The Fire Triangle, A Zootopia Fan-Fiction -- Prologue, Escape From Zoo York

The Fire Triangle, A Zootopia Fanfiction -- Prologue, Chapter 1

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"My greatest pleasure is to choose one's victim, to prepare one's plans minutely, to slake an implacable vengeance, and then to go to bed. There is nothing sweeter in the world."

Joseph Stalin, 1915

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Prologue: 1

Danny Tipperin had never cared much for his underworld nickname—but he understood its value; when you're a relatively small species, a moniker that fairly breathes 'don't mess with me' can be very useful at times.

This, of course, is providing you have the skills to go with it—which you better believe Danny did—and though he couldn't possibly know it, he was less than five minutes away from demonstrating that his street handle was both well-earned and richly deserved.

Danny was a swift fox, a mid-size species as foxes go, standing it at about halfway between a red fox and a fennec fox. Like all of his species, he had fur the color of wheat straw turning to steel gray around the back, and with black highlights dusting the nose and hindquarters. Also typical for a swift-fox he was possessed of a lean, rangy physique, kept rock hard and limber-trim through daily workouts at the local gym. His brown eyes were both sharp and inquisitive.

Unlike most members of The Company, Danny was nobody's flashy dresser, no pinky-ring on his little finger, no gold chains around his neck; his wristwatch was titanium, not platinum. The closest thing to a bauble on his furson in fact was his tie pin—a tiny, golden globe bisected by an anchor.

That was one decoration Danny was more than willing to wear; he'd earned that right, (although usually he went open-collared, instead affixing the pin to his left lapel.)

Today however, was not 'usually'.

"This is a bad idea."

The unbidden thought had been popping into Danny's head ever since he'd awakened that morning. Now it burst in his psyche with such thunderclap clarity, the swift fox actually started in his car seat.

Fortunately he was stopped for a light at the moment and no one else had seen him.

Not that it mattered; both Danny and his reputation were well known to everyone in the Down Under the Mammalhattan Bridge Overpass district, (more commonly known by its acronym;) even if his discomfit had been observed by every animal in the neighborhood, not a single one of them would have even so much as acknowledged it.

Then the light turned green and he moved on.

After five more blocks and a sharp right turn, 'heads up, here's Finagles', as the locals liked to say.

It was a trick of the local topography that the club never came gradually into view. One second it was nowhere to be seen and then there it was, in all its glazed brick glory. Unusual for Zoo York City, the place came with sprawling parking lot, a once-and former cargo dock. It was prime real-estate that empty lot, especially for this part of Barklyn, but no developer in his right mind would dream of making an offer on it—not unless he relished the idea of spending the next three months in a wheelchair.

A Zoo York magazine columnist had once described Finagle's architecture as 'sugar-cubist'; a towering, modernist castle, sheathed entirely in hotel-soap white. Even in daylight with the neon dimmed to a cool ash-gray it was a hard place to miss.

As Danny knew well, those lights would not be coming back on for at least another week...as attested to by the flowing blue-and white banner spanning the front of the building, "Closed For Annual Spring Cleaning."