I'm so sorry it's been so long, I've had so much to do it's been ridiculous! i've tried so hard to update but just simply haven't had the chance until now, so thank you very much for being patient you lovely people.

Tia Snow was a curious creature, Nick found. She was nervous, but not in the same way as Peter Bush, but rather in a way that showed she was hiding something. Her fur, a peculiar mix of brown, grey and white, looked puffier than the regular lynx's fur, so soft looking yet the strands looking as sharp as needles with their intense stiffness. Her eyes never relaxed on them, always darting here, there and everywhere, almost as if she was looking for an escape route.

Nick didn't trust her from the get go, and judging from Judy's flattened ears and stern expression, she didn't either. Snow knew it. Her claws teased the hems of her sleeves, damaging the carefully knitted threads. Nick could even smell her nervousness, a sour smell that tickled the back of his throat. The room grew warm with the tension that swirled within, and Nick loosened the tie around his neck to allow his collar to breathe.

"You seem nervous, Mrs Snow." Judy remarked, not meeting her gaze as she looked around the room. They were in the lynx's office at her work, where she was in the position of a teacher at a primary school. The sounds of children laughing and playing outside was almost pleasant, as well as the many years worth of drawings created by youngsters dotted around the office, along with class photos, various marked calendars and text books.

"If the children see you here, they'll worry." Snow said, but her voice shook.

Nick frowned. "If I saw two cops at my school, I'd be excited."

"Yeah, I think they'll be fine." Judy agreed, eying the lynx suspiciously. "If you don't mind me asking, do you still hold a strong relationship with your godchildren?"

"I do mind you asking, Officer Hopps." Snow snapped, her lips pulling back to almost, almost, bare her teeth at her. Judy didn't even flinch, and smiled almost lazily at the mild threat that came her way. Nick fought the urge to roll his eyes; her sense of danger was almost none existent.

"This is about Mr Haring, you are aware." Judy continued. "Do you visit him much? What with his condition still being critical."

Snow shuffled uneasily in her seat. "I ask about him. I hear he's out of the woods."

"But you haven't been to see him." Nick added, raising a brow. "Odd, considering you have a close friendship with both him and his wife."

"I look after the kids whilst Mary goes to see him in hospital." Snow argued. "I have plenty to play in the healing of their family."

"And how are the children taking it? Have they said anything about what happened that night, things that might have only just come back to them?" Nick asked, resting his chin in his palm, gently scratching with his nails.

"They already told everything they could remember. Now they don't speak. They stay in their rooms all day, come down on the off occasion for food, and then disappear again. The attack had damaged them so much I doubt they'll be the same again."

"And the youngest, Sarah, how is she doing?" Judy asked, scribbling down notes that Nick couldn't quite read from his angle.

"Silent." Snow snapped, instantly tensing at the mention of the youngest child's name. "She hasn't said a word in weeks."

"Not even to you? I read that the two of you had the closest relationship, best friends, if you will. And now she doesn't say a word to you? Does she speak to her mother?"

"The attack ruined all of us, and we're coping in our own different ways. Why don't you make yourselves useful and find a suspect to interview rather than a working primary school teacher?"

"We are." Nick said, gritting his teeth when Snow began to rise out of her seat. The lynx froze at his words, staring him in the eyes, almost daring him to repeat himself. He met her gaze hard, swallowing stubbornly. He was almost certain that she was hiding something. The stench of her unease almost choked him, and for someone who used to lie all the time, he knew lying when he was faced with it.

"Those kids are talking. If we were to go there now and ask them what happened, I'm sure they'd happily cooperate. You're talking to a fox, the face of lying. I think it's more a case of you not letting them talk."

"Don't be so ridiculous!"

"Fine. Hopps, shall we go and test that theory?" Nick asked his partner, who's eyes gleamed with exhilaration.

"Absolutely."

Playing along with his game, the pair began to leave. Nick mentally counted down in his head from ten, and once their feet were out of the doorway, it didn't take her four seconds to cry, "Wait!"

The pair looked over their shoulders at her, only to see her on her feet, arms reached out to them while her eyes gleamed in fear. Nick smirked. All on a hunch, and they were finally getting somewhere. For the first time in this case, Nick and Judy were finally working as a team again, outwitting the animals they interviewed to get the answers they needed. He could almost believe that they were back to how they used to be, and when he turned this smirk in Judy's direction, she wasn't looking at him. His heart instantly sank.

