Yes, you should watch Justified...it's the shit(In a can't-gather-the-family-around-and-watch-it-violent-and naked sort of way. Although Raylan would think it very important that I tell you the violent and naked happen at *completely* different times.Of course, my mom and I watch it together, but we ain't right. So that's okay then(/Art voice) Of course, I love Elmore Leonard anyway. Well, except for that one minute after I read his writing tip that was "Cut out the boring parts," then, for one brief moment, it was like "Fuck you, too, Best-Seller Man," but I'm over it. Mostly.

Once again, not required reading [link]

"Cut out the boring parts,"

Basic stone sculpture.

1) Decide what you want the sculpture to look like.

2) Acquire block of stone bigger than that.

3) Chip away all the parts that don't look like your mental image in step 1.

Still, not quite that simple, but that's why he has two houses and I don't. D'oh, stupid know-it-all crime-fiction legends!

A quick "Lost Girl" Fic. I'm not sure I quite have the Morrigan's voice right.

"Don't worry," the Morrigan said, "I'm just here to buy you a drink and share a little girl talk… "

"But.." Bo began.

"I won't take no for an answer. Just a few minutes of queen to succubus talk before I head off to a less - human - place." The Morrigan glanced disdainfully around the hotel bar. "Or we can argue, which will prolong this, and probably add drama. I rather enjoy drama."

Bo flashed the hard empty smile that served her as a poker face. "You can buy me one drink. When I finish, so do you." She turned to the bartender "Same again please."

The Morrigan smiled. "I'm sure I can time things properly so that we finish at the same time."

She turned to Bo. "I'm not here to ask you to make a choice. I'm here to tell you that in your heart you already have." Ignoring the polite look of skepticism on Bo's face, the Morrigan continued. "You know that sacrifice is fundamental to light Fae and dark Fae alike. And you know that the two factions vary in a lot of particular customs. But the fundamental difference goes far beyond those particulars." A slight hint of interest showed in Bo's eyes before she could hide it.

"For example, none of us has much regard for humans. Differences between the sides are simply a matter of - well call it resource management. Two shepherds may disagree on how best to care for their sheep. But in the end the both agree that what sheep are for is wool and mutton. You on the other, at least claim a very different attitude towards humans, to have even mistaken yourself for one for years."

The Morrigan laughed her tinkling laugh, and all expression fled Bo's face. "If that is really your belief, then it makes your actions all these years - interesting. Killing your first lover, well if you were really raised in ignorance, you could not have known what you were doing in time to stop it. And perhaps with the second and the third you thought you had the will power for your love not to mean death. But very soon you must have realized that as long as you lived others must die."

"Not any more" Bo protested.

"And I'm sure," the Morrigan said, "that all those people you killed would be happy if they knew their deaths kept you alive long enough to live the life you wanted to live. Now, now, I'm the last one to criticize. I think you did exactly the right thing my dear. What are the lives of a few hundred humans compared to the happiness of someone like you? But you claim to believe humans are for more than feeding and the occasional pet. You could have ended your life and saved all the humans you knew you were going to kill month after month, when you believed (or so you say) you were one of them. Instead you chose to go on. A sacrifice could not be avoided."

The Morrigan looked at Bo with no trace of humor. "You chose to sacrifice others rather than yourself. And that is the true difference between dark and light Fae. In your heart you have already chosen. In your heart you are already one of us."

Ok, not just begging for compliments...(maybe a little...they're all I have, save my feminine virtue) but I really want someone Southern to go over this part. My grandfather was an Okie, but he died when I was nine.

Raylan had mostly chalked up the events of that Halloween party to alcohol, mixed with something transitory and demonic(He planned never to discuss it, but he hoped Dr. Walsh and the guys had stomped the shit out of it.) He'd almost shaken it off like a nightmare after a hard night of drinking, but then he saw her again. Buffy, looking fresh and lovely, and absolutely dominated by the yogurt machine. He realized he hadn't been paying attention to the guys' lunchtime chatter. Suddenly, it was as if he felt, rather than seeing, two pairs of Initiative eyes following his. "I would so hit that," Forrest told him.

