By the time Dudley was done in the simulation with Jeremiah and his other agents, they had run through three different simulations, Dudley had a different role each time, and every time came out a failure. Jeremiah was not pleased. And after the first simulation, Dudley could conclude that Jeremiah didn't dislike him. Jeremiah hated him. Even though Jeremiah gave instructions and orders, Dudley just didn't follow along. Finally at the end of the series of simulated battle zones, the agents put their borrowed equipment back into the stocks and went back toward the entrance where a computer was handing out report cards.

"If I had to guess, you were more like a drop out mascot than an agent.", Jeremiah scorned as Dudley waited to collect his report, "Well, listen closely. You're not in TUFF anymore."

Dudley felt low. Even though Jeremiah was hurling bad comments, he felt like this wasn't the end of it. Dudley's report card looked much worse than the rest. He got a D- on his final grade of that run. Jeremiah on the other hand got an S( the highest grade on the scale). Dudley felt like he was getting the cold shoulder while Jeremiah got all the glory. And that wasn't the end at all. After that, Jeremiah escorted the class into a combat training room to practice punches, kicks and dodge with several training dummies that attacked the one that attacked them. Jeremiah put on a display that would be the envy of most agents( including Dudley). When he was done, Jeremiah washed his face with water from a nearby fountain and turned to everyone else.

"Okay, here's your next test. Prove you are able to hold your own. Every move can be used against you or benefit you. Your job is to find out which is which. First seven on the mark."

I'll spare the details, but after that one, Dudley was sore in his arms and legs. He had never worked this hard on TUFF. Unfortunately Jeremiah took a look at Dudley and paused for a comment.

"Do you wear pants on a daily basis?", he asked raising an eyebrow.

"No.", Dudley answered, "Those go against everything I believe in. Except shorts which go against half the stuff I believe in."

Jeremiah just did a swift motion and the next thing anyone knew, Dudley was wearing a pair of gray pants( the pants he wore at the end of Watch Dog).

"Now you do.", Jeremiah insisted.

"What?!", Dudley gasped as he noticed his new wear, "No! How do you get these things off?!"

Jeremiah clamped his fingers over Dudley's lips to quiet him and waited til he did before taking his hand away.

"It's called the zipper.", Jeremiah said harshly as if Dudley knew, "You look better like this."

Dudley looked shocked.

"But-"

"NO BUTS!", Jeremiah yelled.

We'll just skip the details after that. I'll just say that Dudley certainly had a rough session before he was allowed to leave. In the halls, he met up with Kitty. Jack was on other duties.

"You okay?", Kitty asked him as she noticed that Dudley looked a little down( and bruised).

Dudley just shook his head.

"Jeremiah is the meanest agent I ever met. He's put me through several training courses, works my butt off, and doesn't give me credit for anything."

Kitty felt Dudley's pain on that one.

"He's hard on everyone, except me who he's extra hard on. Why?"

Kitty shrugged. She didn't know how to answer that, but she couldn't let Dudley feel like nobody cared.

"Your just going to have to show Jeremiah you're not the push over he thinks you are.", she told him, "That might get some sense into him."

"And that's not the worst of it.", Dudley told her pointing to his pants, "He makes me wear..THESE!"

"You actually do look better like that", Kitty thought inside her head.

Dudley started on his usual complaining of not being able to do thing in his pants, until he got to the one about not being able to see his tail which he noticed was visible.

"Well I can see my tail, but still. Jeremiah really doesn't give me credit for anything. I'm trying, but to him it's not enough."

Kitty put her arm around his shoulder.

"Oh it's okay Dudley. I'm sure you'll find a way to get Jeremiah to be less hard on you."

Dudley felt better. It was nice to know even though Kitty and him were not working together often, she always found a way to make time for him. Now Jeremiah was in the training room Dudley and Kitty were just passing with his partner Iris. Jeremiah was using a heavy weight punching bag to work on his footwork and martial arts. Iris was doing gymnastics, and she wanted to know how Jeremiah took having Dudley as a student.

"So, how did it go?", she asked very eager.

Jeremiah just sighed heavily.

"Can you believe that of all the new recruits I could get, Dark Wolf pairs me with an idiotic, butt chewing moron?!"

Iris could tell Jeremiah was really upset and allowed Jeremiah to wear himself out and take a water break before she brought up another issue.

"Dudley's just new.", she assured him, "Just give him time. He'll get there."

