24/12/74

[swordznsorcery]

Ironside Christmas fic, for seal_girl.

Fandom: Ironside
Characters: Chief Ironside, Ed Brown
Gen, c. 2000 words



24/12/74

There was music coming from somewhere. A Salvation Army band, Ed thought, playing Christmas carols on some nearby street corner. He was half tempted to go over to the window to look, but he knew that it was too dark now to see anything. It was a wonder that the band could even see to play. It was late - near to ten o'clock, although somehow it seemed later than that. Somehow it always seemed later when he was doing paperwork. He yawned, and rubbed briefly at his eyes.

"Am I keeping you awake, Sergeant Brown?" came the familiar voice from nearby. Ed suppressed a smile, but had to fight off another yawn in order to answer.

"No. It's just this report. It's not exactly enthralling."

"Police work is in the details. It can't all be about car chases and shoot outs."

"Yes, Chief. I mean, no Chief." Ed smiled with more good cheer than he had thought he had left. "Well, whichever one sounds most like agreement." He leaned back in his chair in order to stretch his back muscles, and watched his companion for a while. The Chief was busy in the kitchen, beginning preparations for his latest batch of chilli, lining up ingredients with mathematical precision on one of the counters. The sight was such a familiar one that Ed couldn't help but smile again.

"You given any more thought to what you want to do tomorrow?" he asked. Ironside paused for a moment in his careful organisation.

"It's a day like any other, Ed," he said eventually. "There's plenty of work to do here. If we go taking days off, then we're going to have crooks thinking they can run rings around this city just because it's a public holiday. Anyway." He looked up meaningfully. "At this rate, somebody is going to have to finish reading that damn report."

"Sorry, Chief." Ed ducked his head back down again, but it was too hard to concentrate. He had been reading the thing for nearly three hours now, barring a break for coffee somewhere around eight. He loved police work. He loved his job, even with all of its mind-numbing paperwork. It was just that at ten o'clock at night on Christmas Eve, he couldn't pretend to give it his full attention. He glanced at his watch.

"If you would rather be somewhere else..." began the Chief. He wasn't even looking, of course, his eyes still fixed firmly upon his proto-chilli. Ed had long since given up being surprised by his commander's remarkable ability to know what everybody was doing all of the time. Feeling rather like a guilty schoolboy, he tried to return his attention to the report, having the grace to look at least slightly abashed.

"Sorry. I said I'd meet Mark, if there was nothing too important going on here. He's got to clear out of the house for a bit this evening, so Diana can get things done. We thought we'd go for a drink somewhere."

"Then go," Ironside told him. "I don't know how I'm expected to create culinary masterpieces when you're jigging around like a child who's eaten too much sugar."

"I'm sitting down," protested Ed, then frowned. "Anyway, you're making chilli. That's hardly gourmet cookery."

"And what would you know about gourmet cookery, sergeant?" Ironside shot him one of his famous withering glares. "Just how many times do I have to tell you and your fellow Philistines on my staff that chilli is the finest dish known to man?"

"It represents all the main food groups," quoted Ed dutifully. "A man can live forever on chilli." Ironside nodded approvingly, and Ed tossed the abandoned report down onto the tabletop. "It is Christmas Day tomorrow, though. Most people don't eat chilli on Christmas Day."

"Most people are fools," Ironside told him, rather predictably. "Anyway, I'll have you know that it's turkey chilli. Just this once I've decided to leave out the beef. Don't say that I never make allowances for a holiday."

"Yes, Chief." Grinning now, Ed leaned back in his chair. "You want a hand?"

"No. If you're not going to get that report read, you might as well go off and meet Mark. Just don't get him into trouble. It's his first Christmas as a married man, and I don't think Diana wants to spend the day bailing him out of jail."

"Trouble?" Ed straightened up, looking wounded. "When do I ever--" A meaningful glare from Ironside silenced him, and he lowered his eyes. "Well, okay. Sometimes I do." He looked up again, smile restored. "It's a shame Eve's out of town. I could pick her up on the way over to meet Mark, and then you wouldn't have to worry."

"On the contrary. Then I'd have to worry about the whole of San Francisco." Ironside sighed, beginning to drop some of his ingredients into the large, waiting pan. "Christmas in London. Well, I suppose it'll make for a more traditional climate. Maybe I'll call her in a few hours. It's practically morning there already."

"I doubt she's asleep anyway, with the baby to keep her awake." Ed got up, joining Ironside in the kitchen. "Are you sure you really need quite that many chilli peppers?"

"The more peppers a chilli has, the finer it is." Ironside gave the contents of the pan a cursory stir. "Anyway, I thought you were going out? I do not need you trying to help me. The last time I let you near my chilli when it was cooking, it erupted like Mount Vesuvius."

