Disclaimer: Zootopia stories, characters, settings, and properties belong to the Walt Disney Co. This story is written under Fair Use Copyright laws
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The Fire Triangle - A Zootopia Fanfiction
Prologue – Escape From Zoo York
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Chapter 5
Pushing the duffel and backpack ahead of him, Dylan Yeats wormed his way up the chute, with Danny Tipperin's penlight clamped firmly between his fingers.
At first the going was relatively easy; the tunnel rose in a gentle arc and he was able to push the bag and pack out ahead of him, and then pull himself up behind.
Soon however, the shaft became steeper and steeper, and he was forced to brace the items on top of his head while inching his way upwards, using his fingers and toes. The sharper angle also obliged him to transfer the mini-light from his paw to his mouth. With every move he made the beam would yaw to the left or the right like the searchlight of a destroyer. Dylan would have just as soon shut the darn thing off, but even foxes can't see in total darkness.
Still, although he didn't realize it, he was lucky to BE a fox, a mammal that likes to den beneath the ground. While his species wasn't as earth-friendly as say, a rabbit or a ferret, had he been a creature of the wide-open spaces like an antelope or a cheetah he would have already surrendered to the fear of being confined in such close quarters.
Even so, it seemed to the young silver fox as if he were two miles underground rather than a single story below street level...and claustrophobia breeds paranoia. When he got to the tunnel exit he knew—he just knew—that the instant he opened the hatch, (or lid, or whatever was up there,) strong paws were going seize upon him. And then he'd find himself in cuffs, being frog-marched towards a police cruiser while the crowd jeered in the background, and..."SHUT that stuff!"
He bit his lip and pressed on.
As he continued to wriggle his way upwards, Dylan Yeats had three factors working in his favor; two that he knew about and a third that he did not.
The first one was that he couldn't hear that blankety-blank police PA from nside here. ("...we have you surrounded...") The young fox didn't understand it, but he'd take it; that thing was like a cross between the Voice of Doom and a Chinese Water Torture.
Second factor, the chute was old and badly corroded in places—which made it easy for the young fox to find pawholds, toeholds, and spots where he could brace himself against the wall to rest.
The third factor, (the one of which he was unawares) was that he happened to be burrowed beneath a city street. In the countryside or even the suburbs, the walls of the chute would have long ago been pierced by a thousand trailing roots.
All very good, except something was blocking the shaft up ahead; almost directly above the young fox, the beam of the mini light was no longer melting into darkness, but forming a translucent circle against a solid background. For half of several seconds, Dylan held in place, with no idea what to do. How the heck was he supposed to get past...?
Then it hit him. "Agggggh, grrrrr, that's the exit hatch, DUMB fox!"
After mentally beating himself to a pulp, Dylan allowed himself to relax—and felt his right foot losing purchase against the wall. He instinctively tried to dig in with his claws; big mistake, the metal here was slick, and he fell headlong into a backwards slide.
Skidding down the passageway, Dylan found himself caught in the grip of a full-court panic, thrashing wildly, desperately, grabbing for something, anything to arrest his fall.
Arrest...
By now the cops must be in the basement...and when he hit lower the hatchway they'd hear him. Then they'd pull the cabinet away from the wall, yank open the hatchway, and iron paws would seize him by...
Dylan stuttered to a halt as he hit a patch of the corrosion. For a long moment, he hung there, fighting to get his breathing—and his terror—under control.
The thing that finally brought him down earth was the realization that he had a crying need to gag. In the midst of his free-fall, he had somehow managed to get the penlight pushed halfway down his throat. He worked it free with his tongue and lips and took inventory. Amazingly, the backpack and duffle were still there, albeit just barely in his grip.
Taking hold of them a bit more firmly, Dylan slowly turned his head and shined the light upwards once more; the exit hatch was not only still visible, it looked barely any further away than before his 'death slide'...three, maybe five feet at most.
If he'd had a free paw, he'd have slapped himself.
With a concentrated effort, the young fox untangled and straightened himself, working carefully so as not to lose his gear. And then he was pressing onward and upwards once more. He was three-fox lengths from the exit when he felt the pack hang up on something. Ahhh,eeyarrrrrgh, now what?
