Story [Disney] The Adventures of Milo Murphy

Episode Seventy Eight


Milo’s walkietalkie crackled static as Melissa’s voice issued from the speaker. “Wait,” she said, with a note of concern in her voice, “Milo, what do mean, your hand disappeared? Is everything alright in there?”

Milo’s voice carried the suggestion of a casual shrug. “Everything is fine,” he replied. “Can you put Dr. D on?”

The walkietalkie hissed static for several seconds, then Heinz’ voice crackled out of the speaker. “Hello?” he said. “Hello? Is this thing on? Can anyone hear me?”

“I can hear you,” replied Milo. “I found the Shrinkinizor.”

“OK, good,” replied Heinz. “Can you describe it to me?”

Milo turned to glance for a moment or two at the Shrinkinizor. It was lying on its side. For the first time, Milo noticed that there was something leaking out from underneath it. It was glowing a vivid electric green, and it suddenly occurred to him that that was probably where all the green light was coming from. The strange glowing fluid, whatever it was, seemed to have the consistency of molasses.

Amanda seemed to have noticed it too. She nudged Milo and said, “What is that?”

He responded with a shrug that plainly said, “I have no idea.”

“I think it’s broken,” replied Milo. “It’s lying on its side, and there’s this weird green stuff leaking out from underneath it.”

“OK,” replied, Heinz, “that’s liquid pizzazium infininite. You want to be very, very careful with that stuff,” he said.

“Why?” asked Milo, “what does it do?”

“It’s very, very unpredictable stuff,” answered Heinz. “It gives off a rare form of radiation that shrinks or expands molecular bonds-,” something suddenly clicked in Milo’s brain.

“Does it make the air shimmer?” he asked.

“Well, I don’t know if it shimmers,” replied Heinz, “its more like it ripples. I tried to use once for my evil schemes and-,” Milo interjected. They didn’t have time for one of Heinz’ convoluted backstories.

“What happens if it comes into contact with, oh, I don’t know, me?” asked Milo.

“That would be bad,” replied Heinz, again.

“How?” asked Amanda. She shot Milo a slightly anxious look.

Heinz started to say, “I told you, it expands or contracts the space between molecules-,” but Zack’s voice cut him off. “Milo? Did that stuff shrink your hand?”

“Yeah,” replied Milo, “I think it did.”

“Well, what do we do about it?” asked Melissa. “He can’t just go around one-handed forever!”

“He won’t,” said Heinz, with an exasperated sigh, “Milo will be fine eventually-,”

“-well, that’s a relief-,” interjected Melissa.

“-of course, on the other hand, I don’t know of any instance where liquid pizzazzium was exposed to such a strong concentration of negative probability ions-,”

“-yeah, not helping,” said Milo, interrupting Heinz’ musings.

“Oh, right,” said Heinz.

Milo turned to Amanda. “Go into my backpack and see if you can find two radiation suits,” he said.

“Will they help?” asked Amanda.

Milo shrugged again. “Honestly, I have no idea,” he replied, “but they can’t hurt.”

“Right,”said Amanda. She said it mostly to herself. Milo had to work at pretending not to hear Amanda muttering under her breath. “Its fine,” she said, “everything is fine. It’s only weird green ooze and weird radiation and a supervillain and Milo’s here, so everything is fine-,” She continue rummaging through the contents of Milo’s backpack. She pushed aside a baseball glove, a pair of bowling shoes, a Bunsen burner, his first aid kit, several bowling pins and one of Diogee’s chew toys before she found it. She pulled out two suits and handed one to Milo. It was made from some sort of silvery material with a shiny finish. A hood with a clear faceplate was attached to the neck. It was difficult for both of them to wriggle into their radiation suits in the cramped and unevenly shaped void created by the wreckage of the videotron, but eventually after a few minutes, they were able to zip up their radiation suits. Milo pulled the hood over his head and it snapped closed. Milo turned his attention back to the Shrininizor. He picked up his walkietalkie and pushed the button. “OK,” he said, “what do you want us to do?”

“We’re going to build a Shrinkinator,” replied Heinz, crackling out of the speaker, “is the Shrinkinozor lying upright or face down?”

“It’s facedown,” replied Milo.

“OK,” said Heinz, “you need to find a panel to take off, so that and tell me what you see.”

“Give us a minute,” said Milo. He turned to Amanda and opened his mouth to say, “can you get my tool kit?” but she was a step ahead of him. She was busy rummaging through his backpack, looking for his tools. After a couple of minutes or searching, she found a red metal tool box. With some effort, she pulled it out and set it on the ground between them. Milo turned and flipped up the latch with a metallic click. He opened the lid of his tool box and glanced at the contents. An assortment of tools and various types stared back at him. He glanced over his shoulder at the back panel of the overturned Shrinkinzor. It was held in place with a series of screws. He grabbed a screwdriver and out of his toolbox, Amanda did the same. Together, they turned toward the Shrinkinizor and set about removing the screws. It only took them a few minutes. They were almost finished when, it happened again. The air around the Shrinkinizor shimmered, and Milo felt as if an invisible wind was tugging on his radiation suit. Then several things happened at once. He felt as though something on the end of his left arm was swelling up, and he was momentarily confused. After a second or two, he realized that it was his hand. Oh, he thought, so that’s what happened to my hand. No soon had the thought occurred to him, than the cramped space was filled with a loud metallic groan. Something struck Milo hard in the middle of his chest. Everything spun and something hard rushed up to strike him on the back of the head. He saw stars and lay still for a moment or two. Milo could feel a lump rising on the back of his head, where his skull had hit the ground. There was something heavy lying across Milo’s chest. He tried to sit up. He was pinned under a tangle of wreckage.

With some effort Milo pushed the wreckage off his chest. He tried to up again and winced. There was sharp pain in his chest, and Milo guess that a couple of his ribs were broken. Something flashed in the corner of Milo’s eye. He turned and saw his walkietalkie lying on the ground. Milo stared at it for a second or two and blinked. His walkietalkie, which a couple of minutes ago had fit comfortably in Milo’s palm, was now the size of a phone book. Milo opened his mouth and got as as far as saying, “what the-,” when a shadow fell over him. He looked up to see Amanda standing in front of him. Wait, he thought, standing? It took a moment or two for Milo’s brain to register what he was seeing. Amanda was standing next to him. She was standing fully upright and looking him in the eye.

For a second, Milo wondered if he had somehow grown. He pushed the thought away after a moment consideration. I think I would have felt that, the thought.

Amanda spoke, interrupting his thoughts. “What was that?” she asked. “Are you alright?”

Milo nodded. He flexed his hand again. “I think so,” he replied. “I think a I broke a rib,” he said, “but my hand is back. I think it must have been shrunk by the Shrinkinizor.” He paused. “What about you? Are you alright?”

“I’m not sure,” she replied. “I felt weird for a second, like I got he by something, and then I felt like I was being compressed. Milo, this might sound like a really strange question, but how tall am I?”

“Oh,” he paused, wonder how to answer her question. “Well, actually-,” he began, but he was saved from answering, when his now-phone book sized walkietalkie began to squeak again. Zack’s voice came out of the speaker.

“Milo?” he asked, “Is everything alright in there? Something weird just happened.”

Milo picked up his walkietalkie. It was so big that he needed two hands to hold it. “Zack?” he said. “Is everything OK out there?”

There was a brief pause before Zack said, “Not exactly, everything seemed to shimmer for a moment, and the videotron got bigger, oh and Jeremy is about a foot tall now-,” Zack was interrupted someone grabbed the walkietalkie out of his hand.

“Milo, whatever it is that you’re doing in there, hurry up!” interjected Melissa.

Milo decided at that moment that he wasn’t going to tell them about Amanda. Instead he said, “put Heinz back on.” His walkietalkie hissed again. Milo set the phonebook seized device up on end He turned to Amanda. “I need you to operate the walkietalkie. I think I’m going to need both for this,” he said, “can you do that?”

Amanda nodded. “I think so,” she said.

Milo picked up his screwdriver and turned his attention back to the Shrinkinizor. He took a deep breath, paused, held it for ten seconds, then slowly let it out. He fitted the screwdriver into slotted head of the screw and and gave it an experimental turn. It moved slightly. Milo paused a moment, as if waiting for something to happen. When nothing did, he resumed unscrewing the screw.

The walkietalkie crackled loudly and Heinz’ voice issued from the speaker. “Are you still there Milo?” asked Heinz. “Can you here me?”

Amanda grabbed hold of the the overly large walkietalkie and pushed the button. “We can still hear you,” she said. She glanced at Milo, who was carefully unscrewing the screws that held the Shrinkinzor’s backplate in place. He was going slowly, as if the Shrinkinzor was made of something fragile. He looked as though he was about turn blue, and it looked Amanda as Milo was holding his breath. Milo must have realized that too because the face plate of his radiation suit suddenly misted over for a second or two as he audibly let out a breath. She headed him muttering to himself as he extracted the screw from the socket. He put it next to the other two, which he had put in a plastic container he had dug out of his backpack and placed on the ground next to him.

“OK,” he said to himself. “That’s two.” He glanced at the remaining screws “Only four more to go.”

Heinz’ voice crackled out of the walkietalkie again. “How’s Milo doing?” asked Heinz.”Has he finished yet.”

“No,” replied Amanda. “He has three more.” As she spoke, Milo picked up the third screw and deposited it with a metallic plink! Into the container with the other two.

The walkietalkie crackled again. “OK,” said Heinz, “but I feel I should warn you that the long the liquid pizzazzium is exposed to oxygen, the more unstable it get.”

Milo, who had been half through removing the third screw from the back of the Shrinkinzor paused at these words. He picked up the walkietalkie with both hands. “What kind of instability?” he asked.

Heinz’ voice seemed to carry the suggestion of a shrug, as they were discussing the weather. “Well, you know,” he said casually, “sudden changes in size, items suddenly being transmuted into other objects, existing in several points on the timeline at once, stuff like that.”

For half a second, Milo and Amanda traded a look. “That-,” began Milo.

“-wasn’t exactly helpful,” finished Amanda.

“Yeah,” replied Milo. He had a sudden image of simultaneously being several different sized at once. It was very unnerving and he had to work at pushing the thought out of his head. Milo was suddenly aware that he had a screwdriver in his hand and turned his attention back to what he was doing. He finished removing the screw from its socket and dropped into the container with the others. He finished removing the last screws and removed the Shrinkinzor’s back plate. Milo and Amanda peered inside. The Shrinkinzor’s innards were a kludged together assortment of wires, circuit boards and other things that Milo couldn’t even being to describe. Milo and Amanda looked at each other. “That looks-,” Milo began.

“-really, really complicated,” Amanda finished.

“Yeah,” Milo nodded. He picked up the walkietalkie and pressed the button. “Are you still there Dr. D?” he asked. “I removed the Shrinkinzor’s panel,” he said. “Now what do I do?”

Heinz’ voice crackled of the walkietalkie. “What does it look inside?”

Milo and Amanda traded another look. “It’s a mess,” replied Amanda.

“Now when you say, ‘mess,’” asked Heinz, “what do you mean exactly? Is it a mess as in it’s a jerry rigged contraption or it’s a mess held together with spit and bailing wire, or perhaps it’s a-,” Milo,didn’t hear the rest of Heinz’ question.

He was staring at Amanda. She was staring back at him. The look on her face told him that she was silently asking the same question that he was. There’s a difference?

Milo pressed the button on the walkietalkie again. “It’s a kludged together mess,” he said.

A long, slightly static “ohhhhhhhhhhh,” issued from the walkietalkie. “That’s the worst kind,” said Heinz. The walkietalkie went silent for a moment, as if he was considering the problem. “OK,” he said,”you can start by telling me what you see.”

Milo turned his attention away from Amanda and back to the Shrinkinizor. “Well, it’s full of wires and circuit boards and whole bunch of stuff that probably won’t react well to me,” he said.

“That’s OK,” said Heinz, “the first thing you want to look for is the the current flow amplifier.”

Milo surveyed the profusion of wires and modules again. Everything was tangled together. As far as he could tell there appeared to be no logic to how the Shrinkinzor had been built. But then again, thought Milo with a mental shrug, evil super genius, so you know….his thoughts were interrupted by the crackle of static coming from the walkietalkie. Heinz was speaking again. “The current flow amplifier regulates the flow of power from the power source to the rest of the inizor,” he explained. “It’s flat, round and has a bunch of wires.”

Milo had been scanning the interior of the Shrinkinozor while Heinz had been talking. After a couple of minutes he spotted some flat and round about the size of his palm with wires coming out of the top. “Hey,” he said into the walkietalkie, “I think I found it. What do I do now?”

“You need to pull it out,” replied Heinz, “but you need to do it very carefully.”

Milo had been in the act of reaching toward it and stopped. His hand had been hovering only a few inches from the component. He withdrew his hand and turned toward the walkietalkie. “OK,” he said slowly, “why do I need to be careful?”

“The current flow amplifier connects the power source to the signal antenna,” Heinz explained. “Ordinarily, unplugging the current amplifier isn’t a big deal, but Gimmelshtumpian tech can be very unstable. You could be electrocuted or turned into a llama or shrunk down to the size of an atom. There’s no way to tell.”

Milo swallowed. He had a sudden mental image of being turned into a llama. I guess that wouldn’t be too bad,he thought. He took a deep breath and took hold of the device. He pulled at it. It didn’t seem to want to budget. Milo frowned slightly to himself. Come on, he thought, come on. He tried twisting it laterally and felt it give slightly. He turned it a little more and it came loose in his hand. He started to pull it out of its receptacle, but no sooner had Milo begun to move it, than several things happened at once. Milo felt a tingling sensation run his arm, as if he was plugged into an electric current. He felt a strange sensation if he was expanding and contracting at the same time. He tried to let go of the amplifier, but his hand wouldn’t open. It was as if the amplifier had become a part of his hand. Milo’s vision obscured by a blinding flash of light. He had a brief sensation of falling and knew no more.

 

LOL! The situation escalates ... a llama? Hmmm, where have I seen that before ...

 

Episode Seventy Nine


Milo hit the ground hard enough to momentarily see stars. He instinctively tucked and rolled, but landed sprawled on his face. He felt one of the bones in his left arm break. There was a bitter taste in his mouth. It took Milo a second or two to realize that there was blood in his mouth. He lay very still for a moment, checking himself for injuries. When he didn’t find any, Milo slowly pushed himself to his feet. A jolt of pain shot through his arm and he gritted his teeth. Milo guessed that his arm was broken in a couple of places. He could feel the jagged ends of the broken bones catching and grating against each other.

Milo stood up. It was then that he noticed that the faceplate of his radiation suit was a spiderweb of cracks. He frowned thoughtfully to himself. He was trying to decide to if it was safe to remove his radiation suit. He decided that he would have to risk it in order to bandage his broken arm. It was then that Milo suddenly realized that something was missing. My backpack, he thought, what happened to backpack? For a second or two, Milo peered through the splintered mess of his faceplate, trying to see his surroundings. It was like trying to look at the world through some sort of insane kaleidoscope and he was forced to take off his radiation suit. He unzipped it and pushed back his hood.

