Section 36

“You may soon reconsider your words, ma’am. You gentler souls may want to turn away. Our treasonous Colonel is going to get his wish granted. The hard way it is.”

He approached the first prisoner in line, but spoke to the third. “I want you to tell me how many men are in the Colonel’s private army.”

Phil did not get an answer. “I see you need to know what silence gets you.” He pushed a dagger to the hilt into the first guy’s eye, pulled out the knife and shoved the corpse aside. “That one didn’t look talkative. I hate to waste time.”

There was a sudden startled silence in the room. “Look at my face, traitor. Do you think I’m kidding?” He glared at the Colonel.

His eyes were black pools, dead, deadly. SuLing’s matched. The six twins had a faint red glow. None appeared to have pupils. Even Pierson and the two Majors were taken aback. None doubted they were looking at Death and his Handmaidens. Not a word was spoken.

Pierson developed a new appreciation of the Family ‘talents’. Chief St. John was correct. This was beyond any special ‘gift’ he had ever suspected.

Phil went to the second in line and simply snapped his neck. The sound was deafening. He asked the third guy again. No answer. “Son of a bitch. We scared him to death. What a sissy. I thought you fools were the Master Race. Can’t stand the thought of pain.”

His was the voice from the grave.

The doctor spoke. “Lt. Commander. If you lift the chin a bit, you can paralyze them from the neck down. It will draw out the suffering so much longer. Appropriate for the monsters who tried to hurt my children, don’t you think?” She could tell that the victims were already dead before the ‘death’ stroke. The Colonel couldn’t.

“I like the way you think, Doc. You got game. Perhaps you will coach me through the Colonel’s debriefing?”

“Perhaps. I might enjoy that.” She had a very effective predatory grimace that did not go unnoticed by the two shackled traitors. “I’m almost positive he won’t. Doctors know things.”

“Number four is over, too. What a waste. Paper tigers, sheesh.” SuLing said. “Can I have the next one? Just ‘cause you have rank, it’s not fair to have all the fun. You know you’re doing it right when the light goes out of their eyes. I miss that. It’s the personal touch that makes all the difference.”

SuLing’s cold dead voice made her words as frightening as her eyes.

“OK dear, I know you get crabby when you can’t have fun. You can have number five. I’ll bet a big butch dude like that would make a good plaything in prison. Bonnie, you seem bored. Lend a hand. Help him be still.”

“He’s a big one, Phil.” Bonnie put a chair in front of the guy and hopped up. “Now, I can reach his eyes and throat.” She placed a dagger within millimeters of his right eyeball. “If you twitch, mister, you will be fitted for an eye patch. If you don’t answer Cousin Phil’s questions fast enough, I’ll pop it like a grape.”

SuLing, meanwhile, was slicing the front of his trousers away. “Wonder what he will be taking to the party in the big brig. Oops, sorry about that. You OK up there, sister?”

“Yeah. I’m OK. Mister Master Race, not so much. He blinked and nicked his eyelid.”

“Not so much down here, too. The steroids didn’t leave much for me to work with.” She put the edge of the blade against his smallish wiener and dragged it slowly across. “He won’t miss this. His cellmates can call him Miss Tiny Toy.”

“The Marshals are on the other side of the door, recording your feed. They do not want to interrupt.” Nick advised.

Phil pressed a pressure point on the hyperventilating goon’s shoulder, paralyzing his arm in agony. “Can we talk? How many of your comrades did not pay us a visit tonight?”

“None.”

Phil pressed harder. “That’s none ‘sir’, unless you would rather deal with me as a civilian who cares even less for the Articles of War than I do now. Careful. Stop shaking. You don’t want my girls to get nervous. What brought you all running?”

“We all were to leave the base when we had you and the attaché, Sir.”

“Much nicer answer. Insects running back into the shadows. Where did you get so many non-issue assault rifles?”

“Sir, Lt. Bergstrom in the Armory. He has two sailors who sneak guns in. He gives them to us when we have a mission.”

“See. It’s so much less painful when you tell me what I want to know. SuLing and Bonnie. Let the nice asshat sit and contemplate his new status as a lifer.”

“Do we get to play with the Colonel?” Bonnie asked.

“You might not want to get that close, twin. He seems to have soiled his panties.”

