Lying in her bed in her, Dipper, and Mabel’s room, Misao rested with her chin on her pillow and her phone held up in front of her. The twins were already asleep, and she had just finished recording a video on her phone. It was still in the process of uploading as she switched from her YouTube app to her phone contacts, and scrolled down to the name “Sammy.”
Hitting the call button, she brought the phone to her ear and waited.
Sam answered the phone, R&B music playing in the background. “Hey baby-girl.”
Misao giggled softly. “Hello Sam, how have you been?”
With a chuckle, Sam replied. “Been good, just another day in the life. Hand shaking, move making, so a young rich nigga don’t gotta be risk taking. How’s your new living situation working out?”
After looking over at the sleeping Mabel, and then at Dipper, she replied. “It’s been hectic. I’ve registered at my new school and already making some… interesting friends.”
“Oh yeah? What are they like?”
“Well… there’s another exchange student. She’s so much fun, I met her the first day I came here and we’ve clicked right away. The boy in her host family, he’s also very nice, but very grounded like Dipper is, and he knows karate.”
“Word? Maybe I should swing by see if he can show a nigga somethin’.”
Misao giggled again. “Probably, he is very strong! I also met a young man whose grandmother runs a comic book store–”
“… Hol’ up, that wouldn’t be Zoom Comics, would it?”
That took Misao by surprise. “Um… yes? How did you guess…?”
“You said grandma runnin’ a comic book shop and there’s only one ol’ lady in all of LA who does… Big Nano.”
Nano was a larger than life woman, so it wouldn’t surprise her that Sam knew about her. “I really like Big Nano. She’s very nice and also very crazy, when I first met her, she got into a drag race with my host and won.”
“Yo, was she on that monster of a bike?”
“Yes, actually.”
“I’m not surprised. I heard she shows up at street races and rides off with everybody’s money like they're ATMs. She definitely got my brother Ace with that shit.”
Misao giggled. “Oh no!”
“It’s all love, though. Big Nano showing up at the function is always a good time. I really need to get out there so I can say what’s up.”
“Maybe soon,” Misao said. “At least when it gets a little less hectic and I don’t have to worry about Señor Senior Junior.”
Sam was silent for a moment. “Don’t worry, baby-girl, I got people. Y’all just keep your head low and stay out the news, aight?”
“I appreciate it, Sam.”
@@@@@
Night had long fallen on the legendary Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills, California, and its ultra-high-luxury shops were closing up for the night. One store in particular, an ultra-high luxury jewelry store, still had its doors open. Besides the two clerks and several customers, four heavily armed guards who concealed their deadly weapons under slick and well-trimmed suits watched the doors and the jewelry cases that held millions of dollars’ worth of hand-crafted jewelry.
Young prodigal Supervillain Señor Senior Junior pretended they weren’t surreptitiously eyeing him as he stood in front of a counter, looking at one particularly expensive item–a Smartwatch made with rare metals and encrusted in diamonds. With a pair of contacts in his eyes, and his hair dyed blonde, and his tips frosted, he hoped against hope that the guards didn’t see through his disguise.
“Excuse me, sir?” A pretty clerk a few years older than him chimed. “Is there something you’re interested in?”
“Oh, yes,” Junior spoke in a low, suave voice, and turned to the clerk. “I cannot take my eyes off this fine piece right here.” He then gestured to the watch. “And this watch, too, what’s the deal?”
The shot across her bow threw the clerk off, and she blushed. “O-oh you have an eye for luster, sir… that is an exclusive Hyuuga Light Smartwatch, just released at the start of the year. Compatible with Hyuuga Light Phones and Computers, it’s one of the hand-built prototypes of the mass production model, furnished from platinum and encrusted in precision cut diamonds… the asking price is 4.5 million dollars.”
Junior raised an eyebrow and whistled. “Dang, that’s money. Do you come with it?”
The clerk’s cheeks all but glowed, and she let out a very affected giggle. “Oh my goodness! I’m sorry but we don’t give discounts for flattery.”
Junior laughed himself. “I wouldn’t be here if I wanted a discount. How about I buy the watch right now, and you pick something nice for yourself. Anything you want.”
