Judy sat alone in the interrogation room. On the table in front of her lay her folder of evidence, ready to be presented to Stripes once he was let inside. Stripes himself was outside the door, held by Wolford, about to be brought in and sat down opposite her. In the next room over, behind the one-way mirror, Chief Bogo waited patiently for her to give him the signal that she was ready to do this.

She was ready, but being ready meant that she had some hesitations. Stripes had been ready and willing to cooperate during their last interrogation, several days ago, but his non-disclosure agreement had prevented him from talking. The court order still hadn't come in that would release him from his agreement, but Judy was running out of time, and she needed for Stripes to tell her as much as he could.

She rubbed her eyes, weary from her lack of sleep. Just as she planned, she had slept in one of the cots down the hall the night before; she wanted to be there the second Bogo arrived for work the following morning. When he did, she had approached him with her new evidence—and, for the first time, told him about the threat against Nick's life. She had expected him to be furious at her for keeping it a secret for the past three days, but he kept himself uncharacteristically calm at the news. In fact, the first words out of his mouth after hearing about the incident, were that he himself would keep it a secret—which meant that she wouldn't have to worry about news of threat getting out.

Bogo agreed with her that the threat was most likely meant to throw her off the trail of the savage predator attacks in the city, which is why he agreed to this interrogation. After checking his email one last time to see if the court order had finally arrived—it hadn't—he had sent Wolford to bring Stripes back to the interrogation room. And now the time had come for him to walk in, sit down, and talk to Judy once again.

Judy took a deep breath. A lot of things had to go right for this to work. She would have to convince Stripes that it was okay for him to talk, despite his NDA. Stripes would have to tell her information that she didn't already know. He would have to be calm enough to talk to her without his shock collar going off. And, worst of all, this would have to be done in such a way that his rat lawyer, Timothy Fields, wouldn't hear about it and stop the whole thing.

She closed her eyes. Inhale… Exhale… Inhale… Exhale…

She was ready. She had to be.

Carrot pen in paw, Judy turned to the one-way mirror and gave a thumbs-up. A few seconds later, the door on the opposite side of the room opened, and Stripes and Wolford walked inside. Stripes, wearing his orange prison uniform, recognized Judy immediately and smiled in greeting. Wolford politely escorted him to the open chair on the opposite side of the table from Judy and sat him down. Protocol usually mandated that Wolford would next handcuff Stripes to his chair, in case he started acting aggressively, but the wolf casually ignored the rule and, after sitting Stripes down and exchanging glances with Judy, walked back out the door, which he closed behind him.

Stripes, confused, looked at Judy. Aside from the orange jumpsuit, he might have been mistaken for a visitor rather than a prisoner in his current situation. "Officer Hopps?" he asked, hoping for clarification.

Judy pointed at the one-way mirror with her pen. "Chief Bogo is on the other side. That's it. No one else." She rested her other paw on the folder in front of her. "I have brought some things here that I'd like to show you." She flashed a faint smile. "If you're okay with this, of course."

Stripes nervously glanced from Judy to the folder, then to the one-way mirror, then back to Judy. "But Mr. Fields told me not to talk, or else…" He lowered his head, unable to finish the sentence. "I don't have a lot, Officer Hopps, and what little I do have means a lot to me. I don't want to lose it."

She was prepared for that answer. She set down her pen and leaned forward, resting her paws on the table. "I know you're scared, Tony." Stripes's ears perked upon hearing her address him by his first name. "And believe it or not, I know exactly how you feel right now. You want to do the right thing, but you feel like you can't because if you do, it might just make things worse." It might mean losing the ones you care the most about. Those you love…

Stripes lowered his gaze and nodded, but did not speak.

Judy flipped open her folder. The first page of the stack was a screenshot she had taken from the news that morning. In the picture, dozens of predators were standing in line to receive shock collars, every one of them with a gloomy look on their face. In the background, a giraffe-sized car was on fire, and on the right side of the photo, mostly cropped out, an elephant police officer was wielding a riot baton, ready to knock out any predator who wanted to make a getaway.

