Howl 11

Jane had caught the scent on the wind as the boy passed her on the street. She was out there with Jo Friday, Frankie having dropped her by earlier that day. Maura was inside avoiding the last of the sunlight. Jane picked up a thousand things from that one thin whisp, where the boy had been and even where he was going. He was hunting, she could see it ripple through his body just as it had rippled through her own and the hairs on the back of her neck stood on end.

Jane followed, she left a small gap, but knew that the young man was so focused on what lay ahead that he would not think as to what was behind, he was green, fresh, new, she could feel that in his over eagerness, blindly letting his hunger lead him on. She watched him cross the street through a throng of people, pushing through them unseeing. He was already on the trail, had already selected his prey and Jane's eyes skipped ahead of him to where a young blonde woman in a cotton dress disappeared around the corner of a large building heading down toward the University campus.

Jane crossed and followed a little closer behind the young man as the street became quieter. The young man was dressed in an outfit you would wear to go out at night, not quite casual enough to be daytime attire and his hair was scruffy and unkept. He strode faster now and closed the gap between himself and the young girl just as she turned and cast an eye at him, over her shoulder, she frowned slightly, perhaps getting a strange sense of his intentions and began to hurry just a little more. Jane caught the scent of the boy's excitement as the girls eyes had flicked over him and her uneasiness had become evident.

Just as Jane went to cross the street again, with the intention of taking hold of the young man, before he could get any closer to the girl in his sights, an old lady stepped out from one of the small store fronts and called to Jane. Jane was momentarily distracted as she passed the time of day with the elderly woman and when she turned back, both the boy and his potential meal had vanished.

Jane hurried around the next corner and found nothing, she crossed another street and tried the next, this led to a narrow side street and just along that Jane heard something, a scrabbling sound, maybe a swallowed scream. Jane broke out into a run just as the blonde girl appeared out of the alleyway and ran past Jane, clutching her jacket and looking distraught.

Jane headed into the alley and saw a familiar figure standing over the boy in her immaculate suit.

"You stopped him?" Jane asked.

Riley brushed an imaginary layer of dust from her sharp suit. "He was foolish, attacking in daylight, no thought for who or where." Riley shook her head in mild disgust.

"You know what he is." Jane said, it wasn't a question. "All this time it's been you? I knew there was something off about you from the first second..." Jane remarked.

Detective Riley Cooper smiled smugly. "Sure you did Rizzoli."

"So you've been helping them get away with crime's, with murder, you work for them?" Jane said, appalled.

"No." Riley stated. "I work with them. They're not all on the same side, you should realise more than most, that it's not quite that simple. There are more of them than you can possibly imagine...I should say, more of you." Riley grinned knowingly.

Jane frowned, wondering how much Riley knew about her.

"I'm glad I bumped into you actually." Riley said walking out of the alley, leaving the boys limp body on the ground behind them. "We need to have a little discussion. If you're back in Boston for good, we want to bring you on board. You were planning on coming back to work right?" Riley said, stopping to look at Jane.

"I am going back to work, but I won't be working for you." Jane spat.

"Really? You think you can go on protecting your Doctor friend, alone, forever? It's not gonna happen. But she has something to offer, we could use her, in the morgue. We could take care of you both." Riley offered.

Jane tossed Riley a look of disdain. "You think it's that easy? You think I'm just going to sign up to whatever it is you are up to, no questions asked?"

Riley sighed deeply. "No, I knew you'd have questions Jane. Let's go get a coffee."

"What about the guy?" Jane tipped her head in the direction of the young vampire.

"He'll be taken care of." Riley said easily and just as she moved to the edge of the road and checked the street, ready to cross, Jane spotted a white van with some kind of work logo, much like the one her father had owned when his plumbing business had been good, slowly turn into the side street and stop by the alley.

Xxxx

"Doctor Isles, I'm so pleased that you came." His smile reached his glowing eye's.

Maura had folded her arms across her chest, Jane's warnings had not gone unheard and though she did feel drawn to this man's obvious magnetism, she was all too aware of what he was, what he was capable of. She had sworn to Jane that she would be careful.

"I wanted to know more." Maura began quickly. "I would like you to tell me more about what you are."

"About what we are?" Dennis corrected with a grin.

Maura nodded stiffly and waited as Dennis strode across the dark room toward her and handed her a glass of what looked like scotch.

"We are what we are." He smiled. "You are a Doctor, I am a writer, an artist, I sculpt, I create, I create beautiful things. We are all different." He spoke to the room as if it were filled with audience.

