Literature
Alone at Home 3
Jenna Widebottom, the blonde master spy, kept a cool exterior as she walked through the airport customs. She had lost sight of one of her compatriots, the more junior agent Nancy Knickerson, but the third member of their group was standing at a window while a customs officer checked her passport.
"Eliza Pants-Ripper?" The officer asked skeptically, examining the passport.
"Panschripper." The redheaded Eliza corrected him, then repeated with exaggerated pronunciation in her Eastern european accent, "Pan-shree-perr."
"Okay, everything looks in order." The officer handed the passport back and Eliza went through, to meet up with Jenna, who was pretending to admire a group of carol singers past baggage claim.
"Any trouble?" Jenna asked.
"No, but what about the microchip?" Eliza replied.
"Nancy has it." Jenna said. She pulled a sweet from the pocket of her coat and slipped it into her mouth, indulging in her habit of nervous eating. A moment later, though, the two spotted Nancy- the dark-haired girl was leaving a side room, her trousers halfway down her thighs and her shirt unbuttoned, she saw her partners and hurried over.
"I was picked for a strip search." Nancy said, in response to their looks while putting herself back together.
"What did you do with the microchip?" Jenna asked, popping another sweet into her mouth.
"Relax, I slipped it into another passenger's luggage," Nancy said, "there was a remote control car, I stuck it inside, no one will notice."
"Which passenger?" Eliza asked.
"Er..." Nancy looked around, until she spotted a dark-haired woman walking off through the automatic doors, carrying several plastic bags of duty-free shopping. "That one!" She smiled.
"Okay..." Jenna nodded, "and how do we get it off her?"
Two days later, the villains had managed to set up home in a vacant house down the road from the one they had tracked the woman to. Eliza sat watching a bank of monitors that filled one wall of the lounge, each playing a feed from the tiny cameras the women had set up around the house, hidden in the snow and Christmas decorations. All except one, which was showing a roadrunner cartoon while Nancy sat in front of it.
"So, the mother is away from 8 till 6 every day." Eliza said, her eyes going from the monitors to her notes.
"Then that's when we'll go in." Jenna sat on an armchair in the middle of the room, an open bag of crisps at her side.
"The girl is still there." Eliza pointed out.
"What girl?" Jenna leaned forwards, her leather trousers squeaking alarmingly.
"Maybe you should lay off the junk food." Nancy suggested.
"I'm eating my feelings!" Jenna snapped, before turning back to Eliza, "Girl?"
"She has a daughter." Eliza tapped one monitor, which showed a slender dark-haired girl sitting on the sofa in the lounge, flicking through TV channels.
"Why isn't she in school?" Nancy asked.
"It's the Christmas holidays." Eliza replied, "She doesn't have anything better to do it seems."
"She's just a girl." Jenna shrugged, "How difficult could this be?"
Melissa sat on the sofa, idly flicking through TV channels. Christmas movie, Christmas TV special, Christmas shopping on QVC...
"Ooh, Muppets Christmas Carol." She said aloud, stopping her flicking. The young girl settled down in her seat, crossing her long legs. She wore a red tartan dress over a long-sleeved white top, and had white tights, making a slightly old-fashioned Christmas look. To her side, the tree stood decorated and ready for the big day.
The doorbell rang, Melissa let out a grunt of frustration as the film was just getting to the part where Scrooge was visited by Marley and Marley, but she got up and went to the front door.
On the doorstep stood a blonde woman, dressed in a brown shirt and shorts of a delivery company, with a name badge saying she was 'Jemma', and with a large cardboard box in her hands. Melissa could not help noticing two things, however; the first was that there was no apparent truck this delivery could have come off of, and the second was that the uniform the woman wore seemed much too small for her, and potentially moments from bursting apart at the seams.
"Hello?" Melissa said.
"Hi." Jenna, in disguise as Jemma the delivery woman, put on her best customer service smile, "I have a delivery for you."
"Okay," Melissa stepped forwards to take the box, but Jenna held out a hand to stop her.
"Just a second, young lady, I have a few questions."
"Okay." Melissa sighed.
"Right, could you confirm your full name for me?"
"Melissa Heineman."
"And your address?"
