The Time Traveler's Guide to Zootopia

Chapter 42: The Final Showdown...

***

(One Small Favor: Part 4/5)

***

All those favors have led to this moment...

As I ventured further into the climate wall, walking through the narrow service tunnel and taking a sharp right, the natural light quickly faded until it was nothing but darkness. The overhead lightbulbs were either broken or missing in various places, almost as if they were purposefully destroyed. It was hard to see a thing. The only exception was the muzzle flash from my gun as I fired a couple of rounds to break the latches off another sealed door at the end of the corridor. After that, it was just me and my flashlight.

Significant time passed as I wandered through the vast network of empty hallways and rusty catwalks. Tools, workbenches, and deprecated control stations sat frozen in time, collecting dust and dating back many generations. One of the shriveled calendars on a nearby bulletin board was outdated by more than three decades.

I went up another flight of stairs and continued down another service tunnel.

There was no sign of anyone.

Water droplets trickled down the concrete walls from the ceiling above, and air pipes vibrated with a series of quiet hisses, rattles, and pops. I crept down the tunnel, keeping my gun aimed just in case. I had been walking for a while when I finally reached the exit, but there was no light at the end of the tunnel... only more darkness.

As I emerged from the service tunnel, I came upon a massive chamber. My footsteps echoed in the distance, signifying this new area's vastness. It was a lot to take in. My head pivoted in every direction. Heavy machinery could be heard a few hundred meters below, above, and around the catwalk. It had the strangest intricate industrial design I had ever seen—nothing technologically advanced but something far more sophisticated than a pocket watch mechanism. It felt like being inside a subway, a factory, and a warehouse simultaneously.

I didn't really know how else to describe it.

The USG Ishimura ship's interior with a Disney edition makeover? That didn't make much sense... but neither did this place.

As I continued along the endless catwalk, moving between the two hydroelectric generators suspended from the ceiling, I noticed something peculiar about the metal railings. I could feel it in my hands.

I pointed my flashlight to get a better look.

The catwalk railings were bright yellow—likely per industrial safety standards—but they also had golden pieces of thin wire wrapped around them, like vines growing up a tree. It was actually real gold based on its malleable texture. The golden wires stretched in both directions along the catwalk, interwoven with its metal surfaces and connecting to the climate wall's various machinery, equipment, and mechanisms in an organized web-like structure.

Based on all the modern scaffolding surrounding the climate wall's interior support beams and reinforced pillars, someone had recently placed the golden wires with moderate precision. But for what purpose?

As I knelt down on the floor to inspect the golden wires leading under a dusty control console with dimly lit buttons, I felt a metallic object press firmly against the back of my head.

"Drop what you're doing, and put your paws up," a gruff voice behind me threatened.

I immediately turned around... only to feel a second gun barrel pointed directly at my forehead.

"Don't move," a second voice said, moving in closer.

There were two razorbacks, both armed with long tranquilizer guns. Each wore heavy SWAT armor, extra dart ammunition on a tactical belt, and highly modified ZPD gear. Someone got an upgrade.

Per my battle instincts, I reached for the rifle slung over my back, only to get smacked upside the head by a third mammal who came out of nowhere.

"Drop the weapon too, or—whatever that thing is—or we'll drop you faster than a drunk cheetah on a dirt bike," he ordered, activating his high-intensity flashlight.

We all took aim at each other. The razorbacks surrounded me on each side of the catwalk—two on one end, two on the other. I was outnumbered four-to-one.

"How'd you get in here?" they demanded.

I didn't answer. I figured my gun could do the talking. After all, the odds were somewhat likable. I could probably take them on.

But then I looked up and saw a dozen more razorbacks standing on the upper scaffolding platforms and taking aim. Each had a long tranquilizer gun loaded and ready, like knights armed with crossbows to protect a castle wall—or, in this case, a climate wall. There were six on one side of the room and six on the other. In sum, I was now outnumbered sixteen-to-one.

I didn't like those odds anymore.

As a result, I lowered my rifle, not wanting to take any chances of being tranquilized, especially when there was zero cover to hide behind.

"Well, well, well... look who it is," a larger razorback came forward, carrying a set of metal restraints. "If it isn't Mr. Cherry Blossom himself. Literally in the flesh. More so than ever before," he took a brief moment to inspect me. "I love your new look, by the way. Imagine how much easier it'll be for us to peel you apart, piece by piece."

"Enough. Where's the girl?" I demanded, clenching my fist.

He laughed. "Oh, you mean Penny? That frightened little jackal girl? I wouldn't worry too much about her. She'll probably be outliving you tonight... once our work here is done. Once we're through with you."

I angrily aimed at his forehead, lightly pressing against the trigger.

"Wouldn't do that if I were you, human," he waved his hoof mockingly, grinning proudly. "We've got you completely surrounded."

"No shit," I sighed, setting my rifle on the ground.

Cued by his glance, two razorbacks struck my neck with their batons, causing me to fall to my knees and clutch onto myself.

"And you must understand," he continued. "You are no longer in control here. We are. Us razorbacks," he gestured to everyone in the room. "Zootopia is officially... under our control."

I glanced upward. "Go to hell."

That earned me another bash in the head. Then they took another baton swing just for the hell of it, right before jamming a high-voltage taser into my neck. Why not hit me again just in case I didn't feel it? That's exactly what they did.

While I was on the floor, writhing in pain, one of the razorbacks came over to search me. Then, one by one, they confiscated my ammo, tools, and supplies, which greatly irritated me beyond measure with each passing second.

The larger razorback knelt down to my level as they continued looting me, keeping their tasers aimed.

"Did you honestly think you could sabotage our entire operation? Our grand vision of the future?" he scoffed, cocking his head slightly to the side. "There's more going on here than you can ever imagine, human—more than you could possibly understand," he paused, staring intently around the room in wonder. "But, no matter, our boss Tusk will be thrilled when he knows we've captured the human intruder. We'll see what kind of death he has in store for you," he turned to his buddies and nodded with a smile. "Take him away."

As they prepared to put cuffs on me and remove my 9mm pistol from its holster, I twisted out of the razorback's tight grip, "Argh!" and flung him over the catwalk railing. I was too prideful to be taken in.

"Restrain him!"

I threw multiple punches, fighting my way to get past the razorbacks.

However, my efforts quickly proved futile as my body got bashed by multiple riot shields, front and back. Most of my punches were successfully blocked. Bare skin against solid metal? Things weren't the same anymore.

I fell to the floor again, barely holding onto the railing to keep myself upright as we got into a violent struggle.

"Keep him down!"

"Don't let him get up!"

Unfortunately, the razorbacks immediately overpowered me, restraining my head and arms until I was immobilized. Meanwhile, the larger razorback took out his spiked baseball bat and got himself into position. Those sharp rusty nails gave me painful flashbacks.

"Back away!" he ordered his hench mammals. "I will deal with this human scum myself."

The other razorbacks did as instructed and loosened their grip on me, albeit with much hesitation.

"Your move?" I asked, surprised that he would engage in a more honorable fight.

He scoffed, shaking his head. "Ha! I'm just kidding. Everybody shoot this fool."

Per his orders, they all raised their long tranquilizer guns and took aim at me. Everyone, including the razorbacks on the upper scaffoldings, loaded their darts. That bastard was just toying with me.

"Aw, shit." I cursed under my breath.

As they prepared to pull their triggers like a firing squad, one of the razorbacks suddenly fell from the upper scaffoldings, seemingly out of nowhere. The mammal's unconscious body plopped right down in front of us, completely immobilized.

"Huh? What the?" the larger razorback flinched as a random tranquilizer dart went straight into his neck, making him twitch and jolt before he collapsed.

The razorbacks and I stared at each other awkwardly, utterly confused.

Then, one by one, the razorbacks started dropping like flies all around the room. From the upper scaffolding to the catwalk, the mammals were collapsing on all sides. The room grew increasingly darker as flashlights were turned off with each mammal being knocked out. Eventually, all the razorbacks were taken down, each with a tranquilizer dart in its neck, with a sleek stabilizer design I'd never seen before. I was the last one standing.

"What... the hell?" I scanned the environment, not seeing anyone. The entire room was pitch black.

Having a bad feeling about this, I walked up to one of the razorback's limp bodies and picked up my rifle. I activated my tactical flashlight and aimed.

"Who's there?" I asked, keeping my head on a swivel.

No one responded. No one could be seen. All I heard were footsteps rapidly getting closer and closer. I fired a couple of rounds to scare them off. They briefly stopped, waited, and started moving again. That was when I saw two animal figures moving in the shadows.

From their direction, a tranquilizer dart whizzed through the air into my vambrace, barely missing the skin.

As I took aim at them, I suddenly felt a hard kick to my face, which made me drop my gun. Damnit. Resorting to my pistol, I turned to see who it could possibly be.

They were moving swiftly together and united as a team. I saw their shadows again for a split second, albeit with a bit more clarity, and I couldn't believe it.

A bunny... and a fox?

Before fully registering the quirky reality, I received another swift kick to the face, almost dropping my pistol, yet unable to fire it due to an unlucky slide jam. Good hell. Since when did Nick become so agile?

I heard the duo land behind me, and I was done playing around. Hence, I pulled out my boot knife and did a whole 180-degree pivot turn to face them directly.

What I saw next took me by surprise.

Turns out, it wasn't Judy or Nick.

It was a male jackrabbit and a female arctic fox... both with their tranquilizer guns trained on me. Their pistols appeared to have a prototype semi-auto firing mechanism instead of the traditional single-shot, which was an extremely rare upgrade, especially in Zootopia.

The male jackrabbit had silver fur, black stripes on his ears and cheeks, light blue eyes, a white dress shirt, and a black suit. Meanwhile, the arctic fox had a white fur coat, soft blue-purple eyes, and a royal blue dress.

It was like an inverted Nick and Judy. Even the genders were swapped, which only tends to happen in woke movies.

I lowered my knife slightly. "Who the hell are you guys?"

***

The jackrabbit had a careful look on his face, whereas the fox had a sly smirk on her's. Some things don't change between species. They briefly looked at each other, nodded, and then lowered their weapons.

"I am agent Jack Savage," he presented himself before turning to the vixen. "And this is my partner, Skye Winter."

I almost snorted with laughter at their names.

"And it's an honor to finally meet you, Mr. Chenry," she said with a wink. "We work for the ZBI."

"ZBI?" I came to a realization. "You're the task force?"

The fox proudly smirked. "Yep, that's us."

The jackrabbit nodded. "We have been tracking down the razorback's whereabouts for quite some time. We had just received intel on their new hideout, which is said to be situated inside these climate walls. We've been trying to gain access for many days, only to find everything sealed off from the inside; air vents, shafts, mining tunnels, everything. Thankfully, our satellites picked up on the door you just opened—however you opened it—and now, here we are. Zootopia's in danger, and we are here to put an end to the razorback's grand scheme before it's too late."

"I see..." I said, collecting all my dropped weapons and gear from the razorbacks' unconscious bodies. It was all a mess, but I eventually got everything back in order and loaded up again.

The three of us began walking down the catwalk together.

"Sooo, what brings you in here?" Skye asked, giving me a skeptical glance. "You look like you're geared up for some kind of turf war or something. Oh, look," she plucked a tranquilizer dart she found lodged into my forearm guard. "I almost got you back there, didn't I?"

"I'm here for the missing girl," I showed them Penny's paper document. "The razorbacks have taken her."

"Aww, the poor thing..." Skye's ears drooped as she placed a paw over her chest. "She's adorable."

"Then we should work together," Jack suggested, crossing his arms. "If we can get to the razorback's hideout in time, we can stop them once and for all and save the girl. The place will be well guarded."

"And we can use the extra muscle," Skye added with a gesture. "After all, we tried to recruit you back at the police academy... Buuut you actively avoided us. We really could've used you in our last mission over in the South Seas."

"Regardless, we still accomplished the mission, even if we only had a few milliseconds to spare," the jackrabbit reminded.

"Yeah, after that time you fought a buffalo with your bare paws during our escape," Skye recalled. "I'm surprised you and I made it out of there alive with nothing more than that scar on your back."

He sighed as we turned a corner. "It was just a scratch. That's all."

"You're right. Just a big scratch requiring only like fifty or so stitches," the fox sarcastically remarked.

He seemed to shiver at that painful memory while trying to hide it. Meanwhile, his fox partner gave him a funny look.

"Did you manage... to kill it?" I asked curiously.

Skye's eyes widened. "Kill? Kill what exactly?"

"The buffalo." I clarified.

The two troubled mammals briefly looked at each other in silence before Jack finally spoke. "No. We merely battled each other for control. Killing is not our way at the ZBI, nor anywhere else in Zootopia, Mr. Chenry. Never has been," he said sternly. "Why ask that kind of question?"

I didn't answer, only staring down at the ground. Over a minute passed as we navigated down the catwalk into another chamber.

"Regardless," he said, shaking away his thoughts. "We have more mammal power this time—enough to break through the razorback's line of defenses. Together, we can do this."

"Yeah, thanks," I continued walking. "But I prefer to work alone."

"Why is that?" Skye wondered.

I inspected my rifle magazine, subtly comparing it to their tranquilizer darts. "Let's just say my methods differ from yours."

She crossed her arms. "In what way?"

I stopped walking, paused, and shook my head. "You wouldn't understand."

Jack came forward. "As the ZBI's first rabbit agent, I can try to understand you. I, too, wished to be alone so that I could focus solely on the mission—by doing things my way—without any interference from others," he then turned to his partner. "But then I met her and realized I was wrong. I could never reach my full potential without her."

"Couldn't have said it better myself," Skye smiled proudly.

He put on a serious face again, turning back to me. "Which is why we must operate together as one. Zootopia is in a vulnerable state—more so than ever—and we cannot afford to let our differences cloud the vision of what brought this great city together in the first place. No matter how skilled or talented we are, it's nothing without the proper unifying mindset, which can be the difference between mission success and failure."

The fox smiled in agreement, turning to me. "Sooo, what do you say?"

I sighed, slinging the rifle back. "Fine. I'll come with you. Just so your exemplary speech doesn't go to waste."

"Great! We'll unofficially welcome you as our newest junior agent," the fox quipped. "Sorry, I didn't bring any stickers."

While they weren't looking, I swapped out the lethal rounds of my rifle for non-lethal tranquilizer rounds. This I did behind my back. Grudgingly.

"Right. We must go then," Savage motioned us down the catwalk. "Every minute we waste, the climate walls continue to wreak irreversible havoc on Zootopia. We've got no time to lose."

The arctic fox and I followed him up a ladder. Well, to them, it was a ladder; for me, it was more like a step ladder. We moved through the scaffoldings, climbed more ladders, and kept going past the massive boilers until we entered the next set of climate chambers.

There were a few razorbacks on patrol, unsuspecting of our presence until one of them began sniffing the air.

"Hey! Who goes there?" one called out, turning on his flashlight.

The other aimed his long tranquilizer gun. "Come on out, wherever you are."

Without thinking, Savage and Winter made short work of them—the non-lethal way, of course—before anyone could sound off the alarm. I was impressed with the duo's ability to clear out rooms quietly and efficiently.

More armored guards stormed in while the duo was reloading, only to get kicked right in the noggins. The guards staggered a bit and reached for their backup weapons. Regardless, the bunny and fox were much faster and managed to tranquilize them.

One more wave of animals came in, trying to ambush us.

"There they are!"

"Get em'!"

The three of us held our ground.

As I grabbed one of the razorbacks by the neck, Skye landed a drop kick from the side, effectively taking him out. Two more razorbacks rushed in from behind us. They got double-kicked in the face by Jack before getting finished off with a third hard kick to their snouts.

"Whua!" the last one squealed as he toppled off the scaffolding and onto the catwalk below us.

"Hmph," the fox brushed her paws in satisfaction.

Perhaps working as a team made things easier, I admitted. It prevents me from having to kill anyone. However, I would've saved at least one of the razorbacks for interrogation just so I could torture it for information. But that's just me.

"Not bad for a handsome little rabbit," Skye playfully elbowed her partner.

"Not bad for prey in general," I added.

He pulled a keycard from the razorback's tactical vest. "You say that as if the word 'prey' is synonymous with 'weak' or 'fragile,'" he said, unlocking the next set of electronic doors. "Superior size may give you one advantage, yes, but it can just as easily be used against you, as many have come to learn from me over the years."

"I'd say you've done pretty well over the years. Although, there's been a few exceptions, if you know what I mean," the fox winked.

The jackrabbit cleared his throat and straightened his tie.

"Alrighty. Let's go." I said, moving along.

The two little mammals followed from close behind, keeping their pistols ready. We'd likely see more razorbacks again. We walked through the climate walls for the next fifteen minutes without any encounters.

Along the way, I kept noticing the same golden wires as before, interlaced with all the complex machinery and various guardrails before splitting off at multiple junction points in the overhanging walkways.

"If we follow these anodized wires, they should lead us to the razorback's hideout," Skye mentioned, guiding us through the darker areas with her fox night vision. "Or their little lair, whatever they wanna call it. At least, that's what I'm hoping."

"Or into a trap." Savage reminded, carefully feeling the wires with his paw. "Stay alert."

"What's with the golden wires anyway?" I kept wondering, noticing them attached to the ceiling above as I crouched under a low-clearance area. "I've seen this shit everywhere."

We came to a dead end, except for a ventilation shaft in which I popped the cover off for us to shuffle through. It was a tight squeeze, but at least it was only twelve feet long.

"Well," the fox began as she crawled in front of us. "If my hypothesis is correct, which it usually is," she humbly admitted. "Then the razorbacks are using these wires to control the climate walls, all from one centralized location."

"But why use gold?" I asked, climbing out the other side of the shaft. "Isn't that expensive in your world?"

"Yep, it most definitely is," Skye acknowledged, raising an eyebrow. "I mean... isn't it expensive in your world too?"

"No."

"No?" she tilted her head. "How?"

"We mined it from asteroids."

"Really?" she was fascinated.

"Yep."

"Wow. Now that's amazing! You hear that?" Skye said excitedly, only for Jack to urge her along. "I'll have plenty of questions for you later on that topic. But yeah, to answer your first question... gold is one of the best non-corrosive electrical conductors on the market due to its malleable properties. It doesn't tarnish like steel or copper when exposed to air and water. And when you combine it with specialized inhibitors, you essentially get a direct override switch for the climate walls. Pretty convenient, I must say."

