Part 4
"Dammit!!"
A clenched fist pounded on a concrete wall, bruised slightly from the stuck-o surface. It was all Triple D could think of doing to get out his overall frustration. It was horribly out of character of him to be left so haggard in rage, but well-justified after fleeing the scene of the battle... where his mission had officially failed.
Buttercup wasn't SUPPOSED to regain her memory. How the HELL did those idiots know that ruse would work!?
"...Fuse is gonna kill me..." he muttered to himself. Well, not so much 'kill' as decommission. Which involved a liquidating process he was not too fond of. He was too comfortable in the body he was in right now.
This drawn-out war needed to come to an end, by any means possible. Those were his instructions. He needed to find a replacement... someone that could tip the scale.
With another idea already in mind, he did his best to recuperate, taking in deep breaths and readjusting his clothes. He wouldn't have been able to convince anyone if they saw any weaknesses in his stoic character.
Regaining his stone-cold face, he calmly began to walk out of the skate park down an empty alley.
"...!!!! ...ngh...!"
...until a sharp pain buried in his head began to stab outwards at full force. His booted steps grew staggered as he leaned against the wall, clutching his cranium and fiercely fighting the inward force back inside. It was some time before it gave in and retreated away, and the pain faded soon after.
"...nice try, kid," he gruffly grumbled. "But I'm not finished yet."
He had to admit, this human had a strong will. This wasn't the first time they were having this problem. But as long as he made sure they knew who was boss, he maintained control.
After all, he was stronger. The kid's inner physical strength was a bonus added on. It was a valuable resource he didn't want to lose.
Retaining his composure, he adjusted his glasses and moved on.
--
The Castle-de-Sac was awfully quiet this afternoon. For some reason, most agents had business elsewhere today. Only a few stragglers passed by to update their mission specs and journals.
Usually, this would aggravate Eddy something fierce. What could've possibly been more important to his agents than the candy treasure hunt he was spearheading?
But not today. Lounging atop his red-cushioned throne, his hollow gaze was staring at the jar he was turning in his hands, filled with the coins he so deeply endeared, but his thoughts were a million miles away.
No one really saw him grieve much after his best friend's disappearance. On the outside, he had appeared to move on and continue his sneaky operations as usual. The distractions that came with the role of lackey managed to help Ed get over it eventually as well, which was good for productivity, but others still found it...unfitting. Any questions would be answered with an 'I'm fine' or 'did you get the bounty or what!?'
Eddy did a pretty good job of hiding it. He didn't care if it was unhealthy.
Of COURSE it hit him hard. Of COURSE he was upset. Did he really come off as that heartless?
Of COURSE he did.
Though Eddy would never openly admit it, Double D was the best friend a guy could've asked for. Sockhead was the only person who really understood him. While everyone was always asking...
"Why is that Eddy so mean? Why do you hang out with a jerk like that?"
His response was always...
"That's just the way he is. To anyone else, he may seem to be a sour grape all the time, but if you knew him as well as I do, you'd understand. There are many of his qualities I disapprove of, but many I admire as well. Nobody's perfect, after all."
Man, he was so GOOD at that. While others put Eddy down, he would twist it around so it didn't sound as hurtful. He was really good at making Eddy feel better about himself.
Nowadays... though the promotion to leader of Peach Creek operations garnered a bit more respect, the sharp words still came, no matter how lightly they were thrown out. If they stung him at all, he gave no outward sign...
...but still...
"EDDY!!!"
"WAGH!" Surprised by the sudden bright smile that popped up behind his chair, Eddy jumped and tumbled off his platform with a noisy clatter. Hanging off the chair's backside, Ed grinned sheepishly at his pal, who had collapsed on the asphalt with the jar halfway covering his head, tapping an impatient finger.
"Sorry, Eddy."
"Idiot..." Slowly, Eddy sat up, and looking around, there a split-second of panic when he realized his scattered change was gone. That is, until he turned forward, where he was presented with neat little coin stacks held in tiny little paws. A doleful smile supported them from behind.
Eddy sighed.
"Thanks..." he muttered in chagrin as Courage replaced the quarters in the jar. "Now, what do you want, Lumpy?"
"I found out why nobody's here!" Ed beamed cheerfully, quite proud of himself.
"...So? Where IS everybody?"
"They're all at Hero Square!" Ed paused, his ear-to-ear grin shrinking slightly into almost a normal smile. "...they found Buttercup."
Courage emphasized the good news with a typical happy cry.
Eddy, however, blinked. "Who?"
Ed gawked incredibly. "The missing Powerpuff Girl, Eddy!" When Eddy gave him nothing but a blank stare, he hastened to elaborate. "Y'know, the superheroes, with the flying... and the punching... and the laser eyes..."
"...oh, THEM," Eddy finally nodded in understanding. "...didn't know one of 'em was missing."
