So a guest commented on my last chapter and said that the best thing to do would be to write a story about the changes in phone screen's. As you can tell, I more than agreed. It's a far cry from my heaviest fic (those are coming, kids. So get ready for some major hurt/comfort!) but it's a perfect way to really talk about Nick and his progression.

And as you know, I love that stuff.

Next fic might be as calm and muted as this one as well. Suggestions are, as always, welcome (though I can't promise they'll all be done) and I'd love to hear from you all about what you'd like to see! Remember- I can do basically anything except for Romance in this fic.

To those hoping for a Nick x Judy fic, turn thee round to other places. This is strictly platonic, and it's gonna stay that way. If you want romance there's a lovely collection of fics already scattered about that can sate all your needs!

So here it is- Nick's changes in phones and the screens on those phones.

o0o

Friendship is unnecessary, like philosophy, like art... It has no survival value; rather it is one of those things which give value to survival.

~C.S. Lewis

o0o

Nick got his first cell phone when he turned fifteen and business deals became considerably harder when carrier pigeons vied for their own rights and began to unionize against him.

"How'm I supposed to do anything without you guys?" the young Fox, still barely growing into his coarse pelt, complained, eyes wide and bemused. As far as he knew he was the only way the small flock was getting their payday. "And what'r you s'possed ta do without me!"

"You pay us in seeds," the leader pigeon, a small grey thing by the name of Anthony Plume, scowled, the rest of the small congregation behind murmuring their agreement. "Besides, you'll do fine without us."

"I need to get messages out!" the younger shot back, folding small arms over a shirt that was far too large for his lanky body (truth be told he looked more like a scarlet beanpole that had traveled to Hawaii and had only had the common sense to bring back an ugly shirt. Or so a few people had told him). "You're the only way I can do that!"

"There's more ways, Wilde." The bird spat out his name like it was a curse, tutting back and forth across the overturned crate he'd used to deliver his speech on freedom and the press and such and such. They'd met in an alleyway by the Fox's home- a shabby place that smelled like old chinese food and damp socks. But it was one of the only places in the city that had access to some of the major pawn shops and connected itself securely in an intersection of two main streets that lead to and from the highway, bringing in new, valuable and naive customers. Without communication, ways of going down both at once, he was done for.

"I need you," he said again, almost ready to drop down on his knees into the filthy puddles of sewage and fast food containers. "You're my only way to make anything in this stupid city!"

But there wasn't any convincing the birds. "Why don't you just get a cellphone." Anthony told him, shuffling the rest of his flock off. "It'll do you some good to rely on yourself for once."

And then they were gone- off to change the world of avian rights, no doubt.

Wilde, at first, hadn't known quite what to do. But in the end it all came down to the fact that the bird had been right. He had to learn to depend on himself and no one else. So Wilde, at the fresh faced age of fifteen and three quarters, waltzed into the nearest T-Mammel on 3rd Street and Trunk Drive and bought his first cell phone. It was a flip phone the size of his paw and had a preselected set of screens.

There was a park, a famous painting and an Island Paradise. He chose the Island. It looked most like what he was going to buy with his millions when he made it big.

The phone also came with a selection of seven ringtones. Three were various animal sounds that were almost too ironic to use, one was a popular song that had been on the radio too much to manage, two were zen (wind chimes and ocean breezes), and the last one was a simple office tone. He went with the latter at first to sound professional. When it was told to him that scams weren't professional in any sense of the word he switched to the windchimes. They amused him, if he could even use that word.

They did not amuse the people he did deals with.

"The hell is that?" He'd been selling something or other that had been picked up in one of the pawn shops and refurbished as new to a Rhino with a bad temper when his phone had gone off.

"Nothing," Wilde had just waved him off. "Ignore it."

Ting-ling-ling-ling the windchimes chirped.

"I hate it." The Rhino snarled. "Pick it up or the deals off."

"It's just a cell phone," Wilde snorted. "You can't judge a deal by my ringtone."

Ting-ling-ling-ling the windchimes agreed.

