Sandra fought to control her churning stomach. Charlie meanwhile was forced to surrender in his theater of the war on nausea, and ejected a foul-smelling pool on to his shirt front. Sandra staggered to her feet and approached the door, but it refused to budge.

“Why the hell won’t this open?”

“Why the hell should it?” Charlie gasped back. “You want that thing to come in here and kill us faster?”

“Kid, I’ll take my chances with some ghost any day,” she said. “Listen.”

Charlie did. At the closed factory door could be heard the metallic pounding of the assault bots battering the door. 

“How do I open the damn door?” Sandra growled through gritted teeth. 

“You have to… deactivate the motion security system,” he said finally. “The whole joint is locked down when the system is on.”

“Great. How do I do that?”

Charlie’s eyes darted from the increasingly-darkening parking lot outside, to the door behind him, which was beginning to creak and bend under the pressure of repeated blows from the assault bots.

“Tell her, kid!” Venus barked, attempting to struggled to her feet.

“Enter 123 on the keypad by my desk,” he blurted. 

“Oh, my God,” Sandra said. Despite everything else, she formed the thought What on earth did Lurge see in this kid? Shakily, she stepped to the desk and began to punch in the code. 

Her finger had just hit the “3” when the door to the factory gave with an ear-splitting shriek of metal wrenching from metal, and the assault bots began to surge into the breach, weapons raised.

Venus tried to stand, but collapsed to the ground. Charlie yelled “No!” in terror and threw up again. Sandra gripped the edge of the desk for support.

The infantry bots stood still, frozen for a moment. Sandra wondered if time was slowing, as it sometimes does during moments of life-threatening catastrophe. But then she realized the machines had in fact stopped, and were now lowering their weapons, and beginning to return whence they had come.

“Well, this is a break,” said Venus blandly, as the hulking machines marched away.

“I don’t get it,” Sandra said. “But I’ll take it.”

Charlie, who was still a shuddering mass on the ground, gurgled something about the Eidolon.

“Doesn’t look like it’s a problem to me,” said Sandra, jerking her head in the direction of the parking lot, where the lights were now blazing at full power, their reflections glinting off of the asphalt, still wet from the recent downpour.

Charlie looked around suspiciously.

“What in the name of all that’s holy happened in there, ladies?” Max’s voice asked. “Last I heard you where leaving Lurge’s office; after that it was all garbled.”

“Long story,” Venus said. “We’ll tell you on the way out of here.”

She had recovered enough to stand, and together she and Sandra advanced out of the door—which slid open as soon as they approached—and into the cool night air, Charlie following nervously behind them, glancing around as though expecting to be attacked at any moment. The two investigators were on edge as well, though they feared attack from physical entities rather than any phantoms. But nothing waylaid them as they crossed the wet pavement, and they reached Sandra’s orange hatchback without incident.

Sandra slid into the pilot’s seat, and Venus entered beside her. 

“Should we give the kid a ride?” Venus asked.

Sandra glanced at him dubiously, but jerked her head in the direction of the rear cargo area, indicating he could ride if he wanted.

“Wait a sec. There’s got to be a towel back there. Clean yourself up a little and throw the towel in the trunk.” 

“Thanks,” he said softly, squeezing himself in between the shopping bags, camping gear, beach supplies, and other objects that Sandra preferred to store in the car rather than carry into her home. “I didn’t want to wait alone for the shuttle tonight.”

After riding in near-silence to drop Charlie off at his apartment, Max began leading the discussion, planning their next moves.

“I’m going to set up a meeting with Mrs. Lurge at the office tomorrow,” he said. “We’re going to confront her with everything we’ve got, and ask her to give us a more thorough account of things. In particular, I want to know why she omitted telling us about the change in ownership.”

“She should probably have the family lawyer there as well,” said Venus.

“I have invited him, Venus. And I’m also going to bring a police escort there. I fear our Mrs. Lurge may be a, uh, flight risk.”

“Anything else we should know?”

“Yes—I think it’s appropriate to invite Mr.McIntyre as well. I want to give him a chance to hear Mrs. Lurge’s allegations against him.”

“How about Mr. Lurge’s gal pal, Miss Ritter? Have you tracked her down too?”

 “I’d like to, Venus, but unfortunately my sources indicate she’s skipped town. Apparently, she has a second home in the Bahamas.”

“Nice!”

