Hi there! Back with another chapter, and this one is another favorite episode of mine. Hope you enjoy it.

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Chapter Twenty-Eight

Wild Style

Mediterranean Sea- 2:37 PM

On a gorgeous day in the western Mediterranean, the cruise liner Juliet was undergoing its 27th voyage in all. And its passengers were all too content to swim, get tanned, drink, and watch dolphins leap out and over the sparkling waters. All in all, these people had not a care in the world.

If only they or the crew knew the ship's 27th voyage would be its last for a long time.

For on the bridge, one of the crew members picked up something on sonar.

"Uh, Captain, sir," he said to the captain behind him. "I think you better take a look at this."

Leaning over the young crew member's shoulder, the captain looked at the sonar then back to the horizon.

There was nothing up ahead yet sonar clearly indicated something was right in front of them. Or possibly below them. In all his years at sea, the captain knew that this meant either submarine or something else underwater.

"Holy monkfish!" he exclaimed.

Within minutes, the captain's fear was justified as the ship experienced choppy waters like it never had before, people clinging to tables, railing, and even doors for dear life. Then the ship began to swirl around like a record on a player. The captain didn't have to look at the water outside to know what this meant: whirlpool.

Finally, after about a minute and a half of terror, the Juliet sank beneath the sea.

I'm in heaven, Sean thought as he and Sam walked along the sidewalk to Beverly Hills High. Not that he'd planned to be alone with her that morning in advance.

He had been halfway from his house when he met up with her. And when she offered to walk to school with him, he couldn't possibly pass up.

Nor could he resist grabbing her hand when they got closer to the building. He hadn't intended to hold her hand, but now that he was, he was almost tempted to not let go ever again.

He couldn't explain why, but he was particularly happy when two other boys glared at him... and his hand locked with Sam's.

It didn't last long, as Alex came over, prompting Sean to let go, but he was glad it lasted as long as it did.

"Hey Sammy!" she greeted. "Hey Sean!"

"Hey Alex!" Sam responded.

Then they noticed someone was missing from their usual quartet.

"Where's Clover?" Sean asked.

"She said something about going shoe shopping before school," Alex answered.

Sean rolled his eyes.

Figures, he thought. Only Clover would risk being late for school just to get new shoes.

"Hey, guys!" her voice called out from behind them... and above.

All three turned around to see Clover standing over them; inexplicably, she was now only two inches taller than Sean. He thought she might have just been having a sudden growth spurt until he looked at her feet.

"Hey, Clover," he greeted, looking at her red shoes that looked like platform shoes, but somehow even higher.

"New shoes?" Alex asked.

"Like 'em?" Clover said boastfully. "They're inflatable."

She demonstrated this by pressing a button on the sole of her right shoe. The bottom expanded another inch. She did the same to the left, and by the time she was done, Clover was taller than most girls Sean had seen... taller than any girl he had seen, as a matter of fact.

But the shoes themselves didn't seem all that practical... or even fashionable for that matter.

"Uh..." he struggled for an answer, before Alex and Sam gave him a look that told him to just play along.

"They look... different," he tried.

"Oh, yeah," Mandy's taunting voice came up from behind Clover. "They're great... if you're a circus clown!"

For once, Sean found himself agreeing with Mandy.

"Oh, we'll see who's laughing," Clover fired back. "When the super tall, super hot superstar player of Bev High Basketball asks yours truly on a date! You know he only dates tall women!"

Sean, Sam, and Alex facepalmed, knowing what was coming next.

"Should have know this was about a boy," Alex groaned.

"I second that," Sean agreed.

At the first bell, Clover dragged her three friends behind the fountain in the quad, as Max Murray, captain of the basketball team walked down the front steps.

He carried a basket ball in the crook of his left arm and ate a banana from his right hand.

As he threw the peel away, Clover zipped into action. But as she ran towards him, she was oblivious to the banana peel in her path.

"Hey, Ma-" her words were drowned out in a scream as she slipped on the peel and slammed into Max, knocking him to the ground out cold, all while her three friends looked on in shock and concern.

"And I thought that only happened in cartoons," Sean commented as he rushed over.

Clover, in the meantime, could only gasp in horror at what she had done.

"Oh! My! God!" she screamed. "Max? Uh, Max?!"

By this point, Clover was joined by her friends as well as Mandy.

"You really know how to knock a guy off his feet, Clover!" she taunted as she walked away, laughing.

After getting over the shock of what happened seconds before, Clover jumped up.

"What am I gonna do?!" she asked her friends in desperation. "Guys!"

"Just calm down," Sean tried to reassure her. "When he wakes up, you can just explain this was accident."

But the subject was explored no further before a trap door opened up on the ground beneath them, sending them down into a dark hole and into what looked like the car of a roller coaster: one that was just starting up.

On the surface, Max was regaining consciousness.

"Who was that giant woman?" he asked himself, sitting up.

Back down below the Earth's crust, the car raced along the track through a series of caves at almost breakneck pace, while the space around filled with the echoes of screams from the four teenagers.

Finally, the coaster came through a giant metal door that, in the split second before it opened, Sean could see the letter "W" painted on it.

