These Guys? They Be Naked

(ooc: April 6th. Open to anyone who wants to interact with Nick and Judy. Nick and Judy's introduction thread.)

"So this is the pridelands..."

Judy had stepped out of the vehicle she and Nick used to get them there, and she took a moment to look around. It looked like something out of the natural history museum, if the rabbit officer was being quite honest. But this was where Chief Bogo had said they needed to go. She trusted the chief's instincts. After all, he hadn't exactly steered either herself or Nick wrong before. If this was where the investigation needed to happen, then this was where they would go. So, Judy motioned for Nick to follow her and started to walk toward the camp entrance.

"Come on. The first thing we need to do is find someone who can help us get started here," Judy said. Ideally, that would have been whoever was in charge of the little operation. But right then, Judy didn't know exactly who was in charge. She had written down all the information on the case that Bogo had provided, but it didn't directly say who they were looking for. The only name Judy had gotten was 'Simba,' and that could have been anybody. Well, there was no sense in just standing around. They had a case to begin working on. So Judy continued to move forward, and purple eyes darted from one direction to another in an effort to find someone that could help them.

So far, Judy wasn't seeing much of anyone around. Maybe everyone was busy? The day was hot, and there was a good chance that the supposed heroes were out and about doing whatever they were meant to be doing. Well, the little rabbit officer was a bit perturbed by this. She'd hoped to find someone who could give them some information.

"That's strange... Where is everyone?" Judy wondered out loud. She decided to try something a moment later. What could it possibly hurt?

"Hello?" Judy called. "Officer Hopps of the ZPD here. I was hoping my partner and I could find someone who could tell us if they knew anything about some missing animals?"

She was a hyper little thing. He knew this but Nick couldn't help but pant as the rabbit bounded ahead of him. His ears flicked straight up as he stared towards the place they'd landed. Soon after his sunglasses were flicked out of his pocket. He placed them on his nose, shielding himself from the insane sun. He dipped his nose down towards the rabbit as she called out. He shook his head.

"Yeah," he scoffed, "A widdle bunny shouting out in a land filled with things with teeth for help. Judy, we...are not in Zootopia anymore." He flicked his phone out of his pocket and gave a grunt. "Clearly. I have no bars. How are we supposed to communicate with the Chief if we can't even get a proper signal?"

He leaned to the side, placing the phone back in his pocket. He flanked Judy a bit closer in case he had to attack one of these savage jungle beasts. He wondered if Carrots had read up on what kind of critters they'd be dealing with.

Nudity on their part would be the least of Judy's problems if what he read was the truth.

She had thought...

For half a moment, seeing the distant shape of another fox moving about the camp, Vixey had thought of Tod. It was a stupid thought, she knew; still, the sight had been enough to start her padding in the other's direction. Perhaps he was a newcomer, because she was certain there were no other foxes around the camp besides her, Robin and Marian - and Vixey figured that he a stranger might be glad to see someone of his own species here.

The new fox didn't, however seem to be alone. Before Vixey could reach him, she heard the voice calling out an introduction - what on earth did ZPD mean, though? - and the fox had moved in its direction. Apparently, he and this Officer Hopps were together?

Not that there was much unusual about that; not everyone who came to the war arrived on their own.

At least, there wasn't much unusual until she caught on to the fact that his companion was a rabbit.

For herself, Vixey had never been much for eating small animals. She could, it was true, and she hunted mice on occassion to supliment her diet; for the most part, however, Vixey had always lived a life that was more in harmony with the rest of the animals around her. Her main diet, ever since she'd dug her own burrow in the game preserve, had been fish; she wouldn't really have considered a bunny as a snack. But she knew other foxes most likely would have, so this pairing surprised her some.

The fact that they both seemed to be wearing human clothes didn't even strike Vixey as odd by this point. Marian wore them all the time, for one; and while it had at first confused Vixey, she hadn't let it worry her for long. Now, she didn't even bat an eyelid at it--

Nor did she consider that they might see her lack of clothes as weird.

"Well, hi!"

With the return of the sun, Vixey had quickly started to return to her usual chirpy self. Even with Tod's physical absence in life, she still knew he was with her in some ways; and it was impossible to feel too down when the savannah was once again bathed in the light and warmth that had been absent for so long. As such, it was with a very cheery tone she addressed the unlikely duo. Her bushy tail curled lightly around her hind paws as she stopped before them.

