could find whoever you're looking for there."
"Great," Nick said as he placed the paper he printed earlier in front of Bentley, "this is all of Longfellow's know victims, the ZPD has nothing on them in our system, hopefully you can find at least one of them. How big is that list of yours anyways?"
After quickly looking over the paper and inputting a few commands on his computer, the turtle read off his contacts. "6,174 in the immediate area."
"Jeez, that's more than Hopps has siblings."
"Hey!" Judy called over to her partner, "I heard that."
"So, think you can find any of them?" Nick continued after shooting a particularly smug grin back.
"I'll see what I can do." The turtle fixed his glasses and went to work.
While Bentley typed away on his computer, Nick casually strolled over to Judy, who was standing at the foot of the couch, talking with Sly and Murray. The fox took a seat on one of the arm rests, hoping to engage in more small talk with the two outlaws. He had a subtle fascination with how they functioned as a professional gang, a carefree attitude at first glance, but a well-oiled machine underneath. The variety of toys and gadgets they used interested him as well, it was crazy how effectively they used them. Cooper's cane especially had peaked his curiosity, and seeing it was merely an arm's length away from him, he hoped he could get a hand on the tool. Unfortunately, his interest would go unfulfilled as the conversation in progress reached Nick's ears.
"How long do you think it'll take you to catch Longfellow?" Judy could not bring herself to wait any longer as she eased her way into asking Sly's permission to hand over the case.
"It depends," the raccoon spoke from where he lay, using minimal effort to prop himself up as he did so, "I'm sure Bentley's already putting a plan together, but we definitely need to do more recon, and then setup for the heist, so at least two more days. It's longer than I'd like it to be, but it's what we have to do."
"Gotta take into account all the risks, right?"
"One thing I remember my dad telling me was 'you don't have a plan if you don't have a plan b'. We have to think about and plan around every eventuality."
"Well, what if you didn't have to do that for this one?"
This caught Cooper's attention. He sat up just enough to make eye contact with Judy, giving her a puzzled yet interested look, knowing she was up to something.
"I know you have been working hard on this case, but so have we." The rabbit paused to find the right phrasing, "I don't want to wait around, letting him murder all those mammals. The pictures you took last night, it's all the evidence the ZPD and Interpol would need to move in and take care of this right now. Let us handle it, you don't have to risk anything going in there by yourselves and nobody would ever know you were here."
"She's got a point Sly," Murray chimed in, "I don't like that Longfellow. Giraffes have too many spots, you can never see 'em when they're in a group, it freaks me out a little. It'd be nice to let someone else do all the hard work for once."
"Got anything to add Wilde?" Sly asked without even looking at the fox seated on the arm rest behind him.
"I'm going to leave it between you two."
"Fair enough," The raccoon closed his eyes as he sat up, now properly addressing Judy, "I know where you're coming from. What Longfellow is doing is awful, and you wouldn't be doing your job if you didn't what to stop him as soon as possible. But, we are not here to stop him."
A look of resentment and confusion washed over the rabbit's face, unsure how to take that last statement.
"I mean he is a crazed, murderous, kidnapping lunatic who needs to be taken down, but that isn't the reason we are here. Our goal has been to find and rescue Penelope, Bentley's partner. If Longfellow has her, like we think he does, then sending in the cops could ruin our one chance at getting her back."
"But if she is in there, the ZPD would rescue her along with anyone else he has locked up."
"Yes, and then hand her over to Interpol, where Carmelita would arrest her and probably use her as leverage against me."
Judy went to argue her side again, but stopped herself, taking a moment to think, really process what Sly was saying. She had gotten so wrapped up in her idea of justice that the sincerity in the raccoon's voice had gone unnoticed. It was clear he wanted Longfellow put behind bars as much as she did, but he knew things had to happen a certain way, and not everyone could be happy about it.
Slowly, Judy swept her look around to everyone around her, reading exactly what all their faces said. With a barely distinguishable nod, even Nick told her to let it go.
"Two days, right?" The rabbit conceded in a quiet tone, knowing what she was saying, but unsure of the outcome it would have.
"Two days." Sly responded confidently, "We'll get it done, then Longfellow is all yours."
