Chapter Forty-Seven
Wastes Nine

'T' minus 170 minutes and counting...

A number of large, black-bodied flies had entered into Judy's apartment through the slightly open window, and had started buzzing busily around the small, simple room. They buzzed across the small fridge and her microwave, over her small desk, paperwork and the photograph of her mother and father, around the wardrobe, the upturned bed... and onto on the twisted body which lay dead upon the floor. The flies landed their fat bodies on their short, stubby legs and explored across the corpse's bent limbs and vacant face, over its glassy eyes and inside its gaping, foam-encrusted mouth.

The reek of death hung heavy in the air — the scent of blood and sick. The white foam, which had fizzed and bubbled up from inside his lungs, had spewed out from his mouth and nose. The white was diluted with clots of red from where the thin tissue of the lungs had been torn and savaged from inside out, choking the armadillo on his own blood. This was a slow and painful death indeed. Footsteps approached gradually from down the corridor, the sounds of voices in accompaniment and clearly audible through the building's thin walls.

"It's an armadillo, yes?" asked the lower voice.

"Yeah," returned the higher other, "the landlady's nephew, I think."

"Who, Dharma's?"

"Uh-huh." The footsteps approached and halted just outside the door.

The male spoke, "Well, here we are. Key?"

"The lock's smashed anyway."

"That's how he got in?"

"I don't know. I guess so."

"Interesting. Are you coming too?"

"Hmm..."

"It's okay, Hopps. You wait here."

"No, I should be there with you."

"Well," the fox said dryly, the door handle rattling as he turned it from without, "it's your funereal." The door swung open and the fox gazed inside. His first reaction to the scene was to flinch back from the ravaged body of the corpse and the heavy stench of death. But he forced himself to focus on the situation, and his averted eyes returned and lingered sternly upon the scene, his brow lowered in a grimace. Judy stepped in beside him and took one fleeting look at the body and the carpet, which was coated in blood-clotted sickness; then turned hastily away again with a paw rising to her mouth. Nick edged to her. "You wanna step outside? Get some air?"

"I'll be alright," Judy tried to say with confidence, but all that came were her weak whispers. "I just... need... to—" The rabbit was cut off by sudden and violent gagging. She bent double, a paw clutching at her chest, her face contorting as she fought to hold back the rush of hot liquid that raced up her throat.

"Come on, Hopps," Nick tried again, ushering the rabbit hurriedly down the corridor, "the carpets here may be horribly outdated, but there's no need for you to redecorate." Judy just groaned, holding a paw over her mouth and stumbling down the corridor, but she held upright by the fox as they made towards the toilets. Nick pushed the bathroom door open and ushered Judy inside. The rabbit staggered forward towards a toilet cubicle, cringing severely as her mouth suddenly filled with the unpleasant tang of hot stomach fluid.

The rabbit threw up the toilet seat and emptied her stomach into the old and rather stinking toilet. Nick watched as the rabbit hacked up mouthfuls of partly digested breakfast, her shoulders throwing back as she retched loudly. Tilting his head to one side, a smirk grew as he spoke, "Want me to hold your ears back or something?"

A few seconds later, Hopps' bout of vomiting ended, and she was left kneeling on the floor, just mindlessly staring into the regurgitated condense of her stomach, while coughs drained her acidic throat. "Shut up," she returned flatly.

Nick chuckled as he leaned over her shoulder. "So, that's how they make a carrot smoothie."

Judy took a deep breath and wiped her mouth with a paw. "Enough with the jokes, already. You find this all terribly amusing; I'm aware of that."

"Sorry," Nick said, as though realizing just now at how he was acting. "Sorry, I didn't mean to say that. It's just, well... all this—"

"Brought back old habits?"

"Yeah, bad habits. It's just the way I'm used to dealing with that kind of thing." He put a paw on her shoulder. "I'm sorry; I didn't mean anything by it."

