Disclaimer: I don't own any of the characters

Undisclosed location, Southern California 2:46pm

Inspector Gadget was in the Gadgetmobile, driving down the sunlit highway. At least that's the way it would seem to most, and for those who were close enough to look into the Gadgetmobile's windows they'd say that Gadget had his eyes shut as he drove. However, in this case they'd be dead wrong. The Gadgetmobile was in autodrive, allowing the inspector to concentrate on his work.

Currently, Gadget's hands resided on either side of the computer modem that rested in his lap. Several wires and cables reached out from his coat and shirt sleeves, hooking into the various outlets found on the tower. Playing before his eyes was all the information the computer contained, of course for him to view them he needed darkness, hence the reason for his eyes being closed. This was not the first time he'd done this in the days following Brenda's murder. No matter how many times Gadget probed the entirety of the computer for information, he found nothing on that was even remotely related to the book which currently sat in the passenger seat next to him. It had apparently not occurred to the late Dr. Bradford that the book and her personal computer might fall into allied hands, for she had done a more than thorough in destroying any possibly useful information to Gadget's search. The only real reason why he was probing the computer now was because it helped him concentrate and put things together as he reviewed the events of the past few days.

It had so far been four days since the murder of Brenda Bradford. He received an email from Penny telling him that the funeral was beautiful, and that she wished he could've been there. Gadget was shocked that she'd attended it and that she'd risk an email to tell him as such when he explicitly told her to go into hiding. She did reassure him by stating that she'd been incognito, her hair being cut and dyed whilst she wore a fake beard and sunglasses, Gadget didn't even want to fathom what his beloved niece could've possibly looked like.

She ended the message by reaffirming that the funereal was wonderful, with many officers from the force showing up to pay their respects, she also restated that she wished he could've been there. That was a wish that he wholly sympathized with, but he couldn't grant it. Over the years, Gadget had come to understand how a few days, hours, heck, even minutes could make all the difference between cracking or sinking a case, evidence ages and moves, so time was far more precious than most people realize. So far most of the inspector's investigations had been over the phone and in the Gadgetmobile, with an appalling amount of times being spent on plane and car rides to the homes and workplaces of those who'd come into contact with the book in order to gather clues.

Gadget, being an old hand at hacking into the US Postal records was able to procure a list of people for whom the book could've possibly been sent. As he ran down the list of names, and he soon found himself cutting a swath through a trail of bodies So far from what he'd gathered, this book had manifested into something of a curse for whoever came into ownership of it, the owners being the bright and brilliant of the scholarly and archaeological communities, all of whom had come to their own sticky ends shortly after sending the book off to someone else. The only person that didn't fit the mold of the rest of the body pile was a Yuri Raskolov.

Yuri Raskolov, the son of Ukrainian immigrants, was the black sheep of the family on crack, to say he was the thorn in his mother's side was too light a statement, he was more like a pike. A sucker for cheap and easy money, Yuri quickly became acquainted to the world of crime. He soon found himself to be a regular patron of state penitentiaries, being locked up for just about every crime short of murder, that's not to say he wasn't suspected of it on more than one occasion, he was about as common a thug as you could find. His last trip to the big house was for beating his then girlfriend to a bloody pulp, he was sentenced to two years, but that was five years ago.

Eleven months ago, Yuri was found with a broken neck at the bottom of the stairs of his apartment building, sending the book to a Mina Raskolov that same day, his sister who was a professor of ancient languages at a local university, which marked the start of the book's bloody history among the scholarly community, which had thus far claimed fifteen lives, sixteen including Brenda. Gadget decided to pay Yuri's landlady a visit, since she and the late Mr. Raskolov were both Metro City regulars.

The meeting with Yuri's landlady, Agnes Stillman, was less than stellar. People who wore fur to animal rights conventions felt less awkward than Gadget did in the meeting he had with the widowed Mrs. Stillman. It wasn't easy, but the inspector was able to get the old bag to stop trying to grab his crotch long enough to get the information he wanted. According Mrs. Stillman, she insisted that Gadget called her Agnes, he didn't, until the day she had to get his body picked up from the bottom of the stairs by the cops, lest the tenants have something new to complain about, she hadn't seen hide nor hair of Yuri for three months.

After Yuri got out of jail, and started living in one of Agnes' "luxurious" apartments, he was just about a blight upon all others in the building. Yelling, cussing, playing music all night, making lewd propositions to female tenants, unemployed, all of this was par for the course when it came to Yuri. Agnes was about to kick him out, when one day he paid up his rent for that month, and not just that month, but the three other month's rent which he owed her at the time. After that came a steady schedule of Yuri disappearing for three months, steady checks coming in to ensure he had an apartment, then out of the blue he'd be back again for a couple of weeks, then it was back to three months of no show, and so forth. That of course all came to an abrupt end when Yuri was found dead as a doornail at the bottom of the stairs. Mrs. Stillman finished by saying that she was going to miss Yuri, well not so much the person but the two hundred and sixty a month he represented.

Having run to the end of his rope on finding the origin of the book, so far, Gadget decided it was high time to learn about the mystery gunman and get acquainted with the enigmatic Cornelius. Luckily, both targets weren't too far from one another, as each lived on private residences in the gorgeous Californian countryside.

The first target was easy enough to find, her name was a standard in just about every fashion magazine known to man ever since, well, Gadget himself was a kid. Gadget pulled of the highway and onto a back country road, his internal GPS giving the Gadgetmobile it's directions. After an hour or so of staring at grassy fields, which can be beautiful for only so long before they become boring, a simple drive over a grassy knoll bestowed Gadget with a superb view of a fantastically new age compound. However, as beautiful as the compound was, Gadget knew that this place was about as safe and artsy as a den of starved lions with a couple of rabbits thrown in the mix. Now, while the inspector did not possess x-ray vision, and never could get enough cereal box tops to get the ones advertised in the back of the comics, the enhanced cybernetics in his eyes allowed his vision to catch the subtle signs of danger even from a couple of miles off. His telescopic vision delivering such clarity that he was able to see the patches of grass that had been squared off for a trap door of some sort, he also took note of the explosive charges that lined the road that lead to the main house, on top off that his infrared vision gave him a clear view of the laser trip wires that crisscrossed the lawn, oh, and the blue glowing laser fence with the ability to atomize all matter on impact that surrounded the compound was a pretty good tip off too. A blind man could see that any fool who tried to sneak in was lining themselves up for a very flashy suicide. Gadget liked to think he wasn't a fool, at least not any more, that's why he was going to use the front door.

The Gadget pulled up to the front gate, at where a video monitor was waiting for him. The screen lit up to reveal a grainy black and white image of a man in three piece suit and sunglasses. "Name?" the nameless face on the screen asked via speaker.

"Inspector Gadget," Gadget rarely liked to use his own name to get into places, usually stating he was on orders from the Metro PD, but celebrities usually tended to meet with other celebrities much more quickly and cordially than the common place flatfoot.

True to form, once the inspector's headline worthy name was mentioned, things took a turn for the irregular. Almost soon as the "G" of his own name left the inspector's lips, the man on the screen was ushered off to the side by an unseen person, and the top of a head accompanied by a pair of bespectacled eyes became visible along the bottom of the screen. The eyes narrowed upon the inspector, and a high pitched nasally voice replaced the previous man's deep bass, "Who?...Are?...You?"

"Inspector-"

"Yes, yes, yes, I heard that, why are you here? Do you have a warrant?"

"I'm not here to search the premises ma'am, I just need to ask you a few questions."

As amazing as it sounds, the already narrowed eyes seemed to push narrowing to a brand new level, and in the silence that transpired in the next few seconds made Gadget begin to suspect that he was about to come under fire. His suspicion rose to new heights when the screen unexpectedly cut off, however when he and the Gadgetmobile weren't engulfed in flames, he merely took this as a sign that he wasn't going to be able to talk today. He was about to pull away, and add "get a warrant" to his list of things to do when the sound of whirring gears caught his attention. Gadget looked up to see the front gates peel away to allow the inspector a way in, although the reception had thus far been far from warm. Despite this, it did nothing to shake the inspector's confidence that this meeting will prove helpful, even though he didn't have the slightest idea as to how.

Moments later, the inspector parked the Gadgetmobile in front of what was undoubtedly the main house. No matter how many times Gadget looked the structure over, the only message the architecture seemed to convey from it's big and expensive looking design was that whoever lived here had way too much money. At the front door, Gadget was met by the same man from video monitor, accompanied by three other men dressed in the same manner as the first. They were actually a lot more impressive in person than they were on screen, each one built like a line backer all of the easily a head or so taller than Gadget, and from the slight bulge underneath each of their jackets, it was apparent to anyone who cared to look that these guys were packing heavy iron. Now while this all did a fine job of intimidating the riffraff who might find themselves upon this house's doorstep, it did little to cow the inspector, the Gadget almost being so bold as to say, "I'd like to see you guys try."

Nevertheless, Gadget was lead into a foyer that worked in perfect concert with the outside of the building to flawlessly portray the message of wealth befitting royalty. Gadget stretched himself out on one of the incredibly expensive looking love seats that arrayed themselves about the room that was adorned with modern art portraits Gadget had only ever seen pictures of. Gadget looked at each of the pictures, knowing that if he were to pawn off all the state of the art technology his body was comprised, it still would only come out to half of what one of these portraits would cost.

The inspector's viewing of these horrifically costly works of modern art was interrupted by a slight cough, which was so small, so light, that Gadget almost hadn't registered it, even with his overly advanced hearing. The inspector turned around to see an incredibly short woman that barely came up to his elbows. She had black hair that came down to just below her ears, cut and trimmed to perfection with an almost militaristic determination. She wore glasses with thick lenses with even thicker black and polished rims. For the moment, aside from her lingerie blouse, which was burgundy, all of her clothing was black. Dress shoes, stockings, skirt, blazer, pearl necklace and ear rings, the whole nine yards, all of it black. To be honest, to Gadget, her choice of clothing strongly reminded the inspector of a realtor or possibly a used car saleswoman. Of course he didn't voice such an opinion, in the likely event that if he did; he'd get a swift sock in the jaw and a kick out the door. And he probably would've deserved it too, because then he'd be insulting someone extremely important.

The woman standing before Gadget, as unassuming as the visage may be, was someone not to be trifled with, nor one whose time should be wasted, for her time truly was money, not just to herself but to many people. If she wanted, she could buy and sell the heads of every major clothing company ten times over and still have more than enough change to purchase several hundred yachts. The woman's name ranked up amongst several others, such as Prada, Gap, and JP Lizzy, her name being almost synonymous with the word "fashion". This was the foremost, and easily the most renowned, clothing designer in the late twentieth century, a visionary whose insight has shifted the style and form of clothing as we know it, her mind never being in the past, or the now, but the tomorrow. This was Edna Mode.

Currently however, the impact of meeting such a woman was significantly lowered, considering she wore a mask of objectivity identical to her employees who were arrayed around her, although from the perfection of it's execution it was clear that such a facial expression was something her work force had picked up from her. However, regardless of what was picked up from whom, the expression played it's part to inform Gadget that she did not desire the inspector's presence in her home, nor did she plan to even pretend as such.

"So," Gadget began wryly, grasping at straws for something to say, "How about those Yankees?"

"…Quaint," the clothing designer stated without emotion, "Your clothes look ridiculous, what blind man designed them?"

"I actually bought them off the rack."

At this, Edna's nostrils flared and her eyes widened, as if she were about to attack Gadget for saying something so sacrilegious in her high priced kingdom of style. However, she managed to keep her murderous instincts in check long enough to carry on to the situation at hand, "Why are you here?"

The inspector reached into his coat pocket and pulled out half the fabric that had been cut away from Brenda's murderer's jump suit, he was only able to cut it in half by using the ion particle laser that was located in Brenda's laboratory. He walked over and handed the piece of cloth down to the woman, who took it from his hand and stared at it intently.

"What is this, some sort of wardrobe malfunction?" Edna asked.

"It came off of an assassin's jumpsuit. The cloth was skin tight, yet it was capable of deflecting bullets."

If Edna was surprised, or shocked at any revelations the information might bring, she didn't betray it. As impartial as ever, she looked from the cloth to the inspector, questioning, "And what makes you think I would know something about this?"

"Nothing, at least nothing official, which I'm certain is the way you and your rumored clientele would want it."

"Clientele?"

"Ah, ah, ah, I'm sure you don't want us touching any subjects that would be…embarrassing to file in an official report now, would we?"

"…I understand…So why would you bring the fabric to me? I am just a mere fashion designer."

"That live in a state of the art fortress."

"You can never be too careful these days. So why would you come to me? For the sake of your report."

"Well considering that if there was a lineup of the world's smartest people, you'd be among the first twenty without a doubt, and the fact that before your career in fashion design, you designed some of the most advanced military hardware used to this day, I suppose you just might have a theory or two."

"So, you want me to find out how this cloth is made?"

"I'm not so much concerned on the "how" of this cloth, but more the "who". I need you to look into who would have the means to create such a fabric and employ it to killers."

"Serial?"

"More of the hired help kind."

"And how do you propose I do that? That is to say if I were interested in the least, which I'm not. I'm a very busy woman you know. And it's not like I would know anyone in that sort of business, so who do you suppose I should ask?"

"Once again, that touches in the market of that "nothing official" business we were discussing earlier. However, I'm sure there just might be one or two friends you have in the fashion industry who might have an idea. And that's not to say there might be that enigmatic friend of a friend, you know, a line of information that's solid, yet untraceable. Besides, you're just a concerned citizen, I'm sure that something like this is bound to come up in conversation."

"Hmm…I suppose it might."

"So are we on the same page?"

"…I see…I think I'll ask-"

"Ah, ah, ah, remember, names have to be entered in the official report."

"I'll ask…around."

"Fantastic," Gadget said with a smile, heading for the door, "Thank you kindly ma'am."

