Once again, before David Grant's arrival, Hannibal and Face had taken the liberty to sneak into Grant's reserved hotel room and bug the room and the phone since they highly suspected he would be getting in touch with Saunders again upon arrival. All that was left now was to wait for the guest of honor to show up; Hannibal waited down in the lobby in a younger disguise to remain inconspicuous, and the others stayed in their rooms and watched the time pass. Face, Murdock and Jean sat around in their room and waited for the signal from Hannibal that Grant had entered the hotel, and they might as well have been waiting for an execution to take place. Nobody talked, nobody moved from where they sat, they just stared at the clock and at each other and waited; Jean remained seated on the foot of the bed with one foot shaking and one fingernail permanently being chewed on, alternating through all ten of them.
After an hour of watching the clock, Murdock couldn't take the silence anymore; without a word to anybody, he got up from his chair and went into the next room where B.A. was waiting. Jean and Face looked at each other and without saying a word they questioned what he was up to, and they got something of an answer a minute later when they heard B.A. screaming at Murdock. They both sprang to their feet and ran in to see what was going on now and were just in time to see B.A. wrap his hands around Murdock's throat and throttle him. Face looked around the room for something hard to hit B.A. with and Jean managed to squeeze herself in between B.A. and Murdock, forcing him to let go of Murdock.
"Murdock, what did you do now?" Face asked.
"I caught this crazy fool going through my stuff," B.A. told him.
Jean noticed that while B.A. was looking at Face, Murdock had slipped something into his jacket, zipped it up and as nonchalantly as was possible for Howling Mad Murdock, slipped out of the room while B.A.'s back was turned. Once he was gone, Jean went over to B.A. and jabbed him on the shoulder to get his attention, and when he turned around she got as much in his face as was possible for her and said, "You can yell the roof off of this place…"
"He will," Face warned her.
But she cut him off and continued, "But I told you before when I first came here with you morons, all I've seen Murdock do is try to help and all you do is try to wring his neck. But you don't fool me. B.A., if anything bad were to ever happen to Murdock, you'd feel terrible and you know it."
B.A. snorted and replied, "I doubt that."
When they managed to get away from B.A. and back to their own room they saw Murdock back in the chair, with his shoes off, one foot brought up over the other leg and he was using a large wood file on it.
"What're you doing?" Face asked.
"I got a callus I'm trying to get rid of," Murdock answered.
"That's what you stole from his room?" Jean asked, then she turned to Face and asked, "What's he got a wood file for anyway?"
Face just shrugged in response. Murdock just kept his head down to hide the smirk on his face. For the moment anyway he had been able to break the tension and end the haunting silence between them. Fifteen minutes later the phone in their room rang and Face answered it; he nodded his head at everything Hannibal said and only got out a few 'uh-huh's and 'yeah's before hanging up.
"He's here, isn't he?" Jean asked.
"Yes," Face answered, "He is…Hannibal just saw him entering an elevator and he's coming up to this floor now."
Old habits died hard, as soon as Jean heard that she sprang for the door but Murdock blocked the way and grabbed her and pinned her arms down so she couldn't fight them.
"Calm down," Face told her, "Hannibal told you before, we're going to get this guy, but he had to lead us to Saunders first, get it?"
"I can't, I can't!" Jean replied as she struggled against Murdock's hold, "He's going to suffer like they all suffered!"
Murdock kept one arm wrapped around her and with the other lightly brushed his hand against her face as he went into a mantra of shushing sounds, alternating between that and some kind of gibberish that neither of them could understand.
"Murdock, let me go!" Jean told him.
"Ah, not until you calm down first," he told her as he continued stroking her cheek and remained calm and spoke in a soothing tone.
Face couldn't help but interject, "Murdock, I don't think it's going to work, she's not a dog."
"Oh be quiet, Face," Murdock said sarcastically, and in one of his deeper voices with a thicker accent he added, "The sounds that soothe the savage beast work on either animal or human."
