Episode 1 : Scene 5 : Vows
There was a kink in his neck. Thank you, plastic hospital chair. Sitting up, Nick snatched a glance at the clock. Not enough time had passed, in his estimation. He could sense movement in the hall again, though, and that meant it was time to get up. To Nick's thinking, hospitals were a weird mix of timelessness and the march of time, in the patient rooms at least. There was only the slow beep of monitoring equipment and the buzz of fluorescents to mark the beats of life. Without windows, lights, scents or any of the other natural signs of the passage of time, it would be difficult to tell if the outside world had simply frozen over. At the same time, the nurses came and went, and there was a certain cycle, a certain breathing life to the building itself that made it just possible to not crawl the walls with boredom or insanity.
Languidly, Nick straightened out of the chair and stretched up to the tips of his toes. Oh, that's much better. A blurry glance brought him the still form of Judy, sleeping peacefully in the middle of the over-sized bed. Not wanting to disturb her, Nick padded out of the room. There's got to be coffee around here somewhere.
As soon as he stepped into the corridor, the fur on the back of his neck started to crawl. The weasel who had been standing down the hall the night before (Or was it early this morning?) was still there, in almost the exact same spot, in almost the exact same position. His eyes bored holes in the file that he was holding. Nick brought a hand up and ran his claws slowly along his jaw, scratching as he went. With an internal shrug, he started forward.
The weasel only became aware of the fox once he had stepped to within a few paces of him. Though Nick was purposefully not walking directly towards the smaller mammal, he still caught the twitch that ran through the weasel's whole body as he glanced up and saw him coming closer. A quick glance down brought Nick the smaller mammal's name.
"What's up, Doc Flock? How long do you have left?"
"Excuse me?"
"How long on your shift?"
"Oh. An hour. Then I'm off to brave the storm."
"There's a storm outside?"
The weasel nodded and rubbed a hand along the back of his neck. He had closed up the folder and stuck it beneath his arm, but was still standing in the exact same spot as before.
"Yep. Storm Warden cooked it up overnight. Didn't you hear about it on the radio? Been in the works for weeks."
"Nah, I'm not from around here. Just visiting a friend."
"Ah. I was going to ask. Would that friend be Ms. Hopps?"
"That'd be the very rabbit."
"Good, is she awake yet? I wanted to go over a few things with her before I got off shift."
"Sadly, no. She's still eating carrots." Nick shrugged. "Or whatever it is that rabbits do in dreamland."
Flock's hazel eyes crinkled and he chuckled obligingly. Shifting from one wiry leg to the other, the weasel glanced down the hall and sighed. Though his voice was full of energy, Nick could see the long hours weighing on him. His eyes grew distant as he sunk into thought.
"I'll give her awhile, then. Thanks, Mr…"
"Wilde. How do you take your coffee, Doc?"
Needle-sharp, slightly yellowed teeth showed as Flock grinned up at him.
"Black as the night."
"Good 'mal. I'll bring you back some. Last question: why're you standing here in the middle of the hall?"
"Oh, yes, I always come out here to read reports. My office." He jerked a thumb towards the darkened passage to Nick's right, then followed it up with a vague warding-off gesture. "Colder than a mole's butt in there. That vent sends a nice draft of heat right here, though."
Nick waved a hand over the weasel's head and was indeed rewarded with a puff of hot air trailing through his fur. Nodding appreciatively, he stepped past the weasel and waved a paw in farewell.
"Take it easy, Flock."
The hunt for coffee would have to be put on a temporary hold. Getting a chance to look at one of the wardens' storms was not something he wanted to miss. They hardly ever deigned to cook one up, and when they did, it crashed through the city like a runaway train. In Happy Town, the storms had left the streets filled with slate grey water up to your shins. That was always a pleasant reminder of the amount of trash produced by a major, mammalian metropolitan area.
Winding his way through the hospital, Nicholas found the front door exactly where he had expected and congratulated it on not having wandered away sometime during the night. Standing in the middle of a glass fronted lobby space easily stretching half a city block, the front entrance consisted of a series of five rotating doors, one for every size of animal, from the tallest giraffe to the shortest mouse. They were rattling in their frames. His ears came up to attention as other sounds, other signs life that had been hidden behind the thick walls of the hospital, made themselves known. A siren blared as an ambulance crawled along the street outside. The wind howled, sounding like a thousand wheezy hippos blowing at once. From somewhere amongst the waiting, slouched chairs in the long front room, a radio that he could not pick out by sight played a Kites and Kits song.
