Pixie and Lena have lunch at the Continental Cafe and Lena shares her worries about seeing ghosts. Elsewhere, the vexatious Natalia talks to her father about Lena. Molly's art notes: Set up and rendered with Poser 13.2.518 using the Superfly Cycles X rendering engine. Some postwork was accomplished in Superfly and some in good ol' Photoshop. The separate images were then mounted as a graphic novel page using Comic Life 3.5.21 and are also uploaded here for those who are interested in a view of them unobstructed by speech balloons and the like. Pixie is based on Project Evolution One and Lena upon Ali's Bela. David 3 is used for the waiter, Miki 4 for Natalia and a low rez figure called Lorenzo LoRez is Arkady, Natalia's father and one of the terrible twins employed by Anzhela Kropuskov. The setting has bits and bobs from a lot of places but mainly from Blue Tree Studios. This page was difficult for me. It was planned for Lena to confide in Pixie her worries about seeing ghosts but somehow I couldn't get a flow that I felt was natural. Sometimes the story flows and other times...😣 If you've forgotten Natalia, see here: Pixie and Lena clothes shopping Here's a reminder of who her father, Arkady, is: Lena is targeted by bad actors For my friends who are not English speaking the dialog follows after the break for easy use with translating software. ---------------------------- Dialog ----------------------------------------- PANEL 1 Narration: Soon Pixie and Lena are seated on the roof top dining area of the Continental Cafe... Waiter: I'm surprised you ladies wanted to be up here instead of in the air conditioned portion of the cafe! Lena: View is lovely. No crowd up here. Am liking very much! Waiter: Fair enough! So... what can I bring you? Pixie: We'll each have a vanilla Frappe and the house salad! PANEL 2 Pixie: You're gonna love the frappe, Lena. If you're hungry for more than a salad.... PANEL 3 Lena: No. Order of light lunch is good. Frankly, am getting a bit nervous about the interview. Have told no one until now but I may be hallucinating; I think I saw ghost and also my brother who is fighting in Ukraine. Both during interview yesterday. It was relief to put out of mind when meeting you and Brooke and today has been very wonderful but after lunch I must go back to Van Humbeek mansion where maybe I am seeing ghosts. There. Have shared. What do you think? Am Crazy, right? PANEL 4 Pixie: Seriously? If you're crazy than so is the professor, her sister, your brother and Brooke. I don't work for her like Brooke does, but the whole deal with the Professor is that she's a Ghost Hunter. Brooke has been talking to me about one ghost that they are in regular communication with: a very pretty specter called 'Grace' according to Brooke. Now, about seeing your brother who is thousands of miles away in Ukraine? Maybe that's crazy! but. really, is it any crazier than the rest of it? PANEL 5 Lena: So what you're saying is... Pixie: Lean into the 'crazy', girlfriend! As near as I can tell that's going to be a big part of your job with the professor. I've never seen 'Grace" but for all we know you're some kind of sensitive person and the ghost you think you saw was their resident spirit! Lena: Am so relieved you think these things, my little Pix. Thought perhaps you would tell me am nuts! Pixie: Eh. Wait until I show you around campus. Then you'll see some nuts. As near as I can tell, Brooke and your brother aren't crazy and they both believe in the ghostly 'grace'. I just wish I could ever see her. I don't think you're nuts, I think you're... very cool! PANEL 6 Lena: As for my job? If I get, it will be doing hardware design and programming based on graduate work by Brooke. She is working on thesis regarding electromagnetic entity detection. Pixie: Woah! Like a PKE meter that the ghost busters use?!? Girlfriend you are just layer upon layer of crazy coolness!! Now, let's eat! PANEL 7 Narration: While Lena and Pixie enjoy their lunch, Natalia (Pixie's nemesis from the clothing store) has lunch with her father, one of the 'terrible twins' employed by Anzhela Kropuskov... Natalia: Thank you for buying lunch, Papa. Arkady: It is nothing, dear one. when you called me you said you had a question I could probably help you with. What would that be? Natalia: I know you have information about every Russian who comes to town; Have you heard anything about a new girl who just arrived yesterday? Arkady: Maybe. Would she be called Vladlena Bubnoff? #VladlenaB