Chapter 22: The Lost & The Alone

The cold early December breeze filled the air of the Wednesday morning. As lunch time had arrived, Gumball and his friends were chatting at the table while some were eating cheeseburgers from the cafeteria. It was all going well until Cato's phone started ringing.

"It's Andrew. I gotta take this." he said in a rush.

Cato walked out of the cafeteria and to the school field where he could answer it with peace and quiet. He wondered what could Andrew possibly be calling him for. He answered the phone call.

"Hey, Andrew. What's up?"

"Hey there, brother. Mind if you come by to my place later? After school?" Andrew pleaded.

"Why? What's happening? Did Sean get Amy pregnant?!" he screamed hoping no one heard it.

"What?! No! Gosh, why would you think that? And why would sister have anything to do with me?"

"Maybe because Sean works at the gas station where you live?"

"No, hideout." Andrew corrected him.

"Call it whatever you want. It's still a gas station. So what happened?" Cato asked again.

"It's easier if you came by."

"At least tell me something about it."

"*sigh* Okay, you remember Eric right?"

"The green wolf that came with you during that simulator battle?"

"Yeah, he went missing last year. I wanted to keep it a secret from you so that you wouldn't care much."

"Barely know the guy. So why tell me this now?" Cato questioned his brother.

"That's why I asked you to get here after school. Got it?"

"Alright, alright. You're making it look like I'm the younger brother."

"Cuz you're asking too much questions like one."

"Okay, I get it. I'll see you later then." Cato said as he hung up the phone. Thoughts started wandering in his mind on what might happen. How did Eric went missing, why telling this now, and why does he need him? Cato shook the thought out of his head for the time being and went back into the cafeteria.

In the meantime, after Cato left the cafeteria, the group were having a chat of their own.

"Wonder what's his little brother calling him for?" asked Gumball.

"No idea. They rarely make contact with each other." answered Amber.

Suddenly, a familiar blue wolf passed by them and Darwin stopped her.

"Hey, CJ. You wanna sit with us?" he asked with a smile.

"Sure, thanks." Christine thanked and joined the group.

"You just got out of class?" Dante asked.

"More like I spaced out for too long. It's about my brother."

"Again? You've been like this for a week. Ever since we had to fight that dark force thing." Carrie said feeling worried.

"Yeah, you should take it easy or talk it out with someone." Amber added.

"Well to be honest with you guys, I really don't like talking about it."

"You could at least talk about it with your parents. Right?" Kelsey suggested.

"That's another thing. I never told anyone about this. I...lost my parents when I was younger. My mom and I were in a car crash. She died but I lived. However, my dad committed suicide before he found out I survived. Then, just when I started feeling insecure, I lost my brother. It seemed all planned out. As if someone was watching me this entire time. Now I'm a survivor living in Elmore trying to live a better life. It's funny how I'm literally a lone wolf right now." Christine told her story of how she lost her family as she almost broke down in tears.

"Sorry to hear that. Wish it could've ended better."

"So did I." Christine replied silently.

After that was a long silence that ended upon Cato coming back from his phone call.

"Alright I'm back. Oh, hey CJ." Cato said.

"Hi, Cato."

"What's with all the sad faces?"

Cato asked at a really wrong time and everyone sat there staring at him while Amber nudged him at the shoulder.

"What?!" Cato asked while easing the pain on his shoulder.

Nobody said a word while Amber motioned her finger to her mouth telling him to be quiet. It took awhile for Cato to comprehend before finally giving up and stopped talking. As the minutes go by, the bell started ringing signalling the end of lunch time. Everyone got up and went to their respective classes.

The bell rang and everyone started rushing out of their classrooms as school has ended for the day. After the group got out of the school, Cato stopped and had to go see his little brother.

"Hey, guys. I gotta get to my brother's place. Something came up."

"Was that why he called?" Amber asked.

"Yeah."

"Well, okay then. Take care." Gumball said.

"You got it."

Cato separated from the group and set out to the gas station where his brother lived for the past 9 years. It took about half an hour for Cato to get there, but the time was worth it as he had nothing else to do for the day.

He finally reached the gas station somewhere in the outskirts of Elmore and entered only to be greeted by his sister's fiance, Sean Fischer.

"Hey, Cato. What brings you here?" The black humanoid greeted.

"Andrew called me and asked me to come." Cato replied.

"Oh, he's down in the basement. I'm going home now. My shift's over."

"Alright, say hi to my sis for me."

