Author's Note: Things begin to open up.

Disclaimer: Nope, I don't own him! And never will.


Chapter 9: Bullet and a Bible

"So where are we starting, Cinny?" Sarah asked me as her, Jak, and I were walking towards our houses. Libby and Sheen took a detour through the park.

"We'll start with the Lab, in anyplace I missed, and then we could go to Jimmy's room and see if we could find something interesting." I replied to the little girl. "We should find anything that would give us a clue to who killed him."

"Okay, sounds easy enough…" she said with a trace of thought behind her voice. "Jak, how are you getting home?"

"I live a few more houses down, dumbo." He replied laughing.

"Don't call me a dumbo, stupid, or I'll hit you." She retorted raising a hand, threateningly yet in a friendly way. I saw Jak flinch a little bit, but still had a smile on his face, but in his eyes something that looked like fear shown.

I ignored it, thinking it was just my imagination. "You two remind me of Jimmy and I." I said laughing.

"We're here…" Jak said.

"I'll see you later, okay?" Sarah asked, giving Jak a hug. "Thank you…" She whispered in his ear.

"No problem…" he whispered back. He waved goodbye to us and started down the street.

Sarah turned to me as she started walking up the walkway. "See you tomorrow Cinny!"

"I'll meetcha in the lab around eight-thirty or nine." I replied.

She nodded and said 'bye'.

"Goodnight." I said and headed towards my house. As I walked in I heard clanking of dishes. "Mom, I'm home." I yelled as I closed the door.

"Sasha's still at work, Cindy." Said a voice from the kitchen. "How was school?" the voice asked as it walked it out.

"Matt!" I said brightly, running up to him and giving him a hug. Matt was my step-dad. He had brown hair and grey eyes and dark tan skin and a great personality. My real father walked out on my mom and I when I was four. My mom and Matt got married when I was eleven. "I thought you were in New York?" I said letting him go.

"I took an early flight home," He answered. "And made dinner."

"Great, I'm starved." I said smiling.

Dinner was great, BBQ ribs with spaghetti, my favorite. The mean was quiet without my mom there, too quiet for my liking. So, as I started a conversation, Matt spoke first. "How's school?" He asked putting a forkful of noodles into his mouth. "So far, I mean."

"Pretty lame, as usual." I answered.

"And you grades?"

"I'm failing all my classes already." I joked, smiling. "Matt, it's been two days."

"Just cheak'n, how's that Neuron boy your always staring at?"

I dropped my fork in surprise of the question along with my cup of water. The fork made it onto the plate but the cup shattered as it hit the ground.

"Oh crap, Cindy!" He exclaimed rushing over to me. "Are you okay?"

I ignored his question and pushed away from the table. Then, I got up and slowly walked over into the living room, all the while thinking of how I was going to explain this situation. I sat on our olive green couch and slowly closed my eyes. My head was pounding over the stress of my problem. 'Think, think ,th-' "Ow…" I muttered as a sharp pain shot through my brain. I opened my eyes and Matt was sitting on the brown chair in front of me.

"You're thinking too hard." He simply said.

"How'd you know?" I asked, still thinking just not as hard.

"When you think hard, you tend to close your eyes." He answered smirking.

'Jimmy used to do that, so does Sarah…' I thought. I looked directly into his grey eyes and saw that he wanted to know what was wrong. Taking in a deep breath, I began to tell him what I had been up to for the past two days. "Jimmy Neutron is dead, Matt." I stated softly. "He died about two weeks ago."

His face instantly softened, and his eyes grew wide. "Oh, my god…" He gasped. "Oh Cindy…I'm, I'm so sorry." He said after a few seconds. "How's his family doing?"

"They're recovering…" I answered.

"How'd he die?"

"This will take a while." I simply replied, and told him whats been going on. Two hours later, I was finished with my story. I gave him a minute or two to let it sink in.

"Murdered…?" he asked. I nodded. "And your trying to find out who and why?"

"Yeah," I answered. "It's the only way to let him rest." 'Oh, he's gonna say no…' I fearfully thought.

"Unlike your mother," he said looking me in the eyes. "I like him, Just call me if you need help, Okay? And stay safe…"

"THANKYOUTHANKYOUTHANKYOUTHANKYOU!" I shouted giving him big hug.

