Lately, Allison had the feeling she was just going through the motions. The console would beep, Tasmin would silence it, grunt something about a new mission and open a portal. The two of them would go around the fic. Tasmin would point out everything that was wrong, Allison would write it down and at some point they would confront the Sue, charge her and kill her. For Allison it all started to become kind of meaningless. It's not that she didn't love her job; she did. Where else do you get paid to visit fictional places? She just wished that the pay wasn't largely fictional as well. And that there would be a little more variety in the kind of missions they got.
Allison quickly stopped thinking. Never challenge the Ironic Overpowers like that, she told herself. Agents wishing things is pretty much agents getting things. She decided to think a little bit more about her pay check not being fictional.
The console rang out. Its beep was as loud as ever, but apparently, with fifty-something missions under her belt, Allison had finally gotten used to the sudden noise. She only jittered a little.
Tasmin, who never jittered, was already on top of it. Figuratively speaking. She had rolled up her chair to the console as soon as it beeped and pressed a button to accept the newest mission. "Abby's getting a new assistant, Tony a new romance and we a new headache," she rattled off. "Where did you put the dummy?"
Allison raised her eyebrows. "I believe you have expressly forbidden me from handling any kind of equipment more advanced than a biro. That would include storage." She smiled. "Did you misplace it?" Now that would be something new. "Where did you last have it?"
"The last time I saw it was when you grabbed it by the arm and ran out of the room." Tasmin glared at her partner.
"That was... ages ago." Allison couldn't quite pinpoint how long ago, but ages seemed near enough an approximation. "Surely, we've used the dummy since then."
"We haven't. So, please try to think of where you last had it, or we will be going into the fic without it."
Allison shuddered. That's what they did before they even had a dummy. It was not an experience she cared to repeat. Growing impatience started to show on Tasmin's face and Allison racked her brain trying to remember where the thing was.
"It's underneath the sofa! It deflated and I couldn't find its box, so I just stuffed it underneath the sofa."
Tasmin growled. "And this is why you are not allowed to handle equipment. You have to fold the dummy into parcel form." She got on her hands and knees and pulled the rumpled up plastic out from underneath the sofa. "I really ought to send you into the fic without the dummy, but I don't want to risk getting Sued myself." She spared a moment to glare at her partner. Then she walked over to the console, pressed some buttons to set disguises and open up a portal, and threw the dummy into the fic first.
Allison quickly ran after it, to avoid getting thrown in second.
-oOo-
The portal opened to a hall way, where the dummy quickly took the shape of a young woman with brown hair, a purple button down shirt and a black skirt. The dummy stood on one side of the glass sliding doors to Abby's lab. Abby and Gibbs stood on the other side, arguing.
Their argument was about the dummy. The dummy wanted to be the best forensic expert and to do that, it first wanted to learn from the best current forensic expert. Which was Abby Sciuto. Or at least, she was the best forensic expert in the building, and the dummy seemed to prefer to look no further than the building it was in in its quest to learn from the best.
Abby, however was in no mood to take on an assistant. Gibbs persuaded her with the promise that it was a trainee and by giving her a slushy — rather than her preferred Caf-Pow. Abby finally gave in and Gibbs invited the dummy to come into the lab.
"Come on in sweetie."
"Sweetie? Now there's a word that doesn't sound the least bit patronising when your boss uses it," Allison said. She was already holding notepad and pen. Writing down charges was par for the course.
The agents followed in. Normally, they would stay away from a Sue to avoid being spotted and being told on, but a dummy was PPC equipment and didn't mind the agents one way or the other.
Abby studied the dummy carefully, even walked around it to get a look at all sides.
"Is she noticing it's not an actual person?" Allison whispered to Tasmin.
"She shouldn't be able to notice. The dummy looks as real to her as any other character would."
Abby asked the Sue one question, about her taste in music, and then went to work.
"I would have expected her to be a little more critical," Tasmin said. "At the very least she might have asked: are you going to frame any of my friends for murder?"
"It's what anyone should ask their new colleagues," Allison agreed.
Tasmin slapped her partner in the back of the head. "Try to keep up with canon."
The dummy just stood idling in the lab. Abby's stares had freaked it out earlier and it seemed to have forgotten that it wanted to learn from Abby. It didn't even dare ask Abby what she was doing. Instead, it pulled a large sketch pad from its bag and started drawing.
