justagirlwithmanyobsessions

“Where is she?”

“She…she didn’t make it.”

Is actually so chilling. Everything Pawbert says to Nick is deeply terrifying.

“But with snake bites you…go fast. You’ll see.”

“She’s gone Nick, just get it over with.”

“You’re done. Know when to quit.”

And finally,

“Leave it! You’re gonna kill us both. It’s not worth dying for.”

The ONLY thing Nick does through this narration is fight. The ONLY words he says are “Where is she?” “JUDY!” and “Agree to disagree.” That is the entirety of everything Nick had to say to Pawbert. At no point does he try to converse, talk him out of anything, question, trick, bargain, rationalize, nothing. And all Pawbert knows Nick as is That Fox Whose Entire Reason For Living Is Judy Hopps.

It’s chilling because Pawbert knows that telling Nick that Judy is dead is going to destroy him, and he believes that it’s enough to let him cave and give into death entirely. He sincerely believes that Nick’s entire purpose for self-preservation is to keep Judy alive and if she’s gone, he might as well be, too. And he’s not even entirely wrong. Pawbert’s final plea, the complete 180° turn, “it’s not worth dying for,” isn’t “keeping her alive isn’t worth dying for,” it’s “YOU CANNOT SAVE HER, STOP FIGHTING, YOU HAVE NO REASON TO LIVE, SHE IS DEAD.”

But Nick saw her lifeless body. He heard she was dead and he SAW she was gone. And all he could think was, “If there’s even a fraction of a chance she’ll be okay, I can die knowing I did everything I possibly could to protect her.” The pure desperation in his eyes as he fights for that pen, not even sure if it’ll work, but fighting to do EVERYTHING he POSSIBLY can to save her. Even if he’s already SEEN that she’s dead. Which he has.

And then suddenly he’s looking her in the eyes and crying.

The slow-mo and pacing make it hard to grasp how fast it all happened, but he saw her, DEAD, and within sixty seconds he thought he was dead too, and then suddenly he was staring her in the eyes and panting. And all he could hear in his head was

“She didn’t make it.”

“She’s gone, Nick.”

“Know when to quit.”

But she’s right there. Alive.

“It’s not worth dying for.”

credits to the sleuth on reddit for figuring this out, credits to @/okiberri on X for the image

Judy: Wow. She sounds stupid.

Nick: But she's not. She's really smart actually. Just dense.

Judy: Maybe you need to be more obvious? Like, I don’t know… “Hey! I love you!”

Nick: I guess you’re right. Hey, Carrots, I love you.

Judy: See! Just say that!

Nick: Holy fucking shit.

Judy: If that flies over her head then, sorry Nick, but she's too dumb for you.

The same Judy who never reported Nick for his tax evasion? The same Judy who offered a partnership to Nick after only knowing him for a couple days because she saw the potential he had to be a good cop? The same Judy who, immediately after returning to Zootopia after discovering the truth about Night Howlers, rushed to find Nick before even daring to continue working on the case because she knew what she did to him was wrong and had to apologize first? The same Judy who gave Nick his badge at his graduation and smiled at him with such warmth and pride it melted her heart? The same Judy who gave him the carrot pen to symbolize their official partnership? The same Judy who got him a new tie with Night Howlers on it as a gift for their ‘anniversary’? The same Judy who was so desperate to prove that she and Nick ‘belong together’ because the thought of being split up terrified her? The same Judy who knew exactly where Nick lived despite never being invited over likely in case she needed to go over there for an emergency? The same Judy who had Nick’s exact measurements to have a custom-made tailored suit for him? The same Judy who desperately tried to crawl her way to help Nick despite being injected with snake venom, on the verge of her own death? The same Judy who knocked down three animals that were five times her size and threw herself off a cliff, not even thinking she and Nick would survive, but still did it because if they were going to die, they could die together?