"Um, gee, I'm not sure how much I know about missing animals, but I've been around here for a while. If I can help at all...?"

By that point, Judy was more or less used to Nick's personality being the polar opposite of her own. That didn't stop her from rolling her eyes a little at his comment about her calling out into the general area being a bad idea. Maybe it wasn't the most brilliant tactic, but what else could they do? It wasn't like they had any idea of who this Simba was and where to find him. All they could do was go on what they knew and hope that someone would be able to help them.

His comment about there not being any signal in the area did spark some interest, though. That wasn't a good thing. How were they meant to report back about anything they found if they couldn't get in contact with the ZPD to begin with?

"Seriously?" Judy asked. She reached into her own pocket and retrieved her phone a moment later. Sure enough, Nick was right. There were no bars on the signal portion of her phone. Great. Now what were they supposed to do? They had no way to contact Bogo if something happened, and no idea of who to actually look for in the strange new territory. Well... Judy wasn't one to give up. She never had known when to quit. Not even when she was a child had she been able to take a hint to give up... Especially in the face of accomplishing her dreams. So, Judy decided to keep rolling with it. What was the worst that could happen.

"Okay. So we have no way to contact the chief," Judy said. "We can still make this work. I mean, it's not like it's the end of the world if we can't get a signal. And back to your first comment... Do you really think I don't know that? We have to at least try to find someone to help us here. I seriously doubt we're going to find animals that would behave like our ancestors did." Judy would have said more, and she did want to, but her ear twitched at the sound of a voice coming from nearby. Thank goodness. They had found someone to help them after all! From the sound of it, it was a female. Maybe she knew something.

"Oh, thank goodness," Judy said. She turned from Nick to see where the voice had come from. But the rabbit didn't immediately focus on the appearance of their would be helper. Judy was more focused on getting information than taking in the newcomer's appearance right then.

"Hello yourself. I'm Judy Hopps, this is my partner Nick, and we were hoping that maybe someone around here might be able to help us with a caaaaAH-"

Naked. The fox that had approached them was completely devoid of clothing. Judy recoiled, much like she had when first interacting with the yak back at the Mystic Springs Oasis, and she covered her eyes for a moment. She was certain that Vixey was a nice enough fox, of course. Judy had no issues with foxes, as Nick was one and he was her partner. But the fact that Vixey wasn't wearing any clothing was a tad bit disconcerting.

"Oh, you are naked. I am so sorry," Judy said as quickly as she could manage.

“Carrots, sometimes I think you might be a tad too optimistic for your own fluffy good.” He sighed as he shook his head. "We don't even know anything about the missing animals. We should find the guy in charge...this...Simba guy. He should be able to point us towards whatever the hay's going on here." And then they could leave, he thought to himself. 

Nick dusted the African wind off of his shirt. Dusty landscape was dusty. He wasn't a fan already of this horrible grassland. No cell signals, no restaurants, no nothing. The voice that echoed on the air was clearly female. He turned to face the woman speaking and…

...Oh boy.

His ears folded back, dropping slightly at his side. Before Judy noticed, he certainly did. Nick wasn’t all that uncomfortable with nude animals. He’d hustled a few of the creatures at the spa before. But THIS was a fox. And a female fox. And Nick was a guy. So as guilty as he felt he stared a bit longer than he should have.

Though he turned an amused grin at Judy’s reaction. “See, Fluff, toldya we weren’t in Zootopia anymore.” And she walked on four legs? This was going to be weird. He peered at the female over his sunglasses, lowering them slightly.

“Hi, sweetheart, how’re you doing?” He whistled, his charm back on after the initial shock of seeing Vixey’s nudity on display, “
We're looking for someone to help us out here and I think YOU would just be the perfect one to do so." He leaned down slightly to her level making him parallel with Hopps. 

"Do you know someone named Simba?" He asked, eyes still dipping over his sunglasses slightly. 

Naked...?

That was weird to her? Or... to both of them, even? Vixey couldn't fail to miss the male checking her out; although it hardly seemed like anything indecent to her. Still, her dark-brown eyes followed his gaze for a moment before she looked back at the two of them, head canted in distinct puzzlement. Both new animals looked as though they were seeing something distinctly odd and - in the bunny's case particularly - unnerving to them, and Vixey just couldn't see why.

