Bonham looked around the small room, eyes lingering on the circle of folding chairs and the cloth banner which read, 'Welcome to the First Annual NNA (No Nookie Anonymous) Session.' With a whimper, he sank into the seat with an index card bearing his name taped to the back.

"'s this for real?" questioned Jones as he took his place next to the other thief.

James sniffled and clutched his casio-mini closer to him. "All I know is the last time these weirdoes got their hands on me, I was naked. And Lord Gloria was doing terribly indecent things to Uncle NATO."

B stuffed his hands over his ears and began to hum in an attempt to block the image. Beside him, A turned to Bonham and pleaded, "I shouldn't be here! I'm married - I get regular sex!"

"With a woman?" Jones asked, already knowing the answer from the
nervous, lamb-at-the-slaughter expression the agent wore.

"Of course!"

Z patted his shoulder sympathetically, "That's why."

G's lower lip trembled like he was going to burst into tears at any moment. "I hate this! If we go along with this insanity, the major will have us shipped to Alaska... If we don't go along with it, the Muse will try to sacrifice us to another demon!"

To which Z thought, perhaps it was best not to mention that in a few more shorts, the Muse was planning on sending them all to Alaska anyway, so there was really no difference. But he didn't want to start a mutiny right then and there. It was time for calm, it was time for level-headed –

"Hey! This place has a mini-bar!" Merrily, James began to stuff the assortment of (free) beverages into the pockets of his patched trousers.

It was, apparently, time for booze.

Z sighed, giving in to the inevitable. It was just always easier that way. And so it was that the thieves and NATO agents once again found themselves sitting around, drinking, and waiting to hear word of what was expected of them. Neither Lord Gloria nor Major Eberbach were around to deliver orders to them, and so they waited.

"Can somebody please take that sign down?" G pleaded, pointing to the 'No Nookie Anonymous' banner. "It's really annoying."

Jones nodded and raised his sample-sized bottle of whiskey in
agreement. "'xactly. Lord Gloria and the machine maniac are prolly off boffing somewhere, and we're all stuck here having our lack of action waggled in our faces!"

James began to tear up over his beer at the thought. A quick game of janken later, it was decided that G was to be the one to offer him a consoling arm around the shoulders.

"How is this fair?!" B finally exclaimed. Six pairs of surprised eyes turned to the pudgy agent, not having expected an outburst to come from his direction. "It really makes no sense. We're all good people. We all have our heads on straight." He quirked an eyebrow at James, "Well, mostly, anyways. But the point is we're all rational, *nice* guys! Why are we sitting in some sort of group-hug session about not getting any?"

"My first inclination says, because we're all not gettin' any, and the Powers That Be are being shites about it." Jones looked to his left and right and got agreeing nods from both sides.

"The ones getting action," G began to count off on his fingers, "are the mean, loud, bullying closet-case and the skin-flaunting, teasing queer. While the, well, the *more* emotionally stable, *nice* people are left... drinking mini-bottles of booze in therapy!"

"So, the key to getting action is to be rude, uninterested, boorish, *badly* dressed, testosterone-driven *male*?"

Even Bonham had to nod his head sadly. "So it would seem. Those two have it so easy..."

"I could do that..." James muttered to himself, wringing his calculator nervously. "I could be uninterested and boorish if I wanted to. Do you really think I could get Lord Gloria if I ignored him when he wanted something and hit him when he did anything remotely perverted?" Bonham and Jones had a difficult time controlling their sniggers at the image.

To everyone's shock, A stood. "I think it's a great idea. If nothing else, it's a bit of fairness! We always do all the dirty work that they get the credit and nookie for. Who gets them the information they need to find out what the plot of the week is about? We do! Who does all the mad driving, suffers the yelling abuse, and lives in a perpetual fear of being shipped to the snowy tundras of *America*, God forbid?"

"We do!" came the chorused reply.

"With poor clothing tastes and bad attitudes, we too will be the
primary protagonists of our own fanfics!" A rallying cry filled the room. "Come, men, we'll find Gilderoy Lockhart's tailor and get to it!"

There was a momentary lull in the fervor. "Who's that?"

"Just work with me here for a minute, please?"

After a round of shrugs and nodding, the war cry rose again, even more vigorous. All exited the room, dragging the shredded remains of the banner with them and dribbling its bits like confetti as they went.

From behind the one-way glass window, KGB-Muse looked despondently at the video equipment that had been set up. "They weren't supposed to do that!"

The confused neko-muse beside him nodded in agreement. "I don't know what went wrong... They were supposed to laugh, maybe cry a bit, swap manly war stories, and then go at it like weasels in heat."

Eyes growing large behind his sunglasses, "What the hell are we going to do with all this Cool Whip?"

"Well, we still have an earl and a major to torment... After all, we were just accused of letting them off easy and everything." That thought seemed to please the Russian immensely. "But I have this terrible feeling that things are going to get very strange, very quickly."

"Should we try and run damage control before it gets out of hand?"

Taking his pupil's hand, he patted it and stated sadly. "Still so much to learn. The insanity that will follow is not necessarily a bad thing to be stopped."

*gleam* "This is going to cause massive suffering, isn't it."

"So long as it isn't are own," the neko agreed as the room darkened with another scene change.

He had contracted some sort of horrible disease during his two day forced vacation. And he was currently suffering through its final, hallucinogenic stages. That was Major Klaus Heinz von dem Eberbach's first thought as he stepped into the office shared by his Alphabet of agents.

While it was normal for G to push the dress code's boundaries, there was no possible way that Agent A would ever wear – or not wear, depending on how you took it – what he was (or wasn't...). Z, in jeans, sneakered feet propped up on his desk, was critically examining the centerfold of a magazine. Four agents were in a corner, intensely engaged in a game of cards, while a small group stood nearby, money exchanging hands as the battle raged.

As B scuttled by with a stack of pizza boxes, he greeted the major airily, "Welcome back, sir," and continued his rounds, handing off boxes of food as he went. The fact that he had not looked the slightest bit phased by Klaus' presence only helped to secure in his mind that this couldn't be real. His agents were trained well enough to know to quake when they did wrong and he caught them in the act.

In an effort to find out what was happening, he stalked over to Z, who had the gall to be seated at *his* desk of all places! Snatching the girly magazine away, he drew in a lungful, ready to lay in to the young NATO agent when suddenly something happened that stopped him in his tracks.

Z stood, scowling and seized his reading material back. "NO! Bad
major!" he pronounced, rolling up the magazine and thwaping Klaus on the nose with it. "BAD! I was reading that!" Then, nonchalantly, he took his seat again, found his place, and continued cataloging the breasts of the centerfold model.

Unable to do more than stand there, the major worked his mouth, but the string of curses he had been about to utter were lost to him. Then he felt it; a pair of hands firmly massaging his ass. Behind him, G smiled, "I missed that perky tochus so much! Welcome back, Major." And just as suddenly, G moved off to spread himself across Agent Q's lap and cheer on the card game's favorite.

"Z," he began in one last attempt to regain his sanity, "what the
hell-"

"IDIOT!" the agent bellowed with the skill that only one who had worked so many years under Major Eberbach could muster. "Can't you see that I'm working here?" He waggled the page he was on in the major's face. "Get to work or go pester someone else!"

Mouth snapping shut, Klaus inched backwards away from his desk and the harsh gaze of the blond man. Bed. He needed to get back to bed. He wasn't a healthy man, after all. Turning, he walked from the room, muttering to himself about the damaging effects of vacations.

~owari~