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The spy terminal was an impressive room, filled to the brim with beeping, high-tech equipment. There was a platypus sized space-suit, a glowing neon platypus-sized transportation tube, a platypus shaped hover vehicle parked in the corner, and an assortment of other platypus themed gizmos, most of which only the nerdy boy who had created them knew how to work. The only thing that seemed to be missing was a certain secret agent to use all this gear; a fact that had not gone unnoticed by the frustrated face that was staring out at the room from a huge computer screen.
“Carl!" Barked the man on the screen, tired of waiting for their expected guest.
“Yes, Major Monogram?” A young male voice responded from off-screen.
“Where’s Agent P?” The Major questioned gruffly. His eyes were still focused on the empty spiny chair in front of him.
“His owners brought him on their day trip to Madagascar, sir.”
“Well, why isn’t he answering our summon?”
The young man entered onto the screen, adjusting his purple glasses with one hand while holding a clipboard in the other. “We don’t have any bases in Madagascar; we figured we would never need any.” He answered the older man, holding out the clipboard as evidence.
“… Really?” The irritation had drained out of the Major’s voice, replaced with mild surprise.
“Yes, sir.” The intern replied.
There was a short pause. The Major seemed a bit confounded by this newfound information. They had entrances to their secret underground lairs in Antarctica, for Pete’s sake. How had he managed to miss such an important island as Madagascar?
“I-in that case, contact agent S. The Tri-State Area is at stake!” the Major ordered as he tried to recompose his professional demeanor.
“Agent S is tracking down Dr. Diminutive today, sir.”
“Er… in that case, call Agent C.”
“She’s on maternity leave this month, sir. Just had a litter of kittens. She’s looking for a home for them, if you’re interested…”
The Major’s face lit up. “Of course! I just love little… don’t get me off topic, Carl!”
“Sorry, sir.”
“Hmmm… Is Agent L available?”
“No, sir”
“Agent G?”
“Nope”
“Agen—“
“Busy, sir.” Carl told him, flipping through the papers on his clipboard.
“Gosh darn it Carl! Doofenshmirtz is up to something! Someone has got to stop him.” He gave his intern a pointed look.
“Me, sir? But don’t you remember the last time you asked me to do a mission?” Carl protested. The Major let up a grunt of acknowledgement at the memory.
“Then who do you suppose we send? All of our Agents are busy… what can we do.” The Major honestly seemed stumped.
“Did you go through spy training at the Academy, sir?” Carl offered meekly.
“Well, yes… but it’s been an awfully long time since I’ve been out on the field…” The Major chuckled nervously, looking around for someone, anyone else to lay the task on.
“Aw, come on Major!” Carl said happily. “You can do it! Besides, The Tri-State Area is at stake!”
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“Don’t we have any bigger vehicles, Carl?” The Major complained from Perry’s lair.
Carl had to admit, Major Monogram did look pretty funny trying to squeeze into the little hovercraft meant for a tiny aquatic mammal not much bigger than a small dog. His knees were sticking out at odd angles and his elbows were squeezed to his sides in order to keep hold of the tiny steering wheel. If Carl had been there next to him, instead of remaining safe at headquarters, he probably would have liked to have had his camera with him. As it was, the connection between bases only transferred images, not capturing them, so Carl had to just try his best to commit the picture to memory.
“Don’t worry sir, I already checked and it should be able to hold your weight fine.” Carl said, holding back laughter. It had taken some convincing to get the Major to agree, and he really didn’t want to have to go through the whole dance routine again… “Well, you’re all set sir. I’ll stay here at headquarters to keep an eye on things… Get ready for launch in 3… 2…”
“Wait, wait!” Major Monogram interrupted. “I haven’t even been briefed on my mission yet! Honestly Carl, don’t you know anything about how to direct spies?”
“But sir, you already know all the details of the mission! You had them all ready to read to Agent P and everything!” Carl protested.
“I have to be briefed before going out on a mission. It’s “How to Spy 101” Carl, you can’t just abandon the basics because they’re unnecessary. How would we get anything done?” Monogram argued. Having an intern was helpful at times, but Carl could be so clueless.
“Ugh, fine!” Carl conceded. “Doctor Doofenshmirtz has been buying up all the pillows in the Tri-State area, blah blah blah, must be up to something, blah blah blah, Good luck agent… H?”
“Agent Monogram” The Major corrected. “Human spies are always referred to by their surname. Keep that in mind.”
“Anyway…” Carl huffed, “Take off in 3…2…1!”
For all his complaining, Carl was still sure that the Major would be able to do a good job. How could he not? He was practically the face of rough-and-tough movie spies.
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“The building is in sight, Carl. I’m going in. Over and out.” Monogram barely managed to press the button to turn off the speaker from his position, never taking his eyes off of the oddly shaped skyscraper in front of him. For all the years that he had been sending Perry here to stop his nemesis, he had never actually visited it himself. He wondered somewhere in the back of his mind if the interior was as purple as the rest of it.
He set the vehicle to hover just outside of the 50th floor; 5 floors above where Doofenshmirtz was last reported to be living. Monogram carefully squeezed himself out of the tight space until he could stand, balancing himself on the seats.
Now, where was that grapple? He grabbed the hooked gun from a compartment in the dashboard and aimed at a particularly nasty gargoyle hanging off the side of the building. Making a mental note to talk to Heinz later about his horrendous taste in architecture, he fired. The Major gave the rope a sharp pull to ensure that it was caught, took a deep breath, and jumped off the hovercar.
