Nick shuffled through his finals again, pouring over every single detail the files presented to see if there could have been anything he missed.
He rubbed at his eyes, it getting harder and harder to keep them open as the midnight oil kept burning away, looks like this will be another all nighter for him.
'Well it's not like I can do this during normal business hours' he idly thought as he started to thumb through the file on the resident lion in their little community.
'What would that look like if someone came in while I had stack of everyone files right in front of me? Oh hey guys looks like you ruined the surprise guess I have to promote everyone!'
Well he was getting to the end of the files anyway, normally it wouldn't take so long to just go through a roster of 20 officers and a handful of support staff but he had to be thorough and had a system in his mind on what would most likely be the leaks.
First he reviewed some financial information on each of the mammals. Everyone except the support staff had background checks done and he was able to pull some strings in the underworld, this allowed him to see if a background check revealed any sort of debts or financial vulnerabilities and with his other connections he was able to see if anyone was doing anything under the table.
The reason he did this was because this wasn't some sort of zollywood movie and most traitors and leaks come from people who owe money and then here comes Mr. Savior with a life saving loan where they only had to a 'small' favor for them.
This initial sweep turned up nothing out of the ordinary as it hadn't before. There were a few small details but Nick seriously doubted that a Rhino doing under the table construction work on the weekends was a vector into the ZPD.
The second he then looked into was does the individual have any sort of checkered history one that could potentially come back to haunt them. The fact that profiling shit like this is exactly what happened to him for most of his life and that he was doing it, the irony was not lost on him at all.
Still sitting on this end of his desk rather than the other one impresses on him the importance of it and profiling is done only because it historically worked. So he kept shifting through the files.
Once again nothing new or special turned up, there were some individuals such as Huffer would concern others but he knew that throughout his rough background he was a great officer and would never betray him and by extension the ZPD.
Of course he had to have a more extensive check done on him and had to get more information on his history form his illicit contacts but that wasn't because he didn't trust him at face value - a Chief had to be absolutely sure, I'm sure Huffer would understand if he ever found out.
The final method was actually a method he had devised and he wasn't even sure if it worked since he never caught anyone or anything with it but he continued to do it. It was to look at the dates of submitted paperwork. Since the process to fully apply to the ZPD was so lengthy and that there was simply so much paperwork to slog through that the typical time line from first application to final acceptance into the Academy was 4 months. Nick managed to squeeze himself in by the 2 month mark with his natural charm.
'And the help of a little old bunny' he thought, smiling softly.
So his guess was that if a person could get into the Academy substantially faster than 4 months means they had some sort of additional help but the only one that really stood out was Casein which made sense as her father was the old chief of police.
"Ugh" he suddenly said out loud "There is just nothing here, I don't get what I'm missing" as he threw down the final folder onto his messy desk. The haphazard display of personal information would make the most prudent security blush with how he was skipping protocol and proper file handling.
"Although if anyone else saw this I'm sure I wouldn't have a job to worry about stuff like that, maybe I'd actually see the inside of that prison" he continued to speak to no one.
It dawned on Nick just how tired he really was. It was worse than the standard fatigue he would feel from doing these stupid all night events, it was a feeling deep in his soul as he felt himself slowly sinking to his desk against his will. His muscles having gotten too heavy for him to keep himself upright, his lack of progress and frustration of how far behind he was on the curve of secret dealings and alliances was just too much.
Nick's head softly lands ontop of the pile of papers and his eyes close.
His eyes shoot open and he looks at his watch reading 0700, it looks like he managed to wake up just early enough to get his papers in order. Bracing his paws against the edge of the desk he pushes himself back up. He then wipes at his muzzle and when it comes back dry he silently thanking his sleeping self for not having drooled all over the important documents as it would be hard to explain why fox spit was all over the files.
After sneaking over to the filing cabinet located in another room in the building he slips back the documents and let's himself relax for a brief moment. Deciding to chance looking down at himself he finds his uniform pristine as if he had just put on a fresh pair rather then slept in it.
'That's odd' he thinks but this was honestly the first time he slept in his Uniform so he didn't have anything to base it off of. Shrugging he goes to the coffee mess to brew himself out of this mental haze he's stuck in.
The journey to the coffee machine was quite a bit longer than he had thought and honestly he could have sworn that he saw that desk before 'Do we have two Wilde's?' he thought initially as he saw his name placard a second time without the until he saw the small framed picture sitting lone on the desk.
He could remember when the picture as clear as day. It was the day that Judy had proposed to him which honestly when he thought about it didn't surprise him that much, she always was the one to take initiative.
"Hey Nick" she asked while he was lazing in the sun, why does all his dreams involve him lazing around somewhere?
"What's up Carrots, this not your idea of fun?" he joked with her as she idly messed around with his fluffy tail.
