As promised, here's "Operation: T.E.E.T.H.!" It's based on the fourth episode of the show to air and the third to be produced. It marks the first (and only) appearance of Dr. Sigmund Teef (or his counterpart Dr. Sigrid Teef), the first appearance of Mr. Jelly (or Ms. Jelly), and the first appearance of recurring villain Knightbrace (whose identity will be revealed much later in the chapter like it was in the show). It's also the first episode where the DCFDTL don't appear, and the start of a string where they're absent, but not to worry, they will appear again in the thirteenth chapter "Operation: L.I.C.E.!" I made up Ms. Jelly and the genderbent counterparts of Dr. Teef and Knightbrace myself for this story. All that out of the way, let's get this chapter-reading on the road! I apologize in advance if this chapter is too long (especially the beginning), and I also apologize for posting it several days later than I'd originally planned (it's because of a combination of factors—procrastination, getting sidetracked, an Internet outage in my area last month, taking varying and often late shifts at work, and also getting used to my new general posting schedule in the wrong way!)! I hope you enjoy!
Now Loading
Kids Next Door Mission
Operation
T.E.E.T.H.
Tooth
Extracting
Enemy
Terrorizes
Headquarters
It was a bright sunny day, with everything going as planned for everyone in town—that is, except a few people who were about to find themselves in a battle for their teeth (and their candy).
Numbuh 3 was standing in front of a candy store, excited to finally take on the mission he'd dreamed of doing ever since he'd joined the KND—buying him and his team an assortment of candies, including Rainbow Monkey Swirl-flavored milkshake ones. He happily licked a pink lollipop, feeling the wind play with his short hair, tickling him and making him laugh a little as the butterflies in his heart vibrantly fluttered their wings. He held the bag of saccharine-smelling candies he'd been assigned to buy (which was bright blue with light yellow polka dots) over his left shoulder, thinking about all the jokes he'd told with the store's owner Ms. Jelly and his ecstatic interactions with the other kids roaming around the store. He smiled at the thought of his teammates laughing and sharing like the Rainbow Monkeys did in their home show. But little did he know, a mysterious evil was lurking nearby, ready to snatch candy from unsuspecting kids and force them into horrific dental treatments over 9,000 times worse than their nightmares about regular dentists, and it was on the prowl for any tooth decay it could smell.
He turned left and began skipping back to the treehouse, humming the Rainbow Monkeys' candy song (one of his favorite songs from their show) over and over, preparing himself for the moment his teammates would finally receive the candies they'd been waiting the last few quarter-hours for. He imagined them all having fun together; eating candies, sharing stories, and playing happy games; and opened his mouth to savor the lollipop's hypnotically saccharine taste. He revealed his extremely yellowed teeth, riddled with tiny holes and foul-smelling green slime that could knock out even the most strong-stomached of dentists, but he didn't care—it was his lucky day. Lost in his fantasies, he passed the grocery store and turned the next corner, dreaming about future adventures with his team and relishing the freshness of the air surrounding him. He passed a dentist's office right next to the candy store, daydreaming about all the sweet treats and hugs his team would enjoy, and then turned right into an alleyway between the two buildings. Oblivious to the cavity-seeking danger that awaited him, he continued down that alleyway, but he stopped when he saw a fence blocking his way. "Oopsie," he said as he stopped, looking around the area.
The sun suddenly went down, the moon came up in its place, and the sky went dark, signaling the great evil to arrive and reminding unsuspecting passersby of the horrific dental treatment that awaited them. A light turned on above the short-haired Japanese boy, hoping to destroy any solace he could find in this darkness, especially with the looming threat coming to destroy his joy with the mesmerisingly delicious candy. Additionally, the familiar smell of the dentist's waiting room—musty magazines, body odor-covered computers, traces of sweet toothpaste, and mud-covered carpets—filled the area; sending a foreboding forecast over Numbuh 3 and his team for the tyrannical disaster that would soon befall them.
"Hmm?" he asked, looking around for anything that might have noticed him. He hoped it was someone hoping to share in the joy of his candy, but he would soon be proven wrong. A mysterious figure, shrouded in darkness, ran past the alleyway, laughing evilly at finally having acquired its target, and ready to destroy that target's sugar-fueled happiness. "Huh?" Kenji said, looking around for the source of the laughter, to try to find the source of this laughter, unaware of the dangerous mess he would soon find himself in.
The mysterious being ran on top of the fence like a falcon circling its prey, aiming to destroy its unsuspecting target's love of candy and replace it with a pain so great he would never eat it or try to interest anyone in it again. It jumped on top of a nearby roof, shuffling with the faint sound of an owl's feathers ruffling in the wind, and ravenously gazing upon the Japanese boy to block out any hope of resistance. Sensing his obliviousness, it jumped back onto the fence with the lighness of a feather touching the ground, and leaned forward like a cat ready to pounce on a terrified mouse in its sights. Its shadow slowly slunk upon Numbuh 3, reaching to grab the light that bounced off his candy, and swooped down on the bewildered target, as prepared as ever to stamp out the tooth decay it smelled. Kenji quickly looked up and let out a soft scream as the figure landed smoothly on top of him and began readying its tools of torture, turning their power up for maximum torture effect and giggling smugly at the terror it would soon cause him.
Kenji threw his arms in the air, releasing his candy bag and sending it flying, and tried to escape, but the figure had him pinned to the ground. He screamed at the sensation of steel wool scrubbing his teeth and tearing away the enamels, terrifiedly thinking about what Numbuh 1 and the others at the treehouse would tell him about missing their candy. He writhed in stinging pain around the cement, trying to get the dastardly figure off of him, his teeth chattering at the thought of being kicked out of the Kids Next Door for failing to do simple missions correctly. He vigorously fought the effects of the laughing gas the figure had on hand, worrying how he would ever prove to his team he was more than just an oblivious dodo who couldn't follow their instructions as his candies escaped from their bag and rolled out onto the street.
After about twenty minutes of this harsh treatment, Kenji got up, groaning in pain and holding a red toothbrush in his right hand. He looked around the corner with droopy eyelids, slightly blurred vision, and a wobbly jello-like sensation all over his body; hoping for some solace in the effort he had made to bring smiles to his team's faces with his candy delivery. He opened his gums, hoping his teeth were still satisfactory by KND standards, but the bright pearly white glow from his mouth told otherwise. It sliced through the blur of his vision, illuminating everything ten times brighter than the moon and the streetlights combined, and dotting it with electric blue sparkles that invited people to see the dazed and battered operative's spectacularly clean from many miles away. Shocked at this dazzling light, Numbuh 3 screamed loudly into the night, his cries loud enough to slightly vibrate the light bulbs around him, and began running toward the treehouse without his bag.
Meanwhile, the figure had jumped onto a nearby rooftop, delighted at its dirty tooth-cleaning work. It held a similar red toothbrush in its purple-gloved hand, throwing both fists to the sky, ready to fight another day with its torturous dental treatments. Its feet stood proudly in its matching boots, giddy with satisfaction as a toothpaste swirl of happiness began churning in its head that was orbited by a huge set of metal braces. The figure also laughed evilly again, gleeful vibes zipping throughout its dark violet-clad body as it stood triumphantly and jumped across the rooftops to find another unfortunate kid to inflict its less-than-ideal procedures upon.
