5 I'll Fight Anyone

Chapter Five

My eyes opened, but I felt nothing. I didn't feel elated to move onto another day, the previous day still replaying in my head. Thinking about Camilla had brought back dark memories, memories my body shot through my nerves, causing me to feel anxious and on edge. I felt as if the nerves would get too much and I'd pass out or throw up. Either of those would be fine right now if it just stopped this.

I reluctantly pulled myself out of bed, wincing as a oddly familiar pain filled my torso. I lifted up my shirt to see if my ribs had been bruised as they had been while I was being tortured by Black Badge, finding only my tan skin. I sighed and shook my head, feeling my body begin to shake as I felt the nerves build up again, holding onto my dresser as my body continued its small convulsions. Today was going to be a long and awful day.

Pulling open the door to the station, I began to walk down the hallway, hearing a man yell at the deputies in the office. He was obviously drunk even though it wasn't even technically the afternoon yet. He slurred his words, continually falling back slightly, catching himself before repeating the process again.

"Listen here Deputy whatever, get my son out of that holding cell right now!"

He stumbled again as I reached the opening to the office, watching as Nicole stood on the other side of the desk, a case file in her hand as she watched the man with an irritated expression on her face.

"Mr. Burtson, I'm not releasing your son. By the looks of it, you should be in that holding cell as well."

Mr. Burtson didn't like what the deputy said, placing his beer bottle onto her desk as Nicole's mouth fell open, glaring with irritation from his sheer audacity.

"I'm not asking you anymore, Ma-"

"I believe her name tag next to that badge says Deputy Haught, you will address her as such, Mr. Burtson." I spoke up, placing both of my hands on her desk near his beer bottle, catching his attention.

He turned drunkenly towards me, almost falling over from the movement. He pointed his large finger at me, swaying as he struggled to keep his eyes on me. "I don't believe I asked you."

"Well Mr. Burtson, I don't think I've heard you ask a single question the entire time I've been here, so no, you haven't asked me anything."

This angered the large man, fire lighting in his eyes as he glared at me. I started to size him up, noticing that he was quite a large man, one punch would definitely slow me down. My eyes shot to Nicole as she started to slowly walk around the corner of her desk to be closer if the drunk man would try to harm me.

Out of the corner of my eye I could see a group of people take notice in the small altercation that was happening in the office, stopping to watch the spectacle. The man continued to sway as he snarled and glared at me, opening his mouth, words never leaving his throat.

"Are you going to speak, Mr. Burtson? That's how a conversation works." I was purposely provoking him at that point, wanting to fight him. I wanted to feel my fist fly into the flesh and bone of his jaw, I wanted to watch him bleed on the floor, maybe that would get rid of my nerves.

I watched the man grab the beer bottle he had previously abandoned, his hand grabbing the neck of the bottle, slamming his arm down to break the bottle into two pieces, leaving a jagged piece of the bottle in his hand. Nicole's hand was already on her gun, ready to pull it out of the holster to stop the man from hurting me.

I chuckled, his action not surprising me at all. I put my hand up, looking at the deputy. "Nicole don't worry, I've got this, sit down." I stated, watching as she looked at me with confusion.

"How about if you beat me, your son gets released. If I win, you get to stay in that nice holding cell over there, sound like a deal, Mr. Burtson?" He laughed at my offer, shaking his head.

"You really are a dumb girl." The drunk swung at me, his stance sloppy as he mostly fell forward, quickly moving out of the way of his punch.

"Plant your feet, Mr. Burtson. You'll only fall if you don't." I replied, already standing on the other side of him. He whipped around, probably thinking he had somehow landed his punch.

The man growled, deciding it best to swing at me again with the jagged bottle in his hand. He was large enough that I was able to see what he was going to do before he followed through with his action. I easily dodged his second attempt to harm me, lifting my arm in a blocking motion, moving it up to deflect his as I moved towards his now exposed body, bringing my knee up as high as I could get it, aiming for his ribs.