"Look kid. I ain't in the mood to be told what I should or shouldn't like."

"What? Is the big bad Rhino afraid of a little wind chime?"

Ting-ling-ling-ling the windchimes admonished.

Needless to say, the deal was off. And before the hulking mass of a patron had left he'd decided to also show Nick just what he thought of his cell phone and its ting-ling-ling-ing. The Fox wrinkled his nose, pinching the dirt covered device between two of his fingers, delicately excavated from the bottom of a rather murky looking mud puddle. The wires were sticking every which way, blues and reds and yellows cheerily sparking. The windchime gave one last ting-ling-looooooonnnnnnggg before fizzing for the last time.

The Island Paradise went dark.

Wilde tried his best to fix it. But he'd never really been tech savvy, and so he laid his first phone to rest on a Thursday in the middle of the afternoon, throwing it into a dumpster in the back of a Russian cafe that made fantastic borche. With his hands in his pockets and a scowl on his face, he wandered off to look for a way to make money to find his next device.

His third phone had been bought with the winnings of a cheated hand of Blackjack and a bunch of luck in a craps game. He'd been the proud owner of something he'd stolen from a woman's purse until that had fallen into the sink in the back of a dingy gas station and so an upgrade had been needed. The casino cut him off at a $400 limit and kicked him out the door when he'd made $427 (the last $27 had been made at slots that he'd rigged with the help of a very puckish Rat). He got himself a tiny thing with enough buttons to text quickly, a calculator, sixteen ringtones (he deleted windchimes) and a set of wallpapers that were far more satisfactory to his life goals.

There were twelve choices in total. Most were professional photographs of generic scenes with flowers and butterflies and mountains and smoky rivers. The one he ended up choosing was a pirates chest. It fit him best, seeing as one day he'd be rich enough to have a room just to hold his many cases overflowing with gold and silver coins.

He'd lose it in a bet with a Ferret.

"I want the phone too," the wily creature had said, pointing one brown and ill-managed nail at the device that had been sitting casually at Nick's elbow. Their cards were spread in front of both of them like fans for ladies in court, but their intentions were anything but pious.

"No," Nick growled. "No way."

"Then I fold," he leaned forward, eyeing the already growing pile of crumpled bills, still working hotel key cards and a knockoff watch. "And rules being rules, I'll just take my winnings and-"

"Fine." The phone was pushed into the center. "But it's that or nothing. And you'd better have one hell of a thing to put against it."

"Naturally!" He added a gold chain with a happy grin, waving it in front of Nick's face. The Fox just looked at it with the eye of a trained dealer. It was fake. Years of experience with false and faux had taught him well enough. The thing was just a combination of badly formed copper ringlets washed over in metallic paint. But it was something, and if he pitched it with finesse to some of the less trained pawn brokers in the city he could get an easy hundred or two.

"All or none," he said, shuffling the deck.

"All or none," the Ferret agreed.

It would turn out, after he was out $174.55, one watch and a his precious phone, that the Ferret had been cheating. Then again, so had Nick, so there was no reason to get mad. He was a pot. His adversary had been a kettle. It was useless.

The next day he canceled his plan and got a new one. When it went through he picked up his new phone. It was an old flip, and Nick liked the nostalgia for exactly ten days before he got tired of boring, generic wallpaper and was back in the store with a fresh pressed Hawaiian shirt (the green one that made his eyes pop) and his best red and yellow tie (the one that matched his fur) and put whatever moves he'd picked up in bars on the lonely worker that was there, a small, timid lamb who hadn't seen it coming. Prey were easy target, really. His prey (always go for what we used to hunt, his grandfather had told him. Sheep. Birds. Rabbits. Especially Rabbits.). And before long he'd secured himself a gold star of a plan for a fraction of the price and a set of wallpapers that would make even the most sneaky of Ferret's jealous.

He chose a red convertible. His dream car. It seemed like a reasonable (though minuscule) goal for a budding entrepreneur on his way to taking over the world's financial industry.

