I bet you thought this fic was dead, didn't you? No way! I'm just a slow writer...sometimes slower than usual.

You see, I really struggled with this chapter...painfully. The words and characters wouldn't cooperate for me except in snippets, and the dual whammy of family/personal and health problems didn't help much. There were times when I was either too sick or too sad to write.

So, I'm kind of proud of myself for finishing this chapter.

And, on another note: The story format for parts of this chapter and the next few are inspired by the story-telling style Scott Beatty and David Ross used for the comic book 'Batman:Gotham Knights' issue # 42. (yes, I'm a Batman lover). This particular issue dealt with telling an almost month-long story in only 22 pages-and it was done beautifully. This tiny comic book managed to convey the ups and downs, frustrations and resolutions of several people tied together by a single problem. This feat was accomplished by using only one page for each day, and focusing on one particular moment in that day...like a well drawn out montage.

I'm not trying to imitate Beatty and Ross, but I the loved the idea, and the format seemed to fit the plot style needed for this and the next upcoming chapters. And, it's a nice challenge. It's harder than you think, and I couldn't quite do it in some places.

And, a special shout-out to DPShrineInClosetGirl, my BETA. She did a great job encouraging me and helping me get this done when times were rough. Thanks, Shrine!

Disclaimer: I do not own "Despicable Me" or any of it's characters. They belong to Illumination Entertainment. I do, however, own my OC here. I'm receiving no profit for this work, I just wrote it for fun and laughs.

Lunch Break and a Can of Worms Chapter 4

Despite the arrival of spring, snow sliced through the darkness and pummeled the king-sized mansion like it held a personal vendetta with the family inside.

Strangely, this was not noticed by the tiny boy seated snugly between his sister's spindly crossed legs. Some things were more important.

"Yes. Some are red. Some are blue. Some are old. Some are new."

Like story time.

"Some are thin. Some are fat. The fat one has a yellow hat."

The toddler listened with with rapt attention as his sister continued reading.

As a fourth-grade victim of an early growth spurt, she already towered over her classmates. She bent down low to keep the pages at her brother's eye-level. Because of this, her hair draped over them both and to the edges of the book. To the boy, this had the effect of being in a cozy, one-person theater, with two slick black curtains on either side.

"From there to here, from here to there, funny things are everywhere." She turned the page."Here are some who like to run. They-"

"Nah!" The boy sternly grabbed for the book. With tiny fingers, he tried his best to turn the pages back.

"Victor, can't we finish this thing for once?" His sister sighed in exasperation and ran a tongue through her braces.

"Nah! This one!"

"But, don't you want to hear the one about the guy with eleven fingers?"

"This one! This one, Sissy!" He tugged at a lock of his sister's hair impatiently. She managed to separate the strands from his grasp before he started chewing on them.

"Geez," she muttered, " We got this whole book here and he only wants to hear the first few pages." But, she turned the book back to the beginning like her brother demanded.

"Okay, once again for the record, 'one fish, two fish, red fish'...you gonna help me?" She pointed to a pleasant-looking sky-colored fish at the bottom of the page. "What's this one?"

"Bwue fish!"

"Yup! And, this one?"

"Bwack fish!"

"Very good!" Victoria ruffled the toddler's hair affectionately. This pleased the boy, who would have returned the his sister's gesture in kind if he could reach the top of her head. Instead, he settled for lightly pulling on her hair again.

It was strange, but Victoria actually sort of enjoyed her brother using her locks as a pulley system. She understood that like most children his age, he just couldn't keep his hands to himself. True, she couldn't let him get away with it too often, but it was less perilous than say, getting into Mom's experimental weapons stash...or pulling on Dad's pant leg.

"Some are sad. And some are glad. And some are very, very bad."

"Yay!"

Yes, it was never too early to start your kid on the track to villainous behavior in the Perkins family. It wouldn't be too long now before she'd have to start him on 'Fun on The Run With Dick and Jane.'

"Why are they sad and glad and bad? I do not know." And suddenly, almost unreadably, Victoria cringed. She took a deep breath. "Goaskyourdad-"

"Daaddy—mff!"

