I apologize for the slow speed of this but it is likely to be the pace as I try to catch my footing in this particular genre. I'm almost exclusively a romance/humor/drama kind of girl, but hopefully this satisfies. =)

Enjoy!

~SRDempsey

Fury and Flames

Chapter One

Only a few people crazier then him were at the office as early as six in the morning, though Marshall felt it was rather telling that they were the ones who were usually done with work as early as three in the afternoon. Not that he could convince Mary of that – never. And Marshall never left before Mary, because God help them all if he left her unattended in the office more then was necessary. Stan would kill him…and that was if he survived whatever torture Eleanor conjured up.

He eyed the freshly brewed pot of coffee in the employee lounge cautiously, doubtful that it was fit for human consumption and unwilling to begin his day so early without some form of caffeine no matter how inferior it was. Marshall was still staring at it when the early-rising team from the floor below came up, both looking like death had warmed them over as was usual. He didn't see them very often unless he came in early like today, and he doubted Mary even knew their names. Any cooperation they did with other teams was usually quickly forgotten by his partner unless they did something particularly amazing to warrant her notice. Marshals Cassie Hayner and Laurence Harper were about as "civilian" as inspectors could get. Half the time, even Marshall had to admit he forgot they were Marshals instead of bums, let alone WITSEC inspectors.

"Is it edible?" Cassie poked the pot, one eye closed as she peered at it, lips pursed in obvious doubt. She poured half a cup in her "Save the Wolves – Screw the World" mug, half amazed it poured like brown liquid gold, and immediately shoved it under her partner's nose. "Test it."

"What if it's poisoned?" Marshall couldn't help pointing out. Of all the childish things Mary did to him, even she wasn't sadistic enough to subject him to being her personal taste-tester.

"Then Laurence dies and I get a new partner." The statement earned her a grunt from said man, his dark eyes narrowed in half-hearted indignation at best. In the few years he'd been here at the ABQ branch, Marshall couldn't recall ever hearing the man…well…speak. It was downright fascinating, really. He obviously communicated, seeing as his partner understood him. Was it perhaps the tone and length of the grunts that differed…?

I need more caffeine.

Laurence didn't drop dead, like they half expected him to, so Marshall filled his plain white coffee mug with the USMS insignia after Cassie refilled hers and left the two to raid the leftover box of Krispy Kremes from yesterday. Obviously Mary hadn't seen them or there wouldn't have been leftovers to begin with.

He was in the middle of typing up the report about yesterday's check in with one of his families that he'd put off when the good old fashioned Mann-paranoia kicked in. It was a sixth sense dating back to the very first Marshal Mann that his father and grandfather had said was passed down through the generations and kept them alive to ripe old ages despite the odds being against them. It was eerily silent like usual for early mornings – a sharp contrast to the buzzing noise common of the office during work hours – but something felt…off. Strange. The-call-is-coming-from-INSIDE-the-house peculiar.

"Morning, Marshall," Bert the janitor greeted him like usual as he passed him in the stairwell, heading for the seventh floor. Headphones in his ears and whistling to whatever Mexican music he was listening to, he was toting a large bag of trash over his shoulder before disappearing through the seventh floor doors to empty trash bins like normal. Marshall followed him, confused. Neither Cassie nor Laurence noticed anything peculiar when he stopped into their shared office to inquire about it – they being the only ones there besides him – and he was half way between the sixth and seventh floors when he found something unusual. Or perhaps slipped in it was the better term for it.

Marshall went feet up as he slipped off the last stair and crashed butt first onto the tiny landing, his legs dangling over the next flight down and his head cracking loudly against the wall. Liquid was under his fingers and he brought them to his nose, perplexed by the strange odor permeating his sense of smell.

Not water…accelerant? He got to his feet, taking the steps two at a time before bursting into the seventh floor hall just as he heard the distinctive thump of a bullet. Marshall didn't see what or who it hit, diving head first under the first cover he could just as the floor rocked beneath him, his fingers still typing the emergency SOS to Stan's cell as fast as they could when the heat came.

Heat…and fire.

Had the call come ten minutes earlier, Mary would've probably verbally torn into Stan for calling her early. As it was, he called exactly four minutes after seven – six minutes after she woke up, uneasy – and the tone of his voice as he said her name killed whatever snappy reply was on the tip of her tongue.

