Small Changes

                            By:

                         Fox Cutter

    Chapter 3

It felt like I had been punched in the gut, pain lancing
through my chest as I tried to breath. I felt myself
beginning to stumble as around me both the Doctor and the
nurse fell to the floor.

This was an all too familiar feeling for me, but it was much
worse than it had been the time before. I knew what I needed
to do. Taking what little air was in my lungs, I exhaled
hard, activating the filter implant in my throat.

I could feel the implant buzzing just under my Adam's apple,
making my voice rattle as I coughed, and sucked in more air.
By now I was holding onto the examination table to keep
myself upright, but was starting to lose my grasp.

Then the oxygen rushed into my lungs; bitter and hot, it
filled me. I gasped it back out, along with the last
remnants of the gas, taking in a second long breath right
after it.

The pain in my lungs had faded, but was still there, like
hundreds of tiny cuts that flared in pain each time I took a
breath.

I bent down, checking for the pulse on the other two,
finding them weak, and starting to fade. Around me I could
hear a klaxon begin to wail, echoing through the room and
causing my ears to ring.

It seemed clear that no one was going to be coming to the
rescue, at least not in time to save Doctor Banner and the
nurse. Struggling back to my feet, and finding myself
suddenly lightheaded, I tried to concentrate, looking around
the room.

I could see Oria through the large glass window on the wall,
standing with a look of panic on her face, her paws pressed
against the glass. I didn't have time to try and say
anything to her, I had to try and do something for the men
on the floor first.

Along the back wall I saw a small tank of oxygen, attached
to a pair of masks. It wasn't much, probably no more than a
ten minute supply, but it should do. I rushed over to them
and grabbed them off the wall, the muscles in my legs
protesting the rapid movement. I wondered why they were even
there.

Maybe someone had anticipated something like this happening,
I didn't know, and really didn't have time to think about
it.

Rushing back to the others, I dropped to my knees, coughing
slightly as the filter implant started to itch in the back
of my throat. It was built for only a few minutes of use, of
which maybe thirty seconds had already passed, I just hoped
help would arrive before time ran out.

I hurriedly opened the valve on the tank, and wrapped the
first mask over Banner's face. His pulse was weak, and his
breathing almost none existent.

I couldn't find the nurse's pulse at all, but I put the mask
over his face, in the hopes that he might still be alive. If
he had stopped breathing, there wasn't much I could do to
help him.

Banner started to cough in his mask, working to remove the
gas from his system. I held him steady as his body shook,
before it finally settled down. His pulse was growing
stronger but it was still erratic.

The nurse's pulse was returning, very weak, and fluttering
under my touch. He was going to need some serious treatment
if he survived.

I wasn't escaping unscathed either. The muscles in my legs
were starting to scream in pain, burning and aching as I
rested my weight on them. Blurriness was starting to creep
into the edges of my vision, like when I had a really bad
headache.

I coughed again. The feeling from the filter implant was
getting worse, starting to burn in the back of my throat.
Glancing back at the window, I saw that Oria was gone now.
Probably off with whoever was suppose to respond to this
kind of thing.

There was part of me that was afraid that she was still in
the room, that the gas had seeped out into the building,
leaving me trapped in this room, with no one outside to save
me.

I took some comfort in the fact that at least the room had
been sealed in some fashion. The door had a firm pressure
seal, and there was reverse air pressure, keeping the air
inside the room inside. Probably as a precaution from
whatever airborne bacteria might form on a corpse.

But it was hardly a level five bio-lab, and I doubted that
whatever precautions they had would hold up long against the
gas.

Suddenly there came a popping sound from above me. I snapped
my head up, and instantly regretted it, a wave of nausea
rushing through me as my head starting spinning.

I actually grabbed the side of my head, trying to hold the
world in place, as I got a face full of water. It crashed
down over me, forcing its way down my nose and through my
open muzzle.

Dropping my head back down, I coughed, trying to get the
water out, and still trying to regain my balance. It took me
a few seconds to realize what had happened. Someone had
switched on the water-sprinklers in the room.

