(A/N: Chapters are in varying POV'S between Nick and Judy, with possibly some other characters mixed in. I now DESPISE Mary Sue OFC's that are only inserted for romance, so rest assured this isn't that kind of original character fic at all. This characters only purpose is to cause Nick angst, which I can't resist doing. No sibling incest, no quick relationships... Slow, painful emotions with a happy ending... Maybe. Also, slow burn Judy/Nick.)

Judy

Judy knows something's changed that morning, as the officers in the precinct file into the bullpen for the briefing. Everything is the same, but it also isn't, like a room with all the furniture moved an inch to the right. Barely perceptible but still... off. The air is charged with tense, tingling electricity that she can feel in the balls of her feet and the base of her ears, kind of exciting but mostly unnerving.

She glances up at the clock above the door and bites her lip. The time blinks back at her in faded red digits- eight fifty eight. The briefing is supposed to be starting at nine- it ALWAYS starts at nine- but Bogo is nowhere to be found, and the few officers milling around the room can't seem to stay in their seats. The usual loud, pre meeting conversations and ribbing is absent, replaced by low muttering. Fangmire is fidgety, Torro is nervously picking at his hooves, and Clawhauser has actual sweat stains visible in the armpits of his uniform, fur damp and shiny around his pudgy face.

Eight fifty nine. It's warm in the bullpen, warmer than she can ever remember it being. Judy thinks she understands why Clawhauser is sweating.

Nine o clock, and she sits to attention, lavender irises fixated on the door that her Chief is no doubt going to come bursting through at any moment with his trusty dusty clipboard and a bellow for silence-

Nada. Zilch, nein, zippo, and by the time she's finished coming up with synonyms for the word nothing, the door is still closed, the meeting is still unstarted, and the time moves to Nine o one. Even the clock seems tense, switching the numbers quick and jerky instead of its usual slow, lazy cadence.

Rabbits are creatures of routine, and so, to a certain degree, are police officers. Bogo's a stickler for routine and procedure, and usually that falls right in line with Judy's compulsion to follow said procedure. His timeliness was the last thing she was counting on to assure herself that nothing strange was happening, and without it...

Something is definitely, severely wrong.

It's nine o three when Bogo finally enters the room, tailed by DelGato and Katz. The other officers find their seats with nary a whisper, and just when Judy is expecting things to get normal again, it doesn't. Bogo puts a hoof over the microphone at the podium and starts whispering to the two feline officers at his flanks, and it takes every bit of home training having good girl she possesses inside herself for Judy not to strain her ears to hear what's being said.

It's nine o five. The door swings open again, making everyone jump, but Judy relaxes a bit- it's just Nick, late as usual, so at least that hasn't changed. But no one says hello as he comes in, no one smiles or scowls or purses their lips, no one yells 'mornin', Slick Nick' or 'hey, Officer Wilde', or even mumbles 'that guy's here, thought he would have quit by now'. Judy's pretty much heard it all when it comes to her partner-slash-best friend.

Nick settles into the empty seat next to her that might as well have his name on it (any unoccupied seat or space next to Judy might as well have his name on it), slouching down in the way he knows Bogo hates and adopting his usual 'I couldn't care less and am only here to smirk sarcastically at all of you' attitude.

But Judy knows him, knows him better than she knows herself often times, so she sees that he's just as affected by the weird atmosphere as she is. He's got his mirrored aviators on shielding his eyes, but above the band his black tipped ears are pricked and stiff, and his paw is tight around the coffee cup that he's not sipping out of at all.

He glances over at her and graces her with a small smirk, voice low and measured. "Hey, Carrots. You might wanna hit a spa this weekend, de-stress a little bit. You look like you're about to vibrate out of your pelt. Not that I wouldn't mind a new pair of rabbit skin slippers, but I don't think I can pull off that color like you can."

Judy takes her mind off of the current predicament long enough to snort heavily and roll her eyes at his utter ridiculousness, which she thinks is exactly his purpose in the first place. There are times when Nick's brand of humour is appreciated and times when it isn't, but this probably falls into the former category more than anything. Besides, she can hear the undertone of caring in the flippant words.

"If you said that anywhere outside of this room, you'd be skinned yourself, and you know it." she points out. He makes an unconcerned noise in the back of his throat.

"Please. Everybody in this skittish city knows I could never harm a hair on your fuzzy little head." He raises his hand like he's about to take a sip of coffee, but ultimately doesn't.

