[Original: Drabble] "A Bit of Fate" [Zeke Jones, G]
Title: A Bit of Fate
Prompt: writerverse challenge #28 weekly quick fic #9 (‘a long time ago’)
Word Count: 603
Rating: G
Original/Fandom: original ( Zeke Jones ‘verse)
Summary: Zeke learns a bit about her partner’s past.
Note(s): originally posted to the writerverse wv_library
A Bit of Fate
It was near the end of our shift, and everything was quiet. Howell turned our patrol car down a dark alley, where the precinct hoped the sight of a ‘black-and-white’ might help prevent a crime or two.
I watched the lights from the buildings we passed, sometimes colored by a flashing neon sign, sometimes gone altogether, slide across my partner’s face. Howell looked about thirty-five, but he was actually well over a hundred. Werewolves had incredibly long lifespans, if no outside force killed them, just like us vampires did. I hadn’t had a chance to not age yet- I had been nineteen when I was Bitten, and that had only been a few years ago. I had always looked younger than my age to begin with, but now I wondered if I was still going to get carded when I hit the triple digits.
“Hey, sir?” I said. “Is this what you looked like before you were Bitten?”
Howell glanced sideways at me, scowling. It wasn’t usually polite to talk about our ‘conditions’ but I had never really been socially acceptable, anyway.
“More or less,” my partner said, after a moment. “I had longer hair, then.”
I didn’t know the exact dates, but I knew he had been a kid in the mid-eighteen-hundreds. “Long enough for a ponytail?” I asked, grinning.
His scowl shifted to the one that said, are you being annoying on purpose?. I usually was.
“It was the fashion,” Howell said, which I took as a ‘yes’.
“Are there pictures?” I pressed. “They’d invented photography by then, hadn’t they?”
“Yes, they’d invented photography. But it was still complicated and expensive when I was young, so most people couldn’t afford it. And if there were any pictures, I wouldn’t show them to you.”
“Spoilsport,” I muttered.
It was quiet again for a moment, then Howell said, “Things have changed a lot since I was a kid, Jones. Cars, planes, a man on the moon, female cops…” His expression softened to something that almost wasn’t a scowl. “This is a fascinating time to live in.”
“I guess so,” I agreed, then smirked again. “Then do all the old werewolves get together and complain about the kids these days?”
Howell didn’t take his eyes off the road. “Maybe they do. But I don’t know any other werewolves.”
“How could you not-?” I began, but stopped myself.
I was a freak of nature to the Vampire Council, the only person to have survived a Bite from a rogue vampire in over a hundred years, and they seemed to same opinion of me as I had of them- not very good. I supposed that I had thought the werewolves were more cohesive, but Howell was the only one I knew.
“Sorry,” I muttered.
“We aren’t like true wolves,” he said, gruffly. “And definitely not like those ridiculous movies you watch. There’s no Pack, we don’t fight for leadership. There is a certain amount of bureaucracy, but not even as much as the Vampire Council. When I was Bitten, I decided not to let it be a curse and I joined the police force.”
I blinked at Howell. That was… pretty much the same reasoning I’d had, after I’d been Bitten. Why I’d left my job at the library and applied to the Police Academy. If I believed it fate, I’d have thought it had really, really wanted us together.
“Well, sir,” I said. “I’m glad you’re here. Otherwise, I could have gotten partnered with someone mean.”
He let out a bark of laughter. “Just you wait, Jones,” he said, and I grinned.
“Yes, sir.”
THE END
Current Mood:
happy
Prompt: writerverse challenge #28 weekly quick fic #9 (‘a long time ago’)
Word Count: 603
Rating: G
Original/Fandom: original ( Zeke Jones ‘verse)
Summary: Zeke learns a bit about her partner’s past.
Note(s): originally posted to the writerverse wv_library
A Bit of Fate
It was near the end of our shift, and everything was quiet. Howell turned our patrol car down a dark alley, where the precinct hoped the sight of a ‘black-and-white’ might help prevent a crime or two.
I watched the lights from the buildings we passed, sometimes colored by a flashing neon sign, sometimes gone altogether, slide across my partner’s face. Howell looked about thirty-five, but he was actually well over a hundred. Werewolves had incredibly long lifespans, if no outside force killed them, just like us vampires did. I hadn’t had a chance to not age yet- I had been nineteen when I was Bitten, and that had only been a few years ago. I had always looked younger than my age to begin with, but now I wondered if I was still going to get carded when I hit the triple digits.
“Hey, sir?” I said. “Is this what you looked like before you were Bitten?”
Howell glanced sideways at me, scowling. It wasn’t usually polite to talk about our ‘conditions’ but I had never really been socially acceptable, anyway.
“More or less,” my partner said, after a moment. “I had longer hair, then.”
I didn’t know the exact dates, but I knew he had been a kid in the mid-eighteen-hundreds. “Long enough for a ponytail?” I asked, grinning.
His scowl shifted to the one that said, are you being annoying on purpose?. I usually was.
“It was the fashion,” Howell said, which I took as a ‘yes’.
“Are there pictures?” I pressed. “They’d invented photography by then, hadn’t they?”
“Yes, they’d invented photography. But it was still complicated and expensive when I was young, so most people couldn’t afford it. And if there were any pictures, I wouldn’t show them to you.”
“Spoilsport,” I muttered.
It was quiet again for a moment, then Howell said, “Things have changed a lot since I was a kid, Jones. Cars, planes, a man on the moon, female cops…” His expression softened to something that almost wasn’t a scowl. “This is a fascinating time to live in.”
“I guess so,” I agreed, then smirked again. “Then do all the old werewolves get together and complain about the kids these days?”
Howell didn’t take his eyes off the road. “Maybe they do. But I don’t know any other werewolves.”
“How could you not-?” I began, but stopped myself.
I was a freak of nature to the Vampire Council, the only person to have survived a Bite from a rogue vampire in over a hundred years, and they seemed to same opinion of me as I had of them- not very good. I supposed that I had thought the werewolves were more cohesive, but Howell was the only one I knew.
“Sorry,” I muttered.
“We aren’t like true wolves,” he said, gruffly. “And definitely not like those ridiculous movies you watch. There’s no Pack, we don’t fight for leadership. There is a certain amount of bureaucracy, but not even as much as the Vampire Council. When I was Bitten, I decided not to let it be a curse and I joined the police force.”
I blinked at Howell. That was… pretty much the same reasoning I’d had, after I’d been Bitten. Why I’d left my job at the library and applied to the Police Academy. If I believed it fate, I’d have thought it had really, really wanted us together.
“Well, sir,” I said. “I’m glad you’re here. Otherwise, I could have gotten partnered with someone mean.”
He let out a bark of laughter. “Just you wait, Jones,” he said, and I grinned.
“Yes, sir.”
THE END
Current Mood:
happy