U is for Underhanded Deeds

[Frank "Sunny" Laffont]

Frank was busy making cookies while wearing a trench coat and fedora. This took a little bit of explaining, but only a little, because that explanation was rather short: Frank expected to do shady things soon, but she'd gotten bored, and since she was in a kitchen, she'd opted to make cookies. Frank did possess a rather unique talent for baking delicious things entirely out of nothing. No recipe, not always with the right amount of ingredients, but they always seemed to taste almost too good. Probably had something to do with love or something nonsensical like...

oh, right, the trench coat.

Frank had determined that because of the whole tightened security thing, there was need for things that were a little harder to get. Rules had been tightened, the iron grip of the staff turning into steel or what have you. So Frank had dug deep into her contacts (i.e. started texting everyone on her phone's contact list) to determine who she should go to for things of a questionable nature. There had been a few weird suggestions, but a lot had agreed on one name:

Trevor Paige.

So Frank had contacted this Trevor person, telling him that she needed his super special smuggling abilities, that she could totally pay, and that she would be waiting for him in the kitchen. She'd worn the fedora and trench coat because, well, that was what you wore during shady engagements like this. Obviously. And the cookies had already been explained. So there you go: Frank, making cookies, while wearing a fedora and trench coat, and waiting for Trevor Paige to show up so she could discuss things.

She might have been singing too; it was hard to tell. There did seem to be noises coming from her mouth though...

[Trevor Paige]

Trevor stared down at this phone and reread the text message.  This isn't how business is supposed to be ran.  He thought to himself.  Sure the text was from one of the most popular students at the Academy and he knew her family had money but...  did there have to be so many smiley faces and emoticons involved?  Did every sentence have to be separated by the word 'totally'?  Oh well.  Business was business.  If someone needed to procure his services  it meant a payday.  With a sigh he tucked his tablet into his backpack, zipped it up, slung it over his shoulder and was out the door.

As requested, the boy wandered into the cafeteria kitchen, following the scent of freshly baked cookies.  It wasn't an aroma that brought back fond memories of childhood.  It was simply an indicator someone was baking.  There was no mistaking who was waiting to talk shop.  His shoulders slumped and his head tilted to one side as he looked to the trench coat and fedora-clad girl.  Anyone watching would almost be able to hear his body language speak audibly.  Are you kidding me?  It said very loudly.

He could only stand to watch the display for so long before it shattered his all-business veneer and he cracked a smile.  "Should I be on the look out for a hidden camera or something?"

[Frank "Sunny" Laffont]

Frank was ignorant of most of the things involving body language. It sort of fell into one of two categories as far as she was concerned: "happy" and "not happy," and even then, Frank had  a tendency to just sort of assume that people were happy unless they directly proved otherwise to her. So she did not get that Trevor was confused or disbelieving.

No, instead, Frank was figuring that Trevor wanted a cookie.

"You can totally have some cookies if you want. I, like, made a bunch. 'cuz I got bored standing around and just waiting for this guy I'm supposed to be having a semi-secret meeting with and--wait, cameras? ARE WE ON CANDID CAMERA? Are you going to be punking me or something? You don't look like Ashton Kutcher. You could be his kid brother I guess or something. Actually, you kind of look familiar," Frank held up her hands, forming a little frame with them and sort of eyeballing Trevor intently with it. She stuck out her tongue and shifted a little to get him better in the frame.

No, that didn't help. Frank blew out her lips and lowered her hands, eventually shrugging. "Whatever. Did you come for some cookies? I think the first batch should be coming---" and a timer buzzed. Frank let out a little squeal, grabbed a set of hot pads, and headed toward the ovens, soon extracting two rather large sheets of white cookies with strange pink streaks in them.

[Trevor Paige]

Trevor made a mental note to get his hands on a bottle of Ritalin to slip in the girl's food should they have to meet again. This was ridiculous. Amusing, to be sure, but he was expecting business not talk of reality shows and offers of pink cookies. And what was with the clothes? He watched Frank ramble on and waited a few moments to make sure she had finished before finally responding. "I'm the guy you're waiting for." He said almost reluctantly, completely dismissing the bulk of Frank's dialogue. "I'm Trevor."

He would accept a cookie, though, once they had properly cooled down enough to handle and, subsequently, eat. There was no sense in turning down free food, especially of the freshly baked pastry kind. "You know I'm going to need more details on what you want than you texted me." He commented, blowing on a cookie. "What does 'super special smuggling abilities' mean, exactly?"

