Prin: *Ahem* This chapter has a lot going on, so try and keep up! X) JK! But, it does have a lot going on, so…
Iris: YAY! WE UDATED THIS STORY!
Prin: Yeah, for the first time! ^^
Iris: Anyway, we wanna thank you guys for letting us borrow your OCs! ^^
Amy: *pops up* Am I in this chapter?
Prin: AH! WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE!
Amy: O.O Um…Taking care of the chicks…*points at hundreds of chicks running all around*
Prin: Oh, right…You know, Pa shouldn't have put 400 eggs in that incubator….
Iris: O.O Um, never mind, Enjoy this chap!
The supposedly crazy Zach-bots zoomed up into the air in three different directions, keeping up the impression that they might have gotten water into their circuits while going back home at the same time. A-1 was the first to get home.
"Finally, you're back!" Zach glanced at him quickly before turning back to his giant computer. "Where are the others?"
"On their way."
"Good. Here's the programming," Zach stood up, carelessly shoving the small disk into the slot in the robot's head, "Update the other bots with that, no mistakes this time. You have the samples?"
The robot pulled five clear plastic containers out, showing them to Zach, who grinned from ear to ear as he looked at the tiny snippets of hair. "Perfect! Here, go make the clones, and don't forget to update the other bots."
A couple months later, the crazy Zach Bots were forgotten, as the crew was currently studying hyenas. A little ironic, as they were usually running away from overly abundant hyenas, now they were running after extremely rare hyenas.
"Martin! Wait up!"
"The hyenas won't wait for anyone, Chris!"
Chris panted, trying to keep up with his brother. Suddenly, Martin skidded to a stop, and grabbed Chris's collar to keep him from running past him.
Chris bent over, panting, "What?"
"Look!" Martin crouched down behind a large rock. Chris followed suit, and poked his head around it. He grinned.
"Okay, Martin, what's the coolest thing about hyenas?"
"I think its cool how they almost look like dogs, but they are actually more closely related to the cat family!"
"I think it's the matriarchal society. Most predatory animals live alone, or like lions and wolves, have a patriarchal society, or in other words, the males are dominant. But with hyenas, it's the exact opposite! The females are in charge, and they are larger than the males, while with most animals, it's the exact opposite."
"Yeah, that's called sexual dimorphism, and it's pretty cool, too."
Chris noticed that the hyenas were gathering under a tree that had a large burrow dug next to it (courtesy of Slurpy and his relatives, more than likely), and told Martin that he was getting a closer look. He snuck around the hyenas and climbed up the tree with ease, communicating quietly with Martin through their Creature Pods.
Zach was rummaging through the files in his office. While he usually kept things meticulously clean, his office was the exception. It was full of unnecessary papers and tax returns and billing and blah, blah, blah. Zach would have gotten his robots to organize the papers for him, but regretfully, they couldn't read. And he insisted on being alone, so no annoying secretaries for him. He groaned in frustration. If there was something he didn't like about being rich, it was the whole economics thing. It was annoying, it interrupted his work, and it took money away. Sure it gave him some, and he had more money than he could ever spend in one lifetime, but his mother's poor upbringing showed through in him, making him a bit uneasy when it came to giving money away. He even shopped around looking for the best deals instead of just buying the first thing that came into his grasp.
A Zach-bot flew into the room.
"What?" Zach yelled, not in the mood for every little thing the robots always came to him for.
The robot beeped an answer.
"Really?" Zach jumped out of his chair, running past the robot, down the hallway.
Aviva shuddered, looking at the hyenas Martin and Chris had finally tracked down.
"I kinda like them!" Jimmy munched on his ever present pizza.
She huffed, wondering what kinds of powers the hyenas had, other than being an incredible annoyance to almost all other life out on the African Savannah.
"Yeah, they're pretty cool!" Koki pushed her chair over to the large computer screen, smiling up at Martin's face on the screen.
Aviva sighed, getting back to making the Creature Power Disks. Chris called on the screen that sat on her personal desk.
"Hey CK, what's up?"
"I was about to ask you that," he smiled, "You don't seem to be so enthusiastic about the hyenas."
She shook her head, "Eh, it's nothing."
He raised an eyebrow.
"Okay," he didn't sound too sure. Aviva grinned, "CK, I need more data here, I don't have much programmed into the suit other than the hyenas' powerful jaws."
He seemed to light up, the way the Kratt bros always did when talking about animals. Until she noticed the Zach-bot, of course.
"Chris, look behind you!"
