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

…..

A/N: Thank you for all the comments/follows/reviews/kudos you've left, much appreciated and a reminder that it's been way too long since I last posted. Life has been keeping me busy, but I've made progress on this next story arc too. The next update probably won't be for a month, but after that, I hope to be back to my twice a month schedule.

Also, a shoutout to Wissennder on AO3 for suggesting the idea of scent balls in a comment they made to Chapter 32. A fun suggestion that fit in well here.

…..

…..

Nick shut off the car and, looking over at his yawning bunny, asked, "Nice nap?"

"Yeah," said Judy stretching. "Thanks for the snack and driving the rest of the way home."

Chuckling at the sight of Judy stretching everything, including her ears, Nick went around to the trunk and grabbed all the luggage as Judy gathered up their trash and looked for a trashcan. "I thought for sure when you made me stop at that Ted Roos place, I would end up eating gravel. Who calls a cup of ice cream a 'Concrete'?"

"It's not ice cream, it's custard, and everyone from all over goes there to buy one. My siblings and I used to road trip there a couple of times every summer when we were in high school just to get one."

"You'd drive an hour each way, just for ice– for custard? That's crazy."

Stuffing their trash into a trashcan, Judy pulled her fox's muzzle to hers and, after using her lips to see if Nick's still tasted like blueberries, said, "For a Concrete, absolutely. And crazy is watching all the canids jump after Throwed Rolls at Rambert's restaurant in Podunk and catching them in their mouths."

"Whoa, really?" said Nick, panting, "A place like that exists? Maybe we can stop there on the way back."

Shaking her head, Judy gave Nick another quick kiss to stop the panting and said, "Come on, it's late, and I need a shower."

Following his bunny into the lobby, Nick was about to ask…

"And no, I don't need any help washing my back. Best behavior, remember."

"Yeah, yeah, yeah. I remember."

Judy unlocked the apartment door and, taking her bag from Nick, led the way inside.

"I call first dibs on a shower," said Judy as she bounced into Nick's bedroom, walked through the bathroom to the closet, and dumped her bag out next to another pile of bunny-sized clothes before turning on the shower.

"I'll be done in a few."

Nick stood in the living room staring at the open door to his bedroom and then turned to look across the room at the dark entranceway to the spare bedroom and bathroom.

And then back to his room and the sounds of a happy bunny prepping for a hot shower.

"By the way, your place is great. Thanks again for letting me stay here," came Judy's voice, followed by the click of his bathroom door closing.

Shrugging, Nick went into his room and emptied his bag in the corner. After changing into his sleeping shorts, Nick grabbed all his dirty laundry and dumped it into the washer. Figuring he'd wait for Judy to add her laundry to the load before starting it, Nick went to the fridge to check out the food situation.

'Not good.'

Not that he had that much in the fridge before leaving, and what few perishable items he did have, he'd given to Finn or pitched before driving to Bunnyburrow. And from the looks of it, Judy hadn't done much food shopping either. Nick made a mental list of what he'd need from the local market for breakfast tomorrow, and after checking the pantry, he added enough other groceries to tide him and Judy over until they could make a major buy.

Yawning, Nick used the spare bathroom and some extra toiletries to pay Mother Nature her due before washing his muzzle and brushing his teeth. Padding back over to his room, Nick yawned again, his part of the drive had been uneventful, but three hours of it, with Judy napping for most of it, along with the remnants of a blueberry Concrete induced sugar crash, meant that it was a very tired fox that trudged into his room and crawled into his blanket pile bed.

The fact that said blanket pile had a distinctly bunny scent to it didn't help Nick's plan to 'just rest his eyes for a minute' until Judy finished and he could start the washer.

-/-/-

Judy shut the shower off, and after shaking the worst of the water off of herself, she hopped over to the fur dryer to finish the job. Turning the heat up just a bit extra, Judy slowly turned around to let the hot air jets reach all of her.

'This feels soooo good.'

Fur dryers were a rare luxury in Bunnyburrow, almost no one had one. Except for old bun Hayes. His kits used to strut around in high school bragging that they were better than everyone else because their Dad had a fur dryer installed in their warren's common shower room.

'One more minute.'

Five blissful minutes later, Judy was giving herself a quick brush down, and five minutes after that, Judy exited the bathroom wearing the same t-shirt she'd found in Nick's blanket pile a week ago.

Looking extra cute and ready to hang out with her foxy boyfriend on the balcony or maybe watch one of Nick's old movies, Judy stepped into the bedroom and…

…heard snoring.

