Sound...the most terrible combination imaginable of glass breaking, fingernails on chalkboard, and someone crushing a parakeet under their boot.  It was loud to the point of painful insanity.  It was mind-shattering.

The cop who had run for the gate tripped over his own feet and slammed right into it, only to rebound backwards down onto the lawn where his body twisted from the intense aural assault.  Groans came from the cops on the ground and the other man who had surendered to them.  Even with his hands clamped firmly over his ears, Al's head throbbed from the sound's impact.  Ghost, Betty, and NotBetty felt their teeth rattle in their sockets.

Out front, Nine watched impassively as Billy, Murray, and the two cops by the front door grabbed their heads and spun to the ground in writing heaps.  Several windows on the officials' ground cars shattered and the ape realized that Tom and the leader of the other group were being assaulted in their vehicular prisons.  A passerby driving another ground car, a larger one like the one in which the assault team had arrived, swerved and struck the retaining wall across the street from the driveway.  The driver, a woman, was already unconscious when her vehicle stopped.

When Nine cut power to his improvised weapon, all of the police officers were unconscious.  Everyone was, save his little band. 

In the back seat of the sergeant's car, Tom lazed groggily and tried to understand what had just happened.  Understanding was not coming easy and only gave him a headache in the aftermath of that wicked sound.

"Thanks for the warning" muttered Al, lowering his hands.  He scanned the garden, looking for Ghost.  It took a moment but very quickly his sharp eyes noticed a Ghost-shaped distortion standing where Ghost had been moments before vanishing.

Not Betty clamped her hands over her ears and continued to look at the scene with confusion.

When the sound had struck, Tom had tried reflexivly to pull his hands up to cover his ears. This had merely added pain and abraded wrists the ice pick that was tap-tap-tapping at his frontal lobes. He just barely managed to turn his scream into a yelp as it was, his vision going dark at the edges as the sound bore down on his mind.

And then it stopped.

He lay slumped over the uncomfortable seat, a few nuggets of glass tumbling off him as he struggled to get upright, his mind throbbing. So. Whatever it had been, most likely the men who'd come to capture them hadn't done it. Perhaps this was backup to the backup to Bob's backup. He blinked groggely, and tried to regain focus.

"Right,' he croaked hoarsly. He looked inward, trying to find the place his brothers had been, calling for them to come help him get out of this damne car. The others... he had to check on the others...

With no sound to announce his coming, Tom appeared next to Tom in the back seat.  Tom and Tom quickly followed, each simply coming into existence in the front seats.  None of the newcomer Toms were shackled as Tom was.

Nine dropped the device as a familiar acrid odor emanated from the device. Just as he'd suspected, several of the compnents had not wethered the power surge and had failed. He noted where the failures had occured and his mind supplied several alternatives should he need a more lasting variant of the device.

He smiled, quite proud that he had managed to incapacitate the four armed men, right under their noses, however he was sure he'd not get another chance to do so again. They would watch him much more carefully fromt his point should they apprehend them again.  He looked out through the vehicle bay entry and saw the other ground car, resting against the retaining wall. A twinge of regret occured that an innocent had been caught in the device's blast radius. He'd have to be more careful next time.

Nine shrugged off his discomfiture and moved to Saregeant Murray's side. A quick search of his pockets turned up a small silver key, one that likely fit the metal shackles they'd bound Tom with. He moved to the ground car that Tomhad been incarcerated in and after a brief study used the ingenious lever device to open the door.

"Ahh, You've thummoned your brothers. Very good. I apologize for the rudeneth of my actions, however there was not enough time to warn you. We mutht act quickly." Nine said as he tossed the silver key to the non-bound duplicate beside Tom.

"What did you do?" They all asked at once. "It felt like my head was going to explode?" Tom Prime continued solo, as the Tom next to him unlocked the handcuffs. The two Toms in the front of the car got out after a moments figuring out of the latching mechanisim. They then opened the doors for the other two.