"And inspector," Edna called over her shoulder.

"Yes ma'am?" Gadget said, stopping to turn around.

Edna looked the inspector up and down, registering mental length increments, "Why don't you come back on of these days? I'll make you a suit…on the house."

"I don't know ma'am," Gadget said with a smile, "I've grown awfully fond of buying off the rack."

With Mode's assistance in the investigation assured, Gadget entered the Gadgetmobile with a renewed vigor. However, despite the illusion his cordiality with Mode and the wry jokes with the woman may imply, all the inspector's actions were without joy, without love, guided more so with more so by loss than anything else, although he wouldn't admit, probably not even to himself. His actions were fueled by not mere desire, or anger, or even the overwhelming loss he felt himself falling into when not distracted by intense focus on the case, no, all his actions were fueled by need. A deeply ingrained need that transcended need of food or warmth, although in his present condition he was no longer aware of such ailments anymore, no his need was of the most urgent and far more important than those petty things, his was the need for vengeance. And when one walks the hard, cold, and more often than not unforgiving and bloody road which vengeance has forged through blood oaths and tribal vendettas, it pays to be notoriously in efficient in every word and deed.

The inspector's next target was, as incredulous as it sounds, was Edna Mode's neighbor, although the term "neighbor" in such an isolated and desolate place as the hilly back country was more of a cruel joke than an actual concept. Especially when one considers the drive from Mode's compound to the building which was Gadget's next target took up the majority of an hour.

Gadget had no idea what to expect upon his arrival at his next destination, in fact he was more than expecting a satellite relay center since when he looked up information on the property he was bound for,

Gadget had no idea what to expect upon his arrival at his next destination, in fact he was more than expecting a satellite relay center since when he looked up information on the property he was bound for, he was informed that the property had previously been an observatory, until it was abandoned and purchased by a Dr. Lucille Krunklehorn Robinson, to what use she put it to is unknown, and as such there was no register of a Cornelius Robinson living on the was nothing short of a miracle that Gadget found this location at all, for Brenda was quite thorough in leaving no trace of her communications with others concerning the book. If it hadn't been for the fact that a Cornelius had emailed Brenda inquiring if she'd translated the book or not, Gadget would have no idea where to go. The only reason this sole email had survived destruction was that it had been sent three minutes after Brenda had been shot, and despite the grim timing, Gadget was able to push past his feelings about it, hack the email systems and find out the location of the sender, his name; C. to find a rather dark and gloomy locale, Gadget was surprised to find that, as he went over a hill, the large observatory out post had been converted into a rather charming, albeit massive home. The building lay in stark contrast to Mode's compound. It just wasn't the fact that this place was all one central building instead of several small and spread out facilities, or even the visible lack of lethal weapons, although those were certainly contributing factors. No it was the building's aesthetic, the 1950's architecture of the observatory, with all it's curves, stood above the sharp lines of the Mode compound, the architecture of the sock hop era portraying a sense of forward motion into the future far better than Mode's flashy and expensive "new age" look, this building was definitely something one didn't see every much as the inspector would've liked to simply sit and stare at the building, captivated by it's clean cut yet rustic charm, he was here with a job to do, the image of Brenda bleeding upon the floor crept up sickeningly in his mind. He exited the Gadgetmobile, weighing the pros and cons of simply bursting into the building and waving a gun around until he got the information he wanted, specifically the whereabouts of this Cornelius if it turned out he wasn't there. Unfortunately, or fortunately, whichever side of the fence you sit, the cons of such a recourse outweighed the pros, so Gadget settled with ringing one of the doorbells, the reason for there being two was lost on the bells made a light clinking sound, like shattered crystal, and the inspector was taken aback by this unique choice in guest alert, he was tempted to try the other bell to see if it sounded differently, when the door opened suddenly opened and Gadget was met by a short man with black hair, a friendly face, and for some reason he wore his clothes backwards."Can I help you?" The man said with a smile, having to take a few steps back so as to get the much taller inspector's eyes into view."…Cornelius Robinson?""Yes?""I believe you've had contact with a Doctor Brenda Bradford in regards to-""Oh, you want to meet Cornelius!"Gadget was taken aback by this sudden outburst, but was quickly able to compose himself once more, "…Well yes, but…you're…not Cornelius are you?""Oh, shucks no!" the shorter man replied, his voice sounding as if it waltzed the line between interpretable speech and laughter. "You want, my son. So, has he been nominated for another Nobel Prize, or has he finally received that doctorate in Astrophysical and Pandimensional Theory? He's had his eyes on that one for a while you know."The inspector was temporarily at a loss for words, he was able to follow everything up until "doctorate". After that he was at a blank, trying to process what exactly they were talking about, failing miserably, and finally deciding to focus on the fact that this was not Cornelius. "Um…Is Cornelius here?""Why of course he is! Say, you wouldn't happen to be from NASA to give him his funding for that space project he's been wanting to develop?" The short man with backwards clothing said, walking across the lawn, beckoning the inspector to follow. "To be honest I didn't think you guys would pony up the money, but I'm glad you all finally came round, I mean it is space exploration on a galactic scale we're talking about here.""Um, perhaps it's best that I just speak to Cornelius," Gadget said, not wanting to seem stupid, well, at least stupid in comparison."Say no more, you don't want to let anything slip until the press conference, you probably want me to deny you even being here, I understand. By the way, the name's Bud, Bud Robinson.""And Cornelius is your…""Son, that's right.""He must be a very smart man to get so many doctorates and awards.""Cornelius? Well he is a bit of a smart cookie I suppose, but as for the man part, I'm not too sure.""Excuse me?" Gadget asked, Bud's last statement catching the inspector a bit off guard."Well he's not even legally allowed to drive yet.""Cornelius?"At the inspector's question, Bud stopped dead in his tracks, and swiveled around on the spot, staring Gadget hard in the eye, "…Do you know who exactly I'm taking you to see?"Gadget wasn't sure, at first he'd expected to find a linguist, then a physicist, then a aerospace space engineer, and now, well, he didn't know which story to go with, so after a few seconds, the inspector finally answered, "Cornelius Robinson?"At Gadget's response, Bud gave the law man a wry smile, "Yes, that's right."From then on, the rest of journey across the expansive lawn was taken in silence, although admittedly the walk wasn't all that long. They eventually came to what Gadget thought might've been a large green house, but with the windows heavily tinted black, it was impossible for even the inspector to see what sort of plants might be in there, if there were any at all. Once they got within a few feet of the building, the inspector's vision became weird and distorted, bending everything he saw out of shape, the same thing happened once when he stood too close to an MRI machine, and again when he accidentally fell in a crate of fridge magnets. It took a while for the internal imaging and magnetic resonance field with in his body to kick in and sort this out, but it was still disconcerting. It would take magnetic distortion of an incredible force to do that to his eyes, and from so far off no less, it was impressive and unnerving all at once. Gadget, couldn't help but ask himself just what the hell Cornelius was doing in there, assuming of course Cornelius was even in the building, and for what they neared the door, Gadget saw that hanging along the wall were two of the foam rubber body suits that the police used when training attack dogs, as well as two extra hardhats and safety goggles. Bud wasted no time in getting into one of these getups, goggles and all. It wasn't until the man pulled his hard hat down on his head that he noticed that the inspector had yet to follow suit. "You're going to want to be in one of these," Bud informed him, "Trust me.""No, I'll be fine," the inspector politely declined."No, you won't," Bud insisted, handing the inspector a pair of safety goggles."Trust me, I'm tougher than I look," Gadget said, consenting enough to at least put on the goggles."Not tough enough.""Sir, it is very important that I see Cornelius as soon as possible.""*sigh* Okay, it's your hospital bill."

Bud went over to the door and pulled it open. Almost immediately as this happened, a small, hard plastic orb, that'd probably fit easily into one's hand, jetted out of the darkness from within the greenhouse, flying straight as an arrow and knocking the inspector's head back. Gadget could see why Bud was so insistent on safety, had it been anyone else, they would've been knocked off their feet, on their back, unconscious, with a concussion and possibly, probably, a fractured , apparently well aware of the consequences of neglecting the safety standards set in place, looked the inspector up and down, and was quite satisfied to see no blood, impressed that the inspector was still standing. "Hmm, I guess you are tougher than you look."The two entered the gloomy greenhouse, the inspector a bit more humbly and cautiously than his heavily padded guide. Gadget was amazed by what he found inside, the greenhouse was dimly lit, the light that filtered in through the heavily tinted windows set a deep Prussian blue tone for the room, which was about the only calm thing about the dark building. The despite the dim illumination, the main attraction and theme of this room was light and motion. And oh, there were lights, everywhere, orbs of beautiful light zooming this way and that, occasionally pelting the two entering, but not to the extent that they caused damage. The orbs came in all sorts of sizes, ranging from orbs the size of softballs to pinky toes, all of them moving at such dizzying speeds that not even the inspector's advanced targeting systems could keep track of one for too long. And the only thing that rivaled in variation to the orbs size range was the bouquet of colors in which they ranged from. The dark reds, the bright yellows, the brilliant aquas, the vibrant violets, the dazzling greens, some of the orbs, as incredulous as it sounds, trailed tails of silver dust as they zoomed through the air. It was like watching a never ending fireworks display in action.

The awe inspired Gadget came to his senses however when he heard a voice call out to him and bud, "Was anyone hurt?"

The inspector looked to the source of the voice to find someone at the center of the expansive greenhouse. The mystery person was dressed much in the same manner as Bud, and at first Gadget didn't see him, it wasn't like he was hiding or anything, but it wasn't easy to make heads or tails of anything too far off in the gloom of the green house. And even when the inspector concentrated, it took him a few seconds to make out the image of the speaker, not because of the green house's darkness, but because he was placed near a slightly more eye cathcing object, a word that here takes place of "a large device that was roughly the size of three full size vans. The object in question was, as mentioned before, quite larger than the person working on it, and, for all intents and purposes, it resembled a giant metal pawn chess piece.

"Nope," Bud said to answer the person's question, "no blood or broken bones…so far."

"Which one was it?"

"X five-six-three."

"Of course it was X five-six-three, it's always X five-six-three. There's just something about it and that door…*sigh*, might as well turn it loose."

Gadget turned to see Bud reach into his padded suit and remove the small plastic orb that had struck the inspector before, Bud must've snatched it up whilst the Gadget's view was turned upwards the inspector theorized. The ball in Bud's hand lit up, gaining a bright and friendly orange glow before zooming off through the air, joining it's brothers and sisters on it's own erratic and unpredictable flight path.

"Aw geez," the person said, stepping back from the machine, "What day is it?"

"Thursday," Bud answered matter-of-factly.

"That makes it…"

"Four days you've been in here."

"FOUR DAYS!?! THAT'S…no wait that sounds about right. Any new developments?"

"Dr. Paulsen wants you to look over his neurosurgery hypothesis before he begins to experiment."

"I'll look it over on the toilet."

"The Green Society wants to congratulate you on your recycling machines so-"

"Just tell them to use the machines, that'll be thanks enough."

"Toyota wants to-"

"Next month. Next month. I told them that I'd meet with them next month."

"Oh, Franny called, she wanted to know if you, her, Goob and Gaston were still on for the movies tonight."

"Of course."

"*cough*," it was at this point Gadget felt it important to remind Bud he was still there.

"Oh!" Bud exclaimed, slightly embarrassed for forgetting the inspector, "this man came here to meet you."

"About what?" the person said, now verified as Cornelius.

"About, uh…hmm…you know, I'm not really sure."

"Might I ask a question?" the inspector interjected, "Just, what exactly is all this."

"It's a model galaxy!" Bud answered with a grin.

"But it's broken," Cornelius lamented sourly.

"I think it looks great," Gadget admitted, quite impressed with how it all looked.

"Oh yeah, it looks wonderful, aside from the fact that it doesn't conform to look like our galaxy, and it only looks pretty until someone's head is cracked wide open by one of the balls."

"Oh, I see, yeah that could be a bit of a setback…So, how much are you going to charge people to see it?" The inspector's question quickly garnered a great deal of derisive laughter from both Bud and Cornelius.

"Ha ha, that's a good one," Bud said, wiping a hysterical tear from his eye, "He's not building it for people to pay him for it silly."

"I'm working pro bono on this," Cornelius admitted.

"The orphanage he used to be in is having some renovations done and being enlarged, he's developing this to go on the new roof."

"It was originally going to be all holograms, but I thought, 'hey, how cool would it be if a kid could reach up, pluck out a star or cluster of planets, bring it to a scanner that'd tell him all about that section of space, let the orb go, and it'd fly right back to it's exact place in the simulated cosmos,' y'know?"

"See?" Bud said, giving the inspector a good natured nudge, "I told you he was a smart one."

"The problem is that for some reason they won't align the way they're supposed to," Cornelius continued with a frustrated growl.

"How does it all stay afloat?" The inspector asked, his interest unhindered as he briefly plucked a caribbean blue orb from the air and let it go to fly off once more.

"Aloft," Cornelius corrected, "and it's all due to this super magnet I'm working on right now. It has several different magnets inside of it, all working at different power levels, the positive magnets need to be powerful enough to suspend the orbs in the air, and the negative magnets need to be strong enough to keep all the orbs from clinging to the super magnet's exterior, and each orb has it's own internal magnets and computer to keep it in it's proper place as the "galaxy" slowly rotates. It should be in proper balance, but something keeps throwing it all off."

"Hmm…" Bud mused, rubbing his chin, "Did you take into account the rooms own air currents?"

"They wouldn't have had this much of an effect on them, not to mention I switched it all on in a vacuum environment, no change."

"Did you take into account the earth's own magnetic fields?"

"ARRGH! Of course, no wonder this thing doesn't work! You're a genius dad!"

"Ah, no! I would've never have gotten this far."

