Disclaimer: Zootopia and all related characters are owned by Disney. All other characters, product names, trademarks, and copyrights, belong to their respective owners.

…..

Judy pushed open the lobby doors and looked up at a wall clock. She'd made it on time, but just barely. Nick's place was way better than her old shoebox of an apartment, but it was further away from the precinct than she was used to, and she still needed to figure out the best Metro train to catch to get her here on time.

Waving to Clawhauser, she said, "Hey, Ben."

"Hey yourself, girl, what happened? You're almost late, I thought you'd be here ten minutes ago. Everyone's in the bullpen, and Bogo's about to start."

Remembering Finn's advice about not telling anyone where she was staying, Judy couldn't exactly bring up the fact that she wasn't used to the Metro schedule from Nick's place yet, so instead, she replied, "I, uh, the showers in my building were all full, so I had to wait." Judy's ears pinked up telling the white lie, so she let her ears drop as she ran over to the bullpen.

Sliding into her and Nick's chair, she looked over to where her temporary partner had his head cradled on the table in front of him and was quietly snoring. Nudging the wolf in the side, Judy whispered, "Connor, wake up."

"I'll go, just give me a minute," was the mumbled reply she got in return.

"Connor," said Judy a little louder, nudging him again.

"Come on Olivia, nobody mixes maple syrup and pickles with fish sticks, that's disgusting."

"Connor!"

Bolting up in his seat, Pawson whined out, "What?" just as Bogo entered the room.

"Good morning Officer Pawson, thank you for joining us."

Judy rolled her eyes as Bogo started the brief.

…..

"Here you go, sir," said the waitress as she set two plates down on the table, one in front of the equid and the other in front of the empty bench across from him. "Is there anything else I can get for you or your friend?"

Sliding his glass of water over toward the panther, he replied, "May I please have a bottle of water, a glass bottle, unopened, if you don't mind."

Nodding, the waitress picked up the still full glass of water and then mumbled that she'd be right back as she left.

About to start in on his breakfast, the Mule paused when he heard his partner slide onto the empty bench. Cutting into his apple stuffed oat pancakes, he hesitated again when he heard grunting and the clink of a fork hitting his partner's large teeth as she attacked her waffles.

"Do you mind?"

Looking at her fork, the mare replied, "Sorry."

Lifting his fork to his mouth, the Mule was about to enjoy his first bite when his partner said, "They changed her schedule for today."

Lowering his fork, "And?"

"Her shift ends at 1:00 this afternoon, instead of 5:00. She's working morning crowd control for the Torch Relay."

Finally, taking his bite, the Mule savored the taste and said, "Very nice, with the relay going on, the ZPD will be distracted, less able to respond to a screaming doe if someone were to hear her once I begin."

"Same plan then, we wait in the spot we were told about, follow her home, and then take care of her wherever she's staying?"

Turning to the waitress that had just come from the kitchen with his bottled water, the Mule smiled and took the bottle from the panther, opened it, and drank deeply, "Ahh, clean, pure water." Setting the bottle down, he continued, "Yes, the same plan, and after today, the illustrious Officer Hopps will be nothing but a memory."

…..

Judy and Connor were all smiles as they walked in from the garage and stopped at Clawhauser's desk.

"You wouldn't have believed it, Davis Buckham was like 'that close' to me," said Judy as she extended out her small arms and wiggled her fingers like she was touching something.

Pawson raised an eyebrow and cleared his throat. "Hopps…"

Hearing Connor, Judy huffed, "Fine, maybe not quite that close, but really close." Pulling out her phone, Judy touched the screen and showed it to Clawhauser, "Look, I got a picture of Sylvester Stallion passing the flame to Buckham. It was so cool, wait till I show Nick this picture, Sylvester Stallion is one of his most favorite movie stars."

"Enough of all that Judy, was she there? Did you get me a picture of Gazelle?"

"Yup, take a look."

