Zig Zag is Copyright © Max Black Rabbit. Sabrina, Darke Katt andR.C. are Copyright © Eric W. Schwartz. James Sheppard, MarvinBadger, Rhonda Badger, Yohni, Alexi, Michael, Esteban, Mia, WandaVixen and Tamara Rabbit are Copyright © James Bruner. AlexO'Whitt is © Tigermark. The B-Team is © Silver Coyote. JeanLeBrun, Gabrielle Ryder, Timothy Bigglesworth-Farthington vonSalzburg, Malcolm Grazer, Doctor Fox Jones, Peter Spermophilus,Miranda Spermophilus, Dina Spermophilus, Leo Leon, Miriam Redtail,Lizzy Doe, Emma Grey, Professor Moose Nicholson, Professor EricaBelge and Pethouse Magazine is © Joan Jacobsen, 2005. All othercharacters appearing in this story, except where otherwisespecifically noted, are likewise © Joan Jacobsen.

Legal Notice: This story isCopyright © 2005 by Joan Jacobsen. This story may not be sold orused for commercial profit in any form or fashion. This story may notbe modified in any way. This story may not be posted on a mirror siteor any other Internet site without the written permission of theauthor. This story may not be distributed on print, magnetic,electrical or optical mediums.

Permission to use charactersthat are Copyright other individuals was obtained prior to theappearance of said characters.

The author, Joan Jacobsen,hereby asserts moral right to be identified as the author of thiswork.

This is an independent workof fiction with no connection whatsoever to Max Black Rabbit, Eric W.Schwartz, E.S. Productions or James Bruner and is in no way meant toimply any connection with Max Black Rabbit, Eric W. Schwartz, E.S.Productions, or James Bruner. This story contains characters createdby Max Black Rabbit, Eric W. Schwartz, James Bruner, Tigermark andSilver Coyote. Events and characters occurring in this story shouldnot be considered part of the storylines for either 'Zig Zag','Sabrina Online' or 'Sabrina Online - The Story'.

In fact, as far as 'ZigZag', 'Sabrina Online', 'Sabrina Online - The Story' and 'Zig Zag theStory' are concerned, this story does not exist. The artists disavowany knowledge of and do not officially sanction the events in thisstory.

A visitor from far away...

Zig Zag closed the door to her office behind her. Not that there really was a need to. It was Sunday, and no one else was at the studio. It was just a force of habit. She sat down behind her desk and switched on her computer. Remembering the warnings Sabrina had already given her, she started by updating her various firewalls and virus-protections. It would take a while, and she turned to look at the mail that had dropped in since she left her office for the weekend.

It wasn't easy to concentrate on it. Alex kept popping up in her mind, and she wasn't quite sure why.

His visit had been a very welcome one, and while she had been very surprised at his emotional outburst and his story about 9/11, she was happy that he had been with her when he finally 'broke'. That sort of situation was best dealt with in the company of family.

Maybe that was it?

He was family. As far as she was concerned, the only family she had apart from her siblings. And the entire studio, of course.

Although admittedly, no one at the studio was a blood relation.

"Silly skunk," she mumbled, smiling crookedly at her own thoughts. "Family isn't about being related..."

She knew most furs would disagree with her, but she felt that she, of all furs, had a right to say that, given her experience.

So why did Alex keep popping up at the back of her mind? He was certainly family, and related to her. She wasn't sure what caused it, but she kept worrying about him. Which, she realized, was rather silly. Alex was a grown fur, more responsible than most others, too.

Turning back to the computer, she opened a web-browser to read her email. The updating was almost complete. She knew she'd better wait until it was all done, nonetheless, and decided to check the news.

Every article on the newspaper homepage was about Afghanistan.

About the war.

Zig Zag felt a sinking sensation in her stomach.

###

It hadn't been the kind of night Emma wanted to remember. Now, that night had turned into a day which so far promised to be even worse. She couldn't really remember all that'd happened. She was sitting in a room she didn't recognize...she was cold, she was scared and worst of all, she was alone.

