"Left, open…clear," the bear paramedic said, flashing a penlight at Judy's eye before moving to the next. "Right, open…clear. Pupil dilation is normal. No signs of concussion. Looks like all you've got is a nasty goose-egg, Detective!"

"Hmm," Judy said, looking through the ambulance window over at the pumphouse as a dozen officers milled about outside in arctic gear, waiting for the special ops team and paramedics to clear out. The lights and sirens droned together as she stared off into the middle distance. The sky was clear and sun was out, some part of her expected it to be night when her fellow officers carried her out, there was something about horrible things happening in broad daylight that somehow made them worse. That it took so little to be so far from the warm comforting light of the sun, that such evil was potentially around every corner, behind every door.

"Tsss!" Nick hissed, off to her side. "Careful! I've been tenderized!"

Judy looked over to see Nick flinching away from an otter paramedic, his shirt was off and the otter was palpitating his right side, his fur was raised as the skin beneath swelled. She felt a smile tug at the corners of her mouth, watching him swat away the otter's probing paws.

"Detective Wilde, how am I supposed do my job if you won't let me feel the area?" the paramedic chided, brushing his hands out of her way, gingerly touching the bruised flesh. "Hmmm. The swelling's bad, but I don't think any ribs are broken. You're going to want to take it easy, though, your liver took quite the shock."

"I noticed!" Nick said, gesturing at the bite-marks on his shoulder. "What about this? Is it bad?"

The paramedic gently palpitated the area around the worst of the holes in his flesh, her nose curling. "We can protein-bond the smaller cuts, but we'll need stitches for where the eyeteeth got in, maybe surgery."

"Fuck me!" Nick clapped his hand to his face.

"If you like," the paramedic said, winking. "But I work tonight."

"You hear that, Carrots? …Carrots?" Nick smirked and looked over at Judy, who was staring off again. "Hey, Carrots. Earth to Carrots! You in there, bunny?"

"Hmm?" Judy turned back to him, shaking her head. "What?"

"You okay?" he said, putting a hand on her shoulder. "You've been a little spacy."

Judy rallied, she didn't want Nick to see her so low, she didn't want him to think she was… "Well, I did just get choked out. Little creep got the drop on me, is all."

Nick laughed and clapped her on the back, she couldn't help but smile; Nick had that effect on her. "Well, at least you have an excuse! A ferret could sneak up on just about anyone, I managed to let a huge bobcat get behind me!"

Judy smiled and shook her head, opening her mouth to say something when a large black van roared up the icy road. She hopped off the gurney and pressed her nose against the glass. The van came to a stop and not one second later did six heavily armored mammals come spilling out the back, in their arms were various cases and bags.

"Holy shit!" Nick exclaimed. "That's the bomb squad! The boys inside must have found something!"

The bomb squad filed up the stairs and towards the door when it swung open. The heavily armored squadies did an almost comical turn around, running down the stairs to make way for the paramedics hauling a stretcher, a jackal medic ran alongside it, holding a bag of saline over his head, barking at them to get out of the way. Judy could see a pile of red-stained bandages and swung the ambulance door open to the frigid tundra air, racing out to meet the rushing medics.

"Richie!" she cried out as she approached them. "Richie, can you hear me?"

A single eye peered through the mass of bandages and gauze, glazed and unseeing. A bandaged hand reached out and pawed at the air; Judy took it in hers and gave him a reassuring squeeze.

"Ma'am" the lead medic said. "Do you know him?"

Judy paused and looked back at the ambulance, Nick was watching her as she walked alongside the stretcher; he nodded and gestured for her to go ahead. Judy turned back to the medic. "Yes. He's my friend."

The medic nodded and gestured at the ambulance they were heading towards. "Okay, we have him stable, but he's drifting in and out. We'll need you to keep him awake for as long as possible, do you understand?"

"Yes," Judy said, looking down at the tattered remains of a man she barely knew. "I'm here now, Richie. You did good, you understand?"

The hand gave her a feeble, almost imperceptible squeeze, the eye looked over at her, now shimmering with tears. Judy smiled and clambered in the ambulance with him. "You did good."

