"Look, you just can't meet Agnes Fairbrook. Sorry to break the news to you but she's very reclusive. I've only met her once, and even then she was just dropping off some blueprints. Other than that, I just talk by phone or letter." Lillard twiddled his cigarette between two fingers as he leaned on the frame of his trailer. "Sorry, folks, but that's just how it is."

"Like, you have her number though, don't you?" Shaggy pleaded. "Anything that would get us in touch with her?"

Lillard shook his head.

"She drops by when she feels like it, which isn't often. Furthermore, she gave me direct instructions not to give out her personal information, and since she's the one paying my rent around here, I'm not about to piss her off. Get it?"

Velma rolled her eyes. "This is ridiculous. You know that, right? You're being ridiculous."

"I'm not gonna bite the hand that feeds, lady," Lillard said.

"Then at least explain why you were so adamant about the specifications of the blueprints!" Velma demanded. "It's completely incongruous that you'd want to put on a good fair yet wouldn't budge on those obviously flawed schematics!"

Lillard blinked at her, gormlessly.

"Like, why'd you throw a fit about bad blueprints, man," Shaggy translated.

Lillard sniffed loudly and leaned back in order to look down at the pair. He had to lean quite a ways back to make it work.

"Look," he said, "you two wouldn't understand. Agnes has nothing to do with all this, see? I can tell you right now you're barking up the wrong tree. This is a, ah, whatchamacallit, a red fish blue fish?"

"A red herring?" Velma suggested.

"Yeah, that," he said, taking another long drag from his cigarette. "Agnes is paying me a lot of money to be in this role, and she's the one putting on this whole shabang. I can't see why she'd sabotage her own fair."

Something about Lillard's phrasing gnawed at the back of Shaggy's brain, but as soon as he tried to pin down the thought it skittered away like a frightened insect. He tried to recall exactly what it was that was bugging him, but he couldn't put his finger on it.

Velma sighed. To Shaggy's surprise, she turned around and thanked Lillard for his help. He looked as confused as Shaggy did. Without another word, Velma turned away and began walking towards the parking lot. She gave Shaggy a meaningful bump on with her elbow as she turned; she wanted him to follow her. Shaggy waved a half-hearted goodbye to Lillard, who sneered and stepped into his trailer.

"Not a lot of polite people around here today," Shaggy said, catching up to Velma. "So, like, what's up?"

Velma turned around as they reached the parking lot. In her eyes was a look of fierce determination.

"Shaggy, I have a plan."

Shaggy's eyes went wide with surprise. His lips curled into a smile, despite how he felt about their previous conversation.

"Like, you do? What is it?"

Velma put her hands on her hips and smiled with a swagger that Shaggy couldn't help but admire. She radiated confidence. "We're going to break into Lillard's trailer."

Shaggy's heart dropped.

"W-what?" he stammered. "Why?"

"Because," she said pointedly, "you know as well as I do that he's hiding something. Maybe he's got the Phantom's costume tucked away into a desk, or maybe he's got some secret set of second blueprints that will clear everything up. Heck, maybe Agnes Fairbrook is a fake name he made up. Whatever he's hiding, I have a hunch we'll find it in that little office of his."

Shaggy swallowed audibly.

"Yeah, but, like, if we get caught, we're done for! That's illegal! What about our reputation?"

"Do you want to find Scooby Doo or not?"

Velma's words felt like a splash of cold water on his face. Of course he wanted to find Scooby. He would die for that dog. In fact, he nearly had - many times. He had to go with the plan, of course. He knew that. He always agreed to The Plan, whatever The Plan might be. It was his role. He didn't like it, but it was what he was there to do, he knew.

"Alright," he said. "Alright, alright, alright. We'll do it. How?"

Velma grinned at her new accomplice.

"Simple enough," she said. "We wait until night, come back in the dark, then pick the lock. Bingo bango, we're in."

Shaggy looked at her, pleasantly surprised.

"You can pick locks?"

"Indeed," she affirmed. "It always seemed like something that would have come in handy back in the day, so I grabbed a book on it from the library and went to town."

"Wow," Shaggy said, admiring her attitude once again. "It's that easy?"

"Sure," she said. "Honestly, it's a bit frightening how easy it is to break into someone's house. Why, when I bought my first set of picks, I went down to my front door and gave it a try. Within three minutes, I'd-"

"Stop," Shaggy said, raising up a hand. He suddenly felt ill. "I'd rather keep my peace of mind, thank you. The less I know about how close I am to death every moment of my life, the better I'll feel about my next heart-stopping burger, thank-you-very-much."

Velma laughed.

"Alright," she said, "but you should probably invest in a better lock on your apartment. Just a word to the wise."

Shaggy groaned, and Velma laughed again.

"Alright," he said, "like, speaking of burgers, it's barely noon. What do we do until nightfall?"

"Sounds like you already have an idea," Velma countered.

"Well sure, if you put it that way - there's a little mom and pop burger joint about three miles down the road that has this thing called the everything burger. Like, it's got ham, turkey, bacon, sausage, lettuce, tomatoes, mayo, ketchup, mustard, relish, onions, a pickle spear, some stuff they call scrapple, and even some tofu on there."

"Some tofu?"

"Yeah," Shaggy said, "so it's healthy."

They both laughed and hopped into the Mystery Machine, a small trail of dust following them out of the parking lot as they drove off.

Author's note:

Chapter 10! Wow, I wasn't sure I would get this far. I'm glad so many of you are enjoying this story! There are more twists and turns to come. I believe I should have no trouble with the current schedule of one update per day, and I've got a few chapters of buffer between this one and my current point in the story.

Thanks for sticking with it so far! I've felt very welcomed by the FFN community. Feel free to reach out if you have any comments or questions!

Edit: The formatting on this got a little wonky - I've tried to fix it. Sorry in advance if anything looks like it's formatted strangely.