In the beginning, Rick didn't think much of her except as another summer intern to help with research. When he saw a manila folder on his desk one morning in June, he internally groaned. There was a small note with Caroline's handwriting attached to it, but he didn't need to read it. He knew that it was the 'Here's an intern I want you to watch over you can take it or leave it but remember your bonus' note. From previous years, he'd seen his colleagues get the same message from that cheekily manipulative woman. He begrudgingly resigned himself that there was no chance that he would be able to get out of this overly air-conditioned office and travel around the world this summer. He sighed, and flipped through the folder labeled "Madeline".
Madeline Collins was petite, and was acutely aware of how easily she could be ignored - unless she was a stellar student. She always sat in the front row of her classes so she could make sure that her teachers acknowledged her existence, and always had the loudest voice when asking questions to the chagrin of the classmates. Her rather vehement curiosity had led her to be shoved into higher level classes, her former teachers finally unable to answer her questions (and quite possibly, to get rid of her). Starting university courses at the age of 16, she didn't mind that she was doing significantly harder classes then other students her age, or that she had to give up a weekend or two with friends in order to complete a paper or a particularly long chemistry assignment. At the age of 21 she was almost done with her master's in chemical engineering, and was hoping this summer internship would boost her out of state job prospects. When she was living in a state like Iowa, nothing interesting was bound to happen there anytime soon and was looking forward to traveling out of state. She had no idea what she gotten herself into with going into a laboratory deep in the Michigan wilderness, but at least it was a start.
Rick was taken aback when he met his intern for the first time. Madeline looked like a kid-shit, she practically was one, with her dirty blonde curls tied into a bushy ponytail at the nape of her neck and wide hazel eyes framed by cherry red glasses. He made an excellent contrast with her, with his dark brown hair slicked back and olive green eyes. With Rick's tall athletic frame towering over hers, he found it a tad humorous when Madeline went to shake his hand. She was babbling on about being excited to help and whatnot, she pretty much seemed like a kid in a candy shop when it came to lab research.
But dear lord her questions, they never stopped.
For Rick, the fifteen minute walk to the research labs was made even more irritating that it already was because of Maddie (she insisted on being called that) spitting out questions faster than he can answer them. Most of them were easy ones that pertained to the facility, but when it came to the ones that involved a lot of explaining involving theoretical science, his patience was wearing thin. Slap on the fact that Caroline started the internships on a Friday to make employees obligated into working a full shift instead of clocking out early for the weekend, he wasn't in the best of moods as they reached the labs.
Nearing the entrance, he hastily swiped his keycard and quickly pulled her through the door and into a laboratory around the same size as a large dining hall. Maddie took note of how Aperture seemed to have a preference for three colors. Rick and the other researchers were easily identified by their crisp white lab coats, and stood out from the sea of blue in various hues, which was composed of medics and clean-up crews. The test subjects were all wearing identical jumpsuits in that odd, cheerful orange.
She had to quickly jump aside to avoid colliding with a swarm of lab boys sprinting from the entrance to the test chambers carting a slightly damaged device while a occupied gurney followed suit. The poor test subject was in some type of delirium, mumbling about how a dog was peeing on his leg. In actuality, he had a compact fracture in his lower leg, and blood was dripping out at a disturbingly quick pace. The nurses were looking at the test subject with disdain, looking at each other as if to say, "These idiots." It was quite an eyeful for her first day.
"That has to suck, don't it?" Said a deep voice behind her.
"What?"
Maddie turned around to see Rick and one of his fellow colleagues, a curiously pale man with a pink tie, shake their heads at the sight. He shot her a look of indifference and shrugged.
"It happens a lot here. Get used to it kid."
Maddie was slightly disturbed by how nonchalant Rick was about seeing gruesome injuries. It was as if he was just looking at...modern art statues.
"How often does this happen?" she asked.
"Once a week, maybe twice. Four times if we're lucky. Usually just broken wrists though." She cringed at the other man's disturbingly calm reply.
"The clumsy ones usually have the more, to put it bluntly, entertaining injuries," Rick added, and he let out a stifled laugh. "And I do love me some explosions. Anyways, feel free to look around for a bit. I gotta talk to Craig here about the molecular stability of this new refracting material..."
Craig scrunched his face in confusion, his eyes narrowing.
"Liar, you never want to talk about-"
Rick oh-so-slightly pushed his new intern to his left, and jerked his head to the right to tell Craig to walk with him, making himself appear thoroughly immersed with his fellow scientist's findings. When they were a safe distance away from the girl, Rick let out an exasperated sigh.
