SPIDERS!
 
 
 
 

General Tan stomped into the offices of SI, glaring at the guards.  "Where are those demented twins?"

"In the office, sir," he said, paging them.  Alex came out to stare at him.  "Him, Alex."

"Hey," he said, shaking his hand.  "Did something not test out right?"

"Those damn spiders are dangerous!" he said hotly.

"If you've got the explosive ones armed, yeah.  Did you turn it on and it didn't go far enough?"

"The other ones!"

"Oh, the surveillance spiders."  He grinned.  "They have to be able to be thought of as real to work for hidden surveillance work, General Tan.  Otherwise they'd stick out if you put one on a wall or a ceiling."

He huffed.  "They're too realistic.  Half of the time my people won't pick them up."

"Then teach them they're the metal ones and not to touch the real ones."  He shrugged.  "You guys said that you needed very well hidden surveillance gear that wasn't standard issue.  The daddy long legs ones do that.  Even if they're swatted and fall onto the floor, they still work and will record things for you to remotely download.  Plus they're like sixty bucks to make so if one does get stepped on, it's not that expensive to make a new one."

The general sneered.  "You're being a smartass today."

"I'm a smartass every day, General.  Usually I just try hareder to hide it."  He smiled.  "If you don't like the design, then don't use it.  Plenty of other groups love the things.  They can paint them for the native environment so they don't stand out.  I'm told the people in Central and South American teams adore them because they can fit ten of them in a pocket."

"Hmph."  He glared.  "Where's your twin?"

"Having a headache.  He's on the couch in our office."

"You two do *share* don't you," he sneered.

"Not like that."  He smirked.  "But everyone else already realizes that.  Even if you're trying to start shit it won't happen."  Mac walked in.  "2's on the couch."

"New concussion?" Mac joked.  He handed back the three robotic spiders.  "Flack said thank you."

"Not a problem."  He put them onto his shoulder.  "Like I said, General Tan, others adore it even if you don't."

"Whatever."  He stomped off.

"Don't worry, if you're that big of a whiny ass, we won't sell to you anymore," Alex called after him with a wave.  The general glared.  "We are a private company.  We reserve the right not to sell to assholes."  He smiled.  "Plenty of others love us."  He slammed the door on his way out, breaking it.  "Have that repaired and send the bill to his wife," Alex ordered the guard.  "Or his mistresses."  He looked at Mac.  "You traveled all the way out here for that?"

"I wanted a preview of what's coming up since one of your usual sellers has a leak."

"I heard.  Actually we told."  He led him to look over the current catalog.  The spiders went into their glass enclosure in the lab.  They always kept a few on hand for things.

"EWW!" someone shouted a few minutes later.  "SPIDERS!"

"Electronic ones!" Xander shouted back from the couch.  "Don't smoosh them unless you're building more."

"The tarantula is a robotic spider?" she demanded, walking in a minute later with it on a piece of cardboard.  "Really?"

Xander looked then nodded.  "Listening trial.  Each hair is a tiny micro filament microphone.  You probably blasted someone's ears."

She groaned, tapping it on the top of the back.  Yup, it was metal.  It didn't flinch.  "These things are getting too real."  She huffed off to put that in the glass case as well.  She hated spiders.  Their little ELF tank, Pippen, hated them too.  It liked to run over them.  She had trained it well.

Xander grinned at his twin and Mac.  "I think it'll be helpful and if someone undercover wants to have a subtly creepy pet that's excellent."

"It would be and it is a popular pet in some circles."  Mac shuddered.  "I still don't like them."

"What's the range?" Alex asked.

"Um, about the room they're in, maybe a bit farther.  I need the engineer who hates spiders to up that for me.  Plus the micro cameras on the eyes and spots."  He went to talk to her.  He still had a thumping headache.

Alex shook his head.  "We would've used them in the girls' dressing room at school when we were younger."

"They would've freaked them out," Mac assured him.  They went back to the pretty artillery they were putting out this quarter.  "Is anyone beyond General O'Neill and Larabee testing some out?"

"I sent one to Horatio."

Mac moaned, shaking his head.  "Did you warn anyone?"

"No.  It has a note."  He grinned.

***

Down in Miami, Horatio accepted the box with the sticker on it saying it had been scanned.  "Why was it let through with electronics?" he asked the person delivering.

"The name is your former intern's company, sir.  We thought it was something they were testing."  He grinned.  "It shocked the hell out of people in the scanning room."  He walked on.

