"Perfect." Dane said happily. "Heavily scented. I can track him, no problem. I assume it's male. Very masculine scent there."
"Yeah, whatever." Prince said, stuffing the notebook into her jacket pocket. "Let's just get away from this place."
"Nearly get caught?" Dane asked smugly.
"Oh, shut up." She snapped.
Dane had the sense to obey. Prince was cranky, and he knew that it wouldn't be good to irk her any further.
"I hate going down there." She grumbled. "Just hate it." She pulled out the notebook again and turned the pages while walking.
Sketches and doodles filled the pages. Most of them were of two children. Occasionally a bad drawing of some guy came up. There were other careless sketches of things that didn't exist. Prince recognized these as doodles of boredom.
Then she turned to the last page. A very intricate drawing covered the whole page. It looked like it had taken a lot of planning and time. The outlines were so dark it was as though maybe someone had traced over them hundreds of times.
The two kids who had recurred throughout the book were in the drawing, hugging a platypus wearing a fedora. They all looked sad.
Above it, someone had written: I am so lonely. But I am not alone.
Prince slammed into a surface and fell down in pain. Moaning, she pushed herself back up.
Dane was doubled over with laughter. "Watch-where-you-… ha ha ha HA! Oh man! You just fast-walked right into that pole!"
Prince stuck the notebook back in her jacket.
"What was so interesting about that notebook?" Dane asked, suddenly all seriousness. "Information?"
"Just drawings." Prince said matter-of-factly.
Though inside, her chest sank. She'd forgotten about what a skilled artist he was, how good he was with humor, how cute he was when he smiled, how obsessed he got when he talked about the agency…
Going down in that lair had been hard enough.
"Come on." Prince said. She stood up. "Are you going to guide me, or just stand there?"
"Have some lettuce, Phineas."
"Aw, thanks, Ferb!"
"Ferb, eat your lettuce." Linda said.
They had stopped at a diner for dinner. Perry was sitting in between the boys, eating his salad happily.
Ferb cocked his head innocently. "But I already gave my lettuce to Phineas."
Pajamas hopped onto Phineas's plate and began pecking the lettuce.
Linda stood up to go get more.
"It's okay, mom! Pajamas won't contaminate it." Phineas said.
Ferb took a piece of lettuce that hadn't been in Pajamas's way and nibbled at it.
Having finished his salad, Perry looked around for his next meal. Candace's looked tasty. Perry leaned across the table and began chewing up Candace's grilled cheese.
Candace was ignoring him, talking to Stacy on the phone. "So, I was like, 'No, Jeremy, you're the best'. And he was like, 'No, you are!' and I was like… well, no, not really, but you could tell he was thinking it."
Ferb placed some of his French fries on Perry's plate. It distracted him from Candace's food. He began eating the French fries.
"Okay, bye Stacy!" Candace hung up and stared at her grilled cheese. "Huh. Weird. Looks more clumpy than usual. Ew, Phineas! You shouldn't eat the same lettuce that Pajamas pecked." She took a bite of grilled cheese. "It's disgusting and unsanitary."
Phineas just stared at her with wide eyes.
Perry had no idea what she was talking about, so he continued eating the French fries.
"Eating good, clean food untouched by animal paws, beaks or saliva." Candace said. "That is best."
"Uh…" Phineas said, looking slightly concerned.
Ferb kicked him under the table, his way of telling Phineas to keep quiet or Candace would probably blow a fuse.
Perry finished his French fries and looked up. Ferb patted him on the head.
"Wake up."
"Pie." Phineas murmured.
Perry poked Phineas in the side. "Shhhh. Come on. Wake up."
Phineas yawned and rolled over to face him. "What time is it?"
"Five in the morning."
"What?"
"Come on. I need to do some stuff in the bathroom, and if a family member wakes up and hears me, and notices everyone else is in bed…"
"Fine." Phineas yawned and shuffled over to the bathroom door. He opened it and let Perry in.
Perry was glad they were staying in a hotel instead of the RV, due to the fact that there wasn't any water. It was a lot roomier.
Once both of them were in the bathroom, Perry closed and locked the door. He dug around in his pocket, drawing out his razor.
"You carry that around with you?" Phineas asked sleepily.
"I usually use an electric, but it makes a lot of noise. You running water in the bathroom makes more sense if someone wakes up."
"It's so cool you get a beard." Phineas said.
"Not really. It's just stubble. And I keep having to shave it off."
"Why?"
"Don't you think your parents would think something weird was going on if I had stubble?"
"When Ferb and I get older, we're going to grow beards." Phineas fantasized.
"Where? Your whole face is your nose."
"I'm gonna have one all the way down to the floor." Phineas giggled. "And then I'm gonna dye the end pink and tie a blue ribbon around it."
"You're overly tired."
Phineas watched Perry with interest as he shaved. "Why do you have a beard, anyway?"
"I don't know. I guess I adapted to human nature or something after I was trained. That may be why I'm living longer and my teeth are falling out slower."
