Disclaimer: Zootopia and all Canon characters are owned by Disney. All other characters, product names, trademarks, and copyrights belong to their respective owners.

…..

Nick stirred. Something felt off, and his innate predator senses were trying to get his attention.

A stern discussion with the predator senses, pointing out that said predator was currently wrapped around the softest, most bestest bunny doe in the world, who happened to be asleep and purring, led to the predator senses apologizing profusely and retreating back into their mental blanket pile.

Until…

Smell noticed a disturbance in the majority bunny girlfriend scent, with a subdued, nearly washed-out, fox scent-mark chaser and, breaking away from the skulk of senses, raised a finger.

'I think I smell another mammal, one that's recently had carrot snacks.'

Vision yawned and cracked open an eyelid.

'Yup. We're being stalked.'

And then closed back up and started snoring.

"Hi."

Hearing groaned and covered his ears.

"Are you awake?"

Hearing signaled for a head shake but ended up alerting Brain, who reluctantly took control and said, "Nope."

"Ya-huh."

Nick stretched, thankfully without waking up Judy, then, with both eyes open, confronted his nemesis.

"Hi, little bun. Shouldn't you be napping or playing with your brothers and sisters?"

"I'm June. You gave me snacks."

Nick nodded, "I guess my mom was right about what happens when you feed wild creatures."

"What happens?" came another sleepy voice from next to Nick.

"Dad says I can't feed the lizards and snakes 'cause they'll keep coming back, and snakes make my mom scream."

"Oh," said Judy, pulling back the blanket she didn't remember crawling under and putting her head on Nick's chest. "Hi, June."

"Hi. Are you a Mommy and Daddy?"

"Well," replied Nick, "I'm a fox, and Miss Judy is a rabbit, so…"

"My dad says only mommies and daddies sleep together, and I watched you be asleep. I'm good at watching people be asleep. Ask my mommy. I watch her every day."

Judy smiled and, slipping her paws under her chin, motioned with an ear for Nick to continue.

"Uh, well, we don't have any kits so…"

"I asked Mommy for a different brother. Jordan keeps coloring in my book." Holding her book up, June turned it to a page of scribbles and said, "See."

Nick nodded, "Yeah, I'd be mad too if somebun drew outside the lines in my book too."

June sniffed, "Yeah, I want a new brother, but my mommy says I can't have one until Daddy puts a lock on the door.

"How will I be able to watch Mommy and Daddy if I can't go in their room?"

Judy chuckled.

"Do all mommies and daddies have locks?"

Nick thought for a moment before saying, "My mom and dad did."

Judy also thought for a second before nodding.

"Do you need a lock? Is that how come you're not a mommy and daddy?"

Nick and Judy both nodded until June plopped down in the aisle, flipped open her coloring book, and got to work. A black crayon appeared almost out of thin air and was studiously applied until a grey, then a blue took its place on the page. A pink flower was carefully added, along with purple polka-dots for good measure, until, finally, the drawing was determined to meet the artist's strict standards and turned over to Nick.

"Now you can be a mommy and daddy."

Nick held up the drawing so his bunny could see it.

"A lock," said Judy.

"Yup."

Nick smiled and said, "Thank you, June. I'm sure this will come in handy. Right, Miss Judy?"

"Maybe," smirked Judy as she extricated herself from her fox and landed next to June in the aisle.

"Your attention, please. Next stop, Bunnyburrow. This will be a ten-minute stop."

Nick popped his lower lip out and, channeling his best inner Sunni, let it quiver a bit, followed by a quiet whine.

"Your attention, please. Next stop, Bunnyburrow. This will be a ten-minute stop."

Taking in the sad sight that was her fox, Judy leaned down, gave Nick a quick kiss on his pouty lip, and whispered, "You're incorrigible, you know that." And a little louder, said, "Come on, Mr. Nick, let's help June find her dad. I'm sure he's very worried wondering where she is right now."

"Miss Judy, what's in-curl-ugable?"

…..

Bunny doe safely returned to her worried dad, well, a snoring dad whom Nick had to wake up, and a new door lock safely tucked away for some future use, hopefully. Nick and Judy waved goodbye to June, who waved back at them through the train window.