It fell off his shoulders and he let it fall to the ground. He gritted his teeth again. Milo’s left arm protested as he carefully pulled it out of the sleeve of his radiation suit. He noticed something rectangular lying on the ground a few feet away. It was his walkietalkie. It had been returned to its normal size. He walked, crouched down, picked it up and clipped it on to his belt. He looked around again and suddenly realized that everything was different. There was sheer black wall on his right. It rose up over his head and out of sight like a cliff. With exception of a few pools multicoloured light, everything was diffused and murky. It was Milo was standing in a thick fog. He peered through the pale gloom and a saw a crumpled shape lying on the ground in a pool of green light. Hey! he thought, its my backpack. Milo threaded his way through the strangely twisted and shadows and crumpled shapes all around him, all the while trying to puzzle out what they might be. They seemed to be diffuse and distant. Milo found breathing difficult. The air thick and syrupy. He felt slightly light headed, as if someone was hold a wet cloth over his mouth.

After a couple of minutes, he reached his backpack. Milo got down on his knees and began sifting through the contents one handed, looking for his first aid kit, splint and bandages. He found them after after a couple minutes underneath a scuba mask and several of Diogee’s chew toys. Milo winced a little, as he held the splint in place. He wrapped the tensor bandage around his arm, which protested loudly as he pulled it tight. At the same moment the walkietalkie on his belt crackled.

“Milo?” it was Melissa. “Milo?” she said again. “Is everything OK? Can you hear me?”

Milo reached down and pulled the walkietalkie off his belt. He lifted it to his mouth and pressed the push-to-talk button. Well, that’s a relief, he thought. He had no idea where he was, but had wondered, at least first if he had been flung in an alternate dimension again. It wouldn’t be the first time, he thought. “Hi, Melissa,” he said, “I’m fine.” As soon as he said it, he felt something soft, squishy and stick fold itself securely over his right foot. Milo stumbled. His arm protested and he nearly his balance. “Well, mostly,” he said. He looked down at the thick viscous glob that had ensnared his foot. It was bright pink in colour and smelled like-

Uh-oh, thought Milo. He looked around at the strange shapes, and suddenly realized what they were. Pepperment, he thought. He had stepped in a wad of chewing gum. It’s been in somebody’s mouth and on the ground. Those are the two most disgusting places on Earth. In the distance, Milo suddenly recognized scattered popcorn kernels, a towering overturned soda cup, ice cubes the size of boulders and the uneaten end of a hot dog which was a tall as he was. With some difficulty, Milo pulled his foot free of the wad of chewing gum and turned his gaze toward what he had initially taken to be a sheer wall. Milo walked over to it. He clipped his walkietalkie back onto his belt and placed his hand on it. It was smooth, cold and made of metal. There were a series of lines on it’s surface. Milo traced them with its eyes. They looked like letters.

He took several back and craned his neck upward. The letters rose out site and were lost in the murk, but he thought they read MADE IN GIMMELSHTUP. Everything made sense now and Milo realized that he had been shrunk again. His hand went to his down to his belt again. He retrieved his walkietalkie, brought up to his lips and pushed the button. “Zack, Melissa,” he said, “are you still there?”

Melissa’s voice crackled out of the speaker. “Well,” he began, “aside from the fact that I broke my arm-,” Zack interrupted.

“That’s all?” he asked. “Isn’t that kind of a light day for you?”

“Well, yes,” replied Milo, “but I’ve also been shrunk down to,” he thought for a second, glancing at the letters running up the side of the Shrinkinzor, “about a millimetre tall.”


At these words, Zack and Melissa traded a look. Jeremy seemed to have sensed that something had happened. “What is it?” he asked. “Is everything alright?”

“Milo broke his arm,” replied Melissa, “which is nothing new-,”

“But he’s also now a millimeter tall,” interjected Zack, “which is a much bigger problem.”

“So what do we do now?” asked Melissa.

Zack frowned thoughtfully for a minute or two, wracking his brain trying to think of a way to help Milo and Amanda. He looked at the opening that they had crawled through and his chest constrict at the sight of it.

Melissa cast a glance at Zack. “Don’t tell me that you’re thinking what I think you’re thinking,” she said.

Zack tried to laugh, but it came off as forced. “What would I be thinking of,” he said, “have you forgotten that I have acute claustrophobia?” as he spoke, he felt the invisible bands around his chest cinch themselves a little tighter. “And besides,” he said, “its not like I could fit in there anyway.”

She gave him a knowing look, “but you’re thinking about anyway,” she said. “Milo’s in a fix and you want to go in there and help him.”

“Alright,” he said with a sigh, “yeah, I thought about it,” he said, “but I have no idea how to fix the Shrinkinzor-,” something moved in the corner of his eye and Zack stopped talking. He turned and stared down at the arena floor. Perry the Picklepus was making his way through the scattered and over turned chairs that lay around the wreckage of the videotron. “Of course,” he said, nodding his head in strange creature’s direction.”Maybe Perry the Picklepus can help Milo and Amanda.”

For half a second Melissa felt as though her brain was hurting, as she tried to wrap her mind around Zack’s idea. “OK,” she said slowly, “you think that that-,” she paused momentarily searching for the right word, “whatever he is,” she said, “can help Milo and Amanda? That is the weirdest idea I’ve ever heard.”

Zack cocked an eyebrow in response. “Really,Melissa?” he asked, “how is this weirder than literally anything else happens to Milo?”

Melissa considered the question for a second or two. She was unable to come up with answer. “OK,” she conceded, “I guess it isn’t, but how do we even know that he can do all the things that Perry the Platypus can do?” she asked. “I mean you’ve heard Dr. D’s stories.”

It was Zack’s turn think for a second. “Alright,” he conceded, “I guess we don’t, but I don’t see you coming up with any ideas.”

“Fair enough,” replied Melissa with a shrug. She turned to Perry the Picklepus, and motioned to him, he turned, but before the ambulatory pickle could waddle over to where Zack and Melissa were standing talking, Heinz interrupted them excitedly. “There you are, Perry the Picklepus,” he said, “come over hear, I have something I need you to do-,”

Zack interjected. “Yeah, so do we,” he said.

Heinz gave Zack and Melissa a confused look. “What can you possibly mean?” he began.

Melissa interrupted. “Milo and Amanda are in there,” she said, “and they’re in trouble-,”

“Yeah,” Zack continued, “Milo said he’s only a millimetre tall,” he nodded his head at the opening, “and none of us will fit through there, but he might,” he said, gesturing to Perry the Picklepus.

Whatever it was that Heinz had been about to say vanished from his mind. “Wait what happened to Milo?” he asked slowly.

Zack and Melissa looked at each other and shook their heads. “We’re not sure,” said Melissa. She raised the walkietalkie to her lips and pushed the button. “Milo?” she asked,”are you OK?” She let go of the button for him to respond. The walkietalkie in her hand hissed softly for a second or two. It seemed like an eternity. In actuality, only a minute or two passed before Milo’s voice crackled out of the speaker. “Yeah,” he said, “I’m still here. Is everything OK out there?”

“Yeah,” replied Melissa, “listen, we have an idea about how to help you-,”

“-that’s great,” interjected Milo.

Melissa kept talking, quickly explaining what she wanted to do. “So basically, we’re going send it Perry the Picklepus to help,” she said, “but we need you to explain again what happened.”

“Well, OK,”replied Milo, a slightly skeptical note in his voice, as he wasn’t entire sure how that would help, but he told them anyway. Heinz listened attentively as Milo’s voice crackled out of the speaker. When he was finished speaking Heinz looked at Zack, Melissa and Jeremy. “OK,” he said, “this is very, very bad.”

“In what way?” asked Zack.

“You remember I told you about Perry’s molecular bonds could fly apart as a result of being hit with the Shrinkinozor?” asked Heinz.

“Yes,” replied Melissa. A look of dawning comprehension crossed her face. “Wait, are you saying that Milo could-,” she paused for a moment, trying to think of the right word, “I don’t know, shrink out sight forever?”

“No,” replied Heinz, with a shake of his head, “he’ll shrink down until he becomes a momentary blip of quantum energy.”

“Yeah, that’s basically the same thing,” said Zack in a flat voice.

“Well, I suppose,” Heinz started, “if you really wanted to get all nitpicky-,” Zack interjected again.

“We don’t have time to argue,” said Melissa, “we need to get Milo and Amanda out of there, and we need to do it before something other weird thing happens to them.” She cast a glance down as Perry the Picklepus, who had been following the entire conversation without making a sound. She turned her attention back to Heinz. “Are you sure he can do everything that Perry the Platypus can do?”

Heinz nodded. “Of course he can,” he replied, “why would even need to ask?”

“Maybe because our friends are in danger, and we’re relying on a sentient pickle to save them,” said Zack.

“Well, actually we never established that Perry the Picklepus is-,” began Heinz.

“Yeah, not helping,” replied Melissa.

Heinz rolled his eyes. “OK, OK,” he said. He turned to the Perry the Picklepuss and got down on one knee. “Perry,” he said, “I need you to go in there and look for this boy.” As he spoke, Melissa dug in her pocket for her phone. She tapped and swiped through several screens until she found a picture of Milo. She handed it to Heinz, who showed took it and showed it to the pickle. He studied it intently for a moment or two, then he nodded. “He’s very small,” Heinz continued. “Probably only millimetre tall. You need to find him and I need these parts from the Shrinkinzor.” He rattled off a list of parts. Zack and Melissa could even begin to guess at what most of them did. “Do you understand, Perry the Picklepus?” The pickle made a squelching sound, then turned toward the narrow opening in the pile of twisted wreckage. “Good luck, Perry the Picklepus,” said Heinz.

Perry paused for a moment. He pulled his fedora off with another wet sounding noise. He reached inside and pulled out a flashlight. The pickle clicked it on and a beam of light shone through the translucent skin at one end of the flashlight. Perry turned his back on Heinz, Zack, Melissa and Jeremy and walked over to the gap in the pile of wreckage and got down on his hands and knees. The pearlescent green light from his flashlight reflected off the sharp edges of the twisted and jagged steel. He crawled forward eyeing the sharp pieces of metal warily as he wormed his way under and around them. After a few minutes, which seemed a lot longer. He emerged from the narrow, twisty passage into an awkwardly shaped void. It was only just big enough for him to stand up in. He shone his flashlight around the space in which he found himself. The space was crisscrossed with heavy pieces of structural steel at odd angles. His flashlight cast everything in a faint greenish white glow. The Shrinkinzor was lying on its side. Something was leaking out from under the Shrinkatron. He walked toward it, eyeing suspiciously. As he did so, something moved out of the corner of his eye.

He turned and saw a girl, moving toward him. He guessed she was the girl they had been talking about, Amanda. She was as tall as he was. She ducked under a beam as she approached him. He turned his flashlight on her and she blinked in the green tinged light.

“Oh,” said Amanda, upon recognizing the ambulatory pickle. She looked as though a thought had occurred to her. “Did Dr. Doofenshmirtz send you in here?”

Perry the Picklepus nodded in reply and made a squelching noise thar Amanda took for, “yes.”

“OK,” she said, “because something happened to Milo. He was here, and then there was this bright flash of light and then he was gone.” She took a breath and a worried expression crossed her face. “Do you have any idea how to find him?”

By way of an answer, Perry put a brief, comforting hand on her shoulder. The anxiety in her face seemed to ease a little. He let go of her after a second or two and he made his way toward the overturned Shrinkinzor. He eyed the oozing puddle of pizzazium on the floor and noticed that someone and taken the back off. He turned and looked at her what Amanda thought was a questioning look.

“Milo took the back off,” she said. “I think Dr. Doofenshmirtz was trying to talk him through removing some parts, but they didn’t get very far.”

Perry the Picklepus nodded in understanding. He reached up and took off his fedora. The top of his head came with it. Amanda flinched involuntarily at the sight of the picklepus holding the top of his head in his hand. As if this was perfectly normal, he stuck the flashlight under one arm, and holding his fedora upside down, angled it so that the light shone inside and started rooting around. Amanda wondered what he could possibly be looking for, after a second or two of searching he withdrew his hand with something clutched in his fist. Perry turned to Amanda and held out his hand. For a second, she was confused. She wasn’t entire sure what he wanted her to do. She glanced what Perry the Picklepus held in his hand. It was flashlight, similar to the one stuck under his armpit. The other item appeared to be a large magnifying glass. She took them at once. He nodded and point first to his eyes and then at the floor. Amanda gave him a nod of understanding in return. I hope I haven’t stepped on him, she thought. Amanda’s stomach flipped nervously and she pushed away the thought, which took some effort. Perry the Picklepus was rooting through his fedora again, searching for something else. After a few minutes he found his tool kit and turned his attention back to the Shrinkinzor.

Amanda stared at the flashlight and the magnifying glass in her hands. The handles of both of them were hard and knobbly against her palms. In the pearlescent green light of Perry’s flashlight, the magnifying glass’s lens shone a faint green. She pressed her finger to the lens, wondering what it was made of. To her surprise, it bent slightly under her fingertip, almost as if it was made of jello. She withdrew her fingertip and stared at the flashlight. There was a large knob on one side and one end appeared to be translucent. Amanda squeeze the knob and a beam of pearly light lanced out. OK, Milo, she thought, where are you? She took a deep breath and bent down close to the floor. She pointed the flashlight at the ground and raised the magnifying glass to her eye. Amanda peered through it. Everything seemed to be slightly distorted, as if she was looking at her surroundings through a lens made of water.

Amanda moved her flashlight slowly back and forth across the ground, staring intently through the magnifying glass. She wasn’t entirely sure what she should bee looking. You’ll know when you see it, she thought.

 

Episode Eighty


Amanda wasn’t sure if she was telling herself that because it was true, or if it was just what she wanted to hear right now. In the end, she decided that it didn’t matter, and she turned her attention back to the task at hand. She continued to sweep her flashlight and magnifying glass back and forth across the ground. She turned in a slow circle, with a number of conflicting thoughts in her head. She was moving slowly and carefully, watching where she put her feet. Twice Amanda stopped because she thought she had seen something move. She had fixed her eyes on it and stared hard, but she decided that it was just her eyes playing tricks on her. In the background she heard the sound of Perry the Picklepus rooting through the guts of the Shrinkinzor.

Amanda completed her circle, and frowned to herself. No sign of Milo, she thought. She wondered what to do next, trying to put herself in his shoes. What would he do in this situation, she thought. She doubted that he would be able to get very far. He said he was only a couple of millimetres tall. Amanda frowned slightly to herself, looking around at the bent and twisted steel that crisscrossed the cramped space. A sudden thought occurred to her. Could Milo have climbed up here? she wondered, glancing at the beams. On initial inspection it seemed like a crazy idea. As Milo was only a few millimeters tall, climbing the all the twisted steel would be like climbing a mountain. And what about his broken arm? She wondered, could he do that one handed? She thought about for a few minutes. She knew that Milo was tougher than he looked, but somehow this seemed like a stretch. It would be like climbing a mountain. After a second or two, Amanda pushed the thoughts aside, having been unable to come up with a better idea. Amanda crouched down and turned and pointed her flashlight and magnifying glass toward the bottom of the nearest I beam. It rested against the arena floor and rose up at a forty five degree angle, where it got lost in the tangled wreckage overhead. Amanda peered at the bottom end of the I beam through her magnifying glass. She didn’t see anything thing. She got to her feet and scanned as much of the I beam as she could reach with her flashlight and her magnifying glass, which wasn’t very far. She got down on her knees and examined the side of the I beam as well. She didn’t see anything there either. She got up and walked around the other side and looked examined it. Again, nothing. She walked over to next I beam, pausing to examine the ground around her feet again. After a second or two, Amanda looked up again. She turned suddenly. Something seemed to flicker in the corner of her eye.

