Playing With Fire

A/N: This story (and every other "Urban Legend") is set in a variant of Gryph's "Deep Water" universe, developed by Gryph and Laura Boeff. Godzilla: The Series to Toho and Tristar, the Real Ghostbusters to Columbia/DIC, Gargoyles to Disney and Buena Vista.

~*~*~*~*~

"Fire extinguishers?" Leaning against the H.E.A.T. Seeker's railing, Nick ran his finger down the checklist.

"Got 'em, jefe."

"Flame-retardant blankets?"

"Ready," Mendel said firmly, Nigel blinking beside him.

Nick hesitated as he hit the next item. Say it and go on. Just say it and go on. "Set to record, Doctors?" That's it. My name in the scientific community is now officially mud.

"We're fine, Nick," Ray Stantz waved. Egon Spengler barely glanced up from the PKE meter he'd just finished tuning, slipped a thin screwdriver into his jumpsuit pocket.

"Hole in satellite coverage?"

Monique's gaze flicked to her watch. "Thirty seconds."

"You know, you guys are way overreacting," Elsie said, clinging to one of the raft's lifelines. The raft itself bobbed on the waves, tied to the H.E.A.T. Seeker by one strong cable. Delilah gripped another lifeline, looking dubious and not a little seasick.

Randy leaned over the rail. "Yo. Who set off every smoke alarm in the building last night?"

"So we got a little carried away... Satellites, Nick?"

The biologist's lips were a thin, worried line. "Better safe than sorry."

"You don't think we'd get in trouble for trying this, do you?" Delilah glanced up nervously.

Nick grimaced. "You want to find out the hard way?"

"We are clear," Monique reported.

"Ohh-kay." Elsie drew a deep breath. "Tanllwyth," the paleontologist said clearly, holding out one open hand. "Fflam yma."

Pink fire burst into being in her palm, flames curling into shapes like falcon's wings. A bird of fire mantled on her hand, feathers wavery outlines of rosy sparks.

"Fascinating," Egon murmured; half his attention on his readings, the other on the fiery spectacle. "As we thought, Ray. The energies are closely related to spectral frequencies, quite different from the psychic spectra."

"Cool!"

Elsie swallowed. "So..." Her fingers were visible through the flames, obviously untouched. "Now what?"

"Experiment," the French agent said flatly. If the prospect of a team member holding live fire bothered her, it never showed. "Such creations are controlled by will. Movement, intensity - these are shaped by the force of your mind."

Curiosity prodded at Nick's mind. See?

If you want, the biologist answered, startled. He'd occasionally caught impressions through Godzilla's senses, but he still wasn't sure how much the lizard picked up from him. You could just come out here.

A sense of moving water surrounded him, echoing from the mind slipping into his own. Power, confidence; strength irresistible as the tide. See what you see.

Nick blinked, feeling the odd sweep of nictitating membranes across eyes that weren't his. There was the glint of starlight off the surface, the cool splash of spray as a massive head lifted clear of the waves.

"Whoa!" Randy backed away from the rail. "Thought you said the G-man was out fishing!"

Elsie blanched, rose light flickering higher over her face. "Oh, no."

"Hold the fire!" Monique said fiercely. Knees bent and tensed, as if she meant to spring over the rail. "Nothing else matters."

"It's okay." Nick waved off worry. Blinking again, against the curious doubling of images, the vertigo of two different sight angles. He could see Elsie from the rail; at the same time, he could see Nick's mate holding strange fire. "He's just - curious."

"Great. I get a lizard for an audience," Elsie muttered. Shaking her head, she twirled her fire-wreathed hand through the air, watching how pink flame followed her movements. Gradually the worry eased from her face, turning to bright interest as she cast fire up like a child's ball.

Godzilla's head tilted, tracking the glittering flight path. Playing?

Like a squid hunt, Nick agreed. This was what his charge had wanted, he realized; not Nick's vision, but his understanding of that sight. Like peering into caves. She wants to see what's there. What she can do.

Now Delilah was chanting, dark flames rising about her talons. Wonder danced in her eyes; she molded fire in her hands and giggled.

"You're sure this is safe?" Mendel whispered, hands dancing over his keyboard as Nigel recorded the fluctuating EM levels.

"Unless they decide to fry us," Randy pointed out. "You step on Delilah's tail lately?"