"Shares a hobby with Kate." Tasmin sighed and pulled a novel from her bag. "Better get comfortable. We're gonna be here a while."
Allison studied her partner, who appeared to have no problem just standing somewhere and reading a book. Then she looked at the dummy, who appeared to feel the same about drawing. The agent sighed. Apparently, this was what you got when you asked for something different. Still, it could have bee- Allison quickly slapped herself to knock that thought out of her head.
-oOo-
The dummy was admiring the picture she had drawn of Abby and reminiscing how her parents objected to this hobby, when Tony walked in. He wanted to know if Abby had any leads on their case, because they were stuck without.
Tasmin returned her novel to her bag. "Bit of a contrived reason for Tony to go to the lab. He could have asked that over the phone."
"Probably just wanted to stretch his legs and get away from Gibbs."
"Unsuccessfully."
Tony commented at the dummy's pretty face and Gibbs slapped him in the back of the head.
"Doesn't anyone around here know how to talk to a new colleague?" Allison asked. "I know you don't," she said to her partner, which earned her a glare she ignored. "But I would have expected these guys to know how to be professional. So far they have been nothing but patronising."
Two more people walked into the lab and Abby put the crime scene photos on the big screen so they could all stare at the dead marine.
Gibbs was asking them all what could we have missed and I unconsciously doodle the male figure I did not know. He noticed my doodle and smiled.
Allison shuddered as the dead man in the pictures suddenly displayed a keen interest in the dummy.
Tasmin stared at the Words. "The writing is very compact, but it's possible that male figure refers to one of the two people who walked into the lab. Undoubtedly they were McGee and Ziva, but since it wasn't mentioned it was them or even if either of the new people was male, the fic put a smile on the face of the one person that met both criteria of being male and being unknown to the dummy. And that was the dead marine. Charge."
Allison shuddered some more and wrote down the charge of ambiguous writing.
McGee introduced himself to the dummy. Abby asked if the wife had been taken off the suspect list. Only then did the dummy decide to pay attention. It took one look at the crime scene photos and noticed something it didn't think anyone else had notice. But rather than tell them straight out, it raised its hand and waited for its turn.
"Well, that's new," Allison said. "Most Sues can't wait to out shine everyone."
"Charge though," Tasmin said. "She's doodling and not contributing to the team effort. Making everyone's day, including ours, just a little bit longer."
For some reason, everyone noticed the dummy had raised its hand — and stared at the dummy until it put its hand down. Gibbs gave in first and asked the dummy if it had anything to share with the group. The dummy walked over to the screen and pointed at the cell phone in the picture; it had trace amount of blood on it as if someone — the killer, the dummy said — had grabbed at it. The dummy then explained its theory.
"Well, maybe he had a mistress and he was breaking up with her and taking her cell phone, he maybe is paying for it and she killed him."
Tasmin slapped her forehead with her right hand.
Abby was a little bit mad.
"And rightfully so," Tasmin said. "This dummy is theorising about things that at this moment could already be known as fact. The phone is in the picture, so it must be in an evidence bag somewhere. So, unless unprofessionalism spreads like a disease, Abby has already tried to find a match for the blood and McGee or Ziva has run checks on who paid for it and what numbers were called. Even the matter of a mistress might have come up already. Particularly if the man had a wife and was paying for his mistress' phone. Some wives check credit card statements because they want to know about their households' financial situation."
This was not Abby's concern. She merely made the dummy repeat itself. But the dummy still felt Abby was trying to make its idea sound stupid.
"Doesn't need to try hard when it's a stupid idea," Tasmin mumbled.
McGee, however, thought it made sense.
maybe that is why we didn't look at it.
"I'm writing McGee up for unprofessionalism," Allison said.
Tasmin nodded and took a step back. And another. She pulled on Allison's sleeve and took so many steps back that the agents ended up outside the lab, behind the sliding door. "I think this should protect us against flying bits of ruptured canon characters."
McGee quickly made up for his earlier oversight. Within minutes he had found out the dead marine paid for four cell phone subscriptions — three for his family — and that the fourth phone was currently at a local diner.
"If I were to pay for my illicit lover's phone," Tasmin said, "I would get them a pre-paid or a disposable cell phone. Anything that would not require a contract where the number gets linked to my name."
"Guess this dead marine is not as smart as you."
