On the ninth day of Christmas, my true love gave to me...
xxx
The motley members of the great "Operation CaptainCanary" (as Jax dubs it) spend the next day waiting for Sara to announce that she's changing the ship's course away from Central City—oh, and by the way, they have their crook back on the team.
But...nothing.
"I don't get it," Jax confesses to Stein as they run some diagnostics on the Waverider's systems. "They're obviously, well, into each other. So why are they being so stupid about it?"
The older man sighs and regards his younger colleague with an expression that's both patient and melancholy. "Jefferson, that question is one that no one but the two of them can answer—and possibly not even them. But one thing I do know: the matters of the human heart are capable of confounding the most brilliant of physicists. For example, I still cannot tell you why on Earth Clarissa married me. Or stuck with me all this time." A fond look comes over his face.
Jax, meanwhile, rolls his eyes at the self-characterization, but hides a smile simultaneously. "Yeah, well, we're running out of time. We're due to touch down in 72 hours, Waverider time." He shakes his head. "I hope they get their shit together, but I really would like to surprise my mom on Christmas."
"And I, Clarissa and Lily at the beginning of Hanukkah. As you say, even if they do get the aforementioned 'shit' together, perhaps we could make a brief stop anyway." He smiles. "Certainly, Dr. Palmer has enjoyed the trappings of the holiday season."
"Heh. Yeah. Ray wanted to start playing romantic Christmas songs over the comms all the time to encourage our lovebirds, and Nate was egging him on," Jax says with a shake of his head. "Told them that might not be the greatest idea."
Stein coughs, an obvious attempt to choke back a laugh of astonishment. "No...no, probably not."
"I'm not sure I talked them out of it."
And then, as the opening notes of Mariah Carey's "All I Want for Christmas is You" echo throughout the ship: "As a matter of fact, I'm positive I didn't."
After the crew threatens to maroon him over his song choices, Ray sulks for a bit, but puts together a somewhat less annoying playlist. Sara, to be honest, suspects he'd had it ready all along. Ray can be a gigantic puppy of a human being at times, but there are times he's crazy like a fox—and he's not above pranking his teammates for the sheer hell of it.
In return for inflicting that on her, though, she decides the Atom has gotten a bit rusty on his nonsuit-powered self-defense skills. And Nate—who hasn't admitted contributing to the insanity but was laughing like a loon when the others converged on Ray-has barely any nonpowered self-defense skills at all.
This could be fun.
"Psst. Snart."
Leonard's been wandering the halls, looking for Sara without admitting he's looking for Sara. He knows she has other things to do besides play countless hands of gin, these days, but having regained something of their old camaraderie, he finds he craves it.
And soon enough, it might be gone forever. The thought makes his stomach plummet. But...
Fortunately, Mick's interruption had come at the perfect time to allow him to avoid more uncomfortable introspection. "What?"
Mick's leaning out the doorway of the room that, he recollects, has been set up as a makeshift training room. He wanders over, stepping aside at the last moment as two other team members exit.
Raymond looks sweaty and rather chastened, and Heywood looks even more so, with the rising shadow of a real shiner around his right eye. He blinks, then looks past Mick. Ah. And there's Sara.
"Nate, make sure you have Gideon take a look at that," she calls from the other end of the room, swinging her bo in slow arcs from hand to hand. "And next time...duck."
"She took down Pretty Boy four times and Haircut, three," Mick whispers gleefully. "This is quality entertainment. And it's about to get better."
"And you? She take you down?"
"Nah, I know she can kick my ass. And she knows I know it. Doesn't mean she won't decide to do it anyway one of these days, but it's not today. I think she just wanted to show them what she can do if they prove they have too much time on their hands."
He nods toward the other end of the room, though, and Leonard suddenly realized what he meant by "better." Because Amaya Jiwe has stepped onto the mat.
Sara can, indeed, kick the ass of just about anyone on this ship. But Jiwe is a fifth-degree black belt, and she's no pushover. Watching the two women spar is a thing of beauty, and he throws Mick a glance of appreciation, smirking as he notices how the other man's eyes are fixed on Jiwe.