Which explains why the razorbacks stole those unmarked packages from a PUPS depot a few months ago, I thought to myself, trying to make sense of past events. Cody mentioned those packages had electronics inside them, exported from Little Rodentia, where the tiniest paws made high-quality gadgets in Zootopia with a unique level of exquisite intricacy that no large mammal could ever match. I remembered reading about it somewhere.

As we followed the wires into a new tunnel, Savage wondered the same thing I was wondering. "How did the razorbacks obtain all this gold in such a short amount of time?"

"That's what I wanna know," Skye reacted with a shrug. "I mean, it's pretty common to find milligrams of gold embedded in most modern pawheld devices, such as laptops, phones, or computers... but to find kilograms of gold merged into an industrial-era climate wall system? One that stretches for kilometers across the city? That's quite an achievement if you ask me. Definitely as mysterious as it is suspicious."

"...could the razorbacks have extracted the gold?" Jack supposed, knowing it was a stretch.

Skye let out a laugh. "Maybe if they had 20,000 plus devices to spare, an expendable amount of labor, and all the free time in the world, which I highly doubt," she then turned to me and gave me a smirky look. "Or a 'golden' asteroid."

I scoffed at her remark. But then that got me thinking: How did the razorbacks acquire all this gold? Obviously not an asteroid. That's when I realized: It came from Zootopia's Treasury Reserves. That day when the razorbacks got away with their bank heist. They didn't just steal the gold for early retirement or for the hell of it. Instead, they melted it down into thin wires...and combined it with the machinery and the rest of their supplies... to gain technological control over the climate walls. To shut them down permanently and create a shitty swamp environment throughout Zootopia, as they cleverly advertised at the Palm Hotel incident.

I clenched my fist in anger. "Those bastards."

The two agents did a double take. "I'm sorry?"

"... never mind," I walked past them, following the wires leading out of the tunnel. "Let's just keep moving. We must be getting close."

"Right behind you," the duo nodded, covering my six while I covered their twelve.

We all knew that we'd be facing an army of razorbacks soon. It was just a matter of how and when. Hopefully, we'd be ready for them once we reached the control room.

Would there be a final fight? For some reason, I was looking forward to it.

My primary objective was to rescue the girl— a small favor I promised Cody. Nothing would change that, regardless of the climate crisis in Zootopia. However, if push becomes shove, the secondary objective would be to finish off those razorbacks for good, with a bullet lodged into each of their skulls. They embarrassed me enough, and I didn't need permission from two agents to do what was necessary.

The new climate wall chamber we entered was similar to the previous one, except that it was brighter, colder... and hotter at the same time?

I must've been going crazy.

It had to be one of the strangest places I'd ever been in.

One side of the room had thousands of giant icicles growing down the walls with large air vents blasting cold frosty air...

"Brrr... It's freezing in here!" the fox ruffled through her fur, holding her tail close.

"What are you talking about?" the jackrabbit began unbuttoning his suit collar. "It's hot in here."

"That's because you are hot," she winked.

He rolled his eyes. "Let's stay focused."

The other side of the room had bright red heating coils, similar to the inside of a toaster appliance but meters long, with heat vents blasting hot air.

I extended my arms to the sides and felt the guardrails. One was cold to the touch, while the other was scalding hot. It was the weirdest thing I've ever experienced. Two extreme temperatures from opposite ends of the spectrum. One of my eyes felt numb, and the other felt dry. One side of my body produced sweat, while the other produced goosebumps. But, of course, this was only because I was walking down the middle of the catwalk.

"It looks like we're between Sahara Square and Tundratown," Jack noted, rolling up his sleeves.

I rotated my head, feeling slightly dizzy. "That's what I was thinking."

Despite the extreme sauna and icebox conditions coinciding, this place was truly fascinating. An industrial marvel of engineering at its finest. One of the keystones of maintaining a diversified mammalian society. It provided millions of animals in Zootopia with an environment best suited to their species' and families needs.

Listening to the fuel circulating within the furnace heat exchangers and through the resistors below the catwalk was satisfying. Exhaust fuels from combustion piped out of the furnaces through multiple vents. A series of blower fans directed newly warmed air through the various ducts above us.

The temperature gauge on the guardrail read 300°F.

At the same time, compressed air was shooting up through the nozzles, which met water and split it into thousands of tiny droplets. The sudden pressure loss rapidly cooled the water to form ice flakes and pellets, with a giant fan propelling them into the air alongside the fine mist of water droplets.

The other temperature gauge on the other guardrail read -3°F.

Interesting, I thought.

The three of us had obviously never been here before. Hardly any animal in Zootopia ever has. I could tell by the look on the two agents' faces. Hence, it was a lot to take in.

"I don't understand," Skye raised an eyebrow, monitoring the hot and cold machinery humming with power above and below us. "The climate walls seem to be working just fine."

Jack stroked his chin, equally perplexed. "That's strange."

The fox fingered through the golden wires that were frozen to the guardrail. "This doesn't add up with what's been going on in the city lately."

We pondered about it for the next minute or two.

Jack shook his head, slightly frustrated. "Let me check our surveillance feeds. Something's not right."

"How can you check?" Sky asked. "The power grid's down in most of the city."

He addressed her concern. "Cynthia's got a chopper in the air. I can check with her."

Skye rolled her eyes. "Oh, lucky us."

Jack took a moment to adjust the frequency on his headset radio while facing numerous technical difficulties due to the chamber's extreme temperatures. First, he had to find the right spot. Eventually, he got the device working.

"Any word from her?" Skye asked impatiently, freezing in her dress.

Due to the loudness of the climate machinery, we couldn't hear the conversation between Jack and the other mammal on the other end. So all we could do was wait. As seconds passed, the jackrabbit's ears slowly began drooping.

"What? What is it?" Skye asked quietly.

"Zootopia's still flooding everywhere," Jack said with sorrow, receiving a red notification on his smartwatch. "And it only continues to get worse."

He showed us the screen on his smartwatch containing aerial footage, revealing that the ZPD and City Hall lobbies had been breached with water after a bus plowed through the windows. There was also live footage of mammals desperately placing sandbags in front of the hospital as water levels continued to rise.

Skye's ears lowered slightly. "Then we must hurry! Find out what's going on."

Jack firmly nodded, already taking off. "This way!"

With a reinforced determination, we jogged down the endless catwalk deeper into the unknown climate wall territory. The heat and the cold didn't feel so great with the cardio, and it became increasingly more intense the further we went. Visibility was also gradually dropping by the minute as thick steam pressure began building up along the sides of the climate chamber.

As we ran faster, my sweat turned into ice, and my ice turned back into a sweat. It kept occurring in repeated cycles, lasting only a few seconds each. It all felt so weird...

We eventually came to an abrupt stop. There was a sizeable gap in the catwalk, measuring about 10 meters across, with a bottomless dropoff. There was no other way to proceed or go around.

"Give me a boost," Jack stopped running for a moment.

"On it," Skye said, knowing exactly what to do. She cupped her paws low to the ground for her partner to place his foot. As soon as he did, she launched his lightweight body high into the air across the abyss, where he did a somersaulting landing on a platform. We watched as he pressed a button on a rusty console, activating a retractable bridge for us to cross over to him safely.

However, as soon as Skye and I began crossing the bridge, we heard a loud thunderous rumbling beneath our feet. We glanced down the grating and saw the pitch-black abyss suddenly become brighter than daylight.

"Look out!" I shoved the fox across and jumped.

A pillar of flash fire blasted up through the bridge, completely destroying and incinerating it. Flaming pieces of scrap metal flung everywhere, landing all around us. We narrowly survived that fire blast. The tip of Skye's tail barely caught on fire, which her partner quickly put out with his bare paws, nearly burning himself in the process.

"Sheesh!" the fox exclaimed, crawling back away from the ledge. "That was close!"

Indeed, it was.

We saw that the pit we crossed was now filled with fire. A tall, raging fire engulfed that entire section of the room, almost reaching the ceiling. There were also a series of miniature explosions going off like fireworks and firecrackers in the vents below.

As Skye's tail slowly gave off smoke, she turned to her partner. "...What just happened? Why did that happen?"

Jack and I only looked at each other briefly. Both of us were equally perplexed. He then approached where his partner sat and extended his paw.

"I don't know," the bunny said, helping her get back onto her feet. "But we have to keep going! We're almost there."

"Aww," she held up her tail in disappointment, noticing the slightly burned tip. "That's gonna ruin tomorrow's date."

"There won't be a tomorrow if we don't stop the razorbacks," Jack said as we began picking up the pace.

The three of us hastened down the catwalk. This we did for over a minute as we followed the string of golden wires. Then, the next thing we knew, we were slipping on... ice?

Yes, there was actually ice on the catwalk now.

An entire section of the climate chamber was frozen solid—it had icicles, snow, and frosty air particles—even though it was right next to red-hot metal, such as railings, floor plates, and heat coils.

Why was ice building up on the other side of the room all of a sudden? That wasn't supposed to happen.

Just then, a few heat vents next to us started powering down and going dark.

"Watch out!" Jack shouted, forcing us to duck.

A powerful wintry blast shot through the heat vents, barely grazing our backs as it left a patch of frost. We stood back up to keep going. Then we were hit with a fiery heat wave from one of the ice vents. The sudden temperature change around us caused the adjacent metal railings to shatter like glass.

"Boy, these climate walls are sure malfunctioning big time, aren't they?" Skye remarked, dodging a series of fire blasts.

Meanwhile, Jack was too busy dodging a barrage of ice blasts.

Everywhere we stood, anywhere we went, the climate walls were randomly acting up. We were in a dangerous situation of being burned or frozen to death. As a result, our progress was greatly hindered. Interior temperatures were worsening as they kept falling and rising, becoming further apart from each other. The entire system was going berserk.

"It's the razorbacks," I said, shielding myself from falling icicles. "They're using the climate walls against us," I dodged another fire blast. "It's a trap."

"I see the control room!" Jack pointed toward the end of the chamber at a windowed structure high above the catwalk. "We must get up there. Now."

But getting up there was the question. Ice and molten metal covered our path, making our final run extremely hazardous. Not to mention, we were getting blasted by unpredictable patterns of blaze and frost blasts from nearly all directions.

I was doing okay, for the most part; the armor helped absorb most of the impact, even though my exposed skin got singed and scorched in a few places. But the animal duo? They were beginning to struggle and slowly fall behind. As a result, they had to use me as their only mobile shield of cover for protection against the climate wall's internal vents, which were now being repurposed as defensive measure cannons.

I deflected and absorbed ventilation blasts left and right to protect the duo—anything I could do to help us punch through. But, of course, that didn't mean I wasn't getting burned at all. On the contrary, I was getting burned up quite a bit. Nevertheless, the plan was working, more or less. We were almost to the stairs at the end of the chamber. The agents stayed close behind and protected as we made our final advancement.

"Just about there!" Skye said excitedly, keeping her head down as she patted me on the calf. "You're doing great, big guy."

"Stay alert! We're not through this yet," Jack reminded, pulling his ears down to prevent them from getting frostbite.

We took another step forward and felt the ground rumble below us. Weird. Was it an earthquake? Was it another climate vent about to activate? We didn't know what was going on...

...until the ground started splitting below our legs. A dark abyss opened below and between us, getting wider and wider by the second.

We barely had enough time to react to avoid falling to our deaths. I quickly stepped to one side while the duo stepped to the other. Since the metal surfaces were icy, we had to grab onto the railings tightly to avoid slipping to our deaths.

"Oh, no, no..." Skye panicked. "They're retracting the catwalk bridge!"

"Hurry, jump!" Jack commanded, grabbing her paw.

I extended my arm, preparing to catch them.

But before the duo could make the leap together, a massive wall of flash fire unexpectedly erupted from both sides of the chamber, directly cutting them off in their path. It was almost like a NASA rocket engine being tested.

"Argh! Son of a bitch!" I angrily retracted my hand in pain due to receiving multiple second-degree burns.

The icy metal edges of the retracting catwalk immediately turned into steam while the frozen ground boiled beneath my boots.

Fortunately for the agent duo, they weren't incinerated nor vaporized, for they had narrowly veered themselves from the blast at the very last second. Burnt strands of fur and burnt clothes were the worst they received. Unfortunately, the three of us were now separated by a massive curtain of fire that didn't seem like it'd be turning off anytime soon.

"Mr. Chenry! Are you okay?" they called out from the other side of the flames.

Their silhouettes were barely visible. At the same time, the flash fire continued to roar ferociously, making the room unbearably loud.

Carefully wrapping up my burnt hand with a piece of cloth, I responded, "I'm fine."

There was a brief pause before any of them spoke.

"Do you see another way around?"

"How can we get to you?"

I looked around the chamber for options—another way to regroup. But, to our dismay, all the scaffoldings and auxiliary bridges between us were heavily damaged—melted, warped, covered in flames, or reduced to molecules. Any attempt to use them would be suicide.

Surprisingly, the ventilation shafts weren't acting up sporadically like before. So the traps must've been disengaged. Nevertheless, that massive firewall between us remained in place, keeping us separated. We had to raise our voices to hear each other.

"Any luck?" the agents asked.

"Negative," I responded. "This area's in rough shape."

"Yeah," Skye was coughing from all the excessive smoke on her side. "Tell me about it."

There was another long pause between us as the jackrabbit paced back and forth, trying to devise a solution.

"Okay, Skye and I will try to find another way around," Jack said, already backtracking. "Stay put. We'll regroup with you on the other side."

I checked my damaged watch, shaking my head. "There's no time. I'm going in."

"Wait, what?"

With my back turned, I removed the tranquilizer rounds from my rifle and tossed them into the fire blast. I watched as they instantly got vaporized before hitting the ground. Next, I loaded the gun with live rounds.

"But Chenry," Skye objected. "We have to work together on this. You don't know what's waiting for you up ahead! It's too risky!"

"She's right," Jack agreed. "This could very well be our last chance to restore stability to Zootopia. We have to plan this right."

I ignored them and began walking up the stairs. "I have a plan."

Skye sighed in the distance. "What is it then? Attack?"

With my back turned against them, I smiled beneath the helmet and quietly answered. "Annihilate."

Even though the duo didn't hear me, they were still shouting for me to return to them.

"Wait, stop!"

"Don't go up there!" they warned.

I continued regardless, going up the flight of cement stairs toward the control room. It took less than a minute to reach the top. The duo's silhouettes behind the ongoing fire blast disappeared from my view as I turned a sharp corner. It was just me and the razorbacks now.

Time to do what needs to be done.

With my rifle loaded, I busted down the iron door and barged straight into the control room.

"Hands up!" I shouted.

***

The room was well-lit and full of razorbacks, donned in ZPD tactical gear as if they were ready for a fight. My finger feathered lightly against the trigger, ready to blow their heads off. But these guys didn't even have their weapons ready, nor did they even wield them. In fact, they were just... sitting there, lounging around, doing absolutely... nothing.

The hell?

The razorbacks only glanced at me briefly before resuming their personal duties. They knew I was here, my entrance was obvious, but they offered no reaction to my presence whatsoever.

One razorback was reading a magazine while resting its legs on a control console by the window. Two razorbacks played ping pong on a rickety table in the corner next to an old vending machine. Another razorback sat on the couch with his two buddies, munching on potato chips while watching a Zootopia Breaking News broadcast. I aimed to the side and saw a group of razorbacks sitting around a table, playing a game of cards while making bets with cash and chips. There was even a razorback throwing darts onto a board mounted to the wall. Meanwhile, the rest were spread out, listening to music from a record player and taking a siesta.

Overall, this place was like a makeshift man cave—or in this case, a mammal cave—with uneven cement flooring and crude industrial lightbulbs. The razorbacks seemed to be enjoying themselves... but not for long.

"I said hands up!"

No response.

"Paws up!" I corrected myself.

Still no response.

"Hooves up!" I corrected myself again, this time louder. "Arms where I can see them!"

Once again, they heeded me not, only continuing with their business as if I wasn't even there.

I slowly made my way toward the middle of the room, keeping my rifle aimed while switching between potential targets.

One of the razorbacks peeked up from a newspaper, shrugged, and continued reading. This was starting to get awkward. The only background sounds were soft opera music, television, chips crunching, and a bouncing ping pong ball—no bullets, ricochets, or shattering skulls.

Perhaps I should just... shoot them? I debated in my head. Something strange was going on, and my patience was wearing thin.

Someone missed a serve by the ping pong table, causing the ball to roll and bounce toward me until it rested at my boot. A razorback timidly approached me, holding out his hoove as if I were going to throw the ball back to him.

With derision, I crushed the plastic ball under my boot.

The razorback sighed and decided to go play pool instead.

I saw another razorback grab a bag of chips from the vending machine and open them up. The hog sniffed the bag's contents with pure joy as if he were about to enter paradise. Then, as he eagerly sat down to eat, I furiously snatched the bag away from him before he had a bite. I crumbled it up and tossed it aside.

He gave a sad look, staring down at the ground.

I didn't care.

Regardless, no one spoke a word. Only among each other did the razorbacks talk. This whole situation was getting ridiculous and, quite frankly, anticlimatic.

"Alright, enough games!" I smashed the record player into the ground, shattering the glass case into fragments and causing record disks to roll everywhere. "Where's the girl?"

The razorbacks merely flinched but offered no further reaction. Even though their music was cut off, they resumed their leisure activities.

Frustrated, I racked the gun back and yelled, "Where is she?" pointing at each mammal's head, alternating back and forth. "Tell me where she is!"

No response. All that could be heard was someone quietly sipping Sunflower Soda in the background.

Pissed, I grabbed the closest razorback and threw him to the ground. With a big "Umph!" he showed his hooves, not resisting but still turning wide-eyed.

"You wanna tell me where Penny is?" I glared, pressing the gun barrel against his hairy forehead.

He simply stared into my eyes—or at least, tried to—and breathed heavily with fright.

I fired one round into the ground, inches from the razorback's face, causing everyone in the room to duck and cover. The razorback under me froze, kept its eyes shut, and dared not to look.

"No?" I said condescendingly, kicking him off to the side. "I guess I'll have a look around..."

With that, I wandered around their room, wreaking havoc on whatever I encountered. I toppled bookshelves, punched a hole in their TV screen, flipped over their vending machine, and crushed their coffee table. The razorbacks shuffled around, trying to keep their distance, but they didn't do or say anything.

