Quaranteam Ch. 36

"Y'know," Andy said to himself and the cat, "I feel like I should've yelled that there's no running in the house after them, but I just know it wouldn't have done any good."

"Meow," Muninn said to him in response.

"Oh hush," Andy said. "What the hell do you know?"

"Meow," Muninn agreed.

"Damn straight."

After leaving Hannah's room, he was halfway down the hall when he ran into Sarah, who was wearing one of his t-shirts, one for a band called Stereophonics, and sweatpants beneath it, her hair done up in the least stylish ponytail he'd ever seen from her, as if she'd just put her red mane up to get it out of the way for a while. "Hey you," she said, her pearly white smile beaming at him. "Maya should be here any minute, and I know you're just gonna love her."

"I actually spoke to Phil a little bit ago, and she's not going to be here until tomorrow, but she's still coming, don't you worry." He explained the Orange Variant to her, and while she was a little disappointed that her friend's arrival would be delayed, she understood that Maya's health was the most important thing, and the base didn't want to let her out of their sight until she was ready. "What've you been up to today?"

She rolled her oceanic blue eyes at him with a big harumph. "Reading screenplays that my agent sent over, trying to pick my next project. It's looking like everyone's going to want to do serialized television right now, because they can get more content out of smaller budgets, but so many of these stories are just so boring," she groaned. "It's like my agent's only sending me the same stuff."

"Well," he said, taking her hand in his as they walked down the hallway, "tell your agent what you want then, whether that's more drama, more action, more comedy, more whatever it is you want more of. They only know what you want when you tell them. I had to learn the same lesson with my literary agent early on."

She squeezed his hand thankfully. "My agent really should know better, but you're right. I can get her on the hunt for the kinds of things I want to be doing. You know there aren't really any good spy stories on television right now? I should see if she can get me something like that. I'll give her a call tomorrow, see if maybe she can reach out to the production companies, see who's already got projects winding up I can try and piggyback onto."

They walked past the door of Emily and Sarah's workspace, and Andy noticed it was closed. He pointed with his other hand at the closed door as they kept on walking. "Em in some kind of meeting?"

Sarah nodded. "London based production company wanted to reach out to her, so she's taking the call today, but she should be out in an hour or so." The doorbell rang, and Sarah arched an eyebrow in surprise. "I thought you said Maya wouldn't be here until tomorrow."

"That's what Phil told me," he said, as the two of them started to head downstairs, although Andy could hear someone answering the door, followed by a loud squeal of recognition.

When they came down the stairs, Andy could see it was Piper who'd answered the door, and she had her arms wrapped around a short blonde girl, hugging her tightly. "Andy! Sarah! Brooke's here!" Piper said to them, swinging the shorter girl around a bit.

"That's great, but I thought she was--"

"Surprise, man!" Xander said as he stepped in through the doorway. Andy let go of Sarah's hand and rushed down the rest of the stairs, suddenly stopping about six feet away from the door.

"Are you...?"

"Paired with three people this morning, so I'm 100% safe as houses," his tattooed friend said.

Once he'd gotten the word 'paired' out, Andy had continued rushing his best friend, wrapping his arms around the burly guy, giving him a hell of a hug. "Oh Jesus, it's good to know you're safe, man," Andy sighed. "And it's so fucking good to see you. I know we hung out last December, but fuck, these eleven months have felt like five fucking years..."

"Glad to see my mouth's rubbing off on you," Sarah laughed, closing the distance to meet them.

"Xander, these are my partners Piper Brown and Sarah Washington, both of whom you've talked to a bit through FaceTime. Piper, Sarah, this is my best and oldest friend, Xander Baker, whom I've known since we were both, like, what, 6?"

Xander laughed, nodding. "6, 7, something like that. However old we were in kindergarten."

"Not very," Andy said.

"Not enough!" Xander replied. "Anyway, Andy, Sarah, this is my soon-to-be partner Brooke Maloney, whom I have your partner Piper to thank for."

"Well," Piper laughed, "I'd originally pitched her to come here and be Andy's partner, but he realized she'd be a much better fit for you, considering how much you both love classic cars, although really, I think it was just so he didn't have to hear her singing Vince Gill songs around the house all the time, 'cause she does that a lot, and I hope they warned you about that, Xander."

"She can be singing Vince Gill while I'm singing Wu-Tang Clan, and somewhere in the middle, over the engine of a Dodge Charger, I think we can make it work," Xander said.

"Honestly, Pipes," Brooke said to her, "the only reason he said soon-to-be is because I wanted to come over and say thank you to y'all, and let Xander have a bit of time with his friend before we got to bumpin' uglies. But all the other gals in his house have just been so sweet, y'all, I can't wait for you to meet'em."

"Why don't Piper and I give you a tour of the place, Brooke," Sarah said, "and the boys can do a little bit of catching up. You want me to have Jenny bring drinks to you out on the patio, hun?"

"Yeah," Andy said, "I'll take a pina colada. Xander?"

"Just a Corona."

Sarah nodded. "Drinks coming up! This way ladies!" she said, marching them down towards the kitchen first.

"Jesus Andy," Xander said quietly. "You really bagged Sarah Washington. I mean, I know I've talked to her vidchat, but seeing her in person like this..."

"Seriously, I don't deserve this much luck," Andy said with a chuckle as he started to lead his best friend towards the back patio.

"Oh fuck you," Xander teased. "You deserve exactly this much luck. Our entire lives, I've been watching you do good things for people left and right and never asking for so much as a thank you in return, and this is what karma has brought you, dude, so live a little. Enjoy it." As they moved out onto the patio, Xander shook his head. "I will say, however, that my house isn't quite as big as yours is. Don't get me wrong, it's still a fucking palace compared to that one bedroom shithole I lived in back in Ohio, but I'm just saying..."

Andy rolled his eyes with a smirk. "You know I didn't pick the places myself, right jackass?"

"I guess so," Xander said, as the two men moved to sit down on deck chairs near the pool. It was cool for November but not so cold that either man felt like they needed to add layers, both having grown up in the Midwest, where California winters would be considered nice spring days. "God, I'm really here. It's wild, man."

"It's great having you out here, Xander. Jesus, the stories I have to tell you. You're here early, though. I didn't expect you out here for at least a few more days."

"Turns out these DuoHalo Variants are pretty intense," Xander sighed, "and since they were pairing me up with someone in the military, they wanted to make sure I got hooked into the system as quickly as they could, so everything got very rush rush rush. When you told me to be ready to go at a moment's notice, you weren't kidding. As soon as we finished up that conversation, I started packing, and just barely got done before they showed up to cart me away. They're even taking care of selling my house for me, although I suspect it's just going to become government housing or something."

"Yeah, that wouldn't surprise me," Andy agreed. "God, it's good to have you here, man."

"Well if it isn't my favorite hoodrat," Fiona said, carrying out a tray with three drinks on it, setting it down on a table as Xander immediately got up and hugged him hard. "How you been, lunkhead?"

"Better now that I know you made it here okay, muckraker," he teased back. "How the hell you been Fi?"

"Better now that I know you ditched that crazy ex of yours," she laughed. "Can I say it?"

"Oh I think you've earned it."

"I told you that girl was no good."

"You did indeed tell me that," Xander agreed, taking his bottle of Corona from the drinks tray, as Andy grabbed his pina colada and Fi grabbed a tall glass of wine.

"Hey hey hey, the gang's all back," Fi said with a smile. "To old friends and new flames."

"To life, liberty and us getting through this fucking plague together," Xander toasted.

"To family," Andy corrected.

"To family!" they all toasted together, clinking glasses.