_The Look-Alike Series_ Daria fan fiction by Canadibrit Season 3, episode 12: "Sets and the Single Girls" prose adaptation by Austin Loomis "You're waiting for someone to push you together You're waiting for someone to push you away There's always another room to discover Always something more you wish he'd say" -- Vertical Horizon, "Everything You Want" ACT 1: ANGELS DON'T FALL IN LOVE Andrew Philip McIntyre was pacing around a corner of the Lawndale High auditorium stage, script in hand, throwing out Romeo Montague's lines at random. "`Ay me,'" he sighed, '`sad hours seem long.'" He thought a moment, then stubbornly insisted, "`I'll go along, no such sight to be shown/But to rejoice in splendor of mine own.'" Then he skipped ahead to the lovesick announcement, "`Did my heart love till now? forswear it, sight!/For I ne'er saw true beauty till this night.'" A long pause, in which he looked dejected, then a sigh. "`I am fortune's fool.'" "Hey." He jumped about three feet in the air. "*Yaaaagh!*" Trying to calm down, he looked and saw that it was the Chorus, known in real life as Daria Morgendorffer. "Oh. Hey, Erudite Emerald." Daria raised an eyebrow. "If this is what rehearsals do to you..." "Well, it was like Purple Peril said. No one pays any attention to drummers unless they make great big idiots of themselves," he groaned. "*This* way, I'm in a lead role, on stage in front of the whole school, and the only way I *won't* make an idiot of myself is if...actually, no, there's *no* way I'm not going to make an idiot of myself." "You're not that bad." "Only because I'm not acting most of the time," he muttered. Daria gave him a commiserating little smile. He shrugged and went back to pacing. At the other end of the stage, the said Peril -- A.P.'s co-lead, and Daria's look-alike (and half-sister), Lynn Cullen -- was sitting cross-legged on the floor, flipping through the script. Jane Lane, who'd be opposite her as the Nurse, crept up behind her with one of her usual evil smirks. "`Go, girl! Seek happy nights to happy days!'" Lynn didn't even look up. "If you were going to try to sneak up on me, you could have at least picked a cue line." "I didn't startle you?" Art-Smart Scarlet threw up her hands in exasperation. "Oh, no, of course I didn't. Lynn Cullen is *impossible* to sneak up on these days, *isn't* she." Lynn still wasn't looking up. "Not impossible." She let Jane think about that, then smirked. "Just very, very hard." Jodie Abigail Landon, cured superstudent, approached them then, looking nervous, and stepped over to Jane. "Um...Jane...? I never made a deal with *you,* right? About...extra-curriculars?" Jane was instantly suspicious. "That's right..." "And...you owe me one? From the tutoring?" Her suspicions deepened. "I guess I do..." Jodie let her panic show. "You've *gotta* help me! I'm going *nuts!* The set design is going to *kill* me! Mr. O'Neill doesn't know *what* he wants and he wants *me* to figure it out and I'm not all that great at the abstract and--" Jane interrupted, totally bemused now. "Whoa, whoa, whoa. What is it you want from me?" "Ideas." "For the set design." Jodie gave a weak nod. "And we're putting on the play in two weeks." Another meek nod. "Uh-huh. And what have you got so far?" The reply was almost inaudible. "diddlysquat." Jane looked at Jodie, who looked very small all of a sudden. Then she sighed and turned to Lynn. The Peril raised a Nimoy eyebrow. "Think modern. Last thing in the world I want is to be slammed into Elizabethan-era gear. Bustles and ruffs and..." She shuddered involuntarily. "God defend me." Jane thought a moment...then got that evilly-inspired look. Jodie looked pleased. Lynn, knowing Jane better, looked nervous and slightly wide-eyed. "Not asking. Don't want to know." She thought about it and realized something. "Oh, I'm going to find out anyway. Damn." She cast around for something to distract herself, settling on the lesser of two evils. "*Hey A.P.!*" "*Yaaaaagh!*" the Psycho-Maverick replied. After a pause for recovery: "Oh! Hey Purple Peril!" With great effort, Lynn forced herself to sound normal. "We're running through the balcony scene!" "Okay!" he gleeped. With one final look at Jane's smug face, Lynn walked off. Now even Jodie looked a bit worried. "Um...what are you planning?" "You'll see, my pretty," Jane almost cackled. "You'll see." Jodie, by now, had a look on her face that asked, _What have I created?