Disclaimer: I don't own WordGirl or Two-Brains or Tobey or Scoops or the henchman . . . this is just a fan fiction.

(A/N) Sorry for such a long wait for this chapter; finals were coming up, I wrote another story and Christmas happened . . . and then I got a new expansion pack for my Sims 2 game. Review old chapters if you need to. Please R & R and enjoy this chap.

"Authorities say they are looking for a missing child tonight. The boy was last seen at the horse showing at about noon, and officials say no one was with the child when he left. The boy's information is now on the screen; if you know anything about the case, you are encouraged to call the police department . . ."

TV never did much in the way of distracting his minds. It seemed every time he turned on the idiot-box it always brought him more pain then relief. This time was no different. As he looked at the reporter boy's picture his thoughts where wrenched back to WordGirl. That worried image of her haunted him. Not even a mountain of cheese could calm the man trapped inside him.

"In other news," the anchor went on to say. "The Two-Brains threat seemed to be nothing more than just idle words."

Two-Brains threw his remote right into the screen. Unfortunately the screen did not break as he had wanted, so he had to stand to retrieve the remote and turn off the television.

"Stupid light weight remote." The doctor tossed the thing to the sofa and proceeded to his cheese vault. "How dare they claim I'm making idle threats. They should fear me."

"I wonder if WordGirl's okay."

"No I don't care."

The doctor opened his vault, trying his best to ignore the raging battle Prof. Boxleitner was trying to start. But the professor's persistence proved a more problematic propionate. Dr. Two-Brains was at a loss on how to calm that part of himself down and get back to a more serious issue, cheese.

"Why should I care!" He began his convincing. "If someone's out trying to blow WordGirl up, all the better for me. And good riddance to that nosey reporter."

The images of Tuesday only became clearer in the conflicted doctor's minds as he mentioned the journalist. That kid might have died if he wasn't there.

"So why did I do that if I didn't care." His vision of the vault became very blurred. "Because I do care, someone is out there trying to hurt WordGirl, and what better way to get to her than through civilians-"

"No!" Two-brains hissed forcing the thoughts out of his mind. "I am going to work on collecting the city's cheese as planned and be happy that this is distracting that flying nuisance."

"And possibly killing that fly nuisance."

"I don't care."

Two-Brains was momentarily jerked out of his thoughts as the voice of one of his henchmen could be heard.

"You okay, boss?" The man leaned his head around the corner of the vault door.

"Yes, yes, I'm fine. If I need you I'll call you. Now-Get-Away-From-Me!"

The man almost tripped over his own feet trying to back away from his boss. He'd never remembered a time when the doctor was this agitated, but it was best not to question his methods now. Maybe he should do something else while his boss had some 'lone time.'

Two-Brains on the other hand, stood gazing at the now open entry way, breathing heavy from his recent outburst. The two desires combating inside him where becoming too much to bear. He didn't want Prof. Boxleitner's dearest friend facing the enemy that attacked her Tuesday alone, but Squeaky wasn't willing to save WordGirl. Where was the happy medium Two-Brains needed? Unexpectedly the high pitch hum of the television could be heard as Two-Brains henchman sat down to watch TV. The machine was still tuned in to the nightly news.

"It appears another child has gone missing tonight," stated the anchor as Two-Brains left his vault to stand behind his henchman. "She was last seen at seven-thirty in this apartment complex." Images of Violet's housing area along with pictures of Becky flashed on the screen. "Investigators are no longer convinced that the two children might have gotten lost."

"I could have told them that." Two-Brains spoke spooking his assistant. "No one has ever gotten lost in this city."

"Really, boss?" The henchman turned up to his superior.

"Well, maybe small children, but they are usually found within the hour. . ." It was at that moment that Two-Brains began to fully understand the meaning of his own words. The anchor continued.

"Due to the nature of this case the mayor has called a press conference happening, right about . . . now." The image on the screen changed to a shot of city hall where the mayor was standing at the podium preparing to speak. He flipped through a few cards. He began his speech.

"Ladies and gentleman it has come to my attention that a possible abduction has happened in our city. Abduction?!" The mayor held the card out at arm's length with a puzzled expression on his face. "We have alien abductions in our city?!"

The crowd, gathered to see the speech, gasped in fear as they turned their gaze upward. It was then the mayor's assistant quickly came alongside the man and corrected his understanding of the word 'abduction.'

The mayor frowned at the definition and went back to thumbing through his cards before becoming too frustrated to read them anymore.