Next, I approached the control consoles by the window and smashed the computer monitors one by one with the rifle stock. I went down the line until each one was out of commission. The razorback in the rolling chair tried shielding its eyes from all the glass, debris, and electrical sparks.

Outside the window, nothing seemed to be changing. The fire blast roared in the background while the other climate traps around the catwalk remained active.

I sliced through the cluster of golden wires beneath the control console using my tactical knife. This should've worked in theory. I could feel the heat conducting through them. Yet, it didn't do anything.

At this point, I didn't know whether to get angry... or just laugh. Why not both?

Using my hand, I pinned the razorback's head to the keyboard, using my other hand to hold a knife up to his throat. I could feel him shaking nervously.

"Is there any information you'd like to share?" I asked in a low, sinister tone.

He desperately glanced over at his companions on what to do. They all looked back at him in silence, shaking their heads. It was almost as if they were begging him not to do something. That's when I saw a tear rolling down his cheek and onto the blade.

"Very well," I accepted the situation, instinctively raising my knife over his head. "Then you are of no use to me."

As I prepared to eviscerate the razorback, I heard a large metal door open behind me across the room. Multiple figures were funneling into the room. Keeping the nervous razorback next to me pinned, I turned to see who it was.

There were two female grey wolves, a brawny rhino, and a hulking bear. All of them were armed with long tranquilizer rifles and wearing tactical gear. At first, I thought they were ZPD officers, but they were accompanied by other razorbacks wearing heavy riot armor. Unfortunately, they were all on the same damn side. Figures. Criminal diversity at its finest.

Keeping my knife against the razorback hostage's neck, I whipped out my revolver and pointed it at them.

"Stop right there," I ordered, cocking the hammer back.

The animals stopped in place while the two wolves glared and growled lowly.

"Now, where's Penny?" I asked impatiently.

None of the animals answered. All they did was stand there idle. Then, after a brief moment of intense staring, the group resumed their way and headed toward a pair of double doors at the end of the room.

One razorback pressed a button on the wall for them, causing the doors to automatically slide open to unveil a service elevator. The entire group stepped inside the cabin.

I jogged over to join them.

Surprisingly, they made room for me, albeit with some hesitation. I wasn't expecting that. Either way, I stood in the middle while the other animals surrounded me. The cabin was a tight squeeze, but we made it work.

The female wolf pressed the second-to-last button on the dusty elevator console. The automatic doors made a low screeching sound as they slid closed. We slowly descended into God knows where. For all I knew, it could've been the dungeon, the torture chamber, or the center of the Earth.

Meanwhile, I stood in the middle with my hands clasped. I took a few deep breaths. The ride down seemed to be taking forever. Unfortunately, there was no elevator music to pass the time.

We briefly stopped on one sublevel, where two white tigers entered the cabin with us. They stood in the back right behind me. Like everyone else, they were also wearing full ZPD gear.

After the elevator doors closed again, we resumed our long journey downward. Meanwhile, my anxiety shot upward.

Being stuck in a crowded elevator full of anthropomorphic criminals was beyond awkward.

I didn't know if or when this ride would ever be over. It just kept going and going. How deep into the ground did this climate wall system go? At this point, it had to be at least 100 meters deep...

As time passed, I noticed something suspicious about the animals in the elevator with me.

One razorback had a tiny drop of sweat running down the side of its head while whispering something nearly inaudible to another mammal. At the same time, a white tiger cracked its knuckles with its claws unsheathed, and a female gray wolf slowly placed her paw on her holster while looking the other way. Her finger was on the trigger. Towards the front, the brawny rhino firmly grasped its baton before giving a subtle nod to his companions.

The elevator cabin then grew eerily quiet, except for the vibrating steel cable mechanism above us.

Taking a deep breath, I asked them. "Before we get started, does anyone want to get out?"

There was a short pause.

"I do," said one of them.

The other animals nodded, voicing their answers.

"I wanna get off."

"Yeah, me too."

"Me three."

"Yep."

"Same here."

The elevator doors slid open, and all the animals exited the cabin orderly. Nothing more, nothing less. They simply scooted past me and disappeared into the service tunnels up ahead.

"...okay?" I splayed my arms in confusion, slightly disappointed that I couldn't paint the elevator red. "...I guess that's a yes."

I stepped out of the elevator too.

This new area was different than the previous one. It was much rockier, rugged, and less complete, almost as if it were being prepped for some aggressive expansion. However, the ground was still covered in loose dirt and gravel, with the walls only illuminated by red flares and portable light towers.

In other words, a mining tunnel and a construction zone rolled into one. What else could the razorbacks be building down here?

I didn't know where to go; this place was almost like a maze swallowed up by a labyrinth, so I took the lonely route with golden wires dangling by rusty hooks on the ceiling above. The dimly lit pathway gradually reclined downward, taking me deeper into the tunnels. Maybe this would lead me to the razorback's final base of operations.

After a minute or two of trekking through winding tunnels, I shined my flashlight on a large concrete slab. It stretched across the entire cavern chamber and was filled with various wooden crates stacked on top of each other.

No guards, apparently. No one else was here.

I moved past the loading dollies, ducked under the forklift, and came across three metal objects. Each one had vertical bars made of iron and a padlocked door.

They were cages.

I quietly walked around them, pointing my flashlight beam inside.

The first and second cages were empty, but the third one had something in it. Better yet, it had someone in it.

"Cherry?" a female voice called out in distress. "Is that you?"

Could that be Penny? I ran to the bars and saw two furry ears, a fluffy tail, and a slender body. Though it was a canine, it definitely wasn't a jackal.

"Charity?" I realized who it was.

"Oh, Cherry!" she cried with tears of joy. "I never thought I'd see you again!"

I couldn't believe it was her. And yet, it really was her.

She clasped her paws around my hand, gently resting her furry head against it, before closing her eyes and sighing in relief.

The coyote had a few bruises on her side but nothing too serious. Her fur was scraggly on the ends, and her hospital scrubs were torn in various places.

"What happened to you?" I asked.

She sighed, taking a deep breath. "It was a late night shift," she explained. "We had a massive influx of flood victims. We received a call that three ZPD officers were wounded outside Rainforest District. We got there as fast as we could in an ambulance. When I arrived at the scene to treat them—or, at least, who I thought were ZPD officers—they took me away. They brought me inside the climate walls, locked me up, and left me down here alone," she paused, looking around with droopy ears. "For some reason, they left in a hurry."

"How long ago was this?"

She thought about it for a moment. "A couple hours, maybe. Six tops. Feels like it's been days."

I angrily clenched my fist, loading a new round into the chamber. "Then let's bust you out."

The coyote sat down in defeat, lowering her head. "It won't be easy. They took the key with them."

"We don't need a key."

"Wait," she raised her paws up cautiously. "What are you doing?"

"Improvising," I replied, taking aim. "Stand aside. Cover your ears."

***

The coyote did as she was told, hunkering down in the corner of the cage and hiding behind her tail. I fired three shots into the padlock, which made her squeal with terror as the sound waves echoed down the caverns. She didn't expect it to be so loud.

Smoke erupted from the jagged hole in the padlock. The air filled with the burning scent of gunpowder. Using the rifle stock, I bashed away the remaining loose pieces, allowing the cage door to crack open.

I half expected Charity to celebrate her restored freedom, but she was visibly shaken and hugging her tail.

"You alright?" I asked, reaching into the cage.

A few seconds later, she finally looked up, slowly taking my hand as I pulled her onto her feet.

"Please... let's not do that again," Charity begged, rubbing her ears.

"Can't make any promises."

I opened the cage door all the way. As the coyote stepped out, there was a loud clicking noise above us. I saw a tiny hook detach from the door, causing a series of ceiling pulleys to rapidly unwind until we heard a metallic clamp disengage further down the caverns. Multiple chain reactions were occurring. More increasing by the second.

It was like a bunch of Rube Goldberg shit going on. We didn't know what the hell was happening.

"Umm... Cherry?"

The sounds got louder and louder until, all of a sudden, we heard a thunderous roar heading straight toward us. It was coming in fast. As soon as we saw what it was, our hearts instantly dropped.

We looked at each other in unison. "RUN!"

Massive walls of water came crashing into the tunnels, sweeping up anything and everything in their path. Cavern lights briefly flickered and spewed out electric sparks before completely going out.

We were now running in the dark. Hopefully, Charity had night vision because I could hardly see a damn thing with a little dimming flashlight.

First, there was fire, and now we're dealing with water. Good hell, I groaned.

We bolted as fast as possible in the opposite direction, backtracking through the tunnels, trying to reach higher ground. We huffed and puffed and gave it our all. Dollies and crates were crashing all around us. We hadn't run this hard since the police academy. Our adrenaline was kicking in at full throttle.

"Go, go!" we pushed each other.

"Don't look back!"

"C'mon!"

Unfortunately, the flood waters were swiftly gaining upon us. Our speed was just no match for them. In only a few seconds, our ankles were submerged, and then our knees. Soon it'd be our waist. The current grew stronger and stronger while the water levels kept rising higher and higher by the minute.

"We're almost there! Keep going!" I shouted through the raging waters.

"Look! There's the elevator!" she pointed, leaping across floating crates and debris. "Hurry!"

"Go, go!"

We scuffled through the icy water and climbed up the loose sedimentary incline toward the service elevator. It was situated under an orange flashing bulb illuminating it from above.

Just when we thought we were in the clear and on dry ground, the flood waters rapidly caught up to our ankles again, as if the caverns were trying to swallow us into the dark depths.

I cleared away all the heavy wooden debris for us to access the elevator. Charity helped too. With only a few seconds to spare before we'd drown, I pressed the button on the console, only to get my hand electrocuted.

"Cherry!" the coyote yelped, reaching out with her paw.

"Argh! Dammit!" I shook my charred fist in pain.

"Oh, Cherry!"

Electrical sparks spat out sporadically from the console until everything around it became engulfed in water. We were now swimming instead of standing, unable to touch the bottom. The elevator powered down, shattering the light bulb above it, leaving us in the dark again. Our only escape route was gone.

Those damn razorbacks, I cursed under my breath. They must've used Charity as bait to kill us off in these tunnels. No wonder they led me down here. It was all an elaborate trap.

I thought about prying the elevator doors open, but they wouldn't budge—not with my charred hand. I held my breath a few times to try again and gave it all my strength, but to no avail. Charity dived under the waves to help, but we weren't having any luck. The water levels continued rising, and the situation became more hopeless.

We got swept into another cavern, spun, and tossed about through the water by the rapids. I tried to grab something, a rock, a ledge, anything, but it was too slippery, and I couldn't catch hold of anything against the sheer force of the current. Our heads bobbed up over the water for a split second and were pulled back down again. I attempted to swim to the side but struggled with the pain of my charred arm in the salty water, let alone with the rapids pulling us wherever they desired. We were losing strength and oxygen. We were going to drown.

Making one final effort to get our heads above water again, we felt a sudden drop as the cavern began to flow downward again. Finally, we ended up in another rocky chamber, continuing to spin and toss uncontrollably like ragdolls. As the cavern began filling up, we only had a brief respite before the conditions worsened again.

All this damn effort to rescue a missing jackal girl?

We struggled to stay afloat in the rapids, searching for any alternative escape route, only to find a solid volcanic rock ceiling that our heads gradually floated towards. As far as we could tell, there was no escape. We were trapped down here.

I sighed in disappointment, straining myself to stay afloat. Of all the ways I could die, why did it have to be drowning? I could've died honorably, fighting for the Stratocracy.

Meanwhile, the coyote beside me welled up with tears, gracefully swimming closer to me as this would be her last swim. She stared into my eyes with sadness.

"Cherry?" she said in a quiet, soft voice. "There's something I have to tell you..."

"Not now," I said, desperately glancing around the flooding cavern.

She rested her soaked arms around my neck, drooping her ears back in despair. "If... If we don't make it... please...I want you to know how much I-"

"Wait!" I interrupted her, feeling something tangled under my boot. "Do you feel that?"

"What?" she was confused.

"Beneath the waves. Do you feel something?"

"Feel... feel what?" she asked, trying to stay afloat.

"This," I said, trying to lift my boot underwater without sinking myself. The coyote couldn't reach down far enough to feel what I was referring to. Whatever object I felt, it was quickly slipping away. It had tension and was anchored to something—whatever that something was.

Fortunately, the coyote felt it with her toes before it sank again. "It's almost like... a rope?"

"Or a cable," I added, unable to see past the murky water. "Maybe a way out?"

Charity nodded. "Let's follow it!"

By this point, her ears barely touched the ceiling as the cavern filled with water. Now my helmet started scraping the top. In just a few more seconds, we'd be deprived of air. We only had one chance.

"Deep breaths, on three," I said softly. Then, looking at Charity for encouragement, I saw a nod from her.

"One," I started, barely keeping my nose out of the water.

"Two," she counted, holding my hand. She, too, was nervous.

"Three!" we counted in unison.

Taking one big deep—and possibly our last—breath, we descended into the dark watery depths together. The cavern had completely filled up above our heads, and there was no going back now. Either we find another pocket of air... or we die drowning.

We swam down as far as we could, navigating past all the loose debris, far enough down until we felt the cable again. Given the nearly pitch-black underwater conditions, it was almost like a space rope. We firmly grasped it in our hands/paws. As it turns out, the cable consisted of damaged golden wires clumped together in a long thick strand, appearing like tangled headphones in a few spots. They were messy but primarily intact and tethered to random points along the rocky floor, potentially leading somewhere through the flooded caverns.

Using hand and paw gestures to communicate, we decided to take our chances and follow the golden cable.

We had no idea where we were going. We could barely see more than six feet in front of us. But we knew that it was better than staying here and wasting oxygen.

We swam as far as we could, as fast as we could.

The route didn't look very promising so far. Instead of going upward, we were only going downward—further and deeper into a random tunnel. There was no light at the end of it. Only darkness.

What other choice did we have? The clock was ticking faster than our heart rate, and we were already committed.

My lungs were starting to intake small volumes of water. I could feel myself entering the early stages of choking. I didn't know if I was going to make it.

Even though Charity was also struggling, she kept moving and swimming forward, not giving up yet. She looked back every now and then, checking to make sure we were staying close together. Despite the dire circumstances, her perseverance gave that tiny spec of hope. Perhaps it'd be enough to get us out of here.

Just a little bit further...

Only a couple of more bends to swim around...

We came upon what we initially thought was a dead end. The cable we had been following for the couple hundred feet disappeared into a rocky outcrop. Adjacent to it was a significant amount of wooden debris, including a sizeable industrial crate tangled up in double-braided rope. Everything appeared to be getting crammed against the wall, almost like it was all unable to get sucked out. Similar to a clogged drain.

Charity signaled toward the bubbles seeping out of the sides.

I nodded in understanding.

We both knew what we had to do.

Using my last couple ounces of energy, I immediately began digging away at all the lodged debris, trying to clear it all out. There was so damn much of it. Cuts, splinters, and abrasions hit me left and right, but I didn't care. I ignored the pain and kept digging through it. We had to get out of here fast... or die trying.

Much of the debris was too heavy for Charity to lift or move. Even though most of it would barely budge an inch for her, that didn't stop her from trying to help out.

I managed to clear away a large portion of the blockage. We could hear more and more air bubbles escaping from the sides. We were so close to potentially getting out of this hell hole.

However, there still remained a giant crate obstructing our path. It should've sunk to the bottom by now since there were no other pieces of wreckage to hold it in place. We kept pushing and shoving the crate. But, no matter how hard we tried, our combined strength couldn't get it dislodged.

We started panicking.

Our lungs couldn't take it much longer.

At the corner of my blurring vision, I spotted a long rope compressing against the bottom half of the crate. It was wrapped tight enough to leave noticeable dents. Wherever it came from, it must've kept the container anchored.

I reached for my tactical knife to cut the crate loose. However, all I felt was an empty sheath and no handle. Dammit, I cursed in my oxygen-deprived head. I must've lost the blade... when the cave... first flooded.

In desperation, I viciously punched the sides of the crate, hoping it would budge. It didn't. I tugged and yanked against the ropes, hoping they would tear. They wouldn't. Being physically exhausted and having exhausted all my thinkable options, I slowly felt my body sink into despair as my vision turned black.

Charity swam forward, and, using her sharp coyote teeth, she bit the rope to cut it. After several loud snaps, the crate tipped over and fell into the dark chasm below. A thick cluster of bubbles suddenly seeped from the back wall, revealing a new tunnel.

She did it... she actually... did it...

The coyote grabbed my hand and guided us through the dark tunnel. We swam and squeezed our way through. Being only about two feet in diameter, the tunnel was extremely challenging to navigate, having too many uneven, rocky surfaces, which frequently snagged on my gear and scraped my skin. Never had I felt so claustrophobic in my life. It was like being trapped in a collapsed building after an Earthquake during a flood.

Before one of us could faint, we caught a short glimpse of a dim light at the end of the tunnel. We fought our way towards it, exerting any and every last—if any—gram of oxygen remaining in our dying mortal systems. The tunnel gradually curved upward, getting wider and wider, and the gray light grew slightly brighter.

We kicked our way upward.

We gave it our all... until we had no more to give.

With our hands and paws extended like we were about to cross the finish line of our lives, we finally broke the surface, gasping for precious air. We coughed up what felt like pints of water, struggling to breathe again.

Using the little energy we had left, we swam over to the closest ledge we could find. There was a thin section of dry rock overhanging the water. Like doing pull-ups for the first time, we barely managed to climb up to safety, nearly falling back into the flood waters after a couple of attempts. Regardless, we finally made it.

Words couldn't describe how wonderful it felt. Never again would we ever take air for granted—at least not for today.

I tossed my gun and helmet aside and collapsed. Charity shook her fur and fluffed her tail before curling up beside me.

We were both lying face up toward the light at the top, breathing heavily as we processed what we had just been through a few minutes ago. We were in pain, our entire bodies ached, and our lungs were burning as we were coughing up water.

After a moment, however, Charity and I looked at each other, and we both started laughing. We simply couldn't contain ourselves, just being thankful to be alive and grateful that we were finally out of that hell hole. Well, at least we were almost out of it.

The coyote sighed with exhaustion, letting her head fall back as far as it would go. "Let's definitely not do that again."

I spat out water, unable to speak but nodding in agreement.