"But you would've remember the magnetic fields of the planet you were standing on to begin with," Cornelius said, bitterly criticizing himself, "It's going to take me weeks to figure out a way around that, ah well…After four days, I guess I could do with a break. It appears that I'll have time to talk with you after all Mr…whatever your name is." A crank of a wrench was heard, swiftly followed by the typing of keys on a keyboard, and the bouquet of swirling colors and lights slowly lowered to the ground, the orbs light diming with the descent, it made Gadget sad for some reason, though he couldn't tell why, he knew Brenda would've loved to see something like this.

The orbs finally went out, casting the room into a deep and almost impenetrable blue darkness. This was quickly lifted however by two resounding claps from Cornelius, their sound affecting lights along the ceiling that Gadget hadn't seen due to the gloom that pervaded through all corners before. The lights quickly bathed the room in a dazzling fluorescent light, allowing the inspector to get a much clearer view of not just his surroundings but of Cornelius as well.

In proper lighting, Gadget was able to make several revelations that left him rather surprised, Cornelius was quite shorter than first perceived in the darkness the room held before. The inventor approached his father and the inspector, removing his head gear as he walked, thus causing Gadget to come to grips with an even more startling and unsuspected revelation, forget old enough to drive, Cornelius Robinson wasn't even old enough to shave. With the removal of his safety goggles and hardhat, Gadget was able to get a clear view of the blond hair that bolted straight up and the circular, double thick glasses that rested on a face that couldn't have been older than fourteen, fifteen tops.

The inspector was taken quite aback, at first unable to take the boy's outstretched hand, unable to keep himself from blurting out what he thought, which wasn't very good at all, "What are you, like, ten?"

At this rather rude question, Cornelius retracted his hand. "I'm thirteen," the young genius replied sourly, the word "dick" not being said at the end of the sentence, but more implied, "and before you begin to embrace the entire boat load of misconcepitons you'd make based on my age alone, know this; I'm smarter than you, richer than you, and I'm one of the higher ups at a-" Cornelius stopped establishing his dominance in the situation as the inspector's face became somewhat familiar to him. "What did you say your name was again?"

"I am Inspector Gadget of the Metro City Police Department," Gadget answered, taking out his badge and showing it to the young inventor.

Cornelius looked the badge up and down, his face filled with amazement and awe as traced the outline of the inspector's badge, which did not have the points of a star, but instead held the squared off teeth of a cog. There was absolutely no mistaking it now. "OH MY GOD!" Cornelius shouted positively thrilled, his excitement rivaling that of a kid on Christmas morning. "Wait right here! I'm going to be right back!" Cornelius instructed the inspector.

The inspector sighed and began to unbutton his shirt. It hadn't been the first time things had happened like this, he went through it a lot when he was dating Brenda. She'd take him to parties, dress him up in monkey suits he didn't really feel comfortable in, introduce him to her scientist friends, and once they found out who he really was; they did exactly what Cornelius was doing right now.

Cornelius returned with screwdriver in hand, relieved that he wouldn't have to go through the slight awkwardness of asking the inspector to unbutton his shirt. To be honest when Gadget's chest is left out and put on display, there isn't very much for one to look at, the synthetic skin making it look just like any other, including even a few curls of hair. Really nothing too out of the ordinary, other than the zipper that's been sewn into the skin, but other than that, nothing really interesting. The zipper in question, which looked extremely macabre and unsettling to most, ran it's course as an inverted "U", going up from one side of his lower abs, arcing across his Pecs, running down and ending at the other side of his lower abs.

As squeamish as the thought may make some people, Cornelius held no fear in unzipping the inspector's chest, as odd as the statement may sound. Cornelius swiftly grabbed the slider and ran it through it's course, pulling away at the flesh which pulled away with a sickening ripping sound, like the removal of a band-aid, the dual colored skin of pale tan and wet red giving way to the shiny grey that was the metal plating underneath. The young genius wasted no time in undoing the screws which held the central plate, which held the scratches of many failed stabbing and gunshots, in place. The inspector held the central plate since it weighed in at nearly ninety pounds.

"I'll go get us something to eat," Bud said queasily heading for the door, his stomach unsettled at the sight of the inspector's flesh simply hanging off of him, pulling out and downwards like the tongue of a shoe.

"Now this," Cornelius said, completely awe inspired, "is simply amazing." Laid out before him was and orchestra of the finest and most sophisticated robotics, circuitry, and life support systems on the face of the earth. Cornelius had dreamed of this moment since he'd first read about Gadget in a Popular Science magazine back when he was eight, the entire issue was dedicated to the inspector, his inner workings, how he interfaced with other technology, how the Gadget Mobile was operated, his favorite foods, everything. It'd always been a dream of Cornelius' to see the inspector's inner workings, everything from how food was broken down into nutrients to feed his heart, liver, spleen, and one remaining lung, to how the internal actuators functioned in order to propel the over one thousand pound investigator so swiftly without collapsing in on itself. I t was simply-

"Are we done here?" the inspector asked, uncomfortable with his insides hanging out in the open.

"Hmm?...Oh yes, I'm sorry!" Cornelius said, blushing after realizing that he'd been unintentionally prodding the inspector's exposed lung, fascinated by the organ as it inflated and deflated, getting oxygen to the other organs. "So what brings you here to see me?"

"This," Gadget said, reaching into his coat, removing the strange book he'd received from Brenda, he'd taken a habit to making sure that he had it on his person at all times when leaving the Gadgetmobile, not that losing posed much of a threat, he'd already mentally copied down the entire book, page by page, if worst came to worst, he could just print out the entire book if necessary.

The two did a trade off, the book to Cornelius, the screws to the inspector, this allowed the young genius to quickly flip through the volume's text, while Gadget was left to close himself up, not needing Cornelius' screwdriver to reattach the plate, as his own was located in his left ring finger.

"I've seen this language before…" Cornelius mused, his face glued to the antiqued paper as the inspector zipped up his skin.

"Any idea what it says?" Gadget asked, beginning to re-button his shirt.

"Not a clue," Cornelius said looking up to face Gadget, closing the book with a snap.

"But Brenda said that you'd be able to translate it."

"Whoa, whoa, wait, Brenda as in THE Brenda Bradford? Is that who I've been working for this whole time?!?" Cornelius asked, astounded at such an amazing prospect.

"Yes, I thought you'd know."

"No! I didn't know anything about who I was working for, I never saw picture or anything, I just thought that Bradford was a screen name. Wait, is she here!?! Oh, man, I can't believe it! Brenda Bradford coming in person to see-"

"She's dead," Gadget stated solemnly, the statement swiftly quieting the young inventor.

At first, Cornelius was at a complete loss of words, he felt like he'd just been hit by a mack truck, he didn't know what to say. Brenda Bradford had been his hero ever since he still had his baby teeth, he named his first welding torch after her for crying out loud, and now, well, he just didn't know how to process that information. "…Uh, how did it happen?"

"She was murdered," Gadget answered without emotion, objectivity being the key to all indirect interrogations, so far the boy had proven to be innocent, for now. The inspector continued to feed the boy information, carefully reading his reactions, "I believe her assailant's motives are tied to this book, so it is very important that you tell me everything you know about this book."

Cornelius took a moment to process all this, briefly removing his glasses to rub his eyes in order to jog his memory, "I still can't believe she's gone, but…a few months ago, I'd been contracted anonymously to make a program that'd translate the symbols into modern text."

"And you didn't read any of it?" the inspector asked skeptically.

"I'd been instructed not to, only a few bits here and there to see if it was working and that was it. After it was done, I'd sent it off and had been instructed to destroy the program and everything tied to the book."

"And you didn't think any of this was odd?"

"Not at all, it hadn't been the first time I've been contracted to translate a dead language, and a lot of professors, afraid of others publishing their findings, ask me to destroy all my work, my guarantee of silence being a big part of why my price is so high."

"Is there anything you remember from you work?"

"Well…god, it was a while ago…I do remember some things…I remember that when I'd received a picture of the book, I looked it up and it matched the description of something called the Sheppard's Journal."

"The Sheppard's Journal?" the inspector echoed, raising an eyebrow as his internal modem did an automated internet search for all sources on the book.

"Yeah, it was supposedly the key to finding the lost continent of Atlantis," Cornelius said, looking down and thumbing through the pages once more, "But this isn't the actual Sheppard's Journal."

"Excuse me?" Gadget said, his ire being raised at such a prospect.

"There's no way this is the original journal, you can tell by the iron bindings, this is clearly early middle ages metal work here, with hardwood and leather binding, the original journal would've probably been a collection of scrolls that would've dissolved into dust by now. But don't worry, supposedly the other Sheppard's Journal wasn't the original either."

"Other?"

"Yes, you see, way back when, Christian monks found the scrolls which made up the original and took them to be copied at one of their monasteries in the north, there were several copies that were going to be sent and translated at Constantinople, but before that could happen, the monastery had suffered from a Viking raid. The Vikings had burnt and destroyed many of the books, including the journal copies. Although, obviously, some had to survive. One such copy landed in the possession of an unnamed Viking prince, the prince believing it to lead to some great treasure. The expedition was a failure and the book along with his shield and several other personal possessions were sent home to his family rather than being burnt along with his body on a pyre. It had been believed for years that his home was in Ireland, but a privately funded expedition in 1906, lead by famous adventurer Thaddeus Thatch, found the book in Iceland. That copy of the Sheppard's Journal was lost in a subsequent expedition, supposedly also to Atlantis itself, that expedition was met with failure as well."

Gadget wasn't sure if he bought into all of this. Atlantis? He'd sooner buy into things such as Area 51 and the man on the grassy knoll than something as farfetched as an entire continent sinking into an ocean in a single day and night. However, Brenda had died for whatever was in that book, so whatever story the book had to tell was important to the catching her killer, that much was certain. "Listen Cornelius," The inspector started, his mind beginning to formulate a plan of action.

"Mmm hmm?" Cornelius hummed in confirmation, his eyes still fixated upon the ancient pages.

"Is it possible that you could recreate the writing program you'd made for Brenda?"

"Recreate it? I can easily recreate it, and even paint it gold and slap a big red bow on it if I wanted."

"As for payment…" the inspector began, not entirely sure how to approach the delicate subject of cash, "I don't have the money to pay you right now, but-"

"If the program helps you catch whoever got Bradford, not only will I call it even, but I'll do it smiling if you like."

"Then there's just one more thing."

"And that is?"

"Although I've worked hard to destroy all possible connections linking you and Bradford, it's possible that the killer may have gotten information leading to you just the same, and I'm not discounting the possibility that I'm being followed, in fact I can almost guarantee that I once I hit the highway, my whereabouts will be quite known to the killer. For your safety, I suggest that you lay low, and possibly hire a bodyguard."

"Come on, isn't that a little extreme? I mean they wouldn't go so far as to kill a kid with glasses would th-" Cornelius stopped in his sentence because by the time he'd looked up from the book, Inspector Gadget was already gone. "Hmph, who does he think he is, Batman?"

Days later, St. Eisner's Asylum for The Mentally Insane, Iowa 12:00am (Witching Hour).

She worked quickly, it had been the first time she'd tried to escape in three months, they wouldn't expect her to try such a thing tonight. She looked outside the window for the door to her padded cell. Pressing her face to the glass, she heard the slosh of the janitor and his mop as they made their way along the floor in the hall, even though she couldn't see him from the limited view offered to her by the window. She was glad he was there, she wouldn't be able to escape without him, at least escape without revealing her secret, and her secret was one thing she was determined to keep hidden from the director.

She crouched down to the door, making sure that her back was to the camera in the high corner of the cell, the director would come up with a million possible theories as to how she pulled this next trick off, every one of them would be wrong.

She placed her hand upon the door. It was a strange feeling, this power of hers, how it worked was not even something she could accurately explain. Truth be told, she didn't even know the extent of it, if she wasn't so shy about showing it off, there was a good chance that it'd be powerful enough to simply blast her way out of the oubliette in which she'd been held captive in these past few years. But, not being too familiar with it's capabilities, there also stood the good chance that her power would fail at some point during such a grandstanding and violent escape attempt. The risk was far too great if she failed after using such a means. If there was anything that this world had taught her was that originality and being special was a curse. The more important you were and the harder you tried, the better they got at locking you away. If her power were to fail her during such recourse, they'd lock her away so deep that it'd be impossible for her to ever escape. She'd already wasted too much time and waited too long for her return, forever never knowing was an idea far too unbearable. She needed to escape and find out, escape and find out, it had used to be escape and revenge, and before that escape and rescue, time had become a poison of uncertainty. That was why she just didn't want to, but needed to escape and find out. And she intended to do as such tonight.

She wasn't sure how it happened exactly, or why, all she knew was how it started. She closed her eyes and concentrated. Upon what she exactly she was concentrating, not even she was wise enough to say, all that she knew was that once she did concentrate it soon came. She felt it begin to come upon her even now as she kneeled upon the floor, a great power, a power which spoke in the voices of the kings of her past, a power whose name has been lost to the seas and the rocks can no longer recollect. It was vast, and strong, as well as swift and cunning to boot. She'd once almost been one with this power many years ago, but no longer. And despite her rejection, this power, this force, looked down upon her and loved her, and gave her sight beyond what is to be seen.

She felt it grow, her awareness. She became omnipresent of all that was in the asylum. She saw everyone and everything, no detail escaping her closed eyes. She not only saw all things in the gated world of the asylum, she was one with them. She looked upon the grass outside and instantly felt the water within every blade and root flow, coursing as if through her own veins. She looked upon the lights and felt the wiring that was full of so much life, shining white hot as their power course through the small coils. She looked upon the two security guards in the monitor room a few floors down, the synapses in one's brain firing as he lied to his friend about how he met this one unbelievable beauty last night, one who had flowing brown hair with matching eyes that were only for him. She briefly flitted over her own cell, her attention catching upon the tight fibered network which made up her gray, baggy fitting chino cloth t-shirt and matching sweatpants. She saw everything, even as she had her eyes closed and saw nothing.

