PREVIOUSLY, ON "THE LOOK-ALIKE SERIES" SEASON 4: "He took a bullet for the woman he *loves,* Daria! No *thing* does *that!*" "'Falcon says transfer to Lawndale High and keep an eye -- preferably both -- on Peril and Emerald.'" "You possess a unique ability in our family -- you can move with the current, so to speak, and get what you want with a minimum of wave-making." "...*You* don't touch me. You're dead." "To the world, I am. In your mind? I'll live forever." "Oh, and say hello to J...Kes for me." "I was about to tell you the same. She's not back in London?" "`*Family*' nickname, yes. You knew about this." "Yeah. Yeah, I knew." "Turns out the casualty is one Charles Ruttheimer the Third. Apparently he looks a lot like your target." AND LAST TIME: "Who the hell made decaf?" "Four of our top people are, respectively, missing, dead, missing, and overdue." "YOU DIDN'T SEE WHAT HE DID TO MY GIRLFRIEND!" "No. I saw what you did to my brother." "Actually, it's a lot more than a few lousy guns. I'm willing to risk our lives for the surrounding three blocks." A FAMILY HOLIDAY novelization by Austin Loomis based on the teleplay by Janet "Canadibrit" Neilson & Ben Yee & Austin Loomis [Anglo-Canadian Studios production code 5.00] "Come inside, the show's about to start Guaranteed to blow your head apart Rest assured you'll get your money's worth The greatest show in Heaven, Hell or Earth Gotta see the show, it's a dynamo Gotta see the show, it's rock'n'roll" -- Emerson, Lake & Palmer, "Karn Evil #9 (First Impression)" December 17, 2000: Prolegomena "Life is made of meetings and partings." -- Bob Cratchit, in "A Christmas carol in prose" by Charles Dickens Jodie Abigail Landon, cured superstudent, was dressed to travel, in her tattered jeans and a baggy white T-shirt. She was standing in a hallway of the Landon residence with a bag over her shoulder. Mr. Hopper -- no, he'd said to call him "Lehrer" -- was standing in the open doorway to the living room, with Jodie's dad right in his face. Mrs. Landon was fidgeting in the background, unsure as to exactly how to handle this. "You are not taking my daughter *anywhere*," Andrew Landon announced. "Mr Landon, it's a simple holiday trip," Lehrer insisted. "Yer daughter'll be perfectly safe with--" He got no further. "I don't believe a word of it, mister -- so who *else* is going on this...trip?" "Some've the more intellectual students--" "Stop *right* there," Andrew interjected again. "I know what *that* means at Lawndale High, and if that Cullen girl's involved, my Jodie's not going anywhere *near* it. Don't think I don't know what you're doing, Mister..." Jodie decided there'd never again be a better time to intervene, only worse ones. "Dad, look--" "Stay out of this, Jodie; you don't know what you're talking about. You may *think* these people are your friends, but I've heard stories -- why do you think they won't go by their real names?" He turned back to Lehrer. "Now she's staying *right* here, and be damned to the consequences!" "Look, mate, *yer* the one who doesn' know what he's on about..." "Dad--" "Shut *up*, Jodie! You're not going with these people and that's *final*!" Reason having now failed (or at least been officially thrown by the wayside), Lehrer, with a fed-up look on his face, simply laid Andrew out by the expediency of a single punch, then turned and left without a backward glance. Jodie followed him, but turned back to see her little sister Rachel, in a nightgown, looking at the scene with *very* wide eyes. Jodie closed her own eyes and walked out. * * * Elsewhere, DJ prowled catlike along the dark corridor. She opened a door and slowly stepped inside -- then, suddenly and without warning, the lights came up. It was a square room, with a desk, a chair with its back to the door -- and an armed guard, drawn down on DJ. "Hey, Mr. Norton," he said, "look what we caught." DJ closed her eyes and stood stone-still as the chair turned slowly to reveal the Norton in question, a tall, powerfully-built man with reddish hair whose face bore a noticeable resemblance to that of the late Bryce Merritt. "That perimeter guard just earned his keep," said he. December 18, 2000: Hit the Road, Jack "I search your profile for a translation I study the conversation like a map 'Cause I know there is strength in the differences between us And I know there is comfort where we overlap" -- Ani DiFranco, "Overlap" Daria Morgendorffer decided it would no longer be a mistake to open her eyes. Their opening revealed a generic spare bedroom, furnished and decorated by someone with a lot of money, an IKEA catalogue and no imagination -- this must be one more room in the Cullen house Lynn had neither destroyed nor redone. Realizing she was lying on the bed, Daria turned her head -- to see Warlock watching her. "What're *you*--?" "I caught up with the Peril saving your life outside Biers," he explained. "Brought you back here to recover." He took a moment to let that sink in, then asked, "How're you feeling?" "Someone tried to kill me. I'm confused, frightened, and more angry than I've ever been in my life. And if you don't tell me what the hell's going on, I'm pulling a Lynn on..." She trailed off. _Oooh, *there's* a thought..._ "She--" "She'll be right as rain when the tranqs wear off." He sighed; Daria's astonishment must have shown on her face. "When she was sure you were going to live, she made for her car with the intention to track Refugee down and feed him his kidneys." He shrugged. "Had to take her down somehow." It was indicative of Daria's continued minor aches from the smoke that she *felt* her eyebrow go up. "'Refugee'?" "Rogue assassin now on semi-permanent hire for the Merritts. Dangerous mofo. For now, that's all you need to know." Daria clung to the words "rogue assassin on semi-permanent hire" in her desperate effort to find some context for the situation. "So he's to them what DJ is to you?" Warlock was good at putting up the mask. Daria, however, was better at seeing behind it. She decided it was time to get out the sledgehammer. "So what's the plan now? "Scar and Pagebert brought Narcissa, Scarlet, Maverick and the Four Musicmen..." Daria was very nearly amused by the improvised codename. "Neo-Grunge Earache," she corrected. Warlock allowed himself a very slight snicker, one that would probably be spelled "snrkl" if you were to try and write it phonetically. "...Anyways, they got in awhile ago. We got Lehrer to whip up some cock-and-bull story about a field trip over the vacation and fed that to the parents. Except yours -- we told them the truth." "You'd better be kidding. My family was close enough to a complete nervous breakdown. And that was *before* I met Lynn." "Told them you were spending Christmas with your family. Didn't say whether it was big-F or small." "They were okay with that?" "Or were too scared of Scar to argue. Either way." Warlock let that hang there a moment. "I need to see the Peril. We had your sister pack a bag for you. Get yourself cleaned up and meet us downstairs in fifteen minutes." He got up from the chair he'd been sitting in and headed for the door. Daria sat up herself, feeling her heart sink as she did so. "Why a bag? Where are we going?" Warlock left the room without replying, shutting the door behind him. There was a very short silence. "Why," Daria asked as dryly as only she could, "did it have to be *Quinn* doing the packing?" * * * Up in the Chamber of Dark Mysteriousness, Lynn was sprawled on top of her bedclothes, pretty much dead to the world by all appearances. After a long moment, she deigned to stir. "Hey ho, Sleeping Beauty." "Don' call me tha'..." Lynn was very groggy, still feeling the sedative. She opened her eyes and looked around. Yeah, that was A.P. she'd heard. She could see the McIntyre sitting in her desk chair, putting a book down on the desk. He got up and brushed her bangs out of her face. "Y'okay?" he asked gently. "Wh..." Lynn tried to fight her grogginess, but ended up losing. "...why d'my shoulders hur'...?" "CPR will do that," Warlock observed from the doorway. Lynn was still groggy, but seeing him, and hearing his reminder, helped her catch up with current events. "Uhgod...she's okay?" "Fine." He gave her a moment to digest that. "I'm hoping you're lucid enough to take orders and...relaxed enough to do it without too much of an argument." Lynn, waking up properly now, sat up slowly. "I want coffee...and I want an explanation." "Coffee we can do. Report's going to have to wait until we're on the road." Lynn just *looked* at him for a long moment...then swung her legs over the side of the bed. "Start the coffee. I'll start packing." * * * Before too long, they were all on the road. We join Warlock already in progress, sitting in the shotgun seat of the bigwhitevan, talking on his cell- phone. "Report." "Alrigh'," said Lehrer, "I've got GPA Girl, Captain Sanity, Miss Manners and the Ranger." "Any problems with the parents?" "I took care've th' lot of it. So now wha' do we do?" "Find somewhere and go to the mattresses." "An' if they come after us?" "I hope it won't come to that..." He trailed off, and his eyes briefly flittered shut. "...but if it does, sell yourself dearly." He hung up and put his phone back on his belt -- at which point, it immediately rang again. He picked it up and Trek-flipped it open. "Yeah?" "We are stopping *here*." "Peril, we--" "We need to *stop*. We're running on no food and less information and if you *don't* let us stop and get what we need...we're just ditching you." "Peril, that's not advisable. You remember that people are hunting you?" "At this point, I'm past caring. And so are most of the rest of us. Stop or you'll have to track us down and drag us behind you with tow chains." With that, his phone went dead. Warlock sighed as he turned to Scar, who was driving. "What's *that* about?" she asked. "There's a rest area in a mile or so. We're stopping there." "Should we really do that?" Pagebert asked from the back of the vehicle. "Unless you can track their cars from back there, I don't see we have any choice." Pagebert went thoughtful. "I'll work on that when we stop." * * * The rest area came with a roadside picnic space, into which they pulled. Warlock, Pagebert and Scar climbed out of the BWV. Lynn's Mercedes pulled up in a parking space next to them and disgorged Daria, her friend Jane Lane, and Lynn and A.P. Junior affiliate Tom Sloane, his father Angier, and an extremely pissed-off-looking Quinn Morgendorffer pulled up a few spaces down in Tom's rustbucket, and Mystik Spiral's A-Tank parked next to it a moment later. As the four music-men climbed out of their vehicle, Lynn came stalking up to Warlock with a severely put-out look on her face. Daria, Jane and A.P. were right behind her. "Warlock," the Purple Peril began without niceties. "We've been on the road for hours. I want answers. Now." Warlock, though tired, managed some dry humor. "So do I." "WARLOCK..." She gave his callsign a subtext along the lines of _I'm warning you._ "I wouldn't test her, man," A.P. piped up. "Last two hours, it's been nothing but Methods. Methods I haven't even *heard* of. And they all sound really, *really* nasty." "I notice that didn't stop you from helping, though," Jane pointed out. "Hey, look, I may not like the 'rents all that much but when someone comes up to 'em and..." He trailed off, clearly trying not to think about it. "Could you think of some *other* way to make them let you go?" Scar asked. "Listen, lady, *no one* terrorizes my parents. That's *my* job." "And mine, when he needs to double-team," Lynn allowed as. "But we're off the subject here, Warlock. I want *answers*." "I'll give you what I know," replied that worthy. "But you were the one complaining about lack of food." "On behalf of the band, yes." "We heard their stomachs growling from two cars away," Daria observed. "Over Rammstein." "Hey, can we eat?" Max Tyler's voice could be heard asking from nearby. "I'm *starved*!" Warlock sighed deeply. "Okay, Scar, take the Musicmen and go get some food." She nodded and headed towards the A-Tank, where the band was still congregated. "Rest of you -- stretch your legs, whatever, but *stay together*. No one wanders off alone." "Excuse me." That was Daria, not Lynn. "Given that we left with the approximate speed and organization of a Polish fire drill, what are the odds that someone followed us out of Lawndale?" "Higher than you think." They looked at him. He looked back, impassive. The foursome walked off a ways, and Quinn opted to join them. * * * "Okay," she snapped once they were a safe distance away from that Warlock person, "*someone* is going to tell me what is going on, like, *now*! Do Mom and Dad know we're gone? Why are we out here? Where are we even *going*? And Daria, are you okay? When they brought you to the house with the really weird decorations, you looked like you were...I mean, *GOD*, Daria..." With that, Quinn reached out and hugged her sister, who looked more than a little shocked. Daria waited for a moment, though, before pulling away. "I'm okay, Quinn, thanks. As for Mom and Dad, apparently they were told that we were spending Christmas with *my* family. Which, in a way, is unfortunately true." "But why would *I* spend Christmas with *your*...people? I mean, Christmas is a *family* holiday!" "You sound like Mom. And possibly so that they could have some time to themselves. We've *both* been acting strange since the summer." "Daria, you've *always* acted strange." Jane decided this was getting bogged down. "Okay, can we stop the sibling crap for just two minutes? She asked some other halfway-decent questions too." For all his Incredible Inarticulate Boy status (or maybe because of it), A.P. was the best one to sum it up. "We're out here 'cause those...those *freaks* we did nasties to last time tried to kill the Twin Terrors! And we're going...east?" He considered that a moment. "Why're we going east?" Lynn thought about it a moment. "...I think *I* know. We're going back to Mississippi." "What, you mean that place with all the seafood where the Tank blew up?" Even knowing A.P. as she did, Daria still had trouble believing her ears. "And it's a sick, sad thing when all you can remember of a state is how someone tried to kill you in it." "Hey, give the guy some credit." Jane had to think a moment about what exactly he deserved credit *for*, but came up with something. "He remembered the food, too." Lynn sighed. "Yes, the Gulf coast, where the Tank got bombed, A.P. got his face mashed in with a tenderizing mallet and we did more shopping than gig- playing. We have...friends there." "And when Mafia people say that, I come over all...shuddery." "What *kind* of friends?" Quinn boggled. "I mean, we saw you with people in Texas and we saw you with people in Pittsburgh and we saw you with people in New York and *duh* we saw you with people in San Francisco but we never saw you with *anyone* but *us* in--" Daria connected the dots. "When you went out the night the Tank blew up. You were... taking care of business, weren't you?" "Not *exactly*," Lynn insisted. "I was conning money out of Dad to pay for the damages to the van, the instruments and our wardrobes. But the guy who's out there does some other things than hiding the money. He's a shelter -- I figure we're headed for his casino resort hotel. And when we get there, depending on what Warlock has to say, I am going to get in touch with Dad and we are going to have *words*." "Are you sure that's wise?" "He's our father and he's letting this happen to us. Do you think that's right? Is that something Jake Morgendorffer would do? Or Fred McIntyre? Angier Sloane? Even Vincent Lane?" The other four looked at each other; it was hurting them to hear it as much as it was hurting Lynn to say it. Very nearly as one, they lowered their heads in grim acknowledgement. * * * An office that generic could have been in any workplace in the Western world. Walking among the cubes, carrying a small pile of papers, was a short, sturdy figure in black blazer, black skirt and sensible black shoes -- blend-into-the- background tempwear. Her light brown hair was tied back. All in all, nearly the archetype or generic of what the Japanese call an "office lady" (OL for short). Mr. Mitchell walked past her in the opposite direction. They nodded casually at each other, as colleagues, then she went through a door into Mr. Norton's office (the one DJ had blundered into, though this young lady didn't know that). Mr. Norton himself was inside, and he looked up at her as she dropped the pile of paper on the desk. "Those files you wanted, Mr. Norton." She sounded like a typical American girl. "Thank you. Any trouble getting them?" "Nope. I'm pretty good at getting that kind of thing." Norton nodded at her and went back to his computer. Without another look, the Kestrel walked out. She had her reasons for being there. Soon enough, she'd have done everything she needed to do. * * * Meanwhile, back at the picnic tables, the sisters and friends were sharing a couple of tables with Tom and Warlock. The others were more or less nearby, but there was enough space between them to create an illusion of privacy for the group, who were all staring at Warlock. "Don't tell us you didn't expect the Spanish Inquisition," Daria scoffed. "I mean, who's in *charge* now?" Quinn blurted. "Those guys..." Warlock, knowing Quinn's cotton-candy head, opted to give a gentle reminder. "Like I told you -- you can't kill a crime family just by killing a few people in it, even the head people." Lynn, while inwardly acknowledging the point, decided her anti-sister's question was a good one. "So who's in charge now? From what I've heard, Merritt's son is far too young and Jensen's only family is...independent." "Currently at the head of things is Bryce Merritt's cousin, Brett Norton." "Oh, the Ram. And let me guess; Wedge is the Consigliore." Warlock nodded. "Figures. Still stays in the family, no matter what you do." "Not that I'm not grateful for a sudden evacuation from Barksdale family feuding and Lawndale boredom in general," Daria allowed as, "but I would like to know what prompted it." Warlock realized the time had come to tell the tale. "Okay. The other morning, I was woken up by a pair of phone calls. One was Leopard, up in New York." "And?" Lynn asked. "Falcon and Number One missed a meeting with her. So she did some digging. She found One's body in a morgue." "Uncle Adam's dead?!" Tom interrobanged. "Yeah." "Even when the man's *serious*," Jane asided, "he makes those wretched puns." That got her some strange looks. "You know...digging..." The looks got worse; she sighed. "That was probably in bad taste." Emphatic nods all around. "What about Dad?" Warlock shot Lynn a look for that. "This is not the time, Warlock -- he's my father and I'm not going to bullshit around with his codename if something's wrong." "He's missing," came the answer. "Not confirmed dead. But here's where it gets *really* bad. Leopard says the shot that did--" There was a pause, then Warlock seemed to choke ever so slightly. "--Adam in came from Falcon's weapon. At close range -- powder burns on him." Lynn couldn't believe it; whether from lack of ability or inclination was not a matter she was in the mood to examine. "How?" "Falcon's weapon was this silly Russian chambering. I trust Leopard. She sold it to him." "So, you're saying Jer...." Daria caught herself. "...uh, Falcon shot Adam?" "Him, or someone using his weapon. There're about five scenarios, and I like none of them." Stunned silence greeted this observation. After a while, Warlock broke it. "The other call was Slack, in Biloxi. He hasn't heard from Kestrel since she bugged out of SF. Put that together with the fact that someone on the other side obviously knows stuff they shouldn't..." He trailed off. Lynn was outraged. "Are you suggesting *Jan*--?" "I..." He trailed off again, this time lost for words. "I'm not listening to this." She stood up and walked towards the Merc. Daria got up and followed her; Jane and A.P. at least took the time to glare at Warlock on their way out. Warlock dropped his head on the table. As if on cue, his phone rang. "Warlock," he said, answering purely on reflex. After a pause, presumably for caller identification, he got up and wandered away. Tom and Quinn looked at the remnants of their meal, then shared a look. "And *we're* stuck doing the cleaning up?" she asked. "You get used to it. Welcome to the bottom of the totem pole." With that, Tom picked up some of the trash on the table, got up and headed for a garbage can. Quinn stared after him. "But...I'm *always* the popular one..." He was far enough away already for yelling to become necessary. "Hey, *wait*! What do you *mean*, *bottom* of the totem pole?!?" She grabbed some garbage without even thinking, got up and jogged after him. Some distance away from the picnic tables, a slightly tense Warlock was talking into his phone. "Have you tracked him down yet?" At the other end of the line was the man called "Chopper" -- a heavyset man with black hair. "Cost me two good people, but yeah." "Get in touch with Eco and gather the forces. That place needs to be hit." _Who the hell does this kid think he is?_ "...I'll set things up." Warlock could hear the reluctance in the other's voice. "If nothing else, they probably have one of our assassins captive." "How do you know?" "Never mind! Just do it!" Chopper debated the matter internally. On the one hand, he did *not* appreciate this young turk giving him orders. On the other, he *did* appreciate the opportunity to fight. "Yes. Sir," he steamed slightly. "Good." Warlock slapped his phone shut and headed for the rest of the group, who were already congregated by the cars. The picnic mess had been cleared away. "Fed, watered, present and accounted for," Scar assured him. "Good. Let's roll." The Peril was in a small huddle with the Erudite, Scarlet and the Maverick, but she looked up at the command. "No." Sigh. "Peril..." "*No,* dammit. If you really believe what you're saying, part of this is going to turn into hunting Jan down. I'm not going to be part of that. She's no damn traitor." "If you'd let me finish..." He paused to test whether she would. At length, she inclined her head in a 'go on' motion. "...I don't think Kes is a traitor. Of the five or so scenarios, it's the least likely one as far as I'm concerned." "But..." "My best guess is she went deep cover to try to crack a Merritt operation. The main reason I'm concerned is that, if we have a leak, her cover might not just be blown. It could be nonexistent." * * * After hours. Click, the lock was picked, the door opened. Kes stepped into Norton's office, switching on the lights as she did so, then closed the door behind her and sat at the desk. She switched on the computer, then set to work picking the drawer lock, to have something to do while she waited for the computer to boot. She typed in a username, then paused for thought. When she was done, she typed a five-letter password and hit enter. It got her in. "'Merit'," she muttered under her breath, dropping the American accent (thank you, the theatre department at St Chris). "How bloody predictable." She opened his e-mail program and started sifting through the sent file. Once she found some likely stuff, she took a floppy disk out of her pocket, stuck it into the drive and began exporting mail files. Then she saw one that hit her right where she lived. She winced, stifling a gasp. _Bloody hell, he's *dead*? I *have* been here too long._ Then she exported it to the floppy and started logging off, taking the disk out and pocketing it again. "Mission accomplished." She took a quick sift through the desk drawer she'd opened, ignoring the gun, then shut it, locked it up again and made for the door. Just before she reached it, it opened from without. The Refugee was standing there, with goons at his back and a sadistic grin on his face. "Kestrel. Heeeeeeeeey..." _Oh shit,_ Kes thought as he dragged her out into the corridor. It was rather narrow, so Refugee's goons were having to walk behind him, double-file. As they passed one of the cubes, she grabbed a potted spider plant from the desk and went upside his head with it. He staggered, and she ran for it, knocking over a partition in passing to block the path and buy herself some time. "HE-- oh, screw it." He must have pulled a gun; she didn't see it, but she heard the *bang* and felt the bullet. She half-stifled a scream as her legs turned to jelly and went out from under her. She heard little mutterings as he (presumably) wiped flowerpot dirt off his face, then noises as he moved the partition back into place, then approaching footsteps. "'Night," he said. She felt what must be the butt of his gun coming down on the back of her head, and the world exploded and went away. * * * They'd found rooms for the night, in a Louisiana motel whose exact location doesn't matter. Daria and Lynn were in bed in the room they'd been given, but neither of the Smythe daughters could sleep. They were both lying on their backs, staring at the ceiling. "Lynn?" "Yeah?" "...What do you know about...Jan, Kes, whatever?" "Well, she was sort of the first Smythe to visit at Thanksgiving. Along with Lorna -- I guess she was just in St. Chris by then and needed the company. She insulted the crap out of my mother." "You two are...close?" "As you can be to someone who's always lived a good few thousand miles away from you." A moment of thought followed that. "She was good with presents the way Dad wasn't...couldn't be, I guess." A short silence followed that observation. At length, Daria spoke again. "I keep thinking about how I met her back in London. And I keep trying to make her fit the...I don't know, the profile. And I can't do it." "She looks too straight-edge, doesn't she?" "Actually, I think her throwing that guy's drugs out the window is what makes it hard." "We don't deal in that. And she's a medico -- anything heavier than pot offends her sensibilities somehow." Daria waited a moment before going on. "She's going to be okay." "And you know this how?" "I don't. And I'm not very good at this 'comforting people' thing. But I'm trying, so be kind." Another pause for thought, this time Lynn's. "Thanks." With that, she rolled over and pulled the covers over her head. Daria looked at the ceiling for a moment longer. "We'll be okay too," Lynn went on, her voice muffled by bedclothes. "Or at leaft, you guyv will. I'll make fure of it." Daria's nerves twitched at that -- there was not very good at comforting people, and there was genuinely bad at it, and Lynn's comments had just crossed the line between the two. "If you're not okay, *we're* not. You *do* understand that, right?" Daria waited a long time, but never got an answer. The lesson to be learned here is that "comforting" and "honest" don't exactly mix. One of them is going to drown out the other, so your best bet is to try and err on the side of comfort. If you can, anyway. December 19, 2000: Materia Medica "'How ya doing son?' say the old boys Now you're living in your home from home 'Where ya going son?' say the old boys Going nowhere but your home from home Can he walk in a straight line All the way home from home from home?" -- The Yo-Yos, "Home from Home" DJ was sitting on the floor of the darkened room as usual when the door opened and Refugee appeared in it. "Who do you think *you* are, Captain Rahim?" she snarked. He didn't answer the Jay Sherman-ism directly. Instead, he gestured to the two goons behind him. They dragged a female figure into the room, dropping her roughly. She was a bit too backlit for DJ to quite make out who it was, but the silhouette was familiar. "This nosy bitch isn't very good company right now," her host observed, "but take what you can get." He turned to one of the goons. "Find our medic. Let's see if he can't get a Kestrel to sing." The door shut. DJ could almost feel her eyes widen as she realized whom she was now sharing her cell with -- and the condition that cellmate was in. "Kes? Ke-- oh shit." * * * In the Rustbucket, Tom had passengers. The Erudite was riding shotgun, and Narcissa and the Maverick were in the back. "Is it safe to ask why you asked to ride with me?" he asked anyway. "I thought I was to blame for all this." "Well, you *are*! Or at least you're a good scapegrace!" The Maverick thought about that. "No, wait, that isn't right..." Daria was used to this sort of thing by now. "You mean scape*goat*, A.P. And I wanted to ride with *you* because you're in a position to help me with something. And, in turn, help yourself." Tom was on his guard. "And how do *I* need help?" Quinn barely suppressed her contempt. "Even *I* know this one. You have, like, *no* pull with these people and you *obviously* need some or you're going to get treated like...well, like *you* for the rest of your *life*! You *want* them to call you H forever?" Silence reined for a moment. Tom's face could have gone on Mount Rushmore, it was that stony. "What's the position?" Daria put a name to it. "You were given the job of safeguarding Lynn, weren't you?" "And you've been *crap* at it!" A.P. blurted out. Tom fumed inwardly a moment. "...I was *given* the job. And no particular training for it, either. But I've been doing the best I could. So?" Daria decided to spell it out. "With all this going on...Lynn gave me the idea that she's set to go kamikaze." As has been said before (mainly by him), A.P. may not have words, but he has a memory. "...Wait. That's the Japanese guys who did the suicide bombing things in planes?" Daria nodded. "She *can't*! She *wouldn't*! She...oh. She *can*, she *would*, and she already *did*. Crap." "And *you*, Tom, should be trying to *prevent* that, if at all possible." "Oh, *please,*" Quinn scoffed. "It's not like he has the first *clue* about her." "You *what*?" blurted A.P. "You saw her more than *we* did, last spring! You've *gotta* have *some* idea how she is and how she's gonna be, right?" "Well, when *I* trained with him, he kept complaining. You know, about how looking at Lynn's face is like trying to read emotion in a brick *wall* or something. I guess he figured I'd understand all that, being Daria's sister and everything, but come *on*, even *I* can tell with her sometimes. When I feel like paying attention..." "Will you shut up, Narcissa?" Tom gritted. "I was counting on you to keep your mouth shut!" After that, Daria had only one thing to say. "And the basis of your reptuation with Warlock and the others suddenly comes clear." A.P. was blunter. "You trusted the gossip queen of Lawnhell to keep her *mouth* shut? You're *stupid*!" "But we're sidetracked. You're the one who reminded me of the 'hurricanes in her eyes' condition that affects her in times of stress. What I'm asking you to do is simple. Watch for that and if you see it...follow her. Keep her safe." That hung there a moment. "You do realize," said Tom at length, "that agreeing to that is signing my own death warrant?" "Better *you* than *her*," A.P. snapped. A sigh. "And I think Warlock would agree with you there." Another moment of silence. "Why are you telling me to do my job?" "We're not telling you to do it," Daria pointed out. "We're *reminding* you to do it." Tom, saddened by the observation, just kept driving. * * * The first time Kes had occasion to visit the Mississippi Gulf Coast's beachfront Casino Row, she described it almost immediately, and almost perfectly, as "the bastard child of Kissimmee St Cloud and Las Vegas". The specific casino in Biloxi where works George Austin (the man callsigned "Tuxedo Slack") certainly embodies that comment, as the Lawndale convoy could see when they came rolling into the entry drive at the front. It's an architectural nightmare of a building with harsh angles (they were probably supposed to be "funky and exotic" or some such doubletalk), pastels and neon signs, directly on the coastline like the rest (tempting fate in the event of a hurricane, but they've been lucky so far). Before long, Warlock was stepping into Slack's office, followed by Daria, Jane, Lynn, A.P. and Quinn. "I've seen the convoy," he greeted them. After a moment, he decided he'd something to add. "All that? Just for my personal problems?" Warlock got dry on him. "Your personal problems and the Smythe business problems are linked in some areas, Slack." "I noticed that, yes." "Get the kids set up somewhere and I'll brief you." "Sounds like a--" "You mean *we'll* brief him," the Erudite cut in. "You mean, you'll brief *us*," the Peril corrected. Warlock gave up. "There'll be briefings." Between purple and green, Slack was starting to feel a little shut out. "So they're going--" "Will you people shut up and get me somewhere where I can get a *bath*?" That *had* to be Narcissa. The Peril had told him about her, and his sweet bird had confirmed what her cousin'd said, but there's a difference between hearing about something, even from someone you trust, and seeing it for yourself. Even now, he couldn't quite keep from blurting out "Is she for--?" "At least you finally noticed you *needed* one..." said a different redhead, one who had to be the Maverick. "Now that's just--" Narcissa hit the presumed Maverick. "Creep!" "ow..." PHWEEEEET! That was Slack sticking two fingers in his mouth and blowing an ear-splitting whistle. Once he judged they had to have noticed, he spoke up. "EXCUSE ME! I KNOW I'M ONLY YOUR HOST AND ALL, BUT COULD I BE PERMITTED TO GET A WORD IN WEDGEWISE HERE?" Silence -- and now they were *all* staring at him. _How do we do it? Volume!