A/N So I'm back at college now, which means things are gonna get crazy busy, which means I'll reach a point soon where I won't be able to write this for awhile. I should be able to get the first half published, though. Look out for new chapters on the 10th, 20th, or 30th of any month, because I will try to update on those days (though not every single one, depending on how busy I am or how busy my beta-reader Agent0002 is).

Anyhow, this chapter's aaaaaaall Otto's POV. Let's see what he has to say!

* * *

\ˌa-drə-'nī-təs\ (noun) Frustration with how long it takes to get to know someone.

* * *

Otto's mind was in a turmoil.

That look she had given him.

The look on her face as she was zapped out of the O Games arena and returned to headquarters.

A look that could not be mistaken for anything other than what it was.

Two days since he won the O Games, and still the way she looked at him had Otto racking his brain, trying to figure out what signs he could've missed and how. I never even really met her until the day Ms. O got sprayed by that plant and we had to go get all that antidote stuff. Could she have liked me then? No, it can't be. Maybe when we all started making odd noises? She did do that awkward thing where she put her head on my shoulder and jerked away when I noticed. But then why did she get so mad at me when I asked her for a spare gadget? Or could it have started when Olive got the skips and she kept introducing herself to me? But then why didn't I see her vote for me at the Captain Fun elections just before that? And then how could she have come to like me before two weeks ago, if she was so frustrated at me that day when we chased Ori everywhere? I mean, of everything that happened before then...

Otto shook his head and rubbed his temples, trying to clear his mind. This was the fourth time today he'd had this exact cycle of thoughts, and still it was getting him nowhere. Try as he might, he couldn't focus on his desk work. Aside from name and date, the case report sheet still lay blank in front of him.

Soundcheck. Of course. Try listening to Soundcheck, that'll take your mind off things.

But as he reached into his pocket and pulled out an empty hand, and felt for the headphones around his neck that weren't there, Otto realized he'd left his OddPod at home that day. Drat. Okay, well maybe the radio. Surely they'll have a Soundcheck song playing in a Top 40 hit or something. Pulling up the K-ODD website, he clicked on the internet radio broadcast and waited for it to load.

"...got it bad, and I got it good / Doctor, Doctor, gimme the news I've got a / Bad case of lovin' you—"

"Are you serious?!" he snapped at the computer, immediately closing out of the browser window before putting his head in his hands and letting out a groan.

"Something wrong, partner?"

Otto brought his hands down to find Olive watching him from her own desk with concern in her eyes, pen in hand forgotten for the moment. "Nothing," he muttered, wishing for once his partner wasn't always so close by.

She raised her eyebrows, unconvinced.

"I just can't focus on my work today," he admitted, though not mentioning why. "And I don't like that song."

"I thought you liked all kinds of music?"

"Yeah, well, not that one!" he snarled, slamming his palm against the desk. Immediately regretting the outburst, he rubbed his eyes. "Sorry, didn't mean to shout."

"S'okay." Olive blinked a few times, and a small smile crept up onto her face. "Tell you what. Let me fill out the case report for you, and you go take a walk around headquarters to clear your mind of—er, whatever's bothering you. Maybe stop in the Cookie Room or the Pillow Fort Room along the way?"

Otto exhaled with relief. A walk around headquarters. Why didn't I think of that? "Doesn't sound like a bad idea," he agreed, getting up from his chair to hand her the report. "Thanks, partner. Be back soon!"

Sure enough, as he summoned all his effort to not glance up at the Medical Bay, and set off through the Hall of Doors, his thoughts finally wandered away from the tormenting cycle into—well, more of the same. But this time they were more like: When am I going to talk to her about this? Tell her that I like her too? I do, right? I mean, she was my competition, yet I helped her win the Centigurp challenge even before she gave me that—that look...those muddy brown doe eyes...there's no way I don't...

Wait a minute. We're kids. Is this even allowed at Odd Squad?

No, probably not. So that means I can't tell her anything.

So it doesn't exist?

Then why am I so nervous around her now...?

Later, after coming back from his walk with more questions and no answers (and more than a few cookies from the Cookie Room), Otto would be relieved when Ms. O called them on a new case. And for a little while at least, he could forget about Dr. O and enjoy the odd but fun confetti blasts out of a befuddled man's milk carton.

Meanwhile, he knew nothing whatsoever of what an intrigued Olive, busy with her partner's unfinished case report, was quickly piecing together with what she'd already known of Dr. O's crush on him:

Maybe he really likes her back?

* * *

Though a rookie agent with less than ten months' experience under his belt, it was sometimes nice to know his seasoned veteran partner could sometimes be just as bewildered as he was.

One of these times was the September day Ms. O and Oscar switched bodies.

Even if Otto had no clue that the actual source of Olive's confusion was her special affection for the Lab Director, Otto felt it all too easy to hesitate after being told to "meet me outside my office" by someone whom his eyes, ears, and even nose told him was Oscar. It just so happened Olive seemed to think the same.

