It’s in Marta’s old room.
↓ Transcript
THEO: Todd, if there was a medical issue going on, don't you think you should have led with that?
TODD: Argh. Amanda...
TODD: Look, Dad, I can't... really get into it. But everything's going to be fine. She's not in any harm.
THEO: Uh-huh. Selkie! I'll give you twenty dollars if you tell me what you did today.
SELKIE (VO): We shot lasers, Grandpa!
TODD: Selkie, goddammit!
THEO: Todd, swear jar. And pull out twenty bucks for your kid's bribe while you're there.
TODD: Argh. Amanda...
TODD: Look, Dad, I can't... really get into it. But everything's going to be fine. She's not in any harm.
THEO: Uh-huh. Selkie! I'll give you twenty dollars if you tell me what you did today.
SELKIE (VO): We shot lasers, Grandpa!
TODD: Selkie, goddammit!
THEO: Todd, swear jar. And pull out twenty bucks for your kid's bribe while you're there.
There's approximately two hundred dollars of quarters in that swear jar accumulated over the years
I’m afraid at this point the best thing for Todd to do is round up the kids and go home, reminding his parents that a) he and Andi are literally under government restrictions not to talk about this and b) he didn’t expect them to be so nosy AFTER they’d been told he couldn’t talk about it, let alone make an end-run using the kids (that’s just not cool), and c) if Selkie complains, point out that if she didn’t want consequences, she shouldn’t have been working so hard to skirt the rules.
Shortly put, Todd needs to get the situation under control, and fast.
While I think that the whole family should have been read in, including the grandparents, I do think that what the grandpa did here is pretty nasty. If the parent says that he can’t get into it, don’t go around him and ask the kid. This is especially the case if the government is involved. He’s lucky that Todd isn’t rounding up the kids, leaving, and not talking to him for a while. While Todd was being a brat giving his mother a hard time earlier, that doesn’t excuse this behavior. It’s a break of trust if you don’t trust when your kid says that he can’t talk about it.
Honestly, it was kind of stupid for Todd to even bring it up and goad his parents—to the point he’s upsetting his mom. It seems like all the characters in this arc (including the kids) lost their intelligence and sanity.
The only defense I could think for Todd is that he could be doing that to downplay the high stress he is in (not that it is a good defense). Seeing the damage that Amanda and Selkie both have done, along with the involvement of the government, would be highly stressful, and it hasn’t been that long since it happened. It also could be that he unconsciously really does want to talk to his parents about it for advice, but can’t.
Also, he would have had to come up with some excuse for Amanda’s barrette anyway, but I do agree that he sort of set up his parents for not wanting to take his word for the moment after all he did earlier.
I’m a parent with a kid who has been in trouble. Last thing my SO or I do is tell our parents about it. This is not only to protect our child’s privacy, but keep our parents from trying to meddle. My friend with kids do the *same thing*. It keeps things much simpler—especially with parents who don’t do boundaries well with their adult kids. The only people I’ve met who make the kind of mistake Todd is making have massive emotional problems or a tendency to do…not smart things across the board. They are usually not good parents themselves. A bit out of character for Todd—though his personality seems tor have changed a lot since the Amanda reveal story.
The Grand-somethings still think of themselves as the highest authority in their family, and Todd is still one of their *children* to them.
Trusting the 9(?) year olds to uphold national security is frankly unfair to them. They’re 9.
Some boundaries need to be set here, and I think Todd needs to do the setting.
I’m torn here, because you’re right, they’re 9 and this is super exciting to them, and there are adults who would be hard-pressed to keep their mouths shut. At the same time, although Todd wasn’t privy to their conversation, Selkie and Amanda were discussing breaking the rules as soon as they heard them. This isn’t over-excited kids letting something slip, this is *intentional*.
Frankly I agree. Next scene should be Selkie getting grounded, and Todd having a FRANK talk with his Grandfather about how ticked off he would be if someone made an end run around him regarding his kids.
They’re Todd’s parents, not his grandparents…
The secret is out. And grandpa knows a lot more of human (or sarnothi) nature than you do, Todd.
Well, at least now a practical demonstration is no more needed, no?
Grandpa. Shut. Up. This is classified. Todd could go away for his next five lives for talking to you. Take a clue and don’t push it.