It was an hour before Nick was finally allowed to explore the crime scene…again. Rodent SOCOs scurried all around, picking up even the most infinitesimal clues. There was something about their itty-bitty cameras flashing at random intervals all over a one hundred square-foot room that Nick found hilarious. Less amusing was the lonely blood splatter analyst exploring Finn's Happy Place. Her badge announced that she was the chief scene supervisor, her own area of expertise being blood-splatter, obviously the type who didn't trust anyone else with the job. She was a small beige jerboa; her long springy legs propelled her around the room with a quick, almost weightless elegance. Each hop was concluded with a flash from her camera, her arms making flinging motions as she mapped out the splatter patterns.

Nick stopped in the doorway and watched for a moment, one of her tall, oblong ears angled back, she spoke without turning around, her speech lightly accented. "Detective Wilde. Thank you for not spoiling the crime scene further. Those paramedics ran roughshod over a lot of the evidence."

"Trust me, this is the last place I want to be." Nick shuddered. Even when given the chance to air out, the room still stank of pain and fear. "Find anything interesting, Supervisor…?"

"Tafra," she said, glibly, still focusing on the crime scene. "Sura Tafra. And maybe. There's a lot of cast off well away from the vic, drips and drops all over the room," she gestured at the long, thick rope-like splatters on the floor and walls. "And these. They're thick, slow, like flicks from a brush. I can't quite make out why that is, or what did it. There's also not a lot of arterial spray, which is odd, considering the state of his left hand. I understand that you may know who did this, Detective. Have any theories?"

Nick swallowed thickly; blood-techs were always so weird and dry about their gruesome work; but they had to be, he supposed. "I think you're trying to picture the kind of tool that was used here. A knife or shears or whatever, those would cause a bit of spray…all this mess all was done manually. The victim was chewed apart."

This caused her to pause and actually turn around to face him, her dark eyes wide and shining, her expression elated rather than horrified. "Yes! That makes sense! The dripping would be off of the perp's mouth as he walked around, the flicks would be when he…" she motioned like she was pulling something off with her mouth, jerking her head to the side; Nick could practically hear the ripping flesh and flinched. She hopped over to another set of splatters near a bucket of ruddy, murky water and a heavily stained towel; they were more violent and almost circular in their cast-off pattern. "Over here, I was pulling my whiskers out about what they were, but now I'm thinking they're shake-offs. Like he came over and shook his head to get rid of the excess before washing himself off…he must have been covered in it for this kind of pattern. Not a very friendly guy."

"You'd be surprised," Nick said, flatly amused at the morbid observation. "He was pretty chatty and affable until he started biting."

Sura shot him an incredulous look, prompting Nick to pull away his collar and reveal the bandage on his shoulder. Her ears dipped down in shock and she gasped. "You were…oh, my God. That explains the fox and rabbit prints I found. Uh, they didn't tell us much about what had happened here, I'm sorry if I seemed–"

Nick waved it off, covering his wound once more. "Hey, I'm alive, aren't I? What do you think, though? You have enough evidence here to convict someone?"

Sura nodded and gestured at the floor and chair. "Prints in blood, both hand and paw, all over the place. Not to mention saliva, fur, he left almost as much DNA as the victim!"

Nick nodded and gestured for her to come closer, leaning in as she did. "How good are you?"

"E-excuse me?" she said, taken aback.

Nick pressed forward, his expression serious. "I said: how good are you? Real good? Thorough? Professional? I guess what I'm asking is, can I trust you to not completely screw this up?"

"I don't have to take this from y–" she sneered, turning back to the scene when Nick grabbed her by the upper arm and pulled her close, squeezing just hard enough to make her gasp.

"Listen, and listen closely," he said, his voice low and even but his eyes glinted in a way that made any protest die in her throat. "These aren't some small-time thugs, they aren't a bunch of whack-jobs, and they're definitely not idiots. They're professionals, they're connected, and they know some very good lawyers. Now, what I want from you is an assurance, no, a guarantee that we not only have all the evidence we need to charge, try, and convict these motherfuckers, but that it's going to be tight, spotless. No room for doubt, no signs of tampering or malpractice, nothing! Because if they get anything, anything at all, they're out, they're free, and it'll be on you."

"I can't control what lawyers do, Detective," Sura said flintily, pulling her arm away from him. "But I can tell you with certainty that no perp has walked because of my work. I am the best."

