The Direct Approach (Spicer and Prescott)

Jack was going through with the deal... as far as his 'partner' and Wuya were concerned anyway. He had only a couple of Wu left and he needed this one as well. And he was hoping that he would not have to go through with the deal... but just in case he had an app open on his phone that was one click away from completing the deal with the technology company for the patents to one of his oldest JackBot styles.

A cool billion in the bank would help out with a legitimate transaction...

He shook his head a little bit as he waited at the airport for the British dealer to arrive, drawing many looks both because he was dressed as a gothic scientist and because he had a small group of JackBots with him.

And a purple ghost thing.

No matter how many times he told Wuya to hide, she seemed to enjoy scaring the normals. He sighed a little bit and turned to the DriverJackBot9000 (aka, the one with the name on the sign, thin legs for pedal pushing and a little hat),

"Make sure you recognise her correctly this time." he told the robot in an annoyed tone, "You've made us rush up to three people already... and those handbag attacks really hurt!"

Dahlia was finally off the plane, it had taken so long to actually get to Japan that her legs were more than a little numb from sitting on the plane for so long. She was not looking forwards to now getting in a car for a few hours as well to get wherever she needed to go. There was a deal to be had however and it would just show her mother that she could do deals just as well as she could do them! Just because she was younger didn't mean she was useless.

Although at 18 she had just come into the family business...she didn't really have a lot of experience and admittedly the tickets were pricey to Japan. So how on earth was she going to justify this if the artefact didn't at least cover the plane ticket?

Maybe she could spin it like it was a little treat for her upcoming birthday? Maybe her mother would buy that if the deal went south?

Sighing softly she picked up her carry case from the luggage wheel and began to pull it on the handy wheels towards the area where people were commonly picked up from the airport. Dahlia was told that she would be picked up here by Jack Spicer, the guy who had requested the Wu. Although she hadn't seen him in person, he didn't seem all too bad on his profile picture. If his profile picture was right that is.

As Dahlia saw the sign with her name on it, she grinned and approached the...odd ensemble.

"Ah hello!" she smiled brightly "I am Dahlia Prescott, the dealer that you've been in contact with. Pleased to meet you Mr. Spicer."

Extending her hand so that he might shake it, Dahlia had to admit, he was cuter in real life than his probably photoshopped profile photo.

Jack hummed a little bit as he idly wondered aloud to himself about how viable it was to make some kind of death ray. The comic book villains always seemed to do quite well with those kinds of devices and thankfully his arch-enemies didn't have super-powers to do away with him and his minions! Except the Wu of course.

And their elements.

And their super-mega-awesome kung-fu...

Well shit, maybe rays were a bad idea after all.

When a woman came walking over to the assembled crowd of JackBots he blinked a few tmes. Dahlia Prescott was her name? He glaned at the sign before hitting the JackBot over the head with a stick,

"You spelt her name wrong you bucket of bolts!" he scolded his robot, "How do you spell Prescott as 'Saxon'?"

He sighed a little bit before drawing himself up to his full height and grinning at Dahlia,

"Hello Dahlia, I am... Jack Spicer! Super Evil Boy Genius!" he declared as he shook her hand before pausing and adding, "Well I guess teenage genius makes more sense but... I don't know, it doesn't have the same evil ring to it, you know what I'm saying?"

Dahlia smiled softly when she heard that the robot had spelt her name wrong on the sign, to be honest she thought that the fact that he had a robot in the first place whether or not it could spell was quite amazing.

"Aw don't be too hard on the guy." she teased with a little wink "Did you build all of these? They're very impressive! Did you major in mechanics in college or something?"

As Jack drew himself up to full height, Dahlia blinked a little bit when he introduced himself as an evil boy genius, she didn't think that he was still going to be going on about that when they did meet. Perhaps it was part of his unique charm, he did seem to be rather hyperactive when it came to getting this artefact that she had.

He explained to her that it was very valuable and very powerful, although it didn't seem to do a lot.

"I know what your saying." she agreed with a little laugh "It makes it entirely too long to say. I hope that there isn't too much of a journey to your home, I am a little bit numb still from being sat on a plane for that long."

Dahlia's attention turned to the...odd...floating...purple thing. Blinking at it for a few moments, Dahlia wondered if she was just imagining the thing being there.

"Uhm...uh...what is that?" she asked quietly to Jack, in case it was actually there and it might be offended by her question.