In a rare gesture of vexation, Ed facepalmed. Courage rolled his eyes beside him.
"So I'm guessing her return is a big deal, then," Eddy ventured.
"Well, YEAH!" The oaf climbed down from the pedestal. "Actually, me an' Courage were thinking..."
"You? Thinking? That's hard to believe."
Ed continued as if he hadn't heard. Eddy's insults never really affected him. "...well, since she's new to the Fusion fighting stuff, we should go meet her!"
Eddy made a face. "What would be the point of that?"
"Hey, Blossom told you to stay on top of things!" Ed chided with a waggling finger. "'Cause you're the new leader here! You gotta do your job and stay in touch with other leaders!"
Eddy bit his lip. No matter how much he wanted to deny it, Monobrow had a point.
"Come on, Eddy," Ed asked again, Courage climbing onto his massive shoulders. Ed had been his main companion ever since... "She's at Dexlabs by now. The Urban Rangers said they'll watch the fort while we're gone."
Eddy groaned. He hated those Urban Losers, and he really hated the thought of leaving the cul-de-sac in their hands. Even so... he needed a break. Maybe meeting this Buttercup would take his mind off all those other things that were bugging him.
Deliberately, he stood with an exasperated sigh, brushed off his pants, slid his quarters into his pocket for safe-keeping, and set the jar on his chair as a seat-holder.
"Alright, fine... let's go."
--Dexlabs--
"Let me start by saying that it's good to have you back, Buttercup."
"Yeah, thanks, Dex. I've only heard that a million times."
A few behind her, mainly Ben, Numbah Three, and Bubbles, snickered, with disapproving looks from Blossom, Professor Utonium, and Numbahs One and Five.
Situated in front of the same projection wall, Dexter briefly frowned. "No, I mean it. At this point, we'll need all the extra manpower we can get."
"You mean 'girl power,'" the Powerpuff girl smirked.
"Seriously, woman," Numbah Five chided next to her. "Pay attention to the briefing, alright? I know Super-genius here's boring to listen to, but you gotta know where we stand on the Fusion front."
Buttercup sighed, turning forward and slumping back a bit. The KND officer was right, of course, so she complied, silently reminding herself that she still had business to wrap up Downtown after this was done.
"Proceed, Dexter," Numbah One nodded to him.
Dexter complied, hardly wavered by the insult Numbah Five managed to sneak in. He clicked the remote for the projection screen, and a map of the wide area flashed up on the wall, covered in dots and pulsing areas.
"The Fusion are scattered throughout the city, but are mainly focused in these designated areas," he explained, moving a laser pointer over the said dots. "These pulsing areas here, labeled as 'infected zones,' have been quarantined and are therefore restricted..."
"Hey, guys!" a cheery voice interrupted the lecture as Mac and Bloo entered the projection room. "Are we interrupting anything?"
Dexter raised a brow. "Well, yes, actua..."
"Of course not, Mac," the Professor replied paternally. "Go ahead and take a seat."
"Buttercup...!" Bloo grinned slyly at her, snapping nonexistent fingers her way. "The toughest Powerpuff girl around! Good to have you back, man!"
"Thanks," she chuckled, slapping high fives with the imaginary friend. The overdone phrase bugged her slightly, but his attitude softened the blow.
"Oh my gosh!! There she is, Eddy!!!" came a fan-boyish cry from behind the two, and in zipped an olive green blur. A second later, an excited oaf was standing in front of a bewildered Buttercup.
"...yeah, we kinda brought company in," Mac shrugged sheepishly. "They really wanted to meet her since they missed out on the ceremony in Hero Square."
"Speak for yourself..." Eddy grumbled. Courage had opted to perch on his ideally flat head.
"Got it," Ben nodded at Mac's clarification. Sensing the awkwardness between confused Buttercup and grinning Ed, he stepped in, backing Ed up a bit. "This is Ed, Eddy, and Courage. They run operations down in Peach Creek."
Courage gave out a shy wave, and Eddy threw out a tiny, loose salute.
"I'M SUCH A BIG FAN!!" Ed crowed happily, bounding up and down.
"...charmed," Buttercup raised a brow, venturing a hand out. Surprisingly, the girth in his handshake was enough to even shake HER up and down. "Whoa-oa-oa! Hah, good on ya."
"Thanks!"
Slightly irritated, Dexter cleared his throat loudly. "If I could continue..."
"Oh... sorry, Dex."
"Should we go or what?" Eddy asked, looking irked over the whole situation.
"No, this won't take long," Blossom replied, smirking his way. "Stick around, 'guide.'"
Eddy growled lowly to himself as he took a seat. He hated when she picked on him, even though he knew she meant well.
Ed sat down, grinning excitably, next to him, and Courage jumped off Eddy's head, much to his relief, and into his lap. Mac and Bloo settled nearby, just because they had the privilege to.
