"Lieutenant! Lieutenant Bogo, ma'am!" Looking up, Maia instantly spotted the young officer rushing toward her, seemingly oblivious to the yellow police tape he was about to cross.

"Stop!" She snarled, freezing the startled mammal in his steps. "In case you didn't notice the barrier tape, this is still an active crime scene. Contaminate it and I swear I'll have your badge!"

"Y-yes, ma'am. Sorry, ma'am. It's just that...uh..."

"Just what?"

"T-the Chief wants to see you."

"Tell him to wait." The jaguar muttered, her tail giving an irritated twitch. "I'm working."

"But he told me to..."

"I'm working," Maia repeated firmly. "Tell him that if he's that desperate for an update than he can come down here himself."

The officer blinked, his mouth moving silently as he searched for a response. He glanced back over his shoulder, and she could practically see him debating the risk of passing on her message. Sighing, she dug her phone out of her pocket and held it up for the younger mammal to see. "Would you prefer if I told him myself?"

The officer's entire body sagged in relief and he nodded thankfully.

Silently dismissing him with a wave of her paw, Maia looked down to her phone, tapped out a message to her husband, and dropped the device back in her pocket.

~o~o~o~

Several more hours passed before Maia felt she had anything worthwhile to report, and the horizon had just started to glow as she made her way up to her husband's office.

Leaning against the doorframe, she quietly watched him pour over the pile of documents littering his desk and waited for him to acknowledge her. Noticing a vein on his forehead begin to throb, she idly wondered if he'd remembered to take his blood pressure medication.

He probably hadn't.

No one could claim that Adrian was anything less than an exemplary chief, but if he had one fault, it was his habit of trying to do everything himself. Even when the two of them had still been walking the beat, she'd always had to remind him to slow down, take a breath, and let other officers do their part. Sometimes he'd listened, sometimes he hadn't, and sometimes he'd leave her standing outside a burning tenement building while he rushed into the flames.

The two days that had followed that particular event, most of which she'd spent in an uncomfortable hospital chair while waiting for her idiot of a partner to wake up, had felt like the longest of her life. When he'd finally asked her out a month later with that same devil-may-care spark in his eye, she'd briefly considered punching him in the face.

If she was being honest, despite the fact that they'd been married twenty-five years and she loved him as dearly as the day she'd said, 'I do', she still felt that urge sometimes.

After a few more minutes, she coughed lightly and he glanced up. "Oh. Come in."

Padding softly into the room, she dropped into the chair opposite her husband's desk. "How are you doing?"

"Fine."

Maia eyed him skeptically; she could practically feel the stress radiating from his body. She briefly considered walking around the desk to give him a hug and dismissed the idea almost immediately. As much as it pained her to see him in pain, she knew how important his professional demeanor was to him.

Adrian Bogo would need his wife later. Right now, the ZPD's Chief needed his top forensics expert.

As if on cue, he sighed and leveled his gaze on her again. "So, what have you learned?"

"Less than I'd like, but it's still early," she hedged. "Most of the evidence we've gathered is still being processed."

"Just give me whatever you've got."

"At this point, all I can say for sure is that this could have been much, much worse." She took a moment to gather her thoughts, pressing her paws to her temples to ward off an approaching headache. "The on-site analysis of the bomb residue indicates a common ammonium nitrate based explosive."

"Common?"

"More or less," Maia shrugged. "Ammonium nitrate is easy enough to come by. Mix enough of it with fuel oil and you've got yourself a fairly effective homemade explosive. However, whoever cooked up these explosives used too much fuel oil. They ended up with a lot more flash than bang, which is probably the only reason there was enough of the bomber left to be taken to the coroner's office."

"Are you telling me that this was a failure?"

"What I'm telling you, Adrian, is that a big fireball is a hell of a lot better than a concussive blast. If that explosive had been mixed correctly it could have killed every last mammal in the atrium. Even then, it was lucky that..." She trailed off.

"What?"

She regarded him quietly for a few seconds, tapping one claw on the arm of her chair as she considered whether or not to finish the thought. "I want to stress that this is a purely professional assessment."

"Out with it, Lieutenant."

