Connecting the Dots
Perry was a Secret Agent. Our pet platypus, who didn't do much, was suddenly bipedal and sporting a fedora, and the three of us were fleeing for our lives. Phineas was shocked and hurt and dealing with it in the same way he dealt with nearly everything, in a flood of words. I, on the other hand, was unexpectedly reminded of a sort of puzzle I used to love when I was younger: the sort that involved dragging a crayon from one numbered dot to another, until the lines formed a picture, of a sailboat, or a rocket ship, or a platypus…
The daily question, "Where's Perry?" had at last been answered. He was off battling his Nemesis, Dr. Heinz Doofenshmirtz – who was neither a physician, nor a pharmacist, but an Evil Scientist. Well, that rather complicated matters, since he also happened to be the father of the beautiful, remarkable, incomparable Vanessa Doofenshmirtz, who made me weak each time I saw her. I had connected her to the odd-looking man in the white lab coat as a result of our adventure at the Super-Duper MegaStore – and I now realized that this was probably the second time I had assisted an Evil Scientist in an Evil Scheme, since I did help Vanessa find the Pizzazium Infinionite for him. It was an alarming thought – but the adventure had definitely been worth it, and I would have done it again in a heartbeat if it meant another kiss from her.
That, in turn, reminded me of our conversation at the top of the Eiffel Tower, and how she had left me there, holding the single rose I had intended as a gift for her… oh, lovely, there was a distraction I didn't need just now. The point was, I had been fairly certain at the time that Dr. Doofenshmirtz was the man with whom she had left. Admittedly, the thought of Vanessa reconciling with her father was far preferable to the thought of Vanessa swanning off with some amorous Frenchman with a penchant for lab coats. But, at the time, I couldn't explain the platypus-shaped hover-jet I had seen, carrying her away. Oh, I had recognized it at once – at least, once I'd taken a moment to think about it. But, what on earth was it doing in Paris with Vanessa's father?
Phineas and I had used a platypus-shaped hover-jet to rescue Candace and Stacy and the Bettys on the day we had gone on our own Secret Agent Mission. Of course, Phineas had assumed that I had built the hover-jet, and the spy lair, and all of it, but I knew I hadn't. Now, it occurred to me that the white-haired man who had given us our mission had mentioned the name Dr. Doofenshmirtz – I knew I had heard that name somewhere before the day I first set eyes on Vanessa at Blueprint Heaven – uurrgh! I really had to put a stop to these distractions! The white-haired man had addressed his instructions to "Agent P," which, of course, my brother had interpreted as "P for Phineas," even though I knew that couldn't be right, because I wasn't the one who had built the spy lair or planned the mission.
And now, it was all starting to connect. "Agent P" had stood for Perry all along. That was Perry's spy lair we had stumbled into, and Perry's hover-jet we had borrowed. Did that mean that Dr. Doofenshmirtz had taken Perry's hover-jet to pick up Vanessa in Paris – or had Perry been with them that day? He certainly hadn't been with us. If Perry was Vanessa's father's Nemesis, did that mean that Perry and Vanessa knew each other?
Now that dreadfully complicated matters. When had there ever been a romance where the Boy's Pet Secret Agent Platypus was the Nemesis of the Girl's Evil Scientist Father? Oh, Shakespeare would have had a field day with that one. I could only hope it would turn out to be more Comedy of Errors than Romeo and Juliet.
Perry was a Secret Agent, and I felt foolish for not having seen the whole picture before now. It all made sense. And none of it would matter if we failed to escape this with our lives.
A/N: Phineas & Ferb and all related characters in both dimensions belong to Dan Povenmire and Jeff "Swampy" Marsh. Now - am I the only one who has noticed that "Ready for the Bettys" seems to have been pulled from the episodes aired on television (along with "Flying Fishmonger," the episode paired with it)? After watching "Bettys" again on YouTube, I can see why - the whole "P&F stumble into Perry's lair" plot does tend to clash with events in the movie. But, until Dan & Swampy use the Amnesianator on all of us, that "Bettys" episode still exists, and I had fun referencing it here. I just felt that, while Phineas was freaking out, Ferb would be thinking that, in some bizarre way, this Agent P business actually cleared up a few things.