If this was a normal day, that cup would already be empty and in the trash. Judy hears the liquid sloshing around inside- it's nearly full.

Nick loves coffee. Nick NEEDS coffee. Nick not chugging down coffee like it's going out of style is...

Weird. Hence her point.

"Hey," she hisses, swinging her feet over the edge of her chair. "What's going on today? Everybody's acting really bonkers."

And Nick, bless Nick, because Nick knows everyone and by extension knows everything, looks over at her and whispers back out of the corner of his mouth-

"It's the FurFlung sting. Apparently there's been some kind of new development."

In the span of a breath, Judy's nervous energy turns into boiling excitement that practically lifts her out of her seat. She thinks she whimpers a little. The entire FurFlung case had been kept under super secret wraps by Bogo and the very few officers involved from the get go. Judy had been salivating after the tiniest tidbits of information after a simple noise complaint turned into a two year long investigation.

"What did-?"

"EVERYBODY SHUT IT!"

There's a mad dash to get into a chair and all noise ceases immediately, leaving the room as silent as the grave. Bogo glares at them all as they stare fearfully back. A few tense moments pass. Eventually, his roaming eyes settle on Nick.

"Glasses off, Wilde. If I have to tell you one more time, you're out of this precinct."

Nick getting threatened with unemployment is a daily occurrence, so he simply salutes and pushes the aviators onto his forehead. "Absolutely, Chiefy Weefy. Won't happen again, sir. Sorry sir. I'd just like to say sir, that scowl really brings out the seriousness in your eyes, sir-"

"STUFF IT, OFFICER!"

Nick lapses into a smug silence, and Judy has to bite her tongue to keep from giggling. They'll probably be on parking duty for a week for that. He's a mess, but he's her mess.

The cape buffalo shuffles his papers and glances at the officers still by his side, beginning to speak in a low, ominous voice. "This morning, Detectives DelGato and Katz have brought it to my attention that we now have enough evidence to proceed with the FurFlung investigation. For those who have not kept up with the case, or are hearing about it for the first time, dispatch called in a noise complaint at FurFlung nightclub nearly two years ago. We received an anonymous tip later that the club was engaging in trafficking and illegal prostitution, and that many of the girls have been reported missing by their families in recent months, so it's very possible this is not an operation based on consent."

Judy could put it together from there. Foxes weren't the only mammals with certain reputations, and felines were notorious for engaging in the trafficking business more often than other species, particularly in the flesh department. So that meant DelGato and Katz were best suited to go undercover, scouting out the tips, rumours and complaints surrounding FurFlung night club.

She did know about the call, because she'd been there when Clawhauser picked up the phone (and Judy always suspected the suspiciously muffled voice was really Finnick. In exchange for Nick looking the other way on some of his more harmless schemes, the Fennec fox had agreed to be an informant of sorts for the precinct).

That was the last she'd heard of it though, before today.

According to the rest of Bogo's report, they'd went in with the works- wires, bugs, hidden cameras, recording pens, marked bills- and discovered that there was indeed an illegal trafficking ring being run out of the club, involving animals of all species and classifications.

"It's a moveable hareem set up," DelGato growls. "The girls are shunted from club to club, word is sent to the underground, and the sleazebags line up at the back entrance for a few nights. Then they pack up to a new host location and start it up again. FurFlung is the main command center."

Judy scoots over a few inches and nudges Nick's foot with her own to get his attention. "Did you know about this?" she breathes. Nick may have been a criminal, but he had morals, and she can't imagine him knowing about something like that and not saying or doing anything about it.

The knot in her stomach uncoils when he gives a small shake of his head. Up front, Bogo is still talking.

"Detective Katz was informed by one of the organisers that the operation will be stopping at FurFlung tonight. I have conferred with City Hall, and a decision has been reached- we will uproot this disgusting business at the source," Bogo snarls, slamming his fist down hard on the podium. "At twenty three hundred hours, Officers DelGato and Grizzoli will enter the club as customers. When they give the all clear, a squadron of backup units will move in and secure both the girls and the perpetrators. These units will be..."

Please, Judy thinks, please please please. Please. She wants this so badly she can taste it.

"Fangmire, Katz, Phurson, McHorn, Torro..."

He wouldn't leave her out. He wouldn't do this to her, he just wouldn't. She's proved herself, he knows she can do this, he wouldn't-

"-Woolinski, Hopps, and Wilde."

