Chapter Two:

A Lesson On Hostile Acupuncture

It was accustomed for him to be up late and because of it he was developing dark circles under his eyes.

He'd rented a shabby little room above a tattoo parlor, which was open at odd hours to accommodate the occasional walk in at 2am who'd been drinking heavily and was ready to make one more mistake before the evening was over. He could hear music coming from down below as well as unabashed laughter. Clearly it was a slow night and the employees were taking advantage of the time by having their own party, particularly unfortunate for anyone who might come in tonight.

He yawned and picked up one of the many scraps littering the table, an old radio, burned out and also slightly melted. He eyed it for a moment before removing a few wires from inside. Directly in front of him was an ugly mess of metal and wires inside a body of what could only be called patchwork, made up of various materials, which were mostly some type of metal. An onlooker would vaguely be able to make out the lettering of a license plate even. He joined the new wires with a few already protruding from the monstrosity and then grabbed a soldering iron from beside him to join a couple things together.

After this he pulled off the safety goggles he's been wearing and rubbed at his eyes. He pushed out from the table, pulling a chain attached to a hanging bulb as he went past and then sitting on the edge of something that was almost a cot. He kicked his shoes off and laid on his back, his eyes gravitating towards the window.

His view consisted mainly of a billboard advertising some sort of cream for warts, but there was also a sliver of the night sky and the moon, tonight, or this morning, as it were, a crescent.

His weary expression turned into a scowl. They'd turned up the music; It was now loud enough so that neighboring apartment buildings could probably hear it as well. There was a crashing noise, followed by laughter. After a few minutes he sat up and crossed back over to the table. He picked up a screwdriver and eyed its head briefly before picking up some metalworking sheers as well and heading towards the door.

There was a narrow staircase that lead down to the front door and the door into the tattoo parlor. The door was open now. He avoided it and instead opened up a door that lead into a storage room. There was a large circuit breaker on one wall. The young man began to unscrew the large bolts on the cover of the circuit breaker, blowing, with some irritation, the hair out of his eyes. Then after he'd removed the cover he placed the screwdriver in his mouth and raised the shears, eyeing the breakers contents briefly before picking out a wire and cutting it. Nearby the music stopped abruptly and the lights in the tattoo parlor went out.

He spat the screwdriver out in his hand and replaced the cover.

They'd have to call the electrician tomorrow…again.

XXX

"Ady," Ady was shaken awake. She mumbled something nonsensical and then blinked. Vanessa was standing by her bed looking alarmed.

"What, what is it?" Ady said while rubbing at her eyes.

"Your shoes are on fire." There was a pause while Ady decided whether or not she could have heard this correctly.

"What?" She said, now completely awake.

"Your shoes…are on fire."

A moment later they were both in the living room staring at the aforementioned shoes. Ady opened her mouth to say something before closing it again, at a loss.

"I just…got up to make some coffee and saw all of the smoke…I thought we left something in the kitchen on."

"Well there aren't really flames…" Ady said after a moment before she risked prodding one of the shoes. "They aren't hot."

"What are they doing?"

"I don't know." Ady said wearily.

"Should we throw water on them?" Ady shrugged. Vanessa went to the kitchen and filled a cup up with water. After a moment of hesitation she threw the water on the shoes. It made a fizzing noise and the smoke started to die down.

"Well, it looks like…" Vanessa started. She was interrupted when the shoe started shooting sparks.

XXX

Gru grabbed a bag of coffee from one of his cabinets and eyed it before his eyes moved treacherously to the box of instant coffee sitting next to his coffee maker. He frowned a little. In the last week or so he'd been trading out coffee that was actually…well coffee for the sad little tea bags. He wondered vaguely if he should be concerned about craving something that made gas station coffee look like gourmet brew. He placed the bag back up in the cabinet and opened the box of instant coffee with a sigh. There was probably something wrong with him.