"What has happened to us?" Maura asked impatiently.

"You have heard the stories, the spooky tales and the movies? They are a caricature of the truth. We are just like them in so many ways, we come in so many shapes and sizes, there are many of us. Those of us that last, pass unnoticed, we have lives, we have loves."

"But we are not alive!" Maura interrupted him loudly.

"We are not." Dennis agreed, still smiling, seemingly impressed by her passionate outburst. "You get used to that."

"How?" Maura asked incredulous. "How could you? How do you? How do you survive? How do you feed?"

"There are ways Dr Isles. I believe you have found one of the most obvious for yourself?" Dennis drained his glass and watched her squirm a little in her own guilt and shame.

"What about the other ways? You are the next Hoyt, are you telling me that you kill innocent people? That you take pleasure in it, that you torture them, the way he did." Maura demanded.

"I didn't say I was the next Hoyt. I was sickened by much of his activity, believe me." Dennis admitted and for the first time his smile slipped, if only for a moment and Maura was gripped by the thought that this may be the only true thing he had said to her so far.

"You said..." Maura was about to remind him of their last conversation.

"I said I was his replacement...I am the new hope for our kind. Hoyt ruled the Boston streets by fear, he and his beasts. I...I have a lot of support Dr Isles, a lot of us want change. You could be a part of that." He promised, causing an involuntary thrill to pass through her.

"I'm not interested in joining a cause..." Maura protested weakly. "I just want information, I intend to find my own way..."

Dennis' smile did not falter, in fact he looked a little amused. "You think you can keep on the way you are now? The hunger will grow Maura and your pup will no longer be able to keep you, or you her, you will use her up, wear her out, you may even destroy her completely. That is your decision to make." He said looking somber, grave, for a second allowing her to fully absorb the idea. His hands firmly in the pockets at his sides. "But I can offer you an alternative."

Maura struggled to argue with him, she wanted to, but here he held all the cards. She had no knowledge to share, no evidence to present, for the first time in her life her superior intellect was not the secret weapon in her arsenal. Could it be true? That she would ultimately destroy Jane?

"What is the alternative? How do you feed?" She asked, tossing her hair back and pretending that the answer wasn't suddenly vital.

He smiled, knowing he had made the all important breakthrough."We feed on the unworthy." He said. "On those who have chosen the wrong path, those souls that are already damned to hell, we send them on their way before they can do anymore damage, it is often a kindness."

Maura felt the air suddenly shift, like the wind changing, it felt dangerous but magnetic and then she knew why.

"Vigilante vampires? Who the hell are you to judge who is deserving?" Jane tossed the question to him as she stepped out of the shadowed corner that he had been heading to, also having sensed her arrival.

"We have help." He explained smoothly.

"You think because you have Detective Cooper in your pocket you have free reign over Boston?" Jane shot, enjoying the fact that she already knew some of what he was saying, trying to undermine his mysterious, all knowing, routine.

He nodded as he conceded her point. "This is much bigger than even Miss Cooper is aware. She isn't one of us. You, Dr Isles, could be a part of making this city, this country, safe."

"I don't understand..." Maura said, looking from one to the other for more.

"He is working with the cops, they have a specially assigned team, Cooper gives a heads up to this guy and his goons and they round up the villans and have a bad guy buffet. Part of the bargain is that this beast has to keep numbers down and isn't allowed to bring his own food to the party. Everybody's happy." Jane scoffed.

"A little basic but..." Dennis nodded. "We are evolving Maura, we are no longer the monsters of every child's nightmares. We have already wiped out the creatures that would run around this city taking pleasure where they found it. We thank you for your help in that." Dennis gestured to Jane but kept his focus on Maura. " We are becoming an organised people. It is an exciting time."

Maura looked doubtful but smiled through it as Jane moved in beside her and she felt a warmth flush through her. "That sounds like an interesting arrangement..." She offered. "I hope it works out for you but I don't see what I could do, even if I wanted to be involved..."

Dennis looked excited as if he was just getting to the best part. "Oh you can! You can help the Police, we have a position for you, you will work with the bodies, you can help them to solve crimes, just as you have been doing behind the scenes and you can help explain the unexplainable deaths, by overlooking certain signs. It is such a little thing but it would help us all and it would help you too."

Dennis had, like Jane, moved in beside Maura, on her opposite side and actually picked up her hand as he spoke, looking into her eyes as if Jane was nothing but a shadow. Maura's skin prickled but she couldn't pull her hand or her gaze from the man before her.

