Lieutenant JG Miranda Delgado was one of the many people who worked in the intelligence offices of TRES Corps. She also had one passion that never made sense to her fellow Intelligence officers -- she adored woman's college basketball. She had played in college a few years back, and never missed a chance to watch her team -- the California Golden Bears -- take on whatever team they were playing this week, if she could pick up a feed.

Luckily on her part, there was not only a feed, but the game was against the Stanford Cardinal, Cal's bitterest rival and one of the best teams in the woman's game. Cal, on the other hand, wasn't always the greatest of teams, but they had surprisingly gone 8-1 in the non-conference schedule, their only loss coming at the hands of Connecticut, one of the best programs in the country. They might just pull off second or third in the Pac-10 behind the Cardinal, and this excited Lt. Delgado to no end.

Unfortunately, the game was on a Saturday afternoon where she had to be monitoring the feeds for Bharnate activity. So she compromised, and set up the game on one of the screens at her desk.

The game feed started, showing the familiar confines of hated Maples Pavilion. Delgado smiled, hoping that this might finally be the year that Cal had the talent to finally beat the Cardinal. Helen Wu was a talented point guard who she remembered playing with, and Marika Sjnyder was good at blocking shots, and she'd been hearing rumours about this freshman walk-on who'd single handedly kept the game with Connecticut close.

And it wasn't long before Delgado was watching the game instead of monitoring the feeds. On the other hand, she wasn't the only one watching it. Over her shoulder, her commanding officer, Lieutenant Commander Stephen Nodrick, was watching with her. She called him over in the first few minutes, because she hadn't trusted her eyes as to what she'd just seen.

"She's a very fluid ballplayer," Nodrick said. "Only a freshman, you say?"

"Yes, but that's not why I called you over here," Delgado said, turning the sound down a bit. "There's something else..."

On the screen, the ball left the hands of somebody wearing white and clanked off the hoop. A player in blue came down with the ball and passed it off to Wu (who Delgado recognized). "Okay. I think they'll try the play again. Watch her."

Wu passed the ball off to a player wearing a really odd sort of goggles, who cut around behind the block Wu set. Nodrick said, "There's no way she's taking that...HOLY COW."

"I wanted to make sure I wasn't seeing things. Did she just go through the center?"

"Yeah. It's very close, I'm not sure anybody not expecting to see that would have just seen a nice cut around the defender."

"Right. But we're trained Jihaddi, we've seen stranger things."

"You mean, like Admiral Foxglov? You're not kidding." Nodrick smiled. "Anyway, my best recommendation is to file this sighting, and keep an eye on the kid. If the Jihad can recruit her, she might be useful, with skills like that."

Delgado glanced back at the screen. "I'll file it. In fact, give me two months, and I'll be requesting time off to go to the NCAA tourney. The way my Bears are killing Stanford right now, it looks like this might just be their year to go deep."

"Of course. As long as you make sure you file a report. If you're going to watch basketball on the payroll, you'd better make sure you can justify it as a Jihad-related matter." Delgado laughed. Nodrick smiled again and added, "If you do well with this scouting report, I'll see what I can do to get you a promotion."

Delgado looked at him. "No, sir, this isn't worth a promotion."

Nodrick looked at the screen again. "Wraith, eh? What a nickname. And this would just be the latest in a long string of things as to why you deserve a promotion."

NCAA Woman's Regional Basketball Finals
Southeastern Regional
Memphis, TN

The three California basketball players walked through the streets of Downtown Memphis, dressed in street clothes and looking for a restaurant to celebrate their latest win. The three of them made for an interesting cast of characters -- Helen Wu, the shortest of the three, but also the loudest; Marika Sjnider, tall but quiet, somewhat embarrassed by her Swedish accent and troubles with English; and Katze Brenner, better known as Wraith to her friends, who traded barbs with Wu, but left Wu to interact with the crowds.

"First we beat ol' Boise State/ Then Northwestern we hexxed/ Last we took out U- T-X/ and now Tennessee's up next!" Wu sung randomly, making Sjnider grin.

"Another orange team. We up for this?" Katze added in.

"Tennessee. I ain't scared." said Wu.

"You're never scared." Sjnider said.

"Well, it's either be confident or be scared, and being confident's served me well. We're gonna beat them."

"They're the best team in the country," Sjnider pressed.

Wu looked up at Sjnider and smiled a big huge grin. "And we're betterer! Right, Wraith?"

"Right, Helen, whatever you say," Katze just shook her head and agreed with the point guard. It made Wu happy, and Katze was all for harmony.

"Betterer isn't a word," Sjnider added.

