Chapter Text
The smell of smoke still lingered in the air when Judy stepped onto the bustling crime scene. Quick paws took careful steps to avoid the pieces of shattered glass and rubble that were lying about. What was once a quaint little home now lay in ruin after being set on fire by a group of unknown arsonists. She stood silently watching the various officers and the lingering members of the Zootopia fire department work around the crime scene. Chief Bogo stood near the center, looking tense as he spoke with one of the remaining firefighters.
It had been a stressful few weeks for the force and the city as a whole. This new disaster makes three reptile families that have been attacked in the past three weeks. Thankfully, no one has been mortally wounded but there have been serious injuries caused by the fires. Shaky footage from the past three attacks showed large hooded figures head to toe in black that came from an unmarked black vehicle. Said figures would spray paint the surrounding buildings with graffiti before setting the main target ablaze. Judy would bet that the recordings they would find from tonight would show the same pattern. One of her feet hit the ground over and over as she took it all in.
“Hopps, Wilde, get over here,” Chief Bogo’s voice rang out over the crime scene. Nick poked her and laughed,
“Seems like we are in hot demand tonight, let’s go see what Bogo wants,” He playfully patted her shoulder before sauntering forward, gracefully avoiding the sharp debris as he walked.
“Evening, chief, what have you got for us tonight? Anything in particular?” Nick asked the buffalo who huffed a large breath before going into it,
“I want you two to dedicate your attention solely on this case. I’ll have some other officers pick up the other work you’ve been doing but I need more people on this now. It is getting out of control,” Finishing with a finger pointed down towards the ground in emphasis.
“You’ve got it, Sir, Hopps and Wilde are on the case,” Oh, she was so ready for this! A burst of pride filled her chest knowing that she and Nick were trusted with such serious work nowadays. They had been helping out with the other two fires but it was rewarding to be put on this case full-time. The two had built up quite the reputation for themselves. Her meter maid days were far behind her now and she did not miss them in the slightest.
“Good, I expect you two to have this figured out before the planned reptilian and mammal union anniversary. We do not need these criminals getting in the middle of that,”
“No worries Chief, we’ll get this arson situation figured out in a jiffy,” Nick had a small but proud smile on his face. He may have been trying to hide it but Judy knew he was proud too. Bogo nodded and walked away.
Leaving the duo alone, Nick turned to her, “Sooo we should probably get a lay of the land first, huh?” Judy agreed and made off towards something that caught her sharp eyes. The targeted home was destroyed but the neighboring houses were still standing. The light orange paint on one had been covered in soot but what was visible was a variety of graffitied words written in shiny silver paint. All contained similar hateful messages.
Slither away you snakes
Get out
Monsters
And others following the same theme. Whoever was leaving these behind did not want the reptiles here.
“I can’t believe people can be so cruel,” Judy whispered as she took it all in. Nick gave her a small shrug, the type of shrug that had weight behind it,
“Some people are just the worst Carrots…but with the dream team on the case, they aren’t going to know what hit them,” He looked around before gesturing at a badly spray-painted circle. “What do you think this is supposed to be? There was something similar at the other two houses,”
It was a large squiggly circle with some sort of blob? Other than the mystery shape in the middle, there were two long points coming out from the top. It was pretty abstract to say the least but it felt familiar in a strange way.
“I’m not entirely sure but I feel like I’ve seen it before, if that makes any sense?”
“Well, you definitely didn’t see it at an art museum, that's for sure. Whoever painted this was not artistically gifted, I can tell you that,”
“Can’t argue with you there,” she made a mental note of the marking and moved on. The street they were on was empty except for the emergency vehicle. All the residents most likely staying put in their own homes until the trouble blew over. It was sad to see what should be a joyous neighborhood, broken down like this.
There was a camera placed a little bit down the street but there wasn't enough footage to paint a clear picture as to what happened. All the footage stopped once the criminals got back into their van.
Unfortunately, the coverage in this area was not nearly as good as the more established areas of the city. It was still in the process of being updated with more modern technology and then attaching it to the other camera systems throughout Zootopia. They better be speeding up that process after this.
The case wasn’t looking promising but she was certain that with their teamwork, they could solve anything. Something would turn up, it just might take a bit of waiting but waiting was never her strength.
