A/N

Sorry about the slow updates, my other story will be updated soon too, but sometimes real life gets in the way of fun things. Sometimes you actually have to do real work, or take care of stuff, or get press ganged by insane WildeHopps zealots.

Disclaimer: Ugh, too tired to care right now, try again tomorrow.


Chapter 2: Revelations

Judy's mind froze. Well froze was an understatement, it was more like a car wreck, an epic car wreck that turned into a massive pile up and shut down the entire highway of her brain. The only portion that still seemed to be functional was the sarcastic portion in the back of her mind that had happened to be walking instead of driving. Of course you'd be engaged to an annoying fox, should have seen that coming the way your days been going. It was enough for Judy to let out a groan and flop her head forward onto her desk, her ears going limp and falling over the front edge.

She couldn't help but indulge in some self-pity at the moment.

Why, of all mammals, did I have to be engaged to someone who has made it their mission in life to annoy me?

And a fox? Can't forget about that little detail.

Cheese and Crackers! What had happened to make my parents engage me to a fox?

And a snarky, irritating one at that!

Maybe they didn't know he was a fox?

Carrot Sticks! Unless this is some sort of colossal mistake, I'm going to end up married to an infuriating fox for the rest of my life!

At least he has beautiful eyes.

A few more mental cars crashed into the pile up at that, before she ruthlessly squashed the thought.

But before she could think of much else there was a tap on her shoulder and an almost concerned voice whispered, "pssst, Carrots? You alright there?"

She let out a groan.

"This day couldn't possibly get any worse." she mumbled to no one in particular.

"Now don't be like that", came the still whispering but now smug voice from behind her, "This is only homeroom, there's still plenty of time for today to get worse."

Judy had just raised her head and turned around to tell him just how she would make his day worse when Mr. Weston called out, "If you two are done with your private conversation, I'll continue."

Judy turned back forward, ears burning in embarrassment for having been called out like that. She could hear a quiet snicker from behind her, and determinedly decided to ignore the fox for the rest of homeroom.

Unfortunately, ignoring the fox didn't keep her mind from thinking about him. It did however give her some time to think. When the bell finally sounded, she got up and turning to the fox said, "We need to talk."

He gave her another smirk before replying, "Isn't that what we're doing?"

Insufferable, irritating, annoying, fox! He made her want to pull her ears out. She almost growled but kept her voice even, "I mean privately, now come on."

Judy had taken a few steps before she turned around to see he hadn't followed her, in fact he had an almost confused look on his face as he took another deep breath and his nose scrunched slightly. She stormed back over and since he wasn't wearing a tie or anything else she could conveniently grab, she reluctantly snatched his paw and nearly dragged him out of the room.


Nick had found it amusing, almost charming, how the bold little bunny grabbed his paw and pulled him out of the classroom and down the hall. He'd at first thought that she had caught him sniffing her scent in the classroom and was going to berate him for it. It was pretty rude after all, but he thought he'd been subtle about it. However she wouldn't bother dragging him down the hallway like this if she had intended to just tell him off.

He took another careful breath and sniff catching her strange scent again. It wasn't that it was weird or even all that dissimilar to other bunnies, but every mammal smelled just a bit different, had a touch of uniqueness that separated them from the rest of their species. Since foxes were one of the species with a better sense of smell, this was especially apparent for him. Not only could he tell one mammal from another, like the bunny dragging him along probably could, but each mammals scent had multiple complex layers. And something about this bunny's scent was different, special even. Unfortunately for him though, he couldn't figure out exactly what that special aspect was; the sense of smell after all was a very abstract sense, it was more like interpreting a painting than reading a book.

Following in her wake as she moved through the hallway, he didn't even need to take a deep breath to get a good sniff of her scent. Smells like bunny and lavender shampoo and grass fields and vegetables, bit of stress and excitement and a touch of something else, he concentrated harder trying to clarify the complex weave of the smell that was this particular bunny. He couldn't define it properly but if he had to try and put it into words, her scent smelled like, like happiness and comfort. He nearly shook his head at the mental description.

Strange, that was what this bunny was.

Near the end of the hallway and close to the science labs, where there weren't any lockers that most of the other students were congregating around she stopped. Taking a quick look around, she quickly opened a door and pushed him into what appeared to be a janitor's closet.

By this time, he was thoroughly confused as to what she wanted, so as soon she'd closed the door and turned to face him, he let his automatic wit take over.

"You know, its polite to at least ask a guy out before dragging him off somewhere to make out, and isn't a janitor's closet just a little bit cliché?" he said giving her his best grin.

She had opened her mouth to say something before he spoke but ended up spluttering out a, "W-What?! No, No that's not-"

Nick cut in before she could finish speaking, he was starting to enjoy this and he needed something fun to compensate for the situation that had lead him to being sent out to the middle of no-where to finish his senior year of highschool. And anyway, despite what she might have said she was cute, especially how her pink nose twitched when she was flustered and mad.

"Carrots, come on, the highschool janitors closet? The only way you could get more cliché was if you dragged me under the bleachers."

Nick had to work hard to keep from laughing as embarrassment and anger seemed to be having a battle for control of her face. After a few moments anger seemed to win out and she snapped back at him, "Stop calling me that! And I did not bring you here to makeout! You're a fox anyway!"

He leaned down so they were looking eye to eye, she did have wonderfully beautiful eyes, and gave her the most charming smile he could manage before saying, "Too bad, you're so cute I might just go out with you even though you're not a vixen."

