Chapter Thirty-Eight
Truth
Registry House was an old building, smaller than most in that area, for it had been designed with a smaller range of mammals in mind. For this reason, the chairs and tables were low enough for Nick to sit quite comfortably, with his legs resting on the floor and paws clasped on the surface of one of those tables. But this did nothing to alleviate him of the growing sense of concern that bubbled within him as Judy sat down opposite of him.
Even as Judy knew the cause of the cut upon her partner's lip, and that the person responsible for it was currently 'hanging around' in the corridor outside, and while she naturally wanted to meet this 'acquaintance'... and show that little bastard exactly what happened when he'd mess with the boyfriend of a Hopps, she still was content of patience and finding out the whole truth through Nick, instead from his little, pawcuffed friend.
"So, erm," Nick drew uneasily, staring down at his paws as he fidgeted them unconfidently before him, "where should I start?"
"Start with whatever you feel comfortable with. We'll work from there." Nick looked up from his paws as Judy's own reached out to touch his. "And stop treating this like some kind of interrogation. I only want to know so I can help you, Nick. As a friend, I want to help you."
"You... might not like what I have to say. In fact I know you won't, and if the wrong people were ever to find out about it: Bogo, for instance—"
Nick leaned back in his chair and pulled his paws away, as a result, Judy all but leaped up onto the table to keep her paws clasped in his. "I promise you, Nick, I shall never tell another living soul about what you tell me here so long as I live. And I promise, I promise, I will not let it affect our relationship in any way whatsoever, except for good."
Nick allowed his paw to close around hers as he responded, "Judy, I know I've called you dumb about a million times in the past, but I've never really meant it. You know that. In fact, you're the smartest little bunny I've ever known."
She quirked an eyebrow at him as she disengaged her touch with a settle back on her prior spot. "Oh, smartest bunny? What are you saying? That bunnies are dumber than the average mammal? You speciest little—"
"Alright, wisebun, any femam-mammal! Any mammal of any gender, species or ethnic origin. You're the smartest of them all. Anyway, my point is: when I was telling you about my past, I mostly skimmed over exactly what I was to the Krays and in The Firm, and barely mentioned Scarlett at all. You know I skimmed over some important details, yet you didn't push me to tell you anything more than I was comfortable telling you and… I just wanted to let you know that I am very grateful for that."
"Wilde, I knew if you'd wanted to tell me, you would have. As long as I've known you, you've always had such a silk tongue, such a way with words; if ever you mention something, or fail to mention something, I know it was only with the best intentions at heart: trying to protect me; our relationship."
The fox smiled. "Well that's just it," he said, "my sharp tongue always was and still is my greatest weapon. Upon joining The Firm, I figured I didn't really need to pull a gun, so long as there was time for talking it over. After all, working with Krays, you could use house-sized bluffs with bells on and people would still believe you."
"But, bluffing aside, there must've been instances when talking didn't work."
"Oh, there were, but that's when Scarlett would come in useful. We had this little plan, you see. We stuck to it, and it never once failed us. I would take the lead role, drawing lots of attention to myself with all the smugness and self-assurance of a real mean baddie. Meanwhile, Scar is creeping-up behind them with a gun in her bag. If things take a turn for the worst, and my 'client' reaches for something, they get the gun-in-the-back treatment."
"And when that didn't work? What about when they threatened, I don't know, that their associates would be after you or something?"
"I had this line I used, what was it now? Something like 'even all the king's horses and his men can't put you back after you've been shot, so put the gun away' or something like that."
"Wow, you had it all worked out, then. I bet you did a lot of good work for those Firm guys."
"Yeah! Well, when word got around that there was a new guy on the block who could get people to do stuff only with his tongue, what took others with a gun, the Krays took an interest in me personally."
"And that's when you went to dinner with them?"
"Yep. They wanted to meet me and Scarlett on a more sociable basis so they could get a feel for who we really were. After eating, they spent about three hours talking to us. They asked all the questions, mind you, and after that, well, I don't really know. But they left and made whatever arrangements needed to be made. And a few days later I was approached by one of their manager types and offered the position of Chief Recruitment Officer."
"It was your job to hire new paws for The Firm?"
"Primarily, but as chief of that role, it was also down to me to manage and maintain the cover of our undercover operatives too. But for the most part, it was my job to locate suitable candidates we might recruit to our cause. It mostly depended on what the Krays wanted, that being anything from a safe cracker to a grave digger." The fox sat back as he continued the explanation, while Judy listened with interest to this new insight into the criminal circles prior unknown.