ฅ^•ﻌ•^ฅ
A leopard news reporter stood in front of what remained of the simple two-bedroom home Judy and Nick had investigated today. Her smooth voice crackled out from Judy’s old laptop speakers,
“Another building in the reptile district was targeted tonight. The next stop in this dangerous spree of arson attacks that have been plaguing this vulnerable community. A small gecko family were the victims in tonight's attack. What was meant to be a fresh start had turned into a tragedy. Thankfully, there have been no casualties so far but with no end in sight to these tragic attacks and with the injuries piling up, things are looking dark. When will these perpetrators be brought to justice? This has been Lea with Zootopia news, make sure to keep an eye out tonight and if any of you viewers watching have the means - consider donating to the Hounds United: Together we can make a difference,”
Judy shut off the recording of last night's news report with a frustrated huff. Things had been going smoothly these last few months since the reptiles were finally allowed into Zootopia. In just a month, it will be an official year since their communities have been combined as they should have been all those years ago. Such an action had brought them all closer to a Zootopia Judy was proud of. With the first anniversary of the move fast approaching, Judy knew that Gary and the rest of the De’Snake family had been looking forward to celebrating the hard earned victory. These unexpected acts of violence have thrown a wrench into all this, leaving a horrible taste in her mouth. Her friend and his family had suffered enough.
Judy started unconsciously thumping her leg and biting the end of her pen, she urged herself to think. There was the obvious motivation of this being a string of hate crimes. Only reptiles had been targeted and disgusting graffiti messages had been left at the scene of the crime. While it seemed like the majority of Zootopia citizens had embraced the new part of their community there always seemed to be those who vehemently rejected any kind of change. They let their fear, ignorance and hate dictate their lives and innocents had to suffer because of it. Oh it just made her so unbelievably mad.
She just wanted to make the world a better place.
No scratch that, she was going to make the world a better place. Judy Hopps was no quitter and she was going to take down whoever was causing this no matter what. Determined, she spread open the case file on her desk once again. There had to be something she missed in all of this. Flashes of the different arson scenes popped up in her vision as she scoured the photos but there seemed to be nothing but rubble and charred remains of these families’ belongings. She had begun to form a mental tapestry when a sudden knock at her door made her jump out of her seat. Shifting her attention to the fox who was now leaning against her door frame.
“Hey, what's got you so jumpy? Not getting up to anything crazy in here are you?”Nick joked, chuckling at the spectacle.
“No, nothing crazy. Just trying to see if I missed anything from these pictures. There’s got to be something that can give us a lead,” She gestured to the photos and forms strewn out all over her desk.
“Carrots, it’s midnight. I highly doubt you are going to be getting any closer to cracking the case if you’re jumping from the slightest creak,”
“I’m not that bad, just a little bit more I swear-”
“Nope, you are getting in that bed. You do remember what happened when you stayed up for two days to solve that coyote case right?”
“This is nothing like the coyote case-”
“You got coffee all over Chief Bogos pants, man that was good,”
“He snuck up on me! I had a good reason for that reaction,”
Some of the escaped criminals from Nick’s prison escape a while back had been a coyote gang that went on to rob a bunch of jewelry stores. Judy had gotten so caught up in trying to find their hideout that sleep fell to the wayside. Justice was not going to wait for her to take a nap after all. Unfortunately, she had gotten, well, let’s just say tense after a few days surviving off of pure determination. It all ended with Chief Bogo definitely sneaking up on her at the station while she was holding a fresh cup of coffee but maybe her constant nodding off throughout the day had something to do with it.
Maybe.
Nick continued on,
“You certainly didn’t but it was really funny so we’ll go with it. Anyways, I don’t think we need jumpy Judy right now,” He sighed, looking at her with a more serious expression, “I know you want to help those people but you need to actually be aware of your surroundings to do that,”
Judy wanted to interject but Nick did have a point here. They did have to actually listen to each other if they wanted this whole partnership to work. She got quiet and nodded,“You’re right, I’ll get some sleep. I am still getting up at 5 though,” She pointed at him, smiling. While the new apartment was great, it was a bit further away from her old place which meant an earlier wakeup was in order. She had her schedule and she liked to keep it.
“I wouldn’t expect anything else. Get some sleep Carrots,” And with that he turned and shut the door behind him. Off to go back to pass out in his bedroom most likely, there was no way he was staying up this late.
A couple of months ago, after viewing Nick’s living conditions and having lived through her own. She had proposed that they were better off combining their salaries and finding a nicer apartment that they could share. It was purely out of convenience of course, they spent so much time together anyways that being roommates just made sense. It would simply be a temporary arrangement so the two of them could save up to eventually find their own living quarters once again. So, for now, it was bye-bye to her old cramped single-room apartment, hello slightly less cramped two-bedroom apartment. They were living fancy now, it even had a living room!
The rent in this area of Zootopia was still insane to her, even after all the time she had lived here. She’s pretty sure her parents would have an aneurysm if they saw what she and Nick were paying for this place. Still, it was nice living with her favorite person. It made the painful rent worth it.
Collapsing back onto her bed, she kicked her way under her sheets and drifted off into a fast sleep.