"That's probably part of the reason why he is dead."
Ziva and Gibbs walked past the two agents — they were on their way to the diner. Gibbs called out a compliment to the dummy.
"No need for that," Tasmin said. "Your current investigation is based on the fact the dummy thinks the phone in the picture belonged to the mistress. Yet you are now going out to meet someone that owns a phone that cannot possibly be in these pictures. Because if the phone was in a crime scene photo, you would have the phone in evidence. Unless someone stole an evidence bag." Tasmin almost shouted the last bit after Gibbs.
He gave no response. As would be expected from a canon character that can't notice PPC agents.
"Wouldn't really put it past these characters that an important piece of evidence got stolen right from under their noses."
Tasmin slummed her shoulders. "At the moment, I wouldn't either."
McGee was impressed with the dummy too; he thought it was smart and pretty. Abby finally warmed up to the dummy too and showed it around the lab.
What the tracking of the fourth cell phone number had led to, the agents did not find out as they were forced to follow the dummy as it went home. It didn't really want to go home, because if its "soon to be marine ex-boyfriend" was there, he would want to have sex.
"If you keep having sex with a guy, he's not going to get the point that you don't want to be in a relationship with him," Tasmin said.
"Rather than continuing to put out, perhaps she should have changed the locks so that the ex could not get in any more."
The agents didn't want to go into the apartment either. Not because of the sex, per se, but because the soon-to-be-marine was an OC and he would be upset if he saw the PPC agents.
The soon-to-be-marine was at the apartment and assaulted the dummy. It managed to kick him in the groin and make a run for it, but only got as far as the hallway before the soon-to-be-marine grabbed it. He hit the dummy in the face, stood on top of it and kicked it in the gut. Then he left.
"I'm really glad I remembered where I had put the dummy," Allison said.
Tasmin nodded sympathetically.
The dummy was bleeding heavily from the cut in its face. It found its bag and keys and quickly walked the familiar way to the hospital.
"At least she's living near a hospital."
At the hospital a doctor placed sutures to close the cut. He put a band-aid over it and told the dummy to come back in two weeks' time.
The agents had followed the dummy to the ER and sat in the waiting room to observe procedures. Tasmin rolled her eyes.
"Sutures in the face generally are removed three to five days after placement."
The doctor asked the dummy what had happened.
"I fell." I lied, I just knew that if I said my boyfriend hit me they would call the police I would fill the form I always did and when the police man walked out the door he would through it away.
"Domestic abuse is actually treated a little more seriously than that by local authorities," Tasmin said. "It's not perfect, but when someone presses charges for domestic abuse the file is not thrown into the nearest garbage can. On the other hand, it's not likely the police is called at all, as in DC, and its neighbouring states, Maryland and Virginia, it's only mandatory for health care professionals to report domestic violence to the police if wounds are caused by guns, knives and other lethal weapons. Whether hands count as lethal weapons is debatable."
"Probably not," Allison said. "Otherwise the laws could have just said: mandatory reporting is required for all wounds unless self-inflicted."
"In some states health care professionals receive training about how to deal with possible victims of domestic violence. That would have come in handy here too. I'm sure the training would cover things as providing a safe environment for the victim, don't pressure them to talk to the police, and most importantly, don't send them back to the abuser after they have pressed charges."
The doctor didn't seem to believe the dummy, but if it was sticking to its story there was nothing more he could do, but send it on its way. The dummy wanted to go home even less now. It, however, had made friends with one of the nurses because of its many trips to the emergency room, and that nurse offered it a place for the night.
"Unprofessionalism grows where ever the dummy goes," Allison said and made a note.
-oOo-
The nurse's shift ended at 1.30 am — which to Tasmin sounded like a shift that ended in the middle of the shift, but she couldn't quite decide whether it was a good thing or a bad thing that not all hospital shifts ended and began at the same time. She thought, however, that it was a bad thing that the nurse took the dummy home (bad nurse) and that she — knowing the dummy had a new job — did nothing to wake up the dummy when its phone kept ringing in the morning (bad friend).
"oh GOD! I'm late," I said putting on my black pants and a pink button down shirt.
"When did she have time to change?" Allison asked. "Or grab a clean set of clothes from her closet? That's not what she was wearing last night," she said as the dummy ran past them. The agent had only gotten as far as the hallway of the building the nurse lived in.
