16
The Best of You
Chapter 2: The Flash
The Smooth, cool concrete was something Nicks hind paws rarely contacted. Pavement and common sidewalk concrete is all too familiar, but the new, parking lot complex material felt oddly off to him. He follows Judy, carrying his new taser which is held within its carrying case and his cup of Pawpsicle, to wherever she was taking them. After a few moments of walking he was about to speak up when Judy stops behind a police car and turns to him.
"Well? What do you think!?" she clasps her paws together and slightly stands up on her toes for a second, Nick hides his excitement at her cute gesture and looks to his right, taking in the truly massive size of the cruiser
"This cant possible be your car." He looks at Judy who smirks.
"It's OUR car now, slick, and yeah, I guess cracking one of the biggest cases in Zootopia really gave us some perks didn't it?"
"You use that term 'us' very loosely but yes this is a very massive car, I am looking forward to ramming through buildings with it."
"Hey, you did just as much for the case as I did! I wouldn't have been able to do it without you!"
"Ah come on fluff, we both know you'd figure it out on your own sooner or later, I was just your side kick but enough of that, come on, I wanna see if I can even climb into this thing, and I need to put my taser on." Before she could launch into her rebuttal, he walks out of her view beside around the car towards the passage door. she sighs and makes a mental note to bring this topic up again, she wasn't going to let him half himself that easily. She reaches into her pocket and clicks the key fob for their cruiser to unlock. The car clicks and emits a few quick beeps and the fox swiftly opens the door with one paw.
The police cruiser is huge, as far as Nick is concerned. The bottom of his seat was level with his head and it seems to be a challenge at first glance to get into. After giving it a good look over he found that there is well place steps and bars to grab onto to get into the vehicle easily and they are conveniently painted in stripes of yellow and black. He easily navigates the steps and gets into the cruiser with his coffee cup of pawsicle and taser. He sits in the seat and looks around, the thing that stands out the most to him was the welding done to the interior of the vehicle to accept the new seats and redone computer mount. This was most obviously, at one point in time, a squad car for mammals much bigger than themselves, most likely tigers, or maybe wolfs, as far as he could tell.
Nick stands on the new metal plate welded to the inside of the cruiser. It is a well thought out design but lacks a finish, making it seem much more haphazardly thrown together than it is. He turns his attention back to the box in his paws after placing his cup between the seats. He opens the box and saw exactly what he was expecting, a taser, much like the one he had trained with in the academy. He carefully picks it up out of its case, gripping it firmly. He flips it over and looks at the markings on the side and serial number. The matte black metal and polymer are well constructed for a first model he thought. While the overall design of his gun was the same as Judy's taser, his was somewhat larger to fit the size of his paws. While it wasn't the first taser made of its kind it was the first official, duty ready one, and the look of the gun shows. No smudges, scratches or imperfections in the finish on the metal or polymer parts of the gun and to top it off it fit very well in his paw. The engineers behind the police department have seemed to really listen to his suggestions when they asked him about it. He clearly remembered the first model that they had put together for him in training, it was functional but was very rough looking. He smiles and sets the gun back into its slot in the box before getting out its hard-plastic holster. He sets the holster on top of the open plastic box before reaching for his belt. Undoing his belt and the top buttons on his pants.
"What are you doing?" Judy looks over at him with a somewhat amused smile as items fall from his belt and into the floor of the cruiser.
"I'm putting my taser on my belt, what do you think?" Nick removes the rest of his belt from his pants and begins threading the holster onto it.
"Couldn't you have just waited till you were in a rest room or something?"
"Oh, come on I'm not taking off my pants and I need this! This is the only reason I sighed up to be on the force, remember?" He smirks at Judy who just shakes her head. Nick focuses his attention onto the holster and belt again, making sure it is oriented correctly. Judy looks back over at him, she watches him as he attempts to figure out how to properly thread his duty belt into his holster, which he is doing backwards at the moment. Judy internally laughs. She starts to say something but draws a blank when her eyes wonder over to Nick's mid sections
His beltless pants have fallen slightly, and his shirt has become untucked in his haste to undo his belt. Judy's eyes slowly move down from the Fox's midsection to his crotch. His lower, cream colored stomach fur pokes out between his shirt and unbuttoned pants. He is much more in shape than she last remembered him being in. The Police academy really did make a difference on him physically at the least she is sure. He turns away from her and bends down to pick up the things he had dropped, and Judy couldn't help but stare.
His pants slide even further down, and her eyes grow as his boxers come into view. Her eyes travel to the base of his tail, she stares at the small bit of fabric that loops over it. It was so odd for her, she had paid attention in anatomy in high school of course, she got straight A's in everything, but they had barely touched on anything other than rabbits. Seeing more of him than what she had ever seen before was strangely both exciting and frightening at the same time. Nicks tail swishes back and forth while his paw shoot up to his waist to keep his pants from falling any further. He stands back up straight and turns back to his side all while trying to re-thread his belt into his pants. Judy quickly tares her gaze away from him as her ears run hot. She stares into the concrete wall in front of their car while squeezing the string wheel.
Don't think about it. Don't think about it. DON'T THINK ABOUT IT. What is wrong with me?!
