Disclaimer – If I owned Eureka, then second season would have been slashier.
Chapter Two
Nathan woke up with a crick in his neck, a stiff body, and the panicky feeling of not knowing just where he was. It took a few minutes for it to sink in that he'd fallen asleep at his desk at GD and that it was some time after noon. Odds were that the majority, if not all, of the people affected by the neural network and his dream device had been cured already.
Well, everyone except for the dead truck driver.
Swallowing convulsively, Nathan fought back a nauseous feeling in the pit of his stomach. After a few minutes he was fine and decided that he wasn't feeling well because he hadn't had anything to eat since lunch the day before and from sleeping odd hours. He'd be fine once he had something to eat.
On his way out of GD, Nathan passed by Fargo's desk and watched his ex-assistant guiltily close something on his computer.
"Fargo, what was that?"
"What was what?"
Nathan's eyes narrowed. "Whatever the hell it is you just closed on your computer screen."
"Oh… that…" Fargo stammered and then swallowed nervously. "Nothing. It was nothing."
"Oh really?" Nathan felt a headache coming on, but he circled around the desk and pulled up the window. It was an internet browser designed specifically for use with Eureka's intraweb, an intranet used by the entire town. Within was a fanfiction written by Dr. Childress that was basically 'fan-servicing smut'. It was the typical sort of thing that Fargo would read, except for two small details. The main characters were Nathan Stark and Jack Carter. "What the hell is this?"
"Well… uh…" Fargo swallowed and looked like he wanted to curl up and die on the spot. "It's, um… Dr. Childress has been writing these for weeks now and they've gotten pretty popular. After that, uh, kissing dream she had last night, I thought I'd see what all the fuss was about."
"She's been what?!" Nathan growled out.
"She's not the only one," Fargo stammered out. "There are other writers. It's all fiction and it isn't meant to hurt anyone…"
The headache building up between Nathan's temples spiked some and his glare at Fargo grew more intense as a result. "God knows that I'm not going to be able to get that…" he gestured wordlessly at the screen, "off the web and if I kill you, Allison will likely fire me, so just stop reading it at work." Then he deactivated the window and smacked Fargo lightly upside the head before walking away.
After arriving home, Nathan rifled through his pantry until he found some soup. It wasn't hard to keep thoughts of the dream-kiss with Jack or what little he'd read of the 'fanfiction' out his mind what with how badly his head hurt, but the headache was also making his stomach rebel and he only had about a third of the soup before heading to his room to burrow under the covers of his bed and pass out.
-=-=
Around noon the next day, Nathan was still curled up in bed. He'd missed dinner, again, and had a vague recollection of waking up at his usual time that morning only to call in sick and pass out again. The fact that Fargo hadn't shown up demanding to know if he was dying was probably a good sign.
At least, Nathan was assuming that Fargo hadn't shown up. The front door was locked and the accident prone man didn't have a key, so Fargo might have stopped by and simply received no answer.
Nathan lay there for awhile, not really able to convince himself to get up. The covers were just too warm and he felt fuzzy headed, sore all over, and his throat was scratchy. Lying in the cocoon-like covers, he drifted in and out for an hour or so. Distantly, he heard the front door opening and the sound of someone venturing into his room, but Nathan just snuggled deeper into his covers.
"Hey, scientist," came the familiar drawl of Jack Carter's voice.
Opening his eyes, Nathan blinked blurrily at Carter, who was dressed in civvies instead of his uniform. "Carter?" Nathan's voice was scratchy and he had to resist the childish urge to pull the covers over his head.
"You look like hell," Jack observed, sitting on the edge of the bed. "Have you eaten anything today?"
Forcing himself to sit up, Nathan shook his head slowly. "How did you get in here?"
"You keep a spare key in a very realistic-looking fake rock. I almost overlooked it, but there was just something… off about it." Jack eyed Nathan critically and then got up. Walking over to the closet, Jack found a clean t-shirt and a pair of sweat pants which he then laid out on the bed. "You should get into something clean and I'll find you something to eat, okay?"
Not waiting for an answer, Jack wandered out of the room.
Nathan stared at the open door for a long moment, feeling dazed. What the hell was going on? Unsteadily, Nathan got out of bed and shut the door. He leaned against the door, breathing heavily, and then reluctantly changed into the clean outfit. Why was Jack…?
Walking into the kitchen, Nathan sat down at the kitchen table and watched as Jack made soup on the stove. "Why are you here?"
"Because you aren't sick," Jack said quietly. "You were poisoned. Your lab assistant, Dr. Hodgens, went in this morning and is now in a coma." Nathan's eyes widened. "Henry, Allison, Jo, and I have decided to keep this quiet for now, but…" he shrugged. "Henry said you'll be fine once the poison works itself out of your system, which ought to take a few more hours."
