Chapter 9: Psychic Rodents

Susie held her palm out to represent the small animal. Calvin and Jeremy glanced in awe. They believed less than what they saw.

"A mouse?" asked Jeremy rhetorically, clearly the first to accept disbelief. "Dude, Android roaches are a highly different subject, they have an explanation. A MOUSE! LET ALONE ONE THAT DOESN'T MOVE ITS LIPS!"

Susie scowled.

"They call him Ignatz, and is this really comparably irrational to children who can build an entire advanced system way beyond adult capacity?" asked Susie.

"Does he know who the real boss is?" asked Calvin.

"We know someone who does, actually" said Ignatz, in which Calvin looked back with even more awe.

"Whoa, that mouse really DID talk!" said Calvin, smiling in return.

"Not the way you think, or in this case speak" replied Susie.

"Telepathy, it's nice to see we're living in a post-Xmen world yet apparently the only evolved beings around here are the ones supposedly smarter than us according to Douglas Adams" added Jeremy, undaunted to hide his lack of impression.

"Okay boys, let's try focusing on the real important matters right now: locating the Real Boss' hideout." said Susie.

Calvin knew it was all making sense all of a sudden. The thought of having a psychic mouse on their team would prove an easier way out if they knew how to take advantage of their time.

Let alone the obvious shortcuts that didn't look that way.

"Wait" said Calvin "Don't you get it? This is the Bilk Division! It's all about the video games. That's why the first HQ didn't give us anything for starters"

"What do you mean?" asked Ignatz.

"What's the biggest cliché found in every single video game structure known to man?" asked Calvin.

It had been a long time since any of them actually grabbed a joystick or logged in to anything more practical. Video games were the exact opposite of having a life if they knew what was good for them. Especially Calvin, who once lost himself in an unreal world long enough ago.

"You mean action-adventure, RPG, First person shooter-?" asked Jeremy, giving up when Ignatz interjected.

"As far as what's known, the hero living a normal life when all of a sudden-"

"- An arbitrary turn of events forces them to take a journey meant to resolve the dilemma they were burdened with! I GET IT!" said Susie.

This might've been what the plan was looking for all along. The Boss was clever enough for anything, especially concerning the gambit of leading them to its grasp in any way possible. They had to be much cleverer if they were to succeed.

"Get what?" asked Jeremy.

"The Boss WANTS us to find her or him: It's a trap!" said Susie "It might even be a red herring if we don't keep our guard up"

Soon it made sense just how Jeremy was holding up. It took him more than just the events he'd gone through with them to leave his trust out.

"What else you suggest we do? No use calling it revenge if all we're doing is sitting here whilst that Boss continues to strangle the last breath off the rest of us." He said.

"Okay, don't fret, Jeremy, the option is very obvious: What the Boss wants is for us to fall into its mark, so why not swap?" replied Calvin.

"You're saying we lead it towards us?"

"He's saying we need to find its weakness!"

"But Sue, how do we know the Boss even has one?"

"I had a chat with it, once, back when I was still interviewed, it discussed with me how ideas were its prized possessions" she replied as she laid Ignatz down. "Maybe we can locate some sort of limitation as a separate object containing said hint and lure it right at us."

Jeremy looked down at the mouse. He crossed his arms, wondering if he was the only one who thought bringing a potential suspect was begging them for failure.

"Okay, I get it, we're looking for its vulnerability points, assuming it even has them" said Jeremy "Explain how we know where they are?"

The mice laid eyes on him, letting him know he was also inside the circle and open to ideas.

"That's where I come in" said Ignatz "My team has access to coordinates from another set of headquarters. Let them do the rest and we'll locate the paraphernalia stat"

"Is that where we'll find The Boss' weakness?" he asked.

"That's where we'll be able to pinpoint one of the higher subordinates with access to all the deep sidetracked data within the Bilk Division's database"

"Soooooooooooooo…is that a yes or a no, will we find the blackmail or will we keep on searching?"

"Didn't you listen to what he said? The guy we'll be looking for knows where the evidence lies" retorted Susie.

Jeremy took a great amount of breath, now nearly annoying everyone else.

"How can I listen to him if he speaks with his head? Is that a yes or no?" asked Jeremy intolerantly.

"Both or neither! Yes that'll propel us one step closer to finding The Boss' weakness, NO that's not the exact location to where it's hidden! Need I repeat myself or is it easier if I MOUTH the words for you?" replied Ignatz in an almost threatening tone.