She bit her tongue, using the slight pain as a reminder as to why she invoked such power. It was easy to become overwhelmed with such awareness, but now was not the time to overindulge in viewing the goings on in the asylum, if everything went right, she'd never have to see the asylum in any form ever again. She concentrated her awareness to her current obstacle, her cell door. As she focused her sights on the lock, her vision of the asylum had begun to blur, only allowing her to make out vague shapes and no colors. As for the lock however, she instantly saw in every detail, it was new, out of the box just to detain her. She saw the wires in side and knew the color of everyone of them, she saw the number pads, she even saw the black ink on it's underside that was meant to inform all that it had been made in Taiwan. But what caught her attention the most were the bolts and tumblers which held the door firmly in place, they were her target. She concentrated all her awareness upon the lock, the world beyond the lock becoming nonexistent. She didn't need to concentrate this much, she was sure of that, but one never could be too careful, and not to mention that everything needed to be perfect, especially tonight. She focused solely upon the lock, extending her power from mere sight into action. All she needed...was the slightest…little…push.

She opened her eyes at the sound of a click, she pushed the door open and she was free.

A few minutes later two orderlies rushed to the scene, the sound of their footfalls keeping in step to blare of the alarm that had been triggered. Their names were Walt and Roy, and they did not have high hopes for this situation. A maximum security patient was loose, and the orderlies guts twisted with dread at their suspicions of which one it may be. They rounded the corner to get confirmation of their fears, there was a janitor on the ground and the door to room 423 was wide open. A pitiful moan from the janitor confirmed that he wasn't dead, and from a quick intake of him as they ran by informed them that the patient was armed with a mop, bucket, and the janitor's keys.

It'd take five minutes for the actual security guards to get organized well enough to bring the patient in, they first needed to secure all areas before dealing with the patient directly, this has been protocol ever since one of the patient's escape attempts involved a rather violent riot. So until the people with actual weapons arrived, Roy and Walt were to act as duct tape on the Titanic. True, in such situations they were given ridiculous amounts in hazard pay, as well as paid time off, but it's often hard to enjoy such perks when one's jaw is wired shut and all their time off is spent on the couch learning to live with metal kneecaps.

The two ran on unhindered, the path from that point being linear only as the janitor's keys would not permit access to any cells, the entire floor having been recently switched over to number pad locks for the cells. They rushed down the path laid before them, skidding to a halt as they rounded a corner to find their target, the escaped patient, public enemy number one, the curse that'd been cast upon the asylum, the two rounded the corner to find the princess.

Currently, she had her back to the two, her mop and bucket leaning against the wall next to her which wasn't to say that she wasn't aware of their presence, Walt and Roy were well aware of the princess' capabilities. The orderlies, despite being built like linebackers, knew full well that it was they who were actually in trouble should the situation turn violent. The reason why the princess paid them no mind was because the path had been fenced off, and iron bar gate had been automatically slid and locked into place, as per protocol in the event of an attempted escape by any prisoner. Due to some of such gates occasionally malfunctioning, janitors were given keys to unlock them, however in light of the princess' reoccurring escape attempts, the janitorial staff were forced to give up their keys to prevent her from getting past such defenses. Upon discovering that the janitor's keys were useless to her, the princess checked for cameras and was about to unlock the fence as well using her power, unfortunately that's when the two orderlies had shown up.

The princess turned around to face the two, Walt and Roy eying her cautiously, making sure not to make any sudden movements. "…Key," she uttered softly, thinking aloud.

Instantly Walt looked to his hip, relieved that he had the foresight to unclip it and leave it in the break room when the siren had sounded. After briefly checking himself Walt looked to Roy and became alarmed to see that Roy still had his keys. "GET OUT OF HERE ROY!" Walt urged his friend, upon realizing too late the disaster about to take place.

Roy turned around and began to run back towards the corner, but sadly he didn't get far. In a swift, almost blur like motion, the princess removed the mop from the bucket, then giving the bucket itself a powerful kick, her slippers working to protect her from stubbing her toe on the hard plastic. It's wheels on the bottom greatly aided the bucket in rocketing across the floor, and perfectly, almost as if it was the princess' idea that Roy should run, while his left leg was firmly on the ground, his right was coming down just as the bucket got in his foot's path. This surprising turnabout caused Roy to misstep and panic as his foot hit the water, the wheels only aiding in exacerbating the situation. So much so to the extent that while his left foot remained where it was, his right continued to move forward so quickly that the man did an involuntary, and very painful, perfect leg split.

"ARWK!" Roy's out cry of pain at this was similar to the sound of a parrot being strangled. All he could do at this point was pull his foot from the bucket, assume the fetal position, grab his crotch, hop he still possessed the ability to have kids, there'd be no more running for this man tonight.

Walt gritted his teeth at seeing his partner taken out of the game so swiftly, leaving him as the mercy of the princess. He faced the lithe and dangerous woman, putting his dukes up and striking a defensive position, for whatever little good it would do him. The princess however, had no intention of drawing this out, using the keys she still held within her right hand, she threw them at the orderly's eyes. Walt, out of surprise and instinct, closed his eyes as the pieces of metal painfully, yet ultimately harmlessly, hit the bridge of his nose and hit the ground. Those few seconds in which Walt failed to keep his eyes on his highly dangerous opponent was all the time the princess needed to rush forward and sweep the orderly's legs out from under him. Hitting the ground hard, Walt had no real time to adapt to the fast paced situation. The princess capitalized on this by placing her foot firmly on the side of Walt's ribcage, grabbing a hold of his left arm. After that, she quickly proceeded in twisting and pulling and pulling the limb, until…

POP!

Sound of a crunching pop signaled that she'd just dislocated his arm.

"GYYAAAH!!!" Walt screamed, as white hot, blinding, electric pain coursed through his body, any movements causing a higher abundance of, if not more potent, fireworks of pain to shoot through his body.

With both orderlies incapacitated and in need of medical assistance, it was no great feat for the princess to make use of Roy's keys and unlock the gate which blocked her path, taking the mop and keys with her.

She rushed onward, her path mirroring those of several other escape attempts she'd tried before. She eventually came to the end of the hall and was met by two doors, one being the elevator doors, the other being the door to the stairwell. The stairs were absolutely out of the question, since she could already hear the combined footsteps of orderlies and security guards alike, their feet clomping up and down the steps as it was, not to mention the stairway was completely monitored. If the princess were to go through that route, it would only be a matter of time before she would be overwhelmed. That left the elevator, or to be more accurate, the elevator shaft. The shaft, although the more perilous of the two, offered not just on escape route, but two, as opposed to the alternative which offered none. The two routes of escape were at the two places the elevator dropped off at lowest; the first floor, where it'd be a straight shot through the door, or the basement where she could get outside the building via the kitchen loading area or the staff car parking lot. In either case, the shaft was unmonitored by cameras, so in order to keep their bases covered, the guards and orderlies would need to mobilize and divide by two to block each elevator door properly, and even then, there was a decent forty-two percent chance that she could overpower and evade a divided asylum force. It was a sound and fairly decent plan, but it wasn't her plan.

For the princess' plan to work, or any plan of hers to work, all she needed to do was get outside, not necessarily by door, once outside, it would be no problem for her to scale the wall and loose any pursuers in the woodland surrounding the asylum. She intended to go upwards and make use of certain facets of the asylum's architecture to aid in her access to the asylum grounds. By making her way to the upper floors, she will be spotted by the cameras. Upon seeing her, her opposition will mobilize to the upper floors, thinking that her intent was to destroy evidence such as photographs and he like to keep her picture from being shown on television, it was one of her earlier escape attempts that saw the use of this tactic. Regardless, the opposition, seeking to corner her on the upper levels will go up the stairs and positions a few people in the shaft. Whilst the guards are hopelessly confused, unorganized, and crammed onto the stairs, she will make her master stroke and be free of this place forever.

But first things first.

Using a swift kick and a stomp, the princess broke away the mop head, leaving the shaft with a decent wooden point. Shuffling the matted and useless cloth to the side, the princess drove the wooden point into the stiff elevator doors, prying them open. Placing the orderly's keys in her pocket and making sure she had a firm hold on the mop handle, the princess ran forward and leapt onto the elevator cables. She climbed upwards slowly with no fear of the elevator activating, since it automatically closed down in the event of a prisoner escape. Not that she could run the damned thing even if it were active, her experiences in the shuttling device had always been a bit of a confining situation, seeing as she was almost always in handcuffs, or a straight jacket, or strapped to a gurney with someone else operating the vessel.

After two floors, the princess had reached her destination. Not that the specific floor mattered, it was more the time it took that mattered. She needed to allow her opponents time, allow the opposition all the time they needed to establish their futile little barricades, allow any stragglers the time they needed to get in exactly the wrong place to stop her. Using the skills that only the most hardened and well trained trapeze artists have spent years acquiring, the princess leaned back and placed the mop shaft on the small ledge between floors. Afterwards, she readied herself and jumped from the cable towards the ledge. Her feet missed the landing by a mile, but that was something for which she was already prepared, her fingers expertly catching the narrow metal space, unfortunately her feet smacked into the hard metal of the shaft wall. She cringed at the surprising and unexpected pain, but she didn't let go of the ledge, the consequences of such an action being all too evident. She had come too far to die in a manner that was so, well, stupid.

She pulled herself up, the pain in her arms and toes being a promise for what was to come. Once on the ledge, she very carefully kicked the shaft handle up to herself, nimbly twisting the handle around so that the pointed end was facing towards the elevator doors. She jabbed the wooden handle into the crevice, and pried the doors open and climbed into the floor, mop handle in hand. The floor she was on, the fifth floor, looked essentially like the floor she'd come from, the third floor. But that wasn't surprising since, with the exceptions of the first floor, sixth floor, and basement, the entire building was a vertical duplicate of itself floor by floor. With that in mind, it was no problem for her to go along the floor, unlocking the gates as they appeared, until finally she reached a janitorial/maintenance closet, she couldn't have hit one of these earlier without possibly tipping off security of her intent. Upon raiding the closet, her heart sang as she found her prize. A stroke of good fortune came in the fact that while she raided the closet in search of a humble screwdriver, she instead found a fully functioning and full powered electric screw-gun.

However the universe is always one of give and take. And while it gave the princess convenience in the form of the screw gun, it gave her inconvenience in the form of three security guards waiting for her at the end of the hall. The princess frowned and mused that they probably had been sent up here in advance in the event that she did try to go for her records again. Security guards were different from orderlies, they had much more extensive training when it came to taking down armed assailants, not that that was going to matter in the least, but it's important to keep all the fact in mind, trivial or no.

The princess sighed and set the screw-gun down. After breaking the mop handle over her knee in two, she turned to face her opponents, and waited, holding a mop end in each hand. While it was true that she was in a bit of a hurry, for obvious reasons, she wasn't going to rush things and screw up. She was going to grant the courtesy of the first move to her enemies, since they were prone to fouling up on the first go, not to mention she could benefit from the brief distraction, the higher up the guards on the stairs got, longer it'd take them to get back down when the time came.

The guards, seeing that the princess would not rush to meet them head on, began to run towards the princess, the largest of the three taking point, arms spread wide incase she tried to run past them, the latter two of the group spread their physical net wider by hanging back a bit and flanking him.

The princess nearly smirked at this, sometimes they were just too predictable. She couldn't tell if it was out of instinct from their training that they moved like this, or if it was really the only plan they could come up with, but she was well aware of what they were trying to do. They intended for her to meet the front man head on, and while she dealt with him, the other two would come at her from the side. In theory it was a rather sound plan, it probably works when used on just anybody, the problem was; the princess was far from being "just anybody".

She waited for them to get in a bit closer before making her move, she didn't want them to be too far away or give them the opportunity to spread themselves out and corner her. When they were in close enough, she got low and sprinted forward, her speed shocking the two back guards, stopping them in their tracks for their eyes to follow her, the larger guard, however, had gained too much momentum to stop, which was what the princess was counting on. She cut towards the wall and jumped towards it, hands in the air. Incredible agility allowed her to not only jump off the wall, but off of the guard front guard, knocking him into the ground, and into the air. As the princess had predicted, the two latter guards had continued to follow her with their eyes, and in order to do so, they had to tilt their heads upwards, leaving their necks wide open. She threw the mop end in her left hand towards the throat of the guard on the right, striking it with the deadly accuracy of a professional knife thrower.

Not one to waste opportunity when it became present, upon her landing, the princess shifted her downward momentum into a forward roll, and ended it with a magnificent sweep that ended with the left guard on his back. Capitalizing on this, before the guard could effectively get back on his feet, or even fight back for that matter, the princess was on her feet, she picked up his left leg and with a firm stomp…

CRUNCH!

"RRAAARGH!"

Bent his knee backwards.

During these few seconds of savage efficiency, the right guard was preoccupied with sputtering and coughing up blood. It was true that the mop end that struck him was blunt and didn't puncture the skin, the princess was nowhere near foolish enough to kill anyone, she had thrown the stick roughly seventy miles per hour, the speed of most minor, and a few major, league baseball pitchers. The princess grabbed the guard by his hair and, using the mop end she was still holding, shattered his jaw. She finished him off by slamming his face into the wall, blood from his mouth splashing horridly upon the white painted brick.

The original guard was finally turning around to find that his two associates had been effectively removed from the fight. It wasn't that the guard was slow, it was that the princess moved that fast. Despite the grim examples his associates on the floor provided of those who stood against the princess unwarily, the guard dutifully refused to let the mad woman loose upon the asylum without seeing resistance. The princess turned to face him, ready to meet his challenge.

The guard rushed forward, and threw a punch, that would have decked the princess and sent her head reeling, if it had connected. Unfortunately, the lithe woman seamlessly sidestepped the blow, grabbing the outstretched arm and using her mop end to…

CRACK!

