Anderson's receptionist-slash-secretary was a hard-core military-trained woman. She'd had 10 years of active combat before being relegated to a desk, which was irritating to the team for a small handful of reasons, the main one being that she would totally call them on all their shit.
No matter what the team tried, she was immune.
And she was smart … Oh Heavens did she give them a run for their money.
Mischief and mayhem simply did not work with this woman.
Jason called her the "Iron Curtain", the assumption being that nothing, no one and no how got past her without her knowing the most intricate details about it. Princess assumed, however, that the "Iron Curtain" comment was far more seedy and insulting that Jason would care to admit.
She assumed that he'd probably tried to … open her curtains … so to speak.
She'd heard a rumour that he had tried to use his charm to sneak through to the Chief's office when his keys to G2 had been confiscated after an illegal street race bust. She'd been immune, though, apparently. Unaffected by the Condor's husky charm, and completely disinterested in anything he had to offer her, she'd given him a verbal slap across the ass and sent him along his way.
Oh she bet Jason must have been pissed off.
She got an inkling of his ire towards Sgt. McCoy when she'd suggested he try and distract her so she could get in to Anderson's office. He'd muttered something about frigid old hags and how he would rather amputate his own … member … than try and come on to her.
Ooh that was harsh.
Amputation over implying he'd rather have sex with a man? That had to be the ultimate insult.
Jase was proud of his little Jason – sorry - king-size, ultra-length. King-Kong, Titan super sabre shlong. He'd die a million painful deaths before he'd amputate.
So, in other words, he truly loathed this woman.
It took them about five minutes of heavy discussion and a squeal of disgustingly feminine fear at Keyop's pet tarantula from Princess for them to decide on their mission parameters for Operation "Get Rid of the Secretary".
If Princess – the woman who would wander into a heavily fortified Spectran base and face Zoltar without breaking a sweat or batting a lash – could be so scared of a little hairy eight-legged critter, then surely the stone-faced warden of the main offices would be, too. So long as all rolled up newspapers and magazines were outside of her reach, the critter could scare the bejezus out of her without being squished and they'd be free to ferret through the Chief's office.
Keyop had taken much bribing, however, and they'd lost precious time. Jason had to promise to allow the boy to drive the G2 once, and solo, in order to use the hairy critter, and Princess had to promise a pizza/Nintendo night with no curfew what so ever.
Big sacrifices on both parts…especially to Jason, whose eye had developed a slight twitch since Princess finished the bartering.
So now they walked towards the Chief's Office, and Sgt. McCoy's desk. Princess walked as close to the wall, and as far from her little brother, as was possible. Jason appeared not to be bothered, although his eyes were definitely on the mammoth arachnid. The spider, named Fuzzy-Butt, was proudly perched on his owner's shoulder. He didn't move, but Princess felt all of his eight eyes watching her, and made sure the rolled newspaper was secure and ready in her hand … just in case tarantulas jumped.
Sgt. McCoy lifted her eyes slowly as the threesome approached. Her professional smile quickly faded, and her eyes rolled and she looked back down at her paperwork.
"Security Chief Anderson is unavailable at the moment. You'll need to come back later."
Princess gave her most innocent stance, both arms straight and taut, held together at the hands, behind her back. She had her hip slightly tilted to the side in a purposeful slouch, and her head dipped shyly. "Then maybe we could just wait for him in his office?"
Jason's eyes rolled upward at the sickly-sweet way in which Princess spoke, but said nothing.
Keyop smirked and petted his pet spider. He dipped his shoulder toward the Receptionist's desk, which allowed the spider to drop gently on a pile of papers in front of her. He let out a small chuckle, "oh, sorry."
McCoy froze, and raised a brow at the spider rearing onto its hind legs, but showed no other outward reaction.
Keyop seemed pleased, and smiled with closed eyes at Jason. He pressed both hands onto the edge of the desk and lowered himself to be at face level with his pet. His eyes caught the receptionist's. "Do you like my pet? His name is Fuzzy-butt."
"Please get that insect off my desk," she responded in controlled tones, obviously desperate not to show any emotion.
Rather than attempt to correct her on the incorrect identification of the insect's family classification, Keyop thought he'd play cute. "Aww, but I think he likes you. Look, he wants to dance."
