Upon the roof of the apartment complex, the Ranger Wingamathing finally came to rest. Gadget strapped her goggles back onto her head and hopped out, followed soon by the others. Most were excited; they were finally close to NIMH. Dale and Brutus were still the most apprehensive of the bunch.
"Okay, here's how we'll do it," said Gadget, "Zipper, you stay up here with Michelle and the airplane."
"Awwww," Michelle sighed, knowing complaining about being left behind was pointless.
"The rest of us will head through the air conditioning vents," Gadget continued.
"Thank goodness buildings have those, or else we'd never get into anywhere." Dale quipped
"NIMH's won't be so easy," Brutus remarked, "Only two of the mice survived the air vents."
"We'll have to come up with a work-around for that, maybe putting plungers on our feet…but we'll discuss that later," said Gadget, "As long as the air conditioning isn't going here, we'll be okay. And it's not too hot out. We may be in luck. It's on the top floor too so we won't have to go far."
"And when we get in…then what?" Willy asked.
"I'll open the vent up," said Gadget, "And we'll see if Penny's home. If not, I guess we can wait for her."
"I'll have my spear," said Brutus, "It won't do much to a human, but it could give us time to escape."
"S-sure, just in case," Gadget said, scratching her head and looking down at the vent. A fan spun relentlessly below.
"Well what are we waiting for?" Abigail asked.
"All right then," Gadget said, "Hm, mind if you use your spear here, Brutus?"
"I suppose not," Brutus said, lowering his spear. The fan stopped with a clang.
"See, it makes a useful tool too," said Gadget, hopping down into the vent. The others followed, and Gadget grabbed the other end of the spear to hold the fan in place as Brutus jumped down with a loud thud, the heaviest of the gang.
"Sure is dark in here," said Russell.
"Nah, this is fine, follow me," said Edgar, walking down the windy corridor.
The furlings trailed closely behind Edgar, with the adults taking the rear.
"Any idea when we'll know we've reached the right room?" asked Dale.
"It's apartment H8. We entered at H2, so if I'm right, we'll pass three vents on our way to the correct one. The even numbered apartments are all on the top floor."
They soon passed their first vent, then their second. Before long, they reached what they believed to be the correct vent.
"Wow…it's a mess down there," said Edgar.
Abigail peered through the vent, seeing a messy bedroom with a broken mirror and debris strewn about.
"It looks like what I saw in Justin's vision," said Abigail, "This has to be the right place."
Gadget took a small wrench from her pocket and reached through the vent cover, undoing the screws until it opened, the covering falling to the floor. She then unraveled the rope around her shoulder and lowered it toward the bed.
"This way we'll have a soft landing," she said.
One by one they lowered themselves onto the rope, which reached about halfway down the wall from the ceiling, and then jumped down onto the bed. The room was still.
"Anyone home?" Abigail called out, cupping her mouth.
"Sure we want to shout like that?" asked Willy, not liking their presence being advertised so loudly.
"It's alright Willy. What's the matter, scared?"
"No! Just…cautious."
"I wonder what happened here," Edgar remarked, inspecting a teddy bear beside the pillow.
"It's more than just messy housekeeping, if I were to chance a guess she must have had some kind of breakdown here," said Gadget, looking at the shards of glass on the ground, and an answering machine cassette with the tape inside pulled out and strewn on the floor.
"I bet she felt terrible about being a part of NIMH," said Abigail, feeling sad on Penny's behalf.
Brutus gave a disbelieving snort, though he couldn't come up with a better reason why the room was in such shambles.
"If no one's home, what do we do?" asked Edgar.
"I suppose we wait," said Gadget.
"For how long?" Abigail asked Gadget, "We can't leave Michelle out there all day."
"Zipper would come down and tell us if there was a problem," Gadget answered.
"We'll need something to eat if we're going to be waiting a long time," said Dale.
"I was trying not to be the one to say it this time," Russell added.
"We could search the kitchen, but I'd hate to come off as a terrible house guest," said Gadget.
The sound of a key in a door knob reached their ears from the other room. The furlings were still ignorant as to what the sound meant.
"Someone's coming!" exclaimed Dale.
"Maybe it's her,' said Abigail, trying to remain calm, "Don't be scared."