Back at the treehouse, the rest of Numbuh 3's team was impatiently waiting for his return, hoping to taste the sugary treats Numbuh 1 had sent him to buy. Numbuh 1 stood indignantly over the other operatives, hands authoritatively behind her back, her eyes exhibiting a notable fiery glare that contrasted with her sunglasses' darkness, and her feet firmly planted to the ground but growing more fidgety the longer she had to wait; while Numbuh 4 sat atop a large purple chair on a branch; Numbuh 5 leaned against that branch, and Numbuh 2 spun around on a tire swing made from a huge tractor tire. "Where can he be?" Nicole asked, looking up toward the ceiling and then down at her comrades. "It's a simple mission..." She threw her hands up in the air, tiny veins in her head pulsing at Numbuh 3's wavering focus. "A trip to the candy store!" She began pacing towards the door, fuming at her fellow operative for delaying their candy-tasting fest by longer than half an hour. "He can't even get that right!" the bald-spotted British girl yelled, ready to tear into the green sweater-wearing Japanese boy for not following her orders to the letter.
On the last word, the door opened. Kenji was standing in the doorway without his bag, happily waiting to greet the rest of his team and tell them his stories. But what he saw were four furious (or desperate, or some combination of the two) candy-deprived operatives, who were most certainly not in the mood for anything of the sort.
"It's about time!" Willie yelled, jumping out of her chair. "You got my-"
"Chocolate logs?" Hillary pleadingly interjected with her hands on her head, cutting her Australian teammate off. "Did you bring the chocolate logs?"
"And Numbuh 5's caramel critters?" Alberto added, leaning in for an answer from his teammate.
"You'd better have a good explanation for this, Numbuh 3," Nicole furiously finished, butting in and lowering her head for her teammate to see the glare from her eyes.
"Ummm..." Kenji stammered, preparing for his expulsion from the team as Numbuhs 1, 4, and 5 continued glaring at him. "I, ummm..." he continued, nervously playing with his hands and looking around the room as he tried to think of a response, but suddenly something shiny had gotten a hold of his mind, begging him to tell the others of his unfortunate encounter with the evil dentist vigilante. He tried fighting this urge, but it overpowered him and opened his gums to reveal his teeth. "Look!" he yelled through clenched teeth, shocking his teammates, who shielded their eyes from the intense glare as if it came from headlights without their covers.
"What happened?" Nicole shouted in disbelief, moving forward to get a closer look at the blinding sparkles that emanated from her teammate's teeth. "Your teeth..." she began, waving her hands to her left before turning to Willie, "should look like this!" She opened the Australian girl's mouth, revealing her rotten teeth.
"Or this!" Hillary added, opening her mouth with her hands to reveal similarly yellowed teeth with noticeable gaps induced by decay.
"Or this!" Alberto finished, moving his lips aside to show their teammate his hole-ridden teeth coated with sickly green gunk that gave off a similar foul smell to the latter's before that mysterious figure had brought on that shine.
"I know..." Kenji said, looking down in shame of the state of his teeth not meeting his team's standards.
"Look," Alberto began, motioning for his fellow operative to simmer down with his hands. "All we got to do is get some candy," he reassured him with a smile on his face, "and we'll get those teeth back out of shape in no time!" He pointed at Kenji's teeth with his thumb up.
"Good idea, Numbuh 5!" Nicole agreed, firmly placing her left fist in her right hand. "To the candy store!" she shouted, pointing toward the doorway.
With that, everyone was off to the place where Kenji had been sent to pick up the sweet treats, ready to indulge in another round of Ms. Jelly's sweet treats.
Near the street leading toward the grocery store, the five numbuhs were walking down the sidewalk, hoping to reach Ms. Jelly's place before it closed at 10:00 that night. They strolled like a train, Numbuh 3 forming the engine with his teeth as the main headlight/searchlight, looking for any sign of sweet treats and checking up and down the street for anything that stood in their way. The light sparkled like the magic from a fairy's wand, enchanting everything it came across with a glimmering shine piercing the night sky, and creating a miniature light show for everyone to see as the parade moved onward. "Eyes front, Numbuh 3," Numbuh 1 indignantly reminded her Japanese teammate as she noticed the pattern.
"OK," Numbuh 3 said through his clamped teeth, focusing his attention on the view ahead of him to allow the operatives a better view of their surroundings. They turned the corner, continuing onward toward the candy store, the huge novelty lollipop now clearly in their view.
But suddenly, someone popped up before them, blocking their path. "Children, children, children," the person began, holding their arms up in the air.
The operatives stopped in shock, contemplating how they would get around this new obstacle, who turned out to be a dentist waiting to schedule some appointments for them.
This dentist was a tall woman with dirty blonde hair, whose ever-analytical eyes were always on the lookout for new dental problems to solve, and whose eyebrows were thick and bushy like the bristles on a toothbrush. She wore a pink dress shirt with a yellow-and-green striped tie, a pair of brown dress pants, and a pair of matching dress shoes with white soles and tongues. She sported a light blue lab coat full of teeth-cleaning tools like those on the villainous figure Kenji had encountered earlier, reminding the kids of their scary encounters with dentists and heightening their worries about all the dentists who happened to be running around this late at night, but she didn't seem to care about that—she was giddily looking forward to getting the KND operatives' teeth back into shape with those appointments. "Dr. Sigrid Teef at your service," she cheerfully continued, bowing before them, "and you kids look like you'd love a complimentary checkup!" She made gun gestures with her hands as she winked at them in an attempt to sound hip to get them to agree. "Ah," she continued, throwing her hands to the side and then placing them on her hips, "there's nothing like a good teeth-cleaning!"
But the KND operatives just stood there; either unamused, bewildered, or some combination; as Dr. Teef continued her excited speech. "First is the brushing," she said, making L shapes with her thumbs and index fingers, "then there's the scraping, and the scrubbing, and the spitting! Oh, the freshness!" She made a grand gesture toward the kids like a circus performer announcing their next act, her heart soaring higher with every word, her smile growing bigger by the minute, and her feet feeling more springy the more she looked forward to the appointment. "So, why don't you all step inside my office," she continued, but the team of kids kept walking onward, obviously not in the mood for getting their teeth cleaned when there was delicious candy to be had at the shop next door, "and we'll, umm...ummm..."
The dentist turned back toward Numbuhs 1-3 as Numbuhs 4 and 5 passed her. "We'll make an appointment for Tuesday..." she called after them, raising her finger to the sky to motion them to come back, but they ignored her and kept walking on, the temptation of sweet delicious candy too strong for them to accept the offer. "Or, Wednesday..." she continued, but still no answer from the numbuhs other than a rude "Freak!" from Numbuh 4 at the rear of the five-kid train. Surprised and annoyed at such rudeness from five potential customers; Dr. Teef growled angrily (causing her body to vibrate rapidly), clenched her hands into tight fists, and planted her feet firmly on the sidewalk; resisting the temptation to blow up at the numbuhs as she thought of how she would convince them to take her up on their offer and improve the dismal state of their teeth.