Handing Judy her duffle while picking up all the larger suitcases, Nick chuckled as he said, "That was nice of the conductor to help us with our luggage, but what was that about me enjoying my nap? Do I have bedhead or something?"

Judy brushed a few errant tufts of head fur down and said, "Yes, you pretty much always have bedhead, and bed chest, and bed arms, and bed tail."

"Maybe I could talk a certain bunny pillow into taking a break from being cuddly and help me brush out my fur in the mornings."

"I don't know," hmmed Judy, "depends on if any bunny foot rubs are involved in the deal."

"You drive a hard bargain Miss Hopps, but this fox is nothing if not ready to give his all in making the world a better place, one foot rub at a time."

"Assuming anyone ever picks us up," added Judy.

"Yup," said Nick, setting the luggage down next to a wooden bench overlooking a very empty parking lot.

"You're sure Mom told Janae we were coming in on the late train?"

Nick nodded, "Yeah, pretty sure. You want me to text her?"

Judy shrugged and, about to turn on her phone and text Janae herself, lifted an ear instead.

"What's up?"

"I think…," started Judy.

Nick picked up headlights in the distance. Lights that seemed to go almost vertical, then bounce back horizontal, then point back up to the sky, then float as if…

*vroooom*

A truck landed in a shower of dirt and gravel, fishtailed its way across the unpaved parking lot, and slid sideways until it stopped right in front of the bench Judy was sitting on and Nick was now hiding behind.

"Hey guys, sorry I'm late," said Janae, hopping out of the nearly overheated truck. "Dalton and I were doing a last-minute inspection and," quickly doing a drool check of her muzzle, smiled and said, "and, you know, lost track of time.

"Is that all the stuff you brought?"

"Yeah," Judy said, hugging her littermate. "Nick's only got a couple of weeks of duty left. Once Carrot Days is over, we're planning on heading back to Zootopia."

Hugging Nick, Janae whispered, "You should talk Judy into you both staying longer, Mom would like that."

"Sure, I'll see what I can do with little Miss 'We have to take the late train because I have to get all my paperwork done.'"

"I heard that, and it only took that long because you kept wanting to play on your phone."

"Unconscious, biding my time for the big finale."

Judy rolled her eyes and said in a sing-song voice, "Thank you, Janae, for coming to get us. Sorry, it's so late," and then made a face at Nick.

"It's okay," replied Janae, slinging a suitcase into the truck bed. "Dalton has to open the store tomorrow, so I had to get going anyway. Mom said something was wrong with Nick's car. What happened?"

"Carrots killed it," said Nick, loading the rest of the luggage into the truck. "Poor thing bled out all over the street," and after sniffing and putting a paw on his chest, Nick moaned, "Oh, the sadness, the pain, the broken trust, I don't think she'll ever let a rabbit doe drive her again. Speaking of…"

Nick put out his paw, motioning for the truck keys.

Janae ignored the paw and whispered out the side of her mouth to her littermate, "Does any of that ever work on you?"

"Nope."

"Good. Come on, you too Shakesbear."

"But…"

"Mom put a few sprigs of fresh blueberries in the front seat for you."

"Fine, you can drive."

-/-/-

Brown rubbed his eyes. It was already way past his regular bedtime, and the answer to his formula problem was still eluding him. Adjust the botanicals, and some markers improve, but then the prohormones need to be tweaked, which causes other problems. Maybe a buffer would help. Orange was planning on adding one before I told him to switch gears. Unfortunately, Orange's notes didn't say what type of buffer he'd planned on using.

This is all that rabbit's fault.

"Damn it," grumbled Brown, pounding the desktop, "Why couldn't you have waited one more day to bust into the lab? That's all we needed, one more day of testing."

"Huh?" came a young voice from over near the hospital-grade medicine storage cabinet.

"Who the hell are you?" spat Brown. "And what are you doing messing with my formula samples?"

Not seeming to be startled at all, the 20-ish year old mammal pulled out a dart ball from one of the trays in the cabinet, closed its glass door, and calmly turned and said, "Hi, I'm… wait, you aren't Mr. White. Who are you?"

"White is dead. I'm his boss, Mr. Brown. Now, who the hell are you?"