"Gee, um... I didn't know that was an issue?"

She wasn't in the least bit abashed about being naked, of course. Just... very confused. She wasn't part of some naturalist club or anything - Vixey literally just didn't know otherwise. In the world she had grown up in, clothes just weren't a thing; and even after she'd learnt that humans were rather partial to them, it would never have crossed Vixey's mind to try wearing any herself.

Much less that there were some animals out there who'd think she needed to.

Of the three of them - the flustered fox, shocked bunny and confused vixen - the male was the one to recover first. Vixey didn't miss the fact that he seemed to be coming onto her a little bit too fast, but aside from a slight arched eyebrow, made no acknowledgement of the fact. Quite aside from her apparent nakedness, which Vixey wouldn't even have given the slightest thought to until that moment, the two animals sounded like they needed some assistance. The russet female shook off her confusion and nodded.

"Oh! Oh, well, I know of him. He's the king around here, but..."

She hesitataed for a moment. She didn't want to sound like she was bad-mouthing their ruler straight off, not when she didn't know many - or any - details of what was occupying him so, but all the same... if they were asking after the king, then they needed to know, right?

"Ah, we don't really see a lot of him. I mean, he usually keeps to himself more than anything."

"Nick!"

When Judy finally was able to look again, she saw Nick looking straight at Vixey and with absolutely no shame. He was speaking in that smooth tone of voice that she knew all too well. Frankly, Judy was pretty surprised at that much. How could he be so calm about the fact that he was looking at a lady like that? Never mind that Nick was completely used to interacting with naturalists at the spa. He'd probably done his fair share of hustling there. But she couldn't believe this was actually happening. The rabbit raised a paw to bat at one of his ears in a sort of scolding manner, for she didn't actually want to hurt him this time, and only realized moments later that he actually was getting information.

Oh. Well, okay, Judy could excuse that much. But she still couldn't get over the fact that he was looking at Vixey the way he was. He could be so... So... Well, Judy didn't know what the appropriate word for it would be. But she did know that she wasn't exactly fond of it. As was evidenced by her tapping her foot against the ground at a rather quick pace moments later.

"You can't just look at a lady like that," Judy scolded. But it occurred to her, too, that Vixey didn't seem to be bothered by this much in the slightest. Huh. Maybe she was used to living the sort of naturalist lifestyle. When Judy realized this, she looked back at Vixey and tilted her head to the side a bit. But there was no time for questions. Vixey was providing them an answer about Simba, and Judy was quick to at least try to take it in. So Simba was the king of the area in question. That was good for a start, but... Apparently he didn't mingle among the commoners that often? That was a little bothersome.

"I see," Judy said at last. "Do you know where he might be right now? We were sent here to help find some missing animals, and any amount of information we can get would be great." Though considering what Vixey had said earlier, maybe it wasn't going to be that easy. If she didn't know about any missing animals, then who else might have? Simba could probably provide information, though. Judy was sure of that much.

"...Oh, right. Sorry. We didn't ask your name, did we?" At least Judy seemed to slowly be getting over the fact that, technically speaking, Vixey was naked.

"Nick!" "Ow!"

Nick was snapped out of his trance as Judy batted at his ear. His sunglasses jiggled down on his nose, his orbs narrowed behind them. "You can't just look at a lady like that,"

"Hey! She's a naked female fox, what do you expect me to do?" He hissed in a whisper, straightening his tie. He folded his sunglasses into his pocket as Judy approached the female fox. Trying to keep his eyes on the vixen's eyes, Nick just nodded along with what Judy was saying. Oh right, they hadn't asked her name! How stupid of him, he groaned inwardly, how could he just oggle her and not ask her name? Hanging out with Judy was making him lose his tact. He waved his hand towards her.

"Hang on carrots, maybe it'd be good to meet some of the other animals here," he said with a whistle, "If this so called king of the jungle doesn't mingle among the common folk, perhaps following miss...ah, I'm sorry, sweetheart, I didn't catch your name." He went to hold out his hand to shake the vixen's dainty paw but he pulled it back. If she didn't wear pants or a skirt, it could stand to reason she didn't know what a handshake was either.