Walking over to the large drawer, Judy sighed as she saw her fox curled into a tight ball, sound asleep.

'What happened to foxes being nocturnal?' thought Judy. 'Yeah, well, maybe napping instead of helping drive wasn't such a good idea if you wanted a little extra slash-B tail time.'

Heading back into the closet, Judy gathered up all her dirty clothes and carried them out to the washer. Seeing the washer door open and some of Nick's stuff in there, Judy filled the washer up, tossed in a detergent pod, and started the machine.

Paws on hips, Judy looked around at the furniture deprived living room and then toward what was supposed to be her room, then to Nick's room, and then back to hers.

'Best behavior.'

Everything had been shoved into the corner to get it out of the way of the painting, so Judy started with moving the nightstand and dresser first so she could pull the small-mammal, single-sized bed out from under the windows and put it so its headboard was up against the wall the way it was before she'd moved it.

Sitting on the bed, Judy quickly figured out it was too thin for two mammals to lean against the headboard, and unlike the bed in her apartment, no wall to lean against either.

"A little bit bigger bed would have been nice, Slick."

Hopping off the bed, Judy thought about turning it sideways to take advantage of the wall, but with the headboard, it didn't fit any other way.

Stepping back, she mentally moved the bed around some more, and even with the headboard off, she couldn't make it work. And unfortunately for her, there was no awake male handy to spend the day moving furniture around for her to be absolutely sure.

So, with a sigh, she gave up on movie nights and any extracurricular cuddling happening in her bedroom and moved the nightstand into the corner and the dresser against the newly painted wall.

"Good enough," she said to herself. 'The sun rises on the other side of the building, so I won't have to worry too much about the morning light coming in the windows. Probably one of the reasons Nick likes this apartment. Pretty sunsets with gorgeous views of the moon and no early morning wake-up calls from the sun.

'Although, I probably need to add curtains to the list if I'm going to be stuck sleeping in here all by myself.'

"Best behavior," mumbled Judy as she shook out the bedding Finn had left for her that night he'd brought her here, a night that felt like it was a lifetime ago. 'And almost was, girl. A lot's happened to you in less than two weeks.'

Catching a whiff of Nick's mark on her, she smiled and whispered to herself, "Although, not everything that happened to you was bad."

Sheets tucked in, pillowcases on, blanket in reserve if it got chilly, and she was done.

"Now what?"

Making her way to the kitchen, Judy grabbed a bottle of carrot juice out of the refrigerator. She downed half of it before closing the door and the other half after deciding she wasn't the best housekeeper in the world, and a little tidying up was warranted.

Judy threw away her old takeout containers and then, gathering up a few plates and some used silverware, loaded the dishwasher. Wiping down the counters only took a few moments, and that's when she found Finn's note.

Officer Toot-toot
Your pain in my tail boyfriend is worried about you. Call him or I'll bite your face off.
Finn

Staring at the note, Judy smiled. Nick was so sweet, always watching out for her and supporting her when she needed it. If it hadn't been for him… well, she didn't want to think about that.

Which suddenly reminded her of someone else who worries a lot.

Judy grabbed her phone and texted her mom.

Made it home ok, love you.

Love you too, Bun-Bun, and give Nick a goodnight hug for me.

Ok, I will. :)

About to set her phone down, she took another look at her text, "Oh, carrot sticks," and quickly sent her mom another text.

Tomorrow, when I see him. Since he's at his place by now. I'm pretty sure. Goodnight.

Of course, dear. Goodnight.

Judy exhaled, 'That was close, girl.' And then quietly chided herself, "Janae's right, you suck at this secret boyfriend stuff."

Scrolling down her contact list, Judy tapped a Gazelle icon and sent Ben a quick text that she and Nick needed to meet with the Chief after the bullpen meeting tomorrow and to text her in the morning with a good time once he'd cleared it with Bogo.

Setting her phone down next to the box she was going to mail to Nick, Judy decided to head–

'The box!'

Taking Finn's note and the small box over to a side counter, Judy opened the box up, pulled the packing material out, and stuffed it in the junk drawer where Nick wouldn't see it.

Glancing over her shoulder toward the open door to Nick's room, Judy pulled out a gray rabbit plushie sealed inside a plastic bag along with a few fabric balls. Judy sighed in relief, 'Thank goodness I found this before Nick did.'