"We were lucky that the bomber was posing as a member of the press. He was so closely surrounded by reporters when he triggered the device that their bodies absorbed most of the shrapnel."

Adrian leaned back in his chair and gave her a familiar look - an irritating mix of surprise and incredulity. It wasn't the first time she'd seen it, and it was an expression she'd grown to hate over the years. He knew full well that forensic investigation demanded an unbiased perspective. Every factor and piece of evidence had to be assessed and reported on dispassionately, no matter how cold-blooded it might make her sound.

"What about Hopps and Wilde?" she asked, shifting the topic. "Did they get out alright?"

To her relief, he followed her lead. "Yes. Their close protection detail moved them to a secure location."

"Safehouse?"

He shook his head. "Precinct Thirteen."

"Good idea." Maia nodded. "Thirteen is probably the safest place in the city right now."

"Perhaps, but safety seems to be in short supply at the moment."

"How do you mean?"

"Precinct One wasn't the only attack." Her shock must have been obvious as he gestured to the papers before him. "You were already processing the scene when the reports started coming in. I didn't want to interrupt you."

"You didn't want to... Adrian, for something like that, you can interrupt me." She took a breath, rubbing her forehead again. "What happened?"

"There were attacks on a half-dozen other precincts. Several Molotov cocktails got thrown into the Precinct Two parking lot, a series of flash bombs were set off in Precinct Eleven's lobby, the power transformer for Precinct Six was disabled by a stolen school bus, and some kind of non-lethal deterrent chemical was released into the HVAC system at Precinct Eight."

"I..." she blinked. "Holy shit."

"Quite. Thankfully, none of those attacks were quite as..." he hesitated. "...effective...as the attack here. There's no shortage of ringing ears and headaches at Eleven, especially among the nocturnal officers, but nothing permanent. Six is running on emergency generators but expect to have their building restored to full power by this time tomorrow, and the ZFD responded quickly enough to the fires at Two that they only lost a row of parked vehicles."

"And Precinct Eight?"

"Essentially put Eight out of commission for the next few days. Every interior surface will need to be decontaminated before most officers can return to work." He scowled. "Even then, at least two-thirds of their canine officers won't be fit for duty for at least a week. Until then, Precincts Four and Twelve are going to be stretched thin picking up the slack."

"Oh, is that all?" Maia asked humorlessly.

"If only," the Chief snorted. "A pair of armed mammals thought they'd try their luck at a drive by shooting at Precinct Nine."

"What?! Was anyone...?"

"No," Bogo interrupted. "Seems all the luck was on our side. Their SWAT team was just returning from a high-risk call and were right in front of the building when the shooters tried to attack. Those bastards might as well have driven straight into an ambush; SWAT took them out before they got so much as a shot off."

"Luck is right," Maia commented. "Any leads on the other attackers?"

"They've already been arrested. The ones who didn't get themselves killed, at any rate. Most were caught either attempting to escape on foot, or not long after."

"They didn't have any actual getaway plans?"

"It would seem not."

"Someone plans half a dozen simultaneous attacks on the ZPD, but they don't bother setting the attackers up with a way to escape?" Maia scoffed. "I'd call them stupid if that wasn't so suspicious."

"Stunning insight, Lieutenant."

She didn't comment on his sharp tone. It would have been different if they'd been off-duty, but part of the reason their marriage worked so well was the understanding that the job was the job, and home was home. In this building, Adrian was the Chief and she was a Lieutenant. Simple as that.

Even so, she was grateful when he offered her a brief apologetic look; it made asking her next question a little easier. Not that she wanted to ask it, but someone had to and it might as well be her. "Have you received any news back from the hospital?"

"I have."

"And?" she pressed.

"Dozens of mammals were hurt in the explosion, both civilians and officers. Some injuries were relatively minor; scrapes and cuts and a few broken bones. Others, though..." He pulled a sheet of paper from one of the stacks around him and held it out to her. "It might have been more if not for Officer Fangmeyer."

"Oh?" Maia carefully maintained an even tone as she scanned the names on the page. She knew many of them. Some were friends.

"She's a former EMT. Went right to work, even before the dust had settled." He shook his head. "Who knows how many mammals she saved?"