Perhaps he had been listening in on the conversation, or maybe the timing just so happened to land perfectly, but either way Bentley's shrewd, nasally voice ended the discussion. "Alright Nick, we've got a match."
"Cool." The fox jumped up and headed back over to the other side of the table, followed by everyone else. Even Sly, through some obviously exaggerated groans, got up and joined.
"It's not all of them, but I found six of the victims. There's not a lot of information on them, but what I do have is rather interesting."
Judy glanced at the screen displaying the results, six boxes held neatly organized descriptions of the mammals. Next to the names was a bolded line reading 'specialization'. Each of them had something different, there was a skunk labeled 'technology/gadgets', a tiger with 'athletics', a rabbit under 'infiltration', a sheep saying 'strategy', a rhino categorized as 'crowd control', and finally a grizzly bear – 'field work/charisma'. Names, locations, skills, any other useful information filled up the rest of the easy to view boxes.
"I've been developing a theory," The turtle continued, "and this evidence only supports it further."
"Great, what is it?" Judy asked, hopeful this meant the gang could end things quicker.
"I can't say right now, not until I am certain of its legitimacy. We don't need any confirmation bias plaguing this operation."
"Think you can run me off a copy of that? I'd like to compare it with my notes."
"Sure." With a simple click of the mouse, Bentley brought the printer to life and handed the sheet over to Judy.
"You finish up that bug yet?" Sly asked as he looked to the device Murray was helping with when the two officers first entered the building.
"Well it's technically not done, the prototype is only in version 3, and the coding could use some updating, but field operation is feasible."
"In English, please."
"Yes, we can use it."
"See, how hard was that?"
"Extremely," The turtle responded straight faced, "why? Are you ready to go right now?"
"Hey, the quicker we get this thing in there, the more info it'll send back." Sly took a step back and stretched quickly, getting ready to go to work, obviously trying to advance their schedule. Judy took notice to this, appreciative the raccoon was taking his word seriously.
"You do make a good point. Alright, suit up, I'll get things ready over here."
"How would you two like to go for a ride? Murray's been dying to show off the van." Sly addressed Nick and Judy while Bentley began rigging up his binocucom station.
"I'm down," Nick agreed happily, "how 'bout you carrots?"
"Eh, why not." Judy figured the big pink ball of joy that was 'The Murray' might distract her from whatever was going on at Longfellow's compound that night.
"Awesome!" The hippo drew their attention with an outburst, "C'mon outside, I'll give you the grandest of tours."
Without waiting for confirmation, he practically ran out the door. Sly gave the two cops a nod, letting them know to follow Murray while he readied up. Once outside, the two found him standing proudly in front of the not so inconspicuous vehicle.
"Behold! The fourth member of our gang, I don't have a name for her yet, but she needs no introduction." Neither of the officers had ever seen anyone so excited to talk about a beat up old van. "It doesn't look like much, but there's a lot hiding underneath the sick paint job. I like to do all the modifications myself, but sometimes Bentley doesn't let me touch his new gadgets and gizmos." The hippo began to walk around the exterior, motioning to parts as they passed them. "Kevlar reinforced tires, got those after Carmelita nearly took us out in Cairo. Extra support to the chassis in order to handle all the bits we added. Custom exhaust, she may look good, but she sounds even better. Anyway that's just the outside." Flinging open the driver's door revealed a mostly stock dash, but a center console that looked like it came out of an airplane. Without even thinking, he started listing off what each switch, knob and button did. "This is where the magic happens. We got the push bar actuator, satellite controls, emergency roof release, turret elevator, not sure when we are going to fix that, and the rocket boosters, Bentley never said why we needed those, but they're awesome! Oh, and my personal favorite, the cruise control." For someone who liked to scribble in coloring books, he sure was serious about his van.
"Pretty cool, huh." Sly's voice startled Nick and Judy, the sneaky raccoon had managed to walk right up behind them without them noticing.
"Please don't do that." The rabbit said in a gasp as she turned around, allowing her partner time to hide his shock under a veil of laughter. Both of them found it impressive actually, Judy could usually hear anyone coming up behind her, in fact it had become an ongoing game at the ZPD to see who could get closest to her before she noticed. Wolford currently held the record at 39 feet, or at least he did.