“Oh, yes—my sources also discovered a series of fund transfers made from Mr. Lurge’s account to hers over the past year. Those can’t have gone over well with the Missus.”

Venus shook her head, then turned to Sandra, who throughout this exchange had been leaning against the window, her head propped on her hand, wearing a forlorn expression as she gazed vacantly at the empty road speeding along in front of them.

“Sandra? You’ve been awfully quiet.”

“Mm? Oh, well; you, uh… you seem to have things pretty well in hand.”

“You see,” Max chirped. “I told you she’d be a fine addition to our team, didn’t I?”

Sandra said nothing, opting instead to continue staring and idly biting a nail on her right hand.

They pulled to a stop, and the car descended to a landing outside the agency building, directly behind the sleek, red vehicle Venus indicated as hers. She opened the door to get out, and then said, “Hey, Sandra—can you come out here a sec?”

Sandra languidly stepped out as well.

“Max,” Venus said crisply. “We’re going to take our earpieces out. This is on personal time; girl talk, okay?”

“Understood, ladies. I’ll talk to you in the office tomorrow, 10AM sharp!” he said crisply.

 “What is it?” Sandra asked after they had both tossed their earpieces into the car.

Venus took a deep breath, and then began: “I just wanted to say thank you. Like I said, nobody’s wanted to hire me, what with the whole cyborg thing. So I try to keep it a secret, but of course a simple drug test gives the game away. It’s been years since I’ve been able to just… partner with somebody. Y’know, as an equal.”

Sandra laughed. “An equal? You did everything! You got the files, you were able to see what was what in that factory while I was stumbling around in the dark, and you saved my life. Without you, the whole thing woulda been a disaster.”

Venus smiled. “Like I said, glad to be part of a team.”

Sandra stared at her. Did she really mean that? Did this woman, who, in addition to being attractive, friendly, and intelligent, also happened to posses superhuman strength, really find it so strange she was wanted?

“This might sound weird,” Venus pushed on. “But once people find out about me, they treat me like I’m an alien or something. It was even that way in the Service, after the procedures. They didn’t look at me and see good old Venus, the chick who likes hats and rock & roll and cheese pizza—they saw a frickin’ battle robot like those things back there. So,” she said, becoming self-conscious. “I’m just saying, I know it’s been awkward for you, but, thank you.”

They stood for a moment, regarding each other. Venus bit her lip.

“Oh, uh, sure.” Sandra said at last.

“Well; see you tomorrow,” said Venus, smiling and walking to her car.

Sandra watched her go. What on earth was that about? She thought. I was totally useless. Some ‘team.’ I’ll be lucky to have a job for another month if this keeps up. 

Shaking her head, Sandra finally climbed back into her hatchback and stared ahead blankly.

“Voice Authentication,” the machine prompted. 

“Sandra Darcy.”

“Password?”

“Disco,” she said softly, and the car rose from the ground and zoomed off into the night.

Sandra’s police training kicked in, and she immediately dropped prone to the floor, as the sizzling hot beam of light singed the air above. She arched her head upward, and beheld, stomping towards her, the silhouettes of three Lurge assault bots, the barrels of their cannon-arms glowing orange and already charging up for another barrage. Sandra glanced around wildly for cover. There was a stack of crates some yards off to her left, and she began to scramble for them, though she knew she was unlikely to cover the distance before the volley hit, and instinctively closed her eyes, bracing for painful annihilation.

At that instant, she felt a powerful force seize her by the back of her jacket, lift her off of the ground, and, with a speed that felt as though she were being hurled through the air, deposit her safely behind a stack of metal boxes. The next thing she was aware of was a hand sweeping across her torso and seizing her pistol from its holster.

Falling on her hands and knees, gasping, Sandra looked up to see, silhouetted in the nearly-blinding blaze of the laser beams, the figure of Venus, in a perfect combat stance, and returning fire with her pistol. At first, it seemed suicidal; surely she would be cut to ribbons by the deadly beams. But then, a translucent mist shimmered into view around Venus, deflecting the energy away from her, and she stood her ground, firing again and again with calm control. Sandra could not see over the boxes, but she could hear the rounds hit home with repeated metallic thuds. Shortly, the clanking of the assault bots ceased, as did their cannon fire. Venus lowered the weapon, turning to look at Sandra.

The two stared at each other for a moment, breathing heavily.