My knee hit just below his ribs, knowing that even though I had not hit my target, the blow would still cause him pain. I watched as he bent over holding his stomach, almost vomiting on the floor.

"If you vomit you, you have to clean it up." I shot out, watching him turn around with pure rage plastered on his face. "Also, you can't leave yourself so open to attacks."

The drunk growled at my suggestion, deciding the best thing to do as a reply was to run at me full force.

I had no where to go, I was pinned between two desks. If this man hit me with his speed and weight, I would undoubtedly go through the damn wall. So, I did the only thing I could do, I played dirty.

In one fluid motion, I pulled out the baton I had concealed in the pocket of my tactical pants, throwing my arm down to force the baton to slide open to its entire length. Without a second thought, I brought the weapon down right between the shoulder and head of the large man, causing him to fall into the wall behind me.

He did not get up, nor did he move an inch. I bent down, placing my hand on his neck to find his pulse. He was still alive, only knocked unconscious from my blow. I stood back up, pushing my baton back in before putting it in my pocket, clearing my throat. I looked at Nicole as she stared at me with her mouth fully open, her eyes the size of saucers.

"Jesus Lyons, you almost killed him."

"He's fine." I replied, stepping over the mans legs, turning towards the deputy once again. "He'll regain consciousness soon, with those blows it's only for a few minutes to buy time, usually. If I would have hit a vital nerve then yes I could have killed him, I chose not to, Deputy Haught."

She could only gawk at me, trying to find words to reply to my odd statement. "Lyons, what were you at Black Badge?"

I laughed and shook my head, lifting my eyes to look directly into hers. "The last thing people saw, usually."

With that, I walked out of the office and into my own, sitting down at one of the desks as Jeremy continued to type on his computer. He didn't even bother to look at me, his fingers flying over the keyboard as if his life depended on it.

"Lyons that was out of line, you know I have to report that." Dolls stated, coming into the office after me.

I turned in my chair to face him, smiling at him. "You're only doing your job, I suppose." I answered as Wynonna ran into the office, raising her hand up towards me for a high five.

"That was badass, Lyons. You have got to show me how to do that." She stated, Waverly nodding in excitement next to her.

"Me too!" She shouted as I chuckled and nodding, standing as Doc came into the office.

"That was a dirty move Lyons, in my time that would have gotten me killed." He shot out, lighting a cigarette.

"As I recall, you weren't the cowboy of the year in your time, either." My remark caused him to chuckle, tipping his hand towards me.

"That, you are correct." He replied, sitting in his chair.

Dolls cleared his throat loudly, trying to get our attention rather aggressively. "Wynonna and Lyons, you two will do surveillance on the house that the revenants are supposedly going to sometime soon." I nodded and rose from my chair, Wynonna following close behind me.

I closed the office door, running into someone. I felt their hands land on my waist to steady me, my eyes shooting up to glare at the person, my hands ready to punch them. My eyes softened as I looked directly into Nicole's eyes, her mouth falling into a nervous smile as she quickly moved her hands and stepped away to create distance between us.

"I um, I wanted to give Dolls the report on what just happened." Her face was turning red as she lifted up the case file to prove her statement. I only nodded and pushed past her, getting into the car.

As I parked the car in front of the assumed abandoned house, I listened to Wynonna clear her throat three or four times, trying to get me to look at her. I sighed and gave in to her tactic, looking at her with slight irritation.

"Yes?"

"Were you an assassin?" She asked, looking at me, expecting me to say yes.

I smiled and chuckled, cocking my head to the side to look at her. "Partly, yes. Everyone at Black Badge has that type of training, I was usually called on to use it because no one expects the small lesbian to shoot them at point blank range or snap their neck without a second thought."

"Damn try hard, that's some scary shit." She said, shaking her head as she looked around at our surroundings.