"OH MY GOOARRGH!"

Break the man's arm at the elbow. Red splashed upon the floor, the princess' blow forcing the skin on the guards arm to give way, and expose a point as his bone had broken through the skin.

The guard fell to the ground, shock and pain overtaking him. The princess went back to get the screw-gun, holding it in one hand and the remaining mop end in the other. She continued down the hall, with no further concern for the guards, the paramedics would be along shortly to tend for them, as usual.

Her path drove the princess further along the corridors which snaked along the perimeter of the building. She passed the final gate, making sure to close it behind herself, relocking it, and breaking off the key in the lock. She then made her way to one of the windows, and looked down. Two stories below was the roof to the asylum's indoor pool, it being an added on section to the asylum as a whole, it was the furthest away from either of the two exits, on the first floor. Being an added on section of the asylum, and one that is significantly low on the asylum's priority list, it often received the short end of the stick when it came to the security renovations that had been going underway within the asylum, meaning that the fire exit was most likely unlocked.

Using the mop end, the princess wasted no time in knocking away the glass in the window. It was just about the time that she heard the sound of heavy footfalls; she looked to the end of the hall, past the gate to see a small mob of guards and orderlies. They all rushed to the gate, ready to unlock it and take out the princess, only to find out that she'd made that impossible. The princess smiled as they were given the order, via walkie-talkies, to circle around and come at her from the other side, even though she'd be long gone by then.

With the glass cleared out of the way it was time for the screw-gun to prove it's worth. It took some doing, but she able to fit the cumbersome tool through the bars which were what stood in the way of certain suicidal patients from feeling…tempted. She worked fastidiously to remove the screws which held the obstructing metal in place. With the task done, all it took was a slight push for the bars to fall away and land with a great resounding crash on the rooftop below. As a last precautionary action, the princess brushed away some of the glass that was remaining on the windowsill, since it just wouldn't do for her escape to be marred by the fact that she had glass her foot.

Pocketing the mop end and abandoning the screw-gun, the princess stepped out onto the narrow sill, astounded by the fact that she had no true notion of exactly how high up she was until she heard the low roar of the cool night wind in her ears. If she was afraid of heights or not was out of the equation, seeing as she'd come too far as is to get cold feet at this point. She just reassured herself that she just needed to be extra careful, the consequences of the alternative interpreting itself as the twisted metal and glass she'd left down below. Her heart pounded loud in her ears as she slowly turned around to face the now smashed and derelict window, the anticipation of what she was about to do acting as a form of unbearable torture all it's own. She took one last swallow of air, licked her lips, and stepped backwards off the ledge.

Her fingers caught the ledge easily, although not painlessly. The princess' chest, toes, stomach, and pretty much everything, excluding her hands, face, and back, slammed painfully into the building with a resounding smack. And as much pain as a stubbed toe , and well, a stubbed everything can bring, the princess made sure not to do something so foolish as to let go, at least not until she was ready. She looked down to realize that it was still possible for her to do this, all she needed to do was place her life in the gamble that she could let go of the building a few more times and grab back on, relatively simple when said, scary as hell when attempted.

The princess released her grip on the ledge, gravity ripping her downwards once more, until she latched onto the bars which were placed on the window of the floor below her, or more precisely, the floor she was on now. She pulled this trick once again, her arms screaming and the abrupt stops and stress. She'd never trained herself for such an act, simply dropping down one floor and stopping, it was something which had yet to be done by her, and she was fairly certain that if she were forced to do it one more time, her arms would probably dislocate themselves from her shoulders. Fortunately, she wasn't required to do as such anymore, at least not tonight, but that wasn't what her current obstacle was.

What currently laid in the princess' way was an unaccounted for element in her plan, such a thing seeming so trivial and insignificant until now. She had forgotten to take into account what would happen to the glass and bars that were knocked away and her answer was provided in several jagged shards, shining menacingly in the moonlight, accompanied by several pieces of sharp metal. Somehow, jumping one floor down, straight down onto twisted metal and broken glass didn't seem to fit very well into her plan, so the princess looked down and back to study the spread of the glass. She was relieved to find that it wasn't that bad, but if she screwed up this next trick, she stood a very good chance of breaking her own neck. It wasn't easy, but she was able to maneuver so that the bottoms of her feet were planted upon the side of the wall. Wanting to make sure she cleared the glass, the princess bent her knees as far as she could, before twisting away from the wall in a jumped. She outstretched her arms forward, with her palms flat and her head tucked downwards. Her hands made contact with the gravelly rooftops, and reflexively, she buckled her arms, so as not to snap her wrists, and pulled her knees to her chest. Her downward momentum became displaced and combined with her forward momentum as she tucked herself into a ball, allowing her to roll a bit across the rooftop.

Returning to her feet, the princess made her way over to the pool's skylight. From here the plan was to drop down into the pool, exit through the fire escape emergency exit, since it was probably unlocked, scale the wall and make her way through the woods, going on for at least three days straight before seeking rest, she'd done it before. After the authorities had been ditched, and she was across the border, she'd be safe enough to resume her search.

Using the mop end, she knocked away the glass in the skylight, her point of entry being above the deep end of the pool. She waited a minute or so before jumping in, making sure that most of the glass had time to sink to the bottom of the pool and lie flat. She jumped into the window, her body straight as a arrow. She hit the water with a…

SPLASH!

She shot trough the water like a jet, which was unsurprising when one considers that she'd leapt from two stories downward. Still, it was a good thing that the pool's deep end was so deep, if she'd tried to land in the shallow end, the princess would've surely broken her legs. As is, she water did it's part to break her fall, but not so much that her feet colliding with the pool bottom didn't cause her pain in her legs from the sudden impact, as well imbed a few shards of glass in her feet. Nothing to too dire, a few pebble sized stabs, nothing that'd stop her escape.

She quickly surfaced and made her way to the pool side where she pulled the pieces out of her foot. She moved towards the fire exit with quick yet jovial saunter, her exhilaration over taking any pain she felt in her foot. She opened the fire exit door with a smile, her first in weeks. The sting of the fresh, cool night air upon her wet skin and clothing went unnoticed, as she spied her final obstacle, one so simple that it was laughable to call it as such. She slowly began to walk towards the obstruction, joy over taking her, her feet moving as if she were in a dream. A simple, grey stone, ten foot tall wall was all that stood between her and freedom. It posed no challenge to her, it even had ivy running several thick vein up and down it's surface. This was it, it'd be the third time she'd genuinely escaped from the asylum, so it was quite the momentous occasion for her. But this was it, she'd finally be free, she'd finally-

"Stop this foolishness at once."

The sharp words shook the princess from her euphoria. Alarmed, she looked around and searched for the source of the voice. She rounded upon a singular red glowing dot of a cigarette in the shadows of the building. The person to whom the cigarette belonged to stepped out of the shadows, even though such and effort was unnecessary, the princess knew full well who it was. A somewhat short, balding, and paunchy middle-aged man thick rimmed glasses and full moon facial hair stepped out of the darkness, standing at an angle that hid one hand and showed the other. He'd once described himself to her as resembling someone named Paul Giamatti, not that she knew nor cared who that was. This was the princess' doctor.

In all honesty, the princess held no real malice towards the guards and orderlies, in fact she felt nothing but shame and guilt over the extreme measures she used to subdue them, she knew full well that they were only following orders. However, their orders were to lock her away, and they were conflictive to her goals. Harming them so brutally was merely a casualty to her, just another part of the process, an unpleasant part, but unavoidable. And while she had sympathy for the guards and orderlies, she held nothing but contempt for the pencil pushers and cowards who ran this place, the doctors and administration respectively. She couldn't stand the entire lot of them, that is, all of them except for Dr. Daniel McPherson, her doctor.

Dr. McPherson had been her doctor ever since the beginning of her imprisonment of this place. He'd been pulled on and off her case countless times, mostly due to the pencil pushers and their lies of him indulging in her "fantasies" as they liked to call her life's story. In truth, Dr. McPherson was the closet to ever shaking her beliefs in her own story. Unlike the other doctors, who had merely looked into the princess's case to boost their own careers, "curing" her standing as something of a pugilist's title shot amongst doctors, Dr. McPherson was the only one who genuinely cared about her. He had come to know her and the way she thinks just as well as she had come to know him, he was in one breath, both her best and only friend, as well as her greatest enemy. He was the only one who genuinely wanted to help her.

Unlike the other doctors, who for the most part all went home at the end of the day, back to their perfect homes, with their perfect lives, far away from the austere, cold and broken reality of the asylum, the place becoming nonexistent to the m once they were in their cars with the doors locked, McPherson was the only doctor who worked over time. He was the only who constantly held temporary residence within the asylum, was the only one who had to be forced to go home, was the only one who wanted to be called in case something came up, and not just to his patients, but to all of them, he was the only doctor who was on call, twenty four hours a day. The princess knew that he only wanted the best for her, his own needs coming after those of his patients, so much so to the fact that it had cost him three marriages.

He didn't like anyone being in the asylum, she knew it pained him to see her locked away, she knew that if she would but only accept his help that she would be free in a matter of months, with a brand new life waiting for her, free of strife and grandstanding escape attempts, she'd truly be free. But, unfortunately, his help came at the price of accepting that her whole life was bunk, and the admittance and accepting of a truth that everyone she'd ever known and loved, never existed. It simply too much for her to handle. If they, all the doctors, and administrators, and even Dr. McPherson were in fact right, and she really was crazy, then all of her work to escape from the asylum would be for nothing, that was something she could live with. However, if they were wrong, and she was right, then far too many people will have suffered and paid the price for nothing, and that was simply unacceptable. That is why she needed to escape and find out.

"What are you doing?" the doctor asked in a voice a parent would use to reassure a child after they've gone into hiding after accidentally wetting the bed.

"I am escaping and leaving this place forever," the princess declared with a snarl, "and there's nothing you can do to stop me." She then turned on heel to leave, making her way towards the wall.

"*sigh*…I really didn't want it to come to this," McPherson said wearily. The princess swiftly turned around to see the doctor reaching into his pocket, at least with the hand she could see. The princess as understandably, shocked and apprehensive as the doctor removed his had from his pocket. However, she was confused to see that as opposed to a weapon, the doctor removed a humble pair of glasses from his pocket. It wasn't until the doctor dropped the glasses upon the ground and placed his foot menacingly over them, did the princess realize the horror that it was the glasses. The glasses were far too important to be destroyed, she told him as such, he knew how important it was that the glasses remain safe, and yet, here they were.

"You. Wouldn't. Dare." The princess snarled, shaking visibly. If it were from rage or fear, it's unlikely that even she could tell you.

"You're making me do this!" McPherson practically shouted, "You can't go around hurt people, you can keep hospitalizing asylum staff. The higher ups are completely fed up with you. They're seriously considering transferring you to the federal penitentiary as opposed to staying here. And if you think this place is intolerable, trust me, it's peanuts compared to the federal prison, and the cutthroat crazies they have their. This place is best for, but I can only defend you so much!"

"Who pushed you to this?" the princess asked, concerned for the doctor, "I swear I shall find them and-"

"You pushed it to this! The asylum is at it's wits end as is, and you keep hammering them, making them go to extremes! Don't you see what you're doing to yourself!?! I want to help you, but you've got to play ball! And if this is the only way, so be it! Go ahead, jump the wall, but if you do, the price is the glasses."

The princess' mind was in turmoil and conflict. This was it, this was freedom for the first time in a long time, and there was no guarantee that she'd ever get this close again. But at the cost of the glasses? For the most part, she hadn't even thought up a coherent plan for when she finally shook the heat, she had no idea what to do or where to go once she was safe, and there was no telling if she'd get caught or not once on the outside. She was torn between two impossible choices, and in that void of uncertainty, she swiftly found a third. She studied, how the doctor was standing. He had sacrificed a lot of balance to stand so that his foot remained hovering over the glasses, she wasn't sure if her plan would work, it was a gamble, but a sound one.

There was an unwritten and unspoken rule among the patients at St. Eisner's, and it went along the lines of no matter what, never, ever, attack your doctor…The princess was never much for rules. She took her mop end, reached back and threw it at the doctor. The wooden end painfully struck McPherson square in the chest, knocking him off balance and on his back. With his foot no longer over them, the glasses were safe. The princess rushed forward to retrieve them when the doctor pointed something at her, the hiss of pressurized air being released called the princess' attention. She looked to see that in the hand she'd wasn't able to see previously, there was a handheld dart gun. A sudden pain caught her attention and she looked to her thigh to metal and red plumage of a tranquilizer dart sticking out of her leg. The pain she felt there quickly disappeared, the target area being hit with a strange yet welcoming numbness that had begun to creep outward from that area, as the potent sedative had already begun to make it's way through her body, being only sped up in it's journey due to the rapid beating of her heart.

It was all over now, it didn't matter if she took the glasses with her now, not even she could fight the potent cocktail that was spreading around inside her. She had only a few minutes, if even that, until she finally went down. She needed hours, days even, not minutes, escape plan was screwed. At least she had enough time to grab the glasses, hop the wall, and hide 'em to ensure that this sort of thing didn't happen again, at least that's what she thought until the fire exit door burst open and an endless line of guards and orderlies began to pour from it. The princess was only able to grab the glasses and throw them to the side so they'd be out of harm's way before meeting her enemies head on. There was no fight this time round, not a real one, the drug's effects were violently taking a hold of her body, her movements were sluggish and sloppy, and she was unable to truly concoct some sort of stratagem, at this point she was fighting the embrace of sleep more than she was fighting her soon to be captors. She was so tired and disoriented that she hadn't even removed the dart from her leg.

At the behest of the doctor to restrain her, the conflict was brought to an end when the guards merely circled the princess, who's movements and attacks were like watching an old, sick, and delirious lion die. The finally closed in on her, but by that point she already tuckered herself out, and she surrendered to unconsciousness and the guards. The incident, had finally been brought to a close.

