Time: Thursday 4/30/98, 4pm, Liam's hotel room, Toronto
Place: The Fiendish Glow
Follows: A Brief Interlude
Lora Conk, Jessica Murray, and GSS Phantom are used with permission.
Daniel Patrick Kelly, Dennis Cleary, Ronnie O'Mannion, Deirdre, and Colleen are fictional characters.
Liam O'Neal is the Irish vampire hunter in the second-season Forever Knight episode, "Bad Blood"
[Kris Kristopherson's Help Me Make It Through The Night and Jefferson Airplane's Don't You Want Somebody To Love are real; names are provided to give credit where due and no copyright infringement is intended to the artists.]
[Thursday 4/30/98, 4PM, Liam's hotel room]
Liam checked out the equipment he'd laid out on his bed -- all he would need for the evening's activities. He'd seen The Fiendish Glow's flyers around the city and had a feeling a few vampires would show up that evening: he was ready for them.
His plan was to attend the opening, wait until a few vampires entered, then trap them there using specially blessed lamb's blood. The bogus shamrock- shaped "seals of approval" from the Irish Culinary Heritage Preservation Bureau looked innocuous enough, but laminated inside each was a layer of the lamb's blood that would ensure that no vampire would be able to pass within two metres of them, which would work well on The Fiendish Glow's two entrances. One seal on each side of each door would do. In addition, some specially-treated electrician's tape would pose as an in-window security system, preventing the vamps from jumping out the windows of the cantina.
Once he had a few trapped, he had three choices: to re-enter the club and start taking them out one-by-one at his leisure, to wait outside until all the "mortal" guests were gone and torch the place, or just wait until his shamrocks were discovered and pick off the vampires as they exited.
He rejected the idea of torching the place -- too much chance of innocents dying since he knew the two managers probably would remain, plus a few of their security -- as much as he disliked the "boys", he was still an officer of the law, and they deserved hanging, not torching.
His weapons were few, but deadly to vampires. His collapsible crossbow with three bolts went into his pant-leg; his pennywhistle with both garlic and curare darts went into his jacket pocket; his gun went into its holster. His gun was his crowning achievement -- actually, the bullets were. He'd designed them himself: standard propellant in the back of the chamber (by firing ring) to launch them; the main chamber filled with ultrafine, packed sawdust for filler (wood); a hollow point at first third of the chamber to cause tissue damage. Additional propellant in the second third of the chamber would ignite when the hollow point collapsed, sending shards of sawdust everywhere in the vamp's body. Just to be on the safe side, though, he'd added garlic oil to the sawdust, which worked great when it came to packing the material in the chamber.
He slipped the shamrock "seals of approval" into his pocket, downed a couple of "no-scent" garlic pills -- guaranteed to ensure that he reeked of garlic breath for at least eight hours -- then took off for The Fiendish Glow.
[5PM, Thursday, street entrance to The Fiendish Glow]
It had been a slow afternoon. Lora and Ronnie had checked in very few customers so far. Fortunately, the dinner hour was fast approaching, so she still had hopes.
"Just go' another couple," Daniel's voice came through her earpiece.
"You're doing better that we are, Danny -- keep up the good work," she said quietly through her mike. "Two more via the metro entrance," she told Ronnie.
"I' 'll pick up soon, m'lassie," Ronnie assured her liltingly. Lora suddenly reached for her sword and Ronnie wondered hesitatingly what he said to ire the feisty redhead this time. Then he noticed her gaze was not at him; he spun just in time to see a short fellow-Irishman approach. "Can I help ye, sur?" he said politely, remembering his agreement with Lora regarding the "warring factions."
Ronnie was to play the polite, protective one -- to pull/push/drag whoever started trouble out of the way of Lora's sword. Seeing the man's age, Ronnie wondered which "faction" the Irisher belonged to -- his employers had told him that most would be in their twenties or thirties, yet this man was at least fifty. Also, being a Celt, the man by all rights should belong to the Glow Worms, but Ronnie had also been told that many Glow Worms this war were hanging out with their earlier affiliations (Glow Worms being a new faction and all). Also, considering Lora's reaction to the Irishman, Ronnie knew the man couldn't be a part of her faction -- she just wasn't capable of having ire toward her mates.
All these thoughts took only a moment in Ronnie's head. Before the shorter man had gotten under The Fiendish Glow's overhang, Ronnie had sized the man up as not affiliated with the "war" he'd been told of and so still wondered what had set Lora's back up. When the Irisher was within a few feet of the two, Ronnie signaled to him to remove his hat, as there was a lady present.
Lora kept one hand on her sword as she extended her other to the newcomer. "How nice of you to come by, Inspector O'Neal," she said in an oh-so-polite- but-not-so-warm tone.
