Title: A Father's Duty

Author: Jedi Buttercup

Disclaimer: The words are mine; the worlds are not. I claim nothing but the plot.

Rating: PG-13.

Summary: Die Hard, B:tVS. "Oh, I'm just going to Moscow to find Jack," John muttered under his breath, mocking his last conversation with his daughter. "What do I need the arsenal for? Just couple of stakes in case I get cornered in an alley; don't worry, Lucy, I'll be fine. Ha! Should have known." 1300 words.

Spoilers: "A Good Day to Die Hard" (2013); general Buffyverse.

Notes: Because I watched the fifth Die Hard again, and was amused at the thought of adding Jack to the Hard Duties 'verse.

Chernobyl. Freakin' Chernobyl. Of all the places John McClane might have expected to end up on his quote-unquote vacation to Russia, Chernobyl hadn't even made the list.

Not least because it wasn't even in Russia anymore. And why did they still have no backup, if Jack had been able to use his spy shit to get them across that border? Or at least some of those ugly moon suits? He'd already been having a real clusterfuck of a day even before following his son onto radioactive soil; it might not matter much to John whether or not he grew a third arm or some shit at his age, but he'd kind of like to have grandkids at some point, and Lucy and Matt sure as hell weren't going there anytime soon.

Or, they'd better not while Lucy was still kicking demon ass all over New York and New Jersey. Matt was doing a fair-to-middling job as back-up field Watcher for her lately, about fucking time given how creaky John's joints got after being tossed around a measly graveyard or two, but it meant both of them were in danger on a regular basis. No kid of John's was going to risk leaving orphans behind for him to raise. What point was setting a terrible example if nobody learned from it?

It wasn't just the invisible specter of nuclear waste raising John's hackles, though; it was the dark and the crumbling condition of the buildings he and Jack were stalking through, too. Over the last six years, he'd mostly been to places like that in Lucy's company, abandoned warehouses and half-built commercial complexes stalled during the economic collapse taken over by vampires or gangs of demons. It made his instincts even twitchier than usual. Human bad guys, he could handle; was probably getting a little too blasé about, actually. Supernatural shit was much more unpredictable.

"Oh, I'm just going to Moscow to find Jack," he muttered under his breath, mocking his last conversation with his daughter. "What do I need the arsenal for? Just couple of stakes in case I get cornered in an alley; don't worry, Lucy, I'll be fine. Ha! Should have fucking known."

"What?" Jack hissed, throwing a puzzled glare over his shoulder.

John pointed at his eyes, and then back ahead, shaking his head at his son. Kid had decent instincts, but he doubted 'em when he shouldn't, and kept letting distractions pull him away from his goals.

"Eyes on the prize," he murmured absently, casting a glance around the edges of the large, tiled room they were sneaking through. What the hell had the building been anyway, some kind of big hotel? A swimming pool occupied the center of the floor, mostly filled with dirty-looking water; the tiles covering the floor and running halfway up the walls were ugly with discoloration, and the paint above the tiles was leprous and peeling. You could hardly tell it used to be blue.

A man-sized shadow shifted suddenly in a corner, and John's grip tightened on his weapon as he swiveled to cover it. The shape resolved after a minute into another Russian goon in a bullet-proof vest... but he wasn't alone; he was struggling in the arms of a skinny wraith of a guy in rotting clothing, forehead ridged and teeth sunk into the goon's throat.

"What the hell?" Jack looked a little wild around the eyes as the vampire dropped his victim, but didn't let that stop him from putting a burst of bullets into it.

Too bad that did jack shit. "You really haven't talked to your sister in a while either, have you?" John observed.

He rolled his eyes at his son's antics, then pulled a stake from where he'd kept it tucked in the back of his waistband under his flannel shirt, and dropped his own gun as the vampire charged them, golden-eyed and snarling.

"What does Lucy have to do with-- what the fuck!" Jack choked, as the vampire shrugged off another burst of bullets like so many bee stings.

Fortunately, it didn't seem too smart; hell, it couldn't have been if it had stayed in Chernobyl since the population evacced. How many security guards and idiot tourists could it possibly have found to snack on in any given year? Radiation must not've been too good for demon brains, either. John wouldn't have given a tarnished quarter for his chances in a one-on-one with your average decades-old vampire, but a dumb one? That he could handle. He easily dodged its attempt to grab him, then buried the stake between the fourth and fifth ribs.

It collapsed into ash, like all good vampires did. John grunted, then wiped the stake clean with the tail of his shirt and tucked it back into his waistband.

Jack gaped, even worse than Matt at the first sign of violence when John first met him.

"Lucy slays vampires every day. What, did she get all the balls in this family? You need to sit down and put your head between your knees or something?"

Jack glared, awareness returning with the irritation, as John had expected. "I stopped taking her calls about the time she started singing your praises again, but we still texted each other, and she never said anything about..." he grimaced in disbelief, "vampires. You're seriously expecting me to believe that was what, a bloodsucking creature of the night?"

"I'm seriously expecting you to believe I couldn't possibly have had any idea I'd end up at Chernobyl on this trip to set up some kind of staged attack. With bonus goon? Get real." John snorted dismissively. "C'mon, if we're gonna rescue your friend Yuri before that dancer guy gets the file out of him, we'd better get moving."

Jack stared at him for a long moment, then narrowed his eyes. "And I suppose you're gonna tell me you took everything in stride, the first time you heard about... this?"

"What the fuck do you think?" John growled. "I threatened the guy who told me about Lucy's destiny, then went out and killed vampires with her. But then again, I'd just killed a helicopter with a car and took down a jet plane with a semi. I don't think you want to be looking at me for an idea of how a normal person reacts to things."

"No, just a McClane," Jack replied, very dryly, a faint, self-deprecatory smile tugging up one corner of his mouth. Then he shook himself and turned to face forward again, leaving footprints in the ash that had been their foe as he moved to check the fallen soldier. "You're right though, that conversation'll have to wait for later. You think there'll be any more of those... things?"

"Vampires? Probably not; or if there are, I bet they'll be as dumb as this one. Other things, though? Your guess is as good as mine," John shrugged. "And me without my sword."

"Other things?" Jack replied as he relieved the corpse of its spare cartridges. "Sword? Damn, I think I really am going to have to hear the whole story now."

"That'd be a first," John chuckled. "You gotta promise you won't tell your mother though. She'd kill me. But it's what Lucy wants, so. What am I gonna do?"

"No promises. Mom'll kill me if I start acting like John McClane Junior again without a damn good explanation," Jack pointed out.

"Fair enough. Though why you don't just cut the difference and call yourselves Gennaro-McClane, I'll never know. Both of you got your mother's sharp tongue, that's for damn sure."

They shared a wry, familial smile, in concert for maybe the first time in the whole damn journey.

Then they lifted their weapons and moved forward again, minds back on the goal.

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