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Be not afeard; the isle is full of noises, Sounds and sweet airs, that give delight and hurt not. Sometimes a thousand twangling instruments Will hum about mine ears, and sometime voices That, if I then had waked after long sleep, Will make me sleep again: and then, in dreaming, The clouds methought would open and show riches Ready to drop upon me that, when I waked, I cried to dream again.

--"Caliban," The Tempest, William Shakespeare

It was the smell of fresh flowers that stirred him. His nose twitched as while he was dreaming his mind recognised that something was different. There was a cool breeze that ruffled the fur on his shoulders that carried with it the scent of earth and sweet grass. The morning twilight and the sound of chirping birds reached his ears; and in the half-sleep that cradled him, he smiled and reached out for Judy . . . and fell out of the chair he'd been sitting in. Nick rolled onto his back and opened his eyes as he was jarred awake to find himself staring not at the ceiling of his apartment but at the wide open sky. The stars were fading as the early light became steadily brighter. Fully awake now, Nick sat bolt upright, startled and momentarily disoriented. _'What? Where am I?' _he wondered, bewildered, as he took in his surroundings and looked around to see if he could figure out where he was.

He noticed on his right the stone bridge he used to sleep under when he was homeless. 'What the . . . ?' His thought broke off as he got up and noticed that the chair he'd fallen out of was the green and white chequered one he used to laze in when not running schemes. He was wearing his khaki pants, thank God, since he was out in the open but was bemused as he distinctly remembered having fallen asleep pantsless and tied with his mate. He left the chair where it was as he walked past it, coming closer to the stone bridge. He pinned his ears back as he approached.

"Carrots?" he called out tentatively. "Hey, ya' got me: Joke's over!" he said loudly, certain that this had to be some devious prank she was pulling. She had said only last night, after all, that she was going to get him back for scaring her. There was no answer, however, and the eerie stillness was making his fur stand on end. "Hey, where are you?" he asked again, his voice echoing through the arch. He turned around slowly while continuing forward underneath the bridge. He noticed, much to his discomfort, that his side was sore. He rubbed his shoulder to work some of the ache out of it. 'Well, where the hell is she?' he wondered. This had to be some kind of elaborate prank. "Carrots?" he called out again; "Judy?" he shouted, sharply now. He scowled and flattened his ears when there was still no answer. He saw that his green palm-leaf pattern shirt was on the ground in a crumpled ball as he used to leave before going to bed. The way he'd used to before he'd met Judy. He really had come a long way since those days, he thought to himself. He used drawers and everything, now! He picked up his shirt, shook it out, and looked at it: The buttons were all undone, his tie was loosened around the collar; it looked exactly as he remembered it.

"Judy!" he shouted again, loudly as he turned his head this way and that. But he was alone and there was a part of him that sensed that.

He knew he was in a park-like area of Savannah Central which wasn't very busy at this time of morning and this far away from the more heavily populated areas of the city. Nick looked around carefully as he came out from under the bridge: No tire tracks, no footprints--especially not Judy's--save for his own. 'Why am I here?' he wondered. He was utterly baffled by the situation: outdoors, shirtless, and under his bridge. And here he'd been hoping for some early we-don't-have-to-go-to-work-today cuddle time with Judy. This had to be a joke of some kind but it wasn't funny to him. 'This is actually really annoying.' He sighed and made to look around again but was startled when he heard a scream behind him. He turned and saw a young beaver looking right at him. Upon seeing her, Nick yelled out in surprise, recoiling, and quickly covered his torso with his shirt as best he could. "Turn away! Don't look!" he shouted. But she wouldn't stop screaming.

'Okay, but seriously, she won't stop screaming.'

She paused to take a breath.

"Are you-"

She resumed screaming again till she ran out of air, paused to take another breath . . .

"-done?"

. . . and started screaming again.

Now, he was beginning to think that there was something seriously wrong with her. He momentarily considered walking toward her to figure out what the matter was but dismissed the idea almost immediately when he realised how it would look to have a shirtless fox advancing on a young . . . -ish . . . beaver. He also realised that the cause of her concern might have been the fact that she came upon an unexpected scene in the early morning. He ducked under the bridge and put on his shirt. As he finished buttoning the shirt, he heard two voices coming closer and he looked out to see two other animals coming to the young woman's aid from over the bank of the wash.

"What's all your shouting about, Mable?" came a decidedly masculine voice. The beaver who'd been screaming, Mable, merely pointed straight at Nick. When the older male, presumably the girl's father, laid his eyes on Nick he gasped and let out a scream.

"Oh my God! Get back, Mable!" he shouted. The terrified male picked up a relatively long branch from the bank of the wash and started advancing on Nick and swinging it menacingly. "Get back, you savage! Get back!" Nick flattened his ears, completely taken aback at the man's reaction. He came out from beneath the bridge and began walking backwards away from the wildly swinging creature.

"Sir, I'm gonna need you to just calm down!" said Nick, going for an authoritative tone.

"Harold, get away from it! Cheese and Crackers, that thing could rip you to shreds!" called another hysterical voice. Nick saw the young woman he'd originally seen sobbing into the chest of an older female whom he took to be the younger one's mother. In his distraction, Nick caught a swipe of the branch across his face drawing a cry from Nick.

"Ouch!" he yelled, and he reflexively caught the branch when the male made to swipe at him again. He angrily wrenched the branch out of the beaver's paw. "I'll have you know that you just assaulted a police officer with the ZPD!" he shouted. He ran his paw across the left side of his muzzle and looked down at his palm to see that it had come away with blood, the branch's hard stems having cut him. He advanced on the animal who backed away fearfully.

"Daddy!" shrieked the girl as the father tripped over a rock as he backed away from the fox.

"Sir," began Nick, "I'm gonna need you to turn around and put your paws behind your back." He spoke as flatly and as calmly as he could given the situation--almost sounding bored. His anger, however, was screaming at him to fight the beaver. "You're under arrest for assaulting an officer," he finished. Nick looked around for something with which to restrain the male. When he found nothing, he remembered the tie around his neck. As he loosened it, he continued, "Just . . . pretend like you're handcuffed right now."

"You're the one who's gonna be under arrest, chomper!" shouted the mother, her face a mask a general hate and rage such as Nick had rarely seen directed at him.

"When I saw it before it was naked!" exclaimed the daughter.

"You liar!" shouted Nick, embarrassed and disgusted at the insinuation. But no one paid his outburst any mind.

"You savage!" cried the mother as she became hysterical, "What were you going to do to my daughter?!" she shouted.

During the exchange, the father had risen to his feet. He spat and regarded Nick angrily. "You filthy fox! What the hell were you doing to our daughter?!" his spoke, his voice growing louder as his anger grew.

"Did you not hear what I said? She's lying!" said Nick, raising his voice as he assumed his authority, "And!" he continued, "I said turn around and put your paws behind your back. I'm an officer with the ZPD. And for the record, nothing happened with your daughter. I was not naked when she saw me!" He finished untying his tie as he said this.

"Daddy! It's lying!" shouted the daughter as her tears poured ever more profusely down her innocent-looking face. As Nick came closer to the male beaver in an attempt to placate him, she screamed and shrieked, "Daddy, look out!"

"I know, honey, I know. It's not wearing its collar it's just gone a little crazy. Try not to make any loud noises, though. Just let daddy handle this," replied the male softly though fearfully as Nick approached.

"I'm not lying," stated Nick. He was positively furious!