“Military cyborg enhancements,” Venus said finally. “They gave them to me when I was in the Service. Experimental; top secret thing. ‘Operative of the future,’ they said. Then, a couple years later; new government, new priorities. They RIF’d me, and outlawed all weaponized robotics. So I couldn’t get work anywhere—nobody was willing to hire me and risk all the lawsuits. So,” she said furtively. “That’s my deal. Sorry I didn’t tell you. I just didn’t know if I could…”

“Don’t apologize. Ya’ll just saved my bacon. Thank you.” said Sandra. She paused. “And. . . that was awesome.”

“Anytime. You hurt?” Venus by now kneeling beside her and gently prodding her torso for injuries.

“Whoa, this is so hot,” came the voice of Charlie, who was standing in the doorway of the stairwell, peeking out at them.

Venus rose, turned, briskly crossed the yards between them, picked the young man up by the waist, twirled him around over her head blindingly quickly, and plunked him down unceremoniously where he had stood.

“Thank you again,” said Sandra. “Now we need to figure out what the hell is going on with these robots. Didn’t chucklehead say,” Sandra nodded at Charlie, “that these things had to be activated from the main office—where he just was?”

Venus leveled the pistol at Charlie. 

“I swear, I didn’t do it!” he protested. He had been shaking his head to try to clear it, and now raised both hands in the air. “I didn’t touch a thing! Maybe it activated automatically when you logged in as Mr. Lurge!”

“Why on Earth should that be?” 

Charlie made a motion halfway between a shrug and a twitch. “How should I know? All I’m saying is, I didn’t do it, okay?”

Venus glanced at Sandra, but kept the weapon aimed at Charlie’s chest.

“Tell ya what, Chuck,” Sandra said, a slight smile curving one side of her mouth. “As I recall, you said something to the effect that, even when the robots are activated, they respond to the voice of Lurge personnel, isn’t that so?”

“Uh, yeah… yeah, I guess so.” 

“Well, then, I reckon you can lead the way , and talk down any more of these things that we run across.”

Charlie swallowed hard. 

“She’s right,” Venus added. “I can hold my own against these things, but I can’t cover the both of you at the same time. If we run into a bunch of them, we’re in trouble.”

“But…”

“It’s our best bet for getting out of here. C’mon, let’s go find that back door that Lurge used.”

Reluctantly, and still shaking his head, Charlie followed as they walked towards the rear of the factory. They stayed close together, with Venus in the lead, pistol drawn. The distant percussion of more infantry bots patrolling echoed all around them, making it difficult to tell from which direction the sound came. They kept close to the walls, creeping between different points of cover.

“Okay, we’re coming up on the door,” Venus hissed at last. “And there’s seven, no, eight of the damn things guarding it.”

“How—?” Sandra began, squinting into what appeared to her to be complete blackness. “Oh. Retinal enhancements, right. Dumb question.” she muttered.

“Okay, Charlie,” Venus said as they moved closer to the door, concealing themselves behind a stack of scrap metal. “Do your bit.”

Charlie took one glance at the pistol in Venus’ hand and swallowed hard. He peered hesitantly over the pile of metal, and called out to the lumbering machines, “Attention! Um, attention! This is Charlie Bradler, ID number 410-D.”

The machines all turned as one, the red cores of light that glowed within their metal-mesh skulls pulsating ominously. 

“Um, that’s right. Charlie Bradler. 410-D. Please stand down and assume passive stance for human inspection, please,” he said, trying his best to strike a tone of authority.

The machines did not obey the command however, instead raising their arm-mounted cannons and firing. Venus leapt in front of Charlie as he dove behind the metal pile, raising her arm to again create a barrier.

“This won’t hold up long,” she said. “Start running!”

Together, the three retreated back into the factory, dodging stray lasers as the infantry bots mounted a pursuit. 

“What the hell, kid?” Sandra shouted at Charlie as they clambered and scrambled across ancient manufacturing equipment.

“I don’t know!” he cried, “It should have worked!”

 Venus continued to fight a delaying action as best she could, but soon the pistol ran out of ammunition. 

“You got any more ammo?” she called to Sandra, blocking a laser blast with a flick of her free hand.

“In the car,” Sandra replied grimly.