Judy takes a glance back over at him and finds that he had us figured out the proper way to put his holster on and that he had fixed his clothing situation. He looks down at himself and smiles before looking over to Judy who does her best to return the grin. She tries to suppress the odd feelings swirling in her stomach about her Fox partner while she sticks the key into the ignition and puts the cruiser into reverse. A relief finally washes over her as she realizes he hadn't caught her staring.
"If I'm honest carrots, I look pretty damn good in police attire, wouldn't you say?" Nick smirks at her for a moment before clicking his seat belt into place.
"You're so full of yourself, you know that?" Judy does her best to focus on driving through the parking complex of the ZPD headquarters.
"Oh you know you wouldn't want me any other way!" He smiles while pushing himself back into his seat to get comfortable and then getting his pawsicle out of his cup.
"Sureeeeee slick." She smiles while pulling out of the parking complex and into the outer parking lot of the police station. She carefully navigates the lot and makes it to the main exit onto the street which features a stop light. The traffic lights were very usefully when a real emergency was happening, and many vehicles needed to exit the ZPD headquarters unhindered by the traffic on the main road. They would simply make all the lights red and give themselves the right of way, but today was no emergency and Judy patiently waits at the light. After some time, the unusual duo made their way through the streets, getting to Savanna Central and then their patrol area. The rabbit notes that her partner was unusually quiet for the drive over to their beat. She ponders this while she makes a turn off onto a side road. She scans the streets out of habit, something that Wolford had taught her to idly do. It is a helpfully habit for the most part and helps to remind her to keep check of her surrounding, especially the mammals within it.
Judy finishes mindlessly scanning one street side and out of habit switches to the next. Her eyes cross over the road in front of her that she was more or less paying attention to. Their cruiser quickly comes up on another vehicle in the road and Judy lays on the breaks. Not enough to skid, but differently enough to spill a coffee if she had one in her lap. She looks more closely at the car in front of her and sees that it was just trying to park on the street and almost got re-ended by a police car. That would have been bad she thinks. The car makes its through its parallel parking unharmed, much quicker than she could do herself, she notices and then they were back on their way. She makes it almost to the end of the road when Nick finally speak up.
"So, are all rabbits bad drivers, or is it just you?" Nick looks over at Judy and smirks. There it is, she thought, the smug Fox makes his entrance. He goes to lick his pawsicle again but is thrusted forward suddenly. The pawsicle misses his mouth and flies straight into his eye, his seatbelt barely catches him before his muzzle hits the glove box.
"Ops, sorry." Judy smirks with her ears held high. The fox does his best to sit back up while pulling the Pawpsicle off his face.
"Hehe, sly bunny."
"Dumb fox." Judy chimes.
"You know you love me." He points his pawsicle accusingly at his fellow Rabbit officer but pauses. He didn't meant for that to sound the way it did. He hadn't meant for that to come out at all.
Oh shit
"Do I know that?" Nick stares at the bunny, unmoving. He watches her in frozen terror as she seems to contemplate what he had said. Surely, she took this as a joke, he didn't mean anything by what he said.
"yes, yes I do." The Rabbit attemptes her best smirk yet, and it seems to be just that. She had to hand it to herself, seeing the opportunity to turn Nick's joke around like that was prefect timing, and a bit of luck with the traffic light being red already. The enduring comment made her happy as well, it was extremely common for bunnies to tell one another they loved their friends and it seemed Foxes were no different in that regard as well, Judy deduced. The more you know, well that or it was another one of his endless carefree comments, either way, she thought.
She looks straight ahead and smiles at her little victory. Her partner was only as smooth as she would allow him to be and getting him would put him in his place. The traffic light turns green and she smoothly accelerates. Suddenly, a blur of red streaks through the intersection, running a red light. She slams on the breaks to avoid getting t-boned and the speeding car nearly misses the front of the cruiser. She glances over at Nick and smiles. This was going to be it, there first traffic stop, which would then cause there first ticket giving and then there first write up and paper work! Judy's beaming with excitement as Nick flicks on the lights and sirens. she steps on the gas.
Pilling out into intersection they make chases after the speeding car. After a moment or two of catching up to the car it quickly slows down and stops at the first most suitable spot to pull over at. The car was some type of new sports car, as far officer Hopps could tell so she new this was most likely their street racer. She pulls in behind the car and gets her ticket writing material out of the console.
"Damnnnn carrots, we clocked him going 115! And he ran a red light, looks like we got a serious reckless driving ticket on our paws." Nick taps the DSR on the dash of their cruiser and double checks that it did indeed display 115 mph.
"Yeah, definitely reckless driving, looking like hill get a suspended license for sure. possible even jail time depending. You want to right the ticket?" Judy looks over at him while she unbuckles.
"No no, I insist the professional does it." Nick takes the last bite of his Pawpsicle, unbuckles himself and opens his door.
"Well ok but your just as trained as I am at this, your taking the next one though, I'm not getting hustled into all the work." Judy opens the door and steps out onto the street. She walks around the front of their cruise and heads towards the red sports car.
"I am hurt you would ever accuse me of hustling such a fine officer as yourself." Nick puts his paw against his chest, mocking a hurt actor. Judy rolls her eyes while shaking her head before smiling, she could really get use to this. She puts on her professional face as she gets closer to the car and walks up beside the window, her ticket writing material at the ready.
