Chapter 14

There was plenty of time for them to anticipate the mysterious, awful punishment headed there way as Numbuh V8, Numbuh One, and Numbuh 362 were taken to a room with nothing but a bunch of pillars in the middle and tied up to those pillars with more of that icky slithery subduium. Way too much time for V8's tastes. He'd already had too much time to think and brood in the company of that bald maverick and 362, whose THING had led them all to destruction. He didn't want time to think anymore. He wanted to do something. Anything. Even if it meant accepting his ultimate fate. Whatever it was, he could take it better than wondering and anticipating. About the only bright side of the whole was that at least Father and his five pets hadn't been brought along with the rest of them.

He wondered why.

"Oh, no," One moaned suddenly, eyes widening in realization. "Not splurgy ball!"

Alien GKND operatives stepped into visibility from all around, holding mesh bags of slimy, sticky, damp balls in a dozen different bright colors. Some of the balls blurbled.

"Splurgy ball," one of them confirmed coldly, closing in, gently tossing a blue bubbly yeasty sphere from one tentacle to another, over and over.

V8 hoped that some of them had sight based on movement, like the dino in Jurassic Park, and kept himself very very still. He pretended he was back in his lab on the Moonbase, figuring out how to grow those green bean lassoes he'd been thinking about making for the last couple weeks. Or maybe in his interrogation cell, having a few pointed 'questions' submitted to a much smaller version of the Grand Brat. Or Numbuh One. Or the Delightful Children. Or 362. Buncha jerks. None of them cared about anyone but themselves. None of them cared for the great cause of fighting adult tyranny, not like he did. None of them understood how important it was to really give your all to beat back those dumb controlling slavemaster adults! His fantasy stopped short of imagining interrogating Father, because even in his fantasies V8 had a certain level of practicality and realism he couldn't bring himself to give up.

"Isn't that your gunner?" he heard 362 muttering to One in surprise.

"Uh... yeah..."

"Well, talk to him! Her, it, whatever!"

One gulped. "Well it's kind of... complicated..."

"Hey, Numbuh One," the cosmic horror gunner said with the kind of friendly voice that was really not friendly at all.

"Hi... KlKLkleEEp... I don't suppose you'd mine putting down that splurgy ball? Eheh... heh..."

"You remember all those times I asked you out on a date, and you said yes, and then you blew me off for a mission someone else could've done?" she went on in that same tone.

V8's flesh would've crawled except, honestly, he didn't care what happened to One, and was just glad the focus wasn't on him anymore.

"I do now," One said wearily, hanging his head. "I must've pulled that on you at least a dozen times."

"Fourteen times," his gunner corrected him curtly. She raised the blueberry-like bubbling pod up.

362 started laughing. "Hahahah! I can't believe it... Lizzie all over again... even in space you're still you, Nigel... oh jeez, that's a reli-ULCK!"

"This is punishment, not a joke!" KlKLkleEEp snarled, having thrown the ball right into 362's mouth, leaving her spitting and coughing and gagging in disgust. The ball seemed to get absorbed into her mouth and lips, leaving behind a dark blue stain. The scientific part of V8's mind was interested, and wondered if it tasted bad.

That was the signal for everyone else to jump in, apparently, and operatives began throwing balls at the three of them rapid fire. It was basically dodgeball from PE all over again minus the dodging, which was, V8 had to admit, a darn good torture method. The balls themselves had interesting quirks, too. Some of them were hot, hot enough to be really uncomfortable if not quite burn. Others were icy cold, and getting a hot and a cold one close together made for an incredibly unpleasant sensation combo. Some were sticky and clung to the skin as oozy deflated membranes, and some itched maddeningly like mosquito bites. Only a few seconds into it V8 already wanted a shower more badly than he'd ever wanted anything in his life, and the splurge ball throwers didn't seem like they were gonna run out of ammo any time soon.