Melissa paused, looking sceptical,
"Right here."
"Right, right..." Jenna looked nervous. She took a deep breath, and as she did a button burst off her shirt and went flying into the hall of the house, narrowly missing Melissa. The gap it left in her shirt revealed the purple and pink floral bra she had beneath. "Er..."
"You want me to grab your button?" Melissa offered, starting to turn back into the house.
"No!" Jenna snapped, "I have more questions- occupation?"
"Mine?"
"Yes."
"Student. At school."
"Good, good. And your..." another button burst from the shirt, lower down. It bounced off Melissa's front and landed on the doorstep.
"Are you sure that's the right uniform?" Melissa smiled.
"My uniform is fine!" Jenna gulped, despite that being blatantly untrue. "Now, what is your, er..." a third button burst, then a fourth, leaving the shirt gaping over Jenna's chest and belly. She grabbed at the shirt and tried to tug it closed, but could not get it close.
"Are you sure?" Melissa asked.
"I'm asking the questions!" Jenna gasped, "What is your full name?"
"You already asked me that."
"And your, er..." The fastenings of her shorts popped open and the garment started to slide down her legs, unveiling Jenna's pale blue knickers with Olaf from Frozen smiling on the front. "What's your... favourite Disney film?"
"Probably not Frozen." Melissa stepped back and started to close the door, "I'm going back inside now."
"No, wait..." Jenna lunged for the door, causing both her shirt and shorts to split up the back, and was still too late to prevent it closing.
Melissa walked back to the lounge, to an even stranger encounter; two young women, dressed in black winter clothes, were scrabbling around on the floor under the Christmas tree, examing the presents.
"This one?" Nancy asked, holding one up.
"Too small." Eliza replied, "Like your brain. We need one that's big!"
"Like your bum?" Nancy replied.
"Heh-hem." Melissa cleared her throat loudly and both women paused, looking over to her guiltily. There was a moment of confusion, then the two thieves turned and pushed at the lounge window, both trying to get through at the same time.
"I was first!" Nancy insisted.
"I'm senior!" Eliza snapped back.
"You're on my foot!"
"You've got your hand on my breast!"
"Well, you've always got them in the way!"
Both of them managed to bundle through the window and fall in a heap in the snowy garden, before scrambling to their feet and running away.
"That was weird." Melissa said.
Nancy and Eliza returned to their home base, to find Jenna in the torn remains of her delivery person disguise.
"I don't suppose you got it?" Jenna said.
"You were supposed to keep her talking!" Eliza snapped.
"My clothes fell apart!" Jenna replied. "Stupid disguise doesn't fit any more, Nancy washed it too hot and shrank it!"
"The disguise is fine, it's all that junk you eat." Nancy replied.
"Well, no more disguises." Jenna said, "we go in tonight, and we take it back."
"Honey, I'm going to be late tonight." Melissa's mum told her in a voicemail message, "Order a pizza and don't stay up too late."
Melissa put down her phone. She was reluctant to invite another delivery person to her house, and she had a feeling the three women were not going to stop after one failed attempt. She was going to have to act to stop them from getting back in.
"Right, all set?" Jenna hitched up her black jeans as she looked around at her crew. Nancy and Eliza, also dressed in black, nodded and gave thumbs up. "Right, let's do it."
The women crossed the snow-covered street to the house, which was lit up from the curtained windows and the Christmas lights strung across the front. Jenna approached the front door while Nancy walked around the back and Eliza considered the side wall. She looked up and down the trellis up the side of the house, leading to a second floor window, then took hold of it and began to climb up.
"Not Santa Clause coming to see you, little girl." She muttered as she pulled herself up, trying to ignore the creaking sounds from the trellis as she did. "Coming to... nng!" She gave a grunt as she pulled herself up, the window was right in front of her, until it suddenly became out of her reach. "No no no!" Eliza exclaimed as the trellis came away from the wall and fell backwards, it jerked to a stop at a 45-degree angle, leaving Eliza suspended, hanging over the garden but not able to either climb down or reach the window again. "Oh no..."
Nancy surveyed the back door, then pulled a set of lock picks from the pocket of her leather trousers.