"Lucky she was there, then." She paused. "What about casualties?"

Adrian took a breath and let it out slowly. "Twelve confirmed deaths, as of an hour ago. Four officers and eight civilians, mostly reporters. There are another six currently in surgery that could still go either way."

"I'm sorry."

"Hm," he grunted. "Did you find anything that might identify the bomber? Anything at all?"

"My team hasn't fully processed the scene yet, but there doesn't look like we'll have a lot to go on. There wasn't much to send to the coroner's office, the security footage we've reviewed hasn't given us a good look at the bomber's face, and I'd bet my pension that we aren't going to find any remnants of identification." She shrugged. "We're pretty sure they were in the ovis family."

"Ovis? Are you...? A bloody sheep? Have you any idea what kind of public reaction that will get?"

"We don't know that for sure. It could have been a urial, or maybe an argali," she ventured. "Confirmation is still pending, but unless we can find some other footage of them approaching the building I doubt we'll be able to pin down the exact species."

He peered at her dubiously. "Do you really think mammals are going to care about that distinction?"

"Even if they don't, we will. I'm not going to be responsible for the fallout of a false identification," she growled, her tone inviting no argument. "I doubt there's enough of his skull left to check against dental records. We'll probably have to wait until the DNA results come in."

"Which will take a week, at least. What do you suggest I tell the press in the meantime?"

"Sorry, love." Maia offered her husband as supportive a smile as she could manage. "You're on your own for that one."

~o~o~o~

Taking up the top three floors of the Zoetrope Building in downtown Zootopia, the infamous 'Precinct Thirteen' was home to the ZPD's Special Investigations Unit. With two secure elevators, a state-of-the-art surveillance & security system, three-inch bulletproof glass windows, and their own dedicated Tactical Response Team, the SIU's headquarters was practically a fortress. They also boasted a bleeding-edge communications and data processing system that was plugged into virtually every public camera in the city, giving the SIU the next best thing to a god's eye view.

Nick and Judy, however, saw none of this. The moment they'd stepped out of the featureless elevator, they'd had their phones confiscated just before they were practically shoved into an equally blank walled conference room and ordered – in no uncertain terms – to stay there until told otherwise. The only concessions to comfort they'd been given had been a quick trip to the locker room so they could get cleaned up, and a pair of camping cots; as if they could possibly be expected to get any sleep.

They tried not to take it personally. Part of the SIU's mandate was to actively hunt down major threats to the city at large, and secrecy was second-nature to all of them. Often, it was the only thing that kept them ahead of the criminals they arrested. Even so, after the adrenaline-ride of the previous days, being told to sit quietly with nothing to occupy their minds bordered on torture.

"This is ridiculous!" Judy groaned, pacing the length of the room. "Why are we just sitting here?"

"Patience is a virtue, Carrots," Nick replied, despite looking just as restless as his partner. He pointed to the room's expansive windows; the sun had begun to rise over the city skyline. "At least the view is nice."

"I don't care about the view, Nick. I want to know what's going on!"

"I know, Carrots. But what else can we do right now? When there's something to tell, I'm sure they'll let us know." Leaning heavily against the wall, Nick slowly eased himself down to the floor. She stared at him wordlessly for a moment, then moved to sit beside him.

"This whole week has been..." Nick trailed off, gesturing vaguely into the air.

"Yeah."

"I mean, why us? In the last six years we've risked our lives ninety-two times for this city." He gently thumped his head against the wall. "Ninety. Two. Times."

"I had no idea it'd been that many."

"Yeah, well it has," he groused. "You'd think we'd just get a pass every once in a while, but nooooo..."

"I also didn't realize you'd been counting." Sighing, she lay her head on his shoulder. "I don't mind. There are worse things than dying, anyway."

"Name three."

"How about two?"

"I'd accept two."

"Well, I've only got one." She looked up at him. "Not having each other."

Nick snorted. "That's pretty corny."

"You love it."

"I love you."

"You'd better," she teased, looking up as she playfully poked his side. She was surprised to find him gazing down at her pensively. "Nick? What it i-"

"Marry me," Nick interrupted. "I love you and we're perfect together and I don't know what's going to happen tomorrow, but I love you and I never want to spend my life with anyone else because I love you."

