A/N Huge thanks to Cori Crow and Jasper Dragonfly for replying on chapter one! You guys rock, and I hope you enoy this chapter(besides the writer's block)!

Next few chapters, things begin to get interesting(excluding this one)!

Sadly, I do not own SRMTHFG! or I would not have ended the show on such a cliffhanger.

Chapter Two

"So what do we do with her?" Otto asked, motioning towards the little girl. Thirty minutes had passed since the girl had made the startling claim, and they were outside on the street of the abandoned sector. She had fallen asleep in Chiro's arms as he carried her outside, and he made no move to lay her down, instead rocking her slightly in his arms as he held her bridal-style.

"I'll contact Jinmay and ask her to search the Shuggazoom databanks to see if there are any missing children reports," Chiro said. He shifted the snoozing girl to his left arm as he turned on the communicator on his coat. "Jinmay, do you copy?"

"Here, Chiro. I was starting to worry. I thought you would have been back by now."

"We ran into a, er, complication," Chiro said, glancing at the girl. "Can you check and see if there are any missing girls reports in the Shuggazoom City mainframe?"

"Righto. Can you describe her?"

Chiro searched the girl's peaceful face. "She's about six or seven, small, and has light brown hair. Don't know her name."

"I think her hair's more of a dirty-blond," Sparx said, rubbing his chin thoughtfully.

"No, it is most definitely brown!" Gibson cried. The red and blue monkeys glared at one another, and Chiro sighed.

"Hey, break it up, guys. Okay, Jinmay, she has either light brown or dirty-blond colored hair."

Chiro could hear the robot on the end of the line mumbling to herself in concentration as she searched for the girl. "Oh, right here; Gracie Halman, reported missing two hours ago. She was playing in the backyard when she vanished. Sending Antauri her address."

"Thanks, Jinmay. You rock." He turned off the communicator and turned to look at the simians. "You guys wanna walk, or-?"

"It would be wise to walk," Antauri nodded. "The house in which the girl's mother resides isn't too far away. We could do with the exercise."

"As if we don't have enough of that," Sparx grumbled non-too-quietly to himself. "After all, we practice every single day…"

"Sparx, shut up and stop complaining," Nova said, punching him forcefully on the arm. Chiro laughed to himself at the team's antics.

"Alright, team, let's move out."

The Hyper Force had only been walking for about ten minutes when Antauri approached Chiro. The boy had been playfully bouncing the small girl in his arms, laughing when she giggled in her sleep.

"Nova, could you please take the girl while I speak to Chiro," the silver robotic monkey asked. Nova jumped, clapping her hands together.

"Sure, Antauri!" Nova skipped over to Chiro, who carefully slipped the girl into the yellow monkey's arms. The teen unwound his scarf and wrapped it around the girl's bare arms, feeling the temperature decreasing.

Antauri placed a hand on Chiro's shoulder, dropping a considerate amount of space behind the rest of the team before the two started walking again.

"Chiro, about the girl's message," Antauri began. Chiro cut him off with a casual wave of his arm.

"Hey, don't worry about it. I get threats all the time, and they're hardly ever legit." Although he didn't say anything about it, Chiro was secretly shaken up by the prospect whoever had given this girl this message had also kidnapped a girl from her home and left her in a dilapidated old building in an abandoned section of Shuggazoom on a whim the Hyper Force might figure out someone was there.

"I sense you do not believe this is the case here," Antauri said, searching Chiro's expression intently. Chiro winced, turning slightly away. He wished Antauri wouldn't look at him like that; it was impossible to get anything against that robot. He watched Sparx and Gibson bickering a few feet ahead of him as he carefully thought out his reply.

"Look, Antauri, the way I see it is this-we don't know who or what is after me, or what they have against me, and we can't prevent something if we don't know what's going to happen, so I say we wait it out and don't worry about it until necessary. Besides, Gracie refused to say anything about who gave her the message, anyway."

"I have reason to believe that she will be more willing to share her thoughts with us once she is back in the safety of her home," Antauri said. "For now she remains quiet, perhaps still afraid her captor might return until she returns to her parents' arms warm embrace."

"Hey, Chiro," Nova said, back stepping a bit, "Gracie is awake, and she wants you."

As Chiro invited the sleepy-looking girl back into his arms with a smile, Antauri began checking addresses as they passed by. Chiro looked around, surprised; he hadn't even noticed they had entered the inhabited part of the city.

"I'm tired," Gracie yawned, resting her head on Chiro's shoulder.

"You'll be back in your bed soon," Chiro promised.

"And no bad man to take me away again?"

Chiro looked at her in surprise before smiling. "And no bad man to take you away again."

"We're here," Antauri said, stopping in front of an apartment door. He stepped forward, knocked on the huge wooden door, and stepped back.

A thin, frail woman with the same colored hair as Gracie opened the door, her eyes puffy and red, as well as her nose, as though she had been crying. She blinked at the newcomers, pulling a pair of glasses from her pocket and jamming them onto her nose. "Hullo?" she said thickly before she caught sight of Gracie. Her large amber eyes filled with tears as her breath caught. "Gracie?"

"Mama!"

Chiro set the little girl down and she ran to her mother, embracing each other for several minutes in which the Hyper Force hung back awkwardly. At last the mother and daughter pulled apart, and she turned to them.

"Oh, thank you, thank you-Ben! Ben, get down here!"

A thin, pale man appeared beside the mother a moment later, and he wordlessly dropped to his knees, hugging his daughter tightly. After a moment, he silently motioned the team inside.

"Have a seat!" the woman cried. "I'm Linda and this is Ben."

"I'm sorry, ma'am, but I was hoping we could ask you a few questions," Chiro said lightly as everyone took seats in the large living room. Linda pulled her daughter onto her lap, nodding earnestly.

"Of course, of course, anything!"

"Did you see who took your daughter?" Antauri asked quietly.

"No, I was letting her play in the backyard. I only took my eyes off of her for an instant to grab the phone, and she was gone…" The woman's eyes turned red, and she sniffed, turning away.

"Gracie, do you know?" Chiro asked, his voice barely above a whisper. Every eye in the room turned to the little girl. She looked around uncertainly before leaping off of her mother's lap and crossing the room to Chiro. She cupped her hands over Chiro's right ear and whispered, "He told me I had to tell you a message or he'd hurt me. I didn't want to…" her voice cracked.

"Gracie, I promise that he will not hurt you anymore," Chiro said quietly. The little girl shuddered.

"I don't know who he was. I only know he looked different-he said he dyed himself weird colors, to seem more different."

"Thank you, Gracie," Chiro said, giving the girl a loose hug. "You have been very brave." He stood up, motioning towards the Hyper Force. "We had better be going."