Bzzzzzzz.
Bzzzzzzz.
Bzzzzzzz.
Perry opened one cautious eye. He glanced around the darkened room, making sure that he was the only one awake. Then, certain that he was, he turned his attention to his vibrating right foreleg. Pushing back a patch of fur, he revealed his super secret spy watch, and pressed a little button on its side. It fell silent and still.
Perry sat up, taking care not to disturb Ferb, on the foot of whose bed he was sleeping. He whipped out his fedora and placed it on his head, before jumping to the floor, crawling under the bed, and diving into the secret chute underneath.
Moments later, he fell into his chair in his familiar hideout. He pressed a button, and the giant screen before him flickered to life.
"Glad you could make it, Agent P," said Major Monogram as his image appeared on the screen. "We have an emergency. It's Doofenshmirtz again. He's been buying seemingly random items off the Internet. I have a list of the items right here."
Perry pulled out his communicator and opened the notes application.
Monogram felt his pockets. "Where's the list? Karl, have you seen the list?"
"No, sir," came Karl's voice from behind the camera.
"I… I thought I put it in my pocket." Monogram looked puzzled. "Hold on, Agent P. I'll have it in a moment."
Monogram walked away from the camera. Perry could here him rummaging around. A couple bumps, bangs, and frighteningly loud crashes, plus a muffled "ouch" came from off-screen. Perry rolled his eyes.
Monogram reappeared a few moments later, looking rather disheveled. One of his eyebrows and half his mustache had been singed off. "Sorry about that, Agent P," he apologized. "But I found the list!" He held up a little sheet of paper, and began to read from it. "Ten industrial-size fans, a twenty-foot long log, two chainsaws, an extra-long drill bit, and two coils of rope."
Perry entered the data into his communicator.
"I don't know what Doofenshmirtz is up to, but it can't be good," Monogram went on. "It's up to you to stop him, Agent P. We're counting on you."
Perry saluted and ran to his hovercar. In moments, he was skimming over the Danville suburbs towards downtown.
It wasn't long before Perry reached the familiar skyscraper. He guided his hovercar up to the roof, switched it into autopilot mode, and then leaped off. He landed lightly next to a hatch that Doofenshmirtz had had installed for him when he'd gotten sick of Perry busting through the ceiling. Opening the hatch, Perry dropped down into the building.
Inside, it was quiet… a little too quiet. Suspiciously, Perry hid behind some nearby crates. Then he heard a swish and looked up. Something large and pink was shooting down towards him. Before he could dive out of the way, the something had wrapped around him, pinned his arms to his sides, and lifted him up in the air. Then the contraption juddered forwards, carrying Perry deeper into the room.
"Ah, Perry the Platypus," said a familiar squeaky voice. The machine came to a halt in front of a goofy-looking guy in a lab coat-- Perry's nemesis, Dr. Doofenshmirtz. "Your visits are always so unexpected-- and by that of course I mean completely expected!" He grinned at Perry and said, "So before I show you my latest evil invention, how do you like my new trap? Comfy, right? It's plush. I made it myself. Believe it or not, even after making my Doofania model, I still had a lot of felt."
Perry glanced down at the trap that held him. It was indeed rather soft.
"So, do you like it?" asked Doofenshmirtz.
Perry nodded.
"Good," said Doofenshmirtz. "You might as well be comfortable before I get rid of you once and for all, right? Well, come on, and I'll show you my latest invention."
Doofenshmirtz made his way to the far side of the room. The trap carrying Perry followed behind it.
"Here we go," said Doofenshmirtz. "So, what do you think?"
Perry looked at the thing before him in confusion. Suspended from the ceiling by ropes was something huge, long, and wooden. It was shaped sort of like a hollow tube, with large holes on the top-- like a very large, very strange instrument. One of its ends poked out an open window.
Above the wooden thing was another contraption. This one consisted of a bank of huge fans mounted on a trolley. The trolley sat on a rail that was attached to the ceiling.