Her blood is rushing so fast in her skull Judy almost doesn't hear her last name, but it breaks through right when she thinks she's about to explode. She has to restrain herself from leaping onto the table and singing a gospel chorus. Nick starts to smile, but then Bogo says one last thing that sends a chill racing down her spine and wipes the expression clean off his muzzle.

"Detective Katz mentioned that many of the girls appeared drugged or impaired. It's very possible that this operation is connected to the lingering Night Howler trade, so we're all going to take a draft of antidote before commencing, no acceptions." He glowers at them. "Stay sharp and follow infection procedure. All who's name was called, you're off the beat today, but I still want you around. Dismissed."

Chairs scrape against the floor as everyone files out of the bullpen. Judy makes a beeline for her and Nick's shared desk with the fox following more slowly behind her.

"I can't believe it," she laughs, spinning in her rolly seat. "A bust, Nick! A real live bust!" This is proof, proof that the department doesn't think what happened with Bellweather was a fluke or a stroke of dumb luck. They really think she can do this.

"Night howler," Nick grumbles darkly. "Why does it always come back to friggin' night howler? Who thought it was a good idea to start selling shit that makes people go psycho?" He grinds his teeth, jaw twitching. "It's not even getting high. Getting high I understand. Why would anyone want to feel like a bloodthirsty killing machine?"

Judy tamps down her enthusiasm in the face of his muted anger and reaches across the desk to grip his bunched bicep. "It'll be alright, Nick. We'll take the antidote, and everything will be fine."

He relaxes under her touch. She can see him wrestling with his pessimism before it escapes as a resigned sigh, and the smile that was slashed by the mention of night howler returns slowly as his shoulders droop. "Alright, Carrots. I'll refrain from pointing out the obvious and crushing your upbeat attitude just this once."

"Gee, thanks." Judy deadpans, cutting her eyes at him. "How very passive aggressive of you."

"It's my specialty." He starts to fiddle with the little radio they also share and Judy goes back to bouncing in her seat as they wait for the nurse to arrive from the hospital and administer the antidote. After a while she boots up her computer and looks up the floor plan of FurFlung, setting herself to studying it until her eyes bled if that was what it took to make this bust go off without a hitch, for both her sanity and Nick's.

This is the first step on the rest of their careers. Nothing will go wrong.

Nothing.

Judy can firmly say with one hundred per cent accurate conviction that the next 14 hours are the longest she's ever had to endure in her existence. She thinks she wouldn't be this close to losing her sanity if Bogo hadn't taken them off patrol and given her something to occupy herself, but that's risky and she grudgingly accepts that. The last thing they need is to stop someone for a speeding ticket and have that same mammal recognize them later at the club and send everything to hell.

So they wait.

And wait.

And wait.

And wait some more.

Until finally it's nearing nine thirty, the sun is slipping beneath the horizon outside, and Bogo emerges from his office into the front of the station to inform them somberly that it's time. Grizzoli and DelGato strip out of their uniforms and leave for the club in civvies with wires threaded through their buttons while the rest of them don themselves in ZPDSWAT vests and layers of Kevlar. Nick and Judy are given the task of making sure every available, vulnerable patch of flesh and fur is covered on their fellow officers, one that Judy takes to with relish and determination. No one's going savage on her watch.

If she triple checks Nick at possibly the expense of Woolinski's midriff, she doesn't think anyone would blame her. The thought of losing him in any way, even just mentally, puts a taste in her mouth and a blade in her heart that she knows she couldn't live with. As usual, whenever her mind surprises her with thoughts like that, she pushes them to the back of her skull and resolves to think about them later. (Needless to say, it's getting crowded in there.)

Their squadron takes unmarked SUV's' to the border of Tundra Town, where FurFlung is situated. The few jokes Nick tries to crack fall flat and short, until even he's silent. Judy's nerves and thoughts have reached a strange state of primed and poised, yet calm as well, as they near their destination. She's hot and cool, Yin and Yang, and she can do this.

They park a block away. Even from there, they can see the colored spot lights and feel the thumping of the bass music through the floor of the car. They crowd around the speaker, listening for the signal to be given.

Grizzoli and DelGato pass the doorman with no trouble. Judy leans forward and stretches her hearing to its limit to hear their voices past the deafening music. Beside her, Nick's paws are balled into tight fists, totally still. She feels the urge to grab one, but she refrains at the last minute, not wanting to throw off whatever he's doing to prepare himself for what's about to happen.

