Run: 2026-02-24-01KJ8VFPK9P8ZHJFW8A1VAHJ2T

Molly spread the hand-drawn map across the hood of their rusted van, smoothing out the crayon marks with her palm. The illustration was detailed, thorough, and had been completed entirely in purple crayon borrowed from a gas station parking lot. "The target," she said, tapping the paper with a gloved finger, "is the Henderson boy's seventh birthday party. The intel suggests a bouncy castle on the east flank and a clown working the perimeter." Bill squinted at the map. "Is that a drawing of a unicorn cake?" "It's a floor plan, Bill." "Right, right." He nodded slowly. "Why is the floor plan pink?" "Because purple ran out." She straightened up and crossed her arms. "Now focus. The presents are piled in the living room, unguarded, while the adults congregate by the punch bowl on the back patio." Bill scratched his chin thoughtfully. He had the kind of face that suggested deep thinking was expensive and he was watching the budget carefully. "What's our window?" "Pin the Tail on the Donkey. Four minutes, maybe five if they put it on a kid with good spatial awareness." "And the clown?" "Neutralized. We bring him a balloon animal request so complicated it buys us time. Something with seventeen segments." "A giraffe riding a motorcycle?" "That's only twelve. Think bigger." Bill's eyes widened with sudden inspiration. "A giraffe riding a motorcycle while juggling." "Now you're thinking like a criminal." Molly rolled up the map and tucked it under her arm. She surveyed the quiet suburban street with the practiced eye of someone who had cased at least four birthday parties this spring alone. The neighborhood smelled like cut grass and somebody's charcoal grill, which was either comforting or suspicious. She had not yet decided. "What about party bags?" Bill asked. "Do we take those too?" "Absolutely not. Party bags are for the guests. We have standards." "We're stealing gifts from a seven-year-old, Molly." "We're redistributing joy, Bill. There's a difference." She pulled two fake mustaches from her jacket pocket and handed him one. "Put this on. We're going in as relatives." Bill held up the mustache. "Whose relatives?" "Doesn't matter. Every party has an uncle nobody recognizes." He pressed the mustache above his lip and looked at her expectantly. She put on her own and they regarded each other with the solemn gravity of seasoned professionals. "How do I look?" he asked. "Suspicious." "Right, good." "No, Bill, that's bad." The bouncy castle inflated with a series of mechanical groans from somewhere behind the fence, and children's laughter erupted like a small joyful riot. Both thieves flinched instinctively. A dog three houses down began barking at nothing, which Molly took as either a bad omen or simply a dog being a dog. "You sure about this?" Bill asked quietly. Molly listened to the chaos beyond the garden wall and nodded with the calm certainty of someone who had absolutely no business being this confident. "I've never been more sure of anything." She was, of course, completely wrong.