After taking a minute to recollect ourselves, I aimed my head at the opening above us to gain situational awareness. We were still inside the climate walls, albeit in a much better place than before. We were in a pit cave of some kind. The walls were lined with volcanic rocks, some illuminated by a single floodlight at the top of the mining shaft. Of course, there was still a long way for us to climb out, but to my surprise, that didn't matter.

In the meantime, we only wanted to rest—at least for the next little while. Thus, we continued lying on the rocky ledge as the flood waters rumbled below us.

I slowly sat myself up against the wall, grunting in pain... likely due to a dislocated shoulder or something.

"Amor," the coyote crawled closer, giving a worried look. "You're bleeding."

I looked at my bruised arm, and it was fine. But my other arm was oozing a fair bit around the bicep. Charity then knelt by the side, taking a closer look.

"Oh, right," I covered it with my palm, steadily exhaling. "It's nothing."

She playfully rolled her eyes. "You like to say that, don't you? Big tough guy."

I stared at the ground, not having anything to say.

"Here," she tore a piece of fabric from her scrub pants and began wrapping it around the wound. "This should help stop the bleeding—at least until we can find a way out of here," she tore off another piece, placing a paw on my forehead. "Try and relax for me, okay? I'm gonna take care of you."

I nodded and sat back to let her do her work. This wasn't the first time. Unfortunately, we had no medical supplies or bandages to patch my wounds. Yet, the coyote found ways to improvise.

"Baby, you really need to know your limits," she pleaded, referring to all the injuries. "It's hard to see my cute boyfriend like this."

"I wasn't always this way," I quietly recalled, reminiscing the glory days of being in my prime.

She tore a piece from her sleeve, folded it neatly into thirds, and carefully placed it over my palm. Next, she used her claw to cut a long thin strip of fabric from her joggers to tie down the makeshift patch.

"How's that?" she asked softly, cradling my hand in her little paw. "Is that better? Let me know if it's too tight."

I nodded, opening and closing my fist. "Much better."

"That's good. But try to keep it relaxed," she reminded.

I did as she instructed: Simply chilled.

It didn't take her long to find other wounds on my body—rock lacerations, wood scrapes, metal gashes, and electrical burns from earlier—all of which would eventually require medical attention. So she decided to treat those as well.

However, as she tore more and more fabric from her scrubs to make bandages, I became more and more concerned. Her pants became shorts, and her shorts were quickly becoming short shorts. I didn't like where this was going. I mean, what if she gets cold?

"Um, Charity?"

"Yes, amor?" she tore a piece of fabric from her midriff, using it to wrap my forearm.

I sighed. "...couldn't you have torn that from somewhere else?"

She looked up at me and batted her eyes. "Would you have preferred the chest?"

I looked down. "...never mind."

She smiled slyly. "I thought so."

After a minute or two, she finished patching up my numerous injuries and gently laid her head on my lap to rest. We closed our eyes for a moment.

"I could use a vacation," I said.

"You and me both," she added with a giggle.

I began stroking her ear, which she seemed to enjoy. "Perhaps we could figure something out..."

She nudged her head into my side. "I'd like that."

We both inhaled and exhaled, matching each other's heartbeats. While we still needed to get out of this place, we were in no rush to get moving until we had the energy.

While the coyote's eyes were blissfully shut, she spoke up. "By the way, thanks for saving me."

I cracked a small smile. "Anytime."

She tirelessly stretched her paws out with one of her fingers crossed. "Hopefully, I don't get another crazy call like that at the hospital again," she said, lowering her ears. "That was really scary... I just wanted to help those mammals... I didn't know what to do."

"Next time that happens, you tell me," I said sternly, worried for her safety. "I could've ID'd them. And I can ID all your patients going forward."

She gave a soft laugh. "You know that's technically a violation of ZIPPA, right?"

I rolled my eyes. "I don't care."

"Yeah, I know," she playfully rolled hers too.

We got closer to each other, and we kept each other warm. The cave pit was a cold, dark, and wet environment. Nevertheless, there was a peaceful moment of silence between us.

She lifted her head up. "I was gonna ask you. How did you find me?"

"It's a long story..."

She got herself comfortable. "I'm all ears."

"Well, I was looking for a missing mammal," I explained, pulling out a soggy picture. "A little jackal girl. She's been missing ever since the flooding."

Charity's eyes dropped back as she cradled the picture in her paws. "Oh, no, no... that's terrible! "I can't imagine what her family must be feeling right now. They must be devastated."

"Yeah," I quietly uttered, staring at the ground. "...I guess."

Charity stared down as well. "What's her name?"

"Penny."

The coyote's ears fell back. "Did the razorbacks take her too?"

I nodded. "I'm afraid so."

Charity was quiet for a minute before finally looking up and standing up with determination. "Then we have to find Penny while we still can. It's not too late. She's gotta be around here somewhere..."

I remained seated, not feeling very motivated. At least, not right now. My body felt like complete shit, and everything up to this point was supposed to be just one small favor.

"I want to help you find her," the coyote said.

"Even after all the crazy stuff back there?" I reminded her, more worried for her safety.

"Please," Charity begged, giving those desperate yet sincerely beautiful eyes filled with hope. "She needs us. We can still save her," she extended her paw. "Together."

I exhaled, reluctantly taking her paw gently. Not like we'd be spending a relaxing weekend in Zootopia anyway since it's flooded.

"Alright," she began looking around the cave pit. "Let's find a way out of here."

"How?" I was curious.

She approached the wall. "We climb."

I let out a tired sigh. "I knew you'd say that."

***

She had already started climbing. "Look on the bright side, baby. It can't be as bad as those frigid ice walls at the ZPD academy, right?"

I shrugged in partial agreement, following close behind her as we clambered up the thick volcanic rock of the cave pit. It was about as tall as the ZPD station. Maybe less. We didn't have ropes or safety equipment, but we felt confident enough to scale it. The wall's uneven surface was rugged enough to maintain a secure grip without the significant risk of falling. Either way, there were flood waters below us to cushion our fall if things got dicey—as long as I didn't land a belly flop.

We zig-zagged our way across the second-to-last ledge and eventually reached the top. The coyote and I climbed side by side while helping each other out. As I gripped the final ridge, we heard heavy footsteps approaching out of nowhere.

"Cherry! Watch out!" Charity exclaimed.

"There you are!" a razorback guard marched over to us, readying his baton.

He swung at Charity, but I blocked his strike with my rifle, causing him to stagger for a second. He then redirected his attack on me, which I barely dodged. I grabbed the side of his baton, and he tried stomping on my other hand, but I caught his ankle and flung him down into the cave pit behind us.

"WHUA!" he yelped, releasing a deep version of a Wilhelm scream.

We watched as he belly-flopped into the water, making a big splash. Charity winced at his landing, and the razorback waved a fist at us.

We finally climbed out of the hole without any further interruptions. Regaining our footing, we glanced at our new surroundings. We were in a well-lit storage room of some kind—somewhere deep within the climate walls. At least, it was a storage room at one point until the razorbacks dug a massive vertical tunnel in the middle of the floor. They had their mining equipment and golden coils scattered around the edges.

I leaned against one of the crates, meticulously checking my guns, gear, and ammo. Had to make sure everything was accounted for. Everything, except the tactical knife, of course.

"Hey... are you okay?" Charity asked, worried about our recent razorback encounter, making sure there were no new injuries.

I gave a solid thumbs up. "Never better."

She responded with a cute peace sign before wandering around the room, looking for any useful clues while staying close by.

Meanwhile, I counted my ammo supply and saw that it was sufficient. But the rifle barrel was noticeably bent out of place, thanks to that stupid razorback, which would undoubtedly affect accuracy.

"Alright, now I'm pissed."

Charity cocked her head to the side. "But aren't you always, though?"

I contemplated for a second, then nodded in agreement. "You know me too well."

The coyote teasingly brushed my face with her tail. It was kind of cute, even though I had to regain my focus.

She noticed me counting brass bullets and became disquieted. "What are you doing?"

"Getting ready."

"For...for what?" she didn't fully understand.

I went silent for a moment. I didn't really know what to say to her. Retribution? Judgment? None of those terms would fly well with her. Thus, with my back turned, I simply replied, "The final act."

She raised an eyebrow. "You mean finding Penny... right?"

"Of course," I lied.

The coyote gave a worried look. She knew something else was up. "You're not going to seriously hurt somebody, are you?"

I shook my head, inspecting my rifle. "It's just a diversion," I assured. "Or a tool, in case there are any more locked doors."

She looked into my eyes steadily. "You promise?"

I gave a single solemn nod. This seemed to put the coyote's mind at ease—at least, for now. I offered her my sidearm for self-defense, but she refused, saying human weapons were much too loud, heavy, and scary for her. Such was the case for all animals in Zootopia, I guess. I had no choice but to respect her decision. Good thing she knows martial arts.

After a brief moment of silence, we stood near the doors leading out of the storage room and took a deep breath. Then, with my rifle ready, we busted through the doors and continued down the winding hallways. Since the walls were pure cement and fully developed like the ones from earlier, it was safe to say that we were out of the mine and back on ground level.

Thankfully, we didn't see any razorbacks on patrol.

We eventually came upon a long rectangular tunnel illuminated by soft yellow lights from the ceilings and floors. The walls were laced with multiple golden wires, just like in previous tunnels I'd encountered, except they were far more decorative than before.

It was more or less like a makeshift palace corridor.

Even the concrete floors were polished, scrubbed, and rinsed clean. The golden wires were strategically and beautifully placed under the glossy finish. But why? Except for this area, the climate wall's interior typically had a utilitarian appearance. Now it felt more welcoming.

Charity and I turned to each other and shrugged. None of this made sense.

We walked as far as we could down the gilded rectangular hallway until we came upon a thick tall door. It measured about the same height as a giraffe, which was unusual, especially when it had a cypress wood finish covering its metallic structure. It was the type of door one would find in a video game before facing the final boss.

Charity and I looked at each other and nodded. Time to open this thing... and see what's on the other side.

We both pushed on each panel as hard as we could, awkwardly realizing it was a sliding door. We both chuckled as we proceeded to open the door correctly. Good hell.

"You ready, amor?" she looked at me for the cue, her paws gripping the door handle.

"Ready," I nodded, my hands gripping the other handle.

"Let's go find Penny."

With tremendous effort, we slid the heavy doors open. Then, without warning, our eyes became blinded by a series of intense lights. No, it wasn't heaven. It was something else entirely.

Charity and I were utterly dumbstruck.

We were in perhaps the most incredible room we had ever seen in Zootopia. The ZPD lobby, the downtown theater, and the mine pit were not even close in comparison. To say the room was enormous was an understatement. It was absolutely massive.

Equipped with an uninterruptible power supply and backup generator power, the room had cranes spread throughout, vertical platforms, vehicle-access scaffolding, individually retractable doors and bridges, high and low bay fixtures, computer stations, coffee stations, and an organized network of golden wires enveloped around the steel support columns like a web.

The razorbacks have obviously retrofitted and modified the hell out of this place.

In the center of the room, suspended by multiple steel cables, was one of the strangest machines I had ever seen. It had golden wires bleeding in and out of it like a digital hivemind. Whether it was the climate computer mainframe or some type of turbo encabulator, I knew it had to be something important. After all, it was heavily guarded by razorback sharpshooters standing in the distance across the room. Unfortunately, there was also an army of razorbacks working below, along with a few other species of animals.

It was a lot to take in. We didn't really know where to start. While Charity gazed in astonishment, I realized I didn't have enough bullets for this job. Luckily, the room was large enough that no one heard or spotted us yet.

"If this isn't the control room, then I'm gonna lose it," I said, peeking over the railing.

"I don't think you're gonna have to worry about that, baby," Charity remarked, standing by my side. "This must be it."

"Which means..."

"Penny's gotta be around here somewhere..."

I panned around the room, using binoculars to focus on the ground level. There were dozens of razorbacks working around the clock, carrying heavy crates, and using power tools to further modify the climate walls. Among them was one razorback I recognized from a few months ago. He was gray-colored, of larger stature than the rest, and was one of the first razorbacks I ever met. He also happened to be the leader of the razorbacks, going by the name of Tusk.

Behind him, on an elevated platform, was a sub-level control station with computers, monitors, and switchboards. Multiple razorbacks and wolves were working in that area. Then, from the corner of my eye, something above them caught my attention. A metal cage was dangling by a chain attached to a support beam, with a young-looking animal trapped inside. She had long pointy ears and a bushy tail that she was hugging.

"There," I pointed across the room, handing the binoculars to Charity.

As the coyote gazed through them, her ears fell flat. "That must be Penny. The poor girl looks so scared."

"And she's not alone," I added, surveying the area below. "We'll have to deal with the guards."

"That's not gonna be easy," Charity remarked, nervously fiddling with her paws. "I mean, look. There's so many of them."

"...and not enough bullets," I murmured.

One of the coyote's ears sprang up. "What was that?"

"Bulls. I said bulls," I falsely clarified. "There's not enough bulls down there."

She playfully rolled her eyes. "Okay... I can see that all the way from here, silly."

I shrugged, "Just saying.." and gazed through the binoculars again.

After a minute or three of gathering intel on our surroundings, one of the razorbacks guards from a watchtower across the room shined a bright searchlight in our area. Charity and I barely ducked in time, hiding behind a scaffolding tarp.

"So, what's the plan?" she whispered.

I put a fist to my chin, trying to come up with something. Soon enough, I devised a plan and carefully explained it to Charity. Without going into too much detail, it involved striking the razorbacks in the heart of their operations: By dealing with their mainframe hanging in the center of the room. High-density armor-piercing rounds ought to bring it down. If successful, its destruction would significantly distract the razorbacks and provide some ground cover, allowing us to extract Penny without being caught in the wide open. Kill two birds with one stone. The only problem was that the mainframe was well-protected in a large steel casing. The exposed interior was on the other side of the room, where all the golden wires fed into it. All we needed was a better angle.

"Are you sure about this?" Charity asked, worried. She was hoping for a quieter plan. "This could get really dangerous very quickly."

I nodded, loading the gun. "I just need one clear shot."

She sighed, knowing her fluffy ears were probably going to hurt afterward.

I checked my tactical pouches, which were still wet and damp. Only six rounds and one grenade remaining. The other munitions were either lost, cracked, or deteriorated from the flood, meaning it was critical to make every shot count. With more than fifty razorbacks, this was going to be interesting. Fingers crossed, they'd line up for a headshot, but that was unlikely, given the grand scale of this room.

After some convincing and finalization, Charity finally agreed to the plan, albeit with hesitation. Taking a deep breath, we looked at each other, nodded, popped our heads out of cover, and ran down the scaffolding.

"There they are!"

"Move, move!"

"Take em' down, boys!"

As expected, the razorbacks heard us and spotted us moving in. They scrambled to get their sharpshooters moved into position to take shots at us. They sounded off the alarm, and within seconds, everyone in the room knew we were coming. Good.

"You're too late, Mr. Chenry!" a commanding voice spoke over the intercom. "My ancestors designed these climate walls. And now, we are going to take back what is rightfully ours!"

They began shooting a barrage of darts at us from above. We ran and took cover behind a stack of blue tanks, which quickly deflated due to being filled with water.

"We will control everything, and nothing—not even you—will be able to stop us," the voice taunted.

We rushed behind the next closest cover available: A loading truck, whose tires were immediately shot out and deflated within seconds while the windows were promptly shattered. The projectile darts from the razorbacks weren't standard-issued by the ZPD. Instead, they were longer, sharper, and more harpoon-like.

The voice belted in laughter. "No Officer Hopps... no Officer Wilde... and no more ZBI agents to save you this time. It's only us now!"

Getting annoyed, I fired one round into the overhead speaker, causing it to shatter. Totally worth it.

Charity and I scurried along the elevated platform, struggling to get past the series of suppressive shots, trying to make our way toward the back of the computer mainframe.

"As I was saying..." the voice pulled out a megaphone instead. "We'd like to extend you a warm welcome to our climate wall, Mr. Chenry. Or a cold one, depending on where you stand. Zootopia never welcomed us, so we're welcoming you! What an honor it is for you to finally join us! We admire the stubborn energy you bring tonight, so come, please make yourself at home."

The coyote and I got pinned down behind a crate of fire extinguishers, some of which started spewing out clouds of powder upon getting shot. I threw one of them toward the razorbacks as smoke cover before advancing again. We stayed low, keeping ourselves hidden as we moved into one of the scaffolding towers to take the stairs down. Oddly enough, some metal surfaces had vines, weeds, and urban growth... even though we were indoors.

"Every mammal in Zootopia deserves its own habitat, whether arid, frigid, or tropical..." the voice continued to narrate as we pushed our way through the razorback's line of defenses. "But what of the swampland dwellers? What about us? We did their dirty work... we did what City Hall asked us to do. We laid the foundations of this splendid city to make it possible and for what? To be treated like societal outcasts? Not anymore. Since no urban planners took us into account, I did it for us. I gave us what we deserved. A place we could finally call home. A swamp. I even altered the scenes at the Natural History Museum and the Palm Hotel to foretell this change. Think of it, thousands of acres of Zootopia, FLOODED!"

We came to a 'vertical' dead end in the tower, unable to descend any further unless we jumped. Since it was too high to jump and we'd likely shatter a femur or two, we instead hopped onto one of the loading platforms of a crane, swinging ourselves to the other side of the room using gravity.

A backup squad of razorbacks began firing upon us from the other tower. While we were moving, I quickly aimed and fired one round into the tower's support post, causing the entire corner to collapse beneath them.

"You think this disruption will be enough?" the voice echoed around the wreckage. "Zootopia is already ours. This is our home! A chance to build a better life! We will not; we cannot let you take that away from us!"

Charity and I leaped onto the next lower platform before the crane came crashing hard into the adjacent wall. We hopped through all the dust and debris to descend to the main level. As a result, we were closer to where Penny was being held captive, only a hundred steps away, along with an army of razorbacks waiting for us below.

In addition, the computer's giant mainframe core was nearly exposed, suspended from the ceiling, filled with electric chips and a gilded motherboard. The internals coursed with electricity and sparks, flashing a bright blue hue on everything around it. They were vulnerable yet well-protected in a large outer shell casing the size of a cargo container. Thus, I still needed a better angle to get a more precise shot.