She'd intended on dropping the box off at the Post Office, but due to almost getting sliced into bunny-bits, she hadn't been able to. Opening up the bag, Judy took a sniff at her handiwork, it would have been a fun surprise for her fox.

After finding out how little Judy actually knew about fox relationships, Toni explained how important scents and marking could be to canids in general and foxes in particular, especially in regards to their mates. Toni explained that once when Walter had to go out of town to audit a client's accounts, they'd both exchanged scent minders, soft fabric balls that they each thoroughly marked and gave each other. That way they could each carry a remembrance of their mate. It made being apart a little more tolerable.

Toni showed Judy a few different scent minders she had, and when she pointed out that Aidan and Tyler had each scented a toy plushie for their father, Judy gasped.

"Nick marked my fox plushie a few weeks before I broke up with him. I thought he did it as a joke, but now I'm not so sure. If it wasn't for that plushie…"

Judy sniffed, "It was his scent. If it hadn't been for that, I think I would have gone crazy.

"And now that I'm thinking about it, I don't know where it is. I think I lost it moving out of my old apartment.

"Actually, being moved out of my old apartment."

Toni soothed her friend with a hug, "Don't worry Judy, maybe next time you see Nick, he'll mark the real thing instead of just a toy."

Chuckling at how right Toni had been, Judy picked up the note she'd included in the bag for Nick.

She'd spent over an hour and gone through ten pieces of paper before deciding on,

Nick,
I miss you.
A lot.
Judy :)

Maybe not her best work, but it had been written with a lot of feeling.

Putting the note and the open bag of cloth balls back in the box, Judy looked around for what to do with the box, and the plushie in her paw, when she heard a whining sound come from Nick's room.

Dropping the box on the kitchen's built-in desk, Judy ran into the bedroom to see what was wrong. Stopping next to Nick's makeshift bed, Judy saw in the dim light from the living room Nick's arm batting away at some unseen force while his legs motioned as if he were keeping himself in front of something and being punished for it.

As if he were protecting someone.

"Oh, Nick."

Judy leaned over the edge of the drawer and reached out to soothe her fox. Putting her paw on his shoulder, she rubbed his back and made cooing noises as she used to when helping her young siblings get back to sleep from a bad nightmare.

Moving her paw to the side of his muzzle, Judy used her dull claws to scratch behind Nick's ear.

All the frantic fox motion ceased, as even still asleep, Nick's tail started to wag, and he leaned into his bunny's touch.

Judy smiled as her ministrations slowly turned her fox into a relaxed pile of mush, and Nick began to purr.

Yawning, Judy checked the clock and figured she better get over to her room. Looking longingly at Nick, she really didn't want to exile herself, but 'best behavior' applied to her too.

Now that Nick was calmed down, Judy started to move, and then remembering the bunny plushie in her paw, decided that she'd at least fix it so Nick would stay comfortable. Reaching around Nick, Judy set the scented toy in the crook of his neck right next to his muzzle.

A job well done, Judy started to lean back when she heard a growl.

"What's wrong?" whispered Judy.

Nick flipped the toy away from his muzzle, and sniffing around, poked his cold nose right into Judy's chest.

"Nick what– Niiiiick!"

Judy suddenly found herself at the center of a soft-shell fox burrito.

"Nick," Judy giggled, "I need to–"

"Mine," interrupted a sleepy whisper.

Judy sighed, 'Best behavior…' and then stretching to her fox's muzzle, gave Nick a quick kiss, "We'll talk in the morning. Good night, Nick."

-/-/-

"Good morning, Orange," said White nodding toward a cage housing two sleeping predators. "How are the new subjects responding?"

Yawning, Orange rubbed his eyes, "White. About time, let's do this so I can get some breakfast."

"Not everyone can pull an all-nighter like you. Some of us need our beauty rest," replied the ram stifling his own yawn.

Orange huffed, "Well, you'd better head back to bed because you look worse than I feel."

"Yeah, it's Brown. He's worried that we won't have the formula ready for when the media breaks the news on the rabbit. He wants to take advantage of the citywide panic to expose the preds for the vicious savages they really are."

"And demand the solution we have ready to implement," said Orange, nodding.

"Yes, and in the meantime, he's all over my tail. So, you wanted younger and at least one female. Where are you with them?"

"Better this morning than yesterday. It took a higher level of negative stimulus than I'd expected to exact the hormonal responses I needed for my preliminary tests. I'm assuming your people picked up this pair because they expressed feral mating behaviors."

