Chapter Sixty-Five
The Fall Before the Storm

Hospitals were strange places. The air, so clinical and crisp. The rooms, so large and tidy, yet packed with tools and instruments, each with their own special place of belonging. The air smelt of disinfectant, while every hallway was filled with general chatter and the continuous, repetitive beeps of dozens of different medical equipment. The walls were painted white and lit by white lights attached to the white panel ceilings, which shone down upon the white-coated professionals, who were wheeling beds with white sheets, or escorting patients with blue, white-striped hospital gowns, around the white corridors.

The glass doors of the main reception opened automatically, and two people stepped in from the blackness outside. The first being Nurse Flo, still wearing the oversized fleece, who continued directly towards the main reception, while the second, Officer Wolfard, slowed to a stop to wander around at the sterilized, white-shining and stainless steel that surrounded him. "Evening Kathy," Flo said, one worker to another. She slipped off Wolfard's fleece and pawed it over the desk.

"Hey, my—"

"You'll be more than warm enough inside. This way, Mister Wolfard."

"Flo, I—"

"We have a bed for you in Ward A one, one, th—"

"But, my wallet was in that!"

"No it isn't," she countered, wearily taking a leather object from her pocket and holding it aloft. "It's right here."

"What? You took it from my pocket!?"

"You were just complaining you didn't have it. Now you're complaining that you do?"

"Well, erh, I—" Wolfard caught the wallet as it was thrown towards him, catching it clumsily in both paws, while Flo continued to her destination of guidance.

"Left here," she said, pushing open a large pair of doors. "As part of medical procedure, you'll have to spend the night. Try not to let it get to you. Just see it as a 'government-sponsored mini-break'."

"Okay," he agreed amidst the entrance to another corridor.

"You will also be required to change into a hospital-issue medical gown. The Saint Bernard hospital," she added, talking as though reading from a script, "and all associated parties would like to remind Subject-Name-Here that these gowns are brand new, that they have never been 'recycled' from a deceased former patient and that you are an excellent Person-being-treated-for-medical-problem."

"Right..."

"And to save you asking later: yes, I will avert my eyes when you remove your undergarments. But don't expect me to waste time leaving the room, et cetera. Nurses have a million and one things that needed doing half an hour ago. It's no different in my case."

"Guess you must get pretty snowed under as a nurse."

"You don't know the half of it. There's far too much work for us to handle, but it's cheaper for the government to let us metaphorically work our guts out, rather than hire more staff. In here." Flo pushed open a door to a small, single-bed holding-room and stepped inside.

...

In the ZPD, across town, Judy Hopps paced up beside Nick Wilde in the noise and celebratory chatter of the bullpen, and pulled him over to one side. "Nick," she said softly, "I'd better be going. Are you going to be okay? With Fin, I mean."

The fox smirked weakly. "Well... we'll find that out once I've tried to pull it off. By the way, Carrots, if anything does go wrong: we never spoke about this. You've never met Fin, never heard of him and I did nothing to mention letting him out." The two glanced to their side as Bogo exited the ready room beside them, waiting until there was distance enough between them and anyone else in there, so that their discussion would not be heard over the noise of general chatter.

"You stay safe tonight, Carrots," Nick reminded with a turn back towards her. "We've made it through the raid. So our lives aren't directly threatened anymore at least. But Jack can still get a little grumpy, if he doesn't get his own way."

Judy nodded, checking about her to make sure no one was watching; thus, she fished a paw into her pocket. "I snatched this from my dart gun."

"A tranq round?"

"A strong enough dose to take down Bogo."

"Nice."

"Well, you said to take the whole gun. I think he'd notice that… but, if I have to, I can always give him a quick prick with this. Given his martial arts training, I thought I'd better get a strong one, so even if I can only graze him with it, he'll still be knocked out."

Nick nodded with the growth of amusement. "Good girl."

Hopps smiled back, trying to keep her expression cheerful. "Thanks."

But then Nick's ardor started to fade to grimness, and his gaze found its way to his feet. His heart felt like a rock and that rock was pulling him down stronger than ever. "Well, this is it, I guess."

"Yep... this is it. For now, at least. There'll always be later. Right, Nick?" Wilde's gaze rose to meet hers. His expression twitched with the intention of speech, but nothing came. He didn't want to lie to her and say it would all be fine. But he didn't want to tell the truth either and say he was at more risk now than he was during the raid. At least then he had the law on his side, now he just had himself. Nick's lip sealed. Emotion taking over, he dropped down onto one knee and put his arms about the rabbit's small, shivering frame. Judy reacted instantly, slipping her arms around the fox's soft, warm neck, even as the officers around them turned with a startled glare or a wolf whistle or a lazy cheer.