The coyote and I peaked over the edge of the scaffolding, accidentally making eye- contact with the gray razorback leader, who smiled up at us. He stood shoulder to shoulder with his fellow razorbacks and female wolf accomplice. All of them were heavily equipped with the latest ZPD SWAT gear and weaponry.

"Don't be a fool, Mr. Chenry. We've already won," Tusk spoke proudly, tossing aside the megaphone he had been using. "There's more going on here than you can imagine. More than you're ever willing to imagine."

"Yeah, shutting down the climate walls.... all for a shitty swamp," I uttered nonchalantly, adjusting my iron sights. "That's not a lot to imagine."

The animals behind him gave me a hostile stare, seemingly offended.

"Shutting down?" Tusk chuckled, mockingly shaking his head. "Now, don't be ridiculous. Do you think we'd destroy our life's work? Our temporary home? This beautiful chef-d'oeuvre of civil engineering?" he gestured to the entire room around us. "One of Zootopia's greatest technological achievements of all time passed down from generation to generation by my species? No, no, no... We're not shutting down the climate walls. We're reversing them."

Charity and I turned to each other, slightly surprised. "...reversing?"

"Why waste such a valuable asset?" Tusk continued, showing us around. "All this raw, untamed power at the tips of our hooves. A way to bend the will of Mother Nature herself. The weather, the climate, the temperature, everything! Not only will we turn this grand city into our beloved swampland, but we will keep it that way. Forever!" he chanted, earning a loud chant from his fellow mammals that echoed across the room. "Indeed, Zootopia will thrive as a swamp—not for days, not for months—but for many years to come!"

"You can't do this!" Charity glared down at the gray razorback. "Think of all the innocent families and mammals that'll be displaced, separated... without a home..."

"I already have," the razorback said flatly, pointing his finger at the coyote. "Trust me, those mammals can find a home elsewhere. I've seen them do it. Look back on our ancient history, Ms. Charity. Before the Pre-Zootopian era. If their ancestors could migrate hundreds of miles to reach the watering hole, then I believe they can migrate again."

Tusk's associate nudged him on the shoulder. "Plus, they've got cars now."

Tusk laughed. "My point exactly."

"Even though the city's roadways are crippled," I added.

Tusk thought about that for a moment, then merely shrugged. "Well, then... I guess those mammals will just have to adapt to survive. Hate to say it."

"But Zootopia's a place for everyone," Charity reminded, trying to talk sense into him. "It's a place where we can come together, set aside our differences, and live in peace and harmony. Please... I know your family's been through a lot, and I'm very sorry. This city's not perfect, it never has been, but we can still find a way to-"

"Enough!" Tusk interrupted her with a loud roar, causing the whole room to go silent. He then took a deep breath. "We've already found a way to set things right! This plan's been years in the making, and nothing's going to change that! Not a cute poem, not an inspirational quote, not a politician's lie. Nothing! And we will not stop until our work is finished."

The coyote growled lowly. "Then why take Penny?"

Behind the razorbacks, we could still see the little jackal girl suspended high above the ground in her rusty cage, tightly hugging her tail and shutting her eyes as the razorbacks made scary faces at her and teased her from below.

"Ah, yes, Penny," Tusk glanced back at the scared jackal, smiled at her, then turned back to us. "Isn't that obvious? We knew your alien boyfriend was the only mammal dumb enough and capable enough to come barging this far into our climate walls to try and stop us. A pathetic cop freak rescuing two damsels in distress? Ha! Typical. You were always Plan A, Ms. Pawts, yet you both 'miraculously' survived the tunnels, so Penny is now Plan B. All that remains is taking care of him to fulfill our vision. And trust me. Mr. Chenry," he chuckled, turning his stern gaze toward me. "Plan B will be far worse for you than Plan A." he and his animals loaded their tranquilizer crossbows. "So... you wanna get to the girl? You gotta go through us. All of us."

"Pray I don't survive," I angrily clenched my gun, trying to get a clean shot on the mainframe above the razorbacks. "Because I'm gonna kill you all."

Tusk raised an eyebrow, lowering his crossbow slightly. "That seems kinda dark for a cop, doesn't it?"

"I don't give a shit," I said, taking a few steps closer to them. "And I'll see to it that you never get your swamp back."

Tusk laughed. "What are you gonna do? Events have already been set in motion that you cannot stop."

"In that case," I loaded a new round into the chamber. "I'll bathe those stairways in your blood. Then we'll see how the morale holds up in your crew."

Tusk and his razorbacks stared at each other in surprise. "You know, when Chief Bogo finds out about this..."

"Bogo's not here," I said, aiming my rifle at his head. "And neither will you."

Upon hearing this, the razorbacks tensed up to defend the control stations with their pesky riot shields, preparing for our final battle.

Just then, I felt something sharp stab near my abdomen.

Argh!" I stumbled, losing grip on my gun, and fell to my knees in excruciating pain as I turned to see who it was.

No.. it couldn't be...

It was Charity.

She had her claws completely unsheathed and a vengeful look on her face as she placed a foot on my chest and shoved me over the edge of the scaffolding. I fell two stories, banging my head against the support beams and crashing into a crate of rebar before hitting the cement floor.

What the hell was she doing?

I grunted in pain, unable to walk or stand. My vision blurred, and I could barely crawl or limp. The coyote climbed down, rolled my body over, and stood over it to keep me pinned.

"On behalf of the ZIA, I've brought you the human," she announced.

The razorbacks' shocked expressions quickly turned into triumphant grins. Soon enough, they slowly regained their composure and came toward me.

"Excellent work, Ms. Charity," Tusk congratulated her, slinging his tranquilizer crossbow onto his back. "I am most pleased. I knew you'd come to your senses."

***

"Charity?" I cried out, reaching up toward her. "You... you're betraying me?"

She swatted my hand away, staring down apathetically. "Sorry, Cherry, but I'm doing this for the greater good of Zootopia. If you were an animal like us, you'd understand."

My mind was racing, unable to understand why she'd do such a thing. "Wait... what?"

"It was all part of the plan," she said, crouching down. "Ever since the day we met," she raised my chin with her sharp claw. "Everything we've done together, everything we've been through... it was all a cruel ploy to gain your confidence."

"W-Why?" I asked. "I... I trusted you..."

She didn't answer. All she did was stare down and smile in victory, giving a proud nod to the razorbacks.

I bled, crawling along the floor to reach for my gun, with crimson red ooze seeping between the armor plates. It was starting to get gross. To my despair, the coyote kicked the gun away.

"Oh, Mr. Chenry..." Tusk marched over to us, holding a spiked baton in his hoof. "How does it feel now? To fall lower on the animal hierarchy? To no longer be the apex predator of this room?" he chuckled, sighing in relaxation. "For a while, we thought you were dead, drowned in that water back there. And yet, here you are, drowning in your own blood."

More and more razorbacks gathered around to celebrate. I was utterly speechless. Lying on the floor and just... helpless. Powerless. After all this time, everything led to this very moment? I went through all that hell and shit to rescue my only true friend, just for her to stab me in the back? The amount of physical pain was nothing compared to the emotional.

Meanwhile, Tusk wouldn't shut up. "I remember the day we first met you, Mr. Chenry: A high, mighty, powerful alien—unlike anything this world has ever seen. You were all over the news. But now? You've seriously downgraded over the last few months... You bleed just like the rest of us. What a shame."

I kept crawling toward the gun, trying to reach it. It was no use. The weapon was clearly out of reach, and the trail of blood grew thicker as my legs dragged lifelessly along the cement floor.

Charity watched as I struggled and groaned in pain. I shot her a look of betrayal, continuing to crawl slowly. The coyote then started to tear up.

"Charity, what are you doing?" I whispered angrily. "You're breaking out of character."

She fell to her knees, overcome with emotion. "I...I can't..."

It didn't take long for the razorbacks to notice something was off. They were somewhat confused until their leader decided to step in.

"Uh, huh... Nice try, you guys," Tusk sniffed the air around him with his snout. "But if there's one thing I know better, it's the smell of ketchup from a mile away. Y'all can't fool me, even with my bad cold," he turned to his razorback associates. "Throw these two in the brig."

In a last-ditch effort, I whipped out the pistol I had secretly hidden under the chest rig and tried to shoot the mainframe's weak spot from underneath. I still wasn't close enough, nor did I have the best angle, but I had to try. Right as I did so, however, an armored razorback clubbed me in the face before I could pull the trigger.

"Cherry!" the coyote cried out, trying to stop the razorbacks from grabbing us until she got seized by two razorbacks.

Four more razorbacks came over, pinned my limbs down, and injected my neck with tranquilizer fluid before dragging us away into an undisclosed location within the climate walls. Wherever that might be, it was unknown since my vision began to blur and blacken.

"Damn it," I uttered in frustration, unable to clench my fist.

For the next few minutes, the razorbacks lugged us around like luggage, taking us through a series of winding passages until we came into an isolated area.

After hosing me down to clean up all the ketchup stains, they placed us into two separate cells suspended over a fire and ice pit in a medium-sized room. It resembled the catwalk from the Tundratown-Sahara-Square section of the climate wall; it had icicles on one side and heat coils on the other. However, it was a single square room.

I was shoved into a cell on the cold side, and Charity was placed in a cell on the hot side. She was already stripped down to her torn, skimpy scrubs, whereas I was stripped of all my guns and gear.

"Well, I never thought I'd be saying this," a razorback jailer commented, locking the cell doors with his keys. "But you two make a great-looking couple."

"Couple of what? Prisoners?" I asked, slowly regaining consciousness. "I don't get it."

The burly razorback only chuckled and said nothing, marching out of the room with the keys jingling on his belt. The solid metal door closed loudly behind him, leaving us alone in our cells.

"Charity, what the hell was he talking about?" I turned to face the coyote across the room

She sat in her cell, knees to her chest, weeping uncontrollably. Her ears hung low, and her tail was wrapped around her legs.

"...Charity?"

She finally lifted her head, sniffling. "Baby... are... are you okay?"

"I'm fine," I replied bluntly, angrily clenching the cell bars. "Just pissed that our plan failed."

"I-I mean... are you hurt?" she asked, stuttering as dread filled her heart. "Did... did I hurt you?"

"No," I said irritably.

"But... all that blood on you... it... it was everywhere," she choked with emotion as the tears ran down her muzzle. "There... there was so much of it... "

I sighed. "Tell me, Charity. Are you a nurse?"

She seemingly doubted herself but nodded. "Yes... yes, I am."

"Then how the hell can you not tell the difference between blood and ketchup?" I asked derisively.

She was stunned by my shift in demeanor. "But... you didn't tell me there was gonna be blood—or anything like that. I-I was so scared..."

"How else were we supposed to sell it?" I raised my voice at her. "You think those razorbacks would let me crawl toward my rifle if they didn't see me bleeding to death? C'mon, Charity. It was supposed to be a subtle yet gradual advancement: I fake an injury, you kick away my primary gun—make them think I would never reach it—and that's when I pull out my hidden secondary pistol once I crawled close enough under the mainframe," I reminded her. "That was our best chance of getting a perfect angle to destroy the core. They never would've expected it. The plan was working well—they thought you betrayed me and were on their side—until you got all damn emotional about it... and then you ruined it by giving us away!"

Her ears lowered as she tried to bite back the sadness and frustration that was welling up inside her. "I... I'm sorry..."

I threw my arms up, slumping against the cell bars. "Well, it's over now."

There was a brief pause, followed by a long period of silence. All we could hear was the boiling lava pit and freezing ice pit beneath the cage gratings. We were helpless, defeated, and stuck here while Zootopia continued to flood and transform into a giant swamp.

"But, Cherry...." the coyote realized something. "You didn't know that most razorbacks have a heightened sense of smell?"

I thought about that for a moment, then shook my head. "No, I did not."

She sighed, staring down through the grating. "Baby, if you had told me you were going to use ketchup, I could've told you that sooner."

"Right... I know," I admitted, feeling that I should've explained the plan better without skipping through all the explicit details—the ones I previously thought were only trivial. "...I didn't mean to get upset."

She gave a soft smile. "It's okay, baby."

I nodded, resting my head back against the bars. The tranquilizer effects were still wearing off, and the first thing to meet me was the cold surface of the cell.

"So where did you get the ketchup from anyway?" she asked curiously.

"From the climate wall breakroom," I pulled out a leftover packet from my utility pouch. "I figured it'd come in handy," I said before flicking it into the lava pit under her cell like a disregarded cigarette bud. "Apparently not."

"Next time, please try not to scare me like that, okay?" the coyote implored. "You can at least warn me before you pull off any more crazy stunts... because that last one you did... that was pretty gruesome—especially in front of Penny."

I merely shrugged. "We all have to grow up someday..."

"Cherry," she became stern.

"Okay, fine," I partially agreed, fighting against my mental instincts. "I'll keep that in mind."

The coyote nodded in gratitude. Meanwhile, we sat in our individual cells, contemplating the future. We were stuck here for all we knew and unsure what to do.

"Aw, but poor Penny," Charity's ears drooped in despair. "She must've thought we were going to rescue her. We were so close, too. Now all three of us are in cages."

"Yeah, that's too bad."

"There has to be a way we can still help her." Charity thought out loud. "We've gotta try."

I let out a tired exhalation. "Good luck with that. Because I'm all out of ideas."

Charity took a minute to glance around the room, paused for a few seconds to think, and then smiled. "I might have a few tricks up my sleeve."

I scoffed. "If you had sleeves."

It was true, though. Charity didn't have any sleeves. She was sleeveless, as much as I was planless to get us out of here.

The coyote's ear perked up as she heard someone approaching. She stood at the edge of her cell and held onto the bars with her paws. A few seconds later, a razorback guard entered the room to check on us. He was fully armed and on patrol. He sat in his foldable chair in the corner of the room, gave us occasional glances, and began tapping away at his phone.

I shot him a quick death glare before he shot me back with a nasty scowl. He then turned to Charity, who gave him a cute smile.

His demeanor changed completely, making his face red before he nodded at her.

The coyote winked at him.

The razorback looked side to side, cracking a shy grin.

Eventually, he and the coyote gazed into each other's eyes.

"Hola, bebé." Charity fluttered her eyelashes at him. "¿Cómo estás?"

"Oh, uh... bien! Muy bien, gracias," he greeted, clearing his throat. ¿Y tú?"

"Aye, con mucho calor. Mucho."

I had no idea what the hell they were saying...

"¿Verdad que si?" he chuckled, fiddling with his gorget. "Así se siente en este cuarto. Casi siempre me pasa algo con la tempuratura, jaja."

"Sí, hace demasiado calor y me siento sola," the coyote said, stretching out her midriff. "¿Puedes quedarte conmigo? ¿Porfis? Es que mi novio no me hace caso. Está enojado conmigo."

"Aye caray, que mala onda él," the razorback stood up and eagerly walked up to Charity. "Pues, me gustaria ayudarte. Cualquier cosa por una hermosa coyote como tú."

The razorback and coyote chatted in that same foreign Zootopian dialect for the next few minutes. Too bad my helmet HUD wasn't active to translate.

"...también me encanta explorar pantanos y todo eso," the razorback continued excitedly. "¡Será súper chido una vez que se termine! Un lugar perfecto para ir a una cita..."

The coyote giggled, tickling his muzzle. "Seguro tenemos muchas cosas en común, ¿Qué te parece si tomamos el atrevimiento de averiguarlo?"

"Oh, me gustaría eso," he tittered, reaching for her waist.

She grabbed him by his tooth horn and bashed his head into the cell bars, knocking him unconscious as he fell flat onto his back. Then, stretching her slender leg through the bars and using her foot, she grabbed the keys from his utility belt with her toes and used them to unlock her cell.

"Hmph," she nodded in satisfaction, stepping over the razorback's limp body to come over and unlock my cell.

"Strange but effective," I remarked.

The coyote smiled, holding out her paw. "C'mon, baby. We can still do this. Let's go save Penny!"

I nodded and followed her toward the exit. Along the way, I looted the razorback guard's body, wielding his ZPD baton, holstering his custom tranquilizer pistol onto my belt, and stealing his pack of mints.

Once we were all set, Charity unlocked the double doors, and we tip-toed down the service tunnel, hoping we could find a way back to the control room.

Nearly outside the cell block, we came across four off-duty razorbacks. One of them was naively using my rifle as a back scratcher, and they hadn't noticed us yet. Their other weapons were resting against the wall. All of them were distracted by a social media app on their phones—laughing and scrolling through all the frightened citizen's frightened comments about Zootopia being flooded.

"Hey, Chuckles," a razorback chuckled next to his companion. "Get a load of this..."

Before the razorbacks could type their next hashtag # catchphrase to taunt the public further, the coyote and I pounced on them from the sides like a pair of raptors working and hunting together. However, instead of using our teeth and claws, we simply used our arms and fists—or feet in Charity's case, since she was more of a kicker—to knock the razorbacks flat on their backs. I personally preferred punching since it was less demanding on flexibility. Plus, I didn't have to stretch beforehand.

Once the razorbacks were on the ground, they desperately crawled toward their phones—instead of their weapons?—which was rather strange. I guess everyone has different priorities in this whole climate wall heist. Regardless, the coyote and I stood over them, grabbed them by the scruff, and tossed them into one of the nearby empty cells.

As Charity closed and locked the cell door, the dizzy razorbacks turned to us with cocky grins.

"I'd hurry if I were you," they mocked, laughing among each other. "...because your time's almost up... the climate machine's fully processed... and we're about to change history forever."

"For Zootopia!"

"For our Zootopia!"

I shot and tranquilized each razorback before they could finish chanting. Finally, some peace and quiet. However, that wouldn't last long since we had to move quickly.

I collected the rest of my confiscated items from a metal chest. At least what was left of them. The rifle, the pistol—both very short on ammo—and a frag grenade. Yes, I remembered making at least one in the lab. It was a pain to assemble; I never thought I'd have to use it... but now I realized I'd been saving it for this moment.

"What's that?" the coyote asked, peaking over my shoulder.

"Um..." I frantically hid it away in my tactical pouch. "It's... it's nothing... it's just a, uh..."

"...an ornament?" she finished, raising an eyebrow. "Like a tree ornament?"

I nodded, fidgeting with the metal pin, "Yeah."

She didn't seem very sold but shook away her thoughts anyway. "Okay, then... Are you ready?"

I immediately stood up, "Yep. Let's go," and followed her down the tunnel.