Clawhauser clapped his paws and cooed as Judy flipped through a dozen pictures of Gazelle, most of them of her and Buckham holding hooves. When she was done, Judy highlighted the images, sent them to Clawhauser, and then, just because she knew it would drive him nuts, she sent a copy to Nick too.

Clawhauser scrolled through the pictures again and smiled, "I can't wait to post these, it'll be the scoop of the month!"

Pawson, deciding he'd heard enough Gazelle talk for one day, interrupted the two giggling mammals saying, "Hopps, come on, let's go, I think I'm owed a burrito for having to get up so early this morning, and since I'm extra hungry…"

Judy smirked and showed Pawson a picture on her phone, one of Pawson looking like a teenage fangirl as he watched Clint Eastwolf pose for photos with Sylvester Stallion.

Seeing that his inner fangirl was about to be outed, Pawson groaned, "Fine, send me a copy of that and make sure no one else sees it, and the burritos are on me."

As Judy and Connor headed back outside to peruse the food carts, Clawhauser looked up long enough from his new pictures to call after the pair, "Hey Judy, Gunny Hartbull wants you downstairs on the target range in half an hour. He said he can't find your pistol certification in the system and needs you to test today, so you're up to date."

Judy turned and replied, "Okay, tell him I'll be there." And then looking at Pawson she said, "Ugh, I just recertified with Sergeant Deerland a few months ago, I remember because I must have gone through a couple of hundred rounds before he'd sign off on my paperwork. I wonder what happened to my scores."

Pawson shrugged, "Maybe Deerland was as disorganized of a Range Officer as he was a Quartermaster and never put your scores in the system."

Judy nodded slowly as she wondered if she needed to talk with Bogo and make sure her records were correct in the ZPD's system.

…..

Parking the car, the mini-horse shut off the engine and turned to her much larger companion and asked, "Have you got your phone? If I have to follow her onto the Metro, I want to be able to call you when I find out where she's living."

"Minnie, you can stop treating me like a foal anytime now."

"I hate it when you call me that."

"It's what your parents named you, isn't it?"

"Yeah, and they thought it was really funny too, up until they suddenly died of lead poisoning. So, have you got your phone?"

"Yes."

"What about your vest?" and then gesturing toward some papers on the dashboard, said, "I can't tell from her records if she's carrying anything besides a standard ZPD tranq, so I want you geared up for the hit."

Chuckling, the Mule replied, "Yes, mother, I'm wearing everything you gave me for Christmas." And then more seriously, "Stop worrying, what I've got on will stop a round from most of the real weapons the ZPD issues medium to large-sized mammals, which means it'll be more than fine against anything a small rabbit can carry, tranq or otherwise."

"Do you have your backup piece?"

"I've got my carving glove, and the client wants it to look like a pred did it, so I don't need it."

"She's a cop, take it just in case, or I'm calling it for the day."

"You worry too much." Rummaging around under his seat, the Mule pulled out a pistol, slipped it into the back of his pants, and then turning to his partner, asked, "Happy?"

"Yes," replied Minnie checking her watch, "We're good here for maybe thirty minutes before I have to move, so," leaning back in her seat she nodded to her partner, "now we wait."

…..

Clawhauser looked away from Pawson and clapped his paws together when he saw Judy top the stairs. Judy was still geared up in her full uniform and looked like she'd been put through the paces on the range.

"There she is, how did your recert go, Judy?"

Judy plodded over to the reception desk, where Pawson was in his street clothes, looking like he was ready to head home and enjoy being done with their early shift.

Stopping next to the desk, Judy replied, "I guess it went fine, it just took forever." Looking up at the lobby clock, Judy groaned, "Great, Gunny Hartbull made me miss my train and the market I need to get to closes in half an hour." Sighing, Judy added, "Today's the day that they get fresh celeriac in from Burrow's Edge."

Pawson glanced up at the clock and replied, "What market closes this early on a weekday."

