"Now," said Logan, "I'm sure you all know why I have called this meeting."
"Nope," said Francis. She shook her head, and her bubble wrap squeaked.
"No idea," echoed Elisha, with an apologetic nod of his frisbee.
"Not for the life of me," said Micah, rattling his tin helmet.
"Not I," said Karleigh. She was sharpening her pencil with her teeth.
"Haven't the faintest ghost of an idea," said Beau. His hair had grown back somewhat, but it still looked charred.
"Don't look at me," Nathan said, looking embarrassingly down at his armor (or lackthereof).
The Thunder Squad sat in their living room-I mean base-as usual, around a small coffee table laden with soda and the leftovers of Elisha's perfectly-cooked sausages. As they talked, they ate. The sausages crunched and a black powder settled onto the floor.
"Well then," said Logan, rubbing his hands. "Let me tell you. Our last mission was somewhat... unsuccessful."
Elisha bowed his head. His face turned red.
"As you all know," Logan went on, "my faithful sidekick has failed to bring down Katherine Dowling; but that is not his fault. The mod was altogether too powerful for him."
Karleigh shook her head.
Beau shook his head.
In fact, everyone shook their heads. It was the Thunder Squad, after all.
"Katherine can teleport," said Elisha said miserably. "We can't beat her."
"How do we know she really teleports, and it's not just some embellishment Karleigh puts in her notes?" asked Nathan.Everyone stared at him.
"Never doubt our heroic deeds!" Logan bellowed, beating his cardboard armor like an ape. "The Thunder Squad will never lie. The Thunder Squad will never die!"
"The Thunder Squad will never die!" shouted Karleigh, Elisha, Beau, Nathan, Francis, Micah, and Nathan.
"The poetic Logan creates yet another perfect rhyme," Karleigh wrote in hernotebook.
Logan picked up a charred sausage and chewed it meditatively. "We need to find out how that mod teleports," he announced. Crunch, crunch. "We must find a way to stop her.And if we can't, at least we can give ourselves her power, so that there will no longer beunfair ground."
"Incredible idea!" Elisha shouted.
"Stroke of a genius," Nathan remarked.
So on, so forth.
"Anyone have any ideas?" Logan asked.
"Ideas are important!" Nathan ventured to add. "An idea is the seed, and the mission is the branch. The branch cannot sprout without a seed."
("Do branches sprout?" asked Elisha, but he was ignored.)
"I might have a clue as to where Katherine gets her powers," Francis suggested, picking up a sausage and trying to bite it. The carbon was diamond-hard.
Logan, Elisha, Beau, Micah, Nathan, and Karleigh all leaned in closer. Logan's armor banged against Micah's colander. Elisha's frisbee knocked against Francis's color pencils. Karleigh's notebook flapped against Beau's sword.
"I think it comes from the food she eats," Francis said. "I think there's magic in her food."
Logan's eyes widened.
Elisha gasped.
"Why didn't we think of that?" Nathan whispered in awe.
"It makes sense," said Logan, thoughtfully rubbing his chin. "It makes sense that the mods would use food to further their tyrannical regime. Food is always the tool of the bourgeoisie."
Karleigh gasped. She quickly penned Logan's use of big words in her notebook.
"If that is so, commander, what should we do now?" Elisha asked.
Logan stood up, and his cardboard hit the ceiling. Plaster rained.
"My fellow Squad members," Logan boomed, "there is one path open in front of us. Together, we must raid Katherine Dowling's fridge!"
