Hello dear friends and Zootropolis fans,

Time to bring in a new chapter as the old year fades away. Happy Holidays to one and all, hope everyone's holidays are full of cheer!

And now, on to our heroes, and their very eventful summer days (and nights)!

"Love is friendship set on fire."
- Jeremy Taylor.

Mrs FruFru Grande (née Big) was one busy arctic shrew these days. Being a mother already meant she had her tiny paws figuratively and literally speaking full (heaven knew young JuJu Grande was quite the active child). Then there was her husband, her home, her extended family, her friends, the many shopping sprees and social functions she was invited to.

And now, as if this were not enough, FruFru was actually to become an entrepreneur, the head of her own hair salon, to be opened at the luxurious Zootopia building now owned by her two dear friends (who the reader is, by now, intimately acquainted with, no doubt). FruFru frowned in concentration over the many hair clips, minute sets of curlers and hair extensions, not to mention cans of fixing spray and headbands spread out before her on the quilt covering the huge (by shrew standards) four poster bed in her room. Little Juju was safely seated at the head of the bed, playing contentedly with a tiny plush rabbit (courtesy of her godmother).

An impartial observer might have believed that the reason for FruFru's frown was her concern over her new business, the official opening of which was after all planned the following Monday. True, her new and even busier lifestyle was approaching ever so quickly now. And yet, FruFru was not cowed. She had carefully planned out her schedule and the strategy for this business venture of hers, and she felt sure that, what with the help of her two friends

Josette and Trixie (who had agreed to be part of the salon's team, and who our reader might have seen earlier in the day shopping around with FruFru as she commented about leopard-print jeggins) she would be making a profit within not too long. The shrew had even planned out her theme for the first set of 'summer specials' hairstyles. The theme was to be 'Casual Day on the Beach' by the way, and was to offer a series of updos that were both cute and chic, and that would enable the mammal wearing them to don a pair of shades without spoiling one's chignon in the process.

None of this was even close to the reason for FruFru's frowning, and one could not even have pretended that it was after a time, because FruFru had abandoned her appraisal of hair accessories and was gazing out the window of her bedroom absently, oblivious to JuJu who had secured a pair of hair extensions for her plushie. As the toddler pinned the hair extensions in place triumphantly, FruFru exhaled with a long and wearisome 'whoosh'.

"I give up," she murmured, running her paws through her long dark mane of hair in distraction. "I just don't remember – I was really too young.." she trailed off, gazing eat her daughter absently.

JuJu was growing up so fast, FruFru thought in distraction. That was exactly what her father used to say to her, day in and day out, "You're growing up so fast Baby! Daddy can't keep up with you." And yet she had felt like she had been growing up at a sloth's pace at the time.

How old had she been at the time of the Jack Savage scandal? Had she already been a teenager? Yes, maybe, or just about so. Still young enough that she had been on the outskirts of any open discussions about the subject, but old enough to have gathered the gist of the story, gleaning bits of information here and there.

Skye had died, the story with the ship; that much she had understood. Savage had disappeared from the social scene her father mingled in. Disappeared how? FruFru had wondered at the time. Was it like moving cities? Or going into a different line of work? What exactly was the fate of an animal involved in something so… well, tinged with shame?

She had not wanted to question her father on the subject at the time, despite her curiosity (as every young mammal might be curious over something that obviously shocked the grown-ups in strange and inexplicable ways.) In her great-grandmother (Mr Big's famous Grand-mamma) who had been a very much active participant in social events at the time, FruFru had always found a ready confidant for any sort of topic, including that one. It was to her great-grandmother that teenage FruFru had addressed her questions about that case.

She remembered her Nanna's response as vividly as if they had spoken yesterday.

"Savage?" Mrs Big had said, raising her heavy eyebrows at her great-granddaughter. "Why, Baby, we ain't got no need to talk about that animal anymore now. We won't be seeing him again in this city, that's a fact! It's the end of the line for animals what choose that path Baby, that's what it is, the end of the line."

FruFru of the present time and day shuddered over the memory. She did not, it has to be said, care a hoot for Mister Savage, and whatever his fate would or would no be. She had never actually met that rabbit.