Jeremy only looked at the rest of his comrades. They clearly didn't seem even the slightest perturbed by the mouse's edge, even when they should be.

He needed a moment of real indulgence for at least one of them to see it through his suspicion.

"Sue, um, a quick word please" said Jeremy as he motioned a finger at Susie, who just like Calvin and Ignatz, felt weirded out.

Nevertheless did she follow him. They were about three yards away from the other two before Jeremy began.

"I'm just curious that's all, but what did this rodent say when you asked it how you can trust him?" asked Jeremy. Susie gave him a puzzled tude.

"What are you talking about? You know I never asked him!" she replied.

"Ah, no wonder! I take it it's just cause he's a…what's that word I'm looking for? Right, A FUCKING MOUSE!" asked Jeremy spastically "Does that involuntarily qualify him as a trustworthy soul? For all we know, this could be exactly like The Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy and Mickey here might be on to us"

"You can't prove that, he's the only hope we've got to finding The High Boss' weak point!"

"Convenient, isn't it? Would you promise me I can betray you back if he overthrows us?"

Now Susie was contaminated with Jeremy's sour doubt.

"What's that supposed to mean?" asked Susie, though Jeremy knew it was rhetorical.

"I'm saying we might've already found our red herring the size of a red hammer driver!"

"Ssshhhhh! The Mouse is psychic, remember? He could probably hear you right now!"

Jeremy and Susie turn around arbitrarily. They see Ignatz returns the gaze innocently yet kindly. Jeremy was the first to look away.

"Not even looking at us" replied Jeremy smugly.

"Exactly! Doesn't that show we can trust him enough?"

"What? But…I don't know!"

"Neither do I! All I know is that he's the only option we have of reaching the high boss, we need him more than anything right now"

" Okay, but just remember, I'm calling it quits if he stabs us in the back!"

"He's not stabbing us!"

There wasn't a reason to judge the possibilities without putting them to exercise. Susie wasn't the kind who believed measuring them was going to be as fair as actually putting them into practice. She knew Jeremy was less prone to getting the most out of danger or risks if it meant a haunting possibility it would all fail.

"Whatever!" said Jeremy as he walked back to the group.

Later that day, Jeremy came up to a building aping the Wall Street edifice in deliveryman attire and hoisting an enormous box on a wheel cart. He passed through the automatic doors and came as far as what were two members could spot him.

It was like any entrance hallway, containing nothing more than a service booth in the center and two elevators on both sides of the walls at the very end.

"Special delivery!" bellowed Jeremy. The member guards were on to his fraud.

"Who sent you?" asked one of the two members in the service booth, raising his gun.

Jeremy didn't know if he was doing a good job. His inability to sweat at this might've been helping.

"Why?" he asked, before noticing the member tilts his head downward. He had to think something quick before more suspicion arose.

"What's in the box?" the member asked.

"I don't know…" said Jeremy, getting it at last. "But I can guarantee you, there ain't a person"

Jeremy waited to see if the members were as gullible as they appeared. The both seemed to read his mind as one of them laughed.

"Haha, why should we believe you?" asked the member on the left. This didn't seem to shock Jeremy, on the other hand as he'd prepared for the occasion.

"Because it would need air holes for someone to survive in their" he replied, reaching for his pants.

"No it wouldn't" said the both "Yeah right!"

The two members were in for a demonstration when Jeremy released a liability to his theory. A whole Tommy gun rested in his grasp, giving members the idea he was about to bring them down like flies.

Rather that, he pins the barrel onto the box and pulls the trigger. Countless bullets rage throughout with heavy noise, making some members close their ears.

The box was easily reduced to a brown giant Swiss cheese. The members remained, nearly shaken at the Styrofoam leaking out of the cardboard. Jeremy just waited a few seconds before talking.

"Hm, guess its true" he said, taking out a clipboard and a pen "Sign here, please"

The members didn't even look at each other, rather instead gave the same reply.

"Sure"

They both took hold of the clipboard, whereas only the one on the left held a pen and signed the single paper. The other grasped the clipart and gave it back to Jeremy, who read it thoroughly.

"Very good" said Jeremy, before looking up for a wooly reason "Sue!"

They had no time to feel perplexed when she emerged from between them and tapped both their shoulders. They turn around before she knocks them out and shoots the rest of the guards.

Susie looks back at Jeremy before running towards the elevator.

"You take care of the fourth quadrant, I'll head upstairs" said Susie as the doors closed.

