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Title: Sitting on the Dock of eBay
Author:
Miss Murchison and Rating: PG Pairing: Anya and Tara Disclaimer: All characters are the property of Joss Whedon, Mutant Enemy, etc. Only the lame plots and dialogue herein are mine. Setting: Late Season 6 Notes:
This is a sequel to Resistance is Useless, written for Keswindhover's birthday. Any poetry is
The bell over the door rang as Tara entered the Magic Box, carrying a small bag of groceries and a large backpack of books. She waved at Anya, who was assuring a customer that all the chicken feet in the shop came from free-range birds. Tara set her belongings down on the round table at the back of the store and went over to the jars of herbs to find some oregano and basil for the spaghetti dinner she was planning. By the time she'd finished her chore, the doubtful woman had allowed herself to be reassured, made her purchase, and left. Anya remained behind the counter as Tara stowed the herbs away with the other groceries. "I checked out that CC place again," she said in a defiant tone. Tara tried to be surprised, but her interior voice intoned, Of course. Anya might be distractible, but only temporarily. Once she got hold of a topic, she returned to it again and again, until it had been investigated, resolved, and autopsied to her satisfaction. "On-line or in person?" "Just on-line." Tara sighed in relief. Perhaps another restraining order wasn't in her girlfriend's immediate future after all. Anya marched over to the table and opened her laptop. "But I found out that the name of their store here is Cookie's Collectibles. So far today he's sold a cookie jar shaped like an albatross for twenty-three dollars. And put up some Buddha butter that's getting a lot of bids. Most of them from two people." "Buddha butter?" "Some delusional Tibetan villager saw Buddha in a pat of fresh yak butter. So he dried it, and it's selling on line for—" Anya refreshed the web page—"five hundred and twelve dollars so far. Most of the bids are from MTentrees and RZVincent again. And it's always the same group of people bidding against them and driving up the prices, but those other people always lose. Let me see if he's put up anything else new." Tara frowned at the list of items on the screen. "Those mini-cauldrons are seriously overpriced. And your prices on motherwort are more reasonable." "That's not where he's making his money, although he seems to be catching some silly witches with shiny pots and special packaging on his herbs." She paused for a moment, and then said. "I meant 'silly witches,' not 'all witches are silly,' honey. I know you'd never buy some comfrey just because it came in a pretty jar." Tara patted her shoulder. "I know, Anya. It's okay, and you're right. Look at that knife! It's the wrong shape, and anyone who tries to cast a serious spell with sterling silver deserves to have the copper in it turn them green for a week." Tara was becoming intrigued in spite of herself. A lot of the items that CCSunnydale listed just didn't go together or gave her a twitchy feeling that she'd learned not to ignore. "I think you're right, honey. There's something very odd about this place." Anya gave Tara a hug. "I knew you'd understand. Come on!" She closed the laptop's lid and headed for the door. "I hate closing the shop during the day, but this is important." A confused Tara followed. "Anya, where are we going?" "Cookie's Collectibles." Anya was standing by the open door, quivering with impatience and resolve. She reached into her handbag, pulled out a pink baseball cap emblazoned "I ♥ Beanie Babies," and set it firmly over her currently blond curls. "Undercover." She marched out the door. Tara followed with much greater trepidation. The restraining order specter was looming, and she didn’t want to go through that again.