Horatio opened it, seeing a few spiders and a letter.  He plucked out the letter carefully.  He did not like spiders at all.  He read it and smiled.  That was good to know.  He carefully plucked out one to look it over.  It looked real but felt metal.  He turned it on and took it to ballistics to let it run up a wall and sit in a corner.  It even extruded some synthetic thread for a make-shift web.  Then he went to log into it from his computer.  They had included the disc to run the software.  It did give a narrow but fantastic picture of the area it was covering.  He saw when Calleigh walked in and winced at her scream when she spotted it.  He went down to save the thing.  "It's the newest trial from the twins," he told her.

"Excuse me?" she demanded.  "That's a spider!"

"That's a robotic surveillance spider."  He smiled.

"It's still a spider!"

"It's metal."

"Darn it!  I should paddle them both!"

"I was testing the camera."  He clapped the three clap pattern and it came down the wall to sit in his hand.  He let her see it.  "Totally harmless."

She touched it on the back and grimaced.  "It's still a spider."

"But mostly unnoticeable to most bad people."

"Yay!"  He laughed.  "Is it a log in sort?"

"It can be or remote downloaded every two days."

"Huh.  Still, get it out of my lab.  Please, Horatio?"

"I will."  He smiled, taking it to the morgue.  Alexx screamed and got up on the chair to get away from it.  "It's the twin's newest invention."

"I do not care!  Get it out of my morgue, Horatio!"

"It's metal, not a real one."

"I still don't care!"  He picked it up and put it into his pocket.  She stared at him.  "Why did they make that?" she demanded.

"Cameras."

She huffed.  "Wonderful.  I'm sure some skanky thug boys and girls will ignore it in the dirty warehouses they use for doing their bad things.  Take it to SWAT or something."  He smiled and left, letting her get down off the chair.  She huffed and went to complain that Calleigh needed to beat them again.  She had the same problem so they both sent the twins a dirty email.

***

Horatio walked into an office with the box.  "I have a tester present from the twins at SI."  He took off his sunglasses.

The head of SWAT stared at him.  "I'm almost scared.  What sort of tester?"  Horatio held up one of the spiders.  "I've heard about those from someone in the NYPD.  Their guys are scared to pick them up."  He took it to look over.  It was a full spider.  "This little spot on the bottom?"

"That is to load more synthetic web fluid."

"Oh.  Neat."  He turned it right-side up.  "How do we use them?"  Horatio handed over the letter with a smile.  "Did you freak out Wolfe with them?"

"Calleigh and Alexx both had adverse reactions to them."

"Figures.  They're women."  He put it on the wall and it climbed up to a corner and hung there after putting out a small web.  "Huh.  You can't tell."

"No," Horatio agreed with a smile.  "It's also remote downloadable."

"I adore those freakish twins you had, Horatio."  He grinned at him.  "How many do we have?"

"Seven."  He let him have the box.

"Hmm.  I can definitely use those.  Thanks."

"Welcome.  Put them to good use and write a report on any flaws for them."  He put on his sunglasses and walked out to the hummer.

The head of SWAT for Miami-Dade just grinned at the little thing.  He had some junior officers he wanted to keep an eye on so that one could stay up for a while.  The rest... he had a use for.  Definitely.  Including the taking down of three gang hideouts later that day.

***

"OH MY FUCKING GOD, THAT HAD BETTER NOT BE YOURS, HARRIS!" a female voice screamed.

Alex leaned out of his lab.  "My what, beauteous one?" he called back. He walked toward the scream.  He stared at the huge spider and shook his head.  "Not ours.  Ours are subtle so they can be ignored.  That's a demonic spider and it's very poisonous.  Thankfully they're killed by shoes like the others."  He tried to stomp on it but it ran.  "Xander, demonic spider in layout 3!" he yelled.

Xander walked in and shut the door.  "C'mon," he called, using a pin to pierce his finger and drop a few drops of blood on the floor.

"That's what I forgot to do."  Mac walked in and shut the door before the spider could escape.  Not that they couldn't hunt it.  The thing was a foot across and shiny black.  The spider came out to taste the blood and Xander tasered it. It squealed as it flipped over and twitched.  Once it was mute Alex stepped on it.  "There you go."  He smiled at the female tech.  "One dead demonic spider."

"Can't you make them in some other animal?" she demanded.