[Frank "Sunny" Laffont]

Frank was, thankfully, used to people ignoring or outright dismissing large chunks of whatever it was that she said. She pretty much did that herself, since it was nearly impossible to remember everything that poured forth from her mouth. She got a name, and Trevor got a cookie, so they were pretty much good to go in that regard.

"It means that people think you're totally awesome at doing stuff that's not exactly lega--oh," Frank paused, then looked around the room. She moved about closely, looking under the various things, even lifting a few. "I probably should've asked you if you were followed or something, but you're the professional here. Oh, should I do some sort of like, test or something? You don't have to worry about money or anything like that. I'm totally loaded," Frank waved a hand dismissively, which was pretty much what she did anytime there was any mention of money.

"But yeah, I'm thinking that this whole crackdown thing really sucks, since, like, some people can't even leave. how messed up is that? Just 'cuz you look a little different. Doesn't that sound like racism to you? It so sounds like racism to me. It's like,' Frank paused and grabbed two cookies, jamming them both into her mouth at once. She then talked out of them, somehow barely obscuring her words: "it's like they're getting prejudiced against jus' cuz they look funny and stuff and that is so," she actually had to pause to swallow, "wrong."

[Trevor Paige]

Oh, this was going to be exhausting. Trevor sighed and nodded and let the girl do her thing, which was talk. And talk. And talk. Just as soon as he thought there was an opening to speak she started back up again. Again he hesitated to respond to her avalanche of questions, musings, and insights to ensure she was completely finished for the time being. "No, I wasn't followed. We don't need to talk money yes because I don't know what you want. There's no test. It is racism." That should answer most of her questions. At least Trevor hoped he didn't miss any.

With a faint shake of his head Trevor placed the cookie in his mouth so he could withdraw the tablet from his bag. He would shift to get a little close to Frank, though, she did have the right idea. Subtlety was key in these situations. "So, tell me what it is you need." With the press of a button the tablet blinked to life. He casually manipulated the screen, his eyes shifting up to Frank in hopes they'd be getting to the point quickly. Sure she was extremely easy on the eyes and he didn't see why they wouldn't get along in a personal sense but business was a different matter. He didn't like this much talking without actually saying anything.

[Frank "Sunny" Laffont]

Wow, he actually answered all her questions. Frank practically jumped for joy at that realization; she certainly beamed a smile. She also began digging about in her coat. "I wrote a few lists here somewhere," she said, glancing over at Trevor. She kept digging, which required some wiggling on her part. A few unlabeled bags fell out of the pockets (joke powders, for the most part; though one was that sugar that came with those fun sticks), as did a few party favors. One pocket apparently contained nothing but glitter, another nothing but confetti. Which already meant that she had about three pockets more than any sane person needed.

"Oh, nice tablet!" she said, nodding to the device. "I bet you need one of those for your super secret dealing and stuff, huh? My parents bought me one; it's a different color though, and probably not as good as yours. I mean, you've probably had somebody upgrade it with their super mutant power---aaaha, there's one of them!" Frank managed to pull out a wrinkled ball of paper. she began smoothing it out as best she could, moving to rub it against the table a little.

"I need some stuff smuggled in that's kinda hard to get. Most of my usual suppliers for this are back in England," she said, still working over the list. "oh, and I'm thinking that we should totally see about getting some of these poor mutants out. I know this one girl, she's this adorable skunk, and she can't even go out to go shopping! Stupid racist junk," Frank wrinkled her nose and then leaned into the paper. She might have worked more but, yet again, there was the buzz that meant cookies. And as Frank clearly had the attention span of a five-year old on redbull, she took off to the oven without thinking twice about it.

[Trevor Paige]

Trevor watched the girl go through her pockets in a stunned silence. Was she a damn clown with all that crap? Who in their right mind would ever need a pocket full of glitter? Still he gave her the benefit of the doubt. There seemed to be a great deal going on behind that spastic veneer of hers. "Let me see." He said, extending a hand for the list. "You get most of this stuff from England?" Damn. There was a helluva lot more to this girl than meets the eye.

Trevor's eyes perked up slightly at the mentioning of smuggling students out. His heart skipped a beat, although Frank would never know it.  How did that get out?  He thought as the sharp pang of panic began to subside.  We didn't go through with it!  His mind raced behind the calm, collected exterior.  As long as he wasn't going with them, he'd do his best to make the proper arrangements.  "Uh, smuggling students?"  He eyed Frank warily.  "How many, to where, and why?"  The last question was for his own benefit.  Normally if the cash was there Trevor did not care.  In this case he wondered why anyone would dare undertake such a dangerous task with the threat of SPECTRE looming over the Academy on top of the tightened security.

