Disclaimer: I own nothing but my OCs.
Jacobs wasn't sure what exactly had happened or how it all went to shit, but one moment Kinney and he were interviewing a so-called witness, and the next, they were fighting off a crazed man. Jacobs thought for sure they were gonna lose, what with Kinney unconscious and him getting himself pinned by their attacker. And then there was that blonde lady. She shot the crazed man, the man with yellow eyes and teeth that didn't belong to any human.
"You okay?" the woman asked, moving the body off him.
Jacobs managed a nod sat up slowly. From the way his head was throbbing, he'd taken a bump to his noggin, and his back ached from being tackled, but he was okay overall.
Blondie went to check on Kinney. "No bites or scratches so that's good, but your partner's head will probably feel worse than yours when she wakes up."
"Who are you?" Jacobs asked, "and what was that thing?"
She gave a enigmatic smile "Name's Jo, and that was a werewolf."
Jo had been having a rough go of things lately. Since news had traveled about Dean's decent into hell, she had gone back out on the road again, finding cases pattered all around the states. Hunting was a way for her to feel close to Dean again as well as her father, both of whom had died on the job.
At the same time, she felt stupid, because she hadn't been close to Dean. They shared some common experiences and had a few momets, but the results of their respective choices had kept them apart. It was more like missing what could have been instead of what was, and Jo berated herself for how childish because it was.
"Wrong place, wrong time," she recalled her past-self saying.
Those words could sum them up for eternity, and there was no need to dwell on it. She did anyway.
In any case, Jo was back to the grind. Her mother was talking to her again, but she still didn't approve, not that Jo blamed her. Jo could see it from her mom's point of view, maybe not with one-hundred percent clarity, but Jo wouldn't want a child of her own with such a dangerous occupation. It didn't stop her from going her own way, though.
"You got anything for me, Bobby?" she asked, phone to her ear.
Bobby grunted. "Your mother would kill me if she knew I was handing out hunts to you."
Jo rolled her eyes. Bobby said the same thing every time they were on the phone.
"Then don't tell her."
"Have to," Bobby said. "She'll find out anyway and call me up, yelling about how I gave you a job too dangerous. Might as well tell her myself, get the eardrum-busting lecture over with."
Jo huffed, almost laughing for the first time in weeks. "You do that, Bobby. Now, tell me the job."
"Got a wolfy situation is Virginia, near D.C."
"Lunar cycle matches up?" Jo asked.
"Mm-hmm," Bobby hummed in the affirmative. "Seems to be in one area. I'll send you the coordinates and the info."
"Thanks, Bobby," Jo said. "Other than that, how are things with you?"
A weary sigh came over the line. "How do you think?"
The click came before Jo could ask anything else, but she didn't take it personal. It'd been a hard couple of months for everyone, and maybe the only person more deeply affected than Bobby by Dean's passing was Sam, who was currently off the grid from everybody. Sam, she couldn't help, but Jo made a mental note to have her mom call Bobby to check in. Then she packed her things and drove off to Virginia.
"I thought it was an animal attack," Helen, the most recent victim's mother, said, "so, why are the FBI interested?"
"Just routine," Jo lied.
Helen merely nodded, too deep in grief to think it through all the way. "Are you coordinating with animal control in case it really was an animal?"
Jo blinked in confusion. "Sorry?"
"Animal control," Helen repeated. "They sent a couple of people over earlier, said they wanted to track my daughter's last movements to better analyze the animal's patterns."
"Oh, right," Jo said. "I'm sorry, yes. It just slipped my mind. We are considering all possibilities."
"I see," Helen said in that distant tone Jo now associated with numb devastation. It always seemed most prevalent in the parents of victims. Jo's mother briefly flashed through her mind, but Jo shoved the thought away. Now was not the time.
While Jo wrapped up with Helen, she wondered if animal control really was on the hunt for an animal, or if there was a pair of hunters in the area who caught wind of the case before she did. She would have to call Bobby and ask.
Jo leaned back in her booth at the nearest diner in the neighborhood, a joint called D.C. Diner, which was unoriginal, not to mention inaccurate. D.C. was a few miles away. The food was passable, though, edible.
