Once upon a time, there was a little werewolf. Her name was Claudia. She lived in a rather well-to-do town in New England, in a slightly down-at-the-heels toolshed. Her life was very orderly. During the day, she hung around in her shed and read books. She was especially fond of mystery novels. In the late evenings, she would go out for a nice little walk and steal some fruit and vegetables from the safeway. Then she would return home and groom her fur for a little while, and go to bed. During the full moon, she usually went out past the town limits and killed some chickens.

Claudia would be the first to admit she was a little settled in her ways. But that suited her just fine, for the most part. Every once in a while, she felt a little restless and depressed, but fortunately the full moon would always come around again and things would work out just as she liked. A little chicken raiding always lifted her spirits.

One night, she was on her way back from a particularly pleasant chicken raid. She trotted down her usual path. It did not matter that the usual bright light of the full moon was obscured by clouds, because, as a creature of habit, she knew her way quite perfectly. Then, suddenly, the ground gave way under her feet. It was a TRAP. Claudia landed at the bottom of the pit. She was unhurt but very, very put out.

Pits were not part of her routine.

Traps were definitely not part of her routine.

And so, although daring escapes and possible revenge were not part of her usual routine, either, she rapidly began to feel that both might conceivably be in order, nonetheless.

She examined her surroundings. They consisted of a deep pit. This was not so promising.

"What," she asked herself, "would Perry Mason do under these circumstances?"

She pondered this question. As she pondered fretfully among the tree roots, a thin, nasal chorus of laughter drifted down from above. And Claudia realized that Perry Mason was not often in a pit, because he was a mere lawyer who never got his hands dirty. Claudia, by contrast, was a werewolf. A big, mean, terrifying CREATURE OF THE NIGHT, in fact.

"Fuck Perry Mason!" said Claudia. And she gathered up her unholy strength and leapt out of the pit. Her eyes glowed and her fangs were bared.

This turn of events came as quite a surprise to the four unpleasant and bepimpled young men who had been slapping one another on the back at their great cleverness, just a little bit further down the path. They were even more surprised when she tore them limb from limb.

After this stimulating exercise, Claudia felt rather energetic, so she took a little trot down a nearby side path. There, lo and behold, was another pit of much the same variety as the one she had tumbled into herself. Within this pit there was a rather handsome, bookish-looking young wolfman.

"You really need to ditch that pit," Claudia advised him.

He explained that there were some dangerous humans outside, and that she should be careful.

"Ha, whatever!" said Claudia. "I already tore them limb from limb."

And she sounded so very pleased about it all that he at last timidly scrambled up the side of the pit. With a little further encouragement, she was able to convince him to give mauling humans a try, and he found that actually he rather enjoyed himself, much to his own surprise.

So after that night, Claudia had a new routine. She and her handsome young man prowled the night together, culling the herd. By day, she moved in with him at the recently abandoned public library, where they had many more books to read, and running water to clean up from after the gore.

The End.