Muttering and growling, Dylan reached over the backpack, and felt his paw wrap around a bar of metal. Wha...? Now what the heck was...? Wait hold it, that's a rung—a sweet, wonderful, beautiful rung! Oh thank you, thank you, thank...
He felt the duffel bag slip out from beneath him. ("Not again!") He made a desperate grab with his free paw but felt his fingers only brush the surface before the bag slithered away and down the chute. There was nothing he could do but let it go; otherwise he'd lose the backpack as well; he couldn't even look to see where...
Something jerked his tail taut, nearly pulling him down after it. (If it hadn't been for the rung he was holding, it would have.)
After a short, grueling moment the young fox had the backpack propped against another rung and was finally able to look downwards.
The duffel's shoulder strap was tangled in his tail fur; sometimes bad luck is good luck in disguise.
Gingerly, carefully he curled his tail upwards and reached with his paw to retrieve the duffle. It seemed to take a year-and-a-half, and twice he nearly lost the backpack in the process.
"I'm just glad Danny and Kieran can't see this," the young fox grumbled as he worked, "I must look like a one-fox Goofball Troop... Agggh, grrrrrr, no you don't... c'mere!"
Once he finally retrieved the duffel, things went a lot more smoothly; unhooking the bag's shoulder strap, Dylan looped it through a ladder rung, and then did the same with one of the backpack straps. Now at last, he had both paws free. He climbed the last few feet and braced his left arm against the ladder's topmost rung, then reached up and pressed with his other arm against the exit hatch. Taking two deep breaths he pushed with all his might.
His only reward for the effort was a creak and a groan, plus maybe an inch or two of movement. Even so, the young fox felt encouraged. The cover had moved; he had gotten it to move. The exit wasn't locked or sealed up as he had feared.
Now, moving slowly like a yoga-master, he turned himself over into a head facing downwards positon. And then, closing his eyes against the vertigo, he compressed himself into a tight, furry ball and grabbed the third rung of the ladder with both paws. Another short, deep breath followed and then he braced his back against the wall and pushed up hard on the hatchway with both feet.
Success—the door popped open all the way!
...with a thump and scrape of metal on asphalt that must have been audible from here to Pawkeepsie; there was no way all the cops upstairs wouldn't have heard it too; at any second he'd feel strong paws seize him by the tail and haul him up into the daylight.
A second passed, two seconds passed...nothing.
Then a familiar, if not quite welcome refrain brought the young fox back down to earth.
"Attention inside the building, this is the Zoo York City Police Department..."
He pulled himself up and peered cautiously over the rim of the exit-hole.
The lid was lying just beside it, an odd set-up to be sure; there were no hinges to be seen, but neither was it unattached like a mammal-hole cover; instead the hatch-cover was held to the wall of the shaft by a chain, like an old-fashioned, rubber bathtub stopper. Dylan wondered how he could have missed it before, and then decided that it didn't really matter. (He could also see for the first time that the lid had been painted to resemble the surrounding blacktop.)
He pulled himself up a tiny bit further.
Over on his right the young fox could see the front side of Finagles, the 'Closed for Spring Cleaning' banner torn and laying mockingly askew, as if to proclaim, "Correction, make that 'Closed For Good!'"
When Dylan looked to his left he saw finally why the cops hadn't nailed him yet. There, about five feet away, standing between him and the police line was a light-pole pylon the size of a fuel-storage tank. As for anyone having overheard him, what are you kidding me? Between the rumble of all those vehicle engines and the non-stop drone of the Police PA, ("Throw down your weapons...!") the hatchway covering could have been as big as a bank-vault and the cops wouldn't have heard it crack open.
Dylan turned again, looking straight ahead... and saw a van barreling straight towards him! He grabbed the chain and pulled himself hurriedly back inside the chute, closing the lid behind him. At once something heavy rolled over it, peppering him with rust-flakes as it thumped to a halt.
He gave it a quick moment, and then tried the hatch again.
It refused to budge...but why? It wasn't jammed...it hadn't even closed completely; he could see a needle-thin crescent of light where the covering hadn't quite matched up with the exit.
So why wouldn't the darn thing move?
It took the young silver-fox only all of three seconds work it out, and then he wanted to bite somebody.