Jeremiah paused a minute.

"I've run him through seven different simulations and what happens? He chickens out, gets distracted easily, and never listens to a single thing I say. When did the times when TUFF agent applications were handed out all willy nilly? What happened to the entry examination test they used to have?"

"Maybe you're trying to train Dudley the wrong way?", Iris asked him.

Jeremiah looked her way suspiciously.

"Are you questioning my seven years worth of experience in leadership?", he asked her as if she was on Dudley's side instead of his.

Jeremiah hardly yelled at Iris, but she could tell what he ment.

"I'm simply suggesting you use a different tactic.", she said.

Jeremiah stopped his martial arts session and looked Iris in the eye.

"Explain if you will.", he said eager to find out what Iris had in mind.

The rest of the day seemed to go without a hitch til the alarm went off followed by an announcement to meet in the meeting room. And with this much agents, the auditorium like room was pretty big with plenty of seating to go around. After everyone settled in, Dark Wolf appeared on the stage with Jeremiah, Iris, and Dorian at his sides.

"Attention everyone. We will be assigning our missions today. Our enemy is on the move and we need field operatives to go out, and take your duty to the next stage. Your assignments will be sent to your rooms first thing tomorrow morning. Our previous operatives will be returning soon with reports on our enemy's movement. Now we don't tolerate failure in our organization. Let us all stand and recite the ULTRA pledge."

Everyone stood firm and placed their hands over their hearts as they looked upon the ULTRA logo.

"As a member of this organization, I solemnly swear to uphold my honor and protect those in need. I will follow orders as given and accept all consequences should I not. If I am to overcome my own image, I must first overcome myself. For the glory of ULTRA, I salute to you."

After everyone finished the pledge, Dark Wolf had everyone sit while he continued.

"Your training will still be our priority before field work. Now, let's get busy."

After concluding the announcement was over, the auditorium left and went back to their scheduled training sessions. On the way back, Dudley noticed a tennis ball bounce past him. Dudley couldn't resist.

"BALL!", he yelled and he chased it down the hall.

No matter how far he chased it, the ball bounced into a simulation room just as the top level of difficulty was about to start. This simulation took place in a desolate landscape like all the others, but the enemy forces were more aggressive and lethal here. Dudley just followed the ball. The enemy androids tried using tasers, missiles, and electrical wires, but the ball bounced between it all and Dudley followed. The next wave used flying targets with poisonous arrows, grenades, and sharp blades, but just like the first time, Dudley dodged those too. Again and again waves came, but as the ball avoided the onslaught, so did Dudley. Finally, Dudley had made it to the end of the room where a huge mechanical monstrous chimera stood over. The ball bounced past the flames, the claws and the fangs, so you can guess what happened to Dudley. Yep, he avoided all that too. Finally, Dudley got to the finish button which the ball pressed and he caught it finally as the simulation faded. As he left, he saw Jeremiah at the door and he looked pretty concerned. Dudley just walked over and hoped he wouldn't be too mad.

"You went through a simulation alone?", Jeremiah asked.

Dudley nodded. Just then, his report card came in and Jeremiah looked over it.

"You..just got a perfect score?", Jeremiah asked him looking both confused and impressed.

Dudley looked at his grade which was an A.

"Does this get me on the field?", he asked.

"No.", Jeremiah explained, "It confirms your worthy of my teachings. How'd you pull this off? Uh, I don't wanna know. Just try a little harder next time you're with me."

Dudley was relieved that Jeremiah didn't yell that time. Jeremiah looked a lot less scary too. Maybe he wasn't so bad after all. For the rest of the day, while teams were called into Dark Wolf's office for deployment, Jeremiah was with Dudley training as usual. Jeremiah didn't yell very often, but Dudley knew he had to do his best or it was back to Jeremiah yelling. As he was working on his punches( using a punching bag), he didn't know why, but he had to talk to Jeremiah.

"Jer?"

"Yeah?"

"Why do you train so long?"

"You never know when OMEGA is going to show up. You need to keep your edge sharp."

Dudley paused a minute and wiped his face with a towel(hey he just did a long training session). Jeremiah saw he had stumped Dudley and explained.

"You always need to be ready. Keep your guard up, be aware, and always suspect OMEGA's goons are around."

"Don't you save time for you?", Dudley asked.

"At times", Jeremiah answered, "but what do I do with time for me?"