It was all vague. All she could remember was a feeling of absolute terror.

The more she tried to think about it, the harder it was to concentrate.

It was so foggy. Confused.

There had been yelling...and pain. And fear. A lot of it. A lot of all of it.

She shook her head and tried to get up. Her whole body hurt. She was black and blue...she didn't even have to check for bruises to know she had them. Everywhere. A whimper escaped her.

That made a shutter in the door open. She could see a pair of eyes look in.

"She seems to have come around," a voice said from the other side of the door. "You want to go in now?"

"Better now than later," another, irritated voice answered. Emma knew that voice...she was sure of it.

The door opened. A male figure appeared in the door.

"Emma...Emma are you hurt?" a concerned voice asked.

"I'm...Emma...right?" she asked and sat up. She was fairly sure the answer was yes.

The lights were stronger in the hallway than in the room itself and she didn't have her glasses. It was very hard to see anything clearly. The figure in the doorway was definitely male. A canid of some kind...she was pretty sure of that. Red...mostly. With some white...

"It's me...It's Fox, Emma," the figure said and came closer, slowly. "Oh God, what did he do to you...?"

The voice was choking.

"Wh...what do you mean? Who?" Emma asked, confused. "Hey Fox...is...is...Miriam here too?"

Fox sat down opposite from Emma. He had seen some bad cases of abuse, but he was shocked and appalled at what he was looking at. Emma was severely beaten up. Why she was still at the police station and not at a hospital was well and truly beyond him. Her eyes were swollen. Her lips cracked. She breathed in wheezes and he was pretty certain the mink had cracked ribs. Her clothes were a complete mess of now-dry blood. From what Fox could gather...most of it wasn't her own.

"I...would gladly give you a hug right now, but I think it'd hurt," he said, quietly.

Emma tried to smile. "Where am I, Fox? What's happened?" she asked. She honestly had no idea what was going on or why she was hurting so badly.

Fox felt stumped. He hadn't expected the mink to completely block out what had happened during the night. It must have been extraordinarily terrible for her to have an emotional reaction that strong, that quickly. He'd seen it before, as part of his work. But it was something else, when confronted with it...face to face.

"Emma...can't you remember?" he asked, gently. "Nothing at all?"

The mink shook her head. She looked utterly helpless. "I think it's something bad. Maybe I fell down some stairs or something. It hurts a lot..." she tried.

Fox closed his eyes. This was something he'd normally treat slowly, but there was no time for that. The police would want to question the mink as soon as he was done in there. The only reason he'd been allowed in first was precisely because he was a professional counselor, with knowledge of Emma as an individual. Apparently, the cops hadn't been able to get even her name out of her.

"Jeremy is dead..." he said, ready for a full blown panic attack. "They found him in your apartment, with five bullets in his body and one in his...his...well, let's not talk about that. There was blood everywhere, they said. Floor, furniture...and you. You were sitting there, with a gun in your paw. Emma...you shot him."

The mink blinked a few times and looked at her friend. "Oh..." she said, quietly.

Fox waited. Letting it sink in. This wasn't something he should force. It had to take the time it took.

For a long moment, Emma just sat there, as if trying to understand what Fox had told her. Like he had spoken in a foreign language. She blinked a few times...incomprehensively...

There was a brief moment, where Fox thought he might have to explain it again. But then he saw the tears rolling down Emma's cheeks.

He knew it probably hurt. But he still put his arms around her, to let her know she wasn't alone.

###

"Will you get the door, love?"

Malcolm peeked out of the kitchen in response. "Sure. What's up?"

"I'm not dry yet...and I need to get dressed!" Timothy answered. He came out of the bathroom, stark naked and with his head entirely hidden under a huge, fluffy towel. He was vigorously drying his mane.

"You'd better. I'm the only one who gets to see that," Malcolm grinned and pointed towards the bedroom.