"Oh, that's right. You were still alive at age twenty-five."
"Still half-alive, anyway." Perry said. "From what I've seen, my future self is probably part fossil."
"Do you have to rinse and spit?" Phineas asked.
"Right after I finish, you're going straight to bed." Perry said, wiping excess shaving cream off of his face. "You're obviously still asleep."
He dragged Phineas out of the bathroom and back into bed. Moments later, Phineas was asleep again.
Perry patted down a spot next to him and curled up.
Perry yanked back on Candace's diary, growling and snorting furiously. He loved tug-of-war.
Candace didn't appear to share his feelings. "Let GO, Perry!"
Perry jerked his head back and tugged the diary free. He tore down to the end of the RV.
Pajamas twittered excitedly and hopped up to a cabinet handle to get a better view of the action.
"GET BACK HERE!" Candace shouted.
Perry lay down on the floor, chewing happily on the diary. It felt good against his teeth.
Candace jumped. Perry soared over her and ran to the front of the RV. Candace landed face-down on the floor.
Perry loved being a pet. It was good to let his animal instincts run free after they'd been cooped up inside at the agency.
"MOM! PERRY STOLE MY DIARY!" Candace said.
"Don't worry, honey." Linda said. "Perry can't read."
"Or so you think." Perry chattered, muffled slightly by the diary, which he had resumed chewing.
Candace snatched it out of his grasp and stormed away. Annoyed, Perry bounded over to the boys to see what they were doing.
Ferb was sitting on the couch with his computer open on his lap. Phineas was interested in a map.
"Whatcha doin'?" Perry asked, hopping up next to Ferb.
"Watching things in slow motion. Look, it's popcorn popping in slow motion."
"Cool!" Perry said, watching as the kernel on Ferb's computer slowly released its contents. "What else?"
"There's a balloon popping in slow motion. And an eagle flapping its wings in slow motion."
"The flittering eagle." Perry said.
"That's awesome, Ferb!" Phineas said, looking up for a moment from his map to gaze at the kernel. He lowered his head again when it had finished.
"Ooh, pimple bursting in slow motion." Ferb said, clicking on one of the related videos.
"No, Ferb." Perry shook his head. "Just no."
"Oh, dude!" Phineas shouted, covering his eyes, even though he hadn't even been looking at the screen. "Dude, dude!"
"I've never had a pimple." Ferb commented, intrigued by the video. "Does yellowy stuff really come out?"
"Yep." Perry said.
"What does it feel like?"
"Painful."
Phineas was attempting to stuff his head into the couch, still shouting words expressing his disgust.
"Ferb, honey!" Linda called. "Don't torment your brother."
"I'm not." Ferb insisted. "We're just watching things in slow motion."
"Please change the video." Perry said. "I feel like I'm gonna throw up."
Ferb changed the video to "Milk Pouring in Slow Motion".
Phineas sat back up and watched. "That's pretty cool-looking."
Ferb nodded in agreement.
Perry had thrown up twice on the floor of the RV. Now he sat on the couch and watched with interest as Candace cleaned up his floor art.
"So gross." Candace grumbled.
"Let's make a rest stop." Linda said.
She parked the car by a little stream, which was next to a tiny wooden structure.
As soon as the door to the van opened, Perry jumped out and ran toward the stream. He happily submerged himself in the water and popped back up again.
"Does anyone need to use the restroom?" Linda asked, pointing at the wooden structure.
"Eew! THAT'S what that thing is?" Candace shrieked.
"I do!" Phineas said.
Ferb raised his hand.
"All right then." Linda said.
Phineas went in to the bathroom first. The rest of the family stood and watched Perry as he played happily in the stream.
"He's gonna be all wet." Candace said.
"We have towels." Linda assured her.
Phineas came running out of the bathroom, as excited as ever. "Can I have some hand sanitizer, mom? Oh my gosh, Ferb, it's the coolest bathroom ever! It doesn't have a flush or anything! Instead it's this toilet that is above a GIANT hole in the ground and you can hardly see the bottom but I think the bottom's flat there's a cool breeze that comes up from it…"
Candace covered her ears.
"No way!" Ferb said. He ran to check it out.
Linda gave Phineas hand sanitizer.
"It's so awesome!" Phineas said. "And it doesn't use up any water or anything! It doesn't even smell, believe it or not!"
"Ew ew ew ew!" Candace shrieked. "Stop it, Phineas!"
"He's right." Ferb said, coming out of the bathroom. "It is a nice breeze. And I saw the bottom of the hole, by the way. It is flat. There was some folded-up toilet paper down there, too."
"Do you need to go, Candace?" Linda asked.
"No way!" Candace said, running back into the van.
"Come on, Perry." Phineas said.
Perry hopped out of the stream and trotted alongside his owners. "Was there really no flush on the toilet?"
"Nope!" Phineas said cheerfully.
"Awesome."