But still he took it better than the other two, a fact he took a little pride in. As a scientist-interrogator he was well studied in this kind of thing and thinking about it kept him occupied from the physical sensations. As for the degradation, well, he was pretty much as degraded as he was going to get, thank you, and having accepted his total humiliation didn't really care what else happened to him. But 362 and One were outraged and scared, just like any of V8's own interrogated captives had been countless times. It was almost funny. But mostly, it was just pathetic. These were supposed to be the best of the best? Couldn't they do any better than this? So much shouting, and wailing, and threatening, and a little crying (not on 362's part, but by One, amusingly).

So Numbuh V8 just took it all and used the time productively, analyzing his situation all over like a mouse in a maze with possibly no exit. Why hadn't Fathers and the Delightfuls been splurge balled, too? Well, maybe they had their own unique punishment. Who knew. He'd see when this was over and they got back to their cells. Hopefully showers would be allowed first. He kind of also wanted some kind of food that didn't look like a video game powerup, but that was probably asking too much.

To his relief, showers weren't necessary. When the ordeal was finally over, the splurges were dried out with a tools that looked suspiciously like a bunch of hair dryers taped together, and then their hardened shells were pulled off. Even that was annoying, though... it got them clean, but the pulling process sucked at the skin in a technically not painful but really really gross, revolting way. V8 wondered if he could get some of his veggies to do that.

The worst part, though, wasn't the splurge balling itself, but coming back to their cells to find Father and the Delightful Children looking all cozy and relaxed!

"Didn't they do anything to you?" V8 asked Father, feeling a sour taste invade his mouth at the unpleasant concept of talking to the arch-enemy of the KND like it was a, ugh, person or something.

"Hmm? Well, they gave us some nice monte cristos and banana splits while you were gone," Father said, gesturing to some cleaned out plates and bowls with a few crumbs still in them. "Not really the best I've ever had, but for aliens, it was a remarkably good job."

"Our sandwiches were a bit too buttery," the Delightfuls added in their five in one voice. "And they didn't use a whole wheat bread. We prefer healthier things."

Father beamed at his minions while V8 quivered in outrage, listening to 362 and One yell all kinds of nasty things across the middle space that kept the cells separate. It was weird. Why would the GKND treat Father and his brainwashed freaks so much better than supposed 'traitors' who had been the KND for practically forever?! There was no sense to it all, unless...

Unless the GKND was scared of Father.

Yes. That was it. Father was the epitome of rage. While no kid had ever gotten close to him long enough to analyze the man's powers, it was even possible that anger fueled all that fire and heat. Yes, the GKND was afraid of making him mad, so they captured him but treated him nicely so he wouldn't do anything dangerous. The same went for the Delightfuls because Father was so close to them. Meanwhile, a bunch of measly traitors could be treated like trash, serving as safe targets for kids to vent petty resentments on! After all, there weren't any other humans that V8 had seen in the entire GKND. They were like foreigners. People didn't like people who were Different. And with One's long record of lonerism, and 362's now obvious THING, and his own... uh, less than active social skills, they just made the best targets, didn't they?

For all they knew, the GKND knew they were innocent, and just wanted some scapegoats for their operatives to wail on to keep everyone happy!

But that was maybe an unfair jump in thinking to make. In any case, it didn't matter until he could prove it. What mattered right now was proving that he, at least, was totally loyal to the KND and would do anything, absolutely anything, to rid the universe of scummy adulthood forever. How could he prove that, though, having been caught by Father's dumb lies so he couldn't be taken for his word no matter what?

Not words... actions. Actions would do it.

So the GKND were still scared of Father? That was fine. He wasn't. Well... he mostly wasn't. Okay, fine, he was totally freaked out by Father, but still, he wouldn't let that change his mind now! Now that he had a plan. Well, the start of one. He knew what he had to do to prove his loyalty to all kiddom. There was only one course of action left to take so that he could clear his name.

Obviously, he had to find a way to destroy Father and the Delightful Children.