FruFru did, however, care about her friends and family. The young shrew was fiercely loyal to those who were dear to her heart she felt their misfortunes and thei happiness as keenly as if it was her own (and this is, actually, a much rarer trait than one might think and therefore very valuable.) It was because of this trait of her character that FruFru was now both apprehensive and a bit upset, and not in the excited and eager mood that the upcoming opening of her hair salon should have normally put her in.

She was worried, you see, that someone much closer and precious to her than someone like Jack Savage was going to end up… well, walking the same line. The one that, according to her Nanna, one then arrived at the end of.

FruFru had turned the matter over in her head, this way and that, and there was nothing, from what she could see, no way on which she could help matters. She was thus condemned (in a way) to watch events unfold in the fatal way she was afraid they would, like some sort of tragic echo of the story that she had heard as a child.

Except that, this time, it would be two of her best friends that would get swept away with the current of events.

The end of the line.

"Bother everything!" FruFru exclaimed in a frustrated, high-pitched squeak of a voice, before taking her impotent annoyance out on an innocent set of butterfly hair grips that she chucked across the bedroom with all the force of her small paws (much to the surprise of her little girl, who after all knew nothing of her mother's inner trail of thought).

The weather was playing tricks on the city of Zootropolis and its inhabitants. Here they were, with summer in full swing, and a heat wave that had lasted through the week, and yet Friday dawned windy, announcing its arrival with a sky so crisscrossed with torn and tortured clouds of purple and scarlet and crimson, that one would have easily believed oneself to be in the middle of winter. If one ignored the trees and shrubbery full of high-summer foliage below, tossing and bending in the wind.

It was a habit with Judy to check out the weather conditions when the sun came up. Came from living on a farm and from seeing her father and mother do as much morning after morning. Did the sudden red sky announce upcoming hail, the young rabbit Officer wondered, her face upturned to study the heavens through the massive oval window dominating the living room ceiling of the penthouse. That wouldn't be good for the berry harvest back home, she mused, clicking her tongue as she blew steam away from her hot mug of tea. The rabbit was seated at the dining table, munching away at her breakfast of wholegrain oatmeal with coconut milk and bits of pineapple.

"But I like it," Judy decided, after another moment's reflection and sky-gazing.

"Like what?" Nick asked, as he entered the room, knotting his ZPD uniform's tie as he went.

"Oh good, you're up," Judy nodded at her friend over the brink of her cup. "I was just going to go and knock on your door in a minute. We shouldn't be late!"

"Yes yes, pull the other one Carrots," Nick grumbled, heading over to the fridge and pulling out a jar of jam and another one containing peanut butter after rummaging a bit. "What do you like then? You were muttering to yourself again."

"I don't mutter," Judy said dryly, setting her mug down primly and looking at the huge and sloppy PBJ sandwich Nick had started putting together with distaste. "If you must know, I was admiring the sunrise."

Nick jerked his head up to look out the window at her comment, before turning back to Judy, the corners of his mouth twitching in amusement.

"You bunnies are quite the poets, aren't you," he laughed, taking a huge bite out of his sandwich.

"And you foxes are quite the sloppy eaters," Judy shot back, moving her bowl away from anywhere near the perimeter that risked being sprayed by the crumbs that were flying around as Nick chewed away.

The fox chuckled at that.

"It's due to historic reasons," he commented between bites. "We used to have to eat super-quickly cause our food was trying to get away from us. Or hadn't you heard?"

"You're gross," Judy said grimacing. "I hate you Nicolas Wilde!"

The rabbit was hardly sincere with that last remark, it was more of one of the set of many private jokes the two shared, and a line to which Nick normally had only one reply, which was of course 'You love me Carrots, snap out of it." Once this line had been delivered, the pair would often move to some other subject, in a kind of unspoken truce over whatever had caused their disagreement.

This particular morning, however, after chewing for a moment or two in the silence following Judy's comment, all Nick did was swallow his bite of sandwich and say,

"You done with that greyish porridge thing of yours or what Carrots? No way we should be late, like you said."

Judy raised her eyebrows in some surprise, giving Nick a searching look.

Clearly, the rabbit decided, as she drained the last dregs of her tea, it was not only the weather that was weird this morning. She decided to dismiss the matter after a minute; perhaps Nick had stayed up late last night and was consequently sleepy, and grumpy, or something. He'd come around, Judy told herself with a shrug. They'd been working for the State Exams after work and over the week-ends. Maybe he hadn't gotten enough sleep these last couple of days.