As he stepped up to the glass, something wormed in the back of Nick's mind. A feeling, a hint of intuition. Rather than clamp down on it, for that might have scared it away, he simply waited and watched the storm outside. It was hard to tell that it was morning through the blowing stream of snow. A seemingly impenetrable miasma hung over Tundra Town General, casting everything into the jagged contrasts of a charcoal drawing. As the ambulance rounded the corner towards the ER, the street was returned to its lonely accumulation of snow. Not a thing, not an animal moved.
With a hint of childish glee, he blew onto the glass. It fogged immediately, making an excellent pallet for two parallel strokes of his paw, and then an upward curve beneath. For one moment, Nick considered going out, throwing caution to the wind, and travelling out into the storm. Then a glance down at his clothes, at the tuxedo, loose bowtie, and cummerbund covering his thin form, sealed that away. He smirked, still letting the niggling sense that there-is-something-I-should-be-thinking-of grow, and stepped back from the window. A beat later, and he was retreating deeper into the hospital, back in hunting-mode. His prey: caffeine.
He backtracked all the way to the ward that Judy was staying in, sticking his head in every likely room along the way. Nothing. As he went to step past her room, he caught movement out of the corner of his eye. Flock was inside, and Judy was sitting up, listening as the weasel spoke to her. She looks fine. Get me coffee or I will leave you with this head pounding, eye-twitching, scratchy feeling all day. Nick rolled his eyes at his internal monologue and continued down the hall, thinking he had finally picked up the delicious alkaline scent.
When he finally found a coffee pot, it was hidden away in a back corner of the ward, in what was probably supposed to be an employee break room but more closely resembled an overly-furniture ridden janitor's closet. He pounced on the carafe. You're mine! Then he found himself at a loss. In his haste to enter the room, Nick had forgone flicking the light switch. That was not a problem, as there was plenty of light for his eyes. The problem was the decided lack of cups on the counter. He started digging through the cabinets. Paper plates. Napkins. A box of barf bags. Cleaning supplies for said barf. That's not supporting the assertion that this isn't the janitor's closet. Sugar, creamer, stirring sticks, and there we are.
Straightening, he held aloft a stack of Styrofoam cups, striking the pose of a knight before a dragon. En garde, decaf demon! Then, for the second time that day, Nick found the fur on the back of his neck crawling. The light was wrong. There had to be something behind him.
Something was behind him.
Standing in the doorway. A black silhouette. Blocking the only way out. Stupid, stupid. Then the lights clicked on. It was the pig. His heart roared in his chest. For one second, it only knew one word. Kill. Kill. Kill. Nick saw red.
"Oh, sorry. I thought you were Dr. Flock. Gave me a little scare with your eyes there. My name's Michelle. I just got on shift. Are you visiting one of our patients? …Sir?"
Not the pig. A pig, a sow, decidedly on the thinner side of her species, wearing blue scrubs with her shirt tucked into her pants. A brown paper bag and a newspaper were held loosely at her side, while her other hand had been extended for a handshake that was starting to look like it would not happen. Her smile was just starting to wilt: it had the look of a flower that was on the edge of salvageable. Nicholas P. Wilde prided himself on being a smooth operator, so he moved in for salvage operations, chuckling away the tension and taking her hand with one of his own. There was a surprising amount of force behind her grip.
"Hi, Michelle. Sorry about that, you gave me a little scare there too. Name's Nick. I'm in to visit Hopps."
"Ah, right. The cop."
"Heard of her?"
"Not before this morning."
"In there?" He gestured at her newspaper.
"Nah, just from the late night shift."
Though she was still answering his questions, Nick thought that he could detect a hint of tension around her eyes. Some barely perceptible tightening that she might not even be conscious of doing.
"Could I squeeze by you, Mr. Nick?"
Nodding his assent, Nick pressed up to the counter to let the pig get to the fridge. She did not quite flatten herself to the wall as she went by, but it was a close thing. He could tell that she was trying really hard to control some instinct, some knowledge that told her to run. She was trying so hard. Setting down the stack of cups, Nick noticed that he had managed to embed his claws in another piece of hospital property. Jumpy, jumpy, aren't we?
While he poured himself and Dr. Flock a cup each of coffee, Nick watched Michelle out of the corner of his eye. She deposited her lunch in the refrigerator; made herself look busy for a moment; watched him back.
"Do you drink coffee, Misha?"
"Misha?" A slow grin spread across her face as he waved the carafe in the air. "Yes, I do."
He poured another cup.
Misha had an appreciation for his bad joke collection that was refreshing, and by the time they had made their way back to Judy's room, having stopped along the way to pick up a platter of breakfast food from a cart, Nick was fairly sure that he had managed to smooth over any anxiety that she might have had. As Flock stepped out of the room, Nick pressed one of the remaining coffee cups into his hand. The weasel raised it in salute.