"We're working on mice," Xander said with a grin.

"Oh, yeah, just as cuddly as a spider," she complained.

"They have to be unnoticeable," Alex reminded her.  "Those two beasts fit in."

"Fine.  Get that carcass out of my lab."

"Why was it in here?" Mac asked.

"I have no idea.  I was on the stool and it came out to say hi from the wall socket."  She pointed at the one that had a maintenance tape over it.  "If they're dangerous, can we fume the building?"

Alex shook his head.  "No pesticide works on their breed.  I'll get Wendy to come in and see if she can sense the nest."

"Please!"

"How dangerous are they?" Mac asked.

"Their poison is about as strong as a Black Mamba snake's," Alex offered with a smile.

"Please get them out of our building."

"Sure."  He called, moving the tech out of the way when he saw movement in the socket.  "Wendy, me.  We have an infestation of those demonic spiders we found in the DRC."  He nodded.  "We've killed one.  I think there's at least one more."

"Why did maintenance leave that open?" Mac asked, looking inside.  "There's definitely another one."  He got farther away from it.  Alex took the taser and shot the thing, which meant the prong hit the electrical lines.  The lights dimmed for a second but the smoke coming out was from the electrocuted spider.  Two more came out.  "Alex?"

Alex released the taser wires so he could pull them back and hit them.  "Wendy, we could really use some help right now."  He hung up and they moved.  "Move, people.  Out."  They left the lab once everything had been gathered and taken out by Mac and the tech.  They shut the door and taped over the cracks with the plastic and duct tape from the emergency supplies.  More were coming out to eat their brethren.   "We have a whole nest," he said.

Xander shuddered.  "Don't remind me of those things.  Please."

"You got bitten?" Mac asked.

"One of the groups that decided we were evil and probably stealing people dumped me into a nest," Xander said with a grimace.  "Thankfully Wendy killed them."

"How do you kill them?"

"Stabbing or smooshing," Alex said.  "They had me in a cell.  Which I later destroyed.  They knew what Wendy was and they weren't happy to have pissed her off by any means."  Faith and Wendy both walked in.  "Day off?" he asked Faith with a grin.

"Yuppers, all this week and next.  Apparently we're too poor to have me there anymore."  The twins gave her a hug.  "At least you guys pay me for the stuff I do for the company."  She looked in there and shuddered.  "I hate spiders."

"These are really badly poisonous," Wendy told her.  "Even with slayer healing I felt sick for weeks after one bit me."

"I nearly died for the next two weeks after getting tossed in a nest," Xander told her.

"Any super chemicals that'll work?" Faith asked.

The twins looked at each other then at her.  "Nothing pesticidy," Alex admitted.

"We can bomb them but it'll be corrosive."  Mac shook his head quickly at that suggestion.  "They're in the wiring as well."

"How did African spiders get to the US?" the tech asked.

"Probably a cargo ship," Faith sighed.  "Plenty of other demonic species have traveled that way."  Wendy nodded.  "And her."

"And me," Wendy agreed with a smile.  "Demonic ants are worse.  They can do what those plains ants that can strip a cow in under an hour do faster.  With less of them."  The tech shuddered.  She looked in there then at Mac.  "I have no idea how they got from the ship to here."

"I'm going to find out."  He went to call up the surveillance cameras in the building to search for spiders coming in or whoever had released it.

Xander shrugged.  "We can't corrode them and I don't know how else to kill them but they're going to be back in the walls soon."

"We left a small crack so we could toss in another offering," Alex pointed out.  Xander went to snatch someone's lunch and put it in there.  They really loved Adam's sandwich.  More of the nest came up.

Adam came to complain but stopped when he saw the horde.  "Yours?" he asked.

"No," they said in unison.  "Demonic."

"Charming."

"Poisonous," the girls said in unison, smirking at each other.

"Even better.  Killing them?"

"Sure, we can acid blast the whole lab," Alex said with a grin.

"Oh please don't," he moaned.  "Let me get them more meat so they all end up in there and we can seal off any other areas."  He went to the deli on the corner, coming back with three pounds of roast beef that was really rare.  They adored that.  Spiders kept flowing out of the wall socket for another ten minutes.  "How many are in there?"

"Usually about six hundred to a thousand in a nest," Xander said.

Alex looked.  "Maybe two hundred in this one."

Adam made a whining noise.  "Let's get you set up in another layout area," he told the tech.