After he'd steeped it in one of his mugs he moved to the living room. Kyle was lying on the couch. Gru stared at him for a moment. The creature was sprawled out in the center. While he eyed him, Kyle opened one eye and it rolled slowly towards Gru. Gru frowned and moved back into the hall and towards the stairs to see what the girls were doing. He hadn't seen them for an hour or so and when it came to Edith especially, he made sure to try to keep tabs on her in case she was playing with something that could hurt her or her sisters or his house.

He found them in the hall by their room coloring on the walls. He was aware that a parent was supposed to discourage this sort of behavior, but in an odd way he kind of enjoyed it and instead just limited them to coloring this wall…especially after that incident when they'd painted the house pink…

"Hey dad." Margo said brightly, pausing in the act of drawing a green butterfly. "Want to color with us?" She added as she raised a crayon.

"I will pass for de time being." Gru responded with a smile.

"Look, dad. I'm drawing one of Agnes' unicorns on fire!" Edith said. Beside her Agnes looked up from what she was doing.

"Aw," Edith had also drawn fire on one of Margo's flowers and Agnes' squiggles.

"Stop making your seestors drawings on fire Edith." Gru said as he took a drink from his mug. Agnes tugged on his leg.

"Wanna see what I'm drawing Daddy?" She said as she pulled on his hand. "Look, I drew Ady on the family tree." She said happily. Gru choked on his coffee.

XXX

A few minutes later he had returned with a bucket of soapy water and a sponge. He set down the bucket.

"What's wrong with my drawing?" Agnes asked morosely.

"Notheeng ees wrong. Eet ees very nice Agnes, you can draw hor somewhere else on de wall," he said. In truth the drawing was hardly recognizable and was mostly blue but Agnes had written ADDY underneath in her slightly wobbly scroll and, because that hadn't been enough, had drawn a line from Gru to her and a heart around her.

"Why can't she stay there?"

"Because dis ees a family tree and she ees not a part of de family, Agnes," he said as he rolled up his sleeves and dipped the sponge in the bucket. Edith was sitting on the floor watching with one eye covered by her hat. She exchanged a look with Margo, who was standing by Agnes.

"But I thought you liked her." Agnes said.

"I do like hor, but I would prefer…why ees dees not coming off!"

"I drew it in permanent marker." Agnes said. Gru's shoulders slumped and he rubbed at his forehead with the back of his hand.

"Why…would you draw dis een permanent marker?"

"We did all of the drawings on the family tree in permanent marker so they wouldn't get scrubbed off again." Margo said behind him. He looked at her and sighed.

"All right, I will feegure sometheeng out," he said while eyeing the drawing. "Go geet dressed and I will make lunch," he added.

XXX

While the girls were getting ready for lunch Gru headed outside to get the mail, ignoring Fred as he waved to him. He collected everything from the mailbox including a black envelope with a red wax seal on it. He turned this over in his hand. Up in the corner where the return address was supposed to go was just A.C.E in red lettering.

His attention was diverted when a cab pulled up at the curb and he straightened with some bewilderment when Ady got out, slamming the door behind her.

"Ady," he said with a hint of nervousness as she approached him. "What are you doeeng here?" She was holding a bag at her side, which she brought up and opened. Gru leaned back a little as a pillar of smoke rose from the bag.

"I don't know what it is you look for in shoes but I like mine to not be on fire," he tucked his mail into his coat and leaned in again and, eyeing the bag before carefully removing the shoes with his eyebrow raised.

"Eet looks like saltpeter."

"Great, why is it coming out of my shoes, Gru?"

"Dat…I do not know," he said before motioning for her to follow him back to the house.

"Uh hey Gru, hold on a sec." Fred said as he put down his watering can, while waving with his watering can."I didn't get the chance to talk to you yesterday." As he approached Gru's yard, Gru flipped the panel open by his door and without looking at his neighbor, turned on the electric fence. Ady watched Fred wearily as he jumped back when a burst of electricity zapped the watering can out of his hands. Gru shut the door behind them.

"Nice Gru."

"What?"

"Nothing, forget it. Saltpeter, that's like…the stuff you mix with sugar to make smoke bombs right?

"Yes…" Gru said carefully while raising his eyebrow at her.

