Disclaimer: Again, not mine.
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Holly woke up still angry at herself for how much she had liked her "fantasies" last night. It was just ridiculous that she could possibly think of Root as anything more than a friend. Except it was becoming more and more obvious that she did. But she didn't.
"Admit it, Holly. You're in love with him," the voice said, starting right in.
"I am not," Holly snapped. "This is just my reaction to being with anyone of the male species for an extended period of time."
"Really? It seems to me that you work with them everyday," the voice pestered.
"On a personal level," Holly corrected herself.
"How personal? Just how personal is this becoming?" the voice asked and then left, leaving Holly to think about that.
Holly sighed. This wasn't fair. The voice in her head had always been the devil's advocate, but this was getting ridiculous. She was *not* in love with Julius Root.
"But you *do* need to fix what you said yesterday," the voice said and mentally pushed Holly out of bed.
Holly sighed and got out of bed. She yawned, stretched, and walked up the stairs to Root's bedroom. She knocked on the door and when she didn't hear him reply, she wondered what time it was. Holly shuffled into the kitchen and glanced at the clock. She flinched. It was only five-thirty. She yawned again and went into the living room to wait for Root to wake up. To her surprise, she saw Root sitting on the couch.
"What're you doing up early?" Holly asked him.
Root looked at Holly suddenly. "Couldn't sleep. You?"
"I'm sorry for yesterday," Holly said softly, going over and sitting down next to Root. "I was just jealous that you had all of this extra stuff and I have nothing. I'm also sorry that I said you can't call me Holly. You can."
Root looked at Holly, surprised. He had never seen her looking so . . . vulnerable, even when had been crying in the hospital. It seemed to him that Holly wasn't telling him something. "It's ok," he said.
"Thanks," Holly replied.
They sat in silence for a couple of minutes until Root said, "You were right, though. I need to think about things other than work. And other than Nichkola."
"You still love her, don't you?" Holly asked, although why she wouldn't admit to herself.
Root opened his mouth but realized he didn't know what he was going to say so he closed it again. Eventually, he answered, "I don't know."
Holly toyed with the buttons on her shirt and realized that it was quickly becoming a habit. "Let me know when you find you," she finally said and left.
"Why?" Root asked.
Holly turned around and leaned on the door frame, still fiddling with the buttons. She saw Root stiffen when he saw this but it didn't register so she continued to play with them. Eventually she said, "I don't know," and went back downstairs, thinking about how much she did know.
"Buttons!" Root thought angrily to himself. "Why the *hell* does she have to be wearing buttons?"
"Well maybe she knows-"
"No way. Nobody except for Owen knows and he lives in Atlantis," Root snapped at the voice.
"She might have guessed," the voice suggested. "You *do* keep on blushing whenever she mentions them."
"How could I not?" Root snapped.
"Especially after last night-"
"Last night was bullshit," Root yelled in his head. "Brought on by stress."
"Stress about what?" the voice asked. "Stress that you haven't even *thought* about the fact that somebody tried to kill Holly and blew up her apartment?"
"Shit," Root muttered out loud. He *hadn't* thought about it. In fact, he had completely forgotten about it. Holly had kept his mind on other things.
"Yeah, like buttons," the voice said and cracked up.
"Shut up!" Root hissed in his head and started putting the scant pieces of evidence together.
Through its laughter, the voice said, "Scant, like that lingerie?" and laughed harder.
Root ignored the voice, thinking. He stood up, went to his bedroom and quickly dressed for work. He then went down to the basement to find Holly lying on the bed, still in the work shirt, reading a book.
"What're you reading?" he asked her.
Holly looked up suddenly. "'Time Holders'," she said and went back to reading.
Root felt his breath catch in his throat. "Can I see that for a second?" he asked, using all of his strength to make his voice sound normal.
"Yeah, sure," Holly replied, glanced at the page number and handed the book to Root. "Are you going in?" she asked, noting his clothes.
