Fanfic: “Window of Opportunity”
Round 10 of the Circle of Friends Remix is now open for reading at cof_remix.
Banner by aadler
Window of Opportunity
(the Turning Points Remix)
Copyright November 2020
Disclaimer: I don’t own the characters or settings of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, or of Magnum, P.I., or of Leverage. I’m not even sure who does own them, but I’m playing in these worlds for fun, not profit.
This remix let me expand my own previous drabble “ Mixed Heritage”, combined with some of the possibilities opened out by JediButtercup’s induce me to unfold series (with the Buffy/Eliot part first being seen in “so immovable a dislike”). The result is posted for cof_remix’s Round 10.
Plea for mercy: Sorry, but I can’t get the timelines to sync. Magnum, P.I.’s run was 1980-1988, Buffy’s was 1997-2003, and Leverage’s 2008-2012. For Lily Catherine (Hue) Magnum, born in 1981, to be 14 in a time where Buffy has partnered with much of the Leverage crew, simply can’t be made to work out. So don’t try, just relax and suspend disbelief and go with the flow.
***
This had been a hard one, no getting around that. Buffy had faced more supernatural threats than she could count, but it was always trickier when civilians were involved, especially when she was also cut off from her normal support system. And most especially when the threat was centered around a 14-year-old girl who couldn’t be completely shielded because she was an integral part of the situation that had to be resolved. (As a long-time Child of Destiny herself, Buffy had plenty of sympathy for someone who’d just had the whole business dumped on her without warning.)
With the battle itself done, though - and successfully, no friendly fatalities - it was time for the pesky wrap-up part of the process.
“I’ll be honest with you,” she told Lily Catherine Magnum, who was sporting bruises and scratches but was otherwise miraculously unharmed (miraculous in that it had taken Buffy and Lily’s own best efforts and the frenzied protectiveness of four non-supernatural protectors and a heavy dollop of luck to bring the girl out unscathed). “I’m not really any good at this. I mean, explaining the facts of demony life to teenage girls, I do that a lot, but …” She shook her head. “It’s always been Slayers, others like me, who could already fight even if they might need to be shown how, and I could tell them exactly what the choices were. You, you’re just a totally different case.”
“Yeah,” Lily said, nodding gravely. “You tried to explain it, and the demons - the ones who said anything instead of just coming at us, or maybe while they were coming at us - had their own take on it, but I never really understood what it was all about.”
“Right, welcome to the club.” Buffy sighed. “The scrolls didn’t give us much, and I will be so glad to get back with Giles and Willow so they can do the big deep-research voodoo they do so well, but basically you’ve been chosen by Fate, and not in the usual Slayery way that gives you superpowers to go against the big uglies that’ll be looking for you. There are going to be demons and cultists out there that want to stop you, and others that want to use you, and others that’ll just think that makes you an extra-tasty treat. Welcome to the usual universe of fun.”
“And I’m stuck with it,” Lily said. “No way out, this is just how it is from now on.”
“Well … probably,” Buffy said. “Or maybe. There might be ways to pull it off you, that’s another Giles-and-Willow deal we’ll have to check out. And if there’s an exit clause, and you want to go for it, I won’t blame you. You’re not supposed to have to grow up for another four, five years, fourteen is just not the time to have something like this dropped in your lap. Been there, so I know.”
Lily frowned a little, studying her. “But you stayed with it.”
“No choice then,” Buffy told her. “And now, yeah, I’m kinda glad I’m still in the fight instead of touring with the Ice Capades, but now I am the grown-up I didn’t believe I’d ever live to be. It’s not the same for you.”
“But what do you think?” Lily insisted.
“I think, if you’re given a choice, that means you’re the one who gets to make it.” Buffy crimped her mouth a little, shrugged. “Look, you already know about the downside, the danger and misery and no-normal-life and probably-an-early-death part. The upside, though: what little info we had makes it sound like you’re … I don’t know, I guess Willow would say a ‘potentiator’. When things could go either way, you seem to be able to effect which way they can go, which in so many situations can be a major deal.” She looked away, not meeting the younger girl’s eyes. “If you decide to give that up … well, I said it’s your choice and I meant it, but you should just make sure you know what you are giving up if you go that way. And that’s as much as I’m going to say on this.”
“All right,” Lily said. “Thanks.” She was quiet for a minute or two, and finally said, “I guess I should talk to my dad.”