Once inside, the coaster came to a stop, with the sudden force flinging its four passengers out and onto the floor... right at Jerry's feet.

"Good morning, agents," he greeted warmly. "I trust you found the tram ride enjoyable?"

"Oh, yeah!" Clover exclaimed sarcastically. "My eyeballs needed a good blow-dry!"

Ignoring her, Jerry turned on the screen behind him, showcasing a picture of a luxurious ship and a list of people with their pictures next to their names.

"Yesterday afternoon," Jerry began to explain. "The luxury cruise liner Juliet disappeared in the Mediterranean Sea with 200 passengers on board. It vanished from radar. A complete mystery."

"And you want us to solve that mystery and find the missing passengers?" Sean asked as he and the girls finished zipping up their spy suits.

"Precisely," Jerry answered as a table came up between him and the spies. "Now, let's have a look at the gadgets, shall we?"

Jerry gestured to the gadgets in front of the teens as their images appeared on the screen behind him.

"Aqua Lips Waterproof Lipstick, doubles as state of the art scuba gear, Scan Man 9000 Portable Radio and Radar Scanner."

Clover pressed a button on the radio and the screens flipped over, now replaced with two radar screens.

"Ice Queen Perfume," Jerry continued. "Actually a concentrated freezing agent."

"Perfect for cooling off a hot date," Alex said, picking up the star-shaped perfume bottle.

"Or stopping an attacker in their tracks," Jerry reminded. "Next we have Cyber-Jacker Sunglasses that automatically hack into any computer system. And finally, you'll be getting a brand new R.A.S.H."

"A rash?!" Clover exclaimed in disgust. "But my makeup's hypoallergenic!"

"R-A-S-H, Clover," Jerry clarified, as picture of a high tech water craft appeared on the screen. "Rocket-Powered Amphibious Stealth Hydrofoil, which you can remote control with this diamond ring."

He held up the ring in question, then tossed it to Sam, who put it on.

"So here's the ring," Sam said. "Where's the boat?"

Jerry snapped his fingers, and four pink seats came up from beneath them, strapping them in.

"You're sitting in it," Jerry answered, as from above, a metal crane dropped the hydrofoil on top of them, a hole in the floor opening up to perfectly encapsulate the four confused spies.

Jerry waved. The spies waved back, nervously. And with that, the boat fell through another trap door, this one leading into a canal.

Once it was in the water, the boat began to move on its own, zooming out of a tunnel that led to the open ocean.

On the console directly in front of Sean and Sam, a screen lit up, showing Jerry behind his desk.

"The autopilot will take you to the ship's last known coordinates," he explained. "Begin your investigation there. And Clover?"

"Yeah, Jer?" she asked.

"Would you please take off those ridiculous shoes?"

Jerry hung up, eliciting laughter from Sean, Sam, and Alex, and pouting from Clover.

Mediterranean Sea-3:44 PM

After several hours of sailing over the Atlantic, then the Mediterranean, the R.A.S.H, stopped at a stretch of water somewhere in the Strait of Gibraltar.

Sean looked around. Other than an island in an area that was supposed to be relatively devoid of land mass, all he could see was miles of open water.

"According to the global positioning satellite," Sam said as the craft came to a complete stop. "This is the spot where the Juliet disappeared."

"Juliet!" Clover said, dramatically. "Juliet! Wherefore art thou, Juliet?!"

"Jerry was right, Sam," Sean said, as he checked the Scan Man's radar screens. "There's no sign of a cruise ship on the radar."

Then he looked off in the distance at the large, imposing island not too far away from their position.

"But what's really weird," he continued. "Is that there's an island nearby that's not on the map!"

"Not on the map?" Clover asked, thinking before beaming. "I bet it's an exclusive tropical spa! We should definitely check it out!"

"Or," Alex broke in, leaning over the side, where she saw an unusual amount of bubbles beginning to form. "We could could just stay here and enjoy the jacuzzi."

"Wait a minute," Sean said, leaning over to look himself. "That shouldn't be happening. At least, not in salt water."

All at once, the water turned choppy and the R.A.S.H began to spin rapidly. Sean didn't need to be an oceanographer to know what this meant.

"This is no jacuzzi," Sam said as she steered their craft away. "It's more like a..."

"...whirlpool!" the other three shouted as the whirlpool in question grew large enough to suck the hydrofoil into it.

"Hang on!" Sam shouted, as she pulled the lever that would activate the turbo engines. The good news was, the whirlpool's suction was slowed enough to the point where they were no longer barreling toward the ocean floor. The bad news was, they were stuck.

"We need more power!" Alex said urgently as she pulled at handle between her and Sean.

"That's the brake!" Sean tried to warn, but to no avail. Alex had already pulled it, stopping the boat long enough for the laws of physics to take over and knock them overboard. The kicked as hard as they could against the harsh ocean waters, while their craft disappeared into the depths.

Thinking fast, Sam took four pink tubes out of her backpack and threw three to her teammates, taking the fourth for herself.

"The Aqua Lips!" she explained as she stuck one inside her mouth. Sean, Alex, and Clover imitated her actions before being pulled under.

Pressing a button on the side of the tube, a thick, pink, oval-shaped pane of tempered glass covered his face, forming a diving helmet of sorts.

