The Loch Ness Syndrome: Zed's Fishing Trip
Part 10: Catch of the Day
The flight back to HQ was surprisingly quiet, everyone was exhausted from the case. The two alien criminals were having more problems with cramping than Jay at the moment, enduring worse conditions than Coach. MIB policy, all extraterrestrial menaces threatening the well beings of agents or other MIB staff were to be stored in the cargo hold as 'pets'. Yazmine had happily obliged to Zeeltor testing his latest form altering device on the two gummy crooks.
"What form should I give them?" he had inquired of Zed.
Zed had thought about this a moment before getting a mischievous grin and replying, "Oh I dunno Zeeltor, they look like they'd make pretty good fishing worms to me."
"NO!" the two swindlers had screamed, but to no avail. They were now miserably traveling back to MIB HQ inside a bucket that sat in the back of the plane inside of a trunk full of Zed's fishing gear.
Zed looked around the plane. Delia was slumped over on R, both dreaming away. Kay was going over some reports for no doubt another case that was waiting to be solved once everyone got back. Jay had finally wriggled into a comfortable position and hit the sack. Zed sighed, peace at last, this was the only way to travel. Then a thought hit him, 'Better call Agent U and make sure I've got an organization to come home to.'
******
U groaned and gazed out at the mess that the MIB HQ had become. Ceiling plaster (of a rare metallic make) littered the floor, along with paperwork and luggage. Agents were sprawled out all over the place trying to get a handle on the chaos, so many files misplaced, so little time to get back on track. Why did these things always have to happen to him?
The communications screen flickered and in an instant Zed's face appeared, "Agent U?"
"Uh, y-yes Sir?" Agent U stuttered, standing close to the screen to block Zed's view.
"We're on our way home with the perps behind the Loch Ness attacks." Zed informed him, "I trust I'll find everything still in working order?"
"Well---sure---everything's been running smoothly as usual Sir." U hated lying to the chief but his job was on the line here.
"Good to hear, our plane should arrive in," Zed paused to look at his watch, "about an hour."
'Gulp!' U nodded as the screen went black. "Oh perfect, NOW WHAT DO I DO?!"
A thought occurred to him, a thought he really didn't want to follow through with. But he was desperate. Sighing he hit a button under the desk, "Yes Si--oh yeah---it's you, U." W strolled in.
"Gee thanks." he mumbled and then took on a pleading expression, "Zed's flight arrives in one hour! What am I supposed to do?!"
W burst out laughing, "Get a change of address form, and FAST!"
"I'm serious!" U snapped.
"So am I!" she couldn't stop laughing. Finally Mr. Perfect was gonna get chewed out!
"W, PLEASE, help me out here."
She stopped laughing for a moment. The poor guy looked so pathetic, he was down on his knees now. With an, "I'm gonna hate myself in the morning for this." she walked out of the office and over to the Twins' station.
"Mind if I borrow this?" she asked Bob, he replied in his own language and handed her the headset with the microphone attached. "Attention MIB staff," she began, "we have a bit of a crisis on our hands here. Zed will be arriving in approximately one hour. That means we'd better have this place back to normal by the time he comes through those elevator doors or we can kiss our bonuses---and our necks---good-bye!"
There was a murmur through the crowd and agents immediately dropped what they were doing and started cleaning up the main floor. Other staff members rushed down to filing with their forms while still more hurried down to the garage to help fix the backed up mess at the entry. W turned and smiled to U, "And that, my friend, is how it's done."
U couldn't believe this, Zed may as well have left W in charge! Now that was a scary thought. "You honestly think we can pull this off?"
"Only one way to find out." she stopped an agent rushing past her and took his broom, tossing it to U as he approached she smirked, "Get busy."
"This was not the paper pushing I had in mind." he grumbled as he started sweeping the mass of crumpled papers away from the Twins' station.
******
Exactly one hour later the elevator doors parted and a very pleasantly surprised Zed made his way out into HQ. Things looked---great. The lines were moving quickly, all the forms were being delivered on time and to the right agents, and nothing seemed amiss at all.
"Ah, welcome back Sir." Agent U panted. "May I take your luggage?"
"Why so out of breath Agent?" Zed inquired.
"Oh, uh. Running the MIB takes a lot out of one Sir." U replied, and boy did he ever mean it!
"Agreed," Zed chuckled, "but you seem to have done an okay job of it son."
"Thank you Sir." U smiled proudly.
"In fact," Zed continued, "I wouldn't mind going off with the other agents here on a few more cases and leaving you in charge. You certainly seem to have a knack for this leadership thing."
U grew pale, "M-more cases Sir?"
"That's right, what do you say?"
Beads of sweat dotted U's forehead, instead of replying his eyes rolled back and he hit the floor. "Uh---Agent U?"
W snickered, "His just a little overwhelmed Sir, nothing a few days back in the field won't cure."
"Dude looks like he could use a few days in the Mental Ward," Jay joked.
"Hi Zed," Val smiled, approaching the lot with a stack of folders, "nice to have you back." Glancing at U lying on the floor unconscious she added, "We've REALLY missed you."
"Hey Val," Jay began flirting, "missed you too. How 'bout a kiss for your favorite field agent?"
"How 'bout a black eye for the arrogant player?" Val countered.
"Aw c'mon Val, you had to have missed me?" Jay insisted.
"I bet that stewardess doesn't miss him." Delia snickered to R.
"Stewardess?" Val's eyes flashed.
"Whoa, hold it Val," Jay said nervously as she advanced on him, the others were enjoying this, "now you know you're my one and only."
"Better run Tiger." Kay warned.
"One and only huh? Ha! For today maybe!" she took off after him throwing the folders up in the air and sending their contents raining down on the other agents and scientists.
"My medical advise to him would be to keep running," Zeeltor chuckled.
"Hope he's in good physical health," Yazmine laughed, "of course, Val's been working out."
Zed sighed, in the background he could hear Val screaming at Jay for being a no good lying cheat, "I guess what they say is true---there's no place like home."
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~The End~