Flora: "Sword of Truth, fly swift and sure, that evil die and good endure."

Sword of Truth

Brooke walked into the office smiling and not really caring that she was half an hour late, but before she could sit down Jackie called her into her office. Jackie didn't bother looking up as she said, "Brooke you're late, as my personal assistant you know I need you here on time." Jackie looked up, instead of seeing a frown she saw that Brooke was smiling. "What's going on?"

"You wont believe who I had breakfast with." Brook said smiling.

Jackie pretended to think. "OK, I give, who did you have breakfast with?"

"Eric Forman."

Jackie raised her eyebrows. "I haven't seen him in two years, where did you run into him?"

Brooke started laughing. "Whats so funny?" Jackie asked.

"I didn't run into him, he literally ran into me." Brooke told her.

Jackie leaned back in her seat and said, "Alright Brooke, explain."

Brooke smiled and made herself comfortable.

Flashback

Brooke was walking in the park enjoying the morning air before going into work, she needed this peace and quite before going into the office. She loved working for Jackie, but she could be a pain sometimes; before her, Jackie could never seem to keep a personal assistant around for very long. At first she couldn't figure out why, Jackie was a very warm and caring person, then on her first day she found out. That woman could be a taskmaster, by Wednesday she wanted to pull Jackie's hair out by the roots, by Friday she figured out how to handle her. The next week was much better, she was now a much nicer person to work with. There were still days that were tough, much like yesterday. Thus the walk in the park before work. Brooke stopped walking and watched the ducks swimming in the small pond, when someone ran right into her and she almost fell on her rear end. But strong hands grabbed onto her biceps and made sure she didn't fall.

"Oh my god I am so sorry." The man that ran into her said. When she looked up into the mans face they both gasped.

"Eric?"

"Brooke?"

They both spoke at the same time, surprised to see each other.

"Brooke, I'm so sorry, I was running and I wasn't paying attention." Eric explained to her; embarrassed at his inattention to his surroundings.

"All is good, I wasn't hurt or anything." Before he knew what was happening she hugged him. "Eric, I missed you."

Eric hugged her back. "Um Brooke, I'm all sweaty."

Brooke just laughed. "I don't care, Eric," She pulled away and placed a hand on his chest; 'oh my he is solid' she thought to herself. She smiled at him and looked into his eyes. "I am so glade to see you again."

Eric smiled back and said, "I'm glade to see you too Brooke." He couldn't believe he literally ran into her. 'Wow she still looks great.' He thought to himself. "Can I buy you breakfast, to make up for running into you."

Brooke smiled and said, "Sure you can."

"Great, if you don't mind coming up to my apartment." He pointed to a building across the street from the park. "I live over there, that is if you don't mind waiting for me to get cleaned up?"

"Not at all, lets go; I'd love to see where you live." They started walking out of the park. As they neared the building, Eric took off his shirt and stopped to wring the sweat out of it before they entered the building. Brooke had to look away, 'Wow' she thought to herself. From what she'd heard, he couldn't lift his own weight, but from what she was seeing, he could lift her up with no problem.

"I'm sorry, if I don't do that, the sweat drips all over the place and I don't like it dripping all over my floor."Eric explained his actions.

Brooke swallowed the lump in her throat. "That's alright."

When Brooke entered Eric's apartment she was impressed. It was clean, the furniture was nice and she saw pictures of his friends and family on the walls and shelves.

Eric headed to his bedroom."Make yourself comfortable, I won't be long," he said over his shoulder. While he was in the shower, Brooke decided to look around and snoop a bit. While looking at the pictures she noticed that the only picture that Michael was in, was when it was a group photo. She decided to ask about this later when they where eating. She also noticed that there were no pictures of a girlfriend. Brooke sat on the couch and couldn't believe how comfortable it was and it felt like real leather, the coffee table was beautiful and looked like an antique. 'How does Eric afford furniture this nice?' she asked herself.

