Last time on Holly Maxwell and the dynamic duo. Cressida
documented a the last few months of their lives.
We also met the owners a prestigious club, and their adopted son, josh.
Welcome back to Holly Maxwell and the dynamic duo!
laptop, and we've got another mission.
Holly: Brutus, no. We talked about this. No more of those crazy
so called missions.
Cressida choked on her cereal. "But we only did one". she mumbled,
mouth full of cornflakes.
again however. "Look I think, it would be a unique opportunity
to bond with my roomies".
"N-O"
Brutus gave up at around lunch time. He'd tried everything
from pleading to bribery, Holly wasn't having any of it.
If they wanted to stay downstairs all day playing
chess together, that was okay. But he couldn't
just sit there while someone was in as much
trouble as Josh.
The two played chess in silence down in the basement.
Cressida needed to use all of her concentration in order to beat
her cousin. There wasn't room for idle chit chat when they
were in a serious match.
Holly cut the silence however in order to talk about Brutus's earlier
behaviour. "So, why do you think Brutus broke out the puppy dog
eyes?"
Cressida stared at the board, her tongue sticking out a shade.
She moved her rook forward to take out one of holly's pawns
before saying "Y'know it isn't really like him to beg people,
and I'm not so sure that he's doing this for the excitement".
"He wanted to show me the case on the computer later, do you think
I should?" Holly made her move, and captured Cressida's bishop.
Cressida's tapped her chin, analysing the game. "I don't know man.
I'm not one for advice. Well I'm no good with advice with boys anyway.
Hey, did you catch up on game of thrones yet?"
"Hey you.." Holly said carefully. She wasn't one for intentionally
hurting people's feelings, especially not someone as sweet
as Brutus and felt slightly awkward about approaching him.
"Oh, hey babe. You just missed a really great episode of
'the sims-sons'."
Holly plonked down on the couch, next to her boyfriend.
"So what is this about exactly?" Holly asked, gently.
"I'll show you. Just let me boot up the computer".
The old monitor confirmed with a little beep
that it was now connected to Brutus's email client,
and Holly leaned in, eager to learn what was so important
"Look. See?", Brutus pointed eagerly at a line of text on the computer. "It's Josh!" gasped Holly. She studied the email more closely.
"Yeah, and it's pretty serious too".
"Brutus, we could die. I've always avoided getting mixed up
with dealers and that calibre of people" she tucked her hair behind
her ear before continuing. "And I just don't know what to say, or
do. We could die if we get too involved. We could die."
became a concerned whisper, as Cressida was downstairs still.
"Well, what do you suggest?" Holly bluntly replied.
"Let me poke around in the bins and see what I can find.
I'll take the evidence to the police and then we'll leave it be."
Whilst Brutus poked around in the red room's bins,
Cressida and Holly had some time to talk.
Holly rinsed out her bowl of mac and cheese from the night before,
"Heard from Josh lately?" she said. Cressida snorted, "No, not recently,
he's probably busy doing teenage boy stuff".
"Besides, he's always working in the red room?" she inquired. "Like its not like I
could just ring him up on a school day and say, hey let's go play some videogames
or whatever?"
Holly faced Cressida, "Take it from me, you're going to
want to give him a call".
While the two attempted to contact their alleged client,
Brutus leafed through the bins at the red room, looking
for evidence.
He'd been fishing through his third bin, when at last
he was rudely interrupted by a guy staggering out of the back door.
was plastered, so it didn't take much effort on Brutus's part to appear
innocent. smelling of the contents of a nightclub's bin, Brutus headed
home with the little evidence he'd found.
He finally answered after the 4th call.
The theme to a popular anime series began to blare out of Josh's
left pocket as he was walking back to the Cavendish's from School.
The song reached the high pitched notes from the fourth bar before he
answered. There was no mistake about it, Cressida was calling.
"Josh... You bastard!" The casual way in which Cressida entered
a supposed "Covert mission" caused Holly to roll her eyes.
