Nick had fallen asleep again, his head back and wobbling with the bumps in the road, despite having been asleep for almost two days beforehand. She decided that it was just a side effect of the concussion. As it was, however, it was all she could do to keep her eyes open herself. She decided to keep her mind awake with conversation, and there was only one option.
"If you don't mind my asking," she asked quietly, not wanting to startle him, "What was it like? Being a hybrid, I mean."
If Eli was at all surprised by the question, no detective alive could have detected it. He glanced at the rearview mirror at his two smaller passengers. "If you're asking how I got through school, then know that I didn't." he said casually. "Far as most of the world's concerned, I don't exist."
"What about your parents?" Judy asked.
"Don't remember them," he replied, "Charlie's been my guardian my whole life." A sadness passed through his eyes and would have been missed if he hadn't been speaking with a certain police officer.
"What happened?" she asked, fully expecting no answer.
"I suppose there's no reason not to tell you, so, to answer your question, they were murdered. By Jack Savage."
Judy found it hard to breathe for a few seconds, and the car was silent, save the sound of the tires on the asphalt. Nick made a small grunt and shifted slightly before stilling again.
"Charlie told me everything once I turned sixteen," Eli continued, "My parents were from the country, and once they eloped, the kept to themselves in the mountains. Then I came along, and there were… complications. My father rushed my mother to a proper hospital, and paid a pretty penny to keep us on the hush-hush. Unfortunately, it wasn't quite hush-hush enough." He paused and took a steadying breath. "Charlie told me that my dad fought like he was possessed, that he managed to get three of them with his shotgun before he went down. Seven shots is what it took." He chuckled softly. "Wish I could have met that crazy wolf," he remarked before continuing, "He gave my mom enough time to duck out the back, but not quite enough for her to get away." He paused again, bringing up the memories of that day in the apartment when he had learned of himself. "Charlie came in with the investigation team and found me under some tree roots the next morning, sleeping like the baby I was. He took me in and raised me like a normal kid. Never had to go to school though, he took care of all that. Wasn't till I was sixteen and he told me who I was and what had happened that I decided to follow his line of work.
"And there you have it, my whole sad backstory." He finished, and glanced back at his one still conscious occupant. Judy sat stock still, her eyes huge and watery, but with a steely conviction behind them that was likely permanent.
"Why?" she asked quietly. Eli's eyes went back to the road.
"Jack Savage, first and foremost, despises predators with almost fanatical devotion. Why? We don't know, only that he, for all intents and purposes, wants them all either dead, or as his new plan suggests, completely subservient. Secondly, we have deduced that he is more than disapproving of inter-species relationships, which I can attest to personally." He said, and was suddenly distracted. "Ah! Here's our turn."
Nick's head flopped to the left as Eli made a right turn onto a long driveway. Judy dried her eyes and looked out the window to catch a glimpse of the cabin through the trees. It was by no means large, but neither was it small. It seemed to fit perfectly into the middle ground, not too big to lose the coziness of a cabin, but not so small as to feel cramped. It was nestled humbly between multiple large pine trees, like the earth itself had reached up to hold this little place steady despite the toil of the rest of the world.
"Nick, wake up you sloth, we're here." Judy said and gave Nick a shake as Eli parked the small car. Nick's eyes popped open on the third shake.
"Already?" he said groggily and glanced out the window. "He wasn't lying when he said cabin in the woods, was he?" He stumbled out of the car and Eli handed him his old high school backpack that contained a grand total of three shirts, two pairs of pants, and a toothbrush. Eli slapped a key into his paw.
"Alright, the place is yours for the weekend, don't trash the place. There's enough food for a month, so you're fine there, and the internet's good enough for Petflix; phone reception, not so much. And don't let anyone in if you don't know who they are."
"Alright, dad. I think I got it." Nick said sarcastically, and Judy stiffened behind him.
"Good." Eli said, ignoring the comment and moving back towards the driver's side of the car. "See you Monday!" he said cheerfully, ducked into the still-running car and pulled out and away.
"Well I guess we should start vacationing," Nick said, turning towards the heavy oak door. The door swung in smoothly and without complaint, and Nick quickly flipped on the light. The cabin's layout was simple, a short hallway from the door ended with a larger room that was divided by a dining bar into kitchen and living room, with two doors facing opposite in the hall leading to two bedrooms. The one bathroom came off the kitchen. "Well," Nick said, "beats having paper for walls, huh?"
