#and riley said justice for that bug

[boxwinebaddie]

me: there was a bug in my hands it was so heinous i was crying please comfort me pls i was so afraid im so brave

riley: wHAT TYPE OF BUG WAS IT

[saffronmidnightparade]

Round 1 Concludes!

@vixletserenity / @kokorowoutsu / @auraguardians / @skullkxd / @pokerats / @greenxprof / @multimusecatastrophy / @cosmoscourge / @mirroredranger / @horizonboundtrainer / @startgamc / @silentchamp / @tapuhauko / @abelladxnna

Janine gathers everyone around the stage, wearing a purple ballgown layered with tulle and satin, fabric cutouts resembling a pair of Crobat wings drape her thighs, while another pair are attached to the wrists of her long gloves. Her hair is let down by her shoulders for the occasion, a black cat-eyed mask across her face, while a wide brimmed witch hat with bat wings rests on her head.

"Good afternoon and welcome! We've gotten the results from our public polls finalized, and the winners of each category selected. Before we announce who was selected to move on, I wanted to give a very special thank you to everyone who participated, both contestants and voters alike! This event would not have been possible without your passion and willingness to put yourself out there for the world to see. I can truly say that everyone's costumes were hard to choose a favorite."

"That being said, there must always be winners in competition- but the Friends of Fuchsia want you to know that there are no losers here! All contestants, regardess of their placement will receive the following..."

Janine throws down a smokebomb, filling the air with purple fog and glitter. When the fog clears, upon the stage are pre-wrapped bags of prizes.

"Each contestant will receive a Jack-o-Lantern treat bucket of five thousand Pokédollars and select candies, a Dratini plushie with a special Shiny Molt pattern, five Safari Balls that can be used here or in Johto, hand-carved by our very own Safari Wardens, and two movie ticket vouchers that can be redeemed for any showing!"

She claps, "Prizes were provided by a benefactor who wishes to remain anonymous."

Unfolding an envelope, she clears her throat, "Now, without any further ado, let's start with the announcements..."

"Starting with the Beautiful Category, our winner is Celeste! What a stunning transformation! Honorable mentions to Kianga and Riley! I absolutely adored everyone's grace and poise- expect a special gift from me to each of you!"

"Next, we have our Cleverest- Ree! The way you incorporated your chair into your costume was inspired! Honorable mention to the Rat King- closet construction is a skill and one you are not lacking! Again, I'll give you something personal these next few days."

"Award for the Coolest Category goes to Green! What a fantastical display of costumery! Honorable mentions to Allister and Lillie. I thought the use of masks and accessories were inspired! And Lillie, the efforts of you and your partner pokemon were brilliant!"

"Valerie is our winner for Cutest! You don't see vibrant vampires everyday! May- I loved the Dustox Capelet, and the inspiration- way to show the natural cute qualities bugs have! Kotone, I loved you bringing a kind of adorable and whimsical side of Giratina to life in your outfit, that starry texture..."

Janine has to hold herself back from gushing- "Cute" is kind of a big thing for her.

"And last of all- Red is our Champ for Toughest Costume! Lucario Man dispenses justice! Honorable mentions to Hau and Kita! Famous figures of literature each- I wasn't sleeping on your Terror of Sleepy Hollow, the Headless Horseman, nor Kita's sickening take on a debutante Red Death!"

"That's all for now, until a winner is selected from our finalists. Be sure to check your mail these next few days! Until next time, thank you and have a Happy Halloween!"

[asflowersfade]

Ficlet: The Blond Annoyance and the Not-Lawyer Guy

MacGyver ficlet. It falls to Greer to call that MacGyver guy. Oh, joy.  Detective Greer’s POV.

They make the discovery completely by accident.

Actually, it’s the purse snatcher who leads them to that room.

They just finished eating lunch, Greer and Turner, and as they exit their favorite bistro and head down the street towards where they parked their car, some kid grabs some woman’s purse and off he goes.

They run after him, of course, being officers of the law and stuff.

Well, Turner runs after him, his speed matching that of a cheetah on steroids, Greer just sort of waddles after them, carrying his weight and age and the big lunch he just ate with sort of a wheezing effort. But he does his best.

When Greer reaches the street corner around which the kid and his partner disappeared several seconds ago, the two are already halfway up the rickety fire escape, leading up from the litter strewn alley. Sanitary, this place is not.

With a sigh, Greer girds his loins, so to speak, and dashes ponderously after them again. Up he goes, wheezing - and cursing - some more, only to hear the sound of shattering glass a moment later, and when he looks up, he sees first the kid then his partner disappear through a broken window inside the building.

