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Nick Wilde finished the exchange on the radio and put the raspberry pawpsicle back in his parched mouth as Judy drove their custom police car into the heart of Sahara Square.
"So, what happens now?" Judy asked. She hadn't been listening due to the need to put her full attention on the hazardous, winding road that had cost that speeding mouse his life. Her heart ached at the needless death. It was so common it was depressing. Some careless driver chooses to speed off rather than face the fuzz, endangers themselves and everyone on the road, and ultimately someone, the driver, the cops, or the innocent civilians pay the price.
They'd found nothing incriminating in the car wreck or around the scene, leaving the mouse's motive a mystery for the time being. What had been so important that he would put himself and countless others at risk? What could they have done to prevent it?
She wanted to ask Nick, but she already knew his answer; Nothing. They had no way of knowing what the mouse would do. That was why pulling someone over was one of the most hazardous duties a cop could undertake. She and Nick weren't at fault for what happened. As tragic as his death was, the mouse had brought it on himself.
"The big blue cheese wants us back at HQ for briefing, but first there's a domestic disturbance in Savanna Central they want us to check out." Nick said.
"Where?"
"Duke Weasletwit's usual spot. Some yak didn't like being sold a pirated copy of Floatzen."
"And we have to bail him out."
"Yeah. With cuffs."
Judy snorted with laughter at his deadpan response and made the turn on the road that would bring them to City Central. They were passing the Palm Hotel, the crown jewel of Sahara Square, when the radio once again demanded their attention. Nick listened while Judy focused on the road, unwilling to get distracted after what had just happened. She did notice that the voice was Clawhauser's. After a few minutes Nick burst out laughing. "You serious?!"
"Dead serious!" Clawhauser said breathlessly. "The poor mayor peed himself, he was so scared!"
Nick laughed so hard he dropped the pawpsicle on his thigh. "Hahahahoh my god! I wish I could have been there!"
"Hang on, I'll send you a picture." Clawhauser said.
"Peed himself?" Judy said, her ears dropping at the gross image that came to mind. "What're you talking about?"
Nick covered his mouth as he continued to chuckle. "You know how McHorn was sent to check out that situation in the Rainforest District? Well, a spider stowed away on his back and found itself on the mayor's arm. He freaked out so bad he elbowed Bogo in the face! They're not pressing charges since it was an accident, but Clawhauser took the spider into custody. They're still figuring out what to do with it." He retrieved the red ice pop just as his phone buzzed. "Nuts, if you ask me. Sure it sent the Bullpen into anarchy for a few minutes but seriously, it's just an itty bitty..." He stopped speaking when he saw the photo. He looked at it for a full ten seconds and dropped his pawpsicle again. "Oh. Wow."
"What? How big is it? A dollar?" Pale as a ghost, Nick turned the screen towards her.
The car came to a screeching halt. "Yowzas!"
If Bonnie hadn't left her phone back in Bunnyburrow, she would have called Judy and Nick the moment she learned about the money. Instead the only phone the three bunnies had was in Pop-Pop's paws, and he was still adamant that they would not risk revealing the existence of a buried treasure to a fox.
So she stood by and glared daggers at her husband as he found himself taking charge of the ongoing discussion, likely as a result of decades of running a three hundred strong family of rabbits. The group before him was a medley of polar bears, a kudu, an oryx and a mini-fox, but the situation was similar enough that the patriarch had regained a measure of his confidence. He stood tall and firm, holding his ground before the bigger mammals as he spoke.
"... So to recap, this mouse, after crashing and fatally injuring himself, said that there was a large amount of cash in Ripe Carrot Park, which is located in our hometown. This money, if it exists, is supposedly hidden with something called the Blue Goliath, but he started losing his mind before he could tell us exactly what this Blue Goliath is."
"Big and blue would be my best guess." Pronk said.
"Yeah, like the bed which you broke during last night's fight." Bucky muttered, his arms crossed.
Pronk whirled on his partner. "You wanna start again?!"
"No, so shut up!"
"You shut up!"
"You shut up!"
One sharp whack each from Pop-Pop's cane and Finnick's baseball bat put an end to the squabble.
"Anyway, considering the circumstances our best bet would be to assume that this mouse, god rest his soul, was telling the truth." Stu went on. "As a lifelong resident of Bunnyburrow, I know for a fact that the town where the park where the money is located is roughly two hundred and eleven miles away. To prevent any further... reckless driving..." He and the others eyed Raymond and Kevin, who merely snorted. "I suggest that we all drive down at a safe speed, keeping each other in sight of each other. Once we reach Ripe Carrot Park, locate the Blue Goliath and dig up this money, we should share it out in a reasonable and sensible manner."
"And I suggest that we tell the police, as we should have done back at the crash site when our daughter and her partner showed up!" Bonnie said harshly.
"So that fox can run off with six-point-five million bucks?" Pop-Pop retorted. "You're as crazy as Trudy."
