It's been hard for me to write anything these days, but I hope you like it!

The first room opened to a regular-looking office, much like the one they were in previously, only way smaller. There was a heavy desk without a chair and in the very corner of the room stood some old metal shelves full of files stacked rather neatly side by side; but that was it.

"Ok, it's empty," Judy said as she opened the door and walked into the room, being careful not to make much noise. She turned on the flashlight of her phone and looked around, pointing it to the shelves, "What do you think those are?"

Rick's eyes widened when he walked into it behind Judy.

"Hum, I'll check them, while you go try to open the other rooms," Rick told her and laid a hand on her shoulder, slightly pulling her back as he walked in but hoping she didn't notice, "I'll see if I can find anything useful here."

Judy raised an eyebrow, but then nodded and grabbed the keys from the door, "Let me know if you find anything," she said as she left the room and started fidgeting with the keys on the other side of the hallway.

Rick gulped as he approached the files. He wasn't lying to her, he told himself. He was looking for something useful, for him. Maybe not necessarily for the case. But that still was not a lie, was it?

It was going to be ok. He just wanted to check on something really quickly.

His eyes skimmed across the letters written in the shelf, until he found the letter F. Once he did, he searched through the files above it, searching for one with the name tag he searched for - only to find it wasn't there.

It took him by a surprise before it dawned upon him and he went to look on the letter W instead – and sure enough, there it was.

A yellow, worn out file that read 'Lydia' on the tag.

Rick pulled it out and opened it. The first page had an old picture of said vixen, with the word 'POSITIVE' written on her picture with red sharpie. His heart sank, but he shook his head back into reality and skipped straight to the last pages, where he could find what he wanted to know.

The most recent pages contained a more recent picture of Lydia, which contrasted heavily with the one in the first page, taken years before. Her smile was worn out, her fur had lost much of its brightness, and so had her eyes.

His heart sank even further, but he didn't have time for pity.

He did his best to focus again, and found the most recent annotations right under the picture. Sheen's handwriting was one of those things he could recognize anywhere, for the rest of his life.

Written in blue pen, the file read 'Alive. Active. Ally.'

Rick sighed in relief and made sure to put the file back exactly where it was. As far as he could tell, Sheen had no intent of harming her.

He then went back to the letter F and searched some more. It didn't take him too long to find what he was looking for, as there were only two files under F – one that read 'Sheen', and the other one that read 'Rick'.

He opened his file and the second hand embarrassment settled in, both from the old pictures and from the shame of remembering the things he once did. He looked up and skipped to the last page, not wanting any more unwanted memories to get to him. The last update on him just read, 'Gone. Irrelevant.' On the second to last page, some annotations marked his current location and occupation as 'Unknown'. Relief washed over him upon seeing those as he whispered a 'thank God' and put it back in place as well.

Rick was about to leave, but then decided to turn around again and go to the letter R. He shuffled through several files before finding the one he had in mind – the one that read Coy. He did the same thing he'd done previously, went to the last page. He winced when he saw the last picture in there, a picture of the mangled body in an alley. The last annotations contained the place he was killed, who was involved, and the even the reason why.

'DECEASED. Inside job. Treason – information leak.'

Wow. He actually thought he would get away with that? Rick shook his head.

Rick cringed and closed the file, putting it inside his shirt. He might as well get Judy a clue to make up for hiding what he knew for so long. Coy's death would be one more mystery solved once they got out of there.

"Rick," He heard Judy call from outside. He turned quickly to go see her, but fell on the floor when he slipped on the carpet.

"Rick," Judy appeared on the doorway, as she'd come running to check on him after hearing the thud, "Are you alright?"

"Yeah," He looked up at her from the floor and rolled to be on his stomach, holding the back of his head, "I just slipped, sorry. But I think I found a clue about Coy!"

Judy let out an exasperated sigh and laid a hand on her chest, "I thought someone had knocked you out," She shook her head and looked around, "Great! And come on, you have to see this. Careful."

Rick watched as Judy left the doorway and flexed his arms to get up from the floor. However, he stopped himself just before he could. He'd caught a glimpse of something under the desk, just for a second, and now he had to check it.

He looked under the desk again and squinted, and surely, there was something under it. A bump on the floor that he could barely see in the darkness and wouldn't have noticed hadn't he fallen with his head right beside it.

The void between the bottom of the desk and the floor was just thick enough for his arm to snake through, although even then the corner of the desk sank on his arm and left a dent on his fur. He stretched his arm, and his fingers, and barely managed to touch the object.