Carefully, I tilted my head back, letting the water splash
into my face and fur. It was cold against my skin, and felt
like it was burning, but also brought a sense of relief. It
meant that someone was out there, trying to save us.

I checked back on Banner, his breathing was still weak but
his pulse had settled down to something soft, but regular.
The nurse, on the other hand, was still fighting with the
gas, and was looking worse by the minute.

Then came the sound of a fan starting above me, and I could
feel the air begin to move over my wet fur. It was being
cycled out and replaced by clean air. I was sure of that, as
the burning from the filter implant started to level off,
then slowly grow cooler.

By now my vision was as bad as it was in my human form, sans
glasses. Everything was blurry, and I was starting to see
spots of color. My arms hurt; the effort of just holding
them at my side was causing them to cramp up.

Even with the filter, I didn't think I had more than a
minute before I would finally collapse.

Then, like the cavalry cresting over the horizon, the door
opened, and in walked a large man dressed in a plain grey
chemical suit. A heavy black respirator was wrapped over his
muzzle, and air hose trailed back out of the door.

Three more people dressed like him walked into the room. It
only took me a moment to see that one of them was Oriana.

She rushed over to me as I tried to stand, my legs wobbling
under me as I put my weight on them. I only got halfway up
before they collapsed under me. Luckily she was there to
catch me as I fell, and lower me to the ground.

"Hello Love," I said, or at least tried to; what came out
was a raspy croak that irritated the filter implant.

She pressed a small oxygen mask to my muzzle, holding it
tightly.

The apparent leader of the group came over to me, as the
other two attended to Doctor Banner and his nurse.

"This will counteract the toxin," he said rubbing my arm
with a cotton swab, and pulling the fur away. Without any
additional warning he pulled out a syringe and pressed it
into my arm. He was going slow, but it still hurt like hell.

I knew the instant he pressed the plunger, as whatever was
inside of it rushed into my body. It was like having fire
poured into my upper arm, rushing down the veins and ripping
through me.

Instinctively I let out a whimper, and tried to jerk away,
but he was ready for that, his grasp on my upper arm
suddenly very tight. Beside me Oria pushed some of my wet
hair off of my face, and I could feel her gloved fingers
trace over my ears.

"How are they doing?" I asked, trying to take my attention
off the pain in my arm by motioning towards the two men on
the floor.

No one said a word in response, and I frowned in turn. At
the same time Oria was slowly working our wedding band off
my wrist. She had a serious look on her face, which was
partly obscured by the water running down it from the
sprinklers.

"Hon?" I asked her, coughing slightly from the effort. The
inside of my throat felt hard and raspy. What little talking
I had done so far had been enough to aggravate it.

The man in the suit, who I could now see was a wolf, said,
"Your jewelry needs to be decontaminated," as he pulled the
syringe from my arm. "Your clothing will have to be
destroyed, and you will be put into a decontamination shower
in a few moments."

I nodded, rubbing my throat, and coughed again. My head was
starting to ring as well, and a large headache forming just
over my eyes was starting to grow.

Oria had removed my watch, and was currently slipping off my
engagement ring, which was still waiting for us to get
married on Earth. I noted she was dropping them all into a
small plastic bag.

Glancing over at the others, I noted that both Doctor Banner
and the nurse had been striped. The oxygen masks I put on
them had been removed, and full respirators had been put on.
The two men in the chemical suits were doing treatment on
both of them.

"Will they be OK?" I asked.

The wolf bent down, and shared a few words with his team.
When he seemed satisfied, he turned back to face me. "We
can't say yet. From the looks of them, it could be touch and
go for a while."

I nodded, as Oria slowly helped me to my feet. I was
unsteady, and my legs still screamed in pain, which was now
being accompanied by the pounding of my forehead.

"Let's move out of the way," Oria said, her voice strangely
muffled. "They're bringing in stretchers."

I grunted in agreement, and limped in her arms to the other
side of the room. She helped me sit down on an empty
examination table, as I winced in pain from my legs.

Two stretchers were wheeled into the room towards the medial
team. Outside the door I could see what looked like a heavy
containment tent, and what was clearly a portable airlock of
some kind.

