Chapter Eighteen (I finished. Holy crap.)

Guys. Guys. Hey. Guys, guess what. I finished. No, seriously. It's done. Hey, guys. Hey. Hey. (DISCLAIMER: It is about 1400 short of 2k a day, because I ran out of plot, but only in the last epilogue bit. So I'm still saying I finished.) I'm more or less repeating 'HOLY F***' in my head permanently. And yes, I'll censor myself here, because I haven't given the warning yet.

Warning: Honestly, I'm not even checking if this is actually safe or not. Just assume it isn't. 

There's a question at the end, so you guy should TOTALLY READ ALL OF IT FIRST then answer the question. 

Stranger watched the end of Leroy's trial on TV, in another room, via closed-circuit cameras. He'd requested that, and the request had been granted, because Leroy had this unfortunate tendency to spazz out whenever Stranger was within sight, trying to attack him and ignoring all attempts to stop him, shouting, "You belong dead!" at the top of his lungs. Stranger was of the opinion that he'd finally snapped, but because he was more than capable of acting like a suave, charismatic human being at all other times, he wasn't declared insane. (It was generally suspected, at least among the group, that he was, in fact, a genuine psychopath, but normally very, very good at hiding it.) Instead he got twenty consecutive life sentences, which broke some kind of record, and made Stranger a bit happier than it probably should have. He smirked at the screen as the judge said, "I only wish that I might have given you more. May God have mercy on your soul. This trial is adjourned." The gavel was banged, and the gallery went into an uproar. He turned the television off, and looked at George, who was sitting next to him.

"Hey, I was watching that," George protested.

"I want junk food," Stranger told him. "We can get you some sort of stupidly unhealthy fried stuff. I hear there's a diner that does deep-fried twinkies downtown."

"Really?" George asked. "Why was I not informed? Do they cater?"

"I don't know. Let's find out." Stranger felt lighter now then he'd felt in a while. He'd known there was basically no way that Leroy would get off, not with Rochester on the team prosecuting him. (Watching that man work was like watching a lion toy with its prey - interesting if you weren't the target, and the prey never, ever survived.) He'd been nervous anyway. It had taken months and months for the trial to conclude, and if Stranger and George hadn't been funding the prosecution, it might have just run out of steam. But now it was over, thank every deity ever, and Stranger was a little ecstatic about that.

They wandered down to the cafe, a little thing off [fillintheblank] Street that did, indeed, serve deeped fried Twinkies. It also sold turducken, deep fried and fresh cheese curds, and deep fried butter. George was in the heaven that is usually reserved for people who die of cardiac arrest during a fair. He was extremely happy about it. Stranger watched him eat, and texted Persephone. You going to be at the after party? He'd never really gotten the hang of text speak.

course came the reply. dont come buzzed, thatll spoil the keg were setting up. and come sooon

I'll stay sober as a saint Stranger replied. "We're being requested at the party," he told George. "I think you can get a carryout box for the rest of that."

George looked up from his platter of turducken. "Good, because I have taken this as a challenge. It shall be defeated!"

"Honestly, how the hell are you not fat?" Stranger asked him, as a waitress was flagged down and a box asked for. "There are women who'd give you a spare liver for your metabolism."

"It's the meetings," George confided in him. "Some of the people I have to deal with are so stupid that I lose my appetite."

"Sure," Stranger said, rolling his eyes. "Let's go, Mr. Metabolism."

They were at the party half an hour later. It was at Malcolm's, of course - the new, completely refurbished, no longer falling apart Malcolm's. It had been closed far longer than the two weeks that Malcolm had said, mostly because of people unofficially hired by Clark Jr. to trash the place. He was in prison himself at the moment, for holding up a 7-11 for pocket money. He'd literally shot himself in the foot, though, and had been apprehended at the scene. It was almost a little pathetic. Stranger felt no pity, though. The kid deserved it for delaying Malcolm's reopening by eight months.

The place looked really, really nice now, though, with the payout the insurance company had given him, and some extra cash donated by Stranger to speed the whole process up. It was still all woods and bricks and tiles, but cleaner, neater, and not gnawed on by rats or plastered patrons. There was even a billiards table with a stained glass light above it, which Stranger thought showed definite class. Currently, the place was filled with people who'd been involved in the trial one way or another. Persephone was there, and gave Stranger a kiss at the door. Havisham and MacAlleister were in a back corner, talking and drinking things with pink umbrellas in them. Jean was playing billiards with Rochester and being beaten soundly, from the sound of it, and Caroline was talking with Jack, of all people. Jack and [what's his name?] had come up from Gary for a visit, and hung around for a few extra days when they'd heard about the party. There were other people around, too, mostly those who'd been recruited by George or Havisham to help finish taking Leroy down.

And Alice, guest of honor, was sitting at the bar in a new, polished body, more or less exactly like the one he'd had previously. It had taken tricky work on George's part, and some strings pulled by the reconstituted unnamed group, but they'd managed to both completely restore him from his last backup. (He didn't remember the second half of the mission nor the two months it had taken to fix him, but he'd likened it to amnesia - he probably wouldn't remember that if he'd gotten severely injured and sent into a coma, either.) He was considered a State Secret, so he wasn't supposed to go out during daylight, or at night without a latex mask, but he'd learned that no one looked twice at a person wearing a black hoodie with the hood up, staring at the ground. It was sent to the 'Somebody Else's Problem' and promptly ignored, if it was thought about at all.