"I also did computer stuff along with business security. It depended on the case, really. I mostly said that to scare Deputy Haught."

Wynonna turned to look at me with confusion on her face as a deer came into my view behind her head. "Why?"

"She's getting too close. I can't have a relationship with her and she should know that by now."

"But would it be so bad if you did? Think about it, that woman is already head over heels for you, have you seen the eyes she gives you?"

I sighed and ran my hand through my hair, starting to feel stressed out. I didn't want to explain to this woman why I couldn't date Nicole, it wasn't something I could easily explain.

"It's not that, when this case if over, I'm going to leave. There's no point in starting something. On top of that, I don't want to feel that hurt again, physically or mentally." I spewed out, not entirely sure why I had just opened up to a woman I didn't know that much about.

"What's happening in Purgatory isn't going to disappear in a week, Lyons, you shouldn't think like that. It's probably going to take years to end this thing. I know you were hurt, you made that pretty clear yesterday. But, look at how far you've come already. You've allowed yourself to be attracted to Nicole, I've seen that much, so just act on it. You both want it."

I sighed, not wanting to be apart of this conversation any longer. Before I could reply, some people began to come into view, sparking my attention. I cursed and moved the car so that our cover wouldn't be blown, my full attention on the people walking towards the house.

As they continued trekking closer to us, I could see that they were all carrying boxes, none of them empty handed. I strained my eyes to get a better look as Wynonna did the same, hitting her hand on the window. I held back a laugh as she rubbed her forehead, suddenly looking out the window again.

"Shit Lyons, there's explosives in those boxes." I raised my eyebrows as I leaned closer to her window, realizing the woman beside me was right. All of the men, about 15 in the group, were carrying boxes filled with explosives into the house, following behind each other in a single file line.

"We need to get back." I replied, waiting until all of the men were in the house before I started the car and drove back to the station.

"Dolls, they have a shit ton of explosives." I said right as I barged into the office, catching the agent completely off guard.

"Excuse me, Agent Lyons?"

"There was about 15 to 20 people in the group we had observed going into the house, they were all carrying boxes filled with explosives."

"You're sure that's what they were?"

"Dolls this isn't my first rodeo with explosives, I know them when I see them." I heard him curse and run his hand over his head, obviously stressed out.

"Well, we still have time before the gathering. Tonight, I'll run surveillance on them so that I can get a better idea as to what we're dealing with." I nodded as there was a soft knock on the door, Waverly practically running to answer it.

She opened the door to reveal Nicole in her usual uniform, wearing her coat.

"Lyons, Nicole is going to take you home today. I have to punish you somehow for the stunt you pulled earlier, so you're getting the rest of the day off." I whirled around to face the agent, irritation filling my body before I could stop it.

"Are you serious?"

"Hey, I could have done a lot worse. I'm letting you off easy, have a nice rest of your day." Dolls turned away from me, effectively ending the conversation. I rolled my eyes and grabbed my coat and gloves, following behind Nicole as she escorted me to her squad car.

"Did you want to talk about earlier at all?" The deputy ended the 20 minutes of silence we had both endured, looking at the side of my face before turning to look at the road again.

"No, I don't." I responded, hoping she would catch the vibe that I wasn't in the best mood; she didn't.

"Well, Mr. Burtson did regain consciousness soon after I had put him in the holding cell, he decided he wasn't going to press charges."

"Good for him."

Nicole pulled into my apartment parking lot, shutting the car off before turning to look at me.

"Rose that could have been very bad."

"I don't need you to lecture me, Deputy Haught." I got out of the car before she could respond, moving around the car before I stood in front of the driver side door. I placed my hand on the handle and pulled it open, opening her door.

"What are you doing?" She asked, cocking her head to the side.

"I'm off for the rest of the day, might as well be bored with someone else." Nicole didn't need to reply, she simply got out of the car and allowed me to close the door behind her, following me up to my apartment.