(Meanwhile)

*{Agent Anya is on a special mission called 'Operation Lovey-Dovey'. I got to get something called a Nortica Ice-y Tea to the bored girl at See-Mush's table; if possible it's got to be done by Red Circus Man.}*

Anya Forger stood beneath the aquatic archway, her brow furrowed with grit and determination very much akin to the fedoraed and masked hero whose image and likeness bore at her from every direction of the store; and while the plethora of products presented for purchase sang at her psyche like the sirens of old, she dashed as feverishly as her frame could allow her to do towards the packed bar…to little avail.

… *clank*…*clink*… "Whattaya got on hand for shots?" …*{Must everything on this [REDACTED] menu be a pun or callback?}*… "Oop! Sorry Nicole." …*{*groan* cheapskate stiffed me on the tip}*… "Yo! Barkeep!" …*slide*… "Sorry, we don't take Ostanian Express cards." …*pop*…*fssssshht* …*{Whose ring ya gotta kiss to get a happy hour menu around here?}*… "JP! How long ago did you tell the barback to hustle with that keg." …*crash*… "Gah! There goes another glass!" … "Here. Let me clean that up for you." …*{We're [REDACTED] swamped.}* … "You mean that idiot hasn't come back yet?"…

For a moment, fate seemed to smile on Anya as Rubin stopped briefly at the bar to pick up a drink. But as Nicole and J.P. summoned him to see where things stood with replacing a keg of beer, and he left as quickly as he arrived. With all the speed she could muster, Anya dashed across the bar hoping to catch him…but being older, it was to no avail. By the time she reached the bar, Ruben had long since vanished into the restaurant proper and passed into an area reserved for employees.

An overwhelmed Anya rested against the base of the shark tank and gripped her head in frustration; even there, she felt betrayed by her telepethetic powers as she all too clearly found herself privy to the gripes that came with life within the marine museum.

*{Reef rough. Not comfy place to hide.}*

*{Where is chum? Hungry for chum.}*

*{Light too bright. Must go in cave now}*

*{No want lettuce. Want chum.}*

With a groan, Anya retreated into the girl's bathroom and locked herself in one of the stalls.

Steam wafted off her head as she sighed deeply and leaned against the toilet tissue roll hung on the barrier. It wasn't the most sanitary or optimal place to rest, but it was soft.

"So. The little worm stood the three of you up as well?"

Anya gasped. Peering from beneath the doorway, she saw four women congregating around one of the sink. Their indignation and fury fomenting all the more as they passed their phones among each other and slowly pieced together how they found themselves duped.

"'Darling. Meet me tonight by the Bondman fedora stand at 10.' Well, it's 9:49 now."

"Well Seamus told me he'd pick me up at 6:30 before feeding me some crock about getting a stomach bug. And Mariah waited ten minutes by the shark tank before we bumped into each other."

"And a month after ghosting me, he asks me to meet him here."

"Hold up!" Came another furious interjection. "You didn't just say Seamus? As in Seamus Brayzen?!"

From her hiding place, Anya watches as the door to the stall next to her opens and a fifth member joins the collection of furious females. Amidst their commiseration, the wheels in the pink-haired one's head begin to turn as her next course of action becomes clear.

"Oh. Poor, poor me. I'm alone in this restaurant and can't find my cousin."

Anya's 'woeful' spectacle worked all too well; the swaying, the arms across the chest, the mournful and almost seasick frown for good measure. Quickly opening her eye, she sees the

foursome of furious females turning their heads in her direction.

"I'm so scared and lost and sooooo saaaaaaaad."

"Oh, sweetie. We'll help you find him." Mariah said while consolingly scooping the girl in her embrace. "In the meantime, I'm Mariah."

"Vanessa." Said the second.

"Peyton."

"Erica."

"And I'm Abigal." The girl from the stall said. "What's yours, and who's your cousin?"

"I'm Anya and my cousin Seamus left me in the store to go get flirty with-"

Crouched behind the plaster rocks making up the base of the shark tank threshold, Anya watched the squad of young women she had mobilized barrel through to Seamus' table. In their haste to rip the cad a well-deserved new rectum, they had forgotten to consider that the "lost little girl" who spurred them into action was incapable of keeping up with their scornful strides.

"My stubby little legs served me well." Anya thought smugly to herself as a mortified and fatigued Catherine stumbled into the store. "Now for Part 2!"

Anya clenched in her hand a Twenty Dalc note, a token of gratitude/concern from one of the women who implored her to purchase a toy in hopes of lifting her spirits. Sure enough, fate decided to work out all too well for the girl as a spot not only opened up at the bar, but also Rubin had come back with a new keg which he and the bartender had just finished hooking up to the array of taps.

*THWAP*

If the twenty Dalc note being slammed on the bar top didn't steal the two men's attention, the spectacle of Anya Forger in her gumshoe costume (NOW complete with one of the masks bearing the likeness of Bondman's handler) did the trick.

"One Nortica Ice-y Tea."

"I'm afraid I'm all out of juice boxes kid." A lanky and mustachioed man bearing the nametag J.P. quips as he tries not to laugh.

"I said. One Nortica Ice-y Tea…please."

"Look. You're cute and all, but where's your mom and dad?" Rubin wheezes, also feeling his lungs pop in some attempt at holding back a fit of guffaws.

"Perhaps you misheard me…(Anya turns to Rubin, recognizing him all too well from that night at the Royal Hugaria when he tried to kill her mother.)…I'm here on behalf of Catherine."

Rubin's eyes slowly follow the direction the girl's head turns towards before coming to rest on the girl in question as she listlessly glances at a display of masks bearing the likeness of Bondman's boss. Turning back to the seat, he finds that Anya vanished; leaving behind the twenty Dalc note in her wake.

"I guess I got this J.P." Rubin said taking a glass as his companion rings the order up.

Catherine sighed as she finished checking her watch. It wasn't a date she wanted to go on anyway, but that still wasn't an invite to have it end as badly as it did. Hyperbolic japes were one thing, but reality is another. With a deep and defeated sigh, she glances at the doorway in resignation knowing the experience had nothing else in store for her.

"Excuse me, Catherine?"

Turning around, she sees J.P. gesturing towards the bar where an empty seat and a Nortica Iced Tea await her, as does the hopeful beam of an all too familiar face.

"Apparently, we have a mutual friend…"

"…everything should be clear, but I'm afraid my time here has run its course. The fate of the kingdom is now in your hands."

As the lights came back on, Anya dejectedly rose from her place behind the table. Part of her seethed with envy that Bondman THE BONDMAN had come down to grace the diners with his presence and that she missed it because of her mission. And the real salt to the wound was that Becky Freaking Blackbell was the one who got to rub elbows with him.

"She doesn't even like him." Anya muttered to herself before picking up an all too familiar stream of thought.

*{Damnit Twilight, this mission has softened you like butter; you know she has a habit of wandering off all willy-nilly. It's bad enough her chances at Imperial Scholarship are shaky at best, but her disappearing means the end of STRIX as we know it!}*

Darting back to the store, Anya returns the mask she was wearing and begins to not-so-convincingly rummage through the others on display. Occasionally, she glances at Rubin and Catherine in the middle of the long overdue heart-to-heart that every couple has when mending fences.

*{But it's like Papa's Boss Lady said, what matters is peace won the day}*

"Anya?...ANYA!"

Before she could respond, Becky bolts toward her in a frenzy.

"Oh thank goodness I found you. You know this show better than I do; tell me how do I find the Tummy Warmer?"