In the meantime, the numbuhs were approaching their destination, still looking around for any sweet treats that were lying around the area. Numbuh 3 resumed shining his flashlight teeth in front of him, his and his teammates' hopes of getting his teeth to their hideous state once again rising with every passing second. He fantasized about them all sharing and laughing with the Rainbow Monkeys once again, but this time he did it more carefully, not allowing anything to distract him from pointing the team in the right direction. As soon as they got close enough to the door, Numbuh 3 turned his head toward the glass to shower it with sparkles, sending strong glimmers of hope into his and his teammates' hearts. "Finally, candy time!" Numbuh 5 shouted, his eyes lighting up brighter than the shine of sugar in freshly baked chocolate chip cookies.
But the sign on the door had some not-so-good news to tell them, which Numbuh 3 could see in red ink from the glow on his teeth. In huge red letters (and huge clear ones on a red background), it read:
SORRY WE ARE CLOSED
And below, in smaller red letters:
PLEASE CALL AGAIN!
"Uh-oh, looks like we've got a problem," Numbuh 1 said worriedly, as the sparkles gleamed the worrisome message for all to see.
"CLOSED?!" Numbuh 2 cried, holding her hands up to her face and then looking down in defeat. "But it's only midnight!"
"We'll just have to come back first thing in the morning," Numbuh 1 addressed her team as they let the message sink in, trying to keep their morale high against the red print. But just as they were dejectedly walking back toward the treehouse, the lights suddenly turned on, and the door opened. The owner, Ms. Jelly, excitedly stepped onto the front porch and started waving at them enthusiastically.
She was a tall woman around Dr. Teef's height, who was just as excited to sell her wares as the dentist was to give her services. To match this jolly occasion, she wore a happy outfit—a light blue dress shirt with short sleeves and a red-and-white striped bow tie, a yellow apron with a red pocket in the center, a pair of white-and-purple striped pants, a pair of white socks, a pair of light blue shoes that matched her shirt, and a white hat with a red stripe down the middle—and a smile as bright as the sun that would soon come in the morning afterward. She sported an iron-gray mustache, a huge bald spot on top of her head surrounded by matching gray hair, a small nose that looked similar to a pig's snout, and perched a pair of glasses with small round frames protecting her ever-ecstatic eyes with a mischievous glint behind them at every turn. She felt an excited tingle vibrate throughout her body, elated at seeing some of her favorite customers visit the shop this late at night when business was slow. "Whoo, whoo, hey, come back!" she yelled, motioning them to come inside with grand gestures slightly more theatrical than Dr. Teef's. "Jelly's Candies is always open for my best customers, the Kids Next Door!"
"Hi, Ms. Jelly!" Numbuh 3 shouted, waving jovially at his favorite store owner.
"Hello!" Numbuh 2 added, happy at seeing Ms. Jelly in such a good mood.
"Good evening, Ms. Jelly," Numbuh 5 chimed in, gleeful at the prospect of finally getting the candy Numbuh 3 had failed to obtain because of Knightbrace's torturous interference.
Ms. Jelly cheerfully put her hands on her hips, watching her customers slowly shuffle into the building to enjoy their long-awaited candy. "Come in, come in!" she said, beckoning them in with another grand gesture holding her hands out as the sweet smell of candy flew out the door toward the Kids Next Door operatives.
As soon as the numbuhs were all inside, their candy-buying frenzy had begun. They ran around the store, looking around at all the different varieties and types of candy that Ms. Jelly had on sale, as joyful music played on the intercoms to encourage them to go on for as long as they wanted. They grabbed some bags from the counter, their mouths watering at greater levels than rivers overflowing their banks, their hearts pumping with excitement greater than a crowd at a major concert, and their taste buds reacting more violently than rubidium with water. They stopped at their favorite candy booths and began picking their favorite candies, Numbuhs 2 and 4 loading the latter's bag with multicolored balls from a barrel toward the center near the left wall, Numbuh 3 literally diving into another barrel with pink balls on the front left corner, Numbuh 5 getting all the gumballs he wished from the machines on the right wall near the entrance, and Numbuh 1 picking out her selections from an assortment of crates of hard-shelled sugar-coated candies arranged like a rainbow just past those gumball machines.
Ms. Jelly looked around at her customers, enjoying their smiles and dancing happily in her mind about the exciting adventures they were having as they got lost in the sweet taste creating a whirlwind of wonder inside their mouths. "You got to have candy, right?" she asked, ready to go on these adventures with the kids. "No fun without candy, eh?" She made an "I love you" sign with her right hand, laughing giddily at all the sweet treasures they would find during their travels. "Help yourselves now, there's plenty to go around, so go ahead and eat, eat, eat!" she continued, making another "I love you" sign with her left hand as Numbuh 2 threw volleys of wrapped candy into Numbuh 4's bag, Numbuh 5 turned the gumball machine knobs faster to empty the dispensers, and Numbuh 3 threw a thick chocolate coin with orange wrapping into his bag. "And if that nasty dentist, Dr. Teef, tries to give you a brushing, well, you can run, run, run!" she happily warned them, running one step in place with each "run."
On the last "run," Numbuh 2 walked up to her. "Got any taffy?" Hillary asked, excitedly waiting for her answer.
Ms. Jelly froze and trembled in shock. "T-T-Taffy?!" she stammered, acting as if she had spasms in her shoulders as she tries to think of her response.
I hope she says yes, thought Numbuh 2, because we're all in the mood for eating that stuff. I mean, doing this a lot will get you some serious medals in the Kids Next Door, and we'll be famous for holding the world record for eating the most taffy in the world...
But her thoughts were interrupted by some more terrible news from Ms. Jelly. "No!" she yelled, making a stop motion with both of her hands like a traffic cop. "We're, uh, we're fresh out..." she began, trying to maintain her cheerful disposition while she frantically thought of her response and got the sudden wiggles again, "fresh out of ta-ta..." She took a moment to calm her nerves and compose herself before giving her response. "That stuff." She quickly put on her sunny smile again, wanting to find more candy treasure in these far-off lands she was exploring with the kids. "Now let's get you kids squared away," she said, holding out a blue candy bag with yellow polka dots (similar to the one she had given Numbuh 3 earlier) in her hands for Numbuh 2, "so you can run along and enjoy your delicious candy!" She emphasized the last word in a joyful singsong tone as she proceeded to hand Hillary and her teammates each a large bag of candy full of the sweet treats they had been longing for (and some of the kind that Kenji had lost).
When they had all received their candy, the Kids Next Door operatives smiled thankfully at the candy store owner. "Excellent," said Numbuh 1, excited for them all to start tucking in to their sugary feasts, "Just put it on the Kids Next Door account!" She started to leave the shop, motioning the others to follow her.
"Goodbye now!" Ms. Jelly shouted, waving at the five operatives as they left the store. "And don't let that dentist get you!" she warned, pointing her finger in the air, and then chuckling as she put her hands on her hips, waiting for another fun-filled day like this one to come her and her customers' way.