"I used some of the objects laying around to create a hyperthonic pulthe emitter. by broadcasting it through the thatellite dish I was able to create a feedback loop in any active radio devithe. The feedback loop had a thpecific frequenthy and amplitude, one that should have interrupted neural pathwayth, inthtead due to the infiority of the materialth at hand, inthtead of interrupting them, it seems to have overloaded them." Nine sighed, his brow creased in concentration. "A thimple design flaw, one I'll have to try to work aroud should I need to conthtruct another thuch devithe."  

The four looked around, getting a read on the situation, then broke. One went to the stalled vehicle across the street to check on its occupent. Another went to find Bob, and make sure he was still accounted for. A third, the one who'd been beside Tom in the backseat, took the handcuffs and secured two of the officers to one another, then set about collecting weapons from the downed officers.

Tom Prime rubbed at his chaffed writsts as he considered the Ape's answer. "You are a very dangerous ma... ape." he said at last. Al was standing not to far away, and he could tell the Betty's were doing fine from the strange sight he shared with his brothers. "Wouldn't it be best to try and get these fellows to help us?" he asked, indicating the fallen officers. "Do we want to be on the run from not only mystery assailents, but the local Watch? Or whatever they are?" 

Nine considered the man's question carefully before adding. "Normally I would agree, however, my brief bit of research indicates thith BlacKnight corporate entity theemth to have many ties to local law enforthement as well as what ever patheth for a military here. By allowing ourselves to be captured, we in ethenthe hand ourselves over to them.  Not  a prothpect I find desirable. Do you?"

"Speaking of research, there's another of those data archive devices in that vehicle. Perhaps it has more robust access than one of an average citizen?" He considered what the ape had said carfully, flicking back and forth from viewpoint to viewpoint as he performed his various tasks. "We can't keep running. We don't even have a place to run to at this point." Tom looked around. "Where's that Ghost fellow? He'll be the first to drop out of sight if things get bad, mark my words." 

"Ghotht? I believe he went towards the back to athitht our friend Al." Nine eyed the device in ground vehicle. "Ahh, perhaps it does. Motht thertainly it will have acceth to a thubthet of databatheth the general public most likely won't. With the two combined, I may be able to find a thuitable location." Nine met Tom's gaze. "We have thomewhere between five and ten minutes before the local watch regains conciouthneth. We should use the time wisely. Lets gather our compatriots, the weapons, regain the previously gathered rethourthes and use one of these vehicles to make our ethcape." 

"I understand your points, but running does no good unless we have a place to run to. Random flight is a tactical mistake." Tom pointed out. "Though," he said thoughtfully, rubbing at his bald scalp, "the randomness could work in our favor if we are smart." 

"Exactly!" Nine exclaimed in relief. At last someone was thinking, other than himself. "The randomneth makes it hard for them to track uth, and thuth even harder to ambush uth or take uth by thurprise. We need to get out of thith thity, travel a bit, and then find thomewhere to go to ground.  I think that private ground car would be perfect, it's leth likely to have any thort of tracking devithe and much leth conthpicuouth than the ones our attackers or the local authorities arrived in.  It  altho looks like it could hold uth all." 

Nine clambored into the front seat of the ground car and examined the computer. He tried to judge how badly it might have been damaged by his Pulse emitter and how best to extract it without further damage.

The screen was intact but it wouldn't turn on.  It was likely, he decided, that some part of the internal workings had been damaged by his indescriminate application of science.  Fortunately it looked to be merely seated into a docking station.  Nine lifted the computer from its cradle, closed the clamshell case, and withdrew.

The object of their inquiry was currently standing on the lawn in the backyard, shaking his head to try and clear the ringing in his ears. He held his hands out in front of him, turning them this way and that. He could see--something; a blur, maybe, like a smudged line of print--around his hands. He felt no different but from the reactions of those around him (both conscious and recently unconscious) he had somehow...disappeared.

Ghost frowned, staring at his hands. It was a useful talent, whatever this was, but without control it could do him more harm than good. He took a moment to control his breathing, pushing the pain and discomfort of the recent auditory attack away from his conscious mind. He focused on his hands and tried to will himself visible. It didn't happen instantaneously, but over the span of several seconds the visual effect that concealed him faded from his flesh. He felt...relieved.

