CHOSEN (WELL, KINDA…)
Written by Ann Rivers ann.riversvirgin.net
Summary: A DM/ Buffy crossover… how much trouble can Jesse get into with some painkillers,
garlic bread and the TV remote…? Hey, come on…! This is Jesse we're talking about…!
Spoilers: None for the story, but it's set shortly after Talked To Death. Reference also made to
Murder Can Be Contagious
Disclaimer: I'm not making any profit from this story – yeah, like anyone would pay me for this !!
Feedback: Yes please ! I need the therapy !!
He was, Mark Sloan knew, wasting his time. And his breath. He had last time. But he said it anyway.
"Don't even think about it…!"
Two big blue eyes blinked innocently up at him, pretty much scuppering his attempt to look stern.
A lower lip pouted outwards, creating the perfect expression of plaintive, child-like disappointment.
Then the little half smile appeared, and Mark could feel his fatherly authority start to crumble.
Damn, he thought, trying, without success, to suppress a smile, this boy is good…!
'This boy' was hungry too, he noted, watching those big blue eyes travel yearningly back to the table.
And, as he knew only too well, a hungry, convalescing Jesse Travis was a force to be reckoned with.
So was Steve, of course. Especially when his favourite pizza was at stake.
"Jess…" he warned, glaring down at his young friend, the unspoken threat hanging in the air.
It was the tone of voice that left hardened criminals either blabbing like babies or running for cover.
And that was the problem, Mark reflected, enjoying the silent battle of wills that now raged before him
Jesse Travis wasn't a hardened criminal. He was the irrepressible bundle of energy and mischief that,
for all his protests to the contrary, had Steve Sloan wrapped effortlessly around his little finger.
That wrapping had started two years earlier, when Jesse had swept, like a mini tornado, into their lives.
And, to the delighted amusement of his father, there hadn't been a thing that Steve could do about it.
Like it or not, his son now had the troublesome kid brother that, in truth, that son had always wanted.
Where Steve Sloan went, Jesse Travis followed. If it involved 'helping' on a case, so much the better.
Unfortunately the boy had just learned, the hard way, that 'helping' Steve had its drawbacks too.
Trying to stop a fleeing miscreant by blocking his path had, in hindsight, not been such a good idea.
Ever since Jesse had come to stay with them, convalescing from the wrenched knee he'd suffered,
his gruff, strait laced, no nonsense son had turned into a six foot two inch version of Mary Poppins.
And while he normally hated to be coddled… well, it seemed, this time Jesse had made an exception – if only to enjoy every last mischievous moment of running his nannying friend as ragged as possible.
Surfacing from his musings, Mark now fought to stifle a chuckle of laughter behind his hand.
Those big, plaintive blue eyes had now latched onto Steve, the smile stepping up to all out melt.
The stern, brotherly glare that Steve had tried to direct on his young friend was starting to falter –
and Mark could almost see his son dissolve into a big pile of slush on the carpet.
Knowing from much practice when he was beaten, Steve just threw up his hands in exasperation.
"It'll be cold by the time we get back anyway…" he muttered, reaching for a slice of garlic bread – coming dangerously close to fratricide as Jesse slapped his hand away, tutting in grave disapproval.
"Ah, ah…! Bad move, Steve…! I mean, all that garlic on your breath… yeeugh…!" he pointed out,
casting his startled, wrist-rubbing friend a bright, beaming grin of pure and utter sadism.
Sensing that brotherly warfare was imminent, Mark now stepped bravely in to avert it.
"Okay, boys, back to your corners…" he chuckled, directing a fatherly glare towards each boy in turn.
Once they started bickering, these two really were impossible, just a couple of overgrown kids –
well, he reflected fondly, glancing down towards the couch, not quite so overgrown in Jesse's case…
"Steve, we'd better get going to help Amanda out at this crime scene… and as for you…" he went on,
again struggling to keep his face straight as his surrogate son blinked up at a sternly wagging finger.
"You rest that leg… we'll be back as soon as we can, okay…?"
Rolling their eyes at Jesse's selfless 'I'll be fine, no need to rush back', Mark and Steve then left –
making a mental note that they'd need to call in on the grocery store on the way home. Again…
Reaching eagerly for that glorious pizza, Jesse winced as his knee painfully twinged in protest.
Massaging away the throbbing stiffness, he then eased himself more carefully back into his cushions,
gratefully downing a couple of painkillers while flicking idly through the TV's plethora of channels.
After wading through the worst of daytime cable, one channel finally piqued his heavy-eyed interest.
"Aww, hey…! Buffy…!" he enthused, yawning through a sleepily happy, lovelorn grin.