"Belay that," Mac ordered as he walked toward them.  "Pack all the evidence and let's evacuate the building.  The Commissioner wants to have it handled by a professional."  Wendy and Faith raised their hands.  "Entomologist.  He's calling Grissom from Vegas to come kill them for us.  Would cold work?"

"It'd have to be a deep freeze," Xander said.  "They'd run."

"I don't have a freeze ray built right now," Alex quipped, waving a hand.  "Go pack the exemplar.  I'll pack the evidence."  They walked off to do that.

"We'll kill any that's not in there," Faith said.  Mac smiled and nodded, going to tell the others.  She looked at Wendy.  "You took on a nest by yourself?"

"I had to.  They had tossed Xander in it for being evilly white."

"Oh.  Them."  She nodded.  "I've met a few of those myself."  A few spiders were still coming.  "I wonder if we can block the hole somehow."

"Only if I can get behind it," Mac called.  "Then we can spray foam it."

"They can eat through it," Alex called.

"Damn it," Mac muttered.  Everyone else was carrying stuff down to the trucks they were borrowing, which were checked first to make sure they had no spiders.  The morgue was emptied to the other one in Manhattan.  Within an hour everyone was out of the lab but the girls and Mac.  Mac met the local entomologist when he came off the elevator.  He showed him the spiders.  "They're extremely poisonous."

"So I'm told, though I doubt the demonic reputation is from more than a superstitious society."

Faith smirked.  "Hi, Senior slayer Faith," she said smugly.  "This is Slayer Wendy."  The entomologist went pale.  "Yeah, they're demonic.  They're African originally."

"Oh, dear.  How do they die?"

"Smooshing or stabbing," Wendy said.  "We'd have to acid blast the whole room to kill them.  Did you bring them more food?"  He handed over some that was poisoned with bug bait.  They could smell it.  She tossed it in through the small opening.  The spiders ate it happily and nothing happened.

"Can we trap one?" he asked.

Faith stared at him.  "Hell no I'm not opening that door."

"We can lure one to the crack and capture it," Wendy said.  Faith shrugged and Mac got a mouse sticky pad to do that with.  The huge spider ran up and got stuck.  Wendy dropped the whole pad into the glass case he had waiting.  "More'll figure that out soon."

"I know."  He went to study it under the microscope.  It was most fascinating.  He had been told he'd be working with a renowned forensic entomologist so he made notes for him to read on the flight.   He tried every single poison in his arsenal and nothing happened.  In fact, one had made it puff up and start to sway like it was dancing in happiness.   He did extract some of the poison using a tube on a stick.  The thing was happy to bite the edge off it for him.  He handed that to Mac.  "That needs to go to Liberty Lab.  They can make an anti-toxin from it."

"Gladly."  He handed that to one of the uniforms who came with the Commissioner.  "Liberty Labs."

"Midtown?" he asked the scientist.

"Yes, by the college."

"Yes, sir."  He took it off, being careful to keep it upright even though it was sealed.  It was a fairly quick trip this time.  He nodded at the receptionist.  "The Manhattan felony lab is being overrun by poisonous African spiders.  I was told to drop this poison sample off for anti-toxin making?"

She called the director and he came out to see what was going on.  He sped it back to the people who did that and came to see the spiders himself.  The commissioner had a news crew come in to cover it in case they were in other buildings.  He got the mayor to send out a message to all the local area hospitals so they'd know who was working on the anti-toxin.  They did not need some child bitten by one of these.  Or tourists to get alarmed and leave the city.

***

Grissom got off the plane and was met by Mac.  "Taylor," he said, smiling and shaking his hand.  "Are they that bad?"

"Yes.  One got into some evidence that got moved.  We nearly lost a tech from the poison," he said quietly.  "The rest are being fed meat in the lab.  The local entomologist the commissioner called in is baffled.  We're hoping you can kill it without destroying my building."

"I hope so too.  It sounds fascinating.  Demonic in origin?  We're sure?"  They walked off to get Gil's bag and sample case.  Then they drove to the lab.  He got the full notes from the entomologist once he was in the SUV.  Mac had them handy for him.  What he read stunned him.  "I've only seen mentions in mythology about these."

"I wish they were a myth.  Our building's nest is about three hundred strong.  We were wondering why we haven't had a rat problem recently.  It's eaten all the sewer rats, all the roaches that occasionally migrate up from the sewer, but they're still dangerous."