Nick hadn't gotten enough sleep these last couple of days, that much was true. The State Exams were hardly to blame.

It is hard to sleep sometimes when.. but we're getting ahead of ourselves and mixing everything up, we must recount things in the proper order or risk leading our esteemed reader astray.

Jack Savage's brief but eventful passage at the penthouse had perhaps had some impact on our red-furred hero's thoughts, but it was hardly a game-changing, earth-shattering one-of-a-kind revelation sort of impact. It had been more of a yet-another-confirmation-of-something-one-suspects-but-really-desperately-wishes-to-avoid thing.

Nicholas Piberius had lived long enough (in terms of experience, varied and contradictory) to be rather well acquainted with his own mind by the time, even the more shadowy and hidden corners of it one often needs several years or even decades to discover in oneself.

Naw, Nick knew himself well enough, his thoughts and feelings, though the latter were hardly his strongest point generally speaking. Then again, one hardly needed to be an exceptional expert to detect something that was coming dangerously close to what can only be described as 'obvious'.

So yes, Nick had been having trouble sleeping. It was the kind of 'lying awake, listening to the clock ticking away in the sitting room, paws behind one's head, stretched out on one's back with one's tail poking out from under the sheets given the warm air of the summer's night' type of insomnia. The stillness of the night is often a trusty companion for facing thoughts one would normally have preferred avoiding by daylight. Nick would have very much preferred to avoid the particular circuit of thought he seemed to be running down every night at any given moment, but it seemed that after the sun set and a certain stillness came over the city, even a busy ever-bubbling city like Zootropolis, that the thoughts refused to be avoided any longer. It was at this point that they leapt out on you in full force, while in daylight hours they merely crept around in the shadows surrounding you.

"Things just come piling over one's ears so gradually, next thing you know you can up and throw the word 'sly' out of your lingo cause you don't even know yourself anymore old boy," Nick told himself somewhat wearily as the thin new moon peeked cheerfully in at him through the crack in his bedroom blinds.

Had he known where everything would have led to, he would never have agreed to work that elephant's popsicle joint that time back in the day. It had been Finnick's idea, Nick recalled with sour amusement. Well, not the baby elephant outfit the small fox had worn, that had been Nick's addition. But the general plan of working that place, for the extra-large popsicle. Thus everything that had followed that day was Finnick's fault, including Nick's current predicament. This made Officer Wilde feel somewhat better. Would he have skipped the job altogether if he had known everything that would follow? Yes, the answer was a firm yes, Nick decided. It might have been 'no' back in the day when all that had come out of it had been an insane investigation, a new friendship and a career with the Force. But now – now it was a different ball game altogether.

"You can admit it when you're licked Nicky," the fox muttered under his breath. "Dead fox walking, my bushy tail."

He wondered cynically why he'd always been the odd fox out, ever since he'd been a kit, like when he'd wanted to become a scout. Why couldn't he have been like his cousin Oscar or one of the other Wildes of their generation, Nick pondered, unconscious that his cousin Oscar in turn envied him. Cause it can be said that Nick came rather close to being envious of his cousin at this time, or at least of something the latter represented – a home, a family and kits. Nick Wilde from several years back would have laughed his whiskers off at the idea that these were things he would one day feel like having and sharing with someone.

Then again, the fox thought, that had been Nick Wilde back in the day, before he'd ever met anyone like Carrots. She'd be good at raising a family, of this Nick felt certain. She'd never quit her job, and she'd not want a family quite as humongous as most rabbit families seemed to be, But she'd do great raising several kits, and she'd keep up working on the Force too, with that crazy energy and zeal that seemed to come from nowhere, considering the fact that she never drank anything with a decent amount of caffeine in it.

It seemed so easy to imagine that little image in his head, some years from today, and so easy to imagine himself in the picture too, enjoying every day and every minute of it, whether it be work, hanging out together or having kits – having whom, you long-nosed idiot? Nick cursed himself. Cause it was all very well to tell oneself a little fairytale in one's head, when it came to real life it was hardly Nicholas Wilde who had to be educated on who he was, who Carrots was herself and where each of them stood in their society.

Yup, maybe he was fundamentally flawed or something. In terms of brain development. (That could explain a lot actually). Medical specialists would have probably been fascinated by his case. Hello Doctor, my name is Nicholas Piberius and I am attracted to species that formerly served as food to my ancestors.. why the straightjacket Doctor? Is that absolutely necessary? What are you on about Doc, 'take me apart and study my pathology'?