Wu laughed, and started teasing Sjnider lightly. Katze was happy to see her friend in such a good, lighthearted mood. The win against Texas had made Wu very bouncy and somewhat overconfident of their chances against Tennessee, Katze thought, but Wu was always like that after a big win. She'd calm down by Saturday, and the game would be all business.

Sjnider, on the other hand, was brooding about match ups for Saturday, and was not totally happy with Wu's antics. Maybe it was time to reel Wu off the edge of the overconfidence to keep Sjnider from totally panicking about the game before it happened. Yes. That was probably a wise idea.

But before she could say something, Katze blinked. That was odd, the connection she had with both of them seemed to be somewhat...diminished? It wasn't possible, she had been working with Wu and Sjnider for months now, she knew them forwards and backwards, and she wasn't purposely shielding them out. It bothered her, but she decided to somewhat ignore it, and said, "Hey, let's celebrate our win over Texas tonight, and we'll spend tomorrow looking to our next opponent. How's that?"

Sjnider spoke before Wu could shoot down the idea. "That sounds very good, yes? We should find a restaurant."

Wu scowled at the both of them and then grinned. "Yeah. Food is good. How about up there?" She pointed up the street to what appeared to be a very nice restaurant. Katze wasn't all that sure about three people standing on the sidewalk that they'd have to pass to get there, though.

They were dressed in the oddest shade of purple Katze had ever seen. One of them had printed material he was trying to hand out, the second one had a plate of what appeared to be carrot sticks, and the third was holding onto a plush Barney doll for dear life.

Wu was already nearly running up the sidewalk when the person with the carrot sticks stepped out in front of her. The two collided, sending carrot sticks flying all over the sidewalk and enough time for Sjnider and Katze to catch up.

Katze grinned as she looked at Wu entangled with the odd character, who was screeching something about all the healthy snacks being dirty. Wu looked up at Katze and scowled. "Get me up, dammit. Stupid people ought to watch where they're going!"

At this moment, the person with the papers tried to hand Sjnider one, along with a purple crayon. "Want to help us color?" he asked her. "We're having a coloring contest! Everybody wins! 'Cause Barney wants us to share!"

Sjnider looked utterly baffled at this, and Snack Girl started to cry. "All the prizes are on the sidewalk!"

Katze offered her hand to Wu, puzzling over everything. Snack Girl and Colouring Boy seemed to be adults, but they were carrying on in a manner that befitted a five year old. There was something horribly wrong here, and it wasn't just that odd distant feeling from both Wu and Sjnider. Wu was starting to get pretty angry, Sjnider was confused...and the figures in the odd group, well, she wasn't even getting any feelings off of them at all.

About that time, the man cradling the Barney doll looked up. "Is one of you Katze?"

Katze nearly let go of Wu in surprise. She considered not acknowledging the question, but this suddenly became an option that was impossible as Sjnider pointed at her and said, "She is."

Wu stood up and brushed her hands off. The man with the Barney doll suddenly had an ear-to-ear grin split his face. He stood up and handed the doll he was carrying to Katze. "I was told to give this to you!"

"I don't want it," Katze said, trying desperately to back away.

The face of the man handing her the doll crumpled and he started to cry. "I was told I had to give it to you, and I have to give it to you and I'll get in trouble if I don't..." he whimpered.

"Oh, for good grief, Wraith, take the man's toy and let's get dinner," Wu said.

"It's cute," Sjnider chimed in.

"Then you take it," Katze told Sjnider.

The man with the doll looked up at the argument. "No, no, no! It has to go to Katze! It belongs to her! I was told to only give it to her!"

Katze looked at Wu. Wu shrugged, and said peevishly, "Take the damn toy if we're going to get dinner sometime tonight."

The man smiled broadly and dropped the toy in Katze's arms. "You're welcome!" he chirped happily.

"Thank you," Katze muttered, and then beat a hasty retreat after Wu up the sidewalk. Sjnider looked at the three a bit longer, and then followed.

As they walked in the restaurant, Sjnider pointed. "Isn't that Coach in the corner? Who's she eating with?"

Wu looked and smiled. "An old teammate of mine."

Katze glanced too, taking in Coach and some Latina lady. "Teammate of yours, Wu? When?"

"A few years ago, for the Bears. Her name's Miranda Delgado, and she was really good. Played your position, Wraith. She was around my first couple years but those teams weren't like us -- the juniors and seniors didn't tend to hang around the freshman and sophomores, so I didn't get to know her that well."

At this point the waiter took them to be seated. As they walked past the table, Katze noticed that the person who was eating with Coach watched her. Was it the stupid doll? Doubtful, that was just paranoia speaking. Who'd be upset over a stuffed children's television character?