"Yeah, well I hear you're in some kind of trouble. Wanna tell ol'
Cressida about it?"
Josh pressed his hand over the microphone and studied his surroundings.
"I'll come to you" he said, before hanging the phone up.
Josh ran. There was no time to waste after all.
into sports gear) He could see the small cottage where his friend
lived. Brutus stood at the door, fresh from bin digging. He eyed
Josh eyed Brutus back. If there was one thing he'd learned at all
from his foster parents, it was how to not be intimidated by
a hulking mass of muscle. "I'm Josh."
Brutus's green eyes softened, "Well, you better tell me what is so
important about endangering your life just to put your foster parents away".
Josh's eyes widened in shock, he hadn't told mentioned that to Cressida.
"Background check, right?" he asked. Brutus nodded. He leaned forward
"Now, what can we do for you Josh?"
nasty stuff, and I don't want anyone to get hurt because of their
greed". He folded his arms and stared off into the distance. "Its
people like my so called foster parents, who feed off of the weakness
of others that make me sick. So for my sake, and for theirs, help me."
Brutus hastily replied, "I need evidence, then its just a case of dumping
it on the cops and wiping our hands".
that Cressida's a part of that, to back me up".. Brutus cut in,
"There's no question about it kid, if you're a friend of Cressie, there's not a
thing that Holly and I wouldn't do." "Now as they say in Spanish, Mi casa is su
casa" he pointed to the desk, "That's Holly, our resident hacker and computer
specialist, I'm Brutus, the brawler and grunt if you will. And somewhere around
here is our distractor, and also a very talented grafter, Cressida.
Brutus tiptoed over to the desk where Holly was lost in a fantasy
world, headphones in, watching Netflix. He tapped her on the shoulder,
grasped her two hands and stared into her similarly green eyes.
He glanced back at Josh. "We need to act quickly. Your foster
family will soon notice your absence". "What's your plan?"
Josh inquired. Brutus looked back over to Holly. "We infiltrate
the red room. If what you say is true, your family are managing
illegal operations, then there is bound to be a large amount of contraband hidden there".
Does Sonja have an office?" a voice piped up
Josh's eyes wandered over to the kitchen to see quite a sight.
Cressida cooking in her grundies. He stammered. This wasn't
a sight he was used to. "Y--eah, they do.. I always see people
going in and out of it".
"Alright, let me get dressed then we can go". Cressida halted
her chopping.
An hour later, and the four of them arrived at 'the red room'
Holly was inexplicitly in charge once more. The group
had agreed that it was best that she manage the mission
as it were. Holly glanced around the room for a viable
distraction. She turned to Brutus. "We need to get
Cressida and Josh up those stairs over there".
She nodded in the direction of a group of middle aged tourists,
a type that was commonly found in summer in Hellerville.
"I need you to pick a fight with them".
"Get ready Josh. Holly's entering phase one". Cressida cracked a smile,
Holly had been a grade A drama student, and with her upcoming
performance it was easy to tell why.
"What? Already? We've only been here ten minutes".
As the couple drew nearer to the drunken club-goers, Holly
grinned. "Okay, do it now." Brutus winked and shimmed
backwards, right into one of the tourists.
A blond haired man spun around.
"Sorry man, didn't see you there". said Brutus. The blonde's
eyes were aflame with rage and he pulled a gnarled expression.
"---well, now you're in trouble" he slurred.
Cressida and Josh, looked on at the scene as it unravelled.
She pushed him up the stairs, "Go, Dummy" she said,
letting out a giggle.
They galloped up the stairs, carefully keeping out of sight.
Cressida admired her surroundings. "Well, gotta hand it to Sonja and
Chippy, the views up here are spectacular".
"Hurry up. We need to get out of sight" Josh reminded her.
Josh led Cressida into a small room, adjoining the upper passageway
"This is Sonja's office", he said.
"Well there's only one thing you can tell from a person
with a desk this big" she said, beginning to leaf through the
drawers a little. "What's that?" Josh said, sitting down on the couch.