"No lock can keep me out." She smirked, selecting two tools and crouching at the lock. She inserted both tools into the lock, and frowned as she heard a faint buzzing noise. Her frown turned to an extremely startled expression as she felt electricity coursing through the lock, her tools and into her. Her hair stood straight up with the static flowing through it, her mouth widened into a large O of shock, and after a moment she flew away from the door and landed in the garden, wisps of smoke curling up.
Nancy coughed as she sat up, looking down at herself. Her outfit had taken a beating from the electricity, her jumper was burnt to rags, leaving her in some burnt scraps and a purple bra with pink stars, and the fastenings of her jeans had exploded. She staggered to her feet, grabbing at her jeans as they fell down past her purple knickers.
"Nope." She grunted, squinting at the door, "Not going to keep me out." She gave her wild hair a futile pat down, then ran at the door, intending to charge right through it if she had to. As it turned out she did not need to, as just before she reached it the door was swung open and Nancy ran straight through it and into the kitchen. Her feet skidded on the tiled floor, which was covered in soap suds, and she went careening across the room, fell over headfirst and ended up with her head stuck in the door of the washing machine.
"Get me out of here!" Her muffled voice echoed from inside the machine.
Jenna looked at the front door skeptically. It seemed too easy to just go in, but the girl couldn't be too clever. Shrugging, she went for it, turning the handle and opening the unlocked door.
Inside, she just had time to glimpse Melissa, grinning widely and holding a hose, before a torrent of water blasted her, sending the villain flying backwards and back out into the night.
"Come on... come on..." Eliza clung firmly to the hanging trellis with one hand, while reaching out to the window with the other. Her tongue stuck between her lips as she strained, but it remained out of her grasp. She gave up stretching and grabbed onto the trellis with both hands again. She looked down, seeing a thorny bush ten feet below her, and decided against dropping down on the sharp barbs which reached up towards her soft buttocks, but the angle the trellis hung at made climbing down impossible.
An idea struck her, and Eliza carefully reached to her belt, unbuckled it, and pulled it out of the loops. She whirled it as well as she could in the circumstances and flung one end like a lasso, snagging the buckle on the catch of the window.
"Aha!" Eliza crowed, pulling hard on the belt and pulling herself and the trellis back to the house. It clattered against the wall and she scrambled through the window, failing to notice her trousers slipping down and off until they fell to the snow below and she sat on the carpet of the bedroom inside, with only white and red heart-patterned knickers and knee-length grey socks below her waist.
Eliza got up, finding herself in what appeared to be the girl's bedroom, the walls pastel pink and decorated with posters of pop stars, and the bed full of cuddly toys. She looked around dismissively, then went to the door. She walked through, and as she pushed the door open a bucket full of ping pong balls tipped down on her, bouncing off her head and all over the floor.
"Wha? Agh!" Eliza exclaimed, her feet skidding on the balls, she lost control and fell down the corridor, falling straight onto a large piece of flypaper stretched up one wall, and sticking herself firmly in place.
Jenna stood up awkwardly, barely able to move her limbs, as the freezing water she had been blasted with combined with landing in the snow had frozen her near-solid. Her blonde hair had solidified in place as she lay, and now she was stood up it stuck out from her head in all angles, like a frosty halo.
"Damn... brat..." she grunted through her icy face. She stiffly made her way back up the front steps to the door, and swung her whole body to get her hand to it to push it open again. Inside, the front hall was surprisingly deserted. "Little girl?" Jenna called. She took a few more steps, each easier than the last, as the ice melted rapidly off her, and she realised it was actually very warm inside, the heating appeared to be on full blast. "Oh, that's better." Jenna sighed, smiling. She flexed her arms as they came free, and went into the dining room. After a few more moments, however, she began to frown, as she realised her outfit was constricting her again, despite being unfrozen. She looked herself over, and saw the cuffs of her top creeping up her arms, and the hems of her trouser legs rising up her ankles, as the whole outfit tightened, the combination of freezing snow and then blasting heat causing the material to shrink. "No, this isn't fair!" Jenna wailed, as the seams started to split and fastenings to pop. She grabbed at the outfit, but was unable to do anything to present it shrinking off her body completely, falling in tatters and leaving her in her underwear again; her blue Olaf knickers, blue bra, and white socks. "That outfit fitted me!" She exclaimed. She turned and stormed out of the room, and into the kitchen. "What the heck?"