"Agggggh, grrr, I don't believe this! A zillion stinkin' places to park and you had to stop with your tire right HERE?!"
But then he heard the voices; the first one deep and righteously angry—and then two more, both of them high and indignant.
"Heyyy," Deep voice all but bellowed, "What the heck do you two think you're doing? Get that rig back behind the police line and right now!"
"Hey yourself," high-voice number one responded archly, "We're a news team and we have every RIGHT to be here." He sounded to Dylan like someone who walked with a swagger.
"A FAKE news team." Deep voice sneered, "And even if you weren't, there's no press allowed on this side of the barricades."
"We're embedded reporters, officer!" the second high voice insisted, nasal as a head cold and also female—and also clearly belonging to some kind of rodent species.
"It's 'Sergeant' Miss," Deep voice informed her, curtly, "not 'Officer'; that's number one. Number two, there's no such thing as an embedded police reporter, and number three, you two aren't any kind of news reporters, so...."
"Yes, we are!" High voice one was refusing to back down. (Dylan would have liked to kick him down...all the way to the bottom of the escape chute.)
"Look, right there on the side of our van," high-voice number two had become an aggravated squeak, "See that? FreeNet News Service."
"Yeah, I noticed." Sergeant Deep Voice had assumed a tone that made Dylan picture him folding his arms and drumming his fingers on his elbow. "And I also noticed that you spelled 'Service' with an 'F'. So either get that pile of junk out of here right now...or you can pick it up at the impound yard tomorrow." He paused for effect, and then added a cherry on top, "IF you make bail."
That should have been the end of it, but noooooo!
"What ever happened to freedom of information?" High male voice protested, miserably. (Now he sounded like a kit, demanding to know WHY he couldn't have any ice cream.)
Not to be outdone in the obduracy department, his partner chittered. "This is a violation of our speech rights!"
That was all as far as the police mammal was concerned.
"If you two aren't out of here in the next ten seconds, the only right you're getting is the rite of SPRING ...nine...eight...seven..."
"You'll be hearing from our attorneys!" the guy reporter shouted, and then doors slammed, an engine cranked and more rust flakes were falling.
Muttering under his breath, Dylan gave it half a minute and then pushed the hatchway open again and peered out through the gap.
Yes! The coast was clear, the vehicle was gone, and no sign of that cop!
Moving fast, he slid out the backpack and duffle and pulled himself through the opening after them.
Then he winced, waiting for it. Now it would happen; now he'd feel those strong paws grabbing...
Wait, what was that sound? Dylan turned and saw another vehicle, coming fast from the opposite direction, a big one. He hurriedly reached for the pack and duffle , but there was no time, he could only save himself. He dropped back into the hole and pulled in the lid again, bracing himself and waiting for the inevitable sound of cracking and splintering as his bags were crushed into worthless debris.
The noise never came...there was only the scrunch of tires the vehicle pulled to a halt.
"...right on top of me again! Agggggh, grrrrr!"
He screwed his eyes shut and tried the door.
It opened—only part of the way before hitting something, but more than enough for the young fox to push it aside and pull himself through. And there in front of him, beneath the vehicle's drive shaft, were his backpack and duffel-bag, both without a scratch. (Hallelujah!)
Wriggling out of the chute opening, the young fox pushed the lid back into place (making sure it was flush this time,) and slid cautiously out from under the vehicle.
It was a police ambulance...no surprise there. Of course the cops would be expecting casualties. Why wouldn't they, with all the firepower stashed inside that club? (And he should know.)
"...give yourselves up. You now have seven minutes to...
SEVEN...minutes? Dylan blinked and looked as his watch, and then his eyes were wide and he was shaking it as though it might have stopped, (never mind that it was digital model.) There was that much time left? It felt like he'd been inside that shaft since before Blu Ray was invented. But then something scratched at the back of his mind. Sayyyy, when he'd looked at his watch hadn't he also seen...?
He looked at it again and oh crud; his paw appeared to have been sprinkled with cinnamon; no wait, it was rust. Never mind, he couldn't be seen looking like this. Crouching low and out of sight of the ambulance mirrors, Dylan hastily dusted himself off. Surprisingly, it was not that bad. Except for his paws, the rest of him was fairly...
A hard grip seized him by the shoulder.
