"I can't believe it! Why did I listen to you at all?!" Wilbur complained.
"Shut up, Junior!" Parr snapped.
She had directed him to the other end of the city. Until then, she had been quite determined, but after they had driven for five minutes through an uninhabited area, Wilbur came to the conclusion that she really didn't know where their younger versions were.
"We are wasting valuable time driving around in the middle of nowhere!" He continued to rant.
"Well, your complaining isn't doing any good! Be glad that I'm helping you, after all, YOU were the one who lost them!" Violet sneered at him. She was extremely irritated... because of Junior mostly, but also because she had no idea what she should do next. She was here, at the other end of town ... and now what?
Wilbur was annoyed. By now, they could have been able to reach Cornelius. His father certainly would have known what to do!
But no! They had to cruise around in the middle of nowhere!
Why had he let himself be convinced?!
He gritted his teeth and fixed his eyes in front of him.
Suddenly, he discovered something in the distance.
Wilbur suddenly turned into a curvy path, filled with potholes.
"What are you doing?" Parr asked in surprise.
"This building back there is brightly illuminated! Didn't you just say that there is no power anymore? Well, I think that's very suspicious!" He replied precociously.
Violet was completely astonished. She hadn't paid any attention to it... The building was quite unremarkable and ordinary. She had actually expected something like ... well, a giant laser cannon or something like that...
Violet had to admit that she had simply overlooked it. But instead of being grateful for Junior's discovery, she was even more annoyed. Now, he probably felt really smart!
This was her mission here! He was just the chauffeur. Why was he making arbitrary decisions all of a sudden?!
She tried hard to contain herself. After all, she wasn't here as Invisigirl, but simply as Violet Parr, an ordinary girl without any super powers ...
"Ah! And you think you could just drive into their parking area, or what?!" She asked irritably.
Wilbur shifted gears. Actually, he really had no idea what he should do next.
"Park the car there!" Violet commanded harshly, and pointed to a tree within an overgrown hedge from where the illuminated building couldn't be seen. The whole area was overgrown with hedges and brushwood, a stark contrast to the rest of Todayland...
"Please!" Wilma completed Violet's sentence. Wilbur had to grin when Violet grit her teeth.
"See? Even my little sister has better manners than you."
"Now move it, PLEASE!" Violet hissed.
Wilbur reluctantly drove the Lady Crema to the tree and parked the car. Then he climbed out.
But midway, he stopped - Parr also started to climb out of the car.
"What are you doing?" Both Vi and Wilbur asked simultaneously.
Vi answered first. "I'm going -"
"You're not going anywhere!" Wilbur interrupted strictly. "You're gonna take care of my sister, while I go in there!"
"Hello! That's your sister! You take care of her!" Violet retorted.
Wilbur clenched his fists. He knew that Parr always did the opposite of what he said, just to annoy him! But this was neither the time nor the place for this stupid game!
"And how do you plan on doing this?! You can't just ring the bell, bat your eyelashes and expect that the problem is solved!" He tried to outdo her.
It was true. She was only an annoying young woman ... what could she do?
Not to mention, she had nothing to do with this issue - except that her younger self was involved ...
The kidnappers had it in for him obviously - but accidentally caught his past self. They probably wanted ransom from his family, or something like that ..
"Sure I can! You'll see!" She said, slamming the door in his face.
For a moment, Wilbur sat in the car, completely stunned.
If Parr had seen this giant robot-monster, she certainly wouldn't be so fearless.
"I can't believe this! That woman is just -!"
Angrily, Wilbur also got out of the car and ran after her.
"You certainly won't go alone!" He called out to her.
"Be a good little babysitter and bring your sister back home! And please try not to lose her on the way too, Junior!"
That was the last straw. Her spitefulness drove him crazy.
"If you call me 'Junior' once more -" he growled dangerously. His neck muscles tensed.
Parr turned around, folded her arms, and gave him a cool glance.
"Think 'shark-head' fits better?" She asked with a laugh, making it clear to him that she wasn't taking him seriously.