"Call the police!" shouted the beaver as he became alarmed at Nick's repeated outbursts; and Nick watched as the girl ran off.

"Sir!" shouted Nick as he finally lost his temper, "Put your paws behind your back, now!"

The beaver turned back to Nick, fear showing in his eyes but made no move to comply. Nick had had it.

"Alright, sir," began Nick as he came toward the beaver, "I'm just gonna nee-"

Nick was suddenly cut off when a relatively heavy rock struck him on the side of the head. He cried out as it bounced off his head. Nick fell forward onto the ground in a daze at which moment the male beaver fell on him punching his head and kicking his ribs and stomach. Nick coughed, his limbs buckling under the onslaught of blows; he rolled to his side and groaned as the male beaver stood over him. "Look at it," said the male beaver to his wife, contempt evident in his voice, "there's no reason to fear 'em." The beaver looked down at Nick disdainfully and spat in his face. The beaver turned and went up the side of the bank to rejoin his wife.

"Harold!" she cried when he reached her, "that was a very stupid thing! It could have killed you!"

'Are they fucking serious?' thought Nick as he spat out blood, his head still ringing from having had a heavy rock launched at his head.

"Now, now, don't fret," said the male as he patted his wife, calming her. "Besides, someone had to teach that thing a lesson." He smiled down at his wife.

"You're so brave," she whispered as she leant into him.

If Nick had rolled his eyes any harder he was certain they'd've ended up in orbit. He simply lay there and listened to their conversation, just taking it in. He had no idea whether the daughter had called the police but he wouldn't bet on it since it was so obviously an assault on his person. He needed to call the ZPD himself.

'While I'm at it, how 'bout a paramedic and getting the hell away from these animals, too?'

Enough was enough. He was going to find Judy and figure out why the hell she'd decided to prank him--likely with Finnick's help: there's no way "kind and sweet Judy" would think to do something so devious as to leave him in the middle of some deserted place. Well, maybe she would think about it.

'Maybe. Very maybe. In fact, yes.'

He knew, of course, that the prank had merely been to drive him someplace remote and have him find his way back; the prank did not include being beaten by a herd of angry beavers.

He figured that it had to be a prank. First, he reasoned, he'd been with Judy the night before--tied to her, in fact--and that would have lasted a good deal of the night. Therefore he could only have been taken to this place relatively recently; perhaps about an hour to an hour and a half or so ago or the chill would have woken him. Judy was not a mean-spirited mammal, which meant anything she did was done out of the goodness of her heart or out of playfulness. He'd been pranked in similar fashions before so he imagined that this was simply a play on that. Where he started to think that the prank was out of character for her was when she hadn't even stuck around to bring him back. That aspect might have been more Finnick's style. But that made no sense: she would have had to have called Finnick early in the morning in order to set him up unless they had this whole prank planned before hand. But that made no sense either because their becoming mates last night was totally unplanned and would have derailed plans for a prank such as this quite a bit. While it made no sense, though, it had to be the truth. What other reasonable explanation was there?

He turned these things over for a short while before noticing that the beavers were out of sight. After recouping enough energy to get his wind and senses back, he braced himself and got to his feet with a groan; managing to stumble along, up the wash bank opposite his attackers. Once he got to level ground he turned back and could see the family: they seemed to be involved in some kind of group huddle, chatting and comforting each other. He turned away in disgust and started shuffling his way down the road which led toward the downtown area whose buildings he could see in the distance. He searched himself for his phone but found he didn't have it, and there was no way he was going back to the bridge to see if he'd dropped it somewhere. He'd also dropped the tie when the male had beaten him. 'Another write-off,' he thought. As near as he could tell, he had none of his personal effects on him and that was bound to cause him some trouble down the line. He stuck to the side of the road, hoping to flag down a passing driver or morning jogger to use their cell phone. He seriously needed to call the police.

As he went along he couldn't keep his mind from recapitulating the oddness of the situation: Last night he'd been with Judy in his apartment; moments ago he'd awoken at the stone bridge he used to sleep at--the only thing that made sense was that Judy had moved him here or at least done so with someone's help. He knew for a fact, however, that Judy wasn't so devious as to move him here, especially not after they'd shared their feelings the other night, which could only mean that if she'd done this it had been as a prank. But of course, she wouldn't have, and that was the point--That was the very uncomfortable point. This wasn't in keeping with her sense of humour. The idea that someone--_not Judy and, upon reflection, likely not Finnick either--would have taken the time to find his old shirt and pants, somehow steal him away from Judy and his apartment without his knowing, and sit him in the same chair he'd used when he was still hustling _and near the same bridge he used to sleep under? That made no sense. Very few people with whom he worked and hung out with really knew that much about who he'd been at that point in his life and the full details of his day-to-day. This wasn't a joke, he concluded. But then what the hell was this?

He had no idea and it was pointless to continue considering it since there was no way to come to any conclusion that added up. He sighed and thought back angrily at the memory of the beavers. He'd experienced that kind of treatment before, of course, but now it somehow felt so much worse. The male had really tried to hurt him. 'And that girl was seriously . . . seriously afraid of me.' He hated thinking about it--hated the fear he saw in the girl's eyes. It reminded him of the awful time he'd seen that same look in Judy's. His chest seized at the recollection. They'd called him a savage and had seemed genuinely terrified of him; that he was going to kill them. Why did they think that? It pained him in a way he hadn't expected, though he did his best to swallow the sensation. He'd get over it eventually, but for now, he was so angry and hurt he didn't know what to do! He just wanted to see Judy.

'Never let them see that they get to you.' He never thought he'd have to say the words to himself again. He'd been able to drop the mask in front of Judy. He'd been able to be himself, and for the past year and a half, he'd been a damn good cop. He had a larger circle of friends now. Finnick, of course, would always remain a loyal and dear friend of his; but being able to have a network of new friends with whom he could be totally honest rather than just one, and learning that he could be open with the rest of the world, had been a gigantic weight off his shoulders. Having animals who would back him up and who cared about him made all the difference. It had been a long time, or so it felt, since he'd thought it necessary to rely on his old skills. He and Judy had spoken the other night about their fears--their good days and their bad days--and this was shaping up to be a bad day. He'd feel better once he got back to her and saw his friends--the ZPD itself having become for him the pack he'd always wanted when he was younger.

Nick looked around as he walked along the roadside and took in his surroundings. He found them somehow changed--different--from how he remembered them. The area he was in was somewhat scenic, however: There were grass and trees on either side of the road which he remembered from before. What was different was what lay up ahead of him: there was a suburban development spread out before him that he would have sworn hadn't been there before. Alarms started sounding in his head but he explained away his disorientation by telling himself that he must have been mistaken, somehow. 'You know how fast these kinds of neighbourhoods can spring up . . . .'

After a few minutes of walking, he finally saw someone, a jogger, heading in his direction as he listened to music strapped to an armband as he came up the opposite side of the road. Nick was grateful and felt a sense of relief when the jogger came within shouting distance. "Hey!" Nick called out. The jogger--who appeared to have not noticed him until that moment--turned his head and saw Nick standing across the road. After a split second the jogger, a guinea pig, widen his eyes in shock. He immediately turned in the opposite direction and ran.

