DISCLAIMER: Don't own anything associated with the show… I just like playing with the characters in it from time to time. Dance Monkeys! Dance!
RATING: T for Teen
SPOILERS: None...it's my own little happy world and I'm not leaving it, so there!
WORD COUNT: 1871
PAIRING: N&Ms (Nick/Mandy)
SUMMARY: Things are not always so peaceful out on the range...or when they come home from it.
A/N: Got fed up with not writing so much anymore, and I forced the issue with some old friends using a little challenge, just like back in the old days. This was the result.
REVIEWS: Reviews are the way I know if people are enjoying the work or not. So, if you leave one, THANKS! And if not, I hope you found at least a little something to brighten your day, and thanks for taking the time to read.
Upon walking in the door, Nick's senses were instantly assaulted by the utter chaos occurring in his house. Screams, wails, stomping feet, and banging on the walls all seemed to be coming from the top of the stairs. That was, except for the pleas for peace and threats of lifetime imprisonment being shouted from the base of the stairs by his normally lovely wife.
Once Mandy's eyes found him, she threw her arms in the air and screamed, "FINALLY! I've been dealing with them all day. This is your problem now!" She turned and stomped away from the stairs, leaving Nick to figure out what in the world was happening in their home.
Instead of adding to the volume level, he decided it was best to climb the stairs and seek out the source of the disturbance. The moment he reached the landing, the source was more than evident. The oldest of the hooligans was trying to bully his way into the bedroom of the other two, and there was a fabulous brawl in progress to prevent his entry.
Without saying a word, Nick walked right up to the scene and prepared to sort them all out. He grabbed the oldest by the scruff and scared the whole lot of them when he bellowed, "What in the name of Christmas is goin' on here?!"
Their fright didn't stop them for long, and they immediately began shouting their troubles to Nick. "Okay, okay, hold on, one at a time. Why are you three tearing up my house?"
The twins, pretty much in unison, quickly shouted, "HE WANTS TO WRECK OUR ROOM!"
Nick put his hand over the older boy's mouth before he could try to out volume the other two, and said, "Considering wreck is its normal state, I'm not so sure that's enough to qualify for this kind of fightin', boys. Why does he want to wreck it?"
He continued to struggle with silencing the oldest, as he tried to get the younger ones to explain their situation. Nick knew his son didn't think it was fair, but he also knew from experience as the youngest, that the truth often lay somewhere between the two sides, and by starting from the bottom up, it was usually dead center. If the oldest went first, it skewed the results through an intimidation tactic he knew all too well.
The smallest of the two boys very quietly answered, "He says we took his stuff…"
"…and he says he can come look in our room any time he wants to, 'cause." The other boy chimed in, with a bit more indignation in his tone.
Nick furrowed his brow and pondered that one a moment. "Did you take his stuff?"
"NO!" both boys shouted in unison again.
Turning to the older boy, he asked, "Okay, now, what's your side of this?"
"They took my new catcher's mitt, and my Rangers ball, and I'm gonna tear up their room until I find 'em!" Nick met his exclamation with a scowl, and the boy began to back pedal a bit. "Pop, they're always taking my stuff, and they never own up to it, and I want to show the kids at the park the Rangers ball the Judge got me, and it's not in my room, and I know they took it, because…like I said, they're always taking my stuff, and…" Nick's face never changed from the scowl, and the boy finally wound down from his fit.
With his expression firmly in place, the boy tried one last burst of indignant rage. "Don't look at me like that! I got probably cause to search their room, and that's the law!"
Suddenly the whole thing made more sense, and it took everything in Nick's resolve not to burst out laughing. "Son, you got a long way to go before you can try something like that on me."
He turned to the twins and said, "James, Ricky, you boys better clean up that room before I let your mother ground you from now until you're thirty. And when you're done with that, you go downstairs and do whatever chores she asks you to do, because you've done a fine job of ruining her day off with this nonsense. You hear me?"
With sunken faces and slumped shoulders, they answered together, "Yes, Pop."
He placed a hand firmly on the older boy's shoulder and turned him toward the stairs. "Let's go, little man. You got a lot to learn today." And he marched the boy down the stairs to meet his doom.
In the dining room they found Mandy going through a mound of paperwork spread out on the table before her. She looked up from the papers and asked, "Oh brother, now what've they done? They already broke the glass pitcher horsing around in the kitchen. Thankfully it wasn't full, but no bare feet for a few days, just to be sure."
Nick turned the boy to look him in the eye with that revelation, "It was an accident, honest." Shaking his head, Nick pulled out a chair and motioned the boy to have a seat.