_ "Thank you." "Was that really necessary?" the Erudite wondered. "I don't have any fuel-air bombs on the premises. It seemed like the only other way to get your attention. You've been through some serious shit, haven't you?" "Indeed," said Warlock, still dryly. "Well, you're forgiven then. For now, anyway. I'd better go hold a Bavarian Fire Drill and free up some room space for your passengers." "I don't want anyone in a private room, understood?" "My security's not that bad, Warlock..." "I understand him -- we'll explain later." That was the Peril, taking charge. "For now, let's say Daria shares with Quinn, Jane with me, A.P. with Rust..." "Purple *Peril*!" the Maverick blurted. "Fine. Rust can share a room with Remora, then. Trent, Jesse, Nick or Max. Take your pick." "Aw, *jeeeeeeeeez*...Sir Naps-a-Lot, then, if I gotta." The Peril went on without missing a beat. "Nick, Max and Jesse can squeeze into a room and the rest as they see fit. *They*, evidently, can take care of themselves." She left that observation to speak for itself. "So what do we do while we're waiting for you to get things in gear?" "Look for my wayward brother and his cronies, maybe?" Scarlet suggested. "I think they found the bar," Warlock opined. "Great! We'll join them, then. I for one could *use* something..." "Scarlet..." "Oh, shut up," the Peril explained, and the teeners went off. Warlock looked at Slack. Slack looked back, wrestling for a moment with the urge to quip _You see a sign out front saying 'spooked teenager storage'?_ Then he shrugged and stifled it -- storing spooked teenagers (and other friendlies who needed a place to lie low) *was* his fucking business, or a key part of it anyhoo. He picked up the phone and got Rachel. "Yeah, want to get Scooter in here?" "No, I *don't*; I'm doing my nails right--" "Sorry -- poorly phrased. Get. Scooter. In here. I have a job for him." She tried to emulate his quick wit, but only got half of it. And this was the absolute worst time for it; nerves might justify that sort of cutesiness, but she'd sounded altogether too calm for that excuse to fly. One of these days, she was going to give the wrong clever answer to the wrong Family higher-up, and he had no idea if he'd be able to save her from the consquences. _But I'm trying, Ringo. I'm trying *real* fuckin' hard to be the shepherd._ Since Slack didn't seem to be watching, Warlock's face took on a look that mirrored his thoughts. Those thoughts mostly ran to the effect of _I don't like this at *all*._ * * * The decor of the bar is not strictly relevant to our story. Besides, most of the patrons were already too drunk to care about it anyway. Max, Jane's brother Trent, Nick Campbell and Jesse Moreno, for instance, were seated at a table, with a great many beer bottles on the table in front of them. They looked very much the worse for wear by the time we join them. Nick was the first to speak. "I feel like we dealt with the devil, man." Jesse, as usual, wasn't shy about admitting he didn't get it. "What?" "Take a look at it, you guys," Max snapped. "We find this kid -- she sings *damn* well, she plays, she manages, she's hot..." "How many times, man?" Trent rasped. "You missed your shot. She's with the punk these days." "*Still* doesn't mean I can't *look*! And don't talk to me about missing shots, okay? You and that thing for Daria..." "Shut *up*, Max." Nick decided it was time to pick up the thread again, before someone got hurt. "Anyway, we sign on this kickass singer with connections, and then we find out what all those connections *are*. I mean, living fast and dying young is one thing, but I got a *family*!" "Nick, it's too late to be thinking like that now. If we weren't in it when we first met Lynn, we were in it when we went into that place in California armed to the teeth and looking to rescue her. Anyway, could you *really* turn your back on her now?" "And Jane's in it," Jesse pointed out. "*And* your Daria," Max added. Speak of the devil. "Sorry -- I wasn't shown my ownership papers. Whose am I?" They all turned around, Trent going into a four-alarm blush, to see the new arrivals. "Hey, Daria. Janey. Lynn. Punk. Daria's sister." Quinn made an exasperated face. "I don't know which is worse -- 'Narcissa' or *that*." Jane had a more relevant question. "Are they going to give us hassle over drinking here?" "Not if I go," Lynn pointed out. "I've been here before, remember? Who wants what?" "What's that peach stuff we had that time?" Quinn burbled. "With Jodie and that creepy Goth girl?" A.P. winced, and Lynn looked at him somewhat bemusedly. "He...had a bad experience with the stuff at Biers," Daria explained. "Just...nothing lethal?" he asked hopefully. "The exact *opposite* of what he wants," Jane countered. "I'll have what you're having," Daria seconded that. "You shouldn't go alone," Trent said flatly. While Lynn appreciated the chivalry of the sentiment in *theory*, she was starting to find the practice a pain. "What is *with* you people -- we're in one of *our* places." "Still. Jess?" Jesse stood up. Lynn, realizing she'd lost the discussion on grounds of height, sighed as she let him accompany her bar-wards. Left now to their own devices, Daria, Jane, Quinn and A.P. dragged over some chairs and sat down by the other band-members. Daria spoke. "That was nice, Trent. Very...much like what a caporegime would do, but nice." "Thanks, Daria," he rasped. After a moment, something occurred to him. "But what's a...?" The word escaped him. "A capo's sort of a guy who runs a piece of a crime family," Jane clarified. "Answers to the Don, but leads a lot of little guys." She thought about that. "Or not-so-little, in Jesse's case." "Oh. Right." Another moment of thought. "So what's going on? So far, we know jack." "Well, we're sort of thrown by what little we know ourselves," Daria allowed as. "But the basics go, we're being hunted by the Merritts, who have picked *now* to make a move on the Smythes." She thought another moment, then decided not to sugarcoat the issue. "Tom's uncle is dead. DJ, Kes and...Jerome...are missing, maybe dead. And one of them's a traitor and they don't know who." A dreadful silence fell across the table. "Shit." "This is *dumb*!" blurted Nick. "They oughta *know* this stuff! It's *their* organization!" Max put his own two cents in. "Yeah; I thought criminales knew it *all*." Trent, say what you will about his sleeping habits, was awake enough to realize Daria had more immediate concerns. "How're you holding up? I know that Jerome guy--" "Oh, please," she scoffed. "I barely know him, and my only real ties to him are genetic and...dangerous." "It's Purple Peril you oughta be worried about. She's not showin' it, but she's freaked." "We're *all* freaked, A.P." "But *you're* not gonna go medieval on their asses with sharp things and no backup, *are* you?" That hung there a long moment. Nick broke the silence this time. "She's not gonna *do* that, is she?" "Not if we can stop her," Jane said simply. Lynn returned then, with Jesse at her back and no drinks in her hands. "Word at the bar. We have rooms and there's a meeting. Daria, you're with me. The rest of you, hit reception for rooms. A.P.'ll fill you in on who's sharing with whom." "But Purp--" "You're the one with the memory. Please, A.P." A.P. gave a grudging nod. Daria stood up and followed Lynn out of the bar. The others all looked to A.P. as implicitly instructed. "Uuuuuuuuuuukay..." he began. * * * In his office, Slack was seated behind his desk. Warlock was in a chair opposite his host. Once they'd come in, Daria and Lynn stood near the door. "So, now that they're here," Slack quipped, "what's on your mind besides your hat?" "Ha," Warlock sneered, packing the utmost scorn into the syllable. "We have a situation." "Specifics, please. Generalities make my teeth itch." "Well, for starters," Lynn noted dryly, "there's a minor question as to whether my cousin's a traitor." "I explained that, Peril." "I should hope you did, mister." Slack didn't do machismo much, but one good way to bring out his inner Jesse Custer was to run down his sweet bird, or even *sound* like you were running her down. "Bitterness dies hard," Lynn pointed out. "You know that." She wasn't talking to Slack, but he answered her comment anyway. "I know *all* about that." As if cued by the words, his left foot started to itch. He knew scratching would do no good, so he rubbed at it gently. "There's a leak within the Family," Warlock explained. "And there's reason to believe that Kes is gathering information on that leak under deep cover." "Oh yeah," said the Erudite, remembering something. "And if you're right, that leak blew her cover." *That* got Slack's attention. "Fuuuck." "Adam was last seen in a NYC morgue," Warlock helpfully added, "and the Falcon is missing." "Jesus. If they can get to the Falcon, they *must* have inside info." "There are four main members of the Family dead, missing or both. And an attempt was made on those two." Warlock made an indicative gesture at the Erudite and the Peril. "They're here because this is the closest friendly place we could find." "Would have been Texas," the Peril allowed as, "but the Rat met an exterminator." "Or twelve," her sister added. "A hit is planned on a Merritt stronghold in Michigan," Warlock went on. "We have reason to believe that at least one of our people are alive in there." "Kes?" blurted Slack and the Peril as one voice. "Unspecified. It might be Kes. It might also be DJ." The Smythedottirs exchanged Looks. "Zoinks," Slack shaggied. "That's the briefing as it stands. Any questions?" _As a matter of fact..._ "Are these kids being stashed here to await the rescue mission, or to keep them out of its way?" "The latter," replied the Erudite. "To my extreme disappointment." "Lynn..." "We need them alive at all costs," Warlock pointed out. "We're the Family's present; *they're* its future." "No one seems to ask if we *want* to be this Family's future..." "The Peril seems to have already made up her mind," Slack remarked. "Mostly, anyway. If you want out, feel free to start running." The said Peril, for no reason Slack could see, got to her feet at that and just marched out, slamming the door as loudly as possible behind her. "What brought that on?" "Nice move, *Zedd.*" The Erudite could only have heard about that callsign from the Peril. "We're still trying to talk her out of that decision you seem to assume she's already made." With that, she slammed her way out as well. Warlock shot Slack a Look as Slack sat there, nonplussed. He spoke in what Warlock would probably be able to identify only as a bad cockney accent. "And for my next trick, I will swallow my other foot." There were probably better methods of admitting you'd fucked up, but there were certainly worse ones. The quote had often stood him in good stead, even with people who had never the hell *heard* of Vila Restal. "You run a casino," Warlock noted. "I thought you needed diplomacy for that." "I'm the Head of Special Accounts." He didn't bother putting scare quotes around the euphemistic title. "I got kicked into the books *because* of my amazing people skills." _Or lack thereof,_ he didn't need to add. Warlock glared at Slack for a moment, then dismissed him as meaningless. "This is all need-to-know. If I think you need to know, I'll tell you." He got up and started to leave. "One more thing," Slack columbo'd just as the other was about to open the door. Warlock stopped in his tracks, but didn't actually turn around. "Yes?" "I may have to send somebody to Hel for punching her ticket to Valhalla. Help me make sure it's the *right* somebody." Warlock nodded and let himself out. George Austin, alone with what we might as well call his thoughts, took off his shoe and rubbed his foot some more. _When it all comes down,_ memory quoted an old comic book at him, _I want a piece of him._ Since he was alone, he hiked up his left pant leg and rolled down the sock. _A small piece will do, for old times' sake._ He came face to face, once again, with the reason why he couldn't actually do anything about the itch -- the artificial nature of his foot and calf. _You know,_ he finished the thought as he stared down at the post-modern sculpture in wood and metal strapped to the stump at his left knee, _it still hurts when it's cold._ He sighed loud and long. Yes, it did still hurt when it was cold. And what with one thing and another -- his sweet bird in a great deal of trouble from one side or the other, the Family's heirs-apparent justly pissed off at him, and him in so far over his head that a bathyscaphe would have trouble finding him; not to mention outside-world problems like the new president -- it was likely to get a *lot* colder before it warmed up again. _Hiyo God damn Silver._ * * * Out in the hall, Lynn was waiting for an elevator. A machine went *ping* and the door opened. She stepped in and hit a button. The doors were closing as Daria approached, but she thrust her arm between those doors. The little rubber sensor-pads that keep it from guillotining your arm kicked in, and the door came open again. Daria stepped in and looked at Lynn harshly as the door shut again. After a moment long enough for that lift to start moving, she spoke. "So have you? Made your choice?" "Overall, probably not. For the time being, yes." "Lynn..." "They might have my cousin under suspicion of espionage. You don't know what they do to prisoners." "...I thought you didn't remember." "The less you know, the better. You have enough nightmare fuel." "Are you talking about this, or the two morons from Highland?" "I don't know. Which makes it harder for you to sleep at night?" Daria actually had to think about that for a moment. She finally reached the same decision five Supreme Court Justices had taken a month to overcome. "It's too close to call." Lynn gave a slightly amazed chuckle at that, and the doors pinged open. * * * The door of the "holding cell" opened, and DJ glared at the new arrivals. This time, the Refugee was accompanied by two mooks and a man of medium height with sandy blond hair who, despite his youth, had the bearing of a medical man. He scanned the cell, glancing briefly at DJ (who looked back at him blankly). Then his eyes fell on Kes. "Dear Lord..." He rushed over to her, knelt down and looked her over. Refugee watched impassively for a moment, then his impatience took over. "So what's the verdict, McLain? Can you patch her up enough to let us grill her?" "She's a human being, not a...a...fraying pair of jeans! She needs more medical attention than I can give -- hospital care -- or she is going to die." Shrug. "She's a Smythe...you think we care?" DJ shrank back a little, unconsciously. McLain, if that was his name, was likewise appalled. "But if she dies before..." He checked her breathing. "Oh hell..." He looked up, going into command mode. "I need a laminated card -- credit card or library card or something -- and a roll of duct tape, STAT!" He got Looks from the surrounding mooks (a weak rhyme, I know). "You heard me; *move!*" He was a doctor, used to being obeyed. They were mooks, used to doing as they were told. Someone produced the requested duct tape, and Refugee himself provided a library card (with a 1987 expiration date). McLain cut Kes' shirt away from the wound, cleaned the area as best he could with what was available, then slapped the library card into place and taped it over the wound. This done, he checked Kes' breathing again and sighed with some relief. "Does it talk?" Refugee asked, demonstrating his boundless sensitivity. McLain didn't even try to hide his bitterness. "No. *She* lives. And not even *that* for long." With that, he gathered the hypocritical tatters of his Hippocratic Oath about him and made his exit -- as always after dealings with Refugee, grateful for his *own* life. December 20, 2000: This Boy Can't Swim "Baby, baby, ain't it true I'm immortal when I'm with you But I want a pistol in my hand I wanna go to a different land" -- P(olly) J(ean) Harvey, "Big Exit" Daria's side of the room she was sharing with her other sister was spotless; she seemingly had yet to unpack. She was just sitting on her bed, reading a book. Quinn's side, on the other hand, looked like a bomb had hit her luggage, and she was fussing with her hair. She turned around and looked at Daria with some scorn. "How can you *do* that?" Daria didn't even look up. "Well, unlike you, who nearly had to be beaten with a stick to learn to read, I learned on my own when I was three." "You know what I mean! How can you *read* at a time like this?" Daria held up her reading material -- _Cabin Fever: How to Cope with Siege Conditions_. "At least I'm doing something useful." "Daria, *look*. If I'm going to die in this mess that...that Lynn freak got us into, I'm at least going to leave a pretty corpse. I have a reputation!" Eyeroll. "If I believed in a god, I'd be praying for deliverance right about now." As luck would have it, there came a knock on the door. Daria looked up, a little surprised. "Go *away*!" The door opened, and Lynn, Jane and A.P. poked their heads through. "Sorry, Princess," said Jane, "but we automatically do the opposite of everything you want us to." "Ugh!" "And to what do I owe the interruption?" Daria wondered. "You remember the strip malls?" Jane asked by way of explanation. "I remember the short-shorts." "All they got's a Radio Shack but what the hey, it's better than nothing, right?" Only A.P. would put things in that sort of perspective. "You're not suggesting we go *out* there, are you? It's more *Quinn's* job to risk her life for the sake of a shopping spree." Lynn almost seemed to be suppressing a sigh. "Relax, Daria. There won't be any repeats of Pittsburgh." "Your near-suicidal self-confidence is always going to amaze me, you know." "Not like *that*, Erudite Emerald! It's just she's been up to her ol' tricks again!" Daria thought about that for a minute, then outright Stared at Lynn. "You bugged a Mafia family. And escaped detection." "Hey," Lynn verbally shrugged, "the FBI do it all the time, with other Families. And the word is that most of the fighting is happening a lot farther north. And I could use a distraction." "Only you would see an attempt to sneak out from under armed guard as 'a distraction.'" "And you wouldn't have me any other way. So are you in?" "I don't know..." Leave it to Jane, who'd been Daria's friend the longest, to put it all in perspective. "Daria, would you *really* rather spend the rest of the day sitting in here with the same girl you've been trying to avoid ever since I've known you?" Silence fell. The other people in the room with Daria, relatives and friends alike, watched her expectantly. A sigh. "Okay, I'm in." "HEY!" Quinn watched, stunned, as Daria got off the bed and headed out. Only when she was alone did she find more of her voice. "Hey, wait! But...what am *I* supposed to do?" Just then, Tom appeared in the doorway, looking a bit nervous. Quinn looked at him. "Uh, hi," he said. After a moment, he asked, "Bored?" "Yeah, *tell* me about it." "Uh...there's a training room downstairs. Feel like venting some of that frustration by beating the living crap out of me?" "Sounds good. Just let me find the right outfit..." "Even when you're about to sweat off about a pound of water weight, you still have to look your best doing it?" "Oh, why do I *bother* with you geek-people who don't understand the first *thing* about dressing *right* for something! I *meant* gym clothes or something!" Tom nodded, turned to go -- then had a thought and looked back. "Hey, where are the others?" Quinn considered her reply for a moment. "God, like I pay attention! Downstairs or upstairs or wherever." Tom, accepting this at face value, shrugged as he made his departure, shutting the door behind him. Quinn shrugged in turn, but she allowed herself a smile as well before she began digging in one of the piles of clothes. * * * A dark green midsize Ford (so dark it was almost blue, in fact) went roaring down Beach Boulevard. Lynn was driving, A.P. riding shotgun, and Daria and Jane were in the back. "Whose car is this?" Daria wondered. "Slack's," Lynn explained. Now Jane had a question. "Why not the Merc?" "Just a precaution. The Merc's a little conspicuous and I'm sure no one would want me driving it outside a convoy." After a slight pause, Daria asked the question that brought to her mind. "I thought no one knew we were gone?" "They don't." "Then how'd you get the..." The penny dropped. "You *hotwired* it?" "Of course I didn't hotwire it -- what do you take me for?" She left that just long enough to lull them, then explained, "A.P. hotwired it." Daria and Jane exchanged a look. A.P. picked up on it -- he's inarticulate, not oblivious. "What? Just 'cause I can't drive 'em, I can't *steal* 'em either?" They just kept gawping at him. * * * One of the workout salons in the hotel spa had been set aside as a training room, and it was there that Quinn and Tom faced off. "Hey," said he, "what say we make this a bit more interesting?" "Don't even *say* it. Last time someone said *that*, that fat Goth chick Andrea suggested strip poker." Tom actually started to blush a little. "What, you afraid you're going to lose to me? Don't tell me you're worried just because you're not wearing matching underwear." "*God*, no. Just, come *on*, I've had at *lots* of boyfriends and you are *not* who I want my first naked guy to be." At that, he blushed even harder. Quinn, once she realized what she'd just said, did the same. _I'm not, like, *really* thinking that. Am I?