Buffy nodded. “Probably a good idea. I was a little worried about him at first, he just did not want to believe, but when it came to crunch-time, he really stepped up.”
“Yes,” Lily agreed, smiling. “He does that.”
***
On the bed in the upstairs room of the small house rented as an impromptu HQ by the combined crew - and Lily still didn’t fully understand how that particular group dynamic had come about -Thomas Sullivan Magnum IV, Commander U.S. Navy (ret.) was stretched out trying to give the impression that he was humoring everybody else by resting, rather than having any particularly pressing need for it. He was a big man, and had stayed stubbornly in shape, and remained impressive and even formidable in many ways, but time just wouldn’t be denied past a certain point. He’d returned to the Navy after a long hiatus, and then later transferred to the Reserve to allow him to stay in even longer, but eventually had reached the official age limit and been forced to make his second transition back to civilian life.
Lily had worried a little about that, though he’d done everything he could to give the appearance that he was solidly coping. (Well, that’s what he’d do.) Now she had considerably more to worry about.
In the foreshortened preparation for the eventual attack, he had stubbornly refused to accept Buffy’s insistence, backed by Eliot’s, that firearms weren’t the weapon of choice against demons, mostly because he hadn’t completely accepted the idea of demons until he saw them. When the horde broke into the vacant church where Lily’s protectors had set up their last stand, though, he’d played it smart, going for head-shots and kneecapping with his beloved .45 and then wading in with a spare sword when there was no longer time to reload. No real skill with the sword, even Lily could see that, not compared to Buffy or even Eliot, but he’d been totally committed … that being the source of the injuries that now had him laid up, and also one of the reasons they’d all survived. Because it had been really close.
He didn’t look … old. Not really. But he did look tired in a way Lily wasn’t accustomed to thinking of her father.
He greeted her with the grumpiness that generally manifested when he was distressed by something and didn’t want to admit it. “So are they still trying to give you the recruiting pitch?”
She smiled at him. “Actually, Buffy was saying they’d find out if there might be a way for me to get out of this, if I want.” She saw him catch the qualifier, which meant no putting it off before getting to the point. “Dad … why did you go back into the Navy?”
He regarded her, not quite frowning, doing what he could to shield his feelings. “Because, looking back on it, those were the times when I was the best version of myself.” He didn’t try to pretend not to recognize the subtext. “But I didn’t re-enlist to go back to war, Lily. Not with a young daughter.”
Lily considered that. “Maybe not as a full time thing,” she said. “But, much as you tried, you still wound up being away a lot. More than you wanted, I could see that.”
He shook his head. “Those were training missions.”
“Right. To other countries. During wartime. Doing things you couldn’t talk about when you came back.” She held up a hand when it looked as if he would protest. “I’m not complaining. I love you, and I’m proud of you. But part of that is because you always did … you always do your duty.”
His eyes were troubled, almost as if they were hiding pain. “This isn’t your duty, Lily Catherine.”
“Maybe not. That’s what I need to decide.” She went to the bedside and took her father’s hand. “And I need you for that. Not to decide for me, but to help me decide. Because …” She leaned forward, kissed his forehead. “… because I don’t ever want to look back and know I turned away from what would have been the best version of me.”
He stared back at her, frozen, almost stricken, and at last gave her a short, reluctant nod.
She still didn’t know what the decision would be, but she knew the man she had loved and trusted for as long as he’d been in her life, would make every effort to provide her with his best judgment. And that would just have to do.
***
Hardison’s frenetic pacing was making Parker impatient. Everyone knew what happened when Parker got impatient (and Hardison had reason to know it better than most). Still, they had something of a history by this time, so Parker suppressed - for now - the normal impulse toward a more extreme response, and demanded, “Okay, is there a problem?”
Hardison glared at her. “Problem? Problem? What, can’t a man get a little freaked when the whole world goes freaky?”
Parker scoffed at that. “You’re acting like this is all new. We’ve backstopped Eliot on this kind of thing before.”
“Yeah, sure, but that was support, that was, was theoretical. That was with us enough in the background that I could believe it was all a big joke, and the weird stuff we did see was just special effects. This was there, this was right in our faces, those things were trying to eat that little girl!”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Parker corrected irritably. “Us, maybe, but they needed her in one piece for whatever they were planning.”