[Frank "Sunny" Laffont]

"Well, I had suppliers who got me the stuff back in merry ole England," supplied Frank, complete with an awful British accent for the last few words. Technically Frank could manage a passable English accent when she wanted to, but she almost always preferred to sound like a cartoon character. That could actually be applied to nearly everything she said and did, but it certainly applied to her accents (though her French was oddly flawless). "I know that the energy drinks come from, like, Japan or something." There'd likely be a shrug or something.

Of course, Frank had said most of this while getting out cookies and juggling various other sweets. She supposed she was more or less done with that, which meant setting the cookies down to cool. She grabbed a few of the already cooled and nibbled at them while talking, thus demonstrating another talent that she'd managed to pick up: the ability to talk with her mouth full without spitting crumbs or altering her words more than a little.

"But yeah, I totally need most of the stuff on the list. I had, like, a bunch of the drinks and stuff. My guy usually just ships them wholesale and crap, since they're not legal here or something," she shrugged, clearly not caring. "But I've been drinking like, three a day. Well, drinking and eating, you know how it--oh, yeah! The smuggling. I'm thinking at least one, but we could probly get at least two. I mean, there aren't that many interesting people that can't go to town who want to go, right? There's only so many people worth paying attention to, y'know? It's like the rest are there to be our extras or something..." and lo, Frank stared into space, lost in ideas that stretched beyond mere mortal understanding.

[Trevor Paige]

Trevor's eyes slid curiously over the list when he'd finally gotten it into his hands. The only thing Frank had revealed was on it were her illegal energy drinks, the brand name of which he'd already expected. Everything else, though, he couldn't wait to see. What could a girl like this possibly need that she would be forced to get through him? Normally Trevor had a general idea what items certain people would be looking for, that was his business, after all. But Frank's entire existence seemed to be a large, strange joke played on the rest of humanity that no one else, save for her, really understood.

Something about the topic of smuggling students stuck with Trevor and prevented him from fully taking in the 'Frank Cox Experience. Normally he'd probably be, at the very least, amused by the girl's combination of boundless energy and surprisingly astute observations. Unfortunately today Trevor was still a little thrown off by the task in which she wished him to assist. "Okay, I can work it to get students out." Of course he could. He'd already made this plan once. "But I need specifics." His gaze followed Frank as she went about the kitchen. "A who, what, where, and when sort of thing. The sooner I get the details, the sooner we can make this happen."  Good lord, the things he did for money.

[Frank "Sunny" Laffont]

Frank finally remembered the whole list thing, so she represented that, still wrinkled, but certainly legible enough. It contained about what you'd expect: a listing of the name, actually written in Asian characters, of the forbidden energy drink, as well as another that had been banned in the US recently. Several candies from various places, most of which weren't technically legal, but Frank apparently figured Trevor could get them faster. There was also a listing for illegal explosive compounds, some makeup (again, not illegal, but damn hard to find around Kalispell), and what appeared to be elephant tranquilizer.

Frank continued eating, only shoving her food to the pouches of her cheeks while she talked (as opposed to ceasing eating like a normal person). "Uh, I figure that we're not gonna want more than a few people, probably?" she said, tapping her chin with the cookie. "I know this one girl, her name's Solkat; she looks like a skunk and she totally wants to see the town but they won't let her because they're meanyheads. I'll be there too, to help, 'cuz I'm obviously a stealth expert," she gestured to her totally not suspicious getup, then continued: "an' I might be able to get us some more helpers. uh, man," she tapped her head a few times with a fist, "I'm not good at the planning thing. When do you think would be a good time? Like, when everyone's at class so we can miss all the boring stuff or something, maybe?"

She sounded a little too hopeful at that last. She was pretty sure she had a test coming up in a few weeks that she'd just love to miss.

[Trevor Paige]

Trevor's brow furrowed as he looked over the list. "You know..." He started, his eyes shifting up to watch Frank as she casually engulfed her freshly crafted treats. "I don't normally ask, but why do you need explosives and..." He looked down to the paper in his hands to make sure he was reading it right. "Azaperone?" He had no clue what it was but it didn't sound like any over the counter drug he'd ever encountered. What, exactly, in the hell was this girl planning?

