Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

"What a perfect plan. Nothing could possibly go wrong." Alright, I'll give you one guess as to who said that. If you read the introduction, you'd know it was Thaddeus who thought that. Now, I bet you did read the introduction and guessed just fine but just wait until later. I'll catch you skipping paragraphs.

As you likely know, any story involving time travel is sure to have something go wrong. It's the whole butterfly effect thing. Change the past, alter the future. While you'd think that would happen here, Thaddeus, being the genius he was, had carefully planned for exactly that. You see, he was going to get revenge on his annoying neighbors. You see, those pricks where always building annoying things that violated H.O.A. rules. They needed to be stopped. Thaddeus had built just the machine to do it, a time machine.

Quickly, he hopped in and set the machine to a very important date, one where very important history was made. When the time machine arrived in the past, Thaddeus looked around. He needed to find a red headed chick dating a tall, thin British man. After searching for a while, he found them.

"Now, time to ruin their date." He snuck up on the lovers, discreetly grabbed the British guy's arm, and made him slap the redhead. Thaddeus then made a run for it, returning to his time machine and sending off to the time in which he was from.

Once he got home, Thaddeus was eager to see how he'd changed the future. He was certain his actions would prevent his neighbors from remarrying, preventing their kids from teaming up to cause him misery. When Thaddeus looked over the fence into his neighbor's yard, he saw nothing; no inventions, no fun, no any of that stuff. He staked out there in secret the entire day, hoping to see some sign of change besides nothing. At dusk, he resigned for the night, but the next morning, he was at and at it again. He was sure the Flynn's still lived there, as he'd seen the women of the house leave, but the triangle headed one was nowhere to be seen. Thaddeus soon devised a plan. Using a disguise, he would walk up to the front door and ring the doorbell. When he did this, the respective target answered the door.

"Would you be willing to sign this petition to end the neighborhood ban chicken coups." Thaddeus said. It was a perfect cowl for his true intentions.

The triangle headed person just sort of shrugged and muttered his way through the conversation, but Thaddeus had information to pull out.

"How come you're not around too often?" Thaddeus asked.

"Eh, nobody wants to be my friend." Triangle replied.

"What about the Helga expy across the street?" Thaddeus asked in response.

"She's too clingily. She's always clinging to me, literally." Triangle said.

"Must be harsh in a single parent household." Here we are, money time.

"Yep, I can't even remember having a father figure around to help guide me." Ha, ha, ha. Triangle head got screwed. Thaddeus was very excited, and after getting home, decided to throw a sleepover and invite all triangles former friends, except for his crazy lover, and everyone had a great time and they become best friends, much to triangles dismay.

"So, what's the problem with it?" Real world Thaddeus asked while Thor moved the paper to his side.

"That it's embarrassing and it sucks." Thor replied with a monotone ring to his voice that would such the air out of most conversationalist throat. Thaddeus was riled up though, so he pressed forward.

"No, it's not!"

Thor was not amused by this passionate defense. "The narrator uses 'I' while narrating."

Although Thaddeus should have just given up at this point, he didn't. "So?"

"Your multi-day story only took up one page, your grammar sucked, the plot sucked, it just sucked." Thaddeus found this argument rather unconvincing and proceeded to explain why.

"It wasn't written to be a masterpiece; it was just written for instant gratification."

Thor put a hand to his forehead. "Any bloke can do that; a true writer will flesh out their story and further examen themes and character influences."

As Thaddeus was now dug in on his stance, he refused his brother's point, which was actually rather sound, with the ultimate counterpoint. "Shut up with your hogwash! If you're so fine and cultured, you do better." Deva sass aside, Thor actually stopped momentarily to consider this point. It was a momentary stop though, and he soon replied.

"I could quite easily, but it really wouldn't be a worthwhile endeavor." Thor replied, attempting to be as condescending as possible. This tone of delivery served to calm his brother down.

"Bla, bla, bla, I don't want to hear it. Stop depriving my story!" Thaddeus yelled, frustration echoing in his voice.

"Only once you stop yelling." Thor replied.

"I'm not yelling now." Although Thaddeus needed to revisit the insult dictionary, he had succeeded in getting Thor to pause his verbal assault for a moment.

"That was a poor choice of words." Thor conceded.

"What does that mean?"

Thor gave a smug look. "I'm still going to deprive your piss take story."

Thaddeus looks intensely at his brother. "Shut up."

"You shut up." Thor playfully replied

"No, you!"

"Who's even talking now?" Thor asked.

"Stop stalling, turd face."

Thor remained calm in the face of this scorn. "What? That insult has no basis in real life."

"This is real life, you dumb butt. It's not some stupid story where people said dumb things for the entertainment of an unseen audience."

Thor stared at his brother blankly. "You're a moron."

"What, that comeback is pathetic. I called you a turd face for goodness's sake, and you can only come up with moron?" Thaddeus proudly stated. "Get outta town you loser."

"Says the person who authored Thaddeus's revenge story?"

"It was a draft!" Thaddeus was undoubtably triggered, but Thor, of boy, the hammer man had one hell of a good thought going.

"Whatever, it did give me a totally radical idea, bro."

Thaddeus was confused. "Are you joking with me? Bro? What's with the change in tone?"

Thor remained stern faced, and replied "I'm serious about this, alright?"

After rolling his eyes, Thaddeus conceded. "Alright, but what are you serious about?"

Now moving and speaking with intent, Thor started "We've tried to recover from that embarrassing contest for way to long now, right?"

"You mean the fort building contest with Phineas and Ferb, our next-door neighbors?"

"Yes Mr. Exposition. Now your story gave me an idea for an easy way to get back at them."

After spending a moment, if that, contemplating the implication of his brother's statement, Thaddeus replied. "Ending the neighborhood ban on chicken coops?" Although Thaddeus should have been checked for a concussion at that moment, he wasn't.

"No, you turd head." Thor replied condescendingly. "All we need to do is unleash the power of love."

"With a love machine?" To put it lightly, this was a horrible idea on Thaddeus's part, one that Thor would normally berate, but not at this important moment.

"No." Thor mildly corrected. "By revealing that his best friend is madly in love with him, causing a spiral of recuperation that will take him and that whore down a dark path, while driving the two brothers apart."

"Stepbrothers."

"Whatever. It is a scheme so easy to execute, what could possibly go wrong?"

"A few things actually." Thaddeus said while rolling his eyes. "The least of which is that both he and that whore have actual friends and such. It's not like they'd just abandon them while they go down this vague 'dark path'."

Despite the opposition, Thor remained indentured. "Alright, consider this then, when triangle head learns the truth from us, he will say something along the lines of 'why didn't anybody tell me?' when it becomes clear that everyone else knew, it will dampen his friendships, and at a minimum, improve his perception of us."

"But under that same line of logic, wouldn't his then love interest be pissed at us for spilling the beans?"

"First of all, we have no obligation to let her or her open secrets. Secondly, how long will she really be mad when Phineas throws her a big picnic or some other romantic thing?"

Thaddeus took a long moment to chew on this thought, rubbing his chin as he did so. Moments later, he was ready with a response. "But what if he already knows?" he innocently asked.

Thor was beside himself. "The hell...? What stupid theory is this?"

I his typical, dumfounded way but still somehow uptight way, Thadeus responded. "What if he just really likes her as a friend or something dumb like that?"

"Here's the last thing I'll say on the manner." Thor said with an exhale. "Those two are just too perfect for one another to not hit it off. If we can pull this off in a natural way, things will play out just like the romances of those horribly written Disney Channel teen shows."

Thaddeus gave a bemused look. "As in?"

"As in this place will either become a cringey sitcom, a romantic comedy, or those losers will become boring and fade into oblivion." Although Thor seemed correct, Thaddeus still wasn't buying it.

"I don't know Thor; this whole situation just seems too easy. What if those two hit it off, but it doesn't change their group dynamics enough to create a major chance? What if they behave like actual people and have their young love squashed with time?"