"Oh forget the cards." He spoke gruffly as he turned his full attention to the media. "I don't think I have a speech prepared for this kind of emergency." The mayor's assistant whispered something into his ear before he continued. "Two young people are missing and, there's reason to be believe they've been kidnaped?! We have a crisis on our hands." The mayor seemed as shocked by the information as the media.

A loud murmur rose among the reporters present until one man spoke up.

"Mr. Mayor? What do you believe happened?"

The mayor shrugged instantly not really sure he understood what a kidnapping meant for the city. This kind of thing had never happened before, what was he suppose to do?

"I think the commissioner told me the kids must have been walking home alone and someone kidnapped them." The official answered.

The press gasped and then all at once began bombarding the mayor with questions. The chatter, mixed in with the mayor's confusion about the situation, made the mayor very nervous and somewhat angry.

"Quiet, Please!" The mayor raised his hands and silenced the crowd. "I can't take all this commotion." The man would have loved to take a moment and congratulate himself on the use of his newly found word, but he refused himself such a pleasure. "Being this kidnapper's target seems to be children; I've decided to do something about it."

The crowd murmured again as the mayor took more of his assistance's advice.

"Please settle down. The city is going to close all schools a week early, have the finest police monitoring playgrounds and other child filled places, and do everything we can until the bad guy, or girl, is caught."

"Mr. Mayor?" One of the reporters called out before her colleagues had a chance. "How can you be confident that you can catch this kidnapper? Has our police force ever dealt with this kind of crime before?"

Blank stare.

"Well," the elected official scratched the back of his head as he searched for an answer. "No, I don't think there has ever been a kidnapping before, but I'm sure we can handle it."

"Mr. Mayor?!" Another report shouted. "Are you aware that this is the worst criminal offence that has ever befallen our city?"

At this remark Dr. Two-Brains had seen enough. No criminal was better than him. And kidnapping children just to lure WordGirl out, not even he was that desperate; or at least that's what it appeared this villain was doing.

"I'm the criminal everyone should fear." At this remark Two-Brains felt his old fire burning again. "Henchmen get the van ready; we have a villain to thwart."

"But boss," the vocal henchman stood from the sofa. "Why do you want to stop him?"

"To make me look good of course."

Though he couldn't admit it, Professor Boxleitner could agree with himself on this.

"I'll be helping to save WordGirl yes, but it is so I can prove to this city that I am the number one villain. Me!" Two-Brains laughed as his henchmen quickly got started on setting up the van. "Only I should be the one who finishes WordGirl. I am the worst scoundrel around, and by stopping this pyro-kidnaper the city will see I'm evil enough to have my cheese threats taken seriously. It's the perfect alibi . . . scheme, I mean scheme."

o.

Frustration.

Being grounded always made for the most frustrating, trying, annoying, exasperating, vexing, maddening, irritating evenings.

Was that the best word list he could come up with . . . for now it would have to be, for his mind was preoccupied by the infuriating fact that his mother had grounded him for No Reason. He hadn't built any new robots, he hadn't destroyed the city-He did his chores without being asked for crying out loud! Why Was He Grounded!

Perhaps this wasn't his mother's doing. Liz was probably behind this, using it as a way to get back at him for scaring her on Wednesday. Wasn't his fault she opened the broom closet and a robotic skeleton was there. . . wait, yes it was. But where else was he supposed to put it. Mother was due home at any minute.

Tobey sprang up from the rocking chair, where he sat to sooth his troubles, and bolted to his bedroom door. He planned to give his babysitter a piece of his mind. She had no right to keep him locked in here. Regardless of whether she had mother's neutralizing remote or not, he would make Liz regret having done this to him.

"I'll have you know Liz that you have no hope in keeping a brilliant mind like mine from . . ."

"Dang Tobey!" Liz jumped at the sound of the young man's voice as he stormed into the living room. "I am tryin' to watch TV, shut-up. Man, what is wrong with you children today."

Tobey raised a finger in protest but Liz continued.

"I thought you was supposed to stay in your room all night."

"That is exactly what we must talk about . . ."

"I mean, what do ya think your mom's gunna say when I tell her you didn't stay in your room."

"Mother would never ground me without reason Liz, you're the one-"

"Maybe she grounded you for being an annoying little pest when she's trying to watch her shows!"

That was it. Tobey now had enough anger coursing through his young body to send eighty robots after Liz. How dare she treat him, Theodore Tobey MaCallister III, like he was some mere child. He wouldn't stand for this.

