Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

13:45, 25 October

Watford Secret Agency Headquarters

Special Agent Baz Pitch

It’s a bad day to be me. Bad fucking week to be me, actually. Waist deep in autopsies and reports and the leftover takeaway that I’ve let accumulate in my flat, and then in the middle of my Friday I get called in to speak with Minotaur. That’s never happened before, so I know I’m justified in every ounce of dread I feel walking to his office. It’s bad news. I know it is. I have no reason to anticipate it, I haven’t done anything but bust my arse all week, but then again, he has no reason to call me in. 

Division Chief Minotaur resembles his namesake; he’s a beefy man that I would assume on first glance is a WWE star rather than head of the forensics unit at Watford Secret Agency. As I walk in, his muscular figure is sitting behind a desk, looking at me like he’s about to body-slam all my hopes and dreams of a steady career. Another thing about Minotaur is that he isn’t one for greetings, because the first words out of his mouth are, “Pitch, what do you know about Agent Snow?” 

I try to keep my face calm. Agent Snow? Excellent bloody question, I know nothing about him. Well, that’s not true. I’ve seen him around, but we don’t work in the same division, so I’ve never met him personally. But, for an agency where discretion is so highly valued, rumors travel fast. It’s inevitable to hear gossip about my coworkers, but especially about him. Snow’s a laughing stock to put it lightly. If I say all of this to my boss, the worst that will happen is he thinks I’m a gossip, something that’s semi-true. But truth is really the question here, isn’t it? I don’t know for sure that Agent Snow is as loony as everyone says it is, and when someone with a medical degree starts spreading half-truths like it’s the real deal, like they have any basis at all, heads start to turn. And I don’t know why he’s asking. 

“Not much,” I play it safe. “I know he works in a highly specialized field.”

“Highly specialized,” he scoffs. “That’s certainly a way to put it. Agent Snow works in our unexplained unit, the so-called X-files. Up until now, he has been the only agent dedicated enough to stay assigned to it.”

“Until now?”

“We have decided it’s in everyone’s best interests for you to be reassigned there with him.”

There it is. The metaphoric body slam. It makes my left eye twitch. “Sir, I’m not sure I understand.”

“Pitch, you’re a scientist. You were top of your class at medical school, you have continuously shown exemplary work here at Watford. To put it bluntly, you would bring something to the unit that it currently lacks: logic and reason.”

“Sir--”

“It’s not a request.”

“But surely Agent Snow doesn’t want--”

He waves a hand to silence me, and says to make up for it I can leave early, which doesn’t appease me as much as he had probably hoped. I stuff the belongings on my desk into a tiny box to bring home, since it’s apparently an immediate transfer, and my first day is Monday. This gives me the whole weekend to dwell on how much I hate myself for joining the agency, for doing the one thing my father told me not to do.

He was fine when I said I wanted to become a doctor, and was more than happy to put me through medical school, but he nearly burst a vein when I told him I’d applied to work at Watford Agency just as my mother had before me. Granted, it led to her death. I knew there would be pushback from father, but I didn’t know it would sever our relationship entirely. I always thought being gay would be the last straw, but no, it was this. If he knew I was being forced to make an example of the workplace lunatic…

I don’t tell him, I tell my Aunt Fiona, who calls me a whiny bitch. “Shouldn’t you be taking this as a compliment? They’re sticking you with him because you’re damn good at what you do.”

“No, they’re doing it because they think I’ll take one look at the division and dismantle it. I guarantee it. They can’t cut it without a reason, so they need me to find one. I’m just their pawn.”

“You signed up to be their pawn, boyo. I remember when you were tearing your hair out over whether or not they’d hire you,” Fiona cackles because she thinks the suffering of her only nephew is hilarious, as all good aunts do. “And anyway, fine, just go in and shut the place down. Then you can go back to your morgue and be happy.”

“But if there isn’t a reason? There wouldn’t be an unexplained unit if there wasn’t a need for one in the first place.”

“Then blow your supervisor and hope someone else gets sacrificed. Christ, kid, are you even supposed to be telling me all this?” 

Probably not, but that’s auntie privileges for you, even if she did take the piss out of me often and with pleasure. Who else did I have to complain to? I suppose there is Dev, but with him I really wouldn’t risk saying anything Agency related with, not the way he goes off the deep end with conspiracies. By the sounds of it I’m about to get enough of that without the help of my halfwit cousin.  