Sean left without saying another word, leaving Cato alone. He shrugged it off and proceeded down into a storage room. As he went down, he saw the door cracked open a little. He opened the door slowly only to see Andrew all alone sitting on his desk with his massive computer setup fit for a hacker. Andrew turned around and saw his older brother walk in.

"Cato, glad you could make it. Thanks for coming." Andrew greeted.

"Yeah, long time no see too, Andrew. So what is it you wanna show me?" Cato asked anxiously.

"Oh yeah, so I mentioned that Eric went missing a year ago."

"Yeah, I get the story. What's with Eric in all this? You got a lead to him or something?"

"Not just a lead, but a message." Andrew said making it sound like he was smart as he turned back to face his computer to find something. "I just found a transmission a few hours ago before school. It was from Eric, and you're not gonna like it." Andrew continued.

He clicked on a link in his mail inbox and it showed a video of Eric in some sort of a camo suit with a new 'X' mark on his cheek standing in front of a wallpaper with a logo.

"Hello, Andrew. It's been awhile, hasn't it old friend? Still worried about me? Don't be. I've found my place now. An actual place to call my home. Not some rotten dead-end gas station. Free food, free place to live, everything that we've ever dreamed about. All for one price, and that is to serve. You see, I'm now a part of an organisation. A criminal organisation. It's really cool. Never really got to do some bad kids stuff, you get me? We're kinda looking for some new recruits and I thought you'd be interested. Agree and you get to live handsomely in the shadows. Disagree, well...you know what me and my new buddies are gonna have to do. But if you do, consider out friendship gone. You have 24 hours. Don't leave me hanging on this decision, or I'll leave you hanging with a rope around your neck."

The transmission ended leaving Cato clueless on what had happened between them. He has known Eric back when they were younger, the first person to take Andrew in after his parents died. He was very kind-hearted and always willing to help his friends. But the Eric he witnessed in the transmission wasn't the same Eric he knew back then.

"He's not himself. I know Eric, he won't say stuff like that. He's a good guy, but he just sound too menacing. I...It felt like I had lost a friend." Andrew said trying to hold back his tears. He had the thought that he's actually lost a friend. Cato looked back at the message.

"How long did he say you have to think about this?" asked Cato.

"*sniff* 24 hours...I think." Andrew replied.

"This message was from 2 days ago..." Cato mentioned pointing at the date the message was sent.

Glass breaking was heard upstairs and they heard a commotion going on outside. Andrew felt petrified as Cato walked slowly to the door. As he opens the crack on the door, he noticed something being thrown into the room. A flash popped up blinding the two brothers whilst someone took the opportunity to bash the door down and knocked Cato to the ground. Two more people with black suits walked in with one of them, who is a crowbar, holding a gun at Andrew. The person who knocked down Cato was a blue feline like Gumball, but with a different figure.

The third man was clear to everyone who it was. It was Andrew's old pal, Eric.

"So, made up your mind yet?"Eric asked.

"Uhh...can't I get more time?" Andrew pleaded just to stall them.

"Oh, come on Andrew. It's a yes or no question. You just need to say which one. Can't say about your safety if you choose the wrong answer though." Eric explained.

"Andrew, don't you do it." Cato said

"So, what's it gonna be, buddy?"

It took Andrew a few seconds until he had the guts to say something.

"No."

"What was that?"

"I said no. Eric, don't you see what they're doing? They're manipulating you to commit crime, the thing that you actually vowed to stop when we first got here. Why can't you see that?" Andrew tried talking some sense to Eric but to no avail.

"Well, I see how it is." Eric turned his back on them.

"...we'll just have to take you then."

"Over my dead body!"

Cato managed to get off of the blue cat and took the crowbar's gun from his hands and knocked him unconscious. Eric took out a smoke grenade and filled the room with smoke while the blue cat took out a duffel bag and put it on Andrew's head. The two ran out with Andrew while Cato tried to look for him.

"Andrew, where you at?" Cato screamed.

As the smoke cleared, Cato sees a now empty room with only their only partner left behind still on the floor. Cato rushed up the stairs and outside only to see a truck driving away as he made it to the door.

"Dammit. Andrew.."

Cato looked toward where they went and just noticed that they were headed towards Elmore. He started wondering why they would go there.

"Maybe that punk downstairs know something."

Cato went back down to the basement and saw the crowbar crawling to his gun, looking weak. He walked over to the gun and stomped on his hand causing the unknown intruder to weep in pain.

"You just haven't had enough, have you?" Cato asked with an evil grin.

"What're you gonna do with me?" The crowbar asked.

"What am I gonna do? We're gonna play a little game."