"Do you hear yourself? Part of Phineas and Ferb's ethos is to banish the normal and ordinary in favor of creativity and imagination. I'd bet you that by tomorrow they'll be turning the entire town into a romantic theme park."

Ignoring his brother's trap bet, Thaddeus mused on another topic. "But where does love fall into that ethos. I mean, people say love sets you free as much as it weighs on you... I guess."

"Just as soon as you have an intelligent thought going, you blow it." Thor Smugly stated. "Maybe you should actually listen more carefully, then my elegant prose might rub off on you."

Thaddeus paused for a moment, grimaced, then said, "Will you shut up if we just do the thing?"

"After we do it, yeah."

"Well then," Thaddeus started, "where do we begin?"

Thor clinched his teeth. "Were you even listening for the past five minutes?"

"Yes, but we need more details for this to be an actual plan, you know."

"Fair enough." Thor replied with an accompanying eye roll.

"So?" Thaddeus asked, seemingly at random.

Thor gave his brother a tired look. "What?"

"How will we execute your plan?"

Giving his brother a smug smile, Thor gave an answer few others could pull off. "I'll tell you after we've waited for tension rises sufficiently."

Thaddeus inhaled. "Or you could just tell me now and get this over with quickly."

"But that would be boring." Thor started with bland and upright contempt. "It would be like watching a movie where the hero doesn't waste valuable seconds on an emotional goodbye to a friend or loved one, and instead just goes to save the world."

Thaddeus could only shake his head. "I'm not sure that example is applicable to our situation."

Thor continued on his condescending reign. "Right, because you're just so genre savvy about these things."

"What did I ever do to deserve this?" Thaddeus muttered.

"Well..." Thor began, only to be immediately and violently interrupted.

"Besides the story Thor!"

Thor laughed at this reaction, only managing to respond after he'd recomposed himself. "Trust me, you've still done plenty of things."

Once more, Thaddeus shook his head and sighed. "This sucks."

Chapter Text

"Okay, here we go." Thor said. He and Thaddeus were situated close to their neighbor's backyard gate and were fully prepared to execute their master plan.

"By the way, when do you use 'okay' as opposed to 'ok'?" Alright, scratch that, they were mostly prepared to execute their master plan.

"What are you talking about? Spelling?" Being that this was a series moment, Thor had precious little patience for his brothers' antics.

Thaddeus replied nonchalantly. "Uh, yeah."

Frustrated by the lack of urgency, Thor made sure Thaddeus got the point. "It's time for my radical plan you blockhead! It's not time to worry about spelling!"

"Ok, what's the plan again?" Thaddeus replied, not changing his tone.

"We've been over this ten times already!" Now, Thor wasn't one to boil over in anger. In fact, he tended to react to situations in appropriate ways, which occasionally meant yelling at his brother, but mostly meant patronizing him.

"I know, I just want to make sure we don't screw this up." Thaddeus's face was as flat as possible when he spoke, along with his voice, which was bland enough to make a camel go flat.

"We already did this you moron. Besides, it is impossible to screw this up. All we need to do is 'argue' with each other about the hole crush thing, Phineas will check it out, and we'll mic drop the obvious truth. Even if he doesn't believe us, he will try to help resolve the conflict, and whatever machine he builds will reveal the undeniable truth."

The words of Thor's speech hit Thaddeus like ocean waves on a Scottish cliff. He made a light nod before belting out the following. "Okay, I just have one question though."

"Oh, now you have a question." Thor mumbled, intending the comment as an aside.

"Yeah, I do." For the first time in ten minutes, Thaddeus spoke with vigor. "If it's so obvious that... oh, what's her name..."

Thor gratefully offered an assist. "Isabella."

Undeterred, Thaddeus continued on. "... Isabella, right, is incredibly infatuated with the Phineas there, why hasn't anybody said anything to him about it?"

Given the choice to speak a half truth, Thor's tone lightened with his reply. "Because they're afraid of the consequences Thaddeus. I'd be like Lois Lane and Superman getting hitched. There'd be so many wildcards, no sane writer would ever do it."

Thaddeus was unimpressed. "I'm pretty sure that's happened a few times actually."

In spite of this counterpoint, Thor continued explaining. "Alright, how about this. There's a reason romantic arcs are never resolved. Nobody really cares what happens once a couple split it out, because at that point the love story has no endpoint and becomes boring."

Thaddeus replied. "But that's not really the point. Superman, to the best of my knowledge, is really just there to be cool. A super powerful being saving the city or the planet or whatever shouldn't be contained to a love story. Even if he is, your 'Superman' character is still awesome enough to anchor a cool story, irrespective of his relationship status."

While most people would make a concession at this point in the argument, Thor used his keen communication skills to do otherwise. "You just came so close to making my point for me. If 'Superman' has a girlfriend, he'll still go on dates and show out for Valentine's Day. We're trying to put Superman in a hallmark movie. That's the endgame here."

Knowing how these arguments usually spiraled into nonsense, Thaddeus decided he had had enough. "Good to know."

"So, you understand now?" Thor asked.

"Completely, except for one little thing."

"What!?" If murder were legal... let's not go there.

"It would take a total moron not to see that she likes him," Thaddeus explained, "so it would be suspicious of us to argue over such a factual thing."

In response to this question, Thor raised an excellent counterpoint. "Well, I happen to know just the moron for the part."

Thaddeus gave a stern look. "I am not a moron."

"I have evidence to suggest otherwise."

"No, no! That doesn't count!" Thaddeus screeched.

Seeing that their conversation had made an academic turn, Thor figured he would keep it on point. "What about the time with the fort?"

"Alright, two things. First, we just did this ten minutes ago. Second, what does that have to do with..."

Thor rolled his eyes. "Isabella."

"Thank you." Thaddeus muttered through grated teeth, "Isabella's crush?"

"It matters because it was all your idea." Thaddeus had no good counter argument to this.

"Hey, it was a good fort!"

"But you still lost that bet." Thankfully, the two brothers' loud bickering was soon interrupted by a familiar voice.

"Uh, what are you two doing." Phineas asked. He was standing in the shadow his oversized gate with a perplexed look adorning his face.

"Oh, Phineas, long time no see. How's it been?" Thaddeus said in the most casual way he could.

"Fairly well Thaddeus, all the typical summer things. In fact, we had another awesome summer day going, but then me and Ferb heard you yelling and came to see if you were okay." If you were ever going to depress people with positivity, Phineas had just done it. Yeah, his life was just sunshine and rainbows.

"Trust me, we are fine. Me and Thor where just having a stupid argument about if Izzabelly..."

"Isabella." Thor corrected, this time doing an accompanying facepalm.

Ashamed, Thaddeus continued his statement. "...Isabella had a crush on you."

"HAS a crush on him." Thor added dryly.

Thaddus turned his head toward his brother. "Shut up Thor."

"I'm not listening to someone who denies the obvious truth."

Thaddeus sighed. "We just went over this a point a minute ago."

"But you were still wrong." Thor replied unflinchingly.

"Shut up!"

Before Thaddeus's anger could boil over, Phineas interrupted.

"I'm confused." he said, turning to a suddenly present Ferb, seemingly in need of confirmation, before his attention to his neighbors. "How could Isabella have a crush on me?"

"Well, just from casual observation, I would point to her last birthday as a good bit of evidence."

"I hope you weren't stalking her, Thor." Thaddeus said, making an accompanying side eye and pointing gesture to go along with his dry, smug wit.

Thor looked at his brother with mock sincerity. "Did you not hear that sad song she sang about alone time with our neighbor."

Phineas once again looked perplexed. "What song?"

"I don't know, ask Mr. Creep." Thaddeus helpfully added.

Thor spoke up, "What do you want? I'm not going to do a rendition of it. It's not like we just have a video of it, and it's too bad we don't, because if we did, there would be no debating that I'm correct."

As expected, Phineas knew a way to resolve the important question at hand. "Actually, I have a friend named Irving who records most of our adventures. He probably has some footage from that day."

