September had begun with the tail end of summer warmth still waving across Danville as though it were reluctant to go. With fall already beginning to take hold elsewhere and school having begun a month prior, it seemed like an odd time for Phineas and Ferb to call the gang in for the execution of another Big Idea. Summer vacation - though shorter than it used to be, now that they were older - had been filled with inventions and adventures of all kinds. Why would they devote their time to a new project when they were supposed to be focusing on their educations?

"Why not?" Phineas asked with a shining grin.

Isabella put her hands on her hips and gave him a disapproving look, and he smirked back at her before turning and jogging over to the growing frame of their creation, screwdriver in hand.

The argument, if it could even be considered as such, was over before it had even begun. Isabella honestly hadn't expected any different. Phineas was very focused boy, and when he came up with something he wanted to do, that was usually the end of it. School, chores, prior obligations, the laws of nature - none could dissuade him from his goals. And in all honesty, that was one of the very things that made Isabella love him so much. He was so determined, completely unstoppable when it came to the pursuit of his dreams. What girl couldn't appreciate that?

So she gave in, her hands falling to her sides and a smile lighting up her face as she walked closer to the construction zone. "Alright," she said. "So what it?"

"It's a scrap metal sculpture!" Phineas replied in earnest. Then he paused, hesitating, before giving Isabella a sheepish smile. "Well... it's gonna be, anyway."

From the side of the shed came a loud guffaw, exaggerated for the purpose of making sure everyone paid attention. Buford, always the most generous of "critics", would not go unheard. "You dragged us back here for a freakin' art project?" He asked, as though an art project was something he would ever pass up on. "I knew ya lost some of your spark during the school year, but I didn't think it was this bad."

"I like it," countered Baljeet, who stood a few feet away with his arms crossed over his chest. "Though I admit scrap metal is not my preferred medium, art is a welcome break of pace from... everything else."

The door of the shed swung open, and out stepped Ferb with a box of scrap in his arms. Phineas had opened his mouth to speak, but it was his brother who said, "Come now, 'Jeet, you love all the things we get up to."

Buford chuckled as Baljeet sputtered for a reply. "Well, yes, but - no! No, I do not loveit, I am merely a friend to you two and thus I join in your many adventures!"

As Ferb set the box down by Phineas's feet, Phineas took his place in the conversation back. "Aww, you know you don't mean that, dude. Maybe in the beginning that was the reason, but you love this just as much as we do! You have all kinds of fun!"

"And what, exactly, is your definition of fun?"

Buford pushed away from the shed and rested a hand on his best friend's shoulder, his expression a mix of amusement and affection.. "A'ight, stop arguin' with 'em, y'know you won't get anywhere," he said. "'Sides, they're right. You're just tryin' to act like you're more civilized than the crazy kids who build rollercoasters for fun. You can drop the act in good company."

Baljeet tensed up and pushed Buford's hand away. "I am not acting!" he protested. "I am merely expressing my distaste for -" Buford cut him off with a gentle shush, then went on to lay out all the reasons why Baljeet would want to distance himself from the rough-and-tumble summers of days past and why it was unnecessary. It was a debate that wouldn't end any time soon.

Isabella shook her head at the two of them, then walked closer to Phineas and Ferb. "So what exactly is this gonna be a sculpture of?" she asked. "And why scrap metal?"

Phineas laughed and handed off his screwdriver to Ferb, who pocketed it before rifling around in his other pocket for a different tool.

"Why not?" Phineas asked for the second time that day. "We have enough of it, don't we? As for what it's gonna be... Ferb and I were thinking of a giant metal platypus."

"I should have guessed," Isabella said with a teasing roll of her eyes. "So is there any way I can help?"

Ferb looked up, then, revealing that he'd been paying attention the whole time. "Yes, could you fetch the ladder for me, love?" he asked. "A certain red-haired airhead forgot that tall projects require ways to get up to the tall bits."

Phineas's eyes widened, then he smacked Ferb's arm, yelling something about how tool-gathering wasn't his job before falling into a fit of laughter. Ferb smiled a bit, then resumed his previous task.

It was funny, really, how little he had changed over the years. He had begun to talk more, but only by so much. A comment here, a request there, and he had gotten in his say for the day. Phineas always spoke of long nights spent laughing and talking and sharing secrets with Ferb, but to Isabella and everyone else, he was the same silent boy he'd always been, never revealing anything other than what he deemed necessary.

