Chapter 14: Promises Made…Promises Kept

Zootopia…Zootopian Embassy…10 years ago…

Kaiden, per the plan, was crawling through the airduct trying to find the main air feed to the lower floors. The plan was simple, get to the basement, find the security office, plug in the DataThief, have operations do what the same thing they did in the previous office. This would allow Kerberos to access the basement without being seen. Stealth was key here since until Kerberos could be brought down, the fox was on his own.

This was a tall order even with his new enhancements. Enhancements he was still getting used to. While the training he received got him past the initial awkwardness, this would be the first mission to test his new skills. The fox crawled through the duct, trying to be as quiet as possible, the knee pads on his combat pants making a small piff piff as the cushions squished under his weight.

Thankfully the air was moving covering up what sound he was making, the cold air flowed over his body, and a slight woosh filled his ears as the air caught the right angle of his ear flaps, causing him to repeatedly pin them back instinctively.

He eventually found his way to the main air feed, a shaft that led straight down the floors. Which branched off to feed the various floors' respective ducts providing climate control for the whole building.

The main duct was larger than the one he was in, and it had a smooth metallic sheen. immediately realizing he had a problem.

"Kerberos, can you read me" he spoke into his comm.

A static hiss preceded the bear's reply but cleared as he opened the comm line. "Kerberos here, what's up?"

"There are no paw holds, nothing for me to hold onto, how do I?….." Kaiden trailed off almost not wanting to hear the answer.

There was a short delay. "You should be able to bridge across the duct with your arms and legs and 'crab walk' down."

"Seriously?" the fox replied incredulously

"Yeah, we didn't bring any climbing equipment, you'll have to make do." The bear replied

"You got to be kidding me!" The fox exclaimed.

"No I'm not." The bear clarified.

The fox resigned himself to the task, and looked down the shaft. Turning on his vision mode to try to see in the darkness. His eyes glowed a dark crimson. He saw ducts every floor just like the one he was able to climb out of. He thought about it for a moment, trying to talk himself into it. Rationalizing that he could take a break every floor if needed by hanging onto the duct for that level.

"Ok, descending." He spoke into the comm.

He climbed out of the duct and bridged his body across, putting one foot against the wall opposite the junction he just climbed out of, and one foot on the edge of the junction. He did the foolish thing and looked directly down, wincing by what he saw. The duct trailed downward, fading into pitch black as even his enhanced vision had a maximum range. This made it even worse than seeing the bottom, making the duct seem like it would just swallow the poor fox like a mythic monster from a fairy tale. Kaiden tried to steady his breathing and started his decent. Slowly but surely, he would press against the walls with his legs, lower his torso, press against the wall with his arms and lower his legs. Bounding down the duct.

He would turn it into a game, how many feet he could go before he had to take a break. Even though his arms and legs were augmented, he still had an organic heart, albeit with some enhancements. He'd have to stop to catch his breath and pant. The cold air didn't help as much as he thought it would, it was cold, not cool, which caused the capillaries in his skin to tighten and not let out heat, which gave him a sense of being in Tundra town sapping his already highly in use stamina.

Eventually he made it past the lobby floor and felt the air getting heavier as he went below the surface level, and the air felt even colder. A few more feet down the duct, he placed his foot on a panel on the side wall like he had done several dozen times already, except this one came loose. He lost his grip and slid down the duct. His eyes went wide as he frantically tried to cling to something, eventually gripping on of the junction paths below. He panted audibly as he tried to keep hold of it.

"Aw shit" he grunted as he felt the edge slip out of his fingers.

Kaiden bounced around the duct as he fell to the bottom, grunts of pain erupted out of his mouth. Eventually he hit the bottom with a loud thud. He gritted his teeth and sucked air through them before letting out a weak but pained grunt. He held his sides as they ached. His reinforced ribs thankfully had not broken, but precisely because they persisted it compressed the soft tissue around them, which was very much still his. The pain was intense, and he tried to steadily breathe through it and endure, squirming on the bottom of the duct assembly.

He sat there for what seemed like a while before he heard his comm chirp to life.

"Hey kid, you ok? Operations said you're your dot went straight to the bottom. Kid? Kaiden!"

Kaiden panted several times before mustering an answer "I'm fine, I just hurt, I need a minute." He panted into his comms.

"Did you break anything?" Kerberos asked with concern.

"No, just the pain."

