Fox Force Five! (continued!)

As you may recall, the Fox Force Five! are looking for clues as to the whereabouts of a missing super-secret stealth bomber and its pilot, Lt. Col. Brock Towers. The trail of clues has led them to the world renowned Getty Center in the L.A. hills. Team leader Lark is scouring ancient korean documents in the South Pavillion, in the hope of coming up with a clue. japanese martial arts expert Suzume, frustrated by everyone's mistaking her nationality, is keeping a low profile in the azalea garden, while Michelle, the french bombshell, is having cautious sex with a docent in the cactus garden. Meanwhile Raven and Robin are sitting in the central courtyard, reflecting on what they've seen so far over iced lattes .......




"Sure, he's a great painter, you just have to look at the nuances of the apostles' expressions to see that, I'm just saying it's all so freakin dark. I mean, didn't they have windows back in seventeenth century Holland? How about some candles?" asks Robin of the exhibit of Rembrandt's Late Religious Portraits.
"What do you expect? He painted his girlfriend as the Virgin of Sorrows - how happy could the guy be? Besides, these paintings were pretty revolutionary in the way they portrayed the apostles as real, vulnerable people. You can only knock down walls one at a time." countered Raven "But maybe it would be a good idea to go look at some lighter stuff."
"SHOW ME THE MONET!" yells Robin.
The two of them burst into laughter.
Their reverie is interrupted by the shrill ring of Raven's phone. She fishes it out her pocket.
"Hello ....... Okay, we'll be right there." she looks to the South Pavillion, "Lark thinks she's found a clue, lets go."

Lark is closely examining a very large, beautifully engraved book, clearly of great antiquity and value judging by the broken glass and comatose guards on the floor around her. Suzume is already there, clearly irritated that Lark had taken out the guards before she got there.
"What've you got Lark?" asks Raven.
"Where's Michelle?" asks Robin.
"Something that shouldn't be here....... She said she'll be coming in a few minutes." replies Lark to them both.
Raven, Robin and Suzume roll their eyes.
"Look here", Lark points at a section of faded parchment. "If my memory of ancient korean dialect serves me right, this is a reference to the hunting of the great black hawk by the ancestral followers of Tangun. Do you agree Suzu?"
"Japanese, you fucking bitch," Suzume mutters under her breath.
"What's that Suzu?" asks Lark, engrossed in the manuscript.
"I wouldn't know, Lark hun, I'm Japanese, remember." she chirps merrily.
"Oh yes, sorry Suz - you know how it is." responds Lark with a wave of the hand.
"Sure, I'll know how it is when I kill all four of you bitches. We'll see who can remember who's japanese, chinese and korean then!" Suzume thinks to herself and grins.
"And thai?" thinks Robin.
"Fuck!"

"So what's out of place, Lark?" asks Raven.
"Well, it's this," says Lark, turning a huge, fragile parchment page gingerly.



"Wow, that IS out of place," exclaims Michelle as she walks in, tucking her blouse into her jeans.
"Yes, but there's something even more out of place" exclaims Lark with urgency, "I need to get to the library!"
"What is it?" asks Raven.
"It's a large building with books in it. But that's not important right now," replies Lark, hurrying out of the door.

As the five make their way across the courtyard towards the Getty's impressive research library, Raven spots something unmistakeable in the reflection of the window opposite - the reflection of of a sniper's telescopic sight! Or someone wearing sunglasses. She spins, in one fluid movement reaching to her boot to retrieve the knife and flinging it upward in a perfect spiral. A body falls from the roof, a rifle crashing beside it. The Five! gather around the fallen sniper, knowing they have little time before having to call in some favors. Reaching into the dead man's jacket, Robin pulls out an ID card. "Ngoyen Van Luc; Vietnamese Department of Virus Control, Special Attache to the Centers for Disease Control".
"The guy's a virologist - why'd he be shooting at us?" she asks, bewildered.
"And why are the vietnamese involved now?" asks Suzume, fearing yet another misunderstood asian nationality trait.

From behind them a commanding voice exclaims,
"I might have guessed the Fox Force Five! wouldn't be able to go to a museum without killing someone!"
The Five! whirl on their heels, unaccustommed to being referred to by their supposedly covert group name.
"And who may you b..." starts Lark, instantly recognizing the face of the person standing before her.


Guest Starring Vincent Vega as Special Agent Cliff Powers

"The face you clearly recognize is that of my identical twin, Lieutenal Colonel Brock Towers." says the tall, dashing man standing before them. He holds in front of him an ID card; "Special Agent Cliff Powers. FBI, MI5: Super High Level Clearance."
"Wow! FBI and MI5," exclaims Raven, clearly impressed.
"My mother was british," explains Special Agent Powers.
"But I saw no mention of a brother in Lieutenant Colonel Towers' dossier, and it was pretty detailed." recalls Lark, once again calling on her photographic memory.
"Well up until just recently I didn't know I had a twin brother ....."

