Chapter Text
Foxes have been chasing Judy all her life.
The one standing opposite her now is not Nick Wilde; he is heavier built, and his fur is sandier than Wilde’s deeper, richer red. Yellow eyes flash under the brim of a black hat.
“ACTION!”
The fox snarls, all animal and teeth. Jack Savage pushes himself in front of Judy, paw on her wrist, arms spread out to protect her.
“Back, you mangy mutt! The Chief’ll be here any second, you’ll see!”
(Come on, Jack, you can do better than that).
“No-one ain’t doin’ nuthin’ bucktooth,” the fox is drooling this time, which Judy thinks is a little excessive on top of the growling and the extended claws and the mange makeup he’s clearly resisting the urge to scratch.
Jack narrows his eyes.
“Chief’s got your boss’s number, pal. With any luck he’s already rotting in a cell.”
The fox cackles and spits into the dirt.
“Tha’s jus’ wha he wanted ye t’ thank. We got yer precious leader strung up on th’ tracks waitin’ for the 11:03 train.”
“No!” Judy wails. It’s been her only line for the last four scenes; she might as well milk it. Jack draws her close and draws himself up (better, Jack, just like we practiced).
“You’ll never get away with this!”
She looks up at him for a second, haloed in the studio lights. She tries to imagine doing this again, the damsel thing, minus the cameras and audience. How would he look without the backlighting to cast him heroic?
The fox snarls and pounces. Jack throws her down like they’ve rehearsed and jumps to meet him. They fall to the floor, scuffle, moving through the choreography like clockwork figures, click, click, click.
(Brace yourself, Judy. It’s okay, you can do this, remember the line this time, breathe -)
Jack is tossed away like a ragdoll. Those sulphurous lamplight eyes find her. The fox’s snarl rips through Judy’s guts.
(- breathe breathe breathe breathe breathe -)
He’s on her. Claws and open maw. Hot, predatory musk, and Gideon Grey slashes her face open like paper -
(line, remember the line -)
“You’ll – you’ll never take me alive!”
The monster from under her bed leers. A claw traces her cheek, right over the scars Gideon made.
“That can be arranged, Doll.”
“And cut!”
The fox relaxes, growl shut off, claws retracted. He picks himself up and gazes down at her, still panting in the dirt. She meets his eyes and they flicker down to his feet – shy? Scared? He pads away in silence.
Another difference from Nick Wilde. Though – she thinks back to the smirk, the eyes that gave nothing away, how his words danced around her without really saying anything – maybe not. They just chose different kinds of silence.
Jack is here now, and she lets him help her up, tries to get used to the weight of his paw in hers. Does he know about the Studio? She searches for it in his eyes, but they’re just the usual clear, empty blue, like the sky at the height of summer back home.
“Nice work, kids, nice work!” Mr. Mansfield slaps Jack on the back, “particularly from you, Hopps, I really felt that fear.”
Judy offers him the Cute Starlet Smile she’s been perfecting in the mirror.
“Thank you, sir.”
“And you remembered the line that time!” forced laughter, “Fourth time’s the charm, eh?”
Judy’s smile falters.
“Yes, sir.”
“Well, we got there in the end, that’s all that matters.”
Mansfield peers at her, eyes flicking down to the spot where the two foxes were just at her throat. The actor has already packed up his things and left to get his makeup removed, but his musk still lingers.
Jack coughs.
“Mr Mansfield, sir, if you wouldn’t mind me an’ Judy having a talk?”
“Oh no, of course! You kids have fun now, and I’ll see you bright and early tomorrow.”
Mansfield leaves and Judy watches him go, heart climbing into her mouth as she realises exactly what he meant by ‘fun’.
Oh god this is it, calm down don’t straighten your ears, why is this scarier than the fox?
“So,” Jack’s foot twists in the dirt, “Miss Judy –”
“Judy Hopps?” calls a voice. “Mail delivery for Judy Hopps!”
Judy remembers how to breathe.