"No, no! We go through this ever time! You don't need to ask Dad!" She was never fast enough. She never could quite get get her hand cupped around her baby brother's mouth before he inevitably called for their father. She cautiously removed her hand. As usual, the boy gave her a look of annoyed curiosity.

"Then whysit say so?"

"Because Dr. Sues didn't have you in mind when he wrote it."

"Me?"

"Yeah. You." She brushed some of her long hair behind her ear. " How many kids speak so well at your age?"

This was new. Sissy didn't usually say that. Little Victor pulled off his glasses and chewed on the lenses questioningly. He still wasn't used to the heavy things, but Mommy and Sissy had them, too, so they must be a good thing.

Sissy gently pulled the glasses out of his mouth. She eyed him thoughtfully as she placed them back on his head. "And, how old are you?"

"Uh..." The boy's tiny face scrunched together in concentration. "'leven...'leven years."

"No, not years. Try again."

"Umm...one less than...than twelve parts of one year."

Honestly, how could he already understand stuff like that? "Months. Eleven months."

"Months!" He sat up straighter and nodded proudly—he would not forget again...and he probably wouldn't.

Victoria watched this with a mixture of pride...and maybe a hint of unease. It was like he was growing up way too fast. Was Mom like this when she was little?

"Nah! More book, Sissy!"

Did it even matter?

Instead of continuing, Sissy leaned in close. "How many little boys know math before their first birthday?"

Wow! Sissy was full of funny questions tonight! Victor didn't know where to even begin answering that one. He stared wonderingly back at her in the wide-eyed puzzled way all children look before they've learned to be upset by the unknown. He watched Sissy smile knowingly as she pointed a finger to his chest.

And suddenly the boy's face blossomed into a huge grin. He knew the answer to this one!

"Meeeee!"

XXXXXXX

Twenty-or-so years later...

Day 1

"Okay, let's see it."

Vector watched as his sister pulled the thermometer out of his mouth and examined it critically.

She whistled. "Weeeelll, looks like you're not doing much today.

Oh, for the love of-was she really gonna do this? He wasn't a little kid anymore! Couldn't she figure that out? This was his house! He should probably tell her to take her stupid satellite and get lost.

...But he didn't.

He just sneezed and stared with groggy curiosity at the woman who looked kind of like the girl who used to read him bedtime stories. He couldn't quite see it. She looked more like a polished version of the angry young woman who'd stormed our of their house all those years ago...all her bags slung over one shoulder.

Funny what time does. That couldn't be the start of crow's feet at the corners of her eyes. And there was a nasty little scar just under her chin that he was pretty sure wasn't there before.

At least Victoria was still wearing her silver wristbands. That was comforting. He wondered if she'd improved on his original design.

She'd let her hair down completely today, and it spilled out impressively like ink on the orange bedsheets. He snagged a few strands before she sat up.

"What's this? Trying out for Rapunzel?"

She yanked her hair away irritably while pocketing the thermometer. "I like it long. You know that."

Long? It looked like she hadn't cut it since she moved out!

"Hey wait!" Vector scrambled to snatch her hair back again. "Is this gray?"

"Is what—Oh." Victoria paused for millisecond before retrieving her hair...just a millisecond. "Many of my clients are older, more experienced. Sometimes it helps if they think I'm a little older myself," She lied.

"It's gray."

"It's artificial."

It's stress-related. Great gravy, it was just like him to find a tiny needle in a haystack! It wasn't like she was an old granny, yet!

Vector shrugged and laid back down. "Doesn't bother me much, but if you're going gray, how much longer have I got?"

"Aww, Bro. You don't need to worry about that. Dad's going bald, remember?"

And she left him with that horrifying thought while she dished out breakfast.

There was a...questionable smell coming from the covered trolley parked next to Vector's bedside. He watched his sister with a raised eyebrow as she busied herself with whatever was on that thing.

"What's that?"

"I took the liberty of preparing the morning meal."

"I got robots for that."

She didn't bother to turn around. "So?"

"You burn water!"

Victoria rolled her eyes and placed a tray with a glass of...something in front of him. "That only happened once. I've learned since then."

Had she? Vector prodded the glass sceptically with his spoon. "What's this?"