On the girls, he could see that the Aqua Lips had a similar effect on them. Just before they could go under further, a pair of hands caught his ankles, dragging him back up to the brilliant light of the surface.

A few seconds later, Alex and Sam emerged, Clover supporting them by the shoulders.

Sean and the girls took off their breathing devices as Clover floated on her back.

"And," she said with pride. "In the event of a whirlpool, Clover's shoes may be used as a flotation device."

Sean looked over to the island, lost in thought.

"Question is," he wondered. "What caused the whirlpool?"

After re-donning the Aqua Lips, the spies swam back underwater, hoping to find the exact cause of the whirlpool.

As they reached the ocean floor, they found two wrecked ships beside a giant, glowing purple turbine. If Sean's hunch was correct, that was the origin point of the whirlpool. And connected to it was a long, metal tunnel that stretched seemingly for miles.

Checking the Scan Man, he relayed his findings to the girls.

"That tunnel leads in the direction of the uncharted island," he informed.

"A good swim will tone our calves," Alex acquiesced, as she, along with Sam and Sean swam in the direction of the tunnel.

But Clover...

"Hey!" she called out after them. "Wait up! These boots weren't made for swimming!"

Indeed, her shoes were so buoyant that she had trouble propelling herself through the water.

Unknown Island- 4:37 PM

Surfacing on the beach, the spies saw that the tunnel ended close to a dense jungle. Taking off the breathing devices, they looked around.

"Blech!" Clover exclaimed in disgust at the island's... less than glamorous atmosphere.

"So much for your tropical spa theory," Alex told her.

"Yeah," Sean agreed. "It doesn't even look like anyone lives here."

"I do!" an unfamiliar voice announced.

The spies jumped in alarm.

The voice's owner came out from behind the tree line: a middle aged, thin man dressed in burlap loincloth, moccasins, and a leafy headdress. Around his neck was a necklace made of what Sean could only guess was animal teeth.

"Oh," the man said apologetically. "Forgive me. I didn't mean to frighten you. I'm not used to visitors on my island. I'm a fisherman. Name's Trode."

"Oh," Sam said, getting over the shock. "We're looking for a missing cruise ship."

"And there's a tunnel leading from the crime scene to your island," Sean added.

Clover zipped in front of the man.

"Uh, you haven't seen like 200 people wandering around in Hawaiian shirts looking kind of lost, have you?" she asked.

"Afraid not," Trode responded. "And that tunnel is just an abandoned oil pipeline. I'm sorry, but your missing ship isn't here."

"Well, thanks anyway, Mr. Trode," Sam said. "Uh, mind if we have a look around before we go?"

Trode waved a hand, gesturing to path ahead of them, which appeared to go through an endless jungle.

"Suit yourself," Trode conceded, and the spies left him behind on the beach... unaware of his jovial smile becoming a suspicious scowl and also the fact that he pulled out a radio.

"We've got company," he whispered into it.

"Then get rid of them," a woman's voice, harsh and cold, answered.

After a two hour trek, and with no sign of the missing passengers, the spies stopped by a rock in the middle of a clearing to rest.

"Maybe that guy was right," Sean admitted, wiping sweat off his brow. "I haven't seen anything that looks like a ship since we got to this island."

Alex sat down on the rock, widening her eyes at the enormous pawprint, along with several others dotting the ground beneath them.

"Woah!" she exclaimed. "What kind of creature leaves a print like that?!"

The print itself looked like... well, to be perfectly honest, Sean wasn't sure what it was. It could have been a bear, but he didn't know if they lived on this island. Or a dog.

No, he admitted. It's way too big to be a dog.

"I don't know," he said, taking out his wallet phone. "But I bet the W.O.O.H.P computer does."

He knelt down in front of the print, opening the wallet as Jerry's face dominated the screen.

"Hey, Jerry!" he greeted. "No missing passengers yet, but we found this weird footprint. I'm sending a scan for computer analysis."

"And in just one moment," Jerry said, beginning to type. "I'll tell you."

A minute passed as dozens of animal prints flashed across Sean's screen, next to images of their respective owners. Finally, the print he scanned in showed up... along with the word "Unknown."

"Oh," Jerry said in confusion. "That's odd. The print doesn't belong to any known species of animal."

"Well," Sean suggested. "It could be an animal no one's discovered yet."

"It's possible," Jerry admitted. "I'm going to do a little more digging. In the meantime, keep up the search for the Juliet and the missing passengers."

The screen went dark as Clover let out a small scream.

"Ow!" she shrieked, rubbing her neck before slapping her hands together. "Ew! Bug!"

"Well," Sam spoke up after their rest was finished. "Other than a weird little fisherman and some unknown species of animal, I'd say this island's deserted."

Clover, after having gone ahead to look for any other signs of life, came back looking exhausted and disappointed.

"One thing's for certain," she said, her face lowering. "There's no spa!"

"Looks like you need a little spa treatment!" Alex exclaimed, pointing at the blonde's forehead. "Those eyebrows are looking pretty bushy, girl!"

Sean noticed it too. Indeed, Clover's eyebrows had somehow become thicker. Almost like two caterpillars that had crawled on her face.