"Say the Krays were organizing some big bank raid, it'd be my job to hire some muscles who could fire a gun and who were greedy enough not to mind putting themselves at risk for cash. Now, the Krays themselves wouldn't say what they wanted exactly, they'd just say what they were planning, and it'd be down to my own initiative to decide exactly what they would need. I had to know where to look, what to look for in the individual and, most importantly, how that individual might best be bribed. With some guys it was easy: you just offer them a cut of the spoils. Other guys were a little harder. But, at the end of the day, everyone had their price."
"And Scarlett? What was her role?"
"Similar thing, but pretty different at the same time. She was in a division they called 'Analytics', though we still worked very close with each other. I spent my time looking for people with promising holes; she looked for holes in promising people."
Despite herself, a smile started spreading on the rabbit's mouth. She was intrigued — and not a little in awe — of this newfound level of intelligence she never knew the fox had, and gosh did it get to her in all the 'wrong' ways. "So, mister psychologist," she needled with a sultry smile, "what would my price be? Say you wanted to get into bed with me, but had never met me. How would you go about making that happen?
Nick smirked. "What, other than seduce you utterly using my golden tongue alone, you mean? Then, I'd say..." Nick gazed at Judy with something of a smug smile as he ran through the options in his mind, but then his smile slowly crashed, his expression becoming serious as he dawned upon his conclusion.
"Your family."
Her amusement died, her nose started twitching and her voice was suddenly very small and meek… "What?"
"Bribes of money definitely wouldn't work. If you were stuck being a meter maid long enough, the promise of promotion might get some results. But your ego isn't so inflated and your morals are too strong for you to allow yourself to fall into the same trap Jack did."
"You're way too brave to be frightened, and you're relentless in your pursuit of justice. The only option I'd have left to me would be to threaten harm on your family."
"And... and if, just theoretically, I hadn't done what you wanted… would you—"
"No! God, no. I'm not a monster, Hopps, and I wasn't then. As I told you before, I've never killed and that fact extends to having people killed too. Look, at the very most I might have had one of your favorite sisters beat-up a little. But not too bad, and not unless there was any other option or way of getting things done. And I would never have had someone killed." Nick inched closer and reached out a paw, which he touched upon the shoulder of the startled and slightly fearful-faced rabbit.
"I promise you."
A moment of tension passed across her face and then Judy's smile returned a little, and she reached up to touch the reassuring paw. "Alright, Slick Nick," she finally muttered, "I believe you. And, just for the record, even if you had done some... less reputable things in your past, I still don't think I'd have it in me to leave you over it."
"Thank you, Hopps, for being so understanding."
"So, how exactly did you get this 'silver tongue'?" she asked with a peak of interest. "Were you just born with it or did it develop over time?"
The fox sighed in memory, sobering instantly with his gaze flicking-off to the side. "If you said the wrong thing within twenty feet of my dad, you'd get a smack. I think that has something to do with it."
"Oh. Nick, I'm sorry I—"
"No, Judy, you need to know this. Now, after putting me in a coma for a while, he never dared touch me again. So it wasn't all that bad. But after the little Cub Scouts incident, I started learning how to defend myself. Not physically, verbally. I started observing the school bullies, started noticing how single-minded they were when threatening or bullying the other kids. I realized it only took a little push: a few carefully chosen words and they'd more or less forget what they'd came for and would walk away thinking they'd won."
"So that's the reason? Right... I'd always, kinda, just thought it was, you know—"
"That it was just a fox thing?" he asked with a grin. Embarrassed slightly, Judy nodded as she bit on her lower lip, likewise, Nick chuckled to the crossing of his arms. "You know, Hopps. For someone so against acts of speciesism, you sure do have a lot of outdated ideas."
The rabbit blushed, shrugging her shoulders with a coy smile. "Hey, not that outdated. I'm dating you, aren't I? That's pretty modern thinking."
"Huh, futuristic I'd say! Any of your sisters date outside their species?"
"Well, a few married hares, and a couple of them married slightly larger mammals. But none that I can remember married a predator," she said, her flush growing as she added, "no less a fox." But then the subject of marriage brought her mind to another question, something she had been wondering about for a while. "So, how far did you and Scarlett actually go?"
"Did we spend a lot of time together? Yes, yes we did."
"That's all very well, Nick," Judy surmised softly, "but that's not the question I asked." Solemn silence cooed around them— of all the subjects she could have asked about, this was the one he was most uncomfortable discussing — but he had made a promise, 'no more lies, no more secrets', and he was going to stick to it.
"Alright, what do you mean 'go'? Sexually? Romantically? Emotionally?"