"Oh god, what happened now?" She was already jerking on her jeans and hastily pulling on a clean shirt as she spoke, her mind processing all of her witnesses who were in critical danger at the moment. Mary ignored Raph, who made that face she hated, and managed to mentally think of at least four witnesses who might be the cause of 'That Voice'.

"Just get down to the courthouse," he ordered, his voice stressed, and she didn't ask why or how come – he would tell her when she got there.

"I've got to go," she murmured quickly, more to herself then for Raph's benefit. She grabbed at her keys and jammed her feet into her shoes before exiting the house at a sprint. Mary didn't believe in much, but the fact that her mysoginist metaphor of a car didn't fight with her like normal worried her worse. It always fought her. It was a morning ritual.

Mary passed the Sunshine Building on her way to the courthouse, and that bad-feeling churn that she'd woken up to worsened. Now she knew why Stan told her to go to the damn courthouse.

The building looked like a roasted turkey.

She gunned it the rest of the way, ignoring the honks and trying to remember if anyone might've been working. The janitor, maybe. Maybe one or two inspectors around six if paperwork was bad. She and Marshall had done so a time or two…

God, Marshall.

He was caught up on his paperwork, she reasoned, squelching the flash of bone-deep fear before it could take root. Doofus is probably at the courthouse helping Stan get everything in order, babbling about the number of liquids that can be used as accelerants or something equally as mind-numbing… Mary still felt uneasy though, stomping the gas a little harder in her haste. When she finally arrived, she barely remembered to grab her keys from the ignition before hitting the steps at a run.

He was there in the judge's chambers turned WITSEC office, alright, but his state of being worried her immediately.

"What the hell? Doofus, why aren't you in the hospital!?"

Marshall inhaled from his oxygen mask deeply once more before pulling it away to grin weakly at her. "They didn't have any lime jello or pie. Can you believe it? Every hospital has to have-"

"To hell with the jello and pie!" She squatted to look at him eye level, checking his eyes, looking at his legs that were an angry red. No welts or broken skin, but a harsh red from exposure to heat. His pants were cut off at the thigh so they were more like shorts and made him look like an overgrown boy scout, but Marshall seemed not to notice as he laid them out extended across the couch against the wall of their temporary base of operations. Mary let her fingers graze lightly just above the red-red skin, watching his face for signs of pain and cursing when he cringed at her ever so light touch. "Marshall, you need to be at the damn hospital! You could get an infection if these blisters burst and-"

He placed a finger to her lips, his smile not quite reaching his eyes. "I need to be here. I gave my statement but I need to be helping. Bert is dead – died from the floor collapse due to the explosion. Cassie is…she was shot. The bullet nicked her head and she's in surgery so the neurologist can repair any damage that he can."

Mary had to think hard, trying to remember Bert was the janitor and even harder to recall who Cassie was. Since women were out numbered in the marshal's service nearly 200 to 1, and even fewer physically capable of becoming WITSEC inspectors, it shouldn't have been very difficult to recall her but was. She didn't particularly know any of the inspectors who worked on the seventh floor and forgot them almost as soon as she stopped working a case with them.

Still, a marshal was a marshal. No one screwed over a fellow marshal and didn't feel the full weight of every USMS employee come bearing down on them like a cold iron anvil. It was like a fraternity. Solidarity in shared danger and all that crap.

Marshall knew this and smiled a little wider, shaking his head. "Been an inspector three years, partnered with the 'Silent Sentinel'?" When recognition didn't dawn, he took another breath of oxygen before adding, "Showed up to our last company picnic with that intoxicated guy and ended up beating the crap out of him for picking a fight with the judiciary marshals?"

"Her!" She remembered that. Mary had actually been mildly impressed by her moved and looked up kickboxing because of it, though she never went to an actual class for it, sadly. No time. Never any time. "Jesus. Was it a hit?"

"No," Stan put in. "Not in a personalized sense. We believe it was an attack on our office in general."

"How the hell can that be? No one knows we're WITSEC personnel." Except Raph. But he'd never tell anyone. After a moment's hesitation she amended, not purposely. "The office isn't even listed as owned by the USMS."