“Damn. Okay, let’s make a break for it,” Venus ordered. Quickly, she closed the gap between herself and Sandra, striding across the floor with incredible speed. She raised her arms as if holding an invisible shield behind the three of them, and then gripped both by their collars. Lifting them off the ground, she accelerated, hurtling through the maze of boxes, machinery and roaming assault bots. The gargantuan machines tried to draw a bead on them as they sped by, but Venus’ moved much too quickly for the powerful but lumbering battle platforms to deploy their weapons accurately. Errant lasers struck walls, stacks of boxes, and even other robots, but none hit the three fleeing people.

At last, they came in view of the door by which they had entered, and Venus was beginning to slow down. Her grip on the other two slackened, and they stumbled on their own feet the last few yards—Sandra managing to slap the control panel as they slipped through to shut the door behind them. All three collapsed to the floor beside Charlie’s desk, Venus from exhaustion, Sandra and Charlie from motion sickness.

“Must… recharge…” Venus panted. 

“We can’t stop here,” Sandra said, gasping for air herself, and trying to desperately to keep the contents of her stomach down. “Those things will get through the door eventually. We need to get to the car.”

“We can’t!” Charlie groaned. 

Sandra shot him a look. “What do you mean?”

“Look!” He gasped the word, pointing a shaking finger towards the glass doors and into the parking lot beyond.

At first, there seemed nothing noteworthy about the scene. But as they watched, they perceived the light of the lamps seemed very weak. Only about half were lit at all, and soon, these too began to flicker and die out. 

“It’s the Eidolon!” Charlie whispered. “It’s coming!”

“What?” Venus exclaimed, looking around wildly.

“He’s talking on our comm sets,” Sandra said, tapping her ear piece. Her momentary surprise had given way to annoyance. “It’s his favorite trick; you’ll get used to it eventually.”

“Really, Sandy; so cynical!” Max clucked in his velvety baritone. “The fact of the matter is, I wasn’t able to get through to you for quite some time.”

“The factory floor must have blocked service,” Venus mused.

“Quite possibly. I have some news for you. I’ve been ‘following the money,’ as they say, and I’ve found a bit of a bombshell. It took a surprising amount of digging, but I’ve learned that Lothar Lurge was no longer the owner of the Lurge family robotics factory, effective September 30.”

“What? Then who was?” Venus asked.

“Mrs. Lurge, of course. The company transferred to her sole ownership on that date. And that’s not all I found, either. Are you ready for this one? The Lurges’ divorce was finalized on that same date!”

Venus and Sandra exchanged a look.

“Well, I guess that isn’t too surprising, uh, given what we just read.”

“No, indeed. But you can see this casts Mrs. Lurge in quite a different light.”

Venus nodded, and then remembered Max couldn’t see her, and added, “Sure does. Find out anything else?”

“I did! Before he, ah, ‘passed away,’ Mr. Lurge had wrapped up a deal with the state to let them take over running day-to-day operations and receiving revenues from events on the grounds.”

“What!”

‘That’s right—you remember, Mrs. Lurge said the state had been trying to buy them out for years.”

“So what about the whole thing with McIntyre?” Venus asked.

“Most likely a red herring,” Max finished, “Thrown in to put us off the trail.”

“You mean… Mrs. Lurge was lying to us?”

“Let me posit a hypothetical series of events,” said Max. “See if you don’t agree that it has at least a better than 50/50 chance: Mrs. Lurge finds out about her husband’s infidelity, and she is outraged. She further finds that he intends to effectively abandon the family business by turning the proceeds over to the state. That’s the last straw. So she seizes control of the family firm, and brings old Lothar here, unsuspecting, and has him murdered in the night by his own machines!”

There was a long pause, broken only by the rumbling of the thunder. 

“But then why would Mrs. Lurge hire us? She’d already committed the crime and gotten away with it.” said Venus.

“Why, to assist in the final masterstroke: the framing of Mr. McIntyre for the crime! She wanted to settle the old score with the McIntyres along with everything else. So, she contrived things, told us stories of the McIntyre’s interference with operations, to plant the suspicion in our minds. She wanted us to come here, find what we were supposed to find, and point the finger at McIntyre.”

Another pause.

“What do you think, Sandy?” Max asked at last.

“I dunno… maybe.” She murmured. “I just feel like… feel like…”

She whirled around suddenly.

“Like somebody’s staring at our asses instead of standing guard like I told him to,” she barked at Charlie, who had advanced into the room and had been hovering behind the two women.

He yelped and leapt backwards. “No, no,” he insisted, “I heard a man’s voice in here and wondered what was going on.”

Venus shook her head. “C’mon, let’s see what else we can find on this machine.”

