An Evolved Sense of Justice

by dobanochi

A raccoon PI seeking asylum finds himself in Z-Town, he encounters a trailblazing hare police officer who's grown frustrated with her work and a fox who quit the force after an existential crisis - but didn't have a backup plan. As a strange new threat comes upon the city, the three must solve the question: how do you help save the world when you can hardly help yourself?

2. So Much for My Happy Ending

Chapter Two, "So Much for My Happy Ending"

For what it was worth, she believed that he believed he meant it when he said he would continue supporting her law-enforcement career from the sidelines, but he sure had a funny way of showing it. Verbally, he gave plenty of words of approval and encouragement, but he wasn't doing very much.

She'd never told him she thought that about him because she would fully expect him to reply with something to the effect of, well, what can I do? To which she wouldn't honestly have a straight answer - but sweet cheese and crackers, something. Nick was a clever fox; she would have thought he'd have conjured some way by now of more actively expressing support for her beyond what came across as mere lip service. It was enough to make her wonder if he really had bought into the narrative that the institution of the police was intrinsically, irredeemably evil inside and out and now he was only pretending to support her because he needed someone to pay his bills now - and maybe because he just saw her as living fetish fuel.

"Hey, slow down, slow down, slow DOWN-!"

SCREEEEEEECH!

The hare hit the brakes in time to just barely keep from hitting the minivan, but both had mini heart attacks anyway at the sound of her partner's cell phone flying out of his paws and hitting the windshield and dashboard. They each took a second to get their lungs working again before discussing.

"...Oh my gosh, I am so sorry about that," she finally said after catching her breath.

He needed an extra second to catch his own breath. "...You got something on your mind? Like, something distracting you?"

"No, no, I'm… I'm fine. I'm good."

"You sure?"

"Yeah-"

"You're sure?"

She turned and deliberately locked eyes with him before answering. "You don't have to keep asking."

Timid as he was, he didn't shy away from her eye contact. "I really feel like I do."

She turned away from him. If she couldn't change his mind about how she was feeling, then it wasn't worth arguing.

"Light's green."

"I can see that," she said flatly as she pressed the accelerator.

Judy wasn't truly angry with her partner, and indeed she knew that he hadn't been trying to be a dick; that right there had been a genuine attempt at expressing concern. But it was just another example of how - and she knew this was absolutely not fair to him, but still - her new partner paled in comparison to Nick.

It was wacky enough when the first bunny to join the municipal police department got paired up with its first fox; so when her second partner turned out to be a dog, well… in context, it seemed like a ridiculous doubling-down of the first joke, but by itself it just seemed like a lamer version of the first joke. With no disrespect to the German Shepherd, Brady Braverman really did seem like a poor man's Nick Wilde.

A big part of what disappointed her about having Braverman as a partner was just how similar he and Nick were on paper, and yet how he was just so much… lesser. They both had sarcastic and cynical senses of humor, they both had a "disappointed optimist" vibe about them with good hearts under rough exteriors, and they both certainly cared for her in their own unique ways. And out of all the new officers fresh out of the academy they could have assigned to her in Nick's stead, Brady made a perfectly fine protégé, just as Nick once had. But this poor pup just didn't have even one iota of the fox's charm.

Braverman came across as someone who not only was well aware that he was fundamentally lacking charm, but also like someone who was trying desperately to acquire it - and he seemed like someone who was fully cognizant of the fact that if you have to try to be charming, then you just aren't, but who tried anyway because he'd definitely never get better if he didn't. And in that way, Judy could respect his efforts, but jeezaloo, it just seemed pathetic. And Brady had more or less explicitly expressed that all of this was the case after meeting Nick a few times and lamenting how impossibly charismatic he was, but in a strange twist of irony, Nick, no longer the smug bastard he used to be, would now freely attest that his charm was purely an acquired skill he'd had to learn to survive on the streets as he did for so many years, but Brady seemed to Judy to be living proof that some mammals just weren't born to be socialites.

Like just now. Judy almost crashes their cruiser. Brady expresses concern that she is distracted by intrusive thoughts. He was right to be concerned because he was correct. But even though she knew he was, his questioning didn't come across as personally worried about her, it just came across as… accusational? Is that the right word? One way or another, the poor kid couldn't control his tone when he got flustered, and he was always flustered because he wasn't comfortable in his own fur, and everybody on Earth could see it and consequently they weren't comfortable with him either, and so even though there was nothing evil about him, he just wasn't an attractive personality to have around. One could only imagine how badly he'd take it if he found out that one of the things bugging Judy when she lost her concentration was the thought that her dream job had become irreparably less dreamy now that this dog was a part of it.

But don't just take my word for it that Officer Braverman was too awkward and unconfident to live. Judy and I don't need to tell you when Brady himself will surely show you any time now.

"...Kid," he suddenly spat after a few minutes of silence in the car. It was so curt and monotone, he sounded not unlike a spooked robot.

Yup, called it. Braverman being involuntarily weird, just like clockwork.

"What?" asked Officer Hopps, genuinely having no idea what the heck her partner had just said.

"Kid," the dog repeated as he pointed to some entity on the side of the road which they passed as he was sputtering. As often happened with him, he knew exactly what he wanted to say, but the words just weren't coming out right, and while he hadn't initially been nervous, confronting the fact that he wasn't in control of his speech made him progressively more and more terrified. "Kid. Sidewalk. Small. Alone. Stop, stop, car, stop!"

She got the picture. The hare yanked the squad car into an empty space by a fire hydrant and they both hopped out.

On the sidewalk, a black bear cub, certainly no older than kindergarten age, was standing alone, turning his head frantically in every direction, looking like he was trying to be a big boy and not cry, but he wasn't quite succeeding.

Judy and Brady ran up to him. Although the kid was already plenty bigger than her, the bunny made a point to wrap her arm as much around the bear cub as she could. The German Shepherd, meanwhile, crouched a little and put his paws on his knees to look less big and scary.

"Hey, buddy, what's wrong?" asked Judy.

"What's up, little guy, how ya doin'?" asked Brady, doing his damnedest to come across as more empathetic with this kid than he had with his partner five minutes prior.

Unfortunately, the kid looked even more nervous in the presence of these adults.

"My mom says I shouldn't talk to strangers!" he whimpered.

Judy just kept smiling a friendly smile at him. "And you know what, young man? Your mom raised you right. But don't worry, we're not just any old strangers! I'm Officer Judy Hopps and this is my friend, Officer Brady Braverman -"

"Nice to meet you, friend," said Brady as he held out a paw for an informal little handshake, hoping the kid would appreciate being treated like a grown-up, but instead the cub just looked at the dog's paw in horror. Judy gently shook her head at him to tell him he'd probably come on too strong, and Braverman tried not to look too embarrassed as he retracted.

"...and we're from the Zootopia Police Department!" Hopps finished as though nothing weird or awkward had just happened. "We're here to keep you safe and make the world a better place! Now, can I ask, what's your name, my friend?"

After a moment, the bear cub spoke: "...Joshton."

Braverman stood up and stepped away for a second, clearly trying desperately to contain his laughter.

The hare just rolled his eyes at her partner and soldiered on with her genuinity. "Well it's nice to meet you, Joshton. Now, you mentioned your mom; is she around right now? Is there any other grown-up who's supposed to be with you?"

"My mom ran off down the street and told me to follow her, but I tripped and fell down and when I looked up, she was gone!"

"Oh no! Did you hurt yourself?"

"Um… it hurt a little…" the boy said as he rubbed his knee. "...but… now I just wanna know where my mom went."

Sorry to say, this cub's misfortune was just what Judy needed. Little things like this were the reminders she needed to reinvigorate her passion for this job. Somebody has a problem that Anybody can solve but Nobody is doing it - so she'll rise to the occasion and be the one to do it. Look at all those mammals passing by on the street leaving this poor kid alone. Terrible people, all of them, but at least they'd make her look better by comparison. Who needs intoxicants when you can get high on a sense of importance?

"Well in that case," she told Joshton, "we're gonna help you find her! You said she was running down the street? Do I understand that right?"

"Yeah, and that's when I fell down and then she wasn't there anymore!"

"Do you remember which way she was running?"

"That way!" Joshton pointed down the street.

"Alright, let's start heading that way!" the hare declared as she took the cub's paw in hers and started walking, soon intercepting the dog again.

"By the way, buddy," Braverman ventured gently, "would you happen to know why or where your mom was running? That might help us out, too!"

Hopps flashed him a quick smile; she thought that was a very good question to ask, and he'd asked it very well.

The cub nodded. "Yeah, she was running after some guy!"

"Pfft," Brady could be heard scoffing, not quite under his breath. "Somebody pissed off Mama Bear."

"Brady!" Judy hissed at him; her goodwill toward him from ten seconds ago was gone.

"What?" asked Braverman unapologetically. "You know bears swear like sailors, I guarantee you he's heard that word before." (You see? Sounds vaguely like something Nick would say, but whereas Wilde would have said it with an irresistible smirk, Brady just looked and sounded annoyed, like he didn't want to be there.)

And this reminder that she was stuck working with A Guy Like Nick But Like A Version Who Sucks was a contributing factor towards the death-glare she was giving him.

...Now Braverman looked like he regretted his words. "Alright, um… you want me to run ahead and see if I can sniff her out? Maybe she just went around the corner."

Hopps nodded. "That would be nice, Brady, thank you."

The German Shepherd scurried off and left the bear cub alone with the bunny, walking behind at a pace somewhere between leisurely and urgent.

