Part I: Bored to Death

Chapter: What are friends for?

Myers had been buried in his emails for at least a few hours, (Damn that Manning - couldn't he do anything?) when he suddenly heard a loud bang from the door.

His hopes stirred - Margot?

But no such luck. There was Red, giving him a stare that would have scared a lesser man shitless.

"Wimp." he growled, pointing a finger at him. "Answer your phone."

"You've been trying to call me?" Myers dug out his phone. Shit - he'd forgotten it was on mute!

"No, but Kat's been driving me crazy."

"Kat?" Myers gave him a puzzled look. "What does she want?"

"To talk to you." Hellboy rolled his eyes. "And you'd damn well better answer, and get your shit together. I don't want to hear any more whining about your love life."

Myers rolled his eyes, and checked his phone. Crap - Kat had been trying to call him 57 times, and there were at least as many messages. He so was not going to read them all.

"Fine, Red." he said. "I'll deal with Kat, Ok?"

"You'd better." Hellboy grunted. "She's mad at me now, and I haven't got the slightest idea why. Fix it!"

On the other side of Atlantic Ocean, a certain young woman was restlessly pacing around Hellboy's room. She was tall and slender, her hair was pitch black, her skin was of a striking shade of blue and she had a long, pointy tail, that made wide circles in the air behind her.

She dialed Myers' number for what felt like 100th time - but unlike before, now he actually answered.

"Myers, damn it! Answer your phone!" she snapped.

"I am answering it." his voice was blunt. "What do you want?"

Kat blinked a few times. Myers sounded completely normal, but she wasn't about to let that fool her. She'd seen what Margot was capable of doing to guys, and she had a very bad feeling about what was going on.

"Is she still not talking to you?" she asked.

Myers sighed, and Kat practically saw him rolling his eyes - he did that a lot to her.

But he also knew, that when Kat was curious, he wasn't going to get off the hook without telling her exactly what she wanted to know.

"Not so much, no." he paused for a while. "Well, she talked to me about work, sure. We had all kinds of meetings today about the job. I sent Mannings a report about it, shared it to you too. You should read it."

"First things first, Myers - forget about the job." Kat was growing impatient. "So you haven't talked - about the other stuff?"

"About the stuff where she slept with me, and then told me it's over?" Myers sounded a bit bitter - Kat could hardly blame him. "Well, I did try to bring it up, but it didn't go so well."

"What do you mean?"

Myers was quiet for a few heartbeats.

"Well, she threw me to the wall, telekinetically."

"What!" Kat screamed. "What did you do to her?"

"Nothing! I just tried to comfort her when she was crying."

"You made her cry and then you tried to grab her?" Kat could hardly believe her (slightly pointed) ears. "Man, no wonder your love life sucks."

"Gee, thanks." said Myers. "You're making me feel so much better right now."

"Oh, kid." Kat said, and finally sat down on the bed, making room fer herself among various cats. "I really wish I could help you, but Margot isn't answering her phone either. And she can be really stubborn if she wishes to be."

"Yeah, tell me about it." he stated gloomily. "I mean, I don't understand what's going on. I know she likes me, she…" He paused for a short while, as if searching for words. "Ah, Gods, I know she wants me. But then, she keeps pushing me away. I don't get why. Does she… does she have someone else?"

"Not that I know of." Kat replied. "I mean, nothing serious anyways. In the matter of fact, in these few years I've known her, she's never had a real boyfriend." (Well, there had been the short fling with Jay, Kat's brother, but she wasn't gonna tell Myers that, was she?) "She's kind of a lone wolf, I guess."

"A lone wolf?" Myers sounded incredulous. "What you're saying, is that she sleeps around, right?"

"Well, yeah." Kat shrugged. Margot did that - a lot, sometimes. "But it wasn't just a one night stand for you, was it, John?"

"No. Damn, Kat. I've never felt like this about anyone." his voice was desperate, and it made Kat feel really bad for him. "I think I'm falling in love with her."

"I'll be damned." said Kat. "This will be harder to fix than I though."

In a small nightclub on a dark alley of Prague, Margot Duval sat on the table with her ex boyfriend, and tried to drown her troubles in cheap beer. It usually worked just fine, but there was something different about this night. No matter how much she tried to have fun, she seemed amiss.

She felt lost.

And she didn't even know what she was looking for.

"Margot, what's wrong?" asked Marco, taking her gloved hand. "You're not yourself."

"Rubbish." Margot tried to smile. They were speaking Czech, hers not quite as fluent as his. "I'm fine. I'm just nervous about tomorrow, that's all."