“You think that makes me feel better?” Hardison was trying hard to maintain his normal grouchy-carping demeanor, but the strain was still showing. “Okay, pitching in to help Eliot score points with his new squeeze, sure, I’m down with that. I got crazy lucky with you, why not help spread the joy? But there is no joy here, this is straight-out Hellraiser Evil Dead stuff!”
Her only response was a little shrug. “It was kind of fun, actually.”
“Somehow I knew you’d say that.” He pulled himself together, sat next to her on the bed. “Sweet girl, this business is pulling us in deeper and deeper. Extra little favor here and there has turned into some-more, and then some-more, and then alla sudden we’re re-enacting the Alamo against extras from the Mines of Moria. It’s not just that this isn’t what I signed up for, this isn’t what I’m good at!”
She gave him a little punch in the shoulder. (Parker being playful. Very creepy.) “Come on, you did great!”
“I’m alive, which is a hell of a lot more than it was looking like for a while there.” He sighed. “You did great. I think Lily got more out of the ‘stealth moves’ you showed her than training from any of the others … ’cause let’s face it, Buffy is superhuman and Eliot damn near, and you’re not normal but at least it’s human not-normal, you could teach her something she could actually do. But I’m a keyboard warrior, and that was just not my gamescape at all.”
Parker stood up. (Hardison was good, being with Hardison was good, but too close for too long was still too much.) “Okay, sure, things got a little hairy for a bit there, but it all came out okay. We’ve had that happen lots of times. This is just one more.”
Hardison shook his head. “This is not the same thing and you know it. We do cons, that’s what we do. This is combat, which is a whole other deal.”
She studied him, slit-eyed, as if trying to read something in a code she didn’t know. “It really bothers you that much.”
“I think if we’re not careful, we’re gonna wind up doing more of this than we can handle,” he said. “Okay, than I can handle. I’m afraid I’ll … let you down.”
Feelings were not Parker’s province. She sat down again, frowning, clearly uncomfortable. Hardison shifted to the other end of the bed, automatically granting her space. After a long while she said, “What we’ve been doing since Nate brought us together … helping people … This new deal with Buffy is a different way of going at the same thing. So if we don’t do it, less of it gets done. And people who need help don’t get it, or maybe don’t get it in time.”
Which was a very hard argument to refute. In fact, slot it in with ‘impossible’. Hardison sighed. He’d done his best. “If you really want to do this,” he said at last, “then I’m in.”
Her reply was longer in coming. “If you really don’t want to … then I’m out.”
Well. Okay. Still didn’t settle which one it was going to be, but okay.
After a few minutes she put her hand out beside her, without looking at him. He took hold of it, carefully, and they sat without saying anything.
***
Eliot found Buffy in the kitchen, studying the directions on a box of mac ’n’ cheese as if they were written in Sanskrit. (Given her previously demonstrated ‘cooking skills’, they very well might be just that indecipherable to her.) He knew she’d heard him come in - probably had a basic position-lock on everyone in the house - but he greeted her cheerily all the same, it was just polite. “Hey, Buf. Looking to expand your skill-set? Because you know cuisine is where I’m the Slayer.”
“Yeah, yeah.” She stuck the box back up into the shelves. “I’m just rattling around till we can do something else. We’re still in the ‘job’s done’ part but not yet over into the ‘move on to the next thing’ part. Makes me restless.”
“I can see how it’d do that,” he agreed.
“And even if we managed to save Lily for now,” she went on, “she’s still been shoved center-stage into the Apocalypse Sweepstakes. I wasn’t much older than she is when I got drafted by the Powers That Be. I can remember how that felt, and it really, really sucks.”
“Uh-huh,” Eliot said. “Anything you can do about it that you haven’t already done? or are set to do?”
“No,” she admitted. She shot him a piercing glance. “Not getting the sense of a lot of sympathy here.”
He shrugged. “Hard times, yeah, we avoid ’em when we can. When we can’t, though … going through ’em, that also gives us something that’s worth having.”
She looked away, and muttered, “Well, aren’t you just a ray of sunshine today.”
“We all could have died,” he said to her. “We didn’t. That’s a win, and I’m good with it. Anything else is extra; it comes along, fine, but right now we have what we have, and it’s enough.”
Her face closed, and she sat down at the kitchen table. “Oh, great,” she said. “Just great.”