"Yeah, hang on," he replied distractedly, flipping through the pages until he came to a certain passage. He sighed and handed the book back to Holly. "Yes, I'm going in," he repeated. "I dunno when I'll get back. Hopefully not too late."
"Should I wait to have dinner?" she asked him.
Root looked surprised. "We were going to have dinner together?"
"Why not?" she asked.
Looking as if he had been suddenly jerked out of his own world and thrown into somebody else's, he said, "Yeah, I guess. I'll call if I'll be too late."
"Alright," Holly replied and went back to reading. "See you tonight."
"Yeah," Root replied and left, still feeling as though he was in a daze.
Holly sighed happily to herself, relishing in the fact that she had somebody to ask if he would be home in time for dinner, even if it didn't make all that much sense. Her brow then furrowed, wondering what Root had been looking at. She quickly flipped through the book but found nothing out of the ordinary so resumed reading, figuring that she would either come on it or wouldn't.
*
"Sorry I wasn't in yesterday," Root said to Foaly as he stopped by the Ops booth on the way to his office. "I took Captain Short shopping."
Foaly raised an eyebrow. "I won't ask. How's she been?"
"Ask her," Root replied, not having the slightest clue how to answer that.
"What about you?" Foaly asked, a note of worry in his voice. "You seem really out of it."
Root didn't know how to answer that either. "I'll let you know when I figure it out," he eventually said. "Any leads on the terrorists?"
"Yeah: they're definately the same fairies as last time," Foaly replied, stating the obvious. "Other than that, just like last time. Zilch."
"Well I intend to catch them this time and throw them in Howler's Peak," Root growled.
Foaly glanced at Root. "Are you and Holly together?" he asked.
Root looked at him oddly. "No, of course not. Quite the opposite, in fact. Why?"
Foaly shrugged. "You seem really out of it. You remind me of when my cousin fell in love. And you seem so . . . determined."
Root's eyes took on a gleam. "I'm usually not?" he asked dangerously.
"No, you are . . ." Foaly trailed off and shook his head. "Maybe I'm just imagining it."
"No doubt," Root snapped. "Let me know if anything turns up."
"Of course, your highness," Foaly replied and went back to typing on his computer.
Root grabbed Foaly's sack of carrots on his way out as revenge. Once he was back in his office, his familiar office, his familiar office where nothing was ever out of line, he began to think in earnest, absentmindedly taking a carrot out of the bag and chewing on it, biting down harder than he really needed too.
Who had done this? There weren't any clues, just like last time. Whoever it was had covered their tracks well.
Root sighed and looked down at his desk. A piece of paper caught his eye. A clue. He grabbed the pieces of paper, touching as little of it as possible, and brought the note that Holly had found on her desk on the 21st to Foaly. Root knocked on the door of the Ops booth and Foaly quickly let him in.
"Come to give me back my carrots?" Foaly huffed.
"Clue," Root replied. "Holly found this on her desk on the day of the attack. You might be able to get fingerprints and definitely you can do a handwriting analysis."
"I know what I can do with a handwritten note," Foaly said excitedly, taking the note only after he had put on a pair of gloves. Root had no idea, nor did he want to know, why Foaly had gloves lying around. "Why didn't you show this to me earlier?"
"I forgot," Root admitted grudgingly. "I had other things on my mind."
Foaly snorted. "Yeah, like Holly. Anyways, I'll start in on this now and let you know what turns up."
"Thanks," Root replied, went back to his office and started chewing on another carrot. He was beginning to see why Foaly liked them so much. Stress relievers.
*
A little under five minutes later, Root's phone rang.
"Commander Root," he answered.
"Come down to the Ops booth," Foaly said and then hung up.
Curious that anything could've happened that quickly, Root walked down and was quickly let in. "What?"
Foaly handed Root the note. "Anything look familiar?" he asked.
Root looked at the note angrily. "Foaly, if I had thought anything had looked familiar I would've told you," he snapped.
