I was bored one day at work and this story was the result.  (The idea sort of 
grabbed hold of me and wouldn't let me go until I wrote it all down.  Luckily 
for me--and the sequel to "No More Yielding" which I'm also working on right 
now--it's short.)  It's set during the episode "A More Permanent Hell" and is 
sort of my take on what two of my favorite characters might have been doing  
during that episode.

Disclaimer:  Tracy and Vachon aren't mine, and never have been.  They belong to 
Sony and will be returned in perfect condition and the original wrapping when 
I'm done with them.  Advance apologies for any geographical errors about the  
city of Toronto.  I don't know the area and Yahoo's maps proved notoriously  
unhelpful on the subject.  Permission to archive at fkfanfic.com and the FK FTP  
site, all others please ask first (but I'll probably say yes).


Near Miss
by Anne Jensen (ajensen@west.net)

Tracy watched the streets roll by through the window of the car.  She'd never 
seen anything like this before, never heard the kinds or volume of crimes that 
filtered over the radio.  It was as if the whole world had gone crazy.

Which was, she thought, a fairly accurate description.

It still hadn't sunk in yet, the whole end of the world thing.  It was hard to 
believe that in just a few short months, everything would vanish in a roar of 
fire followed by darkness.  Something like that was almost to much to 
contemplate.  If she did, she'd probably wind up like the poor folks on the 
outside of the window.  

Instead, she let herself concentrate on the job.  She was a cop, and with all of 
the looting and unrest, there was a lot of work to focus on right now.  

Coming in like this hadn't made her parents happy.  They thought it was too 
dangerous for her to be out.  And what made her father nervous made her captain 
nervous.  He'd tried to convince her to go home--after all martial law had been 
declared and the army had moved in, but the simple fact was that things were so 
bad that every extra person was needed, and her captain had reluctantly caved 
in, pairing her up with her old partner Paul Moreau, and sent them out to 
patrol.

It had been a busy afternoon and it had only grown worse after dark.  The sun 
going down had brought out all the crazies, and Tracy had lost count of the 
fights, the stores they'd seen looted, and the fires that had broken out.  
They'd had to prioritize the calls they were receiving to just the very 
important ones.  

"43 Beta, please respond to a robbery in progress on the corner of Yonge and 
Charles." came the voice of the dispatcher.

Paul nodded at her and Tracy reached for the radio.  "Copy.  We're on our way.  
43 Beta out."  She looked over at Paul: "Another looting," she said with a sigh.

The attempted thief was still in the store as they pulled up.  "Stay with the 
car," Paul told her.  He'd been telling her that all day.  Either it was a 
holdover from when they'd been partners and he'd been ordered to make certain 
she stayed out of danger, or it had been a reiterated command from the captain, 
but the end result was the same: the commissioner's daughter was to be kept out 
of harm's way *again*.  Paul was her *partner*--how was she supposed to back him 
up if she was always stuck "keeping an ear on the radio"?  

She kept her fingers on the door handle, watching the confrontation inside and 
preparing to rush in if her partner needed her, or to corner the perp who might 
come rushing out.

"Help, please!  Somebody!"  Down the street, a man was dragging a woman into an 
alley.  "Please help!"

Tracy sighed.  Paul seemed to have the situation in the store in hand and she 
was the only cop here.  She opened the door, pulled out her gun and headed after 
them.

The attacker seemed to have the woman by the throat somehow.  The woman had 
moved from screaming to whimpering now, as he seemed to be very intently kissing 
her neck.  

"Police!  Freeze!" she shouted as she stepped into the alley.  "Let go of the 
woman and put your hands in the air!"  Her challenge startled the man out of 
what he was doing all right, but instead of complying, he threw back his head 
and laughed.  

Tracy was taken aback, but didn't lower the gun.  "Release her, or I'll shoot."

The man laughed.  "Go ahead."

Tracy scowled.  He was right.  There was no way to shoot him without risking 
hitting the girl.  She considered her options.  The safest thing to do would be 
to leave--to get Paul, maybe--but to get out of there.  

"Please," the girl pleaded, eyes boring right into Tracy's heart, and it decided 
her.

She was *not* going to leave an innocent girl to get raped and murdered in a 
back alley while she ran off to save her own skin.  She was a cop and it was her 
job to face down the bad guys, and there was no way that Paul, her captain, or 
her father would keep her from doing her job.  

She put her gun away, and tensed her muscles up.  If she attacked him, he'd have 
to let go of the girl so he could fight her, and then the girl could escape.  
And of the two women, Tracy knew she stood a better chance against the guy 
because she'd been trained for it.  She launched herself at him, hoping to take 
him by surprise.

It wasn't even close.  She hadn't even touched him yet when he grabbed her by 
the front of her uniform with his free hand and lifted her up.  

No one's that strong--the random thought passed through Tracy's head.

"What do ya' know?" the man murmured, his eyes seeming to glow green--a trick of 
the light, no doubt.  "Two for the price of one."

She struggled, trying to get him to loosen his grip, but he laughed again and 
effortlessly tossed her into a pile of boxes that had been left by a dumpster.

She lay there, stunned for a moment, hearing the distant sounds of sirens, the 
girl's renewed screams and--of all things--a motorcycle, the rank odor of trash 
filling her nostrils.  More boxes fell on her, hitting her head and her last 
thought before losing consciousness was that she might not even get those last 
three months.  


Javier Vachon--although he was currently styling himself as J.D. Valdez, was 
riding along enjoying the night.  Other vampires were worrying about whether 
they'd survive the coming doom, but it didn't bother him all that much.  Either 
they would or they wouldn't.  There was nothing he could do about it in any 
case, so he might as well enjoy this world while it lasted.