As the numbuhs left the store; they were walking down the street; their hearts filled with a mixture of happiness, excitement, bewilderment, alertness, and the adrenaline from that fresh memory of their encounters with Dr. Teef and Ms. Jelly (and Kenji's with that mysterious figure who was out to purge the world of children eating candy and enjoying sugary treats); looking forward to diving into the candy the kind candy store owner had given to last them the next several days. "If that stupid dentist tries to fix my teeth," Willie said confidently, pointing her thumb at herself, "I'll give her a whumph!" She threw her foot in the air at an imaginary opponent. "Then I'll give her a kapow," she continued, uppercutting that opponent, "and a thwack," giving them a strong jab with her other fist, "and a grrrrr!" finishing with a combat bite on her hand. "And if she brings out the floss," the blonde-haired Australian girl began to finish, imitating a few more combat moves to the chagrin of Numbuhs 1 and 5 but to the delight of Numbuhs 2 and 3, "then I'll give her the old wumpah-thumpah, and then a—" but she suddenly went silent.
"Finally, Numbuh 4 shuts up," Numbuh 5 said, looking at Numbuh 1. Nicole smiled in agreement, relieved at not having to hear her Australian teammate's boasting anymore for the night, and confident at returning Numbuh 3's teeth to their hideous state. But little did they know, this evil dental figure was out on the prowl again, and it was ready to end their honeymoon of happiness.
Later that night, the numbuhs were back in their treehouse, doing their normal activites. Numbuh 1 was reading stories about the heroism of the legendary Numbuh 0, Numbuh 2 was catching up on her Yippers comics, Numbuh 3 was playing with all the stuffed animals in his room, Numbuh 5 was listening to some funk music and relaxing in his arm chair with a series of lava lamps creating a colorful light show, and Numbuh 4 was sparring with a robot in her room. She threw a left hook at the robot's head, knocking it out, and then followed it up with a right uppercut that sent it flying toward the ceiling. The blow created a small hole that suspended the robot from the ceiling, one of its joints smoking while the others hung listless from above the room. The smoky smell drifted out of the door to the room, making the hall reek of an overheated barbecue disaster, and flying through the entrance toward the houses below. But little did Willie know that the same figure Kenji had encountered earlier was prowling around the neighborhood, looking for kids with any cavity-ridden teeth it could find to attack with its ever-torturous dental tools, and it was coming after them.
The figure got a whiff of that smoky smell, ready to exact its revenge on the KND operatives for giving in to their temptations at Ms. Jelly's candy shop. It jumped on top of the buildings, planning its route and testing out all its tools to ready itself for the rematch with the numbuhs. It primed each one, straighening out any kinks, and then placed a few carefully chosen ones inside a trash bag it had found laying around the alley, inspecting the bag for any tears or damage that could impede its plan. The figure ran and jumped throughout the city to where its nose led it, its footsteps quick and quiet like an acrobatic raccoon slinking throughout the night to steal people's food, flying gracefully through the sky like an acrobat in a circus reaching new heights in order to find the source of the smell. It leapt through the streets quickly, slinking around like a thief trying to avoid detection, brief glimpes its dark body the only evidence anyone had of it coming to raid their homes. After a few minutes, it finally reached the treehouse, ready to start phase 1 of its machinations: force brutal dental procedures on Willie for insulting it.
The other numbuhs were in their rooms engrossed in their activities, oblivious to what was going on, heard this noise, when suddenly they heard a horrible noise from the briefing room that shattered their peace like glass meeting a metal slug designed to take out large game in the wild. They ran up to solve the situation, throwing their activities aside pell-mell around their rooms, their hearts pounding faster than drums playing blast beats. But when they arrived, it was too late—a horrific sight awaited them.
Numbuh 4 was tied to a dental chair made out of wood, metal, tape, toilet paper, cement blocks, and other tools; struggling to get free. She had white braces on her teeth, which were so large they looked like her teeth were protrding from her mouth, and they stretched her mouth so painfully she could barely close it. Furthermore, the green laser from the overhead projector was trapping her within its imaginary confines, triggering that horrible memory over and over again in hopes that she would completely abandon eating candy. "It's...Numbuh 4!" Alberto gasped, his body frozen in terror and struggling to get free as Willie tried her hardest to tell them what happened. "She's been BRACIFIED!"
But the braces on Willie's teeth were so thick and bulky they scrambled her words. She pointed at a tag hanging on her braces, which had a black tooth drawn onto it to let the kids know who was watching them. She removed it with her right hand and handed it to Nicole, who began to examine the scribbled writing on the other side.
"Brush after meals and snacks," she read with a tinge of fury in her voice, "or else, signed..." She looked down at the signature, which was marked with a huge letter K and a drawing of a sparkling human tooth, her anger replaced by confusion as she struggled to comprehend who could have done something so evil to her teammate. "Knightbrace?" she asked, wondering who (or what) this term could possibly refer to.
"What's a Knightbrace?" Numbuh 2 asked, equally confused.
"The dentist!" Numbuh 4 responded, finally able to get somewhat coherent words out of her mouth. "The dentist!"
"It has to be that dentist!" Numbuh 5 responded suspiciously, the not-so-great encounter with Dr. Teef fresh in his mind as he pointed at his captured teammate.
"Let's not jump to conclusions," Numbuh 1 said, pointing back at his French/African-American teammate. "It's obvious we're dealing with a villain obsessed with dental hygeine," she continued, pacing around the room, "which can only mean..." She stopped walking, trying to think of a plan to counter this villain's maniacal endeavors, and then suddenly got an idea from their fun with Ms. Jelly at her candy store. "We need more candy!" she yelled, pumping her fist toward the air. "Numbuh 2, prepare the—" she started, but she stopped when she realized Hillary wasn't standing where she previously was.
"Numbuh 2? Where'd she go?" she asked, doing a quick scan around the room, but Hillary was still nowhere to be found. "Numbuh 5, where's...?" she asked, turning to Numbuh 5, but he was also nowhere to be found. "Hey," she said to Numbuh 4, "where's Numbuh 5?"
"I don't know," Numbuh 4 said through her braces, having been too stuck in her struggle to notice anything else with that suspicious "Knightbrace."
"Guys?!" Numbuh 1 said, looking at a control panel with a steering wheel and a pair of red hanging dice. "Guys?" she quickly turned to her right at another control panel, but there was no sign of them anywhere either.
Numbuh 3 was munching on his bag of candy near another control panel, seemingly oblivious to the whole thing going on. His taste buds overpowered his train of thought, enticing him to eat more of the delicious candy in his bag, and the sugary taste wanted him to share it with everyone else to help them forget about their troubles in this dangerous situation. He waved at Numbuh 1 as soon as she saw him, hoping she hadn't forgotten he was still there, and wanting to invite her into his feast, but the British girl didn't seem interested. She turned her attention toward a door on the right that the wind kept open, the leaves blowing inside motioning her to go and find the source of the terrified sounds outside.
