FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

The trip seemed to take a long time, even for Sunday traffic. I looked out the window as an endless procession of flat suburban estates went past, each more nondescript than the last. It made me nostalgic seeing this landscape so emblematic of the Great Australian Dream. I knew enough to know that many of these estates contained more nightmares than dreams.

I grew up in Donvale originally, which back in my day was solidly working class and full of Greek and Italian and Yugoslavian migrants who came over after the war to find a better life. I remembered moments of simple belonging which never came in my own family. Like the old Greek tigress two doors down who would feed me dolmades and spanakopita and tell me in decidedly broken English about her time on the run with ELLAS. Or the kitchens, always outside in a shed, where they would make huge lots of preserves or sauces or cook for extended families on Orthodox Easter and a lost anglo stag could hang in the background and watch and eat until his tummy burst for once.

"Christos anesti..." I muttered the words, sitting in the back seat of the police patrol car, as we sped down the Eastern Freeway.

"Alithos anesti."

It surprised the hell out of me when my bull made the correct response, and then he turned and gave me a grin.

"Yeah, been there done that. I was stationed near here in Nunawading and grew up in Balwyn. Been to plenty a Greek Orthodox Easter. Didn't know you did too Nige."

"Donvale, we probably ran into each other at Doncaster Shoppingtown as teenagers."

"Fuck, I remember the cake shop..."

I smiled finally. Hmmmm cake...

"Ferguson Plarre. My favourites were the ones filled with crème with bright green icing that looked like frogs."

"Fuck, I preferred the snot blocks..."

"Ahem! If you two elderly gentlemen could interrupt your stagger down memory lane for a moment with your zimmer frames, can you tell me where the fuck we are going?"

The rabbit was driving, and she had been noticeably quiet until now. Her sudden question caught us both off guard, and my bull blinked a few times not sure what to make of it. I saw the rabbit's broad smile in the rear vision mirror, and she saw me looking and gave me a wink.

"Constable, I have had words to you in the past about respect for your superiors..."

"Sure, I will show them exactly as much as you do Sarge. I learn fast as you know..."

The bull was smiling now too, and I relaxed. Clearly this was part of their dynamic, a sort of bull and rabbit version of Morse and Lewis. I made a mental note to ask about the bunny some time.

"Constable Czuba, we are going to Ringwood station. I need to talk to an old colleague."

That seemed to satisfy the bunny, and she grunted and resumed eating up the miles at a steady pace. I did see her look pointedly at some buttons though, and caught a mournful look from Mike.

"Problem?"

The rabbit smiled at me again, with the sort of look you give a doddering uncle who has fallen asleep in the punch.

"Nah, just wanted to use the blues and twos. Siren and lights for you lesser civilian types. Would make this go a heck of a lot faster..."

"And you know the sort of trouble that gets us in Constable."

"Oh yes Sarge, but I know you like trouble."

Mike scowled at that one, and subsided into a huff reading the missing persons file. I decided to do some digging of my own.

"How did you find him?"

"Huh?"

"How did you find the file...on the colt?"

She managed a bigger smile now, and this was a genuine smile of pleasure. I could tell, her ears went upright and her whiskers twitched. It was so incongruously cute for an officer of the law I had to stifle a chuckle lest I piss her off.

"Ahhh that was down to Peg...I mean Peggy, the ferret. She is only an unsworn member, a civilian, but she has been working there a long time. When I was sent to work in missing persons I came to know her better, and soon I came to rely on her."

"Interesting combination...a ferret and a rabbit I mean..."

I stammered to a halt, seeing the ears swivel and the whiskers stop their twitching and instead poke straight out. I caught a look from Mike, and it was the sort of look you give someone dancing the Macarena naked in a minefield.

"You got something against that? Worried she might sink her teeth into me at a moment's notice?"

"No...no...no...um...no..."

"Well, I would probably enjoy it."

I dropped into a sound cavity formed by that response, waiting for my head to stop spinning. Instead I heard the gentle tinkle of rabbit laughter.

"Poor stag. You gay guys are so fucking predictable. We are an item, Sir. You know, gay but no cock. Well, unless it's strap on time, in which case...oh dear, have I made your sensitive gay soul recoil in horror?"

I was caught between a laugh and a yelp and it came out as a coughing fit. Mike rumbled protectively from the front seat.

"Constable..."

