How does one begin the sequel to their first story? Explosions? Sex? Mystery and angst? Nah, none of those cliches. How about a new year, instead?
I kid, of course. Intrigue will be updated once a month as long as my primary story, A Fox in Shining Armor, is still being written. So on the first of every month, get ready for more hijinks and heroes, murder and mayhem, terror and trivia!
Granted, I'm a few days (more like months) late on release, but I can assure you that releases will not normally be impeded. I'm still in a sort of limbo with regards to where and when I'll write, so bare with me for a few more weeks as everything gets sorted.
If you're starting this without having read Primal: A Zootopia Fanfiction, then I must warn you that very little of this will make any sense. I recommend in the highest degree that you take an hour or two to go and read that story first.
Ima stop babbling on, now. I hope you enjoy the Prologue to the second (and now final) installment of the Primal stories!
WARNING: THIS STORY IS THE SEQUEL TO PRIMAL: A ZOOTOPIA FANFICTION. IVE SAID BEFORE, I'LL SAY IT AGAIN; PLEASE READ THAT STORY BEFORE YOU ATTEMPT THIS!
The sirens were blaring louder than a roar in a surround sound theater.
Nick could feel adrenaline pouring through his limbs at a rate greater than even the most destructive monsoon storm. His muscles were numb with soreness, a pained yet determined expression rooted on his face as the whites of his crowns peeked into the blinding sunlight. Time and time again he forced his body upward, each repetition only making his core tremble to the point of complete collapse, but he had no other choice other than to push higher and harder than the last count. He knew the consequences if he didn't...
That's about when the lyrics started.
"I'm Chewie, and he some hot, Preda," The rapper passionately introduced, a bassy cacophony of instruments rising up behind his voice as he droned on about life in the slums. All Nick knew was the blood-pumping music pulsing through his earbuds, shooting up onto his feet as his set of sit-ups climaxed and descending right into a string of deep squats.
The windowed walls staring out over the endless canopy surrounding the MGRI were reflective today thanks to the cloud cover, letting him correct his form as his workout pushed on. He grinned between heavy pants, both amazed and proud of how far he'd come in a matter of weeks.
His orange pelt was thin and sleek, no longer a mix mash of short and long fur, and his colorful markings were more vibrant than ever. His long tail was groomed from tip to base, his claws trimmed and his teeth white from the insane amounts of brushing he'd done to them. Yet the biggest plus was that he didn't look like he was about to starve to death anymore! Quite the opposite, in fact.
Thanks to Doctor Zdanskyi's strategy of medicine, rest, and very hard work and a little bit of pushing from his fretful rabbit his weight has stabilized and the majority of his organs had returned to full working order. And if he was alone with his partner, he'd venture that just maybe he'd become a little more fit from before his Arctic vacation!
Carrots had left about three weeks ago along with the Chief, her annual vacation time all spent up, and he had boo-hooed until she had been forced to quit the ZPD just so she could be his housewife, washing his clothes and cooking his meals. Well, not really, even in the wildest universe.
Her job back in the city was busier than ever, if her stories over the institute's wired phone line weren't exaggerated. So busy that he hadn't seen her in the flesh for well over two weeks. He couldn't wait to get back to his old job, not just so they could end this whole long-distance-relationship thing but because he hadn't cracked some criminal neck in well over two years. Even though he was pretty sure he'd be unceremoniously relieved of duty for it, his paws were itching for the action his partner was getting!
"How are you faring today, Mr. Wilde?" A polite voice asked, barely audible over the deafening beats and raps battering his eardrums. Nick shot up from a final squat with a pumped expression and an eager smile, pulling his earbuds out and letting them dangle on his bare chest. He hopped from foot to foot like he was about to sprint down a track, kicking his heels up behind him as he gradually turned to greet Doctor Zdanskyi face on. The aged tiger had pushed through the gym's chic glass doors that led in from a partially open hallway with a pen and clipboard in his grasp and his eyes watching him intently.
"Mighty fine, Stripes, might fine," He glumly answered, coming to a standstill in front of the tiger, his lab-coated form towering above him. "Just ready to get back to my dull life."
