Chapter 3
The car skidded to a stop outside of PD headquarters.
“Aaaaack,” Mike had been in a state of near catatonia on the trip back. Alice, white faced, had
braced herself against the back of the driver’s seat.
“th@7 w@s 70talLY @w3soMe!” enthused Rex.
“You probably noticed how I kept my calm, sexy nerve throughout the trip.” Tom said suavely.
Alice smacked him on the back of the head.
The four of them got out of the car and headed back to their office.
“So what’s our next move?” Tom asked Mike.
“M-m-must not let you d-d-drive.”
“I think we should break into Baxter’s office and see if we can find anything incriminating,”
Alice announced.
Tom stopped. “That is so stupid.” Alice glared at him. “I mean, if you were doing something
crazy like Baxter, would you leave stuff all over your office?”
“i 7hInk i7's a G00d id3a!” Rex chimed in. Alice smiled at Rex.
“Oh, all right...” Tom stuck his hands in his pockets and stalked towards the PD building.
* * *
“No one’s that stupid!” Baxter said incredulously as he watched Alice, Mike, Tom and Rex
break into his building over the CCTV. “I mean, they didn’t even try to avoid the camera.”
“I think the lizard waved at us. So what do we do?”
“Call the cops, I guess.”
* * *
After 20 minutes of bumbling about, the four of them managed to find Baxter’s office. Locked.
“Now check out this incredible lock-picking skill of mine!” Tom said, but Rex simply walked
up to the door and kicked it open, managing to knock the door off its hinges.
Mike started hitting his head against a wall (softly).
“No, no, no.”
Alice rubbed her face.
Rex rushed in and starting literally tearing the place apart.
“So much for being subtle...”
“There is no way we are going to find anything in the mess he’s making!” Mike gritted.
“dud3! cH3ck I7 0ut!” Rex held up a folder with the words “Secret Plan” written on it.
“What kind of a moron would put the words ‘secret plan’ on the cover of a folder containing a
secret plan?” Tom demanded.
“This kind.”
The lights went on and the team found themselves looking at several police officers as well as
Baxter himself.
“Ummm...officers, we are with the Planetary Defense Agency and this man is in violation of
erm...something or other that makes it legal for us to be ransacking his office.”
“Up against the wall. Now!” a cop wearing mirror shades yelled at them.
* * *
“And they rolled me out of bed to deal with you idiots!”
Sterling was chewing the four of them out after springing them from jail.
“But sir! The Elder thinks that he’s up to something!” Tom protested.
“And you! One of the reasons why we wanted you assigned to these two clowns was because
you were the only one in the group that didn’t have a Puppeteer! Now what do we do with you?”
“Rex still doesn’t have one.”
“And he can’t,” pointed out Mike. “You see, the synapses in Raptors are completely different
from humans, so...”
“Shut up,” snapped Sterling. “Now all of you get out of here!”
The four of them walked back to their desks.
“Yikes,” said Alice.
“dud3! wh@t D0 we do now?”
“Now, we do things my way,” said Tom severely.
* * *
The four made a discreet entrance into the casino. It would have been more impressive if table
limits had been more than $5, leading to a somewhat cheezy clientele.
“Are you sure Baxter likes to come here?” Alice asked.
“Absolutely,” Tom assured her. Then, to Mike: “Now I can try out my new...magnetism.”
“I think the Elder may have been exaggerating a little bit when he told you...” but Tom had
already left the other three and was homing in on an attractive blonde.
“Mind if I join you?” Tom said, taking off his shades.
“Yes, actually, we do!” A rather beefy looking man stood up next to the blonde.
“It’s not every day I meet someone as attractive as you.”
“You shouldn’t say that in front of my boyfriend.”
“Actually, I was talking to him.”
The man slugged Tom, then left in a huff with the blonde.
Alice and Mike helped Tom to his feet. His nose was bleeding.
“Wow, not even Mike is that inept.” Mike glared at Alice. “OK, you’re more inept than Tom.”
Tom staggered a bit. “Hey, where did Rex go?”
They looked around and found Rex at the blackjack table. He was wearing his shades.