Well, fat chance, he decided, turning on his side. There was no other way anyway, this was the one, the only way to proceed. No one would ever know! Easy-peasy. True, he'd maybe been indiscreet one or two times, but now that he'd had the whole thing sorted out in his head… it was just a matter of hiding his feelings forever and behaving as good old Nick from now on. Luckily he had years of hustling experience behind his tail, experience that had greatly helped perfect his acting skills.

The fox closed his eyes, aiming to get some shut-eye finally, a strategy having been landed upon. There was just one flaw in this strategy worth noting; it rather seemed to Nick that he would spend the rest of his life in some amount of pain. He did not feel worried on that account; he already had vast experience in carrying around some amount of hurt, experience that dated back from the fateful episode in his childhood that made him understand so brutally where foxes stood in society. That memory had been finally and magically erased thanks to the events of the preceding years though, and it can be said that Nick had known some period of more or less unclouded joy. It was a shame to be going back to carrying a thorn around, especially a thorn that was so easily susceptible to grow over time (supposing Carrots fell for some Rabbit-Face some day, ran off to start a family and set an end to their easy daily comradeship?)

There was no answer for this dilemma. Nick sighed rather heavily before finally nodding off, and no one was there to hear the sigh.

Miss Margaret Frost was not having a great day. It was true that the day had barely started, her flashy silver rhinestone-encrusted watch read half-past eleven am. But Margaret felt, with a fox's instinct (or arctic fox's instinct, to be exact) that things were not going to go her way today any more than they had done so the day before.

"Are you going out for a smoke again?" Tabitha asked her in surprise, as Margaret made to riffle through her purse in search of cigarettes and lighter.

The journalist fought to keep a spike of irritation down and to smile sweetly at her assistant.

"Yup Tabbie," Margaret said with a tinkly laugh. "Guilty as charged! Be thankful you're still so young, my dear, you can get by without caffeine and nicotine. Enjoy it while it lasts!" The vixen secured the packet of cigarettes among the general chaos of her purse's contents and fished it out.

Tabitha had sat up straight, momentarily abandoning the papers and notes that were littered over her small desk squashed into the corner of Margaret's spacey office and giving her supervisor a thoughtful frown.

"You hardly smoked at all a few weeks back, Margaret," the young tigress remarked. "And since a month or so your nicotine intake, as you put it, has been going up exponentially! Are you so stressed-out about the ZPD special?"

She was sharp, Margaret thought sourly, giving Tabitha a long slanted sideways look. She went around with her nose buried in her work, this striped Miss Tabbie, and yet she picked up on things. Why couldn't she be more useful with Wilde and Hopps' case for heaven's sake?

Out loud all she said was, "It's high season Tabbie, this period is always charged. Nothing to worry about, it will die down by mid-August."

And out the office she sauntered, Miss Frost, for all the world the image of careless professional efficiency, out on a little break for a smoke. She took care to smile and nod here and there at her many colleagues as she crossed the entrance hall of the ZNN HQ, as always bubbling with activity at this time of year. Several of the reporters among with camera-animals and assistants, were dashing back and forth, preparing to head out and film footage, interviews and what-not. The concierge was busy signing for a delivery – a sturdy bear was piling parcel after parcel on the counter – while juggling the receiver and taking incoming messages.

Miss Frost straightened a bit more and gave her head of department a particularly dazzling smile as she passed the latter (a heavy suited hippopotamus in pince-nez). The vixen believed in always being in her superiors' good books, one way or another, and always appearing cheery in front of them.

Regardless of how she was really feeling.

The grin slipped off Margaret's lips as soon as she found herself safely alone outside the ZNN HQ building, down a little side alley, clicking her lighter impatiently.

"Damn this thing," she murmured, as it took her several attempts to finally light her cigarette. Once she'd lighted it, Margaret brought the cigarette to her lips and took a hearty pull, exhaling the smoke through her long pointy nose with a faint whoosh.

So Tabitha thought her stressed, did she? The devil, that was putting it lightly. Her job was not advancing at all as previewed. In fact, one could say that the whole plan was backfiring. The vixen shivered, heedless of the baking sun, at the thought of what her boss would say (and do) if she were to fail.