"Alright, Nick…" Judy sighed, standing shakily. "Could you fill a sink with warm water?" Nick nodded and turned to the taps, pacing towards them as the rabbit stared into the toilet bowl, holding her troubled stomach as she reached forwards and flushed the chain. The red fox found a sink, which hadn't yet been vandalized, and twisted on both taps, putting in the plug and testing the temperature of the water with the pad of a finger, thus, adjusting the hot and cold until the sink was full with warm, steamy water.

Turning the taps off again, the fox heard the rabbit approach from behind and stepped to her in concern. He placed a paw on her cheek as he looked at her, consequently, she was exhibiting paleness with dull eyes, ears drooped low and breaths long and deep. "You feeling okay?" he asked despite the obviousness.

"Better now, much better."

"Still shaky though?"

"Well, yeah. Sorry, I'm just not used to that kind of smell."

"Don't apologize, Hopps. I understand."

Judy blinked up at him wearily. Nick knew that she needed to rest. She needed to sit down, have a cool drink and something good to eat — particularly after losing as much of her stomach as that — but right now, there was something the fox needed to do more than provide for his rabbit companion: he had to know if this was murder and if this in any way was putting his partner in danger. Something about the dead body was bothering him. The fox drew his paw from the rabbit's cheek and made towards the door. "Nick?"

"Stay here. Clean yourself up, have a drink and take a breather. I'm gonna check out the body."

"Wait, I'll come with you."

"You will not," he ordered, his voice stern enough to stop her instantly. Wilde held her gaze intently for a moment, and then his expression dropped into soothing assurance. "Judy, stay here; let me check things out."

"But—"

"And if you really can't bear to be out of the action for even a few minutes, then get in touch with Bogo, okay?" Judy stared after the fox as he disappeared out the door. It had been a long time since he had last used that tone of voice on her, and she knew better than to ignore it.

...

Wilde stepped fearlessly into Judy's small apartment room. His nose wrinkled at the appalling smell, but he pressed uncaring on, driven by fear and fury — fear that Judy could in some way be a target in all this; fury that her safety might have been brought into jeopardy. His pace slowing as he approached, the fox drew level with the body. Wilde gazed down, trying not to breathe too deeply of the putrid and almost sweet, yet very sick, scent that infected the air. Stepping over the body of the armadillo, he pulled up the window fully, taking up one of Judy's pillows and swiping it through the air, until most of the flies had unwillingly left. It was time to get this started, he guessed.

Nick knelt down beside the corpse and his eyes traced along the cold, stiff body. He reached out and tried to turn the head with his paw, finding the joints of the neck rigid. He reached lower, lifted the paw and found the arms and fingers just as wooden. Reaching lower still, the fox tried to move the corpse's foot. His brow rose when the body's foot moved freely. Apparently rigor mortis had started to take effect, but it hadn't yet reached the victim's feet. That meant that he must've died sometime this morning, otherwise he wouldn't have been as rigid as now. Nick couldn't see any apparent injuries, bruises, stabs or anything, just the foam around the body's inched closer towards that filthy foam but instantly cringed back from the repugnant odour. Murder or not, it was definitely foul play.

Jokes aside, this guy was surely killed by an overdose. But an overdose with what? There was a split bag of white powder resting on the floor by the body's foot. The fox lifted it with a cautious claw and looked at the fine, white powder within it. Glancing over his shoulder and out of the door, his ears in tune with the corridor, he checked for Judy presence. The coast was clear, so he again looked over to the bag, lightly dabbed the pad of his smallest finger into it and raised it to his nose. The scrutiny went through hesitance for a moment, but then he parted his lips and took it into his mouth.

It tasted of nothing for a few moments, and then it hit his sensors. It was a stingy, salty taste which slowly started to grow in intensity. Wilde rolled his tongue. He had only taken a tiny amount — far too little to do any damage or give him a high — but even that little amount was already making his tongue numb.