“He dishonors the uniform in yet another way. He does not deserve to wear the insignia of the Unites States Marine Corps. Cannoneers and Rocketeers, would you remove any and all buttons, ribbons, badges and patches that might suggest he was in the Marines? How they come off is up to you. Zina, you have dagger-at-the-chin rights. Emily, you may have the throat.” Phil ordered. “Free his feet and stand him up.”

“Now, Colonel. If you nod or fall, you puncture your brain. If you tip forward, you cut your own throat. If your answers do not make me happy, I will castrate you. If you are lucky, you will bleed out before I cauterize the hole. If you doubt my sincerity, you are a bigger idiot than I thought.”

Phil stared hard at a terrified man. “Tell me who organized this cell, who gives you orders and, what the hell, anything you can think of that might convince me to let you continue to waste air. Make it fast. You will not like me if I get upset.”

“April, May, Sara and Sally, would you field strip the Captain? The Motor Maids have head, neck and gonad duty. Encourage him to fill in any gaps our better-be-chatty Colonel leaves.” He pointed a blade at the trembling man. “Tattoos optional, depending on his answers.”

“Do we have to touch him? The Captain is marinating in his last meal. He smells bad.”

“Blades work as well as fingers, Lanie.” Joanne said, “We’ll have to saw the patches off. The tattoos will peel like skinning a bottom feeding catfish.”

“Colonel, I’m becoming annoyed. Spill it or die as slowly as the good doctor can arrange. She’s a doctor. They know stuff.”

Andrea agreed. “I might instruct Lts. Redbird and Templeton on the fine art of shooting knees, ankles and elbows to inflict maximum pain with a minimum of blood loss. They deserve some payback, too.”

“When the good doctor says that it might hurt a little, trust me, it will.” Olivia Goldbaum was Igor to Andrea’s Frankenstein.

By the time the officers were down to the brads on their stained pants, a miserable hierarchy of treachery was exposed. The former Colonel knew a lot for a local cell leader. “Every word of this will be true, mister. There is no place you can hide where we cannot reach a liar. It can take days for you to die.”

“Gunny Thanos. Ask the US Marshals to come in now. We’re done here.” He turned to the others. “No, I’m not a heartless murderer. Those men were already dead. I let them serve one last purpose. It was not pleasant, but the job got done.”

Phil faced the room. “Ladies and gentlemen. Thank you for your courage and patience. I am proud to be in your company. Please give the Marshals whatever they need to wrap this up. I am going to wash the blood off and talk to the children for a while.” He sighed. “I’ll meet you in the cafeteria or wherever after I talk to the marshals myself.”

In the men’s room, he scrubbed the visible blood from his hands and face. The clothes didn’t show much or the Shock Troops didn’t splash as much as the smugglers at the high school. Either way, he wasn’t bloody enough to frighten the kids more than they were already.

“You still there, Nick?”

“What you need?”

“Let the listeners keep the feed from the girls. You and I need to go private.”

Click, pop, click, click. “Done. We are alone and scrambled. What gives?”

“Get your laptop and access the security cam in the lobby through your personal Singer account.”

“OK. Got it. What next?”

“Put the cursor in the bottom left corner and type this string. It won’t show. Be careful.” Phil repeated a ten character sequence, “Now press and hold ‘F4’. Hit enter.”

“There’s a password box in the middle of the screen.”

“The password is ‘00=0X0’, with a capital X. On the keyboard, press and hold ‘control’, then ‘escape’.”

“OK. Done. The screen flickered. What did I do?”

“You just fried everything recorded for the last three hours, back-ups included, anywhere. Nothing happened in that room that needs distribution to the public. The audio is more than enough to send the lot of them to the gallows. Psychological terror does not need to be on the Internet.”

“I just destroyed evidence. Great.”

Phil laughed. “It was an untimely hardware glitch, self corrected. They will replace the camera and DVR anyway. You were never there.”

“Phil, you make me crazy. So what are we discussing?”

“Lisa’s condition, rearming the ‘Darling’, and the guest list in DC.”

“Lisa’s great. I’ll tell her you asked. The ‘Darling’ is fine, but Annapolis will top off the supplies. The ‘plus ones’ were thoughtful. No one will be left off the list.”

“Thanks, Nick. I have to go now. Cut the connection to the earwigs. I’ll call you on the sat phones if I need help.”

“Done.” Click.

Now for the little kids. He found them in a small room adjacent to a nurses’ station. He spoke to Lt. Brixton first. “An apology, Lieutenant. I did not mean to disrespect your medical skills by making you a babysitter. You were simply closest to the girls age and not covered in blood. Thank you for helping.”

