A/N: I'm not positive, but I think may have missed sending out follower notifications for the last chapter update. I follow myself to get emailed when my stories go live, and I never got said notice for chapter 6. If you're following along, might be worth checking back a chapter to ensure you're caught up. As always, thank you for reading and I hope you enjoy the story!
"Alright, we're lucky that skits are up first this year. I've spoken to some people, and you two will be the third group up." The last half hour had been a whirlwind as suddenly the frivolous fancy of getting Tesla up on stage to compete had become their one chance to disarm the artifact without causing an incident with hundreds of witnesses. "I hope your costume's alright Dr. Magnus, it was the best I could find in the dealer's room on such short notice."
"I'm sure it will be fine, Mr. Pennell. Thank you."
"And here's your stuff, Mr... um, I never got your name actually..." Benjamin handed Tesla another bag from the convention's shopping area, and hurried them both into his empty hotel room. There wasn't even time for an awkward silence when the vampire didn't answer. "You'd better hurry and change, you're already late for the green room and I'm going to have a hell of a time convincing them to let you in."
Benjamin closed the door for them and ran to check up on the rest of the project. Since Tesla made no move to be the gentleman, Magnus carted her stuff off to the bathroom and closed that door too. It was a thin enough divider that she could still hear Tesla's every complaint.
"This isn't even shatterproof glass. Or tinted. Do these gears even do anything?"
"I have it on good authority that goggles are this year's must-have accessory" Magnus' smile turned to a frown when she started trying to work out the dress she'd been given. It was so familiar in some respects, and yet they'd gotten key details completely wrong. It was like someone had tried to reconstruct the fashions she'd grown up with from pictures, and just made things up when they needed to fill in the blanks. Which, she supposed, was probably what had actually happened. It was also clear they'd brought her one of those fancy leather outside-wear corsets.
"They're a safety hazard. These people wouldn't know real science if it electrocuted them."
"Have you put on your moustache yet?"
"Please. Allow me to savour my last few moments of dignity."
But when Magnus emerged in her outfit, he'd worked up the courage to install the fake facial hair. Oh, now this did bring back memories, her in a bustled dress and him looking just like he had back in Oxford. He'd been so much younger then, not just in years. Back when his ego couldn't fill every single corner of the room, before he'd coined his debonair smile and shrugged off the naiveté that had lost him a fortune in patents to Edison. He'd grown stronger, smarter, and meaner over the decades, but then so had she. Was that awkward little Serbian still in there, under a hundred years of the vampire's charm?
"Ah, leather and low cut dresses. Will you be adding this ensemble to your regular wardrobe after this?" No, apparently not.
With her trip down memory lane brought to an abrupt dead end, Magnus went back to snapping at Tesla. "We don't have time for games right now, Nikola. Help me lace up."
She turned her back to the vampire, who was more than happy to walk over and assist. His long, elegant fingers against the nape of her neck, brushing away her hair, took all her concentration to ignore. Give the man an inch and he'd take a mile, but... well, she didn't keep inviting him along on these excursions exclusively for his brilliant mind.
The sharp, sudden tightness as Tesla pulled hard snapped her back to reality for a second time. "You don't have to take it off right away" he continued. "Maybe after I save the day, a nice evening in a hotel room. Just you, me, and" oof, another pull to tighten the bottom half "a bottle of something... hmm, full-bodied and a little earthy?"
"Believe me, I am taking this damned thing off the second we're done."
"In front of all those people? My, Helen, I'm shocked." She'd walked right into that one, so all she could do was roll her eyes and try to start breathing again.
Benjamin hadn't been kidding when he said they were late, the second they got to the green room they were grabbed, tagged with numbers, pulled aside, and placed in line for only half a minute before they were dragged off again to be taken from the green room to backstage. It all felt almost like being in a real theatre production, something Magnus hadn't done in... oh, half a century at least. From the sounds of it there was quite the audience, and they'd have to keep them entertained and unsuspecting while they diffused a live bomb on stage. And they hadn't had time to come up with any sort of script.
Benjamin met them back stage, he'd changed out of his Tesla costume and into the plain black shirt and pants that all the stagehands wore to stay inconspicuous. "Okay, here's your headsets. I've let them know you're going to be using the artifact as a prop, so no one should stop you. Remember, skits are five minutes or less, if you take any longer the stage ninjas will try and drag you off."
"I understand. We'll be quick."
"Good luck!."
Benjamin left to wrangle the previous performers off stage, leaving Magnus and Tesla to themselves for a final few seconds before the show. The clock on the bomb kept ticking, they couldn't take much longer than five minutes even if they'd wanted to because their time was nearly up.
"This is beyond humiliating" whispered Tesla, and to Magnus' trained ear there was something more behind it. He actually sounded nervous of all things, but maybe that was her imagination. Will would have called it projecting. Nonetheless she smiled, and put a hand on his back.
"Just... be yourself" she suggested. He looked puzzled by the suggestion for a moment, then his eyes lit up that way they always did when he'd just come up with some new brilliant idea. The smile that followed it unnerved Magnus to no end, more so when it was followed by his eyes turning dark and his teeth growing out to their full vampiric length.
"Well, if you insist."