It would break after two years, but it had had a good run.

When Wilde turned nineteen, pagers were all the rage. He had one for seventeen days, four hours, six minutes and eleven seconds before he threw it out, damning the thing to hell in a hand basket. What was the use of it anyway? It had no ringtone, no style and, most importantly, no wall paper. How was he meant to display his dreams on a small 2x4 screen if he didn't have the screen it was meant to be displayed on in the first place.

He'd fortunately brought it back early enough to trade.

"Not satisfied, sir?" the female Giraffe had taken it back with a knowing grin.

"They're everywhere," he said, his excuse feeble but true.

"Yeah," she sighed. "We've gotten a lot of returns lately. People think these are cool or something like that. I think it's because they were on a show. One of those drama romance things or whatever. They don't get that they're mostly for doctors and lawyers and things like that." She packed it back in its box, slipping it beneath the deep red counter that stood between them. Going through a selection in an old three ring binder she tapped her hoof twice on what she'd been looking for. "I can give you an exact trade, if you'd like. You won't have to pay anymore than you already did. It's not the newest model but-"

"I'll take it."

His fifth phone could slide two ways, one to show a keyboard, another to give him the full screen. There were twenty five ringtones and sixty seven wallpapers. He chose a Victorian mansion looking over Sahara Square backed by a golden sunset. It made the most sense, as one day he'd have that exact mansion on that exact hill and enough money to buy the sun so it'd be stuck in the same glorious sunset for as long as he desired.

On March 7th a news report was released on Fur 5 about a line of technology released by a miser of a Tiger named Edmund Namurr, the CEO of Namurr & Namurr Inc and Nick's personal hero for seven years running (his embezzlement scandal of 1994 still held a special place in the Fox's heart). Apparently no safety had been placed inside of his devices, and the absence of flame retardant material had quickly ended in most of his devices bursting into small fires while being charged.

Nick's was one of those devices.

Suffice to say, while he watched the mansion bend and twist and then turn black around the melting plastic and sparking paint, Namurr was moved to the number seven spot on Nick's idol list. Conning was one thing, but he was not going to be outfoxed by some bigwig cutting corners.

He was out of inspiration and a phone.

The Fox would go through several other models and makes. Every screen would display a passion. None of these would come true, but it didn't stop him from trying.

Nick's twelfth phone had been a present to himself for his 30th birthday. A sad and lonely day. He had bought a six pack of sour beer, ordered cheap pizza covered in sausage and bacon and wrapped the single box for himself in the bag that the food had come in. His cake had been a stack of pancakes with an unlit candle pushed through the top.

He had no Island Paradise. There wasn't a house or a room just for gold coins. He didn't own a mansion or travel the world. There was no bombshell on his arm (though he did have a few numbers stored away that he was proud of) and the Universe didn't know who he was.

He was a Predator of no real prowess or importance. Just a Fox with a scam.

So as soon as he got his phone he unlocked it, turned on his camera and took a picture of himself. Looking at it, dissatisfied with the gap in his fangs, the angle of light, he took another. And another. And another. When there were enough there to fill a small hard drive he picked his favorite and deleted the rest. That would become his new wallpaper. Himself. Because if he was to be of no importance to anyone yet, then at least he could be for himself.

"You really are an ass, aren't ya?" Finnick, a newly found partner in schemes commented dryly, looking at Nick's phone with a wary eye. "Who even puts a picture of themselves as their background?"

"People that don't have any friends." Wilde sneered back.

Finnick found that answer suitable and never commented on the matter again.

Nick had become an expert at the selfie. He knew the right angle the sunlight had to be, the right smile, the twitch of his brow, eyes, the curve of his head. He was the master of all things vain and self indulging.

He also was very particular with the things that he was vain and self indulging about.

Which was why the day he set up for his newest wallpaper -smile, pose, quirk, snap- and was interrupted by a Rabbit he was not pleased. What would people think, really, if he, Nick Wilde, a Fox, had shared the screen of his most intimate communication devices with a Predator. And not only was she a predator. She was a Type A, stubborn, holier than thou Bunny with a skewed idea of how the world worked. Like how she thought she could be a Police Officer. Or how she thought she could just invade his picture.

