Good response from last chapter. That's all I have to say. I love all of you who're still with this story. Hope you stay until the end! (It's approaching faster than you think...)
Without further a do, here's chapter 13 of Primal: A Zootopia Fanfiction
The gentle buzz of the florescent lights was the only sound that entered Judy's straightened ears as she sat with her eyes closed and the back of her head resting on the concrete wall behind her. She was still waiting for Doctor Zdanskyi to come through the gigantic, metal door only a few feet to her side and give her an in-depth description of what was happening to her partner.
Ever since she had arrived at the headquarters she had been determined to figure out the quickest possible ways to drain Nick of his Primal Instincts. All she had to go off of was her own experiences with her partner, which were, while numerous, usually not much help. To her own eyes some of Nick's mental improvement could have been spurred on by an increase in his weight and health, but those factors were completely out of her control. The only way she could think to help him was to continue to do what she was doing before - by showing him love and compassion.
If the theory Doctor Elandrew came up with while he was monitoring Trunklin almost two centuries ago was really what was helping her partner recover then Judy was sure that, if the current situation was less serious and ominous, she'd be awwwing until she couldn't awww anymore. But right now she didn't have that luxury. Her partner was dying, and the only thing she could do was wait until the striped feline examining him was finished to know the full extent of his sudden decline in health.
Judy slowed her breathing and cracked open her eyes, blinking as the bright florescent lights above temporarily blinded her. Her squinted gaze shifted to her superior as she slowly straightened in her chair. The Chief was idly staring at the ground, his arms resting on his knees and his hooves clasped together as he sat on the edge of an office chair he had taken from one of the cubicles outside. His foot gently tapped against the concrete floor as quiet as a mouse's whisper, but as Judy moved to rest on the edge of her chair the tapping stopped and his gaze darted up to meet hers.
"Good morning, Officer Hopps," He grimly greeted, a smile devoid from his face. Judy stretched her arms upward as she continued to sheepishly blink at the chief, her mind weighed down by lack of sleep and stress.
"What time is it?" She dourly asked as her arms came down to rest on her lap and her right leg crossed over her left in a semi-relaxing position.
"Almost six," Chief Bogo responded, and Judy silently exasperated.
"Has Doctor Zdanskyi said anything yet?" She asked as her nose began to twitch, unsure whether she had been deep in thought or uncomfortably dosing for the past few hours, but the Chief shook his head and straightened in his chair.
"He's been silent," He sullenly answered, leaning against his chair's flimsy wooden back and the concrete wall behind. "I spoke with the mayor a little while ago. He wishes you and Officer Wilde the best and hopes that your partner will have a speedy recovery and will soon join us."
Judy couldn't help but feel a small pulse of anger at the mention of Mayor Lionheart's name, and her paws squeezed together as her jaw clenched. She realized that he was trying to protect the city from becoming any more divided than it already was, and that wasn't a problem to her at all. It was the way he was doing it that was ticking her off - making her hide her partner's existence from the entire world and all the mammals who cared about him! As it turned out, even she couldn't keep a state secret a secret forever. The shocked expressions of Finnick and Voltaire as she told them about their friend's struggle to survive still echoed in her mind...
"I personally called all the officers who know about Wilde to inform them about his sudden change in fortune," The chief explained, his gaze softening. "I don't know if you know, but I've been keeping them after work once every few days to update them on your partner's condition. They all wish you and Wilde the best, and regret that they can't be there to help you. They, and I, don't doubt Wilde's strength. We have the utmost confidence that your partner will be fi-"
"Sir," Judy sternly interrupted, a small, polite frown coming onto her face as she raised her paw out to her side. "We can't just pretend that everything is fine and go on hoping that Nick will recover. If there's one thing that Zootopia has taught me, aside from that anyone can be anything, it's that you have to be the change that others need. And change is exactly what Nick needs right now."
Chief Bogo carefully studied Judy's almost defiant face for a few seconds before a small, humored smirk made its way onto his face and he slowly shook his head back and forth.
"You never cease to surprise me with your passion, Officer Hopps," The Chief warmly stated as he crossed his arms over his broad chest. "But you're absolutely right. We can't just brush off Nicholas' downturn as a temporary problem; we don't know yet if it is temporary or if this will hinder all the progress Officer Wilde has made so far. We can have as much hope as we want, but if we don't do anything with that hope then nothing will change."
