The Good Life

AN: I'm leaving on a roadtrip Wednesday morning and won't be back until the following Wednesday or Thursday. So, to make sure another week of chapters isn't skipped and to celebrate Easter, I'm posting a chapter for all four of my concurrent fanfics. Yesterday, I updated my Wings of Fire and Godzilla fic as normal. Today, I'm posting this one and my Hobbit fic.

With that little announcement out of the way, on with the chapter.

Disclaimer: I do not own the Bad Guys or Zootopia.

Chapter Eight:

Thankfully, neither Jaime nor Viktor mentioned the events of that morning once Wolf got back to work. Viktor also didn't comment on how quiet he was through the day, either. The bear and their new bunny employee had worked together for most of the day, talking about Jaime's education and home life and how he learned how to work on cars.

Distracted as he was, Wolf wasn't as hyper-focused on his work like usual. And he was a bit slower, which Viktor also didn't comment on. It was a bit of a slower day, anyway. Most of the jobs for the day were easy things. One mammal wanted fancy new rims on their SUV. Another wanted new, bright blue LED headlights installed on their sports car. The biggest job of the day had been replacing the springs on that truck.

It was almost as if the universe was giving him a small break after the horrible morning, and while he appreciated it, he had to wonder what the catch was. How long would it be until the next bit of bad news hit him? Best to not think about that too much, actually. No sense in jinxing things.

There was a part delivered around lunchtime that Wolf had been waiting for. In fact, getting it had made him feel a little better overall. After lunch, Viktor let him go install the part on his car since, well, they'd already finished everything for the day unless someone else came in. Viktor had a few bodywork jobs to do for other customers, but he always did those personally. He was a mechanic, yes, but the bear preferred to do bodywork. That's why he had employees like Wolf to do the actual mechanical jobs.

It was around two in the afternoon now. He was still working on his car when the familiar sounds of a ratchet wrench overlapping the radio playing in the background was broken in an unexpected way. "Is this really your car?"

Wolf started, the ratchet nearly falling from his grip, before he glanced over at the bunny standing on the front bumper. Jaime was taking in the details of the engine with a mechanic's eye. "Yeah," Wolf answered, going back to his work.

"Want some help?" Wolf paused again, glanced at Jaime, and then looked over his other shoulder at Viktor. The bear seemed to be working, but Wolf caught him glance back with a small nod before actually getting to work.

Viktor apparently wanted him and Jaime to work together for now. With a small huff, Wolf turned back to the rabbit and nodded. "Alright. You ever work on a Ferrari before?"

Jaime shook his head. "No, this is a first. The fanciest car I ever worked on was a Lotus."

"Pliers," Wolf held his hand out, waiting for Jaime to pass them to him. Once he felt the handles, he got to work securing a few clamps back on the myriad hoses to keep them from falling off. While he was doing that, he started chatting with the rabbit. "So how old are you, anyway?"

"Twenty." Wolf was surprised by the answer but didn't say anything. "I graduated high school a year older than my classmates. I'm not the smartest guy out there, but I've been working on cars since I was ten. Me and Judy's older brother, Steven? He's thirty-three, and he ended up opening a shop up in Bunnyburrow. I used to help him out over school breaks, and it all just clicked, you know?"

"I do know," Wolf nodded, listening to the rabbit's story. "I myself didn't even touch my first car until I was eighteen. I had fun working on mine, so I taught myself how it all worked. I used books and the internet to help, obviously, but still. My old car, similar to the one I drive now, I built from the ground up. I took parts from half a dozen different cars to do it, but it was beautiful and it worked." He stopped and smiled wistfully. "I miss that car..."

"What happened to it?" Jaime was watching him curiously, patiently awaiting an answer.

Wolf didn't think he'd believe the whole story, so he just said, "Totaled it doing something stupid. My girlfriend got me a new car after that incident."

"Who's your girlfriend?"

