Lab Gremlins

by Cedar Sanderson

  “Can’t call me crazy. They know that. Everyone who works here better be.”

  The training video he’d abandoned loaded slowly, and Steven’s mind wandered. “Lasers. Seeing how it reacted to any light, even puny little flashlights like those sucky ones Septimus wanted to use, I’ll bet you could make a dent in it with lasers.” The walls were unimpressed. The video played, ignored. “Huh. Wonder if they make handheld models?” He opened a search engine in another browser window.

  Steven was getting papers off the printer, and thus out of his office, when he heard his name being called.

  “Steven! You go home or something?” Septimus was standing in his office, shouting.

  “Well, since I’m not in there, and there’s not enough room for me under the desk, maybe yelling at the walls isn’t a brilliant move?” Steven suggested from behind the older agent.

  “You finish your stupid-ass videos yet?” Septimus spun around without a hint of embarrassment on his face.

  “No. I don’t think. Hang on...” Steven dropped the papers on his desk and tapped the space bar to wake up his computer, then signed in. “Yeah, that one ended but I have... gosh. Only two more, can you believe it?” He looked up.

  Septimus was holding the stack of papers and leafing through them. He grunted, then looked at Steven again. “Well, finish them up, then.” He walked out, looking down at the papers again.

  “Hey!” Steven started to yell after him, then subsided into his chair again. “Those were mine,” he finished softly. It wasn’t like he couldn’t just print them again. It was just that it was embarrassing to be caught like that. He looked at his watch. Lunch hadn’t happened, and surprisingly, their adventure in the tunnel hadn’t lasted that long. It had, however, been long enough to make his day in the office feel like no time at all. But then again, Septimus had said to finish the videos.

  Steven opened his desk drawer and pulled out a protein bar, and then, after a moment’s hesitation, his last, warm, energy drink. He queued up the training video and popped the can top, then leaned back in his chair and put his feet on the desk. On his screen, the agent in BCG, white shirt, and tie, pointed to a bullet point on a swear-to-god actual chalkboard and started to read it into the camera. Steven tipped his head back and felt the carbonated sugary liquid slide down his throat. He belched, listening to it echo off his hard office walls with a small sense of rebellious satisfaction.

  He woke up to the sound of the video instructor rapping on the blackboard. No... the video had ended. Right. He’d finished both of them - at least, all the links on his training page had turned gray. He blinked and looked up at the doorway. An impatient Fritzy stood there, rapping on the door jamb.

  “Ah, I see you’re with us again, Mr. Taylor. Would you be kind enough to join us in the library when you finish your training videos? I thought I’d find you at home, however, since you’re here...” She was already walking down the hallway, and Steven staggered after her in the direction of the elevators. He blinked crusty eyes, and realized she was standing there holding open the door for him.

  “Um. Sorry?” He managed.

  “When did you last sleep?” She asked curiously.

  Steven yawned, inhaling the faintly vinegary scent of the gremlin. “Um, er,” he looked at his watch. “Yesterday morning until 6 am. And just now a bit of a nap.”

  She sniffed. “Sleeping on duty is not acceptable...”

  Steven gulped, but she went of after the briefest pause. “In most jobs. In this one, if you are not necessary to the action, catching sleep when possible is generally a good idea. And I’m just as happy you didn’t go home to do it.”

  The elevator doors slid open, and she stepped out with Steven on her heels. He was trying his best not to gape at the assembled group jostling one another in the hall.

  Fritzy, her voice grim, spoke to him over her shoulder. “You see, Nonus, we need your special expertise.”

  “I’m not an ex... wait.” The penny dropped for Steven. “What did you call me?”

  The heavy weight of a hand on his shoulder made Steven jump and turn to look. Septimus stood there, bags under his eyes, wearing...

  “Is that Mopp gear?” Steven asked. He never wanted to see that again after the last time.

  “Nonus, welcome to the team. This time, it’s official.” Fritzy broke into their nascent conversation. “Hurry up and ask questions later.”

  Behind him, Steven heard a faint grumble in someone-not-Septimus’-voice. “That should be our motto.”