"Mary." There was that tone again, Mary mused, accompanied by the look Stan usually got when he was going to do or say something he didn't want to. "Did you tell anyone about what you do for a living?" He held up an evidence bag to show her, and Mary eyed the single message printed on plain white computer paper.

Death to those who stand in the way of justice, Inspectors.

"The fuck?" She nearly crumpled it in her aggravation, bag and all, but remembered it was evidence and tossed it back to Stan instead. "Jesus…Stan." I told Raph, but he wouldn't…

That disastrous dinner flashed in her mind…his drunken joke about her job in a public place because of his anger. If someone had been there and put two and two together…

Oh sweet Jesus. This is my fault. Her heart dropped to her feet and she crashed to her knees, clinging to Marshall's burned sleeve, staring blankly at it. I got another marshal injured. I could've gotten Marshall killed because…why? Why did I tell him? There was a reason…I KNOW there was a REASON…

But is there any reason that was really worth this?

Mortifyingly, her eyes watered as she stared at Marshall's legs – her best friend – and wondered if it was worth it. Soothing Raph's semi-justified irritation…hanging onto the only relationship other then her friendship with Marshall that she'd felt might last…how much was that fraying relationship worth? Marshall's legs? Another marshal's life?

Marshall hugged her, a one-armed grasp that pressed her face into his shoulder, hiding the tears she forced to stop. The plastic of the oxygen mask brushed against the back of her head, emphasizing just how much she could've lost for a relationship that was all angry fighting and frustration then it was joy these days. Awesome sex too, but if she thought about it, she could get sex anywhere. Anyone. Hell, she was pretty certain Marshall would throw down with her if she asked, and it was always said that it was the quiet ones who are the wild ones…

"We're alright," he murmured, his voice soothing despite the distortion of the mask and the oxygen. "Could Raph have told anyone?"

"No." She firmly believed that. "He's a good guy. But he did get drunk and made a joke in a restaurant – La Carina Notte – once that could've compromised my job…it was a month or two ago and nothing happened, so I figured…"

Stan sighed. "We thought as much. You know there will be consequences for it later, but for now the top priority is tracking down this jackass. We'll need all of you on this, and until further notice our branch is on lockdown. No one can leave the Albuquerque program or enter it until further notice with relocation on an emergency basis only."

"Where are the others?"

"Laurence was still sitting in Cassie's hospital room, last I checked," Marshall rattled off. "Josiah is enroute and Micah is helping Eleanor figure out what paperwork needs to be reprinted and if anything was lost in the fire."

Stan nodded absently, rubbing his chin with his fingers thoughtfully. "For the moment, I think we should keep this between us. It's not like they wouldn't get why you told Raph, but…emotions are high right now and one of our own might not make it, and if she does, she will likely not be without permanent injury. The last thing we need is internal fighting."

Mary listened half-heartedly to Stan as he rattled off the particulars, knowing Marshall would fill her in if she missed anything important. She was too concerned with the wheeze he had from the smoke inhalation, a thin whining in his otherwise generally pleasant voice. And of course he was down-playing his injuries. She didn't need to have memorized an entire medical dictionary to realize he should be in the hospital for the severe first degree burns…never mind his lungs.

Marshall saw her staring at his chest, contemplated cracking a joke, and thought better of it. "I'm fine," he said instead, thumping his hand on his chest for proof. "I know you secretly love staring at my chest, Mare, but really…"

"Doofus." She punched his shoulder, lightly, and rested her head against his shoulder. "I should never have told him. Never should've…"

"Who did you tell?"

Mary whipped her head up, alerted by the lethal quality of that tone, and had to think hard before she pinned the hard-eyed man in the doorway as a fellow inspector. Laurence…Harding? Harper? Something like that. The 'Silent Sentinel', as he was called, because he never spoke but was similar to a wild horse: proud, more then a little untamable, but congenial enough to work with the domesticated. His partner usually spoke for them both unless directly spoken to. His brown eyes were hard as stone and Mary touched her gun out of instinct.

Raw killing intent fell off of him in waves.

