This is a Test

Ch. 5 - Part III - The Second Test

Cashe returned to the table, pretending to inspect further, all while being watched by the three from their respective work areas. After a bit, he moved his hands about as if performing calculations and pointed a finger upwards in an a-ha moment before retreating to the tunnel where the robots awaited commands. Cashe went to the forklift that pulled ice from of the tunnel. The machinery was identical to the ones that they used to bring the crates into the facility. He inputted commands that guided the machine out of the tunnel.

The forklift rolled into the Garden with a clatter. This was not unusual, as they would often traverse supervised with ice in large bins. One empty was unusual, especially with Cashe behind it leading it off its normal route towards the fish tank. Heavy machinery brought the others running.

"What are you doing now?" Karina snapped.

"I'm going to lift the table up and put the leg on underneath. That way, the fish can continue to rot away in peace."

"Don't think that by raising it, that you'll end up shaking them?" Dante squawked.

"Not if I do it slowly." Cashe taped on his tablet and tried a command. It raised the forks of the lift slowly, but far too fast for anyone's pleasure, his included.

"That's too quick," Karina snapped. "The water'll splash all over the place."

"I will be careful," Cashe said, guiding the forklift under the table. With their next bit of complaints, he would suggest that Lia could lower the speeds. That way, the table would float up and they would have no legitimate cause for complaint.

Dante's hand rubbed his chin as if this would help his thinking process. "Wait. What if Lia can reprogram the jack to move slower?"

Cashe felt a momentary elation that someone else had suggested this first, as failure could now be blamed on Dante, but his hidden joy died a swift death as he noted the looks of approval from the women.

Karina nodded. "I got to admit, Dante, that's really smart."

"Genius," Miranda agreed. "Real out-of-the-box thinking."

Of course, it was genius; Cashe had thought of it first. He was the genius first. He was the one who had already been really out of the box, thinking first. While Dante went off to fetch Lia, Miranda raved about how this was the type of problem-solving that Anoptica would expect from them. Cashe nodded, but raged inside. The company had better not award an extra bonus to Dante for Cashe's idea. Cashe had practically led the chemist to that solution.

Dante returned with Lia, showing her the forklift. "What we need is to lift the table slow. SLOOOOW," he drawled out sloooow. "So the fish aren't shaken." He shook his body. "Can you reprogram it to lift the table slowly? Real slow?"

Dante looked at her. Cashe was sure by Dante's face that he didn't think Lia understood him. Cashe was sure by Lia's face that she understood Dante the first time, but remained implacable and nodded for civility's sake. She typed in her tablet, the forklift made some clicking sounds, and she did whatever it was that she did.

Meanwhile, Miranda seemed content to bother Lia by repeating how Dante's idea was so genius. Cashe could not see how Dante's thought thievery made the chemist the genius. Would they be raving so much if Cashe had expressed it himself? He doubted it. They had to have already figured out that he was smarter than most of them, with Lia perhaps being the exception. They wouldn't want to say the words out loud to reinforce it to themselves. The marveling at Dante's brilliant idea was most likely due to no one expecting creative intelligence from him.

In the five minutes it took to re-code the machine, Roger came in with some vials of sand. He had been tasked with finding premium soil for the worms to use, as their little gizzards needed grit to process the waste, and after playing outside, he proclaimed that it was finest dirt he could find. Cashe was sure he only grabbed what was right outside their doors.

Once ready, Lia aligned the jack with the center of the table and lifted the fork so they were an inch below the bottom. She crept it higher until it just touched, then tapped some more on her tablet. The prongs of the jack lifted so slowly that none could not perceive the movement, but a time came where they touched the table. He heard Miranda catch her breath as it crept up.

Under Lia's skilled management, the water level never shuddered while the fish remained unperturbed and undisturbed. Some seemed more alert than before, while others continued their lethargic motions. A half-hour passed before Cashe was able to crawl underneath and wedge the leg with the liquid adhesive on top in place. As he did so, his hand rested on the table bottom and he thought he could feel minute cracks in the surface, but he understood that was an illusion brought on by his staunch belief that only the incompetence of others would be his downfall.

He crawled back out and Lia used the same imperceptible motion to lower the table once more. Lia was applauded, which seemed appropriate, and some clapping was directed at Dante as well, which seemed wrong. With the new leg in place, Lia maneuvered the jack back out and Cashe took over to return it to the tunnel.

He came back just as the box of bees was opened, causing Roger to run off screaming and waving his hands around himself. He probably wouldn't be visiting the Garden anymore, making the area more desirable to Cashe. Some of the bees landed on the black plastic piece Lia had placed on one of the hydroponics tanks, apparently allowing them a safe place to land and drink water. Cashe smiled. He had performed his job responsibilities satisfactorily while insulating himself against blame for any failure. Now he could focus on the worm house. Everything was great.

Seventy minutes later, three of the fish were dead.

The carcasses were quickly relocated to the lab to see if Miranda could salvage eggs from one. The loss of the two males was not seen as distressing as the death of the female, as she had been pregnant and could have produced bountiful offspring. Yet despite the fact that raising the table had been too incremental to be noticeable to man or fish, still, he received the bulk of the glares and animosity.

"I hope you're happy," Karina snapped.

"I don't see how this is my fault. You heard the doctor. The fish were sick already, and they hardly moved in the first place. But, really, if you're so pressed to look for someone to blame..." Cashe paused to shrug. "Well, I wasn't the one to use the forklift."

1134 words

AUTHOR'S NOTE: I wish to apologize to my readers for the lengthy delay and the quality of the work in these three mini-chapters. It was necessary drudgery to write and I feel that it is reflected in the dead prose. I find this the weakest thing I have posted on Wattpad to date. This is not a cry for sympathy, merely a statement of what I believe to be facts. I assure all the rest shall flow from this point on and that I should be able to maintain a more rigorous publishing schedule from now on. My thanks to all.