"Do you trust me?"
Daphne didn't know what to think about those four little words he had spoken to her. Sure, she trusted him.She lived in the same household for years and never once thought anything ill about him across the hall. But when he said it aloud, she had to pause and give it thought.
"... That depends..." She tentatively spoke, her mind unable to come up with what he might be thinking.
"What do you have in mind?" Looking down at him, she couldn't deny that she was a bit curious. What could his little mind have come up with, after mentioning the project (Which he still didn't say what it was.) and Red Herring?
"You'll see." Fred said with a smile, standing up and letting go of her hand he had been holding. But his answer didn't satisfy her. She recently had to deal with Shaggy being mysterious on her, and she wasn't going to put up with Fred doing it as well. Placing her hands to her hips, she gave him a measuring look.
"You're not going to add 'scouts honor' to that, are you?"
"Well, I could. If it makes you feel any better." Fred said simply, shrugging at the end of his sentence. This earned a puzzled look on Daphne's face, before she recalled that Fred had actually been in the boy scouts as a kid. Unlike Shaggy, who had used it as a ruse to convince both Velma and Daphne to do things... Fred could actually use it truthfully.
Knowing that she would eventually remember, he brought up one hand and held up three fingers. Straightening up, he fixed his posture as he spoke. Copying the motions that he had memorized as a kid, he recalled the Scout Oath. The motto for the Boy Scouts, and the rules and honor code that they lived by.
"On my honor I will do my best. To do my duty to God and my country, and obey the Scout law; To help other people at all times; To keep myself physically strong, mentally awake and morally straight."
He held up his hand for a little bit longer, before breaking his ridged posture to grin at her. Using his hand he made the Scout sign with, he moved it to tug on his orange ascot that hung about his neck.
"Always be prepared."
Daphne caved under his show, placing a hand to her forehead as if she had a headache. (Though, it was actually an attempt to hide her grin from Fred.) But she eventually gave into the smile and shook her head.
"The mighty scout Ascot. Bandage, sling… Out dated fashion trend. Yep, ready for anything." Daphne quipped, unable to resist the prod at his favorite accessory. Not that he didn't wear it better than anyone else she knew, but it still was far out of fashion.
"Yep!" He agreed, not bothered by her comment at all. He loved his Ascot, and it came in handy way too many times for him to consider anything else. Plus it was comfortable and he liked the color. It went with the rest of his outfit and he had worn it long enough that he felt odd without it.
"It's very useful. But you still didn't answer my question. Do you trust me? I have an idea."
He asked again, which she then had to actually consider it seriously. She did trust him, but she didn't like not knowing what was going on. Bored or not, she preferred to know what she was about to do.
"I do trust you Freddie, but I want to know what you have in mind. I like being surprised, but I don't want to be jumping out of the window without knowing why..."
"Funny you should mention that..." Fred muttered, letting his vision drift towards his window. Blinking, she followed his eye line and found herself looking at his window. It was still somewhat hot, even at night, so Fred had the window wide open to let the heat out and breeze in.
"I am bored Fred, but not bored enough to jump out a window..." She said flatly.
"No no. Well, yes." This earned him a look. "Let me explain…" Pausing, he tried to figure out how to exactly to word it, without seeming crazy.
"You know those romance movies you like watching? Where they guy always comes to the girl past her window? Usually he uses a tree to climb up, or one of those lattices for plants. It's like that, well... sort of. Think of it as reverse…"
Usually, Fred was good at talking in front of people and explaining things. But for some reason, Daphne was throwing him off of his game. Or maybe, it was because it was late at night. (Not like that fact ever stopped the villains they chased.) But either way he was having some trouble explaining it to the awaiting red head.
"Let me start again. Shaggy, Scooby and Velma are sleeping. We don't want to wake them, so we need a way out... That is our way out." Finally getting it out clearly, (at least to his own mind) he pointed at the window to indicate his plan.
Even though he had explained it somewhat, Daphne was still trying to put all the pieces he gave her together. Walking to the window, she tried to recall all the movies she watched that had to do with a window. Looking out, she noticed the roof that hung over the porch that stretched along the front and part of the side of the house.
Window plus roof, plus romance movies... Equaled an escape plan! Finally putting it together, she realized he wanted to use the classic run-away-together cliché. Where the guy comes to sweep the woman off her feet, and they escape out the window to go... Where ever they planned to go. Usually that depended on the plot of the movie. But the idea was sound. Looking back at Fred, he knew the look on her face meant that she had figured out what he had said.
"I always wanted to try that. But never had a reason to sneak out of the house to use that method. So, you want to?" Fred admitted honestly. It just wasn't something that had come up very often in his life. He didn't know why it always happened to the guys in the movies, but he really didn't have too many times that he could count that required climbing from windows. Well… mysteries aside.
"Ok, well what do we do after we get out of the house? And how do we plan to get back inside when we come back?" Daphne wondered, still not knowing what this was all going to lead to. Well, besides getting out of the house.
"I want to keep that a secret, but I promise that you will like it." Fred admitted honestly, trying to at least hide some of his grand plan from her.
"Alright, as long as I'm not bored anymore. But we need to change first into some better clothes. I'm not going anywhere with you and those... Pajamas." She said making at face at Fred's attire, before Daphne turned to go get dressed herself. She didn't want to wreck her night time pajamas when she had other outfits for these kinds of things.
Fred grinned, and waited till she was out of his room before he closed the door and moved to get dressed. Though all he really needed was to change his pants. Picking up his Masters of the Universe pajama pants, he looked at it sideways and wondered why she didn't like it.
"But… Everyone likes He-man." He whined a bit at the pants, giving the material an affectionate rub. It was comfortable, and He-man was cool. At least he thought so.