He took a chair across from her. Whatever was going on here, it seemed that she was finally getting to it. Once that was out, then would come picking a response.
“I’m glad you were here,” she told him. “The Zmotischk’k Clan … I might’ve been able to take them myself, I’ve faced numbers before and I’m still here, but I don’t think I could’ve done that and kept Lily alive. You and your friends made all the difference, and I’m grateful.” She looked up at him. “I just don’t know if I can give back what it’s worth.”
“This was worth doing all by itself,” he told her. “You don’t owe anything.”
“Not … not exactly what I meant.” She frowned, studying her closed hands on the tabletop. “Eliot, this thing … the you-and-me thing … that’s been great. I love being able to be with somebody without having to wade through drama. I love not having to lie to the guy I’m with, and it’s pretty good when that guy can hold his own if my professional life decides to invade my personal life. And you having friends who can actually help? huge bonus.” She grimaced. “I just … I keep feeling like what we have is, is good enough that there ought to be more. And I’m really, really bad at ‘more’. And taking what you give, when I know I’m still putting up shields, that’s just really not fair to you.”
Eliot smiled at that. “Met a woman a while back,” he said. “Lot like me, lived the same kind of life, did the same kinds of things. There’s a solid possibility that she shot me once - we were on different sides in the same theater and she’d done some of that as a sniper - and it … well, for the kind of people we were, knowing it was possible actually made a kind of connection.” He gave Buffy an amused look. “Nothing came of it, but we could have. You, me, this? Better. If there was more, better yet … but if there never is, it’s still damn good.”
Buffy thought about that, sighed. “So you’re okay with, with how things are.” She shook her head. “And I’m not sure I am, but I’m the holdup. Why can’t life ever be simple?”
Eliot chuckled wryly. “Because we’re us.”
They sat together in silence. “I’ll try,” Buffy said at last. “If I want more, I’ll just keep trying to, to be good for more.”
Eliot nodded. “All a man could ask.”
***
It was morning. Eliot had made breakfast, and everyone happily attacked it. Lily studied them all. Her father was moving a bit stiffly (Buffy and Eliot had done basic combat-medic treatment on the clawed shoulder, given that there were very few regular doctors who could have been shown such a wound), but seemed generally back to his normal self. Buffy and Eliot were both physically fine, of course; as a couple - which Lily was sure they were - they were easy with each other, comfortable and even teasing, which had been somewhat less evident in the previous few days. Hardison and Parker seemed more thoughtful, more reserved than usual, but she couldn’t feel any tension between them, so maybe they were just in an introspective phase.
Which she could certainly understand. It was basically where she was right now.
She and her father had talked well into the night, but she’d cut it off before a continuation would have deprived him of sleep. She’d tried to think on it further, and nodded off while still in-process on that. She was no closer to a decision today, but somehow found herself less unsettled about the whole business.
At length, Buffy announced, “Not getting any more tingles, so I’d say the fields have gone down. We can move without being marked and traced, so it’s time to wind up our little weekend holiday. Thoughts?”
“I wouldn’t mind getting back home,” Thomas Magnum observed, with a sidelong glance at his daughter, “but there’s no urgency on that. Retirement gives a man some flexibility.”
Lily chose not to say anything, so Eliot spoke up. “No other jobs going that we had to postpone for this, so I’m still free for a bit, unless something comes up.”
Hardison nodded at that. “Yeah, well, me ’n’ Parker are gonna go back and check the offices, but right now I’m thinking we could use a vacation from our vacation, y’know what I’m sayin’?”
“Right,” Buffy agreed. “Likewise, I’ll get on the line and find out if anything’s come up in the Jeopardy categories for Doom and Destruction. See how it goes from there.”
After that, nobody spoke. Not a hint, Lily concluded, but letting the opportunity be there. “I haven’t made up my mind yet,” she said. “There are a lot of things I’ll want to know first, so right now that is my decision: find out all the things I need to know to decide.” She turned to Buffy. “I’ll say this much, though. If I do stay with this, I’ll want it to be working with you.” And, looking around the table, she added, “And if there’s any way it can be done … I’d want it to be all of us.”
Some of them looked slightly surprised, but none dismayed. (Hardison … for Hardison, ‘resigned’ might be the right word.) “Okay,” Buffy said. “Okay.” She looked around the table herself, and smiled. “No promises yet, but … we’ll just have to see what we can work out.”