“What do you think you’re doing?” Mike demanded.
“duDe liGH7en uP. i've Won lik3 $1,000 5o f@r.” Mike looked around.
Hey, do you think you’d be any help with this sort of thing?
Oh please, this game is all simple math!
$500 later...
Wait, I think I’m getting the hang of it.
Shut up.
“bLackjack!” Rex yelled to a cheering crowd.
“Don’t look now, but guess who just walked in?” Alice said in a low voice.
Mike, Tom and Rex all turned at once and looked at the entrance.
“Idiots!”
Standing there was Baxter, with a plump, older woman on his arm. He saw them and narrowed
his eyes. Rather than leaving, however, he came over to the blackjack table.
“Sooo, look what the cat brought in...and then brought up.”
“The name’s Blob...James Blob,” Tom intoned.
Baxter stared at him.
“Are you here to talk or to play?”
“Actually I’m here to...” but Mike elbowed him in the ribs.
“We’re just here with our friend Rex.”
The lizard had acquired a cigar from somewhere and was waggling his eye-ridges above his dark
glasses.
“Oh yeah?”
$2,000 dollars later...
“You guys suck,” Baxter said as he busted again.
“0wN you!” Rex danced a jig of victory.
“Well, perhaps I can show you that I’m as good a loser as you are winners...would you care to be
my guests for dinner?”
“Delighted.” said Alice.
Later on, at a local IHOP...
“Wow, this is great.” Alice said tonelessly.
The waitress put a plate of crispy chicken strips in front of Rex.
“Clo53 3nouGh” said Rex, and dug into the not-quite-chicken nuggets.
“And if you want something other than water, you have to pay for it yourselves!” Baxter
announced grouchily.
Baxter’s woman, whose name turned out to be Roxanne, was sitting next to Tom.
“So what do you do, Tom?”
“He’s one of those PD, blob-loving stooges, just like the rest of them!” pronounced Baxter,
forking up his pancakes.
Tom looked like he was about to say something, but all that emerged was a “Yipe!” Roxanne
had put a hand on his thigh.
“We know you’re up to something, and you won’t get away with it, Baxter,” Mike said, trying
for a steely glare. Gobbling sounds came from Rex, who had discovered the “all you can eat”
chicken strips deal.
Baxter stared at Mike with tepid disinterest then shouted “Waitress! I’m out of diet coke!”
“How come he gets to have a diet coke while all we get is water?” Alice grumped.
Mike turned to Tom in disgust, but found that the PD agent was trying to scoot farther away
from Roxanne. Mike noticed that the woman had a hairy upper lip.
“So, what do you do, Ms...er...Roxanne?”
“Oh, I just hang out with his cheapness here,” she said, pointing a fork at Baxter, who smiled.
“But I’m so much more interested in what you do...Tom, especially for fun.” She squeezed
Tom’s thigh for emphasis.
“Ohmygawd, I think I’m going to throw up,” Alice dashed for the bathroom.
“If you do, I want a refund!” Baxter said.
After dinner, the group walked away from the IHOP.
“Just remember...we’re watching you, Baxter!” Mike warned.
“Oh shaddup.” He got into his beater and drove off.
“So what do we do now?” Mike asked, turning to Tom.
Rex burped loudly.
“I...I suppose I could try contacting Roxanne to find out if she knows where Baxter’s secret base
is...”
“How do you know she’ll cooperate?” Mike asked.
“She gave me her phone number.” Tom held up a greasy scrap of paper. It read ‘If you want to
know more about Baxter, give me a call.’
“I guess that ‘sexual magnetism’ stuff works after all!” Mike chortled.
Alice gagged.
* * *
“OK, I’ll call her, but you guys have to promise you won’t let me sleep with her.”
“Don’t worry stud, I’m sure you won’t get any sleep!” Alice put in nastily.
“dUD3! i think $He's h@wt!”
Mike looked at Rex incredulously.
With a shaking hand, Tom dialed Roxanne’s number.
“Hello?” a female voice said breathlessly.
“Um...um, Roxanne? It’s Tom. You probably don’t remember me but...”
“Oh, I remember you.”