"Sure thing," Isabella said as Phineas pushed Ferb's shoulder for calling him an airhead (though he was still laughing about it). Ferb nodded but didn't look up again.

As she exited the gate and walked around to the front of the house, Baljeet walked closer to the brothers and raised his eyebrow in Ferb's general direction. "Did you just called Isabella love?" he asked. "Has something changed in the past few weeks?"

Phineas stopped laughing and looked at his brother with imploring eyes, as if something possible could have changed and he somehow wouldn't know about it. But Ferb remained calm, his eyes on the ruler he'd retrieved from the abyss of his pocket rather than on Baljeet's face. "It's a British phrase," he said as he knelt down to inspect part of the frame. "Typically used towards females, also applies to significant others of the same sex. Sorry to have upset you."

Yet again, Buford was laughing as Baljeet struggled for a response to a comment he hadn't seen coming. "I - you did not upset me! I was just curious because you have never - I do not - "

"Calm down, Baljeet," Phineas said as he hid a smile behind his hand. "It's okay if you have a crush on Iz, we won't tell."

"Right, 'cause it'd totally matter if ya did," said Buford. "We all know who she's got her eyes on."

"...We do?" Phineas lowered his hand, his smile gone, and gave Buford a puzzled look.

"Don't even bother," Ferb said before Buford could reply. Phineas looked over at his brother with the same expression, begging for answers, but then Isabella was walking over to them and the conversation was at an end.

"Here you go, Ferb," she said as she opened the ladder up and set it on the grass. He offered her a nod in thanks, then moved it closer to the sculpture and bent over to gather some more materials strewn about its base.

Isabella returned her attention to Phineas and gave him a sweet smile. "So... show me what to do and I can help you build this thing."

"Count us in," Buford added as he put his hand on Baljeet's shoulder again. Baljeet seemed about to object, then decided to stay quiet, knowing he'd lost the battle.

"Awesome!" Phineas exclaimed in glee. "Let me show you the blueprints!"

As Phineas hung up the blueprints for the giant metal platypus on the nearby whiteboard and began to explain them in great detail, Ferb leaned around the framework to watch. He smiled as Phineas swept his arms out in grand gestures of size and might, thinking to himself how fantastic his brother was - something he pondered often.

Phineas was such an endearing young man. He had a bit of a temper, sure, and he had the odd sad day, but overall he was a bright and bubbly boy who was always excited to embark upon the next adventure of life, whether that be finding long-lost civilizations or going shopping for a new mattress. He was beloved and admired, even looked up to by the children who'd grown up in the Danville built on his influences - and why not? Phineas exemplified what so many wished to be, confident and eccentric as he was. He wore pink hi-tops to the battlegrounds of high school, had a platypus for a pet, defied logic as a hobby, and even dared to have a girl as one of his best friends.

Ferb didn't even mind that most people didn't realize he did those things, too. The spotlight was almost always on Phineas, and that was fine - because when it came to Phineas, he shone his light on Ferb. That was all the recognition he needed.

It was different when they were younger, of course. Ferb was never one to be the head of any situation, but he liked his credit, especially when it came to the ladies. He did plenty of work back in those days to try and impress any woman who crossed his path. And when he went through puberty and realized boys were just as fun, he'd made effort to attract both ends of the spectrum with his ever-so-sexy accent and ability to fix a car within ten minutes. Date after date had proven, however, that romance was fleeting and inconsistent - at the end of the day it was always Phineas who was there to appreciate all he'd done. And Ferb had grown comfortable with that, was more than content to recede further into the shadows where only Phineas (and their friends, to some degree) could find him. Perhaps "true" love would find him in time, but until then, he was content in the dynamic he and Phineas had.

In truth, they just fittogether. For every direction one pushed, the other pulled. They were a perfect balance of emotions and ideas and creativity, the ultimate duo of ingenuity and platypus facts. Their disagreements were always short-lived, their "fights" never more than headed debates. They were even almost perfectly in sync, always aware of what was on the other's mind and what needed to be done before it was even said. They made music together, danced together, sang together, all without even a hint of rehearsal. When one vocalized an idea, the other already had the tools needed in hand; when the project was underway, they took turns in some special rhythm only they seemed to understand. It was as though they were bound together by invisible threads; a dual puppet, perhaps, operating under the same pair of hands.