"Alright, alright," Jean gave in, "You win, now let go of me."
They could tell the fight was genuinely out of her, Murdock let go of her arms and stroked her hair and repeated in a new mantra, "Good, good, good, good-good-good."
"Murdock, what're you doing now?" Face asked.
"Uh," Murdock covered Jean's ears and said, "It's kind of a private joke, Face, remember the Bad-Man?"
It took a few seconds for Face to realize what Murdock was talking about, something else from those cartoons they were watching that morning; a little boy who would turn into a horrible monster anytime someone said the word 'bad' around him, and then return to a nice little boy whenever they said 'good'. Face got what the gist of it was; when Jean threw herself at the door and was screaming, Face had a good idea that this was Brutus's character starting to shine through. Brutus was a self made secondary personality that Jean was fully and consciously aware of, meaning he could only be an invented persona; that was one thing he'd learned from all of Murdock's jibber-jabber from being in the VA all those years, people who had multiple personalities were never aware of each other existing. Jean knew about Brutus because she had created him, but Face was starting to wonder if she was still in control of him; her voice when she spoke about Grant suffering as they all had suffered was not Jean's normal voice. It was like somebody else was speaking through her, an evil force, perhaps even a man, but whatever it was, it didn't sound like her at all.
"Uh, Jean," Face said, "Uh…Murdock and I have to go talk to B.A. for a minute, in private, are you…going to be okay here by yourself?"
"Oh yeah, sure," she answered as she sat down.
"Good," Face replied, realizing after he'd said it that without being aware of it, he'd said it as a precaution. If there was a word that triggered Brutus's appearance, he hoped he didn't stumble over it accidentally.
Murdock went with Face over to the door and before they went in he called through the wall, "Yo B.A. we're coming in, you decent you big angry mudsucker?"
"What kind of fool question is that?" B.A. asked.
"Ironically enough," Face started to say as he opened the door, but didn't finish the thought because it was just too easy.
"What you want, fool?" B.A. asked as they came into the room.
Face closed the door behind them and said quietly so Jean couldn't overhear, "Nothing really…can you listen at this door and make sure she doesn't go out the other way?"
B.A. didn't get what was going on but he did, he went over to the door and listened while Face and Murdock went over to the other side of the room to talk.
"Listen Murdock, with all you know about mental disorders," Face said, "There's something I want to know."
"Shoot."
"Is it possible for a person to consciously create a second personality?" Face asked, "Like a split personality, is it possible for somebody to create a second person within themselves and the two sides trade off like a genuine multiple personality?"
Murdock seemed to seriously consider the question and gave a surprisingly on topic answer, "A person can willfully and intentionally create a secondary persona, not a personality. They'll know the persona exists, they may try and shift the blame for anything they did onto the second persona, they may even start to think in terms of being two people, but the dominant original person will always be aware of the persona's existence. To know the second personality exists defeats the purpose of split or multiple personality, they each exist individually and are oblivious of one another's existences."
"What you thinking about, Faceman?" B.A. asked.
"Brutus," Face looked to the other man, "Hannibal gave us the heads up that Grant's here and she was ready to fly through the door to get her hands on him, but I don't think it was really her."
B.A. looked from Face to Murdock and asked, "What're you jabbering about now?"
"Okay, B.A., remember The Exorcist?" Murdock asked, and waved from one hand to the other as he said, "Sweet little girl, Satan incarnate, they trade off, remember that? That's what we saw a minute ago, if her head snapped clear around she couldn't have switched any faster than she did."
"Brutus isn't just a name to hang the responsibility of those murders on," Face told them, "I think she's really made him a part of her." He looked to Murdock and asked him, "You got any idea about it?"
