Author's Note: No actual violence occurs in this chapter, but the aftermath of said violence is there... So, thus the warning...
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Jade Drake had been drawn to the doorway by all the shouting that had come after her husband went to the door. She could tell that Dymixious was angry, and that a part of her move had been intended to get him to calm down and let the situation be talked out. After all, Moon Lake was a town of weres and surely they would understand the need to remove rogues like Lionel Ulysses who had the potential to be looking at life in prison. Even if the state of Virginia or the Federal Government threw the death penalty at Lionel Ulysses, even THAT could take enough time that the wererat's lengthy lifespan would have been exposed before it could be carried out, and from what Dymixious had told her, the poisons used in lethal injections might take longer and much larger doses to kill a were. All of that did represent a need for that kind of service if the secret of were's existence was to be protected.
However, she arrived to find Dymixious raging at and engaging at least three police officers in direct combat. One was laying on his back with weak and pained breathing, likely with his ribs at least cracked. Another was on his knees and gripping at a bleeding arm, which had clearly been bitten open, judging by the blood and loose bits of flesh actually hanging from her husband's jaws. Clearly he had lost his temper and engaged in an all out fight, and had bitten that officer, who would likely need some anti-venom treatment as a werekomododragon was venomous, just like the mundane monitor lizard that Dymixious's and her own were forms were based on. As she appeared in the doorway, she noticed another pair of officers move from the sides, as if to get between her and Dymixious. At this, her husband had roared at something the leading officer, Ryan Conner had said and lunged forward. The officers, already stressed due to the fight that had begun drew their weapons and opened fire, gunning Dymixious down. Jade could only watch as blood spurted from her husband's wounds and he fell to the ground on the sidewalk that lead out to the street while the officers tried to recover.
"Dy!" Jade cried out, using a pet name she'd used from time to time after meeting Dymixious and actually coming to love him.
She rushed forward and kneeled beside him, ignoring that she was kneeling in her husband's blood or that it would stain her own clothing. She might feel that her husband could do more to control his temper, but that didn't mean she didn't love him or that in her present emotional and hormonal state as a result of her pregnancy that she could fully understand the police shooting him. Dymixious said nothing, but lay there with his breaths weak and shallow, and Jade only looked up to Ryan Conner who had just reported in on the battle, including his wounded officers and for the moment their wounded perpetrator.
"I don't understand all this," Jade said to him, "Why? Why did it come to all this? My husband's sought to PROTECT our secret. So that humanity doesn't know that we're real..."
She watched as Ryan Conner sighed and holstered his weapon, "No one wanted anything like this... but the situation is not one that a man like Dymixious can easily understand."
"What does THAT supposed to mean?" Jade demanded, "that because he's a werekomododragon that he doesn't understand? That because he doesn't carry an official badge that he doesn't understand?"
"More than likely it's his AGE that has lead to the result of things that he doesn't understand," Ryan Conner said weakly as he looked down to her, while his other officers moved to check with Samson Carter and the officer that Dymixious had bitten in the battle, "He likely grew up at a time when communications and surveillance technology was rather limited. It'd take time for a message to get from one point on the globe to another. And MANY weres may tend to struggle with how much technology has advanced over the years. Today, law enforcement can get visual records, meaning they aren't solely dependent on witnesses, as a security camera can give a far more accurate image. They can make phone calls or emails with the contact and coordination being instantaneous. It means that it's a lot harder to go around killing rogue weres and not attracting attention..."
Jade didn't say anything immediately. Dymixious and his father had been somewhat aware of the Seattle Police identifying him as a person of interest in the murder of Lionel Ulysses. That was why they had come to Moon Lake in the first place, but she'd figured from that sense that Moon Lake would protect them.
"And the Seattle Police and the FBI's field office in Seattle are already aware of your husband's contacts with Akane no Tachibana," Ryan Conner continued, "they're bound to come here to fully investigate that connection to make sure that she isn't hiding your husband or anything else... and should they find him here... THIS might have happened with a team of normals watching your husband change and physically attack them. Which in the end wouldn't protect the were-secret one bit... and if they have ANY reason to suspect that we were knowledgeably hiding your husband here... WE would face corruption charges, which would be a different problem."
Jade only sighed and looked down, "but Lionel Ulysses was a bad guy..."
"He was," Ryan Conner nodded, "but law enforcement and the law will also view vigilantism as a crime. That's why the Seattle Police and the FBI are looking for your husband... and with all the progress that has been made since the 1800s when he was growing up, it isn't like he can just hide. And in the US, and as a naturalized US citizen, Akane no Tachibana's royal title from Japan is worthless. If she commits a crime, her title won't protect her... And that's what has gotten the hunt after your husband launched."
Jade looked down to her husband. His breathing was weak and his eyes were barely open. She could hear the sound of an ambulance siren fast approaching their position. In many ways she was conflicted and didn't know what to do. With the way things were explained, it seemed as though the were secret might not be something that could be preserved with everything else that was going on. If the only thing that protected it was that no one was looking, then just about everything that Dymixious had told her about the nature of what he did was wrong. She looked back up to Ryan Conner with tears going down her cheeks.
"So it was all wrong?" Jade asked weakly.
"That isn't quite the right way to put it," Ryan Conner said slowly, "rogue weres could very well expose our secrets through their own actions... particularly away from places like Moon Lake. In that, wanting deal with rogues isn't a necessarily bad idea... but it's the problem that technology has grown so that anonymity isn't as easy and thus... making the entire action, problematic, as killing Lionel Ulysses has proven to be."
Ryan then looked up to see the lone ambulance arriving on the scene. It rapidly pulled up and sun cut off its siren, for the benefit of sensitive were ears. Their first moves would be to secure and at least attempt to stabilize Dymixious, as well as to get Samson Carter and the officer that Dymixious had bitten treated. It might take a few moments, but a good emergency team would be able to manage it.
"What about me?" Jade asked as she looked up to Ryan Conner as the EMTs rushed out of the ambulance and approached them.
"You will be perfectly free to remain here in Moon Lake, and if the FBI make any inquiries... we will do what we can to make them think that you had no knowledge of your husband's activities," Ryan spoke, "or if you wish to admit knowledge... that he had put you in enough of a state of fear that fighting was... not an option for you. It may not be much but it is the best we can do in these... "complicated" circumstances."
Jade could only nodded.