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Post By Visionary Sat Jul 09, 2005 at 12:17:57 am EDT |
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Crossing the Thin Blue Line | |
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Al B. Harper studied the readouts on his data pad while trying not to drip any mustard onto the screen. Failed experiments always went down better with a sandwich and chips. The big question was, why had this one failed? He rested his chin in his hand as he leaned on the Lair Legion’s kitchen table and chewed. The Ionic Discombobulizer had discharged a full 8.753kdr into the atmosphere of the lab, but the resulting effect on the target cucumber was distressing to say the least… He stopped chewing and paged back up to the raw feed from the diagnostic equipment. The problem suddenly became apparent… It wasn’t 8.753kdr at all… it was 875.3kdr! Damn decimals. Well, that would certainly make a difference to the cucumber, he admitted to himself with a swig of Coke. Luckily, despite being a much higher intensity than planned, that amount of Kirby Dot Rads was still completely harmless. At most it might screw with the mansion’s picture tubes, or disrupt a few satellite signals, or… “HARPER!” a voice bellowed from the hallway entrance to the kitchen. “Uh-oh” the physicist managed through a full mouth. He swallowed slowly and turned to face his doom. “Um… Heya Hallie…” he tried gamely. “Care for half a sandwich?” “Don’t ‘Heya’ me!” she growled. “What did you do?” “Use too much mustard?” he asked hopefully. “I’M BLUE! she observed quite loudly. “Oh… I, uh… hadn’t noticed” he managed. “Although, now that you mention it… It looks quite good on you.” “Looks good on me?! It makes me look like a freaking humongous smurfette is what it does!” she growled. “I can’t shift out of the blue end of the spectrum, no matter which holo-emitters I try!” She grabbed him by the front of his shirt and leaned in to snarl at him up close. “And it apparently happened just after a mysterious power surge came from your labs… So I ask you again, while reminding you that blue electrical shocks are especially painful… what did you do?” “I, um… may have accidentally flooded the mansion… and much of the East Coast, actually… with Kirby Dot Rads.” “You… what?” “I was trying to expose a cucumber to a controlled burst of 8.753kdr in order to spontaneous induce cellular realignment into a cubic shape… but, ah… missed a decimal placement or two.” Her face developed a subtle eyebrow twitch. “You… Just to be clear… You…used theoretically improbable radiation… in an effort to make… square-shaped vegetables.” She looked at him levelly with icy blue eyes, which, admittedly, were their normal color… although they seemed especially chilly at this particular time. “And you did this… why?” He smiled nervously and shrugged gamely. “For science?”  “Heya Al… Hallie…” Fleabot said distractedly, bounding into the kitchen. “Okay, so I went over the latest results with the Idiom, and she suggested… Holey Moley!” “You! Don’t you even start!” the indigo hologram warned the tiny flea shaped robot. “I’m not in the mood, so just let it be!” “It’s, um… hardly noticeable” Fleabot managed with a tight voice. “Really.” She ignored him and turned back to the wincing scientist. “Fix it” she demanded. “Whatever you did, turn the knobs back the other way, flip the polarity and throw the switch and undo it already! I have a painting class in half an hour and I can’t go like this!” “I’m sure they’ll understand…” Fleabot chimed in helpfully. “Just tell them you’re in your ‘blue period’.” “It not funny!” she insisted vehemently. “They all think I’m normal… but I can’t pass for human if I’m constantly tinted periwinkle!” “Well, that’s not technically true…” Al suggested helpfully. “There’s an exceptionally rare condition called hereditary methemoglobinemia which causes a person’s blood to be the deoxygenated color in both the arteries and the veins, giving their skin a bluish tint. It was made famous by a clan in the Kentucky Appalachians who were perhaps a little too… um… interrelated.” “See? There you go” Fleabot preened. “Nothing to worry about, and no need to be embarrassed. You can still go to class and people will just assume that you’re a normal inbred mutant hillbilly.” “Um… about fixing it…” Al began with concern, noting the currents of electricity that had started to run through the cerulean hologram’s hair, and further noting that she was still clutching the front of his shirt which he had never gotten around to testing for conductivity levels. “Did I mention that this color looks quite fetching on you?” “Well, yeah…” the tiny robot concurred. “But I think it’s going to cramp her relationship with Epitome when he finds out she now resides in a blue state...” With a snarl she let go of the physicist and clenched and unclenched her hands until she calmed down enough to continue. “Are you telling me… that I’m stuck this way?” “No!” he assured her. “No, no, no, no, no…” He took a deep breath. “Well… yes. But only until we can replace the diathode prism crystals that focus your holographic emitter beams with ones that have not been flooded with Kirby rads.” “And when can we do that?” “Um… just as soon as we order some more from our supplier” he assured her happily. Her eyes focused on the distance as she checked the accounts paid records for the Lair labs. “That wouldn’t be from… Steranko Laboratories, would it?” Al blinked. “Well…” “Just to be clear… that wouldn’t be the Steranko Laboratories that’s located on the Kirby rad flooded East Coast?” “Ah. Yes, well… Good point. Um… I’m sure we can find another supplier” he suggested gamely. “You tracked down that one awfully fast, after all…” “Well, she is Bluetooth enabled…” Fleabot added happily. ”Oh, like this isn’t going to get old…” she snarled, rubbing her forehead. The kitchen door banged open again, and Trickshot strode purposefully towards the fridge. “Heya Nerdlinger… You didn’t take my last beer, didja?” He found the desired beverage and popped the top, draining it all in one long pull. With a satisfied belch, he tossed the can in the garbage, came up behind Fleabot and squinted at Hallie. “Huh…There’s something different about you, isn’t there?” he noted. “She’s going to play some chess with Gary Kasparov later” Fleabot explained. When the archer just blinked and tilted his head sideways at the sapphire young woman, he tried again. “Maybe her Window’s operating system crashed? She won first prize at the county fair? She doesn’t fear the Reaper? She’s on a mission from God?” “Hey…” the archer finally noted shrewdly. “You’re blue.” “There you go” the tiny robot encouraged him. “What?” the annoying archer asked, rubbing the side of his neck. “Finally get tired of being mistaken for the Caphan with the ‘great personality’?” Asil leapt backwards, clutching the dossier on the Brotherhood of Evil Mutates that Mumphrey had requested. She was just in time to dodge the violently swinging kitchen door as a blinding light flashed through it, accompanied by a sharp electrical crackling noise. More noticeable that that, however, was the body of the beefy archer which came flinging backwards through the swinging doors to skid across the Persian rug in the hall and crash into the side table supporting a vase of flowers. His costume was still smoking as he came to a halt, drenched in water, daisies, and broken pottery. “I don’t care what you say” the woozy and scorched little robot perched on his nose managed unsteadily. “…That was so worth it.” |
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