Chapter 89: Bad Neighbors (Part 1)
The City of Townsville. Suburbs. 'Powerpuff' Lane. Smith Residence.
03 MAR (Friday) 1989. 2303.
Harold Smith had been spying on 'The House' through the Venetian blinds of his office for the past hour. As usual, the lights in that house were still on - those villainous neighborhood invaders had no sense of preserving Mother Earth! But that was the least of their crimes. The dad and husband of the Smith family seethed with pent-up rage and frustration. No. If only being wasteful was the 'Utonium's only sin. His life would have been so ideal as it had been had it been their only sin.
Just four months ago, life was perfect. He was married to the most stunning lady he had ever seen. His eldest kid, Bud Smith, though possessed by the usual angst and wild emotions that many teenagers had to deal with, was nonetheless talented in his own way, having formed a garage band and found mountain biking as a form of outlet for said wild emotions. While he wasn't the most academically accomplished of students in Townsville High, he was at least good in mathematics and the sciences, not to mention music and physical education.
Julie Smith, his daughter, had been the newest addition to the family, and although she had a rough sibling relationship with Bud, had nonetheless bonded with him over music. She had picked up several instruments including the flute and musical triangle which had seen her join the classical music club of her elementary school - her wish in music was to 'collect' even more instruments and learn how to use them all. Despite her pudgy physique, she had also found her place in ballet school, and despite being mocked by thinner students, was one of the top dancers there who had taken part in several performances. Although she had shown no other talents outside of music and dance, her parents believed that she would grow to gain more talents, and even if she hadn't, she would likely end up in a conservatory by the time she was a teenager.
For all his children's accomplishments, Harold wasn't sure where their talents had come from. He himself was a simple man who, ever since marrying his wife, cared only about being a breadwinner; he had no appreciation for the finer things in life, no hobbies unless caring for his family could be counted as such. Harold's wife, Marianne, had no sports or musical talents. She worked in a fashion shop before becoming a homemaker. He'd put it down to her parenting and gentle touch while she was holding down the fort whenever he had gone to work in the city.
It'd started even before his new 'neighbors' moved into the house next to his. The USDO, functioning then as a, frankly, scarier entity since it was unknown then, had moved everyone out of the neighborhood. From what he heard, they were offered compensation, though not enough to pay for the houses they lost.
Harold was one of those who didn't budge, though he wasn't sure if there were others. He'd even stood on his porch with his shotgun when the G-men came with some papers for him to sign that day. He was disarmed easily, of course, after security officers in unfamiliar grey uniform swarmed him and threatened him with physical and mental consequences. When he continued to refuse stubbornly, the G-men in suits threatened him with legal and financial consequences. The only silver lining was that his children weren't there to witness their father plead his case in tears, blubbering and bawling like a baby.
Unlike his neighbors, he didn't have the financial resilience to move. He had been poor before he moved to Townsville a year ago, deep in debt from a failed business venture. He'd caught a break when he accepted a managerial position in Morbucks Industries because of his flexible problem-solving abilities and engineering skills. The catch was that he had to move from California, risking even more debt if he couldn't keep the job.
And the USDO made damn sure he couldn't keep the job. While the USDO had relented and let him stay in his house, he was subjected to security checks every time he went in and out of the neighborhood. He was put on a strict curfew, making his working hours terribly inflexible, and when his employers finally caught wind of his situation, decided to let him go. His kids suffered similarly. Despite being a teenager and prepubescent respectively, Bud and Julie were put on curfew too and couldn't pursue their interests. Bud had to disband his garage band and discontinue his biking expeditions. Julie stopped going to ballet and music classes. Bud became more irritable and irritating than before, and they began seeing a side of Julie they had never seen before.
To make ends meet, Harold Smith had to take up a dreary job as a worker in a mustard jar factory. Compared to his managerial position, the pay was meager and just enough to pay for his mortgage and monthly debt repayment. Marianne had to go back to work running a shop, which meant less attention spent on the kids.
But that wasn't all. Within weeks of the Utoniums moving in, Harold Smith found his Golden Retriever dead in his own backyard, hidden away in the bushes. It had been dead for days by the time he found it. He had previously hoped that the dog had just wandered off and would return. The news devastated both Bud and Julie the most. The burial ceremony they held in their backyard didn't help matters. Harold knew who to blame right from the start. The evidence was there: tiny footprints of mary-janes, his dog had been stabbed in the eye with a tree branch, its neck snapped and there was a great force behind the injury.
Then there was the constant fear of just being dragged away by the USDO or their enemies. The USDO had conducted random security checks on their house once in a while, making sure that he couldn't make it work on several occasions. There were times when the enemies of the USDO do pay the Utoniums a visit, and they had to cower in their basement whenever it happened, for fear that they would become collateral damage.
