we have found our solace here in this unexpected place

[herotypical]

Who: slaying & lists_to_port
What: there is a tradition that needs to be upheld on the eves of horrors.
When: sunday night.
Where: good spirits, at first. then elsewhere.
Summary: debriefing and de-traumaing and all kinds of good stuff.
Rating: danger danger high voltage -- things get r-ratedish. fair warning!

Back on Friday, Buffy had scribbled a tense little note to Captain Jack Sparrow:

Need some time. Don't worry. Mission accomplished -- no deaths. Just gotta look after me for a bit. Good Spirits on Sunday night?

-- Buffy

After returning to the village, Buffy had wanted nothing more than to find the pirate and curl up next to him. But the fight with Derek had been harder than she would care to admit and she wanted to scrub as much of that from herself before rejoining the rest of Luceti. She had Giles to look after and she had her own mind to tend to and she spent hours focusing on those meditation crystals -- begging for peace. Peace was so far away.

But on Sunday, Buffy took a long long bath. She put loose, fashionable curls in her hair and she took the luxury of all the time in the world to dip into her make-up drawer and line her eyes and mascara her lashes and pick a natural, light lip gloss. The aim was to look healthy if she couldn't look happy.

She walked into Good Spirits with apprehension in her step and looked around for the man she had asked to meet with her there.

Comments

[all7seas]

With a very serious expression on his face, the pirate continued to play with her feathers as he considered this conundrum, stroking them against the grain of the feather before reversing direction and smoothing them out again.

"Most of your run-of-the-mill law enforcement types, my love, are not clever. Although I've met one here who might be a bit moreso than most..."

Thursday Next. He still had her notebook, which he had been reading avidly. Jack wasn't sure what to do with this bit of leverage yet; perhaps it would be better not to reveal it to Buffy just yet either, even though her name figured prominently in it alongside several others.

[herotypical]

"...Booth?"

The name and the curiousity was out before she could stop it; she immediately felt guilty. Bringing up Angel's look-alike (though she hadn't yet named the doppelganger to Jack) certainly seemed like the wrong thing to do when that stroking pattern on her wings was sparking electricity in her shoulder blades. Against the grain, it felt like a mounting and twisting tension. The smoothening that followed undid it all briefly and would bring her nestling closer.

After a sweet few seconds of enjoying this, she rushed to clarify: "He just...seems like one of those clever-type badges. FBI, though. So I'm not sure he counts as run-of-the-mill."

[all7seas]

"Booth? Hmm. Not certain I've ever heard of him, darling."

Jack had spoken to Booth once, but the other man had never introduced himself by name.

[herotypical]

"New Feather. One of two FBI agents all in one cycle." And Buffy had managed to befriend both of them. "His partner's not an agent, though. She's a scientist. And also kind of lacking in a personality."

She ever-so-casually began the same process she had engaged in on the eve of the last experiment. Almost compulsively, Buffy tidied and ordered his feathers. One by one. "I mean that in a nice way, of course."

As if that could ever be classified as nice.

[all7seas]

"Lovely. Two law-enforcing clever clay-made fun-ruining prats--just what Luceti nee---mmmmm. Needed."

It was expected, of course, that Buffy Summers would cozy up to agent-y types. Jack wasn't all that fussed. He was also enjoying having his feathers sorted too much to pay it any mind.

[herotypical]

"He didn't come across as fun-ruining. Neither of them did." She ran her thumb nail along one or two feathers to straighten then out next to each other. "One believed in aliens. Mulder." Buffy delivered this name as if it should mean something before her mind caught up to her mouth and -- oh, yes. Why should Captain Jack Sparrow be at all aware of X-Files? "And I guess Booth's non-skeptic about the whole supernatural thing."

She shimmied closer. "His partner is, though. Oh!" Buffy found a light grip on one wing before leaning backward and undoing most of that shimmy's work. "He calls her Bones. How much of a coincidence is that?"

1/2

[all7seas]

"Mmmm, that's very nice, Annie--very nice indeed. You can keep doing that for a bit, as I---"

[all7seas]

"Bones?"

Things were beginning to click into place.

"Also goes by the name of Brennan? Temperance?"

[herotypical]

"That's the one."

Buffy didn't so much mind Brennan as simply hardly understood her. Too stiff. Too standoffish. Too stubborn. Strange judgments coming from someone like her. But Buffy did know that she much preferred the company of Seeley Booth -- though she worried over how much of that preference sprang from his appearance. "Apparently she's some kind of very important person in the world of science and pocket-protectors."

[all7seas]

"So this 'Booth,' then, is her partner? I believe I've spoken with him. Surprisingly, Annie, I don't think he liked me at all. Threatened to shoot me, actually."

Jack stretched with added nonchalance and folded his hands behind his head, leaning slightly to the side so she could access his feathers and do that lovely thing she was doing more easily.

[herotypical]

"...To shoot you?"

No, she wasn't in the least bit surprised. "Huh. And there he was telling me this charming story about buried pirate gold." But she was a little concerned. Buffy had no doubt that Jack must have done something to deserve the threats -- he was not in the least bit angelic even if he was generally non-violent.

She took to his body-language invitation with gusto and actually began to coax the pirate onto his stomach. Then, she could reach both wings rather than one.

