Chapter 4

"Hi, Nancy," Yomiko greeted cheerfully and surprisingly casually when she and Wendy returned to the library twenty-five minutes later, to find her waiting for them on the massive stone steps.

After all, a long walk really had been required to get Wendy over her fury at men everywhere. It had been rather worrisome when she had started plotting against Joe. To be sure, her plots had all been small annoyances, such as tying his shoe laces together, loosening the top of his pepper shaker, replacing his salt with sugar and his sugar with salt, and toilet-papering his house – Wendy had never been good at devious schemes – but even this was something totally out of the ordinary for the sweet, friendly, kindly-hearted secretary, and Yomiko had thought it best to steer her away from the library for a while. Give her time to compose herself.

However, at long last, they had found their way back, as, apparently, had Nancy.

"Did you return that vehicle to that poor cabby?" Wendy asked sternly.

"Yeah, I gave it back," she replied.

"Yeah; what was stealing the cab all about, anyway?" Yomiko asked with a frown.

"You know, I have no idea," Nancy admitted, equally confused. "I think it's something in the water here."

"It makes you steal cars?"

"No, it just makes the water taste bad."

Wendy looked from one to the other, and then blinked several times. Then…

"Owwwww…Wendy is confused."

"It's okay, Wendy," Yomiko assured her comfortingly. "It's been a confusing day for all of us."

"Why? What's going on?" Nancy asked.

"Well, apparently we didn't do a very good job of getting rid of all of the I-Jin."

"Oh, Ikkyu brought out one of his clones?"

Wendy and Yomiko blinked in simultaneous confusion.

"I don't know why I'm surprised," Wendy sighed.

"So, how many Ikkyus are there, anyway?" Yomiko asked.

"I don't really know," Nancy admitted thoughtfully. "I know of about five or six, but a few of them are just for parts."

"Yick."

"Well, accidents happen when you're a nefarious villain."

"I guess…"

"So, they're back, hmm? Any idea what they're doing?"

"No, not really."

"They're probably just trying to get back on their feet right now. I wonder which one took over. I'll bet it's the one he stashed in Northern Ontario."

"Why did he leave him in Northern Ontario?" Yomiko asked, bewildered.

"Cold tolerance. That, and he wanted to instil a healthy hatred of all people everywhere."

"A healthy hatred, you say?" Wendy murmured.

"Northern Ontario would be one of the best places to do it," Nancy continued. "There are only fourteen people who live there."

"I've heard about that," Wendy said. "All named Frank, right?"

"Even the girl," Yomiko added. "Isn't she really popular?"

"Yeah, that's the other thing. The Northern Ontario Ikkyu clone fell for Frank, and it broke his heart when she married Frank instead. So he left Northern Ontario, and the other twelve Franks, and moved to rural Saskatchewan right away. But it was way too crowded for him there, and it snapped his mind. So, he'd be the obvious choice, even if he is more flamboyantly evil than the last Ikkyu. I seem to remember him doing a lot of evil laughs at the Christmas party."

"Wow…" Yomiko commented, quite at a loss.

"Of course, it could also be the Easter Island one. Or the one in rural Manitoba. Of course, that's less likely. He didn't give that one a hat."

"And…the hat is important?" Yomiko asked, wondering how many more times her confusion could increase tenfold without rupturing the fabric of time and space.

"It had some special significance to him, I guess. You know, men and their little toys."

"Oh, don't I," Wendy said grimly. "I know all too well how a man can lose all interest in everything else once something new and exciting comes along."

"What's she talking about?" Nancy murmured to Yomiko.

"She's…having a bit of a personal crisis right now," Yomiko replied, expression sympathy mingled with utter bafflement.

"Oh, Joker, you bastard!" Wendy was meanwhile wailing, before running, weeping, up the steps and into the building.

"Uh…" Nancy began, before shaking her head. "No, never mind. I don't want to know."