Oh, he tried to turn things around even during these dark days. He'd tried damn hard to turn things around. Back in January, he invited them over for dinner. It was no easy feat, as he had to submit written requests to the USDO - in triplicates - and wait for a reply that came sluggishly, insultingly, and only after days. He'd tried ever since late December, only to be rejected several times before whoever it was in the USDO's admin allowed it. It was funny how it worked. He'd tried to approach the man of The House, Professor Utonium - he believed - but he was stopped by Captain Scott of the suburb's security detail before being turned around. Forcibly.
And when he had them over finally? Oh, it was all well and good at first. Harold had made gentle hints to the professor and his (apparent) wife, Selicia, about getting a job in the USDO itself, and the apparent father of the Powerpuff Girls - if such a thing was possible - seemed to be receptive. He'd worked his way through the subtle pleading during dinner, sure that things would finally work out. Then dessert came.
Marianne had spent hours upon hours on her (literally) award-winning coconut cream pies. Harold had no idea what had set the green one - Buttercup - off. Perhaps it was the color of the pies, resembling the kind clowns commonly used to attack one another. Perhaps it was in Buttercup's nature to incite pandemonium. But whatever the cause, it happened. Buttercup, for no reason whatsoever, threw her pie at the blue one - Bubbles - who, after screaming and crying shrilly, threw hers at Buttercup. The ever impressionable Julie mimicked them by stuffing her pie into Bud, who retaliated with equally creamy fury. Marianne had gotten so mad that she threw hers at Blossom, who thought it was fun, and threw hers at Marianne as if it was some snowball fight.
Needless to say, Harold's wife broke down inconsolably by the end of it. It wasn't cheap nor easy, making those pies. Harold, on the other hand, hated seeing his wife that way. It'd set him off with no way to defuse the nuclear explosion. He'd yelled for the Utoniums to "GET the FUCK out of my HOUSE!" That wasn't all, of course, as he'd proceeded to call the Girls and their supposed parents all sorts of names while they were on their way out. Predictably, all his attempts at getting a job in the USDO, which was basically a huge blow to his pride in the first place as it was tantamount to sleeping with the enemy, had all gone down the drain with his wife's coconut cream pies.
Oh, and the PTF visited the next day, headed by some guy called Lieutenant Blake, who proceeded to bust down his door and wreck some furniture in his house for a 'random security check'. After enough damage was done, he warned him to be nicer to Blossom, Bubbles, and Buttercup, and to never call Blossom a 'clueless idiot', Bubbles a 'born slut' (which was followed by 'fucking whore') and Buttercup a 'raging psychopath' ever again or he would 'make damn sure' he would never see his own children again, since…
'You, Mister Harold Smith, must be the worst parent in the world to ever say such things to three of the world's most beautiful and gifted children,' Lieutenant Blake had said back then before leaving. Although Harold thought he'd gotten off light considering that he had called Selicia a 'God damn prostitute' and Professor Utonium a 'retarded geek', slurs which Captain Blake had overlooked, the PTF officer's words had stung him to the core, partly because he had little left, and being a good father was part of his ever-diminishing dignity… But also partly because there was a distinct possibility that Lieutenant Blake was right. He did drag his children into this, and before that, through the mud of his failures - things a good son and daughter shouldn't be made to go through.
Needless to say, he'd been avoiding the Powerpuff Girls and their handlers ever since that incident, but to do that, he had to leave for work earlier than before, and he couldn't venture beyond his home much. Whenever he saw any member of the Utoniums, he would run back into his house, afraid that he might somehow be struck down by lightning or some other instance of bad luck.
But recently, he'd been receiving messages, messages that would hint at a chance to end all this. Back in the middle of February, a colleague at the mustard factory whom he did not really know had passed him a piece of paper rolled up into something resembling a cigar, with a few hundred dollar bills at its core. Someone who went by the abbreviated name of 'J. J.' had empathized with him, and offered him a way out by following his simple instructions.
In following the first instruction, he took his family out the next weekend on an exceedingly rare shopping trip using the money this 'J. J.' fellow had supplied him with. They bought mainly clothes, and Harold had bought himself and his wife black clothes and sneakers.
The second instruction led him to the bushes in his backyard, where someone had planted a lockpicking kit and manual. He would learn the craft from then on, using the doors in his own house. Whoever this 'J. J.' was, he had proven his power by implying that he had a spy within the USDO.
The third instruction told him where to hide everything that was given to him, which also told him where to find a couple of pistols. As it just so happened, they were in his backyard, coincidentally just after the USDO had conducted another random search of his house.
The fourth roll of paper gave him a detailed schedule of the guard rotation and patrol routes of the USDO security detail protecting the Utonium family.