Numbah One sighed, sharing in the frustration of the random interruptions as he rubbed his temple. "...please continue, Dexter."
"Right then." Dexter flipped through a few more slides as he continued talking. "As you know, we've already recruited a hefty number of brand new agents to combat against the Fusion assault, and more are signing up every day. It's critical that you aid them in their consistent training, as the rest of us are."
"Gotcha," Buttercup nodded listlessly. She was almost ready to high-tail it out of here. "Anything else?"
"Well..." Dexter put on a rare look of hesitation, glancing over the new visitors. "...there is... one thing..."
"Oh, just tell her, already!" Eddy irately threw out, returning to his own bored sitting pose, tinged with subtle hints of inner frustration. Ed and Courage had suddenly put on identical saddened faces.
This response was typical of the trio, but an uncomfortable silence still settled in. Buttercup gave out a look of puzzlement.
"What?" she bluntly questioned, turning back to Dexter. "What's the problem?"
Sighing, Dexter continued, "...we've had a missing operative for about a month now. He used to seamlessly run Peach Creek operations until he disappeared near Infected Zone #6A."
He made another click, activating the next slide.
"...Operative Double D."
Buttercup went pale at the profile picture shown to her. Things just got a whole lot more interesting.
"...Buttercup?" Bubbles squeaked, naturally worried. "..are you okay?"
"...I've seen him before."
"What?"
"Recently, too."
All around her, the different phases of shock played across everyone's faces.
"W-wait, are you serious!?" Eddy was fully attentive now.
"I'm lying, I'm dying," Buttercup replied, left in surprise herself. "I mean, he LOOKED different, but... but, yeah, that's him."
Everyone exchanged glances. It sounded almost too good to be true.
"Could it possibly...?" Blossom trailed off.
"How can we be sure?" Ben rebutted. "Look-alikes exist, after all."
"How different did this kid look?" Numbah Five threw Buttercup the question.
"Well..." She carefully looked at this Double D's picture, gathering what she remembered. "That black cap he's got is pretty close... but this guy had a bandana instead."
"A likely replacement," Dexter noted. "His beanie was left at the site of his disappearance."
"Right. He also had dark clothes, a trench coat... sunglasses... ear piercings..."
"Yyyyeah," Eddy shook his head. "That can't be our Sockhead. He's too squeamish for ear piercings."
"B...but..." Ed looked like he didn't want to let go of this hope as easily. "But Eddy, she said...!"
"Maybe it's another amnesia case," Mac guessed. "Like with Buttercup."
"That's a thought..." the Professor contemplated this. "...but in most amnesia cases, personality still carries over past the memory loss, so he wouldn't have a complete turn-around in behavior."
"Yeah," Buttercup nodded. "This guy was a total creep. Went around picking fights with people. He garnered quite the reputation Downtown. He called himself Triple D."
"Triple D?"
"...how coincidentally similar," Numbah One mused. A sudden, jumping movement from the one beside him, however, caught his attention. "What is it, Numbah Three?"
"...Aww!" She smacked her forehead, surprising her leader. Her gleeful smile was still there, though. "NOW I remember what I forgot!" She waved down Dexter as if her odd behavior hadn't already gotten him to notice her. "Hey, Dexter! Do you still have the pictures we gave you last time?"
"...yes..." Operating the nearby terminal, he went through several menus to bring them back onscreen slide-show style. "...What about them?"
"Keep going! Past the Rainbow Monkey cloud...!"
"Y'know, that shot's a complete waste of perfectly good film—OW!"
Mac gawked slightly at Numbah Three, who had beat him to punching Bloo into submission without batting an eye.
"After the Belladonna shots... there he is!!"
Dexter stood back, once again in awe. Everyone was slack-jawed, staring at the imposing figure at the bar's doorway. Half of them had gotten to their feet for closer inspection.
"No... way..." Eddy was surprised to find himself short of breath.
"...Double D...!" Ed whined, eyes big and wide and welling up with hopeful tears.
Courage could only gasp in disbelief.
"Geez... different is right..." Ben breathed. "You can barely recognize him."
"...that... that's him." Eddy wasn't sure where his own certainty was coming from, but it was there. "Who cares about all the get-up, that's totally him."
"Double D... you're... okay...!" Ed sniffled, Courage doing the same at his feet.
"...Computer, bring up Double D's profile next to this photograph," Dexter suddenly ordered, and his command was followed through. More silence was the response.
"...the similarities are there, no question in that," Numbah Five admitted. "Still..."
"Comparison."
At Dexter's instructing, the computer screen began to flash multiple symbols, measuring precise details and comparing aspects of both pictures. Soon, it came to its conclusion.
"Match confirmed."
The hush that fell over the room was near-suffocating.
"...so, do all our missing operatives hide out Downtown, or what?" Bloo broke the silence, to no one's surprise.
