Cinderella Saves the Day

"You know, we have been watching this show for 20 minutes now and I still don't know what's going on. It may have to do with the fact that it's in a language I don't know." It was a hot July day and the only refuge from the sun was the air conditioned inside. Even then, the heat was affecting everyone differently. For the two people sitting alone on the couch, it created great lethargy.

"Yea, that could be it," the man lounging next to the sarcastic brunette added, "but the remote is too far away to change it."

"This is true, and since neither of us is going to get up, we're stuck; possibly forever," Jess added with a yawn. Hot weather always made her unusually sleepy and today was no exception as she rested her head on the shoulder of her fellow couch potato.

"Hey, you aren't falling asleep on me are you? I'm not going to try and figure out this friggin' Italian nonsense alone."

"I'm quite sure you'll live…or die whatever,"she added with a laugh, "I should take a nap before tonight, though; I'm quite sure I'll need it since the heat is sucking the life out of me." Searching around her area, Jess took one of the couch pillows, propped it up against the man next to her and laid down.

"Do I look like a bed to you?"

"What part of 'we're stuck; possibly forever' didn't you understand?"

"Well, I can't argue with that logic."

"I know," she remarked, "I'm a master debater. Just wake me up in time to get ready."

"What if I want to get up before then? You're kind of prohibiting me from moving here."

"Again 'stuck…forever.'"

"Oh," he exclaimed with a chuckle, "almost forgot."

While his leg acted as pillow for the aforesaid lady, Jigen tilted his hat down in order to catch a few z's himself. Making fun of foreign television wasn't the same without his partner in sarcasm anyways. His own travel into slumber was interrupted when the other female brunette in the men's lives appeared out of the corner of his eye.

"I really don't know what she sees in you."

"I don't know what you're talking about," the gunman stated. He wasn't in the mood for arguing or discussing such matters as that.

"Whatever, you're little friend there needs to get up. I said I would help get her ready."

"Hey," a muffled voice from the pillow exclaimed, "I have a name." The lethargic girl stretched and stood up with a new found energy. "OK, Operation: Get F-ing Pretty is in progress; let's go."

The process of Operation: Get F-ing Pretty was a long one as was expected. It wasn't that either woman was ugly to begin with; it was just because there was always so much to do. Any man that has had to wait for a woman to get ready knows it takes hours and hours. What they all do is a trade secret…or voodoo. Either way, the two men on the job were ready in their tuxes at the designated time and were left staring at a closed bathroom door that showed no sign of opening.

"Should we knock on the door again?" Lupin asked his comrade in waiting.

"Not unless you want your head friggin' chewed off like last time."

"Ug, true."

Luckily their wait was over when they heard the voice of Fujiko pronounce, "We're ready!" First to step through was the one who announced their arrival. Fujiko looked as radiant as usual, which produced the same horny dog expression from Lupin. She suppressed his wandering hands and added, "Wait till you see what I did with Jess."

She wasn't kidding because as the aforesaid girl walked through the door the two men couldn't believe their eyes. It's one thing to see pictures, but to see her all dressed up in person was quite amazing. Jess was confident (though she deemed it fake confidence,) even in this awkward moment she held her chin high.

"I asked her not to choose the red dress," Fujiko added, "but she insisted on it. Red isn't in fashion this year."

"Hey," Lupin interjected as he thought of his own style, "red is always in fashion."

With that, the two couples left for the party. They had rented a limo to take them to the engagement, but had a car waiting for their escape. The limo ride itself was relatively silent as everyone continued to go over the plan in their head. Jess, for her part, was absolutely terrified at the thought that she might mess everything up.

"I shouldn't be here," she thought, "I'm not cut out for this sort of thing. I have fake courage, not real courage." For all that was going on in her mind, her face showed no sign of the worry that was running rampid. The only indication was the index finger she tapped rapidly on her knee.

The man sitting next to her, though trying to focus on the job tonight, was quite distracted by the low cut dress she wore. In fact both men were distracted by their dates' new appearances. While Lupin blatantly stared, though, Jigen tried to be very discrete. What he did notice was Jess' nervous tapping.

"Cut that out," the gunman whispered to her.

"Huh? Oh, the tapping." Jess turned to look out the window. While she would have usually felt the sudden warm hand take hold of her own at that time, our brunette was too preoccupied with appearing calm to realize it. At least she stopped tapping her finger.