"Sooooory Sarge. You know how much lesbian invisibility shits my fluffy tail though. Sorry Sir...but yes, Peg and I are an item, and no she has no immediate plans to make me into dinner."

"I'm sorry Kelly, I..."

"It's ok. People underestimate her, is the problem too. She can be hard to get used to, she is an Aspie, and it makes her difficult for some. But she is also loving, kind, and smart. She has an eidetic memory for faces, which is why she is so good in missing persons. She can match a face to a picture in ways that the computers struggle to compare with, and she got your colt's number in about five minutes flat."

I nodded, understanding how lucky we had been, and also some of the import of those words.

"Kelly, I guess that's the problem for me. If she matched his arrest mugshot to the file..."

"Well, it's happened before that people have had strong resemblances to relatives. He could be a son of the missing colt...in which case, he may know what happened..."

I looked out the window as we came off the freeway and frowned. Perhaps; but the knot of uncertainty still lingered.

We pulled up to the station and got out. I felt like an extra in a cop show, with the two in their uniforms with all the hardware. Perhaps I could be detective Stag, no nonsense dispenser of justice...

"Nigel, one rule. Eyes and ears open, muzzle and bum shut. Capisce?"

"Capisco."

"Not bad...now, onward."

I filed into the station behind them, and was ignored by the desk officer while my bull did the honours. We were shuffled into an interview room, and waited a long time before a sudden knock on the door heralded the arrival of another uniformed officer from the local station.

Eyeing him up, I found my ears suddenly upright with tension. Something was wrong, and it took me a second to realise what it was. My nose got in on the act too, flaring wide to catch the barest hint of scent. He hid it well with mouthwash, but it was still there. The stench of booze.

I had to do everything in my power then to stop the instinct to flee. My past contained more than enough examples of drunks making my life hell, not least from my dad. I had never become used to it, and I still carried a huge bias against people who couldn't control it. I had to physically clamp down on the instinct to yell at him.

He was a rather well-proportioned Doberman, of perhaps mid-fifties or more. It was hard to tell, as he clearly had not had an easy time of it. His eyes were a little too bloodshot, his belly a little too round, and his walk a little too laboured. He bore the rank insignia and badge of a senior sergeant, but the manner of a defeated man. And his eyes were wary as well as bloodshot.

"Mike! Well it's been a while...how the devil are you mate?"

I could see my bull was friendly but wary. I settled in to watch, and learn. This one had issues all right.

"Great to see you Brian. Yeah been a while, I have to catch you and Sally again soon..."

The Doberman's face fell like a fallen soufflé and reddened even further. I coughed to cover up the awkward silence as Mike finally realised what had happened.

"Err...another time maybe...so what can I help you with?"

"Andrew McNaughton."

The silence was deafening. I watched the clock on the wall tick past thirty seconds, and then the progress of a large droplet of sweat on the side of the Dobie's head. He remained through it all, staring into the middle distance.

"Ahhh...have to help me Mike..."

"A missing person case, 1982. Ringwood station."

"Still have to help me Mike..."

"You were the officer who took the statement from the informant. A Mrs Helen McNaughton, the colt's mother?"

He seemed to shudder a little, then broke into a smile and leaned back in his chair.

"That's a long time ago Mike, you might have to prod my memory..."

"A colt, sixteen, student at the highschool, went missing on...let me see...June 18..."

I swallowed hard and almost choked. It was the date I found him in my skip, well, Ryan's skip.

"...had been absent from home for a week it seems, mother had been receiving phonecalls from the colt daily though, and then on the 18ththey stopped. She called it in on the 20th, no sign since, case closed..."

"Ahhh, maybe Mike, sort of familiar..."

"Seems a rather...hopeless case from the file. I remember you teaching me as a connie, you were the best Brian. So if there was something to find, you would find it. What happened?"

He managed to look somewhere around anger and snorted.

"Nothing to know. He left home, reasons unknown, called his mum, reasons unknown, and then vanished. We checked his known haunts, ran down everyone who knew him, nobody knew what happened or heard a thing. We stopped looking as was standard procedure and handed it over to misper for follow up."

"Anything strike you as odd?"

"The teacher...can't remember the name, seemed to know something but wouldn't say. Other than that no."

"Miss..." Mike was hunting through the file.

"Naylor." It came to me suddenly, a fragment of memory. I frowned, as did Mike. The Dobie suddenly looked at me, and he was startled.

"Yes. How did you know...?"

"I...um..."

