Disclaimer: I own nothing. Janet owns all these wonderful people.

Author's note: Set two months after Night Off/Night Off 2. This is not a 'Billy' fic, but occurred because of the events of that infamous night. Rangeman needs a Halloween off….

Halloween Off

Part one

September 18th

"Steph, I need to see you in my office."

"Well, yes sir, Mr. Intercom."

"Babe."

I had just finished a search I had been doing for Rangeman. I was working there part time and part time for Vinnie. Ranger and I had been…well…doing it for the last few months since Joe and I had broken up so that (I found out later) he could be with a stripper. Whatever. I was having Ranger sex. We still hadn't defined our relationship, however, but I doubted this summons to his office was going to rectify that. He sounded a little stern.

I walked down the hall, knocked, and opened the door. Ranger was behind his desk with a large manila envelope sitting front and center. His face was blank.

"Nooner?"

"Babe."

"It was worth a shot."

"I was wondering if you could explain this to me. It was delivered this morning."

I picked up the envelope and peered inside. Hmmm…no bombs. Always a plus. No naked pictures of me or what appeared to be death threats, another plus. I took out the intro letter and burst out laughing. Ranger kept his face blank but I saw a small smile playing about his mouth.

"I can't believe it worked!"

"So I'm assuming you can tell me what this is then?"

"Well, yeah, Ranger. You mean you don't remember? You filled out the application."

Ranger looked momentarily confused which was not something I saw often. It was a beautiful thing.

"Babe, I know for a fact that I would not have applied for this."

"You're right. Sober Ranger wouldn't have applied. But happy Ranger who had been hanging out with Billy and his herbal remedy thought it sounded like…what was the word you used.. a 'hoot'."

Ranger stared at his desk for a moment and I suddenly saw his eyes widen slightly. I almost missed it. He closed his eyes and grimaced.

"I take it Batman remembers?"

"It's beginning to sound familiar. Well, I'll have them contacted to inform them of our cancellation."

"Oh, no. You can't cancel! Lester will be crushed. He brought it up again just yesterday to see if we heard anything. I thought he would have mentioned it to you, too."

Ranger leaned over and pressed his intercom button again. "Chuckles, can you come to my office?"

I grinned and organized the papers. Ranger was smiling lazily at me as he leaned back in his chair. Lester was going to be so excited. He had earned the nickname 'Chuckles' after our infamous night where, at one point, he had laughed for over 10 minutes straight because, as he claimed, his laugh switch was on and he didn't know how to turn it off. It ended with Bobby kicking him hard because apparently the switch was in Lester's ass.

A minute or two later the man himself strode into the office. He glanced at me and I hid a smile. He raised his eyebrows.

"You wanted to see me?" Ranger motioned to me and I handed Lester the envelope.

"What's this?" He swung his eyes to me.

"Open it."

Lester cautiously peered in and took the same inventory I had. He looked relieved as he took out the intro letter. He read quietly for a moment before his face broke out into a huge grin.

"Ahhhhh! You've got to be shitting me!" He yelled. I laughed out loud. Even Ranger smiled. Lester bolted to Ranger's desk and leaned over him to press the intercom.

"Tank! Get your black ass in here!" Ranger was mumbling something. I think I caught "…I get stoned with them one time…lost all authority…"

Tank buzzed back. "No can do, Lester. I have to work, unlike some of us, and set a good example for the new employees. I, solely, uphold the Rangeman values."

"Whatever, bitch. The envelope came! Grab Bobby!"

The intercom remained silent but we heard, faintly from way down in Tank's office, "YES!"

Not 20 seconds later Tank and Bobby burst in Ranger's office. Ranger tossed up his hands and leaned back, closing his eyes.

Bobby had the letter and was reading and laughing.

"Holy Shit" Tank laughed, "This is going to be awesome! I have to call Lula." He whipped out his phone, hit speaker, and pressed speed dial.

"Hey, Mountain Man. Your 12 inches been missin' me already?" All of us except Ranger gaped at Tank.

Ranger shrugged. "I've seen him naked."

Tank didn't even notice. "Guess what, Babydoll! They picked us! We are all going to be on Scariest Places on Earth!"

"Get out!"

"No, Babydoll. I'm dead serious! We just got the letter today!"

"Get out!"

Ranger finally got everyone quiet. Tank still had Lula on speaker.

"Can someone please explain to me what this is and how we got selected in the first place?"

Bobby spoke up. He was the automatic spokesperson whenever something needed to be clarified from that night since he was sober.

"We were at Tank's grilling and Steph and Lula started arguing about which is the better Holiday."

Tank's cell phone spoke up. "And I'm still right! It's Christmas. You got Santa and shit. And food and that mistletoe. And your man can dress up like Santa and get freaky. Oh, yeah and Jesus." We eyed Tank. He had the decency to study his shoe.

"ANYWAY," Bobby continued "Steph was bringing up all the Halloween TV shows that would come on and we all started talking about Scariest Places on Earth." Ranger just stared at him and raised his eyebrows.

"Dude, Ranger." Lester shook his head. "Live a little. You don't remember any of this? It's this show where they take families or groups of friends to the most scary, fucked up places they can find and then make them spend the night there. And they have, like, missions and shit they have to complete. Someone has a breakdown every time! It's awesome! They even got that midget woman from Poltergeist to narrate!"

"No, Lester, it's safe to say I have never watched it. How did we get signed up?"

"Actually, that was you." Bobby smiled. "You decided that Rangeman needed paranormal training to make us a full-service Security operation. You went on-line and filled out the forms for the six of us."

Ranger looked at me and I smiled and nodded. He looked around the room at our smiling faces at looked each of us in the eye one at a time.

"You have to know we aren't really going to do this."

"What the fuck, Batman? You a little chicken?" Apparently Lula was feeling brave over the phone. Ranger stayed silent and stared down the phone.

"Yeah, okay. I might have crossed the line about the chicken."

"Ranger," I tried "This could be good for the company. A lot of people watch the show. We could bring some equipment, complete the missions and not cave like the others and it would be free marketing. Really get your name out there."

"This is not the kind of publicity I want."

"Please!" I wrapped myself around him. This worked once before, not too long ago, and I was hoping for a second success. "Please please please please!"

Ranger held me and closed his eyes. "Alright. Looks like we're going to Massachusetts."

"Massachusetts. What the hell are we going to be doing in Massachusetts?" Tank's cell phone yelled.

"That is where our destination is." Said Ranger calmly. "The abandoned Danvers State Insane Asylum."

"What the fuck! Nobody said anything about no insane asylum! Do I sound like a nut job? Tank! You didn't tell me about no insane asylum! You said we'd be on T.V. and in the dark. I figured we could get freaky when no one was looking! Do you know what kind of shit they have at insane asylums?"

Ranger leaned close and brushed his lips against my ear. "I'm ready for my nooner."

TBC…if you dare…muh ha ha ha ha!!!

Danvers State Insane Asylum (for the sake of my fic, we are going to pretend they didn't demolish it a few months ago):