"Fast response," I said, my voice rasping, "it couldn't have
been more than ten minutes."

My wife nodded, motioning for me not to talk. "Eight
minutes, actually," she said, pulling my soaked shirt off
over my head. "The terrorist response team for the city is
located here, so they were suiting up as soon as Baxter hit
the alarm."

I nodded, and coughed again, and with a snap the filter
implant disengaged. It caught me by surprised, causing me to
start coughing harder. Once I got my breath back, I was
somewhat relieved to feel the clean oxygen flowing from the
mask into my lungs.

She helped me take off the rest of my clothing, and someone
provide me with a paper-thin gown that stuck to the wet fur
of my body. Of the three of us who were exposed to the gas,
I was given the lowest priority, having shown the least
reaction to it.

So, I got to sit patiently, next to Oria, as they wheeled
first the nurse, then Doctor Banner out of the room. As it
was nearing my turn, I suddenly felt my stomach twist, and
the remains of lunch forced its way back out.

I vomited two more times before I finally got to the
decontamination showers. The leader of the team told me that
it was one of the side effects of the anti-toxin, along with
the headache, and supposedly a loss of equilibrium, but mine
was holding together.

He also told me that there might be some long term side
effects from my exposure, but there was no way to know for
sure until they surfaced, days, weeks, or even years later.

I made plans to see Doctor Stall as soon as I got back to
Prid.

* * *

Three hours later, and I was once again sitting in Baxter's
small office. Cleaned, dried and pressed, or at least it
felt like it. My fur itched from the decontamination shower,
and felt dry and brittle, with all the oils that keep it
soft striped away. The inside of my mouth and nose felt
rough and stripped, after having some kind of chemical
forced into it to clean out the soft tissue. I had been
given two more shots, which had finally stopped making me
vomit, and my headache was roaring hard, as the local pain
killer didn't seem to have an effect on me.

Every muscle in my body ached, my legs protested when I
tried to move them, and my knee ached from where I had
slipped in the hastily erected shower, and wrenched it.

Oria had at least provided me with some clean clothing, even
if the sizes were a little off. The plain shirt hung a bit
too long, and forced me to roll up the sleeves, and the
shorts felt just a little too tight.

Add to that the pile of items that came from my wallet,
which had to be destroyed along with my clothing. I would
have to sort all of that out later, when I could think
straight.

The only thing I had left that fit me was my jacket, which,
thankfully, I had left in the waiting room with Oriana.

For the moment, I was alone in the office, Baxter having run
out to handle a few things, some of which I suspected was
letting me out early. The doctors wanted to keep an eye on
me for a few days, and wanted to know why I was so resistant
to the gas. We had talked them out of it, but only just.

Resting my head in my paws, I sighed, trying to will the
headache to go away, but with little luck. Thankfully Oria
had some painkillers from home in her purse, and I had taken
them gladly. They seemed to slowly be taking effect.

My fingers brushed against the dangling earring as I pulled
them away. It was once again hanging from my ear, getting
tangled in the damaged fur. I was surprised to find it in
Oria's paw when she brought my things back from being
decontaminated. I didn't know she had removed it. She tried
to keep me from noticing that she was putting it back on,
but failed.

It left me wondering how she could have taken it off in the
first place. I should have reverted back to human the
instant it left my ear. The fact that I didn't meant I
needed to talk to Ken about it. Hopefully, he would also
have an explanation of why he had given it back to me.

I let out a sigh, thinking about the time he and I had spent
together as a couple. Even if it was only a month, it felt
like a lifetime. We had both been young, I younger then Ken,
sixteen at the time, while he was in his twenties.

In retrospect, the age difference was an issue, but neither
of us noticed at the time. We had been together as a team
for nearing a year, and it just seemed natural.

Of course, there were other issues that had driven us
together. Ken was partly there to keep an eye on his spell,
but that seemed like a small part of it from what I
remembered.

I had been willing to become Ken's lover, partly to recover
from what Grasion had done to me. Of course I didn't think
about it like that at the time. I've had five years to work
that out, to think about that relationship.