"*Ah, my feline friend! Back again, I see. Welcome, welcome. You brought company?"

"*What can I say, Raymond. You intrigued me. This is Magnus. He was interested in my stories and wants to see if he could get his feet wet.*"

"*Of course, of course. Perhaps you'll sample my humble wares before deciding to invest? I'm sure we have something that'll tickle your fancy.*"

"*I'm sure you do.*"

"*Right this way, gentlemen.*"

"*After you, Chief.*"

"That's it," Judy shivers, signalling the rest and jumping out of her seat. "He said it, he said Chief." Nick snatches for the nearest walkie talkie almost before she's done and hails Bogo's frequency. She notices he's shaking slightly.

"Chief is in. I repeat, the chief is in. Over."

A hiss of static, and then-

"*Bogo in, Copy. All ZPD units, move in to back exit and follow previously outlined procedure, over.*"

Judy's chest seizes- she can't breathe- her limbs lock- her vision whites out-

The car door flies open.

"GO GO GO GO GO!"

They're across the street in milliseconds. Mchorn charges down the locked entrance, the music and lights swamp her senses, and then the gleam of the snow outside is replaced by flashes of darkness and blinding strobe lasers. Judy's head is empty and full all at once. She can feel her lungs working overtime, but she can't remember the last time she took a breath. Her heartbeat's in her ears, thick and all consuming. A flick of red-

Nick's tail. Nick. She has to keep up with Nick. No matter what, she has to stay with Nick.

Down the stairs- to the right- stairs again-

Nick. She has to stay...

"ZPD, FREEZE! PAWS IN THE AIR!"

Judy blinks, and it all comes back in an almost painful rush of lights and sound and awareness as adrenaline floods her brain. She's standing in a parlour type room, ladden with pillows and silk cushions and screaming, half naked girls. The air is salty and heavy with sex and pheromones and sickly saccharine perfume that barely covers either.

Her sweaty paws are vice gripped around the handle of her gun, pointed dead center in the chest of a lynx with his arms raised and his fangs bared. Around her, Mchorn and Grizzoli have someone in an arm bar each, and DelGato is working on subduing a panther. Woolinski's position matches her own, keeping the five other mammals from reaching for the hilts in their waistbands.

"HOPPS! WILDE! PERIMETER CHECK!"

Phurson pulls his taser and downs the lynx, freeing Judy to leap over his spasming body and make for the metal door on the opposite side of the parlour. Nick's an inch in front of her. She hears the scream and the pop of the gunshot seconds before they enter what appears to be a barren dressing room, and then she's staring down the barrel of a pistol.

"FUCK!"

She hears the curse, sees the hammer drop back in slow motion. There's nothing she can do to avoid it.

"FUCKING-!"

There's a blur of russet and white. Nick SOARS towards the ram, tackling him at the knees and throwing both of them to the ground. The gun goes flying, and Judy chases after it on reflex, throwing it out of the closest open window she sees before redirecting her taser on the mammal grappling with her partner. She gets a clear shot to the thigh and takes it, smiling grimly as he collapses, jerking and drooling.

Just like that, it's all over. Everything goes mostly quiet, except for the sobs of the girls. Now that the immediate threat has been taken care of, Judy notices the moving figures surrounding them- more girls, females of all species. All of them are secured to the rough walls by their wrists either with rope or duct tape or a combination of the two, with thin blankets tossed haphazardly over their bodies. The room stinks like bile and urine and the coppery tang of blood. There's a small washtub in the corner and, randomly, a few scattered makeup items on the floor.

Nick struggles to his feet and kicks the twitching ram in the gut, snarling ferociously. "You're under arrest, you son of a bitch."

The mammal spits out a cracked molar at Nick's feet and gives him a bloody smile. "T-traitor...f-fuckin' f-fox b-b-bastard..."

Judy holsters her weapon and watches as Nick handcuffs the nearly unconscious ram. Now that the adrenaline is fading, her knees feel weak and wobbly, and her head is floating. A warm sensation on her shoulder brings her back down to earth a little. Nick is gasping, bracing himself on her, supporting them both. For a split moment, they lean against each other, trembling and recuperating.

Nick is the first one to speak. "Who owes who on the 'saving each other's life' tab again?" he wheezes, shaking his head. "I'm losing count."

