Pancake Night 1: A Comedy of Errors

by Seven


Disclaimer:  Earth: Final Conflict and its characters are copyrighted by Tribune Entertainment Company.  All rights reserved.



Note from Author:      I thought I'd do something weird, wacky, and fun. Takes place between "Atavus" and "Stitch in Time", so Liam is still trying to understand life and what goes on.



**********



Have you ever had pancakes before, Liam?" Lili asked, running her hand under the tap.

Liam shook his head. "No, never."

"He's living on burgers, nothing else," Augur announced, through a mouthful of pancake. "Lili, I didn't know you could cook."

"I don't, normally, but I'm not so bad that I botch pancakes," Lili pulled her reddened hand from under the water and blew on it. "What sort of deranged mind would give a frying pan a metal handle?"

Augur wisely said nothing. Liam pulled something from his jacket and began to flip through it. Lili noticed it. "Liam, what is that?"

"A magazine."

Augur interrupted nervously, "Hey, I was wondering, Lili; why don't we help Liam go apartment-hunting?"

"What for?" Liam asked.

Lili shrugged. "Liam, you can't spend your entire life in the back of a bar. You have the paycheck of the average Companion protector, and that gives you a sizable income. You've never had a car or a house, so you have no debts. It's simple."

Liam looked confused, but simply shrugged and continued looking at the magazine. Lili craned her neck, and her mouth fell open. "Liam, where did you get that?"

Liam looked at her with large, innocent eyes. "It was with Augur's beers, in the back."

Augur was turning a very peculiar shade of red, while Lili was threatening to turn purple. "Liam, that is an issue of Playboy and you are to put it down right now," she said.

"Why?"

"Because..." Lili racked her brains. "Errr..."

"Why?"

"Because it is not acceptable to gape at naked women."

"Then, why does Augur do it?" Liam asked.

"A good question," Lili growled through her teeth. A smell of burning permeated the air. "Ohmigosh, the pancakes!" She shot out of her chair and grabbed the frying pan. "OW!" She yanked her hand away and stuck it under the faucet.

Augur mock-sighed and smiled. "Some people never learn."

Lili stuck out her tongue at him and wrapped a dishtowel around her abused fingers. Gingerly, she dropped a couple of semi-burned pancakes into each of the plates. Augur was quietly slipping the magazine under his chair, but Liam attacked the pancakes with relish.

Lili sat down and stuck her hand into the ice bucket. "Liam," she said casually. "I was wondering... uh, what is your life expectancy?"

Liam took a bite. "I don't know, maybe a couple million years."

"A couple..." Augur said, open-mouthed.

Liam's casual attitude convinced Lili that he was not joking. "So, um, do all Kimera children grow up fast and then age slowly in adulthood?"

"Mmm-hmm," Liam said, paying only marginal attention.

"How long until they're fully adult, mentally?" Augur asked.

"A couple thousand years," Liam responded, taking a sip of his beer.

"Go easy on that, you've never had it before," Lili cautioned as he continued attacking his pancakes. Half of the second one was gone now. "Liam, what have you had to eat today?"

"A cheese sandwich at seven o'clock," Liam responded.

"PM?"

"AM."

Lili stared at him. "And you can function on a cheese sandwich ALL DAY?" she asked incredulously.

"Maybe if it were a really BIG sandwich," Augur suggested. Lili shot a look at him. "And you didn't feel weak or light-headed?" she asked.

Liam shook his head. These topics of conversation seemed to be boring him. "I eat when other people eat."

"And you hang around with Da'an all day, and Taelons don't eat. Well, that's one mystery solved," Lili said, pulling her hand out of the ice bucket and drying it off. Then she winced and stuck it back in. "You have the slowest metabolism of anyone I've ever met."

"I want to be part alien too," Augur commented.

"Oh trust me, it's not as cushy as all that," Liam said, taking his last bite of pancake and pushing back his chair. "I'll be back in a couple of minutes: Da'an needs some help at the Embassy."

"Chocolate?" Lili asked, pulling a Hershey bar from her pocket.

"What?" Liam took the bar, unwrapped it partially, and viewed the substance with a hint of revulsion.

"Chocolate. It's good," Augur said. He leaned closer to Lili. "Is this the same Liam who is supposed to have Sandoval and Beckett's memories and yet doesn't like chocolate?"