_ For a moment, neither of them could meet the other's eyes. "I meant something a little different than that," Tom explained once he'd recovered. "How about...for every hit I score on you, you answer a question. Completely honestly." "What do *I* get for every hit I score on you?" "The immense satisfaction of seeing my face contort with pain?" "Not good enough...Rust." "Five bucks?" "Deal." She punctuated the sentence with a punch that put him on the floor. He got up with a rueful look on his face. "What the *hell* did I let myself in for...?" he asked as he ducked a flying kick and drove a fist toward her midsection. * * * Some time later, Warlock opened the door of the training room to see Quinn and Tom sitting shoulder to shoulder, dripping sweat and panting. Tom looked like a man in serious pain. Quinn looked tired, but endorphin-rushed as well. Warlock looked at the two of them and spocked an eyebrow. "You two look...busy." "Ew! Warlock-person, look, I'm not going to sit here and listen to your...inneeandoes?" Tom just blushed. _The airhead doth protest too much, methinks._ "I was hoping to find the Peril. We have things to discuss. Seen her?" "She and Jane and that red-haired freak Daria used to date showed up at the room and said they were gonna find something to *do*. In case you, like, haven't noticed, it's *boring* in this place!" "Tell me that this 'something to do' involved them staying in the building." Tom intervened. "Warlock, she told me that they had gone upstairs. Or downstairs. I think that covers 'inside the building.'" "I was asking *her*. Don't you think that was a little *vague*?" "Look, they don't tell me *everything*, okay?" Quinn scoffed. "And it's not like I care what they do or anything!" "You cared enough to be deliberately vague about where they were running off to. And we had the building searched -- they're not *anywhere* here. So where did they *go*, Narcissa?" "Stop badgering her!" "Guh-*awd,* Tom, I can take care of *myself*!" She turned back to Warlock. "Look, *I* don't know really where they went and even if I did, I wouldn't tell *you*. I don't really care about that Lynn girl or the AP freak except that Daria likes them or whatever, but if *she* wants to get away from *you* freaky people, then I think that's *great*! And *especially* when she wants to go *shopping*!" Tom felt his heart sink into his socks. "Sh-shopping?" "And I'll see *you* later so you can pay up!" She got up and stalked out of the room. Warlock looked after her, then turned to Tom and noted that he too had been following her progress with his eyes. The eyebrow went up again. "Get cleaned up, H." "What?" "I want you to set the land-speed record for showering; you should be outside in the parking lot in ten minutes. You know the malls better than we do. You're going to help us find them." "Yessir." Warlock stood there a moment as Tom picked himself up off the floor, the latter wincing as fresh bruises grated. "As for Narcissa..." "Don't push it, Warlock. Just don't." With that, Tom pushed past Warlock and out. His suspicions confirmed a little bit more, Warlock rolled his eyes and reached for his phone. * * * On the food court of the same shopping mall where they'd replenished their wardrobes in the summer, Daria, Jane, Lynn and A.P. were digging into their meals. Lynn had Chinese; Jane, a burger; Daria, lasagna; and A.P., a pizza. Jane could no longer contain her curiosity. "Don't you get enough of that at home?" "That's kind of the point." After a moment, Daria added, "Just don't let it get out that I'm a little homesick. What I want to know is how A.P. managed to make them make that pizza." "Hey," the said Maverick pointed out, "it's not the normal one. They couldn't find capers *or* artichoke hearts so I kinda had to improv. It's creamed corn and ladyfingers this time. Anyway, this one uses catfish instead of tuna." The girls all Looked at him. "I guess it's a Mississippi thing. It's kinda good, though. Anyone want?" They all reacted to the offered slab of pizza the same way vampires would react to that much garlic, i.e. by flinching back. "Yeah," said Jane, "I want -- I want your head examined." "Or perhaps your tongue," Daria counter-offered. Lynn just smirked. "I can attest to the fact that there is *nothing* wrong with his tongue." At that, A.P. blushed a pardon-me-while-I-burst-into- flames kind of blush. Jane and Daria exchanged smirks of their own, then Jane decided to change the subject. "If that thing tastes like it smells, A.P., you should have a biohazard warning slapped on that tray." "Hey, Art-Smart Scarlet, opened your fridge at home lately?" The girls all glared at him. Jane clipped it out. "Yeah, I have, A.P. Telekinetically. From three-four states away." With that, A.P. realized what he'd said. His eyes got saucer-wide, and he crammed his mouth with pizza in the hope that there'd be no room for his foot anymore. Silence reigned for a little while again while they let him recover. Then, of a sudden, Lynn raised her head, looked across the room, and casually picked up her still mostly full tray, which prompted her sister to ask, "Lynn, what are you doing?" "Making a strategic retreat. Look." They all did, prompting Lynn to roll her eyes. "Way to be casual, people." Easy for her to say -- she'd been the first to see Warlock, Tom, Scar and Pagebert standing by the nearby mall directory. "Aw, dang," A.P. muttered. "It might not be a whole *lot* of fun, but Radio Shack was gonna be *way* better than seeing all the gear I'm not allowed to play with at that stup--" "Go." "Come again?" "Go, but go via someplace they'd *never* look for you. If we hang back for long enough, they'll start looking in the *un*likely places long enough for us to do some time in the *likely* ones. Now split up. If we're not caught, we'll meet at the car at four." "But..." Daria trailed off, realizing Lynn was already gone and A.P. was following her example. Left on their own, Daria and Jane looked at each other. "Where would they *never* look for us?" They looked in each other's eyes long enough to see the answer appearing there...and sighed. * * * Later, in the "Coiffe Medicine" hair salon, two figures were hidden under large driers and behind magazines. After a moment, Daria and Jane lowered the magazines. Neither of them was all that impressed, and it showed. Daria raised her voice a bit, to be audible above the drier. "Thirty- five dollars to look like we've never been *near* this place. EACH. And they didn't bat an eye when we asked them to manage that. Does that strike *you* as strange?" "WHAT?" Daria sighed, rolled her eyes and lifted her magazine again. * * * Lynn drifted past the front of a jewelry store and peered in the window. After a moment, a young man in a good suit came out of the shop and looked at her. "Were you looking for something in particular, ma'am?" She looked at him a moment, then back into the shop window, then sighed. "Nah. A bit fancy for my blood, if I'm honest. Thanks anyway." With that, she walked off. The young man watched her leave, then shrugged. He was headed back into the shop when a voice from behind him shouted, "Hey, mister, hold up!" He turned toward the sound to see a young man with red hair careening into view at a dead run. The youth tried to stop, glided a few steps, hit the shop window and collapsed on the floor in a little heap. The clerk's confusion showed on his face. "Can I...help you..." He paused for long enough to show his doubt of the youth's status. "...sir?" A.P. groaned. "Well, first you can help me off the floor..." This the clerk did. Once A.P. was on his feet, albeit reeling slightly, he got the once-over from the clerk. "Now...was there something else?" "Yeah. Can you show me what the girl was looking at? It's kinda important." Now the clerk got *really* dubious. "If you mean the girl in the purple jacket, I sure can, but...I think that's a little out of your reach..." A.P. scowled at that, then produced a wad of cash from his pocket. "Mess ye not with techno-weasels, pencil-neck. You get *real* embarrassed. Now you gonna tell me what she was looking at or *what*?" The clerk's eyes had gone very large at the monetary display. Now, he was looking at A.P. with something that might once have been in the same room with respect -- or at least, with a dictionary containing the word. "I'll show you, sir. If you want to come inside..." He led A.P. into the store -- as luck would have it, just as Tom and Warlock were turning a corner. * * * Later, A.P., stuffing a small velvet jeweller's box into a jacket pocket, looked at the Radio Shack and sighed. "Oh, how the geeky have fallen," he mused aloud. "That's the problem with Southern backwaters." "GAH!" Having got that out of his system, A.P. looked in the direction the voice had come from to see Pagebert approaching, and looked at him with big (Dust)puppyish eyes. "What were you after in there, anyway?" "You want truth? I didn't really know -- just whatever hit me, y'know. Well, I need *something* to put together! Purple Peril and Erudite Emerald can do word puzzles and stuff and Art-Smart Scarlet can paint and draw and put together kitchen stuff and melt gummybears and--" "I get the idea." Pagebert thought a moment. "Well, if I'm vague about when I found you, I can probably give you fifteen minutes." "Fifteen *minutes*? I'll *never* find anything in...ooh!" Suddenly coming over all Kiki, he nearly bounced into the store; Pagebert looked after him a moment, amused, before following. * * * We'll call the chain bookstore "Thoreaufare" -- it gets the point across, I think. Daria had a large stack of books under one arm and a list in her other hand as she approached the counter. On arrival, she dropped the books on the counter, under the amazed eyes of a slightly scruffy clerk. "What," he asked, "are you going into quarantine?" "Yes. The AMA has recently stated that stupidity is contagious, so I'll lock myself in the storm cellar until the epidemic blows over." He frowned at her for a moment, then turned his head and called out to an unseen party to the left. "Hey, dude, this the one you're looking for?" Tom stepped out from behind a nearby shelf. Daria was appalled. Tom allowed himself a slight shrug. "Hey, it worked for Cullen, didn't it?" "What," Daria asked as calmly as she could stand to, "are my chances of getting away from you by screaming 'rape'?" "Well, if you really feel like calling that much attention to yourself..." He let her mull that over. After a moment's mulling: "I say this to Jane, but I *mean* it to you -- I really hate you sometimes." "Hey, you going to buy those, or what?" They both Glared at the clerk for that. * * * In the Sound by the Pound location, Jane had an armful of CDs and was consulting a list of her own. She steps to the counter and dumped her silvery burden, then looked up at the sullen-looking lady behind the counter. "I'm still looking for a couple of things. You got 'Demons and Wizards'? Self-titled album." "Who?" the saleslady asked helpfully. "Never mind. Anything by Iced Earth?" "We got Ice-T, Ice Cube and Vanilla Ice, kid, but never heard of Iced *Earth*." "Pop Will Eat Itself? Mercyful Fate? Therapy? Me Mom and Morgentaler?" The saleslady had been looking less and less knowledgeable -- and more and more pissed-off -- with each band Jane'd named. At last, her temper failed her. "Look, what you see is what we got! Now you gonna *pay* for those?" "You can track the rest of it through Amazon," said a familiar voice from behind her. "Like you should have done with *this* stuff." Jane turned to meet Scar's accusing face with a visage doing its best to copy the saleslady's sullen, pissed-off expression. * * * Lynn stood in a firing stance with the gun in her hand. The gun was pale blue and plastic, and she was using it to blast the unliving shit out of _The House of the Dead 2_ in the mall's arcade. Warlock took up station at her side and watched for a moment as she blasted zombies and Arcana. She never took her eyes off the screen, but she must have seen his reflection in it. "It was too much to ask to let us out; we knew that. So we didn't ask." He gave that a moment's thought. "You could have done this for real back at the resort." "Yes, but I would have *had* to do this for real back at the resort." She left that alone a moment. "I couldn't convince you to be briefly distracted by a game of _Silent Scope_ or some..." She trailed off as Warlock just Looked at her. When he said "No," it was just a formality. "Can you at *least* let me finish my game?" He looked at her for a moment, then dug in a pocket. He produced tokens, added them to the Player 2 side and picked up the gun. "A different man would tell me to enjoy this while it lasts because twenty-four hour lock-up begins the minute we get back to the casino, right?" "Yyyyyyyyyyep." "Oh great. Out of parental supervision and I'm *still* getting grounded." * * * Daria, Jane, Lynn and A.P. piled into the Isle's foyer carrying shopping bags and looking somewhat pissed off. Behind them, Warlock, Scar, Pagebert and Tom had the stern looks of parents who have been defied once too often. "I've been talking to Pagebert about this," Scar began without preamble. "There are such things as MP3s. And e-texts. And there's that little thing about people out there..." "This is not the place," Warlock warned her. Scar didn't miss a beat. "Upstairs, you people. We need to have a *talk*." "You mean *you* need to have a bitch-rant," Lynn corrected. "Not interested." "She's right," Warlock countered. "You took a big risk today. I don't think you understand the situation." "It's *you* who doesn't understand," Daria informed him. "We know the situation better than you think we do." They'd not been standing still during this byplay; in fact, they were now waiting at the bank of elevators. Warlock looked at Daria with some interest. * * * Warlock had followed the girls into the room Jane and Lynn were sharing. He had the look of a man losing the battle with extreme irritation. Daria summed up. "So we're telling you that we *know* that most of the Southern Merritt operatives have been moved to Detroit, and those who *weren't* are holed up in New Orleans somewhere. So Lynn figured that, with that kind of lowered risk, going out to the local temple of capitalism was about as safe as school's been for the last year. Possibly more so." "And you know this how?" he asked. "Boy, *you're* a bright spark, aren't you?" Jane snarked. "We know because Lynn knew." He aimed a Look at Lynn. "And she knew because..." "I bugged Slack's office," Lynn replied, as casually as most girls her age might say something like _I bought a new sweater_. "And a few other strategic points around the resort. You know what they say about forewarned is forearmed." Warlock just openly stared at her. "That should not be possible. Doesn't this place sweep for bugs?" "Not as far as I'm aware. Remember, it's a remote outpost, of which Slack's in charge." "Look at it this way," Daria suggested. "If you stopped keeping things so close to the vest, we wouldn't have to resort to covert espionage. You have only yourself to blame." "This won't happen again." With that, Warlock left. Silence reigned for a moment. Daria broke it. "Just reassure me of one thing." "What's that?" Jane wondered. "No matter what he does, no matter how bored we get, we will not resort to board games." A.P. rummaged through the bags. "We got...King...Moliere...King...Eugenides...King... Garland...Coupland...King...Gaiman...a whole bunch of *other* people I never heard of...Y'know, I don't think you got a lot to worry about on 'stuff to do that isn't board games.'" "You make a point. But what are *you* gonna do?" A.P. got a big grin as he held up a Radio Shack bag. "Build a better mook-trap?" Jane was already at one of the end tables, where a boom box sat waiting for her. "Music to irritate?" She, Daria and A.P. shared a look. * * * Scooter -- a young man whose presence was obviously the result of someone going to Central Casting and saying "Get me a young Gary Burghoff" -- was wheeling a room service cart toward Jane's room. Almost there, he literally jumped when he was hit by the opening chords of Skunk Anansie's "Rise Up" blaring out loud enough to make not only your ears bleed, but quite possibly your nose. Recovering after a moment, he then ran the cart up to Jane's door, hammered on it for a second, then ran away to a safe distance. "o/` You're too cool to be smart, but that is what you are; you're too sane to be hard, but that is what you are; you're too sad to be high, but that is what you are; you don't have to run; you got to rise up, sweet woman child... o/`" * * * The holding cell was dimly lit, reducing DJ and Kes to vague shapes on the floor. Kes was still sprawled out, on the borderlands of the living. DJ, seated in the corner, was wriggling in her bonds. "Almost...got...this damn thing," she muttered under her breath. She got an arm free, detangled the ropes, and stood up, looking at the room's contents or (apart from people and ropes) lack thereof. "Weapon..." she mused. "...weapon..." The door opened, letting in a bar of light. A silhouette appeared in the doorway. She flattened herself against the nearest wall, scarcely daring to breathe. "Hello, Smythes." It was Mitchell. There was a *snick-clack* as he loaded and chambered a semiauto. "Your friends are here to see you. Too bad you can't come out and play." He stepped further into the room and pointed the gun at Kes, who was still sprawled motionless on the floor. DJ lashed out with her foot, knocking the weapon away into the wall. She spun, kicking him in the head and the groin in rapid succession. He slammed into the wall, and she scooped up the gun and gave him a quick double-tap for luck. As he fell to the floor with his eyes going out, she turned to face Kes. "DROP THE WEAPON! NOW!" DJ did this thing, but with a tired and amused look on her face. "Aph, it's a *really* good thing I recognize your voice." Aph stepped out of the shadows, gun out, looking completely stunned. "DJ!? *You're* the assassin Warlock was...no *wonder!*" Then she noticed Kes on the floor. "Ohmigod..." DJ just leaned against the wall -- the last few days had been pretty rough. "You guys, like, need backup?" "No, you just sit down. We've almost got things covered outside and NCM knows some first aid -- he'll want to look you and Kes over and--" She heard gunshots from nearby, followed by the voices of two *very* pissed-off East Coasters. "Oh my *God,*" NCM kyle'd. "You killed Eco!" The mocking tone hid real grief, but not completely (not if you knew him anyway). Chopper's voice, on the other hand, was serious as a stroke. "You *bastards.*" Aph and DJ shared a look; then, as one, they raised their weapons and headed for the cell's door. * * * A.P. stepped into the doorway of the bedroom, then stopped and looked around. The bed nearest the door was unmade, and a sketchpad was lying on it -- Art- Smart Scarlet's, obviously. Purple Peril was sitting on the other bed, cleaning her gun. Not the sort of thing a growing Maverick likes to see. "Hey ho, Purple Peril." Lynn was distracted by her task, but managed a "Hmm." A.P. thought for a moment...then got a *ping*. "And now for a musical interlude!" Lynn probably raised an eyebrow, but it was hard to tell because she still wasn't looking up. "'Interlude.' That's an impressive word for you." "Yeah, well, I guess that 'Word of the Day' website is payin' off. Now do you want the music or not?" She continued to not look up. "Yeah, whatever." A.P. turned away in thought, then cleared his throat. He didn't turn back to her yet, though -- given *her* expertise, he couldn't face trying to sing face to face with her. Besides, he could only remember the one verse. "o/` Your eyes cast a spell that be...o/`" He heard a *rustle* and *thunk* from behind him and turned, bewildered. "...witches?" he said, just to finish the line. Then he saw her, curled up in a ball in the corner of the bed, pale and shaking, the gun lying forgotten on the floor. He stared at her, unable to work out what could've happened. "Purple Peril?" After a moment, her lack of response made him worry even more. "lynn?" Still nothing; his panic started to show. "Lynn!" He leaned forward, reaching to touch her shoulder. "Lynn, it's okay; it--" "NO." She punctuated that with a lashing-out foot; it was a totally uncontrolled move, but it hit him hard in the shoulder anyway, knocking him over. "--'s *not* okay," he muttered to himself, finishing the word he'd been in the middle of; "okay is the *last* thing this is...How do I put this?" He took a moment to try and put the words in order, then decided to let them do what they felt like. "SOMEONE GET THE HELL *IN* HERE!" Tom entered the room just in time to see A.P. hauling himself into a sitting position and rubbing that shoulder. "What the hell happ--?" "Get. Warlock." Then Tom saw Lynn, and his eyes widened. "What's with *her*? I--" "Just shut up and get Warlock *now.*" "Look, kid, I--" "DO YOU NOT SPEAK *ENGLISH*?" "Okay, okay!" Tom left the room at a considerable run. A.P. stayed at a distance, watching Lynn closely. He know he didn't dare speak until he knew what he'd done wrong so he couldn't screw it up again. Not that way, anyway. * * * In another bedroom, Warlock was asleep on a bed -- literally *on*, not in; lying on top of the covers, fully dressed. When H barged noisily in, Warlock sat up, readjusting his glasses and looking at his visitor with some irritation. "Warlock, we have a...situation." He seemed nervous. "What *kind* of situation?" Squirming slightly, H began to explain as best he could. * * * Warlock barged into Lynn's room, followed by H, to find the Maverick (still) on the floor, still staring at the shaking Peril with some concern. He took in the scene, keeping his distance from Lynn. "Peril," he said. When she didn't respond after a moment, he changed tactics. "Lynn. Three deep breaths. Stat." After another pause, the shaking eased a little. "Lynn, calm down and see the way back." She seemed to calm down a little more. "Okay. H..." "RUST..." "Now is not the time. Just get to her and get her to lie down." H did as he'd been told, approaching the Peril and reaching out for her. She tensed up and lashed out, putting him on the floor alongside the Maverick. Warlock sighed, set down the case he was carrying and opened it, taking out the tranquilizer gun. He loaded it, aimed and fired in one very nearly continuous cycle of action. Lynn flinched, then slumped as the tranq takes hold. Warlock stepped over to her and checked her pulse, then turned to the two boys, who were just getting to their feet, and assessed them silently for a second. "...You're okay. Get out of here." "NO!" the Maverick fairly barked. "I want to find out what I did *wrong*!" "Warlock..." H started to say. "I'm the amateur psychologist around here," Warlock observed with only mild rue, "and what I say goes. Both of you get out of here. Maverick..." He softened a little, knowing about the feelings involved. "...stick close by." With varying degrees of reluctance, the two boys left the room. * * * Some time later, Lynn opened her eyes. She still looked a bit pale and frightened, but at least now she was likely to be coherent. She sat up and looked at Warlock, who was still nearby. "How are you feeling?" he asked by way of preamble. "Is A.P. okay? I..." She couldn't finish the sentence. "Him and H are both fine. You didn't kick them that hard." Now Lynn was guilty as hell. "I thought it was the same person twice." "Nopenope." After a pause, perhaps to let her digest that: "What happened?" In the silence that ensued, Lynn looked at Warlock very dubiously...then sighed. If she couldn't tell *him*, after opening up to him about so much else, she couldn't open up to anyone. Carefully, weighing her words: "Let's just say that Lehrer is probably not a good idea." "The Affilliate or...?" "No, not the Affiliate." * * * (_Then: August 2000_ (In the prison area of the Merritt compound, Quinn was bearing the twin weights of a belabored A.P. and her own facial bruise. She looked at Lynn-dressed-as- Daria as Merritt's men grabbed her. Lynn looked straight into Quinn's eyes...and Quinn frowned, almost realizing that something wasn't quite right here. ("GO!" Lynn barked. ("I'll bring help." A simple statement of fact. The sun rises in the east, vertical stripes make you look taller, I'll bring help. "I--" ("Will you just get *out* of..." She was injected and slumped into her captors' arms. "...ah..." Quinn turned and fled as quickly as she could under A.P.'s nearly-unconscious weight. (Once the ex-hostages were gone, Bryce Merritt turned to Will Jensen, who was dusting off the knees of his suit. "Let's just see which one we actually have." ("It has to be the Peril, sir," Jensen replied. "The Erudite isn't known for *that* kind of boldness..." ("The Erudite is barely known at *all* yet, Jensen." Merritt stepped around behind Lynn and pulled down the collar of her yellow-orange T-shirt until he could just see the head of the shark tattooed on her left shoulder blade. "That settles that. We have the Peril. And as per our agreement...carte blanche, Jensen. But eke it out and get photographic evidence." He made his exit without a backward glance. (Jensen sprouted the grin of a child about to play with a new toy -- unfortunately for Lynn, the child whose grin he grew was Sid Phillips about to give that toy some involuntary elective surgery. He rubbed his hands together in a further demonstration of his glee. "Oh, *good*!" he exclaimed, sounding fairly manic. "This one can take a punch!" He went thoughtful for a moment, then turned to the minions and hurriedly barked out opaque orders. "I need shrooms, strongest ones you can get hold of...at least six more ampoules of that stuff..." A gesture to the now-empty syringe in one minion's hand served to illustrate what "that stuff" signified. "...a bottle of ipecac and thirty-three blue M&Ms." After a moment, he remembered what else. "Oh, and the camera!" That got him some odd looks. "Don't ask questions; move!" They scattered. Alone now with his prey, Jensen bounced around the room cheerily, bursting into song. "o/` Oh, I ache for the touch of your -- lips, dear/But much more for the touch of your -- whips, dear... o/`" Despite the drugging, Lynn retained enough motor control to start whimpering. Jensen looked over at her with a widening grin and a brief drop into speech. "Ooh. You don't like *that* much, do you, dearie? o/` You can raise welts/Like nobody else... o/`") * * * Lynn couldn't go on. She just sat there in her bed, hugging her knees, very pale. Warlock watched her carefully, and after a moment, when he felt comfortably certain she wasn't going to take a swing at him, he put a hand on her arm. From the doorway, Daria and A.P. were peeking in with worried looks on their faces. Then Lynn started talking again, and they faded out of the doorway as her voice droned on. In the hall, out of sight of the door, they stood there, somewhat shell- shocked, for a long silent moment. Then: "You're the one with the words. *Say* something, Daria." "What kind of something?" "Something that makes that hurt less." "The only thing I can come up with is that at least there's a rational explanation for how she's been since the summer." "...Doesn't help." A.P. started walking. Daria followed him. "All that time. Three months at least. And she never said a word to any of us about it. She locked it all up." "D'you think you could've?" "I would have tried. I would have wanted to. But *that*..." She trailed off, then, after another moment, shook her head. "No. I'd have just fallen apart." More silence. They'd reached a doorway. A.P. opened the door, started to step into the room, then turned to look at Daria. "I felt bad, y'know? I felt like, fine, sure, maybe it wasn't so bad to have killed the guy who did some really nasty crap to my...well, to *her*... but that it really sucked to have actually killed a body. Y'know? Even just knowing what she was like after, I still felt bad. And it's not that I don't feel at all bad anymore, but..." The words failed him again. "You feel a little more justified, maybe? Some of the things you heard helped to salve your conscience?" "In Geek-lish, please?" "There's a voice in your head that you've had to argue with every day since you pointed that gun at Jensen's head and pulled the trigger. It's told you that you committed a murder -- a crime of passion, maybe, but that doesn't make ending someone's life right. And the other parts of your mind argue with you that you had your reasons. What you just heard gives that voice more ammunition." "Oh." "I'm not very good at making people feel better about much of anything. Actually, I spent the best part of my childhood trying to make people feel *less* comfortable about their positions in life. So this might come out...well, like something you might say." "Great! I might actually get it first time for a change." "I heard Warlock talking. He wasn't going to let any of us on the front lines of this *before*. Now that he's hearing Lynn's little horror story, the odds are high that he's going to take the fight as far away from her, and consequently from the rest of us, as he can get without taking it -- or us -- out of the country." "Some parts of Purple Peril, you just don't wanna know, do you?" "Excuse me?" "She doesn't *wanna* be taken out of the fight. She had scores to settle when she *didn't* remember what the stupid goons did to her, and now she *does*. You don't think she wants it *over*? I mean, so she *knows* it's over, like her being right up at the front of it?" A.P. had shut the door before Daria could even think about an adequate response to that. December 21, 2000: Precious Things "Hello, don't you know me? I'm the dirt beneath your feet The most important fool you forgot to see I've seen how you give it, now I want to receive I know that you would do the same for me" -- Soundgarden, "Mailman" A breakfast buffet had been laid out at the far wall of the casino's restaurant bar. Nearby, three large tables were occupied by most of the group -- Daria, Jane, Lynn, A.P., Quinn and Tom at one table; the band at another; and Slack, Scar, Pagebert and Angier at the third. Warlock stepped into the room and surveys everyone, just to get the mood of the room before he spoke. "State-of- the-war update, people." Such conversation as there'd been died as people turned toward him. "Chopper led a strike against a Merritt stronghold in Michigan. Some of you already knew about this. While we didn't get Wedge, and lost Eco..." A moment's pause. "...we managed to pull out DJ--" For a second, the imperturable mask cracked, and real relief showed on his face. "--and Kestrel. And we're pretty sure Kes knows who our leak is." Of the group, Lynn looked the most relieved, with Slack not far behind. Angier, however, tried to school his expression but winced a little anyway. From the teens' table, Tom had noticed and now threw a hard look at his father (which Remora missed). "Unfortunately," Warlock went on, "she had to go into surgery. She's going to make it, but for the moment, we don't know exactly who said leak is. That is all." He went to the buffet table, grabbed a plate and loaded up on food. Lynn and Slack, in such nearly-perfect unison it looked almost choreographed, stood up and approached him; with a sigh, Daria followed. As Warlock was turning around with his plate, he saw the incoming questioners, sighed, and put his plate down. "No, that is *not* 'all,'" Lynn announced. "Yeah," Slack fairly snapped. "I mean, *surgery*? What the hemorrhaging fuck do you *mean*, surgery?" "Well put," the Twin Terrors chorused. "Oh shit. How bad is it?" "She'll live," Warlock assured him. "Probably have nothing more than a scar for her trouble." "Could be worse. At least *she's* keeping all her limbs." "That's supposed to be a comfort?" Lynn gritted. "What the hell was she doing in that situation without backup?" "'Damn if I know, Sarge,' he peed sarcastically." They all glared at him. Hard. He shut up with a contrite it-just-slipped-out look. _Lucky I didn't finish that or they'd be *really* peeved._ Warlock worked his way to an answer. "Lynn, you know that there's a leak somewhere, yes? Kes was one of the few your father trusted implicitly." "Trusted enough to risk her life for the matter," the Peril muttered. "Wonderful." Now Slack finished the words of St. Janor, at least inside his head. _I mean, it was *your* idea to *kill* 'em, *Sarge*..._ "She knew the risks, I guess. Not that it makes me feel any damn better." "We all did," Warlock pointed out. "Yes; basically, we did. Frankly, we didn't have any choice but to take them. Did she?" "Lynn, how do you think I feel? I was not one of those few, and now command has devolved on me." "You and the command deserve each other. You could show a little concern for Kes." "Showing concern is bad for morale. If I'm not worried, they're not worried." "And it does my morale all kinds of good to know that, if I went down, you'd be an automaton." "In public." Daria, being Daria, had to speak her mind sooner or later. "It might do morale better if you gave a damn about your...well, whatever Kes is to you. After all, they're not just co-workers, as far as I can tell." "'Don't ever let your people see you bleed.'" He was obviously quoting, though they couldn't tell what or whom. "'Don't ever let them see you hurt. Do- -'" He stopped in mid-quote, then continued with an almost Vulcan calm. "Kes is to me about what you two were to each other before you found out your lineage." There was a long silence as this sank in. Lynn closed her eyes, and proceeded to keep