Choices. Opportunities. And then watching to see where the chosen road led.
THE END
Banner by aadler
Window of Opportunity
(the Turning Points Remix)
Copyright November 2020
Disclaimer: I don’t own the characters or settings of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, or of Magnum, P.I., or of Leverage. I’m not even sure who does own them, but I’m playing in these worlds for fun, not profit.
This remix let me expand my own previous drabble “ Mixed Heritage”, combined with some of the possibilities opened out by JediButtercup’s induce me to unfold series (with the Buffy/Eliot part first being seen in “so immovable a dislike”). The result is posted for cof_remix’s Round 10.
Plea for mercy: Sorry, but I can’t get the timelines to sync. Magnum, P.I.’s run was 1980-1988, Buffy’s was 1997-2003, and Leverage’s 2008-2012. For Lily Catherine (Hue) Magnum, born in 1981, to be 14 in a time where Buffy has partnered with much of the Leverage crew, simply can’t be made to work out. So don’t try, just relax and suspend disbelief and go with the flow.
***
This had been a hard one, no getting around that. Buffy had faced more supernatural threats than she could count, but it was always trickier when civilians were involved, especially when she was also cut off from her normal support system. And most especially when the threat was centered around a 14-year-old girl who couldn’t be completely shielded because she was an integral part of the situation that had to be resolved. (As a long-time Child of Destiny herself, Buffy had plenty of sympathy for someone who’d just had the whole business dumped on her without warning.)
With the battle itself done, though - and successfully, no friendly fatalities - it was time for the pesky wrap-up part of the process.
“I’ll be honest with you,” she told Lily Catherine Magnum, who was sporting bruises and scratches but was otherwise miraculously unharmed (miraculous in that it had taken Buffy and Lily’s own best efforts and the frenzied protectiveness of four non-supernatural protectors and a heavy dollop of luck to bring the girl out unscathed). “I’m not really any good at this. I mean, explaining the facts of demony life to teenage girls, I do that a lot, but …” She shook her head. “It’s always been Slayers, others like me, who could already fight even if they might need to be shown how, and I could tell them exactly what the choices were. You, you’re just a totally different case.”
“Yeah,” Lily said, nodding gravely. “You tried to explain it, and the demons - the ones who said anything instead of just coming at us, or maybe while they were coming at us - had their own take on it, but I never really understood what it was all about.”
“Right, welcome to the club.” Buffy sighed. “The scrolls didn’t give us much, and I will be so glad to get back with Giles and Willow so they can do the big deep-research voodoo they do so well, but basically you’ve been chosen by Fate, and not in the usual Slayery way that gives you superpowers to go against the big uglies that’ll be looking for you. There are going to be demons and cultists out there that want to stop you, and others that want to use you, and others that’ll just think that makes you an extra-tasty treat. Welcome to the usual universe of fun.”
“And I’m stuck with it,” Lily said. “No way out, this is just how it is from now on.”
“Well … probably,” Buffy said. “Or maybe. There might be ways to pull it off you, that’s another Giles-and-Willow deal we’ll have to check out. And if there’s an exit clause, and you want to go for it, I won’t blame you. You’re not supposed to have to grow up for another four, five years, fourteen is just not the time to have something like this dropped in your lap. Been there, so I know.”
Lily frowned a little, studying her. “But you stayed with it.”
“No choice then,” Buffy told her. “And now, yeah, I’m kinda glad I’m still in the fight instead of touring with the Ice Capades, but now I am the grown-up I didn’t believe I’d ever live to be. It’s not the same for you.”
“But what do you think?” Lily insisted.
“I think, if you’re given a choice, that means you’re the one who gets to make it.” Buffy crimped her mouth a little, shrugged. “Look, you already know about the downside, the danger and misery and no-normal-life and probably-an-early-death part. The upside, though: what little info we had makes it sound like you’re … I don’t know, I guess Willow would say a ‘potentiator’. When things could go either way, you seem to be able to effect which way they can go, which in so many situations can be a major deal.” She looked away, not meeting the younger girl’s eyes. “If you decide to give that up … well, I said it’s your choice and I meant it, but you should just make sure you know what you are giving up if you go that way. And that’s as much as I’m going to say on this.”
“All right,” Lily said. “Thanks.” She was quiet for a minute or two, and finally said, “I guess I should talk to my dad.”
