Fundy tumbled through the door right as it unlocked and quickly caught himself from falling, taking a few steps forwards. Tubbo was pushed by Bad through the doors and fell onto his hands and knees next to Fundy. It was obvious Bad didn't mean to push him that hard but it still hurt a little.

Fundy helped Tubbo to his feet as he watched the double doors shut automatically, separating the group. He saw Bad and Sapnap turning towards the guards with weapons materializing in their hands. Tubbo turned towards the door right as it clicked shut, after he dusted off his clothes.

"Wait, why didn't Bad and Sap rush through too?" Tubbo asked, looking up at Fundy.

"They're buying us time." Fundy closed his eyes, "We need to get those crystals quickly." He turned to Tubbo as he said it, looking him straight in the eyes. Tubbo nodded.

Fundy's ears quickly flicked to the side and he grabbed Tubbo's arm, pulling him to the wall and flattening against it without saying a word.

"Cameras."

Tubbo didn't question it, and flattened himself against the wall like Fundy did, holding his breath wide eyed with fear.

Fundy looked up at the camera oddly placed on the corner, and waited for it to start turning back.

"We need to run down to that door at the end of the hall!" He quickly whispered. Pulling Tubbo hand along for a few seconds before letting go. Tubbo caught the idea and they both sprinted to the end of the hallway before the camera turned back. They never looked back, and could only hope it didn't see them.

"Ok the camera can't see us here, but stand in the corner just in case." Fundy whispered as he caught his breath. Tubbo nodded silently and did so, panting a little harder than Fundy.

"Bad was supposed to slip under this door..." Fundy mumbled mostly to himself, but Tubbo heard it too.

"Good thing I got this!" Fundy thought to himself, pulling out a lock picking set from his jacket. It was just the pick and the handle he needed, but opening the set full of all the metal pieces looked impressive.

He felt Tubbo staring and took a little pride in himself for it.

Tubbo watched Fundy fiddle with the lock, who was listening closely to hear the slight click of a rod fitting into place.

"Wait I just noticed-" Tubbo started to talk quietly as Fundy worked, "-you haven't been wearing your armor this whole time. Where did you put it?" He asked.

"Oh I left it in the bushes with Wilbur. Figured it would be loud on a stealth mission. I guess it hasn't gone too perfect stealth-wise, but eh ...." Fundy trailed off.

Tubbo hummed in response.

After a moment of silence he spoke again, more quietly.

"I wonder how they're doing." Tubbo muttered, looking at the floor. Fundy knew he was talking about Badboyhalo and Sapnap.

"I'm sure they're fine. They're both good at fighting." Fundy reassured him.

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(Hallway fight intervention!)

The guard with blue hair, referred to as Katelyn, swung her sword over Sapnaps head, who had less than a second to drop down and duck. He barely made it, but his apparel suffered the consequences. A good chunk of the tip of his bandana was cut off, fluttering down to the floor weakly.

"That was my favorite one!" Sapnap exclaimed as he whipped his head over to her to glare. She had a confident smirk on her face, showing no mercy for the damaged and tattered white cloth. As it gave a final dying breath (as the inanimate object it is-) Sapnap shed a single tear....-

Alright enough of that- his headband ripped a little ok? No need to go all dramatic on this part.

ANYWay Travis was also getting better luck, deflecting and dodging more knives. He had gotten at least two slashes towards Bad who had narrowly dodged them, but he was getting tired.

"What about the other two that got through the door?" Travis asked, hardly having to catch his breath.

"We'll deal with them after we take care of these two." Katelyn answered. She clashed her sword against Sapnap's again and they were face to face.

"What makes you think you can beat us so easily?" Sapnap whispered, his breath catching on each word as he tried to take the time to breathe.

"This is how." She whispered only loud enough for him to hear.

She twisted her sword near the blade of his axe, and pulled it out of his hand in a swift move, sending it flying across the hallway and well out of his reach.

Bad and Travis both watched in silence and everyone listened to the clanking noise of the axe hitting the ground down the hallway.

Bad took the sudden opportunity of Travis being distracted to throw a dagger at his shoulder, pinning him to the wall.

"Hey what the-" He started as he tried to pull away in shock.

It was awkward to pull out the dagger from the wall while he was holding the sword, so he switched the sword to his pinned hand so his free arm could get the dagger out. This bought Bad a little time.

Bad jumped in Katelyn's shadow, confusing and surprising her, which let him snatch the sword from her and throw it across the room before she could react. When she got her senses back she threw a punch in his direction, but he was already back in her shadow by the time it would've hit.

Neither Sapnap or Katelyn had a weapon now, leveling the field.

"Thanks Bad!" Sapnap called over. Bad had jumped out again and was back at his starting place across from Travis. He looked a little dizzy and pretty exhausted, but still gave a quick thumbs up to Sapnap.

"Alright, fine. I can do hand to hand too." Katelyn smiled, cracking her knuckles and crouching her body lower.