As the Asian rematerialized, a look of relief spread across the quiet twin's face and a genuine smile lit up her face.  She reached out tentatively to touch him, patting his arm twice to make sure that he was indeed real.  "Bang...Poof."  She said to him as she waved her hands in an animated fashion.  "Boom!" And she covered her ears, trying to fill him in on all that he had missed, until she finally pointed at the prone strangers on the ground.  "Sleep."

Ghost watched the animated display with curious amusement, only catching on at the very end. He smiled and nodded. "Thank you," he said sincerely. "But I was not gone. Only....hidden."

She cocked her head curiously, at that, her red gold ringlets cascading over her pink hello kitty jacket.  She finally nodded her head and the confusion slid off of her face.  "Hid-den."  She tasted the new word and nodded once, after deciding she liked it.  She looked from her sister back to the Asian, expectantly, waiting to see what to do next.

Betty offered a brief smile to her twin as she joined the couple, "Nice disappearing act," she muttered to the Asian with a sideways glance.

Ghost shrugged, a noncommittal gesture that could have meant anything. Or nothing. There was a hint of a smile on his lips, though.

Tom walked past the group, dragging an unconcious policeman behind him. "Can you give us a hand? Nine says these men will only be unconcious for a few minutes more, and I'd like to get them into that vehicle bay and secured before they wake up." 

Betty regarded Tom and the task at hand with hesitation, not eager to take up physical labor.  "I'll go fetch what's left of the tape we used on our friend Fox,"  the princess jogged off in the direction of the house.

The quiet twin seemed all together uninterested in the bald man's suggestion, and continued to watch the Asain with unwaivering interest.

"Once we've got them tied, we'll stash them in the treehouse.  It seems fitting that as we arrived there, we should leave them there.  And we should have sufficient transport to leave, now."  Al set off for the house, aiming to collect Fox for depositing in the treehouse.

Ghost nodded once, then turned to help with the moving of the uniformed men. "The men with suits," he said to the quiet twin, pointing to one of the downed men they'd faced earlier. "Take everything out of their pockets and put it in a bag." He gestured to the uniformed men. "These we will leave alone. No point in adding insult to injury."

The girl nodded in understanding and bent to the task.  It took her a few moments and she wasn't overly intuitive about it, but after the first time through she got the hang of it.  She fit what she could into her purple bag and the rest she settled into her jacket, after pulling it away from her body until it made an improvised pouch.

Betty entered the house through the sliding door nearest Robert Fox.  A gleeful smile spread across her face when she discovered the man remained captive under her spell through the roar of fighting.  She crawled on his lap, stradling his torso with one leg on either side.  She pried his eyelids open one at a time. 

"Are you awake Mr. Fox?  Wake up!"  She wanted to continue playing and wished she hadn't rendered him unconsious for such a long period of time.

He stayed sleeping peacefully, oblivious to the nymphette atop him in the chair.  She became aware of how physically fit he was not that she was in greater physical contact with him.  His thighs, arms, the muscles of his chest, suggested a man in prime condition.  It gave her a familiar feeling of satisfaction to be astride him like this, in this semi-seductive way.  Surprisingly, it made her think of Tom and her flashes of feelings for him.  It was at once both comfortable and uncomfortable, exciting and scary.

With the five of them working together, the assailants were duct-taped and All quickly carried them up to the tree house for deposit.  There were eight total, including the one who was still handcuffed and had to be dragged out of the back of the other police vehicle.  The cops were arranged neatly in seated positions, back-to-back, in the residence's vehicle bay.

NotBetty had quite a stash from her search of the men in the tree house.  She had one wallet, eight identical chronometers, four metal collapsible batons, three combat knives, seven of the stun projectile firearms, one large gold ring, eight small devices taken from their ears, and an assortment of uniformly-shaped and marked green papers.  The latter numbered about forty slips total, with varying icons, numbers, and faces centered on them.

The group now stood outside watching the vehicle bay's large door slide closed - Nine had figured out the combination on the keypad to operate it. 