"I believe we can find a way to kill them."  They parked outside the parking garage and were let in.  The building was cordoned off and had uniformed officers standing guard.  They went up to the lab where most of them were.  Mac was carrying a package of raw meat from a butcher.  He worked it into the opening and the spiders attacked it.  Gil watched, gaping some.  "That's beautiful."

"Until they bite someone," Mac said.  "I'm all for them living in their natural habitat but not in my lab."

"Do we have an anti-toxin?"

"Yes.  We have a lab in the city working on it."  He led him to where the entomologist was working.  They found him slumped over the empty glass case.  "Crap."  Mac looked around before carefully moving to check him.  "Bitten.  Guys, he needs an ambulance."  They came in to get him, carefully stripping him on the way out the door to make sure no spiders came with him.

Gil found the spider and stomped on it.  It was still moving so he stomped it harder.  It died.  "They're pernicious and tough."  He picked up the carcass to look over.  Two legs were still moving.  He used a canister of wart freezing solution to finally kill it.  He extracted more poison in case they needed it and the sacks they were carried in.  Mac had that taken to the lab too.  Gil handed over the carcass in case they needed it.  He went back to staring at them.  He dropped in more of the solution and it hit a few, who did freeze and die.  The others ate them.  So he dropped more on them.  It was a good chain reaction but some weren't falling for it.  "They're learning."

"People are going to jump for months about any of the robotic ones the twins created for surveillance," Mac told him.  Gil gave him an odd look.  "They look very realistic."

"That's probably a good thing.  It means it'd be easier to watch people."  He looked at the real spiders again.  "I'd like to see some of those."

"I'll see if they'll let you test one out."  He smiled.  "After we kill all these."

"Freezing seems to work.  Unfortunately we can't freeze the whole building that far down."

"I can see if the twins can build a freeze ray."  He texted that.  Andrew appeared in a flash of light with a smile.  "Which witch are you?" Mac asked.

"I'm Andrew.  The geek king."  He beamed.  "Freeze ray?"   They pointed at the spiders.  He considered it then handed over something.  "My geek trio of evilness made that once.  It'll freeze a room within a minute."

"Hmm."  Mac looked over the small grenade then put it in there and let it go off.  It coated the window with frost.  They warmed it with a hand so they could see.  Some had lived, some had escaped.  Mac put in more meat and they came back.  They survived the remaining cold.

Andrew gaped.  "Oh, those spiders!  Oooh.  Johno would've loved to experiment on them."

"Where is he?" Mac asked.  "Can we call him?"

"Only if you can do a seance and you'd get the First Evil," Andrew sighed.  "Unfortunately."  He pouted some.  "This so sucks.  Jonho would've built a kick ass freeze ray."  He sent himself to SI's labs so he could work on one.

Xander was there looking through their notes on the things.  "Huh."  He called O'Neill.  "It's Xander.  I need to ask a question."  He smiled at the quip.  "No, actually, demonic spiders.  No, taken over our lab."  He read off the chemical formula.  Jack wrote it out and sent it to someone.   Xander read him the section in the book on that.  "Any idea what that is and how to deliver it to a shitload of spiders?"  He made his own notes on what O'Neill got back from his geek kingdom.  "Is there any chance there's some of that handy?  No, the Felony lab, not ours.  They're in the walls, Jack.  Yeah, exactly.  Please?  Mac would.  Need his number?"  He got it from his cellphone and read it off.  "Thanks, man."  He hung up and texted Mac to expect a call from O'Neill.  He went to find Andrew to let him see that section.

"Hmm, can we combine that with cold?" Andrew asked, moving to another computer to work on that.  "We can."  He sent an email to that general to offer that suggestion.  He'd have a working model by that night.  If they could get that radioactive chemical he'd be happy.  It might make someone Spiderman but oh well.

***

"Geez," Jack complained when he saw them eating.  "When they said a nest, I was thinking a few, maybe a dozen or so."

"No, this is apparently a small nest," Gil told him with a smile.  "They can get up to a thousand in one nest."  Andrew came jogging up.  "What's that?"

"A freeze bomb."  He put it down and pointed.  "The radioactive stuff goes in there, general."

He stared at him.  "Which geek are you?"

"Andrew.  Housemother to the main Council building."

"Alex told me about you, kid."  He unpacked that and they left the building.   Xander did a check once they were outside then they set it off.  A window blew out.  A few spiders went flying.  The rest just squealed.  They watched as the frost spread up and down from that floor.  They could feel the cold spreading from across the street.