Kerberos hesitated for a moment then broke into the comm again "Top left of your Hud, under medical, activate the pill icon that says P." he muttered.

Kaiden did as he was told. The moment he 'clicked' it there was a rush of sensation inside of him, the pain began to quiet down and was replaced with a sense of relief and then a slight euphoria. Kaiden laid his head back on the duct floor and chuckled out loud. The relief and calm that replaced it make him a bit giddy.

"Yeah, that's what I was concerned about, I'm serious kid, don't overuse it. Last thing we need is a cybernetically enhanced junkie on our hands."

"I promise, I won't let it get out of paw. God that hurt…."

"I'm sorry kid, it's my fault for not bringing climbing gear. And the freefall devices we used only work out in the open and take several hundred feet to work."

"It's fine, I'm coming out of it." The fox absolved his comrade.

Kaiden picked himself back up and looked around. He reasoned he must be on the lowest sub-basement, and he per the waypoint on his map he would need to ascend two floors just to get to the same floor with the security substation. He decided to accept this detour and see what this floor had to offer while still finding a way to keep with the plan.

He crawled into the horizontal duct and followed it till he reached the end. Eventually ending up in a Janitor's closest.

"Perfect" he muttered, as he pushed the grate off and climbed out of the duct, dropping to the floor. He could already feel the soreness of the soft tissue around his ribs setting in.

He took the opportunity to swap the ammo for his rifle with the shock rounds, checked his shock prod by zapping the nearby wall before placing back in his belt. He slung the rifle behind him and held the pistol at the ready. Not sure of who or what was outside the door. He went to grab the door handle but stopped just before he made contact. He curiously went through the options in his HUD for his eyes, arriving upon a curious icon.

He selected it and his head flinched as his vision changed, he was able to see ahead into the hallway a bit. The ghostly image of the door was translucent now, he felt that it was still solid. His mouth agape as he was able to see through his own paw, the inner workings, the mechanical skeleton, muscle fibers, mini piping and wiring. Waving his paw in front of him, this would take getting used to. He saw the hallway outside the door was clear. Interestingly there was a range to this 'vision' that became black and static towards the edge. 'Something to keep in mind' he thought. He turned the vision mode off and with a quick motion opened the door and swung out, first aiming down the hallway then sweeping to the corner near him. His "vision mode" had been accurate, as he saw that no one around.

The hallway had a metallic silver sheen, though when he felt it, he realized it was painted plastic, a facade. He made his way down the hallway, keeping an eye out for guards and cameras. Dodging past various crates and equipment left in the hallways, eventually finding a stairway. Two guards were stationed there, one walking impatiently back and forth and the other standing still looking forward.

The guards, both wolves, were cladded in what looked like riot armor or urban warfare gear. The uniform pants and shirt primarily grey with orange striping running the length, with shoulder pauldrons, elbow and knee padding and chest armor with the letters "WRC" stenciled into them, and a hard combat helmet with eye protection, a comms mic and a helmet flashlight attached to the side. Kaiden had read the briefing about them, Wolverine Risk Control. They marketed themselves as a private security company headquartered out of Zootopia, though not cleared to operate there. Their chief operations happened elsewhere in the world. But past the private security front they portrayed themselves as, they were a private military contractor, working for the highest bidder acting as a force multiplier, and in some cases a private army for those who have the money, clout and a questionable moral philosophy.

However, because the embassy technically wasn't Zootopian soil, but a legally allowed international neutral no mammal's land. A place where citizens of various countries can seek asylum, even if they themselves were belligerent to one another, meant that WRC was not really violating any law by being here. However, that also meant that, Kaiden couldn't expect any quarter in terms of legal protections afforded to Zootopian citizens. The "No Mammal's Land" philosophy went both ways. Legally speaking he wasn't trespassing; he was a foreign national on foreign land engaging in espionage. Which meant if anything happened, it was anyone's story as to the truth. The fox wouldn't stick around to find out but returned his focus as to what to do about the guards.

He went through several options in his mind and tried to picture the movements. He could catch them by surprise with the dart pistol, but he'd have to be quick about it. The question who to shoot first. The standing guard would be easy, the moving guard depending on his facing could have a chance to get a shot off and alert everyone who heard his weapon. He could take out the moving guard, though run the risk of missing and have two perfectly able guards to deal with.

"Damn I wish Kerberos was here." He muttered.

