"Well?" Azalea asked, taking a seat.

"I knew your parents because I was once an Acme detective and a good
friend of them," the man said.

"You know, we've told you our names already. Aren't you going to tell
yours?" Michael asked.

"Name's Billy Running Bird. My apologies for not introducing myself
properly."

"What do you know about Mom?" Azalea asked.

"Determined. Ivy was extremely determined to do her work well.
Together with her younger brother Zack, they were a pretty cool team. Too bad
Lydexter never got along with anyone at Acme." Billy sighed.

"Billy, where are the other detectives?" Azalea asked.

"I don't know. I only know that there's only one other person who
calls himself Jackie Li, but I'm not sure if he was once part of Acme."

An Asian man came in. "Mr. Alvarez, I have a favor to ask--" the man
started before he noticed Azalea and Michael. "What are those two doing
here?"

"Cool down, Li, it's Azalea and Michael. Zack and Ivy's kids." Billy
answered.

"Zack and Ivy...you're not Billy Running Bird, aren't you?" Li asked.

"There's no one else in the world with that name." Billy turned to
the two teens. "How's the Chief?"

"He's in Carmen's laptop. He's starting to feel a bit better now that
he's got the time to grieve over Mom and Uncle Zack's death," Azalea said.

**********

Carmen looked at an electronic map of the base. 'Where the hell is
Lydexter?'

"Can I help you?" a voice asked behind her.

Carmen turned around and gasped. "Manny? Is that you?" she asked
back.

"Carmen? What are you doing here?" the man asked back.

They both stared at each other for some time. Then Carmen broke down
laughing. "This is stupid! Why are we staring at each other like total
idiots?"

"I don't know," Manny shrugged. "How's VILE?"

"VILE's gone, Manny," Carmen answered, getting serious. "Everyone's
scattered."

"What about Acme?"

"Acme was shut down after Wall Street crashed. Why are you working
for Lydexter?"

"I needed employment here in Peru, and this was the only place."
Manny sighed.

"So far I've got Sara Bellum in Portugal, Paige Turner in England,
Frank M. Poster possibly hiding in Canada, and now you in Peru," Carmen said.

"What about you?" Manny asked.

"Spain." Carmen quickly answered.

"I barely recognized you in that black winter coat. It wasn't until
the style of the coat that reminded me of Christmas 25 years ago," Manny
said.

A female security guard making rounds in the hallways saw the two
conversing with each other. She approached Carmen from behind.

"Excuse me," the woman asked.

Carmen turned around and blinked when she recognized the woman.
"Dara?"

"How did you know my name?" the security guard asked, surprised that
the visitor in black called her by her old name.

"You remember that robbery in Yangon, do you?" Carmen asked back.

"Boss?" Dara took off her glasses. "It is you!"

"Anyone from VILE here as well?" Carmen asked.

"I don't know, Carmen. I've heard rumors that Al Loy is somewhere in
Alaska and Tim Burr is in Russia somewhere," Dara answered, sadly shaking her
head.

**********

"Mr. Alvarez! I thought I told you to station at the reception desk!"
Lydexter's voice boomed over the base.

**********

"Oh man, we're dead!" Michael looked at Billy in sheer panic. Li had
already left Billy's office.

"Who's Alvarez?" Azalea asked.

"My other name. Hide under my desk, Azalea. Michael, go hide in the
closet. I'll take care of this." Billy said.

**********

"Lydexter! He'll kill me if he found me with you!" Manny said.

"Ditto, Manny," Dara added.

"Then we'll part." Carmen quickly left Manny and Dara alone.

**********

Azalea and Michael listened as Billy tried to explain to Lydexter.

"What's going on here, Alvarez? Why aren't you at the reception
desk?" Lydexter demanded.

"I left something important here," Billy answered calmly.

"And why didn't you do this earlier?"

"I was too preoccupied at the time."

"Search his office, soldiers. He's lying."