"It was an accident." A red flush rose in the roboticist's cheeks.

Thick brows waggled. "Gotta love those backless dresses, right Doc?"

"Yeah - I mean, no! I mean-"

Nick cleared his throat. "If you two are done with the homeroom gossip?" He pointed toward the raft, where black fire intermingled with pink, wrapping around and around in a helix of black-rose flame. "Be careful!"

The steady, high beeps of a PKE meter snagged his ear; Nick turned on the blond physicist. "Do you mind?"

Egon didn't flinch, completely absorbed in his equipment. "Simply confirming a theory, Dr. Tatopoulos." He re-tuned the meter, pointed it toward the raft once more. "While our equipment is well-suited to detecting paranormal phenomena of the spectral type, it appears to be less appropriate to studying empathic psychic abilities. Especially those exhibited by anincantares. The PKE intensity is strong, yet elusive. Not quite ordinary human biorhythms, though apparently they can appear to be." A blond brow arched. "Yet when the background PKE spiked due to the incantation, your aura appeared to shift to match it. Strange."

"That looks... almost like radar ghosts." Mendel traced a finger over the flickering readout on Ray's computer; the low-level background PKE of the ocean around them, the intense spike of magic, the faint, half-interpolated line that was Nick and Godzilla.

"Matching frequencies! Of course!" Ray grinned. "Stealth psionics!"

"Ray, psychic abilities are by their very nature nigh impossible for humans to detect. Why on earth would-" Egon stopped, pushed up red glasses thoughtfully. "I see."

"I don't." Though Nick was afraid he did.

"Creatures that can block or disperse psychokinetic energy would be considered a threat by most paranormal entities," the physicist stated. "Unless they could somehow disguise their presence, they would not survive."

"And the potential would tend to drop out of the gene pool, even if it were a true recessive trait," Nick nodded. Population genetics weren't his specialty, but he had looked into them to understand what he was seeing in his Chernobyl earthworms. Even if supernatural creatures only encountered a population deme once every two generations, that would be more than enough to wipe out a trait that couldn't hide.

"Which, given that both empathy and the ability to disperse magic appear consistently in your clan line, it is evidently not," Egon agreed. "Although that may be a statistical artifact caused by your family's traditional use of the ceasg cup to ensure viable offspring. Such psychokinetically charged items do tend to bring out recessive traits."

"And we can't rule out human behavioral aspects in maintaining the set of traits," the biologist nodded. Interested despite himself; if there were rules to the way the world seemed to warp around these people, if there were actual, scientifically plausible, statistically definable patterns to this frightening ability he possessed....

Then maybe he wasn't a freak after all.

No, Nick thought wryly, feeling Godzilla's puzzlement at his fear. Just a statistical outlier.

The polite, scientifically accurate term for freak. But it sounded so much better.

"Somebody want to translate that into English?" Mendel leaned back against the rail.

"Human nature, Mendel," Nick shrugged. "People tend not to go too far outside their own culture when they want a permanent relationship. We see it in any species where both parents contribute substantially to raising or protecting the offspring; birds, humans, a bunch of the crocodilians. You have more success raising offspring when both mates understand each other - down!"

Nick yanked Mendel back from the rail, dimly noting Egon knock his younger co-worker away from his equipment. Rose-tinged black fire shot overhead, embedded itself in the Seeker's deck. Tentacles of dark flame curled outward, engulfing Ray's computer in a shower of sparks, reaching out to entwine Nigel in a wildfire of crimson. Egon's meter wailed, lights flashing madly.

"Nigel! No!"

With an electronic shriek, the yellow robot crumbled in dark flame.

Randy pounced, extinguisher spewing foam. Black surged against white, struggled-

Died.

"Sorry," Delilah winced.

"You're sorry?! Nigel!" The roboticist picked up a flame-charred yellow head. "Oh...."

"Maybe we better call it quits for today," Elsie sighed, gingerly closing her hand around rosy flame. Halting, fist half-shut, as pink flashed brighter, forcing her fingers open. Sweat beaded on her forehead, dripped down the side of her nose. "Um. Help...?"

Monique yanked down on the winch lever, motor hauling in the raft. "She cannot hold!"