"Continuity error. Charge."
The dummy ran to the Navy Yard followed by the PPC agents.
Abby was quick, and uncharacteristically mean, to point out to the dummy that it was late the moment it arrived. Then she noticed the band-aid in the dummy's face. The dummy shrugged it off as being nothing. Abby didn't push the subject. Rather, she went over to her computer to play a multi player game with McGee.
"I take it that there is no further evidence from yesterday's unsolved crime to investigate," Allison said. "Has the crime been solved?" She positioned herself on top of the high-legged table in the middle of the lab.
"Doubtful," Tasmin said. "They overlooked the vic's credit history. They probably missed other important investigative angles as well." She pulled her book from her bag.
"Makes you wonder when the dummy is going to realise she is not actually learning from the best."
"Not really."
The dummy returned to its drawings. It was interrupted by Tony.
He sat down beside me. "What happened to your pretty little face?"
"It is possible to show concern for a person without belittling them." Allison scowled at Tony.
"Actually, I think it shows more concern if you don't belittle them," Tasmin added.
The dummy said it had fallen. It was surprised that Tony didn't buy into that explanation.
"Gibbs' rule number seven: always be specific when you lie," Tasmin said. "If you want people to believe you fell, elaborate on the accident. Lots of domestic violence victims make excuses like they fell. To make it believable that you actually fell, make the fall specific rather than generic."
"Charge?"
"No." Tasmin shook her head. "Just some advice to people who want to lie."
The dummy changed the subject and asked Tony to tell about himself. It liked staring into his eyes. Gibbs ran into Abby's lab and slapped Tony.
"Stop flirting with Russo and come with me, a marine has gone nuts in the Hospital looking for his girlfriend."
"I don't think that is a case for the Major Case Response Team," Tasmin said. "NCIS investigates major criminal offences. Those are typically crimes that are punishable under the Uniform Code of Military Justice by confinement of more than a year. Causing a disturbance falls under article 116 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice — breach of peace. However, the maximum punishment for breach of peace is confinement for six months and forfeiture of two-third of monthly pay for six months. In short, not enough to get a MCRT involved. Now, if he were to be holding people hostage..."
Allison nodded. She wasn't going to contest anything Tasmin said when she started quoting the Uniform Code of Military Justice. Or quoting anything else for that matter, that made it sound like she had a huge database for a brain.
"The dummy should have mentioned that its soon-to-be-marine ex-boyfriend is harassing it," Tasmin added. "That could possibly fall under article 120a, stalking, which carries a maximum punishment of dishonourable discharge, forfeiture of all pay and allowances, and confinement for 3 years."
"Yeah, but he isn't a marine yet. Military law doesn't apply to him."
"That depends. If becoming a marine was just his intention, then no, but if he's already enlisted, then yes. The UCMJ applies to people who voluntarily enlist from the moment they take the enlistment oath."
"Don't think it counts as a charge that a civilian doesn't know the UCMJ," Allison said. "Even if she just started working for NCIS."
"Hmm. NCIS investigates crimes against UCMJ; its employees should know the UCMJ. If only to know what crimes to investigate."
Time passed and the dummy's attention was caught by a disturbance in the hallway. When it went to check it out, it saw two police officers holding her soon-to-be-marine ex-boyfriend down.
The two PPC agents left the lab too.
"What are all these people doing in this part of the building?" Tasmin said. "This is restricted access. You can't get here from the street."
Gibbs noticed the dummy knew the screaming man and took her to an interrogation room. There he left her alone. The police officers also gave up holding the screaming man down, because a moment later he was standing in front of the dummy giving her a hug and acting as if nothing had happened.
The next moment he was gone and Tony got upset the dummy hadn't told him it had a boyfriend.
"Shouldn't he have more pressing matters on his mind, such as trying to stop an arrestee from just walking out?" Allison wrote 'unprofessional' in block capitals across one page of her notepad and underlined it three times.
Perhaps he was about to see to these other pressing matters, but the dummy grabbed Tony's hand and asked him if he wanted to know the truth.
"I'll tell you the truth,"
"I don't think I can handle that truth."
The dummy told him it had been trying to break up with the guy for a year now. Tony asked if it was unsuccessful because the sex was good.
"What the hell kind of question is that?" Allison said. "That's not an empathic question. If someone replied with sarcastic questions when I was telling them something personal, I would stop right there."