She gently slid the photo over to Stripes. "It's hard to believe that things can be much worse than this, though." Stripes' face suddenly grew dark as he examined the scene in front of him. "I'm not sure how much they tell you in prison, but things are bad in Zootopia. Really bad."

Unable to stop himself, Stripes picked up the picture and held it closer to his eyes, his paws shaking in terror. His focus darted back and forth across the photograph as he tried to make sense of what he saw. After a second, he looked back at Judy, his eyes wide and frightened. "This…" Suddenly weak, he sat back in his chair. "This is City Hall!" he whispered.

Judy nodded. It was a sad, scary sight for her as well, seeing her beloved city collapsing on itself like this—and she had only shared a small sample of it all with Stripes. But she couldn't let herself be overcome with emotion. "Tony, if you still don't want to tell me anything, you don't have to. But…" She motioned toward the photo. "I can't save Zootopia without your help."

Stripes considered her words for a few moments. Judy could only guess what was going on in the tiger's mind right now; between this sudden news of the city in chaos, and his struggle with his NDA, she certainly didn't envy his position. At one point, he glanced at the one-way mirror, probably wondering if Bogo really was the only one listening in on their conversation.

He wanted to talk, she could see it in his eyes. But his worry over the NDA was causing him turmoil, and until the court order came in, he was at risk of losing everything he owned to a lawsuit if he talked.

Luckily, Judy was prepared for that, too. "Look." She quickly fingered through her folder until she came across the piece of paper she was looking for. She pulled it out and slid it on the table over to Stripes. "Maybe this can help."

Curious, Stripes set down the photo he was holding and picked up the paper instead. As he read it, his expression changed from curiosity, to surprise. Then, finally, to Judy's delight, he actually smiled when he got to the end. She knew why, too: the paper was an excerpt from Zootopia's code of law, which stated that a non-disclosure agreement could not be used to prevent a person from reporting a crime.

After finishing, Stripes looked at Judy. "This is good, Officer Hopps," he admitted, before his smile disappeared again. "But I don't have a crime to report."

"But your eyes did light up." Judy stared at him. "You do know something. Something illegal. And you can talk about it." Before he could reply, she picked up her carrot pen and used it to point at the paper he still held in his paws. "No lawyer can stop that."

Stripes, however, remained conflicted. Clearly, whatever was written in his NDA—combined with whatever threats Fields had made—were strong enough to keep his mouth shut, even now.

Which is why it was time for Judy to pull out her ace in the hole. She pulled out the paper at the bottom of the stack and held it up. "Do you recognize this?"

It was another screenshot, this time taken from the traffic cams that Judy had accessed the night before. She had zoomed in on the dark figure she had found and printed the picture in as high quality as she could. It was just a hunch, but she was sure that whoever this animal was that had threatened Nick's life—and was involved in the savage predator attacks all around the city—was somehow connected to Stripes's NDA.

His reaction to the picture told her all she needed to know. His eyes widened in recognition, before he realized he had just given himself away. He quickly tried to return to his previous expression, but it was useless. Judy had seen everything.

And she was ready to press him for more information. "Who is that?" she asked.

Stripes sheepishly averted his gaze. "Please, Officer Hopps, don't make me answer that," he quietly begged.

Judy could certainly appreciate his hesitancy, but she had come too far now to let it go. "Tony, innocent people are getting hurt because of this mammal." She set the picture on the table. "And some might even die because of them." She caught his gaze again and, eyes locked, pleaded as genuinely as she could. "Please, Tony. I have no one else who can help me now."

Stripes looked at her for a long time, still struggling with his thoughts. Then his line of sight slowly fell back down to the table, resting on the picture of the animal. For a moment, Judy wondered if she had been too hard with him; she could see his jawline stiffen as he rubbed his teeth together in contemplation.