A team of eight men volunteered to take the princess back to her room, two to carry her and the other six just in case she was faking, no chances, ever, that's what they'd taught themselves. The rest went off to do a double check of The Asylum, for security reasons, as per protocol, with a few others neglecting protocol, going to the infirmary to check on their friends and see the damage the princess caused this time.

That only left Dr. McPherson. He watched the proceedings, letting them close out before making his way over to where the glasses had been thrown. He stood there for a moment and looked down at the spectacles, and contemplated the pros and cons of destroying the glasses there and then. He wasn't proud of what he did, it was low down and despicable, he knew what the glasses were, and true while it was all a part of the princess' lunacy, that it didn't matter if he smashed them or not, that didn't mean he felt any better for taking advantage of the facts surrounding it. In the end, he sighed, picked up the glasses, and put them in his pocket. He mentally scolded himself for doing what could be interpreted as indulging in the patient's fantasies, and wondered what was on TV. It was over…for tonight.

In dreams, the time is whenever

Penny was accustomed to strange dreams. Let it be known that this Penny is different from the Penny mentioned earlier in this story, as that Penny was currently lying to a motel check in clerk that she had no pets with her, even though her dog Brain was in the car, going through a bag of Cheetos. No, this was not the same Penny, even though she too had a dog, a very famous one, one that had been on TV, one by the name of Bolt. This Penny was Penny Allard, she was sixteen years old, a former child television star, had red hair, a button of a nose which she hate even though her friends called it cute, and she once thought that her life had come to an end when she first developed acne and got braces, at the same time. Currently, she was having a strange dream.

Not that she was alarmed by this, as I said before, she was accustomed to them. And it is seldom that we show fear in our dreams at the situations, unless of course it's a nightmare, in which case, that's the point. She was however perturbed when they came true.

For instance, many years ago, she had a dream where her feet had swelled so much that they resembled circles, but despite this, she was still capable of running faster than light. The following morning was Christmas day, and she'd gotten a bike that year. Many years after that, she had a dream where she rode atop a giant white wolf into battle against a green eyed cyclops, the next day the casting agency had called to let her mom know that Penny had gotten the part in a pilot episode of "Bolt: The Superdog".

Currently, her dream was going a bit beyond the norm, at least the norm when it came to her dreams. She was in the deep place below the dirt, surrounded by a great deal of odd people and items. The only recognizable face there was the great white wolf, the others were complete strangers, even though she knew them, once again, the dream was weird. Currently, everyone was quite angry at the man-whose-head-was-fire, the-clock-in-the-coat had finished a story which gave an express list of details as to what the man-whose-head-fire had done. Now while all were quite furious at him for his deeds, it was the woman-who-was-so-old-that-rocks-couldn't-remember-her that was absolutely seething with rage, the man-whose-head-was-fire had taken something from her. Seeing that the situation was getting out of hand, the white-faced-tall-man-in-black intervened, not wanting to fight as much as the rest, and tried to appeal to the man-whose-head-was-fire's better nature. The man-whose-head-was-fire did as the white-faced-tall-man-in-black asked, but despite this, the white-faced-tall-man-in-black became sad. The man-whose-head-was-fire had to leave to do something very important.

Then, the boy-with-four-eyes called attention to the walls, with whom everyone got in a fight with. The clock-in-the-coat threw an egg at one wall which burst into light upon hitting the wall, as the great white wolf and the woman-who-was-so-old-that-rocks-couldn't-remember-her ran at another wall. One wall was about lash out at Penny, when she was grabbed by the-boy-who-was-made-of-wind, and wouldn't you know it? Her face

fell off.

Penny's Room, Oklahoma 12:00am (Witching Hour).

Penny awoke in a cold sweat. She swiftly looked around her room, her eyes finding all the old waypoints and markers, her computer, her hamster, Rhino's, cage, her closet, Bolt lying by the wastebasket, she took in it all to reassure herself that she was awake and that indeed she was in her room, her observations meeting both criteria. This fact soothed her and calmed her bewildered mind. For some reason, ands she couldn't really explain why, but that dream scared the hell out of her.

"It was just a dream," stated flatly to herself, closing her eyes, writing the phenomena off, chocking it up to the large amounts of Doritos she'd consumed watching the B-movie monster marathon earlier.

"Oh I doubt that," came a deep rolling voice from the darkness, "very rarely is something so devoid of reason, importance, and purpose that it should be cast off as "just a dream"."

Alarmed, Penny quickly looked around her room once more and became doubly alarmed to find a strange man standing at the foot of her bed. The man looked like he was a stand in for a Harry Potter movie, he was rake thin and garbed in blue robes. And if that weren't stereotypical enough, he had a beard that reached below his belt, assuming, that he wore one under his robes, and a tall hat sat upon his head, adorned with pictures of the stars and moon. He appeared to have simply materialize out of thin air in the less than a second Penny had her eyes off that exact spot, so she did what any sensible person would do.

"WHO THE HELL ARE YOU!?!" Penny shouted at the top of her lungs, alarmed and enraged that this old man had snuck into her room in the middle of the night. Her shouting alarmed both the pets that were in the room at the moment, and while the hamster was incapable of doing anything except chatter a lot and leave hamster chocolate among the wood chips of his cage, Bolt was up and growling at the old man, his teeth capable of delivering a decent if not powerful bite.

For some reason, the old man could not help but smile at this. But returning to the question that was posed to him, the geezer gave a curt nod and with a tip of his hat, spoke, "I am and the great wizard Yen Sid, and it's high time that we talked about your future Ms. Penny Allard."

"…Riiiight," Penny stated skeptically as she reached for her baseball bat which lay in the space between the bed and the wall, she really hoped that this creep wasn't carrying a gun.

Before Yen Sid could do anything, Penny had grabbed the bat and leapt out of bed and hit Yen Sid in the head. Or at least she would have, had he not disappeared in a flash of smoke and light. The dumbfounded teenager lay on the floor a second. Her lunge having failed her, she was left wondering where the creep had got to. Her question was answered a moment later, when Bolt's barking heralded the strange old man's reappeared a few feet in front of her. There was silence for a few seconds, save for the dog's yelping, Penny then gritted her teeth before she spoke, giving the devil his due, "Okay, so you're fast…and quiet, I'll at least admit that."

"You still doubt my claim?" Yen Sid asked coolly.

The redhead scoffed, "Gramps, let me brake it to ya. For most of my life, I've been around some of the most impressive and state of the art equipment known to show biz today, a couple of fire crackers and a few smoke pellets ain't going to cut it. So unless you pull a dragon out of your ass right here and now, I'm going to start screaming for my mom to call the cops, and I continue trying to wail on you with the bat."The Wizard's face had a faint grin on it "Splendid. You're not gullible and stupid. I'd expect no less from you. But I think you'll accept a somewhat less crude show of proof."

"Get the hell out of my house," Penny growled, gripping the bat tightly, her heart beating a million miles a minute.

It was strange set up how the two people were standing. Penny's room had two windows, on by her bed and the other on the wall that lead to the door to bed, the moon shone through the second window. The crazy old man walked slowly from his corner, for a moment Penny had hoped he was leaving, but he'd walked to place himself in front of the second window, the moonlight silhouetting him fantastically. Ignoring the show of force from the bat and the growls of the dog that stood between him and the girl, Yen Sid reached up his hand to cover Penny's view of the moon outside. This irritated Penny greatly, that this mad man was not leaving as he pantomimed grabbing the moon between his thumb and forefingers. She didn't understand why she wasn't simply wailing on the old loon right now, why she was restraining herself from attacking.

She was about to attack him, listening to her better judgement, when it was all gone, the man, the room, everything had become swallowed in a sudden and inexplicable darkness. Scared, angry, and confused, Penny rushed forward, blindly swinging the bat. She stopped only when she realized that she'd come all too close to breaking her own window. Light returned to the room as her bedside lamp turned itself on, and the old man now stood where Penny was standing, clearing his throat to call Penny's attention. She spun around, Bolt at her side, ready to rush the old man again, when he tossed her something. She caught it easily, it was gray and the size of an apple, although it felt much heavier.

Driven by some unknown reasoning that was not her own, Penny turned the object around in her hand. It was a stone, a strange little rock, all full of holes, well more craters, since none of the pock marks went all the way through. She turned the rock over and over, before realizing where she had seen it before, in photos and footage of astronauts, and everytime she looked up at a clear night's sky. Penny Allard was holding the Moon. "No" she thought out loud, "this is impossible." She was still was still in disbelief when it occurred to her that it was darker outside. She spun around to look out the window, and despite there being no clouds or anything else obscuring her view of the night's sky, no matter how hard she looked, she could no longer find the moon, except perhaps, in her hand.

It's a strange feeling, fear. It's a powerful feeling, an ancient one, the first feeling any species develops to survive. Fear is powerful, fear is potent, the realization of what the old man had done filled her with it. Her mind became filled with images and ideas, old movies, scary movies, screams in the dark, screams in the shower, 'let's split up', 'I'll be right back', the roar of chainsaws. Penny Allard turned to face Yen Sid, thoroughly afraid, she scarcely took notice of Bolt, still ready to attack should she give the call.

It seemed like a bad joke really, a small white dog ready to attack a being of unimaginable power. He'd plucked the moon from the sky as if it were a peach from a tree. Her heart was beating a million miles a minute. She noticed that she wasn't acting as swiftly as she normally would, or as rationally, did he have something to do with that as well? What would she do if he did? What could she do? Should she run? Could she run? Would he let her? What would he do if she tried? What was he going to do now? Penny didn't know. She couldn't know. She thought about running, she was certain that wouldn't work, she thought about fighting, that had already proved to be ineffective, then she thought about running again, and then at some point it occurred to her that she couldn't breathe. She fainted.

"Unfortunate," Yen Sid commented on that specific turn, the situation would go much more smoothly if she were awake. He strode forward, but his path was impeded by Bolt, who was still growling angrily at Yen Sid. Now this intrigued the wizard greatly, animals were different than humans, as most humans were separated and cut off from the flow of the universe, animals on the other hand were well attuned to it, they communicated through it, and as such they were well aware of when magic was afoot, and Yen Sid was one of great magic indeed. The dog didn't have a snowball's chance should the wizard choose to become deadly, Yen Sid knew this, Bolt knew this, yet despite the there being no chance of survival for him, he chose to stand and stay with the girl. Yen Sid smiled, for this information gave him reassurance that his actions were the right ones.

However, the dog was still in the way. Yen Sid looked Bolt in the eye and enlightened him. Instantaneously, Bolt gained an understanding, he knew what had happened, part of what will happen, and how things are supposed to be. Bolt hid his fangs for the moment and stepped aside, he made his choice, and he stood with Penny, now Penny needed to make her own.

The Wizard strode over and placed two fingers upon her forehead. He filled her with energy, and removed some of the anxiety that had caused her to get into such a state to begin with. He didn't want to keep having to repeat this process all night, a process which, by the way, was not entirely painless.

Penny shot up like a bolt her every nerve feeling as though they were on fire for the most fleeting of moments. She clutched her chest in a swift spasm of pain. She got up off the floor and was disappointed to find Yen Sid still in her room, standing a few feet away from her. For some reason she didn't feel as afraid as she previously had, and was bold enough to be more direct with the wizard. She was quite out of breath, but she began with the most important question in the list, "What the hell…are you…doing in…MY house?"

A sly and sardonic grin slithered across the old man's face before he answered, "The answer to that question is so complex and carries so many different answers, many of which are so beyond the comprehension of even the most sophisticated human minds that if I were to explain it to you, not only would you not believe me, but you'd also be driven insane. Unless of course you question was pertaining more so to my being in your room, in which case the answer is quite simple; I'm here to make you dreams come true, along with a few nightmares."

Penny was about to ask another question when everything changed, and she noticed something quite important, they weren't in her room anymore. In fact they weren't anywhere near her room anymore, or her house, or even her town, they were underwater.

She closed her eyes, and slowed her breathing, breathing that she shouldn't even be capable of doing given the current circumstances. Did her best to calm herself in this current situation, which was practically impossible as she felt the lull and weight of the waves enveloped her. She finally opened her eyes and turned her head to get a better look at this new environment and saw her loyal dog Bolt, had been transported with her as well, he was currently chasing a school of small fish, his feet sending up small clouds of sand as he padded along the ocean floor. The ocean was a beautiful place, they were near some sort of coral reef, and she watched as fish of every shape and size cut through the water like multicolored knives and an endless parade of crabs skittered across the sand. Then suddenly, it occurred to her that there was someone quite important missing from the picture, she looked around in earnest, searching to find what had happened Yen Sid. Her search ended when she found the old man sitting on top of a large rock, waiting for her to finally get the lead out and continue the discussion.

"What are we doing here?" Penny asked directly, a steam of bubbles coming from her mouth as she did so. She remembering that she was still angry at the wizard, or at least momentarily forgetting her fear of him. Somehow, it came as no surprise to her that she could still speak in such a place, and she continued, "And more importantly how is it that I am still alive?"Yen Sid who had his eyes closed for the moment, cracked one eye open "You are kept alive by my power, as for why we are here, it helps me think. Now if you'll excuse me, there are other matters that call for my attention." And with that, Yen Sid closed his eyes and focused on whatever men of great and infinite wisdom focus upon when their eyes are closed.

So, Penny waited, and waited and waited. It took roughly about an hour or so before it occurred to Penny that she might be here for quite sometime. In that time, she decided to take a mental stock of where she was and how her life had gone recently. Five hours ago, she was going to bed after watching some gag reality show, lying to her mom that she would take out the trash before she went to sleep, and lying to herself that she'd do it first thing in the morning. In that short period of time, she'd been woken up by a wizard, held the moon in her hand, and gone to the bottom of the ocean without any scuba gear whatsoever, oh, and she brought her dog along for the ride.