"Yeah, Miss Naylor, here in the file. English teacher. An ewe...any guesses?"

"She knew some things about him she didn't want to tell, I thought maybe he was into drugs, maybe pot, and she didn't want to get him in trouble. She wouldn't budge."

"Hmmm...what about the parents?"

"Solid citizen types. Clueless, as most are. Look, whats this about Mike?"

The Dobie was wary now, and looking at all of us with a keen eye under the bloodshot. I felt it, a stream of anger now barely in check, and looked at the rabbit. She seemed to feel it too, judging by her ears.

"Nothing Brian, just routine. We had a lead that may have been related, from a case at Prahran. Just following up..."

"Seriously Mike, cut the crap. You are so far out of your patch it isn't funny, and if there is something here you should be handing it over to the cold case squad or local CID. So why are you on it?"

"Brian, just routine really..."

"Really? I don't buy it Mike. Now, if you will excuse me, I need to see the head of the gangs taskforce about my budget."

The interview was suddenly over it seemed, and there was no handshake on the way out. I looked at the bull and bunny, who seemed to shrug at each other, and we shuffled out again and headed for the car.

We headed into the traffic without a word, and I found I couldn't keep it up.

"Mike..."

"Huh? What Nige..."

"Mike, about your friend..."

"He isn't usually that much of a fuckwit but he must be having a bad day."

"Mike, he is an alcoholic. I could smell the gin a mile off..."

My bull seemed about to get angry with me now, but the rabbit stopped him in his tracks.

"Sarge, he's right."

The bull stared out the windscreen, but his features hardened into a frown.

"Drive Constable..."

We came to an undistinguished crossroad in an undistinguished part of Ringwood. On the corner, a line of shops sprouted in ugly brown brick, with a copy centre on the very corner. I realised this was where the colt said he lived.

We looked it over, eyeing up the scene, while Mike read his file with a heavy expression before closing it with a sigh.

"Right...canvass?"

I looked lost, and the rabbit took pity.

"Basic investigation. Some of these houses may be inhabited by people there at the time, or who remembered the family...we can at least find out. Then hunt down the family, the teachers, friends...but it starts here."

"Why did our friend leave home..."

"Because he got busted sucking someone off in a public toilet..."

"That's what your colt mate said happened to him Nigel. I want to find out what happened to the real Andrew McNaughton."

I was about to ask more questions when I heard the radio on Mike's belt spark into angry life.

"Prahran Seven-Two come in."

"Seven two over."

"Free to speak?"

"Negative wait one."

He headed into the car, and we watched him having a conversation with his muzzle set in a flat line like a post box.

"Kelly, what's going on?"

"Beats me Sir, way above my pay grade, but something is wrong. You were right about that Dobie, not uncommon amongst coppers I'm afraid, and he is hanging on by a thread. But something is definitely up..."

Mike rejoined us then, bearing a look like thunder.

"We are heading back to the station."

"What?" the rabbit and I made a nice chorus, but not a happy one.

"Brian went to his Inspector. We are warned off with extreme prejudice. Back to Sodom and Gomorrah for us Constable."

The silence on the way back was as heavy as the late afternoon winter weather, which proceeded to underline the point by raining all over us just as we got to Punt Road.

I was dropped off at home, still fuming. The townhouse was empty and cold, and I found I could not settle. Instead I went for a walk, trying to burn off the anger with activity. My hooves flew over the streets, and I found myself in Alma Park before I knew it.

A familiar muzzle was lying on a bench, staring at the sky as darkness fell. He seemed unconcerned about the fact he was drenched, his mane matted against the woodwork. He just looked up at the stars coming out with his hands behind his head. I trotted over to him with frustration building in my heart.

"Who the fuck are you?"

He swivelled and sat up, looking at me blinking away tears. I melted like a snow cone.

"Nige..."

"Who the fuck are you?"

"You know who I am Nigel."

I felt the frustration giving way to something else. My body shivered in time to his, my antlers rattling as much as my teeth.

"What the fuck...what the fuck are you doing horse?"

"Leaving you alone mate."

I reached out, gripping his shoulder, and pulled him to me though he towered over me easily and I looked up at his eyes still glistening with tears and screamed.

"What the fuck is your game!?"

"Just trying to do what I came to do and fucking that up too. All I do is fuck up mate. It's all I do..."

I pulled him against me and kissed him on the muzzle. His pain and anguish then made me break, all I could do was try to staunch the wounds somehow.