Even at nineteen years of age, all of these things were still true. Fifteen years together... fifteen years of commitment and adoration and an inseparable bond. Ferb had his crushes (some very uncomfortable), Phineas had his obsessions (some very intense), and they both had their own agendas from time to time... but by the end of the day, they were always together again.

Always.

"Alright, everyone got that?" Phineas asked as he looked out at his three friends with one hand still on the blueprint. They answered in the affirmative, and then all four went to join Ferb by the ladder with their tools in hand. He had long since resumed his work and no one noticed anything out of the ordinary.

It was not long after they all began, however, that Isabella noticed the distinct lack of monotreme anywhere in the back yard. After so many years, she didn't really needto point it out; none of them did, not after so long. But old habits die hard, as they say.

"Where's Perry?" she asked, earning a glance from both Phineas and Ferb.

"Hm. That's weird," said Phineas. "Coulda sworn he was... Ah, never mind. You know Perry."

"This wouldn't be an issue if he was old and slow," Ferb said in that emotionless way of his. But then a tiny flicker of a smile graced his face, and he turned to his brother and spoke in a much lighter tone. "But someone just had to extend his lifespan."

"I can knock you right off that ladder, mister," Phineas replied, trying to smirk even as he held back a laugh.

"Behold, Perry the platypus - the Fall-Apart-inator!"

Perry glared out of the tiny window left for him in the Lego pen that had been placed over him almost as soon as he'd arrived. Most of his view was obstructed by one of Norm's legs; the rest of what he could see was some gleaming metal contraption placed just inside the back door, aimed out at the city below.

Heinz strolled in front of the machine, into Perry's view, and rubbed his hands together in what was likely an attempt at being sinister. "You see, Perry the platypus, this entireworld is made up of things that are... well, made from other things. You put things together to make... bigger things..."

He faltered, then made a frustrated sound and crossed his arms. "Okay, that was awful, I should have thought it out first. But - but you know what I mean!" He looked over at the Lego cage, then resumed his evil grinning and walked closer to his invention to place a hand on it. "The Fall Apart-inator has the ability to make things... well, fall apart! From buildings to cars to clothing, I can make anything come undone in an instant! With just a press of this - Hold on. Can you even see this?"

The answer was no, but Perry only continued to glare. Heinz leaned over, back into his view, then out of it again. "Norm! You already trapped him, get out of here! How is Perry the platypus supposed to behold the doom of the Tri-State Area with your fat legs in the way?"

"That's very hurtful, sir!" said Norm, his voice cheerful as always. As he stepped to the side, he added, "How would you feel if I said something about your small legs? Not so good I bet!" With a full view of the scene, Perry saw Heinz's eyes narrow. He hadn't even opened his mouth before Norm went on again; "I'm sorry, sir, that was out of line."

As Norm moved, Perry noticed that the Lego bricks bounced a bit with each step - not sturdy in the slightest. He looked back to Heinz to hide the fact that he had noticed anything, but he already knew breaking out would be easy. They may as well have used Lincoln Logs, or Jenga bricks - then again, those probably would have taken longer to assemble. In any case, Perry would wait to make his escape; such was the ritual. And he really was sort of interested in this one... well, that wasn't the whole truth. Over the years, he'd become interested in almost all of Heinz's inventions and his reasons for building them. It had more to do with their relationship than any improvement on Heinz's part, really.

"Now then," said Heinz with a clap of his hands. "Back to the matter at hand! The Fall-Apart-inator will make anything it hits disassemble into the parts used for its creation! Not like, down to atoms or anything, just... you know, down to the individual components. I would have called it the Disassemble-inator, but I'm pretty sure I already used that for something else, and you really can't be redundant with these things." He paused, staring at the machine, then sighed. "I mean, there's a certain level of redundancy allowed when it comes to evil scheming... I mean, especially when your nemesis always foils you without fail..."

Perry raised an eyebrow and chattered.

"That wasn't a compliment," Heinz snapped, hands on his hips. "It's annoying, Perry the platypus. If you could just let me win once in a while -"

Perry stuck both hands out of the window of the Lego pen, displaying his wristwatch with one and pointing at it with the other.

Heinz narrowed his eyes and frowned. "Oh, do you have somewhere to be, Perry the platypus? Just for that, I'm giving you the extended version of my backstory." He cleared his throat, put one hand over his heart, and began in earnest: "You see, when I was a young boy back in Drusselstein..."