His head shook some as she explained a little more about the smuggling plan. "Everything depends on what methods for extraction are available on the date you want it to go down." He explained. "Especially with security the way it's been lately, to get one or two students out is going to be tough." And expensive. Frank wouldn't believe how much it cost to get the UPS guy to pick up an extra package or the laundry truck an unaccounted for sack. "And then there's the matter of the pick up on the outside." Was he planning a getaway for students or a prison break? "Do you have someone in place that can get out and serve as transportation once they've gotten out?"

[Frank "Sunny" Laffont]

"Why does anyone need explosives?" asked Frank. She then mimicked an explosion and let out a little poof of air, which actually did sound closer to an explosion than some of the fake ones, which might be a little worrying under the circumstances, really. She grinned, "Did I write down the wrong elephant tranquilizer? I've totally done that before," she leaned over to look at the list. "You wouldn't believe how hard that stupid word is to spell. I still can't say it right. but it's super useful for knocking people out for, like, a long time. I used all these different ones to try and see which worked best when, say, you baked them in a pie and then left them in the teacher's lounge, and that one usually works the best."

She tapped the list and nodded, before moving to hop onto the counter. This got her in better condition to scoop up another cookie. She tossed this one back and forth on her hand, blowing down at it, while listening as Trevor explained the difficulties of sneaking someone out. 'Wow, you've totally thought this out before!" she said, looking up, impressed. "I was just thinking we could dress them in disguises and sneak them out the back by moving through the forest and then hooking up with a getaway car driven by someone that's, like, super cool but probably above being suspected of doing something though i suppose we could also find a student that does illusion things, bribe the heck outta them, go out for a training session and get lost and sort of end up by a getaway car or something but I'm not really good at the plan thing."

It was then that Frank realized she was holding a hot cookie, let out a yelp, and shoved the thing in her mouth, chewing almost mechanically. She spoke while chewing: "and I know toooooons of people who would totally be our drivers. I might not even have to bribe that many people. Did you know that I'm friends with Ellen Banks? She's kinda mean, but she'd totally do something for money and to cause people trouble," which did show something of an understanding of Ellen... sort of... maybe?

[Trevor Paige]

Trevor actually stifled a laugh as Frank rattled on about the uses for the high-grad animal tranquilizer she had listed. It was a rare outburst of emotion from the boy when business was being tended to but he couldn't help it. Who the hell was this girl and what planet does she live on? "Yeah, I'll, uh, see what I can do." He folded the list up neatly and tucked it into his pocket.

And now the talk of the big job. Sure he'd thought over smuggling a student out before. He nearly sighed in relief when Frank seemed surprised he'd already developed a plan. It meant the cancelled plans between himself and another student, as far as he knew, remained their little secret. "The perimeter security at night has been increased by at least fifty percent." When your parents operate the largest private security firm in the world you had a habit of keeping tabs on such things. "There's no way you'd get far enough out for a pick up." A little bit of that Paige-ian smirk crept back in. "Tell you what. You just get me the date and the number of students you want out and I'll take care of the rest."

[Frank "Sunny" Laffont]

Frank nodded as Trevor said he'd do what he could. She knew that was shady-business talk for "I totally got your back." "Awesome!" she said, nodding her head quite enthusiastically. Nice to know that at least the little details were taken care of. At least she wouldn't have to leave things like her energy drink supply up to Fate. That could've just gotten awkward or left her high and dry at the wrong time.

It also meant that they could better focus on the task at hand, namely figuring out how to smuggle out some students. Frank did her nodding thing there, as it seemed like this was another one of those instances where the guy totally had things figured out already. Though he did also seem to be good at poking holes in whatever she had to say.

"Uh, we're gonna need at least a little bit of time. I'd have to check with some people and junk. But there's gonna be at least me and another girl. Uh, maybe a few more? We don't wanna have too many people, 'cuz we'll totally get spotted," said the stealth expert who spent most of her time wearing brilliantly colored camouflage. "But we should at least try to get a couple of them out. I know there's, like a cat and a skunk and isn't there someone with like goat horns or something? We should definitely get at least two out, which leaves me and the getaway driver..." she was doing math on her fingers, trying to figure out how many it took for a job like this. "I really hope you don't tell everyone to kill someone else though. Like if you told the getaway driver to kill the skunk who is supposed to kill me so you get out or something, though i guess that doesn't make much sense with what we're planning or something..."