Chapter 1

"Oh my god!"

Bullets fired from the gun at such a high speed. Mr. Ligma, a monkey, did not even have time to reflect on his life. His body fell face first onto the hard wood floor in his living room, right next to the leather couch. The impact of the fall caused a photo of him and his family to fall off a table and shatter. His lifeless body laid in a pool of blood.

Mr. Ligma was just getting ready to leave the house before he was murdered. He was a tax collector, and a very good one too. His co-workers noticed he was not on time, and he was always on time. His co-worker Tammy, a sheep, picked up her cell and called him. No answer.

"Where is Mr. Ligma? He always arrives to work on time, he is now an hour late!" The boss screamed.

Just then, a lady monkey came running through the doors of the office, causing a doorknob to fall off. "Please someone, my husband!" She screamed.

A bunny sitting at one of the office desks perked her ears up in alert. She hopped up and approached the lady. "What is wrong with your husband?"

The lady shook. "My husband, I just woke up, he's been shot! And our phones are missing so I cannot call the police!"

The bunny backed up in horror. Shot? Who was shot? It was not Mr. Ligma was it?

"What is your husband's name miss?"

"Mr. James Ligma." The lady started crying. "He works here, and this was the closest and safest public building I could find."

The rest of the workers heard all of this and stared at each other. Mr. Ligma? He was always so nice to everyone and very caring of others. No one could come up with a valid reason why someone would want this man dead. But despite the confusion, the bunny assured everything was going to be okay and that she was going to call the police.

Meanwhile at the office…

Officer Hopps and Officer Wilde were getting ready for a busy day stopping crime. Zootopia was full of crime and suspicious behavior, and someone had to take control. The two officers sat in the meeting room, ready to receive today's assignments. As soon as they took their seats, the chief walked into the room with a clipboard and a serious expression on his face.

"Okay so here are today's assignments everyone…Officer Jake and Officer Brown, you guys are on the mission of the missing horse in the tundra…"

The chief went on assigning assignments to everyone in the room. Just before he got to Nick and Judy's name, his phone rang.

"Yes this is the chief…" He answered. "…oh…okay…"

Officer Hopps looked at Nick with a worried expression. "Do you think everything is okay?"

The chief eventually hung up the phone and gave Judy and Nick a serious expression. "You two are on your first murder mission today."

Judy and Nick looked at each other with shocked expressions. "…murder mission?" They asked in unison.

The chief lowered his head. "A poor monkey was murdered out in his house today. We need someone on the case and you two are the perfect ones for the job."

Judy certainly did not want to argue with that, but she was not all that comfortable with investigations yet. She did almost fail a missing person case, so how was she going to be able to tackle a murder case? She knew deep down she should not be afraid though, Nick was going to be her partner and he would always keep her safe. Judy was not really afraid of her safety, she was afraid of the fact that someone had DIED and she was going to have to find out why. She turned to Nick and half smiled.

"Well, on the bright side we get to work together, right Nick?"

Nick was just as scared as she was, but he did not show it. "Yeah, I guess so."

The chief approached Judy and handed her a slip of paper he wrote stuff down on. "Call us if you need some backup. I'm counting on you, Hopps."

Judy folded the slip of paper and slipped it into her pocket. "We should get started now, Nick."

"Agreed." Nick followed Judy out to the door and into the patrol car. Judy started the car and they were off to investigate the crime.

At the crime scene…

Judy and Nick arrived shortly after the 911 team showed up. A police officer came approaching Judy and Nick with a scared expression.

"Officer Hopps, Officer Wilde, I'm so glad you two are here!" The officer shook their hands. "The victim is still in there, poor thing had no chance for fighting."

The police officer lead Judy and Nick to wear Mr. Ligma remained. They passed through a tiny kitchen and into the living room. There lied Mr. Ligma in a pool of blood. Judy slowly approached the body with extreme caution, and with her gloved hand she gently touched his forehead and rolled his head over so he would be facing her. There she saw an exit wound…but no entry room.

Judy placed her hands on her hips. "Well Nick, we know he has been shot…but where is that entry wound?" Judy did not want to tamper with evidence, so she decided not to mess with the remains any longer.

Nick walked around the room finding any evidence he could find. He found some shell casings, a pen, a knife and a stereo remote covered in hair and blood. He placed all these evidences in their own separate bags and placed them in an even bigger bag.

Judy also looked for evidence, but was mainly taking notes on her surroundings. To her understanding, there were no witnesses except for the wife, but right now she was in too much emotional distress to talk to the investigators. Judy and Nick knew this was going to be a hard case, but they knew it needs to be cracked somehow…