Nathan leaned forward and massaged his temples. "How was I poisoned?"
"Whoever did it put the chemicals in the air vents." Jack took the soup off the stove and poured it into a bowl. As he went to place the bowl in front of Nathan, he continued explaining. "The toxin used dissipates over time, but Allison found traces of the compound in Hodgen's tox-screen. Henry, Jo, and I went over your lab and found some sort of dispersal unit in one of the vents. Henry thinks that it was put in there yesterday on the assumption that no one was going to be getting any work done. The toxin would build up in the air throughout the day, kill you today, and the evidence would simply disappear. Except you did go to your lab for a little while yesterday and inhaled enough toxin to make you feel sick without hurting you too badly. Since you called in to take a sick day, Fargo kept stopping by your lab to check up on Dr. Hodgens and Fargo was the one who found the guy."
"Is Fargo okay?" Nathan asked and then started in on his soup.
"He's got a headache, but that's about it." Jack twisted one of the chairs around backwards then seated himself on it, crossing his arms and resting them on the back. "Jo's recovered from yesterday, but she's investigating at GD under the pretense that, like some of the others, she's being required to stay under observation. Henry rigged up a fake version of the dispersion device with a locater in it so that when the person who planted it retrieves it, we can trace them. Allison identified the toxin as something Section 2 had been working on as part of a temporary-stasis experiment."
"Why does that leave you here, looking after me?" Nathan hated phrasing it that way, but it was true. If Jack hadn't shown up, Nathan wouldn't have started fighting to use his energy. Already the hot soup had made his sore throat better and moving around had eased the soreness in his muscles, mostly. It was just the fuzziness and shortness of breath that persisted.
Jack laughed, his expression open and mirthful. "Well, someone had to get you active. Henry said that the compound would leave your system faster if you got something to eat and stayed awake. I'm here since, technically, I'm only on call today. After yesterday…" Jack shrugged and waved his hands. "I have no real reason to be at GD unless there's an investigation. Since we aren't running the investigation overtly… I volunteered to check up on you. I'm sure the rest of the town thinks we're having some sort of tryst or whatever."
Dropping the spoon, Nathan stared uncomprehendingly at Jack. "What?"
"Apparently, the majority of the town has started reading Dr. Childress' fanfictions... which are typically about you and me and..."
"Varying degrees of smut," Nathan filled in, groaning softly and shaking his head. "I know. I caught Fargo reading it."
"One of Zoe's friends reads it and accidentally traumatized her; she's been trying to convince me that I have the power to make fanfiction illegal within Eureka's borders." Jack laughed, looking more bemused than outraged. "Since it isn't hurting anyone, I haven't confronted Childress or the other authors about it; in fact, it's sort of coming in handy right now."
Nathan nodded, "letting the rest of the town's minds fantasize about fanfiction turned reality keeps them from wondering what's really going on." His own mind briefly went back to the dream-kiss and he fought the urge to blush.
Nodding, Jack said agreeably, "so, any ideas on who'd want to kill you?"
"It's a long list," Nathan admitted. "I'd probably finish coming up with names by the time you've already caught the person."
"Aw, now don't be so negative," Jack teased. "Just because one person is trying to kill you doesn't mean that everyone you've ever irritated does."
"I suppose you'd have shot me by now if that were true," Nathan grudgingly agreed.
"Oh, I know how to be sneakier than that." Jack eyed the half-finished bowl of soup and then narrowed his eyes on Nathan. "You need to finish that."
"What are you, my mother?" Nathan grumbled, but he started eating again.
"Now don't be childish, Stark."
"So, basically I'm supposed to take it easy today while my would-be murderer is caught," Nathan confirmed. Jack nodded in affirmation. "The device in the air vent might have been placed yesterday with the assumption I'd die then and not be found until today," Nathan posited. "I wasn't really working in my lab yesterday. I've been pulling a lot of all nighters lately on a… personal project."
"You fell asleep in there?" Jack looked a bit surprised. "That can't have been comfortable."
"No, not really."
"So… this personal project would be figuring out what's wrong with Kevin?" Now it was Nathan's turn to look surprised. "Yesterday, Allison finally told me that something's wrong with Kevin, but she didn't say what just that it's been a while now and that she's scared." Jack's tone of voice changed as he spoke.
"Something the matter? You sound upset with her," Nathan asked.
"It's just… we're supposed to be friends, but she never even hinted that something might be wrong with Kevin until I confronted her about the real purpose of your dream receiver. You not saying anything makes sense; you don't even like me. But Allison… what's the point of having friends if you don't trust them enough to talk to them and go to them help, even if all they can give is moral support." Jack looked a little agitated. "So yeah, I'm not exactly happy with her right now."
