INTERIOR - Sickly Charlies, poorly named moderately-priced and moderately-enjoyable chain restaurant with a handful of locations throughout Triangle Valley. The building is moderately sized, moderately decorated, with a moderately dark color pallet, with a moderate amount of tables, chairs, wait staff, cooks, etc. The internal temperature is slightly chilly.

  PRESENT- THE BOY (cospying as the girl, but the hat says “BUG” on it), MOUSE RATTINGTON (Tall, lithe, very elegant man with blond hair, green eyes, and a green/gold robe), JOK (rge, burly, retively older man with tasteful facial hair, and less tasteful artificially greased and bckened hair.) Also, a moderate helping of wait staff and patrons, and a sizable amount of Moderators, who happen to be congregating for their bi-monthly luncheon, where they discuss all things moderative.

  TIME - Approaching dinnertime, but still a good ways away from it. On average. That depends on when you eat dinner, I suppose. The sky's still pretty blue, although that can only be seen from the windows at this particur moment.

  "Eerrrruhh..."

  "Hmmmm..."

  "Um."

  The three man sat together at a table of four. Jok and the boy sat beside each other, and Mouse sat across from Jok.

  Their eyes were all glued to the moderately rge menus in front of them, with confused and conflicted squints on their faces.

  "Well, before we make any decisions-" Mouse speaks up, briefly gncing up from the menu. "Is anyone here at all hungry?"

  "Nah. Still full from the huge lunch we just had." Jok said, a notable amount of displeasure and irritation bubbling up. "Y'know, the massive lunch we ate in preparation for our raid on the encampment of hyper intelligent bio-engineered lizard people."

  "what." The boy, who was about to muse something about the fact that he still doesn't know whether or not he feels hunger, looked towards Jok with a deeply curious gleam in his eyes.

  "Oh yeah. Lab escapees. There's a whole cave full of 'em, hidden in pin sight underneath an artificial hill." Jok set the menu down, and looked towards the boy, fully prepared himself to expin more than he should. "We found out about 'em while we were actin' as mercs for a bit- taking a couple weeks off from the thievin' and smuggling racket. We found one of the b crazies holed up in the st room of a dungeon- Long story short we grabbed him, screwed off, beat the crap outta him for a bit for info, turns out those lizards could have all SORTS of crazy pricey magic crap and can also shoot LASERS outta their eyes-"

  Jok pauses, takes a breath, and lifts his menu again before clearing his throat. "Anyway, that's what we were pnning on doing today." He said. "But now we're doing this. Ordering food."

  "wow." Says the boy, his eyes gleaming.

  "Ooh. Yes." Says Mouse, setting down the menu and leaning across the table, towards the boy. "That face... Yes. That is a very good face. Hold that look."

  "what?" The boy looked towards Mouse with mild confusion.

  "No! Go back!"

  "like this?" The boy shifted his face back.

  "Yes! Yes!" Mouse praised, his gaze scanning every inch of the boy's face and posture. "That's... Ooh, yes. I like that face. So perfectly... Malleable. Yes, that's it. The face of utter subservience. I sincerely believe I could tell you to do anything, and you'd obey without concern. Oooh, that's rich. I feel more powerful just looking at it. That's a very good sense. There were some doubts before, but now I fully understand why she's taken you in... It's perfect."

  "... noted." The boy had a hard time following Mouse. In general.

  Jok raised his eyebrow, assuming Mouse was about to say something easier to respond to.

  "I would very much like a portrait of it. I should paint you. You should let me paint you." Mouse stated.

  "portraiture... i would like to witness such a process." The boy nodded.

  "You do paintings now? Aren't you more of a music guy?" Jok asked.

  "I've dabbled!" Mouse decres, sitting up in his seat once more, but still keeping eyes on the boy. "No art is exclusive. And Rattington is a man of great many talents."

  Jok let out an affirmative exhation and nod. "True. Annoyingly true, some might say."

  "Well, you face is annoying." Mouse, an adult, reasonably well-educated man, returns without missing a beat. "And your hair. Mostly your hair."

  "Meh." Jok returns his gaze to the menu once more.

  "Meh." Mouse, at st, did the same.

  ...

  "I am serious about that portrait, though." Mouse gnced back at the boy for a moment. "Let's discuss timing once we get the food situation sorted. I'm willing to be flexible here, we can work entirely around your schedule. Or, more likely, P- I mean, Hat's."

  "yes. let us do that." The boy nods, and the three men return to looking at the menu.

  Before long, their waiter had returned to them, drinks in hand. It was three waters.

  And the men had come no closer to a decision.