Lydexter's entourage started to tear the place apart when Azalea and
Michael were discovered. "Uh boss...we have a little problem." one of the men
said.

Lydexter made his way between the soldiers and faced the two teens.
"So, we have two stowaways here." He turned to his soldiers. "Kill them."

"Not if we can help it!" Azalea shouted. "Billy, get out of here!"

Michael tried to fend off the soldiers but his minimal kung fu was no
match. "Get off!" he shouted as he was being pummeled by the rifle butts.

Turning her attention to the soldiers, Azalea took the majority of
them down. "Get off my cousin, you jerk!" Azalea pounced on the remaining
soldier, the second commander after Lydexter. After dealing a blow with an
abandoned rifle, she went to Michael, who was unconscious from being hit so
many times. "Bro..." she whispered, shaking her head.

**********

Carmen heard the commotion going on and found Lydexter exiting.
"Excuse me," she called.

Lydexter turned around to see Carmen. "What are you doing here,
Sandiego?" he asked.

"Just wanted to talk about old times, Dexter," Carmen answered
coolly.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Lydexter asked.

"By the powers of Acme, you're under arrest." the Chief came up.

"Not if I can disable it." Lydexter hit something, and the Chief
vaporized.

"Lydexter!" Carmen looked at Lydexter with sheer shock. "How could
you?"

"If a detective like you could hack into Acme, then I can shut down
the Chief."

"You're despicable!"

"Thank you, I'll take that as a compliment. Now if you'll excuse me,
I'm going to get something."

"For what?"

"That's a secret." Lydexter left.

Carmen ran into the room Lydexter had exited earlier and found Azalea
with an unconscious Michael. "What's happened to Michael?" she asked.

"Lydexter's entourage were beating him..." Azalea's voice trailed
off.

Carmen went into Billy's computer and typed something. The C-5 portal
opened up, and the three went in.

**********

A hospital
San Francisco

Azalea slumped to the floor. "This is my fault," she muttered.

"Don't blame yourself, Azalea," Tatiana answered. "You and Michael
were outnumbered. There was no way you two could've taken on Lydexter's men
all at once."

"Lydexter's weak when he's alone, but with his men there's no way to
get past any of them," Billy said.

Carmen came back to the three with a tired look. "Michael's got some
serious head trauma. It'll take a few weeks for him to recover from all that
damage he took from Lydexter. He's lucky Azalea stopped Lydexter's men from
giving one more smash to his head. He might've died."

Azalea couldn't take it anymore. She bolted from her spot.

"Azalea, wait!" Li shouted.

"Don't, Li," Carmen said. "She needs time alone."


Azalea went outside of the hospital and sat down on a bench. 'I
nearly killed my own cousin,' she thought. Looking up to the sky, she saw no
moon. 'The stars of the midnight sky don't seem to guide me tonight...when
will the night be over?'

Taking a watch-like device from her pocket, Azalea activated the C-5,
and stepped in.

**********

On top of the ruined Space Needle
Seattle

Azalea looked down on Seattle from the top of the Space Needle. 'Is
this what I came for? To avenge my family's death is worth having someone
injured or even worse, killed?'

Azalea took a few steps forward, and sat down. 'Why does Lydexter
have such a bad grudge against Acme? Why would he kill Mom, Dad, Uncle Zack,
Aunt Irene...send the detectives into exile or kill them...'

The sound of the C-5 echoed in Azalea's ears but she pretended it
never happened. It was Carmen, still in her black coat. "You okay, Azalea?"
she asked, sitting down besides her.

"Why does Lydexter hates Acme so much he'll go as far as to kill Mom
and Dad? Or send agents into exile?" Azalea asked back. "What did Mom and
Uncle Zack do to tick Lydexter off this badly?"

"It's not your family's fault that led them to their deaths by
Lydexter. They would've been dead, either way." Carmen said.

"Then why didn't you tell them?"

"Azalea, you have to remember that this was before the Crash. I was
still a thief back then. There was no way I could warn your family about it."
Carmen's cell phone rang. "Hello?"