Jack sighed a little bit in exasperation. When were people going to learn that he was just giving his JackBots a bit of tough love? He loved the little guys really! They just needed to be taught their lesson otherwise he'd have to spend ours upgrading their programming when he could, instead just make them learn as they went.

Evolving programming was another design that companies wanted to buy off of him.

"Ah he's made of sterner stuff." he told her with grin before shaking his head with a massive grin of pride, "Nope! I'm completely self-taught! I went and took the exams at college and university level and I aced them just on my own knowledge! See? Genius!"

He grinned a little bit. Finally, someone who knew what he was saying! Wuya just stared blankly at him when she wasn't nagging him about getting more Wu. Seriously, that was almost all she did. He grinned,

"Exactly!" he agreed before clicking his finger, "Driver-Bot-9000... to the car!"

As they were making it to the car he asked 'what' Wuya was and he had to immediately cover his ears.

"WHAT?! YOU DARE CALL ME, THE MIGHTY WUYA, A 'WHAT'?!" she screamed, shaking the glass in the airport building, "I AM AN IMMORTAL WITCH OF AMAZING POWER! AND YOU SHOULD SHOW ME SOME RESPECT MORTAL!"

Jack sighed a little bit before pressing a small button... and suddenly no sound came from Wuya. He sighed in relief as he opened the door to a limo for Dahlia,

"Been working on that device for a long time now..."

Dahlia smiled brightly when she heard that Jack thought that his robot was going to be able to take it on the chin, of course it all depended on what you thought about the ethics of robotics. Could they feel emotions? If so then they should probably be treated just as well as humans and not bullied. Although, it was pretty stupid for the robot to have gotten her name so wrong.

She was impressed by how clever Jack was and her jaw dropped open a little bit, he was so much more intelligent than she and it made her feel a little sheepish actually.

"I can't believe it!" she grinned "That's amazing, truly. I've never heard of anyone doing that before, so you really must be a genius."

Following Jack to the car, Dahlia hummed as she took in the weather of Japan. It was rather like England actually only a slight warmer. It was actually nice to have a change of pace here, when the business was done she might check out a few of the main sights along the way.

Unable to stop herself from hugging her arms around her head when the thing began to shriek at her, Dahlia thought that this was too...surreal to actually be happening in reality, but, here it was, happening.

"Uhm I...I'm sorry I didn't know!" she apologised "I've never met a witch before I didn't know you weren't supposed to be solid. I'm sorry I didn't mean to offend."

As soon as Jack pressed a button and the shrieking stopped, Dahlia giggled softly;

"Thanks for that, is she always so cranky? Honestly, I've never been in a situation quite like this, it's rather thrilling. Do you have an 'evil lab'?" she asked with a glimmer of excitement in her features as she clambered into the car.

Jack wasn't big on the idea that robots could feel things because... well they couldn't! With him it wasn't a question of ethics seeing as he had actually made robots. It wasn't an ethical question, just a factual one! He asked them if they could feel as humans did. He gave them the processing power to answer and... the answer was no.

Robots did not have feelings and robots do not have souls.

"Yeah I was given the title of genius after that." he admitted with a massive grin, "I kicked so much academic ass back then! And I was only seven! My first JackBot could barely even fly! Oh yeah... they can do that too by the way."

Jack was a little bit ashamed that he had to leave Dahlia to face the brunt of a Wuya-Rant on their first meeting but he didn't have time to warn her about it. He grimaced a little bit,

"Don't menion the solid part!" he told her after he had silenced Wuya, "It's a sore spot that she doesn't have hands you see."

He smirked a little bit,

"Oh she is usually much more cranky. She's in a good mood because of your little package I think... says its an important one." he told her as they began to drive back to his home, "Of course! I have a mansion with an evil lab in the basement levels! It's the only way to be evil!"

He hummed a little bit,

"I'm guessing you don't see many super villains out in England?"

Dahlia was even more ashamed to be in the same room as Jack when she heard that he was given the title of genius when he was only seven years old. When she was seven she was still playing around with her mothers compact cases and high heels! Jack had achieved a lot that she could admit now, but what he did with his talent...remained to be seen.

"Now I think someone is just showing off." she purred softly with a teasing wink "Although I myself have a plethora of skills I don't think they are as valuable as being trusted with the title of a Genius in robotics at seven."

When Jack advised her not to mention the solid part, Dahlia giggled softly again and nodded her head. She wanted to be able to stay on the good side of this woman, she did not fancy having her eardrums exploded because she said something wrong again. It would appear that she had a very low threshold for annoyance.