She looked down at the figure of Nancy, her head in the washing machine and her hands and knees skidding on the soapy floor. Jenna bent and with a grunt tugged the younger thief out.
Nancy stood in front of her, in her bra and tattered top, along with her broken jeans, and dripping wet.
"What happened to you?!" Both criminals asked at the same time.
"Did you find the car?" Jenna asked.
"No, I only just got inside and then ended up stuck in there." Nancy replied, "Where's Eliza?"
"I'll go find her." Jenna said, "you find the car."
While Nancy went to the lounge, Jenna backtracked to the front hall and up the stairs.
"Eliza?" She called up.
"Up here!" The accented voice came back.
"Have you found anything?"
"Nothing."
"What are you still doing up there?"
"Nothing."
"What?"
"Come up and help me!"
Jenna trudged up the stairs, wondering why the rest of her crew seemed incapable of doing anything without her help. As she made it almost to the top, she felt the carpet shifting under her feet. She began to fall, and as she did she got a quick glimpse of Melissa at the foot of the stairs, pulling at the stair carpet, before the blonde thief descended rapidly, bouncing down the stairs and letting out a series of grunts and groans as she did, before tripping over a line of coloured lights strung across the bottom of the stairs, and tumbling back out the front door again.
Nancy spotted the Christmas tree and the wrapped presents, just like earlier that day.
"Right... which one is the car?" Nancy wondering bending to the presents, accompanied by the sound of tearing fabric as her jeans split, revealing her purple knickers and the picture of the Grinch that adorned the seat. "My pants!" Nancy wailed.
"Ha ha ha ha!" A chattering laugh made Nancy dart upright and look around, but she did not see anyone.
"Who's there?"
"I am." The voice came again.
"Who are you?"
"Ha ha ha ha!"
"Do you think you're funny?"
"I am."
"No you're not!" Nancy stamped her foot petulantly, causing her trousers to drop to the floor and prompt more laughter.
"Where are you?"
Nancy's question was answered a moment later as a parrot, riding on top of a remote controlled car, skidded across the room and out through the door.
"Stupid parrot," Nancy grumbled, "thinks he's so great because he's got a little car, and... wait, little car?"
Leaving her trousers where they bad fallen, Nancy ran out of the door after the pet bird.
"What's going on down there?!" Eliza shouted, listening to the various bangs and suspicious noises from the floor below. "I suppose I'll just have to free myself." She said when there was no reply.
She managed to wriggle her arms out of the sticky trap enough to reach a clear bit of wall with her hands on each side, brace against it, and push backwards.
"Yes... yes..." Eliza said, pushing herself away from the flypaper, "Yes... no!" She was free, but her top had torn off her and remained stuck, leaving her in a red bra that matched the red of the hearts in her knickers.
Increasingly annoyed at the way this job was going, the European thief stomped down the stairs, as her foot touched the floor at the bottom a parrot riding a small toy car came speeding out of a doorway and ran over her foot.
"Ow!" She cried, hopping up and down on her other foot, she was already off-balance when Nancy chased after the bird and ran straight into Eliza instead, the collision knocking both of them out through the open front door to land in the snow-covered front garden.
"Idiot!" Eliza exclaimed, sitting up and brushing snow off her.
"Klutz!" Nancy shouted back, "Where are your clothes?"
"Where are yours?"
"Where's Jenna?"
"Here." Jenna sat up from under a covering of snow, emerging like a slender yeti.
"That damn girl." Eliza said.
"How did she do this to us?" Jenna agreed.
"Maybe we're not very good at being thieves." Nancy suggested.
"You might not be." Eliza said.
"Look, why don't we just go back in, all three of us." Jenna said, "We can take her, she's just one girl."
As she said that, the three criminals were suddenly bathed in light as multiple spotlights were shone on them from various angles. The women turned to see a group of police cars had pulled up around the house.
"Jenna Widebottom, Nancy Knickerson, Eliza Pants-Ripper!" A voice called over a loudspeaker.
"Panschripper!" Eliza called back. The voice continued,
"You are under arrest..."