"Are we gonna find my mom?"

"I'm sure we will, Joshton," she said as they turned the first corner. "Let's head this way just in case she just took a quick turn you didn't see. Now, can I ask you a couple questions about her, though? It might make it easier to find her!"

"...Okay."

"Do you know her first name?"

"...Carla."

"And does she have the same last name as you?"

"I think so."

It sounded like they could hear a husky-voiced woman screaming somewhere not too far away. Hopefully nothing too dire.

"What's your last name, Joshton?"

"...Coleman."

"Awesome! Now you see, Joshton, that helps us because now we have a name we can ask for -"

"Found her!"

Well, that hadn't taken long. They saw Braverman peek around the next corner, now on the opposite side of the block as they'd started. The hare and the bear ran over to him and saw that there was indeed a black bear woman present. Hey, with a nose like that, at least the dog was objectively better than Nick at something.

But the black bear woman was indeed the woman they'd heard screaming.

And she was screaming at a cop.

A meter maid, specifically.

Judy and Brady recognized the officer as someone new to the force, a member of a rather obscure species called a… an addax? I think? Guy looked like an antelope but his family was from Mauritania. Much like what they'd done with Judy when she first started, they put him on parking duty to familiarize him with the city (he was from Phoenix originally), a job he certainly thought was beneath his dignity. So he was presently doing his best to nonverbally convey to this woman that he didn't plan to heed her protests when his fellow officers arrived.

The bear quickly noticed them too. "Do you seriously have nothing fucking better to do other than ruin people's lives, you fucking asshole!? What makes you think-!? JOSHTON!"

"MOM!"

Ms. Coleman stopped her diatribe to kneel down and hug her beloved son.

"Joshton, I told you to follow after me!"

"I did, Mom, but I tripped on something and fell down and when I looked up, you weren't there anymore!"

Judy was absolutely beaming at the sight. A job well done, she was feeling good about her choice of career. She shared in their joy and hoped this moment would never end.

But the meter maid made a point to assure it would. He shot her and Braverman an unimpressed glance and a slow nod to assure them that this wasn't just a case of an open-and-shut happy ending.

"So she didn't even realize her kid was missing?" the addax grumbled.

"...Excuse me?" Carla asked as she stood back up.

"Mom, this nice rabbit lady helped me find you!" Joshton exclaimed, pointing at Judy.

"Oh, hey, it's the bunny cop!" said the bear woman with sarcastic excitement. "Of course, everyone knows Judy Hopps! Hey. Hey. You're a good cop, right, ma'am? Maybe then you can help convince this guy that a good cop wouldn't be handing out parking tickets like candy?"

The addax beat Judy to the punch: "Well guess what, lady? She's on my side! I'm doing exactly what she did when she first started to prove herself and now I'm doing the exact same thing! She ain't gonna be a hypocrite!"

The bear woman raised an eyebrow at the hare. "Is that so? You were more than happy to go around ticketing people for victimless crimes just so the city could squeeze even more money out of us!? It's expensive enough to live in this goddamn city, you can sleep at night knowing you're burdening us even more!?"

Ah, yes. The part of her story most civilians didn't know about. The part of the story she didn't know how to feel about anymore after Nick told her the other side of the story. The part of the story she wanted desperately to forget, but wouldn't be allowed to just yet.

"Well… you see, ma'am…" Hopps stuttered, her confidence eroding quickly, "...I didn't want to be on parking meter duty, I-I was just going along with it to prove to my bosses I was a good worker who could handle more -"

"That's exactly what I'm doing!" said the addax whose name Judy and Brady still didn't know.

"So you two are one in the same!" the cub's mom growled. "So you don't actually care about people! I've got bills to pay and a son to feed! I don't need another bill! Did you see my car on the other block!? It's a '97 Plymouth Voyager! I'm fucking broke! This is gonna make paying my other bills harder!"

"Well I've got bills to pay, too, lady, and I plan on keeping my job!" At this point the two of them were basically having a conversation around Judy rather than with her. "Your meter was expired and now it's my job to punish you for breaking the rules! You know what else is part of my job? Writing tickets for disturbing the peace! So I suggest you calm yourself and start acting like a freaking adult!"

"HEY! Don't swear in front of the fuckin' kid!"

"I didn't swear, lady, YOU did! Are you fucking hearing yourself!?"

"NOW you swore!"

"Yeah, NOW!"

Judy had absolutely no idea how to remedy this situation. So she didn't.

"Um, excuse me?"

The addax and the bear both gave the dog an inpatient look.

"How late was she?"

"Huh?" asked the meter maid.

"Like how long was she past the expiration, um… time? How far over was she? The limit?" Once again, Brady's stumbling lack of confidence when speaking became a self-fulfilling prophecy.

"Not even two minutes!" Ms. Coleman hollered. "My son had to pee before we left the store!"

"Seven minutes," the addax rebutted flatly.

"Okay, that…" Braverman sought the courage to speak. "...that does seem a little uncharitable."

Eh, seven minutes over was in the gray area where it was getting to be a little too long, and this woman did seem to have a little bit of a sense of entitlement to leniency about her. But Judy couldn't help but remember what Nick had argued, and she couldn't remember coming up with a better point.

"Yeah," she finally said. "I'd let her go on this. There's plenty of cars in this city, you'll meet your quota some other way."

"THANK YOU!" said Carla, but her tone was more of exasperation and frustration than gratitude.

The addax, however, was unmoved. He turned the screen of his handheld device around to show them some details. "Alright, Hopps. I know you've done this before, I know you know how this works. Ticket already went to city hall. It ain't coming back. No takesy-backsies."

"WHAT!?" Joshton's mom screamed again.

"Mom, please stop screaming, you're scaring me."

"Oh, come on!" Judy protested the addax. "There's definitely a button on there to undo one for when you type in license plates wrong and stuff!"

"Hey!" the addax protested right back. "Did that fox of yours infect you with his stupid ideas? We're cops. This is what we do. You know why everybody on the force hates you now? Because you don't even back the blue when you are the fucking blue! And because you're fucking a traitor who's red - apparently in more ways than one!"

"Hey! Leave him out of this! He decided the police wasn't the right thing for him and I chose to respect that! And you should too!"

"You want me to respect the fact that he straight-up said my line of work is -?"

"How much is it?" Brady interrupted.

"...What?" asked the meter maid.

"The ticket. How much-?"

"A hundred fucking dollars!" yelled Ms. Coleman. "Which is way too goddamn much!"

Braverman just rolled his eyes as everyone watched him pull his wallet and leaf through until he pulled out a wad of twenties, tens, and fives.

"Here," Brady said as he handed it to the meter maid. "Consider it paid."

"Do I look like a fucking cashier?" asked the addax. "Braverman, why do you even carry that much cash on you?"

"Man, why don't you?" the German Shepherd grumbled as he handed the money to the black bear. "There. Even Stevens."

"Brady," said Judy, taking hold of the dog's free arm, "you don't have to do this, that's a lot of money -"

"Evidently I fucking do." He didn't even look at her as spoke.

The bear had a skeptical look on her face as she accepted the money, but accept it she did. She made eye contact with all three of the officers before grabbing her son's arm. "Thank you," she said angrily to Braverman.

"Thank you, Officer Dog!" Joshton beamed. "You made my mom stop being mad!"

Brady kneeled down to get closer to the kid's level again. "Don't mention it, little dude. Hey, you're a pretty cool kid, you know that?"

"I am!?" asked the cub excitedly.

"Yeah! And you sure were a brave young man when you couldn't find your mom."

"I was!?"

"Yup! Say, what's your favorite thing in the whole wide world?"

"I like memes!"

Braverman clearly wasn't ready for that and his face made it look like his brain had ground to a halt. "O...kay, then…"

Joshton's mother, who had wanted to split before Braverman tried buttering up his kid like a fucking weirdo, wasn't going to wait around for another opportunity to bounce.

"Well, thanks again, Officer Dog," Carla said as she began dragging Joshton away, but not before turning to the addax - "Fuck you…" - and the hare. "...and fuck you."

The three of them watched the bear's walk off, little Joshton looking behind him and waving at Brady and Judy. The addax, though, quickly moved along with checking meters.

"Whaddya wanna say to him?" the dog whispered to the bunny.

"Honestly?" Judy asked as she pondered the answer herself. "...Nothing. Let's just leave this guy alone." And she led the way back to the cruiser.

"Really? You don't wanna try to inspire this guy to be… y'know, less of an asshole? A good cop?"

"We already tried leading by example and talking some sense into him when that didn't work," she said, trying to sound unfazed and not completely dejected. "If we haven't gotten through to him already, we never will. All we can do now is be better than him."

Braverman couldn't help but feel like this was a completely uncharacteristic response from his partner, but he shrugged with an "Uh… m'right," and kept walking.

Hopps would have completely agreed that that response wasn't quite like her - most assuredly not like the cop she wanted to be. But that was an extremely rough situation on a personal level and she simply wasn't ready for it, so she would accept that the scene had a happy ending, forgive herself, and wash her paws of the situation. She'd try to be ready next time; maybe if she'd failed to inspire this addax dude to not be a jerk, it was a flaw with her ability to inspire people, not with his ability to be inspired.

But speaking of inspirations…

"By the way," she began anew, "that really was a nice thing you did, paying for her parking tickets. I mean… you didn't have to do something that drastic, but I think it says something good about you that you were even willing to make that big of a move."

