Disclaimer: All the characters from the "Magnificent Seven" TV series are property of Trilogy Entertainment, The Mirisch Group, MGM Worldwide.
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"Oh... my... God!" Nathan exclaimed first, his eyes moving from Chris Larabee who was still wearing his tuxedo to Chris Larabee who looked, well to tell the honest truth, like an honest-to-God cowboy. The only thing missing was a lasso and a cow.
"Imported Russian vodka, my ass!" Buck muttered, performing the same dance with his neck as his shifted his gaze between the two identical men. "That stuff was spiked from radiation from Chernobyl and it's got me high as a kite!"
"I didn't drink the vodka," Josiah mused, with the same astonishment, "and I'm seeing two of them as well."
"Maybe it's a mirage," Casey replied. "JD, go stick your finger at one of them." She nudged him.
"Mirage or not, he'll still kick my ass," JD retorted. "You go do it. He won't hurt a girl."
"I'm guessing this means that there is no car," Inez frowned, just as stunned but wishing that she could get out of this dress. Every since Buck had spied a look of her exposed skin with thong in presentation, she could see him replaying the image in his mind each time he looked at her with that damnable grin on his face! Oh and then there were the two Chris and two Vin's as well. It was good that she could keep things in perspective.
"I would say that is a distinct possibility," Ezra answered, unafraid to admit that for the first time in his life, he had no idea how to ease the moment with his usual glib or flippant remarks. In fact, the entire occasion was beyond the ability of even his acerbic wit to describe.
Alex could not blame her companions shock, she found herself thinking of two Vins. One who was staring at his mirror image with as much astonishment as the "Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman reject" version of himself was displaying. In every respect, they were identical. Same hair, some baby blue eyes and bodies to die for. While everyone else was wondering how this could be, only one thought seemed to be ringing in her head: ménage à trois.
Two of them? Mary Travis thought as her mind started to swim at the impossibility of it. However, it was no illusion. The Chris in the tuxedo appeared just as amazed at the copy of himself in black. As her confusion became a bubble about to burst, she retained just enough sense to be enjoy the fact that for once, he did not have that smug expression on his face.
"You people always have this much fun on a night out?" the Crimson Fox asked just before Mary fainted.
"Is she all right?" Chris Larabee asked, concerned as he watched Alex dabbing Mary's forehead with water, courtesy of his doubles' water flask. Alex had found a napkin inside the limo and was using it as a cold compress on the woman's brow.
"She's fine," Alex replied as she continued to use the cool water to revive the unconscious Mary Travis who was presently lying in the backseat of the limousine under Chris' watchful gaze. "Just a little surprised, that's all."
Who could blame her? Chris thought inwardly as he glanced outside at the man in black who was himself in every sense of the word. His mind could barely wrap itself around the concept let alone accept it and somehow Chris knew he had to. Whatever this nightmare was they had stumbled into, it had the consistency of reality that was undeniable. That man out there was him. Almost a hundred and twenty years in the past, but was undeniably Chris Larabee.
"What happened?" Mary's voice mumbled, and immediately bringing Chris' attention from the man outside back to her.
"Easy," Alex said gently, forcing Mary to stay still even though the woman was readying herself to sit up. "You fainted."
"I never faint," Mary muttered and forced herself onto her elbows. When she saw Chris next to her and reacted immediately by slapping him across the face.
"Hey!" Chris swore as he recoiled from the blow. "What was that for?" he demanded as his cheek stung.
"Well she's feeling better," Alex sighed, deciding she did not want to be present for the latest episode of the Chris and Mary sparing show.
Larabee watched the curious exchange between his double and that of the woman who looked exactly like his wife Mary before glancing at the rest of this strange group that looked like all his friends but were not. "They always fight like that?" he asked no one in particular but expected an answer nevertheless.
"Oh, not at all," Ezra said with a completely straight face. "Just whenever they get within breathing space of each other."
"You remember what it was like pard," Tanner replied, trying not to stare too much at Alex who looked fantastic in the dress she was wearing and made him want to ride home and find the love of his life for a passionate bout of lovemaking. "Weren't you the one who got slugged by Mary in the saloon, cowboy?" The tracker smirked at him with an expression that oozed nothing less than smug sarcasm.
Larabee bristled, detesting being addressed by that appellation, and gave the younger man a dark look which the sharpshooter's alternate self caught on immediately.
"You call him that too?" Vin could not help asking when he saw the smoldering look on Larabee's face at the use of that loathed nickname. The ATF sharpshooter was unable to deny the amusing parallels between his own habits and that of his past self.
"At the risk to his life," Larabee growled, unable to feel anything but friendly towards Tanner's double because he was too much like the young man that rode at his side for so long. In fact, he had trouble feeling his normal hostility towards any of these strangers for that exact same reason. Their counterparts in this time were his family. So he could not help but feel a little of the affection for them as well.
"Watch this," Vin said to Tanner with a devious smile. "Hey cowboy!" he called out to Chris at the top of his voice before a response was heard a moment later from inside the limousine.
"You call me that one more time, Vin, and I'm gonna come out there and rip your goddamn throat out!" Chris' voice barked loudly before returning to his heated argument with Mary and sending everyone into fits of hysterical laughter.
"Well," Vin said, with a grin. "So I'm guessing that you're a disagreeable bastard in any life time."
"That's about the size of it." Tanner nodded, taking great amusement in the look of chagrin that Larabee was sending in his direction.
"So am I to assume there's doubles of us running around in this town of yours?" Buck inquired, still unable to fathom the how, let alone accepting that they were somewhere in the past, facing themselves in an earlier incarnation of time.
"Yeah," Tanner answered, taking the liberty of offering explanations because Larabee was even worse than he was at these things. This was supposed to be a routine trip to Sweet Water to drop off a prisoner. Who would have thought they would have stumbled upon this on the way home? "You're supposed to be at the jailhouse with JD."
"Really?" JD piped out, thinking that this was a dream come true that in this past, he was lawman in a frontier town just like those western he loved so much. It would be too cool if he was sheriff but did not expect such a possibility when Chris was here too.