There were hours and hours of high-quality footage for the ZPD special, all of the key interest figures had been interviewed for the show, and Tabitha had even gone overboard and managed to gain access to filming the officers on several of their outings. The tigress had then gone over the footage painstakingly with the ZPD's legal representation, getting rid of any evidence that was not supposed to make its way onto the screen. Finally, the lawyers had given their green light to the reporters for what footage they could keep and air. So all in all, the show would be ready to be aired as scheduled. (Largely thanks to Tabitha's tireless efforts, it has to be added.)

This was not the 'job' Margaret Frost was concerned about, and it had nothing to do with her sudden renewed zeal for smoking. Margaret was working another job, for another employer, one that had nothing to do with the ZNN, journalism or the late-night news special. Miss Frost was one of those creatures who did not stay satisfied with her success for very long. She had been thrilled with her ascent to fame on the silver screen, and her quick path to becoming a household name. That her remarkable progress had been largely thanks to a general rise in demand for foxes (following a certain ZPD officer's sparkling career) and that there were other mammals displaying much more promise than her at much an earlier stage in their professional lives (Tabitha came to mind) bothered Margaret Frost very little. She believed in seizing an opportunity with her sharp teeth as it came sailing by, not working her way up through hard work and sweat. You walked over others to get to the top, was the vixen's cold-blooded belief, or else others clambered over you.

This attitude was responsible for the very short-lived feeling of triumph Margaret's success had had. (But then, it is hard to really savor something one did not fight for through effort, courage and relentless faith in oneself). Margaret had quickly felt bored in her new position, and had turned her sharp-nosed head left and right, in search for new opportunities.
These had arrived in a somewhat unexpected form.

Margaret had not felt any scruples in turning off the straight and narrow. Her family had had some history of working for shady business; she had not been the first and she would not be the last one of the Frosts (a branch of the great Snow clan) to dabble in activities on the other side of the law.

She had thought that this job would be a breeze; she'd waltz in, get it done and waltz out. Several hundred grand the richer, a nice supplement for her ZNN payroll, and one that did not need to be declared for tax payments either! Bonus. Things were not looking so good several months into the scheme though, not from where she was standing. Tabitha threw her cigarette butt on the ground and ground it viciously with her heel.

Stupid rabbits, she cursed in her mind, stupid, doe-eyed carrot-munching cabbage-farming… that was the whole issue though, she had believed them stupid, simple-minded creatures. She had known, of course, that Officer Hopps had made a breakthrough, been the first bunny on the Force, make that the first small mammal altogether to make it into the ZPD. Margaret had never given the fact much thought when accepting her mission though. Hindered by her own professional experience at the ZNN, she had more or less believed that Judy's career was the result of some of her supervisors' wish for PR-friendly diversity than actual personal talent and dedication.

Fast-forward to the present, and Margaret was forced to admit that the rabbit officer was far from corresponding to the 'dumb bunny' cliché. Which was exactly the issue that rendered her, Margaret's, mission all the more complex. The vixen paced up and down the alley in agitation, paws behind her back and brow furrowed. They were a close-knit little team, Hopps and Wilde, she thought listlessly. They sure had each other's back. There was no edging one's way in. How cute, the reporter thought sourly, kicking an empty coke can out of her way with unnecessary force. A young pig mother was approaching Margaret, heading in the opposite direction down the same street, and she gave the vixen a somewhat disapproving glance following the reporter's gesture. Margaret glared back, but the mother was busy maintaining a grip on her pram and chiding her two preschoolers at the same time.

"Keep holding Tommy's hand Sally," the pig was saying to her eldest. "Mommy's got her arms full with baby here, not to mention the shopping. You keep a firm hold on your brother for Mommy, kay? You two should always stick together, that way you're safe."

That was an idea, Margaret thought, watching the curly-tailed family pass her and head off on their way, the children obediently clutching each-other's hands (or hooves as the case were.) She was hardly any match for the duo of ZPD officers on her own, but she felt intuitively that, divided, they'd be easier prey for her to deal with.

Only thing was, she could hardly drag them one from the other. They worked together, they were partners, it was only normal they stick together day in and day out. The most she could do was hang around and hover over the two mammals, uselessly hoping for an opening.