"Exactly. That's why I've been thinking about the different ways we can help Nick," Judy eagerly began, uncrossing her legs as her ears straightened even more than they already were and she moved even further to the edge of the chair. "He seems to really progress whenever we're together, so I think the next step in his recovery should be physical contact with me."
Chief Bogo raised an eyebrow and unstraightened, letting his hooves fall to rest on his knees as he leaned in towards Judy with his eyes cast off at the floor in deep thought.
"I'm not sure that should be our next approach..." He began as his gaze flicked back to Judy's, his voice full of warning. "I could shake up his diet a little. I've been feeding him raw fish since he returned. Maybe he could use some cooked food, like a good salad or-"
"Blueberries!" Judy exclaimed, pointing at her superior as she raised out of her seat a tiny amount, the previously depressed thoughts completely dispersed. "Nick loves Blueberries!"
"I can get some for him," Chief Bogo replied, nodding, as he brought one of his paws up to rub his chin. "They'd go nice with sauteed broccoli and cauliflower. How does Wilde like his fish and insects?"
"I'm not sure," Judy answered, her eyes widening when she realized she didn't know how her partner liked his non-vegetarian foods. "I've never seen him actually eat meat or bugs. I think he might be a vegetarian."
"Then maybe feeding him fish these past few weeks hasn't been helping him out," Chief Bogo countered, his stern gaze darting to Judy's again. "Next time be sure to speak up, Hopps."
"Will do, Sir," Judy warmly replied, sending her superior a quick salute. "But hopefully we'll never have to have this conversation again!"
As soon as her words left her mouth the sound of a lock turning and metal creaking entered Judy's straightened ears, and she quickly turned to watch the huge, metal door beside her slowly open up. Doctor Zdanskyi stepped through a moment later, a pen in his lab coat's pocket, a clipboard filled with papers under his arm, and a professional-looking medical suitcase in his paw.
Judy could immediately tell something was far from being right with her partner. Doctor Zdanskyi was an older mammal, but his movements were too stiff for someone of his age, and as he turned to close Nick's cell's door behind him Judy could see dread and sorrow in his aged, blue eyes. She slid off her chair as worry began to drive out the warm and hopeful thoughts she had been thinking only a few seconds before, and out of the corner of her eye she saw the chief rise up from his chair to face the feline.
Doctor Zdanskyi turned towards them, his expression blank but his eyes still filled with dread, and he stopped closing the cell door when he saw how intensely Judy and the Chief were staring at him. At first his gaze met with Chief Bogo's, but when he noticed the small mammal between him and the cape buffalo he turned his eyes downward to look at Judy with a regretful and sorrowful expression. As the tiger began to speak Judy felt a part of her die.
"He's not doing well," He solemnly began. "He has a week, at most."
"A week?" Chief Bogo asked, bewilderment and disbelief in his voice, and Doctor Zdanskyi quickly nodded up at him before his comforting gaze returned to Judy.
"I'm so sorry-" He began, but Judy held up a paw. She didn't want to hear how sorry he was that her partner was dying. She had heard enough of that crap after Nick had been announced dead by the city two years prior. If she was going to keep her fox right here on Earth then she'd have to be quick about it. A week wasn't a long time. She couldn't spare even a second to hear about how sorry Doctor Zdanskyi was. She needed facts, not empty condolences.
"Do we know why this is happening to him?" Judy asked, her voice and attitude more resembling an officer of the law than a mammal who had just learned that someone she loved only had a week left to live, and Doctor Zdanskyi nodded as he dropped his medical bag to the floor and pulled his clipboard out from underneath his arm.
"I don't think Officer Wilde's sudden change has to do solely with his age, but I do think there is some correlation between that and his situation," The feline explained, flicking through the pages on his clipboard. "The best way to explain his declining health would be from a surgical perspective. Are you listening, Chief Bogo?"
Judy turned toward her superior officer, who was staring idly down the hall, a bewildered expression on his face and his eyes wide in shock. One Week, Judy saw him mouth before he shook his head and motioned for Doctor Zdanskyi to continue. She could only guess that his surprise at the news was because he had never seriously thought about Nick dying while he had been spreading the word about his sudden downturn .
"Before a transplant, a doctor has to find a suitable replacement for a patient's defective organ," Doctor Zdanskyi continued, his gaze flicking from Judy to the chief and back to his clipboard. "Once the organ is implanted in the patient, the body will hopefully accept it and use it as it normally would. If the body rejects the organ, then that's where problems begin. The nervous system will attempt to purge what it sees as a foreign body. In reality, it's only destroying itself. From what I can tell with Officer Wilde, his recent change in mental state is what's causing this. Whether he believes it or not, some part of him believes that becoming normal again is a threat to the body."
