Summer In Neptune (10, part one/?)
Title: Summer In Neptune (10, part one/?)
Author: Pat Kelly
Pairing: Veronica/Buffy
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 1712
Summary: A crossover with BtVS. Buffy runs away from Sunnydale and goes to the first place she called home.
Timeline: Between S2 and S3 for BtVS. Between S1 and S2 of VM, so there be possible spoilers. Fudged with the years, so Buffy is 17 in 2005, not 1998, like in the show.
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A Saturday night in mid-July found the Marses, the Fennels, and the...um, Buffy, attending a baseball game at Sharks Field. Keith wanted to at least get in one game this season, because it would be the last before the team switched stadiums and this one was imploded to make more parking. And spending an evening at the ballpark with those who mattered most to him, seemed a swell idea.
He sat in the stands wearing cap, jersey and glove, hooting and hollering like the passionate fan he was. It was a passion his company couldn't come close to equaling, but they smiled and indulged him. Who would believe that a grown man this loveably ridiculous cracked the murder case of the decade and had a tell-all book coming out in a couple of weeks? Not his daughter, that's for sure.
"I'm suddenly hankering for peanuts and crackerjacks." Veronica announced. "But I'm gonna need cutoff men to glove those wild spills." Buffy and Wallace sat on either side of her and raised their hands, indicating that yes, they wanted to come along. "Are you sure? 'Cause I don't care if I ever get back."
"I'll take that chance." Wallace responded.
"Ya-huh." Buffy agreed.
"A whole childhood of box scores and tee ball wasted. Have I taught you nothing?" Keith sighed disappointingly at his daughter as the kids stood up from their seats. "The 'cut off man' is the infielder who--"
"Yeah, don't care." Veronica cut him off with a grin, and looked at Alicia. "Give him some sugar while we're gone, will ya? Distract the man."
"I'll try my best." Alicia laughed, and then turned to her younger son next to her. "You want a hot dog, Darryl?" He nodded silently several times, and she got money out of her wallet. "Would you mind?"
"Do we mind?" Veronica asked her cutoff men, who shook their heads. "It's unanimous. If there're no more requests, then we'll just..." She waved off the cash, and pointed away.
"Walk softly, honey." That was Keith's way of saying "be careful," and that he and his lady friend were both fine.
"Always do." Veronica then gestured to her girlfriend. "Got my big stick right here."
As the trio squirmed and excused their way out of the row, the hazel-eyed blonde grumbling, Alicia asked her date, "You're really okay with her and Buffy dating?"
"They both know what they're getting themselves into, and I haven't seen Veronica this euphoric, for this long, in years. Buffy's, well...unique, and the best person for her right now, really." He explained. "So yeah, I am. Is there a reason why I shouldn't be? Besides certain biblical interpretations?"
"No, no..." She assured him. "It's just, very progressive of you, that's all. If it were my child, I don't know if I'd be as understanding. I'd like to hope I would, but..."
"I don't think that's something you'll have to worry about, but if you saw that it made them happy--and for a lot of people, I'm sure allowing themselves to see it is the toughest hurdle--I believe you would." Next, he spoke in his "cool" voice. "However, *I'm* just extraordinarily attuned and hip to the times in which we live."
"Oh, you're hip all right." She chuckled, and then kissed him.
"Why you always gotta be macking?" Darryl uttered abruptly.
Kids said the darndest things.
***
"Five dollars for a bottle of water." Buffy shook her head in disbelief.
"Three for a hot dog." Wallace complained with her.
"Three-*fifty* for a pretzel." How was a pretzel more than a hot dog?
"But eating away our paychecks away together?" Veronica spoke up as they walked around the 360 degrees of consumer gouging that would make Adam Smith and Karl Marx both cry. "Priceless."
Wallace frowned. "Maybe to you, but Sack'n'Pack doesn't pay me enough for this."
"Oh yeah, 'cause we're *drowning* in Benjamins and bling." Veronica told him sarcastically. "Wah-wah."
Buffy smirked. "Who has time for shiny, wastes of gold when we're busy drowning in each other?"
Veronica leaned her head against her male friend's should and pretended to sigh from being incredibly moved. "My woman's so poetical. I think I'm getting verklempt."
Wallace grinned. "So what did you two, fine ladies do for date number nine yesterday?"
"She fell, I watched. As it happened again, and again, and again...it was sort of a pattern. Until, by the end? Her butt had hypothermia." Buffy fought her lips natural inclination to smile. "But in no way did it ever skirt being guffaw-worthy. Nope." Beat. "Um, except there was a whole, pee-wee hockey team that got on the ice as we were leaving? And they might've thought different."