Perry grunted and sat down, the tip of his bill sticking out of the window of his pen. Of course, it was all an act by that point, but they both played the game. You weren't supposed to enjoy time with your nemesis, after all.

"Man, this is really coming along great!" Phineas said as he stepped back from the magnificent creation emerging in the backyard.

Isabella whistled in appreciation from her place by a box of scrap. "Yeah, it's actually starting to look like a platypus now," she said. And it was true; the framework was mostly done, and the work Ferb had been doing around the face was really giving it some personality. As a side-thought, Isabella added, "You know, I bet you could turn this into your shop class for a lot of extra credit." Not like it would last long after they finished it, nothing ever did, but it was a valid thought.

Even so, Phineas laughed and waved his hand at Isabella in a dismissive sort of way. "I couldn't move this thing if I tried, how would I turn it in?"

"You know what I meant!" Isabella stomped over to Phineas and gave him a shove, but he laughed when she did it and she laughed right along with him. He made as if to shove her back, but she just pushed him away with a hand to his face.

Ferb was coming down the ladder as they bantered, and the closer he got, the more critical his expression became. There was something else there, too, something very much like jealously, but no one was watching so no one noticed. "You can stop flirting now," he said once he was back on the grass. "I think we all get it."

"Flirting?"

Over by the base of the giant platypus's tail, Buford burst into wild laughter. Phineas looked baffled by the response and looked around to see if anyone else would answer him, but Isabella only looked flustered and Ferb's expression hadn't changed at all. He tried to say he wasn't flirting with anyone, but by then Buford had fallen over from laughing so hard and that demanded more focus than Phineas's mumbled protest.

"It is not that funny," said Baljeet as he stood over Buford. "Pull yourself together." As Buford began to stand back up, still chuckling, Phineas could swear he heard him say something along the lines of "ten goddamn years", but he wasn't entirely sure. Ten years of what? Flirting? He didn't even know how to flirt, and if Isabella was doing it he'd never really noticed - she was much more upfront about her feelings than that anyhow.

Or so he thought. He thought a lot of things that weren't true; part of it was optimism, the other part naivete. Some things just didn't change in a decade. Of course, Isabella was getting tired by then, had even gotten over Phineas briefly before coming right back in middle school, and the others were all sure she'd come out with it sooner or later. Not that they hadn't always thought that - it just seemed far more likely now. She obviously loved him very dearly and it was only hurting her the way she kept it in and waited for him to notice.

Strangely enough - or perhaps not strange at all - was that Ferb was one of her biggest supporters outside of her girlfriends. He always had been for a variety of reasons, many of which shifted and changed over the years even as the goal remained the same. He supported the idea of his brother being with Isabella; they worked together. The jealousy remained, though, for reasons he was afraid to admit even to himself.

Ferb banished these thoughts from his mind as he headed around to an underdeveloped part of the structure near one of the legs. The platypus was sitting up like Perry did when begging for food, and the pose made it rather tall; too much work on the head with chunks still missing down below would cause a lot of instability. Ferb considered waving someone over to help him, but Buford had returned to the tail and Baljeet was working on a foot, and soon enough Phineas and Isabella would find places to work as well.

Of course, that was when Phineas appeared, and before he could ask about the "flirting" comment, Ferb cut him off with a nod towards the section he planned to reinforce.

"Oh, sure!" Phineas said. "Let me drag one of the scrap boxes over here. You have the tools, right?"

Ferb held up his blowtorch, and Phineas grinned before turning away to fetch the materials. As he left, Ferb caught Isabella's gaze as she stood several feet away, her expression strained.

He could only shrug in reply.

"...And so, the Fall-Apart-inator will destroy the orphanage before it can be built, and Roger will be blamed for its poor construction and kicked out of office!" Heinz did his best evil laugh, fists raised in the air in triumph. This lasted all of five seconds before something occurred to him, something Perry had already taken for granted because he knew his nemesis well.

"Of course, this will be when no one is actively working on the orphanage - all the construction workers are going on break in just a few minutes, you see. I don't wait to maim anyone. I mean, maybe a sprain or something, but maiming isn't really my style..."