ฅ^•ﻌ•^ฅ
Her alarm beeped right at 5, jolting her upright to slam a paw down on the button. Today was a new day and that meant she was going to find her lead. They could not just sit around and wait for the next innocent family to have their lives burned down. With fresh motivation rushing through her veins, she hopped off the bed and got herself ready to face the day.
By 5:15, she was happily knocking away at Nick's door,
“Come on, up and at 'em, we’ve got some arsonists to track down,” She could hear some grumbled noises coming closer to the door, which cracked open to reveal one incredibly disgruntled fox. His fur poofed out in every direction. It was adorable.
In an entirely platonic way!
One thing she had learned quickly into their roommate arrangement was that Nick was not a fan of early wake-up calls. He would grumble and groan the whole time she hopped down to the car with him. Of course, he would always come with her but his pace would be what one would consider “meandering” which was far too slow when they had so many things to get to.
“Yeah, yeah, I’m up, no need to knock my door down. Just give me a sec to get changed alright,” With that he closed the door and did whatever Nick considered getting ready. She smiled and skipped her way to the tiny kitchen area in the main room of their apartment.
They had this schedule down to a tee. She’d get up first and wake Nick up before getting something ready in the kitchen for them to eat on the way to the station. As the two eventually rushed out of the door at 5:40, she would feel a fuzzy feeling build in her chest. This rhythm they had was nice, reliable and consistent and this day was no different.
Behind the wheel, Judy navigated the two to work where the duo would then reach the station, right on time at 6. Today, her mind was going 100 mph. They would need to see if they could talk to the victims again, maybe they could remember something about that night that could line up with the other families' stories. They would also need to go through the stored evidence again, seeing it in person may trigger some sort of revelation or they could check street cam footage again. She knew they lost track of the hooded figures last time but may-
“Hey, hello, earth to Carrots over there. You care to share with the class?” Nick snapped her out of her thoughts just in time for her to step down on the breaks for a red light. Stopping precariously close to the car in front of them. Yikes, that was close.
“I was just going over all the possible places to start today. We need to get this situation sorted out as fast as we can,”
“Yep, I’m with you there. There are only so many devastated baby snakes and lizards a fox can see on TV. Whatcha thinking?” He asked as he was gripping the door handle, trying to appear casual while biting down on his toast.
“Well, I think going over the collected evidence again might give us something to go off of and we can check the cam footage while we’re at it,”
“Makes sense to me,” He said, finishing off the last bite as they pulled into the parking space. Looking over to her, “Hopps and Wilde?”
“Wilde and Hopps!” And the two were off, walking through the ZPD with a set goal. Clawhauser waved at them as the two strolled by, he was snacking on some doughnuts while a reality show seemed to be playing on his phone. From the looks of it, it was Keeping up with the Hounds. A show featuring the famous Hound family, a prestigious lineage of Gray wolves that had quite the famous reality tv show. The show was annoying in her opinion but at least they had a massively popular charity organization so that made it more tolerable. Oh that sounded mean, maybe she was being a bit too harsh on them. It was just rough; her opinion on the ultra-wealthy had worsened quite a bit after dealing with the Lynxleys last year.
Judy responded to her coworker with a friendly wave back. She was just happy that her relationships have grown with her coworkers. What had started off as such an isolating place had become one she was no longer AS insecure about her position in. She and Nick had proven themselves multiple times over the course of their partnership. Hopefully, one day that feeling of inferiority would be completely gone and she could move on.
The evidence room was a cold grey and filled with piles and piles of boxes. Thankfully, they did not need to dig through piles and rows of evidence storage. Since the arson attacks were the talk of the town right now, it was all fairly easy access at the front of the lockers.
“Ok, I am going to go through the evidence from the first two attacks while you handle the last one. If there's anything that stands out I’ll let you know right away,” Judy turned to Nick, handing him a grey evidence box. He put a hand up in mock salute,
“Rodger that, Officer Hopps,” Setting down the box onto one of the metal tables in front of them, “We’re the dream team this is going to be easy peasy, we’ll be in and out,”
ฅ^•ﻌ•^ฅ
It was not easy peasy.
Hours had gone by and nothing. It was like the trail ran dry, the only thing that seemed remotely promising was the clumsy spray-painted insignia on the crumbled wall. It was not very clear what it was supposed to represent, maybe some sort of animal? She was pretty sure the two pointy things at the top were meant to be ears. As Nick said when they first saw it, whoever drew it did not have an artistic background that's for sure.
“I just don’t get it, there has to be something in all of this,” Judy began to push those aside and kept desperately digging. She had to figure this out, she had to help them. A light paw touched her shoulder, making her pause.
“Hey, now, go any faster and it’s all going to end up on the floor. I don’t think we want to spend the rest of the day cleaning up the evidence room,” Nick spoke gently as he rubbed her shoulder.
