Disclaimer: I don't own Human Target and intend no copyright infringement.
Without Harry's presence, discussing the case was pretty senseless. Granted, he most likely had no idea why anybody would want to kill him, but usually it could be deduced from his summary of events.
Harry, however, was taking his time in Chance's bathroom. "Oh, I bet this artificial stuff causes allergies! There's this spot on my backside, left buttock, can't see it, but…", he complained loudly from underneath the shower.
"You would do mankind a favor…" Joubert repeated, leaning back in the armchair.
Chance, still fuming, decided to make the best out of the situation. "Get me some juice from the kitchen, will you?", he asked, settling back on the couch with a pained groan.
"There's water on the table." The Old Man nodded in the direction of the bottle of mineral water that was standing within Chance's arm's reach.
"No water. Juice. Sick people need lots of vitamins. You want me to develop a deficiency?"
"You're not sick, just a little banged up. And this is not the Terra Nova Expedition. You won't die of scurvy anytime soon." Joubert got up and walked to the kitchen.
"Apple juice, if you don't mind. The orange stuff gives me heart burn", Chance called after him.
Baptiste, dressed in nothing but sweatpants Ilsa once had acquired for clients in need, came back from the office's showering facility – just in time to see Chance make a strange bend over maneuver on the couch.
Seeing Baptiste, Chance quickly dropped backwards, winced and rubbed his shoulder. A telephone began to ring, first upstairs in Chance's living-room, then it was redirected to Chance's phone on the coffee table.
"Uh, could you get that for me?" Chance looked at Baptiste, blue eyes sparkling.
"Get it yourself, matey."
"Can't reach it." Chance made a show of trying to get to the phone on the far end of the table top, wincing a little more, grasping at thin air.
"Did you put it there on purpose?" Baptiste asked.
"Why would I do that?" Chance slightly tilted his head and smiled.
"That girlie shit doesn't work on me, Junior." Baptiste threw the phone into Chance's lap, just in time to see Joubert coming back from the kitchen with a glass of orange juice.
"You'll drink this."
Grinning, Chance checked the caller ID and answered the phone: "Hello, Ilsa."
He listened for a moment, then: "So, you'd like to know how to build a homemade plastic bomb just for the heck of it? Curiosity, hm? And it's not that you're knee-deep in trouble and could use a helping hand?"
Apparently the call was abruptly ended. Chance took a sip from his orange juice, looked at his watch – the phone rang again. "Yes, Ilsa?" He broke into a broad grin, listened for a moment again, then: "I'm notsmirking. Why should I smirk? Because you thought you could pull this off without me and now look at you, making a long distance-call to…"
The call was abruptly ended again.
Chance drank some more orange juice.
The phone rang for the third time. This time, however, Baptiste grabbed it from his hand, took off with it and put some distance between himself and Chance before he answered it.
Chance was just about to chase after him when a loud "tsk" from Joubert stopped him. "You're sick, remember?"
"Wallpaper paste will work fine, sweetheart. All you've got to do is increase the sodium hydroxide part", Baptiste instructed Ilsa.
Just then Harry came walking down the stairs, wrapped in nothing but Chance's bathrobe.
"Favor… mankind…" Joubert prompted again, but Chance motioned Harry to sit down. Baptiste, having ended the call, came back to them, but when he saw Harry and his attire, he preferred standing.
"I have no idea why they are after me. Seriously. There's nothing, absolutely nothing I've done wrong this time. No messed up adultery case, no cherry cocktail accidentally poured over mobster's wife's favorite white silk dress… Nelly and I spent most of the week out on the farm. I'll be going to Asia next week for a couple of days, to see my uncle, and we wanted to spend some time together before I was leaving. Only came back for the weekend, buddy of mine had a stag party."
"Stag party, hm?" Chance rubbed his forehead. "Let me guess, you woke up in the morning and couldn't remember a thing.
"Well, it was a stag party. Wild night, you know, just like mine, where I punched Guerrero in the face."
Baptiste and Joubert both looked at him in what passed as amused (and doubtful) astonishment. "You hit Guerrero?"
"He sported a black eye in the morning and I had his blood all over my jacket." Harry proudly puffed his chest up. Baptiste and Joubert both frowned for a moment, then exchanged knowing glances.
Behind Harry's back Chance threw an almost pleading look at the two men. Don't tell him…
Both smirked at him like sharks.
"Anything unusual when you woke up in the morning?", he addressed Harry loudly, trying to divert his attention.
"Nothing but that sore spot on my backside that got worse when it got in contact with that food coloring. It's been bothering me ever since the stag night. I can't see it, tried to in the mirror but slipped and fell and Nelly is still at the farm. Maybe one of you could take a look?"
Chance opened his mouth, but Joubert cut him off before he could say anything. "Do you really think you're too sick to perform this task for your friend?" The veiled threat of telling Harry the truth about him knocking out Guerrero was unmistakable.
Chance stared at him defiantly, while Joubert and Baptiste shared a smug smile.
"What's going on?", Harry asked, slightly confused.
"Nothing, Harry. Just turn around, I'll lift the robe myself." And so Chance did. He took a look at Harry's naked butt.
"There's actually something…."
"I've done it! I picked the…" Ash, who had come down the stairs impressively quietly, stopped in mid-sentence and froze to the spot on the last step, staring wide-eyed at his father.
And Uncle Harry.
"What?" Harry shrugged his shoulders. "We're all guys here, aren't we? I've got some strange rash and asked your father to take a look."
"You spend too much time at the farm." Chance straightened himself up.
"I'll… go back to my room…" Ash quickly ascended the stairs again. Before anyone could ask him to take a look and give his opinion.
"You can watch TV if you want to!", Chance yelled after him.
The loud clap of Ash's door was the only answer he got.
Both Joubert and Baptiste broke into thunderous laughter.
Chance rubbed his forehead. One hundred things you never thought you'd have to explain to your children…Number 47.