Chapter 12 – Don't Quit Your Day Job

He was close.

Joss could feel it.

She hadn't been hallucinating. Those two silhouettes weren't an illusion – Bear and Antonia were working together. And if they were, so were Finch and Elias.

And John.

John was coming for her. She knew it.

"Finally, the transfers are complete," Quinn said with a smile.

Pretending still to be weakened by the torture, Joss slumped in the chair as Simmons cut the cords around her wrists, legs and waist. He roughly pulled her to her feet. "Time's up, bitch."

Joss fought against the natural instinct to try to get away now, telling herself to wait until they were in the main sanctuary.

Quinn sighed dramatically. "It all could have been so different. Instead of escorting you to your death, I could have been walking you down the aisle to marry Cal." He flung open the door to the office. "Your new bridegroom awaits, Ms. Carter – the Grim Reaper."

XXX

Guns drawn, flanked by Bear and Antonia, Reese and Mr. Burton walked into the sanctuary. The guard at the front of the room didn't even look up, intent on putting the final adjustments to a pair of detonators. The guard at the back of the room opened his mouth in shock at the visitors, but before he could react, Reese knocked him out, easing his unconscious body to the floor silently.

The Cafeteria Lady's experienced eyes swiftly scanned the space. As Mr. Burton had guessed, there were two guards on the main floor, but a fleeting shadow in the choral balcony told him there was at least one, probably two more men upstairs, and possibly more in the hallway leading to the back office where Joss was being held.

In order for his plan to work, they had to lure everyone into the main sanctuary and he needed to be as close as possible to Joss.

As he stepped forward, the hallway door opened. A guard walked out, then Simmons shoved a stumbling Joss into the room, followed by Quinn.

Reese's heart soared at the sight of her. She had a nasty cut over one eye and looked exhausted, but as her eyes met his, she nodded slightly, that brief gesture telling him everything that he needed to know – that she knew he'd come for her.

Simmons' snicker cut across the silence as the two groups faced off. "Oh, look, it's Lurch, Uncle Fester and," the Teacher's Union President sneered at the two dogs, "Cousin Itt-i-ot and Mrs. Cousin Itt-i-ot."

"You rang?" Reese smirked. His eyes softened as he gazed at the Auto Shop teacher. "You okay, Joss?" he asked, as he walked further into the room.

She shrugged. "Nothing one of your Carter Creamsicles couldn't cure, John."

"I'll make you as many as you want, Joss, whenever you want them," Reese promised as he walked closer to her.

"I'm holding you to that, John," her lips quirked as her eyes took in his companions. "And I've got witnesses."

"How touching. Young – well, middle-aged love blossoming right before our very eyes," Quinn smiled coldly, "but I'm afraid this is as far as it will go."

The Cafeteria Lady turned to the School Board Head. "It's over, Quinn."

"Over?" Quinn laughed out loud. "In a few moments, this entire campus will be reduced to rubble. The soon to be late Ms. Carter will be blamed not only for destroying Machine High, but for killing several of her colleagues as well. You're outnumbered, Cafeteria Lady. If anything's over, it's this conversation, and this damn school."

All pretense was gone now. Reese knew that the man who stood before him was as evil as some of the worst people he had hunted when he was in the CIA. "You never wanted Machine High to succeed, did you, Quinn?" he said, as he kept moving slowly forward.

"Of course not! This…institution…was supposed to die a quick and painless death after we milked all the construction and union contracts. A noble, but failed experiment. Why do you think we hired all of you? Losers, malcontents, over the hill, no experience, an animal – every one of you, except for her –" he jerked his head at Joss – "has some blemish or shortcoming on your record, some reason why another school wouldn't hire you."

Reese nodded. "You're right. We're a bunch of misfits. Yet somehow we succeeded, somehow we made it work."

The Auto Shop teacher smiled. "This 'Island of Misfit Toys*' became," her eyes met Reese's and then she looked at Mr. Burton, Bear and Antonia," a family."