"Question," Otto found himself double-checking as he and his partner whirled back around again. "Your office, or Ms. O's office?"

The kid in Oscar's body narrowed Oscar's eyes, making Otto cower in a way only one kid could do. "I mean my office because I'M MS. O!"

But Otto had forgotten one thing: lately, there was someone else who could have an even more impactful effect on him...

"You're Ms. O?"

Otto's heart leapt into his throat.

Using her bizarre ability to pop into rooms from out of nowhere (something literally everyone except he and Olive could do, it seemed), Dr. O had happened to place herself in the same room as Otto for the first time since the O Games. Granted, that had been only three weeks ago, but still.

Vaguely he heard Olive scramble to fabricate some sort of plausible explanation, but for the most part Otto's mind looked like this:

. . .Oishere(Here?-?-?) . (do?-?-?)Uhh...uhh...uhh...ohGodohGodohGodaaaaaaaAAAAAAAAHHHIDIDN'TUSEDTOBELIKETHISAROUNDHER(what did I used to be like again?-?-?)WHATWOULDOLIVEDOOOoooooo...

Speak of the devil, at that moment an expectant look from his partner pierced his overdriving mind. Stunned and still stuck in a mental rush, Otto rewound the part of his subconscious that had been paying attention to his surroundings and listened for what he was supposed to say.

Game. She's Otto. Right.

So I say...

"I—I-I-I'm Olive!" he stammered, just in time for Olive to complete the cover story with Oscar as Ms. O (or rather, Ms. O as Oscar as Ms. O). It took another moment, though, before Otto realized his hands had balled up into fists and were rapidly quivering close to his chest. With some effort he steadied them, as the irony in his comedian brain pointed out how not unlike Oscar the gesture was.

With that realization came another: the more he watched Dr. O, the more he noticed how equally surprised and embarrassed she was.

Come to think of it, it was pretty obvious. Hadn't her face been a bit less pale when she'd first popped into the lab? And hadn't her shoulders been a bit less stiff—no, stiff wasn't the right word, she was always stiff, this looked more like defensive—than normal? And he was pretty sure her face hadn't been so obviously turned away from his direction when she'd first opened her mouth with the words, "You're Ms. O?"

"Can you call me...Dr. Pickle?" she asked tersely, showing no change in her otherwise blank expression.

Is Dr. O trying to join our game? She really wants to do that?

"Yes!" Olive gulped out.

The doctor paused a moment, her doe eyes flicking in Otto's direction for oh-so-brief a second, then she nodded. "Thank you." And with that came her signature exit line: "What's next?"

Otto felt himself exhale. He hadn't even known he was holding his breath. All he knew was that, in spite of learning something new about her regarding pickles, that whole exchange had been hecka awkward in more ways than one; and though it was obvious why, what he didn't understand was how.

I didn't used to act like this around her. Everything was fine for my first eight months on the squad, she was just another agent, a coworker to get along with.

So what did it mean for Otto if the knowledge of her crush on him could take all that normalcy away?

* * *

In spite of having driven Agent Olsen's car all the way up to the K-ODD radio station in the first place, Olive agreed with Otto about it being best to take the tubes back to headquarters instead, for the sake of time. Popping out of their red pods into the Tube Lobby, Otto barely had time to catch his breath before his partner was already marching out the doors. "Olive, wait up!" he called, running after her. "Where exactly are we going?"

"To the Medical Bay," she answered curtly, no doubt still beating herself up about being the real Countdown Crook. "Dr. O's the only one who'll know how to cure me."

Otto almost broke stride. "Dr. O?" he repeated dumbly, remembering all too well what had happened the last time he found himself in the same room with the doctor. What if I get nervous again and can't say anything? It was bad enough on the day Oscar and Ms. O switched bodies, what if today's worse? I can't, not when my partner's the one I should be worrying about...

Caught up in his worrying, before he knew it Olive had marched him all the way up the stairs and right to the door of the Medical Bay. And, to his horror, she was now going inside. Otto gulped and straightened his tie. My partner is the only one I should be worrying about, he reminded himself, following her. It's only for a few minutes. And it's not like I haven't talked to the doctor plenty of times before the whole O Games thing happened. I can do this.

"Dr. O?" Olive announced. "I need you to confirm an odd illne—what are you doing?"

The partners stared at the doctor in question, who stood in the corner of the room by a large metal vat full of pink goo and held a small syringe filled with white liquid parallel to her bare arm. At Olive's worried question she glanced up sharply and pulled down her lab coat sleeve, and at the sight of Otto she yelped and stuck the syringe needlepoint-first through her blonde bun.

Otto nearly swallowed his own tongue in surprise. Couldn't that have pricked her neck or something?

