Chapter 3: The Case Of The Missing Bird

The time after breakfast was used to introduce the four new Rangers to the usual working methods of the small rescuing and law enforcing group. Checking the police station for new cases was part of it. This time, they went there by foot, only Zipper flew as always. That way, the newbies, especially LaWahini who had never really been in this city before four weeks ago, could have a closer look at the surroundings of the Headquarters and the quarter they were in. Besides, none of the Rangers' vehicles was large enough for all of them.

"Here we are," Chip said as the group of nine arrived at the station, "the 5th precinct. An excellent place for finding new cases as the police don't deal with everything, and even if they try to, they can't often solve them without our help."

"That's probably why Spinelli is still a Sergeant after all these years," Gadget supposed. "Most of his cases seem to solve themselves. It doesn't serve him quite well when it's clearly not his achievement that his case is completed."

Monty commented, "Ol' Spinelli's jes' got the bloomin' luck ta get so many cases that 'e an' 'is lads can't solve without us."

And Zipper concluded that it was practically the Rescue Rangers whom Spinelli, Kirby and Muldoon should thank for saving their jobs, and that it wasn't the Rangers' fault that their careers didn't proceed at all.

"Okay, everybody, we're going inside." Chip motioned the other Rangers to follow him and advised the new members, "Be careful not to be seen. Even if Monty won't. They've given up hunting him long ago, but you may not be as lucky."

"An' robust," Monty added, "don't ferget that."

"Right. He's the only one of us whom mouse traps can't do any harm," Chip explained. "So I don't want anyone to try their luck on that. And stay together so that no-one gets lost in the darkness in there."

The chipmunk in the fedora directed his team through the maze of hollows in the walls of the police station which led to several locations in the building, many of them of considerable importance for the Rangers. He didn't waste a thought on making a map of them; the old Rangers had memorized everything after a while, and the chances that a group of only newcomers would pay the police a visit, that early in their career no less, were about zero. On their way, they used spaces between walls or between floors and ceilings, air ducts and cable ducts. Gadget remembered the latter quite well from past enterprises involving actions like tapping the phone lines or even rewiring worn-out and damaged parts of the installation.

After a while, they reached an exit to one of the office rooms. The working-place of a rather busy policeman was right below. Chip introduced him to the four new Rangers, although some of them may already have seen him on past cases. "Foxy, Tammy, Sparky, LaWahini, this is Sergeant Spinelli."

"The guy who might be Captain or Chief today if he had solved his cases on his own?" LaWahini asked.

"The same," Dale answered.

The rotund Sergeant had just received a new case. And he didn't show any signs of being used to such degrees of strangeness. "Who does he think we are? An animal shelter? How are we supposed to find an escaped parrot? I mean, it has disappeared from a penthouse. It can have flown to who knows where."

"Mr. Jacob said he doubts that the bird has escaped, Sir," Officer Kirby pointed out. He and Officer Muldoon were standing in front of Spinelli's desk. "Someone must have opened the cage from outside."

"But he has also said that he hasn't found any evidence for a burglary," Muldoon added.

Spinelli got up. "And that's the reason why finding evidence is our job. We've been trained to do that. We've got the experience necessary for doing that. Okay, show me what you've found out in that Whatshisname case," he referred to an immigrant from Romania whose name he couldn't pronounce and who rather seemed to be a burglary victim to him than the parrot owner, "and then we go to that Mr. Jacob and take a closer look at his penthouse."

The three policemen left the room. It was now empty except for a handful of animals who took their chance.

"Sounds like a case for us," Chip said. "I bet we can find more about it in the papers Spinelli has left on his desk." It was then when he realized that he had forgotten the foldable fishing rod at the Headquarters. Things like this kept occurring frequently during the past four weeks, and he knew pretty well why. "We need to get down onto the desk."

"Or get the papers up here." After saying this, Foxglove dove down, flew to the desk, and carried the top sheet up to the other Rangers. She asked herself what the Rangers had done on their first two years without a bat's help.

"Thank you, Foxy." Chip started studying the paper. "So this parrot is not only rare and precious, but he's a talking one."

"What's the point, Chipper?" Tammy wondered. "We can talk, too, can't we?"

"Yes, but the humans are used to talking parrots. They'd go crazy if they found out that squirrels or chipmunks can talk, too. We're keeping it secret for a reason. Besides, these parrots don't talk to humans like they talk to other animals either."

"Well, we've talked with Nimnul when his head was on Zipper's body," Gadget remembered.

"Nimnul has been crazy as long as we know him," Dale said, "he doesn't count. Now what's the hassle about that talking parrot, Chip?"

"He knows the code to Jacob's safe. It reacts on his voice."

"Too-ra-loo," Monty commented, "'e's a safe key with feathers."

"And that makes him even more interesting for all kinds of crooks. I say we go back to the Headquarters, get the aircraft, and have a look at this place." Chip pointed to Mr. Jacob's address on the paper before he handed it back to Foxglove who brought it back to where she had gotten it from.

Despite having a longer way to go and slower vehicles, the Rangers managed to arrive at the penthouse in Rangerplane and Rangerwing roughly at the same time as the police. It didn't take them long to find out how to get inside.

As they made their way through a stainless steel tunnel, Chip gave some explanations about it. "There's no door to the roof, and since the penthouse has its own air-conditioning, the windows can't be opened either. So the air channels are the only ways in and out. What makes it easier is that the air-conditioning is hardly used at this time of the year."

Immediately before they reached the air grille, the Rangers were about to learn the hard way that hardly doesn't mean not at all when the air in the channel started moving. "Golly," Gadget shouted, "it's starting up!"