***

We started off jogging, and then we started running. We did our best to backtrack despite our unfamiliarity with this section of the climate wall. We heard machinery powering up in the background as we climbed up ladders, crossed catwalk bridges, and navigated through service corridors. It got slightly louder the further we went, and the floor vibrated beneath our feet. We then started sprinting to pick up the pace. That noise would surely lead us back into the control room. We had a feeling that it would. Charity continued to lead the way since she had the best ears between the two of us.

However, the further we went, the more inconsistent the noise became. It initially got louder and louder, but now it was only getting quieter and quieter. It felt like we were either lost or going in the wrong direction.

"C'mon, baby, it's this way," the coyote waved her paw.

I grew doubtful as we entered another dark hallway. "Are you sure?"

She kept running. "I'm positive."

"How do you know?" I tried to keep up with her.

"I can smell it."

"You can... smell it?"

She playfully rolled her eyes. "Baby, what do you expect? I am a coyote, after all."

"Yeah, but..."

She grabbed my hand, hurrying us along. "Just trust me."

Apparently, she also had the best nose between the two of us. It took a while to see why until it suddenly became clear. Because after kicking through the last door of the utility tunnel, we were finally back in the razorback's climate wall control room. However, unlike last time, things in this room were different.

The catwalk bridges between the scaffolding towers were all retracted, and even the ladders were taken away, leaving us stranded on the upper platforms with no easy way down. Floodlights were flickering, ceiling dust was collecting on the sides, the overall environment had a slightly burnt orange glow, and the floor plates beneath us started to rumble.

We peeked over the railing and looked down to see the armored mainframe machine powering up to maximum capacity. The one I intended to destroy.

As we stared down in awe, I tightly clenched the frag grenade in my hand. The coyote kept wondering why.

Whatever final phase—whatever fate the razorbacks had in mind for these climate walls... I knew it couldn't be anything good. Maintaining a transient swamp environment was one thing... but keeping it that way forever on a large geographic scale—locking down the entire system and hard coding the climate wall settings—could lead to an irreversible ecological disaster stretching beyond the boundaries of the city.

As long as I was breathing, that wasn't going to happen.

And no, this wasn't about saving Penny anymore. Nor was this about restoring the climate walls back to their original settings. No, it was all about putting those razorbacks in their place. Making it personal. Whether that's six feet under, in a hospital bed, under the mainframe rubble, or turning them into a new animal skin coat, that depended entirely on how this would all end. Either way, I looked forward to making those razorbacks suffer the consequences of their actions... every last one of them. And all it required was a well-placed grenade.

I squinted through all the golden cables and spotted an open ventilation hatch on the lower left side of the mainframe. Perfect. Now we just needed to get closer.

"How do we get down there?" Charity asked as she stood near the edge of the scaffolding.

I replied, "We climb," and scaled over the railing.

She took a deep breath, "I knew you were gonna say that," and nervously followed from above.

I couldn't blame her. It was a long way down—high enough to kill either of us if we fell. Nor was there any body of water to catch us. Regardless, we had no other choice.

We both descended down the interconnected scaffolding support beams, carefully sliding our way down, using the horizontal and diagonal braces and transoms to cushion our speed against the force of gravity.

Before we could reach the halfway point, Charity and I heard footsteps and tranquilizer guns being loaded below us.

"Don't let em' get to the mainframe!" a razorback squad member yelled.

We slid down the scaffolding as fast as possible to avoid being shot. The razorbacks barely missed us as we continued downward. However, one of the razorbacks grabbed a sledgehammer and started banging away at the scaffolding support beam a few floors below. Charity and I were quickly losing our grip.

However, before we could fall or get shot, a roided-out razorback from the opposite side of the scaffolding leaped onto us. It was almost like a silverback gorilla coming out of nowhere in the jungle.

The large mammal tackled us onto the lower platforms, pinning us down onto the metal grating using his thick muscles and armored gear. My neck was clamped under his heavy baton, while the coyote's neck was trapped under his bulky hoof as he continued to choke us with all his strength.

"You two ain't going nowhere!" he belted in laughter.

Coughing from the force of his grip, Charity kicked him in the nose, and I punched him in the gut. We both struck him as hard as we could.

Unfortunately, it didn't do anything to him. Our strikes only seemed to encourage him to squeeze tighter.

Charity kicked him in the groin, causing the razorback to squeal suddenly. Then, using our combined strength, we flung him over our heads and sent him flying into a pile of crates.

As soon as we stood up, however, and before we even had a chance to recover, more and more razorbacks descended upon us like a riled-up hornets' nest, where everything inside was seemingly intent on snuffing us out of existence.

"Quick! Back to back!" the coyote commanded.

Understanding her logic, we got ourselves into a defensive position as we shuffled down the ramp to the next platform. The razorbacks immediately rushed in.

"After them!" the horned mammals shouted.

By this point, it became a close-quarters engagement, and we were already blocking and exchanging punches with the razorbacks. They tried cornering us on the ledge, hoping we'd fall or surrender, but we held our ground. Barely. A human and a coyote against a swarm of SWAT-geared animals. It quickly became an all-out fight and a race against time, as we could hear the mainframe machine powering up in the dark chasm below us.

"Heads up!" Charity warned.

I instantly ducked, and she performed a high double jump kick on an unsuspecting bear charging from the side. The bear fell backward and toppled over onto two of its comrades.

"Thanks," I stood back up to rejoin the fight.

The coyote winked back and continued delivering punches like nobody's business. Despite her smaller size, she was quite a strong and fierce female fighter.

Amidst the furious razorbacks, a white tiger began barreling toward us with a riot shield aimed at us, seemingly intent on shoving us over the edge. However, the striped cat would quickly find that he had been too hasty as I ran forward also, grabbing his shield by the edges and twisting it out of his grip.

As the feline lost his balance and tumbled over, I used his own shield against his companions and started beating them away with it, delivering hard uppercuts and lowercuts onto two to three of them at a time. Hard enough, in fact, that the shield had already accumulated a few dents in it.

With the razorbacks unable to advance on us, they readjusted their formation and aimed harpoons at us, firing at will. "Take 'em down!"

I immediately pulled Charity behind and raised the shield, feeling the glass panel cracking from the barrage of projectiles.

"Yeah, yeah!" they kept firing. "Get some!"

The glass panel took heavy damage, rendering the shield nearly useless, and harpoons were constantly whizzing by. One embedded into my vambrace and cracked it before another skidded off my shoulder while another ricocheted off my waist... and hit Charity.

The force of the impact knocked her clear off her feet, causing her to fall on all fours and clutch her side in severe pain as both her paws were covered in blood.

"Shit!" I cursed under my breath as more projectiles rained upon us. I used my body to shield the coyote from further harm.

The razorbacks reloaded their harpoon guns and prepared to finish us off.

I pulled out my revolver and fired a loud single shot into a nearby scaffolding cable made of interwoven steel. It powerfully flung toward the razorbacks like a giant rubber band, whipped them all in the face, knocking away their weapons from their hooves and incapacitating them.

With the threat temporarily under control, I turned to the coyote, who was on her knees, breathing heavily.

"You okay?" I asked, helping her up.

The coyote clasped her side, wincing in pain. It was heart-sinking to see her like this. The poor animal could hardly stand upright without leaning.

I pried her paw away to get a better look. She had a sizeable laceration on the side of her waist from the metal harpoon shot at her.

"I'm fine... It's just a scratch," she said, trying to remain positive.

Just then, there were loud footsteps fastly approaching us.

"Let's fix that, then!" a rhino snuck up from behind, grabbed me by the neck, and held a spiked bat to my throat. I could feel the rusty nail breaking the first layer of skin.

"Cherry!" the coyote cried out, leaping onto the giant mammal's back and sinking her teeth into his shoulder.

"Argh! Get off me!" he thrashed, trying to throw her off his back while I was stuck in his headlock. "Get off!"

"Leave him alone!" she gave him a muffled growl, her jaw still locked tight.

The armored rhino growled angrily, grabbed her by the neck after dropping me on the floor, and tossed her into an empty storage room behind him. He then kicked the iron door shut and locked it tight before turning his attention back toward me.

"I should've known she wouldn't have the spine to finish you!" the rhino glowered, reloading his biceps as he readied himself to shove me over the edge.

Still lying on the metal floorboards, I aimed my revolver at his head and pulled the trigger. All I heard was a 'CLICK' signaling it was empty. Out of options, I threw the gun at him as hard as possible, pelting him in the noggin.

"Argh! My nose!" he clutched it as he complained.

I spied a section of a metal beam resting against a crate. I tightly grasped it with both hands and swung at the rhino with all my might, mind, and strength. I hit him again. And again. And again... and again.

He merely laughed, spitting out a tooth. "You'll have to do better than-"

I hit him again.

This time, the rhino stumbled backward, left, right, then finally fell flat on the metal floorboards, making the whole platform shake and rumble throughout the scaffolding.

Tossing the metal beam aside, I ran over to check on Charity, who was still locked inside a storage room behind an iron door.

"Charity...?" I called out, tapping the door with my knuckles.

"Baby... are you okay?" she could be heard from the other side, albeit very faintly. "Are you hurt?"

"Don't worry about me," I said, gripping the rusty door handles. "How you holding up?"

She breathed a tired sigh of relief. "I-I think I'm okay. Not the greatest, still kinda hurting... but could be worse."

"Standby," I began prying at the heavy door lever. "I'll get you out of there."

"We've gotta hurry," she urged, already tugging from her side. "Penny's still down there."

"I know," I gritted through my teeth as I flexed every muscle to force the door lever open. The rhino who locked it was really starting to piss me off.

Charity and I tried and tried, but we failed to get it open. Even with all our combined strength, we couldn't get her free.

Matters got worse when the control room suddenly dimmed and darkened. The mainframe machine down below was nearly finished powering up to self-sustaining capacity. The climate wall's settings would become irreversible in just a few minutes, and it'd all be over. I knew exactly what I had to do.

"Stay here," I said, walking away from the locked door and toward the platform's ledge. "I'll be right back."

"Cherry?"

"You'll be safe."

"What are you doing?" she asked, becoming more worried.

I unclipped the grenade from my belt, gripping it tightly. "Finishing this."

"Cherry, wait-"

Before she could finish, I jumped and grabbed onto the steel cable suspended from the damaged loading crane from the platform above and began rappelling down to the bottom of the chasm toward the mainframe machine.

It was a long way down. Unfortunately, visibility was limited due to the control room being shrouded in darkness—likely due to power being rerouted and focused toward the mainframe. Still, I spotted orange auxiliary lights arranged into a square shape below, indicating where I needed to land.

I squeezed onto the steel cable with one hand, controlling the speed of my descent while gripping the grenade in the other hand. Just a few hundred more feet until I reached the bottom of the mainframe chamber to access the open cooling hatch from underneath.

Meanwhile, the razorbacks were already positioning themselves on the upper platforms, rapidly launching their harpoons at me as I sped past them, desperately trying to slow me down. They were mobilizing everything they could muster and becoming increasingly more trigger-happy.

It wouldn't be enough, though.

As I landed on the polished concrete, my boots made a loud metallic thud. Unfortunately, the steel cable ended sooner than anticipated, so I did a compensating roll to cushion the unexpected fall. Thankfully, my femur bones only popped instead of cracking.

Harpoons from all angles, hundreds of feet above, were raining upon me like a hailstorm, ricocheting and bouncing across the floor. I ran and dolphin-dived between sparsed crates to avoid getting hit. Then, with one last round in the rifle's banana clip, I shot a large cluster of gas pipes to provide me with the additional smoke cover.

It was a spacious area down here, large enough to hangar an entire passenger aircraft—or in this case, a Kaaba-sized mainframe machine suspended thirty feet above the floor—but the window of opportunity was as small as the emergency hatch itself. In other words, I had to get close enough under the mainframe machine to ensure a successful grenade toss into its electromechanical interior. Otherwise, I'd only be scratching the paint or causing superficial damage, at best.

With the grenade in my hand, I made a final run for it. Surprisingly, the coast was clear... but not for long since the smoke cover would soon dissipate.

I darted toward the mainframe, intent on ending the razorback's climate wall scheme...Once and for all.

But as soon as I reached the halfway mark, a long tactical rope randomly dropped from the ceiling above... and someone was rapidly rappeling down it. Someone big and heavy...

Though most of my weapons were out of ammo, I readied myself up regardless, waiting for the bulky figure to appear through the thick smoke.

The figure landed with a loud metallic thud, which was... unusual, especially for a mammal. Its broad-shouldered silhouette stepped out of the smoke screen and came into full view, which was revealed to be a razorback.

He chuckled maliciously, marching closer.

Instead of black tactical gear, he was covered in a metallic copper-colored plating from head to ankle. Crudely built yet primed for combat. An animal juggernaut with brightly polished armor and custom gear. He had knee guards, shin guards, neck guards, shoulder guards, and many other types of guards between the spaces of his scruffy fur. In addition, he had a full-face custom helmet with a horned mohawk, except that his muzzle and mouth horns were exposed in the front. Finally, the metal plate visor covering his eyes had eight eye holes punched into it for visibility, which resembled something strangely... familiar.

Manually lifting his creaky visor and giving a broad smile, he bore his unbrushed fangs while wielding a two-handed harpoon launcher in his hooves.

"Well, well, well... If it isn't Mr. Chenry!" his voice echoed across the misty floor. "So good to see you! Didn't think you'd make it to the grand finale."

I immediately recognized him. It was the same gray razorback that I hoped to never see again. Yet, here he was. Mr. Tusk, leader of the razorbacks.

The rest of his arsenal consisted of every imaginable weapon crafted in Zootopia. It was the most decked-out loadout I've ever seen on any animal. Dual crossbows on his back, harpoon guns, tranquilizer pistols, tasers, a riot shield, a sword, and other primitive tools on his shoulder belt.

He noticed me staring and was amused. "You like it?"

I scoffed. "It's a piece of shit. A pale imitation of my legacy."

Mr. Tusk frowned. "It may not be as advanced as yours once was...," he loosened his shoulders a bit before inspecting his heavy weapon with a twisted grin. "But I can assure you... this is gonna hurt."

Right after he said that, we could hear the mainframe machine powering up above him, getting louder and louder, faster and faster by the second. Orange and blue electrical sparks were zapping everywhere while the generators were humming up with increased power.

"Stand aside," I glared, clenching the grenade with one hand.

"No!" the armored razorback stood with his legs shoulder-width apart, positioning himself between me and the mainframe machine, committed to defending it. "Never."

I grew impatient. "I don't have time for this."

"Whatever you're planning to do, I can't let you do it," he growled, aiming his oversized weapon. "No, I won't let you do it! I've come too far."

I slowly began approaching him. "...so have I," and broke into a full sprint.

The razorback leader fired the first shot.

I slid onto my knees and barely ducked in time as the giant harpoon projectile struck the loading truck behind me, completely eviscerating it. After processing what had just happened, I felt a fresh scrape on my shoulder. That weapon was overkill.

Mr. Tusk discarded his empty two-handed harpoon and switched to his dual crossbows.

I somersaulted behind a stack of crates as he fired bolts at me. Even though the wooden frames caught most of the projectiles, a couple of them managed to penetrate the other side, compromising my cover. The razorback had me pinned down.

He moved in closer to get a better shot. As he was reloading a new bolt rack, I took that opportunity to fire a tranquilizer dart at him. I aimed between his armor plates and pulled the trigger before he could fire back. It struck right above his neck plate, not doing anything to him. I fired a follow-up shot before he could react. Regrettably, the dart hit under the heart of his armor, simply bouncing off him like a toothpick.

"Ha! How does it feel now?" he boasted in laughter, firing his crossbow.

The bolt scraped across the side of my head, almost giving me an ear piercing if it weren't for the helmet. I kicked the crate sideways, which slid across the floor, crashing into Mr. Tusk's waist. He nearly tripped over, dropping one of his crossbows, and that's when I rolled onto the other side of the crate and grabbed his other crossbow, attempting to disarm him.

He jerked his head back and bashed me in the face with his horned helmet, causing me to fall. He then pulled out a taser from his chest belt and delivered 50,000 volts into my body. Fighting against the aggravating pain, I grabbed the taser wire and pulled him down far enough to give him a solid kick to his face. He staggered only for a bit, quickly resuming his firing position.

When he fired the third bolt, I rolled behind another stack of crates. He was smart enough to wait me out instead of firing blindly or suppressing me. Knowing I was in his sights, I broke off two pieces of wood and held them together as a makeshift cover to help me advance closer to the mainframe.

The razorback fired another crossbow shot at me. Fortunately, I caught both bolts in the wood plank inches from my face. He then switched to the other crossbow, firing a follow-up shot that landed between my fingers.

"Argh!" I hissed in pain, dropping the wooden planks as blood droplets fell upon them.

"Give it up, Mr. Chenry!" Mr. Tusk taunted, aiming the crossbow with a newly loaded bolt. "You only delay the inevitable."

I quickly ran up to him to punch out his skull. Before I could reach him, however, he switched to his crowd control shield and bashed me away from the mainframe, giving me a nosebleed underneath the helmet.

He swung again, and I caught his shield mid-strike, trying to twist it out of his grip. It was a power struggle. He tried head-butting me, and I head-butted him, denting his helmet... only for him to keep fighting, as we couldn't steal the shield from each other. Eventually, the shield's metal frame and its polycarbonate glass bent in half, becoming warped.

Rattling in his heavy bronze armor, Mr. Tusk shoved me away with all the strength he could muster, creating some space between him, me, and the mainframe. I skidded against the floor, using my fist to stop myself from sliding back too far.

Both of us were breathing heavily as the room powered up. Time was almost up.

"You know, I told my mammals not to fear you," Mr. Tusk said, cracking his neck and shoulders. "I wish I could say it was easy for them... but it wasn't," he scoffed, giving a low, irritated growl. "I admit, it's been hard for them," there was a brief pause, followed by a wicked grin. "As for me?" he gestured to himself, pulling out two spiked bats in a menacing manner. "Not anymore."

In response, I gripped my empty rifle as a makeshift club.

The armored razorback spun his dual spiked bats around his hooves with a show-off mentality. Then, with a loud roar, he charged.

Determined to finish this, I ran toward the mainframe.

He dashed toward me at full speed, raising both his weapons.

