warehouses they bought out, while at the same time setting up clandestine laboratories."

He turned his head and looked at the test tube filled with bright orange liquid, sitting safely inside a glass cabinet to his right.

"Whatever it is, I doubt it's super-vitamin formula," said Garth. "There's a reason they wanted it kept out of the public eye."

"And I think I know who can help us figure out what this stuff is," said Nick.

"Let me guess…" said Judy with a teasing smirk. "Oh, Officer Wilde! You can deliver me your fluids anytime you want! Um…meaning the fluids you found in test tube…in clandestine labs…not what you think I totally didn't mean…and yet did, in a manner of speaking," Judy did her best impression of Amber.

Nick chuckled as he pulled Judy into a hug and gave her a gentle noogie.

"Are you jelly, widdle bunny?" teased Nick.

"Hah!" said Judy.

"Alright," said Nick. "Let's all go. That way you can make sure your pwecious widdle foxy behaves himself."

Judy snorted with laughter as she and Nick walked to the door.

"You too, Garth," said Nick. "And bring that orange stuff with you."

"Okay," said Garth, reaching for the test tube of orange chemical. "Hmm…forensics lab. This might be enlightening."

It was late afternoon when they got to Precinct 1. Benjamin Clawhauser was just getting ready to end his day, packing his most prized belongings underneath his desk for safekeeping, chief among which was his limited-edition numbered Gazelle doll that Judy had gotten for him from the Bunny Burrow County Fair.

"Hey Clawhauser!" said Judy.

The cheetah smiled with delight.

"Hopps! Wilde!" he said. "I thought you were on leave!"

"We are. But we just needed to stop by," said Judy. "Do you have any visitor badges? For our friend here."

Clawhauser looked beyond Judy and saw Nick with Garth.

"Mr O' Possum!" said Clawhauser. "So nice to see you!"

Garth had been an essential player in cracking the crooked carnival caper two months earlier, and Clawhauser had become quite the fan of the little opossum.

"How's it hangin', Ben!" said Garth.

"How's everyone's favourite Junior ZPD Officer?" said Clawhauser.

"Doing fine! We have a little business in the catacombs," said Garth.

"Oh, go right ahead," said Clawhauser. "Our Honorary Junior ZPD Officer is always welcome here!"

Nick led Garth to the stairs to the basement.

"Hey Clawhauser, I need to go upstairs for a bit," said Judy. "To my cubicle. I have something I need to check on my computer."

"This is your home, Hopps," said Clawhauser. "Go right on ahead."

As Judy walked up the stairs, Clawhauser looked at the three of them heading in different directions and sighed with joy.

"We're one big happy family," he said dreamily as he left his front desk to clock out.

Nick knocked on the door of the Forensics Department and heard the familiar footsteps approaching.

The door opened and Amber's bespectacled face greeted them.

"Officer Wilde!" she said delightedly. "What a lovely surprise!"

"Hello, Amber," said Nick. "I'm afraid I have more work for you. Sorry to impose."

"Oh, it's no bother at all, Officer Wilde," said Amber, inviting them in. "Please, please come in and make yourself at home!"

Nick walked in and Garth followed.

"Oh!" said Amber. "We have a visitor!"

"Yes," said Nick. "Amber, I'd like you to meet a long-time friend of mine and Junior ZPD Officer extraordinaire, Garth O' Possum!"

Nick turned to Garth.

"Garth, meet Amber Beverly Latrans, our extraordinary forensics specialist," said Nick.

"So pleased to make your acquaintance, Mr O' Possum!" said Amber, extending her dainty paw.

"The pleasure is all mine," said Garth, taking her paw gallantly and kissing it lightly in the old-fashioned way.

Amber giggled.

"Such a cavalier," she said.

Amber walked over to the coffee machine in the corner.

"May I offer you a drink?" she asked her guests. "Coffee, tea, hot chocolate perhaps?"

"Coffee is fine," said Nick.

"I never turn down a cup of hot chocolate," said Garth.

"Heehee, neither do I," said Amber as she reached for José Carioca's Finest Dark Coffee, a Zootopian favourite brand, and two sachets of powdered cocoa.