"Uh huh," Tanner replied, still unable to accustom himself to how much these people looked like his family in Four Corners. "You... I mean our JD usually hangs around until after Buck goes home to Inez and the baby."
Inez who was in the process of taking a sip from Tanner's water flask spat out the entire contents upon hearing that. "What?" she stuttered, more or less scrambled over to them when she was given that revelation. "Did I hear you say baby?"
"He said baby," Casey grinned trying to stifle her laughter.
"I'm sorry ma'am," Tanner apologized quickly, when he saw the look of dismay on her face that she was not happy by the news and he had to wonder why. "Didn't mean to upset you."
"So, Buck." Larabee looked at his old friend's duplicate copy, unable to resist teasing him because of the look Buck was giving the sultry Mexican. "I take you it two aren't married yet."
"And we're never going to be!" Inez declared loudly, her cheeks crimson with embarrassment, not to mention mortification at the same time.
"Not if he were the last man on the planet," Alex and Casey said in unison in a sing song voice.
"You're not funny!" Inez glared at both of them. "Either of you."
"Come on Inez, it's fate, honey. You're going to have my baby." Buck slipped his hand around her shoulders and looked at her with smile that made Inez think the same thing that Mary had earlier when she had slapped Chris at the fundraiser. That no woman should have to put up with that smile coming from this man and thus slammed her elbow hard into his stomach, causing him to double over in pain.
"Strange how it always starts like that for them," Tanner pointed out to Larabee who nodded in agreement.
"As much fun as this is," Ezra spoke up. "What are we going to do? We cannot remain out here forever."
"You can't go into town looking like you do," Tanner pointed out quickly. "Talk about seeing double."
"He's right," Vin nodded in agreement.
"You would agree with him," Buck pointed out, still rubbing his sore stomach. Damn, that woman had a sharp elbow, he winced as he glanced at Inez who was still horrified by the prospect that some version of her in time had actually married Buck Wilmington. It gave Buck a deep sense of cosmic balance to know this. As well as thinking about all the enjoyment he was going to be had at her expense when he reminded her of this for the next ten thousand years.
"They're both right," Nathan added. "We don't know how we got here and we sure as hell ain't gonna find out how to get back to where we were if we have interference from the town. They're never gonna understand this and it could dangerous if too many people know about us."
"They're likely to think this is witchcraft or something," Josiah pointed out. "Folks in this day and age aren't exactly enlightened."
"We'll take up them to the ranch." Larabee made the safest decision for now after ruminating for a few minutes on what had been said. Nathan and Josiah were right, no one was going to understand this and it was way too complicated to try and explain it. "That way, we can keep em under wraps until we figure out what to do."
"One of us is gonna have to go back to town," Tanner suggested. "We need a wagon and horse to move all these people."
"I'll go," Larabee replied. "Stay with them, Vin," he ordered the tracker before striding to his horse, not waiting for Tanner to respond, simply assuming that it would be done without question. "I'll be back soon."
"Sure pard," Tanner answered automatically.
"One hundred and twenty years," Vin sighed. "And I'm still taking orders from him. You think there would have been some progress."
"Vin, get over here!" Chris' voice suddenly shouted at him.
"I guess not," Ezra said with a smug smile as he stared at Vin.
"Your Ezra's ain't that much different from ours," Tanner remarked, feeling the need to aid his future self. "He can't shut up either."
"I take umbrage at that ... Mr. Tanner." Ezra forced himself to address him as such because it was still Vin after all, just a different version.
"So does ours," Tanner grinned and threw Vin a conspiratorial wink of solidarity.
"Good God," Josiah groaned. "They've both got the same sick sense of humour."
"Who?" Nathan asked. "Vin or Ezra?"
"Both."
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No one noticed as Chris Larabee, notorious gunslinger, rode back into Four Corners. Once his presence, or the presence of any of his friends, would have instilled fear. Now, it instilled a deep sense of safety in the citizens of the small town. The seven men protected the town with a ferocity that was quickly becoming legendary. But if anyone had looked closely they would have been surprised to see the mischievous light in his eyes.
Larabee shook his head with a smile. He couldn't believe it. First, Darien came back in time to tell him and Mary that they would be the ancestors of a man who would save the world. Then SG-1 came through that damn portal thing, taking him and his men across the cosmos. Now he and Vin had found their exact twins wondering around in the open prairie. And not only their twins, but also the twins of everyone in their eclectic large family. He wondered if his life could get any stranger. Probably, he thought with a grin. He quickly steered his black to the jailhouse knowing that Buck and JD, his Buck and JD, would still be inside.
"Hey, pard," Buck greeted him with his usual enthusiasm as Chris dismounted. But Wilmington frowned when he noticed the absence of the longhaired tracker. "Where's Vin? Is there trouble?"
"Not exactly. JD, go round up the others. Mary and the girls too. Have everyone meet at the Clarion." JD nodded, running first to the saloon. "Buck, come help me get two wagons."
"What's going on, Chris?" Buck quickly fell into step with his old friend as they both headed to the livery.
"Vin and I stumbled onto a little... situation on our way back from Sweet Water."
"Situation? What kind of situation?" Buck was starting to get a bad feeling in the pit of his stomach. Chris was usually never this vague.
Chris smiled. "Remember Darien? And Jack, Sam, Daniel, and Teal'c?"
"Oh God! More of them future people?" Buck was horrified. Every time someone from the future came into town, there was trouble. Big, huge, butt-kicking trouble.
"Sort of," Chris said as he paid Yosemite for the rental of two wagons and the mules to pull them. Each man took a wagon and began hitching up the animals.
"What do you mean 'sort of'?"
Chris wouldn't meet Buck's eyes but there was a little smile playing on the gunslinger's lips. The small smile turned into a full fledge grin. "You'll see."
Once the mules were hitched and the wagons ready, Chris and Buck lead them to the Clarion where the others were waiting.
"Where's Vin?" Alexandra quickly pounced on Chris as soon as he was in hearing distance.