"So the more he recovers, the faster he'll die?" Judy asked, and Doctor Zdanskyi nodded, his expression becoming grim.
"Regrettably," He confirmed, looking back down at his clipboard. "The... interesting part about Officer Wilde's condition is that it doesn't appear to be his nervous system attacking his body. I can't exactly pinpoint where the decay began, but it seems that his heart is taking the blunt of the damage."
"His heart?" Chief Bogo inquired, taking a step toward Doctor Zdanskyi. The feline confirmed the Chief's question with a quick nod of his head.
"The degenerative properties are spreading out of the right atrium," The doctor went on. "But there's also evidence of organ failure in the left atrium. That will, over time, make it very difficult for him to breath, almost as if he is suffering from a respiratory infe..."
Not feeling that any more critical information about her partner would be revealed in the conversation, Judy shifted her attention away from Doctor Zdanskyi to the open metal door behind him.
Nick's got a week left to live. She thought, a plan of action for the next few days beginning to form in her head. I'll have to be quick about this. I have to spend as much time as I can in there with him. Police duties can wait. I can't rest until he's guaranteed to survive or until he's regained control of his body - whichever comes first.
With steady determination, Judy walked around Doctor Zdanskyi, who was still deep in conversation with Chief Bogo, and through the open cell door. She stood just inside the concrete room, her eyes focusing in on the mammal laying in the center of it.
He looked absolutely feeble. Nick was laying, sprawled out on the concrete floor, with his back facing towards her, but even from half a room away Judy could see and hear that his breaths were heavier and wheezier than they were only a day before. It was worrying how much he could physically change in a mere matter of hours, but she knew she could help him; the huge, glass panel that usually separated them from each other was raised, giving her complete access to him.
Judy turned back towards the doorway, and a few feet out in the hallway she could see her superior and the doctor locked deep in a conversation about concealing the doctor's medical bag on the way out of the headquarters. She was lucky that the Chief had his attention shifted away from her, or else he wouldn't have let her do what she was about to do.
In one subtle and silent move she quickly walked back out into the hallway and with a massive pull started to close the windowless metal door. It was heavier than she had thought it was, but as soon as it began to gain momentum she darted inside the cell and let it close itself. A moment later the door slammed shut, but there was still something she had to do - and judging by the angry HOPPS! coming from the other side of the door she had to do it very quickly.
In one final movement Judy threw herself up into the air and grabbed onto the door's doorknob with one paw while her other manually locked the door. She dropped down just as the chief tried to open the door on the other side, and she couldn't help but breath a little heavier at the sudden burst of activity and the rebelliousness of what she had just done. She could risk whatever punishment the Chief could deal out to her, though. She was sure that what she was about to do would really help her partner.
Judy's feet began to move without her even realizing it. Her mind was focused only on her dumb fox now laying directly in front of her...
She bent down into a kneeling position and gently placed her paw against his cheek, her gaze softening and a hopeful smile coming onto her face as she felt the softness of his fur. She scooted closer to him and pulled his limp, tranquilized head onto her lap, keeping one of her paws under his muzzle while the other curled around his head.
The longer she stared down at him the larger her smile grew. She loved the fox with the twitching tail who's head was resting on her lap and who's heartbeat she could feel, through his thick fur, was heavier than normal. She didn't want him to leave her again. Not ever.
"Never again," She quietly said as she leaned down and rested her own cheek against Nick's, a small feeling of despair entering her as she felt how truly strange his heartbeats were and heard how strained his breaths were.
"You're not leaving me that easily, you sly fox," She commanded, more to reassure herself than to actually tell her partner. She turned her head as she preeminently forced out the negative emotions that she knew would eventually begin to plague her thoughts, and with all the strength she had she pecked Nick's cheek, closed her eyes, and plunged her head between his muzzle and the tuft of fur at the top of his chest, letting her breath warm his cool neck fur. His real scent, which she hadn't smelled for a very long time, washed over her, and she took it all in as if she would never have another chance to.
Nick had never been the biggest fan of his weekly check-up. It wasn't that he didn't like Doctor Stripes; he had nothing against the feline. He just didn't like being tranquilized. There was a noticeable difference between being stuck in his mind while his Primal Self was sleeping and being stuck in his mind while his Primal Self was under the influence of the sedative.