That caused a few more splutters and made her ears go bright pink. That hint of a smell in her scent from earlier grew just a bit. She was actually very cute, he thought, the mix of her determination and embarrassment along with her fit figure was a very attractive combination even to him as a fox. He wondered why she hadn't been sitting paired up with some buck on the bus or before class. Nick decided that he did like her despite everything his cousin had said about her.

She finally seemed to get her voice back under control because she poked him in the chest again and nearly snarled in a deliberate and slow tone, "I brought you here so I could figure out why my mysterious fiancée turns up during my senior year and. Is. A. Fox!"

And she had a sense of humor. Yes, he definitely liked this bunny. "Well, Carrots I have to give you credit, I've never heard a pickup line like that before." He smirked, "I know that I'm strikingly handsome but I didn't think that I was so good looking that I could make bunnies fall ears over tail in love with me at first sight."

Her response caught him off guard; he was expecting the flustered mad expression yes, but not what she said.

"I'm not fooling around Nicholas Piberius Wilde!"

His ears flattened, "Hey, how do you know my middle name?!" gods, had Gideon gone around and told everyone at the school? Being the new mammal during senior year was going to suck enough without having everyone laughing at his middle name.

"Because I'm supposed to marry a Nicholas Piberius Wilde!" she shot back at him, still mad.

Whatever fun he'd been having had vanished, "Okay, I'm sorry for teasing you, you can stop now. This isn't funny anymore. Did Gideon tell you my middle name?"

Her anger seemed to have diminished but had left behind a mountain of exasperation. "I'm not joking! There's a marriage contract for me to marry one Nicholas Piberius Wilde. All I know of it besides the name of the buck, well mammal, that I'm going to have to marry is that they're from a family we sell produce to in the city."

"Wait, you're from that Hopps family?" Nick said, his mind spinning. This had to be some sort of joke, a prank on the new mammal in the senior class.

The rabbit nodded, saying, "Yes, I'm Judy Hopps. You'd know that if you been paying attention to roll call instead of trying to annoy me by breathing on my neck."

Nick blushed and was glad his fur hid it, "I wasn't breathing on you! I was…" He shut up before he said something really stupid. The look the bunny, well Judy, gave him clearly said, 'Oh, really?'.

Nick crossed his arms and said, "Ok, look. I get it. You're really friends with Gideon and you two have staged everything today to pull a prank on me. He told you my full name and that my dad's grocery store buys food from your farm. Congratulations," he clapped his paws a few times, "You two got me, even had me going there for a minute. Now, if you don't mind I've got to go to my locker before next period."

He turned and reached for the door handle, but her paw grabbed his arm and turned him to face her before she said seriously, "I'm Not Joking!".

Nick was starting to get mad, in fact he was really starting to get worried that she wasn't kidding, but the thought that she wasn't, terrified him. So getting mad seemed like a better option. Anyways, it was ridiculous to think that his parents would arrange a marriage for him to a bunny, or that they'd never tell him. The idea was absurd, especially with that incident with the ranger scouts he'd had as a kit. His parents would never arrange for him to marry a prey mammal after that!

He had opened his mouth to tell her exactly that when the door opened behind him, knocking him into Judy. They tumbled forward in an awkward tangle of limbs onto the ground.

There were several gasps, snickers, and laughs, and a deeper exasperated mutter of 'high schoolers'.

Nick, with a flood of embarrassment the likes of which he'd never experienced before, yanked his mouth off the bunny's and whipped his head around. Most of the door was filled with Mr. Weston, but there was enough room for plenty of the students in the hallway to see them. One of them, another bunny, had her phone out and took a few pictures before squealing, "Judy!? You're making out with the new fox?! What about your fiancée?!"

Most of the other students went quiet at that, though there was a muttering of, 'fiancée?'s and scandalous, 'Ohh!'s.

There was an angry cry from the bunny below him. "Jessica!" and the bunny with the phone in the hall muttered an "Oh, didn't mean to say that!" before turning to make her escape.

"Would you two get up please?" grumbled Mr. Weston.

Nick realized that he was still mostly on top of Judy, she'd somehow managed during the fall to get a leg hooked around his hindpaw and had wrapped her arms around his chest. They both scrambled apart and got up not looking at each other or anywhere but at the floor for that matter.

Mr. Weston turned and with a stern glare sent the other students scurrying on their way before continuing, "Now I know this is senior year and everything but you can't go making out on school grounds, especially not during the school day." He turned to look straight at Judy, "Now what is this about you being engaged? I haven't heard about any buck proposing to you and I'd have thought that you of all the bunnies here would take that more seriously, Judith."

Judy's ears were flat against the back of her head, though Nick could see the blush on her cheeks even through her fur. She mumbled something.

"What was that? Come now, speak up. This isn't like you at all Judith." Mr. Weston said.

She mumbled again but this time it was understandable, barely, "I have an arranged marriage," she gave a nervous embarrassed glance at Nick, and squeaked, "to him."

Mr. Weston just grunted and muttered, "Explains the transfer." Before hitting them with a stern glare, "Engaged or not, that's not an excuse. Don't let me catch you two doing this again." And he turned, walking away down the corridor shaking his large head.

Nick looked at the bear, then at the bunny, and back at the bear. This couldn't be true. It couldn't be. But would she lie to a teacher? She'd been wearing her emotions on her sleeve since he'd met the bunny, Judy. But, but… It simply couldn't be true. He gave the bunny one last embarrassed panicked glance before he dashed out the door.


A/N

Due to corrections and a few bruises the following disclaimer has now been redacted:

Typo Disclaimer: Either wait a bit to read, or read at your own peril. This message will be squashed when 'Typo Thumper' squashes all the typos out of this story.