"He's fine, Alex. There's a little problem and he's keeping an eye on them." Chris reassuringly squeezed the doctor's hand. He continued walking towards the Clarion's covered porch where his wife stood with Billy. Mary Larabee's welcome home smile was glorious and Chris thanked God for her in his life. His lips touched hers, while his right hand loving curved over her womb where their child slumbered. "How are you two feeling?"
Mary nodded with a smile. "We're fine, darling. You said there was a problem?"
Chris turned to look at his friends. Almost everyone was there. "Where's Casey? And Rain?"
"She and Miz Nettie went to Ridge City to visit some friends. They won't be back for a week or so," JD spoke up from the back of the group.
"And Rain's still at the village celebratin' the birth of her friend's baby," Nathan informed his leader.
"All right. Josiah, I need you to get everyone to the ranch. Take the buggy for the women. And I need everyone to bring a change of clothes."
"Mr. Larabee, may I inquire as to why we are making this track in the middle of the day? In the middle of a working day?" Ezra indicated the Standish Saloon, which was currently filled with paying customers. Due to Rain's absence, one of the working girls was currently manning the bar quite successfully, but Ezra wanted to keep an eye on it nevertheless.
"Chris says there's more people from the future here," Buck said in response. Surprised exclamations and bewildered expressions followed his declaration. They all wanted to know the where, why, and how's. Chris held up his hand for silence then spoke.
"I'll explain when we get to the ranch. But right now, I need all of you with me." Crystalline green eyes swept the faces in front of them and saw acceptance in each of their faces. Chris Larabee rarely asked for help, so when he did this time, they all rallied without question. Each of them dispersing to get the clothing he had requested.
"Chris?"
He turned to Mary and saw the concern in her pretty blue eyes. Her husband sent her a rakish grin. "Don't worry, Mary. I think you're going to get a kick out of this."
The wagons rolled to a stop in front of the small cabin and it's surrounding corrals. No one was in sight. Larabee figured they were out by the small stream that ran through his property. It was shaded there and made for a very nice picnicking spot.
Chris jumped out and surveyed the ranch. "Nice."
"Thanks," Larabee said as he held his arms up for his wife's twin. "Vin, Buck and I went into the horse ranching business."
"Then somehow, it turned into a group project," Tanner said with a grin. "Everybody just kinda picked out a job that needed to be done."
"It's not as big as Chris'," JD commented as he helped Casey down.
"You have a ranch too?" Larabee raised an eyebrow in surprise. It seemed that the similarities didn't stop with their looks or their friends.
"Yeah, but it's not a business—"
"Chris!" Everyone turned to see a blonde haired little boy come barreling around the corner, heading straight for them. The owner of the young voice skidded to a stop, his eyes wide as he took in the sight of two Chris Larabees. "Chris?"
Larabee hunkered down and held out his arms. "C'mere, Billy." His stepson quickly stepped into his father's protective embrace. Staring with huge wide eyes, Billy whispered rather loudly, "Chris? Who's he?"
"Billy?" The child turned at the voice to see his mother, wearing a pretty white dress, coming towards him. Mary Travis's face was a mask of confusion. The little boy was her son but he had never meet Chris Larabee, yet here he was clinging to the man like he was his father.
"Ma?"
"Billy!" The same voice came from behind the cabin and Billy twisted to see another 'Ma' coming around the corner.
"Ma?" Billy was really confused now. First, two Chrises and now two Mas.
Mary Larabee stopped dead in her tracks. Before her stood a woman who could have been her twin. There were only two differences. Her twin's hair was shorter and she wasn't pregnant. Next to her twin stood Mary's husband... no wait. Chris was standing by the wagon, holding Billy in his arms. The other man was his exact twin. Mary crossed her arms over her chest and glared at her husband. "All right, Larabee. You better explain and you'd better do it fast or you're spending the next week out here... alone."
Team Seven and the four women followed Wilmington, Larabee, his wife, and Billy to the stream. The first thing they registered was the peacefulness of the glen. Trees provided shade while the gentle trickling of the stream soothed and calmed. The second impression was the voices of several people, voices that matched their own perfectly. Then they heard a baby's wail split the air as they neared the clearing.
"Inez? Honey? Is something wrong with Elena?" Wilmington broke from the group and hurried to where his wife stood, gently bouncing Elena.
"She's just being fussy. Perhaps she misses her Papa?" Inez Wilmington looked up with love in her eyes at her husband as he gently reached out and caressed his daughter's silken cheek.
"Is that true, sweet pea? You missin' your daddy?" Wilmington cooed. Elena's cries stopped as she recognized the soft timbre of her father's voice. She smiled up at him and his heart melted.
Buck and Inez watched the new family curiously, seeing themselves, yet not quite believing it. Buck's curiosity got the best of him and he moved closer to his twin and his family. He still wasn't close enough to actually see the baby but the sound of his footsteps caught Inez's attention. Looking up and seeing her husband's twin made her eyes go wide and without warning, Inez fainted.
Buck scrambled forward, catching the tiny bundle while his twin caught the unconscious Inez. Buck watched as tiny fists furiously waved around, trying to displace the blanket around its face. He gently moved aside the blanket before the baby suffocated and in doing so caught his first glimpse of a little angel. The ATF agent's heart melted as he saw the tiny little girl, all rosy and pink. She was perfect. From her little bow shape mouth to her tiny dark eyes, she was absolute perfection.
When Inez Rosillos saw her twin faint, she hurried forward to help. But she stopped at the sight of Buck Wilmington, her Buck Wilmington, smiling mistily down at the small bundle in his arms. She edged closer to him and looked down at the baby girl in his arms. Inez's little 'oh' of surprise and delight was heard only by Buck and it brought a smile to his lips. She held out her arms and Buck gently transferred the precious baby into Inez's arms. He watched as she cooed and crooned at Elena Rose. She's going to make a great mother, he thought with another smile.