Then he headed to the front door to open it. He knew Abu-Yusuf was meaning to come by, but he wasn't sure when, exactly. It wasn't early in the morning...but last night's performance had ended up with most of the dancers going out for a drink. Or two. They couldn't really get drunk, since there was a performance the next evening again, but it was a different one...and Malcolm wasn't in it. So he and Timothy had been...tipsy, when they got home. That was the way he preferred to think of it at least.

He opened the door.

The smiling face and rotund shape of Abu-Yusuf met him. The oryx had a large basket under his arm, full of all kinds of fruit.

"Greetings, Malcolm. I hope I am not here too early?" he asked.

"Not at all, come on in," the stallion replied and moved aside.

Abu-Yusuf entered. The basket of fruit was placed on the nearest table, and Malcolm couldn't help himself. If he'd been a canid, he'd have wagged his tail. All kinds of good things filled the basket. Fruit and berries of all kinds, as well as a strange looking, tall pot. It looked like it was meant to boil something in. A little like a tall teapot, with no lid.

"What's this?" he asked and lifted it carefully.

Abu-Yusuf wagged his eyebrows conspiratorially and came up next to the stallion, patting his shoulder.

"That, my friend, is my secret weapon. I'm sure the FBI would've liked to get their paws on that, no?"

It got a good laugh out of Malcolm. Even though he had no idea what the pot was intended for, he was pretty sure it wasn't a weapon of mass destruction.

"Why would they be particularly interested in a teapot?" he asked and tried to look deadly serious. Without much luck.

The oryx grinned again. "Not tea, my friend. Khoffe..."

"Ch...rrroffay?"

It took a while before Abu-Yusuf got control over his vocal cords again. When he did he wagged an admonishing finger at the stallion and shook his head in a paternal way.

"Don't try your paws at my language again. It's slaughter," he said and took the pot out of Malcolm's paws. "This is what I make Khoffe in. Arabic coffee. Very powerful stuff. I figured you might want to try it."

"Absolutely!"

"Excellent. Where's Timothy, by the way? I hope I haven't scared him away before even coming?"

Malcolm shook his head. "Not at all. He's just gotten out of the shower. We had a very long night, last night. Unexpected, even. The performance went better than anyone had thought...so most of the dancers went for a drink."

"Ahh...yes. Now there is one thing I have to admit I don't do..." Abu-Yusuf chuckled.

"What? Dance?"

"No, drink."

The stallion nodded. While Abu-Yusuf was extremely relaxed about his religion, it was reasonable to assume there were some rules he'd uphold. He noted, though, that there was no blame in the oryx' voice.

"American beer is like making love in a canoe anyway," Abu-Yusuf went on. "Fucking close to water..."

Malcolm realized he might as well not bother trying to keep a straight face. He facepawed and groaned hard though. Somehow, he hadn't expected that from the oryx...but it fit. It was the right kind of statement for Abu-Yusuf to make.

The stallion nodded and smiled.

"I have to agree."

Abu-Yusuf smiled. "So...let's get this fruit arranged while Timothy makes himself decent."

He looked around for the kitchen.

###

Leo was sitting in the living room. He had his head in his paws, and Lizzy had her arms around him. She had been trying to get through to him for the last twenty minutes, but he hadn't been very responsive.

Mostly, he was staring ahead, looking totally stunned with shock.

Or covering his face with his paws.

Jean and Esteban were on their way. Lizzy had talked to Jean on the phone, and from what she had to say, Esteban was reacting roughly the same way as Leo...

"Leo, talk to me. What's gotten into you?" the doe tried, giving the lion a slight shake by the shoulder. "Come on, snap out of it..."

Leo finally turned his head and looked at his girlfriend. He swallowed and tried to think of how to explain what had happened during that fishing trip. He knew he had to say something.

"I think...Esteban and I did this," he said at last, really quietly. His eyes were getting wet.

"What are you talking about?? Look, Jeremy was an abusive shit, and he went too far once too often, and Lizzy shot him. Even the cops can surely see that!" Lizzy said, but she could hear her own voice...and she didn't sound too sure of herself. Leo had looked very strange.