Twenty minutes later he walked out dressed in tan dress pants, a white dress shirt and a tan sports jacket, he was also wearing Italian leather dress shoes. She knew this, thanks to Jackie and her obsession with all things fashion. Needless to say she was floored by how good he looked.

Eric grabbed his keys. "You ready to get some grub?"

"Y-Yes." Brooke stammered.

Eric gave her his patented smirk, when he heard her stammer and opened the door for her.

EJB ****

"So our Eric Forman finally filled out?"

"Oui," Brooke said. "Jackie, let me tell you something, he has changed a lot since we last saw him. After he broke up with Donna he changed, he got more confidence in himself." Brooke blushed and looked everywhere but at Jackie and said, "When he had his shirt off, I had to use every ounce of will power not to stare."

Jackie raised her eyebrows and smirked at Brooke and asked,"So he's hot?"

Brooke waved her hand in front of her face to cool herself off after picturing Eric shirtless and seeing how fit he is. "Oh yeah, he was." She readjusted her position in her chair.

"Brooke you're acting like you went on a date," Jackie said making fun of the way she was behaving and blushing like a school girl.

Brooke laughed nervelessly. "I know it was just breakfast, but the food was really good and the conversation was even better," she said. "I wouldn't mind doing it again."

Jackie smiled at her friend; she hasn't shown any interest in dating since the whole Michael incident, she really couldn't blame her. Brooke was a complete mess for the first month afterward; she cried just about every other night, she stayed up with her, comforting her, eating chocolate ice cream and cursing Michael; all Jackie wanted to do was kill him for hurting her friend like that. Jackie shook her head, 'Oh God,' she thought. "Um Brooke, Micheal and Eric are friends – do you think that would be a good idea?"

Brooke shook her head. "He told me that he stopped being friends with Michael when he found out what he did to me."

******EJB

Eric leaned back in his desk chair and scanned his third period class; he watched the ones he knew liked to cheat. When he first took over the math class he gave his students a little test; remembering that a friend of his back in high school stole a test, copied it and sold it to his fellow students. Needless to say everyone that bought it passed with flying colors. So what he did was place a fake test in his desk draw a week before the real one; on the day of the test he could tell that a few of the students were dismayed at what they saw, they were the ones that failed and learned a valuable lesson. Don't buy a stolen test, especially when it was a Mr. Forman test. The ones that liked to cheat didn't buy any more tests, so they put their energy into finding new ways to cheat. Some times he caught them, sometimes he didn't, some learned it wasn't worth the effort, others didn't.

He watched as his students sat quietly and took the test. He tapped his pen on his desk and smiled as his favorite student turned her paper over and set her pencil down. The reason he liked her: not only was she smart, but she also reminded him of a certain midget. She was on the cheer squad, she was arrogant, conceited and if she wanted something she went after it till she got it. Sometimes he missed Jackie; Brooke filled him in on how she was doing and he was happy that she found some peace. He smiled when he thought of Brooke, he reached into the inside sports coat pocket and pulled out a card and looked at the number on it. He still couldn't believe what Kelso did. He could remember the day Kelso told him what happened.

FLASH BACK

Eric was walking back to his apartment after dropping Stacy back at her place, after a very enjoyable date. As he was approaching his door, he saw Kelso standing there about to knock.

"Kelso man, what are you doing here?" Eric asked as he got to the door.

Kelso stopped in mid knock as he heard Eric's voice. "Forman, thank God your here, I need your help."

Eric opened his door and motioned his old friend into his humble apartment; as Kelso walked into the living room, he noticed him limping badly. "What happened to you?

Kelso plopped down onto the couch, bent down and rubbed his shins. "Jackie is what happened."

Eric shook his head and sat in the chair next to the couch. "Haven't you learned to never piss Jackie off." Eric stared at his old friend and wondered what happened to get Jackie so mad that she would kick Kelso so hard in both legs as to leave him limping. "What happened?"