"Come home."

He followed me back, still dripping with rainwater, and clopped up the stairs leaving wet hoofprints on the wood.

I got him into the shower, shedding damp clothes like autumn leaves, and let the hot water pouring over him revive his body if not his spirits. Questions could come, I felt, but for now he needed something more like this. Something more like me.

When I went to soap his mane he stopped me with a hand on my wrist. Instead, he pulled me to the shower wall and gave me a soaping all over, with extra attention on my tail. Then I felt his soapy fingers find my pucker and slide inside with ease.

"Old beefy got you nice and wide I see..."

"Ahhh!"

He sawed his fingers into me rougher than was comfortable, but just perfect for what I needed. I felt him pull on my hips, until I had my rump poking up and out invitingly, almost wantonly.

The touch of his flare on my hole brought me back to reality a little. Soap or no, I wasn't really ready, and there was a small matter...

"Condom!"

He gave a whinny and a snort and pressed against my hole, and I was about to yell when he let his cock slide up my spine, rubbing his flare on my coat as he bucked his hips. Biting my lip in frustrated need, I was not waiting too long for some attention at least. He reached round to grip my cock and rubbed while his other hand returned its soapy digits to my tunnel.

"Fucking condoms...I'll give you fucking condoms..."

He drew a wild orgasm from me as the water poured over us both, the onslaught of climax almost painful. He left his fingers inside me, teasing my prostate, and rubbed his palm over my aching tip. I was still hard, and still needy.

"Now...my turn..."

Shutting off the water violently, he pulled me to the bedroom. I was dripping, barely able to stand, and a little disoriented, but I sobered up fast as I watched him lay back on the bed, still soaking wet, and lift his knees to his chest.

"Come on stag. Please, we don't have too long."

I found my condoms and lube, still chuckling at that.

"What, going to run off again?"

"Just fucking do it mate. My ass needs this."

Kneeling before him, I admired the majesty of his body. My hands traced every inch of his flesh, the long lean lines of muscle and sinew and bone, and the damp coat soft and smooth under my touch.

"Someone is going to be very lucky to have you if you let them colt."

"Whatever....just do it."

My tip found his pucker, the ridge of muscle exquisite to touch. I took my time, edging into him, watching the look on his face as he took me. I knew I was no match to his size, but I wanted him to feel it anyway.

When I was buried to the hilt I rocked gently back and forward with my hands on his length. He watched me the whole time, his expression guarded until close to the end. Eventually he lay his head back and closed his eyes, with a little pink colt tongue extended to sample the night. His sighs became moans became cries and he clamped his ass down so tight as he came, the liquid evidence of his pleasure everywhere to see as he painted his chest with it. I leaned forward to lick it off and kept on fucking and jacking him and he grinned back like a maniac.

"Fine...nice stag...good stag..."

Then I bit his nipple.

"Hey! Right..."

I was suddenly and rather violently pushed off and thrown on my belly. A grinning colt muzzle looked down with malicious intent.

"Condoms?"

"On the bedside table..."

He let me lie there while he covered up, then made me watch his slow deliberate lubrication, his fingers seeming to delight in the touch of his own flesh even covered in latex.

"Waiting here..."

"Shhh....such a needy doe..."

"Still waiting....ahhhhhhhhhhhhh..."

Lying over me, he entered easy, the flare spreading me wide and the rest following like a beautiful flow of heat, even the medial not enough to cause me pain. He kicked my knees wide, bit down on my shoulder playfully, and pulled back until his flare nuzzled my ring.

"Gonna miss this..."

"Wha..."

My question was lost in a scream as he rammed to the hilt with all the force of a teenage stallion. Then my scream was lost in his muzzle as he pulled mine round into a kiss and fucked me again, no less powerfully. I ached, and I shuddered, and I pushed back to take more as he began to wildly ride my rump with a heat and rage I never knew.

"So tight, and so needy. You will enjoy that big bull, he will treat this ass right..."

"Yeah? Can't I have some horse too...AHHH!"

He slapped my ass and gripped my antlers and pounded into me until it hurt. It felt good too, way too good, my poor hole split wide open, the taut skin of my depths strained to breaking point. He began to thrust faster, then deeper, then I felt his body tense and knew it was close.

"Ohhh...ohhhh...ohhh...OHHHHH!"

A last few thrusts and he lay still buried to the hilt inside me, the heat of his cum still present even through the latex. He lay there while I writhed, then he pulled me into a kneeling position in his arms, resting on his thighs, and he gripped my cock.