"Hey!" he snapped at her, when she leaned over his shoulder to smile cheerily into the eye of his lense. They were on the train to collect another piece of potential evidence. The lighting outside (sunny, brilliantly so) was perfect and the movement of the wheels against old tracks had finally evened out enough to get a steady shot. And then she was there, propping her head up on his shoulder, her long ears draping across his head, her smile bright and cheery and so genuine it made him sick.

"What!" She pulled back, stunned and perhaps even a little insulted.

"You can't just do that."

"Do what?"

"Get in on my photo's like that."

"Why not?"

"They're mine."

She sniffed, her tiny pink nose wiggling in antipathy, glaring at him with those intense violet eyes that seemed to follow his every move. Finally she turned away. "Fine," Judy said through a huff. "Take your stupid pictures."

"Thank you," he drawled, smile dripping with artificial sugar.

He didn't notice that she made sure to tilt her ear ever so slightly, just to make sure every picture was interrupted with a tiny triangle of grey fluff. Even if he didn't see, it was still a tiny victory for the Bunny next to him as Nick snapped away, choosing his favorite and setting it to his screen.

She didn't comment on it until the next day when his hands had been busy on the wheel of his car and he'd asked her, with tentative trust, to text a contact of his for information.

"You know," Judy told him, scrolling down the seemingly endless list, "you don't smile as much as this."

"What?" He looked at her for just a moment, the road pulling his eyes away.

"Your pictures." She gave the list another scroll. "You smile a lot in them. You don't smile as much in real life. At least, you don't smile for real."

"What's that even supposed to mean, Whiskers?"

"It's Judy."

"Whatever." He waved her off, taking another turn, stopping at a red light, tapping his finger impatiently against the rounded, black edge of the steering wheel. "What does that even mean?"

"It doesn't mean anything." She shrugged, finally finding who she was looking for. "You just don't smile for real in your pictures. But you have a lot more of you smiling on your phone then you actually smile. That's all."

Before he could comment on the ridiculousness of it all she'd already started to talk to the shady figure on the other end, introducing herself as a ZPD officer and merrily going on about how helpful they were and grateful she and her newly christened partner were for their help. Nick just drove silently, listening to her prattle on, wondering endlessly if the smile lines he'd developed were worthy of their place beside his maw.

With seven hours left on the case, Nick took a moment to relax on the ride back. They'd picked up food from a greasy and cheap drive thru. He'd gotten something with meat on meat on meat and she, scrunching her nose at the smell of cooked animal, had dug into a container of fried roots.

After their hands were wiped clean and the mish mosh of cardboard was thrown away she'd thought she'd seen a map in a kiosk on the corner that could have helped them navigate their way better. To help with the time, he'd pulled out his phone, waiting for her to return, and started up his camera.

By the time the flash had erupted, she was already there, by his side, her arm hooked around his neck.

"What was that for?" he asked, rubbing at the shoulder she'd leaned on. For her lithe weight, the small thing had one hell of a sharp body, made up of points and jabs and edges. She was more of a mystery of geometric kind then a fluffy Bunny.

She just shrugged, unfolding the large picture of the city across the dashboard. "Revenge?"

He checked the picture, rolled his eyes and sighed. "Well, if you're gonna get back at me can you at least do it on my good side?"

He took three more pictures of them pressed side by side, finally settling on one where they'd held up the phone together.

"You know," she mumbled over the criss crossed lines and exit signs scattered haphazardly in between wrinkles and greasy thumbprints, "you could just delete it."

"What?"

"You haven't deleted it," she commented numbly. "I get it, you know. Not wanting to have my kind on your phone…"

Nick tilted his head, ears flopping to the side. "Your-"

"Prey."