And for a brief moment, the German Shepherd looked comfortable with himself. "Huh! Um… thanks!"

"And it was cute how you were trying to make that kid feel good." Although Nick would have done it a lot better. "Though… I gotta ask, what was that part about what his favorite thing was… about?"

Aaand Brady felt awkward and uncertain again. "Man - I dunno, I was just trying to relate to him."

"Well, it was a good effort! You'll get better at it, don't worry!" Of course, having all the optimism in the world couldn't make it a certainty that she was right.

Brady nodded. "Well, I sure hope so… hey, at least we did some good, right?"

"Yeah!" Judy beamed. "That's the spirit! A net positive! We stumbled along the way, but we learned from our mistakes and we won in the end!"

"Damn straight," Braverman said rather unenthusiastically.

"It's a shame we had to be the ones to do good, though," the hare continued. "Good thing we were around. All those mammals just passing by a cub crying in the streets like it's nothing -"

"I-I mean, to be fair…" the dog ventured, "...if I weren't wearing an officer's uniform, I wouldn't be approaching a strange kid on the street."

Judy's face was twisted in disgust as she looked up at the dog. "Why not!? You seriously wouldn't feel bad about leaving a crying kid all alone!?"

Brady didn't look ashamed, just embarrassed as he leaned over to whisper something to his diminutive partner. "I wouldn't want people thinking I'm a fucking pedophile!"

"Oh, come on!" Hopps scoffed at full volume. "Nobody would think that!"

"I guarantee you they would."

"Brady, you're being paranoid again -"

"You want me to get my mom on the phone so she can explain to you why she specifically discouraged me from taking a job at a swim school?" Braverman pulled out his smartphone and waved it in Judy's face; he wasn't bluffing. "I'm serious, we can call her. It was gonna be a summer job in college and when I told her I got the job she basically said 'No the hell you didn't, if a man like you works with half-naked children all day long, people are gonna think you're a creep, including me, your mother.' She probably won't admit to that last part, but she'll gladly admit everything before that."

Braverman seemed pretty adamant about his fear being justified, so Judy just let it go. "No, that's… that's alright, I believe you."

And hey, maybe he was right. Maybe people were hyper-aware of stranger danger these days and nobody wanted to risk being taken for the stranger who posed danger. And as she and her partner got into their squad car, she told herself that this was further proof of the importance of their work: this world needed people who wouldn't be afraid to do the right thing… even if it sometimes looked like the wrong thing.

Unfortunately she didn't know whether her new partner could be someone who could be said to be quite as willing as her.

When Nick quit, they bounced her around with a bunch of different officers to try as her new partners; these were all officers who didn't have partners specifically because everyone else already refused to work with them, so you can imagine how much crap these hostile characters gave Judy over Nick's decision to walk. They even put her on desk duty for about two weeks just as a product of being completely out of ideas of what to do with her. Then they offered her a chance to take a kid fresh out of the academy under her wing and she jumped at the chance.

Thus she was paired with the ironically-named Brady Braverman. The German Shepherd wasn't technically a college dropout; he'd completed community and gotten his Associate's with plans to transfer to a four-year, but he had already been in enough debt and (in typical Brady Braverman fashion) he didn't have enough faith in himself to ever be able to pay off his student loans - okay, actually, on second thought, that last part might have been a rational concern. But one way or another, he felt the need to pay off his community college bills before pursuing a Bachelor's (not that he knew what he wanted to go into anyway), so he joined the police to make himself some money. Besides, his aunt had been a high-ranking cop back East (incidentally in the same city Nick was from), and although she did eventually quit herself due to her own moral qualms before Brady could even remember, she was probably his coolest family member, so he might as well take some cues from her, right? It was either the police or the armed forces, and he knew he couldn't handle the armed forces.

With the political climate at the time that he graduated the academy, however, he was seriously wishing he'd just joined the armed forces. Judy was ecstatic to have a protégé all to her own, someone to mold into a shining officer of the law who would stand for peace and justice, and here she got a pup who right off the bat expressed to her that he was afraid he'd made a very bad decision. But this was Brady Braverman; he was too afraid to just cut his losses and change his mind, so he stuck with it, and Judy had time to work on him.

And she'd say she did a… eh, a decent job. After the better part of a year with him, she'd successfully convinced this dog that good cops do exist and that he could be one… but he just didn't seem that into it. He seemed like he was playing the part of a good cop because it seemed like what he ought to do rather than because it was something he wanted to do. Which is better than nothing, it was better than being like one of those cops Nick warned about who did more evil not by choosing to be evil but by not choosing to be good, but it was just a disappointment that he couldn't share her passion. Brady was a good kid with a good heart and he did seem like he was trying to be a good person in life, but it was clear as day that he did not believe that he could be making the world a better place in any substantial, tangible, meaningful way by being a police officer.

In a way, he was a similar case to that of the addax they'd just met. Judy had done her darnedest to demonstrate to Brady over the last year that they could be forces for good in this city, using moments like helping a lost cub find his parents as proof, and to a good extent he was buying into it, but there seemed to be a ceiling to how inspired he would ever be. He prompted the question: was his lack of enthusiasm for his job his failure as a pupil or her failure as a pedagogue? The former option seemed so dismissive, like she was absolving herself of responsibility without so much as reflecting on it, but the latter… that scared her. If she wasn't a good teacher now, when would she be? What did she need to do to get better? How do you teach yourself to teach others - especially if you don't know how to teach in the first place!? Existential terror of the limit of her abilities, you get it.

But at least Brady tried. So many cops on this force didn't; that was one thing Nick was right about that she couldn't disagree with. She could just as easily have gotten stuck with one of those instead of Braverman, who never once expressed any ill will toward Judy and Nick for their strange career-crossed-with-domestic situation and if anything seemed to understand it more than most mammals. This German Shepherd might not have believed in the cause (nor himself, for that matter) but at least he wasn't actively difficult to get along with.

Saying he was easy to get along with, however, wasn't always true. He had two modes, and you've already seen glimpses of both: either he was incredibly self-conscious and awkward and made everyone around him feel awkward by proxy, or he completely said screw it and acted however he felt so possessed, which frequently made Judy feel uncomfortable because in an effort to assuage his own discomfort he'd stop caring that she didn't care for sophomoric quips or profane language. He'd go from clearly sweating that he didn't know how to be platonic friends with his female partner to saying whatever crossed mind with an astounding quantity of candor he hadn't had two minutes prior - and again, the things Brady said with candor just didn't have the same charm that the things that Nick said with candor had. It wasn't fair to him, but Braverman had a big pair of shoes to fill, and he'd likely never fill them.

Brady had met Nick a few times via Judy, so they had a decent grasp on each other's personality. They always made a few jokes about how foxes and hounds weren't supposed to get along, and they seemed to be comfortable in each other's company - of course, Nick worked his magic which could make damn-near anyone comfortable in his company, something Brady was well aware of. As mentioned, Brady had expressed to Judy several times that he'd had a weird admiration-slash-jealousy of the fox; he admired Nick's intelligence and headstrength, his conviction to follow his heart out of the force and not care what anyone else thought, his cunning and survivalism to last as a street businessman for nearly two decades, the way he'd bettered himself after being such a heartless conniver for nearly two decades, his readily self-apparent self-confidence and his… well, his foxlike charm and charisma - and the dog was bitterly, self-loathingly jealous that he didn't have any of that himself and didn't know how to get it. But Braverman had also confided in Judy that he also thought a lot about the people he admired and wished to be like - Nick among many others - and wondered whether, if they could see him trying and failing to emulate them, they'd be disappointed in him for being a failure; of course, pessimist to the end, Brady always stipulates that he knows this worry is stupid, because the people he admired surely aren't even thinking about a loser like him.

Little did he know, Nick thought about him regularly. He had to; when your live-in girlfriend and former coworker routinely complains about the strange mix of emotions she gets from her new partner, lamenting being stuck with a kid who didn't seem to have enough self-esteem to butter a piece of toast but lamenting that lament because she knew he was doing his best (wasn't he?)... when you keep hearing these grievances over and over, you start to ponder the subject of said grievances fairly often. And wouldn't you know it, Nick did initially dislike Braverman for all these weird feelings he was putting Judy through, making her question her ability to lead and inspire as though Brady's low self-opinion was somehow contagious, but after hearing Judy's own opinions about her new partner evolve (and Nick himself realizing he may have forgotten how to empathize with people who weren't quite as socially adept and self-contained as he was), now he just felt bad for the guy. The German Shepherd fully had the fox's pity. So maybe it's in our collective best interest that one of the mammals Brady admires didn't feel like he was a disappointing failure, but rather felt like he was a poor, pathetic little pup who just wasn't wired to have a chance for greatness.

But hey, opinions can change. Maybe they just had to get to know each other better. Nick's opinion of Brady had already improved in a few other aspects. For one thing, Nick knew and appreciated that Brady respected him as a man and harbored no grief about Nick's choice to bail on the ZPD, nor did Nick sense anything but approval from the dog about the whole "a fox and a hare are clearly in a romantic relationship" thing. And whereas Nick had once privately regarded the German Shepherd as another guy who joins the cops for the sake of getting a safe government job where they don't have to have goals or apply themselves, he now understood Braverman was more complex than that. Brady still wasn't striving for greatness very much, yeah, but Nick had shared his philosophy about how much - not all, but much - how much of policing is less about protecting and serving and more about ticketing people for bullshit and making revenue for the government, and while they disagreed over how much that could be changed from the inside… he got it. Brady understood his point of view and completely agreed that a significant chunk of policing is a scam, and Nick did genuinely respect that about him.