Munching through a huge slice of pizza, Jesse settled back for an afternoon of action packed slayage.
Slowly, though, increasingly leaden eyelids blinked, then fluttered, then finally drifted shut…
Walking along an eerily dim lit, shadowy corridor, Jesse Travis frowned in mounting puzzlement.
"Jeez, what's wrong with the lights…? Don't tell me Admin forgot to pay the electrics again…?!?"
Admin, it seemed, was due an apology, since things were no better in the main lobby.
If anything, the darkness there seemed even deeper. More eerie, more intense, more threatening…
Swallowing nervously, Jesse glanced around him, feeling both his unease and confusion deepen.
When he'd left earlier, to check on Mr Da'Culra's transfusion, the lobby had been a hive of activity – bustling with patients being admitted and treated in the orderly chaos that only the ER could provide. Now, less than half an hour later, the place was deserted. And cold. Chillingly cold.
"Where'd everybody go…? What the hell's going on here…?!?"
"I believe I can help you with that, Dr Travis…"
Spinning to confront the heavily accented voice that had addressed him, Jesse's mouth fell open.
"Mr – Mr Da'Culra…? B – But… I – I – I mean, what are you doing out of bed…?"
His supposedly severely anaemic patient now smiled, revealing perfectly even, gleaming white teeth. Except…
No, the two incisors were slightly longer than the others. And they were red. Dripping red.
And no, Jesse's inner voice now practically screamed at him, somehow I don't think it's ketchup…
That drippy red smile now widened, in a happy anticipation that Jesse Travis did not currently share.
"I felt… hungry…" the owner of that smile explained, emphasising his point by slowly licking his lips.
Now backed helplessly against the wall, Jesse dredged up his most melting, vampire dissuading smile.
"Aw no, you – you don't wanna eat me…" he stammered at last, shaking his head in frantic denial.
"I – I mean, look at my body mass, there – there's hardly enough blood in me for a light snack, and…
and – and the smallpox, did – did I mention the smallpox…? Yeah, real nasty, mutated smallpox, so…
well, you know, I'm gonna be full of antibodies, and – and all sorts of other yucky stuff, and…
and, see, it's gonna taste real icky, and… and… hey, put me dooooooooooowwwwwwn…!!"
Grabbed beneath his arms and hoisted upwards, Dr Jesse Travis was now clutching at straws.
Well, no, not straws… no, he was grabbing at something slightly longer from a nearby lunch trolley.
Trying to fumble a cross out of his uselessly flimsy weapon, he then rolled his eyes at its sheer futility.
"Aw, this is just great…! I'm fighting off Dracula with a crucifix made out of breadsticks…!"
Wriggling in sheer desperation as those fangs drew closer, Jesse brandished it anyway –
yelping in peeved irritation as the top half vanished, before those teeth relentlessly advanced on him.
"Hey, cut it out…! Stop eating my crucifix…!!!"
Before he could protest further, though, something pulled his tormentor violently away from him – with such force that, suddenly released, Jesse fell to the floor in a boneless, winded, gibbering heap.
Dazedly shaking his head to clear it, his eyes then rounded like saucers at the scene that met them.
Still in total shock, a normally razor sharp mind began, inevitably, to go ever so slightly ga-ga.
"Now there's something you don't see every day…" he mused, idly munching a remaining breadstick.
"Count Dracula having the crap kicked out of him by someone even shorter than I am…!"
He had no idea who this person was – the wonderful person who, quite literally, had saved his neck.
And watching her work, in all honesty, a now hopelessly smitten Jesse Travis didn't really care.
"I think I'm in love…" he murmured dreamily, utterly mesmerised by this tiny, blonde tornado on legs.
"And the 'I love Buffy brigade' gets a new member… oh, puh-leeese…!" a voice beside him pleaded –
a voice which then magically changed into a warm purr of ingratiating, equally lovelorn approval.
"Ooooooh, you're a doctor…! Kinda short, and you're a bit of a wimp, but… oooooooh, a doctor…!"
Not knowing which was worse to face, a doctor-hungry vampire or doctor-hungry cheerleader,
Jesse wriggled clear of eagerly appraising fingers and stood up, trying to re-assert his authority.
"Hey…! I am not sh… uh… a wimp…!" he protested, lamely amending the last part of that sentence.
Admittedly she stood taller than him on teetering stilettos, but… well, she'd still made a valid point.
He needed some back up to help defend his battered male pride. Right on cue, that back up arrived.
"Gee, Cordelia, with a pick up line like that, you should be beating the guys off with a stick…!"