The rope seemed to hold was weight well, and Monogram prayed that it would stay that way as he set his feet on the side of the building, ready to scale down to the 45th story window. He remembered this feeling of danger from his time as an agent, a slip of the hand and he could be falling to his death, but he had been a lot more confident then and a lot less heavy. Still, the adrenaline rush was a welcome change from his safety behind the scenes, and dangling there hundreds of feet in the air he tried to remember why he had ever retired in the first place.
After scaling about 40ft down, Monogram carefully peered through the window and saw a familiar head of wacky brown hair standing in front of some type of large ray for a split second before drawing back to avoid being seen. He was in the right place, now came the breaking in.
Momentum was the best way to break anything down, he remembered from his lessons at the Academy. It worked worlds better than any sort of brute force he could get hanging by a thread. Luckily he had come prepared. Monogram leaned forward and grabbed the heel of his right shoe, lifting it back to reveal a small rocket hidden there. He quickly did the same to his left, then leaned back and waited for only a couple of seconds before the rockets lit up, sending him flying backwards, still tightly gripping the grapple. He leaning to the left and stuck his legs out towards the building. In a second the tension from the rope was pulling him back towards the building.
As soon as the Major’s feet made contact with the Plexiglas window he let go of the rope as the window gave way and he was sent tumbling though. Not giving Doofenshmirtz a second to react to the noise, which had been softened by the large piles of pillows that he had landed on, he rolled onto his feet and prepared a snappy remark in his head. But before Monogram could blink a small cage, about the perfect size for a small aquatic mammal, had fallen onto his head.
He stood there dazed for a few seconds, before coming back to his senses and realizing that Doofenshmirtz hadn’t even bothered to turn around. He was still facing the large ray, and seemed to be tinkering with some of the wiring.
“Not now Perry the Platypus, can’t you see that I’m busy?” He said with an impatient tone.
Monogram, staring through the bars of the tiny cage, cleared his throat before replying. “Doofenshmirtz…” He began, a silent threat following the word.
“I mean, you would think that if you order an evil ray, you would get an evil working ray, wouldn’t you? I paid good money for this thing, and I can’t even use it until I get these stupid wires fixed…”
“Doofenshmirtz!” Monogram tried again to get the Evil Scientist’s attention as he lifted the cage off of his head and threw it onto a nearby pile of pillows.
Doofenshmirtz gave a small yelp when the green and red wires were not, in fact, the correct combination and sent a small shock through him in response. Shaking his hand, he continued. “There’s no use trying to get out of that cage, so I would appreciate it if you would please be quiet. I to concentrate on this Perry, it…”
“DOOFENSHMIRTZ!” Monogram yelled, thoroughly irritated.
This time he was heard, and Doofenshmirtz spun around 180 degrees, ignoring the blue electricity ringing through his hand. “You!” he gasped. “What are you doing here?” And then noticing the angry look on Monogram’s face and the discarded cage in the corner began to chuckle nervously. “W-where’s Perry the Platypus?”
“Agent P is… busy. Very very busy. I’m here to stop you instead!” Monogram informed him. “Buying up all the pillows in the Tristate Area... what are you planning?” He asked accusingly.
Doofenshmirtz recovered from his initial disappointment of missing his nemesis for the day faded quickly. “Well you see,” He began, “As a young boy growing up in Druelselstein, I was made to sleep outside on the cold, hard ground every single night. I would –“
“I don’t have time for time for your flashbacks!” Monogram interrupted, irritated. Honestly, did Perry always put up with all of this silliness?
Doofenshmirtz, pride injured, put on an indignant face and replied, “Well then” He snapped “Let’s just say, that I’m going to put the Tri-State Area to sleep for a long, long time! Hahahaha!” He smirked and began laughing to himself as he hurriedly ran to the other side of his ray, and got ready to press the largest red button on the control panel.
“Not so fast!” Monogram yelled, leaping forward as Doofenshmirtz took aim at the open window. But Doofenshmirtz, still grinning at the thought of the Tri-State area’s impending fate, pushed the button.
“Gaaaaaaah!” Doofenshmirtz screamed as the machine malfunctioned, sending flying backwards into a wall, with small bolts of electricity still flickering on his skin.
Monogram walked over to stand above him, examining Doofenshmirtz’s dazed eyes and newly spiky hair while shaking his head. “I was about to warn you…” said, laughing at the sight.
Doofenshmirtz just lifted his head to see his machine, completely fried, and let out a miserable groan.
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Monogram entered his favorite bar (they always played his favorite jazz artist) and hung his jacket up on one of the available racks before taking an available seat next to a man in a white lab coat.
He greeted the bartender with a smile and nod of his head before turning to his companion. “So, Doofenshmirtz, how’s your week been?” He asked merrily.
“Hmpf! I’m not talking to you.” Doofenshmirtz glared and turned to face the other way.
Monogram just gave a big smile and clapped him on the back. “Come on! No hard feelings about today! It was fun going against you myself for once.”
Doofenshmirtz sighed and resting his head in his hands, seeming embarrassed. “It didn’t even work! What a lousy invention!”
“Don’t worry, you’re a great evil villain. Today was just a fluke, is all. Here, drinks are on me tonight.” He attempted to console his friend, motioning the bartender over to order. “Anyway, I have to talk to you about those gargoyles you have on that building of yours…”