"And just where do you think YOU'RE going, kid?"
It was the same voice he'd heard berating the two 'reporters' earlier Before the young fox had time to even think of an answer, he was hauled roughly to his feet and spun around to find himself looking upwards at an elk in police-tac gear.
His expression was anything but friendly.
"I don't stinking believe this," he snorted, staring down at Dylan with obsidian eyes, "first those fake news-nerds and now YOU."
The young fox tried to stammer out an explanation, but before he could manage even half a word, the grip on his shoulder tightened.
And then it let him go and the elk-cop was pointing backwards with a baton, towards the police line.
"You get your thrill-seeking, bushy little tail back behind those barricades right this second, and stay there! If I catch you on this side of the line again, you're gonna leave here cuffed and in the back of in a police car, got that?"
"Yes sir...yes, sir." The young fox nodded breathlessly. He should have been elated—except there were his backpack and duffel, still hidden halfway under the ambulance; at the moment they were invisible to the cop, but the instant he spotted them he'd realize that this fox-kid was no mere rubbernecker but something else. Dylan was still in the trap, he couldn't make a grab for his stuff without being seen and he couldn't just leave it behind either.
But then the elk-cop turned abruptly and pointed off to the left.
"Hey, you two! Back behind that barricade and right now!"
In that instant, Dylan saw his chance. Dropping to all fours, he snatched up the bag straps in his jaws, and scampered full-tilt for the police line. It looked a thousand yards distant, and with every foot he covered, it seemed to pull that much further away from him, as if his senses were having way big fun at his expense. Any second now, he'd hear the elk's voice calling him back again...or someone else cry out, "Heyyyy, what's that fox kid doing?"
He saw a gap between the barriers, a blessed, wonderful gap, just wide enough for him to pass through with his gear. He altered course by two degrees and made a beeline for the opening.
"Come on...just a few more feet, just couple more; come onnnnn!"
Dylan slipped through the gap and stopped, panting hard and letting the bags drop to the pavement. After finally catching up with his breath, he stood up, taking a quick survey of the animals surrounding him.
None of them were paying him any notice, not even the rodents; their attention was all focused elsewhere at the moment, on Finagles to be precise. More than half the crowd had cellphones out, lenses aimed directly at the club; more than a few had brought video cams. One character, a zebu, was toting a camera with a lens the size of a portable SAM launcher. Many of the spectators had brought folding chairs and ice-chests, and there were hard-shell cases and duffle-bags everywhere. Hrmpf, no wonder Dylan wasn't raising any eyebrows; compared to some of the animals here, he was actually traveling light.
Wellll, that's what the cops got for staging this circus on a Sunday. If today had been a workday, there wouldn't be half as many gawkers here. And wait a minute this was Easter Sunday, a day when plenty of mammals would be packed to picnic anyway. Sorry coppers, you brought this on yourselves.
Looking around once more, the young fox had to wonder what the heck these folks expected to see; nothing was going to happen out here, it would all go down inside the dance-club, out of sight if not out of mind.
But then he had to suppress a small shudder; it was a lucky thing for all these would-be Pawparazzi that Finagles had no outside windows; there were weapons inside the place that could mow them down by half in the blink of an eye. He remembered the story of how The Mister had once proposed installing a Gatling gun turret on the club's roof—and had only been dissuaded when his brothers had threatened to quit the gang. It was only a rumor of course, but given The Company boss's increasingly erratic behavior of late, you never really knew with that sea-mink.
Dylan grabbed his bags and started to work his way through the crowd, pausing every now and then to catch his breath. (That run for the barricades had tired him out more than he thought.)
But then he halted in place, nose rippling and tilting upwards. His sharp, vulpine nostrils had just picked up a familiar scent...but his head was refusing to process the information.
"Wha-heck? Noooo, it can't be him! No way, Rene!"
He turned cautiously in the direction of the odor...and then his eyes were blinking like semaphores. It was him, it was Junior McCrodon—perched halfway up light pole not twenty feet away from where the young silver fox was standing.
Dylan felt his black-furred ears working in confusion. How the heck had Junior managed to get out of there before the cops showed up? Well, never mind; somehow he'd managed it, only...what now?