"Hey, guys!" Yomiko greeted Joker and Joe cheerfully as she and Nancy entered the office, from which the rich scent of freshly brewed coffee seemed to be drifting. "Guess who I ran into!"

"I really don't think this is a good idea," Nancy told her. "They don't exactly remember me in a good light. Switching sides halfway through the mission leaves a bad last impression, you know."

"Well, I know you were really on our side," Yomiko said, eyes wide and serious.

"Well, actually-" Nancy began to reply, only to be cut off by an angry exclamation.

"What the hell's going on?!" a burly blond man whom many of us will know as Drake Anderson demanded, nearly spilling his coffee in his shock. Of course, the coffee-spilling may have only been due to his badly shaking hand, the result of the eight cups he had drunk already. "Aren't you supposed to be in some hospital?"

"That's my clone. 'Little sister'. Whatever," Nancy explained patiently.

"Oh, my," Joker murmured. Then, setting down his coffee cup with a shaky hand, he asked thoughtfully, "Well, if this is the case, how exactly did you manage to get out of the rocket, and back here?"

"Uh…um…well…uh…hey, look over there!"

As Joker, Drake, and Joe, as well as Yomiko, who apparently took a few tries to learn a lesson, looked curiously in the direction Nancy indicated, she bolted from the room, and the next moment, five very confused people watched through a window as she darted from the building, toward the nearest parked vehicle, and the next moment, the sound of a revving car engine filled the air.

"Uh…what?" Joker asked rather vaguely.

"I think I've seen her somewhere before," Joe was meanwhile reflecting thoughtfully.

Several seconds later…

"Hey, that was my car!" Drake exclaimed, charging from the room.

"Never do that again," he growled when, ten minutes later, he stalked angrily back into Joker's office, and poured himself a cup of coffee to help himself calm down, despite the utter irony of this ridiculous statement.

"Sorry," Nancy said, just a wee bit contritely, as she followed. "It's a reflex."

"What a weird reflex," Joe commented. Then, as he stared thoughtfully at Nancy, he continued. "I'm sure I know you." Finally, a nearly visible light broke over his face. "Oh, right! Skim milk latte, two artificial sweeteners, and cinnamon flecks! And latte with two-percent and whipped cream and chocolate flecks on special occasions!"

"That's got to be the weirdest thing I've ever been called," Nancy said, rather bewildered.

"What the hell is with this guy?" Drake muttered under his breath. "Hey, do you seriously only know people by how they take their coffee?"

Joe looked up.

"I'm sorry; what was that, strong-black-coffee-with-four-sugars-and-a-dollop-of-evaporated-milk?"

"Look at it this way, Mister Drake," Joker said, not entirely liking the way their new friend was being disparaged. "Joe is very good at what he does."

"Too bad it's the only thing," Drake rejoined with a smirk. "Still, it is damn good coffee. Hey, pass another cup over here, would you, Joe?"

"So, what do you do if you meet someone who doesn't drink coffee?" Yomiko asked.

"Doesn't drink coffee?!" Joe repeated, aghast, nearly dropping Drake's cup in shock. "Does such a creature exist?"

"Well…I don't drink coffee," she admitted slowly and thoughtfully.

Joe gibbered incoherently for a moment, and then pulled himself together.

"Okay, Joe, calm down," he commanded himself. "Just because you've just found out that your personal safety has been in the hands of some non-coffee-drinking nutcase for the last three days, there's no reason to panic." Then he turned back to her. "Well, you drink tea, right?"

"Sometimes, I guess…"

"How about hot cocoa?"

"Only at Christmas," she replied apologetically.

"Hot water with lemon?"

"Yuck."

"Steamed milk?"

"Steamed…what?"

"Hot lemonade?"

"Does Neo Citron when I get a cold count?"

"How about this: have you ever eaten your soup in a mug?"

"No, I eat my soup from the little Styrofoam containers I buy it in."