The furlings had plenty reason to fear humans, however, and even Abigail was having a hard time fighting the urge to run and hide. Brutus drew his spear and prepared himself. The door creaked open.
"Well here it is," said an old lady, "So you say she's been committed to an asylum?"
Gadget's ears perked up. Penny was where?
"Yes, and she won't be returning for some time," came a man's voice, "You may want to arrange for an auction of her belongings after evicting her."
"It must be the landlord and someone else," Gadget whispered, "Hide!"
The group scrambled, hiding beneath blankets and the pillow. Brutus quickly grabbed Abigail by the wrist, disregarding anyone else in the group, and slid down the blanket to the floor, pulling her beneath the bed. Willy followed after them, scurrying on all fours and jumping off the bed to the floor as soon as he noticed Abigail being taken by Brutus. He still didn't trust the rat.
"Hm, perhaps I will do an auction," said the landlord, "Penny seemed like such a nice lady too, always thought she had such a down-to-Earth disposition, but I guess you never can tell. Anyway, I'm going back to my office. Take whatever it is you came here for and lock the door behind you, then return the keys to me."
"Yes ma'am," said another man.
The door closed.
"You take this room," said one of them, and footsteps were heard echoing off the tiled floor in the kitchen, "Remember, we're supposed to be looking for her access key, and any documents she might have saved. Don't let them fall into the wrong hands."
As the footsteps came closer to the bedroom, Brutus held his hand over Abigail's mouth and huddled in the far corner, with Willy scurrying over to be next to them. They saw a pair of boots enter the room.
"Hmm, I can see why Nimnul had her committed now…" said the man, "Let's see what she kept in here."
Beneath the covers of the bed, Dale clung to Gadget and shivered with fear, "Did he just say the last name I think he said?"
"They must be from NIMH," Gadget whispered, "If I had to guess I'd say they're here collecting any classified information she left behind."
"Sure they don't know we're here?" Dale asked, fearing the worst.
"I don't see how they could know."
"They're gonna find us, they're gonna find us," Dale was beginning to panic.
"Shhh, be quiet or they will," Gadget warned.
Russell rolled into a ball beneath the pillow as Edgar tried to burrow deeper into the blankets. The scientists attention was drawn to the movement on the bed. He walked closer, Abigail, Brutus and Willy watching his feet as they came up to the bed. The man pulled off the blanket, and Abigail heard the screams of her friends. She struggled, wanting to save them somehow, but Brutus held onto her tight. For a brief second, the amulet seemed to give off a glow, a golden sparkle. But it faded within a couple seconds. Brutus was the only one who noticed, but he kept quiet while eyeing it.
"Clark! Get in here!" the man yelled, making a grab at the rodents as they tried to run, "She's been hoarding test subjects!"
He picked up Gadget as Dale tried to run, and Dr. Clark came into the room, seeing the clothed rodents on the bed scramble. Gadget squirmed and tried to bite him but the man held on tightly.
"Wilson! Pull off the sheets, we'll get them that way!" Clark said.
The other scientist dropped Gadget back on the mattress and the two of them picked the sheet covering it by either side, and fashioned a makeshift bag out of the sheet, trapping them inside.
"Take these to the van," said Dr. Wilson, "I think we have at least one spare cage in there. I'll keep searching, there may be more of them."
"We can't let them do this!" Willy whispered harshly.
"We can't do anything about them now," Brutus replied, "We have to fend for ourselves, then think about how to save them along with the other captives. Don't you see? That amulet is still our best hope."
"Why can't it help us now?" Willy asked.
"When Abigail wills it to work, it will," Brutus said, "It isn't happening now. Not yet."
Abigail's eyes teared up, looking down at the amulet and not seeing it come to life. Willy glared angrily, more out of frustration with the amulet than at Abigail for not being able to awaken its supposed powers. But they did as they were told. Without the amulet they didn't stand much of a chance against humans.
"Let's get behind that dresser in case he looks under here," Brutus whispered, leading them behind the dresser with the broken mirror.
The scientist stooped down to check under the bed just as they'd slipped away, reaching underneath and feeling around. He got up and moved the bed, making doubly sure there were no rodents hiding beneath it. Dr. Wilson glanced over at the dresser, but reasoned that the space between it and the wall as too narrow. In truth, the three of them were barely able to squeeze through it one by one, but past the wooden beam at the edge there was slightly more breathing room. Instead Dr. Wilson began rummaging through her drawers, looking for anything else that could give away what was going on at NIMH. The three survivors waited for several agonizing minutes as every drawer was emptied, and he moved on to the closet. The doctors were leaving no stone unturned.