They made their way up a rickety staircase to the second-floor. At the top, a panel door with a handwritten sign stuck at first, but gave way to Anya's determined shove. The interior was badly lighted and somehow managed to give the impression of being both cluttered and half-empty. Merchandise sat in sad little clusters on dusty and ancient shelves. Since items further away were masked by a haze of cigarette smoke that smelled as ancient as some of the wares, Tara examined a shelf by the door. A plate decorated with teddy bears sat next to a depressed-looking stuffed dog, which was leaning on a wooden case half-filled with tarnished silverware. A few inches away, a large ceramic cat grinned insanely. Tara looked more closely at the dog. It had been stuffed by a taxidermist, not a toy factory. "Ick." Maybe the cat was just gloating over the poor puppy's fate. Most of the items in the store had been organized about as well as that shelf, although there was a glass case behind a counter that held what Tara recognized as the "real" stock. There were stacks of jars containing herbs, some tacky ornaments, including a pile of the knives she'd disdained on eBay, and a pile of boxes that were relatively free of dust. Maybe those held some of those VHTF items? The case was locked, and a sign on it read, "Some items not for sale." "Can I help you?" Tara jumped and turned, to see a stout man of middle height and little hair was standing just behind her, his crossed arms resting on his stomach. His clothes didn't match him or the store. They were expensive slacks and what Tara thought was a real silk shirt. He wore a heavy gold chain and several clunky gold rings, as well as one of those watches that Tara always thought were a silly waste of money when the Timex her mother had given her for a birthday present worked just as well. "We're just browsing," announced Anya in a tone too bold for the purpose. "You know, like customers do." She stuck out her hand. "I'm—I'm Clarice. What's your name?" The proprietor looked at her hand for a moment, then grasped it with both hands, moving close enough to make Tara feel a bit angry and possessive. "Charley. That's me." He looked at Tara, or at least at her breasts, in a way that made her want to cross her arms across her chest. "And who's your pretty friend?" "Ta—" She stopped, remembering they were undercover. "Tansy." Anya pulled Tara forward, making her shake hands too. "She's my girlfriend." "Yeah?" Charlie's eyes gleamed in a nasty so-you're-lesbians-eh? way all too familiar to Tara. "Well, take all the time you want. As long as you want." The two girls wandered down a dreary aisle, and Tara resisted an impulse to hold onto Anya's hand for support. She had never seen so many things in the shape of other things in one place, and the sight unsettled her, even if a lot of the things were cookie jars and candlesticks, and they were mostly in the shapes of comical animals. There were also more figurines of cloyingly sweet children than she felt had a right to exist in the entire universe. Tara really, really didn't like this place. There was no magical energy she could discern, but it didn't feel right. She was also unnerved by the presence of Charlie, who was trailing along behind them. "Ooh!" Anya picked up a teapot that sent a shiver down Tara's spine. The pot had been shaped, or maybe warped was a better word, into the semblance of an almost-human face, and the handle was an extrusion from the creature's hair. The features were disturbingly familiar, but Tara couldn't quite place them. They were clearly demonic… "That is a nice piece," said Charlie, his voice moving into a salesman mode that sounded automatic and stale. "Now, I could let you have that for—" "Margaret Thatcher!" cried Tara in horrified, if belated, recognition. "That's Margaret Thatcher's face! And the spout is her nose." She turned to Anya. "There is no way you're keeping that in our apartment. Numinous urns I can purify with a few herbs, but this—" Anya set the pot down and cast annoyed glances at Charlie and Tara. "I do not collect teapots," she said stiffly. "I would never have gotten so excited about something I planned to buy." She nudged Tara. Tara was still staring in revulsion at the teapot, and it took another nudge and Anya's saying loudly, "My girlfriend is looking for some very special, magical items. I saw—someone told us you have that kind of thing." "Yeah." Charlie glanced at the locked case, then back at Tara, and grinned. "I can show you some stuff, sweetie." Tara nearly stumbled as she followed him. A stolen glance behind her showed Anya moving towards the back of the store in what she doubtless thought was a stealthy manner. Gritting her teeth, Tara smiled at Charlie and tried to meet his eyes so that his attention would remain focused on her. He smiled back, his gaze riveted to her breasts again, which she decided would work just as well. But she couldn't help wishing she'd worn a turtleneck instead of one of the pretty tops Anya had bought her. Charlie unlocked the case and set a large box down on the counter. Tara picked over an uninspiring pile of fake amulets and crystals, uttering a nearly Gilesian "Tsk!" when she found a dove pan meant to be used in a magic trick. It was labeled, "Magical urn." Since she had no plans to stick some poor, scared bird inside a pan and pretend to make it disappear, she set this aside and looked through a tangle of jewelry. One or two of the pieces had small, harmless charms attached to them. There was a clang of metal from the back of the store, but before Charlie could react, Tara started asking him some very silly questions about an amulet with a bit of amber in the center, and he responded