The kitchen was indeed well-stocked, and after a great deal of can-opening, they had prepared a sensible dinner, which they ate while watching a predictable mystery movie on the large, expensive TV in the living room. They made small, meaningless talk for most of this time, adjusting to the way they would be living for the next two and a half days. Darkness fell sooner in the mountains, but it wasn't really dark, as the moon rose and every star in the sky seemed to arrive to look at the planet. One of them suggested a walk in the dark, and soon they were side by side in a wide meadow, close enough to see the lights in the cabin window, but far enough that they wouldn't intrude.
"I don't think I've ever seen this many stars all at once before," Nick said into the night and Judy giggled.
"I'd almost forgotten what they looked like myself," she replied, and this time Nick chuckled.
"Like anyone could forget this." He said, waving a paw across the sky. Judy gave him a light shove with her body.
"Har har." She said, expecting another offhand remark from Nick, who didn't say anything for a moment.
"If you want to be sad for Eli, I can't stop you." He said abruptly. "But being sad about it isn't going to help anyone."
"How do you-" she began, but a quick glance from the fox told her everything.
"He knows it better than anyone, I expect." Nick continued. "That's why he's following Charlie's footsteps. He has to do something, not sit around and mope like most mammals would." His voice lowered to a nearly inaudible level. "Like I did."
Neither of them said anything for a while then. Nick, as was the usual, broke the silence again.
"You know what my favorite star is?" he asked suddenly.
"No I don't." Judy answered, anticipating another joke.
"That one right there," he said, pointing at a small star that, through some strange space phenomena, seemed to be twinkling violet. Judy saw it, and something inside her finally broke apart that felt like it should have never been kept together.
"Which one?" she asked, and Nick bent down to better position his arm to allow her to find it. Instead, he found her paw gripping his collar. He turned toward her in surprise,
"Wha-?" was all he managed to say before he lost control of his lips.
Every thought Nick had ever had seemed to run out of his ears and into the forest floor in an attempt to make room for what he was experiencing right then. All he could see was Judy's closed eyes that were suddenly so close to his own, and all he could feel was the touch of her small lips on the end of his muzzle. Some instinct he didn't know he had returned the kiss without his consent on the terms that he could not have given it any sooner, and then his eyes were closed as well, every form of sensory input focusing directly on the contact between them.
Judy's mind, in stark contrast, was in overdrive. For the fraction of a second before Nick returned the kiss, she had run through at least ten possibilities as to why, but had found peace an instant later. It was several seconds before her thought process slowed enough to register what she had just done. She pulled away, Nick swaying forward slightly before opening his eyes.
"Well then." He mumbled, dizzy from the occurrence, "That just happened. Not that I'm complaining or anything."
Judy's heart was beating much faster than it normally would have been. All she could do was nod, as she wasn't sure she could trust her mouth right then.
"Any chance of it happening again?" Nick asked, and Judy made no response other than to turn towards the cabin. "Right. You have a very tight sleeping schedule, if I remember correctly." He said, and Judy nodded.
Soon they were standing with their backs to their respective rooms, Judy on the right and Nick on the left. Nick spoke first.
"So, uh goodnight, and all that." He said and Judy nodded again before turning and bumping into the closed door, which she then proceeded to open with more difficulty then she would have cared to admit. She was though and gone in a blink.
Nick stared at the closed door while leaning against his own, and was only just then beginning to question the… He shook his head. Overthinking it was the last thing he wanted to be doing right then, he didn't want the memory spoiled. He entered his room without a sound, letting it click softly behind him.
He picked up his old backpack off the slightly too-big bed and set it on the floor. He reminisced on the moonlight pouring through the large window, and although it pained him to do so, he drew the curtain shut, knowing his light-sensitive eyes would deny him sleep if he didn't. He noted that the heating system hadn't completely filled the building yet, and that the room was a bit chillier, but the bed looked more than adequate to compensate for the reduced temperature. He wondered briefly if Judy was experiencing the same dilemma, and a very peculiar image flitted to the forefront of his thoughts. He tried to shake it away, but only succeeded in pushing it back into his subconscious, where it stuck.