Perry looked out of the window in the Lego cage again, watching Heinz consider his own morals, then put his fingers on one of the bricks making up the sill and attempted to pick it up. It didn't come right away, but it didn't take much effort to get it loose. That confirmed his suspicions that glue hadn't been used. It really was just a Lego pen, probably meant to symbolize the overall idea of being able to break something down into its individual components - and with the backstory finished, it was just about time to demonstrate. Perry formed a fist around the single brick he'd taken, then punched through the wall of Legos, sending several flying and the rest toppling down around him.

Though hardly impressed, Heinz looked annoyed by the escape. "Norm!" he shouted as Perry advanced on him. "Didn't I tell you to use glue on those Lego bricks?!"

"I wanted to use them again, sir!" Norm replied from across the room.

Perry paused a few feet away from Heinz and waited for them to finish. In the years since Vanessa had grown up and moved out of her mother's house, Norm had been around for more and more schemes and adventures - despite all of Heinz's assurances to the contrary, it very much seemed that he saw Norm as more than an evil robot assistant, and enjoyed his company more now that his daughter wasn't around as often. So Perry treated their conversations and spats just like he had treated those between Heinz and Vanessa; unless they managed to hold up a chat while a fight was actively happening, he let them wrap it up before he finished his thwarting. It was a matter of respect, really.

As Heinz yelled something about his childhood toys (or lack thereof), Perry spared a glance at his wristwatch and frowned at the time. It had almost been enough time for the boys to finish up whatever the day's project was. He knew it was something about all the scrap they'd accumulated over the past summer, but beyond that he'd sort of tuned it out; regardless, few things they did took more than a few hours and almost never extended past sundown. He mentally cursed himself for letting Heinz go on for a long as he had about Drusselsteinien building practices.

"Just take your Legos back to your room!" Heinz demanded, pointing off in the direction of what Perry was sure was just a broom closet. "I'm kind of busy here, Norm, I don't have time for this!" He folded his arms across his chest and watched Norm for a moment before returning his attention to Perry. "Sorry about that, Perry the platypus," he said. "Now, where were we?"

Without missing a beat, Perry drew his arm back, then hurled the Lego brick he'd taken earlier directly at Heinz's face. As his nemesis recoiled in pain, Perry darted forward in an attempt to reach the Fall-Apart-inator, but was thwarted as Heinz recovered and threw a leg out to trip him.

"That was such a weak move, Perry the platypus!" he yelled as Perry rolled back onto his feet and sidestepped away. "You always go for the face - are you trying to take one of my eyes out?!"

Perry grimaced at the thought. Not necessarily because of how gruesome it was, but because it reminded him of the alternate dimension where Heinz was actually evil. Few things unsettled him as much as memories of that man did. Such a warped version of someone he knew so well... He shook himself out of the thought as Heinz made a grab for him and just barely missed. Routine as their fights were, Perry couldn't afford to lose focus; it tampered not only with their tradition, but with his time. He wasn't going to miss dinner over uncomfortable memories.

So the two of them jumped and ducked and wove around one another in their typical fashion, Heinz yelling and taunting as Perry chattered and swung his fists in response. Over a decade they'd been doing this, and yet it never got old, somehow. It was comfortable in the same way that going home was comfortable - it was something to settle into, something cozy and familiar. Most of the time they didn't even leave any marks on each other in their fights; for all the punching and biting that was done, there was no real malice or ill intent behind any of it anymore. It had been like that for a long time; when it began, Perry couldn't remember. Heinz was his nemesis, yes, but the term had taken on different connotations the closer they got, most of them of the friendly sort. Maybe even more than that.

Not that Perry gave it toomuch thought or anything.

"What do you think you're doing?" said Heinz as Perry dove for one of his feet and latched onto his shoe. "I just got these shined, Perry the platypus! Get off!" He shook his leg, but Perry held on tight, even going so far as to bite down on the leather (which tasted terrible). Heinz lifted his foot up to try and dislodge Perry with his hands, but wasn't able to keep his balance and went toppling backwards into his own invention, changing the aim and activating it at the same time. As a single beam shot out over the town below, Heinz braced himself against the Fall-Apart-inator, his foot still in the air. "Now look at what you've done, Perry the -"

He didn't get to finish as Perry yanked his shoe off, dropped back to the ground, and scampered out of reach. "What was that for?!" he yelled after his nemesis. "You could have just asked -" Again, Heinz was interrupted, this time by his own shriek of pain as he put his shoe-less foot down on the very Lego brick Perry had thrown at his face earlier. He pulled his foot up again to grab it, then fell back again, this time into the railing of his balcony before he slid down to the floor.