He didn't reply, deciding that silence, for once, was as golden as they claimed it to be. She was right, of course. His family, all of them Foxes, would have rebuked the presence of such a creature there and his friends, if he could even call the meager collection of Carnivores he'd done deals with over the years that, would have most likely gone on a rampage and done their best to smear his already filthy name through the mud.

Zootopia was a place where animals of all genus, phylum, species, got along and lived side by side. It was not a place where they found those of another step on the food chain cheek to cheek with their prey in their photo album.

So it was even a surprise to him when he clicked on the least awful one that they had together and set it as his wallpaper.

His excuse was that it was the best he'd looked in ages.

He wouldn't reason that his smile looked the most real it had in ages.

During the case, Nick had cracked his phone three times. The poor thing, suffering too much abuse, had rebelled against him and the face mirroring back, smiling up from pixelated happiness, faded out into a collage of spots and colors and spiderweb leaks of light. So the moment that it was all over he grudgingly traded it in for an older model (all that he could afford) and slapped it into his new case.

The phone had an app for making his own ringtone and a decent enough camera. He started it up, found the angle of light, rose the device up to begin a smile…

… and then he stopped…

For two hours he sat on a park bench in front of a large fountain, listening to screaming children and sirens and a bubbling chatter of the streets around him, and looked through the pre-programmed pictures. There were piles of money, pirate chests, mansions and worlds.

He chose a blue sky.

The case was over, and it was time to say goodbye.

Judy had already been congratulated by over half of the police force, and her head had spun enough from remembering names and ranks and numbers. The small bread drawer in her pull away kitchen was now stuffed with business cards (the bagels sulking atop having been unjustly relocated) and she'd already received enough emails from Chief's across the country requesting she move to their cities for twice the pay and prestige.

"You could, if you wanted to," Chief Bogo had told her after escorting her into his office the day before. "I would understand if you did."

"Their treatment of me would have been the same had I been there first, sir" Judy protested easily, making sure to take all precautions to avoid an accusatory tone. "You gave me a chance. They wouldn't have. If you're okay with it, I'd like to stay here."

Bogo had smiled, or gave her something close to a smile. They'd never like each other. Not really. Bogo and Judy had too many walls between them from the short time they'd been given to build, and there wasn't a strong enough hammer to break them down. She'd always remember his treatment of her and the way she'd been demoted for her place on a food chain. He'd always remember her renegade ways and sneer at her suck up, thick headed behavior that was sure to stick around. But respect was all that was needed in a healthy and working environment like theirs, and they did, if anything, respect one another.

"I admire you for your choice," Bogo said truthfully. "But I still extend the offer of switching. There isn't a raise for you here, and there won't be special treatment-"

"I'm not asking for it, sir."

He nodded stiffly, the muscles of his neck scraping the stiff edge of his collar. "Right. Then I applaud you for your stupidity. And your loyalty. We'll be sure to get you a partner before the end of the week."

Judy's ears had perked, her body going strait. "Actually, Sir, that was the one thing I wanted to talk to you about."

Bogo steepled his hooves, looking at her from over the long ridges of his snout. "No special treatment, Hopps," he warned, "remember?"

"No, of course, sir, I totally understand that. But I don't really need a new partner. You saw how I worked with Wilde-"

"The Fox." the Ox burst out. "How could I miss. You two- a Fox and a Rabbit."

"We worked well together, Chief! We really did." He'd been her line of defense, the one standing beside her through thick and thin. And the animal was in dire need of a job. There was only so much longer he could go on swindling people in the city before he ran out of pockets to trick. "He's a great candidate. He knows the city, sir, and everything in it. And I believe that-"

"You worked well enough, Hopps." his paw in the air cut the new detective off, and her mouth snapped shut with a sharp pop. "You're blinded by whatever kind of comradery you developed. And I commend you for trying. But you forget what kind of animal Wilde is."

