"The whole park!"

"Yup. And just the two of them."

Hey Linda where's your other fucking child?

We're gonna pretend Perry had no idea where he set the laser to fire okay? Okay. This was an excuse to make Ferb and Dr. D interact and I'm not ashamed about it. Set post "It's No Picnic"


One second, Ferb was dangling in the last car on a picnic basket themed ride, watching as Isabella escorted Phineas away to talk. The next, he was being zapped with some weird laser, and then he was falling from said picnic basket themed ride and onto the hard metal of what felt like a laboratory floor.

Ferb groaned, pressing a hand to his head; the hit had jostled his mouth and made his molars ring in pain. Despite all of Phineas' enthusiasm, he had been at the dentist before he'd been mysteriously transported home, and his brain was still incredibly fuzzy from the laughing gas. Not fuzzy enough not to know how to build an invention, of course; that was practically second nature at this point. But fuzzy enough that when he stood, the room swayed around him, and Ferb stumbled over his own two feet.

There were other people nearby as well, but they all just seemed to be muttering in confusion and leaving whatever space they were in. Meanwhile, he could barely put his feet flat on the floor. Phineas had been kind of dragging him along as they went. Much as Ferb loved his brother, sometimes he wish Phineas had common sense about certain things.

Like how you probably shouldn't be making someone high on dentist drugs construct a massive amusement park, for one. Ferb was pretty sure a forklift counted under "heavy machinery" in the warnings.

"All right, pack it up people," came a nasally sounding voice from off to his right. "Party's over. Sheesh, how am I supposed to get rid of a whole amusement park?"

Ferb pressed both hands to his face and shut his eyes tightly. His brain felt like it was melting out his ears. "It folds up into a picnic basket," he slurred out.

Silence, and then footsteps approached him, and a gentle hand fell on his shoulder. "Hey kid, you doing okay? You're not gonna puke, are ya? Cause I just cleaned the lab."

Ferb swallowed and shook his head, wincing as he stumbled. The hand tightened and steadied him. "Dentist," he muttered, focusing on the grounding feeling of the grip on his shoulder. "Was at…"

"Aw, shoot," the man said. He had a Drusselsteinian accent, Ferb thought somewhere in the back of his mind. "I must've accidentally zapped you when my -inator was random firing. H-Here, sit down."

Careful hands guided him across the room, until Ferb finally managed to open his eyes and find the sofa himself. When he turned, looking at the man, he faltered, and relief flooded through him at the sight of someone at least a tiny bit familiar. "You're Vanessa's dad," he said.

The man – Mr. Doofenshmirtz, if Ferb remembered Vanessa's last name right – blinked in surprise. "I am. And you are?"

Ferb swallowed the taste of cotton in his mouth. "Ferb," he said shortly.

"Right. And you said…to get rid of this theme park…?"

He gestured in the general direction of the rides, and Ferb noticed that everyone else was long gone. He wondered if his family had noticed his absence yet, and moved his other hand to his pocket, only to grimace when he remembered that he'd left his phone with his mother. "Big red button in the ticket booth," he answered finally, remembering the question. "Turns it into a picnic basket."

His tongue felt too thick, he thought, as Mr. Doofenshmirtz darted over to the rides and into the booth. Seconds later, the room was filled with the clattering noises of things folding up, and eventually all that sat in the space was a small picnic basket with a red ribbon on the outside. Mr. Doofenshmirtz picked it up in glee. "Oh wow, you really know your stuff, kid. Say, ever thought of an internship?"

Ferb furrowed his eyebrows and opened his mouth, only to hiss as his tongue caught the wrong way on his tooth. He clutched his jaw and shut his eyes again, breathing deep for a moment, and when he peeked out at the room once more, Mr. Doofenshmirtz was kneeling in front of him, his eyes concerned. "You okay, kid?"

"I-"

"You said you were at the dentist," the man recalled, and Ferb nodded, wincing again as the room spun around him. "Did he give you medication?" Another nod, and Mr. Doofenshmirtz sighed.