He smiled handsomely and clapped her on the shoulder. "That's what I want to hear! I'll see to it that you get the files from the other cases, so you can avoid making the same mistakes they made. I'll see you around."

Nick turned around a made for the door, pretending he didn't hear what she called him under her breath. Didn't matter what she thought of him, he'd called her competence into question, her ego would do the rest. All flies prefer honey to vinegar, but some would work harder for the sweet after a taste of the sour. He looked over his shoulder as he left the room; Sura Tafra was hopping around the room quickly, meticulously, capturing every aspect of the crime scene.

He smirked.

Nick turned the corner just in time to hear her bellow at some poor SOCO who stumbled into the room. 'Gonna get you, you sons-a-bugs. We're gonna make it stick.'

"Detective Wilde!"

He turned around to see a member of the bomb squad jogging towards him, his respirator up and resting on his helmet. "Sergeant, your boys defuse the…whatever it is?"

"Ayuh!" the ocelot said, gesturing for him to follow him down the hallway. "Wasn't even active, the sniffers just caught a whiff of C-4, all the electrics were deactivated. Looks to be a jury-rigged remote detonator, civilian issue short-range wireless."

"How were they going to set these things off?" Nick said, looking around at all the concrete surrounding them. He was shocked at how much smaller and less ominous the halls seemed when illuminated by a string of quartz halogen forensics floodlights. The flat grays and rusty reds of the walls and pipes were muted and blanched by their unrelenting glare. They entered the main cavity beneath the pumphouse where the enormous hump of the water main ran through. The air down there was warm and clean smelling, pumped alongside the massive pipe all the way through Tundra Town, the warm air, concrete, and permafrost all acting as insulation, keeping the water above freezing even in the dead of winter. Nick looked up and estimated that there was at least thirty feet of reinforced concrete between this room and their hideout, compounding the question further in his mind. 'If Carrots was here, she'd probably figure it out in a second. Remember some otherwise pointless factoid or correlation between here and all the other locations. I'll just have to make do until I can get the CSR to her.'

"Dunno," the Sergeant replied, shrugging as best he could in his blast armor. "Weirder still, scans suggest there's barely enough C-4 there to crack the outer layer of the main pipe. We're talking two inches of steel surrounded by a foot of reinforced concrete. Even a shaped charge wouldn't do much more than rupture the main. If that was their plan…"

"It wasn't," Nick said, tersely, pointing at the team of bomb technicians huddled atop the giant pipe. "Is that it?"

As they climbed the pipe Nick saw exactly why they had called in the bomb squad; it was a keg-sized metal cylinder with a larger circular rim one on end, this rim was affixed to the pipe by twenty heavy-duty anchor bolts.

"Should I even be here?" Nick said, eyeing the contraption dubiously.

"It's safe!" one of the technicians said, muffled by his mask. "EM's completely flat, there's nothing lit up on this thing. Ultrasound and x-ray shows there's no analog detonator, triggers, or fuses either. It's dead."

A technician exclaimed a warning; the top of the canister detached with a click as several fastening mechanisms disengaged. Slowly, carefully, the tech unscrewed the cap, gingerly pulling it free of the main body along with a bizarre looking mechanism; a long sturdy-looking metal tube with wires bristling out the upper end, up and down the tube was slanted-rings of C-4 explosive, meticulously molded and wired together. Nick didn't have to be an explosives expert to know that these charges were meant to detonate consecutively, but why?

"I'll be damned," the sergeant said, gesturing at the rings. "Shaped ring charges. And I bet this bug's nest up here at the top is a charge with a pusher plate. Must have a liquid inside the cylinder, water or something."

"What makes you say that?" Nick said, examining the curious device.

The sergeant shrugged. "Hunch, mostly. Had something similar when I was working on the old petro-pipelines down south. We'd fix this sort of thing to a pipe that was filled with volatile gases and the like, as way to pump buffer chemicals in while also creating a pressure release. Each explosion compressed the liquid more and more, and water will only compress so much before it has to go somewhere. More often than not the path of least resistance was clean through the steel. At those speeds, not even fumes can light up. 'Course, we were dealing with quarter-inch high tensile steel, water mains are a whole different critter."

Nick gestured at the cylinder. "What do you suppose they could cut through with a charge that size?"