“Over here!” (try not to make the arm wave too frantic. Ignore the disappointment in his eyes, he’ll get another chance. Don’t think about that other chance, because it makes the bottom drop out of your stomach, and-)
A runner scampers over, a young squirrel in a checked shirt too smart for his job.
“Letter from Bunnyburrow, ma’am.”
“Thank you. It’s Squire, right?”
“Yes. Ma’am. And, yes, my parents did get a good laugh out of signing my birth certificate,” Squire the squirrel grins.
“My second name is Hopps. No judgements here. You new?”
“Yes ma’am, just started last month. No-one else has remembered my name yet, so…”
“Well, us newbies have got to stick together, right?”
“Yes ma’am.”
“Judy, please.”
Squire blushes, but then Jack coughs again and he flinches.
“Right, uh, I should be going. Nice talking, Judy.”
He jogs away as Judy opens the envelope, addressed in her mother’s hand, so she can put off having to play Juliet for another few seconds.
Jack shifts from foot to foot.
“So, uh, Judy. I was just wonderin’ if you’d like to, maybe sometime–”
“What the cheese?”
Jack blinks at her.
“Excuse me?”
“I–” Judy stares up at him with vacant eyes. Her paws are shaking, “I need to go find Nick Wilde.”
“W– the fixer?”
“Yes,” Judy sprints around the back of the set to her dressing room, Jack following, “you know where he is?”
“Security I’d guess, but – Judy, I’m not sure I’m comfortable with you being around that guy,” he catches her wrist, leans far too close for Judy’s liking, and stage-whispers, “rumour has it he’s a spy for another studio. Collecting all our secrets,” he gives her a significant look, “so he can sell them for a buck. Retire to some private island.”
Judy snorts.
“He’s not a supervillain, Jack. I’ll be fine,” she shoves her dressing-room door open, grabs her coat, and closes it again, already dashing across the soundstage and through the door–
Stops herself. Sticks her head back around the doorframe.
“Sorry. About interrupting you. It’s just, uh, bit of a crisis,” she hopes she doesn’t look too crazy, “have a good night! Doing… stuff.”
(She’d quite like to die now).
Jack smiles warmly.
“And you.”
Judy tries for a smile in return, then she’s gone, wrestling her arms into her coat.
(He’s nice, she has to admit. The kind of buck Mom would coo over if she brought him home.)
(The letter weighs heavy in her pocket. Oh, cheese, Mom…)
She races across the backlot, past vistas of painted mountains and the plywood shell of a cruise liner, head down and ears flapping in the chill evening wind. Security is over in the far left corner, a nondescript box with a heavy metal door she has put her shoulder against and shove.
It’s still cold inside, but at least she’s out of the wind.
The cold is for the benefit of the polar bear sitting behind the main desk.
“Miss Hopps?” Mr. Koslov’s accent is thicker than a winter muffler. Judy shivers. She’s heard horror stories about his bloody defection from the Soviets that rival the campfire whispers back home. The fact he’s the approximate size and shape of the iceberg that sunk the Titanic doesn’t help either, “How can we help you this evening?”
“Um,” Judy forces herself to step forward and smile, “I have a question for Nicholas Wilde? I was told to contact him with any queries about studio life.”
On the wall behind Koslov’s desk is something that reminds Judy of a detective’s investigation board, studded with dozens of photos and newspaper clippings about Studio employees. She spots her own photo, bound to Jack Savage’s by a thin red thread. The drawing pin is embedded right between her eyes.
“Indeed,” Koslov’s chuckle is like an avalanche looking for someone to crush. “We sent Nicholas to Stage Seven to check up on another client. Try there.”
“Thank you, sir,” Judy turns and struggles to heave the door open. There’s the sound of a chair being pushed back; Mr. Koslov crosses the room in two strides and pulls the door open as easily as if it were made of paper. Judy mutters more thanks and ducks back out into the wind. The door slams shut behind her, but she swears she can still feel those ice-chip eyes boring into the back of her head.