“I just want to stop this Nick. Enough people have gotten hurt already. I can't stop thinking of what Gary had to go through just to be able to live here but now people can’t even let him do that peacefully? It’s just not fair,” Her words were quiet, with her paws curled up into tight fists against the cool metal table.
“I know, it’s not fair. Lots of things in life are like that but that’s why we’re here, yeah? To make it just a little bit more fair?” He smiled at her and she felt that fuzzy feeling again. Suddenly, this didn’t seem so insurmountable.
“Wow, that was more emotion that I expected out of you,” Smiling, she brushed her hand against her watery eye.
“Yep, that's all you’re getting out of me for the week. My quota has officially been filled,” His chest was all puffed out of joking pride and the moment was over, and so was that strange feeling replaced with something more heavy.
“I think we need to look more into this symbol, it’s the only thing that seems to stand out. The group or people behind this must want to be recognized, why else would they leave something to associate themselves with?” Judy asked as she focused back on the mess on the table.
“That would seem reasonable but-” Whatever Nick was about to say got cut off by a sweet voice,
“Hmm, what are you guys looking at that old crest for?” Nick and Judy looked up quickly to the elephant standing beside them. She must have had the softest steps known to mammals as Judy did not notice her enter at all. Said elephant was leaning down and pointing to one of the pictures of the sloppily painted symbol.
“Oh we are just looking over the evidence from last night again. You, um, do you recognize this image from somewhere?” Judy asked quickly, picking up the picture to show her more clearly. Finally something!
“I sure do, that drawing right over there looks like the one from that workhouse fire a little while back. It was a random thing, a whole warehouse burned down in the middle of the night. Seemed like a big deal at the time but the case ended up going cold,” She explained, “This little drawing looks awfully similar to the graffiti found during that case is all, you’d have to check it over yourselves though as I could be misremembering. I may be an elephant but even we make mistakes sometimes,” She chuckled sweetly before blushing, “Oh my, sorry for busting into your conversation like that,” She put a large hand in front of her trunk, cheeks still red.
“No, no, no you are totally fine! Thank you so much, you have been a big help,” Judy hurriedly exclaimed, “Do you think you can point us to where the evidence from that case is stored?”
“Sure, I can, just follow me I'll take you right to it,” and she began to weave through the large shelves before eventually leading them to a random spot near the back. She lifted her trunk and grabbed onto a sorting container from the top to pass it down to them. Nick caught it and held onto it tight while giving the elephant a thumbs up.
“That should be all of it, just come find me if you two need any help with anything,” The two thanked her and headed back to the table.
With a paw on the top of the box, Nick opened it up and pulled out the files from within. He handed her some and started flipping through the ones in his paws. He suddenly stopped before Judy could start going through hers. She was surprised, that sure was quick.
“What, you found something already? Show me, show me!” He grimaced and turned the page over to her which made her face drop as well. It was some sort of form documenting the warehouse's ownership. Said building had apparently belonged to the now infamous Lynxley family.
“Great,” She said through gritted teeth, “Because we didn’t have enough of them before this,”
“It gets worse, that wonky drawing that our arsonist keeps on drawing is definitely supposed to be an image of their family crest,” He then showed her one of the pictures from the file, this one showing the crest in its horrible glory, signed onto a document. A grey silhouette of a lynx side profile surrounded by a circle. Looking at it, she could see the resemblance between the two markings. Seems like she was right about the pointy bits being ears at least. She knew it was familiar somehow!
“Why would the arsonists spray paint the Lynxley family crest at their own warehouse. And why would someone be spray painting it at these new locations? Milton and his oldest kids may have gotten out but Pawbert is still in prison,”
It had been awful to hear that the majority of that family was able to escape serious punishment for their crimes and even Pawbert had gotten less of a sentence due to their family’s immense wealth and influence. It had left her questioning things for a while. What was the point of working so hard for the sake of justice when those who had done horrible things never faced it? All the evidence and witness accounts she gave only to hear that the Lynxley's had managed to get off with minimal charges.
Nick had told her back then that was the kind of power money gave you, the ability to get away with anything. It was a depressing thought, one that would always affect her. As a child, it seemed like everything would go like a story. The good guys saved the day while the evil villains got what they deserved in the end. The real world just doesn’t work like that but it doesn’t mean that she should stop trying. Every person she manages to help makes the struggle worth it.
Leaving that depressing train of thought behind, it left her wondering what the deeper meaning of leaving this mark behind was.
“Do you think that they have something to do with all of this? Even after everything that happened last year”
She put a paw to her chin in thought while Nick stood leaning back on his heels, who spoke up with a grin,
“Who knows? What I do know is that we have found ourselves our lead. Seems like we are in for a little trip to Lynxley Manor,”