"Oh," replied the young mammal, "my name is, ah, Blue-son. Me and my family take care of the prisoners and help dispose of the… failures."

"Blue son?"

"Yeah," chuckled the boy. "My dad is Mr. Blue, so that makes us Blue sons. Get it? We're his sons, so…"

"Yes, I get it. The holding pens are dug deeper into the facility. What are you doing in the lab, and what do you want with that dartball of my formula?"

"You mean this?" said the mammal, holding his paw up with a small blue-purple gelatin capsule. "We need to dart one of the preds every once in a while with some of this. He's been caged up here for a while and needs a shot of this old stuff to stay steady. He's almost like someone that's got an addiction to squeeze. Ain't right in the head without it."

"A little late at night for that sort of thing, don't you think?"

Blue-son shrugged, "The animal's nocturnal."

Brown sighed, he needed a break anyway. "Fine, show me the pens. And then I'll want to talk with the real Mr. Blue."

-/-/-

"Yum, these are delicious."

"Try some of the Rabbiteye blueberries. They're behind your seat in the pink basket. It's one of the new varieties that Dad's been trying out to help with cross-pollination."

"New blueberries? I am 100% the right fox to try them out."

With Nick busy rummaging, Janae mouthed to Judy, "Does he know I know?"

Judy shrugged and mouthed back, "I don't know."

"Vundabar! These are amazing. Two thumbs up. On to the final round of that dessert competition show for whoever found these babies in the wild."

Janae smiled big and said, "Good enough to share with your girl in the city on a romantic date."

"Absolutely," said Nick, handing Judy a few berries and kissing her on the side of the muzzle. "So, what do you think, Carrots? Want to make out?"

Pushing Nick's muzzle away, Judy groaned, "Nick, we're supposed to be a secret, remember?"

"What? Janae knows about us already. Right?"

"Uh-huh, and so will the rest of the warren once they catch a whiff of the fact you've marked each other. There's some Farm Fresh Musk Mask in the glove compartment. Dalton and I use it after our dates, so no one in town freaks out about us."

Handing the spray bottle of Musk Mask to Nick, Judy asked, "So everyone at home is cool with you guys being together?"

"Pretty much. Mom's good. Most everyone else doesn't care, or they're asking for the family discount at the Diggar's store."

"And Dad?"

Janae shrugged, "He doesn't say anything. He's not exactly shunning us or anything, but he usually finds something to do somewhere else whenever Dalton is around."

"What about in town?" asked Judy, taking back the Musk Mask and spraying herself down.

"Meh, most everyone ignores us," said Janae, "but we've been keeping the PDA to near zero except for in a couple of places like the Leapwell's where they don't mind us holding paws and stuff."

Leaning around Judy, Nick said, "As one of Bunnyburrow's finest here, I heard you say 'most.' Is anyone giving you guys a hard time? I could talk to the Sheriff about the town's policy on courtesy visits from law enforcement and the best place to dispose of the hard cases that don't respond well to some 'ole country encouragement."

"Nick…"

"No, it's okay," said Janae, chuckling, "The mostly part is the looks we get from some of the old-timers like Hayes and a few of the crazies who only come into town once in a while anyway.

"I think the words out from what Sunni did when your car got tagged, that the Hopps family takes care of their own and anything beyond a dirty look is going to be dealt with... severely."

"Okay," said Nick, leaning back, "but if anything worse than a dirty look happens…"

"I know, thanks," replied Janae. "How about you guys? When are you going to drop the bomb on everyone about you two courting and whatever else you've been up to since you left?"

Both Nick and Judy groaned.

…..

Pulling into a parking spot near the front of the house, Janae held her littermate back after Nick got out to get the luggage from the back.

"So?"

"What?" replied Judy.

"Have you guys sealed the deal yet?"

"No, stop it. We still have a few things to figure out before we go that far."

"You're kidding? I looked up how it works for canids on the internet, do you need a link?"

"Aargh, you're as bad as Toni. No, I don't need any links or any more diagrams. I'm talking about all the other stuff. You know, Dad, the town crazies, the law, bad guys constantly wanting to kill us, I mean, we haven't had time to think, let alone… you know."

"Diagrams? You have diagrams. When did you get diagrams?"