And more importantly, Nick respected that Braverman agreed with him on the more important tenet of his philosophy, something that most cops would vehemently dismiss as balderdash (and something that even Judy took an alarmingly long time to come around to): that laws aren't always just nor moral, and that a significant segment of crime is committed not out of malice, but out of necessity. Not always, not even necessarily most of the time, but often.

Judy begrudgingly agreed with that argument too now. Again, not always is it a crime of necessity, but often.

But not always.

You could almost see the "oh shit" look on the hyena's face as he sprinted out of the liquor store and across the street with a big glass bottle under his hand, only to realize there just happened to be a cop car immediately outside the door.

"RUNNER!" Braverman barked. "Hey, slow down, um -! Shit, what's the name of a famous sprinter? Like, who's that Jamaican cheetah dude?"

Hopps didn't waste time replying. She screeched on the brakes and threw the car in park. They quickly unbuckled their seatbelts and jumped out of the car, tailing the perpetrator as fast as they could. They both knew this was a greed crime, not a need crime.

"ZPD! STOP RUNNING!" hollered the hare.

"USAIN BOLT, I REMEMBER NOW!" hollered the dog.

The hyena was fast, almost as fast as the cops on his hide. Down the length of a block, they were definitely gaining on him, but not by much. Judy was trying to pace herself as she thought about how she wanted to go about stopping this guy, and Brady - who could run pretty fast, but not for very long - was just about maxed out and hoping to get lucky in catching this guy soon.

The thief was getting lucky in that there were no comedically inopportune obstacles in his way, but neither was there anything he could use to deter the officers either. When he turned the corner and ran down an alleyway, there was no giant wall or fence boxing him in (has anyone ever even seen an alley with a wall randomly halfway down? I sure haven't), but there also wasn't anything he could knock over that could make the cops trip or slip. Right before the end of the alley, however, he decided that even a bottle of fancy expensive vodka wasn't a good price for his freedom, so he tossed it behind him, aiming the best he could for the bunny's face.

The bottle was heavier than expected, so it landed instead right at her feet. But the exploding glass was no major obstacle; Hopps just… hopped over it.

Braverman, however, had to grind to a halt to slowly and carefully tiptoe his way around the jagged shards now peppering the asphalt surface of the alley. (Suffice it to say that there was an ongoing discussion in the Department about perhaps mandating officers to wear shoes for when moments such as these occur, and this instance would be added to the list of cases cited in favor of the rule). If anything, though, this gave the poor pup a chance to catch his breath before sprinting again.

They were running down a main street once more. Some pedestrians saw the chase unfolding and stepped out of the way. Judy was a tad bit irritated that none of these mammals had the guts to make a citizen's arrest - like, c'mon, there was a hippo on the sidewalk who could have easily bodyslammed this perp but just chose not to - but this was yet another reminder of the importance of her work. Despite society's great fascination with stories of heroes, most people don't actually want to be heroes, they'd like to imagine they could be but don't actually want to put the work in to become heroes, they just want to be safe and comfortable while someone else performs the tough task of playing the hero. And while she may have been doing a better job of it at some times more than at others, the fact that she even wanted to be a hero to this city is what made her special.

She almost had him. A quick glance back showed that Brady wasn't too far behind. There didn't seem to be any less reckless option, so they'd go for an old classic. It was a tactic she'd used to great effect multiple times with Nick, but Braverman was a heck of a lot bigger than Nick so it was even more effective with him. Working with the German Shepherd undeniably did have some advantages. She kicked her little legs onto high gear and got ready to use herself as a weapon.

The criminal was looking for hazards to be cautious of, so he wasn't looking down, he was looking forward. But "down" quickly became "forward" as he felt himself trip over something small and furry and the concrete rapidly approached his eyes. The hyena faceplanted hard but wouldn't let that be the end of him, quickly scrambling to make it back to his feet. He never made it.

BAM.

"STAY ON THE GROUND! STAY ON THE FUCKING GROUND...!" The dog panted for a few moments before he could finish his thought. "...DO NOT GET UP!"

Judy was right there ready to mirandize him: "You're under arrest for-"

She didn't get very far.

"Well if it isn't Brady Braverman!"

All three of them just then realized they were right in front of a café, and another trio of mammals was sitting at an outdoor table, looking on at them. They were a wolverine, a koala, and a European badger, all wearing clothes that would make hipsters call them hipsters and looks on their faces that made it clear they had strong opinions about what they were witnessing.

"So this is what you're up to these days!" continued the badger, the same female voice from earlier. "Oppressing the poor and marginalized for a living!"

Braverman's face looked like a vessel had popped somewhere and drained him of blood.

"You know, we really wouldn't have bothered standing up to the bullies for you if we'd have known you were gonna grow up to be a bully, too," said the koala woman with the same condescending coo, her self-important glasses as round as saucers.

"I guess those people who voted you Most Likely to Be a School Shooter were right," chimed in the wolverine gentleman, "if out of all the jobs in the world, you chose one where you get to have a gun and the people you deal with don't!"

"It's like joining the army but for guys who're too afraid of the other person shooting back!" the badger quipped.

And then the hyena did what the hyena did best: he laughed. Loudly.

Judy felt like she ought to do something. But she couldn't figure out how to help Brady so she just went up to the crook and told him, "Sir, please be quiet, laughing is not appropriate right now. You're under arrest for -"

But he kept laughing. Cackling. Louder.

"Hey!" Braverman said as he grabbed the hyena's head and pushed it into the ground. "You really think it's a good idea to laugh at a police off-!?"

"Whoa! Phones out! Phones out, everyone!" said the koala, and she and her two friends all whipped out their cell phones and started recording the interaction.

"Just look at how angry he is, this man is dangerous!" the wolverine explained. "This dog should be fired immediately!"

"This officer is a broken man who got beat up as a kid and now he wants to beat up other people!" yelled the badger. "You know, you're supposed to learn from surviving bullying and become compassionate, not become like the people you hate!"

But Braverman was clearly straining to ignore them. "You're under arrest for robbery, resisting arrest, and assaulting a police officer," he told the hyena under his haunches. "You have the right to -"

"Oh, 'resisting arrest', that's a classic!" remarked the badger. "'How dare you not unconditionally submit to my authority!?'"

"'Assaulting a police officer!'" added the wolverine. "I bet he coughed in his direction and he felt it was justified to chase him down and tackle him!"

"We're livestreaming this!" the koala warned. "Arrest this officer immediately for assault! Fuck the ZPD!"

"You have the right to… to remain silent…" Braverman struggled and stumbled as he addressed the thief.

"Okay… I need to ask," the hare said as she stepped forward toward the café crowd. "My name is Officer Judy Hopps, I'm with the Zoot-"

"Yeah, thanks for saying your name out loud so we can get you fired too for being complicit in violence!" said the koala.

"Look at you just letting it happen!" said the badger. "Take a stand and stop him! Or is he another cishet male who'd try to hurt you if you tried to tell him he was wrong!?"

"Is that your badge number!?" noticed the wolverine. "Everybody zoom in on her badge number!"

"Hey!" the bunny protested. "He isn't doing anything wrong! He's not using excessive force, and this man did run out of a liquor store with a bottle of alcohol which he threw at us!"

"Good!" jeered the wolverine. "He should have! He was probably scared for his life because he realized there was a good chance Brady would kill him if he caught him! And Illinois v. Wardlow would have let that dog get away with it!"

"Why would you assume that!?"

"Like we said!" answers the badger. "We grew up with him! Everybody always made fun of him and beat him up from kindergarten straight through high school and we were some of the good people who told off the bullies and put them in their place! But apparently he didn't want to be like us, he was a power-hungry little puppy who was bitter that he wasn't the one beating people up! And now he gets to!"

"Besides, he stands out!" added the koala. "There aren't many dogs in this city and you could tell an Alsatian from a mile away!"

Judy couldn't help but since. "An… Alsatian? What's an Al-?"

"Goddammit," Braverman grumbled, "like Alsace-Lorraine, which is in Germany! It's a term for my people from, like, the Queen's English or something! Because 'German Shepherd' isn't politically correct to some mammals!"

"Oh, look at him complain about political correctness," said the wolverine, shaking his head.

"He just wants to remind people how much his ancestors loved forcing sheep into serfdom!" said the badger.

"I'm not responsible for the sins of my ancestors!" the dog barked.

"Then what have you done to make amends for the lasting damage they've caused!?" demanded the koala. "Because it sure looks like you're willfully ignoring that your ancestors have caused long-lasting damage! Hell, look at you right now! You've got a hyena under your knee, one of the most oppressed species in world history!"

"I don't have my knee on him, I'm sitting on his back!"

"Yeah, probably tryna break a vertebrate and paralyze him," the wolverine mumbled.

(In case you were curious, the hyena was still laughing.)

"Okay, STOP!" Judy found herself screaming. "Why are you being so… gosh-darn mean to him!?"

"Because he's a bad person," said the koala plainly.

"It's okay to be mean to bad people," added the wolverine. "Everybody knows that. That's why people love superhero stories. That's how wars get justified. Good doesn't equal nice."

"Hell, you should know that good doesn't equal nice!" said the badger. "Your entire line of work is based around the idea that you're the good guys and that makes it okay to bludgeon the 'bad' guys with bullets and billy-clubs!"