"Buck? I thought I saw... " Inez had quickly regained conscious and was staring at her husband with wide eyes. She could have sworn she had seen... no, it couldn't be. Perhaps the hormones from her pregnancy were doing things to her vision. She didn't really see what she thought she saw and looked at her husband for confirmation. Instead, she saw a mischievous grin.
"You did, honey. You did." Wilmington moved out of her line of sight to show her the other Buck and Inez fussing over Elena.
"Madre de dios!"
Wilmington grinned. "That's what I said."
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"So y'all are from the year 2000," Wilmington repeated.
"Yup," Buck said with a grin.
"You work for the ATF. A government law enforcement agency." Larabee seemed to be intrigued by the idea. His counterpart nodded.
"And the seven of you have been together for three years." Sanchez indicated the seven men. "But Vin and Alex just became... an item, about a month ago." He paused at the JD's strange use of the word. Both Vin and Alex nodded.
"And you have just made the acquaintance of Mary and Inez," Standish added. Both aforementioned women nodded.
"And you've just arrested Julia," Mary Larabee said with a teasing smile and nudge to her friend. The respected Emporium owner simply stared at her twin with fascinated horror.
"That about covers it." Josiah grinned at the still slightly shocked faces around him. It wasn't everyday that you meet a group of people that mirrored your own family.
"This is damn strange," Jackson breathed out on a sigh.
"So what do you think happened?" Larabee sat back against the tree, his arms wrapped snugly around his wife's expanding middle. Everyone was sitting in a circle under the shade of the trees and eating lunch.
"All I know is that one moment JD's grabbing me to keep me from falling into the door, the next moment there's a blinding light and then we wake up here." Casey leaned into JD's side as she picked from his plate.
"I remember the light too. I thought they were headlights from another car," Nathan said as he took a bite of Inez Wilmington's delicious chicken enchiladas.
"No, they weren't from headlights. It was all around us, not just from the front." Vin looked up from his food with a frown as he remembered those last moments on Denver's streets.
"Vin's right. They weren't headlights," Chris agreed with his second-in-command.
"Then what happened?" Buck asked out loud.
"La Piedra de las Epocas." The Crimson Fox spoke for the first time and all eyes turned to her.
"Julia?" Ezra gently nudged the thief, indicating for her to go on.
"The Piedra de las Epocas. The stone in Mr. Larabee's, our Mr. Larabee, possession might be what transported us to this time." Julia Catherine slowly explained as the reasoning worked itself out in her mind.
"How?" Mary Suzanne asked her old friend.
"The legend says that the gem has mystical powers, that it grants wishes, but only in the hands of the right person."
"Wishes?" Sanchez's ears perked up at the word. The last time he dealt with wishes, life as he knew it had almost vanished.
Julia Catherine's nod had all heads turning towards Chris. But it was Alex Ellora that ventured to ask the obvious question. "Chris, what exactly did you wish for?"
Chris shook his head. "I didn't wish for anything. Except maybe for everyone to survive that little game of chicken with Rainer's men."
"Were you thinking about anything? Cowboys? Indians? The Old West in any form?" Casey listed the possibilities hoping to prompt the older man to remember.
Once again Chris shook his head. "The last thing I remember was looking at Julia and thinking that we wouldn't be in this mess if it had been the good old days... " He trailed off, a flicker of horror flashed across his face but quickly faded. Only four people caught it. His twin, the two Vins, and his twin's wife who knew her husband well enough to catch it.
"What were you thinking, Chris?" Mary Larabee looked straight into green eyes that she knew so well, yet didn't.
Chris sighed, knowing that he was going to have to tell them, if only to get back home. He just didn't particularly want to deal with the reactions of the four independent women from his time. "I was thinking that if it were the good old days, women would be in the home being housewives and not cat burglars, and we'd would've never been in this mess."
Just as he predicted, all four women from his time went ballistic. What he wasn't expecting were the reactions of all the other women there as well.
"You chauvinistic pig!"
"I can't believe you would think that, senor!"
"You sexist jerk!"
The outraged comments continued but Chris tuned them out. Instead he looked over at his friends. Every single man wore an amused smirk on his face.
"You did it this time, cowboy," Tanner smirked as he scooted out of the line of fire.
Chris watched him move and knew what he was doing. "Coward."
"Against them? Hell, yeah!"
Chris turned his head to see Larabee shaking his head and grinning. Chris raised an eyebrow and indicated the still fussing women.
Larabee leaned over and whispered, "You got yourself into this mess. Don't go dragging me into it."
Chris rolled his eyes, knowing himself and apparently his counterpart too well. "Like you don't believe the same thing."
Larabee winked. "Yeah, but I'll deny it to my dying day."
Mary Travis's voice broke through the men's whispered conversation. "Do you hear me, you chauvinistic bastard? This is all your fault! We're stuck in the goddamn past because of you!"
Chris's eyes widened in shock. Then he started yelling, "Me? My fault? If you weren't such a harping shrew... "
BANG!
The gunshot caused several things to happen simultaneously. All arguments ceased and every man on the ranch aimed their own guns at the source.
Larabee holstered his still smoking six-shooter. "That's enough!" He glared at his double and his sparring partner. "We need to figure how to get you folks home, not arguing whose fault it is."
"He's right." Chris was grateful for Larabee's intervention. He was pretty sure that he would have slugged Mary Suzanne Travis if they had continued their little 'debate'. That, or he would have thrown her on the ground and had his way with her. Either course of action was best done without witnesses.
"If you wished us here, perhaps you could wish us back home." Josiah's deep baritone voice had its usual calming effect on its listeners.
Chris could feel several pairs of eyes on him as he retrieved La Piedra de las Epocas. Holding the still velvet covered gemstone, he silently wished he and his friends back home. Chris held his breath, felt nothing and tentatively opened one eye. He still saw two of everyone. "Shit."
"Try it again," Tanner prompted the ATF leader.
Chris shrugged and then clasped the stone, concentrating on familiar things from the future. Cars, planes, his ranch, their ATF offices. None of it worked. He opened his eyes and shook his head.
"C'mon, Chris, there's got to be something you're doing different." Buck nudged his old friend.