"Three, four inches at a half-inch bore. That's about the practical limit, though. And it would have to get through the concrete first." The sergeant sniffed, a smirk tugged at corners of his mouth. "Though I'd bet the guy who put this thing together knew that. Bet he knew a lot of things. Talonson, is there anything else in there?"

"Yessir!" Officer Talonson said briskly. "They're homemade, but I know a linear thermite charge when I see one."

"Well, that accounts for the concrete," the sergeant said, smiling grimly and looking up at Nick. "What are we dealing with here?"

"Same thing we always deal with, Sergeant," Nick said, casually, examining the cylinder in the Talonson's hands; Talonson unscrewed the bottom and pulled a long, clear plastic container from the tube. Nick's eyes lit up when he saw what was inside: a familiar looking light-blue liquid. "Very bad people."

The ford sped down the highway leading out of Tundra Town, towards the tunnel leading to the Rainforest District. It was keeping pace with traffic, and as one of the most widely sold vehicles in the world it blended in more or less completely. The trio sat inside the cab, idly listening to 'The Garden' over the radio. Elim looked despondently out the window, watching the bleak landscape race by.

"Hmm…" Grigori muttered, tapping his scarred fingertips on the wheel. "What band is this?"

"July Bark," Finn said from the back seat. "Why? You like it?"

"I do. It's got a good sound," he said, tapping in tune with the music.

"You got a problem with your head / And the doctor says you shouldn't be alone / Well, I got hips and you got lips / I plan to keep them oh oh oh oh~"

"Canidean band, y'know. Lead singer's a snow hare, weirdly enough." Finn idly picked something out of his teeth.

Grigori almost flinched when the male lead barked his lines. "Really! I wouldn't have guessed, he sounds like a cement mixer that learned to talk."

"But there's a true poetry to their lyrics," Finn replied. "I'm a bit of a fan."

"He sings about as well as you," Elim muttered, still looking out the window.

Finn and Grigori exchanged nervous glances through the rearview mirror. Finn motioned his head at Elim, his expression questioning. 'Should I ask?'

Grigori's brow creased in worry and he nodded curtly. Finn cleared his throat and idly scratched at the seat-cover. "So, uh, Elim…where we at?"

"What do you mean?" he said, flatly, still enthralled with the middle distance.

"Uh…how fucked is the plan?"

Elim inhaled through his nose and shrugged. "The alpha site's gone, the injector's in cop hands, and they'll probably find all the others, considering their record. Our faces are about to be plastered on every screen in a city of eighty million people, with an APB for our immediate arrests, and that smug bastard fox fried the only computer with the execute program, so we can't even set them off early to get the fuckers off our tail! The upside? The spare canisters and paperwork is all with us, and even if Richie lives, he doesn't know enough to mess with plan B."

"Plan B?" Grigori asked, glancing away from the road for a moment. "We have a plan B?"

Elim made a more-or-less gesture. "Probably? Boss ain't the type to not have a contingency. I'll have to give 'em a call."

"Hoo-boy!" Finn said soberly, his otherwise cheerful demeanor damped by the recent events. "They are not going to be happy."

"It's not like we left a trail or anything," Grigori said, angrily. "We were careful, methodical. They even fell for the false lead like you said they would, Elim!"

"I know, I know!" Elim hissed, pulling his phone out of his pocket with a shaking hand. "That goddamned fox! How'd he even figure it out?!"

"He didn't," Finn said, matter-of-factly. "It was the bunny."

"The bunny?" Elim snorted. "What the hell makes you think she had anything to do with it?"

"She solved the Nighthowler Case," Finn held up his hand and counted, "and the drug ring, the bug plot, and she even booked the Shearer!"

Elim scowled and scoffed, waving him off dismissively. "No prey is that smart, no small prey is that smart, and sure as hell no bunny is even half that smart! I'm telling you, it was the fox, because I'll be damned if I got sniffed out by some diversity hire!"

"She's not like other bunnies," Finn said. "She chased me, Elim. She came right after me down a dark hallway. She's a whole other animal."

"And look where it got her!" Elim retorted. "You were about ready to gnaw the back of her head off if we hadn't shown up, or mount her, I can never tell with you."