Joe looked devastated.

"I'm afraid I have nothing more to say to you, then."

A pause.

"But you're still going to give me that copy of Moby Dick, right?"

"Oh, brother," Drake grumbled. "Look, I've had a long day. Traffic was terrible, the flight over was nothing great, and then, once I got here, I had my rental car stolen-"

"You sure hold a grudge, don't you?" Nancy noted resentfully.

"I'd really just like to find out what the hell we're supposed to be doing, and why the hell I have to be doing it," the gruff, crusty pottery guy continued, utterly ignoring the interruption.

"Yes, of course. How silly of me," Joker said sheepishly.

I think all the coffee is eating his brain, Yomiko noted silently. I'd better tell Wendy about this.

"At any rate," he continued, "I might as well make it known that, as of today, Joe is officially our new coffee guy."

A sharp gasp from the door drew everyone's attention that way. Wendy, who had just appeared with an armload of papers, immediately dropped them, and to cover up, made a show of tripping over them.

"Goodness, I'm sorry," she called with a horribly forced little laugh, gathering the papers together again and wondering what on earth she would do all day, now that the other half of her job description of fetching and filing papers and making tea for Mr. Joker had been assigned elsewhere. If this meant a reduction in her hours! How on earth would she pay her rent? She'd have to sing at her landlord about how she was "not gonna paaaaa-aaaaaaay last year's rent, this year's rent, next year's rent," and so forth! And, as everyone knew, nothing good ever came of random musical interludes!

"Are you okay, miss?" Joe asked, alarmed.

"Just fine, thank-you," Wendy replied icily.

"Goodness, Wendy, are you sure you're feeling all right?" Joker asked, rising from his desk with a concerned expression. "I've never known you to be so out-of-sorts. Perhaps you're coming down with something."

"Ugh," Nancy groaned, shaking her head in despair as a nearly visible wave of the silliest drama-substitute possible crashed down upon the group.

"No, no, I'm perfectly all right, Mr. Joker," Wendy hastened to assure him, smiling valiantly.

"Still, perhaps you ought to take another short break. Will you join us for a cup of coffee?"

"No, I don't think I'll do that, thank-you," she replied through gritted teeth.

"Well, then, perhaps you ought to go have a cup of tea."

"Y-yes, I think I'll do that," Wendy agreed. Then she continued hopefully. "Would anyone else like one?"

With a sad little sigh as everyone replied that no, they were just fine with their coffee, or their lack of any hot beverage whatsoever, Wendy tried to slip quietly from the office, tripped over a box left in the middle of the floor, and pitched head-first into a bookshelf.

As an avalanche of books began to cover her, Joe, who had been regarding her thoughtfully since she had announced her intention of going to get a cup of tea, leapt to his feet and tried to haul her out of the pile, only to lose his balance and slam into the bookshelf again, causing the remaining fourteen books to bounce squarely off his head one by one.

"Sorry about that," Joe laughed nervously from his position both on top of Wendy and beneath several large, heavy books.

"Not at all," she replied with a slow, deliberate calmness that barely masked a rather alarming degree of fury.

Finally realizing exactly what those pleasantly warm, rather pillowesque things directly beneath his hands were, Joe leapt back in horror, face brilliantly red, nose beginning to bleed ever so slightly.

"What a stunning display of stupidity," Drake muttered, staring in perverse fascination as both tried to get up, and simultaneously slipped on stray books, only to land in an even more tangled heap on the floor.

"Now, now, let's not be too hard on them," Joker tried to say lightly.

"I don't think you possibly could be too hard on that guy," Nancy commented, perhaps rather unfairly, as the initial accident had been Wendy's, whether or not Joe had made it far worse than it needed to be. But danmit, Joe was the man, and everyone knew that everything in the world was a man's fault! The only reason the poor girl had tripped and crashed into the bookshelf was because the idiot man had put her into a disastrous mental state!

