"What happened, K'walski?" Private asked, Skipper long gone. Kowalski didn't answer, his mind elsewhere. He'd seen the way Skipper had looked at the photograph. The Photograph. Kowalski's gazed shifted to the image in question, in which the young Skipper sat perched on the jeep, his two late teammates on either side. The leader's signature confident smirk seemed only to rub salt in the wound the single out of place letter had created, reminding Kowalski of simpler, happier times. Private, thankfully, eyed his elder quizzically, completely unaware of significance of both the photograph and the misspelled word.
Skipper marched into the empty ally. It was obviously some kind of trick. At first he'd been stunned by the message inside. He'd only left the apartment as it had, on some level, gotten his hopes up that those two knuckleheads might just be alive, and by now, he had come so far he might as well see it through. The misspelt letter had been their sign, a way of identifying that one of them had sent the letter. They'd sworn never to tell anyone about it; at least, that was what Rockgut had told him. Obviously, someone had found out. At least, that was far more likely than that the one thing he was certain happened on that fateful day actually hadn't happened at all.
Skipper stopped at one of the commercial dumpsters behind one of the buildings backing on to the ally. He opened the lid, and climbed inside, falling through the holographic garbage and into the room below. Skipper was surprised the hologram was still working after all those years.
"Alright, I'm here," skipper called into the darkness, the cobwebs brushing against his face as he took another step into the disused safe house. Then he added, for the benefit of Blowhole, who was doubtless smirking somewhere in the shadows: "And you're going to wish you hadn't used the sign to invite me. I'm a little old to believe in ghost stories."
"Ghost stories?" a frighteningly familiar voice questioned from the darkness surrounding him, though not the voice he had been anticipating, any of them. In fact, this one was by far more terrifying.
"See, I told you Manfridi," another voice, equally familiar, hissed, "They've gotten to him. He really believes them."
"Don't be silly, Johnson, he was obviously just acting," Skipper swung his flashlight in the direction of the voices, "Still, nice touch with the nightmares of our horrifying demise, Skipps."
"No!" Skipper stumbled backwards until his back hit the concrete wall behind him, "You're dead! I remember! I saw you die!" the two men stepped forward and into the light cast by the still open dumpster, "You have to be some part of one of Blowhole's insane schemes… or… or a space squid…!"
"We're not space squids," Manfridi answered, "You can cut the act."
"He's not acting Manfridi," Johnson hissed, before continuing in a more audible voice, "No offence, but you've got a thousand memories of how we died. How do you know we even did?"
Skipper stared open mouthed at the two men in front of him. Manfridi, or supposedly Manfridi, hadn't changed much from the photograph Skipper kept on his desk. His light brown hair was still cut in that ridiculous vintage style, his uniform fashionably rugged as ever, and he still towered over Skipper. Johnson was a few inches shorter than his companion, and still towered over Skipper, but the complete opposite. There wasn't a single fibre on that man's being that didn't conform to regulation, and Kowalski often theorised that the subatomic particles that made up the fibres were equally rule abiding.
"I told you Manfridi, they got to him!" Johnson hissed again.
"Ok, Johnson, you might possibly… in some incredibly vague way… have a point." Manfridi admitted, though it was obvious the two had probably bet a lot of fish on the fact.
"Manfridi… Johnson… how…?" Skipper stuttered, still paralyzed by the situation.
"Well Skipps, there's really no pretty way of saying this," Manfridi answered, "You've been brainwashed."
"First things first, though," Johnson added, "You need to know what really happened in Denmark."
"We can't tell him that, Johnson," Manfridi objected, "He wouldn't be able to handle it."
"Well the longer they control him…"
Skipper cleared his throat, interrupting the two, "I am in the room, by the way." Their constant bickering gave his brain time to reboot, or at least regain some of his composure.
"Sorry Skipps." The two replied in unison. Now that was familiar. Those two never did seem to have grown up. Wait, how did he know…?