The lion shook his head and looked at his paws again. "You don't understand, Lizzy," he said, quietly.

The problem was, he didn't understand either. He and Esteban had dropped the weasel over the side of the boat and left him there, to get home. It wasn't like they had actually hurt him. But what if they had caused him to get so angry he had gone to take it out on Emma, anyway?

He couldn't think of anything else that could've happened. Which meant that he and Esteban were responsible for placing Emma in a position where she had to use deadly force...

Which made him responsible for Jeremy's death.

But what was much worse...it made him responsible for Emma's predicament.

All he had wanted was to help, and now it looked like his good intentions had backfired completely. He turned his head and looked at Lizzy, next to him.

"I think I'd better tell you what happened on that fishing trip and why I came home so early," he said, quietly.

###

Abu-Yusuf looked happily at his little pot of coffee. Or khoffe, as he kept calling it. It was bubbling merrily on the stove, and he was stirring it with a long spoon, occasionally. It had taken a moment for him to find the right heat-setting and it had nearly bubbled over the rim more than once.

Malcolm was astonished. Coffee which was actually boiled. It sounded horrible, but he didn't want to be impolite. He could always taste the stuff.

Timothy didn't even seem worried about it, which astonished the Arabian stallion. Normally, Timothy wouldn't drink coffee unless it was covered in liberal amounts of milky foam or thinned out with sugar and cream.

In other words, if it tasted like coffee, Timothy wouldn't drink it.

"I think I promised to tell you my story, Malcolm..." the oryx said. "And...considering what's happened here in New York and that you and I spent a night in a prison together, I can't think if anyone better to share it with."

He turned around and looked at both the equines after taking the small pot off the heat. He sat down by the table, opposite his hosts, and looked in the fruit basket. Taking out three tiny cups, he placed one in front of each of the two males opposite of him, and the last in front of himself. Then he poured the khoffe into these. It almost oozed into the small container.

"It looks...nothing like coffee as I know it," Malcolm admitted. "It smells different too. What's that spicy scent?"

"Cardamom, actually. Be careful. The ground coffee is still in the liquid. Let it settle and sip it carefully," the oryx explained.

Timothy grinned. "I've tried this once before. It's got a strong, bitter taste...with just a little spice. My sister told me it'd make me 'knurd'..."

"What's 'knurd'?" Malcolm asked, looking cross-eyed.

"The opposite of drunk. She said she read it in a book, once...by some English author. If you drink this, you get out the opposite site of drunk. It's the best possible pick-me-up after a hefty night of drinking. Or if you just have to stay awake for very long hours of studying..." Timothy explained.

Then he took his tiny egg-cup sized container and sipped it. He made a grimace at first...then smiled and sipped it again.

Abu-Yusuf looked approvingly at Timothy and nodded. "You just earned yourself a few points. Most westerners won't drink it even if paid," he said. "Anyway, I promised to tell you my story."

Malcolm nodded and sipped his own khoffe. He had to admit...it was an acquired taste. It was extremely strong, hitting his palate like a sledgehammer, but the slight aftertaste of cardamom took the nasty sensation away. To his own surprise, he realized he might actually grow to like it with a bit of practice.

Abu-Yusuf folded his paws on the table. "You asked me once, not long ago, Malcolm, why I always call you 'my sinful friend' or something along those lines. Truth is...I shouldn't. It's not very nice of me. I do it, because that's what furs in the street expect of me. I mean look at me? I'm a big, bearded middle eastern fur of a type few Americans even know exist until they see me. I'm fifty pounds overweight...if we make the pounds really small...and I wear a T-shirt to work saying 'I love NYC'. I'm supposed to be a laughing, jesting, jolly goofball. That's what the customers expect of me," he began.

Malcolm nodded and listened. The idea of 'putting on an act' was, at least, completely understandable to him. It made sense on a number of levels.

"So you're behaving like a caricature of a middle eastern fur...because that's what those buying your fruit expects..." Timothy said, slowly. "That's...sad. Not for you, I mean. But for all those who expect it of you."