Buffy nodded. “Probably a good idea. I was a little worried about him at first, he just did not want to believe, but when it came to crunch-time, he really stepped up.”
“Yes,” Lily agreed, smiling. “He does that.”
***
On the bed in the upstairs room of the small house rented as an impromptu HQ by the combined crew - and Lily still didn’t fully understand how that particular group dynamic had come about -Thomas Sullivan Magnum IV, Commander U.S. Navy (ret.) was stretched out trying to give the impression that he was humoring everybody else by resting, rather than having any particularly pressing need for it. He was a big man, and had stayed stubbornly in shape, and remained impressive and even formidable in many ways, but time just wouldn’t be denied past a certain point. He’d returned to the Navy after a long hiatus, and then later transferred to the Reserve to allow him to stay in even longer, but eventually had reached the official age limit and been forced to make his second transition back to civilian life.
Lily had worried a little about that, though he’d done everything he could to give the appearance that he was solidly coping. (Well, that’s what he’d do.) Now she had considerably more to worry about.
In the foreshortened preparation for the eventual attack, he had stubbornly refused to accept Buffy’s insistence, backed by Eliot’s, that firearms weren’t the weapon of choice against demons, mostly because he hadn’t completely accepted the idea of demons until he saw them. When the horde broke into the vacant church where Lily’s protectors had set up their last stand, though, he’d played it smart, going for head-shots and kneecapping with his beloved .45 and then wading in with a spare sword when there was no longer time to reload. No real skill with the sword, even Lily could see that, not compared to Buffy or even Eliot, but he’d been totally committed … that being the source of the injuries that now had him laid up, and also one of the reasons they’d all survived. Because it had been really close.
He didn’t look … old. Not really. But he did look tired in a way Lily wasn’t accustomed to thinking of her father.
He greeted her with the grumpiness that generally manifested when he was distressed by something and didn’t want to admit it. “So are they still trying to give you the recruiting pitch?”
She smiled at him. “Actually, Buffy was saying they’d find out if there might be a way for me to get out of this, if I want.” She saw him catch the qualifier, which meant no putting it off before getting to the point. “Dad … why did you go back into the Navy?”
He regarded her, not quite frowning, doing what he could to shield his feelings. “Because, looking back on it, those were the times when I was the best version of myself.” He didn’t try to pretend not to recognize the subtext. “But I didn’t re-enlist to go back to war, Lily. Not with a young daughter.”
Lily considered that. “Maybe not as a full time thing,” she said. “But, much as you tried, you still wound up being away a lot. More than you wanted, I could see that.”
He shook his head. “Those were training missions.”
“Right. To other countries. During wartime. Doing things you couldn’t talk about when you came back.” She held up a hand when it looked as if he would protest. “I’m not complaining. I love you, and I’m proud of you. But part of that is because you always did … you always do your duty.”
His eyes were troubled, almost as if they were hiding pain. “This isn’t your duty, Lily Catherine.”
“Maybe not. That’s what I need to decide.” She went to the bedside and took her father’s hand. “And I need you for that. Not to decide for me, but to help me decide. Because …” She leaned forward, kissed his forehead. “… because I don’t ever want to look back and know I turned away from what would have been the best version of me.”
He stared back at her, frozen, almost stricken, and at last gave her a short, reluctant nod.
She still didn’t know what the decision would be, but she knew the man she had loved and trusted for as long as he’d been in her life, would make every effort to provide her with his best judgment. And that would just have to do.
***
Hardison’s frenetic pacing was making Parker impatient. Everyone knew what happened when Parker got impatient (and Hardison had reason to know it better than most). Still, they had something of a history by this time, so Parker suppressed - for now - the normal impulse toward a more extreme response, and demanded, “Okay, is there a problem?”
Hardison glared at her. “Problem? Problem? What, can’t a man get a little freaked when the whole world goes freaky?”
Parker scoffed at that. “You’re acting like this is all new. We’ve backstopped Eliot on this kind of thing before.”
“Yeah, sure, but that was support, that was, was theoretical. That was with us enough in the background that I could believe it was all a big joke, and the weird stuff we did see was just special effects. This was there, this was right in our faces, those things were trying to eat that little girl!”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Parker corrected irritably. “Us, maybe, but they needed her in one piece for whatever they were planning.”
