Saturday, September 23, 2000 (4:30 PM)

"FRANK!" Samantha's voice rang out as Frank went sprawling on the ground in front of the stands. Frank felt someone touch his back, felt someone else touch a shoulder and he grimaced in pain.

"Frank? Can you sit up?" Samantha asked him and he felt her hand on his arm. Frank shook his head. He wasn't going to do anything until he could breathe again. The wind had been knocked from him and he hadn't yet convinced his lungs that they could come out of hiding. He felt more hands prodding him and he batted them away, until, finally, in one surging breath, his lungs did their job.

"He had the wind knocked from him," someone that Frank did not recognize by their voice said, probably to Samantha. "Frank? Take another breath for me, please."

Frank obliged, grateful that he could do so. It hurt to breathe, his lungs felt battered on the inside, but he took breath after breath. He felt something cold press against his chest and realized that it was probably one of the paramedics who attended every football game. Hands prodded him some more, running along his arms, back, shoulder, stomach and legs, he winced only when they pushed too hard on the shoulder that broke his fall.

"All right, Frank," the paramedic told him. "Go ahead and try to sit up for me."

Frank felt hands helping him into a sitting position. Everything still felt all right, except for the throbbing shoulder. He shook the cobwebs in his head and knew, if he could see, his vision would be spinning around in circles. He felt like he was doing just that, anyway. Frank grimaced again.

"All right, Frank," the paramedic said. "I need you to follow this light, I want to see if everything in your head is connecting."

Frank smiled a bit shame-facedly as he reached up and pulled off his sunglasses, allowing his eyes speak more eloquently of the plausibility of his following a light anywhere than he could say himself.

"I'm sorry, I didn't realize," the paramedic told him. "It's recent, isn't it? I saw you last season..."

"Two weeks ago, almost three," Frank said, glad he had enough wind to finally speak. "And my head feels all right, I landed on the shoulder. That hurts. I think I wrenched it."

"Let me give it a once over," the paramedic said and Frank grimaced as the paramedic manipulated the shoulder back and forth, forcing Frank to raise the arm into the air and back down again. "It doesn't appear to be broken. I'd ice it down tonight, however and rest it for a while. I wouldn't do anything strenuous with it for about a week; take some time to let it heal properly."

"I'll give you some exercises," the team doctor, Jay Dunn, said to Frank; he stood somewhere over Frank's shoulder. "It'll get your shoulder back to shape in no time. Come see me when you get a chance on Monday. Until then I want you to carefully manipulate it, up, down, back and forth, five times, about once every two hours or when you feel it stiffen again. Take it slow, if it pulls again, stop and start again."

"All right, Doc," Frank agreed, somewhat slowly. "If that's what you want."

"I want," Doc grinned at him. "Go on, get out of here, I'm sure you have better ways to spend your time."

"Thank you," Frank said again and he felt several hands helping him back to his feet. Someone, probably Samantha, was brushing off his trousers and his shirt.

"What the heck happened, Frank?" Chet asked him, concerned. "One minute you're behind me on the stands and the next you're in front of me on the ground."

"Someone pushed and then threw me over. And since that someone was very strong, I'll bet money on the 'very large man,'" Frank said and growled. "That man is starting to be a very huge pain in my backside and my shoulder."

Frank rubbed at his sore shoulder and grimaced. No more rubbing, he reminded himself. Rubbing bad!

"Well, forget about him tonight," Samantha said. "We have a victory party to go to and I don't want to hear about cases tonight. All right?"

Frank grinned at her. "Oh, I suppose I can accept that easily enough. Where the heck is Joe?"

He heard nothing for a minute but assumed that the crowd was thick enough no one could see his brother. Samantha took his arm and slowly led him forward.

 

"All right, MacKenzie!" Joe grinned at his friend. He high-fived the quarterback. Connor looked hot, tired and sweaty even on a rather cool day in September. "That was one righteous throw you made the last five minutes!"