Tobey jumped onto the couch and began wrestling the remote from Liz's hand. The boy pried at the teenager's fingers as she fought vigorously to push him off of her.

"Get off me you little dweeb!" Liz shoved Tobey to the opposite side of the couch and turned back toward the TV. "Aww man, you changed the channel; I missed what happened to Bee and Carl on Frantic Homemakers! Oh, Tobey I'm gunna kill-"

As Liz looked to Tobey it was as if he had seen a ghost. He was staring blankly at the television as if death itself was present on the screen. Liz turned her gaze to the screen and saw that the news was on and that there was a picture of some girl, about Tobey's age. She was missing.

"Well that really blows." The teen remarked off handedly as she switched the channel back to her show.

"Why Did You Do That?!" Tobey hallowed as he again lunged for the remote. Liz extended the remote at arm's length as she raised her foot to hold him back.

"I don't want to watch some depressing junk on the news. They lie about everything anyway. Plus your mom said you can't watch TV."

Tobey quit his assault on his babysitter and sat back; eyes welling with fuming tears.

"If you don't give me that remote right now, I'll show you why mother's had to hire so many different babysitters."

The seriousness of Tobey's tone was enough to get Liz to release her grip on the remote. The boy quickly returned the screen to the news shocking citizens city wide; a kidnapping.

o.

"I have the reporter Adler," Curtis spoke warily into the communicator in his hand; the image of Adler halo-graphically projected in front of him. "He'll be waking up soon and I have him securely locked up."

"Good, I think we're going to need his help more than I anticipated." Adler wasn't looking at the image of his partner. He was busy typing away at the equipment accessible to him through the school. "I've found the whereabouts of the one kid, but WordGirl's information is somehow blocked."

"Uh, Adler?" Curtis played with the device in his hand. "About that other kid you're after. . ."

"I'm going to deal with him right now, it appears he's alone; from there I'll join you."

"But why are you doing this?"

"It's nothing you need to be concerned with Curtis. Just start asking that reporter boy about WordGirl. We've laid off of her long enough." Adler cut the feed.

Curtis slowly placed the device in his pocket and went back to the bedroom where Scoops was being held. The lake house that the two men had taken was now wired with Britannican technology. The house was impenetrable from the outside with a security system strong enough to hold back a Lexiconian armored vehicle. The only thing harder than getting into the house was trying to get out of it. Even basement to the home had been replaced with a complete Britannican underground computer networking base; a center Curtis was afraid to hide Scoops in due to High Law. Honestly, everything Curtis and Adler had done to the home was against High Law.

Scoops had been laid out on one of the room's beds to rest. Curtis decided it would be best to let the boy wake up on his own to which Scoops was doing now. The young reporter half-lidded his eyes as he slowly sat up. He was slightly confused by his surroundings as his mind fought to sort the events of that afternoon.

"Where am I?" Scoops' focus soon fell on Curtis who stood motionless at the door. "You!" The boy's weariness melted away as the memory of being kidnapped hit him. "You kidnapped me!"

Curtis watched as the child threw the sheets off, jumped from the bed and took a serious pose in front of him.

"I demand you take me back immediately."

Curtis took another moment to stare down at the child before stepping into the room fully and shutting the door. Scoops wasn't intimidated by this gesture at all; there was no way this man was going to take his story.

"I said I want to go back now."

"Sit down."

"No, I want to go home!"

"I said, Sit Down!"

This tone did frighten Scoops, at least enough to get him to comply with the command. Curtis remained still as the boy glared at him from his position on the bed. The boy must have been upset and Curtis couldn't blame him. But that didn't really matter right now. Curtis knew that once Adler got all the information he wanted out of this kid, he'd kill 'em. High Law did not permit the people of Earth to have this much contact with anyone from any other planet. To keep Adler's record clean, Scoops would have to die.

For some reason, it didn't seem so bad at first. Killing was a part of war and it wasn't like some eleven year old would really be missed; that's why he could rig the club to explode with the boy in it. But this seemed to be taking it too far. It wasn't like this child was unfortunately next to their target during battle, he was out having a fun day when he was kidnapped and killed. Curtis would have to look into his eyes as he killed him.

"If you want me to tell you who WordGirl is so you can steal my story, well, you can just forget it." Scoops was trying to appear fearless, a futile effort.