Finn bristled, his lips fleering back to reveal his fangs. "You get one, because you're my friend. I don't do that shit. My Ma raised me better than that! You saying that she didn't?!"

Elim blinked nervously and raised his hands. "Redacted. Sorry, Finn. It's been a long day."

"Finn is right, though," Grigori chimed in. "The bunny was…different. I mean, she tried to chase after us when you picked up Finn. And all those cases couldn't have been just the fox. We should let Boss know exactly what happened, maybe they can get some people on those two."

Elim nodded and smiled. "Yeah…yeah! Get 'em off our case for a bit, preferably off it and into a pine box!"

Finn inhaled through his teeth. "Oh, I hope not! I wanna see her again, we have some unfinished business. She chased me, Elim! She chased me!"

"Well, this conversation got weird fast," Elim said, flatly. "Changing the subject to 'shaddup, I'm talking to the Boss'. How's that grab everyone?"

A round of agreement passed through the cab and Elim speed-dialed the mysterious number. It rang for what seemed like an eternity, droning into his ear. Elim almost jumped when the line clicked and the harsh, reverberating voice spoke. "Maybe I didn't make myself clear last time, Elim. 'You do not call me, I call you' was the gist I believe. Now, this had better be good, I–"

"The alpha-site's been overrun," Elim cut in. "Injector One and the catalyst have been captured by the ZPD, and the ignition program has been lost." Elim felt a tap on his shoulder and looked back, Finn was hopping in the back seat, his fingers making crude bunny ears as he did so. "…It was Detectives Wilde and Hopps. They found us, somehow, and fucked the whole thing up."

There was a pause, when Boss spoke they didn't sound the least bit surprised. "So, Judy Hopps flushed you out? Hm. From the sound of things, you got away. Tell me, did you kill them?"

"No, we couldn't spare the second," Elim said. "By the time they were gunning for us they had already called for backup. We got out of there just as the whole fucking fleet was rolling up the road."

"You're awfully calm, Elim," Boss observed, something like pride in their flat metallic voice. "Do I hear a silver lining?"

"We have the spare catalyst canisters." Elim cleared his throat, drumming his fingers on the dashboard. "And I managed to scoop up the paperwork. The cops have what they have, but they won't be able to get the whole picture."

"Good! Good boy, Elim!" Boss crooned. "Naturally, I have a contingency plan."

"Naturally."

"It's a bit more direct than plan A, there's a lot more risk to you and your teammates." Boss paused; a distorted conversation could be heard in the background. "That's why I'm giving you a bit of an advance; five million each. You get the rest when the job is done."

Elim pumped his fist, much to the confusion of Finn and Grigori, and had to stop himself from laughing, simply grunting in approval. "That's mighty kind of you, Boss."

"And I can trust you to not take the money and run?" Boss said, though the inflection suggested that it was not a question, but a warning.

Elim snorted and shook his head. "Boss, if you can sign a check that big and put a plan like this together, you're no one I want to fuck with."

There was a chuckle; it made his hackles stand on end, not for the grating metallic edge of the distortion, but for the complete void of good humor behind it. "That has got to be the smartest thing I've ever heard anyone say, Elim. Now, what else do you need?"

"A safehouse and some breathing room." Elim cleared his throat nervously. "Also, what, if anything, can be done about WildeHopps?"

"WildeHopps?" Boss said, mulling the name over in their head. "…Oh! Oh, that's cute! Sounds like a health food store, the kind of place that sells organic supplements and local produce. Anyway, never mind them, I have something special planned for those two. Now, I'm going to send you an address to a safehouse in the Rainforest District; there you will find a new computer with everything you need for plan B," his phone buzzed as text came though, "and a schedule, follow it, I'll be keeping tabs on your progress. Don't call me again, Elim. For your sake."

"Understood, Boss." Elim said, sighing in relief when the line went dead. "Brr! Alright, Gori! Finn! We're back in business and got an advance!"

Finn and Grigori laughed and cheered, high-fiving one another as Elim checked the address, grinning openly. 'Back in business. I hope you're enjoying your victory, Wilde, I hope you're happy and have everything you ever wanted, because I'm gonna take that from you. It's personal now, you todd sunnuvabug! No one sniffs me out. No one.'