Wolf huffed at all the questions in amusement. He'd originally intended to be the one asking Jaime questions, yet the clever bunny had turned it onto him. "The governor of California," he answered, glancing at the rabbit. He was pretty skeptical, by the look of it. "No, I'm serious. The governor of California is actually my girlfriend."

"Uh huh..." Wolf actually snickered at his skeptical tone. "So why are you working in some random garage in Zootopia and not living in San Francisco or something?"

"I lived in LA for fifteen years before moving back here a few months ago. LA's population is almost entirely humans, so I wasn't really all that welcome over there. Work was hard to come by, so I decided to just find somewhere else to work." That wasn't the full story, obviously, but he didn't need to know that. "Diane respected my decision, even encouraged me to leave."

Jaime was quiet for a few seconds. And then, "You sure it's not because there's another male?"

Wolf snapped a glare over to him before getting back to work with a huff. "No, there's no one else. And I don't appreciate the insinuation. She's already said that she'll move out here once her term is up."

At first, Wolf thought he was going to have some other snarky comeback to that, but he was glad to be proven wrong. Jaime ended up changing the subject, to which Wolf was thankful for. "So...how'd you two meet, then?"

Wolf snorted at the memory, pausing in his work as he remembered the dolphin heist. "An event at the art museum. I was an...unexpected guest."

"You crashed the party?"

"Yeah, pretty much."

"So how'd you two end up together if you met like that?" Jaime asked, clearly confused.

Wolf sighed fondly. "We interacted a bit, and neither of us liked the other at first. We were just too different." Then, he smiled. "But then we discovered that we were more alike than either of us would admit. We grew closer, and the rest is history."

"You're not too good at telling stories, are you?" Wolf actually huffed in surprise. Normally, he was, but he was trying to be vague on purpose. Telling everyone he was an internationally wanted criminal just over a year ago wasn't the best way to stay on their good side. In fact, it was probably the best way to make people actively dislike him. "So what's wrong with the car?"

Wolf nodded, glad to be back on a less personal subject. "I bought this thing from a scrapyard, so the engine was in pretty rough shape." Worse than he initially thought, anyway. "I replaced the entire engine block, flushed the transmission, replaced the clutch, the alternator, the starter, the sparkplugs, and the fuel injectors, put a new belt on and replaced all the hoses, and put a brand-new battery in it. It's topped up on oil and coolant, and the radiator is fine as far as I can tell. I may replace later it just on principle." He was probably going to replace the transmission at some point, too, but it looked good enough for now. Really, the only things he needed to focus on now, provided the car actually started and ran without issue, were the bodywork and interior. Neither of those would be particularly difficult, though. "I've not actually tried to crank it since I started working on it, so I can't really answer that question yet. So...stay here and make sure everything looks fine."

Wolf went around to open the door and sat in the seat. With crossed fingers and a hopeful prayer, he put the key into the ignition for the first time since buying it. The 'door open' bong was probably a good sign. Then, he turned the key to the 'on' position, not cranking the engine all the way just yet. "That's...a lot of warning lights." The one thing he hadn't really checked yet was the electrical systems, which was probably the problem here. He knew the tires weren't low. He knew there wasn't low oil or coolant. He knew—had a good idea, at least—that the brakes were fine. He hadn't been able to test them, but he did check them out, and they all looked fine. There was plenty of brake fluid in it, too.

Other than that, the air conditioning was blowing cold. These cars didn't have any sort of radio or stereo system in them, so he didn't have to worry about that. He hit the switches for the windows and door locks. The locks worked. The windows didn't. He'd have to check that later. "Alright, here goes nothing..."

He turned the key all the way, and the engine roared to life, the new belt screeching loudly before the car went into idle. Wolf grinned in victory. Sure, he wasn't completely done with it, but the fact it cranked at all was a good sign, especially with all the warning lights still on. He'd have to adjust the tension on the belt to get rid of that bad squeal, though that was a pretty easy fix. "How's it look?" The engine sounded a bit rougher than he'd like, so he was keeping a careful eye on the gauges. Oil pressure and temperature looked good. Fuel was low, but that was true. There was only three gallons in it right now.

