"Well, when you said you wanted to meet with me, I honestly wasn't expecting to actually meet with you in person." The people passing by the small cafe paid little mind to the woman in the black dress as she rested her elbows on the table and propped her head against the palm of her hand. She raised her brow at the short teen seated across from her. "This is what, the second, third time you've left your house in your whole life?"

"Seventh, actually." Wade Load, consummate genius and hacker extraordinaire, had to fight to keep his distaste for the current situation from showing on his face, though judging by the smirk on Shego's face, it seemed he wasn't fighting hard enough.

"Whatever, it doesn't matter." Shego rolled her eyes. "Why I'm here on the other hand, that does. So spill already short stuff, before I get bored and leave."

With that he gave up the fight entirely and his face twisted into the grimace of someone who's bitten into something sour and ill-tasting. His expression caused the young woman to chuckle and lean back in her seat.

"Aren't you little Mister Sunshine. What's wrong? Someone piss on one of your computers? Or maybe one of favorite porn sites got shut down, is that it?" Wade began to grind his teeth and the villainess only laughed louder at his reaction.

"Oh relax, it's not like anyone died." Her laughter ceased immediately as Wade reflexively went blank-faced, something he immediately berated himself for. "Wait, seriously? Someone got killed, so you spent your time tracking me down?"

She leaned forwards again and stared into his eyes with a flat and serious expression on her face. "Alright, I'll bite, who died?"

Wade sighed. He hadn't meant to give away that tidbit of information yet, but there was still a chance he could turn his slip to his advantage. It worked in Destiny \ Halt Dusk after all, and that wasn't too different from real life, for a visual novel at any rate. Well, that and he was rather sure that he could catch her off guard with the full set of details.

"Discharge."

The silence that dropped over the table was harsh enough to push aside the everyday noise that had filled the air.

"What." Shego's voice is flat and the word comes out more as a statement than question.

The teen hacker reached down beside him and grabbed the newspaper leaning against the leg of his chair before throwing it onto the table. The cover photo displayed a body hidden beneath a pale sheet, and it was easy to tell what had likely occurred given the blood staining the floor. The caption ran below the image, doubling as the headline for the paper. "The former high profile enemy of Team Go, Lance Alfvén, also known as the villain Discharge, is dead."

There was a pause as the information sunk in, and then came the question that Wade had been dreading. "Well I'll be damned — which, now that I think about it, I probably am already. So, who killed him?" She leaned back and tapped her chin with her finger. "No way it was Mr. Straightlaced Hego. The Wego's wouldn't have had it in them. I guess Mego could've done it. He'd definitely love the —"

"It wasn't any of them." Shego glared at the hacker for his interruption but he pressed on. "It was the only person, to be frank, who scares me more than you do. The only person I know you can track down for me." Wade stared across the table at the proverbial devil he intended to make a deal with, and wondered just where it was that everything had so utterly and completely derailed.

"Kim's missing, and I need you to find her."