"I was wondering when you'd ask." Chirped his comm with the voice of his former task master.

Kaiden shocked pushed himself back from the corner.

"Humphrey?" he whispered.

"Forgetting my lessons from 'The Pit' already? What was my 1st lesson?"

"Never leave an enemy alive?" Kaiden answered confused.

"Eh…Ok yeah you got me. What was my 2nd lesson?"

"No mammal is an island, always remember your team." Kaiden answered knowing what the bear was meaning.

"Exactly. Do me a favor look at the guards, and switch on your analysis mode."

Kaiden did as he was told and his vision automatically tagged the guards, they had brackets around them in his vision and his hud populated various information about them, their names, radio frequencies, security levels, along with various other data.

"Perfect, I'm looking through your eyes kid, and I've locked onto their radios."

"So?" Kaiden asked.

"When I say go, you rush 'em, I'll take care of the distraction part, ready?"

"Yeah."

"Ok, 3….2…1…Go!"

Kaiden rushed the guards, they saw a motion coming at them but just before they could react, a sharp shrilling sound caused them to grab their ears.

"Ahh…. Motherfu*er!" screamed one of them.

Kaiden shot the first guard with the dart, it landed with a thud into his fur, and he went down. The other guard fought through the radio shrill and tore off his helmet. Kaiden turned and with a left cross and hit him square on the right side of his muzzle causing to snap left abruptly then swung forward. The guard blinked his eyes in a daze and his head bobbed for a moment before he collapsed on the floor.

"Eaaaasy, kid. You're not flesh and blood anymore, you do that too hard, and you'll snap a neck that way." warned Kerberos.

Kaiden looked down at the guard and checked his health data to make sure he was still breathing. His HUD told him that the guard had minor head trauma, but he didn't break bones or bust any blood vessels in his brain. The fox panted to catch his breath and looked at this paw, the power in his newfound abilities starting to resonate with him.

Lily had told him so many years ago to stop pulling his punches and to commit. But now realizing if he did that, he wouldn't just hurt mammals, he would likely kill them. Restraint, at least focused and intelligent restraint would be the guiding mandate from now on.

Kaiden took a deep breath again, trying to steady his nerves. Then proceeded to move the unconscious guards out of the hallway. He found nearby bathroom shortly down the opposite length of hallway, took a moment to make sure it was empty and stashed the guards in there. Kaiden saw the security pass on the guards, comparing them and took the guard with the higher clearance level written on the card.

He left and went up the stairs to the 3rd sub-basement. This floor was filled with a giant room that was encased in windows, a few glass doors every dozen or so yards, locked with badge access panels. There was an access hallway encircling this room. Inside were racks and racks of servers mounted on the rails. Kaiden peered through one of the glass doors and saw that a large service conduit the size of a tree trunk was in the center of the room.

"Kerberos, you seeing this?" Kaiden asked

"Yeah, I see it, I don't know what I'm looking at, but I see it."

"Think the DataThief could do its thing with security here?" the fox inquired.

"Perhaps…Maybe. It might be worth a try."

Kaiden walked up to one of the badge panels and swiped the badge, it blinked red indicating the lock didn't open. He badged again. Same thing.

"Oh well, worth a try." The fox muttered.

He turned to walk away when the badge panel on its own blinked green and the buzzing sound of the mag lock disengaged.

"Oookay? That wasn't ominous or anything." The young fox commented.

Kaiden grabbed the door handle and pulled it open, no alarm, nothing. The inside air was frigid. He stepped inside and the door snapped shut behind him, the slight his from the door's auto closing piston. The room was dark, the dull blue glow of the various led lights and conduit lighting give the room a blue hue. That along with the air temperature made it feel like the fox stepped into tundra town. He could see his breath fuming into a white haze from his mouth with ever exhale. The moisture sticking to his whiskers and the fur around his lips.

He walked forward and found the "Tree Trunk" sized conduit. It was a tightly packed bundle of various data wiring, ethernet, fiber optic, coaxial and few other types he didn't recognize. They all seemed to go straight up through the ceiling probably to whatever was above him on the second sub-floor basement level. Attached on one of the sides of the cylindrical bundle was a access station, a simple keyboard, mouse, and monitor attached to a mounting arm, which itself was attached to the pillar the wiring was bound on.

He awoke the workstation and attached the DataThief. Launching the same app that he saw Kerberos use earlier, a plethora of data displayed on the screen.