With a final reminder from Fujiko to "just look confident," Jess stepped out, took Jigen's arm, and mustered all the fake courage she could.

"It's just like being a Drum Major, except for the fact that if I had messed up the tubas wouldn't have shot me," the young woman thought to herself. "Song, what's a song I can sing to keep from going crazy?"

On the outside world of the brunette's head all was going as planned. Lupin and Fujiko walked up to the large man who guarded the door. Producing an invitation and a look at his fabulous date, the thieves entered with no problem. Next up was Jigen and Jess. She held tight to his arm and the gunman could have sworn she was singing that Les Mis crap she always listened to. But, just as the couple before them, they entered no problem.

"Wait, that was it?" the now relaxed Jess asked her date.

"Did you think you would have to do a handstand or something?"

"No, but now I feel like an idiot for being that nervous."

"I know; you nearly left me a friggin' amputee with that kung fu grip you had on my arm."

"O shut up, it wasn't that bad."

"Look at this," he said limply waving his arm, "I can't even move it!"

"You know," Jess whispered on the verge of breaking out in laughter, "you seem to take pleasure in tormenting me. Either suck it up or I'll give you something to whine about."

"It's that kind of sweet talk that must have all the men flocking," he continued with a grin.

"Yea, well flock you."

"Ouch," he added. There weren't too many girls who would take his crap, but she always took it with a laugh and usually countered it with some mean comment of her own. "Alright," he whispered as his expression went from a smirk to concentration, "you know what to do, I'll see you in about an hour." As the gunman strolled around nonchalantly waiting for the moment he and Lupin would meet in the adjacent room, Jess sauntered over to Fujiko.

"Did you find Mr. Narcus yet?"

"Yes," the curvy thief replied, "he's the man with the women all around him." She pointed out a very flashy looking man in the center of the floor with a gaggle of gold-diggers around him. He was the mark. It was Fujiko's objective to keep him occupied and to exchange the watch with a fake one. The reason for the switch was that Mr. Narcus took it upon himself to keep watch over his precious Helios Diamond via a camera projection in his watch. One may ask why he didn't just stay in the room holding it then. Answer: he was a very social and society conscious man. "I'll go it alone, honey, you just enjoy yourself."

"Hmmm," the girl in red mumbled in response. "All alone, I guess I will just make my own fun." Quickly scanning the room she found a tall lean man in the corner that seemed none too pleased to be there. He reminded her of the first time she saw Jigen in the Smithsonian.

"Not into the extreme social scene?" she inquired as she walked over.

"Oh, no…I prefer a small group of close companions to this mob of fair weather friends," he answered a bit off guard.

"I'm much the same, this really isn't my cup of tea…actually I hate tea." Her comment produced a smile on the sullen gentleman's face, which in turn made her grin. "My name is Jessica, how about you?"

"Well Jessica, can you keep a secret?"

"Depends on how awesome it is," she replied but detecting that he was being serious she added, "yes, of course."

"My name is Malcolm, Malcolm Narcus."

"As in the Mr. Narcus who is the owner of all this?" she remarked looking around at the large mansion.

"Yes, unfortunately," the billionaire said with dismay.

"I don't understand. You obviously dislike all this flash and sparkle, why do you throw parties and then sit in the back looking like your dog just died?"

"Because my dog did just die!" he exclaimed but began laughing. "No, I do all this because my publicist insists that I must keep up face in society so that everything continues to run smoothly. To appease me into doing this I was allowed to hire an impersonator who would act as myself so that I wouldn't have to deal with all the phoney people. You see him right over there," Mr. Narcus indicated to the flashy man with the gaggle of women around him including Fujiko. "To be honest, out of all the parties I have had to throw, you were the only one who has come to talk to me. May I ask why?"

"You reminded me of a good friend of mine. I'm quite sure he's not one for huge gatherings like this."

"Oh, is that the man you came in with? Is he your special someone?"

"I have no idea what we are," she whispered but feeling a bit uncomfortable she recovered and added, "How did you know who I came with? Were you watching me? Stalkers are not welcomed."

"I'm afraid I did watch you," he remarked with a laugh, "you didn't follow the prescribed fashion all these women worship and wore red. Your date shouldn't have just left you like that; he's obviously insane to let such a beautiful woman walk around by herself." He was moving closer, which was on the verge of crossing Jess' bubble.