"I'm sorry," Cooper chuckled apologetically, "but it was just too tempting, not to mention it's good practice. Speaking of, here's your phone."
Sly produced a cell phone from his thigh bag, watching Judy quietly freak out, checking to see if all of her stuff was still in her pockets.
"Haha, nah I'm just kidding, this is Nick's phone." The fox who had previously been laughing at the display quieted down once he realized his phone was in fact not where he left it. Hiding his embarrassment under a grin and a quick roll of the eyes, he snatched back his belongings.
"Not gonna lie, that's pretty impressive." Nick commented.
"So did Murray show you the inside yet?"
"Some of it." Judy replied as Sly swung open the rear doors and hoped in.
"Well, come on in." The raccoon said, folding down a bench seat from the left wall.
The two cops had taking a ride in the van before, but under the circumstances neither really took a good look at it. The right wall looked like a scaled down version of Bentley's station back in the hideout. A small monitor sat above a fold out keyboard, all mounted to a large metal sheet containing other displays. One was definitely a binocucom station, another appeared to be some kind of radar, and still others remained unidentifiable. Mounting brackets adored the floor, roof, door frames and anywhere one might be needed. Other than that, the rear cargo area seemed fairly bare.
Sly pulled his cane out from where it was stowed on his back and hung it on a rack next to him before sitting down. Nick and Judy joined him on the one long seat as Murray fired up the van and peeled out, showing off just a little to his newest passengers. The ride over to the drop off point went surprisingly quickly. They had moved the site closer to the compound, thanks to information gained on last night's mission, however the van would have to be moved further out after the ditch. While en route, Cooper spent most of the time explaining what the goal of this trip was to those next to him. He showed them the electronic bug he had in his thigh pouch and described basically how it worked, or at least what Bentley had told him about how it worked, and how he was to place it in Longfellow's office in order to gain information. After that he was to quickly search the area for any signs of Penelope, and mark the locations of any security alarms, guards, and other points of interest before heading back.
"Approaching destination." Murray called back commandingly as he flicked a switch, killing all exterior lights on the van and illuminating the inside with a dim red overhead.
"Well time to go." Sly smirked as he stood up, grabbing his cane off the rack and casually walking to the back doors.
The van almost silently slowed to a stop, the back door popped open and out slipped the raccoon with a smug "See ya later." Leaving the door open as not to make any noise from it closing, Murray crept back up to speed and got out of the area.
Once far enough away, they pulled off the road and set up shop. The hippo tapped a few buttons, checked to make sure his antenna was properly extended, and swiveled his captain's chair around to face the rear of the van.
"Hey Judy, can you hit that white switch over on the right?"
Without a word, the rabbit tentatively approached the controls for the binocucom station. As illogical as it sounded, she figured if the screen never came on, then nothing like last night could happen again. Her thoughts and actions disconnected however as the click of the switch was heard, followed by the display slowly clearing up from static. Murray showed her the button to press to send the radio audio thought he van's speakers as well. Whatever went down that night, Judy and Nick were going to see and hear all of it.
"All set over here." Murray spoke into radio.
"Alright Sly, you are good to go." Bentley confirmed back.
Cooper's voice was the last one needed to get things moving. When it finally came through, the confidence in his tone was both reassuring and concerning at the same time. "Roger that, it's go time."
1:30 A.M.? Perfect time to work on my story! But seriously, if the last few lines of this chapter (or this author's note) are screwed up in any way it's because I actually wrote them at that time. It's okay though, the important bits at the beginning were actually written when I had some form of coherence to my thoughts. Why am I writing this so late? Because I'm actually going to be away for the rest of the week and if I didn't finish it now, you would have to wait even longer. (Sorry, the next chapter will be slightly delayed). Anyway, the break might be a good thing, I'd like to remind you all this story is tagged as mystery for a reason (Crazy tired nonsense ramblings, or actually story related, you'll never know!). But in all seriousness, thanks for reading and putting up with my antics, I really appreciate it. See you all in the next one.