_ * * * Later, Daria hammered on Casa Lane's front door. After a moment, it opened, and a puzzled-looking Trent Lane peered out. "Oh," he rasped. "Hey Daria." He needed a moment to revive enough to be more coherent. "Um...Janey's not here. She's still at the school. She called about play sets or something." "Oh, actually," she replied, "I just wanted to talk to Lynn." A shrug. "I was knocking so loud to make sure you could hear me over rehearsing." After a moment, realization sank in. "Only...you're not rehearsing, are you?" Sir Naps-a-Lot's confusion was all the answer she really needed. "Uh...no. But the knocking did wake me up." _She's still trying to cover it up._ Another shrug. "Okay. Thanks." She turned to go. Trent started tuning in on his crush's words. "Wait a minute, Daria." She turned back. "Who told you we were having a rehearsal today?" "Lynn." Trent went thoughtful. "Oh." After some more thought, he spoke with a slight trepidation. "Um...Lynn *is* okay, isn't she?" He didn't notice Daria's slightly hurt look at that. "She's been acting--" If this were a comic strip, Daria's word-balloon would have had little icicles hanging off the bottom of it. "I know how she's been acting. I see it more than you do." She realized that could have come out better. "I should go. Things to do." Trent seemed bewildered, but said, "Oh. Okay." Daria turned and walked away from him. She got as far as the end of the walk before she stopped for a split-second, shaking her head in resigned dismay. "Mr. Oblivious. No kidding." She walked off down Howard Drive. The look on Trent's face suggested that his brain had finally started firing on enough cylinders to register the anomalies in Daria's behavior and, more importantly, their meaning. His eyes went big. "I blew it again," he muttered. After thinking some more, he added "*Damn!*" and kicked the door frame for emphasis. * * * It's kind of convenient now that, when Lynn is at the usual table in Biers, with the usual guy across from her, I no longer have to tiptoe around his identity. She frowned suspiciously at Tom Sloane. "You're only ever this easy on me when you have news." She thought about it. "And it's not going to be news I like, if your face is any indication." She let *that* sink in. "I'd spill it, if I were you." He sighed. "Assignment." A blink. "What part of `I don't want any part of this' is so hard to understand?" "Look, I don't like it any more than you do, but you're trained, you have built-in cover...you're ideal." He let her weigh that, then added, "And I'm going with you." "`Built-in cover'?" He just raised an eyebrow. It sank in. "Oh no. No *way.* I had a hard enough time getting them to London. What does he expect -- a county-wide tour?" "You're missing a letter." She frowned for a moment, then got it. "No." A nod. "Your aunt's not as clueless as she looks." "Or sounds," said Lynn. "Or acts. Or the word from her multiple ex-boyfriends indicates." A sigh. "And I can't do a tour without help. Which means..." She trailed off. When she spoke again, it was with real fear in her voice. "I've *got* to get out of this." Tom shot her a reproachful look. "Rust, listen to me. They don't know *anything.* And I can't tell them. Imagine the reaction...no, wait, you don't have to. You *know.*" Tom sighed, remembering the way Jane had freaked when she found out about the vest and the heat. "Yeah. I know. But..." The door opened and Oakwood's own Mara Fitzgerald stepped in. The bartender raised an eyebrow at the nympho-Goth, then turned to Lynn and Tom. Lynn just nodded with a resigned look. "So much for a place where no one knows me." Mara spotted Lynn and headed over to the table, sitting down without waiting for an invitation. She eyed Tom appraisingly for a moment -- and when I say "appraisingly," I mean in the sense of a farmer looking over livestock. "Nice. I see why you kicked geek-ball to the curb." "This is Rust. We're not dating." Something occurred to the Peril. "You're not supposed to be in here." "And you *are?