"I know we got off to a rough start-"

"I think that you're under the impression that rough start is all you'll have." Judy's mouth snapped shut, sitting back in the old wooden chair, observing the officer before her with a kind of terrified reality. Bogo leaned forward, brows raising just enough to make a point. "He gives up things and gets new ones as fast as you can run, Hopps. That's what he's like. That rough start? That's him. That's what you're getting. There isn't some second layer that's hidden underneath. And I know you have some… fascination with fixing people," she flinched. He ignored it. "but Wilde isn't a project. Too many people have worked on him. And I'm not going to let an officer in my precinct fall prey to that. We have too much work to do. I hate distractions." He leaned back again, turning down to go through a few papers on his desk, harrumphing at whatever he saw there. "That Fox has been in and out of here before. Trust me, Hopps." he told the papers, "He replaces his cell phone every few minutes. What makes you so special?"

"With all due respect, sir, I'm not a cell phone."

"You are to him," Bogo pointed out. "You're just another object to Wilde. You're disposable. He uses you when it's convenient, and then he turns you in for the next model." Her ears had stuck backward, drooped, her entire body suddenly a great deal heavier. Her superior didn't seem to take notice, though, closing the file and reaching for his coffee mug. "He's probably halfway done with his next scheme right now, and when he is we'll be sure to send you out to arrest him."

"But sir-"

"No, Hopps." He took a sip, grimaced, and then took another. "You need someone who can work well with Rabbits. By nature, Fox's can't. Wilde is gone. He left. He isn't coming back. It's time you made your peace with that. Find someone who can work well with you. Someone who won't be a danger to your kind."

My kind can manage themselves, she almost wanted to snap. But she bit the inside of her mouth and nodded instead. "Yes, sir."

So that day, walking to work, she wondered what kind of trouble she was in. With a bread box and an email filled with job opportunities and moping over the idea that a Fox had left her behind after all that they'd been through, it must have been a substantial amount of trouble.

The precinct was in the middle of a busy intersection, four blocks from the bus stop that she took too and fro on her commute. She'd left early that day so she could stop at a terrible coffee shop just a few steps away. It really was awful coffee- bitter and grainy, like every cup was the bottom of the pot and every pot was broken, but they had fantastic carrot pancakes, and she'd ordered a stack and stared at them until they went cold, watching the steam recede, taking sips of bad coffee and sulking.

It wasn't fair, really. It just wasn't.

She hadn't expected the special treatment. Not really. But she'd expected…

… she'd expected…

Perhaps it was just mover's remorse. Her mother had said something about that over the phone. Some sort of fake condition that made animals attach to others too quickly in order to instill a sense of home. It sounded like complete bull hockey, and was definitely something that her mother had made up just to make sense of it all, but as the hours passed it hadn't sounded all that unreasonable. Maybe that had been it after all. In a desperate effort to make friends she'd attached herself to the first person who was there. And that first person was a Fox… who happened to be a flight risk.

Sinking down into her booth, Judy let out a heavy sigh, staring forlornly at her stack of pancakes.

"Screw mover's remorse," she told the flapjacks. "No such thing…" And she knew, in her heart of hearts, that she was right. Maybe she was too trusting. But she'd made a friend. An honest to god friend. And she'd seen so much coming out of that… thing they'd had. Whatever the hell it was. A connection, a perfect pair, the partnership of all partnerships. It had been doomed from the start, really. Her father had been right. Bunnies had to watch out for Fox's. They were tricky, and in the end they'd just find a way to make you miserable.

She sighed again. Her stomach growled but she knew eating wasn't going to happen. Her hand raised, ready to call over the waiter to get the check and a to-go container-

FLASH

She yelped, nearly falling off the booth, but a longer arm caught her, tugging her to the side of a larger animal. The familiar and smell of cologne (something woodsy and dark and cheap) and shampoo (like clean laundry and chemicals) filled her nose, followed by an overwhelming amount of red. For a moment she didn't know what or who was attacking her, and her hand reached down for her taser, ready to take care of what she needed to if need be-

- In the end, though, it was a ugly tie that gave them away.

"Nick!"

