Chapter 64
Best chapter ever incoming. I strongly suggest looking up some Metal Gear Solid stealth/sneaking music while reading this one.
He slowly shook his head as the room came into focus. "Wha- what happened? Where?"
He looked around but had a hard time shifting his position as he looked at what caused so much resistance. "Oh, right."
He looked over and saw a blue-furred angel laying next to him, her leg on top of his and he head cradled on his chest. He forgot that he and Krystal fell asleep earlier in the day after they got home from school. Fox looked around for his clock as the room fully came into focus now.
"It's 10:42? We slept like that for six hours? And mom and dad didn't say anything?" The fox shook his head as he looked around his room to validate this information, outside his window he could see plenty of stars.
"Oh man, her parents are gonna be ripped."
His attention now shifted to the sleeping angel that was holding down the right side of his body.
"Krystal, hey Krystal." He shook her lightly with the one arm that was actually free.
"Mmm, just a little longer."
"Krystal wake up!"
He shook her a little harder now. Krystal's eyes began to peek open. "Mmhm- Fox? Is something wrong? What happened?"
He began to sit up when she moved off of his arm and legs. "We fell asleep, for a while. Look at the clock." She stretched her arms and took a loud yawn as she came to, looking around for a clock.
Her eyes widened, "Holy cow! It's 10:43! We slept for six hours?"
"Yeah that's what I said, keep your voice down. My parents may be home." The events of the day, and how they led to this, were coming back to Krystal now.
"Oh, right, sorry. You make a good pillow." Fox smiled at her as she tried to diffuse the current situation.
"Thanks, I'm glad I do. But what about your parents? Aren't they gonna be mad that you're not home and it's so late?" The vixen shook her head.
"I told them that you might invite me over today, and being so nice, mom and dad actually invited a friend to watch Marty for us tonight. They went out for a little date night, since it's been a while. I don't know what time they'll be back, but so long as we can get my car back home and close my door and cover up my windows, we should be in the clear to do whatever we want tonight."
Fox was taken back a little, aside from their excursion to corner café earlier in the week, he never knew her to be so…adventurous. Fox certainly didn't mind, life gets too boring without some kind of spontaneity and adventure.
"So come on, let's go get this done." Fox quietly got back up and located their shoes. He opened the door and poked his head outside, all of the lights were off except for a lamp in the living room, the door to his parents' room was wide open. "Looks like my parents aren't here. We can go now." They crept out of Fox's room after grabbing their things and walked out to Krystal's car.
She started it up and they slowly drove home. As she slowly brought the car to a halt and cut it off, she relayed the plan to Fox. "So I'm just gonna go in and tell our babysitter that I'm really tired and just wanna go to bed. I'm gonna go into my room and put everything down and then you come meet me at the window." Fox nodded, agreeing to her plan as the two foxes quietly got out of the car.
Fox walked around to Krystal's window that he had seen her through plenty of times, leaning against the brick wall beside it. Then he heard a noise, she was opening it.
"Okay, come in."
"Come in? I thought we were leaving?" The vixen shook her head as she reached out and grabbed his hand, tugging him closer to the window. He accepted the forced invitation and made his way in.
"So what are we doing in here?"
"Just help me make sure everything looks convincing. I'm sure my parents won't come over towards my bed, but at least let's prop up everything to make it look like I'm asleep." Fox shook his head as a response.
"You know you're overthinking this? There's no sort of prop that can look half as beautiful as you."
She turned over towards him and gave him a quick peck on the cheek. "Appreciate the flattery, but we have a mission to finish here." He helped her stuff pillows and any other sizable objects underneath the covers. "I think it's good enough." Krystal nodded her head in return.
"Now we just have to cover up the windows and we'll be good to go."
She walked over to her windows and pulled the drapes across them, blocking any outside view. When the last window came, she beckoned Fox to step outside before the pulled the drape across and shut the window from outside.
"Okay princess, now what?"
"Now the night is ours. What do you want to do?"