with some very silly answers that he apparently made up on the spot. She'd never heard of Argentinean amber, and she was pretty sure the piece she was holding had come from Eastern Europe. She was positive that what he dismissed as a "minor flaw in the stone" was an insect that had been trapped in resin. This man knew nothing at all about his own stock. There was another noise behind her, and Charlie looked up suspiciously, but when Tara turned around, there was nothing to see but Anya holding up two lunchboxes, apparently deciding between Rambo and Ronald McDonald. Then she shook her head, put both boxes down, and tripped forward. "Find anything, honey?" Tara held up the amulet. "The amber in this one is pretty." Charlie smiled. "That's a precious stone, and it's in a magic amulet too. But because I'd like to keep you two as regular customers, you can have it for fifty dollars, and I won't collect the tax." He winked, inviting them to be his partners in cheating the state of California of revenue. Tara stepped backwards, retreating involuntarily from the overwhelming smarm. But Anya took a deep breath, and Tara realized that Charlie was about to pay for insinuating earlier that she was such an inexperienced haggler that she'd show enthusiasm for a possible purchase. She hammered the price down, "because of the flaw in the stone," and Tara got her bit of amber for seven dollars. Charlie looked bored by the whole business by that point. Tara tucked her purchase into her pocket. She intended to throw away the amulet, which was amateurishly designed and useless. But she had a friend who made jewelry, and she thought the amber might make a pretty pendant for Anya. As they left the store, Tara looked over her shoulder and saw Charlie disappearing into the back room. "What does he have back there?" she demanded as soon as she and Anya had climbed down the rickety stairs. "Not much." Anya frowned. "Well, lots of porn. Tapes and DVDs. Even more than Xander. And a big monitor for his computer to watch them on. I think that must be what he does most of the time, when he’s not on eBay." "That's all?" "Well, he certainly doesn't have anything really VHTF there, like one of the lost Doctor Who episodes, or even the Holy Grail. Mostly empty shelves. Very dusty and nasty empty shelves." Anya gave a shop-proud sniff. "But look what I found in the wastepaper basket!" Anya held out a rectangle of paper. Tara squinted at it. It was a mailing label for Mr. Marcus Tentrees at an address in London. "Do you know who he is?" "He’s the one who bought the God Pod. And, look, here's another one for Ms. Rachel Vincent, with an address just a few miles from here. She’s another big bidder." Tara shook her head. "So, he has mailing labels for his best customers. Why is that surprising?" "Look, I used to have lots of things of Xander's. I tore up all the pictures of us right away, of course, but there was stuff that had gotten mixed in with mine when I moved out. A commemorative coin for the decommissioning of Babylon 5, his buy-ten-get-one-free card from Doogie's Donuts with seven holes punched out, and his favorite jock strap. So I threw those out too. The guy in the alley complained to my landlord because they landed on his head when I pitched them out the window, but I said—" Even Tara's patience had reached a limit. "Anya, what does this have to do with those mailing labels?" "People keep things that are really important to them safe, and they throw out things that aren't, but sometimes they throw away things that used to be important. Or are important in a way that makes you want to get rid of them." Tara's head was beginning to hurt. "A mailing label? What are you saying, that the guy from Cookie's Collectibles broke up with this Rachel Vincent? Or Mr. Twotrees?" Anya unlocked the door to the Magic Box and flipped a sign over to show she was open for business again. "Tentrees. And I'm pretty sure it wasn't that kind of a relationship. Look, I print out labels like this all the time. When someone buys something from you on eBay, the site lets you print these to mail the packages. It makes it really easy to send them their gross of chicken's feet or whatever they bought. So why did he print out lots of these and then toss them away?" Tara took the strip of paper and examined it. "There's something wrong with it?" she said, but her voice was doubtful. “Or he delivers some other way?” "It looks fine. And it wasn't the only one. There were two or three others in there, all with the same address on them. Why print them out if you’re not going to use them?" Tara handed the label back. "I don’t see what it proves other than that Cookie's Collectibles and CCSunnydale are the same place. Maybe these people moved and he had to print new labels." "But they weren't thrown out all at once. He doesn’t empty his trash much, and there were other scraps of paper and empty cigarette packs mixed in, and some old bills. All the packing material was on the other side of the room, thrown in a big box." Anya cast a glance towards the back room, where her own shipping area was kept pristine and ready for action. "Hey, where are you going?" "Home to start dinner." Tara finished gathering up books and groceries. Anya pouted. "You think I'm being silly." Tara put everything down again, hugged her and kissed the pout away. "I think that you're right and there's something weird about that store, but I'm not sure we have enough clues to figure out what it is. I promise I'll talk about it some more at home tonight." Anya clung to her, not yet fully appeased. Tara carefully disengaged herself from Anya's embrace and picked up her books. "I’ll try to study before you get home, so we have time to talk."