"Operations." Kaiden spoke into his comm "You gettin' any of this?"

Operations chirped into his comms "We are in. This system is rather large, a lot of data. Trying to access security."

The fox waited several moments, and then looked around, he felt he was being watched. He switched on his vision mode and looked around again, nothing again, no one hidden behind the banks. He switched it back off and looked around again, then looked up and realized he was being watched. There was a camera above the workstation he didn't see until that very moment.

"Uh, Operations. Did you loop the video yet?"

"Why?" Kerberos asked with deep concern.

Kaiden saw the eye of the camera move back and forth in the housing, indicating it was being operated.

The fox bit down on his lip realizing his mistake, instinctively gripping his weapon, waiting for an alarm and subsequently the alerting of guards but after several seconds neither of those things happened.

"This is odd." Operations said puzzled.

"What?" Kaiden asked still fixated on the camera.

"The cameras on this level are already looped, in fact the security card you just used was just granted for global access."

"How is that possible?" the fox asked.

"The only explanation is that someone else is in the system." The operations agent.

A deep feeling of dread suddenly fell upon the fox. "A trap." The fox muttered himself.

Kaiden was about to call for an abort, then the terminal in front of him opened a command line, data traversed across it before stopping at a blinking green cursor that typed two ominous words.

"Help Me."

"Humphrey…." Kaiden spoke, the fur at the back of his head standing up and tingling fear crawling up his spine.

"I see it, Kid." The bear replied.

"You see what I'm looking at?"

"No, I mean that just typed on my screen up here too. That means who ever this is, knows exactly where we both are."

"Help Me. Plz." Said the test prompt. "I Don't Want To Die."

Kaiden broke past his fear and typed into the keyboard.

"Who is this?"

"I'm…I'm Me."

The fox decided to cut to the chase

"Where are you?"

"Above…Above… Plz Help Me."

"I'm on my way. Hold on. We're coming. Just hold on."

"I'll….I'll Try."

"You have to hold on."

"I Will Try."

Kaiden decided to take that as an answer. Right as he was about to get back on the comm a series of dots showed up on Kaiden's HUD, on the map of the subbasement level 2 above him. Some were moving, some weren't.

"Humphrey, Sergeant…. I…. I think that's…."

"Yeah, it's got to be, I don't know how it could be, but it's got to be. We'd better hurry."

"It looks like he's locked down the security system, that just means we have to worry about the guards."

"Yeah, agreed. And knowing their exact location and number. This should be interesting. I'm on my way down."

When Kerberos stepped out of the elevator, the various WRC guards standing in the landing way were caught in absolute shock and horror when a black cladded grizzly bear stepped out. The landing was a rectangular shaped room where the elevators from the upper floors came to and the stairs leading down to the lower floors.

He noted that the elevators didn't go all the way down, stopping service at the second sub-basement. Wasting no time, he shot the first two guards with his rifle, the shock darts finding their targets and caused them to collapse on the floor. The next guard went to aim his weapon at the bear only to be caught from behind by Kaiden coming up from the lower level and shooting the guard with his tranq pistol in the back of the neck.

The guard went wide eyed as be felt the bite of the darts and fell to the floor. Kaiden shot the next guard who rounded the corner before he could even react.

"Down before they feel the prick of the dart, eh? Might we have oversold these a bit?" Kaiden quipped gesturing with the dart pistol in his paw.

"Just a tad. Keep pushing." Replied Kerberos.

The pair walked forward to the other end of the elevator lobby and checked down the length of the hallways that ran adjacent to the door. Seeing nothing, Kaiden swiped the key card and opened the door.

Inside was a split-level room with what looked like a chair with wires coming down from an overhead torus that was mounted to the ceiling above. Datalines and cables from below, presumably from the data center Kaiden was in, ran into the chair.

The split level was raised and walled off with glass running around the room, there were guards on either side watching the center of the room, they hadn't made out the duo yet.

Kaiden palmed one of the gas grenades. The grenade was square, flat however it had rounded edges. He tossed it in his paw to get a feel of the weight and balance.

"You know, I got an idea."

"Yeah, do it kid." The bear encouraged, getting a sense of the fox's tactic.