Bobby said there were no other hunters in the area to his knowledge and was shorter with her than usual. He was slurring even more than before too, and Jo texted her mother right away to call the old man. There was no reply, but Jo knew her mom had done it anyway, probably giving Bobby that chewing-out he kept dreading and mentioning.
"No one is taking us seriously," said a man in the booth behind hers. "Should've known it was a dumb idea, posing as a dog catcher."
"It's because you're too intense to pass for animal control," said a female voice. "You should be interested in getting the job done but also more sympathetic."
"Like you're any help. All you do is stand there nervously like someone's gonna call us out."
"Actually, I'm not too concerned with that. I just don't like talking to people."
"Whatever you say, Kinney. I still think we'd have been better off posing as law enforcement, like FBI or something."
'Kinney' sighed. "It's against regulations to pose as local or other federal law enforcement without authorization, Jacobs, but you already knew that. Anyway, FBI creds take longer to forge, especially if I gotta do it without our organizational resources."
'Jacobs' stood up and threw some money on the table to cover their meal. "Whatever. I still feel dumb with our cover."
Jo watched them leave and tried to memorize their faces. She had partial names at least, and maybe Bobby or her mom could do something with that. They didn't sound like hunters, but if they were, they seemed like rookies, and sloppy ones at that, which was dangerous for everyone.
'What are my options?' Jo thought to herself as she payed for her food. 'I could join them, or tail them and see what turns up, or ignore their involvement and concentrate on my own work.'
Tailing them seemed like the best plan. Working with beginners was risky, and Jo wouldn't put her mother through what Helen was dealing with. Not if she could help it.
"We missed something," Kinney said, laptop open as she scrolled through the local police station's database.
Jacobs sighed, beyond ready to drop Kinney off at her place, call it a night and go home. Then he remembered he couldn't and would only end up sleeping in the office again, and he let out another sigh. Walking out on Raquel had been short-sighted, and he kicked himself for not at least leasing another apartment first.
"What is it, Kinney?"
She pointed to her screen. "Before the bodies started turning up, there was an attack with a survivor."
Jacobs perked up. "What, really? How'd SHIELD's program miss something like that?"
"Maybe it only checks for murders," Kinney suggested.
"You have an address?" Jacobs asked hopefully.
His partner nodded reluctantly and entered it into the GPS. "Guess this means more talking, huh?"
"C'mon, Kinney, this is a break! It's a good thing."
"I know," she said, still unenthusiastic. "Guess sleep can wait."
"It's not even that late," Jacobs pointed out. "Only eight."
Kinney shut her laptop. "Seems later."
Jacobs said nothing, still unsure exactly what it was they were looking at here. Theories abounded from a murderous cult to a serial killer who used dogs to do his dirty work, but they all sounded farfetched to him. Not as farfetched as Kinney's werewolf idea, but still, this was strange.
"Don't worry," he said, shooting his reluctant partner a smile he hoped was reassuring. "We'll be okay."
The rookies were almost done fore before Jo showed up. The woman, Kinney, had been knocked out by the werewolf. Jacobs was holding it away with all he had, but he was about five seconds from being eaten.
"Hey!" she shouted, getting wolfy's attention.
When it looked up at her, she didn't hesitate to shoot it in the heart. It howled and collapsed lifelessly onto Jacobs who squirmed his way out from under it with Jo's help.
"You okay?" Jo asked.
He nodded, but she wasn't sure if it was just out of habit, because he looked like he had his bell rung pretty well. Still, a concussion was ideal in this situation considering the alternative. Speaking of, Jo gave Jacobs and Kinney a good once over.
"No bites or scratches so that's good, but your partner's head will probably feel worse than yours when she wakes up."
Jacobs ignored her comments, regaining some of his senses. "Who are you? And what was that thing?"
Having grown up in the life, Jo never got over how weird it was that some people needed this explained to them. "Name's Jo, and that was a werewolf."
So, I'm not happy with this chapter at all, as per usual. However, it's been a while since I updated, and I figured the story needed to move on. I'm still practicing writing scenes in between the scenes I envision clearly. My mind keeps skipping ahead of where the story is. Anyway, enough rambling. I hope it's okay and that y'all enjoy it.