"Yes…" Quinn heaved an exasperated sigh, "somehow you 'Misfit Toys' did. And somehow that ridiculous Coach Finch, a man who never coached a game of Tiddlywinks, much less a football team, kept winning, and with a winning program, the students and the donations kept coming. I couldn't shut down Machine High without people asking questions."

"Until Samaritan Industries came along," Mr. Burton added.

"And their tens of millions of dollars. I was already slowly diverting donations into my getaway fund, but the death of my duller than dishwater godson Cal meant I could do it all in one fell swoop. If I had known how easily his death facilitated my plans, I would have killed him myself."

Reese was just a few feet away from Joss. He tapped his earwig. "Now, Finch."

Harold's voice was tight with rage. "With pleasure, Mr. Reese." Outside, the Coach aimed the grenade launcher towards the chapel's glass roof and pulled the trigger.

Reese threw himself on top of Joss, Bear and Antonia rolled under a pew and Mr. Burton crouched down, holding the bag of weapons over his head.

Nothing happened.

"Finch!" Reese cried.

"This isn't something I do every day, John!" The Coach flipped the safety, then pulled the trigger again.

The grenade shattered the roof, causing huge shards of glass to rain down. There were screams up in the balcony, and as the shards hit light fixtures and ceiling fans, the glass splintered, showering the room with sharp needle like pieces.

Loading another grenade, Finch fired again, opening a hole in a chapel wall. As flames flickered and smoke filled the chapel, Bear and Antonia rolled out from under the pew and leapt lightly to the top of it. The two dogs then jumped from the top of one pew to the next, heading towards the front of the room.

Mr. Burton ran forward and swung the heavy weapons bag at the two stunned and bleeding guards, knocking them out. With a feral smile on his face, he plunged through the smoke, looking for Simmons.

Sheltered underneath the Cafeteria Lady's body, Joss was still, her eyes closed. His hand shaking, Reese gently cupped her cheek. "Joss? Are you okay?"

She slowly opened her big brown eyes. "You…really know how to sweep a girl off her feet, John Reese." Her eyes widened as she saw blood streaming down his arm. "John, you're hurt!" Joss cried. Pieces of glass had cut the back of Reese's uniform to ribbons and several large chunks had sliced into Reese's right arm.

"As long as you're okay, Joss, I'm fine."

As they rose to their feet, Quinn screamed as he lurched towards the pew where the detonators were kept, "I can still blow this place to Kingdom Come!"

"Looking for something?" Antonia snarled between clenched teeth. Both she and Bear had a detonator in their jaws, the wires pulled out, rendering them inoperable.

Quinn stared at her with his mouth open, stupefied that she could talk.

"Now he is silent," Bear said. "If I had known that I would have spoken years ago."

The two dogs leapt along the pews and then jumped through the hole and out of the building.

Mr. Burton leaned over the balcony. "The men up here are secured, John, but Simmons is missing."

"He'll have to wait. The rest of them will be here soon."

The English teacher tossed down the weapons bag. "Go. I'll take care of Quinn."

"Me first." Joss stepped forward and clocked the School Board Head on the chin with her fist. Quinn dropped like a stone to the floor.

Reese grinned. "You as good with a gun?"

Joss grinned back. "Better."

"Harold –" Reese held out his hand, "and I – could use your help."

She intertwined her fingers in his. "Let's go."

They followed the two dogs through the hole in the wall and out of the building.

A/N: As we know, Root has referred to Reese as Lurch, the Addams Family's butler. "You rang?" is what Lurch would say when summoned by his employers.

*The Island of Misfit Toys first appeared in the 60's television special Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer as an island sanctuary where defective and unwanted toys are sent. Toys include a bird who swims instead of flies, a cowboy who rides an ostrich, a train with square wheels on its caboose, a bear on a bicycle, a boat that cannot stay afloat, a water pistol that shoots jelly and other defective inhabitants. – Wikipedia

Next, What You Owe Me will be posted on December 10.