*" A smirk. "Hey, I'm a month your senior. And you *know* I could party you under the table any day of the year." "That's never been proven..." Lynn noticed the challenging look that came onto Mara's face at that. "...and it isn't going to be proven today either. Now what *are* you doing here?" "The Merc's outside; figured you were playing a gig or something. Wanted to talk to you." "What about?" "Well, you know Guy? Our singer?" "Goat-boy. What about him?" "He wants info on one of your friends." Lynn raised an eyebrow. "Tall, pale, cas/Goth clothes, hair from the mixing-bowl-and-kitchen- scissors school of hairdressing?" "Yeah, I know the one." "I want *details!* Name, address, dating status, the works. He doesn't like to show stuff like that in front of a lot of people, but he thought she was *fine.*" "Wouldn't it be easier for me -- and better for my friend -- if I just let her know he's interested? She knows him -- or at least, she knows *of* him. She can make her own judgement calls." "That's just like you." When this got no response: "Come on, do this for me. We have *history.*" "This would technically be a favor for Goat-boy, with whom I have no history." "Look, when this guy pines for a girl, he screws up musically. Not if he's been dumped, not if he's dumped someone and not even when he's in a...thing..." "It's called a relationship. Which you'd know about if you'd stayed with the same guy for more than three days running." "Whatever," Mara dismissed the notion with a wave of a hand. "But when he's pining over someone who doesn't know he's alive..." She needed a moment to decide how best to summarize. "He's screwing us up." "I will mention him to her. You know where I can be reached. I'll let you know." Mara just flashed a brief smile, then got up and walked out. Lynn rolled her eyes in a sort of affectionate exasperation, then sobered her expression when she saw the pain on Tom's face. "Sorry about that. It was the only way to get her off my case." "It's okay," Tom lied like a rug. A cheap rug. After a pause for her to believe him or not: "Now, what do I have to do to make you take this?" "Put a gun to my head," came the immediate, firm reply. The look on Tom's face suggested that he might do just that if necessary. Lynn, when she saw that, looked scared -- and a bit resigned. ACT 2: IN YOUR ROOM Later, in her dark and mysterious room, Lynn was sprawled across the bed on her stomach, reading a script with real feeling. "`Oh, Romeo, Romeo; wherefore art thou Romeo? Deny thy father, and refuse thy name Or, if thou wilt not, be but sworn, my love And I'll no longer be a Capulet.'" "`Shall I hear more...'" Lynn screamed and pulled something out from the pillow she was leaning on. To her visitor/interlocutor, A.P., it almost looked like a gun before she pushed it back under the pillow upon seeing that it was a very shaken McIntyre looking at her through the window. "God *damn* it, Maverick!" she said breathlessly. "*Warn* a body!" "Hey ho, Purple Peril," came his cautious reply. He thought a moment, then suspicion set in and he asked, "Uh...what'd you flash at me?" After studying her for a long moment, he added, "Y'know, I don't think I want to know." He finished climbing in. "Sheesh, Purple Peril, you should be used to this. I've only been coming in like this for eight years." "That was *before* the security precautions." "Oh, wanted to talk to you about those. Anti-climb paint? *Very* easy to neutralize. And a pair of pliers deals with the staples. You want to use something more permanent. Saw about three-quarters of the way through some of the supports on the trellis, then paint over the cracks. Anyone trying to climb *that* falls seven-ten feet onto the lawn. No splat, but--" "You wanted something...?" Lynn interrupted. "Oh," he nervously allowed as. "Yeah. Lines." He thought on that. "But I like talking about your new booby traps a *lot* better, so maybe we..." Lynn waved a script at him sternly, and he sighed and produced his own. "Okay, let's take it from...Oh, we did the balcony this afternoon and if we do the ballroom scene once more I'm gonna yack." "Um..." _Can't believe I'm saying this._ "The m-morning-after lines?" "oh." She sounded ever so slightly strangled. "yeah. we *have* been neglecting them, haven't we." They flipped through the scripts, found their respective