"Whoa!" Sam exclaimed, taking notice as well. "When's the last time you waxed?!"

Clover opened her Compowder, then looked at the screen.

"What are you tal-" but she never finished that sentence before a low growl permeated the area.

The spies turned around, and upon seeing the origin of the sound, ran faster than their training had taught them too.

After all, any sane person would run after seeing what could only be described as creatures that looked like a mix between human and animal.

"Wait!" Clover called out after them. "I can't run in these shoes!"

While Sean, Alex, and Sam continued their retreat into the jungle, Clover grabbed a branch, then flipped backward into the tree.

"Phew!" she sighed in relief, looking down at the boar-man, still apparently sniffing for her.

"Whoa!" Sam shrieked as she ran from a bipedal tiger wearing the remains of red boardshorts.

Using a tree to vault herself, she did a backflip before kicking the tiger in the solar plexus, sending him down in an instant.

Alex and Sean leapt over a log, narrowly avoiding a bear and wildcat hybrid, only to come face to face with an alligator man.

Vaulting themselves over it, Sean looked back to see it pursuing them. Leaping up, he delivered a kick to its head, dazing it.

"Sam!" Clover shouted from the tree. "Alex! Sean! Climb the trees; it's totally safe up-"

But her announcement was drowned out by a strange hissing noise.

Against her better judgement, Clover looked back. Slithering up to her was a cross between cobra and woman. One who looked ready to strike.

Clover jumped off of the branch just in time, before it could land a bite.

"Uh-oh!' she admitted, looking up. Sure enough, she was surrounded.

Meanwhile, Alex was back on the run from the alligator when she tripped over a tree root.

Landing on the ground, she felt helpless as it began to widen its jaws... until she saw the stick.

Thinking fast, Alex jammed the stick between the roof and bottom of the monster's mouth.

"Ever heard of breath mints?" she asked, trying to wave the stench of its breath away from her.

Sean, in the meantime was cornered by four more animal-human hybrids. One of them in particular, a woman with the lower body of a zebra, leapt over him, knocking his backpack loose... and letting the Scan Man 9000 fall out. As it hit the ground, however, the button for the radio option was accidentally pressed.

The loud rock music that filled the air was painful to Sean's eardrums... but also to the creatures that had been chasing them.

All around him, they had begun to double over in pain. When they seemingly had enough, they all took off.

When the music stopped, Sean picked the radio up.

"Huh," he said to himself as the girls walked over. "I guess not all types of music soothe the savage beast."

"But they looked almost human!" Alex pointed out. "What kind of beasts were they?"

Clover, noticing something, knelt down. She picked up a golden medallion with an image of ship against a blue background painted across the center.

"The kind that wear cheap jewelry?" she suggested.

Her teammates all gasped upon seeing the word on the back of the medallion: "Juliet."

"That's the Juliet cruise line's logo!" Sam pointed out.

"It must have belonged to a member of the crew!" Sean added.

Clover screamed, realizing that the necklace could have potentially been taken off a dead person, then dropped it.

"You know," Sam pondered. "I think those freakshows may be the passengers."

"But that's impossible," Clover said, turning around, eliciting gasps from her friends. "How could-"

"Clover!" Alex exclaimed, staring at her friend's face.

Sean could see why she was so shocked. In addition to her eyebrows being thicker, Clover's teeth were now pointed into fangs. And her eyes were turning an amber tint with her pupils becoming slits.

"Okay!" she said, frustrated and taking out her Compowder. "I need to wax! I get it!"

But when she looked at the blank screen, she could see her reflection was looking a little more... catlike, prompting her to scream.

"Whatever happened to those passengers..." Alex trailed off, catching on.

"...is happening to me!" Clover cried in despair. She knelt down, breaking into tears.

"But how?" Sean asked. "And why is it only affecting Clover?"

Sam put her finger under her chin, thinking back.

They had first started to notice her eyebrows thickening after she complained about a bug biting her.

Sam widened her eyes in realization.

"The bug bite!"

After a trek back to the rock where Clover had been bitten, the spies looked on the ground and rummaged through bushes to find... whatever it was Clover felt.

"What kind of stupid bug bite turns people into... poorly groomed weirdos?!" Clover asked.

"This kind," Alex answered, picking up something she found lodged in a tree root.

Clover cringed upon seeing what her friend had found.

"A dart thingy?" Clover asked. "Ew! It was nasty enough when I thought it was just a bug!"

"Since we're on his island," Sean said. "I'm guessing that Trode guy is the one who fired it."

The sound of air hissing prevented him from elaborating any further.

They all looked down to see what the problem was. Clover's feet, apparently, were the next things about her to change as her nails elongated and sharpened into claws, puncturing her inflatable shoes and restoring her to her previous height.

"Then let's hurry up and kick his butt!" Clover said, infuriated. "I mean, look what his freak serum did to my new shoes!"

It took several hours, but the spies found the ideal place Trode would set up shop. Sam had suggested it would likely be somewhere further inland.

Sean had expected her to be right, but he didn't expect to see an abandoned, Greek-style building in the center of the island. And according to the sign above the entrance, Clover was proven right as well.

