Preparations
In which the Bluestocking continues to behave with admirable restraint and perspective...
By lunchtime, the Bluestocking no longer resembled a pub.
It resembled:
a maritime insurgency,
an amateur legal collective,
and a nervous breakdown.
Maps covered three tables. String connected Plymouth to places nobody fully understood. One gerbil had labelled an entire section, PROBABLE UNDERWATER TUNNELS, despite several others repeatedly explaining that Plymouth was not Gotham City.
Disguise kits had appeared. Forged visitor passes were being laminated near the bar. Somebody was baking “rescue muffins”.
The Choirbils had begun composing sea shanties of liberation. Unfortunately they were workshopping rhymes for “habeas corpus”. This was proving difficult.
Near the kitchen, two capybaras were constructing something involving pulleys. Nobody knew why. Nobody asked.
Colin was currently being trained to “sniff out corruption.” So far he had located:
three sausages,
half a pork pie,
and somebody eating contraband Blackpool rock upstairs.
He remained under informal suspicion regarding the earlier Battenberg incident despite increasingly persuasive evidence pointing toward Brains.
Brains, meanwhile, had announced herself willing to join Swashbuckled’s crew on the grounds that:
she had previous boating experience,
a cute and extremely sociable dog was a fantastic diversionary tactic,
andshe might be able to blag biscuits off the rozzers.
On the other hand, she had also identified a particularly sunny patch of garden and was keeping her options open.
Hunter had also volunteered for the expedition. He believed his tracking skills might prove useful and had declared himself entirely willing to discover whether or not he suffered from seasickness “if it helps rescue Gosie.”
This was widely considered extremely noble right up until somebody pointed out that he weirdly appeared to have quite the crush on her. Hunter denied this with the slightly wounded dignity of a dog experiencing emotions far beyond his operational training.
At the centre of the pub, Maud and Grünhilde had established what several gerbils were now referring to as “The Big Girls’ Table.” This was unfair but not entirely inaccurate.
AngleofRepose arrived carrying coffee, quietly took in the maritime crisis unfolding around her, and sat down next to Maud without visible surprise.
Then she said, “Before this turns into an actual maritime incident, we need train times, phone chargers, somewhere to write things down properly, and snacks.”
Several nearby gerbils looked immediately encouraged.
A notebook appeared almost instantly. Three chargers followed. One of the gerbils was already reaching hopefully toward the snack pile when Angle added, “For Gosie.”
The little paw withdrew slowly. The room became noticeably quieter for several seconds.
At the far end of the room, Swashbuckled was calmly packing provisions into sea chests. The contrast between her quiet competence and the surrounding hysteria was becoming deeply alarming. One gerbil approached cautiously carrying a notebook. “Captain,” she whispered, “we have prepared three possible extraction strategies.”
Swashy looked up. “Only three?”
The gerbil panicked and ran away to prepare more.
Nearby, HorticulturalHussie was explaining the basics of lock-picking to an increasingly focused audience using what appeared to be two cocktail sticks and a decorative hairpin.
“I’m just saying,” she said reasonably, “most doors are mainly confidence.”
One of the Choirbils had started drawing possible prison layouts despite having no evidence whatsoever that Gosie was in a prison.
A capybara appeared carrying rope. Nobody had asked for rope. Swashbuckled accepted it anyway.
Back at the Big Girls’ Table, Maud watched all this for several long seconds. Then she rubbed her forehead. “We need a lawyer before piracy,” she said firmly.
From somewhere near the back of the room, Hedgehog looked up sharply. “I’m a lawyer,” she said.
The room fell silent. A gerbil dropped an entire forged visitor pass into a bowl of muffin batter.
Hedgehog adjusted her scarf with quiet authority. “We need proper custody confirmation, arresting authority, detention grounds and access to representation before anybody attempts to invade Devon.”
Several gerbils looked mildly disappointed by this approach.
Then Hedgehog paused. “…although,” she admitted carefully, “I would feel better if Octavia were involved.”
Silence.
And then, from somewhere near the kitchen, a gerbil voice squeaked, “Octavia Breakfast!”
Several gerbils gasped. One dropped a clipboard. Near the bar, somebody whispered, “She once made a fisheries authority apologise to a stoat.”
“I heard customs officers can smell her coming.”
Maud blinked. “Who?”
Hedgehog looked up from her phone. “Octavia Briefcase,” she corrected. “The lawyer.”
The entire pub froze. Even the Choirbils stopped mid-shanty.
“You know Octavia Briefcase?” whispered a gerbil.
Hedgehog looked mildly uncomfortable. “We were on a panel together once,” she admitted. “With Naomi Cunningham.”
Somewhere in the room, a gerbil fainted quietly into a pile of maritime maps.
Across the Bluestocking, thirty gerbils leaned collectively toward the speakerphone.
Far away, in chambers lined with leather-bound case reports and alarming quantities of annotated paperwork, an elegant ocelot in an immaculate dark suit looked down at her vibrating phone. Octavia Briefcase glanced once at the caller ID. Then she answered immediately.
“Darling,” she said smoothly, “this had better involve either constitutional law or organised crime.”
Hedgehog glanced at the photograph of Gosie in the police car. “Possibly both,” she said. “In Plymouth.”
There was a brief pause. Then, very calmly, Octavia Briefcase replied: “I’ll take the afternoon train.”