If Nick Wilde is the Studio’s scalpel, Koslov is their sledgehammer. She sucks in a breath and picks up the pace.
***
“Sorry, sister, I got no clue where the fox went,” drawls the vole.
Stage Seven is shooting some kind of monster movie; behind them rodent extras scream as a towering grizzly bear wades through their paper mâché city.
“You must know where he was going when he left,” Judy sighs, wincing as a skyscraper crashes across the set.
The vole, a young female with fur like chocolate silk, fingers do an agitated dance across her chair.
“I dunno, he did – have you got a smoke?”
“Sorry?”
“A smoke. I’m dying over here.”
Judy’s snout wrinkles and the vole groans. "The fox is usually the one to fix me up with booze and all that – don’t give me that look, Missy. How old are you, twenty, twenty-two? You’ll get there eventually.”
The voile can’t be more than twenty-seven herself, but Judy plays Good Cop and keeps up the Cute Starlet Smile. The bear roars and puts his foot through City Hall.
“So, he came down here because he’s getting you on AA?”
Her laughter is high, trilling.
“Why would the Studio waste time forcing me through rehab when I could be making them money?” she gestures at her costume, a ballgown elegantly torn to expose just enough of her pristine fur, “Gotta grab this while it lasts, right? The fox just does the legwork for me, makes sure I don’t get caught buying anything that’d get the higher-ups in trouble.”
For a second Judy is speechless.
“So, he facilitates your addiction?”
“He did,” she sighs and taps her stomach conspiratorially, “until this thing came along.”
Judy blinks.
“You’re pr– oh, congratulations!”
The vole snorts.
“Yeah, congratulations. Studio’s biggest Small leading lady gets banged up out of wedlock. The headlines practically write themselves. And suddenly, no booze, no smokes. It’d harm the baby, they say, and I can’t get rid of it because that doesn’t fit my character.”
Judy frowns.
“Your character? Is she pregnant in the movie or something?”
“No, not that character. Jesus, you really are a bunny, aren’t you? I mean the character you put on for them,” she waves vaguely at the space beyond, outside the studio walls and into the night. “The character you play on the red carpet, at the press junkets, the one you let the public think is their best friend. That’s why the Fox was visiting. Trying to get me hitched before I pop." She peers at Judy’s stomach interestedly, “same for you, I guess.”
Judy chokes on her own spit.
“Wha – no, of course not!”
The vole raises a placating hand. Back on set the National Guard is being thoroughly stomped by Bearzilla.
“Sorry, just. A young, attractive bunny like you,” (it’s like she underlines Judy's species in red marker) “Figure you’re bound to get around to it eventually.”
“I don’t want–“ Judy stops cold. She feels Koslov’s drawing pin between her eyes, sees Jack Savage’s face, and wonders. How long will she be expected to keep this up?
Behind them the bear demolishes a suburban dreamland with a swipe of his paw.
“Anyways, I have to be back on in a minute,” the vole’s fingers haven’t stopped dancing, but her gaze stays steady. Judy knows that look. The one Nick Wilde brushed off so easily in her dressing room, “I have to be in his paw for close-ups, then I’ve got to have a ‘romantic climax’ with a bear. Apparently audiences these days are into that kinky pred-taming shit.”
Judy tries to smile sympathetically.
“So, you remember where he went?”
“Nope,” she yawns, “Fox could be anywhere.”
“He has a name,” Judy snaps.
“Huh?”
“Nicholas Wilde. You might want to use it.”
The vole’s fingers pause their dance.
“Listen, bunny, here’s some real advice for you. Be careful around that pred. We have to expose a lot of shit to him, and it’s dangerous. You know that’s the whole reason he got his job, right? I heard he and his little pal have some dirt on the Studio and he blackmailed them into hiring them. Only way they’d let a fox be their eyes and ears down here.”
Judy files this away in the same box as a thousand other rumours about Nick Wilde.
“Why are you telling me all this? Isn’t it meant to be secret?”
“What would be the point? Besides, you’re one of us now, right? Think of it as a sneak preview. Welcome to the family.”