Phoning Fiona is the only thing of note I do over the entire weekend. I cook lasagna that will last me a handful of days, I watch a pitiful amount of Coronation Street, I lounge. Mostly, though, I think about every single nasty bit of gossip I’ve heard about Snow: he’s only an agent because his foster father was (not that I have room to speak), he’s a total loon who believes in aliens, he thought he saw one of the kids at a care home get abducted one night, he puts six sugars in his tea, on and on and on until suddenly it’s Monday morning.

The unexplained division is in the basement of one of the older Agency buildings. I’ve never had a reason to visit, so I get lost four separate times trying to figure out how the hell one even gets to the basement level, and by the time I’m where I’m supposed to be I feel a cold dread in my chest. Maybe that’s just because it’s cold on the level, full stop. I’m sure I’ve been in warmer morgues than this. 

I wander the halls, my oxfords the only sound as they hit the tile, until I come across the only room that isn’t designated for cleaning supplies. The little plaque on the door that says Special Agent Simon Snow is crooked, hanging by a nail. I knock just beneath it.

“Yeah, come in!”

It was true that I had seen him around, and during those few times, I never thought he looked crazy. In the light of day he was only slightly disheveled, but then again, so were plenty of people. It was a highly stressful career path we all chose; not everyone is an angel all the time. But this isn’t the light of day I’m dealing with down here in his lair, it’s flickering fluorescents, and my heart drops to my stomach at the sight of him. The sight of everything. The posters on the walls, the documents on the floor and all over his desk, the empty coffee cups, the maps, the projector screen that’s pulled down and displaying nothing but a glowing white page, the utter, utter madness of it all. Him, sitting in the middle of it, scribbling into a notebook.

No wonder they want me here. Talking some sense into Agent Snow and saving Watford some money looks like the right choice, but how the hell do they expect me to do that on my own when it’s this I’m up against? Has anyone other than myself walked into this room in years? Division Chief Bunce definitely hasn’t. If she had, she would have sent a hazmat team, not me, a doctor in over his head. 

The man himself stands back from a swivel chair abruptly, holding out a hand, a confused expression on his freckled face. “Agent Snow. Um, Simon. Simon Snow. Nice to meet you.”

“Agent Pitch. Likewise.” I neglect to shake his hand back. It's slathered in ink; he must be lefthanded. And, anyway, if he touched me, he might see how frozen I was, might comment on it, and I’m not one for small talk. Cold down here, eh? That’s October for you. Absolutely horrendous, those kinds of conversation.

Snow draws back and wipes his palm of the white of his button-up. “Right. Well, this is it! Home sweet home. This is the only desk, but I’m sure we can find you something. Anyway, you don’t need to spend time getting anything situated today, we’ve got a full schedule.”

“What do you mean?”

Snow smiles, sinks back down in the swivel chair, then slams his fingers into the keyboard of a computer until the projector is finally showing something. A neck. More precisely, a human neck covered in blood, with two identical wounds on the side. “This is what I mean. Three people have been found like this in the woods near a village in Cornwall within the last three months.”

“Unfortunate. What does that have to do with us?”

“We need to investigate it. Obviously.”

“Why today?”

He swivels. Again. Snow seems rather unkeen on keeping anything out of an arms reach, including a…lunar calendar? “It’s the full moon tonight.”

I feel myself raise an eyebrow, more judgmental than I mean to be. “Are you suggesting there is a--what, a werewolf, loose in Cornwall?”

“I’m not suggesting anything. I’m theorizing that something has been attacking teens in this village for the last three full moons, and if we want to get there in time to figure out what it is, we need to shake a leg.”

Somewhere between being appalled by his choice of idiom and an encore of total despair at my career path, I found myself driving down the motorway with Special Agent Simon Snow, conspiracy theorist extraordinaire and confirmed nutjob. The agency never lets us take our own cars, so we’re stuck in one of the black, nondescript ones they set aside for missions. I say they’re nondescript, but when you put two men in black trench coats in the front and suddenly you look anything but inconspicuous so it’s lost on me why they even bother. If we were in my car, we would look less like we were cosplaying the Men in Black. That, and I would have a real excuse to yell at Snow for fiddling with the radio. 

“Can you find it in your heart to listen to one song all the way through?” I sigh, watching him twist the dial for the seventy billionth time since I hit the accelerator. 

“I thought that one had ended,” he shrugged. “Anyway, this doesn’t seem like the right mood music, does it? Like, classical doesn’t shout secret mission.”

“I happen to like Shostakovich, so I don’t give a damn what the mood is. The mood is irrelevant.”

Snow has the audacity to groan. He has a bloody lot of audacity, actually. For the thirty minutes that we’ve been driving, he’s been smacking his gum and fidgeting, as if he wasn’t the one dragging me out to the sticks to chase make-believe creatures. 