"Wait a sec!" Finnick spoke up, his brow furrowing. "You saying something against Nick?"
"What's not to say?" Pop-Pop straightened his bent back so he could properly look down on the small fox. "Nothin' but lost valuables with you lot! Lost bags, lost kids and lost cause! Your red fox stays near Trudy much longer and it'll be lost panties, too!"
Finnick's ear twitched. "Maybe your eyes are as crooked as your back, pal, but in case you haven't noticed my bat is bigger than your cane."
"Alright, that's enough!" Raymond shouted. "Mr. Hopps, how do you suggest reasonably and sensibly sharing this money?"
Stu, transfixed by Pop-Pop's outburst, shook his head and remembered what he was saying before the interruption. "Well, it's just a suggestion, but since there were four vehicles at the scene, we could split it four ways."
Raymond and Kevin exchanged glances. Bucky and Pronk's fingers twitched as they started muttering calculations under their breaths.
"Wait just a carrot picking minute!" Pop-Pop tapped his cane on the cold ground to draw attention. "The rest of us have to split quarters but the midget gets a quarter all to himself?!"
Stu blinked. "Just trying to keep it simple, Pop-Pop."
"No, the coot's right." Kevin said. "That's not as fair as you think it is, Mr. Hopps."
"Yeah, six-point-five million divided by four is..." Bucky poked at the air as he finished his mental mathematics. "One million, six hundred and twenty-five dollars! That would all go to the fox, but the rest of us would only get half or a third of that!"
"Six of us were actually there when the mouse died." Pronk said. "We should split it six ways."
The polar bears grimaced.
"That's an idea. Divided by Six that would be..." Bucky poked at the air again. "One million, eighty-three thousand, three hundred and thirty-three hundred..."
"Point thirty-three." Stu added. "Cents."
Bucky looked the rabbit up and down. "You used your phone, didn't you?"
"Nope. Do you have any idea how many allowances I had to sort out for all my kits?"
"Never mind that, I ain't taking no one million, eighty-three thousand, three hundred and thirty-three hundred dollars and thirty-three cents while you four brutes get double!" Pop-Pop squawked. Said four brutes gave the rabbit filthy looks.
Bonnie groaned and turned to look at the beautifully painted graffiti on the brick wall of the building the car park lay at the base at. Greed did funny things to people.
Finnick snapped his fingers, making them all look at him. "Look, I'm freezing my tail off and so's the juice in my van, so I'm gonna stop you all there and say something."
"What?" Stu asked.
"Have you idiots forgotten the missus and the backwards grandpa? There were eight of us there!" He pointed his bat at the two rabbits. Stu smacked his forehead. "Aw crackers, he's right! I'm sorry Bonnie, I didn't mean to leave you out."
"I didn't want in in the first place." Bonnie replied dryly.
"That would mean eight hundred and twelve thousand bucks each." Bucky said. "I'm okay with that, what about you?" He asked Pronk.
Pronk scratched his horns. "Times two makes million, six hundred and twenty five thousand... That's good enough for me."
Raymond was about to excuse himself to call Mr. Big and ask if he was okay with a quarter of the money for the time being, when Pop-Pop flared up again.
"I agree with you. It's good. Too good to be true!" He eyed Finnick suspiciously, his chin almost touching his cane. "With you on your own, shares for everyone would mean you don't get as much as the rest of us. What're you really up to, fox?"
Finnick bared his teeth. "Old man, I will bite your face off if you don't get your racist crap out of mine!"
Stu rubbed his temple. As much as he didn't like his Pop-Pop being threatened, things could get ugly if he kept up his ranting.
"Shut it, both of you." Kevin must have been thinking something similar. "Eight shares would be the closest we get to being fair."
Pop-Pop's ears went flat. "Don't tell me you're seriously agreeing with the devil's pipsqueak..."
"PIPSQUEAK?!"
POW!
The lid of the empty donut box had a large plastic window to display its delicious contents to potential consumers. It worked wonders on the donut loving Clawhauser, but today the window was displaying a different kind of spectacle.
The cheetah peered through the window, hoping that he wasn't frightening the massive tarantula that was curled up in one corner of the box. Then again it wasn't rearing its front legs and baring its curved, needle like fangs, as it was known to do when threatened, so it was probably just resting. The spider was like a stuffed toy in a way. It was bulky, with bristly hair and eyes Clawhauser knew it had but couldn't see. The hair was a pretty grey colour, Payne's Gray if the cheetah could hazard a guess. He knew tarantulas like this one were typically brown or black with subtle markings, but not a colour like this. It reminded him of something, but he didn't know what.