"Aren't we all," Zdanskyi wryly replied with a heavy sigh, a sympathetic grin on his muzzle, and Nick snickered as his tail waged back and forth energetically, pleasantly surprised by the generally solemn mammal's humor.
"You are keeping your incision clean?" The tiger asked, his blue gaze moving to connect with his, and Nick nodded, inviting him to inspect the scar between his pecks with a polite grin and a motion of his paw.
Doctor Zdanskyi accepted the opportunity gratefully, kneeling down to his eye level as he pressed an ear against his chest, listening to his heart beat away like a war drum while Nick moved his paws behind his back, his gaze wandering aimlessly around the room's workout equipment as he waited for the all-clear.
"Clean and steady, just like it should be," Doctor Zdanskyi eventually noted, pulling away while he scribbled down the diagnosis, and Nick beamed up at him with an outrageous amount of pride in his grin, knowing fully well the tiger wouldn't take the bait for him to make an extra snarky comment.
"When you're out of my care I'll make sure to send you with a year's supply of Dormicine," The aging mammal promised, rising with a grunt, his tail straightened behind him. "I'll have more shipped in via Todderdam this weekend. Do you have enough pills to last until then?"
"Yup, and enough painkillers to last a lifetime," Nick quaintly assured, rising up onto the balls of his feet as a pondering frown ruffled his brow. "They give them out here like it's Halloween every day. I could start a drug ring with all the bulk I have."
"Rhetoric like that will land you in prison," Doctor Zdanskyi dryly warned, more concerned with finishing his form than idly chatting. Nick used the silence in the air to wander over to the gym's far glass wall, not rushing his steps as he squeezed between two rhino-sized treadmills lined up against the thick, transparent panel. He gazed out blankly across the impenetrable, seemingly endless jungle and the raging river that wound through it like a highway until his tail flicked and lowered in dissatisfaction.
"Come on, Doc, aren't you gonna tell me when I'll be let out of this luxury jail cell?" He asked, turning his pleading gaze over his shoulder as his ears pressed against his skull, and the tiger looked up from filling out his form with a serious spark in his eyes.
"That's not my decision to make," He informed, moving towards the doors he had entered through with his clipboard and pen under his arm. "Physically your tests show you're fit enough to return to duty, so long as you keep taking two of those pills a day. It's the Mayor and Chief Bogo who're taking their time ensuring your return to society is as seamless as possible."
"Well I hope they're quick, otherwise I might bolt back to Zootopia and disappear without a trace," He emptily threatened, more annoyed than angry, and his emerald gaze retreated back to stare out the window intently. "The security here isn't too enviable. Sure, I'd have to spend s few days in the jungle, but hey, at least it's not the Arctic."
"That it is not, Mr Wilde," Doctor Zdanskyi absentmindedly agreed, holding open the Gym's door behind him for a moment as he departed with a farewelling nod of his head. "I'll be back in ten with Trainer McCollie."
A sigh escaped past Nick's lips as the doors clicked shut, leaving him in his own company once again. He stood at the window for a few long seconds, studying his own orange and white reflection before he turned and stepped onto the oversized treadmill beside him.
"Grey and dark green are my least favorite colors, you know," He pointedly told the window, straining his paw up onto the high console and setting the treadmill's pace to 'As swift as a fox'. It took the machine a few seconds to catch up to the speed, but when he found himself panting again he plugged his earbuds in and was immediately greeted by another sweat-inducing slur of racy words.
"I've come to like purple," He casually admitted, steepening the incline of his sprint and speeding up his pace even further.
Judy's purple eyes snapped shut as she collapsed face-first onto her tiny bed, her limbs sprawling lifelessly across it and her ears falling like boulders onto her sweaty back. The bags that had been accumulating like snow under her eyes for the last exhausting days dragged her towards the sleep she so desperately craved, but with a groan she forced herself to roll face-up, her right arm lying across her core as she stared up at the orange evening sunlight making the discolorations in her ceiling even more noticeable.
"I've got to ask that Gnu upstairs to fix his pipe," She unenthusiastically murmured, watching the blades of her ceiling fan spin in a lopsided circle, sending cool air flowing over her lower body.