Stan motioned for the marshals guarding the doorway to stand down, shutting it firmly behind his tightly strung inspector who advanced two predatory steps forward. He knew he should intercede, but quite frankly, it was probably best for him to get it out now rather then on a mission where personal feelings couldn't afford to get in the way of his judgment. Marshall must've figured the same since he wasn't automatically going on the defensive, though he did shift closer to Mary, his gaze relaxed but ever vigilant to Laurence's every move.

At 5'10", Laurence wasn't much taller then Mary, but he was more muscled, and Stan recognized the poise of a brawler. Each of his inspectors had a unique background in fighting that Stan knew by heart. Mary and Laurence had similar styles; both of them were brawlers, but hers was more spontaneous and every-man-for-himself while his was a composed but deadlier type of fighting that spoke of experience. He'd gone to see some of the obligatory sparring matches between his six current inspectors in the training gym a few times and the matches Mary and Laurence had were…interesting to say the least.

Mary faced him, head held high, one hand at her side and the other on Marshall's shoulder to keep him from doing something stupid. Rage she could deal with. The anger she could deal with. Hell, she'd have been tearing into someone if Marshall was the one in surgery now.

She said nothing as Laurence came way too close and stood nose to nose with her, his breathing a little too quick then was normal and his eyes a little…off. Frantic. Constantly searching. It was the look fugitives got when they were cornered and had one of two options: Flee or Fight. Mary faced the emotions she saw running in his face that had just enough Navajo in it to be pinned as 'not white'. She did not jump when his hands grabbed her shoulders, squeezing hard enough that she'd have nail indents later, and waited. Pressed a single finger into Marshall's shoulder when he moved, saying everything she needed to with just that one touch.

Don't.

Mary half expected him to hit her, and though he didn't, watching him silently fall apart because men are so STUPID and can't let themselves just fucking cry like a normal human being slammed into her as effectively as any fist could – if not more so. His hands let go abruptly and he sunk to his knees, head bowed and salty tears dripping silently one after another like a leaky faucet onto the carpet below.

"You can hit me if you want," she offered with a shadow of her usual grin. "I can take it."

"It would serve you right if I did," he grumbled, his voice pitched low but normal. No killing intent. His gears compartmentalizing his emotions for dissection later. "But you're bitchy enough that you'd slug me right back, Shannon."

She shrugged, the tension easing in the room as Marshall snorted from somewhere behind her. "Conditioned reflex. So?" When Laurence finally looked up, his face set in its usual ambiguity and dry of any signs of tears, Mary asked him, "How is she?"

"Still in surgery." To Stan, he said blandly, "I can't take the silence anymore, so I was hoping you had figured out something for me to shoot."

"Isn't that her line?" Marshall mused dryly, jerking his finger in Mary's direction.

Laurence's eyebrow jerked up high in response, as if Marshall were daft. "My partner, my turn."

"You all need a better way of dealing with stress," Stan grumbled, rubbing at his temple. "We're handling this in house, so we can't go to our brother agency for help on this one. I'm going to have Josiah and Micah help deal with the witnesses and paperwork, so you three go find that damn arsonist sniper!"

"Uh…Stan?" Marshall was staring at something over her shoulder and Mary followed his gaze, blinking a few times as her brain tried to catch up to what she was seeing. "I think we know where to start."

"That's…" Mary inhaled once – deep, calming fucking breaths – and scowled at the television to cover the gut-sinking worry clawing at her stomach.

"Mare?" Marshall poked her, once, and forced himself to his feet with a wince even as Stan shot him that sit the hell down you moron expression.

"God damn it. That fucker lit my house on fire!"

For a silent sentinel, Laurence looked happier then the exclamation warranted and checked his Glock with a habitual kind of detachment. "Oh goody, maybe I'll get to shoot something after all."

And there we have it. Chapter 1. Mary's life is getting completely tossed into the air and Marshall is hurt. Again. (Because I so love injuring the Mann. Bwahaha!) So we now have her house being burned, and three possibly casualties. Any thoughts?

Also features two of my newest marshals, Cassie Hayner and Laurence Harper. Not quite the Marshall/Mary type partnership, but still obviously close. Hopefully Laurence is mildly endearing, as he'll be around for awhile. Thoughts on him? Like him? Hate him?

Come on, you know you want to give me some feedback…