"U-um..." Dr. O stammered, in a way Otto wasn't used to hearing from her. "I was just...checking to make sure that—that the medicine in my syringe was the same color as my arm! I'm a doctor, everything's fine!" She tried to manage an assured smile, but her attempt awkwardly petered out into a cringe as she grasped for a syringe that no longer resided in her hand.

Otto cocked his head. "If it's supposed to be the same color as your arm, then why is the medicine white?"

Suddenly a Security agent who was passing by on the walkway outside groaned. "Oh my odd, Otto," she called out, white-gold hoop earrings and brunette curls bouncing as she shook her head. "You can't just ask doctors why their medicine is white!"

Otto felt his cheeks flush. "But O'Gretchen, I was just—!" he began, stopping himself when he realized she'd walked away without listening. "Never mind," he said, turning back to the other two girls while trying to ignore his reddened face. "Is now a bad time, Doctor?"

For a moment Dr. O didn't say anything, and it seemed she was taking the moment to compose herself. "I'm a doctor, not a timekeeper," she finally said, her voice back to its usual terseness. "But no, now isn't a bad time at all. Now what can I do for you?"

In reply, Olive walked over to the sickbed and hopped up on it. "We think I might be the Countdown Crook who's stopping everyone from counting down. I need you to confirm this and give me a cure, and fast."

Dr. O nodded brusquely. "Very well. One moment please." Avoiding eye contact with Otto (Is she avoiding me on purpose?), she opened a drawer in one of her filing cabinets and rummaged around for a bit, eventually pulling out a rubber hammer, an eyedropper, and a curlicue pink thermometer. Setting the latter two items on the edge of the bed, Dr. O took the rubber hammer and rapped on Olive's forehead with it. Otto watched wide-eyed as Olive's ears immediately flapped back and forth violently for a second before stilling again. His eyes grew even wider when "La Bamba" started playing all around them after Dr. O put a few drops of some sort of pinkish gooey substance similar to that of the metal vat in Olive's eyes. When the music (and Otto's urge to dance) finally faded, she stuck the thermometer in Olive's mouth for about a minute, then pulled it out to examine the reading.

Otto, noticing his partner's worried look, cleared his throat. "Well? What do you think, Dr. O?"

For the first time since he'd entered the room, she looked directly at him. "You want the good news or bad news?" she said flatly.

She must be well into her doctor mode right now, Otto thought, not unlike what Olive found herself noticing about Oscar from crisis to crisis. "Bad news," he said, mustering up some confidence for Olive's sake.

"The bad news is there's no good news."

Oops, there went his confidence. "WHAT?!"

"Olive is definitely the Countdown Crook," she explained, once again averting her gaze from Otto to Olive.

"But is there a cure?" Olive went on pointedly, her voice rising in what Otto hoped wasn't panic.

Dr. O nodded. "Of course." Turning around, she moved back towards the metal vat and gestured at it, still not quite meeting Otto's ever-wider eyes. "All you need to do is sit in this pink goo for two weeks."

Olive's face was frozen in a mask of poorly-concealed dread, and Otto felt a flickering twinge of doubt. The kind you only get when you discover something about someone you like, the kind that makes you think, Is this really the kid I decided to fall for? Was there really no other alternative cure that might be less disgusting or, more importantly, less time-consuming?

As if to voice his thoughts, a purple sequin-bedazzled ball of anxiety in the form of Ms. O barreled into the Medical Bay and yelled, "We don't have two weeks! I have to be onstage tonight!"

But unlike Olive and Otto, who flinched and shirked from their boss's raised voice, Dr. O wasn't one to be intimidated. "I'm a doctor, Ms. O, not a party-planner!" she retorted, slamming her hand on the sick bed to emphasize her point. As her mud-brown doe eyes darted a glance in Otto's direction, however, she looked away and cleared her throat uncomfortably, intimidated after all.

It's just like the Skips all over again, Otto was thinking, except now it's twice as much time that we can't afford to spare. He risked a glance at the doctor. And I didn't know then what I know about her now. What'll the next two weeks be like? I don't even want to try and count the ways I might embarrass myself, it's a list I'd never be able to finish mak—

Wait.

Finish.

Count the ways.

Count...down?

That's it!

"Wait, I have an idea!" he exclaimed. "Olive is a Countdown Crook because she's counting down her resolutions, right?"

"Right," the three girls said in unison, nodding at him.

Otto fought the urge to stutter as he found himself looking directly at Dr. O to say the next part. "So if she finishes her resolutions, then—"

"Then she won't be obsessed with counting down and everyone can count down again!" Dr. O finished, pointing at him approvingly to show she'd caught on.

Otto felt a grin creep across his face as he returned the finger point. "Right," he finished, proud of himself.

Maybe I don't always have to embarrass myself in front of her. Is it really possible that I can do things right when she's around? That I can just...be myself?

Suddenly he was even more happy he'd gotten her that bike for Christmas last week.