Princess shuddered and tried vainly not to show her own morbid fear. "Is that thing safe, Key?"
Keyop shrugged and stroked the spider's back with the very tip of his finger. The sound that came out of his mouth seemed to be "I dunno" but the hummed way with which it was spoken made the actual words unrecognizable.
McCoy cleared her throat. "If you don't get rid of that thing, Swallow, I will kill it."
"You do, and I kill you." A well hissed threat.
"What?" Jason asked as he chewed on a well-tooth-beaten shuriken. "The big, bad Sergeant doesn't like a little spider?"
She raised her eyes to him and clicked her tongue in disappointment. "If you kids have no message for Security Chief Anderson, then I'll have to ask you to leave. I'm very busy."
"Oh come now," Keyop chirped. "You can touch him." He gave the spider a little push with the tip of his finger. It wandered a couple of inches closer to the woman, who recoiled and turned her head away from it – but she kept an eye on it.
"Get that thing out of here!" She snapped. "You can be sure I'll Report this to the Security Chief if you don't."
Keyop raised a brow at Princess, then turned back to the receptionist. "Fuzzy-Butt just wants to play." Fearing his pet may become a splat, Keyop reached down gently to pick him up.
Unfortunately a small cricket, and escapee from the base's Entomological labs, chose that exact moment to leap up onto the desk, then onto the perfectly crisp green uniform of the receptionist.
Fuzzy-butt leapt, literally, into action.
Before Keyop could blink, or react, the spider leapt on to the Receptionist's chest.
Princess' and Jason's eyes widened in expectation.
There was a moment of still, where the air seemed to vacuum out if the room … and into the chest of Sgt. McCoy … and then a scream. The scream started out as a low, hoarse warning, then escalated into a shrill, more panicked sound as the spider chased its bounty up onto her shoulder.
McCoy stood bolt upright, took a breath, then let out another scream. "GET THIS THING OFF ME!"
Keyop started to panic. "Just stay still, let me get him."
McCoy didn't allow the young boy any time before she kicked her chair out of the way, and bolted – still screaming – out of the office.
Keyop was half a step behind her. "Don't you kill him! Don't hurt Fuzzy-butt!"
Jason and Princess watched with wide eyes as the two of them left the office. The screaming sound quickly moved away, no doubt to the ladies' washroom. They took a brief moment, glanced at each other, and burst into laughter.
"Oh God," Princess panted, barely able to take a breath from her exploding laughter. "That was brilliant!"
Jason's face turned red as his breath exploded from his lungs, and he let out a snort as he struggled to inhale. "Did you think she'd be able to move that quick?"
"With that outfit on? Nope."
Jason wiped at his eyes. "That, alone, almost makes loaning Sweetheart to Keyop worth it."
Princess nodded and tried her absolute best not to have to snort an inhale herself.
Fortunately the booming voice of Anderson from the hallway stole any laughter she had left in her.
"What on God's green Earth?"
Jason's eyes immediately widened, "Did he give up swearing for Lent or something?"
Princess coughed and all to quickly adopted her most impossibly innocent stance. "Shhh," she stifled a laugh. "He's gonna be ticked."
Jason shrugged and leaned his shoulder up against the wall beside Princess, waiting for the Chief's entrance.
Anderson entered the outer part of his office with an annoyed stride. Two steps behind him was Cronus, who seemed mildly amused. They took a look at the two birds doing their best to look innocent and shook their heads.
"I should've known," Anderson huffed.
"Hey," Jason breathed as he rose his hands, palms out, in innocence. "Blame the kid. Prin and I don't walk around with giant, fucking spiders on our shoulders."
"Jason," Princess breathed in warning. "Language."
Cronus smirked and took a seat in the waiting area. He knew this might take a while.
Anderson took a couple of breaths, raised a finger to speak, thought better of it and huffed out a long-suffering breath. "Oh, you are both going to come up with one Hell of an apology."
"Why?" Jason hissed. "It was the kid's animal."
Princess pursed her lips and looked to Cronus for assistance. He shook his head and leaned back in his seat.
"Somehow," Anderson said slowly, "I get the feeling that someone put Keyop up to this. He doesn't EVER take that damned spider out of his room."
"First time for everything."
"Are you … arguing with me?"