"Sez you," Connor said as he swung his arm around in a circle. "That play was more the work of our erstwhile number one wide receiver, Culbert, than anything I did. I nearly got my butt sacked because Coonby missed yet another block! I'm going to murder that boy with my bare hands."

"You'll have to beat me to it," Joe told him. "But you'd better go get cleaned up, my sister's not going to want to bring you to the Victory party the way you smell. And if she doesn't go to the party, she'll figure out some way to blame me for it. I've got to go find Frank and Vanessa and the others."

Joe waved his hand in front of his face for emphasis on the 'smell' part. Connor batted him playfully on the arm and chuckled.

"Tell Mandy I'll pick her up in an hour," Connor told Joe.

"I'll think about it," Joe grinned at him. Connor waved a threatening hand. "All right, all right, MacKenzie, I'll do it. But only because Mandy would kill me if I didn't, not because I'm scared of you."

Connor chuckled, cuffed his friend a good one and sauntered away to be further congratulated by teammates and friends. Joe turned to go find his brother and girlfriend and sister when someone walked right into him and he was knocked back a step.

"Watch where you're... oh, it's you," Joe grumbled. "Hi Anna."

Anna Phillips blushed and lowered her head ever so slightly and Joe cringed again. Could she be any more obvious if she tried? Probably, he just hoped he wasn't around when she as doing it.

"Hi, Joe," Anna said in a soft voice. "I... I saw you standing there and wanted to just come by and say hi and see how you're feeling. Your face looks awful!"

Joe sighed and glowered at the girl. She just didn't take a hint. He was going to have to hit her over the head with the fact that he dated Vanessa and wanted nothing to do with Anna. That girl was weird and had been since the day Joe rescued her from the gangbangers.

"I'm trying a new look," Joe said, finally. "I see you don't care for it. I'll write that up in the report I'm doing."

"Report?" Anna asked, confused. "You're writing a report on wearing a bandage?"

Joe rolled his eyes and didn't bother to hide his irritation with the annoying girl. When they created 'dense' they must have had Anna Phillips in mind. No wonder she was, she didn't understand subtle hints that he wanted her to go away! Sure, he thought again, she was cute. He had been attracted to her for about five minutes and the he had listened to her actually talk. In high school, he would have probably dated her. Now that he had dated Vanessa for two years, he found he actually liked a girl with a brain. Even worse, now his feet were starting to throb. He really needed to get off them again. Soon.

"I got hurt at home," Joe said through clenched teeth. "It's nothing big, I didn't even go back to the hospital. Even my parents said I'll be ok and my mom worries. I'd better get going, though, or Frank and Vanessa are going to leave without me and then my goose is cooked. See you later, Anna."

Anna sighed as Joe made good his escape, walking quickly through the crowd until he saw his brother. What did he have to do to get that girl to stop fawning over him, paint her a sign? She obviously understood very little about the art of subtlety. And, yes, she was sure cute but she was also annoying. Definitely not his type, in any way, shape or form.

"There you are," Vanessa came up beside him and took his arm. "I thought we were going to have to call in the Marines to get you out of that crowd."

Joe leaned forward and gently kissed her, his eyes finally lighting up as he looked into her eyes. She was the girl for him, no doubt about it. Anna was nowhere near the same league as Vanessa Bender! He liked the kiss so much that he kissed her again and gently pulled her into his arms to hold her for a moment. Ah, jasmine today. She smelled just like jasmine.

"Annoying is named Anna Phillips," Joe told her as he wrapped an arm around her shoulders and walked with her through the crowd. "I swear she lays in wait for me to walk by. And then she pounces, like some half-crazed tiger waiting for a deer to walk by. Last I checked, I wasn't a deer."

"I'm happy to see you too," Vanessa smiled at him. "But we'd better get out of the crowd, don't you think? These people can get rowdy if you stay too long. Samantha's already got Frank halfway to the car by now."

"Let's go catch up to them. Where did Chet and Kaitlyn go?"