them closed. Daria looked from her to Warlock, who looked back at her impassively, with large eyes. "Oh." "The word, you three, is umsiblings." "And we," Slack blurted out, "are in an umsituation." "Why am I not surprised an 'um' would find itself in there somewhere." The way Daria said it, it wasn't a question. "And that's not funny, Slack," her sister added. "It was worth a try, I thought. Not really supposed to be all *that* funny anyway." _And a --ing good thing too,_ he Mr. Tulip'd inwardly, _'cos it was about as --ing funny as a clown at --ing midnight._ "Now. About this leak. Any leads?" "Any leads you can't give in public, at least..." Daria added. "Well," noted Warlock, "if one applies logic..." Slack decided to counter Warlock's earlier bout of Vulcanry with an impersonation of Mr. Data. "Ah. Indeed." _Warlock Holmes,_ he thought inanely. "Slack," Lynn requested with surprising politeness under the circumstances, "shut up and let's hear the man." Slack made a zipper motion across his lips. Warlock began laying out datapoints. "It has to be someone who was high enough up to leak all this information." "That narrows it down some," Daria allowed as. "And I guess Kes is fairly well alibied now..." Lynn added. "Fairly." Warlock seemed to have decided dryness wasn't necessary. "So are Adam and Jerome." "That kind of leaves the heads of the other Family branches," Daria observed. "Or people in close proximity to them," her sister added. Slack allowed himself to contribute a sage nod. "Point." "We think there's a mole at LHS," Warlock went on. "Because somehow they found out about the NASA trip." "You're nuts," Lynn proclaimed. If they'd been at school, I'd have spotted them by now." "She left the surveillance gear up," Daria explained. "Laziness or foresight -- I'm not making that call." "Could just be luck." _It may not exist in Kenobi's experience, but it's played a recurring role in mine._ Warlock took a different perspective. "Slack...I don't believe in coincidence." "Someone related to a student, maybe," Lynn resumed the thread of discussion. "But not the Landons," Daria stated flatly. "Someone related to a student..." That gave Warlock furiously to think. "I saw 'Rust' throw a hard look at his father. And what Rust told me about the decaf. He said they didn't even keep decaf in the house!" "Sounds like evidence," Slack had to admit, "and like a plan." "I know it's circumstantial evidence, but it's a lot of circumstantial evidence a), and b) there's no evidence pointing at anyone else." "Point taken." "We just kill him now to save time, then?" "That's not funny, Lynn!" Daria half-barked. "That wasn't meant to be funny. If it was him, look what he's done!" Slack offered an opinion. "He's graduated from remora to lamprey, that's what he's done." "How about to leech?" Warlock asked. "I'm pretty sure lampreys suck blood too. My dad's an oceanographer," Slack offered by way of explanation, or at least setup for an explanation. "Not exactly a marine biologist, but he knows enough." "WILL YOU TWO SHUT *UP*?" Lynn thundered. After that, the players took a moment to collect themselves. "In any event," Warlock resumed at length. "This is why the caution with public information." Slack nodded once. "Sensible." Lynn was confused. "So we suspect. And we're not doing anything about it?" "If he dies, his backtrail dies with him." "Innocent until proven?" Daria suggested. "How much more proof do you want?" Lynn snapped. "A dead body at his feet?" "Well," said Warlock, "you remember I said no one is to leave for any reason? Not even to run to a store or whatever?" "Vividly," Daria didn't actually sigh. "How does certain sabotage on his car sound?" Lynn seemed on the verge of perking up. "What kind of sabotage?" "Dig out the steering wheel airbag, replace it with a tranq dart, set it to trigger with the ignition." Slack chuckled. "Desmond Llewellyn, call your office." "The sound you just heard was that flying so far over my head it had to file a flight plan." "'Q' from the Bond movies. Up to the later part of the Brosnan era, anyway." _Is it really accurate to speak of 'the Brosnan era' when we don't know for sure that it's over? No matter -- *some* era came to an end when the last cast member from the Connery days cashed in his chips._ Daria was starting to get sick of this digression. "I'm sure this isn't the time or place for mindless trivia-buffery -- or maybe that should be *buffoonery*." "Is that even a word?" Normally, he'd have said something along the lines of _I resent that. I don't *deny* it, mind you; I just *resent* it._ This time, however, he deemed it not a good idea to admit weakness in front of Mr. Iron-Man Warlock. Too late -- Warlock had already scented it. "This *also* isn't the time and place for random verbal sniping." Lynn decided to drag them back onto topic. "Warlock, I'm not sure a dart is what you're looking for. You have to be careful where you aim it, for one thing. Not to mention dosage. If you want him alive--" "Which we do, now you mention it." That was Slack, demonstrating that "relevance" *is* in his vocabulary after all. "You're telling them how to do their job?" Daria was somewhere between amazement and fear. "Hey, I practically wrote the book," Lynn pointed out. "You *did* write the book." _It may have A.P.'s name on it, but you're the one with the words._ Warlock made an observation. "Lynn, you just gave me a better idea." "Why," Lynn wondered only half-facetiously, "does that scare me?" "You think the Maverick remembers the formula for that knockout spray?" "What do you mean remember? He carries a supply of the stuff since the incident with the gunman. Whether he'd get time to use it is another thing, but it makes him feel safer." Slack nodded again. "Wise of him." "Enough to load the airbag compartment with it?" Lynn had to think about Warlock's question a moment, but finally replied, "Yes, I think so." Now it was Daria's turn to look scared. She could see how well Lynn fit in with these people, and it wasn't a comforting sight. "Works for me," Slack allowed as. "The question at that point is, how do we make it work for *him*? Or *on* him?" "That *is* the question," Warlock stated flatly. A sigh. "Let me talk to A.P. I'm sure he can rig it. I mean, if he can set up a blow-up doll in the airbag of Sam Stack's convertible..." "Peril..." "Look, I have to be a part of this *somehow*, don't I? This is personal now. And if all I can do is arrange the deed done, I'll *do* it. Just make sure he gets everything he needs -- including time and cover -- to do what you need him to do." "Understood." "Nice to know. Now if you'll excuse me, I have things to do." With that, Lynn headed off. Daria glared at the two men and followed her out. * * * Daria had to jog to catch up to Lynn, and to struggle to keep up as they strode down the hall. "Are you okay?" "I suppose." Daria went wry. "Of course. *Not* being okay would involve you acknowledging the emotional side of things." "Want to stop posting to alt.pot.kettle.black for awhile, Daria?" They walked for a moment in silence before she went on. "Okay. Fine. You want emotion? I'm terrified. Things weren't great when I first came to Lawndale, but the problems I had were manageable. Mom put work ahead of her family, Dad was clueless and a half-assed parent, Quinn was..." Words failed her. Fortunately, Lynn didn't need them. "Quinn was Quinn. Carry on." "But it had its compensations. I had a best friend, who made school purgatory as close to fun as it was ever going to get. And then I had *two* friends who did that. And then three. Then, before I know what's happening, one of my friends is my sister, and the bloodline we share goes back a long way in the crime annals. And now people want my sisters dead, not to mention my friends, and *me*. Instead of just watching the Barksdales or the Morgendorffers or both warring with words over Christmas, I get to spend it in fear of my life. And yes, it scares me. And it pisses me off beyond my ability to express it." "And it's my fault." _Oh crap._ "Lynn, I didn't mean--" "Probably not, but it's true. I wonder if you know just how bad I feel about this. How I wish I'd never been in any of your lives. How I would give anything -- anything at all -- to get you out of the firing line. Or if you'd believe it even if I had the words to say it." That hung there a moment. "Now if you'll excuse me, I need to talk to AP about this whole 'get Angier' thing." "Lynn--!" But Lynn had already ducked into an elevator and hit the Door Close button, shutting Daria out. * * * It was dusk. Out in the parking lot, in a light rain, Remora was loading a car. From the window of his room, a window black like the rest, Tom was looking out with a pair of binoculars. "Oh, dammit..." he muttered to himself. He dropped the binocs, slapped a clip into his gun, shoved it into the waistband of his cargo pants and headed out on the dead run. * * * In room 316, Jane was sitting on her still-unmade bed, sketching, and Lynn was standing at the window. After a moment, Jane looked up at her. After another moment, she spoke. "Much of a view, out there?" Lynn didn't turn to look. "Parking lot." She stared for a silent moment at the same view Tom was seeing -- a dark figure, obviously Angier, loading his car. "Seems...pretty interesting." Jane could probably have sounded less convinced, but it would've taken some doing. "Eh. I'm all out of book." "...Oooookay..." Jane turned back to her sketchpad. Lynn just kept looking out the window. After a moment, unseen by Jane, she got a worried, puzzled look on her face. Then she stepped expeditiously away from the window, letting the curtains fall shut, and reached under the pillow on her bed. Her attention gotten by the fall of the curtains, Jane looked up again. "Where're you going?" Out of Jane's line of sight, Lynn was stuffing the gun, which she'd just retrieved from under her pillow, into her unlaced boot. "I just realized: if I'm all out of book, I can just raid the gift shop downstairs. Part-owner privilege. I'll be back in a while." So saying, she headed out of the room, not at a run but still in a bit of a rush. Jane looked after her with some confusion. Her bafflement would probably have lifted if she'd looked through the window at the drama playing out below, where a dark figure was approaching Angier from the shadows... * * * "Dad, what do you think you're doing?" Angier jumped and spun in the same motion, bringing him face-to-hard-face with his son. He made landed-fish faces for a moment, trying to collect himself. "Umm...Warlock sent me on a mission," he heard himself saying. "Top priority, can't wait." "Cut the shit, Da-- Remora. I know what you are." Angier's face suddenly went as cold and hard as his son's. "Do you." * * * In the security office, Scar and Slack were seated at a table, playing cards. Monitors on the wall showed parking lot, the hotel corridors, and various angles of the main gambling area. A rifle was leaning against one of the work stations nearby; the pistol he called "Baby" sat at Slack's right elbow. Scar had two cards in her hand; Slack, about five. Scar laid the eight of clubs down and knocked on the table. "Diamonds." Slack started picking up cards from the facedown stack on the table. After three, he smirked and laid down the eight of spades. "Hearts." "Dammit, Slack..." "Remember, I worked the tables for a year before they kicked me upstairs." "Card-counting scum..." Scar muttered as she started picking up cards. After she'd picked up her fourth, Slack took a look at the parking lot monitor and did a facefault. "Our little parasite's out there...and he's not alone." Scar dropped her cards. "WHAT?" * * * "How could you?" Tom demanded. "Maybe you were happy with being kicked in the teeth constantly," his father replied. "Made constant fun of. Sneered at. Never good enough for them. I showed them. I showed them *all.*" _Oh shit, he's a little over the edge._ "But--" "Oh, come on, *Missing H*. You know what I'm talking about. They promised me money. Power. Best of all, respect. The respect I couldn't get with this lot of weak minded cowards led by that ostrich." * * * In the space the WCB had made a common room, Pagebert was crashed out on a sofa. Warlock was sitting at a table, reading something off a laptop screen. Scar barged through the door, Slack following a moment behind. Both of them had rifles to hand, Slack having decided that was more to the purpose than Baby. "In the parlance," he observed, "Remora's doing a runner." "But he has company," Scar added. "H is out there with him." "'With'?" Warlock asked, making the question sound casual. "Well, he's out there, anyway. Trying to hold him off, from the look." "...Without backup? -- Idiot." He got up, and they all charged out of the room. * * * "You could join me, son!" Angier insisted. "You could! Think of the glory! We'll get a hero's welcome!" "Get real," Tom scoffed. "The only thing we'd get is killed." "But I helped them! They owe me!" He was now a *lot* over the edge; he looked as though his eyes were going to start spinning in little circles any second. "You owed me. You owed Uncle Adam. That didn't matter to you." "Adam owed me! His own brother! And look what it got me." _And look what it got *him*,_ an inner voice scolded. Dawn broke over Marblehead. "You're stalling. I don't want to someday have to kill you, son. Come with me. Join me." For a second, Tom was tempted to accept. But only for a second. If it'd been anyone else but his father, it wouldn't even have lasted that long. But weighed against Mom, and Else, and Uncle Adam -- not to mention the Look- Alikes, Jane, Quinn... "No way in hell, Lord Vader." "Nice ref. -- You've been hanging out with Warlock too long." Tom drew his sidearm. So did Remora. They locked eyes. "Rus...no. Tom. Last chance. Join me or die." "*Now* who's quotehappy?" "Answer me." "Fuck you." They raised their sidearms, which spoke in unison. Tom's head snapped back as the bullet tore through his throat. Remora dropped to one knee from the pain as his shoulder was punctured, but still managed to say, "Too bad. I win." Suddenly, his chest seemed to explode, and he dropped to the ground. Charging in behind him were Warlock, Scar, and Slack. The latter two had those rifles I mentioned; Warlock had the sweet little pump-action shotgun he'd taken to the Merritt compound in his hands, a bow strapped across his back, and a quiver of arrows at his waist. "No," Scar informed their target. "You lose." Warlock walked over to Tom, flipped him over with a boot, and sighed. "Rest in peace--" His mouth started to shape an Aitch, then he stopped it. "-- Rust." "We'll never figure out who he told what." Warlock spared a glance at Angier. "We shoulda called him Cain." He startd taking his jacket off. "Slack, help me." Slack, though not quite sure what was going on, handed over his own jacket. Warlock had soon rigged a makeshift stretcher and hefted Rust onto it. "He's dead." "He proved himself at the end. I'm not leaving him out here in the rain." With that, he grabbed an end of the stretcher and Slack got the other. Scar watched them both as they lifted him. "And that?" Slack indicated Angier with a twitch of his chin. "Let him rot." There was a brief pause, then Warlock put own his end of the stretcher down and kicked Angier in the ribs as hard as he could. Slack raised an eyebrow; Scar just stared at him, dumbfounded. He picked up his end of the stretcher again. "We'll figure something in the morning." As they started walking towards the entrance to the Isle, Slack had a thought. "Who tells Peril about this?" _Oh shit._ "We'll burn that bridge when we come to--" They reached the hideout door just then, and Warlock stopped the sentence in its tracks as it became clear that they'd come to that bridge a little sooner than they'd expected. Lynn, in nightwear and unlaced boots, was standing at the door with a gun in her hand. She looked them over, then leaned a little to look at the corpse slung between Slack and Warlock. They stood like that in silence for a moment, frozen in tableau. "Remora?" she then asked flatly. "Got what he deserved." "Doubtful. You weren't out long enough for that." In the moment of silence that followed that, she glanced down at Tom. "We treated him like crap. All of us." "Peril..." She turned and walked back inside. Warlock, Slack and Scar shared a look, then resumed bringing Tom's body inside. December 22, 2000: If She Could Speak "I see fire brought by the winds of change I sense pain from the depths of my heart I`m all wired, fired up for better days I saw stars right from the start. Burn, burn, Babylon! So wake up, wake up, children!" -- Pop Will Eat Itself, "Babylon" Back in the bar, Daria, Jane, Lynn and Quinn were seated in a booth, colored various shades of morose. There was a cup of coffee in front of each of them -- Quinn's hadn't been touched, but the others were mostly empty. "What a *waste,*" Quinn sulked; "I mean, he was *annoying,* but he was *cute.*" Lynn was too pissed off and miserable for this. "Shut *up,* Quinn." A short pause. Jane broke the silence. "This sucks. This sucks *so* badly." "Jane--" Daria started to say. "No. I treated him..." She trailed off into a sigh. "Never mind." She grabbed a nearly-full bottle of wine and left the room, brushing past A.P. as he came in. He looked after her, a little worried, then looked at the other girls, who looked like he felt, only more so. "Where's she going?" "Don't ask," Daria said simply. In the uncomfortable silence that followed, A.P. took the seat Jane had vacated. He started toying with her mug thoughtfully. "Well...I don't even know what to think here. I mean, I didn't...I didn't think any of us..." Maybe Python would give him the words, but all the Python he could think of at the moment was the Parrot Sketch. "...I didn't think any of us was going to fucking *snuff* it, that's all!" "A.P..." Lynn warned. "Yeah, well, I *know,* but if he can...I mean..." "A.P., if you would calm down for just one second..." He dropped the mug. It bounced off the table, hit the floor and shattered. A.P. took a deep breath. When she judged that he'd calmed down as much as he was going to, Lynn went on. "Tom wasn't built for this; he was being raised for something...different. Why he was thrown into this, I don't know." "Probably," Daria observed with lemony-fresh bitterness, "because Family doesn't give a damn about Family--" "No, *Angier* didn't give a damn about Family." _Backtrack._ "Lynn--" "NO," Lynn overrode her sister with tone that said clearly, _We're not discussing this._ After a moment, she repeated, more softly, "No." Another uncomfortable silence. At length, A.P. got out the Sledgehammer of Subject Change. "Art-Smart Scarlet's taking it hard." "Yeah, I know," Daria acknowledged. "She didn't exactly...well, after how their relationship ended..." "Should it have mattered, *really*?" "Quinn..." "Well, I mean, if she *liked* him..." "You liked Ted, didn't you?" Lynn countered pointedly. Quinn went back into a sulk, an angry one this time. "Don't talk about that. That's not *fair.*" "Yes it is," Daria replied. "Well, actually, no it isn't." "A.P.?" "Well, it *isn't*! I mean...Well..." He sighed. "AwhellIdontknowwhatImean. I guess this Family crap just screws with everything, doesn't it." "It doesn't have to." Lynn said that so quietly that the others nearly didn't hear the hopeful undertone. This time, after a very short pause, the Sledgehammer aforesaid was swung by Daria. "That reminds me; do we have any news on Kes and DJ?" "No; no, we don't. Kes is still in surgery...as far as I know, anyway. Warlock's playing things closer to the vest than I'd like." Daria responded to the bitterness she heard. "Lynn..." "No, it's my *family.* With a small f." "Mine too. Technically." "Yeah, but you haven't known them very long, have you?" "Maybe it shouldn't matter so much at this point." Lynn conceded the point. "Maybe." Quinn gave vent to an exasperated sigh. "Daria...why are you talking about them like they *are* your family? "Ex*cuse* me?" It was hard to say which was uppermost in Lynn's tone: anger that Quinn would say such a thing, or incredulity that *anyone*, least of all Quinn, would say it to or even *near* her face. Quinn ignored that, addressing herself only to Daria. "Well, you don't know them, you're only half-related to them and..." Utter frustration seized her vocal cords. "...they're going to get you *killed,* Daria!" Now Daria was starting to worry. "Quinn?" Quinn was on the verge of tears. "No; I *can't*! I...just CAN'T!" She got up a little too quickly, nearly knocking her chair over, and ran out with her hands over her face. Silence supervened again. "Well," Lynn observed presently. "That's an interesting turn of events." Daria had more pressing thoughts. "Now. Here's the question: which one of them do I talk to?" "Come again?" A.P. boggled. "Do I talk to Jane, who obviously needs someone right about now...or do I talk to Quinn, my up-until-recently-thought whole sister?" "That's your call, Daria," Lynn informed her. "I mean, I could try to talk to Jane, but I don't think I would do as much good as you would and...well, I don't really think Quinn wants to deal with *me* right about now." "You make a point." Daria thought a moment more, then voiced a deep sigh. "You may as well just rename them Scylla and Charybdis and be done with it." That elicited a snicker, much to Daria's confusion. "A.P.?" Lynn had her head in her hands. "Just...don't...ask, Daria. If you have any respect for me at *all,* you will *not* ask." A.P. took another moment or two to get himself under control, then asked, "So what're you gonna do?" Daria just gave a miserable shrug. * * * In the room she was sharing with all the sister she had, Quinn was flopped face- down on her bed, not even crying. The door opened, and Daria stood there for a moment. Then she knocked on the doorframe and waited for acknowledgement. After another moment, she realized she wasn't going to get it, stepped fully into the room and sat down on her own pristine bed. She took a deep breath to collect herself before she spoke. "It's going to be okay, Quinn." Quinn raised her face from the pillow and glared. "Yeah, *right*, Daria! You're always so *good* at telling it like it *is*, and now you tell me that all *this* is going to be okay when people are *dying* all over the place! I'm not so stupid that you can lie to me and keep me from feeling bad 'cause I feel bad enough *already*, okay?" She dove back into the pillow. Daria looked at her for a moment, considering how to concede the point without also conceding the argument. "Okay, let me amend the statement. If we sit back and let it keep getting worse, it *isn't* going to be okay." Quinn looked up again. "Like *we* can do anything about it! We're just *kids*!" "That's true. But we're *smart* kids. With talents. And if we use the brains and the talents we have, we stand a better chance at getting out of this alive than if we stick our heads in the sand. -- Or the synthetic fabric of a pillowcase." "Oh, go *away*, Daria! Go and hang out with your *friends*, or something. -- Or your *real* sister." Daria was so shocked that it almost showed on her face. "Quinn, *you're* my sister as much as she is. In ways, more." "You stand *up* for her! You went out of your way to rescue her!" "I would have done the same for *you*, if Lynn hadn't done it first." "You'd *rather* have grown up with *her*. You *like* her better!" Daria remembered the dream-image of Quinn, suggesting she'd have been happier growing up as Daria Smythe alongside Lynn Smythe. Now, she had an answer for the real one. "Familiarity breeds contempt." "What's *that* supposed to mean?" "I've grown up with you. I've seen you twenty-four hours a day, three hundred and sixty-five days a year, for most of my life. I've listened to you belittle me in front of your friends, get the lion's share of our parents' attention, and waste your brain in the never-ending search for popularity. I know you well enough to know when you're being manipulative, wasteful and just plain stupid -- and I see it all the time. You get to know someone well enough, sometimes you outwardly get sick of them." "I...I..." Anything that could render Quinn speechless was still a good thing in Daria's eyes, albeit not the unalloyed good she would have thought it a year or two ago. "...you think that's why I always try to be so *different* from you? 'Cause I get sick of you?" "That's probably part of it. It's also something you can be better at than me, mostly because I don't have the least bit of interest in it." "...I don't want to die. And I don't want *you* to die either." "I second that. But the situation is as the situation is. And burying your head in a pillow and hoping it will all just go away won't make it do that. -- If you don't at least try to get along with the rest of us, at least for a little while, it's going to get harder to keep you safe. Ever heard of a tactic called 'divide and conquer'?" "Like Sandi always tried to do with Stacy and Tiffany and me to make sure we'd never gang up on her and kick her *out*?" Daria raised an eyebrow at the sudden display of perspicacity. "Once I got out of the Fashion Club, I kinda picked up on that." "Okay. In that case, yes. So will you try not to irritate people so they'll be more willing to keep you alive?" "Uh...sure! I mean, I'm *good* at fitting in!" Daria rolled her eyes, but with affection. "I guess you are." "*Now* are you going to go and talk to your Jane friend?" Daria's surprise must have shown on her face. "I picked up on that *too*; I mean, *duh*! But why'd you come see me *first*?" "Don't make me say it. I've said enough to prove the sisterly bond." She walked out of the room. Quinn looked after her with a thoughtful expression, then got a little smile on her face. * * * In the room she was sharing with Lynn, Jane had a pad on her knee and a stick of charcoal in her hand and was furiously sketching. Daria, after hovering a moment in the doorway, cleared her throat, and Jane looked up. Without a word, she held up the pad. It was a rainy-day graveyard scene where pale shadows hovered -- whether they were mist or ghosts wasn't clear at this distance. Daria stepped closer. "It's--" "Dark?" Jane conjectured. "Depressing? Morbid?" "...Actually, I was going to say it's just what this room needs. Art with personality." She nodded a little at the bland landscape hanging on one of the walls. Jane gave a reluctant smile. "The Horror-Show Hotel. Hey, think that Slack guy could turn a profit on that concept?" "Well, I'd say it would clash with the architecture, but I'm pretty sure you'd say that the design of this building is enough of a horror-show for anyone." That got another reluctant smile. "You okay?" "Hell no." "Do you want to talk about it?" "Hell no." "Do you just want me to sit here and not pressure you to talk so that you can be alone but not alone?" "Hell yes." "Got a book?" Jane gestured toward Lynn's side of the room. Daria moved across towards the windows, where Lynn's bag was lying. She rummaged, pulled out Clive Barker's _Weaveworld_, then looked back. Instead of sitting on the side of Lynn's bed nearest the window, she moved around to the gap between the two beds and sat down on the bed's other side, fairly near to Jane. She opened the book without another word. Jane looked up and gave a grateful half-smile before going back to her sketch in companionable silence. * * * A privacy curtain was drawn between the generic hospital room's two beds. In one, ENGELS, P. was sitting up and reading. In the other, McGOVERN, J. was just waking up to find a tube in her throat and two IV tubes running to arm-veins -- one bagged with saline solution, the other whole blood. She blinked a couple of times, her panic showing in her eyes. She pulled at the tape binding both her arms to the bedframe for the convenience of the IVs. "Kes? You awake?" Kes froze instantly. In her current condition, she had no definite idea to whom that voice belonged. Her last proper memory was of running for her life through Mitchell's office; she thought she remembered getting shot, and her current position would seem to bear that out, but anything past that point was a blur. "It's okay. Aph and them pulled us out. Speaking of whom..." Kes was still tense. She was beginning to feel like she knew the voice, but she still couldn't attach it to a name -- or even to an affiliation. For all she could tell, she might still be in Merritt hands, being set up for an info-pump. There'd been a film like that, she remembered someone telling her -- RAF man captured by the Jerries, they try to convince him he's in friendly hands after the Normandy invasion (actually not yet happened) so they can get specific forewarning. It was the kind of thing that bloke's junkheap memory *would* hold onto. Her neighbour dialled a mobile phone, paused for an answer, then spoke. "NCM? DJ. She's awake." Kes relaxed at once. DJ. She knew that name, yes, or rather that callsign. She was officially in friendly hands. The same infuriating (yet somehow lovable) bloke who'd told her about the war film had an expression for just this sort of situation, one he'd picked up from a favourite sci-fi writer: _My son, I perceive that a great express-train has just been lifted from your testicles._ The full force of the saying came home to her in a way she'd never expected, purely on anatomical grounds, that it ever *could* do. * * * In his room, Warlock was on his bed again, grabbing some much-needed sleep. There came a muted ringing from across the