Golden light filtered in behind the heavy curtains of a hotel room as the sun rose over downtown Zootopia, making the outline of a small gray bunny visible as she lay on a bed that was a size or two too big. From the bedside table, a phone chimed and vibrated as its alarm clock went off. The supine mammal immediately reached a paw over and shut it off, having already been awake for some time.

Ordinarily Judy was quite the morning bunny, as was expected growing up on a farm, and would have long since been awake and prepared to greet the day with enthusiasm. But today she just wasn't feeling it.

How did things go so wrong yesterday? She lamented. You dreamed of coming here for so long, and to finally get the chance to be here with Officer Wilde... And what do you do? Get yourself in trouble and almost get him fired, just because you couldn't stop yourself from being a dumb bunny...

Despite being alone with no one to see her, she pulled her ears over her face in shame. After a couple moments of screaming internally at herself, Judy sat up on the edge of the bed. Might as well get up, you DO have a train to catch, she begrudgingly conceded. The sooner you get home, the sooner you can try to forget about everything.

She went through the motions of dressing herself very robotically, wishing she had packed a more casual outfit; the dark leggings and blue shirt too closely resembled the navy of a ZPD uniform, and only made her think of Nick again. I didn't even give him a proper goodbye. I wonder if I'll ever get the chance?

Judy drew back the curtains, fully illuminating the room so she could make sure she had collected all of her belongings. The ZPD vest had been cast aside next to the entryway, she considered leaving it behind but decided against it; the hotel would just mail it back to her anyway. She tucked it under an arm and left the room.

The lobby of the Grand Zootopian Hotel was a beautiful sight to behold, the floor which appeared to be a solid slab of quartz-flaked granite causing the sound of several fountains to echo thunderously, dampened only slightly by the lush, well-pruned foliage. Just another one of many sights Judy would have marveled at were she not so emotionally encumbered.

"Checking out, Miss Hopps?" asked the concierge, a professionally-dressed deer, as Judy approached the front desk. She was slightly surprised the young buck had remembered her name, but guessed bunnies were uncommon enough as hotel guests that she stood out. Either that or his memory was just that good.

"Yes, I am," she said, passing her key card across the equally lavish marble countertop.

"Excellent," responded the cervine, "and how was your stay? Did you sleep well?"

Judy forced a smile. "Just great, thank you," she lied; she had slept only fitfully and sporadically, though it wasn't the fault of the wonderfully plush mattress or 800-thread-count linens.

The concierge bowed slightly. "Glad to hear it. Will you be requiring shuttle service this morning?"

She nodded at the buck. "That would be great, I need to get to the tr-"

"Actually, I think she'll be okay," said a familiar voice behind Judy's back. She turned and found herself looking at the comfortably smiling face of Nick Wilde.

"Nick...?" she said, stunned.

"Good morning, Carrots," he hummed softly, before waving a dismissal at the concierge. He turned his voluminous tail towards Judy, replaced his sunglasses, and clasped his forepaws behind the small of his back before sauntering towards the door. "Coming?" he asked, turning his head slightly back in the general direction of the immobilized rabbit.

She picked up her dropped jaw and scooped up her possessions before skipping up to join the navy-clad canid as he strode through the hotel's ornate doorway and onto the street. "Wait!" she called. "Nick... Not that I'm not glad to see you, but why are you here?"

"Well, silly me, with all the excitement yesterday I forgot that I still needed you to give your official statement on what happened immediately leading up to the arrest of one Duke Weaselton. Before you leave town, I need you to come with me and take care of that." Nick said easily without breaking stride.

"Shouldn't you be continuing your investigation on the missing mammal case?" Judy asked, a puzzled look on her face. "I mean, by now you only have, what, thirty-six hours left?"

"That sounds about right," Nick replied, seeming just as aloof as before. "And yes, I am continuing that investigation. I was just on my way to the location we got yesterday."

"Wait, we're not going to the police station? Surely you don't want me to keep following you around at this Mystic Spring Oasis, whatever that is?" Judy said, looking at Nick a little more intently.

Nick cocked his head to the side. "Well, I guess you could, if you really, really wanted to... But it's not exactly a place for a cute little bunny."

"Don't call me cute." Judy said, with firmness but also a hint of amusement as she began to realize what was happening. "Well, if I'm going to have to take time to give you an official statement, I'll have to cancel my train ticket. It leaves in just half an hour."

"Already done, Fluff, I called them this morning," Nick said, flicking his tail.

"You planned this whole thing, didn't you, Slick?" accused Judy, planting her heels and giving Nick a wry grin.

The fox stopped as well, whipping the mirrored shades off his face and placing his paws on his knees as he did an about-face. He thrust his nose within an inch of hers, and gave her a wink. "It's called a hustle, sweetheart."