During this lengthy bit of narration, Wendy had scrambled to her feet, attempting to salvage what dignity remained, and began to gather together some of the nearest books.

"Oh, don't worry about those, Wendy," Joker hastened to say. "I'll look after them later. Why don't you go have that cup of tea and try to feel better?"

"Yeah! I'll go with you!" Joe suggested eagerly.

"Right. That'll make her feel a lot better," Nancy said lightly as Wendy visibly swallowed back a wave of horrified anger at this idea.

Yomiko, finally tearing her horrified gaze away from the books strewn about the floor, frowned in confusion.

"But…wasn't she upset because-"

"No, she's upset because she just got pinned under a bookshelf," Nancy hastened to interrupt. After all, if too much got revealed now, they'd have to come up with another silly side-story, and she had the horrifying feeling that it could only get worse.

"No, no, I'm sure she was upset because of Mr.-"

"Trust me. It's the bookshelf."

Yomiko blinked, then readjusted her glasses.

"Oh. Okay, then."

"Well, that's very nice of you, Joe," Joker was meanwhile saying. "In fact, I would rather like for you two to get to know one another."

"Of…of course," Wendy agreed with a very forced smile.

"Cool!" Joe beamed. "And hey, maybe I can give you some pointers to improve your tea technique! If I can work my magic with coffee, I can work my magic with tea, baby!"

"Yes, perhaps," Wendy agreed again with a smile so forced it more resembled a grimace of the sort of pain one feels while giving birth to a thistle patch.

"How nice," Joker beamed after Wendy and Joe as the two left the office, Joe chattering animatedly about something or other, and Wendy trying very hard not to save the I-jin some trouble by strangling him with a spare bit of thread from her travel sewing kit. "I'm certain they'll be the best of friends in no time. Now, as I was saying, the point of bringing you two – " Here, Joker nodded toward Drake and Yomiko in turn. " – not to mention Joe, is to keep him safe from his former employers, who wish to kill him."

"Why?" Drake asked, bewildered.

"Do you mean, why do his former employers wish to kill him?" Joker asked.

Drake hesitated.

"Sure, if you like."

"Er, very well. As I see it, they wish to keep the man's skill from the rest of humanity, as they do not believe the rest of humanity worthy of drinking coffee of such high quality."

"Wow…they've really run out of things to do," Yomiko said decidedly.

"Be that as it may, Agent Paper, it is now your and Mister Drake's duty to keep Joe safe from the I-Jin. You will find and eliminate the assassin teams that are currently searching for him."

"Do we have to keep him safe from his own stupidity, too?" Drake asked.

"Er, yes," Joker replied.

"Damn," Drake grumbled. "They don't pay me enough for this. I've gotta babysit not only her – " He gestured toward Yomiko. " – but that coffee-obsessed idiot? And don't tell me; she's along for the ride, too," he finished in disgust, gesturing toward Nancy.

"Well, as long as she's here, she might as well be!" Joker said brightly.

"What?! Hey, does 'complete betrayal' ring any bells to you?" Drake asked angrily.

Joker thought carefully.

"No, not really," he finally answered.

"Okay, no more coffee for you," Drake proclaimed, yanking away the other man's coffee mug.

Joker suppressed a sad whimper, but, as his hand shook uncontrollably, decided that perhaps it was for the best.

"Um, Mr. Joker?" a timid voice piped up.

He looked up at the source, and sighed at the sight of Yomiko fidgeting nervously, casting worried glances in the direction of the bookshelf.

"Yes, Yomiko, you may go pick up the books."

With a relieved sigh, she leapt from her seat and began gathering up the various heavy tomes scattered about the floor.

"It'll be okay," she assured one particularly battered book, stroking it soothingly before putting it back on the shelf.

"Damn it, why me?" Drake whimpered.

End Notes: Whoo! A rewrite! Glaring continuity errors have now gone the way of the old moon! Or something... :o)