"Wait a minute...there's something *Veronica Mars* can't do?" Wallace gasped in surprise, praying he didn't laugh. "I cannot believe what I'm hearin'."
Veronica gave them both her "stare of death." "Sure, she skates with Olympic flair and has a decent center of gravity, but can her hands bug a Pinto as smooth as these can?" She showed hers off. "And I'll have you know, I can be graceful in ways she only *dreams* of."
"Ouch. You're gonna tease her like that?" Wallace disapproved.
Buffy looked pitiful. "Yeah, you're gonna tease me like that?"
"If she doesn't keep certain stories to herself from this point forward, that's all I'm *ever* gonna do to her." Veronica threatened with a smile.
"Does she think she projects some kinda mystique that I've now ruined?" Buffy posed to Wallace with a smile all her own, but he was abstaining. "Y'know, somewhere other than in her own brain?"
Veronica nodded as if to say, "Okay, if this is how you wanna play it..." "Does she think anything is really scared of--?"
That second, people ran out of their sections, and into the concourse. It was bedlam. Instinctively, Buffy made sure the three of them stood tight together, as a riot erupted. The cause, they'd discover later, was the ejection of star pitcher Miguel Arroyos for putting an illegal substance on the ball, in order to cheat. Being Mexican, he was a town hero to his people. They didn't like that the umpire who threw him out, was white.
But what lit the fuse was some drunk asshole yelling a slur that wasn't very nice, then proclaiming that it served Mr. Arroyos right, and that he should be "sent back with the other illegals and stick to picking beans." This was Neptune now. People were just looking for any reason to get violent, and Veronica, Buffy and Wallace were in the crossfire. They dumped their food and moved as a group.
"C'mon, it's too dangerous to try for an exit; we need to get to like, a bathroom, then lock the door and wait till this dies down." Buffy instructed, having switched to her "slayer" mindset.
"My mom and Darryl." Wallace uttered concernedly, thinking of them.
"They're with Veronica's dad--he'll take care of 'em." She promised. "I'm more worried about us." She addressed her girlfriend. "You have your Taser?"
"That's the new plan, Stan." Veronica said, gripping it inside her bag, whose strap she moved from around her shoulder to around her neck. She kept her other hand on the middle of Buffy's back.
"Then let's slip out the back, Jack."
"Hey, don't need to discuss much; just get yourself free." Veronica told her. "We're right behind you."
"What the hell are you doing?" Wallace asked, looking at them like they'd gone nuttier than the inebriated people fighting.
"Paul Simon soothes my nerves during a riot, okay?" Veronica revealed for him. "There--another layer of mystique torn to shreds."
They ducked and weaved and pushed their way through the chaos, until they saw a little boy get separated from his parents just as two, large gentlemen began brawling. Everyone else formed a wide circle around them, to move out the way. The combatants were both white, but looked like they might've shared the same cellblock at one time. The little boy was in the impromptu ring, and crying. The bald one was going to fall right back into him.
Before that happened, Buffy rushed in, grabbed the boy, gave him to Wallace, and then went back and put her foot on Baldy's throat, as he'd crashed to the ground. "There's this sport? Called 'boxing'? Dunno if you've heard of it, but it's on TV sometimes. Anyway, it'll let you punch someone all you want, *and* you get money even when you lose. If you stay alive." She pressed down harder. He gagged. "But there's really no benefit to doing that here. People who didn't ask to be punched, just wind up getting hurt. Which makes me mad." Her voice was hard. "You don't wanna make me mad; you wanna stop. Don't you?" She took her foot off, but too soon.
He grabbed it immediately, and pulled until she lost balance and fell. He got up, and just as he did, she used her foot again, this time to give him a shot to the shin. While he collapsed to one knee, she flipped herself back up to standing, and without hesitation, round-housed him in the head. He was out.
"There's always kickboxing, too." She commented to his unconscious form.
Veronica had taken care of the other, straggly-haired, "had a little too much fun in the 70s" guy with a stealthy shock to his back. Wallace came over as she crouched and held the Taser over him. "Jet Li couldn't even *interview* with your girl's league, V...damn. And sorry, but she scared *me*? And I was on the sidelines."
Was her face flushed? "Really? She did something else to me entirely." While grinning half out of admiration and half out of that something else, her phone rang. Veronica answered it with her free hand. "Dad? Are you guys okay?...You did? Whew, thank god." She gave Wallace a thumbs up. "Big sigh of relief on this end...Yeah, we're fine, too...Nah, I don't think you'll have a hard time finding us..."
A few feet away, the mother, hugging her little boy, was thanking Buffy. Then she asked, "Could we, uh, follow you?"
