An Irish Werewolf In America

Disclaimers: Walter Skinner and Fox Mulder are the property of 1013 Productions. Hugh O'Neill traces his origins to the Watchers CD produced under the auspices of Rysher: Panzer/Davis. Ishtvan Aziz, however, is mine. No money made; no profit, either. Title taken indirectly from the movie, An American Werewolf in London, and inspired by Warren Zevon's gloriously mad song.
Rated: R for violence and language. What did you expect from a werewolf story?

An Irish Werewolf in America

"...those individuals who have succumbed to the more vicious seed of the wolf within them walk among us today as those sadistic sex criminals who slash, tear, rip, rape, mutilate and cannibalize their victims. When one compares the details of the offenses charged to alleged werewolves during the witchcraft mania of the Middle Ages with the offenses attributed to such sex criminals as the Chicago Ripper, Harry Gordon, Richard Ramirez, Henry Lee Lucas, and Jeffrey Dahmer, it becomes clear that there exists a true werewolf psychosis that can cause people to believe that they are transformed into wolves or can cause them to commit cruel and vicious crimes as if they were wolves scratching, biting, and killing their prey." The Werewolf Book, Brad Steiger, xviii

The phone was ringing.

Not a good sign for it to be ringing when he still felt this tired. Skinner reached for it with his eyes still closed, unerring from far too many late night awakenings. "Hello?"

Male, well-educated, odd mix of accents with Arabic and Eastern European fighting for dominance, faintly amused, but only faintly... that much trickled into Skinner's mind before he replayed the man's words. "I'd say stop me if you've heard this one before, but you might have. A werewolf walked into a bar."

Skinner stared at the phone. "What?"

The too-patient voice repeated, "A werewolf walked into a bar. Well. Sort of a bar."

"Is this a joke?" Skinner finally asked, entirely too calm.

The silence that lay between them was contemplative and not at all restful. Skinner felt no urge to fall back to sleep. "No," the man said finally, mostly amused and with a disquietingly dangerous thread under it. "It's not at all a joke. Fox Mulder is sitting in Howl at the Moon, talking to a man about werewolf sightings, among other things. The problem is, not all werewolves sprout fur and claws. They don't all need to. And I'm not in the profession of guarding FBI agents. If I were you? I'd get him out of there."

Skinner had rolled out of his bed partway through that insanely sober discourse. Pulling on clothes with a phone in your hand was a necessary skill he'd acquired while still an agent. "Who are you?"

His informant only laughed: an imp's laugh, or a devil's. "One, that would be telling. Two, what does it matter? Go get your man out if you want him alive. Dawn's coming."

"So?" Skinner went for brusque and sarcastic, hoping for more information. "You said werewolf. Once the moon's down--"

Voices sounded in the background; late-night, 'Is the shift over yet?' tired by the tone, but not loud enough to be intelligible. The stranger spoke over them. "Oh, the moon won't set until 8 AM. Daylight Savings Time is a mother." Mischief simmered in his voice as he added, "And it's not nice to fool with Mother Nature. Didn't anyone tell you that?"

The strange informant fell silent for a moment, then, much more intent, he murmured, "They're in the back booth. Move."

The man hung up, and Skinner cursed steadily as he ran downstairs, pulling on shoes and coat almost simultaneously. He'd already managed jeans, sweater, and gun. He wasn't sure which would piss him off more: if Mulder wasn't there, or if he was.

-%-%-%-%-%-

What Skinner wanted, badly, was to slam through the front door with a lost-sleep-satisfying crash, find his most wayward agent, and get the hell out of there for explanations. What common and sense and fine-honed tactics demanded, though, was an apparent late-night desire for a beer. So he walked into the bar, letting himself look as tired as he should have felt, and ordered a beer.

He barely restrained a frown when he realized that the corner barstool which gave the best view of the entire room -- bar to tables to booths to back door -- already had an occupant. The young man was barely legal from the look of him, and entirely too pretty to be sitting in a bar at 3 AM in silks and leather without some 'daddy' protecting him. Skinner's gaze had flicked over him, taking in all the details, and then moved on, but he frowned now, wondering why he'd come to that conclusion.