"Wait, what is he... why is... GAH!" Eddy writhed in frustration. "I don't get it! What the heck is he doing Downtown!?"
"How should we know?" Ben shrugged. "Or HE know, for that matter. He lost his memory."
"...I don't think memory loss had anything to do with it."
Once again, attention swiveled Buttercup's way.
"What do you mean?" Bubbles asked her sister.
"He didn't have that 'uncertainty' look to him," she emphasized with finger quotes. "Plus, he... he said he knew who I was."
"Cryptic," Dexter commented.
"I met him at the skate park... Right before the fight with Mojo, he was going to tell me..." Slowly, she came to a realization. "...I think he was going to tell me I was a part of the Fusion Army."
"HEL-lo," Numbah Five spoke up at this new detail.
Currently unnoticed, Courage's ears perked up slightly.
"...you're right," the Professor sternly replied. "This is beyond amnesia. This time, Fuse must have something to do with it."
The dog mused to himself. What was it he was suddenly triggered into remembering...?
"That would make sense, 'cause we heard a scream before he disappeared," Mac reminded. "...maybe it was him."
There. Now he remembered.
"!!!!!!"
"Hey, what's up with Courage?"
Going into conniptions, Courage stumbled into the center of the room, babbling senselessly as if trying to them all something.
"What is it, boy??" Bubbles gasped.
"...maybe he's remembering what happened that night!" Blossom realized.
"Well, it's not like he can TELL us what he's remembering," Eddy groaned.
Courage was about to prove him wrong. Suddenly, he shape-shifted into what looked like a puppy-dog version of Double D.
"Whoa!" Ben jumped back a little, astounded. "How'd he do that!?"
Courage would continue to impress as he reenacted the scene, an exaggerated version on Fusion Double D attacking his human (or in this case, canine) counterpart. He even managed to animate the dissolving into dust and floating into his brain bit pretty well.
When he was done, he went back to normal, gazing up at them all fearfully.
"...okay, seriously, how does he do that!?" Ben threw out the question again. No one answered it; no one questioned the dog's antics.
"So, what you're saying is..." Mac knelt down to Courage, acting as translator of the pantomime. "Fusion Double D attacked you guys and somehow... possessed him?"
"YES!" Courage actually yipped.
"Possession?" Numbah Three cocked her head. "Sounds weird!"
"It's certainly something I've never heard of," Dexter mused. "...it must be a new tactic."
"D...Didya hear THAT, Eddy??" Ed surprised everyone with his loud cry, oddly wearing a happy grin. "He's just possessed!"
"Ed, I don't think that's a GOOD thing."
"B-but it means he's alive!"
Eddy's face softened considerably at that. Once again, the lump had a point.
"Judging by Courage's story, this Fusion has the ability to change its matter state in order to enter its host and take control at the neural level," Dexter deduced. "If you can find and bring him here, the Professor and I can perform tests to see if we can remove the Fusion matter from his brain."
"Sounds like a plan," Ben agreed.
"Well..." Numbah Five turned to Blossom levelly. "Whadda you think...?"
Knowing what was being asked of her, she deeply considered it. "...We managed to recover Buttercup on a good, old-fashioned hunch. With any luck, we can get Double D back the same way. I say we go for it."
"Hooray!!" Ed cheered, highly motivated. "So what're we WAITING for!?"
A hand underneath a long sleeve grabbed the collar of his jacket, preventing him from bolting out the door.
"Silly!" Numbah Three waggled a finger at a sheepish Ed. "We gotta suit up first!"
Numbah One blinked under his glasses. "Suit up, Numbah Three?"
"Oh, yeah!" she nodded seriously. "He's really tough. I saw him in action!"
"Psht!" Bloo snorted in laughter. "You're kidding, right? THAT nerdo??"
"Yeah, seriously, he can't lift a butterfly," Eddy clarified.
"I saw him too," Buttercup spoke up. "He mopped the floor with Ace without breaking a sweat. I don't know what the Fusion's doing to him, but he sure can brawl."
"..."
"We'll figure all that out once we get a good look at him," the Professor replied. "For now, focus on bringing him here without too much damage."
"Right. Numbah Five, gather the battering weapons and stun guns."
"You got it, Numbah One!"
"We should face him off ourselves in a closed group. Too many agents and things could get complicated."
"Too true. You and I'll lead the operation."
"We've got his location. Now's the time. Get to it."
"Just to be clear, I wanna be the one to knock him out. I got a score to settle with him."
All of this was happening so fast, people already rushing off to go prepare, that Eddy's head was swimming. He was almost left behind in the madness, until Ed had picked him up and carried him out of the room, package-style. Courage was bounding beside them.
"Come on, Eddy!" Already Ed had regained all the previous brightness in his grin. "Let's go get Double D back!"
