I trace criminal drilling behind cell (9)
I believe the answer is:
bacterium
'cell' is the definition.
The answer and definition can be both animals as well as being singular nouns.
Maybe there's a link between them I don't understand?
'i trace criminal drilling behind' is the wordplay.
'criminal' indicates anagramming the letters.
'drilling' means one lot of letters goes inside another (inserted letters drill through others).
'behind' becomes 'bum' (synonyms).
'i'+'trace'='itrace'
'itrace' is an anagram of 'acteri'.
'acteri' going inside 'bum' is 'BACTERIUM'.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for bacterium that I've seen before include "germ?" , "health risk?" , "Fundamental" , "Micro-organism that can cause disease" .)