Judy shrugged, "It's a market over by Prairie Street and Forest Parkway. It's owned by a guy from Burrow's Edge, and he plays cribbage on Mondays, so the store closes early."

"The whole store plays cribbage?"

Judy huffed, "Of course not, that's silly. His partner plays pinochle."

Pawson nodded slowly and decided against asking any more questions about small-town mammals and instead asked, "Is that the place with the dancing vegetables on the sign?"

"Yeah, it's called the Root Cellar."

"I know that place, I've been by it a couple of times. There's a specialty predator market about ten minutes further up Forest Parkway from there that Olivia likes. I'm actually headed there now to pick up some groceries Olivia has on order. We're eating at my in-laws tonight, and she and her mom are cooking." Nodding at the clock, Pawson added, "If you hurry, I can give you a ride and drop you off before the place closes."

"Really, thanks! I need to get my cleaning kit, I'll be back in a minute."

"I'll meet you out front."

Judy ran into the female's locker room and skidded to a stop in front of her locker. Opening her locker, she grabbed her bag and quickly stuffed her street clothes into it, did a quick check to make sure her tranq was still secure in the locker's lockbox, and then dug around for her gun cleaning kit. Just as she found the kit in the back of her makeshift locker, her phone squirmed out of her pocket and bounced on the ground. Stuffing the kit in her bag, she picked up her phone, dropped it in the bag, and ran out of the locker room.

Waving as she passed Clawhauser, she yelled, "Bye Ben," and bolted through the lobby doors before Clawhauser could do anything but laugh at the speedy bunny.

Judy stopped on the stairs in front of the building, surveyed the parking lot, and saw her target. Rushing over to Connor's car, she practically dove into his Zoobaru, stuffed her bag under the seat, belted herself in, and smiled at her partner who'd barely had time to put his key in the ignition.

Frozen in place, Connor looked at Judy and raised an eyebrow, "You could have changed if you'd wanted to."

Judy shrugged, "You said hurry, so I hurried."

"Uh-huh."

…..

"There she is, at the top of the stairs," said the Mule.

Focusing on the rabbit, the mare replied, "Good, it's about time, she was supposed to have been out twenty minutes ago."

"Whose car did she just get into?"

Having almost missed tracking the gray blur as it streaked across the parking lot and jumped into a car, Minnie focused on the blue Zoobaru and said, "I don't know, a wolf's driving it. He must be giving her a ride home. If we're lucky, you can ice her once he drops her off."

"Very good."

…..

"Hey Connor, how did it go when Gunny Hartbull recertified you?"

"Fine, I guess, I certified. He ran me through more scenarios than Deerland did last year, but nothing I hadn't seen in the Academy. Why?"

"After I did all the standard scenarios, he had me go through some low-light ones. They did a little of that at the ZPA, but there, once I met the basic standard, the testing stopped. This time, Gunny Hartbull kept making it dimmer and dimmer. It's like he'd never seen a rabbit that could shoot before and was trying to stress test me by playing with the lights."

Connor raised an eyebrow, "Rabbit cops aren't exactly mainstream if you know what I mean."

Judy huffed, "I suppose, but is that what you had to do when you requalified?"

Connor shook his head, "No, the last time that happened to me, I was in the Academy. Do you think you did alright? He's not going to make you go back for a retest, is he?"

"No, it was no problem. I've always been able to see better at night than anyone else in my family." Chuckling a little, Judy added, "Which was the reason why I was able to catch my siblings trying to sneak out of the house late at night when they wanted to meet up with their girlfriends or boyfriends during high school."

Pawson laughed, "I'm sure glad I didn't have you as a sister growing up. What's the point of high school without a little sneaking around?"

Judy raised an eyebrow, "Studying?"

"Sure, Officer Buzzkill, whatever you say."

Rolling her eyes, Judy waved toward a colorfully painted sign with vegetables that looked like they were dancing at a country hoedown and said, "There's the market, you can drop me off out front."

