Meanwhile, Phineas, Ferb and friends are sitting in the backyard again. Isabella was feeling a little nervous, since later today, she and Phineas are finally going on a date… alone, hopefully.

Phineas, however, wasn't nervous at all, but he was also oblivious to the situation.

The gang then saw Chester and AJ enter the backyard.

"Hey, whassup", Chester asked.

"We're doing fine", Phineas replied. "Say, where's Timmy?"

"Oh, he said he will be preparing himself for a date in the afternoon", AJ responded.

"Is it not like, 8 in the morning", Baljeet asked.

"Well, he said it was a date with Trixie, believe it or not", Chester said. "Considering her status and stuff, Timmy wants to be on his absolute best, make as much of an impression as possible."

"Yeah, having Trixie as your date can be considered a bit of an only-once-in-your-lifetime moment", AJ added. "Since Timmy crushes hard on her, he absolutely doesn't want to screw up."

"Is that so", Phineas asked. "I should congratulate him when I see him, then."

"Good idea", AJ noted. "And what are you going to do today?"

"Isabella asked me to hang out alone with her later today, so we're not gonna do much", Phineas replied. "Mom and Dad said that the rest of us can hang out at the comic books museum to give Isabella and I some space. I don't really get that analogy, but I understand that a day without any activities can be rather boring, so I don't object to it."

AJ and Chester glanced at each other. "Umm, okay", they said. AJ added: "Excuse us for a moment", as the two walked away from Phineas.

"Dude, do you think Phin and Iz are gonna be on a date too", Chester asked quietly.

"The implications of those are incredibly high", AJ mused, "but I doubt Phineas realized it himself."

"Y'think we should tell him?" Chester queried.

AJ hesitated. "I'm... not sure", he truthfully replied. "It could also be regularly hanging out as friends. Though, if it is a date, I think Isabella should tell it herself."

"Wait, how are you sure she likes him like that?" Chester questioned.

"Come on, Chester, it's pretty obvious", AJ said. "I mean, she's got a Phineas-sense, for crying out loud."

"Alright, alright", Chester said. "So, I guess we're not gonna say anything about it."

"Precisely", AJ nodded. "Instead, I think it's a good idea to join the remaining crew to their trip to the comic books museum, what do you say?"

"Are you kidding? Of course we should do that!" Chester agreed.

The two boys returned to the other kids. "Say, your parents wouldn't mind if we joined your friends to that museum, would they", AJ asked.

"I'm pretty sure they wouldn't", Phineas replied. "Hold on, let me ask."

Phineas stood up as he and Ferb went inside the house.

At the same time, Buford's phone buzzed. He got a text from Chloe, saying: 'Urgent, come with Baljeet to the Cake N Bacon. -Chloe'

"Hey nerds, can ya tell Dinner Bell that 'Jeet and I are gonna be busy for a while?" Buford asked.

"Umm, what for?" Irving asked.

"Uhh, dunno really", Buford replied. "Not that it matters to ya, anyway."

He grabbed Baljeet by the collar, saying: "C'mon, nerd, let's go", and dragged him along.

As Buford and Baljeet left, Phineas returned. "Chester, AJ. Mom and Dad would love it if you joined along", he told the boys. He then noticed the lack of two other boys. "Hey, where are Buford and Baljeet?"

"Had something important to do", AJ responded. "Don't know what, exactly."

"Hey, maybe we have enough time to play some games as the arcade", Chester suggested.

"Sounds fun", Phineas said. "What do you guys think?"

Phineas's friends responded positively, although Isabella's response seemed a bit distant.

"Cool, let's go, then", Phineas exclaimed.


Buford and Baljeet had finally reached the café Chloe requested to meet her at.

"Oh hey, so there's Candace", Buford noted, noticing Candace and Veronica were with the pale blonde girl.

"Excuse us if we took so long", Baljeet apologized. "We are still kind of new in Dimmsdale, you know…"

"Yeah yeah, that's all good, but we got an emergency at hand", Chloe said with alarm.

"An emergency?" Baljeet asked. "What is it? You need to build a portal to Mars due to today?"

"Is a giant squid attacking the town?" Buford asked.

"Are you losing your mental edge and forget obvious facts?!" Baljeet spewed out.

"Is Li'l Suzy in town?!" Buford queried.

"Is a planet nearing our atmosphere and crashing onto ours, and therefor endangering all the life on both planets?!" Baljeet asked.

"BRIGITTE IS BACK AND GOING TO PUNISH ME WITH WHIPS AND TRUNCHEONS WHILE DRESSED IN A LEATHER OUTFIT?!" Buford panicked.