Thaddeus asked a question, not out of tenacity, but instead out of scatterbrained curiosity. "Dumb question here, but has he been filming people without consent?"

Thor immediately added to his brother's comment. "Yeah Thaddeous, you're right. He could get in serious legal trouble for doing that. If nothing else, we should make sure he's blurred people's faces or something like that."

"You know what? Do you and Thaddeous want to go with Ferb and me to Irving's house? We could check that technicality and resolve your debate all at once." Phineas asked as though he was asking a normal question.

The tension present in Thaddeus's face lifted as he responded. "Sounds Good to me. Thor?"

"Yep, let's do it." Thor replied, subtly smiling as he did.

"Alright," Thaddeus stated. "we'll follow your lead."

"Alright. Ferb, let's go." Phineas said, immediately walking off in toward their desired location.

Thaddeus and Thor looked at each other in confusion. "Eh, no idea." Thor muttered before heading off after them, Thaddeus not far behind.

Irving's room is an interesting place. It's the type of place that borders on the cusp of cool and creepy, where you're uncertain as to if the blotches illuminated by the black light where a disease of a decoration. Fortunately, Thaddeus was keen to screw around and find out.

"Why do you keep everything on CD's?" Thaddeus asked while running his hands down Irving's extensive bookshelf.

Irving gave the most boring response he could. "So I own a physical copy of what I've filmed."

"Makes sense, you don't want to lose any digital copies." Thaddeus replied indecisively, still distracted by the contents of the room.

For a moment, the indistinguishable clamoring of Phineas and Ferb was the only sound present, creating a chaotic symphony of sound. Irving soon spoke up. "So, I have a question for you."

Thaddeus turned to face Irving. "Let's hear it."

"Why were you and Thor arguing about something that obviously true?"

This question put Thaddeus in a drab. He had just asked that stupid question to his stupid brother, but no, that moron couldn't bother to answer, that stupid head was off in another room doing God knows what. Still, Thaddeus was capable, and cleanly responded, "Uh, the best way to explain it is that we've been out of the loop for the better part of a year. After that fort building contest, we just tried to keep out of it. There's always uncertainty as to how people's feelings change with time, and I was just trying to point out that we don't know crap. She could have finally given up. I mean, it sounds unlikely, but it's not imposable."

Irving somehow comprehended Thaddeus's blurb, replying instantly and confidently. "I can tell you, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that she still likes him."

"Wow, what a shocking revelation." Thaddeus replied flatly.

Irving wasn't does yet though, as he procced to fluently build off his earlier statement. "There is one important thing I should tell you though"

"Oh boy." Thaddeus muttered, his right hand to his forehead as he did.

"Oh boy indeed." Irving acknowledged. "You see Isabella has made everyone vow to keep her 'crush'..."

"Small crush, nothing significant." Thaddeus added, a smug, condescending smile adoring his face.

"Precisely." Irving replied with a knowing brow. "Anyway, everyone has promised, basically at gunpoint, to keep her crush a secret, such that Phineas could come upon his feelings naturally, and your whole argument situation sort of messed that up."

"What do you want?" Thaddeus said with faux exaggeration. "We didn't sign an N.D.A. Plus, someone was bound to crack anyway, and it's not like she was being subtle about it."

"You're not wrong," Irving started, "but you should probably watch out for some form of retribution."

"I'll keep that in mind." At this point, Thaddeus was just happy to have a conversation without insults and continued to a new topic of conversation. "Jeez, girls can be so awkward when it comes to 'liking' people or whatever. They act like these things are a lifelong commitment when it's just pointless puppy love."

"Well, in Isabella's case, it might be a bit more than puppy love."

"Listen to yourself Irving." Thaddeus replied, continuing his eccentric delivery. "This isn't a rom-com. Grown adults can't live together for two days before the yelling starts. You can't seriously think a couple of children will turn warm, fuzzy feelings into something meaningful long term?"

Irving gave a thoughtful look. "I don't know, Isabella has been rather persistent about this thing."

"As you would know, given your aptitude for secret cameras." Thaddeus said with a playfully undertone.

"They are very helpful in reveling things."

In response to Irving's weirdly innocent defense, Thaddeus took the high road. "I'm not going to take the layup there, but I hope to God you don't have bathroom cameras setup."

"Come on! Even I know that's a recipe for trouble."

"Good, we don't want any of that."

Irving once again looked concerned. "Any of what?"

Looking at Irving as thought he was and idiot, Thaddeus explained, "Trouble! Trouble, Irving? what did you think I was talking about?"

Irving looked around innocently. "I don't know, secret cameras?"

For whatever reason, Thaddeus found humor in this. "Ha... I don't think you need any more of those."

"Oh yeah," Irving replied daringly, "what if Phineas makes even more friends, then I'll need a few more backyard cameras."

"If what you say about Isabella is true, I don't think you'll need to do that soon."

Irving raised his eyebrows pompously. "You'd be surprised."

"Well, I guess we'll see." Thaddeus added with a slight laugh.

"If you survive the retribution."

Although Irving had said these works playfully, they did make a mark on Thaddeus. He was much more somber than before when he added, "I am not looking forward to that."

Irving shook his head. "You really shouldn't."

Stil, Thaddeus was confident, and sighed dismissively while saying, "Oh, what's the worst that can happen?"

At that moment, the door to Irving's room opened, from which Thor adamantly made his presence felt.

"Hey, have you two confirmed I'm right yet, or are you just stalling for time?"

A frustrated Thaddeus was the first to take up a response. "If I just said you were right, would you shut up already?"

Thor was humble in victory. "Nope! I'm going to ride this victory lap as long as I can."

"Great." Thaddeus mumbled.

"Don't be such a sucker Thaddeus. Now come on, let me see this proof already."

As it happened, Irving's old, blocky computer had a clip ready to play. "Okay, I've taken one very specific clip from three days ago that undoubtably resolves this conflict. Observe."

As the video begins, we see Isabella alone in her room, looking out her window at her neighbor's house and holding a framed picture of Phineas.

"Oh Phineas, I... I just cannot live without you. No matter how hard I try, you... you... just, overwhelm my senses."

She then shifts her eyes away from the window toward the picture in her hands.

"Phineas, oh Phineas... "she said as she slid her finger along the length of Phineas's photo body.

"I know we still have a long time to wait, but the moment where you can final take me as yours and yours alone, it will be everything I've ever wanted."

She proceeds to turn and walk away from the window, still looking at the picture, and eventually holding it tight against her chest.

"Until then, you, me where stuck playing our universe's cruel games."

As she placed the picture on her nightstand, she grimaced and shook her head, clearly going into some sort of daydream.

She closed her eyes and spoke into space, "I love you Phineas Flynn, with all my heart. I'm sorry for making it so hard for you to have fun and seize the day. I know I'm obsessive, eccentric, and slightly unhinged, but you still love me for it."

As the clip ended, Thaddeus looked like he was about to throw up. "Could you have found a more disturbing clip to play?" he asked in a disgusted way.

Irving provided the most robotic reply he could. "You did say you wanted definitive evidence, and it's often that people just lay out their innermost thoughts to themselves in such a clear manner"

Thaddeus could only shrug. Thor then spoke up, ignoring the prior topic entirely in favor of another. "Boo yeah! I was right!"

"Some accomplishment." Thaddeus replied.

"You're just upset because you lost Thaddeus."

Thaddeus was once again annoyed "Alright, you know what? I'm not reacting to your teasing anymore."

"Ok princess."

"Nope, not doing it." Thaddeus defiantly belated.

"Give him five minutes," Thor said with a smug gleam "he'll be back to normal by then."

Irving spoke. "Ok, I just thought you two could resolve your issues a little bit better."

"Oh, and how do you recommend we do that?" Thor asked.

"According to the book I've been reading on the subject..." Before Irving could continue, Phineas and Ferb crashed into the room, Ferb holding a ray-gun like contraption.