Whenever his Primal Self did something in the real world, Nick was able to feel it with less intensity. When it rubbed up against a wall, Nick felt his fur press against his skin. When it sniffed the air, Nick could smell his own scent. When it ate the raw fish that Chief Bogo would bring to him every day, Nick nearly choked on the taste. So if it was tranquilized, then why would he not feel the effects of the sedative?
The answer was that he did feel the effects, but those effects weren't as strong as those felt by his Primal Self. He could only speculate why that was, but in his current state those speculations didn't get very far. His best guess was that since all his other senses, aside from hearing, were second hand to him through the currently vanished vision, then he would also feel the effects of the tranquilization second-hand from his Primal Self.
He didn't know what it felt like to be high, but Nick could guess that what he was experiencing right now was as close as he'd ever get. He was idly standing in the darkness, his paws in his ragged officer uniform's pockets and his eyes staring half-lidded at the darkness right in front of him where he knew that the vision would eventually return. His mind was functioning on a different, almost restrictive, level. He could only concentrate on one object or idea at a time, and even then he could only think the most basic of thoughts.
Nick turned his bored gaze downward, curious to see what strange notions he would come up with about his body. He looked marginally heavier than he did a few weeks ago. He supposed that was good. The more fur he shed and the more weight he gained the closer he'd be to fitting in his uniform again. Nick turned his head over his shoulder to look at his tail, which had yet to begin the shedding process, and stifled a chuckle. It looked kind of ridiculous compared with the rest of him, like a giant, furry extension of something that normally was half its size.
"Oh well," Nick nonchalantly said as he turned his head back around and shrugged. "It'll shed eventually."
"Yes it will," Nick responded to himself as he closed his eyes. He could feel he was slowly becoming more and more delusional. He needed something to distract himself from himself...
"A memory would be nice..." He told his brain as his neck muscles began to relax and his head cocked upward. "Maybe one with Carrots..."
As soon his words left his mouth Nick immediately felt a change in the air and a return to his normal thought process. He slowly opened his eyes and was greeted with darkness, but unlike the absolute blackness which surrounded him in the confines of his mind there was a twinge of moonlight to it, and as his eyes became use to the scene he gradually began to make out the shapes of a car door and gearbox.
He was back in his, or more correctly his partner's, cruiser, laying on the passenger's seat with his legs hanging off the edge. The air was frightfully cold; Nick could only guess that he was watching one of the times he had fallen asleep while on night patrol in Tundratown. But something was off about the whole situation. Even when he had fallen asleep in the cruiser while on patrol, he had always woken up in the morning, never during the night. And if he was on patrol, then where was Carr-
Nick felt something squirm against his chest, and he turned to look down towards where the movement had come from. When he saw something what had made moved against his chest his already wide eyes grew tenfold. Resting on his chest with her arms curled around his trunk was Judy, a peaceful, sleep-filled expression on her face. At the sight of her Nick immediately felt his heart burst with affection, but he couldn't help but also feel curious and confused.
This must've been one of the times he and Judy had been forced to share body heat when Chief Bogo had thoughtlessly sent them to patrol Tundratown overnight. The chief should've known better than to send two small mammals into the coldest district of Zootopia without proper winter gear! Yet the question of why he was watching this memory when it never actually happened still wasn't answered.
Maybe this isn't a memory... Nick ventured, testing the thought by raising his paw off the car seat and gently resting on the side of his partner's head. Judy yawned at the sudden movement but didn't wake up, instead re-positioning her head and burrowing further into his chest fur. Nick smiled down at his partner, his mind overwhelmed at her raw adorability. This wasn't him watching one of his memories. This was him living something new - going back in time and remaking a moment in his own design.
Nick raised his other paw up and onto his partner's bare lower back and pressed her further into his chest. He swore he felt his heart jump miles out of his rib cage as Judy accepted his embrace and gripped him tighter with her small arms. What made the whole situation perfect, though, was her smile. It was small and not very noticeable through his chest fur, but it was still there none the less.
Nick relaxed himself and let his head fall back onto the car seat, a huge, contented grin coming onto his face as he shut his eyes.
"This is the way it was meant to be," He mumbled, his smile only growing as he focused on the warmth he and his partner where sharing. But before he could wallow in the moment, a sound drew his attention away from Judy and back into the darkened cruiser around them.
"Nick..." A ghost-like voice began, no louder than a whisper on the wind. "Don't do this, Nick. Don't fall in love with a rabbit..."
"I already have," Nick answered as a small frown became chiseled onto his forehead, his voice quiet so that he didn't wake the rabbit laying on his chest. He recognized the familiar voice speaking to him from somewhere before, but he just couldn't put his finger on where. "I thought this was decided a while ago."