places...then just stood there looking at each other for a moment. Finally, Lynn sighed and led off. "`Wilt thou be gone? It is not yet near day. It was the nightingale, and not the lark that pierced the fearful hollow of thine ear. Nightly she sings on yon pomegranate tree. Believe me, love, it was the nightingale.'" A sigh. "`It was the lark; the herald of the morn...'" A.P. burst out laughing. "I can't *do* this, Purple Peril!" A different kind of sigh. "Look. Didn't we sometimes run around pretending that we were movie characters?" A raised eyebrow. "That was a long time ago." He remembered for a moment. "And I got to be Luke Skywalker. It's *easy* being your sister." Lynn stifled another sigh of the same type as her last one. "Well, it's the same thing. Just in front of people who are specifically there to watch us pretend." She paused to let comprehension happen if it was going to. "Look, let's skip the lark and the nightingale and the bloody pomegranate and go from..." She leafed through her script a moment, then sank into character. "`Therefore, stay yet; thou needs not be gone.'" "`Let me be taken,'" said "Romeo" with a mad grin; "`let me be put to death; I am content, so thou wilt have it so!'" He let that hang, then tenderly added, "`I have more care to stay than will to go.'" Another pause, then, with teasing abandon, "`Come, Death, and welcome! Juliet wills it so!'" Tenderly again: "`How is't, my soul? Let's talk; it is not day.'" "Juliet" sighed, then quietly admitted, "`It is.'" She paused a moment, then repeated, "`It is.'" The words came out like pulling teeth. "`Hie hence; be gone; away. It was the lark that sings so out of tune Straining harsh discords and unpleasing sharps.'" Another pause. "`Oh now, be gone; more light and light it grows...'" "`More light and light,'" he miserably confirmed, adding, "`more dark and dark our woes.'" They'd just about forgotten that this was going to be a play, filling in the Nurse's lines from memory. "`Then, window,'" Lynn said, voice trembling, "`let day in... and let love out.'" "`Farewell.'" A beat. "`One kiss and I'll descend.'" They all but leaped into each other's arms. The result was the sort of kiss where, if this were a movie, the "Love Theme" from Felix Mendelsohn's operatic version of the star-crossed lovers would swell in the background as the two romanticks tried to suck each other's tonsils out. It made the one between Rhett and Scarlett on the road to Tara look chaste. Then they sprang apart, looking really flustered, and started talking over each other, each oblivious to the other's reaction. "Um...I don't think we were supposed to pull away so fast..." "Drowning people hanging onto the life preservers, sort of?" "That was the stage direction, but..." "Maybe we don't have to go through that right now. Um...I think we..." _Think fast, Maverick._ "Shoot! I think I left the Bunsen burner on! There's gonna..." "I don't need to know; just..." "Yeah, but we'll..." "Yeah, of course. Later." A.P. nearly jumped out the window. Lynn looked at the casement for a moment, then sat heavily on the bed. "Crap," she observed, and after a pause added, "Crap." * * * Daria was sitting across from Jane in their usual booth at Pizza King. Jane was sketching madly while Daria stared blankly at empty space. Eventually, she noticed the sketching and looked at the half-finished work. When she saw it, she raised an eyebrow and nearly smiled. "Lynn and A.P.'ll love that." She realized something, and her eyes widened a little. "*You're* going to love *that* one, you sick--" "Disturb not the working muse..." Jane loftily replied. A sigh. "Do you really think O'Neill will *go* for any of this stuff?" "Sure. He has two weeks to get low-budget set and costumes together. He's too desperate to turn his nose up at something *this* tame." Daria practically did an anime-style facefault at that. "*Tame?