Counteragent Arc

Cavendish promising to double-reverse thwart Milo back in "We're Going to the Zoo".

## Information

### Involved character(s):

Balthazar Cavendish
Vinnie Dakota
Milo Murphy

### Major episode(s):

"We're Going to the Zoo"
"School Dance"
"The Little Engine That Couldn't"

### Last episode:

"Missing Milo"

The **Counteragent Arc** is a major arc of Season 1, directly following after the B.O.T.T. Introduction Arc. This arc follows Balthazar Cavendish and Vinnie Dakota, after the former becomes convinced that Milo Murphy is actually a secret counteragent, sent to deliberately muck up their pistachio missions. The arc begins with "Time Out" and ends during "Missing Milo".

## Timeline of Events

* "Time Out": After Dakota and Cavendish learn about how incompetent and insignificant they are, they take notice of how all their pistachio missions go wrong whenever Milo is around. This leaves Cavendish to conclude Milo is a counter agent sent to deliberately ruin their missions, proudly believing they aren't as insignificant as Mr. Block thought.
* "We're Going to the Zoo": After being assigned to the zoo, Cavendish observes the area with a spyglass, looking for Milo, believing he may be around to sabotage their mission. Dakota doesn't believe so, and they bet whether Milo is at the zoo or not. They eventually do see Milo after they failed their mission, meaning Cavendish wins the bet.
* "School Dance": Cavendish misinterprets Mr. Block's message about Milo as permission that they can spy on him, as he and Dakota arrive at Amanda's school dance to do so. They don't find much information about Milo in the end.
* "The Little Engine That Couldn't": Cavendish and Dakota chase Milo after a firetruck he's sitting in ruins their batch of pistachios, resulting in Milo interacting with them again. After Milo saves some kittens and drops Cavendish and Dakota at the lake, the latter is convinced Milo is actually a hero. Cavendish is not convinced.
* "Missing Milo": Having enough of Cavendish's mistrust, Dakota decides to finally ask Milo why their missions fail when he's around. Milo explains to the two that it's due to his Murphy's Law, having no intention to deliberately ruin the pistachios, clearing everything up for the two.

## Pre-arc Episodes

Most of the episodes related to this arc prior to it starting up are part of the B.O.T.T. Introduction Arc. Notable episodes include "The Doctor Zone Files" and "Smooth Opera-tor", in which Cavendish and Dakota properly interact with Milo.

## Major Episodes

### "Time Out"

In "Time Out", Dakota is at a pier, guarding a pistachio cart while waiting for Cavendish, who went away to receive their next mission. He properly introduces himself to Milo when the two encounter each other again, having encountered each other a few times before. After Milo leaves to join Zack and their fathers to go fishing, Dakota's pistachio cart gets skewered by a swordfish, confusing Dakota how a swordfish got there in the first place, noting that the water at the pier is freshwater. By that time, Cavendish returns to see that they once again failed their mission. Cavendish nevertheless moves on to reveal their next mission, but expresses frustration that it's yet again another pistachio protection mission (this one being about protecting an import from Tunisia). Lamenting about the fact that he joined the Bureau of Time Travel to save the world, Cavendish then attempts to call their boss, Mr. Block, for an explanation, but finds out that the battery of their intertemporal communicator has been depleted. Dakota claims to know who else may have an intertemporal communicator for them to borrow, leading the two into a gala where they meet up with Brick and Savannah.

Dakota and Cavendish find out from the two elite agents that they're actually the worst agents of the B.O.T.T, and that they're given the least consequential missions because Mr. Block just so happens to like pistachios. This news greatly upsets Cavendish to the point he accidentally mucks up Brick and Savannah's mission before they rewound time. When they've been given the chance to communicate with Mr. Block, he confirms Brick and Savannah's claims and commands Cavendish and Dakota to return to their given mission.

Dakota and Cavendish return to the pier, when they run into Milo again, as his boat flies past the dock into a fast food stand. Dakota then tell his partner that Milo always seems to be nearby when their pistachios get destroyed. Cavendish was initially doubtful, but as an oxygen tank from Milo's boat flies into the just-arrived Tunisian shipment, causing pistachios to rain all over the dock, Cavendish is convinced, and concludes that Milo is in fact a counteragent, sent to thwart their missions, now convinced that they must be important after all. Despite Dakota questioning the logic behind this conclusion, Cavendish remains his stance throughout the rest of this arc.

### "We're Going to the Zoo"

Dakota and Cavendish return in the very next episode, "We're Going to the Zoo", in which their next mission is at the Danville Zoo, which Dakota is excited about, as they're going to see actual live animals. Cavendish is more concerned about Milo, however, and once at the zoo, he hogs the spyglass in search of the backpack-wearing boy. When Cavendish reveals he's still convinced Milo is a counteragent, Dakota mentions it's just a theory, mocking him as Cavendish asks who else could thwart their missions with such precision. When Cavendish claims he's going to double-reverse thwart Milo back when he figures out how he'll be able to thwart him, Dakota makes the claim that they probably won't even see him this time, followed by a five-dollar bet from Cavendish if they do. Dakota follows on the bet by saying if they don't encounter Milo, Cavendish has to fill his pants with pistachios and dance to his zoo song, and the reverse if they do encounter him, since Dakota would like to do it anyway.