A click turned his gaze upward. Chief Bogo had just put his desk phone down. Clawhauser frowned in sympathy as he set eyes on the bruise on the buffalo's cheekbone. Mayor Hornbull had left soon after Clawhauser had managed to pluck the spider off his flailing body and put it safely in his donut box, humiliated by his own phobia. While Clawhauser guarded the box and Bogo sent himself to the nurse, a small investigation led by Fangmeyer quickly revealed the chain of events that led to the incident.
Nearly a month ago, Judy and Nick had almost single handedly busted an exotic insect smuggling ring that had recently raided a small insect zoo and stolen several rare bugs to sell on the black market. All of the stolen creepy crawlies had been recovered, except for one particularly rare and valuable giant tarantula. They'd been too late to stop the thieves from selling the spider to the highest bidder... or so they'd thought. As it turned out, the spider had escaped its tank during the police raid and had been living in the Rainforest District for the last three weeks, until one day it found itself on Officer McHorn's broad back. Unaware of his passenger, the rhino finished his business and returned to the Precinct, resulting in chaos within the Bullpen.
Clawhauser giggled. He'd never imagined how much damage one bug could do.
"What did the keeper say?" He asked.
"The missing tarantula matches this one's description. They want it back as soon as possible." Bogo said through gritted teeth.
Clawhauser's big heart ached with sympathy. Between the kidney stone, Chief Iron's attitude and getting hit in the face by a hysterical mayor, Bogo was having a pretty lousy day. "I'm sorry, sir. I should have told someone. I thought I could catch it before the mayor arrived."
"It's alright." Bogo said with a wave of his hoof. "You were just trying to avoid a panic. I would have kept things under wraps myself had I'd known about this. What's more important now is that I find someone to make the five to six hour trip to the zoo."
"Aren't there any officers available?"
Bogo rubbed his brow. "You saw that handful of officers in the Bullpen, right? They were the last available men and I just assigned all of them to the Mousekewitz Case."
Clawhauser raised his eyebrows. He'd fled the Bullpen as soon as he'd caught the spider, so he hadn't witnessed the handing out of the assignments after things calmed down. "I thought Precinct Two had rejected our involvement."
"That was what the mayor came here for. He pulled a few strings and overruled Chief Irons. The bottom line is that we're investigating the circumstances that led to Mousekewitz's death while Precinct Two focuses on the stolen money."
"I don't think Chief Irons liked that."
Bogo harrumphed. "I'd liked to have seen his face. God knows I can do with a laugh right now. I've got enough on my plate without a bloody spider added to the mix..."
Clawhauser looked through the donut box window, watching as the spider within stretched its eight legs and started slowly making its way along the wall of the box. The chief was doing his best to hide it, but the cheetah knew he was suffering physically and emotionally. All this stress wasn't good for him. If only there was something Clawhauser could do to ease his fellow Gazelle lover's burden. Then there was the cargo itself to think about. A donut box was no place for a giant spider, and Forensics didn't have anything big enough to contain it...
His ears perked. He had an idea. "What about me?"
"What's that?" Bogo had been holding his side.
"What if I took the spider to Bunnyburrow?" Clawhauser asked. Bogo looked at the box, his mouth a thin line. "Lately that lady who's training for the night shift has been asking for a chance to prove herself as a Front Desk Officer. If she took over the rest of my shift, I could take the train and be back by late afternoon. I know I'm not a field officer, but you said yourself that there was no-one else who could do it."
Bogo was now tapping his chin with a pen. "It's a very long trip, Clawhauser. You may end up spending the night."
"Sir, please. I can do this, and you know the little guy can't stay here for very long. Not without an expert who knows how to take care of him."
Bogo sighed. Clawhauser was right and he knew it. He just didn't like the idea of his sweetheart of a Front Desk Officer travelling hundreds of miles with a valuable cargo that a lot of people wouldn't mind slitting a throat or two to possess. On the other hand, he wanted the troublesome arachnid off his hooves as soon as possible.
"Firstly, you are not taking the train." He said after a deep sigh. "A heavy enough crowd could wind up killing the spider. Take an unmarked car instead. Second, you are to first return home and change into civilian clothing so you are less likely to draw attention. I may sound overly cautious, but that spider is of high value and if some scumbag notices..."
Clawhauser nodded, at the same time smiling at his proposition being accepted. "I understand, sir. I'll keep him in the box so it'll be hard for people to see him."
"Good. I'll contact Officer Knightfall about taking over your shift. You get that wretched bug out of my sight before it wreaks more havoc in my precinct."
"Yes, sir! I promise I won't let you down!" The beaming Clawhauser saluted his boss, gently picked up the box and left to begin his journey.
Bogo watched him go before downing another glass of cranberry and picking up the phone to contact the trainee. Then perhaps he could catch a few minutes of rest before he received an update on the situation in Tundratown.
Maybe it was nothing. Maybe those eight people were discussing something other than Mousekewitz's death. Anything was conjecture at this point. All Bogo could do was wait. Wait and hope that with Clawhauser taking charge of the spider situation, the day would start to get easier.
