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For jerusalem_s.

It's a Saturday morning and being a teenage boy, Pyro's doing what comes naturally to his kind -- that is to say, being studious and walking about the second floor of the school, backpack on shoulder and what looks like a sheaf of schematics in hand. He seems to be slightly confused as to where he's going, though -- and in fact walks past a certain door before stopping, turning, and heading back to his destination, which happens to be exactly one floor up from the Journalism classroom.

"So," Pyro says aloud, and knocks on the door before edging to one side just in case. He went to school with Iceman, Gambit, and Boom Boom for years, after all -- and Pyro's always been one to learn fast.

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"Play feed."

Behind Spider, the camera moved in, following the winding drive up to the house.

"This particular house has any number of stories, documentation and video footage of its various peculiarities. It has all the standard hallmarks of your average 'haunted house'." Spider wasn't even bothering to watch the footage as the camera reached the front door, which opened without any apparent help from the man with the camera.

"There are reports of ghosts that walk, talk and drag you to an unpleasant fate in the basement, whispers of scorpion pits and man-eating plants, stories of time running backward...."

The camera was panning across an entry that showed the ruin of years, cobwebs and shattered furniture, half of a spray-painted gang logo visible beneath the trash on the floor. Moving to a nearby room, the door was opened - this time by the camera man. On the other side was a cozy study with a polished hard wood floor, a roaring fire in the fireplace and, despite the summer weather outside, a howling winter blizzard outside the window.

"All of these can be explained away in some fashion, but no one's managed it." Spider steepled his fingers and leaned forward, smile aquiring an edge. "I thought it would be fun to explore. Ghosts or no ghosts... it's a good story and one that can be exploited."

Pyro watched the film play for several seconds after Spider spoke before raising his own voice. "Exploit it how?"

There were a lot of other ways he could have said it, perhaps, but sometimes the most direct way was the simplest.

Krycek was just glad he didn't have to ask it. He watched the feed, trying to keep track of the layout mentally, but the house didn't seem to much care for staying still for the camera.

"You sell the experience," Spider told him, grinning maliciously. "And it works either way. 'Haunted House Debunked' or 'Ghosts Proven Real'."

"Good enough for me." Pyro smirked, sitting back in his chair and going back to playing with the pretty flame. Ooh, fire, shiny!

Krycek pulled his attention away from the feed to look at Spider shrewdly. "Is there a possibility of hazard pay if this turns out to be a near-death experience?"

If Spider's as good at wringing every possible dollar out of a story as he thinks the professor is, then violence or danger would probably up the payload quite a bit.

"If anything dangerous happens," Spider paused and visibly reconsidered. "If anything dangerous happens, and I get to determine what is and isn't dangerous, then yes. Hazard pay all around."

"And it's okay with you whatever weaponry or equipment we choose to use, so long as we don't get caught with it on school property?" Pyro flicked his wrist, making the small spark that he'd been playing with zoom away and blink out of view. Presumably, anyway. "You are, I assume, going to bankroll this endeavor."

Spider raised an eyebrow. "If I were taking you into a warzone, I might arm you - albeit defensively. This is the supernatural. If you'd like a leg up on the 'enemy', I'd consult with Abe no Seimei."

"Or we can brave the crazy librarian and see if there's anything helpful there." Krycek leaned back in his seat, crossing his arms loosely as he thought. "None of us are experts though. And given this place, any ghosts around might not conform to other examples."

He wondered if he could manage bringing a gun anyway. It'd be a bit more reassuring than relying solely on everyone else's abilities.

Pyro was unabashed by Spider, apparently. "Just because it seems like it's supernatural doesn't mean it is. It could be some kind of psimutant, or some kind of interdimensional being or an alien or invisible Gojira for all we know."

"I mean, we don't even know if this thing's gonna show up on that film stuff you've got Halliwell lugging, but we're still taking it anyway."

"Do you know anything about self-defense?" Spider asked him, raising an eyebrow and looking over the tops of his glasses. "I don't like guns... and most of the weapons I have access to require a great deal of skill."

Momentarily distracted by the cat attempting to eat his lunch, Spider swore before returning to the subject. "I'm not going to give you anything that they can lynch me for catching you with."

"You asked about guns on the application - why bother if we're not even going to use them?" Krycek would rather not be limited to hand-to-hand combat, especially against anything not human.

"I said that I didn't like guns," Spider pointed out, "not that I wouldn't allow you to use them. However, I'm going to want to see some proficiency scores from the firing range before I hand either of you a projectile weapon. Friendly fire - isn't."

"My last boss gave me some training without powers," Pyro said flatly in response to Spider's earlier remark, "just in case the govies ever try to pull something really fancy, but that ain't what I was talking about. Fancy weapons're all well and good, but they ain't my style - I don't like stuff the other guy can use against me. But what I really don't like is going in somewhere knowing that the other guy's got something up on me in the first place."

He paused, and there was the faint clicking sound of a lighter snapping open and shut before he went on. "You want me to learn how to get my shooting scores up, I can do that, but what I had in mind was more along the lines of -- well, flamethrowers, obviously. Portable ones. Maybe some explosives. Napalm, too. Some souped up snappers, the kind that explode on impact, 'cos grenades're too hard to control. The stuff they use in Mark 77s, too, if I can get ahold of that."

... obviously, Pyro had never given this a great deal of thought before.

Krycek looked at Pyro oddly, impressed despite himself. His tone though was not nearly so admiring. "Maybe you can control fire, but unless there's a lot of distance between me and the target, I'd really rather not be using anything that incendiary."

"Explosives in an old, wooden house?" Spider gave them both a skeptical look. "Forget it. Not only will we be working in enclosed places, I'd rather not burn to death, thanks. All right. Krycek can have a gun, but so help me if anyone finds out it came from me, I will find ways to make you regret it that you've never imagined."

Turning to Pyro, Spider frowned. "I'll see if I can find something for you, but it'll take me some time."

Pyro looked faintly insulted. "It's just fire." It wasn't as if it could hurt anyone. It just burned! And burned! And more burn! "My aim is not that bad."

"... okay," Pyro agreed finally to Spider, figuring that it was better than nothing. It wasn't like he wasn't going to smuggle a lighter or two along on the mission. And a few packets of matches, too.

Feeling inwardly smug, Krycek nodded. "Fine by me. When are leaving?"

"Early, as I need to sneak off campus." Spider frowned suddenly. "Someone needs to distract the damn security... thing."

"S'it already tipped off about you?" Pyro frowned a little. "I mean, do Krycek and me an' Halliwell got to sneak around it too, or are we okay?"

"... I'm here as punishment," Spider told him, grimacing. "Think of it as a form of house arrest. I'm not supposed to leave the campus unless I'm going back to my own place or taking an official field trip someplace off-world."

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