“No apology necessary, Sir. This is much closer to my training than being a morgue assistant.”

“So, are we having fun yet, little ladies?”

“Hey, Captain Swenson! Thanks for saving our stuff.” Jessica shouted. “How did you know they are our favorites?”

“Call me Phil. These are the ones you didn’t leave at home. They have to be the favorites. I have sisters just a little older than you. It’s easy if you know little girls.”

“Well, thank you. We just knew everything was at the bottom of the ocean.” Cathy, the youngest smiled. “This makes it better. And you saved us two times. Thank you for that, too.”

Charlie gushed, “That was so awesome. Real Superheroes in action! What’s it like? Is it like that everyday?”

“I hope not! That’s what I wanted to talk to you about.” He sat Indian style on the floor. “Sit with me, girls. I want to tell you some important stuff, secret hero stuff.”

“Ooh, secret stuff!” The three sat in an arc as close to his knees as possible.

“Little ladies, this is not who we are most of the time. In fact, we don’t like this part of our life.” He explained, “We have do this when no one else can. We’re really just a bunch of college kids, trying to get our degrees. I’m a computer guy, some build computers, one studies biology, a bunch are musicians or artists or chefs and some study literature.”

“A secret identity like Diana Prince and Clark Kent? Wow.” Little Cathy giggled. “You sure have short Amazons!”

“Sort of the other way around. We’re just regular people getting scholarships and trying to grow up. But sometimes we have to act like action figures to help other people.” He sighed. “When we rescued you tonight, it made some very bad guys very mad. They tried to hurt everybody. We couldn’t let that happen and it got messy.”

Charlie said, “It was real messy, but they got what they deserved. But they couldn’t hurt you or the others.”

“Anybody can be hurt, Charlie, hurt bad. But they didn’t have anyone good enough to do it.” He grinned. “It takes years and years to be as fast as we are. You have to work hard and study harder. Listen to your parents. It wasn’t easy for your Mom to be a doctor. She must be real smart. Your Dad is a general in the Army. He got there by being smart and strong and a hero. Miss Olivia is a hero, too. She got to be a mast6er sergeant by being very strong and smart. Be special like them and you will be OK.”

“We want to be heroes like your sisters and the ninjas.” Cathy said, “Then we won’t be afraid of the dreams.”

“The dreams can’t hurt you, little one. You can be the hero of your dreams, you know.” His heart was breaking. This is what he was afraid of, their nightmares. “If the dreams are scary, hug your mommy and daddy. They will protect you. It is like Charlie said. These people wanted to hurt you. Now, they never can. They got what they deserved. Don’t let them be dream ghosts, too. It’s better to help others so they don’t have bad dreams and to be brave like your parents.”

“Is that why you and the girls have to be super guys sometimes?” Jessica asked, “To help people?”

“Exactly. Everybody should help people who can’t stop all the bad guys by themselves.” He grinned again, “We’re pretty good at helping other people, don’t you think?”

He held their little hands. “Do this for me. Always help however you can. It feels good to help. Help your classmates do their homework, help your Mom make cookies, show your teammates how to play games better and smarter. To really help people, you have to study hard so you can show them new stuff. You have to know a lot if you want to teach things. I teach kids how to defend themselves and how to talk to computers. Connie and Bonnie make machines. Traci will design buildings. Karen teaches college students how to do biology. Marcie writes books about lots of things. My sisters study math so they can build better computers. Melody, SuLing, Willy and Polly teach music. Amy, Lanie, Rachael and Dana teach all kinds of art at the university. Zina and Emily make pretty statues and jewelry. Joanne and Nancy make the costumes and sets for plays. Sara and Sally study chemistry so the food tastes better.”

“Chemistry to make cookies?” Cathy grumped. “Yucky.”

“Not so, sweetie. Sodium chloride dissolved in hydrogen hydroxide to a 3% concentration sounds awfully complicated. But a cook would call it slightly salty water and a nurse would call it Ringer’s solution. It’s still just salt water with a different name. Nothing complicated there. Yes, salty cookies are yucky. But you can leave out the sugar and add flour and make crackers that are delicious with peanut butter. Chemistry can make you a great cook or a great doctor or an oceanographer. Learn how to learn everything and you can do anything, even make bad guys go away.”