Rick pressed his fingers down and pulled his arm out as he dragged the object out as well. Once he'd managed to bring it out, he saw it was another file.

Rick frowned and got up, grabbing it from the floor.

He thought it was just another file that fell from the shelf and nobody had noticed, probably couldn't be of much help. And he would just have put it back under the desk, had it not been for the label written on it.

'Robin'.

Nick's head hung low as he found himself exhausted and his body ached immensely. He had been rubbing his wrists up and down against the pole to try to get the rope to break, twisting his head in weird angles as he tried to bite it – even though he knew there was no way he'd ever reach it; desperation to escape growing as much as the feeling of hopelessness. But he was not about to give up.

He knew he needed to hold on. He had been through way too much shit to die like that.

A spot on his wrists was now furless from the rubbing, the pole seemingly wearing down his skin and fur way more than the rope, if that was even being worn down at all by that point. Sheen definitely knew what he was doing.

Suddenly the door opened, and Nick jumped up. The rope kept him in place and pulled him back to his previous position, the back of his head hitting the pole with a deafening thud as he groaned.

"Hey, it's alright," A soft voice spoke as the door closed, "Don't worry, it's me."

Nick raised his shaking head to look up, vision still blurry from the blow against the pole, but still good enough to see that it was Lydia who approached him.

"Well, I'm not sure that makes me any calmer," He said carefully, although that was a lie. Having Lydia come see him was way less nerving than Sheen, even though as far as Nick knew, she could be just as dangerous.

"I… Understandable," She sighed as she knelt down by his side, "But I really just came to help, Nick."

Nick blinked and she held out her hand, holding a wet cloth much like she'd done before. He didn't say anything, only lowered his head in silence, which she took as him consenting to her touch. She took the cloth to his arm, rubbing off the dry blood that had run down from the place where Sheen had pierced.

"What's he going to do with that?" Nick dared to ask once she was done, the once wet cloth now stained with lines of a dark shade of red.

Lydia seemed unsure for a moment.

"Oh, your blood," She sighed, "Well, he's going to analyze it."

Nick raised an eyebrow, "That… does not really answer my question. I mean, it kind of does, but it raises many more in the process."

Lydia chuckled, "Sorry, you're right. I, I tend to forget others don't know him. It's… It's all I've known for a while now."

There was a silence as Lydia grabbed a water bottle and took it to Nick's mouth. She carefully held it there as he gladly swallowed it, and she waited until he tilted his head back to take it away. She dropped some water on his neck, making him shiver with the cold but relieved when it washed away some of the cold sweat.

Only then she started to talk again, as she patted his back to dry it.

"Sheen's a sick guy. Very, very sick," She shook her head in a somewhat pitiful way, "As far as I understand… His own body fights itself, like every organ is a disease that needs to be exterminated. His entire life has been a fight, against himself. Because if he doesn't fight back, his body will just kill him."

Nick frowned, "That sounds… Awful."

"Tell me about it," She nodded, "He's been desperate for a cure. But so far, all we managed to do was slow the process down. Which has done wonders, don't get me wrong, but… there's only so much that can be done with that, before it catches up to his attempts."

Nick nodded slowly, trying to pierce all that information together, "So, my blood…?"

Lydia reached for a blanket and tried to wrap it around Nick's body in the best way she could with the pole behind him in the way, "When you're desperate for an answer, everybody is a possible right guess," She looked away from Nick, "So he tries it, with everyone. To see if a transfusion is possible, if compatibility is real, if…"

"If he's found a possible cure?" Nick nodded as he asked, finishing her sentence before she could.

"Yes," She nodded, "He's been trying, everyone he could try, for years. Even the mammals he didn't intend on, hum, keeping around. Just to be sure."

Nick sighed in relief with the small comfort the blanket brought him, although he was far from being truly comfortable. But it was still immensely better than before.

"Any success?"

"Well," Lydia sighed as she sat down by his side. She had nothing else to do to help him, except maybe keep him company for a little longer and satisfy his curiosity, "Yes, and no. He did find one mammal whose blood significantly slows down the process and buys him a lot of time. But it's still not a cure, he still needs to inject it every so often if he wants the results to be there. And even that seems to be losing the efficiency over time… He needs them more and more now…" She scratched her arm, to which Nick took notice.

