And a little something extra, too, just for the hell of it. This was on the Livejournal a bit back but I wanted to give it another go at life.

It's kind of AU, but only for the sake of sticking Anderson in Europe when he ought to be in South America. Other than that, everything should be peachy.

Seras wandered, and lost herself, very much on purpose.

They were talking about important things, again, which meant that she wasn't part of the conversation, again. Which normally meant it was Bother-The-Pervert time, except that she could smell better than a bloodhound even on her worst days, and South America was hot, and, well, there hadn't exactly been a shower on the plane. She wasn't going near the man until he'd gotten some shampoo into that ridiculous braid of his.

So, she wandered up and down the hallways, bored and feeling pretty useless. And angry, too, at the fat little man on the television screen. She hoped she'd get the opportunity to shoot him for real, eventually. He'd sent a child, was the thing, an unusual one, but a child nonetheless, and that was what had her angry. Children weren't supposed to have to be a part of something like this. Children weren't supposed to have to –

Seras stopped and took a breath. Carefully, she squashed that bit of rising ire back down in the bottom of her mind. She wasn't like that. Anger was wrong. Fighting was wrong. People didn't deserve rocks thrown at them for personal slights. So went the buzzing in her head.

She was concentrating very hard on this, and when she started walking down the hallway again her little mantra went in time with her footsteps. And besides, she had to walk carefully anyway, so that what she'd found earlier didn't prick her skin through her pocket.

So she was distracted, which meant she didn't notice the noises coming from around the corner up ahead; the muttered sounds of frustration, the squeaking shriek of furniture being pulled across stone floor, and the deep, rumbling brogue that said: "Oh, yeh've jest got to be keddin' me . . ."

Seras rounded the corner. She was at the end of a long hallway now, lined with a few wooden benches on one wall and flanked with windows on the other. Potted things at either end put on the general appearance of plants.

Sunlight came in through the windows, but it was pale and filtered through an overcast sky. So it wasn't the light that stopped the girl short in her tracks, so much as it was the massive, broad-shouldered frame of a too-tall man in an ash-grey cassock, crouched on the floor and staring intently behind one of the benches. He'd pulled it away from the wall, and was talking to himself, quietly.

"Saint Anthony, Saint Anthony . . . "

Seras made a noise. It was a lot squeakier and higher-pitched than she would have liked it to be. She gasped, and clamped her hands over her mouth at the same moment that the man on the floor whirled and looked up at her, suddenly very aware of her presence and his awkward position.

Not that it really mattered. Before Seras could even let out a proper scream, Father Anderson was up, the distance between them closed and his massive, gloved hand clamped over her face so she couldn't make so much as another squeak. Seras grabbed at his hand and tried to pull it away. She slipped in the action, and her boots scrabbled against the floor in a useless panic.

"Please," Anderson said, and for a moment Seras stopped, and realized to her surprise that the look on the great man's face wasn't fury, or battle-lust, but simply tired exasperation. His glasses were gone, his brow sagged, and he slouched where he stood. "Please," he said, "Don't scream, all right? Ah've enough of a headache t' deal with already, y'ken."

Seras hesitated, unsure, and then nodded. Slowly, Anderson unwrapped his fingers from her cheek.

"Thank yeh fer that," he said, and turned back to the bench.

Seras' knees were still shaking. She suspected she'd be wanting to throw up at the moment, had she actually eaten anything recently to do it with. "I, um, jeez." Talking was still a bit difficult. Seras persisted. "I thought you stayed back in South America?"

"Fer aboot an hour, aye. It'd be a bit silly fer a mess a' folks like Iscariot t' only have one private jet lyin' around, don't yeh think, lass? I got in jest after all the shootin' and yellin' bits."

"Oh. Okay." Seras stared at her feet, feeling silly. She still felt like it was odd for Anderson to be here, for some reason. "You're, um," she said. "You're not going to, you know. Try to kill me or anything?"

Anderson didn't look round. "Queen's here, lass," he said. "Ennybody tries t' make a fuss in fronta her, that's jest plain stupid. It's only most a' the Tower they let the tourists into, y'ken." He bent over, scrutinized the floor behind the bench, and then shoved it back into its proper place against the wall. "They'd have a field day with me, yeh can be sure, too: 'Oh, look, it's th' oddest thing, sir, we've given this basterd all we can, yeh see, but 'e jest keeps commin' back! Yeh stick 'im and it fixes itself! Do we get paid overtime fer this, do yeh reckon?'"