He didn't need to be clairvoyant to know that Junior didn't like him, and if anything, he liked the young sea-mink even less. On the other paw, like or no like, right now they needed each other. And so the young silver fox swallowed his bile and began moving in the sea-mink's direction.
...and stopped in his tracks, even more confused. What now? Junior looked almost...gleeful!
He took a slow step backwards, the way he had come; every single one of his vulpine instincts was screaming like a fire siren. Something wasn't right here, something was VERY much not right here. Spotting a recycling bin on his right—large-mammal size; thank the stars—Dylan hurriedly ducked behind it, watching and waiting for ...what?
He didn't have to wait for long. Just then, the crowd parted and a midnight-grey Hump-Vee nosed its way through the throng, pulling to a halt less than ten feet away from him. The young fox felt his teeth set on edge and his tail starting to frizz; this bad boy was the real deal, not the weekend-warrior knock-off, a gen-u-wine, mil-spec Humper with armored windows and all other trimmings.
That alone shouldn't have been enough to turn the young fox's tail into a bottle brush; compared to at least half the other police vehicles here, it was a Trunka toy.
But when you threw in that lettering on the hood, all bets were off. Dylan Yeats didn't know ACM from ZNN, but this vehicle bore a slightly different acronym, A.C.C., a combination of letters the young silver fox knew much, much better than he cared to.
He pulled himself even further behind the container. For a long moment, nothing happened.
Then the Hump-Vee's doors swung open and a pair of wolverines got out, one male and the other one female, both of them dressed in coal-black paramilitary gear. Their species alone was enough to give Dylan pause. Back in the pre-evolutionary days, wolverines had been known to take on grizzly bears, even entire wolf-packs...and kick their tails.
But when the male wolverine turned to speak to the female, the young fox's anxiety level went straight into the red zone; the fur of his right paw was the color of a dirty white eggshell.
Dylan had never met this animal, not face to face, but he'd come within a mouse's whisker once...and he'd HEARD plenty about this creep, both from Danny Tipperin and from data that Kieran had shown him.
Just then the female wolverine tapped his arm and pointed with two fingers...
...right at Junior.
And the male's expression became...what the heck? Did he look...pained?
He gave a single, weary head-shake, and then stalked over in the sea-mink's direction, beckoning for the female wolverine to follow.
Dylan knew he should get while the getting was good, but right now he was a moth circling candle flame.
"We have you surrounded...."
The two wolverines were about six feet away, when Jimmy Jr. spotted them.
...and then he started to...hey, what the heck? He was waving at them, waving at them like a pair of old school chums! What the double heck?
"Hey, guys," the young sea-mink called, hanging onto the light pole with one paw and pointing towards Finagles with the other, "Fish in a barrel."
The white-pawed wolverine was in a somewhat less convivial mood. He aimed a finger at the ground in front of him, an angry teacher summoning a troublemaker.
"Get down from there you little idiot, and right now!"
Junior's reaction to this was his most bewildering move yet.
"Hey, you don't talk to me that way." He hissed, but jumped down from the pole just the same...while Dylan stared in total disbelief. Not only was Junior mouthing off to a wolverine, he sounded almost like...like he was their... No, of course not! Why would he ever be hooked up with these two?
It was the sea-mink himself who answered the question, thumbing his nose in the direction of Finagle's.
"Gonna ice me NOW, Unkies?" he sneered, and now Dylan got it...or enough of it anyway.
Everyone in The Company knew how badly their boss's health had been deteriorating over the past few months; that, and how much his two brothers loathed their spoiled-brat nephew. And of course Jimmy Jr. knew it too; how could he not know it? Cripes on a cracker, hadn't Dylan reminded Junior of it himself, only a short while earlier in the boiler room? DUH, The Mister's son knew he was on Denis and Gerry's short list; what no one had ever expected was that he might someday pull enough guts together to actually DO something about it.
Only...what exactly had he done?
"You now have six minutes...."
Once again, the answer was not long in coming.
"Did you take care of the computer files?" the white-pawed wolverine asked him.
Junior grinned and tossed him a thumb drive. "Roasted and toasted; worked just like you said, big guy."
Dylan felt his face changing so rapidly he could almost have become a shaper-shifter. In the blink of an eye from he went from confusion, to shock, to unbridled rage. So, that's what Junior had been up to on Big Brenda.