Then it finally dawned upon her, whilst she had been prattling on with the wizard, she forgot to keep tabs on the mutt. She searched for where the dog had got off too and began to wander the paths and lee ways offered by the corals. She finally reached a clearing of sand, she looked back and was surprised to find how far she got in such a short time, Yen Sid was a barely visible blue lump on an otherwise black hill. She walked further into this clearing, and began to feel pain in her feet. She looked down to find that she'd been walking on the bones of a great score of fish, she then felt eyes upon her and new that this was a bad place. She turned around to find a shark already upon her. She stared head on as several rows of sharp, gnashing, merciless teeth swiftly came at her, she didn't even have time to scream.

Suddenly, from out of nowhere, a giant blur of white side swiped the shark. Penny stared in shock as the two forms, one white and one grey disappeared into the darkness or large coral cave. Penny turned to see the shark swim out and away from the darkness of the hole, leaving a trailing red cloud in it's wake as it fled, the sharks blood poured from several deep gashes in it's side. But that's not what held Penny's attention. She turned her gaze back to the hole, and was horrified to see two fierce looking, glowing green eyes staring right back at her.

So, very logically, and very quickly, Penny did what any sensible person would do, she ran. Penny turned tail and cut down the path she had come from, making a mad dash for Yen Sid. She ran faster than she ever had in her entire life, the water slowing and restricting her every movement. She ran so fast and hard that it felt like her legs were ready to explode, and when she hit that point, she ran a little more. Afraid for her life, Penny jetted through the maze of coral, looking for any way to escape the nightmare she seemed to be entrapped or at least the part of it that was behind her. In her panic, Penny lost her way back to Yen Sid, so it should serve as no surprise to you that she eventually found herself in a dead end, Penny on the other hand almost had a heart attack and dropped on the spot. With nowhere to run and the stone and coral being too sharp and jagged to climb, Penny turned around, wanting to at least see whatever it was that was going to kill her, it was a decision she immediately regretted.

Standing before her, as impossible as it sounds, was the biggest wolf Penny had ever seen. It was something out of a Tolkien novel, the wolf was the size of a horse, covered in brilliant white fur marred only around the muzzle as it had splashed it's mouth with the sharks blood. It's mouth hung open and panting to reveal huge, sharp teeth the size of sabers, it was a four legged nightmare, and Penny didn't stand.

"It was unwise of you to run off like that," came a stern voice from above. Penny turned and looked up to Yen Sid standing atop the mass of stone and coral, staring down at her with the piercing gaze of a hawk.

"Okay I get it," Penny began, doing well to hide the sheer unbridled terror she felt, "Now call your dog."

"It is not my dog."

"Oh yeah? Then who's is it?"

"It's yours."

The answer came out of left field and hit Penny right between the eyes. Thoroughly confused, Penny turned to look at the white beast once more. Her eyes scanned the monster, her mind and memory working quickly to fill in the blanks. The sharp ears, the proud stance, the sharp fangs, the wild and spotless fur. This was The Great White Wolf. But there was more to it than that. The round nose, the way the tail wagged from just staring at her, and those eyes that just loved to chase carrots.

"…Bolt?" Penny queried tentatively.

"ARRF!" Bolt replied, his bark now booming. The dog then rushed Penny and proceeded to lick her face, no longer needing to jump in order to do it.

It took some doing, but Penny was able to push Bolt back long enough to return her focus on Yen Sid, her courage and anger returning, "Look this is all fine and dandy but what is it you want out of me?"

The shapes on the Wizard's hat moved a second before he spoke, "It is quite simple, I want you to save the world."

"Oh yeah, good one, pull the other leg while you're at it."

"It is no joke."

"Really?" Penny retorted skeptically, "If that's true then why don't you do it yourself if you're so "high and Mighty" huh? If you're capable of all this and more, I don't see any reason to bring me in on this."

The remained wizard unfazed by the remark and stated, "There are precisely three million, fifty eight thousand, two hundred, and forty four perfectly good answers I could give to answer your question to that effect. I can send you a list of them if you like, but for now, let's just say that I'm lazy."

"Doubt that. So why me? Why was I chosen? I'm no genius, but I know that there are definitely other people more certified for the job."

"Instead of asking why you were chosen, you should be asking yourself what you will do now that you are chosen. Will you follow my instructions and save the planet upon which you live?" Yen Sid asked sternly, reaching behind his back to swat away a tentacle that was trying to grab him.

"Do I have a choice?" asked the redhead, "Way I see it, saying no could be real hazard to my health."

"Of course you do. Whether in prison, or in a palace, every person has an incalculable amount of choices they can make. And you too can make a choice right now, and make many more thereafter. You can choose to not accept the path which I offer you, I'll return you to the life you had prior to this meeting."

"But who's going to save the world? It's not much of a choice, working for you or annihilation."

The Wizard stepped backward to let a shark pass, before speaking again, "Oh, by no means undergo fear. As you have pointed out, there are other, more qualified, individuals from which I can choose. I will simply ask one of them, and the world will go on as usual. You will be allowed to fully live out your life, free of any memory of this meeting happening."

The former actress considered the pros and cons of that before asking, "Okay, and what's the catch? What happens should I choose to take the job?"

"Then you will be given a life like no other. It will be filled with great pain and suffering, as all lives are, and the dangers will be great, there is by no means a guarantee of old, or even middle age for that matter. But there will also be many rewards along the way, both great and small. And it is sure to contain something that you've been lusting after for a long time."

"And that is?"

"Adventure. You've been bored for quite some time haven't you?"

That hit Penny at her core. True, she still took the occasional acting job, because, you know, old habits die hard, but it wasn't enough for her. She wanted to do great things, amazing things, she didn't know what they were, but she knew it was something more than hitting stuntman b and letting him fall off to the side and onto the safety net.

"…Well?" Yen Sid cut in, breaking Penny from her reverie.

"I'm thinking," she said curtly, biting her lip as she weighed the consequences of the choice before her. It was quite a bit to take in one sitting, she had no idea what she wanted to do tomorrow, much less for the rest of her life, she doubted this deal would go on only for a day or so, and that's not even confronting the fact that she now had to accept the existence of magic. And what was that bit about no guarantee of old age? True, she was looking for a little action, but she wasn't stupid. She was certain this endeavor would step on the toes of one two less than benevolent individuals, and if this Yen Sid freak was one of the good guys, she'd hate to run into the bad guys. But that's probably what Bolt's change was intended for. Not to mention no one lives forever. So…to hell with it.

"Your Answer?" Yen Sid asked coolly.

"Okay, I'll do it."

Yen Sid's face did not change expression, as if he knew her answer in advance, "I know. Wait for the white-faced-tall-man-in-black, he'll know where to go."

Penny's Room, Oklahoma 12:01am

Penny awoke in a cold sweat and sat straight up like a rocket. She looked herself up and down, and sweat aside, she was bone dry. She turned and looked out the window, the moon was right where it was supposed to be, craters and all.

"It…was just a dream?" Penny mused, feeling let down and confused, staring at the lumps in her blanket that indicated the location of her feet. It was a relief sure, but also a disappointment, to be so worked up over something so supposedly incredible, only to be let down even faster. She'd get over it, sure, but she still felt cheated.

"Hey Bolt, have you ever had one of those dreams where you think you wake up, but it's just-" Penny's words stopped dead in her throat. At some point during her question, Penny had turned to look at her pet, only to find him staring straight back at her, the size of a horse. As amazing as this may sound, Penny was unsurprised, and Bolt only managed to look quizzically back at her, as if waiting for the answer.

Her cat Mittens, however, was a different story. The small mass of grey and white fur waltzed in, took one look at the mutt, and keeled over on the spot. Penny jumped up to make sure her cat was breathing. Mittens was fine, sure enough, but her reaction called to attention a rather serious problem.

"Man," Penny said looking back at Bolt, "Mom's going to flip when she sees you. There's no way I can explain this. I can't even hide you, not unless I can get you through the door, which I can't…S*** I have no idea what I'm going to do."

That's when something caught her eye. It was a simple, almost trivial little thing, but it was resting on her bed where she herself had been not half a minute before. It was a small, purple drawstring bag, emblazoned with gold lettering, which read, "The Big Bag of Good Advice."

This definitely wasn't here when I fell asleep, she thought to herself. Anxious, she picked up the bag and looked inside to find fortunes. The inside of the small bag was filled with nothing but little scraps of paper one would expect to find inside an actual fortune cookie. She pulled out several of these small scraps, everyone of them had some helpful hint or another on everything from oral hygiene to summer travel plans, none of the messages pertained to her current problem however.

"This thing's useless," Penny said sourly. It was then, as she was putting the scraps of paper back in the bag, that she read the last one in her hand; It helps if you close your eyes.

Feeling that she had nothing to lose, Penny, closed her eyes and reached into the bag, her hand felt around for a few seconds before she pulled out a fortune that read, Good dogs like to obey their masters.

She put the bag down and turned to Bolt "Bolt, um, geez, how do I put this? If it isn't too much to ask, could you shrink if you can, I don't know how you feel about being big but I need you smaller because we need to make sure that no one knows about this. Do you understand?"

It took a moment, but Bolt reared himself back like he used to when he performed his super bark. Then, with a booming "ARRK!" Bolt vanished in a black cloud of odorless smoke. The smoke dissipated quickly enough, and when it did, Penny saw that her dog had been returned to it's original size. "Good boooy!" Penny said, kneeling down to ruffle the dog's fur. The sound of heavy footsteps shook Penny from this action. She looked up to find her mom standing in the doorway.

"…Did you just hear that?" she asked.

"Penny turned around, looked back at her bed to find that the small bag had vanished. "No," she replied, "It was probably just a dream."

The Robinson House, California 12:00am (Witching Hour).

Cornelius wheeled his chair back and let out a great yawn. Ever since his meeting with Inspector Gadget he'd been working around the clock to see the program to it's fruition, even going so far as to put all other projects on hold in order to complete the translation program. He despised redoing old work, especially completed work. It was one thing to work on an unfinished project, because then there was the prospect for new work and ideas to come in once the discovery of what went wrong was made. But to recreate an entire old project from scratch, exactly the way it was before, there was simply no area for new ideas, no chance at something new, in short, he couldn't keep moving forward, and he hated that. However, he was grateful that is his hatred, he at least had his regular clothes back on. There was nothing like getting out of a smelly safety suit that made you gain an appreciation for your good old clean ensemble of red knickerbockers, white shirt and blue sweater-vest. The safety suit from the green house had clung to him like a second skin by the time he finally left the building and peeled it off. He surmised that that it wasn't an entirely horrid idea to install either an air conditioner in the building, or lessen on the padding in the suit by the time he went in to work on the model galaxy some more.

He stretched and shuddered a little. He was currently alone in his lab, the only light came from his computer monitor. It was Bud and Lucille's anniversary, they wanted Cornelius to come along, in fact, they had planned for him to do as such, but he explained to them how important it was that the inspector brought this case to an end, and how it required his work and immediate attention. Bud and Lucille, being the wonderful and understanding parents they were, were wonderful and understood completely, going out on the town with Cornelius' well wishes and the promise that they'd be back late.

He typed in one last line of code, yawned again, and rolled away from the computer desk again. He was tired, he was haggard, he was frayed, he could now safely say it was time to call it a night. He been up for the last two days straight working on the program, and he could probably go for several more if he resorted to using the caffeine patch, but he wasn't so sure about Lucille's guarantee of no side effects. Not to get anything confused, he thought the world of Lucille, the same going for his other parent as well, but there were times where either one or the other was just a tad bit off, and the end results were disastrous, that's not to say he was completely without fault either. But all these were arguments for another time, right now, he was tired and he was going to bed.

"Was" being the key word in the last sentence, for as he reached to save his work and shut down the machine, something caught his eye. He looked out the window to see someone coming up the road to the house. Well more something, not someone, the beauty of living so far away from everything is that it's hard for surprise guests to be much of a surprise, that and your average Jehovah's witness tends to shy away from going so far out of their way to wake you up on a Saturday, not to mention it's highly unlikely that you average girl scout is so insistent and desperate to get that bumble bee badge that they go all the way to the Robinson house. And while all of the mentioned benefits are equally fantastic, let's return attention to the first of the three mentioned.

It was fairly dark out, the moon probably hidden behind a grouping of clouds no doubt. If it weren't for that, Cornelius would've never noticed the car coming up the road, especially after it shut it's lights off from a bit away. Cornelius shut off the computer, so that the monitor light's reflection on the window would not disrupt his view. Cornelius hadn't been expecting Bud and Lucille to be back so early, but then again, their version of a good night's sleep ranged from thirty-two hours to a mere twenty minutes, so "late" could range from any number of conceivable time sets. However, as the car pulled off the road and onto the long driveway of the Robinson home, Cornelius could easily see that it was not the Robinson's blue stanza that was making it's way towards the house, but a black sedan, although he couldn't be sure in the dark.

But that left the young genius somewhat puzzled and baffled at the identity of the late evening/early morning visitor. Even the most earnest and powerful corporations had at least the decency, not to mention common sense, to wait until daybreak before sending a representative, and never sent one after ten, that's just common business etiquette. Cornelius then deduced that it could possibly be the inspector, arriving with another revelation in the case that would require the young inventor's expertise. Cornelius would have to remember to scold him about arriving so late, or at least failing to call ahead again, it's not like the inspector could actually lose his cell phone, it was built into him for crying out loud. Not that Cornelius actually gave the inspector a phone number, but being digital detective meant he should at least competent enough to discover that on his lonesome.