"How strong did you make that?" Mac asked him.

"It'll probably chill a few more buildings all around.  Probably not more than a whole block."  He smiled at Mac's incredulous look.  "Just doing my part to reverse global warming," he said happily then disappeared.

Mac and Jack O'Neill both looked at the twins.  "His geek trio used to want to be evil and rule the world too," Xander said with a grin.

"Does he have a PhD in anything?" Jack asked casually.

"No, not even a bachelor's, and the slayers will kill you since he cooks and cleans for them."

"Why didn't you hire him?" Mac asked.

"Because now and then Andrew quits being a reformed evil genius and backslides," Alex said.

"Plus he doesn't like weapons.  Though I would've killed for that or one of the cold grenades back in Africa a few times."  His twin nodded quickly.

"Thank god it's summer right now," Jack said, looking around.  All the buildings he could see the windows of had frost on them.  "I think he made it too strong."

"I hope it killed all of them," Xander said dryly.  "It was close to ninety earlier, everyone will like the sudden drop to sixties."

Mac called City Hall to tell them they had bombed the building with a cold bomb.  That answered a few questions they were wondering about.  He hung up.  "It reached city hall.  It's in the seventies there."

"Someone will quip about New York adopting San Francisco weather," Alex said dryly.

Xander got a text back from Andrew, who had answered his.  "He said he made it as weak as he could, guys.  He could've made it stronger but that was as weak as it goes."

"A thermonuclear cold weapon.  I know some jungle places that I could use that on," Jack quipped.  Mac gave him a dirty look.  "Not here."

"I don't need to know," Mac assured him with a smirk.

"Probably true."  He shook their hands.

"Can we go in yet?" Mac asked the twin geeks.  "I hope the machines still work."

"Not for about three days with the radiation dose we added to it," Jack said.  Mac nodded. "I know that's inconvenient for your lab."

"We're already borrowing space," Mac assured him.  He looked at the twins.

"Ballistics was clear and we're all packed up and able to work if we need to," Alex assured him.  "It's all in a mobile lab unit.  Locked and under guard at the impound lot, and they do know what it is."

"Thank you.  This radiation, how far will it spread?"

"Ninety feet past the walls," Xander said.  "On all sides.  They worked out the strength together."

"My geeks thought he couldn't do it," Jack complained.  He shook his head.  "Can he make Ironman's arc reactor?"

"We can do that," Xander said with a small shrug and a grin.  "It runs the company."

"Andrew created a magically based electrical grid that uses the excess energy coming off the hellmouth to run the house.  They have an occasional brownout because the energy can drop sometimes, but otherwise it runs all the hairdryers and curling irons very well.  They have regular electricity as a backup."  Alex grinned at him.

"He made a radiation based energy system," Jack said flatly.  They smiled and nodded.

"Guys, I thought I was the geek king," Adam said.  "I was clearly wrong and I should bow down to that guy."

"He'd say that the other two in their evil geek trio were stronger geeks," Alex said with a sad smile.  "He misses them a lot."

"Warren went schitzo but he built a realistic looking, feeling, acting robot that reacted in real time and you had a hard time telling the difference," Xander agreed.  Adam's mouth dropped open.  "Their evilness eventually caught up with them.  Willow killed Warren for shooting Tara when he went off the deep end and attacked Buffy."

"Andrew killed Johno during the First Evil thing because she tricked him," Alex said quietly.  "They weren't bad guys when they weren't helping Warren's plans to evilly take over the world."

"I'd hate to face them," Jack said.  "I want to recruit him so badly."

"The slayers will pout," Alex assured him.

"He's getting his evil fixes now from making the pink clothes fade and making pants shrink so the girls think they're gaining weight," Xander said with a grin.

"That would be evil to a bunch of teenage girls," Adam agreed, shaking his head quickly.

"One of the French slayers annoyed him to no end about something so he turned all her clothes into Barbie clothes.  Any clothes she touched would shrink.  If they got handed to their original owner afterward, then they resized," Xander said with an evil grin.

"Now that's evil," Mac said with a smirk.  "She quit being so problematic?"

"It took her two weeks.  All the other girls got annoyed with her too.  They all thought it was Dawn because the girl had put her down a few times.  Andrew had her back because of that and the way she dissed his cooking."

"Which school of thought does he follow with his gifts?" Jack asked.