But supposing – she remembered suddenly how both animals had applied for the State Examinations recently. They had told Tabitha about it, and the latter had mentioned it to Margaret. And Margaret had seen the books littering both officers' desks… they must be knee-deep in revising at the time. When were the Pre-qualification tests? Another month, give or take? That would ideally leave enough time for…

Yes, she had a chance, Margaret decided, carefully weighing the pros and cons of her newly-formed plan in her head. She definitely had a chance and it was maybe the best one she'd get. Better not blow it. She had been authorized access to the ZPD till the end of the summer, what with her show coming up. It would be long enough for her plan, she decided. It had to be enough.

Margaret was beaming decisively, her head held high, as she made her entrance back at the office. Smoking seemed to calm her down in any case, Tabitha thought in amusement.

"All good?" she asked her supervisor.

"Never better," Margaret replied with determination, pulling her desk chair out and sitting down smartly. "Tell me my dear, when is it that you were planning to head over and see our friends down at the ZPD next time?"

Nicolas Piberius might have taken the decision to keep every and any possible feeling linked to that very forbidden subject forever hidden, based on how shocked he himself and almost every member of his society felt over the topic. There were, however, some mammals in Zootropolis who would not find the situation so very provoking or gruesome, as it were.

There was Mrs Pebble, for example, a rather middle-aged, slightly pudgy porcupine who ran the 'Pebbles and Needles' teashop down at the south side of Savannah. Mrs Pebble was a patient, hardworking soul, who had inherited the tea shop from her mother. Her mother had inherited it from Mrs Pebble's grandfather; it was thus three generations since the cosy salon had been run by the same family, by someone bearing either the name Pebble or the name Spikes. (For Mrs Pebble was Miss Gertrude Spikes by birth, or Gertie for her old chums).

That Mrs Pebble's mother and grandfather had managed to run the business relatively profitably was little surprise; things had been different back in the day. The real miracle was that in the current day and age, Mrs Pebble managed the place as well as her fore-runners had before her, if not better. 'Miracle' was the correct word to use in this situation, because many a family café and restaurant had been forced to close in previous years, what with the rise of such ginormous chains as Starbears and McPiggins'.

When questioned about her success, Mrs Pebble would shrug easily, and click away with her knitting needles. (Mrs Pebble was forever clicking away at her knitting in between brewing pots of tea, making tiny socks for her many grandchildren. In this she was more fortunate than Mrs Wilde, Nick's mother, had been so far, for Mrs Pebble already had seven very real grandkids and the eighth one was due in early autumn.) Gertrude Pebble did not believe there was any real 'secret' to her success. Unless it was simply the fact that she put some effort into keeping a customer, once she'd gotten one.

Take the two young things who'd taken to haunting her salon just a couple of weeks ago. It was an unlikely pair, a fox and a rabbit, and both in uniform. Then of course, she'd recognized them from the news articles of a couple of years' back. Recognize them she had, but Mrs Pebble had wisely refrained from accosting the two with questions about their selves or their careers.

The ZPD officers had only come in the first time because they had not felt like dragging their tired feet till the end of the street to the Starbears joint yonder. That much Gertrude Pebble had gathered from the snatches of conversation she overheard as the young animals made their way into her salon and settled at a table.

Mrs Pebble took no offence at being their 'substitute' choice for a tea parlor, she merely came over with a couple of menus for the newcomers. She noted with her usual knack of sizing up new clients that the rabbit buried her nose in the long list of quality tea brews, while the fox didn't even bother to open the menu, instead asking her with a slight frown,

"You do make espresso, Ma'am?"

She did make espresso, Mrs Pebble assured him, she had quite a wide selection of coffees, nearly wide enough to match the teas. If he'd just flip to the second part of the menu he was twiddling.

"You make carrot cake?" Nick had exclaimed, his eyes flashing a happy green as he caught a glimpse of the cakes lined up on the counter behind Mrs Pebble's back.

She did indeed, the salon owner confirmed gravely.

"Do you put nuts in your carrot cake?" Nick had questioned, "I don't really like carrot cake with nuts."

She did, generally speaking, Mrs Pebble replied diplomatically. She just had a fresh batch of batter back in the kitchen, and she had not added any walnuts into this batch yet. She could, therefore, cook one nut-free carrot cake, as a special exception.

"How bothersome can you get?" Judy grumbled, tearing her gaze from her menu to scowl at Nick.

"Better be bothersome while you're ordering than when the order has already arrived Carrots," her friend chuckled, rubbing his paws at the thought of the nut-free carrot cake.