room. It stopped without actually waking him; the Hypothetical Observer would have heard muted mumbling in the background. Then a hand poked Warlock in the back. He came awake immediately and turned to see the Erudite standing over him. "Meef...?" he grogged. "We've been watching you for an hour and a half now." She let him digest that, then drily added, "We had orders from on high." Warlock could go from Grog to English a lot quicker than A.P. or Jane, and without needing coffee. "Why?" "Fielding internal questions and standing guard so you could get some sleep. We didn't want to, but it was pointed out to us that you're the best chance we have of getting out of this alive. But I had to wake you for this." "For what?" "It was your phone. Kes is awake. And talking. Sort of." For a moment, Warlock just sat and stared at Daria, who stood there impassively. "'Sort of,'" he said when he judged something to need saying. "Apparently, they're keeping her intubated for a little while longer until they're a bit more secure about her lungs. Though NCM said something about it being 'almost worth it to shut her up for awhile.' And given what she helped make me do in Pittsburgh, I can't really disagree with him." Warlock looked at Daria in shock, and she favored him with a *very* thin version of her Mona Lisa smile. "In any other circumstances, I might say the same. Not here, though. But thanks for the attempt at humor." "Just don't let it get around; I have a reputation to maintain. -- Anyway, he said they were going to get information out of her and to give them a half-hour or so to do it. Consensus is she's fairly resourceful." Warlock nodded and looked at her. The expression on his face wasn't exactly expectant, but Daria knew how to read other people's lack of expression. "DJ's fine. She was the one who made the call telling them she was awake. Best not to call at the hospital, though." "Why not? She not taking calls?" "Not because of DJ's inability to take phone conversations. Let's just say Kes proved that she and Lynn are related." "...Property damage?" "No, but she nearly ripped the side-rails off the bed when she found her arms were taped there. Then she started making some very odd hand gestures." Warlock raised an eyebrow at her. "DJ thought she was trying to communicate. And that she might know what happened to..." She groped for the right thing to call him, finally settling on: "...the Falcon." * * * One odd interview later, Leopard, Aph, NCM and Chopper piled out of the hospital room and stopped in the hallway. "Who calls Warlock with this?" Leopard demanded first thing. "What about DJ?" Aph suggested. "He'd want to know she's all right anyway." "Thought about that," NCM pointed out, "but no dice. Nurse Ratchet and her band of Nazi candy stripers took her cellphone and she'd kill us if we went in there again. -- Lep?" "No *way*; you're not sticking *me* with shit detail just 'cause I'm the youngest!" Aph rolled her eyes. "*I'll* do it." "No," NCM interjected, "*I'll* do it. He needs info, not a dramatic reading." Aph scowled. "HEY!" NCM took out his cellphone -- but stopped, as just then, Chopper's phone rang. The others all looked at Chopper, who shrugged at them, took out his phone and opened it up. "Yeah? -- We were about to call you. Got news on the snake in the grass. It's--" Warlock was just a bit too tired to hide his anger and sadness, or to let Chopper finish an explanation that was no longer necessary. "Remora, I know. He's dead. Anything else?" Chopper blinked, then went on with the rest of Kes' gesture-message. "Uh...Falcon's dead. They got him and he did the cyanide pill thing." "...Good. I'll be in touch." Click. Chopper was left bemused and annoyed. "Not the most polite person, him." "Pity the man, Chopper," said Leopard. "Why the hell should I?" "He's gonna have to tell the Peril her father's dead." Total, thoughtful silence fell. Chopper, to his credit, managed to look almost ashamed of himself. December 23, 2000: Blood on My Hands "Down, down, down you're rollin' Watch the blood float in the muddy sewer Take another hit and bury your brother And we die young, faster we run" -- Alice in Chains, "We Die Young" There were crates everywhere in the basement loading dock and storage area, but there'd been a space cleared. In this, Trent, Jesse and Nick were tuning their guitars, and Max was setting up his drumkit. Daria, Jane and AP were sitting on crates, watching them set up. "You couldn't have left *without* that stuff?" A.P. wondered. "Says the punk," Trent rasped back, "who's got a chemistry set all over the room." "We wanted to play," Jesse replied. "Stay sharp." "Jesse. Sharp," Daria couldn't quite resist saying. "That's about as much an oxymoron as Microsoft Works." "Where's Lynn, anyway?" Poppa Bear wondered. "She had that ripping set of lyrics and Trent thinks he has a tune, don't you, man?" "Yeah," Trent acknowledged, "but give her some time, Nick. Dunno what Warlock wanted her for." "Probably bawling her out for the mall trip again," was all Jane could think of. "I still don't believe you didn't let us in on that!" Max blurted. "You think we didn't want out too?" "Yeah," she snarked, "but you're such a criminale, we figured you'd make more trouble than it was worth." Her sarcasm affected Little Drummer Boy the same way an SR-71 flyby affects a dairy cow. "Really? Cool!" The door opened, and Lynn stepped in, looking fairly horrible. No one was entirely sure what to say. As it turned out, the decision would not rest with them. "I came to say that I'm not singing. That is all." She turned around and headed back toward the door. "Hey, Purple Peril, hold up! What's going on?" Lynn stopped, but she didn't turn around. "Daria." "...Yeah?" Fear in that voice. "Our father's dead." In the shocked silence that followed this announcement, Lynn started walking again. Jane, the fastest of them, got up and sprinted for the door, slamming it shut almost on Lynn's nose. "In the immortal words of *both* of you...ex*cuse* me?" "Lynn?" Trent asked. Daria had a different reaction. "So...it's confirmed, then?" Lynn just kept facing the door, not looking at anyone. "The story is that he and Adam were cornered on their way to a rendezvous with Leopard. They couldn't fight their way free, so the theory is that Adam was a mercy-killing, to prevent him from being tortured for information. -- As for Dad...he was prevented from doing the same job on himself, but managed to pop a cyanide pill before he spilled anything." A long moment of tense, shocked silence followed this flat narration. Lynn remained obstinate in her refusal to face her friends. Daria was the one to break it. "I'm not sure if I think that's sick or noble." Jane spoke from a perspective given her by the loss of Tom. "Maybe there's not too much difference between the two concepts, with a Mafia family." "Now," Lynn said, "if you'll excuse me..." That raised a question in Daria's mind. "You're not going to do anything stupid, are you?" "You keep asking me that. -- In this case, the answer is 'not yet.'" "Lynn, I know--" "Forgive me for pointing out that you know *nothing* about this, Daria. This was the ultimate act of war; the Smythes either fight or roll over and die. And I don't think *anyone* in this organization knows how to do that." "Which means they're going to anything they can to keep you...us...out of the firing line." "*Us*, maybe... But I'd like to make sure I know who they *are* sending to retaliate." There followed an exchange of looks, which left Trent, Jesse, Nick and Max looking unaccountably nervous. Lynn left, with Jane on her heels; Daria and A.P. followed them. "They'll find out," Jesse said once the band was alone. "I know, man," Trent rasped. "I know." * * * Some time later, Trent, Jesse, Nick and Max had abandoned their instruments and were going through the boxes. Trent had a couple of pistols, which he stuck in his belt with a shrug. Jesse was tying his hair back; he'd put on a black T- shirt under his usual black leather vest, a machete was hanging at his belt, and his raised arms made it easier to see the shoulder holster he was wearing and the Colt .45 in it. Nick and Max pulled out wicked-looking machine guns with near-identical grins of satisfaction. "Put them down." "Aw, come on, man, we're criminales! Big-ass guns are what criminales are all *about*!" Warlock hove into view with the sternest look imaginable on his face, targeted chiefly at Max. "Handguns only." Nick and Max, sullen but cowed, put the nasty guns down and accepted the 9mm pistols Warlock was offering. Daria and Jane came in with the angry looks of avenging angels, Lynn and A.P. close behind. "NO!" It wasn't *quite* ripped from Daria's throat; more sort of launched. "No, *what*?" "Only one part of the owner's codename fits him," Jane quipped, forgetting that Slack was technically more of a middleman. "Since he doesn't wear a monkey suit..." A.P. opted to pare it down to essentials. "He still hasn't swept for bugs yet. They know. 'Bout New Orleans." Warlock went into Briefing Mode as a defense mechanism. "Most of our operatives are in the North, or gone to the mattresses. Word is that a Merritt base in New Orleans has the information we need to take this fight to the Merritts. It's a simple in-and-out--" Lynn didn't let him get any further. "Not the band. Not any of them. Do you understand me? This isn't their fight!" "Sure it is, Lynn." That from Trent. Lynn turned on him, but Jane beat her to it. "How the *hell* is this your fight? You shouldn't even be involved!" "If we don't fight them now...fight 'em and win...they're gonna get you, Janey. And Lynn. And Daria." That last had hit hard; he needed a moment to collect himself before he could go on. "Even the punk. And they won't let you fight, even though from what I hear, you'd be best at it. So we're gonna. We protect what's ours. Like Max says -- we're criminales. For real...for now." Daria looked at him for a long moment. Lynn watched them both. Then Daria stepped up to him slowly and kissed him on the lips; closed- mouthed, but nothing else about it even approached chaste. Lynn smiled. After a long moment, Daria pulled away. Trent looked completely stunned, lost in his own little world. But he must, on some level, have heard what she said. "Chivalry isn't dead, is it? It's just a little stupid." After getting that off her chest, she turned to the rest of the band. "You'll watch his back?" "Daria," Lynn boggled, "you're not accepting this...?" "*I'm* sure as hell not!" snapped Jane. "Scar'll be with them," Warlock assured her. "She'll cover their backs." "Yeah, but will she be *enough*? This is my brother's *life* you're gambling with!" "Her?" Jesse shrugged with his mouth. "Maybe. Her *and* us? Sure." Nick joined the rising chorus. "Hey, we look after our own, Jane! You know that!" "Yeah, man!" added Max. We're--" "I know, I know, criminales." Jane took a moment to nerve herself. "Can I--?" "Don't even say it!" Lynn cut in. "It's bad enough if *they're* determined to go." Trent was still standing there, totally lost. Jesse was the best one to deliver reassurance. "It'll be cool, Lynn. Daria. Jane. We'll keep safe." "Just make sure you do," Daria replied. "I guess that's all I can say." "I can say one more thing." Jane took another moment, this one to get right in her brother's face. "You don't come back, and that kiss you just got from her will only happen to you once." She and Daria left on that note. A.P. looked at Lynn; she nodded toward the door, and he followed the others out. Lynn kept watching Trent, who was still standing there with that dazed, vaguely happy look. When he spoke, it was just above a whisper. "Once was plenty..." Lynn stepped up to him, a bland look on her face. "I once said to her that if she hurt A.P., I would make her life hell. -- Come back alive. For her. Or I'll kick your ass via astral projection if necessary." "I didn't think you believed in that stuff, Lynn." "We're all grasping at straws here, Trent. -- Besides, I think you'd make a damn good brother-in-law." With that, she left. Jesse, Nick and Max clustered around their front-man. "You cool?" Jesse asked. "Oh yeah," came the reply. "Sure you wanna do this, man?" Max now wondered. "You got a lot to lose." "No more than Nick does. Less, really. -- Hey, man, *you* want out?" Poppa Bear hesitated, but only for a moment. "We're the Spiral, man. The original. You go, I go." "Criminales all the way, guys! Right?" A short silence, in which there was real solidarity, but also real fear. Trent put a label on it. "We're a freaky bunch of friends, man." "Freakin' friends," Jesse condensed that. "Hey, someone else wanna drive first? That'd make a cool song." All bearing weapons, they piled out to the A-Tank, Trent writing the first verse in his head. _When the aliens come, when the death-rays hum, when, uh...when the bummers bum, we'll still be freakin' friends..._ * * * There was a chessboard set up on the table in the security office. Warlock was sitting there, watching the security camera views, when Lynn walked in. "Why them?" she demanded without preamble. "Why them and not me?" "You know." He turned around to face the table, now directly in front of the black pieces. Lynn dragged a chair around and sat in front of the white pieces. "They're not as well trained as I am. -- This had better not be one of those ageist, sexist things." She moved one of the white pawns ahead two spaces -- by some unspoken agreement, a game had begun. "They're also expendable." He moved a pawn of his own. Moves and countermoves punctuated the rest of the discussion. "Not to *us*, they're not." "You're the Family's best chance at long-term survival." "Others could take the position. They may have to anyway, if I decide I don't want to play." "Others would also be resented." "And I won't be? Warlock, I'm *eighteen*!" "You're also the natural successor, in more ways than one." Lynn looked at the chessboard in silence, considering her next move. She picked up a knight and toyed with it. "This is personal now. It *has* to be my fight." "Personal isn't the same as important, Peril." Not *quite* a rolling of eyes. "Oh, spare me the Terry Pratchett bullshit. They are going after my immediate circle. -- They got my father killed. They got Tom killed. Kes is in the hospital. And how many times have they tried to kill Daria? And the others?" "You've seen what taking on too much has done to your family." "That's the point -- it's my family, so my fight." "And what do you think it would do to the Maverick, if you got lost out there?" Warlock moved a piece. "Check." "...You miserable overprotective wanker." "Your little stunt in San Francisco made that part of my job description." "Well, it's sort of part of *my* job description to be protective of the band. They need *some* guidance..." "They've got Scar." "Scar doesn't know how to handle them. I *do*." Lynn made a move. "Check." Warlock calmly studied the board. "...And if you go out on some unprofessional kamikaze run and get killed yourself, *she* becomes the natural successor." He considered in silence again, then moved a bishop. Lynn frowned at the board before making her move. "I'm better than that, and you *know* it." "You're telling me that you're willing to throw away your family, your friends and someone you love for a revenge ride?" He moved a piece. "Checkmate." She studied the board, then tipped her king over and walked out without a word more. December 24, 2000: A View to a Kill "I realise I'm dead, I'm fucked in the head, I'm not living without you My life is a game, my life is a shame, I'm not living without you My life is alone, my life is alone, I'm not living without you" -- Coal Chamber, "Not Living" It was an ordinary-looking industrial park somewhere outside New Orleans. A large unmarked van was parked off to the side of the administrative building. In the back of the van, five figures in black were poring over a plan of the complex. Four of them were obviously looking to the fifth -- a tall man with short mouse-brown hair slicked back from his face -- as their leader, shooting odd glances his way from time to time. He, on the other hand, looked only at the map. A large, heavyset man of Samoan descent sat behind the wheel of the van; headphones with an attached mike rested on his head. After a moment, he turned to face his passengers. "Time-check, people. We havin' company in fifteen. So fill them in on the plan, Kat." The tall leader-man raised an eyebrow, but said nothing verbal about this informality. Instead, he addressed his strike team. We last heard that voice rattling off, to his brother's killer (A.P.), an assessment of the strengths and weaknesses of that killer's girlfriend. "We are to allow them access to the compound -- they will get the information they require, and they will leave. By the time they have left the building, we will have the entire area covered." A young woman, her long curly hair tied in a braid with a red ribbon, looked scornfully at him. She spoke with a very strong French accent, an approximation of whose consonants I will at least inflict on you. "'ow is it you are 'ere now, if zis is so? We do zis well enough wissout...wissout _les assassins nouveaux_!" "Dom, the Ram had his reasons, right?" the Samoan suggested. Dom, as we might as well call her, replied, "_Ferme-la, cochon!_" (For those of you who lack ready access to French/English dictionaries, that means, pretty literally, "Shut it, pig!") The man called Kat continued as if none of this byplay had taken place. "Your job is to kill as many of these people as you can. My job is to take out the primary target." "And who the hell *is* the primary target?" a blond asked. "Or don't we get to find that out yet?" Kat produced a photograph, obviously taken with a telephoto lens as its subject entered The Blue Motorcycle once. "Karen Willis, a.k.a. Scar. Hand-to- hand expert for the Smythe Affiliation, trusted advisor to the acting head of their family. Strengths include her hand-to-hand expertise, an encyclopedic knowledge of firearms and the hand-eye coodination to make the best possible use of that knowledge, and a certain amount of bravery. Weakness is her temper -- she has a slight tendency towards arrogance that gives a window of vulnerability lasting anywhere between thirty and seventy-five seconds. I was put among you to make best use of that window. So I repeat -- your job is to kill as many of her companions as you can. You kill any innocents, I kill you. You kill my kill, you get my pay. And that will make me unhappy." He said all this with no inflection whatsoever, but the lack of inflection became an inflection all its own. It was like the eyes of the junkie called "The Sailor" as described in _Naked Lunch_ -- "without a trace or warmth or lust or hate or any other emotion [you have] ever experienced in [your]self or seen in another, at once cold and intense, predatory and impersonal." Everyone in the team flinched back from him...except Dom, who looked at him with a speculative glint in her eye, perhaps wondering if her fire could melt his ice. * * * There was a very small Christmas tree set up in one corner of the Biloxi hideout's sitting room. Lynn was curled up on the sofa, in nightwear, gun close to hand, reading. She heard footsteps, and even though she recognized his tread, her hand dropped to the gun. Sure enough, A.P. appeared in the doorway, in track suit bottoms and a t-shirt with Dexter captioned _This Looks Like A Fine Day For SCIENCE!_, rubbing his eyes like a sleepy 5-year-old. "You're not on watch tonight," she pointed out. "Mmmno." He shook his head, then gave coherence a try. "Thought I'd keep ya comp'ny." With a sweet little smile, Lynn closed her book. "Always glad of it." A.P. plopped down on the sofa next to her. Silence for a moment, then: "Purple Peril?" "Yeah?" "Uh...Y'know Warlock keeps saying that you kinda sorta should stay out of the fight? WellIagreewithhim." She instantly turned on him. "Excuse me?" He grabbed her by the shoulders and gave her a shake. "Look, Lynn! You don't *get* it! People...have it...*in* for you! And..." He had to turn his face away from her to say this next bit. "...well...you've come too close. I can't take that." Now he could look at her again. "So listen to the man. For me?" After a long pause: "You know how low that is?" "Any weapon I can get my hands on, Purple Peril." A sigh. "All right. All right. For now, I won't press the issue. -- I can't promise that I'll be able to keep to that if we lose anyone else to this crap." "I..." A reciprocal sigh. "...just don't want to lose you." Lynn decided not to answer that verbally -- just snuggled up next to A.P. He put an arm around her, and they sat in a companionable but uneasy silence. Then he got an idea, with a visible *ping*. "Hey, Purple Peril? Remember when I was eight and you'd just turned nine and we snuck out on Christmas Eve and exchanged presents under that big pine tree in Redgrave Park?" "Yeaaaaaaah..." "We-ell..." With a hopeful look, he pulled a little wrapped box out of his pocket. Another smile. "Okay, fine. You'll probably appreciate not having to unwrap mine with everyone watching anyway." Piku piku. "Come again?" Lynn got up and rummaged through her bag, coming up with a wrapped parcel, which she handed to A.P. Then she sat next to him and watched him as he looked at it. "This is one for tonight," she explained. "You get the other Christmas morning." He looked at her, then at the parcel, then opened it up. Inside was a navy blue T-shirt, with yellow cursive writing across the front identifying the wearer as a CODE POET. He looked at it for a long moment, Lynn watching him with some trepidation. Then he looked at her and, rather than struggle with the words, just grabbed her in a hug. She wasn't braced, so flopped on her back. From the doorway, where they'd stopped en route to their own turns on watch, Warlock and Daria had seen the whole thing, or enough of it. "Anyone tries to get to them," Warlock asided, "they'd have to get through me first." December 25, 2000: Photograph "It's Christmas at Ground Zero There's music in the air The sleigh bells are ringin' and the carolers are singin' While the air raid sirens blare" -- "Weird" Al Yankovic, "Christmas at Ground Zero" There was a knock on the door of Slack's office, and it opened without permission a split-second later. Warlock barged in, looking harrassed. "Okay, Slack, if we're going to do this, we have to do it now. Get--" Then his brain registered what his eyes were seeing, and he froze in the doorway. A pale, worried-looking Slack was sitting at his desk, accompanied by a heavyset goateed blond guy in a Buffalo Sabres cap...and Jodie and her boyfriend, Michael Jordan MacKenzie, who both looked really, really freaked. "Salutations!" said the Sabres fan. Then, to the look on Warlock's face: "Uh...Merry Christmas?" "What...are *they* doing here?" He turned from Slack to Sabres. "Fett?" Fett explained: "Incubus showed up on our doorstep couple days ago. Wisconsin got hit and they needed a hole." "they shot mr. hopper," Jodie added. "a lot." Mack was blunter. "I thought we were supposed to be dragged out of Lawndale to get *out* of this kind of trouble!" "So where *are* the Sloanes?" Warlock demanded. "And Incubus?" "I sent them out to Pagebert and Scar," Slack replied. "Figured someone ought to tell them about Remora and Rust." That raised immediate questions in Jodie's mind. "...Wait. What *about* them? Did something happen to Tom and Angier?" This was met with silence. Jodie visibly tensed. "Answer me. Did something happen to them? -- But they weren't...if someone wants them, does this mean they could go after Dad? -- WHAT IS GOING *ON*?" "Talk to the Peril," Warlock replied. "I haven't got time for this." "Don't talk to her like that!" Mack bristled. "Shut up. That kind of thing is something *else* I haven't got time for." That set Fett off. "Chill the hell *out*, Herr Warlock! They're just *kids*!" The two men glared at each other for a moment. Slack held up his hands, trying to get everyone's attention. When he deemed that Jodie and Mack, at least, had noticed, he addressed himself to them. "Try room 316. Scarlet and the Peril should be in there." They noded at Slack, shot Warlock glares of their own, and left. * * * In the room, Jane was sketching, while Lynn paced like a caged animal. Jane looked up at her from time to time, looking more and more stressed every time. Finally, she spoke. "Stoppit, you. I can't *draw* when you're like this." "I can't help it. They disarmed me, they've got me on surveillance, and *why*?" "'Cause they're afraid you're gonna go psycho, maybe?" "And can you *blame* me?" "Look, it's worse for me than it is for you, Lynn, and you *know* it." That froze Lynn in her tracks, and even left her sitting on the floor, looking at her boots. Then came a knock on the door. She reached out, grabbed a book and threw it at the door as hard as she could. "Lynn?" came a voice from the other side. "Jane? Uh...merry Christmas?" They looked at the door, then at each other -- Lynn saw some happy surprise in Jane's face, while Jane glimpsed deep anxiety in Lynn's. That's probably why Jane was the one to speak. "Jodie! Come in!" The door openrf and Jodie and Mack stepped in. "God, it's good to see familiar faces!" Then she fell silent, as she really *saw* those faces. "What happened? Where'd they send you?" "Wisconsin. Green Bay." "Remind me *not* to let the Packers pick me in the draft, if I ever get that far..." muttered Mack. "We got there okay, but when we did, it was a mess. We got to this sports bar and the next thing we know people are shooting at us. -- They got Mr. Hopper." "I'm just glad they didn't get *you*," Lynn said simply. "So what's been going on here? No one was really willing to talk to us downstairs and that Chinese guy seems *really* stressed out." "Not surprised," replied Jane. "Assassination attempts on the heirs to his crime empire are going to do that." "Well," added Lynn, "that and his girlfriend and my cousin going missing. And the hefty attack on the Blue Motorcycle. And--" Mack cut in here. "They went after *Lynn*?" "They got us both to Biers via an...inside informant...and torched the place over our heads." Now Jodie had a question. "It didn't have anything to do with Tom, did it? That guy Warlock told us to ask you--" "It's a long story," Jane almost sighed, "but yeah, the inside informant has something to do with Tom." "Tom wasn't--" "No," Lynn said simply. She and Jane couldn't meet each other's gazes. Jodie and Mack exchanged looks of their own. "Then what?" he asked. "There was a confrontation -- Tom and...him. -- Tom's dead. Along with a whole bunch of other good people." Surprisingly, Mack seemed to understand better than Jodie did. "You're not telling me--" "Don't say it. He's dead too, so does it bear considering, what this business will make people do?" Blessed silence came down. Then a thought hit Jodie. "You said 'heirs,' plural. What about Daria?" Lynn stood up, shot Jane a look, and walked out. Jodie and Mack looked at each other, panicked. Mack decided it was his turn to speak again, or maybe he was just the first one in a condition to. "Answer the question, Jane. What happened to Daria?" Jane realized how Lynn's exit must have looked. "Don't panic; she's okay. Lynn's still a little shaky from the whole thing. She had to do CPR to bring Daria back. -- We're gonna beat the guilt out of her with a stick eventually." Jodie was puzzled. "Shouldn't she feel *better*? She saved Daria's *life*!" "But she got Daria's life in danger in the first place. Or that's how she likes looking at it." Silence again. Jodie and Mack looked at each other, then watched Jane cautiously. Again, it was Mack who spoke. "Tell us everything." "Guys, I really don't think you want to be involved in this--" "We *are* involved, Jane," Jodie pointed out. "If I wasn't involved the day before Ms. Li tried to kill you guys, I got involved the day I accidentally told Daria about it. And the less we know, the less we can do to protect ourselves. So tell us." Jane looked at them. She saw the determined looks in which their faces were set. Then she sighed. "I'll tell you what I know. But it's not that much and you're not going to like it. Still, it'll pass the time while we wait for-- " She stopped herself. A second too late, it turned out. Jodie and Mack glared at her. "Wait for *who*?" Jane conceded defeat. "My brother. My brother and most of his band went out there and God only *knows* what's happening to them now..." Jodie and Mack looked at each other again, this time worried. * * * And, indeed, the state of affairs in the industrial park looked extremely rocky for the Lawndale team. Nick was in the back of the bigwhitevan, with Max slumped on the floor at his feet, clutching his shoulder and moaning. Trent stood at the back doors, a gun in his hand, trying to lay down cover fire for Jesse as the latter carried a limp, black-clad figure toward them. Two more shots rang out, and Jesse slumped; somehow, though, he managed to toss his burden into the back of the vehicle before himself French-kissing the ground. Nick grabbed one of Jesse's arms, Trent the other, and between them, they managed to haul him into the van. Nick shut the door, and Trent ran toward the driver's side and climbed in. A moment later, the BWV started up. Still behind the wheel of the other van, the Samoan spoke into a walkie- talkie. "They mobile! Are they *suppose* to be mobile?" "All units to the van," Kat's flat voice crackled. "We have a report to discuss." * * * The room