The opening for this is also the one page comic Touch the Fox http://www.furaffinity.net/full/20855088/

Soon, all the broken or bloody bits were tended to. Nick sat, looking very awkward with all his splinted paws and a cast on his left arm, wearing a hugely over-size surgical scrub top. "Carrots" He began both mournful and very embarrassed, "While we've been partners and good friends for a while now, I may find I may need some help, very much above and beyond, and possibly - ah -soon."

Judy took a beat to get what he was suggesting, then shrugged, "After years of way too many younger siblings to help take care of, I think I can manage my own little cub."

Anlef chuckled, carefully with her own wounds, behind her paw.

Judy helped Nick get up, as he was still a bit shocky for the ordeal and they tottered to the bathroom.

Anlef considered the unlikely pair with a wane smile. The mission might be something of a failure, but she had found some good mammals from it. A welcome relief from the usual suspects.

In a while they returned, Nick looked mortified and Judy had a goofy grin. Anlef cocked her head quizzically.

"I got to touch a Fox!" She beamed, clearly in an effort to embarrass Nick ever so.

The Cat was still puzzled, "I though you were already a couple?"

The pair exchanged shocked expressions, "Oh, no no no! Not That kind of a couple. We've been partners and groomers and, I'd guess you'd call it cuddle buddies, but..." Judy was blushing ever so, made more obvious with her current dye job.

"Beyond the obvious affront to the laws of nature and society," Nick added dryly, "Why spoil a good thing with all that icky sticky stuff?" He gave his Bunny an adoring gaze.

Anlef shrugged.

Another agent entered the room and whispered something to Anlef. She turned to the pair, "I have a thing, but will be back in a bit." The agent pulled over a wheelchair and she gave it a dirty look, but after she got up, clearly trying to power through the pain, she sighed and surrendered to the assistance.

"See, I told you we've become a bad influence." Nick observed. He had earlier observed in mock surprise that Anlef had any reaction to being shot, along with any number of snarks about her stoic disposition in general.

Anlef shot Nick a hot glance, then softened and grinned. And as her accent was similar, was able to do a perfect "I'll be back." with a wink.

"Cuddle buddy?" Nick gave Judy a look.

"Well...? What else would you call it?"

"There is, no doubt, some clinical description of the social bonding and emotional comforting of a physical embrace."

A couple of hours later, Anlef returned to find the pair curled up in one of the larger chairs together. She smiled as warmly as she could muster and was rolled up to them. Motioning her assistant to leave, she softly called to them. "Hello, cuddle buddies".

Judy, who had been not quiet dozing, smiled in return, doubly so in seeing her much happier face. She made a sign to keep it quite, as Nick was noisily asleep, his jaw slack and drooling across her shoulder.

"Fox drool." Anlef made a face.

"I've had worse. What's up? And are you okay, you look terrible."

"Just very, very tired," but the smile returned.

"Some good news. In the material I picked up from the bad guys, we got lucky. They were mostly very careful about having anything that could link them in any way with the PDR. Identity papers to Zootopia or neutral third countries. Cheap burn 'phones with no history on them.

But. The leader also had a little smart 'phone that he was using as a little personal log. No calls on it, just little entries. He seems to have fancied himself a bit of a poet and along with some "poetry" that would make a Vogon weep, we found little hints of where he was and what he was doing. He was careful to not say too much, but we have a pretty good picture of his movements for the last couple months.'

"How do you know that isn't just some deep disinformation?"

That is always a concern, but we feel we can afford to use it for now." And Judy noticed that Anlef, even as wretched as she seemed, was yet genuinely happy over something. "So, I have some news that I think your Fox Kit will want to hear with you."

Nick woke with a start, gasping "No, not the spoon!" then shook himself more awake, only to be reminded that he needed to be more careful moving in his current condition. "Owie!" Then as he focused, "Ah, is that a smile, a real smile? I know you secret agents are trained in all kinds of disguises and stuff, but is that a real happy kitty I see?"

Anlef hissed and bared her teeth. Then recovered in an instant, shame faced. "I am soo sorry. I would like to blame it on being over-tired and do not do pain meds, so it really hurts, but I ought to be better than that." Her paws only slowly relaxed from angry fists. "That can be a bit of a trigger word...."

It was now clear that she was very much running on fumes, her earlier smile was likely that last scrap of positive energy she had left. At this point, she just tried to concentrate to get her words out. "With what we've got, it looks like this part of the mission was at least a partial success. The leader and his team seem to have been the very ones who attacked you Father. We had suspected he may have involved in some way, but now we are very confident that he was personally responsible and his crew, the ones we shot, were the ones who actually did the deed."

Judy's paws clenched and unclenched and her face flickered through several emotions, settling on vague disappointment. "I was hoping for more, vengeance, accomplishment, justice, closure, maybe."

"Be glad you helped stop them in any case. Maybe without satisfaction, but that's not what the job is about, right?" Nick pressed his splinted paw to her arm. "Making the world a better place is for their sake, not ours."

Judy gave Nick a wane smile. "How did you ever get so clever, dumb fox?" And leaned into him so he could drape his arm, carefully, around her.

"I dunno, hanging out with a clever Bunny?" And as he considered, "Ya know, those were some real super spy moves you pulled early on." He looked over to Anlef for confirmation. She just rolled her eyes. But he also noticed she had a wobble to her, she was clearly deeply exhausted.

"Carrots, I think we need to get our favorite spook to bed, eh?"