Great, just great. More paperwork.

It takes Greer a moment - alright, several moments - to reach the window and then he climbs inside, too. And then he’s done. He needs a break, just a short one. He feels for the woman who just lost her purse, he really does, but he also feels his heart hammering like crazy. Maybe he should really lay off the burgers and fries.

Panting like a racehorse, Greer turns around to see whose apartment their little purse snatcher broke into - and freezes, his eyes turning saucer big with shock. What the ever-loving hell?

There are footsteps in the hallway outside the apartment, then Turner is back, thief-less but with the lost purse clutched in his hand. “Got it!” he states, voice victorious, face beaming, as he shows the handbag to Greer.

Greer just nods, without looking at him, and replies, “Yeah, and we’ve got a situation here, partner. Better call the forensics. Now.”

It falls to Greer to call that MacGyver guy. Oh, joy. And double that heaping of happiness when MacGyver arrives with his not-lawyer friend... partner… well, bodyguard! Greer still hasn’t figured out how that guy relates to the blond annoyance he met months ago. Ulcers, that’s what these two and their super secret whatever organization are going to give Greer. Ulcers.

“Detective Greer?” MacGyver calls out to him as he and his shadow are stopped at the door by one of LA finests.

“Let them through,” Greer orders, waving them inside the filthy, messy apartment in the rundown building where everything smells of mold. Lovely.

They enter the room where Greer’s waiting for them, MacGyver and Dalton - yeah, that’s the not-lawyer’s name! - and looking around warily, they approach Greer with an air of expectation and not a little confusion. Greer namely didn’t tell them what they found in this apartment when he called them because he wanted to see their reaction first hand.

“You said you wanted to show us something on the phone?” MacGyver asks.

Greer nods. “Yes, this,” he says, pointing at one of the walls, and watches them closely.

They turn to look - and freeze. Only for a moment, sure, but the shock, the startled widening of eyes, it’s there. And no wonder. The wall along which the forensics are milling like ants is full of photographs, there must be hundreds of them. Close-ups and far-offs, in all sizes, in full color and black and white.

Pictures of MacGyver and Dalton and the others Greer saw at MacGyver’s when he came to arrest him last Christmas. They’re arranged in groups by subject in a circle around one big photo smack in the middle: a photo of Angus MacGyver himself.

“What the--!” Dalton mutters, staring at the wall.

MacGyver stares, too, frowning a little.

“Care to explain this to me?” Greer asks them, pointing at the wall again.

MacGyver just shakes his head a little, standing still, but Dalton walks up to the wall to peer at the photographs closely. His face’s dark but more annoyed than anything else, really. It feels like, first shock aside, this isn’t anything he hasn’t seen before.

What kind of weirdos are these two, really?

“What do you think, Mac?” Dalton asks, bent at the waist and with his nose barely an inch or two away from the wall. “Murdoc or The Ghost?”

“Who?” Greer asks, turning to MacGyver.

The blond annoyance glances at Greer. “An international assassin and a bomb maker, respectively,” he explains to Greer before responding to Dalton’s question, “Neither would need this.” He waves at the wall. “They’re obsessed enough, sure, but they both know where I live, so this would be… redundant.”

Greer lifts his eyebrows. “There’s an international assassin and a bomb maker with an avid interest in you and they know where you live?” he asks in disbelief. Jesus hopscotching Christ! What kind of a life do these people lead?

“I keep telling him to move,” Dalton mutters, throwing an annoyed glare over his shoulder at his partner.

MacGyver glares back. “And I keep telling you I’m not leaving my grandfather’s house!”

“Yeah, yeah, because the mortgage is all paid off, right?” Dalton shoots back, voice snippy, the whole thing apparently an old argument.

But then Dalton moves on, turning back to them, and points over his shoulder with his thumb. “So, who did this? Do you have any leads?” he inquires, looking at Greer.

Greer shakes his head. “We don’t know. We discovered this by accident, it’s not linked to any of our investigations - yet. We thought you might give us some explanations because all we found was this” --he reaches into his jacket pocket for an evidence bag-- “and it’s all gibberish.”

MacGyver takes the baggie and Dalton steps closer to peer at it, too. And his eyes widen again. “Is that…?” he trails off.

“Yeah, it seems so,” MacGyver replies, nodding, as he stares down at the single piece of paper in the evidence bag. The scribbles on it are unreadable. Complete gibberish.

“Care to explain?” Greer prompts, getting really annoyed with the secrets that seem to hang over these people like smog over LA on a hot summer day.