That’s not how this works. Grandpa IS A GRANDPA. When his grandkids health is in question he’s not gonna give two shits about clearances or bureaucracy or anything like that.
Avery should know this, Todd should have brought it up, and the grandparents should be brought inside.
Remember, Todd’s ill-advised idea in coming over here was to say ‘neener neener neener we have a secret”. How the hell did he THINK this was gonna go? We
Then he either raised his son so badly he’s an irresponsible father or he doesn’t trust him or he doesn’t give a damn if Todd goes to prison. Any one of those three would mean he was a crap parent. Since he isn’t he should, once again, STFU and accept “I can’t talk about it right now. Let me see if I can get you read in”
Meh, I would have just told them.
With that being said, it should have been Todd’s choice, his Dad bribing hid kids shows disrespectful for his authority not just as an adult, but as a parent. Todd’s parents are not entitled to know everything that I’d happening in their life.
I suppose Todd brought it upon himself by not waiting and talking with the girls privately. First he scares his Mom and then he teases his family with information he can’t share.
Everyone is kind of wrong here.
Now we get to see how much pull our dear agent has with the agency, since he’s going to have his hands full with these security breaches. Then again, he likely already briefed his superiors on this since, due to Selkie’s past performances, she’s proven she cannot keep secrets.
I mean how would the agency find out, unless the house is bugged or something. Theo and Mari aren’t gonna narc.
In this situation the proper thing to do is to get Grandma and Grandpa clearances.
This is *so* far outside the normal security infrastructure that Avery’s gotta realize extraordinary measures are required.
Relying on the ability of nine year olds to keep a secret of this magnitude was never a good idea. Agent Brown had to have known this.
The only answer to this was always to bring in the entire family, not just their parents.
I think that was a punchline in an earlier comic… basically, let the 8/9 year old kids know what’s up, and they’ll end up telling everyone.
I’m over here laughing at the implication that even though the Swear Jar has been present through their lives, it is still well-filled enough to spit up a $20 bribe.
According to the secret commentary it holds ten times as much (wich leads
me to wonder: what type of jar is big enough to hold 800 quarters?)
Well… Are the kids under the NDA or whatever?
Probably. Or whatever.
But yeah, time for Todd to pull Selkie and Amanda aside and remind them why this is important to keep secret.
…
Or not. Let’s just see what happens.
To be fair, if a child told me that their hair clip was a medical device, I would have questions. Granted my first thought would be lice infestation control device (like dog collar) though hair clip is too small to be an active monitor. Maybe passive sampler to contaminate or a chemical test strip case. Exposure to a meth lab or Super Fund clean up site could warrant something like that since hair can indicate various levels of ingested/exposed substances. I would not suspect laser eyes. Possible communicable infestation or hazardous chemical exposure would worry me. I might feel and end run around the stone walling worth ticking off people to get to the point.
It could be connected to something monitoring the health, like a 2 part device with this being the one that beams out a signal at a longer distance. Sort of like how some watches are now.
Shoulda known your dad would bribe your kids, Todd. Best plan here is to be proactive. Tell the kids that if they take bribes, the money goes to you, and they get grounded.
That would be stealing and stealing is wrong. Instead the money goes to their college fund, that’s called investing and investing is smart. Totally different. Or so I’m told.
Still need to be grounded for spilling secrets that could potentially get your grandad disappeareded
It can be difficult, as there are some secrets that you should be concerned about that you do want kids to spill (such as abuse, where the abuser says it should be a secret). Because of that, I don’t think that kids have the maturity to understand the difference sometimes (or the brain development to even be able to fully understand), so I would hold it more on the grandparents than the kids.
I miss the clever iconographic swearing.
Many, many years ago Todd used to have serious anger issues towards parental figures… My guess is that when under severe stress he regresses to being bratty towards well loved parental figures. Basically he ran for home and started acting up with his mother… And his parents kept being good parents providing boundaries and figuring out what is distressing him.
Theo is being a good parent. Todd is obviously upset about something but minimizing it. From Theo’s point of view if Todd didn’t want him to pry and provide reassurance and support he wouldn’t have come running home and disclosed “something is going on, everyone is pretty shaken up, but I’m not gunna tell you what!”
My take is that Todd wants to tell his parents and is circumventing the NDA by getting the kids to tell them, but probably doing it unconsciously.