"I don't know, I didn't exactly have time to plan you know."
She laughed a little in response, they both had to keep their voices to a whisper for the time being. "Wait, I know." Was all Fox said when she finished laughing.
"What? What is it?" The vulpine said nothing in return, only extended a hand to her as she grasped it and they walked off. Fox pulled out his phone on their way back to his house and dialed the right person.
"Falco, you doing anything?"
"Yeah, just playing some games online since you ditched me." Fox wasn't phased by the bird's antagonizing.
"Wanna do something else tonight?"
Fox quietly filled the bird in on the plan while Krystal tagged along trying to figure out the mystery that Fox was planning. "Yeah, I'll meet you there in half an hour. Go on over, I'll bring my backpack to hold all of it." Fox grinned as he hung up his phone and looked back at Krystal.
"Falco's gonna meet us at the school in half an hour, come on."
"But why are we going back to school?"
"You'll see."
Now he was the one tugging on her arm as they briskly walked back to Fox's car. He drove them down to a…general store? "Fox why are we here? At a general store? At 11:06 at night?"
He grinned more at her as he took the key out of the ignition. "Well, since we're being spontaneous a little bit, and since we've been to corner café plenty…we're gonna pull a little prank."
Krystal gasped at this idea, until she realized how much she liked the mischief of it.
"We're gonna pick up some toilet paper and silly string here then meet Falco."
She grinned at his idea, a little adventure can be the real spice of life. "Let's split up, I'll go look for the toilet paper, you find the silly string." Krystal agreed and walked off looking for whatever aisle might have it.
'Maybe a party aisle has something like that.' She looked up at all of the signs and saw no results. She went further back then was greeted with fruitful results. 'Found it, now I'll have to meet up with Fox.' She grabbed a few cans of it and then headed for an aisle that looked like it had toilet paper.
"Krystal!"
She heard a somewhat loud whisper as her attention jerked to her left. Fox was walking up to her with a sheepish grin on his face, he had a package of twelve rolls of toilet paper.
"This is gonna be so great." He leaned towards her to whisper.
"These are only two credits apiece, so I got a few." She held out her arms to show Fox how many cans she got. They made their way to the checkout with mischievous grins on their faces.
"Hey, Krystal?" She looked up at Fox, answering his call.
"Do you uh…have two more credits?" Fox had a somewhat embarrassed smile on his face asking the question.
Krystal let out a small laugh as she reached into her pockets and pulled out a few extra credits. Fox grabbed the plastic bags that had their loot and headed for the school.
They saw Falco's car as they pulled up beside him. "Took you long enough, you got everything?" Fox had that grin full of mischief on his face again as he beckoned the bird over to the back seat.
"Oh yeah, you got everything we need."
Falco reciprocated the grin as he pulled his backpack out of the passenger seat and stuffed it full of their supplies.
"So Foxie, if you don't mind me asking, you got a plan on how to get inside? It's not like we have an Arwing here to drop us off on the roof or anything." Fox laughed a little, sounding somewhat nervous.
"Arwing? What's an Arwing?" Krystal looked as confused as she sounded.
"It's nothing, it's just the aerial fighter craft that dad pilots. Got everything?" The bird leaned back up out of the backseat of Fox's car and strapped on his backpack. "Ready, let's go."
The three teenagers snuck up to the building, making sure to avoid any potential detection. "Geez, shoulda dressed a little warmer. Didn't know it would get this cold out." The vulpine was right, even for a January night, it was cold.
"Then find us a way inside, I'm freezing." The vixen's comment made Falco laugh as Fox began discussing his plan.
"Okay, I'm pretty sure that we can take the outdoor staircase up to the second floor, from there we can stand up on the railing and get up on the roof. And then we can descend through a duct." Krystal and Falco looked at each other with confused looks, then looked back at Fox.
"And you said I overthink things." She huffed at him.
"Alright, whatever you say Solid Snake." Falco shrugged his shoulders as they made their way towards the staircase.