"Great news guys, me and Ferb fixed Irving's videos."

Thor was unimpressed, and he made that sentiment known. "Well, all of them except for that one it seems."

"Do you mean the one on Irving's computer with Isabella staring lovingly at a picture of me?" Phineas asked, leaving Thor dumbfounded.

"Ah, yeah."

"It's okay, our invention, the video-face-blurrier, will fix that immediately. Ferb..." On Phineas's command, a green beam emitted from the device, striking the screen of Irving's computer, instantly blurring the face of the love marauder in question.

"Cool..." Thor started. His eyes rapidly darted around the room, and he quickly adding further comments. "By the way, as a minor side note, I won my bet with my brother."

Despite Thaddeus been cartoonishly pissed off, Phineas was oblivious to the smugness on display and complemented the victory. "Good for you, although it still doesn't make sense that Isabella would have a crush on me."

Most people would have trouble explaining this situation to the notoriously dense Phineas, but Thor wasn't like most people. No, he didn't know the meaning of the word drama, he just spoke of things as they were.

"What do you mean by that? If nothing else, you're both good friends. That's all you need as a jumping off point."

Phineas was still confused. "I'm not saying you're wrong, I'm just struggling to wrap my head around this."

"Well then I'll shut up about it." Thor said, before quickly adding, "except to remind Thaddeus I won the bet, but you get the idea."

Seeing an opening in the conversation, Thaddeus attempted, rather unflatteringly at that, to change the subject. "Since our conflict has been resolved, I'm going to go do something far away from here to get away from my brothers' cheap insults."

As was typical, Thor had a response. "We live in the same house."

"But I'll have thought of a comeback by then." In reaction to his brother's remark, Thor made a side glance towards Phineas and Ferb. Upon seeing as though they weren't on the same wavelength, he shifted his gaze to Irving, who was picking his nose.

Suddenly, the deep voice of a brit became audible. "Do you two always bicker like this?"

Seeing as though Ferb had finally talked, Thor made sure the occurrence was noted. "Well look who's talking."

While you'd expect some conversing after this, that was none. Silence fell on the room like darkness upon a valley, and it freaked Thor out.

"What? Why is no one saying anything?"

Thaddeus took then proceeded to take the floor. "You know Thor, you could just answer questions directly instead of acting like a space cowboy."

"But it was a dumb question." Thor replied, before turning to Ferb and adding "no offence."

"None taken." Ferb blandly replied.

"That makes one of you." Thor added, leaving Thaddeus once again confused.

"What do you mean by that?" Thaddeus asked of his brother.

"Nothing important." Thor stated. "Now I say it's about time everyone here leaves poor Irving's bedroom and moves on with their days."

"Alright, let's go." Phineas said, turning around immediately."

"Hold up." Thor interrupted, prompting Phineas to turn back in the direction of the conversation. "What is it with you and being direct about leaving? Your always saying 'alright, let's go' or 'Let's go gang' at the slightest cue."

Phineas was dumbstruck. "I don't know, I think I've always done that."

Thaddeus then interjected. "Why are we even talking about this?"

"Because I asked." was Thor's helpful, painfully direct response.

Being that he was used to his brother's brashness, Thaddeus responded confidently. "No, I mean why is this a topic of discussion? We should be giving Phineas objectively bad girl advice or something, not pestering people over weird observations."

Thor looked at his brother, not a hint of malicious intent showing, and responded. "Like I said, it's a topic because I asked."

Suddenly, Phineas interrupted. "Are we good to go or..."

"Yeah, go. Out of the house." Thor chaotically spoke. He soon remembered his manners though. "Oh yes, thank you for helping settle our argument, Irving. I really appreciate you showing that I was correct."

"Yes, thank you." Thaddeus reluctantly agreed.

"It was no issue at all." Irving replied, a sense of pride beaming from his voice.

As everyone headed out Phineas belted out on last "See you later!" This was accompanied by Thor trailing up to reconvene with his brother.

"Hey, have you ever considered that maybe, just possibly, Phineas is actually... you know" Thor quietly spoke as he straightened both his index fingers, and procced to tap them together rhythmically.

"He's what, nine years old?" Thaddeus vigorously responded, making clear his position on the matter. He then added "You're reading into things way to much man." This proved enough for Thor to shrug off the thought and move ahead.

Chapter Text

After leaving Irving's house, the resident redheaded know-it-all had a glow of uncertainty about him. He neither talked people's ears off nor made any hurry about his actions, he just gingerly made his way about walking home. For the part of others, Ferb wasn't really expected to talk, so his silence came as no surprise. As for Thaddeus and Thor. Neither really had much to comment about, as it wasn't exactly the best time to debrief on how their plan was going. Nope, everyone just continued on their quite walk home through the homogenous Danville suburbs.

Well, that was until Phineas suddenly spoke up.

"So, what are you two going to do with the rest of your day?" Phineas asked, looking back to face Thaddeus and Thor as he did.

"You already know what Thaddeus is going to do." Thor responded, sarcasm evident in his voice.

Thaddeus's response was to cruelly side eye his brother and slightly shake his head side to side.

Phineas spoke up again. "And you Thor?"

Thor responded again, this time speaking earnestly. "Something normal, I figure. I could ride my unicycle, visit my dad's house, loiter around..." Upon leaving his statement with a dangling end, Thor looked at Phineas, who had the same bland look he normally did.

"Well, that sounds interesting." Phineas said without a hint of irony in his voice.

Thor made an inquisitive look. "The unicycle one?"

Phineas didn't change his expression as he replied. "Sort of, I never knew your parents were divorced."

With this, Thaddeus commented. "Yeah, and they love it when we tell people that."

"Really?" Phineas asked.

Being that he was wise beyond his years, Thaddeus maturely responded to this inquiry. "No! I was being sarcastic!"

Phinneas apologetically replied. "Sorry about that then."

"No worries." Thor interjected. "Thaddeus isn't the type to hold a grudge."

With a grimace on his face and exasperation evident in his voice, Thaddeus replied. "Thanks for speaking on my behalf."

"Don't mention it." Thor said, before motioning his hand forward and pointing ahead on the sidewalk. "Now, these two jokers up a head are your friends, right?"

"Jokers?" Thaddeus asked with a raised eyebrow.

"What?" Thor replied. "It's not an insult; they have a funny dynamic." Once again, an awkward silence followed Thor's off kilter comment. "The silence! What is it with the silence?"

"That is a weird phenomenon. It's just like in that one movie." Phineas replied inquisitively.

"Well, it must have been some movie." Thor pessimistically added

"Oh, I get it now." Thaddeus said after what seemed like another fifteen minutes of silence.

"Get what? The joke?" An unamused Thor asked.

"That was a joke?" Phineas asked. Thor sighed and planted his right hand on his forehead.

Before another period of silence could occur, Buford took a break from poking Baljeet to inject himself into the conversation. "What are you two losers doing?"

"Which two losers?" Thaddeus asked.

"You two losers." Buford said, pointing towards Thaddeus and Thor. "I thought we'd embarrassed you guys so badly you left town or something."

Thor was quick to defend. "That's not what happened. We did a relatively good job and, upon losing, shifted our attention towards other endeavors."

Buford was, predictably, unconvinced by Thor's spin. "Whatever, yous' two where embarrassed and you know it."

"There are so many words I want to use right now..." Thor quietly uttered.

"You're mumbling." Buford called out, grinning confidently as he did.

Thor scoffed, shifting his eyes the black haired Indian. "Do you have anything to say..." Thor started, before forgetting the name of Buford's sparring partner.

"Baljeet." Baljeet said.

Thor was quick to defend his mistake. "Sorry about that, homeboy here has a lot of friends."

"Don't worry about it." Baljeet said, before turning his head towards Buford. "I go through worse on a daily basis."

Naturally, Buford had a response to this accusation. "Hey..."

"He forgot my name." Baljeet stated. "It's not like he gave me a wedgie or threw me in a tree."

