The Time Warden's Son

Chapter 1

I stepped cautiously through the lab crowded with expensive instruments and scientists just arriving for work.

"Coming through!" one of the wizened geniuses yelled as he rushed past with a beaker full of bubbling liquid. I jumped to the side to avoid a collision, only to bump into the last person I wanted to deal with.

"Watch where you're going, boy!"

I bit back a retort and instead replied, "Forgive me, Mr. Lagabey. I didn't see you there."

Lagabey's salt and pepper hair was oily and slicked back, as usual; his pasty face was flushed red, "That was made quite clear when you barreled into me," he growled and stormed into his lab. A shiver ran through the wall when he slammed the door.

"Wonder what's bothering him?" I grumbled to myself, but I knew the answer. Everything. Everything bothered him.

"Good morning, David," said a cheerful voice.

I couldn't help but smile as I turned to face Miriam, who stood, hunched over with the weight of the pile of books cradled in her arms. Her pretty black hair fell in thick wisps around her face, despite the hastily made ponytail.

"Here, let me help you with those," I offered.

"Thanks," Miriam shifted the books so I could grab some without sending the rest tumbling to the floor, "Lagabey sure seems to be in a bad mood."

"Yeah," I sighed, "he's always in a bad mood. I am beginning

to think that he likes to make people hate him. Where would you like me to put these?"

"Oh, just over there," Miriam nodded to her desk that sat under a grouping of whiteboards that covered the entire back wall.

I cast a glance at the door to Lagabey's lab before walking across the room, "That man makes me uneasy. He keeps himself holed up in that personal lab of his, and he never says more than two words to anyone, and only when he has to."

"I know, he is strange," Miriam said quietly, but she perked up as she continued, "Thanks for helping me with the books."

"No problem," the books made a satisfying thump as I set them on her solid wood desk, "Would you like help with anything else?"

"No, thanks. That was the last of it."

I made my way back to the front of the large room and sat down at my workstation. Beakers and vials full of bubbling liquids and gasses covered the majority of my workspace. Only just enough space remained for me to write.

I glanced across the room at Miriam. She finished arranging her books on her tidy desk, then shoved the whole thing over to the only board with a blank space. When I say blank space, I mean only one-third of a ginormous board in a set of five other boards, which were completely covered in a single problem written in cramped writing.

She dragged her chair to the base of the board, grabbed her marker, and hopped up on the chair, which was her only means of reaching the top. I had to grin. I liked to tease her about her height, or should I say 'lack thereof'.

I turned my attention back to my work. Reaching into one of the storage shelves under the countertop, I pulled out a jar of transparent liquid. After adding a few drops to the first beaker in the long unit, I watched as the heat from the Bunsen burner turned it into a gas and caused it to float through the connecting tubes and into the other vials. Once the gas contacted the liquid in the final beaker, the concoction began to hiss and pop. I dove under the table just in time to avoid a mini-explosion that sent glass and liquid flying. I snatched a pencil and began to record what happened.