At that moment, a commotion is taking place caused by rampant giraffes, which ruins the pistachio cart Dakota and Cavendish were protecting in the process. When noticing the spoiled pistachios, Cavendish gets the spyglass and scans the zoo again, this time being able to spot Milo, exiting the zoo with Zack and Sara. Dakota admits defeat and promptly fills his pants with pistachios while dancing to the zoo song, accompanied by Cavendish. Squirrels then enter them, as Dakota points out he's got squirrels in his pants.

### "School Dance"

The sister episode, "School Dance", starts with Cavendish and Dakota receiving a mission from Mr. Block, in which they have to plant stakes at a pistachio farm. Cavendish asks Block about Milo, to which Block states that he's just a regular middle schooler, and unless Cavendish has any evidence otherwise, he and Dakota should stick to their mission. Cavendish interprets this as permission to investigate Milo, and decides to ignore their mission to instead spy on Milo at a middle school dance organized by Milo's classmate/crush Amanda.

Upon arrival, Dakota still questions why a counteragent would do undercover agent activities at a middle school dance, and points out that they're still carrying the wooden stakes for the mission they were intended to. They encounter Chad, who spots said stakes and concludes that Dakota and Cavendish are vampire hunters, with intent to kill Mr. Drako. Chad promptly leaves them to warn Zack and Melissa, as Dakota and Cavendish resume investigating Milo.

As a blackout occurs, Cavendish commands Dakota to follow Milo as he locates the fusebox in order to fix the lights to save the dance. Cavendish drops his temporal transporter in the process, which accidentally transports the band Amanda hired elsewhere. After Milo fixed the lights, Cavendish claims they've found interesting information about the kid. As the two head to the exit, they're stopped by Melissa, Zack and Chad. Chad, still believing they're after Mr. Drako, claims that the "one they seek has powers unimaginable", as a warning to stop their pursuit. Cavendish, however, interprets this as a warning about Milo, and feels vindicated. The two are allowed to leave the school dance and return to their apartment.

Once there, they report back to Mr. Block, who is understandably frustrated that Dakota and Cavendish directly violated his orders by ignoring their mission to instead go to a middle school dance. He asks the two if they at least have something noteworthy to report, to which Dakota responds that they spotted a teacher that looks like a vampire, Mr. Drako.

### "The Little Engine That Couldn't"

In "The Little Engine That Couldn't", Dakota and Cavendish are going on their way to bring pistachios to a safe house via a new time vehicle, which, much to Cavendish's frustration, turns out to be a tandem. The mission is put on hold, however, as a decommissioned fire truck boarded by Milo, Melissa and her dad, demolishes both the pistachios and the tandem, and Cavendish gives chase along with Dakota. The two manage to get to Milo by climbing into a diner-turned trolley cart that the fire truck managed to drag along, leading into Cavendish and Dakota's first interaction since Cavendish's belief that Milo is their enemy.

When Cavendish asks Milo whom he's working for, the fire truck runs into a cat adoption event, sending several kitties in the air, to which Milo reacts by getting an umbrella and climbing the fire truck ladder, with the intent of saving the kittens and sending them to a retirement home. In the process, a cat that looks like Cavendish lands in Dakota's hands, who notes the resemblance. As more accidents happen, Dakota and Cavendish lose balance and clench onto the roof of the trolley car, which has been separated from the roof in the process. Milo brings the two to safety by dislodging the roof's fabric from the firetruck, sending the two to a lake in Palm Lake Park. Dakota is now fully convinced that Milo is a hero, but Cavendish still sees Milo as the villain.

### "Missing Milo"

In "Missing Milo", Dakota and Cavendish are protecting a sapling they seemingly had failed to protect earlier, when Cavendish is still mistrusting about Milo. Dakota claims he has enough of that, and decides to ask Milo why their missions fail in his precense. Milo replies by saying it's due to Murphy's Law. Surprised, Cavendish asks if he's not deliberately thwarting their missions, and explains they're from the future, with the mission to protect the pistachios. Milo responds that he never would deliberately do that, and leaves after Cavendish and Dakota managed to protect the pistachio sapling, ending the Counteragent Arc. Unfortunately, this same sapling leads Dakota and Cavendish into an adventure along with Milo, as they discover that the plant will grow into a malicious mutation that will take over the world and destroy humanity in 2175. Fortunately, they, along with Zack, Melissa, Sara and Diogee, managed to avert this future, even if it wouldn't be the last time they'll encounter these murations. In the end, Cavendish has begun to fully trust Milo as well.

## Minor Episodes

Dakota and Cavendish make a minor appearance in "Star Struck". When Tobias Trollhammer was chased around town by Milo (whom Tobias misinterprets as a Menninkäinen) and his director, the two B.O.T.T. agents were among them as well on a pistachio bicycle cart, presumably chasing Milo due to Cavendish's presumptions. Tobias imagines that all three groups are chasing him on their own separate sleds of doom, despite not even knowing who Cavendish and Dakota are.

## Trivia

* Cavendish and Dakota's appearance in "Star Struck" could be seen as a continuity error, since the episode aired after "Missing Milo", the episode in which the Counteragent Arc ended. However, upon viewing the production codes, it is possible that "Star Struck" was originally intended to air before "Missing Milo".