Anlef tried to object, but had to concede that the all-species size hospital bed was calling her. With careful help from Judy, and a bit from Nick, while his paws were a wreak, he insisted his right arm still worked, they help hoist her up. She was heavier than she looked.

Judy gave the Cat a little paw squeeze, "Thanks for everything." As she looked back to Nick.

Anlef just grunted, she had an image to maintain. To which, Nick did an exaggeration of her eye roll, and the two exchanged a little smile.

In short order, Anlef was asleep. Nick and Judy stood nearby, holding each other and watched the Cat. Her face had only then lost the tension and pain that seemed to be so much of her.

"Poor thing. She said that she had come to Zootopia after loosing everything but her military background." Nick pulled Judy closer.

"I'm surprised Mara told you even that." A lanky Cougar came into the room. "I'm - a co-worker. Agents usually can't afford to reveal too much about themselves. The less is known, the less can be anticipated kind of thing." His voice and face were carefully neutral.

"Her name is Mara?"

"Mara Alphonova Anlef. And she lost more than everything. Genocide is hard to prove for an obscure and disregarded minority in a far away land. And she wasn't always a soldier back then." He glanced to Judy, "When she was just a bit younger than you, she was, for a short time, a wife and mother too."

Judy gasped in shock, while Nick hugged her tight, cast and paw splints be damned, and pressed his muzzle to her head.

"She has been alone in so many ways for a long time. Too long with only the next mission for company." He then looked over to the pair and raised an eyebrow. "However, there is nothing formal that could preclude her from having a social life. I'm not suggesting anything, except to say that you need not feel that you not be receptive to any advance she might make."

Nick made a face. "What is with you guys? Its all bloodthirsty spook secrets, and now we're all candid warm and fuzzy."

Judy whipped around in shocked surprise. "Not here and not now!"

The Cougar sighed. "No, ma'm, it's a fair question. Nick, you saw who we're up against, and know what's at stake. So, we make hard choices about what we have to do and how we have to do it. It's hard to turn that off, especially for someone like Mara." He looked at Judy again. "She wasn't drawn to it, no ambition for a higher purpose, it was forced on her. Tragically, she found she was very good at it." He then focused on Nick. "You likely saw her scars. Lots of close combat, hand-to-hand."

Judy gave Nick a questioning look. "I'll tell you more later." He promised.

"Yeah, and a lot were from big preds, but she never showed any magic Kung-Fu moves or anything."

"That was part of her talent. In close combat, everyone tends to go a little -savage- , paws on instead of a weapon. But, especially as most of her opponents were bigger, she always fought smart, not hard. 'Lead and steel beats tooth and claw every time' was her unspoken motto. Some might get close enough to get a paw on her, but never had a chance for a follow through."

Nick and Judy shared a "Yikes."

"Even worse, in the end, she's come to feel this is all she can do." For the first time, the Cougar showed a wane smile, "Though she can't sing or play an instrument, she has music in her heart. I've peeked at her personal stuff, all in the name of security, you understand, and she's actually a good composer and lyricists."

"So, even while we put those we care for in harm's way, we still do care about them. "

"Of course, you can't let on you know any of this, she's intensely private, but I feel you ought to have some context up front, just in case. Don't try to reach out; she's too wounded and suspicious for anything like that. But if you can, I'd hope you'd be there for her if she tries to reach out for you."

"Well, that's my good deed for the day." The big Cat looked relieved. "You guys did pretty good by the mission, we'll see how good in time. And that you're the first informal partners with Mara that she hasn't wanted to kill by the end of the day says a lot about you and how you've helped her."

As he turned to leave, Nick asks. "Uhm, about the practical matters of the moment, what, where, and for how long?"

"oh? Oh! Yeah. You've already had a de-brief and transportation is being arranged, but you're kind of stuck here for another few hours. Don't really have any sleeping arrangements that you could access. That hospital bed is huge and she wouldn't mind."

They had tried the chair, with regrets, and then looked over to Anlef, Mara, looking rather small on the expanse of white. As she was right in the middle, Nick and Judy decided it prudent to be on either side of her. Enough elbow room for everyone without risking getting too close to the edge. They gave each other a last strong and lingering hug before climbing up and on to sleep.

Hours later.

Anlef woke up; biological process didn't care how cozy she was feeling, even with the burning of her wound. There had even been times as a wee kitten when she almost considered risking wetting herself just a little to easy the pressure rather than break out of a particularly scrumptious cuddle. None of that now, of course, but it was soo nice, with that warm pillow - ?! She then realized she had a bunny for her head and a fox at her back. "Cuddle buddies," she whispered, shaking her head. The pain, once she started moving, was awful, but she was able to get the job done with only the occasional spasms that left her wheezing and dizzy.

As she considered the long and treacherous trip back across the room to the bed, she realized Dave was there too, ready with a wheelchair.

"You have to be moved now," the Cougar whispered. "They're all set to go separately."

As he approached she signaled him to wait, and she shuffled over to the bed. The pair of them were still fast asleep, but had shifted to seek each other out and were in the process of a new cuddle. She leaned over to kiss the foolish Fox, ever so gently on the forehead. The pain left her panting. She then hobbled around the bed to do the same for the silly Bunny, though she almost cried out as she did so. Dave helped her back off the bed and into the wheelchair.

"You shouldn't have done that."

"Some sacrifices are worth it, though I think I may have broken something. Are any of the med staff available?"

"We'll find someone."