The clove cigarettes, Irish coffee, and what looks like poetry might have something to do with it. At least he's not writing the stuff. Silk and leather that aren't black, so not a Goth. Something about the make-up and the way the hair's braided back -- well, and the angle of the wrist screams 'camp.' Nice color for a wine, but I doubt his hair's really that shade. Judging from that nose, though, at least once he got into more trouble than someone could get him out of. He shrugged and kept scanning the bar over the rim of his beer. Not my problem so long as he's not cruising for customers or talking to Mulder... speak of the devil.

Skinner settled onto a stool at the point of the bar, nursed his beer, and let himself study the man sitting in the back booth with Mulder, grateful that for once luck seemed to be on his side. Mulder couldn't see Skinner from there, but the 'werewolf' across from him was plainly visible, and he looked too normal to be anything but a wild goose chase. Tall and freckled with a spectacularly copper shock of red hair, the man in the fisherman's sweater looked like a musician trading stories with someone willing to buy the drinks, not a werewolf. His hands moved too sharply, though, emphasizing some point, and Skinner found himself frowning again. Intent. Much too intent. Maybe that joker on the phone was right.

Now he just had to figure out how to get Mulder out of there. At three in the morning. He could hear the conversation from where he sat and couldn't really blame the bartender for staying at the far end of the bar from them.

Mulder's voice carried, something about, "--has to be precise, though. Otherwise, any kind of substitution would do, and no one would have the fascination with virgin blood. Which might improve the teenage pregnancy rate." Skinner nearly snickered at the dry humor under that, but frowned as Mulder went, "There are at least three distinct strains of vampirism out there, and that's before you divide out the ones with different nutritional intake. If vampires can differentiate so much, why shouldn't there be more than one type of shape-changer?"

"At least three? What, you've seen them?" The man sounded interested, amused, and charming but under those lay something that worried Skinner more: calculation.

"I'm with the federal government, Thomas; who'd believe me if I had?"

"Mulder, all you'd have to do is say you hadn't seen them. Rather like your president, the one who didn't have sex with that girl?"

They both laughed at that. Mulder sounded rueful; the other man faintly contemptuous. Or maybe Skinner was just reading too much into a quick sound.

The redhead stood up, Irish accent pronounced as he said, "But that sounds a long tale for a dry throat, mate. Half a minute and I'll stand this round to hear it."

Mulder was grinning; Skinner could hear it in his voice. "You just don't want to try to justify that 'serial killers are the real werewolves' crap, Flaherty. Sure, get the round and marshal your arguments."

"I can tell you read across the pond."

Skinner glanced up when the man started moving towards him, using the natural tendency to track movement to justify 'seeing' Mulder and stopping to talk to him. Just as Skinner stood up to go collect his wayward agent, however, the redheaded man broke stride. He stopped, well out of arm's reach, and straightened from a slight stoop to his full height, shoulders loose and hands relaxed by his side, and subtly ready for some fight. The blue eyes that looked him over held a great deal of calculating intelligence, and they scanned Skinner, weighed him on some unseen scale, and found him wanting... something.

Skinner backed up a step from an irrational certainty that violence was about to erupt. He was already reaching for his gun when Flaherty wrapped his arms around himself in a single quick motion and then unwrapped them again in a flash of claws. Neon red reflected off one knife blade, and florescent white off the other as he passed Skinner in three quick strides, knives parallel to his forearms in a grip that told Skinner the man knew what he was doing.

Skinner's hand finally closed around the handle of his gun as steel screeched against steel... and someone laughed. Skinner's head came up, eyes locking in on his targets and fire zone before his hand brought the gun around. The pretty reader from the bar had abandoned his book to draw knives of his own. One ran back, parallel to his wrist and too bright against dark green silk. That one cut short, sharp glittering arcs in the air as he used it to block Flaherty's strikes. The other knife extended out, a clawed extension of his arm already dripping blood where he'd gotten through Flaherty's guard. He was the one laughing, too.