Amanda bent over and peered at the spot on the ground through her magnifying glass. Sure enough, something appeared to be sparkling on the ground. For a second or two, Amanda wasn’t sure what it was. It looked a bit like a person that had been deflated, and Amanda sudden realized what it was. I think it’s Milo’s radiation suit, she thought, and then she frowned again. So he’s definitely around here somewhere, she thought to herself, but the question is where. She slowly waved her flashlight around again, hoping to find another clue as to Milo’s whereabouts. The clue presented itself almost immediately. In the light of her flashlight, Amanda spied a slender thread hanging from the far end of the Shrinkinzor. She got down on her knees and looked at it through her magnifying glass. It appeared to be a braided rope. It ran down from the top and came to a stop just above the ground. Amanda shone her flashlight on the spot. A three pronged grappling hook, almost microscopically tiny was firmly embedded in the top the Shrinkinzor.

Amanda drew in a breath, if she was afraid that the scant evidence of Milo’s whereabouts would somehow disappear. She examined the area around the base of the rope, on the chance that she had missed something. She didn’t find anything. Amanda turned her attention back to the top of the Shrinkinzor. The outer casing bent at a right angle and formed a ledge three or four inches wide. It should be wide for Milo to stand on, she thought. She focused on the edge of the Shrinkinzor and began to move sideways, carefully scanning the area under her magnifying glass. She hadn’t gone very far when something moved at the edge of her vision again. She turned instinctively it. She breathed a sigh of relief, and then immediately clapped her hand over her mouth as the almost microscopically tiny Milo was knocked almost knocked off his feet by her exhalation. Amanda winced inwardly as Milo regained his balance. I’m going to have to be careful, she thought. Very slowly, so as not to create so much as a breath of wind, Amanda turns toward Perry the Picklepus. He was bent over the Shrinkinzor. All Amanda could see was his mottled green tail sticking straight up in the air, as he rooted through the overturned machine, looking for parts.

“Perry?” she said,

The sentient pickle straightened up at the sound of his name. He turned toward Amanda and made a squelching noise.

“I found Milo,” she said. “What do we do know.”

Perry thought for a second or two, then he took the various parts that he had collected and quickly snapped them together. Amanda stared at the device. She hadn’t the faintest idea what it was supposed to do. She opened her mouth to say something, but before she could get the words out, Perry suddenly raised the device and pointed it at Amanda. He took careful aim and squeezed the trigger. A beam of blue energy shot out of the device and in the same instant, Amanda threw herself out of the way. She hit the floor hard and the smell of burning ozone filled her nostrils. The air crackled with energy and she felt as though her hair was standing on end.

The cramped space was suddenly filled with a high powered whine and a hazy blue glow. Amanda heard a voice behind her say, “OW!” A second or two later, the blue glow dissipated and the hair on the back of Amanda’s arms no longer felt electrified. She got and turned to face Milo. He was grimacing slightly, and cradling his arm, which was wrapped in bandages. For a half a second, Amanda wanted to throw her arms around Milo, but she restrained herself. “Thank god,” she said. She eyed Milo’s broken arm. “Are you-,” she began.

Milo shrugged. The pain in his arm had noticeably subsided. “It’ll be fine,” he replied in answering to her unfinished question. “Being blown up from a millimetre tall with broken bones is about as painful as you might guess.”

“Right,” replied Amanda. She had opened her mouth and was about to say something else when Perry squelched at her. She turned toward the pickle, and he nodded toward the narrow gap that led back out to where Zack, Melissa, Heinz and Jeremy were waiting for them. She bent down and suddenly realized that there was a problem.

Milo must have realized it too because he said, “Umm, I don’t think we’re going to fit.”

Amanda paused for a moment, and eyeballed the uneven opening. She stood up and turned to face Perry the Picklepus. “He’s right,” she replied, nodded her head at Milo. “I don’t think we’re going to fit.”

Perry thought for a second, then held up a hand, squelched something at Amanda and pointed at the kludged together device in his hand. Milo gave Amanda a confused look. “Ummmm, what did he say?” he asked. “Did you understand what he just said?”

Amanda took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “I think,” she said, “he wants shoot us with that thing.”

For a half a second, Milo looked as if he want to object. He stood and wracked his brain, trying to come up with a better idea, but he couldn’t think of one. After a second or two, Milo shrugged. “Well, alright,” he said.

Perry the Picklepus nodded and motioned for the two teenagers not to move. He raised the device in his hand and pointed it at them. He squeezed something, and Milo’s entire field of vision was filled with hazy blue light. His nostrils were full of the acrid smell of burning ozone, and he had the uncomfortable sensation of ants crawling all over his body, then Perry squeezed something on the device in his hand and Milo suddenly felt his body go rigid as if there was a powerful electric current running through. Half a second later, his broken arm protested loudly as Milo suddenly felt as though he was being enveloped in a giant pair of hands. His arm was on fire. He tried to breath and couldn’t. It felt as though there were iron bands around his chest. Then Milo felt as though every atom in his body was being compressed inward toward his centre, and he suddenly remembered what Heinz had said the Shrinkinzor shrinking the space between atoms. He immediately decided that he didn’t like the sensation. No sooner had the thought occurred, than the hazy blue glow lifted from his field of vision and he felt the throbbing sensation in his arm subside again. Milo exhaled loudly and then sucked in a breath. He turned to Amanda. “Are you OK?” he asked

Amanda nodded in reply. She let about a breath. “Yeah,” she replied. “I think so.” She paused. “That was-,”

“-really uncomfortable,” finished Milo. He looked around. Everything seemed to appear slightly oversized again, but nearly as much as they had before. Milo stood at eye level with the ambulatory pickle. He turned and glanced at the opening. It was still narrow, but Milo guessed they would fit now, even if only just barely. He threaded his way through the wreckage to the opening and stopped in front of it. He could hear Amanda’s foot steps behind him. Milo crouched down on his knees and peered into the opening. Sharp and twisted pieces of metal stuck out into the uneven void space creates by the opening. The passage was dimly lit by the ambient light from inside the videotron and Perry and Amanda’s flashlights.

Milo thrust his hand over his shoulder into his backpack. He felt it close over his headlamp. He pulled it out, put it on his head and clicked in on. A cone of blue-white light pierced the semi-darkness. Milo leaned forward. Without thinking, he put all his weight on his broken arm and immediately regretted it. He could feel the bones in his arm shifting painfully and Milo shifted his centre of balance onto his unbroken arm. He started to crawl forward, cradling his broken arm close to his chest. He heard a series of scuffling sounds in the passageway behind him as Amanda and Perry the Picklepus crawled in after him. Milo inched his way slowly forward, keeping an eye out for the jagged bits of metal sticking out all around him. Twice he had to backup as his backpack snagged on overhanging wreckage. Milo had almost made it to the end of the passage when he thought he heard the sound of something clattering to the floor. He stopped, sensing that something was wrong.

“Milo?” asked Amanda behind him, “why did you stop? Is everything alright?”

“Amanda, can you turn your head?” asked Milo by way of an answer.

Amanda paused for a second. “No,” she replied. She started to ask, “why?” but a suddenly thought struck her. She bent down and looked between her legs. Perry the Picklepus was gone. The raygun, or whatever it was, that he had built out of the parts that he had scavenged from the Shrinkinzor was lying on the floor, as if it had been dropped. “Milo, Perry the Picklepus is gone,” she said.

Of course he is, thought Milo. Out loud he said, “I guess his molecular bonds dissolved, or something.” He was pretty sure that that was how Heinz had described it. “What about that raygun thing he had in his hand?” Milo asked. “Is it still there? Can you reach it?”

Amanda lowered her head and looked between her legs again. The raygun was still lying on the floor where it had been dropped. “Yeah, it’s still there,” she said. “I think I can get it.” She thought for a second. The passage was too narrow to turn around in. Maybe I can back up, she thought. She tried to crawl backwards. She had only gone two or three feet, something poked her in the back. “Ouch!” she said. She crawled forward again and looked at the raygun.Maybe I can grab it with my foot, Amanda thought. She stretched out her leg and snagged the ungainly looking device with her foot. She began to pull it toward her.

It had barely begun to move, when Amanda heard a sudden high powered whine. Her hair stood on end and the smell of burning ozone filled her nostrils. Amanda opened her mouth to say, “Milo, watch out,” but she never got the words out. A fraction of a second later, Amanda’s vision was obscured by a hazy blue glow as a beam of bright blue energy shot out from the end of the raygun. The beam of energy shot from between Amanda’s hands and struck Milo’s right leg. It was enveloped in a pale blue aura and the ballooned to three times it’s normal size. Amanda distinctly heard Milo utter a surprised, “what the-?” Then the beam flickered and died. Amanda nudged the raygun forward slightly with her foot. It slid across the floor. She grabbed it carefully, lest it I expect went off again. She stole a quick glance at Milo, as he continued crawl awkwardly forward. “Are you alright, Milo?” she asked. She had to work at keeping the note of anxiety out of her voice, and only partially succeeded.

Milo nodded his head in reply. “Yeah,” he replied, “I’ll be fine once Dr. D. puts my leg back to the normal size.”

A couple of minutes later, they exited the passage. Melissa started to say, “well, good thing the only you got was a broken arm,” but she stopped when she saw his overly large right leg.

In spite of himself, Zack gaped at Milo. “What the-,” he said, a mix of alarm and confusion evident in his voice. “What happened in there?”

Amanda turned to Heinz. She handed him the raygun. “Here,” she said.

“Hey thanks,” said Heinz, taking the device from Amanda. He paused for a moment or two and looked around, as if he had suddenly noticed that someone was missing. “What happened to Perry the Picklepus?” he asked

“He disappeared back there,” replied Milo from where he lay sprawled on the ground. “He was there one second and gone the next.” He paused for a second or two, waiting for Heinz to notice his predicament. When he didn’t, he didn’t Milo said, “can you give me a hand a Dr. D?”

Heinz blinked once and then realized that someone was talking to him. He turned and saw Milo sitting of the floor with his mismatched legs. “Oh,” he said, taking in the hapless teenager, “OK, yeah, I can totally fix this.” He hefted the raygun and examined it closely for a minute or two. He turned it over a seemed adjust something. After a second or two he turned over in his hand again pointed it at Milo. “OK,” said Heinz, “don’t move.”

 

Episode Eight One

Heinz pulled the trigger on the raygun and Milo once again smelled burning ozone. The hazy blue glow enveloped his right leg. The sensation of ant crawling around under Milo’s skin returned. He felt as though someone hand put his leg in a vice. It felt as though it was being compressed. He gritted his teeth. It felt as though the bones in his leg were about to break. Then, after only a couple of minutes, it was over. Heinz let go of the trigger and the sensations lifted.

“OK,” said Heinz, “that should do it.”

Slowly, Milo got to his feet. He tried to put his weight on his right leg. It collapsed beneath him and he almost toppled into Zack, who reached out caught him. He paused for a half a second, as if he had suddenly realized something. “Wait a second,” he said, “why are you only a foot tall?”

Milo blinked. Somehow he had momentarily forgotten that fact as well. “Oh,” he said, “right.” He straightened up and once again tried to put his weight on it again. It twinged noticeably, but held. “Perry the Picklepus shrank us down a little so we could fit through the opening.”

“Oh right,” said Heinz, as if he had forgotten the blindingly obvious. “Just stand over there and I’ll fix you both in a jiffy.” Heinz pointed, and Milo and Amanda walked over to where he had indicated. “OK,” he said, he paused for a moment to make some adjustments to the raygun. “All set.” Heinz pointed it at them and pulled the trigger. This time the sensation was entirely different. Instead of feeling like he was being compressed, Milo felt as if he was being stretched. He felt as if a balloon was being inflated inside his rib cage and he felt like a pair of hands was pulling hard on his head and feet, making his spine stretch like a rubber band. His broken arm protested loudly. It felt as if someone was pulling on it extra hard. Just as Milo thought that all his ribs were going to break, the sensation of ants crawling around under his skin disappeared and the hazy blue glow cleared from his vision. Milo and Amanda both exhaled loudly. Milo’s chest ached slightly.

“Are you alright, Milo?” asked Melissa

Milo nodded in reply, “yeah,” he said. He looked around. With the exception of himself, Amanda, Zack, Melissa, Heinz and Jeremy, the arena was completely empty. “Being blown up felt even weirder than being shrunk.”

“So what do we do now?”asked Zack.

“We still have to save Perry and Nebolshoy,” interjected Heinz.

“Right,” said Melissa, nodding her head in agreement. “A giant blue platypus shouldn’t be that hard to find.” She turned away from the wreckage of the concert and began picking her way through the scattered folding chairs toward the stairs that led up to the arena’s main concourse. The others followed in her wake.

As they made their way across the arena floor Milo suddenly realized that someone was missing. He pushed his way through the jumble of overturned chairs and caught up with Melissa. “Where did your Dad go?” he asked.

Melissa shrugged in reply. “He had to leave,” she replied. “Someone phoned in a tip about giant platypus in the theatre district, and he had to go check it out.”

There was another loud clatter as Zack climbed over a pile of chairs. He stumbled and almost fell before catching himself. “So, what they just left?” asked Zack as he picked himself up off the floor.

Melissa shook her head in reply. “No,” she said. “Dad left to go check out a sighting, but he left the MLRT outside, just in case,” she raised her arms and gestured to the dark and empty arena. “Even if anything happens, the only possible cause is Milo, and the only people at risk is us, and we know how to handle Murphy’s Law, so he figured that the situation is contained.”

“Oh,” replied Zack, “that makes me feel loads better.”

They mounted the steps up the main concourse. It was mostly in shadows. The only light came from the building’s emergency lighting system. They walked quickly along the broad, curving expansive toward the building’s main entrance. They reached, pushed open the doors and went outside. The night air felt slightly cool on Milo’s face. The parking lot was deserted. They made their way down the steps to the emergency response vehicle parked at the curb. One of the fire fighters looked up at the sound of rapidly approaching footsteps and waved at Milo and Melissa.

“Milo, Melissa,” he called out. His voice seemed overly loud in the empty parking lot. “Over here!”

They reached the bottom of the steps, crossed the sidewalk and made their way across the parking lot to where several fireman stood in the open rear door of a heavy duty looking rapid response vehicle. As they approach, Milo ran an appreciative gaze over the big bulky vehicle.

A broad shouldered man with a thick moustache leaned casually against the door jam. His fireman’s jacket was open, revealing a white T-shirt with the logo of the Danville fire department on it. The name tag stitched on his jacket said WENTWORTH. “Hi Milo,” he said.

“Hi Mike,” replied Milo, waving cheerfully with his left hand as he clambered up the ramp, followed by Melissa, Zack, Amanda, Jeremy and Heinz. The interior of the MLRV was brightly lit, in stark contrast to the ruddy orange glow of the parking lot light poles. Milo paused for a moment to let his eyes adjust. “Hey,” he said excitedly, looking around, “when did you guys get a new vehicle?” Despite its size the MLRV’s interior was cramped. Equipment lockers lined the right hand side of the vehicle. Two flatscreen TV monitors were mounted on the opposite bulkhead just below the ceiling. One was connected to a series of CCTV cameras that showed a live feed of the vehicle’s immediate surroundings. The other was tied into a satellite dish on the roof, which allowed the MLRV to pick up satellite TV signals. The other TV was currently set to the Danville News Network. The sound was turned down. A picture of. Milo, with a split lip and a bruise on his right cheek, was taped to the inside of the MLRV’s rear bulkhead next to the ramp. Over the door jamb, the word MURPHYMOBILE had been stencilled in black letters across the the back of the vehicle.