One of the perks of tiny paws was that it took Finnick less than three seconds to form a snowball and toss it in Pop-Pop's face. The aged and angry rabbit still had little bits of snow that stood out like dandruff on his grey fur.
Stu scribbled on a little notebook, gears churning in his skull, painfully aware of the steadily rising tension within the group. Since getting snowballed Pop-Pop's mood had grown darker than ever, and in the thirty or forty-five minutes since then he'd made three more anti-fox remarks, shut down five ways of figuring the shares, mistook Bucky for Gazelle's deformed and disowned cousin who didn't exist, asked for the Taser to use on the polar bears if they so much as bared their teeth, and dropped his false teeth on Kevin's foot. If this latest method didn't work, there wouldn't be much Stu could do to prevent tempers from exploding.
"Okay this time, we're doing shares for everyone and for everything." He said, trying to keep from sounding too desperate. "First there were eight of us at the scene, so that makes eight shares. Then there were four vehicles, so that makes eight shares, adding to eight to make twelve. Then six of us went down to the wreck, so that adds to twelve to make eighteen shares. Then, we add shares for the number of people for each car. That means three for us, one for Mr. Finnick, two for the Oryx-Antlersons and two for the bears. That gives us a total of twenty-six shares. We divide six million, five hundred thousand by twenty-six to make one share equal to two hundred and fifty thousand dollars!" He pointed the pen to Finnick. "First off, Mr. Finnick, you will get one share for being at the scene, one share for your van, one share for going down to the wreck, and one share for being someone in the van!" He redid his sums on the notepad to make sure they were correct. "That gives you four shares and a grand total of one million bucks!"
"Yeah, yeah, I just wanna get out of this frozen slum." Finnick said. His ears had been flat since Pop-Pop's quip about his size.
"If it were up to me, you'd be out of this affair period!" Pop-Pop had indeed suggested several figuring methods that involved cutting Finnick out completely. Even Bonnie had stepped in to shut them down before going back to smoldering in silence and wishing there was a payphone nearby.
"Pop-Pop, why the crackers are you still complaining?" Stu moaned. "The rest of us are getting a lot more than he is! Them over there, the bears are getting one million, seven hundred and fifty thousand dollars, and them, the Oryx-Antlersons are getting the same. As for we, us, we're getting-"
"Yes, yes, I can do my own multiplying." Pop-Pop retorted. "Three shares for three of us at the scene, one share for our truck, one share for going to the wreck and three shares for being three mammals in the truck!" His scowl deepened at that last one. "That makes two million dollars, which Trudy's 'partner' is sure to nick the first chance he gets! I'm not going to agree to this until you call her right now and make her give that punk the boot!"
"Pop-Pop, you know why we can't do that!" Bonnie snapped.
"Come on, old man, I'm always up for a good spat but this is going too far!" Pronk said.
"Give him the boot, and send this small fry chomper packin' too! Those are my terms!"
"One more crack from you, old fart-" Finnick growled.
"With all due respect, he has as much right to a share as the rest of us." Stu said, trying to be civil. "It's not right to cut him out. That's not what a Hopps would do."
"I knew it. The devil got to you."
"Pop-Pop-"
"ENOUGH!" Raymond roared, startling them all. "We've been here an hour and we're getting nowhere! If we don't figure something out in the next thirty seconds, we're gone!"
"For freakin' god's sake, there were eight of us there so that simply means eight shares!" Finnick exclaimed. "One for me, three for you..."
"You're not fooling me, fox! For the last time, be quiet and respect your elders!"
"You need to respect people period!"
"Your kind aren't people! I'd better respect those ugly white brutes than you foxes any day!"
"Right, that's it!" Kevin finally shouted. "Come on, Raymond, let's go!"
Stu's heart and ears sank like stones. "Mr., please don't make a scene-"
Kevin silenced him with deadly glare. "Look! We have figured this twenty-three different ways, and every time we figured it, it was no good, because no matter how we figured it, someone didn't like the way we figured it!" He turned his glare to Pop-Pop. "So now, there is only way to figure it, and that is every mammal... including the old fart... for himself!"
"So good luck and may the best mammal win!" Raymond spat. "Except for you, old man... you can just drop dead!"
"Finally, something we can agree on!' Bucky cried.
"Wait, wait, wait, please!" Stu stammered, stepping into the middle of the group. "Please be reasonable. If we all just calm own I'm sure we'll think of something. There's enough money for all of us, isn't there?" Even as he spoke he could see they were barely listening. At that moment every one of them were predators, tensed and poised to take off for the same quarry that resided over two hundred miles away on the edge of Bunnyburrow. The truce they had formed in the parking lot had shattered. "There's enough for us... and enough for you... and for you two... and for... for..." He trailed off. They were all inching towards their vehicles. "For... for... Oh, applesauce!"
And then they were off.