"You have..." The eerily familiar voice acknowledged, growing a little louder and a little more forceful. "But there is still time to change. Save yourself, Nick. Remember your mother?"
Nick's head darted upward to scan the gloomy car and his arms tightened around Judy as he realized who was talking to him. It was the voice from the day he decided he didn't love Judy and from the night he decided he did love Judy. What was the counter-intuitive voice doing here in his dream?
"You," He quietly growled, bearing his teeth in a snarl as he tried to find where the voice was coming from. "Why can't you just leave me alone?"
"Because I am you, Nick," The voice answered, now at normal volume. "I am just as much a part of you as that little voice in your head which is telling you to love Judy Hopps."
"But that voice is more reasonable," Nick countered, his frown growing. "I already love Judy Hopps - I just needed to ignore you to fully realize that. You make absolutely no sense to me."
"No sense?" The voice angrily spat out. "No SENSE? Nick, do you want to see what will happen if you love Judy Hopps? If you're really that interested, then let me show you!"
In one sudden moment Nick was consumed by pain, completely at the mercy of the voice and unable to even raise a finger against him. His head fell back to the car seat as if something was pulling it downward and his body began to shake from the sheer force of the pain. He felt like he was being crushed by an elephant and being diced into a thousand pieces at the same time. The sound of blood roaring began to clog his hearing, and his wide open eyes were rendered almost useless by the red pouring up inside of them. He swore he could also feel his teeth shattering in his tightly clenched mouth, still stuck in a rebellious snarl.
"Do you feel that, Nick?" The voice rhetorically asked. "This is the feeling of absolute pain. If you keep on loving that rabbit, this is what you will feel."
Nick's mind began to go blank as the overwhelming feeling of agony consumed his entirety. He felt like he was going to pass out - or worse. With a struggled lift of his head he looked down at his partner, and at the sight of her he felt his hard gaze soften and his clenched teeth relax. She was still sleeping, a smile on her face, undisturbed by the turbulent situation going on around her. Even through the red she still looked stunningly beautiful as she lay on top of him in nothing but her underwear and a bra, her light grey fur illuminated in the midnight moonlight. He wasn't going to succumb that easily. Not when so much was waiting for him on the other side.
"I don't care about the pain," Nick responded, pulling Judy closer toward his muzzle as he squeezed his eyes shut. "Do your worst - this is only a hallucination! I'll be ready for anything you throw at me!"
"AHHHH!" The voice shouted in anger, and Nick held Judy even tighter, refusing to let her slip out of his arms. "You want to see the worst, Nick? After everything I've sacrificed for you? Here! Open your eyes!"
Nick slowly cracked open his eyes as he tried to resist the pain killing him, but when he saw what was laying on his chest he couldn't help but open his eyes wide and clench his jaw with the force of a sprinting rhino. Instead of the rabbit he loved laying there, it was him. Yet it wasn't him at the same time. It was a perfect match physically - the eyes, the fur, the ears, the teeth - everything was spot on. But whatever was controlling his body was much more violent and primal than he was. His eyes were filled with utter hate and his lips were pulled back in a vicious snarl, and a small growl shot from between his teeth as the beast slowly began to edge closer to his throat. Nick tried to move his arms off the creature, but the pain had paralyzed him completely. He knew exactly what was going to happen, but as the last of his eyesight was replaced with red all he could do was mentally struggle in vain against the inevitable bite.
"This is what WILL happen, Nick!" The voice shouted, rage filling every decibel of it. "You cannot change the future!"
The strike was fast and deadly. Nick didn't even feel the teeth of the creature piercing and ripping open the skin on his neck. As soon as his jaw clamped around him something changed - Nick felt the freezing temperature of the cruiser flee along with all the pain corrupting his body.
His eyes flew open as quick as he could make them, but when he looked around for the creature it was nowhere to be seen. He was back in the darkness, unchanged from his previous position. His paws were still even in his uniform's pockets.
Nick's first reaction was to collapse onto his knees and hold his paws over his eyes. He felt his breathing quicken and water build up in his eyes as he tried to ease his pounding heart.
What the heck just happened? He thought once he had calmed himself enough to think clearly. That was my Primal Self attacking me, wasn't it. But that voice? Could that have really been me? It couldn't! I'd never give up on Judy...