It was late in the afternoon and Zootopia knew a police scramble like never before. Squads of cruisers raced down the highway, cordoning off traffic and vast swaths of Sahara Square, Savannah Central, and the Rainforest District. To the surprise of no one, the huge surge of patrollers and specialists raced past a completely generic white Ford F-150 as it calmly and obsequiously pulled off to the shoulder of the road.

Armored cars and Haz-Mat trucks roared towards their intended targets, full air-support in the form of observation drones and helicopters to oversee and manage redirected traffic. All citizens within ten blocks of the suspected attack sites were evacuated.

Needless to say, the media noticed.

Mayor Ketchikan was quick to respond with a cross-media statement:

Zootopia is truly blessed to have such a thorough and brilliant police force. While I cannot comment on the exact nature of the emergency, I implore the citizens of Zootopia to cooperate in anyway with all the ZPD and emergency response teams that this crisis may be resolved that much sooner. And I would like to personally extend my deepest thanks to Detective Judy Hopps and Detective Nicholas Wilde, for their dogged and determined efforts in keeping Zootopia the safest, greatest city in the entire world!

#WildeHoppsDoesItAgain #ZootopiaPoliceDepartment #KetchikanAdmin

Chief Bogo could not be reached for comment.

It was late in the day and Judy sat next to the hospital bed, listening to the various monitors as they wheezed and beeped. She looked over at the body on the cot, more bandage than mammal, his sedation long since worn off but he was still unconscious. A coma, the doctor had said, likely the result of prolonged borderline shock and hypovolemia. Judy noted with bitter humor that the doctor seemed amazed that someone in his condition was even conscious for as long as he was.

'A saline drip will do that.' Judy thought to herself, trying in vain to wrap her mind around the thing behind Richie's suffering.

Her mind raced back to that morning, the hallway, the dark. She shuddered; she could still smell him, hear his laughter, his almost non-mammalian body coiling around and immobilizing her. She had fought opponents that outmatched her in nearly every capacity, strength, speed, endurance, and she had emerged victorious. Surely she could have trounced a ferret, right? Why didn't she? Why did she freeze?

He could have killed her. Easily. She'd read his file twice; smaller victims, which could mean anything from a mouse to a mid-size canine, were all dispatched with a bite to the back of the neck, an attack that pried apart the first and second cervical vertebrae: instant death. But he hadn't done that; he had tried to choke her, immobilize her.

He had wanted her alive, but why?

She once again turned to Richie. Richie, who had left her that final clue even when it would have made more sense to run; Richie, who had turned from greed and apathy and found his heart; Richie, who had spent the better part of a day in horrible agony waiting for her to save him. Richie, with his missing eye, mangled feet, unsalvageable left hand, and ruined face.

Judy knew exactly why McNulty wanted her alive.

Judy knew exactly why she froze.

She had been scared. There was no rationalizing it, no computing it, no helpful spritz of logic to make it go away. She had been terrified for what was probably the first time in her life. She had come face-to-face with someone–no–something that she didn't understand, couldn't understand, and it had overwhelmed her. The gleeful insanity and leering, hungry cunning that shone in McNulty's black eyes had made her freeze up. No, it was more than that, she hadn't just frozen up; freezing up implies a momentary interruption of thought, that the gears in her head simply missed their rhythm, and that when they meshed once more she would return to form. But she hadn't, he had dropped down behind her and screamed like a dying mammal, her flashlight shone on him, he was dead in front of her sidearm. She could have netted him, or peppered him, or anything! She had him dead to rights, only for him to laugh and swat the weapon from her hand like she was an unruly child with a stick. She hadn't frozen up; it was something deeper, something instinctual. Her great grandfather had a funny old word for it: going tharn.

How many more people would die because she was scared of a crazy little ferret? How many more people would wind up like poor Richie because some stupid bunny went tharn when a lunatic screamed at her?

Because she had been scared.

Because she had been helpless.

Because she had been weak.

Judy buried her face in her hands, trembling with rage. Rage at herself.

"Knock-knock?" came a voice from the behind.

Judy's ears shot up in alarm and she spun around, expecting to see Finn standing in the doorway, teeth bared with blood dripping from his flexing jaws. 'Let's pick up where we left off, bunny!'