"Can't leave you there can we stag."

"No...oh...oh....ohhhhh..."

It was my turn to lose control. His hand felt beautiful on my length, and he bucked his hips just enough to tease my hole with his flare. I came, falling back into his arms, but he wasn't satisfied. One hand twisted a nipple hard enough to draw blood, the other kept on working my cock. I was begging him to stop by the time I shot my third load of the night and lost all feeling in my arms and legs. I toppled onto the bed then, and he followed, holding me in his arms in a wet exhausted pile.

I should not have been able to fall asleep like that but I did, too satisfied and too tired to care. He was still there when I woke, feeling wet clammy and cold, and I headed to the bathroom to dry off and the cupboard to get fresh sheets.

He was awake by the time I returned, reaching for his clothes.

"No. Please. No."

He was crying again, I saw. I went to him and licked the tears from his eyes, feeling him shaking against my chest.

"Please..."

The sofa in the living room folded out into a makeshift bed, and I brought fresh bedclothes down and lay there in his arms talking about my life, about David, about my job which I hated, about the street, about nothing and everything, and even about an old Greek lady who fed me dolmades and spanakopita and made me feel home when nothing made me feel home. He held me all the time, though about dawn he began to shake, and I went to get him something for the headache and pulled him under the bedclothes and we watched the dawn coming through the windows and the birds going about their feathered business in the trees.

I had fallen asleep without realising it, and woke to find the colt still in my arms, and visitors in the lounge. One bull, and one rabbit.

The bull looked very unhappy.

"Mike..."

"Don't. Just...don't."

"Mike..."

The colt woke with a start, and tried to sit up, then stopped half way and stared at the bull.

"What is your game little pony?"

Mike spat it, the venom clear in his voice. I tried to conciliate.

"Mike, please, he doesn't deserve this..."

"How do you know what he deserves Nigel? You know nothing about him at all. But I know he knows too much about stuff he shouldn't, and that makes him a suspect to my mind. What about it pony?"

The colt was remarkably composed, given he was naked in bed with me, and facing my lover who was clearly pissed off and a fair bit broader than him. The rabbit just stood to the side trying not to look.

"Nigel, it's ok. He is right."

"Yes, tell us pony. Who are you?"

"Andy McNaughton, I told you."

"No. You. Are. NOT!"

The bull had strode forward like a colossus and now stood muzzle to muzzle with the colt. I tried to pull them apart, my own tears starting to flow.

"Mike, stop this..."

"Nigel, leave this to me. So pony, what is your game here?"

"Are you going to arrest me officer?"

"Don't think I couldn't . I could make up plenty of charges that would stick."

"I'm sure of it. But are you going to?"

"We have been out to Ringwood. And we are going back today. We are going to speak to everyone associated with the real Andrew McNaughton, and we are going to find out what your angle is colt. And then I am going to personally enjoy watching you go down."

The colt nodded sadly and finished dressing, turning only once to look at me. He hefted his bacpack over his shoulder, and his eyes were wide and full of hurt, and the tears fell freely now.

"Tell Cam...tell Cameron..."

"What? Who?"

The colt shook his head.

"Nothing. Don't bother."

He turned and trotted down the stairs, and I watched him go without a word.

After I showered and dressed, I found the rabbit making toast in my kitchen while the bull stomped around sneering at the furniture. She handed me a plate with vegemite toast and I found myself eating in spite of myself.

"What are we doing, leave aside the colt?"

"We are going back to Ringwood Nigel." The bull rumbled. "Oh, I know we aren't supposed to but I am going anyway, and Kelly agreed to go with me. We aren't official, off the clock. But we are going. Are you coming with us?"

"It's Monday..."

"Call in sick. You are sick, after all, otherwise you wouldn't be fucking that colt."

I saw the hurt and the pain then and chose to ignore it. One damaged soul at a time.

"Fine Mike. Fine. Let's go."

Morning peak hour traffic is a bitch, but at least we were heading in the right direction. I was grateful the traffic wasn't too bad, as the rabbit seemed keen on making things worse for some reason.

"Cute colt you got there Sir."

"Huh."

"Little young maybe, but they can be the best...little lippy too but that's hotter."

"Um...what the fuck constable?"

I was intrigued now, and the rabbit seemed about to giggle.