The dummy, however, continued. It asked Tony to look at its face and took off the band-aid. It told him the ex-boyfriend — who for some reason had been upgraded to boyfriend status — had done that to it.
"So are you going back there tonight?" He asked very concerned.
"Okay, empathic question. But it still seems out of place," Allison said.
"That's probably because you'd expect Tony to want to arrest the guy for assault. So that the dummy can go home without having to worry about getting assaulted again."
Rather than taking any actions to take against the soon-to-be-marine — who appeared to have also received an upgrade to marine — Tony offered the dummy that it could stay over at his place.
"Fine, don't get your hopes up."
Which must have been dummy jargon for "I'll think about it", because when it walked back to the lab, it thought about not wanting to be a burden on Tony and wanting a place for itself.
A mini waddled after the dummy, bumped into Allison's leg — who stepped in the way as soon as she noticed the mini — and fell over backwards. The mini looked like a male version of the Abby-minis: he wore gothic clothes and a lab coat.
"Abby's Lad," Tasmin said. "I'm actually surprised he is the first mini so far. The sentence structure is pretty rubbish and the fic has contradicted itself on several occasions, but spelling of names seems to be fine."
Allison put the mini on its feet. "Stay with us. We'll get you out of this place."
The mini nodded.
The dummy went into the lab and asked Abby if it could have the rest of the day off to look for a new apartment. Abby said it was okay, but that it also had to check with Gibbs. The dummy rode the lift to the bull pen's floor and asked Gibbs if it could have the day off to go house hunting.
Gibbs said it could and sent Tony with it just in case.
The dummy protested, but Gibbs said it needed a safeguard in case it "fell".
"Or, you know, they could actually all go out and try to find their arrestee. That way the dummy doesn't have to worry about falling again either."
Tony and the dummy first went to his place so the dummy could drop off its stuff. Which Allison insisted could still not be more than the bag it grabbed on its way to the hospital. It seemed though that the dummy had had an overnight bag packed and ready when it arrived home the previous night. Which explained why it was able to put on a fresh set of clothing that morning.
The dummy fell in love with Tony's apartment immediately.
Tony noticed this. Downstairs in the lobby of his building he talked to the concierge and arranged an apartment for the dummy.
"I found you a place." He said and dangled a pair of keys in front of my face. "You can move in next week." he smiled.
"What? Just like that?"
Allison, Tasmin and the mini had just arrived in the lobby by portal, and had missed most of Tony's conversation with the concierge.
"No contract signing, no checking whether it can actually pay the rent, no checking with previous landlords about good tenant behaviour? I don't think that concierge is entirely legit. You can't trust things where no questions are asked." Allison had never rented hassle-free. "Plus, he's already got the keys. The apartment must be available now, so why can't the dummy move in right away?"
The dummy thought it was too good to be true, but accepted that the only down point to it was that it was right next door to Tony. The dummy asked if they could go over to its place to pick up its stuff. Tony said it could move all its stuff into his place.
Tasmin rolled her eyes. She turned to the Words and growled. "Next they go to its apartment and Tony helps packing. Then they decide to skip work for the rest of the day and watch movies instead. There's a sequence in Tony's point of view. I think we should skip that. We've only brought the one dummy. I don't know what will happen to it if it suddenly has to become someone else. I think we should go to the point in the story where things actually start happening again."
Tasmin rummaged through her bag and produced the remote activator to open up a portal.
"But, the dummy is still going to act out the story, even if we're not there?"
"No, it isn't," Tasmin said. "It's coming with us." She grabbed the dummy — that was on the way out the door — in passing and flung it through the portal.
Allison just caught a glimpse of Tony on the sidewalk looking rather bewildered around himself as if he had misplaced something. Then she stepped through the portal too.
-oOo-
The portal brought the agents, the dummy and the mini into a lift with Gibbs. Gibbs was taking the dummy down to autopsy. He looked into its eyes and the dummy could see the hurt in his.
Tasmin rolled hers. "Seriously? Seriously? Though it is not unlikely that three of his marriages failed due to issues of grief. It is rather unlikely that his grief was this obvious. You are not a better people reader than everyone he has ever known." Tasmin slapped the dummy in the back of the head.
"Tasmin." Allison made a 'what gives' gesture with her hands. "Just because a dummy's PPC equipment, I still don't think you're supposed to hit her."