When Numbuh 1 reached the edge of the balcony, another horrible sight greeted her—Numbuhs 2 and 5 were in the tree's branches, trapped helplessly like bugs in a web waiting for its resident spider to come and eat them. And the web wasn't any ordinary web—it was made out of three huge boxes' worth of thick green dental floss strong enough to hold them captive for indefinite periods of time, which sunk so deep into their gums it threatened to make them bleed for weeks on end if they were removed. It also bound them to their clothes, creating angry red marks that would also remain for about the same period of time should they be taken off. The two kids were shaking around, trying to free themselves, but the floss's confines were to strong to allow anything of the sort to happen.
"Dental floss..." Numbuh 1 said, looking at her two struggling teammates. "It's cleaning their gums, and there's nothing they can do about it," she said sadly, worrying about what "Knightbrace" might do to them upon their return. "I'm beginning to think that a certain dentist is behind all this," she continued, putting her hands behind her back and standing confidently as she formed them into fists in front of her. "Well, I have just the plan to deal with the likes of her!"
Numbuhs 3 and 4 emerged from the doorway onto the balcony to look at the scene, the latter having managed to free herself from her confines. "Kids Next Door, are you with me?" she asked them, ready to take on the challenge that was a battle with "Knightbrace."
"Yeah!" they said in response, also pumping their fists in the air, Numbuh 3 accidentally shining his teeth in Numbuh 1's face and Numbuh 4 falling over because of her heavy braces (which hit their leader's foot so hard it made her yelp and hop as she clutched it). They got out some tools to free their teammates, removing all the floss (except some that was still stuck in their mouths, which they managed to move far enough from their gums to prevent that bleeding), and inspecting them for any injuries. When that was done, they prepared to leave for a rematch with that depraved "dentist," ready to stop her activities once and for all.
They all arrived in the alleyway about fifteen minutes later, their eyes peeled, their blueprints drawn out, and their minds as ready as ever to find the devious tooth-hurting figure they knew as Knightbrace and suspected as Dr. Sigrid Teef. They mapped out the area and all the routes of escape, took note of Dr. Teef's office on one side of the alley, and pinpointed their hiding places across the route (Numbuh 1 in a trash can near the emergency exit of Dr. Teef's building, Numbuh 4 in a pile of newspapers at the entrance on Ms. Jelly's side, Numbuhs 2 and 5 in a trash bag in the far right corner near the fence, and Numbuh 3 in Ms. Jelly's air vent). They set out a dummy of Numbuh 1 made out of burlap bags and wood in the center of the alleyway to distract Knightbrace, certain it would hinder her in her mission to eliminate children's plaque no matter the cost. The dummy wore a set of Nicole's spare clothes, had a short brown bald-spooted wig and sunglasses perched upon its head, sported two protruding buckteeth and a pair of yellow hands, held two bags of candies (both from Ms. Jelly and elsewhere in the treehouse), and displayed a paper sign that read "I LUV CAVITIES" on the front (similar to a "KICK ME" sign on someone's back). In addition, they put a huge pink-and-white lollipop in the dummy's hand similar to the one that Kenji had lost earlier, hoping the evil dentist-imitating figure would notice it from a mile away when it came into the area again.
Numbuh 4 poked her head out of her newspapers to scan for onlookers, hoping their mission wouldn't end up a bust even though there weren't usually any customers this late at night. She looked to the left of the candy store on both sides of the street, but no one was walking by them. She did the same on the right, struggling to hold her head up high against her braces' weight, but there were still no onlookers. Finally, she quickly turned her head toward the trash bag containing Numbuhs 2 and 5, signaling them to check on the dummy that stood in the middle of the buildings and their positions.
The Jewish-American girl and the French/African-American boy opened the pag and pulled themselves out enough to see the dummy in its place. Alberto looked to his right, also scanning for any onlookers, but like Willie before him, he couldn't find any. He also looked to his left, but no one was there. When he was sure they were safe, he turned to Hillary, motioning her to observe the dummy with him and keep their eyes open for Knightbrace in case she decided to enter from the entrance opposite the fence. They looked all around them, carefully turning their heads in order to avoid losing any teeth to the sticky green floss, but they couldn't find the evil dentist impersonator anywhere. They closed the bag as best as they could and looked outside a crack they had made with their hands, prepared to signal to their teammates if they saw Knightbrace coming.
While they were doing that, the air vent rattled with Numbuh 3 inside, who carefully moved back to the opening to avoid alerting the villainous "dentist" too early and blowing his and his team's mission. He looked outside the vent, also having his ears open for the tooth-torturing vigilante, and ready to alert his team to her presence. He shuffled quietly to his left to get a better listen to the scene happening around him; ready to find any auditory signal of the villain to get the team to spring up on the villain; but all he could hear was the cool silky wind outside, the fans blowing in the vent, the crickets chirping on the other side of the fence, and the water dripping outside the drainage pipe on the right side of Dr. Teef's office. The wind got stronger after a few minutes, prompting him to move his ear further toward the outside world and investigate what was happening.
Knightbrace was gracefully fluttering around the area like a ballet dancer on feathery ground, feeling the breeze ruffle the folds of her costume, trying to keep the sweet sugary odor of candy out of her nose, and observing the area for her next targets—Ms. Jelly's best customers, Numbuhs 1-5. She scanned the area around her, looking up and down the street lights, but no sign of them anywhere except some of the candies she had indirectly stolen from Numbuh 3 earlier that night. She stared down the alley, looking for any passersby like the numbuhs had done before her, but there was nobody there. When she was about to give up, she saw what she had been looking for—the great and powerful Numbuh 1, or rather a dummy of her. Seeing her chance to finally gain the upper hand, she approached the red turtleneck, stopping and laughing evilly to let it know what she had in store for it. She grabbed her red toothbrush from her utility belt and began scrubbing the dummy's teeth, sending candy flying all over the place toward where the KND operatives were hiding, and laughing menacingly all the while.
Seeing their chance to attack, Numbuh 1 popped her head out of the trash can. "NOW!" she yelled, giving the Japanese boy the all-clear to make his move.
"OK!" Numbuh 3 yelled back, poking his head toward the vent's entrance. He made a big smile with the very teeth the villain had tortured earlier that night, shining a spotlight onto her in a similar manner to the alley light that had bathed him.
"Huh?" said Knightbrace, looking up from her work to discover the light's source.
"Don't move, you freak!" Numbuh 1 interrupted her search from outside her hiding place. She approached the violet-clad figure menacingly, backed by the other three numbuhs and their torturous implements.
"You dare interrupt my sacred mission?!" the villain yelled, holding her toothbrush up to the sky.
"Uh-huh!" Numbuh 4 replied furiously, her speech not completely intelligible but still powerful enough to show her and her team's fury toward Knightbrace for putting these braces on them and ruining their candy-eating fest earlier that night. She jumped forward to attack the evil dentistry specialist, but as soon as she landed, she lost her balance and moved all over the place, struggling to regain it and overpower the weight of her braces.