"Well, implants don't know how to live," Lili whispered back. "Try some, Liam."

"I don't know, I've never had this," Liam hesitated. "I don't think I like it."

"Oh for heaven's sakes!" Lili burst out. "How can you say you don't like it if you haven't tried it?... Good grief, I sound like my mom!"

Liam broke off a square and popped it into his mouth with a grimace. The grimace melted into a smile.

****

When Liam arrived at Da'an's office, he found the Taelon not in his usual thronelike chair in the center of the room, but at Liam's own desk. He was holding a bulky file folder up and shaking it. When nothing fell out, he looked disappointed.

"Can I, uh, help you, Da'an?" Liam asked, approaching him.

Da'an put down the folder and stood up. "Liam, have you seen the dataclip with the document that I was working on?"

"No, not recently."

"It has vanished, and I was wondering if it might have become enmeshed with your assignments." Da'an gestured gracefully at Liam's somewhat cluttered desk. Liam sighed, "I don't understand how I can have been here for a week-and-a-half and already I'm up to my eyeballs."

Da'an smiled. "I have never postponed what humans call, 'paperwork.' I make it a point to work on it immediately."

"You've ALWAYS done that?"

Da'an lowered his eyes, amused. "Not at first."

Liam laughed and began sifting through his drawers. "I can't find it."

Da'an looked vaguely disappointed. "It is of no matter, " he said, climbing back into his chair.

"Well, it is to you," Liam said. "Listen, I'll go over your office."

"I already have."

"Then I'll check the lower levels."

"I have been there also."

"Then I'll check out the subterranean tunnels."

"I have been there as well."

Liam threw up his arms. "Have you left any room untouched?" he asked.

Da'an tilted his head and appeared to be thinking. "I do not think so."

"Even the bathrooms?" Liam asked incredulously. Da'an smiled a little, but didn't answer. A few minutes later, Liam crawled from under his desk, his global chirped. It was Sandoval. "Major, what are you doing?"

"I'm washing the floor, what does it look like?" Liam said sarcastically. Sandoval ignore him. "We have a serious problem, Major!

"What problem?"

"We're picking up Jaridian energy patterns on Earth, in rural Arkansas."

"I've never been there."

"That doesn't matter. Zo'or is requesting your presence on the mothership immediately."

"Request" coming from Zo'or meant "order," and Liam knew it. "I'll be there faster than a meteor hitting a black hole." Sandoval looked confused by that analogy before Liam cut the link.

****

Lili, as Sandoval's assistant, was also there, but she was holding her glove-encased hand in front of her, as if she were balancing something on her knuckles. Sandoval looked at her strangely and apparently decided not to inquire. Zo'or was watching Sandoval, who was gesturing at a large holographic representation of Earth. Liam began gnawing absently on his thumbnail.

"We believe that the Jaridian power signature is from the same source as the replicant earlier this month," Sandoval said. "We may have a weapon against it, but we would need to get the probe or replicant in an open area. A very open area." He turned to Liam. "That is all you need to know at this moment."

"Major," Zo'or said suddenly, with a hint of incredulity in his voice. "You are biting your finger."

Liam instantly stopped chewing his thumbnail. Lili slapped her forehead with her good hand.

****

Jonathan Doors was reading a copy of "Time" magazine about some new blasted Taelon medical procedure (they said they can cure cigarette addiction!) when he noticed a blue-gray object sticking out of Liam's paperwork folders. It looked Taelon.

Doors rapidly got to his feet and yanked out the dataclip out. The graceful swirls of Eunoia marked its small screen. Doors ran over to Augur, who was playing X-Wing on his computer screen. "Augur, drop whatever you're doing!"

"But I'm beating the Imperial scum!" Augur protested, staring at the explosions on the screen.

"Forget the Imperial scum, focus on the Taelon scum." Doors stuck the clip in front of Augur's face. "This Taelon dataclip was in Liam's work. It's written in Eunoia, and Liam doesn't know how to read Eunoia. He can read what's-it-called..."

"Kimera?" Augur asked.

"Yeah, whatever. Tap into the Taelon databanks and translate that for me. I wanna know what that clip says." The X-Wing on the screen exploded. As Augur inserted the clip into his computer, uttering a muttered curse, Doors walked away with a satisfied smile on his lips.