Phil talked and joked with the General’s children until Andrea, their Mom, coughed softly from the door. “The main marshal asked me to find you, but I had to eavesdrop for a while. That was a nice thing you did in here, soothing the fear and keeping my children calm.”

He said to the girls, “I have to put my bossy face on for a while. Get your parents to bring you to my boat and I will make you junior crewmembers, hats and all. I have to talk to the good detectives, not the fake ones.”

He met Andrea at the door and walked with her to the lobby. “Are they all mad at me for going old school inquisition on the Nazis?”

“Doesn’t look like it. Rather, they seem glad you did. Saved a lot of time actually.” She smiled conspiratorially, “I knew the goons were dead already, but you scared the living hell out of everyone else.”

“Not my girls. They were in on the scam. Good little actresses aren’t they? But, they would have played it the same even if the guys were still breathing. They are everything I told your daughters, but when it comes to threatening our family or friends, we are all as cold-blooded as any predator out there. We got tired of looking over our shoulders for the enemy we left able to strike again. We have regrets, not nightmares.”

“For a nice college student, you are truly frightening, Phil Swenson.”

“We are what they force us to be, but only then. Otherwise, we are just college kids. Really.”

He strolled into the lobby as if he owned it. “Hi, guys. Miss me?”

The six twins mobbed him, April grabbing his collar and pulling his face down to her eye level. “You OK Bro? You have time to come to grips with this stupidity?”

“I’m fine with it. Pissed these bozos never seem to go away. Being extra pissed because they targeted children directly is part of it. Shaming the uniform of the Marines is another part that makes it easier to abide this waste. I just wanted to talk to Nick St. John, and then play with the General’s daughters. The Speedlove girls are pretty strong. I think they will be all right. The Attaché and the Doctor have their little heads squared away. Now, they want to be super heroines and help punch out villains like you do.”

“Good Luck with that!” Connie said. “The fearless commando gig is hard work.”

“April, let go my neck. I have to talk to the Marshals. I imagine they have questions. Meet me in the nearest place to get a decent burger. Tell Dr. Speedlove where.” She relaxed her grip and Phil made his escape from her clutches.

The marshals immediately cornered him. A woman, clearly the one in charge, started. “We’ve deposed everyone but you, Lt. Commander. This is being recorded. You will be sent a transcript to read and sign if it is accurate. May we start?”

“Absolutely, ma’am. But can we do it in another room? Some details may require clearance to hear and not everyone has it.”

“We have an unused examination room set up already. Gen. Speedlove requested the same privacy.” She answered, “Follow me.”

On the way, Phil asked their names. The woman in charge answered. “I’m Helen Waite and my associate is Liam Malone.”

“Had to be tough in grade school, ma’am, for both of you.”

“You have no idea. ‘Go to hell and wait’ or ‘leave ‘em alone’. And not another word from you or we will have no choice but brush up on our police brutality skills.” She laughed. “There’s a new sheriff in town.”

Malone said. “We’ll let you slide on that one because your interrogation tactics saved about a week.”

Inside the private room, Helen announced, starting the recorder “We have scanned this room for bugs. It is soundproof and secure.” She did the drill: dates, the matters at hand, names and ranks of those present, that the testimony was freely offered and that the witness was aware the words were recorded. She made him swear to the truth of the testimony. He did and the siege began.

“Lt Commander Swenson, please describe your involvement in the events under investigation, beginning with the test run of the ‘USS Devil’s Darling’, ending with the arrival of the US Marshals.”

Phil did just that, repeating and clarifying details as asked. The deposition took two hours. They were especially interested in his interpretation of the limited information available at the time. He explained as well as he could without claiming to be a fortune teller and they seemed to accept it as strong intuition.

“I think that will do it, Lt. Commander Swenson.” She turned off the recorder, removed the disk and put it in a locked briefcase.

“Ms Waite, there is not much difference in this version and the others that can’t be attributed to point of view and personal perception.” Liam decided. “And it all agrees with the reports coming in from the Embassy. This is a wrap. It’s Miller Time.”

“No can do, Mr. Malone. I’m not old enough.” Phil grinned. “But a soda and burger would be fine. The others are meeting me in the cafeteria. Your treat?”

“Not tonight. We have reports to write. Gotta feed the machine. You actually want late-night hospital food?”

“Not really. The girls are looking for the nearest good burger. If it’s not obvious, I’ll get directions.”