Hearing the fear in her voice, he spun around quickly…too quickly. He fell off of the branch he was on, and with a shout, landed facedown on a boulder that had been under the tree.
Aviva raised an eyebrow, only slightly worried about him. Both of the bros had been in worse situations, fallen from higher up and on harder stuff than what Chris had fallen on just now. She was more worried about the Zach-bot, which had disappeared as quickly as it appeared.
"Koki! Could you see if you could track that Zach-bot?"
Koki nodded and rolled her chair over to her station, quickly bringing up the tracking screen. After a few moments of typing, she shook her head, "Sorry Aviva, but I can't find anything electronic or mechanical for that matter anywhere near us."
"Martin, did you see the Zach-bot?" Aviva turned to the screen. But Martin wasn't there.
"Uh, Martin?"
His voice sounded a bit distant, "Chris, are you okay?"
A strained voice that hardly sounded like Chris's voice at all answered, "Fine, fine, just got the air knocked out of me."
Aviva pushed a few buttons, and the view on the screen expanded, showing Chris slowly standing up, grimacing a bit.
"CK, you sure you're okay?"
"Yeah, fine, but falling out of the tree scared off all the hyenas!" his voice almost seemed to go back to normal, and a smile spread across his face, "Come on, Martin, we need to catch up again!"
"Okay!" Martin started running in the direction he had seen the hyenas run off. Chris smiled and started to follow him, but as soon as he leant forward a little, he collapsed on his knees, wheezing. Martin noticed immediately and made a U-turn.
"Chris! Chris, are you okay?"
Chris could only shake his head, as he tried to breathe. Aviva's eyes widened.
"Guys, stay right there! We're coming to get you."
About an hour and a half later, (Jimmy Z insisted they take Chris to a hospital in the US, and flew everyone there despite a slightly recovered Chris's complaints that he was perfectly fine) they had finally arrived at a hospital.
They spent a good half-hour arguing about whether Martin should carry Chris in or not (Chris denied that he was hurt and refused to be treated so, and didn't "like the idea of being carried in like a girl. No offense, Aviva and Koki.") before they finally were able to agree that Chris could walk until he started to feel the sharp pain in his chest again. Still Martin stuck to his side like a loyal puppy, eyeing his brother every now and then as they walked in.
Chris wrinkled his nose as the unpleasant smells of the hospital hit his face the instant they walked in the door. The nurse directed them to a room, so that they could wait for Dr. Hal to finish with his lunch break or something. Outside of the room, there was a line of six chairs, all of which were full. A girl with loose shoulder length black hair and bright brown eyes, that seemed no older than 12 smiled as they walked by, waving a cast covered arm. The bros smiled back, noticing a Wild Kratts Kid with braided, shoulder length black hair and dark brown eyes sitting next to her.
If only they could remember the girl's name…Coral? Or was it Rennie? After settling into the room to wait, Aviva quickly corrected them.
"That's Reef."
A young woman, with a long brown braid that bounced with every step she made, was reading a small book while she paced in the hallway, extremely focused on her book, but somehow managed to swerve and avoid all the hospital staff that traveled down the hallway. She stopped in front of their door, jaw clenched.
"What?" she suddenly shouted, "Aw, come on, Brian! Seriously?"
The girl with the cast spoke up, "What this time?"
The pacer turned to the girl, snapping her book shut, "He threw the hatchet at a porcupine that was on his leg!"
"Did he cut himself?"
"No, he missed, but the porcupine left like eight quills on the poor boy's leg!"
Reef spoke up, "Ouch! How did he miss?"
"It was midnight."
"Oh?"
The pacer went back to her book…and her pacing.
Aviva sighed and checked the time. "That doctor's taking a long time."
Martin nodded, "Yeah, he is, isn't he?"
More hospital staff passed by, all were left unscathed by the pacer. Except one who happened to pass by as she cried out again.
"What? You're kidding, right?" she nearly crashed into a doctor.
He skidded to a stop, "Jeeze, Amy, keep your outbursts to yourself or I'll have to evict you for disturbing the peace!"
He yanked the book out of her hands, "And take care of your cousin instead of ignoring her for some book!"
The pacer - whom was apparently called Amy – scoffed indignantly and in one swift motion, pulled her shoe off and threw it at the doctor.
"Ow! Really, Amy?"
"Gimme my book back, Steve! I wasn't ignoring Mimi!" she whined as she rushed to grab her shoe and snatched her book back from Dr. Steve.
She stuck her tongue out at him, and childishly stomped off back to her "post" next to the girl with the cast.