"Well," Murdock thought, "People often create a second persona when they do something they don't want to be held accountable for. And Joan of Arc would never brutally kill anybody for any reason, so she had to create a second persona to take responsibility for the killings. Brutus only comes out when she feels it is necessary to kill somebody, so…six months is a long time for anything to happen, by this time it could be a simple reflex for her."
"Oh well that's great," Face sarcastically remarked with a note of panic in his voice.
"I think," Murdock continued, "It's definitely possible that she created Brutus partly to have somebody else to blame for the murders she committed…but it wouldn't surprise me also if she created him as a form of protection."
"What're you babbling about, fool?" B.A. wanted to know.
"Well I'm only guessing but if the first time she killed somebody there was a struggle and she thought she might not get out of it alive, it could be she created the persona of Brutus as a sort of protector. You know, he is not a dominant personality but he comes very close; his only function is to attack and kill, he is a second person entirely so he's not going to let anything happen to her, something like that. So if she was in a position where she truly felt threatened, Brutus would come busting out because he is not going to die and he lives within her, so it's also about self preservation. In her mind she is not worried about the outcome of the fight because she knows Brutus is going to come through, it's not her."
"But she took credit for them when we first met her," Face reminded him.
"Because Brutus isn't a real personality, and she doesn't want anybody to get the idea that he is or that she's nuts," Murdock told him.
"And all this means we could be seeing a lot of Brutus in the near future, couldn't we?" Face asked.
"It's possible," Murdock nodded.
"And there's no telling just what is going to bring him out, is there?" Face asked.
"Uh…'fraid not," Murdock shook his head.
"Just gets better and better," Face dryly commented.
That afternoon, David Grant made another call to Jack Saunders and it was picked up on the recording equipment in Hannibal and B.A.'s room, everybody stood around and listened to the conversation. Another list of roads and interstates was counted off detailing the way Grant would be coming, to make sure nothing went wrong. Then Saunders said something else that made everybody hope they had heard wrong.
"The others are in position and ready to move out," he told Grant, "Dixon and Marco are stationed at the checkpoints to ensure you're not followed after Carbondale."
"The others?" Face mouthed to Hannibal.
"Alright, Jack, you got the next shipment ready to haul out?" Grant asked.
"2200 hours exactly," was the reply.
"That's fine, so everything will stay on schedule."
When they hung up, Hannibal pressed a button that disconnected the recorder, and he was starting to look annoyed, a rarity for him.
"Another shipment, what's that mean?" Face asked Jean.
"Not people," she shook her head, "Just guns and drugs."
"Well what do they call it when they move the recruits out?" Murdock asked.
"A supply haul, there's a difference," she answered, "They reversed it so nobody will ask any questions."
Hannibal seemed to have his mind on something else; he'd taken a piece of the hotel stationary and picked up a pen and started drawing something on it.
"So now we know why Saunders is having his man zigzag clear across the map," he said, and pointed to the scribbled line, "Instead of just going straight up from here, somewhere between here and here he's got two men stationed to make sure when Grant passes certain city limits, he's not being followed."
"I guess Saunders is finally starting to get paranoid," Face suggested.
"No," Jean replied, "He's only being cautious. If he's got more people in the ring again, they're new, Grant's the only original member left alive and Jack's not about to have him killed off too."
"Well, now we know where he'll be going from here," Hannibal said, "And he's not supposed to meet anybody on the way, so now all we have to do is wait for the next few days, and when he leaves, we'll be right behind him."
"Uh, Hannibal," Face said, "What about the checkpoints?"
"Oh I wouldn't worry about that, Face, we'll cross that bridge when we come to it," Hannibal told him.
"And blow it up," Jean added.
Murdock didn't sleep that night. They had all gone to bed at the same time, he and Face in one bed and Jean in the other; but he just lay there in the dark turned on his side so he could watch Jean. It wouldn't surprise him if she tried sneaking out during the night when the others were asleep, and if she would, he would be right behind her to conveniently foil those plans. He could always say that he had suddenly started sleepwalking, again. He never did sleepwalk but she didn't need to know that. It wasn't so much that he had any moral objections to something being done with Grant, even if it did get a little bloody; he just didn't want to take any chances on Grant or anybody else who might be in the hotel laying in wait for Jean to ambush her.
