A/N: Okay, I know what you're all thinking. 'This girl is never on time, this girl is all excuses, excuses, excuses, this girl is irresponsible...' aaaand, you're right. I just- I lost the plot a bit. I got halfway through this chapter and just completely did not know where to go in the slightest. But then, one night I pulled it together and it's not much but it's something, okay? Okay.
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Kids Next Door Mission...
Operation: F.O.R.G.E.T.
Fragments
Of
Recovery
Gradually
Enable
Team
Chapter 39- Progress
Numbuh 3 and Numbuh 4 entered the Treehouse, Kuki still needing to prop the boy up to keep him from falling.
The others, who were already inside, immediately rushed over and began tending to Wally.
Obviously, none of them had witnessed the scene that had played out only moments ago between the two of them.
Joey was in the Treehouse as well, helping Numbuh 350 ready another, smaller shuttle to take back to his own Sector, as the one crashed on the lawn was (obviously) not going to get him anywhere.
Meanwhile, Numbuh 2 was on the computer, trying to work the GPS scanner to see if there was any more enemy troops coming their way.
'Wait, wait, wait,' he heard Numbuh 4 say over the other side of the room.
'Nobody ever told me that Rachel was back!'
Ha, I guess they'd forgotten that part.
'Oh, uhm... Hi, Wally! Yeah... I am,' Numbuh 362 laughed awkwardly.
Numbuh 121 and the rest of her Sector walked in, reporting that all Treehouse bases had now been locked down fully and had been notified about possible enemy attacks from Cree and the teenagers as well as Colter.
'Okay, well that just leaves us then,' Robert said in a somewhat satisfied manner. He was carrying around a clipboard loaded with papers and notes and checklists, gnawing absent-mindedly on the end of a pencil.
'Now, I'm debating as to whether or not we should lock down as well or not. On one hand, it would be a lot safer to go into lockdown as well, but-'
'What the crud are you sayin?' Wally interjected.
'There's no way we can lock down now! This is our chance ta fight back!' He said, pounding his fist into his palm.
'Numbuh 4's right,' Nigel agreed. 'While everyone else is out of action, they're going to need someone to keep all of these guys under control.'
Numbuh 202 furrowed his brow, worried.
'You do realise that we'd be outnumbered about a kajillion to one?' He pointed out.
'So what? It's not like we haven't taken that kind of challenge on before!' Wally said, standing up.
'Yeah!' Kuki chimed. 'We can do it!'
'Well, Numbuh 5 thinks we can do it.'
'And so do I!' Numbuh 2 cheered.
'Can we count you in as well?' Rachel asked Robert and the younger kids.
'You're all crazy,' Numbuh 505 stated bluntly.
'But, what the heck, I'm in.'
So, eventually everyone agreed on ditching the lockdown and fighting back instead.
And in about half an hour, they had divided into three groups;
Numbuhs 1, 2, 4 and 5 were in one.
Numbuhs 3, 362, 121 and 263 were in another.
And Numbuhs 202, 303, 404 and 505 were on the third.
Group 1 was to take to the skies, and ward off any arial attacks, while Group 2 was the Networking group; basically, they communicated, they spied, they managed the rest of the Sectors in the other Treehouses.
Meanwhile, Group 3 was assigned with attempting to locate the Delightfuls -wherever they may have gone- and trying to get as much info out of them as they could.
It wasn't going to be easy, but hey, they were the KND, right?
~(*)~
'Team 3, come in Team 3. This is Team 1. We have achieved lift off, and are now circling the air above The Delightful Mansion. What's your position? Over.' Numbuh 2 reported, while in the background Numbuh 3 and Numbuh 5's fingers flew over the buttons and keyboards of the ship's targeting system, trying to pinpoint the location of the five miserable Delightful Teens.
It was Numbuh 303 who replied, in a comically loud whisper.
'This is Team 3. We hear you loud and clear! We're in the Mansion, but there seems to be no sign of the Children, or even Father for that matter. Over.'
'That's strange. Father should be around there. Are you sure you can't see him, Numbuh 303? Nothing? Over.'
'Nope, nothing at all. We've looked- wait! Something's coming!'
There was a pause, and a shuffling noise as the kids inside the Mansion hurried to make themselves unseen.
A sillhouette -no wait, two of them- made their ways down the corridor.
'Father, I promise you that these brats have no chance against me and my troops,' one of the figures was saying.
Then, the chilling voice of none other than Father himself echoed throughout the hall.
'How do I know you won't blow it like you did last time?' he said.
'But just look at them!' the first voice protested. 'They're so scared of me that they've all run off and hid in their little Treehouses! They don't stand a chance against me!'
It was pretty obvious that the first voice was Dr. Colter.
'Alright then. I'll give you one chance!' Father glowered.