And most recently, a fifth paper told him what his objective was: to steal a sample of the Anti-X, as well as data about it. He had been provided with detailed steps on how to do it, to be followed to the letter. There was a really tiny map on the paper, which he read with a magnifying glass.
And this brought him all the way to the present…
The City of Townsville. Suburbs. 'Powerpuff' Lane. Smith Residence.
03 MAR (Friday) 1989. 2305.
It was time. Turning to his wife, Marianne, he watched her going over the things they needed for the suburban heist. She removed a magazine from one of the pistols they were provided, checked the ammo count, slipped it back in before pulling the slide and putting the pistol on safety. She did the same with him, before checking his lockpick set.
She had always been supportive of him that he could break down in joy right now but now was not the time. Walking over to her, he gave her a peck on the forehead before helping out with the rest of the equipment. The flashlights worked fine. Their clothes and bags had no tears and holes. They were good to go, but there was just one more thing.
After putting on their robbery kits, Harold and Marianne went up to Julie's room. The husband half of the duo sat on the kid's bed silently, before running his hand in her hair. Even in her sleep, Julie was frowning, and it wasn't just anger at the things she had lost, the friends she could no longer see.
"I'm going to make it all better," Harold whispered to his daughter, before giving her a kiss in the cheek. "I promise." With that, he pulled his daughter's blanket up to her shoulders and tucked her in.
He was going to do the same thing with Bud when he heard rock music from his room, likely blasting from the radio he'd given him for his birthday last year when times were more optimistic. Harold knew what it meant. Bud was staying up late - without his permission again - and playing some computer game off of the desktop he'd bought for the teen for Christmas two years ago. Simcity or Minesweeper or something like that, he couldn't remember. It was all he could do now… now that his real passions were stolen from him.
Harold felt for his boy. Putting a hand on Bud's door, he whispered the same promise he made to Julie before heading off. He'd stay longer if he could, but the guard rotation was coming up. It was the only time he could be sure that they wouldn't sneak up on his house or on him and his wife while they were busy raiding the Utoniums' house.
The first they did was to switch off all the lights around his house, leaving only the living room lights on, to give the impression that he was still there. They then went to their backyard and into the bushes around the fence separating his house and the Utonium residence. There was a specific area where J. J.'s insider man had made an entrance by loosening the boards, and he had to navigate with faint light from the streetlamps - which was no easy feat, considering that he had no training beyond brief self-taught lessons encouraged by a man - or woman - he had never met.
It took them a minute too long, but Harold was able to find it eventually, though he had to navigate more by touch than sight. Squeezing through with difficulty, Harold and Marianne soon found themselves in enemy territory; The House, where The Powerpuff Girls had been flying out of ever since Christmas.
They were in the backyard, and so they crossed it to a back door leading into the house. Harold began picking the lock. There was light underneath the door, which meant that the living room of The House was lit. Someone could be there, so Harold tried to pick it as silently as he could. But what he'd made easy in practice was much harder in execution. He had been picking the same locks in his house over the past couple of weeks, and this one was different. He was nervous, and that had made his fingers twitchy in ways that were counterproductive.
"Come on, Harold, please hurry!" Marianne rushed him. She had been supporting before, but now that she was out here in the dark with soldiers all around them, she was a whole different story altogether.
"I'm trying," Harold grunted and whispered back. He'd failed the first couple of times he tried to beat the lock, but he had a good feeling on the third try, having already defeated half the pins in the door by the time Marianne had grown afraid.
They could hear some kind of engine starting up, and it was coming from somewhere near the front of The House. "They're coming, Harold!" Marianne was almost screaming at him, but she still had some wits left to keep it down.
Then Harold turned his tension wrench. The satisfying sound of mechanical parts turning was music to his ears. He turned the doorknob and the door allowed him entry. He could hardly believe it! It felt like an achievement even greater than landing his Morbucks managerial job! But there was no time for celebration, and the thieving couple began piling through the door just as a convoy of military humvees and an APC roared by.
Together, the Smiths sneaked towards the living room, ears peeled for any sound, but they could hear nothing: not the TV, not the flipping of books, no children playing. Harold had seen a map of The House in his last letter. Unfortunately for him, the entrance to the lab was in the living room. Should the professor be there, it might necessitate the use of his gun, which came with silencers and subsonic rounds, but if the professor happened to be facing away from them, choking him to death from the back would be preferable. Oh, how Harold relished the idea of killing Professor Utonium as he who was one of those who oppressed him and his family.
But it was not to be. When Harold peeked out of a corner, he saw no one in the living room; not the professor, not the bitch known as Selicia. Were they really even married? Harold had no clue. Sensing a chance, Harold and Marianne began sneaking towards the lab.
