Two Days of Research & Recon, and Twenty-Five Hours & Thirty-Seven Minutes of Planning Later…
"If I've told you once, I've told you a hundred times!" Alice growled with frustration, "There isn't a large enough time window for me to get there!"
"It's two flights of stairs!" replied Marisa angrily, "I could run that easily in my sleep!"
"Well then why don't you run that part? Oh wait, that's right. You're going to be five levels up because," Alice switched to a poor impersonation of Marisa, "'Only I'm fast enough to avoid the patrols, the both of you are too fat and too out of shape! I'm so awesome, with my bland monochrome fashion sense and my Master Spark, ze~!'" she mocked. In the background, Patchouli sighed. The train of thought had finally been derailed. Not bothering to pay attention when she didn't need to, she cracked open a book and started reading.
"Oh, so now you're going to bring up my verbal tic, are you? The one I've finally managed to get rid of with three years of speech therapy? Gee Alice, that's so totally mature of you! They sure as hell did a bang up job with you at Makai U., didn't they? I guess they just passed you so they wouldn't have to deal with upsetting the little mommy's girl!"
"How dare you! I never got anything handed to me on a silver spoon just because I was the headmistress's daughter! If anything, my professors expected even more from me! I went through four years of HELL dealing with academics, obnoxiously self-entitled brats for classmates, and real world problems while you just sat at home in your underwear getting off on your broom!"
"One time! That happened one time!"
"That I know of!"
A loud banging noise brought the two out of their heated argument, and the pair of blondes turned to behold a large plate of cookies that had been unceremoniously dropped onto the center of the table. Standing nearby was their bearer, a redheaded serving girl holding up a tray with three glasses of milk, dressed in an obsidian servant dress and a blood red tie.
"Now, now, girls," she chided gently, "I think that's enough posturing for one night. Why don't you take a break and have some Koa Cookies and milk?" She smiled as she set down the drinks, the frustration seeming to drain away as the two reached for their cookies.
"Thanks Koa!"
"Thank you Koakuma."
Patchouli walked over wordlessly as she grabbed her snack. "…Thanks," she muttered as she nibbled away at the treat.
Koakuma beamed at the ever so slight praise. "Is there anything else you would ask of me, Mistress Patchouli?" Patchouli shook her head in the negative. "Then may I ask a kiss as reward for my service?" She leaned over, her lips pursed in expectation.
Patchouli rolled her eyes before flicking Koakuma in the forehead. "Don't be ridiculous."
Koakuma frowned in her fake pouty way, as she was wont to do when Patchouli rejected her advances, before turning back to the blondes. "And are the two of you calmer now?"
Alice and Marisa glanced at each other, the latter currently with two cookies shoved in her mouth. Alice sighed. "I'm sorry Marisa."
Marisa swallowed with aplomb. "I'm sorry too Alice."
"Excellent!" cheered Koakuma, "…Although I wouldn't mind seeing the other alternative…"
"What's that?" asked Patchouli quietly.
"You know the old saying: make up or make out!" Koakuma received another head flick.
Once the cookies had been eaten, Alice sighed. "Going back to the matter at hand… We can't do it Marisa. We just can't do it."
"…I know…" Marisa hung her head despondently, before raising it again a few seconds later. "You know what this means, right?"
Alice wrinkled her nose in distaste. "Yes," she replied, "But I'm not going to like it."
Patchouli arched an eyebrow in puzzlement. "Why? What does this mean?"
Marisa shot her a glance. "We need to hire an intern."
Marisa, Alice, and Patchouli sat on one side of a large metal folding table, ready to interview some interns. In front of Alice was a small pile of folders and files, a single pen lying within reach for optimal efficiency. In front of Patchouli was the same, though there was no pen, for Patchouli wasn't going to bother writing anything as she didn't really care. In front of Marisa was…an apple. Which she proceeded to pick up and bite into, bits of apple flying out as she called the first applicant into the room…
"Name and qualifications," prompted Alice.
"I'm Suika Ibuki." The woman paused to take a swig from a gourd-shaped flask. "Lessee now… I'm super strong, super drunk, aaaaaaaand….!" She paused, sending a drunken leer at Marisa, "I'm super horny!"
"Denied!" screeched Alice, slamming her fist down.
"First give me your name," commanded Patchouli listlessly, as she idly wondered what Koakuma was preparing for dinner. "Then tell me what you can contribute."