"Sir, you were going 115 miles per hour, I hope you have a good explanation." Judy blinks and tries to process what she's seeing. She then recoils slightly form the sight.
"Flash, Flash 100-yard-dash!" Nick bends down to the window, the sloths face slowly lights up as he recognizes Nick.
"Nickkkkkkk." Flash smiles at him who smiles back and then looks down at Judy with an excepting smile. The rabbit quickly comes to her sense and regains control of the situation.
"Flash, you were going to 115 mile per hour, I'm sure you understand that means not just a regular ticket will do I'm going to have to give you a reckless driving ticket, wither or not you get to keep your license is up to th-" Judy fells Nick's elbow hit her side. She looks up from the sloth, which was ever so slightly getting that look of dread back on his face. The fox jerks his head towards the back of the car before speaking.
"Flash, buddy you stay right here while I go talk to my partner for quick second, don't run off from us now." Nick walks towards the back of the car with Judy following reluctantly.
"Carrots, come on, we cannot give him a reckless driving ticket, he's my friend!" He puts his arms out in a pleading fashion.
"Just because he's your friend doesn't mean we can just let him go. You and I both now that!"
"Oh come on, he helped us with the case too, remember." He stands up straighter with a more hopeful expression on his face. He smiles while Judy grumbles.
"Ohhhh Nick! come on, Bogo will kill us if we just let him off the hook!" she lays her ears back while crossing her arms. She starts thumbing her foot against the ground subconsciously.
"I know I know, how about this, he ran a red light AND was speeding, so we cut him SOME slack and give him a hefty speeding ticket, but not reckless driving?" Nick turns his hands up as if offering the idea while putting on his conman smile. The rabbit keeps the pained expression on her face and he quickly continues. "Ok ok, we give him the speeding ticket and we ticket him from running the red light, but we don't have to take his license, I mean he helped us with the bellwether case after all." The rabbit sigh and then start to turn around.
"Alright Alright, but you're writing the rest of the tickets today, and paying for lunch." She makes it back to the car window where she found flash to be seemingly talking to himself.
"Before… you go…. Could… we…. May-" Judy jumps in mind sentence. She tries to make a mental note to not leave sloths before their done talking.
"Flash were going to give you a speeding ticket, and you ran a red light, so we will ticket you for both of those offences, separately. You helped us with the case a little, so will help you a little, but you CAN NOT be driving like this in down town Savanna Central. Some mammal could get seriously injured, or worse."
"Work… out… a deal… where…" Judy sighs. She wasn't waiting for this to pan out. She starts writing the ticket while her partner patiently waits beside her. Flash keeps talking, if it can be called that as Judy writes the rest of the tickets. Giving him the maximum speeding ticket without it being reckless driving and also ticketing him for running the red light.
"Flash, if we catch you again, we will be looking much more into this street racer thing. We've gotten many complaints about this and it needs to stop, hopefully you can help us do that." The rabbit attempts to hand over the two tickets but the sloth doesn't take them.
"I… helped you… on the… Bellweather… case… and…" Judy sighs and stands on her toes. She leans into the car slightly and drops the tickets onto the sloth's lap. This was breaking policy somewhat, but she wasn't going to wait the hour needed for the sloth to catch up to their current situation. Judy makes her way back to the cruiser with Nick in tow, within a minute, the duo are back on the road, patrolling their designated area. After a few moments the Fox spoke up.
"Thanks for letting him off the hook carrots, or well, at least cutting him some slack."
"Hm don't think me, I mean, I guess we should, he did help us, but I think Bogo's going to be pretty pissed about us letting him off easy If he finds out how easy we let him off."
"I mean hey, we ticketed him twice and I don't think will be having problems with him anymore either, Flash is a nice guy and his job at the DMV could even have some problems now that we sighted him for 2 traffic infractions in the same day."
"I guess that's true he does work for the people dealing with licenses and how to keep them, bad example he's making for them."
"Hey actually, speaking of Buffalo Butt, what did he want with you?" Nick turns towards Judy as she drives down the street, still scanning the sidewalks.
"You mean 'what he wanted with us' and I'm not sure, he seemed serious though."
"Yeah that's what worries me! I mean it's my first day. My first briefing just hours ago even and he's already asking to see me. I've been thinking about what I could have possible messed up in that time and I can't think of anything! I already got my taxes squared away, or rather, ill be paying for that until my great grandkits die. I just don't know what else I did wrong." Nick huffs and frowns, searching his mind for relevant information on the situation.
"It could be you didn't do anything wrong you know, maybe he just wants to go over something about your new upstanding job?" The rabbits smiles at him. It was odd to her that he immediately jumped to the conclusion that he was in trouble, he barely even had time to get everything ready to be her partner. The paper work alone was enough to keep one busy before their first day and she also knew that he had changed apartments and recently got back in touch with some family members. Surely all those time-consuming activities left no time to effectively piss off Bogo so much he wanted to see Nick after his first day.
"I don't know, theirs no way it could be that, something just feels wrong to me…" he pauses and turns towards Judy. "Oh no." his shocked expression causes her to tighter her grip on the steering wheel.
"What?"
"I know what it is, this is bad."
"Nick, what did you do?" Judy does her best to say the words in a calm manner. She couldn't stand the way her friend was fidgeting, the distraught look in his eyes sends her into borderline panic mode. Her nose begins to twitch rapidly, reveling her concern. Did Nick do something in his past that was really unlawful that he hasn't told me?