Stranger felt himself relax, thoroughly. He weaved his way through the crowd, most of whom greeted him by name, and up to the bar, where Malcolm was polishing a glass, as all good barkeepers perpetually are. "Two Guinnesses," Stranger told him. Malcolm complied, and the drinks were in his and George's hands almost immediately.

Unfortunately, before he could take a drink and then go watch Jean be completely demolished, Peresephone was beside him, with his drink in her hand somehow, and saying, "You know, you should probably talk to everyone. A speech, like."

"Why me?" he asked her, bewildered.

"Because you're the reason this whole mess got started," she told him. "You and that bloody inheritance."

"Which was entirely not my fault," Stranger said. "At all. It was Uncle Perce's fault. Or maybe Missy's."

"Where is she?" George asked, a foam mustache on his lip and half the glass gone already. "Giving nightmares to small children?"

"Actually, I think Rochester sent her to an auction house," Stranger said. "I told him to get rid of her legally and without having my name ever, ever attached to her. And that any proceeds should go towards a sexual health clinic, anonymously."

George burst out laughing.

"Speech," Persephone reminded him. "You will give one. Now, in fact."

"No, I won't," Stranger said firmly.

But George had heard her, and being the bastard he was, started chanting, "Speech, speech, speech, speech," and the chant was taken up by the entire room, because the universe was still fickle and wanted to remind him not to get too comfortable.

"Fine!" he said. "Fine, I'll do it, just stop that." Everyone quieted down more or less immediately, with one or two hoots and catcalls trailing off in the silence.

"I... Fuck, I don't know what to say. This has been the weirdest portion of my life so far," Stranger said, aware all eyes were on him. "But for the first time ever, I fought a bad guy. And he lost. The good guys won, I guess. We won. And that's all, pretty much." Then, desperate to not sound like a complete idiot, he finished, "The house can have a round on me."

Cheers broke out in all quarters. Stranger turned to Persephone, who was grinning, unrepentant, at him, and glared. "I hate you like a hating thing, sometimes," he told her.

"You know, for someone who's highly eloquent in the written word, you're a sucky public speaker and prone to falling into Buffyspeak," she told him, still grinning.

"I came here to get really, thoroughly drunk for the first time in months without worrying it will affect the trial," he said, "Not to speak. Now give me back my beer and let me drink in peace."

"Fine, spoilsport," she said, rolling her eyes. But when she wandered off to talked to one of the financial lawyers that had managed to survive both Rochester and George, Stranger noted that she was still smirking.

The party went amazingly well, to be honest, up until midnight. No one died, no one had a breakdown that had been put off for far too long, and most of all, no one bothered Stranger. He should have known that it was too good to be true.

At the stroke of midnight, all the windows in the place exploded outwards and the room was flooded with men who might have been anything from terrorists to SWAT team members. Stranger, who was at the pool table taking his turn getting trounced, somehow contradicted all his instincts and, instead of diving for the ground, looked around to make sure everyone was intact, then went for Persephone. She was fighting one of the random invaders with a sword that glowed - of course it did. "I thought I asked you to leave your work at the office," he told her, having to shout slightly over the uproar.

"It follows me home!" she told him, reaching across her torso, drawing a phaser, and handing it to him. "Here. You remember how it works?"

"I can make toast with it," Stranger said.

"Then do that." Then she whirled away, and Stranger was left holding a dangerous weapon in the middle of a melee.

Goddammit, why is this my life? he thought, a little pissily. Then he saw some bastard with a knife go for Persephone's back, and he fired, unthinking. The guy collapsed, and suddenly Stranger was fending off his own group of bad guys.

The whole battle lasted barely five minutes, before the invaders were all lying on the floor, incapacitated in various ways. It turned out that a lot of the people employed for the trial had been a part of the unnamed organization. That wasn't especially surprising, and it meant that all of them - all of them - had been armed to the teeth with exotic weaponry, even at a party. Stranger felt a bit put upon. Off behind the bar, he heard Malcolm say, "Oh, goddammit. Bloodstains don't come out of wood."

"Come on, love, time to go," Persephone said, pulling him away. "A safehouse might be a good idea, for a couple days."

"Why me?" Stranger asked her.

"Because you're a good guy who hangs around with the wrong kind of people," she told him. And then her face softened, and she added, "And because you do the right thing, even when it's really, really stupid."

"Damn right, I do," Stranger said fiercely. Then, "Wait, was I just insulted?"

She laughed at him and dragged him out into the night.

So, the Question: WHAT DID YOU GUYS THINK? Is it good? I know it's not coherent, or edited, or really anything at all, but was it funny? Because if anything even made you smirk, then I succeeded in my second goal. I love reviews and comments like I do chocolate, and I've been known to help people review for math finals for chocolate. So, a lot.