"All right," he said, standing. "Can you call someone to pick you up?"

"I don't have my phone," he managed.

"Course ya don't. Hang on, let me get the land line."

Ferb watched him walk away and then set his elbows on his knees, burying his head in his hands and trying to think around the pain in his mouth. His eyes swam with unshed tears, and he forced out a shaky breath.

He just wanted to go home.


"And he wasn't with you at the park?" Linda confirmed one more time.

Phineas swallowed, his arms wrapped tight around Perry. His voice trembled. "He was, but then he vanished with everyone else! I don't know where they went Mom, I swear."

Linda softened at the crackling sound of Phineas' voice and bent down to cup his cheek. "I know, sweetie. I'm sorry, I'm not mad at you, I'm just confused by the whole situation. It's not like Ferb to just…run out of the dentist like that."

"But he didn't-"

"Candace, you didn't see him leave either?"

She looked up from her phone, where she had been rapid-fire texting Jeremy and Stacy about Ferb's missing status, and shook her head. "No. Like Phineas said," Candace grumbled. Her eyes betrayed her concern. "Everyone just disappeared. Ferb included."

Perry was struggling not to panic. If he had even an inkling of a clue where Doof's machine had been set to fire to, he'd be already there searching for his kid. As it was, Phineas had him practically in a death grip, and he couldn't get away. He felt awful. This was basically all his fault; if he hadn't set off the machine in the park before making sure all his kids were out of range, this never would have happened.

"Hang on, someone's calling me," Candace said, flapping her hand at everyone. "I don't recognize the number." She pulled her phone to her ear. "Hello?"

Seconds later, a smile of relief spread across her face. "Ferb," she breathed, and everyone else in the room visibly relaxed. "Where are you, buddy?"

Linda held out her hand. "Let me-"

Candace lifted a finger, brow furrowing. "Vanessa's? How'd you get there? Actually you know what, don't answer, I can barely understand you."

Never mind, Perry was back to panicking. Of course he'd accidentally sent his kid to his nemesis' place. Of course the world liked playing cruel jokes on him like that. And of course, of course, he could do nothing about it.

Linda finally wrestled the phone from Candace and put it to her own ear. "Ferb, honey, are you safe? Is there an adult with you?"

Perry watched the tension ease from her shoulders even as it seeped into his body. "Okay. Stay there, honey. We'll be right over to pick you up."

Candace took the phone back from her mother, hung it up, and studied the screen intently, thumbs flying. "I'm texting Vanessa," she explained, before her mother could ask, and Perry had to silently wonder how his life had gotten so weird that one of his kids texting his nemesis' daughter was normal. "So she can tell me her dad's address. It's that weird apartment complex downtown, but I don't know how to actually – ah, there it is. Got it."

"All right. Phineas, leave Perry here honey. He can't go in with us, and I don't want to leave him alone in the car."

Phineas squished Perry a little tighter and buried his nose in his fur for just a moment before releasing him on the floor. Perry waited impatiently as the trio left the living room, counted to ten to make sure they were really gone, and then bolted for his jetpack.

Listen, he trusted Heinz. He did. But to an extent. And Ferb, while perfectly capable under normal circumstances, and probably the most competent of his kids, if Perry was forced to pick, had been at the dentist. Which meant he probably had a lot of medication in his system, which meant that these were not normal circumstances.

Perry kicked off the ground and booked it for D.E.I, knowing he'd make it there at least a good twenty to thirty minutes before the others; even with Linda's lead foot, traffic in downtown Danville at this time of day was atrocious.

He tucked and rolled on the outer balcony, out of sight of the interior of the building, and eased around the corner behind a pile of spare parts, clinging to one of the pipes and scaling it up to the ceiling. He scurried across the metal, eyeing the seemingly innocent picnic basket sitting in the middle of the lab floor, and focused his sights on the living area, where-

"Oh you are definitely cheating," Heinz scoffed, handing over a card to Ferb, who had the tiniest smile on his face. "No way anyone is that good at Go Fish."

