Ten Steps Back
By Cybra
Spoiler Alert: Spoilers for "League of Villains" in case anybody did not see it when it aired. Ye hath been warned.
Disclaimer: The Adventures of Jimmy Neutron is John A. Davis's.
Cindy Vortex entered through the hole that remained in the front door of Jimmy Neutron's clubhouse. Green goop still covered the structure—yet to be cleaned off by the young genius—so the hole was a necessary evil in order to gain entrance.
The tube leading down into the underground lab was open, meaning that Jimmy was inside. She whistled as she slid down the tube until she hit the ground painfully.
"Jeez, Nerdtron. Couldn't you put a pillow or something underneath this thing?" she demanded.
She spied Jimmy's legs poking out from underneath the rocket she had piloted—and crashed—during the most recent escapade. (Typical Jimmy: tending to his equipment before the exterior of the clubhouse.) The sounds of careful tinkering emanating from underneath paused.
"What do you want, Vortex?" Jimmy snapped.
Cindy paused, seeing the highly alert state of Goddard. That only meant one thing: Jimmy was currently Not Happy about something.
Clearing her throat, she said as normally as she could, "I wanted to make sure you kept your end of our deal."
He paused again before snarling, "Check the trash can."
She strolled over to the trash can he indicated with a wrench and peeked inside. Numerous photos of Betty Quinlan lie within. "Is this all of them?"
Clang! The sound of the wrench being slammed against the ground reverberated in the vast space. She whirled to see Jimmy slide out on the dolly he lied upon in order to sit up and glare at her.
"Gee, I don't know, Cindy," he snapped, voice dripping acid. "Why don't you look around and check?"
Goddard nuzzled Jimmy, keeping his eyes focused firmly on her.
Suddenly, Cindy had the feeling that not even Goddard welcomed her in the lab at that moment.
Trying to salvage the situation, she laughed nervously and asked, "What's your problem?"
"What's my problem? What's my problem?" Jimmy rose from the dolly and stormed over to her, still glaring at her. Goddard trotted by his side. "My problem is that I actually thought I could trust you in my lab without supervision. I thought I could trust you to not touch the controls of my rocket when I said to put it on auto-pilot. But, apparently, I was wrong."
He stood directly in front of her now, tilting his head back to glower right into her eyes. For a moment, she was reminded of his brief stint as the orange "leader" of the N Men who, whenever angered enough, turned into a rampaging monster. Now she was reminded that, while he could not become that ferocious beast anymore, the rage that had created the hulking Hyde to Jimmy's orange Jekyll was still there, forcibly repressed under science and inventions.
"I-I didn't—"
"Don't you dare say you didn't mean it!" he snarled, jabbing an accusatory finger into the middle of her chest. "The only way you would've seen those pictures was if you were looking around where you weren't supposed to! And the only reason the rocket wouldn't have been on auto-pilot would be if someone—namely you—chose to pilot it!"
He literally shook with rage in front of her. Instinctively, Cindy took a step back, unsure of what the young genius would do.
It suddenly occurred to her that she had not just violated Jimmy's trust, she had also violated his privacy. His lab was the ultimate sanctuary for him: No one was allowed inside unless they had his say-so. Having a large hole in it like it did now must have unnerved him enough. Then she had gone through his things, looking at what Carl and Sheen had most likely not seen, and even piloted his rocket without his permission. If their positions had been reversed, she would have been furious with him.
"Jimmy, I'm sorry," she said quietly, holding up her hands in an attempt to placate him.
He turned quickly and stomped back to his rocket; however, Goddard still watched her.
Nervously, she called, "Jimmy?"
"Get out."
"But—"
"I said, get out!"
A hand came out of Goddard's body and pushed a button on Vox's keyboard. A tube came down and sucked Cindy up and out of the lab, making her scream.
She landed hard on the grass. Standing and rubbing her sore rear end, she turned and looked sadly back at the clubhouse.
"I'm sorry, Jimmy. I'm really, really sorry."
Without his forgiveness, Cindy plodded back to her house.