Helen wondered, “I have a question, I think. Where are all the other Marines? I know many are deployed overseas, but there have to be thousands here. Where is the base commandant?”

Phil considered that until they arrived in the lobby. They found a large percentage of the missing Marines. You couldn’t change your mind without bumping into a jarhead. He stopped a man with an M-16 and a body bag. “Pardon me, Lieutenant Harvey. How long have you been here and when did you know you were needed?”

“Lt. Commander Swenson!” The Marine saluted smartly.

Phil returned the gesture. “As you were.”

“Sir. This area was closed for the investigation. People who came in did not come out.” He answered. “Nothing out of the usual, until one of the guards sounded an alarm about two hours ago.”

“I just missed them.” Phil said. “What happened then?”

One of the Majors stepped up. “Then, Lt. Commander, hell broke loose for the second time. I think the problem is, if there is one, is that you and your crew dealt with the threat without firing a shot. No one outside this building had any reason to suspect bad behavior. The Lieutenant is correct. The news flowed in one direction only.”

“So, there was no obvious communications failure. The right people knew the right stuff, but the nature of this affair limited the number of ‘right people’. And some of those people were wrong people, hiding in the open.” Phil did the math. “We had highly skilled Marines and Coast Guard on the ‘Darling’. No need to bring in more. We had a standard guard to escort us to a limited access debriefing. Nothing unusual there. But do us all a favor. Audit the supply line to the Armory and find out who brought in the off-inventory weapons. Extend the investigation to your comm. center. Make sure the seriousness was transmitted properly and not downplayed and that the Base Commandant was kept in the loop, such as it was.”

“The General is a very busy Marine. He left here an hour ago to deal with the State Department, the Foreign Service in particular, DHS and the Pentagon. LeJeune will come out smelling like a rose, but the General doesn’t like surprises. He likes turncoats less.” Major Payne observed.

“Major Payne, I did hear him say he was glad the ‘Darling’ assault team was here. Marines would have had a firefight, hostages would have been injured and the casualty count would have been through the roof. The damage to the hospital would have been tremendous.”

“One of these days, I’ll get a chance to meet him. Has the crash site been secured, Major?”

“Fort Knox is jealous. The NTSC has the black box in a hangar at Cherry Point. The Navy will raise the wreck in the morning.”

“Where are the surviving highjackers?”

“NCIS got to them before the Colonel could finish them off.”

“Major Payne, Lt. Harvey, thanks for the candid answers. Camp operations are not really my area of concern, but you clearly appreciate my curiosity.” Phil looked at a bloodstain on his sleeve. “I suddenly have a vested interest in certain procedures.”

“Ya reckon? Lt. Commander Swenson, if anyone deserves straight talk, you do.” Major Payne laughed. “Don’t worry about the debriefing. The local investigation has been absorbed by greater powers. If I need to fill in a form or two, your deposition and the information we obtained from Lts. Singer and Barton will suffice.”

Phil called out to the crowd in general, “Can anyone tell me where my crew went?”

Someone called back, “Sir, the your Insane Hurricane went to find Private Ridgewalker. He disappeared when my Gunny ordered him to move the bus. As soon as we turned our backs, Wheels locked the bus and vanished. The bus is still where he parked it.”

Phil laughed loudly. “Five will get you ten, Marine, he spotted them coming out, let them board and has the bus warmed. He will probably be a private forever, but he was following my orders in case we needed a getaway car. Please give my apologies to the Motor Pool Boss. The quick exit wasn’t necessary.”

“Sir, you picked a good one. If he can do anything, it’s getaway. We’re just glad he accidentally followed an order.” More laughter. “When you’re done with him, make sure he knows where the base is. Wheels is Wheels, but we’ll miss the bus.”

Phil snapped to attention. “Marines. I can’t say it was fun, but was an interesting evening. I am humbled to be among you. People smarter than me say I suck at protocol, so I don’t know if it is proper for newly Navy to say this. So, shoot me. Oh, sorry, you’ll have to take a number and wait your turn. Anyway, thank you all for the assistance tonight and for all that you do when normal people sleep in safety.” He snapped a proper salute to the crowd. “Oorah!” Phil shouted.

“Oorah!” As one, they answered like the whole crowd rehearsed it with a few cheers thrown in. Phil figured it was the perfect time to make his own escape.