Everyone who had watched the fight, was now looking at her hopefully.
Author: Pat Kelly
Pairing: Veronica/Buffy
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 1712
Summary: A crossover with BtVS. Buffy runs away from Sunnydale and goes to the first place she called home.
Timeline: Between S2 and S3 for BtVS. Between S1 and S2 of VM, so there be possible spoilers. Fudged with the years, so Buffy is 17 in 2005, not 1998, like in the show.
----------------------------------------------------------
A Saturday night in mid-July found the Marses, the Fennels, and the...um, Buffy, attending a baseball game at Sharks Field. Keith wanted to at least get in one game this season, because it would be the last before the team switched stadiums and this one was imploded to make more parking. And spending an evening at the ballpark with those who mattered most to him, seemed a swell idea.
He sat in the stands wearing cap, jersey and glove, hooting and hollering like the passionate fan he was. It was a passion his company couldn't come close to equaling, but they smiled and indulged him. Who would believe that a grown man this loveably ridiculous cracked the murder case of the decade and had a tell-all book coming out in a couple of weeks? Not his daughter, that's for sure.
"I'm suddenly hankering for peanuts and crackerjacks." Veronica announced. "But I'm gonna need cutoff men to glove those wild spills." Buffy and Wallace sat on either side of her and raised their hands, indicating that yes, they wanted to come along. "Are you sure? 'Cause I don't care if I ever get back."
"I'll take that chance." Wallace responded.
"Ya-huh." Buffy agreed.
"A whole childhood of box scores and tee ball wasted. Have I taught you nothing?" Keith sighed disappointingly at his daughter as the kids stood up from their seats. "The 'cut off man' is the infielder who--"
"Yeah, don't care." Veronica cut him off with a grin, and looked at Alicia. "Give him some sugar while we're gone, will ya? Distract the man."
"I'll try my best." Alicia laughed, and then turned to her younger son next to her. "You want a hot dog, Darryl?" He nodded silently several times, and she got money out of her wallet. "Would you mind?"
"Do we mind?" Veronica asked her cutoff men, who shook their heads. "It's unanimous. If there're no more requests, then we'll just..." She waved off the cash, and pointed away.
"Walk softly, honey." That was Keith's way of saying "be careful," and that he and his lady friend were both fine.
"Always do." Veronica then gestured to her girlfriend. "Got my big stick right here."
As the trio squirmed and excused their way out of the row, the hazel-eyed blonde grumbling, Alicia asked her date, "You're really okay with her and Buffy dating?"
"They both know what they're getting themselves into, and I haven't seen Veronica this euphoric, for this long, in years. Buffy's, well...unique, and the best person for her right now, really." He explained. "So yeah, I am. Is there a reason why I shouldn't be? Besides certain biblical interpretations?"
"No, no..." She assured him. "It's just, very progressive of you, that's all. If it were my child, I don't know if I'd be as understanding. I'd like to hope I would, but..."
"I don't think that's something you'll have to worry about, but if you saw that it made them happy--and for a lot of people, I'm sure allowing themselves to see it is the toughest hurdle--I believe you would." Next, he spoke in his "cool" voice. "However, *I'm* just extraordinarily attuned and hip to the times in which we live."
"Oh, you're hip all right." She chuckled, and then kissed him.
"Why you always gotta be macking?" Darryl uttered abruptly.
Kids said the darndest things.
***
"Five dollars for a bottle of water." Buffy shook her head in disbelief.
"Three for a hot dog." Wallace complained with her.
"Three-*fifty* for a pretzel." How was a pretzel more than a hot dog?
"But eating away our paychecks away together?" Veronica spoke up as they walked around the 360 degrees of consumer gouging that would make Adam Smith and Karl Marx both cry. "Priceless."
Wallace frowned. "Maybe to you, but Sack'n'Pack doesn't pay me enough for this."
"Oh yeah, 'cause we're *drowning* in Benjamins and bling." Veronica told him sarcastically. "Wah-wah."
Buffy smirked. "Who has time for shiny, wastes of gold when we're busy drowning in each other?"
Veronica leaned her head against her male friend's should and pretended to sigh from being incredibly moved. "My woman's so poetical. I think I'm getting verklempt."
Wallace grinned. "So what did you two, fine ladies do for date number nine yesterday?"
"She fell, I watched. As it happened again, and again, and again...it was sort of a pattern. Until, by the end? Her butt had hypothermia." Buffy fought her lips natural inclination to smile. "But in no way did it ever skirt being guffaw-worthy. Nope." Beat. "Um, except there was a whole, pee-wee hockey team that got on the ice as we were leaving? And they might've thought different."