A voice from the enclosed cab was suddenly piped through the Murphymobile’s speaker system. “Mike, we just got a call from the Chief,” said a female voice. “Confirmed sighting of a hundred foot tall man in a lab coat in the theatre district.”

Mike nodded at a young man in his mid-twenties. The name on his fireman’s coat was RAMIREZ. He reached around behind Jeremey and pushed a button on a control box. The sound of a whirring motor filled the interior of the Murphymobile, and the ramp rose up and backward into position. It locked with a solid sounding thunk. At the same moment, Mike turned around in his seat and pushed the button the intercom box behind his head. “OK, thanks, Janet,” he said. “Let’s move out.”

“Copy that, Mike,” replied Janet. As she spoke, the Murphymobile’s engine rumbled to life and the heavy vehicle jerked into motion.

“Oh, one more thing,” said Mike, “get on the radio and tell the boss that we have the last people out of the arena.”

“You got it,” said Janet. The Murphymobile accelerated and roared out of the parking lot.

Mike turned his attention back to Milo. He eyed the hapless teenager’s broken arm. “You want to bring me up to speed and tell me what happened.”

Milo took a deep breath and started talking. He spoke for fifteen minutes, with occasional interjections from Zack, Melissa and Amanda. Mike and Ramirez listened while the four of them spoke. “And that’s how we got to here,” Milo.

Mike nodded. “OK,” he said. He thought for a second, then said, “so let me see if I have this straight, you went a Weird Al concert, which was attacked by a supervillain with a short man complex,”

“That’s right,” replied Milo.

“Then you spent the next hour trying to find help, and you ran into,” Mike paused for a second or two, trying to wrap his head around all of the things that had happened tonight, “a pair of time travelling spies?”

Milo nodded. “Yep,” he said.

“And help me understand,” interjected Ramirez, “where did the giant platypus come from?”

“He came with me,” said Heinz. “Exposure to the Shrinkinzor has made his molecular structure very unstable. It’s important that we find him right away.”

No sooner had Heinz finished speaking than Janet’s voice came over the intercom again. She sounded as though what she was about to say next was completely ludicrous. “Hey boss,” she said, “we just got a report of,” she paused for half a second, “ummmm……..a giant platypus, and the corner of Carpenter and Curtis.” She paused. “That can’t possibly be really, can it?”

Mike reached around behind himself and pushed the intercom button again. “It’s real,” he replied. “Better call it in, and then haul ass over there and check it out.”

“On it,” said Janet.

No sooner had the intercom clicked off, than the Murphymobile’s engine revved loudly and surged forward. Milo felt a sudden jolt the Murphymobile crawled over the curb and across the short strip of grass that separated the inner parking lot from the outer parking lot. Milo winced as the Murphymobile climbing over the barrier jostled the broken bones in his arm.

Mike cast a cursory glance at Milo’s wrapped and bandaged right arm. “Are you going to be already with that?” he asked.

Milo shrugged and nodded. “This?” he asked, nodding at his broken arm, “this isn’t to bad. We need to focus on Perry and Dr. Diminutive.”

For a second or two, Mike looked skeptical. “OK,” he said eventually. “Perry first.” Because how hard can it be to find a hundred foot tall platypus, he thought.


Brand and Sanchez was clear on the other side of town. When the Murphymobile rumbled to a stop in the middle of the intersection twenty minutes, Mike unbuckled his seat belt and stood up. He reached up toward the ceiling and pulled down what appeared to be a pair of handle bars. For a second or two, Milo wondered what it was, then Mike bent over and peered through the periscope’s viewfinder and turned in a slow circle, surveying the intersection. “OK,” he said, “the coast is clear.” The periscope retract back into the ceiling. Ramirez got and walked to the Murphymobile’s rear ramp. He pushed the button that he has pushed earlier and the ramp’s motor whirred quietly as the ramp was lowered to the ground. They all piled out of the Murphymobile and looked around.

“Whoa!” exclaimed Jeremy, looking around in amazement. The clear signs of a fight were everywhere. Lamp posts had been twisted like pretzels into abstract shapes. Crushed and overturned cars lay scattered about like discarded toys. Debris was strewn everywhere. Broken glass glinted under the harsh glare of the few streetlights that were still upright. The huge impression what appeared to be a giant platypus was clearly vision in the brick façade of one of the buildings across the street. “What happened?” asked Jeremy.

“A fight,” replied Mike, looking around. He knew the signs of a brawl when they were staring him in the face. He pulled his walkietalkie from where it hung from his belt, raised to his mouth and pressed the push-to-talk button. “Janet, DJ, there’s no activity. Let the boss know that we’ve arrived on scene, and then get out here. We’re going con conduct a search.”

“Copy that,” replied Janet.

A second or two later, the rumble of the Murphymobile’s engine died away and the cab’s two doors opened. A woman with short brown hair and a tall thin man with a crew cut got out. “So what’s the situation, boss?” asked DJ.

By way of answer, Mike waved everyone closer. The all gathered around him in a circle and looked at him expectantly. “OK,” he said. His voice echoed slightly off of the deserted buildings. “We’re going to carry out a search. We have a hundred foot tall platypus, and a hundred foot fall supervillain on the loose. Their molecular bonds are highly unstable and it’s important that we find them before they hurt themselves, or hurt themselves,” he paused briefly and glanced around at all the destruction that Perry and Nebolshoy had left in their wake. “Milo, you and Melissa are coming with me.” They nodded. Mike pointed at Amanda and Jeremy. “You two and Janet are going that way.” He gestured across the street. They turned and looked and nodded in understanding.

“Got it,” replied Amanda.

Mike turned to DJ. “You and Dr. Doofenshmirtz are going go that way,” he pointed in a third direction.

DJ nodded. “Understood, boss,” he said. “Ramirez, we need someone to stay here, in case one or both of them suddenly show up, and to run comms. That’ll be you.”

“Copy that, boss,” replied Ramirez.

Mike walked back to the Murphymobile, stepped inside, opened an equipment locker, pulled several objects from inside and shut the door with a metallic click and returned to where the others stood waiting for him. Milo noticed that he had half a dozen walkietalkies in his hands. He handed them out and they each took one. “We’ll keep in touch on these,” he said. The night air was filled with the squelch of static as they turned on their radio. “Make sure your walkietalkie’s are set to channel one,” he said. “That way if anyone needs assistance, or runs into trouble we can all hear you.” He paused for a moment as they set their radios to channel one. When that was done, Mike pushed back the sleeve of his fireman’s coat and glanced at his watch. “OK,” he said, “let’s all synchronize watches.” The others glanced at their watches, then at each other and nodded. “We’ll search for fifteen minutes,” said Mike. “If we don’t find them, or any sign of them, we’ll come back here and regroup.” He paused again momentarily and surveyed his ad hoc search party. “Any questions?” There weren’t any. “OK,” said Mike, “let’s spread out.”

They broke into their individual teams and headed off in different directions. Milo and Melissa fell into line behind Mike. They crossed the empty street, picking their way among overturned cars and scattered bricks and rubble. Shards of glass crunched under their feet. They reached the other side of the and Milo notice something that he wondered how he has missed before. Huge webbed footprints had buckled the surface of the road. He pointed. “Look,” he said. Melissa and Mike turned looked at where Milo was pointing.

Mike turned and walked into the middle of road. He gestured to Milo and Melissa. “Come on,” he said. At the same, he pulled the radio from his belt, lifted it to his mouth, pushed the button and spoke into it. “Heads up everyone,” he said, “we’ve found Perry’s trail. We’re going to follow it and see where it leads. Be prepared to provide back-up in case we need it.”

“Copy that boss,” said Janet.

“Roger,” said DJ, “what do you want us to do in the mean time?”

“Continue searching,” said Mike. “We don’t know what else we might turn up.” He got a series of clicks from his radio in acknowledgment. Mike put his radio back on his belt and together with Milo Melissa, set off following Perry’s huge foot prints. They walked for several blocks, not saying anything, but keeping their eyes and ears open for any signs or sounds of motion from Perry or Dr. Diminutive. After fifteen minutes of walking the three of them stopped. They were at the bottom of Harding Hill.

“Hey,” said Milo, turning slowly in a circle, and looking around him. The tall, brightly lit skyscrapers of downtown Danville marched across the horizon. He opened his mouth to say, “what happened to Perry’s foot prints?” but he never got the words out. A series of deep staccato thuds echoed off of the surrounding builds. Parked cars rocked on their suspension. The vibrations got steadily loud and Milo felt his teeth rattle as a hundred foot tall figure came bounding up the street. He gaped, open mouthed, as Perry the Platypus sped toward them. “What the-?” Out of the corner of his eye, Milo saw, Melissa’s lips move.

“Perry?” she asked, but the word was lost in the deafening noise of his footsteps.

Milo only just barely had time to register the platypus barreling toward him, when he heard, or rather, felt another concussive set of footsteps coming toward him, this time, from the top of Harding Hill. As If of one body, Milo, Melissa and Mike all turned. For the second time in perhaps ten minutes, Milo gaped open-mouthed at the sight in front him. Charging down the hill, as fast as his legs would carry him, was Dr. Diminutive.

His face was twisted into a mask of snarling fury, and his stumpy legs were beating furiously against the pavement. The pavement buckled under his weight, leaving deep divots and a spider-web of cracks in his passing. Milo only just had time to register the absurd ascend, when something hit him like a freight train, and the world spun crazily. The sidewalk rushed up to strike Milo hard in the face, and in the same instant, he felt a fiery pain in his broken arm, as he landed heavily on it. He only barely time to comprehend these sensations, when he felt his backpack being pushed into his spine, and the air being forcible drive from his lungs. Through his stunned confusion, Milo heard a voice say, “everyone alright?” It took him a few seconds to realized that it was Mike who had spoken.

“Yeah,” he replied, “can you please get off me?”

 

There are so many more, fella ...

That sight must have jolted her.

Thanks for the thumbnail of the past few chapters.

*pictures this* Nice imagery.

 

Episode Eighty Two


“Oh, right,” said Mike. “Sorry.”

Milo felt Mike and Melissa’s combined weight lift from his back. He pushed himself with his left arm and got to his feet. His right arm was throbbing violently, and he palm was scraped and bleeding. He turned just in time to see Dr. Diminutive launched himself across the intersection at Perry. The platypus dropped into a low crouch in response. Dr. Diminutive barrelled into Perry and the two of them went tumbling head over heels to the pavement with a defeating thud. A teal coloured hand reached out from under the prone supervillain, and bodily pushed him away. Perry spring nimbly to his feet and looked around. He saw Dr. Diminutive lying sprawled on the ground and bent over to pick him up and set him on his feet. He had only just barely begun to move, when Dr. Diminutive suddenly rolled over and grabbed Perry by the wrist. He jumped to his feet and Perry tried to pulled his wrist away, by Nebolshoy held him in a vice-like grip. Perry balled his free hand into a fist and drew back his arm. He started to throw a punch, but Dr. Diminutive deftly caught his fist in midair. Perry had only a moment of two register his surprise, then the moment ended as Dr. Diminutive picked him up, spun around in a circle and flung the platypus into the brick and glass façade a building across the street.

Perry hit the building with a jarring impact that made Milo instinctively flinch. Perry pulled himself out of the pile of rubble, dropped into a crouch and barrelled across the street at Dr. Diminutive. He struck the supervillain square in the abdomen and Dr. Diminutive let out an audible OOOOOOF! as the impact the platypus forcibly drove the air from his lungs. In the same instant, Perry wrapped his arms around Dr. Diminutive’s waist. He kept charging forward, attempting to pin Dr. Diminutive against the building opposite, but at the last minute, he stuck his foot, stopping Perry’s forward momentum. Dr. Diminutive pushed off from the wall with his foot and together the two of them toppled the pavement with a dull crash. Dr. Diminutive pushed himself to his knees. He curled his hand into a fist and swung at Perry, who reached out and grabbed it. With his other fist, he landed a hard blow straight at Dr. Diminutive’s right eye. Milo heard It land with a loud thwack! that echoed loudly off the surrounding buildings and sent Dr. Diminutive reeling over backwards.

Out of the corner of his eye, Milo saw Mike pull his radio from his belt and raise it to his lips, “Attention, everyone,” he said. “We found them. Everyone get back to the Murphymobile and rendezvous at my location right away.”

A series of affirmative replies crackle out of his radio. “Copy, boss,” said Janet. “Where are you?”

“Brand and Sanchez,” replied Mike. “Bottom of Harding Hill.”

“Roger,” replied Janet, “West side of Harding Hill. We’re on our way.”

“Copy,” said Mike. “Oh, Ramirez, better call it in.” He cast a glance up at the two giants still battling it out with each other. “We might need the cavalry,”

“Copy, boss,” said Ramirez.

Milo and Melissa glanced at each other. “So now what are we supposed to do?” asked Melissa.

Mike shrugged. “Now we wait.”


They didn’t have to wait very long. The Murphymobile announced its impending approach long before it actually arrived. No sooner had it arrived, than a gaggle of fire trucks and police cars seemed to materialize out of thin air. The Murphymobile rumbled to a stop amid flashing lights and skirling sirens of police cars and fire trucks. Janet and DJ got out of the cab. The rear ramp lowered to the ground with the whir of its electric motor, and Heinz, Amanda, Jeremy and Ramirez piled out. Mike turned to Heinz. “OK,” he said, “you and your doohickey are on deck.”

Heinz visibly bristled at the use of the word doohickey. “It’s an inator,” he replied, an aggrieved note in his voice. “There’s a difference.”

The look on Mike’s face told Milo that the firefighter didn’t seem to know or care that there was the slightest distinction.

The sound of Perry’s chittering teeth echoed loudly off the buildings. [ANY TiME, HEINZ] he said. The sound of the platypus’s overly loud voice made Milo’s teeth rattle. The air reverberated with a deafening slap, as Perry’s flat beaver tail struck Dr. Diminutive hard across the face.

“Oh, right,” replied Heinz, as if he had momentarily forgotten why he was here. He reached into one of the pockets of his lab coat and pulled out the inator. “Behold-,” he cried in an overly dramatic voice.”

Out of the corner of his eye, Milo say someone making their way through the crowd. It was Mr. Chase. He stopped next to Mike.The two men glanced at Heinz and then at each other, exchanging bewildered looks. Richard glanced from Milo to Heinz and back to Milo. The look on his face plainly said, “is he always like this?”

Milo nodded and shrugged in reply, as if to say, “yeah, most of the time.”

Standing in the middle of the street, Heinz was still speaking. He brandished the inator in his hand. “-my Shrink-Perry-inator!” He pointed the contraption in his hand at the grappling combatants, took carefully aim and pulled the trigger. A bright blue bean of energy shot out of the inator. The thuds and rumbles of Perry’s wrestling match with Dr. Diminutive was undercut by a high pitched whine. Milo felt the hair on the back of his arms stand up as the air was filled with the whiff of burning ozone and sound of crackling energy. For a moment or two, Perry and Dr. Diminutive were bathed in a hazy blue aura, then the beam of energy flickered once or twice, then went out.

“Hey, what the-,” Heinz tore his gaze left Perry and Nebolshoy. He stared down at the inator in his hands. He frowned at it. It rattled loudly as he shook it. He raised his arm again, pointed the Shrink-Perry-inator at Perry and Dr. Diminutive again and pulled the trigger. This time nothing happened. Heinz swore loud in Drusselsteinian.

Milo and Amanda looked at each other. They both wore the same look of sudden comprehension. “I think-,” Amanda began.