Jeremy stood there. He looked behind himself as he did in front, making sure there was nobody else on the brink of a surprise attack. Not that he was any vulnerable with a weapon around, there was just so much left to doubt.

"My parents warned me I'd end up in janitor attire, but I forgot!" said Jeremy to himself. "And by forget I mean ignored them completely"

Susie cracked her knuckles as she saw the third floor pass before the next.

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Back in a headquarter-like hideout, some of the members were more worried than usual. One got completely ecstatic once he saw the High Boss enter through the front door.

It would've been wrong to assume it was as worried as anyone else, but he wouldn't know.

"High Boss" began the member "We have to do something, they're killing the other leaders off like rabbits-"

The Boss clicks on a pager, in which the member falls to the ground cringing for the seconds he had left to move.

"Anyone else wish to tell me something I don't know? He sure didn't!" said the boss as it opened the door to its room "Maybe I should: These adversaries are doing nothing more than putting us to the test. Why should I have to kill the rest of you when they're doing it for me?"

The boss entered its office, letting the rest of the members recoil in even more of the same.

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It was the fourth floor at last. Susie walked out of the elevator with the expectation this looked like any set of hallways reminiscent to a maze found in offices.

She stopped as soon as she came up to the hallway leading to the Boss' door.

The left and white walls were adorned with the mounted heads of random animals. Indeed, Susie walked close to see there was one of a goat, a pig, two crocodiles, and even a zebra and a duck wearing a combat helmet.

If this was really the boss' layer, Susie would know.

She opened the door to see what she couldn't have assumed was anything more than any other office. Susie saw it was empty, so she tried to look around.

Then a noise made her stop halfway.

"What took you?" said the rat, lying on a bookend on the topmost shelve to Susie's right. Susie looked up at it, and smirked

"You didn't know I was coming!" she replied.

The Rat fell down onto the desk. Its casual nature still suggested it was on to something, as the ever alert Susie saw he opened another mantelpiece.

"Ya'll's are trespassing, that's as far as I know" said Rat as he continued to search "Then again, I need to get out more often"

Around the time she was still a subordinate, Susie was used to this kind of stalling. It was one of the many things that worked for her from the Boss' evil jaws: patience was an obstacle you had to disguise as a virtue.

"I'll say!" she replied.

Rat stopped searching and finally came across what she was looking for inside that cupboard. He rested his paws on it, leaving Susie to wonder if she should walk closer to take a better peek.

"Don't tell me, I'm psychic like that!...Ignatz brought you here" said Rat, closing the cupboard and turning around. "Probably to die"

"You're all bark and no bite, rat. At times I wonder if you even count as a rodent"

"Raw, unkind words from a latter trophy on the Boss' doorstep, I'm just an individual living it up in a world that tolerates Crappy employees like Stephen Pastis as much as excess of videogames"

Susie went out on a limb and walked even closer to Rat. She slid her shirt up to reveal the slipped sig within her torso.

"How do those traits make any person an individual?" asked Susie, putting his so-called psyche to the test.

"I see your point" said Rat as he held a dagger on his back; Susie saw the reflection on time from the portrait behind him.

"But for starters, I'm not a PERSON!"

Rat threw the dagger at her direction. The speed was enough to graze an inch of her hair, removing the cowlick she had in the front.

"Whoa! Take it easy!" said Susie, "Don't blame me, I enjoy bloodshed as much as anyone, not that I'm here to kill you!"

"That makes ONE!" said Rat, throwing another dagger, this time pinning Susie by her shirt sleeve "I never lived for third or second jobs. Then The High Boss offered me something, it has a thing for rodents by the way"

Rat came close enough to stop Susie from removing the dagger by pinning the other sleeve down.

"I know how you feel" said Susie, a few inches away from the megalomaniac's face "I think you should know the Boss lives for recruiting those it'll get rid of anyway"

Rat took out a blade big enough to cut an orange this time. Susie knew Rat was dangerously close.

"What makes you so sure I'm one of them?"

"I get rid of them for it"

Rat raised the spear, and throws it down at Susie's direction. At the last millimeter away from her touch, Susie head butts Rat out of her side.

Soon Rat began to see everything too blurry, even the image of Susie taking out a seedlike object from her knapsack before passing out.

When he woke up, Rat felt he couldn't move. And when his vision wasn't blurry anymore, the ropes he was tied with were finally visible.

"What the-?" he said before Susie interjected.

