It has been roughly five months since Penfold left London to find Danger Mouse.
Professor Squawkencluck is having a bit of a hard time concentrating on her work. It's not that she's having any difficulties creating a new invention or that she's not as smart as she thinks she is. It's just that for the longest time, she had wanted Danger Mouse to stop messing with her gadgets and let her work in peace.
Let her intelligent brain do the work without any mindless interruptions.
But now, seeing that the mouse isn't here to mess things up or barge into the lab with a broken invention (that he caused unintentionally) like usual, everything was quiet.
Too quiet.
And it's scaring her.
It's like the time Penfold had to return to America, and being forced to marry a rich woman his snobby aunt Doreen had picked out for him in order to expand the wealthy family name, only the wedding was called off after the truth was discovered and Penfold came home, happily unmarried and continuing to be the lovable sidekick.
But it's not like that.
This was different.
She thought Danger Mouse was killed when he shield Penfold from the oncoming missiles during that terrible tragedy.
She thought he was gone for good, never to come back.
It was like the Louvre Museum incident all over again, except it was much worse.
And yet, thanks to Danger Mouse's badge and iPatch being left in the wreckage (before one of the Danger agents brought it back to the lab for safekeeping), Penfold had figured out that Danger Mouse was indeed alive. And it was all thanks to her teleportation device that she had carefully hidden when Crumhorn captured her, Colonel K, and the other Danger agents on the day of the tragedy.
She hasn't told Penfold about it yet.
Call it fate, or pure instinct, but she had a reason to do what she needed to do on the day of the tragedy.
She did it to save Danger Mouse's life at the last second, and to make sure that Penfold doesn't become an emotional trainwreck if Danger Mouse really does die from the blast.
But no one knows where he is. He's all alone in the world without any clothes nor memories.
It would've been embarrassing, but now's not the time to joke around.
As much as her intellect pride hated to admit, she misses Danger Mouse badly.
She missed him barging into her lab without permission.
She missed him not listening to her instructions on how to use her inventions correctly.
She missed his witty comebacks and bad jokes.
She missed him messing with her gadgets to such ridiculous levels that she had to make future inventions Danger Mouse-proof.
She even missed his occasional bragging about how awesome he is.
Looking back, she even regrets getting mad at him for all the inventions he broke, and all the times he pushed her buttons. Sure, she can get annoyed by him, but she knows he meant well and doesn't mean to upset her. She loved him and Penfold as if they were her brothers.
But neither Danger Mouse nor Penfold were here at the flat.
It was an empty tomb of silence.
And it's not just the flat that was empty and silent.
In the past five months since Danger Mouse's disappearance, everything has been quiet. There aren't any villains committing any crime or taking over the world despite the fact that Danger Mouse isn't here to stop them.
Not even Baron Greenback is attempting to take over the world unless the people give him all the money in the world. As much as he wanted to, now that Danger Mouse is gone, he just couldn't find the motivation to do it anymore.
Heck, she heard nothing about Crumhorn yet.
She knew that Crumhorn is planning something big and nasty, now that he believes that Danger Mouse is dead, but she had a suspicious feeling that Crumhorn is doing it in the dark, unnoticed by nosy civilians, employees, and secret agents.
And she had an unsettling feeling that even with or without Danger Mouse at their side, the British Secret Services are not ready for what Crumhorn had in store for them.
()()()()()
Back in the jungle, Penfold was on the other side of the tree, with his back leaned back against the trunk of the tree due to a narrow ledge.
It's no doubt that his little adventure with the feral mouse and the leopardess had scared him.
Throughout the experience, his clothes were a bit torn, and he lost one of his shoes.
"Okay." Penfold cried, still scared from the experience. "I'm in a tree with a wild mouse that looked eerily like DM, but without the eyepatch."
He notices a tree branch not far from him. He placed one foot onto the tree branch, and another soon after.
"This is good." Penfold said.
He tried to reach the branch with one of his hands, but they weren't long enough to reach it, and he slowly slipping.
He had to force both his hands to be pressed against the trunk of the tree he wanted to get off on.