Pushing aside his finished bowl of soup, Nathan wondered what he could really say to all that. For Allison to have not said anything about Kevin to anyone except him was actually fairly out of character for her. Part of it was probably the stress of being Director of GD, but still… she wasn't acting like herself by bottling this up. "I don't dislike you, Carter," was what he finally settled on. "You're too much fun to argue with to dislike."
"You like arguing with me?" was the incredulous reply.
"No one else even tries to match me for sarcasm except you." Nathan was surprised realize that he meant it. It wasn't just that he was attracted to Jack… he really liked Jack's personality – the way Jack refused to back down and treated everyone as an equal. Hell, he was even really cute when he used words like 'invisibling' and 'death ray'. Licking his lips, Nathan felt his pulse pick up a little.
"It is fun." Jack tilted his head to the side, his eyes sparking with amusement. "So, you think that the would-be murderer saw you asleep in the lab and seized the opportunity?"
Nathan nodded. "It's a possibility. No one would have found me until today and my assistant wouldn't have been collateral damage." Nathan scowled down at the table. "There's been too much of that lately."
"This isn't your fault, Nathan," Jack objected. "Neither is what happened with the shared dreams. Don't blame yourself for things out of your control, okay?"
Nathan jerked his eyes up to stare into Jack's as a stunned feeling descended over him. He wasn't sure what startled him more: Jack using his name or Jack's accurate observation of how he was feeling. "I… if I'd bothered to find out whether the neural net was running…"
"You didn't know the details of Childress' experiment, right?"
"Not the exact details, no." Nathan wasn't sure what Jack was getting at.
"Then its like when Fargo's mental mouse and Taggart's nanoids used the same frequency," Jack said. "They didn't know and if they had, it never would have happened. But it did and someone died because of it. What happened then was an accident just like what's happened now. So stop blaming yourself for what was an accident."
"Jack…" he meant to continue with the words 'it isn't that simple', but the truth was that hearing Carter say something like that did make him feel better. "Thank you," came out instead.
The smile that lit up Jack's face was entrancing. Nathan licked his lips and then swallowed nervously as he realized Jack's eyes had briefly flicked down to follow the movement. Surely he was imagining…
Carter's phone rang, interrupting Nathan's thoughts.
"Carter." There was a nod and then Jack frowned. "I've never heard of him. That's not important, though. Good work, Jo. Bring him down to the station's interrogation room." There was a pause and then Jack responded in a mildly exasperated tone, "because you said he works in Section 1. Scientists in different sections only talk about their experiments with immediate coworkers, friends, and Beverly. So either he found out about the toxin from Section 2 from a friend or he had a co-conspirator who gave him the poison."
There was another long pause and Jack smiled, nodding every now and then by habit. "See you in a few," Jack finally said, ending the conversation. Hitting the call-end button, Jack looked at Nathan again. "Until we know if there's someone else involved, you should probably stick with me or Jo."
"Then I'll go to the station with you," Nathan responded. Glancing down at his clothes, "I'd like to change into something else first, though."
-=-=
When they got to the station, Nathan had managed to get in a quick shower, and, though he was still wearing the black t-shirt that Jack had picked for him, he had added an unbuttoned, long-sleeved, navy blue shirt over the t-shirt and changed from sweat pants and slippers to blue jeans and tennis shoes. He felt much more alert and presentable as he walked into the station behind Jack.
Jack disappeared for a few minutes, leaving Nathan alone with Jo in the downstairs hallway. The basement of the station held a single interrogation room and a small shooting range. Nathan hadn't been down here since returning to Eureka and it brought back memories, particularly of the fire he'd caused to protect Callister from exposure as an AI.
Jo was watching Nathan curiously and Nathan was trying to ignore her while simultaneously trying to convince himself that he hadn't been staring at Jack's ass when he'd left. Clearly he was losing both battles since her stare was making him studiously avoid her gaze and his mind kept drifting back to the way Jack looked in his jeans and the dream-kiss.
It was all Dr. Childress' fault. If it hadn't been for her dream, Nathan never would have been standing around daydreaming about what kissing Jack Carter was really like. Stupid fangirl…
Jack returned in his Sheriff's uniform, confirming idle speculation that he kept spares at the office. Of course, Jo had found time to change into her uniform before Nathan and Jack had shown up, so clearly she kept a few there, too.