"Manfridi, why don't we tell him in bits and pieces?" Johnson suggested before Skipper could finish his thought, "that might be a bit more manageable."
"Sounds like a good idea," Manfridi cast a careful glance over Skipper, considering what he should start with and how much he should tell him, "You remember when the 'copter was shot down? After the mission started to go south?"
"Yeah, at least I think." Skipper replied, equally cautious with his words.
"Well, you were knocked unconscious when you hit your head on the side of the door when we all jumped."
"Yeah," Skipper slightly red, "That was… embarrassing."
"We all landed in that lake. The three of us dragged you to shore," Johnson continued, "Then we set up camp..."
"We only left you alone for a few minutes." Manfridi interrupted as if apologising for some heinous crime he had yet to announce.
"When we came back, they'd already got you and were driving away," Johnson continued sadly, "we didn't know what they did to you until recently."
"Slow down boys, who abducted me?" Skipper asked, "And why don't I remember any of this?"
"The enemy of course," Manfridi replied, "they tortured you for months, but they never got anything out of you. So they tried a different approach."
"They created a team, and then slowly convinced you that this was your team, that the three of -" Manfridi elbowed Johnson, interrupting the story, "Sorry, that we'd died in Denmark and that you'd been posted to their fabricated team."
"Then they sent you on missions and when you trusted this team with your life, had them try to get the information out of you. Luckily, the information had been lost to the brainwashing process, buried in a series of ever changing memories, so they never got their hands on it. Still, you were a good agent, so they kept, all the time convinced you were working for Penguin, sending you on more missions against the real Penguin etc."
Skipper eyed the two, trying to seem sceptical, at least, not looking like he felt. He wasn't even sure how he felt. It was just so sudden and… absurd? "You're trying to tell me… my whole life… has been a lie?"
"Yup," the two replied in unison, "Pretty much."
"Well, there's one problem with your story: you say my whole 'team' are LEOPARDSEAL agents, but I remember Kowalski and Rico from my cadet days." Skipper objected, clinging to the hope Manfridi and Johnson were somehow mistaken. Rico, Kowalski, and especially young Private, couldn't be enemy agents. That just wasn't possible.
"Read these," Johnson tossed skipper two manila folders both stamped: top secret, and then continued before Skipper could open them: "Rico was taken on an earlier mission, and we can only surmise that they did the same to him as they did to you. His… unbalanced mind is consistent with the results of some of the psychological attacks they were using at the time. Lucky for you, they'd gotten better at the whole brainwashing thing by the time they got to you."
"Kowalski fell in love with Doris Blowhole whose brother was working with LEOPARDSEAL at the time, and went double. So you see…" Manfridi continued, at least until he realised Skipper was already gone. Skipper obviously wasn't taking the news well. He never opted for the ninja disappearing trick unless he felt completely trapped, or had gotten sick of the presence of Julian King.
Private was seated on the couch, watching the seconds tick by on the clock as he waited for Skipper to return. When he'd left the house, Skipper had seemed so… Stunned? Angry? Haunted? The sound of a key in the lock had Private running out of the living room and to the door, just in time to see the subject of his anxiety enter.
"Skippah, are you alright?" Private asked. Skipper was looking at Private, as if he was some kind of illusion; trying to discern weather he was real or not.
"Just fine," skipper answered gruffly, making his decision. He brushed past Private and into the apartment.
"Hello Skipper," Kowalski poked his head out of the lab, "Was it…?"
"An honest spelling mistake," Skipper lied, hanging up his coat, "Nigel had some more papers he wanted me to take a look at."
"Skipper, are those marked top secret?" Kowalski motioned to the manila folders Skipper held in a death grip, "I don't think Nigel has that kind of clearance anymore…"
"Recently declassified," Skipper interrupted turning around and exiting the apartment, so desperate to leave he didn't even grab his coat, "I'm going for a walk. Tell Marlene I'll be back late." He slammed the door behind him.