"There is a tropical spa!" she exclaimed happily. "See? My spa sense never lies!"

"Well, while you're in there," Sean said gesturing up and down her body. "You might want to get a full-body wax. Don't know what to do about the ears and tail, though."

Indeed, since setting off on their trek, Clover had grown a fine layer of fur all over her body, her ears had become more elongated and moved to the top of her head, and most noticeably, she had grown a tail that now stuck outside her spy suit, which was now shredded in several places.

And in addition to that, her behavior was starting to become more catlike as well: Sean and Alex had to drag her away from attacking a bird on the way to the spa. And just now, Clover let out a hiss in response to Sean's comment.

"Looks like it's been abandoned for years," Sam said in regards to the state of the place.

Clover gripped the fence surrounding the building, preparing to climb it... only be delivered a very painful electric shock.

"If it's so abandoned," Alex said. "What's with the electric fence?"

Sean shrugged.

"It's getting cold out here," Sam said, taking out the star-shaped perfume bottle Jerry had given her. Pointing it at the fence, she pressed down the nozzle, coating the mesh of the fence in ice.

Delivering a kick, the fence caved in, allowing for safe passage into the perimeter.

"Want to go inside and do a little spying?" Sam asked, gesturing to the building behind her.

"Spoken like a true ice queen," Alex said, as she, Sean and Clover followed her.

Sean hadn't really been inside a spa before, but he could tell this wasn't like a normal one. And upon coming into the largest room, his suspicions were justified by the sheer number of chemicals, computers, and a series of glass, cylindrical cages littered all over the room.

"Okay, this spa needs a decorator," Clover said, echoing his sentiments. "Because I'm not getting that soothing and natural vibe."

"Whatever this guy's up to," Sean said, looking around. "It can't be good."

Alex walked over to a computer, turning it on and putting on the Cyber-Jacker Sunglasses.

"Whatever he's up to," she said as she began hacking into the system. "It's probably on his hard drive."

Sam and Sean walked over just as Alex finally got in.

"Whoa!" Sam exclaimed in awe, reading the screen. "The serum re-engineers homo sapien DNA to include genetic patterns from outside the species!"

"And that means?" Alex asked, taking off the sunglasses.

"The bad guys are making half human animals," Sean translated. "Question is, why?"

"Shortage of new exhibits at the local zoo?" Alex offered.

"Guys," Clover said, walking up to them. "I'm hungry. How about we talk about this over a tasty saucer of milk?"

Before anyone could say more, Trode's' voice rang through the hallway behind them. And he wasn't alone, by the sound of it.

"I already infected one of them," he said, as Sam put her hand over Alex's mouth to keep her quiet as she was about to shout something out.

"Shh," Sam silenced. "Company."

The spies ran off, hiding behind a computer console.

When they looked out from behind it, Trode had entered the room, accompanied by a thin, middle-aged woman with a dark teal dress, matching gloves and cape, white hair that ended in points at either of her shoulders, a brick-like nose, a red choker, and golden hoop earrings.

"The other three will be next," Trode told her.

Sean looked at the woman closely, trying to remember why she looked so familiar.

Clover, however, did it for him.

"That's Helga Von Guggen!" she gasped.

"The famous fashion designer?" Alex asked, shocked.

"She's the one behind this?" Sam added.

"No way!" Clover denied. "She must be Fish Man's hostage; no icon of the fashion industry could ever commit a crime."

Clearly you've never heard of Coco Chanel, Sean thought.

"One isn't good enough, Trode!" Helga said disparagingly. "Those spies are a danger to my plans!"

Clover shrugged awkwardly as her teammates glared at her.

"You were saying?" Sean asked her.

They quickly overlooked Clover's naivete regarding the fashion world very quickly, however, and continued to listen to Helga's ramblings.

"I didn't go through the trouble of engineering a mutation formula," she continued, as the formula in question poured from several small faucets attached to a machine above a platform into beakers down below. "And transforming a boatload simply for my own amusement."

Then why did she? Sean thought to himself.

His thoughts, unfortunately, were interrupted by Alex rapidly breathing in and out as Clover's tail rubbed against her face.

Recognizing what was about to happen, Sam put her hand over Alex's mouth again.

"What's wrong?" Sam asked her.

"I'm allergic to cats," Alex said, hoarsely.

"Sorry," Clover apologized and Alex continued getting ready to sneeze.

"Don't sneeze, Alex," Sean tried to warn her.

But that didn't seem to have any effect.

"Just hold your breath!" he added, urgently.

It was all in vain. Alex sneezed.

This caught Helga and Trode's attention, along with Alex and Clover falling forward, leaving them exposed.

Helga scowled.

"Capture the intruders!" she barked at Trode, pointing at the spies who had taken their battle positions.

"Take your best shot!" Alex exclaimed.

Trode simple aimed a gun at them, firing a net that entrapped all four teenagers.

They tried to break out, but the net was simply too heavy.

"Good shot!" Sam admitted.

"Meow!" Clover exclaimed.

While she had Clover trapped behind the glass of a cylindrical cage, Helga had Sam, Sean, and Alex suspended by their wrists over a vat filled with an unknown blue fluid that smelled very much like moisturizing lotion. They stood on a very narrow platform held above the vat by a steel beam, their wrists shackled to it.