"And there's nothing in here we can cling to," Tammy worried while Foxglove had taken off and was more and more frantically trying to fly against the storm. But soon it grew too strong, and she had to lay down on the ground with almost everyone else. Chip held his hat, and Monty held Zipper. Only Sparky, the now tallest Ranger, stood strong against the artificial gale, he even started walking.

"Sparky," Chip yelled, "what are you gonna do?"

"Solve this little problem," the rat replied as he ran with the wind towards the turbine. The other Rangers watched him run away into the darkness. Then they saw a flash, heard a brief cracking noise, and the air stood still again.

It was quiet for a moment. They all imagined the worst. But then they saw Sparky come out of the shadows with two smoking index fingers. "What a pity, the fan motor has broken down," he said with a mischievous grin. "Must have gotten a too high voltage. These things are sooo sensitive..."

Gadget was the first Ranger to get up. "Golly and a half, Sparky!" she said with a smile. "That was amazing. Thanks a lot!"

With memories of when the Rangers had met Sparky for the first time coming back from where he had locked them away, Chip gave Gadget a glance which could hardly hide his jealousy. Had she found a mind more similar to hers than Chip could offer her? Were things to return to the way they were back then, now that they probably were so close to finally revealing their mutual feelings? Was she slipping away from him towards another one, even before he could get a hold of her?

"Aw, that was nothing but action without thinking," Sparky explained. Finding vulnerable parts on an electric motor didn't involve much thinking for him. He had been de-conditioned a while ago, but along with his little memory problems, his attitude had stayed the same. It was too obvious that this understatement of his pleased the inventor mouse, even though "action without thinking" usually was not her way at all.

"What was that noise?" the Rangers heard Officer Muldoon's voice. Crime victim and law enforcers had just arrived.

"Must have been the air-conditioning," Mr. Jacob suspected. "It's not quite reliable, you know, it breaks down every once in a while."

So no police investigation inside the air duct. The Rangers felt relieved. Chip decided to shove his doubts about keeping Sparky in the team and and about the lab rat's influence on Gadget aside and get back to the case. He motioned his fellows to follow him to the grille and watch the humans.

"Look, Mr. Jacob," Officer Kirby said, "the door and the windows are intact, the latter can't even be opened due to the air-conditioning..."

"They can't?" Muldoon wondered as if he had never been in an air-conditioned building.

"Do you see any handles?"

"No..."

"So how is a potential burglar supposed to open them, let alone from outside?"

"Dunno. I'm no burglar, so I don't have that kind of experience."

"But you should have been a police officer for long enough to know the methods of burglars."

"Well..."

"Anyway," Kirby addressed to Mr. Jacob again, "since a key is necessary to take the elevator up to this floor, and only you, the cleaning personnel and the security have such keys, I doubt that anyone has gotten in here through the door to steal your bird. It has most likely flown out through the door when someone came to clean up."

"And if this doesn't convince you," Sergeant Spinelli added, "we can still have a talk with the cleaning personnel and the security staff."

"Is there no other way?" Jacob asked almost desperately.

"The only other way in and outta here is through the air-conditioning ducts," Kirby pointed to the grille behind which the Rescue Rangers hid. "But I doubt that any burglar would fit through it."

"Actually, I don't," Chip said.

"C'mon, Chip, they'd just get stuck."

"Dale, have you ever taken into consideration that we don't have to deal with human burglars?"

"Chip's right, Dale," Monty confirmed the leader's words. "An' I'm pretty sure that a certain tabby's got 'is filthy paws in this case."

"What makes you think that, Monty?"

The rotund mouse handed the chipmunk in the hat a handful of gray hair. "This was under the grille. Ya learn one or two things when yer livin' with a Sureluck Jones fan."

Chip didn't have to examine the hair too closely to find out who was the previous owner. "Fat Cat. I already had a hunch that he's behind this, but here I have the proof."

LaWahini hadn't been introduced to the several villains the Rangers have to deal with from time to time. "Fat Cat? Do I have to know him, Chip?"

"Well, you'd have gotten to know him sooner or later anyway. As his name says, he's a cat, and he's, well, fat. He used to be the pet of a criminal mastermind named Aldrin Klordane who happened to be our very first opponent. He runs a gambling hall on top of a cat food factory and a small criminal organization with four henchmen, and since Klordane's in jail, he's got a lot more time at hand to run both."

Then the former Hawaiian mouse looked up and down the grille. "But how have they been able to get this out of their way and back in its place?"

Gadget explained, "It's quite easy since the grille is not fixed with screws. At the top, it's held by a hinge, and at the bottom, there's a clip that holds it shut. You can push it open from in here, you just have to apply a little force. I would give you a demonstration, but the humans are still there."

"So Fat Cat has stolen this parrot who can tell him the combination of Mr. Jacob's safe, right?" Tammy summed up the case. She had been in the hands of the feline crook before—literally—, so she had a certain experience with him. "And I bet he'll do anything to get the code."

"You've already won that bet," Chip said. "Let's get outta here now and pay him a visit."

"Why don't we just stay here and surprise him tonight?" Dale suggested.

"Why don't you use your head for something else than this?" With these words, Chip bonked Dale's head.

"Ow! Why have you done that?"

"We don't know if he comes back tonight. I even doubt he does, he won't intrude here as long as Mr. Jacob is at home. Besides, even if he did, I don't wanna cancel my date with Gadget if I don't have to." He earned a smile from the inventor mouse for saying this. "And let's not forget that he has the parrot, and I guess most of us know what he does with his captives. No, we're going to the Happy Tom factory right now."