I turn the volume up and try to tune him out. 

09:43, 28 October

Unnamed Country Road

Special Agent Simon Snow

It figures the agency would spring some snobby prick like Baz on me. If it’s between dealing with him and losing the division, then I figure he’s worth putting up with, right? From the moment I was sat down and told if I couldn’t make this work it was over, that I could forget reassignment and had the unemployment office to look forward to, I knew I had to try. But he isn’t making it easy. The bastard didn’t even want to shake my hand! 

I just want to hurry up and get there, but he insisted he drive, and I agreed because I didn’t know he drove like my gran. So I told him he could do two hours, then I could drive the rest of the way, which he shot down. Then, since I packed two muffins--lemon poppyseed, baked by Gran coincidentally--because I didn’t want to have to stop for breakfast, but I can’t do fieldwork on an empty stomach and it’s the most important meal of the day and all that shite, he looked offended when I tried to give him one. 

To be fair, I don’t know anything about him. Maybe he’s sensitive to food. Maybe he’s been told bad news (aka being partnered with me) and he doesn’t know how to cope. Maybe he just doesn’t want to be here. 

Only one way to find out. Can’t make him any more grumpy than he already is. 

“So, um, did you apply to work with me, or…?”

“I was reassigned.”

“Oh.”

It’s the first time we’ve said anything since he yelled at me about the radio, but I suppose I’ve got my answer. Maybe he senses the need for the tension break. We’re off the motorway now, going down a mostly dirt road, so he must think it’s safe enough to dare a glance at me. “I’m sorry, that sounded rude. It’s just that it was very sudden. I was comfortable where I was before, and I didn’t have much intention of being moved.”

“Ah, well. That’s Watford for you,” I say. “What were you doing before?”

“Autopsies for forensics.”

“Oh, that’s grand actually. You don’t know how much help you’re going to be, really. I always hate working with the morticians and whatnot because they treat me like a crazy person,” I laugh. “But now I’ve got my own personal one!”

This is apparently not the right thing to say to Mr. Sunshine and Rainbows, because he fully turns his face to sneer at me. “Right, first of all, I’m not your personal anything. You can take that Sherlock Holmes and Watson fantasy out of your head right now, because we’re equals in this situation. Just because I got transferred--”

“Whoa, man, I didn’t mean it like that. I didn’t mean you belong to me or anything--”

“--does not mean I’m any less qualified to be here than you. And don’t interrupt me! And they probably wouldn’t treat you like a crazy person if you didn’t lead with let’s go to Cornwall and fight lycanthropes.”

“Fuck off. I didn’t say anything about lycanthropes,” though the sound of it coming out of his mouth gets me going a bit. I totally think there’s some lycanthropy going on. The evidence is all there! The full moon, the bite marks, the moors. If the testimonials from my connections are anything to go off of, which they are, then it’s a copycat at the very least. Someone or something wants us to think it’s a werewolf. We just need to figure out which option it is and why, and preferably, how to stop it.

To me, that doesn’t sound crazy at all. Hypothesis, action, solution. Something is terrorizing this community and we can do something about it. That’s our whole job! So what if we need to think outside the box a little bit? 

The box is where Pitch seems content to be. “You certainly implied we’d be dealing with them.”

“Ok, fine. I’m taking us werewolf hunting. Does that make you happy? Is that what you want to hear?”

“Obviously it isn’t.”

“Obviously it is. You already have it in your head that I’m sending us on a wild goose chase. I know my own reputation, you know.”

He scoffs at that, but doesn’t say anything. Prick. I don’t bother trying to switch off driving; I let him take us all the way to the pub we’re going to be staying at. Arthur's Paw. 

Baz audibly sighs as he looks at the sign with a little Excalibur and paw print. If I didn’t witness the fit he just threw over our actually serious business trip, I would think it’s just from all the stretching he does once he gets out of the car. The bloke should have just pulled out the fucking yoga mat, the way he started bending and shit. Again, I offered to do some of the driving. He missed his opportunity to stretch, that’s on him!

“We’re staying at a pub?”

I grab the bag I packed--there’s clothes in there for him I put in before I knew he was an asshole--and close the boot, trying my best not to slam it. “Unofficially. I don’t know if the Agency would be too pleased with it but I know the owners.”

He mutters something about a conflict of interest as we knock at the locked entrance. Penny opens it, and throws her arms around me in a hug when she sees us, making me drop the bag. “Simon! Thank Merlin you’re here. Come on, you’ll get wet out there. It’s been pissing all morning.”

“Did she just say thank Merlin?" Baz whispers to me. I ignore him. 