"Look at the handwriting," Foaly replied. "Doesn't it seem like you've seen it before?"
Now that Foaly mentioned it, it *did* look a little familiar. But he couldn't seem to place it. "Whose is it?" he asked.
"Well, that's the problem," Foaly replied, taking the note back. "As soon as I saw it, the writing looked familiar. It didn't take me long to figure out who's writing it was. Once I figured it out, I checked on the computer. It *is* their writing, but not done by their hand. Somebody's damn good at covering their tracks, though."
"Whose writing is it?" Root repeated tightly.
"Holly's," Foaly finally answered. "She didn't write this, though. No question about it. Somebody is trying awfully hard to make it look as though she did. But do you want to know what the worrisome thing about this is?"
"What do you think, Foaly? What is the worrisome thing about this?" Root snapped.
"Well, whoever did this did a remarkably good job. The only way the computer could tell Holly's writing and this fairy's apart was by how hard he – or she – pressed. That means that whoever did this knows Holly's writing well enough to copy it. Letter for letter. Whoever did this is, she sees everyday. Whoever did this most likely works here," Foaly told Root, trying to sound as dramatic as possible.
Root felt himself pale. "Couldn't somebody have stolen a sample of her writing?" he asked, his voice coming out strangled.
"That's the other possibility," Foaly agreed. "There's no real way to figure out which it is."
Root's face returned to its usual ruddy colour. "Next time you say something with that many implications, make sure it's definitely true," he snapped. "You realize, if that's true, that there's an insane fairy working the in the LEP most likely *as we speak*? In fact, if you're right, then that could quite possibly be why Holly's apartment blew up. Whoever it was could've heard that she was going home, flown over to her house, put the bomb in and left before she got there."
"In which case it would most likely be a sprite since their wings are far more inconspicuous," Foaly suggested. "But keep in mind all of this is just speculating. If there is in fact somebody in the LEP working on this, then that somebody could be the mastermind behind all of this, but most likely, whoever is *really* behind all of this hired somebody to do this for him. Who in the LEP would be stupid enough to do that?"
Root and Foaly exchanged a look.
"Aside from Chix because he's too obsessed with Holly," Foaly added.
They thought for a few minutes before Root replied, "I don't know. I'll let you know if I think of anyone."
"Same," Foaly replied and went back to typing.
Root went back to his office and started on the third carrot of the day. It was then that he realized he had been either so busy helping Holly with her things or eating carrots that he hadn't had a cigar since this had started. He congratulated himself.
*
Holly was bored out of her mind. She didn't know how people without jobs could stand it. Usually, when she was at her own apartment, she had something from one case or another to keep her occupied over the weekends, but here she had nothing. She had finished the book about an hour ago, and now it was five. She figured Root would be getting home around six or seven, but really had no idea. Normally when she left work at exactly six, he was still there, but today was Sunday, so he had it off. Holly sighed.
"Then why don't you start on dinner?" the voice that had been haunting her all day with thoughts of buttons and various other things suggested.
Holly snorted. "He's not going to be home for most likely another two hours."
"Well if you want to sit around either worrying about who tried to kill you and who killed your sister ten years ago, be my guest," the voice snapped. "Or you could do something to keep your mind off that, like make a huge dinner. You haven't treated yourself to something *nice* for dinner in ages."
Holly thought about it. It was true. She couldn't afford to go out for dinner or to get enough really good food to make something nice. So the offer was tempting.
"But what would Root think?" she asked herself.
"Who cares?" the voice replied. "Either get busy living or get busy dying," it said, quoting a line from the first mudman movie she had watched. The title was on the tip of her tongue . . . The something Redemption. Holly went upstairs and started making dinner, still trying to think of the movie.
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Well, there's that. I know it's the shortest chapter I've done so far, but I've been updating so much, I hardly think it matters. Thanks much to reviewers.
IF ANYBODY HAS ANY IDEAS, PLEASE LET ME KNOW!!!