Behind them the bell rings and the director calls for Rita back on set. Judy stays frozen long enough to hear the vole start screaming before she snaps herself out of it and makes her escape, skirting around the camera crew as Rita is swept away by the monster only she can tame.
The city lies in ruins.
Outside, the wind bites worse than ever, snatching the plumes of Judy’s breath away as soon as they appear.
(Okay, think. If you were a smug conmammal with the moral consistency of swamp slime, where would you go?)
She wracks her brains for all those police manuals she read as a kit, the PIs she spent her childhood watching bust criminals over and over on the old TV that always went staticky in the corners, until Mom complained she was going to wear the old set out, so why didn’t she come help out in the kitchen instead? It was about time she learned.
Judy flips through her box of hearsay about Wilde. Polite, charming, guarded. Friendly, distrusting, solitary –
What did the vole say? He and his little friend. OK, narrow it down. Small mammal, obviously. A pred almost definitely, but foxes don’t even trust other preds generally, except maybe their own kind.
It comes to her in a thrill, a call sheet she’d glanced over weeks ago - some schlocky sci-fi she’d turned down because she didn’t fancy being groped by aliens. Right at the bottom, a fennec fox in a minor role.
They should be shooting in Studio Ten, over that way. Judy starts running, to get away from the wind or something else she isn’t sure.
Ten is a cramped broom closet of a soundstage tucked away in the far corner of the studio complex. People call it the dumping ground, where they shot all the low-budget low-profit B movies. Inside, the cameras the crew lug about are near-fossilised. One of the spotlights flickers worryingly.
Her guy is smoking sulkily in the corner when she arrives, tugging at a tacky space-suit several sizes too big for him.
“Finnick?”
He’s small even by fennec standards, but he makes up for it with scowl fit for Bearzilla back in Studio Seven.
“What’choo want, Toots?”
“Nick Wilde. Know where he is?”
His centre of gravity’s low, ready to pounce. Something’s taken a chunk out of his left ear.
“You’re his rabbit,” he grunts, taking a drag on the cigarette.
“Excuse me?”
“Nicky was complainin’ ‘bout you to me just yesterday.”
“Of course he was,” she sighs.
“You ain’t got no right to be pissy at him,” Finnick’s voice is a near subterranean. “He deserves to be left the fuck alone.”
He blows smoke at her and her eyes smart.
“Well I can’t, and I need to see him,” Judy folds her arms defensively. “What’s the studio got him covering up for you?”
Finnick laughs.
“As if the studio would give a shit about a glorified extra like me. Nah, Nicky was checkin’ up on me in his own time.”
Her arms… loosen a little.
“Why?”
“Got in a barfight ‘bout a week back,” Finnick indicates his slashed ear, “Nicky saved my tail from the Fuzz. Said I shouldn’t be throwin’ away my career. Not that it’s much of a career,” he scowls over at the set, where his heroic ram captain is fighting off a hoard of reptiles masquerading as aliens. "Bit part as crew-expendable."
“Tell me about it.”
“Fuck off with that condescension,” Finnick snarls, but Judy has already faced down a polar bear and Gideon Grey today and she has no time for fear.
He seems to be getting frustrated, “Nicky was always pulling that righteous shit,” he waves his cigarette, a smoky underline in the air, “it’s how he got stuck managing this shit-show. Tried to pull a Robin Hood and expose the Studio’s illegal bullshit, steal their secrets and give ‘em to the law. He got caught and he’s been working off the debt ever since. That’s how stupid he is."
Finnick jabs the burning end of the cigarette at her. “So don’t you go dragging him back.”
“Trust me, the less time we spend together the happier we’ll both be. Just make this easier for us, will you?”
Finnick harrumphs.
“...There’s this old hole-in-the-wall we used to hang in way back. Nicky never really grew out of the place. The Zoo. Heard of it?”
“Unfortunately,” Judy grimaces. "Thanks.”
