Vickie was still seated at the computer, head in hands, when Three and Four returned. She barely noted their arrival, her mind churning on possibilities of where Crispy was and who this "Mr. Star" person was.
Zee greeted the two warmly. "Lieutenants! I am so glad to see you arrive safely."
"Of course we did," Mike said flippantly. "But if you ladies will excuse me." He headed directly for his room and closed the door behind him.
Vickie's head lifted and an eyebrow raised at her friend's fleeting form. "So, how was your day?" she asked Becki as she turned to face the other woman.
"Huh?" The young woman was worried for her wingmate. Once today he'd already scared her, now she was scared again.
"Are you two ok?" Vickie'd had a hard day too, but nothing compared to the oddness she was feeling come off her companions.
"Um, yeah. We got ingredients for pancakes. I thought we might need the luck, since the leads seem to be..." She saw the computer components and bloodied shirt nearby. "Oh my..."
"It's ok, Bec. It's not Crispy's. And he's alive, I hope."
The younger woman moved over to sit near her. "What do you mean?"
She pointed to the hard drive. "I found that in a secret cave in the catacombs. It was like Indy and the Last Crusade down there."
Becki looked at her in confusion.
"We really need to get you down to the theater and make you watch my entire DVD library," she grinned broadly. "But there is, or was a large amphibian down there. We found a scale that's Trandoshan."
Becki gasped. "Trandoshan?"
"Yeah, and the drive has transcripts of a conversation from a Lurker Below and our very own Bill Skywalker."
"Unbelievable."
Vickie shrugged. "Perhaps, but it also makes perfect sense. I've already sent word to Nick."
"Good idea," Becki said with a nod.
"Now, I've told you about my day. You tell me about yours."
Becki shuddered slightly before beginning. "Your chocolate finally got here..."
"Really? Great. I could really use a few dozen truffles."
"It came with something else."
Vickie blinked. "Excuse me?"
She took a deep breath before beginning. "It seems your friend from La Maison wants to know what we're doing here. There was a bug brought in with the delivery."
Vickie's jaw dropped open. "I guess that explains some things. Did you two take care of it?"
"Yeah, we got rid of it." She looked towards Mike's room.
"Something happened."
Becki turned back to her quickly. "No, Mike just caused a little ruckus while I placed the device somewhere else."
Vickie just looked at her, which made the younger woman slightly uneasy. Just as suddenly as she started, she stopped. "Josh probably won't be back with us until morning. Pancakes will be a good way to start the day. Did you two get to any of the places marked on the map?"
She nodded. "A couple of the ones nearby. It was odd."
"How so?"
"Two seemed to be abandoned apartments, not exactly in the best of neighborhoods either. One was a bakery..."
"A bakery?"
"Yes, and the entire time I was in there, it felt like someone was watching us."
"Might be the dressing like an American but speaking fluent French." Vickie winked at her friend.
Becki chuckled. "Could be. The last address we checked was an alleyway. See what I mean by odd?"
"Yeah, I do. Well, maybe we'll have better luck tomorrow. After all, you are making your Mendellian famous pancakes."
"We need to make sure from now on that whenever we take a mission we have pancakes before we get started."
"I second that. Motion carries. We'll add it to the Terra Group bylaws when we get home." Vickie grinned from ear to ear.
Becki joined her, laughing lightly. "You have no idea how good it feels to laugh." Her smile faded. "But I miss Thayer."
Inwardly, Vickie blushed and felt uneasy. Her outward appearance contradicted that. "I'm sure we'll be done here soon. We'll go back and regroup to give you two time to reacquaint yourselves."
Becki blushed and looked at the floor. "Vickie!"
"What? I didn't do anything?" She grinned again, trying to set her friend at ease.
"I'm hungry," the younger woman suddenly said. "We had a baguette at the bakery, but that's all we've had to eat since breakfast."
"You're one up on me. I had that banana this morning. How about you and I fix some dinner. Perhaps we can coax Mike to join us."
"Sounds good to me." The two women moved into the kitchen to begin preparing the meal.