In response, Knightbrace revealed another trick up her sleeve. "I am the brush, and you are the plaque!" she shouted, making two metal dispensers on her gloves visible for all to see. She pointed them at Numbuh 1 and squirted mint toothpaste out of them. The latter began to ran forward to counter the torrent of dental gel flying at her, but it hit her like a ton of feathers blown by a powerful fan at hypersonic speed, sending her latter flying backward at a heartbeat-stopping speed and pinning her to the fence with an impact that knocked the wind out of her lungs.
Numbuhs 2 and 5, also charged forward, indignated at the villainous quack dentist's punishment of their teammates, hoping to make the most of their floss confines in order to knock her off her feet, but the latter had yet another dastardly trick up her sleeve. She saw them running furiously at her, trying to gain the upper hand, and she put her hands under the metal of her braces. "Now brace..." she began, pulling those braces off of her head and aiming them like a Frisbee at her targets, "for impact!" She threw them toward the two charging numbuhs, literally sweeping them off their feet with the fast-paced rotations and throwing them backwards as they hurtled toward the fence. As soon as they hit the wood, they ricocheted back toward their owner, bouncing off Ms. Jelly's walls and landing back in her mouth as soon as she jumped to retrieve them.
When that was done, she saw Numbuh 3 jump out of the vent, and pulled out her toothbrush again to make her next move. "Now, this won't hurt a bit," she said, stretching it out to a length almost a head shorter than her full height, and began to engage Kenji in a battle for the fate of his teeth. She swung the brush at him as he skipped and sang a merry tune, but he dodged it by hopping right over it. She swung again, trying for an overhead blow, but the Japanese boy jumped above the bristles just before they hit the ground. She tried to crush him again, but he did a backflip jump in the air. "Huh?" she asked, looking around for the operative, but he took her by surprise by literally flashing a smile at her with the same pearly white teeth she had forcibly cleaned earlier, causing her to shield her eyes.
However, Knighbrace had yet another trick up her sleeve, and she wasn't about to concede defeat to the Kids Next Door. She looked at her tooth mirror, seeing victory in its glass, and pulled it out to counter Numbuh 3's attack. "This'll take care of you...in a flash!" she yelled, holding it out in front of his face and directing the light back at him, causing him to black out briefly as he stumbled backwards and shielded his eyes from his own botched attack.
Certain that victory was hers, Knighbrace laughed evilly as she stood triumphantly in the alley, but the KND operatives weren't done yet. Numbuh 4 jumped down from the roof of the building she had climbed upon, ready to attempt a knockout strike without the limitations of her braces, and took the villain by surprise as the other operatives appeared around her. Looking around for an escape route, Knightbrace spied the window into Dr. Teef's building and took one step forward, using her giant toothbrush as a vault pole and performing an acrobatic 360° counterclockwise as she flew into the building and Numbuh 1 watched her land. "After her!" she said to her team, pointing toward the window and then leading the charge inside.
The British girl stepped onto the windowsill and landed on a small cabinet, looking at her darkened surroundings. "The dentist's office..." she began, jumping down on the floor. "Careful, team, we're on her turf now," she continued as the rest of the team followed, Numbuh 5 climbing in and then helping Numbuh 2 do the same, Numbuh 3 gleefully jumping up and down through the windowsill and off the desk, and Numbuh 4 doing a huge backflip as Numbuh 1 turned on the lights to aid in their search. "Spread out and find the maniac."
"She's not in here," Numbuh 3 said, looking down the spit basin on the dentist's chair.
"Not in here either," Numbuh 5 replied as he and Numbuh 2 opened a large wall cabinet in another part of the room.
"Keep looking," Numbuh 1 said as she opened the small cabinet's bottom drawer. She heard an evil laugh coming from the ceiling, but she continued perusing her drawer, suspicious this could be a false flag to catch the evil "dentist's" enemies off guard. "She has got to be around here somewhere."
As she said this, Knightbrace descended from the ceiling, using the lights as her elevator. She looked around the room at her opponents, five very confused operatives having been caught off guard (and being both oblivious and suspicious of the possibility of such), ready for their long-awaited (in her view) "checkup" that would render them helpless to resist the serious pain that would soon arrive at their mouths' doors, and waiting to be defeated once and for all. Little did she know, however, that the very numbuhs she had inflicted her pain upon had another trick up their sleeves: an adult ally who knew how to properly take care of teeth.
"Look out!" Alberto yelled, pointing at the violet-clad villainous "dentist," whom the others sans Nicole noticed. Willie ran forward again, shouting garbled threats through her braces, ready to use her braces to her advantage. She jumped high in the air, doing a front flip that freed the adrenaline trapped inside her heart, and turned her attention toward her opponent's foot to let the latter feel the pain the former had promised her when she'd left the candy store.
"Wha...? Where!?" Numbuh 1 said in confusion, finally noticing the fake dentist as her Australian teammate landed hard on the villain's right foot. Knightbrace let out a loud bloodcurdling scream as she grabbed her foot and hopped toward a spot in front of the small cabinet, looking for somewhere to soothe her foot. However, there was another surprise waiting for her right in the center of the room.
Kenji was standing a few feet in front of the dentist's chair, waiting to finish his score with the insane dentist impersonator. He moved forward, happily anticipating the pain she was about to feel, and felt an excited tinge vibrate through his body as he prepared to lure the evildoer into a false sense of security. "Hi!" he shouted at her, shining his teeth at her once more.
"Oh, hi, how are—" Knightbrace said back, waving at the green sweater-wearing Japanese boy, but the light shot into her eyes again, this time causing her to lean backward and scream in pain. The light went out after a few seconds, during which the villain leaned forward with her eyes closed and her left hand on her throat as if she were choking. When the blinding light faded, she opened her eyes, ready to take revenge on Kenji again, but he had disappeared from her field of vision, which was now all sparkly and resembled the view from a spaceship in hyperspace. There were two reddish forms running toward him, connected by what appeared to be string cables at their heads, one of them fatter and wearing what looked like an aviator hat and goggles, and the other thinner and sporting a prominent mop of hair. These forms turned out to be Hillary and Alberto, the two numbuhs she had tied up with dental floss earlier, and they were charging at her to take her down in tandem.
The Jewish-American girl and the French/African-American boy charged toward the insane unlicensed quack, ready to use their floss for the good of kids everywhere. They ran with determination, certain the evildoer wouldn't use her boomerang braces on them, their footsteps heavy with confidence and their hearts beating faster than someone playing blast beats on a drumset. They spread out as far as they could to pick Knightbrace up, literally sweeping her off her feet, and dragging her toward a corner of the room between the door and the cabinet. They stopped a few feet short of that corner and flung her toward the wall, causing her to hit her head so hard she started groaning in pain as she saw stars.
"Looks like your cavity-fighting career is over, Dr. Sigrid Teef!" Numbuh 1 shouted, approaching the dazed brace-wearing villain as she sat up to recover.
"Dr. Teef?!" Numbuhs 2-5 shouted, surprised that their supposed enemy was completely innocent.