"A while ago, now stop it. We need to stay focused. Mom and Dad can't know about Nick and me until after Carrot Days, got it?"

"Fine. Did you bring the diagrams with you?"

"What? I'm not telling you—"

*knock knock*

Judy and Janae both looked at a fully laden Nick through the passenger side window and nodded.

"No one finds out, got it?" said Judy, holding up her pinky.

"Okay," replied Janae, hooking her pinky around her littermate's, "I promise."

…..

"Hungry?" asked Janae as they walked past the kitchen. "Mom's already gone to bed, but there's a ton of leftovers in the fridge."

"No thanks," said Nick. "We had some snacks on the train ride in."

Judy nodded, "Yeah, we're good. How come Mom's already in bed? I thought for sure she'd be up when we got here."

"She wanted to, but she was super tired. She hasn't gotten much sleep in almost a week because her Mom-radar has been going off like crazy and keeping her up all night."

"What...," chuckled Judy, "are you and Dalton spending all night, every night, 'counting stars' without checking in? You know Mom's a worry wart about that sort of thing, right?"

"We're not counting stars," huffed Janae. "Dalton's teaching me about the constellations, and they're all very interesting…

"…in between kisses, that is," Janae said with a smirk.

"I knew it," said Judy, giving Janae a side hug. "You two should cut to the chase and get mated."

"Right, except it wasn't me and Dalton she was worried about. It was you and Nick."

"Me and Nick?"

"Yup, I was out late Friday night with Dalton, and when I got back, Mom was way more worried about you two than Dalton and me. Did something happen to you guys Friday night that was bad enough to set off Mom's radar?"

Judy slowed down as Nick turned down the hall to his room before she said, "I, uh, no, not that I can remember. Just a normal—"

"Whoa, what's up with my room?" said Nick, dumping the luggage in the hallway.

Janae rushed with Judy in tow to where Nick stood outside his room. A room devoid of furniture and covered in drop cloths.

"Yeah, and what happened to my room?" added Judy, seeing her room in the same shape as Nick's, except there were samples of different colors painted on one of the walls.

"Mom's redecorating for when Grandma and Grandpa Grazer and Aunt Georgina visit this Christmas. She had Colton's litter move all of whatever you left, along with Nick's bed, into a couple of rooms in the teen section."

"The teen section?" groaned Judy. "Great. A whole section of kits playing video games and sneaking around all night, midnight snack runs, and curfew violators trying not to get caught."

Nick bit back a smile.

Until Judy pulled his muzzle down to hers and said, "The halls all have eyes and ears in the teen section. Everyone knows everything the second anyone is out of their room."

Frowning now, Nick grimaced as he said, "Oh, that's not so good."

"Come on, I'll show you where the rooms are," said Janae.

"Which section, old or new?" asked Judy, following Janae.

"Old. Mom had the dread rooms cleared out and cleaned up."

Judy moaned as the group stopped outside a pair of side-by-side rooms near the end of a hallway, "Seriously? No one's used these rooms in forever."

"Why? And why did you call them 'dread' rooms?" asked Nick, setting down his load of luggage.

Waving a paw around, Judy said, "These were Mom and Dad's old rooms from when she stayed here the summer before they got mated. And no one's been willing to sleep in them since. The overhead pipes used to groan a lot, and the air vents made a weird moaning noise. I heard even Uncle Lewis couldn't figure out what was going on."

"That's because they're haunted," said a young teen buck wearing a colored paw print armband as he came from an adjoining hallway.

"Haunted?" groaned Nick. "Great, I'm going to be sleeping in a cursed room. And I thought getting woken up by the little kits with all the giggling and chores was bad, but now you're telling me that I have to worry about some demonic rabbit moaning and groaning while they suck my soul out through my eye sockets while I'm asleep."

The buck huffed, "Don't worry, all the rooms in the teen section have extra soundproofing, so if some soul-sucking demon tries to possess you or they command a swarm of Egyptian scarab beetles to strip the flesh from your bones, it shouldn't wake anyone else up."

"Thanks, kit, good to know that if I get zombified, the screams won't bug anyone," and turning to Janae, Nick pleaded, "Please can I have another room?"

Judy facepalmed.