Regardless, Cornelius continued to watch the car until it came to a stop, and he became even more vexed as the person who stepped out was far from any Inspector Gadget. He was obviously shorter than the cyborg, and wore a black body suit as opposed to the inspector's Dick Tracy style get up. Cornelius was a bit intrigued as to which doorbell this peculiar late night visitor would choose in calling for attention. However, the inventor's youthful curiosity quickly shifted to full on primal fear, when the man moved in the darkness to reveal that he was holding a shotgun. He aimed it at the door and fired, the fact that Cornelius didn't hear a thing, particularly the crack of gunfire, meant that this man was an assassin and was professional enough to have a silencer upon his gun, not that it mattered, as far away from everything else as they were, there could've been twenty marching bands playing their hearts out at the Robinson home, and no one would've been any the wiser.

With the door no longer blocking his path, the gunman wasted no time in entering the house to search for his target. Cornelius, upon seeing this, became increasingly panic stricken, but calmed down enough to begin looking at his lab. Cornelius has always been possessive of a highly inventive mindset, and any time when an inventor seeks to create something, it is because they see a problem and try to come up with a solution. The question and it's inevitable answer. Putting his emotions in the backseat of his mind, Cornelius looked at his lab, and calmly began to invent solutions to a rather pressing problem at the moment. The question of course being; "a man with a shotgun has just entered your home, what do you do?"

The assassin stalked the halls of the Robinson home, in search of his target. But in all honesty, he didn't know where to look. This place was massive, it wasn't even a real house, it was a government space research center back in the fifties, and even then it was massive. There were just so many rooms and places to search, it could take him all night. Deciding to go up a flight of stairs, the gunman began to contemplate what exactly it was he was about to commit.

To tell the truth, the task that night didn't sit too well with him. Killing a child isn't an easy thing to live with after all. However, ever since the fiasco with Bradford, he'd been catching a lot of heat from his boss. And true, while the guy may be a deranged nut case, he was the deranged nut case who was in charge of writing the checks. The assassin had his finger rub against the metal collar around his neck to remind himself that the money wasn't the only thing his boss was in charge of.

To most, the Robinson house can be quite an imposing place, it's many twists and turns leaving no end to the possibilities for any number of surprises. That of course does not take into the number of hiding spaces that were to be found. Constantly the assassin thought he heard breathing from behind this set of drapes, or felt eyes fall upon him from under that table. That of course isn't taking into account the fact that the floors were carpeted, masking his steps, and if they were masking his steps, they could certainly mask others. Not that he was too afraid. His suit couldn't be pierced, it was guaranteed to block any conventional knife or bullet, not that he was impervious, the ache he felt every morning from when that freak chucked the air vent at him was a sound reminder of that. But the carpet would muffle anyone's footsteps quite well, if they were trying to be quiet anyways. Meaning that at anytime someone could sneak up at any time and-

The gunman swiftly swiveled on the spot, gun at the ready, coming face to face with absolutely nothing. He chastised himself for his actions, he was acting like this was the first time he'd done this. He was forgetting that it was not only his job, but his life to be the predator, not the prey. Although, in his defense, with some of the claims his boss had made, it was hard to be in that mindset. For his part, taking it out grown men and women had no real emotional baggage to it. They lived their lives, had their chance, they screwed up big, end of story, cash the check and go home to Candy. But, it was hard to factor things that way with a kid. Seriously, how the f*** do you screw up so that someone else can say "he had it coming" about you at age thirteen? Nevertheless, the kid was the target, and he was the arrow, make it quick, make it quiet, no backing out. Ever.

He stopped, the gunman not wanting the shifting of carpet fibers to muffle the sound, whatever it was. He strained his ears, stopped breathing himself to catch the hint of it, although the sound of his own heart did nothing to help the detection. All his efforts worked stunningly to allow him to hear it. It was faint and far of, but it definitely happening. He suspected that it was coming from one of the upper tiers of the building, so he made his way to the closest stairs possible, navigating as best he could. His search paid off splendidly, as it got louder, whatever it was. He went higher, his ears leading him to the source being up the next floor. The context clues of his journey as he stalked the halls being wall paper and unused carpeting. The house was receiving a makeover from the ground up, literally, so this floor, and probably the next had no silencing carpet but instead the ever dreaded wood.

Now that he was close enough, the assassin was able to make out that someone up stair was moving quite a lot of stuff around, he could even see the light trickle down the spiral stair that lead up to the person's position. All he needed to do was creep up the stairs and-

CREEEEK!

The assassin silently swore, damned old floor boards were often a more capable detection device than most electronic states of the art this these days. He just hoped that whoever it was upstairs didn't hear-

Click.

The light from the room upstairs cut off, leaving the hall in darkness. Whoever it was knew that the assassin was there and why. Knowing that his cover had been blown, the gunman rushed forward and tromped noisily up the stairs. He came into what appeared to be a shop class mixed with a garage sale and science fair. The place was an utter mess, even with the relatively small light the came into the room from the windows he could see that, which in itself was odd, since it was a full moon by the time he entered the place. He switched on the goggles that were built into the visor of his suit, although it didn't improve things by much.

It'd be like looking for a hay in a needle stack. Well, maybe not as painful or daunting as that, but certainly as frustrating. Everywhere the gunman looked were endless piles of cloth, mile high stacks of paper, and just junk without seemingly any real purpose. There was no real start or end to the number of places his target was hiding in this room.

He cautiously moved forward into the room when-

FWUMP!

He slipped and fell, not exactly the most graceful or predatory thing to do while trying to keep quiet. In a quick search to find out what exactly he'd tripped on, he picked up several smalls plastic balls that looked like over sized marbles or under sized golf balls. Upon being moved so quickly, they all eerily lit up like Christmas tree lights. Throwing the ones he'd picked up on the ground and kicking the others out of the way, he squinted his eyes a bit as even the minute amount of light they provided was too bright for the goggles. Removing the goggles, he became annoyed when the orbs lights died down. He kicked the lot, which lighted up once more due to the sudden motion, and gave him clear light under some of the tables. Unfortunately the boy wasn't there. He walked deeper into the lab, checking every nook and cranny possible.

"HI THERE!"

The gunman whirled around at the source of the voice. In the slight darkness and confusion all he saw was a figure rushing at him with glowing white eyes and flailing arms. The assailant, who was heavier than first imagined, tackled the hitman to the ground, arms still flinging about. The gunman quickly knocked the guy off, and put the muzzle of the shotgun to his chest.

Pof!

The silencer made a whisper of the thunder from the shot. Getting up, the meticulous killer looked down to see that he'd just been given the runaround by a 1950's throwback, a grey tinker toy robot on a metal dolly. Looking to see what set it off, he saw that the dolly was bungeed to a table adjacent to where the robot was, it must've been pulled forward when he stepped on the cord. Another little left for him by the target.

beep! beep! beep!

The alarm at his side went off to inform him that someone was trying to jack his ride. He rushed to one of the windows, knocking inventions off the tables as he ran. Looking down, he saw the target. The little bastard must've given him the slip, the kid left him to play hide and seek while he rushed down the stairs. Currently, the target was trying the gunman's car door, finding it locked, giving up and running across the Robinson house lawn. A razor sharp grin spread across the contract killer's face. "Gotcha."

Cornelius was quite out of breath at this point, he'd never been forced to run so hard before in all of his life. He was currently running across the expansive lawn of the Robinson home, e didn't know how long the distractions in his lab would keep the hitman busy. After the bid to steal his car had failed, Cornelius decided it was best to hide in the greenhouse. He had one last idea on what to do if the gunman should find him. That "if" turned into a "now" as the grass near to the left of Cornelius got shredded apart. The young inventor looked back to see that the gunman was quite a ways away from him, cursing and reloading. Proper incentive now at his back, Cornelius caught his second wind, and ran faster than he ever thought was possible for him, he needed to act quickly now.

The hitman gritted his teeth as the brat rushed to some strange black green house. Picking up the pace, he rushed to the green house door, only to find it locked. Annoyed, he took his shotgun and blasted the handle and lock and proceeded to kick the door off it's hinges. Stepping into the pitch black environment, the gunman reactivated his night vision goggles, the minimal light filtering in from the entrance worked to illuminate the room perfectly to his vision. He was irked to find even more of the orbs scattered along the floor or this place as well. It didn't matter though, he could kill the kid blind right now, just by listening to the clink and crunch of a monkey wrench, coming from behind the huge machine at the back of the room.

"End of the line," the gunman said, tromping into the room. He didn't take pleasure in his work, not really. To him it was just a job, the only thing he was good at. As if to answer his declaration, he heard a click come from the machine.

All of a sudden, the orbs began to vibrate, lighting up almost immediately. This batch was much brighter than the ones in the house, so much so that the gunman was completely blinded in the goggles. He was about to remove them when he felt the pelting. At first it was light, a few brushes here and there, he was afraid that the kid might've gone past him, since he no longer heard anything other than the tapping upon his body. But then the pelting grew worse in a matter of seconds, and what was once annoying tapping progressed into heavy rain, then on into hail, then finally it just felt like bunch of people were punching the crap out of him. He was hurt, blind, and panicking fast. He was going to fire in the direction he remembered seeing the large machine at, when he felt some powerful force begin pull the shotgun away from him. He tried to hold on, but it was like playing tug-o-war with a gorilla, he finally had to let go when on of the orbs smashed into his ring and middle fingers on his left hand, breaking them instantly. The metal collar around his neck began to be pulled on as well, choking him slightly.

"ARRRGH!" He was in real trouble now. His suit was designed so that it could not be penetrated or cut by any conventional means, you'd need a diamond spear and a hell of a through to run him through, bullet became beestings and knives even less than that. However, it was also designed to be flexible and cloth-like, meaning that if offered little protection against blunt force. If one was hit by a truck in the suit, they'd still get snapped in half. So walking into the green house, as designed as the suit was, he might as well have been going in naked. Hurt, weaponless, and blind, the hitman clutched his hand to his chest, but that didn't stop the parade of blows that were steadily raining down him from all directions. The pain was unbearable and constant, he soon felt his ribs begin to fracture and break, the pain from this brought him to his knees. What finally took him out was one final strong blow to the side of his face that nearly shattered his jaw.

Once Cornelius saw the man go down, he shut off the super magnet. He had hugged the side of it during the entire duration of it being turned on. He'd tinkered with it a bit to increase the speed at which the orbs flew. He looked around to see that this decision had rendered more than just a few holes in the sides of the greenhouse windows. He clapped to turn on the greenhouse lights before walking over to where his would-be killer lay unconscious. The inventor used his foot to roll the man from his side and onto his back, movement of his chest and the groan elicited from the action confirmed for Cornelius that the man was still alive. He looked for the shotgun which was quite some way away, having been pulled away from it's owner by the chaotic pull of the super magnet. Cornelius felt that it was probably best that the weapon was in his hands rather than in the hands of the man on the ground, should he wake up, not that Cornelius knew how to handle a shotgun, but he'd seen enough movies to understand how it went, not to mention he was a fast learner. After grabbing the weapon Cornelius walked back to stand over the assassin's unconscious form.

Suddenly, the killers eyes shot wide open. Cornelius backed off as he began to wildly spasm and freak out. He lay on the floor, making choking sounds, foaming at the mouth, his hands reaching out like a helpless beetle that had been turned over on it's back. The gunman, spasming out as he was, removed his goggles, and this eyes fell upon Cornelius. Taking notice of the inventor, the gunman reached into his suit side pocket and pulled out a letter, his hand twitching and shaky all the while. The letter had an address and was for a Candice Aaron, the gunman held it out to Cornelius, who in turn cautiously took the letter. With that done, the hitman allowed his hand to fall to the ground.

"I'm sorry, kahk!" The gunman said to Cornelius, his breathing haggard, and his words being forced out through tightly grit teeth, "…It was halk!...just…business."

With that, the killer's eyes grew cold and glazed, he stopped moving, he stopped breathing, Cornelius waited for a few minutes, the man was stone dead, there was no question about that. The inventor bent down to see what caused the man's death, on the spot investigation not being his forte. His search lead him to study the man's thick metal collar, which was somewhat loose fitting. On the inner ring, Cornelius saw a small hole, and from it, sticking into the late killer's neck, was a hypodermic needle, he'd been poisoned.

To say Cornelius was smart was an understatement in it's highest form. The boy was a walking embodiment of wit and intellect. However, for all his wit, for all his intelligence, for all his imagination, he could not think of what he was going to do next.

And now for something completely different...reviews

Dread Pirate Rackham: Thank you for your compliment Rackham it's very much appreciated and actually I was thinking about trying to get this published someday I hope you'll enjoy this chapter

Masterofhearts1313: we thank you much for your words and as for your question well you're reading the second chapter aren't you?

Heckfan: I hope I haven't disappointed you but Grimm Gun wrote the last chapter I did write part of this one though

Grimm Gun

Hey, Hey kids! First and foremost sorry for the time it took to update, it's mostly my fault, so if you got tomatoes to toss about the update time, sling 'em this way. And now to lick boots where boot lickin' is due, let's talk back to those crazy kids we all know and love; The Reviewers.

Dread Pirate Rackham: Well thanks, it's always nice to hear that my work makes someone out there smile. Sorry for taking so long, I hope the length of this update makes up for the wait.

MasterofHearts1313: Well, as bad as the original movie was, and as horrifyingly terrible as it's sequel was, I felt Gadget deserved at least one incarnation where he's not a complete twit. Mark me, some guy, some day, somewhere is going to get the rights to The Inspector Gadget franchise and is going to have the same idea I did and is going to make it work! …Sadly, I got a bad feeling that tomorrow's not going to be that day…and neither is next Tuesday.

Heckfan: I try when I can, or is that "can when I try"? Anywayses, thanks just the same. Sorry for the wait and all that, college, studying hard, building a future for myself and whatever chick the law of averages screws over in order for her to be with me, I hope you understand.

And now, back to A. Fox for the final word(s) of the day. I hope it's gargantuan (it sounds super cool and no one uses it anymore).

And now I hope you dear readers shall leave more reviews don't be shy we would love to hear your output. And for those of you who are waiting for the next chapter don't worry We'll be starting work soon...whether work on it begins in this month or the next is the question