As Tom the reporter* made his way back to his car, the two men in the car that had been following him all this time grew mad.
"MOON LAKE! How does that police chief know about Moon Lake?" asked the driver of the car, demanding an answer from his passenger. "I thought our man inside the police department removed that information from Lionel Ulysses' files!"
"He was supposed to, when he planted the bug in the chief's office," was the reply. "But his failure shall be dealt with in due course," meaning they would kill him at the first opportunity to safely do so without arousing any suspicion or attention toward themselves. "But what do we do now?"
"Okay," said the driver, after calming down and thinking about it for a moment. "Just because he knows the name of the town where Lionel Ulysses came from doesn't mean he will actually go there after all."
"Do we have any assets who also work for the same newspaper he does?"
"Unfortunately, no," admitted the driver. "Then again, unless this man goes rogue and decides to make the journey at his own expense, his editor will not allow the expenditure without proof that the answer to who killed Lionel Ulysses lies there."
"But that's the reason why we're following the reporter to begin with," pointed out his passenger. "We don't know who killed Lionel Ulysses before we could do so ourselves."
"True," agreed the driver. "Even if it was by pure instinct during a life threatening emergency, Ulysses broke the law by changing in public in broad daylight outside of Moon Lake. But we must make sure that whoever killed the were-rat isn't out to reveal weres' existence to the world, which is why we're under orders to kill the reporter if he gets too close to the truth, even if he doesn't discover who killed Ulysses first."
FOR THOSE FOLLOWING ALONG...
Whoever is in that car is at least pro-were, if not actually weres themselves, with no knowledge as to the identity of the were responsible for killing Lionel Ulysses.
MEANWHILE...
In the back alley where the final stand between Ulysses' "Rat Pack" gang and law enforcement officers took place, a fateful announcement is being made.
"I've got it. Right here for all to see," yelled a homeless man, while pointing to something sitting on an overturned box that was currently covered by a dirty rag.
"Come take a look. Right here. Five dollars for one look, but no pictures!" he yelled, trying to drum up business for his new endeavor, hoping to raise enough money for at least a decent meal, if not a good bottle of something decent to drink as well.
"What have you got?" asked a warehouse worker, coming over to see what all the yelling was about.
"You heard about it on tee-vee. You read about it in the newspapers. But here, right now, I've got what everybody says doesn't exist yet all are still looking for!" declared the homeless man.
"What?" the warehouse worker demanded to know, losing patience.
"The rat-man's missing tail!"
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*Based upon a classic TV character of the 1970s, who we cannot name outright.—tmw.