"Hey there, Judes!" She gaped, mouth opening and closing until she very much resembled a shocked trout. "Oh don't act so surprised, you told me this was your favorite place. The pancakes are good, right? You said they were." He raised his hand, a waitress seeing him from across the way already taking out a pad and pen. "A plate of bacon and blueberry cakes, please and thank you, sweetheart." He turned back to Judy, and that huge smile was soon all that she saw. His hand lifted higher, and the second thing was the phone in his hand. "You're terrible at pictures, you know that?" Him, smiling like a loon. Her, shock and surprise.

She blinked. "Um…"

"C'mon. I need a good one. This is a new phone." There was the flash of a camera. That did the trick to wake her up. Judy shook her head, blinked three more times, and then promptly punched him in the arm. "Ow!" He dropped his phone on the table between two large mustard stains and rubbed his shirt sleeve where her fist had made its mark. "What was that for!"

She pointed at him, jabbing her finger at his face. "You left!"

"What?"

"I vouched for you!" She leaned against the back of the booth, ducking under his arm to get as far away as she could. "And you left. The Chief told me that you were a lost cause yesterday."

"No offense, Whiskers, but I can see why he'd think that." He smiled again, as if the idea of being a threat to security was just a normal, everyday activity.

"But… but you left." she said again, as if saying it a million times over would make it somehow more true. "And the chief said I was like a phone, and then you weren't there and-"

"He said you were a what?"

She swatted the question away. "It doesn't matter. What matters is-"

"I didn't leave, Judy." That made her stop. Furrowing her brow she leaned back again, taking in his whole face, posture, tone. He didn't seem to be lying. In fact, he seemed almost desperate- arms extended, face tight and pleading. Please believe me this time, the con artist was saying between every smudged line he'd drawn for her. You're the only one who seems to.

She swallowed, fingers going to toy with the badge pinned to her pocket. "You… didn't?"

"Heck no! I just had to settle a few things after the case was all over. Plus," he held up his phone, wiggling it at her, "the screen was cracked. Oh, and look!" His hands fumbled with the object of her identification- a horrible red thing with grey stars that only he could seemingly pull off on a backdrop of green, Hawaiian mess. "I got a new tie and everything."

"... oh…" a smile, albeit a small one, wriggled onto her face. "Chief said you bought a lot of phones."

"Wow. How much does this guy know about me?"

"You've got a record, Wilde. Every purchase you make is cataloged."

"Wow," he said the word again, but that time it was far more impressed than she'd expected it to be. "Well, anyway, that's where I went. And then I went to your apartment this morning, but you were already gone."

"You were at my apartment?"

"Yeah. I wanted to drive you to work." He shrugged, but the way his teeth flashed out, eyes going bright, she could see the easy fear that he was doing his best to mask. "You… you said we were partners, right…? Well… figured my first day on the job should be… presentable…?"

You can say no, she heard. You can say no and I'll leave and that'll be it. But please, please, please don't say no.

Of course I'll say yes, she wanted to scream back. Do you realize how much I've missed you? How much it hurt to think I'd lost the only friend I'd made since I moved to this horrible city? Don't you realize that I trust you more than you trust yourself?

Instead she just smiled, winding her arms around his middle, face pressed against his horrible new tie. She felt him stiffen beneath her grip, but just pressed tighter. Her ears tucked and bent under his chin. He chuffed, and the breath ruffled the downy hairs. "Wilde, you idiot…" Judy mumbled. When he wrapped his arms about her, tugging the Rabbit to him, she didn't hear what he said over his heartbeat and the harmonious twinkling of laughter.

And from that moment on, the shift between them happened once more. They were back. But there was no back to be had. The flow of whatever was between them fell naturally and painlessly into place and their conversation and actions were without practice or creed. Everything was as it should be because it felt as if it was meant to be that way from the beginning.

Wilde and Hopps. Friends and Partners.

He sat across from her with a stack of blueberry pancakes, taking obnoxious bites of bacon, she sat on the other end, laughing so hard tears sprang into her eyes at a joke he'd told a million times but was funnier each one. The table between them was covered with strawberry jam fingerprints and Nick nearly spat out his coffee despite every warning she gave that it was the worst in the city. He kicked her knees and told her to eat and she kicked him back and told him to mind his own business, but proceeded to devour three out of six of the orange circles.