Our now slightly uncomfortable brunette looked to the large grandfather clock and noticed it was the time the two men were going to work. With Fujiko occupied with the wrong man, Jess started to panic. She noticed the watch on her new friend's wrist and could see on the screen a clear image of Lupin and Jigen opening a safe. Now was not a time to follow her usual path of standoffish-ness.

"Yes," the now sultry woman exclaimed, "he was quite rude to leave me." Jess moved closer to Mr. Narcus and took hold of his hands to make sure he didn't look at his watch.

"You're a different one Jessica; you aren't like the rest of these gold diggers." His face was getting closer to her own and while red flags were being shot up everywhere in her mind she continued to stand still.

"I go to the beat of my own drum. You shouldn't let a publicist run your life. You should do what makes you happy." Jess looked down and saw that Lupin and Jigen were almost done.

"Right now, you are what is making me happy." Closer he leaned, but as soon as she saw that the two thieves were done she moved away. The clock struck midnight. That was the sign to for the girls to leave.

"I'm sorry, but I must leave."

"Leaving at midnight? Are you Cinderella?"

"Something like that. Remember, follow you heart, not what some publicist says is proper." Suppressing her initial reaction to jump in a fountain and scream from having to be so sensual with a person she didn't know, Jess calmly walked to the back door with Fujiko and simply left without a glance behind.

"Who was that man you were getting so close to?" whispered Fujiko to the eerily silent girl in red.

"That was the real Mr. Narcus. Check that watch you switched and notice that it is a fake; just like that man you spent your whole time speaking with." Fujiko was fully shocked at having made such a mistake.

"Listen, let's make a deal. It's obvious you don't want a certain someone to know of your little adventure and I don't want them to know I didn't hit my mark. Therefore, let's never discuss this ever again."

"I only did that so no one would get hurt."

"Physically yes, but if he finds out it'll be emotionally for sure."

"Hey girls," Lupin remarked from the front seat, "secrets are no fun. What are you all whispering about back there."

Thinking of the vilest thing to get him off the subject Jess blurted out, "Tampons."

"Ewwww," was the collective consensus from the two men in the front.

The ride home was oddly silent with the women giving each other death stares from across the car. Upon entering the hotel Fujiko and Jess continued the tension as both went straight to their rooms without a word of goodnight. Lupin attempted to coax Fujiko out with no avail and left his comrade to try his hand with the other brunette.

"Hey Jess, can I come in?" He knew she wouldn't talk about whatever it was with other people listening.

A crack in the door appeared with one brown eye peering out. With the assurance that it was the person whom she thought it was, Jess opened the door to let him in. Something was weird in the air; she kept at a distance and didn't even turn around to face him.

"OK, what's going on?"

"Can you unzip me?" Jess asked looking over her shoulder indicating to her dress.

"That wasn't a very good avoidance of the question," he replied as he walked forward to accomplish the task she requested.

"If you wish to know it falls along the lines of I don't appreciate being blackmailed." She waited for him to turn around to resume changing and continued, "It's a matter between girls. You all don't want to get involved."

"Well, beside that Mr. Lincoln, how was the play?"

"Hey, stop trying to make me laugh," Jess remarked with the assertion of a shoe thrown at his back.

"Oh, well I'm turning around now if we're going to start this crap again."

"That's fine; I was done dressing a while ago."

"So you would have me stare at the wall all night?"

"It seems that way, better than a trash can lid to the face again." Jigen had a sudden need to put his hand to his forehead as the memory of the event resurfaced. Although it pained him to remember it, he was glad to see her smiling again. "If it's all the same to you all, I don't think it is wise for me to go on jobs anymore. I become way too nervous."

"Well, you certainly never show it aside from that friggin' tapping."

The brunette's eyes became wide as a sudden realization came over her. "You held my hand." He didn't answer. There was no embarrassment at all, he just stared waiting for a reaction from her. "Are we going to do this again? Do you think we can do it right?"

His answer was interrupted by Jess' cell phone on the table. They couldn't just ignore it as she had purposely set it to the gayest sounding ring tone just for the sake of annoyance. The brunette walked over quickly, but by then whoever had called had left a message.

"Hey Jess, it's Kim. I know I never call at this time, but there is an emergency. Please call back immediately…something terrible is going on."