"Oh, I know what you think...let's just say I dabbled at times. Not love mind you, just a fuck, but that can be good. That one though, I think he would need some handcuffs, maybe a taser to the nutsack to make him pliable and then..."

"Constable!"

Mike seemed scandalised, and she gave a demure smile.

"You have your amusements Sarge, I have mine...besides, I'd let you watch."

We got to Ringwood about 9:30, a little less tense thanks to the rabbit, and the first question was what to do. The bull had his mind made up though.

"The teacher, whatever was there it sounded genuine. Lets try that."

"Highschool?"

"Yeah, drive on Constable."

We arrived in time for morning recess. Watching the students running around made me feel wistful. I had been there once; but never that carefree.

"Sarge, maybe let me handle this one..."

I saw him grunt and nod. The rabbit seemed pleased, and she headed for the office with a jaunty hop. No uniform to help them today, but that would probably help here, and they had their badges when needed.

"So, you and the colt..."

His eyes were still hurt, and I kissed his nose and rested my head on his chest.

"I'm sorry Mike."

"Do you love him?"

"No, but I care about him."

The sigh was long and deep, and troubled. My heart was too, but I couldn't deal with that now. Before I could say much, the door opened and we had a rabbit again.

"Righto Sarge, off we go."

He let her keep it in for a block then exploded.

"Out with it Kelly!"

She giggled.

"He only calls me that when he is stressed or impressed. I wonder which..."

"Fucking hell constable, I am so going to..."

"The much missed Miss Naylor has retired, but she lives nearby. They would not give me her address, but after much prodding agreed to call her on my behalf. She agreed to meet, I have the address."

"Where?"

"Here Sarge..."

We had pulled up outside a neat suburban cottage, with neat rose bushes and neat lawn. And neat garden gnomes. I sighed a little.

"Maybe you had better let me take this one too?"

In the end we all went in, but the rabbit took the lead. We watched, and tried not to hit anything in the house.

It was stuffed to the brim with trinkets, little porcelain and glass figures, doilies, dolls. It looked like someone had taken the entire contents of several teashops in mountain tourist towns and dumped them in the one house. The owner, a mild mannered ewe, looked pleased as she viewed us from over her spectacles.

"Hmmm....do you like my collections Mister...what was it again?"

"Mister Cain, and yes, it is...impressive."

She smiled tightly and stirred her tea. We had been offered and accepted cups of English Breakfast, which had been provided with delicate ceremony along with scones and raspberry jam and crème.

"So Miss Naylor...tell us about Andrew McNaughton."

The rabbit was no nonsense but respectful, like a school mistress would expect. The ewe smiled indulgently and blew on her tea.

"He was a rogue, that is for sure. Most of his teachers despaired. But not me."

"No?" it was Mike, unable to resist. He got a frown for that interruption, and a kick from the rabbit.

"No. I knew what the problem was."

"And?" now Kelly fell for it, but it seemed the ewe was in an indulgent frame of mind with her.

"He was gay, it was as obvious as the sun coming up, but nobody else seemed to know. Well, maybe his best friend, Cameron Benetti."

I swallowed, suddenly feeling warm.

"Cameron?"

"Yes. I felt there was something between them, but could not be sure. Andrew did not open up easily, but he did to me a little. The others sent him to detention, where he worked in the school garden, I instead got him writing."

"Poetry..." I said it softly, hoping to be wrong. The ewe gave a sudden start.

"Yes. However did you know?"

"Nothing...please go on..."

She looked distracted enough to put the tea down, but she went on anyway, but the ewe was looking at me now I saw.

"He was good, very good. A lot of love and emotion in that soul, Mister Cain. It needed a way to come out and that was what I gave him. He wrote for me, and I helped him. I was going to try to tell him I knew about his...well, about his preferences, and it was ok, but he disappeared. On the eleventh of June...a Wednesday I think. He had some sort of argument with Cameron Benetti, and it tore him up terribly. Mister Benetti had come to the school and was furious."

All our ears perked up at that. The bull cleared his throat and seemed to silently ask for approval to speak. It was amusing seeing the big buff bull so deferential.

"Ahh...what about?"

"I don't know dear, but it may have had something to do with Andrew. Mister Benetti was not an easy dog, which I always attributed to his work."

"Which was?"

"Same as yours. He was the officer in charge of the police station here."

We looked at eachother then, unable to say the words, but I could see the bull's nosering twitch. I was about to ask him to go outside when the ewe dropped another bombshell.