But no. Nick stood in the doorway, his posture radiating that naturally casual flair that just seemed to roll off him in waves. His expression was serene, self-satisfied, and utterly Nick; but she could see a fondness and relief in his eyes that made her heart flutter. He'd been worried about her. "Someone's jumpy."

"A rabbit joke?" Judy retorted smoothly, being around Nick made it easier to hide her turmoil for some reason. "You're better than that."

"Yeah, well, I did get my bell rung pretty good this morning. So did you. Are you okay?" he said, walking over and handing her a coffee.

Judy sniffed it; it was that wonderful carrot-cake latte they sold at the café near the precinct. She hated lying to Nick, but the thought of him thinking less of her, thinking that she was weak, was even worse. "I'm fine. I have a lovely goose-egg and a bit of a headache, but I checked out for any concussions or bleeding."

"What about Dick? Is he gonna make it?" Nick said, gesturing at the silent, still body on the bed. "Is he still under?"

"Yes," Judy turned away from him and patted Richie's hand. "And no. The doctor say's he's stable, but he's in a coma. Between stress, the blood loss, and infections, they had trouble keeping him breathing as they put him back together. They don't know when he's going to wake up, or if he's going to be…sane when he does."

Nick pulled up a chair next to her and put an arm around her shoulder, Judy had to fight the urge to cling to him like she had in the hallway. Instead she simply allowed him to pull her close. She noticed his scent again, prevailing over the sickly medicine smell of the room that overlapped with the bleach and cleaners the janitors had scoured the room with before Richie was wheeled in. It was harsh and tangy, like an alarm bell for her nose, his true body odor peeking through the products and colognes he liked to wear. Moreover, it was harsh, acidic even, likely from all the adrenaline earlier today, but most of all it was heavy, rich…musky. She felt her heart begin to race, her nose twitched as she inhaled, it was altogether different from a ferret's but her body still reacted in alarm. Her heart began to thunder in her chest, a heady rush of adrenaline surged through her veins, she felt her paws begin to tremble around her coffee.

'No!' she screamed internally. 'You will get yourself under control right now, Judy! You let fear mess things up before, but you're not going to be afraid! Not now! Not of Nick!'

She looked up at Nick, his long elegant snout, his alert pointed ears, his wary emerald eyes; he was sleek and hard, angular and predatory, but also familiar and safe. He looked down at her, causing her to gasp, bringing in a new influx of fox scent. The feeling did not dissipate, but rather amplified as a low, knowing voice in her head purred, 'who's afraid?'

With that she leapt to her feet and made a show of smoothing out Richie's blankets. She cleared her throat and peeked back at Nick, his expression was only somewhat confused, when she noticed the folder in his lap. "S-so! Is that a CSR I see?"

Nick glanced down at the report and nodded. "Yeah. There are a few things I want to go over with you."

"Did they find anything down there?" Judy closely examined the empty corner of the room, keeping Nick firmly in her peripherals. "On the water main?"

Nick smirked, his eyebrow arching. "You haven't been keeping up with social media, I gather. The whole city's in lockdown because of what we found. I spent all day coordinating with emergency response and Haz-Mat teams." He pulled a quartet of photos from the folder and handed them to her. "We found these on all four water mains. Specialists say that they're some kind of injector mechanism. A linear thermite charge melts a hole into the concrete and then a bunch of shaped charges shunt a jet of liquid into the hole and clean through the steel pipe. In this case the liquid is a big ol' hit of Richie's Mysterious Blue Raspberry koolaid. Each one was located just before an emergency shut-off valve, so even if the pipe was compromised, the stuff would be on its way to the Bridge before the shutoff could close."

Judy noted the design of the injector, while it was complex and extremely well constructed, she could tell that it was still a homemade device. "Looks like Grigori's handiwork. And this C-4, I bet it's home-cooked."

Nick tapped his nose in confirmation, handing her the rest of the CSR. "McNulty's special blend of herbs and spices. The only thing that's got us scratching our heads is how they planned to set all of them off. They wouldn't have been able to get a transmitter capable of beaming through all that concrete, much less to four different locations spread across Zootopia. Sarge said the closest thing to a detonator was a civilian issue wireless transmitter and what appeared to be a gutted smartphone. Thoughts?"