At the mention of the name, Ronnie's back went up as well. He mentally hit himself for not recognizing the man right off -- this was the man who'd had the permits! As O'Neal passed him Ronnie was nearly knocked over with the man's breath -- he reeked of garlic.
Under Ronnie's stare, Liam quickly removed his hat. "Top o' the even'n to ye, Miss Conk!" Liam said, taking her hand and shaking it firmly. "Since uy sampled yer fine cuisine yesterday, uy felt it only proper to come buy an' pay for a meal today. An' sample som o' the fine entertainment you hav planned."
"Thank you for coming," the near-redhead continued. "Please do come in and enjoy. You know the way to the pub area, but if you need help finding a table, just ask for Dierdre."
Although her smile was friendly, Ronnie could clearly see the ice flash in her green eyes. Once again, Ronnie reminded himself to always stay on her good side.
[7:30PM, inside the pub area of The Fiendish Glow]
"Lora?" Brenda again said, tapping the mike on her earpiece.
"Hang on," Lora's voice came through.
At the street entrance, Lora patted down the Phantom one more time. Again, she couldn't find anything. Brenda told her extensively about his affiliation with the GSS, and so Lora just knew he had to be carrying something. She kicked herself mentally for not being able to find it.
The young man sneezed.
Brenda had also told her about his allergies.
"Go on in," Lora resignedly said. She turned her attention to the next in line -- another who was obviously dressed as an warring faction member. She scanned her memory of all the FK eps as she analyzed the woman's outfit. "Okay -- you got me," Lora finally said. "What's your faction?"
"A Die-Hard!" Jessica responded, smiling. "I heard you have Karaoke Thursday nights."
Lora nodded with a friendly grin for the newcomer. "Last I checked, you're faction's still neutral, right?"
"Yup. Have you checked out our museum yet?" she asked.
"Not yet," Lora replied, "but I hear you have some really cool stuff."
"That we do!" she said smiling at both Lora and Ronnie, who waved her into The Fiendish Glow with a slight bow.
"LORA!" Brenda's voice came through everyone's earpiece.
"Oops," Lora replied to her friend meekly. "Bob's on his way down," she said, recovering quickly. "I couldn't find anything on him, but keep a close eye on him, will you?"
"No problem," came Brenda's reply.
[8:55PM, inside The Fiendish Glow's pub area]
Brenda tapped her mike again; Lora couldn't be that busy! "Lora," she tried again.
"Hi! What's up?" came her friend's reply.
"No one's signed up yet -- you're going to have to do it."
"You're kidding." Brenda could feel her friend's heart sink.
"I've got the GT's you need waiting for you at the bar. Get down here -- I'll send Siobhan to take your place until you're done."
[9:01pm]
Lora downed the second double gin & tonic before heading for the stage. She had the feeling this would happen -- no one ever wants to be the first, and so she had volunteered to "break the ice" for everyone else. She shook her arms right before she took the microphone from Colleen -- The Fiendish Glow's karaoke announcer -- and said to the crowd simply, "Be kind to me," which managed to elicit a few laughs and scattered applause from half-full room. The strains of music were so familiar as her eyes drifted to the monitor; she eyed the words that awaited her. She knew she didn't need them, but they were her security blanket.
"Take the ribbon from my hair," she began Kris Kristopherson's Help Me Make It Through The Night (and what she occasionally called "Help me make it through this song").
Wow, Jessica thought, listening to the Glow Worm's dulcet tones and watching her well-practiced performance. She had been expecting to hear Celtic folk tunes or ballads, not C&W. She quickly made her decision to head down to sign up for Jefferson Airplane's Don't You Want Somebody To Love.
"Ready to sign up?" Colleen asked.
"You bet!" Jessica said with a smile, wondering if she should dedicate it to Fox Mulder. The lines "When the truth is found to be lies/And all the joy within you dies. . . " just oozed Fox.
[Midnight, inside The Fiendish Glow]
Liam got up to leave. He couldn't take anymore of this. He'd come here for fine Celtic entertainment, not this karaoke! What was worse, no vampires had shown up.
As he walked toward the stairs, a young man bumped into him. "Sorry," the young man sneezed.
Liam mentally shook himself as he ascended the stairs. That was the third time this evening that boy had brushed up against him. He fingered the crosses in his pocket and thought about giving one to the fair-skinned, claymore-toting manager. Again he shivered thinking of his earlier encounter with Brenda when he'd tried to give her one. That one had nearly removed his head, and she didn't carry a sword! He shook his head as he walked out of the place, barely hearing Lora's "Thank you for coming" as he passed by her and headed toward the street and his hotel room.
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NEXT STORY: SUPPORT YOUR LOCAL
PUB/CANTINA
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