"Well, I'm not being shot at by a bunch of gun-toting goons in a speeding limo in the middle of a freak snowstorm." Chris's sarcasm did what he intended. It shut Buck up.
"May I see this Piedra de las Epocas?" Standish inquired and smiled as Chris easily handed the precious gemstone over to the conman. Standish unwrapped it and gasped at the sheer size of the rock. Then a flicker of recognition flitted across his face.
Both Chrises caught it, but it was Standish's own leader that called him on it. "Ezra? What is it?"
"Three nights ago, at the saloon, a cowboy became inebriated and it loosened his tongue a great deal... "
Standish sat shuffling the well-worn cards glancing at the newest investors of the Standish Saloon. Around the room he could see his other friends relaxing from a long day of horse ranching, patrols, and other law enforcement duties. Behind the bar, Rain stood cleaning out shot glasses. Everything was as it should be.
"He's plum loco! Keeps talking about some magic rock. Gold's the only 'magic' rock I know of. But he keeps con-sulting that treasure map of his... " Standish idly shuffled as the drunkard continued with his mumbling. "And those damn clues... don't make a lick of sense, but he just keeps dragging us all over kingdom come looking for the magic rock!"
"If you are so displeased by your current employment, why do you remain?" Standish lazily continued to shuffle. The drunk was not going anywhere, neither was JD or the other cowhand at the poker table.
"Huh?"
"Why do ya stay if you don't like the job?" JD easily translated for the cowboy. After three years with Ezra, JD was use to his big words.
"Huh, why didn't ya jus ask? All them fancy words... he pays good."
>JD blinked at the quick jump from one subject to another, but smiled encouragingly at the ranting man. He went on to describe the Piedra de Epocas in amazing detail. It seemed that his boss was obsessed with the object and continuously gave the description to his men so that they could be on the look out for it.
"He's damn strange... keeps the map and all the clues hidden in some trunk and he wears the key 'round his neck. Damn fool... ain't nobody can read that La-tiny shit the clues are in anyway. Well, best get goin'. It's a long five miles to the camp. Night."
After the rambling cowboy left, JD and Ezra smiled at each other. Some people were strange.
Julia Catherine listened carefully as Standish retold the story in detail. If she couldn't have the Piedra de las Epocas from her time, there was no reason she couldn't have the gemstone from this one. Her devious mind was already planning this night's activities. Julia Catherine's concentration was broken when Tanner spoke.
"Well, 'til we can figure out how to get you folks home, it might be best for y'all to blend in." Tanner's soft Texas drawl broke through the tension. Everyone relaxed including a frustrated Chris. But it was Tanner's future self that made Chris smile.
"Hey, Chris, we're gonna get ta dress up like real cowboys!"
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"You couldn't pay me enough to put on that Dr. Quinn outfit!" Alexandra Ellora Styles declared with obvious disgust as she surveyed the brown skirt and accompanying white blouse Alexandra held up.
"Alex, what is it with you and Dr. Quinn?" Mary Suzanne asked in exasperation. This was the hundredth time that the doctor mentioned the TV show.
"Oh, please, Mary! The whole premise of that show was completely unbelievable! A lady doctor in the Old West? Give me a break!" Alex Ellora snorted in derision.
"And what do you have against lady doctors in the West?" Alexandra went toe to toe with her future self, arms defensively crossed over her chest.
"What? Oh God!" Alex Ellora stared in horror at her twin. "No, please don't tell me you're... "
"A lady doctor in the Old West." Alexandra nodded in smug confirmation.
Snickers were heard from all around the room when Alex Ellora groaned. "Oh my God! I was Dr. Quinn!"
"Wait a minute." Casey's brow crinkled as she concentrated. "Wasn't Dr. Quinn married to a long haired tracker?" She turned to Alex and eagerly asked, "Does Vin know how to track?"
At Alexandra's confused nod and Alex Ellora's horrified gasp, the three other women from the future fell into hysterical giggles.
"It's not funny!" Alex Ellora declared.
"Oh, yes it is! Very, very funny!" Inez Solona gasped out between bouts of giggles.
Glaring at her so-called friends, Alex Ellora grabbed the shirt and blouse from a confused Mary and stormed off to a corner. All the while muttering obscenities concerning a certain CBS show.
"I don't think I want to know." Mary turned away from the muttering doctor.
Mary Suzanne patted her hand with a smirk. "It's best that you don't."
Mary nodded. "Let's get you dressed then, sister dear." She began rummaging around in the carpetbag and pulled out the first article of clothing. "Here, you're going to need this."
Mary Travis' jaw dropped as she saw what Mary was holding up. "I am not going to wear that torture device!" Her voice echoed through the small cabin and drifted outside to the men. "And these clothes! There is now way in hell I'm wearing these clothes! I won't be able to breathe let alone move in this thing!"
Larabee's glare dared his men to laugh when a corset came flying out of the open window and landed on his head. Of course, the only one who did dare show his amusement was Larabee's twin. All fourteen men were sitting outside the cabin, waiting for their female counterparts who were busy changing.
"Sounds like Mrs. Travis don't like your wife's clothes, cowboy," Vin drawled with a smirk.
"Well, she's going to have to. All those women are going to stick out like sore thumbs and that makes them easy targets." Larabee threw the future Vin Tanner a warning look before turning to his own counterpart. "You got anything to say about this, pard?"
Chris smirked and turned to the cabin, raising his voice in a parent's chastising tone. "Mary Suzanne Travis! Don't make me come in there and put you in those clothes! You will do as Mrs. Larabee tells you!" The emphasis on those two words and the use of her full name sent Mary Travis into a fury that surpassed El Nino.
"You jerk! Don't you dare talk to me like I'm a recalcitrant child!"
"If it acts like a... "
"Say it and you will die a painful death, you jackass!"
"Tsk, tsk. Such language! Am I going to have to clean your mouth out with soap, young lady?"