Abu-Yusuf shrugged. "I don't think about it much, really. Westerners expect middle eastern furs, no matter nationality, to be uneducated, mostly unintelligent fanatics. Haven't you noticed? Whenever you see anything on TV from Palestine, it's a group of protesting, screaming furs. Usually including at least one badly overweight femme with very bad teeth."

Malcolm nodded, slowly. Now that the oryx mentioned it, that did strike him as true. He leaned forward and put the small cup of khoffe on the table.

"So...what about the real you?" he asked.

Abu-Yusuf put down his own cup and looked at his host. For a long moment, he didn't say anything. Finally, he shrugged.

"First of all," he said. "I am not Moslem. I have been raised in a Moslem country, in a Moslem culture, but I don't believe. I did, I suppose, when I was younger. Never strongly, though. You see...before Iran was Iran, it was Persia. Before the Ayatollahs, we had the Shah. Now...the Shah made a lot of very bad mistakes. He wanted Persia to go the way of the west. He banned the Hijab, introduced western goods and music. You should have seen the pyres in the streets. Femmes burnt their veils and celebrated their freedom. All the while SAVAK hunted down dissidents..."

Timothy squinted. "SAVAK? That sounds...ominous when you say it. What is it?"

"It was the secret police. If you think Gestapo or the KGB were bad...you never had the misfortune of seeing one of SAVAK's prisons from the inside," Abu-Yusuf said and shuddered. "There were no finer torturers in the world. No more heartless bastards. No furs more twisted and evil. It wasn't that they'd laugh at your anguish or pain. No...they wouldn't react at all. It was as if their victims didn't exist to them. Like they weren't living, breathing, thinking furs. Just...slabs of meat to be prodded...carved...fried..."

It was all starting to come together for Malcolm. Abu-Yusuf had lived in a country where extreme religion had been the enemy, and where it had eventually won and destroyed his way of life. It would be enough to make anyone lose their faith.

"I see..." he said and nodded, slowly.

Abu-Yusuf turned his head to look at Malcolm for a long time, without a word. Then he shook his head, slowly. "I don't think you do, Malcolm."

"The problem was...you had a lot of very poor, very worried furs there. A lot of furs who barely owned the clothes on their backs, let alone food to feed their children. Let me tell you right away, Malcolm...the most dangerous fur in the world is not the fur pointing a gun at you, madness gleaming in his eyes. The most dangerous fur in the world is the male watching his children starve. There is nothing...NOTHING...he won't do to feed them. The priesthood saw that. And they never forgave the west for the Crusades, you know. They still live in a world of eight or nine centuries ago."

Timothy nodded and rubbed his face. "That story is predictable enough, really. All the priests had to do was point at the Shah and say 'look, he has everything and you have nothing. He won't share his wealth. He doesn't care about your misery and misfortune. But we care...', and you'll have revolution."

Abu-Yusuf nodded. "Indeed. That was precisely what happened. Suddenly, SAVAK couldn't stem the tide anymore. When the dissidents became so many that they gained courage through numbers...the secret police lost its power. The Shah escaped...Persia was destroyed, The Islamic Republic of Iran was created. And all things western were blamed for the poverty and misery of the masses. Anyone who was considered pro had to make a run for it...many didn't make it. Most of the furs I knew died...killed by the revolutionary guard."

"But...why did you have to run? Were you pro already then? An atheist?" Malcolm asked.

Abu-Yusuf looked at his paws for a long time. A little crooked smile playing over his lips. "You might say that..."

Malcolm looked sidelong at Timothy. Clearly, the bronco didn't seem to understand either.

"You both know that I'm called Abu-Yusuf because my oldest son's name is Yusuf, I presume..." the oryx said.

Both equines nodded.

Abu-Yusuf emptied his tiny cup and looked into the bottom for a moment. The bottom was covered in ground coffee. Coffee mixed with cardamom. He smiled a little. A little sweetness mixed into the bitter powder. It seemed like poetic justice.