Meanwhile, in the Watterson's residence, the family were watching some TV together of a stand up comedian. They were enjoying themselves until they were interrupted by a phone call. Nicole went to the phone and answered it.

"Hello...Oh, hi...You're coming back?...Today?...Oh that's great news, when should you be there?...7 PM?..Okay, bye. Can't wait to see you." Nicole said over the phone. Everyone else on the other hand were confused on what she was talking about or who she was talking to on the phone. "That was Anais! She said she'll be coming back for winter break!" Nicole explained.

"Isn't it a little too early for that? It's still early of December." Dante asked.

"Guess she got an early break. You know how she gets with assignments. She finishes way too early so she basically has nothing to do there I bet." Lexy mentioned.

"Oh, my baby girl is coming back! This deserves a new batch of my pizza supreme!" Richard exclaimed as he ran to the kitchen.

In the midst of the conversation, Darwin noticed Gumball looking down in all this.

"Hey, Gumball. You alright?" Darwin asked. It took Gumball a few seconds and more eyes staring at him to answer. "Huh..oh yeah. I'm fine." Gumball said.

"You still bummed on what she said when she gave up looking for you?" Dante mentioned.

"Shut up, he doesn't know!" Lexy yelled at him.

"Nah, it's okay. I know about it. It's just...I'm starting to wonder how she'll feel when she sees me. Will she feel happy, hate, regretful? I don't even know." Gumball said.

"Aww, my little gummypuss. I'm sure she'll accept it later on as have we." Nicole said to calm him down.

"Thanks, mom. And lay off the nickname. I'm 16 now." Gumball said.

"Okay. I should get ready, she should be here in a couple hours." Nicole said, running up the stairs to get ready.

"NOO!" A voice screamed from the kitchen alerting everyone in the living room and went to the kitchen.

"What's wrong, Mr. Dad?" Darwin asked.

"We're out of milk! That's the only healthy thing in my pizza supreme meal." Richard said.

"Lexy, your turn." The Watterson kids said as they faced Lexy.

"Ugh, fine. I'll go." Lexy said as she left.

It's 4 PM in the evening at Elmore Park. Anna went there to go for a jog, in which she did a few laps. After finishing her jog she bumping into Christine who was sitting on a bench.

"Christine. Hi!" Anna shouted from the distance as she ran to her.

"Oh, hi. You're Anna, right? You can just call me CJ." Christine said as she faced towards Anna.

"Alright. What are you doing here?" Anna asked.

"I'm drawing stuff on my scrapbook. Your park has a lot of nice views for me to draw."

"Can I see them?"

"Sure."

Christine handed Anna her scrapbook and she flipped through the pages, astonished on her amazing artwork.

"Wow, these are all so beautiful. You're so lucky to have great art skills." Anna complimented.

"Thanks, I was just about done anyway. What are you doing here?" Christine asked this time.

"I was jogging a few laps. Didn't notice you here though."

"Well, I don't blame you, cause neither did I. You wanna go home or get something to eat? It's gonna be dark soon. And don't worry, I don't eat living flesh." Christine said with a wide smile.

"Uhh...sure, I'd love the company." Anna said as both of them walked to the exit of the park. Little did they know, they were being stalked by a black SUV.

Back at Andrew's hideout, Cato was just done strapping the crowbar man on a chair while he sat on another facing towards him. He maintained a death glare at him hoping that he will break.

"So, what's the game?" The crowbar asked the white humanoid.

"Simple, you tell me what the hell's going on, or you gonna get it."

"Get what?"

As soon as he asked, Cato let out a lightning bolt and shocked him. He felt electrocuted and starting breathing heavily.

"Knowing that you're a crowbar and you conduct electricity, you're really gonna taste the pain of it." Cato said.

"Okay, I'll tell you everything I know."

"Spill it."

"I'm not new, but I've only been here for a year. Some of those guys, they've been with the organization for years, maybe decades."

"What organization?" Cato asked.

"We're a criminal organization, CR1M3 with a 3 for an E and 1 for an I. For what I know, the number 3 is supposed to mean that there's 3 main people of the group, the head of the entire organization. 1 head for 1 faction. The number 1 is supposed to come with the number 3 which makes '3 heads, 1 organization'."

"And those factions are?"

"First is the criminal faction. That's where me and those two are. We only do small crimes throughout the region to scare people. Then, there's the assassin's faction. This one is very rare as most of the people go straight to the third faction. The assassin's faction hunts and kills, that's it." The crowbar explained hesitantly.

"What about the third faction?"

"The third faction is the most brutal. They're the terrorist faction. They make terrorist attacks once they feel like it's time. I didn't know what they meant since I never got to go too deep on that faction. Only the terrorist faction knows what they do. They even keep it secret from the other two factions."