  Fritzy was moving at a near run, but Steven just had to take long strides to keep up with the tiny gremlin woman. They were moving down the hall, assorted species hitting the walls t get out of their way.

  “Hey, Bob.” Steven said as they passed the octopod janitor. “Ref’leg, how’s it hanging?”

  The timid brownie, so addressed, made himself flatter against the wall and shook his head, big ears flapping. Steven sighed. He still hadn’t gotten the creature to talk directly to him. Then he paid attention to Fritzy again because she’d reached double doors that were usually barred closed. Now, they were standing open and the familiar glow of computer screens... No, Steven corrected himself as they walked down the aisle of a lecture hall, really big projection screens. The room was filling up with others who were streaming out of the halls as he followed Fritz up onto the speaker’s dais. She made a gesture, and a grainy image popped up onto both screens.

  Steven wasn’t entirely sure of it, but that looked a lot like the tunnel he’d been running through just a few hours before. Why else would he have been summoned? He could see the glowing blob moving into the middle of the tunnel looked a lot like a walking man, too. So night-vision footage... splotches of bright color flashed up down the tunnel from the person.

  “We painted the mold with handheld lasers.” Fritzy’s voice was as calm as if she were describing a trip to the grocery store. Steven wondered if she had actually been there, or that was a team ‘we’ she meant. “It was not intended to do an significant damage, just to repulse it. However, the mold was no longer reacting to light stimuli.”

  She clicked her remote again and this time the footage was grainy but colored properly. Simply shot under low-light conditions, not night vision. Steven watched as two figures in MOPP gear holding hoses approached the mold, which had bulked up into a large blob in the center of the tunnel. Steven felt himself twitch as they got within feet of it. He wouldn’t have trusted it that much.

  “Our second attempt was to utilize a known chemical mechanism against molds.” Fritzy started the video clip. “Unfortunately,” on screen the mold didn’t even quiver as the jets played against it. “There was no visible reaction to the bleach at household concentration levels, and there were concerns about fumes if a more concentrated level was used.”

  Septimus, stripped down to street clothes, had walked onto the stage during the short clip, and now he cleared his throat to get the gremlin’s attention. She handed him the microphone wordlessly.

  He took up the narration. “The concern about fumes was not for the personnel in the tunnel, it was due to the extensive venting into the city above it.”

  Someone in the audience called out, “this is Cincinnati, we’re used to stink.”

  “While that is true,” Septimus didn’t bat an eye at the heckling, “The last thing we needed was curious civilians investigating. After bleach, vinegar, peroxide, and finally an, ah, disconcerting movement by the mold, we discontinued our efforts temporarily.”

  Behind him on the screen, Fritzy had started another clip playing. The mold, moving almost faster than the eye could handle, whipped out two pseudopods at the attackers. They were knocked off their feet as it wrapped around them at knee-height and pulled toward the mold. Another person in gear ran into sight with a massive axe and chopped one free. The other had twisted around to slash at the confining pseudopod with a large knife he produced. Almost as suddenly as they had been attacked, they were scrambling to the
ir feet and running away again.

  Disconcerting was the understatement of the century, Steven decided. That had been downright terrifying, because it was exactly what he’d feared happening while he and Septimus retreated from the mold. Given the reaction of the audience, who had subsided from general amusement to a grim stillness, they didn’t have to have been there to grasp the magnitude of what they’d just watched.

  Septimus went on, while Fritzy brought up yet another clip. “The decision was finally made to use fire, despite continuing concerns over smoke and fumes escaping into the city. Due to that, and the safety of personnel in an oxygen-deprived environment, small flamethrowers only were authorized.”

  It didn’t escape Steven’s notice that personnel safety took a back seat to possible detection. On screen, three figures slowly moved toward the mold, backpack tanks fueling the flames they wielded. The mold quivered violently as the fire touched it, and then exploded into motion. At first, Steven thought it really had exploded, but then the camera stabilized, and he saw it was doing the same thing it was while chasing him and Septimus. It had spread out thinly over the floor, walls, and ceiling of the tunnel and was swarming tendrils out and around the fire fighters. They started to back up hastily, still burning, but there was more mold coming at them... The video ended.