"He's going to tell me to stop being so handsome, or I'll seduce his officers and they'll get distracted on the job and that won't be good for anyone." The facades slips away and is instantly replaced with a smug smirk. Judy's twitching nose slows, the gears in her head screech to a halt and fall out of place. She punches him in the shoulder as hard as she could muster form her position which isnt very hard.
"OW! Hey!"
"You Fox! Don't do that to me, you worried me! I thought you did something that was going to get you fired, or that I would even have to arrest you!" Judy' borderline yelling causes Nick to grow into a fit of laughers as she pays more attention to the road. She grumbles at his antics, that wasn't funny in the slightest, she had gotten more worked up over than she would have liked to admit. She turns towards him to glare, her ears laid limp against her back.
"That face! OH I missed it so much! I haven't seen that snice I hustled you at the DMV I think, oh man I forgot how good it was." Laughing more she quickly turns away form him. The comment was somehow enduring, whether he meant it that way or not, which made her blush slightly, getting almost giddy even. It was good to be back in his company, she had spent most of her free time with him before he went off to the academy, when he left it had left her lonelier than she would have liked to accept.
"And hey! don't call me a Fox, that speciesist." She looks back over at him with a smile of her own now.
"What, are you telling me that you aren't a fox? That's news to me."
"No I'm most certainly a Fox, if anything, the one that should be questioning their species is you, you seem much more like a hare than a rabbit to me." She grumbles and turns her attention back to the road.
"If I'm a hare, then you must be an Artic Fox, because that's just as ridicules of a conclusion!" she laughs.
"Do I look white to you? Oh no, wait, everything makes sense now, your colorblind! That explains it. Never mind, you are forgiven, free Fox pass."
"Now that is speciesist Nick! but I can tell you that your green and not white, so don't worry!" she laughs again and looks over at him. The look on his face is priceless, his eyes were growing bigger by the second and his jaw is dropping.
"Carrots, you said I was green?"
"Yeah, your coat color, I mean, its green, not white like an artic Fox, why?"
"Like green, like the color of tree leaves?" his eyes grew wider when she nodded in agreement.
"Y-Yeah like, the…" She attempts force down a snicker but fails miserably "GraSS-HAhaha". She falls into a fit of laughter. The look on her partner face is worth way more than a thousand words. His ears quickly pin back against his head, his lips even come up a little bit in a weak snarl. The rabbit tries her best not to double over from laughter and drive the best she can.
"I got you so good! admit it! You thought I was colorblind, you thought I thought you were green! Oh purple tulips that was just too good, that's twice in one day now slick."
Her laughing slowly trails off as Nick grumbles quite audibly. After a few moments he points out that he hasn't herd her 'cute country cussing', referring to the "purple tulips", in a while and that it was a nice change to hear it again. Not soon after their roles are switched once again, with the rabbit groaning and the Fox laughing. The rest of patrol went like this. They found that even though they had been physically apart for a while, they easily jumped into an oddly familiar routine that was seemingly there before despite neither of them knowing of it. After a very uneventful first half of the day, which consisted mainly of catching up with one another and sitting in obscure parking lots waiting for something to happen. The heat of the midday increases, witch Nick is thankful for. The further mating season was behind him the better, and the clearer his head became the more jokes he found he could make at the expenses of his Rabbit friend. Soon it became launch time, and keeping true to his word, he let Judy pick where they were going to eat. After some navigating, they make their way form savanna central to the heart of Zootopia, Downtown. The climate not being controlled here let the weather decides for itself, and this afternoon it seemed it wanted to be moderately warm.
After finding a place to park they make their way one block down before turning off into some newly built restaurant style establishment. At first glance it almost seems like a off brand fast food chain. Upon closer inspection that was not the case, this place seemed to have a little more class than the normal fast food chain. Looking around the room the mammals already seated and the ones in line waiting to order are both a wide variety of predator and prey. Getting in line, Nick found that many eyes are on both him and Judy.
He pushes the thought out of his head and scans the menu of the odd restaurant he found himself in. It is a new establishment and had found a niche apparently between severing food quickly but wasn't fast food per say. The costumers were made to form a line to head towards a counter where food could be ordered and then payment given. After thinking about It for a few moments, the fox liked the idea. It was better food than fast food, but still quick to make and serve, and plenty of places to sit down inside to have your meal at tables or booths. The lack of true waiters didn't take away from the effect either, their jobs were simply to bring mammals their food after they order and found a seat and then clean up the mess. No need to constantly check up on you, and snice the food was simple the need wasn't there. This is meant to partly compete with fast food chains, and full on waiters would drive up the cost defeating the purpose. Nick ponders these thoughts while ideally following behind Judy in the line. There are a few mammals in front of them, but the line is moving steadily so Nick scans the menu more thoroughly. Their options spans a wide range of food types, catering to both herbivore and carnivore and everything in-between. Herbivore was mainly to the left of the overhead menu and looking right it slowly fades to the more carnivore type foods. He looks for something in-between the too, remembering, even though she never said it aloud, Judy wasn't fond of him eating fish products in front of her, but bugs did seem to be ok. He finally settles on the bug and bean wrap with a side of mixed berries and apples. Judy decides on her, apparently typical meal here, which was some type of lettuce and hay dish, with a side of mangos and beans. The beans were an odd choice for the rabbit, and when Judy saw his questioning look, she said that she needs more protein in her diet from all the physical work she was doing. He contemplates this for a moment and realizes that it might be extremely difficult for some herbivores to get enough protein in their diet depending on their needs, he had never really considered this.