Sandra locked eyes with Charlie and pointed firmly to the door, and he grudgingly retreated.

“Hey, look; here’s a message with the kid’s personnel file,” Venus said loudly enough to be heard in the hall as she scrolled through the menus.

“What!” Charlie huffed.

“No worries,” she said cheerfully. “Looks like your performance reviews are all strong… let’s see… ‘perfect for the job,’ ‘sensitive to company’s needs,’ a note from Mr. Lurge saying ‘hire this boy at once—he’s perfect.’ Wow, all that, and not a harassment complaint in sight, who’d have thought?”

Sandra chuckled. “What else you got in there?”

Venus continued scrolling through with incredible speed. “Well, there’s a long email exchange here with Mr. Lurge’s lawyers.”

“What’s it about?”

“Arguing over the terms and conditions of his agreement with the state… ‘the party of the first part agrees…’ ‘herewith the party referred to as the ‘operator’ shall agree to…,’ ‘if, after a period of less than 60 days, the goods are found to be faulty, the party referred to as owner shall recompense…,’ blah blah blah…”

Sandra nodded. 

“And then there’s this,” Venus continued triumphantly, continuing to read at an incredible speed. “Some emails between Lurge and McIntyre. It’s a thread that goes back quite a ways, but the last message is from the day of Mr. Lurge’s death. It’s from McIntyre—it says:

‘I’m confirming what we discussed this morning at the Chamber meeting. As we agreed, I’ll meet you on your premises this evening. I’m not sure what you believe will come of this, but you have my word, I’ll be there, as planned.’”

The two investigators exchanged a glance. 

“That’s a bit of a—I mean, why would Lurge have invited him?” Sandra asked.

“Maybe he didn’t. Maybe McIntyre just sent that message to make it look like he had.”

“Could be, I guess. Still, something doesn’t add up.”

“There’s still one more angle we need to investigate,” Max chimed in. “Mrs. Lurge said that her late husband had entered by a back door. Have you been able to find that?”

“No, not yet,” Sandra answered. “Charlie!” she barked.

“Still here, guarding the rear.”

“Where’s the door that Mr. Lurge came in the night of his death?”

“Oh, um, it’s back down in the factory. At the very back, near where they keep the scrap metal.”

“Right, got it.” Sandra turned to Venus. “Can you download those emails? I have a data stick in my purse—”

“Don’t worry, got one right here,” Venus interjected. “You go ahead; I’ll catch up.”

Sandra shrugged, and made her exit. She and Charlie began to retrace their steps back down to the factory floor.

As she descended the steps, she fancied she heard a distant clanking noise echoing from a distance. Probably hail on the metal roof. As she exited the staircase, it seemed to become more pronounced, as if it were all around her. She felt slightly unnerved by it, but shook her head. It’s that stupid kid’s ghost stories, getting to me. Grow up, girl! she thought to herself.

With that thought, she turned on her heel and walked deeper into the darkness. But when the clanking persisted, she stopped and spun around just in time to see an eerie red glow looming out of the blackness, follow by a high-pitched whine and a sudden blaze of light roaring at her head.

Charlie’s eyes widened as the implication dawned on him. “Wait… you mean… me?”

“I didn’t say that,” Sandra replied. “But at the same time… You were the only one here that night.”

“No… absolutely not!” Charlie protested. “I didn’t—like I said, I was holed up at the front.”

“Until your alleged ghostly entity forced you to come back this way, according to your story.”

“What? No; look, that’s what happened, I swear. I came back here, and I found Mr. Lurge. It was the first I saw him or knew he was here! I would never have done anything to him, anyway—he was a good boss! He gave me this gig and he was always nice to me.” 

“Calm down,” said Venus. “We’re not accusing you.”

Charlie seemed not to have heard. “I’ll tell you what happened—it was the ghosts! Samuel, I guess. Maybe something else. But that’s the only way it makes sense—they must have brought the robots online and had them kill Mr. Lurge. Probably to get revenge on the family, I guess.”

He paused to catch his breath, and Sandra seized her opportunity:

“This ghost business has got to stop, okay? I’m not saying you’re implicated, but spouting nonsense won’t help your case, understand? Just be cool, kid.”

Charlie nodded, still looking quite frantic.

“You said the bots have to be activated in the main office—where’s that?”

“It’s in the center of this building. We’ll have to go further into the factory and then go up a couple floors. But it’s—“ he paused abruptly, seeming not to know what to say.