However, in the non smooth talking part of his brain he was thinking...if this girl didn't know the animals were missing did anyone? Was it like the missing predator case before? Or something worse?

Cassie noticed the trio near the entrance to the camp. One of them, Vixey if she remembered correctly, she'd met a couple times before, mostly in passing. The other two were new though.
With a small wag of her tail, the pale Labrador happily walked over with the intent to welcome them.

She hovered just within earshot for a few moments, not wanting to rudely butt into the middle of a conversation. Her ears perked as she listened, the pup's curiosity outweighing the fact that most would conciser eavesdropping to be rude. She tilted her head as she heard something about missing animals. She'd not heard anything like that before, what was going on?

She decided to make her presence known, if they hadn't noticed her already, it wouldn't surprise her if the rabbit had heard her approach, with those large ears. Her tail casually swished back and forth as she padded over, standing a few paw steps away from the three of them and giving a friendly smile
"Hello there."

They really were making a big deal out of this, weren't they?

Vixey didn't catch the whispered words between them, of course; but she wasn't so oblivious that she couldn't catch the gist of it. They were still on about her apparent 'nakedness'; and Vixey still found herself weirded out by that. They were acting like she wasn't the more normal one here...

She shook her head slightly, lovely dark eyes still regarding the two, but didn't make any comment. Not that she might not have had something more to say, if the conversation had stayed where it was... but the duo were talking to her again, asking more about Simba, other animals, missing animals - and, at length, her own name. Any other conversation, the russet female might have been wondering when that would come up--

Here and now, however, she'd been just as preoccupied as the other two.

"Oh! It's Vixey."

She had an idea of the names of the other two already - the bunny had initially called herself Hopps and had addressed her companion as Nick - but Vixey figured she would let them make their own proper introductions if they wanted. She left a brief pause for them to do just that, or to at least respond to her name, before adding on some answers.

"Oh, well, Simba will probably be up in the cave at Pride Rock. All the lions live up there, anyway; only he doesn't leave it very often."

She gave a little bit of a shrug at that. Simba had come under much criticism from other members of the army for his apparent tendency to shut himself away from the rest of the world and the war, but Vixey supposed he might have had his reasons for it. She wouldn't pretend to know, or pretend that she herself wasn't a bit disillusioned with him too; but there was always that chance, at least.

"But, um, say, maybe I could help if you tell me who's missing? It's been kinda hard to keep track on who's around and who isn't recently, but I work in the medical tent so I know a lot of the faces around here. I might be able to tell you something?"



((ooc: I STILL THINK JUDY NEEDS TO TRY AND TEACH VIXEY ABOUT WEARING CLOTHES AT SOME POINT AND VIXEY JUST GETS VERY CONFUSED xDDDD))

(YES. YES SHE DOES. xD)

"I expect you to show some common decency and not stare at her like you've never seen a female fox before!" Judy hissed in return. She honestly couldn't believe him. One would think that Nick had never seen another fox before that point. But apparently he hadn't, and he did make one good point. Technically, she was a naked female fox. Of course Nick would be all over that. The thought of 'what an animal' did cross her mind momentarily, but she realized something a moment later that almost made her want to smack her forehead. They all were animals. Thinking something like that wouldn't help anyone. Then Nick posed his next idea.

That... Actually wasn't too bad of an idea, Judy realized. She'd been focused on just getting to the root of the issue, which would be Simba telling them what they needed to know, but Vixey was likely going to have more information in the long run than anyone else. Hell, even other residents of this odd camp might have more information than Simba did if he didn't mingle with the commoners. So, Judy glanced up at Nick again and nodded. Her partner was right; they needed to go along with what Vixey knew at the moment.

"Okay, fair point," Judy conceded. "Anything you'd be able to show us or tell us would be great, miss..."

Vixey. The vixen had introduced herself as Vixey. That was a sort of on the nose name, Judy thought, but then again... So was 'Gazelle' and that was what a pop star back in Zootopia was named. So, Judy nodded at the introduction and took a moment to repeat her own.