They split the check. She left a tip (a few rumpled bills on top of their receipt) and then they walked out together.

"I have to say," she told him honestly, adjusting the badge on her shirt. "if ever there was a good present for sticking with the force, this is it."

"What? Bad coffee?"

"No, dufus." She pushed his arm, smiling like a goof. "You!"

"At last, someone notices my full potential." He paused, taking in her words. "And what do you mean sticking with the force. You were gonna quit?"

"No! No, no, no. I've just been getting a lot of… offers. That's all. To join other places."

"What's the catch?"

She scoffed. "None. Higher pay, better office space-"

"Oh." He scratched the back of his neck with his claws, leaving little indents in the fur. "So why didn't you accept it."

She shrugged, tugging at her blue vest. "I guess… I don't know…" another shrug. "They couldn't give me what I wanted."

"What you wanted…?"

She didn't say it, but he could guess from the harsh flush that suddenly coated most of her face. A smile, bright and real, encompassed his. Before she could do anything his arm was around her, paw secured over the side of her neck, and he was dragging her against his hip, ignoring her squeak of indignation. "C'mere!"

"Why!"

"Because I need a new wallpaper, that's why." His phone was in the air, his smile already practiced but far fuller than ever before. "And all this phone has are scenic mountain trails and majestic rivers."

"I like scenic mountains."

"No you don't. Now smile." She did, chuckling through her teeth as the clicking sound went off more than a few times. Watching them both appear on the screen together, holding their happy faces while the crowds moved by. He turned the phone around, showing her what he'd gotten, his arm around her the entire time. Together they picked the best one (he was wearing a grin too large, she was laughing too loudly) and he cheerfully set it as his background. "I think this is my favorite one," he told her as they neared the precinct. "I've had a lot of pictures, but this one takes the cake."

Side by side, with his phone in his pocket and hope renewed between them, they strode towards the office.

Chief Bogo was more than surprised to see him there, and put up a heavy mental battle before giving Judy the blessing to keep him on (though one slip up and that's it, he's through, understand me Hopps?), presenting the Fox with a badge of his own and a harsh glare that told him to watch his back.

At the end of the day Judy pulled Wilde close in front of the doors of the ZPD, snapping a picture of her own.

"What's that for?" he asked, watching her fingers burst furiously against the buttons on her screen.

"Wallpaper," she responded casually.

He was too happy to reply.

Please comment, follow, do whatever you need to to keep me fueled! Remember, the more things I get here, the faster I update (Well... sometimes... But I can dream...)

The next ones that I have planned have been condensed into two catagories

Fluffy

1. Nick punches Judy's landlord

2. Ten Times, One Time (or an assortment of numbers followed by one that goes against the previous message)

3. Donuts are a cops best friend. Unless your best friend is a Fox. With donuts.

4. Nick's sister (a character made in development and not in the movie) drops by.

Hurt/Comfort

1. Judy is shot on the job

2. Buried alive (Bogo sends the smallest animals in first to retrieve lost things... even if the ground isn't stable)

3. Judy is attacked on the job by a predator. She's fine. But there's things to think about.

4. Various ways Judy gets hurt

5. Nick get's hurt protecting Judy. Judy is pissed at all the wrong people.

I have Judy getting hurt a lot. Not because I like the whole damsel/hero feminine/masculine complex. Oh hell no. But she's the one with the more dangerous job. And, let's face it, Nick really isn't that present- he's a consultant at best. Which puts her in more danger being the one with the badge. That's why.

I'm not sure what'll come first, last or not at all, but for now know that I have ideas. They are here. They are in development. Might go slowly as I have other stories I need to start/update... but for now, let's just say that this is good.

Have a great day, my lovelies! Don't forget to read and review. And write your own stories! I'd love to see more show up here, especially from talented people like you!