Now you see, my friend, it's best to point out that mammals like these three were not a common sight. Judy and Brady didn't encounter individuals like these who vehemently hated the police and hated each of them accordingly as frequently as Nick encountered people who vehemently defended the police and hated him accordingly. But every so often, the officers would encounter people who genuinely, not-even-trying-to-be-edgy thought All Cops Are Bad/Bullies/Bitches/Bastards and who weren't even afraid to tell these bad bully bitch bastards that they were bad bully bitch bastards. When this happened, Judy always did her best to ignore them and Brady always did his best to make it seem like the frustration wasn't poisoning him, and it usually worked. But these three were taking it to the next level in a way the duo hadn't previously had to deal with, and their connection to the dog's past wasn't making things any easier; let's just say that between this and the deal with the addax and the black bear, Hopps and Braverman were having a uniquely bad day.

And she was in absolutely no mood to just stand there and keep taking it.

"Okay, that's enough!" the hare hollered. "Knock it off! Lay off him! You don't know him as well as he knows himself! You don't know him as well as I know him! And whether you wanna believe it or not, this officer is nothing but a good dog!"

"Bold of you to assume we think you're a much better judge of character," said the koala without missing a beat, taking a slow sip of coffee while keeping her half-open eyes locked on Judy's.

Hopps let out a groan. "You're all from this city, right? Don't you know who I am?"

"A lackey for the ruling class, sent to do the dirty work of oppressing the poor and marginalized groups of mammals?" said the badger, her phone still fixed on the officers and the hyena. Man, forget Braverman, these three really had all of Nick's snark without any of the charm.

Just shook her head. "You guys really have a smart-aleck answer for everything, don't you?"

"You guys really think you're the first mammals we've gotten into an anti-police debate with, don't you?" mocked the wolverine.

Judy stopped and forced herself to take a breather. A quick glance at Brady and the hyena showed the dog was still muttering the stranger's Miranda rights under his breath. Judy told herself that hostility wasn't going to win them over.

"Look…" she began anew, making a point to think through her words before she said them, "...back in 2015, my boyfriend and I-"

Oh, uh-uh. Nuh-uh, sister, you did not just refer to Nick as your boyfriend in public with strangers. Yeah, everybody knew, but you'd been going around insisting it was none of anyone else's business, so you can't go around making it their business by making it a plot point in a conversation. Sweet cheese and crackers, Judy, c'mon, girl.

"Yeah, that fox you're with?" asked the badger, still glaring. "What about him?"

Well, looks like she'd just have to own it. "...Six years ago, he and I -"

"Don't start telling us you saved the city when you're the same person who singlehandedly sewed rampant anti-predator sentiment with your racist rhetoric in your press conference," said the koala. "If anything, you were cleaning up a mess that you caused more than anybody else."

"I… wasn't gonna say that," Judy squeaked, trying desperately not to snap at them. "Okay, long story short: the experience of solving the case inspired him to try to be a good person, that led him to the ZPD -"

"Which was a mistake," said the koala.

"- but eventually, he decided the best way to do that was outside the police."

"Still doesn't absolve him of his sins," said the wolverine.

"But I didn't cut him out of my life after that!" the bunny persisted. "We agreed to disagree, and more importantly, we still discuss our different ideas! We challenge each other! We learn from each other! Uh- look…" She walked closer to the hyena, who Braverman had finally gotten cuffed. "I'll be the first to admit, I grew up in a hick town! Law and order were black and white there! But Nick got me to realize… hey, it's more complicated than that. Sometimes good people break the rules. Sometimes you have to break the rules! And in a society where most people don't seem to care about helping strangers, sometimes people get left behind and don't see any other option to survive and resort to stealing bread!" She gestured to the hyena. "But this man was stealing from a liquor store! I know what a need crime is, and this wasn't a need crime, this was a greed crime! These are the kinds of crimes I joined the police to stop!"

"Oh, so you wanna stop all petty crime?" the badger sneered. "You say you know crimes of desperation exist, but what the hell are you doing to solve desperation!? So what if that man robbed a liquor store? He was probably born into a cycle of poverty and oppression where it was clear that his government didn't give a shit about him, so why should he give a shit about his government's laws!? You want to solve crimes like these? You need universal healthcare, you need universal basic income, you need better access to education, you need better access to mental health care, you need better public housing, you need rep-"

"I AGREE!" Brady suddenly shouted. "I fucking AGREE! I don't know what this redneck rabbit thinks, but I agree we should implement those things! Why would you assume I wouldn't!? I would have fucking voted for any politician running on those platforms, but there weren't any! But you know what? It's actually seriously fucking bogus to poor people that you think that being born into desperation and poverty forces them to make extremely bad decisions that don't even fucking benefit anybody! Nobody's forcing them into a life of pure crime for the sake of crime! Why the fuck can't both things be true!? Yeah, this hyena might have grown up in a bad neighborhood - where you from?"

"I thought I had the right to remain silent," chuckled the hyena.

"Fine, then let's say he grew up in, I dunno, Tundra Town -"

"Tundra Town? Man, do I look like a snow cat!? I grew up in Happytown!" After a second, the hyena realized the trick Braverman had pulled. "...Aw, you mothafucka-!"

"So he grew up in shitass Happytown. He grew up in a place where everyone was desperate and the city and the state and the federal fucking government didn't give a shit about them so everyone around him committed crimes and he grew up thinking that that's just what people did. Maybe his shitty worldview is because he's a victim of circumstance and not because he was born to be evil! But why can't both things be true!? Why can't we acknowledge that this guy was born into a shitty situation that irrevocably fucked with his head forever and still say Hey, Mister Hyena Guy!, nobody broke your fuckin' arm to make you steal a bottle of Crown Royal from a liquor store!?"

"It was Grey Goose, fool!"

"I thought you were remaining silent!"

The three café patrons looked at each other. Far from seeming angry, they kind of looked like they were pitying him.

"As much as I want to point out that he's still not even acknowledging that the worst crimes are committed by the wealthy and the government itself…" the badger said to her friends.

"Which I also fucking agree with," Braverman growled, "why are you assuming I don't!?"

"...let's talk about how pathetic it is that he thinks that voting will change anything."

The dog's jaw fell open. "Then what the fuck do you propose, Patricia!?"

"REVOLUTION!" the three shrieked in unison, leaning in towards the officers as their eyes burned with fury.

"...Revolution?" Judy asked, not comprehending the situation any more than her partner did.

"Yes, revolution!" shouted the wolverine. "The current system in place has a vested interest in not fixing this country's problems! It's not broken, it's operating exactly how it's supposed to! And you can't bring about change while in a line of work specifically meant to maintain the status quo!"

Hopps and Braverman were still speechless for a moment, the hyena still giggling intermittently, before the German Shepherd realized what they were getting at.

"Oh! For the love of - J-Judy, don't, don't talk to them anymore! They're fucking separatists! They're too far gone."

Ah, yes, Zootopia separatists. Mammals who wanted the city and its environs to actually, seriously break off and become an independent Singapore-esque city-state. In some ways, they had valid points, citing that the city was already so much more different than any other city in North America (recall its localized renaming of worldwide companies, its unique lingo and dialect that extended even to official documents and public announcements, and the way that it did arguably more than any other city in the world to accommodate for the physical and geometrical needs of its diverse citizenry). Of course, it was not a very popular opinion and it was never realistically going to happen, separatist advocates typically being those so socially far-left that even the most stereotypical modern college students would wince at their ideas, so the officers encountering them today was an extremely strange stroke of luck.

"Of course we're separatists! Any thinking citizen of this city would be!" the koala shot back. "It doesn't make any sense that a city founded to be a guiding light of civil rights should remain in a fascist country like the United States! Just look! We're being infected by the racist American culture as shown by you oppressing this predator!"

"I AM A FUCKING PREDATOR! WHAT DO YOU THINK I AM!?"

"A lapdog doing the bidding of racist prey mammals," said the koala confidently.

"Aw, fuck you, Kelsey! You're a racist prey mammal if that's all you fucking think when you see me!"

"You're just pissed because you know that when people like us are finally in power, we'll have no use for tools of fascism like you."

"I'm not gonna take that from someone drinking fucking Starbucks and filming me with her iPhone! Hell, you're probably just calling me a fascist because I'm German, aren't you!? I guess my Jewish last name ain't doing anything for ya, huh!?"

"We went to CCD together, Brady," said the badger, "I know you're not actually Jewish."

"And you and I had gym class together," added the wolverine, "and I wouldn't have defended you from that guy who always smacked you on the ass and called you a woman every day in the boys' locker room if I knew then who you'd become."

"Shit the FUCK up, Sam, you are not a good person!"

"My name is Samuel."

"Why should I respect your wishes if you're not respecting mine!?"

"Brady, if you had a theme song, it would be 'Teenage Dirtbag'," said the koala, "except minus the ending, because there's no way you're ever getting the girl."

Now tell me, my friend, does it seem like this argument has been going nowhere for far too long? Don't worry, Judy completely agreed. And as much as it killed her to give up hope on three more people who refused to see the light, she figured it would be a waste of time to let this little spat continue any further. But not to worry, this conflict would soon reach its climax.