  Better Living Through Modern Chemistry

  Septimus, Snirblefritz, and Steven all turned to face the audience as the lights came back up in the auditorium. There was a long silence as they gazed into a lot of wide eyes.

  Septimus broke the silence. “The mold is contained in the tunnel. For now. We would like to open the floor to suggestions at this point, with full understanding of the rules of engagement. First, and foremost, we should not use a method that will attract attention outside of the agency. This leaves out major fire, explosives, toxic fume-producing chemicals, and chemicals that will leave toxic residue resulting in a hazardous waste situation. Secondly, since this does mean that personnel will likely have to administer the solution while in the tunnel with the mold, we will have limited hands for the task, as we can only use people trained on SCBA. Thirdly, and most important, we don’t want casualties. So. Suggestions?”

  “Can’t we just blow it up and say there was a natural gas leak?” someone asked plaintively.

  Fritzy took the microphone and answered. “We have already been told that is not an option. The tunnels are considered historic, and the mold is not considered a high-level threat.”

  “Besides,” a voice called from the far back, “We’ve used that one before.”

  “Has that ever stopped us?” Fritzy responded with a big grin.

  “What concentration peroxide did you use?” Steven asked. He’d pitched his voice low, but as he was talking she’d put the microphone in front of his face, and the last few words were heard by everyone. He felt a wave of heat roll up his face.

  “Seven.” Septimus answered. “We had about forty gallons of commercial cleaner.”

  “Household mold and this... thing are not quite the same.” Steven was more thinking out loud than anything. “I don’t know why, or what’s going on at a biochemical level with it, but maybe something stronger would do the trick.”

  “Like?” Fritzy asked with a quirk of her lips.

  He ignored her amusement at his... what was she amused about, anyway? “Like 30% Hydrogen Peroxide. That’s... strong. About as strong as you could use without special handling. It’s toxic to cells, which ought to finish off the mold unless something really weird is going on. And when we’re done, it’ll break down into oxygen and water. Bonus: the FisherSci warehouse is in Florence.”

  “Aha, only a few miles away.” Septimus was smirking now, too. “Having a chemistry expert is going to come in handy.”

  “Right.” Fritzy looked out into the audience. “Mike, Doug, Mark, can you three commandeer transportation for...” She looked at Steven. “How much hydrogen peroxide?”

  “At that strength I’m not sure how big you can get bottles of it. I’ve only ordered it in 500 mL size.” Steven felt like a deer in the headlights. “Besides, what if it doesn’t work?”

  “Fire worked, but we couldn’t use enough of it to matter.” Septimus looked grim. “Constraints have tied our hands, and your suggestion of the strong oxidizer might actually be the way to go here.”

  “If you use 70% it’s likely to cause a fire.” Steven pointed out.

  “So, let’s start with 30%. Bob, Richard... Um, Annabelle.” Fritzy beckoned. “Meet us in the locker room please.” She handed the microphone to the woman who was slithering up onto the stage. Steven tried not to stare at the naga. He’d been introduced to her once, but the physiology of the half-woman half-lizard-skinned snake form was fascinating to contemplate.

  Annabelle smiled and ducked her chin slightly in a sort of greeting nod to Steven, who could feel his face heating up again as Septimus grabbed him by the elbow and guided him toward the side door. As he left, he could hear her sibilant voice giving cool instructions for the team who would be gearing up to take the tunnel back from the slime mold.

  “It really might not work,” Steven continued to insist. “I don’t know if it’s going to work, and I don’t think I can live with it if people are down there and it goes... badly.”

  Fritzy, who had been walking ahead of them in the hallway, stopped dead and spun around. “How do you think I feel every time I have to send out teams and can’t go along?”

  “Um.” Steven hadn’t thought of that. “But, that’s...”

  “No different.” She crossed her arms. “It’s a viable solution. It might not be the solution, or the only solution. But it’s worth a try, and besides, we have a hole in one.”