"Tell your mother what all that hollerin' and knockin' around was about." The stern expression on his face gave the boy little room to argue, and so he simply stated his reason.
"Probably cause."
Mandy screwed up her mouth and asked, "Probably because…what?"
"No, Mom, 'probably cause.' They're always taking my stuff and so I got probably cause to search their room." The sincerity in his words was what made it so difficult not to laugh, and as Nick studied Mandy's face, he could see she was having the same problem.
"Okay, before we tackle that one…" she was obviously struggling to hold back the smile as she spoke. "What do you think they took, Danny?"
"My new catcher's mitt and my Rangers ball." Danny sunk down in the seat beside his mother.
"Didn't the twins get new gloves from the Judge, too?"
"Yeah, but…" Danny seemed to think twice before he finished his response. "But they just got regular gloves, and mine is different."
"Sounds pretty weak for a motive there, kid." Nick and Mandy exchanged an amused glance as their son lowered his head. "What other reasons do you have for thinking they took your glove?"
"Well, it's not in my room, and they take my stuff all the time!" The boy was grasping at straws, and Nick was doing his best not to break out laughing. He'd been on the receiving end of such questioning his entire life, and there were many times he hadn't fared any better than his son was, especially when his logic was flawed.
"Have you looked anywhere else for the glove? Did you ask your brothers if they'd seen it? Did you think about talking to…oh, I don't know…maybe your mother? Seems to me you haven't done your job as an investigator at all, wouldn't you agree?" Mandy turned the focus back to Nick with her question, but he was ready.
"Let's see, you haven't surveyed the scene, you haven't questioned all the people at the scene, and you have potentially destroyed evidence at the scene by rushing to conclusions… Yep, that's the trifecta of fail, if you ask me." Nick put his hand on the boy's shoulder and knelt down to get his full attention. "Probable Cause is something that's only used in emergency situations, when there's a potential for loss of life or evidence, and only when you know what gives you that cause will hold up in court. We do not make an assumption and jump into action just because. That's how people get hurt and the law is abused…just like you abused your brothers."
"But, Pop, I ju-"
"You just wanted what you wanted, and you decided the best way to do that was to skip over the rules and take it." Danny buried his head in his arms on the table with Nick's pronouncement. "And you know what's even worse?"
Danny sniffed and shook his head, just barely showing the side of his face.
"You were dead wrong." The boy's head popped up to look at his father. "Look over there behind your mother on the shelf." Mandy leaned over to give their son a better look at the three gloves tied up with string and sitting patiently on the shelf near the window. "I took all three gloves last night so they could get oiled before you boys tried to use them."
"Oh…" Nick had to give the kid credit, when presented with the facts he seemed ready to admit his error.
"So, since you failed to follow protocol, jumped to false conclusions, and tried to subvert the law for your own benefit…what kind of punishment do you think would fit such a crime. You, know, since you're such an expert on the law now." Once again, Nick turned the issue back onto his son.
With a heavy sigh, Danny hung his head and said, "No mitt for a week, and dish duty for a whole month?"
Mandy smiled at her son and then scrunched up her mouth. "I don't know, that won't really teach you much of a lesson, would it?" Nick watched as the boy's face turned to worry. "How about you finish oiling the gloves with your Pop after dinner, and you have to play ball with your brother's for the rest of the week?" His face morphed into a delighted expression, just before Mandy dropped the hammer on him. "And dish duty for a month."
"Awright." He got up from the chair and asked, "Can I go now?"
"Yeah, but why don't you try putting away the rest of your things before dinner. You are not living out of that suitcase until you run out of clean laundry, Mister Stokes." Mandy thumped his nose and the boy smiled.
When he reached the stairs Nick added, "And I bet if you clean up that room, you might just find the Rangers ball…where it belongs."
They could hear Danny mumbling the whole way up the stairs, and knew exactly when it was safe to begin laughing.
"Oh wow! You gotta tell that one to your Mom." Mandy was bent over double with laughter.
"Yeah, it sounds like the Judge has been working a little too hard on the boys going to law school again." Nick had to wipe away tears, he was laughing so hard.
"I'm not sure which is worse…getting the heavy hand of the law from a nine year old, after a visit to Texas, or being invaded by every critter and creepy crawly in the neighborhood after the twins' trip to Dr. G's lab in California." Mandy got up from the table as she spoke, but stopped to make one more comment. "If I had known it was going to be like this…I never would have made that wish."
"What wish?" Nick was puzzled by her comment.
"For my twelfth birthday, I wished to be surrounded by beautiful boys who loved me completely for the rest of my life." She rolled her eyes with the confession, and then added, "I should have been more specific."