"It's coke alright," he murmured. "Not a bad batch, either." His brow lowered as he rolled his tongue over his teeth. It had been quite some time since he'd last tasted something like that, and this was some very good quality, after all. Surely another small dab wouldn't hurt, for old time's sake? Slowly, the fox reached out a second time, but the door swung open with a quick rabbit stepping in. Nick flung his paw back as though he'd been burnt, while Judy didn't appear to have noticed, too busy adjusting her radio as she came in beside him. "I phoned Bogo. He's ordering the officers he posted at the docks to come over here and investigate. How's everything looking so far?"

"Fine," Nick said with a guilty mind.

"In what way is finding a corpse in my bedroom 'fine'?"

"Well, I... I mean—"

"Nick," she asked with a stern adjust of voice, "what's wrong?" The fox stood and walked across to her as she remained in the doorway. He looked up and down the corridor before stepping back inside. Judy checked about herself deliberately, self-consciously, as the fox's apparent concern made her own trepidation grow in response. "What's wrong?" she asked again with a lesser volume.

"It's just not right."

"I know it's not right, Nick. There's a dead guy in my flat!" Judy stepped in and took the fox's paw, tugging it towards her as though pulling Nick's attention down with it. "Tell me."

"It doesn't make sense."

"What doesn't?"

"The body. If he came up for privacy, then why choose the second floor? Why not the roof or the basement?"

Judy stepped in a little more, no longer on the point of retching, but still desiring not to get too close to the pile of rotting meat. "How do you mean?"

Nick leaned against the wall, watching the rabbit as she closed into focus. "Well, let's just take a step back for a sec' and look at what we do know. The nephew of the lady who owns this place decides he wants a high. He takes a little too much and has an overdose."

"Well," Judy huffed, indicating the white powder split across the room and the bulges of other packets in the victim's pockets, "there's hardly a little."

"Which brings me to my first point. This guy just seems to have far too much for him to be a user."

"You're saying he's a dealer?"

"And dealers themselves don't tend to be heavy users. They know too well the damage it can cause."

"Okay, but what are you saying?"

Nick crossed his arms. "Just, for the moment, assuming that it was his intention to take some drugs himself: what reason does that give him to come up here to your apartment?"

"To get a little privacy, I guess."

"Agreed. So, why come here? To the second floor? Why not the ground floor or the top floor even? I mean, hell, being the landlady's nephew, he could easily have gotten hold of a set of keys and gone right up to the roof!"

"So, what you're saying is… he chose this room for a reason?"

"Well, what else could it be?"

"I don't know, Nick… perhaps it's just coincidence."

"But he had to choose your door? This particular door out of all the doors on this floor?"

"Again. He had to use one of the flats. Maybe he knew I was an officer and so knew I wouldn't be back for a good few hours. So he used my room, knowing he wouldn't be disturbed."

"But don't you see? That's just it! He must know you're the famous Judy Hopps who saved Zootopia, he must do! And he must also know that this was your room when he chose it. So, why intentionally choose the room of a famed police officer?"

"I guess, but—"

"And, going back to him having keys. That's another point."

"How?"

Nick raised his eyebrows…. "You just think about that yourself, Hopps. You're more than bright enough to figure it out for yourself. But you need to stop denying that something's, well... something's a little suspect…"

Judy's voice dropped to a frantic whisper, "I still don't know what you're getting at!"

"Yes, you, do."

Judy scowled. "You're asking me to believe it's murder?"

"I'm asking you to acknowledge the facts."

"Alright. If this is the landlady's nephew, then why did he go to the trouble of breaking the door open, when he could've just nicked her keys when she wasn't looking, and just strolled right in. I get that, okay?"

"Now, go take a look at the door," Nick prompted, to which Judy breathed a sharp, frustrated breath. This elaborate story was getting on her nerves. She wasn't prepared to admit, even to herself, that she was getting angry because she was starting to see what he was trying to show, but was too stricken in dread to let herself accept it. She faced the door, shut it and pulled it open, not needing to turn the doorhandle, as the latch had been broken. She leaned in close to the lock of the door and examined the side, reaching out a paw and running it down the edge, with a feeling of touch that told her that it had been misshaped by a heavy blow.