"Fine, I'll hit you instead."
Allison stepped away from her partner. The mini decided to hide behind her legs.
The lift arrived and they all walked into autopsy. The dummy thought the smell was revolting.
Tasmin gnashed her teeth.
"Hey, you must be Miss Russo." Said the man that was checking the body. He must be older than Agent Gibbs. "I'm Dr. Mallard, you can call me Ducky."
Tasmin hit Allison in the back of the head.
"What was that for?"
"Can't hit the dummy. Decided to hit other dummy."
"Well, don't. I'm busy writing charges." Making Ducky's speech pattern 'hip', she wrote down.
The dummy recognized the body that was on the cutting table. It screamed. The body was that of its best friend, who had also encouraged it to cheat on its boyfriend/ex-boyfriend. It told this to Ducky and Gibbs. That is to say, it told about the friend part, but left the cheating part out.
Then it was sent back upstairs with the corpse's clothes for analysis. In the lift it broke out in a fit of laughter.
Allison gave her partner a helpless look.
"I could hit it and make it stop."
Allison looked away and sighed. "When are we going to be done with this fic?"
I started working with her, I found a couple of hairs in Adam's shirt, I also found blood. I actually noticed little details Abby didn't really notice.
"Now," Tasmin said. She stepped forward, grabbed the dummy by the arm to make it turn around and punched it in the face.
"Tasmin!"
"All right, all right. You charge it." Tasmin stepped back and crossed her arms. She glared at the dummy that was covering its nose with both hands.
Abby was just gaping.
"Charge? Okay, charge." Allison fumbled for her notepad. "Elena Russo, we are Protectors of the Plot Continuum and we are here to charge you with crimes against fanfiction in general and NCIS fiction in particular," she said hesitantly. "We charge you with bad spelling, bad grammar and bad punctuation. We charge you with ambiguous writing, which caused a dead guy in a picture to start smiling at you.
"We charge you with making everyone unprofessional. Most importantly by making them not do routine checks they do on every case, by making them miss obvious clues, by making them give you compliments when you do pick up these things, by making them give you compliments on a far-fetched conjecture on your part. Please, don't make the canons dumb. They were capable of solving cases before you came along; they should still be able to solve cases now that you are here.
"We charge you with making anyone that comes within a ten feet radius of you unprofessional. The doctor wants to leave your stitches in too long; the nurse took you, a patient, home; the concierge gave you an apartment after minor persuasion from Tony. Even Tasmin here started to hit the OC which she's not allowed to do and never does under normal circumstances.
"We charge you with plot contrivances. You weasel your way into Abby's lab claiming you want to learn form the best, but all you do when here is doodle. Abby does not teach art classes. We charge you with having a token evil boyfriend that is randomly showing up and leaving. We charge you with claiming local police file domestic abuse reports in the bin. We charge you with making Abby be mean to you repeatedly. Abby, the nicest person outside of Sesame Street.
"We charge you with sending a Major Case Response Team to sort out a disturbance in a hospital. We charge you with bringing local police into the NCIS building. We charge you with changing your outfit when you seemed to have left home with only the clothes on your back. That's clothes, by the way, not cloth. We charge you with deformalising Ducky's speech and making him say 'hey'. We charge you with being a better people reader than anyone Gibbs has ever known. You cannot see the hurt in his eyes. In short, we charge you with being a Mary Sue. You have been charged, Tasmin will shoot you now." Allison folded up her notepad. "No, wait."
But the damage was done. Tasmin had shot the dummy. It flew around the lab while deflating. Allison glared at her partner.
"And that's what the dummy repair kit is for." Tasmin calmly returned her gun to her bag. "Go fetch."
While Allison and the mini tried to catch up with the dummy and fold it up to a manageable size, Tasmin pulled the neuralyzer out of her bag and pointed it at Abby, who was still gaping.
"Abby Sciuto. You do not have a new assistant, nor a trainee. You do not want a new assistant. You will not be persuaded by free drinks, whether they are your favourite or not." Tasmin flashed Abby.
Abby started blankly into space for a moment, then one of her machines said "ding" and she quickly went to work.
"How many on our kill list?" Tasmin asked when Allison handed her the bundle of dummy.
"Four, plus we need to neuralyze all the canons the dummy has come into contact with."
"Better get a move on then." Tasmin opened a portal.