The air in the apartment hung thick with the scent of stale coffee and desperation. On a coffee table scarred with cigarette burns, a hand-drawn floor plan was weighted down by a meat cleaver. Molly, her hair scraped back into a severe bun that screamed “military librarian,” pointed a barbecue skewer at a crudely drawn diagram of a picnic table. Around them, the tools of their trade lay scattered: a black ski mask, a pair of walkie-talkies with dead batteries, and a duffel bag that still smelled faintly of cheese. “The presents are the soft target,” she said, her voice a low conspiratorial hiss. Bill, across from her, was meticulously wrapping a pair of garden shears in bright purple crepe paper. He nodded, his brow furrowed in the kind of deep concentration usually reserved for disarming bombs or assembling flat-pack furniture. This was the biggest job they’d had since the ill-fated Great Girl Scout Cookie Caper of ‘23, an operation that still gave him nightmares about Thin Mints and vicious nine-year-olds. “What about the clown?” he asked, not looking up from his work. “Clowns are unpredictable. They’ve got all those pockets.” “He’s a freelance magician named Barry, and he’s scheduled for a 45-minute card trick routine starting at 2:15 PM. That’s our window.” Molly’s voice was sharp, like broken glass. She tapped the skewer on a section labeled ‘Bouncy Castle.’ “We bypass the juvenile diversionary unit entirely. The real threat is the parental guacamole gauntlet. They’re guarding the presents like it’s the last chopper out of Saigon. I’ve timed their refueling pattern. They’ll be distracted.” “I still think we should consider the cake as a secondary objective,” Bill mumbled, tying a perfect bow on the shears. Molly closed her eyes, taking a deep, steadying breath. She could feel a tension headache starting, right behind her left eye, a familiar throbbing that only appeared when Bill started thinking. “Bill, for the last time, this is a precision operation. We are in, we acquire the assets, and we are out. No cake. The extraction vehicle—the minivan, remember?—will be idling behind the hydrangeas. You and I will be carrying two industrial-sized trash bags. We look like we’re cleaning up. We blend.” He held up the shears, now looking like a bizarre, murderous party favor. “Blending. Right. But these are for cutting the zip ties on the gift bags, right? Not for… you know.” Molly just stared at him, the skewer drooping in her hand. The sheer, unmitigated absurdity of it all suddenly felt crushing. Thirty-seven wrapped presents, mostly likely filled with cheap plastic and the faint promise of batteries. One slightly soiled bouncy castle. And a partner who thought a magician might pull a rabbit out of a hat and then use it to attack them. It was going to be a very long afternoon.