Flaherty was snarling and circling his opponent. Their blades clashed and separated only briefly before scraping along their lengths again and again. Both of them were professionals, that much Skinner could tell as he sidestepped to get the bartender out of his line of fire. The bartender saw his gun and, sensibly, ducked.

"Freeze!" Skinner shouted it, and heard Mulder echo it from behind him. The clang and screech of metal on metal never paused.

Mulder snapped, "FBI, Flaherty! Freeze or I'll shoot!"

"Flaherty?" The other man was laughing still, and Skinner recognized the voice as the same man who'd called to tell him Mulder was in trouble. "So original, O'Neill."

"Who are you?" Flaherty or O'Neill snapped.

Skinner pitched his voice to cut across their argument and fight, even as he wondered how they could fight that fast and draw so little blood. "Step back and drop the knives, gentlemen, now."

His unknown informant bobbed, ducking to strike and aborting the motion almost as fast, but it had drawn the Irishman out of position. Blood erupted from Flaherty's arm, staining the off-white sweater bright red. Red drops lay on the floor around his blade which had fallen. Sliced tendon, Skinner diagnosed and winced. They'd be at the hospital a while on this before he could question the man. It would give him time to check out 'O'Neill' with Interpol at least.

"Drop the other knife, Flaherty," Mulder said. His voice sounded reasonable, calm. Skinner had no doubt he'd shoot if need be.

Flaherty saw it too. "All right, Mulder," he said slowly. "I'll be putting it down as soon as this one does."

Skinner growled at the pretty man. "Werewolves?"

That drew a soft laugh and he shook his head just enough to shift the braid back along his spine instead of over one shoulder. "Do you like poetry, Assistant Director?"

The informant's knives were still in his hands, both bloodstained now. He didn't show any inclination to put them down, either. The wide, wild smile of an adrenaline junkie still split his face and brightened his eyes and now the broken nose made much more sense to Skinner. So did the intricately woven braid that held long hair out of his eyes for the fight.

"That depends on whose it is," Skinner said. "You did me a favor, and I'll keep that in mind, but if you don't put those blades down, I'll have to shoot."

The flashing grin hadn't faded; his informant was clearly in no mood to go down to any police station. "I told you they don't all need claws and fangs, Skinner." The man laughed again and told Flaherty, "And you're an idiot if you don't know who I am -- but I know who you are, Red Hugh O'Neill. Next time -- if there is one -- stay out of Morocco."

O'Neill's eyes narrowed and then he said softly, "You. What did you do with my guns, you bastard?"

"Sent them to people who actually need them. Some tribesmen holding off tanks with World War I rifles." His smile shifted to something less out of control, more dangerous from both intelligence and intent. "Hugh O'Neill, a.k.a. Thomas Flaherty, a.k.a. Liam MacDhugal. Wanted for questioning in the '98 Omagh car bombing, in the matter of a shipment of guns through Marseille into Marrakech, and a small matter of a thousand kilos of pure cocaine to be traded for C-4. You're persona non grata in the United States and the United Kingdom alike, Hugh. I'd ask what you wanted so badly from an FBI agent, but I'm sure they're going to be more curious than I am."

O'Neill listened through the list, anger rising slow and sure with each phrase. "I'm sure they will. What I'm wanting, boyo, is your name and the source of your information. The day'll come that you and I have another long talk in a quiet place, after all."

Skinner said grimly, "Whoever you are, put those knives down." He could hear sirens coming and realized that the bartender must have had a phone behind his bar.

His informant only smiled. "Not tonight, Skinner. Sorry." He studied O'Neill, then some merriment curved that smile into an even more mischievous arc. "As for you, O'Neill -- no reason for them to wait on you in some hospital." He sheathed his knives with sure, easy motions, and then gestured with both hands in a fluid, twisting sign language that strongly resembled hula dance. Like hula, the motions clearly held some actual pattern above and beyond their beauty.

"God heal you, O'Neill, so that you can answer their questions more easily."

O'Neill growled and the imp only laughed and turned his back on Skinner's gun to pick up his book from the bar.