"Grow up, Amy."
"I'll grow up as soon as men in white coats stop stealing my books and threatening to evict me from the area!"
"You're disturbing the peace!"
"You're disturbing my peace! And you could ask nicely! Oh, there's an idea!"
The doctor merely glared at her, before turning on his heel and walking away.
"Look who's finally acting mature!"
"Amy, you're 21. Grow up!"
"Give me a good reason!"
Reef buried her face in her hands, shaking her head bit, as 'Mimi' lectured 'Amy' about behaving like that in public.
The Wild Kratts crew, one and all, had gathered at the doorway of the room and were staring at the spectacle, some of them amused, others shocked. A doctor suddenly appeared at the door.
"It'll be a relief when either Dr. Strep goes for his lunch break or that Miss Irizarry leaves!"
'Amy' spoke up, "Let's hope it's the latter! I don't think I can stand Steve much longer."
'Mimi' sighed, rolling her eyes.
Dr. Hall merely shook his head before explaining to the crew, "Um, Miss Irizarry and her cousin, Mimi Olsen, come by here all the time. They're fine, unless Dr. Strep happens to cross paths with Miss Irizarry. Then it's chaos, as I'm sure you heard. Now! What seems to be the trouble here?"
"Chris fell out of a tree."
"We think he broke a rib, because when he tried to run, he got a sharp pain throughout his chest, and collapsed wheezing."
"I see. Well! Let's get him to the X-ray room!" the doctor put on a cheerful face and explained that if his ribs were broken, there wasn't much he could do for Chris other than give him pain-killers and keep him from being active.
Chris, of course, didn't like the prospect of not being able to use the Creature Power Suit (the suit, it seemed, actually changed the proportions of the areas where it was needed, so anything that changed the chest area at all was extremely dangerous) or the idea of not being able to help Martin or the animals.
"I can't believe you!" Zach paced back and forth, glaring at the people stumbling to keep their balance, unaccustomed to their legs.
"A-1, I never authorized this!"
The only one of the people who was keeping himself straight, a tall blonde man with dark brown eyes, stepped forward.
"We have also made the clones you asked for," he gestured to a group that was dressed and talking as though they had been living for as long as their original versions, instead of merely two hours.
Koki, Jimmy Z, Martin, Chris and Aviva…C-14, D-57, B-7, X-97, and H-8
Zach blinked, staring at the clones, all of which uncannily resembled their originals, scars and all.
"And the Wild Kratts crew is currently at a hospital."
Zach turned back to A-1, feeling a growing sense of unease about the whole situation. He glared at the robot-man, but nodded.
"You know what to do."
A couple hours later
"I told you so!" Chris smirked triumphantly, elbowing his brother as they left the hospital.
"But then why did you collapse like that?" Martin followed, just as happy as Chris, but a little confused.
Chris shrugged, "Who knows? Now let's get back to that hyena pack be-"
Martin raised an eyebrow, "Hyenas live in cackles, not packs!"
"Yeah, I know…why?"
"You said pack."
"No, I didn't."
"Yes you did."
"No, I didn't.
"Did too!"
"Did not!"
Aviva rolled her eyes, "Okay, okay! Let's get back to the hyenas!"
Zach stood over Chris, biting his lip. In one hand, he held a syringe filled with one milliliter of lethal poison.
Chris was currently in suspended animation – real suspended animation, unlike Donita Donata's pose beams and such which only held the victim in a state of paralysis, his suspended animation actually slowed down every process in the body, so if Zach pinched him today, Chris would start to feel it next week.
The Chris that was currently with Martin and the crew was actually X-97.
Zach sighed and placed the syringe down. Damn it if A-1 didn't control half of what he did sometimes…He couldn't kill Chris. It was just wrong, even for him. He didn't care if something failed and Chris got away. This just…wasn't important enough to do something like that.
Not important? It is important! The angrier part of him fought back.
No, he sighed, admitting it for once, although only to himself, it's not.
Angry-Zach glared at him.
He blinked. Maybe he did get too carried away with his imaginations…
Zach sighed and sat in his chair, grabbing the syringe and throwing it into a garbage can in the room.
He'd just keep his cousin in suspended animation until he was done with him.
Prin: Okay….
Iris: Not much on your mind?
Prin: Nope…AH! Right! Review, and you get one of these adorable Rhode Island Red chicks!^^ Although a few are a cross between RIR and Buff Orpingtons…
Amy: I was in this chapter! ^^
Mimi: I was too! Yay!