"How could you, Perry the platypus?" Heinz wailed as Perry struck the self-destruct button with the stolen shoe. "You knew that Lego was there, Perry the platypus! You did that entirely on purpose!"

Perry flipped away from the Fall-Apart-inator as it exploded, shoe still in hand. He'd actually gotten his idea from a memory of Lawrence stepping on a few Legos barefoot not too many weeks before, when the boys had found an entire bin of the things in the attic and had decided to play with them in the living room. He tossed the shoe into the air with a satisfied chatter to let Heinz know that, yes, he had done it on purpose.

Heinz sat up and rolled his eyes. "Oh, don't look so smug. It's very unbecoming, Perry the platypus."

"What the hell was that?" said Buford as the last of the beam dissipated into the air surrounding the head of the giant platypus.

"I dunno," Phineas replied, both surprised and in awe. "It sure looked neat - I wonder where it came from?"

He was distracted trying to look for a source to the beam when Isabella tapped his shoulder, and he kept scanning the horizon for a moment before turning to her, hopeful that she had spotted it herself. She looked alarmed rather than excited, however, and when she pointed back to the sculpture with a shaking hand, Phineas saw why.

The sculpture was vibrating as screws and bolts twisted out of place and began falling down into the grass. The scraps that had been welded together were shaking apart, somehow separating entirely, melted pieces and all. Mesh and wires added around the face and tail popped right off and clattered down the sides. The whole thing was about to collapse.

The world slowed down as the four of them began to back away from where they worked, moving towards one another and as far from the giant platypus as they could get. For a moment it seemed like just another strange way that their creation would vanish, even though it wasn't completed; whatever it was that always assured their projects went away had been activated, somehow. It was as routine as the creations themselves. Yet as Phineas glanced at his friends, he realized that the routine was off - Ferb was always by his side at the end. Buford, Baljeet, and Isabella all glanced at him in turn, almost in slow motion, each realizing the same thing.

Phineas was the first to choke out his brother's name above the din of metal clanging and banging as it fell. His whole body felt gripped by the electric terror of what was unfolding before him as his friend joined in, screaming Ferb's name at the top of their lungs. None of it seemed real, especially not his own voice, wailing for Ferb as he tried to get his legs to move so he could run into the sculpture before it all gave way.

Ferb looked out of the opening he had slipped through and even began to step towards it as his friends all yelled for him. The way their voices sounded made his heart beat in a strange way, like it was up in his throat, threatening to choke him. He knew something horrible had happened. The sunlight outside spilled through gaps in the framework and illuminated Phineas, who was moving towards the base in a frenzy. They caught one another's eyes for a moment; Phineas looked terrified and desperate. Ferb reached towards him, almost out of the shadows inside the sculpture, then recoiled as a particularly heavy bolt fell on the top of his head.

He looked up just as everything came crashing down.

Rarely did Perry consider what happened when Heinz's inventions were set off during their battles. There had been a few times where the outcome directly affected him, but usually it was something harmless or under another agent's jurisdiction. Sometimes he picked up on the fact that whatever the boys had built had been taken away by whatever it was that Heinz or his machines had done, but that only happened every so often, really. The idea that both his lives would clash in such a way was strange; once he got home, Perry preferred to put thoughts of Heinz out of his mind.

Even so, as he rode his motor scooter towards Danville's suburbs, he briefly considered the Fall-Apart-inator's abilities and what it might have done. Heinz's comment about not wanting to maim anyone came to mind, but was quickly dismissed. People in Danville didn't get maimed. Some old building that was scheduled for demolition had probably been hit, saving the workers all the trouble and probably doing something beneficial for Roger as well. That was how things went.

Perry repeated this over in his mind several times in a desperate bid to drown out the growing sense of dread he felt deep in his gut. He usually wasn't the sort of platypus who got paranoid - somehow, that made it feel even worse.

Phineas threw an arm up to shield his eyes against the cloud of dirt and debris send flying by the avalanche of metal. As it settled into silence, he lowered his arm and stared out into the dust, praying that at any moment, Ferb would rise up from the scrap pile.

That moment never came.

"Ferb?" His voice was soft, but just loud enough to hear, loud enough to warrant a response - but none came.