"Hey, wait!" shouted Nick, "Can I use your phone!" he finished quietly as the jogger got further and further away. He sighed, disappointed and annoyed at the way he was being treated. Nick watched as the animal ran on till he was out of sight, disappearing into the suburbs whence he'd come. Savannah Central had never been this way, thought Nick. 'I guess that's what you get when hicks start moving here.' But that thought gave him pause--rarely had he ever seen such open discrimination. Condescension? Sure. Even outright dislike and name calling; but never out-and-out violence! Silver tongue and guile were two things he had on his side, but they were decidedly unhelpful if someone weren't willing to give him the benefit of the doubt.

In his observations of animals, he had noticed and exploited in his con-artist days the presumption of innocence. No matter where he went or whom he'd conned, it had to be someone who didn't know him well enough to guess that he was trying to pull the wool over their eyes--and it had to be someone who didn't know him. Or know him well. This presumption of innocence--or presumption of truth--carried over even into situations where people contradicted each other: It was easy enough for people to accuse the other of "not being entirely truthful," but he noticed they shied away from calling each other "liars." That's in part the reason why the question, "Are you calling me a liar?" was often disarming.

There was only one other instance when he found that animals didn't automatically presume that he was truthful and that was when they'd assumed because of his species that he was nothing but a shifty fox. And while he had been, the fact that he was shifty had nothing to do with being a fox. For starters, people on the margins of society often needed to develop tricksterish behaviours in order to survive. The cynicism which he'd never quite escaped after meeting Judy served him well as a cop and gave him an insight into animal nature that might have been missing from his partner's vision. While she had the idealism and the hope to build a dream, he had enough of a realistic grasp on most situations that he was able to judge a suspect's credibility rather swiftly. Of course, it helped that he'd lived that life himself and knew, therefore, what lies thieves and hucksters would tell to get out of trouble.

So now it seemed as though he had found himself in an area of Zootopia where the opposite of his most recent experiences was true. It seemed to him that not only had there been a presumption that he was merely untrustworthy but that he had something murderous (in the case of the beaver family) or violent (as seemed to have been the case with the jogger who'd just run from him) in mind. The beaver family had lashed out at him in what he felt certain was, from their perspective, self-defence--they had felt, he reasoned, that they needed to defend themselves against him. To the point where they'd nearly killed him. Had the rock been heavier or hit his temple--or both--it very well could have! Perhaps he was kidding himself--Zootopia had always been this awful and he was only now just noticing it after having this awfulness piled on him all at once. He'd known things were bad, he mused, just not this bad. Still, there was something that didn't quite sit right with him.

He'd been walking slowly down the road for a total of about twenty minutes, pausing every now and then to soothe his aching head, and finally reached the suburban dwellings that seemed to have been designed for smaller creatures. As he entered and proceeded to walk through it, he got the uneasy feeling that he didn't belong. He walked around the area for some time, encountering the odd prey animal who would either freeze, scream, or run away, or some combination thereof, when they saw him pass by. The queasy feeling in his stomach continued to grow as the sense of unfamiliarity and the feeling that he was out of his element snowballed. It was really unnerving him, but he kept his cool for the most part. He'd've been lying if he said that the reactions he was receiving weren't getting to him. The overt displays of prejudice were disturbing him--for as often as he'd been discriminated against, it had always been more in a more subversive way; a sort of stealth speciesism. It was uncanny, and as he walked down the street and saw signs dictating when chompers had to be out of the area he knew that something was very, very wrong.

'Chompers . . . ? When did it become okay to call us that?' He'd never even heard the term before to say nothing of the legality of a curfew for predators. He assumed that that's what the term "chompers" referred to but got a sense from the way that animals were using it that it was meant as a derogatory term. He read signs dictating whether predators could hang out in large groups, whether they were allowed to show their teeth, whether they could growl.

'As if you could control whether something makes you angry. Why not pass laws that say you can't smile?' This was ridiculous. You couldn't pass laws like this! Not in any Zootopia he knew of. As he walked along Nick jumped when he heard something shatter behind him.

"Chomper! Savage! Tameless freak!" came a voice behind him. Nick turned in surprise to see a gang of four pikas advancing on him and more on the way. "Get back to Happy Town!"

A different member of the gang threw another bottle at him, shattering it inches from his feet. Nick cocked his head and smirked, hoping that affecting his sly and confident mask would intimidate them. "I hope you know I can have you arrested for threatening an officer. So why don't you jus-"

"Oooh, boys! Looks like we got a growler here!" said another one of the gang. They all started laughing amongst themselves

A police siren sounded behind Nick, surprising him. He turned as a feminine voice called out, "Is there a problem here?" He saw that the voice had come from a patrol car that was just pulling up. The officer, a pig, had her head out the window of the vehicle and was looking at them expectantly. When she saw Nick, her eyes widened and she quickly parked her car on the side of the road opposite Nick. The officer got out of the car and came toward them. The instant she got a good look at Nick she sucked in her breath, looking fearful, before reaching for what Nick could see was fox repellent on her belt. "Sir, you're under arrest! Please place your paws behind your back!"

Nick actually laughed but stopped when no one else joined him. "Oh, come on, there's no way I'm under arrest!" shouted Nick, suddenly turning serious. From the moment he'd awoken, it seemed, he'd been running into obstacle after obstacle and he was fed up to the teeth with it! He noticed that there were two tranq guns on the officer's belt, one on each side, and saw the officer shakily moved her paw from the fox repellent to the tranq on her left side and withdrew it. Nick had never seen a tranq gun like that: From what he could see, it seemed to have a barrel about four inches long.

'Small darts,' he thought to himself. 'Gotta be something potent.'

The shape of the gun reminded him of the gun that had fired the night howler serum but was slightly smaller. "There's no need to tranq me," said Nick coolly. He put his paws up to demonstrate that he wasn't a threat. "I am an officer too."

"No way you're an officer!" she laughed. "If you were you'd know this ain't a tranq. Which precinct you from? Happy Town?"

"Happy Town?"

"You aren't from there?"

"No, I'm from here! This is Zootopia, right? What's Happy Town?" He was totally confused now. His brow furrowed and looked at the officer as though she were crazy.

"Happy Town's where you belong. Unless you work in the city, you can't be here--that's offence number one! This isn't your territory and you're breaking the law and you got your collar off. Not sure how you did that without knocking yourself out but it doesn't matter. I'm going to ask you one more time, sir, to put your paws behind your back. No one needs to get hurt."

_'Get hurt?!' _his mind shouted.

"Okay, I'm not from Happy Town. I'm from here! And I really am a cop! I work in the city!" said Nick, now starting to get angry but was trying very hard to keep his voice calm.

"Oh yeah? Let's see your ID."

Nick's ears flattened. "I don't have one . . . ."

"Passport? Badge?"

"Passport?" repeated Nick. He felt as though the walls were closing in on him, feeling more and more cornered with each passing moment.

"Yeah, your passport? Heh, don't tell me you don't have a passport."

Nick just stared at her blankly. "I . . . no, I don't have a passport." He had never needed one. A terrible sinking feeling was starting to form in the pit of his stomach. One thing he always needed in order to gain someone's confidence or to talk his way out of danger was at least some handle on the situation--some kind of control. That was one thing he was starting to realise he didn't have in the slightest, and that thought was starting to alarm him more and more. He felt as though he were losing his handle on reality and he had no idea what to do about it: every action he'd taken so far seemed to be getting him into more and more trouble; and the more he spoke the more he got the sense that things were no longer as they seemed and he didn't know why. His mind vacillated between two impossible scenarios: One, he'd gone crazy and nothing was as it seemed; or two, he wasn't crazy and the experiences he was having were actually happening to him--but if that were true, nothing else that had happened in his life up to this point made any sense! He needed to get to the ZPD quickly--they would recognise him He was sure of it! Everything would be explained to him and he wouldn't have to worry.