Judy beamed back at the smug vulpine. "I didn't think you'd want to have anything more to do with me after yesterday."

"Well, at first I didn't. But what happened wasn't entirely your fault. Besides, it's not like I can be in any more trouble. I might as well let my junior detective finish her ride-along." Nick stopped in front of a three-wheeled, open-cab cart adorned with ZPD livery parked on the street, gesturing for Judy to get in. "Your ride, madam."

"What's this? What happened to your car?" Judy asked, surprised.

"Like I said, I couldn't really be in any more trouble." Nick answered. "Technically, I'm on parking duty. So we get to take the joke-mobile."

"They expect you to write parking tickets while you search for Otterton?" Judy frowned. "That's hardly fair."

Nick momentarily adopted a bitter look. "Yeah, well, the chief doesn't really expect me to be able to make this 48-hour deadline, either. I'll just have to prove him wrong. Let's go! And you can go ahead and put that vest back on."

The cart's engine sputtered to life, protesting heavily as Nick pushed on the accelerator pedal and turned in the direction of Sahara Square.

The Mystic Spring Oasis sat just inside the boundary of Zootopia's desert district. It was encircled by a decorative stucco wall perforated with arched windows too high up for any mammal to see through, while a heavy wooden door guarded its sole entry; the whole structure had clearly weathered many a desert sandstorm. The main door towered several feet over Nick and Judy's heads, clearly sized for the city's largest inhabitants. Even above that hung a painted sign with the establishment's name written in a curvy serif script. A smaller door more appropriate to mammals of their size was inset at the bottom, and it creaked slightly as Nick pushed it inward.

As the door swung back, the pungent aroma of exotic incense washed over the pair. Light inside was sparse, what little illumination there was came mainly from a small skylight in the center of the foyer's ceiling and a circular pane of stained glass in the wall behind the room's sole occupant, a yak sitting in the lotus position on a dais behind the front desk. Steps across the room were muted by a thick, ornate rug that spanned the floor, meeting up with similarly patterned tapestries hung from the walls.

A buzzing emanated from the cross-legged bovine, whose wild mane was twisted into dreadlocks that obscured everything above his nose except for the tips of his horns. As Judy got closer, she could see the source of the noise; at least a hundred flies were orbiting the yak's cranium, but he was also humming a meditative 'om' which was increasing in volume as he sat oblivious to the approach of the two smaller mammals.

"Hey... You awake, buddy?" Nick spoke up softly, his voice drowned out by a further crescendo of humming. Judy stepped forward to the counter, ears perked up high as she looked curiously at the yak. Nick tried to speak up once again, "hey there Yax, just have a quick question for you."

Wow, maybe Nick really does know everybody, Judy thought to herself on hearing Nick utter the name. She was going to ask him about it, but then Yax raised his cloven hands and parted the hair from in front of his eyes, causing the local insects to take flight. He looked down in front of him with a droopy, easygoing expression and caught sight of the bunny that had pushed up to the counter. "Hi!" Judy said with a slight wave on making eye contact.

"Oh, I'm gonna hit the pause button right there," Yax droned in a voice that sounded like a continuation of his hum. "We're all good on Bunny Scout cookies."

"Uhhh, no..." Judy said, her smile dropping into a more neutral expression.

From behind, Nick pushed down Judy's ears to make himself visible. "Actually, she's with me," he interjected, "we're here on ZPD business. We're looking for an otter that may have frequented this establishment." Nick passed the picture of Otterton.

Yax took the photo, and as he looked it over his eyes grew a touch wider. "Ohhh..." he said, as Judy began smiling again. "...CHOOOO!" The yak sneezed powerfully, causing his whole head to shake which momentarily scattered a cloud of flying insects.

"Oh yeah, old Emmitt!" Yax said, regaining his composure as a large fraction of the bug population endeavored to reclaim their homes within the yak's shaggy mane. "Haven't seen him in a couple of weeks. You should talk to his yoga instructor, I can take you out back."

Judy looked back at Nick expecting a response, but the fox simply gestured her forward to take the lead, a somewhat disconcerting smirk on his face. She turned back to Yax, who had stepped down from the dais and begun moving towards the inner door.

"Oh, yes, that would be wonderful, and..." she stopped mid-sentence, having just caught a direct view of Yax's bare posterior. "OOH you are naked!" she exclaimed, spinning around in recoil and shielding her peripheral vision with her paws.

Yax, meanwhile, was nonplussed. "Huh? Oh, for sure! We're a naturalist club," he said as he lifted the latch on the door to the courtyard.

Judy felt a hot breath across her ear as Nick spoke directly into it in a low voice; she hadn't noticed the fox sneaking so close. "Yeah, in Zootopia, anyone can be anything. These guys, they be naked."