"Whatever happens, Judy," Nick whispered, both he and Judy too enwrapped in the moment to care or notice the reactions of the officers around them, "I will do everything in my power to do what's best for you. Now come on," he offered, pulling himself away, "gimme a smile. That beautiful smile." Controlling her uneasy sadness, Judy managed and gave him what he wanted in purity and radiance. "I'll see ya later, Carrots."

"See you later, Nick. And good luck." Nick watched Judy with a fond smile, as she turned and paced from the room. But, as the sweet-smelling bunny walked away, the fox pushed her from his mind. He ignored the love he felt for her, forgot all worries of losing or disappointing her and uncluttered his mind from the knowledge that this wasthe first time the two of them had been separated since Monday.

He ignored his hopes, his fears and solely focused on the task at paw.

Bogo glanced over his shoulder, when the door swung shut with Judy on the other side. He got behind McHorn and authoritatively tapped him on the shoulder. The rhino aligned his confusion at Bogo's steely eyes and received the strong words, "A word in my office, upstairs."

...

Stood alone in the crowded room, Nick watched carefully as the door to the bullpen swung open a second time, with McHorn and Bogo stepping out. His eyes wandered carefully about the room, taking note of the activities and movements of all the officers around him. No one was paying him any attention. But he knew if he just kept standing there like a tailor's dummy, someone was going to notice soon. He hadn't had much time to plan his course of action for getting from there to Finnick, and he wasn't sure which option was entirely best.

He knew getting a beer and mingling with the others was the best idea for blending in, but it wouldn't exactly help him get out. He could just walk out without saying a word — and perhaps no one would take notice enough to remember it later — but then that risked looking even more suspicious if they did notice. He glanced to a small, red box on the wall beside him. Guess he could just ring the fire alarm…

Nick paced up to Bogo's unoccupied lectern — both looking for some inspiration and just trying to do something before someone asked him what he was doing; thus, forcing the issue, so he glanced over the paperwork on the desk. He could have said he was taking up a piece of paperwork to the Chief, but then if he was questioned on it later and someone would point out that he was the only officer missing at the time Fin escaped, it wouldn't take long for people to realize that he never took any paperwork to Bogo, with Bogo never even having asked for any paperwork anyway.

The paperwork was the way to go though. He needed something that couldn't be proved or disproved, something he was doing just off his own back, rather than with orders… Something like—

"Hey, Wilde," Higgins called over, "you okay over there? You look like you've lost something."

Nick turned quickly and slipped into his casual demeanor. "No problems over here. I was just looking at Bogo's paperwork."

"Oh?"

"Yeah, Hopps was complaining before she left about how late she was gonna have to be up, catching up on overdue paperwork. I thought I might surprise her by just doing it for her."

Delgerto snickered. "What's this, Office Wilde filling out paperwork because he wants to? I don't believe that for a second." Nick kept himself fully bleak. "I think there's another reason. An ulteriormotive for doing what you're doing." Nick opened his mouth to respond. If they were even the slightest bit suspicious, he wouldn't have a chance later on.

"Yeah," Fangmeyer piped up, "I think there's another reason you want her 'unoccupied' this evening." Under any other circumstance... Nick would've denied the statement and used any other excuse apart from that one, but in this situation, it was perfect. Not only had they just been seen to be hugging, but also — and more importantly — it brought people's attention away from the fact he was doing paperwork at all. It made the 'evening between them' the talking point and made the paperwork into a means rather than an end — and ends were always remembered more clearly in people's minds than the means used to get there. Besides, if he played it right, they'd just assume he was joking anyway.

He shrugged easily, allowing a playful smirk to dance across his face. "Well, what can I say? She fell for me, as any femammle must. Now, if you'll excuse me," he said, adjusting his tie dapperly as he made out of the room, "I have a very attractive female's evening to 'unoccupy'." The sound of chuckling and clinking beer bottles ringing out through the closing door behind him, the fox stepped out into the quiet darkness of the corridor and began progressing his way towards the interrogation rooms.

A grimace formed, unhappy with himself for what he had just done. He'd never objectified a femammle like that before, and it sent a shiver of displeasure right through him. In all honesty, he couldn't see how other memmle did it.

...

The sheets of the bed were white — Wolfard starting to think that 'white' was the only color, the decorator they'd hired, knew how to use, the walls and floor also being of that same, white color, — and the bed was one of those electrical ones, which could be raised or lowered. There was a wooden desk with a white top, a white chest of drawers and a steel-end table on wheels near the bed, with a number of medical tools upon it. There were also a number of larger pieces of medical equipment about the room, but Wolfard didn't know what they were. He whistled softly, stepping into the room and looking about at the strange pieces of equipment. Then he edged to the table and picked up a random object.

