TITLE: Tourist Trap
AUTHoR: MikeJaffa
SYNOPSIS: An in-joke with InuskyeYash.
DISCLAIMER: Burst Angel is owned by Gonzo. There really is a store just like this in Niagara Falls, Canada, and I changed the name to avoid a trademark infringement. But it shouldn't be too hard to figure out what it is; just add one letter.

8

8

"Damn it, Meg!" Jo grabbed Meg's hand and dragged her away from the hot dog stand, pulling her down the street in Niagara Falls, Ontario. Jo didn't pay attention to the glitzy shops, but she'd had to yank Meg away from every food vendor they'd seen.

"I'm hungry," Meg whined. "You know getting kidnapped makes me hungry." The job in Niagara Falls had given Sei a chance to showcase her new sub, the *Elizabeth.* But other than that, things had gone true to form with Meg being kidnapped. Again.

"Yeah," Jo groused. "And when I got to you, you'd polished off your captors' deep dish pizza and you were halfway through their soda. You shouldn't be hungry after only twenty minutes."

"My blood sugar's crashed. I have to eat-"

Jo brought them to a halt and got in Meg's face, the storefronts behind the redhead. "Meg," Jo said, "you mean everything to me, more than anyone else, but that doesn't mean you don't drive me crazy! Having to worry that you'll get kidnapped if I let you go to the bathroom by yourself is bad enough. But most of our earnings go into stuffing your face, with a little leftover to buy ammo for me! Is it any wonder we can't afford to buy pants? And on top of that, you're supposed to be on a diet for chrissakes! Now, Sei wants us back at the ship and damn it, we're…going…to…" Jo trailed off and stared at something over Meg's shoulder.

"Jo?" Meg waved a hand in front of Jo's face, but Jo didn't respond. Meg looked over her shoulder at the logo in the store's glass window:

THE PEPPER PLACE

She could see shelves along the walls and they were lined with little bottles of hot sauce.

Meg turned back to Jo, only Jo wasn't standing in front of her anymore. She looked left and right and saw Jo just in time as she went through the store's front door with the reverence of a devout Catholic going to the Vatican.

Meg's phone rang.

Meg checked the caller ID; it was Sei. She answered the phone. "Hey."

"Meg?" Sei said. "How soon can you be back?"

"May be a while. Looks like Jo is going to gorge herself on hot sauce."

"Meg…for crying out loud, you can do better than that."

"Hang on a minute." Meg put Sei on hold. She took a picture of the storefront, opened the door, and took a picture of Jo waiting in line. She put both pictures in a text messge to Sei, sent it, put the phone back to her ear, and waited.

Sei came back after a few moments: "Oh, all right, I suppose I can wait another hour…"

THE END