Judy laughs, and Bogo's yell shatters the brief respite, echoing from the previous room. "Officers Wilde and Hopps, report! Do you require assistance?"

Judy does a quick headcount and rubs excess sweat out of her eyes. "All clear. We've got one neutralized perpetrator and approximately seventeen hostages."

"Roger that." The buffalo sounds impressed, and Judy's spirit does a jig. They DID IT. "Ambulances are inbound."

"We should get them out of here," Nick mutters, glancing at the girls while Grizzoli comes in to take the ram back the way they came. The expression on his face is one of fury and sympathy that makes Judy's heart clench.

"Agreed."

He squeezes her shoulder one last time, and then they both get to work.

Judy's stomach lurches when she reaches the first girl, a sweet faced sow, and discovers that she was the recipient of the ram's first and only shot. The slug went in through her jaw and came out her temple, spattering the grey concrete behind her head with crimson. Judy doesn't feel the need to check for a pulse. She drags a paw over the sow's empty eyes to close them and moves down the line, this time to a vixen that looks frozen with fear.

She tries to make her tone as reassuring and comforting as possible as she gently unwinds the tape from around the vixen's arms. "Everything's going to be okay now. My name is Officer Judy Hopps, and over there is my partner, Nicholas Wilde. We're with the ZPD, and we're going to help you."

"Z...ZPD?"

"Yes, ma'am, Zootopia Police Department."

"W-Wilde...N...N-Nicky?"

The name is soft and hesitant, so much so that Judy, listening to Nick repeat her statement on the other side of the room, damnear misses it. When her ears catch up to her brain, she stills and turns her head upwards, gaping at the fox in front of her.

It's hard to tell in the dark room, and her features are disfigured by black and blue swelling and bruises and further obscured by the layers of concealer heaped over the weeping markings, but the vixen looks slightly older than Nick is. She has shiny pink weals and irritated patches of skin where her fur has been sheared or plucked out, but the rest of it is a rusty dark red, almost indistinguishable from the color of the dried blood caked into the side of her battered face. The damp, sheer dress she's wearing doesn't cover anything or hide the dark marks on her too thin thighs, nor disguise the sharp lines of her ribs pressing against her chest. The edges of her lips are stained with a blue liquid that carries the sweetly bitter stench of crushed nighthowler.

Her eyes, hazy and a bit unfocused as they are, are fixated on a point past Judy's head- eyes that are mostly bright, verdant green with a hint of brown around the edges.

Judy whips her neck around when she hears Nick's gasp. The raw emotion and shock in his eyes and face stuns her. He looks like he's been shot in the chest. She sees him drop to one knee and lose his grip on his own taser, shaking like a leaf in the wind. She doesn't even think he knows that sounds are coming out of his mouth, but she hears the name all too clearly.

"...Vickie?"

...

...

"Who said that to you?"

Watching the sun set on another day of patrol, Nick cranes his neck around and pushes up his sunglasses to meet Judy's eyes as the last of the bloody light filters in through the tinted cruiser windshield.

"Who said what, Carrots?"

"That thing, about never letting anyone see that they get to you. I know it's random, but..." Judy shrugs, trying to hide her embarrased bristle as a lazy smirk steals across the fox's face. "I was just thinking back to those first few days. That sounds like something someone might have said to you."

"Getting nostalgic, Jude? You don't think I'm smart enough to make my own mottos?"

Judy just LOOKS at him, narrowing her eyes and cocking an eyebrow. Nick snorts a laugh, then leans back against the headrest. "Alright, yeah. Someone did say that to me. I didn't magically come up with it by my genius self. Happy?"

Judy punches him lightly in the arm. "Who said it? Your mom?"

Nick doesn't answer for a while, and when he does, his voice is subdued. She can feel the walls slowly coming down with each syllable. "...No. Not mom. My sister."

"You have a sister?" Judy echoes, hushed.

"Had." Nick says, smirking bitterly. "She was older than me. She vanished when I was a kit. Just didn't come back one day. Everybody thought she ran away, but..." he pushes a hard breath between his teeth and gives his head a brisk shake.

Judy is afraid to speak, as if the smallest sound from her will bring those impenetrable walls back up and he'll be closed off from her forever. "What...what was her name?"

Nick rubs a paw over his chest like it aches. "Victoria."

"Pretty," Judy says. Nick shrugs.

"Mmhm. But it was kind of a mouthful for a five year old, so I always used to call her Vickie."

...

Well.

Shit.