The sudden scent of his partner at the thought of her name jolted Nick's already startled mind, and he flinched his head upward while his paws remained in mid-air. Just in front of him was the vision, slowly flickering to life like an old TV. Nick sprang off the floor and eagerly watched the pure white oval as his eyes began to gloss over and his mouth hung open in distress. If his partner was really with him she wouldn't be safe. She needed to stay away from him for the next few days if the scene he had just witnessed was even marginally accurate.
"Judy," Nick choked out as the vision's flickering thinned out and his hearing shifted to his Primal Self's ears. "It's not safe for you here."
There was no reaction from the vision as the white in it died, revealing nothing more than the concrete floor and wall of his cell. Nick breathed a sigh of relief when he saw he was alone, the beast in control of his body laying on the floor with its legs sprawled out to its side and its head resting on the concrete. But as the remainder of his senses returned Nick's eyes widened at what he felt curled around his neck. It was soft and tight, and as his Primal Self began to breath Nick could smell his partner's scent all around him.
"Carrots," Nick gently began, softly touching the fur where he felt his partner's paws.
"Carot-" His Primal Self sheepishly stuttered, and at the words Nick felt the grip around his neck tighten.
"Nick. You're awake," Judy lightly began, her voice full of forced happiness but twinged with sorrow. Nick's eyes frowned at her words, alerted to the unordinary tone of her voice. Something was very, very wrong, and he couldn't help but think it had something to do with him.
"What's going on, Judy?" He forcefully asked as he leaned in further to study the motionless vision and moved up both his paws to rest on it.
"What onn, Ju-" His Primal Self repeated, the skin on his muzzle pulling back in a snarl before a small growl edged its way out of his lips and interrupted what Nick was trying to ask. Nick felt his partner's arms tighten around him even more at the question and her cheek burrowed itself into the top of his head.
"Your dying, Nick," She dolefully answered. Nick's frown disappeared at the answer and his eyes widened as his ears became limp behind his head.
"Dying?" He repeated, trying to figure out what Judy meant. He could not be physically dying. There was absolutely no way! It was only yesterday that he had spoken to her for the first time in years! With such a huge leap in improvement after only a few weeks back in Zootopia there wasn't any possible way he could die!
"Dy-?" His Primal Self repeated, its growl cutting off at the word.
"Dying," Judy responded as she slowly began to rub her cheek back and forth against the top of his head in affection. The longer she talked for the more and more wary and worried her voice became. "Doctor Zdanskyi doesn't know what's causing it. He says it has to do with your heart. Please tell me you aren't in too much pain, Nick."
Nick carefully looked down at himself in an attempt to answer his partner's question, concentrating on all the feelings throughout his body. There was cold, heartbreak, hunger, but no pain. He reluctantly raised a paw and rested it on the strips of clothing on his chest he called his uniform, but still there was no pain. It was only when he gently pushed against his skin that the pain began. It was an unnatural, forced pain, but it was still there.
"I'm not, Judy," He answered, his glossed eyes beginning to silently water as he began to understand that he was dying.
"Not," Was all his Primal Self said.
"That's good, Nick," Judy warmly responded, her voice still kept at a careful volume. "We don't have much time to fix you. I'll be in here every day, from sunrise to sunset. Chief Bogo and the rest of the department can wait. I'm not letting you leave me that easily again..."
Nick could feel himself beginning to cry. How could his partner keep a controlled attitude in such a terrible situation?
Because she's strong. A voice deep within him thought. She's been through this before - who knows how long she's loved you! When you died before, Nick, you didn't have anything to live for! Well this time you do - so fight for it!
Nick straightened himself and gripped the sides of the vision as if he was going to pick it up and smash it, a wave of determination washing over him.
If she can be strong then you can be strong, Nick. He thought to himself as he moved one of his paws up to wipe his eyes. He didn't have time for tears and pessimistic thoughts.
"Judy," Nick began, his voice quivering slightly but filled with indomitable power. "I'm not going to leave you. I'll never leave you. I promise you, Judy Hopps, that by the end of this week I'll be by your side again. I promise you, Judy Hopps, that I will fight for every inch of this body until I can't fight anymore. I promise you with every fiber of my being that I won't ever die again."
Mid December here I come!
Primal: A Zootopia Fanfiction Chapter 12 - December 16
A Fox in Shining Armor: A Zootopian Fanfiction Chapter 3 - December 31
Fourty Thousand: A Zootopia Fanfiction Prologue - TBA
Guilt, that Monster: A Zootopia Short Story - TBA
Dire Situations: A Zootopia Short Story - TBA
This chapter was last edited November 30, 2016