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Holly woke up still angry at herself for how much she had liked her "fantasies" last night. It was just ridiculous that she could possibly think of Root as anything more than a friend. Except it was becoming more and more obvious that she did. But she didn't.
"Admit it, Holly. You're in love with him," the voice said, starting right in.
"I am not," Holly snapped. "This is just my reaction to being with anyone of the male species for an extended period of time."
"Really? It seems to me that you work with them everyday," the voice pestered.
"On a personal level," Holly corrected herself.
"How personal? Just how personal is this becoming?" the voice asked and then left, leaving Holly to think about that.
Holly sighed. This wasn't fair. The voice in her head had always been the devil's advocate, but this was getting ridiculous. She was *not* in love with Julius Root.
"But you *do* need to fix what you said yesterday," the voice said and mentally pushed Holly out of bed.
Holly sighed and got out of bed. She yawned, stretched, and walked up the stairs to Root's bedroom. She knocked on the door and when she didn't hear him reply, she wondered what time it was. Holly shuffled into the kitchen and glanced at the clock. She flinched. It was only five-thirty. She yawned again and went into the living room to wait for Root to wake up. To her surprise, she saw Root sitting on the couch.
"What're you doing up early?" Holly asked him.
Root looked at Holly suddenly. "Couldn't sleep. You?"
"I'm sorry for yesterday," Holly said softly, going over and sitting down next to Root. "I was just jealous that you had all of this extra stuff and I have nothing. I'm also sorry that I said you can't call me Holly. You can."
Root looked at Holly, surprised. He had never seen her looking so . . . vulnerable, even when had been crying in the hospital. It seemed to him that Holly wasn't telling him something. "It's ok," he said.
"Thanks," Holly replied.
They sat in silence for a couple of minutes until Root said, "You were right, though. I need to think about things other than work. And other than Nichkola."
"You still love her, don't you?" Holly asked, although why she wouldn't admit to herself.
Root opened his mouth but realized he didn't know what he was going to say so he closed it again. Eventually, he answered, "I don't know."
Holly toyed with the buttons on her shirt and realized that it was quickly becoming a habit. "Let me know when you find you," she finally said and left.
"Why?" Root asked.
Holly turned around and leaned on the door frame, still fiddling with the buttons. She saw Root stiffen when he saw this but it didn't register so she continued to play with them. Eventually she said, "I don't know," and went back downstairs, thinking about how much she did know.
"Buttons!" Root thought angrily to himself. "Why the *hell* does she have to be wearing buttons?"
"Well maybe she knows-"
"No way. Nobody except for Owen knows and he lives in Atlantis," Root snapped at the voice.
"She might have guessed," the voice suggested. "You *do* keep on blushing whenever she mentions them."
"How could I not?" Root snapped.
"Especially after last night-"
"Last night was bullshit," Root yelled in his head. "Brought on by stress."
"Stress about what?" the voice asked. "Stress that you haven't even *thought* about the fact that somebody tried to kill Holly and blew up her apartment?"
"Shit," Root muttered out loud. He *hadn't* thought about it. In fact, he had completely forgotten about it. Holly had kept his mind on other things.
"Yeah, like buttons," the voice said and cracked up.
"Shut up!" Root hissed in his head and started putting the scant pieces of evidence together.
Through its laughter, the voice said, "Scant, like that lingerie?" and laughed harder.
Root ignored the voice, thinking. He stood up, went to his bedroom and quickly dressed for work. He then went down to the basement to find Holly lying on the bed, still in the work shirt, reading a book.
"What're you reading?" he asked her.
Holly looked up suddenly. "'Time Holders'," she said and went back to reading.
Root felt his breath catch in his throat. "Can I see that for a second?" he asked, using all of his strength to make his voice sound normal.
"Yeah, sure," Holly replied, glanced at the page number and handed the book to Root. "Are you going in?" she asked, noting his clothes.