Seras snorted, in spite of herself. A short, dry, humorless shard of a laugh. She still wanted to run, but the feeling was lessening, now. Now she was just trying to stop shivering, and wondering what the most tactful way to avoid eye contact would be if the man ever turned around to look at her.

Anderson ran a hand through his hair. "'Sides, I haven't really any care for yeh, lass. It's the big one I want. Yeh're like, like huntin' a duckling wi' a sledgehammer, do y'ken? It'd be unsportin' of me."

Seras scowled and looked at the floor. "That's what everybody says," she muttered.

Anderson stopped, and turned back to look at her, finally. He stared at her for a moment, the little girl with her knees together and her shoulders down, scrunched up small. He snorted, and dropped heavily onto the bench. His legs, huge as they were, practically filled up half the hallway. Seras felt tiny next to him.

"Is that really what they say a' yeh?" Seras wasn't sure, but it seemed as though the rumble of his voice had suddenly turned a degree or two more . . . paternal?

"More or less," Seras said. She ran a nervous hand along her arm. "Nobody takes me seriously. They all think I'm weak, or that I'm scared."

"Well if I were you, lass, I'd stop pissin' an' whinin' and shape up and do somethin' aboot that, if'n it bothers yeh so much. Whimperin' en't gonna make ennybody think yeh're ennythin' more'n a crybaby, yeh got that?"

"Hey!" Seras started forward. She felt anger flash inside of herself for a moment; teeth getting sharper, eyes getting darker. Half a second later, the feeling was gone, and she was back to standing on slightly wobbly feet and keeping her head firmly down.

"Better," Anderson said, appraisingly. "But yeh've got a long way t' go." He gestured to the spot on the bench next to himself. "Go on, sit down. It's not like Ah've ennythin' better t' do at the moment. I'm not goin' t' be finding them ennytime soon, that's fer certain."

"I thought you hated to be around unholy creatures," Seras said. She was, she noticed, at least relaxed enough now to be facetious.

"Ah reiterate, lass," Anderson replied. "Yeh're not a demon, yeh're a fuzzball. Sit."

Seras did so. "Um," she said, as something occurred to her. "Finding what?"

"My spectacles," Anderson said, sounding impatient. He twirled one enormous finger in a figure-eight motion around his eyes. "Th' little circular things usually hangin' off a' my face, y'ken. Ah've not got a headache fer nothin', all right?"

"Oh. Sorry."

"Don't worry yerself, lass. Ah doon't think they'll be showin' themselves ennytime soon. Been lookin' everywhere for 'em, aye? Lord above knows I go through enough pairs a' the things already. Those were even my spares, ken, yer big red fellow goin' and smashin' t'other ones and all."

"Sorry."

"It's not yer fault, lass. Saints." Anderson slouched farther in his seat, and examined the girl next to him. "What is it thet makes yeh such a pusho'er, ennyway? That's what Ah'd like t' know."

Seras harrumphed. "Well, what I don't get is why everybody thinks I can just switch to being a, a monster-soldier or whatever with no trouble at all. I didn't ask for any of this, you know. Well, I mean, I did, but I think my better judgment was kind of impaired by the bullet hole the size of bloody Cardiff going through my stomach."

"Nobody asks fer anythin', lass," Anderson said. "That's th' point. It's all a big test, like. Yeh've got t' rise t' whatever gets plunked down in yer path in life, no matter if yeh spent yer whole time before hidin' an' bein' useless in th' back o' nowhere."

"I was not being useless," Seras retorted. Her teeth grew sharper for a moment, again. "I was a copper, and a bloody good one at that." She huffed. " . . . Well, a bloody competent one, anyway. But that's different. It's not like being a soldier, is what I mean."

Anderson stared at her, his face a mask of disbelief. Then, unexpectedly, he laughed, long and loud. His guffaws echoed up and down the long hallway. "You?"He wheezed, between bouts of laughter. "You, a doubleyeh-pee-cee? I dinnae believe it. Yeh'd've had me fooled forever, lass, if'n yeh hadn't told me."