More than anything else, he wanted to leap out from behind the trash bin and tear that sea-mink punk a new one; he might actually have done it too, if White-Paw hadn't been there.
But then another thought occurred to Dylan, and confusion reigned once more. That still left one thing unexplained; his DAD was in there, along with his uncles; when they went, so would he.
What the HECK was going on?
Meanwhile the wolverine was pocketing the drive but keeping his eyes fixedly on the young sea-mink.
"And did you finally get us a picture of the silver-fox kid?"
Dylan's ears shot up, and confusion gave way to terror. There could be only ONE silver-fox kid the white-pawed wolverine was talking about.
But then Junior sucked at a corner of his mouth.
"Uhhh, no...sorry dude. Missed that."
White-paw promptly gave him a demonstration of why wolverines are such a dreaded species. Taking two steps forward, he bared his teeth; massive and wickedly sharp, they looked as if they could sever a hawser cable in a single bite.
Dylan nearly bolted, but then he wrinkled his nose instead, "Ewwww."
Mr. White-paw had also just demonstrated why wolverines are sometimes known as 'skunk-bears'.
Or...no, the young fox swiftly decided it was coming from Junior instead—he would have known that stink anywhere—and the sea mink certainly had good reason to lose control of his musk right now; Mr. White-Paw looked as if he were going to plant his tail right now.
"Again?!" the wolverine loomed above Junior like a wrathful demigod. "Two whole months and you blew it off again?"
Acting wisely for a change, the sea-mink declined to snark off again; instead he dropped into a half crouch and raised his arms, looking pitiful.
"Hey it wasn't my fault. Cousin Moron and the Dumbaconda walked in on me while I was shredding that folder. I was lucky I got that much done, okay?"
The wolverine said nothing, only stood with his breath hissing through his teeth.
"...down your weapons and come out with..."
"And what do you need a pic for anyway?" Junior waved his paw in Finagle's direction, assuming his patented, poor-pitiful-me fursona. "How many other silver-fox kids are gonna be in there, huh?"
"There aren't any silver foxes in there NOW, dumbweed!" Dylan whispered through bared teeth, unable to resist, never mind the situation.
"...five minutes to comply."
Surprisingly, Junior's words seemed to pacify the wolverine.
"Yes, of course," he said, moving backwards and clearing his throat. "But now, before someone from the neighborhood recognizes you, James...you need to get as far away from here as possible."
The young sea-mink turned instantly obdurate again. (Cripes, he really was that stupid.)
"Hey...no way, I wanna see..."
"Say...a week in a Mustelique luxury condo?" White-paw interrupted smoothly, and with a toothy smile.
His ploy worked like a charm. The one time Junior had visited The Billionaire's Island he'd been unable to stop talking about it for a month.
"Yea-haaaaaah, now you're talking!" He whooped and performed a few hip-hop steps, singing acapella and balancing an imaginary boom box on his shoulder.
"But you're the real deal..."
Several nearby animals turned to stare, but Dylan only ducked further behind the recycling bin, rolling his eyes in a mixture of pity and derision; he happened to know the REFRAIN from that particular Gazelle tune.
"...some are ready to bite you...!"
(And besides that, Junior McCrodon couldn't carry a tune in A WHEELBARROW.)
When the young fox poked his head out again, a limo had pulled up behind the Hump-Vee, and the female wolverine was holding the door open.
"That was fast," Dylan thought to himself—a little too fast for it not have been arranged in advance.
"This is the Zoo York City Police..."
Junior apparently didn't think of it—or else he didn't care; he practically skipped towards the open door of the limo, but then at the threshold, he stopped and turned nervously in the direction of White-Paw.
...and the last piece of the puzzle finally fell into place
"M-My dad...he only let my uncles talk him into this stuff coz he's sick and he's not thinking right. Your guys won't hurt him...you promised."
The wolverine raised his singular, white paw.
"Didn't my employer already give you his word on that? But all right, if you insist," He put the other paw over his heart and began to recite, "I give you my solemn promise that no one will lay a finger," He nodded over at the bighorn ram in the tank, "—or a hoof—on The Mister, or on you. And now it's time you were on your way." He turned towards the female wolverine, "Ms. Slashburn? Take care of this young mammal, won't you?"
