Episode 2: Idolize Me
Part 1
Nick drove down the roads of Nevada once more. Remembering Pearl’s warning about being careful with her baby, he lifted his foot off the gas. At the slower speed, he took his time reading each word of his mission statement carefully.
Agent 008:
Intelligence has discovered a terrorist group planning to infiltrate the international singing competition known as Global Idol, held at the MGM Grand Casino in Las Vegas. Should you choose to accept it, your mission is to go to Las Vegas, counter infiltrate the competition, and stop this threat…
This message will self-destruct in two minutes.
He nodded to himself and absent-mindedly shoved the note in his pocket, speeding up as the excitement rose within him with the knowledge that his first mission back was in Las Vegas. Things were looking up for him. Then, he remembered something.
“Wait, did that thing say it would–” Nick began to ask out loud before he noticed a small fire burning a hole in his pants pocket. “Shit!” he exclaimed as he tried to pat out the fire, taking a deep breath to calm himself down once the fire was out. The car swerved and he yanked the steering wheel, regaining control of the car.
Speeding up down the long stretch of road, Nick found himself wondering several things. Why do they make mission statements blow up? How do they make mission statements blow up? Do they put some sort of chemical in the paper or something? That sounds like the sort of thing that Pearl would know how to do.
He wondered if Agent K had asked someone specifically to make his mission statement blow up, knowing that Nick would put it in his pocket. That definitely sounded like the type of thing K would do to him. Nick shook his head and tried to re-focus himself on his mission.
He figured he was making good time, so he decided to relax a bit and see what other music Pearl had loaded onto his iPod. “Hmm… Pantera, The Cure, Def Leppard, The Killers…” Nick listed, shuffling through the songs as he kept his eyes on the road. “Even that Crazy Frog song! Not bad, Pearl!” But then, his iPod seemed to turn on him.
“One, two, three, four, five
Everybody in the car, so come on
Let’s ride to the liquor-store around the corner
The boys say they want some gin and juice
But I really don’t wanna
Beerbust like I had last week
I must stay deep
Because talk is cheap
I like Angela, Pamela, Sandra and Rita
And as I continue you know
They’re getting sweeter…”
“What the–” Nick said with a frown. “Mambo No. 5” by Lou Bega. He hated this song. Pearl had always said it reminded her of him, and he guessed that was why she put it on here. He pressed the skip button a few times, but nothing happened. The song continued to play.
“A little bit of Monica in my life
A little bit of Erica by my side
A little bit of Rita is all I need
A little bit of Tina is what I see
A little bit of Sandra in the sun
A little bit of Mary all night long
A little bit of Jessica here I am
A little bit of you makes me your man…”
“Oh, very funny, Pearl,” Nick grumbled, trying to shut off the iPod to no avail. He became frustrated with it and threw it on the passenger’s seat, only to have it bounce off and fall on the floor. Great, he thought. Now it’ll probably be permanently stuck on this friggin’ song. He had been hoping it was only a temporary trick played at his expense. Leaning over onto the passenger seat, he began frantically searching for his iPod. He felt it under the seat and tried desperately to pick it up.
“AHA!” Nick exclaimed, sitting up and holding up his iPod triumphantly. “Oh shit! Again!” he shouted, grabbing the steering wheel and once again trying to regain control of the car he’d forgotten he was still driving. All the excitement riled him up, and he started panting. The fact that the song was still playing didn’t help, either. Thankfully it stopped a few seconds later. At that point, Nick decided that he wasn’t going to take his eyes off the road or his hands off the steering wheel again until he reached Las Vegas. He also decided to try and figure out how to remove that song from his iPod — if there was any way to do that — once he got home from this mission.
***
The drive ended about half an hour later, after another unfortunate incident with the iPod and “Mambo #5.” It seemed that Pearl had programmed it to play not once or twice but three times during the drive.
Nick would get her for that.
It also destroyed his plan to keep his eyes on the road and his hands on the wheel. He had even driven with his knees in an attempt to improvise: one on the wheel and one on the stick shift.
But since he’d arrived at the MGM Grand, he pushed open the car door and brushed off his many near accidents. At that point, he pulled the charred mission paper from his back pocket, tossing it behind him casually as he shut the car door.
“So that’s why it took you so long to get here!” a soft voice giggled.
Nick froze stiffly. Didn’t he know that voice?
“Never mind… It’s just your mission.”
“And what exactly were you hoping for, Diamond?” Nick crossed his arms as he turned to face her. As always, she looked more ready for a night on The Strip than a mission in her sparkling sky-high heels, shimmery silver tank dress, and glittering diamond pendant. But what really caught his eye was her gorgeous long blonde hair that framed her face and blue eyes.