A.P. and Trent were sharing was a complete pigsty, where the things of their lives -- clothes, an acoustic guitar, A.P.'s laptop and chemistry set -- were spread out all anyhow. Lynn and Daria were sprawled across one unmade bed in what they and their friends called the "something's eating at my soul" position. A.P. was working with the chemistry set at the vanity table. Jane walked in and headed towards an easel set up in the corner, which held an unfinished study in purple and green after Pollock. Jodie poked her head through the door, and her eyes went wide. "Guys...sorry for asking, but did a bomb go off in here?" "I'm on it, GPA Girl." Jodie was a little freaked by that. "I don't want to know." She stepped tentatively into the room. "Still no word?" Daria was her usual sunny self. "The saying 'no news is good news' doesn't really apply when those who should deliver the news could be on a slab in a Louisiana morgue, does it?" "Careful, girl," Lynn chid. "You're supposed to be a cynic, not a pessimist." "Yeah," Jane pointed out; "that's *her* job." "Hey, come on! She's not a pessimist *all* the time." "You're blackening my good name, A.P.," Lynn warned him gently. "That's against the Boyfriend Code." "She's right, you know," Jodie confirmed. "Boyfriend Code? Where's that stuff written down, anyway? Jeez, even *my* stuff has manuals..." Lynn's phone bleeped out "Always Look on the Bright Side of Life" (which regular readers may recall has been established as her ringtone). She dug it out of her pocket, flipped it open and spoke. "Cullen. -- WHAT? -- Okay, okay, Nick, calm down and start at the beginning." All eyes in the room immediately focused on Lynn, who got steadily paler with (presumably) each word from Poppa Bear. "Right. -- Oh. Okay. Good. -- No, head north. You'll be met. -- No, you'll be safe there. -- Medical I have no clue." At the word "medical," all those eyes went wide. "Let me think -- what route are you taking? -- Okay, it'll take you a little more time, but try passing through Pittsburgh -- NCM has some background in anatomy. -- Can you afford to be fussy? -- How the hell should I know? I don't *deal* in corpses! -- No, *I'm* sorry. Hopefully we'll see you there. -- Yeah, but give us a half-hour. Luck." With that, she hung up, looked at the phone for a moment, then made a gesture as who would throw it across the room. Then, she just tossed it down on the bed and buried her head in her hands. There ensued a moment of silence as Daria, Jane, A.P. and Jodie tried inwardly to decide how to broach this. It was Daria who came to a conclusion first. "Lynn--" "I don't want to have to say this twice." She got up and walked out of the room. The others looked after her, then followed at a run. She must have noticed them, because before long, Daria, Jane, Jodie and A.P. were able to follow along in Lynn's wake without having to run. They were, however, walking at a killing pace. Jane, despite Lynn's expressed wish not to be obliged to repeat herself, had only one question, and even that wasn't so much a question as a plea. "Not Trent." "No. Not Trent." "Thank God." "Amen," Daria broke her usual agnosticism. "Who, then?" A.P. blurted. "Casualty lists should only have to be delivered once." "You told us about Trent..." Jane pointed out. "You asked." Daria's patience began to wear out. "I'm not in the mood for twenty questions, Lynn." "Don't *bother*, Erudite Emerald. Remember, stubborn as the day is long." Jane knew one thing. "Can't be Nick -- he was the one who called." "Little Drummer Boy?" "Scar? What about Jesse?" "Stop *asking*! I'll tell you when I give the damn report, now shut up!" With that, Lynn accelerated again, breaking into a jog and outdistancing the others. They exchanged looks, but for safety reasons, didn't themselves speed up. * * * When they got to Slack's office, Lynn was stood at near-military attention in front of Slack's desk. Slack himself was seated behind the desk, Warlock in one of the chairs. As the group piled into the office, Fett turned up behind them, accompanied by a tall, skinny off-blond boy with grubby jeans and a beat-up T- shirt. "Sitrep, Peril," said Warlock. "I got a phone call from Poppa Bear -- regarding the mission outside of New Orleans." "Why not from Scar?" Lynn's face was horribly expressionless as she answered him. "Because Karen Willis is one of the casualties. Single bullet to the head. Probably sniped from a high place. Reminiscent of what happened to Charles Ruttheimer III. There was an ambush set up in the industrial estate parking lot. They turned the place into a Roach Motel. Snoops check in, but they don't check out." "But they got the information?" And now a flicker of expression appeared on Lynn's face -- undiluted rage as only the Purple Peril can show it. "Can I finish the casualty list *first*?" "Go ahead." A moment of silence ensued, as Lynn banished expression from her face again. "Little Drummer Boy took a bullet in the shoulder. Probably needs medical attention -- I sent them via Pittsburgh in hopes that NCM knows enough about anatomy to at least get the bullet out. -- And Jesse Moreno survived just past the border out of Louisiana. Double-tapped to the chest." Another moment of silence. "Oh God..." Jane breathed. "They're on their way to Pittsburgh, then Detroit." "An evac *that* far north?" Warlock boggled. "That's nearly thirteen hundred miles, Peril!" Daria, however, had worked it out. "You want them coming *here*? If they're being followed, they'd lead the Merritts straight to us. This way, they've got thirteen thousand miles of road to lose pursuit in." "My brother's good at back roads." Jane's voice was right there in the room with them; it was her *thoughts* that seemed to come from a long way away. Lynn waited with strained patience as Warlock absorbed the data -- he obviously wasn't sure he liked it, but there clearly wasn't a lot he could say against it either. When she judged he'd reached that conclusion as well, she resumed speaking as if she'd never been interrupted. "They'll be briefing Chopper when they get there -- Scar made sure that they *all* had the information before they left the building. But they'll be calling back in--" She checked her watch. "--ten minutes or so. You can get what you need from them when they do. " "Right." Warlock thought a moment. "Someone needs to tell Pagebert." He looked to his companions, none of whom looked exactly thrilled about the idea. Then he turned to Lynn, who met him with a glare that could freeze helium. "Someone. Tell. Him." "We have our *own* dead to mourn. *You* tell him." With that, Daria put an arm around Jane's shoulders; the rest of the Lawndale High contingent huddled around her, and they all left the room. * * * Later, Daria, Jane, Lynn, A.P., Jodie and Mack were all sitting in the bar. They had two large bottles of rum, purloined from behind the bar, one of which was mostly empty. There was also Coke -- three two-liter bottles, one empty and another about three-quarters full. None of them was exactly sober, but Jane and Lynn were farther gone than the others. "It was really wrong to think that we'd get away unscathed. But wasn't Tom enough of a blood sacrifice?" Mack was getting concerned. He'd never seen Daria like this before, and he didn't draw much comfort from it. "I guess when the business involves guns, you can't take anything for granted." "He useta c'mover to the house when we were jus' kids. W'n I was li'l, he'd eat m'artwork. -- 'N I rilly *liked* that toothpick sculpture, too..." "This must be *killing* Trent," Daria added. After a moment, she went on. "Thank God he got out, but at what price? I mean, what is he gonna do about the band? -- What must they be thinking about this?" "Live fast? Die young? Leave a pretty corpse?" Jodie was appalled. "A.P., that's tactless!" "And inaccurate. I wouldn't call a corpse full of holes aesthetically pleasing." "DARIA!" "Oh, when did *you* become my mother?" "I'm not trying to! I'm just...Daria, you're *scaring* me! "Y'*should* be scared, GPA Girl. That's two down now." "'M gonna disem*bowel* those murdering pieces of--" "Jane!" "Lateral incision." Lynn might be drunk, but she was focused. "Just below the navel. Then kick 'em over backwards. Everything'll just fall out at that point." "Good call, Lynn. Thanks for th'advice." Daria noticed something. "What, no shocked and outraged outcry at *her*?" "Uh..." Jodie explained. Lynn got the picture. "My reputation precedes me. Whoop." Mack opted to shift the topic gently. "So *now* what?" "They got the info. Some've us go in and..." Instead of finishing the sentence in any medium so crude as language, she slammed a fist down on the table. HARD. The nearly-empty rum bottle fell over, hit the floor and shattered like the proverbial glass goblin, making everyone jump. "They won't let you," Daria pointed out. "Won't *let*? Don't tell me about 'won't *let*.' A *year* now I've been hangin' with 'em. I said no, they woul'n listen. They. Start. Listenin'. *NOW*." "Will you get *over* yourself?" The vehemence in her voice took *everyone* aback, especially Jodie. "Daria--" "No, you shut up. I don't know why you're in this now, but this isn't for you." She turned back to Lynn. "Look, I'm upset too. And so's A.P., right?" "Damn straight." "And so's Jane. And aside from her drunken, ill-conceived disembowelment comment, *she* hasn't mentioned going out on a revenge run, and she has more reason than you do to--" "*Course* I din't mention. Goes without sayin', right?" "Jane, stand down and shut up; you're drunk." "In vino veritas, Daria..." Lynn pointed something out. "We refer to this concoction as 'lengua libre,' sis." Daria's voice was cold as a grave. "Don't call me that." Silence greeted this. Lynn went a bleached-bone shade of white. "Whoa, Erudite Em--" "And *you* can shut up too. I'm not losing anyone else close to me to this. You insist on taking stupid chances, fine. Consider yourself disowned." "Fine." Lynn got up and stalked out without a sound. Everyone's eyes focused on Daria, except for Jane's, and her eyes weren't focusing very well at the moment anyway, so with luck, her ears weren't either. "Stop *looking* at me like that." "Hell no!" blurted the Maverick. "She's gonna take more chances than *ever* if we're not there for buffer zone! For someone who they call a brain at school, you're real damn stupid, y'know?" "A.P., I can't--" What she couldn't would remain a topic for conjecture, as just then, he grabbed her by the lapels of her jacket and pulled her over until her face was within mere inches of his. "You're outta line, and you're bein' selfish, and it's not *right* for now. You can be a bitch about it *later*. For now, you wait until morning, and then you go to her and you tell her you didn't mean it. *Grovel*, if you have to. But she's not gonna think that no one gives a damn for her 'cause if she does, she's gonna die. You *want* that on your head?" A lot of dead silence followed. "You can let go of me now." "Not until you tell me you're gonna take that selfish...that...that *thing* you said *back*." "I'll...think about--" "Don't *make* me hurt you, Daria." More silence. Jodie tried pleading. "Daria, please. He's right. She needs you." "Let. Me. Go." A.P. thought a minute, but didn't let Daria go. "Mack, Jodie, grab Jane. That's enough'a this crap." Each of the two got under one of Jane's arms, and between them, they managed to haul her upright. A.P., still dragging Daria by the jacket, led the way out. * * * Before long, they were approaching the door to room 320, A.P. still holding Daria by the jacket. Daria rummaged in a pocket for her key. "I may have had a couple of drinks, A.P., but I was perfectly able to find my own room." "Sure, I know. But *you're* not going in there." With that, he started hammering on the door. A moment later, Quinn, in her pale yellow baby-doll pajamas with all the pink hearts, opened it, looking pissed off. "Daria, you *have* a key! *Some* of us *care* about getting beauty sleep..." A.P. used the hand he'd knocked on the door with to reach into the pocket of Jane's shirt, pulling something out. Then he nodded to Mack and Jodie. "Okay, dump her." They, after sharing a look, started hauling Jane into the room. "Excuse me..." Daria started to say. Quinn was more direct. "What are you *doing*? Oh my *God*, how much has she had to--?" "Enough so that you'd get drunk just from her breathing on you," Jodie said simply. "Oh, no, I'm *not* sharing with her! What if she throws up on my clothes?" "It'll be alternative," Daria quipped. "Alternative's for freaks like *you*! And where are *you* gonna sleep?" "Good question. But the way I'm being dragged suggests a Neanderthal mating ritual, so..." On that note, A.P. dragged her off. Quinn looked after them in shock. Jodie and Mack came out of the room, looking a little freaked. "What is going *on*?" she demanded, causing them to share another look. * * * They'd headed back down the corridor and were now in front of room 316. Daria could see where this was heading, and she wasn't exactly tickled by the prospect. "If you think the 'lock them in the same room' routine is going to work, you've been watching way too many teenybopper sitcoms." "I'm not going to play word games with you, 'cause I'm not gonna lose this one." "How can you? You're not even blood-related to her, and you can still-- " "I *love* her. -- Like it or not, so do you." Without ceremony, he unlocked the door, threw her in and shut it behind her -- not slamming it but shutting it gently, in case Lynn was asleep. Then he leaned back on it with a sigh. * * * Daria stood with her back to the door, looking at the shambles Jane and Lynn's room had become. Lynn was curled up on the bed, dead to the world. Daria watched her double for a long moment, then walked over to where she was lying. Lynn still didn't stir, but Daria noticed the balled-up tissue sticking out of Lynn's fist, which combined with the redness around her eyes to indicate that she'd had to cry herself to sleep. "Hey...Lynn?" Daria whispered, not really wanting to wake the other. As hoped, no response. Then Daria noticed something else -- a small photo album on the bed in front of Lynn's head. Daria picked it up, moved to Jane's unmade bed, and started flipping through it. The first photo she saw gave her an oddly tense feeling by being so personal -- a very young Lynn and a slightly younger Jerome, both wearing Boston Bruins jerseys (Lynn's was clearly sized for someone much larger), sitting in hockey stadium seating, surrounded by obvious Dallas Stars supporters who were looking at them *very* strangely. Jerome's arm was around his daughter's shoulders and they looked like any "normal" father and child. _It hit her hard,_ A.P. had said; _they were close until then..._ Daria sighed, then flipped the page: Lynn and A.P. in their silly mouse ears, somewhere in Frontierland, brandishing their water guns. Then Lynn as Daria and Jane had first seen her, sitting in a pub with Jan, in an oversized Montreal Canadiens jersey, and a small group of other people Daria didn't know - - a buxom curly-haired brunette with glasses and a sexy smirk; a tall, sturdy off-blond; a small, skinny girl with lank pale hairl and a swarthy girl with mid-length black hair in spiral curls and a big smile. Then a shot of Daria, Jane, Lynn and A.P. in their Matrix dusters, striking badass poses in front of the A-Tank. Daria gave a very sad little smile, flipped the page again...and was startled by a folded piece of paper falling out. She picked it up, unfolded it and looked at it, and was even *more* startled. "The blood test results?" she breathed. She flipped it over and found these simple words, in Lynn's looping handwriting: _Finally -- family I can rely on._ Daria was actually trembling a little as she folded it up and put it back behind a picture of herself and Jane at the Halloween party last year. She kept going through the photo album -- Jane having to be bodily dragged out of the Tate Gallery by Daria and Lynn; the black-and-white promo shot of Mystik Spiral; Lynn and A.P. as the star-cross'd lovers, kissing; the gang in their Rocky Horror outfits...and then a screen capture, printed on photo paper, of Daria and Lynn sitting around a campfire. If you didn't know the backstory, you'd think they were typical sisters on a camping trip. _Not the first time she's saved my life. Not the last, either._ Daria lingered a moment over that last, then looked at Lynn, considering...then shut the photo album quietly and put it back where it'd been. She brushed a strand of hair out of Lynn's face in an almost tender gesture. "My sister, the sentimentalist," she breathed. After taking a moment to let herself hear what she'd said, she added: "But I won't let it get around." December 26, 2000: Revenge "And the wreck of you is the death of you all And the wreck of you is the break and the fall" -- Soundgarden, "Limo Wreck" The next morning, in what was *supposed* to be her and Daria's room, Quinn was standing in front of the closed bathroom door, looking first-thing-in-the- morning dishevelled and completely pissed off, when there was a knock at the door. Quinn went over and opened it. It was Jodie. "How's Jane?" "Ewwwwww..." An eyebrow. "That good, huh?" Sounds came from the bathroom. If you were inclined to treat them as words being pronounced, "hwalp" might be a good transcription, or "hhuch" (that Alan Moore standby). Or "huey" or "wanabuyabuik" (thank you, Billy Connolly). Quinn rolled her eyes. "It's been like *that* since, like, five in the *morning*. Why couldn't she have stayed in her *own* room?" "'Cause Daria and Lynn needed to talk." "God, what is *wrong* with them? I mean, like, is it *really* a good idea to be fighting or whatever when there's *this* stuff going on?" "No it's not. But sometimes the stress gets to you, I guess. They'll get over it once they've calmed down." "Oh, *please*. Daria holds a grudge for*ever*. She doesn't really get over *anything*! They won't be talking for, like, *weeks*." Daria and Lynn poked their heads around the open door. "How's Jane?" they asked in stereo. "You were saying?" Quinn made a disgusted noise and walked right out of the room, Daria and Lynn watching her with confused eyes. Then they looked to Jodie, who just shrugged. * * * In the sitting room of his personal suite, Slack was putting his foot up. Warlock came in, throwing a look over his shoulder. Slack was instantly as alert as he gets. "What's up?" "I'm sick of this. We're taking the fight to those bastards." "I'm with you. Any ideas?" "Hey, Incubus, remember that website you were showing us the other night?" "Yeah, hang on, I'll call it up," came the reply. "You're thinking high explosives," Slack speculated. "I'm thinking high explosives," Warlock confirmed. "I'm thinking FAE as a matter of fact." "And I'm thinking EMP." They both turned. Yes, that *was* gentle Pagebert who made that suggestion. "Are you okay?" Warlock asked as gently as he could. "I will be." "Right." Warlock dialed his cellphone. "NCM? Warlock. Right, I'm going to put Incubus on in a sec. -- We've got a bomb for you to build." He handed the phone to Incubus, then turned to Pagebert. "Now, as for that EMP..." Pagerbert's voice was cold enough to air-condition a good-sized mainframe. "Let's get started." They left Slack and Incubus to it. * * * The entire Lawndale group was crammed into Jane and Lynn's room, just hanging out. When Warlock came in, Lynn sat up to something that would have been attention coming from anyone else. The others watch her, bemused, but followed her example. "We're moving out tonight," he said. "Moving *where*?" Daria boggled. "I thought we were here for our safety." "From everything but really bad architecture," Jane had to say. "This whole thing is moving north. We have a safe house about 40 miles out from River Rouge--" "Because you're 'sick of this,'" Lynn cut in. "And 'we're taking the fight to those bastards.'" "Remind me to talk to Slack about sweeping for bugs." "I might as well, since it's not going to do me any good to have them anymore." "You're putting us *closer* to the fight?" Jodie asked with remarkable restraint. "Yes and no. You, you--" Warlock pointed to Mack. "--and Little Drummer Boy are going to stay in Chopper's place in Royal Oak." "But what about *them*?" Mack wondered. "We're out *there,*" Daria explained, "because *some* of us will be helping with the pre-game preparation." "Knock-out gas?" A.P. asked, whether suggesting or offering wasn't clear. "EMP? FAE -- oh, and you're goin' about that kinda dumb anyway -- you don't go to the right sites..." "*And* it's easy enough to defend," Warlock pointed out. "Just in case." "And you want Nick and Trent in on this?" Lynn asked. "I spoke to them. They won't be left out." He ignored Lynn's accusatory look for a silent moment, then: "Get packed. We move out in two hours." Exit; they watched him go. Then Lynn got up, pulled out her rucksack, and started jamming things into it more or less at random, and they watched her. "Well?" she asked, not looking up, her voice verging on bitterness. "You heard the man. Oh, and A.P., could you pack the stuff Trent left? I'll come help when I'm done." Jane got up, grabbed her bag and started reaching for her clothes. Daria, Quinn, A.P., Mack and Jodie left to gather their own belongings. "What about Nick and Max's stuff?" Jane asked. "And..." * * * Rather than say whether she could say it, or immediately enlighten those of you wondering what we were casting doubt on her ability to say, we'll cut to A.P. and Trent's room. The Maverick stuffed one last T-shirt into his bag, then snapped it shut and looked at Sir Naps-a-Lot's half of the room. "Need some help?" A.P. looked at Art-Smart Scarlet a bit oddly as she entered the room and picked up one of Trent's green T-shirts. She started trying to fold it, then gave up and threw it on the bed, picking up a pair of jeans next and giving it the same treatment. "Where's Purple Peril?" Jane didn't look up. "She went to get the other stuff. Nick's. Max's. -- Jesse's." A moment of silence as she kept collecting Trent's clothes off the floor. "Oh. -- Yeah." A moment later, he started helping her pick stuff up. December 27, 2000: Just Passing Through "Why all this waste paper getting The People from one place to another? Perhaps to spare The Reader stress of sudden space shifts and keep him Gentle?" -- William S. Burroughs, _Naked Lunch_, "Atrophied Preface: Wouldn't You?" Things did happen on the drive to Michigan, don't get me wrong. But they only advanced the plot inasmuch as they got our heroes from Mississippi to Michigan (a drive you can make in a day and a half if you know how), and they didn't reveal anything about the characters that you don't already know by now if you're paying attention (like I'm one to chide people for a lack on *that* front). So we may as well gloss over the journey. Just so did William Goldman's father gloss over the immortal S. Morgenstern's depiction of the three years Buttercup spent learning to be a princess between her acceptance of Humperdinck's proposal and her formal presentation as Princess of Hammersmith (and subsequent abduction by the Sicilian Crowd). So too did Douglas Adams, of honoured memory, gloss over all the time Arthur Dent spent brushing his teeth and trying to find fresh socks. For that matter, so does El Hombre Invisible, just after posing the colorless question quoted above, advise us that if one of his characters is seen walking around New York in one sentence, and in the next is suddenly in Timbuktu trying to pick up a street boy, that character may be assumed to have "transported himself there by the usual methods of communication" without the good Inspector Lee having to fill in the blanks for us. And so I say, with only a slight change from Poppa Goldman: "What with one thing and another, two days passed." December 28, 2000: The Last Laugh "'The Lord's our shepherd,' says the psalm, But just in case, we better get a Bomb.... We'll try to stay serene and calm When Alabama gets the Bomb." -- Tom Lehrer, "Who's Next?" It was a large ranch-style house on a substantial plot of land. Parked in front of it were the bigwhitevan, a four-door gray Honda, the A-Tank, the Merc, and a blue-green Chevy Cavalier -- all told, it looked like the kind of used-car lot you'd build on a B-movie budget. In the front hall of the house, the group had assembled with their luggage. It was quite crowded in there. It was also, in terms of decor, somewhat ramshackle. The kids looked around uncertainly. "I can usually find something artistic about *anything,*" Jane allowed as. "And..." Daria didn't even bother to make that a question. "Notice I said 'usually.'" "I think safety's more at issue here than decor," Warlock pointed out. "And if everything goes well, you won't be staying here long." "So now what?" A.P. wondered. "There's a dining area that should do for a workshop and lab. Go set up there." A.P. gathered up his bag and a rather large box and began staggering out. "Pagebert?" Lynn asked politely. "Incubus?" Incubus took the crate off A.P., eliciting a grateful look. Pagebert collected his own gear, and they all left the room. Warlock looked at Lynn, who was now digging through a fairly large crate. "What are you up to?" "Surveillance. A few well-placed hidden cameras in area streetlights, that kind of thing. We have no idea how much Remora leaked. This is one of the places Chopper set up, right? Long-established?" "...Point. But take Fett with you. You'll need some cover. -- And take the Blow Job Bus." "Ex*cuse* me?" "I'll let *him* explain." Lynn raised an eyebrow at Warlock, then stepped over to the door. "FETT! I'D LIKE TO EXPLAIN A LITTLE CONCEPT CALLED *POLITICAL CORRECTNESS*!" "Dammit," came the muted reply from without, "if it's about the BJB, that was my *brother*, not me!" The front door slammed, and Warlock shook his head. * * * This particular room in the ranch house was practically a blank slate. There were bits of luggage and weapons scattered around the place, the only signs it was currently in use. There were also a few mismatched chairs, currently gathered around a table battered worse than the one in Lawndale High's staff lounge, but that was it on the furniture front. The walls were dingy, probably from long neglect. Daria, Jane, Lynn, A.P. and Quinn were seated around the table, holding cards. The rest of the deck was resting on the table next to a substantial pile of change. The others' hands were down to three cards or less; Quinn had eight. "Got any fives?" she asked. A.P. grinned. "Gooooooooo fish!" Quinn fished, groaned in disgust at her catch, and dropped a quarter onto the pile. "UGH! What the hell am I doing playing Go Fish...and, like, for *money* and stuff?" "Listen, princess," Jane pointed out, "we're exactly forty miles from *nowhere*. You got any *better* ideas?" "Or would you rather I loan you a book? If you liked the Iliad, you'd *love* the Odyssey." "Daria, *ew*! You're not going to trick me like that again! -- Anyway, *I* heard the Odyssey was silly. That witch who turns guys into pigs...Circa or whatever..." "I think you mean Circe." "What*ever*. Anyway, what I heard about her reminds me too much of Sandi." "You know what we never did?" Jane asked suddenly, apropos of not much. "Spent Christmas in our family's homes like normal people?" Daria offered. "Hey," blurted Quinn, "*I* did that last year!" "Well, I *meant* exchanging Christmas gifts." At that, Lynn and A.P. exchanged a look. Daria saw it and smirked a little. Jane noticed the nonverbal exchange and met it with a smirk of her own. "I take it I stand corrected?" Lynn seemed to have a tough time answering. "We never...really ... finished the exchange, I have to admit." "Oooh-la-laaaa...Sounds like more than presents got unwrapped." "I begin to see why you appealed to me. Familiarity." "Run that one past me one more time?" "Either that or you've been dating Goat-boy too long. You sound more like Mara every day." "I'm going to take offense to that." "Hey, I wanna hear more about the presents!" That got Quinn some awkward looks from the rest of the group. "I *like* getting presents, okay?" And so, some time later, the presents lay before them in small stacks. They'd only been crudely wrapped, and the paper they'd had to the purpose was obvious scrap -- old newspaper, used printer paper, brown paper bags... "Okay," Daria asked, "how do we start?" "Me?" Lynn tossed Quinn a box wrapped in white paper. "Here; now shut up." "...