"Alright Falco, you go first, you're the tallest."
"Alright, watch me work." Falco stood up on the thankfully wide, squared handrail and pulled himself up to the rooftop. "Okay, come on up." Falco reached out a hand to pull up Krystal as Fox gave her a boost, then they both pulled Fox up.
"Okay, we can get in through that vent over there." Fox pointed over to a vent on the southern side of the roof. The lid on the vent easily came off and Krystal looked down, pitch dark.
"Ladies first." Falco said as he beckoned her towards the vent.
"Wait, here put this on." Fox pulled out his visor and Krystal put it on. "Don't know if it'll work this way, but maybe the scouter can give you some kind of night vision. You know, since its green?" Krystal gave it a try as the scouter expanded in front of her left eye and she looked down the air duct.
"It's not great, but it's something. Wish me luck." Krystal slowly descended into the air duct until the guys didn't see her any more.
She eased her way for a few minutes then stopped. 'This must be the end of the line.' She thought to herself. She fiddled a little with the visor, trying to open a communication.
"Falco? Falco do you hear me?"
"Hey wait, I think…" Fox's face had a look of confusion.
"Krystal?"
"Falco?"
"Great, she figured out how to open a communication. What's up?"
Krystal breathed a sigh of relief. "I think I've reached the end of the vent, what now?"
"She reached the end of the duct, what do you wanna do?"
"Tell her to kick out the two bottom corners."
"Hey Krystal? Fox said to kick out two corners on the end, that way there'll still be two corners holding it in place, but we can get out."
Krystal started with a gentle kick, nothing. She gave it a medium kick, it hardly moved. Then she gave it a little more juice, the corner popped right out. She did so with the opposite corner and as Fox predicted, the vent was opened. Krystal dropped down and took a look around at where she now was.
"Okay guys, you can come in. I've opened the vent."
Falco descended and crawled through the vent, eventually reaching the end seeing the drop, easing his way out and dusting himself off.
"Falco? Where's this thing end? Falco?" Fox, being without his visor, couldn't see anything. He kept crawling and crawling, until he eventually found the end and fell right out.
"Oof!"
The bird and vixen had to suppress their laughter, they couldn't make too much noise.
"Thanks for the guidance." Fox shot both of them a small glare.
"Okay, if Slippy's rambling about the school's tech is correct, these few cameras in the school should be triggered by motion and audio. So long as we stay in the darker spots, and stay quiet…" He gave the both of them another small glare, "We should be fine." His two partners in crime nodded.
"By the way, where are we?" Falco wasn't entirely sure himself, he used his visor to look around and eventually found a lightswitch, flipping it on.
"Oh, great." He said in response.
"You gotta be kidding me."
They were in the female's bathroom.
"Of all places…" Falco mumbled to himself.
"What's the big deal, boys?" Krystal covered her muzzle trying to suppress her laughter.
Falco cracked the door open to peek outside, the lighting was scarce. "Okay, there isn't much lighting so we should be okay."
Fox looked at the clock on his phone, it read 11:32. Then he poked his head out the door, then Krystal did. "This is gonna be so great." Fox said, sounding like an excited child.
Falco gasped, "Get back!" He sound with a loud whisper. He pulled the two foxes back inside, causing them to all fall down.
"What? What happened?" Krystal was as confused as Fox.
"Night maintenance. Saw a janitor walking by. Looks like we aren't alone."
"No problem, we'll just have to adjust the plan. Instead of messing with the whole school, why not just mess with some of the bathrooms and a few teachers' rooms?" The bird and fox nodded in agreement to Krystal's abridged plan.
"So then let's start here. Falco, let's give Krystal a boost so she can fix the vent, then we can get outta here." Falco nodded as they picked Krystal up by her feet and she re-attached the lid to the vent then they rolled toilet paper all over the bathroom, with some silly string as the icing on top. Now Krystal turned off the light when they had finished and were waiting by the door.