"It's tang. Drink up."

"What're these little green chunks?"

She shrugged and continued ladling out something hot and watery from a large saucepan. "Your fever's up. You're delirious. Now, drink it."

Less than a second later, a mouthful of those same green chunks were sprayed all over a good portion of Vector's clean sheets. "Eccchhh! Who the heck screws up tang?"

Victoria seemed more annoyed than shocked. "Geez, Bro! There was some good matcha in that!"

"You're slipping me green tea? YOU'RE TRYING TO POISON ME!"

"Oh, hush. It's good for you." And like any patronizing big sister she set about cleaning up her brother's mess. "Powdered green tea and tang—dynamite combination. Drink it and you'll be back on your feet in no time! ...I guess you're supposed to add it to the tang before you add water."

"Gee, ya think?"

He probably would have said more if he hadn't been distracted by his sister mater-of-factually gathering up his now-green tea-splattered sheets.

"What do you think you're doing?"

"Your laundry. Someone has to do it."

"I got robots for-" And a new look of horror suddenly spread over his face. "What did you do with my robots?"

"You don't need your robots. I'm here. Now, c'mon." She plunked a steaming bowl down in front of her still-shocked brother. "Here's your breakfast."

He took an unpleasant look at it's contents. "Oh, God..."

"It's one of those soup mixes I picked up for you," Victoria explained cheerfully, "Egg drop soup, I think."

"Is this caviar?"

"Very expensive egg drop soup. You didn't have any...What?"

Vector was giving his sister the look of someone who's just realized they're trapped in the same room with their worst nightmare.

XXXXXXX

Day 2

"...they're multiplying!"

On the smaller but still impressive wrap-around screen in Vector's bedroom was a quaint little scene of domestic bliss-a picnic...of cookies.

The Patton-esque leader of the small band of rogue cookie-bots sat leisurely beside it's pink-hatted mate. They contently watched their progeny-about half a dozen bite-sized mini-bots-sitting around a large napkin. Some of the other families were playing volleyball with a soda cap, a few were off playing hide and seek. A mountain of a shark's head watched them curiously from the nearby moat.

Back in his room, Vector stared at the screen with his mouth hanging open.

"Sis!" He pressed a button on his mini-keyboard and a smaller window displaying his sister popped up on screen. "Sis, get in-what did you do to my kitchen?"

An apron-clad Victoria Perkins stared back onscreen like a deer caught in the headlights. She stood at ground-zero of a room that was kind of hard to describe...the word 'food bomb' comes to mind. She managed to recover quickly.

"What are you doing up? I told you to stay in bed today!"

"Hey! I'm in bed! Does this not look like I'm in bed?" He gestured to the pillows, bedsheets, and Kleenex boxes around him.

"Awake. And active. Not part of the deal."

"...Deal?" Vector's eyes narrowed. "You barge into my house and take over my stuff. That doesn't strike me as 'deal' material."

"You. Sleep. Now." And much to Vector's disgust, she used a batter-covered spoon to click the screen off.

He sighed and flopped back down on his pillows. It was just like her to do something like this! What was her problem, anyway? As soon as she'd got settled in, it was like she'd declared martial law and he was her hostage. Most of his lights were back on in the other rooms, and all but one of his humidifiers—the one with the sleepy Twinkie tied to it-had disappeared. The only reason Twinkie was spared this hostile takeover was because Victoria really didn't know what to do with it...Vector was beginning to suspect his sister was just a tad scared of that thing: Both sibling and alien apparently had an unspoken agreement that neither one existed.

He blew his nose before looking back up at his screen. Some of the mini-bots were now playing 8-legged hopscotch.

"Cute." He muttered sarcastically. "Why don't you guys do me a favor and crawl up my sister's leg?"

He spent the rest of the day moping in his room and watching the mini-bots sky-dive off Fish's nose.

Later that evening when his fever spiked, Victoria-now clean and crisp—carefully entered his room carrying a wide orange mixing bowl.

"Peace offering?" She held out the bowl hopefully.

Vector regarded his dinner with mild interest. "Cookie dough?"

"Yup."

"You made it?"

"Yup."