"Did you check behind the dresser?" came the voice of Dr. Clark, returning from the van.
"The thing's too heavy. Help me move it."
"Get beneath it," said Brutus, shoving Abigail downward.
She crawled under the dresser, followed by Willy. Brutus had a more difficult time, squeezing underneath just as the two men began pulling the dresser back with a grinding sound that was deafening to the rodents. They stayed hidden underneath the dresser, Brutus having to stay on his hands and knees or else hit his head on the bottom drawer.
"No sign of documents back here, or anything else," said Dr. Clark, "I found her key card and a few printouts from the lab out in the living room anyway, she must not have been keeping anything besides those test subjects in here."
"You'd better be right about that," said Dr. Wilson.
"Guess we'll get back and tell Strauss what we found," said Dr. Clark.
The two of them left, their footsteps becoming more faint until they heard the door close. They breathed a sigh of relief, though Abigail sat hugging her knees and crying.
"Oh don't start with that," Brutus scoffed.
Willy knelt down and hugged her, on the verge of tears himself. They'd all become his friends too since leaving the meadow. He felt like one of the furlings now.
"Justin was wrong," Abigail sniffed, "I-I don't have what it takes to make the amulet work…I don't have the courage…"
"You have more courage than anyone I've known," said Willy.
The compliment didn't reach Abigail, who buried her face in her arms and cried silently.
"You are untrained," said Brutus, "Let's hope that when the time comes where you really have to use that amulet, you won't be caught off guard again."
"Well now what do we do?" Willy asked, as Abigail continued to cry.
"We can forget about help from this human woman, from what those doctors said it sounds like she's locked up somewhere. This was a stupid idea anyway, I don't know what Justin was thinking, blindly trusting his 'visions'. From now on we're going to do things my way. The little girl and the fly are still up on the roof with the plane. We'll get back up there and take the plane to NIMH. Then, we'll make those humans pay. For everything."
"I just want my friends back," Abigail said shakily, "And Cornelius…and daddy…"
"You'll get them back, if they're alive," Brutus answered, "The sooner we leave the higher the chances that they will be alive. Now stop moping, let's get a move on."
Abigail sniffed and wiped her eyes, trying to stay strong. She began to crawl toward the front of the dresser, and the other two followed behind her. But just as they did, they heard the door open again.
"Damn! Get back in!" Brutus ordered.
It was just one set of footsteps this time, but for some reason, there was more than one voice.
"Something's not right…" said a woman's voice, "Was…was someone here while I was gone?"
Abigail stopped, halfway beneath the dresser.
"What are you waiting for?" Brutus hissed.
"You don't suppose NIMH sent someone here?" came a smaller voice, that of a woman with a thick accent.
"That's just like them! Nimnul had to have put them up to it! Did they take my key card?"
"It's Penny…" said Abigail, with the sound of frantic rustling coming from the other room.
"The same human we came to see?" Willy asked.
Abigail climbed out again, much to Brutus' chagrin.
"Where did you keep it?" asked a male voice.
"It's not on the coffee table…let me check my room."
"You fool! Hide!" Brutus yelled.
Willy wanted Abigail to hide too, not trusting whoever this human was, but she wouldn't. Abigail stood bravely on the floor among the shards of broken glass and waited as Penny opened the door, with Bernard and Bianca on each shoulder. Penny was startled, stopping in her tracks with a small gasp at the sight of the lone woodmouse with auburn hair and blue overalls, wearing a pretty necklace.
"Why, it's a little girl," Bianca remarked.
"Who are you?" asked Penny.
Abigail stared up at the gigantic human before her. The woman's hair wasn't as bright blonde as Abigail remembered from that last day at Dapplewood, but she knew Penny's face. She wore a plain blue dress instead of that white flowing lab coat. She was still the same scientist, the first human Abigail had seen without a mask on. But she had two mice on her shoulders. Justin had to be right about her. She'd changed from before.
"My name's Abigail," Abigail began after a few moments of hesitation, her ears down and her eyes pleading, "And…and I need your help."