This kinda goes along with "I Wish I Was James Bond." Warning for some ableist slurs.

Perry had never been much of a talker, even as a kid. When he felt like it, he could be amazingly eloquent, but moments like those were extremely rare. For the most part, words did not come easily to him – his naturally expressive face and body language worked in his favor, and so the people around him understood him anyway.

Then, at the age of thirteen, his parents were killed in a car crash, and he stopped talking completely.

It wasn't a personal vow, or any kind of conscious decision. He just couldn't. Any time he was called upon to speak, his throat closed up, and he found himself unable to get the words out. He began to carry around a notepad as days of impenetrable silence became weeks, and weeks became months. His aunt and uncle struggled to find a good therapist who could help him somehow. But each of them tried to force him to speak, and he would leave in tears.

And then one therapist, a kindly middle-aged woman named Martha, read his prepared note explaining the situation and said, "Have you thought about learning sign language?"

Perry was thunderstruck. Everyone except his new guardians (who seemed to accept him unconditionally, for which he was deeply grateful) expected him to start talking again, preferably soon. But this idea held no expectations. It didn't assume that he would ever speak again – instead, it offered an alternative to help him along the way. It was okay that he couldn't talk. He felt hope.

Martha read this epiphany in his face. "I have a number of deaf patients," she said, "so I'm fluent. If you're interested, I can recommend a couple of good teachers."

Perry nodded enthusiastically.

She smiled warmly. "I'll get you the information at the end of our session, then. In the meantime, how have you been lately?"

He quickly scribbled in his notebook and showed it to her. Much better now.

The crow's feet at the corners of her eyes crinkled with amusement. "Then I believe we're off to a good start."

Around the same time, he decided that he wanted to be a secret agent. He kept this nugget of information from his aunt and uncle (after all, that was what the "secret" part was all about), but they did notice that he began to take some martial arts classes alongside his sign language ones.

If they thought anything of it, they kept it to themselves.

High school was a social challenge he hadn't quite expected. He was now in an entirely new country, surrounded by unfamiliar people and far from what few friends he'd had.

His inability to speak drew unfriendly attention from a particular group of bullies, led by an upperclassman named Harold. Perry mostly ignored them. Why bother? There were other, more important things he was focused on – but that only seemed to make them more persistent. He spent a whole year with hissed slurs on his heels as he walked down the halls, with insults scrawled on his door that he would patiently clean off, with having his books knocked from his hands, with spitballs bouncing off the back of his head in class. Never once did he complain, or even acknowledge their presence.

That was until the day Harold, fed up with the lack of response, approached Perry during lunch outside and dragged him out of his seat.

"Alright, retard," Harold snarled. "Are you too much of a coward to stand up for yourself, or just too stupid?"

Perry shrugged, glancing down at the sandwich he'd dropped when he'd been yanked to his feet. And it had been so good, too.

"Fucking look at me when I talk to you!" the older boy snapped, pulling his fist back for a punch.

Before the hit could land, Perry caught Harold's wrist in a vice-like grip, hard enough to bruise. Locking eyes with his would-be attacker, he pulled a permanent marker out of his pocket and popped off the cap with his thumb. Never looking away from the other boy, Perry wrote three words on the back of Harold's hand.

I dare you.

Harold blanched under Perry's steely glare, and backed away as soon as Perry let go. Rubbing his wrist, he mumbled to his crew, "Let's go. This isn't fun anymore."

Perry calmly watched them retreat, and then he felt a tap on his shoulder. "I think you dropped this."

Standing next to him was a boy who Perry recognized as a fellow classmate named Mark, another of Harold's favorite targets. He was holding out the marker cap.

Perry smiled and accepted it, capping the marker and returning it to his pocket.

"That was pretty cool," Mark said, rubbing the back of his neck awkwardly.

Perry made a 'so-so' gesture with his hand, and Mark grinned. "Don't undersell yourself, mate. I've been stuck with that prick since secondary school, and I've never seen someone stand up to him like that."

Feeling uncomfortable in this small spotlight, Perry looked away and tried to shrug it off.

Noticing the short boy's embarrassment, Mark coughed into his hand and changed the subject. "Looks like your lunch got a bit ruined. Want to share some of mine?"

Perry blinked at the offer, and then nodded, giving Mark a grateful smile. They sat down together at the table. Mark split his sandwich down the middle, giving one half to Perry, and they ate in companionable silence.

(In their sophomore year, they ended up making out behind the bleachers.)

It was the day he graduated from high school when Perry finally found his voice again. After the ceremony and the obligatory family hugs, he beamed up at his aunt and uncle and said, "I made it."

Still, conversation continued to be a struggle for him. Even with sign language (which he had to relearn upon moving to America), sometimes he still couldn't find the right words.

But it was alright, because everyone who mattered didn't mind, and he was happy.

And now, at the age of 24, he found himself standing trapped in a glass box, eyebrows raised as Doofenshmirtz moved his hands uncertainly, signing out, Perry the Platypus, how unexpected.

When he was done, Perry asked, "How did ye know?"

Doofenshmirtz rubbed his arm sheepishly. "I noticed that sometimes when you don't talk, you still kinda move your hands in a certain way, like, like you're still saying something anyway. So I thought to myself, how do you talk without actually, you know, talking? And it occurred to me that it might be sign language!"

Perry knew he'd done that on occasion (usually to express some form of frustration or snark), and was strangely pleased that his nemesis had noticed. And not only had he noticed, he'd gone out of his way to learn at least some pieces of it. Perry tapped his right fist on top of his left one, index fingers pointed out diagonally away from each other, and Doofenshmirtz beamed with pride.

Correct.