THIS IS ME TRYING || Danger Force

08 | Return Of The Kid

"Tons of missions!"
"So many!"

"Oh, cool!" Henry smiled. "Like, what? Anything dangerous?"

Mika beamed excitedly. "We once caught a guy that was stealing books from the library!"

"Oh, yeah!" Miles laughed.

"Okay..." the 19-year-old shrugged. "Was kinda looking for some sick fights, though."

"Oh!" Miles nodded. "We once battled every bad guy in Swellview at the same time!"

"Nice!" Henry grinned. "What happened?"

"Mika let them all out of prison," Miles said casually, and Mika smirked.

"Wow, I kinda spent my whole childhood locking those guys up, so I can't wait to hear how you all caught them!" Henry looked on the bright side of things, still hopeful.

"We didn't!" Miles admitted.

Bose nodded. "Sick twist: they're all still out there!"

Callie gave a small sigh, digging her nail into a strand of her blonde hair as she plummeted her face against the sticky table.

"I've gotta imagine that some of them are out there, committing crimes, right now!" Chapa agreed.

Ray raised his voice to silence everyone. "Alright, that ends your visits with Henry, he's mine now!"

Bose nodded in acceptance. "I enjoyed our time together."

Ray shook his head, looking back up at his former sidekick. "Hey, so, how's Dystopia? Do you need me to come help you? Because I will burn this whole thing to the ground and leave right now."

Again, the kids cleared their throats and rolled their eyes.

"Keep it down!" Ray ordered. "They're always here, it's like─"

Suddenly, red flashed all over the base, dimming and lighting the room, and an alarm started to blare inside everyone's ears.

"Emergency call!" Callie gasped, rushing over to the computer desk, Chapa and Mika following after her.

Callie scrolled through the screen in front of her to find the problem, tuning out the sound of her dad encouraging Henry to go on a mission with him. 

"What's the emergency?" Chapa questioned.

Callie read the words off the computer. "It looks like there's a brawl at the nail salon."

Ray grinned, glancing at the brunette in front of him. "We could fight crime and then get our nails done, just like old times! You can even pick my color."

Callie leaned over next to Mika. "By the way, they've never done that before." She and Chapa giggled.

Henry told Ray that he was tired of crime-fighting considering he'd been doing it so often in Dystopia, and Ray nodded and pretended that was his idea all along. "Right, why don't you five handle this one yourself?"

The children smiled at each other happily, yearning for a sense of independence, even if only brief.

Callie furrowed her eyebrows─she had noticed that Henry was quick to shut her father's ideas down, maybe even desperate to change the subject. His demeanor was off, unusual for his personality. The girl sighed, though, as she had places to be and no time to really think. So, she brushed away the thought with the idea that Henry had just been tired.

"Don't end anybody, and try not to let anyone end you!" Ray advised, pushing the group into the tube as they put gum in their mouths. He hit the button on his side. "Down the tube."