"And I'll have to turn the heat on soon, too," She tepidly added, sighing at the prospect of struggling to use her barely-functioning, ancient heater while she orientated her body so that her feet hung limply off the edge of her bed. With another loud groan she pulled herself into a slumped sit, suppressing a wince and grimacing in pain as her sore muscles fought against her stiff movements. What she wouldn't give to be a permanent resident of Nick's warehouse...
That lazy fox that had forced her paw to get him to follow the doctor's orders was still at the MGRI. It'd been weeks since she had last visited him, and their daily phone calls, the only time she'd be able to hear his voice, only lasted a few minutes at most thanks to the Institute's restrictions.
She had used the last of her yearly allowance of vacation days earlier on in his nearly 6 week recovery, and the sole day every week she got off nowadays she always spent filling out the paperwork for cases she worked every other day of the week. There were several especially that had drained her of both energy and mental strength; a car theft in front of the city council during broad daylight, a hit and run in an industrial zone in Sahara Square, and an attempted arson in Little Rodentia, to name a few.
It was hard enough solving cases with the other partnerless officers that varied in her cruiser's passenger's seat on a day-to-day basis, but on some days she was forced to work alone - left to gather evidence, interview witnesses and suspects, file charges on lawbreakers, and then come home to fill out every last smudge of paperwork - all of it by herself! Thank Gosh she was getting her partner back soon, otherwise she wasn't too sure she'd be able to even crawl out of bed by the end of the month.
With a heavy blink she rose onto her unsteady feet, trudging to her desk chair and dragging herself and her paper-laden knapsack up onto it. They both weighed as much as lead, or at least they felt like it, and she wasn't able to do anything more than throw her bag onto her empty desk, flick her lamp on and open up her laptop with her right paw as her left stripped her of her protective vest, leaving her in her unwashed skin-tight suit.
Even though Nick was coming back to the force ready and raring the exact date of his return was still hidden behind the Mayor's secretive curtain. There had been several times during the last few weeks when she had strolled by Chief Bogo's closed office door to overhear him and the lion talking via phone, but the two or three occasions she had been able to eavesdrop had only left her baffled. Even her long ears couldn't decipher the other half of the confusing conversation.
What was certain, though, was that Nick Wilde wasn't going to be Nick Wilde in the ZPD, or in public, from now on. He'd have to memorize a backstory, childhood, and the character of a completely fabricated individual with a new name and new interests. All of this was to cover up his existence; if the media caught wind that he was still alive and in one of the most coordinated witness protection programs ever constructed who would know what exactly the public reaction would be? Maybe it would all turn out OK, but it wasn't a roll of the dice neither she or the Mayor was willing to risk.
When we're alone or with some of the others who know what's happened he'll be able to be his sly foxy self. She hopefully reassured, clicking open the Zoogle Chrome icon on her taskbar and piloting to the ZPD's online database. She stretched her entire body at once once she had signed in, cracking her fingers and squeezing her eyes shut as she popped her neck out and arched her back.
"I need some coffee right about now," She wistfully admitted as she moved to lean over her keyboard, her gaze cutting over to a daisy shaped coaster with a day old Starbuck's cup on it.
Her fingers began to fill out form after form without her brain being truly invested in the paperwork. It was the same, monotonous information time and time again, recalling the same events over and over, a necessary job but by far her least favorite part of being an officer of the law. A half hour passed in a blink of her worn eyes, then an hour, and finally two before her paws finally stopped tapping her laptop's keys.
A vibrant buzz in her pocket had drawn her attention away from the angelic white light of her screen, and as she pulled out her phone and read over the incoming caller ID a thankful grin rose on her muzzle. A tiny sigh of relief that the boredom of paperwork would be temporarily nullified slipped past her lips as she swiped the answer button.
"I thought I told you not to call unless it was an emergency," She sarcastically scolded, raising the phone up to her perked ear along with a critical eyebrow.
"How would you like me to reply to that?" The unmistakeable voice on the other line joshed, and Judy grimaced wider at the characteristic tone of the tod. "For, 'Being away from you is an extreme emergency and I will always need your love and support!', press 1. Alternatively, for, 'I'm being burned alive by some smartass cute little bunny! Help!', press 2."
"Har har," She mockingly chimed back, rolling her eyes as she leaned into her chair, her left paw fiddling with the peeling veneer along the edge of her desk. "Just you wait until I get my paws on you, you dumb fox."