All through the day they had done well to always keep somebody close to her; when they went down to the pool in the afternoon, he and Face had gone swimming with her while Hannibal and B.A. stayed at one of the tables. And after the pool, she had been allowed to shower first and then while Face and Murdock were in the showers, she stayed in the room with B.A. and Hannibal who made a lot of small talk jibber-jabber but it all spelled out the same thing; skating around anything pertaining to what was really going on. Anytime one of them had to leave the room, the other stayed with her; they'd taken their dinner in their room since nobody wanted to take a chance of her disappearing from the table under the guise of going to the ladies room and instead taking a shot at Grant. True, they didn't necessarily need him alive in order to track down Saunders and the rest of the ring, but it wouldn't hurt to have him unknowingly lead the way either.
And that night, Murdock had once again weighed the options of who to bunk with for the night; he would've felt better bunking with Jean because he could keep a closer eye on her that way. But so far they had managed to hover over her without her getting suspicious and he thought that she might if he wound up crawling into bed with her for no apparent reason. If they could keep her in the dark about any of this, they were all for it, him especially; it would be a lot easier that way than if she was fighting with them the entire time. He had also considered filling Face in on his plan for then night, but decided one of them ought to get some sleep.
If Jean was asleep, he was wasting his time watching her in the dark, but if she was only faking it, waiting until a time when she was sure the others were asleep so she could slip out, then he would be ready for her. But he also noted that if she was faking, she was doing a damn great job of playing possum.
Murdock never noticed when he fell asleep but he woke up when he felt somebody shaking him, and before he opened his eyes he worried that something bad had happened, and he went from an incoherent mumble to screaming out, "G-g-get her, quick!"
"Get who?" he heard Jean ask.
Now his eyes were open and he could see both Jean and Face standing over him, looking down at him curiously.
A quick look around the room told him that everything on this side was normal, and he realized the sun was coming up and it was morning. He had fallen asleep, and now they wanted to know what he was talking about, so he thought of something and quickly, "Sorry…I was up late talking to my mother and," he yawned, "I guess I nodded off."
"Look like you must've slept pretty hard," he heard Hannibal's voice, and looking up saw the man standing at the doorway with a cigar in his mouth; a bit early in the morning for that, Murdock thought, or was it?
"I guess so," Murdock said as he got up and headed to the bathroom to take a shower.
Once the door was shut and it was just the three of them in the room, Jean leaned over towards Face and said into his ear, "I thought you said his mother was dead."
Face returned the favor and leaned over towards her and said into her ear in the same gritted teeth voice, "She is."
Jean did a double take and said, "Oh."
"What's the matter, Miss Rhodes?" Hannibal asked with a small smirk, "You don't believe in spirits?"
"Only the high proof variety," she answered.
"Then I guess you don't consider the possibility of contacting the dead," Hannibal said.
"Why should I?" she replied, "Most of them had their say while they were alive, what've they got to say once they're dead?"
"Well," Face looked at Hannibal and smirked, "Murdock does have a Ouija board, we could give it a try."
"Oh yeah?" Jean asked him, "And talk to who?"
Hannibal looked at Face with that same annoying grin he was famous for, the one that without a single word being said, egged Face on since he opened the door, now he had to come up with an answer.
He snapped his fingers and turned to Jean and said, "Jimmy Hoffa, maybe he knows where he was buried."
Jean fell back on the bed laughing, "Traveling circus indeed, and just my luck I'm stuck in the clown car."