Description

Nick Wilde finished the exchange on the radio and put the raspberry pawpsicle back in his parched mouth as Judy drove their custom police car into the heart of Sahara Square.
"So, what happens now?" Judy asked. She hadn't been listening due to the need to put her full attention on the hazardous, winding road that had cost that speeding mouse his life. Her heart ached at the needless death. It was so common it was depressing. Some careless driver chooses to speed off rather than face the fuzz, endangers themselves and everyone on the road, and ultimately someone, the driver, the cops, or the innocent civilians pay the price.
They'd found nothing incriminating in the car wreck or around the scene, leaving the mouse's motive a mystery for the time being. What had been so important that he would put himself and countless others at risk? What could they have done to prevent it?
She wanted to ask Nick, but she already knew his answer; Nothing. They had no way of knowing what the mouse would do. That was why pulling someone over was one of the most hazardous duties a cop could undertake. She and Nick weren't at fault for what happened. As tragic as his death was, the mouse had brought it on himself.
"The big blue cheese wants us back at HQ for briefing, but first there's a domestic disturbance in Savanna Central they want us to check out." Nick said.
"Where?"
"Duke Weasletwit's usual spot. Some yak didn't like being sold a pirated copy of Floatzen."
"And we have to bail him out."
"Yeah. With cuffs."
Judy snorted with laughter at his deadpan response and made the turn on the road that would bring them to City Central. They were passing the Palm Hotel, the crown jewel of Sahara Square, when the radio once again demanded their attention. Nick listened while Judy focused on the road, unwilling to get distracted after what had just happened. She did notice that the voice was Clawhauser's. After a few minutes Nick burst out laughing. "You serious?!"
"Dead serious!" Clawhauser said breathlessly. "The poor mayor peed himself, he was so scared!"
Nick laughed so hard he dropped the pawpsicle on his thigh. "Hahahahoh my god! I wish I could have been there!"
"Hang on, I'll send you a picture." Clawhauser said.
"Peed himself?" Judy said, her ears dropping at the gross image that came to mind. "What're you talking about?"
Nick covered his mouth as he continued to chuckle. "You know how McHorn was sent to check out that situation in the Rainforest District? Well, a spider stowed away on his back and found itself on the mayor's arm. He freaked out so bad he elbowed Bogo in the face! They're not pressing charges since it was an accident, but Clawhauser took the spider into custody. They're still figuring out what to do with it." He retrieved the red ice pop just as his phone buzzed. "Nuts, if you ask me. Sure it sent the Bullpen into anarchy for a few minutes but seriously, it's just an itty bitty..." He stopped speaking when he saw the photo. He looked at it for a full ten seconds and dropped his pawpsicle again. "Oh. Wow."
"What? How big is it? A dollar?" Pale as a ghost, Nick turned the screen towards her.
The car came to a screeching halt. "Yowzas!"
If Bonnie hadn't left her phone back in Bunnyburrow, she would have called Judy and Nick the moment she learned about the money. Instead the only phone the three bunnies had was in Pop-Pop's paws, and he was still adamant that they would not risk revealing the existence of a buried treasure to a fox.
So she stood by and glared daggers at her husband as he found himself taking charge of the ongoing discussion, likely as a result of decades of running a three hundred strong family of rabbits. The group before him was a medley of polar bears, a kudu, an oryx and a mini-fox, but the situation was similar enough that the patriarch had regained a measure of his confidence. He stood tall and firm, holding his ground before the bigger mammals as he spoke.
"... So to recap, this mouse, after crashing and fatally injuring himself, said that there was a large amount of cash in Ripe Carrot Park, which is located in our hometown. This money, if it exists, is supposedly hidden with something called the Blue Goliath, but he started losing his mind before he could tell us exactly what this Blue Goliath is."
"Big and blue would be my best guess." Pronk said.
"Yeah, like the bed which you broke during last night's fight." Bucky muttered, his arms crossed.
Pronk whirled on his partner. "You wanna start again?!"
"No, so shut up!"
"You shut up!"
"You shut up!"
One sharp whack each from Pop-Pop's cane and Finnick's baseball bat put an end to the squabble.
"Anyway, considering the circumstances our best bet would be to assume that this mouse, god rest his soul, was telling the truth." Stu went on. "As a lifelong resident of Bunnyburrow, I know for a fact that the town where the park where the money is located is roughly two hundred and eleven miles away. To prevent any further... reckless driving..." He and the others eyed Raymond and Kevin, who merely snorted. "I suggest that we all drive down at a safe speed, keeping each other in sight of each other. Once we reach Ripe Carrot Park, locate the Blue Goliath and dig up this money, we should share it out in a reasonable and sensible manner."
"And I suggest that we tell the police, as we should have done back at the crash site when our daughter and her partner showed up!" Bonnie said harshly.
