fandomtownies | Luke's, Thursday Afternoon

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Luke's, Thursday Afternoon

Hardison had assumed that Luke's would be chaos today, with the mistletoe flying around. Luke's staff was socially awkward at the best of times and having plants zooming about waiting to divebomb you until you made out with someone was hardly the best of times. But when he came downstairs for lunch, the diner was surprisingly...peaceful. Well-behaved, even. Cook was cooking, the dishwasher was washing dishes, and the busboy was covering an empty cardboard box with wrapping paper.

"What's that for?" Hardison asked him, helping himself to a bowl of stew. "Decorations?"

"Nope!" the busboy replied, carefully making sure the pattern of the paper lined up around the edges. "We're having a food drive. This is for people to put donations in."

Hardison hadn't been expecting that answer. It was very mature. And responsible. He was starting to worry the diner staff had been replaced by pod people. Well, it was only a worry because he'd probably feel moved to do something if he found that out for sure. Hopefully they'd never say.

"That's cool," he said, giving the busboy a thumbs up. "Yo, put it in the front window right next to the Specials sign, so everyone'll see it."

Today's Specials
Beef Stew with Rosemary Bread for Dipping
Garden Lasagna
Cinnamon Roasted Almonds
Please feel free to donate to our FOOD DRIVE!

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Parker had her reindeer antlers on. And her elf outfit.

The almonds were disappearing at a very fast rate. "Do you think Santa will visit early this year? It's been so ... CHRISTMAS."

"No," Eliot said. He'd swung by to check on some paperwork. Running a diner involved way too much paperwork. "Or if he does, it'll be evil Santa or something and we'll have to take him out."

"Nooooooooooo!" Parker glared at him and pointed. "That's Krampus. We're getting Santa. No evil Santas this year!"

"Tell the island that, not me," Eliot said. "Anyway, you wouldn't want him early. It'd make Christmas . . . less special. Or something."

Eliot was not really big into Christmas. He liked giving people presents well enough (and had no objections to getting them, either), but the trappings of it all mostly just irritated him. He'd done his stint as a mall Santa. He figured that was plenty for the rest of his life.

Parker gave this a sober nod, though, and beamed up at the mistletoe. "The Island loves Christmas as much as I do. It'll do right by Santa." There's a little bit of mistletoe over your head now, Eliot.

Eliot glanced up at it suspiciously. Self-animated mistletoe. Sure, because that couldn't possibly --

The mistletoe swooped down and smacked him upside the head. "Hey!" He grabbed at it but missed. "What the hell?"

Parker leaned in to kiss him in the cheek, since the mistletoe suggested it. "It just likes you!"

She made a grab for it, and--

then made a chirping noise. From inside the pile of her clothing.

"The hell?!" Eliot said again, this time with much, much more urgency.

As you do, when your girlfriend suddenly vanishes in front of you.

. . . Without her clothes, which was -- something. Eliot leaned over, grabbing for her shirt, trying to find a clue. That was a distinctive chirping. Probably. He had no idea what that distinctive chirping meant.

More wriggling from inside the clothing, and then a snow-white ferret with dark eyes was staring up at Eliot. It made an inquisitive noise at him, and then turned around in a circle, examining itself.

Hunh.

Eliot flinched back, startled, then stared at the ferret.

". . . Parker?"

Yes, he'd heard of this happening. Often enough that he checked about it when encountering an unknown animal. But he'd never actually seen it happen before.

A confirmatory chirrup from Parker, and then she was swarming up his arm to chitter in his face.

This was so cool, Eliot! Think of all the places she could get into!

Okay, so either the ferret was Parker or it wanted to eat his face.

Or both.

Also, the mistletoe was whacking him in the head again.

"I'm not kissing a ferret!"

He was, however, going to lift a hesitant finger and see if the ferret would let him touch it.

Parker arched into the touch, and rubbed her face against his fingers. Still chirruping her commentary on the situation.

An animal transformation for Christmas! So awesome!

"This is extremely weird," Eliot told her. And then, because the mistletoe was still whacking at him, very carefully leaned down to kiss her on the top of her tiny ferret head.

Awwww. Parker bumped her nose against his. Then started to climb down to explore the rest of the diner. Because it smelled so interesting right now!

"Wha -- Parker!" Eliot tried to grab her as she went, but she was extremely wiggly right now. And tiny. And easily lost or trampled underfoot -- "Dammit, Parker!"

Parker gave the ferret equivalent of a giggle, and scooted under a booth, then along the floor under another table, heading for the vents.

She bet she could bite those gremlins good now.

Eliot attempted to chase after her, but there was no way he even came close to fitting through the same spaces she did when she was human, much less a ferret.

