Outside the window of Tutorial Tom's office was a strange being that took Kelly and Vincent by surprise and Tom by horror.
A seemingly humanoid robot was peeking into the building. Its head was bald and cream-colored and it had what appeared to be two bulging eyes which stared at everyone inside the office, but on closer inspection the "eyes" appeared to be just glasses. The robot was wearing a dark drown striped suit with a white shirt and black tie underneath. And to add to the tie count it had an insignia of a rust-colored tie on its chest.
Kelly and Tom were stricken to the core with pure shock, Flippy was stricken with confusion, and Vincent was stricken with the need for cupcakes (no no I am just kidding, along with Kelly and Tom he was shocked as well).
"W-What is that?" Vincent stuttered, not taking his eyes off the robot.
"It's a Cog -" Flippy muttered, "A Flunky actually." he relaxed his tense body and Tom did the same, because they realized it didn't pose much of a threat… To them.
Tom looked over to the frozen human siblings with resolution, "You guys!" he called, snapping them out of their trance, "I guess your first mission came to you! Use the gags I gave you to make that Flunky explode!" he ordered, pointing at the cupcakes and flowers on the desktop.
"But – But, how can pastries and pretty flowers beat that thing?" Kelly whimpered, grabbing a cupcake hastily, "It's made of pure metal!"
Flippy grabbed the remaining two gags and shoved them into Vincent's hands, then like that time they met the angry red monkey, he went behind them and began to push the two teens towards the door.
"Just do like I tell you guys!" Flippy stated, "You'll be fine!" he said hastily, and in the span of seconds he had opened the door, shoved Kelly and Vincent out, launched himself out as well, and closed the door with a thud.
Tom blinked, all of this commotion made him realize he forgot to tell the humans something, but he couldn't quite put his finger on it…
==MEANWHILE==
Kelly and Vincent scrambled about in order to get away from the Flunky as far away as possible, with Flippy following after them. The Flunky, however, didn't seem to chase after them, and just stared at them in confusion after seeing the whole show they put up inside Tom's office.
"What do we do now?!" Vincent squealed.
"Approach him!" Flippy said, pointing at the shocked Cog, "He'll engage into battle automatically!"
"What?" Kelly eeked, "I'm not approaching that! What if it tries to crush me or something?"
"He won't do that!" Vincent screeched and charged at the Flunky, who tensed up immediately. Before the Flunky could even react Vincent had already hurled his squirting flower at him, but being like any sort of flower, its momentum stopped like a piece of paper and glided gracefully to the ground in front of the Flunky, much to Vincent's dismay.
The Flunky took this moment of pure unadulterated fail as a chance to compose himself and put on a serious, if maybe bored, expression, "I'm gonna tell the boss about you!" he said in a monotone voice, and the insignia in his chest flipped around to reveal a green light. Looks like he had picked a fight with Vincent, after all.
The Cog edged closer to Vincent, who rose up his hands in self-defense and backed off. Eventually the Flunky had rounded up Vincent until the two were at the middle of the street, and stopped after doing so. Vincent scowled, picked up the blue box that used to go along with his flower and hurled it at the Flunky's head, this time the object hit the Cog's head with a satisfactory BONK and ricocheted off into the side of the street.
"Ow." The Flunky said, but the green light on his chest remained unchanged.
Flippy grabbed Kelly's hand and ran into the battle scene, with Kelly running after him. "He's going to attack you now!" The toon warned, releasing Kelly from his grip, "Dodge it! Dodge it! Dodge it!" he went on and on.
As if on cue, the Flunky pulled out something from his pocket, a big orange tie with green polka-dots, and looked over at Vincent with resolution.
Kelly panicked and rushed to the scene.
"You can't go out without your tie." The Flunky said in a slightly mocking voice and with a swipe of his hand, flung the tie directly towards Vincent's chest.
"Vincent! NOOOO!" Kelly screamed and launched herself in between the tie and Vincent as if she was sparing him from a bullet or something dramatic like that. The tie hit her square in her chest and latched onto her clothes with an uncomfortable sting as she fell down to the ground.
"Kelly! NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" Vincent screamed even louder and hurried over to Kelly's body, kneeling down and resting his hand on her head, "Kelly!" he whimpered, "What did that monster do to you?!"
Kelly immediately sat up and looked at her chest, where the ugly-looking tie was latched on perfectly into her clothes, "Oh, I'm fine," she said casually and stood up, dusting herself, "He just put an ugly tie on my clothes." she complained and unclipped the tie from her shirt, tossing it away.
Flippy, who was watching the whole poorly-acted drama act from the sidelines, was shocked, "You don't feel hurt because of it?!" he asked over to Kelly.
Kelly raised an eyebrow, "Um, no? It's just an ugly tie, I hurt myself more tossing myself on the ground." she shrugged.
Vincent, however, decided to keep up the poor-excuse-of-an-actor act and stared at the Flunky in fake determination. "How DARE you put a mismatched tie on my sister?" he growled, and raised his cupcake, ready for the kill, "That is a fashion crime and I must terminate you for it!" he screeched and launched his cupcake at the Flunky.