Chris leaned back in his chair, fully enjoying the outraged scream from within Larabee's cabin. Around him, the men were valiantly trying to keep in their fits of hysterical laughter. Larabee simply sat next to his twin with a grin. Ahh, the good old days! he thought.
More muttering and curses came from inside and Chris just couldn't help himself. "Don't make me take you across my knee, little girl!"
To everyone's surprise, a half-dressed Mary Travis leaned out of the opened window. "Take me over your knee, huh? Promises, promises. But you're never up for it!"
Guffaws of laughter and the sounds of men high-fiving each other filled the air as Chris sat shaking his head and smiling ruefully.
"You asked for that, cowboy," Tanner managed through his laughter.
Larabee nudged Chris. "Don't you just love feisty women?"
Chris' smile was nothing short of male and smug and if either Marys had seen it, they would've slapped it off his face. "Hell yeah."
Mary Suzanne Travis turned back to the cabin full of laughing women. "Let's see him answer that one."
"Mary... that... was... so bad!" Alexandra gasped out.
"Did you... see... his face?" Inez clutched her sides as she laughed.
Mary Suzanne rolled her eyes. "He deserved it! He's such a jackass."
Mary nodded with a smile. "He can be."
"Why the hell did you marry such a jerk?" For the life of her, Mary Suzanne could not fathom why
Mary... she... whatever... would marry Chris Larabee.
"He gets better," Mary said simply, then turned serious eyes to her still fuming twin. "And because I love him."
Mary Suzanne melted at that. Her twin obviously loved him and what she had seen of this time's Chris Larabee, he was much more considerate and a hell of a lot nicer. It was also obvious that while the Western Chris Larabee wasn't as irritating as her Chris Larabee, he was still just as arrogant.
"And besides," Mary Larabee added with a satisfied smile as she indicated her swelling middle. "He's great in bed."
The gales of feminine laughter emitted from the cabin raised questioning eyebrows.
"What d'ya think they're laughing about?" Dunne asked innocently.
"Kid, with them women... it's best that we don't know." Buck the Bachelor dispensed that little piece of sage advice with a wink.
"Amen," was chorused by every male present.
"So how come you ain't a doctor?" Jackson and Nathan worked together in one corner of the barn. The evening air drifted around them. The two blonde leaders had decided that it would be best that everyone stay on the ranch that night. So evening found both groups of twins scattered about the front yard of Vin's cabin. A roaring fire shed light on them and kept them warm. And since they were all staying at the ranch that night, all the healers in the group firmly decided that they would be protected from the elements. So both Nathans had volunteered to clean out the hayloft of the barn for everyone to use as sleeping quarters.
Nathan shrugged. "There wasn't enough money for medical school so I joined the army with the medical division. Picked up a lot of stuff along the way. It comes in handy, 'specially with this bunch. Damn fools keep getting themselves shot up."
Jackson nodded with a smile. "I know how that goes."
"What about you? I heard Alexandra say something about you being a healer too." Nathan looked at the man whose life paralleled his so closely that it was scary.
"I learned some doctorin' being a stretcher bearer during the War."
"Must have been hard. Being a slave and all."
Jackson nodded. "I got through it all right. What about you? Is everything fair in your time?"
"Mostly. There's some prejudice left. But I don't notice it anymore."
Jackson looked around at his friends, no—his family, gathered around the campfire. "Yeah, I know what you mean."
The two dark healers sat in silence, watching their family for a bit before Nathan grinned. "So where's Rain?"
"You're a thief?" Julia couldn't believe it, she had never wanted for anything. Yet her twin was an international thief.
Julia Catherine simply shrugged nonchalantly. "It was a way to make money."
"But surely you could have gotten a job, or opened a boutique... that's what I did."
Julia Catherine set down her dinner plate and looked up into the clearest sky she had ever seen in her life. "As a kid, I was poor, flipping burgers, working in fast food joints. I scrimped and saved and worked my ass off to get through school. After I graduated, I promised myself that I would do anything I had to so that I would never be poor again."
Julia and Standish both nodded. Neither one understood everything the thief had said, but both understood the need to escape a dark past through the abundance of money. But Ezra listened in silence, learning more about this amazing woman and falling deeper into her spell.
"I completely understand, my dear." Standish quietly supported her life's path.
Ezra started in surprise. "You were poor? I would have thought with Maude Standish for a mother ... "
"With Maude Standish for a mother, one learns the value of easy money very early."
Ezra grinned at his twin. "Hear! Hear! There will never be anyone quite like Mother."
"Indeed. But one piece of advice, my friend. Tell her about Julia as soon as you are able."
"Why?"
Standish's dimpled grin flashed. "Trust me, Ezra, trust me."
Sanchez sat back against the wall of the cabin, carefully shifting his weight to allow more room for his twin. "So where's Audrey?"
Josiah looked over his shoulder with a confused expression. "Who's Audrey?"
Sanchez smiled widely. "Never mind."
Josiah shrugged. Both men sat back and watched the different clusters. In one corner the two JDs vied for Casey's attention, while in another corner both sets of Buck and Inez fussed over little Elena Rose. Billy Travis sat in Chris's lap, watching in fascination, as his parents and their doubles talked. Near them sat the Vins, Alexs, Ezras, and Julias.
"Makes you believe that the Almighty has a even stranger sense of humor than all the Vins and Ezras combined."
"Amen, brother, amen."
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Night stole into the ranch and found nearly everyone asleep. Everyone, that is, except a beautiful red haired thief, who was silently saddling Wilmington's gray mare. Soon, the Fox was riding into the open prairie, determined to find Rainer's ancestor... and the map that would help her find the Piedra de las Epocas. Rounding a corner, the thief nearly screamed. There in the darkness stood Standish comfortably lounging against a tree with his horse's reins in hand.
"I take it my dear, that you are planning to relieve Mr. Rainer of a treasure map?" He was quite causal in his observation.
"Maybe. Why?" The thief proceeded cautiously, not wanting to give up another chance at the gemstone.
"A bargain. We split the proceeds, fifty/fifty."
"And why should I share?" Julia Catherine lifted an eyebrow.