"Oh man, can't you at least be cooperative this time? Our lives are at stake! Do you seriously want to risk our lives just because you can't stop being so stubborn?" He said, slowly getting more desperate.
Parr looked away, purposefully ignoring him.
"Did you say something? I only heard something with 'blah blah', when I wasn't listening..." She replied saucily, then turned on her heels and went.
Gosh! How could this woman be so smug!
"Okay! Then go! You can annoy those guys to death!" He shouted after her.
So what! She should go alone!
Wilbur was torn. He wanted to run after Parr, but the car seemed to attract him magnetically. He had to save the two travelers, but on the other hand, he couldn't escape from family responsibilities. He simply couldn't leave his sister alone...
... his stupid, annoying sister, who always appeared when he needed her least!
"Who cares! Then our existence will be wiped out! Why not?! Then the day can't get any worse at least!" He cried exasperatedly.
"Don't wait for me!" Violet called back serenely.
Wilbur growled. Why did she always had to have the final say?!
Snorting, Wilbur stomped back to Lady Crema and got in.
"We're going home now?" Wilma asked quietly.
Wilbur laid his head on the steering wheel. He couldn't leave now.
A gigantic killer robot had kidnaped Parr's and his younger selves! If something happened to them, they both would cease to exist!
He shook his head and smiled bitterly. Parr seriously thought she could handle this problem alone.
He turned the key in the lock.
But instead of starting the car, he closed the top and turned on the special alarm system.
"You wait here." He told Wilma and got out.
"All alone?" She whined, before Wilbur closed the door. She had left the ballroom because it was so boring ... and now she had to be bored here instead?
"I'll be right back." Wilbur said, trying to sound convincing.
"Can't I come with you?"
"That's not possible, kiddo."
"But -"
"I activated the alarm. You're safe here." He said, but more to calm down himself. A part of him could hardly bring himself to leave his little sister alone.
When Wilma heard that, her eyes widened. The alarm system consisted of an invisible energy shield, which ensured that nobody without a key came too close to the car. Otherwise, that person would get a strong electric shock. Wilbur had installed this equipment after some moron had slit his precious whitewall tires...
"Oh yeah!" Wilma enthused, "Can you make it shine? Please, please!" She begged.
Wilbur rolled his eyes. The protection shield would glow when little objects hit it, and his sister totally loved to watch that. But now, they had no time for goofing around...
Without another word, he closed the door. But when he turned around, he grabbed a stone from the ground and threw it back over his shoulder. He suddenly heard the electric shield fizzling, followed by Wilma's happy squeaking.
Wilbur had to laugh. Children were so silly... and so easy to amuse.
He threw a glance back to the Lady Crema. Nothing would happen to his sister... and even if they did get her ... every kidnapper would be so annoyed after half an hour that they would give her back voluntarily, Wilbur thought amusedly.
Then he hurried along the bumpy road after Parr.
When he came around the bend, he could see the brightly illuminated building. This whole thing was odd - the closer he came to the building, the more suspicious it seemed to him. It was flat, without windows and had a discreet brown sand color. There was no sign or logo that showed the use, the carrier, or the owner of the building.
From afar, he saw the fence that delimited the area. Barbed wire fence stretched along the top of the fence - a rare sight in the future.
Cones of light panned slowly across the terrain. Everything seemed to be thoroughly monitored. Obviously someone didn't want someone to slip in undetected.
Confused, Wilbur looked around, while he continued to approach the building.
Where was Parr? There was no way that she walked that far in such a short time...
Suddenly, he stopped. Something was moving inside the area. Wilbur gulped.
... Guards!
But not usual guards... they were robots. Heavily armed robots!
Three of them marched in lock-step along the edge of the building.
Now, in retrospect, he would have preferred to bring his sister back home, but...
...what if Parr had fallen into the hands of these robots?
Violet knelt down in the bushes and watched the robot-guards. As far as she could estimate, without a clock, the robots needed about 5 or 6 minutes to walk around the building.
Within this period, she had to get through the fence and through this air shaft into the building.
However, the air shaft was about ten feet off the ground ... and since she couldn't fly, she needed another way to get in.