Breakfast had been delivered to their rooms also, and just as well since half of the team still didn't look presentable enough to set foot out the door. Murdock had gotten a shower but hadn't bothered to do anything with his hair which now stood up like he'd been electrocuted and Face was a bit more leisurely about getting dressed and looking sharp today for some reason. Murdock pushed the cart over to the table in the center of the room and one by one everybody collected a tray and lifted the lids on plates full of waffles, pancakes, sausages and bacon, and everybody started grabbing some of everything.
"I saw this guy on TV last night on one of the late talk shows," Face told the others, "One of those Hollywood actors, going on about some new kind of health guru diet, say it'll make you live to be 120 or something."
"Must be Japanese," Murdock said.
"Well all I know," Face said as he stabbed a pile of pancakes and dropped them on his plate, "The guy says to live healthy you have to cut out all meat, sugar, dairy, salt, and fruit."
"What's that leave to eat then, weeds?" Jean asked.
"What's wrong with fruit?" Murdock asked.
"You are what you eat," Jean told him, "They don't want you to eat anything that makes you fruity." The last word sounded like she pushed it out through her nose, making both men flash on Mrs. Bates in Psycho.
"There have been some reports that suggest arsenic can be found in apples," Face said.
"It can also be found in salt," Jean told him.
"Well…" Face started to say but was cut off.
"And also in beer, but you gonna give that up?" Jean asked, "If you take everything that's bad for you out of your diet, what's left?"
"Weeds," Murdock answered, "But I can kind of understand why they would advise against eating fruit, it can be hazardous to your health but not like you'd think."
"Well sure," Jean said, and Face was starting to feel himself becoming the meat of a crazy sandwich again; somehow these two could always find some way to be on the same level when talking. And it was that little fact that was making Face start to question his own sanity, and it didn't help when she continued with an explanation to emphasize what they were talking about, "Apples have arsenic, there's scorpions in the grapes and tarantulas coming over in the bananas!"
"Ex-actly!" Murdock replied, "Can you imagine? You get back from the grocery store, unload your dozen eggs, your quart of milk, your box of doggie biscuits…"
"What if you don't have a dog?" Jean asked.
"What's your point?" Murdock asked, and continued, "At the bottom of the bag is a pound of seedless red grapes imported from Chile, nice and big and ripe, just a little bit waxy…and you reach into the bag to pull them out and—" he hissed and lunged his hand out across the table, curved up to resemble a scorpion stinger, "And next thing you know you wake up in a hospital bed covered in leeches to suck out the scorpion venom, then they bring in a cat to eat the leeches."
"And then they bring in Mr. Buddha diet to eat the cat," Jean added, "All stir fried up with rice and bean sprouts and those long noodles with some kind of wine spread all over the whole mess."
Face shook his head and said, "This guy on TV makes Jack LaLanne look like Marlon Brando."
"I think he's overrated," Jean commented, "Of course as a child I had the exact opposite problem, I would set stuff on fire if I didn't have sugar. Doesn't Smith work out in Hollywood?"
"On occasion, but nobody's going to be checking out the physique of the Aquamanaic," Murdock said as he stacked sausages on his plate like a set of Lincoln logs.
"Seems to me though that about everybody out there is on some kind of crazy diet," Jean said.
"Well 10 years ago people thought eating bean sprouts and tofu was a sure sign you had lost it," Face said, "But these days it's becoming a lot more popular. Everybody's looking for a healthier way to live."
"And I bet they take those cod oil pills every day, and when they die their livers will surpass them by a week before finally being beaten to death," Jean added as she smothered two waffles in butter, "If that's what they want to do with their lives, all the power to them, but I don't have time to worry about my health for the next 60 years. I have enough trouble making it to the end of the day."
"Well if you're gonna go out, might as well go out with a bang," Murdock said as he started piling some of the bacon on top of the sausage.
"Well since you brought it up, Peck," Jean said to Face, "Let's talk about movie stars."
"What about them?" Face asked.
"Well it's like…okay, take Bruce Lee."
"I don't want him," Face said.