"Yes sir, Mr. Whitepaugh." She answered smartly, and then with a grand sweep of her paw, she gestured towards the open limo door, "Right this way, if you please."
"Oh yeah, I please." Junior smirked, giving her a very good look as he hopped into the back seat. Wolverine or no, this babe was easy on the eyes.
But then, just as the young sea-mink was settling into his chair, she turned away and Dylan saw her face become a mask of revulsion. Reaching into her jacket she pulled out a dart-gun and checked the load.
Dylan almost gasped; he was only able to stop himself by clamping his paws around his muzzle. The pellets in the chamber weren't blue in color but a deep, garnet red.
"You now have three minutes..."
In fact, they were the exact same hue as the red pellets Danny had given him earlier; he winced and turned his face away, pulling back behind the bin once more; now, more than anything, he wanted to leap out and shout a warning to the sea mink—but he knew that wasn't on the table either. White-Paw would be all over him in a heartbeat and Junior wouldn't listen anyway.
When Dylan finally looked again, the limousine was already halfway down the street...and four more wolverines were approaching through the crowd.
Like White-paw they were dressed in tactical uniforms, but in camo-grey rather than black and bearing the letters A.S.M. The entire group was heavily armed.
"Sir!" they barked in unison as they came to an abrupt halt, snapping a crisp salute at Seth Whitepaugh.
Once again, the lead wolverine got straight down to business, pulling out a sheaf of photographs, and passing them around the squad. One of them got away in the breeze, skittering away under the recycling bin...and practically right into Dylan Yeats' paw. The young fox tensed for just a second, but relaxed when no one made an effort to retrieve it; White-paw seemed to have brought along extras, just in case.
"This is the kid, you're looking for." he announced...and Dylan clamped his muzzle with his paws again; he knew precisely which kid the wolverine had to be talking about. But when he took a quick peek at the 8 X 10, he not only felt himself relaxing again, he even had to stifle a snigger.
That was him in the photo all right, but you wouldn't know it to look at the young fox now; the kit in the pic was skinny, mangy, a whole lot younger, and his fur was also darker in color. And that wasn't even mentioning his face, a muzzle bent like a crooked 'Z'. Best of all his eyes were barely visible in the photograph, showing none of their distinctive coloration.
But then as quickly as it had arrived, Dylan's moment of relief vanished like chaff in the wind. Even having lived a relatively short life, the young fox already been through enough to know he wasn't getting off that easy.
As if to confirm this, the squad leader clicked his heels. When he spoke, his voice revealed a grating, Teutonic accent.
"Sir, with all due respect, I cannot help but notice that this photo is somewhat dated."
Dylan heard the others murmuring in agreement and saw Whitepaugh nod and curl his lip upwards revealing a fang. (He was still mad at Junior, even now.)
"Yes, that's correct, Hummel. Unfortunately, it's the best picture we have of him at present. However," he unclipped an aluminum bottle from his belt and screwed it open, "We also have this."
Dylan's heart began to gallop as he watched the wolverine pull a swatch of cloth from the cylinder and give it to the squad leader, who pressed it to his nose and inhaled deeply. He knew exactly what was happening...and even if he hadn't, Whitepaugh promptly removed all doubt by saying, "Each of you, take a good, hard sniff. Your target's appearance may have changed since the photograph was taken, but his scent won't be any different."
Five yards away, their target swallowed hard and looked up nervously at a nearby flag. It was fluttering in his direction and away from the wolverines; he was downwind, safe for the moment.
"...two minutes to comply!"
"I want to make one thing crystal clear." The black-clad wolverine was saying, "We want him alive at all costs...if not necessarily unharmed."
"Yes sir," The squad leader answered, "But supposing der polizei get to him first, what then?"
"Then you are authorized to assume custody." White-paw's voice was as flat as a frozen pond. "Any trouble, you call me directly."
"Sehr gut!" the squad leader answered with another crisp salute and a click of his heels. In other circumstances, Dylan might have found his toy-soldier act almost comic...
A red splotch, the same color as the pellet-darts, fell dribbling onto his cheek. The young fox jumped and almost yipped.
