Criminating Caring pt.3

The air duct was surprisingly clean given that it hadn't been used in months, the boy with four arms thanked mother Venus for that. He loved animals, don't get him wrong, but when spiders were crawling all over you in personal places it could make a Rhizomeian curse out every dirty word in the book. Finally reaching the top, he formed every muscle in his second left arm to form a ball and punched out the metal grid covering with ease.

"You alright up there, Kift?" Jill called up after the rest of them heard the painful sounding punch. Smiling down and her he shook his head.

"Yep, didn't feel a thing." He called down as he climbed into the lab. Pulling out a rock climbing rope, he tied one end to a support beam and after testing the durability of it, tossed the other end down the shaft. First up was the boy with the trunked nose started to climb as the others soon followed. Finally entering the laboratory, Jill placed her bag down on the ground and walked over to the others who were gathered around the elephant like boy. Fishing around the bag he pulled out six crème brulee torches.

"I got these from my dad's restaurant. He ordered too many of them and asked me to sell them online for him." He said handing one to each teen. Smiling, Tyler patted him on the shoulder.

"Good work Joseph. Bonus points for getting rid of the serial numbers on them." Shaking her head, Jill chuckled to herself as she walked up to the wall of cages at the back of the lab. Her heart felt like someone struck it with a nail as over fifty small animals looked at her with pleading eyes. It was like they were either saying 'please help us' or 'Are you here to hurt us some more?'. Clicking the torch until a small flame finally flickered on, Jill smiled warmly at them.

"Don't worry little guys," She whispered sweetly as she stroked a Jo-Adian bunny on the head. "You'll taste sweet freedom in no time." Burning the lock off, she took the small mammals out and placed them into a carrier like the others. After a good twelve minutes, they slowly lowered the carriers down to Kift who placed them in either of the two vans they drove there. After lowering the last one down the two girls with yellow and blue skin open their bags and tossed out six cans of spray paint to each teen. Taking the cans they started to spray the words 'Monsters' 'True lower beings' 'Free those who can't speak' around the lab. After using the last drop of paint in the cans, it was Jill's turn to shine. Pulling out the folder, she carefully lifted fifty enlarged photos of the animals in their poor living conditions and handed out eight pages to the other five kids while she took ten. Placing the photos in the now empty cages, they finally finished and cleaned up after themselves. As they were picking up, Jill noticed something. "Hey…where are Tyler and Arabella?"

"Don't know…" Joseph said placing the empty torches away. The girl with purple hair and blue skin walked up behind Jill and tapped her on the shoulder.

"I saw them go out the double doors and down the halls about ten minutes ago. Tyler had his bag with him" The girl's twin who had orange hair and yellow skin walked up to the two.

"I saw them before that. Ara was going through your bag." She said pointing to Jill. After hearing this, she grabbed her bag and quickly rummaged through it, and noticed only one thing missing.

"The blue prints! If I don't get that back we're screwed!" She cried as she scrambled to her feet and dashed off after the two. "Thanks Bleu thanks Dre!" Sneaking down the hall, she saw a light on in one of the offices. Dropping to the ground she crawled under the door's window undetected. She kept this up, either crawling or hiding; she was able to pass by security guards or janitors. She had checked up to three of the five stories of the company when she finally found Tyler reading the prints in front of the power supply room. "Tyler! There you are! What were you thinking? I need to get the prints back or we'll-" He smiled and gently placed a finger on her lips, he gave her a sly smile that made her melt like butter on a frying pan.

"Hush my sweet little GPS. Don't worry about a thing." He whispered. "I'm just finishing up here." Rolling up the blue prints, he handed them back to her. Tilting her head a bit, she gingerly took the prints from the boy's maple syrup colored hand.

"But… we already finished getting all the test animals out, spray painting, putting photos up and cleaning up after ourselves. We're all ready to go." A cold sharp chill ran up her spine as Tyler smiled coyly and gave her an eerie chuckled.

"Oh Jillie, Jillie, Jillie." He clucked his tongue as he slowly shook his head, not once did his smile fade. "So sweet, so innocent, so pure minded. Did you really think this was all we were doing? Sure we saved these animals from testing today, but what of tomorrow? What'll stop these monsters from getting more poor animals to test their useless products on?" Stepping closer to her, Jill felt herself back up against the wall; soon he was just inches from her. "Tell me Jill. Didn't you tell me that you wanted to follow in your mother's footsteps? That you wanted to help free oppressed animals from cruelty?" He was now looking her dead in the eyes, nearly nose to nose with her. "Well, what better way than to hit them where it hurts?" Feeling his breath on her, she tried her best to compose herself.

"But, this will. Trekco will shut down after the police see the lab when they investigate the break in, just like all the others." She said, trying not to gush over the boy in front of her. She felt the hair on her neck stand straight up as he gave that eerie chuckle again. Brushing her thick brunette hair out of her icy blue eyes, the ice soon melted as he gazed into them with his fiery mahogany orbs. Cupping her chin with his hand, he slowly leaned in as his black hair tickled the side of her face as he whispered into her ear.