She leaves him there in his garish space suit, a sad clown who knows he’s the butt of the joke.
***
It's funny how even the buildings around the Studio look like movie sets.
The Zoo is one of several bars within walking distance and by far the seediest and shadiest of the lot. Judy walks through the door already imagining gangsters trading threats at the bar, bikers fighting over the jukebox and a pool-shark dominating the old table in the corner. In reality the pool table is old and lumpy, the jukebox is dark and the only one slumped over the bar is a lonely fox looking much older than the last time she saw him.
She looks down at the criminal, the hero, the urban legend Nicholas Wilde. Without all that snark to prop him up he sags like there’s a mountain on his shoulders.
“Mr Wilde.”
He blinks blearily up at her. His eyes are red-rimmed and puffy, like he’s been crying.
“What’s a place like you doing in a girl like this?” he slurs slightly. "Wait. How the hell did you find me here?”
“I just followed your trail.”
"But I covered my trail. No-one ever finds me here.”
“Well…” she thinks back on it, uncovering the clues, piecing it together. Probably the closest to a real cop she’s ever going to get, “I uncovered it.”
“Huh,” he stares almost too long. There’s some gold, flecked in with the green of his eyes. Just like the fox on set. He shakes himself, “You thirsty?”
“A little.”
“Great, so am I. You’re paying, Little Miss Movie-star.”
Judy huffs and signals to the bartender, an old moose compulsively cleaning glasses with a rag.
“The usual please. And his.”
Nick raises an eyebrow.
“You been in here before?”
“Occasionally. I like to soak in the atmosphere.”
“Atmosphere, right, that’s what we’re calling it. Never knew a fail from the Health Department could be a selling point.”
“Watch it Wilde,” the bartender grunts, sliding their drinks across. “I’ll have you know I passed my last health inspection. And someone who spends so much time in here all on his lonesome don’t get to complain.”
“You only passed 'cause I pulled some strings. Which I maintain should've snagged me free drinks for life."
Nick's fur is unkempt and his top button undone. He looks like he’s been sleeping rough. “Anyway, Miss Hopps, what brings you…”
His jaw goes slack. Judy takes a sip of her drink.
“What?”
“Is that a… carrot martini?”
“…Maybe.”
Nick bursts out laughing.
“You know you’re a walking stereotype, right?”
“Oh, like you’re one to talk,”
“Touché. So, Carrots,” (she whacks him on the arm and he winces) “what can I do for you this fine evening?”
“Well, y’see,” Judy runs a nervous finger around the rim of her martini glass. “I just got a letter from my parents. They’re coming up to visit me next week.”
“My sympathies,” Nick sniffs, taking a practiced swig of his whiskey, “what has that got to do with me?”
“Well, I, uh – I might’ve exaggerated how big of a star I am here, and–“
Nick grins delightedly.
“You lied. Mightier-than-thou Judy Hopps lied.”
“It wasn’t a lie!” Judy protests, “More of a prediction, that’s all. I will make it.”
Nick sighs.
“Still failing to see why this should bother me.”
“Jack Savage is planning on asking me out tonight.”
(Ignore the tightness in your stomach. Make the best of it.)
“I didn’t ask for regular updates on the soap opera, Carrots. And you can’t hold that over me forever.”
“I know. I’m just reminding you that I plan to keep my end of our deal, so you could think about helping me out, since you haven’t kept yours.”
Nick stills, a felon caught in police cruiser headlights.
“You’re basing that assumption on what?”
“Call it a stab in the dark.”
“Tsk tsk, Carrots. Didn’t Mommy ever tell you not to stereotype? Oh, wait."
He takes another gulp of his whiskey.
“You’re not saying no.”
“Yeah, yeah. If I help you, will you promise to behave like a good lil’ bunny and leave me alone?”
“That depends on what you’re going to do.”
“Either you want my help, or you don’t.”
“I do want help. You just happen to be the only person I can ask.”
“Don't you trust me, Carrots?”