To be honest, I still missed being with him. It had been a
great time for us when I had been trapped in Oria's body and
we slept together, even if we were both unsure how to use
the female form at the time.

As I stirred the thoughts around in my mind, the office door
opened and my wife stepped inside. She had a plate with a
pair of simple sandwiches on them, and a smile on her face.

"Welcome back, Love," I said sitting up in the chair.

She sat down next to me, and held out the plate. "It was the
only thing I could find that didn't look poisonous," she
said.

I smiled, took one of the sandwiches, looking at it a bit
leerily. I wasn't sure my stomach could handle food at the
moment, but the doctors had told me I had to get some food
in my system, so I bit into it. It had meat and cheese, and
something that tasted like mustard. On the whole it wasn't
that bad ."Seems edible," I said, before swallowing the
bite.

She smiled, and picked up her own sandwich, and started
eating as well.

With my free paw, I reached over and started to pet her
ears, eliciting a deep purr, which was followed a moment
later by an even deeper yawn.

I matched her with one of my own, which didn't help my
headache at all.

"I hope we can get some sleep soon," she said, rubbing her
eyes.

I nodded as I chewed. "I hadn't thought about that. Neither
one of us has had a chance to sleep since we got here," I
said. Even though I didn't feel that tired, I guess I was
running on adrenaline, and the various pains that we're left
over from the gas.

She smiled and took another bite, wrapping an arm around me,
and leaning against my shoulder as she ate.

"I see you found the cafeteria," Baxter said as he walked
into the office.

Oria nodded, straightening up in her seat, and smiling as
she finished the last of her sandwich. "It's better than it
was last night."

Baxter smiled, and took a seat at his desk, a small,
relatively flat package in his paws. "I never eat the food
here at night," he commented, working to open it.

"What's that?" I asked, quickly chewing on the last few
bites of mine and forcing them down. It was staying down,
but I wasn't sure I could eat anything else.

"I'm not sure," he replied, "it was delivered to the front
desk. It was sent to the person investigating Spider's
murder."

I frowned. "That doesn't sounds good. Did you have it
checked over for bombs, or more gas?"

He nodded, "First thing," he replied as he ripped it open.
"It was also checked for fingerprints, but with no luck." As
he spoke he fished around inside, pulling out a plastic
container which held something that looked like a small CD.

"What's that?" Oria asked.

"A tape," he said, giving her a strange look as he opened
the case, removing the disk inside.

I raised an eyebrow, "Really? It must be from whomever put
the gas in the body."

Baxter nodded, sliding the disk into his terminal. "That's
what I was just thinking," he replied, pulling out a second
one from inside his desk, and inserting that into a second
slot.

"Let's see what it says," Oria said, leaning forward.

The bear smiled, and hit a few keys on his computer. "Soon
enough. I want to make a duplicate of it first, just to be
safe."

I nodded as I stood up, wincing as my head started to spin,
and moved over to his side of the desk, squeezing my way
behind his chair. It was a tight fit; my tail was pressed up
against the wall as I looked over his shoulder.

Oria took up a similar position over his other shoulder,
leaning forward, watching as he worked.

Baxter didn't seemed to mind, or if he did he didn't show
it. He just went about his work as the disk was copied to
the second one.

"Now," he said once the copy finished. "Let's see what they
have to say," and with that he started playing the disk. I
noted it was the copy, not the original.

An image appeared up on the screen, of a feline, or at least
someone that used to look like one. It was hard to tell, as
most of the left side of his face was covered in scar
tissue. It ran over his eye, which was milky under the
scarred skin, and down over most of his muzzle. His ear was
gone as well, leaving an exposed batch of twisted skin. The
other side of his face was as normal as one would expect,
his eye was blue, and a smile was on his muzzle.

"By now you have seen what we can do," he said in a raspy
voice, only speaking out of one side of his muzzle. "We have
killed your men, and now you know we can do so at any time.
If you do not meet our demands, more of you will be killed.
You have until midnight to comply."

With that said, the image snapped off, leaving a black
screen behind.

"Who the hell was that?" I asked, trying to blink away the
afterimage of his face.

"Wrede," Baxter answered, "He's the leader of Fractal."