"Last warning," Skinner said grimly. "Put your hands where I can see them or I'll shoot."

The sleek burgundy head tilted, considering, and it shifted his braid along his back. Then he said thoughtfully, "You would, wouldn't you?" He shrugged, and turned, slowly, mug and ashtray still in his hands.

Mulder snapped, "Down!" just as the ashtray sailed towards Skinner's head, shedding ashes everywhere as it spun. The coffee left its own trail across the floor as it flew towards O'Neill's chest and just missed him. Ceramic hit the wall and shattered into nicotine-yellowed shrapnel that slid off Skinner's jacket; the heavy mug hit the bar and cracked with a spray of coffee and larger pieces that bounced off O'Neill's sweater. Skinner took aim at the retreating back of his informant... and held the shot. He had no choice; the quick little bastard had put the bartender in the line of fire as he ran.

Mulder still had his gun on O'Neill at least. Skinner barely kept his teeth from grinding as he said, "You'd better hope your name doesn't come up as O'Neill in any system we can access, 'Flaherty.'" There was no doubt in Skinner's mind that it would, though. That aggravation stayed in his voice as he snapped, "And Agent Mulder, we need to talk about your talent for finding weird informers."

"We need to get him a doctor, sir, and then we can discuss it. Who was your creditor that got away?"

Skinner let his disgust leak into his voice as he answered, "Just a man who called me to say you'd walked into a bar with a werewolf." He had the satisfaction of seeing that shut Mulder up. For a few moments, at least.

In and through Mulder telling O'Neill his rights under the Miranda decision, though, Skinner could hear O'Neill murmuring names in a considering tone as if he should know the informant's name... or would have a chance to get revenge. Skinner looked at O'Neill, wearing a blood-stained sweater but no longer dripping blood; at Mulder, standing there, gun out in textbook shooter's stance, one hand reinforcing the other wrist so the gun wouldn't waver; at the bartender whose stare kept shifting between the mess that had been left in his bar and the one hundred dollar bill lying on the bar where his deceptive coffee-drinker had been sitting.

How Skinner was going to explain this one to the approaching cops, he didn't know. But he pulled out his ID and prepared to spend the rest of the night/early morning doing just that.

-%-%-%-%-%-

Kim, bless her, had apparently noticed the times in the preliminary incident report he'd left on her desk. Skinner had occasionally considered giving her a raise just for being able to read his longhand. Today, however, he made a mental note to buy her lunch. Soon. When he'd escaped his first meeting ten minutes early, she brought him a large mug of coffee and an omelet and toast from the downstairs cafeteria along with the neatly typed report.

He found an email was waiting for him when he finally got five free minutes before his third meeting and he stole the time to read it from time he should have been reading over his notes for a budget meeting with the other assistant directors and the Deputy Director. The email and its author's escape should have aggravated Skinner, but he found himself more grateful than angry.

Possibly because he was sure an IRA organizer couldn't have had any good reason to be talking to his most wayward agent at 3 AM. Possibly from rueful acknowledgement that he'd underestimated the too-attractive man in ways he would rake a new agent over the over the coals for. Or maybe simply because, concealed blades or not, his informant hadn't attacked first, had made sure the bartender (and the FBI agents) had come out of it intact... and had been the one who stopped first.

Besides which, anyone who'd call Skinner at 2 AM to tell him a werewolf had walked into a bar definitely had a skewed sense of humor. Skinner suspected he'd need that to get through the rest of the day. So he opened the email and read it, a small smile already on his lips just from the header.

From: MischiefWalking@hotmail.com
To: Walter.Skinner@FBI.gov

Subject: Irish Werewolves in Washington

Sorry I couldn't let you arrest me. Or shoot me. Don't bother checking the c-note for fingerprints -- there aren't any. I made sure of that. (Mulder's wallet doesn't have fingerprints either, now. He *did* find it on my barstool, didn't he?)

Look on the bright side; everything I said about O'Neill is true. MI-6 is going to love you when you hand him over. In the meantime, tell your idiot agent that for a man who's survived vampires, he needs to be more careful about the uses people could find for things that he knows are real.