"Earl Grey for me please Madam," Judy said to Mrs Pebble. To Nick she added, "Don't go running off sampling every cake in the house Wilde, we're here to work and don't you forget it."

"We live, breath and brush our teeth to work, I got it Carrots," Nick replied easily, starting to pull some books out of his briefcase.

"Take the corner table then," Mrs Pebble put in helpfully, writing the orders down deftly on her little notepad, before storing it away between the needles sticking out behind her ears, pencil and all. "You'll have more space to spread your things out."

"Oh thanks," Judy exclaimed, throwing the designated table a quick look. "That's really nice of you."

Mrs Pebble nodded and twinkled at the pair before bustling off to get their orders ready and nudging slightly the waitress that worked for her a bit so that the latter would pay attention to a trio of youngsters that had just entered the tea shop and were crowding around the counter, busy picking out their sweets.

The orders Nick and Judy had placed served, Mrs Pebble retreated to her perch behind the counter to carry on with her knitting. He sharp little black eyes observed the new customers from time to time however, and she picked up bits of information now and again.

The rabbit was very neat, and ran no risk of slurping her tea over her papers; the fox was a different case altogether. At least he gulped down his coffee in record time, and Mrs Pebble was able to discretely fetch the cup and saucer away before he accidentally elbowed it, sending coffee dregs all over his work. He was soon asking for a refill, and Mrs Pebble accordingly brought one over, but she wisely placed it on the wide windowsill at his side instead of on the table. No accidents that way.

She had been right to give them the corner table, she decided firmly an hour later. It was a coveted spot, but the dup were obviously there for a few hours at least, what with all their books and studying, and the table suited them perfectly. The bunny was consulting at least three different volumes at any given moment, and the wide tabletop was ideal for placing everything at arm's length. The fox was often sighing and breaking away from his work, but again the corner table came in handy; the vast windows allowing our hero to follow what passers-by on the street were up to and amuse himself a moment or two before plunging back into his books.

She had managed things well, Mrs Pebble told herself, rather well. And the unlikely pair would be back.

Back they had been, nearly every evening since, preferring the small tea salon to Starbears' every time. They came by almost always at the same time each day, and Mrs Pebble tried her best to save the corner table for them and slip some nut-free cake in the oven. A couple of hours would pass companionably as our heroes worked hard for the Prequalification Tests, Mrs Pebble knitted, cooked and chaperoned the waitress, and anywhere from a dozen to two dozen regulars buzzed and chatted placing their orders and laughing (Mrs Pebble's peach-flavor ice tea was a particular hit as the heat wave approached.)

It was, more or less, an idealistic sort of summery setting (if one overlooked the endless studying that was.) Most of Mrs Pebble's regulars were in high spirits, and most of her random stoppers-by quickly became regulars. It did not escape the world-weary hedgehog that her ZPD regulars were not in the best of spirits however, and she was sorry about it, she frowned over it as she picked the pattern out on her knitting needles, because her regulars (especially the ones that came over every day) were almost as an extension of family in her eyes. The good hedgehog went to extra lengths to get her walnut-less carrot cake to be extra-fluffy, but this had little effect on the situation. This was, she concluded gravely brewing yet another pot of Earl Grey, an issue that went far beyond what cake could do and fix.

Nick was unwell. Judy was sure of it. What she did not know was what in carrot patches' sake was wrong. He didn't say anything (but when had he ever been one to open his heart up and pour his feelings out much?) And yet, something was amiss.

Their days very full at the time, this much was true, Judy thought, as she bent over a volume about strategies for training one's new recruits, her unfocused gaze not really taking in the words. The two friends got up early and hurried through their breakfast, as the sky would slowly shift from dark and inky to all the hues of a summer sunrise in the large window over their heads. They'd hurry over to work, go through the usual routine, working on cases, filing reports, heading out for patrol and laughing with their colleagues. They quit work sometimes later and sometimes a tiny bit earlier, and in any case their day was far from over once work was 'out', seeing as how there was the endless revision to be gotten through now, not to mention managing Zootopia along with Finnick and FruFru.