"Yeah, hang on," he replied distractedly, flipping through the pages until he came to a certain passage. He sighed and handed the book back to Holly. "Yes, I'm going in," he repeated. "I dunno when I'll get back. Hopefully not too late."
"Should I wait to have dinner?" she asked him.
Root looked surprised. "We were going to have dinner together?"
"Why not?" she asked.
Looking as if he had been suddenly jerked out of his own world and thrown into somebody else's, he said, "Yeah, I guess. I'll call if I'll be too late."
"Alright," Holly replied and went back to reading. "See you tonight."
"Yeah," Root replied and left, still feeling as though he was in a daze.
Holly sighed happily to herself, relishing in the fact that she had somebody to ask if he would be home in time for dinner, even if it didn't make all that much sense. Her brow then furrowed, wondering what Root had been looking at. She quickly flipped through the book but found nothing out of the ordinary so resumed reading, figuring that she would either come on it or wouldn't.
*
"Sorry I wasn't in yesterday," Root said to Foaly as he stopped by the Ops booth on the way to his office. "I took Captain Short shopping."
Foaly raised an eyebrow. "I won't ask. How's she been?"
"Ask her," Root replied, not having the slightest clue how to answer that.
"What about you?" Foaly asked, a note of worry in his voice. "You seem really out of it."
Root didn't know how to answer that either. "I'll let you know when I figure it out," he eventually said. "Any leads on the terrorists?"
"Yeah: they're definately the same fairies as last time," Foaly replied, stating the obvious. "Other than that, just like last time. Zilch."
"Well I intend to catch them this time and throw them in Howler's Peak," Root growled.
Foaly glanced at Root. "Are you and Holly together?" he asked.
Root looked at him oddly. "No, of course not. Quite the opposite, in fact. Why?"
Foaly shrugged. "You seem really out of it. You remind me of when my cousin fell in love. And you seem so . . . determined."
Root's eyes took on a gleam. "I'm usually not?" he asked dangerously.
"No, you are . . ." Foaly trailed off and shook his head. "Maybe I'm just imagining it."
"No doubt," Root snapped. "Let me know if anything turns up."
"Of course, your highness," Foaly replied and went back to typing on his computer.
Root grabbed Foaly's sack of carrots on his way out as revenge. Once he was back in his office, his familiar office, his familiar office where nothing was ever out of line, he began to think in earnest, absentmindedly taking a carrot out of the bag and chewing on it, biting down harder than he really needed too.
Who had done this? There weren't any clues, just like last time. Whoever it was had covered their tracks well.
Root sighed and looked down at his desk. A piece of paper caught his eye. A clue. He grabbed the pieces of paper, touching as little of it as possible, and brought the note that Holly had found on her desk on the 21st to Foaly. Root knocked on the door of the Ops booth and Foaly quickly let him in.
"Come to give me back my carrots?" Foaly huffed.
"Clue," Root replied. "Holly found this on her desk on the day of the attack. You might be able to get fingerprints and definitely you can do a handwriting analysis."
"I know what I can do with a handwritten note," Foaly said excitedly, taking the note only after he had put on a pair of gloves. Root had no idea, nor did he want to know, why Foaly had gloves lying around. "Why didn't you show this to me earlier?"
"I forgot," Root admitted grudgingly. "I had other things on my mind."
Foaly snorted. "Yeah, like Holly. Anyways, I'll start in on this now and let you know what turns up."
"Thanks," Root replied, went back to his office and started chewing on another carrot. He was beginning to see why Foaly liked them so much. Stress relievers.
*
A little under five minutes later, Root's phone rang.
"Commander Root," he answered.
"Come down to the Ops booth," Foaly said and then hung up.
Curious that anything could've happened that quickly, Root walked down and was quickly let in. "What?"
Foaly handed Root the note. "Anything look familiar?" he asked.
Root looked at the note angrily. "Foaly, if I had thought anything had looked familiar I would've told you," he snapped.