"Heck, I bet you need a university degree just to know what most of this stuff's even called," he said, holding something with some buttons and a kind of nobbley bit on the side.

"That's a polemic distortion pulmonary pacification harmonizer. Please don't break it." Reaching up, Flo stole it away, but her paw touched his for a moment as she took it. The touch lingered a moment longer than it had to, which made Wolfard to wonder what made him observe this fact, and why it made his paws shake so.

Flo took the object and set it down where it had been. Her movements slowed and she paused, her head cocking in the direction of Wolfard's paws. After a second's thought, she turned back towards him and slipped her paw into his.

An inexplicable shiver ran down the wolf's spine, while Flo held his paw. She examined it minutely, and then turned it over, pressing her fingers with medical delicacy into the sensitive pads of his paws. His shaking worsened and his breaths became deeper and more drawn out. Flo's brow eventually furrowed. "Strange," she muttered in quiz, "the effects of the adrenaline should have worn off long ago. Never mind," she added lightly, dropping his paw at last, "it's not serious. Mister Wolfard, I need you to change into your medical—"

The hare turned up to the wolf's face and her expression froze, with her eyes dotting across his initials as she made a scan of his symptoms: shortness of breath, dilated pupils, elusive gaze. Clearly he was suffering from Hypertension Disorder. "Mister Wolfard," she said, a slight amount of urgency building in her voice, "please will you assume an upwards-facing horizontally prone-position on the sleep-deprivation recapitulation unit beside you?"

"What?"

"Will you please get into bed."

"Urh, sure." Sitting down upon the mattress, the wolf swung his legs up with a stretch out on the bed, while the head of the bed was at an elevated angle to the rest of it so that he could sit up comfortably.

"Now," Flo initiated, taking a nightshirt and trousers from a drawer, "put these on." She dropped them down before him; consequently, he looked between the clothes and the hare herself. She turned her back on him, her fluffy tail making delightf— Wolfard tore his gaze away sharply, and he reached for the clothes. His paws hadn't stopped shaking, and the thought he was now about to undress in the same room as the hare — the hare, who'd only have to turn a little to see his unclad body — didn't help things. His breaths becoming short and shallow, the wolf struggled to operate his shirt buttons — failing to undo the fiddley row of small disks due to the instant shaking of his uncontrollable limbs.

Flo turned back to him. "What's taking you?"

"My, erh-heh… my paws are shaking too much. I can't work the buttons."

"Oh." She stepped suddenly at his direction, something like a bubble of shock leaping up into Wolfard's throat, as she reached out towards him. "Here, let me." The wolf stuttered as he tried to reply, the hare's paws reaching towards him, while he lay on his back upon the bed. He stifled a cough as her paws undid his top button — as he felt the softness of her fur fondling against the thicker fur around the front of his neck. It sent a tremble down his back, while her paws slipped lower to the next button, brushing, pleasuring and stimulating the fur of his upper chest.

Her paws moved lower down. A particularly large shiver made itself know everywhere behind him, a shiver which managed to reach the very tip of his tail, making a number of muscles all across his body to tense as the excitement reached his head. His jaw tensed... and so, understandably, did another muscle 'lower down'.

The wolf's eyes widened with panic. No, no, not this now! He risked a glance down — down to the rapidly swelling sensation of heat and tension in his lower midsection — and he saw what he had feared he'd see. Wolfard bit down hard on his long, lavish tongue. Ooh... fudge nuggets! Flo moved to the next button. In vain, Wolfard hoped the hare wouldn't spot the newly appeared lump, but, as her paws slipped down to the lowest of his shirt's buttons, and as they came tantalizingly close to that part of his body, her eyes happened to flick into the new bodily formation.

The moment of her paws slowed to a stop. Her expression froze. She stared at the lump, her mind and body stricken with frost. She had seen a lot of things as a nurse... but normally…

The wolf licked his dry lips. "Flo, I... I'm, heh… I'm sorry—"

"It's okay," she assured, trying to keep her voice natural-sounding as she retracted her paws, carefully. "I understand that males don't have direct control over their erectile inhibitor and that your, ughm... your 'current state' is not truly a fault of your own." Slowly backing from the wolf, but still quite openly looking, Nurse Flo stepped outside the door. "I'll let you, ugh... I'll leave you to, erh…"

The door shut. Wolfard stared out at it for a long interval of uncomfortableness. His eyes turned down to the ache between his legs, and he growled wolfishly, crossing his legs over it as though trying to throttle it, while his paws were brought to his face and his predatorial claws dug into his eyes.