Janae shook her head and said, "Nick. The rooms aren't haunted. No one is going to suck your soul out, and the only demon rabbit in the warren is Amy, and she's on some weird exercise kick, so you're safe from her too. Right, Zachary."

"Nuh-uh. I heard Lucas heard from Uncle Lewis that the rooms were haunted, and that's why no one's ever picked them," replied Zach. "And yeah, Amy's gone weird."

"What Zach meant to say was that the oldest kit still in the warren always gets first choice on any room that comes available except for the guest rooms, and Lucas liked the room he had because it was in the new section, far away from all his annoying little brothers.

"So, the rooms are fine, we will be fine, everything will be fine."

"Just no late-night death screams or gagging noises as you're choked by your own entrails," said Zach, pointing to his armband. "I like to run a tight ship around here. No loud music after ten, lights out at eleven, except on the weekends, you can stay up to midnight."

"And if you keep talking about demons," growled Judy, "the only noises anyone's going to hear will be the moaning and groaning of a hall monitor rolling around on the floor in pain after getting pounded by his older sister."

"Fine, bad pipes. But it's PAW patrol now. Protect and Watch sounds better than Hall monitor."

Nick looked to Judy with a worried face, then back at Zach, "Uh, I'm not a teen, so I might need to be up late," and glancing at Judy again, "or really early, so…"

Zach straightened up, "No exceptions. Mom put you down here for a reason, and I've heard about you raiding the refrigerator for pie and sneaking leftovers to Judy's room. Not gonna happen on my watch. My room's right over there, and I can see everything you might try right from my doorway."

"I didn't sneak anything," whined Nick.

Zach did an eyelid pull and, looking at Nick, said, "When Judy was on duty, nothing, and I mean nothing, got past her, and I plan on topping her patrol record by Carrot Days when I have to pass the baton to the next litter that turns thirteen.

"So, how many curfew violations can I count on from you, huh fox?"

Nick looked toward Judy and sagged, "None, I'll be good."

Making a move to give Judy a goodnight hug, Nick started to lift his arms when he was stopped by Janae clearing her throat and saying, "Goodnight, Nick."

Judy looked toward Nick and sagged.

"Good night, Janae. Night Carrots," replied Nick as he picked up his part of the luggage and shuffled into his new room, shutting the door behind him.

Judy glared at Zach, "That's not fair. We're cops, and we have lots of… paperwork and cop stuff that we might have to do late. So, if I'm up past curfew, that's just too bad."

Zach tapped a claw on his armband and smirked back at Judy, "I don't remember any of that counting as an excuse in the manual you left behind."

"What? I was thirteen. You can't be serious."

"As serious as a file baked into a cake."

Janae grabbed Judy's paw, "Come on, let's get you settled. You're in mom's old room, and Colton said it was in pretty good shape."

"I'm keeping an eye on you too, Judy. No violations, got it?"

"Fine," was all Judy got out before she was pushed into her new room.

"So close, but he might as well be a hundred miles away," groaned Judy, kicking her door closed. "So, not fair."

"Jude, stop. You sound like you're a hormonal sixteen-year-old that just got grounded."

"Thppffft."

"Real mature."

"I just… This sucks. Why did Mom have to pick now to paint the guest rooms?"

Janae pulled her littermate into a hug and pet her ears for a few moments, "I'll talk to Mom and see what's up. Maybe I can talk her into moving you guys back into the guest rooms after they're painted."

"Thanks," said Judy into Janae's shoulder.

Releasing Judy, Janae whispered, "I don't think Nick's very happy either. If you want, I'll create a distraction, and once Zach's looking the wrong way, you can sneak into his room."

Judy sighed, "Thanks, but no. I'd be stuck there in the morning, and I'm betting Zach will do a bed check if he doesn't see me out of my room by breakfast time. I kind of put that in my old manual, too."

Chuckling, Janae gave Judy a last squeeze and then headed to her own room.

"Halt! Who goes there?"

"Put a sock in it, Zach, or I'll do it for you."

"You may pass," was the last thing Judy heard as Janae closed her door.

"I'm trapped," said Judy to no one as she sat on her bed.

"Aaargh! Fine! But I don't have to like it."