"Sweet Jill, the only way to kill the beast, is to cut out the heart and burn it." Confused for only a second, her eyes went wide as she began to realize what he was talking about. Looking around, she saw that not only was Ara missing, but so were her and Tyler's bags. Looking back at him, Jill felt her heart race and skin crawl.

"Tyler?" His name felt like poison in her mouth. "WH-Where's Arabella?" She took a sharp breath as that coy smile reappeared on his face. "Tyler?" he hushed her as he gently stroked her face.

"Shhh, my sweet, let's just go. I promise, it'll be all right." Leaning in, his lips nearly touched hers when she shoved him away.

"Tyler, what are you planning? Where's Ara?" Before she got an answer, a loud deafening boom nearly made her head explode, and a rough tremor almost brought her to her knees. After the loud ringing finally cleared out of her head and her vision return to normal, Jill looked at what had happen. The window on the door to the power room was blown out and smoke was billowing out. She looked at Tyler in horror as the red emergency lights lit up the floors and a siren shrieks echoing threw out the halls. "Tyler?" That creepy smile never wavered. "What did you do?" Holding his arms out, he threw back his head and laughed.

"Setting an example. No one will ever dare try to test on an animal again after this. If they even try, they'll quickly remember what TVA did here; Teens for Vengeance for Animals will go down in history!" Looking at her, he chuckled under his breath. "You like, my love?" She glared at him darkly.

"No I don't. There are people here! That explosion could have hurt someone!" She felt her skin crawl as he smirked back at her, the red lights giving it a spookier look as they bathed over him.

"Exactly. You know the saying, an eye for an eye a tooth for a tooth; you know how many animals they killed over the years? How many Jo-Adian bunnies they threw out with the trash? So what are a few worthless humans lives? There're plenty more brainless cockroaches where they came from." She glowered at him as he laughed.

"You won't be laughing when they send your sick mind to the electric chair for mass murder. This is going too far; killing innocent people won't do a thing!" She paused as her walkie-talkie went off. Grabbing it off her hip she clicked it on. "Mama Thrashasaurous to Canary Squid?"

"You alright?" Kift's panicked filled voice squeaked. "I heard a bang and the whole place started shaking! Everyone's here but you, Tyler, and Ara." Jill froze in fear as she slowly turned towards their leader.

"Tyler…? Where's Ara?" A muffled cry was heard over the blaring sirens. Looking to the power room, where an orange glow was flickering from the other side of the broken window, she dropped the walkie-talkie in shock and quickly darted towards the door where the painful screams where coming from. But before she could reach the door knob, a hand grabbed her wrist and yanked her back.

"Forget her! We've got to get out of here before the Space rangers come!" Tyler yelled over the fire alarms and sirens. Looking back at the door in uncertainty, a memory seamed to pop up and stick to her racing muddled up mind.

/~{+}~\

She was about five or so, playing in her backyard when a distressed chirping reached her ears. Looking around she finally found the source. A tiny newly hatched blue winger chick was at the base of the tree, trying to fly back up to its mother, who was crying out just as loud. Jill concluded that it must have fallen from its nest and luckily landed on the soft grass surrounding the tree. Pulling out her pink handkerchief, she carefully scooped the chick up and wrapped it up (keeping its head uncovered so it could breath) before placing it in the breast pocket on her purple overalls. Getting a good grip on the trunk, she climbed the tree with ease; carefully making sure the chick wasn't squished along the way. She had made it halfway when two strong hands grabbed her around her small waist. Making sure the chick was fine, she looked behind her, only to see her father's angry face.

"Jillian Andrea Isabelle Lightyear! What have I told you about climbing trees?" He paused halfway through his lecture when he saw the tiny chick's head as she carefully turned her body to show him why she was breaking one of his rules.

"He fell outta da twee." She lisped as she placed a hand protectively over the peeping chick. Looking at her for a bit, Buzz sighed and lifted her up to the nest. Smiling, Jill carefully placed the chick back into its home. Setting her down next to him, he couldn't help but grin as the mother bird nuzzled her baby lovingly. Patting his daughter on the head, he ruffled her hair playfully as he gave her a kiss on the cheek.

"Couldn't leave a fallen comrade behind, huh? You truly are a Lightyear, sweetie." He said proudly as he held her close to him.

/~{+}~\

Snapping back into reality, Jill couldn't shake what her father said. Pushing Tyler away she darted for the door to the burning room.

"Are you crazy! You'll both burn to death!" He cried over the alarms. Opening the door, she glared at him.

"A Lightyear never leaves a comrade behind!" Turning her back to him, she hissed. "You want to leave like the sniveling little coward you are, then be my guest." She didn't dare look back at him as she ran into the Power Room and into parts unknown.