  “What?” Steven cocked his head, confused “A hole...?”

  “Ace in the hole.” Septimus supplied. He was no longer hauling Steven along by his elbow and was now looking grimly amused. “You can tell when Fritzy is upset when she starts to lose her English.”

  She harrumphed.

  Steven looked back and forth between the two of them. “So, um, what’s our ace?”

  Bob stuck his head out of a door further up the hall. “You guys coming?”

  Septimus looked up. “Keep your pants on, Whiteside. This is Nonus’ first real mission.”

  “Ah. Jitters. Got it.” The man disappeared back into the room.

  “Ace?” Steven prompted. He wasn’t jittery. He just didn’t want to walk blindly into another horror show like the tunnel that... morning? Had it really only been that morning? Besides that, how the hell was he suddenly a full agent, just because he’d technically watched a bunch of crappy videos. He was so not ready for this.

  “Need to know, and you don’t.” Snirblefritz had regained her composure. “Now, let’s find out how much peroxide we can get our hands on, and how fast.”

  The answer to that, Steven learned a couple of hours later, was a lot, and now. He was sitting in the back of an unmarked white van along with Septimus, Bob the human (who also answered to Whiteside), someone named Mark who had impolitely declined to shake Steven’s hand (sorry, agents tend to handle... stuff), and Fritzy, who had refused to be left behind even though she could not appear in public. They were pulling into the parking lot where Septimus had parked so many long hours before. Steven braced himself by holding onto the strap hanging from the ceiling. They each had one, although Snirblefritz would only be able to reach hers by standing up. Seats were impractical, as they were already in protective gear. Each one who would be entering the tunnel had a Self-Contained Breathing Apparatus in their laps. Steven held his with his free hand to keep it from rolling away.

  “Who’s driving this thing, anyway?” Whiteside groused. “Hey!” He raised his voice. “We’re riding rough back here!”

  “Do I look like I care about your sex life?” The one they’d called Mike put his head around the partial panel behind the driver’s seat. “Keep your pants on.” He had stopped the van, and now he cut t
he engine off. “I’ll let you know when it’s safe to come out,” he finished, opening his door.

  Steven heard it shut again, and they all sat in silence. Steven was doing his best not to giggle at the crude humor, because he was afraid it would come out mildly hysterical. Cincinnati wasn’t exactly the city that never sleeps, but it was nearing midnight and still there were cars on the roads and the occasional wail of a distant siren. Finally, there was a knock at the back doors. Septimus was closest, and he cracked the half-door to look out. Steven could make out a voice, but not the words being said. Septimus only nodded, and then closed the door again.

  “Was that the truck from the warehouse?” Fritzy asked. She was standing, now, leaning against the van wall.

  “Yeah. They’re unloading barrels. Our cover crew is here, too.”

  Fritzy nodded, and then looked at the rest of them, making eye contact with each one of them. “Ready?” was all she said.

  She didn’t need to say more, Steven thought, standing up partway. He couldn’t straighten fully in the van, but Septimus had the door open now and Whiteside was out, then Mark, and finally, he could get out and take a deep breath of fresh air. Steven... no, he corrected himself mentally. On a mission, he was Nonus. Whoever he was, he was reminded forcefully of the way he’d felt about leaving the tunnel not that long before. Only this time, he was going in. At least now he knew what to expect. Mostly.

  Like he hadn’t known what the ‘cover crew’ was. He looked around, blinking, at the tall lights that were making the whole parking lot like day. Someone had already put orange cones at each entry to the lot. Several someones were gathered around a truck.

  “Come on,” Septimus caught his wandering attention. “Nonus, you’re with me. We’ll be in the tunnel, they’ll bring sprayers to us.”

  “I thought we were supposed to be low-key and unnoticed?” Steven-Nonus gestured at the lights and bustle while he followed Septimus toward the same door they’d entered before.

  “Know the best way to hide something?” Septimus grunted as he pressed the hidden door mechanism. Once it slid open, he answered his own question. “In plain sight. They’ll be repainting the lot - it could sure use clearer space markers - and that’ll cover movement and smells.”