| Thin Ice |
[05 Jun 2008|10:57am] |
“You’ve been told to stand down too, huh?”
Spike hadn’t even heard Faith come in. It took a few moments for what she said to register, the vampire sighing as he tossed the letterhead to the floor. He stopped once his eyes met the Slayer, seeing her standing in the doorway to his crypt with her arms folded. Spike sucked in his cheeks, shaking his head.
“So, they conned you too, eh?” the vampire smirked.
Faith shrugged her shoulders, taking a moment to remove her ID from her tank top and shove it in her pocket. If the government was suddenly going all incognito with the whole deal, walking around with an official name tag probably wasn’t a good idea.
“I dunno, Mr. Spike,” she said with a half-grin. “It’s actually not that bad. Especially since we’re still gonna get paid during this hiatus.”
The Slayer took a moment to look around, shaking her head with a sideways grin. The considerable pay raise Uncle Sam was giving them and still, Spike shacked up in this crypt. She supposed windows weren’t something he was looking for, but still – why not upgrade the abode a little?
“Just didn’t expect a vacation so soon.”
( Media Overkill )
Faith disappeared into the night before Spike could say anything in return. He stared at the slightly-ajar door to his crypt, the cigarette stuck between his lips but going unsmoked. Faith had really started to care about this; she saw it as a chance to really make her mark on things, without playing second-fiddle to Buffy or anyone else.
Spike understood that philosophy – that was most of why he bothered signing up – and the cease-fire was an annoyance to him. But it seemed it was more than that for Faith, and Spike couldn’t help but wish he could do something about that.
Another glance at the paper. Something told Spike things were going to get a lot worse before this was all said and done.
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| The Five Stages of Panic |
[05 Jun 2008|02:39pm] |
Panic. The beginnings of it, anyway.
Mallory had read the Beacon article with a mixture of relief and trepidation, wondering who had spilled the beans. Or rather the van, she supposed. After a terse phone conversation with Agent Markowitz, the redhead stowed her badge in the medicine cabinet of her trailer. Her orders were to stand down until further notice, just until the higher-ups behind Project Integration could figure out what had gone wrong.It felt like kind of a letdown to be sidelined so soon, but it only took her a day or two to realize she wasn't really that sold on the program anymore.
It was the gossip at the diner that had sent her up the highway, her ears ringing with the voices of the old folks who lived in Searchlight. The oldsters had devoured every word of the article as well, and a copy of a lesser-known tabloid had been circulating the room by the time she'd hastily finished her cup of coffee and tried not to run from the establishment.
"I'm tellin' ya, Roger, this whole business is all a cover-up for what's really going on!" Mrs. Abernathy had insisted to her nearest neighbor. She held the gossip rag aloft in one gnarled hand, proclaiming, "They're really aliens from outer space. This whole business about demons is just to fol us so we won't know extra-terrestrials have been living on this planet for years!"
Mallory had kept determinedly silent, hunkered over her plate of overcooked eggs and keeping her own counsel. If it were aliens, that would be easy, wouldn't it? But this was home-grown trouble, at least sort of. You didn't need people from space when there were worse things right here.
Now she was sitting in a bookstore, poring through a harmless murder mystery and just trying to pretend she'd never heard the word government. Why was it every time she made a decision it turned out to be wrong?
Thread open to Corbett
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| Unfathomable |
[05 Jun 2008|11:56pm] |
Drew Starnes had been working late a lot recently.
For the last couple weeks, as a matter of fact. Drew had always been fearful that his wife’s work would interfere with family life, but the occurrences of a couple weeks ago stepped over the line. His own son, for Christ’s sake … was nothing sacred to Michaela anymore?
Truth be told, though Drew spent many late nights in his office, it wasn’t necessarily to work on upcoming lectures or to grade papers. Though he probably should’ve been spending the extra time away from home concentrating on Civil War intricacies or the realities of Nazi Germany, he instead used the time to think.
And familiarize himself with an old friend, Jack Daniels.
Drew was proud of himself; tonight, he didn’t pour his first glass until after the sun went down. He’d spent three hours trying to perfect the syllabus for the History of Etruscan Civilization course he’d be teaching in the fall, and after all that time trying to figure out what to cover first, Drew felt he deserved a drink.
Besides, who was going to see him in the near-pitch black of his office?
( You suck (Adult Content: Violence )
[NPC Drew Starnes was written by Jeff.]
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