Spies and Green Eyes:
Disclaimer: I do not own any of Mr. Dixon's characters. But I do own my plot and original characters. However, Nic Prito, and Jamie Hooper are original characters that I borrowed from another writer, United. Enjoy...
Chapter 1: Not So Amateur Detectives Anymore!
"Good morning morning glory! Time to get up Frank, it's almost noon!" I heard Aunt Gertrude telling my brother, Frank in the next room. He was 18, one year older than me, and about one inch taller. He had my father's dark hair and dark eyes, while I had my mother's blonde hair and blue eyes. I could hear him rustling about in his room, trying to find his clothes while Aunt Gertrude lectured him on how he should really clean his room more often, mine was worse and I knew that I would be hearing the same lecture again shortly.
I was awake but my eyes were not open. I could only see darkness and hear a rustling outside my door. The next thing I knew the sheets were ripped off of me and a shrill voice rang in my ears. It was my turn.
"Good morning morning glory," Aunt Gertrude sang in front of my face.
My eyes peeled open and burned as the summer sunlight shown into them. Aunt Gertrude, despite our age, thought it was always necessary to wake us up, even on Saturdays. To her we were incapable of waking up before noon. It's not like we can't wake up before noon, it's just that most of the time we just choose not to. I felt my arm, the pain I thought was a dream, unfortunately was not.
You see the night before my older brother, Frank, and I were on one of our missions for the Bayport Police Department. Our world-renowned father, Fenton Hardy, got us into the detective business at a young age. We worked as amateur detectives for years, but now we were official detectives for the Bayport Police Squad. Our mother, Laura Hardy always stood by our side, but still feared for our safety. Aunt Gertrude, our father's unmarried sister, was the most stubborn of them both. She always tried to persuade us not to take dangerous cases, which to her were all of them. Despite her warnings and concerns she always managed to help us out one way or another.
Our mission the day before was to track down some stolen pieces of art from Bayport's Fine Arts Museum. The two stolen were "Water Lilies'" and "La Promenade" by Monet. Now Frank, being the smart guy that he is new all about Monet, while I had no clue who he was. What can I say I am not a big art buff. But this case was easy to crack despite my lack of art knowledge, we had it solved by dinner time. However good those two goons thought they were, they were far from it, and Chief Collig sent us to give them the heads up.
There were enough clues to hang your hat on in the museum when we arrived yesterday afternoon. By the time we found those thugs and returned home Aunt Gertrude was setting the table. I had scraped up my arm pretty bad in the rumble with the criminals so I hid it in my hoody pocket, out of site, when we walked in. I would later regret trying to hide it from her though because she would find out about it right about...now.
"Joe!" Aunt Gertrude shrieked, "What happened to your arm?"
She ran over to me and pulled my arm up to her face for inspection.
"It's o.k., just a scrape," I said to her pulling my arm away, trying to act as if it was nothing.
"Just a scrape?" she looked at me as if she was trying to read my mind, "What happened to you last night Joseph Hardy?"
We always led mom and Aunt Gertrude to believe that we never got hurt on cases and they really weren't as dangerous as they thought. Dad new the truth and worried about us just as much, but he knew that we knew what we were doing. Right now I knew I had just backed myself into a corner and had no way out. I was now sitting up on my bed, trying to hide my arm behind me as to not freak her out anymore. Just then my guardian angel came to my rescue, Frank! He was standing at my door and I shot him a look and he seemed to get my drift.
"Uh, Joe? Joe we're gonna be late for our meeting with Chief Collig if we don't hurry!"
Good old Frank! He was good at getting us out of tight spots like this. He used his head and I just used my emotions, he's rational and I am, well, not. I gave Frank a quick smile and then turned to Aunt Gertrude.
"Yeah, we really do have to be going Aunty," I said as I pulled some khaki shorts on. I threw a clean shirt over my head and as I walked through the door I whispered to Frank, "Thanks man!"
Frank followed me downstairs, and I could hear Aunt Gertrude walking after us. I knew what she was thinking, why do the boys always have get into so much trouble? As we walked into the kitchen the aroma of coffee hit me in the face. Ahh the smell of coffee in the morning, you have no idea how much I needed a nice hot mug full of it right now! Dad was sitting at the table behind his usual veil of the morning paper. Our mother had her head in the refrigerator.
"Morning mom, morning dad," Frank said as he casually nodded at our dad and kissed our mother on the cheek. I followed his lead and then grabbed a mug from the cubbord and filled it with coffee, still attempting to hide my hurt arm from view.
"Where are you off to today boys?" My father asked us from around his news paper.