As he thought these things the officer smiled what could only be described as an evil grin. "So I've not only got you on not wearing your collar, which is a felony offence, but I've also got you on not having a passport?" Her expression darkened. "Either way, I've got you dead to rights."

"Wait, what?!" exclaimed Nick, "This is crazy!"

"He was going to attack us!" shouted one of the pikas behind Nick. "We were just going home and he attacked us! So we threw bottles at him to defend ourselves!"

"That's not the way it happened!" shouted Nick as both the pikas and the officer began to advance on him. Nick mentally swore. It was one of the supreme ironies of his life that for the majority of his existence he could gain the confidence of animals and be believed when he was really lying and was thought to be lying when he told the truth. He felt as if he were back in those days again when he had to scramble. He turned his gaze to the officer whose face appeared menacing. "Hey, what they're saying's not true!" he said to her earnestly; "I was just walking through this part of town-" he looked around as he spoke and realised how foreign this place and situation were to him, "-and these guys started throwing bottles at me."

He felt a rising tide of fear well up within him. He didn't recognise any of_ this!_ He felt as though he had suddenly fallen from the world he recognised to a world that operated differently. He had been willing to go along with what he was seeing and experiencing in order to survive. That was his default mode in unfamiliar situations, but there was a time and a place for it. Normally he at least had some frame of reference; if nothing else he at least knew what part of the city he was in. He knew he was in Savannah Central but that meant nothing to him because as it was, he didn't recognise it. He knew this city like the back of his paw and one thing after another just kept piling on and piling on. Sure, he could believe that in certain parts of town the cops ran their beats differently. He could not believe there was a part of town that would legally be allowed to put up signs prohibiting chompers--'Preds!' his mind shouted--from certain sections of the city.

And that was another thing, too! Calling predators "chompers" in formal situations but switching that up with the word savage every now and again? Or how about the way that he'd been beaten and the fact that no one seemed to care? Hell, the way that the cop in front of him seemed to totally ignore the fact that he had clearly been in a fight at some point during the morning was utterly foreign to him. He was on the verge of being arrested for not wearing a collar--'Whatever the hell that means . . . .'--and now the little pikas were telling lies about him with no proof whatsoever and were being believed while he, an actual officer, was having his testimony heavily scrutinised or dismissed out of paw!

'For what? Being a predator?!'

"For the last time, sir, put your paws behind your back!"

Nick stood there, stone faced. His integrity was crumbling. This couldn't be happening. "But I . . . ."

"Save it! You know, it's real funny because just before I ran across you I heard a call come out over the scanner saying that a red fox had just sexually assaulted a young beaver. That wouldn't be you would it?" She asked the question with a tone suggesting that she already knew the answer and was moving her paw slowly to her utility belt . . .

Nick sucked in breath. "There's been a misundersta-" He never got the chance to finish:

Before he could move, the officer had pulled out the fox repellent from her holster and sprayed him right in the eyes. Nick covered his face instantly as his nose, lungs, and sinuses were filled with an awful burning sensation that went deep into his chest, burning his throat! He stumbled to the ground and couldn't breathe for what felt like a minute, choking and coughing with every breath. He felt the officer grab his arm and he shook it off and tried to stand. He staggered blindly and felt a blow across his head that knocked him down again.

He finally did manage to stand and broke into a run.

"Stop!" shouted the officer behind him.

He ignored her and ran blindly down the street, away from the officer whom he could easily outrun. He pushed himself to go faster, the pain in his face and lungs increasing as he sucked in breath. He was unsure what was going on behind him but heard a series of loud cracks--like the sound of a car backfiring--which only pushed him to keep going. He felt tranq darts whizzing past his ears; one coming so close that he felt its wake slightly part the fur on his head. He went on long enough until he was certain that the officer was far behind him but forced himself to keep going anyway.

The officer put away her weapon and went to her patrol car. She pulled out the mic and spoke. "This is officer Bauer. I'm calling to report a collarless mammal--a red fox--running loose in Pika Town. Requesting immediate backup. Seems it's the same one that caused the assault this morning. I'm not touching this one so I'm hoping you'll send out the bit guns." After receiving confirmation she continued on her way.

-.-.-.-

Nick ran on for a few minutes till he was sure he wasn't being followed. He forced one of his eyes open and, through the tears and pain he felt, spied an alley on his right amongst the rows of apartment buildings that got taller as he went and ran down it as quickly as he could. It stank badly but he had to look for a place to hide. Finding a relatively large dumpster through his bleary vision, he forced the hatch open, climbed up the side and jumped in. He left the top open to ventilate the stench. He thanked the heavens that the dumpster was filled with lawn clippings and the grass from a recently mowed lawn which did much to dampen the other less-pleasant smells emanating from the container. He allowed himself to relax as much as he could and settled into the trimmings, using them as a kind of mattress. His mind was reeling and he tried to force his eyes to stay open so that his tears would wash out the repellent.

He was losing his grip. Everywhere he went he was being attacked! He knew it had been stupid to run away from the police officer but what the hell had she been thinking when she sprayed him and he hadn't even done anything? Nick sighed as the pain throughout his face and chest began to subside. The next time he saw some officers he would just try to explain his situation before things got out of control. He really needed to talk to Judy, now, and take solace in her. He felt as though he going crazy! While he had considered that option before it was only now that he was really starting to believe it.

Some time had passed before Nick felt well enough to try to move. He needed to get to the city and to a hospital quickly. He groaned as he got up and climbed out of the dumpster. His feet had just touched the ground when he saw a police car drive by the alley he was in. As he walked toward the mouth of the alley he heard the police car turn around and start back toward him. It turned down the alley and made its way to him. He was honestly a little frightened when he'd seen it pass by the alley initially but he needed medical attention and had resolved to just give himself up. He staggered and waited for them to pull up to him but instead found to his surprise that they stopped quite a ways away. Puzzled, he saw the two officers, one of them a rhino whom he recognised as Rhinowitz, get out of the car and stand behind their doors as though they worried that he was armed and might attack.

"Alright, chomper," shouted the rhino, "We're gonna need you to put your paws in the air!"

Nick cocked and eyebrow before making his face settle into its usual smirk, hoping against hope that he'd be able to get control of the situation. He started toward them and the rhino pulled out that small tranq gun and aimed it at him. His surprise increased when he turned to the other officer, a koala he didn't recognise, and saw that his paws were shaking as he held his tranq on him.

"Guys . . ." started Nick smoothly, "so glad you were finally able to make it to the party. I've only been wandering around here for the past few minutes. You know, if you wanna catch the guy who did this to me," he said, referring to the beaver who'd beaten him, "you're gonna find him down the road."

"What did you do to him, savage?" asked Rhinowitz.

"Huh?" asked Nick, genuinely perplexed. "Nothing. I didn't do anything to him. His wife nailed me on the side of my head with a rock and he beat me up!" This was getting tiresome real quick. And the fact that people kept calling him words like chomper and savage was infuriating. "That's assault! Don't you care?!" he shouted at last as he lost his composure.

"Fuck you! I want you on the ground right fucking now, savage, you're under arrest!"

"What did they tell you?" asked Nick, his unease starting to give way to dismay and even fear.