"They think very highly of themselves".
Cressida ran a finger over the desk and inspected it.
"Huh, there seems to be some sort of residue on this thing".
Josh gave out a cry of alarm as Cressida tasted it.
She looked at Josh, unfazed. "Does Chip have an office?"
she rasped.
Meanwhile, downstairs. The fight had resolved with Brutus
ending up bruised and beaten.
As he hobbled away from the two guys who'd perpetrated the
act. He found himself alone. Holly had been having quite the night.
He found her at the bar, pouring her own drinks. There wasn't a
bartender in sight. Brutus called out to her "HEY!"
Holly spun around and waved to him.
Cringing, she put the drink down, and waltzed over to the dance floor,
where the two were reunited.
Holly's eyes were momentarily drawn to another room.
This wasn't the best time to be asking for photos, but screw it.
"Take a photo with me?" she pleaded. All this "secret mission stuff"
wasn't really doing it for her.
"Alright, just point me to the booth".
Meanwhile another 'Boothe' was hard at work, analysing the second office.
Cressida turned to Josh, "So this is Chip's office?" she asked.
"Well, to be honest, I've never been in here before". he replied.
"It looks more like Sonja's style, but maybe they share?"
"Well, we certainly found some illegal activity".
"You were right about your foster parents it seems".
"Well, what is all this". Cressida walked over to where a
pale blue chemical was bubbling over. "At a glance, I'd say
this place has meth lab written all over it".
"But?"
"But looking closer at the kit, I'd say they're manufacturing
a new party drug of some type".
Josh ran a hand through his tousled locks, "Right... Well
should we take a sample of it? So the cops can have it tested?"
"Okay, I think we're almost ready to head back. Take lots
of pictures for me".
Cressida ruffled Josh's hair before returning to the table with
a ziplock baggie. After the two finished collecting the
evidence that would see the Cavendishes' imprisoned,
the two began to head back downstairs.
Cressida and Josh followed the assorted crowd into the other room,
while they looked for Holly and Brutus
Some sort of commotion was occurring, and it had something to
do with the photo booth apparently.
As they got closer, Cressida realised why everyone was pointing and laughing
at the booth, as it shook violently. Josh cut the silence "Gross" he muttered.
"Obviously, they're not here then". Cressida rolled her eyes and sighed.
"Alright, let's just chill for a while in the other room and see if we can't find
Holly".
The four finally left the red room just before 1am. Cressida had
a sneaking suspicion as to who had been in the photo booth,
but decided against embarrassing her cousin. "Some things are
better left unsaid" she whispered to Josh, on the way home.
As the group stumbled into their home, Holly quickly pulled
Josh aside. "Brutus told me about your family, and I just need to make something
clear. After tonight, we're skedaddling.
These so called anonymous tips don't always tend to stay anonymous for very long".
Josh furrowed his brow and holly continued "I'm not going to patronise you
by asking you if you want to go through with this, because its clear you've made up your mind.
But I just want to be sure that you know that you're very welcome to come with us".
"No, I'll be fi-"
Brutus took this moment to waltz over and cut in.
"Look, you're not like a pile of dirty dishes. We can't just
clean you up." Holly placed a hand gently on Josh's shoulder.
" People like your foster parents don't forgive easily. We don't know
if we've even got the evidence to put them away for more than two years.
Please, you have to come with us. You could die."
Holly turned to Cressida, who was now comfortably seated on the couch.
"Tell him Cress."
"Look, Josh it has to be one or the other. We need you to stay safe. Please,
don't spit in our faces when we're offering help".
Josh turned and looked at Cressida. "Fine. I'll go.".
Cressida walked past the trio and picked up a suitcase from the floor.
"Then its settled. Pack some things you two and then we'll go".
"Wait? two?, I just said I was going! You can't leave me alone!?"
Cressida giggled. "Don't be silly. I said for Holly and Brutus to pack, because
I've taken the liberty of packing for you."
"Just like that?"
"Just like that".
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