"I was trying to protect them."

Nick pulled himself together. "How?"

"He threatened me. He threatened them. Three innocent children. I had to keep them safe, I had to-"

"Who threatened them?" Judy demanded, and Nick knew that her carrot pen was already recording. Now wasn't the time to take down notes. She needed every last detail, and Nick wouldn't have had it any other way.

"The tiger." Snow replied, her voice visibly shaking. "He warned me to stay away from the family, and I thought it was just some terrible joke he was playing. But then he cornered me, told me he would hurt every one of those hares in that house, that the kids didn't make a scrap of difference. He said it was wrong, that a lynx shouldn't be mingling with prey. He… he told me that Richard had to pay for his naivety. I tried to warn them, but when I did… he threatened to kill the kids, and that it would be my fault. That I did it to them."

"I need a name." Judy said. Snow ignored her.

"I watched as that tiger circled the house. I was there in the shadows when he broke in and attacked Richard. I'll never forget the screaming, the shouting and all of the crashing and banging and I… I did nothing.

Sarah saw me. She knew that I saw it happen. She knew I didn't do anything. She won't talk to me, no matter how much I try to coax a word out of her. She won't even look me in the eyes. I begged her not to tell the police, that I was trying to do the right thing. I could never forgive myself if I let something happen to those kids, and I hate myself more and more everyday for what I let happen that night. I was so afraid-"

"You let someone attack a father and a husband, and you claim it was to protect his children?" Nick said in disbelief, his heart hammering in his chest with a rage he had never felt before. "Why didn't you call someone? Why didn't you get help?"

"I was afraid he'd hurt them!"

"You were afraid he would hurt you." Judy snapped. "I need a name."

"I don't have one." Snow was crying now. "All I remember is that he wore trousers but no shirt, and that he has a preference for being on all fours. I think he's between the ages of thirty or forty. I don't know anything else."

"If we were to ask Sarah this, would her story match yours?" Nick asked.

"That I ruined her life and her family? Yes. That I didn't do anything to help? Yes. That I'm a coward? Yes!"

The pair said nothing else as they left, Nick's ears flat against his head as a stewed. He could hear Snow sobbing as they left, and had never felt more relieved for her own self-pity. She didn't deserve anyone else's. Nick couldn't understand how she could left harm come to the father of her godchildren, her best friend's husband, and not do anything about it. She could have rang the police and given a statement sooner. She could have intervened and tried to stop the attack before it even started. She could have done something.

"You're theory is proving to be true." Nick told Judy, who was silent as she walked beside him.

"The idea of protecting someone by letting another get hurt is beyond me." She said in response. "All because a group of animals have never gotten over the reality of the new world."

"This is bigger than either of us ever could have imagined." Nick said.

"Yeah." She replied, but her voice sounded far away, her mind elsewhere.

They were out of the school grounds and on the side of a busy road. Nick stopped and waited for Judy to declare what she was thinking. He always knew when she was concocting a plan, but whether it was a good or bad one was always a mystery until she opened her mouth.

Finally, she said, "Go to the station and give this to Bogo. He wanted a statement. Maybe he can do the background reading on this mystery tiger." She handed him her carrot pen.

"And what are you going to do?"

"I need to check on something at home."

"Like what?" he was suddenly untrusting, not liking the distance in which her thoughts were travelling, so far away from him there in the moment.

"It doesn't matter. Come to mine when you're done and we'll figure out what to do next."

Reluctantly, they parted ways, a heavy unease in Nick's chest.

When Judy got home, she was sick to her stomach. This case got darker and darker with each turn, and the threat on children becoming a common theme was almost pushing her over the edge. Children were a big part of her life. She family had children left, right and centre, her siblings now with their own kids who thought of Judy as the most awesome cop to ever be recruited. She loved her nieces and nephews. They were her world, just as her parents were, and her friends. Nick was her world. While she was angry with him now, she would never, ever, see harm come to him. Judy was as protective as a mother, always had been. Now her name had been dipped in the mud during this case, and her name was linked to many other names, names that could hurt her more than the slashing of fatal claws.

Right now, feeling so heavy and drained, she needed to hear the voices of her family and assure herself that they were safe.