"I..."

"And I just realized I said that I love you, like, three times in there," he added nervously. "But I really, really love you so I'm just gonna roll with tha-"

"Yes!" Judy jumped in before he could keep rambling. "Of course, yes."

"I...really? Just like that?"

"You sound surprised," she laughed.

He chuckled, reaching out to take her paw. "This wasn't exactly the romantic proposal I'd imagined."

"We've had two near-death experiences in three days, Nick." Shifting closer, Judy threw one of her legs over his, straddling his lap as she curled her fingers into his shirt. "I think I can cut you a little slack in the romance department."

He gave her a particularly sly smile as she felt his paws come to rest on her waist. "Oh, really?"

"Mm-hm."

Gripping his shirt a bit more tightly, she rose up and kissed him, trying to pour all the emotions swirling around her head into it. He made a small, brief sound of surprise, then his paws tightened on her waist and he pulled her even closer.

"Ahem!" The loud cough startled them both, and they sprung apart like a pair of teenagers caught making out. Looking over to the door, they found Winters eyeing them incredulously. "Really? I leave you two alone and this is what you get up to?"

"It's not like that!"

"Then what, pray tell, is it like?"

"We're engaged!" Somehow, Judy managed to sound both happy and defiant at the same time.

Winters blinked. "I'm sorry, you're what?"

"We're enga-"

"Y'know what? I don't care." He turned to shout over his shoulder. "Fraser! Get in here!"

The wolf appeared a moment later, nodding to the detectives. "Sergeant?"

"Burke wants to brief these two himself." He aimed a mildly irritated look at the pair. "I need you to stay in here and make sure they don't get married while I go get him."

"Er..." Fraser blinked, confused. "Yes, Sergeant."

Winters left without another word, pulling the door closed behind him. Unclipping his carbine from his vest, Fraser placed the weapon on the conference room table and dropped into the nearest chair with a grunt, running a paw tiredly over his face.

Nick and Judy shared a glance, then Nick climbed to his feet and took the chair next to the wolf. "So, how're you doing?"

Looking up, he gave the pair a half-hearted smile. "I'm alright. Thank you."

"Are you sure?" Judy pressed.

"I..." For a second, it didn't seem like Fraser was going to continue. "I should have smelled that bomber a mile away."

"You couldn't have kn-" she began, but Fraser cut her off.

"No, I could have and I should have," he insisted. "I've been a tracker for most of my career and I spent four years as an EOD tech. I should have sniffed out those explosive before we even reached the atrium. Galil and Cooper are in the hospital because I didn't."

"Stop it," Judy interrupted, climbing to her feet. "So what if you didn't notice the bomber right away? Neither did Winters. Or Galil. Or any of the officers there. Cooper only spotted them because he was closest."

"But I..."

"I didn't smell anything unusual either," Nick pointed out. "If it makes you feel any better."

"It wasn't your job to smell anything, Detective." Fraser countered.

"The bomber had probably soaked the bag with scent blocker," Judy suggested. "It's the only thing that'd explain how he got it inside the precinct building without anyone smelling anything."

Fraser gave her a dubious look but didn't argue.

"Let it go, buddy," Nick advised. "Remember the last time you saw that look on her face? When we stole a prisoner from the Department of Corrections?"

"I did think it looked familiar."

"Yup. And believe me, there's no point arguing with that look. Better mammals than us have tried." Nick reached over to clap the wolf on the shoulder. "What matters right now is that we got through it. Let's focus on that and nitpick the rest later. Deal?"

"...deal," he sighed. "In any case, I suppose congratulations are in order...assuming the Sergeant wasn't pulling my leg?"

Judy actually looked mildly abashed, but her partner just grinned. "It was kind of a spur of the moment thing."

"I can imagine," the wolf chuckled. "Though I do hope that's the last impulsive, life-changing decision you make today. There's only so much stress I can take."

Before either detective could respond, Winters re-entered the room ahead of a gruff-looking black bear.

"Everyone still unwed, Fraser?"