"But i-if you're not...a-and you're the...b-but she and..." Numbuh 1 stammered, struggling to process the turn of events standing right before them. She stood on the ground next to Dr. Teef, debating with herself about how to solve their predicament, until an urgent thought pierced her mind like a fiery arrow. Thinking quickly, she cleared her throat and pulled the mask off of the villain, revealing another surprise: a familiar face was staring straight at them, staring through its round-lensed glasses, showing off its wild mane of iron-gray hair (and a matching mustache), and putting its huge exposed bald spot on display for everyone in the room to see. "Just as I suspected!" Numbuh 1 said, her new theory vindicated and provable by her six witnesses (including Knightbrace herself).
Numbuhs 2-5 stood there in disbelief. The seemingly nice candy store owner who had joked with Numbuh 3, smiled so kindly at the operatives, and invited them into her property a few hours earlier to eat all the candy they wished was the true identity of the villain they had been trying to stop. "Ms. Jelly?!" they burst out, shocked that someone so seemingly nice would turn out to wish the worst upon the kids of the world.
"That's right, you cavity-covered brats!" Ms. Jelly shot back at them, furious at having been discovered as the culprit behind the torturous tooth treatments that had been reported over the last few days. "Ever since I was a child, I wanted to be a dentist!"
Years earlier, a young Ms. Jelly was testing out her passion for dentistry, wearing a clean white shirt and carrying a pair of tooth extraction pliers around, looking for a volunteer for her first procedure. She asked her parents, but they turned her down on the grounds that they'd already had their dentist appointments. She hit up each of her siblings, but they also refused, citing the pain they would feel should this come to pass. Running out of options, she found her dog sleeping on the floor, and snuck up on her when she wasn't looking, pulling out a tooth quickly and causing the dog so much pain she howled throughout the household. Startled at the noise, her parents ran out and stared in horror at the blood dripping from the tooth. They asked their daughter what she was doing, to which she responded that she was trying to be a dentist. They responded by telling her to pursue her dream in a much more humane manner and lecturing her about being a responsible pet owner, but she just stood there, too caught up in her fantasies to listen, until her parents snapped her out of this by asking her how she really wanted to be known. When she gave her answer, her parents nodded and told her to use her gift responsibly, reminding her to stay committed. Ms. Jelly said yes to that, and they all leaned down and comforted the dog, her parents proud at having taught their daugher an important life lesson, their teeth and eyes shining with hope she would one day take it to heart. But little did they know, their daughter would one day become a well-known figure in dentistry for all the wrong reasons.
But I was kicked out of school for trying to put braces on babies!
Ms. Jelly grew up and studied dentistry, scoring high grades in her classes (especially exceeding the teachers' expectations in science and human anatomy), and applied to a prestigious dental school on the other side of Virginia. She spent many hours hopefully writing and revising applications, hoping for a spot on their waitlists, but that one in particular was the one she wanted most, and she looked for a letter of acceptance to that school. When she got that letter, she diligently devoted herself to her studies and began packing and preparing for the big day to come. She moved in her dormitory with her parents' help, ready to tackle all her classes with that same enthusiasm and stellar marks in her prior classes, but unfortunately, that was not to last. There eventually came a day when a horrible discovery was made, an event that would dry up her hopes for graduation and earn her a not-so-comfy spot on the United States' permanent blacklist for the practice of dentistry.
She had been designing a set of tiny braces for babies' (nonexistent) teeth, which she intended to use to straighten their teeth as they grew (and stop the babies from crying in the process), which she would often test on random unsuspecting infants to see the results. She would often sneak out of her dorm room and take pictures of the results, hoping this would earn her recognition and fame. She succeeded in doing this, but in the worst possible way—the administration found them out and decided to take disciplinary action. They held a meeting with Ms. Jelly, discussing the severity of her actions and asking if she had anything to do with the pictures of screaming babies with braces. She confessed to this, explaining that she was trying to do good for their teeth, but the authorities didn't buy this and gave her a piece of paper. She read it with a mortified expression, fearing what would come next, and nodded her head when the authorities told her to move out of her dorm room within 30 days. She dejectedly walked out the door afterward, her dreams crushed and her prospects dim, and looked back at the school for one last goodbye, worrying what would be in store for the rest of her life.
Humiliated by the establishment...
A few months after her expulsion, Ms. Jelly began applying for dentist jobs everywhere she could in Lebanon and the surrounding cities, citing her (limited) expertise in performing efficient dental procedures on patients of all backgrounds and walks of life. She went to the buildings, filling out the application sheets and placing them on the hiring managers' desks, hoping for an open spot to call her name. Most of the time, though, she would either never hear back or be told they were moving on to other candidates, and the few times she got interviews, they would reject her on the spot for having been the one behind the infamous baby braces back in school. Nevertheless, she persisted in her search, looking at newspaper job listings for dentistry and hitting up various dental clinics, but she got similar results.
...I had no choice but to work in my family's candy shop...
Running out of options for dentistry, Ms. Jelly finally resigned to the one job she had dedicated her life to deviating from: working in the candy shop owned by her family. She worked day and night; helping prepare the inventory for sales, ringing up customers at the cash registers, ensuring the dispensers were in tip-top shape, filling the baskets with various confections, sweeping and mopping the floor, and going in and out of the back room to find various candies; but she hated every second of it. Every day she would stare out the window at Dr. Teef's dentist office, longing for another shot at achieving her impossible dream career.
...and watch kid after kid come in to buy cavity-inducing treats!
Ms. Jelly looked around the shop at all the kids running around, helping themselves to all the candies they could possibly eat, and began worrying about the state of their teeth. She saw a lot of greenish gunk and holes and smelled a sea of halitosis, hoping she could clean their teeth with the same energy they exuded, but the demands of her job prevented her.
It was too much!
Ms. Jelly began experiencing stress from all this, which drove her even harder to break out of her role in life.
Too much!
Her hair began turning gray from all the stress as the kids ran out of control.
Too much!
And her mind went spiraling out of control, intensely longing for Dr. Teef to offer her an opening at her office.
Too much!
But after being rejected, she went back to the candy shop and began devising a plan to conduct her insane dental treatment of kids no matter what it took.
So I donned the corrective headgear...
Ms. Jelly held a set of braces to the moon to signal the start of the new her, no longer willing to play the nice candy shop owner persona. She'd donned her dark violet costume, put on her purple gloves and boots, grabbed a belt and a set of dental tools she'd stolen from Dr. Teef's office, and even stuck a big fabric tooth sticker to the front of the costume; ushering in a new era of dental torture and pain to kids in Lebanon, Cleveland, and beyond. She looked up at the moon with resolve...
...and became the Enamel Avenger, Knightbrace!
...and then in front of her again, ready to embrace her new life as the Enamel Avenger.
"To correct the damage I've done!" finished Ms. Jelly, forming her hands into fists, finally prepared at last to take down the greatest threat to her plans—the Kids Next Door.
Dr. Teef stood there indignantly with her hands on her hips, waiting for the failed dentist to finally repent. "But we told you in school, you can't force..." she began to reply, shrugging her shoulders, but Ms. Jelly cut her off.