Isabella was the first to step forward, reaching out as if to touch Phineas's shoulder. She was in shock; they all were. She needed to be there for him, she knew that - even as she, too, hoped Ferb was going to be alright. He had to be. They were always alright at the end of it all, weren't they?

Her fingers were inches from Phineas when he began to shake, and she pulled back just as he opened his mouth to scream.

"FERB!"

Then he was gone, rushing into the scrap with a complete disregard for all its sharp edges and protruding nails. His friends could only watch in stunned horror as he set upon the area he'd seen Ferb before it all fell, digging and kicking through the pile even as it fought back against him and cut him with every move he made. "Ferb, can you hear me?" he pleaded as he pushed some of the scrap back with one of his feet, seeming to take no notice of the jagged cut draw across his thigh as he did. "Are you in there? I'm coming, Ferb! You're gonna be okay!" His sweater caught on an exposed nail, and when it stopped his arm from moving, he forcefully tore himself away. In seconds the new hole in his sleeve was soaked in his blood.

Isabella could take no more. "Phineas, stop!" she shrieked, tears flowing down her face. "You're hurting yourself! Stop!"

He continued on as if he couldn't hear her, shoving more metal out of his way so he could reach closer to the bottom of the pile. His eyes were focused on whatever was below him, his teeth clenched and bared in his panic. His tears, mixed with sweat and dirt, fell in a constant stream down his face and dripped from his nose and chin. It was as though he had shut out the entire world but for his goal of reaching his brother underneath the wreckage.

Isabella turned back and looked between Buford and Baljeet, her eyes frantic and pleading. Baljeet tried to respond, or move, or do something, but found himself unable to decide what to do at all. He was overwhelmed and scared and only managed to clench his hands into tight fists, his fingernails digging into his palms.

Buford looked from Isabella to Baljeet, and then to Baljeet's shaking arms. He looked up as Isabella opened her mouth to speak, but then he was moving, making his way towards Phineas to forcefully pull him away. That was what he was good at - force. He didn't need to think about it. He just had to do it. He was the big guy, the muscle; he had to protect his friends.

He was only a few steps away when Phineas suddenly let out a loud, elated sound. "Ferb! I see you!" he yelled, his lips shaking as his grin stretched as far as it would go. Buford stepped back in surprise, and Isabella moved to his side as Phineas all but disappeared past the wall of scrap he'd kicked up between him and his friends. "Oh, Ferb, everything is gonna be alright! Hang in there!"

For a single second, the possibility that everything would be okay reared up again. It would be the story of a close call, a near-death experience to add to Phineas and Ferb's mile-long list of experiences. Life would go back to normal. They would be fine.

Then Phineas rose up, holding Ferb by his underarms, and the sun cast down upon everything that had gone horrible wrong. Phineas was grinning, laughing, even as his face was streaked with blood.

Ferb's blood.

Isabella clapped a hand over her mouth mid-shriek, her other hand going to her stomach. Buford found himself unable to keep looking and looked at Isabella instead, then back at Baljeet, who had both hands over his mouth and looked like he was about to fall to his knees. Buford wanted to help both of them; he wanted to pull them both close, keep them safe. Yet he found it difficult to work out how to do that with how far apart they were, as if his mind just refused to work out the steps needed to fix that. Unsure of himself, he put a hand on Isabella's shoulder, wincing as Phineas laughed and Isabella let out a quiet sob.

Phineas had pulled Ferb up as high as he could, but Ferb had always been taller, and his right leg dragged through the scrap as Phineas moved back towards the grass. His left leg was mutilated beyond belief, skin and muscle shredded down to the bone, and there wasn't enough of it left to drag on anything. His right arm looked much the same as it swayed with Phineas's movements, and made it seem as though the metal had tried to tear him apart from his right shoulder down to his left foot; the worst of the damage seemed to spread out along that path. As Phineas knelt on the grass, making obvious attempts to be careful, whatever had been keeping Ferb's right arm attached finally seemed to give up, and it slid off of his body, thumping onto the grass near Phineas's knees.

"It's okay, Ferb," Phineas said, his lips trembling as he cradled his brother in his arms. "You're gonna be fine. We'll get you fixed right up. Just hang in there." He was staring down at Ferb's face as he spoke, yet it was though he didn't actually see it; he didn't respond at all to the torn skin, the gaping mouth, the one eye half-shut and unseeing, the jagged metal that protruded from the left eye socket. He spoke as though Ferb were looking back up at him, bruised and battered but relieved to be alive, as relieved as Phineas was to have rescued him.