“You think that makes me feel better?” Hardison was trying hard to maintain his normal grouchy-carping demeanor, but the strain was still showing. “Okay, pitching in to help Eliot score points with his new squeeze, sure, I’m down with that. I got crazy lucky with you, why not help spread the joy? But there is no joy here, this is straight-out Hellraiser Evil Dead stuff!”
Her only response was a little shrug. “It was kind of fun, actually.”
“Somehow I knew you’d say that.” He pulled himself together, sat next to her on the bed. “Sweet girl, this business is pulling us in deeper and deeper. Extra little favor here and there has turned into some-more, and then some-more, and then alla sudden we’re re-enacting the Alamo against extras from the Mines of Moria. It’s not just that this isn’t what I signed up for, this isn’t what I’m good at!”
She gave him a little punch in the shoulder. (Parker being playful. Very creepy.) “Come on, you did great!”
“I’m alive, which is a hell of a lot more than it was looking like for a while there.” He sighed. “You did great. I think Lily got more out of the ‘stealth moves’ you showed her than training from any of the others … ’cause let’s face it, Buffy is superhuman and Eliot damn near, and you’re not normal but at least it’s human not-normal, you could teach her something she could actually do. But I’m a keyboard warrior, and that was just not my gamescape at all.”
Parker stood up. (Hardison was good, being with Hardison was good, but too close for too long was still too much.) “Okay, sure, things got a little hairy for a bit there, but it all came out okay. We’ve had that happen lots of times. This is just one more.”
Hardison shook his head. “This is not the same thing and you know it. We do cons, that’s what we do. This is combat, which is a whole other deal.”
She studied him, slit-eyed, as if trying to read something in a code she didn’t know. “It really bothers you that much.”
“I think if we’re not careful, we’re gonna wind up doing more of this than we can handle,” he said. “Okay, than I can handle. I’m afraid I’ll … let you down.”
Feelings were not Parker’s province. She sat down again, frowning, clearly uncomfortable. Hardison shifted to the other end of the bed, automatically granting her space. After a long while she said, “What we’ve been doing since Nate brought us together … helping people … This new deal with Buffy is a different way of going at the same thing. So if we don’t do it, less of it gets done. And people who need help don’t get it, or maybe don’t get it in time.”
Which was a very hard argument to refute. In fact, slot it in with ‘impossible’. Hardison sighed. He’d done his best. “If you really want to do this,” he said at last, “then I’m in.”
Her reply was longer in coming. “If you really don’t want to … then I’m out.”
Well. Okay. Still didn’t settle which one it was going to be, but okay.
After a few minutes she put her hand out beside her, without looking at him. He took hold of it, carefully, and they sat without saying anything.
***
Eliot found Buffy in the kitchen, studying the directions on a box of mac ’n’ cheese as if they were written in Sanskrit. (Given her previously demonstrated ‘cooking skills’, they very well might be just that indecipherable to her.) He knew she’d heard him come in - probably had a basic position-lock on everyone in the house - but he greeted her cheerily all the same, it was just polite. “Hey, Buf. Looking to expand your skill-set? Because you know cuisine is where I’m the Slayer.”
“Yeah, yeah.” She stuck the box back up into the shelves. “I’m just rattling around till we can do something else. We’re still in the ‘job’s done’ part but not yet over into the ‘move on to the next thing’ part. Makes me restless.”
“I can see how it’d do that,” he agreed.
“And even if we managed to save Lily for now,” she went on, “she’s still been shoved center-stage into the Apocalypse Sweepstakes. I wasn’t much older than she is when I got drafted by the Powers That Be. I can remember how that felt, and it really, really sucks.”
“Uh-huh,” Eliot said. “Anything you can do about it that you haven’t already done? or are set to do?”
“No,” she admitted. She shot him a piercing glance. “Not getting the sense of a lot of sympathy here.”
He shrugged. “Hard times, yeah, we avoid ’em when we can. When we can’t, though … going through ’em, that also gives us something that’s worth having.”
She looked away, and muttered, “Well, aren’t you just a ray of sunshine today.”
“We all could have died,” he said to her. “We didn’t. That’s a win, and I’m good with it. Anything else is extra; it comes along, fine, but right now we have what we have, and it’s enough.”
Her face closed, and she sat down at the kitchen table. “Oh, great,” she said. “Just great.”
He took a chair across from her. Whatever was going on here, it seemed that she was finally getting to it. Once that was out, then would come picking a response.