"I used to make them and throw them in the hood of our car. It made it look like there was something wrong with it," she said with a shrug.

"You threw sometheeng flammable een de hood ove your car?"

"Says the man who nearly electrocute his neighbor. No one was ever in the car. It kept my mom from leaving the house sometimes. Can we get back to the shoes? They've been doing this since this morning. My roommate threw water on them and they started shooting sparks and making a loud beeping noise. I thought they were going to blow up or something so I put them outside."

Gru turned around at the sound of his daughters coming down the stairs.

"Hey Ady, what are you doing here?" Margo asked. She was holding Agnes hand.

"Oh, hey Margo, my shoes are on fire…"

"Dey are not on fire, dey are just smoking."

"Fine, my shoes are smoking and I came here because when something goes horribly wrong lately, it's your dads fault."

"I told you, I do not know why dey are doeeng dis." Gru said with some irritation as he headed over to the Rhino chair and pressed the button to activate the lift.

"I drew a bunch of stuff on fire, wanna see?" Edith said.

"No," Gru said quickly before Ady could respond. "Come on," he added while taking her by the hand and pulling her towards the lift.

"Hey wait, I don't want to…"

"Dis will not take long gurls," he said.

XXX

"Stay close to me and do not touch anytheeng," Gru said when the lift stopped. Ady crossed her arms and followed him, looking around uneasily at the thousands of little yellow bean men running around.

"So do you like grow these in a kit or something?"

"No. They were genetically engineered."

"From what?" Ady said while eyeing a couple of the minions wearily. There were two sitting on top of a beam apparently working on hammering a nail, although it appeared that while one was holding the nail the other was just repeatedly hitting him on the head with the hammer.

Dey were made from mutated dna, fatty acids and bananas."

"Bananas…"

"Eet ees Dr. Nefario's formula." Ady caught a couple of them watching her and Gru walk across the room.

"Qui wa sonoda?" One asked while turning to the other.

"Garufurendo, big boss," he said before making kissing noises. Ady raised her eyebrow. Gru eyed them uneasily before taking Ady by the arm and hurrying her along through a door that lead to an area with a small raised platform and a counter packed with beakers filled with liquids of a worrying. One minion was sitting at a stool at the counter playing with a gun suspended by the ceiling, which he was aiming at another minion with an apple on his head.

"Hey! Leave dat theeng alone," Gru said before grabbing the gun from Dave. The minion with the apple on his head sighed with relief. He was approached by another minion who plucked the apple from his head and took a bite.

"'Ave you seen Dr. Nefario?" Gru asked Dave while Ady watched the other two minions slap fight over the apple. He shrugged.

Gru sighed and turned, he nearly ran into Doug, causing him to shout. The large man smiled. Ady looked sideways at Gru who had practically crawled on top of the stool, causing the gun to go off, and disintegrating the apple in one of the minions hands. He gave Ady a somewhat embarrassed look and then scowled.

"I told you not to sneak up on me!" He said. Doug pointed towards a doorway on one side of the room before making a few other charades motions and then giving up when Gru just glared at him and instead motioned for them to follow. "Dat guy freaks me out," Gru said below his breath.

"Yeah, I know the feeling," Ady said while crossing her arms and eyeing a rack of guns of to their right.

The large man led them to a room with shelves of broken weapons. As soon as they entered a dart embedded itself in the wall a half a foot away from Gru, causing him to freeze. There was a low beeping sound. Gru cursed and tackled Ady before the dart exploded.

After her ears stopped buzzing and she got over the initial confusing of suddenly having Gru on top of her Ady blew a little of her hair out of her eyes.

"This happens way more often then it probably should," she said after a moment.

"Dr. Nefario…must be testeeng sometheeng." Gru said, slightly out of breath. He met Ady's gaze and colored slightly.

"Sorry," he said as he stood and helped her up. After a moment of hesitation while he tried to peer around the door to see if another dart was going to come their way he headed in.

"Oh, Gru, I was just testing the dart gun. It seems to be working remarkably well."

"Yes, I noteeced," Gru said while straightening his scarf.