"Julia, my dear, Mr. Larabee is a very light sleeper, the slightest sound would awaken him." Standish smiled. This woman was not afraid of much. But only a fool would not be at least wary of that particular predator. And Julia Catherine Pemberton, in any century, was no fool.
"You'd turn me in?"
"It would seem that my counterpart already has before. And we, after all, are the same person." He chuckled at the glare she tossed his way. The lady did not like the reminder of her capture.
Julia Catherine sighed, then smiled. She really did love this man! "Fifty/fifty."
Standish smiled. "Excellent."
The Fox had a partner.
She didn't like partners. More over, she did not like partners to whom that she was attracted. In every respect, the man riding with her into the town of Four Corners was the Ezra Standish she wanted and craved to make love to. If she could ever overcome the horror that she had actually fallen for a man who was in law enforcement. However, stepping through the looking glass into this alternate dimension, whatever you call it, had put her in reach of a very different Ezra Standish. One that was lacking the morale center of the one she had such difficulty admitting she cared for. This man did not live his life playing by the rules, appearing instead to alter them to suit. Why could not he have been the man she had fallen for? The irony of the whole situation was that in this reality, she had a counterpart who was the love of his life and a respectable member of society.
It was enough to make a girl believe in karma.
"So let me understand this," Standish replied as he rode into town with this intriguing woman who was like his own Julia, resourceful beyond the measure attributed to most specimens of her gender. "You have never been caught prior to meeting my future self?" While both of them were identical, this incarnation seemed to be harder, more confident as if such a thing was possible. She carried herself with the confidence of a man and did not appear to ever need the opposite sex to survive the way Julia Pemberton had done in her earlier years.
The Fox frowned, chagrin rippling through her as she was once again reminded that Ezra Standish of the ATF was the reason she had been caught like a common criminal and led away in handcuffs. Ten years in the game and she had never even come close to being caught. In less than a week, she had been almost caught three times. The humiliation was more than she could stand. "Must we discuss that in detail? And I'll have you know, I am not a thief. A thief steals wallets and televisions sets. I am a cat burglar. I deal in art treasures, gems that price in the hundred thousands and anything that translates into a six figure payoff in a very nice secure bank in Switzerland."
"I grovel in mortification at my misunderstanding," he said, amused and secretly impressed. "So how does a young lady of your beauty and intelligence fall into such a profession?"
The question took her by surprise because no one had actually asked her that in the decade she had been in this line of work. The Fox supposed this was hardly surprising considering very few people actually knew what she did. Mary was the only one who knew her secret, mostly because she had been present during the events that forced the Fox to make the choices she had. There were times when she had no idea why Mary kept her secret. When as a journalist, exposing the Fox could make the story of her career, but then she supposed that was what true friendship was all about; sacrifice. She made a mental note to apologize to Mary for trying to seduce Chris earlier in her escape attempt. She had not missed the daggers in her direction. It had taken a long time for Mary Travis to even look at another man since Steven died and her feelings for Chris were far too strong for Julia to be playing havoc with her emotions.
"I suppose it could not possibly hurt if I told you," the Fox sighed as they reached the outskirts of town. It looked as if it had come straight out of a set on one of those old westerns with Rory Calhoun playing the iron jawed sheriff and some minor actress playing the virginal, yet feisty, school marm. God, she hated those films. Worst of all, she hated playing a part in one of them.
"I give you my word. I shall take your confidence to my grave," he assured her with a smile she had no doubt would charm lesser women.
The Fox looked over her shoulder and remarked. "Tell anyone and you will." She warned, with enough menace in her voice to tell Standish she meant it.
"On that charming note, please continue," he urged, curious to know her history.
"I was poor, as I already told you," the Fox smiled faintly before beginning. "I always liked to dance but didn't have the grace for it and ended up going into gymnastics."
"Gymnastics?" he had to ask.
"Aerial acrobatics," the Fox answered for clarification. "In the future, if you're good enough, you can get into college with sports scholarships and I worked very hard throughout high school to get one. I knew I wasn't going to end up flipping burgers for the rest of my life."
"I am assuming you mean a cook," Standish interrupted.
"Well, I wouldn't call it food," she said with a smile. "But yes, that's a close enough definition. Anyway, I found out that I was more than good. I was Olympic material. I could have been the next Nadia if I had manage to compete."
Standish had no idea what Olympic material meant but if it was at all in the context of the ancient games indulged by the Greeks, then he had some idea as to the scope to which she was referring. "You did not compete I gather?" he guessed judging from the sadness in her eyes. It had been a long time since she had spoke of this to anyone and Standish felt slightly honored that she trusted him enough to reveal such intimate information about herself.
"I got the sponsors and I actually got to the Seoul Games and this was before performance enhancing drugs were sensationalized so I never even considered being careful of what I ate or drank. The German contingent was determined to win and after the first day of competition, where I pretty much kicked their asses, the coach alleged that I was using steroids or something of the like."
"In other words, they claim you cheated." Standish did not have to hear the rest.
"As far as the board were concerned I did. I was disqualified with a life time ban. No gold medal and no scholarship," the Fox smiled sardonically, still stinging when she felt remembered the humiliation and despair that had almost broken her spirit.
"I bummed around in Europe for a bit, using a work visa to travel, trying to hide myself until the newspapers got off my back and then I ran into Donald Avery. Actually, he came looking for me because he needed a partner. He figured that since I had nothing to lose, I might be interested in a change of career. He was the best cat burglar there ever was. He was a legend for the rest of us even though most of the world has no idea who he was. He said because of the gymnastics, I already had the talent, all I needed was the skill. He taught me everything he knew about how to move in quietly, how to fight and how to use my mind so I could come at a problem and unravel it. He used to say that opening a safe was like opening a woman's heart. You just have to listen very carefully to what she has to say."
"What happened to Mr. Avery?" Standish asked as their horses reached the lodging house where he kept a room. His new partner had professed to needing a change of clothes, since what she had on, though fetching indeed, was most unsuitable for what she was planning, whatever that was. Julia Pemberton though her size, had a tendency for flamboyant clothes that seemed to stand out in a crowd. The Fox needed something anonymous. She had liberated some of the clothes that Mary Larabee had brought for her future counterpart before her departure.
