TITLE: Transportation Troubles 

AUTHOR: Celesta SunStar

ARCHIVE: go right ahead

RATING: G

STATUS: Complete

CATEGORY: ATF - Challenge

MAJOR CHARACTERS: Ezra, Vin a little bit of Chris

SPOILERS: None

DISCLAIMERS: They are not mine darn it, and college students have no money anyway

NOTE: January 2003 Magnificent 7 Challenge Offered by AngelaB: Write a story in which one (or more) of the guys horses (or other mode of transportation) goes missing.

SUMMARY: Ezra and Vin come home (exhausted) from a conference and all they want to do is go home and sleep

FEEDBACK: celestasunstar@hotmail.com

WARNINGS: it's short, and I don't actually know the time difference between Paris and Denver

*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Transportation Troubles
-Celesta SunStar

*

Ezra sighed as he and Vin stepped out into the airport terminal. It was good to be back and the only thing he was looking forward to, was his bed. It had been a long week for both of them. He was sure that Vin would agree with him, had Vin not been yawning at the time. Of coarse it was closer to 3AM in Paris where the International Law Enforcement Conference they had just came back from, rather then the 10PM it was in Denver.

Noting that the end of the horizontal airport escalator was approaching, Ezra nudged Vin in an attempt to rouse him from the half sleepwalking state he had fallen into. It worked, but Vin looked over at Ezra with a question on his lips, and completely missed seeing the step-off point. In a futile attempt to stay upright, Vin latched onto Ezra's arm, causing them both to fall heavily to the very hard floor. Ezra sighed as he pushed himself up and thanked the Powers-that-Be that there was enough room for the people on the escalator to dodge around them. Getting tripped over was not fun.

"Sorry Ez," Vin said as Ezra helped him up. He was wide-awake now.

"Are you unscathed Mr. Tanner?" Ezra watched as Vin took a mental inventory, and then took a testing step.

"I'm going to have a big ol' bruise coming in, but I should be okay." Vin replied, favoring his left hip as he bent to pick up his carry-on. "Let's just find Chris and get the hell home."

"I concur." It was fortunately only fifteen minutes later when Chris was leading the Terribly (Tired) Two to where he had parked his car.

It wasn't there.

*

After discovering that there were no taxies or car rentals available, and neither were any of the other Seven, Chris was tied up in paperwork for his stolen car and silently swearing to commit more than a few murders in the near future. Ezra and Vin were a bit more tiredly philosophical about their situation. After all, there had been two rerouted and rescheduled flights, a bomb scare in the subway where they had been, and they had been stuck inside a train for three hours after all the lines had been shut off. Why that kid had been skateboarding on the railroad tracks in the first place was beyond Ezra's comprehension, but the Gods of Travel were not being kind.

A short conversation had Vin informing Chris that they were going to take the bus and crash at Josiah's since he was out of town and wouldn't mind anyway. Chris nodded and told them to call when they got there. Ezra was too tired to argue that hard.

*

Ezra sighed yet again as the Gods of Travel threw one last detour into their homeward journey. A Dodge Truck had tried to run a red light in front of the bus and had gotten hit. Vin swore softly.

When Ezra looked at him questioningly, Vin pointed to the slightly crumpled vehicle, "Ain't that Chris' truck?"

Ezra looked. The license plate matched, damn it.

Would this night never end?

fini