I frowned, remembering the name. Officially he had been
killed in an explosion when Fractal had been shut down.
"Apparently he's not as dead as everyone thought," I
commented.

The detective nodded, his fingers flying over the keyboard
of his computer, searching over the disk, apparently looking
for the demands that had been mentioned.

"Apparently his gas bomb was meant to killed a lot more
people than the ME and his nurse," I commented.

"If you hadn't been there, it would have," he replied as he
worked. "Someone would have found them dead on the floor,
not knowing what had happened. They would have opened the
door, and let the gas out into the building. I don't know
how many people would have died, but it would have been
nasty."

"Which was exactly what Wrede had in mind," Oria commented.

"Right," he replied, and smiled, "I think I found their
demands," he said and opened a file on his computer. It was
about a page of text that looked more like scribbling to me
than words.

"What are they asking for?" I asked, rubbing the edge of my
eyes. There was still a touch of blurring at the periphery
of my vision, but it was nearly gone at that point.

Baxter glanced at me, "Can't you read?" he asked in
disbelief.

I nodded. "Oh, yes, and I do quite a lot of it too; but I
can't read that," I said, pointing at the screen.

He sighed, and shook his head. "You really are aliens,
aren't you?"

"Yes, we are," I replied. "Now, what are they asking for?"

He frowned, and shook his head. "Money, lots of it, and the
release of all Fractal members currently in prison."

"I imagine that's something you wouldn't go about
arranging."

"Right and, I doubt it could be done in time, even if we
were willing to do it," he replied. "I suspect they know
that."

"So, what do we do now?" Oria asked.

"I make another copy of this, and give it to my commander.
I'll send the original down to the evidence lab, maybe they
can pull something out of it."

"And then?"

"Then I keep looking into Spider, to see if there is
anything we can use to track these guys down," he replied.

I nodded, "Alright, you do that. Oria and I will wait here
for you."

He sighed, putting another blank disk inside his machine.
"Out of curiosity, why should I bother with you two? You
are, by your own admission, aliens. Why do you even care?"

I shrugged. "Because it's the right thing to do, really," I
said in reply. "I don't like seeing this kind of thing
happen, anywhere, to anyone. When I run into it, I try to
help out, it's kind of in my nature."

The detective nodded, motioning for us to move out from
behind his chair. "Well, I'm glad you were here; things
would have been a lot worse otherwise. I didn't know you
Zaxie could disguise yourselves to look like us."

I let out a soft laugh as I walked around the desk. "Whoever
the Zaxie are, we're not them. We're a different kind of
travelers. We're actually here to pick up something someone
else hid here a while ago."

"I see," he said, rising to his feet, both the original disk
and the copy in his paw. "You two wait here, I'll be back
soon."

"Right," I replied, settling back down in the chair. Oria
followed suit, sitting next to me. She placed her paw on my
leg as Baxter left the office.

"We may not be able to fix this before we have to go back
home," she said, sounding a bit worried.

I nodded. "I know, but we can help as much as we can. Wrede
is probably close by. If we can deal with him, it should be
a good start for us."

She reached over and hugged me tightly, and nuzzled my
cheek.

I wrapped my arms around her, and held her close to me.

* * *

The clock ticked slowly over two more hours, giving my
headache time to settle down to a dull roar, even if the
rest of my body still hurt every time I tried to move it. At
least it wasn't as bad as before.

I was passing the time, doodling on a notepad. Oria was
still sitting in her chair, her head resting up against my
shoulder, and purring softly as she slept.

She didn't even wake up when Baxter came into the room,
looking haggard and worn. His face was drawn out, and his
eyes sunk in.

"I'm sorry it took so long," the bear said as he took his
seat. "My commander wanted to go over everything on the disk
first."

"Understandable," I replied, closing the notepad. "Have your
forensic people come up with anything from the original
disk?"

He shook his large head. "Nothing yet, but they are rushing
on it. We only have hours left till the deadline."

I nodded, tickling the back of Oria's ear with the tip of a
claw, slowly bringing her around. After a few moments, her
eyes fluttered open, and she suppressed a yawn. "Oh, I'm
sorry about that," she said, forcing herself to sit up.