Kelso looked away from Eric and thought real hard, after a minute he turned back to his friend. "Can we talk about it tomorrow, I haven't slept since yesterday and I'm really tired."

Eric just nodded and said, "As you know the couch is a pull out, just make yourself at home." Eric stopped and thought about what he said and who he said it to. "Well not at home. You know the rules and where the bathroom is. I'll see you in the morning and we'll talk."

Eric walked into the kitchenette to make coffee and breakfast for him and Kelso. As he was taking the bacon out of the frying pan he couldn't believe Kelso was still asleep, just the smell of bacon cooking in the morning was enough to get him out of bed. When he was done with the bacon and the eggs he reached into the draw next to the sink, pulled out a small purple water pistol and filled it up. When he was a few feet from the bed he held the pistol pointing up and looked at his sleeping friend, he then raised his arm straight up, he lowered his arm and took aim at the sleeping form. He smiled a wicked smile then pulled the trigger sending a stream of water right between his eyes. When the water hit Michael he jumped off the bed and fell to the floor.

"Ow, my eye," Kelso said as he lay there holding his left eye. "Damn Forman, why did you have to do that?"

Eric turned and headed back to the counter that separated the kitchenette from the living room and said over his shoulder, "Breakfast is ready."

They sat and ate in silence. Eric watched his friend wondering what happened to get Kelso all the way here to Kenosha from Chicago. All he could think of was that it more than likely had to do with Brooke.

After they ate Eric cleaned every thing up then turned to his childhood friend. "Alright spill whats going on?"

Kelso took a deep breath and let it out then said, "Brooke caught me in bed with my partner from work and then took off to Jackie's after breaking off the engagement in a letter." He then proceeded to tell Eric every thing that happened between him and Jackie explaining why he was limping. "Can you please tell me where Jackie lives so I can talk to Brooke?"

As Eric listened to Kelso tell his tale of woe, he got more and more pissed at him. "One I lost track of Jackie after the funeral, two even if I knew where she lived I sure wouldn't tell you..." Eric said throwing the towel down onto the counter in anger.

Kelso could see the anger in his friend and swallowed, he didn't think Eric would get this mad, after all when he cheated on Jackie no one seemed to get mad.

Seeming to pick up on Kelso's train of thought, Eric walked around the counter and got in his face. "When you cheated on Jackie we were just kids, and no matter how mad I got at you, you were my friend and I could forgive you." Eric took a deep breath then said, "even Jackie, who was a thorn in my side from day one didn't deserve to be treated like that." Eric ran his hand through his hair. "God you don't even know how angry I was at you back then. Now you do this, to Brooke?" Eric balled his hands into fists,'Man I want to hit him so badly' he thought to himself. "I thought you changed for the better when Betsy was born; hell I was even proud and happy for you when you proposed to Brooke and she said yes."

"I don't know what..." Kelso started to say but was stopped when Eric raised his had.

"Don't, I don't want to hear any excuses Kelso." Eric turned and pointed to the door and said, "Get out, don't call me, I will call you when I'm ready to talk to you. Right now I am just too angry right now, so just go."

EFB

Eric looked at the card and decided he was gonna give Brooke an call and see if she wanted to go out to dinner and dancing Friday night. He looked at the clock then turned to his class. "Times up please place your pencils down and turn your papers upside down.

"Joyce can you please pick up the tests for me?"

Joyce bounced out of her seat and said, "Yes Mister Forman."

The boy next to her started making kissing noises then said, "Kiss ass."

Joyce turned to the boy and glared at him till he slumped into his desk and started fidgeting. "Sorry Joyce."

Joyce smiled at the reaction she got, then proceeded to pick up the tests for her favorite teacher.

'Yea that girl is so much like Jackie its scary sometimes,' Eric thought as he watched the interaction between the two. 'She can scare anyone with just a look, even apparently the school bully,' he thought.