"Alright. Brady. Just like you said," Judy insisted as he went over to the cruiser to open up the back door for Braverman to put the hyena in. "Don't engage with them anymore. Ya just gotta accept that some people just aren't ever going to accept you as a good mammal -"

"If you wanted to be a good mammal, you should have become an activist instead of becoming a fucking cop! There's this thing called social media now, you stupid old-ass millennial, and anybody who actually wants to fight for good should be on there spreading their ideas and raising an army to fight for the revolution!" the badger screamed at the top of her lungs as she stood up, arms in the air and vocal cords straining. "Hey, don't get me wrong, I think you're evil and you'd be a very dangerous mammal with a platform and a following. But if you did care to be a good mammal, that's how you do it in 2021! Not by joining the cops when everyone who's conscious in our society knows now that the police literally only exist to maintain oppression!"

Okay, Judy was just about done with all this self-righteousness and jargon.

"You just won't stop cutting me off to talk about how good of a person you are, will you?" asked the hare, looking like she was now matching the German Shepherd in frustration.

"IF YOU WANT ME TO STOP TALKING OVER YOU, THEN LET THAT MAN GO AND GET THE FUCK OUTTA HERE RIGHT NOW! RIGHT NOW!"

And when Hopps and Braverman didn't evaporate in a millisecond, the badger picked up her coffee cup and threw it square at Officer Hopps.

In the next three seconds, the following things all happened more or less simultaneously:

Judy, not at all expecting physical retaliation, froze up and couldn't dodge the cup in time: the cup, almost as big as her, knocked her to the ground.

The badger's friends, realizing they'd just livestreamed her unambiguously assaulting a cop, scrambled to cut their feeds while stammering things like "Patricia, what the fuck is wrong with you!?" and "Jesus Christ, Pat, what did you do that for!?"

Patricia also realized she fucked up, dropping her phone and holding her arms out while sputtering "Oh my God! I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to do that! I didn't think I would actually hit you!"

Braverman made the executive decision to embrace his inner Bad Dog and got up off the hyena to tackle the badger, growling all the way.

The hyena, hands still cuffed behind his back, scrambled to his feet and made a break for it.

A single blare of a police siren went off, and it wasn't from Hopps and Braverman's cruiser.

As Braverman leaped over the low metal railing sectioning off the café's patio section, the assailant badger lunged out of his way, just to find herself in the arms of a much larger cop, this one being a horse.

"Ma'am, I saw the whole thing, you're under arrest for assaulting a police officer," said Officer Carter as he turned the badger around and cuffed her before turning to face her friends. "And you two stay right there," he continued, "we've got some Disturbing the Peace fines for the three a' ya's."

The dog was quiet for a few moments as he zoned out of his fit of rage and back into the present, getting a grasp of all that had just happened virtually instantaneously.

Carter tapped the back of his hooved hand on Brady's shoulder. "Don't worry, Jimmy's got your first perp under control."

Braverman turned to look down the street, where he saw a graphite-gray wolf officer had chased down and tackled the handcuffed hyena all over again. But he only looked for a split second before remembering the incident in the foreground that had sent him into action in the first place.

"JUDY!" he howled in anguish as he ran over to his pocket-sized partner.

She wasn't hurt that badly at all. In fact, not only was she perfectly conscious, she was propping herself up on her elbow. She was in no hurry to get up, though - not because it hurt too much, but because after even more frustration without a satisfying resolution, she just didn't have the energy. So she stared off into space, looking uncharacteristically apathetic about the world she lived in, until the German Shepherd showed up next to her and gave her something else to look at.

"Judy! Are you alright!?"

"Yeah… yeah, I'm fine."

"Are you sure!? Jesus, that cup was almost as big as you! You sure you didn't crack any ribs or anything!? Did your head hit the cement!?"

"No, no, I-"

"If you think you have a concussion, I can call in an ambulance!"

I know you can call in an ambulance because I also have the ability to call in an ambulance, she found herself thinking. Man, this was the same dog who an hour beforehand couldn't figure out how to make his statements of concern seem friendly, and now he was erring in the other direction, absolutely losing his own composure and still somehow managing to sound condescending. Jeez, how could all these faux pas exist in one living being? It was seriously almost like he was a magician at this point, able to conjure awkwardness of all varieties at the drop of a hat.

"I'm fine, Brady," she insisted as he waved him off. "Just shaken is all."

"Here, at least let me help you get up," Braverman said as he offered Hopps not his paw, but his lower arm held sideways like a crossbar. The dog had been taught that this was not only a more efficient way to help someone up in terms of physical effort and exertion, but furthermore a polite way for a gentleman to help up a woman with whom he was not particularly close (and whom he was not comfortable getting any closer to). She did grab his arm almost at the elbow as he wrapped his paw around her small forearm, and it was indeed a much less strenuous method to help her up, but just so very impersonal.

"You good to walk?" he continued.

The hare just kept nodding, not looking at him or anyone else for that matter.

Understanding that she just wasn't in the mood to talk, Braverman went back over to Officer Carter dealing with the separatists.

"Yo, Kelly," the dog beckoned as he approached the horse. "Hey, uh… thanks for the help, man. We appreciate it. Um…" He forced a laugh that still sounded nervous. "...Hey, hell of a stroke of luck that you guys just happened by as that happened, huh?"

Officer Carter was not one of the many cops who outwardly despised Judy, Nick, and Judy's new partner on the force, but he didn't care to pretend to enjoy their company either. Let's just say he wasn't fond of how Braverman had just invited himself to address the horse by his unisex first name (whether a smooth talker like Nick could have gotten away with going first-name-basis with Carter without his permission in ways a neurotic like Braverman just couldn't pull off is unknown as of this writing). So Kelly didn't look too apologetic nor too callous when he laid the harsh truth on Braverman and the approaching Hopps.

"We didn't just happen by," he said flatly. "We got calls from a couple different shop owners on this street that a bunny cop and a puppy cop got into a really, really loud argument with a couple of college kids. It was annoying them for one thing, but they thought it might get ugly if you two didn't get backup. Looked to them like you two just couldn't handle the situation."

Upon hearing that, Brady turned immediately (and badly, and obviously) to look at his partner. He knew how much pride Judy took in her work, and he knew how much it must have killed her to hear that several impartial arbiters had declared her unable to do her job.

And he knew how bad it was that she was still staring down the street, looking at nothing in particular.

-IllI-

It took over half an hour to sort everything out, during which the badger bitched up a storm that their refusal to get a move on constituted a violation of her right to a speedy trial (something that surely would never happen in her utopia Zootopia). Hopps and Braverman arranged that they'd take their original hyena in while Carter and Villalobos would transport the badger, and they'd just rendezvous at the station and fill out the necessary paperwork; in the meantime, Judy and Brady both wanted to be kept away from that radical madmammal. It was also agreed upon that none of the four of them would let slip that Judy really probably should have gone to see a doctor, just to be safe, as she really was bruised and aching from head to toe after that hit.

The problem with seeing a medic, of course, was that it would be conceding that those maniacs had succeeded in hurting her in ways beyond just words, and any diagnosis of injury would be a corporeal testament to her failure to deconvert them from their militant cynicism.

Honestly, even despite the blow she'd taken, Judy was still far safer to drive their car than Brady. The good news was that the dog wasn't freaking out about her health anymore; the bad news is that that emotional vacuum gave him an opportunity to dwell on that frustrating interaction and get angry all over again. If anything, listening to him seething through his teeth on the precipice of outright growling was doing a good job of taking her mind off any physical pain she was feeling.

"...Just… calm down," Judy said gently when they hit a red light. "It's alright, she got what she deserved."

Brady didn't answer. His cheeks puffed out as he blew an angry breath out of his mouth.

"Hey, I'm frustrated by that, too," she continued, "but… I keep reminding myself that Nick meets ten times as many nasty mammals who hate him for quitting the cops than we meet mammals who hate us for being cops."

The dog let out a groaning sigh. "I know he does, because we run into those people too who hate us by fucking proxy for not cutting ties with him! But that's not what's really bugging me. It's like, Jesus Christ, a huge chunk of the force thinks you and me and Nick are fucking communists… and then the actual fucking communists think I'm a goddamn Nazi because I'm not throwing molotov cocktails into the windows of… of… shit, I dunno! They're just angry because I'm not as bad-tempered and radical as they are!"

"Well, look at them! Now they're in trouble with the law for running their mouths off. Who cares what they think?"

"I do!" Braverman barked. "And I care because… because… one thing Nick and I agree about is that those three fucktards definitely care more about making the world a better place than most cops in this country do, probably more than most people do. They definitely care more than most people. Indisputably. They just have really, really wacky ideas for how to do it. And I still do agree with them on, like, ninety percent of the issues, but they hate me because of the piddly shit we don't agree on! They regard me as the enemy because I have the balls to tell them some of their ideas are wacky!"

"It's alright, Brady, I understand." And Hopps wasn't just saying that to get him to chill out and stop ranting and raving; she really did understand because this was not the first time Braverman had rambled about this.

"But that's where we come in! Because you and me also give a shit about trying to better the world, and all those apathetic fucking people who make up the majority of our world think you, me, and Nick are the same as those three dipshits! People like those three make the act of giving a shit look bad! They make giving a shit look dorky, cringy, bitchy, and… weak. And I think they know this, but they're so up their own asses with their counterculture aesthetic that they don't care that nobody's gonna wanna follow their lead if there's nothing appealing about their personalities!"

The hare didn't see any constructive reason to interrupt his monologue, so she just nodded along. She didn't disagree with anything he was saying, she just didn't see any point in getting this worked up over it. Yeah, people like that would always be an obstacle, but save that energy for getting around that obstacle.