Seras drew her knees in to her chest. "It's just regular PC these days, thank you," she said, icily. "And yes, I was. What's so strange about that?"

Anderson's laughs died down to a breathy chortle. He grinned, hugely. "Ah, Ah've no idea, really. Yeh jest don't seem the type fer it. What in th' world'd make a sweet lass like yerself want t' be a police, eh? Ha."

Seras studied her shoes, intently.

The hall grew quiet. Minutes passed. Slowly, gradually, the huge, wide grin on Anderson's face melted, vanished, and became something else entirely. He looked at the bunched-up girl with a dour face. When he finally broke the silence, his voice was quiet, and it didn't echo in the slightest.

"That bad, eh, lass."

It wasn't a question. Nor was it a certainty. But it would have been difficult not to at least get the gist of things from Seras' heavy breathing, or her thousand-mile stare, or the way she kept clutching at her sleeves, clenching and un-clenching the wrinkled yellow cloth.

"Yeh've lost yerself, lass," Anderson said. He put an arm out, but didn't touch her. "A lot of us lose ourselves, at one point'r another. But yeh're still lookin' fer the little girl yeh were, when yeh need to be the woman that yeh are. Th' one who can fight, ken."

"I can't," Seras whispered, into her knees. "I can't, I can't, I can't."

Anderson frowned, and prodded her in the head with a finger. "Did yeh ferget, lass, all that I were sayin' before aboot not pissin' an' whinin' so much? Not one o' the children Ah've in my charge have the fool sense t' say they can't in front a' me."

Seras turned to look at the man, who still loomed large over her even when they were sitting down. That knot of fear returned, but she stared at it for as long as she could manage. The eyes, she kept reminding herself, couldn't see her back. Not clearly, anyway.

"Why are you telling me all of this?"

"Because Ah want a fight, lass, no' a fuzzball. Fire an' anvil, 'steadda duckling an' sledgehammer, ken?"

Seras rubbed the scar on her neck, and the half-dozen spots in her uniform that had had to be re-stitched. "That didn't stop you the first time, you know."

"Consider that wishful thinkin', then. Ah'll only be lookin' on yeh as weak if'n that's what yeh give me to look at, lass. Go an' find yerself, so's the next time we meet, an' there's blood 'twixt you an' I, Ah can see hell shinin' through yer eyes. Deal?"

Seras didn't relax. "I don't know how," she said.

"There en't ennybody on this mortal coil jest knows how, lass," Anderson said. "But I can give yeh a start, if'n that's what yeh meant." He reached out, and plopped a huge hand on the top of Seras' head.

Anderson closed his eyes. "Dear Saint Anthony," he began, and the words filled the room. "Please come down. Somethin' is lost, an' cannae be found." He removed his hand. "There. How was that?"

Seras stared back, incredulous. "I would have expected something a little less casual from you," she said.

Anderson snorted. "Well, I would'a expected somethin' a bit more pointy an' bloodthirsty outta you, so I suppose that makes us even." He rubbed his eyes. "An' that prayer goes for th' both of us, by the way. Damned spectacles. Now go on, lass, get on an' wander off 'fore my headache goes away an' Ah decide Ah'm in a more productive mood, y'hear?"

Seras stood up.

Anderson glared at her from the bench. "And don't be forgettin' aboot our deal, neither. Fire, lass. Hellfire, burnin' an' blazin' from th' depths o' yer eyes. Ah won't settle for ennythin' less."

"It's a deal, Father," Seras said, with something almost approaching a smile. "Oh, and by the way . . . " She pulled a twisted, mangled thing of wire and glass from out of her pocket. "I found these a little way back in the halls. But, um, somebody appears to have stepped on them. By accident. With boots on."

Anderson stared, dumbfounded, at the remains of the glasses. Before he could even rise from his slouched position, though, Seras had tossed them on his lap, spun around, and gone running back around the corner and down the halls, almost, almost managing to suppress the first real laugh she'd managed to have since the start of this whole mess.

She skipped, and the floor blurred beneath her feet, and through twists and turns she wound her way back to the world, and to the little broken mess of people she was starting to love like a family. To prove herself, she thought. To make them proud. To fight. To win. Fidelity, Bravery, and Integrity.

And all the way, singing to herself, "Saint Anthony, Saint Anthony . . . "