"Like I said...I'm not Moslem. Not anymore. I lost my faith...in a prison in Persia," he said, slowly. "Amidst screams and horror, furs begging for mercy around every corner. Even more begging for death. Femmes and males, children and geriatrics..."

The oryx couldn't bring himself to refill his cup.

Malcolm narrowed his eyes for a moment. Then he stiffened...and finally, he sighed.

"What's your real name?" he asked.

Timothy looked confused for a moment. "What do you mean, Malcolm? His real name? I thought it was Abu-Yusuf..."

Malcolm shook his head, slowly. "No. Abu-something means he's got a son. It means 'father of'...and then the son's first name. His first son was Yusuf. Abu-Yusuf is a nickname..."

"Malcolm is right," the oryx said. "My name is Rahim Salar Kiyanzadah. Captain Rahim Salar Kiyanzadah, to be precise..."

Timothy felt a sinking sensation in his stomach and looked between the other two. "So...that's why you ran..." he said, quietly, putting his cup down. "You were SAVAK..."

###

The police-officer on duty was befuddled. He wasn't used to the kind of situation he had on his paws. He was looking at a positively vitriolic doe, an only slightly less angry vixen and two very meek and humbled males. A wolf and a lion.

"I think you didn't hear me, officer!" the doe said, forcing her voice to remain even. "We have information concerning the arrest of Emma Grey."

The officer, a feline in his early fifties, nodded. He tried to answer politely, without sounding overly tired. "I heard you, Miss. The problem is that Emma Grey was caught, as they say, red-pawed. In her case very literally so. What information do you have that the officer in charge of the investigation can't find at the scene of the crime??"

Emma was about to answer when a voice spoke up behind the group. A female voice, sounding slightly annoyed.

"You can take the rest of the day off, sergeant. I suggest you spend it learning that we do not turn away potential witnesses in any case involving a corpse, for any reason. Clear?"

The feline blinked. His mouth opened and closed several times, then he nodded and got to his feet.

"Jean? What's this all about?" the voice asked.

Jean turned around. For the first time in over an hour, she saw some flicker of hope. "Miranda..." she said, quietly. "Please...tell me you're the officer in charge of the investigation?"

"Well, as of twenty minutes ago, I am. I informed the local captain that I have a working knowledge of arsenic and I reminded him how much he likes strong coffee. He scowled some, but he gave me the case." the squirrel said. "I told him that I have met the suspect on a few occasions."

Lizzy turned around as well, looking at Miranda too. "These two..." she said and waved a paw at Esteban and Leo "...have some information for you about Emma's case. I believe they were some of the last furs to see Jeremy alive."

Miranda pondered that a moment, then nodded. "Come on then. Let's find my office..."

###

"How is she taking it?"

Miriam looked like she could badly do with a barrel full of Kleenex and three hours of good sleep.

Fox fell backwards into a seat. He stared ahead, not sure how best to answer the vixen's question. He wanted to cry, but he couldn't. He wanted to shout in anger, but he didn't have the voice.

Finally, he just looked at Miriam.

"She barely knew who she was," he whispered. "You...would scarcely have recognized her...he'd beaten her so badly..."

Miriam swallowed heavily and closed her eyes. There were times where she didn't appreciate having a vivid imagination. This was such a moment.

"I see," she said, quietly. She reached over and put a paw on Fox's shoulder. "Should we stay here or go home for now?"

"We won't do her any good by staying," Fox said, looking down, resting his elbows on his knees. "I won't be allowed in any more today. It's...just hard to understand this."

Miriam sighed and got up. "What part? That he beat her senseless or that she shot him? In my opinion, this is an open and close case. She acted in self defense. Our job is going to be that she doesn't get so traumatized from this that she'll be crippled for life. Our job is to show her that not only are we all still there for her, but we believe her and back her up, every step of the way."

Fox looked up. He didn't know if he had the strength to actually rise to his feet. Then he smiled...warmly. "You know what, Miriam? Everyone should have a friend like you."

Then he rose. Slowly. Putting an arm around Miriam, he headed back out.