Baljeet eyed weirdly at Buford.

Buford looked back at Baljeet, and admitted: "Actually, I think that'd be kinda hot, to be honest."

Baljeet squinted while the girls winced.

"Three letters: TMI", Veronica uttered.

"Also, if Suzy was the problem, Jeremy would be in town too, and that's unfortunately not the case", Candace added. "Also, I would look scared, instead of… annoyed, I suppose."

Chloe sighed. "This is getting out of hand", she said. "Just so we're clear here, none of the things you mentioned are the problem."

"Then what is?" Buford and Baljeet asked in unison.

Chloe breathed in. "Okay, so we are planning two dates: one for Isabella and Phineas, and the other for Trixie and Timmy."

"Oh yeah, she's got a crush on him, right", Buford recalled.

"Both of them", Baljeet corrected.

"Right", Chloe continued, "so anyway, we had an encounter with another girl who has a crush on Timmy, her name's Tootie. She's very sensitive about her crush and hates Trixie, so in order to not upset her, I lied about it. Big time."

Buford and Baljeet stared at Chloe.

"…That's it?" Buford asked

"Yes, this sounds like something with a simple solution", Baljeet said. "Painful, perhaps, but simple."

"You don't know her at all, do you", Chloe asked. "When I say sensitive, I mean she'll throw a tantrum about this, since it's about the only thing she can hold onto. So, I need to prevent her from finding out the truth and hope it washes away the next day. I need you two to keep her busy for the remainder of the day."

"…and you did not come up with the simple but painful solution of, you know, telling her the truth?" Baljeet asked.

"If I would tell Tootie the truth now, she'd be crying even harder than if I told her the truth from the get-go", Chloe defended.

"But if she finds out the truth on her own, then I can bet you that she will be even more upset than if you told her", Baljeet argued. "This is honestly ridiculous. Why would anyone agree to this, right Buford?"

"I'm in", Buford decided.

"See, even Buford thinks it's rid- wait what?"

"Yeah, we could have some fun with this Tootie girl, maybe introduce her to some new stuff to distract her from Timmy", Buford explained. "And don't go all like 'ooh, lyin's bad' on me, nerd. You agreed to pretend to be Dinner Bell to trick Irving's bro when he and Ferb went to the movies."

"That is completely different", Baljeet argued. "Both of us played along Irving's plan so his brother would not doubt him anymore. This here is misleading Tootie because Chloe refuses to admit she lied to her! Irving asked us to substitute for Phineas and Ferb. She asks us to deceive a little girl!"

"Yeah, but then Irving went 180 and told his bro he tricked him anyway", Buford scoffed.

"Um, well, that is true", Baljeet stammered, "but that was not exactly part of the pla-"

"Good, you agree", Buford exclaimed. "Awrite Chloe, we're in!"

Baljeet sprang up with eyes wide open. "Wait, that is not what-"

"Okey dokey, you two are now officially part of the plan", Chloe said after jotting something down, interrupting Baljeet.

Baljeet slumped back in his seat, eyeing angrily at Buford.

"If I were about as strong as you are and a tad little braver, I would punch you so hard in the face", Baljeet grumbled.

"You're welcome", Buford grinned. "So, what do we do, exactly?"

"Glad you asked", Chloe said. She put her notepad on the table and unfolded it as if it were a map. "'Operation: Red Strings', as I call it, consists of two groups. Group A, that's me, Candace and Veronica, will think up of a few locations where to hold our double dates. Step 1 is the brainstorming part, that should last until 1 PM. That gives us two hours of time for Step 2, which is accessing any possible reservations. Step 3 is when I meet the pairs of lovebirds at the park, Step 4 is when we go observe the pairs. I already got some people, which we will dub Vulture and Buzzard, to occasionally peek at them in the theater, which gives the rest of us a bit more time if we failed to get any further reservations during Step 2. Step 5 is, hopefully, when we have succeeded and we got two happy couples. Oh by the way, we also have secret names: I'm Condor, Candace is Crane and Veronica is Starling. Naturally, the lovebirds are, well, Lovebirds."

"Cool, so what do we do?" Buford asked.

"You two, Group B, have to take care of Tootie, and make sure she enjoys her time without ever coming into contact with Timmy", Chloe instructed. "This can last for the whole day, until she needs to go home, of course. Suppose 7 to 8-ish PM."

"Whuh, no steps", Buford questioned.

"Nope", Chloe replied. "Your task doesn't require a lot of steps, it just lasts a bit longer."

"Do we also get bird names", Baljeet wondered.

"Yep, Sparrow for Buford and Titmouse for Baljeet", Chloe said.