"Well… the locks are smashed… the doorhandle's broken and the wood's had such a heavy hit that it's been misshaped to the point of almost being smashed as well..."

"Now, does this sound like the work of an armadillo to you?"

Judy's nose started to twitch; she was silent for a long moment. "No," she finally found some hope of acceptance to her denial. "No, this was done by somemammal quite a bit larger and stronger than an armadillo."

"Something quicker and more deadly too."

"How can you be sure?"

"Armadillos may not be particularly strong, but they are heavy and cumbersome creatures. Whatever brought him up here must've been pretty strong and fast to grab him without a fight."

Judy covered her eyes with her paw, turning and pacing slowly out of the door. "And it's proven that it's not just an overdose?" she asked, traces of heavy distraught starting to appear in her voice.

Nick accompanied her. "I've always followed the rule that it's best to prepare for the worst."

"Yeah," Hopps mumbled without any achieved relief, "but you always were a cynic."

Nick sighed at seeing Judy still in denial. "A cynic is just what an idealist calls a realist."

Judy turned back to face him, a small, cold light in her eyes. "So, we're going to believe it is murder, just in case it is?"

Nick knew the expression. He moved towards her, slowly, and put his large paws tenderly on her shoulders. "Don't be scared, Judy, we've been through worse in the past."

"Yeah, but back then they were only after us because we were directly in their way. Now you're saying I'm being headhunted? That they're trying to a... assa—" Judy trailed off, frightened beyond being able to say those words.

"Assassinate," Nick cut in, and Judy's fearful expression rose swiftly to meet Nick's, her nose twitching and eyes watering. The fox sighed again — now regretting that Judy wasn't in denial.

"Nick," Hopps said, her voice very small and meek, "what would've happened if I hadn't been round yours last night? Where would I be now… if we didn't figure things out between us in time?"

Nick blinked as he tried to hold back his emotions. "If that was the case, Hopps, you would've been tucked up in your little bed, when whomever did this struck."

"And then?"

"Well..." Nick cleared his throat, the thoughts of what might have been, as well as the rabbit's shaken expression, causing him to choke up, "W-well, I wouldn't have a partner anymore. And instead of investigating the murder of a drug peddler, I'd be investigating the rabbicide... of an officer of the ZPD."

"If this really was an attempt on my life, who organized it? Will they try again? What do we do?"

"I don't know," Nick muttered.

"But, Nick," Judy stepped in closer to her fox, drowning her fears in the reassuring warmth, musk of his fur and sweet scent. "What... what if they come for you next?"

"I don't know, Hopps," Nick answered truthfully, actively holding back threatening tears as he pulled the rabbit tighter against himself in daunting frustration. "Really, I don't. But we're going to get through this. The two of us together: we'll make it, you'll see. You don't have anything to fear," he said, though he knew he was lying. "It'll all pan out fine in the end, Jules… You'll see."

"As a team?" Judy asked innocently.

"As a team."

She sighed and stepped back from the reassuring embrace. "Okay, what's the next step?"

"Well," Nick said, breathing deeply as he calmed himself to par, "that largely depends on you."

"Why me?"

"I didn't think you'd like what I want to do."

"Which would be?"

"Judy," he said earnestly, dropping onto one knee, "your life may have just been brought into danger, direct danger I mean. If there's somemammal out there who has it in for you, I... I want to take you home and hide you under the sheets."

"Nick..." Judy squinted, "this isn't innuendo, is it?"

"At a time like this? No, Hopps, it isn't. It's just…" Nick grunted, "it's all I've wanted to do all day… take you home and hide you; protect you. I don't know how, but I knew something like this was gonna happen."

"Knew? What do you mean?"

"I don't know, Judy. There's a lot I don't know right now."

"You don't know? Then how come you're so convinced?"