After ordering, Judy leads the way once again and stops at a booth which she informs Nick is hers, as far as the restaurant owner was concerned. Seating down and glancing around the room, he found that all the mammals look away from him when he attempts to make eye contact. He sighs and turns back to Judy, he opens his mouth to speak but didn't get a word in.
"Judy! It's good to see you again." A muskrat walks over to them at the booth. She wears a blue shirt with a spiffy logo incorporating the name of the place, "The Spill Spot". The Muskrat turns towards Nick and smiles to his surprise.
"And you must be the one and only Nick Wilde! It's great to finally meet you after hearing so much about you!" she extends her paw happily and he quickly stands up and shakes it.
"It's good meet you to miss…?"
"Just call me Kate please! And its great to meet you! It's a great honor to not only have the heroic Bunny cop in my restaurant but now also the Fox as well!" She laughs while the Fox sat back down.
"Oh no no, im going to have to stop you right there, I'm definitely not a hero by any means."
"Wow, not only a hero but also humble, you really weren't kidding when you said he was something special." Both the muskrat and the Fox look at the rabbit who seems to be embarrassed. Nick smirks, and leans in slightly, this was exactly the kind of information he loved to bring up at a latter date to tease and provoke other mammals with.
"Now carrots, I didn't know you thought I was 'something special'."
"Oh. My. Gosh!" Kate laughs drawing again the attentions of both the costumers. "Man, Judy you sure didn't lie when she said you knew him well. She told me you loved to tease and saying something like that is exactly what Judy told me would set you off. Oh, you two are most definitely the dynamic duo, I can see why you two are partners, I wish more police were like that." she smiles but with a touch of sadness in a way. She quickly turns her head in the direction of the food counter at the sound of a bell. "Looks like your foods ready, be right back."
Once food was set on the table the two happily focused on their meal. Nick rarely ate breakfast and this morning was no exception. A comfortable silence fell between the two. He contemplates this while he eats. The only mammal he ever had comfortable silences with was Finnick, and ever sense he told him he was joining the police they quickly turned tense and awkward. Their friendship was most likely not fixable, or the original real friendship that is, Finnick seemed to feel abandoned, which was odd to him. Maybe I should talk to him? I mean he led Judy to me when she was looking for me, that was extremely out of character as well now that I think about it. Nick frowned, deep in thought, after some time, his food was long gone before Judy's was and it seems she was doing her best to down it and get back to patrol so Nick deices to let her eat and keep quiet. His eyes wonder around the room and fell on a booth with a young bobcat with presumably her mother. She seems about early teens to him and was utterly failing to covertly take a picture of him with her phone. The cat see's him glance over and she quickly puts her phone down and acts as if nothing happened.
Nick looks the other way towards the front windows in the restaurant. Looking out the windows one could make out the street, but it just so happened that the sunlight was reflecting in the right way to catch the image of the teenage bobcat and her booth. Nick smirks and waits for the right moment. The cat glances at him again and then around the room, she acts, very poorly at that, he notes, to look forward while bring her phone up to points across the room at him. He had to time this right for the desired effect to work but he is sure he can pull it off. She holds the phone still for a second and then brings her thumb down to snap the picture. Watching from the reflection in the window, he quickly turns around to look at her, making the smuggest look her could muster while sticking out his tongue. He held the pose for a moment before sucking his tongue in but kept looking at the cat. She brought her phone back to her face and excitedly swipes the screen. Looking at the pone the cat yelps, much to his amusement, and then fumbles with her phone before dropping it out of surprise. She slowly turns towards the Fox with an expression mixed between embarrassment and shock. He winks at her before turning back to Judy, who was just finishing her meal and seems oblivious to the whole interaction.
"Ready to head out, slick?"
"I thought it was, 'Ready to make the world a better place!' what happened?" Judy just rolled her eyes as she get up. Nick got up as well but not before slipping a ten for a tip. He knew it wasn't needed, but it felt good to feel so welcome by the muskrat waiter, so he thinks it's appropriate. They mad their way out the door and just a few steps down the sidewalk before-
"Wait…." Judy patted the pockets of her police uniform, at first it is a normal pat down, which quickly turned into her franticly hitting all her pockets. She stops mid pats and stares back at him "I lost my phone!"
"Clam down, it's probably in your booth seat." He smiles as Judy dashes back into the building in search of her phone. He looks down the street, ideally looking for something interesting to entertain him while his partner was looking for her phone. He breaths in through his nose, skewing his ears at the odd bombardment of scents. Most were uninteresting, but one stood out as oddly familiar. It was difficult to pick it out amongst the hundreds of other mammals' odor but he is sure he smelt it. the, smell is distinctive, yet oddly out of place for him. It was almost like something he wasn't supposed to smell, like something he told himself he wasn't supposed to smell. He scratched his head for a moment, thinking about what could have possibly told himself not to smell, then it hits him, Vixen.