"L'chaim." The weasel intoned.
"Bottoms up." The pig murmured.
"Down the hatch." The fox said.
They drank.
"Ugh. Good stuff. Michelle, walk with me." Flock's tone was light, but there was a steel of underlying command.
Misha passed the platter of food and her newspaper off to Nick. In response to his questioning look, she gave him something that was easily readable as you-sounded-curious. Then, casting a quick smile his way, she followed the doctor down the hall. With their heads together, the two were a picture of medical expertise. Good 'mals. He was a little surprised to find that he meant it. And then the thought from earlier clicked into place, like a microwave timer signaling the end of cooking, and Nick almost dropped the food. I gotta' tell Judy.
Judy was staring off into the distance as he shouldered the door open. Turning at his entry, she smiled warmly, though it did not quite reach her eyes. He found that there was another presence in the room, something looming over them both. Nick could not quite put a word to it, and found he did not care to do so.
"Your breakfast in bed, m'lady." He proclaimed with a flourish, smiling a little wide.
After depositing the platter astride her legs, he planted himself back in the seat next to her bed. Nick scooted the chair closer. A glance at the clock revealed that it was a little before eight in the morning. His eyes traveled to the plate. Yogurt, a bit of oatmeal, some orange juice in a plastic cup, and blueberries. Stop avoiding her. Judy looked like she had been hit by a truck. The night before, when she had gone to sleep, the only obvious thing wrong with her was the cast around her arm and the nose plugs holding her newly realigned nose in place. This morning, as Nick felt the caffeine washing through his system, that was decidedly not the case. The area around her nose was swollen, she had the beginning of a shiner on her right eye, and there was a decided hint of paleness remaining in her visage. As she brought up her good arm and brushedbrushed - at her ears, nervous, he caught site of even more damage.
Nick checked the door to make sure the medicos were still gone. Then, leaning forward, he locked eyes with her.
"Morning." And kissed her.
There was a thing he had heard about intentions, but at the moment he was finding it hard to remember. Nick had meant for it to be a quick peck, but once he got within range Judy's paw had come up and locked into place behind his ear, holding him them for a moment. A beat of fire roared in his heart. Her claws scratched through his fur, and then she let go of him.
Popping a blueberry into his mouth, Nick eyed her lazily. She was a good kisser, but that would never stop him from palming a blueberry when he wanted one. It took her a moment, and then she whipped her head down to look at her plate. After a second, Judy brought her eyes back up to meet his and tried to glare him down until he asked "I've got some good news and some bad news. Which would you like to hear first?"
"Dumb question."
"Point, the bunny. Okay, first tidbit, your nurse for the next eight hours is a pig." A cloud passed over her face at that, darkening her already grey pallor. "I've taken to calling her Misha and she seems nice enough, but I thought I'd give you a heads up. Second, I have a bit of admiration for the pig."
Judy frowned at that, though it was more confusion than anything else.
"Not Misha. The one from last night." At this, her face darkened again, and he hurried on. That was the presence. "There's a storm out there." Nick jerked a thumb towards the door. "Big one, from the look of it. Porkie decided to- "
"Nick."
"Sorry." That was a bit much.
"The pig decided to grab up Elm just a few hours before it hit. If he was planning it that way, that means that he was hoping that the storm-"
"-would wipe any traces of a struggle away. Sweat cheese-"
"-and crackers. Right. And her being missing would probably not have been reported for a couple of days, at least, without you there to interfere. Which means …" Nick trailed off.
Judy had apparently come to the same conclusion. There was a darkness in her eyes, a hint of hate and world weariness, for just a moment, just long enough to make Nick wish he could have taken back a little bit of the last few years, taken away some of the hurt and given her back some of her naïveté.
"Finish that thought." Judy's voice was cool.
"Which means that he wanted a head start. That he was not planning on calling in a ransom. That …" Even Nick had his limits.
"But that shouldn't matter, right? Nick?"
"It does. That's the other bit of bad news."
"Oh? Oh. Oh…"
Nick was regretting his choice of bad news order.
She cried then. His bunny, who had been so strong, who had bit her lip through the entire interview with Fangmeyer, broke down at that. He did his best to comfort her. Judy never quite got up to full body-heaving sobs, but it was a close thing. Once it was all out, Nick handed her another in a string of tissues. Then, bringing up a paw, he ran a thumb first beneath one of her eyes, then the other, wiping away her tears. Nick settled into scratching one claw softly through the hair of her cheek, along her jaw line. He was waiting, patient, there for her, ready for what he thought was coming next.