"Nick..." she whispered closer, breathing in a long breath before her eyes rose to meet his, "Did you marry her?"
For a moment, which felt to last as long as the dawning of a new era, their gazes held firm into one another, emerald into amethyst, with tight and tense emotion. After what felt like the passing of a generation, Nick slowly let out his lungful of air, while a small smile grew on his muzzle. "I'm glad you overestimated that, Carrots," he said, "rather than underestimate it."
The clouded fog of worry in Judy's mind started to clear. "You mean, you didn't marry her?"
"No, we didn't marry. But what I did do, Judy, was get engaged to her."
"You proposed to her?"
"Kinda. She told me to. Like, in the same way she told me to ask her out a few months after we first met, you know?"
"Yeah, I see. How did the two of you meet, anyway?"
"Not now," Nick blurted flatly, "not here, that's just... one step too far for the moment." Judy nodded as she skimmed down at the table, accepting that there may be some things from his past that would always be too painful for him to recount no matter how much time had passed, and which she just didn't have any business in knowing anyway.
"Actually, Carrots," Nick sighed with eyes focused elsewhere, his expression troubled while Judy's focus rose to meet him, "although we didn't marry, we still did a lot of, you know, the more physical side of a relationship. And, it's mostly because of that it took me so long to admit, just to myself, that I loved you."
"What are you getting at, exactly?"
"Come on, Hopps, you're smarter than that. You must know foxes only take one mate."
The rabbit's eyes started to widen as understanding slowly dawned. "I-I know foxes don't ever re-marry, I know that much. But if you didn't actually marry her then—"
"Oh, no, Hopps. It goes way deeper than that. We take one mate, not one wife. For, as a young and naïve rabbit once said to a bunch of frightened news reporters, 'it's in our biology'." Judy appeared unsure at the quoting of that wrong day. "Look, Carrots, you're a rabbit, so that means you inherently know more about the reproductive system than even I."
Judy snorted. "Actually, knowledge of the reproductive system isn't inherited."
"But still, you must know that during lovemaking, certain chemicals are released. For foxes, alongside all other monogamous species, a certain set of chemicals are released which sorta hardwire the brain into wanting to be with that person. That's the reason it took me five months just to accept I loved you. It's also the reason my mom stayed with my dad, despite the fact he was a manipulative bastard… Now, these chemicals are only released during the first time foxes make love, and after that they're kinda stuck with that person the rest of their life. Whether they actually want to be or not is beside the point, they're kinda bound to them; forced by their own psychology to stay. And it's impossible to re-create this 'binding force' with any other mammal once you've been bound once."
"Nicky, I— I want the truth here," she sighed deeply, "are you telling me that... that you can never love me as deeply as you loved Scarlett?"
Nick gawked at Judy in daze. He saw a thin trickle of wetness form in the corner of Judy's eye, and then, without a moment's deliberation, he stood and shot at her, consequently, kneeling down on the floor before the rabbit, whose bottom lip had suddenly started to wobble, and threw his arms around her small frame. Judy closed her arms tight around her fox in return. She had meant to remain strong, while asking her questions, but the simple act of voicing them out loud had all but wrecked her emotional control, and so she started to quiver and hiccup small sobs with a burrow of her head into the soft warmth of Nick's neck.
Nick spoke to her urgently while holding her against his chest. "Now, you listen to me, you dumb, brave, beautiful-little rabbit. If there's one thing I've learnt from you, it's what true love feels like. What me and Scar had, it... it was a fling! I see that now. Just a young couple of young foxes looking for a little solace after a cruddy past. Looking for someone to hold them and say they cared for them. But what me and Scar had was nothing but a shadow of what I feel for you. Nothing more than two young, brash kids playing games."
"But— but yesterday," she quivered, "when you walked out, I know I slapped you… and I shouldn't have, but you just completely shut yourself off from me. I couldn't reach you, no matter how hard I tried!"
"I know Judy," he murmured, his voice turning regretful, "I know, and I can never forgive myself for that. It's just, when Fin mentioned Scarlett, somehow, it made the whole thing real. I wanted to believe I was ready to love again but… when her name was mentioned… it put my biology into overdrive, screaming at me that 'we' could never be. I'm glad my biology was proven wrong. And when you came back to me, on the roof... it proved to me just how much you cared."
Nick's hug around Judy's body loosened a little, and he sat back, so he could look into the depths of her eyes. Judy kept her arms securely around Nick's neck, a little wetness still present around her eyes, but a small smile present-still, nevertheless."