Cliff Powers goes on to tell the Five! the story of the two twin brothers. Their parents had both been deeply engaged in espionage at the height of the cold war, Rock at the CIA and Rosie at MI6. They had made many enemies between them, not only in the Soviet block, but all around the world, even in their own home countries. Each of them had made decisions that no person should ever have to make, often resulting in the death of not only their adversaries, but also their colleagues. But when Rosie Flowers discovered she was pregnant and, later, that she was expecting twins, they faced the hardest decision they would ever have to face. They decided that, since both they and their children would be at risk of assassination for the rest of their lives, they would separate, never to see each other again, each assuming new identities and each taking one of the twins. Rock took Brock and Rosie took Cliff. No one, including the twins, was to know of this.
In 1981 Rock was tracked down and killed with a botulinus toxin-tipped umbrella by a vengeful bulgarian widow. Perhaps because she had children herself, she spared Brock, who rapidly rose through the US Air Force's ranks. Rosie had covered her tracks well and eluded assassination by enemy counterparts. only to be defeated by her own genes and habits. She had succumbed to lung cancer just six months ago. But before dying she revealed the whole truth to her beloved son Cliff. Eventually Cliff had uncovered the identity of his twin, only to find that he was missing in action during a routine training flight over North Korea.

Engrossed in the Special Agent's story, the Five! temporarily forget about the dead vietnamese virologist with a knife sticking out of his chest at their feet. As Cliff starts to relate his own meteoric rise to Super High Level Clearance in the FBI and MI5 he is interrupted.
"Do any of you know anything about the dead guy with a knife sticking out of his chest here?" asks a California Highway Patrolman.
"Oh my god! Look Raven, there's a corpse right at our feet!" exclaims Robin.
"Oh my god, oh my god!" replies Raven.
"Okay folks, move it along, this is a murder scene." orders the CHP officer.
As the Five! and Cliff walk away, Michelle uses her experience, and the knowledge that she's not wearing a bra, to divert the attention of every cop at the scene, while Raven reaches down to retrieve her favorite knife from the virologist's chest.

As they walk away Luc breathes a relieved, if very painful, sigh of relief.

Within minutes the Five! are headed south on the 405 in the Big Mutha Foxmobile, their customized SUV. Lark is at the wheel with Raven beside her. Suzume and Robin are seated behind them and Cliff and Michelle are in the back.
"Where are we going Lark?" asks Raven.
"South, we're headed South." replies Lark mysteriously.
"Wouldn't be the first time," chimes Robin.
"Hey, where's Michelle?" asks Lark looking in the rearview mirror.
"Umm I think she uhh dropped something on the floor," replies Cliff distractedly.
"MICHELLE!" yells Lark.
Michelle's head suddenly bobs up from behind the back seat, a startled expression on her face.
"You know the rules!" continues Lark, anger in her voice. "No intimacy with team members!"
"I'm sorry Lark, I forgot for a moment," replies Michelle apologetically.
"Actually I'm not technically a member of the ......" Cliff starts timidly before being cut off by the harsh glare from the rearview mirror.

To break the ensuing uncomfortable silence Robin makes a suggestion;
"How about one of your jokes Rave?"
"Yeah, lets hear a joke, Rave," chime in the rest of the Five!
"Okay. So three tomatoes are walking down the street- a poppa tomato, a momma tomato, and a little baby tomato. Baby tomato starts lagging behind. Poppa tomato gets angry, goes over to the baby tomato, and smooshes him... and says, Catch up."

To break the ensuing uncomfortable silence Robin makes a suggestion;
"How about some music, Rave?"
"Yeah, lets hear some music, Rave," chime in the rest of the Five! and Cliff.

Raven flips on the music. Soon the Five! are singing along, as they usually do when listening to the Bangles covering a song by one of their favorite girl bands. This time its Sleater-Kinney's "The Fox".

"Shiny pretty fox" thought the duck,
The duck came up on to the land
The fox saw her and he just laughed ....

"Great song," remarks Cliff as the music fades out. "Reminds me of a guy I used to work with in the FBI some years ago. Claimed his sister had been abducted by aliens. Good agent though. They retired him in the end to keep him quiet."
"What does he do now?" asks Suzume.
"Apparently he's getting his message out through the internet. He's got a blog under some pseudonym. Duke Of Me or something like that." replies Cliff.
"Good for him, everyone has to maintain their belief in something," comments Robin.

About a mile behind the Five! on I5 a sleek black limo with black tinted windows cruises in the same direction. Sunglasses in the passenger seat follows the red blip on the laptop in front of him.
"Looks like they're headed for San Diego," says sunglasses, turning to face the suit in the back seat.
"Just follow and keep distance," replies the suit in a calm, level, measured tone.
"I think I know where they're going," as he lights another cigarette.

Join us after the commercial break, when the trail of clues lead the Five! to the San Diego Zoo, where Suzume takes on a pair of ninja pandas and Michelle takes on a bunch of horny meerkats.