"Such an idiot," he growled louder to himself. "You stupid, fluffing idiot."

...

The corridors of the ZPD were unnaturally quiet at this time — almost every officer currently celebrating in the bullpen. There was at least one officer still working at this time though, and Nick Wilde could hear him just a little further up the corridor. Keeping his footfall completely silent, the fox approached the ZPD reception area. The blinds had been lowered over the large panes of glass across the front of the building, and so the light of the outside streetlamps was held at bay, like the risk of being spotted in his movements by unwanted eyes.

Nick silently approached the central desk, and Clawhauser snored again, a loud snore which he'd heard from across the other side of the corridor. The lights were still turned off, so Nick guessed that the cheetah had walked over to lower the blinds, walked back and had fallen asleep from the exhaustion; before, he'd managed to flick the lights on. The darkness was no problem to the fox; the shadows accepted him like an old friend. He softly walked up to the edge of the overweight cheetah's large desk, and climbed up onto it, gingerly.

Nick knew Clawhauser well, but he didn't let that affect him. Right now, he was just an obstacle — like a locked safe or an armed guard or a security camera — but not a friend. The fox made a note to feel bad about it, but now, now was not the time.

Reaching out in the darkness, the fox felt for the handle of the drawer, where Clawhauser kept the keys in, carefully watching the cheetah's expression for any sign if he was about to wake up — unsure of how heavily his sleep was. Nick opened the drawer and lifted the large ring of keys out. They jingled, lightly, as he fiddled with them in his search for the right key. The cheetah sighed in his sleep, and Nick's body turned to frost. Clawhauser muttered something under his breath; thus, Nick continued fingering through the small pieces of intricately designed metal.

He found the key to the interrogation room and slipped it off, holding it between his teeth and reaching back, slowly, towards the drawer he had taken the keys from. Clawhauser shuffled in his seat, the keys jingling again, as the fox set them down and pulled the drawer shut.

Slower than before — fully aware the cheetah's sleep had been disturbed and was now lighter than it had been — the fox started to reverse back the way he came, using his tail to dust the surface so he knew exactly how far his legs would have to stretch to meet with the ground, allowing him to get down lightly, rather than just leap and hope for the best.

The fox felt the reassuring cold of the ground beneath the pads on the toes of one foot, and then...

"Clawhauser!"

"Ah! Yes, Chief?"

"Send up a copy of the Disciplinary Action paperwork against McHorn, will you?"

"Oh, yes Chief, right away."

"Good. After that, you take yourself off home."

"Yes, Sir." Taking a deep breath, Clawhauser took his finger off the intercom. He wiped his brow with his arm and promptly fell back into his chair, breathless. "Ughhh," he groaned, clutching at his chest, "gotta… cut down on the… doughnuts." Nick chuckled dryly to himself as he heard the cheetah pant, while he himself silently jogged away down the corridor with the key to the interrogation room door in his paw.

Soon, his jog slowed with the meeting of an iron door. Glancing over his shoulder, Nick paced up toward the thick, metal door and got to insert the key into the lock. He paused, checked his surroundings and noticed another door right beside him. His brow furrowing, a small idea formed. It crossed his mind it probably wasn't the wisest of ideas, but it was insurance against later 'complications' at least. Sidestepping, the fox pushed open the door of the room beside the interrogation room and moved inside, pulling the door closed behind him.

Walking in, Nick gazed out through the one-way-mirror. Finnick was sat, unhappily, on his oversized chair at an oversized desk, straining to lean on his elbow on the table, while he stared at the metal door. He was unable to see Wilde, who turned to the large piece of recording equipment that rested in the darkness, darkness in which this room had to be kept in for the one-way-mirror system to work.

Nick got to the device, felt about for the SD card, got it out and put it to the side. Looking about briefly, the fox quickly found a collection of more SD cards and inserted one of them into the camera, hence, flicking on the recorder. The machine started to whir quietly, and an orange light marked 'visual' started flashing on the side. Then a second light marked 'audio' started doing the same. Reaching out a final time, Nick Wilde began the recording.

He backed from the device swiftly — time was short, after all — and pulled open the door, checking up and down the corridor before slipping out once again. He got to the large door once more and quickly unlocked it with a wince, as a resounding clank echoed at the corridor with the sliding of the door's bolt.

He pulled it open, blinking back at the crack of bright light, which came out to meet him, and looked towards the small, tan fox who impatiently waited inside.

Finnick smirked, sickly. "Nick," he said, fondly, in a way that made Wilde want to puke, "it's about time you showed up..."

Author's notes:

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