A sudden wave of fatigue washed over him, and he only managed to halfway prepare for sleep, toppling over with only his shirt removed. He shivered slightly at the touch of cold sheets, but held his ground until his body heat won out. He found that despite his physical condition, his mind far from dreaming and so he made every effort to fall asleep anyway, which became increasingly difficult as the mental image his mind had produced somewhere found itself unsuppressed and filled his head. He tried to tire his mind out by keeping it in check. He had reached a sort of stalemate and was beginning to feel the haze of sleep descend when he heard his door open.
He cracked on eye open and retained his steady breathing, not wanting to give any hints to a possible attacker. In the shadowed haze produced by the sliver of starlight leaking in from underneath the curtains he watched a small grey and pink form slip into the room without a whisper and close the door. Unsure about what was happening, he closed his eye and listened instead. Nick was surprised to find that that was all he needed. Somehow, he could identify her position without sight, and after a moment, he discovered he didn't even his hearing. It was like his body had attuned itself to her very presence, and it was a revelation that he internalized very quickly and made a point to remember.
Judy wasn't entirely sure what exactly she was doing. Her room had been cold, sure, but it wasn't anything she couldn't handle. But she had still lain awake, unable to find sleep despite every effort. Which, somehow, had led her to this point.
She had no idea how heavy a sleeper Nick was, but so far, it seemed like she had gone without waking him. Somewhere in her frazzled and tired mind a plan had formulated, based on an offhand thought she'd had after Nick had woken up after the attack. She hadn't been able to recall a night when she'd slept better than that one, and so she had decided to sneak in, see if she could fall asleep, then wake up, as always, before him and pretend she'd been in her room the whole night through. So far, the plan was working.
She drifted in her pink nightie to the bad and slid onto the side Nick hadn't fallen upon and inserted herself into the still-cold covers. She curled up and faced his back, then closed her eyes, suddenly content. She opened them again as Nick rolled over, barely managing to not roll on top of her, but he was suddenly very close and facing her. His warm breath that smelled like spearmint, she could feel the very tips of the rough fur on bare chest tickling her nose. He smelled like lavender. He continued sleeping as if nothing had happened.
For a moment Judy almost panicked. As it now was, removing herself would surely wake Nick, and then she'd have some massively awkward explaining to do. The feeling didn't last long, Nick's proximity shut down almost every worrisome thought she could consider. So when Nick's arm came around to pull her closer she didn't resist.
"If you needed a hug-buddy, you could have just asked," he said quietly, his voice travelling no farther than it needed to. Judy pressed closer to him as a response and noticed something she hadn't back at the pastry shop. Beneath the course outer fur, Nick had an almost criminally soft undercoat that felt the way she imagined clouds did. The significance of this was not lost on her.
"You're soft." She mumbled into his chest and she felt Nick chuckle.
"Only for you, Carrots." He replied and she looked up at him.
"Really?" she asked softly.
"One hundred percent," he replied and went to poke a kiss on her forehead. He was caught off-guard, though, when a sudden shift from Judy turned it into a kiss on the lips.
Judy, now without the space between them, felt Nick's heart rate increase and knew he wasn't lying. They parted slowly before coming back together with an increase in intensity that neither of them initiated, but both accepted without complaint.
An alarming thought punched into Judy's mind with enough force to separate them again. Nick sensed her sudden dismay.
"Carrots, what's wrong?" he questioned with legitimate concern that he had made a terrible mistake somehow.
Judy struggled to find words, so they came out unsteady and confused. "Are you sure we should be doing this?" she whispered.
"What do you mean?" Nick asked, fully aware of what she meant.
"It's just… Who we are, what we are-"
"Doesn't matter to me, not anymore." Nick said, and suddenly Judy felt very foolish. She looked up at him with gratitude. "Because this is Zootopia, where anyone can be anything, and I, being part of that anyone, am in love with you, you dumb bunny." He finished with calm finality.
There it was, hanging now in the chilly air that floated around them. Judy took it and held it close.
"And I love you too, you sly fox." She said and tilted her head back for another kiss. Nick happily obliged, and suddenly it felt like any amount of space between them was too much, and the cold air bit just a little too hard for them to spare any amount of spare body heat, and even their minimal amount of clothing became an obstacle and was condemned to the floor. Soon the only way to tell the two mammals apart was color, and even then it was hard to tell.
Neither of them got much sleep, but hey, they were on vacation, so who cared?