“-I know what’s wrong with it,” Milo finished.

“The battery is dead!” they said together.

“Dr.D!” Milo shouted.

Heinz turned at the sound of his name. “What?” he asked in a slightly irritated voice. “I can’t get my inator to-,” Milo interjected.

“We know what’s wrong with it,” he said.

“Really?” asked Heinz, “because I’m pretty sure that the thing that’s wrong with it is that it doesn’t have a self-destruct button, I mean really who does that?”

Milo shook his head. “No,” he replied. He gestured to indicate himself and Amanda. “Perry the Picklepus used that thing on both us-,”

“-at least three or four times,” Amanda interjected.

Heinz looked at the gadget in his hands as if that never would have occurred to him. His face pulled into a thoughtful frown. He absentmindedly began to unscrew the butt of the inator’s pistol grip. Something cylindrical slid out on to his palm. Heinz replaced the inator’s end cap and deposited it into his pocket. He examined the the battery, which slightly warm to the touch. “This is a polycarbonate neodymium power cell,” he began.

Milo and Amanda gave each a confused look. Neither of them had the slightest idea what that meant.

“These things hold a lot of charge, but they’re almost impossible to drain.” Heinz’ frown deepened. Then a look of dawning comprehension crossed his face, and he turned to Milo. “Wait, how many time did you say you were shrunk, again?” he asked.

Milo shrugged. “A couple,” he replied. “Why?”

Amanda thought for a second, then said, “We were zapped with that thing at least three times.”

Heinz’ frowned deepened as he considered this. “But that still doesn’t make any sense,” he said, mostly to himself. “Sure, shrinking someone pulls a lot of power, but these batteries are designed to last for years, so how could-,” Heinz stopped, as if he had just realized something. “Milo,” he said excitedly, “what was the first thing you did to the Shrinkinzor?”

Milo thought for a second. “Well, I took the back plate off-,” he started to say.

“Yeah, OK,” Heinz interjected impatiently, “that’s not important, what about after that?”

Milo and Amanda exchanged a look. They both seemed to be thinking the same thing. “Well,” said Milo slowly, “there was that capacitor thing-,”

Heinz looked as if a lightbulb had just turned on his his brain. “Heinz, you dumkopf,” he said to himself, “so when you touched the capacitor, Murphy’s Law kicked in and it was like years worth of useage in an instant.”

“OK,” said Milo, “so what do we do then?”

“Can we recharge the battery?” asked Amanda.

Heinz airily waved a long-fingered hand. “Oh, sure,” he replied. “Recharging it is easy, if you have a few years-,”

“-which we don’t,” Milo interjected.

“So, then how do we charge the battery quickly?” asked Amanda. As soon as she asked this question another one occurred to her. “And what happens if Murphy’s Law hits while we’re trying to charge it?”

Heinz thought for a second. “These batteries are very energy dense,” he said. “That’s why they last so long.” His frowned deepened as he considered the problem. “But the battery’s energy matrix is also unstable, which is why it needs to be charged very slowly. If we had a capacitor we might be able to charge it really quickly, but we’d still need a lot of energy.”

They all looked at each other. “How much is a lot, exactly?” asked Milo.

“A lot lot,” replied Heinz. “The problem with these batteries is that even of you do it slowly, they sometimes overload and short out. I have no idea what will happen of you tried to do it quickly, never mind Murphy’s Law, and we don’t even have a source of electricity-,”

A light bulb seemed to suddenly go off in Milo’s brain. It was a little wild, but it might just work. “What about using the city’s electric grid?” asked Milo.

“Oh yeah,” exclaimed Heinz, “that would totally work.” He thought for a second, “but we still need a way of regulating the flow of the current, otherwise we could cause a feedback surge.”

“What would happen if we did that?” asked Amanda.

“We could black out an entire city block,” replied Heinz.

“OK,”said Milo slowly, considering this information, “can you build a surge protecter?”

“Of course,”said Heinz, “that’s not a problem, we just need to find the nearest electrical vault.”

Milo frowned at this. Amanda must have noticed the look on Milo’s face because she said, “Milo, what is it?”

He coloured slightly with embarrassment. “Oh it’s nothing,” he replied, “its just that I don’t know the electrical grid very well.”

Amanda’s eyebrows went up in surprise. “Really?” she asked. “I thought you memorized the sewer system.”

Milo shrugged. “I did,” he replied, “but not the electrical grid. I’ve never needed to until now.”

“OK,” said Amanda, “so how do connect the electrical grid.”

“Actually,” said Milo, “I have an idea about that.” He turned away from where Perry and Dr. Diminutive were still grappling with each other. “Follow me.” He turned and started threading his way through the milling throng of first responders and civilian on-lookers. Out of the corner of his eye, Milo saw Melissa give Zack a nudge in the ribs. She mouthed something to Zack that Milo didn’t catch and held out her hand. Zack reached into his pocket and pulled out his wallet. He opened it and handed Melissa a crumpled five dollar bill. She took it from him, pocketed it and they both turned to follow him. No sooner had this occurred than Mike detached himself from Richard and appeared in. Milo’s other side.

“Milo,” he said, surveying the unlucky teenager and his friends, “everything already?”

“Sure, Mike,” replied Milo. “We’re just going to see a man about a battery.”

Mike looked momentarily confused. “And that means what, exactly?”

“Sorry, Mr. Wentworth,” interjected Melissa, “we haven’t got time to explain.” Milo started walking again and the others fell into step behind him.

Mike briefly turned back toward the spectacle of Perry and Dr. Diminutive. Perry kneeling on the supervillain’s back and had his arms pinned behind him. He turned back toward Milo’s retreating back and hurried after him. “Wait,” he said, he gestured over his shoulder. “What that about that?”

“Just make sure they don’t leave,” said Milo. “Oh,” he said, as of suddenly remembering something thar should have occurred to him already, “we need to get some things out of the Murphymobile, is that OK?” Milo thought he heard Mike say, “oh yeah, sure,” in a slightly confused voice. He turned away from where Mike and Richard were standing surrounded by a knot of people. Milo threaded his way through the crowd, toward where the Murphymobile sat on the edge of the assorted gaggle of police cars, ambulances and fire trucks. The Murphymobile’s rear ramp was open. Bright fluorescent light spilled out of it. Milo hurried up the ramp and inside. The others followed him.

“OK,” said Zack, to the interior at large, “someone want to explain what the plan is?”

“Oh, sure,” Milo. He reached out with his unbroken hand and pulled open one of the cabinets. “Nope,” he said, most to himself. The contents cabinet were a portable defibrillator. As he continued to rummage through the Murphymobile’s various equipment lockers, he filled Zack and Melissa in on his plan.

“OK,” said Zack when Milo was finished talking. “So, the Shrink-Perry-inator? Is that really what we’re calling it? Never mind, is out of juice-,”

“-right,” said Milo. He opened another equipment locker, reached inside and pulled out a pair electricians’s gloves

“And in order to save Perry, and stop Dr.Diminutive,” continued Melissa, “we need to charge the Shrink-Perry-inator, yeah I’m not really loving that name-,” she said.

“-yeah, I know right?” Zack interjected.

Melissa kept talking, “-but in order to do that, we need to charge the battery, which you don’t how to do-,” she stopped, as if she had just had a sudden realization. “Wait, really?” she asked.

Milo pulled his head out from the cabinet he had been rummaging through. He turned to face Melissa and shrugged. “We need to find Scott,” explained Milo. He looked a bit chagrined. “The battery in Dr. D’s inator isn’t a typical battery.”

“Yeah, we worked that part out already,” replied Zack, a slight note of sarcasm in his voice. “What do we need Scott for?”

Milo shut the cabinet door and opened another. He reached inside and found what he had been looking for. He reached inside and pulled out a coil of jumper cables. “I actually don’t know the city’s electrical grid very well,” he replied.

“Really?” asked Zack in slight surprise.

Melissa looked thoughtful. “Now that I think about it, no, I don’t think we’ve ever needed to do that before.”

“No,” said Milo, shrugging. “I know the city’s infrastructure pretty well, but not the electrical grid. It’s weird.” Milo shrugged his backpack higher onto his shoulders, and turned toward the Murphymobile’s rear ramp. “Anyway, come on,” he said, “the sooner we find Scott and charge the battery, the sooner we can shrink Perry and Dr. Diminutive.” Milo walked down the ramp and the others followed him.

As they their way past the edge of the gaggle of police cars, fire trucks and ambulances Amanda asked, “so who’s this Scott person?”

“He’s a-,” Zack paused for a moment, searching for the right word.

Melissa interjected, “-a bit of an acquired taste,” she said.

Zack ignored her. “-a friend of Milo’s,” he said.

“You might not remember, but you met him last year,” said Milo, “at the party we threw for Zack when he broke his leg.”

Amanda thought for a second. Zack had broken his leg toward the end of the previous school year. He had been unveiling a new interpretive dance routine, when he had fallen from the stage, and become tangled the harp, breaking his leg in the process. Depressed, and more than a little embarrassed, Zack had seriously considered giving up interpretive dance, until Milo had intervened. In an attempt to cheer Zack up, Milo, Melissa and Amanda had thrown Zack a party at Milo’s house. Milo had invited most of their friends, including Scott. Scott was a construction worker who lived in the Danville sewer system. Milo, Zack and Melissa had had a number of encounters with Scott, and his girlfriend Mildred, who was a milk carton. Milo wasn’t exactly sure how that worked.

Amanda thought for a moment, as if searching her memory. “Wait,” she said after a second or two, “Was he that tall guy?” she asked, “who kind of smelled?”

“That’s the one,” said Zack.

Amanda looked a little sceptical, “and we’re sure he can help us because……?” she asked. It wasn’t that she didn’t trust Milo’s judgement. On the contrary, he was usually a very good judge of character. She supposed that perhaps that she need to give more consideration to Milo’s ability to see past the surface and see people for who they really were. Amanda supposed that that was something the she needed to work on.

The sound of Milo’s voice interrupted Amanda’s thoughts. “He’s helped us out a couple of times before,” he said.

“Really?” she asked.

Zack and Melissa both nodded in agreement. “Yeah,” replied Melissa, “there was first time we met him-,”

“-last year,” interjected Zack, “on that field trip to the natural history museum.”

“Right,” replied Melissa, “and there was time that he helped us escape from Brick and Savannah in the sewer-,”

“-when Milo went missing the first time,” said Zack.

“Wait, what do mean the first time?” asked Amanda.

“This was how the Pistachion incident started,” said Milo, cutting into the conversation. “It’s kind of a long story, but a really good one.”

“And there was that time that Milo got trapped in an elevator at the mall with Scott, Coach Nolan and Lydia,” said Zack.

Zack and Melissa looked at each other. “I feel like we missed one,” he said, frowning slightly as he searched his memory.

“Well, there was the one time we set Ms. Murawski up on a date with him,” replied Melissa with a shrug.”

“And he was my adventure buddy,” said Heinz.

“I think that’s pretty much it, Amanda,” said Zack. “Now you’re all caught up.”

 

Always a bad choice, Milo. *wags finger at him*

I'm imagining the sounds at this happening ...

Yup, all caught up now.

 

I just hope I can do Scott and Mildred justice. He’s such a great weirdo.

 