"I don't know why I didn't think of something like this before…oh what is she doing here?" Dr. Nefario finished with irritation after he saw Ady, who was brushing herself off.

Gru took the shoes from her and held them out.

"For what purpose ees dis happening?" Dr. Nefario moved around the counter and adjusted his goggles slightly.

"The smoke emitter must be malfunctioning." Gru looked sideways at Ady, who was looking both irate and slightly depressed again.

"I asked you to feex de shoes, not add to dem." Gru said with a sigh.

"It was only a few minor experiments. I didn't think she'd stumble on them to be honest."

"They started shooting sparks when we threw water on them, how can you miss that?"

"Well you aren't supposed to throw water on machinery generally."

"They're shoes!" Ady said with a growl.

"Yes well, I don't make shoes. I make weapons. As long as I have to repair a set of grubby sneakers for some…" he caught Gru's expression of warning in time to redirect his sentence slightly, "…young woman I might as well get something out of it. Provided you stay away from water and open flames and high altitudes they should be perfectly safe," he said as he began to search through a set of drawers. Ady was glaring at him. She exchanged a look with Gru who was messaging the bridge of his nose.

"Why would anyone…want dere shoes to be smokeeng, Dr. Nefario?"

"Well I thought it might be handy for escape. You know, in place of a smoke bomb, just a random series of pressure points and it'll come from your shoes."

"Isn't de point of a smoke bomb to sort of drop eet and run?" Gru said.

"Well sometimes carrying a pocket of smoke bombs is not an ideal method of escape." Dr. Nefario said.

"And leaving a trail of smoke is better…" Ady said from beside Gru. Nefario glared at her.

"It is purely experimental. There are other things I was testing as well, that are perhaps more successful," he said as he began digging through his coat pocket before coming up with a sheet of paper which he handed to Gru.

"A bug sweeper, a small grappler using tensile wire and a miniature rocket launcher." Ady gave Gru a dark look. He cleared his throat and set the shoes down on the counter before Nefario could say anything else.

"Please, just feex dem," he said wearily as he handed the sheet back over to Nefario.

"All right, all right, fine. I'll take it out. Waste of perfectly good technology," he grumbled as he set the page aside.

"Guess I should just be glad it wasn't the rocket launcher that went off in my apartment instead." Ady mumbled vaguely.

"Incidentally, you didn't happen to get that invitation yet did you?" Nefario asked. Gru raised his eyebrow and unzipped his coat to get at that mail he'd tucked away. He went through it briefly until he came to the sleek black envelope. He handed it to Nefario.

"Oh good." Nefario said as he undid the seal.

"Well, as fun as this is…I think I've had my fill of the explosions and yellow bean men, can we go back up now?" Ady said while eyeing some minions on platform above with what looked like a huge bomb.

"Hold on, if we are going to this, you're probably going to want to get her to babysit. I don't advise taking your daughters and we're going to be gone for most of the night." Nefario said, while nodding at Ady.

Ady blinked and looked around at Gru and Nefario.

"Okay, wait, what?" She frowned. A look of suspicion crossed her face. "You're not going to try to take over the world again are you?"

"I told you dat was not a habeet! Eet ees just a…geet together…for villains."

"What…like the Legion of Doom? Do you sit around coming up with ways on how to destroy superman?"

"It may please you to make jokes but the Annual Commemoration of Evil is a highly prestigious event."

"Uh huh," Ady said cynically while eyeing the envelope. "And when would you be getting back from this 'highly prestigious event.'" She asked Gru, who was looking somewhat embarrassed again.

"Eet ees held at night…probably not until three or four o' clock een de morning."

"Four o' clock? Can he even stay awake for that long?" She asked while motioning to Nefario, who scowled.

"All right, you know what…" Nefario started. Gru waved him off and took Ady by the arm.

"We weel deescuss eet lator," he said. "Come on," he added to Ady before motioning towards the door.

"Blasted woman…make her shoes explode next time, see how she likes that," Nefario mumbled as they left.

"So what do you do at a villain get together anyways," Ady said as they walked back to the lift. "Drown puppies, undermine charity, knock over mailboxes?"

