Vade was just munching away as he listened to the conversation next to him, and just as he had thrown another handful of crisps in his mouth, he heard Tyra mention why she was here, raising an eyebrow as he quickly swallowed the snacks, coughing a bit as they almost slipped into the wrong pipe in his throat. When he felt the snacks safely on their way to his stomach, he didn't hesitate to ask away. "Friends taken? Now here's an interesting subject. And here I was thinking you folks arrived here for a jolly joyride." Knowing he didn't have to expect any explanation from the wolverine, he turned his attention to the shark: "So... One of your friends was taken, eh? I'm very keen to hear more about that..." He leaned forward as he held out his bag of crisps towards the shark, offering him to grab a handful as he began asking. "What was so important about that friends of yours that they took him? Speaking of which, who are 'they'? Maybe I can be of some help to find them. I do know my way around the city. And I-..." The coyote pulled his endless rambling to a halt as he almost choked on a small crisps that was still left in his mouth, while coughing it up, he was giving the shark and wolverine time to either scram or answer to him.

Casey glanced from Geoff to Latika then back. He blinked several times and opened his mouth as if to speak, but first paused to carefully select his words.

"If this's the case,... why be secretive about who's runnin' the show?" he asked more quietly, with a look shooting off in the direction of the GUN representative in the distance. "None'a you guys have just come right out and said it, but, you know GUN's gonna wanna know."

Geoff was correct about the part where no one had asked. But, hedgehog be damned if Casey hadn't been hinting about it for the past ever-since-they-met. It'd just been one of those topics the hog had wanted to carefully learn more about before outright asking, on the off-chance there was any... attachment, or association, even.

That said, the big, scruffy guy was left blinking for a few seconds.

"Well," he blurted airily, with the sort of breathless tone one might use right after making an important (or, in Casey's case, profitable) revelation. A grin crept onto his face. "That right there puts some pieces together."

He took a couple meandering steps away from he had been leaning, pivoting on a heel, plodding with his hands behind his back like a kid who was about to run away with a stolen piece of candy.

"I'm just gonna go... y'know..."

He looked skyward and tried to be nonchalant, but did it with the about the same effective subtlety as if he had been whistling and humming.

"Take care'a some... things..."

"Just phone calls!" called Casey over his shoulder, cheery in a saccharine way. His stumpy legs speed-walked faster than should have been possible. "C'mon, you know it's important news—can't just keep it under our hats now that we got recorded testimony from one'a the guy's collaborators!"

Huff, huff, huff went the boar down the boardwalk. He was already pulling out his phone.

Casey stopped and rustled about, swinging his arm to break free of the unwanted contact with a snort and a backstep. He looked more offended than upset, though.

"I just told you, no foolin'," he huffed. "So what, I recorded'ja talkin' and I'm gonna tell some people, big whoop. What's it to ya if yer'really such big enemies with'im now, anyway?"

He leered back at the hedgehog indignantly, brows raised.

Casey narrowed his brows and looked ever-so-slightly off to the side, relaxing his posture too.

"Not the only one," he said, maybe a little bitterly. "Well, I mean, it was kind of," he continued with a flustered flap of his arms at his sides, "or it became that. Sort of! Once I, uh, ascertained the situation..." He mumbled a bit, and continued, visibly conflicted. "I mean, it wasn't like it was some kinda coincidence I showed up the day after you guys crashed, you know, but, that's not the only reason I'm here, just... one of'em."

"I'm independent, thank you very much," spat Casey in reply. "I'm a private military contractor, you could say." He tugged on his jacket, straightening it. His lips pursed. "That is... to say, sort of a... soldier of fortune, I guess."

On second thought, maybe it wasn't such a big twist that the burly, haggard old hog with a gunarm was a mercenary. But, hindsight is always 20/20.

"Look," he sighed and put his phone away, "I'd been doin' a little prowlin' around in Chun-nan for a while when Agent Gardyner called me up. Apparently, somebody picked your ship up on radar right before it crashed, but G.U.N. didn't have any personnel in contact in the region to check it out. They had my number, though, an' luckily, I'd just traveled by the site a few days prior, so I was close by."

He took a few wide, wandering steps as he explained, pacing a loose circle.

"They had no idea who you guys might've been. Could'a been Eggman, or just more robots, or anybody. So, I was sent to find out, investigate, maybe even... try to neutralize the situation, if it was necessary. But, instead, I found you kids. And, after I did a lil' diggin', I found out you guys—you an' Ace—y'really did have your noses in some bad business, so it lent a lotta credibility to your story. So, it became my job to getcha back home safe, and find out just what it was you saw up there."

He stopped and stuck his hands (well, hand and gun) out in an open-palmed there-it-is gesture.