*" Lynn entered, carrying books, and slid into the booth next to Daria, who glared at her. "Yo, Lynn." "Hey." Lynn went slightly defensive at the frost she detected in her sister's tone. "What?" It came out as an accusation. "You had a rehearsal last night?" Lynn picked up on Daria's meaning. "Okay, okay, I thought you'd worry if I told you, I apologize for lying, mea culpa, mea culpa. Now can I ask Jane a question?" "Shoot," Jane replied, ignoring Daria's glare. "Remember Goat-boy?" "The guy with the blue hair and the sneer?" "The very same. He has the hots for you and Mara is...nudging me to arrange an introduction." A wry grin. "And welcome to the Yenta game! Isn't it fun?" "As a sucking chest wound. Now just tell me no so we can get on to further business." "Actually...why not?" In utter shock, not to mention their recurrent unison, the Smythe girls blurted, "*Excuse me?*" "Was there extra garlic on that thing?" Lynn added. "If so, was it blue? One time A.P. got blue garlic on one of his 'pizzas' and... well, he spent about three minutes thinking he was a lemming." That got aquatic looks from the other two. "I locked all the doors, kept him from climbing too high and let him jump off the coffee table a few times." They were still staring. "Mom was in Albuquerque." "Look, unlike *you* two, *I* haven't had a real date since..." Jane shot a sidelong glance at Lynn. "Since Tom. You *can* say the name, you know." "Fine, whatever, since Tom. And maybe this Goat-boy..." "If you're going to date the guy," Daria suggested, "call him by his right name." She realized her memory needed refreshing. "What *is* his right name?" Lynn started flipping through Jane's sketchpad. "Guy." "Nicely anonymous," Daria mused, "for someone with blue hair and a voice like a chronic sinusitis sufferer." "*Anyway,*" Jane interjected, "this Guy could be my next great romance!" Daria was skeptical. "How many great romances *have* you had, Jane?" "Well, I..." She trailed off. After a moment: "Well, there must have been *some!*" "Tom, Bobby Bighead," Lynn rattled off, still looking at the sketches, "Evan who you probably never touched, and a still-burning lust for Jesse even though you think he's as thick as elephant crap. What are these?" She brandished the sketchpad. Jane took it back and flipped a couple of pages, showing a drawing. "That's you and A.P. In the ballroom scene." Lynn looked at it. Then she looked at Jane. Then she asked, "Have you drawn these costumes without the...interaction?" "Yeah, but--" Lynn grabbed the pad back again, ripped out the page in question, none-too-gently folded it in half, and crammed it between the pages of one of her books. Jane scowled. Daria craned to see. "Now are there any other..." Before Jane could answer or reclaim the sketchbook, Lynn started leafing through it. She took another sheet out and gave it the same cramming treatment as before...and a few pages later, there was one that she tore out and just crumpled, not even bothering with the book. She looked at Jane. "I'm going to have to *burn* that one. How did you ever get that much detail?" A shrug. "I guessed?" Lynn gave her a hard look. "All right, all right, I've seen you in the gym showers and have a really visual memory, okay?" "Only my *parents* know about that birthmark, Jane." After a pause, she asked, sounding curious, "And...A.P....?" "All imagination," came the sly reply; "sorry. Did I miss any detail?" "I wouldn't know. We were more into Swords and Sorcerers than Doctors and Nurses. Anyway, you want a time and a place for this date with Goat-boy?" "Ah, send him to Pizza King. Friday? Eight?" A shrug. "Whatever you say." She thought of something. "But be careful around the guy, Jane. He's not exactly known for mental stability." Daria raised an eyebrow. "Never bothered her before..." Jane glared at Daria, who just smirked a little. * * * Later, Lynn was in Biers, absently chucking her knife at the dartboard, when Mara entered and shot the barman a "toss me out and feel my wrath" sort of look. The barman looked distinctly unimpressed, but Lynn gave him a "you want to mess with *me?*" look, and he backed down. Mara looked at Lynn with something approaching respect. "What, daddy departed own the place?" Lynn shrugged. "I don't know if I'd tell you even if it *was* your business. Now Jane's agreed Friday, eight, Pizza King." Mara pulled a yuck-face. "How do you eat that stuff, anyway?" "You got a bad batch. Sometimes they add another quart of grease to the pizza recipe, just to keep things interesting." "Whatever." She had a thought. "So what's she like? To tell Guy." "Artist. A bit...smirky. I think they'll get on like a house afire." A grin. "Really?" "Yeah. Leaping flames, screaming victims, emergency services being called in from every direction..." Mara smirked at that Pratchett-ism. "You haven't changed at all, have you?" Lynn shrugged. "Now, there was *one* other thing I wanted to ask. Your friend Rust--" "No," Lynn replied, knowing right away where this could only be going. "But *Lynn*..." "Trust me, you wouldn't want to." "But he's *fine!