If she eliminated the three guards, she could climb on a pile of robot-remains. But maybe, the absence of the three robots would be noticed immediately.... and then she could directly walk through the main entrance. (Or at least, she could do this, if only she had her battlesuit!)
Violet hesitated. Usually, it was the three of them: Inferno, Medium and Invisigirl ... the Incredibles. Three heads were better than one. And three superheroes could do so much more!
Alone, she suddenly felt really stuck!
Suddenly, she heard steps behind her. She made herself invisible (which was ridiculous, because her eye-catching red dress was still visible) and turned around -
- and she would have liked to shout out loud!
"What an idiot!" Vi thought angrily, becoming visible again.
Junior had nothing better to do than walk right in the middle of the road - completely visible for everybody - right into his own doom!
At that moment, the robot guards came around the corner of the building again!
Violet grabbed Junior by his belt and dragged him into the bushes.
"Hey! What -"
Violet pressed her hand to his mouth and hissed at him. "Shut up!"
She was annoyed. Not just annoyed ... she was infuriated!
Though, Violet had an idea. She never considered it, but Junior could be quite useful for her!
She grabbed him roughly by the collar and pulled him through the bushes in the direction of the fence, not caring very much that Junior struggled.
Suddenly, however, another thought came to her mind ...
If Junior was with her, then she had to hide her secret identity. This meant that she'd have to pretend to have no super powers the whole time!
Great...
They knelt down in a hedge near the fence. The robots just disappeared behind the corner again.
"And you wanted to go alone." Wilbur whispered sarcastically. Violet elbowed him very sharply.
"Ouch! Man, that hurt! No wonder you don't have a boyfriend!"
Violet elbowed him again - even harder this time. If it wasn't for the fact that she needed him to get into the building, she would have knocked him out by now.
"Shut up, idiot!" She hissed, then she stood up and went along the fence.
"Come on! Let's search for a way to get inside." She whispered.
Wilbur tripped after her, clutching his ribs where she had elbowed him. "We should let the police know!" He whispered loudly.
"You're even more stupid then you look!" Violet hissed back. Why didn't this idiot understand?! How could they contact the police when nothing was working?
Wilbur rolled his eyes. Any other girl - heck, any other person would certainly behave better in this situation! But not Parr. She was still insufferable! Even now, in this situation, she couldn't pull herself together.
And was she trying to be in charge so much?
He passed her and examined the fence. The solid frame of poles, netting and barbed wire was about sixteen feet high. Climbing that was totally impossible.
Violet took a few steps back. Then - when Wilbur turned his back to her - she generated a force field into the fence. The wires bulged, then broke under the impact. When the field disappeared again, a round piece of the fence dropped out. The hole was big enough so a person could crawl through it.
"We can't climb over it." She heard Junior murmur.
"Oh, really! Thanks for that ground-breaking realization!" She whispered loudly. "Get a brain, Shark-head!"
"Get a face, pig-nose!" He shot back, without turning around.
Violet's jaw dropped. At that moment, she wanted to murder him.
That was absolutely enough! Violet was fed up. That settled it - she would try to get in there alone! She would surely not spend another second with this imbecile.
And besides, she didn't have pig-nose!
... Did she?
Violet gathered her dress, crawled through the hole, and slipped into the wall of the building, where she had seen the air shaft. All without Wilbur noticing.
When Parr didn't respond to his stupid comment - against his expectations - he started to feel sorry.
He had to take several deep breaths and let his heart beat slow down, before he was able to bring himself to talk.
"Sorry," He finally said sheepishly. He honestly meant it. He didn't want to argue with her all the time. "You know, we should really pull it together. After all, our lives are at stake. Maybe we should make peace, or at least call a truce until this is over. What do you think? ... Violet?"
... but Parr didn't reply.
"Violet?" He asked once more, turning around.
She was gone.
He discovered a perfect round hole in the fence and behind it, he could see Parr tiptoeing towards the building.
Irritably, he clenched his fists and gritted his teeth.
"This woman! This crazy little -!" He grumbled as he squeezed through the hole and followed after her.