"Okay, okay" he laughed. "When do you start?"

"…Tomorrow." I sternly replied.

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"This is getting us nowhere!" shouted a frustrated Sarah. "We've searched this whole lab and found nothing…it's hopeless." I looked over at the sad little girl and sighed.

"Sarah," I said, walking over to her. "We can't give up yet."

"But it's impossible…" She murmured looking up at me through tearful eyes.

"The best thing that I learned from Jimmy was that nothing is impossible," I replied. "So we've searched the lab, we've still got the house and his room"

"I guess…"

"We can't give up, Jimmy wouldn't for us."

There was a moment of silence, and then she looked up at me and smiled. "I know let's go!" As we were walking out of the lab, Goddard came bounding towards us.

Bark, Bark! (how's it coming?)

"Nothing in the lab, so after we eat something we'll check his room." I said confidently. "Oh, I got these for you." I added tossing him five sliver lug-nuts. He caught them in the air and ate them happily.

"Mom!" Sarah shouted as the three of us walked into the kitchen. "What's for lunch?"

"Sandwiches," Judy replied smiling. "Ham and cheese or tuna?"

"Ham and cheese, please."

"Could you mix mine together?" I asked.

"Sure thing, dear." She said walking towards the fridge.

"Ewe!" Sarah said with a discussed look.

"What! I've don't that since I was your age." I replied laughing.

"How's it coming, girls?" Hugh asked walking in.

"Nothing's in the lab so after lunch, we're checking Jimmy's room." I answered.

"Hi Daddy!" Sarah said giving him a big hug. "How was work?"

"Hard, sweet-cake…" He said returning the hug. "Now where's my sugarbooger?" He said walking over into the kitchen.

After lunch, Sarah and I went up the stairs to Jimmy's room. 'I've never really been in there…' I thought as I walked towards the door. 'But I guess I am now.'

The first think I noticed when I stepped into the room was the dark green carpet. It was the softest I ever felt. The room was bigger than I thought or remembered. The walls were a mix of dark blue and light blue. There was a map of the earth and a poster of Albert Einstein on the right wall, a dark brown desk with seven drawers on it. On top, there was a monthly planner and a laptop computer, and a closest near the window that took about three fourths of the wall facing the street and my house. The bed was on the right side of the door. The sheets were pretty basic, a plain orange with a black comforter with his famous symbol printed on top. Next to the bed was a blue bedside table with some pictures on top and two drawers on the front. In the first picture it was the six of us huddled together in front of the candy bar making funny faces, the next two were on of the family and of Sarah when she was born, in Jimmy's arms. The last one was a picture of me at the eighth grade dance. I cut my hair chin length that year and was wearing a dark green dress with rose red slippers.

After staring at the pictures for a bout five minutes, I turned to an annoyed Sarah.

"Sorry…" I said timidly. "I've never really been in his room before. Well, apart from the time when your brother and I switched minds."

"He told me about that," she giggled. "So where do we start commander?" She asked saluting me military style.

"Just look for anything out of the ordinary, soldier." I replied back. She nodded and immediately went to the desk.

I sat down on the bed watching the ambitious child. 'She has so much hope,' I thought. 'I wish I had that much...' I took a deep breath and turned to the table and started sifting through the first drawer. Plans, papers, pen and pencils filled to the top. As I dug deeper, I felt something like a book. When I pulled it out I looked at it carefully. 'A Bible?' I thought shocked. Jimmy never caught me as a religious person

I slid my hand over the surface and felt something that felt like a hole. When I opened the bible something cam out that I totally didn't expect; a bullet. "Holy shit…" I whispered. "That was a close one…or, a warning." I put both the bullet and the bible on the table and opened the second drawer. Inside was a book and a pencil. The book was black with nothing on the front apart from the speaker on the side of which it opened. 'Voice activated password?' I thought disappointed. 'I wont be able to copy his voice….'

"Oh, Hey Cinny," Sarah said walking towards me. "You need his password to open that."

"You don't need his voice?" I asked keeping my eyes on the book.

"Nuh-uh, I think it was something to do with his favorite ice cream."

"Okay, that's easy." I said confidently. "Rainbow Sherbet."

"Access denied." The speaker mused.

"Uh-oh that could be a problem…" Sarah said sitting down.

"Yeah, this'll take a while…"