Sorry you're going to run short on sleep today. I'm sure it's no consolation, but I'm running even shorter. But try to take this as consolation, and my other comment on your agent. (You did say you like some poetry.)

Out of three or four people in a room
One always stands at the window.
Has to see the evil among thorns
And the fires on the hill.
And how people who went out whole,
Are returned in the evening
Like small change to their homes.

Out of three or four people in a room
One always stands at the window.
His hair dark above his thoughts.
Words stand behind him.
Before him, voices straying without a kit bag,
Hearts without rations, prophecies without water,
And big stones returned
But left sealed like letters with no
Address and no receiver.

Good luck. I get the feeling you can use it. And by the way, the next time a man calls you about a werewolf in a bar? You might try being a bit more skeptical yourself. But it was past two of the morning, after all. I'll forgive you this once.

There was, of course, no signature. Arrogant, obscure (who the hell wrote that poem? Skinner knew he'd spend part of his evening on Google hunting it down, damn it), infuriating, and shifting the blame to Skinner, or Mulder, for a phone call at an obscene hour.... Skinner's conscience wondered nonetheless how much trouble Mulder had been headed for, or O'Neill had planned for some part of Ireland. Or, worse, the States.

The whole situation -- letter, investigation, arrest and all -- should have driven Skinner nuts. Instead lines from the letter spun through his mind at odd moments during the day, when Skinner wasn't hearing that wild, pleased laughter or flashing on that wicked fighter's grin under a broken nose that made his informant something more real than beautiful. Each time, Skinner had to restrain a grin of his own. He'd never admit that he'd enjoyed having so much mischief wander through, even just the once. Remembering that vibrant personality made the long day less tedious, however.

It made the day more frustrating as well. Skinner had no name for his informant -- although he suspected checking the names O'Neill had mentioned aloud might be very interesting. Somehow, though, Skinner doubted they'd give him any explanation of O'Neill's immediate, almost instinctive blood thirst for a stranger in a bar, or how and where the two had learned to use knives like that. The names weren't likely to explain how O'Neill had been healed, either, or where, precisely, the guns in Marrakech had been stolen from, or sent to.

The whole thing was a tangled nest of mysteries and possibilities that, like so many other things Mulder ended up involved in, would never be adequately explained or sorted out. As for Mulder -- Skinner's most troublesome agent, bar none -- he might be frustrated by those loose ends, but he was also grateful for the slight smile Skinner acquired in the middle of his lecture on proper paranoia in dealing with informants. He also seemed surprised when Skinner agreed to meet up for dinner or a couple beers for a bull session on how O'Neill's wounds had been healed and just what the hell a known IRA collaborator and gun-runner was doing routing guns through Marseilles and Marrakech.

Of course, from Mulder's point of view, it had to beat being lectured further, or told to get back to work on duller case files.

Skinner, meanwhile, wanted to know how in hell 'Mischief Walking' (and that was one of the more honest email nicknames he'd seen in a while) had done all of it. Paying for dinner, and listening to Mulder's tangents, was a small enough price to pay for new approaches to those questions. And the slight smile could be useful, timed properly. If nothing else, Skinner would drive Mulder crazier wondering what his boss knew that he didn't.

Like a Hotmail address.

~ ~ ~ finis ~ ~ ~

Comments, Commentary, & Miscellanea:

The poem is "Out of Three or Four People in a Room," by Yehuda Amichai. Sleeps With Coyotes introduced me to it or to the poetry list that sent it out one morning, one of the two. The unnamed immortal who called Skinner and then vanished after pretending to heal Hugh O'Neill was Ish Aziz, who made an appearance in the end of Sirocco. Hugh O'Neill is listed in the second Watcher CD issued by Rysher: Panzer/Davis, listed as the teacher of Annie Devlin and Liam O'Rourke.

Many thanks to Alice in Stonyland, tarshaan, Misha, and Shrewreader for beta assistance. All errors are, of course, my own fault.

Gorgeous graphics courtesy of