"Impressive, right?" said Doofenshmirtz.
Perry gave him a confused look.
"You don't know what it is?" Doofenshmirtz looked exasperated. "This, Perry the Platypus, is how I'm going to right the wrongs that have been done to me!" He pointed to the fan machine. "I call a Blow-inator. Catchy, right? And that--" he pointed to the wooden thing "—that's a giant replica of a traditional Dreuselsteinian nose flute."
Perry shot Doofenshmirtz another confused look.
"You see, back in Dreuselstein in the days of my youth, I was quite good at playing the nose flute," Doofenshmirtz explained. "I was the star of my school's orchestra because of it. People would even come from neighboring villages to hear me and my trusty old flute play.
"But it was not to last. A new boy came to our school, and his name was Ned. He played the nose flute too, and although he was not as talented as I was, he had the best, newest nose flute you could get. He had a Honker 3000! My old, worn-out flute could not compare. Soon, Ned got all the nose flute parts that I used to play. Everyone started calling him Nice Nose Ned.
"In the school's concert that year, Nice Nose Ned got the big nose flute solo. And do you know what I had to play, Perry the Platypus? The triangle! And do you know how many times I got to play it? Once! Just one time, at the very end of the song, did they need me and my dinging.
"Everybody laughed at me and threw rotten doonkelberries. It was the worst night of my life. After that, I put my nose flute away, and have never played since.
"Until tonight!" Doofenshmirtz's expression changed from sad and forlorn to evilly excited in a split second. "Tonight, I will show the entire tri-state area that I should've been the one with the solo, by playing the biggest nose flute EVER!!!"
Doofenshmirtz pulled a remote control out of his pocket. "See this, Perry the Platypus? This remote turns the Blow-inator on and off. When I turn the Blow-inator on, it will play the nose flute by blowing and moving back and forth on its rail to the different holes. Neat, huh?"
Perry stared stonily back at the evil scientist.
"You just don't appreciate the beauty of traditional Dreuselsteinain instruments, do you?" snapped Doofenshmirtz. "Well, that will change, Perry the Platypus, when I fire up the Blow-inator, in about…" he looked at his watch "…three minutes! In three minutes, it will be nine-thirty, the exact time that Nice Nose Ned played his nose flute solo!"
As the evil scientist was distracted with his monologue, Perry worked on escaping the trap. He had managed work his arms free, and while Doofenshmirtz's back was turned, he pulled out his case of animal-summoning whistles.
"Just wait until you hear the sound of the nose flute," Doofenshmirtz was saying. "It's such a lovely—"
Perry chose a whistle and blew.
Instantly a cloud of moths swarmed into the room. They settled on the fabric of Perry's trap, and, in a matter of moments, had eaten it all away. Perry dropped to the ground and slipped the whistle back into its case as, mission accomplished, the moths left.
"Perry the Platypus!" Doofenshmirtz goggled at him. "I thought for sure you'd stay put this time, after all, that trap was soft—ow!"
Perry had interrupted him by knocking him to the ground. Seizing the remote from his hand, Perry leapt over his nemesis and onto a crate. He studied the remote. Sure enough, right there, was a big, red, self-destruct button.
"No, Perry the Platypus, not the self-destruct button!" shouted Doofenshmirtz.
Perry ignored him and went for the button. His finger was a centimeter away when Doofenshmirtz cried out again.
"Perry the Platypus, wait!" he shouted.
Perry paused and gazed down at Doofenshmirtz with an exasperated expression.
"Perry the Platypus… what harm would it do to let me play my giant nose flute?" asked Doofenshmirtz. "I don't understand what's so wrong with that. It won't hurt anybody." He stood up. "Now that I think about it, there have been lots of things I could've done, that wouldn't have hurt anybody. Like my shadow puppets on the moon. And Doofania. And erasing the messages I left at my girlfriend's house. Why did you have to stop me then, too?"