"Chet said he'd meet us at the party," Vanessa explained. "Kaitlyn wants to run to the mall for a few minutes so Chet said he'd bring her."

"Then let's get going," Joe said. "I want to get back to my dorm room and change, all of my good clothes are there."

Vanessa looked down at his feet and then up again. "How are they?" she asked.

"They're fine," Joe said. "Still attached to the bottom of my legs and everything. You want me to wiggle my toes for you?"

He grinned impishly as he held out one foot at Vanessa and balanced, carefully on his other one. He even managed to not grimace when pain shot up the foot he was standing on. Vanessa held her nose delicately and shook her head and Joe put his foot on the ground as he put his arm around her shoulders and walked with her toward the car, the car in this case being Samantha's Spyder. It barely fit the five of them, counting Mandy. Still, Joe had to admit that Sam had good taste in cars, even if she didn't have a Camaro like he did.

"Sam, sitting in this is like trying to crawl inside a tuna can," Joe told Samantha as he crawled into the back seat next to his sister. Mandy thumped him on the knee and flashed him her most threatening look.

"That's going to get you hurt, Joseph David," she said, pertly. "Next time you can sit in the middle. And this is more comfortable than your Camaro is! I'm surprised Vanessa ever goes anywhere with you in that!"

Joe grinned at her. "Ah, you love my Camaro, sis."

"I love my Intrigue," Mandy said. "And if I had to choose, I'll take Sam's Spyder any day."

"All right, enough insulting my girlfriend's car," Frank told his brother. "I like this car. You wouldn't believe the snuggling properties that are built into this thing."

Joe rolled his eyes and closed them as Samantha, with a couple of more pointed remarks backing up Mandy's statement about Joe's Camaro, drove them to Tauhausen Hall.

 

"Hey, Frank!" Frank turned in the direction of the voice and waited expectantly. "It's Chris, Frank. Chris Montegro. How are you? Hey, Samantha, great dress!"

"Oh, hi Chris," Frank said to the middle linebacker for the football team. "Good game today. How many jerseys did you destroy today?"

"Only two," Chris said with a laugh. He was renowned around campus for his ability to destroy jerseys in a football game, usually without the help of the other side. Frank, as one of the team trainers, had been responsible for keeping Chris in jerseys, all of which Chris had to pay for himself. Good thing Chris had the money for it, Frank thought with an internal laugh.

"Is that all?" Frank said. "It must have been an incredible letdown to all of your female fans. How did they handle their disappointment?"

"Badly as usual," Chris chuckled. "Say, speaking of female fans, I think I see some now. You stay cool, Frank. Sam, keep him on his toes."

"I'll try," Sam told Chris and Frank felt her arm wrap around his forearm. "Come on, Frank, your sister and Connor just got here and I saw Joe and 'Nessa sneak in a few minutes ago. Let's go mingle."

Samantha navigated them through the people gathered in the very large conference room at the local End Zone Grill, a place popular for its after football parties and its atmosphere. A once famous football player, Deter Murphy, a quarterback who once played for the New York Giants, owned the restaurant. Murphy liked to treat his guests well and always hosted the Victory party when the Knights played in town.

"Hi, Mandy, Hi, Connor," Samantha said, cueing Frank that they had gotten to his sister and roommate. "Wow, Mandy, great dress, is that new?"

"Yes!" Mandy said and sounded excited. "I just bought it two weeks ago and never had a chance to wear it until now. It's me, isn't it?"

"It's totally you," Samantha agreed. "Good color too."

Frank raised an eyebrow behind his sunglasses. He turned his attention to other people talking near him and the sounds of yelling on the other side of the restaurant. That sounded like Max "Mad Max" Brownen having his usual after game psych fest. Frank grinned as he listened to Mad Max carrying on about the virtues of his playing, his fellow linebackers playing and how badly the other team played and weren't remotely worthy of even having their butts pounded by the Bayport Knights.

"Interesting," he heard Mandy say a moment later and he turned his attention back to her.