"So that fox can run off with six-point-five million bucks?" Pop-Pop retorted. "You're as crazy as Trudy."
"Wait a sec!" Finnick spoke up, his brow furrowing. "You saying something against Nick?"
"What's not to say?" Pop-Pop straightened his bent back so he could properly look down on the small fox. "Nothin' but lost valuables with you lot! Lost bags, lost kids and lost cause! Your red fox stays near Trudy much longer and it'll be lost panties, too!"
Finnick's ear twitched. "Maybe your eyes are as crooked as your back, pal, but in case you haven't noticed my bat is bigger than your cane."
"Alright, that's enough!" Raymond shouted. "Mr. Hopps, how do you suggest reasonably and sensibly sharing this money?"
Stu, transfixed by Pop-Pop's outburst, shook his head and remembered what he was saying before the interruption. "Well, it's just a suggestion, but since there were four vehicles at the scene, we could split it four ways."
Raymond and Kevin exchanged glances. Bucky and Pronk's fingers twitched as they started muttering calculations under their breaths.
"Wait just a carrot picking minute!" Pop-Pop tapped his cane on the cold ground to draw attention. "The rest of us have to split quarters but the midget gets a quarter all to himself?!"
Stu blinked. "Just trying to keep it simple, Pop-Pop."
"No, the coot's right." Kevin said. "That's not as fair as you think it is, Mr. Hopps."
"Yeah, six-point-five million divided by four is..." Bucky poked at the air as he finished his mental mathematics. "One million, six hundred and twenty-five dollars! That would all go to the fox, but the rest of us would only get half or a third of that!"
"Six of us were actually there when the mouse died." Pronk said. "We should split it six ways."
The polar bears grimaced.
"That's an idea. Divided by Six that would be..." Bucky poked at the air again. "One million, eighty-three thousand, three hundred and thirty-three hundred..."
"Point thirty-three." Stu added. "Cents."
Bucky looked the rabbit up and down. "You used your phone, didn't you?"
"Nope. Do you have any idea how many allowances I had to sort out for all my kits?"
"Never mind that, I ain't taking no one million, eighty-three thousand, three hundred and thirty-three hundred dollars and thirty-three cents while you four brutes get double!" Pop-Pop squawked. Said four brutes gave the rabbit filthy looks.
Bonnie groaned and turned to look at the beautifully painted graffiti on the brick wall of the building the car park lay at the base at. Greed did funny things to people.
Finnick snapped his fingers, making them all look at him. "Look, I'm freezing my tail off and so's the juice in my van, so I'm gonna stop you all there and say something."
"What?" Stu asked.
"Have you idiots forgotten the missus and the backwards grandpa? There were eight of us there!" He pointed his bat at the two rabbits. Stu smacked his forehead. "Aw crackers, he's right! I'm sorry Bonnie, I didn't mean to leave you out."
"I didn't want in in the first place." Bonnie replied dryly.
"That would mean eight hundred and twelve thousand bucks each." Bucky said. "I'm okay with that, what about you?" He asked Pronk.
Pronk scratched his horns. "Times two makes million, six hundred and twenty five thousand... That's good enough for me."
Raymond was about to excuse himself to call Mr. Big and ask if he was okay with a quarter of the money for the time being, when Pop-Pop flared up again.
"I agree with you. It's good. Too good to be true!" He eyed Finnick suspiciously, his chin almost touching his cane. "With you on your own, shares for everyone would mean you don't get as much as the rest of us. What're you really up to, fox?"
Finnick bared his teeth. "Old man, I will bite your face off if you don't get your racist crap out of mine!"
Stu rubbed his temple. As much as he didn't like his Pop-Pop being threatened, things could get ugly if he kept up his ranting.
"Shut it, both of you." Kevin must have been thinking something similar. "Eight shares would be the closest we get to being fair."
Pop-Pop's ears went flat. "Don't tell me you're seriously agreeing with the devil's pipsqueak..."
"PIPSQUEAK?!"
POW!
The lid of the empty donut box had a large plastic window to display its delicious contents to potential consumers. It worked wonders on the donut loving Clawhauser, but today the window was displaying a different kind of spectacle.
The cheetah peered through the window, hoping that he wasn't frightening the massive tarantula that was curled up in one corner of the box. Then again it wasn't rearing its front legs and baring its curved, needle like fangs, as it was known to do when threatened, so it was probably just resting. The spider was like a stuffed toy in a way. It was bulky, with bristly hair and eyes Clawhauser knew it had but couldn't see. The hair was a pretty grey colour, Payne's Gray if the cheetah could hazard a guess. He knew tarantulas like this one were typically brown or black with subtle markings, but not a colour like this. It reminded him of something, but he didn't know what.