"Fools!" Ms. Jelly yelled, ready to take down the Kids Next Door once and for all and continue her painful enamel-tearing tooth-cleaning operation. She jumped into the dentist's chair, which was now the centerpiece of a robotic contraption that was equipped with five arms—the two on the upper sides with drills at the end; the topmost one with a large orange light fixture at the wrist; the lower right one sporting a toothpaste tube each in red, green, and blue; and the lower left one wielding a sprayer with a huge white straw. "Four out of five dentists might not be able to beat you Kids Next Door," Ms. Jelly began, forming a fist with her right hand, "but I'm the fifth!" She strapped herself into the mechanical chair, laughing evilly as she prepared its machinery to go straight into the KND operatives' mouths and remove all and any desire for candy within their brains with a cleaning so painful it would throb their memories for many years to come. "Open wide!" she shouted, activating the drills.
"In the name of fluoride," Dr. Teef said, observing the scene and pointing her left index finger to the sky as if she were a superhero announcing herself, "stop this...?" But she was cut off by a blast of jelly speeding toward her like a bullet, hoping to block any attempt to stop the villainous failed dentist from forcefully cleaning her teeth. She screamed as she dodged the blast, jumping out the door as it hit the wall.
Numbuhs 2-5 weren't so lucky, however. Ms. Jelly continued laughing evilly as she fired toothpaste blasts at each of them, pinning them to the wall and knocking the wind out of them. They looked around the room, trying to find anything they could use to get free and help Numbuh 1 fight the dentist, but everything they saw stood out of their reach. With no one to back her up, the British girl nervously looked around the room, looking for a way to avoid being subjected to the same horrific treatment her teammates had experienced.
Ms. Jelly sensed her terror, and was ready as ever to pounce upon her opponent and savor every moment of the latter's pain. "Time for an appointment, Numbuh 1! I have a special treatment for..." she began, turning her chair toward the bald-spotted British girl, "YOU!" She fired three hooks at Nicole, sending the latter running in terror. The desperate operative tried to escape, hoping she could reach the exit and alert Dr. Teef of what was happening, but the hooks latched onto her mouth before she could make it. Before she knew it, she was yanked her back toward the dental chair, helplessly suspended by the three hooks and worrying about what would come next.
Ms. Jelly sadistically looked at the glaring terror Numbuh 1's sunglasses-concealed eyes, the thought of torturing the bald-spotted British girl happily dancing around in her mind like a flower in spring. Tasting her chance for certain victory, she activated a smaller arm on the left side of the torture device, which ended in a drill-like toothbrush ready to tear its way toward the pulp. "Don't worry," she began, dousing the bristles in a small bucket of pink toothpaste, "this paste is a yummy, yummy new flavor..." She pulled the brush out of the bucket and pointed it at Numbuh 1's screaming mouth, preparing to shoot it forward. "Imitation bubble gum," she finished, pressing a button to activate the mechanism.
With that, the drill brush slowly moved forward, emitting a terrible ear-piercing whining noise as it prepared to drench the operative's teeth in endless pink paste that tasted like sand. It pushed its pink vortex closer and closer to her mouth, growing louder and louder, spinning faster and faster, and making Nicole's heart beat faster and faster, but just as it was about to begin its job, the door opened. Dr. Teef had returned to her office.
"Hey, Jelly!" she yelled, dragging a long rope of pink taffy behind her. "Chew on this!" She whipped it forward toward the evil former dental hopeful's mouth to temper her hyperactive sadism.
Sure enough, Ms. Jelly caught the rope in her mouth, her teeth eagerly sinking into its saccharine flesh as she leaned backwards. "Huh?" she asked, leaning forward again and unstrapping her hands to taste it more deeply. "Mmm! Taffy?" she exclaimed, Oh, it's taffy, my delicious weakness!" She began eating it frantically, hoping to savor it as much as possible before she continued Numbuh 1's detrimental dental procedure, but the temptation to keep going kept her mind too occupied for that. "Ooh, delicious!" she excitedly yelled, throwing her hands up to the air, oblivious to the pulled candy clogging the drills. "Delicious taffy!"
The taffy spread throughout the machine like wildfire, stretching its fingers onto the sprayer and then onto the drill brush, but Ms. Jelly didn't seem to care. "Taffalicious!" she yelled, too ecstatic to speak coherently as she raced to finish as much as she could before it ran out. "Oh, so good! So good! Oh taffy, taffy! Oh, taffy! Yes, yes, yes!" she continued as the machine faltered, which freed Numbuh 1 and gently placed her on the ground where she picked the last hook out of her mouth, chewing on the sweet treat much faster than normal until she passed out.
About fifteen minutes later, the battle was over. The depraved unlicensed dentist villain was vanquished, still moaning and groaning from all the taffy in her stomach, and the whole machine was covered in gobs upon gobs of taffy that stretched across and waited for unsuspecting people to savor its taste like a spider's web tempting its creator's prey. The other numbuhs had managed to free themselves from the sticky toothpaste on the walls, recovering from the impacts, but the torturous treatments remained. Numbuh 1 and Dr. Sigrid Teef stood in front of the candy-encrusted machine, proud at their efforts to stop Ms. Jelly/Knightbrace from threatening another day.
"Well, that puts an end to Knightbrace," Numbuh 1 said, confidently looking at the conked-out villain lying on the chair.
"The dental establishment will do its best to reform Ms. Jelly," Dr. Teef said in agreement, hoping the evil "dentist" could learn some meaningful things from her insane episodes.
"But what'll happen to the candy store?" Numbuh 2 asked, worried about the future of their candy-eating habits.
"Oh, my lazy sister-in-law will be happy to take over," the dentist responded, waving her hands, her eyes glittering at the brighter future that awaited both her office and the villain's former store. "But in the meantime," she continued, pointing her left finger up to the sky and then making another great showman gesture, "how about that free checkup?"
The numbuhs stood there in disbelief for a few minutes, seeming to take in the importance of clean teeth, but then they laughed again just like they had done earlier, walking away from the scene to get their torturous treatments undone. "'Free checkup,'" Numbuh 5 said as they left, leaving Dr. Teef standing there bewildered as they continued to laugh, and then Numbuh 4 interjected "Freak!" through her braces, causing the dentist to growl angrily like before.
While the numbuhs walked back to their treehouse, they laughed about all the funny experiences they had had that night, bringing up the irony of the candy store owner being the one behind the Knightbrace mask, and talking about all the candy they would eat when they were finally free. They had overcome one of childhood's greatest enemies yet, ensuring kids would be free to enjoy all the candy their hearts desired, and the very establishment that had rejected her would try its best to get her mind back on track. This was another victory for the Kids Next Door, in more ways than one, and it would certainly serve as a reminder for more great days yet to come.
End Transmission
The next chapter, "Operation: P.I.R.A.T.E.," will also be up within the next 4-8 weeks. To get it done, I'll try using a method where I write the dialogue (and some of the actions) first to finish the skeleton, then put the rest of the meat on the turkey by writing a little of it each day. I hope that'll get things done quicker, but like I said, I'll still be slowing down my schedule to manage it easier. Be on the lookout for when it comes up, and feel free to leave reviews and stuff explaining on areas I can improve in! I'll focus on writing as much as I can with as little procrastination and as few distractions as possible!