Nick feels a slight pull on his pants leg and quickly looks down at the obstruction. To his surprise, it was a younger fox kit, probably around 5, tugging on his pants leg. Nick looks down at the kid in worry, wondering where her parents were while crouching down to her level. Before he could get anything out the kit spoke first.
"Are you officer Wilde, the first fox police officer!?" The kit excitedly yells while smiling at Nick.
"The one and only, what can I do you for?" he smiles back at the little fox.
"Can I please hav-" The smaller fox is stopped before she could finish her sentence as a vixen quickly runs up and picks her up from behind.
"I am SO sorry officer, she saw you from across the street and I couldn't grab her fast enough. I hope she hasn't caused any problems, officer it won't happen agia-" Nick quickly jumps in and stops the rambling, and clearly nervous, vixen.
"Hey hey hey, everything is fine, no need to be sorry, just a kit being a kit. She runs quick, should be on a track team." Nick chuckles as the vixen attempts to hide her blush and keep her ears up straight. The Kit wiggles in her mother's grasp and speaks again.
"Officer Wilde can I please have your autograph!" The kit wiggles around excitedly, trying to break free from her mother's grasp.
"Cathy please leave the officer alone he has important work to do and the last thing h-" Nick sharks his head and puts his paw out while shaking it side to side as well.
"No its more than ok, I would be happy to do so, where do you want it?" The mother sighs while smiling and lets the kit down who quickly rummages through her bookbag and pulls out something that looks like a scrap book. She opens it to a particular page and then thrust it into Nick's paws smiling wide.
"Do you want it to say, 'From Nicholas P. Wilde to Cathy'?" Cathy nodes happily and Nick takes a quick glance up at the smiling mother Fox before looking back at the page. Looking at the page he notices that this is indeed a scrap book and seemingly devoted to himself. The page beside where Cathy pointed to has a cut out from a newspaper depicting his graduation with the article beside it. He gives a sideways smile at it before looking back at Cathy.
"Have you been stalking me?"
"Yes! I have, I have every news article sense you and Judy defeated major bellwether! See?" Nick chuckles as Cathy begins to flip the pages of the scrap book.
Ahhh haha, I don't think you quite understand what the word 'stalk' means there litt-
His train of thought gets stopped in its tracks as Cathy flips to through the next few pages of her book. The pages are covered in news articles and print outs of Judy at first but then turn into pages and pages of articles about himself. All the news articles that he knew about were there as well as some he didn't, which surprises him because he loves seeing himself in the papers. Some pictures were even printed off the ZPD website, publicizing that the first Fox, who also just so happened to help crack the Bellwether case, was going through the academy. He felt a strange feeling looking at all the work that went into the pages. A bittersweet feeling of both pride and a slight amount of horror overtook him. Not only did mammals know him, but some were now branding him a hero, or at least this kit was. He felt a strange pressure now to hold up some type of hero persona, while also desperately trying to sweep his conman past under the rug. He looks back towards the kit and smiles.
"Now where did you want me to sign?" Nick asks. The kit quickly flips back to her desired page and thrust the book into his lap again. He signs the page with the best signature he could muster, putting in some extra flare but making sure to keep it readable for her. He hands the book and sharpie back to Cathy and smiles at her excited reaction. She quickly runs into Nick for a hug and he happily returns the gesture. He takes the moment to look up to vixen, who was smiling down at the sweet sight. She mouths sorry to him, but he waves her off before carefully extracts himself from the hug and standing back up, noticing that the vixen was slightly shorter then himself.
"Thank you, officer Wilde."
"You can just call me Nick, your kit's sweet, ive never been asked for an autograph before." Nick gives the vixen a warm smile and she slightly blushes.
"Oh yes, when Officer Hopps became the first rabbit on the police force she would just not stop talking about it! She thought It was great to see her breaking the norm. she told me that soon even racoons would be police officers, and I made a mistake by saying something foolish to that. want to take a guess at what it was?" She fiddles with her kits ears, who was pushs up against her legs before she smiles at Nick who smirks back, predicting where this was going.
"Hmm, I think I can take a guess, something like, 'that would be about as crazy as a Fox.'" Nick smirks as the mother's face lights up in a sly smile.
"Well, I can see why you're an Officer, Mr. Wilde, But yes, and then you came along and made me eat my words! Ha-ha." The vixen laughs, drawing a few good chuckles from Nick as well.
"But I'm sorry we bothered you, will be even later to school than it already is."
"Oh its ok, I'm actually waiting for car- Miss Hopps to retrieve her lost phone from the restaurant." Nicks winces for from his slip in professionalism. Calling Judy 'carrots' in front of other mammals was not the best idea for so many reasons. His train of thought was lost when he notices the kits eyes light up and she begins to look around, presumably for Judy. The kit looks up at Nick who points towards the restaurant. The kit fly's from her mother's paws and into the building in a blur, before either of the older foxes could react.
"At least she's running towards a cop." The vixen laughs and smiles at Nick. "Caitlin, by the way." She puts her hand on her hip. The pose making her seem much younger than she is.