"What?" Connor asked, sounding curious.

"Look over there, by Max and his crew," Mandy told Connor. "Just to the right of them. Isn't that...?"

"It's the large man?" Connor asked her.

"It looks like him," Mandy said. "Come on, let's go check it out."

"Mandy!" Frank protested. "Wa..."

"Too late," Samantha told him. "They're already gone."

 

"Wow, there are a lot of people here!" Vanessa told Joe as she dragged Joe through the crowd gathered in the banquet room and back toward a group of friends gathered in the corner. "I don't think we ever had this many people here last year, did we?"

"They opened up the party to more people this year," Joe told Vanessa. "Besides the team and trainers, they're allowing the school paper to send people and the student council. And I think more of the players showed up this year."

He grimaced when someone stepped on his foot which reminded his foot that he didn't like all of this standing stuff. Joe ignored that once again.

"It's great!" Joe exclaimed. "Rowdy too, I needed something like this, it's been too intense lately."

"I never thought I'd ever hear you say that," Vanessa told him as she wrapped an arm around his neck and kissed him. They swayed a few minutes to the beat of the music playing around them, music accented by the shouting of various members of the football team, leading other people in cheers. "I thought you lived on intensity!"

"Frank's the intense one," Joe said. "I hate intense. I'd rather live easy and have fun!"

Vanessa laughed. "I'm not sure you know how to live easy and have fun, at least not all the time. When you and Frank get wrapped up in a case of any kind, you can both be intense. You have a different kind of intense from Frank, yours is more visual, but you're still intense."

"Izzat so?" Joe said as he leaned toward her and he stared into her beautiful gray eyes. "Didn't you tell me you like your men dark and brooding?"

"I think you must have me confused with someone, monsieur," Vanessa's eyes sparkled with her laughter as she leaned forward to kiss him again. "Come on, champ, I need something to drink. Let's go raid the soda table."

"Lead on, my lady," Joe said as he offered her his arm, before leading her toward the soda table. Once there, they both took a soda from the table and sipped on them. Vanessa kept one arm loosely draped around Joe's and she leaned her head on his shoulder for a moment. Joe smiled, content for the first time in days. His feet hurt a little but that didn't matter.

"Hey, Vanessa!" a nearby voice called out to them. Joe turned to see another student approaching them. Vanessa laughed and shook her head.

"It's Marvin, the Martian computer geek. What brings you back to our planet, Marvin?" she asked the older boy.

Joe had to fight, fight hard, to keep from staring at the other boy. He was not, in any way, shape, or form the kind of person that Joe would call 'Marvin'. He looked more like a Butch or a Beast or something like that. The other boy was Joe's height of six foot and probably outweighed Joe by fifteen pounds or more.

"And what is the light of the whole computer department doing in such a place as this?" the other student asked.

"Eating, at least, I hope so," Vanessa said. "Let me make introductions, please. Marvin, this is my boyfriend, Joe Hardy. Joe, this is one of my fellow computer geeks, Marvin Henry."

"Nice to meetcha," Marvin said to Joe as he shook hands with the other boy. "It's especially nice to meet the 'Joe' I keep hearing so much about. Do you realize that you are all this girl ever talks about? I mean, besides the latest rage in graphics programs and whether or not a ti3 is really going to revolutionize the computer cartoon business?"

"Uh, yeah, I guess that would be me," Joe said. "I hope you don't take this wrong, but you don't look anything like a computer geek or someone who should be named Marvin."

"You wouldn't be the first to say so," Marvin said. "But, what can I say? I decided to live up to my name, at least, by being a computer geek as they say. I take after my grandfather on my dad's side. He was a big, jock type. My dad's only five ten and my mom's only five three. Both are fairly skinny. I guess Marvin seemed a natural name for both of them."

"You don't play sports?" Joe asked, curious.

"Well, not really," Marvin said with a shrug. "I played some football in high school but it's not anything that I really enjoy. And Marvin's an OK name. Nobody teases me more than once."