Fat chance. Pierson, Grover and Thanos met him at the door. “With all due respect, sir, you do suck at protocol and you’re terrible at taking orders.” Pierson grinned, “That said, you did a good thing just then. You elevated them. You showed humor, appreciation, then respect by saluting them first. And you just became a Leatherneck by acclamation.”

“Great. More rules. But that wasn’t an act. You guys travel great distances so people can shooot at you. I get shot at with a whole lot less effort. So, where is everybody?”

“On the bus like you predicted, Sir, as are Mel’s guys and the General with his aides and family. We’re going to Ollie’s on the ‘Darling’ according to the First Mates.” Rhonda answered. “The two returning boats have been diverted to Beaufort. We’ll catch our ride home there. Mr. Norton has slip space ready. Ollie is cooking.”

“I love it when a plan comes together. Now let’s get back to the boat where I can be just Captain Phil.”

Wheels and the bus were waiting as expected. “What ya been up to, Private-for-Life Ridgewalker?”

“Music to my ears, Lt. Commander. Just doing what you ordered like a good Marine.” He snapped a salute from the driver’s seat.

Phil returned it. “Take us to the dock, we are outta here.”

They rode mostly in silence. There was no rush to relive the evening other than to hope things stayed calm. The crew talked about the trip to DC to see the President and the burgers at Big Ollie’s.

Marcie did comment, “Gen. Speedlove, I’m surprised the doctors let you leave.”

“I pulled rank. No way I wanted to spend the night there. I like hospitals from the outside.”

“Lt. General of the Army with diplomatic immunity is a lot of rank to pull, sir.” Phil laughed, “But didn’t they want you to wait for the State guys?”

“Of course. But I told them I was demonstrably safer on the ‘Devil’s Darling’ than anywhere else.” He laughed. “They couldn’t dispute the evidence smeared all over the floor. In fact, we might ask for a ride to DC if our flight is late tonight.”

“Well, face it, sir, you don’t have a lot of luggage to deal with. But we might have to remain in the care of Master Gunny Pierson this evening. I’m pretty certain you will be safe and far more comfortable. You might even get a change of clothes at the Base Exchange that doesn’t look too Marine-ish.”

“You are probably right, Sergeant Goldbaum, but the thought of arriving on this water rocket has great appeal. It is almost as fast as the Redbird Jetbird.” He sighed, “In reality, I need to talk to the Secretary of State by tomorrow morning. That part is really seriously serious. Duty is duty.”

“You can meet us in Annapolis Friday morning and have it both ways. Call Captain Max McGuire. He has the details.”

“For a lawyer, Max is OK. I might make it happen.”

“I’ll let Uncle Max know he needs to sharpen his fins.” Lanie laughed. “He’s slipping.”

Wheels called from the front. “Last stop on the route. If ya stay on, ya gotta pay another fare. Sirs.”

“Thank you for the ride, Private. They said to make sure you returned the bus. Go home.”

“I’ll tell ‘em you passed the message along, Sir. Home is at the other end of the state.” He saluted again. “Just following orders.”

“Drive safely, Wheels.” The General laughed. “If you ever need a job, I don’t have an opening.”

“Thank you, General Speedlove.” Ridgewalker actually saluted sincerely. “Be safe. Take care of that arm.”

“Back at you, Pvt. Ridgewalker.”

Everyone waved as the bus disappeared in the distance. “That man is one of a kind. But when the lead flies, you do not want anyone else in the driver’s seat.” Pierson swore. “He’s the best. Don’t tell him I said so.”

“Girls, We’ll hang around here if you want to hang screens and change into something less ghoulish. Help the flight crew get squared away. They need to stick to Gen. Speedlove until someone get him a new aircraft.”

“That’s OK, Phil. We have the body armor to preserve our modesty. and theirs. We need to get underway. I’m starving.” Willy said, running up the gangway. “Saddle up, sailors. You drive. We’ll worry about the gore.”

Marcie, mock swooning, moaned, “The pain, the agony, mixed metaphors much?”

“Nonetheless, she who must be fed has spoken. You must obey.” Melody giggled. “Warp Seven to Big Ollie’s Burger Heaven. Stat.”

“Gimme a break. ‘Stat’ is for doctors. ‘Make it so’ is for us Motor Maidens.” Rachael informed the Cannoneers.

“Change or don’t change. You have five minutes before I light it up. Cat One wind is in your futures.”

“That’s three minutes before curtain. It’s a Drama thing.” Joanne called through her shirt, currently bring pulled over her head. “Break a leg.”