Nick hated the weather in the rainforest district. There was always rain. Nick liked the rain, for it let him have time to think. But there was too much of it in the District. Rain let him think about how life was, is, and will be. He also thought about his new job. The academy was something else, but being on the force gave meaning to Nick's life. Speaking of his job,

"Hey, Carrots," Nick said to his new partner.

"God! I've been staking out for far too long!" exclaimed Judy. "We're partners now and I need you helping me watch for the van, Nick! Stop sleeping on the job!"

"Calm down, Carrots. The van has been a no-show for 2 hours."

"It's been 4, you dumb fox." Judy explained. Nick spit out his coffee all over the dashboard of the cruiser.

"Why didn't you wake me?!" Nick almost yelled at her. He immediately saw Judy's face of alarm and horror and immediately realized that he didn't mean to say it so harshly. "I-I'm sorry Judy. I didn't mean it to sound harsh."

"I'm just messing with you, you dumb fox." Judy replied, giggling. "You should have seen the look on your face! Ha!" Nick blushed a very deep crimson, praying that it wasn't showing through is fur. If Judy had noticed, she didn't let on. "And the reason I didn't wake you is because you look c-" Nick immediately noticed that Judy had her eyes focused on something in the distance. Her ears shot straight up, causing Nick to look in the same direction. And there it was. The van was pulling up in front of the warehouse they (or more like Judy) were staking out. Nick knew that Judy could not see the van nearly as well as Nick, because of the darkness outside of the warm cruiser.

"I figured that Buffalo-Butt didn't mean 30 minutes, so I grabbed these for you," Nick said, pulling a rather small pair of night-vision goggles out of the glove compartment, still dripping wet from the coffee.

"Umm, here. Let's trade," Judy said to Nick, holding out a stack of napkins with the Bugga-Burger logo plastered on each of them.

"Thanks," Nick replied, trading Judy. He cleaned up his mess. Nick opened the door and ran to the nearest trash can to throw away the napkins. As he turned around, he realized he was not alone. He was about to kindly say 'hello' when he saw the leopard holding a gun to its head. "Woah buddy, calm down," Nick said, holding his hands up, showing he meant no harm. "You don't have to do this."

"Yes I do," the leopard said.

"No you don't, there are people who care for you," Nick thought of quickly. He hadn't been trained to do anything like this. He took a step forward, causing the leopard to shout,

"I'm going to do it, or I'm going to make you do it for me," he said, pointing the gun at Nick. Nick reached for his tranquilizer, but it was nowhere to be found. Damn. He only had his lethal semi-auto pistol on him. He did not dare pull that out, though. The leopard turned the gun to his head and pulled the trigger, letting out a massive bang. Nick woke with a start, startling his wife from her peaceful slumber.