Tom shuddered.
“Yeah, well, I was wondering if I could ask you some questions about your friend Baxter?”
“Sure. How about if you drop by my place and we can talk?”
Tom gulped audibly.
“How about if we met someplace...like Denny’s or...”
“I’m afraid I’m not dressed properly to go out. But if you change your mind about dropping by,
here’s my address:” Tom jotted down the information and hung up.
“Ummm...she wasn’t there! Yeah! Got her voicemail.”
“It didn’t sound like you got her voicemail.” Alice leered.
“Oh, well, you see, she doesn’t know anything. That’s it! A complete waste of time to talk to!”
“Come on man! Do it for your country!” Mike slapped him on the back.
Rex wagged his tail.
Later on, outside Roxanne’s apartment...
“Alright, but if I’m not out in five minutes I want the rest of you to rescue me!” Tom had a wild,
desperate look.
“Absolutely!” Mike said.
“You can count on us!” said Alice.
“D00d!” Rex cried out.
Tom got out of the car and headed towards Roxanne’s building. Alice sniggered.
“What did he ever do to you?” Mike demanded, turning around from the front seat to look at
Alice.
“There was that time when he tried to hit on me.”
“Alright, but that was just once!”
“DUD35! aR3 w3 actUaLly going to R3sCUe hiM?”
Alice sighed “I suppose so, but let’s give him 15 minutes.”
After only ten minutes, however, Tom came running out of the building. He jumped in the car,
started the engine, and peeled out, leaving rubber on the road.
“Are you OK?” Mike asked.
“I...I think so. Roxanne gave me the address of the secret base.”
“Don’t you think that was a little too easy?” Alice asked.
“You call that easy?!” Tom shouted.
The car careened down the road.
“Well at least now we know where to find Baxter’s secret base...” Mike pointed out.
* * *
“Are you sure this is it?!” Alice demanded. They were parked outside of a vacant office
building. A banner on the side read “First two month’s rent free!”
“It does match his cheap personality.” Mike observed.
“w@nt m3 to break d0wn tHe do0r?” Rex asked excitedly.
“This time we see if it’s locked first!” Tom informed the Raptor severely.
The four of them walked to the building. Or rather, Mike, Alice and Rex walked up to the
building while Tom darted from place to place trying to “blend in with the shadows.” He
managed to catch up to them in front of the elevators.
“We should take the stairs.”
“No way, it’s seven flights up,” Mike objected.
“I wish you guys would get into the proper spirit of things.” Tom sulked, but got into the
elevator. “How do you know he’s on the seventh floor?”
“It said so on the building directory.”
“What? It said ‘Baxter’s Secret Base’ on the building directory?”
“Nah, they’re the only tenant listed.”
They got out of the elevator and were confronted with a door.
“I’ll have this open in just a sec.” Tom fished in his pocket for his lock picks, but Mike walked
up and tried the door.
“Looks like it’s open.”
The four of them walked into the office, which seemed to be made up of cubicles. Heading
around a corner they found some sort of lab. Tom grinned and headed towards the refrigerators.
“Well, well, well. What do we have here?” Tom produced a plastic bag that contained a liquid.
“Leet!” Rex crowed. The rest of them looked over. The Raptor had found a bag of frozen
chicken nuggets in one of the freezers. Tom turned back to the fridge in a huff.
“Do you really think they’d be dumb enough to leave the virus in a fridge like that?” asked
Mike.
“Well, judging from Baxter, I’d rephrase to something like do you think he’s cheap enough to
leave the virus in a fridge like that.” Tom searched the rest of the refrigerator and the group left
the kitchen.
The four of them turned a corner and were confronted by Baxter himself. He was in a doublesized
cubicle flanked by thugs.
“Dammit! That’s my dinner you’re eating!” Baxter said pointing at Rex, who was carrying the
bag of frozen chicken nuggets. “I got the family sized bag...from Costco!”
One of the thugs came over and took the bag, now empty, from the lizard. Rex burped at him.
“Shoot em, boss?” said one of the thugs.
“Shooting’s too good for them. I’ve got a better idea...”
Chapter 2 Chapter 4
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