"Wait a minute...there's something *Veronica Mars* can't do?" Wallace gasped in surprise, praying he didn't laugh. "I cannot believe what I'm hearin'."
Veronica gave them both her "stare of death." "Sure, she skates with Olympic flair and has a decent center of gravity, but can her hands bug a Pinto as smooth as these can?" She showed hers off. "And I'll have you know, I can be graceful in ways she only *dreams* of."
"Ouch. You're gonna tease her like that?" Wallace disapproved.
Buffy looked pitiful. "Yeah, you're gonna tease me like that?"
"If she doesn't keep certain stories to herself from this point forward, that's all I'm *ever* gonna do to her." Veronica threatened with a smile.
"Does she think she projects some kinda mystique that I've now ruined?" Buffy posed to Wallace with a smile all her own, but he was abstaining. "Y'know, somewhere other than in her own brain?"
Veronica nodded as if to say, "Okay, if this is how you wanna play it..." "Does she think anything is really scared of--?"
That second, people ran out of their sections, and into the concourse. It was bedlam. Instinctively, Buffy made sure the three of them stood tight together, as a riot erupted. The cause, they'd discover later, was the ejection of star pitcher Miguel Arroyos for putting an illegal substance on the ball, in order to cheat. Being Mexican, he was a town hero to his people. They didn't like that the umpire who threw him out, was white.
But what lit the fuse was some drunk asshole yelling a slur that wasn't very nice, then proclaiming that it served Mr. Arroyos right, and that he should be "sent back with the other illegals and stick to picking beans." This was Neptune now. People were just looking for any reason to get violent, and Veronica, Buffy and Wallace were in the crossfire. They dumped their food and moved as a group.
"C'mon, it's too dangerous to try for an exit; we need to get to like, a bathroom, then lock the door and wait till this dies down." Buffy instructed, having switched to her "slayer" mindset.
"My mom and Darryl." Wallace uttered concernedly, thinking of them.
"They're with Veronica's dad--he'll take care of 'em." She promised. "I'm more worried about us." She addressed her girlfriend. "You have your Taser?"
"That's the new plan, Stan." Veronica said, gripping it inside her bag, whose strap she moved from around her shoulder to around her neck. She kept her other hand on the middle of Buffy's back.
"Then let's slip out the back, Jack."
"Hey, don't need to discuss much; just get yourself free." Veronica told her. "We're right behind you."
"What the hell are you doing?" Wallace asked, looking at them like they'd gone nuttier than the inebriated people fighting.
"Paul Simon soothes my nerves during a riot, okay?" Veronica revealed for him. "There--another layer of mystique torn to shreds."
They ducked and weaved and pushed their way through the chaos, until they saw a little boy get separated from his parents just as two, large gentlemen began brawling. Everyone else formed a wide circle around them, to move out the way. The combatants were both white, but looked like they might've shared the same cellblock at one time. The little boy was in the impromptu ring, and crying. The bald one was going to fall right back into him.
Before that happened, Buffy rushed in, grabbed the boy, gave him to Wallace, and then went back and put her foot on Baldy's throat, as he'd crashed to the ground. "There's this sport? Called 'boxing'? Dunno if you've heard of it, but it's on TV sometimes. Anyway, it'll let you punch someone all you want, *and* you get money even when you lose. If you stay alive." She pressed down harder. He gagged. "But there's really no benefit to doing that here. People who didn't ask to be punched, just wind up getting hurt. Which makes me mad." Her voice was hard. "You don't wanna make me mad; you wanna stop. Don't you?" She took her foot off, but too soon.
He grabbed it immediately, and pulled until she lost balance and fell. He got up, and just as he did, she used her foot again, this time to give him a shot to the shin. While he collapsed to one knee, she flipped herself back up to standing, and without hesitation, round-housed him in the head. He was out.
"There's always kickboxing, too." She commented to his unconscious form.
Veronica had taken care of the other, straggly-haired, "had a little too much fun in the 70s" guy with a stealthy shock to his back. Wallace came over as she crouched and held the Taser over him. "Jet Li couldn't even *interview* with your girl's league, V...damn. And sorry, but she scared *me*? And I was on the sidelines."
Was her face flushed? "Really? She did something else to me entirely." While grinning half out of admiration and half out of that something else, her phone rang. Veronica answered it with her free hand. "Dad? Are you guys okay?...You did? Whew, thank god." She gave Wallace a thumbs up. "Big sigh of relief on this end...Yeah, we're fine, too...Nah, I don't think you'll have a hard time finding us..."
A few feet away, the mother, hugging her little boy, was thanking Buffy. Then she asked, "Could we, uh, follow you?"
Everyone who had watched the fight, was now looking at her hopefully.