[all7seas]

Obedient to that coaxing, Jack rolled over, laying his head on his arms and letting his thick black hair fall around his face. He wriggled slightly in anticipation of more of her attentions, not unlike a happy spaniel.

"To shoot me. And that man wouldn't know pirate gold from Spanish silver, I reckon."

Really, Jack had done very little, or so he thought. Of course with people being from such different worlds, it was hard to tell what would set one person off over another.

[herotypical]

"Maybe. Maybe not. But he told the story with pizazz." Of course, there was the part where the big fancy museum was involved. But she didn't argue the point and instead threw one leg over Jack's waist and used an arm to push herself up into a sitting position.

She pressed her palms against his back -- just below his wings -- and leaned down for only a moment. "Apparently some bitter mine worker stole three hundred year old pirate bones from a museum and tried to pass them off at a dig as Blackbeard's."

Okay. So maybe she did want to argue. Just a little bit.

[all7seas]

Buffy might not have felt the pirate tense beneath her at that revelation. His head rose from his arms a fraction of an inch. Then, very softly:

"Oh.


Museum, eh?"

He wondered whose bones they really were, if they hadn't belonged to that fearsome pirate. Angelica's father....

Would he have known the man? Could he be the man? Leftovers to spice up some tale an annoying bastard told to impress the beautiful woman Jack loved? Not buried with honor at sea, to be brought by and by on the Dutchman to the next life, but left in some curiosity cabinet to collect dust and the stares of the mildly-curious? Leverage for a filthy underground workman to grind his axe? Okay, that last part didn't sound half so bad. But still...it was unnerving.

"Blackbeard would not be pleased to hear it."

[herotypical]

She initially steadied herself by leaving one palm on his skin; free fingers could now more earnestly work their slow, careful way across the lowest feathers. Buffy's repositioning under the comforter caused it to slip away and pool -- down by the slayer's ankles tucked by his thighs.

"The something-sonian. I don't remember the name. Still? I don't think it's the same Blackbeard that'd be your room-mate." Different worlds, after all. She knew that much. But what she didn't realize was that the actual Blackbeard of Earthish lore was who Jack was also talking about.

"The whole conversation did remind me about how I've never even heard you do any of the normal piratey sounds."

[all7seas]

At "sounds," the pirate relaxed again with a happy moan, because her fingers were in his feathers again and all was right with the world.

Once he gained a bit more control, he was able to respond: "Not---mmmm---not that Blackbeard, A-annie. Edward Teach, as was. Angelica's---he is...was...a pirate, savvy?"

[herotypical]

"...He was real?"

Control's overrated, Jack. Give in. Or at least, this was the message that Buffy's fingers were sending to him via his wings. In contrast, her voice was just a little smug. "A-anyway. I think the whole point was that the skeleton was definitely not Blackbeard's, 'cause that was what they were supposed to be finding and the bones were actually some other pirate's from the museum."

[all7seas]

"Wonder who he could have been." That troubled introspection was back, now. "Poor devil, eh?"

[herotypical]

And it was the kind of introspection she wanted to steer the two of them away from. There had been so much of that earlier. "They did find a coin. So maybe there was treasure there after all, at one time."

Buffy paid the most attention to the smaller, softer feathers. They felt very rewarding to her fingertips. Fluffy and pettable. "Though -- is it true? The treasure-burying part?"

[all7seas]

"Hmm?" The mention of treasure roused him from those darker thoughts. "Treasure? Aye. Blackbeard's treasure is legendary, darling. Every pirate seeks it or dreams of stumbling upon it one day. I wouldn't touch it, myself--not with a harpoon and a hundred meters of rope."

At "rope," he drew a quick breath---fluffy and pettable and sensitive and more, please.

[herotypical]

"...Why? I mean -- that sounds like all kinds of decided. You're not even a little interested?"

Her steadying palm lifted off his back; after all, she hardly needed it. It had felt warm and comfortable on his skin but now she could thread two hands' worth of fingers through soft lower feathers.

[all7seas]

Jack was more than a little interested; anyone who could pluck that much booty out from under Blackbeard's nose would be the finest pirate in the world indeed. Unfortunately, there were other concerns where Blackbeard was concerned that he did not feel like getting into right there and then.

"Let's just say he's not the most friendliest of pirates, Annie. Your Booth would have probably wanted to shoot him as well."

And as she sank her hands into his wings Jack Sparrow arched his back beneath her--it was just that right kind of ecstasy, really. The kind that burns a little going down but has a brilliant aftertaste.

[herotypical]

"...Yeah, Jack? Don't call him that. Just -- "

She bit down on her lower lip. It was a good moment and she didn't want to pour salt all over that. But the notion of that possessing word -- no matter how often Jack normally used it -- being applied to the man who looked and sounded like Angel? Buffy would not have been able to predict the extent to which her stomach turned. "I barely know the guy."

[all7seas]

"I didn't mean--not like that, you know." Why was she being so defensive? "Annie?" Even though it meant abandoning that lovely feather-petting, Jack tried to twist under her so he could face her. Things had been awkward enough tonight--he needed to see her, to engage with her more than was possible in this position.

[herotypical]

She untucked her knees at his sides and gave him the room needed to turn and re-arrange his position. Buffy had drawn her arms back and now worried her bottom lip with her thumb.

"He threatened you, hm? Did you see him?"