"Sounds a bit rough," Jaime called, and Wolf nodded, goosing the accelerator, but he made sure to keep it below 4000 rpms for now. It still sounded rough even if the gauges still looked good. "Try the lights."

Wolf hit the switch to turn the headlights on. "They're on."

"No...no they're not." Well that wasn't good.

"Highbeams?" He got a nope in response. "Blinkers?" Still nothing. "See if my brake lights are working."

Jaime ran past the open door, and Wolf hit the brake pedal. "Nothing back here, either."

There probably wasn't any point, but Wolf threw the car into reverse, anyway. "Reverse lights?"

"Nothing still," he reported. Wolf sighed in frustration and shut the car off after putting it in neutral. "An Italian car with electrical problems... Who would've thought?" If it was one or two lights that didn't work, then it would just be the bulbs, but for a car in this near-flawless condition to not have any lights working was definitely something worse. And he could do electronics, obviously. It was quite necessary when building a car from the ground up, but it was not his specialty, and it was definitely not something he enjoyed.

"Lucky I'm here, then," Jaime smirked. Wolf cocked an eyebrow at him. "Electronics are my specialty. That's mostly why Viktor hired me. Yeah, I can do mechanical stuff, but these cars and parts are a little big for me."

Wolf nodded down at him, a new respect building for the little rabbit. "Grab your gear, and let's see what's what."

"Electrical problem?" Viktor asked, taking a small break from painting a custom two-tone paintjob on some tricksied-up range rover.

"Yeah," Wolf called back.

"I figured there might be. Good thing I find someone who specializes in that, no?" Wolf nodded just as Jaime returned with several different tools. Once he and the rabbit got back to work, the bear did, too.

Wolf let Jaime take the lead during this part of the job since this is what he was best at, apparently. He kept watch during the whole process of checking each wire and circuit and fuse. On a separate piece of paper, Wolf wrote down the code for each fuse or wire that Jaime found was bad. During the process, Wolf's phone rang, but since he was busy, he just let it ring, figuring if it was important, they'd leave a message.

Except whoever it was didn't leave a message, and his phone started ringing again immediately after it stopped. "Hang on a sec, Jaime..." There was an unwritten but widely acknowledged rule in his group of friends. If he didn't pick up the phone, he was busy to the point where he quite literally couldn't at that moment. If he didn't answer the phone, and if they left a message, he would always call back within an hour tops. If they didn't leave a message, it wasn't that important, so he probably wouldn't call back.

No one called him twice in a row unless there was an emergency of some kind.

On the last ring, Wolf finally pressed the accept button after glancing at the caller ID. "Webs?" Honestly, he wasn't expecting much, maybe an alert on his banking information or something. Or maybe Piranha got in a fight with someone again.

He did not expect her to be in tears when the video call came through. "I-I'm so s-sorry, Wolf!" she cried. "I-I'm s-sorry! I d-didn't—" The call ended suddenly, and Wolf just stared at the screen, a sense of dread rising within him. He thought he heard other voices in the background, but he didn't recognize most of them since they were outside, and they all mingled together. Other than the gang, the only voice he thought he recognized was Chief Luggins, and if the police were involved...

His phone rang again—this time it was a video call from Diane. He answered it immediately. "Diane!? What's going on!? Webs—"

"Is fine, Wolf," she intervened with a clearly forced smile. If she was trying to reassure him, it definitely wasn't working, and as glad as he was to see Diane on the phone, his protective instincts were kicking in. He needed to know what was wrong with his friends, and he needed to know now. "Everyone's just a bit...upset right now."

"Wolf?" Viktor called, concern in his voice. Wolf wasn't even trying to hide how worried he was. His ears were straight back, his posture was rigid, there was panic in his eyes and voice. He was worried, scared even. He'd known Webs for a long time, and he'd never seen her like that before.