"Oh, believe me, I can't wait," Nick lewdly guaranteed, and Judy suppressed an offended scoff as she slowly shook her head back and forth, her cheeks as red as freshly picked tomatoes. Truth be told she could hardly wait too, given how their first time - and their last, she might add - had been interrupted by an infuriated Doctor Zdanskyi before she'd experienced even the slightest twitch in pleasure.
"Work as tiring as always, fluff?" Nick buzzed a tad more humbly, sounding genuinely interested about her day despite its forgettableness.
"You bet your tail," She wearily exhaled, briefly shutting her eyes as her shoulders sagged, and when her vision returned she was staring out her apartment's small window overlooking the artificially lit yellow street. "I've been blowing through papers since about 8. I haven't eaten dinner yet, I'm so busy. I can't wait for you to get back to the city so I can dump this load of crap on you every night for the next year."
"If you do that, I'll accuse you of unjust and cruel treatment," Nick coolly told, and Judy chuckled at his semi-serious tone, her chest warming up. "Jeez, since 8? Take the evening off. You've been busy enough these past few nights."
"Justice never sleeps," She replied, her toothy grin closing while Nick scoffed, and she could picture him shaking his head with a worried yet sarcastic frown entrenched on his brow.
"Chief Bogo is an incompetent imbecile if he thinks he can keep on pushing you this far day in and day out," Nick frustratedly commented, but his tone lightened up again and Judy straightened her form as her eyes moved back to her computer screen. "Hey, talking about Chief Horny, was he at the station today?"
"He was during assignments, but I didn't drop the cruiser by till late, so I dunno about then," She answered, her left paw scratching the back of her neck as curiosity rose within her like a coastal tide over where he was taking the conversation. "Why do you ask?"
"Oh, no reason," He flatly shrugged off. "It's just that a few hours ago I got a visit from some important mammals who left me with a few gigantic manila folders."
"The Chief visited you?" She excitedly cried, shooting forwards as she began to bounce up and down, eyes alight with vitality. "Nick, that's great!"
"He and the Mayor both did," Nick warmly elaborated, sounding humored by her sudden attentiveness. "I sort of got an apology for this whole thing from the two of them, but, you know, politicians. You never really know, do you? Anyways, my evening's been spent pouring over these files they left in my delicate paws. You should really see these things sometime, Carrots; they're deeper than any rabbit hole you're family's ever dug."
"So tell me about the fox who'll soon be my new partner," Judy avidly said, brushing off the sarcastic comment with a twitch of her nose, her feet still bobbing eagerly in the air in anticipation.
"No can do, Carrots, wouldn't wanna ruin the surprise!" Nick warmly chimed, disappointment marginally growing beneath her fur at his jocular reply, but soon enough her spirits were in the clouds once more. "You'll just have to contain your excitement until Monday morning."
"You're coming back this Monday?" She blurted out, hardly believing his words until he confirmed with a cool yet excited uh-huh, and her eyes darted to the seasonal calendar hanging crookedly on a rusty nail on her ugly wallpaper. "That's only a weekend away! Are you sure you'll be prepped for all the attention you're gonna get from the force? It's not like we get a new fox cop every other week."
"That's what I'm spending my every waking moment doing - I've been reading over my childhood years while we've been yapping away, and I have to say you'll either love me or despise me once you hear about it," He blithely commented, and Judy smiled at his oh-so-sure tone.
"One of those I'm already feeling," She confessed, flustered, her paw resting on her side tapping against her ribs as heat rushed over her body.
"Love you too, Judy," Nick reluctantly cooed with forced pleasure, and she pictured him rolling his eyes, sick of her romantic forays.
"Hate you, Nick," She lovingly retorted, hanging up and resting her phone beside her charger to the loud cackles of her predatory boyfriend, and she let another tired sigh slip past her raised lips as her paws returned to batter away at her laptop's keys.
"That fox is going to be the death of me," She glumly predicted, her grin widening.
Choose your words carefully, Judy...
Intrigue: A Zootopia Fanfiction, Chapter 1 - February 1st
A Fox In Shining Armor: A Zootopia Fanfiction, Chapter 16 - January 14th