"As I said to you before," Nick continued, "you risked everything we had because you thought I needed help. You were prepared, selflessly, to sacrifice everything we had together, for me. Scarlett wouldn't have done that! I don't know if she'd have risked anything of great importance for my sake. And doubt I really would have for her. When I was twenty-five, I got engaged to her, but it wasn't until after my twenty-eighth she was... you know, ended… Why do you think we spent three years engaged without getting married? It was never meant to be. Personally, I doubt if we'd have lasted two months with one another if it wasn't for our biological binding."
Cradling her head, Nick gently lifted Judy's face and moved to gaze into her softly smiling expression. "But this: my attraction to you, my wonderful rabbit, is a love more binding and more powerful on its own accord than my attraction to her ever was. It's so strong, how I feel about you, that, in the end, it was impossible to resist it. Even though loving you rebels against every fiber of my biology."
The fox took Judy's paws in his own. He leaned closer until his nose was touching hers, and then, gently, he smoothed his muzzle across her cheek, smiling, as he marked her with his lingering scent. "I love you, Judy Hopps," he soothed, "with or without my biology's consent."
Judy drew her face away — her cheek now smelling resolutely of sweet fox — and brushed her lips gently against Nick's. A playful smile on her lips, her tongue peeped out of her mouth for an instant, and she licked the fount of his lips, both enjoying the lingering, musky taste in her mouth... and wanting more. Her lips parted as her head drew nearer, her eyes glistening as she made to meet Nick's mouth with hers — her tongue with his — and, as Nick's mouth also opened to meet, what he could already tell would be a deeply heated kiss, it happened.
"Hopps!"
"Ah!" Judy leaped back in shock, the chair tipping and almost falling, with a consequent Judy to the floor, had Nick not darted instantly and caught her in his arms to hold her from certain demise, while she desperately tried to seize the police radio that had escaped from its casing and was now dangling and bobbing up and down unhelpfully on its wire.
"Hopps," Bogo shouted, "come in. Report!"
Nick carefully lowered the chair back onto all four legs; meanwhile, Judy caught the radio and responded, "Hopps here."
"Are you and Wilde still located at Reg' house?"
"Yes, Sir."
"And what progress have you made?"
"None so far, Sir."
"And why not? You should have had ample time to find out some information. What have you been doing all this time?"
Judy blushed a little as she struggled with an answer, reminiscing only about the deep kiss which had almost come to pass the moment before her chief had called. "We... erh—"
"Oh," Nick cut in, "Hopps and I had to help give this old lady a paw crossing the road on the way over, and then she needed a paw doing her washing. So we helped her with that too. But she just wouldn't let us go without making us a cup of tea to thank us first. That's what took us."
The sound of Bogo's dismissive grunt cracked through, "That comment was clearly a farce, and I should deal you an official warning about wasting police time, and find out what you've really been up to. But fortunately for you, I don't care. Just so long as you get all the necessities for a warrant by sixteen hundred hours, so I can have it approved by seventeen hundred. That's all that matters."
"Don't you worry, Sir," Nick reassured smugly, "we'll have got it long before then."
"Glad to hear it," Bogo said, followed sarcastically by, "seeing as you are so sure of your ability to get the task done efficiently and on time, then it shouldn't bother you to know I am giving you another assignment." Nick's face fell, regretting his smugness instantly while Judy glared at him.
"What assignment?" she asked, her fierce eyes not leaving Nick's.
"Officers Grizzoli, Rhinowitz and Higgins have identified Nyilas. We want you to pull him in."
"Already?" Judy remarked, "It sure didn't take long to find him, huh."
"He didn't exactly make himself difficult to find. Obliviously, he never considered the possibility that one of his minions would spill his name."
"So who is he?"
Over the radio, they heard the sound paper being picked up. "A-hem. Victor Csizmadia Almássy Nyilas. A seventy-two-year-old billy goat. Born in Cieszyn, Poblanch. He moved to Zootopia at the age of twenty-four and spent three years studying Archaeology and Ancient Civilizations. It was a full-time course, and at the end he received a BA with honors. At twenty-eight, he became a full-time archaeologist. And over the next forty years, he held a successful occupation which took him all over Zoophon to study every major, ancient civilization in detail. Over the years, he also took-up several other smaller studies, including, most notably, the Study of Early Scriptures, Ancient Architecture and pole-dancing…"
"What?" asked Wilde and Hopps in unison with the shock of fluster.
"What?" repeated Bogo, sounding even more confused than them, before he shouted, over his shoulder by the sounds of it, "Who wrote this? Who? Clawhauser, stop grinning. This isn't funny; it's damned unprofessional!"
"Sorry, Chief," they heard Clawhauser say.
