Cody ran into just the person he wanted to see. This would not normally have been true, but it was considering the circumstances. "Sierra?" he asked.
She looked to him, and then she asked, "What do you need, Cody?" She suddenly hugged him and said, "I really want to thank you for letting me be in the studio audience. It made me feel… oh, so in love…" Then she put him down, and smiled, waiting for a response.
"Sierra," Cody said, sighing, "I hate to tell you this, but that might have been the only time you'll ever be able to sit there."
"Wha-what?" she asked, looking aghast. "Did I behave that poorly?"
"It's not you, Sierra," Cody said, assuring her, although he was bracing himself in case she overreacted to that remark. "The show was cancelled."
"WHAT? The show was cancelled! Well, those execs wouldn't know quality programming if it came and bit their heads off!" Sierra shouted, and it appeared as though her nose was letting out smoke. Cody was visibly intimidated at this moment. She stormed off and found a box that contained cardboard and pens. She rummaged through it, picking up a piece of cardboard, and then she wrote on it, "BRING BACK N4".
She headed to the doors of the network studio building, and waved her sign in the air, shouting, "Down with the network! Bring back N4! Bring back N4!"
Looking down on the lone young woman, screaming unintelligible nonsense—as far as they could tell—one of the executives told a security guard to take her away. He obliged, but when he reached her he was immediately intimidated by the fact that she dwarfed him. He ran upstairs and told the executive that she was taller than she looked from the third floor.
A news broadcast was shown about the Crazy Amazon who went to attack the poor unsuspecting studio. "Oh, great," Cody said, "Sierra's on the news."
"Well how about that?" Harold asked. "She really is trying to get our show back on the air."
"But how is she going to do that all by herself?" Beth asked.
"She's not," Cody remarked, and then he made an aside glance. Noah smiled at him.
A crowd that contained the majority of the studio audience began to form around Sierra. "Uh, Sierra?" Izzy asked. She jumped in front of Sierra and waved her hand in her face. "Yoo-hoo! Sierra!"
"Not now, Izzy!" Sierra said angrily.
"What?" Izzy asked.
"I have to get the Nerd Quadrilateral Variety Show back on the air!" Sierra said, continuing to raise her sign.
"Wait," Izzy said, "The Nerd Quadrilateral Variety Show got cancelled? Well that just will not do! Right, Owen?"
"Right!" Owen responded.
"Right, Eva?" she asked again, turning to her muscle-bound friend.
"Take 'em down," she responded forcefully.
Izzy said, "I'll be right back," and leaped away. When she came back she was carrying three signs. One said, "Nerds Rule Networks Drool." One said "Take the 'idiot' back out of 'idiot box'." The final one said, "Noah Don't Go." Izzy handed the first to Owen, and the third to Eva, and kept the second to herself.
"Bring back N4!" Sierra chanted, and pretty soon Izzy, Owen, and Eva had joined the chant.
"Heh," Noah said, looking at the news report, "Would you look at that? The freak brigade came to defend my honor."
"Well of course they did," Cody said, "And that's just the beginning."
Tyler jumped up and asked Izzy if she could get him a picket sign. She said, "Sure!" and dashed off. When she came back, she had gotten three picket signs. Tyler picked up the one that read, "Geeks We Love You."
He turned to LeShawna and said, "You should probably join this protest too."
"Of course I will!" LeShawna said, "Your picket sign is absolutely right." She picked up another sign that said, "Harold Deserves Better." Soon, LeShawna and Tyler had also joined the chant of, "Bring back N4".
Harold looked at the screen, and tears started welling in his eyes. "They really care about me!"
"Well of course they do!" Cody responded. Beth looked forlorn.
"What's the matter, Beth?" Harold asked.
"No one's protesting because of me…" she said sheepishly.
At that moment, Lindsay joined the protest, and picked up a sign that said "My IQ is high enough for two. I love this show!" Noah and Harold snickered at this, and then both looked shocked when they realized the other was doing it too. Beth had a different reaction.
She clasped her hands together and she said, "Lindsay's defending the show for my sake." Then she swooned.
"Um, Les Yay much?" Harold asked in the general direction of Beth.
"Just ignore it," Noah responded in deadpan.
"This is really working! I didn't even expect all the people who joined the protest to join…" Cody said.
"Hey," Noah said, "You're… you're awesome."
"Thank you," Cody said, "That really means a lot coming from you."
"You guys can kiss later," Harold said, "Right now, we have more important matters to deal with. Will the show be saved or won't it?"
Trent and Justin left the crowd, and joined in the protest, although they had no picket signs. Each pumped his right fist in the air and chanted, "Drama Brothers stick together to the bitter end!" repeatedly.
Harold looked at Cody and said, "Yeah! I told you that would be more than just résumé padding!"
"I never doubted that," Cody said, "In fact, as I recall, you said it was just résumé padding."
DJ joined the chant as well. "Unfair cancellation!" he shouted, "Unfair cancellation!"
"Of course," Noah said, "He came to defend all of us because he's just that nice."
Then, something happened that caused Cody to fall over backwards. Gwen got up and joined the protest too. "Bring back N4; Cody worked hard on that show!" she shouted.
"Congratulations, Romeo," Noah said, "You're starting to win her over."
"I am?" Cody asked. Then, he got up excitedly and said, "I am, aren't I?"
"Don't get your hopes up. My tone was mildly in jest," Noah said.