And Elsie wasn't in reach, where he could have blocked the flame. Damn. Damn! How did he stop this, how did he fight this-

Magic blocks with opposites, part of Stantz's half-heard lecture hours ago ran through his mind. Whether or not Nick wanted to believe in the possibility of magic, it was hard not to listen when the occultist was so obviously enthused with his work. Block air with earth. Fight fire with-

Scaly talons slashed at the sea; a wall of water crashed over the raft.

Dripping bioluminescent plankton, Elsie pushed sodden red hair out of shocked eyes. "Eep."

Nick let out a relieved breath. Thank you.

Pleased agreement, tinged with a hint of aggravation. Godzilla snorted, vapor puffing white in the Seeker's lights; dove, satisfied the threat was dealt with. And Nick had thought this wasn't dangerous....

Great. Now I'm getting "I told you so" from a lizard.

"Ugh!" Delilah shook out her wings, water sluicing off white membranes. "Cold!"

"Better than fried. Trust me on that one, kiddo." Elsie reached up, gripped a rung of the rope ladder Monique had flung down. Shivered as the wind caught her soaked sweatshirt. "Tell me there's hot cocoa up there?"

"Alas, no."

"Darn."

"Not yet," Nick corrected, helping the paleontologist over the rail. Delilah was right behind her, talons gripping on rope surer than any human hand could. "Give me a few minutes. Randy, Mendel - see what you can salvage out of the equipment."

"Ohhh...." Mendel slumped, eyeing the foam-spattered mess. "At least I've got all the spares alphabetized."

"Not as bad as it looks, Dr. C." Randy patted the glum scientist on the shoulder of his labcoat. "Few circuit boards, a little tune-up on the outer casing...."

"And we could even put in some new sensors!" Ray enthused.

Even Egon brightened at that. "Though given the wide variety of environments Nigel is designed to operate in, we would of necessity be forced to make various modifications to the original circuits. Simply taking into account the variant effects of trying to measure PKE through various ionic concentrations of fresh and salt water-"

"And that's the last we'll see of them for the night," Elsie sighed, wrapping herself in a wide, rainbow-hued beach towel as Nick and Monique hauled in the raft. "I can smell the burning solder already."

"Is he really upset?" Delilah asked from under her red towel, eyes flicking toward the blond robotics expert.

"He's used to it." Nick gave her a reassuring smile, picking up a few more towels for Elsie and himself. "Just let him complain for an hour. It makes him feel like he's as timid as he says he is."

The hybrid's eyes flashed crimson. "Mendel's not afraid!"

"Only a fool is not afraid, given the perils we encounter," Monique stated, tying the raft down to the deck. "And while he may behave in bizarre ways, Dr. Craven is no fool."

"Mendel may be scared, but he never lets it stop him," Nick nodded. "He's one of the bravest people I've ever met." He held out an arm Elsie's way. "Did someone say cocoa?"

Red-nailed hands latched on. "Lead on, fearless leader."

He waited until they were halfway down the stairs. "So how are you holding up?"

Out of sight of the others, Elsie shuddered against him. "Oh god, Nicky. I almost lost it. I almost-"

"But you didn't."

"This time!"

"We timed how long it was before you started losing control of the fire. Next time, you dismiss it a little sooner."

Emerald eyes snapped at him. "Next time!"

"Next time," Nick said firmly, guiding her to a galley seat. "We don't exactly have a safe profession, Dr. Chapman. One of these days, you will want to use a fire spell in an emergency." Strength rolled through the back of his mind like an ocean wave; deep, powerful, infinitely other than human. "We are... what we are."

He squeezed cold hands gently. "Els. You got me through. We'll get you through." He dropped a kiss on a salty cheek. "Trust me."

A ghost of a smile touched her lips. "You know, Dr. Tatopoulos, when you say 'trust me', sane men head for the hills."

Nick raised a dark brow. "I thought you liked a little insanity?"

"Just a little." A true smile, now; though shadows still lurked around green eyes. "C'mere."

Elsie's lips were soft, and warm, and welcome. Nick reached an arm around towel-wrapped shoulders, felt her snuggle against him-

A clatter on the stairs. "Hey, compadre, about that cocoa - whoa!" Randy chortled. "Go, Doctor Nick!"

A hail of wet towels buried him.

~*~*~*~*~
Translations from Welsh:

Tanllwyth - Wildfire.

Fflam yma. - Flame here.