“I think she’s too much for you,” Raylan suggested. “But be my guest.”

“Well, I wouldn’t want to step on your toes…bros before hos.”

“Don’t call her that.”

“He wasn’t.” Graham said. “He was just making a joke…a bad joke, but still. Personally, I’d be more worried about the intimate relationship she seems to be having with chocolate/vanilla swirl.”

Because Buffy had squirted the yogurt all over her hands, and despite his every romantic instinct, Raylan was reminded of the phone call he got the night before, he stayed silent.

“You sure know how to pick ‘em, Raylan Givens.” Art told him.

“I haven’t picked anybody yet, sir, but I’m guessing something came up in my background check.”

“You’d be guessing absolutely right,”

“Well, you know, I’ve been thinking about that…speeding tickets or underage drinking aren’t really a big deal to me. And the only reason I’d worry about a shoplifter is she might dump me for Arlo.”

“At least you’re over it,” his thesis advisor said lightly. “That’s the important thing.”

“Ok, now I know that there’s something you’re just dyin to tell me, so spit it out.”

“Well, in addition to the high schools, plural, she had some kind of mysterious role in the torching thereof, don’t worry, though, buddy. There’s just two, maybe you can chalk it up to some kind of experimental phase. Like a nose ring, or kissin girls… I don’t know why they say people in LA aren’t friendly…that principal couldn’t say enough about the million ways he hoped your Miss Summers would end up under the jail…we had quite a chat about the permissive nature of the juvenile justice system, wherein he made several noxious assumptions about my level of racial tolerance based on the place of my provenance…I’m telling you, Raylan, the South’s made its mistakes, God knows, but the rest of the country’s lucky to have us to blame…otherwise, they’d have to look in the mirror.”

“You had this conversation about *Buffy* Summers…blonde, pretty, no bigger than a minute…”

“The very same. Look, Raylan, you gave me the photos and stuff y’all secret soldier boys took…there’s no mistaken identity here. She was a cheerleader too, it was a real shock to everybody when she snapped.”

“ I…kinda wasn’t supposed to do that. If Dr. Walsh finds out…”

“Color me shocked. At least now I know it’s nothing personal…I was debating a change in antiperspirants.”

“You always smell fine to me, Art.”

“Now, that’s just cruel, Raylan Givens, makin’ with the sweet talk and being half the country away… you’re a cruel tease.”

“Ha, ha, but, Art, I know she didn’t snap.”

The criminologist turned serious. “You willing to bet your life on that, son?”

“Sir?”

“I swore I wouldn’t say anything about this other part, cause, Lord, you’re a grown man and incredibly smart, and if some barely-legal firebug love is what it takes to get the pressure off, then maybe you should get you some flameproof underwear and go to town.”

“Art?”

“I’m getting to it.”

“What would this story sound like if you hadn’t decided not to say anything?”

“I know, but I know you’ve got a vacancy (continued...)

( continues...) in the advice department…I wouldn’t feel right.”

“Yeah, yeah, I’m a fatherless child. And she’s not exactly barely legal…she’s twenty-two.” Raylan lied.

“Ok, what am I worried about? You like your pyromaniac mental patients squarely above the age of consent…well I might as well spit it out. Your girl Buffy was once charged with murder.”

“No! Who of…”

“Mother’s boyfriend. But this is the weird part… and you know how folks in police stations like to talk,so, take this with a grain of salt, but not only weren’t charges filed but this Ted fella was found never to exist.”

“Schroedinger’s vic…interesting."

“Raylan, be careful.”

“You know it.”

It seemed like simple advice, back in the barracks, but it was a different thing watching her stand in line in the student union, chocolate smearing her wrists…he had to admit, he’d thought of her so much the night before, he’d barely slept, and some part of his brain said “ Hell with it,” At least he wouldn’t be the only one with a secret anymore.

“I’m going over there,”

“Fucking finally,” his Initiative brethren said.

Can't help you on the Southern part. But I like it. Flows well.

Thanks...glad to hear it...maybe my Leonard impression is coming on well, at that.

My father's family are from the part of the South that leads us to sound like Larry the Cable Guy. I'm not sure that's quite what you want.