"Yeah, your first time as a team leader." he gave her a comforting smile. "But it's gonna be great. I'll be there to back you up, just like the old times."

Margot took a gulp of her beer, and eyed the dance floor. So many beautiful people dancing, their bodies moving to the music. Margot felt the beat in her core, and she wanted to be swept to it, moving her body to it, sweating her troubles away. She wanted for her body to press against someone on the dance floor, against a dark, handsome stranger to whom she'd show all about pleasure later on, and then John would - she shook her head, and the image shattered.

What was wrong with her - even now she could only see Myers' face?!

With a frown she grabbed her glass again, and took another sip.

"I know you too well." Marco said, leaning closer to her over the table. "I know it's not the job. It's him, isn't it? That John Myers."

Margot wanted to deny, but decided not to. "Fine, it's him. But I don't want to talk about it."

"I saw how you threw him to the wall, just for trying to put a hand on your shoulder." he noted. "What made you lose your temper with him?"

Margot was silent for a while, sipping her beverage. She remembered all too well, how it had felt. The hot fear, born in her heart, the agony that had lashed out as rage.

It was still there, always there in the back of her mind, dormant.

But that wasn't what Marco wanted to know, and she knew it.

"I might have accidentally slept with him yesterday." she muttered, looking down.

"What?" Marco laughed. "How do you accidentally sleep with someone?"

"You know how." Margot gave her a look. "And I said I don't want to talk about it."

"Fine." he said, meeting her eyes. "But I'm gonna still say this: he seems like a nice guy. Why won't you give him a chance? You deserve some happiness, you know."

"You talk too much." said Margot, turning her gaze. "All guys do. Come on, I want to dance!"

But just as she was about to stand up, Marco's cellphone, that was on the table between them, began to ring.

"Oh come on, don't answer it!" Margot pleaded, but in vain.

"It could be work." he said. "Better take it."

But as soon as he took the call, Margot knew it wasn't work. He had this puzzled look on his face, and then his eyes wandered to her face.

"Yes, she's here." he said then, in English. "Who did you say you were?"

"It's Kat Wagner." Margot snapped and rolled her eyes. "Give me the damn phone."

"Margot, what the Hell are you doing, avoiding my calls?"

Great, straight to business. Just what she didn't need.

"Trying to have good time at a club?" Margot replied, walking towards the door. The music and the noise of people chattering, soon quieted down, as she stepped outside.

"Yeah, clearly. I've been trying to call you for like a thousand times. What's wrong with you?"

"Nothing's wrong with me. I'm perfectly fine." Margot rolled her eyes.

"Don't act like you don't know what I'm talking about, Margot. You're breaking my friend!"

"Oh, Myers?" Margot tried to sound indifferent, even if she felt a twinge of guilt in her heart "I didn't know he was your friend, and I'm hardly breaking him. He's tougher than he looks."

"No he isn't! He's every bit as sweet and soft as he seems, and you know it."

Damn it, she hated it when Kat was right. It always made her annoyed.

"God, can't you see that's exactly the point?" Margot snapped.

"You're not making any sense, Margot. Please, explain."

Margot was silent for a short moment, trying to decide how honest she should be. Yes, Kat was her best friend, but she was Myers' friend too. If she told her what she really felt, Myers would no doubt hear about it.

"The problem isn't that I don't like him." Margot settled for something close enough to the truth. "It's that I like him too much."

"I really don't see what's the problem there. He's single, and so are you - to my knowledge."

"He's a good guy, Kat." Margot said. "I should think about his heart."

"It's a bit too late for that."

"What do you mean?" Margot had the worst feeling about this. "Have you talked to him?"

"Yeah. And he says, he's falling in love with you. So whatever you plan to do about his heart, you should be more careful."

Margot cursed in her mind. Damn, she should've known this. This bode her no well.

"He'll be going back to US in a few days, and he'll never see me again. He'll get over me, I know it."

"That's just stupid." Kat replied, honest as ever.

"Yeah, but it's also true. I can't give him what he needs."

"Then what about giving him what he wants?" Kat suggested.

"That'll just make our problems far worse. The best thing I can do for him, is to stay as far away from him as possible."

"But-" Kat tried, but Margot had had enough.

"Enough already, Kat. I know what I'm doing."

"You never know what you're doing!" Kat exclaimed, but Margot finished the call, and closed the phone.

She walked back in, stuffed the phone in Marco's hand and stated: "Now, let's dance."