The flying pastry hit the Cog with an audible SPLAT, and the Flunky flinched, seemingly in pain, from the hit. Crumbs and filling were all over his chest, which he shook and swatted off in a hurry. The filling that was covering his chest also covered his light, and as soon as everything was cleared it was obvious that the light had turned from green to orange.
Flippy's eyes widened, "You're doing it guys! You're weakening him!" he chimed.
The Flunky frowned and reached out for something else from the hammerspace that was his pockets. A paper shredding machine and a piece of paper were pulled out from one of his pockets, leaving Kelly and Vincent perplexed.
The Cog raised the sheet of paper and dangled it over the slot of the shredder as menacingly as dangling over a sheet of paper over the slot of a shredder can get. "I'm going to rip that idea to shreds." he said angrily and allowed the paper to be consumed by the shredder, thus sending dozens of paper slices towards Kelly's general direction.
The flurry of white cellulose reached Kelly, who had closed her eyes tightly in anticipation, and the attack culminated with a dreadful damage of… 0? As the paper slices fell down Kelly opened one of her eyes and reached up to touch her face to look for paper cuts or the like. Nothing had happened to her, much to the Flunky's frustration.
Kelly swatted off the pieces of paper on her shoulders and reached for her gags, sure that it was her turn to attack next. She pulled out her flower and its matching blue box. The flower had a small clip on one side, and Kelly clipped it to her shirt.
She pulled the box with the button in front of her and took aim at the Flunky, who looked at her in slight panic. Kelly raised her palm and slammed down the button on her box. Immediately the flower squirted out a small stream of water at the Cog, who got completely soaked with it.
The insignia on the Flunky's chest switched from orange to a flickering red, and the robot himself began to shake.
"Guys embrace yourselves!" Flippy shouted and ducked for cover.
"What what -" Kelly got interrupted by Vincent, who tackle-hugged her to get her to safety faster.
The Flunky began to spin and twitch out of control and soon springs, gears and other parts began to fly off from his joints. With a loud BOOM, the Cog exploded, sending many parts, most of them gears, soaring in all directions.
The door to Tutorial Tom's office swung open, revealing an excited Tom.
"Guys! GUYS! Watch out for the Cog's attacks -"
BONK.
"OW!" Tom whimpered and fell down as soon as a stray gear hit him square in the head.
Flippy stood up and looked at the mess of metal parts that the Flunky had left behind after his demise, and then looked over at Kelly and Vincent, whom were on the floor, hugging each other. The toon walked over to the siblings and tapped their shoulders.
"You did it guys!" Flippy cheered, "You destroyed that Flunky!"
Vincent unwrapped his arms from around Kelly and sat up, "We did?" he asked and looked around, "Oh my gosh, we actually did!"
Kelly sprang up to her feet and looked at the aftermath; "I'm seriously starting to think those cupcakes are indeed poisonous." she laughed and helped her brother up.
Meanwhile, Tom approached the trio groggily, rubbing his forehead, "Good… Job… Guys…!" he slurred, swaying from side to side.
"Tom?" Flippy asked, "Are you OK?"
Tom shook his head rapidly, and as if on cue, his normal expression returned, "Yeah I am! A loose gear just hit me, don't worry," he assured, "Congratulations on defeating your first Cog! It truly means a lot for you guys to help our cause."
"No problem, Tom!" Kelly chimed proudly, "What do we do now…?"
"Maybe we can…" Vincent hummed, then snapped, "Oh crud, we have to go back home!"
Kelly's eyes widened, "Oh gosh! What if our parents are already back?" she gasped.
Flippy coughed, "I had forgotten about that!" he whimpered, "Come on guys, we need to take you back to the Dimensionator!" he ordered and ran towards the tunnel to the playground with Kelly and Vincent in hot pursuit.
==MEANWHILE==
While all that madness that happened was described, Clancy and Shade had been left behind in the dust, by choice, but left behind nonetheless. The horse and the cat had just sat down by the stairs of the Town Hall and chitchatted.
"Do you think that Flippy will try to get more…? Er…"
"Humans?" Shade added.
"Yeah, that," Clancy sighed, "Do you think he'll do that?"
The cat shrugged, "Two humans can't exactly take down a whole army, can they? I'm pretty sure he'll try to recruit at least some more." she said.
Clancy twisted his lip, "I have a bad feeling about this…" he muttered.
"Why? Because I said they looked like Cogs?" Shade giggled.
"No… Well, partly. But I just feel like something bad will happen!"
"You always say that for anything new that pops up, Clancy." Shade shrugged.
'And you always say that for anything that worries me…' Was a small thought that Clancy came up with, but didn't say out loud.
The tan horse opened his mouth to speak, but as if on cue…
"CLAAAAAAANNNCCCYYYYYYYYYYYY!" A familiar voice screeched from far away, causing Clancy and Shade to turn their heads.
Flippy, Kelly and Vincent were sprinting towards the town hall in a rush.
"Start up the Dimensionator!" Flippy screeched. Clancy and Shade stood up and entered the Town Hall, leaving the door open. The trio's sprint soon died down and turned into a jog as they entered the building as well.