Connor squinted, trying to look through the store windows as he stopped in the parking lot. Not seeing anyone, he said, "Are you sure it's still open? You may want to check…"

"Thanks, Connor, see you tomorrow," yelled the gray bunny pulling open the market's door and waving goodbye.

Connor looked at the empty seat next to him and then over to the market's door gently closing and snorted, 'I don't know how Wilde keeps track of that bunny, he must have some sort of sixth sense when it comes to Hopps.' And then thinking about it some more as he pulled out of the parking lot, he started to laugh, 'Sixth sense or maybe it's the fact that he's ears over tail in love with her.'

…..

Minnie slowed the car down and said, "They're stopping at that market over there, do you want me to pull over so we can follow her when she comes out?"

"No," said the Mule, watching a car go by, "there's too much traffic to kill her in the open around here, and not enough foot traffic to follow her without her spotting us. We need to find a quieter spot."

"How about behind that construction site over there?"

"Good enough, drop me off and then set up behind one of those buildings. If you find a good spot, text me, and then lure her in."

"Got it, I'll play injured. What if she calls in the cavalry?"

"I'll wait until she's on her way, if she calls for help, I'll call you, and we'll try again later."

…..

Judy waved to the old prairie dog behind the counter, grabbed a small shopping basket, and ran to the back of the store where the celeriac was. Growing up, celeriac was one of the few vegetables that none of the farms in Bunnyburrow grew due to the extra amount of care it took to grow. When she was away at school in Burrow's Edge, she found that farms there grew the root plant, and she'd acquired a taste for it. She'd been thrilled to find this store when she'd been apartment hunting, not that she ever told her parents, they'd probably be scandalized to hear that their daughter was stepping out on them and consorting with produce from another farm.

Thinking about scandalizing her parents, maybe she'd tell them about her taste for foreign vegetables right before telling them about her taste in males. 'Go big or go home,' Nick always said. Of course, her siblings would probably make her pay for the resulting double funeral after her parents keeled over from heart attacks.

After she'd selected enough celeriac to last her for a few days, she sorted through the fennel and parsley and added the herbs to her basket. Judy was about to check out the selection of peppers when she heard a quiet cough and looked over to see the owner tapping his watch. Grabbing two red peppers off the top of the pile, Judy grinned at the prairie dog and bounced her way up to the counter with her basket.

"Sorry, I was running late."

The prairie dog quickly rang up the purchase, bagged everything up for Judy, and was about to tell her how much it cost when–

*BANG BANG*

Judy jumped and turned to where the sound came from and grabbed for her phone to call in a code 10-19, when the prairie dog interrupted her motion by saying, "That will be fifteen dollars."

"What? Didn't you hear that?"

Seeing the concern on Judy's face, the prairie dog nodded toward the front door, "Sorry about that, there's construction going on all down the block, and they've been using nail guns over the last week. I've complained a couple of times, but…"

A series of four more shots rang out, causing Judy to jump again. "Those can't be nail guns, they're too loud."

"Relax there, Missy, they're using concrete loads. Said they'd be done with them this weekend, damn inconsiderate animals. Sorry."

Judy relaxed and turned to pay when she suddenly realized something was wrong. Sticking her paw in her pocket where her phone was supposed to be, she groaned, "Oh no, I forgot my phone, I left it in Connor's car."

Pulling the grocery sack back toward him, the prairie dog pointed at a sign by the cash register and said, "You know we aren't set up to use those fancy gadgets to pay bills with, cash and credit cards are all we can do."

Judy pulled out her wallet, "No, I have the cash." Putting the money on the counter, she waited until it was collected and then asked, "Do you have a phone I can use? I need to call my partner and tell him I left my bag with my phone in it, in his car."

Reaching under the counter, the old mammal picked up an antique rotary phone and placed the heavy unit in front of Judy, saying, "Can't forget this, it's big, and has this fancy coiled wire that makes it so youngsters like you, can't lose the handset."