"Oh crikey." He cried.
He tried pushing himself backwards so that he could be on the other branch, but he lost his balance and went back to square one.
"It can't get any worse, can it?" Penfold asked himself.
Immediately after he said that, he heard the sound of thunder as rain began to pour down the jungle.
Penfold frowned at this. "Obviously, it can."
So he's stuck in a forced position in the jungle during a thunderstorm. He lowers his head in defeat when he saw the feral mouse looking up to him with both eyes. His good right eye, and his left eye with a nasty-looking scar that looked like the injury was caused by a knife.
Just the mouse's presence alone is enough for Penfold to scream.
He immediately pushed himself backwards in order to get away from the feral mouse, but he was losing his balance again. The feral mouse had to climb up the tree Penfold wanted to get off of to push Penfold backwards a little more so that he could at the other branch safely.
Penfold landed on the other side with a THUD, and backs up till his back is touching the trunk with the feral mouse attempting to come closer to Penfold.
"Stay back!" Penfold cried as the feral mouse comes closer to him. "Don't come any closer."
The feral mouse didn't listen as Penfold had to use his foot to keep the feral mouse away from him. The feral mouse began to observe Penfold's bare foot, and starts playing with his toes.
"W-what are you doing?" Penfold asked in confusion.
And then, Penfold began to laugh uncontrollably in which the feral mouse raised an eyebrow for only a second. And then he looks at two of Penfold's toes that he was currently holding. He plays around with the toes again and Penfold continues to laugh uncontrollably.
This looks like fun.
That is until he lets go of Penfold's toes and makes an attempt to look inside one of Penfold's trousers.
This earns him a kick in the face by an angry Penfold.
"It serves you right." Penfold lectured the feral mouse who makes an attempt to get closer to Penfold yet again. "Stay away from me."
The feral mouse didn't listen to him.
"Stay."
No respond.
"I'm warning you." Penfold warned the feral mouse. "I've got a green belt in martial arts, and I'm not afraid to use it."
The feral mouse still didn't listen to Penfold when it seems that he had gotten too close to Penfold.
Penfold had enough of this.
Coward or not, Penfold made the decision to slap the feral mouse in the face, hoping to get him away from him.
But right before his right hand could make impact on the feral mouse's face, the feral mouse, without taking both his eye off of Penfold's, grabs Penfold's right hand with his right hand.
With Penfold's hand still in his grasp, the feral mouse decided to take the time to examine it, much to Penfold's confusion.
Fascinating.
Penfold has four fingers on his hand, just like his own hands.
Penfold could only watch as the feral mouse presses his left hand against Penfold's right hand.
The feral mouse's touch is warm.
Just like Danger Mouse's.
Then it hits him.
"Danger Mouse?" Penfold cried, looking at the feral mouse whom he thought was his best friend back from the dead. He even pictured the feral mouse in Danger Mouse's usual outfit, complete with an iPatch over the left eye.
The feral mouse has to be Danger Mouse.
"Danger Mouse!" Penfold cried happily.
The feral mouse looked confused. "And a… Danger Mouse to you too, stranger."
Penfold was surprised to hear the feral mouse speak. "You do speak. And all this time, I thought you were just a wild, quiet, silent person who looks a lot like my best friend."
The feral mouse raised an eyebrow as Penfold continues. "Don't worry about your memories, Chief. I know everything about you."
"Are you a stalker?" the feral mouse asked suspiciously.
Penfold shook his head. "No, I'm your best friend, Penfold."
The feral mouse tries to think. Nothing popped up in his mind. "I don't think I have a best friend named Penfold. Have we met?"
Before Penfold could answer that question, both he and the feral mouse heard gunshot coming from a distance as soon as the rain stopped.
"Crumhorn!" Penfold cried.
The feral mouse grabbed onto a vine and looks at the direction where the gunshot was heard. He heard it again, this time with construction noises.
"Crumhorn!" The feral mouse cried again.
Penfold took notice of this. At least he's remembering who Crumhorn is.
The feral mouse grabs Penfold and swings towards the source of the gunshot.