Within seconds, the control room floor erupted into a wild duel as we clashed near the suspended mainframe, already engaging in close-quarters combat. Our metallic weapons and armor rang out with every strike, clanging and echoing throughout the chamber. The fate of Zootopia was at stake, tensions were running high, and time was running out.

The razorback performed a flashy flourish, twirling his spiked bat in the air before striking. Then, with a quick thrust of his weapon, he nearly disarmed me. I parried his strike with difficulty, sidestepping with a lack of eloquence. He continued thrusting his spiked bat sideways quickly as he danced around me. I narrowly avoided the rusty nail tips slicing through the air toward my face as I ducked under his attacks. Unfortunately, my rifle could only block his heavy strikes due to expended ammunition.

The razorback leader lunged forward, spiked bat raised, resolute in protecting his mainframe machine at all costs. Then, with a deft move, I thrust the stock of my rifle into his ribcage as a determined counterattack, denting his armor.

"C'mon! Is that the best you got?!" he barked in my face, blocking my follow-up combo with his copper-coated vambrace and slicing the edge of my neck with his spiked bat. "How do you like that?!"

Fed up with him, I evaded every next subsequent attack thrown my way. Finally, my relentless thrusting attack caught the razorback leader off guard, leaving him in defensive mode. The quick swinging of the rifle barrel eventually snagged a gap in his armor, allowing me to pry off a piece of his shoulder plate.

Angered, he feinted a high attack, then quickly switched to a low strike. He kept doing this repeatedly, moving faster and faster each time, alternating between angles as he felt was unpredictable. Unfortunately, he landed a few painful strikes, leaving some of my exposed skin areas, such as my tricep and fingers, covered in seeping blood. I eventually saw through his tactics and reacted quickly. My riposte was swift and precise enough that the animal barely had time to recover from his parry. Next, I struck him in the armpit, to by which he growled in pain, dropping one of his spiked bats.

Tusk sneered at me as we both assumed a high guard, and he threw an uppercut. I parried quickly, reflexively. Tusk cut from the other side, and I again resisted. Barely. With the next swing, I threw my bloodied gauntlet up and deflected high, with my rifle stock swinging towards Tusk's face. In pleasure at my success, I nearly missed the moment to thrust but thrust I did. Tusk, surprised, stumbled backward, attempting an aggressive counterattack from an elevated platform adjacent to us. I did not fight the incoming blow but turned the deflection into a moulinet and swung at Tusk's head as he came down upon me, watching his battered helmet roll away as his armored body tumbled into a pile of wooden pallets and computer stations.

I went over to him, grabbed one of the flickering monitors on the desk, and bashed the glass screen into his head, knocking him out temporarily to ensure he'd no longer stand in my way. Then, from the corner of my eye, I saw a digital countdown being displayed on another monitor.

0:18

I glanced upward and saw the mainframe machine nearly finished powering up.

0:17

That's not good.

0:16

Sparks and lightning surged from above, becoming more erratic and intense, signaling an imminent and permanent override of Zootopia's climate wall settings with the razorback's custom settings.

Not gonna happen.

0:14

Tossing the shattered monitor aside, I grabbed the grenade from my tactical belt and hauled ass toward the underside of the mainframe machine.

0:12

I ran as fast as humanly possible, ignoring all my aches, pains, and battle wounds.

0:11

After spotting the mainframe's open cooling hatch above, I got into position, taking a few steps closer.

0:10

With the grenade in my hand, I pulled the pin, winding up my arm to throw it.

0:09

As I turned my hips to make the toss, feeling the grenade in my fingertips, I felt something strike my leg.

0:08

Before I could react, a strong force suddenly jerked me off my feet, rapidly dragging me away from the mainframe, which caused me to drop the grenade.

Shit.

0:07

"Oh, no, you don't!" a painfully familiar voice called out in the distance.

I looked at my legs and saw a barbed grapple point had impaled my cybernetic calf between the armor plates, penetrating through the shin. The grapple was connected to a long steel cable, continuously dragging me along the floor. I tried desperately to break free—digging my fists into the floor—but it was futile.

0:05

As I was being hauled by the leg, I watched helplessly as the frag grenade bounced off the underside of the mainframe, landing on the concrete floor behind it before rolling down the wooden ramp toward the base of one of the multi-story scaffolding towers.

0:03

"Ha! Gotcha!" Mr. Tusk breathed heavily and triumphantly while reeling me in with his grapple cannon. "Did you honestly think you could-"

He was stopped mid-sentence by a bright flash of light followed by a loud, piercing sound erupting under the mainframe as the grenade detonated, knocking everyone off their feet with an overwhelming force. The feeling of grit stung our faces as flaming pieces of debris shot across the floor, bouncing in all directions. A generator's gas tanks served as a deadly catalyst, sending roaring flames up the scaffolding tower's gas lines, completely engulfing the structure in seconds. Sudden, total silence persisted for a moment as everyone's ears were briefly deafened by the cascading explosion.

It was like a rocket launch gone wrong...

The first scaffolding tower collapsed, causing dust and rubble to shake loose from the walls and the ceiling, sending debris toward the base of the second scaffolding tower, causing it to crumple as well. Every fire alarm in the control room was triggered, muffling off in the distance and echoing as bits of burning wood and tarp cloth floated down to the ground, still burning. The reflection of flames on the polished metal turned everything in the control room red, and animals gawked at the conflagration as industrial warning lights rotated above them.

Everyone, including Tusk, staggered to their feet, feeling shaky in a scene of utter catastrophe. They had trouble seeing in front of them, scrambling through the flaming rubble to find the rest of their comrades, and felt their ears as if they were stuffed with burnt cotton. They coughed nonstop as dust and debris threatened to fill their lungs. The razorbacks were utterly baffled, their minds filled with confusion as their ears continued to ring with pain.

Meanwhile, as I brushed off a piece of burning debris from my shoulder, shaking out the fire consuming my cloak and pulling out the harpoon impaled in my calf, I gazed upward at the remains of the mainframe machine. The entire side of the device was charred and blackened, heavily damaged from the adjacent explosion. Dings and dents could be seen throughout the structure's underside as one of the four support cables had snapped at its base, causing the heavy machine to hang with a steep and unsteady tilt as the activation lights rapidly flickered on and off.

At last... it was all over now. The razorbacks were done for...

However, to my utmost incredulity, those same lights flickered back on again until they were no longer flashing. Within seconds, the mainframe machine finished powering up to total capacity, producing a quiet hum as it emitted a soft green glow. Then, dead silence fell upon the entire control room chamber. No one said a word or even moved.

0:00

I stood still and watched helplessly as the climate walls officially fell under the control of the razorbacks, locking their custom settings in place forever. The upgrades and the retrofits were all self-sustaining now, unable to be reprogrammed or changed without tearing down the entire wall, which would destroy Zootopia either way.

...Damn it to hell.

I couldn't believe it. Despite all my efforts, despite everything I had done, the unluckiest grenade toss in the history of Zootopia gave the razorback's mainframe machine a modicum of a chance to cling to life... and it did so successfully, yet barely, beating all my mentally calculated odds.

Impossible...

Despite everything,... all the broken glass, burning debris, shattered crates, fallen struts, collapsed towers, gas clouds, strobing floodlights, scattered smoke pillars, and drops of blood, the control room began to thrive in a new stage of climate transformation as the dust particles settled.

"Oh, my god..." Mr. Tusk fell to his knees, staring at the glowing mainframe machine in traumatized astonishment. "We... we did it... we actually did it..." he said under his breath, an emotional tear rolling down his cheek. "It... it worked."

And he was right. The razorbacks had won. It was all over.

The rage and ire I felt at that moment was indescribable. "...Sonuvabitch!"

Mr. Tusk quickly turned toward me as I charged him.

Before he could react, I tackled him to the ground using all my momentum, already beating him to a bloody pulp. I wanted to tear him apart. Piece by piece, limb by limb. I shoved his armored body into a pit of burning computer stations, sending electric sparks flying everywhere, before descending upon him again. He reached for his weapon, but I kicked it right out of his hooves, stomping his head into the circuit boards until his helmet broke in half. I grabbed him by the neck and punched him repeatedly, never allowing myself to stop and showing no mercy since I had nothing to lose. He spat out blood a few times and tried reaching out to utter something, but I stomped him again, cracking his chest plate.

Two of his timberwolf associates rappelled down to help him. However, their efforts were futile as I quickly subdued and disposed of them before they even had a chance to land a hit. I dislodged one of their shoulders, kicking them off to the side in a fit of rage before redirecting my full attention back to Mr. Tusk, who was lying on the floor, helpless, trying to limp and crawl away.

"C'mon. Get up," I said sternly, standing over him.

He grabbed a nearby crowbar under a tipped-over tool chest and desperately swung at me. I blocked it with my calf, parried his follow-up attack, and swiftly jabbed at his hooves before kicking him in the face, disarming him. Next, I knelt over his armored body and punched him again... and again... and again, harder and harder every time. Ferociously. Uncompromising. Unforgiving. Blood continued to ooze from his mouth while bones could be heard cracking inside him. I wasn't backing down at this point. Seeing him suffer brought me great pleasure. The razorback reached for anything he could find to defend himself, only to worsen the situation as I used it against him. Tusk stared in shock at his broken bat, lying on the floor, while the rest of his armor was becoming shredded into a crude row of jagged ribbons.

The grey razorback attempted to retreat to safety, fearing for his life, yet, I grabbed him by the leg and pulled him closer.

He wasn't going anywhere.

The two of us closed again, and I swung at Tusk to deliver the final blow to his skull. Tusk barely parried in time, causing my fist to dent the metal floorboard behind him, but I simply mutated the following uppercut into a powerful thrust, making him cough up blood. After that, I fiercely struck his jaw until he stumbled into the collapsed pile of burning scaffolding, unable to regain his balance. Tusk parried desperately and tried to counter, but I pressed without yielding, slipping past his guard, shattering his metal vambraces, and never giving up the initiative. Then, in shock and pain, he lay motionless on the slope of smoking debris, breathing and panting heavily.

Feeling tired myself, I briefly placed a hand on my chest. But instead of feeling a heartbeat, I felt something else. Something cold and metallic. I reached into my tactical vest pouch and pulled out a bullet cartridge. Just one left.

Time to finish this...

Standing over the grey razorback's limp body, I grabbed the empty revolver from my holster and released the cylinder. Then, after inserting a fresh round, I flipped the cylinder closed and pointed the barrel at Mr. Tusk's forehead.

"You can say goodbye to your little swamp fantasy..." I said, pulling the hammer back. "...and to everyone else you hold dear."

Mr. Tusk stared in horror and shock as he had no escape. A steep pile of flaming debris behind him prevented him from doing so. He tried begging for mercy, raising his trembling hoof up high, yet unable to speak as my boot slowly crushed his chest. Now was not the time for chivalry.

With my muscles bulging and iron sights trained on him, I prepared to pull the trigger.

"NOOOOOOO!" someone screamed, their footsteps echoing across the smokey chamber as it ran towards us.

I raised my gun, only for me to lower it slightly as a young mammal broke through the smoke screen, quickly using his tiny body to shield Mr. Tusk, desperately trying to protect him.

It was just a kid... a little razorback kid.

He had gray fur, tiny ears, a stubby snout, and tiny tusks pointing downward on each side of his lip. He was much smaller, slimmer, unarmed, and more innocent-looking than his older peers.

"Out of the way, kid," I ordered, keeping the gun pointed.

He refused to move and kept embracing Mr. Tusk's chest. "Don't hurt my daddy!"

"I said get out of the way!" I tried aiming around him, but it was no use. The little razorback wouldn't let me get a clear head or chest shot.

"No! Don't hurt him!" he begged.

"Don't make this a double kill..." I glaringly warned.

"Son, please... just... just go..." Mr. Tusk coughed from weakness and exhaustion, gently trying to scoot him off to the side. "It... it's gonna be okay..."

But his son wouldn't leave his father's side. No matter what. Regardless of what he knew was coming. Despite my numerous threats and his father's repeated pleas, the little razorback cub hugged his father tightly and wept in his arms. He refused to go anywhere else. Tears streamed down the side of his tiny snout, through the fingers of his hooves, bathing his father's armor and chest.

Shaking my thoughts, I stepped closer to them, lining up a clear shot. I was ready to take it.

Meanwhile, Mr. Tusk lifted his fractured arm, slowly placing it around his son's back to embrace him. One last time.

***

I feathered the trigger... convincing myself that this was for the greater good of Zootopia... for all the mammals of this world. My mind said yes... but something else inside of me said no. Deep down, I really wanted to kill him. I certainly would've liked to. I didn't fear taking a life, for I was trained by the Stratocracy to do it without hesitation and without mercy. But... something felt different this time, unlike other combat situations I've been in during my past deployments. I tried to ignore the feeling, figuring it was just the nature of being stuck in a world of talking animals and that it would eventually pass... but doing so made my heart chill to the core... just enough to make me think twice about it. There was an uneasy pause as I was stuck in ambivalence. Bathed in sweat, anxious, and agitated, I took a sharp breath, and all the muscles in my arms contracted as I tensed to fire. Time seemed to slow down as everything around us stood still. The only sound we heard was the distant fires crackling and the busted pipes spewing out gusts of air. My palms were sweating, and my hands shook under my tightening grip on the gun. Then, seemingly out of nowhere, I saw a flashback of the Bunnyburrow forest... the day I met the Howl family and nearly shot them up in cold blood. I could still see their horrified faces... similar to Mr. Tusk and his son at this very moment. It continued to haunt me. That was when tremendous guilt swept over me like a rogue wave. I just couldn't do it. No. Charity wouldn't want this.

Meanwhile, the two gray razorbacks were huddling together atop the wreckage, keeping their eyes shut, still thinking they were about to die.

I lowered the gun slightly and slowly backed away, dropping it to the side in one hand. All the breath and energy seemed to have gone out of me. I weakly raised the other hand in a gesture, signaling the two mammals to stay where they were, as if, should they move, the fragile balance might tip back the other way.

Fortunately for them, they didn't move or even say a word. All they did was look up and stare in shock, realizing they were still alive. They waited a while just in case. Perhaps fearing the human would change his mind and snap... but nothing happened.

All I did was stand still. My mind wandered as I thought about Charity and listened to her sweet voice as if she were standing next to us. It made me feel more relaxed. My fists were no longer clenched.

Eventually, the two razorbacks sighed in relief and embraced each other, grateful for every second they had together. They shared a little father-and-son moment, gently resting their heads against each other while remaining quiet.

After I had calmed down, I took a deep breath, let out a weary sigh, and turned around to walk away. None of this was worth it.

At that moment, three mammals rushed in from behind.

"Get him!"

I saw them coming from the corner of my eye but didn't even try to dodge them before getting tackled to the ground, my gun being knocked from my hand and falling into a crevice.

"C'mon! Keep him down, boys!" a female white wolf barked orders to her companions.

A razorback, a polar bear, and a tiger decided to jump in.

They forcefully brought me down to my knees, the razorbacks using the blunt of their hooves to kick me brutally into place. The wolf unsheathed her sharp claws, digging them deeper into my neck as it bled, forcing my head down as the towering polar bear used the stock of his harpoon gun to bash me into the floor. At the same time, the tiger and his friend swung at my back with their batons, slamming them hard like they were trying to kill a spider. The mammals picked me up again and repeated the cycle, over and over, until my entire body felt limp and incapacitated.

"Don't let up!" she chanted, encouraging the intensity of everyone's aggression toward me. "Make him pay!"

At this point, I didn't care anymore. The razorbacks had already won at this point. They fought the battle of their pathetic lives and would finally get their swamp encompassing all of Zootopia. What more could I do? I was still pissed... but it didn't matter anymore.

The mammals eventually grew tired, but they didn't stop. They even saved a few of their favorite beatings for last. They kept me in place and waited as Mr. Tusk slowly stood up from the rubble. He escorted his son off to the side, gesturing him to stay away for safety, and limped toward me with a vengeful stare.

"We got him, Mr. Tusk!" the female wolf proudly proclaimed as she tossed the gray razorback his heavy-duty spiked bat, which he caught with his hoof. "Now... it's your turn to make the human pay!"

"Gladly," he replied, limping toward us.

The mammals restrained me even tighter, abruptly positioning my head forward, which caused my helmet to slide off and roll away. This came as a mild shock to a few of them.

"Well, well, well..." The wolf slowly used her finger to claw at my cheek until it bled. "Isn't he a sight to behold?"

"Not for long," Mr. Tusk spoke softly, hiding his surprise, taking a few practice swings in the air despite his injured arm.

He marched straight toward us, overcoming the severe pain in his right leg, before standing directly in front of me. Holding the spiked bat against my head, he raised his weapon above him, ready to make the final, fatal swing.

"We just wanted our real home, Mr. Chenry. Not the one we were falsely promised half a century ago," he asserted, fighting back the emotion. "You... you tried to take it away... you tried to take everything away from us!" he clenched his hooves around his weapon. "Not that you would understand..."

The mammals shoved me forward again before I spoke. "I'm beginning to understand now."

"No. No, you don't," Tusk shook his head. "And you never will."

I let my head hang downward. "Then take the swing already."

He primed his spiked bat up in a threatening matter. "You don't think I will?"

"Go ahead."

The gray razorback tilted his head slightly to the side. "Why do you say that?"

"What do you care? Just finish me."

Tusk huffed mockingly. "Aren't you gonna fight back? Do what you've always been doing to us? Oppose us? C'mon. I know you've got that warrior spirit in you. Show me something!"

I let out a tired sigh. "...Not anymore."

"Ahhh, I get it. You're gonna beg me for mercy?" he gestured to himself proudly and laughed. "Because you know I'm about to end your whole career, right? Your precious life?"

I shrugged. "If that's what you want..."

"It's not what I want," he clenched his hooves around his spiked bat. "But! I'll do whatever's necessary to secure a bigger, better, and brighter future for my kindred. Unfortunately, you stand in my way."

I nodded. "Then you know what you have to do."

The gray razorback growled lowly, shaking his head. "Don't you value your life at all?"

"No."

Mr. Tusk sighed in irritation. "You're really taking the pleasure out of this..."

I scoffed. "Sorry to disappoint."

Mr. Tusk furrowed his eyebrows, exchanging quick glances with his slightly bemused companions before holding the spiked bat close to my head and asking, "Any last words?"

I said nothing.

He waited a little longer just in case, only to realize he wasn't getting anything from me.