Brady sighed again. "I know I'm probably boring you, but… hey, this is my generation, these are my people, I know them. And I know they act so goddamn high and mighty but if you were to show them some edgy shit like… like… like a Hitler speech vodocoded to the Thomas the Tank Engine theme song, they'd be laughing their asses off. Guaran-goddamn-tee it. They'd probably tell you afterwards that it was just nervous laughter and that you're horrible for making them laugh at something so horrible… but they'd still laugh." There he went again, making an uncomfortably dark joke you wouldn't have thought five minutes ago he'd even have the social confidence to say, but nevertheless a joke made out of anxiety rather than out of a lack of it.

He was quiet for a moment as he seemed to finally relax his body for a moment. Perhaps realizing he'd just done a lot of talking, he turned to his partner to give her a turn.

"How you feeling?"

Judy shrugged. "Alright." His presence was taking a toll on her, of course, but she'd never say that.

"No major aches or pains?"

She forced a nasal chuckle. "Hey, I'm a big girl, I'll deal with it."

"Cool. Just, y'know, lemme know if I can help."

But how can you help me if you can barely help yourself, Brady? "You feeling better now that you… got all that out of your system?"

Braverman thought for a moment before answering. "Does Nick know he could lead a revolution if he wanted to?"

"What?"

"Those three dingleberries at the coffee shop. They actually, straight-faced, unironically told us they tout themselves as revolutionaries, but they don't have the basic-ass leadership skills to pull it off. But Nick? Ah, Nicky Dubs… everybody loves Nicky Dubs. He could probably get people to follow him. Hell, he doesn't even have to believe in anything! Honestly, it's almost better if he doesn't! Let him be the figurehead while other people behind him fuck around with the nuts and bolts of what they stand for. Hot damn… the things I would do if I could be like him..."

Judy didn't know where he was going with this, so she gave him a glance to see if his facial expression or body language would provide any hints. And oddly enough, Brady was smiling. But it seemed like a smile of someone who just reminded themselves that they could never be who they wanted to be; the smile of someone who just found a reason to give up on themselves, a great weight now lifted off their shoulders.

"He knows I'm jealous of him," he continued with a tired, defeated chuckle. "He's met me and I've all but told him to his face. But he still won't share his secrets with me. Hm… maybe… maybe… he knows it's not just a secret he can merely teach me. Maybe he knows it's just not something I can learn."

If for no other reason than because it behooved her to have a partner who wasn't drowning in self-pity, Judy interrupted: "Brady, you're young, he's a lot older than you - he's a lot older than us. You've got plenty of time to catch up to where he is." (Of course, Nick was miles ahead of where the dog was when Nick was his age, but that detail was probably best withheld.) "He'd be the first to tell you that he wasn't born the way he is."

Braverman chuckled a more throaty chuckle. "Oh, that's just his social awareness knowing it's not a good idea to tell me straight-up that I'm gonna be a loser forever. He might need me as a resource one day, so he knows better than to piss me off. And good for him, he's doing a good job of convincing me he doesn't think I'm a loser!" The German Shepherd tutted his tongue. "I'm sure he has his own fears and worries, but he's damn good at hiding them. And if I could pretend like he does that I'm not afraid of anything… then I'd really not be afraid of anything!"

Judy couldn't help but think it was curious that Brady said he could never learn Nick's ways. She thought of the first major piece of life advice the fox had ever given her: never let them see that they get to you. It was a lesson Braverman clearly needed to learn, but when he said that perhaps he was simply incapable of learning such things… killed her to say it, but Judy could totally buy that as a possibility.

"So that's why I care so much about what these idiots think," said Braverman, as if he'd just read her mind. "I'm thinking about the bigger picture. Honestly, in my head, I think it's foolish to not care about what other people think in a world where perception is everything… And yet they'll perceive me as lesser if they sense that I care how they perceive me, won't they? It's a catch-22, ain't it!?"

Well, at least you're self-aware, Brady. "I understand what you're saying."

The dog assumed correctly that the hare didn't want to talk because she was dealing with her own frustrations, but he didn't realize how many of those frustrations he was making worse.

"You mind if I listen to music to take my mind off it?"

"Oh. Sure. Go ahead."

Judy could see in her periphery that there was an interval of a solid two minutes where Brady was just scrolling through his music library before finally picking something. And when he did, he did something you might not have expected him to have the guts to do:

"FATHER CAN YOU HEEEAR MEEEEE (hear me, hear me, hear me)..., HOW HAAAVE I LETTT YOU DOWWWN (down, down, down, down)... I CUUURSE THE DAAA-AAAY, THAT III WAS BORRRN… (born, born, born, born)... AND ALLLLLLL THE SORRRRROWWW IIIN THIIIS WOOOORLD! (Dah, dah, dah!) Lemme take ya tooooooo the herrrding grouuu-ouuund…"

Oh, sweet cheese and crackers, even this guy's favorite songs started off with an apology for his existence. And whereas others might have said that it would take some modicum of self-esteem to start belting out a song regardless of proficiency, but Judy knew this dog too well; she knew that he was only capable of doing this because being loud and being quiet gave him equal but opposite types of anxiety and he was simply choosing to mix it up for the sake of variety.

Maybe that was the most succinct way to differentiate Nick and Brady: as mammals, we tend to like people who like themselves, and Brady clearly didn't like himself. Nick had his own hangups about his person and his past, but much more than not, he was okay with who he was. Braverman wasn't a bad dog and he obviously wasn't consciously choosing to retain these self-doubts, but he wasn't making much progress and his constant defeatism wasn't helpful - and it was kind of starting to run off on her. Some might go so far as to call it toxic.

Oh, and speaking of stuff reminiscent of biohazard, there was one last thing in the category of "Things About Brady Braverman Which Weren't His Fault and Didn't Make Him Evil But Which Nevertheless Made Him Immensely Frustrating to Work With" - that being a highly embarrassing medical condition.

"...Oh, God," the dog suddenly said in a low, troubled voice as he keeled over, yanking the earbud wires out and clenching his gut. A quick glance over showed Judy that he looked like his eyes were about to pop out of his head.

"What's wrong?" Judy asked. Judy knew.

"Pull over," he answered tensely. "Find me a bathroom. Now."

"I-I'll keep my eyes out for a place-"

"There's a McDonald's! There! Right there!"

"I would, but I can't cut across two lanes of traffic that fast-!"

"Then turn the fuckin' lights and sirens on, that's what they're there for!"

Judy obliged, and the sudden jerk must have woken up the criminal who'd fallen asleep in the backseat.

"Where he runnin' off to?" asked the hyena through the plexiglass as he watched Braverman run into the establishment. "Old dog want some chicken nuggets?"

The bunny ignored him, focusing inward to just breathe through her day's frustrations. She didn't have much time to do so, however, as Brady was back in less than thirty seconds, looking no less distressed. This was not a good sign.

"What happened?"

"Big-ass restaurant, easily seats plenty people, they have one unisex bathroom!" the dog grumbled as he climbed back into the car. "It could seat a hundred mammals big and small and they have one physical fucking toilet in the place for all the customers and staff!"

"Was it occupied, or-?"

"Just drive."

And so Judy did.

"And if you must know, it wasn't occupied, it was just covered in shit," explained the hunched-over officer. "I was trying to spare you from the details."

"Understood. Sorry I pried."

Well, at least the poor dog had something to take his mind off his discomfort, that being the hyena beginning to cackle in the backseat.

"Aw, somebody get some rice for the puppy, because he's got the runs!"

And to be fair, it was a very real thing that German Shepherds suffered from gastrointestinal issues at a disproportionate rate. But knowing that this was something hardwired into his biology was surely just another thing that made Officer Braverman feel like he was fated by the universe to always be an off-putting weirdo and never able to be someone as well-put-together as Nick.

"Do you have your pills with you?" his partner tried to help.

"The pills take half a fucking hour to work, they won't help me now," he muttered to himself; however quickly you imagined him saying that sentence, imagine him saying it twice as fast.

Judy wasn't enjoying this much more either. Seeing a creature be in pain while some sicko got a chuckle out of it in the backseat was tough enough, but as much as she strove to help people, as she saw her partner writhing in agony, doubled over and whimpering like a puppy who'd been kicked… she could care less for being forced to be the one to solve this problem.

Braverman could sense the motion of the vehicle in his bowels, and for a brief fraction of a moment he was filled with hope as he felt the car slowing down. Then he looked up and all that hope was washed away.

"What're you doing?"

"You can look for a bathroom in here-"

"They aren't gonna have a bathroom in there."

"You haven't even looked-"

"Have you EVER been to a 7-Elephant in your LIFE that's HAD A FUCKING BATHROOM!?"

Brady, I'm trying to help you here, don't get snappy with me. But in lieu of wasting her breath agreeing that no, she couldn't recall one, she just threw it in drive again and turned the lights and sirens back on. This happened just frequently enough that they were both used to it, but just infrequently enough that they never seemed to be able to find him the same bathroom twice.

"I'm sorry for biting your head off, but Jesus Christ, I'm an expert on this matter. 7-Elephants never have public bathrooms - at least not in the city."

"It's fine, I get it." She got it all too well.

"Uh… hotels. Look for hotels, they usually have unlocked lobby bathrooms."

Honestly, as embarrassing as this condition was, if there was anything in his life that he was unabashedly proud of, it was the bravery with which he fought this insipid battle on a regular basis. Like, seriously, I called this guy up on the phone and told him, "Brady, dude, I can just skip this part of the story, it's not that important to the plot," but he insisted I include it. Because if this extended scene of the dog's excruciating bout of diarrhea comes across to you as pointless and childish toilet humor -

"Somebody shouldn't a' let Fido have too many McNuggets!" the hyena jeered.