Call me a bad friend if you want, but it’s been ages since I’ve been out here to visit. That’s what happens when you’re manning a division all on your own. Still, Arthur’s Paw is still as cozy as I remember it being when they first opened the place. Dark interior, vintage beer ads on the wall, photographs of the regulars. It’s empty right now of course, but it was pretty full last time I visited. 

“How’ve you been? Is Shep in?”

“Here!” He says, coming down the stairs that lead to their flat above the pub. He’s still in his pajamas. Classic Shepard. I pull him in for a hug too once he gets close enough. 

“We’ve been as good as you can expect, given everything,” says Penny. She’s sat on one of the barstools in her usual skirt and sweater combo, and she’s dyed her hair blue--last time I was here it was purple. “And yourself?”

If Baz weren’t here, I’d tell her the truth. That I’ve been fucking awful. My job was threatened, Agatha broke up with me, then I had a fling for a few weeks with a guy named Jeremey who ended up being more trouble than he was worth, one of my goldfish died, and now I’m stuck with Dr. Prick at my side. Fucking. Awful. But I can’t say all that, not with him here, so I smile and say everything’s been fine, which she knows is code for we’ll talk later. 

“You’re his new partner, right?” Shepherd asks. 

Baz is still by the entrance, looking like he’s standing on frozen ice and doesn’t know how to proceed. Maybe he’s taking in the decor? He seems like the kind of person to judge a place harshly by the decor. Probably thinks it's kitschy. Still, he clears his throat and says, “Yes, that’s right. Agent Pitch.”

“Pleased to meet you! I’m Shepherd, I’m from Omaha, Nebraska. And this,” he throws an arm around Penny’s shoulders, “Is my lovely wife Penelope.”

“From London,” she chimes in. 

“Yeah, we’re both transplants. It was a big deal with the locals when we first opened the place, you know, the gentrification of country living and all, but that’s really not what we’re all about. We won ‘em over in the end.”

Baz purses his lips and nods. “I see. Well, it’s…lovely to meet you both. Snow, may I have a word?”

“Oh, yeah, you can go up to your room. Simon, you remember the way, right?”

I do. It’s the same room I stayed in last time, and the only other one in the flat other than Penny and Shepherds. As we go up the squeaky stairs, Penny tells me she’ll have tea ready for us when we come down for a proper chat, which Baz scowls at. I want to slap the look off his stupid angular face, honestly. 

When we’re in the guest bedroom, the door shut, I don’t have time to brace for impact. “Snow, what the fuck is this?”

“This?” I point to the bed. “It’s a bed, mate, don’t tell me you’ve never seen one.”

“No, I mean this whole situation. You barely gave me ten minutes notice on my first day that we’re going to be staying on an overnight trip, hours from headquarters, to investigate some murders that you so elegantly imply were carried out by werewolves! I’m given no evidence of this other than one bloody photograph, I don’t have time to even read the case file, and then I’m marched to some wolf themed pub in the middle of nowhere, conveniently run by your buddies!” He’s been pacing during his second temper tantrum of the morning, punctuating it by throwing up his hands. “Excuse me for asking, is this a joke? Am I being hazed?”

I knew the pub being wolf themed would be a hit to the credibility of the whole thing but, honestly, it’s just a wacky coincidence. The whole reason Shepherd wanted to start up the place was because, back when I was in the agency academy and still living with Penelope, we watched the (phenomenal!) film An American Werewolf in London and he thought it was the best thing he’d ever seen. Then we got to talking about how funny it would be if he, an American, started up a wolf themed country pub, and one thing led to another…

Penelope kind of vetoed the whole wolf themed thing, so it’s not exactly as on the nose as it could be. I mean, it’s not like there are wolf heads hung up on the walls or anything. Just some posters. And the coasters. And the pub sign, and the name, and the menu item names, and the little wolf that’s engraved on the pint glasses. But that’s it! It’s subtle! Tasteful, even! Baz just has it out for me, that’s why he’s bringing it up. 

“Look,” I start. “I know it’s a lot to spring on you. Stressful first day and all that. But I want to remind you that I’m not certain there’s a werewolf, I’m only saying that someone or something is going through an awful lot of trouble to make us think there is one. Either way, three people have been killed, and it’s our job to find out why. It's our duty. That’s what’s important, that’s what we need to keep in mind.”