"Don't you play fetch?"

Jeremiah looked confused.

"What's fetch?"

Dudley looked concerned this time.

"You're kidding me. You seriously don't know what fetch is?"

"I'm a serious as it gets."

Dudley cleared his throat before speaking.

"Fetch is the art of retrieving and well, I'll show you."

Dudley walked over to the racks and pulled a frisbee off the shelf.

"I'll throw this to you, and you run and catch it."

Jeremiah just looked confused.

"That's it?"

"That's it.", Dudley told him, "Here you go."

Dudley tossed the frisbee Jeremiah's way, Jeremiah lunged to the side and caught it with his hand.

"Now what?", Jeremiah asked.

"Then you throw it back to me.", Dudley told him.

Jeremiah did so, but Dudley caught it in his mouth. For about five hours, Dudley and Jeremiah kept throwing the frisbee back and forth. While they were, Jeremiah got an idea. As he threw the frisbee, he fired two blaster shots with it. Dudley avoided the shots, and caught the frisbee with ease. Dudley got where Jeremiah was going because he threw an explosive with the frisbee when he threw it back. I'll just say, Jeremiah and Dudley were really worn out after that. Then Dudley noticed something. Jeremiah was smiling. The rest of the afternoon, Jeremiah and Dudley spent more time together and the closer they became almost like brothers. Although they had time for fun, Jeremiah still made sure the games had a twist to make it more like training. While this was going on, Dorian( from his lab) was catching every minute and taking notes.

By the end of the day, Dudley and Jeremiah had never had so much fun. Dudley got his exercise in, and Jeremiah found a way to have Dudley take part in practice. It wouldn't be long til Dudley was doing field work. Jeremiah met up with Dudley in the hall, and he looked ready for something good.

"Hey, what's up?"

"Dudley, I think this calls for a night at the Sassy Salmon."

Dudley's eyes brightened.

"You mean..."

Jeremiah nodded.

"I'd love to."

Jeremiah looked complimented.

"See ya there."

Jeremiah headed down the hall and Dudley knew this really would be a night to remember. Back in his room, Dudley went through some of his dressers which he found now included pants( he was getting used to this) when he saw a package on his bed with a note.

"Something to help you look nice. Mom."

"Great", he thought, "now my mom's here. She'll be living through me, but I'm sure she's okay with me keeping my distance."

"Dudley", came Peg's voice form outside, "would you like me to help you dress?"

"I'm a big boy Mom!", Dudley yelled back, "I can handle it!"

Dudley opened the package, and saw two things, a fancy tuxedo, and a photograph of his mom and him(as a puppy). The left side of the photo was torn, but Dudley didn't mind and put it on his dresser. By the time he finally got his tuxedo on right( and believe me, he had trouble with those pants), and arrived at the Sassy Salmon, it was in full swing. Agents were eating burgers, chatting with teammates, dancing on the dance floor, and having a ball. Dudley found Kitty right away. It was quite easy to see she made the trip and worked hard enough to deserve a break too. Dudley walked over and saw she was wearing a purple dress that covered her blossoms( if you know what I mean) and came down to her white high heeled shoes. Kitty saw Dudley in his new tuxedo and sighed dreamily.

"You look nice.", she told him.

"So do you.", Dudley answered her

Jeremiah entered in which drew everyone's attention. He wore the same tux he wore last time and in the same style. The cat following him could only be his partner. From her fawn coat, sapphire eyes, and blonde hair to her sparkling red dress and black high heels, she was stunning. Iris put one white gloved hand around Jeremiah's arm as Jeremiah made his way to Dudley and Kitty.

"Nice to see you made it", he said pleasantly.

Dudley couldn't take his eyes off Iris. Kitty shook his shoulder, and he broke out of his daze.

"Oh yeah, glad I made it. Hey Jer, who's this?"

"Dudley, Kitty. This is my partner Iris Patra."

Iris put her hand out and Dudley kissed it respectively.

"Well, now that introductions are made", Jeremiah said, "let's party."

That got the room going. The music going strong and the food platters went rushing down the bar stand as the dancing really got wild. Dudley and Jeremiah certainly stood out with their dancing. Dudley even got a few people whispering about him.

"Is that Jeremiah's new student?"

"He's almost as good as J is."

"Looks like the kings got competition."

This kept going on til late I'll tell you that much. By the time Dudley was in bed, it was almost 11:00 at night.