Judy rolled her eyes and carefully put her finger in the rotary dial, spun it one digit at a time, and called Connor to tell him what she'd done.

…..

Judy walked out of the store and set her bag down next to the entrance to wait for Connor. She felt like such a dumb bunny for forgetting her bag in his car. Hopefully, coming back won't make him too late meeting up with Olivia and her parents.

"Heeelp."

Judy's ears shot up, and she stepped into the store's parking area and listened as her ears rotated around.

As Judy concentrated, she heard hoofsteps behind her, and a voice ask, "Is everything alright, Officer?"

Judy put up her paw and hissed out, "Shhh, I heard something."

"Help, I've fallen, and I can't get up."

Judy looked over to where the construction site was on the other side of the fence and grabbed for her phone, and then berated herself again, "Dumb bunny, you don't have your phone." Turning to the voice that had interrupted her, she said to the medium-sized equid standing there, "Call the ZPD now and tell them to send EMTs to this location and that officer Judy Hopps is on the scene with an injured mammal. And then I need you to wait here for my partner, a large wolf, who should be here in about ten minutes, tell him I'm over at that construction site."

"Yes, Officer, I'll call for help and wait right here," the equid said as he pulled out his phone and started tapping on the keys.

Judy ran across the parking lot and past a chain-link fence into the construction site.

"Heeelp me plea –"

The equid spoke into the phone, "She's headed your way, alone. The only help coming is her partner, and he's ten minutes away."

"Gotcha."

The Mule slid his phone into his back pocket, pulled out his 'work' glove from the bag he was carrying, and followed the rabbit at a more relaxed pace, 'No need to rush things, savor the moment, she may not be the one, but she is unique, and killing her may prove to be mildly entertaining.'

…..

Judy jogged up the sidewalk, past the first of a series of buildings under construction, and finding a gravel service road that wound its way between two of the more completed buildings, she headed toward the backside of the construction area. Coming to where the service road dumped into an alley that ran between the construction area and some existing buildings, Judy stopped and called out, "Officer Hopps, ZPD, where are you?"

Judy heard the rustling of some material and then the voice, "Over here, help please."

Running down the alley, Judy stopped when she saw a mini-horse mare in shorts, sitting on the edge of some waste construction material that looked like it had spilled over the sides of an overfilled roll-off dumpster.

Skidding to a stop next to the mare, Judy asked, "What's wrong?"

Almost wailing, the mare pointed at the dumpster and replied, "I was looking for anything I could recycle, and I fell and hurt my leg, please help me. I think it might be broken."

Judy shook her head and said, "You know it's illegal to take construction materials from sites like this. It's the same as shoplifting from a store."

Crying now, the mare said, "I know, I'm sorry, I was hungry, I won't do it again, I promise."

"Alright, we'll talk about it after we get you fixed up. I had someone call for help, and my partner should be here any minute, so let me check your leg and see how bad it is."

"Thank you, Officer, I don't know what I would have done if you hadn't shown up."

Judy chuckled, "It's okay, that's what we do at the ZPD."

Since the mini-horse was sitting, Judy was able to see her whole leg without having to find a stool or box to stand on. The girl was holding her leg and rocking back and forth a little like she was in pain, but Judy couldn't see that the leg bent at a funny angle or that it was bruised anywhere.

"Where does it hurt?"

The girl moaned a little and said, "Right here, where I'm holding it, use your paws, and you'll be able to feel where the break is."

Judy gently placed her paw on the girl's leg and said, "Okay, tell me if this hurts," and then started feeling around for any broken bones. Not feeling anything, Judy moved her paw a little and then stopped when she heard the mare suddenly gasp. Worried that she'd somehow hurt the girl, Judy looked up and saw the mare looking past her as she smiled ever so slightly and nodded.

"What?"