*You* got me something?" "What part of 'shut up' don't you understand?" "In that case...Lynn, this is yours." With that, Daria handed over a package. Without a word that could have tripped him up, A.P. handed one to Daria. Jane handed one to A.P., then looked to Quinn, who shrugged. Still wordlessly, they opened the presents. Daria held up what appeared to be a Geography textbook. "It's...it's..." She trailed off for a moment. "...going to be useful?" "Open it," he urged her. She did so, then flipped through, then announced, "The pages are blank." "Was Purple Peril's idea. Had it made special after you saw Mommy McBeal going through your room. A diary she'd never bother touching." "That was...really thoughtful. Thank you." "Nice etchwork on the glass." A.P. addressed that to Jane, as he held up an Erlenmeyer flask with the words "Li'l Bastard" etched into it. "You could market these at Bob's Bargain Basement." "Like I have the time to make as many as I'd need," she shrugged. Lynn held up a book with a grinning Dustpuppy on the cover. "_Evil Genius for Dummies_. I'm sure I'm going to be disappointed." "Lynn, these earrings are *great*!" Quinn blurted. "God, if you have such good taste, how can you dress like *that*?" "I kept the receipt for them." Quinn's hands closed protectively over the box, and her lips clenched up. Lynn smirked and handed a package to Daria. Daria to A.P. this time, A.P. to Jane, Jane to Lynn. Quinn just shrugged again, but actually watched with some interest as the packages were opened. "A purple satin negligee, edged in black lace. -- This strikes me as being more for A.P. than for me." "The gift that keeps on giving!" the said Maverick replied. "And speaking of; hey, this was on my wish list!" "_Whoomp, There It Is -- Advanced Bathtub Explosives_?" "No," Daria confessed; "they were out of stock." "_Pheromones to Psychopharmacology -- Fun With Biochemistry_!" "Oh lord," Lynn half-groaned. Jane held up a little red tube that looked vaguely like a permanent marker. "What *are* these?" "Portable graffiti pens!" A.P. explained. "Easy to hide, and indelible! Even work on anti-graffiti paint! Been working on those for *months*." "_Parental Unit Programming_?" Daria marvelled. "Section on neutralizing undue smothering resulting from parental concern has been highlighted," Lynn didn't quite beam. "You always get me something useful, don't you?" "I don't deal in frivolities if I can avoid it." "Does that mean no sexy satin thing?" Lynn threw a package at A.P. to shut him up, but it was with a little sly smirk. He, in turn, shyly handed a parcel over to Lynn. Daria and Jane, without a word, exchanged gifts. Quinn was now looking *very* put out. Daria noticed and picked up a small flat parcel. "Oh, here." Quinn took it from her delicately and joined in the general unwrapping. Lynn held the little box A.P. had produced on Christmas eve and unwrapped it to reveal a little velvet box. She didn't even open it -- just looked at him. "How did you know?" "Saw you outside the store?" Lynn looked around herself. "I...uh...excuse me." Without waiting to be excused, she got up and walked out, leaving the others to stare after her. "What's wrong with *her*?" Quinn demanded. "Every Christmas, this happens," Jane remembered. "She *really* doesn't deal well with nice presents, does she?" "So how nice *is* nice?" wondered Daria. "Were diamonds involved?" A.P.'s eyes went wide. "Come *on*, Erudite Emerald; I'm thinking high school and college and crap *first*, okay?" He picked up the box. "I got her these." Then he opened it to show them two pairs of earrings -- one set of very small amethyst studs and one pair of amethyst teardrop pendant earrings set in white gold. They all stared. "God, *why* won't you people show this taste *all* the time?!?" Jane opted to ignore that. "How'd you *pay* for these?" A shrug. "Royalties. The Methods sell pretty good, y'know." Lynn returned then, composed -- indeed, with an almost military posture -- carrying a bat'leth (one of those funky Klingon swords with the curve, for you only-mildly Trek-geeks). Now they could stare at *her*. She kept her eyes lowered. "I ran into Warlock. Scar'd already got it for me." Daria was impressed again. "They got you *Christmas presents*?" "Remember my birthday? -- I'm Family, remember?" Quinn got to her present and...well, "miffed" would be a charitable way to describe her reaction. "A coupon for 'Books by the *Ton*'?" That broke the tension in the room -- enough to let them look at Daria with congratulatory smirks. * * * A.P.'s rather impressive chemistry set was set up at one end of the vast dining room table. The rest of the table was littered with firearms, Warlock's bow and a few sleekly futuristic items that would have looked very familiar to anyone who knew Starfleet weapons of the 24th century. As Warlock went over the more modern firearms with an assessing eye, A.P. grabbed one of the sleeker objects and gawked openly. "It's a phaser! It's a phaser!" Then he picked it up and examined it minutely. "It's a *phaser*!" He looked up. "Who built a phaser?" "Read the tag, Maverick." Following Warlock's dictum, A.P. read, aloud but not ahead. "'Type I experimental laser pistol [prototype]. Capacity: 2 shots. Allow five minutes cooldown between shots. After second shot, dispose of with haste and take cover; overload and explosion imminent.'" Plku piku. "Where's my Leatherman?" Without looking up, he grabbed a random tool from the makeshift workbench -- a small flathead screwdriver, as luck would have it-- popped the cover and started digging. "Maverick, what are you doing?" "Seeing how this thing--" *ZAP* -- the thing discharged a bolt of laser fire and burned a peephole in the wall. Judging by the angle, it'd probably also singed Warlock's hair a little. A.P., still digging around in the guts of the "it's-a-phaser," didn't even notice, or at least didn't show it. "Nice hole in the wall." A.P. still didn't look up. "Give me two seconds." He fiddled with the circuits and wiring for a moment. "Okaaaaay...this should give two minutes cooldown and a total of three shots, *plus* a thirty second margin before the thing goes *boom*." He tossed it to Warlock, who blinked at the contraption as he turned it over in his hands, then stared at the boy. "You *sure*, Maverick?" "Oh yeah. Well, could be more like 45 seconds, but I'd have it out of my hands in thirty." He picked up another "it's-a-phaser" -- or, since Warlock was there, let's call it an "umphaser" -- and started tinkering with that one's components as well. "I see why the Falcon wanted *him* so bad..." This whispered to Pagebert. A.P. looked up. "So if you guys have phasers...does that mean you have...lightsabers? Do you? Do you?" "Not yet. We can't control the laser beam." "Nuts." He sulked for a monent, then: "Can I have a look? CanIcanIcanI?" "It's basically one of these," Warlock indicated the umphaser, "in a hilt instead of a pistol. And no, you can't. They tend to explode." Sigh. "You never let me have *any* fun! Anyway, the Ratman knew jack about the light saber thing. It's not laser -- it's a plasma thing. Loops back on itself and there's a teeny air gap but the problem is where the hilt overheats and the whole thing goes *boom*..." "Whoa whoa whoa. Talk to Incubus about this. But later -- let's focus on the weapons that we know work." "Aw, fine." He fell silent for a moment, then his eyes went wide as he remembered something. "DOWN!" Warlock didn't question, just dove, hitting Pagebert and taking him down with him. A.P. was about to dive when Daria and Jane stepped in. Jane started to ask "Hey, wha--?" "GET--!" *BANG! Something in a flask on the table blew sky-high, and Daria and Jane dove out of the room, as AP just dropped. For a moment, the only sounds were the hissing of smoldering wood and the coughing as the smoke from the explosion hit people's lungs. Then Daria and Jane poke their heads back in. "Let me see if I remember this one," Daria mused. "Method...seven?" "Too much?" he wondered from the floor. After a moment, he suggested, "Too little? -- I have napalm..." A longer pause this time. "What?" * * * The Norton Steelworks, in the Detroit suburb of River Rouge, was a typical industrial complex with administrative buildings, storage areas and all the other crap a working steelworks (such as this was) actually needs for its business side. In one of the offices, Brett Norton was seated at his desk. Standing across from him was the Refugee. "Let me see if I'm understanding this," Norton said as calmly as he could under the circumstances. "You lost my prisoners--" "*Mitchell* lost your prisoners," Refugee corrected. "*I* offed the one they call Eco." "My brother has gone AWOL--" "We got word from one of our border contacts. He's gone to ground in Niagara Falls." "Our mole has been silenced somehow..." That trailed off. "No corrections to make there, wise guy?" "No. -- Sir." "Our New Orleans rat-trap was a failure. Our freelance stopped just long enough to collect his pay and vanished without a trace..." "Probably to go after that Maverick kid, after he turned Bill's head into ground chuck--" Norton slammed his palms on the desk and used the resulting leverage to propel himself to his feet, nigh-apoplectic with both general rage and frustration and the specific angst of this conversation. "SHUT UP! The point is, these are *kids*! We're being one-upped by *kids*! You couldn't even take down a couple of high school brats!" "Warlock showed! What the hell was *I* supposed to--?" "You were *supposed* to put them in the *ground*!" Norton took a moment to collect himself, then sat down again and fixed his gaze on the desk. Refugee wisely didn't speak until he judged the calming process was done. Even then, all he said to lead off was, "I want another shot." "You'll get it." "Solo?" "No. Get a team together. The South is compromised, so you won't be going far." "Where?" "From what I know of their current head, they'll be hiding somewhere in plain sight, and quite close..." December 29, 2000: Vengeance is Mine "the more that you fear us, the bigger we get and don't be surprised, don't be surprised don't be surprised when we destroy all of it" -- Brian Warner, "disposable teens" A gray van marked with the words "Three Chicks in Black Jackets Delivery Service" was parked outside a building of the Norton Steelworks compound. Aph and DJ, both with black ball caps as well as the aforesaid black jackets, climbed out of the back with a crate. Leopard, bare-headed but with the ubiquitous black jacket, approached the door and pushed an intercom button. "State your business," crackled somebody's voice from the other end of the connection. "Three Chicks in Black Jackets," she replied. "I said *business*, not name." "Consignment of eggnog?" "Little late for Christmas, ain'tcha, girlie?" "Hey, I don't make the orders, dude -- I just deliver." This got considered in silence for a bit, then the door opened. Aph and DJ handed over the crate to a fairly burly bruiser, who took it up easily and put it down inside the door. Leopard handed him a clipboard and pen, which latter disappeared in his fist as he made use of it to sign the form. She nodded at him and headed back to the van with the others; they got into the back as she put herself behind the wheel and drove off at a sedate speed. "Eggnog. Ugh," said the bruiser and shut the door. * * * The bigwhitevan was parked at a safe distance from the compound when, some time later, the events we have just seen had their results. The first result was that the building's lights went out; the second was a not-so-muffled explosion and the pretty comprehensive destruction of the building. Warlock, standing outside the BWV's passenger side door, lit a fire-arrow and launched it into the air. "I shot an arrow in the air," he longfellow'd. From inside the BWV, Pagebert took up the poesy. "It came to earth...somewhere back there?" "It landed in a Merritt's hair." "Now let's give 'em more than a scare." Warlock clambered into the BWV and shut the door. It drove off towards the now-buzzing compound. Around it were other vehicles -- the A-Tank, Fett's BJB, NCM's car and the gray Three Chicks van -- all converging on the compound. * * * Somewhere along the line, they'd taken to referring to the ranch house as "the Fortress of Cynicism." This part of it was called the sitting room, so that's what Quinn was doing -- sitting. Specifically, she was sitting in a big, ratty wingback chair, doing her nails and idly watching a juryrigged bank of surveillance screens, when Daria came in and asked, "You want to be relieved from watch?" "Nah; that'd mean I'd have to go out there and maybe be nice to you guys and I'm not very good at that -- I'm not like you guys and you weird me out." "Fair enough. -- All quiet on the western front?" "So far, yeah. I mean, you *really* think those guys're gonna find us out in the middle of *nowhere*?" "Better to have a battle plan and not need it than need it and not have it. -- Do you know what to do if they *do*?" "*Duh*, Daria! I help beat their faces in and ruin my manicure!" "In this case, Quinn, it's your Apricot Shimmer or your *life*." "I *know*. I'm not *that* shallow. -- Daria?" "Yeah?" "I'm really *not* that shallow...am I?" Daria really did have to think about that for a moment. When she was done, though, she had an answer. "Not as much as even *you* like to think sometimes." With that, she walked out. Quinn smiled a little and turned back to the monitors. * * * In the living room, A.P. was pacing, toying with an umphaser. He stuffed it in a pocket and kept pacing, shooting little looks every now and then at Lynn, who was calmly loading her gun. Then, taking a breath to steady his nerves, he stalked over to the sofa and sat down next to her. "Purple Peril?" She didn't look up. "Yeah?" "I...I dunno how we're gonna come out of this...and I thought...before it kicks off..." He took a deep breath. "I gotta tell you something." Now she looked at him, sensing that this was important. "I'm listening." "Purple Per...Lynn...I never said it, even after you did and..." He sighed. "I love you. Have since I was nine. No matter what, I'll never love anyone so much. Ever." For a silent moment, Lynn just looked at him. He started getting nervous. "I...I'd've said it in prettier words, but...well, *you* know how I am...I..." Gulp. "*Please* say something..." Lynn was too obviously focused on fighting incipient tears to say anything more coherent herself than "Oh, A.P..." She kisses him, then just grabbed him in a tight hug. "Awwwww," Jane aww'd from the other end of the room. "Isn't that sweet." "Positively cavity-inducing," Daria agreed. "If I were a diabetic, I'd be in a coma by now." "Does this mean that this is the time to make any of those last-minute confessions or do the soul-baring thing?" "Well, if we don't and things turn out wrong, we could regret those unsaid words for the rest of our lives. -- But then again, in this situation there's some comfort in that 'the rest of our lives' wouldn't actually be all that long." "...Daria? -- I'm scared." "Me too, Jane. -- thank you for being my friend." "thank you for being mine." They reached for each other's hands at the same moment, squoze once, then let go. "They're COMING!" Quinn shrilled from the watchroom. That announcement made for a brief interval of shocked silence. "Of course they are," Daria replied, drily enough to hide her fear. "If we hid in Antarctica, we'd find guys in penguin suits pointing guns at our heads." "If she can see them," Lynn remarked as she approached Daria, "we have a minute. Come on; let's check this out." * * * From the front porch, which was suitably fortified, the gang watched a dustcloud suggestive of at least three cars approaching at some speed. "Huh," Lynn observed. "I do believe Birnam Wood is coming to Dunsinane Hill." "You *have* been hanging out with Warlock too long," Daria replied. "Or Mr. O'Neill." "No, that had a more Warlock-like maliciousness to it." "Can we stop *now?*" A.P. pled. "*Before* they start shooting at us?" At the dry *crack* of a gunshot, everybody flattened. "Too late," Lynn replied, equally dry. "Do I have to say it *again*?" Quinn fairly screamed. "They're *COMING*!" "Gee. Y'think?" Daria snarked as they re-entered the house and shut the door. Anyone outside would have been able to hear the sound of several heavy- duty locks being shot home, even over the low growl of approaching engines. * * * "Let it *roll!* Just as high as the fucker can go! And when it comes to that fantastic note where the rabbit bites its own head off, I want you to throw that fuckin' radio right in the tub with me!" -- Dr. Gonzo to Raoul Duke, "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas" A basement window was jimmied open, causing no alarms to sound. You may remember Wily, the small, wiry Merritt underling in San Francisco who fetched a straitjacket for A.P., fetched Bryce Merritt to talk to Lynn, and finally fetched himself a kick in the stomach from Quinn. Well, Wily was the one who opened that window. Now he clambered in through it, lowered himself...and dropped. There was an unexpected splash as he reached the floor. "What the--?" Four other Merritts followed him through, each with his own splash, and all five men looked down to see that they were up to their knees in water. They looked at each other, a little dubiously. "It's just rising damp," Wily insisted, impatient to reach the targets. "Come on." The Merritts waded forward a few paces...then stop at a burst of light and noise from somewhere above them. The sound might have been a heavily distorted guitar, or electrical feedback, or whirling unshielded manufacturing equipment. After a moment, they looked up. There was a sort of balcony-cum- walkway at one edge of the basement, with stairs leading from it to (presumably) the door to the main house. On this stood their four main targets, all with totally deadpan expressions. The Peril had one boot on a plugged-in TV (hooked to a long extension cord), on which that Marilyn Manson chick was prancing around. The Merritts began to have nervous forebodings. The music hit a crescendo, and the Peril, waring an evil smirk echoed to at least some degree by each of her companions, kicked the TV off the platform. It seemed to take an awfully long time to fall into the water. The shriekback guitar stylings of the Spooky Kids segued neatly into the nasty buzz of electricity in water. The foursome watched as much as they could make themselves watch of what followed, but it wasn't easy. The zzrch-zzrch of the TV shorting out, and the sound of a cathode ray tube blowing up, were as nothing to the sights, let alone the smells. It was no wonder their smirks began to fade before too long. They steeled themselves and walked away, toward the door that led back up to the world, or at least the house. By the time the Jacketeers got into the front hall, it sounded like World War III was in progress outside. Things were blowing up, people were screaming. For all they knew, there were dogs and cats living together somewhere close by. Quinn demanded, "What is going *on* out--?" "Don't ask," Daria explained. "But--" "Okay," Lynn said briskly, "you know your positions. Go for it." They scattered. A.P cornered Quinn in a spare bedroom and handed her an umphaser. "Now, treat this like a pre-Bubble Boy guy, okay?" "What are you *talking* about?" "Use once, throw away." "But...wha...HEY!" A.P. grinned at her and dashed off. Quinn looked at the phaser. * * * The upstairs hallway, so-called, was really more like a wide balcony with a door in it. Quinn's head appeared around a doorframe. She looked one way, then the other, then her eyes went wide and she retreated as shots were fired in her direction. She came back out like a Valkyrie, all fury, with the umphaser held out in front of her. "You singed my *hair* with that!" She fired once, then dropped it as she retreated into the room. Refugee watched as a man named Burns walked up and picked up the gun. He fired it once at the door, making a hole in it at about Narcissa's-head level. "Nice toy there," he allowed as. "Coooooool!" Burns stuffed it in his jacket and backed up, preparing to make a rush at the door. "Do you smell something burni--?" Refugee didn't finish that, just ran around a corner, accompanied by the other two mooks, who'd caught on. A moment later, they heard a muffled BOOM from the spot they'd formerly occupied. They peered around the corner; the result they saw wasn't pretty. "Eww," said a mook. "Burns bits." "Don't you mean 'burned' bits?" General "Ewwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww." "Yeah, you can say *that* again!" Narcissa replied from the other side of the door. "You two get her," Refugee barked. "Where are *you* going?" the same mook asked. "Unfinished business. I got someone to..." He mimed holding a gun to a head. "...take care of." With that, he walked off. The two Merritts looked at each other, then returned to around the corner. * * * Downstairs, Lynn and A.P. were defending another doorway. All was quiet for the time being -- she had her gun and he another umphaser, which he fired once, then tossed down the hall. "Why'd you do that?" Lynn wondered. "Because it's about to ex--" BOOM! The effect on the walls was like the sudden popping of a balloon full of red paint, or maybe raspberry jam. "Oh. -- THAT! Is an *ex-phaser!*" A.P. turned to look down the hallway at the carnage he'd just caused, and Lynn took the opportunity to slip away from him while his back was turned. "And bereft of life, they rest in pieces." He waited for a laugh. When he didn't get one, he turned to find Lynn missing. "Hey! Purple Peril! Where'd ya go?" After a moment, it hit him. "Awwww...Purple *Peril!* You *promised* me you wouldn't *do* this crap!" Bang bang. Duck and run. * * * "Heghlu'meH QaQ jajvam!" (Today is a good day to die!) -- traditional Klingon battle cry The Refugee opened the door to the basement training area and entered carefully. It looked deserted. He went further in, looking curiously at the swords mounted on the walls -- epee, broadsword, shortsword, katana. He took the katana out of the wall rack and unsheathed it. Then he whirled in place as he heard the door slam and lock. Behind it stood the Peril, pocketing a key. For a moment, they just looked at each other. Then he pulled his gun, and so did she -- John Woo stalemate. "You really want to settle it this way?" she asked him. "Who can squeeze a trigger first? Hardly a challenge, is it?" "You that anxious to die, kid?" She just looked at him. Then she lowered the gun. He did the same, then held up the katana. "Better." She reached behind her and pulled one of those Klingon swords that look like a crescent moon with spikes. Both assumed attack stances. * * * The walls in the upstairs hallway were scorched now, not to mention being splattered with the aforesaid Burns bits. Quinn and Jane were standing back-to- back in the middle of the narrow hallway-cum-balcony, blocking the door with the umphaser hole in it. "Why are we doing this again?" Quinn asked as she kicked one approaching Merritt in the stomach and sent him into the nearest wall. "Daria's got something going in there," Jane explained as she slashed out at an approaching mook, sending *him* over the side. "Like *what*? Oh, go left!" As she issued that order, she grabbed the wrist of an approaching mook and kicked him in the head as she threw him. Since Jane had dodged left, he went flying into another mook who'd been coming up behind Jane with a baseball bat. Instead of being able to cosh her with it, he dropped it on his own head as the two mooks staggered backward, out cold. "Not sure I want to know." Nok nok nok. Pause. Nok nok. "Come on!" "Wha--?" But Jane had already grabbed Quinn by the shoulder and thrown her through the suddenly opened door they'd been guarding. A small canister rolled out, and the door slammed shut. The mooks looked at it... * * * On the other side of the door was a small, ratty guest bedroom. Daria was stuffing a blanket into the crack at the bottom of the door. A towel had already been stuffed into the hole the umphaser'd made. "What is going *on*?" Quinn demanded. Then came the sound of several bodies hitting the floor out in the hall. "A.P.'s knock-out spray," Daria explained. "We wait a few minutes and it should have dispersed." "But *then* what do we do with them?" "At least get them out of here. Let them take their chances with the obstacle course outside." "*Obstacle* course?" "Land mines," Jane replied. Quinn stared. Daria lowered her eyes. * * * In the Merritt inner sanctum, the Ram was holding a glass of wine in one hand and a packet of some powder in the other. From the other side of the door came sounds: gunshots, the odd scream and incoherent shouted orders. He poured the powder into the wine glass and sloshed it around a bit to dissolve. He raised the glass, toasting no one in particular...and the door banged open. In the moment he spent frozen in shock, the wine glass was shot out of his hand. In the doorway stood Fett and Warlock, with two college-age youths covering them; Norton recognized the two unwounded band members from New Orleans. All four entered the room, weapons trained on Norton. "Nice of you to join me," he said. "This war is *over*," Fett announced. "Oh, I agree with you entirely there." He allowed himself a slight smirk. "It's just a question of who won." "Looks like us from where I'm standing, hey Trent?" said one of the bandmembers, presumably Campbell. Lane gave an icy smile. "Looks like." Norton decided to burst their bubble. "Of course, you *do* realize why you found it so easy to get in?" "We don't listen to this bullshit." With that, Fett cocked the twin Colt 11As he called the Sithlords. Warlock glared at him and Fett held his hand...for now. Warlock knew what his host meant. "You sent the rest of your men elsewhere?" "That secluded little hideaway you stored the Falcon's fledgeling in." "You little piece of--" That was as far as Lane got before Warlock glared *him* into silence. The Ram couldn't resist the opportunity to gloat. "I'd say that your people are about finished by now. And *my* successor's far more...healthy than yours is at the moment. I'd say the Merritts are ahead on points. You took a great many pawns...but *I* took your pieces of some worth. Rooks, knights...and the Queen." Warlock didn't say a word; just grabbed his cellphone and hit a speed- dial number. After a pause for pick-up, he shot an icy grin in the Ram's direction as he spoke. "Yeah, Peril. Just checking in. -- Good. We're about clear here. Sitrep later." He hit END and *looked* at Ram. Norton was shocked. "That's...impossible." At which point, Fett double-tapped him and he fell over. Trent looked relieved and triumphant; Nick likewise, with a little sickness mixed in. Warlock's face was expressionless. "All right!" Trent shouted. "We won!" "No," replied Warlock. "We didn't." He hit REDIAL on the phone and held it out to Trent, who listened along with Nick and Fett to what Warlock had *really* heard. "You have reached Purple Peril's phone. If you're receiving this message...whoops." Trent and Nick looked at each other -- then at Warlock, who still betrayed no emotion. Apart from the muffled sounds of the continuing gunfight outside the office, there was utter silence. Nick broke it. "She said that when--" "Shut up," Trent fairly snarled. Warlock's attention, however, had been caught. "This means something?" "She said it when she thought she was gonna die." A moment of tense silence followed this. Again, it was broken by Nick. "It was a false alarm then!" "Totally different, man. What are the odds it's a false alarm now? -- And who went down with her?" "Don't jump to conclusions yet. There's still hope until we've seen the bodies." Trent and Nick glared at Warlock for that, then walked away. He scowled after them. "Is it just rock band members that are so undisciplined?" "Hey, Herr Warlock, chill the fuck out, wouldja? They're kids!" "They're older than you are, Fett. Now shut up and follow them. We're going to see just how bad the situation is." He stalked out after Nick and Trent, leaving Fett to scowl after him in turn. * * * Outside the Fortress of Cynicism, the Merritts were in scattered cover, most notably in the trench the explosives had dug in the front yard. Occasionally one would let off a few rounds toward the house, to be answered in kind. The whole scene screamed "Mexican standoff." Jane and A.P. were leaning out a window. Jane had a gun, while A.P. was just watching for the time being. "Jeez, don't these people give up ever?" he wondered. "So long as we got rid of the ones *in* the house, it's cool for now. -- And at least now I have a few tricks for the squatters in the basement if they ever come back." "You wouldn't do that to innocent people, wouldja?" "Not the thing with the TV, and not that little trick with the chandelier, 'cause we don't have one, and probably not with your umphaser, and Method 4 was overkill..." "In the words of a great man with bad hair, no, I think that was just enough kill, seeing as how they were pointing big-ass guns at us that were *probably* loaded with hollowpoints or at *least* had crosses filed in 'em..." "Yeah, yeah, you made your point, but for a bunch of squatters...oh jeez, here comes wave three..." "Hey, no, wait..." He'd realized what Jane was now noticing, that the vehicles rolling into view were the strike force's, with the BWV in the lead. The passenger side window rolled down, and out poked a bright red bullhorn -- which promptly sounded the Cavalry Charge. "*This* I do not *believe,*" one Merritt muttered. "They're a Family of drama queens." He took aim and shot the bullhorn. "THANK YOU!" A.P. and Jane chorused. Inside the BWV, Incubus was behind the wheel; Warlock shotgun, with the remains of the bullhorn in his hand. He looked at it ruefully, then tossed it. "At least two of them are okay. -- Hand me the pump-action, wouldja?" he called to the back. * * * Warlock and Fett came into the front hall first, weapons at the ready. But it was quiet. The only sign that there was life here at one point is a young man who is handcuffed to a radiator, smeared with face cream and painted all over with green and orange. He wasn't moving. "Any shots on him?" Fett wondered. Warlock was baffled. "No shots...no blood..." "One of the Methods, guys." Fett and Warlock looked up. Narcissa was at the top of the stairs, looking down at them. "See, I didn't even *think* about using that on Sandi, even to just make her *sick*, or whatever. But Jane wanted to do something a little more artistic or something on one of them when stuff got quiet and we had the stuff lying around *anyway*..." "...'Stuff.'" "Oh, just some face cream with some other stuff mixed in...