"For the moment, Sergeant."

"Good enough." Winters pointed to the bear as they both took a seat at the conference table. "This is Captain Roger Burke. He heads up the SIU."

"Hopps. Wilde." Burke nodded to each of the detectives. "How are you two holding up?"

"Well, they got engaged in your conference room," Winters said, rolling his eyes. "So they can't be doing that badly."

Unfazed by the Sergeant's flippant attitude, Burke gestured to the remaining chairs. "Take a seat, detectives. It's about time we got the two of you up to speed."

"Finally!" Judy groaned. Then, remembering that she was speaking to a superior officer, she visibly winced. "Sorry, sir."

Rather than a Bogo-like scowl and the verbal thrashing that usually went along with it, the Captain simply gave a dismissive wave of his paw. "Forget it, Hopps. You've earned that one, at least."

"Sir?"

"In the last two weeks you two have dealt with more stress than some officers go through in their whole career. Gods know, I've lost my temper over a lot less." He pointed to Winters with a crooked smile. "To say nothing of dealing with this knucklehead."

"What was that, Rog?" Winters shot back, smirking. "I couldn't hear you from behind that desk of yours."

Rolling his eyes lightly, Burke connected the tablet in his paw to an inset dock on the tabletop. "It's been a long night, Detectives, and not just for the two of you."

He tapped the tablet and a large screen on the far wall turned on, displaying pictures of what they all recognized as Precincts One, Two, Six, Eight, Nine, and Eleven. Although the Precinct One building was by far the most damaged, all of them had large areas blocked off by crime scene tape. "Precinct One was actually part of what appears to be a series of coordinated attacks against the ZPD. The bombing there was likely the signal for the others to make their move."

"How bad was it?" Nick asked, eyeing the images coolly.

"Could have been worse. The other precincts got off relatively easy. All Precinct Two lost was some parked vehicles." He tapped the small device's screen, bringing up the image of a particularly unhappy looking coyote sitting in a hospital bed. Both her paws were cuffed to the bed's frame, despite being wrapped in white gauze.

"Sarah Warren, twenty-eight years old. She was responsible for the Molotov cocktails thrown into the Precinct Two parking lot and managed to fumble one of them in the process. Ended up with second and third degree burns on both paws. Officers arrested her when she tried to visit the ER under a fake name. She's currently under armed guard at Zootopia General."

He tapped the tablet's screen again and the image changed to a mugshot of a scowling pangolin.

"Craig Scottsdale, nineteen years old. Currently in custody. He was the one that set off the flash bombs at Precinct Eleven. Most of the nocturnal officers were stunned, but Eleven had a couple of cheetahs from their Pursuit Team on duty at the time. They ran him down before he reached the end of the block."

"A pangolin tried to outrun a pair of cheetahs?" Despite everything, Judy laughed slightly. "What was he thinking?"

"He'd probably only seen flash bombs in the movies. I'll bet he thought they would be enough to cover his escape." Burke scowled. "It didn't help that he stopped to smash his cell phone before the officers caught up with him. Tech services is working to get something useful out of it, but they aren't optimistic."

The image changed to show the Precinct Six building. The photo had been taken the night before and only a pawful of the building's lights were on. In a previously fenced off area next to it, a small electrical hub was partially crumpled over the twisted remains of a school bus. "Precinct Six is operating solely on their emergency generators after a bus rammed into the electrical transformer that supplied their building with power. Unfortunately, we don't know anything about the driver. I guess the idiot forgot that buses are made of metal. The electrical discharge from the collision pretty much blew them to pieces."

Judy winced. "Do we at least know their species?"

"The coroner's best guess is some kind of canine. Maybe." Burke shrugged. "In any case, I'm told that City Works expects to have Six up and running by end of day. Precinct Eight, not so much."

The next image was of a miserable-looking serval, squinting at the camera with bloodshot eyes, her features red and puffy as though she was suffering a particularly nasty allergic reaction. "Cora Vincent, age twenty-six. At almost the same time as the Precinct One bombing, Vincent released some kind of lachrymator chemical into Precinct Eight's ventilation system. She was lucky it was a non-lethal agent, since she managed to catch a face full of it in the process."