Baz is pinching the bridge of his nose and nodding by the end of my speech. It’s a crooked nose, must have been broken at some point. I wonder if it was a sports injury. Baz has an athletic look about him so I bet he used to play football or something. Used to, because I reckon he’s one of those people who’d rather not play at all than play in a Sunday league. Or, maybe, he has some sort of secret ruffian past. Former bare knuckle boxer. Nah, probably not that. It’s more likely that someone had enough of his attitude one day. Can’t say I’d blame them for slapping him one. 

“Yes, yes, you’re right. I hope you’ve made arrangements to talk to the families.”

“And the local coroner. Already sorted, we’ve got a busy afternoon.”

He sighs. Then, “Simon, one more thing.”

“Yeah?”

“Is this actually the only bed, or am I missing something?”

“Shit, you’re right,” It hadn’t crossed my mind that there’s one. Not even a big one. It’s a pretty small room, and doubles as Shep’s game room, so there’s not much space between the bed, the wall, and the PC set up he’s got. “We’ll sort it out later, yeah? Let’s go get some tea. We’re going to need it.”

Chapter Text

12:43, 28 October

Jones Residence, Cornwall

Special Agent Baz Pitch

It’s still raining by the time we venture out to meet our first witnesses. Snow tells me they had no blood relation to one of the victims, but they knew her, and were the ones to happen across her body on an evening stroll. Their cottage is even further out into the middle of nowhere than the pub, and I begrudgingly let Snow drive, the same way I begrudgingly let him play catch up with his friends for about an hour and ate the jam and toast they gave me. I hardly spoke, but it suited me. I barely know Snow as it is, nevermind his friends, even if they seem mostly alright. I almost wish I was back there now instead of standing out in the pissing down, freezing cold rain. 

“I assume they know we’re coming?” I ask Snow, who’s currently peering into the cottage windows. All the lights inside are off, but the porch light is still on, an oddity for noon. Nobody’s answered the four times that we’ve knocked. There’s a car in the drive.

“Yeah, I phoned them yesterday,” he says. His hair’s soaked, curls sticking to his forehead, and he runs a hand through them before walking through the garden. 

I jog after him. “Maybe we have the wrong place.”

“I don’t think so.”

“You could give them another call?”

Snow’s found a back door, turns the knob and pushes, and it creaks open. He looks at me and grins.

“We can’t.”

“Come on!”

“Snow, it’s against the law.”

He shrugs. “Not if we think they’re in danger. And I’d say these are pretty good circumstances to assume they are.”

Yet again I’m not given any time to think about how utterly, utterly ridiculous everything is, and I follow close behind him as he opens the creaky door. The air inside is only slightly less cold and damp than it was outside, and there’s no sound. No movement, either, aside from our quiet shuffling. We enter through the kitchen, and he stops me about five paces in with a hand to my chest, pointing at the hardwood floor with his other. “Look.”

“They’re everywhere,” I keep my voice low as I take in the muddy paw prints. They cover the floor in overlapping paths, still wet but plenty distinct. “Do you know if they have a dog?”

Snow doesn’t answer me, just gives me a look. I probably deserve it. They are pretty damning. The paws on the Great Dane my parents own aren’t even this large.

I’m in the middle of documenting the evidence (snapping a picture with my mobile) when when Snow, who had wandered off for thirty whole seconds, goes, “Oh fuck. Baz, come get a look.”

A shiver goes down my spine. I follow his voice and end up met with a worse sight than I expect to see. The Jones’, and older couple, deceased in their beds, claw marks all over them. 

“Call the local authorities,” I say, launching into doctor mode to inspect them. Snow’s already dialed them when I say it, mobile up to his ear. 

It’s grizzly, but it doesn’t look like the work of an animal. I’ve been unfortunate enough to see animal attacks; they aren’t as uniform as this. I tell him as much once he’s hung up with the police. “I’ll know more once I can perform a proper autopsy but, Snow, these are definitely from a knife. Whoever did this did it with intent. I mean, I’m not even seeing signs of a struggle. I wouldn’t be surprised if we find some sort of drug in their blood.”

His hand starts raking at his curls again. “I’m willing to bet they left those footprints for us as well.”

“But why? Why go to all this trouble to make it look like an animal? Wolves don’t even live in the UK, they can’t possibly think anyone would buy this.”

“I’m working on that,” He grimaces. Then, I watch his blue eyes narrow right behind me, and he pushes past me to the window. “Baz, look. Hair. Fur! And look at all these smudges on the window--they must’ve escaped out of it!”

My heart does a slight twinge at the weird thrill Snow seems to get out of the alleged fur. He’s holding a clump of it like he pulled it out of his Christmas stocking, a gleam in his eyes, and I beg my brain to get out of the dangerous territory it’s bordering. No, no, Snow is not cute, we’re not going there right now. Not when there’s literally a deceased elderly couple next to us. I motion for Snow to follow me out of the room, which he does quite obediently. 