The trio turned into a group of 5 as they entered the basement and rode the elevator down to the lab beneath the Town Hall. Flippy, Kelly and Vincent took this opportunity to catch their breaths.
"What did you guys do?" Clancy asked curiously.
"We fought a Cog!" Kelly exclaimed and raised her arms to make a V shape, "And we won!"
"For real?" Shade asked, "Which kind of Cog was it?"
"A Flunky," Flippy replied, "Level 1 by the looks of it."
"Wait," Vincent gasped, "What do you mean by level 1?"
"There are more types and higher-ranking Cogs than the one we met," Flippy explained, "But for now the top priority is to get you home."
The elevator doors opened with a ding, and the group walked towards the next door, which revealed the same scientists from earlier working on the computers surrounding the Dimensionator. They all collectively whipped their heads at the sound of the door sliding open.
"Okay guys!" Clancy hollered, "We need to open the Dimensionator again, same coordinates from earlier." he ordered, and everyone promptly began to activate the machine.
The Dimensionator began to whir as usual as it gathered the energy it required to open a portal. When it was fully charged a black beam shot at an empty space on the floor, opening the same inter-dimensional portal from the first time.
"So that's how the black hole appeared…" Vincent muttered.
"Okay guys," Flippy began, "All you have to do now is go through the portal, and you'll be back where you were." he smiled.
"Wait," Kelly asked, "What if we want to come back here tomorrow?" she pouted.
The three toons next to her collectively made a "Hmm" sound, and then one of them snapped their fingers after thinking up something.
"How about we open the portal tomorrow at the same time we opened it for the first time today?" Shade asked.
"That's a great idea!" Vincent replied.
"Very well, I'll make sure we're on time tomorrow, guys!" Flippy said, to which Clancy nodded in agreement.
The group walked towards the portal hole, ready to drop off Kelly and Vincent.
Kelly turned around, "Thank you guys for this experience! I can't wait until tomorrow!" she cheered.
"Neither can us!" Flippy chimed, "We'll be waiting for you!"
Vincent and Kelly bid farewell in unison, to which everyone in the room replied with another farewell. The two siblings then jumped into the hole and disappeared from view. As soon as the toons on the computers saw no one in the portal, they closed it, sealing off the link between dimensions for the time being.
==MEANWHILE==
Kelly and Vincent shot out through the portal, and just as the first time, they landed on their backyard with an audible slap.
Kelly rose up to her knees and looked around, everything was fine, and apparently the portal had closed. One thing that stood out was that Vincent was lying on the ground without moving.
"…Vincent? Are you okay?" Kelly asked and poked his head. Soon enough some coughs and gags that were obscured by the ground could be heard, and Vincent shot up to his knees, coughing up grey sludge in disgust. Apparently he had landed over it.
Kelly couldn't help but to laugh at the show her brother was putting up. She put her hand over Vincent's back and patted it repeatedly until Vincent stopped gagging.
"Eurgh…" Vincent muttered as soon as his mouth was clear, "Sludge."
Kelly giggled, "Come on Vincent, we have to check if our parents are already home." she stated and helped her brother stand up.
The two rushed towards the gate that separated their backyard from the front yard. There were no cars to be seen in the parking space.
"Phew, we made it in time, huh Kelly?" Vincent asked.
"Yeah…" Kelly sighed in relief, but then looked at Vincent slyly, "But you still have some sludge to take care of." she teased.
"OH GOD NO."
==MEANWHILE==
As soon as the portal to the human world had closed, Flippy walked towards the door to leave, but Clancy and Shade followed soon after. When the trio exited the lab and entered the elevator, Clancy and Shade took the time to interview Flippy about his plans.
"Hey Flippy," Shade began, "Are you planning to bring more humans here?" she asked.
"I guess it's something I should do," Flippy replied, "I'd just have to find some more people that'd like to come."
"But Flippy," Clancy objected, "What if something happens to us?" he asked.
"Not just that, Clancy," Shade interrupted, "What if something happens to the humans?"
Flippy's eyes widened, he really hadn't thought if this would bring negative consequences to the toons.
"Well I… I don't really see how they will affect us negatively…" Flippy rubbed his neck.
"But they look like Cogs, Flippy," Clancy stated, "What if they end up siding with them?"
"They might look like Cogs," Flippy snapped, "But they act like us! Besides, I found out that they're immune to the Cogs' attacks, they can't get sad due to them!" he explained.
Clancy and Shade looked at Flippy with their eyebrows raised.
Flippy sighed, "Sorry guys, you know I'm just trying to protect the town," he excused, "Look, I know this all looks really shady, and I'm sorry about that, but for now the problem is making sure the Dimensionator isn't discovered by the Cogs."
The elevator doors slid open and revealed the stairs leading up to the Town Hall.
"Besides, humans haven't given us a reason to not to trust them, right? Let's try to make contact with more of them." Flippy mentioned as the trio walked upstairs.
"Just because they resemble Cogs it doesn't mean we shouldn't give them a chance… right?"
'Tomorrow will be a new day,' Flippy thought, 'I'm pretty sure Clancy and Shade are wrong… They just- Need some proof to trust me and the humans.'