"That's Logan Puer."

Startled by the sudden confession, Judy took a moment to process what he just said. She quickly grabbed her carrot pen, snatched up a blank page from the folder, and started to write. "Spell that for me."

"P-U-E-R," Stripes responded. He continued staring at the page, his expression impossible to read. His tone of voice, however, was no longer hesitant, nor averse in any way. If anything, he seemed mildly frustrated, as if this Puer animal was a source of animosity for him. "He's a skunk from the Rainforest District. About forty years old. Works for the company that wrote my NDA."

Judy was so surprised by this sudden influx of information that she had a difficult time concentrating enough to write it all down. In the span of a few minutes, Stripes had gone from scared of opening his mouth, to blurting out all the information she could ever hope for and more. There was something about this skunk that had triggered something inside of him—something that no lawyer could scare him into keeping a secret.

So, this skunk, Puer, is the one who threatened Nick. She had to keep herself from breaking her pen after thinking of what she was going to do with him once she found him. And this company he works for—is the company behind the savage predator attacks, too?

"Do you know him well?" she asked.

Stripes kept looking at the picture, his expression hardened. "Not really. I've only met him twice. The last time was the day I went on my rampage at City Hall." He finally looked back up at her, and she could see the anger in his eyes as he spoke—even while the light on his shock collar remained a cool green. "Do you remember, when you arrested me, I tried to tell you that someone put me up to it?"

Judy felt her heart skip a beat. "Puer?" Stripes nodded, and she could guess exactly how he had been persuaded to go through with it. "Did he threaten you? Did he threaten someone close to you?"

"My mother." Stripes glared back at the photo of Puer. "This scumbag said that if I didn't follow my predatorial urges, she would suffer. I didn't know whether to believe him or not, so I went along with it." He looked back up at Judy. "I had to, Officer, Hopps!" he exclaimed in a suddenly loud voice.

Judy quickly finished writing down his statement and held up a paw. "I know," she assured him, trying to calm him down. "I know, Tony." She quickly glanced at the one-way mirror, knowing that Bogo was listening to his confession just as closely as she was. "We'll make sure your mother doesn't get hurt."

Stripes's expression softened, ever so slightly. "Thank you," he replied quietly.

"And what about the first time you met Puer?" Judy inquired, readying her pen again.

Stripes looked back down at the picture. "It was on the top floor of the Trunk Hotel." He hesitated, apparently still unsure about how much he was willing to share, but finally continued. "I went there every Thursday night, me and the others who signed the same NDA. I don't want to say exactly what we did—not yet, anyway—but Puer was at one of the meetings. A supervisor of some kind, I think."

The Trunk Hotel was an old but well-known hotel in Zootopia. At one point it was the largest building in the city, before it was quickly dwarfed by several other skyscrapers mere months later. Nowadays it was more of a tourist attraction than a full-service hotel. Judy herself had only ever walked past it, but she knew that the top few floors were all reserved for private businesses—which is probably where the meetings took place.

Today is Thursday…

"Is there another meeting today, then?" she asked.

"Yes," Stripes replied, without hesitation. "Every single Thursday at nine o'clock."

Judy smiled as she went back to writing her notes. This was just the lucky break she needed. If what Tony said was true, it wouldn't take long for her to infiltrate the hotel, spy on the meeting, and gather enough evidence to solve the case. It was almost too good to be—

"I wouldn't go there tonight if I were you."

Judy blinked, her thoughts interrupted by Stripes' suddenness. She looked back at him and raised an eyebrow. "And why is that?" she inquired.

"Because the meetings are for predators only. You can't even access the floor without being a predator. And even if you got there, there are security cameras everywhere. You wouldn't make it five feet without being spotted and thrown out."

That would be a problem, though there were several possible solutions. She could send one of her fellow cops to check it out instead. She could get a search warrant from the judge to examine the place—which would no doubt be approved much faster than the court order on Stripes' NDA. She could even lead the ZPD in a storming of the building under suspicion of domestic terrorism.