"Get out of my sight before I demote you to traffic warden," Bogo called. Over the radio, they heard a door shut loudly. Bogo then sighed and continued, "After over forty years in the field, during the course of which he married and had three kids, Nyilas, at the age of seventy, retired from archaeology and settled with his wife in Zootopia. Now, he gives regular lectures at the University of History and Arts. And just so we're clear, he never studied pole-dancing."
"Chief," Nick took the words, after a moment's thought, "this might sound an odd question, but indulge me. Has Victor Chizz... Csizmold Allmessy... Allmerry—"
"Victor Csizmaldia Almássy Nyilas?" Judy gave a helping paw.
"Yeah," Nick said, "has... who Hopps just said, ever been to Zistopia?"
The line went silent as Bogo skimmed through the report. Nick and Judy heard the sound of pages to turn over before words accompanied the short pause, "Ah, yes. He visited Zistopia several times in his career, most notably to lead excavations in the desert sands just outside the city limits, shortly before he retired from archaeology and became a professor. That was one year ago."
Nick turned to look at Judy; Judy's brow had already furrowed. "So," Nick said, "what's the plan, do we know where he is?"
"At ten o'clock, Nyilas is giving a speech on Zistopian archaeology and architecture. It is now coming up to eight. That should give you enough time to find out what you can at Reg' House and get to the University of Arts in time for the speech. After, you will follow him back to his study, approach him, and arrest him. If all goes to plan, it should be a nice, quiet and organized arrest. He is sixty-three, after all."
"Chief," Nick warned, "we can't be all that sure we can get all you need for a warrant just from the paperwork alone."
"That should not be a problem," Bogo assured, "after you have arrested and brought Nyilas to ZPD HQ, you should still have ample time to infiltrate Erkin and attain as much evidence as we need. Bear in mind, of course, that I'll need an hour to have it approved and legalized, so I need it in my hoof by four o'clock. Am I understood?"
"Yes, Sir," Judy said, "we'll—"
Something clicked in the fox's mind, and then he grabbed the radio from Judy's paw and spoke in distress, "Wait, Sir. I don't think we have enough time to get what we have here done in the time we have. It might take us a little longer than that."
Bogo's reply came in smug quantities, "Then you will have to learn to be more efficient in your application of time, Officer Wilde. Two hours is plenty enough. Now," he added sharply, "back to work." The radio crackled and then went dead.
Nick stood slowly, crossing one arm over his chest and bringing the paw of his other up to his chin in brooding thoughtfulness. "Fluff," he mumbled, "we have a problem."
The rabbit frowned. "What's the matter?"
"It's gonna take us at least half an hour to get to the University of Arts with the traffic as it is at this time of day. That gives us only an hour and a half here. If you want to have a thorough talk with Jack, there's not going to be time to dig-up all the info on Erkin we need."
"And vica versa, I'm guessing." The fox nodded. "Well," she huffed slowly, "we're just gonna have to prioritize finding out what we can about Erkin. That's what Bogo thinks we're doing, after all."
"Actually," Nick interfered, "it would be an easy enough thing to speak to Jack and then bluff to Bogo we couldn't find anything useful about Erkin. If you wanted to speak to Jack, you can still do that, and Bogo will be none the wiser."
"But, if we can't find out enough evidence for a raid warrant, we're gonna have to infiltrate Erkin itself later. We might get caught. Killed even!"
"True, true. That is a risk. But for all we know, we might not get the evidence we need from here anyway, and those cuffs aren't gonna hold Jack forever. As it stands, we hold all the cards against him. That's a rare advantage to have over somebody. If we let him slip now, and if you want to speak to him later, then it'll have to be on his terms. And Jack's terms are always very one-sided."
"Let me get this straight," Judy asserted, "either we speak to Jack now and risk getting captured at Erkin Enterprise later, or we don't speak to Jack and thus find out what we can about Erkin. All that at the expense of losing any information he might have, and hope it's enough to get Bogo a warrant?"
"That about wraps it up," Nick approved to her summary, "speaking to Jack puts us at high risk later; not speaking to him puts us at low risk, but we do lose out a lot of information. And if we can't find what we need on Erkin now, we'll be at just as high of a risk later anyway, and will have missed out on what Jack might have had to tell us. So, how are we going to decide?"
"Let me think…" Judy murmured and lost herself in her musing, while her leg started thumping the carpet underneath to the tiny puffs of dust.
…
Author's notes:
Hesitance jumps around your mind,
Grooms decision thus chosen blind.
Your thoughts most succulent of snack,
All delivered by luscious feedback.
So don't hide like a tiny shrew,
Thus share that belovable review!
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