"I said, 'On the ground!' Now, you filthy fox!"

It was one insult too many. "What the hell is wrong with you?!" shouted Nick as he snapped. 'You can't talk to me like that! That beaver down the road just assaulted me and if he hadn't called you guys I would have!" His voice and tone were desperate, the cool mask having fallen totally from his face.

"Stop resisting, fox, and get on the ground now!" shouted the koala.

"You shoulda stayed in Happy Town, savage, if you didn't want trouble!" said Rhinowitz.

Nick couldn't believe it but he felt his old instincts coming to the forefront. His mind positively rebelled at what was happening! There was no way that he wasn't recognisable to the rhino. A horrifying feeling began to form in the pit of his stomach and his ears bent back. He opened his mouth to speak when another police car pulled up from the other side of the alley, blocking any potential exit. The officers got out of the car.

Nick couldn't see the ones behind him as his focus was on the rhino and koala. He heard a voice from behind him shout, "You're surrounded, fox! Give it up!"

This was a misunderstanding. This was clearly a misunderstanding! He knew now that this wasn't a routine arrest. He had a sense now that if they caught him something far worse was in store for him. This was all his mind needed to know for his body to start jacking up his adrenaline levels. He needed to escape and escape quickly!

'I'm not a criminal!' his mind shouted. 'Not anymore!'

He tried to calm his pounding heart and raised his paws in spite of his better judgement. His old instincts were telling him that something was dangerously wrong and he didn't know what. Once they took him to the ZPD and everyone there saw him they'd know that they'd made a mistake and everything would be cleared up, his rational mind insisted. The past year and a half couldn't have been a dream! He repeated this reassuring mantra in his mind but his heart knew it was a lie. He made himself raise his paws higher.

The rhino kept his tranq trained on Nick as he heard one of the officers behind him shout into his intercom. "Officer in need of assistance! Prepare a cage at the ZPD: we are apprehending a collarless savage! We're pretty certain we've caught another feral," the male continued, "and again, he is not wearing a collar. I repeat: He is not wearing a collar!"

He turned around and saw the two officers behind him pull out two animal control poles with adjustable nooses at their ends.

"H-hey now!" started Nick as he felt the wind leave him at the sight of the poles. "Hey, I-I'll come willingly you don't have to-"

"Shut the fuck up, savage!" shouted the koala.

Nick was becoming more panicked by the moment.

"Just step into the noose!" he heard one of the officers behind him shout. They were all walking toward him now; trying to corner him against the wall of the alley.

His adrenaline, fear, anger, and rage all burst within him and he shot out quickly and made to get out of the alley. In his blind desire to escape, he'd chosen the path through the rhino--a choice which proved disastrous. Nick fell to the ground completely winded when the rhino slammed him in the chest and back into the middle of the semi-circle and found himself momentarily unable to move. As he gasped for breath and tried to process the pain he was feeling in his chest and stomach, he felt the nooses of the animal control poles swipe over his head and tighten from either side of him. He tried to reach up to get his paws underneath the braided plastic of the nooses but was surprised when he felt both of the officers pull on their poles from each side of his neck, choking him! His breath rattled as he tried to let out a scream of terror. He closed his eyes and fought--He struck out like a terrified animal on the brink of death! Several kicks and slams to his face and chest subdued him. He opened his eyes and saw them bring out a muzzle. He jerked away and tried to scream but was held in place by the nooses. He felt as an officer put it on over his face and tighten the harness so that the straps bit into his skin.

He lay there on his side, his mind in defeat and nearly broken as they wrenched his paws behind him and shackled them tightly along with his feet. They laughed and took turns kicking him in the face and ribs till they felt he'd had enough. As was yanked up by the handcuffs, he let out a muffled cry of pain as he felt his shoulders nearly come out of their sockets from the way his arms were being twisted and bent behind him. He tried to stand to relieve some of the pressure on his joints but they dragged him along too quickly. He was thrown onto the floor in the back of one of the police cars, his mind too far gone to track what exactly was happening. The officers slammed the door behind him and got into the patrol cars, themselves.

This was everything he'd ever been afraid of--everything he had ever tried to protect himself against when he cut himself off from the world. He had no idea what the hell was going on but he didn't care. He'd been certain that this was a dream. That this wasn't really happening. That he was going to wake up next to his lovely mate. 'Judy!' he thought. His heart burned and he longed to see her. Somehow, though, he knew he wasn't going to. This was too real, his mind told him.

As he felt the car start and drive away from the alley, a sorrowful thought crossed his mind. He had imagined last night what his life might have been without Judy and wondered fondly whether his life with her were a dream. Now he found himself considering the terrifying possibility that it had been. What other explanation was there? There were several uncanny things that made him think so, too: Even at its worst, nothing like this had ever happened to him in the city. The only thing comparable was his treatment at the paws of the Junior Rangers Club. As badly as he'd been made to feel and as hurt as he was, he'd never felt the threat of death. This brought it all back. He was suddenly a kit again, alone and frightened as the pack to which he thought he belonged mercilessly beat him and muzzled him. He was an untrustworthy fox--and everyone who met him sought to do him harm. His almost being iced at the paws of Mr. Big didn't even come close to what he was feeling now. At least in that instance, he had a sense that he could find his way out of it. And he had.

'No, _she _had!' he reminded himself.

He drifted in and out of consciousness and caught snatches of conversations. A comment here or there about "keeping this one off the books." His heart sank as he felt in his bones that his troubles were nowhere near being over. He only hoped that once they got to the ZPD someone would see him--that someone would recognise him. That the ZPD would recognise immediately the telltale signs of police brutality. In his heart of hearts, however, he knew that he couldn't rely on that. Not anymore. His faith had been shattered and he realised now that he could no longer presume that he knew what this world had in store for him. He laughed to himself bitterly as he realised that the inertia of his life had somehow flipped the script--whereas he once was a con-man who relied on the presumptive trust of those whom he would then betray he now found his own trust betrayed. His last thought before succumbing once again to the darkness was of his longing for Judy.

-.-.-.-

Sgt. Judy Hopps stormed through the doors of the ZPD. Her eyes landed on Cevilla at the front desk and she walked over to her--shoulders back, head looking straight out; determined. Her mood was foul after having discovered her patrol car and her phone missing. Cevilla looked her over and saw that the rabbit had changed her outfit. She was no longer in uniform and was instead wearing a floral pattern blouse and a pair of jeans. She raised an eyebrow, a bit perplexed as to the rabbit's return.

"Uh . . . good morning . . ." said Cevilla uncertainly. The rabbit's demeanour and her choice of outfit were at odds with each other in every way.

"Yeah right. I've been trying to get a hold of you guys for an hour. My phone's missing and so is the patrol car. Gonna fill out a report on it, now."

"Um . . . aren't you supposed to be out right now?"

"I know today was my day off but I had to come in when I found my things missing. It was faster just to take the metro down here than to have to worry about borrowing someone's phone."

"Wouldn't it have been better for you to get into contact with us ASAP?"

"The car's not going anywhere that can't be traced in a day and once we find the car we find the perp; we find the perp we find my phone. That's why I'm in today."

"No, I meant, like, out on patrol. I thought I saw y-"

"Out on patrol?"

"Yeah, Chief said that he sent you an email." Cevilla smiled nervously. "You sure get all the fun ones . . ." she finished lamely.

Hopps looked at her oddly for a moment before narrowing her eyes. "Shut up Cevilla."

