Operation: Moonfall | Jimmy Crystal Revenge & Redemption

The Interview

Buster was adamant he wouldn't watch the interview. There were better things to do with his time than listen to Jimmy Crystal drag him across national television for sixty minutes.

So, it was almost baffling that he found himself parked on the couch in the den right before 8 PM. He wasn't the only one; Rosita, Johnny, Porsha, Miss Crawly and Meena had joined him. Nooshy and Alfonso also came over. Ash passed, saying that any of the juicy bits would likely be all over TV and the internet by morning. Gunter had disappeared with little explanation, but that wasn't that odd for him.

Nooshy ducked into the kitchen a few minutes earlier, and the cacophonic popping and familiar smell gave away what she was doing. When she came back into the den with a tub of popcorn in her arms, Johnny almost looked offended.

"I can't believe you're treating this like some kind of event!" he complained.

"I need good food to watch bad rubbish," Nooshy said before stuffing her face with a fistful of popcorn. She plopped down onto the couch and wedged the tub between them. Porsha slid onto the floor and scooched over so she could reach behind and raid the popcorn as needed. Eventually, Johnny relented and reached inside. He was startled when he made contact with the back of Nooshy's hand. What was less than a second lasted an eternity in Johnny's head. He was thankful the only thing lighting the room was the TV because he could feel the heat in his cheeks. Nooshy's lack of reaction made things even worse.

What a stupid cliché, he thought. A stupid cliché that didn't even go anywhere!

"Meena, you better get some before it's all gone," Porsha said.

"Ah, let her be," Nooshy said, nudging Porsha with her leg. "That girl's in her own world."

Sure enough, Meena and Alfonso carved out some sort of nest of pillows and blankets next to the couch, so wrapped in each other's presence that their trunks coiled together and everything else melted away. Johnny found solace in knowing things were working out for one member of their troupe, at least.

"All right, here we go," Buster said once the endless waves of commercials gave way to the primetime event.

Walter Kilborn appeared in a shadowed room wearing his trademark face, a rigidly expressionless look that occasionally ventured to skeptically shrewd. There was nothing in the room save for a metal table, the faint light from a window (or stage light creating an illusion) stretched across its dull surface. The camera was angled downward enough to show the capybara's compact body, wearing a slate gray suit, his hands folded against his stomach. They knew immediately why Crystal had chosen Kilborn for his interview. The capybara radiated legitimacy and professionalism, a staunch contrast to the atmosphere of liberal day drinking wafting from the Hot News set.

"On tonight's The Real Deal, we come to you with the explosive reveal of a story that's been looming over Redshore City for several months now," Kilborn said, his voice only slightly more animated than his face. "In the blink of an eye, Jimmy Crystal's identity changed from Billionaire of the Year to Redshore's most famous inmate, accused of the heinous act of attempted homicide. Mostly rumors and speculation have swirled around the incident as neither Crystal nor his alleged victim, Buster Moon, have said much of anything publicly about it. Reaching out to us quite recently with the promise of breaking his silence, Crystal was adamant about telling his side of the story, the side he calls the truth about what happened at Crystal Entertainment.

"Crystal currently resides in the Redshore City Jail as he awaits his upcoming trial, and he invited us into his lavish cell for this interview. Due to the upcoming trial, Crystal's lawyers have forbidden us from broaching the subject of the charges against him, but he has promised to speak on the details of his relationship to Buster Moon. This is what he had to say in an interview we've called A Crystal Conundrum."