Tired of the topic at hand, Buford moved the discussion to a new topic. "Whatever, I don't care right now. I just want to know why Phineas and Ferb here are hanging out with Tweedle dee and Tweedle dumb."

Before Thaddeus and Thor could even be offended, Phineas responded to the inquiry. "They had an argument that needed to be resolved."

"Was it petty and dumb?" Buford asked.

With a delightful brow raise, Ferb responded. "Would we have it any other way?"

Buford quickly spoke up. "Say no more. We're burning daylight here, so let's get something going."

"Cool, do you have any ideas." Phineas asked.

A shocked look came over Baljeet's face. "What? You don't have any ideas?"

Phineas replied straight-faced. "Nope, where having a little bit of a weird day."

"Well, there is the obvious thing." Thaddeus interjected.

"Oh yeah." Phineas responded with his usual sense of wonder.

"What obvious thing?" Baljeet asked.

"It appears that Isabella had a crush on me, who knew right?"

It would be improper to say that you could hear a pin drop, but Phineas's words left Buford and Baljeet visibly shocked.

Buford was the first person who dared to comment. "So... how did you figure it out?"

"That's what Thaddeus and Thor were arguing about." Phineas said

"Were they now?" Buford said with a certain menace to his voice.

Thor quickly chimed in. "Don't look at me, Thaddeus was the one being stupid about it."

Now, there were a lot of thoughts going through Thaddeus's head at the moment. To start with his stupid brother had thrown him under the bus again, but that was, unfortunately, nothing new. What was new however was the judgement being brought upon him, which also wasn't actually a new thing. In fact, they'd have every reason to blame him.

Irrespective of this revelation, Thaddeus was soon forced to respond by the silence directed at him. "Obviously, I appears I did something wrong."

Once again, silence fell over the group.

Well, until Phineas had a thought anyway. "What? I don't get it."

Thor was quick to jump on this comment. "Yeah, is there a reason for the stunned silence? Is the news so shocking the world stopped turning?"

Uncomfortably, Baljeet responded. "I guess you could say the news is shocking."

"Normally that would be a pun, right?" Thaddeus asked for some reason.

"Oh yeah, that makes sense." Baljeet inquired, "Because you'd normally say that after someone gets electrocuted and... I'm going off topic again."

With this revelation made, Buford proceeded to make his position known. "Ok, you know what? I've had enough of this girly stuff already. We should go do something awesome."

Phineas naturally jumped on this transition "Alright, I guess we could try to be space cowboys."

"Ok, that sounds good." Buford replied.

Before the group could get going though, Baljeet posed a question. "Thaddeus, Thor, are you two going to follow along?" he asked before pausing in thought. "I'm trying to say... what are you two trying to do here?"

Thor, being a reasonable person, gave a reasonable response. "Na, we were just walking back with them because we're their neighbors and it would be awkward to leave separately for what is basically the same place."

Satisfied, Baljeet spoke. "Okay then. We should go now, right?"

"Uh, yeah." Buford responded

"Let's go then." Phineas Interjected

"Well, here we go again." Thor mussed, only his brother being close enough to process the comment.

"What is it that Shakespeare said?" Thaddeus inquired, "Breviary is the mother of innovation."

Thor had to take a look around, just to make sure this wasn't a joke. "You're a dumbass." was all he said before continuing ahead to catch up with Phineas's group. As he had before, Thaddeus followed suit.

A quarter mile later, the gang in question had made it back to Phineas's front yard, and Thor had something important to say. "Audios mi compadres. I have to say this was a rather pleasant experience with all this."

Thaddeus seconded this notion. "Who knows, maybe we'll do it again next year."

Buford was not amused by the joke and proceeded to shove everyone inside the neighboring gate while leaving a parting remark. "Yes, yes, yes, it was very pleasant, now let's get going, very quickly."

After taking an appropriate amount of time to take in the comedic spectacle that had befallen upon their eyes, Thaddeus and Thor made it inside to the tune of their squeaky front door, much to Thaddeus's relief.

"Wow! What a day!"

Thor had no regrets in making an argument out of this statement.

"Was it Thaddeus?" he asked with a scolding look.

"Most absolutely." Thaddeus exclaimed, "I mean I never thought Phineas and Ferb would forgive us after last summer."

Thor refused to flinch. "Maybe tomorrow they can help you fix your story."

Thaddeus gave his brother a small bump on the shoulder as he said, "Come on, don't be grouchy about this."

"May I remind you that today was a sabotage mission. We weren't there to make friends."

Thaddeus shrugged. "Yeah, but they were legitimate fun. I don't know why I was ever antagonistic with them."

"Well..." Thor started in a condescending tone but was interrupted nearly immediately.

"I know," Thaddeus huffed, "but I'm taking pills for that."

"Thank goodness you told me." Thor added without changing tones. "I would have never known if you didn't tell me."

"Stop being a jackass about this Thor." Thadeus bluntly stated. "I was only saying I had fun. There's nothing wrong with that."

"Whatever," Thor replied whilst shaking his head. "I just liked seeing the tremors."

Thaddeus cocked his head. "Tremors?"

"Yeah, tremors of trouble." Thor started in a suddenly casual way. "The tremors before the whole thing blows up."

Thaddeus shook his head dismissively. "That won't happen. I don't think Phineas and Ferb will get everything under wraps."

With a sigh, Thor walked over to their mother's tattered love seat and plopped himself down in it, rolling his eyes before turning his head back toward his brother.

"What was the entire point of our escapade today?"

Thaddeus curled his lip. "End a major miscommunication."

"Try again."

"Come on Thor, that's all we did." Thaddeus explained, dramatic hand motions and all, "How could those two possibly go wrong?"

"Love is a crapshoot, Thaddeus." Thor replied with a small chuckle and a surprisingly pleased smile. "I don't have to look further than, I don't know, our parents?"

Thaddeus, still high on optimism, tried to counter. "Maybe this will be some good love story thought, where love redeems and solves all of our problems."

Thor turned his eyes to the wall. "I severely doubt that is going to happen."

Thaddeus, walking into Thor's line of sight like a narcissistic professor, spoke defiantly to his brother. "Well, the things you're confident in never go to according to plan, so maybe your disbelief is a good thing."

Thor only raised an eyebrow. "Disbelief?"

Thaddeus turned towards his brother in confusion. "It's a word."

"But the proper term would be nonbelief," Thor casually explained, "as in nonbelievers."

Thaddeus turned around and sighed. "Alright professor, can we give this thing a break. We've been away all day, and I'd rather not be gripped at." As Thaddeus walked toward the back door, Thor spoke up once more.

"Au Contrair."

As Thaddeus opens up the back door, he muttered to himself. "Gibberish." Thor, content to leave the conversation where it was at, made no attempt to follow his brother outside.

Having spent an unknown amount of time sitting and subconsciously reflecting on the events of the day, Thaddeus was no closer to finding clarity. It didn't help when a certain pug-nosed loser forced his way through the backyard gate.

"Oh, what are you doing in my backyard?" Thaddeus asked upon partially recognizing the loser by his size and horrible fashion sense.

"Hey Curly head, I have a question for you." Buford directed.

"Oh, darn it. I forgot your name, but what's the question?"

"It's Buford."

"Alright." Thaddius said while nodding his head.

"So..." Buford started in an unusually soft tone. "What do you think the Fireside girls are going to do to you?"

"I seriously don't get this whole secret thing." Thaddeus earnestly stated. "Like, I don't know I've not exactly been a nice guy, but I'm not out there telling people to not mention the obvious."

"It's a girl thing." Buford exclaimed, returning to his typical punk persona "Them girliys are all about their secrets. I swear it's a cult."

"A cult?" Thaddeus asked, an arc appearing on his forehead. "I mean, I see it, but at the same time, a cult?"

"Yeah," A wide-eyed Buford explained. "Friendship bracelets, matching outfits, purses, it makes no sense man."