Kaiden steadied the grenade in his paw like a stone, and pressed the arming button, then shifted it with his index finger along the thin edges. He tossed it down the length of the hallway but with a rotation like skipping stone across a lake. It hit the wall just before the corner, bounced off, hit the wall after, cutting the corner. Then rattled down the rest of the hallway. The guards heard the clatter and looked down at the object. One tried to turn away realizing what it was before the gas grenade exploded. It's green noxious cloud filling the hallway. Kaiden spun a hundred eighty degrees and did it again for the other hallway.

This time the guards on that hallway heard the commotion and tried coming toward them, just in time to see a gas grenade appear off the turn in the hallway and right at them. It bounced past them and exploded in midair.

The first set of guards clattered to the floor with audible thuds. The second set fell in staggered timing, one guard, a timber wolf, managed to make out of the cloud and stumble into the hallway coming toward them.

"You sons of bi-*cough cough, Aw fu-" He raised his weapon trying to steady his aim but succumbed and fell flat on his muzzle, his weapon clattering to the floor.

"Damn fine job, kid." Complimented the bear.

The two proceeded into the chamber, two guards came from the opposite door and fired at them. One the rounds grazed the bears shoulder but was unfazed. He and Kaiden fired their rifles, the shock darts hit their targets, rendering them unconscious.

"Shit you think anyone heard that?" Kaiden asked.

"Oh, you bet your ass someone did. Let's hurry." The bear responded with concern on his muzzle.

They ran up to the chair in the middle of the room, what they saw shocked and disgusted them. It was Milton Hamilton, the squirrel; he was hooked up to the various devices on the chair. Many electrodes where stuck to his skull, with translucent fiber lines running down and plugged into the chair. Several IV lines connected to his arms and legs, and what looked like tubes connecting to his sides where his kidneys were like a dialysis machine.

Hamilton himself was fixated on screens just above his head and his paws cuffed to the arms of the chair, with his paws resting over halves of a keyboard, one half for each paw. His eyes were darting all over the place, unnaturally fast as if interpreting the data almost at the speed of thought.

Kaiden waved his paw in front of the squirrel. "Milton? Milton!"

The squirrel didn't react. The fox knelt down and whispered. "Hammy." He whispered. "We've come to take you home." Kaiden grabbed Hamilton's paw, he felt it still trying to type against his paw pad.

The squirrel stopped typing, and Kaiden felt him grip with paw giving it a small weak squeeze. The squirrel blinked his eyes as if waking up from a dream. "Is it you?" he squeaked. "Is this….real? Or a dream?"

"It's real. It's real Hammy." The fox replied

The squirrel gave out a breathy sigh. "Oh god, oh thank you God."

"Question though, how do we get you out, these tubes and wires."

"Tie the waste tubes, I can survive for a while before needing medical attention. IVs you can pull. The cyber ware…..cut them….CUT them!" he replied then demanded.

"You sure?" the fox asked worried if such a dramatic act would cause more harm than good.

"No time, just cut them….now!"

Kaiden deployed his combat blade from his forearm and held the edge over a section of the wires, judging where to cut them. One he figured the right length he tapped the edge with a smooth but forceful motion severing the wires. The chair immediately shut down and various systems in the building went dead, lighting turned off, and red emergency lighting turned on.

"What in the hell." Kerberos commented.

Kaiden kept focus, he pulled out the IVs that were feeding into the squirrel, removing them with no issue. The "Kidney tubes" the fox was more unsure about. He looked over at a nearby tray, there were plastic clips and surgical shears along with other implements. He concluded whoever did this to him had kept these here to maintain the medical side of the equipment. He attached the clips to the pipes in the middle, pushing down on the plastic clips. They clacked several times, making a high pitched 'zip' sound as they tightened against the tubing. Using the shears he clipped the tubing free of the machine, then using medical tape wrapped them into loops and ran them under the tape and around the squirrel's waist securing them as best he could.

With the squirrel now free he lifted him off the chair and offered him to Kerberos. Kaiden could feel the squirrel's gaunt form. Normally squirrels had plenty of fat layers giving them a "puffy" look and feel. Hamilton had none of that. He was thin, and he trembled in the fox's paws. Whatever they were doing to him had been slowly killing him. The bear received the squirrel and held him. Trying to figure out what to do, he visibly smiled when he arrived at an idea. Grabbing one of the squirrel sized cushions off the chair, the opened his back pack stuffing the cushion inside, then the squirrel, zipping it up enough so he was secure but his head was sticking out.