Not for the first time, Nathan observed how well-fitted the Sheriff's uniform was. Though, this time Nathan wasn't just idly noticing how attractive Jack was in it; he was attempting to keep himself from visibly staring at how Jack had gone from 'sexy' in his jeans and casual shirts to 'eye-candy' in his uniform. Unfortunately, he had to accept that he hadn't been one hundred percent successful in his attempt; Jo's eyebrow visibly raised as she continued to observe Nathan.
Glancing through the two-way mirror, Jack asked, "how long has he been in there?"
"Twenty, almost twenty-five minutes. He's starting to look at his watch more and more, so…" Jo smirked. "I'd say he's getting a little anxious."
"Good," Jack's face was expressionless as he stared through the glass. Then he turned to Jo and Nathan and flashed them a grin. "I doubt this'll take long." Then he pulled open the door, walked inside, and let the door swing shut behind him.
"Dr. Honda, you were apprehended by my deputy after removing evidence of an attempted murder from Dr. Stark's lab." Jack didn't waste any time getting to the point.
"I-I would never harm anyone," Dr. Honda objected.
"Then what was your air-filtration unit doing in Dr. Stark's air vents, aside from dispersing a potentially deadly compound being developed in Section 2?" Jack seated himself across from Dr. Honda.
"I don't know what you…"
"You were apprehended in the process of removing the device from the air vent, Dr. Honda," Jack growled, interrupting the man. "Now GD scientists are supposed to be intelligent, but if you really expect me to believe that you have no idea what I'm talking about then your IQ must be slipping pretty badly, huh?"
Honda visibly bristled.
"Score!" Jo exclaimed, smirking. "Hit where the ego hurts the most!"
Nathan snorted softly, holding in laughter.
"So… do you always stare at Carter's ass or was that kissing dream a wake-up call for you?" Jo asked twisting around to pin Nathan with a stare that reminded him of a hunter stalking prey. Or Lojack messing with Taggart…
"What?" Nathan knew there was no hiding his blush this time. She had caught him staring and they both knew it.
"It isn't that difficult a question, Stark," Jo raised an eyebrow and the words 'I'm waiting' went unsaid.
"I don't see how it's any of your business."
"He's my friend and his daughter is my best friend," Jo responded forcefully. "So, yeah, it's my business."
"I will not tell you anything!" Honda snarled. "Whether or not I'm in here, Sheriff, Stark will die like he deserves to. That man has no regard for life!"
"No regard for life, huh?" Jack echoed. "See, and here I was under the impression you actually knew something about the person you were trying to kill. Looks like I've overestimated you, hmm?"
"You… you think you know everything, Sheriff. The first federal agent to be permanently assigned to the position instead of a member of the military, so clearly you feel that must make you superior." Honda slammed his hands on the table, standing up. The man was clearly radiating rage.
"Sit. Back. Down." Jack's voice didn't rise in volume, but stayed calm and even. The tone, though… Jack's tone grew icier and more dangerous than Nathan had ever heard. Honda froze and stared at Jack for a moment. The scientist's eyes widened at whatever he saw on the Sheriff's face and he sat down, almost meekly.
"Now, in your anger, you've already given away that there's someone who was helping you. So you are going to tell me who it is and you are going to plead guilty to the charges against you. Is that clear?" Jack's voice was still enough to scare Honda into nodding timidly.
Moving his eyes away from the scene behind the glass, Nathan said quietly, "it was a wake-up call. More and more often, bickering with Jack over… whatever the crisis of the week is becomes the highlight of my day and I didn't even notice it happening."
Jo laughed softly. "You do have it bad, don't you?" She offered him a genuine smile. "When Allison called to tell Jack about your lab… I'd never seen him so worried. She didn't tell him you were home sick at first, and Jack was… he coordinated everything as fast and efficiently as he could so that he could hurry over to you and see for himself you were okay. He didn't say anything, but it was obvious to me.
"If you break his heart, though, I will not hesitate to organize a lynch mob."
"That won't happen," Nathan assured her and then looked through the glass at Carter. "I just… don't know what I'm supposed to say to him. Personal relations aren't exactly my strong suit."
"If words fail, just kiss him," Jo advised. "No one can fail to get the meaning of a kiss. Trust me."
"You've been reading Childress' fanfictions, haven't you?" Nathan accused.
Jo snickered. "Who do you think beta reads and edits them?"
"I hate you."
A clinking noise caught their attention, interrupting any further conversation between the scientist and the deputy. Glancing over, they saw a small metal canister lying on the ground in front of the stairs and pouring out smoke. There was no mistaking what the canister was: a bomb.
A/N - The idea of Nathan getting romantic advice from Jo amuses me to no end, especially if she's a fan of their pairing. 'Cause then you know she's squeeing inside and thinking about jealous all the other slash fans are going to be when she brags about it.