"Healthy as a horse, martial arts expert, could do pushups with a big fat man sitting on his back, and what happens to him? Dead at 32. And then you take someone like Fatty Arbuckle, ate, drank, and was merry for several years, lived to be 46," Jean said, "Not very old but for his own time it meant more than it would today. So I look at that as not just a matter of who lived longer, but who do you think had more fun?"
"But what does any of that have to do with diet?" Face asked.
"Nothing, didn't Bruce Lee die of an allergic reaction to something that caused water on the brain?" Jean asked.
Murdock was starting to laugh and Face was just trying to keep from erupting like a volcano as he asked, struggling desperately to keep a straight face, "And the point is then?"
"Just that healthy people die too, if you don't die from what you eat you'll die of something else, and if you have to go either way you might as well enjoy the trip," she said, "I mean look at all of us. We all have a better chance of dying from being shot or blown up than succumbing to a heart attack."
"Hmm," Murdock swallowed a sip of orange juice and said, "If I'd known you was going to make a speech I would've ordered champagne instead."
"Well here's my bottom line," Jean said, "If I should die first, then Mr. Wheat Germ can feel free to come to my funeral, but on the off chance I outlive the health nuts…" she shook her head, "I ain't going to help bury them, can you imagine what they serve at those receptions?"
Murdock's eyes bugged out and he raised his hands up to his chest and raised his top lip only slightly so his incisors were exposed like a rabbit and he squeaked like a chew toy.
"That sounds about right," Jean commented, and to Face she added, "For all the time they spend in public munching watercress and drinking herbal tea, once everybody's backs are turned they probably barbecue whatever little furry animals they catch in the backyard."
Face's automatic response to that was an impromptu spit take that sent the piece of pancake he was chewing on flying across the room.
"Hmmm," Hannibal grunted as he put down the headset on the audio equipment.
"What is it, Hannibal?" B.A. asked.
"Grant just called down to the front desk, told them that he doesn't want room service, that he's not going to be here for dinner tonight."
"Meeting someone?"
"Could be," Hannibal said, "We'll have to find out where he's going. It could also be that he's onto us and is planning to give us the slip."
B.A. could already tell he was going to be the pack mule again hauling all their luggage back downstairs, and he was right.
"As a precaution," Hannibal said, "It might be a good idea to get the van loaded up incase we have to make a quick getaway after him."
Well, he saw that one coming.
Hannibal went next door and told the others what he'd found out and explained that he was going to go downstairs and wait in the lobby and watch for Grant; when he found out where the man was going he would contact the others and decide then if they should follow or stay behind.
"You got any ideas about it?" Jean asked him.
"I was going to ask you that," he said, "I don't mean to question your work ethic but are you sure that you killed everyone else in the original ring?"
"I don't make mistakes, Smith," she told him, "I know how to do my job."
"And we know how to do ours," Hannibal replied, "No matter, I'll figure out what's going on and get back to you when I do."
He went down to the lobby and stayed away from the front desk where people wouldn't notice him so much, but he had a good view of the exit and he spent half an hour pretending to read the newspaper while he kept one eye open for Grant. He wasn't disappointed, around 6 o' clock the man came down the stairs and went out the revolving door; Hannibal put the paper down and also exited stage right, managing to stay far enough behind that Grant didn't notice he was being shadowed. When he saw the destination Grant was heading to, he took out his walkie talkie and told the others the name and location of the restaurant, and advised them to look nice when they came because he wasn't sure if the place had a dress code. Then he went in, laid on the charm to the waiter and got seated at a table for five that was at a perfect angle to watch David Grant; and also watch the entrance for when the others arrived so they knew where to come.
It didn't take long, within 15 minutes he saw B.A. leading the way with Face and Jean following behind him; Hannibal pointed at his table and they came up and sat down beside him. Hannibal noted that they took his advise of a dress code with a grain of salt; Face still had on the jeans and T-shirt he had earlier that day and a denim jacket, Jean was dressed similarly in blue jeans and a muscle shirt, and B.A. of course was dressed as normally as he ever was.