'BUT if you screw this up again...!' The black shape yelled, bursting into flame suddenly, sending Dr. Colter's shadow quivering along the wall.
'Of course, Father. I won't let you down.'
And with that, Colter left for the door, while Father continued to pace up and down the hallway.
All the while, The four Operatives who had been listening in were crammed longways, sideways and anyways on top of each other in a broom closet not too far away.
'Ouch! Jake, ya standing on my fingers!' Joey complained.
'Get your foot outta my face, Numbuh 404!' Demanded Numbuh 202.
'You're smooshing my face against the wall,' came a rather muffled voice from Numbuh 303.
'Shuddup!' Numbuh 505 hissed at them all.
'I'm trying to listen.'
Silence, from inside and outside the cupboard.
'Ah don't hear anything,' Joey said after a while.
'Exactly. I think they're gone,' Olivia said, beckoning for them to edge closer to the door.
'Okay, now everyone be absolutely silent.'
...
'How silent?' Jake asked after a cautious few seconds of quiet.
'Whaddaya mean, how silent? Silent is silent!' Numbuh 505 shot back.
'Doya mean, like, movie theatre silent or math test silent?'
'Is there a difference?'
This time, Numbuh 303 piped up, eager to share her opinion, even given their current situation in a broom closet in their enemy's mansion.
'Well, I think that movie theatre silent is kind of a more willing silence. Like you're so interested in what's going on that you can't help but be quiet.
'But math test silent is more like you're being silent because you're scared of what will happen if you aren't.'
'Are we seriously having this conversation? Everyone just shut up!' Numbuh 505 whisper-shouted at the top of her quietest voice.
Meanwhile, Numbuh 303 was still babbling away in the background.
'You see, it's all about your varying degrees of silent...'
Numbuh 505 rolled her eyes and snapped her fingers to get the attention of the two boys next to her.
Numbuh 303 was a lost cause at this point.
'Okay, you two. I want you to split up and take the left and right corridors.'
Meanwhile, in 303-land...
'So you've got the co-incidental silent moments, like in class when everyone just accidentally happens to be not talking, and then it gets awkward and everybody laughs...'
'Try to find where Colter's gone and follow him. I'm going to see what Father's gotten up to.' The second-in-command of the Sector directed. Jake and Joey nodded briskly
...
'And then, past movie cinema silent, just-saw-something-creepy silent, math test silent and meditation-isation silent, there's night-time silent, where everybody is sleeping so there's no noises...'
'So are we all ready?'
...
'And then, if you want to go reeeeeally far into it, you can get to nothingness silence, which is like when we go on missions in space and when nobody's talking, you can't hear anything and it's like someone unplugged your ears...'
And it was at that point that Numbuh 505 finally lost it.
'Fern! Would you shut up? With all the noise you're making, it's a wonder we haven't been caught already! I mean-'
And then the door opened.
The four operatives stood there, sheilding their eyes from the bring light of...
'Well, lookie here. A rag-tag group of little kiddies. Lost, I suppose?'
'Father!' Jake cried, scrambling until he was pressed flat against the back wall of the cupboard.
'That's right. But there's nowhere to run to now, ya brats!'
All four of them squeezed their eyes shut and clenched their teeth, waiting for whatever was going to happen next.
~(*)~
Group 1 was still in the air, now leaving the Mansion.
The messages from the four who were inside had stopped, and the team who was airborne just assumed that they were listening for whoever they had heard coming down the hallway.
'Where are we going now, Numbuh 1?' Hoagie asked, keeping his eyes ahead where he was steering the ship.
Numbuh 1 didn't respond for a while. It seemed that he was not thinking, but simply did not know.
After a while, it became apparent that Nigel wasn't going to say anything, so Abby stepped in for him.
'Well, I guess there are going to be at least some villains wandering around, probably scouts sent by Father or Colter to see if anyone's outside their treehouses.'
'Right,' Wally agreed. 'So maybe we should lay low, land back at the Treehouse so they think we're still there, and then pick off any spies one at a time?'
'Wally, that's ridiculo- wait a minute, that's actually not a bad idea!' Nigel said in disbelief.
'Huh? Why did you start to say it was ridiculous?'
...Akward silence.
'Uhm, well... you know... your ideas aren't always... great, Wally,' Hoagie explained nervously.
'Whot's that supposed ta mean?!' Wally yelled indignantly.
'It means that most of your ideas are stupid, Einstein!' Abby called back with a laugh.
'Now shut up before you give us away and ruin one of your only good ideas!'
Nigel rolled his eyes, smiled slightly, then cut off the bantering.
'Alright, guys, cut it out. Numbuh 2, take us back to the Treehouse! Numbuh 4 and Numbuh 5, pack your weapons and be ready to move.'
Hoagie put on the accelerator, Wally and Abby stopped their argument and saluted, leaving their seats and heading for their supply of weapons on the back wall of the hull.