"Oh well don't worry I wont mention it again, and, I've made sure that the artefact is nice and safe." Dahlia smiled gently "Why is it you want it so much anyway, I know you informed me that it can perform an action but, I've looked over the thing with a fine toothcomb and I can't find any indication that it can."

Pouting a little bit, Dahlia crossed her arms over her chest; "I don't like the idea that there's something about an antique that I don't know."

With a shake of her head Dahlia smiled again; "No, not met a super villain before, I haven't heard of your work either, you must be big over in Japan, I hope that I get to see you in action one of these days."

Jack grinned a little bit, proud of his accomplishments and very happy to see that someone actually seemed to be mildly interested in his accomplishments too. Of course when she purred at him and winked he blushed ever so slightly and had to take a second to compose himself a little bit more. He wasn't very good with even mild flirting due to his lack of experience in the area,

"Well I like to show my best when I'm with a beautiful woman." he told her with a grin while on the inside he was currently panicking about what would happen if she didn't like his comment. He was so worried he almost immediately added, "I'm sure that your talents are just as amazing as being a robotics genius! I mean I doubt I'd ever be very good at your job and I can see you are very good at it indeed!"

He smirked a little bit when she mentioned the fact that the artifact did something. Of course it did something! It was the Heart of Jung! It brought whatever it touchd to life. It was massively powerful and apparently had the potential to be even more so,

"Well it's called the Heart of Jung." he told her with a grin before smirking a little bit as they arrived at the mansion, "Well if you'd like I'm sure I can give you a demonstration."

As they arrived a JackBot opened each of their doors and Jack led her towards the entrance to his secret lab. Going through all the checks, he smirked as he gestued her inside,

"Welcome... to be evil lab!"

Dahlia blushed softly when she heard Jack's compliment. Why wouldn't she? She was being whisked up on this adventure with a rather adorable gothic guy...leave out the annoying shrieking witch and it was completely perfect! Why would she mess something like this up? Besides she was probably not going to be here for long and she didn't want to be wasting any time.

Although it was nice of him to say so she didn't think that her skills were going to be up to scratch against his own, although she supposed if she gave him antiques to value he wouldn't know the first thing about them.

"Well thank you." she giggled "I suppose that you don't know much about antiques valuation...although I don't think that's quite as useful for taking over the world as your skills are. I don't think I'm going to be becoming your side kick any time soon."

When she heard what the little artefact was supposed to do, Dahlia blinked and thought that it was quite impossible to do something like that. Certainly she would have seen this ability as it had been resting near to lots of inanimate objects in the show room so why hadn't they all started to move around?

"Ah I can see this is going to take a long time to settle in." she sighed, gently rubbing her temples "I'd very much like to see though. So, is this the only artefact like this or are there others in the world? I am certain that if that is the case they would be better in the hands of someone who knows what they're doing."

Dahlia gasped when she saw the evil lab, it was amazing! She would never even know that it was here looking from the outside.

"I can't believe that you built all of this yourself! Its amazing." she grinned "Don't worry, I wont let anyone know about it."

Jack had to admit that antiques might actually come in handy considering they were basically on a giant scavenger hunt for some kind of ancient magical artifacts. Well... at least that's what he thought they were supposed to be. Honestly, they seemed far too advanced to have been from that point in history.

Unless magic was total hacks, which he knew it was.

A staff that can give you the traits of a monkey? DAMN AWESOME!

He grinned at her when she said she wouldn't be becoming his side-kick any time soon. She had a good head on her shoulders... something he admitted he lacked at times,

"Well your skills would make you a lot better at some things than me." he told her with a grin befre smirking slightly, "You could definately become my side-kick! I'd train you myself!"

He smirked a little bit,

"Oh trust me, it gets weirder and weirder!" he told her with a little laugh before nodding his head, "There are others and I, not bragging here, have some success at using them! For example... Third Arm Sash!"

The blue 'belt' he had been wearing revealed itself to be the Third Arm Sash and it quickly wrapped around Dahlia's waist before spinning her in until she landed, with a small thud, against Jack's chest. He grinned at her,

"See? Awesome right?"

He sirked at her reaction to his lab,

"Ah but now that you've seen it... I cannot let you go unless you give me your solomn word to serve evil!"