As if on cue, her good paw came up to clamp over his own, pausing it in its motion. She was moving slow, as if in a dream. Take your time. Purple eyes flicked up to his green, met and locked in on them. Though her head was still tilted down, he saw her lips curl into something halfway between a snarl and a smile.
"I thought it was strange when Fangmeyer didn't say anything about him. But…" She trailed off and then, after a moment, continued, speaking more softly. "We'll find her. You and me. We will find her. And bring her back. Take her back from that pig. Bring her home. I won't rest until it's done. I can't, it's my responsibility. I messed up, and it's my job to get her home safe. I will find her. I will find her." She gritted out the last sentence through her teeth, nodding her head as if to confirm the thought to herself.
Wait. She breathed in, he breathed in. She breathed out, he breathed out. Alright. Nick leaned down so that they were on a level with one another.
"Judy, two things. One, get that word 'responsible' out of your head. The only one who is going to hear that is a pig. You did the best you could. No, don't. Don't let that stuff eat you up inside." There was a certain savageness in his voice. "Do not." He poked her good arm. "Let it." He poked a finger against her other arm. "Get to you. You got that because you did the best that you could. Like I said, he was probably planning this thing for a while. If you had not been there, if you hadn't interrupted him, we would not even know that she was missing. She would be gone." He swiped a hand through the air. "Kaput. Fin. Like a carrot in the Burrows. But you were there. Thanks to you, she has a chance. We can save her. We can get her back. And I can tear that pig apart."
He finally had to stop for a breather. There was a hesitant smile on her face now, an actual one. She waited a moment, still cradling his paw to her cheek, and then, still speaking softly, asked "And the second thing?"
"I would expect nothing less from you. I am with you in this one hundred percent. I believe in you. And I love you."
"That was more than one thing." She was crying again, but Nick was relieved to read them as tears of joy. A smirk twisted the corner of his mouth up and he stood, leaning in to give her a hug. Judy Hopps, his carrot and his love, hugged him back. There was a certain joy that he hoped would never get old that came from just holding her close. She whispered in his ear.
"I am so grateful for you, you sap."
After breaking off the embrace all too soon, Nick returned to the slightly uncomfortable chair. Purple eyes followed him, tracked the swish of his tail, moved up to his face, lingered there.
"Was there some good news that I was promised?"
"The good news is that there's no more bad news." He spread his arms wide, a disarming smile on his face. Nick liked to think that he let her sock the punch into his bicep.
"Jerk."
"Ow. Okay, actually, there's a couple things. One is that you have once again managed to avoid stardom. Must have been too late for any of the vultures to let their bosses know about a cop getting banged up." Waving the newspaper (CMR: Final Presidential Debate, New Year Celebrated with a Bang, Joey Mike still Missing), he caught a protesting look from Judy.
"Oh ho, don't deny it. I heard you complain enough after the Bellwether thing to last me a lifetime."
He smirked at her. I've got you there.
"You know, I happen to remember a certain fox saying they were glad that I was complaining. Something about how they felt alright whining about the police academy because of that."
"I only complained about the police academy because I don't like pushups. Too many of those can be bad for you, give you muscles. And final bit of news, do you want to hear about the wedding?" It felt easier, for the moment, and it seemed to set the right tone, as Judy's eyes lit up. Her nose twitched in that cute little way of hers when she got excited and it seemed like the bed would have a hard time containing her for a moment.
"Ooh, yes, please! Was it fun? Did you get to dance? How was Judy? Did she look pretty? Tell me tell me tell me!"
He could not resist. "Did the doc give you a shot of adrenaline? There is no natural way you should have this much energy. What'd he want to talk you about, by the by?" Curiosity killed the cat and saved the fox.
Judy huffed out "I'm a morning rabbit. And none of your business, nosy." As she waved her paw in his direction indignantly, he caught it and brought it up to his lips, delighting in the mild blush it gave her as he kissed the tips of her fingers.
"Alrrright. Just some abnormalities in my blood work, but he said it was nothing to worry about. So I'm not. Worrying, that is. Now come on, tell me!"
They settled in that way as Nick launched into his story of the night before, holding hands. Occasionally over the course of the telling, Judy would pull out and stuff a few more bites of food into her face, but the unwrapped grey paw always found its way back to the waiting russet one. They seemed to be made to fit together, like two pieces of an age old puzzle.
End of Scene
I appreciate you guys reading and I apologize for the delay!
I have beta readers now. Arlothia ( u/2414308/) and UmbraTsuki ( u/2088002/). Give them some love.