Disclaimer: I don't own Codename: Kids Next Door!
Title: An Earful of Nothing
Summary: The teenagers, fearful of breaking the fragile peace between themselves in the KND by admitting their own lack of numbers, are desperately searching for new members. Numbuh 313, a twelve year old girl who is in danger of being decommissioned early due to an injury that's led to a slight disadvantage on the battlefield, fits the bill.
...
ShugoYuuki123- Dukes seems to think so!
Flowerchild23- Let's hope!
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"Fourteen years old." Harley's mother sighed, jerked the steering wheel a bit too hard as though jerking the car out of her nostalgia. She grabbed onto the passenger door for dear life, struggling to read her face while she was at it. "Your first day of high school, and on your birthday. That must be stressful."
A ball of anxiety had taken up residence in her gut, but it certainly wasn't from making it to freshman year. "I'm fine, mom. Promise."
"Scared?"
She thought of how awful middle school had been compared to now, going to the very place she'd been sworn into, where Rosie and Jess and Curls (someday) hung out, and felt like she was on much safer ground.
"Excited." She reassured her. "But not scared."
Harley stepped inside the familiar long hallways, feeling her confidence dampen at how crowded they were compared to the stillness of after hours. She could only imagine how loud it was. The image of so many lockers slamming shut and teenager's talking with the world on mute had an almost surreal quality to it. Glancing down the room number's printed in dull black ink, she made an oath to come up with a system later, to avoid getting swept up into anything problematic.
A brown arm wrapped itself around Harley's shoulders. She jumped, then realized it was Rosie and relaxed.
"Hey, girl." She said. "You need help finding first block?"
Rosie prattled on about maybe sharing lunches and what stairwell led where, but Harley wasn't focused on that. She stared at the girl's fluttering hands, reading the signs she made. They'd been busy, this summer.
"Wanna skip?" They said.
"First day?" Her fingers were much more clumsy than Rosie's, taking their time to spell out the words. The older woman had been practicing extra hard, just for her. It warmed her.
Harley caught her grinning out of the corner of her eye. "Successful first day skippers are some of the best recruits you can find. It takes some serious guts: not to mention skills."
"Not that you would know."
"Of course not."
Rosie had her trek up a flight of stairs and march to the very back halls, empty and dusty from lack of use, to duck into a secluded restroom.
"Dukes wants to talk." She said, bringing up Facetime on her phone. Harley's model was too old to be of any use, barring the odd text message.
"Is it time already?" She'd been under the assumption they had months yet before the battle came.
"No." Rosie said. "But it might as well be."
Harley raised a skeptical eyebrow.
"You aren't gonna like what she has to say." With that, Rosie grimly handed the phone over and went to guard the door from diligent hall monitors.
She sucked in a deep breath and toggled through her contacts. She set the phone to speaker and turned on the subtitles- she preferred reading over puzzling out digital lips. The jarring sound of a rather bland ringtone echoing around the tile walls went unheard.
"Yup." Dukes greeted. Harley could clearly see her draped over strategy books and maps, busy and irritable. Her room was dark, and she was seated at a mangled old school desk, an office chair in place of the typical metal seat.
She brought the bottom end of Rosie's cell close to her mouth to be heard better. "You've got bad news for me, I've been told?"
There was a pause. Judging by the lack of a loading circle in the corner, signaling a frozen screen, it wasn't from a lack of translation.
"Oh. Hey." Appears eventually. She's not quite turned to the phone, which seems to be placed on the very edge of the table. "Was wondering if you'd show up. I'm lucky to be homeschooled- I can get my work done quicker and then focus on my own pastimes."
Harley didn't know whether to take her blathering as a sign of lack of sleep or as nervous energy, although she preferred the former to the latter. The thought of somehow scaring her own leader put a strange weight in her chest.
"So," She prompted, "the bad news."
Dukes took in a deep breath, though Harley could only barely see it. "It's not bad news: it's just gonna make you wanna punch me in the face."
She almost laughed. "Do I have permission?"
"To punch me in the face? If we were in a different situation, I'd say yes- but not right now. I've got to keep my strength up. Doesn't help morale to have the leader be hurting in times like these, you know?"
"Dukes, you're stalling."
"That I am. Listen, Harley. All this war talk- it's scaring people. You know I wouldn't force anybody to fight, right?"
Harley nodded even though Dukes wasn't looking. She wondered if the woman was getting a vague idea of how she felt; separate from the rest, only communicating from her cell phone to faceless people, hidden away at the base. "I know."
"Good, good. But not everybody does, you understand. We've had frantic drop-outs all over the place. It's disgraceful. Let's hope those runts never find out." Another pause, this one venomous. "Anyhow, with such a dramatic discharge, we've also had a huge amount of new volunteers. Untried and untested newbies 've been creeping outta the woodwork like you wouldn't believe, especially after so long of just a trickle of new agents."
Harley's heart sped up, then sunk. "Dukes, wait. I think I know where you're going with this, and I don't like it."
"Thought as much." There was a hint of finality to her words, to the way they ended so bluntly on the screen. "Want to punch me yet?"
"I respect you too much for that." She dismissed, leaning against the pink tile wall. Of all the places to receive a promotion, the girl's bathroom wasn't exactly where she envisioned it. "I do kinda wanna run away now."
"Will you?"
"Nah. I don't have anywhere else to go." She contemplated pressing the end button, however, before finally surrendering herself to the fact that she was too cowardly to stand up for herself in such a loud way. "This is a mistake."
"No." Dukes said. "This is an order. The fresh meat needs a few poundings to set them on track. You're just the woman to pound them."
"I'm too young." She tried. "I'm new to all of this. People are still trying to tack the title of "KND spy" on me. It's too early."
"In this case, that's exactly why. You're fresh out of the Kids Next Door. You fought, and you lost, Harley. This isn't some game to you. You know the price to pay with ignorance."
"With all due respect, Dukes, I literally made it five steps into Dad's Lair before I was blown away." She clenched her fists against an onslaught of memories best left forgotten. The walls had been mahogany brown. She didn't know why she remembered that more than the battle itself. "I slept through the failed invasion. In a ditch."
"Exactly five?"
"Exactly." She agreed. "I've counted them enough times to remember. Sometimes.." Harley rapped her shaking fist against her chest, trembling like a leaf. Her heartbeat was still there. She was still alive. The walls had trembled and turned black with char. "I dream about it a lot."
"All the more reason." Dukes said, giving her a moment to collect herself before continuing. "You've been through something horrific; but you're still here. That sort of loyalty is exactly what they need to learn."
She watched her nibble on a thumb nail, eyes squinted from a lack of light and sleep. The stress must be terrible, indeed.
"I don't have an option, do I?" She said eventually.
"Nah. Not really. Come by after school- I'll assign you your trainees. Dukes out."
Harley stared blindly at the phone a long moment, until Rosie gently snatched it away from her, face blank. Harley didn't doubt she had also been pulled into becoming a training instructor.
"Wanna skip?" Her hands said.
"Yes." She said.
Author's Note: Being deaf isn't horrific. Being caught up in a small explosion and getting carried out in shambles is.
More of a filler chapter, but going straight into battle would be un-wise, even for an impatient woman like Dukes.
-Mandaree1