"You mean because they were a young couple in love? No, I didn't–"

"Love," spat Orange, "like these beasts even know what love is. They're monsters, all of them. All they are is hormones, sharp teeth, and claws. They'd just as soon rip a decent prey mammal apart as much as look at one, and to think they have the capacity to do anything more than kill and breed is insane. They deserve everything we're about to do to them."

White put up his hooves at Orange's outburst and said, "I know, and I agree, but I need to know where we are with the formula."

"Sorry," said Orange with a sigh, "I haven't slept much lately, and with having to constantly deal with this street filth, I just…

"Alright, my testing showed that the hormone levels in this pair changed based on the different stimuli applied. The male's levels were a little more erratic than the female's. But after introducing a prohormone that takes advantage of a long-dormant, pred unique neural receptor, I was able to overcome their bodies' natural resistance to the formula and bring the male's numbers within Brown's prescribed tolerances."

"And the female's numbers?"

"Barely within spec, but with almost no variation. And no sign of the rebound effect that overwhelmed that caracal female whose records you were kind enough to procure for me."

"Yes, not exactly a controlled test, but good enough to declare success against female pred biology, and good enough that I can tell Brown–"

"Wait," interrupted Orange pointing a hoof at his monitor, "Since I had to tweak the formula midstream, I still need one more subject to test before we're ready to go to production. I want that additional male I asked for a couple of weeks ago. Same age bracket as these two, but not part of a breeding pair. I want to make sure the final version of the formula is still effective on all predators, not just the old ones or those with raging hormones."

"Not a problem. With Pink out of the picture, I've identified a good source that I can tap into again in a few days. It'll be late again when my guys drop the specimen off. Can you handle that? And how long will you need to run your experiments before knowing if your modifications worked?"

"Late is fine, I'll make up an excuse for my mate. I'll need twenty-four hours of testing and time enough for three autopsies to ensure the formula worked properly."

"Good, I'll let Brown know to send what you've got now to the manufacturing team so they can start gathering the raw materials and be ready to start production this weekend. I might even suggest that he drop an anonymous tip on someone and get the ball rolling if the ZPD keeps hiding what happened to the rabbit."

-/-/-

Nick quietly closed the front door and made his way over to the kitchen island where he deposited two grocery bags. Unloading one of the cloth sacks, Nick caught a can of evaporated milk as it rolled off the counter and almost clattered on the kitchen's tile floor waking the bunny snoozing in his room.

Well, maybe not, she hadn't moved an inch when he'd kissed her between the ears and wormed his tail out of her sleepy grip before getting dressed and heading out to the market for enough groceries to make breakfast.

Waking up cuddling Judy had been the highlight of his morning so far. However, it might have been nice remembering how she ended up in bed with him last night, not that he was complaining or anything, but moments like that were good to know about so that they could be repeated.

He did remember vaguely having one of those dreams. The dreams he used to have after his Dad had died. The kind where something bad was happening and nothing he did made any difference.

He also remembered, and not vaguely, a warm feeling pushing away all those building night terrors, a soft touch, a scent that permeated his soul, a feeling that all was right with the world and it was safe to relax and sleep the deep sleep he'd rarely been able to over the years.

*Sniff*

Speaking of pleasant scents, bunny scents, that is. Nick was drawn to another part of the kitchen, the part where everyone's junk drawer was and where someone had decided that the hardline phone jack should be, not that anyone used those anymore, but…

Nick shuffled through the papers he found, one the note Finn left for Judy to call him, and the others attempted notes that had been scratched out or torn up.

Setting the papers aside, Nick picked up an old, well-worn health book with lots of yellow-sticky tabs marking various pages.

Turning the notebook over in his paws, Nick chuckled, "Seriously Carrots, another manual? What's so important that you'd waste your precious free time studying some boring old book?"

Tossing the notebook on top of Judy's discarded papers, Nick focused on the delicious scent that drew him over here in the first place.

A box.

An open box with his name, and his address in Bunnyburrow, on it.

Reaching into the box, Nick pulled out a note written in his bunny's paw, purple ink of course, and smiled as he read it.

'Short and super-sweet, just like Judy.'

Reaching again into the box, Nick pulled out a plastic bag with a few cloth scent balls in it and opening the unsealed bag all the way, his nose was suddenly overwhelmed by the sweet smell of his bunny's scent mark.

Smiling, Nick took a deep sniff of something so canid he couldn't imagine how Judy had figured them out. Every day, she amazed him with how smart and caring she was.