"I think you're exaggerating." Thaddeus replied with smug indifference. "It's not like an outsider wouldn't say the same thing about what happens in wonder boy's backyard, but it's all in the name of fun."

Buford shook his head, laying his hands out in from of himself as he said. "I'm telling you; those girls can be fierce. You'd best keep on your toes."

Thaddeus tilted his head, curling his mouth as he did. "I'll keep that in mind. I mean, coming from you..."

Buford's face shifted from oddly compassionate back to his trademarked bully stair. "Hey, I can hold my own against anybody."

"I don't doubt it." Thaddeus replied indifferently, "It's just that, love, family, and friends will always trump toughness or careful planning."

Buford looked him straight in the eyes. "Bingo."

Thaddeus lightly grinned at this comment. "Yeah, that's one version of the truth."

"Nah," Buford said, "There is no truth, only what you believe."

Thaddeus grimaced. "Especially when there are no 'facts' to ground your view, then you just have philosophy."

"Whatever," Buford exclaimed, "this conversation is getting too nerdy for me, so I'm just going to leave ambiguously."

"Alright," Thaddeus started, "Thanks for... Leaving, right." Thaddeus tilted his head up towards the bright, blue Danville sky. He didn't say anything more, not from a significant time anyway. Instead, he looked to the world to see if it had changed at all, to see if his actions had made a difference in any way. He looked for hours seeing nothing but the same things he'd see on any other day. When Thor popped out the backdoor to ask for help making dinner, Thaddeus simply sighed.

As their mom was spending the night at her boyfriend's house, Thaddeus and Thor had the house to themselves as night fell. Now, you might think with would be a dream scenario, Home Alone like scenario, but it wasn't.

"Thaddeus, you took your medication, right?"

"Yeah. you got the lights?"

"Yep, doors are locked as well."

"Cool."

Thor then walked over to his bed, pulling up the covers of his bed and sliding onto the mattress. From there, he and Thaddeus lounged about, pondering both the day and the exalting about the future. Particularly for Thaddeus, something felt wrong in the moment

"This is weird." Thaddeus muttered, exhaling as he did.

Thor rolled his tongue. "Why is that, Thaddeus?"

"Because everyone is telling me that we shouldn't have 'spilled the beans'." Thaddeus replied, staring into space as he did.

Thor turned his head slightly. "Because the girl was adamant about that being a secret, I know."

"But why are you so calm about it?" Thaddeus, the intensity in his voice increasing with every word. "Everybody's told be to watch for payback and it's freaking me out!"

Thor chuckled. "You're being a total pansy about this Thaddeus. The entire plan here was to ruin our neighbors' lives through love."

Thaddeus remained unmoved. "They're nice people Thor, but something just seems wrong, like we broke the whole story."

"What story?" Thor asked with a stern voice, "Isabella's dream romance story?"

Thaddeus finally turned his eyes to his brother. "No, it seems like we've broken their whole world. It's almost as though we've undercooked the steak, so to speak, and now everyone's got diarrhea."

"You know what, I'll give you credit for that metaphor." Thor replied with a content smile.

"Thank you?"

"Right, whatever." Thor said with a tisk. "The important question is what's the worst she's gone to do to you. Spank you, yell at you, kick you, hit you, call you mean names, treat you like crap...?"

"I get your point, but this is a different situation." Thaddeus replied, scratching an itch on his head as he did, "We might actually deserve it this time."

"We've talked about this before," Thor began. "it's a stupid issue anyway. I know the plan had nefarious intentions, but we also sliced straight through a stupid will they/won't they scenario. It was a favor."

Thaddeus remained still. "Except for the whole 'ruin their lives' part."

"What do you want, a ten year's joke?" Thor responded, expecting a laugh. When he received none, he shifted to a more considerate tone. "Look, at the end of the day, we solved a problem no one else was willing to solve; that's all we did."

"You're not wrong," Thaddeus stated, turning his head toward the ceiling as he did, "but aside from my whole undercooking point, do you really think Isabella will buy that?"

"I'm not her friend, I don't know." Thor replied.

"Great." Thaddeus said. Frustration peeped through his voice as he pulled himself out of bed. "I'm going to go talk to some people."

Thor raised a brow. "You'll get in trouble."

"What can I say?" Thaddeus said with surprising confidence. "It needs to be done."

Thor made a knowing look. "Who are you planning on talking too exactly?"

"Uh... I don't know." Thaddeus admitted, soon adding "I hate it when you right."

Thor made a big grin at this statement. "And it happens so often, it's no wonder your so grumpy all the time."

Thaddeus settled himself back into bed, shaking his head in frustration.

Chapter Text

On the front steps of the Flynn-Fletcher household, Thaddeus was having a heart to heart with Ferb.

"Thanks' for coming out to talk to me. I understand that your brother is occupied at the moment?"

"Figured." Thaddeus replied. "Long story short, I think me and Thor screwed up."

Ferb said nothing in response.

"Right, I'll just keep talking then. We only did it because Thor proposed doing so as a form of revenge."

Ferb blinked. "Revenge?"

"Yeah, there was a whole Superman metaphor... basically, the idea was that they'd get together, and it would be too overbearing and make your lives more complicated. I don't want to blame this on Thor thought; the only reason we did this is because he found this dumb 'revenge' story here that I wrote because I couldn't get over the fact I lost that fort contest last summer. The thing is that after we revealed everything, you and your friends were actually kind to us. I mean, Thor has tried to stay away, but I've actually had a good time with you guys. I honestly don't know why I was holding that grudge anymore, but that's not the main reason I'm here. I'm here because everyone keeps telling me I made a mistake and that Isabella and her friends will get me back hard, and I just don't know if I screwed up or not. Thor is still being stubborn of course, but I still don't feel like this is a bad thing."

Ferb subtly nodded his head. "Isabella is very unforgiving when it comes to Phineas. She can take a lot, but he's her trigger point. I can try to talk her down if things go bad, but hopefully she's to enamored to care."

Thaddeus found comfort in this response, somehow. "At least you talked to me. It was getting kind of weird with all the talking I was doing there."

"May I read your story."

"Might as well," Thaddeus spoke without reluctance, "but I must warn you, It's not a good story."

After a minute or so, Ferb had finished reading.

"You wrote about yourself in the third person?"

"I'm better now."

Ferb said nothing more.

Thaddeus shifted his attention towards the street. Maple Drive, that was its name, not that anyone used it. It was always 'the street', always 'Danville.' The streets didn't change, but neither did the names. Maybe it was just his youthful ignorance, but Thaddeus felt as though time itself was screwing with him. He should have been enjoying the perfect summer night. He should have taken joy in the sight of buzzing fireflies. The world around him was perfect; he didn't know why the scenery sucked the oxygen from his lungs; he didn't know why summer always seemed to take twenty years; he didn't know, but maybe someone else did.

Breathlessly, he spoke. "Alright, this is getting awkward. Like, this moment, the entire day, it's all felt weird."

Ferb stared off into the night. "Yeah, it was like, nothing happened even though so much happened."

Thaddeus looked out into the darkness as well, hoping to see what Ferb was looking at. Although he saw nothing, he felt as though the world itself was refracting, moving in ways only God himself could command. Oddly still, it was neither surreal nor stagnant. In the same way that the Ocean is in the same breath a wonderful mystery, a cog in the system, and an inevitable outcome of gravity, everything had come and gone with the same irrelevance as always. Thaddeus took a deep breath. "Well, there's still tommoro..."

Suddenly, Thadeus's alarm rang, startling him awake. He opened his eyes and looked around.

"Oh, of course it was a dream." Thaddeus muddled under his breath as the alarm clock shook him awake. After momentarily grimacing, he tossed the covers down to the end of his bed and stood up. Not long after, Thor did the same.

Breakfast was nothing special for Thaddeus and Thor. It was typically just milk and some bland cereal. It wasn't much, but it kept their stomachs settled until lunch. Still, 'lunch' is a relative term when you get up at 6:00 AM on the daily. Breakfast, brush your teeth, and some other thing. That was their morning routine, nothing special.