Perry glared at Doofenshmirtz. What kind of question was that? It was Perry's job to stop Doofenshmirtz from carrying out his schemes. It was that simple.
Doofenshmirtz went on. "Every time I want to do something, you have to destroy it, don't you? Even when it doesn't really affect anybody except me. I don't get it, Perry the Platypus. Can't you let me have my fun, just once? Do you have to make it so that I fail at everything I do in life? I couldn't play my nose flute at that concert years ago, and I can't play it tonight either?"
Perry glanced down at the remote control, and at his finger poised over the red button. He glanced over at the evil scientist looking desperately up at him. He glanced at the Blow-inator and the giant nose flute that, if he so chose, he could blow up in a mere second.
His finger trembled.
Could he really let Doofenshmirtz get away with it? He had never before even entertained such an idea. If Doofenshmirtz was doing something, it was his job to stop it. That was all he'd ever thought about. He had never considered that maybe there would be no harm in letting his scheme go.
He remembered what Monogram had said while giving him his mission. "It's up to you to stop him, Agent P. We're counting on you."
Monogram was counting on him. He couldn't let down his boss.
His finger steadied.
Then he hesitated again as he remembered the other part of what Monogram had said. "I don't know what Doofenshmirtz is up to, but it can't be good."
What if it was good, though? Well, maybe not good- but not bad, at least. What then? Was he still being counted on to stop Doofenshmirtz if his "evil" scheme was no so evil after all?
Perry paused.
Slowly, he reached up and straightened his fedora.
Then he lowered his arms.
"Perry the Platypus?!" Doofenshmirtz gasped, but Perry held up a finger to silence him. He jumped down from his crate and made his way over to the whiteboard that was shoved away in a corner. Picking up a marker, he resolutely made a tally on the side labeled "Perry the Platypus." Then he marched back across the room and extended his hand, offering the remote to an astonished Doofenshmirtz.
"Well… thank you, Perry the Platypus," said Doofenshmirtz. "Wow, I never thought I'd say that before." He looked down at his nemesis and smiled. "Shall we call it a truce, just for tonight?"
Perry nodded and extended his hand, and Doofenshmirtz shook it.
"Are you ready to hear the traditional Dreuselsteinian nose flute, Perry the Platypus?" asked Doofenshmirtz, holding up the remote.
Perry only hesitated for an instant before again nodding.
"Okay, let's go out onto the balcony so we can hear it properly," said Doofenshmirtz. He led Perry out onto a little balcony that looked over the city. Then he pushed the button.
A deep, sweet note reverberated in the summer night air. Perry's eyes widened as the note swelled into beautiful music. He had never heard anything quite like it.
"Ahhh," Doofenshmirtz sighed happily. "I haven't heard a nose flute for years. I forgot how nice it sounded."
Above them, the stars glittered brightly in the darkened sky as they looked down upon the evil scientist and the secret agent, the pair of nemesises, sitting together on a balcony enjoying to the music, for once, at a truce.
Down in the hundreds of small buildings and houses spread out below them, people paused. Sleeping people awoke, yet didn't mind because they'd been woken by something so lovely. Working people stopped what they were doing and went to peer out their windows. Traveling people pulled their cars over and turned off the motor to listen.
Back at the Flynn-Fletcher house, Phineas and Ferb awoke, and for once, Phineas said nothing because he wanted to hear the music, and Ferb murmured, "Listen." Across the street, Isabella stirred in her sleep, and her dream shifted to one of her and Phineas sitting together under the setting sun. At Charlene Doofenshmirtz's house, Vanessa, who was drawing in her room, continued to doodle while she listened, and her drawing of a skull inadvertently shifted into a daisy. At the Johnson residence, Jeremy heard the music and thought about Candace. And back at her own home, Candace heard the music and thought of Jeremy.
For a minute, the entire tri-state area was at peace.