Episode Eighty Three

They reached the other side of the street and stepped up on to the sidewalk. Milo turned and started walking down the street. His eyebrows were scrunched together, as if he were concentrating, trying to remember something. They walked for about half a block, not talking, before Milo appeared to have found what he was looking for. He pointed at a seemingly random manhole cover in the middle of the street. “Come on,” said Milo. He paused for a moment, looked up and down the street for any oncoming traffic and stepped off the curb. Milo walked into the middle of the road and stopped. The manhole cover lay at his feet. It was dull a reddish brown in the pale glow of the street lights. “I think this is it.”
“What?” asked Amanda, a note of confusion in her voice.
“I think this is Scott’s front door,” replied Milo.
Zack and Melissa exchanged sceptical looks. “Are you sure, Milo?” asked Melissa.
“Yeah,” said Zack, “how do you know Scott lives around here? We’ve never actually gone looking for him before. He usually just turns up.”
Milo frowned slightly at these words. Zack had a good point, he realized. “Well,” he replied, thinking for a second or two as he considered Zack’s question. “All the times we’ve run to him have been around the museum district, which is over that way,” Milo raised his left arm and pointed toward the brightly lit skyscrapers of downtown Danville.
“But, Milo,” interjected Melissa, “we’re a long way from downtown Danville.”
“Yeah,” said Amanda, nodding her head in agreement, “and we don’t how long Perry and Dr. Diminutive have before their molecular bonds begin to break down.”
At these words, everyone turned in unison and cast a glance at Heinz. He shrugged in reply. “There’s no way of knowing,” he said. “The Heisenberg Uncertainty Principal makes it impossible to tell.”
Mil, Zack, Melissa and Amanda all gave each other a look. “So, you can’t, I don’t know, build an inator to scan them with?” asked Melissa.
“Well, I could,” replied Heinz, “but it would be useless.”
“Why is that?“ asked Zack.
“Because scanning them with a scaninator would change the quantum resonance of their molecular bonds and change the outcome,” said Heinz.
“So the best thing we can do,” said Milo, “is find Scott and recharge the Shrink-Perry-inator’s battery.”
Zack, Melissa and Amanda exchanged skeptical looks. “So what do we do?”asked Amanda.
Milo answered by thrusting his left hand over his shoulder into his backpack. Almost at once, he felt his hand close over something cold, hard and metallic. He pulled his hand out and produced a long crowbar. “Someone want to give me a hand with this?” he asked the group at large.
Zack’s face flickered slightly and Milo see could that he was fighting with his claustrophobia again, but Zack stepped forward and took hold of the crowbar with both hands. “Here,” he said, “let me.” At these words, Milo relinquished his grip. Zack hefted the long heavy crowbar in his hands, as if testing its weight. He turned toward the manhole cover and stuck the end of the crowbar into the square in the middle of the flat circular disk. The end of the crowbar came up to a point approximately half way between Zack’s waist and his diaphragm. He took a firm grip on the end of the crowbar. Zack hunched his shoulders and tensed his abdominal muscles. He pushed down on the crowbar. His knuckles turned white as he tightened his grip. The crowbar bent slightly under his weight. For a moment, it seemed as if nothing was going to happen, then with a dull metallic scraping sound, the manhole cover shifted slightly, raising up by a fraction of an inch. Zack allowed himself to relax for a moment, but only very slightly, lest the manhole cover fall back into place. Then he’d have to start all over again.
Zack pushed down on the crowbar again and the manhole cover rose up another fraction of an inch. “I think,” he said through gritted teeth, “it’s almost free.” No sooner had he spoken, than a gap approximately the size of his thumb appeared and a stagnant smell wafted up ward into the night air. Zack gave another heavy and the manhole cover came loose. It scraped loudly as Zack dragged it onto the pavement. It fell with an echoing clang. Zack pulled the crowbar loose and handed it back to Milo, who thrust his left hand over his shoulder and put his crowbar back in his backpack. His nose wrinkled slightly at the foul smell wafting upward from the open manhole cover. Milo could Zack muttering to himself under his breath.
“It’s OK,” he said. “Everything is fine. I’m with Milo and we’re just going to Scott and Mildred. Everything is fine-,”
“Hey,” said Milo excitedly, “I just realized, I think this is Amanda’s first time down in the sewer with us!”
“Not the time, Milo,” replied Melissa.
“Oh,” replied Milo. He had the good grace to look slightly chagrined. “Right.” He shrugged his backpack higher up onto his shoulders. He crouched and sat down on the edge of the open manhole. He leaned backward a little and let himself fall onto the pavement. Milo’s legs dangled over the edge of the manhole. He stuck out his feet and braced them against the rungs of the ladder just below the manhole. He leaned forward, took hold of the top most rung and lowered himself into the opening. Milo lowered himself down a couple of rungs, then stopped. He allowed himself lean against the rungs of the ladder. He winced a little as a jolt of pain shot through his broken arm. Milo’s right hand closed around the rungs of the ladder. He let go of the rung just above his head, and brought his left hand down to the level of his broken arm. His hand closed and he let go of the rung with his other hand. He began to lower himself downward. Milo had place his right foot on the rung immediately below the rung he was standing on when he slipped unexpectedly. The rung fell out from under him and he dropped several inches. Milo’s left hand closed instinctively over the rung he had been holding and he let his left arm go lose. His right arm protested loudly, and Milo felt his knee bang painfully against the concrete wall. A half a second later, Milo felt himself dangling half down the ladder, supported only by his left hand. A voice called down from overhead.
“Milo, are you OK?”
Milo looked up to see Melissa’s silhouette framed in the open manhole cover.
“We heard a noise.”
Milo was suddenly aware of a fading echo in the confines of the sewer tunnel. He was only just now aware of the broken rung lying on the tunnel floor. “Oh, yeah,” he said. “One of the rungs broke, so watch yourselves coming down.” Milo reached the bottom of the ladder and the others joined him a minute or two later. The sewer tunnel was dark. The air was full of a thick putrid smell that Milo immediately decided he didn’t want to know the source of. He reached over his shoulder and thrust it into his backpack. When he withdrew it, several headlamps dangled from his fist. Zack, Melissa and Amanda all took one and put them on. Four cones of harsh blue-white light lanced out into the darkness. The sewer tunnel was round and approximately eight feet wide at it’s widest point. Milo, Zack, Melissa and Amanda were standing on a narrow ledge only just wider than their feet. It was strewn with garbage. The tunnel echoed with the sound of flowing water. A dark, turgid stream, about a foot deep, flowed sluggishly along the bottom of the sewer tunnel.
“OK, Milo,” said Melissa. Her voice echoed slightly as it cut through the echo of flowing water and the sound of Zack wheezing slightly. “Which way?”
Milo paused for a moment, getting his bearings. He had most of Danville’s sewer system memorized, but it had been awhile since he had been in this neck of the woods. After a couple of minutes, Milo thought he had his bearing. He turned and started walking. “Come on,” he said, “we need to go this way.” They others fells into line behind him, the echo of their footsteps was lost in the blurbling of the foul, stagnant water as it flowed sluggishly in the bottom of the tunnel. They walked for approximately half an hour, not saying anything. Milo led the, across intersecting tunnels, through narrow gaps and down service ways. Eventually, they came to a stop. Milo paused for a moment, surveying his surroundings. Service tunnels and crawl ways branched off in different directions. Milo shut his eyes for a moment, searching his memory, trying to envision the fastest way to get to the Museum District. Half a second later, his eyes opened again and he started walking again. “It’s down this way.”
They skirted their way around the edge of the space, which was mostly taken up by a large cistern. The space echoed loudly as dark, brackish water spilled over the edge of the cistern from several different directions at once. A foul smell wafted up from the bottom of the cistern.
Melissa coughed, pressing her hand over her mouth and nose. “That smells really bad,” she said, her voice. “What is that?”
“Well, this is a sewer,” replied Milo casually, as if they were discussing nothing more important than last night’s episode of Doctor Zone, “so I would venture, sewage?”
“Oh, ha ha, very funny,” replied Melissa.
“Well it is kind of a redundant question,” said Zack.”Or do you need someone to explain where it goes after you flush?”
“No,” Melissa responded archly, “I don’t, but I do recalled someone once asking where’s the exit to the human digestive system.”
Zack opened his mouth, as if to respond. He paused, apparently unable to think of a sufficiently damaging come back. After a second or two, Zack closed his mouth, and said, “touche.”
Milo started walking again, his footsteps echoing loudly on the metal catwalk that encircled the cistern. “Come on,” he said. “I think the fastest way to the Museum District is down this way.” They crossed a foot bridge stretching across the culvert in the bottom of the tunnel. They turned a corner and then crossed another one. No sooner had they crossed the second one, than the tunnel reverberated with the squeal of rending metal, followed first by a loud crash, then a second one in quick succession.
“Well, that was good timing,” sand Milo nonchalantly, as the echoes faded. Nobody said anything for awhile as they made their way through the maze of tunnels and access corridors. Their headlamps threw stark shadows everywhere. As they walked the foul smell wafting from the cistern began to ease, and the air in the tunnel didn’t seem quite so thick. Twenty minutes later Milo stopped in front of what appeared a nondescript grey door. He examined it closely, as if looking for some hidden sign. “I think this is the right place,” he said after a minute or two.
Melissa glanced sceptically at the door. It was scratched and faded looking. “How can you tell?” she asked. “We must have passed a dozen doors that look exactly like this one.”
“Yeah, they might look like this,” said Milo, “but they’re not. You forget, I memorized Danville’s sewer system.” He shrugged, “I worked out the best route to get here in my head.”
“OK,” interjected Zack, “so let’s just open the door, then.”
“Right,” said Milo. He cast a critical eye over the door, as if looking for hidden weaknesses. After a second or two, Milo reached into his backpack and pulled out a thin, flat headed screwdriver out of his backpack. He stuck it in between the door and the door jam and jimmied back and forth three or four times. Something inside the door’s locking mechanism gave way with a metallic clunk and the door swung open. The door’s hinges, which Milo guessed hadn’t moved in awhile, protested loudly. Milo, Zack, Melissa, Amanda and Heinz stepped through it. Their footsteps crunched slightly on a bare dirt floor. Melissa exhaled audibly. The air in here was dry and slightly musty, but it was better than then the damp fetid air in the sewer tunnel.
“OK, Milo,” asked Amanda. The sudden sound of her voice made everyone jump slightly. “So, where do we go from here?“
Milo looked around. The only light in the tunnel came from their headlamps. The shadows jumped wildly as Milo turned his head. He thought for a second, searching his memory. “Come on,” he said after a moment’s thought, “I think it’s this way.” He turned and started walking. The others followed him. Milo wasn’t sure how long they walked for, but eventually they came to a junction with half a dozen different tunnels branching off in seemingly random directions. Milo paused for a moment. He looked at each of the tunnels in turn, searching his memory. Two he didn’t recognize, but he thought that several of the others looked familiar. After a couple of minutes consideration, he made a decision. “I think it’s down this way,” he said.
“Are you sure?” asked Melissa.
“Yeah, because none of these tunnels seem familiar at all,” Zack added.
“I think I recognize that one,” replied Milo. “Anyway, there’s only one way to find out.” He started walking and the others followed him. The tunnel sloped down and around to the left. After awhile it bottomed out and ran straight, while rising slightly. Eventually they came to a wide fissure and stopped.
“Well this looks familiar,” said Melissa.
“Does it?”asked Zack with a slight frown. “I don’t remember this at all.”
“Are you sure?” asked Milo. He looked as if he had just made a connection. “Do you remember the first time we came down here, just after we met?”
Zack look confused for half a second, then a look of dawning comprehension crossed his face. He searched his memory. “Wait,” he said after a second or two, “wasn’t there a bridge here?”
It was Melissa’s turn to look thoughtful. “Now that you mention it, Zack,” she said, “I think there was.”
At these words, Zack felt his chest constrict slightly. The incident in question had occurred not long after he had become friends with Milo and Melissa. They had been taking the subway to the Danville Museum of Natural History when the coupler had come loose. Their subway car had rolled down an unused siding and had eventually come to a stop in an unfinished tunnel. Zack had to force himself to exhale. The memory wasn’t a wholly pleasant one. In the process of trying to retrace their way back t9 the surface, Milo and Melissa had been buried under a sudden rock fall. Milo had initially attempted to move a rock blocking a small opening a small opening, but had been unable to get it to budge. Against his better judgment, Zack had found himself eyeing the narrow opening. He had thought he could fit. He had gotten down on his knees and peered into the opening. In the semi-darkness, the jagged rocks had seemed to in press extra close. As if of its own accord, Zack’s hand went to the back of his skull. He absentmindedly rubbed his scalp. He had hit his head twice. Groping blindly in the dark, and trying to fight off a panic attack, Zack had successfully pried loose the stone at the base of the rock pile, and Milo and Melissa had crawled to safety.
Zack edged slowly toward the gap, as if it might give way at any moment. He peered down into the depths. A jumbled pile of roughly cut wood planks, caution tape and safety cones lay at the bottom. As Zack looked at it, another memory, this time of a crudely built bridge. It had collapsed as soon as they had crossed it.
“Well that looks familiar,” said Melissa, standing next to Zack and peering into the gap.
“It must be ten feet deep,” said Zack. He looked up and eyed the other side, trying to measure the distance. His gaze shifted from the open the crevice to Milo’s broken arm and back again. He frowned slightly. “I don’t suppose we could jump?”
The wheels were turning in Milo’s mind as he looked at the crevice. As he mentally ran the the contents of his backpack, he was suddenly aware that the other were looking at him. “OK,” he said after a second or two, “I think I have an idea.”
“Yeah?“ asked Zack. “What is it?”
By way of an answer, Milo thrust his left hand over his shoulder and into his backpack. He rooted through its contents for a couple of minutes until he found what he was looking for. He pulled out two collapsible tents, a coil of rope, some hammers and tent pegs. Melissa saw what Milo was planning at once, but no sooner had she put two and two together, than a thought occurred and she frowned slightly. “OK,”, she said glance at the various items in Milo’s hands, “so we can use the two tents, the rope and tent pegs to make a bridge, but we still need to get over there somehow to anchor the other end of the bridge. How do we do that?”
Everyone looked at other for a couple of seconds. Melissa had a good point, they all realized. Amanda turned to Heinz. “I don’t suppose you could make something?” she asked. She quickly glanced back and forth from Heinz to the crevice and back again.
Heinz briefly looked as if he wanted to slap himself on the forehead. “Oh of course,” he said. “I could totally do that!” He frowned thoughtfully at this and began patting his pockets, as if looking for something, muttering to himself. “Let me see,” he said. He thrust his hands into the pockets of his lab coat. He pulled out several inators in rapid succession and inspected them, as if looking for some hidden flaw. Some he put back in the pockets of his lab coat, while others were cast aside. Finally, he seemed to find what he was looking for. “Yeah,” he said, mostly to himself, “these will do nicely.” Heinz set down the handful of inators that he had pulled from his pockets and started patting his pockets again. After a minute or two, he found what he was looking for he pulled a tool kit out of an inside pocket and threw himself down the ground. Heinz picked up one of his inators in one hand and brandished a screwdriver in the other. He set about the inator and in less that ten minutes, a pile of inator parts sat on the tunnel floor in front of him.
Milo eyed him as he worked. “So, are you going to fill us in, Dr. D?” he asked.
Heinz paused momentarily, looking up from the pile of inator parts scattered on the ground in front of him. “Oh,” he said, “it’s simple. I’m going to build an inator that will get us to the other side of that gap.” His hands seemed to be working with a mind of their own as he spoke.
“So, what like Perry’s grappling gun?” asked Zack.
Heinz paused for a second these words. “That totally would have been a lot better,” he said. “Anyway,” said Heinz, snapping the last component into place, “here it is.” He got to his feet.
Melissa glanced skeptically at the device Heinz was cradling in his hands. “What is that?” she asked.
“This is a short range transport-inator,” replied Heinz.
“Which means what exactly?” asked Amanda slowly. She shared a quick looking with Zack and Melissa. The three of them were all thinking the same thing.
Heinz shrugged in reply. “It’s matter transmitter,” he said, “like the one from Space Adventure.”
Zack and Melissa both sighed in unison. “Wait a second,” replied Zack, “you want to use a teleportation device move twenty feet-,”
Melissa interjected, “and more importantly, you want to use it on Milo?!”

 

Episode Eighty Four

Heinz gestured in annoyance at Amanda, “she asked me to build an inator,” he exclaimed, gesticulating excitedly, “and I did, and now that I’ve built it, you decide that you don’t want to use it.”
“Well, yeah,” replied Amanda, “but I thought you’d build-,” she shrugged her shoulders, “-I don’t know, something useful, like a crossbow or a catapult.” She nodded at the device in his hands, “not whatever that thing is.”
“It’s a matter transmitter-,” said Heinz indignantly.
“Might I remind you all,” began Zack, “that there’s an building-sized platypus out there with an unstable molecular structure who needs us.” Everyone fell silent at these words. “So let’s get this over with.”
“Super,” said Heinz. “OK, everyone stand over there.” He pointed at a spot just in front of the crack in the tunnel floor. Milo, Zack, Melissa and Amanda all turned and walked toward the spot that Heinz had pointed to. “Good,” he said, “now I need all of you to stand a couple of feet apart from each other.” The others looked at each other for a second or two, judging the distance between them. They then shuffled sideways a little, trying to give each other some space.
“How’s this?” asked Milo. He thrust out his left arm, holding it level with his shoulder. He estimated that there was two of clearance on either side of him. He was standing between Zack and Amanda.
By way of an answer, Heinz held up both hands, making a rectangle with his thumbs and forefingers. He stared through it for a second or two. He closed one eye, and then the other. He ran through some quick mental calculations in his head. “Yeah, that looks good,” said Heinz. “I just need to make some adjustments to the inator.” He bent over and picked up the inator, which he had set on the floor. He held it in one hand and fished in the pocket of his lab coat with the other. He pried a panel off the back of the inator and stuck it in his pocket. He stared critically at the mess of wires inside. Heinz quickly pulled several of them out and plugged them into new sockets. He fished in his pocket again, pulled the panel out and snapped it back into position. Heinz took several long steps backwards and then stopped. He made some adjustments to the inator and then put it back on the ground. He turned a few knobs and pressed a button. The inator began to emit a low frequency whine. Heinz ran forward, covering the distance between the inator and where the others were standing waiting for him to finish his tinkering. He reached the others and stopped. He had only just begun to turn around, when the inator suddenly emitted a beam of blue-white energy.
It was pencil thin and it felt if there were ants crawling around under Milo’s skin. Zack laughed convulsively. Milo had just started to reach up the scratch the back of his neck. Out of the corner of her eye, Melissa saw Heinz open his mouth to say, “don’t move,” but he never got the words out. At that moment, the inator emitted a blindingly bright pulse of energy. Milo instinctively threw his hands up in front of his eyes to shield himself from the intense light. In the same instant, Milo suddenly felt as though every particle in his body was being pulled apart, as if it has suddenly developed a mind of its own. He opened his mouth to say something, but nothing came out of his mouth. He only had just long enough to realize in surprise that he no longer had a mount before his consciousness winked out of existence.