He chuckled as he said that. "But mostly people call me Marv or Hank. I'll answer to any of them."

"Did you bring Sherry with you tonight, Marv?" Vanessa asked him.

"Nah, she had to work," Marvin said. "We'll be getting together later on tonight. In the meantime, Lady Van, I'm leaving you and your boy, here and going to go harass Sputnik. Stay cool."

Vanessa laughed and waved him off as Joe watched him walk away. Interesting character, he thought. Vanessa had the strangest friends!

He and Vanessa continued through the crowd over to one of the food tables where they scored a couple of slices of pizza and went in search of some chairs so Joe could rest his feet. One of them had a slight burning sensation in it, probably because the wounds on them were pulling when he walked. His side hurt from nearly being stabbed.

"Oh, joy," he heard Vanessa mutter just as they were about to take a seat near the window.

Joe looked up just in time to see Anna Phillips standing in front of him. He sighed and tried not to roll his eyes as he saw her.

"Hi, Joe. Hello, Vanessa," Anna said in her breathy voice. "Are you enjoying the party?"

"Oh, yes, sure," Vanessa answered for them. "Great food as usual."

"Oh, yes," Anna said. "Let me introduce you to my date for the evening?"

A young man about their own age stepped around them and even from a height of two inches shorter than Joe, he seemed to look down his nose at Joe.

"Jordan Cuthbert-Essex, this is Vanessa Bender and Joseph Hardy. Vanessa and Joseph, this is Jordan Cuthbert-Essex. He just transferred to Bayport University from Carthige College in Boston."

"Welcome to Bayport University," Joe said as he held out a hand to shake with Jordan. "What brings you to a school like Bayport U?"

"The political sciences program," Jordan said in an upper crust Boston accent that made him sound just as snobbish as he looked. "To be precise, to learn under Doctor Anderson, who, as you know, once served as the Governor of New Hampshire. He's a brilliant man and I consider it an honor to be able to work with him."

"Ah, I see," Vanessa said while Joe tried not to yawn in his face. Joe hid his yawn by taking a drink of his soda. The guy was not only a snob but he was boring to boot.

"Anna said that your last name is Hardy?" Jordan said a moment later. "Is your father, by any chance, a detective? I can't recall his first name just at the moment."

"That would be Fenton," Joe supplied for him. "Yes, he's my father."

"He helped my father with a problem we were having at my father's company," Jordan explained to Joe. "That's how I knew of his name. He made a great impression on my father."

Joe stared into his glass and frowned when he saw it was empty. Now what was he going to do? Maybe he could pretend to faint. Nah, the team wouldn't let him live it down if he fainted in front of them.

"Excuse me," Vanessa interrupted a second later. "I'm going to go and get us a refill."

She deftly snagged Joe's cup out of his hand.

"Let me join you, please," Anna said. "What would you like, Jordan?"

"Try for an Evian or another brand of bottled water," Jordan said and Joe rolled his eyes while he was looking away. Joe sat down in his chair and hoped Jordan would go away. It wasn't meant to be, however, Jordan pulled up a chair as well and proceeded to bore Joe more than Professor Patterson did last year in American History. Life, Joe reflected again, was not fair.

 

Frank felt himself stumble over someone's foot as Samantha tried to steer him through the crowd at the End Zone, in their effort to get to a chair located along one of the walls of the banquet room. He grimaced as he came up short against someone else and Samantha finally stopped and took a firmer hold on his arm.

"Sorry," she apologized softly. "I didn't mean to trip you up."

"It's all right," Frank said. "Are we anywhere near those chairs?"

"Just about," Sam promised him and a minute later she had him sitting in a chair against one wall. He carefully leaned his cane against the wall behind him and felt Samantha kiss his cheek a moment later and heard, or imagined, a smile on her face. "I'll go get us something to eat, valiant warrior, you stay put."