He sat up shakily and shoveled a few spoon-fulls into his mouth. "The one food you don't screw up. Good bribe."

"Pfft. You're just picky." She casually sat on the foot of his bed and picked up her brother's bedroom keyboard. It had the same color scheme as everything else in his house—white with orange touch-screen buttons.

"Okay, I gotta ask: Why orange?"

Vector paused between spoon-fulls and looked his sister up and down. "Why red?"

Touche. She smirked and pressed one of the buttons on the keyboard. The large wrap-around monitor folded in on itself and retracted into the ceiling.

"Impressive, Bro."

"Ha! If you like that, you should see my-" He paused and smacked his lips. "...you put something in this, didn't you?"

"Just a light sedative. You haven't been sleeping." When she saw the alarmed look on his face, she added, "Nothing you're allergic to. I didn't forget you can't take normal meds."

Vector looked down at his already half-eaten bowl of cookie dough...and considered the possibility of a stomach-pump.

He took another bite.

But, it was such a shame to waste all this good nosh...

He took another bite.

And...he hadn't had cookies at all since he got home...and a little nap couldn't hurt..

He took yet another bite.

"Sis, you're an evil genius."

Really, it was like she was some kind of savant who could demolish a kitchen and come out with the Holy Grail of cookie dough.

"Aren't we all?" Victoria waved the keyboard in his direction. "This is coming with me."

"Not."

She stood up and found a smaller remote on his nightstand. "This one's going, too." An she ducked just in time to avoid a Wii Remote halfheartedly aimed at her head. "Why, thank you. This saves time."

"Nazi. You won't find them all." But he didn't seem as upset as she thought he would be. He looked more like he didn't believe she was up to the task. Strange. The sedative was only supposed to make him sleepy.

"Perhaps. And perhaps I don't need to."

"And...what do you plan on doing if Mr. Hotshot shows up?"

She looked up. "Oh, right! 'We're being watched'..."

"Sis-"

"I'll take care of it."

"Just like you 'took care' of my robots?"

Why did he look so offended?

"Yeah, about that—You really need to change your password more often."

"Pfft." He licked his spoon. "I change my passwords plenty." There was considerably less cookie dough now, but the bowl was getting steadily heavier. He leaned back into his pillows as his spoon clattered to the floor. Shoot. Sis always took over everything. Sis always thought she knew best...so, why wasn't he freaking out and throwing her out of his house?

"..But you know," she added, "with some of your bigger stuff, I didn't need a password. A lot of your rooms gave me a retina scan before I could go in...your computer fingerprinted me. I thought I was going to have some problems, but they all...welcomed me."

She turned and regarded his prone form. "You never programed them with my information when I got here. So, why do they know me?"

A light snore was Vector's only response.

Victoria sighed and continued gathering up all her brother's gadgets. She hadn't expected him to say anything. One pinch of Valerian had about the same effect on him as an elephant tranquilizer. It's not that she had wanted to drug him, but she had no choice. Victor's allergies limited him from pretty much any and all the medicines out there, so the best remedy was always sleep—which he had not been doing.

There was now a stylish little collection of gizmos in her arms. Victoria sighed again. Seriously, he'd be better by now if he wasn't always fiddling with this stuff.

She glanced mournfully at her brother before heading for the door. "Bro, why do you do this to yourself?"

The door was almost closed when she heard someone mutter, "Why do you ask stupid questions?"

Author's note:

'One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish' belongs to the lovable Dr. Seus

And hey! My fic now has fan-art! The lovely Windmaedchen, DeviantArt artist of many a Despicable Me pic, drew a round of requests not long ago, and I was one of the people she drew for! I originally wanted her to draw the flashback at the beginning of this fic, but I got to thinking and decided I wanted this instead:

h ttp :/ windmaedchen .deviantart. Com/ art/FlyingMoped-198818337 (without the spaces.)

It's so perfect! She got the looks and size ratio down perfectly! And, that's pretty much the same age Vector and Victoria are in the flashback, so you get a nice visual of their childhood. :)

And, also, Valerian is an herb sometimes used to help people relax enough for sleep. I wouldn't recommend using it like Victoria did, though (she comes from a sneaky villain family, after all!).