After a while, Amber gave Garth and Nick their drinks and took a sip of her own.

"So, to what do I owe this unexpected pleasure times two, Officer Wilde?"

Garth beamed. Nick took the test tube of orange liquid wrapped in handkerchiefs out of his pocket and carefully unbundled it. He gave it to Amber, who looked curiously at it in the light.

"I need you to tell me what this is," said Nick.

"Wow," said Amber. "This is high-quality work. The test tube alone is worth more than a luxury dinner at the Maison du Bison. Will it be inappropriate to ask where you obtained this?"

"No, but Amber…"

Nick looked very seriously at her.

"I need you to keep this a secret," said Nick. "I trust you. You're more than our colleague, you are our friend. There are some things you don't come back from without becoming friends, and helping to clear your name after the carnival debacle, and you repaying us a billion times over by coming and working so hard to help as a forensic science specialist…"

Nick put his coffee down and held her paw.

"You are a treasure, Amber. I want you to know that."

Amber didn't know what to answer.

"I hold you in the highest esteem, darling. I need you to know that we are following the clues of what may be a very large and elaborate crime, and we are alone in this. Judy, myself, Garth…and now you, Amber."

Amber blushed, but not with infatuation. With genuine emotion and feeling of solemnity.

"Whatever is in that tube, we have reason to believe it's something that is being used for bad purposes," said Nick. "And now…it's up to you. Whether we triumph or fail is in your paws."

He let go of her paw and stepped back a little, letting his words settle in. Amber adjusted her spectacles and looked determined.

"Leave it to me, Officer Wilde!" she said in a determined tone. "I'll find out what this orange stuff is if it takes me all night. Your trust shall not be misplaced with me."

"Thank you, Amber," said Nick, genuinely grateful.

With a confident smile, she went over to her workbench, placing the test tube safely in a cooling cabinet while she prepared the tools of her trade.

"Let me bring you up to speed," said Nick. "Terra Firma Incorporated is the company we're investigating. We found that orange stuff in one of their warehouses, in a laboratory that I seriously doubt was declared in their building permission documents."

"A clandestine lab," said Amber. "That is already grounds for investigation."

"But it gets better…or worse," said Nick. "They're buying farmland in a three hundred mile radius around Zootopia. And they just so happen to buy land right after the crops on those lands fail. Officer Hopps and I are convinced that they are responsible for the failing crops and are swindling people out of their land to monopolise the agricultural industry around Zootopia. And they're trying to acquire retail and warehouse space here in the city as well. And we suspect that the explosion that happened last night was not an accident. It was intentional. An intimidation tactic, perhaps masterminded by the president of the company. So Terra Firma would own the retail outlets, warehouses, distribution networks and the farms. Win-win tactic for them, at the expense of many."

"That is an evil and despicable plot!" spat Amber with indignation as she calibrated her tools. "The small farm has always been the cornerstone of our society. Surrendering what little we have left of the wonderful reminder of what made this nation what it is to corporate conglomerates…it shall not be tolerated!"

Nick liked the way she put it. Garth was sitting by the coffee machine, sipping his yummy hot chocolate and listening enthralled to every word.

"Whoever the CEO is over there at Terror Firma," said Amber, and Nick chuckled at her pun. "I shall see him put behind bars. He sits up high looking down upon the world, but the higher he climbs, the farther he shall fall! Vae victus!"

"The Lord of Murder shall perish," quoted Garth from the other side of the room. "But in his doom he shall spawn a score of mortal progeny. Chaos will be sown…"

"…from their passage. So sayeth the wise Baa-laundo," finished Amber.

And they both stopped dead. Garth and Amber stopped what they were doing, turned around and their gazes met. Nick would have sworn he felt electricity coursing through the air between the two gazes.

"You played Bulldur's Gate?!" exclaimed Garth.

"Only every night all night for several nights all summer in my last year of school!" said Amber, giggling like a school girl.

Their smiles could have cut diamond.

"You've had an itty-bitty piece of my soul in there for quite a while now. What's it been

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