I chuckled. "It's alright, Love, you needed it."

She smiled, and rubbed her eyes. "So do you, but you don't
seem to be taking any."

I gave her a kiss on the nose, and stood up. "I have other
things to worry about right now," I told her as I walked
around the desk to stand next to Baxter. "So, on to looking
into Spider. What do you have that would be useful?"

"Only his last known place of residence," he replied,
hitting a few keys. "He hasn't officially lived there since
he jumped bail, and neither has anyone else. There have been
a few complaints about criminal activity filed against the
address, but nothing that makes it look interesting."

I nodded, "I assume you checked there first when he went
underground. Maybe he's moved back in since?"

"It's possible, and something that should be checked out.
I'll send a pair of officers out to give it a looking over.
Nothing too involved."

A frown crossed over my face, and I shook my head. "If he's
been living there again, your officers might be expected.
Someone could be waiting there to kill them."

"I thought about that," he replied. "They are not going to
go inside. They are just going to drive by, and see if
anyone is living there. Nothing major, nothing that will put
them at risk."

"Good," I said leaning on the edge of his desk. "No need to
go rushing in headlong; they might even be expecting that.
Remember, they think they've killed a few dozen cops, they
may not be expecting you to act rational."

He nodded, "My commander mentioned as much to me." He
started typing as he spoke, bringing up new information.

"I assume you have already staked out wherever he wants you
to drop off the cash?"

He nodded again. "Of course. We're trying to be subtle about
it, but there's not much there. It's in a trash can in the
park across the street. It's hard to sneak up on, so we
should have a clear view of whoever is going to pick up the
money."

"I wouldn't count on it," I muttered.

"I'm not," he replied, with a toothy smile. Then he picked
up his phone, and had a short conversation with someone on
the other end, giving out what I assumed was Spider's
address.

When the conversation was done, he returned to his computer,
leaning forward as he looked over the data that came up.
"Interesting," he said, half to himself.

I leaned over his shoulder. "What did you find?"

He glanced back at me, "I've been running the various
chemicals that would be used to make that gas. They are all
pretty common, but the amounts needed do stand out."

"And?" I prompted.

He touched the screen. "Well, there are a few places that
ordered most of the items, some of them pretty big orders."
He smiled, "We'll send a few people out to interview at the
various locations. Most are the kind of place you would
expect to order them, so it's not that suspicious."

I nodded, glancing over at Oria, she was starting to drift
back to sleep. "Hey, Hon, if you're up to it, maybe you
should get us some of whatever passes for tea on this world?
Or failing that, coffee?"

She perked up, rubbing her eyes, and nodded. "All right,
Fox, I'll see what I can find," she said as she stood up.

I smiled, and said, "thanks, Love." I hoped she didn't think
I was trying to get rid of her, or to shuffle her off to
keep her out of the way. At the moment, half awake, she
wasn't going to be at her best, and the walk would help her
to clear her head.

"Oh, hell," Baxter said, a few minutes later.

"What is it?" I asked, glancing back at him.

He already had his phone in his paw, and was dialing
quickly. "One of the matches I got is Spider's address; the
last delivery was just a week ago."

I frowned, and watched as he made the call, ordering back
whoever he had send out just a few minutes before.

"Sounds pretty dumb of them," I commented as he put the
phone back in its cradle. "To dumb, if you ask me."

"I agree," he replied. "It's too obvious... it feels like
we're suppose to go there," he commented with a frown.

"A trap?" I asked.

He nodded, "That's what I suspect. Wrede doesn't like cops,
and used to go out of his way to kill them. He's probably
doing the same thing now. We'll hold off until we can get a
good team together before we even try to get inside."

I smiled. He was making the right decision in my opinion.

There was a quick knock at the office door, and a young male
wolf stuck his head inside. "Detective Baxter?" He asked,
stepping in to the room.

"Yes?" The bear said, glancing at him.

The wolf pulled out a disk, and held it out in front of
himself as he stepped over to the desk. "This is the
information we've gotten off the video you sent us. You
wanted it as soon as we had something."