When Milo regained his senses, he was lying face down on the tunnel floor. Several seeming very heavy somethings were lying on top of him. He groaned. His stomach was churning and for a moment he thought he was going to be sick. “Can you guys get off me, please?” He coughed. His mouth was dry and felt as if it was full of cotton balls. He coughed. His throat felt as if it was full of gravel. He immediately decided that he didn’t like teleportation. The several somethings rolled off him with a chorus of groans. Through a single half closed eye lid, Milo dimly registered what he thought was a familiar looking shoe. It was brown and laceless and looked a bit like a slipper. But how could that be? He momentarily wondered if he was having some sort of out of body experience, and then wondered if this was a side effect of Heinz’ inator. Milo coughed again, and swallowed two or three times, trying to get rid of the gravelly sensation in his throat. Milo’s brain felt as though it was enshrouded in a thick fog. Without realizing thinking about what he was doing, Milo thrust out his right arm. It moved very stiffly, as if it didn’t belong to him. Then a sudden thought occurred to Milo. Wait, he thought, I broke my right arm. He turned his head slightly and stared at it. The arm that seemed as if it didn’t belong to him was too long. It was wrapped in the white sleeve of a pharmacist’s lab coat. A long splay fingered hand emerged from the end. Milo had a sudden sinking feeling. Of course, he thought with a sigh.
Milo pushed himself into a sitting position. He paused and waited for a wave of dizziness subsided. Zack slowly sat up. Milo thought he looked like he wanted to be sick. “I feel like I’m going throw up,” he said. “What hap-,” he stopped. Zack frowned slightly, as if he had suddenly realized that something was wrong. He patted himself. “OK,” he said, “why am I a boy, and which one of you is in my body?”
Melissa raised her hand. “That’d be me.” She glanced at Milo. “What did you do?”
Milo waved Heinz’ hands in front of him. “What do you mean?” he asked, “I’m Milo, I didn’t do anything.”
Melissa turned Zack’s head to look at Heinz. “OK,” she said in Zack’s voice, “if you’re Milo, than where is-,”
As if on cue, Milo popped up into a sitting position like a cork. “Hey, it worked,” he said.
“No it didn’t,” Zack, crossing Melissa’s arms across her chest. “As if we didn’t already have Perry to worry about, now we have this to worry about too.”
A look of dawning comprehension crossed Milo’s face as Heinz realized what had happened. He unconsciously started wave Milo’s broken arm, then stopped when it throbbed in pain. “Ow!” he said, cradling it close to his chest. The others were still looking at him and he shrugged. “OK, so some of us swapped bodies, but I’m pretty sure that I mentioned that this might happen-,”
“No you didn’t,” said. Melissa, pulling Zack’s face into an annoyed expression.
“This is exactly the kind of thing we were afraid,” said Zack.
“This isn’t helping,” said Milo, turn Heinz gaze to look at Zack and Melissa. “We can’t afford to waste time sitting here arguing.”
“Well, what are we waiting for?” asked Melissa impatiently, throwing Zack’s hands in the air. “Let’s get going,”
Everyone got to their feet. Milo swayed noticeably on his suddenly long legs. He felt the blood rush to his head as he straighten up. Everything spun. He took a deep breath and waited for the dizzy spell to pass. Milo tried to straighten up a little more. He suddenly felt a sharp pain in his neck. He reached up with a long splay fingered hand and rubbed the back of his neck. “Ow!”
“Oh, yeah,” replied Heinz, looking up at himself. “I have a tendency to slouch. So watch you don’t strain my neck.”
Right, thought Milo, as we don’t have other things to worry about at the moment. No soon had this thought occurred to him, than he looked down at himself. Heinz was still wearing his backpack. “Hey,” said Milo. “Dr. D, can you hand me my backpack?”
“Oh sure,” replied Heinz. He slipped it off, and handed it to Milo.
Milo took it from him. He thrust out his long arms and slightly awkwardly slipped the, through the straps. Milo shrugged several times, settling his backpack more squarely on Heinz’s stooped shoulders. Milo frowned slightly. His backpack seemed to be overly small, but he wondered if that was just the result of his overly large body. He pushed the thought away and stared down at his feet. He picked up his right foot, stretching out his leg and let himself fall forward. Milo felt himself wobble, and for a brief moment he thought that he was going to topple over. He instinctively threw out his arms to regain his balance and steadied himself. Milo straighten up again and readjusted his backpack so that it was more centred on his shoulders.
Amanda eyed him sceptically. “I hope this is isn’t permanent,” she said.
Zack and Melissa shared a look. “It better not be,” they said in unison.
“OK,” said Milo, “let’s try this again.” He thrust out his arms and took a slow, careful step. Milo paused, mid stride, as waiting for something to happen. When nothing did, Milo took another step. And another and another and another. He walked a dozen or so paces down the tunnel before turning to join the others. “Hey,” he said excitedly, “I think I’ve got the hang of walking.”
“Great,” said Melissa, crossing Zack’s arms across his chest. “Can we go now?”
“Sure,” said Milo.
They started walking. Milo’s movements were stiff and awkward at first, as he was still getting used to Heinz’ different centre of gravity. They had only been walking for about fifteen minutes when a loud thud echoed through the tunnel. Shadows leapt wildly, and they all looked around to see what had made the unexpected noise.
“What was that?” asked Zack as he turned Melissa’s head, looking for the source of the disturbance.
“That was,” Amanda began. She looked back and forth between Milo and Heinz, “Dr. Doofenshmirtz, sort of, but not really, I mean…” she trailed off in confusion, not really sure how to finish her sentence.
Milo awkwardly knelt down next to where Heinz had landed face first in the dirt. “Are you OK?” he asked.
Heinz pushed himself up off the floor with his left arm. “I tripped,” he said, “over a crack in the ground.” He gathered his legs under himself and pushed himself into a upright position. “I mean really, who does that?l
Milo chuckled. “I used to do that all the time when I was a kid.” Heinz winced and cradled Milo’s broken arm. Milo eyed it critically.“How’s the arm?”
“Well, it’s an arm and it’s broken,” replied Heinz. “I’m not really sure what else you want me to say.”
“Well, maybe you should be careful, OK?” suggested Milo. “You’ve never had to deal with Murphy’s Law before.”
Heinz got up and they started walking again. Milo wasn’t sure how long they walked for, but eventually the tunnel widened into a large cavern. A collection of ramshackle hovels were scattered around the open space.
Zack audibly exhaled.
“Well how about that,” said Melissa. “We actually managed to find the place on our own.”
Milo gave her a sidelong look, “you doubted me?” he asked.
Amanda played the light from her headlamp across the scene. “So which of these is his?”
“I think it’s that’s one,” he said. He pointed at a shack that sat by itself surrounded at the far end of the cavern. “Come on.” He turned and started walking. The others fell into line behind him. With Heinz’ longer legs, Milo took two strides for everyone of theirs and they had to hurry to catch up. They reached the wooden shack in a few minutes and stepped up on the porch. Milo made a fist and knocked several times on the rough wooden door. The thud-thud-thud of Milo’s fist knocking on the roughly sawn planks seemed to be overly loud in the stillness of the cavern. He paused, listening for any sound coming from inside the crude dwelling. They all exchanged looks. “Is he home?” asked Milo. As he spoke, Heinz’ eyebrows knitted together.
Zack sighed and waved one of Melissa’s hands. “He lives underground with a milk carton, and it’s after midnight. Where could he possibly go?”
Milo thought about this for a second or two. “Good point.” He put his hand on the door knob and turned it. It was locked.
“He locks his door?” asked Melissa. “Down here? Seriously?”
Milo shrugged Heinz’ bony shoulders. “I guess you can’t be too careful.”
“Yes you can,” replied Zack. Melissa’s face suddenly wore a determined look. “Milo, get out of the way.”
Milo started to say, “Zack, what are you doing?” but before he could get the words out, Zack had taken a couple of steps back. As Melissa dropped into what was clearly a linebacker’s crouch, Milo suddenly put two and two together. So, it seemed, had Melissa, because Zack’s face suddenly wore an agitated look. Milo took a couple of steps back in anticipation. Zack launched himself at the door. The pounding of his footsteps made the rotten floorboards shake under Milo’s feet. Zack’s shoulder had barley touched the door, when it was was flung open. Milo had a brief glimpse of a man standing in the door before Zack barrelled into him. Milo heard a loud OOOF! as the man had the wind knocked out of him. This was was followed by a loud crash as Zack and his unfortunate victim went tumbling to the floor in a tangled heap.
From the bottom of the heap a high pitched voice said, “hey! What’s the big idea!”
Zack slowly off him, breathing heavily. There was cut above Melissa’s left from where Zack had the floor.
From where she had been watching, Zack’s face pulled into a frown as Melissa sighed and rolled her eyes. “Zack, what was that?!” she asked, waving his hands in the air.
Zack got to his feet. “I was trying to break down the door,” he said. “We need to find Scott.” At these words, Scott got to his feet. “And we found him.”
“Yeah, but did you have to use my body to do it?” asked Melissa.
“Well I didn’t here you coming up with any ideas,” Zack shot back.
“Can we do this later?” Amanda interjected. “Or have you forgotten that we have a giant platypus to sage?” She paused for a moment, “which is a sentence I never thought I’d say.”
“Sorry,” said Zack and Melissa at the same time. They both had the good grace to look slightly shamefaced.
“Oh by the way,” said Melissa, glancing at her forehead. “I’m bleeding.”
For a second Zack looked confused, then he felt something hot and sticky on Melissa’s forehead. He reached up and felt blood on his fingertips. Evidently when he had collided with Scott, he had hit his head. Melissa’s face pulled into a slight frown. Zack had no recollection of hitting his head. “Oh,” he said. He felt Melissa’s cheeks grow hot. “Sorry. Milo have you still got your first aid kit?”
Milo turned at the sound of his name. “Yeah,” he said, “sure. Let me check.” He thrust a long arm over his shoulder, evidently aiming for the top flap of his backpack, however, he missed and a second later Amanda said, “OW!”
Milo flushed. He had accidentally hit her on the head. “Sorry Amanda,” he said. He pulled open the flap on his backpack and rummaged inside. He found his first aid kit after only a moment or two of searching and pulled it out. Milo opened it and took out a bottle of rubbing alcohol, a bandaid and a cotton swab. “Come here,” he said, “and let me take a look at that.” Milo walked over to where Zack was standing and unscrewed the cap on top of the bottle of rubbing alcohol. He dabbed some rubbing alcohol on to the cotton swab and dabbed it onto Melissa’s forehead. Zack flinched.
“OW!” He said. “That stings.”
“I’m almost done,” said Milo. He replaced the cap on the bottle of rubbing alcohol and put it back in his backpack. He put the now bloody cotton swab in one of his side pockets and opened the bandaid’s paper wrapping. He pulled the adhesive off of the back and stuck it onto Melissa’s forehead. “There,” he said. “I don’t even think there’ll be a scar.”
“Thanks,” said Zack.
“Excuse me.” Everyone turned at the sound of Scott’s voice. He spoke with a high pitched nasal voice. “But just what exactly are you doing breaking down my door?”
That brought Milo, Zack, Melissa, Amanda and Heinz back down to Earth. “Oh,” said Milo. “Right.” Heinz’ face flushed a little in embarrassment. “Sorry,” said Milo. “We need your help,” and he quickly explained every that had happened. “So you see,” said Milo after ten minutes, “we need to connect Dr. D’s inator to the the city’s power grid in order to recharge the battery.”
“Oh, sure,” replied Scott with a wave of his hand when Milo had finished speaking. “That’s easy, Mildred knows exactly how to do that.”
The others looked at each other. For half a moment, a muscle flickered in Melissa’s face and Milo could tell that Zack was biting his tongue. “Uh,” said Zack slowly. “Yeah, sure.”
“Great,” said Scott. “Let me get my tools and we’ll go.” He turned and went back inside, sound of his heavy boots stomping away inside.
“So Mildred knows city infrastructure?” asked Melissa skeptically
“Apparently,” replied Milo with a shrug.
The sound of Scott’s boots started getting louder again, and he reappeared. He was carrying a battered metal tool box in one hand and a milk carton with a crudely drawnly smile face on it in the other. “OK,” he said, “Mildred says its over this way.” Scott started walking and the others followed him. He wound his way among the through the narrow twisting allies form by the collection of ramshackle buildings. To all outside appearances he seemed to be wandering aimlessly, and once or twice they appeared to have lost him, except he stuck his head around the corner and said, “you coming?” and continued on. Eventually they came to a small side tunnel that Milo had never seen before. They went inside. The tunnel low and narrow. Milo felt a sudden sharp pain on the top of his head. “OW!” he said. He reached up and felt a lump rising on the top of Heinz’ head.
From behind him, Milo heard the sound of wheezing again knew that Zack was having another attack of claustrophobia. He heard Zack say, “I’m OK, I’m with Milo and Melissa and Amanda and I’m going to be put back in my own body and everything is going to be fine.”
“That’s the spirit, Zack,” said Milo encouragingly. “Focus on the positive.”
At these words, Melissa said, “Just how do we get back into our own bodies?”
There was a pregnant pause. “What?” replied Heinz, waving Milo’s unbroken arm. “You swap a few minds one time and everyone expects you to put them all back!”
“I think we should focus on one thing at a time,” Amanda interjected. “Our first task should be charging Dr. D’s inator.”
“Thank you,” said Heinz emphatically.
“Not so fast,” replied Amanda, “you’re still on the hook for,” she paused and gestured searchingly at Milo, Zack, Melissa and Heinz, “whatever this is.”
Heinz sighed and rolled Milo’s eyes. “OK, fine.”
They resumed walking, following Scott and Mildred as they made their way down the narrow tunnel. Milo wasn’t sure how long they walked for, it seemed as if they had walked for at least forty five minutes, during which nobody spoke. Eventually, they exited the side tunnel and found themselves in a much larger service tunnel. It was wide enough to for four people to walk abreast and Zack exhaled audibly.
Scott stopped for a moment and looked around. He reached into his long, ragged coat and took out Mildred. “Which way now, Mildred?” Scott asked. He paused for a moment, as if listening to a voice that nobody else could hear, then held Mildred out in front of him, as if to allow the milk carton to see better. After a second or two, he put her away and said, “come on, its down this way.”

 

This is stated so calmly!

 

Episode Eighty Five


Scott turned and set off walking again without bother to look and see if the others were behind him or not. They followed along in his wake, trying to keep up with him. Zack, Melissa and Amanda had to two strides for every one of Scott’s. Milo brought up the rear. He had to duck several times to avoid hitting his head on protruding pipes. They went straight for awhile, exactly how long they walked for Milo didn’t know, but eventually Scott came to a metal grate in the floor. He stopped walking and got down on his knees. “Mildred says it’s through this duct.” Scott set Mildred down on the tunnel floor. He thrust a gloved hand into a pocket inside his tattered coat. His hand closed over something. He paused briefly and said, “Gerald, this is no time be shy.” Scott pulled his hand out of the inside of his coat. A rusty screw driver was clutched in his fist. He inserted Gerald’s tip into the heads of the four screws holding the grate in position. With a few deft turns, Scott removed the four rusty screws and pocketed them. He put Gerald away and stuck his fingers in between the slats of the grate. With a grunt of effort, he lifted it up. It squealed loudly in protest. Evidently, it hadn’t been moved in a long time. He cast it aside and it fell to the floor with a metallic clang that reverberated loudly off of the tunnel walls.

They all clustered around the opening and stared into it. “So, where does this go?” asked Milo. The square hole seemed to fall away into pitch black emptiness. The light from Milo’s headlamp seemed to be swallowed by the darkness.

“Mildred says that this goes to cable vault three-four-seven,” replied Scott. “It’s the main distribution bus for downtown Danville.”

“And Mildred knows that exactly how?” asked Zack.

“Because Mildred’s been here before,” replied Scott.

“Wait,” interjected Melissa, raising Zack’s hands, “how has Mildred been here before?”

Scott waved a gloved hand in reply. “Oh sometimes she needs some alone time and this is where she likes to go.”