"I'm Kogasa Tatara. And… I have lots of umbrellas!" To illustrate her point, the blue-haired girl reached into her bag, pulling out two armfuls of umbrellas.
On the other end of the table, Alice sighed with relief. Well, at least this wasn't too weird, right? "I'm also great at licking things!"
"OUT!"
"I'm Keine Kamishirasawa, and I possess an eidetic memory. Additionally, when the moon is full, I become extremely horny."
"Reusing jokes already? Out." Patchouli deadpanned.
"What's your name?" asked Marisa.
"My name is Cirno, and eye'm the strongest!"
"Rejected," Marisa dismissed immediately.
"What?! But you didn't even give me a chance!"
Marisa rolled her eyes. "Fine. What are your qualifications?"
"Eye'm the super illustrious, highly esteemed, and exceedingly good looking leader of Team (9)!"
"Oh! Why didn't you say so? Definitely rejected. Next!"
After two hours, dozens upon dozens of people had been heard and rejected, none of them meeting the team's requirements. Soon, it was down to a single applicant. It was at this point that three things occurred.
First, Alice stormed out of their makeshift office, fuming at the constant barrage of sheer idiocy, misconduct, and perversions of not just one but all of their applicants! This was why she surrounded herself with dolls; there were no unrealistic expectations projected onto their intelligence.
Second, Patchouli stopped caring. Well, to be fair, she'd stopped caring for a while now, but as Alice stepped out, she figured there was no longer a point to hiding her disinterest, so she'd popped open a book and immediately burrowed nose deep into it. In response, Koakuma quickly tried to burrow nose deep into her, but was repulsed easily enough.
Third, Flandre Scarlet walked into the office.
The blonde loli plopped herself down onto the metal stool, a broad smile on her face radiating sheer, oblivious happiness. Marisa tossed a finished apple core across the room to the growing pile of finished fruits, her hand reaching down to pluck another from her basket. She eyed Flandre in curiosity before taking a bite.
Immediately she spat out the chunk she'd bitten off, and hurled the fruit into the garbage. Flandre looked at her in confusion. "Sorry about that," she apologized, "Bad Apple."
Flandre nodded happily. "So," started Marisa, "What's your name?"
"I'm Flandre Scarlet!" she chirped, "It's nice to meet you!
"It's nice to meet you too Flandre. So tell us. What are your qualifications?"
Flandre put a finger to her mouth, deep in thought. "Hmm… I… like playing."
Marisa raised an eyebrow. "…Playing?"
"Yep!" nodded Flandre enthusiastically. "Mainly with weapons! Just last week I got a DOWS98 Zun-Pattern Assault Minigun Mark IV off gBay! It came fully equipped with a 16x detachable scope, customized grip and trigger, extended barrels, and a 70mm grenade launcher attachment!"
Marisa stared at her.
"I got it to fire about two million rounds before it broke down, which is actually pretty good considering I was firing it nonstop for about four hours, and got it off gBay. You know what they say! A good gun can fire twice its monetary worth in ammunition before it breaks. And the two million rounds, which were explosive rounds too, cost a lot of money! I almost had to break into my piggy bank!"
"…so you know your way around a gun?" asked Marisa.
"Yep! If I can get it off gBay, I know how to use it!"
Marisa glanced at Patchouli, but the purple-headed woman was completely unhelpful, too engrossed in her book to care. She then glanced at Koakuma, but the red-headed woman was equally unhelpful, too engrossed in Patchouli to care. She then glanced at Alice, but the table's empty spot was a glaring reminder of her earlier departure.
Marisa blinked. Well, what the heck? How bad could it be?
"Congratulations Flandre. Welcome to Mayhem."
"So… What does Mayhem mean, anyway?" asked Flandre as she stared up wide eyed at her employers.
Once Alice had returned, they wasted no time in ushering Flandre to the backroom, the place where their planning and preparation came to life. They'd say her down on a stool, then laid out a series of maps, schematics, timetables, and blueprints before her. Some were slapped haphazardly on a table, others were drawn down from ceiling mounted hanging screens, and others still appeared on a large flat screen television on the far side of the room, movable with the swipe of a finger.
The members of Mayhem glanced at each other, wondering just how they wanted to answer the question. Seeing their pause however, Koakuma quickly chirped up. "It's an acronym! It stands for Marisa's Aspiring Youthful Harem of Excitable Maidens!" The red-headed serving girl felt three glares at her back, and turned to give a sweet smile.