Cevilla crossed her arms in annoyance as Hopps went on to her cubical.

Sgt. Hopps logged into her email but found no messages from the chief. Cevilla, that brainless moron, had probably gotten her wires crossed again. 'Better go downstairs and ask Clawhauser what he knows. If there's one thing, _he can get shit done. At least he seems to know what's what around here.'_ She went down the steps to the basement level making a left at the landing and through the narrow hallway that led to the records room. She rapped loudly on the open door to get the attention of the workers.

"Excuse me!" she shouted loudly, "anybody seen Clawhauser? The Chief might've left instructions for me around here somewhere and I'm hoping he might know what they are."

Bogo had still been working when she left for home the other night. She was relatively certain that he'd spent the majority of the night awake and trying to work out the details of a case that they'd been working on:

From what she and Bogo could tell, something in the city was causing animals to go feral. While it had been merely a few at first, the number had grown exponentially within the last few weeks. In every instance of this phenomenon they had been able to keep the incident a secret to a greater or lesser extent. They had been working on several leads as to who might have an idea on why this was happening: whether drug-related or something else. All of their suspects were chompers, of course. She suspected it was to do with some kind of substance that was being peddled in the chomper subculture. She just needed to find the epicentre--the place where it was finding the widest distribution. She had no idea where that might have been but she knew that it had to be someplace in Happy Town. Counterintuitively, however, the bulk of the transformations were taking place in Animalia.

The chompers in records turned and merely looked at her, not one of them daring to speak.

'Typical,' she thought as she regarded them.

"So!" she shouted more loudly still, "Clawhauser? Where is he? Hello?!"

A younger wolf, one of the new hires, replied, "He isn't here, Sarge. He went home. He said he was feeling sick."

She rolled her eyes in annoyance. "Does anybody here know anything about instructions that Bogo left for me? Possibly an email?"

They all looked around at each other nervously and that made her uneasy. Hopps was sure they knew something but she didn't want to press them.

'Better to keep these things to yourself or you may play your trumps too soon.'

"So that's a no, is it?" she finally said to the rest of the room.

She nodded to herself more than to anyone else when she got no response. Yaguarete was likely in charge upstairs and that would probably be of absolutely no help to her. She went back through the door, out of the records room and sat on the steps leading to the main floor. If the chief had wanted to tell her something important related to the case then she needed to know about soon since it might be urgent. She placed her head in her paws and sighed to herself and tried to think of what she could do. There was no way she was gonna call Bogo and ask him; especially since he was likely sleeping and would probably tear her a new one if she interrupted that. Besides, he needed to the sleep after all the hours he'd put into this case; not that she couldn't do with a nice rest as well, but she had to come down to the station the instant she found some of her items missing.

She let out a depressed sigh and decided that she should stay and work the case with what she had while she was there plus get some of her formal paperwork done to boot. She stood from her seat and was just about to head back up the steps when she heard some laughing and moaning echoing down the corridor from another hallway. The landing of the stair split in two directions--one off to the left which led to the records room and another off to the right which led to the operating room and holding cells for criminals. As she peered down the corridor, she heard the sounds of someone moaning in pain mixed with laughing voices. The sounds came closer until she saw two officers, Rhinowitz and his partner Coal, dragging what appeared to be a severely beaten fox to the holding cells. She sighed to herself and slowly made to follow.

'Just another day in Zootopia . . . .'

-.-.-.-

He didn't know where they were taking him. When he awoke he was in a daze but tried to make sense of his surroundings as he was dragged along by the shoulders. His gaze darting about, bleary eyed and frightened, he made to look around. He was still muzzled and the sudden desire to run or fight galvanised his senses and he redoubled his efforts to take in things around him and figure out where he was. He found to his momentary relief that he was, in fact, in the ZPD. He knew that he was somewhere near the records office when noticed his captors passed by the hall that led there. He finally turned his eyes straight ahead to see that they were taking him to a room he knew to be a holding cell. When they opened the door, though, he found himself looking instead at what appeared to be an operating room. Someone flicked on the lights and he could see what looked like an adjustable gurney with straps on it. It was situated in the middle of the room on a mount made of plastic or metal and bolted to the floor. As they brought him forward he renewed his struggle to escape.

"Looks like he's got some of his fight back," said the one called Coal, who then turned and punched him in the stomach. Nick grunted and bent forward and tried to regain his composure but failed when he was brained from behind by the massive rhino. Nick fought to stay conscious and within seconds found himself on his back and being strapped to the gurney. Its incline was adjustable and the arms of the gurney could be separated and adjusted as well--with his arms strapped to it. The gurney was manoeuvred so that Nick was in a nearly-standing position. The arms of the gurney, to which his own were strapped, were brought forward. He heard behind him something being wheeled around. When he looked to his right he saw it was a series of tools whose purpose he didn't want to know.

"You have finer paws," said Rhinowitz to someone he couldn't see.

Nick heard the scraping of something to his left and a moment later a gopher popped into view. Nick assumed it must have been a ladder or some other kind of stool or step that he had heard.

"Off the books, you said?" The gopher appeared to be talking to the rhino but it was the koala who answered.

"You know how Chief likes to have a low number of these incidents," said Coal.

"Right then," said the gopher as he adjusted his spectacles.

Nick was terrified as the rhino came back into view--terror which quickly became horror as he saw the rhino retrieve a scalpel from the other side of the gurney. Nick flailed and tried to break free of his restraints, screaming as loudly as he could against the muzzle as sheer panic took him.

_'This can't be happening! This can't be happening! This can't be happening!' _he screamed in his head. He was terrified of what was coming next and he was breathing heavily, his blood was pounding in his skull, and he was certain at any moment he was going to die of fear--if they didn't kill him first.

The rhino grinned and brought the scalpel close to Nick's throat. Nick moved his head away, extending his neck out of instinct--straining as he struggled ever more for freedom. He let out several long muffled screams as he felt the cold metal brush through his fur and lightly scrape the skin on his neck--not hard enough to draw blood or even scratch him, but being in such a helpless position had him to the point where he was nearly losing his reason.

"Do you have any idea what we do to sly savages like you?" said Rhinowitz

Nick turned to look at him as the scalpel was withdrawn, his heart beating nearly out of his chest. Nick was totally and completely surprised when a powerful electrical shock tore through his body from behind. He threw his head back and screamed as loudly as he could in his throat. The shock was repeated three times more, each time longer than the last. He closed his eyes and started wheezing as the pain began to subside.

"Think he gets it yet?" asked the koala, smiling brightly.

"These fuckers wanna kill us," started the rhino. "I don't think there's any teaching them at all, but I sure as hell wanna keep on trying." His grin was maniacal.

Coal let out a bark of laughter which ended abruptly when he stared at Nick intently. Nick, whose head had fallen forward and whose breaths were thin and raspy, was yanked up by the rhino by the scruff of his neck. The two other officers who'd been with them had gone--there were only Nick, the Gopher, the Rhino, and the koala. "You savages ran the world, killing us prey left and right. That's not something many of us forgot. You think it's fun to chase after and scare something for food? You think it feels good to be eaten alive?"

Nick made no answer--not that he could have anyway. Nick couldn't believe the rational. They were going to kill him for things that took place thousands of years ago?! He had lost the ability to struggle and his head was forced up again by the rhino.

"So how about we begin," began the gopher, drawing Nick's attention, "with a little declawing?"