Baxter nodded, leaning forward and taking the disk. "Thanks,
and send me anything else you find."

The wolf nodded, and left the office, humming a tune as he
closed the door. A second later it opened again, and this
time my lovely wife walked in.

She was holding a pair of cups and a smile on her muzzle.
"I'm sorry, Baxter, I didn't know what to get you."

He smiled, "It's OK, Oriana, I don't drink coffee at this
time of night." As he spoke, he put the disk into his
computer.

I walked around the desk towards my wife, wincing slightly
as I strained my hurt knee. I took my drink from her, and
sipped at it, then smiled slightly. "Hey, this is pretty
good," I said.

She smiled, and gave a little purr, "I stepped outside
instead of going to the cafeteria. There was a better chance
of getting something good."

I chucked, and nodded. "A good choice on your part, Love."

"I think I got something," Baxter said.

"Oh?" I asked, brushing my fingers down the side of Oria's
face before turning away, and walking back to his desk.

He nodded, "We have three possible areas for where the video
was filmed. Number one on the list contains Spider's old
home."

I chuckled, "Imagine that. That place is looking worse by
the second." I rubbed my forehead with my free hand;
surprisingly, the coffee was helping with my headache.

"Right," he replied, working at his computer. "The
probability of that location is too high to be an accident.
The second one is interesting, but doesn't add up with
everything else I have. The last area has some potential,
but it covers five miles.

"Lots of doors to knock on," Oria commented, sipping at her
coffee.

"Let's not go pounding the pavement just yet. I'm cross-
checking the area with the companies that ordered the
chemicals and," he taped a few keys and smiled, "we have one
match. They took orders for most of the chemicals, over the
last six months."

"Really?" I asked, leaning closer to his screen. It was out
of habit more then anything. "How strong a lead is this?"

"Pretty low," he said, "but the two data points match, and
if you discount Spider's home, it's all we got."

I smiled, and glanced at Oria. "So, when are we leaving?"

He looked up, I could see him start to say something,
probably to the effect that we weren't going along with him,
but he held it back, and then smiled after a moment. "As
soon as I can get a patrol car for backup. We're not going
out there by ourselves."

I nodded, "Good. Perhaps I could get my weapons back?" I
suggested with my best winning smile.

He shook his head, standing up. "Sorry, Fox, but they are
staying put in evidence until you're tried. Then they will
be destroyed."

I sighed, and shook my head. It wasn't an attitude I could
understand, but I would accept it for the moment. Still, it
cut at me to be unarmed, more so if we were going into
someplace dangerous.

"Come on," he said, walking out of the office.

Oria shrugged, and gently patted the side of her hip. "Don't
worry love, I'm still prepared," she whispered.

"Good," I replied, then took her paw in mine and followed
Baxter out of the small room. "We may need it."

* * *

I was half lying in the back seat of Baxter's car, turned as
far as I could with the seat belt on. Stretching out my legs
helped relieve some of the pain in them. Oria was in the
front seat, looking fully awake now, and also a little bit
worried.

Baxter, of course, was behind the wheel, driving with some
intensity through the evening traffic, heading towards an
industrial area of the town. A patrol car followed behind
us, in a strange blue and yellow color scheme, with two cops
inside of it.

None of us knew what to expect when we got to our
destination, but I think everyone was worried. Baxter has
his fingers tightly clenched around the wheel, muttering to
himself about the traffic.

We were going to a location just shy of twenty miles from
the police plaza, significantly further away from the item
of our quest than I had planned to get.

As a whole, it wasn't a major diversion. We couldn't get
into the clock tower just now, but I suspected I would be
able to talk Baxter into it when things were wrapped up.

"We'll be there in a couple minutes," Baxter said, glancing
at me in his rearview mirror.

"Good," I replied, resting my paw on my hip. Digging the
fingers gently into the fabric of my pants, I wished I had
some kind of weapon.

It was futile at the moment, so I took a deep breath, and
leaned forward against my seat belt. Reaching out, I touched
Oria's shoulder.

