The more I see of Moray the more I become convinced she's another Emily. That is, a character whose only trait is being completely off the walls nuts, exists to say and do silly things for about a couple dozen comics at the most, gets little to no development, and that Jeph will have fun with for a while and then drop with a new Emily coming in a while after that. Emily herself, Punchbot, Melon, Willow and probably a few others I'm forgetting because they've had even less time than those. Actually I'd say Hanners would be the first Emily the comic has had if it weren't for the fact that Hanners has both stuck around and gotten loads of development since her introduction.
Claire sounds completely weirded out by this entire situation. On the one hand, this job in Cubetown is clearly setting off so many red flags both in universe and out that the Soviet Union could've just stamped their hammer/sickle symbol on them and supplied their whole country for a decade. On the other hand, getting to run an entire IS department right out of the gate might be good for her chances with other prospective employers after Cubetown crashes and burns if Claire doesn't take the fall for it. Given how this comic has had very
very few genuinely malicious characters in it or anything truly horrible happen to anyone I doubt Claire and Marten would end up any worse off than they started even if Cubetown did fail.
Aw... Hanners! Don't sell yourself short, I think you're way past the point where you're going to freak out while taking over the coffee shop for a couple hours tops. This reminds me of the time Hanners got put in charge and just froze because she was "paralyzed by the responsibility" or something. She's come a long long way since then, to the point that her neuroses have all but completely disappeared.
Penelope not working today? She's the Assistant Manager.
About half of the Coffee of Doom employees have all but completely disappeared over the last several years. They don't show up even when they should and the CoD itself has become less and less significant over time. Mostly it's just been a place for the crew to meet up, chat for a bit, and then go somewhere else now when things used to actually happen there. I get the impression that Jeph has stretched himself thin with all the loads of characters he's introduced over the years and has decided to all but completely phase several of them out even if they should technically still be around.