Scent balls. He remembered himself as a kit, rolling his eyes when his mom gave him and his dad scent-marked cloth balls when they went on their car-camping trip so many years ago.

He also remembered the last time his mom had scented that old rag of a ball for him. Barely sixteen, more streetwise than any mom would have wished for, but thankful that her son had enough experience with the city's underbelly that he wasn't going to get killed, she'd marked his toy and passed the next day.

"Yeah," Nick chided himself, "and if she ever finds out that you lied about your age and hustled your way into Mr. Big's organization the day after her funeral, her spirit will haunt your tail for the rest of eternity, and I don't think Sister Mary's going to be able to help out this time."

'I wonder what Mom's avenging spirit would think of me now?' thought Nick chuckling now, 'If I pulled out my badge and used it like it was a cross, she'd probably think it was fake. No, maybe I can get Judy to talk to Mom's spirit, that might work.'

Nick sighed. He'd tossed that old scent ball in a box somewhere in his parents' garage, walked out of their house, and never slept there again for fear of those demons finding him and judging him.

'Yeah, too proud to get rid of the place, too guilty to live there, you are one messed up fox, Wilde.'

Shaking himself back to the present, he was pleasantly surprised to see that cooking pancakes was still one of his auto-pilot modes, because milk, eggs, flour, and butter were all now magically ready to be fed to his bunny as one of his favorite comfort foods.

-/-/-

Judy yawned.

*Mmmmm*

Something yummy smelling was trying to make her wake up.

Judy unconsciously put out her paw and felt around the blanket pile. Someone was missing. She'd fallen asleep wrapped in a warm fox blanket and now…

…not so warm, and not nearly enough fox.

'Okay girl, that makes two reasons to open your eyes.'

Judy stretched, and as another yawn creeped out, she opened one eye and peeked at the alarm clock.

'Okay, three reasons. You forgot to set the alarm, and now you've overslept. Way, way overslept, and If you don't get your bunny tail out of bed, you won't make your noon meeting with Axl, let alone any chance to meet with Bogo this morning.'

Rolling herself over to the edge of Nick's drawer bed, Judy sat for a moment rubbing her eyes before groaning out, "Barely a week of hanging out in Bunnyburrow, and you've fallen into a routine of eating too much, sleeping late, and wanting to pet a certain fox's tail all the time.

"Alright, effective immediately, operation bad behavior detox."

Standing, Judy padded over and opened the bedroom door. Stopping at the sight of her fox in an apron, tail wagging while he bounced around the kitchen, Judy sighed, 'Okay, except for the tail petting, a little more of that shouldn't hurt.'

"Morning, Fluff."

Judy sat up on a barstool and seeing a stack of thick pancakes covered in warm strawberry sauce, smiled as she replied, "Morning Slick, this smells great."

Coming around the center island, Nick kissed Judy on the cheek and took a seat in front of another stack of pancakes, except this one was dripping in blueberry sauce and sprinkled with powdered sugar.

"Sleep alright?" said Nick, smirking as he nodded toward the guest room, "Was your bed comfy? New mattress and all."

Judy blushed and took a bite to cover her pinking ears and buy herself a second. Nick had let her move in and his 'mi casa, su casa' had turned into her taking over his room, his bed, and some of his clothes. Like the overlarge sleeping t-shirt she was currently wearing.

"Yup, super comfy," she said, quickly taking another bite.

"You're sure? I could get one of those ultra-fluffy mattress covers if you'd like."

Judy coughed and said innocently, "Nope, bed's pretty fluffy."

Leaning toward Judy, Nick waggled his eyebrows and said, "I don't know, it sounded like you might have been a little restless last night, you know, kneading the mattress, burying yourself in a fox tail blanket."

Judy, glancing at her tease of a fox, decided that no way was she going to admit that sleeping curled up next to, or on top of, her fluffy boyfriend was soooo much way-better than sleeping in a sibling bunny pile.

'No way in heck.'

"Now that you mention it, the mattress was a bit lumpy, and it kept needing belly rubs when it got restless."

"Belly rubs?"

"Yup," said Judy, giggling, "and the mattress purred when I nuzzled its tail."

"Oh."

Shrugging, Judy casually took the last bite of her breakfast and said, "Maybe I should talk to Finn, see if there's something wrong with the bed frame or the box springs. If I described what was going on, in detail, he might know how to fix it.

"Or if I need to get a new mattress."

Nick dawned his best puppy-dog eyes, mock-sniffed, and asked, "You'd want a new mattress?"