"Well I see were already at a first name bases, as I said, Nick if you will." He bows slightly getting another laugh form the vixen. He takes a moment to really look at her. She must be just slightly older then him, judging from the scent Nick as picking up and possible a guess from her having a kit with her. Her eyes are a lovely dark amber, she sports a pair of dark ears, dark brown around the base and black at the tips. Her nose was black as well, slowly turning into a lighter shade of brown and then almost white at the edges of her checks. The rest of her coast was more traditionally light golden tent, with her neck and chest region the normal cream color. She most certainly seemed to be a golden furred fox, which was a common pattern among the species.
"Well, Nick, what brings you to patrol this part of town, anything I should be worried about."
"Nothing in particular, just making sure that Kits get to school in a timely manner, which seems that didn't happen for someone." The smirk he gives her make her ears twitch, and an almost forgotten scent hits Nicks nose like the blast from a battel ships main cannon. He must focus his attention on other thoughts as he attempts to subtlety flush the scent of excited vixen from his nose.
"Oh, yes, I promise it's not my fault, officer." She holds up one paw and covers her heart with the other in a playful fashion. "Cathy actually managed to miss the bus, again, and I had to drag her to work with me. I'm attempting to take her to school in a timely manner on my lunch break, but she just has other plans it seems." She laughs again, and Nick smiles. A breeze blows through the street, bringing some much-needed relief for him.
"well I hope we haven't held you up any, actually I –" Nick is interrupted mind sentence when he notices Judy approaching from behind the vixen, with the kit in tow behind her anchored by her paw in Judy's. It was something he would have branded cute if it weren't for the expression on his partners face. Her ears are up at attention and her eyes are wide. Both signs of focus he had leaned, although the thing that most confused him was her nose. It was twitching full speed, and even her whiskers are bouncing up and down from it. That meant she is worried or stressed, or some combination of the two, he is pretty sure at least. No sooner can Nick tilt his head in confusion than the expression disappears and Judy approaches with the kit.
"I thought I had already given out all the autographs I was going to get. I was surprised to see someone who still wanted one, especially without a parent and when she's supposed to be in school." She cast a glance at the vixen before Nick jumps in.
"No worries carrots, already taken care of it, they were actually already on their way to school, believe it or not, they missed the bus." Nick winces from his mistake but it was too late. Oh well, calling Judy carrots wasn't the worst that could happen on his first day, surely. The vixen checks her watch. After doing so her expression became slightly panicked with her ears shooting up to attention.
"Cathy were going to be late! Again! we need to hurry sweetie." The kit grumbles but hops away from Judy towards her mother.
"Bye Officer Nick and Officer Judy!" she happily bumps up against her mother legs grasping her scrap book of admiration for the odd duo. Caitlin takes the smiling kit's hand and pulls her close to her side. She looks over at the two and waves while starting to walk away.
"Sorry to bother you Officers, we have to be getting on our way now or will be late, again." she laughs.
"Oh, its fine, and you know what number to call if you ever need us." Nick smirks and starts to walk away. Caitlin lets out a little laugh and without missing a beat answers.
"I take it that'll be 911? And if you ever need a meal I'll be at the red fawn, where down town and rainforest district meet, I bet I could get a discount for the first hero fox Officer?" Caitlin slightly swivels her ears and swishes her tell while putting on her best smile, wondering if officer Wilde would pick up the question.
"I'll have to take you up on that offer soon enough. Have a nice day you two." Nick says and gives a slight wave, doing his best to pretend he didn't catch Caitlin's body langue. Cathy and Caitlin wave back and he takes note of Caitlin's ringless paw before he turns around to face his partner. Well great getting flirted with on the first day, and by a mother no less. Would have loved that a year ago but that felt oddly… wrong, do I feel guilty? And why does It seem Judy's about to thump her foot off while looking distraught as hell.
"Earth to carrots, are you ok? You mad about something? Sorry I called you carrots in front of civilians, please don't write me up for harassment!" He playfully says. The comment snaps Judy out of her mood and she changes her attitude quicker than the flick of a tail. Nick rises an eyebrow at this "What, don't tell me you're at that mad at that poor vixen getting her kit to school so late." Judy expression flickers from slightly panic to relief and finally semi-relaxed. Nick wonders if this is a rabbit thing, or a Judy thing, these moods swings seemed Rabbit related to Nick though.
"Yeah, your right, she said she was taking her to school, its just their so late, being tardy isn't good, you know." She looks over at Nick who just laughs. With that they make it back to their cruiser. Getting into the cruiser Judy sticks the key into the ignition.
"You know that kit wanted my autograph…" He looks over at his partner who rolls her eyes.
"Oh wonderful, now your going to get crushed under the weight of your massively growing ego."
"No, really listen for second, the kit wanted my autograph, I mean, she looked up to me. Judy…" He turns to look at her and saying her name really caught her attention. "No one's ever looked up to me before, let alone a kit, I mean, damn. That was a serious wake up call for me back there. This is, I don't know, something that's a big deal for me, you know? And I have you to think for that. I just wanted to properly think you for it, I feel like I haven't and wanted you to know I appreciate you helping me out and, well, believing that I could be more than I was." Judy stares at Nick for a few moments in silence. It was so rare to get to see this side of Nick, and she couldn't help but feel a little honored that he trusts her with some of his more personal feelings.
"Nick, it's like I said, you had it in you the whole time. you just needed a little push. I was more than happy to be the mammal that gave you that push." Judy reaches over and places a paw on his shoulder. She found it surprisingly easy to reach him since he was leaned over towards her in their car. He looks at her a moment, his expression seeming to weaken even further before tightening up and he gets hit classic Wilde smile back.