Dahlia blushed softly when Jack said that she would be much better at some things than him, she wondered what for a moment before realising that perhaps he did not have the best head on his shoulders when it came to money and such. Although the lab was amazing and she loved it, it seemed to be rather expensive for a teenager to have built himself, genius or not.

The offer to become an evil sidekick was...utterly irresistible! How could she say no? Continue to sweep me along this journey, Dahlia pleaded in her head, it was so much more interesting than sitting behind a dusty desk drinking tea all day and smoozing with customers.

"You would train me?" she asked with a softly nervous smile "What would you teach me to do? Mechanics? The basics of combat? How to use these...dohickies?"

When Dahlia heard that there were others out there, she blinked and thought that she might just be able to help track them down. She was sure that a great number of these artefacts would have already been found and therefore in private collections. If she was able to source them before anyone else, it would give the edge!

Squeaking when the belt Jack had been wearing circled her waist and pulled her backwards until she was pressed softly against Jack's back, Dahlia looked up at Jack, her nose mere millimetres away from his jawbone as she did so. A soft blush was on her cheeks;

"Oh yes, thoroughly awesome." she whispered, as she took in Jack's features in profile. Maybe he wasn't so cute after all.

Smirking softly Dahlia spun herself out of Jack's reach and placed her hand on her hip;

"Well maybe wont give you my word, I'm kind of warming to the idea of you keeping me captive down here." she teased with a sly wink.

Jack could see that she was enjoying the idea of being his side-kick... and he couldn't blame her for that at all! Being evil was awesome and being a super villain was at least a million times better! It was just immense! She would be honestly rather silly to be going back to being a boring bystander by leaving.

But if she were to become his side-kick...

He would teach her the tricks of the trade! He would make it so that each and every day was filled with evil deeds and massive victories for the two of them against the Xiaolin Chumps! Grinning widely, he nodded,

"I would train you to be the best evil doer ever!" he declared without hesitation before grinning, "All of the above! And the dohickies? They're called Shen Gong Wu... call them Wu for short if you want though."

She was a squeaker eh? Feeling her body against his own, Jack made a note of that for some private time later. He blushed lightly but tried to move on quickly so as not to be caught out. Smirking down at her, he nodded,

"Only the best for my side-kick!"

When she spun out of his reach like that he couldn't help but take an instinctive step towards her to try and get her back,

"Careful there Dahlia..." he warned her with a light blush on his cheeks, "I can use the Third Arm Sash to have you wrapped up close to me in a second..."

Dahlia thought that it was going to be too good of an opportunity to pass up, being Jack's sidekick, someone like him teaching her the tricks of the trade was going to be invaluable. It hurt to admit it but her moral compass had always been a little bit skewed towards the badder sides of morality, perhaps this was where she was meant to be? She could at least see and test it out, instead of dismissing it outright.

Besides he flight wasn't due to leave for a week. That could be her trial period.

"Ah." Dahlia blushed softly and rubbed the back of her head in embarrassment "I apologise I didn't know that they had a collective name, I will strive to remember all that you tell me about the Wu from now on, I have an impeccable memory!"

The title had a nice ring to it, she liked the idea of being Jack Spicer's side kick, maybe they would be able to do amazing things together, change the world? Or perhaps she should just take baby steps, one at a time. Slowly but surely.

Through their emailing, they had been flirting a little bit, and it seemed as if Jack liked her physique enough in person to continue it now. Dahlia herself knew that she liked Jack's appearance now more than she did on the images that he had sent her online, there he had hyped himself up so much it seemed almost comical. Here, she could see the little subtleties that gave him a deeper level of attraction.

Purring softly, Dahlia sat down on his workbench, sensually slipping one leg over the top of the other as she reclined slightly on her arms.

"Maybe you don't need the third arm sash?" she suggested with a soft smirk "But perhaps I make too many assumptions, we have after all, only just met. Maybe I prove I'm worthy of being your apprentice first, then we can talk about getting closer."

Jack was going to have a side-kick!

Oh this was going to just be so awesome! They should totally have a theme song! Something a little bit dark but also catchy and upbeat so that anyone in the streets could suddenly decide that they wanted to be with them... just be singing their theme song! Of course he wasn't going to write his own theme song to avoid copyright law.

He was going to just steal someone's song without permission!

Even now he could see them stood there, victorious over the Xiaolin Losers, with their matching gothic outfits and Dahlia draped sexily over him... yeah that was his ultimate victory! He smirked slightly,

"Well don't worry... I have a spreadsheet for the ones we currently know about!" he told her before smirking, "And Wuya detects them when they awaken... when they are ready to be used in other words."