Travis had wiggled and yanked out the dagger that had gone considerably far into the wall. Bad felt a little guilty for whoever had to clean that, but instantly cleared the thought when he remembered that no one cared about obviously broken cameras; No one would even notice the dent. Travis threw the dagger down the hallway away from Bad. There was a pile starting to form over there.

Daggers and knives obviously weren't working, so Bad shifted out a sword instead to use for closer combat.

"Running out of knives huh?" Travis asked with a smirk.

Bad didn't answer, but thinned his eyes towards his opponent and adjusted the grip of both his hands on the hilt of the sword.

Strategies shifted and everyone was getting tired, but they were all still on an even playing ground.

If "playing" includes throwing knives and swords. Eh, maybe it does?

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"Yeah I'm sure you're right." Tubbo whispered. Fundy acknowledged him, as he tried to focus a little more on what he was doing.

"Only 4 rods? Jeez this place is cheap. This part of the building must be even more outdated than where we work." Fundy speculated as the last rod clicked into (or rather, out of) place.

The door handle pushed down, opening the door, and Fundy gave a proud smile as Tubbo followed him in.

"Can you teach me how to do that?" Tubbo asked hopefully.

Fundy smiled and nodded. A part of him wanted to explain the mechanics of it on the spot, but they were still on a mission and that would be stupid. You just had to move the rods up and out of place slowly and carefully until each one had found the right height as the key would do. Sometimes a few combinations worked, but it was relatively the same process. Move them up, wait for the click, go to the next rod. Back to front, keep pressure on the handle metal piece so the rods don't fall back to normal. Simple!

They left the lights off to avoid any unwanted attention and wandered further into the room. The door didn't shut behind them, but neither of them noticed. 

It was pretty empty, and the only light came from the windows, nothing spectacular except for the one thing they came for.

The crystals.

They were in the corner of the room and glowed softly. Honestly really pretty. In the dark they glowed, and in the light they sparkled. Fundy would've let himself stare at them all day if he had the time.

There oddly wasn't any covering or locks on them. They just sat in a simple container on the counter, up for the taking!

"That's weird. Guess it makes it easier for us!" Fundy thought and shrugged as he casually walked closer.

Tubbo sped ahead to the windows on the far side of the wall.

"This is the escape window right?" Tubbo asked, pointing to the window farthest from the door and closest to the crystals.

"Yeah." Fundy said. "I'm taking a picture so we can count them easily later then I can help you open it."

Fundy took out his phone and took a picture of the tray of crystals. They were way less than he'd been expecting, but he didn't have time to count them.

"A lab group probably took a handful recently." He decided as he started at the empty spaces in the tray. "But even still, that's more than a normal lab group would need......" He shook off the thought as he put his phone on the table and turned back to the crystals.

He grabbed out a small bag of holding for the crystals. It wasn't a super strong one, as the space inside wasn't actually that much bigger than the outside, but it would still work for all of the crystals they needed. Honestly though, looking at the amount there was, he wasn't sure there were quite enough.

He decided to deal with it later and focused on getting the crystals and getting out now. He quickly and carefully put them all in the pouch, tied it up, and set it on the counter next to his phone.

Tubbo had already climbed onto the counter, ready to finally get out of this place through the window.

"You sure we can't rob the vending machine before we leave?" Tubbo asked with a smile to break the silence.

"You can't run a job in a job." Fundy quoted. Tubbo didn't get it.

Fundy leaned over the counter and examined the window. Two notches on either side of the bottom of the frame needed to be pushed inwards as it was lifted up. The glass was pretty thick and looked sorta of heavy, but with both of them lifting it, it probably wouldn't be a problem.

"Ok you slide out first, I'll hand you the crystals, then I'll jump out." Fundy instructed. Tubbo nodded and scooted over to one side to click the right notch.

They both clicked the notches inward.

"Lift lift lift!" Fundy said as they both clicked down. It was a bit heavier than he'd expected, but they got it open and lifted it high enough for Tubbo to fit through.

Tubbo let go of his side so he could get through, and all of the weight was in Fundy's arms.

"Go go!" Fundy whispered somewhat loudly as he strained to keep it open. It was a bit of an awkward position as he stretched over the counter and he had to stand on his tiptoes to reach.

Tubbo squeezed through the window and fell on the small patch of grass outside of it. He quickly jumped back to his feet to grab the window from Fundy, who had come close to dropping it.

It was easier for Tubbo to hold it when he was standing up straight outside, and he quickly held on with both hands as Fundy let go.

Fundy felt way better when he let go and was able to relax his muscles a bit.

He grabbed his phone and the bag of crystals, when the phone suddenly went off with a whole bunch of notifications that started to ring very loudly.

"Shit shit shit!" He frantically opened it up and turned off the ringer glancing behind him to make sure no one heard. No one was there, but he finally noticed that the door was open. It was too late to walk over and close it now, but it probably didn't matter.

