🕶 operation: m.e.e.t.c.u.t.e. 👓
by airauralintensity (aka me, xyzcekaden!)
memorable encounter explored through changed universes, totally excellent
fandom: codename: kids next door characters: lizzie devine, nigel uno ship: nizie genres: romance, comedy, fluff, pre-canon, first meeting, transfer student!lizzie, hero complex!nigel, nigel pov, mostly themes: paranoid!nigel, nigel asks first, literal schoolyard bullying, canon typical laws of physics, loosely inspired by operation holiday and stop the g:knd word count: 2.6k+ chapter: 1/3 rating: K+ for depictions of bullying
read it below, on ffnet, or on ao3!
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A/N (1.11.2025): I can’t believe a kids' cartoon is what breaks my 2 year fanfic writing slump. All of this is sparkymouse’s fault. If they didn’t leave such a great comment on just another textbook case, none of this would have happened!!!
I didn’t rewatch every episode of C:KND, just the Lizzie ones. If anything I write contradicts canon (not that the show is overly preoccupied with canon to begin with, lol), then just read this like an AU, nbd. I deal in feels, not facts.
One-shots are in the order of ideation, nothing more particular than that. Chapter titles are from Soldier by the Backstreet Boys.
~~~
somebody shot you down
His working theory is that Lizzie is a disguised alien from a planet of sentient plants sent to monitor Earth’s children, and he just needs the proof.
~~~
“Class, settle down! I have an important announcement to make before homeroom ends!” Mrs. Thompson’s voice rings out above the chatter of fourth graders.
Nigel listens with half a mind as he draws up blueprints for the new scanner he wants to install in mission control. Projectiles smaller than a baseball are currently ignored by the treehouse’s security system, but the Teen Ninjas have started paintballing graffiti onto the tree trunk; and he wants that behaviour curtailed expeditiously.
Normally he’d use this time to chat with his teammates, but they’re all out this morning. Hoagie has food poisoning, Kuki’s got a family emergency, Wally is suspended, and Abby is on some personal candy mission. It’s just him today.
“We have a new student who’ll be joining us for the rest of the year! Please give a warm welcome to our newest classmate, Elizabeth Devine. Elizabeth, why don’t you go and tell us a little bit about yourself?”
He lazily tilts his head up to catch sight of the new girl—long auburn hair in twin braids framing a cherubic face, wide circle glasses framing wide brown eyes, wide frame in general. She doesn’t look like much; but then again, he thought the same of Kuki until he got to know her better.
“Hiii, everyone! I’m Lizzie, and I just turned 10,” she introduces with a voice that sits high in her throat. “I like watching romcoms with my sister and baking pies with my grandma.”
At least she’s American. She won’t have it as bad as he did when he transferred to Gallagher. In fact, he notices a group of girls in the class surround her table once Mrs. Thompson prompts her to sit; and the sound of eager gossip among them starts not too long after. Seems like she’ll be in good hands.
He doesn’t pay her any more attention for the rest of homeroom, and he more or less forgets about her entirely, too… until recess, that is.
While on his customary playground patrol (a routine he is well-equipped to handle even without the rest of his team), he catches sight of a group of kids where the fence meets the wall of the school. Curiosity propels him closer; to his knowledge, that corner of the playground has nothing there to play with.
He doesn’t want to unnecessarily get their attention, though. The point of recess is that kids can spend their time doing whatever they want in order to recharge and face the rest of the school day; so be it if these guys are choosing to spend their time over there. A few paces away, he makes the decision to just leave them be… but then he hears laughter.
It’s not the fun and happy laughter of a good joke; it’s meaner than that. It’s the laughter of bullies.
He lurks on the periphery of the group to observe the situation. Through the gaggle, he sees someone on the ground, but he can’t tell yet whether that person was pushed down.
“But I don’t understand,” a familiar voice pleads. “What was I doing wrong?”
“For crying out loud, girlie! You were eating dirt; do I really have to spell it out for ya?” the ringleader jeers.
Natural shifting of the crowd reveals none other than the new girl, Lizzie, as the center of attention. She’s lounged on the ground, hands trenched in the earth and legs neatly tucked to her side. There are grass stains on her blue skirt and a brown smudge on her cheek, too, lending even more credence to the absurd accusation that Nigel just heard.
Was she really eating dirt? he thinks to himself with slight disgust. That is, admittedly, very, very weird.
But for all that she essentially doomed herself to a lifetime of name-calling and ostracisation, she does not appear distressed at all. Her posture is lax and movements unhurried as she draws herself up to stand.
“Gee, I had no idea…” Her voice wobbles with innocence, and her eyes get impossibly more fawnish.
Nigel’s face hardens. He has to step in before she starts to cry.
“Absolutely no idea that THIS SCHOOL IS FULL OF NOSY BULLIES!!!”