She rang her parents with the video on, just so that she could see their faces. She missed them so much at times. She missed the playing and the laughter and the family all together, no matter how many of them there were. She'd missed so many birthdays, so many school achievements, so many family arguments that she couldn't defuse simply because she wasn't there. She missed it all, and every once in a while needed to be reminded that they would always be there for her waiting.

"Jude the dude! How you doing sweetheart?" her dad was there on the other side of the camera, his booming smile and automatic relief.

"I'm doing good, just wanted to check in on you guys." She said, grinning ear to ear. They were in their family kitchen, her parents and her two oldest sisters with their kids. The children were already arguing until they heard her voice, and all at once they were there, shoving their granddad out of the way to get their faces in view whist crying out her name in excitement. She silently sighed with relief.

"How's this new case of yours going?" Her mother asked as she fought her way through the youngsters, getting a little too close to the camera that made Judy giggle.

"It's okay, a little stressful but okay."

"Nick still being a good partner? If not I'll be having words." Said her dad from somewhere in the background.

She laughed, believing that one only when she saw it. "Everything's fine. How're you guys?"

"Manic as ever!" he dad cried.

"Yes, but this is the first proper phone call we've had in a while. The line's been playing up. The phone keeps ringing but when we answer no one is there. Even tried getting a new landline. Ridiculous, all this technology; it's meant to be good for the future but it never even works!" said her mother, and instantly Judy's chest seized up.

"You've been getting silent calls?"

"All the time. I told you, I think it's the landline, it's just to actual talk to an actual mammal."

"Has anything else happened?"

"Not really. We don't see much of Gideon anymore, but I think that's just due to his work getting busy."

Alarm bells began to ring, and Judy did everything she could to not panic. Gideon wouldn't shy away from them, busy or not. They were close friends. Work partners.

Even if it was nothing, she had to get home. "I'm coming home."

"What? Why?"

"I just am!"

She hung up, and she was out of the flat in a heartbeat.

When Nick arrived forty minutes later, he was unnerved to find her door unlocked and slightly ajar. He gently called in to the little room, hoping to get a flabbergasted reply, but only silence awaited him. His heart began to drum heavily in his chest, weighing him down, making it hard to breathe. He knew she was acting weird, and when she got weird she got irrational. The lesser perks of behind friends with a bunny.

What he didn't expect, however, was to swing the door gently open to be met by an occupied room. Her smell hit him before he saw her in the gloom, and suddenly he felt ill. The light of the doorway crept towards the back window, the sky beyond orange with the setting sun. a silhouette stood there, ears pricked and alert, legs stood apart in a powerful stance. There was a book in her left paw, whilst her right paw was hidden behind her back.

"What are you doing in here?" Nick asked uneasily. "This is Judy's flat."

"Judy isn't here." Ffion replied.

"And?"

"What she doesn't know won't hurt her." She stepped into the light, a lazy smile on her face. The book in her hand made Nick's stomach flip. "So this is what you were hiding from me in the library, huh?" she flipped through the pages. "The History of Predators and their Prey: Never to Resurface. How original."

"Where's Judy?" Nick demanded, the worry in his gut growing more and more tight.

"You tell me. She just took off into the night." She shrugged.

"Why are you here?"

"Waiting for you, of course." She replied, still scanning the pages of the book in her paws. "I could only assume you'd come here looking for your friend after seeing the lynx."

Something felt so off Nick thought he was going to be sick. Judy wasn't here. Ffion was. Ffion knew about Snow. How? Had she been following them? Why? Where was Judy?

"I think you should leave."

"I don't. I like it here."

"This isn't your home."

She looked him in the eyes, her yellow orbs glowing. "And neither is it yours." She snapped. "It's a rabbit's."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"It means that you are a very, very, dumb fox." She snarled, dipping her head ever so slightly as she began to walk towards him. "I could have liked you, Nick, but I don't have a time of day for a fox who likes to run with the enemy."

Before Nick could say anything to reply with, is heart stopped all together. She pulled her right arm from behind her back, revealing a nightmare from his past. It looked heavy as it swung on her claws, mental clinking ever so slightly. The panic was overwhelming, and Ffion did nothing but grin in malice.

In one paw was a heavy, blunt object, and in the other was a muzzle.

She swung, and Nick never even felt the pain before he slipped into darkness.

Uh oh.