She turned back, and gave me a small smile. She probably
could tell how I was feeling, as she reached up and placed
her paw on mine.

Out of the corner of my eye, I caught Baxter smiling just a
little bit. It only lasted a moment, before it was replaced
with a serious look, his eyes focused on the road.

"Is there some kind of taboo against public displays of
affection?" I asked him.

He blinked, and glanced back at us. "Well, a little, but
it's more the fact you two are different species. That's
generally frowned upon around here."

Oria chuckled softly, and I smiled. We really weren't
different species, not anymore. At least depending on which
way one looked at it. I was just an animal, a very smart
one, that could shape-shift, but still an animal.

Another minute passed, before Baxter pulled the car to a
stop outside of a small glass-fronted building. It looked
very professional, but not very busy. The small parking lot
in front was nearly empty.

He shut off the engine, and slid out of the car. Oria and I
followed just behind him. The pavement was cold on my bare
feet, not freezing cold, but enough to be annoying. I
adjusted my balance a bit, shifting back and forth on my
toes. Oria was perfectly comfortable with it, but it was
normal for her.

The patrol car had pulled into the slot next to ours, and
the two officers had left their car.

Baxter went over to them, and they talked for a few moments.
One leaned against the side of the car, looking both
serious, and slightly bored as the second officer followed
Baxter as he came over to us.

"Shall we go and knock on the door?" Oria asked.

He nodded, and started towards the front door. The officer,
a middle-aged feline, followed at the detective's side. Oria
and I followed up just behind.

We entered into the lobby of the building. It was pretty
plain, two stories tall, with hanging lights, and a few
scattered chairs. On the far side from us, behind a low
desk, was a bored-looking secretary, and a pair of locked
glass doors.

Baxter talked to her for a few moments quickly getting us
buzzed through the door.

A male wolf was waiting for us on the other side. He smiled
pleasantly, and escorted us through the offices, telling us
about the business on our way. It looked like any other
company to me, but the place was pretty empty, lots of desks
sitting around unused.

The desks had clutter on them, and at first glance they
looked perfectly normal, but it was just too neat. Like
someone tried very hard to make it look like a mess. The
whole place looked... artificial, like a set instead of an
office.

My lovely wife seemed to have noticed it herself, her eyes
flicking around the empty rooms as we walked. Her paw held
lightly against her hip, a natural looking position, but
ready to grab her needler at a moment's notice.  A small
frown slowly crept over her muzzle, her tail sweeping behind
her long skirt as we walked, low to the ground, like she was
ready to pounce.

Our guide hustled us into a large, open lab. A few benches
lined the walls, with various bits of equipment resting on
them. A few of them we're on, apparently doing something
very important, that wasn't obvious to the naked eye.

And standing at the end of the room, like a priest at the
alter, a smile pulled over his disfigured face, was Wrede.

I barely had time to register that fact before a shot rang
out. I reflexively jumped to the side, finding that our
escort was holding the offending weapon, which was now
trained on Baxter.

The officer who had come in with us, was slowly crumpling to
the floor, blood blooming out from a wound in his chest.

I ran over to him, catching him as he fell, which sent
streaks of pain up my arms, and gently lowered him to the
ground. I turned my attention to the wound, frowning. It was
in the side of his chest, and was bleeding thick, dark
blood.

"You must be the detective working on my little case," Wrede
said. "I must say I'm surprised to see you here, I fully
expected you to run into my little trap."

"Sorry, but your score for killing cops has been at zero all
day," Baxter replied. From the corner of my eye, I could see
he had his paw on his gun, but hadn't pulled it out of the
holster. Another person had entered the room, also with a
gun, and also pointed at the bear.

I reached over the officer, pulling off his shirt, and
balling it up. I adjusted myself over him pressing it
against the wound. It also blocked Wrede and his men from
seeing me as I slipped the officer's gun into my paw.

"Well, I can fix that now," Wrede snarled. "Kill them all."

   To Be Continued...

-----

This story is copyright 2003 by Fox Cutter. Hardcopy
reprints limited to one per person, all other rights
reserved. This story may not be distributed for a fee except
by permission of the author, and this copyright notice may
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