"Okay, looks like it's clear, let's move across to the guys' restroom right here." The three teens crouched and moved over towards the bathroom just a few feet away. After trashing that room, they peeked outside again.
"Don't see any heat signatures down this hall, let's go." They turned off the light and snuck out the door into the hallway at Krystal's signal.
"Get up against the wall, don't let the lights catch any trace of you." Falco's warning may have been in vain, but even he didn't want to take any chances.
As the teens slid against the walls, they found their next set of restrooms and successfully TP'd them too.
"Hey Fox, how are we gonna get out of here now that we sealed up the vent?" Falco was wondering the same thing as the vixen. "We'll just go down to the first floor and go out a window." Easy solution, so why not? They eased their way towards the main staircase, slowly and quietly.
Fox peeked around the corner of the staircase but quickly retreated.
"Go back! Go back!"
He frantically motioned and whispered for them to quickly turn around and retreat.
"What?"
"There's a janitor coming, go back to one of the bathrooms." They hid out in the bathroom for a bit, then poked out the door again. Fox saw the same janitor with his back turned to them as he beckoned his friends to follow him back down the staircase. As they finished descending the staircase they took another look around.
"Go! Go!" Falco gave them a small push towards their next target. They ducked inside a male restroom.
"I think one of them saw me, hide." They looked around for any place they could hide.
"Well, the stalls it is I guess."
"But Fox, there are only two stalls."
Falco had already rushed into the larger stall, "Hope you guys can figure it out." Was all he said as he locked the stall.
"You can just sit in my lap or on my back, hit the lights!"
Krystal turned off the lights and rushed towards the stall Fox was hiding in, more thankful than ever for the small night vision from the visor.
"It's…so cramped in here."She said as she sat in Fox's lap, both of them having their feet propped up on the side of the stall so they can't be seen from below.
Then it happened, they heard the door open.
'Oh no, we're done for.' Was all Falco could think. Krystal heard it, and she was thinking the same thing.
'If there was ever a bad time to fart…' Fox thought to himself, wishing that he hadn't. Krystal heard it, and Fox could tell she did when he felt her shift. He threw his hand over her muzzle to keep her from laughing, for once her lovable laugh would spell doom for them if it erupted this time.
They could see the janitor's flashlight move around, then the lights came on. They could hear the loud footsteps going to and from one end of the room.
'We're so dead.' Falco thought.
But just like that, their pursuer left. The lights were off, and they could hear the door shut. They waited a few minutes before anything else.
"Falco…" The bird heard a quiet whisper from his friend.
"I'm fine, you guys okay?"
"Just barely." He heard a much prettier voice say back.
They quietly moved out of their hiding places as Krystal hit the light switch. "We need to get out of here." There was nothing the two boys agreed with her more on.
"Stockpile's running low anyways. We can get this place and then each take a roll of TP home as a bonus." The bird pulled the last two cans of silly string out and one more roll of toilet paper.
After trashing the male restroom on the first floor they shut off the lights and peaked out the door once more. "No nearby heat signatures, let's go." The trio slid across the walls down the hallway, back towards the end of the school their cars were parked at.
"Great, this is all we need."
Fox turned around to his friends as they made their way down the hall. There was a classroom light on and the door was open. He peeked inside, but no janitor in sight.
"I don't sense anything inside, maybe it's clear?" Krystal's telepathy was never wrong, and it sure looked like no one was inside, so Fox peeked his head inside.
"Yeah, let's go." No janitor inside, the light was on and the door was open, but no one was home.
"Okay, so let's get outta here. The windo-" Fox's idea was interrupted by the sound of loud footsteps.
"He's coming back!" Krystal frantically whispered as she looked for another hiding spot.
She ran to the back of the classroom and opened a grounded cabinet, balling up and hiding in it.
"What are you two doing? Hide somewhere!"
"Where? We're not as small as you, you know?" The bird's smart attitude wasn't helping in this tense moment.
"Get in that closet over there."