Next came an exterior shot of Precinct Eight in the Rainforest District. Most of the building's doors and windows had been sealed off with heavy plastic sheeting and several dozen mammals milled around, all wearing hazardous-chemical gear. "Although no one was permanently injured, the precinct itself is going to be out of commission for a few days while the building gets cleaned up."

Nick leaned forward. "Do we know what they got hit with?"

"A full analysis is still pending, but the best guess right now is a concentrated form of either Fox-Away or Wolfsbane."

"Ouch." The fox's nose gave an involuntary twitch. Just behind him, Fraser winced sympathetically.

"Yeah," Burke agreed. "And last but not least..."

He tapped the screen again, bringing up a picture of two capybaras. Unlike the previous arrest photos, this image looked as though it'd been pulled off social media. "William and Nelson Hensley. Brothers, twenty-three and twenty-one years old respectively. Both deceased following a spectacularly failed attempt at a drive-by shooting at Precinct Nine last night. The poor bastards practically drove right up to Nine's tactical team. I'm sure the two of you recall the vehicle that tried to gun you down in Savanna Central?"

Nick snorted. "Tough to forget."

"I'll bet." Burke brought up the next image, showing a side-by-side comparison of the same pale blue sedan. On the left was a still shot lifted from a traffic camera feed, showing the car speeding past a familiar Savanna Central café. On the right was a crime scene photo taken outside Precinct Nine of the same vehicle, now riddled with bullet holes. "Well, it's safe to say that your would-be killers won't be hurting anyone else."

Judy's brow furrowed as she peered at the bullet-riddled car, but she didn't comment. Nick leaned over, speaking softly. "You alright, Carrots?"

She nodded. "I'm okay."

"You sure?"

"I'm fine, Nick. I'm not happy that they're dead, but they made their own choices." She turned to glance at Winters. "I was actually worried about the SWAT officers. I can't imagine it's an easy thing to live with. Killing another mammal."

Winters regarded her for a moment, then shook his head slowly. "No, it isn't. And it shouldn't be."

Another moment of silence passed before Nick gave a faint cough. "So, Captain. Is that it?"

"That's it," Burke confirmed.

"Why didn't anything happen at the other six precincts?" Nick wondered out loud. "Is there anything about the ones that were attacked that makes them special?"

"We've got our analysts looking into it. There's a few possibilities, but so far nothing that really stands out."

"Maybe there were other attacks planned," Judy suggested. "But the mammals in charge of them lost their nerve?"

"It's possible, but supposition doesn't close cases," Burke snorted. "And unfortunately, none of the mammals we have in custody have said a word."

"None of them?" Nick asked, surprised. "It looks like their bosses have hung them out to dry, so why keep quiet? Most mammals would be begging to make a deal by now."

"True believers, Wilde," Winters snorted, eyeing the screen disdainfully. "They'll throw themselves under a bus in a heartbeat if they think it'll help their cause...whatever the hell that is."

"That could be why Scottsdale put breaking his phone ahead of trying to get away," Judy agreed thoughtfully. "What if-"

A voice from outside the room interrupted. ""Captain Burke! We need you out here, sir!"

"Ugh. More surprises," the bear grunted, glancing back over his shoulder. "Wonderful."

"Is there anything we can do?" Judy asked hopefully.

Winters glared at her. "You can stay here, Hopps."

"Listen to the Sergeant, Hopps," Burke chuckled. "I'll only be a minute."

~o~o~o~

END PART 8

~o~o~o~

A NOTE TO MY LOYAL READERS

A few days ago, my computer fell victim to a sudden and catastrophic technological whoopsie. I won't bore you with the fine details but the punchline is that a shit-ton of data was lost, including the remaining chapters of Guarding and my most recent backup copies...along with several other writing projects of mine, but that's beside the point.

It's not the end of the world, though. I still have my notes and a (very) old backup copy for Forty Glimpses, so I won't have to start over from scratch. However, this does mean that I won't be able to keep up the 'new update every weekend' schedule I've been on for the last couple of months.

I'll get the lost chapters re-written as soon as I'm able to. Until then, thank you all for your patience.