"You'll never get away with this!" Sam shouted at her.

"Yeah!" Alex agreed.

"By the way," Sean asked. "What exactly are you trying to get away with?"

"Since you're about to be part of my experiment," Helga answered. "I suppose I can tell you."

She picked up a fur coat that Trode handed her.

"Furlings. My hybrid creations will become the world's first form-fitting, seamless fur coats. Made without a single stitch."

Realizing the implications, Sean fought to keep bile rising from his throat.

"Ew!" Sam exclaimed in disgust.

"Gross!" Alex agreed.

Sean had to concur with them. Helga was the first criminal they dealt with whose plan actually revolved around murder... in a very gruesome way.

Helga put the coat on.

"It won't seem gross when my fabulous fur line has made me insanely rich. Like it?"

She rubbed the collar of the coat.

The spies remained silent.

"It's genuine lawyer," she added.

Sean glared at her.

"You're gonna need that lawyer when we get finished with you!" he shouted at her.

"Au contraire, it is I who will be finished with you."

She snapped her fingers, giving Trode the order to press a button that lowered them into the vat.

As hard as Sean, Sam, and Alex struggled, they couldn't break free.

"Once my lotion treatment has softened you up," Helga explained. "Trode will add the serum."

"Since we're short on time," Trode broke in. "You'll be getting an overdose."

"If you survive the transformation," Helga continued, gesturing to Clover's containment unit, now surrounded by three very muscular guards. "You can join your friend here at my processing factory in Milan."

"Processing?" Sam asked.

"Aren't you worried about getting caught?" Sean asked. "I mean, don't people work in a factory?"

"Not this one," Helga dismissed. "It's fully automated. I need 200 coats in time for next week's fashion show so I can make millions... fast."

One of Helga's henchmen began to push Clover's cage out of the room, Helga herself following them.

But she turned back for one more moment.

"By the way, if everything goes well, you four are going to be the center of my new fall line!"

And with that, she was gone.

The spies continued to struggle against their restraints.

"We've gotta get out of here!" Sam grunted. "I do not want to wind up an accessory."

A bright light glinted above them, prompting Alex to close her eyes.

"Speaking of accessories," she said to her friend. "Yours is blinding me!"

Sean looked up at Sam's hand, more specifically at the diamond ring still on her finger.

"The R.A.S.H!" he exclaimed.

Alex smiled. "Never thought I'd be glad to have one of those."

Sam tapped the diamond on her finger, causing it to open up a small screen and joystick.

Unfortunately, her hands were so high above her head that she couldn't see it. And from Sean's position, he couldn't either.

But Alex could.

"See anything?" he asked her.

Alex shook her head.

"We must be out of range," she said.

"But if the passengers came to this island through that whirlpool..." Sam said.

"...the so did our boat!" Sean picked up.

Sam nodded.

"So, if I can rewire the transceiver to extend its range."

She moved the joystick around as carefully as she could.

In an underground harbor on the island, docked next to the Juliet, the R.A.S.H's engines roared to life.

Sean and Alex waited patiently as Sam fiddled with the controls, until finally, the words "Remote Control" appeared on the tiny screen.

"You did it!" Alex exclaimed. "But I can't reach the controls!"

"Me neither!" Sean added.

"Just tell me when to turn," Sam said.

A few more movements of the joystick, and the R.A.S.H began to move. Its hidden wheels activating, it climbed out of the water, on to the ramp and into a tunnel that, after a few twists and turns, would lead to Helga's lab.

"Left!" Alex instructed. "Left!"

Sean, who could neither see the controls nor reach them, could only watch and listen as Alex told Sam which way to turn the craft.

"Turning," Sam said, focusing on the controls. "Turning."

Out of the corner of his eye, Sean saw Trode pick up a beaker filled with the mutation serum.

"We're about get turned into zoo animal rejects," he whispered, concerned. "Could you turn a little faster?"

"You kids ready to get wild?" Trode asked, just as the sound of the engine filled the room.

As the R.A.S.H broke through the doorway, Trode, in his surprise, dropped the beaker before backing into another elevated platform.

Sitting on it, he soon found himself trapped as a glass cylinder like the one Clover was imprisoned in lowered on top of him.

"Hey!" he exclaimed, pounding on the glass. "Let me out!"

Sam pressed another button on the ring, revealing a gun that popped out of an open panel on the hydrofoil.

Twisting the joystick carefully, she aimed the gun at the beam their wrists were bound to.

"Do I have clear shot?" she asked Alex and Sean.

Sean looked at the gun.

"You're good to go," he said, nodding.

Sam closed the diamond-screen, giving the gun the order to fire.

The blast broke the beam, sending the spies deeper into the lotion vat.

Thanks to the lotion, Sean noticed his wrists became slippery enough to slide out of the manacles. And it was the same for Sam and Alex.

As he climbed out of the vat, he exhaled deeply in relief.

"Creepy part aside," Alex said. "This was pretty good for our skin."

Sean nodded in agreement.