"But your right, its also nice to have my ego boosted as well, don't get me wrong." And just like that, the moment to look deeper into the feelings of Nick are gone. Judy groans both form the felting moment and the ego boosting comment. This had happened a few times before, the first being the gondola which now seemed like years ago. But each time, Judy felt like she got to know Nick a little bit better. She was determined to tare down all the walls he built up around him after so many years of hurt. She decides she would mark this day as another one of her little victories, constantly taking steps further and further into his life and helping him fix things. She starts the car drive out of the lot. They slide smoothly back into what Judy would consider one of the most uneventful days of patrol she had ever done. She was entertained the rest of the day by her partner of course. While she found nothing of significance really happened in terms of policing, the day went but quickly with them keeping each other company and they soon found themselves headed back to the ZPD at the end of their day.
Nick is still uneasy about walking back into the ZPD and Is no rush to do so. His partner, however, seems to want to run to their destination instead of walk. Knowing where they are headed, he is even less inclined to keep pace with Judy. After seeing this, she puts two and two together and attempts to tell Nick all the reasons why they are not in trouble and this must be something good. Needless to say, he isn't buying it, he knew from many years of not so legal dealings and business to see a set up when it presented itself and this was no doubt going to cause problems. This is going to causes problems, he thinks. He spots Wolford down the main hall while still in tow behind Judy. At some points she had grabbed his paw and was leading him like a lost to kit, but instead of taking him to his mother she was leading him to his inevitable doom, he is sure.
"Hey Wolford! How's it going?" Judy cheerfully asks.
"Its going good…" he rises an eyebrow at the rabbit leading the Fox by the paw and then smiles broadly. "Well now, Wilde, you so scared you needs Officer Hopps here to hold you paw?" Judy laughs as well as Wolford but Nick whines.
"Wolford, please you gotta help me! Bogo already wants me in his office! Judy won't listen, my only hope. Tranq her, or Taze her, or something!" Judy jerks him along forcibly by his paw, causing Wolford to laugh more than what she thought is called for.
"Hahaha, Damn Wilde, this is a new record! Never herd of a new recruit piss off Bogo so fast, shit we're going to have to update the leader boards, looks like your putting me in third now." He laughs some more before waiving slightly and going back to his business. Such an odd pairing, a Fox and Rabbit, maybe they will be the dynamic duo like Fangmeyer said. He went ideally on his way, mulling over the paper work he needs to finish.
After a few more moments of walking, and the fox getting jerked unwilling along, they arrive at the door of the Chief of Police Office. Nick stares at the door, "CHIEF BOGO", written in gold lettering on the door somehow reminds him of Mr Big, which made him shiver. Judy knocks on the door and he starts to get himself mental prepared.
OK, no problem, already meet him, he liked my joke this morning. Other mammals laughed. Haven't done anything wrong, have I? He thinks for a second, Nope, can't come up with anything. Ok here were go, be funny, break the ice, no problem. First Fox officer, no panic, first Fox officer, with the first bunny officer… and the first fox officer has a not so legal background…. Don't Panic, Don't panic, Don't Panic…
"Come in." Bogos deep and authoritative voice sounds from inside the office and Judy starts to open the door.
PANIC PANIC PANIC PANIC PANIC Nicks mind flails as they enter the office. They are just a few steps in when the chief speaks up again.
"Wilde, please step out for a moment, I would like to speak to Hopps alone first." Nick nods in agreement before stepping out and quietly shutting the door behind him. Judy position herself on her seat, Bogo is tall enough that setting on the chair works just fine, his piercing eyes from across the desk do nothing to help Judy calm her nerves now that Nick was asked to leave. This was a very odd meeting now, indeed.
"Officer Hopps, how was your first day with Officer Wilde?"
"Very good sir, we ticketed who we presume is the street racer and he shouldn't be a problem anymore now."
"Does he seem to be fitting in well? Did you and him get along well while out on patrol?" Bogo clasps his hooves in front of him on the desk, giving his full attention to the her. This is extremely odd to her, never had Bogo asked her anything like this before, these questions were going towards personal inquiry and away from work it seems. She answers honestly none the less.
"I thought he fit in well in the brief this morning, I'll be honest, I was worried that he wouldn't fit in, or get ridiculed even, but that seemed to have been a pointless worry. Me and Nic- Officer Wilde got along fine out on patrol today, I didn't ask to have him assigned to me to be my partner before knowing that we would work well together." Judy nods at the end of her answer, pleased with the way it came out. She didn't want anybody but him to be her partner and she is confident that she could rely on Nick both as a friend and as a colleague.
"Officer Hopps, can you trust Officer Wilde?" She looks at Bogo in the eyes and he stares right back. His eyes seem to bear down into her soul, looking at the very strands that hold her together. Her voice hitches for a moment, she than breathes in a deep breath before speaking.
"Sir?"
"What I mean, Hopps, is, can you trust Nicolas Wilde with your life?" he leans in slightly, huffing air through his long snout, slightly ruffling the few papers on his desk. Judy stares blankly at him, briefly searching her mind for some string of coherent thoughts to help make sense of the suddenly heavy question. The only thing her mind can come up with is:
Sweet cheese and crackers.