When he looked up, a little wildebeest boy was seated on the bin above him, staring ahead disinterestedly while he absently licked at a pawpsicle.
That was what finally broke the spell. Dylan slipped on the backpack, grabbed the duffle, and then quickly but quietly began filtering his way through the crowd and towards the street.
Almost at once—and unbeknownst to the young fox—the flag he'd been looking at a moment ago went limp...and then it began flapping in the opposite direction.
"You now have..."
Behind him, Seth Whitepaugh abruptly raised his nose and sniffed—and then he stiffened and pointed to two of the squad members. "You...you...with me...now!"
Not far away, Dylan Yeats was at curbside, attempting to flag down a taxi.
They all just zoomed right past him. One of the drivers, a caribou, even yelled out his window, "As IF, fox-kid!"
"...and thirty seconds to comply."
Then the young fox heard a familiar dark voice, coming from somewhere to his rear—and from down-wind.
"Through here, this way...follow me."
"...one minute..."
Dylan searched frantically for something to write on; spotted a pair of ragged cardboard pieces, snatched them up and pulled out a sharpie-pen scribbling furiously. When the next flock of taxis approached they were greeted by the sight of a fox kid holding the first of the makeshift signs high over his head:
'LaFurdia Airport!
Extra $20 Tip 4 U.'
That did the hat-trick; no one, but THREE different cabs pulled over.
"Thirty seconds...twenty-nine...twenty-eight..."
Behind him, Whitepaugh and the others were closing fast, bulling their way through the crowd, pushing the other animals aside and sweeping rodents out of the way with their feet. At the edge of the throng, they found an elephant blocking their path.
"You there, out of the way." Whitepaugh ordered, but the pachyderm only regarded him with a look of lazy disdain.
"You don't look like no cops to me, p—"
That was as far as the elephant got; a split second later he was sprawled on the pavement, face down and groggy while the crowd—typical Zoo Yorkers—hooted and jeered with unfettered glee; an animal that size, putting down an animal THAT size? You had to love it!
The wolverines didn't love it, they had other concerns right now, at last bursting free of the crowd and into the street beyond.
"...nineteen...eighteen...seventeen..."
Dylan Yeats was nowhere in sight.
Whitepaugh immediately ordered the others to fan out in opposite directions. While they rushed to obey, he pulled out a radio and was about to key the mike when he noticed something lying on the sidewalk, a torn shred of cardboard with what looked like fresh lettering on the side He picks it up and sniffed, then turned it over in his paws. The letters, "..xtra $20," jumped out at him and he sniffed the cardboard again, letting out a small angry growl. The kid had grabbed a taxi—but where to?
He spotted another, bigger piece of cardboard, laying in the gutter and snatched it up. The message was still incomplete but it told him all he needed to know. He hurriedly keyed the mike.
"Red-Fire One to Red-Fire Central, clear all lines, priority transmission. Target silver has escaped the perimeter, I say again, target silver has escaped the perimeter. He is headed for..."
His next words were drowned out as the PA cranked up to full-blast.
"...three...Two...ONE... ALL UNITS, MOVE IN! ALL UNITS, MOVE IN!"
An even louder pandemonium followed; elephants trumpeting, big cats roaring, wolves howling, and engines revving—mixed together with the whoops and cheers of the onlookers. High above their heads, gas and smoke canisters were already arcing towards the club.
"Red-Fire Central, did you get that? Over!" Whitepaugh was shouting into the mike while cupping a paw over one ear.
The answer was barely audible over, but he heard it well enough.
"Red-Fire One that's an affirmative; we have all available units en route to intercept, over."
"Very well Central," Whitepaugh replied, "keep me informed; Red-Fire One out."
He keyed off the mike and smiled for just a second.
"Almost boy, but not quite," he thought, looking down at the scraps of cardboard in his paws, "You should have taken this with you instead of tearing it up and leaving it here."
He let the first piece drop but kept the second one.
It read, "..unn Statio..."
"See you at Bunn Station, kid." the wolverine snorted softly and then crushed he scrap of cardboard into a tiny ball
Then he glowered up the street with narrowing eyes....never suspecting for an instant that he was looking in the wrong direction.
--------------------------------
Author's note: Several more Easter Eggs are to be found here, including a veiled reference to Peter Pan.