A click turned his gaze upward. Chief Bogo had just put his desk phone down. Clawhauser frowned in sympathy as he set eyes on the bruise on the buffalo's cheekbone. Mayor Hornbull had left soon after Clawhauser had managed to pluck the spider off his flailing body and put it safely in his donut box, humiliated by his own phobia. While Clawhauser guarded the box and Bogo sent himself to the nurse, a small investigation led by Fangmeyer quickly revealed the chain of events that led to the incident.
Nearly a month ago, Judy and Nick had almost single handedly busted an exotic insect smuggling ring that had recently raided a small insect zoo and stolen several rare bugs to sell on the black market. All of the stolen creepy crawlies had been recovered, except for one particularly rare and valuable giant tarantula. They'd been too late to stop the thieves from selling the spider to the highest bidder... or so they'd thought. As it turned out, the spider had escaped its tank during the police raid and had been living in the Rainforest District for the last three weeks, until one day it found itself on Officer McHorn's broad back. Unaware of his passenger, the rhino finished his business and returned to the Precinct, resulting in chaos within the Bullpen.
Clawhauser giggled. He'd never imagined how much damage one bug could do.
"What did the keeper say?" He asked.
"The missing tarantula matches this one's description. They want it back as soon as possible." Bogo said through gritted teeth.
Clawhauser's big heart ached with sympathy. Between the kidney stone, Chief Iron's attitude and getting hit in the face by a hysterical mayor, Bogo was having a pretty lousy day. "I'm sorry, sir. I should have told someone. I thought I could catch it before the mayor arrived."
"It's alright." Bogo said with a wave of his hoof. "You were just trying to avoid a panic. I would have kept things under wraps myself had I'd known about this. What's more important now is that I find someone to make the five to six hour trip to the zoo."
"Aren't there any officers available?"
Bogo rubbed his brow. "You saw that handful of officers in the Bullpen, right? They were the last available men and I just assigned all of them to the Mousekewitz Case."
Clawhauser raised his eyebrows. He'd fled the Bullpen as soon as he'd caught the spider, so he hadn't witnessed the handing out of the assignments after things calmed down. "I thought Precinct Two had rejected our involvement."
"That was what the mayor came here for. He pulled a few strings and overruled Chief Irons. The bottom line is that we're investigating the circumstances that led to Mousekewitz's death while Precinct Two focuses on the stolen money."
"I don't think Chief Irons liked that."
Bogo harrumphed. "I'd liked to have seen his face. God knows I can do with a laugh right now. I've got enough on my plate without a bloody spider added to the mix..."
Clawhauser looked through the donut box window, watching as the spider within stretched its eight legs and started slowly making its way along the wall of the box. The chief was doing his best to hide it, but the cheetah knew he was suffering physically and emotionally. All this stress wasn't good for him. If only there was something Clawhauser could do to ease his fellow Gazelle lover's burden. Then there was the cargo itself to think about. A donut box was no place for a giant spider, and Forensics didn't have anything big enough to contain it...
His ears perked. He had an idea. "What about me?"
"What's that?" Bogo had been holding his side.
"What if I took the spider to Bunnyburrow?" Clawhauser asked. Bogo looked at the box, his mouth a thin line. "Lately that lady who's training for the night shift has been asking for a chance to prove herself as a Front Desk Officer. If she took over the rest of my shift, I could take the train and be back by late afternoon. I know I'm not a field officer, but you said yourself that there was no-one else who could do it."
Bogo was now tapping his chin with a pen. "It's a very long trip, Clawhauser. You may end up spending the night."
"Sir, please. I can do this, and you know the little guy can't stay here for very long. Not without an expert who knows how to take care of him."
Bogo sighed. Clawhauser was right and he knew it. He just didn't like the idea of his sweetheart of a Front Desk Officer travelling hundreds of miles with a valuable cargo that a lot of people wouldn't mind slitting a throat or two to possess. On the other hand, he wanted the troublesome arachnid off his hooves as soon as possible.
"Firstly, you are not taking the train." He said after a deep sigh. "A heavy enough crowd could wind up killing the spider. Take an unmarked car instead. Second, you are to first return home and change into civilian clothing so you are less likely to draw attention. I may sound overly cautious, but that spider is of high value and if some scumbag notices..."
Clawhauser nodded, at the same time smiling at his proposition being accepted. "I understand, sir. I'll keep him in the box so it'll be hard for people to see him."
"Good. I'll contact Officer Knightfall about taking over your shift. You get that wretched bug out of my sight before it wreaks more havoc in my precinct."
"Yes, sir! I promise I won't let you down!" The beaming Clawhauser saluted his boss, gently picked up the box and left to begin his journey.
Bogo watched him go before downing another glass of cranberry and picking up the phone to contact the trainee. Then perhaps he could catch a few minutes of rest before he received an update on the situation in Tundratown.
Maybe it was nothing. Maybe those eight people were discussing something other than Mousekewitz's death. Anything was conjecture at this point. All Bogo could do was wait. Wait and hope that with Clawhauser taking charge of the spider situation, the day would start to get easier.