He’s already put the fur into an evidence bag that he procured out of thin air, and he’s tucking it in my trench coat pocket. “Can you analyze this for me? I’m sure there’s somewhere you can look into it when they take the bodies. We were gonna meet with the coroner anyway so this just speeds that up.”

“Me? What about you?” He’s rapidly walking away from me, out of the dark house and back into the drizzle, headed for the car. I’m yet again left jogging after him. 

“I’m gonna meet up with the other witness.”

I can’t lie, I feel a bit of relief. I don’t want to talk to anyone. I didn’t get into this line of work to have conversations, especially not conversations about creatures out of a children's tale or bad romance film. Still, the fact that he’s just up and decided this without even consulting me is peeving. “You’re not leaving me here to explain all this, are you?”

He’s already in the blasted driver's seat. “You’ll be fine. This is your forte right? Bodies? I’ll text you where I’m headed just in case, yeah?”

“But Snow--!” It’s too late. He leaves me, standing in the front garden getting increasingly more soaked. 

13:16, 28 October

Petty’s Goat Refuge, Cornwall

Special Agent Simon Snow

I feel a bit like an asshole leaving Baz like that, honestly, but I hate dealing with coppers. Ironic, I know, but they always look at me funny. Either they don’t trust me because I’m with the Agency or they think I’m a nutcase. Either way I don’t appreciate it, them and their little sweaters and hats. That’s not even mentioning the fact that I’m worried that if I don’t burn rubber to get to the goat refuge, the owner's life could be in peril. So there’s that. 

The refuge is only about a fifteen minute drive from the Jones’ cottage, and I spend all of it trying to figure out what I make of everything. As much as I’d like it to be a werewolf, I know it’s probably not. But it’s something unusual. Something weird. 

I feel guilty for the rush it gives me. 

It’s always been this way. Other kids in the care homes weren’t the most adjusted people out there, don’t get me wrong, but even for them I’ve always been a bit odd. When I was twelve and all the other boys started getting into back alley fights and hocking things they’d pickpocketed, well…Okay, I was doing all of that too, but I was in my own world when I was doing it. I wasn’t Simon Snow, getting sent to juvie, I was Simon Snow, getting unjustly thrown into the king's dungeons. I wasn’t bleeding because some other punk kid beat me up for a candy bar I’d stolen, I was bleeding because I narrowly escaped a vampire attack. 

For a little while I knew it was just my imagination. Looking back, I know that some of it was just a way to cope with the shitty cards life dealt me. Some of it. But now that I've been to school, I’ve looked at the science, the folklore, the testimonies from real people. I know the world isn’t as normal as it seems. It can’t be! 

If something can’t be explained, maybe we’re just relying too hard on what we know. Maybe we need to get creative with it. 

So, werewolves. Something with werewolf tendencies, at least. People get it in their heads all the time that they can transform into a nonhuman being. Clinical lycanthropy is an option, but I don’t reckon it’s the right one. If we want to go the human route, it’s more likely someone wants us to think they’re an animal--they’re just not smart enough to do it foolproof. What I know for a fact is that they’d probably have no reason to kill the Jones’ unless they knew they were the couple that came across one of the original victims on the moors. They must have known that, and must have figured out some agents would be sent around sooner rather than later. 

I’m relieved to see a woman in a green overcoat and herding staff when I pull up to the driveway of the goat refuge. She calls to me as I get out, “You that Watford Agency bloke I’m expectin’?”

“I sure am,” I flash my badge out of habit as I walk up to her. “Agent Snow. Nice to meet you.”

“Likewise. I’m Ebb Petty,” she tells me. She runs the goat refuge, one of the only in all of Britain, and also works as the local veterinarian. There’s about thirty of them in the field I meet her in, and a white one comes up to me and starts trying to nibble my sleeve as she goes to shake my hand. 

“Enough of that, you,” she says fondly. “Sorry about that. How about we go inside, hey? Dry off a bit. I’ll make us some tea and we can have a talk.”

“That sounds lovely,” I say, not lying even a little bit. I’m fucking starved. I ate a few slices of toast before we left the pub but it’s been a long morning. After all the damp and the grizzly crime scenes and the bickering with Baz, I could use a warm drink and a snack. 

Baz. It’s weird, but I’m kind of antsy to get a text from him. I pulled over briefly to send him the location on the way here, but when I check my phone inside the barn that’s apparently also where Ebb lives, it only says it’s been delivered. The prick hasn’t even read it yet. Granted, he’s probably busy analyzing things and whatever, but he should still check his messages! I’m his partner. I’d check it if he sent me things! 