"Again, I've got nothing apart from my gut reaction."

"So, what are you saying we do? Run and hide from shadows?"

His gaze answered the lack of answers… "I don't know."

Judy waited at her fox. He was troubled, clearly, and apparently more worried for her safety than even she was. She stepped forwards and took his paw in hers, waiting for his gaze to rise from the floor and to her again before she spoke. "Hey," she said, her voice soft but cracking a little around the edges — sad and worried, but trying to do her best for the sake of her partner, "come on, Nick. We've got an important job to do."

Still holding Judy's paw, the fox raised his own and placed it on her cheek. Without a word, he leaned forwards and pressed his lips delicately against hers and held them there, until the rabbit's lips moved in return. The kiss prolonged for quite a while, Nick savoring it long through the simplicity of the perfect act of passion, of love. He knew that the moment the kiss ended would be the moment that they'd have to go back to work with all the rest of the pain that came with it. Pushing himself firmer against the rabbit's lips, Wilde relented and mooned fondly at his partner. "So, what now? What do we do and where do we go from here?"

"What can we do, really, other than follow our orders?"

"The warrant for Bogo is still your first priority?"

"For the moment... it has to be." The rabbit's face closed on Nick's, and she nuzzled his cheek gently with her nose. "Overall though, you will always be the most important thing in my life."

A warm smile grew on the fox's lips. "You're saying I'm just a 'thing' to you now?"

Judy grinned at him as she stepped away. "Nick, as much as I'd love to stay here and make jokes… maybe make something else too… Ughm, if we don't get on with this warrant, then Bogo won't have a raid and we won't have a job." Nick thought on the facts that Judy had brought up... then the reality of the situation returned to his disorganized mind. They were stood in Judy's apartment, with a dead body which, if it was not for him and where she had slept last night, could've been hers. It should've been hers…

The thought entered Nick's mind like a cloud of ash — silent and slowly moving, but as deadly as poison and as paralyzing as death. Cold as ice and harsh as sin, the revelation hammered into Nick's soul. Hammer into anvil, it left him without thought and without emotion, as he stared, in his mind's eye, at the corpse of the small rabbit, lying in a pool of her own priceless blood on the floor.

Beside him, unaware of what he was thinking, Judy forced herself to chuckle floatingly as she tried to brighten the mood. "Well, if nothing else, I'd better go get some food. I need something to take the taste of sick away. And if we've gotta go to a raid later, I'd better be at my best."

Nick stood motionless, staring at the floor as though he couldn't hear. Biting on her lip, the rabbit silently turned and started to make from the room. Nick's ear twitched when she stepped through the doorway; hence, his paw shot out and stopped her, grabbing her by her wrist. "Hopps!"

Judy turned back with no small amount of startle. "What?"

The fox pointed a black claw at her. "You are not going anywhere on your own today, Missie. If something's going to happen to you, it's gonna happen through me first." She gawked at her fox, struck by the animalistic, almost passionate fury she could observe in his eyes, fury at whoever might try to harm her, while the tips of his canines peeped out from beneath his ever-so-slightly snarling muzzle.

"Come on," he said, taking her arms, "let's go." A tremble ran up and down her spine as he took her arms and started pushing her out the apartment. He wasn't gentle — just strong and so masterful — and the rabbit hated herself for every inch of excitement it gave her, every ounce of enjoyment she received from being handled like that; every degree Fahrenheit of heat that built-up in between her legs. She scolded at herself and the fluffing heat, while stumbling down the corridor. Her life was in danger, someone was murdered in her flat, Nick wanted nothing else but to protect her and all she could do was get aroused!

A small, sick part of Judy's mind couldn't help but find it amusing; a small part of Judy's mind that was finding her partner just so sexy right now.

Sweet cheese and crackers, why hadn't she taken those pills when she had had the chance?

Author's notes:

Hesitance jumps around your mind,

Grooms decision thus chosen blind.

Your thoughts most succulent of snack,

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