*" "Give me awhile and I'll set you up with Leather-boy." A lecherous little smirk. "We-ell...that *is* tempting...but Rust is *so* much more sophisticated about it." "Believe me. More trouble than it's worth." Mara looked like she wanted to keep teasing, but something in Lynn's face must have told her what a bad idea that would be. "And you're not dating him." Lynn shook her head. "And none of your friends are dating him." Another headshake. "And you can fix me up with Leather- boy?" A nod and a smirk. "All right, keep your cutie. I'm gonna go call Guy; he'll be stoked." "*Stoked?*" "Watched _Heathers_ last night." Lynn conceded the concept with a nod. "Give my regard to Goat- boy." Mara smirked at her and left. Lynn looked at the knife in her hand, shrugged, then hurled it at the target. Bullseye. ACT 3: NOTHING ELSE MATTERS Janewalked into Pizza King and saw a blue-haired figure that had to be Guy, sitting in one of the booths. His normally sullen face lit up a little when he saw her, and she gave an almost imperceptible shrug and sat down. "Hey," he said, not *quite* sneering. "Jane, right?" "Uh-huh. And you're Guy. Yo." Dead silence. "Uh...order?" "Good idea." Each could see the "maybe this wasn't such a good idea" look on the other's face. * * * Lynn thumped down the stairs into the basement of Casa Lane and saw Trent sitting on a rickety stool in the corner, strumming out chords nearly at random. She rolled her eyes, knowing full well what this must mean. "What did you do?" Since he didn't have other music playing, or headphones on, Trent actually heard her this time, without her having to unplug anything, and his chords came to a crashing halt. "Huh?" "The aimless strumming and the kicked dog look on your face suggest that you've made yet another spirited attempt to gag yourself with your steel-toes as regards the object of your affections." She let him wend his way through that sentence, then asked, "What'd you do?" "Ever have one of those moments when you felt -- you really, *really* felt -- that if you'd just known right at that second what you figured out three seconds later, things could have been perfect?" "Yep," came the sad reply. "Well, that." A sigh. "Oh." Pause to consider pick-me-ups. "Good lyrics could come out of that." "Not in the mood." "Jangle out `Nothing Else Matters' and let me sing along because you can't hold most of the notes?" Lynn snarked. It was only slight sarcasm, which explains why Trent missed it completely. "That sounds cool. Thanks, Lynn." Lynn shook her head softly, but when he started playing the opening chords, she straightened herself up in preparation to do just what she'd inadvertently suggested. * * * A good ways across town, Daria heard the doorbell ringing, walked into the front hall, and opened the door...to find Tom standing on the other side of it, a nervous sort of look on his face. Her eyes went wide. "What are *you* doing here?" she blurted before she could stop herself. "I wanted to talk to you." There was a pause while she did not *verbally* ask _About what?_, but her bearing must have made that message clear. "About Jane. And you. And the other one." "You can talk to Lynn about me, Jane and the other one." "No I can't. She's at a lyric-brainstorming session with Trent." He let her chew on that. "Anyway, she thinks what happened between Jane and I was all for the best. I need to talk to someone who might be at least a little more sympathetic." Daria nodded, caught by her curiosity. "But I'm still not riding in that car." "Still with the common sense. Walk with me?" She hesitated. "You'll at least be safe from muggers with me around." That reminder served only to make her glare at him, but she still followed him outside and down the street. After they'd been walking for a while: "So talk. Again." "Listen, I