~(*)~
Meanwhile, the second group was hiding out; in an old abandoned shed near the skate park.
'We have another transmission coming through,' Numbuh 121 said, who was wearing a headset and twisting the knob on a radio set
Kuki, Rachel and Robert jolted to attention, sitting upright where they had been boredly slouched on the benches in the shed; Networking sounded fun, but it involved a lot of laying around, waiting for something to happen.
'What is it? Kuki asked, rubbing her eyes. She may have dozed off in her boredom.
Numbuh 121 held up a finger in a 'hold on a minute' signal, listened, adjusted the knob, rolled her eyes and spoke;
'It's just another Sector complaining about how they're not allowed to leave to restock on soda,' she explained, covering the microphone with her hand so the operative on the other line couldn't hear her. The three others slouched once again. All they had heard all afternoon was Sector after Sector asking why they couldn't just leave for five minutes to 'get more candy' or 'pick up their Rainbow Monkey'.
'Look, Numbuh 694, the conditions are the same for everyone. You can't leave until the order is given. I don't care if you're out of soda, drink some tap water or something! End Transmission.'
And with that, the radio was put away again.
Back to nothingness.
But underneath the boredom, Kuki was bubbling, bursting to tell someone, anyone about her and Wally. She had to try and contain herself, which, if you know Kuki at all, is not an easy thing for her to do.
She was sitting there, jittering around again, when Rachel finally decided to find out what it was all about.
'Okay, Numbuh 3. What's with the whole bouncy, distracted thing. I mean, I know that's just you and all, but come on, there's something else, isn't there?'
Kuki blushed, unsure if she should say anything, but at the same time, dying to tell the whole story.
Finally, it was too much to take.
'Wally and I kissed!' She blurted out, before covering her mouth again.
Rachel almost screamed. In fact, she started to, before she remembered that they were in hiding, and any screaming would have given them away.
'You what?! Woah... wow. I did not see that coming. I- how?'
Robert looked on with a puzzled kind of interest, not completely sure what the situation was here, while Numbuh 121 smirked and settled down to listen intently.
'When the SCAMPER that Wally and Joey were on crashed, and I was looking for him in the wreckage, I, uhm, he said... some stuff, and then it just kind of... happened.'
Rachel squealed, which was quieter than screaming, but twice as girly.
'That's great! I didn't know Wally had it in him to confess! Are you two together now?'
Kuki looked unsure, nervous even.
'Uhm, well, we haven't really talked since then, but... I guess so.'
'Oh, Kuki that is really-'
'Guys, we have a transmission!' Robert interuppted.
~(*)~
'Sh! Shut up guys, I think I have a connection!' Jake hushed, holding up his improvised device in the hopes of a better reception. Their walkie-talkies had been broken when Father had tossed them into the dungeon, and Numbuh 202 had had to try to fix something up from all the spare parts.
'Come in, come in! Do you read me?' Jake tested, crossing his fingers and hoping for the best.
'We read you loud and clear, who is this?' Came a fuzzy reply.
The four of them in the dungeon cheered.
'This is Numbuh 202 of Sector V!'
'Jake? Jake, it's Robert!'
'Robert? Yes! Oh, this is great! Listen, we're trapped. Father found us, you gotta send help!' Numbuh 202 urged, still searching for a sweet spot for reception.
~(*)~
The four operatives on the other side of the line gathered around the radio to hear their friends.
'What are we going to do?' Rachel asked, frowning in concern.
'Can't we just go?' Kuki said, sitting up straight on the bench.
'Well, some of us have to stay here. We can't all go. What if something else happens here? Who would take care of that?'
Rachel suddenly looked up in realisation.
'I know what to do,' she said, standing up.
'But we're going to need some help.'
Ten Minutes Later
Diiing Dong!
The door opened, to show Rachel and Kuki standing outside, smiling widely.
'Oh, hey guys! What's up?'
'Hey, Fanny. Look, we've got no time to explain, but right now, we need you to come with us. We gotta go get Patton.'
Rachel grabbed Fanny by the wrist and pulled her out the door, but Fanny pulled back.
'Uhm, actually...' she said sheepishly, 'Patton's... kinda already here...'
'Hey, what's going on, babe? Oh, Rachel, Kuki! Uhm, what are you guys doing here?' Patton came to the door, and Fanny just blushed and smiled a slightly embaressed smile.
Kuki's jaw dropped.
Rachel was speechless.
And then they started to laugh.
And laugh and laugh and laugh.
But it wasn't long before they came back to their senses and remembered that they were there for a reason.
Rachel stifled her laughter and cleared her throat.
'Okay, you two. We have to go. Now.'
~(*)~
A/N: Okay, so I think I have been able to get the ball rolling again. I Think.
Hope you liked that, really, I do.
See you all next time!
-Numbuh 25 out