At this, Nick reached his breaking point. He had seriously reached his fucking breaking point! Tears started rolling down his face as he saw Rhinowitz hand the gopher the scalpel. He saw and felt the gopher draw his pinkie finger out. Nick closed his eyes tightly. He had lost the will to fight. Dread filled his senses and his tears poured more readily as he felt the sharp edge start to press into the flesh of his finger . . .

"Don't you think he's had enough?" came a new voice.

Nicks eyes flashed open. He didn't dare move. Didn't dare breathe.

'Carrots!'

Rhinowitz turned away from him to the doorway.

Judy! He needed to see Judy!

"You think so?" asked Rhinowitz. "You know he tried to rape a beaver who was out for a walk with her family this morning."

"Did he?" replied Judy's voice. "Take off the muzzle; let me see him."

"Look we was hopin' t' wrap this up, quick! Plus we had it that he might be a feral. He's a real fucking savage, Sarge!"

"Too fucking bad! You guys got my ass in trouble the last time you pulled this kinda' shit! I've had to cover for you too many fucking times and if I have to cover for you one more fucking time I swear to fucking God I'm the only savage you're gonna need to be afraid of and I don't have to wear a collar. Now I'll say this to you slowly so that maybe you can get it through your thick skull: Get out of my fucking way and unmuzzle the fucking fox!"

Rhinowitz stepped back. Reluctantly and begrudgingly, he turned around and undid the muzzle.

The instant it was off, Nick started screaming, crying out loudly, "Carrots! Carrots your here! Carrots, what the hell is going on?!" His mind and his emotions had been swinging like a pendulum between two extremes of terror and relief and it was wreaking havoc on his psyche. "Judy! Judy! Help! Please help me!" He was begging her with everything he had, tears rolling down his face freely, sobbing as horror, fear, anguish, and relief boiled over into a cocktail of emotional outpouring. His relief was short-lived, however, at the next exchange.

"You know this guy?" questioned the rhino menacingly.

"Are you out of your fucking mind?!" shouted Hopps in return. "Like I know a vile fox from a hole in the wall."

The three others present laughed loudly.

"Don't worry!" laughed the rhino as he wiped a tear from his eye, "No one would ever accuse you of being sentimental!" His laughter subsided.

"Perish the thought!" she said, cruelly. "I'd kill myself if I were its mother. It's probably been stealing since it could crawl."

Nick tilted his head up and stared at the ceiling, his heart positively breaking. He just wanted to die. There was absolutely nothing left for him. It had to have been a dream, he concluded. All of it! His life with Judy, the thought that he could have a mate, the aspiration of someday being a father, being able to make an honest living, having decent friends--all of it! The whole thing was a lie--an illusion. 'There's always a hammer,' he reminded himself. Last night he had contemplated the fearful notion that the powers that be were just waiting for things to go well just to snatch it away.

He must have dreamt it all up, he decided. He must have faced years of this torture and his mind must have snapped at some point and conjured a reality where life was beautiful. He had reached the age of thirty-three living his life as a deviant, had a crack-up, and imagined that he was living far off somewhere in a better life because nothing he had experienced so far led him to conclude anything but the reality facing him--this was his life. He saw before him a life where predators were now actively hunted. He knew that if this were happening to him that this must have happened to predators before him. He knew that he was going to live the rest of his life alone, on the run, with no pack except Finnick.

_'If he's even alive . . .' _he thought depressively.

The rabbit before him regarded him with a heartless apathy. Her face hardened when she looked into his eyes. "Leave us," she said to the others in the room. The rhino turned tilted his head questioningly. "You heard me."

"Are you sure you don't want me to . . ." the gopher trailed off as he aimed the scalpel at Nick's claws.

"No, I'm not sure. That's why I want you to stick around just outside. Actually, while you're gone, bring me a collar. We need to get one on this freak."

The gopher nodded and hopped down from his chair. He walked out the door followed by the koala and the rhino. The rhino closed the door behind him and left Sgt. Hopps alone with Nick.

He said nothing but only stared at the rabbit in front of him.

She began to pace around the room and seemed to be thinking to herself. He was still strapped, both of his arms and his torso, to the gurney. She seemed to come to a decision and he saw her tilt her head and nod. A last she spoke with the same lack of emotion or concern as before. "Did you try to rape a beaver?"

Nick, who had been looking down, suddenly looked up at her angrily but said nothing.

"Did you?" she pressed.

Nicks anger and frustration led him to growl. "No!" he said sharply, half growling.

She walked up to him unconcerned and, to Nicks surprise, caressed his cheek; but the fact that he had been beaten all over his face meant that there was a painful bite to her touch. "You need to be careful, savage. You could be dead soon." She removed her paw. Her face had remained impassive the whole time and he had felt no genuine emotion in her words; which is why it surprised him when she spoke next.

"I believe you, fox, against my better judgement. If I find you here again, though," and here she turned to face him, anger marring her features, "I'll declaw you myself!" she finished in an angry whisper. She seemed to calm, and her face went back to its natural scowling position. "So today, you get off with nothing but a warning."

'Is this for fucking real?!' thought Nick angrily. Fury surged through him as his pain and humiliation combined to form a dangerous admixture in his mind. '_Nothing _but a warning?! Is that what she said? Has she fucking seen me?! Has she seen the way they've beaten me?!'

He swallowed his anger but not before another growl escaped his throat.

She regarded him coldly and it seemed to him that she could read his thoughts for she said, "Yeah, that's right. You heard me fucking right you fucking fox. This is only a warning. Uppity savages like you who like to sass back and think that they can change things are only good for two things--adding to the amount of paperwork I have to fill out and lining the inside of my coats."

Nick's mouth dropped in shock. There's no way she was serious. There's no way an animal would wear the skin of another animal as a fucking coat!

'Is she fucking crazy? Is everyone here a fucking psychopath?!'

Oddly, he seemed to see her expression soften in reaction to the horrified reaction. "It's a figure of speech. We don't actually do that here. But I need to say this to you because you genuinely don't seem to understand: Chompers die here in our custody everyday. Every day. Now, I'm not a cruel rabbit--I don't especially enjoy the idea of killing--but that's the reality of life here. Preds have their place, prey have ours."

Before Nick could ask, the door opened as the gopher returned with a collar. It stepped up on his stool and fastened it around Nick's neck. The doctor proceeded to undo the straps of the gurney and released Nick who immediately collapsed onto the floor with a grunt; unmoving but breathing heavily.

"Anything else you need, Sarge?" asked the doctor.

"Nothing, now. You can go."

The doctor looked warily from Nick to Hopps before leaving and closing the door behind him.

"Why?" asked Nick brokenly, his voice trailing off as depression took him.

"Why what?" she said acerbically.

"If you don't like killing, then why . . . ? How can . . . you be a part of this?" His cheek was pressed against the cold linoleum floor which is what he was looking at, his face lacking any care or emotion.

"We all have to make sacrifices," she said dully. "Can you move?" she asked.

Nick shook his head no. He was surprised when she felt her arm around him; felt her lifting him and dragging him. He was not only surprised at the action because it appeared to help him but because, apparently, she had a level of upper body strength he didn't remember her having. But of course he didn't remember her, he reminded himself; it had been a dream.

Slowly they made their way out of the operating room, slowly made their way down the corridor and up the back stairs. They came out through a back exit at street level. They were behind the parking lot, now, and were facing a row of tenement buildings behind the ZPD. Hopps waited for the traffic to ebb before jaywalking and getting him across the street. Once they were on the side of the of the apartments, she helped him down a back alley and sat him down against a wall.