Jane set a hand to the small of her back, a small reminder, a tether and Maura pushed back against it and into Jane, her hand still in the large but surprisingly soft hand of Rockmond. For a moment Maura was being held by both of them and the feeling made her first weak, then incredibly strong, as if drawing strength from them and the stand they were taking against one another.

Whether Jane felt something was wrong or whether she would have dragged Maura away anyway, the Doctor did not know, but a minute later Jane was holding her arm and pulling her backwards out of the building into an even larger expanse of darkness. Once enough distance was put between she and Dennis, Maura began to feel a little steadier, but hungry, intensely hungry.

"You alright?" Jane checked when they were, what she deemed, far enough away from Rockmond.

Maura nodded. "Yes. I thought you were going to let me do this on my own?"

Jane frowned suspiciously. "I did, I just came in at the end is all, make sure you got home in one piece, anyway I already found out some answers, you didn't need to go to him."

Maura felt anger at being babied by Jane when she felt so strong, so full of powerful energy, she wanted to make her see, she was strong. Maura stopped and her Jane's hand slipped from her arm. Jane looked back at her questioningly.

"What is it?" She asked, agitated, reaching to take Maura's arm again but feeling Maura pull away.

Maura felt the life in each muscle, each bone. "More than half the bones in your body are in your hands and feet, the hand itself is the most beautiful and complex pieces of natural engineering in the human body." Maura stated, flexing both her hands like a cat and looking at them in wonder.

Jane looked puzzled.

"And I can feel every one, every bone, every muscle, each tendon, how it connects to the forearm, the ligaments that lash bones together. But no blood, no flow, no fuel. I'm getting stronger. The body is getting stronger, the mechanics, but it needs that one ingredient, the charge, to run on. The more I feed, the stronger I get, the stronger I get, the more I need. He was right."

Jane wanted to deny it, what she had suspected from almost the beginning. Each time Maura fed, it took her a little longer to get back her strength, she thought recently that it may be because the wolf was leaving but she had also realised it was more than this.

"It doesn't matter." Jane decided finally, her voice softer than it had been all night, entreating. "We'll work it out."

"No." Maura snapped. "We can't work it out. There is no answer or solution. We have to stop. I have to stop."

"Maura you can't just not feed, you know what will happen..." Jane argued.

"I can do whatever I want. I am strong. I decide. And I can walk away." Maura said firmly.

Jane's softness faded and in it's place she felt hard, bitter. She looked at Maura. Seeing everything that she was willing to give her, had already given her, so easily. Jane didn't give to people like that, not of herself. Jane shoved her hands into her pockets.

"What the hell are you saying Maur?" She asked now.

"I don't want to feed from you anymore Jane." Maura said simply.

"What? So you're going to take him up on his offer?" Jane said shaking her head.

"No. I don't know... Not yet." Maura replied, suddenly loosing some of her certainty.

"Jesus Maura, If I'm being replaced at least have the guts to tell me to my face." Jane spat.

"I don't know what I'm going to do yet but I do know I can't keep on using you. We both knew that before tonight." Maura persisted. "You need to leave me alone now, it's too much, having you here, I can't think about anything else, about another way if you're here, offering yourself up to me all the time!" Maura accused.

Jane frowned at Maura's uncharacteristic outburst. The harsh way she looked at her. "He's already gotten into your head."

"Just go!" Maura yelled, taking a step and pushing Jane with both hands, with enough force to make her stumble backwards.

Jane called on whatever of the wolf was still inside her and poked at it to come out, dared it to surface. The hurt that had threatened to invade her at Maura's rejection was pushed aside by the anger that the wolf pounced on and brought forth. Jane took hold of Maura by both her arms and pushed her back hard, not letting go and forcing her against the damp wall of the nearest building.

If Maura had had breath she would have been winded but she only felt exhilaration and the stirrings of desire as she felt Jane's breath quicken and felt the heat of it on her cool skin as Jane leaned in, her lips a perfect red, just a fraction of a movement would have brought them to her. Jane held Maura against the wall, her fingers and nails digging into her lovers arms, holding her away for fear that she would hold her close.

"I'll go. See how well you get on without me. But be warned Maura, if you do join him and you get in my way, I won't show you any mercy. You saw what I can do." Jane said darkly.

Maura almost gave in then, she saw the flicker of pain in Jane's eyes and all she wanted to do was ease it, but before she had chance Jane had turned and walked away without looking back.

A/N- Thanks for reading xx