Trying hard not to smile, Judy pulled her fox's muzzle to hers and kissed him.

Judy felt herself being lifted off her chair and onto Nick's lap, and in response, she pulled his muzzle in tighter and deepened the kiss.

Parting his blueberry flavored lips with her small tongue, Judy tasted his larger one and hummed as she chased him around the inside of his mouth. After a few minutes of that delicious game, Judy explored her boyfriend's sharp canines. Sharp teeth, designed by nature to gobble up creatures like her, now succumbed to her delicate touch and, she hoped, eventually to her dreams.

How could she, a prey mammal whose DNA was infused with the fear of sharp teeth and claws from time immemorial, be so… so, turned on by everything sharp that made Nick her Alpha predator.

Judy moaned, 'Everything fluffy, too. No other mammal would ever stack up against her fox, her best friend, her soulmate, her Nick.'

Rising to her knees to better position herself and show Nick exactly how she felt about him, she–

"I wanna try everything, I wanna try even though I could fail…"

Judy groaned.

Nick blinked. Soft Judy lips, good. A Gazelle ringtone interrupting a make-out session, bad.

Judy thunked her head against Nick's chest, "That has to be Ben. I texted him last night to set us up a time after the bullpen meeting to talk with Bogo before we have to meet with Axl."

Nick hummed, "That means we should have plenty of time to talk a little more about mattress shopping.

"Or not," added Nick with a whisper while nipping at the crook of Judy's neck.

Judy, trying to resist her fox's lips, reached out blindly for her phone and then reading Ben's text, groaned again. "Bogo wants us in his office at nine sharp. No uniforms."

"Which means–" started Nick.

Judy put a finger to Nick's muzzle and said, "Which means we should talk about…" Judy released Nick's lips and pointed back and forth between her and Nick, "…how this is going to work."

"What do you mean?" asked Nick loosening his tail from around Judy.

Pulling Nick's tail back around her, Judy quickly said, "Nothing bad, but we need to be careful now that we're back in Zootopia."

"You mean relationship careful like we were in Bunnyburrow?"

"Yeah, except that most of the mammals we work with have better noses than my family."

Nick exhaled, loudly, "Marking is a big deal to foxes. It's not something we can just snap our fingers and pretend didn't happen."

"I know, it's a big deal to rabbits too, and for me, wearing your mark is a very big deal. I don't want to have to wash it off for anything." And then blushing a bit, Judy added, "I sleep a lot better surrounded by a certain fox, or at the very least your scent."

Kissing Judy on the top of her head, Nick said, "Yeah, I am kind of irresistible, aren't I?"

"Pfftt, you mean annoying, don't you?" huffed Judy poking Nick in his side.

"Well, Miss pokes-a-lot, as much as I too, sleep better wrapped around my bunny, I think you're right. We work with too many good noses. So, how about we Musk Mask in the morning before work and mark each other when we get home."

"And no PDA while we're working," added Judy.

"Unless we're in a storage closet," countered Nick.

Judy rolled her eyes, "You're incorrigible, you know that."

"Yup. So, we agree the janitor's closet, records storage room, and sleeping together in the same bed are all okay as long as somebunny doesn't get too pawsy, and the cruiser's off-limits until I can disable the dash-cam. Right?"

"Sure, Slick, sounds like a plan," said Judy giggling now, "except the cruisers have voice recorders too."

"Noted, no talking. Anything else?"

"Nope," replied Judy popping her 'p'.

"Good, because I call dibs on the first shower while you clean up the dishes," and then using an almost fully sheathed claw he caressed, bottom to top, the inside of Judy's long, sensitive ear.

"Mmmmmmh," she moaned, as her eyes rolled back up in her head.

Standing and setting his now dazed bunny on the stool, Nick grinned, pulled his t-shirt, which Judy was wearing much better than he ever could, off her tail and let it drop to cover said tail and the strawberry-themed panties she was wearing.

"Remember, best behavior," said Nick with a smirk as he let his tail flow against her cheek and down her front on his way to the bathroom.

"I messed up tonight, I lost another fight…"

"Yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm coming, Ben," moaned Judy.

-/-/-

With the flip of a switch, the lights in the large, windowless lab went dark.

Dark, except for the few bulbs that only dimmed as a safety measure.

Dark, except for the screen-locked monitors with their floating graphics.

Dark, except for the dim light glistening off a tear. A tear rolling down a female's muzzle as her paw crept across a dirty cage floor and came to rest touching her boyfriend.