A young university student named Valerie Payne has just moved from Toronto to San Francisco, and gets hired as an assistant at Uncle's Rare Finds. She discovers on her second day on the job that magic is real and criminals are in conflict with the Chans. Takes place between "Shell Game" and "Project A, for Astral".
- Action Survivor: Valerie is established to be an average young woman who's not fought anyone before. Even she is surprised when she manages to deck Ratso by using her broom like a baseball bat.
- Berserk Button: Mishandling Valerie's books turns out to be one for her when Finn attempts to use one of them as a weapon against her.Valerie: Nobody touches my books!
- Broomstick Quarterstaff: Valerie fights the Enforcers with a broom surprisingly successfully. When Valmont is told of this, he assesses that his three henchmen are hopelessly incompetent if a random woman can fight them off with a mere broom.
- Call-Back: Jade gives Valerie a brief recount of what canonically happened before this point, and she proves her words by using the Rabbit Talisman – which happens to be at Uncle's Rare Finds since Section 13 hasn't finished building the vault yet.
- Cassandra Truth: Jade bluntly tells Valerie about her and Jackie's current adventures, but Valerie goodnaturedly writes them off as imagination until she sees Jade using the Rabbit Talisman and the Enforcers try to kidnap her.
- Cliffhanger: While Valerie agrees to keep the job at Uncle's Rare Finds, Valmont reassures Shendu that he'll find out who she is.
- Continuity Nod:
- When Uncle complains to Jackie that nobody asked him if he wants a shop assistant, Jackie's reply is "didn't want to bother you". This is the same answer he received from Uncle in the show's first episode to his protest that no one asked his opinion about Jade coming to live with him.
- Uncle complains that coffee is the only thing keeping his ancient heart beating when he chastises Valerie for making him decaffeinated coffee.
- Eye of Newt: During Valerie's second day on the job, Uncle is out buying ingredients, half of which Valerie doesn't want to recall, including powdered rat liver. Still unaware he's a wizard, she can only guess they're for his herbal tea.
- Faint in Shock: Right after Jade uses the Rabbit Talisman to prove to Valerie that magic exists, the Enforcers burst in to kidnap the girl, and Valerie fights them despite having no experience until Jackie jumps from the second floor with a flip and scares the Enforcers away. After all is said and done, Valerie faints in shock.
- Friendly Address Privileges:
- Jackie quickly tells Valerie that she doesn't need to call him Mr. Chan.
- Upon first meeting Valerie, Jade asks if she can call her Val or Ray-ray? Valerie politely declines, but has no issue being called Val in future chapters.
- Get Out!: When Jackie jumps from the shop's second floor, he tells the Enforcers to scram, and they obey.Jackie: Leave. Now.
- Hand Behind Head: Jackie scratches the back of his neck as he tries to write off to Valerie Jade's recount of his adventures as imagination.
- He Knows Too Much: A downplayed heroic version; Captain Black informs Valerie that it would be best for her to remain working at the shop so that Section 13 can better protect her from the Dark Hand, and also because they can't let her spread classified information.Captain Black: … treason is a bad sentence…
- Jaw Drop: This is Valerie's reaction when Uncle assesses her to be a good employee, when Jade has used the Rabbit Talisman in front of her eyes, and after Jackie has demonstrated his acrobatic skills.
- Last-Second Word Swap: Not wanting to tell Valerie about the existence of magic, Jackie explains to Uncle that he's hired her to help cleaning and watching over the shop while the old man does his "private work". He also tells Valerie that Uncle's too busy with his "other hobbies" to watch the shop.
- Pet the Dog: After frustrating Valerie with his nitpicking during her whole first day on the job, Uncle surprises her when he tells Jackie that she's good enough to continue working for them.
- Puppy-Dog Eyes: As the Chans and Captain Black wait for Valerie's answer if she still wants anything to do with them after her first scuffle with the Dark Hand, Jade is pulling this on her.
- She Is Not My Girlfriend: Uncle initially mistakes Valerie for Jackie's girlfriend. The Enforcers make the same assumption upon first meeting her. She corrects them both times.
- Shout-Out: Valerie considers Finn's outfit to look something straight off of Saturday Night Fever, and she refers to Jade's act of demonstrating the Rabbit Talisman's power as turning into a mini version of the The Flash.
- Stating the Simple Solution: With four Talismans in the heroes' possession so far, Shendu tells Valmont to find out Section 13's location by having the Enforcers trail Jackie there. Valmont asks if the Shadowkhan weren't better suited for said task, but Shendu replies that since the shadow-ninjas cannot talk, they'd still have to escort the Enforcers to Section 13 after locating it, so having the Enforcers do the job by themselves would save time. The Enforcers get impatient on waiting though and decide to speed things along by kidnapping Jade and making her take them to Section 13, only to be thwarted by Valerie before Jackie enters the fray.
- This Cannot Be!: Valerie is on the brink of hysterics after she sees Jade using the Rabbit Talisman.
- Would Hit a Girl: Uncle gives Valerie his trademark Dope Slap when he blames her for letting the Enforcers in and thus risking his antiques getting broken.