Sam walked over to the computer they had noticed before, putting on the Cyber-Jacker Sunglasses, and began to type.

"Hello?!" Alex shouted from beside Sean in the R.A.S.H. "Clover in danger?! No time to web surf!"

As Sam continued typing, a robotic arm picked up another beaker, holding it under a faucet.

"I'm using Helga's research to engineer an anti-serum," she explained as the beaker filled with a purple liquid.

As soon as it was full, she stopped the beaker with a cork, and sat beside Sean.

"We have to get this to Clover and the passengers."

"So we can turn them back into people," Sean said. "Before Helga turns them into fashion statements."

Taking control of the R.A.S.H, Alex steered them out of the lab and eventually, off the island, leaving two things behind: A partially destroyed laboratory and Trode still trapped behind glass.

"Let me out!" he shouted desperately, but there was no one around to hear him.

Genoa-2:33 AM

On the docks, over 200 "furlings" as Helga called them were onloaded off of a boat that she had taken to the mainland.

From the doorway to her factory, she watched her henchmen push every glass cage inside with glee.

"Excellent," she said to herself. "My automated coat making machine will have every last garment ready by morning."

The last one hauled in, this one containing Clover, who looked more terrified than she had ever been in her entire life.

Becoming more catlike by the minute, she let out a scared meow.

"Patience, pretty kitty," Helga told her. "I promise you'll be the first in line."

The guard pushed her away as Helga flashed an evil smirk.

The R.A.S.H zoomed through the harbor, as Sean pointed off to a building on the dock in the distance.

"There!" he shouted.

The building had the words "Von Guggen Apparel" plastered on the side in bold letters.

Taking the signal, Alex pressed the button to cloak the R.A.S.H, ensuring no one would be able to see it... or them.

Stopping below the pier, they uncloaked and leapt onto the pavement above.

"Could've used that stealth mode when stinky Bobby Roberto was trying to ask me to spring formal," Sam said.

"Who?" Sean asked flatly, jealousy twinging inside him.

"Some guy I knew in middle school," Sam clarified. "I don't wanna talk about it."

Sean sighed in relief, and he and the girls ran off toward Helga's factory.

Perched on top of a crane, they observed three of Helga's henchmen patrolling beneath them.

Just as Sean figured they would, the guards looked up to see the three spies.

Backflipping down the crane, they each kicked a guard in the chest, sending them tumbling backwards out cold.

"Thanks for the kicks, boys," Sam said, coyly.

They activated the grappling hooks on their belts, hooking on to the railing on the roof.

Propelling themselves upward, the three teens landed safely on the roof and located the entrance to the building's interior.

Treading carefully on the catwalk above, Alex stopped beside the controls for the sprinkler system.

"We've gotta find some way to get this ant-serum to all the passengers," she said. "Before it's too late!"

"But how?" Sean asked.

Sam, thinking fast as usual, pointed to a pipe next to the sprinkler controls.

"Simple," she responded. "We load it into the sprinkler system, pull the fire alarm, and voila! Anti-serum showers for everyone!"

She walked over to the pipe, and poured the anti-serum into the service hatch, while Sean stood ready near the switch that would trigger the alarm.

"Ready for a fire drill?" he asked.

"Freeze!" a gruff voice shouted.

They looked around, and sure enough, they were surrounded by more of Helga's guards.

While Sean and Alex gasped in shock, Sam took out the Ice Queen Perfume.

"How about you guys do the freezing?" she asked, spraying three of them, encasing them in ice.

As Sean and Alex took combat stances, Sam sprayed another.

Then another, Sean ducking so she would accidentally freeze him too.

But as Sam continued to use the perfume, she noticed that the stream in which it exited the bottle degenerated from steady fan to short squirt.

She had run out.

"Aw!" she complained. "I like that stuff!"

No longer threatened with being turned into a human popsicle, the guards advanced toward them.

"Look's like we're gonna have to do this old fashioned way," Sean said, cracking his knuckles.

He delivered a punch to one's neck, knocking him backwards.

Sam, through a series of kicks, was able to incapacitate three of them.

Alex held her own, but was distracted by the sound of Sam being picked up from behind and Sean was pinned to the ground by two more.

Thinking fast, Alex rushed to the sprinkler controls, but a hand caught her wrist, yanking it away before she could even touch them.

"Let me go!" she shouted.

After being apprehended, Sean found himself tied up along with Sam and Alex and brought to a conveyor belt that lead to a very large, very menacing machine with a series of metal doors that rapidly opened and closed together. Doors with jagged edges.

They were surrounded by Helga, along with several of her henchmen and animal-human hybrids in their glass cages, Clover included.

"This can't be good," Sam said.

"There's the understatement of the 21st century," Sean said, struggling against the rope. "We're about to be chopped into mince meat."

Helga walked over to the cylinder Clover was trapped under.

"I know you wanted to go first, my dear," she told her. "But your friends were just so pushy."

She laughed sadistically, earning a glare from the cat girl.

Tied together, the three remaining spies were about to give up struggling when Alex spoke up.

"Sean!" she said in a complaining tone. "Your stupid gadget is poking me in the hip!"

Sean's eyes widened as he fingered the gadget in question.