“Wh-what?!” The clerk gasped. “I couldn’t… I…”
To prove he was not playing at all, Junior whipped out a black credit card, printed with gold and silver. Staring at it, the clerk’s eyes grew larger. “… Oh my goodness… re-really?”
“Tonight this is your store, mami. Pick out what you like,” Junior insisted.
As the overwhelmed clerk did her level best to not burst into tears and complete the sale, Junior glanced back at the guards, who were painfully rolling their eyes at him. He smirked back at the nearest one, and gave a discreet scan of the store before he looked back at the clerk.
“Okay, sir. Please come this way to our office and we’ll get your paperwork signed and your items paid for.”
Junior grinned. “Lead the way.”
“Oh my goodness…”
The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.
After a swipe of the card, an ID scan, and more than a few signatures, Señor Senior Junior walked out of the jewelry store with a four and a half million dollar watch on his wrist, an eight hundred thousand dollar string of gems around the clerk’s neck, and her phone number in his pocket.
Leaving the heart of Rodeo Drive’s most expensive shopping district, he walked to a million dollar luxury sedan and climbed into the back seat, where he sighed and began taking deep breaths.
“‘Do you come with it?’” The car’s driver, Shego, asked as she looked back at him. “When did you get so smooth, SSJ?”
Clearing his throat, Junior spoke again–his voice returning to its higher, whiny inflection. “I just watched some of my father’s old movies. You know he ad-libbed most of his lines.”
Shego glanced back. “No kidding?”
She looked down at his watch. “So, what’s the thought process here? You bought the watch and a necklace on top of that… is this some kind of postmodern heist?”
Junior leaned forward in his seat, quite eager to explain. “Well, you see I wanted to go inside and have a look at the security measures. So I went in as a normal customer, purchased some expensive items and while I was flirting with the clerk, I could make observations while she and the guards were distracted.”
Shego nodded. “I like it, I like it, and what did you get?”
Junior leaned back in the chair. “The store is watched by twelve security cameras with microphones. All the cases are pressure sensitive and made with bullet-proof blast-proof glass–you should have no problem melting through them. There is no visible security panel in the store’s lobby, it is in the back office and uses a palm reader in order to be accessed. I did not see any silent alarms, and the guards all appear to be cyborgs–Hench Co. cyborgs by the look of it.”
The smile Shego was growing through his explanation disappeared. “Cyborgs?”
She turned around in her seat and dropped into it with a scowl. “Great, so much for knockout gas in the vents, or going in through the front door.”
“We shouldn’t do either of those anyway. What we should do is find a way to knock out the power and backup power. That would cause the security systems to reboot, and while that is happening…”
Shego realized where he was going and turned back around to look at him. “We hack the security system so that we can take it offline for our actual heist! Junior, why do I work with guys like Drakken?”
Junior looked aside. “Because you’re a masochist?”
Shego’s eyes widened, then narrowed as flickers of green energy popped around her. “What was that?”
Junior looked at her out the corner of his eye and gave a cheeky smile. Shego huffed out her nose and turned back around to start the car.
“So,” she said as she began driving–course set for their safe house. “Our first order of business is to find a way to knock out the power. That shouldn’t be too hard, we can do that as soon as tomorrow.”
“And we will be able to do the real heist as soon as Sunday. It will be very easy, and we will make back all that I spent and more–they will have another watch like this one on display by then.”
“I must sound like a broken record heaping my praise on you, but you’re my best project yet,” Shego said.
“Do not let that stop you,” Junior teased back before he pulled out his phone and began browsing social media.
Going to Twitter, his well-trimmed eyebrows furrowed when he found that the account he was looking for was set to private. A jaunt over to Facebook revealed a similar state. Only when he reached Youtube did he find that the subject of his search, channel “FaithfulPony371”, had posted a new video.
Without hesitation he pressed play, and Misao Darlian’s face appeared in a dark room, her long hair wrapped up in a towel.
Smiling to the camera, she spoke. “Hello fans, it’s your Faithful Pony here with a quick channel update, ja? First off, do not worry, I am safe and sound in here America, yay! But unfortunately some things have changed so all of the big events I planned for the next few weeks are on hold. I am not sure how long it will take for me to come back online, but until then… my streaming is on hold as well. I am so sorry.”
Junior frowned.
“Again, again, do not worry. I will be back with you soon enough and we will definitely make up for lost time. My scheduled appearance on the Our Family Christmas Special has also not changed.”