Unzipping one of her suitcases, Judy found her sleeping t-shirt, well Nick's old sleeping t-shirt, and changed into it.

Sitting back down on the bed, she felt a little better, but not much. 'Maybe I'll call him.'

Grabbing her phone, thumb hovering over the power button, she… tossed the phone on her bed and pulled her ears over her eyes.

'You are such a bunny! One night, you can last one night without being wrapped up in your fox.'

Judy sat for an entire count of ten. And then, trying to make it to twenty, she gave up and grabbed her phone again.

This time, thumb anxious to pounce on Janae's number, Judy had a gleam in her eye, 'Fireworks, and a couple of smoke bombs, that'll work. I only need a few seconds.'

Thumb grinning and about to cause household havoc… Judy threw her phone down again. 'Darn smoke alarms will wake up the whole warren.'

Giving up, for reals this time, Judy dumped her suitcases out on the bed, then stuffed her unmentionables in a dresser drawer, piled her shirts and shorts on a chair in the corner, and after spreading the rest out on her bed, tossed the empty soft-sided suitcases in the closet.

The closet.

It spanned half the length of the shared wall with Nick's room and was built side by side with his for efficiency's sake. Or so the builders might say, but Judy knew better. A few feet of air, thick paneling, and a double layer of insulation were all purposely installed generations ago for the sole purpose of keeping her and Nick as far apart as possible. That's what's really going on.

"Aargh, my kingdom for a sledgehammer."

Staring at the ceiling in the hopes of seeing a sign from the gods, Judy finally huffed out her frustration and turned back to the dresser to check out what might be in the drawers.

"Clothes, who would have thought."

Judy found the clothes she'd left behind all nicely folded, along with some new t-shirts she didn't remember.

"Thanks Mom, I guess," mumbled Judy as she arranged a few of the personal things she hadn't left behind, namely a couple of cute framed pictures of her and Nick went on the bedstand, and a special ear bangle was stuffed into the back of her underwear drawer.

Grabbing her small duffle, Judy unzipped it and hung up her uniforms in the closet. Turning to put a couple of nice but now wrinkled shirts she brought on hangers, too, she heard the scraping of hangers being hung through the closet's shared sidewall.

Which shouldn't be possible because of all the insulation between the rooms in the teen section.

"Nick?"

…..

Nick stood for a few moments after closing the door and listened for footsteps. Nothing. The kit was right, these rooms could handle a lot more noise without waking anyone up.

'Maybe if I wait the kit out.'

Nick padded back to the door and cracked it open enough to see… Zach sitting on a stool inside the doorway to his room, playing a pawheld game.

"Damn," whispered Nick.

Zach looked up and pointed two fingers at his eyes and then toward Nick.

Nick sighed and closed his door.

Looking around the room, Nick didn't see much left over from what must have been a hurried cleanout. Some old books in a box that was missed, mostly science fiction and fantasy, and a rolled-up one-sheet sized poster hidden behind the dresser.

"Jessica Rabbit," marveled Nick as he held up the iconic image of the starlet posing in her signature form-fitted red sequenced dress while holding a microphone. Autographed too. 'To Stu Hopps, My #1 fan in Bunnyburrow. This song's for you!'

"Stu, you old dog, you."

Chuckling, Nick slipped the poster back into its hiding place and, grabbing his suitcase, opened it up on the bed.

Unrolling his t-shirts and shorts, Nick carefully refolded them and, along with his underwear, loaded up the dresser. Grabbing his ZPA graduation picture of him and Judy both in uniform, Nick set it just right on his nightstand and then, with a glance toward the hidden poster, said, "Eat your heart out, Jessica. Judy's got you beat paws down."

"Yeah," said Nick, tail drooping and ears folded back, "and it's not like you haven't gotten used to sleeping wrapped around your girlfriend either."

Holding his phone in his paw, Nick debated with himself what to do.

Call Judy and work out a distraction so he could sneak into her room, or suck it up and go to bed alone?

And then a brilliant idea popped into his head: a tunnel. Pull back some of the carpeting and dig. He was an Alpha predator, and his ancestors used to dig out dens in the wilderness. Should be simple enough, right?