"Fine," he accepted the situation, readying himself up to swing the spiked bat. "Be that way then."

"Wait," I finally interrupted him last minute.

He barely stopped mid-swing and chuckled," Ha! That's what I like to hear. You got something you'd like to share?"

There was a moment of silence. "Maybe just a few thoughts."

"Hmph. This better be good, then."

"It's probably not worth your time."

"Oh, yeah? Try me," Mr. Tusk insisted, crossing his arms. "Because, unlike you, I've got all the time in the world—in this new swamp 'world' I've created. Plus, I'd hate to be dishonorable when I become the very first mammal to kill an alien in the history of Zootopia."

"That's too bad," I stated, short of breath as the towering bear nearly suffocated me under his grasp. "Because with how things are going, there won't be a Zootopia anymore..."

"There will always be a Zootopia," Mr. Tusk remarked, gesturing around him. "I'm just making it better for those that survive, including my family and all future generations of my species."

"I admire that," I said. "You've got something good going on here. So why stop there?"

He lowered his bat slightly. "What are you talking about?"

"I've seen what you did to these climate walls. All the upgrades, retrofits, and modifications. At first, I hated them... but then it got me thinking..."

"About what?" he asked.

I glanced at our surroundings. "All the untapped potential coursing through these golden wires. You've essentially upgraded these climate walls and made them far more efficient than ever before. Imagine if they could accommodate more than one environment per square kilometer..."

Tusk merely laughed. "Mr. Chenry, our work is already done, in case you haven't noticed. We're getting our swampland. There's nothing you can do or say to change it."

"You're right; I can't. Not in this chokehold..." After saying that, the bear and the wolf tightened their grip. "...But you can."

Mr. Tusk gave a suspicious look.

I continued, "You and your razorbacks now control these climate walls, which might be a good thing, all things considered-"

"It IS a good thing," Mr. Tusk boasted. "Because we know what's best for Zootopia, and no one, nobody else will decide that. Not even the Mayor himself."

"Exactly," I agreed. "Zootopia's at your mercy. Which means you can do whatever you want with its climate wall system. But... that doesn't mean you should."

He crossed his arms. "I don't care. Whether you like it or not, we control it. End of story."

"Mr. Tusk, I'd hate to say this..."

He held up his hoof. "Then don't say it."

I persisted. "... but your swampland, it's not sustainable."

"Not sustainable? Ha! Spare me," he belted in laughter before switching to a more intrigued stance. "Better yet, enlighten me if you will."

"Think about it: If you convert all of Zootopia into a swampland, you'll get what you want in the short term. But in the long term? You'll sabotage all your immediate resources to keep the climate wall system running smoothly over the next century."

"Like what?" he questioned.

I looked around at the debris for a moment. "Iron ores from the Canyonlands District, minerals for steel in Sahara Square, electronic microchip parts from Little Rodentia, carbon dioxide absorption from Rainforest District, pure air circulation from Tundratown, etc. Not to mention, you'll displace millions upon millions of animals. Don't you get it? You can have the most superior vessel in the universe, customized to your liking, with advanced weaponry and quantum components. Yet, without life support systems and a crew with diversified knowledge, experience, and expertise, it's nothing."

Tusk and his crew appeared to be thinking.

"In other words, you need a conglomerate of knowledge from various mammals of distinct habitats and backgrounds to keep the city from falling apart," I explained. "Otherwise, it'll inevitably cease to exist. If this doesn't make sense to you, just kill me now... because I'm tired of explaining."

"Hold on," the grey razorback looked at his companions before returning to me. "Even if you were right—what makes you think we'd just change our ways and put everything back to normal? Maybe catastrophe, destruction, and city-wide disorder are what we want."

"Trust me, nothing's going back to normal at this point, Mr. Tusk. Zootopia has already changed forever because of you."

"A fact which we're very proud of," he bragged.

I reflected for a moment. "But that doesn't mean we can't all get what we want."

Tusk gave a steady look. "What do you mean?"

I gestured around the chamber. "You guys control the climate walls now. They belong to you... and someone needs to be here to operate them," I explained. "That honor can fall under your jurisdiction since you're the ones who installed the upgrades. Zootopia can have all of its original environments, including your beloved swampland. You can place it wherever you want. In between Rainforest District and Tundratown... or somewhere over by Savanna Central, I don't care. As long as it's discreet."

This got everybody thinking, including Mr. Tusk.

I went on. "Imagine: You can be Zootopia's secret rulers. You can produce multiple environments at once to suit everybody, including yourselves. It can be done for a great and noble cause... without becoming the bad guys. Nevertheless, since you have the power and claim to have faced decades of injustice, you can prioritize your swampland above the others if you feel so inclined. Just don't get carried away."

A razorback's ears perked up. "Like, we get first dibs?"

"Right. As long as other mammals get their fair part."

The white wolf next to him snarled. "I don't just want a part of Zootopia for myself. I want all of it! That's what we planned all along," she tightened her grip on my shoulders as she glared at the grey razorback. "Daddy, that's what you promised!"

Tusk sighed, nodding in understanding. "Yes, I know, sweetheart. I know. But-"

"But what?" she growled. "C'mon! It's just a trick! The human's only playing us, can't you see that?" she accused, obviously unhappy with my proposal. "He's just gonna lock us all up!"

The animals turned to each other, believing she had a fair point.

"We can't just let him go! He's seen our operations," she retorted, refusing to back down. "He'll bring in Hopps and Wilde and the entire ZPD force here to take us away, and we'll lose everything we've worked so hard for."

There was another long duration of silence. Everybody, including Mr. Tusk, appeared to be reconsidering the situation, except for the white wolf, who already had her mind made up.

"Hey, what's your name?" I suddenly asked her.

She sighed, rolling her eyes in annoyance. "...Helen."

"That's nice. You look like a Helen..." I complimented with a fake smile, trying to get past her spiked jewelry. "...well, to some extent," which made her growl lowly. "Listen, I know what it's like to not have a home. I lost my planet a long time ago... including everyone and everything else along with it. Not a night goes by that it doesn't haunt me. My species made many wrong decisions for our own short-term gain—at the expense of others— and it cost us everything. Even though we thought we had the best intentions, it never worked out. I just don't want something similar happening to you and your people in this world. As an endangered extraterrestrial, I feel like that's all I'm good for: helping you succeed in areas where we could not."

She quietly grumbled to herself, not saying anything.

"I promise... you can still have your swamp environment, just not as big... or vast as you might've hoped for. Why? Well, why the hell would someone need all that extra land space anyway? It'd get monotonous pretty quickly, you'd feel empty, and a lot of it would go to waste, especially if other mammals can't enjoy it with you."

Once again, she didn't say anything. All she did was cross her arms defiantly as the other mammals held me in place.

"What'd you say your name was again?" I asked for clarification. "Loona?"

"Helen," she corrected with an annoyed growl. "Loona's my cousin."

"Okay, got it." I gave a thumbs up, lowering my arm and exhaling. "Well, Helen. Do whatever you want with me. I've said enough. Since I've already caused everyone here enough trouble, the least I could do was give you my two cents. Now that you've heard me... go ahead and finish me."

Shaking her thoughts, the wolf snatched a spare spiked bat from one of her companions and held it to my neck. As the three razorbacks kept me in place, she lifted her arms to deliver the final blow to my skull.

I closed my eyes, bowing my head. It's been fun.

She jerked her arms back, taking a big step forward, only for Mr. Tusk to catch her paws mid-swing.

"That won't be necessary." he said.

"Dad?" she stuttered, trying to raise the bat against the gray razorback's hoof, which prevented her from doing so. "What are you... what are you doing?"

He gently escorted the female wolf to the side with one arm, turning to face his other associates. "Release him."

They looked at each other, confused. They thought Tusk was crazy.

"Just do it," he ordered, not messing around.

After some hesitation, they eventually loosened their grip on me, letting me fall onto the floor and land on my hands. I was still tired and injured from everything that's happened.

Mr. Tusk came forward and extended his hoof.

I carefully took his arm, and he pulled me up, which felt weird. Was this actually happening?

With a gentle smile, he patted my shoulder and nodded, "You've got yourself a good deal, Mr. Chenry."

I didn't know what to say.

He looked me in the eyes. "I believe we can make things work, you and I. You seem like a nice guy. A little dense and very stiff-necked... but you're a nice guy," he paused, pondering for a moment. "You know, it was hard to tell who you were behind the mask... I always thought of you as a monster... but I was wrong."

I cracked a shy smile. "Thank you, Mr. Tusk."

We took a brief stroll around the chamber together, chatting for the next little while.

"Sorry about the mess," I said, accidentally stepping into a broken monitor as we tried to maneuver around the debris.

"We'll get it all cleaned up, you'll see," he assured. "This ain't so bad.

"You sure about that?"

He nodded. "Leave it to us, and we'll formulate an elaborate plan to restore Zootopia's climate wall settings back to normal. Or, at least, close to being normal. Not to mention, the many upgrades we're going to further implement. As you mentioned, nothing will quite be the same anymore. You know that, right?"

"Yes. I understand."

"However," he raised a finger. "That doesn't mean we won't be treating ourselves to a generous landmass of swampland," he reminded. "Just so we're both clear."

I shrugged. "Fine by me."

Meanwhile, as Tusk's crew began salvaging through all the debris, the female wolf in the background clenched her paws around the spiked bat before angrily chucking it across the room. She crossed her arms and slumped against a wall of debris, sitting down in protest.

"Don't worry about her; she'll get over it," Tusk chuckled. "You know how daughters are."

"Daughter?" I quietly asked.

"Well, adopted daughter," he clarified, gazing proudly upon her. "But she's still my daughter, all the same. It's just me, her, the rest of my crew here—most of which you've probably already met," he started introducing me to everyone, which was a little awkward. "...and my little boy here, Zero."

The little razorback kid nudged up against his father.

I gave him a little nod.

"Do you wanna know why we call him Zero?" Tusk asked, rubbing his hoof across his son's scruffy head.

I took a random, wild guess. "Because nothing's going on in his stupid little head?"

Tusk frowned. "Hey, be nice to him! It's Xero with an X, not a Z."

I stared at the floor, embarrassed. "My bad."

"Anyway," Tusk waved his hoof dismissively. "I call him Xero because he's got a bit of a dry scalp, as you can see. Xero means dry. It's a medical condition he was born with. I figured a nice moist swamp-like environment could help him in relieving his symptoms."

"I see," I crossed my arms in understanding. "That makes sense."

"And for my daughter, Helen? Well, she doesn't really have any sort of condition except maybe for anger management," Tusk chuckled at his joke, earning a displeased glare from the white wolf. "She's rough around the edges to be sure, as you've discovered for yourself..."

I rubbed my aching neck. "You got that right..."

"But deep down, she's only ever wanted what's best for us," he continued. "That, and despite being born in the Arctic, I suppose she's acquired a few of our 'razorback tastes' over the years. Haven't you, sweetheart?"

She bared her teeth at him and immediately looked away, fiddling with her phone instead of assisting her fellow crew members.

"...And you?" I asked Tusk.

"For me?" the gray razorback thought about it for a minute. "Well, let's see... I like the swamp environment simply because I feel most comfortable in it. It kinda feels more natural to me, you know. It's where I can truly embrace my spiritual roots."

The rest of Tusk's crew shared their reasons for preferring a swamp environment over others. Many of them had fair points, while others were just plain weird. Spiritually, mentally, or psychologically speaking. Regardless, I tried to show some respect, at least by listening.

"Right. I understand."

The razorbacks continued sharing their stories, which helped me to understand them better. I went from hating them with a passion to mildly disliking them . They sure had a lot to say.

"By the way..." Tusk remembered something. "I'm sorry about the time I flooded those tunnels on you," he apologized. "You know me, I just got a little carried away."

"A little? That was a dick move," I stated.

He splayed his hooves innocently. "Well, you did quite a few numbers on us on multiple occasions, didn't you?" he chuckled. "So consider us even."

I nodded, taking a moment to gaze upon his numerous wounds. "...I see you're no stranger to pain."

He gave a tired laugh. "I've been married. Twice."

"Good hell..." I sighed.

He and his crew snickered, reminiscing about the good old days. "Either way, we're off to a better start, right? I appreciate your understanding, Mr. Chenry."

I gave him a thumbs up. "It's understanding that makes it possible for people like me to tolerate mammals like yourselves."

"Well, uh..." he scratched his head. " Thank you, I guess."

"Don't mention it."

There was an awkward moment of silence.

"So, we're cool?" the razorbacks asked.

I paused for a second, thinking about it. "Yeah, we're cool."

They seemed both relieved and pleased to hear this.

I better get going then," I said, preparing to leave. "Lots of favors to take care of."

"Aren't you forgetting something?" someone reminded me.

I turned around and raised an eyebrow.

Two razorbacks pointed toward the small metal cage suspended over the computer station pit.

"Ah, shit. You're right," I realized Penny was still captured. "I should probably get her home."

Tusked raised a finger. "On one condition, though."

"Seriously?"

"What? It's just one small favor. Is that too much to ask?"

I sighed. "...here we go again."

Tusk eagerly clapped his hooves together. "I'd like you to train my son to become a police officer. Just like you."

"For the ZPD?"

"Yep, you heard me," he confirmed. "I'd like Xero to live up to his dreams and become the very first razorback officer in Zootopia. Invested with integrity, bravery, and trust. The mammal I could never become. To be honest with you, I haven't really been the best influence on him. But that doesn't mean it's too late for me to place him on the right path. Yet, I still have to take care of my own messes first... and maybe rethink my life a bit as a father who struggles in a life of crime," he reflected, turning toward his son before facing me. "Will you do that for me? Become his mentor? It'd just be on the weekends, no more than an hour."

I slowly exhaled, wishing I had a to-do list to write stuff down. "I'll see what I can do."

"Then we have a deal, my friend," Tusk grinned, snapping his hoof to signal one of his razorbacks to come over. "Open the cage."

The razorback did as instructed, unlocked the cage door with a large rusty key, and carefully helped little Penny to step out. The little jackal girl was timid and scared, requiring extra assistance and direct support. Fortunately, the razorback was very gentle and patient with her. Nevertheless, Penny looked like she would still need some therapy after this.

"You be a good girl now, okay?" Tusk knelt down to her level, pulled out a broken lollipop from his pocket, and gave it to her. "Here, take this as a token of my apology. I know it ain't much—it's in rough shape—but you can blame Officer Chenry for that," he winked.

I rolled my eyes and scoffed.

He smiled, turning toward the jackal. "And don't you worry, little one. He's not gonna hurt you. He's gonna take you home."

She nodded, albeit quite nervously, accepting the gray razorback's random yet generous gift with hesitation. At the end of the day, kidnapping is still kidnapping... but hey, at least the gray razorback was trying to make amends to some degree, even though I probably should've arrested his ass.

"I guess you're coming with me then," I said, towering high above Penny.

"You two better get going," Tusk said, helping us locate the nearest exit high above the scaffolding still intact. "Remarkable changes are coming to Zootopia. I can promise you that."

I nodded. "I'm counting on it."

The gray razorback smiled again and extended his hoove, which I shook with my hand.

"How do I know I can trust you?" I asked, still shaking his arm.

"You know, I could ask the same for you," he replied, eyeing my dented badge. "I reckon the ZPD's gonna want some answers. Especially with all that's happened."

I paused for a moment as I slowly exhaled. "I'll figure something out."

"I'm sure you will."

We bid each other farewell for now and exchanged numbers. God knows if we'd ever have to do monthly prison rotations in case the city demanded to know who was guilty or responsible for all the extensive damage. We'd have to put up some sort of convincing public facade. Either way, we'd come up with a game plan. The razorbacks seemed willing to cooperate.

Penny and I climbed the scaffolding tower stairs for the next few minutes until we reached a familiar spot on one of the platforms overlooking the control chamber. With a razorback crew member to escort us, he used his rusty keys to unlock the heavy iron door, and together we pulled it open.

Inside, a beautiful yet tired coyote in tattered scrubs stepped out.

"Cherry?" she gasped as she ran over and threw her arms around me. "Are you alright? What happened?"

I gave an exhausted chuckle. "It's a long story."

Charity's eyes widened as she noticed the little jackal girl standing behind me. "Oh, Penny... is that you?" she ran over, scooping her up in an embrace. "You're here! I'm so happy that you're okay!"

Penny couldn't help but return the gesture. She melted into Charity's arms, knowing she was safe.

After a short while, the two of them finally looked up. That's when Charity noticed the razorback who was standing near us.

He gave her an awkward, friendly wave. "No hard feelings."

"Um... is someone gonna tell me what happened?" she asked.

I began heading to the next set of stairs. "Penny can tell you on the way out."

The little jackal immediately shook her head.

"Fine. I'll tell you on the way out."

And that's precisely what happened. As we navigated through the dark corridors of the climate wall, passing the areas where the traps were thankfully inactivated, I recounted what happened between me and the razorbacks to Charity. There were obviously a lot of questions asked. The coyote escorted the jackal with her paw, carrying her around whenever she got too tired from walking and climbing ladders, and listened to everything I had to say. Eventually, she understood, even though I purposely omitted a few details. Some were a bit too morbid to share. Regardless, I gave her the main gist of it.

Soon enough, we entered one of the old climate wall generator rooms through a metal door that was previously locked on the other side. We passed a few more winding hallways and corridors. As the last door creaked open, we breathed a fresh gust of rainforest air and felt the warm sunlight on our faces as a familiar-looking jackal boy perked up his ears and ran straight toward us.

"Penny!" Cody exclaimed with joy.

The little jackal girl ran up to her older brother and fell straight into his arms. They hugged for a good minute or two , never letting each other go. Without a doubt, it was one of the happiest reunions I'd ever witnessed between two animal kids.

"You're safe now," Cody closed his eyes and let his head sink onto Penny's shoulder. "I won't ever let anything happen to you."

She nudged herself deeper into her brother's arms, shedding many tears.

Charity placed a paw over her heart as if it had just melted. Meanwhile, I checked my watch, realizing it was getting late.

The jackal boy looked up at us briefly, "Thank you," he said before resuming his long overdue hug with his baby sister.

"Make sure they get home," I requested from Charity, standing up to head in the other direction.

"Where are you going?" she asked.

"Finishing up some favors," I replied, already hiking to the nearest road.

And that's what I prepared to do for the rest of the day.