"Wi-Fi," Judy said, glibly, as though it was the most obvious thing in the world. "The locations are an electronics warehouse, a grocery store, and a civilian residence. All have Wi-Fi, which Richie probably hacked into. The pumphouse had a Wi-Fi network jury-rigged and open to use. I mean, how else were you able to call for backup while still inside?"

Judy was too enthralled to notice Nick give himself an exacerbated self-chiding slap on the forehead. "And the detonator's a phone. They'd set it off with a text!"

"Or call, or email," Judy said, her brow furrowing when she saw the picture of the laptop. "Says here you 'neutralized' the computer. Any chance of us recovering what was on there?"

Nick gestured 'maybe'. "That's up to the techs. I zapped it pretty good."

"Why?"

"Elim was trying very hard to get me to look anywhere but the computer," Nicked said. "Also it had this great big sinister-looking loading bar thing going on. Call it a gut-feeling."

Judy smiled sadly. "Probably saved the city…more than I can say."

"What?" Nick got to his feet, walking over to her. "Carrots, if it wasn't for your hunch, I wouldn't have even been there! If anyone saved the city, it's you!"

"If it wasn't for me…" Judy reached up and touched his shoulder, feeling the prickle of stitches there, and then down over the tender swelling on his side. "I almost got you killed, Nick. I wasn't thinking straight; I left you to take two perps on your own, all because I was…angry. I lost track of what was important. I'm sorry."

Nick's arms shot out and before she could pull away they had drawn her in close. His arms crossed tight behind her back, her face pressed into his firm stomach. Judy didn't pause for a second; she wrapped her arms around his waist and squeezed as hard as she could, burying herself in him. Her heart hammered in her chest once more, her ears burning as she inhaled his rich and comforting scent, relishing his warm body against hers. She wanted to be closer, to nestle into him, to never let go. She'd almost lost everything that day, but just then, in that hospital room, she felt her world in her arms and she wasn't about to let go.

"I almost followed after you," he whispered. "When you went after him. I was scared for you. But then, I remembered something."

"What?" she asked, muffled in his belly.

"That you're the bravest, strongest person I've ever met. I never need to fear for you, or protect you, because you'll never need it, not really." He pulled her away from him, looking her in the eyes, a warm smile on his face. "But I'll always be there to help you, whenever you want it. All you have to do is ask."

Judy felt tear well up in her eyes; her voice began to hitch as she unraveled. "I-in the hallway with McNulty, I froze up. I could have bagged him, and probably the others, too. But I was so scared…he scared me. I couldn't–he almost–he–he–"

Nick knelt down and embraced her again, letting her bury her face in his neck as she sobbed. He rubbed her back and stroked her ears soothingly. "Everyone gets scared, Carrots. That you're alive shows just how strong you are. So you messed up, so they got away. You know what? That's on them! They left us alive, so it's up to us to make them regret it, yeah?"

Judy could only sniffle and nod, clutching handfuls of his shirt and rubbing her face into his soft, inviting neck fur. They stayed like this for several minutes before Nick cleared his throat awkwardly. "So, uh, guess who I called on the way over here."

"W-who?" Judy asked, her voice still catching.

"My mom," Nick said, an uncharacteristic edge of nervousness creeping into his voice. "Since tomorrow's gonna be an absolute gong show, I figured that we deserved a home cooked meal. Uh, y'know, i-if you still want to come and, uh, meet her, that is."

Judy pulled away from him, smiling smugly. "Finally found a girl you could take home to meet mother, eh?"

"Ha-ha," Nick laughed sarcastically. "What do you say?"

Judy dried her eyes and nodded ecstatically. "Of course I will, Nick!"

Nick sighed with relief and straightened out his shirt. "Great! I'll tell her you're coming. Now, what say I give you a ride to your car, huh? After today, I really need to go home and have a heart attack."

Judy laughed and said, "Yeah, early night for me, too." She turned around and walked over to Richie, gingerly patting him on the shoulder. "I'll make some time for you tomorrow, Richie. You get better, huh? You're safe now."

Nick leaned over and grabbed his right hand, shaking it respectfully. "Yeah. You did good, Dick. I'd like to grab a beer with you sometime."

Nick and Judy left the room, closing the door gently behind them. Soon, the only sound in the room was the slow, steady beat of the heart monitor.