"Carmen?" It was Ryan.

"Ryan? What's up?" Carmen asked.

"Can I talk to Azalea?"

Carmen handed her cell phone to Azalea. "It's Ryan."

"Ryan? What's wrong?" Azalea asked.

"It's about Iris," Ryan said.

"What's happened to her?" Azalea stood up, alarmed.

"She's dying of some bioengineered disease Lydexter had created back
in his Acme days, long before the Crash. The doctors thought it was some new
strain of pneumonia but it's much deadlier. Iris has a lead on where the
other residents are, but she doesn't have much more time to live," Ryan said.

"Where's Iris?"

"At the local hospital. Like I said, Iris has some important info you
may want."

"Alright." Azalea hung up and handed the phone back to Carmen.

"What's gone wrong this time?" Carmen asked, standing up.

"Iris is dying of some disease Lydexter made. She has a lead on where
everyone else is."

Carmen took out a watch-like device and punched in a button. The C-5
opened and the two went in.

**********

A hospital
Seattle

Azalea and Carmen stepped out of the C-5 in front of the hospital.
The two went inside, and went to Iris's room. At the door the two were barred
by the doctors.

"We're here to see Iris Sayak," Azalea told the doctors.

"We can't let you two in. Her condition is very bad and her virus is
highly contagious. You can talk to her through the door window if you want,"
the doctors said.

"That'll be fine enough," Carmen said.

Once they reached Iris's room, Azalea saw Iris dozing off. "Iris!"
Azalea hissed.

Snapping of her dozing, Iris looked into Azalea and Carmen's
direction. "Azalea...what are you doing here?" she asked.

"No time. Lydexter injected you with something back at the Asylum. An
informant told me you knew where the other siblings are." Azalea answered.

Iris painfully got up from her hospital bed. "You don't have to get
up to tell me, I can hear you!" Azalea shouted, alarmed.

"I have to, Azalea," Iris answered, slowly making her way to the
door. "Tina and her twin brother Jeffrey are in London. Roger could possibly
be in San Francisco with his girlfriend Marie. Nicholas may be around New
York with his older sister Tatiana. Those guys are your best bets if you want
to find more about Lydexter. I got contact through William to Roger and
Jeffrey because those two had ties to outsiders at the time we were in the
Asylum, and Tina to Nicholas since his sister Tatiana escaped the Asylum when
he was fourteen, a few years before Michael and you came. I've heard
Lydexter's moved base again." Iris looked at Azalea with her brown eyes.
Then, they both simultaneously raised their hands to the glass, as if trying
to hold each other's hand.

"I wish you weren't dying such an agonizing death," Azalea said,
sadness evident in her voice. "It's bad enough that I nearly killed my own
cousin and now I'm losing another sibling."

"Neither do I," Iris said. "But it's not your fault, Azalea. Blame
Lydexter, he was the one who caused all this trouble for everyone at the
Asylum." She picked up a photo and slid it under the door. "Can you take this
photo to my Aunt Aileen? She was a mother figure to me before the Crash and I
want to thank her before I go."

"You mean Aileen as the one from the once-famous Acme Detective
Agency?" Carmen asked.

"That's her." Iris nodded.

"Where is she?" Carmen asked again.

"I think in Hawaii. Try Honolulu." Iris answered.

"We'll do that." Azalea picked up the photo and watched as Iris went
back to her hospital bed. "Goodbye, Iris."

**********

Ryan's apartment

Ryan looked up on the GPS while Carmen typed frantically in her
laptop, trying to bring the Chief back. "Damn Lydexter..."

"What did Lydexter do this time?" Ryan asked.

"Azalea and Michael went to Lydexter's base in Peru. Michael got some
serious head-bashing from Lydexter's men and Azalea feels it's her fault for
almost killing her cousin, and Lydexter managed to vaporize the Chief,"
Carmen said.