However, none of those were good ideas. At the first sign of something amiss, the whole operation would undoubtedly be shut down and cleaned of evidence immediately—and she couldn't allow that. The only possible way she could see what was going on in the meetings was with her own two eyes—without raising suspicion. That meant no warrants, no police uniforms, and no going by herself.

No going by myself…

"What if I was accompanied by a predator?" she asked. If a predator accompanied her, perhaps she would be allowed inside—or at the very least, the predator could create a distraction so she could more easily sneak around.

"I don't know. I never saw anyone bring a plus-one." Stripes looked back at the photo of Puer, and it seemed that he was beginning to feel his hesitancy return again. "I hope I didn't say too much," he whispered.

Judy wanted to press him for more information, but it was clear that Stripes was afraid—and now she knew that he was not only afraid of Fields and a lawsuit, but also of Puer, and the threat against his mother. "You've told me enough." Judy looked at the one-way mirror and raised two fingers. A second later, the door opened and Wolford walked back into the room.

Stripes stood up, ready to be taken back to his cell. Wolford approached him and gently placed a paw on his shoulder. He hung his head, unable to look her in the eye. "I'm sorry I'm such a coward," he murmured.

He didn't say it very loudly, but her rabbit ears allowed her to hear it perfectly clear. She stood up on her chair, almost eye level with Stripes. "You're not a coward, Tony." He raised his gaze slightly. "You're a very brave tiger for talking to me." She motioned to the folder, its contents now strewn all over the table, and smiled warmly. "And thanks to you, I have a whole lot of new leads for this case—maybe even enough to solve it."

Their eyes remained locked for quite some time. Judy could see that he struggled to accept her words—that he knew she was telling the truth, but had a hard time believing it. So she tried her best to convey, with her own eyes, how much she had meant it. He had given her enough information to finally make some progress, and she couldn't thank him enough for that. She needed him to know how grateful she was, especially considering how desperate her situation was right now.

"Thank you, Officer Hopps," he finally managed to say. A smile beamed from his face, and for the first time since she had known him, he seemed genuinely proud.

Wolford patted his shoulder, and the two of them walked out of the room. This time, the door did not close behind them. Judy took a few seconds to gather the papers together, stuff them in her folder, and bolt out the door. Before she knew it, she was in the surveillance room on the other side of the one-way door.

Bogo sat in one of the chairs, clearly pleased with the interrogation. As soon as Judy entered the room, he placed his hooves together and sounded a single clap. "Well done, Hopps," he congratulated.

Judy closed the door behind her and walked up to him. She handed him her folder so he could make a copy of her notes later. Wanting to waste no time, she stood at attention and asked, "Sir, with your permission, I would like to investigate the meeting tonight at the Trunk Hotel."

Bogo rested the folder in his lap. He pulled out his reading glasses from his chest pocket and put them on. "I expected as much." He fingered through her notes for a second, then nodded and looked back to her, though he kept his glasses on. "Before I answer, I have some information of my own I'd like to share with you."

Mildly surprised, Judy raised an eyebrow. "Sir?"

"I did a quick search on the Trunk Hotel while you were talking with Stripes." He rested his hoof on a piece of paper lying on the desk next to him, which she could tell had only been printed out a few minutes prior. "The upper floors were built for elephants…" His voice dropped to a mutter as he groaned, "Which doesn't really make much sense to me, but whatever." He cleared his throat and continued in his normal speaking voice, "As such, the duct work is easily large enough for you to crawl inside."

This news excited Judy. She grabbed the paper and quickly scanned it. It was a printout of the floor plans for the top floor of the Trunk Hotel, exactly where Stripes had said the meetings took place. Sure enough, the floor was one-and-a-half stories tall, to allow elephants and other large animals plenty of room to walk around freely. The ceiling cleanly hid the pipes and small tunnels that were used to move air, electricity, water and heat throughout the floor, and it did seem that she could easily fit inside.