"Oh great," he grumbled, giving up. "I lost Parker. How the hell am I supposed to explain that one to Hardison?"

After his stew was finished, Hardison had run up to the apartment to make sure his laser sword was in proper working order for tonight's showing of Space Battles. "Parker, you ready for tonight, babe?" he called.

Silence. Huh.

Maybe she'd gone down to grab something to eat? Leaving the sword on the table, he jogged back downstairs. "Yo, any y'all seen Parker?" he asked. "Eliot?"

Hardison had quite possibly never seen that brief look of panic that crossed Eliot's face before.

"Um." He looked to the vents, then towards the kitchen. The kitchen crew were nowhere to be seen. He looked back at Hardison. "Parker turned into a ferret and ran into the vents."

"A'ight," Hardison said, nodding. "So long as she'll be back by toniii--say whaaaaaat?"

Yeah, it had taken a second for Eliot's explanation to penetrate the Space Battles haze.

"Ferret," Eliot said, his voice breaking faintly. He pointed at the clothes still sitting by one of the booths, a pair of antlers on top of it. "We were just -- talking and she -- the mistletoe -- and -- ferret."

"Eliot." Hardison started rubbing the bridge of his nose. "Eliot. Please tell me you're messin' with me an' that our girlfriend is not currently runnin' around as a mustelid."

"What? No. She's a ferret." Wait. ". . . That's the latin name for ferret, isn't it."

"Give the man a prize," Hardison grumbled, flinging himself into a booth. "Is she, like, still her, just, like, a ferret? Or is she a ferret all the way down."

You know, he'd never had to say that sentence before Fandom.

"I don't know, man, she's a ferret!" Eliot wasn't not really handling this well. What if someone stepped on her? "She ran up my arm, chittered at me, let me pet her, then she ran into the vents. . . . So she's probably her."

"That's...somethin', at least," Hardison said, slumping forward on the table. "At least we ain't gotta worry about her, I dunno, skitterin' down into the furnace or somethin'."

Probably?

"You know animals have self-preservation instincts, right?" Eliot shook his head. "I mean -- I heard of this stuff, but she just -- one second she was there and the next she was a ferret!"

"What good is self-preservation instinct if she ain't know what a furnace even is?!" he demanded. "I can't believe you let this happen!"

"She can tell it's hot!" Eliot rolled his eyes. "And let nothin'! You couldn't even stop her runnin' into a vent as a human, much less a ferret!"

"Who's worried about Parker runnin' into vents as a person?" Hardison asked. "No reason to be concerned about that! But lettin' her just scurry off on all four legs? That's damn irresponsible!"

No, he couldn't have done anything better. But he hadn't been here and he was still aggravated by Eliot, so...

There was mistletoe swooping wildly over Hardison's head. Eliot didn't trust it as far as he could throw it. MAYBE THE MISTLETOE MADE PARKER A FERRET. "She's still Parker! If anything, she can probably get around even easier in there!"

Of course there was. It totally wanted them to kiss. Angry-kiss or kiss-and-make-up, it didn't really matter.

"That don't mean we want her to!"

"Of course not!" The mistletoe jingled merrily. Or would have if it had any bells on it. Eliot growled and snatched it out of the air, throwing it at the wall.

It stopped in midair and zoomed back over to bop around above their heads again.

Okay, apparently he couldn't throw it very far.

That was fine, Hardison was trying to swat it out of the air like an oversized housefly.

"So what're we gonna do?!"

Eliot sighed, glaring at the mistletoe. "Unless you can fit in the vents in here -- wait till she comes back."

"That's the worst plan I ever heard," Hardison complained. Not that he had a better one, he just hated that one.

Look, he was worried. No one he loved had ever turned into an animal before!

It wasn't like this was known territory for Eliot.

"You got anything better, I'm all ears."

Hey, Eliot had a whole year on Hardison when it came to dealing with Fandom!

"Could we...lure her out somehow?" he suggested. "What do ferrets eat? Or should we use diamonds instead?"

Ten months, technically.

". . . Fish?" Eliot guessed. "Mice, maybe? Her teeth were pretty sharp." She'd chittered right at his face, after all. "Diamonds are probably a better bet."

Same ballpark! Look, it had been hard enough to go ten months without him. A whole year would have been impossible.

"...You got any handy at your place?"

Because Hardison wasn't going to mess with Parker's if they didn't have to.

Eliot gave him a Look. "No."

Did he look like someone who kept diamonds around?

"Food it is, I guess."

What? He didn't keep some handy for Parker-related reasons? Hardison had, but then Parker had stolen them all.

"Lemme check what ferrets eat, I guess. Unless you wanna put out cereal-covered donuts."

Okay, he was going to put out donuts and whatever ferrets normally fed on.

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Luke's, Thursday Afternoon

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