did and still do really like Jane. But I'm fairly realistic; I know she probably has some ideas about me because of what she saw on our last date..." "Actually, most of her dates wear Kevlar nowadays. It cuts down on the scars on their backs later on in the proceedings." Tom raised an eyebrow. "Really?" A shrug. "No. Just wanted to give you a moment's pause." "Hmm. Good one," he allowed as, in a slightly grudging way, then paused to weigh his words. "This is probably something you won't want to answer, but I kind of need to know -- how much do you and your friends hate me?" "I *still* don't hate you. I still don't even *know* you. But first you screw up my relationship with Jane -- however briefly -- and now I..." A sigh. "And now you finally find a sister you could live with being related to and I'm taking her away from you too." Daria's utter incredulity must have shown on her face. "Don't you think I've heard that often enough from the other side?" _At what point did I lose control?_ "She...She said..." _Okay, had just about enough of this..._ "Start at the beginning -- what... the hell...is going on?" "You wouldn't be impressed if I said I couldn't tell you all of it?" "How did you get involved with her? As much as you can without ...without doing whatever it is you're so afraid of doing." "It was a set-up. A family thing." Daria gave him another of those stares. "Look, my dad has wanted some firmer connections with the Smythe family for years. Uncle Adam works really closely with the Smythes but Dad never got...onto the board, if you see what I mean. But because we live here, when Lynn got attacked, Mr. Smythe thought that I would be ideal for..." "A guard dog?" Daria snarked. Another sigh. "Woof." She might not know him, but he obviously knew her well enough to distinguish her complete lack of amusement from her usual flat stare. "Okay, so it was pathetic." "That just about covers it." She thought carefully before asking the next question. "So what are you protecting her *from?*" "That I can't say." "Jerome told you not to?" "*Lynn* told me not to." _Okaaay..._ "Why did it have to be *you?*" "Around that time, we were finding out that there was another Smythe. And that I knew her and her friend. Dad and Mr. Smythe thought it might be easier if I was..." Daria nodded slightly. "I think I see what you mean. And now you want to know how much we hate you because..." "You can make it easier for me. Or you can make it harder. And I'd at least like to know which it is." Daria looked at him, weighing the pros and cons of having this... person...back in her life and the lives of her friends. Tom watched her gravely. * * * Jane and Guy were sitting across from each other, picking at their pizza, not talking. I'd say the conversation was dead, but that would require it to have been alive at some point. Suddenly, Jane got that *ping* look that can only mean the impact of sudden inspiration and dove for a sketchpad. This caused Guy to blink almost audibly. "What?" "Sorry," came the distracted reply; "working on the set and costume design for school play. Got an idea. Got to get it down on paper before it--" " ...gets away. I hear that." Jane kept sketching, but an eyebrow raised in interest. "You push the paint around?" "Nah. But lyrics are like that." "Yeah, that's what Daria and Lynn say about writing. But I don't see how it's the same, most of the time. I mean, it's creativity, but..." "...It's got more and less to do with boundaries all at the same time." That actually made her look up. * * * The next day in the hall, she showed the resulting sketches to the other Jacketeers. Lynn looked at a sheet of paper speculatively. A.P. gawked over her shoulder with a grin. Daria, standing off to one side, looked indulgent. "Cyberpunks and Anne-Rice-style Mopeygoths?" Lynn wondered. "Why not?" Jane defiantly replied. "They obviously don't mix; it's really visually powerful stuff. And the Cyberpunk look will suit A.P.'s personality." He grinned at that. "Hey! This could be cooler than I thought!" He stopped and thought of something. "You *are* going to let me rig the lighting for this ballroom scene, right?" "Could I do it without you?" He just grinned. Daria shrugged. "Plain black velvet dress." She paused. "I guess I can