They've been going out for a while now as was shown when he would let her do whatever she wanted to his tail. In Fox culture that it was a big deal to do something like that, it meant that you trusted another mammal enough to handle a part of you that was not only very sensitive but also an important indicator of your overall status as the quality of fur on the tail was the first to go whenever a fox would hit hard times - a fact not lost on him any time he'd see one of his species in jail.
"No it's not that, it's just..." she released his tail as she trailed off.
He didn't look when she let go but did turn when he heard the shuffling as she adjusted herself to sit next to him, now both lounging in the sun baked grass.
"Nick when I was a kit I had my entire life planned out, I knew what I was going to do every day of every year." she started again as Nick smirked in response "I knew you were crazy but not THAT crazy fluff."
She lightly bopped his nose "Stop it and listen you jerk, like I was saying I always wanted to be a police officer and I knew how I wanted to do it too."
She grabbed his paw "Everything was going how I've always thought it would that was until I met a dumb fox."
She started gently rubbing his arm at this point, Nick remained silent as he wasn't sure where this was going.
"At first I detested this fox as he just threw a wrench in my life and changed things from what I had planned out so carefully. But then the more time I've spent with him the better my life has been."
She took a deep shaky breath, Nick noticed she was noticeably shaking at this point.
"Carrots..." He started but was softly quieted by Judy.
"Nick I just want you to know that you're still a dumb fox and the only thing that's changed since we first met is you're my dumb fox."
She moves again to a bag she had laid away from them and when she comes back he notices a small black felt box in her right paw, when she started to knee next to his position his heart started pounding.
'Is this what I think it is?' He thought looking at her.
"Nick will you do me the honor and be my dumb fox for the rest of our lives?"
He sits there wiping away at the tears that seem to have materialized in his eyes, it was always bittersweet to remember his mate but as much as it hurt he would never give those memories up.
It still doesn't really explain why both desks were here as Judy's desk was removed long ago and his desk was now located in the office he had just left.
When the desks started melting and molten remains started pooling around his feet he realized he was dreaming.
"So let me ask you a question" came a voice in the darkness, his ears picked up and he spun around to look into the void - parts of the room having seemingly vanished when the dream state was discovered.
"I already know the answer" the disembodied voice continued "So you don't need to answer but I just want you to think about it."
Nick was straining his ears to figure out the location of the voice, it may be a dream but dreams have a funny way of leaving important details in subtle ways.
"Yeah, what is it then?" was his gruff reply as he started wading through the desk muck.
"What do you hope to accomplish?"
It was such a simple question but before he could respond the voice followed up "Not what you tell other mammals" the voice chided "We both know it's not because you're trying to fulfill a dead rabbits silly dream so what is it really?"
He couldn't really stop the pearls of anger from bubbling up inside. Nor could he stop the pulling back of his muzzle exposing his razor sharp teeth or how the skin on his digits retracted as his claws came out. He also definitely couldn't stop himself from shouting out to the inky black sea "Who the fuck are you and what do you want?". It was one thing for some weird dream ghost to mess with him but insulting his mates dream was taking it one step too far.
The voice was now coming from all directions now and the rest of the dream police precinct dissolved into more of the inky void, he was barely treading the dark abyss at this point.
"Who I am is not important and what I want is not important but if you're going to do what you're going to do... you need to be fully committed" the voice enigmatically stated "If you truly believe your mission and if you are willing to risk everything to fix this world then and only then you will know what you need to do".
The energy to fuel his rage vanished as he struggled to keep himself above the water as it felt like he was getting sucked in, each time he'd come up for air he'd get pulled deeper into the water.
Right before his head vanished beneath the currents for the final time he heard the voice say "Different paths end in different ways, what would a ranger scout do?"
Then he was pulled down into the depths.
Nick shot up, breathing hard as he felt his heart pound in his chest. He still couldn't understand why all his nightmares involve drowning in some way, he liked swimming so it was odd but it must have meant something.
'Oh fuck' he cursed looking down at the spittle on the file.
'Hope they believe it was some coffee or something if someone sees this and speaking of someone' glancing at his watch read 0540 so he did have time to put the files back. Standing up his bones creaked and shifted under his muscle his advancing age creeping up on him. His uniform was fairly disheveled but nothing too terrible. Nick pinched himself and the feeling of pain didn't help alleviate his worries about whether or not he was still dreaming, his dreams becoming more real and the sensations impacting him more each day. It was a shame he didn't have any peppermint at his office for just this situation but since he never slept at his desk it hadn't been an issue before.
"Well guess I'll just assume it's real until I know differently" as he cleaned off his desk and went to put the files back into their respective lockers. Afterwards he went to the coffee machine and the journey there was thankfully short and uneventful and the walls didn't fall apart from around him which was assuring.
He could see the faces of mammals walking around in this early morning through the ZPD windows and the sun begin to come over the horizon signaling the start of a new day.
He still felt dead tired as that little nap didn't help at all, thinking about what his dream ghost had asked him he made up his mind.
"I'm going to take the day off."