Their days were full, but this could not be what was bothering Nick, Judy thought. She knew her friend rather well, knew he enjoyed the variety of things going on simultaneously around them, and that even all the extra studying could not, under normal circumstances, weigh heavily on his spirits. Judy had gone so far as to wonder whether Nick's mother was ill and carefully inquire after her. The result was a comforting statement that Mrs Wilde was 'fit as a fiddle' and cheerier than ever into the bargain and would love to have Judy over one of these days for some home-made pie. This was reassuring, but it hardly shed any light on the puzzle that Judy went over and over in her mind as she drank her tea in Mrs Pebble's salon.

Not five minutes ago, she had raised her head to ask Nick for his notes on macro-economics to check some point or other, only to see her friend bending over his papers with an absent, pained expression as he fiddled with his pen. Judy sat straighter and set her mug down with such a sharp 'clink' that the fox immediately snapped out of his reverie and looked up as well, all traces of his pained look gone. Judy knew she hadn't imagined it though, and she was on the point of phrasing a question, but her friend beat her to it,

"You want the notes I took yesterday again, that it Carrots?" he said, fishing around his many files. "I'm almost feeling like I'm the bookworm now, it should really be the other way around with you passing me your notes."

He tossed her the necessary papers at that.

"Are you OK, Nick?" Judy asked in concern, disregarding the notes entirely. "Are you feeling fine? You looked a little peaky for a moment back there.."

"Must be all this poring over texts," Officer Wilde returned, shrugging. "It's enough to make anyone go distracted. Pass us the sugar, would you Carrots?"

That was as clear a 'stay out' signal as one could get, Judy told herself, as she passed the requested sugar box. Her stomach clenched suddenly as a frightening possibility occurred to her: supposing Nicholas were ill? 'Rubbish,' the bunny pronounced in her mind a second later, rather firmly, as she observed her friend wolf down (or fox down) a sizeable plate of chocolate chip cookies. (It has to be mentioned that our hero was at least fortunate in that his feelings were not interfering with his appetite, as is sometimes the case for less fortunate animals and people.)

It as a shame, Judy reflected somewhat resentfully, that he can't just tell me what's wrong. I'm his best friend, I should think.

And the rabbit took her anger out on her wholegrain sun-dried apple bar, breaking it into several pieces with feeling.

"How can you possibly run on that, Carrots?" Nick asked her, smiling. "I get the heebie-jeebies just seeing all that stuff you go through, muesli, oatmeal, whatever new and gruesome invention you happen upon."

"The more interesting question is," Judy replied tartly, "how you still haven't had a stroke, what with all the sugar and caffeine you inhale in a day."

"I've gone down on the coffee," Nick replied, in mock-offense. "No more than six cups daily now."

"It's the size of the cups that's gone up then," Judy commented in a bored tone, pretending to flick through her books nonchalantly. "Is that it?"

"Might be," Nick agreed, laughing, "You know me well Carrots. But what's one to do when one doesn't have your natural morning-animal constitution?"

"Take a morning jog? A cold shower? Drink jasmine tea?" Judy shot off. "There are multiple ways to wake up without becoming a coffee addict."

"Addict is such a strong word," Nick muttered, choosing to ignore Judy's suggestions for coffee replacements and hiding his third espresso cup behind a stack of notebooks just in case (one never knew with bunnies).

Why couldn't things always be like this, Judy asked herself, as she demonstratively shoved Nick's notebooks to the side to show that she knew about the coffee cup lurking back there perfectly, causing Nick to grab it out of harm's way and go 'Don't you dare Carrots!' warningly.

I just, the bunny mused, just want things to keep going the way they used to.

The funny thing is, everything would maybe have gone right back to the way it used to be. It is highly possible, given his many talents, that Nick would have managed to so well conceal his feelings and thoughts at every given moment, that Judy would never notice anything to be amiss again and the pair would go through their daily lives as the friends they had been these past years.

It's possible. Had it not been for two personages that were now firmly stuck on our heroes' horizon.

The first one was of course Miss Frost, who was, unknown to our friends, busily putting into motion her new plan.

The second one was Mister Jack Savage.

Two things can be said about Jack Savage and about Margaret Frost, two things they had in common.

Firstly, both of these animals were carrying their own agendas, involving our pair of friends more or less closely, agendas that would soon bring about the most unexpected events.

And secondly, neither of these two animals had our heroes' best interests at heart.

Once again, wishing you all the very best for this holiday season and looking forward to seeing you with much much more when our next chapter comes out in 2017! As usual, feel free to leave your thoughts, comments and feedback :)

-ChezIBY