Flandre tilted her head in confusion. "So… I'm part of a harem now?"
"No!" chorused Alice and Marisa in unison.
As the pair tried to extinguish the idea of harems to Flandre's innocent mind, Patchouli turned to Koakuma. "Did you really need to mention that?" she deadpanned.
"Absolutely!"
Patchouli facepalmed. "Well, at least you didn't tell her the actual name…" For the uninformed, the actual name was 'Marisa's Aspiring Youthful Harem of Erotic Maidens'.
"So…" continued Flandre, "I'm not part of a harem…"
"Yes," affirmed Alice in exasperation. "Look, let's just move on, shall we?"
"Un!" agreed Flandre with an adorable nod.
"Alright then, listen up newbie." Flandre gazed up at the doll enthusiast, eyes wide and eager for the road ahead. "We're going to steal," Alice paused to consider her next words, "A religious artifact."
"A holy object?!" gasped Flandre.
"Yeah," started Marisa with a chuckle, "There's a good chance it's definitely-"
"Marisa!" Alice hissed, glaring at the master thief. For her part, Marisa just laughed. "Ahem! As I was saying, we are going to steal a religious artifact. You don't need to know what," she added quickly, seeing Flandre about to ask. Flandre pouted indignantly. "Oh don't look at me like that! It's for operational security!" Alice snapped, though the light pink dusting her cheeks tended to belay that reasoning.
"But Koakuma knows!" Flandre protested, pointing accusingly to the group's cleaning lady.
Koakuma paused in her dusting, twirling gently to face the new recruit whilst simultaneously showing off the custom tailored maid outfit she had somehow found time to change into. "Who, me? I have no idea what you're talking about!" she declared, though the smug smile that followed most definitely revealed her obvious falsehood.
"It doesn't matter what Koakuma knows or doesn't know," Alice said before Flandre could complain again. "What matters is that you are an intern, and you do what we say."
"Just tell her what she needs to know and get on with it," complained Patchouli, actually bothering to look up from her book.
"Yeah Alice," goaded Marisa from a reclined position in a swivel chair, nonchalantly popping a piece of chocolate in her mouth, "Get on with it."
"Why do I have to be the one to brief her anyway? You're the one who hired her!"
"Yeah, but you left early. So now you get to pick up the slack."
Alice grumbled incoherently under her breath, but didn't argue the point. "Fine." She grabbed one of the larger timetables buried beneath the veritable mountain of paper and slammed it down beneath Flandre's nose. "Now then…let's get to it, shall we?"
Abstraction is a wonderful thing, isn't it? Also, time skips! Yay!
"So," asked Alice, "Do you think you've got all that memorized?"
Flandre looked up at her cluelessly. "Umm…"
Alice sighed despondently. She cast her gaze to Marisa and Patchouli, but the former had fallen asleep, leaned back in her chair with her signature witch's hat covering her eyes and her feet atop a file cabinet, and the latter was pointedly ignoring her. Growling in frustration, Alice kicked Marisa's chair, sending the blonde to the floor with a loud crash and an alarming shout of awakening.
"Okay, let's run through it again…"
Look! A birdie!
"Do you at least know what you're going to be doing and when?" inquired Alice, her patience wearing thin.
She'd spent the last six hours trying to teach this girl their masterfully crafted plan, and all her attempts had ended without success. Patchouli had been of no help whatsoever, and Marisa had tried, but kept screwing around, so Alice had eventually told her to go out and bring them all smoothies. That had been two hours ago. Amazingly, Koakuma, the only one not involved in the actual plan, had been the most helpful, both in organizing the necessary charts and in the actual explaining to Flandre. Alas, her help was limited by her periodic attempts to get in Patchouli's panties, endeavors that were neither lengthy nor effective.
"Yep!" chirped Flandre.
Alice sighed in relief. "Good. Then take this," She reached into a hidden compartment and withdrew a sack of money, placing it before a wide-eyed Flandre. "And go buy yourself a weapon from Nitori's shop, Kappa's Kaboom!. Then go to Kokoro's place, Faceless Facelifts, to get a mask so you don't get recognized. Then come back here and we'll start the final stretch. Okay?"
"Okay!" exclaimed Flandre enthusiastically. She hopped off the stool, grabbed the sack, and made off like a bandit. Which, she supposed, she would be in the next couple days…