One of the perks of tiny paws was that it took Finnick less than three seconds to form a snowball and toss it in Pop-Pop's face. The aged and angry rabbit still had little bits of snow that stood out like dandruff on his grey fur.
Stu scribbled on a little notebook, gears churning in his skull, painfully aware of the steadily rising tension within the group. Since getting snowballed Pop-Pop's mood had grown darker than ever, and in the thirty or forty-five minutes since then he'd made three more anti-fox remarks, shut down five ways of figuring the shares, mistook Bucky for Gazelle's deformed and disowned cousin who didn't exist, asked for the Taser to use on the polar bears if they so much as bared their teeth, and dropped his false teeth on Kevin's foot. If this latest method didn't work, there wouldn't be much Stu could do to prevent tempers from exploding.
"Okay this time, we're doing shares for everyone and for everything." He said, trying to keep from sounding too desperate. "First there were eight of us at the scene, so that makes eight shares. Then there were four vehicles, so that makes eight shares, adding to eight to make twelve. Then six of us went down to the wreck, so that adds to twelve to make eighteen shares. Then, we add shares for the number of people for each car. That means three for us, one for Mr. Finnick, two for the Oryx-Antlersons and two for the bears. That gives us a total of twenty-six shares. We divide six million, five hundred thousand by twenty-six to make one share equal to two hundred and fifty thousand dollars!" He pointed the pen to Finnick. "First off, Mr. Finnick, you will get one share for being at the scene, one share for your van, one share for going down to the wreck, and one share for being someone in the van!" He redid his sums on the notepad to make sure they were correct. "That gives you four shares and a grand total of one million bucks!"
"Yeah, yeah, I just wanna get out of this frozen slum." Finnick said. His ears had been flat since Pop-Pop's quip about his size.
"If it were up to me, you'd be out of this affair period!" Pop-Pop had indeed suggested several figuring methods that involved cutting Finnick out completely. Even Bonnie had stepped in to shut them down before going back to smoldering in silence and wishing there was a payphone nearby.
"Pop-Pop, why the crackers are you still complaining?" Stu moaned. "The rest of us are getting a lot more than he is! Them over there, the bears are getting one million, seven hundred and fifty thousand dollars, and them, the Oryx-Antlersons are getting the same. As for we, us, we're getting-"
"Yes, yes, I can do my own multiplying." Pop-Pop retorted. "Three shares for three of us at the scene, one share for our truck, one share for going to the wreck and three shares for being three mammals in the truck!" His scowl deepened at that last one. "That makes two million dollars, which Trudy's 'partner' is sure to nick the first chance he gets! I'm not going to agree to this until you call her right now and make her give that punk the boot!"
"Pop-Pop, you know why we can't do that!" Bonnie snapped.
"Come on, old man, I'm always up for a good spat but this is going too far!" Pronk said.
"Give him the boot, and send this small fry chomper packin' too! Those are my terms!"
"One more crack from you, old fart-" Finnick growled.
"With all due respect, he has as much right to a share as the rest of us." Stu said, trying to be civil. "It's not right to cut him out. That's not what a Hopps would do."
"I knew it. The devil got to you."
"Pop-Pop-"
"ENOUGH!" Raymond roared, startling them all. "We've been here an hour and we're getting nowhere! If we don't figure something out in the next thirty seconds, we're gone!"
"For freakin' god's sake, there were eight of us there so that simply means eight shares!" Finnick exclaimed. "One for me, three for you..."
"You're not fooling me, fox! For the last time, be quiet and respect your elders!"
"You need to respect people period!"
"Your kind aren't people! I'd better respect those ugly white brutes than you foxes any day!"
"Right, that's it!" Kevin finally shouted. "Come on, Raymond, let's go!"
Stu's heart and ears sank like stones. "Mr., please don't make a scene-"
Kevin silenced him with deadly glare. "Look! We have figured this twenty-three different ways, and every time we figured it, it was no good, because no matter how we figured it, someone didn't like the way we figured it!" He turned his glare to Pop-Pop. "So now, there is only way to figure it, and that is every mammal... including the old fart... for himself!"
"So good luck and may the best mammal win!" Raymond spat. "Except for you, old man... you can just drop dead!"
"Finally, something we can agree on!' Bucky cried.
"Wait, wait, wait, please!" Stu stammered, stepping into the middle of the group. "Please be reasonable. If we all just calm own I'm sure we'll think of something. There's enough money for all of us, isn't there?" Even as he spoke he could see they were barely listening. At that moment every one of them were predators, tensed and poised to take off for the same quarry that resided over two hundred miles away on the edge of Bunnyburrow. The truce they had formed in the parking lot had shattered. "There's enough for us... and enough for you... and for you two... and for... for..." He trailed off. They were all inching towards their vehicles. "For... for... Oh, applesauce!"
And then they were off.