He was getting out of his depth now.

Ask him to build robots that could fly and shoot lasers? Done that! Ask him to use Wu with no practice? Been there, done that! But ask him to competantly flirt with someone as sexy as Dahlia? Well let's just say his tongue was unlikely to untangle itself for awhile.

He swallowed thickly and moved closer to his workbench until he had her pinned against it, a hand on the desk either side of her hips as he blushed at being so close,

"Being close is good for our roles as Apprentice... and master." he winked at her before smirking and stepping back, "You're definately rocking the evil temptress angle... and look..."

Dahlia thought that she could invisage the uniform that she would be wearing already, and she knew that she was going to make it herself for the first time that she and Jack were going to be going out as a pair together. Or technically were they a threesome considering that they had the weird ghostly witch Wuya flying around with them, even though she couldn't technically do much but talk. Perhaps she was good at giving advice and help?

The fact that Jack had a spreadsheet for the ones that they knew about, made Dahlia deflate a little bit, she wanted to be able to help find them.

"Do you know where they all are or, do you need some help finding them? I am sure that with my contacts I will be able to search the ones owned by private collectors." she offered with great enthusiasm, her eyes sparkling with the desire to help her new found friend and prove her usefulness to his cause.

Jack looked a tad...out of his depth when it came to the flirting she was doing, and they had only just met. Perhaps she should be taking this whole 'You only have 7 days' thing just a little slower. She didn't want to give out the wrong message.

Gasping softly when Jack placed his hands either side of her hips, locking her into place on the workbench, the softly cautious look on her features broke her prior smirk. She wasn't afraid Jack would do something wrong, she just didn't know what he might do next.

"I like the sound of that." Dahlia purred, before grinning brightly and punching the air "Oh really? That was what I was going for! I was hoping that you wouldn't mind? Do you think that would be a good evil villain thing for me to do, to be the 'dark sensual one'. There isn't someone like that already is there?"

Jack could see that news of his spreadsheet had not been taken well and he sighed a little bit in defeat. No one liked his idea of a spreadsheet! It wasn't fun at all. But thankfully Dahlia was in a position to offer an alternative, as opposed to Wuja, who just seemed to find fault with everything that he did simply because he was the one doing it.

He grinnd a little bit,

"Oh we don't know where any of them are until they activate! The ones that have already activated, I have written down. An us and them list if you like." he told her with a small grin, "You will be able to track them down before they activate! That way we will already have them when they activate!"

He grinned at the idea even though he was currently still rather out of his depth what with the whole flirting scenario. And she seemed... worried when he moved to pin her slightly like that. Was that wrong? Was he going too fast? Too slow? He just didn't know! He swallowed thickly,

"Hehe... you do?" he blushed a little bit, "Oh yeah you can definately work that angle! No one is anywhere close to working it like you would... Though Wuya might disagree and I know Katnappe would. But they're both just jealous of you!"

He blushed,

"Now... how do you feel about black leather?"

Dahlia made a small noise of understanding when Jack told her that the spreadsheet was only to keep tabs on all of the Wu that had activated so far, so that they knew what the other side had to anticipate their attacks on them. It was really quite clever now she understood what it was being used for properly. She just didn't like the idea that it would make her obsolete, but it wasn't doing that, thus it was a great idea.

"Ah I see!" she grinned "Well then the spreadsheet sounds like a great way to organise yourself, that way you can know what Wu the other team have and prepare to come up against it with the Wu that would defeat it best from the ones you own."

Both of them seemed like they weren't the most confident when it came to flirting, of course Dahlia had more practice with it than it seemed that Jack did, but that was all she had experience in, flirting. Not the more physical aspects, and she was sure that that didn't have a lot of experience in that department either.

Blushing herself, Dahlia was often told her physique was impressive and therefore believed that the sensual typecast of evil was right for her.

"Well great!" she giggled "You have yourself one hot tamale of a side kick then, maybe I can distract the boys on the other side with my feminine wiles?" Dahlia joked with a cheesy wink.

The suggestion of leather pants made Dahlia blush again; "I have worn leather shorts before, it was a fancy dress and I went as Kate Beckensale from Van Helsing...I think I might still have them. So I'm not against them if you want to use them for our uniform, but I have a great idea for the top I want to wear! I want it to be a surprise though."