"Phineas," Isabella choked out, one hand still over her mouth.

All of the sudden he seemed to realize his friends were still there as his head snapped up, his eyes fixated on them, shining and wild. "Call an ambulance!" he shouted, a hint of frustration in his voice. "There are med-kits in the shed, grab some of them! Do something!"

His voice cracked on the last word, almost as though he were about to lose his composure and crash back down to reality - but he didn't.

The others stayed where they were, staring at Phineas in different degrees of horror and disbelief. It was Buford who spoke next, uneasy and wavering: "There's... There's nothin' we can do, Phineas. He's..."

Blood ran down Phineas's arms, his own and Ferb's all mixed together, circling around his skin and dripping onto the ground. There was so much of it. Too much.

"He's going to be fine," said Phineas.

Isabella could take no more, and she broke into a fit of sobbing so powerful than she almost doubled over. Even as Buford rushed to support her, she was near falling, overwhelmed by the weight of everything that was happening. Her break caused Baljeet to begin crying as well; not as loud, or as strong, but he wept all the same, still un able to make himself move so he could join his friends.

Their grief seemed to send Phineas into a panic. "Stop it!" he yelled. "He's fine! He's going to be fine!" He seemed ready to leap up and shake them all out of their nonsense, but Ferb weighed heavily on his arms and legs. Instead he gripped his brother tighter. "Stop crying! I need - he needs our help!" He shook with the force of his own words, and Ferb swayed limply in his grasp, sending blood running in all new directions across both of them. Phineas could feel it coating his fingers, making his palms slick and sticky, but it was nothing to worry about - nothing to fear -

"I can fix him!"

Phineas jerked back, almost as though he were recoiling from what he had said. Buford was staring at him, afraid and angry and desperate all at once, and Phineas met his gaze in shock. Then he looked down at Ferb, searching his face for something that made sense in the back of his mind. Ferb's remaining eye never met his.

"...I can fix him," Phineas repeated, his voice drowned out by Isabella's screaming and Baljeet's wails. "I can... fix him."

Buford found himself unlucky enough to see the horrid smile that spread across Phineas's face, splitting his lips into a snarling grin as he stared down at the body in his arms.

Lawrence was the one who delivered Phineas, kicking and screaming despite his wounds, to the waiting paramedics who arrived on the scene. As they placed his other son in a body bag, he helped hold Phineas still even as he shouted at everyone around him to let him go and stop touching Ferb. Lawrence stared into his eyes as Phineas looked up at him, pleading, and said, "Dad, don't let them take Ferb away!"

Buford, Isabella, and Baljeet were questioned briefly before being released to their parents, and then it was Candace fielding questions as she had been the one to call 911 when she heard Phineas screaming outside. All she could tell them was that it had been some sort of sculpture project that had fallen, and yes, her brothers really did do such things without proper gear or protection, and no, they weren't too young to be doing such things - they'd been doing them almost as long as they'd been alive. She just barely managed to hold her composure through it all, then finally broke down when all attention was returned to Phineas, who needed to be loaded into the ambulance for transport to the hospital. She fell sobbing into her mother's arms, unable to respond when asked if she would be coming with them. Ultimately it was Lawrence who agreed to go, with the assurance that his wife and daughter would be along shortly. They just needed time to get ready, he said.

Linda and Candace sat on their front steps as the ambulance drove away, holding one another tight and sobbing. Curious neighbors had appeared along the street in he midst of all the sounds, and now they stood in the distance, unsure of what to do or how to respond. Some weren't even sure what exactly had happened; they asked others in hushed tones if it had something to do with the Flynn-Fletcher boys, always in the midst of something strange or insane.

"I should have listened to you," Linda said between sobs. "I'm so sorry, Candace, I should have believed you..."

Candace couldn't even think of what to say. She had waited for so long to finally be validated, but this... This was all too much. This was a nightmare, not a victory, and part of her wished her mother didn't apologize at all. She wiped her eyes on her sleeve, tried to say it was okay, then noticed they were no longer alone and decided to focus on that instead.

"Oh, Perry, there you are," she said as she lifted him from the ground and held him tight against her chest. "Oh, Perry..."

Tight against the fabric of her hoodie, his face half-obscured by her hair falling over her shoulder, Perry stared down the road where the ambulance had gone.