There was one problem, however. "How exactly do I get inside of this?"

"That's for you to figure out," Bogo replied. It wasn't dismissive; he was simply stating it as a matter of fact. "You'll have to go there and find a way inside." He leaned forward in his chair, in order to get closer to her eye level. "Without raising suspicion," he added pointedly.

That would be difficult. Stripes had assured her that there were security guards and cameras everywhere, and if she were to ask the hotel staff to help her out, there was no way it could be kept a secret long enough for her to do her job. That really only left one obvious solution: bringing a predator with her to act as a distraction, so that she could slip inside unnoticed.

She had the whole rest of the day to think of more ideas, but if she couldn't, that was still a pretty good one, if risky. "Understood, sir," she replied, standing at attention once again.

Bogo nodded. "Very well." He sat back up in his chair. "Permission granted, Hopps." However, he immediately dropped his voice down to barely above a whisper, and his expression grew serious—the kind of serious it grew when he had threatened to fire her if she had failed to solve the missing mammals case from the year prior. "But this is off the record. This whole operation, this little escapade you're planning, this interrogation you just had with Stripes, and this conversation you're having with me right now. It's all off the record, do you understand?"

Judy took a moment to process what Bogo was telling her. When an assignment was off the record, it meant that if she got in trouble, Bogo would deny any knowledge of what she was doing. It meant that if she got caught, he wouldn't be able to send backup to help her—and that if she lived through it all, he would most likely have to fire her from her job in order to keep the ZPD in a positive light. Off-the-record jobs were the riskiest for a cop, but right now, she didn't have any other choice.

"I understand, sir," she replied, in just as quiet of a voice as him.

He continued staring at her. "That also means I can give you no other cops tonight," he added. He took off his reading glasses and pointed at her with them. "You want a predator to help you? You'll have to find one yourself."

That announcement left Judy feeling a lot less excited about this plan than before. Bogo was right, of course: he couldn't assign one of his other cops to accompany Judy while she was working undercover, especially since it was her case. It was just too dangerous, and too unfair to anyone else who might have to go with her.

But it also meant that she now had limited options if she wanted to continue on with her plan. She couldn't even begin to think of how she could find a predator to help her with this plan, especially since all predators now had to wear shock collars. This would be a dangerous mission, with too many unknowns for anyone to feel comfortable with it. At the moment, she struggled to think of any predators she even knew outside of the ZPD—or at least, any that might be willing to work with her.

She puffed her chest, unwilling to give up so easily. "I'll figure something out, sir," she promised. She had come too far in this case to face a hurdle now, and she was determined to make this plan work.

Bogo smiled, ever so slightly, in admiration. "That's why you're my best cop." He stood up, grabbed her folder with both hooves, and made his way to the door. "Let's get to work, Hopps."

Judy followed him out the door, then they went their separate ways, Judy to her cubicle and Bogo to his office. Despite the current problem Judy had of trying to think of a predator who could help her, she was excited by how well the interrogation had gone. Tony had overcome his fear over his NDA and for his mother's life—

She quickly whirled around. "Chief! Stripes' mother—"

"I'm personally going there right now," Bogo quickly called back to her. "She'll be under Witness Protection before anyone knows it."

Grateful, Judy nodded in acknowledgement, then turned back around and started walking again. She felt a spring in her step as she felt excitement grow in her chest. Thanks to this information from Tony, maybe I can finally solve this case. Maybe I can fix Zootopia, and get the predators out of their shock collars, and get Nick back…

She felt herself slow to a stop. Her ears dropped against the back of her neck. She felt her heart constrain in her chest, replacing the joy she had felt mere seconds prior. Her brain filled with thoughts of sadness and hurt and guilt over what she had put Nick through over the past few days.

But she also realized exactly what she needed to do next.

And that thought, more than anything else as long as she had lived, scared her.

Nick…