"Where's Murdock?" he asked.
"I think he said he was going to the restroom," Face said.
"So where's Grant?" B.A. asked.
Hannibal ever so subtly pointed to the side and they all turned and saw the man, sitting alone.
"Is he meeting someone here?" Face asked.
"I'm not sure yet," Hannibal said, "But I'm guessing there's a reason he decided to leave the hotel and its option of room service for this place."
"Lot of people," Jean said, "Lot of witnesses who could either see something or be like Schultz and see nothing, hear nothing, know nothing."
"Either way," Face murmured to her, "Not exactly on the level with how Brutus would do something, is it?"
Jean shook her head in response, "Too risky, I don't involve innocent bystanders for anything."
"Well I have a feeling it's going to be a while," Hannibal told them, "We might as well order dinner."
"Fine with me, I'm hungry," B.A. said.
A few minutes later, Murdock joined them at the table, and Hannibal wasn't overly surprised to see that he was dressed in his usual manner either; still in his tan pants, bomber jacket, black Chuck Taylors, blue cap, and a T-shirt with some slogan on it that was concealed by the jacket.
"You' late fool," B.A. told him.
"We ordered for you," Face added.
"Oh thanks," Murdock said, "What're we having?"
"Steaks," Jean answered, "Best thing I've heard of in a long time, T-bone steak smothered in sauce with baked potatoes and a shot of bourbon to go with it. Ain't eaten like that since I was back home."
There was something in her statement that suddenly made the men surrounding her feel humbled. None of them had a dream life, it was dangerous, it was busy, they hardly got paid by their clients, certainly nothing to the effect of what they charged for their services, they were always risking being caught by Lynch or the police or somebody, and they all knew that sooner or later their luck was going to run out; but all the same, every one of them had a place to go back to at the end of the day, where for a few hours their lives could return to something resembling normalcy. Even for Murdock, he always knew when a mission was over where he would be going and what routine his life would be resuming; he might not have had as many doors open to him for the finer things in life like Hannibal or especially Face, but all four men could count a handful of times in the last few months that they'd been able to come to a place like this and enjoy a meal like this. Nothing particularly fancy or expensive, but a hell of a lot better than Jean had apparently been having to live on since she joined the army.
Hannibal kept one eye on Grant's table all through the meal; for all that time, the colonel was disappointed to realize that nobody was coming to meet this man for any reason. He finally let that eye roll and join the other that was looking at the people at his own table; apparently he had been watching the other man for a long time because the busboys were clearing the table.
"Well," he said, "I guess I was wrong."
"That's got to be a first," Jean said, "Hannibal Smith admits he's wrong," she leaned over the table and asked him, "Can we get that in writing?"
Hannibal was taken aback for a second but he recovered and laughed over her comment and had started to say he would pay the bill and they could go back to the hotel, when he and the others turned when one of the waiters came rolling the dessert tray over to them and lifted a large cake covered in white frosting onto the table.
"There must be some mistake," Hannibal told the man, "We didn't order this."
But the waiter refused to listen, he explained that there was no mistake, this was the right table and the cake had been reserved earlier for the young lady's birthday. All eyes turned to Jean who looked as surprised as they did.
"Birthday?" she repeated in disbelief, "My birthday? Who…" she turned to the man on her left and put it together, "Murdock?"
The pilot couldn't hide the large, closed mouth smile that had taken over his face and he merely looked down at the table until his normal expression could return.
"How the hell did you know it was my birthday?" Jean asked.
Murdock picked his face up and answered, "A magician never reveals his secrets."
"Shut up fool, you ain't no magician, you just crazy," B.A. told him.