The bell over the door jangled, confirming Tara's gentle and temporary desertion of Anya and her conundrum. Anya sulked for a minute or two, turning a mailing label over and over in her hands until a new idea struck her. Then she ran to the phone, and a minute later was saying, "Giles? You know how you're my silent partner even though you left us all alone here even though you had to know everything would go wrong without you? Well, I need you to be a little less silent for a while."
When Tara got home after dropping off Xander's car and going to class, Anya was sitting in the kitchen, a determined expression on her face and her laptop and a crystal ball in front of her on the table. "He's on-line right now. Cookie Charlie. So far tonight, he's put four things up for bid: a commemorative coin for the anniversary of Princess Di's death with a certificate saying the company that made it sold thousands of them, a copy of Left Behind, some novelty Margarita glasses, and a loaf of sourdough bread with Mr. Bill's face baked in the crust. No activity on the book or the glasses, about what you'd expect on the coin, but a $2,000 bid on the bread." "Oh, nooo!" said Tara. But Anya was too intent to be distracted. "You need to get on-line with that thing—" she gestured at the crystal ball, "and let me see what he's really up to." "Honey, I'm not sure that's the best idea. And it's almost dinner time, and I skipped lunch--" Anya interrupted. "I found out who owns Cookie's Collectibles, aka CCSunnydale." "Oh. Not Charlie?" "Charlie is an employee. With a very big house and a very expensive car. But CCSunnydale belongs to a larger corporation that is owned by a holding company that operates a string of successful retail businesses." Tara's stomach stopped growling and started churning. "What kind of businesses?" "About six places just like Cookie's Collectibles. All of which sell things on eBay." "Like Virgin Mary toast and Elvis potatoes?" Tara sat down at the table, dropping her backpack on the floor next to her. Anya nodded. "They make millions of dollars doing that. From just a half-dozen stores. But there's more. There's another company that runs a lot of little retail stores in three or four countries. Rachel Vincent is the CEO in the U.S. And I got Giles to check on some things for me. Guess who manages that business in England?" "Marcus Tentrees." Tara shook her head. I still don't understand." Anya pushed the crystal ball towards her. "That's why I need to you to look and see what he's doing." "I can't—" Tara's feeble protest faded. "There's something else you're not telling me." Anya looked down at the table. "After you left today, I saw Charlie outside the Magic Box, looking in the window. And the guard from the Vincent house was with him." Tara stared at the crystal. She had no choice then. "I'll need something for the locator part of the spell. Something of his or something that he handled lately." Mischief returned to Anya's face. "Would a bit of amber work?"
"I still don't get it," said Tara. She looked out the window. The street was narrow and grimy, but it was still more attractive than the interior of the tiny bar where she was enjoying a drink with Anya. And enjoying might be too strong a word for it, especially as far as the drink was concerned. "Were all those people on eBay really just Charlie?" Anya shook her head, her gaze also fixed on the street. "Only the losers. Marcus Tentrees and Rachel Vincent are real, and they made their own bids. They paid all that money for the God Pods and Mr. Bill bread, but they didn't want those things." Tara stirred her margarita. "Then why did they do it?" "They know people with lots of really lucrative and totally illegal businesses. They get cash from drugs, illegal gambling, prostitution and all those things people want but aren't supposed to have. But remember when we had that big run on charms and low-level hexes during the World Cup? I hadn't realized that so much of the Sunnydale demon population was into soccer and I wasn't ready for the rush. We were so busy I couldn't get to the bank for two days, and when I did, I had over ten thousand dollars to deposit." Anya's eyes shone with the memory. "They made me sign forms and things, and they told me they were going to tell the Treasury Department about it. I was afraid they were going to use that to take even more tax money away from an honest businesswoman, but they explained it was just to make sure I wasn't washing the money." "Laundering," said Tara. "I think they call it money laundering. I never understood how that works." A large but otherwise ordinary car pulled up across the street. A big but otherwise ordinary SUV parked behind it. Another oddly similar SUV pulled in front of the first two vehicles. "I read about it on the internet. All that reporting to the Treasury and tracking deposits is a big problem for really rich criminals. Because they make lots of cash, but you can't really show up at a Bentley dealership with a bag of tens and twenties, so what good does it do them?" Anya looked suddenly sympathetic. "Imagine having all that money and not be able to spend it! So they pay off little businesses like mine that make lots of little sales and are expected to have lots of cash. The little businesses deposit the drug money along with whatever they got for selling cigarettes and condoms and groceries and things like that. If it's spread out