"Of course it was," Cody said, slightly disappointedly, "My bad."
"You've already won someone over," Harold said under his breath.
"What?" Cody asked.
"Nothing, never mind," Harold said.
Bridgette and Geoff joined in. Bridgette shouted, "Bring back N4!"
Geoff shouted, "Yeah, you party poopers!" Courtney had up until this point been completely still. She turned to look at Duncan, and then at the protestors, and then she stood up too. "Bring back N4!" she yelled.
Harold gasped. Cody gasped. Beth gasped. Noah asked, "What?" flatly.
"I guess Courtney realized that ideology was more important than relationships," Cody said.
"Courtney?" Noah asked, "Please. She's just doing it because all the other nice people are, and she doesn't want to look bad."
"Bring back N4!" Courtney shouted, and then she tossed her shoe at the building. Suddenly, it wasn't only these people that used to be on the show with them, but several dozen others joined in protest. Many of them were Noah's relatives. There were also about six who weren't.
"Would you look at that?" Noah asked, crossing his arms smugly, "The bountiful tree has come to save the day."
"Bring back N4!" the crowd continued to protest.
Suddenly, the anchor said, "And now, a Muskoka cat got caught in a tree today. That is our top story!"
"What? No! No, no, no!" Harold, Noah, Cody, and Beth all screamed.
"Go back to the story that concerns us!" Harold shouted.
"Yeah," Noah said, "It's the only way we'll know for sure our plan didn't fail."
"The only way we'll know for sure our plan didn't fail?" Cody asked. "Don't you mean the only way we'll know for sure it did?
"Um…" Noah stammered.
"It's okay, really!" Cody said, laughing, "I'm just teasing, you know."
"Guys! This is serious! No time for jokes, and Cody, I'd appreciate it if you didn't encourage Noah to heckle," Harold shouted.
"But…" Cody began, "He just isn't Noah if he isn't critical." Noah turned his head away, embarrassed.
"But I still don't know if the show was saved or not," Harold said.
The man in the sunglasses with the goatee came back. He looked frazzled and had his tie on weird. He was visibly sweating. Harold was on edge when he turned to him. "What's the word?" he asked.
He began, "Well, it turns out that the ratings were a little misleading. And some of your friends are downright scary. And Noah has more relatives than a queen bee. And they always brag about his abilities and hold them against me."
"Psh," Noah said, flicking his wrist, "Only the immediate ones."
"Anyway, long story short, you guys have your show back," he said.
All four of the nerds cheered. "But, listen carefully, because I'm only going to say this once: please stop losing people during the show."
"I'm sorry," Beth said, "I'll try to stay put until after the show."
"So, losing people was the only problem?" Noah asked.
"The only one that we caught," the man said. "Why? What else went wrong?" Noah wore a proud smile.
"Don't even say it…" Harold said.
"I. Told. You. So," he said, without a hint of remorse on his face.
"Argh! I told you not to say it!" Harold said.
"Guys, do you have to fight all the time?" Cody asked hesitantly.
"Well, now that I have evidence that I was right and Harold was wrong—I told you so, by the way, Harold—I don't see any reason why we shouldn't. As long as it's all in good fun, of course."
"Of course," Harold grumbled.
The show was set to air the same time next week, and of course, the gang talked to the studio audience before the show.
Cody told Sierra, "That was amazing! I knew I could count on you."
"Really?" Sierra asked, and then got a creepy smile. Cody made a nervous face and ran. Sierra pouted.
"Thanks for helping me out of a jam, guys!" Noah said to Izzy, Owen, and Eva.
"Don't mention it! I gotta help my girlfriends out," Izzy said. "Just kidding!"
"But seriously, I know how it feels to be cheated out of stuff," Eva said, "And this show… is something you really want to do."
"You guys rock!" Owen said.
Harold thanked Tyler and LeShawna. "No problem," Tyler said, "You guys are all pretty cool, after all."
"Yeah," LeShawna said, "And you love what you do. That matters more than anything."
Beth hugged Lindsay for her help.
"Gwen…" Cody said, shuffling his feet, "Umm… about the protest…"
Gwen said, "Cody, listen, I know you like me. I might not feel that way about you, but that doesn't mean I don't care if your show ends too soon. You were doing a great thing. Plus, if you have more of those vampire skits, I might just fall in love..." Cody looked unhealthily excited. "…with this show."
He looked disappointed for a brief moment. Then he said, "That's really great! I don't know about vampires but Harold wrote a pretty good one about zombies! Maybe we'll use it today!"
"I'd like that," Gwen said.
Courtney walked in sheepishly. "Aha!" Harold said, pointing at her. "You joined the protest. You like the show."
"I don't!" she denied. Then, almost immediately, she relented, "Oh, okay, I do. I really do. There aren't enough shows out there for smart people."
"It's okay, Courtney," Beth said, "You're one of us."
"You're right," she said, "I am one of you. I don't suppose that you could let me join after all?" she asked sheepishly.
"We'll think about it. We already have more than three dozen skits in our queue that don't contain you, and we'd need to find room for you to perform a solo," Harold said. Then he had an idea. "But… but if this show makes it to a second season, you'll be in season two!"
"I'd like that," Courtney responded, smiling. Courtney was smart enough to know a bad deal when she saw it, so this gave Harold confidence. There was a very likely possibility there would be a season two.