A woman's screams echoed form a nearby alley.  The screams themselves were a 
common thing, but the sense of another vampire presence caught his attention.

He didn't usually interrupt someone else's hunting or feeding, but ever since 
the news about the asteroid had broken, the younger vampires had been going on a 
free-for-all binge, which he found unsettling.  And well, he'd always been a 
sucker for a damsel in distress.  As Urs too often reminded him, he had a good 
heart.

He pulled up behind a police car, its lights still flashing.  Cops, he groaned 
to himself.  The last thing he needed.

But this car was empty and a glance through he window of a nearby store told him 
why.  The cop inside was nearly done arresting a would-be robber.  Vachon 
wondered briefly why there was only one cop--didn't they usually work in pairs?  
Oh well, everything had been crazy these past few days.  They were probably just 
as crazy for the cops too.  

A step in the alley revealed where the other cop was.  Vachon could just the the 
uniform pants and boots sticking out from under a pile of boxes.  

What caught his eye most was a scene in the center of the alley, however.  A 
vampire had a girl by the throat and was about to take a bite out of her.  
Sensing Vachon's presence, he looked up and growled.  "Find your own.  This 
one's mine."

Vachon flew at him, pulled his head back by the hair, and hissed, "Let the lady 
go."

The other vampire said in a quivering voice, "You can have the other one."

Vachon tightened his grip.  "I said, let her go."

The younger vampire let go and the girl collapsed in relief, trying to get her 
breath back.  Vachon dragged the other vampire into a wall and pushed him 
against it.  "Do that again, and you'll find yourself sporting a sharp stick as 
your next body piercing," he said pointedly letting his eyes wander to the large 
number of rings, beads, and chains the other vampire was wearing in various 
locations. 

"What difference does it make?" his opponent protested.  "They're all going to 
die."

"And if you have them all today, there won't be any left for *after* the thing 
hits."

"When we'll all be fighting over them?" the younger vampire scorned.  "I'll get 
mine in now, thanks."

Vachon shrugged.  "Then maybe I should just stake you here and be done with it."

The younger vampire scowled.  "Fine.  I won't do it any more."

"Glad to hear it, friend."  Vachon let go and stepped back.  The instant 
Vachon's hands were off, the other vampire rushed him.

Half-expecting this, Vachon dropped down, grabbed a stick of wood he'd seen 
earlier and shoved it into the other vampire's heart.  

He was young enough that it killed him quickly.

Just in time, too, because Cop #2 moaned under the boxes, and he could hear Cop 
#1 finishing up in the store.

A few quick adjustments to the girl's memory and a moment to pick up the body to 
hide any evidence and he was on his way.


Tracy opened her eyes to darkness.  For a moment she thought she'd slept through 
the end of the world, but then memory slowly returned.  Oh yes.  The boxes.  She 
pushed them off  and found Paul and the girl starting to bend over her.  

"You okay, Trace?" Paul asked, giving her a hand up.

"Yeah, I'm fine" She pressed a hand to her head.  "What happened?"

"I was about to ask you the same thing."  

"I saw this woman being attacked and tried to stop her attacker.  When he didn't 
respond, I had to rush him and wound up getting tossed into the boxes for my 
pains.  What happened to him?"  Had Paul come along and dealt with it, and, if 
so, where was the would-be rapist?

"I just finished inside, came out, and when you weren't at the car, started 
looking around.  He was gone by the time I got here."  

They both looked at the girl.  "I don't suppose *you* could shed a little light 
on the matter?" Paul asked.

She nodded slowly.  "He was holding me, but then we heard a siren in the 
distance.  I think he thought there were more cops coming because he let go of 
me and ran off.  I don't know where he went," the girl murmured in what seemed 
like a singsong voice to Tracy, although Paul didn't seem to notice.

"You were very lucky, miss," Paul soothed.  "Would you mind coming down to the 
station so we can get a description of him and try to catch him?"

"No.  I don't want to press charges.  It was all an unfortunate accident.  I 
just want to go home."

Paul blinked in surprise.  "Well, if that's what you want...  Do you need a ride 
there?"

"Yes, thank you."  The girl put a hand to her cheek.  "I shouldn't be walking 
alone at night."

"O-kay," Tracy muttered.  But being attacked did strange things to people's 
psyches sometimes.  

"Trace, why don't you call another car.  We don't want to take her home with Mr. 
Congeniality in the back."  As they walked out of the alley, Paul  nodded at the 
perp he had cuffed in the car.

"Sure thing."  She opened the door and reached for the radio, but it was already 
squawking.  "All units, repeat, the asteroid is just a hoax.  It will *not* hit 
us."  The dispatcher sounded as if she were on the verge of hysterical 
laughter.. 

"Did you hear that?" Tracy asked Paul, feeling a hysterical relief well up in 
her as well.

Paul nodded and broke into a smile.  "It's not going to hit us."

The girl's chest heaved and she started sobbing.  Even the perp from the 
attempted robbery put his head in his hands and started murmuring, "It's not 
going to hit us.  It's not going to hit us."

Paul patted Tracy on the shoulder, "Come on.  The sooner we get this wrapped up, 
the sooner we can get home to our families."

Nodding, and still unable to stop smiling, Tracy picked up the handset and said, 
"Dispatch, this is 43 Beta.  Request a squad car be sent around to..."

Fin.

Comments and/or stakes may be sent to:
Anne Jensen
ajensen@west.net