"Oh after he taught me everything he knew as he promised, he bought himself a nice little chalet in France before retiring permanently. He died while tending his vineyards and he had left me all his contacts and his fortune."
"How fortunate," Standish replied, choosing not divulge that the Donald Avery of this reality was Julia's father and his daughter had not come away from the association with as pleasant a memory as the Fox obviously held about her incarnation of the man. "So do you care to enlighten me on how you had planned to liberate our treasure hunter of his key in order to penetrate his trunk?"
"Mr. Standish," she looked at him with a hint of mock hurt. "The day I need a key to break into any room or a trunk, is the day I give up my ill gotten gains and join a nunnery. I take it you are a fair man for the cards?"
"The day I do anything else, I would be joining a monastery." He flashed her a dimpled smile and reminded the Fox why the Ezra Standish of the future affected her so deeply. "You have a plan madam?"
"I do and it's right up your alley." She smiled an equally radiant smile at Standish who had to remember that she was not his Julia and any move he made towards her in that context would probably give him the same bruises he had spied on Ezra back at the ranch.
"I am at your disposal." He said neutrally.
Chris Larabee had trouble sleeping and finally decided he was going to give up even trying.
He climbed out of the cot in the barn and stepped into the cool night, staring at the stars in the sky and noting with a slight smile that they did look a lot brighter, without the pollutants of the twentieth century obscuring the vista. He did not know how long he stood leaning against the fence of one of the holding pens reveling in the sight of it. Reaching into his coat, he pulled out the gemstone that had caused so much grief, before and after it had transported them to the past. La Piedra de las Epocas glimmered under the light of the moon and Chris held it in his hand for a moment, fisting it against his palm as he tried hard to concentrate on sending them all back where they were meant to be.
Click your heels and get us home Dorothy, Chris told himself as he put the full force of his considerable will behind the effort.
When he opened his eyes, he found himself exactly where he was a moment ago, still trapped in the past. Damn, he swore when suddenly something very unusual happened. The gem in his palm fazed in and out of reality, one minute it was there and a second later it was not. For that brief instance, it appeared as if La Piedra de las Epocas was ghosting in and out of space. Chris knew he was not asleep nor was he dreaming. The fact that they were here was proof enough of the mystical energy contained in the gem, so what was happening now?
"Something wrong?" Larabee's voice broke through the silence and made Chris jump. When the ATF leader looked over his shoulder as his past self, he took it as a good sign that only Larabee could sneak up on him like that.
"Something strange is going on with this thing," Chris stated, still studying the thing quizzically, waiting for a repeat performance of what it had just done. "For a minute, I thought it was going to disappear out of my hand."
"This whole thing is strange," Larabee pointed out, unafraid to admit that. However, for the present, the gem could wait. He had discovered something even more pressing that required attention. "We've got another problem."
"Of course," Chris said sarcastically, his ability to be surprised by anything bizarre was suspended indefinitely. "What's happened now?"
"Your Fox is gone. She stole Buck's horse and took off," Larabee said with a smile, expecting his counterpart to take the news the same way he would have in the same position and supposed that even the future could not alter his personality that much. It gave a certain balance to his universe to know that he would still be Chris Larabee in any time.
Chris stared at his mirror image, trying to understand why the Fox would do that. If she had any chance of getting back to their reality, she needed to stick with them. There was no reason for her to leave unless... Chris thoughts drifted away on an uncomfortable line of thought as his gaze rested upon the gem still in his palm.
"Oh shit!" he swore. "She's gone after that damn rock!"
"The one in your hand?" Larabee asked, not understanding.
Chris had seen enough episodes of Star Trek to know what was happening and hoped he could explain it as clearly as Mister Spock. "The one in my hand is from the future. In this time, it hasn't been found yet and wasn't Standish saying something about someone in town having a map of where the thing might be during this day and age?"
"Aw hell!" Larabee growled before he started running towards the house when he realized something else as well. Chris wondered what had gripped his past self with such concern and followed the man. He found Larabee at the hitching post and heard the lawmen swearing profusely.
"Goddamn son of a bitch!" Larabee swore profusely as he paced back and forth in the space next to where their horses were tethered.
"What?" Chris demanded upon reaching him.
"Ezra's horse is gone!" the gunslinger growled. "I didn't notice it before cause I was too busy trying to work out which one of you had taken off. I'll give you ten to one odds that he's gone with your Fox."
"Why?" Chris asked confused. He could see no reason why Standish would be party to theft when he was a lawman in these parts.
"Because when that idiot gets a whiff of money, he loses all common sense!" Larabee barked angrily. "I should have known when I saw him drooling over that rock he was gonna do something stupid!"
"Okay," Chris found himself trying to be the voice of reason. "Calm down. Where would they have gone?"
"Four Corners," Larabee answered. "If they're after the gem then they're going have to get the map from Rainier."
"All right," Chris nodded with a frown. "We better go after them."
"You and your people stay," Larabee returned. "There can't be two of us running around."
"Yeah, I suppose," Chris had to concede him that point but thought about what it would take to bring in the Fox. "All right, we'll stay but you take my Vin with you. If it comes to a fight, that woman would kick your asses. Vin's the only one we got who can take her."
"She's that good?" Larabee said with measure of surprise. The woman was identical to Julia Pemberton, who was diminutive in size and hardly what Larabee would consider threatening.
"Ezra didn't get those bruises by walking into a door. She knows how to fight and she can take down anyone who underestimates her, I shit you not," Chris said firmly so that Larabee understood. In her time, the Fox was more than adept at evading law enforcement agents, himself included. He was not going to underestimate her by thinking his past self was capable of going hand to hand with her, when she had kicked his own gun from his hand at their first encounter.
"I hear you," the gunslinger nodded, not about to question the determination in eyes he saw in the mirror every day. "I'll saddle up the others."
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