“I’m glad you were here,” she told him. “The Zmotischk’k Clan … I might’ve been able to take them myself, I’ve faced numbers before and I’m still here, but I don’t think I could’ve done that and kept Lily alive. You and your friends made all the difference, and I’m grateful.” She looked up at him. “I just don’t know if I can give back what it’s worth.”
“This was worth doing all by itself,” he told her. “You don’t owe anything.”
“Not … not exactly what I meant.” She frowned, studying her closed hands on the tabletop. “Eliot, this thing … the you-and-me thing … that’s been great. I love being able to be with somebody without having to wade through drama. I love not having to lie to the guy I’m with, and it’s pretty good when that guy can hold his own if my professional life decides to invade my personal life. And you having friends who can actually help? huge bonus.” She grimaced. “I just … I keep feeling like what we have is, is good enough that there ought to be more. And I’m really, really bad at ‘more’. And taking what you give, when I know I’m still putting up shields, that’s just really not fair to you.”
Eliot smiled at that. “Met a woman a while back,” he said. “Lot like me, lived the same kind of life, did the same kinds of things. There’s a solid possibility that she shot me once - we were on different sides in the same theater and she’d done some of that as a sniper - and it … well, for the kind of people we were, knowing it was possible actually made a kind of connection.” He gave Buffy an amused look. “Nothing came of it, but we could have. You, me, this? Better. If there was more, better yet … but if there never is, it’s still damn good.”
Buffy thought about that, sighed. “So you’re okay with, with how things are.” She shook her head. “And I’m not sure I am, but I’m the holdup. Why can’t life ever be simple?”
Eliot chuckled wryly. “Because we’re us.”
They sat together in silence. “I’ll try,” Buffy said at last. “If I want more, I’ll just keep trying to, to be good for more.”
Eliot nodded. “All a man could ask.”
***
It was morning. Eliot had made breakfast, and everyone happily attacked it. Lily studied them all. Her father was moving a bit stiffly (Buffy and Eliot had done basic combat-medic treatment on the clawed shoulder, given that there were very few regular doctors who could have been shown such a wound), but seemed generally back to his normal self. Buffy and Eliot were both physically fine, of course; as a couple - which Lily was sure they were - they were easy with each other, comfortable and even teasing, which had been somewhat less evident in the previous few days. Hardison and Parker seemed more thoughtful, more reserved than usual, but she couldn’t feel any tension between them, so maybe they were just in an introspective phase.
Which she could certainly understand. It was basically where she was right now.
She and her father had talked well into the night, but she’d cut it off before a continuation would have deprived him of sleep. She’d tried to think on it further, and nodded off while still in-process on that. She was no closer to a decision today, but somehow found herself less unsettled about the whole business.
At length, Buffy announced, “Not getting any more tingles, so I’d say the fields have gone down. We can move without being marked and traced, so it’s time to wind up our little weekend holiday. Thoughts?”
“I wouldn’t mind getting back home,” Thomas Magnum observed, with a sidelong glance at his daughter, “but there’s no urgency on that. Retirement gives a man some flexibility.”
Lily chose not to say anything, so Eliot spoke up. “No other jobs going that we had to postpone for this, so I’m still free for a bit, unless something comes up.”
Hardison nodded at that. “Yeah, well, me ’n’ Parker are gonna go back and check the offices, but right now I’m thinking we could use a vacation from our vacation, y’know what I’m sayin’?”
“Right,” Buffy agreed. “Likewise, I’ll get on the line and find out if anything’s come up in the Jeopardy categories for Doom and Destruction. See how it goes from there.”
After that, nobody spoke. Not a hint, Lily concluded, but letting the opportunity be there. “I haven’t made up my mind yet,” she said. “There are a lot of things I’ll want to know first, so right now that is my decision: find out all the things I need to know to decide.” She turned to Buffy. “I’ll say this much, though. If I do stay with this, I’ll want it to be working with you.” And, looking around the table, she added, “And if there’s any way it can be done … I’d want it to be all of us.”
Some of them looked slightly surprised, but none dismayed. (Hardison … for Hardison, ‘resigned’ might be the right word.) “Okay,” Buffy said. “Okay.” She looked around the table herself, and smiled. “No promises yet, but … we’ll just have to see what we can work out.”
Choices. Opportunities. And then watching to see where the chosen road led.
THE END