In Seattle, Tom awoke to what he'd come to love, Alice laying beside him. In that sense, meeting her and letting her turn him into her male werefox was something that was amazing. It had sparked a connection that he'd never really had before, and in that it felt wonderful. He never wanted to let her go or make her feel unhappy. All of it was possible to his own suspicions at what had went down with the manhunt and arrest of Lionel Ulysses, and he had to admit to himself that he could have never seen anything like this coming. That weres were in fact real beings, but not the mindless brutes depicted in horror movies. Some may in fact be predatory and they did seem to have a much higher libido than normal humans did, but since letting Alice turn him, he hadn't noticed any real lack of control on his part. In that, he was quite willing to say that weres were not really that different from normal people and that they had many the same fears that normal people did.
And he knew that many of his original investigation into the arrest of Lionel Ulysses had the real prospect of exposing weres everywhere, and did privately admit that when he started that investigation that his intended story probably would have been very different from the one he intended to write now, but in the end, his opinions on honest and openness hadn't changed that much. He had some fear that someone wouldn't see Alice as the beautiful, kind, and loving woman that she was if they knew she turned into an anthropomorphic vixen at will, but at the same time he had the realization that were society couldn't just keep hiding. Claims of humanity not being ready wouldn't work, for as technology advanced so would the ability to find something "off" about weres and the harder it would be for were society to keep the truth about its bad eggs hidden. And if were society waited until some rogue were revealed itself in an open attack on people, the response would be negative as a result of the attack. The attack would drive the narrative and make things worse. Things may not be perfect, but Tom was certain that while there was no explicit threat of a rogue were causing trouble, they'd have the best chance to control the narrative and let the truth be told.
Would things be perfect or the same as before? Probably not, but to Tom, he saw it as a means to provide weres with a means to come into the open, be WHO they were and at least gain legal protection for it. It would let any "rogue" were be seen simply as a rogue, and not as something that would identify ALL weres. The road might be bumpy, but it would at least be on a real path to progress. And that was the story Tom wanted to tell now, and use the power of the press to give weres their best a free and open future.
However, that wasn't the story he was able to tell. At first because he hadn't been able to get everything he needed. He found clues, but nothing that would be concrete and his editor didn't want to ruffle any feathers, particularly with the FBI who called the tail caught on tape in Lionel Ulysses' arrest a "costume piece." With little more than circumstantial proof, his editor pretty much killed the original story and put Tom on "vacation" covering the Seattle Seahawks for the week, since the normal sports writer actually was on vacation. That meant covering practices, weakly press conferences, and now coming to the actual game. The press box was nice, Tom did find himself among several other reporters for various papers, but Tom also found himself having to rely on the program and taking notes through the game as it was played. He also had rely on the fact that Alice was a fairly decent Seahawks fan and provided her with some of the basic updates on the season and the motivation for the game.
In that, the Seahawks had some motivation for getting even for the upset the Cowboys had scored the previous year, also in Seattle, according to Alice.
"And that's all this is?" Tom asked to Alice as they sat and watched the game.
"On some level... yeah," Alice smiled, "the better part is that since their starting QB got himself hurt... Dallas has no offense worth mentioning. And against Seattle's defense... that doesn't mean good news for Dallas."
Tom shrugged and let things go, though he did hear a Dallas reporter, who had overheard Alice's comment, mumble that things weren't quite THAT bad for Dallas and that from what he'd seen, Seattle's offense hadn't been that much better. Tom didn't really argue that point, as he really wasn't a sports reporter and neither was he really a football fan. In fact much of his opinion on football was actually shaped by an assessment of football that equated it to little more than "violence punctuated by committee meetings." But, he'd been assigned to cover the Seahawks for the week and wouldn't even be allowed to go into the story he wanted to tell, be it the one he wanted to get the information for earlier or the one he wanted to tell now, until after the football game had been told. So hear he was watching men in grey and white with blue trim battle against a team in greenish grey with blue green trim battle against each other on a football field.
And the game ultimately did go back and forth with very little real "excitement" if one went by what would consider "exciting" in football. In the end, Dallas managed very little, if any, real offense, managing one field goal. The team also did score a touchdown, but that was also a defensive score, not an offensive score. The Seattle offense didn't do much better, but they did manage to move the ball and kicked four field goals through the game and in the end they did win 12-10. Tom jotted down his notes and then moved to follow many of the other reporters to the stadium's "office areas" near the locker room where the press conference would be held, with Alice following him. He really didn't intend to ask any questions as there were plenty of TV reporters there who had more interest in it than he did. He noted both their questions and their networks and the answers that they got that dealt with the game, and largely carrying some optimism and confidence that they were able to win and that was what mattered, not showmanship.
Once that was done, Tom and Alice slowly made their way out of the stadium with Alice on his arm. Looking to her, Tom felt better about being there, but that didn't change the fact that he personally would have preferred to simply be with her as there plenty of things on his mind. Working out how to work "the big reveal" so that weres could live openly everywhere and that humanity would see them fellow human beings, just a bit different was one of them. The other was ultimately winning Alice's parent's support. Would they like him? Would they support him, even though wasn't born a werefox? He'd covered a fair number of stories where that sort of thing happened, leading to all sorts of trouble.
"So... when do you need to get your story in?" Alice asked him as they walked along.
"I need to have it typed and edited by six PM," Tom sighed, "thankfully I can do that via Email... so, we can head home. It shouldn't take too long. From there... I suppose we can get into whether or not your parents will like me."
Alice gave a small chuckle, "they'll love you. Trust me."
The two continued walking, though Tom did feel some reassurance from her as they did so. He might have his nervous worries about meeting Alice's parents with her by his side, there was a lot that he felt he could do. And now with the football game over, he'd be able to prepare for the stories that were more important than two football teams.