Nick's breathing was still raspy. There were gouts of dried blood all over his fur, matting it, and both his nose and lips were bloody. She knelt in front of him, grabbed his jaw in her paw, and made him look at her. "Whatever you do," she said intently, "do not move from this spot."

When Nick made no comment she spoke louder, squeezing his jaw and emphasised, "Whatever you do, do not fucking move from this spot, do you understand me?!"

Nick choked back a sob but nodded enthusiastically, just wanting her to leave him alone.

"Just know," she warned, "you leave this place, I'll know. You leave this place . . . you die." She stood and began to walk away.

"Why do I have to stay here?" he asked, "Why not someplace else?" Not that he could move if he wanted to, anyway.

She looked over her shoulder. "This is where the trash goes." And then she was out of the alley and gone.

Nick stared at the brick wall of the building directly in front of him and then turned his gaze to the roof where he caught a glimpse of the morning sky. And then he started sobbing. He cried openly and wept profusely as the events and horrors of the day fell on him as heavily as the building across from him might have. And he couldn't stop. He collapsed to his side as his tears continued to flow, his body convulsing, as the darkness of his mind pulled him further and further down.

He was there for what seemed to him about fifteen or twenty minutes when a van slowly pulled up to him. He had fallen into a shallow sleep from grief and at the sound of an approaching vehicle, his eyes flashed open and he tried to move but cried out in pain. He heard someone get out of the vehicle and heard a sliding door open.

"Holy fuck!" he heard one voice shout, "What the fuck did they do to this one?!"

Another voice, "Holy shit! Check 'im--does he have his claws?"

Nick felt a paw grab his. He let out a feeble growl but let out a bark of pain when the collar sent him a painful shock. He felt himself being gathered up and wanted to fight but couldn't. He tried to mentally fortify himself, unsure of what was happening in his foggy half-wakened state. He was surprised, therefore, when he felt himself gently laid down on a mattress in the back of a van whose seats had been taken out. Someone sat next to him--the first voice, a male's he'd heard, who started softly trying to patch him up. He heard voice number two say something to voice one. The van started and they began moving; to where, he didn't know. Nick looked to his side and saw himself in the glass of a window. He couldn't even recognise himself, his face was so cut up and swollen! He bent his ears back and let out an involuntary whine.

"There there," said voice one, "This happens to all of us at some point or other, though it looks like you got the worst of it. Was it the ZPD?"

Nick nodded softly.

"Yeah, they're bastards. Who put you in the alley?"

Nick didn't want to answer--didn't want to say, feeling somehow that voicing it out loud would make it real . . .

"Who did this?" asked the voice again.

"Judy" replied Nick, "Sergeant Judy Hopps. She told me not to move from that spot!" He was suddenly terrified again. "She said she'd know . . . she said . . . !"

The voice sounded incredulous now, "She did all this?"

Nick shook his head no and weakly said, "Alley."

The voice seemed to understand.

"Said she was taking out the trash," finished Nick.

"That fucking bitch," said voice one. "That fucking bitch. You gotta seriously watch out for 'er: She's the worst one on the force. She's nailed more preds than anyone."

Nick nodded. The chatter continued but it was nothing to which he cared to pay any attention. He fell into a foggy dream where he saw his sweet Judy, Carrots, regarding him with the devotion he'd imagined shining in her eyes last night. It was a poison to him now that burnt his heart.

As voice one continued ministering to him and patching him up, Nick closed his eyes and cried himself to sleep.

-.-.-.-

Sgt. Hopps finished the phone call she'd made when she got back to the basement, exhausted from having to practically carry the fox. She'd used the phone in the operating room with the door closed.

'No telling what kind of tricks those assholes might pull,' she said to herself as she opened the door and went out into the hallway. She looked down the hall toward the records room before going back into the operating room and cleaning up what she could. She left the rest for the janitor and left the room. She hummed as she walked down the corridor then down into hall toward records as she made her way to the stairs. As she came closer she saw a long line of chompers staring at her menacingly as she walked by. She came around the bend and saw a lion and a wolf blocking her way up.

She looked up at the wolf. "Yes, Garou?" she asked. Her shoulders fell, thoroughly unimpressed with the display.

"Where's the fox?" he asked.

"Gone," she replied flatly.

"Where's the fox?" he asked again with a bit more anger in his tone.

"I threw him out with the trash," she smirked.

The wolf growled but was censured by a shock to his neck.

"And bear in mind," she began sharply, "that the same can happen to you. You don't get special treatment just 'cause you work here. If it were up to me you'd all be outta here. Now! My guess is that most of you are here because you have to work off your sentences, am I right? If things are that shitty for you here, just hand us your claws and maybe we won't pull your teeth while we're at it."

Some of those who were standing behind her had backed away and flattened their ears; the wolf, on the other paw, stood his ground as did the lion.

"There will be a day," began the wolf dangerously as he leant down to Judy's height, "when I won't have this collar on. We'll see how brave you are then."

"There will also be a day," she returned, in a deceptively quiet tone, "when I might not have to worry about whether or not I kill someone. It may also be that that day is coming soon, and very soon." Her tone of voice wasn't haughty, nor pretentious. She spoke as easily as discussing the weather. But now her face darkened and her tone took on a decidedly menacing edge. "The Razorbacks" she continued, "are an excellent squad. As it so happens, I've been invited to join them. I've been thinking it over so far; but the more I see savages like you, pretending like you somehow matter, well--it makes me long for a cull."

A shudder went through the assembly and several of the crowd sucked in air through their teeth. No one dared to move. The wolf only looked down at her in shock. She moved forward and both the lion and the wolf parted to let her through.

"So just keep in mind," she said over her shoulder as she went up the stairs, "if anything happens to me or to anyone else, that's the end of preds in Zootopia. I have it on good authority that Mayor Pricilla is begging for a reason to do it."

They stood there like pillars as they heard her go up the second flight and through the door to the main level. For several moments after she was gone they could only stand there, shoulders slumped. Finally, they all began shuffling, one by one, back into the grey-painted records room.

-.-.-.-

In a large office furnished lavishly with paintings and bookcases, a pig was sitting at a large desk in front of an enormous window that gave the best view of Downtown. On the desk, among other things, were stacked official-looking papers, a phone, and several personal knickknacks along with a framed photo of a smiling family of pigs. She was looking over paperwork, pausing occasionally to sip from a coffee cup, when she was interrupted by the phone as it started ringing.

She picked it up. "Hello?"

"It's me. Just wanted to give you an update: We just got a hit on one of the tracking collars. A red fox species, name unknown. Should we follow it?"

"Don't follow it, no, but keep carefully watched--with the new trackers there's no need to waste the energy. See where it goes; it's too early to put feet on the ground."

"Will do. Anything else?"

"Yeah: Update me at five. That should be good. Bogo called me earlier and told me that Hopps was on it. I think we should have everything we need in place by then but we can't do anything till the sergeant gets back to us."

"Understood. I'll give you a call at five. If plans change, we're gonna need an update, though."

"Sure thing! But I think we'll have everything we need either way by then."

"Alright. Take care!"

"You too! We'll be in touch." The pig hung up the phone and smiled to herself. With any luck, it would only be a matter of hours before everything was ready.

'It's barely past eight and already everything seems to be falling into place.' She smiled to herself and went back to her paperwork, humming cheerily to herself.