"So, cleaning." Thaddeus asked of his brother once their silent breakfast had concluded.

"Yep," Thor solemnly replied, "If we want to have any free time today, we need to get started early."

Thaddeus was visually unresponsive, blandly stating, "We always start early."

"Hey, just think." Thor exclaimed, "we don't want to end up like Mandy."

"Right." Thaddeus dead panned, a cold grimace adoring his face, "We don't want to be do drugs, or at least that's what my doctor tells me when he's not prescribing me some new wonder pill."

Thor made a hearty laugh at this comment, and the two brothers got to work, spending the next hour or so intimately detailing their home, working with great efficiency in doing so. Eventually, they were far enough ahead to move into their 'landscaping' duties.

"Where doing pretty well today." Thor exclaimed, his voice peeling in sincere joy, one which Thaddeus had heard precious little times.

"Well at least... Oh." Just as Thaddeus walked into his backyard, he saw a short girl with reading glasses adorning her face. Before Thaddeus could properly react, his always helpful brother spoke up.

"You must be Isabella?" Thor said, blurring this line between question and statement in doing so.

The girl closed her eyes and sighed. "Actually," the girl said, "I'm her friend Gretchen."

"Well," Thaddeus started "I hope you're here to talk on good terms."

Thor raised an eyebrow at this remark. "Good terms?"

Given that it wasn't even eight-thirty yet, Thaddeus was in no mood to be publicly chastised and responded as such. "What are you even talking about Thor?"

Unfortunately for Thaddeus, Gretchen had even less patience for the brother's unnecessary bickering. "Can you two be quite for just a minute?"

Although he was taken back by the subtleness of this request, Thaddeus immediately began defending his position. "Look, that was Thor, not me."

Gretchen still wasn't amused. "I said to be quiet, I'm not here to play the blame game."

Afte a brief pause, Thaddeus replied cautiously. "Understood, go ahead."

"Okay." Gretchan began. "First, I want you to know that you two ruined everything."

The two brothers, in a rare moment of unity, exchanged a quick glare before Thor spoke up. "I'm sure that whatever it is, it's not as bad as you think."

"Can you please just listen?" Gretchen urged. "This is really, really bad, and I'm trying to give you two a chance, but you're making that really hard to do."

"Understood." Thaddeus uttered.

"And you?" Gretchen asked, uncomfortably glaring toward Thor, who remained unfazed.

"I'll do as I please."

"Alright..." Gretchen began unnervingly, momentarily stopping to collect herself. "Right. You both seem to know what you've done, but you clearly don't grasp the significance."

Thaddeus, with his mouth hung ajar, decided to pipe in. "Well, it's pretty clear that Isabella can be very serious about Phineas."

"Wow, you finally got it." Thor blatantly interjected. "Because I've told you that twenty different ways already."

Ignoring his brother's remark, Thaddeus spoke again. "We also figured he would talk to her about it."

Gretchen's stoic look faded as she shifted her eyes to the crunchy, half-dead grass that covered the backyard. "Well, he did, and let's just say Isabella is still very mad at you two." she ominously stated. "The whole reason Isabella didn't want anyone to just tell Phineas was that she didn't want him to just try to appeal her, she wanted his feelings to be genuine."

Thor, a smug smile once again adorning his face, gave a reply. "So, I assume their little talk went well."

"It didn't go great." Gretchen said, the tone of her voice lightening as she looked up. "Like I just said, Phineas wasn't ready to fully return her feelings."

It was here that Thor shifted offence. "At the risk of a major rebuttal, I'd like the point out that she's only nine years old, so I'm told, which is just a little young for lovey-dovey things."

Thaddeus simply scowled at his brother. "Isn't that the exact reason she wanted to wait though?"

"Why are you rebutting me?" Thor asked in a clear attempt to be condescending, before shaking his head and continuing. "Whatever, it's just as well. She had strong 'feelings' about him anyway, and nothing ruins good feelings worse than poor communication."

Thaddeus rolled his eyes. "Yeah, you of all people would know that."

"Oh really..." Thor leered.

"I'm a hypocrite. I know." Thaddeus breathlessly replied, seating himself against the poorly stained fence as he did. "Moving on..."

Thor then took the podium once again. "Anyway, I don't think your aware of the potential perils of poor communication."

"What is it point of this?" Gretchen asked with exhaustion evident in her voice.

At once, Thor provided an answer. "The point is that Pinkey's poor communication skills were creating deeper emotional scar. The problem now, as you seem to have described it, is that she has big 'feelings' for Phineas there, so big he seemingly cannot recuperate them. If this whole thing had been resolved much earlier, they'd be on an even footing and there wouldn't even be a commitment issue. Similarly, it would be irresponsible to just let the scar grow deeper. Unless she was going to give up on the man, we'd either have a very similar situation happen, or she'd have more emotional scars to deal with. In fact, the only way the situation would work out in her favor is if Phineas there just woke up some day and decided not only that he loved her, but to tell her about it." Thor then paused, looking Gretchen in the eyes. "Look, I know I just said a lot, but the idea I'm trying to get across is that our actions have, in all likelihood, did her a favor."

It took Gretchen a minute to process this information.

"Are you alright there?" Thaddeus asked, not giving her time to respond before adding, "I'm more than happy to translate."

Gretchen shook her head, replying with none of her pervious brevity. "Thanks for the offer, but I'm fine." Thaddeus simply shrugged, and Gretchen then turned to face Thor. "Do you have anything besides hypotheticals?"

Thor then responded in a way only he could. "Worst comes to worst, all we did was expose a known fact we were not obliged to keep a secret."

Abruptly, Thaddeus, straightening himself from his slumped position, rejoined the conversation. "Yeah. Thor's going to kill me for saying this, but we planned to reveal Isabella's crush such that we could ruin everyone's summer, but at the same time, Thor was correct there. At the time, we both had no obligation to keep it a secret. I mean, I regret that decision now, and not just because you girls are going to hold it against us, but also because along the way I learned Phineas is a fun guy. So, I don't want to ruin that fun now, if you know what I mean."

Gretchen, despite subtly acknowledging the honesty on Thaddeus's part, remained unmoved. "But you've still screwed things up though. Isabella's still upset. There must be some accountability on your part."

"Yes, I completely agree." Thaddeus replied." In fact, I want to take some accountability for this. Honestly, I was hoping Isabella would be here so I could make my remorse even more clear."

For some reason, Thor interrupted with a thought. "You know, I'm thinking of a word right now..."

Thaddeus didn't sigh at this impasse, but he did lightly exhale before softly uttering, "One you probably shouldn't say, I imagine."

"Eh, depends." Thor said indifferently.

Gretchen closed her eyes in frustration. "Thor, if you're not going to offer anything constructive, can you please not interrupt?" she asked, a strained kindness present in her voice.

Thor was having none of this reasonability thought and defiantly crossed his arms. "Frankly, I feel as though I have been quite constructive in this conversation. You're clearly just denying the fact that me and Thaddeus did the right thing."

Thaddeus's eyes widened. "But the real-world results indicate that we did the wrong thing."

"Right," Thor exclaimed, slightly turning his head and smiling as he did. "Just make sure to tell me that when she starts acting like a clingy girlfriend again."

Thaddeus, being that he had no rebuttal to this point, gestured for Gretchen to interject.

"You're not seriously saying this will all work out fine?" A bemused Gretchen asked.

Thor then brought on a huge grin and fired up another zinger. "Can you honestly tell me a time it didn't?"

This question visibly took Gretchen aback, but had no such effect on Thaddeus, who abrasively replied, "How about any time we're involved?"

Thor shrugged, dropping his smug tone momentarily to say, "That's on us, not them."

Gretchen then proceeded to interject, abruptly emerging from her wide-eyed stare. "I'd say romance is about the only thing Isabella has failed at."

"Maybe that's why she's taking this so bad." Thor quipped.