"I, I see…" He frowned, "And whose blood would that be, exactly?" He asked, suspecting he already knew the answer – which was confirmed when Lydia braced herself and buried her head between her knees.

They stayed in silence again.

"So you just let him do it?" Nick tilted his head to the side to look at her, his voice lowering.

Lydia's ears perked up, "What?"

"Well, if I understand correctly, he wouldn't be alive without you. He needs your blood. And you just… give it to him?"

Even in the darkness, Nick could hear it when she growled, "I don't 'just give it to him', ok? It's more complicated than that."

Nick waited for her to continue, but that sentence was followed by complete silence.

"Why not just let him die?" He questioned further, and he could see her head perked up with the question, "I mean, morality aside… You don't owe anyone your blood, you know."

Lydia just shrugged and looked away from Nick.

"I… I wish I could. But there's just… There are some things I can't risk, Nick. I, I would tell you if I could. Trust me."

Nick raised an eyebrow, trying to figure out what was implied in that sentence. It was then when Sheen's previous conversation with him came back to his mind, and he tried to make the puzzle fit.

Nick raised his eyebrow, "Are you attached to him? Is it because he's Robin's father?"

Lydia's face and tone changed completely, from despair to confusion, as she tilted her head to the side and frowned to look at him.

"Who?"

"Sheen," Nick repeated, wondering whether she was playing dumb or legit confused, "Is he Robin's father? Is that why you keep him alive?"

Lydia just blinked with a blank expression, opening her mouth to ask something.

"Do you love him?" Nick questioned before she could, patience running short. He was sure she was playing dumb now. She had to be.

"Oh, well, that I can answer," She nodded with a roll of her eyes, "No. Very far from that. I… I dislike him quite a bit," She started whispering, suddenly afraid the walls could hear her, "I… I don't. At all. And if in the end you can save us from him, I won't hesitate to go with you. If… if that's ok."

Nick raised an eyebrow, "So you're on our side?"

"You can say that," Lydia shrugged, and then her eyes widened, "Please, please don't tell Sheen if he talks to you again. If he finds I want to go, he will…" She trailed off as horrifying images came to her mind.

Nick gulped, "Don't worry. I won't."

She sighed in relief, "Thank you. So, so much."

He nodded, "But if you're on our side… Why don't you just let me go? Help me escape, Lydia," He pleaded, "Untie the rope, and we will-"

"Nick," She interrupted him, "Trust me, if I could, I would."

He frowned and looked away from her, his suspicions about her returning to him.

"Listen," She took her hand to his chin and made him look at her, "If I let you go, you'll have to go through the entire club before you can reach an exit. Someone will see you before that, and once they see you, they will kill you. And if Sheen sees that someone aided your escape, we will be both dead."

Nick raised an eyebrow, chin still resting on her hand, "So you'd rather I stay here, so that at least you can live when he kills me anyway? I get it," He moved away from her hand, "It's every mammal for themselves here."

"Nick," She sighed, grabbing his chin again, "Letting you go is a death sentence, what part didn't you understand? If I let you go, you will be killed. But if you stay here, stay put, Sheen won't kill you… at least not until your blood tests return, but that buys us time."

Nick rolled his eyes, unwilling to admit she was right.

"Buys us time for what?" He lowered his head, "If the results come back negative, which I'm almost sure they will, he will just kill me anyway."

Lydia's ears folded back, "True," and then she gave him a smile, "But if we hold on, help will be on the way. That gives you way more chance than if I let you go."

Nick frowned, "Help?"

"That bunny partner of yours doesn't give up easily, I've heard," Lydia smiled as she got up from the floor and dusted up her clothes.

"Judy?" Nick squealed, only to be shushed by Lydia, "You mean she's here?" He asked in a whisper.

"I'll keep an eye out for her," She whispered in Nick's ear, "But now I have to go. Sheen can't know I spent so much time with you here. Hold on tight, Nick, and things just might be ok."

Nick nodded with a smile, hanging his head low almost in a silent prayer. Lydia walked up to the secret passage on the corner of the room, lifting up a wooden lid from the floor.

"Lydia?" Nick called before she could leave the room, "Thank you." He bit his lip, wondering how true his gratefulness words were. Was there a chance he was thanking someone who was merely helping Sheen con him?

All he could do was hope not.

And all Lydia did was smile quickly at him before jumping into the hole and closing the lid, disappearing into the darkness.

Boy it's difficult to build up things that will just come crashing down! These poor characters.

I hope you enjoyed it! Say safe everyone!