"According to the latest news Lydexter's starting to get aggressive
on his genetic research. He's starting to hire young women to get them
pregnant, and then take their babies to create perfectly genetically
engineered soldiers." Ryan said.

"I thought Lydexter already had his G.I. entourage, why would he need
genetically engineered soldiers?" Carmen asked. "And if he feels like it he
can make some airbourne man-made disease and kill us all."

"It's not that, Carmen."

"What, then?"

"The soldiers he had sometime before the Crash were defects,
according to him. Some of them died of premature aging, others because of
seizures that could only be controlled through tryptophan, an amino acid
found in warm milk and turkey. He's trying again, and this time he swears he
won't mess up." Ryan explained.

"And how does one control their seizures?" Carmen asked.

"Praxil's the preferred brand used by many of the soldiers. But ever
since the Crash Praxil's been getting harder and harder to find due to high
costs and lower production. Nowadays Praxil is limited to hospital use, but
sometimes hospital workers will steal large quantities of Praxil and sell
them on the black market for high prices."

"Where's Lydexter's base now?"

"He's relocated base from the Andes Mountains in Peru to Antarctica."

"The one place he thinks no one will look." Carmen banged on the
coffee table. "Damn!"

**********

Honolulu, Hawaii

"Great. This city looks like an almost exact duplicate of Seattle...
just that there are palm trees than skyscrapers..." Azalea saw that many
people were no better off than those in Seattle after the Crash.

"What are you looking at?" a little girl's voice asked. Azalea looked
down to see a young girl, maybe 10 years of age.

"Just someone." Azalea answered, a little annoyed.

"Jade?" a woman stepped out from under a makeshift store.

"I'm coming!" the girl ran to the woman.

Azalea quickly moved on, leaving Jade and the woman alone.

Walking past a man listening to his radio, she heard a snippet of a
song: "'I believe your parents did the best job they knew how to do.'"

'Hm...interesting line. Wonder if Mom and Dad really did do the best
they knew how to do...' Azalea mused.

"You looking at something?" the man asked.

Azalea snapped out of her thoughts. "Uh...yeah. I need to find a
woman named Aileen."

"She's down the street with her daughter Jade." the man answered.

Azalea looked down the street and back to the man. "Uh, thanks."

"No problem."

Azalea returned to the woman and Jade. "Excuse me," she said.

The woman looked up. "Yes?"

"Are you Aileen?"

"Uh...yeah..." Aileen looked at her suspiciously.

"I have something to give you. A friend of mine, Iris Sayak, told me
to give this photo of her to you." Azalea took out Iris's photo and handed it
to Aileen.

Aileen and Jade took a glance at Iris. "What's happened to my niece?"

"The headmaster of the Asylum we were in injected some kind of
bioengineered disease into Iris. There's no cure for the disease, and even if
there was an antidote Lydexter wouldn't provide it."

"Who's Iris?" Jade asked.

"She's your cousin, Jadie," Aileen said. Then she looked at Azalea.
"Who are you?"

"You probably don't remember me, but I'm Ivy Hayes' daughter. The
name's Azalea."

"Ivy..." Aileen blinked at the sound of the name. "How could you have
survived all these years?"

"I guess it's just luck," Azalea shrugged.

"Thank you for giving me this. If Iris is still alive when you go
back, say goodbye to her for me."

"I'll do that," Azalea promised. She hit the C-5 and exited.

**********

Seattle
May 28, 2024


Ryan went into his bathroom for a shower when he noticed a box of red
hair dye next to his sink. "What the hell?" He looked inside the medicine
cabinet and found a note Azalea left had left behind.

"Ryan--or Carmen--whoever receives this note: I've left for England
under the disguise of my deceased mother. I've heard that Lydexter is
planning on seeing if Tina and Jeffrey are in their mansion, ever since news
mentioned that the twins received a vast inheritance, and Lydexter could be
after the money. Cheers, Azalea. PS: Tell me if Michael will be alright."
Azalea's voice echoed out in Ryan's mind.