Starring:
Guest Starring: Leslie
Summary: Kory's plans for a quiet Valentine's Day are overridden by Leslie's plans for Kory.
Date It Happened: February 14, 2008
Roses and Ruses
Kory's Apartment
Kory had taken Valentine's Day off months ago, even before meeting Randall. It was just too depressing a day to work in a comic store. The geek boys and girls who weren't lucky enough to have found another geek would be in the store singing the blues about not having found anyone to be with. It was all simply too depressing for the dreamy-eyed Kory.
This year is different, and not in the good way. She's managed to convince Randall that she's not reckless with her abilities, that she's well practiced, and is smart enough to keep safe, even when going into the mind of someone like Gabriel — whom she made a point of indicating was trying to turn away from the crimes and evils of his past, and overcome the hollow hunger that drove him to kill.
But the man she loves is still not quite ready to call them truly together again. He still has his doubts, and even with her training, she's unsure what to say or do. Rationally, she knows she can't say or do anything, really; that he has to come to the decision on his own. So it is that they're not together on Valentine's Day.
Given there's no one else she'd rather date, nor anywhere else she'd rather be, Kory has decided to spend the day as a recluse, hidden from the world. She just doesn't have it in her this year to keep a smile and a stiff upper lip while the whole world engages in an orgiastic display of hearts, flowers, and marketing.
To ride out the storm of enforced romance, she has a handful of DVDs sitting on her coffee table — The first two Friday The 13th movies, the first Nightmare on Elm Street, the first Child's Play, My Bloody Valentine, Student Bodies, Pieces, and Prom Night. A big bowl of freshly popped popcorn sits beside it. And beside that, a bowl of individually wrapped chocolates from Dove, Ghirardelli, Lindt, and Hershey and Nestle, all tossed helter-skelter for variety. And the pomagranate tea she's been drinking since the new year, as she finds it very relaxing.
Kory's got on a pair of track pants and a Camp Crystal Lake grey T-shirt, and she's polishing her toenails in a particularly lurid shade of summery, day-glo orange. There's a knock at her front door, which she fully intends to ignore, but it opens. Randall? Kory catches her breath. He and her brother are the only people with keys. "Anzeti?" she calls.
"No, it's me, Kore."
Leslie? Kory looks up, frowning. "Did…did I leave the door unlocked?"
"No, love," Leslie assures her, stepping inside. "I got … the super to let me in. I wanted to surprise you." He's wearing a finely cut suit that probably costs more than Randall's entire wardrobe. There's a long box in his hand, as well as a heart shaped box of candy. "Happy Valentine's Day." He gives her a warm, engaging smile, but it fades quickly when he sees what she's doing. "Horror movies? By yourself?" The hair mop isn't here, trying to weasel his way back into her good graces? So much the better. "Today of all days, you shouldn't be here alone."
"It's fine, really," Kory tells Leslie, not standing. Her toenails are wet. "I …" she pauses, torn between wanting to make a lame excuse for her lone status, and deciding she doesn't need to. "I'm fine spending the day this way."
"Oh, no, no, I won't have it!" Leslie says in a wheedling voice. "How about you go change," he suggests, humming a handful of phrases from a song. "I'll take you out for the night of your life."
Kory is about to protest she doesn't want to go out or do anything, but she finds her mind changing. She hums to herself, answering phrases to the tune Leslie was just humming. "All right. Let me just hop into the shower." She gets up to offer him a hug. "You're sweet to bring me flowers and candy. And to take me out. Thank you. You're a good friend."
'A good friend'?! After all his work with the drugged tea and the doctored music, and he still isn't out of the Friend Zone with her? Leslie clenches his jaw even as he wraps his arms around Kory, returning the hug she's offered him. "Anything for you. Anytime. You know that."
Kory reaches up to kiss his cheek and is surprised when Leslie turns his head so the kiss lands on her lips. He presses the kiss against her, hands tight at her shoulders. And the response programmed into her by weeks of music — music Peter tried and failed to warn her about — kicks in. She returns his kiss.
But not entirely. Underneath the drugs Leslie's been building in Kory's system in the guise of a gift, beneath the subliminal responses in the music designed to make her want him, the truth remains. The truth is, she loves Randall, and that makes her step back. "I really…look, I know you mean well, but I'm just…I don't…I can't…" she can't seem to finish the thought, though, as the brainwashing begins reasserting over her real wishes. "Leslie…I'm not feeling so well, I don't think…"
And with that, she collapses, like a marionette with cut strings. Leslie watches, with satisfaction as Kory literally falls into his arms, his kiss the strongest of the suggestions he'd implanted in her head, and a stronger dose of the tranq he'd been dosing her with in a tiny lancet he'd used when she came close.
"Yes, my love, don't think. Sleep. When you wake, I will have taken you away from all this. You'll never need to look back. I'll take care of everything." He kisses her unconscious form again, and reaches to wrap her in a blanket before setting the flowers over her unconscious form, sweeping her up into a carrying position, and stalking out of the apartment, leaving the door to swing closed and lock behind them.
Bluetooth in his ear, Leslie speaks to his driver. "I have a suite in the Radison near JFK, but you know where to go first. I still have to throw the competition off my trail."
With Kory's head lolled against his shoulder, he sets her oh-so-gently into the seat of his limo. "You found someone to deliver the message to him? To get him to the warehouse this evening, so he's distracted and won't have the time to think about where Kore is?"
"Yes, sir."
"Excellent."
Satisfied his plan is proceeding apace, Leslie checks his jacket pocketd. The remote is in place in one pocket, and the plane tickets are in the other.
"Let's hit the road, Sullivan."
"Yes, sir."
The limo pulls smoothly out into traffic, and no one bats an eye that the man in suit and trenchcoat carried an unconscious woman into his limo. On Valentine's Day, people just smile and nod, mistaking what most people would call kidnapping as the romantic gesture Leslie believes it is.
"There'll be time for a few more trips to the Lair, to throw off suspicion when people notice you haven't turned up, Kore," Leslie sighs into Kory's sleeping ear. "And then we're off. Leaving this dark city behind. There's nothing left to stand in our way."
He puts a pair of earplugs in and turns on more of the doctored music, the better to reinforce his subliminals while Kory remains suggestible under the strongest dose yet of the drug he's been giving her. His free hand laces fingers with hers, and he sighs, happy.