"That actually makes sense." Thaddeus confidently added, although it was clear from his voice that he was still processing the statement.

"Of course it does." Thor added. "It's human nature to be disappointed when your dreams don't match reality."

"That... explains a lot actually." Gretchen said in a tone that surprised even herself. Somehow, someway, Thor's predictably stubborn logic had made the gears in her hear turn just enough to make a decidedly nefarious action seem justified, even in her mind, where it had no right to do so.

Seeing that Gretchen was lost in thought and Thaddeus wasn't doing anything helpful, Thor decided to ask a risky question of Gretchen. "So, are we cool now or what?"

Gretchen, partially emerging from her stunned state, shook her head. "Not quite. You two still broke the secret."

"Yeah Thor," Thaddeus interjected, "we should at least apologize for unwantedly interfering with her life."

Thor sighed but still countered with solid words of advice. "Actions speak louder than works bud, so I'm going to stick out of this from now on."

Although Thor didn't go anywhere after saying this, he moved to sit against the fence as Thaddeus had done earlier. This immediately prompted Thaddeus to stand back up and turn to Gretchen. "Well, should I do something or...?"

Calmly, she replied. "Not right now. To be honest... I don't know, you only exposed the problem, you didn't cause it."

Despite everything seemingly being resolved, Thaddeus still felt the need to say more. Gretchen had rebutted him with a tangible uncertainty to her words, with wasn't a firm no in Thaddeus's book. He motioned gently as he said, "Still, I do want to be helpful in resolving this."

Both Thor shrugged at this suggestion, and Gretchen followed suit.

"What? I can be helpful!" Thaddeus exclaimed, darting between subjects as he spoke.

Thor furrowed his brow and smiled; not a smug smile, but another genuine one. "Right, with your outsider knowledge and excellent people skills, you're basically a professional diplomat already." Thor retorted.

"I want to help." Thaddeus intently repeated, grimacing as he did.

"But you shouldn't." Thor replied with surprising intent. "You'd be a child on a man's job."

Gretchen then interjected, looking unnervingly anxious as she did. "Your annoying brother is right, there's really not much you can do to help besides getting out of the way."

Unfortunately, Thaddeus still wasn't done talking but did intently go about rubbing his forehead before he spoke, "So, I just do nothing. Just like that, boom story over. Ten years from now, nobody will remember me and Thor as anything besides the blokes who broke the news and fled like cowards.

"Nobody said that." Gretchen empathetically stated.

"Yeah, nobody said that." Thor added. "Ignoring the stupidity of your 'legacy' framing, I'd much rather cash out then go broke with a bad hand."

"What?" Thaddeus asked, confusion evident in his voice.

Thor rolled his hand palm-up. "It's a poker reference. To put it another way, World War one is said to have started when a group of Serbian nationalists assassinated the archduke of Austria-Hungry, but those conspirators only lit the gunpowder. Serbian independence is only a footnote on the legacy of the Great war."

Thaddeus raised a befuddled eyebrow. "So, the metaphor is that... the Serbian nationalist... where inconsequence in every regard besides lighting the match. After a while, things grew so far beyond them that it's as though they never existed."

"Yeah, close enough." Thor affirmed dismissively.

Following the brother's stated agreement, Gretchan spoke up once more. "So where good here, right? You two will try to stay out of the way of this."

"Yep." Thor authoritatively stated.

Thaddeus followed suit. "Sure."

"Great, now I'm going to try to talk with Isabella again." Gretchen said before starting her walk toward the exit, pushing her way through the squeaky backyard gate, not fully shutting it on the way out.

After she left, many moments of silence passed before Thaddeus broke the silence. "So, that's it."

Thor looked at his brother. "For now, yeah."

With the mid-morning sun now in effect, the shape of the day became clear; another bright, sunny day, the kind that yearned to be 'seized.' Despite the normality of this, it somehow felt wrong. Everything had happened, and yet there was nothing, no change, no revolution. It just... just... raised questions for the unheeded brothers in question.

"What are you thinking about Hammer man?"

Thor sighed. "I was named that before the movies you know."

Thaddeus laughed. "It's not like I get a say about good names either, but a joke's a joke."

"All time one liner there." Thor responded farcically.

"Seriously thought," Thaddeus remarked, "what's on your mind Deadpan Jones?"

Thor gave his brother a depriving look before giving a response. "Nothing much really. I just had a thought going about something."

"About the past couple of days. A general random thought?" Thaddeus paused, looking his brother in the eyes. "Give me something."

Thor almost bit his tongue but did give a response. "I was just thinking about summer."

Thaddeus, growing impatient, gave a prompt reply. "What were you thinking about summer?"

"The number of days in it." Thor said with a wide-eyed glint. "I know last summer felt very long, I mean, don't get me wrong, 104 days is a long break, but I think we were on vacation longer than that. Like, twice as long, or something around that."

"Well, that's stupid." Thaddeus said with a laugh. "Summer went from date to date. 104 on the dot. 200-something days of summer vacation would be almost two-thirds of a year and far eclipse the actual length of summer." He soon added. "And you say I'm a moron."

Thor made a spiteful look. "My shower though has nothing to do with you being a moron."

"You know," Thaddeus said as though he was on a high. "If I have never written that story, our last day and a half would've been quite different."

"You at least could have made it a good story, you know?" Thor added, subtly agreeing with his brother's sentiment.

"You know," Thaddeus whimsically continued, "I don't think it's as bad as you've made it out to be."

Thor put his hand to his mouth. "What redeeming quality do you think the story could possibly have?"

"It's fun," Thaddeus explained, "It's a fun read. It's the type of thing I can go back to and have a good laugh at."

"You do seem to like embarrassing yourself."

Thaddeus immediately shook this comment off. "It could be worse. I could be at the center of a romantic drama right now."

"Very true." Thor acknowledged, though a different thought immediately popped into his head. "Hey, if we don't get going with chores, mom is going to be pissed."

"Ha," Thaddeus snorted, "she's always pissed at us."

"Maybe she won't be this time." Thor added with dry realism.

Thaddeus gave a conflicted look. "I doubt that."

"Surprises happen, you never know."

Thor cocked his head. "Except when you do."

Thaddeus sighed, intently turning to Thor. "Just shut up Thor."

"Yeah, I'll admit it, that didn't make a lot of sense."

Thaddeus curled his lip. "Really?"

Thor nodded. "Yeah."

A big grin appeared on Thaddeus's face. "When has that happened before?"

Thor gapped as he replied. "Never, first time ever."

As this moment of apparent happiness settled upon the two brothers, Thaddeus soon remembered why good things never last. "Seriously, though, this is our calm before the storm moment. We better get to it."

"It's not like we haven't weathered a storm before." Thaddeus turned to his brother, sporting a resentful look on his face. As always though, Thor had an out. "Come on, it's your turn to clean mom's bathroom anyway."

Thaddeus scrunched his face. "No, it's not."

"Yes, it is." Thor replied, lightly darting his eyes randomly as he did.

"No, we are not doing this Thor." Thaddeus said, focus and intent clear in his voice. "I am not going to bail your lazy ass out again."

"I'm not lazy," Thor stoically stated. "I do more than you do on any given day."

"Uh," Thaddeus exclaimed with a dramatic head roll. "I am so done with you."

Thor brought his hands together and tilted his head. "Right, you say that, but you don't mean it."

"Oh, I mean it." Thaddeus thought, closing his eyes in an attempt a solemn reflection.

Thor noticed this moment and painfully acknowledged it. "What? You know I'm right."

"You're not always right." Thaddeus muttered.

"Yeah, nobody's perfect." Thor said with an honest sense of sincerity, one which he just had to break by adding "But I am correct."

Thaddeus gave a reluctant smile as he entered the backdoor to his residence. He had no reason to smile. It's not as though he was walking into a palace of holy virtue, or even common decency for that matter, but that didn't make any difference. It was his second home after all; he did owe it just the slightest bit of respect.