"Don't remind me." Ed winced at the thought. It had taken him, Mark and Fran the best part of two days to clean the stuff up, working in steady shifts. Fran had insisted that the chilli had taken the skin off her hands, and certainly he and Mark hadn't been inclined to argue. There were legends in the police force dating back decades about Ironside's infamous chilli. Its bite was said to be almost as powerful as that of its hot-tempered creator. To Ed, who knew Ironside better than most, and knew his chilli rather better than was probably medically advisable, it was a fairly even bet.

"The night's not getting any younger, you know," pointed out Ironside a moment later. Ed glanced at his watch again. Mark would be waiting for him by now, in some comfortable bar where there would be plenty of beer and a distinct lack of chillies. He nodded.

"Yeah, I should probably be going. Provided you don't mind..."

"The report can wait. I can answer the telephones myself. Just don't be late." Beginning to chop an onion, Ironside threw another sharp glare at his long-suffering protégé. "Crime doesn't stop for Christmas, Sergeant Brown. We can't afford to--"

"Rest on our laurels and let our heads get filled with seasonal nonsense," chimed in Ed. Ironside raised an eyebrow. "You've given me that speech every year since we met. And that's a scarily long time by now."

"Well in that case maybe something will finally start rubbing off on you." Ironside laid down his knife. "Go on, get out of here. It's Christmas. I think I can let you and Mark have a couple of hours to relax in."

"I'm gone." Ed turned around, heading back across the room. He stopped when he reached the steps that led towards the door. "Do I really have to read that report tomorrow, Chief?"

"Are you, or are you not, on the staff in this office?" came the typically fierce response. Ed sighed.

"I am."

"Then get the damned report read, sergeant!" The order was barked out in a tone of voice that brooked no argument. "Although obviously you can have time off for some chilli."

"Thanks." Ed eyed the vast amount of waiting peppers from his vantage point across the room, and winced. "I think."

"Sergeant..."

"I'm going." Taking the steps with his usual vigour, Ed stopped to look back when he was halfway to the lift doors. "Well?"

"Well what?" asked his superior, busy eyeing a second onion as though it were some deadly foe.

"Are you coming, or aren't you?"

"With you?" Ironside managed to look suitably irritated. "Am I to understand that you're you asking me to waste my time in some questionable drinking establishment, when there's work to be done?"

"Yes sir." Ed smiled, and gave a little shrug. "After all, it is Christmas."

"And so it is." For a moment Ironside smiled as well, his customary grouchiness vanishing in an instant behind a rare gleam of the warmth that he so liked to hide. "All the same, you two don't want some old grouch hanging around and getting in the way. I've got plenty to keep me occupied here. Like some blasted report that some blasted sergeant keeps refusing to read."

"Like I said, Chief, it's Christmas." Ed, who had been playing this game with the older man for more years than he cared to remember, knew better than to wilt under the force of the glare. "Christmas is for family. Right?"

"Right." For a second Ironside hesitated, onion in one hand, knife in the other, before the smile made another brief appearance. "Very well. But not for long. Crime--"

"Doesn't stop for Christmas." Ed grinned. "I know."

"Good." Setting aside the onion and the knife, Ironside began to wheel his way over to join him. "I do have to wonder sometimes whether anything is actually getting through that thick skull of yours."

"Oh, some of it does. Occasionally." Pressing the button for the lift, Ed stepped aside to let Ironside go past him through the doors. "Mostly the exciting stuff."

"Figures." Ironside manoeuvred his chair around, so that he was facing back towards the doors, ready for when the lift arrived downstairs. "Trying to get you lot to learn things could drive a man to drink."

"Just as well that's where we're going then, isn't it." Pressing the button for the ground floor, Ed leaned back against the wall, unable to hide his smile. "And no trying to make Mark come in tomorrow. You promised him time off for good behaviour."

"Would I do such a thing?" The incorrigible chief of detectives was innocence itself. Ed, however, was not remotely fooled.

"You tried to persuade Eve to spend her honeymoon in the office," he pointed out. Ironside glared at him once again.

"That was different. And did anybody ever tell you that your memory is too damned good?"

"Not very often, no." Ed laughed quietly. "By the way..."

"What?" The single word came out with all of Ironside's legendary irascibility. Ed didn't flinch.

"Happy Christmas, Chief." His boss stared up at him, still glaring, eyes still hot and fierce. After a moment they crinkled at the corners, and a smile flashed very, very briefly across the craggy face.

"Sentimental seasonal nonsense. Bah humbug. And yes, you do still have to read that report tomorrow."

"Yes sir." Ed was still smiling, and after a brief moment for a an obligatory glower, Ironside relaxed back into his chair. He smiled as well, although he aimed it at the floor. It wouldn't do to be seen to smile too often. People might think that he was getting soft. He didn't bother to hide the warmth in his voice, however, when he spoke up again a second later.

"Happy Christmas, Ed."


The End