"You know, I still have his exercise book with all his poems. I kept it for him, telling myself I would give it to him when he returned. It was superstitious of me, I know, but I always felt he would be ok if I kept it."

She brought the old book out of a camphorwood chest in the hallway, held in a small decorated cardboard box bound with a ribbon. As I reached for it, I looked up and saw the ewe's face. She was crying.

"He isn't coming back, is he..."

I took the box unable to speak, and we left the ewe to her tea and her tears while we sat in the car to regroup.

"Benetti...he was the senior sergeant. Brian...he was Brian's senior officer..."

"Mike, what do we do..."

"Sarge!"

We looked at the rabbit, who was looking at the box with her whiskers mobile.

"Sarge, this book will have his fingerprints. If he has been involved in a case since, it will be in the records, on LEAP. We can search for him."

"Fuck..."

The drive back to the city was fast, it was only a pity that we were in Mike's car and not his police cruiser. I felt this time he might have gone for the "blues and twos" after all. Instead, we made a legal but rapid trip into the carpark and killed the engine.

"Follow me."

We went in another entrance and down a different labyrinth this time. When it ended, we were before a door proclaiming the presence of the A division forensics team, and would we please wait patiently.

My bull didn't do patient, and he barged through the door.

Inside, we found two mice, one female looking down a microscope, one male, wielding a revolver.

"Michael! By my paws and whiskers...do we have a quote my dear?"

The female mouse looked up from her microscope and winked

"'Atque inter silvas Academi quaerere verum."

We looked blankly, as the mice shared a smile. Eventually the male took pity.

"Search for the truth in the groves of academe. Horace, you know. No, of course you don't, the force is remarkably uncouth in these degenerate days as I keep telling the Chief Commissioner..."

"He does you know, but he does it in latin so he doesn't get fired."

The female had come over to her mate, as I saw he was now, and put her arms around him and beamed into his face. The male pouted back.

"Really dear, do you think he would understand me even in English?"

"I know I don't my love, but then in bed I need no language."

"Ahh the language of love is universal my dear, a kiss, a sigh, a lick..."

"Enough!"

My bull had been left behind long ago, and seemed to have reached his limit. Probably the thought of these two fucking pushed him over the edge, though the rabbit seemed to be enjoying the show. She was giggling into her forearm.

"My dear fellow ...when it comes to red wine, good cigars, or sex, there is no such thing as enough!"

"I have work for you...or would you prefer to fuck right here in the lab?"

"Ahhh work..."

The mice were all business now. I did however see the female give her mate a pinch on the rump.

"Tell me about this book."

"Thirty years old, may have prints from several individuals, but we are looking for the one with the most prints."

"Species?"

"Equine..."

"Ahhh horses. So crude. Should be smeared all over it like cum on a picnic blanket..."

"Dear! Manners!"

"Sorry my love...so, what do you want me to do with them?"

"Run a match search, for anything since 1982."

We waited, sipping bad coffee, while the two mice went to work. It didn't seem to take long, and they were back with noses twitching in excitement.

"At least three individuals. We will run them all, but one has the most prints, including a full set of left hand including thumb on the fifth page, and they are big enough and the right shape for an equine."

"Good. How long?"

"Who knows Michael. The computer is a mysterious beast, unlike you. So very unpredictable..."

We sat in a side office looking at police magazines while the mice went back to work. I wasn't expecting anything for a while, so it was a surprise when the male came into the room looking angry.

"You have been toying with me Michael, you naughty bull."

Mike swallowed and managed to look suitably penitent.

"I promise I haven't Gaius. What have you found?"

"The main set of prints. A hit, recent. Very recent. The arresting officer was your good self."

"I don't understand Gaius."

"You arrested a certain Andrew McNaughton, in Prahran, for theft, arrest number 13187623 dash 2014 on Friday. The suspect was printed and processed, and the prints match those I just took from the book you gave me. A 100% match, no possibility of error. I can show you if you like."

We looked at eachother, stunned, and I felt a chill go up my spine. Mike looked like he was about to have a seizure.

"I don't understand."

"Michael, it is fairly straightforward, and I am even speaking English. You arrested someone on Friday, and they were also the person who left their prints all over this book thirty years ago according to you. Presumably that is what you expected otherwise why bring it to me?"

I leaned on my bull, and felt him shaking. I was shaking worse.

"My dear fellow, are you quite well?"

"No Gaius...no..."