"We have a meeting with Chief Collig this morning, I guess he has another case for us to work on," Frank replied.
"Another case already? But you only just finished your last one?" My mother questioned us, her eyes filled with worry, "You two don't get enough rest as it is, maybe you should take a vacation?"
"A vacation?" I scoffed, "Detectives don't take vacations mom! We have to be here in case of trouble!"
Out of the corner of my eye I saw Frank rolling his eyes at me. Usually I am the one who is rolling my eyes at him! I knew what I said sounded lame but it was true! Frank and I rarely ever got a break from our detective work, but that is the way we like it. Always someone new to shadow, or something new to search for. We liked living life on the edge, even if we wouldn't admit it in front of our mother or Aunt Gertrude.
"Well Laura, Joe's right, detective work is their job and they need to take it seriously," Dad said.
"Dad's right, we do take our work very seriously. Now if we don't get a move on we might just be out of work, we're supposed to be in Chief Collig's office right now!" Frank said as he headed for the front door.
I downed my last bit of coffee and grabbed a couple of pop tarts that had just popped up from the toaster. Frank grabbed his keys that were sitting on the little table by our front door, and I did the same.
"See you later!" I yelled to my parents as I hurried out the door. We backed our motorcycles out of the garage and strapped on our helmets.
Did I mention our bikes? 130 horsepower, chrome, things of beauty! With nifty GPS systems and communication systems built into our helmets! That way Frank and I could talk while we were on the road. Pretty cool, huh?
As we revved up our engines, Frank and I looked back and saw our mother waving good bye to us from our living room window. I waved back and then followed Frank off down our street.
"How's your arm Joe?" Frank's voice crackled in through my helmet.
"Oh okay, thanks. But Aunt Gertrude almost found out about our little rumble last night. Good thing you arrived just in time or else we would be on house arrest for the rest of our lives!" I replied.
" I feel bad keeping things from mom and Aunty, but it would just upset them." Frank said to me.
"I agree, plus we would never be able to go on missions ever again if they new how violent it can get" I mentioned.
We rolled up to the Bayport police station. At least twelve police cars whizzed past us, their sirens blaring.
"I wonder what's going on?" I said to Frank as we walked up to the front entrance. When we walked in it seemed desolate. Usually this place is swarming with people and police men, but not today. We went back towards Chief Collig's office. We walked up to the desk in front of his door. A young man, maybe in his early thirties with jet black hair looked up at us.
"Hello, can I help you?" He asked in a low, scratchy voice.
" Yes, we are hear to see Chief Collig, we're Frank and Joe Hardy, he's expecting us," Frank told the guy. It was funny because I have never seen this guy in here before. I glanced at his ID badge, Scott, Ray Scott. Didn't ring a bell, must be a new recruit or something.
"Chief's not here, had to go out on special business," The mystery man went on to say.
I jumped in to the conversation, "Was that why all of those patrol cars sped out of here so fast?"
"Yeah," He paused for a moment and looked at us, "I guess you can wait in his office if you want, I don't know when he'll be back"
"Thanks," Frank said as he opened the heavy, brown door, behind the man's desk. I followed him inside. It was dark, so I felt around for a light switch and turned on the lights. The door slammed behind us. Frank slid into one of the arm chairs.
"I wonder what kind of emergency business the Chief had to go on," Frank pondered out loud.
"I don't know, must have been pretty important, almost every patrol car was taken." I answered as I sat down in a chair next to Frank. Just then I heard a strange sound, like a high pitched whistling sound. I looked around and saw a small hole in the door near the bottom.
"Frank? Do you hear that whistling noise? I think it's coming from that hole in the door!" I asked Frank and pointed to the door.
"Now that you mention it, yeah I do! That's strange, why is there a hole in the door?" Frank said as he leaped up to investigate. I ran over to the door too. Then all of a sudden I got a whiff of something, something strong!
"F-frank?" I stuttered.
"Yeah I smell it too!" He replied as he tried to open the large door, "It's locked! Go open that window Joe!" He ordered.
I ran to the window behind Chief Collig's desk. I tried to open it but it wouldn't budge!
"The window won't open Frank!" I yelled to him. I tried to open it again with all of my strength, but I could feel my muscles getting week. I took a deep breath only to cough up the stale, tainted air. Then I realized what the gas was, but before I had time to say anything Frank did.
"Joe! It's chloroform, I know it! Chloroform!" He said as he gasped for fresh air, but there was none to be found! I was just going to reply to him when I felt my body go limp and my mind turn to blackness. The last thing I remember is hearing Frank's body hit the ground!