Laboratory Chapter 14

Read Table of Content | +Kyla Scurchio
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"Caution! Do not imbue a radioactive blue cheese potion unless prepared for the consequences. Once imbued, may the King be with you. The undead wait."
I read allowed the piece of scrap paper to Zugzwang. We had only just managed to enter through the locked door when I found it. Scorch marks seared the edges like it had tried to be destroyed, but I could still make it out.
"Calls for one Radioactive Blue cheese potion." I told him looking at the page.
"Well, for now let’s heed its advice aye." Zugzwang said flipping over a damaged book.
"It looks to me like they were trying to clean house." I said rolling a test tube across the floor.
"Yeah, probably. At least they were, until something else wanted to clean house too." Zugzwang said
as he pointed to the claw marks on the wall.
I pocketed the note for radioactive blue cheese and continued scavenging for anything else in the main lobby. There were halls to our right and left and a stair case that took a person straight to the upper levels of the laboratory.
"Your move mate, left or right?" I asked Zugzwang looking down the separate halls
"I'll take left." and with a swish of his traveling cloak he was swooping down the hall with ease.
I stumbled and crunched my way down the right passage. I found two doors bolted and locked so I continued to the remaining room. I felt my heart quicken when I saw the door had been smashed and thrown off its hinges.
I entered the room cautiously. It appeared to be empty. There were a few smashed test tubes here and there, but the room was bare apart from a table and a few flickering electric blue lights. I gazed at the glass tubes containing the light. I only had seen such a thing in a lightning storm, it was strange to see that power harnessed and contained. I quickly noticed the metal table wasn’t bare; Bolted to the table were thick leather straps meant for containment. Clearly whatever was being contained had thrashed loose and ripped its way through the door.
"Z!" I yelled suddenly as I sprinted out of the room. I crashed through the debris of the passage and the main lobby, only slowing when I reached his hall.
Like my hall, the first two doors were bolted shut. The remaining door stood ajar at the end of the hall. Though there was a massive dent in the center of the iron door it was at least still attached to the frame.
I gasped when I entered the room. So many things hit me at once. First I noticed the smell. An awful smell much like rot or death assaulted my nose. I tracked it to the biggest pile of cheese I had ever seen. Much like normal cheese but it had a dangerous green glow about it. The next thing I had noticed was Zugzwang's motionless body lying on the floor.
In seconds I had taken in the room. Zugzwang unconscious body and the horrid pile of cheese, but that wasn’t what made the biggest impression. When I cleared the door way I felt a searing pain to the side of my head.
I hit the ground hard as my vision glazed over. I felt blood running down my face. I turned to see a huge mouse like nothing I had seen before coming at me. He held up a steel fist ready to strike his second blow to my skull. I ducked and rolled to my side avoiding the crunching of his paw. A growl erupted from his tattered torso. It grunted and snarled as I stared it down. It was like all the mice in one; steel mice, gold mice, brown, white, and grey mice, it even had the tail of the bionic.
My head gave a very painful throb and I couldn’t think any longer. This was what the scientists had created, this was the Monster that got loose and destroyed their experiments. Another howl ripped from the mouth of the Monster mouse.
It stayed its distance for several minutes before I realized what it was actually doing. We had stumbled upon its nest. In the corner was its horded food source.  And it thought Z and I were threats. An inch at a time I slid over to Zugzwang. The Monster paced raising its lip to growl if it thought I was moving too much.
Zugzwang was alive but knocked out. When I reached Z I felt a clatter as something slid from my pockets. A small Living shard fell onto the floor, glowing dimly in the laboratory light. Instantly the mood of the Monster changed. Its anger seemed to fade and a mad hunger came over its eyes. Never blinking it stared at my living shard. Knowing how precious the little stone was and how angry the Digby citizens would be, I hesitantly threw the stone from the room and down the hall. At once the Monster took off after it, his tail whipping through the air as it left the room.
"Mad," I whispered to myself "it's all mad."
"Who's mad? Am I mad, or are you mad? Because personally I feel like I could now be the crazy one." Zugzwang propped himself up with a wince and touched the lump on his head.
"Glad you could join the party, but the man, or should I say mouse, of honor has just left." I smiled at him, he was as blood stained and battered as I felt.
Reluctantly, we shoved a hefty amount of the cheese into our packs, knowing to never let anything go to waste, before exiting the room. We didn’t want to be there when our little friend decided to returned.