She beamed. “I will be posting an update featuring Sam Haley himself as the filming date draws near. So please stay tuned for that.”
“Is that November…?” Junior murmured. He wasn’t sure how far in advance they filmed sitcoms.
Misao grew somber. “Lastly, I ask for forgiveness from my fans who have eagerly awaited my arrival in Beverly Hills… I will not be attending school there, this year. I am still committed to finishing my education here in Los Angeles, and I will come visit you at the first opportunity. Hopefully when filming of the Christmas Special begins.”
Junior’s frown deepened. “So she does know I am looking for her.”
Misao managed a smaller smile. “I am sorry that this all has had to happen, but please know that everything will be fine, and when you see me again? I will be making content like nothing you’ve ever seen. So please stay strong, stay smiling, and always check your six. Have a good night, everypony, and bye bye~!”
The video ended and Junior lowered his phone. Shego, having been focused on navigating Los Angeles traffic, glanced up in the rearview and caught his disappointed expression. “No luck on the real prize?”
“She is not here in Beverly Hills and trying to wait us out,” Junior lamented. “We will have to be patient a little longer.”
Shego shrugged her shoulders. “Well, the longer she hides the longer we can busy ourselves. What is your interest in a Youtube Streamer, anyway? She doesn’t seem your type, and while her dad’s brilliant, he’s no DNAmy.”
Junior looked forward at her, his expression surprised. “You do not know?”
“Don’t know what?”
Junior looked away. “Oh, it would not be important to you, then. It is a matter of family pride, that I am after this girl.”
Shego was skeptical. “Since when did you have pride in anything other than the chiseled temple that is your esteemed self?”
Junior raised his head. “I am doing something that my father at his age cannot.”
“Chase after teenaged girls? Yeah, I can see why he wouldn’t be into that.”
“Ransoming that girl will satisfy that ambition,” Junior said, “And my father will be proud of me.”
Shego huffed. “You’re a good kid, Junior. Well, in a relative sense.”
“Of course, I am a villain, no?” Junior spread his muscular arms across the span of the seat. “And thank you for having patience with me.”
Shego shrugged her shoulders. “It’s not like I have anything better to do. Dr. D’s brewing some kind of cockamamie scheme that he won’t even let me in on. I mean, don’t take that the wrong way? I’m glad you came to me with a job, it means I don’t have to work with any of the weirdos who put their gimmick before their scheme. You see what happened to Duff in the news?”
“Yes, he sliced his last ball so badly it came back and blew him straight into custody.”
“I’ve said it a hundred times before, and I’ll say it a hundred times more. Don’t fall into that gimmick crap-”
“It makes you predictable and easy to counter,” Junior finished. “But, Señor Killigan can’t help it. He’s insane.”
“Tch, no he’s not. I’ve worked with him enough, he’s just a giant golf nerd with a Scotland fetish.” Shego glanced back again. “Get this, he’s not even from there.”
Junior did a double take. “No way!”
Shego looked forward. “Yeah, he’s South African!”
“OH EM GEE!” Junior gasped, drawing Shego’s attention back to him. “I cannot wait until I tell my father this! He has always suspected, but to know that it is true…!”
The car’s dashboard beeped, the only warning before the car’s automatic emergency brake kicked in, the car lurching to a halt. Shego looked ahead, annoyed. There wasn’t anything on the road a second before.
“What happened?” Junior asked.
“I don’t know, something triggered the brake.” Shego scanned the city street in front of her.
“Maybe it was a kitty or a doggy?” Junior asked.
Shego half-listened to him, and scanned the road again, and saw nothing–just residential houses on an empty street, bushes in front of each home obscuring the view into their front yards. She couldn’t shake the feeling that someone or something was watching them, but she couldn’t see anything out of the ordinary. She looked back past Junior, and out the rear window of the luxury sedan. There was nothing there, either.
Junior began to look around as well. “I do not see anything.”
“Then this car already needs to go into the shop,” Shego grumbled as she resumed driving.
As the car continued on, the head of an unnaturally large green snake with a pale yellow belly peered out and flicked its tongue. In the air it tasted power, danger, but not what it sought.
Hissing, the snake pulled back into the bushes and moved with incredible speed.