Going to the closet, Nick scraped a toe claw along the floorboards under the carpeting and sighed, "Great, now all I need to do is find a Den Depot that delivers power tools and earth-moving equipment in the middle of the night."

Figuring that a heavy equipment delivery suddenly showing up might be a little conspicuous, Nick mulled over a plan B by running his paw along the thick paneling of the closet's back wall. Unfortunately, whoever built these rooms knew what they were doing when it came to keeping loud, unruly teens apart, and unless there was a reciprocating saw duct taped behind a toilet tank in the common bathroom, he would be sleeping alone.

With his girlfriend reunion plans now on hold, Nick focused on finishing his unpacking. Grabbing a few old metal hangers, yes plastic hangers were now on his shopping list along with a shovel and a pickaxe, Nick hung his ZPD uniform, some dress slacks, and the last of the Pawaiian shirts he'd kept hidden from Judy.

Finally getting undressed, Nick slipped on his sleeping shorts, and a t-shirt that still had a residual Judy smell to it, and, sliding all the hangers, with a screech like claws on a chalkboard, down a bit, threw today's clothes in the laundry basket.

About to close the bi-fold doors of the closet, Nick heard a muffled voice…

"Nick?"

Nick stopped closing the doors and instead put an ear up to the closet's shared sidewall. "Carrots?"

"Nick?"

Nick tapped the wood-paneled sidewall with a knuckle before going to one knee to tap the rest of the way down. 'It feels as thick as any of the other walls in the warren, but it's weird that I can hear through it.'

*tap tap tap thunk thunk*

"Did you hear that?" asked Judy, sounding clearer down low.

"Yeah, sounds hollow. Hang on," replied Nick on his paws and knees.

"I know," replied Judy, much clearer now, "Someone must have forgotten to insulate the wall down here."

Nick tapped a little more and then ran a claw along a crease in the paneling until it turned into a near invisible seam. "I don't think so," muttered Nick.

"What?"

Feeling around more, Nick broadened his search toward the interior edge wall that acted as a doorjamb, where he found an electrical outlet with one of the plugs covered with a plastic kit-proof safety cap. A cap with a laughing rabbit buck on it.

"Who puts an outlet inside a closet like this, and what's going on with the safety cap?"

Thinking for just a second, Nick pushed in on the covered plug and heard a quiet click.

"I heard something, what'd you do?"

Looking over, the seam in the shared wall was now a gap.

Pushing in on the door a little, Nick was able to slide it up inside the wall until he heard another click as the panel was locked open.

"I heard another click."

"Yeah, hang on."

Spying a latch holding his door's mate down, Nick pressed a release and slid the second panel up just in time to see his bunny fall back on her haunches in surprise.

"I'm not sure, but I think I found more of your Uncle Lewis's handiwork."

Crawling through the opening over to his bunny, Nick smirked, "That plug over there isn't just a plug. Push in the capped outlet, and…"

Judy pulled Nick onto the floor, hugged him, peppered him with kisses, and said, "You're amazing."

-/-/-

Stu popped up in bed, "Did you hear that, Bon? I think I heard Judy's voice."

Bonnie yawned, "Uh-huh, remember I told you she'd be coming in on the late train tonight? Go back to sleep."

Stu started to lean back into his pillow when he jerked up again, "That fox is back too, isn't he? Which rooms did you say you were putting them in again? I'm glad they're not in the guest rooms anymore. This time, they better be somewhere far apart. I don't like how much time they spend together."

Sighing, Bonnie replied, "I put them in our old rooms in the teen section, and both rooms are in plain sight of Zachary, who is a very diligent hall monitor, so nothing untold can happen. Good enough?"

Leaning back again, "I suppose… wait," Stu was up again, "Our old rooms? What about the—"

"Stewart Hopps, please stop. You know I had Uncle Lewis fix that years ago. Remember that weekend after Janae and Judy's litter was born, and you had to go to Podunk for the Co-op? Uncle Lewis fixed everything tight as a drum."

"Oh, okay. I guess I remember that trip. Although, I thought the Co-op trip was—"

Reaching up to her mate, Bonnie pulled him in close and whispered, "Remember what we used to do while we were courting? How about we pretend it's that first night you found those loose boards."

"Mmmmhhh."