He knows better than to say anything, though. Especially given that he's aware than his own eyes are fixed, mostly, on Sara.
This sparring match goes on far longer than the others, of course, but Sara eventually wins, forcing the other woman to yield before thanking her for an excellent bout. He watches her cross the room to take a drink from her water bottle and, closing his eyes, takes a deep and just slightly shaky breath. If he's trying to convince himself he needs to give up on Sara Lance, that did not help.
"Len?"
At that point, he realizes that both Mick and Amaya have left the room and Sara is staring at him.
Then she grins. Shit.
"Rusty here too?" she taunts him. "Go a few rounds without your gun? Come on, if Ray can..."
He licks his lips. "You can wipe the floor with me and you know it." But even as he's talking, he's letting his jacket slip off his shoulder and pool on the floor, bending to unlace his boots.
Sara watches him without further comment, although as he straightens from removing his boots, he's pretty sure she's been watching his ass. The thought makes him smirk, grants him back a measure of the attitude he might once have brought to this meeting, and he joins her on the mats, nodding at her bo.
"Come on, we both know you don't need that."
"True." She shrugs, then leans it against the wall. "Come on, then."
Leonard knows he can fight, but he's a brawler, skills born of survival in prison and on the street. It takes, all told, less than a minute or two for her to take him down. He lands hard, flat on his back, and Sara follows up her victory by planting a knee on either side of his hips and an elbow right in the middle of his chest, holding him down easily.
But as she shakes her hair out of her face and grins at him, eyes shining, he has a hard time believing he's the one who lost.
She's not sure why she'd decided to taunt Leonard. Maybe it's just that, full of adrenaline and flush with victory, she's feeling reckless. And now they're here, in a distinctly intimate posture, adrenaline still high, and...
Maybe this is precisely what she wanted. Maybe it's what he wanted too.
He's looking up, past her shoulder. "Looks like Raymond's been in here, too."
She glances back over her shoulder, lifting her eyes to the ceiling. But... nothing. She turns back to Leonard, only to see a smirk on his face, the asshole, and he's propped himself up a little more on his elbows, his face that much closer to hers.
Well, there doesn't really need to be mistletoe, does there...
Leonard's not sure why he made the crack about Raymond and that stupid mistletoe. But Sara'd fallen for it, then turned back to mock-glare at him, and now she's leaning toward him and if he tilts his head just so...
Their lips just barely brush.
"Sara! There's an alarm going off on the bridge! I'm not sure..." Jax charges into the room, stops dead in his tracks, yelps, "Oh, shit!" and vanishes back out the door.
Sara blinks at him, then suddenly rolls off him onto the mat. He sits up quickly, bringing his knees up to, uh, recover his composure and watches as she springs to her feet and starts for the door, glancing helplessly back at him.
"Um," she says, pausing, "I need to see about that."
"Right. I..."
But then she's gone, running out the door after Jax. And another chance is gone too.
"Mr. Jackson, I would have informed Ms. Lance if the alert was anything that needed immediate attention."
"Yeah, well, I didn't know that. I just knew it was going off, I couldn't figure out the reason, and no one else was doing anything about it. And why didn't you inform me that I was about to walk in on that?" Jax is pacing the galley in clear agitation and Mick, his only audience, isn't inclined to stop him.
"I was taking steps to make sure it wasn't anything that needed swift attention." The AI sounds a bit annoyed. "The time fluctuations have changed somewhat. If we plan to continue our course for Central City for Christmas 2016, adjustments need to be made. That is something I can do automatically, but Ms. Lance had requested an alert in the case of such changes. She must approve them first."
As the impact of the statement sinks in, Jax stops his pacing and stares at his older teammate, who just shakes his head in resignation.
"Well," Mick says finally, "someone's going to have to make a choice pretty soon. Just wish I knew what it was gonna be."
xxx
...nine Canary takedowns
Eight hands of gin
Seven teammates plotting
Six silver snowflakes
Five throwing knives
Four cups of cocoa
Three hidden truths
Two lonely hearts
And a crook who came back to me.