“It’s what?” 

“Uh, well, I don’t know how to… that is…”

“It’s something else about ghosts, isn’t it?” said Venus.

“Uh, yeah.”

“Look, we can handle any ghosts, okay?” Sandra said firmly. “Take us to this office.”

Charlie swallowed hard and then pointed the way. Together, the three continued past the long, silent line of mechanical warriors, which were sporadically illuminated by the blue glow of lightning flashes. The storm outside was drawing near, and the narrow window slits where the wall met the ceiling rattled in the increasingly violent wind.

At last, they reached a sort of central pillar made of huge concrete blocks, inside of which was molded a stairwell leading up into blackness. The three went inside and up the winding stairs, advancing slowly, sweeping the beam of Sandra’s light before them. Once, Venus abruptly held out a hand, pressing it into Sandra’s chest to bring her to a halt.

“What are you doing?” Sandra demanded.

Venus nodded upward, and Sandra raised the beam of her light in the direction indicated, till it fell upon a huge, hairy spider scurrying into a crack in the wall. 

“Whoa, thanks. How did you know that was there?”

Venus shrugged. “Sixth sense, I guess.”

They began to move forward again when a muffled noise from behind made them turn around. Charlie remained on the landing, staring at the wall. 

“I hate spiders, okay?” he said. “Can’t we just blow this haunted pop stand and come back in the daytime?”

“We’re going to the office,” Sandra said. “You wanna stay down, be my guest.”

Considering this, Charlie reluctantly followed. “Sure, you two probably feel safer with me.”

 At last, they came to the top of the last flight, and a battered red door that opened into a long hallway. This hall was more luxurious than the industrial, unpainted metal-and-concrete of the lower levels. It was carpeted with avocado-green shag and the walls featured vintage Lurge adverts depicting bots in alien landscapes or space stations. There were doorways every few yards, leading to vacant offices.

“These are the executive suites,” Charlie said. “I’ve only been up here once, for my interview. That’s when Lurge told me about the control panel in his office. It’s at the end of this hall, on the right.”

And indeed, as they reached the end of the corridor, they saw to their right a large wooden door, with a brass nameplate bearing the words, “Lothar Lurge, President and CEO”

Charlie stepped forward and inserted his key into the lock. He turned it hesitantly, and the door creaked open.

“Look at you, with a key to the boss’s office,” Sandra remarked.

“Naturally,” he said, some of his old bravado returning. “Old Man Lurge knew I’d need a master key since I kept the whole joint secure at night.”

Lurge’s office was fairly spacious.  An area at the front, separated from the main space by avocado-colored dividers, had a desk and filing cabinets, was presumably for a secretary — Miss Ritter, according to the nameplate.  The larger, executive desk sat at the rear of the room, in front of a massive bank of windows against which the rain continued pounding. 

“So, where are the controls you were talking about?” 

“I think they’re at Mr. Lurge’s desk, but I don’t know exactly”

“Okay. Stay just outside in the hallway and  guard the door,” Sandra commanded, as she and Venus hurried to the desk, and started looking at the panels of monitors, buttons and switches arrayed there. 

“It wants a password,” said Sandra, opening a window on the largest terminal. “Do you know it?” she called to Charlie, who shook his head.

“Hey, I’m pretty good at guessing passwords,” said Venus, resting her fingers on the keypad and closing her eyes, as if concentrating for a moment. Then her fingers flew, and immediately, the words “Access Granted” flashed on the screen.

“How’d you do that?” Sandra asked in amazement.

“Something I picked up in the FES,” the other woman replied with a shrug. “Here, let’s do some digging.”

Together, they read through the messages on the mail client, which was automatically displayed on the screen. Most were uninteresting reminders, alluding to meetings and deals they had no knowledge of. 

“What’s this here?” Sandra said, pointing at one message, from Mr. Lurge to Miss Ritter. Venus opened the message and read aloud:

Babe —

I need to expedite matters. She’s been looking daggers at me every morning, and it gives me the creeps. I think I’ve got a plan.  I’ll give you the details — and a whole lot more — when you get back.

–L.

“Ewww!” said Sandra and Venus in unison as they exchanged shocked looks. “Well, I don’t like the sound of that!” said Venus, with a scandalized expression.

“Neither do I,” said Sandra.

“Me neither, ladies,” the voice of Max concurred, causing both of them to start.