"Nice to meet you, Vixey. I'm Judy. Judy Hopps," she said. From there, she listened to what else Vixey had to say as far as information went. From the sound of it, Simba stayed up at the big rock that she and Nick had seen as they were driving up to the pridelands to begin with. What an odd sort of place to make a home, Judy thought. But then again, these animals were nothing like the ones in Zootopia. That much had been made readily apparent when Vixey had first made her presence known on the scene. Vixey had suggested one thing that might help, though. If they could tell her about the missing animals, or what Judy believed were missing animals since that was what Chief Bogo had told them, then she could help.

"Oh, sure. We actually didn't get any pictures or much information, but our chief back in Zootopia did mention a couple of names that he'd heard. Let's see, I think I wrote them down," Judy said as she dug a notepad out of her pocket. Sure enough, she had scribbled down a couple of names. Bogo had been giving as much information as he could, but it wasn't a lot. So they had to just go based on what they knew at the moment.

"Ah, here we go. Tell me if these names ring any bells. Jock... Mulan... Au..."

Judy started to say another name, but her ears twitched a bit at the sound of movement from nearby. She looked around a moment, and seconds later she caught sight of a little animal approaching them. This one, too, was naked as far as Judy could tell. But she had some sort of blue band around her neck. So she wasn't completely naked. Thank goodness for that much! When Cassie greeted herself, Judy waved a paw at her in greeting and decided to speak as well.

"Well, hello to you too!" Judy greeted. "What's your name, little one?

Is every animal we're going to meet here naked?

Cadpig had walked over when she had noticed two new recruits. Cadpig was always the kind of girl who just loved meeting new people. And she all ready found these two officers "Fascinating" In Judy's mind of course animals shouldn't be naked. But, not only did she find it odd that these two animals were fully clothed. But, they were walking on two legs instead of 4. All though the whole "Naked-Ness" thing was new to Judy seeing animals dressed up, and walking on two legs was a new thing to see for Cadpig.

"Hi, there, welcome to the Heroes camp. My name is Cadpig" Cadpig said happily

It was about that moment that Cadpig noticed they were police officers. They most have been here on a very special case, but Cadpig had no idea what this case was.

The fox rolled his eyes, ears flicking back slightly as Judy continued her judging of him. How was he supposed to help himself? He was a guy. She was pretty. And nude. He stuffed his hands into his pockets, leaning to the side as Vixey introduced herself. Vixey the Vixen. How delightful. He gave a slick grin and a nod before introducing himself. "And I," he said, "Am Officer Nicholas Wilde. Just call me Nick."

An animal approached and Nick's eyebrow raised. What the heck was it? A small canine mammal of course but what kind? Domestic dogs never evolved in Zootopia so Nick had never seen anything like her. Her little collar made Nick uneasy. He slid back slightly and kept his eyes on Vixey. She made him more comfortable. Not just because she was a naked lady, but because she was an animal he recognized. A fox.

Judy, seemingly getting used to the animal nudity, greeted the creature with a friendly tone. Another one approached after, this time one that was spotted. He raised an eyebrow again, leaning back once again on the other foot.

"Nice to meetcha kid," Nick said, "Wilde, Hopps. Officers of the law. WHAT exactly are you guys?" He couldn't hold it in. He had to ask.

Cassie grinned at Judy, her tail wagging a bit faster "My name's Cassie. It's nice to meet you."
From what she gathered, these two newcomers seemed to be some sort of law enforcement, similar to the human ones back in London. She'd seen canine officers who worked with humans before, but never a fox or rabbit.

Her ears perked when she heard the familiar voice of Cadpig, glancing over, she gave her friend a smile, before turning her attention back to the two new faces, as Nick introduced themselves, then proceeded to ask what she was.
Cassie tilted her head a little, a small look of confusion crossing her face
"I'm a dog...? A Labrador to be specific... have you never met a dog before or something?"
Perhaps dogs didn't live where these two came from, though she found that unlikely, since as far as she knew, dogs lived almost everywhere in the world, in some form or another.

Cadpig smiled back at Cassie . These two police officers seemed nice enough so Cadpig would reply in turn.

's very nice to meet you officer Wilde, and officer hopps" Cadpig said. She was a little confused, but it was clear on quite a few levels that they were from different worlds. And that was pretty much an understatement.

"And I am a Dalmatian" Cadpig said the friendly smile never leaving her face.