I push it out of my mind. Ebb sets some biscuits and a bowl of fruit on her small dining table, and I start gratefully snacking while I ask, “Have you had any more encounters since we spoke over the phone?”

She shakes her head. “No, thank goodness. I was devastated when I found the poor wee things all mangled. My goats, I suppose they’re a bit like children to me, you know? To lose three of them in one night…” Tears start welling up in her eyes. 

“I’m really very sorry,” I rush to say. Meeting with loved ones is always hard. “I’m doing everything I can to get to the bottom of it. Now, the local wildlife and gamekeeper says there hasn’t been any large animal sightings in the area, nothing out of the ordinary at all. But given the fact that your goats were found in a similar state to the recent murder victims, we have to treat their deaths as being by the same killer. For right now, I mostly want to know why. Have you got any enemies? Anyone around here who might have a grudge against you?”

“I don’t think so. I keep to myself. I’m not big on socializing, you see, so I only leave the refuge if someone needs a vet in a pinch, and even then I’m just dealing with their livestock. Only I haven’t done that in at least over a year.”

“Ok. And I’m assuming you're the only one living here?”

She nods. 

By the time I’ve finished running through all my questions, I don’t feel any better about anything. Everything Ebb describes about the bodies of the goats, where and how she found them, the behavior of the rest of the herd…it all sounds like an animal. The only problem is there’s no photographs of them, and when I ask if she would consider letting me dig them up, she only starts to weep again. 

“I’m sorry, but I can’t,” she sniffles. “I’d hate for the wee dears to be disturbed. They went through enough.”

“It’s ok, I understand. You’ve been a lot of help, though, really.”

“D’you know what did it then?”

I bite my lip. “Miss Petty, do you know anything about werewolf mythology?”

“Werewolf? Can’t say I do. Now, my brother, he’d know. Nicky’s into all sorts of things like that.”

“Does he live around here?”

Ebb gets a grim look on her face. Worse than when she’d been crying over the goats, even. “No, I should hope not.”

My mobile starts buzzing in my pocket before I have a chance to ask why. I excuse myself awkwardly, and Ebb grins and waves at my apology as I shuffle off into the hallway. 

“Snow, it’s me,” he sounds a bit wary. “We’ve run into a bit of a roadblock. I’ve all but tried to challenge the local coroner to a duel--he won’t let me see anything to do with the other victims. I wasn’t even allowed to sit in on the Jones' autopsy, I just have to sit and wait around hoping they’ll let me read the report. Honestly, Snow, I’ve never met anyone as difficult as this Smith-Richards guy. He’s been passive aggressively smiling the entire time he’s been telling me to get lost.”

“Yeah, he sent me a pretty hostile email when I was trying to set things up,” I winced. Now I felt even worse about leaving him. 

His sigh crackled over the phone, and I could almost picture his fingers pinching the bridge of his nose like they had this morning. “Ok, well, what about you? How’s it going at the…whevere it is that you are?”

“The goat refuge? Great, actually, I’ve just gotten done with my tea.”

“Oh, piss off.”

I grin because I had a feeling he’d say something like that. A hope. He’s fun to tease.

“Look, everything she’s told me is just confirming what we already know. I think what we’re dealing with is someone or something who maybe doesn’t know how to adapt to their urges. If it is a werewolf, maybe the first couple of kills were purely instinctual, complete accidents. Then, a few months later with more experience, they attack the goats to avoid anymore human bloodshed. Sound feasible?”

“That wouldn’t explain why they would kill the Jones’, and it doesn’t account for the fact that they clearly weren’t killed by an animal. And, correct me if I’m wrong, but werewolves don’t crave bloodshed. Why would they have an instinct to kill?”

Something clicks as he says it. “Hold that thought. I’m going to finish up here and then I’ll swing by the station and we’ll talk more then, okay?”

“Fine,” he says. Then, lowering his voice, “but the next time we have to split up, you’re going to be the one dealing with the stupid bloody coroner, got it?”

“Got it.”

15:09, 28 October

Village Police Station & Coroners Office

Special Agent Baz Pitch

I’m folding an origami crane out of my notepad paper in the waiting area of the police station, hoping God will strike the building with a lightning bolt and kill us all, when Snow finally bursts through the door, dripping wet. And then the bastard has the gall to smile at me when our eyes meet. 

Admittedly my stomach does a flip, but I can safely blame that on the fact that I haven’t had any lunch. It’s nothing to do with the fact that he has a smile like sunshine and I am but a weary plant in need. Nothing to do with that at all. I’m annoyed with him. Obviously. 