"The Scan Man!" he exclaimed, sliding it out of his open backpack. "This is our ticket out of here!"

"Yeah!" Alex fired back sarcastically. "A good radar sweep will fix everything!"

"Not radar," Sean corrected. "Radio!"

"Huh?"

Sam brightened up, understanding.

"Remember what happened back on the island?" she asked.

As Alex began to realize what Sean was about to do, he pressed the button on the Scan Man for the radio function.

Just as it did before, the loud rock music drove Helga's hybrids crazy enough to need to escape right away. And in their frenzy, their glass containment units began to shatter.

"Huh?!" Helga asked, confused. "What's going on?!"

Fear overtook her confusion and she ran, doing her best to avoid the glass shards and her now vengeful creations.

"Protect me!" she shouted to her guards, who instead of following orders, ran for their lives.

The spies where still struggling against the ropes when one guard, in an effort to escape, dropped his gun on the conveyor belt.

Picking it up with her feet, Sam aimed them into the compactor doors.

"Before you eat," she said. "How about a little juice?!"

The doors clamped down on the gun, crushing it, and causing the doors to short circuit. And in seconds, the machine was covered in flames.

One of these flames jumped onto the rope that held Sean, Sam, and Alex together, burning it away and freeing them.

The fire alarm sounded.

"There's our fire," Alex said, jumping up.

Then the sprinklers, which had activated in response to the alarm being triggered, began to spray water all over the factory; water that was tinted purple tanks to the anti-serum.

"And there's our anti-serum fire alarm," Sean added.

Helga, in the meantime, was cowering before her creations, who hadn't transformed back yet. Walking backwards, she soon found herself standing over a small vat of a substance she knew all too well.

"Careful," she pleaded. "This vat is full of my mutation formula! Don't!"

But one of them, a man who had been turned into a lion, pushed her in. Helga screamed as she was submerged under a pond of her own serum.

As soon as the sprinklers stopped, every human- animal hybrid was soon just human again, their clothes in various states of damage.

Clover was the last one to transform back, and she looked down at herself with utter glee.

"I'm me again!" she celebrated. "Hello, clawless feet! Hello, delicate, freshly waxed eyebrows!"

In minutes, dozens of W.O.O.H.P agents descended into the factory via cable. Jerry was among them, wearing a S.W.A.T team uniform.

"Excellent work, spies!" he said, congratulating them. "Looks like you've got everyone back to normal."

"Well," Sam admitted. "Almost everyone."

Wondering what she meant, Sean looked back at the vat Helga had fallen into. She had crawled out... but she looked very different from the woman they had been trying to bring down all day.

Her body was covered from head to toe in fur. And in addition to that, she now had the feet of a gorilla, the tale of a lion, the arms of a tiger, and a head that now looked like the unholy fusion of goat and bear.

In response to her new mutated body, she let out a roar of anger and hatred.

"Whoa!" Clover said. "And I thought I looked bad."

"I don't see why she's so upset," Sean said. "If you ask me, that's an improvement over how she looked before."

The next day, after dropping Helga off at the W.O.O.H.P detention facility, Sean, Sam and Alex concluded their trek to school.

They found Clover standing beside a trash can, apparently having thrown away her inflatable shoes.

"Hey, guys!" she greeted, waving her boots in front of them. "Like my old shoes?"

"So," Sean said, folding his arms. "It's goodbye, super boots!"

"So, does this mean goodbye, Max too?" Alex asked.

"If Max and I are meant to be," Clover said. "He should like me for who I am, shortness and all."

Clover's friends smiled, impressed.

On their way up to the school entrance, they were blocked by the last person they wanted to see that day. Clover, especially.

"Hey, Clover!" Mandy said, now looking suspiciously taller. "Ready to watch and learn?"

Before Sean could ask why Clover looked so angry, he noticed that Mandy's shoes were the exact same model Clover had been wearing almost all day the day before, only purple instead of red.

Pressing a button, Mandy's left shoe inflated, making her look taller and earning a growl of frustration from Clover.

Mandy ran up behind Max, whom she now towered over, and tapped his shoulder.

Max looked behind him, then turned around to face Mandy.

"Hi, Max!" she greeted flirtatiously. But Max's reaction was not what she expected. Looking over her from top to bottom, he screamed in pure terror before crouching behind a tree, much to Mandy's shock.

Walking behind the tree, Clover knelt down beside the shivering basketball player.

"Max," she said. "Are you alright?"

"Yeah," Max answered, his voice shaking a little. "It's just ever since I got decked by this giant woman, I'm freaked by tall girls."

He stood up, looking directly at Clover.

"From now on, I'm only dating girls who are... right about your size."

"Oh, really?" Clover asked, blushing.

Mandy, in the meantime, was fuming while Sam and Sean laughed at her.

Sean's laughter died down when he noticed his hand had accidentally touched hers, however.

Well, hope you enjoyed it. By the way, for those of you who haven't noticed, this story now has a cover image. I give credit to Peter Sakazaki on Deviantart for it and highly recommend you check out more of his amazing art.

Anyway, next chapter is an original chapter, so it may take a while for me to plan it out. Until then, feel free to re-read some older chapters.

Thanks for reading!