• Location: My Desk
• Mood: tired

FAKE Ficlet: The Storm

Title: The Storm
Fandom: FAKE
Author: badly_knitted
Characters: Ryo, Dee.
Rating: PG
Setting: After Vol. 7.
Summary: A bad storm is raging over New York and affecting the city’s power grid.
Word Count: 500
Written For: Challenge 152: Thunder at anythingdrabble.
Disclaimer: I don’t own FAKE, or the characters. They belong to the wonderful Sanami Matoh.




Thunder rolled, lightning flashed, and Ryo sighed, sipping his coffee and staring out the squad room window. The storm was playing merry hell with the NYPDs ability to do their job. He would have thought a storm this bad would have deterred people from committing crimes, but there were still plenty of idiots who seemed to think that weather warnings and the mayor’s advice to stay home unless absolutely necessary didn’t apply to them.


Turning away from the cataracts of water being hammered against the window by gale force winds, he returned to his desk, slumping into his seat. The precinct’s computer system had already been shut down as a precaution in case of lightning strikes; it wouldn’t do to risk everyone’s hard-drive getting wiped in the event of a power surge.


Now the squad room lights, which had been switched on as the storm clouds had turned broad daylight to a dimness that seemed more like approaching night, flickered fitfully before their illumination steadied. That had already happened several times; chances were they’d lose power before the storm was over. He hoped someone had checked the backup generator, just in case. Opening his desk drawer, Ryo got his flashlight out, put in fresh batteries, and made sure he had a few spares. If he had to go anywhere at all, that flashlight was going with him; better safe than sorry.


“Sheesh!” Wandering back into the squad room, Dee stared at the windows near his desk as the rain battered the glass with a noise more like hail than water droplets. A vivid streak of lightning briefly illuminated the outside world, brighter than day, and the boom of thunder that immediately followed was so loud the windowpanes rattled in their frames. “Didn’t think it could get any worse!”


“The storm’s practically overhead.” Ryo had to raise his voice to be heard over another thunderclap, as all the lights went out. “That’s done it. Power’s out; I had a feeling that would happen.”


“Generator’s gonna kick in, just give it a second.” Sure enough, a few moments later the lights came back up. They didn’t seem as bright as before but it was better than nothing. “See? Told ya. I was just down in the basement, makin’ sure it was fuelled and ready.”


“Since when is that your job?”


“Someone had to do it and Charlie didn’t make it in this mornin’.” Charlie was the two-seven’s daytime janitor and handyman. “I’ve helped him with it before when he’s needed an extra pair of hands.” Dee was no slouch in the handyman stakes himself, able to fix most things.


“Guess that means I won’t need my flashlight after all.”


“Wouldn’t count on that; if we get called out…” Dee trailed off, darting a glance towards the heavy black clouds hanging over the city.


Ryo shuddered. “If we have to go out in that we’ll need more than a flashlight.”


“Yeah, lifejackets and a boat probably.”


“Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that.”



The End