- Braverman would have said that was exactly his point. Moments like these seriously made him wonder whether it was his calling in life to prove to your average mammal that IBS or Crohn's or colitis or whatever undiagnosed syndrome he had was not inconsequential and certainly no laughing matter, and the fact that people thought it was was troubling. It did seem like such a Brady Braverman thing that the best he could hope to become in life was the Martin Luther King of mammals with chronic GI problems, but any march on Washington he could try to lead could easily be quelled by just locking up all the public restrooms in the District of Columbia.

The police car pulled into the taxi lane of a Marriott hotel (branded here as a "Bearriott" because "Mare-iott" and "Hare-iott" were too confusing to spell, but the business tax credit was still worth the cost of resigning all their logos within the city limits), and the German Shepherd hopped out and ran inside without saying thank you. Judy wasn't offended; she understood he was in a rush.

Officer Hopps was no longer enjoying her job. The positive feeling she got for using her power to do good simply wasn't outweighing all the negativity. For crud's sakes, she hadn't signed up for this job just to spend a significant chunk of her day taking a grown adult to the potty. And she knew, she knew he wasn't choosing to have this awkward medical condition, but this just seemed to perfectly encapsulate the mood of what her job had become: ridiculous tedium tied to a mediocre coworker who wouldn't (or couldn't) strive to be somebody greater than who he was. And with a partner whose back she always needed to have while he could rarely have hers, she didn't feel like she had the support to adequately deal with the growing number of naysayers.

The dog came back to the car a few minutes later, not only looking relieved but also… a little excited? "Man, I got lucky in there! I walked in the front doors and just then it randomly dawned upon me, wait, hotels have gotten wise these last couple of years, they know people turn to them for public bathrooms and they started putting their lobby bathrooms under lock and key - and sure enough, you needed to have a fuckin' keycard to get into the men's room! But I decided to go up to the door and try it anyway, and by some miracle, some dude was on his way out as I was getting there and he held the door open for me, thank God! I was about to shit on their concierge desk, I swear to God. The nerve of them to deny mammals their basic rights."

Judy wasn't feeling these crass remarks. "I'm sure they would have let you use one if you just showed them your badge," she said as she threw the car in drive and got back on track towards the precinct.

"No, now that would be abusing my power as a police officer! Those three nutjobs at the café coulda said that's an abuse of power and I wouldn't even disagree with them! I shouldn't have to be a cop just to be able to pop a squat. Heh… speaking of those three, I oughta find them and tell them that that hotel didn't have gender-neutral bathrooms, they'd probably burn it to the fucking ground. And I'd let them!"

"Brady," Hopps said sternly. "I get it. I agree. Take your pill so this doesn't happen again."

Braverman looked as clueless as ever, but he did eventually start digging around in his back pocket. "Uh… yeah, probably a good idea." He extracted a single blister-packed blue gel tablet and peeled the foil off; having another classic Brady moment, he dropped the pill on the dirty floor of the cabin, leaned over, picked it up, stared at it for a few seconds as he contemplated his fate, and eventually submitted himself to gulping it down dry.

"Aw, what, you ain't gonna wrap that up in a slice of cheese first, Rin Tin Tin!?" went the gentleman in the backseat.

And he cackled so loudly that people standing on the sidewalk could hear him, drawing attention to the vehicle. One particular pair of teenage boys, a margay and a vicuña, seemed particularly amused when they saw the two officers sitting in the squad car that pulled up to a red light.

"Ha! They really thought it would be a good idea to put a dog with a bunny!?" laughed the margay.

"No, no!" insisted the vicuña, also smirking and pointing. "Dog cop and bunny cop, it's Sam and Max!"

The two kids fell apart laughing as the officers drove off.

Brady was confused. "...Who?"

"I don't know either," Judy replied without an ounce of enthusiasm. It was another thing she couldn't blame her partner for - or maybe she could, if you wanted to argue that it was his fault that everyone could smell the anxiety coming off of him, therefore making him an easy target, and he wasn't doing enough himself to get over said anxiety - but Nick had never been as much of a lightning rod for wayward ridicule like Brady was.

Honestly, this wasn't fair to anybody. It wasn't fair to him that he had to live up to everything Nick was, but it also wasn't fair to her that her job had effectively become babysitting this puppy while aimlessly patrolling the city with no grand motivation. And to think that he was one of the least troublesome officers for her to be partnered with.

The German Shepherd put his ear buds back in and picked another song. It was a tune that anybody into '90s punk rock would recognize immediately (the irony of a cop listening to punk not at all being lost on him) but anybody not familiar with that specific niche would likely find it obscure, strange, and quite possibly unlistenable; Judy certainly thought that Brady was singing dreadfully off-key since she had no way of knowing that that's how the song actually sounded:

"POSSESSSSSSIONS NEVVVVVER MEAAAAANT AAANYYYTHIIING TO MEEEEE! I'm nooot craaazyyy… well THAAAT'S NOTTT TRUUUE, III GOTTT AAA BEDDDDD! And aaa guiiitaaaaar and a BIIIRD NAAAMED BOBBB WHOOO SHIIITS RIIIGHT OOON MYYY FLOOOOOR! That's riiight, I gottt a flooooooor…!"

Judy had to ask herself: was Braverman even brave enough to be a good cop? Even if he did have the guts to go out of his way to do what was right, was he competent enough to do it right? His heart really didn't seem to be in it, and many would say it would be in everybody's best interest if he just quit the force, but Judy was absolutely not comfortable with telling someone who seemed to be a good (if ineffective) kid that he had no place serving in the municipal police. It just went against everything she stood for.

Because Brady had expressed multiple times to her and Nick alike that he would have loved to become a real-life hero but simply didn't know how to go about doing that. Let's put aside for a moment that he had mixed feelings about whether the life of a police officer would be such an avenue towards becoming an everyday hero; why did Braverman want to be like Wilde so badly? Because the dog fully believed that if he just had the fox's self-confidence, he could do great things with it - perhaps even heroic things. Didn't have any plans for what kind of heroic things he'd do, but he was sure beyond the shadow of a doubt that he could do them. And with someone with that much confidence that they could one day become confident, Judy would never have forgiven herself if she gave up on such a mammal if she didn't have to.

She was starting to think she had to. They both had a vested interest in believing that there was a hero somewhere inside him, but with every instance of Brady bluescreening or tripping over himself or simply being a Debbie Downer, Judy had to wonder whether she was trying to extract something great from inside of him that simply wasn't there.

"THAT'S MEEEEE, ONNN THE BEEEACHSIIIDE, COMBING THE SAND! METAAAL MEEETERRR IIIN MYYY HAND! Sporting a poccckettt fuuull of chaaaaaaange! That's MEEE on the streeeeet with a violiiin uuunder my chiiiiin! PLAYYYIN' with aaa GRIIIIIN! Singiiin' GIIIBERRRRRIIIIIIISH!"

If only he always had the courage he had while he belted out a song, not caring that the guy in the back was openly mocking his shoddy singing.

"THAT'S MEEE… onnn the BAAACK… of the BUSSSSS! That's MEEE iiin the celllllll. THAT'S MEEE IIINSIIIIIDE YOUUUR HEAAAAAAAD! That's meeeee insiiide youuuuur HEHHHHHHHHH-EHHHHHHHHHHH-EHHHHHHHHHHHHH-eeeeeeeeeeeeeeead! ...THAT'S MEEEEEEE IIINSIIIIIDE YOUUUUUUUR HEAD!"

Oh, you were in Judy's head alright, Brady. Did it seem like a lot of this snapshot of her day seemed to focus on her partner in some capacity? Because that's what it seemed like to her. That's what every day now seemed like to her now. For everybody's sake, this dog needed to get her life together so she could get back to hers. So he didn't know what he wanted to do with his life yet; that's fine, he was twenty-two, he had plenty of time to figure it out, but he needed to get out of the way and figure it out somewhere else, because he was just wasting everybody's time here.

Those who knew Judy would say this negativity and passive hostility was entirely unlike her; perhaps even you've heard of her from a few years back when she and Nick blew the lid off the Nighthowler conspiracy and this doesn't match the impression you'd gotten of her. Once again: she'd agree. She hadn't been feeling like herself, not like the mammal she wanted to be, and she was displeased with that. And in a strange instance of irony, that was the key way she could relate to Brady: she didn't know how to salvage her life from her current situation either.

Maybe she was a bad teacher, maybe he was a bad student, maybe none of this was either of their faults and they were just bad fits for each other's personalities, maybe Nick quitting put her in a bad headspace that she hadn't yet fully recovered from, or maybe his quitting made the world around them more hostile towards them in a way that she just wasn't prepared for (which would have consequently put her in a bad headspace that she hadn't yet fully recovered from). Or maybe she'd gotten shot in the head somewhere along the line and the last year had literally been her own personal hell; that would make sense, as nothing would be more hellish to her than falling out of love for her passion. But this wasn't working as it was and nobody was happy with it. Something needed to change, and soon.

Luckily, there was reason to believe that things would change for her very, very soon. A long day for her was going to be longer still as the Chief had told her earlier that he'd like an audience with her privately after her shift. He'd been extremely coy about the details and she couldn't even guess what it might have been about. With any luck, it might be a change of pace towards something more fulfilling for her; with her luck, it was probably a reprimanding for not sufficiently developing Braverman into a suitable officer after almost a year. Only time would tell.