"You know, I think you are running out of names", Baljeet replied.

"Who cares", Buford spoke. "I'm raring to go! Where does that Tootie girl live?"

"Right here", Chloe said, showing a map of Dimmsdale, encircling a street and writing down Tootie's address on a photo of her. "And here's her photo and address."

"Hopefully you can get past Vicky without torn clothes", Candace added nonchalantly.

Buford raised up. "Wait… what has Yuckster to do with this?"

"Oh um, yeah…" Chloe hesitated, scratching the back of her head. "We kinda forgot to mention she's Tootie's sister…"

Buford's eyes popped. He stared down to nothing particular, having awful flashbacks of yesterday. He was speechless, but he was screaming inside his mind.

"Oh, and we don't allow take-backsies", Chloe added quickly. "We couldn't trust anyone else with this task."

Buford's eyes shrunk. The stocky bully's mind was filled with even more panicky thoughts.

Baljeet noticed Buford's shock, and smugly replied: "Yes. That is what we call 'karma'. I bet that now you wished that you did not agree so qui-"

Buford interrupted Baljeet by punching him hard in the face.

"Betcha wish you were as strong as me and a tad little braver now, do ya nerd?" Buford grumbled.

"H-h-hey", Baljeet stammered, dazed, "w-where is Perry?"


While Phineas and the gang were on the way to the arcade, Perry got a mission call from his communicator watch, but it wasn't a regular call.

The text on the watch read: 'URGENT! Report to OWCA lair immediately!'

Perry was with Phineas when he received this message, and the closest location would be the Dimmsdale Park. Luckily, Perry knew there was an OWCA lair entrance there.

Perry really, dearly hoped that this one wasn't denoted with a sticky note like all the other lair entrances, especially since this one had been very clearly explained by the note he got from Carl. It was under a commemorative statue of Chompy the goat, the town mascot, which was standing proudly in that same park.

As he went to the park, many thoughts raised in his mind. Perry rarely had mission calls with any note of urgency, so his awareness had increased. If it was this urgent, then the mission today must be really important, and the threat really dangerous. But what could it be?

First of all, it had to be noticed less than a minute prior, since Perry recalled that he had received an urgent call at midnight due to the escape of the Regurgitator. It could be him, but who else?

2nd Dimension Doofenshmirtz? Honestly, that seemed a bit out there. All Otherdimensioninators in his dimension were destroyed, 2D-Doof needed Phineas or the other Heinz to recreate it, and above all, last time he recalled, he reformed (though anything could've changed over time).

Dennis the Rogue Rabbit? No, he only could've escaped with Heinz's help, who told him yesterday he was taking a break. Besides, the OWCA made sure that his cell had been secured ten times more than last time.

Liam McCracken? Honestly, he doubted a hunter as him would be considered an important threat, as he didn't desire control over the world, or didn't know anything regarding the OWCA.

Really, he could think of only one person, but he was locked up safely after he nearly caused a new ice ag-

FWOOP!

Suddenly, Perry has been tied into a lasso made out of what resembled a seatbelt. He then felt himself getting swooped away to a familiar white and purple van, in which he got trapped by a few more seatbelts. Perry knew immediately who was responsible, even before an evil jingle could spell it out.

"Doofenshmirtz driving his van again!"

It was indeed his rival Dr Heinz Doofenshmirtz, who was joined by his daughter Vanessa and his robot lackey Norm.

"Have a seat, Perry the Platypus", Heinz said, "and please don't rebelt against me!"

Perry chattered and growled at Doof.

"Eh, you're right, that was a horrible pun", Doofenshmirtz admitted. "Alright, I bet you're wondering why you're finding yourself in a seatbelt trap right now, when I specifically said to you yesterday, that I'm taking a week off here. Well, the truth is, something urgent just came up, and I need your help."

"AND YOU WOULD'VE NEVER FOUND OUT WITHOUT ME", Norm stated cheerfully.

"Yeah, only because you forgot to turn your live feed off", Doof chided, "but thanks anyway."

"Okay, so we got Perry", Vanessa said, "so we can tell him what's up, right?"

"Actually, since we need all the help we can get, we probably need one more", Heinz replied. "Again, thanks to Norm, there's someone else who knows me and Perry the Platypus we can get help from."

Perry raised an eyebrow. Who else in Dimmsdale could Doof possibly have in mind?

"Dad, I think Perry has no idea what you're talking about", Vanessa noted.

"Well, he should, really", Heinz grunted. "I mean, unless he somehow forgot about that blonde kid in white…"

Perry widened his eyes. Her?!

"Oh, I guess he knows now", Doof said. "Oh well, better late than never, I guess."