Sometime in January 2016, in the back room of a high tech facility, a shadowy suited man laughed with a subdued tone as the United States of America launched a surveillance satellite into space. This shadowy man had built the satellite, and was very pleased with the results. With a grin on his face, he turned to face his employees.

"Thanks to all of you, Stage One of our Executive Global Outreach plan has been a success, and now it is time to begin Stage Two."

In the corner of the room, a lone male stood alone, with a phone to his ear.

"Any updates, Enrico?"

"Not yet. But he's going to say something. Put me on speakerphone."

"Si."

The shadowy man continued to speak.

"Stage Two of our plan, as I may have said before, is to acquire the Ultra LASER from a secret vault, hidden underneath the streets of Budapest. To get that we require a special key, a marble, known as the King's Shooter. Our latest intel tells me that the marble was last officially seen by Spanish airport security at the arrivals area.

"Are you getting this?" Enrico asked.

"Seems far-fetched to me?" came the voice on the other end of the phone.

"He has pictures."

"Can you get them to us?"

"I'll try." Enrico said before hanging up. He waited until all of the co-workers had gone before accessing the computer from which the boss had explained his plan. Having accessed the relevant files, he attached them onto an email and sent them to his friends on the other end via a private email server. Having sent the files, he started to shut down the computer. Just as he was about to finish shutting down, he was interrupted by the shadowy figure, who had returned.

"Didn't expect to see you here." The shadowy man said.

"Yeah, I was just…"

"You're standing at my computer. You've taken some sensitive files. I'm not as blind as you think I am. Sit down." Enrico slowly sunk into the seat.

"Given that the computer is off, I assume you've already sent them off, you dirty rat." He snarled, grabbing him by the scruff of the neck. "My business plan relies on my employees unwavering loyalty, and if they are not, then they are going to have some problems. Have I made myself clear?" he said menacingly.

"Yes sir. It won't happen again sir." Enrico whimpered. The boss stepped away from him, drawing a gun from his left pocket.

"No, you won't." *Bang*, *Bang*. Enrico thudded to the floor.

Over the ensuing couple of months, some people became displeased about the surveillance powers the new satellite would bring, so they protested, which occupied police time and reduced their coverage of the area, which allowed a few people to bend the rules. In the town of Birchwood, not much had changed. The kids found that there was more things to do. Charlie Brown, for instance, had stumbled upon a small, broken motorbike, which he eventually fixed, and now owns.

In her spare time, Sally Brown had found a tan brown longcoat, so she chose to moonlight as an ace detective, solving "crimes" after school and during weekends. These were always trivial things, like finding a lost watch, or solving crosswords. A few days ago (22nd March 2016) she had visited the Van Pelt siblings at their house. Lucy as usual had been outside, running her psychiatrist stand. Thanks to the current political state of affairs, Lucy had more clients than she ever used to. Unlike when she used to torment Charlie Brown, Lucy actually tried to give good advice to most of her clients, not that it made any difference. Sally and Lucy were both walking to the front door, when their paths crossed.

"Hi Lucy, how's things?"

"Pretty good, Sally. Nothing more interesting than usual. Any new cases to solve?"

"Nothing interesting, either." Sally replied. "Some kid dropped their pencil on the sidewalk. It took me 5 minutes to find it."

"Still, at least it beats school." Lucy replied. "So, what are you doing today?"

"Visiting Linus." Sally replied.

"Of course you would. You love him to pieces, don't you?" Lucy replied, smiling.

"Naturally." Sally said, walking up to the door. She knocked on the door loudly. Linus and Rerun were inside, watching TV. Linus heard the door knocking, so he got up from his beanbag and walked up to the door, his blanket clutched in his left hand. Linus opened the door, where he saw Sally and Lucy were waiting.

"Hi Linus." Sally said endearingly.

"Good evening, Sally. Hi, Lucy." Linus replied, blankly. Linus was of course aware of Sally's long established affection towards him, but he chose to ignore it. "Would you like to come in?" He asked them, politely holding the door open. They walked inside.

"What have you been doing today?" Sally asked him.

"Going to School, doing homework, watching TV, the usual." Replied Linus.

"And I've been at Kindergarten." Said Rerun, sounding bored.

"And I suppose it's as boring as ever." Lucy said, with a hint of sarcasm.

"Of course it is." Rerun agreed. "What else would I be grumpy about?"

"Not having a dog." Lucy pointed out.

"Let's not have an argument over nothing." Linus said calmly. "Mom will be home soon, and boy would she be cross when she saw you two bickering."

"You would be the perfect diplomat, Linus." Sally said.

"Don't you start." Linus said back, rejecting her compliment.

"I'm only being nice." Sally replied back. "Although if you don't want my praise then I shall be taking it elsewhere. Oh, and Rerun, if come to my house on Saturday, there are a bunch of case files that I need a second opinion on, if that interests you." Sally walked away from the siblings and out of the door, closing it firmly.

"I'll think about it." Said Rerun quietly afterward. No one said anything in response. The silence was interrupted by the jangling of keys in the front door.

"That'll be Mom." Lucy said dismissively. The door opened, and Mrs Van Pelt walked in.

"Enjoying yourselves?" she asked.

"Yes Mom." Linus replied. "We're doing fine."

"Homework all done?" She asked.

"Yes Mom." The three of them said in unison. The three of them continued watching TV for the next hour. In that time Mrs Van Pelt had begun cooking dinner, and Mr Van Pelt had returned home and greeted the kids. Dinner didn't start until 6:30pm, and by that time, all of the children were sitting at the table, and Mr Van Pelt had changed out of his suit into a red checked shirt and blue jeans. Mrs Van Pelt had just finished cooking 5 jacket potatoes, and she had just put each of them on everyone's plates. They all sat down and began to eat their food. Lucy was the first to bring up any sort of conversation.

"Next week's going to be fun." She said.

"You mean the field trip?" Linus asked in reply.

"Yes, that field trip." Lucy replied.

"Tell us more about this field trip, Lucy." Mr Van Pelt said. "I know we've all been talking about it since January, but your mother and I don't know anything about it, apart from that it's in Budapest."

"So, it lasts for a week." Lucy began. "On Tuesday we leave from the airport early, arriving in Budapest late in the evening."

"On Wednesday we go to the Art Gallery." Linus said, continuing on from Lucy.

"What about Thursday?" Mrs Van Pelt asked.

"On Thursday, we're going to a concert, I think." Linus said. "I can't remember what we're doing on the other days."

"All we do know is that it's going to be fun." Lucy said.

They continued eating. Meanwhile over at Charlie Brown and Sally's house, Sally and Charlie Brown had already eaten. Charlie Brown had already gone to bed, and Sally was summing up the cases she had solved that day in a notebook.

"22nd March, Today's cases: Dropped pencil on James Street. Status: Pencil found and returned to client." She wrote. After documenting these unimportant events, she went to bed too.