"Operations, this is Kerberos, we have the objective, repeat we have the objective. We need evac now. Shadows are in the light, repeat, shadows are in the light."

"Affirmative on status, evac will be on roof. Go now." Responded the operator.

They turned to leave when a gun shot rang out, Kerberos took the hit and fell to his knees.

"Oh mothef*ker." He gasped in pain. He led out a loud inhale, sucking in air. He was hit square in the chest, the vest took most of the hit, but it did penetrate. Kaiden went wide eyed as the bear retreated behind the chair.

"Im fine, I got the same ribs as you." The grizzly bear squawked.

Kaiden spun his head back around to see who fired the round.

"Well now, who in the hell are you and what are you doing with our project?" said a voice.

Out from the dark of the elevator landing was a badger, white with two black stripes that ran down his face cutting down across his eyes and neck. He sported one natural green eye, and a cybernetic one, it glowed green matching the color of the other. He had a long-barreled rifle in his paws and his arms had augmented piping and muscle fibers in them, though not fully artificial, but enough to tell Kaiden this wasn't a normal badger.

"So… you're the fox a*hole that they had me replace, eh?" the badger spat disrespectfully.

"Replace?" Kaiden's eyes glared at the implication.

"Yeah…" the badger shifted the rifle back into a low ready position "Boy is Jarod gonna be pissed when he finds out he didn't end you."

Kaiden turned to Kerberos and whispered, "Get to the elevator.. I got this."

"Kaiden this isn't about…"

"I got this." The fox repeated louder.

The bear nodded and tossed Kaiden a pistol.

"What's this?" the fox gestured with the new pistol.

"Lethal rounds, anti-aug, you're gonna need it." The bear replied.

"You two done whispering? I ain't got all day." The badger condescended. "Look you can use whatever the f*k you want, you both are still going to die down here."

Kaiden stood up and walked several paces toward the badger. "So how you want to do this?"

"Hmm, how 'bout we work together?" asked the Badger

"What?" The fox replied incredulously. "What do you mean?"

"Easy, I shoot you, and you die, how's that for working together? Hehe" the badger quipped ending with a cold bout of laughter.

Kaiden chuckled with the badger joining him, which caused the other to stop. "You got a good sense of humor for a dead mammal." The badger quipped arrogantly.

"Oh you don't get the joke do you? Let me ask you something what do you think is happening here?" the fox asked in a playful, flippant tone.

"I think your smug ass is in over your head. I think you're going to try and out draw me with whatever the hell is in your pistol, thinking that's going take me out. You think that because you don't know who I am."

Kaiden smiled and paced a few steps toward the wall, which the badger rotated slightly to keep him front and center.

"Well in that case, introductions seem to be in order." The fox conceded.

"Oh I know who you are, Kaiden Ellison, former point mammal. Me, I'm Tex Avery, the best shot in this hemisphere. And that was before I got this little 'upgrade'. Now, I can shoot the nuts off a flea at 2000 yards." Tex tapped his ocular enhancement.

"That seems oddly specific" Kaiden joked as he paced a few more steps.

"Oh keep it up smart ass, go ahead, go right ahead and twitch. I guarantee, I will blow your f*kin' head off before you even get a bead on me." The badger's words now starting to boil with aggression.

"I am sure that in a fair fight, you could probably outshoot me. But there is one problem with that though?" the fox started holding up a single finger.

"Oh yeah, and what is that smart ass?"

The sound of the metal casing of an EMP grenade hitting the floor, tossed by Kerberos, caused the badger to look down and then back at the fox.

"I don't fight fair." He smugly shrugged and smiled as the grenade went off.

The blast short-circuited Tex's systems causing him to buzz with electrical energy of the blast, draining his systems and dropping him to the floor. Any normal mammal would be unaffected by the EMP, but Tex like Kaiden was partially machine now making him susceptible.

Tex grunted in pain as Kaiden walked up with a cold expression on his face. He looked up and past Tex as Kerberos who was looking back at him wondering what the fox was going to do.

Kaiden's expression softened. "It's not enough to just fight evil, I have to do good." He reminded himself. And instead of skewering the badger like his initial instinct told him to, he decked the badger hard in the face and knocked him out cold.

The fox looked up at Kerberos and saw the bear smiling proudly and nodding in approval.

"Let's get the hell out of here Sergeant." The fox suggested.

"You got it…Agent." Kerberos replied with a smile.