MUNCH

Another thrilling briefing(or possibly indoctrination) at Wolfram & Hart. “You’re late,” Lindsey said. “Don’t make a habit of it.”

My internal clock led me astray again, damn it.Evil apparently always wears a watch. But I’m not going to let this little pisher tell me anything.
“Abreit macht frei, eh, Commandant?”I stop just short of clicking my heels together, but I’m muscle now... I can be a bastard if I feel like it. “I’d surely hate to waste my abilities with a roving pack of Fyarls,but I’d be willing to take a pay cut to get some respect.”

“Now, I’m sure nobody here wants to do anything rash...the firm is counting on us. Detective Munch does have to use the sewers to travel...I’m sure it’s time consuming.” Lilah said.

I knew I’d win her over. But she won’t look my way..Lindsey looks like he wants to say something else, but she raises one eyebrow and turns a look on him and he shuts up. Please, darling, tell me how you do that...I want to ask, preferably after I taste the coffee breath from those beautiful lips.But the silence goes on a little too long, and even I get a chill, or since I’m cold all the time now, a phantom chill, like people feel pain from their amputated limbs.

Honestly, I’ve not stuck out this badly since that awful summer after the newspaper, but before the police academy, when I wrote fortune cookies. Not surprisingly, they thought my work reflected a certain nihilistic quality people wouldn’t want with their chicken lo mein.
Every once in a while, I still see the one they kept, “Don’t expect romantic attachments to be logical or rational.”But apart from that,they told me my fortunes put people off their food. Can you believe that? As much bad Chinese food as there is criss-crossing this great nation, and it’s all my fault?

I waited around afterward, outside the door, to see if Lilah would talk about me with Aryan Ken.(They had to have fucked...why else would they distrust each other so?)

“Are you sure about this one?” Ken(I mean Lindsey) said. “The Senior Partners haven’t really forgiven us for the Faith debacle. And, you know they don’t...give many second chances.” Was it me, or was Mr. Perfect afraid? I could swear he was.Part of me loved hearing it, and part of me dreaded anything that could get up a Hitler Youth member’s skirt.

”The problem with Faith was her poor impulse control,” Lilah pointed out. “I can reason with this one...he thinks he’s an intellectual.” Ouch. And these are defense lawyers? Obviously, I’m not getting her best material.

“What if he decides to start a revolution, Lilah?”

”I’ll take care of it...the best way to kill this guy is to love him.”

“Just so we find the new muscle at AI. Some repulsive demon or something...I’ve no doubt. I hope this guy can kill it, if he has to.”

“Don’t be so species-ist, McDonald...your precious Darla’s a demon...your beloved Angelus,too...and we can’t let your self-loathing make murder the first resort.We’re lawyers...threats and intimidation are our first weapons. It worked in Florida, didn’t it?...I really ought to get out to Kennebunkport one of these days...Poppy’d love to see us...well, me. I think he finds you a bit nouveau. Poor man’s from an era where that matters.”

Holy shit...all this looking for a conspiracy, and I had to die to find it. I tried to block out her sexy laugh, and how long her legs looked in her short black skirt...the thrill when she said my name. On to the easy part...the Hyperion. A stakeout without bodily functions should be a cakewalk.-more-

KAY

Wesley can’t believe what I’m telling him, even though it’s been three times. “Like I said before, I kicked it in the nuts and my bunky Gunn there cut its head off, while it staggered.”

”Without incantations or an amulet?” Wes asked. “You could’ve been killed. Or worse.”

“I know some things about fighting, Wesley...they taught us the academy. Go for the eyes, throat, or(and for some reason this felt embarrassing to say) basket. It’s not that h...difficult, huh?”

“What if you fought something that doesn’t have a ‘basket” as you put it...then what would you do?”

“Well, if it’s a he, no wonder he’s cranky...”

“Yes, I know, you’re terribly ribald and clever, but it’s a serious question.”

”I don’t know, Wesley...take it one step at a time, I guess...I’ve got stuff to do upstairs..”.like find a dictionary so I know what “ribald” means.

“Cordelia, what’s a bunky?” I guess I wasn’t the only one with a vocabulary question, huh?

“Don’t be so species-ist, McDonald...your precious Darla’s a demon...your beloved Angelus,too...and we can’t let your self-loathing make murder the first resort.We’re lawyers...threats and intimidation are our first weapons. It worked in Florida, didn’t it?...I really ought to get out to Kennebunkport one of these days...Poppy’d love to see us...well, me. I think he finds you a bit nouveau. Poor man’s from an era where that matters.”

Holy shit...all this looking for a conspiracy, and I had to die to find it.

(planning vow renewal with erika in groovy Vegas chapel)

Connie, could you come over to Bitches for a moment?

This week's drabble theme is: use one of the four elements.

Earth

She came awake suddenly, too suddenly. From perfect quiescence, the quiet of oblivious unending sleep, to the critical heart-starting shock of blood moving through collapsed veins, new flesh blooming on dead bones, muscles that had become the consistency of jerky suddenly coming alive again, rediscovering themselves - it was too much, even for her.

A lid screwed on tight, imprisoning walls. She began to breathe, remembering fiery holes in the sky, her sister screaming, the ground that she lay in now, coming closer as time ceased to matter.

Buffy, embedded deep in earth, began to claw at her own coffin.

Absofuckinglutely, Deb...sorry after the finale of SATC, have it on the brain. CN is still the only man who could call me "kiddo" and you know, live.

Funny or not? Cause I don't need help making me laugh...and I've got enough stuff to write,
On a Fictional Manhattan Elevator
>

We see Detective John Munch starting his day with, well, his usual attitude....standing in the elevator, mumbling about some injustice or other. The elevator stops on a floor and dings. As the door opens, we see Samantha Jones, overdressed as usual. She is debating whether to get on or wait for another elevator.

MUNCH: You know, lady, they stopped issuing invitations for these things years ago...make up your mind...while we’re young.

SAMANTHA: In that case, I’m about...fifteen years too late then. Going down?

MUNCH: Not after that, I’m not.

SAMANTHA: I meant the elevator.

MUNCH: Sure you did, babe. And that’s the face you were born with.

SAMANTHA: Well, it’s mine now. I paid for it.

Hee! Banterlicious.

Second drabble in the elements theme; this time fire.

Fire

There was sunlight in his veins.

It happened fast, the way he'd have imagined, had he given it any thought. A creature of the darkness, of unending night, possessor of a soul that did nothing but hurt, no matter what he did - and here he was, deep underground, and the sun was moving through him like a flash flood of solar flares, uncounted atoms of raw heat under his dead blue skin.

He stood, and laughed, and marvelled, flesh and blood and bone burning away as he channelled the power of the light.

And he saw how it ended.

Wow, deb. You have a way of making powerful moments even more powerful.

Thanks, sj. After all, he did say he wanted to see how it ended....

One final elements drabble, for all of them.

Elemental

It only took a moment to die.

From inhale to exhale, the briefest moment in history - it went like this:

First, the sound of air whistling, surprise, cold steel embedded in the soft toughness of the human heart.

Next, the slow icy burn of the bullet, so small, so infinite in its hurt; the froth of water boiling up in dying lungs.

Finally, the sorry dance of gravity, falling into death, earth to earth.

It takes longer to tell than to feel, to end, to cease to be.

Inhale, exhale, a look of surprise. She never heard Willow screaming.