*I* dunno -- cya-something." "Cyanide?" Incubus suggested from behind them. "Potassium cyanide," the Erudite clarified as she came in from a corridor. "I think she and A.P. made it as a Christmas present for DJ." "Yeah," Scarlet added from her position behind Quinn at the top of the stairs, "but we didn't want it just lying around, and anyway, that's supposed to be one of the little bastards who shot Jesse." Not that Warlock wasn't glad to have that cleared up, but just now he had other concerns. "Where're the Peril and the Maverick?" "I...I don't know," the Erudite confessed. "I haven't seen them. Jane? Quinn?" "Uh...no..." replied Scarlet. The Maverick came dashing out of a room upstairs, headed for the stairs, lost his balance at the top and was only prevented from tumbling headlong down the things by Narcissa and Scarlet grabbing his arms. "So we all here?" Then came Sir Naps-a-Lot and Poppa Bear. The former headed straight for the stairs and his sister. When she headed down to meet her brother, the Maverick, his arm released, rushed down them himself. Artist and narcolept met on the stairs and hugged *tight*. "Thank God you're okay. We got Lynn's message and we thought--" Naps-a-Lot got no further. The Maverick, now at the bottom of the stairs, turned to him fast enough to knock himself over. "You got her *voicemail*? Her phone was *OFF*?" *Now* Warlock might start to worry. "Who was the last one to see her?" "M...me. I...I...I--" "Were playing hand grenades with the poor man's phaser, last I saw." Now they *all* turned to see the Peril, coming through a door at the back of the room, spattered with gore and quite pale. For a moment, no one spoke. Warlock had a question that needed a relatively swift answer. "Any of that yours?" "Not enough to--" "*LYNN*!" The Maverick scrambled to his feet and launched himself across the room at her, nearly knocking her over. After a bone-crushing hug, the Peril pulled away slightly. "I'm covered in--" "Oh, who gives a..." They started kissing. Much like the bunny with the power, they just kept going and going and going... "Getting ideas, brother dear?" Scarlet asked up on the stairs. Naps-a- Lot slid down the banister, hit the floor and opens his arms to the Erudite, who approached him slowly. Too slowly for his tastes, as it turned out -- he took three running steps to intercept her and grabbed her up. "Well, it's about *time*!" Meanwhile, the Peril and the Maverick, who *still* hadn't broken *their* kiss, had stumbled toward, and now through, an open door. A boot hit it and it slammed shut. Fett, Warlock and Incubus were slightly amused by the whole thing. "That was a bedroom..." Warlock observed. "Lucky guy," replied Incubus. The Erudite broke the embrace she was in. "I hope you don't think we're playing follow-the-leader, Trent." Naps-a-Lot just shrugged and kissed her some more. "My *God*, unpopular people *do* put out!" "Shut it, Narcissa!" Scarlet joined the three Affiliates in that chorus. Narcissa was taken aback, but recovered quickly. "FINE! I'm going to take a shower!" "No hot water," Scarlet pointed out. "Bad pipes and blown fuses in the basement, remember?" "Ewwwwwwwwww!" Narcissa ran away from the stairway, and everyone heard a door slam. Scarlet looked from the direction Narcissa'd gone, to her brother and the Erudite, to the shut living room door, to Warlock, Fett and Incubus, who shrugged at her in a "now what?" chorus. "We kept your heirs safe," she remarked, "we downed a *lot* of your rivals and we got you the war." "And your point?" Fett wondered. "You owe us pizza. And *lots* of it." She moved the rest of the way down the stairs, brushed past them and left the house. "She can eat," Incubus observed. "I'm impressed." "Come *on*! That kind of workout would put an appetite on an anorexic! -- And do you *reeeeeeeeeeally* want to be around when that bedroom gets...*ahem* noisy?" That gets through to even the Erudite and Sir Naps-a-Lot. "A-Tank," said he. "Shotgun." They left then. Warlock, Fett and Incubus followed them out. December 30, 2000: In the End "The sun is settin' on the century And we are armed to the teeth We are all working together now To make our lives mercifully brief" -- Ani DiFranco, "To The Teeth" It was a private hospital room, but it was starting to look a little lived-in -- books, a laptop computer, stacks of paper, flowers and cards, varied hospital room detritus. Kes was sitting up in bed, a little stiffly, reading, when Lynn came in, with Daria behind her like a trepidatious shadow. "Jan." "Hallo, you lot. -- How're you coping?" "'Coping,'" Daria didn't quite scoff. "That's a good one." "We have a few things to set straight with you--" Lynn started to say. "No; *I* have a few things to set straight with *you*, cousin mine. With *all* of you. And I'll start with Uncle Jerome's will." Kes pulled a few sheets of paper from the top of the stack on the table before her and looked them over. "Now, Uncle Jerome made a few last-minute changes to his will after the summer ended. Basically, it states that Smythe Affiliated belongs to his two daughters, to be managed by myself until such time as they grow into the position." "*Oh* no," Daria nearly groaned. "I'm not--" "Jan, do you even--?" Kes held up a hand for silence. "*But*, if you'd let me finish..." She waited a moment to ascertain that they would do. "Daria, this is yours." She groped for another piece of paper and handed it to Daria. Daria scanned it -- and her eyes got *big*. "A bank account. In my name. Containing a pro sports star's salary for most of his career. Including endorsements." "It's called 'buying you out'. Your half of Smythe Affiliated belongs to me, if you accept this. And you're out -- I've made some provisions regarding buying your privacy. Provided you take no further part in any action against the Merritts, now or in the future, your safety is assured. You're out...Ms Morgendorffer." "What about Jane and A.P.?" Lynn wondered. "Quinn? Jodie and Mack? The band?" "*And* Lynn," Daria pointed out. "Jane and AP won't be as well-off as Daria is in all this," Kes admitted, "but Jerome left them both a little something; it's the closest thing to an apology he could think to give, I suppose. And the provisions around Daria cover them as well. That includes Quinn, your bandmates and Jodie and Mack." "From what I've been hearing," Lynn pointed out, "it's not that simple for A.P. What about Jensen's brother?" "We're...*I'm*...in the process of making provisions for that, as well. You're going to have to trust me there -- you *all* are." "And what about Lynn?" Daria wondered. "Entirely up to her. I've bought her safety until she finishes high school, renegotiable afterwards, depending on her choice in the matter. Basically, all of Lawndale is a Merritt-free zone from now on. But the terms of the will won't allow me to simply buy Lynn out until such time as she turns 21 and makes a clear-cut choice either way." She turned to Lynn. "If you don't want in, you still receive profits from the Affiliation and can live your life *exactly* the way you want to. If you *do* want in...your spot is waiting." "But--" "Now you listen to me, Lynn. You got hauled into this by some very poor circumstances and a few even poorer judgement calls on the part of your father. By sheer bad luck, people you care for got hauled in with you. I've never been happy with it -- you're only eighteen, and should be allowed a normal life and the ability to make your own choices. Now I've bent over bloody *backwards* to make sure you all have a fighting chance to get your lives back to normal. The *least* you could do is appreciate it a bit." After that, silence briefly reigned in the room. "Yeah," Daria said at length. "Um. Thanks. -- Really. Thanks." A small smile. "You're welcome." "Now how am I going to explain this to my parents?" A raised eyebrow. "Who says you have to? If there's something you must buy with the cash in that account, tell them the truth -- your biological father bestowed some guilt-cash on you." "Can I talk to Jan alone for a minute, Daria?" "Sure. I'll be outside with the others." So saying, Daria left. Lynn looked at Jan. "What happens to *you*?" Kes shrugged. "None of your concern, for now. But let's just say I have good people around. I'll be fine." "...They're going to be safe?" "As anyone ever is. -- Which way are you leaning, if I may ask?" After a long silence of consideration, Lynn bowed her head. "I don't know." "Fair enough. But whatever you do, don't let the internal debate colour your *entire* life. You have a good chance at something...well, let's just say something *more* with those three. Don't waste it because of this. You get very lonely if you try." Lynn looked hard at Kes, who looked back stoically. "I think you have a few things to tell me, don't you?" * * * In the hospital cafeteria, Daria was sitting with Jane, A.P. and Quinn. "So," she said once she'd told them about the deal. "Happy now?" "Well, *yeah*! But, like, are you going to use that money to get some decent *clothes* or something? I mean, *God*, Daria, that outfit *bites*!" Quinn noticed the looks she was getting. "I'm *kidding*! Like I need the competition *anyway*." Daria gave Quinn a look of fond exasperation, or maybe exasperated fondness. Jane developed a similar expression, only this one was definitely fond exasperation, emphasis on the exasperation. A.P. just rolled his eyes. "I once said that I didn't know what the future holds, and that the only thing I *did* know was that if it moved, I was shooting it. -- I tempted fate, didn't I?" "But that part of it's over now," Jane assured her. "For us, anyway. What about Lynn?" "She's not stupid," A.P. reminded them. "She'll figure *something* out. Anyway, for now, let's play cricket!" "Since when did you get interested in British sports?" "You know what I mean! The cricket and...ants, and...the world owes me a living..." "Grasshopper," the girls corrected. Even Quinn knew that one. "Oh. Anyway. We saved our butts. I say we party!" They all looked at him. Quinn was the one to say it. "*He* watches *BUFFY*?" "We don't let that get around." Jane adopted a faux-perky voice. "Like, we have our *reputation* to think of, or whatever." "Hey, *you're* the one who reads the fanfic!" A.P. scoffed. "At least I don't sink *that* low!" "Hey, I mostly read it because of the sick entertainment value of Xander/Angel slash!" "EWWWW!" Quinn turned to Daria. "I was right -- even when you guys do *normal* stuff, you're weird." "So you get to keep your sense of superiority. And you're arguing with it?" _Change subject now._ "Y'know...I hate to admit it, but the geek has a point. We *should* party. Sometimes you, like, *need* to blow off a bit of steam! Look at *those* two!" "It's all about artistic *outlet*!" Jane insisted. "It's all about people wanting to play *God* with some characters that someone *else* made up!" A.P. countered. "*And* doing it crappy!" "Actually, I'm not surprised you don't read it -- that would involve understanding words of two syllables or more!" "Hey! When you can figure out square roots of five-digit numbers or higher in your head, *then* you can call me stupid! Until then, *shut it*!" "You make a point," Daria conceded as the argument carried on in the background. "But would you be seen at a party with freaks?" "It's not like anyone *popular* is going to see me there!" A Mona Lisa smile. "Thanks, Quinn." "What for?" "For staying you." Then along came Lynn, and Daria stood up to meet her. "You okay?" "As I'm going to be. -- There's a wake-thing happening at that house tomorrow night." Eyebrow. "Oh yeah. The scarred-woodwork and bloodstain motif just *makes* a party." "Ask Jane about that -- her with the tribute to Jackson Pollack. Anyway, it's mostly being cleaned up and at least we don't have to worry about wrecking the place." "There's one thing you *are* forgetting." "Huh?" "Drunken crime family members falling into the holes in the front lawn." Lynn looked at Daria, who gave a Mona Lisa smile. Lynn responded to it in kind. It was a nice moment. So, naturally, it couldn't last. "I can't *believe* you're being such an elitist!" "I can't believe *you* have no taste!" A.P. replied. "Buffyfic?" Lynn asked Daria. "Isn't it always?" "That or punk." "Party?" "We could use it." December 31, 2000: Drunk on the Lawn "Welcome to the strangest party, baby It's like we're staring at the sun Everyone's got the invitations I hoping that you're gonna come...yeah." -- INXS, "The Strangest Party" In the living room of the ranch house, some classic-rock thing with too many guitars was was playing softly in the background, something about the strangest party. For Quinn, it *was* the strangest party; she wasn't usually the one standing on the sidelines watching as the others sat in small knots, drinking, not saying much. Eventually, she walked over to A.P., who was sitting a little apart from Daria, Jane and Lynn with a pizza box on his lap. She couldn't believe she's resorting to talking to *him* of all people, and it showed on her face. "Hi..." "Hey ho." "Who're *these* freaks? This is *such* an uncool song." "Classic Britstuff, Narcissa. 'Course, *you* only know stuff from bands that some bunch of suits made up, so you're kinda lost here. These people like *original*." Quinn scowled at him, but he didn't notice. Then she looked at the pizza box. "Does that thing have cheese?" "This one, no." "Can I have a piece?" He gave her a very strange look. "Ooooooookay." He opened the box, handed her a slice, took one for himself and shut the box again. Daria, Jane and Lynn had watched this transaction with interest. "I guess no one ever warned her about the APizza," Jane mused. "That is *not* the APizza," Lynn informed her. Daria was surprised. "The Techno-Weasel changes his feeding habits?" "This is the thing he gets when he feels like having something more--" Quinn's scream Dopplered past then as she ran by. "HothothothotHOTHOTHOT!" They all followed her with their eyes, then stared at Lynn, whose face remained expressionless. "...Intense," she finished the sentence as if she hadn't been interrupted. And then along came A.P., looking a little annoyed. "Jeez, everyone's a critic. She could'a at least asked what was *on* it first..." "Let's say I'm asking on her behalf," Daria hypothetical'd. "Red pesto base, onions, tofu chunks, asparagus, jalapenos and wasabi. Oh, and..." Jane jumped into the sentence. "Don't tell me, let me guess -- extra garlic." Daria was croggled. "And she *ate* that? -- And *you* ate that?" "And you expect Lynn to kiss you *after* you've eaten that?" "Part of his last birthday present to me was a butt-load of mints," Lynn assured them, "to be presented to him as and when necessary." Quinn returned, wiping her mouth with a damp washcloth and carrying a piece of paper. She peeled off the backing and slapped it onto the pizza box without a word -- it was a Biohazard warning label sticker. Then she stalked off. They watched her. Then they all started laughing...well, except for A.P., who looked at it, very much offended. "Hey, look, Narcissa, you *asked* for it!" "So what are we going to do with ourselves when we get back to Lawndale?" Jane wondered. "What, you mean now that we don't have to pummel secrets out of Lynn and run for our lives every school break?" Daria let that lie there. "Study? Try to graduate?" "College interviews." Lynn sounded bitter about that for some reason. "Get back to the writing. -- I have a whole new perspective on Melody Powers now, I guess." "I was thinking of a new series of paintings," Jane commented. "'The End of Innocence' or something like that." "Well, without the band I'll have plenty of time to model for *that*." A slight respectful pause followed Lynn's comment. A.P. broke it with a hopeful look. "Prom?" He stood there, gauging the Looks. "Oh, c'mon, we *gotta* do Prom! I mean, I know the music's gonna suck and the people're gonna look at us funny and I'm gonna have to do the tux rental thing and it'll mean shopping again and all that, but...but...but..." Daria decided to help him with the words. "But you're an incurable romantic who's afraid to admit it lest his girlfriend make a spirited attempt to disembowel him for being a soppy twerp?" A.P. blushed magenta. Lynn rolled her eyes, and let the pause stretch out and become loaded before answering. "Yeah, we have to do Prom. -- But no corsages!" A.P. was blushing with pleasure now. "Aye-aye, ma'am!" Warlock's voice came to them. "Peril." They all looked at Lynn, who shrugged and stood up. "Lynn, no..." Daria begged. "I don't think it's like that. If it turns out to be..." She considered, then just shrugged again and walked off. They watched as she approached Warlock, who was sitting by a large unlit fireplace with Leopard and Kes. Leopard held an acoustic guitar. Daria, Jane and A.P. were a little perplexed. "Guess it really *isn't* like that," he said. "I dunno," Jane mused. "You think it's good to see her tight with them?" "I couldn't tell you. -- But in a way, they *are* her family. Like it...or not." Daria's "or not" came out in a tone that said without words that she for one most definitely did *not* like it, but also made clear her awareness that there wasn't much she could do about it. And the music started -- a haunting rendition of Moxy Früvous' "The Drinking Song" that would carry them through time. It took them into the past, to images of absent friends. And it went forward with them, through the end of this bus-manic holiday. And the band played on (It took them back to the night at The Zen when As the helicopters whirred Tom first approached Jane and they hit it off Drunk on the lawn in a nuclear dawn so well. Little did she know about the My senses finally blurred surprises he had in store.) He was a rock (It took them back to the night at Skunk's when 'Til the end a solid reminder Trent took the bottle in the face. Jesse Couldn't deny a friend stood like a rock between Trent and his We lived in the noise'n assailant, finally getting fed up and punching The sweet amber poison the jerk out. That was how Lynn became part Peekin' up the skirt of the end of Mystik Spiral.) And we'd drink (Daria, Jane, Lynn, A.P., Quinn, Jodie and Mack Two gnarly dudes and some records sat at one end of the sitting room in a Much like plates of black food protective huddle, just listening. They would We filled up our faces be sitting there a long time, though not as Saw some far places long as it felt. A metaphorical part of them Stood on the roof in the nude would always be there.) And the band played on (It took them back to the strip club in DC, As the helicopters whirred where Trent shoved Max's shirt down over a Drunk on the lawn in a nuclear dawn nearly-naked Lynn and Jesse scooped her up over My senses finally blurred his shoulder, hauling her offstage.) Between poles (It took them back to the parking lot of the He said we're like cows in the grass lounge/casino in Nevada. Tom and his gun had Brushing off flies been the only things standing between them Chaise lounging around (well, all of them except Lynn] and a gun- Standing up, falling down toting Merritt mook.) Til we no longer opened our eyes And we'd drink (After the party, the youngsters stood on the Ever notice how drinking's like war? ranch house porch, looking at the carnage. They Cup of troops o'er the gums all wore their backpacks. Their war was over. To the end of our health It was time to leave this battlefield and A campaign 'gainst myself return to the daily struggle.) Armed with bourbons and scotches and rums And the band played on (It took them back to the halls of Lawndale As the helicopters whirred High. Tom, newly condemned to share their Drunk on the lawn in a nuclear dawn schooling, was pinned to the lockers by Lynn, My senses finally blurred who held a knife at his throat.) Think of bombs (On the road, Jane was driving the Merc, with We're poised on the edge of disaster Daria sitting shotgun. A.P. and Lynn were in Whether it's right or it's wrong the back. Lynn was asleep with her head on We opened the window A.P.'s shoulder, but she shifted in a way that Played some Nintendo made clear it wasn't a restful sleep. Daria Sang a few bars of some pretty old songs looked back with some concern, which A.P. returned in kind.) Irene, goodnight Irene, goodnight (It took them back to the Zen again, to the Goodnight, Irene Battle of the Bands. Jesse had stopped Nick Goodnight, Irene and Casey scuffling by bashing their heads I'll see you in my dreams together.) Oh to dream (Trent was driving the A-Tank. From the Those impotent bones of extinction shotgun seat, Nick looked back at Max, who was Flying graceful and free lying asleep in the back, well padded, arm in a None but the best sling and looking extremely pale. He twitched But the man cannot rest as if having a nightmare. Nick looked forward Til he's finally beaten his me again, sadly.) And the band played on (It took them back to what they'd heard about As the helicopters whirred Tom and Angier's face-off in the Isle's parking Drunk on the lawn in a nuclear dawn lot. Shots rang out, and Angier went to his My senses finally blurred knee as Tom collapsed.) Til the end (It took the Spiral back to the New Orleans He passed out on the sundeck that morning ambush. They saw Jesse taking the double-tap Quietly saying good bye in the back and slumping to the ground, still But I was so hammered managing to chuck Scar's body into the back of I sputtered and stammered the A-Tank as he fell.) Told him he couldn't just die He was a rock (The small convoy that had left Lawndale two Went straight for his own armageddon weeks and a lifetime ago -- reduced now to the Face froze in a grin A-Tank and the Merc -- was parked by the side Ambulance flying in of the road. The nearby sign said WELCOME TO I never drank again LAWNDALE: POPULATION 1,437. That number was Can't really call that a loss or a win scrawled out, probably by one of Jane's graffiti pens, and underneath it was written And the band played on the correction 1,434. With that done, the As the helicopters whirred diminished convoy resumed their progress Drunk on the lawn in a nuclear dawn through Carter County toward the town proper. My senses finally ... blurred. Home.) SPEAKING CAST (in order of utterance where I knew it) Jodie Abigail "GPA Girl" Landon ..... Jessica Cydnee Jackson Jon "Lehrer" Hopper ..... Robbie Coltrane Andrew Landon ..... Bart Fasbender Portia "DJ" Engels ..... Shelby "DariaJane" McGowan guard ..... Marc "Vin Diesel" Vincent Brett "Ram" Norton ..... Rich "Paperpusher" Morton Kevin "Wedge" Norton ..... John Takis Daria "Erudite Emerald" Morgendorffer ..... Tracy Grandstaff Marcus "Warlock" Bishop ..... Ben Yee Andrew Philip "A.P., Psycho-Maverick, Maverick" McIntyre ..... Barry Gordon Lynn J. "Purple Peril" Cullen, Janet N. "Kestrel, Kes" McGovern ..... Janet L. "Canadibrit" Neilson Victor "Pagebert" Page ..... Chad Page Jane "Art-Smart Scarlet" Lane, Quinn "Narcissa" Morgendorffer ..... Wendy "Hannah" Hoopes Karen "Scar" Willis ..... Kara Wild Max "Little Drummer Boy" Tyler, Nick "Poppa Bear" Campbell ..... that information was still not available at press time Thomas "Tom, H, Missing H, Rust" Sloane ..... Russell Hankin William "Chopper" Cleaver ..... Martin J. Pollard "Refugee" ..... SkiPPy, Psychic Refugee George Milton "Tuxedo Slack" Austin ..... Austin George "Super Slacker" Loomis Jesse "Leather Boy" Moreno ..... Willy Schwenz Trent "Sir Naps-a-Lot" Lane ..... Alvaro J. Gonzalez Joshua "Bones" McLain ..... Noah Wyle jewelry shop guy ..... Jeff O'Halloran clerk in Thoreaufare ..... Brian Anderson clerk in Sound by the Pound ..... Joey Lauren Adams Leanne "Aph" Lefferts ..... Diane "Smoochy" Long Norris "NCM" Jones ..... Robert "Crazy Nutso" Ohler Bryce Merritt ..... Harry Shearer Will Jensen ..... Tony "Wind Lane" Jensen Angier "Remora" Sloane ..... that information wasn't available at press time either Victoria "Leopard" Toffell ..... Jill "Leopard Jones" Friedman Samoan ..... Benicio Del Toro "Kat" Jensen ..... David "Star Kat" Timmons Dominique LaFleur ..... Anne Parillaud blond ..... cast whoever you like in the role Jason "Fett" Szybala ..... Brian "Tolshak" Menczynski Michael Jordan "Mack, Captain Sanity, Picard" MacKenzie ..... Amir Williams "Incubus" ..... James "J" Clark bruiser ..... Brad Garrett Wily, mook 2 ..... Frank Welker Burns, random Merritt ..... Charlie Adler ADAPTOR'S NOTES While I was working on this, August 1, 2002 rolled around -- the tenth anniversary of the opening of the Coast's first dockside casino, the casino at whose fictional counterpart Slack works. A chunk of his backstory (yes, he has one, as the leg should imply) has him having worked there since its opening. Lucky him. According to my American Heritage dictionary that stood me through college in such good stead, "prolegomena" are prefatory remarks or observations. CB's dictionary doesn't define them, and a lot of y'all's might not either. (In the singular, a prolegomenon is a prefatory discussion, especially a formal essay introducing a lengthy or complex work. Ours wasn't a formal essay, but the work at hand, you may notice, is both lengthy and complex.) If "snrkl" looks familiar, it's probably because you've chatted with me or someone who contracted the meme from me. I got it from Beth McCoy, but can't be bothered asking whence she derived it. There have been occasions when I've been more honest than comforting. You can guess whom I was failing to comfort those times, and you can ask her about them, if you don't have any great sentimental attachment to (e.g.) your spleen. The stuff Slack's brain quotes at him, from "When it all comes down" to "it still hurts when it's cold", is from Frank Miller's 1986 apocalyptic Batman saga "The Dark Knight Returns" -- a one-armed Green Arrow says it as he agrees to side with Bruce for the grim guardian's final showdown against Superman. "Hiyo God damn Silver" is what the Emerald Archer says after firing a synthetic- Kryptonite arrow at Clark. And this probably loses me the not-fanboying points CB gave me for the Tarantino quotes, but I thought it fit. I drive a turquoise Ford SUV in real life (we're sorry, Afghanistan; we're really, really sorry). CB says that wasn't what she had in mind vis-a-vis Slack's car. I believe her, but I somehow can't make myself rule out the possibility that it was at least part of what *Thren* had in mind. Yes, Sid from "Toy Story" has a surname (last name to us Yanks). He says it himself, when he impersonates a news reporter covering a rocket launch. And yes, that's the same St. Janor who came out with that garbled nonsense about how you can't run from your own legs. The whole quote is one of the voices in his head answering another voice's question about "What is the key to Doktors for 'Bob' [the antimusic band in which Janor participates]? The origin? The egg? The id?" This is for the sweet bird who gives me so much to work with, and who does for me what I evidently do for her -- that is, reminds me what I have without even knowing it. It's also for Warlock, _sine qua_ nothing after season 2 of TLAS. You're one of the good guys, Mr. Yee. Obligatory legal blap: Daria Morgendorffer was created (as were the rest of the Lawndale characters) by Glenn Eichler and Susie Lewis Lynn, and she and her neighbors are copyright 1993, 1997, 2002 MTV Networks, a Viacom company. (As Michelle Klein-Haess has pointed out, work-for-hire sucks the yolks from ostrich eggs.) Monty Python quotes and characters, if any, are copyright 1970, 2002 Python (Monty) Pictures Ltd. They are here used, without the permission of their creators or owners, in the not-for-profit context of fan-fiction. The characters of Lynn Cullen, A.P. McIntyre and the rest of the Smythe (and Merritt) Affiliations are copyright 1999, 2002 by the lovely and talented Janet "Canadibrit" Neilson. This storyline is copyright 2002 Canadibrit, with contributions to the dialogue from Ben Yee (also timeline and additional characters) and Austin Loomis, and was adapted by the said Loomis (to whom the prose format version is copyright 2003) under standing permission. All other characters, locations and incidents (of which I don't think there are any, actually) are either imaginary or used fictitiously. Any coincidence of names is regretted, and any resemblance to persons living, dead, undead, or wandering the night in ghostly torment is either purely satirical or not my fault. As a "substantially transformative" derivative work, this story is protected by the Supreme Court's decision in re Campbell v. Acuff Rose Music. It may be freely redistributed as long as this copyright notice is maintained intact, but may not be in any way redistributed for profit without the permission of the legal owners of all concepts involved. The present author hereby gives permission for any and all keepers of Daria fanfic pages to archive this work (as if I could stop them). Any publication of this story for profit without the express written permission of Austin Loomis, Janet Neilson, Ben Yee and MTV Networks (like any of that'll happen, especially the last) is strictly prohibited, and violators, if I ever decide to track them down, will be strung up by the thumbs, beaten about the head and shoulders with a free-range carrot, and then handed over to corporate lawyers who will do terrible things to them. On purpose. Austin, and good day. Al D T0 W- Q Fw^Fr O+ Ow+OH+Of m c- MV+ F:111,208,313,407,513 BB+ FCT -DT+ q fJ^fj^fD