"Diane, you tell me right now if this is an actual emergency because I have never seen Webs that upset, period." She sighed, an apology in her eyes. Then, to his ever-increasing concern, she nodded. No other word was needed. Wolf stepped outside to get away from the other two and sat down on the hood of his Camaro. Thankfully, neither of them followed, even if their expressions indicated that they wanted to, if only to make sure he was alright. "Is anybody hurt?"

"No, nobody's hurt." With that answer, a massive weight fell from his shoulders, and he breathed an equally massive sigh of relief. "There was an accident at the apartment earlier. A fire. A few other residents have some minor burns. One elderly man in the floor above died, and the MEs say it was from smoke inhalation, so...it could have been worse. The police did an initial survey once the fire was put out—most of the building was intact, so it didn't get completely out of control and most of the floors were still relatively safe to walk on. It originated from the guys' apartment, Wolf. Initial theory is that Webs' electronics shorted out the wiring, there was a spark and something flammable was nearby."

Wolf let out a heavy exhale and wiped his eyes. A massive stress headache was starting to form. "I can't—I can't do anything here, Diane!" he snapped. Not at her, just in general. Just when he didn't think this day could possibly get worse, this happens! He knew the universe was about to screw him over after the slow work day and the excitement of getting his car running!

"I know, Wolf. I know," she replied gently. "And no one's asking you to come back to LA. We just thought it was better to let you know."

We? "Are the others there with you?" She nodded, turning the phone and pointing it across the street. There was a crowd of onlookers watching on, some just curious about what happened and the residents angry for the things they lost. In the middle of the crowd, Shark, Piranha, and Webs were being questioned by Chief Luggins. Hopefully, she was just taking statements. Still, seeing them safe made it easier to know they were safe and alright. The camera turned around, and Wolf took the opportunity to ask. "Do they have anywhere to stay?"

Diane sighed. "No...and some of the other residents have already threatened lawsuits. I'll do what I can, but I've come under some scrutiny lately. There's a lot of people that aren't happy about my ties with you and the gang."

Wolf growled a that. "It's none of their business!" Diane didn't answer, though he knew she agreed. Then, he sighed, glancing over to the building where he could just see his new car. They were going to need a lot of cash fast, not only to find a new place to live and replace what they lost, but also to fight any lawsuits that were more than just threats. But as much as he loved his friends, he wasn't quite willing to give up his dream car for that cash, either. "Tell Webs to take what she needs from my account. There should be enough for a down payment on a small apartment. I'll...figure out a way to get some more to you guys soon."

"Wolf..." he could hear a hint of a warning in her tone. "Don't do anything rash, alright?" He nodded silently, still staring at his car in thought. "I'll call you when I learn something new, alright?" Another nod. "Hey...I love you."

A ghost of a smile pulled at his lips. "Love you, too, Diane. I gotta go." With that, he hung up with a sigh. How in the world was he supposed to get a large amount of cash within a short span of time. His job paid good, but it didn't pay that good, and they had no project cars ready to be sold unless it was his Ferrari, and he'd already decided that wasn't an option. At least, not yet. If there were no other way, he would, but there was always another path.

The only way he knew how to get cash fast was by doing something illegal, but without the rest of the gang here, he wasn't confident in him and Snake pulling a heist alone. And heists required months of planning, anyway.

So that left him with one option. "I guess I will be racing, after all..." The only problem? He had no idea where to find the street racing scene. The only solution? Asking someone for directions. Wolf growled again, knowing exactly who he'd need to talk to. There was a certain fox he knew that always claimed how he knew everybody...and he was a cop. If anyone knew where to find the street scene, it was Nick Wilde.

Now he just needed to figure out a way to persuade his old partner to help instead of turning him in for even asking.

AN: And now, finally, the true conflict of this story is introduced. Wolf has to revert to illegal activities to make sure his friends are well off. That can only end well, right?

Let me know your thoughts about the chapter.

Until Next Time

AdmiralCole22