"Phew," He let out a quite breathe, and then immediately felt stupid for forgetting to turn the alarm off.

"Damn it, that's like the first rule of a heist!" He scolded himself. He tucked his phone into his coat pocket and turned back towards the window.

He handed the crystals to Tubbo, who had to let go of the window with one hand to grab them. 

"I can't hold it high enough-" Tubbo said through a strained breath as he tried to balance it open with only one hand. His grip was slipping.

"I'll shift into a fox to fit through." Fundy whispered. Tubbo didn't respond. Fundy shifted into a little fox and jumped onto the counter. There was easily enough room to get through, but he hesitated as he looked at the distance, which seemed much longer than before.

Tubbo put the bagstrings around his wrist so he could use both hands to get a better grip on the window, but in doing so slipped up. At the same time, Fundy's tiny hat fell on Tubbo's face as he was about to jump down and Tubbo backed up in surprise.

It was at this moment, they knew, they both had screwed up.

The window slammed down shut, trapping Fundy inside.

"No no no!"

He desperately scratched at the window, almost begging it to open back up, so he could jump out to freedom.

To make matters worse, Fundy heard footsteps quicking in the hallway, making their way straight to him. He thought about shifting back quickly to normal to open the window himself and jump out, but was stopped quickly by a voice in the doorway.

"Hey is someone in here!?"

"Shit."

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A guard walked down the hallway casually, grumbling to himself about some stupid meeting he was forced to attend. His idiot friend had totally forgotten about it, and so now he had to find him so he could show him the way to the meeting place.

"He did sound a little sick on the communicator though. I hope he's alright." The guard thought to himself. Maybe his cough was also screwing with his memory a bit? Either way, he was on his way to get his friend, and maybe meet the other two on the way. He couldn't quite remember where their posts were, but he felt like it was in this area somewhere.

Peering down the hallway, he saw a door opened halfway that was definitely not supposed to be like that.

"Huh?"

A muffled ringing noise came from the room, which was quickly quieted. The guard picked up his pace to investigate and wrapped a hand around the sword on his belt.

A loud 'thump' noise came from the room seconds before he was at it.

He slammed the door open and yelled out into the room before he even saw what was going on.

"Hey is someone in here!?"

He was met with a somewhat dark room, with the large windows providing the only light to see. It was practically empty, and it felt wrong in a way. There were a few books on a few counters but not much else really. The room felt important for some reason, but he wasn't sure why. It was barren.

The only thing in the room was a little fox, desperately scratching at the farthest window with a puffed out tail and folded back ears. The guard took his hand off of the sword with a sigh, and walked farther into the room, closing the door behind him.

"Oh? Just a little fox?" He asked no one in particular as he walked closer. The fox stopped scratching and quickly turned to face the guard, trying to back up but only hitting the window.

"Hmm, I wonder how he got in here?" The guard wondered aloud.

"Good thing Aph isn't here. She would beg me to keep it."

He calmly approached the fox so as not to scare it, but the fox seemed to have other ideas. It quickly looked around the room and jumped down onto the floor running through the guards legs. It ran to the door and started to scratch at that too.

The guard sighed and tried again, now cornering it near the door. It tried to run through the guard's legs again, but he saw it coming and caught it's tail as it tried to dash through.

He quickly scooped it up and held it in front of him. It tried to scratch at him, and the guard was grateful then for the fingerless gloves protecting him.

That is, until the fox noticed this, and bit him on the finger.

"Ouch!" The guard winced and held the fox by the scruff in the other hand, examining the cut on his finger.

He scowled at the fox who was trying to wiggle out of his grasp.

"Jeez you're annoying." The guard said. The fox had kept struggling, but paused to glance back at the window again.

The guard grabbed a box from the top of the cabinets which was a hard task to do with an animal in one hand who was trying to get away, but somehow he managed. The guard grabbed a pocket knife out and stabbed the empty box a few times to make some air holes. The fox flinched at the sight wide eyed with fear.

After some struggling and a few more scratches, the guard got the fox into the box and shut the box quickly to keep him in. He let out a sigh of relief and held the top shut while he stretched over to reach the books sitting plainly in the corner. He put quite a few books on the top to hold it down. The fox tried to push on the top to get out, but it was way too heavy.

The guard peaked through one of the holes he made.

"I'll deal with you later."

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Fundy was trapped.

In a stupid empty room, in stupid dark box, as a stupid, little, weak fox.

He had heard the door click shut behind him, meaning the windows were in front of him. Not like direction mattered much though. He tried to knock off the books again, and then tried to inch the box towards the ledge, but it was no use.

Fundy was absolutely stuck, one window away from freedom.

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Well I made this way faster than I thought I would! not much else to say except thank you for reading! The first book to this thing hit over 2.1k reads and I can't believe it! You guys are awesome and I hope you're enjoying it, even if it's taking way longer than I anticipated to get to the good stuff. Have an amazing day or night wherever you are!