“Yeah,” MacGyver says, looking up from the bag. “Last year, we… assisted with the apprehension of a killer in San Francisco. It was a Zodiac copycat. He used a code similar to this one” --he waves the baggie-- “just like the original Zodiac Killer. He had that guy down to a pat.”

“The Zodiac Killer,” Greer states in voice heavy with disbelief. Are they serious? “Are you serious?”

“Yes. I mean no,” MacGyver corrects himself immediately. “It was a copycat, not the original killer from the sixties. We caught him, and before you ask, detective, he’s serving his time in prison, so it can’t be him.”

Dalton looks at his partner with a pensive expression on his face. “You think we have another copycat on our hands?” he asks.

MacGyver shakes his head and returns the evidence bag to Greer. “I don’t know but I don’t think so. That would be too much of a coincidence, don’t you think? Two Zodiac copycats in under a year?”

Hiding the baggie, Greer asks, “So what do you think?”

With a long look at the wall, MacGyver takes a deep breath and blows it out before saying, “I can’t be sure - we need to get the evidence back to Riley--”

Greer frowns at that because it’s his crime scene, his!

“--but… I think this time, it might be the real deal,” MacGyver finishes slowly.

What the what now?!

“You mean the real Zodiac? For real this time? Really real?” Dalton asks, his voice climbing a little.

MacGyver shrugs. “Well, it’s either the real deal - which is highly improbable, I admit - or we have crossed paths with a second copycat - which is even more improbable, don’t you think?”

Dalton groans.

“But why would the real Zodiac be interested in you?” Greer asks. And he still can’t believe he’s actually saying this. Zodiac. The Zodiac Killer. Are these people from another planet, or what? Nobody stirs this much crap in one lifetime, let alone in one year!

MacGyver looks at him. “The copycat in San Francisco might’ve forced him out of hiding. Maybe he got annoyed because someone tried to steal his fame. And since we helped to catch the upstart, we might’ve made him curious, is all.”

“Is all? Is all?” Dalton laments, scrunching his face. “Dude, please, don’t tell me we’ve made another psychotic enemy, please, please, I’m begging you. Two are enough!”

MacGyver glances at him, unperturbed, and responds, “I would really like to tell you otherwise, Jack, but the evidence” --he waves at the wall-- “seems to speak for itself. Though maybe he’s just looking, you know? Maybe he is just curious. He hasn’t done anything yet.”

Dalton looks at him, bug-eyed, then he points at the wall sharply and with deep aggravation. “This is not nothing, hoss! Maybe Murdoc and The Ghost’s displays of-of interest skewed your perception there - you know, what with the shooting and the kidnapping and the bomb - but this, this is not normal. Normal, sane and safe people don’t do stuff like that!”

Shooting? Kidnapping? Bomb? Greer’s starting to feel like these two live in another dimension, or something.

MacGyver rolls his eyes. “I know that, Jack, but until he actually does something, there’s very little we can do about him. We can let Riley and our lab handle the evidence--”

As if! Greer thinks. Especially if it’s the real Zodiac Killer!

“--but that’s pretty much it. The Zodiac’s managed to avoid getting caught for decades now - if it’s even him! - so, as much as I would like to, I don’t expect it to be us who finally brings him to justice,” MacGyver says. “So… why make a big deal out of it? It’s nothing we haven’t seen before, in one iteration or another.”

Dalton just stares at him for a moment, squinting and with his lips pursed, then he shakes his head. “You’re weird, dude. Like so weird! Fighting Saddam was safer than hanging around you. Your company’s just not good for my health.” Still shaking his head and grumbling, he turns on his heel and marches out of the room, calling over his shoulder, “I’m going to go wait in the car. This is just not good for my blood pressure.”

MacGyver glares after him for a moment, then he turns to Greer, and looking all earnest, he says, “Detective, we would really appreciate if you could share your findings with us. Anything you uncover.”

And then, before Greer can do more than open his mouth to say, “Hell no!”, the blond annoyance turns around and hastens out of the apartment, calling after his partner, “Hey, Jack, wait up!”

Greer snaps his mouth shut, irritated with the lot of them. The gal of these people!

“Trouble?” Turner asks as he approaches from behind.

“With that bunch? Always!” Greer snaps, huffing.

The Zodiac killer. Pah!

The next day, the case is taken off their hands, Greer’s and Turner’s. Because apparently, there is no case. Orders from above. Explanation? None.

If Greer ever sees those two again, the blond annoyance and the not-lawyer guy, he’ll shoot them on the principle!