This made Curtis feel even worse. Why did being a loyalist mean he had to hurt children? Couldn't they just threaten him and send him home? Stupid probably would be too scared to tell anyone anyway. . . and, he couldn't kill . . . not the child from the picture.

"Todd," Curtis quickly came to Scoops and bent to his level. "This isn't about getting a story."

"What are you . . ?"

"I'm not a reporter, neither of us are."

"I'm confused."

Curtis sighed. What was he doing? If Adler found out . . .

"Listen to me boy, any minute now Adler is going to return and try to get you to tell him who WordGirl is. You Can't tell him." Curtis grabbed Scoops' arms to force the child to focus on him and see the severity of his words. "If you tell Adler anything he will kill WordGirl, and then he will kill you."

Scoops searched the man's face looking for any hint that this was a joke. The young reporter could feel his heart quicken its pace as Curtis continued.

"Do you know what 'status-quo' means?"

The boy shook his head.

"It means that as long as Adler thinks you know valuable information, he won't kill you. You need to make him think you are worth keeping alive. Do you know WordGirl's secret identity?"

Scoops was feeling so uneasy. They wanted to kill him? What had he done? He didn't want to die; He didn't want to drown.

"No! I don't know anything please let me go." Scoops began to struggle against Curtis' grasp, but the man only tightened his hold on the boy.

"Stop that!"

"Let me go!"

Scoops began kicking at Curtis forcing the man to lose his grip on the boy. Quickly Scoops rose from the bed and dashed for the door. His right arm, however, was promptly snatched by Curtis and his body was forcibly brought back to its former position.

"Listen to me," Curtis shook Scoops lightly to scare him stiff. "Whether you leave now or not Alder will find you and bring you back. The best card you have to play here, is to keep the status-quo; got it?"

o.

His mother had grounded him for his own protection, or at least that's what Liz had said. His mother didn't want him to worry, so she called Liz from work and told her Tobey was grounded; as simple as that.

Worry? This feeling was beyond worry.

Had Becky really been kidnapped? Did he really care?

Tobey had never heard about this kind of thing before; it had never happened in this city. Sure adults told kids not to go out late at night, but that was because the kid could become lost or get hurt. But kidnapped?

Tobey looked to the bookcase of his room; the dictionary apprehensively waiting to be read. Tobey went and thumbed through its pages until his finger came to rest on the word:

Kidnap- transitive verb-etymology: formation from kidnapper, from kid plus obsolete napper: thief- to seize and detain or carry away by unlawful force or fraud and often with a demand for ransom.

Tobey knew the definition of this word; he just didn't want to believe that's what it meant. The boy sat in his rocking chair staring at the letters on the page until the words began to make about as much sense as the confusing feelings raging inside him. Nonsense- these words meant nothing.

Why would someone want to take Becky, oh, and that other kid? Becky's parents weren't rich; maybe it was because Becky's mom was the district attorney. But then why hadn't the ransom been asked for yet.

"This book is worthless!"

Tobey threw the dictionary as hard as he could; harder than he thought he could. The dictionary crashed into the bookshelf knocking most of its content to the floor.

Tobey was startled by the events resulting from his outburst. Tobey looked at the only two books remaining on the shelf; the 'K' encyclopedia and his WordGirl scrapbook.

Maybe the encyclopedia would have a better explanation. Sadly its examples were just of political figure heads being taken for opinionated demands on government.

Useless. There was no ransom or political gain. The last book on his shelf didn't appear to be able to give him any clarification.

WordGirl. Looking at that scrapbook made Tobey wonder about his concern for Becky. When he had first meet her, he could have sworn she fit the profile for WordGirl and, despite their rather rocky start, he had to admit she was . . .but now that she was missing, he just felt perplexed. Should he be doing something? WordGirl probably was. WordGirl would definitely find her so there really wasn't a need to get all worked up . . . it was just that they seemed to be getting to a place where, maybe they could forget about that giant misunderstanding and just be friends. A small smile found its way onto his lips as the events of Monday afternoon passed through his mind . . .

Right now Tobey needed to clean his room and stop thinking about trivial things like Becky. There was nothing he could do to help his 'friend' now. It wasn't like he was some kind of hero, nor was Becky truly his friend. It would be foolish for him to risk getting himself kidnapped over her. . .right? To look for her meant that, Becky wasn't just. . .

The boy knelt in front of the bookshelf and began placing books back in their respectable order when he noticed one of the books had fallen open. Its highlighted text caught his attention immediately.

"Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one's life for his friends."

John 15:13.