"What! Are you crazy, I'd rather be in that closet with yo-" Fox's preference was interrupted, the footsteps were getting louder as Krystal beckoned them towards the closet as she closed the cabinet door. The bird and vulpine reluctantly headed for the closet and jumped in together.
"I can't believe this, can this thing be any more cramped?"
"Hey Foxie, what makes you think I wanna be in here with you?" The two had a frantic and panicked whisper fight going on.
"Just shutup, as if this isn't embarrassing enough."
"Embarrassing? This was your idea you furry idiot!"
"Yeah well it's not like I thought I would be stuck in a closet less than a few inches away from you!"
"Oh what you think I'm enjoying this? I got news for you bud- I think he's here, shut up."
Fox and Falco quickly silenced themselves and their thinking out loud. They could hear the janitor outside, he wasn't terribly loud, but everything else was so quiet that they could hear him clearly.
"Oh no…" Falco said quietly.
"What? What's wrong?"
Falco had an embarrassed look on his face, not that Fox could see it. Fox's nose began to sting.
"Dude! Seriously! You couldn't have held it or let it out earlier? This is the ABSOLUTE worst time to let out a fart!"
"You think I did that on purpose? You moron if you had come over tonight we coulda gotten pizza instead of my parents making burritos. This is on you!"
"Me? I'm the one who made you eat that for dinner?"
"Oh shut up, you're the one who didn't even try to find a better place to hide. Instead you decided to stand in this cramped closet and-" Fox cut him off.
"Shh, I think he's leaving. Can you ask Krystal if she can still sense him?"
"I'll try. Hey, Krystal?"
"Yeah? What's up Falco?"
"Is he still out there? I can't move my head to check with the thermal sensor." Krystal turned her head to look with her own thermal sensor on Fox's visor.
"I don't see him with the sensor, and I don't sense him nearby. I'll take a look."
Krystal cracked the cabinet door ever so slightly, but she didn't see anything. Amidst their bickering, Fox and Falco completely missed that the janitor had finished in the room, turned off the lights, and shut the door. Krystal slowly made her way out of the cabinet and walked over to the closet.
She opened the door and both of the guys fell right out, coughing and gasping for air.
"Guys, what's wrong?" She sniffed the air, "And what's that terrible smell?"
After catching his breath, Fox explained to her the abridged version. "You don't wanna know, let's please get out of here." She laughed a little, piecing it together as the realized what the foul smell was.
"I'll get that window open." Falco reached over and popped the window open, swinging it open and feeling the cold air blow in.
"Geez, it's so much warmer in here." Fox said at the introduction to the frigid wind. He vaulted out into the cold and helped both of his friends out with him as they shut the window, no longer caring about their noise level.
"Let's get outta here!" Krystal exclaimed as they ran in unison back to the parking lot, letting out their laughter at the night's events.
The clock struck 1:19, it had once again been a long night.
"See you later Falco" Fox waved to his friend.
"Yeah Falco, I had fun." Krystal flashed him her happy smile, glad that she was so happily welcomed back.
"See you guys later." The bird waved back to them as he got back in his car and drove off.
Fox and Krystal drove back towards Krystal's house and Fox quietly eased up to it, noticing that there was a new car there.
"Krystal, wake up. Geez how can you sleep even after this afternoon?"
"Wha- oh right we're home now." She rubbed her eyes from her small nap and realized where they walked her up to her window, the same one she snuck out of earlier.
"Not the most traditional spot to say goodbye, but anything for my one and only, blue-furred Juliet." He smiled and laughed with her as they approached the window.
"Oh Romeo, where art thou? Oh I don't care just shut up and kiss me oh Romeo!" He laughed at her overdramatizing as he gladly fulfilled her request.
"I love you Juliet"
"I love you too Romeo."
"Just do me a favor and let's not die while we're young, deal?" She laughed as she tightened her arms around him.
"Deal." She smiled gladly as she kissed him one more time then retreated back through her window.
101% The most fun chapter ever to write.