"No." Gru said with some annoyance. "Eet ees more like…a deener, or banquet."

"So someone brings potato salad and you talk about who's got the biggest doomsday device?" Gru sighed heavily. He couldn't help but be reminded of how his mother made him feel in similar circumstances. What made it worse was that; minus the potato salad that really was, more or less, what generally happened at the A.C.E. Villains trying to outdo one another.

"Are you capable of goeeng more den five meenuts weethout being sarcastic?" Ady shrugged. "Would you like to stay for lunch?" he added as they stepped onto the lift.

"I need to get to work. If I babysit for you, do you promise it won't end with my apartment being blown up or anything?"

"Eet ees just a deener…" he said while looking sideways at her. She gave him a pointed look. "All right, I promise."

"Okay," When they got up into the living room the girls met them in the hall.

"Hey daddy, we fixed the picture so Ady's not on the family tree anymore," Agnes said happily.

"What?" Ady said.

"Notheeng," Gru said nervously as put his hand on her back and ushered her out the door.

XXX

Hugo had never been to the Bank Of Evil before. He'd been given somewhat odd instructions on how to get in. The front was a regular bank, which today seemed to consist of a middle-aged man at a desk and a very old lady who was carefully filling out a form. There was also a security guard sitting at a chair in the corner. He was asleep.

Hugo, without lingering for long headed towards the men's restroom and approached one of the urinals. He raised his eyebrow and leaned over slightly as a portion opened and scanned his retina. How did pedestrians miss something like that?

The wall opened into an extensive hallway, which appeared to be under some construction. At the end was a very high desk.

"I have an appointment. Hugo." The young man said. He was carrying a heavy bundle under his arm. A woman with sharp features nodded him in.

"Welcome to the Bank of Evil, Mr. Hugo." Perkins said, sitting back in his leather upholstered chair with his fingers meeting at a steeple.

"It's just Hugo," Hugo responded.

Vector was sitting in a chair next to Perkins playing on a handheld game system. This gave him a very 'coming to work with daddy' look.

"Did you bring an example of you experiments with weaponry Mr. Hugo?" Perkins continued. The young man nodded and unraveled the bundle revealing a gun that looked as if it might be dangerous just to hold it. It looked like it was mostly scrap metal.

"The needle gun." Hugo said before raising it and handing it to Perkins who took it carefully and eyed it with skepticism.

"Does it just shoot needles?" Perkins asked.

"One or many."

"What's the use of shooting one needle? That doesn't sound very impressive." Vector said while looking up from his game. Hugo motioned for Perkins to hand it to him.

"What shall I test it on?" He asked while looking coldly at the younger man. Perkins stood from his desk and walked around it. He nodded at one of the men on a ladder working down in the lobby.

"He's been painting that spot for the last hour." He said while eyeing Hugo out of the corner of his eye. The young man hesitated for a moment before raising the weapon, making a few adjustments and aiming carefully. A moment later there was a very faint sound, almost like an arrow leaving a bow, a little twang. Perkins eyed the painter wearily.

"You missed."

"I didn't miss." Hugo said.

"Well if you didn't miss then…"

"Wait." Hugo interrupted. The gentleman below, who was probably middle aged and balding set his paintbrush aside and started down the ladder. Or he would have, his leg seemed to give out, resulting in a misstep and he fell the rest way. The ladder and paint came down after him. "I modified them so that they're very tiny and it's too fast and too small to notice."

"Interesting. Another non lethal weapon?"

"Potentially lethal. If I hit someone in the heart, for example it'll do enough damage to be fatal…and undetectable. It would look like a heart attack."

"Impressive." Perkins said, and it was clear by his expression that he was impressed. It was a nasty creation, the sort of thing that made people uncomfortable.

Vector, perhaps sensing that he should add something put his game aside and picked up something underneath his chair.

"That's nothing. My new weapon, the Jellyfish Ray, fires box jellyfish at 85 mph up to 300 feet."

"Why?" Hugo asked after a moment.

