Minion braced his teeth angrily and paced, for the hundredth time today, across Megamind's lair, under Megamind's idea cloud. By Megamind's table. With Megamind's things.

A less rational fish might have flipped that table in frustration, and broken some of those things. The idea had passed only occasionally through his mind. But Minion was far too reasonable for such violence, and limited himself to ripping down the few notes that hung low enough to bother him.

One of them, hung back in 2004, had a little doodle of himself, smiley-faced, in sharpie marker.

Minion clutched it in both hands, staring stiffly at it as he paced.

A brainbot buzzed by to inform him with a whistle and a blurp that Megamind had called out a small squad of bots to help him kidnap Miss Ritchi. Which meant there would be plenty of time to prepare… something. Some evil thing.

But even if Megamind did get hung up trying to kidnap Ms. Ritchi, there was no way Minion would be able to figure out that computer code on his own. So oh well!

He hadn't wanted to switch roles! He'd only wanted a little more appreciation! But Sir had thought that Minion was challenging him and flew off the handle. And, somehow, here he was, expected to come up with some grandiose plan all alone in only a few hours! Well!

He'd taken one of Megamind's old lasers and repainted with a nice subdued color pallet he'd found on Pinterest.

Operation: I Tried

It was… well, what was expected of him. To obey, and take the challenge, and have something!

At best somebody would sympathize with him. Maybe Megamind would realize he was asking too much, and actually apologize for once? Wouldn't that be swell.

At worst, he'd be put in jail.

Minion stopped pacing, staring at that cartoonish smiling version of himself. Without a body.

He'd really rather that didn't happen.

He nearly jumped out of his scales when a brainbot thummed behind him. Picking up the scattered papers. Laughing at himself, Minion thrust the drawing out to it. "Put this in my box."

It buzzed away. Minion glanced back at the computers.

At the next bus stop, she still didn't get off. Or the next one. Megamind scrubbed at his itchy face and tapped his fingers on the wheel.

He'd had to disguise the invisible car as a yellow taxi to prevent giant trucks and such from driving right into him. From the sidewalks, several angry citizens had tried hailing him over.

He ducked his head anxiously into his collar, and kept his gaze fixed on the road, still watching the third bus stop from the corner of his eye.

Wasn't this it? This was her stop. The next one wouldn't be for several miles.

He pulled a quick and illegal maneuver to get his car two lanes over and parked by the curb. Horns blared, but Megamind ignored them, intent on his target.

He could see her through the windows; the sleek slope of her shoulders, the noble nape of her neck and the handsome hair of her head. The Radiant Roxanne Ritchi.

Megamind checked his appearance in the mirror. He smoothed his eyebrows, biting his lip, and went through the steps in his mind.

"Oh how lucky!" one of her friends said, as they stumbled off the bus after her. "A taxi!"

"Oh I can't take that one," said Roxanne offhandedly. "Minion's in it."

No! He blanched, and her friends tried to peer in through the one-way windows. "How can you tell?" asked one of them, and Roxanne replied something about car models and spikes. "Nice try, Minion!" They were walking away, and he fumbled in humiliation for the controls.

How did she- how do you recognize your kidnapper, acknowledge him and just-?

He almost pounced at her from the car, but then he'd be exposed. And by now she was far enough to evade him easily. Her hips swayed as she walked away, and Megamind anger was flattened beneath something else.

"Hey, taxi!" Some random man welcomed himself into Megamind's car with a huff. "Take me up t- HOLY SH-!"

With a growl, Megamind dehydrated him and threw him back out into a crowd of cityfolk. He activated invisibility mode and revved away as cries of alarm spread down the street.

Minion must be feeling lazy today, Roxanne supposed, as she rounded the corner. Synthia and Amanda broke off to get coffee, but Roxanne had promised to come to work a little early. She hadn't expected they'd be trying to kidnap her already.

She put as many people between she and the street as possible, and from the distance it was tricky to tell which taxis were real, and which weren't. Though up close she couldn't believe Amanda had fallen for it. Really, what was up?

As she turned the corner, Megamind lept out at her.

"Crap!" She yelped as she dodged to the right. Megamind's eyes widened as his arms pinwheeled, and she took the chance to kick him in the knee.

"OW! Wait-"

"Can you at least wait until I've checked into work? Would that be too hard? And why are you here?"

"I'm- Ms. Ritchi, please-"

"-In public? I can't be seen talking to you. Buzz off."

His eye twitched. Roxanne barked a laugh at him and turned running.

With legs proportionally longer than his, even in heels she was faster. She grinned despite herself, about to hurl a coy insult over her shoulder when a flash of blue pulsed by her field of vision, and a newspaper box to her right shrunk into a tiny cube.

She stared at the cube, her thoughts ground to a halt. Megamind was standing behind her, not even trying to chase her. She turned around slowly, eyes wide.

"Did you just try to dehydrate me?

The incriminating gun was still glowing in his hand, and he stared back at her, his expression open, eyebrows lifted over a pinched frown. Slowly he pulled it behind his back. "No?"

"You did! What's wrong with you today?"

"I just need you t-"

"You guys wanna buy a bagel?"

"NO" They both whirled around simultaneously on the poor man who had stumbled out a nearby store. At spotting Megamind with a gun in his hand, he dropped his bagels. "My bad," he said, and went back where he came from.

Megamind groaned in frustration and brandished his gun again. "Miss Ritchi, you're coming with-"

She wasn't there anymore. He blinked and listened for the sound of her heels on the pavement ahead.