"Face it, Rat. If the Boss knew I was going to kill you, it wouldn't have hired you for all that trade" said Susie "Not to mention entrust you with the location to its one sole weakness"

Rat's eyes became as wide as his ears. He barely knew this creature and she dared disclose the one job he was sure to carry out just like that.

"How did you know?" asked Rat.

Susie crouched down so as to look at the little mammal face on once again. Hopefully this was becoming easier by the second.

"You tell me, maybe Ignatz didn't bring me here to die" said Susie, before grasping the rodent by his chest "Looks like you're not so psychic after all"

Rat shook his head begrudgingly. He never got the chance to see if she was either the vigilante or brutally heroic type. It didn't make sense to keep him this way, so he took a nab at the latter.

"You're wasting your time, kid. For all I know, the brick throwing excuse for a rodent might be pulling your leg as we speak" said Rat, in which Susie let go of him "Try Borris Lane, 128"

Rat's shock came back when he saw Susie grab hold of his blade. Maybe he should've opted for the vigilante type instead.

"That's it?" asked Susie, before untying Rat with the blade "How challenging"

Rat knew he was alive, yet wondered if she really was going to spare him. To him, it wasn't just Susie turning around that took to convince him.

"You're not going to kill me?" he asked. Susie didn't even bother looking back.

"All taken care of" she said as she revealed the pill and threw it over her shoulder "Just to save the Boss the effort and you the trauma"

Rat looked down at his feet as he freed himself from the loose shackles. The very capsule looked less like arsenic than it did something more harmless than aspirin.

"So…there isn't any pain?" said Rat, taking hold of the blade. Susie didn't even hear him get up.

"Nope" she said, continuing her walk towards the door.

Rat saw she was indeed careless on whether he would spare her now that he wasn't on the same page. He jumped onto her shoulder and raised the knife once again.

The knife was even less of an inch away from her head when he stopped, and fell headfirst into the ground. A brisk seizure followed, pain being one of the factors.

"Though I can't speak for the side effects" Susie said as she stopped for a moment.

Susie saw how Rat finally stopped moving. However he didn't die right away. Instead, Rat slowly began to dissolve into the wind like sand. Susie turned back away, trying her best to feel unmoved.

"You may be able to prolong your life, but it's not like you can escape your inevitable death, is it?" asked Rat teasingly, the bottom half of his body almost invisible "How pathetic, I would've asked for its true identity"

Susie almost closed the door, but Rat's last words make her turn back to him, who was still slowly dissolving. She grabbed the remainder of his arms.

"You know it?" she asked anxiously "Tell me, TELL ME RIGHT NOW!"

Rat smiled before laughing. only his head remained to evaporate.

"Sorry" said Rat's mouth before it released a smirk as it dissolved into the Air conditioner's dense breeze "I'm dead"

The rodent was no more. All Susie could think of was how some things could've been easier if she had the right perspective.

The Boss could have a more contemptible weakness if she knew what it was.

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Jeremy stood guard, waiting to see if anyone was heading his direction. None of the other members seemed remotely conscious so maybe he was right.

It all changed when he heard a noise from behind.

"Jeremy?"

Jeremy turned around. Nothing was seen, until he looked down to his feet level. Ignatz stood there as innocently as any anthropomorphic being.

"Oh, you" said Jeremy, looking away coldly "What do you want?"

"You don't trust me right now; we're in the middle of a defining battle between the forces of moral egotism and ethical corroboration, I can see that"

"I'll ask again, what do you want?"

Jeremy didn't know yet that one of the members a couple of yards away regained consciousness and heard the first half of the conversation. He noticed they weren't looking at him, so he pointed the gun at Jeremy.

"Nothing, I just want to tell you something" said Ignatz, before looking past Jeremy.

"Okay, so come on! I haven't-"

A loud bang interjected his words. So did a floating bullet and the same member pointing the gun at Jeremy. At first he's paralyzed, but then sees something even more gruesome happen: the member's head explodes. After that, Jeremy turns around to see the mouse's eyes glowing.

" That…was pretty cool man!" said Jeremy, making Ignatz's eyes cease the glow.

"What? Exploding heads?" asked Ignatz

"Saving my life, Man…thanks"

"You're welcome; I just want to help in any way"

Seconds passed, and Jeremy finally saw the advantage of accepting strangers into his circle. Even if they weren't human.

"So what did you want to tell me?"

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That's all I have for now. I think I got a bit too carried away with this chapter. Really, the final draft of it is actually two thirds its original size. I'll have to submit the last third as a separate chappie. Like I always say, if I can get this to finish, I can get it to finish.

Farvél!