Caught mid-stride, her volume forces him to take a step back. The bullies circling her get the brunt of it, though: the power of her decibels knocks them onto their butts, skidding in the dirt.
“How bored are you that you have to go around causing trouble where there isn’t any, huh!? Does it make you happy to pick on kids all by their lonesome? Kids who aren’t bothering anybody?? Only losers care too much about what other people are doing with their free time! Go touch some grass, why don’t ya!”
Kids flee left and right, but very few escape the wads of turf she throws after her aggressors. Her aim is erratic, but her power and frequency more than make up for it.
Just on the edge of the target zone, Nigel merely watches her defend herself with an eyebrow raised in interest. He believes he just got to know Lizzie better.
“Haven’t had enough yet, baldy?” she growls at him as he walks up to her.
“Trust me, I’ve had plenty; but I’m afraid you’re mistaken. I’d never join a ring of playground bullies like those guys.”
He stands in front of her with feet shoulder-width apart, arms crossed behind his back, and chin held high. “Allow me to introduce myself. I’m Nigel Uno; but when acting in my capacity as a Kids Next Door operative, I go by Numbuh One,” he says with a slight smirk. He’s not ignorant of the effect he tends to have on people between his position, his confidence, and his accent.
“‘The Kids Next Door’? What’s that?”
The smirk freezes on his face in an awkward way. The KND aims to save kids worldwide from adult tyranny, and no team was more prolific at that mission than Sector V. Based in America as Lizzie was, surely she should have heard of them. Has his team never saved her or her classmates from overpowered bullies, insane teachers, or gross school lunches before?
No matter; he was never one to pass over the chance to advocate for his cause. He passionately describes the mission, vision, and creed of the Kids Next Door; details the various perpetrators who stand against kids’ rights and privileges worldwide; and expounds upon the bonds and camaraderie that forms among operatives.
The only thing that stops him is the bell that signifies the end of recess.
Lizzie noticeably perks up at the sound, to Nigel’s mild embarrassment. “Well… All that being said, you should join us. The Kids Next Door is always on the lookout for promising youths to join our battle against adult tyranny. Extending recess by an extra 15 minutes is one of our long term goals,” he entices.
“That’s real sweet of you to offer, Nigel, but I’ll have to pass. See you in class!” She punctuates her dismissal with a smile and a wave before skipping off towards the school entrance.
He stares, flabbergasted enough to let her get a head start, but he quickly gets himself into gear. “W-W-Wait, are you sure?” he stutters as he catches up to her.
Nigel prides himself on his 100% success rate of recruiting hopefuls into the KND ever since he himself was scouted by Numbuh 5. He knows potential when he sees it, and he’s usually so good at galvanising that potential into action. What part of his impassioned spiel didn’t immediately appeal to her? Lizzie has moxie and gumption and spunk and—
“Yeah. I’m not interested, no offense; I’ve got other hobbies that need my time. I really appreciate the invite, though! Your club sounds like it would be the perfect fit for someone else, someone with way too much time on their hands or who has trouble making their own friends. You know the type. Anyway, good luck with recruitment!”
—absolutely no interest whatsoever. (Not to mention tact.)
He watches the school doors swing shut behind her, bewildered and a little bit offended. What kid would give up the opportunity to join the Kids Next Door?
Then the hamster wheel in his brain kicks into gear, and his eyes narrow.
Unless she isn’t a kid in the first place.
~~~
His working theory is that Lizzie is a disguised alien from a planet of sentient plants sent to monitor Earth’s children, and he just needs the proof.
There’s the alleged dirt thing, of course; but Nigel didn’t see that for himself. He tries tailing her during recess in case of a repeat performance, but she’s since started hanging out with some girls from class. They often gossip in the shade of a tree with branches whose strength he misjudged, and they did not appreciate it when he accidentally crashed onto the flower crowns they were in the process of making one afternoon.
(There is an errant thought about how the crown becomes her when she puts it on, but it is fleeting and ignored in favour of figuring out his next course of action.)
He almost caught her eating celery once during lunch—which is honestly no better than eating dirt and would have been surefire proof she was not a human child—but it turned out to be ants on a log. Just because he doesn’t think that’s a real snack doesn’t mean she’s forcing children to eat vegetables against their wills necessarily. Since then, Nigel’s been monitoring her lunch every day, cleverly taking samples when she wasn’t looking and searching for unknown contaminants hidden in her food that might indicate her true biological identity, but he had to stop after he made the mistake of actually trying one of her homemade meals. He was out of commission for three days after that.
(He can’t help but be impressed that she finishes every bite of her lunches, though. He’s always been jealous of kids who can eat whatever they want without getting sick; it’s almost like a superpower.)