Droplets falling from his curls, he walks over to me, practically buzzing. “Tell me you still have that hair sample.”

“I still have the sample,” I pull it out of my pocket. After the back and forth with Smith-Richards, who I’m positive doesn’t even have the credentials to be a coroner and who I will be investigating once this nightmare is over, I didn’t bother mentioning it. The station here probably isn’t even set up to analyze something like this. 

“Great. Look, I’ll deal with trying to get the report, just take this out to the car, yeah? The owner of the goat refuge is tagging along. I think she’ll be able to identify it for us, she’s got a veterinary background.”

If I hadn’t spent the past hours sitting around convinced I was an extra in Hot Fuzz, I might have put up a fight. Told him that I highly doubted even a veterinarian could definitively tell us what kind of hair or fur it was, off hand, just by looking. But I don’t; I just slink out of the room and run the wet distance between the station and the car. 

I climb into the backseat to be met with a lady about my aunt’s age, with a kind face and a rainbow wooly hat. “Hiya.”

“Hello there,” I say, trying my best to sound friendly. “I’m Special Agent Pitch. Agent Snow told me you might be able to help us with identifying what we suspect is animal fur?”

This is against the rules, I’d like to point out. The Agency doesn’t recommend we just pull people off the street and ask them for help. But of course Snow doesn’t play by the rules, of course I’m relying on nothing other than his word that she can help us. Of course! Why not! And I suppose I’m not better, because I’m already shoving the baggie full of mysterious fur into her hands before she can even answer me. Not even half a day and I’m already corrupted. 

“Ah, yes. Goat.”

I blink. “Excuse me?”

“Oh, this is definitely goat fur,” She says, nodding and inspecting it. She pops the seal of the bag open and sniffs it. “From my wee darlings, I’d know it anywhere. This came from the goats that monster killed.”

“So, you believe it was a monster that killed them?”

The woman chuckles. “Not in the literal sense. I meant morally. You’d have to be quite the monster to kill two helpless creatures like that, in their homes no less! And then to go and get involved with the Jones’...only someone deeply troubled would do that.”

I suppose Snow’s made her privy to that as well. Perfect. 

Though I’m a bit skeptical, I’m sure if anyone can recognize goat fur by sight alone, it would probably be her. She hands the resealed bag to me, and I nod in thanks, trying to figure out why her face looks so bloody familiar. “Well, I can’t disagree. I assure you, we’re trying to get to the bottom of this.”

“Oh, of course, Simon’s told me all about that. He’s such a nice young fella! He tells me you’re new on the job. How’re you finding it?”

God, okay, here it is. The small talk. “It’s been…fine. Rather eventful, but fine.” Better to keep the British sentiment well and alive by not complaining to a total stranger. Besides, it’s not very professional. If I have someone to pick a bone with, it’ll be Snow. 

Ebb gives me an understanding smile. A suspiciously familiar one. There’s no way I’ve met her before. I would have surely remembered meeting a professional goat handler. But then again, would I? My father is nothing if not a countryman at heart. We never raised goats, only horses, but maybe they ran across each other at some point? During one of those horrendous county festivals he was always making me attend? 

I’m about to nosily ask her how long she’s lived in Cornwall--her accent is distinctly East London--when Snow bursts back into the driver's seat, haphazardly passing a beige folder to me. “Hi, sorry if I took too long. Is it a goat sample?”

“Certainly.”

“Fantastic, that makes things a lot easier. Baz, read through that, I took it and ran before I had to make much talk with Smith-Richards, but it’s the report on the bodies. We can drive Ebb here home and then discuss back at the pub.”

I scoff. I can’t help it. “Use your manners, Snow, for Christ's sake. I don’t think I heard a please anywhere in there.”

“He’s got you there, lad,” Ebb pipes in with a laugh. 

“Sorry, sorry. Baz, will you please read through that and then sum it up for me like I’m five?”

If he didn’t sound actually genuine, I would have had no choice but to go ballistic at him on principle. But I do think he really does want me to do that, and not for the first time it hits me that he isn’t being so brash because he wants to order me around, he’s just excited. He’s enjoying this. I suppose you would have to be mental to get into this line of work if you didn’t enjoy it, but then again, being mental is Snow’s entire reputation. 

My heart yet again betrays me by fluttering by my realization that Snow is just earnest, like a dog asking me to throw its toy for it. I don’t respond to him--I refuse to let him have that--but instead dive into the stack of papers before me, rain hitting the windshield and chatter from the front seat as my background noise.