Murdock didn't care, he still would never reveal his secret, but in truth it was really very simple. When he'd said he was going to the bathroom, he instead went around the corner to a payphone and made one very long distance call back to the Rhodes in New York. He had managed to keep Mrs. Rhodes calm as he told her that they firmly believed they were close to finding Jean; they had a name that was probably false, but they also had a birth date to check against her own, but they needed to know what it was.
"It's funny that you should ask that," the woman had said, and Murdock could tell by her voice that she had been crying, and no wonder with what she said next, "Because it just so happens that today is her birthday."
He hadn't seen that one coming but he knew he couldn't fall off the turnip truck now. "This woman we've spotted is going to a restaurant tonight, if it's her she may see reason to celebrate…for her birthday was there ever any particular kind of cake that she preferred?"
"White," was the solemn answer from the woman, and with a sad laugh she added, "She always hated chocolate cake, even as a little girl we could never get her to eat it."
It would've been so much easier to just scream into the phone that they had her daughter and were bringing her home but Murdock knew he couldn't do that. Instead he told Mrs. Rhodes that they would see what they could find out, and tried to assure her not to worry, that he firmly believed their daughter was safe, and he hung up. Then, he sneaked into the kitchen and, speaking quickly before somebody had a chance to throw him out, explained that he was there with his little sister and their friends for the night; it was her birthday, their plans had fallen through so she was just trying to forget the day ever happened, but he wanted to surprise her so he requested that after dinner one of the waiters bring out a large white cake for her and ignore anybody else's comment that they didn't order it. The staff had been mildly surprised by his sudden entrance but they were happy to oblige.
"Well," Face spoke up, breaking the silence at the table, "We ought to order champagne too then."
"Not with the cake, that just ruins it," Jean replied.
"Well," Hannibal said as he picked up a knife to cut the cake with, "Since it's already here, we might as well enjoy it."
Unfortunately they didn't have long to enjoy anything; halfway through the cake Murdock started making choking, gasping sounds and he pointed to the entrance and told Hannibal, "Don't look now, Colonel but here comes the rain-on-the-parade brigade."
Looking towards the entrance they saw a few MPs had made their way inside and were speaking with the restaurant's manager.
"This guy don't ever give up, does he?" Jean whispered.
"Now what do we do?" Face asked as he slumped down in his chair.
"I've got an idea," Hannibal said, "Everybody get ready to run for the kitchen, we'll try getting out the back way."
Hannibal picked up a piece of the cake in his hand and went over to another table and tapped the man sitting there on the shoulder and when he turned around, Hannibal said with a sneer, "I heard that, pal," and shoved the cake into the man's face and added, "Nobody talks about my mother like that and gets away with it."
The man gasped angrily as he wiped the frosting off his face and he started screaming at Hannibal who had made a calm retreat to his own table. The man got up and went over to their table and started to give Hannibal a piece of his mind, but upon seeing B.A., he also made a retreat back to his table. Murdock picked up the half glass of scotch that Face had ordered and tossed the alcohol across the room and hit that man and managed to splash a couple more, who screamed in response and shot up from their chairs. One of them picked up a plate of spaghetti and hurled it at them, but they ducked down and instead it hit a man at the table next to them.
"All systems a-go," Hannibal smirked as they pushed their chairs back and rushed for the kitchen, but not before Murdock uttered the universal war cry, "FOOD FIGHT!" and the dining hall exploded in everything that wasn't nailed down being hurled in every direction, and the MPs got caught right in the middle of it.
Murdock grabbed Jean by the arm and pulled her towards the kitchen but she pulled away from him screaming, "Wait a minute, I didn't get my wish yet!" And, still with the plate in hand and one piece of the cake on it, she calmly walked up behind the man with the most brass and said in a singsong voice, "Oh Colonel Ly-y-y-y-n-nch!"
"Yes?" before he could turn all the way around and see who was speaking to him, Jean shoved the cake right into his face and momentarily blinded him.
"Courtesy of the A-Team," she told him as she turned and ran to join the others.