"How many times did I tell you!? No picking at your stitches, Buttercup!" a voice suddenly exploded after a door slammed open. The noise was coming from the second floor. It'd made Harold and Marianne jump. It was a female voice. Selicia. It'd made them hurry, padding briskly towards the lab entrance. But there was some hope to this. If the Utonium bitch was upstairs, did that mean that Professor Utonium was upstairs too?
"But Mom! It itches! It really itches really badly!" one of the blasted three freaky girls complained, her voice fading as if going further away.
"Just stop touching your cheek or you'll break the stitches! I'll get the cream from the bathroom!" Selicia voice was fading too, before disappearing completely with the slam of another door.
In the meantime, Harold had been hard at work trying to open the airlock leading into the laboratory as quietly as he could. The airlock wasn't the most subtle entrance there was. It was heavy and loud, and it came with two sets of doors. It was like trying to build an aircraft engine quietly: something darn near impossible.
Another burst of sound caught him off-guard just when he was able to open the first set of airlock doors. The sound of children, girls, giggling down the corridor above. It was probably the two other members of the 'Powerpuff Girls'. Afraid that he would be discovered, Harold closed the doors behind him after ushering his wife in.
He was less cautious when it came to the second set of doors. He'd opened them loudly and quickly before descending down the stairs and into the labs. When he was there, he couldn't help but to pause and stare in wonder at the huge underground facility; he couldn't believe that these strange activities of the USDO were being conducted right under his very nose, not that he was that important a person. It was like being in a science fiction movie. His wife had to snap him out of it, and together, they made for what they believed to be the main computer of the labs.
That was when the professor himself jumped out at them, at least, that was Harold's impression. The professor had just been carrying some documents out from storage for analysis when he ran into Harold and Marianne. The Smith duo pulled their pistols on him, and the professor was too shocked to react; he just stood rooted to the ground, files in his arms.
"Harold? Is that you?" the professor muttered the man's name. Apparently, the clothes Harold had put on had done nothing to hide his identity. His bald head, crowned by hair greying from stress, had stuck out above his black hoodie, whose hood had fallen off, and his mask. Harold, though, couldn't believe that the professor could even remember his name, but then again, he thought he must have made an impression after his explosive release of pent-up rage that saw Professor Utonium's entire family getting bombarded with vulgarities a hardcore Hell's Angels biker wouldn't use. "What are you doing here?"
"I could've asked you the same question!" Harold yelled at the professor as he jabbed his pistol at him. He was shaking with fury; apparently, the last time he'd released his rage hadn't been enough. "You and your federal friends have ruined my life! And I'm putting an end to you and your freaky little family!"
"Your bug-eyed mutant daughters are a menace!" Marianne added. The professor recognized her too. Her dark skin tone and light blonde hair had given her away.
"I- I don't know what to say…" Professor Utonium replied. He remembered what had happened with the Smiths back in January because of how messed up - literally - it was. He would have lectured his daughters in front of the Smiths, apologized and made up for the ruined desserts somehow had he been given time.
"Then don't say anything!" Harold yelled at the professor, before gesturing for Marianne to get a move on. "Honey, why don't you search for the Anti-X and data while I hold our dear neighbor here for a chat?"
"You're looking for the Anti-X?" the professor said in disbelief. How did they know about that? Furthermore, how did they even knew to come down to the lab or even come anywhere close to The House without security detaining them? "Why?"
Harold realized his mistake of revealing his intentions when the professor questioned him, but what was done was done. It didn't matter anyway. What could one retarded geek do to him anyway? Now that he had him at gunpoint with none of his Chemical X-enhanced daughters anywhere near him?
"Well, I can imagine that someone's looking to destroy your daughters and rule the world," Harold said in an almost comical way, mostly just to tick the professor off. The professor had served as a constant reminder of how shitty his life had become because of the USDO, and he would suffer for it. "Yeah, I would imagine that the Anti-X will kill your daughters - are they really even your daughters? Or are they adopted? It begs the question, really - where did you even get them from? And how unethical is the USDO to allow human experimentation on little kids?"
"Harold, please," the professor pleaded with the man, clearly disturbed by the implications of his neighbor's words. Harold, indeed, did look pleased with himself. "We can talk about this! Just- just stop. Please don't hurt my precious little babies!"
"Your precious little babies? If that's how you feel about kids, why did you hurt mine?" Harold hissed, his voice narrowing into a dangerous whisper. "Do you know how they used to be like? How much of themselves they've lost? No, I bet you don't. I'm not going to stop. I won't stop until the USDO is gone, and your monster daughters are dead and burnt to ash, and I'm going to burn the ash too-"
The professor tried to rush Harold when reasoning with him seemed futile, but Harold was too fast. BANG! He'd fired his pistol before the professor could even touch him…