Cato had to think it through on how all this had anything to do with anything that transpired just moments ago.

"Okay, but that doesn't explain on what your partners that left you do. What were they planning?"

"The boss told us to find new recruits in the region to join us. They said target the children so that it's a lot easier."

"So basically, you're kidnapping. So that's why your faction does this part of the job." Cato said trying to reason with what the crowbar had explained. "But it's just the three of you, and with you left behind they're left with two. How are you gonna kidnap even 5 kids if you only have 2 guys?"

"That's the thing. It's not just the three of us. We spread out to different cities. There were about 3 groups sent to Elmore."

"What're you gonna do with them?"

"I overheard them saying that they are gonna use them to join the organization, either by will or by force."

"How does 'by force' work?"

"Brainwashing. They'll brainwash them and make them seem like they and whatever they're doing are good and everything else is bad. Once they have enough, they're gonna launch a full-blown mass of terrorist attacks across the globe."

"What else do you know about?" Cato yelled as he held back his hand when he heard about the terrorist attacks.

"No, please. That's all I know about. Spare me. Let me live." The crowbar said, cowering in fear.

"I don't know how did you last a year in that shithole organization, you're really a little pussy. But I'll spare you, however..." Cato said as he took out his phone. "...that doesn't mean you won't go to jail." He continued as he dialed 911.

Cato sat around for awhile, toying with the captured criminal and his gun. He noticed it was a semi-auto sub-machine gun. He looked around it and started laughing at the crowbar.

"Wow, you really are a pussy, ain't ya?" Cato said confidentally.

"What makes you think that? Besides on everything I said earlier." The crowbar asked.

"Lookie, safety lock. No criminal would go in and commit crimes with safety lock on. Either that shows you're more of a pussy, or just a fraud. Possibly both." Cato mentioned as he pointed the gun at him right after. The crowbar got scared and turned his head sideways as Cato pulled the trigger. Not much of a surprise for Cato, his head(?) didn't go all over the room. "Okay, you really got a problem with all this. You're even scared of a gun that you know has safety lock on."

"It's been a rough ride."

"You tell me."

As he played around with the gun, they started to hear sirens outside the gas station. "Alright, time to get moving." Cato took off the restraints he put on the crowbar's legs and took him upstairs. They found three officers in the gas station already investigating, one of them being Donut Cop.

"Ah, there you are. We were beginning to think you ran off."

"Just like old times, man. Anyway, here's one of them." Cato said, shoving the crowbar man to the cops.

"Wait, one of them? Where's the rest?"

"Two other guys were with him and kidnapped my brother. And I'm pretty sure they're the reason why he's like that." Cato pointed to one of the workers who happened to work at that shift. He was very injured and was taken care from the paramedic bandages.

"Did you see where they went? We might still be able to catch them."

"You can try, but I doubt you will. They went off heading to Elmore. Black SUV, complete with iron clads on the bumpers. You can't miss it."

"Alright, thanks. Let's move, men. Get this guy in the car."

"Hang on, why are you here? This isn't part of Elmore." Cato asked.

"Well, do you see any police teams nearby? And technically this counts as the outskirts of Elmore, so it's still our responsibility. Now you better get going. It's getting dark."

"It's gonna be hard sleeping in the night knowing your brother just got kidnapped, don't you think?" Cato asked sarcastically.

"We'll try and get him. If you have any leads on them, that'd be great." Donut Cop said as he and the other cops left the premises.

"I guess I should tell the others about this." Cato said as he started walking down the road. He took a good 5 minutes on the road till he started thinking of what the crowbar said. "They're trying to kidnap kids? Good thing Anais isn't here. Gumball and his family would be heartbroken. However, Andrew's 14. So that must mean people of the same age as him are gonna be kidnapped too." Then he stopped for a second with his eyes wide opened as he just thought of something. "Wait, Anna's 14 too. So that means...ah, shit. Gotta get to Riki."

Cato took out his phone and tried to call Riki but to no avail. "Dammit, I'll have to get to him myself then." He started super speeding towards Elmore hoping that the worst won't happen.

Wow, that was pretty intense even for me when writing this. So that wraps up this chapter for now. What would happen to Anna and maybe even Anais? Would they get kidnapped as well? And what ever happened to Eric and the blue cat accompanying him? Did Lexy managed to get back home with that carton of milk her dad asked for? All that and more on the chapters to come but for now, leave a comment down below on what you think of the chapter and the story so far and I'll see you guys in the next chapter. Love you guys, peace out!