The speaker was tall, dark haired, with an easy smile that Jesse felt an immediate kinship towards.
Before he could compliment him on his one liner, though, Cordelia hit back with one of her own.
"Well, at least I have a pick up line, Xander… you just stand there, imitating a goldfish…"
Feeling ridiculously like a tennis ball being zinged across the net, Jesse held up a placating hand.
"Hey, um… excuse me…" he chipped in, his eyes still flicking from one sparring partner to the other.
"But… um… well, who are you…?"
The dark haired youth, in mid goldfish mimicry, frowned at the interruption, then sheepishly grinned.
"Oh yeah… I'm Xander…" he explained, nodding towards his lovely, if acid tongued, companion.
"And this fine ambassador for Sunnydale's diplomacy corps is Cordelia… Cordy to her friends…"
Pausing for effect, making sure he had Cordy's full indignant attention, Xander then grinned wickedly.
"Which explains why most people call her Cordelia…"
"And the reasons people call you loser are just too numerous to name…" Cordy shot back with,
Jesse noted, a caustic relish that seemed to suit her as perfectly as her faultlessly fashionable clothes.
Not to be outdone, Xander merely raised an eyebrow, a wry smile lifting one corner of his mouth.
"Ooooh, that's the best you can come up with…? Whoa, Cordelia, you're losing your touch…!"
"In your dreams…" Cordelia retorted, with a sharpness remarkably similar to a certain pathologist.
The result was inevitable – another volley of insult and counter insult that made Jesse's head spin.
"Whoa, guys…! Hey, time out…!" he pleaded, hoping to distract them by changing the subject –waiting until he had their patient attention before pointing past them, to the other battle beyond.
"And who's…? I – I mean, who's she…?"
"That's Buffy… she's the… um… uh, well, she's the…" Xander started to reply, then floundered –
not sure how much of her secret identity Buffy Summers would want him to reveal.
Cordelia Chase, however, had no such qualms. If there was gossip to spread, she would spread it.
"What Mr Clear and Conciseness here is trying to say is that she's the Slayer…" she explained at last, rolling her eyes as this admittedly thoroughly lunchable doctor stared back at her, utterly bewildered.
"She who spends just waaaay too much time in cemeteries, has the worst fashion sense ever, and…"
"She slays vampires, demons and other freaks of nature…" Xander chipped in, smirking at Cordelia.
"Guess Miss Clear and Conciseness here slipped through the net…"
The result, again, was inevitable – causing Jesse to shake his head in utter exasperation.
Jeez, when it comes to bickering, these two make me and Steve look like a couple of amateurs…!
Leaving them to it, Jesse turned his attentions back to another, far more absorbing battle.
"Gee, I wish I could be the Slayer…!" he sighed wistfully, now even more smitten than ever.
Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed a red haired figure – one whose face looked oddly familiar.
Eyes he would recognise anywhere glinted back at him, the face breaking into a truly wicked smile. Lightning seemed to flash around him, in blinding colour. Then everything went white, and…
Jesse stared down at himself. Then he rubbed his eyes. Then he pinched himself, hard, on the cheek.
"Ow…!" he yelped, silently telling himself never, ever, to do something as stupid as that again.
It hadn't worked anyway. Nope, he was still standing there, holding a wooden stake in his hand.
This, Jesse thought to himself, would be a good time for Mark to turn up and explain what the hell…
Right on cue, his friend, mentor and surrogate father came running up to him… except… except…
A suit…? A tweed suit…? What the hell was Mark doing wearing a three piece tweed suit…?!?!
Mark was now yelling something at him, practically screaming at him to 'stake, Jesse…! Now…!'
He was still trying to decide whether he'd prefer that steak with fries or onion rings when something – no, someone, someone with a real personal hygiene problem, grabbed him painfully across the throat.
An instinct that Jesse was still too dazed to understand compelled him to kick out at his assailant –
a kick that saw said assailant fly through the air, with a speed and grace that Steve would kill for.
Speaking of which…
Jeez, he was at it again, waving his hands over something that looked astonishingly like a crystal ball.
Another flash of multi coloured lightning. Quick puff of smoke, blinding whiteness, and…
…and suddenly there were two lumps in the front of his chest that most definitely did not belong there.
Jesse Travis was now miffed. Seriously miffed. And he was getting more miffed by the minute.
As if having a gang of Amanda's suddenly undead customers trying to kill him wasn't bad enough,
his soon to be ex best friend was now gleefully changing his gender. Yes, he was now seriously miffed.
"Damn it, Steve…!" he finally yelled, sending another luckless demon into a shower of exploding dust.
"Stop turning me into a woman…!"