"Hurry back," he whispered to her as he pulled her down and found her lips again. He kissed her not once but several times, until she laughed and pulled away from him, one hand lightly brushing across his cheek.

Frank leaned his head back against the wall behind him and contented himself to listen to the sounds around him. The football boys had finally finished with their cheering and yelling and the roar was down to a loud murmur over the sounds of music from the jukebox. He heard several students talking to each other and a couple of arguments, one between a boy and a girl, another between a small group of people discussing the upcoming elections. The scents of tomato sauce and onion wafted through his senses as well and the sound of sizzling from the nearby grill; probably hamburger.

"We lost him," Frank jumped when he heard Mandy's voice. "It was him, though. He went into the men's restroom. Connor followed him in there but somehow, he got out without me seeing him."

"I wonder what the heck he was doing here," Frank murmured. "It's not like we won't recognize him instantly. Did you recognize him at all, Connor? Ever seen him with a football player?"

"No, Frank," Connor said. "The only times I've ever seen him is the last couple of days, when we've been following him."

"Here, Frank," he felt something land on his lap, something warm. A plate filled with food. Samantha continued, "Pizza is dead center, pickles at nine o'clock and pasta salad at three o'clock."

"Thanks, Sam," Frank said as he found one of the pickles and began to munch on it. "Mm, good stuff."

"You and your pickles," Samantha laughed at him. "I could get you a jar of pickles for your birthday and you would love me forever."

"Already do," Frank promised her. "Mandy, Connor, leave the guy for tonight. We've all been stressed lately, we need to relax."

"Never thought I'd hear you say that, big brother," Mandy said to him, though she sounded quite happy. "But I agree and I'm hungry. Connor, be a love and go get us some food, would you?"

"Yes, your majesty," Connor joked with her. He laughed. "Be right back."

"Lout!" Mandy called after him and Frank felt something press onto his plate. He slapped out and came into contact with a hand.

"That's my pickle," he warned his sister. "If you want one, go get your own."

Mandy laughed. "I know, I know, don't come between Frank Hardy and his pickles."

Frank snickered. "Yeah, and don't forget it."

He continued to eat on his plate of food, breaking his silence only to answer questions directed to him.

"So, this is where you have been hiding!" he heard Joe say a moment later. "I thought maybe you'd managed to fall into a black hole or something."

"You're not that lucky," Mandy teased him. "Joe, what is that on your shirt? Are you missing your mouth again?"

"Someone," and Joe sounded decidedly hostile when he said that. "Decided to 'accidentally' bump my arm when I was drinking some soda and, of course, I managed to spill it all over myself. That girl is a walking disaster area."

"What girl?" Mandy asked, curiously.

"Who else?" Vanessa said a bit hostilely. "Anna Phillips. She brought this uber-snob as a date tonight. I swear, she's like a vulture, waiting to pounce whenever I leave Joe alone for two seconds. Tonight she made this show of introducing us to this rich, handsome, boyfriend of hers but I could tell she was trying to make Joe jealous. Of course, Frank, I thought you'd LOVE to know that she was asking all kinds of questions about you tonight. I wonder if she's about to switch affections?"

"Too bad she doesn't know that..." Joe started to say but he stopped suddenly. Frank looked in his direction, a curious look on his face.

"Joe?" Mandy said, concerned. "Joe?"

"Can't... can't..." Joe's voice came out in an agonized whisper. Frank stood and reached for him but Mandy gave a startled screech. Frank felt something hit his feet and he fell back in his chair again.

"JOE!" Mandy screamed.

"What's wrong?" Frank demanded. "What's going on?"

"Joe's having convulsions, Frank," Samantha exclaimed. "Something's wrong!"

The Hardy Boys belong to Simon and Schuster and the Stratemeyer Foundation. I've only borrowed them to play with for a while but I promise to return them whenever I've finished with them.  (I make no promises as to condition, that's entirely up to them).  I promise, I'm only writing for fun and I'm not making a single dime off of this (unless you count personal fulfillment).