cancel that tombstone order now, Jane." "Dammit," Jane feigned disappointment; "I always wanted to read my own epigraph." Lynn didn't correct the malapropism. "So that reminds me; how was the date with Goat-boy?" "We're gonna try another one." That got looks from the others. "Yeah, fine, it was *mostly* death but at least we found common ground somewhere." "Be it ever so tenuous..." Daria muttered. A derisive snort. "Who went out with A.P. for six *months* just because she happened to find him cute?" Daria, A.P. and Lynn all glared at Jane until she took the hint. "Anyway, I'm not saying it's true love." She thought about that. "Hell, I'm not even saying it's approaching *like.* But he's...interesting. In an abrasive, go-to-hell- I-don't-like-your-face sort of way." "If you like that sort of thing..." Lynn observed. "You *are* that sort of thing," Daria reminded her sister. The bell rang, and Lynn handed the paper she was holding over to Jane, who accepted it and asked, "Pizza?" "Can it wait until six-thirty?" Lynn asked. "I have--" "I think we get the idea, Lynn," Daria kindly intervened. "Say hi to Rust." And, with Jane, Lynn and A.P. staring at her, she walked off. Jane recovered first and jogged after her. When she caught up, which didn't take long at all, she asked, "What the hell was *that* all about?" "Leading by example." She weighed her next words very carefully indeed. "I know you're freaked, but be nice to him." That still met with a landed-fish gape. "You maybe get the feeling Lynn's in trouble?" Jane nodded, still not very clear on where this was going. "Wouldn't it be nice to have that gun you saw in his glove compartment between her and that trouble?" Jane stopped moving to consider this, letting Daria outdistance her. Then she nodded, but by this time A.P. had caught up with her. "The *hell?*" he boggled. Jane just shrugged. "We're being nice to the guy." And, leaving a flummoxed A.P. in her wake, she walked away. ADAPTOR'S NOTES It *was* a malapropism. Jane was thinking of an epi*taph.* But let it stand; why should Quinn and A.P. do all the language abuse around her? Obligatory legal blap: Daria Morgendorffer was created (as were the rest of the Lawndale characters) by Glenn Eichler and Susie Lewis Lynn, and she and her neighbors are copyright 1993, 1997, 2000 MTV Networks, a Viacom company. (As Michelle Klein-Haess has pointed out, work-for-hire sucks the yolks from ostrich eggs.) Monty Python quotes and characters are copright 1970, 2000 Python (Monty) Pictures Ltd. They are here used, without the permission of their creators or owners, in the not-for-profit context of fan-fiction. The characters of Lynn Cullen and A.P. McIntyre, and the modifications to the existing character of Tom Sloane, are copyright 1999, 2000 Janet "Canadibrit" Neilson, as is this storyline, which was adapted by Austin Loomis (to whom the prose format version is copyright 2000) with permission. All other characters, locations and incidents (of which I don't think there are any, actually) are either imaginary or used fictitiously. Any coincidence of names is regretted, and any resemblance to persons living, dead, undead, or wandering the night in ghostly torment is either purely satirical or not my fault. As a "substantially transformative" derivative work, this story is protected by the Supreme Court's decision in re Campbell v. Acuff Rose Music. It may be freely redistributed as long as this copyright notice is maintained intact, but may not be in any way redistributed for profit without the permission of the legal owners of all concepts involved. The present author hereby gives permission for any and all keepers of Daria fanfic pages to archive this work (as if I could stop them). Any publication of this story for profit without the express written permission of Austin Loomis, Janet Neilson and MTV Networks (like any of that'll happen, especially the last) is strictly prohibited, and violators, if I ever decide to track them down, will be strung up by the thumbs, beaten about the head and shoulders with a free-range carrot, and then handed over to corporate lawyers who will do terrible things to them. On purpose. Austin, and good day. Al D T0 W- Q Fw^Fr O+ Ow+OH+Of m c- MV+ F:111,208,313 BB+ FCT -DT+ q fJ^fj^fD