She flashed him a quick smile before ripping up the remainder of the charred paper. “Well, that’s not the best way to use Pearl’s new expensive gift, you know?” She put her hands on the back window. “Are the seats leather?”
He brushed off her remark, if only to himself. After all the time he had spent cooped up at Himitsu Takana, K had finally given him a mission! And not some bullshit mission either, a real mission. He figured this was a reward for all the time he spent balancing pencils on his nose. He once stacked five of them together through the erasers. Or all the card houses he made. They really impressed Diamond and Lancy; good thing he’d found that superglue in the supply closet. And his dominoes experiment… Hadn’t gotten past Red, but somehow he would get them to stay up. Maybe that was another use for that superglue…
But even after all that — although K didn’t know about the dominoes… yet — he had actually gotten a real mission and a new toy. But that was completely a coincidence; Pearl had been working on it before today, right? Oh, and a watch that didn’t tell time… What time was it anyway? Lunch? Happy hour?
Nick puzzled over that for a moment with a forlorn glance at the watch, then looked up to see Diamond pressing herself against his new toy like a model in a car ad or the latest Playboy. Exactly what the car needed to make it perfect.
“…junk in the trunk…”
Nick snapped back to attention. “What?”
Diamond sighed, brushing her blonde hair over her shoulder. “It looks so sleek, but there’s a lot of junk in the trunk, huh? Wouldn’t be a Pearl toy without that.”
“Oh, the car….”
Diamond turned to Nick with a small grin and tousled his hair. “Pearl would kill you if that was the first thing you used the car for. Could be the second.” She winked as she adjusted the collar on his black jacket, then ran her thumbs down the lapels and break line. A warm smile filled her face as she fiddled with the long chain of his necklace; the single diamond on the anchor glittered as the pendant swung against his chest. He considered it to be a good luck charm after she’d given it to him a couple of years ago.
Nick weighed his options, then frowned. “Happy to have you, but how’d you get here so fast?”
“HimTak helicopter. I wanted to surprise you.” Diamond pulled out her phone and began typing on the keypad, barely acknowledging Nick.
“We got a helicopter? Since when?” Nick pushed down her phone, leaning closer to her.
“Last week?” Diamond leaned toward her phone, thumbs flying against the keyboard. “Figured you’d take a cab or something. Unless you wanted frequent flier miles in the mile-high club.” She winked, then glanced at her phone and laughed.
Nick grabbed her phone, briefly glancing at her rows of text messages. “Busy lady. Asking your secretary to pick up your dry cleaning, scheduling hair appointments, dinner dates, flirting… Got any left for me?”
“Always.” Diamond swiped for her phone as a new message popped up on the screen.
“Why is Lancy commenting on a picture of my butt?” Nick frowned, showing her the image with hastily drawn circles, crosses, and highlighting.
Diamond grabbed her phone back and giggled. “He’s just saying your butt looks better without the saggy pants.”
“And what about you?” As a lopsided grin covered his face, Nick grabbed her waist with one hand and pulled up his jeans with the other. He hoped his flirting would get her to focus on him and ignore Lancy during the mission.
“Add some decorative boxers? Pink with hearts?”
“Can’t help making requests when we get back to the Strip?” After grabbing her phone from her hands, Nick pressed her against the car and ran his hand down her hip. “Maybe we should celebrate that my first mission back is our first mission alone together. We can get a suite and some champagne…” He smirked. “Remember when we went to the Wynn Casino?”
“How could I forget?” Diamond ran her hand down his chest. “Soft beds, bubbly tubs… Didn’t we talk about getting a balcony last time?”
“Yeah…” Nick leaned in to kiss her, but a loud popping sound interrupted him. “What the hell?!” Nick turned toward the hood of the car, then the trunk. Gaping at the open trunk, he wondered if he’d pressed some button and interrupted their moment. “Damn.”
“Good timing, ace. Hopefully, you have smoother moves later.” She giggled and pulled her phone from his hand, hurriedly updating Lancy, no doubt.
Nick tossed open the trunk, examining the contents he’d only half-listened to Pearl explain. A road repair kit that he had no idea how to use, a spare tire that he had no idea how to put on, medical toxins and cures that he knew nothing about, and… bright pink boxers with hearts on them. Nick pulled them up and frowned as he threw them to Diamond. “What the hell are these?”
Diamond snapped a photo and grinned, then folded the boxers into her hand. “God answered my request! Lancy’s going to love this!”
A scowl crossed Nick’s face. “Damn it, Pearl!”
***