Princess groaned. Okay, this was going from fun to just bad. "Jason, come on, let's go."
Anderson shook his head. "Oh no, not so fast. I want the two of you in my office now."
Jason let out a huff, Princess sighed, but they did as asked. Cronus followed them closely, curiosity abounding.
Anderson immediately notified Mark to join him in the office and then started on a litany about their supposed behaviour and disrespect to Base personnel.
The tirade lasted a long ten minutes before Anderson was forced to drink a glass of water to wet his throat. Jason seemed completely unaffected by it, while Princess, quiet with her head down, seemed pretty close to crying … or laughing … it was hard to immediately tell.
Jason finally leaned in to Princess when Anderson turned away from them to refill his jug of water. "Cronus, you and Mark in the same room."
Princess' eyes widened. "And?"
He smirked. "Twenty this time."
Princess' head titled sideward. "Only twenty?"
"You want to break me, Prin?"
She let out a giggle, and was immediately silenced by a low growl from Anderson. "Are you two about done with your shit?"
Princess sucked on her top lip to stop a giggle. "No," she whispered to Jason, "he didn't give up swearing for Lent."
From the front office, McCoy (who must have recovered from the spider attack) shakily greeted the Eagle Leader.
Jason gave her a little nudge. "It's a dare and a bet, Princess."
She closed her eyes and let out a short breath. "Okay." She rolled her shoulder, flicked her hair and slid across the floor toward Cronus. He looked up at her as she coyly leaned across him to retrieve a tissue. She made sure to let her shirt hang forward to give him an eyeful of white lace. "Excuse me," she purred low and sultry as she slowly rose to a stand, then lowered herself into a seat on his armchair's armrest.
"There's simply not enough seating in here. Do you mind?"
With an innocent roll of her shoulder, she raised her head to see her commander standing in the doorway, his mouth as wide as Anderson's, watching her.
Jason watched the other people in the room. Cronus looked like somebody had handed him a bomb, Anderson looked furious and Mark... Mark looked hurt. At that moment, Jason began to regret this game he and Princess had started. They hadn't meant to hurt Mark, only to tease him a little. He tried to frantically signal Princess, but Anderson's voice stopped him in his tracks.
"G3, I did not tell you to sit," he said, voice cracking like a whip. Princess looked startled and sprang up. Anderson pointed to a spot beside Jason, and she moved to that spot. Her eyes were huge, and she didn't dare look at Jason.
Instead, she looked at Mark, and recoiled at hurt and accusation she could see in his eyes. She hadn't intended to hurt him. She tried to desperately convey that with her own eyes, but he deliberately looked away. Princess looked at the floor. At the ceiling. Anywhere was better than meeting that hurt blue gaze.
Anderson looked at Mark. "Commander." His voice was cold, hard.
"Chief. What's up?" Mark had been genuinely puzzled at the summons.
"We have a disciplinary situation here. G 2 and 3 have been playing childish pranks on the Sergeant."
"Princess?" Mark sounded genuinely surprised.
"Don't play ignorant, Mark. You know how these two work. I've overlooked a lot of their actions, but not when it disrupts work."
This time, Mark looked directly at Jason and Princess, and glanced down at the frantic flicking of Jason's fingers. Bugger. They'd started the mission without him. He sighed.
"They will, of course, apologise to the Sergeant," he said. "I'll take care of the disciplinary matter, Chief."
His eyes narrowed. "Nice to see you here, Colonel. Anything G-Force can help you with?" His tone was deliberately provocative, and Cronus managed to smother a smile.
Damn, the boy was growing up fast. "Just a social call, Mark. You might say I was catching up on things."
"Then you won't mind leaving whilst we discuss this matter."
"On the contrary, Mark, I would like the Colonel to stay," said Anderson. They were up to something. He looked at Cronus and saw the barely perceptible nod. Oh yes, his team had definitely just made the first move in a game of information and mis-information.
He frowned as he saw the resemblance between Mark and Cronus and made a note to keep them from being seen together too much. The resemblance was getting too noticeable - and one of the team would pick up on it.
There was one matter, however, he intended to nip in the bud.
"Mark, I leave this in your hands. You and Jason are dismissed. Princess, stay here. I want to talk to you about your behaviour this morning."