Ferb set his match down on the table in front of him, and by the look of the pile, he had been doing that for a while. "Do you have a 7?" he asked innocently.

Heinz groaned, thumping his head back against the headrest of the sofa, throwing his cards to the table. "I give up, kid. You win. Again."

Ferb's smile widened just a little and then he winced, pressing his hand to his mouth. Perry tensed, but Heinz jumped to his feet. "Right! Ice pack, I'll grab that."

He darted off to the kitchen and Perry relaxed instantly. Thank god, he'd gone into "Dad Mode," as Perry called it in his head. Those weird times where he got overly protective, usually because of Vanessa, and all thoughts of evil flew from his head. It was oddly reassuring that he slipped into that mode around any child, but especially right now, it made Perry breathe a sigh of relief. That was his kid. Not that Doof knew that, obviously, but if he'd been in anything but "Dad Mode" when Perry got here, he couldn't say he wouldn't have taken it out on the scientist during their next fight.

"All right, here ya go," Doof said as he returned, holding out an ice pack wrapped in a hand towel. Ferb took it and pushed it to his jaw. "Sure you don't want me to whip up an "Anti-Pain-inator or something? I mean it's not evil, but I'm sure it could come in handy with how often Per-"

Perry tensed, but Ferb held up his hand before Heinz could continue talking and potentially blowing his identity (though there was no guaranteeing that hadn't happened already, a traitorous voice in the back of his head reminded him). He shook his head, eyes glittering in amusement, and Doof offered him a lopsided smile. "Right. Okay, kid. Best two of three?"

Ferb blinked at him slowly, and Perry knew his kid well enough to know he was stifling a yawn. Heinz must have figured it out too, if his sudden shift from "Evil Scientist" back into "Dad Mode" was any indication. "Tired? H-Here, let me turn off the lights or something, I'm sure those drugs from the dentist plus making an entire literal amusement park knocked you out."

Ferb waved his hand dismissively, but he did sink a little further into the couch cushions and let his eyelids lower. Perry finally fully relaxed against the pipe he was on, crossing his arms under his chin and watching quietly as Doof bustled around, lowering the lights and cleaning up the card game while Ferb dozed. The man eventually sat down himself with a clipboard, a pencil, and some blank blueprint paper, and Perry rolled his eyes even as he smiled; of course he was already prepping for tomorrow.

The doorbell rang about ten minutes later, and Ferb jolted awake, gripping the ice pack from where it had been slipping from his grasp. He pressed it fully back to his jaw as Heinz set aside his work – out of Ferb's eyesight, Perry noted with appreciation – and moved to the door. He had barely gotten it open before a blur of red streaked through and then Phineas was clinging to Ferb.

"Ferb!" the boy yelped. "I am so sorry that we lost you, so sorry dude, we should've made sure that-"

Perry turned his attention to the door as Candace went to join her brothers and plopped his chin in his hand, watching with interest as Heinz rubbed the back of his neck awkwardly. "Um. Sorry your kid ended up here," he offered. "H-He's okay, his mouth is just sore. I gave him an ice pack and some water, b-but I don't know if that was enough."

Linda gave him a kind smile, though her eyes were searching him like she couldn't quite place how she knew him. Perry sometimes wondered how everyone he knew was so dense. "More than enough. Thank you, Mr. Doofenshmirtz."

Heinz shifted on his feet. "Doctor, actually, b-but no worries."

Candace let Ferb lean against her as they walked back to the door, where he attempted to hand off the ice pack to Heinz. Doof held up his hand and shook his head. "Keep it. Trust me, I've got plenty."

Ferb gave the man a small smile. "Thank you."

The group finally trekked out and Perry watched as Doof shut the door and shook his head. "Nice kid," he muttered, before turning back to the living space.

Perry held up his hand, ticking down his fingers. 3, 2, 1-

"Oh my god that was Linda."

Perry snickered at the man's stricken expression and then backed up off the pipe and out of the building, leaving Heinz to his turmoil and strapping into his jetpack once again.

He had a kid that he very much wanted to be home to greet.