"He's a confirmed Jedi believer.  He belongs to the church and everything," Xander said with a grin.

"We even made him a light saber last year for his birthday," Alex agreed, grinning at his twin.  "He's decided he hasn't earned it fully yet.  He's still struggling with his Sith desires."

"I have a few geeks who believe in that methodology," Jack admitted.

"He equates magic with the Force?" Mac guessed.  They grinned and nodded.  "Well, I guess it could be."  He shivered.  Alex handed him his jacket.  "You'll freeze."

"I won't freeze.  I have a date tonight," he said proudly.  "My evil chick of the day can warm me up."

Xander looked at him.  "Bringing her home?"

"Nope.  We have a hotel room booked."  He smirked.  "Have fun with the girls."

"I will.  I need to work on something anyway.  I have a date next weekend."

"I know.  That's why I planned ours this way."

"Check in later," Mac ordered.  "That way I know you're not kidnaped."  Alex winked and strolled off.  "Xander, tell me if you feel him be taken."

"Of course.  If I can't go solve it myself."  He skipped off, taking the girls home.  They were both shivering.

Adam shook his head.  "I'm not sure if I should bow down to the altar of Geek or not with those two sometimes."  He looked at the general.  "How long?"

"Three days."

"Thanks.  We didn't need to be killed by spiders.  We have enough problems with gangs."  He walked off to tell the others.  Flack was shivering in the temporary lab.  "You can see your breath across from the lab," he reported.  "The general said three days."

"By then, will it be unfrozen?" Danny quipped.

"I hope so.  The machines won't take the sudden ice age for that long."

"As long as it kills all those damn spiders," Stella said firmly.

"It will," Danny assured her.  "It nearly killed me and we're twenty blocks away."

Flack hung up on the weather line.  "The weather people say they're not sure what caused it or if it will continue onto tomorrow."  They all moaned.  "So layer up, people, just in case."

Adam turned on the tv.  The local news people were covering a church that was saying it was the end of days and they were praying to make sure they went the right way.  He called to let them know it was against those spiders that had been reported on but it had been stronger than they had expected.  They didn't believe him but oh well.

***

Horatio caught the news that night, staring oddly at the news of the cold surge in Manhattan.  He called Mac's cellphone.  "Did the twins goof?" he asked in greeting.  He listened to what happened.  "Send me the files on those things, in case we get some?"  He smiled at the 'it's in your email from Gil Grissom'.  "Thank you.  How are you?  Beyond chilly?" he teased.  He smirked.  "The reporter said it was a beautiful fall day in the middle of July."  He leaned back and listened to him tell him how that had come around.  "Honestly?  Huh.  Well, I suppose being the house mother is good for him then.  Yes, I would.  Just in case they use it down here some overly warm summer day."  He smirked at Alexx when she walked into his office.  He turned up the tv so she could hear it instead of read the closed captioning.

"Did the twins do that?" she demanded.

"A friend of theirs but it was helpful.  Mac Taylor said hello."

"Tell him I said hi right back."  She smiled.  She walked off shaking her head.  She hoped her son would never turn into that sort of boy.

Horatio smiled.  "Yes, she's probably hoping her son never turns into the twins again.  I do have a few sweaters in the closet for trips north if you'd like one," he teased.  He laughed at the comeback that Mac was going to come down to get warm.  "If you want to, we'll make sure none of your escaped criminals get you.  You have a better night, Mac."  He hung up and watched the news.  That was a bit strange but clearly within the strangeness of the twins' lives.  Anything outside that range he'd worry about.  As long as that cold front didn't stay everything would be fine in New York again soon.

***

In Denver, JD found the article on what had happened and handed it to Vin.  "Andrew emailed you too.  I think that email might explain that."

Vin read the news report, then got into his email.  He stared.  "Am I proud or not?" he asked himself.

"Be proud, he may have reduced global warning for the year," JD quipped.

Chris came out to read over Vin's shoulder.  Vin handed over the news report.  "Spank him.  Please?"  He handed it off and walked off shaking his head.  "Get the ATF a report on it in case it's used elsewhere, Tanner."

"Sure, Cowboy."  He wrote that to Andrew.  He got back one on the spiders and decided the cold snap was worth it as long as they never had any of those in his town.  Ever.  Or else Denver could be an icicle for a few days.  There were worse things than being cold.

The End.
 
 

Back to Crossovers Index