over enough little stores, no one notices, and it's a lot easier on the storekeepers than actually selling stuff." Men and women in nondescript dark clothes were pouring out of the car and SUVs. Several of them swarmed up the steps that lead to Cookie's Collectibles. Others ran around the back of the building. A waitress set another glass down in front of Anya, who sipped it eagerly. "This isn't too bad, but I don't think there's enough alcohol in here for them to actually need a liquor license." She returned to the topic at hand. "The problem is that if the police know you are a big-time pimp or drug runner, then they're watching you, so you can't be too close to the business that deposits your money, or they'll figure it out. But if you're far away from that business, in a corporate sense, you have to figure out some way to get your money back into your own account. But, of course, you let the people who own the grocery stores or whatever keep a nice big cut for themselves, so everybody gets rich." Tara watched as a struggling Charlie stepped onto the sidewalk, his hands cuffed. He was surrounded by several large men. Tara could see now that their nondescript clothes did not fit very well, as if they were wearing bulky vests underneath. She understood now. "So the grocery store magnates Marcus Tentrees and Rachel Vincent bought lots of stupid things on-line for lots and lots of money, and they paid it to a company owned by these drug lords and sex ring operators?" Anya sighed. "I don't think Charlie ever delivered the God Pods and Buddha Butter and the other things. That seems very sloppy to me. But he did print out the labels so that if anyone got a warrant to check the eBay records, they'd find nothing but a couple of really crazy rich people wasting their money on holy relic pastries." A man came out of the entrance to Cookie's carrying a CPU. A woman followed him, dusting her hands. She looked very pleased. Tara noticed that someone else was also looking very pleased. "So I really am the best VHTF seller in Sunnydale!," said Anya. "I bet lots of the things Charlie sold never even existed outside of Photoshop. But lots of money went from one person's account to another in what looked like legitimate, if stupid, business transactions. And they paid with credit cards instead of cash so the transactions didn't have to be reported to the Treasury. And if anyone noticed the auctions, all they'd think is that it proves some people just have more money than is good for them." "Or for other people." Tara watched as Charlie was pushed into the back of one of the SUVs and driven away. Slowly, the other two vehicles pulled out as well. "Anya, you were upset last night because you found out Charlie didn't have the kind of secret you could use to make money. Why are you so happy now?" "Well, I found out today that the really interesting thing, for those of us who are productive and non-criminal members of society, is that if you report someone who's money laundering, you get a reward." Tara swiveled in her chair to stare at Anya. "A reward?" Anya was beaming. "Yes. And since you helped, you get part, so you won't have to keep going to that Sara Lee person who I still think is a loan shark to borrow money for school." "Sallie Mae," said Tara, her throat suddenly dry. "I could get away from Sallie Mae?" "Isn't it wonderful?" Anya reached down and pulled something out of her carryall. "We get to make money from crime without doing anything wrong. All we have to do is help catch the criminals." "Yes, but—" Tara stopped, staring at the cap Anya was setting on her head. "Oh, honey, no. No, you can't. That's too dangerous." Anya patted the blue cap with "Bounty Hunter" written on it in large white letters. "Don't worry, Tara, I won't be foolish. I learned something from my mistakes on this case."" Tara smiled with relief, and lifted her margarita glass in a toast. "Good." Anya clinked her glass against Tara's. "Yep. I promise I won't ever wear this hat when I go undercover." Tara choked on her drink. Even better than vengeance for pleasure
Is justice rewarded with treasure, So this witch and ex-demon May shortly be schemin' To chase fugitives during their leisure. The End
The always fabulous ![[info]](http://stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} revdorothyl and I made up (I hope) most of the stranger eBay sales mentioned in this fic, although I'm sure those Princess Di items and a few others are out there, and there was a Nun Bun, although I don't think it was ever auctioned. There is one other notable exception. Here is a pic of the Margaret Thatcher teapot. I also referred to the Holy Grail and the lost Doctor Who episodes, which are indeed sought by the Faithful. Of course, everyone knows the best place to shop for David Hasselhoff CDs is Amazon, because of the quality of the reviews. If you check eBay, you may find that some of the names used in this fic are real user names. Those should all be me. I didn't want anyone to Google his or her user name and find this fic. However, there is apparently a limit to the number of IDs that eBay will let you make with the same IP address, so I couldn't reserve them all. None of the remaining IDs were listed on eBay at the time I finished this fic.
The End
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Please send feedback to: missmurchison@mchsi.com
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