"Look at the handwriting," Foaly replied. "Doesn't it seem like you've seen it before?"
Now that Foaly mentioned it, it *did* look a little familiar. But he couldn't seem to place it. "Whose is it?" he asked.
"Well, that's the problem," Foaly replied, taking the note back. "As soon as I saw it, the writing looked familiar. It didn't take me long to figure out who's writing it was. Once I figured it out, I checked on the computer. It *is* their writing, but not done by their hand. Somebody's damn good at covering their tracks, though."
"Whose writing is it?" Root repeated tightly.
"Holly's," Foaly finally answered. "She didn't write this, though. No question about it. Somebody is trying awfully hard to make it look as though she did. But do you want to know what the worrisome thing about this is?"
"What do you think, Foaly? What is the worrisome thing about this?" Root snapped.
"Well, whoever did this did a remarkably good job. The only way the computer could tell Holly's writing and this fairy's apart was by how hard he – or she – pressed. That means that whoever did this knows Holly's writing well enough to copy it. Letter for letter. Whoever did this is, she sees everyday. Whoever did this most likely works here," Foaly told Root, trying to sound as dramatic as possible.
Root felt himself pale. "Couldn't somebody have stolen a sample of her writing?" he asked, his voice coming out strangled.
"That's the other possibility," Foaly agreed. "There's no real way to figure out which it is."
Root's face returned to its usual ruddy colour. "Next time you say something with that many implications, make sure it's definitely true," he snapped. "You realize, if that's true, that there's an insane fairy working the in the LEP most likely *as we speak*? In fact, if you're right, then that could quite possibly be why Holly's apartment blew up. Whoever it was could've heard that she was going home, flown over to her house, put the bomb in and left before she got there."
"In which case it would most likely be a sprite since their wings are far more inconspicuous," Foaly suggested. "But keep in mind all of this is just speculating. If there is in fact somebody in the LEP working on this, then that somebody could be the mastermind behind all of this, but most likely, whoever is *really* behind all of this hired somebody to do this for him. Who in the LEP would be stupid enough to do that?"
Root and Foaly exchanged a look.
"Aside from Chix because he's too obsessed with Holly," Foaly added.
They thought for a few minutes before Root replied, "I don't know. I'll let you know if I think of anyone."
"Same," Foaly replied and went back to typing.
Root went back to his office and started on the third carrot of the day. It was then that he realized he had been either so busy helping Holly with her things or eating carrots that he hadn't had a cigar since this had started. He congratulated himself.
*
Holly was bored out of her mind. She didn't know how people without jobs could stand it. Usually, when she was at her own apartment, she had something from one case or another to keep her occupied over the weekends, but here she had nothing. She had finished the book about an hour ago, and now it was five. She figured Root would be getting home around six or seven, but really had no idea. Normally when she left work at exactly six, he was still there, but today was Sunday, so he had it off. Holly sighed.
"Then why don't you start on dinner?" the voice that had been haunting her all day with thoughts of buttons and various other things suggested.
Holly snorted. "He's not going to be home for most likely another two hours."
"Well if you want to sit around either worrying about who tried to kill you and who killed your sister ten years ago, be my guest," the voice snapped. "Or you could do something to keep your mind off that, like make a huge dinner. You haven't treated yourself to something *nice* for dinner in ages."
Holly thought about it. It was true. She couldn't afford to go out for dinner or to get enough really good food to make something nice. So the offer was tempting.
"But what would Root think?" she asked herself.
"Who cares?" the voice replied. "Either get busy living or get busy dying," it said, quoting a line from the first mudman movie she had watched. The title was on the tip of her tongue . . . The something Redemption. Holly went upstairs and started making dinner, still trying to think of the movie.
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Well, there's that. I know it's the shortest chapter I've done so far, but I've been updating so much, I hardly think it matters. Thanks much to reviewers.
IF ANYBODY HAS ANY IDEAS, PLEASE LET ME KNOW!!!