Out of the corner of his eye, Milo thought he noticed Zack and Melissa exchanging a look. Their eyebrows were both raised in incredulity.

“er…..right,” said Zack slowly.

Milo turned his attention back to the hole in front of them. The hole was narrow, only just wider than Milo’s shoulders. A decrepit looking ladder was sunk into one side of the shaft. “So,” said Milo to the group at large, “who’s going first?”

Beside him, Amanda took a deep breath. “I am,” she said. She down on the edge of the shaft, her legs dangling over empty space. She swung herself on to the ladder and began climbing downward. After a second or two she disappeared from view. The only sounds they could hear were the soles of her shoes on the rungs of the ladder.

“See you at the bottom,” said Scott, and he followed Amanda into the hole.

“So, I guess its my turn,” said Melissa, and she followed in Scott’s wake.

Milo glanced at Zack and Heinz. “So who wants to go next?”

Zack nodded at Heinz. “He can,” he said. Melissa’s face suddenly wore a tense look, and Milo suddenly put two and two together. He nodded at himself. “You go,” he said to Heinz. “We’ll be right behind you.”

Heinz opened his mouth and started to say, “I don’t know, this looks-,” but stopped when he saw the stricken look on Melissa’s face. He glanced one from Milo to Zack and back again. When the sound of Heinz clambering awkwardly down the manhole had faded away, Milo turn to Zack. He open Heinz’ mouth and started to say, “are you OK?”

Before Milo could finish speaking Zack interjected. “I’m fine,” he said, a little too quickly.

Heinz’ eyebrows beetled together as Milo eyed him. “Are you sure?” Milo asked. ‘It’s OK to not be fine.”

Zack opened Melissa’s mouth and started to protest. “No,” he said, “it’s my claustrophobia, and being in Melissa’s body, which feels really weird by the way.”

Milo chuckled. “Yeah, tell me about it. I’m at least a foot too tall, and then there’s Dr. D’s slouch.” He paused for a moment. “Look, it’s going to be OK, Zack.” Milo put a hand on Zack’s shoulder. “You got everyone through San Fransokyo. You can get through this. Just focus on the goal and don’t think about anything else.”

Zack nodded in reply. “Yeah,” he said. He sounded as if he speaking more to make himself better that anything else. “Yeah,” he said again. “I can do this. I can do this.”

“That’s the spirit,” Milo replied.

“I’m here with Milo and Melissa,” Zack continued, “and we’ve been through way weirder stuff than this.”

“Yeah, we have,” replied Milo. “Now come on, let’s go save Perry the Platypus.”

“Right,” said Zack.

Milo turned toward the opening and lowered himself into it. Zack followed him. When they got to the bottom they found the others waiting for them. “Took you long enough,” said Melissa.

Milo replied with a shrug of Heinz’ stooped shoulders. “Sorry about that,” he said.

“Yeah,” interjected Zack, “we were having what you might call an out of body moment.”

“So now what?” Amanda asked. She glanced at Scott. “Where do we go next?”

Scott turned at these words. “Come on,” he said, “Mildred says its just down here.” He started walking and the others followed him in single file. Milo brought up the rear. He hung back slightly. The tunnel was even more narrow that they last one and his long legs made hard to walk without accidentally kicking Amanda in the back of the shins. A row of incandescent light bulbs ran down the middle of thee tunnel’s curved roof. Milo had to hunch Heinz’ hunched shoulders even more than they already were in order to avoid hitting his head. The air was humid and smelled very musty.

After a while, Milo wasn’t sure exactly how long, they exited the tunnel. Milo sensed more that saw the space they were in. The only light, aside from the light spilling in front the tunnel came from their headlamps. Heavy machinery cast long shadows, which leapt wildly as they turned they turned their heads.

Milo heard Zack exhale loudly, as he forced Melissa’s body to relax. “OK, Scott,” he asked. Melissa’s eyebrows knitted together as he peered around him into the gloom. “Where are we?”

Scott shrugged in reply. “This is where Mildred comes when she wants to be alone,” he said.

Amanda turned and looked at Milo. “Does any of this look familiar to you?”

Milo started to shake his head in reply and then stopped. The jumping shadows made him feel slightly dizzy. “Nope,” he said promptly. “I’ve never been down here before.”

They all looked at each other. “OK,” asked Zack after awhile, “so then how do we connect the inator to the electrical grid to charge the battery?”

While the others had been talking amongst themselves, Heinz had been examining the hulking shapes that loomed in the semidarkness all around them. “Of course,” said Heinz, interjecting into the others’ conversation. There was a note of excitement in his voice. “I recognize all of this.”

Milo, Zack, Melissa and Amanda all stared at each other for a moment. “Come again?” asked Milo.

“I know where we are,” Heinz continued excitedly. He was apparently heedless of their confusion.

“How can you know where we are?” asked Melissa. She put Zack’s hands on his hips. “It’s pitch black and we can barely see anything.”

“Yeah, but come over here and look at this,” said Heinz. He gestured with Milo’s unbroken hand and the others turned and looked at where Heinz was pointing. The light from Heinz’ headlamp illuminated a tarnish brass builder’s plate.

Melissa bent in very close. Zack’s eyebrows knitted together as Melissa attempted to read it. “Sticklegruber and Sons. Ten thousand amps. 1924. Made in Drusselstein.” Zack’s face momentarily pulled into a confused frown, as Melissa started to say, “I don’t understand,” but the words died almost as soon as she spoke them. A look of dawning comprehension cross Zack’s face as Melissa said. “Of course, it’s a generator.”

Heinz nodded in reply. “My Uncle Boris was an electrician,” he said. “He worked for Herr Sticklegruber himself. Electrical generators were Drusslestein’s only export, well in addition to fermented cabbage and lawn gnomes.”

“And your point is?” asked Melissa archly.

Heinz opened Milo’s mouth to reply sarcastically, but Zack beat him to it. “We can use these generators to charge the inator.”

Milo thought about this for a moment or two. “OK,” he asked, “how do we do that?”

“Have you got jumper cables?” asked Amanda.

Milo thought again, mentally sorting through the contents of his backpack. “I think so,” he replied. “Why?” he asked, “what are you thinking?”

“Well, I don’t know,” said Amanda, “could we not use this generator to charge the inator?”

“Yeah,” replied Heinz, waving Milo’s unbroken arm excitedly, “we could totally do that.” Milo’s face pulled into slight frown, as if Heinz had just had sudden realization. “The only problem is that one generator isn’t enough, we’d need a lot of them.”

The others all traded a look. “Well, how many is a lot?” asked Zack.

“Well,” replied Heinz thoughfully, “we’d need enough juice to light up all of Drusslestein on Walpurgistag.”

“Yeah, we have no idea what that means,” replied Zack.

“It means we need a lot of energy,” said Heinz. He glanced around at the hulking shapes, trying to count them. “How many are there, anyway?” he asked.

“Mildred say there are eighteen,” replied Scott. “She also says the light switch is over there by the door.”

“Why didn’t you just say that?” Exclaimed Heinz waving Milo’s unbroken arm.

Scott shrugged in reply. “This was more entertaining,” he said. The others stared at him and he shrugged. “Well sorry,” he said slightly sarcastically, “it was very entertaining and sometimes we get bored.”

“OK,” said Milo. “Everybody stay here. I’ll be right back.”

As Milo turned to go, Amanda said, “Milo are you sure this is a good idea?” She gestured to all the generators around them. “I mean, you and well, you know-,” she trailed off, leaving her sentence unfinished, but Milo her point at once.

“Ordinarily, yeah,” he replied. “I’ve been shocked a few times, just changing a lightbulb.” He gestured at Heinz. “It’s. Dr. D you should be worried about.”

Heinz turned his head at the mention of his name. “Me?” he asked. “What for?”

“Well, you’re in my body,” Milo replied, “and being as I’m me, and we’re surrounded by all this electrical equipment, it occurs to me that it might be a good idea if you didn’t stand so close to that thing.”

Heinz appeared to think about this for a moment or two. “That’s a good point,” he replied. He cast a suddenly wart glance at the nearest generator and took several careful steps backward.

“Stay here,” said Milo. “I’ll be right back.” He turned and threaded his way back through the maze of jumbled machinery. The shadows leapt wildly as he moved. After a few minutes, Milo reached the entrance where they had come into the room. He glanced around at his surroundings, searching the light switch that Scott said should be there. After a second or two of searching, Milo found a large junction box. A thick electric cable emerged from the top of it and run up the wall, getting lost somewhere in the darkness. An ancient looking guillotine switch was bolted to the front of the panel. Out of force of habit, Milo thrust Heinz’ hand into his backpack, looking for his electrical gloves, before remembering that he had lost most of the contents of his backpack while dangling in midair over Danville Arena. Milo felt Heinz’ face pulled into a slight frown as he considered this. He eyed the large guillotine switch again. Two thoughts, chased each other back and forth in his mind. On the one hand, he wasn’t in his own body, he had to actively work at pushing away the weirdness of that thought, which meant that he probably wasn’t at risk of being electrocuted by the antique equipment, but the equipment was, well, antique, which meant that even with Murphy’s Law, there was no way to be certain that it would work properly, or at all. Milo though about this for awhile, but eventually gave up. He didn’t see a solution except to throw the switch.

He took a deep breath, held it for ten seconds and then released it. Milo wrapped Heinz’ long thin, fingers around the switch’s handle. The bakelite grip felt rough and cracked against Milo’s palm. He flexed Heinz’s fingers a little, tightening their grip. Milo paused for a moment and gave a hard tug on the end of handle. It moved perhaps a fraction of an inch and stopped. He instinctively started to search his backpack for his can of WD-40, but remembered almost immediately that it was somewhere on the floor of Danville Arena. I guess I’m going to have to do this the hard way, he thought. He tightened his grip once more and pulled on the switch’s handle a second time. The rusted metal squealed loudly in protest. Milo pushed the switch all the way down into the ON position. It made contact with the electrical leads and for a brief moment the space was bathed in a dull orange glow. Then the moment passed and Milo was suddenly bathed in a shower of sparks. He ducked instinctively throwing Heinz’ long hands up over his head in an effort to protect himself from the shower of hot embers.

At the same moment, he heard himself cry out wordlessly in the distance from where he knew the others had been standing. Well, that doesn’t sound good, he thought. Milo turned, shadows leaping wildly in the beam of his headlamp, and threaded his way back through the hulking generators. As he got closer, the smell of burnt ooze filled his nostrils. Milo rounded a corner and saw himself stretched out on the ground. That’s definitely not good, he thought.

Zack, Melissa and Amanda were all hunched over Heinz, who was apparently out cold. Zack was slapping him gently on the cheeks and muttering, “come on Doof, wake up.” At the sound of Milo’s footsteps, he stopped, stood up and turned to face Milo.

Milo and Zack looked at each other for a moment and said, “so, what happened?” at the same time.

“I’m not really sure,” replied Milo. He nodded back over Heinz’ shoulder at the now fried switch on the wall by where they had come in. “I threw the switch, and-,” he finished his sentence with a shrug.

“Well, I guess that explains the orange glow,” replied Zack. He was interrupted by the sound of a low groan coming from the floor. Zack turned and knelt down next to Heinz. He tried to sit. Milo knelt down next to Zack, Melissa and Amanda.

Amanda started say, “I don’t think that’s a good idea,” but she was interrupted by Heinz wincing and saying, “who would have thought that being hit by ten thousand amps of electricity would hurt so much?” Milo’s clothes were scorched in places. A ragged electrical burn ran down his left arm from his elbow to his wrist. That’s going to leave a scar, he thought.

Milo thrust a long arm over his shoulder and into his backpack. Heinz’ hand closed over his first aid kit. Milo pulled it out and set it on the ground in front of him. He opened it and pulled out a roll of bandages and a tube of burn gel. Milo squeezed some out onto his palm and rubbed onto Heinz’ burn. The red and blistered on Milo’s forearm glistened slightly under the light of from Milo’s headlamp. He screw the cap back onto the top of the tube of burn gel and picked up the roll of bandages. Milo took one end and quickly wrapped around Heinz’ burn. “That feel should better,” he said, “How does that feel?”

“That feels great,” replied Heinz. “I can barely feel it.”

“Good,” replied Milo. He stood up, and the other joined him.

“So what now?” asked Zack.

Milo frowned thoughtfully at the question. He opened his mouth to answer, but Amanda spoke first.

“Well we still need to find a way to charge the inator,” said Amanda. “Is there way to do that without anyone else getting electrocuted?”

“That’s a good question,” said Melissa.

“But we still need to turn everything on,” said Zack. “How do we do that?”

Milo’s thoughtful frown deepened a little at this question. The shadows jumped again again as he looked around the room. There was ladder that ran up to a catwalk overhead. There were more junction boxes and circuit breakers along the walls. Tangled cables snaked out of them and away into the darkness. He thought he could see another level with yet more junction boxes and cables above that. Exactly what they did, or even what they were connected to, Milo couldn’t even begin to guess. He wracked his brain for several minutes trying to think of a better idea. Eventually he gave up. “Everybody spread out,” he said. “I think we’re going to have try throwing those switches up there and hope one of them works.”

Heinz eyed him beadily. Milo had had no idea that his face make that expression. It was unnerving and Milo suddenly found that he never wanted to see himself do that again. “That’s your plan?” he asked, “just throw switches and hope for the best?”

Melissa crossed Zack’s arms across his chest. “I don’t hear you coming up with a better idea,” she said.

Milo’s face screwed up again, as Heinz tried to think of a retort. After a couple of minutes, of wracking Milo’s brain, Heinz gave up.”OK,” he said, “I got nothing. I guess random switching throwing it is.”

“Everybody spread out,” said Milo. “There’s a lot of switches to test.”

They all scattered at these words. It took them the better an hour to find the right combination of switches and circuits breakers before they were able to restore power to the cable vault. The room was bathed in a dull orange glow. Milo reached up and clicked off his head lamp, now that he could see. The others did the same. They all looked around. In the palled orange light, the aged generators looked even more ancient. The cable vault was filled with a faint electrical hum.

“OK,” as Amanda to nobody in particular, “so now what?”

Everyone looked as Heinz at these words. “How do we charge the inator?” asked Milo.

Heinz shrugged. “That’s actually pretty easy,” he replied. “All we need to do is channel the current into the inator.”

Zack opened Melissa’s mouth to say, “OK, so how do we do that?”

Heinz continued as Zack hadn’t spoken. “Connecting the inator to the generators is the east part,” he said. “All we need is jumper cables.”

“Well, that shouldn’t be a problem,” said Melissa, “Milo always has a pair of jumper cables.”

“Except I don’t,” Milo replied. “Most of the stuff in my backpack is all over the floor of Danville Arena.”

“Besides,” interjected Heinz, “one set of jumper cables isn’t going to be enough. We need the power from all of these generators, and we need to phase the power very carefully, otherwise the inator will short out.”

“OK,” asked Amanda, “how do we do that.”

“We need to build an inator,” replied Heinz. “We can use it to channel the energy from all the generators into the inator at the right frequency.”

Melissa pinched the bridge of Zack’s nose in exasperation. “OK, hold on,” she said. “You want to build another inator after-,” she waved Zack’s hands in a wide circle to include herself, Heinz, Zack and Milo, “-this.”

Heinz responded in a slightly aggrieved tone. “Have you got a better idea?” There were several seconds of silence. “I didn’t think so,” he said.

 

I'm enjoying Scott quite a lot, and Gerald and Mildred have distinct personalities, too.