With a heave, the heavy wooden door was pushed open and unfettered daylight once again streamed inside. Yax stepped out into the oasis, and motioned into the distance. "Nangi is just on the other side of the Pleasure Pool," he drawled.

Judy turned back to look out the open door into the afternoon sunlight, and her little jaw dropped farther than she had ever thought possible. All across the courtyard, mammals of all types were lounging around in their bare fur. A panther groomed herself with her tongue, several varieties of bear were scratching their bodies against the rough bark of palm trees; elsewhere a group of pigs wallowed in a mud pit, a rather mismatched set of opponents played volleyball, and many more mammals simply laid out on rocks to sun themselves. Throughout the club, not a shred of cloth was to be seen other than what was worn by one sly fox and dumbstruck bunny.

Once again Nick leaned in close to Judy's ear. "Does this make you uncomfortable? I warned you, Carrots." he teased with a sing-song cadence. She glared at the self-satisfied fox, and marched off after Yax. Nick watched Judy's head dart back and forth with great amusement as she would catch sight of a nude mammal and avert her gaze, only to find herself looking at yet another.

"Some say the naturalist life is weird, but you know what I think is weird? Clothes on animals!" Yax said to no one in particular as he continued on his path. On the far side of the compound past the fountain and pool, an elephant adorned with henna designs was stretched out as she led several other mammals in a yoga routine. "You see, Nangi is an elephant, so she'll totally remember!" Yax said, turning back to Nick and a thoroughly mortified Judy.

"Hey Nangi," the yak called upwards. "These guys have some questions about Emmitt the otter."

The elephant unwound herself enough to look down at her coworker. "Who?"

"Uh, Emmitt Otterton? He's been coming to your yoga classes for like, six years." Yax said.

Nangi curled her trunk as she shut her eyes to prepare for another stretch. "I have no memory of this beaver."

Nick held up the picture. "Actually, he's an otter," he offered.

"Yeah, he was here a couple Wednesdays ago. He was wearing a green knit sweater and a paisley tie with a sweet windsor knot. Real tight." Yax said with an approving nod. "Remember that, Nangi?"

Nick nudged Judy with an elbow, breaking her loose from her shell shock. He held a paw up to his ear to indicate he wanted her to listen to what was happening as he took a notepad from his belt and began writing in it with the carrot pen he was still carrying.

"No," the elephant harrumphed, contorting into a new pose.

Yax continued despite the unfavorable reactions from the pachyderm. "Yeah, and when he left he got into this big ol' white car with silver trim. It needed a tune-up, the third cylinder wasn't firing."

Nick tapped the babbling yak on the arm. "Hey, don't mean to stop you big guy, but I don't suppose you caught the plate number?" he said, coolly as ever.

The mammal's eyes lit up behind his scruffy locks. "Oh, for sure! It was 2-9-THD-0-3."

Judy raised an eyebrow as Nick gave her a grin before looking back up. "Thank you sir, you have been more than helpful. Really, you're too kind."

Yax turned a reverent look to the disinterested yogi. "I told you Nangi has a mind like a steel trap! I wish I had a memory like an elephant..."

"All done, Carrots! We got what we came for. I'm ready to go, unless you'd like to stick around for a little while to take in the sights..." Nick said, pocketing the notebook and pen. Judy just glowered at him.

The sun was beating down from just a little further West as Nick and Judy exited the front doors of the Mystic Spring Oasis once more. Judy released a breath she hadn't realized she was holding upon seeing the empty street outside devoid of any further nudity, and glanced up at Nick.

"A warning might have been nice," she said, her voice as dry as the desert air around them.

"What, and spoil the fun?" Nick laughed. "I did tell you it wasn't really a place for a bunny like you. It was another good lesson on police work anyway, you've got to expect the unexpected. You aren't just writing tickets and chasing down onion-thieving weasels every day."

Judy grumbled her reluctant agreement. "Well, you've got that plate number now anyway. Do you just call it in?"

"Yeah..." Nick said, retrieving his notebook. Then his self-confident expression faded into one of irritation as he remembered what Clawhauser had told him that morning. "...Or that's what you'd do normally. I'm still locked out of the ZPD system, so as far as resources go right now, I've pretty much got none. Spots tried to get it fixed, but he says it looked like somebody at the mayor's office locked me out by accident so he couldn't do anything."

"Aren't vehicle registrations public record? I thought any moron could run a plate," Judy said with a sarcastic head tilt.

"Are you offering?" Nick asked with a smirk. "Actually, I just remembered I have a friend at the DMV..."

I can't believe this story is about to break 10,000 views and 200 followers! All I can really say is thank you!

~FoxStang

The cover image is used with permission, and is copyright of user "sweetmarshmella" on DeviantArt.