“… I don’t trust your methods,” she says carefully, because she honestly doesn’t know what to make of this new Nick Wilde with his ruffled fur and raw eyes and the weight of the world pressing him into the dirt. “You enable addicts.”
“The carrot’s always more effective the stick, right? You of all people should know that,” his smirk does nothing to shift the mountain on his shoulders. "Then again,” he drains his glass like a mammal dying of thirst, “shouldn’t really have expected anything more, should I?”
“Why’d you say that?” Judy snaps.
“Young, country background, got your start in soap opera. Bet the only time you ever saw a pred was when they were playing the villain on set,” he sneers.
“No. Not just on set,” Judy says quietly.
“Well, hardly matters going by the smell. Must say, you never struck me as the type to shack up with a fox, Carrots,” he taps his nose knowingly, the smirk still refusing to reach his eyes. “You sure proved me wrong.”
Judy chokes on her drink. She'd assumed the fox musk was just in her head, another after-image of Gideon
“Wha- that is not – how dare you!”
She whirls around, half expecting Him to still be there, still stalking. Nick sighs.
“… or else not so wrong. Tut tut, that is disappointing.”
“And why exactly does me not shacking up with foxes disappoint you, Nicholas?” she snaps.
Nick freezes. Judy’s brain hits the emergency brake.
“I need more alcohol for this,” Nick mutters, and moves to signal the bartender, but Judy catches his wrist.
“No,” she says firmly (hold the contact, ignore his body heat seeping into your fingers, the texture of his fur, the thrum of his heart under the skin). "Help me do this, then I’ll be out of your fur.”
He extricates himself carefully.
“Fine. Let’s get this over with.”
***
It’s almost three in the morning by the time they’re done. Judy caved to Nick’s demands for drink at about two, and now they’re both giggling in a warm haze of whiskey fumes.
“I can’t believe you think Carrot martinis are classy,” Nick sniggers.
“Yeah, well,” she catches her breath. "Country living will do that to you.”
“Thank God you escaped when you did.”
That sobers her up.
“Yeah. Yeah, I guess so,” she notices the clock and jumps. "Crackers, I’ve got to go.”
“It’s okay, Carrots,” Nick assures her with pleading paws, “you’re allowed to swear. You’re a grown-up now. I won’t tell.”
“Old habits die hard,” she pauses, coat finally on after a few false starts with the buttons, looks down at those earnest green-gold eyes and thinks, my God, this guy can act.
Option one, this is a façade, and he’s doing a damn good job of playing her.
Option two, this slightly tipsy fox with the lopsided smile is the real Nick Wilde. She doesn’t know which is scarier. “Thanks for this, Nick.”
He leans back, trying to play it cool, but she can see the embarrassment behind his mask this time. “Yeah well, sometimes even the pure and saintly have to stoop and get their paws dirty.”
“And sometimes they have to admit when they’re wrong,” she touches his paw, just barely this time, brushing the soft fur of his knuckle. “Honestly, thank you.”
He draws the paw back.
“Yeah, whatever. Y’know, maybe you’re really not as talented as you think. You bunnies just seem to come by this melodrama stuff naturally, huh?”
“Whereas you foxes specialise in being jackasses?”
He clutches his heart, the overdramatic six-year-old.
“Smartass fox, Miss Hopps, not a jackass. I'll have you know they're completely different.”
“Uh-huh. Oh and Nick, do me a favor?”
“Just one more?”
“Don’t drink alone. No-one deserves to make themselves that sad.”
The expression that washes over him is difficult to name, but his brow smooths over and his eyes sparkle, and his mouth does this funny little quirking thing that Judy decides she’d quite like to see more of in future. He’d be so embarrassed if he could see himself in the mirror.
“You realise you’re not actually my boss, right?” he says.
She smiles, relaxed and easy.
“We’ll see.”
***
The next morning Jack Savage is waiting for her on set with a bouquet of flowers and his usual cornball smile. Judy fixes on her own Cute Starlet Smile, marches up to him and tries not to think of it as an ambush.
All part of the plan.