"Box jellyfish just happen to be the most poisonous type of jellyfish in the ocean. Contact with them can easily kill an adult. They kill more people then sharks every year."

"Yeah, in the ocean. In a gun a jellyfish is a stupid projectile." Hugo said. He'd absently tucked his hand in his coat again. Vector made a brief sound of indignation.

"Oh like anyone's ever heard of needle deaths. There is nothing wrong with my design."

"85 mph is about as fast as a major league baseball travels, which is hardly enough to kill someone as it is without the projectile being gelatinous and in order for the jellyfish to actually poison someone you'd have to ensure it lands on them tentacle first. Also, in the ocean people may not have much clothing on, but they will if you're shooting at them, so in order for your gun to be at all effective you have to make sure it hits someone where they're not clothed, tentacle first at 300 feet at a speed that many people can dodge anyways." He said before turning back towards Perkins, who was watching his son with the merest fraction of dissatisfaction.

"Although," Perkins said before Vector could respond, "one important thing about villainy is that a certain level of presence is required. No one gets praise if it appears that their enemies have just dropped dead of natural causes." He said before shooting his son a stern look, indicating him to sit back down.

"It was purely experimental." Hugo said as he carefully wrapped the weapon up again.

"Well either way, I am willing to give you a…shot Mr. Hugo. Have you ever heard of the A.C.E?" Hugo shrugged a little to show that he had not.

"The Annual Commemoration Of Evil. An event that belongs to the old days of thinking if ever there was one. Still, it might prove useful. I pulled some strings and made sure that Gru was invited this year. I'll see you get an invitation too."

"You…want me to do something to him there?" Hugo asked skeptically.

"No, in any case it isn't allowed. There are regulations, otherwise everyone there would be constantly on edge. Besides, this is not my plan. You're the one being tested here. You're to pull this off on your own. I am not involved…if you get my meaning." He looked behind him at his son, who had his tongue sticking out as he continued to play his game. "Victor!" Vector looked up from his game and then made a sound of frustration when he was killed on the screen.

"Since my son is a full fledged villain, he's in charge," he said. Vector looked at Hugo smugly, who scowled in return. "The A.C.E is a relic of the past in villainy, but it might be useful for information. After that I'm leaving Gru's fate in your hands. If you fail this task, mark my words, whatever plans in villainy you might have, fail with it."

XXX

To those of you without an account or the people I didn't get around to replying to last time.

Past-The-Point-Of-No-Return: Hehehe good to hear it. I'm glad Gru's accent is working out, took a while to get down some sort of consistency with it and I'm always pleased to hear when people like my OC. Thanks for the review :)

Liloapril: Yeahh, it's kind of been a mess. He's a horrible businessman so he basically didn't renew his lease and then tried to sell the store. Moron. He was going to move everything out without telling any of our customers, but luckily the landlord gave him an extra month.

Anyways, enough of that, thank you for the review ^^ Ady is definitely going to have a hard time adjusting to Gru's character. I am definitely going to be focused on that.

The Fabulous Person: Totally forgot to respond to this review in a private message. Thanks very much :) I'm pleased that you like the story and I'm flattered that you care enough to review. I've heard from a lot of people that Ady looks like a boy when I draw her, lol. I don't really try. I guess I finally got over my habit drawing female characters too pretty and now have to find a happy medium. Hehe, yeah Hugo's not Dillon…Dillon's probably not going to show up ever again but I'm guessing if he did he'd make a pretty lousy villain.

So, the chapters are staying fairly short for the time being, but they're going to get longer, probably starting with the next one.

Thanks for your reviews and to everyone who added the story to their watch lists or favorites ^^

EDIT: Ooh, almost forgot. Early on when I was still writing The Worst of You, one of the reviewers Cary Meiers suggested that I have Agnes draw Ady on the family tree. At the time I didn't because I couldn't find a place in the story to fit it in, even though it was a cute idea, but I filed it away anyways in case I found a place. So, that was her idea. Normally I do not take ideas because for the most part my stories are fairly planned out and in any case I am slightly uncomfortable with using other people ideas even if they are made with my story in mind, but I thought it was cute. :3