Decaffeinated

CHAPTER 1:

Lester Santos sighed and gripped the steering wheel harder for the turn onto Haywood. The slime coating his hands had transferred to the wheel the minute he'd gotten into the SUV. While it was finally drying enough to be tacky, it still had some slippery spots and he wasn't taking any chances. Walking into Rangeman looking like this would be embarrassing enough without having a fender bender a couple of blocks out.

At least the late hour meant the streets were nearly deserted. Even a busy city like Trenton looked like a ghost town at 3:00 a.m. It also meant that there would be fewer eye-witnesses to his arrival, not that that would matter. He had to think for a minute to remember who was manning the reception desk in the lobby. Manny? No, Binkie. Manny was up on 5 with the rest of the overnight crew.

He pulled into the garage, glad to see a parking spot near the door. At least his walk of shame would be a little shorter. Less time in view of the omnipresent security cameras was a good thing, right? Small blessings. Count them where you can. He parked and took a deep breath, needing a moment to center himself. It felt like there wasn't a single spot on his six feet four inch frame that hadn't been hit by disaster. Huh. Except his hair. A quick check in the rearview mirror showed his hair was still spiked up and tousled. And his face was clean, unlike the rest of him. Oh yeah, he still had that signature Santos style. Well, from the neck up. He sighed again.

The early morning air was utterly still, making the "thunk" of the driver's door unlocking sound like a hammer strike. There was no street noise, no ambient sound, no hustle and bustle of cars and pedestrians to mask it. He knew from long experience that smaller sounds that would have gone unnoticed during the day seemed amplified and filled the space. He didn't really notice the effect until after he was first deployed. That same hush that had made summer nights almost magical growing up had become a threat on covert ops.

He opened the vehicle door, and stepped out. There was the faintest whisper, a barely audible "pffff", as his left foot, clad only in a sock, touched the concrete. The rubber sole of the steel toed work boot on his right foot wasn't much louder. However, the water that had soaked into the boot squelched loudly followed by a wheezing kind of hiss as tiny bubbles of air were forced through the boot by the pressure of his foot.

His pants were still fairly wet and uncomfortable, chafing his inner thighs. The bottom half of his shirt was starting to dry. At least his utility belt had been slung over one shoulder and didn't get the dunking that the rest of him did. He put his face in neutral and headed to the front door, keeping his stride as casual as he could. Having only one shoe made one leg longer than the other, so he listed slightly with every other step.

Sway, pfff, squish - sway, pffff, squish - sway, pffff, squish - sway, pffff, squish.

A light breeze drifted into the garage and across his butt cheeks, cooling his wet clothes enough to chill. He knew that the seat of his cargo pants was mostly gone but it felt as if his boxer briefs might have taken damage as well.

He had a sinking feeling that his entrance would end up in the annual Best Of video compilation. Lord knows if one of the others had come limping back looking like something the cat had dragged in, Lester would have had no qualms about distributing those video clips. Teasing was one of the ways that the guys bonded with each other.

Just ask Hal. The video of Stephanie tricking him into handing over his stun gun and then tagging him with it was an instant hit with all the guys. Yeah, they mocked him mercilessly for it and yeah, he did end up assigned to monitors and motor pool duty for four solid weeks as punishment. But thanks to the notoriety of his Baptism By Bombshell, Hal went from newbie on the fringes to a central figure within Rangeman.

Lester didn't have to hit his fob to unlock the main door. He heard the click as Binkie did it for him and reached for the handle. He strolled in, nodding his thanks. Binkie raised one eyebrow at Lester's condition. He shrugged in reply, never slowing as he passed the reception desk heading for the stairs. After a few more wonky steps he thought "Fuck it" and veered off to the elevator instead. No way was he doing this up five flights of stairs. The instant he pushed the button the doors opened with a cheerful DING!

As he rode up to the control room floor, Lester recalled one of the first lessons he'd learned in basic training. It's only embarrassing if you let it be. He had to put that on loop in his head for this situation especially considering the blow to his pride. With a bit of effort, he radiated insouciance by the time he sauntered onto five nearly colliding with Ram and Gene. Obviously they'd seen him arrive and were waiting to pounce.

"What the hell, man?" Ram waved a hand broadly at Lester. "You look like you've been chewed up and spat out."

"Since when does a 30 minute coffee run take an hour and a half?" asked Gene. "And where the hell is the coffee?"

"Forget the coffee. Where's our snacks?" Manny spoke loudly from his station in the middle of the floor, eyes flicking up briefly before returning to the monitors.

"I was promised pastry," added Vince flatly from his chair next to Manny.

Lester held his hands out in a placating gesture. "Gentlemen, my apologies." He stepped between Ram and Gene who trailed behind him as he moved to join Manny and Vince. The industrial grade carpet did little to muffle the sway, pffff, squish of his steps. "I find myself in the rare position of having failed to meet the mission objective."

He grabbed the chair from the cubicle across from the monitor station and turned it to face the guys. As he slumped into the seat, a small blob plopped out of one pant leg and landed in front of his boot. He assumed it was a bit of mud until it moved again, catching everyone's attention.

Lester, Ram, Gene, and Vince all stared directly at the little frog. Manny showed his dedication to duty by pulling up the feed from the nearest camera and zooming in on it on screen. For a solid thirty seconds no one moved.

Fighting the urge to sigh again, Lester gently picked up the tiny creature, carefully curling his fingers over it.

Ram grabbed a mug off of the nearest desk. "Here." He held it under Lester's fist. "It's clean."

Lester dropped the frog into the mug. Gene set a small pack of sticky notes over the top to keep the frog from escaping, and then Ram set the impromptu cage back on the desk where he found it.

"We better get that little guy back outside before shift change," said Gene, "or else Cal's gonna go for coffee and get a frog in his throat."

There were a couple of smiles and one eye roll, but no one laughed.

Ram's gaze bounced from the mug to Lester and back again a couple of times before settling on the scrap of fabric sticking out from under Lester's butt where his pants were torn.

"Okay, Santos," said Vince. "You've got our attention. What. The. Fuck?"

With a weary shake of his head, Lester said, "I dunno, man. I had a run of Beautiful's kind of luck and feel like I barely survived. Basically? I got Bombshelled."