The men stowed, the extra Toms had gone back to whatever space they dwelt in when not called forth. Tom stood singularly out with the others, after making sure the unfortunate woman in the groundcar had been placed comfortably on one of the divans inside the house. He just felt better about that, who knew why.

Probably because they were about to steal her vehicle.

"Right," he said, looking at Nine and gesturing towards the dented automobile. "Can you show one of us how to operate the thing?" 

"Hmm, I may be able to figure it out, but I don't think we have the time." Nine said thoughtfully. A thought tickled his mind, and he searched his prodigious memory. "However, it may not be nethethary.  The princess's twin has a gift of mimicry, and I believe she may have been watching a show with a thimiliar type of groundcar." Nine turned to the simple twin. "Isn't that right my dear?"

The quiet twin looked at the Asian for a moment and then at the SUV.  She tilted her head curiously and stepped forward to peer inside.  When she caught site of the steering wheel, she nodded her head enthusiastically.  "VroomVroom.  Vroom Vroom!"  She gave the Orangutang a bright smile that lit up her hazel eyes.  "I know VroomVroom."

She clutched her pillowcase possessively to her middle and hurried over to get into the driver's seat.  The key was in the ignition and the controls were laid out differently than those that she'd seen on the television, but it was easy to tell that she was eager to give it a try.  

Nine climbed into the rear of the vehicle, and perched in aspot where he could look at the operating controls of the vehicle. He patted the team's mimic reassuringly on the arm. "I'm quite thertain you can do thith. However, I'd like you to pay clothe attention to the other groundcars and their behaviour. Perhapth, we can infer the rules governing vehicular traffic by observation. I'll help as I can."

The quiet twin made no move to acknowledge the Orangutang's words. Instead she ran her hands over the steering wheel and center console.  In addition there were several buttons that seemed to intrigue her, as she tilted her head and pressed a couple of them.  Finally she looked down at her feet and pressed on one of the pedals that resided on the floor.

Nothing happened.

Her face pinched with confusion and then a thought occurred to her.  She reached behind her left shoulder and pulled on the safety restraint, it took a few moments, but in short order she clicked it into the harness mechanism.  "No Boom."  She said softly as she pulled on it once to make sure that it stayed in.  "Yes.  No boom."

A pretty smile settled onto her face and she pushed on the pedal again, obviously certain that this time it would produce results.  ...but once again, nothing happened.

"No VroomVroom!  No Vroooooom...Vroooom?"  There was a resonance in her voice as she imitated the harsh roar of the cars she'd seen on the picture box.

Ghost allowed himself a smile. "This would appear to be a theme in our adventure thus far," he said to no one in particular. The amusement he projected was blunted by the alert way he continued scanning the surrounding area.

The quiet twin continued making a rumbling pur sound as she ran her hands over the console and dash.  Experimenting by pushing buttons, pulling levers and finally, twisting the key in the ignition.  As the SUV fired up, she made a most triumphant "Vroom! Vroom!" and pushed heavily on the gas pedal.

The car revved to an exciting pitch, but the retaining wall in front of them prevented any forward movement.

With a bit more exploration and persistence, wind shield wipers came on, the horn blared, interior lights came on and a rush of warm air came out of the vents.  Not Betty was captivated for several moments by the warm air and how it fluctuated as her hand wove in front of it, close to the vent and then far away.  Upon hearing the impatient rumbling of the others in the car, she continued until she found the gear shift.

Reverse was rough, scary even.  To which she announced to the car, "No Booms."  And pulled on her safety harness, before finally reinitiating the gear into the drive position and shooting off down the suburban neighborhood road at an alarming speed.

"Vroom!  Vroom!"  She continued to mutter in concentration as she drove down the street, still experinmenting with the gas pedal speed and the brake.  The car would zoom forward and then slow down, halt abruptly and then stream forward again.

Al grinned encouragingly at her.  "You're getting the hang of this.  Doing well.  Now try and keep it smooth, steady.  And let's see what's down there."  He looked around at the others.  "The further we are from this house when they start to wake up, the better."