"That, Jess, is something I'd give my lifetime's salary to see…"
Jesse's eyes snapped open, staring dazedly towards the source of that familiar, brotherly teasing.
Still trapped halfway between sub and full consciousness, dream and reality, that face kept merging – changing from rugged, blond handsomeness to pert, flame haired mischief.
Gradually though, the familiar, puzzled, amused, concerned face of Steve Sloan took precedence
Clearly deciding this was the perfect time for payback over that lost pizza, Steve grinned. Wickedly.
"So then, Jess…" he went on, favouring his still utterly befuddled friend with a quizzical smirk.
"This miraculous knack I seemingly have for turning you into a woman… care to elaborate…?"
"You… I… turning me into… I… wh – what…?!?" Jesse stammered, desperately stalling for time.
He needed a diversion. Back up. Someone to wipe that infuriating smirk from Steve's face.
And no one wiped smirks from faces with quite so much style, or speed, as Dr Amanda Bentley.
Especially when her little brother was being picked on. Even more so when he was hurt…
"I – I had a bad dream, 'manda…" he mewled, turning plaintive blue eyes upon the pathologist – appealing to every one of her motherly instincts as he cowered pathetically beneath his blanket.
"A real bad one…" he clarified, blinking up at her with all the doe eyed charm of a newborn fawn.
"And – And my knee's hurting too…"
Whether she knew she was being set up or not, it didn't matter to Amanda. She'd seen enough.
So had Steve, whose smirk, to Jesse's inner delight, rapidly vanished under a glare that could melt lead
"Oh Steve, how can you pick on Jesse when he's clearly so upset… and in pain…?!?" she demanded – not giving the hapless Steve a chance to open his mouth, let alone reply as she pointed to the kitchen.
"Now make yourself useful and get Jesse some orange juice…"
"And – And maybe some ice cream too…?!?" Jesse piped up with a hopeful, wheedling smile –
the glare he received in return silently warning him that he'd pay for this one… big time.
As one Sloan fled for the sanctuary of the kitchen, another silently convulsing Sloan left it –
soft mutters of 'I'll throttle that traitorous ingrate' sending Mark into fresh fits of delighted laughter.
"Well, son, as a magician, I'd much prefer watching you turn him into a woman…" he chuckled –
making good his escape into the den before that still muttering son could retaliate.
Of course, the real fun started a short time later, when Amanda left to collect CJ from daycare – Jesse's plaintive entreaties that he should go with her met with not entirely comforting assurances.
"Don't worry, Jesse… however much Steve bends you, I'm sure Mark can mend you afterwards…"
Now, as the sun disappeared behind mountainous shoulders, Jesse seriously doubted that assurance.
He'd seen that deceptively pleasant smile enough times to know that he was in trouble. Serious trouble
There was only one thing that could possibly save him. Out came the glacier melting smile.
Five seconds later, that glacier melting smile melted in on itself. Steven Sloan was not buying it…
"So just to recap here, Jess…" Steve said at last, perching himself neatly on the edge of the couch – making a deliberate show of flexing his knuckles in front of Jesse's wide, suddenly very nervous eyes.
"You fell asleep while watching Buffy, then you dreamed that my dad was Giles… Iwas Willow…
and I cast a spell that… um… gave you bumps in some very interesting places…?"
Taking full advantage of the peeved glare that followed, Steve's already broad grin grew evilly wider.
Oh, this was getting to be fun ! Without laying a finger on him, he had Jesse Travis at his total mercy.
With so much for his mind to disbelieve, that mind inevitably chose to question the most outlandish.
"Oh sure, Jess… yeah, like red hair would even suit me…!"
"Oh yeah…? How would you know…?" Jesse shot back, determined as always to really push his luck.
He was still seriously miffed at his friend for, albeit subconsciously, completely altering his gender.
"I mean, you've had enough practice already, with that glow in the dark, fluorescent blond look…
then there was that strawberry blond, and that weird multi blond you've got at the moment, and… well, hey, ya know… I think red hair would really suit you… bring out those beautiful blue eyes…"
Those beautiful blue eyes warningly narrowed – then glinted with the perfect means of revenge.
"And I'm sure you made a gorgeous girl, Jess… if it ever happens again, I might even date you…"
"Yeah, bite me…" Jesse shot back. A pause, then, "That's a figure of speech, Steve, not an invite…"
Thoroughly enjoying the entertainment, Mark Sloan raised his own eyes despairingly heavenward.
"Oh yes…" he sighed, still chuckling helplessly as he retreated into the sane refuge of the kitchen.
"The Earth is most definitely doomed…!"