The mare rolled away from the rabbit's touch just as Judy heard hoofsteps come up behind her. Judy's ears rotated toward the new noise, and the rest of her followed just in time to hear a laugh that was a cross between a hee-haw and a horse's whinny and see the flash of sunlight off of the impossibly sharp metal tines that raked across her chest and flung her toward the side of the dumpster.

…..

Pawson put his phone down in the center console of his car and looked at Judy's bag that was now sitting on the seat next to him. Chuckling to himself, he started the car, pulled into the street, and flipped a U-ey.

Hopps was lucky that he'd had to pull over barely halfway to the market. Olivia had called him in tears to tell him that everything she'd picked out for dinner was totally wrong, and she needed him to take everything back and pick up something different. He'd ended up spending most of the last few minutes parked, trying to calm his mate down.

Of course, telling Olivia that it was just dinner and he could pick up some takeout if she and her mom didn't want to cook was his first fatal mistake. Absolutely she was going to cook, how could he say she didn't want to cook, she loved to cook. Which led to the wolf's second fatal mistake, disagreeing with his mate and telling her that he cooked more than she did, and he'd be happy to prepare tonight's meal for her parents.

'Is it even possible for one girl to cry that much?'

Pawson shook his head, something was up with Olivia, and hell if he knew what it was. Although, on the upside to whatever was going on, he'd just been banished from the kitchen as part of Olivia's vow to cook every meal from now until the end of eternity.

Figuring he'd better deal with Hopps, and then get to his in-laws' place before Olivia changed her mind on the food again, Pawson made pretty good time back to the market and was turning into its parking lot not too long after Hopps had called him.

Turning off the car's engine, Pawson got out and looked around at the empty lot, 'Hopps wasn't kidding about how important cribbage was to these guys.'

Spying a grocery bag sitting on the sidewalk near the store's door, Pawson jogged over and checked it out. Looking in the bag, he saw some fennel and some celeriac and remembered Hopps talking about what she was going to buy. 'This must be her bag, but where is she?'

Pawson pulled on the door to the store and, seeing that it was locked, walked toward the corner of the building opposite the construction site, figuring he'd look for a side door. Coming to a locked gate instead, he headed back toward his car. A little worried now, Pawson was about to yell for Judy when he heard a shout.

"Freeze, ZPD!"

Pawson's ears twitched toward the construction site.

*BANG BANG*

*BANG*

Pawson ran.

He'd only made it across the parking lot to the construction fence when his entire body was stunned by the sound of a horrible scream. A scream that chilled his soul and pulled at long-forgotten hunting instincts. He knew without knowing how, that he was hearing not just the cry of a mammal that knows it's about to die, but one of warning to other prey, 'DANGER!', a rabbit's death scream.

Still holding onto the fence post, Connor looked on in horror, "No," and then hearing the crashing sound of debris, he took off running again.

He ran up the sidewalk and hit a service road at a dead run, slipping on the loose gravel. Hitting the ground, Pawson rolled twice and popped back up, screaming at the top of his lungs,

"HOPPS!"

Pawson bolted up the service road as fast as he could. About halfway to the alley, he heard a car door slam and the sound of tires spinning out on the concrete. Putting everything he had into it, he made it to the alley and turned… just as the car he'd heard turned up another alley, out of sight, behind a cloud of black smoke from burnt rubber and exhaust.

"Hopps!"

Pawson continued down the alley and only stopped when he saw shredded pieces of blue neoprene all over the ground near a dumpster. Turning in confusion at seeing what had to be pieces of his partner's uniform, he did another full circuit looking for Judy and then froze when he saw chunks of her Kevlar vest on the ground too.

Dropping to his knees, Pawson scooped up a piece of the ruined chest protector and running a claw along the cut edge, he saw that it was surgically sliced with something sharper than anything he'd ever seen or heard of.

"Hopps."

Dropping the chunk of Kevlar, Pawson, in a near panic now, went on all fours, and nosing around the dumpster, he saw something that made his blood run cold, a rabbit's foot sticking out from under a pile of construction debris.

"Oh my god, Judy."