She behaves strangely in class, too. Whenever someone uses an idiom, she has to ask the teacher what it means. On top of that, she actually takes notes and pays attention. That should be enough to make anyone suspicious, but she also doodles! By virtue of their last names, Nigel sits far enough behind her that he can surreptitiously examine her notebook with 2x4 technology (Glaring Ocular Gap Gadget Lets Entities See). The flower sequences she draws all over her notes are patterned in such a way that reminds him of code. He hasn’t quite cracked it yet, but he’s working on it.
(The most common flower has a blue center and yellow petals, which instantly brings to mind the shirts she always wears. It’s to the point where he can pick her out in any crowd by that fact alone.) (For surveillance, of course.)
As far as he’s concerned, he needs no further proof; but he knows his team. If he goes to Sector V with anything less than photographic evidence of Lizzie Devine’s alien heritage, they’ll make fun of him and his paranoia for weeks. He just has to keep observing her until he captures something on camera.
When he reviews the photos later at his locker, however, her eyes seem to take up more and more of the images’ focus.
“These are useless,” he mutters to himself.
“What’s useless?”
“Wah!”
He jerks away from the surprise voice, and the photos from the Long-range Orbit Observations Kaptured Only Using This fly into the air. He hastily grabs at them as they fall down before whirling around to find none other than the object of his investigation holding one that he missed.
“Hey, I look good in this!”
“Lizzie!” he screeches in embarrassment as he snatches the picture out of her hands. How is he going to explain this? “What are you doing here!?”
She crosses her arms and levels him with an unimpressed glare. “As of two weeks ago, I go to school here, Double-Oh-Seven.”
Nigel’s embarrassment is momentarily overshadowed by excitement. “Actually, my Numbuh is One,” he corrects eagerly, thinking this is her way of expressing interest in taking him up on his offer from all that time ago. He knew his sense for potential operatives wasn’t deteriorating! If she joined the KND, it would summarily lay all of his misgivings about her to rest!
“More like Number Dumb,” she scoffs, crashing his hopes again. “When you told me all about your little spy club, you made it sound like you were actually good at spying.”
“I’m one of the best there is!” he retorts with offense.
“That’s sad, then. I could tell you’ve been following me and my friends around for the last two weeks, and I’m actually here to tell you to knock it off. The other girls won’t keep hanging out with me if some loser with a crush is always there to weird them out.”
He blushes something fierce. “I’m not f-following you,” he stammers out. “I-I’m just… gathering valuable intelligence about areas where you happen to be.”
“I see. So this is for one of your missions?”
“Yes!” he exclaims, happy that the easy answer is the truth.
“Can you tell me about it?”
“I—Um. Am! I mean, I am… I am afraid that’s classified.”
“Oh, so I’m a suspect.”
“N-not necessarily.” His voice breaks as he deflects.
“Am I a target, then?”
“I’d be taking much better precautions if you were,” he swears.
She leans forward as she baits, “I’m not any kind of person of interest?”
He blinks. “I, uh, wouldn’t say that…”
She looks him up and down before raising her eyebrow. “For a James-Bond-wannabe, you sure are a bad liar.”
He’s actually a fantastic liar. Normally. He doesn’t know why it’s so hard now, though.
The longer it takes for him to think of something to say, the more amused she looks. She even smirks at him as she leans back.
This is nothing like he’s used to. He knows how to handle himself in front of threats to his safety or threats to other kids’ freedoms, but this? Whatever threat Lizzie poses is not one he has any defences against.
But let it never be said he ever backed down from a threat.
Just when he decides to stop letting her get to him, however, she rolls her eyes and sighs. “Let me make this easy on you, then. Do you know what a pinky promise is?”
“Of course I know what a pinky promise is,” he snaps.
She shrugs. “I just learned about them on Tuesday. Anyway. Ask me whatever question you want, and I pinky promise to answer it honestly.”
He gapes stupidly at her outstretched finger, offered way too lazily considering how vulnerable she’s making herself to him. Whatever internal conflict he was facing doesn’t matter now. He could learn anything about her: where she came from, what she’s doing here, whether she really eats dirt.
It’s a heady feeling.
He sees himself reaching out his own hand in slow motion, not fully cognisant or controlling of his own actions. Not until his skin touches hers.
“Are you free on Saturday?”
Instead of his pinky hooking around hers, his hand settles over her fist in entreaty. He hastily arranges his fingers into the correct orientation before meeting her eyes, and what he sees there makes him gulp.
The guarded look she always wore—the one he can only recognise now that it’s melting away—is replaced with a surprised delight, glittery and warm.
“I sure am.”
She giggles behind her other hand, and the sound wraps around his heart and squeezes a little too tight. If Lizzie really is a threat to the children of Earth, she’ll have to get through him first.
There is no one else he could allow to face her like this.