"Christ, it's only been what, an hour in? Craig, she's already a pain in the ass. All of her questioning, jeez...she could be worse than that Brit nurse, who's already a moron in the first place." He rubbed his temples and sighed. "And I have to spend the rest of the day with her?" The brunette groaned. Craig offered no sympathy as rolled his eyes and smirked.
"Correction. Two months and three weeks," he teasingly replied. "If you would like, I could break it down for you further into days, hours-"
"Nope, no thank you. Gimme that report, why don't ya Pinkie..."
Rick hastily ripped the papers from Craig's grip, suddenly finding a new-found appreciation for something as mundane as molecular structures. It would be at least an hour of peace.
Meanwhile, Maddie was mesmerized by the levitating gels in pneumatic glass tubes around the lab. The lights shined on the peculiar substances, giving them a ethereal glow around them. Glancing to see if Rick was still talking to Craig, she scurried closer to one of the tubes, dodging a hurried worker here and there. Finally face to face with one of the odd blobs, she just stood there peering through the glass at the strange substance that glowed like moonlight. Unbeknownst to the girl, her hand had brushed over what seemed to be some little inconspicuous switch.
It's always the little things in life that seem to change everything.
Rick and Craig were just about finished going over where to use the new compound from the report when a lab tech ran towards them, with Maddie trailing behind. She looked frightened to death. The young man handed her over to Rick, clapping him on the shoulder.
"Hey Rick, take care of your intern, will you?" The tech said with a grin. "You might lose your job over her."
Rick was quickly riled up by that last sentence. He stared at his skittish intern with disbelief. He swore he heard a snap a minute or two ago, but if she was involved
"Why is there a clean-up crew there?"
The lab tech nervously laughed, then sucked in his breath.
"Uh, well you see what happened was...the tube was kind of filled to the brim with gel, and it kind of leaked."
"I see broken glass." Craig was poking his head around the tech's shoulders.
The lab tech couldn't hide it anymore. He sighed and shot Maddie a sheepishly apologetic look, throwing his hands up in the air.
"Fine. The tube exploded."
Rick was not amused as he shot an accusatory glare at Maddie. She tried her damn best to swallow that lump of fear forming in her throat.
"What the hell did you do? One freaking hour-"
Maddie's heart sank. Not even done with orientation, and she'd already screwed things up.
"IswearIdidn'tmeantoIwasjustcuri-"
"She also changed the reactivity of C-G 217." The lab tech butted in.
"WHAT?" Rick had been keeping a close eye on that experiment, and the due date for its findings was looming near. There was no way in hell he could restart it and give a decent report.
"Don't worry, it seems that the volume of the gel expanded in the tube, so the gross product increased." He gave an awkward thumbs-up.
"We collected most of it, and we're placing it in a new pressurized chamber. The joy of mixed blessings, huh?"
There was a moment of tense silence between the four of them.
"I'll overlook the rest of the transfer," Craig began, trying to make things less awkward than they already were, "And collect the necessary paperwork for the incident report."
Rick sighed and quickly ushered Maddie to the exit, nodding to Craig and the lab tech.
"I guess that's fine for now, I'll get a look over it after I give a little talk in my office to this young lady."
It was a brisk walk to his office, but the tension between the two from the made Maddie feel absolutely horrible.
"Um, Rick?"
There was no response. He merely swiped his keycard and motioned for Maddie to enter. She found herself slinking into a chair across from Rick at his desk. What she was about to ask was stupid and absolutely insane. She licked her lips and hoped for the best possible outcome.
"Can I stay during your overtime? I mean, I'd like to help correct my mishap."
Rick noticed he holding in her breath. Does she really expect something? He scoffed and shook his head at her.
"Heh. That's pretty bold of you little lady, considering you may have fucked up something I have worked on for who knows how long now."
He raised an eyebrow at Maddie's blank stare. "What?"
"So is that a yes or a no?" She already felt like she knew the answer, but it didn't hurt to confirm.
"Seriously? Whaddya think?" He grabbed the forms in his in-tray and started to read them, waiting for her to respond. He wondered why she was taking a while for an obvious answer.
"Y-well, no. No sir." Maddie held her head down, silently berating herself.
"Correct. Finally, for once today, you've answered your own question. You're dismissed for the day." Without looking at her, he pointed towards the door.
Maddie stood up and was ready to leave, but not without one last appeal.
"But why can't you let me help?"
Now Rick had enough.
"First, you bombard me with your annoying-ass questions, then destroy my work, and now you're trying to fix your mistakes like all it takes is puttin' a band-aid on it? Shit, you'll probably make everythin' worse."
Rick was irate, and his Southern drawl was rearing its head in his spiel. He got out of his chair and beat Maddie to the door with his long strides. Leaning back on it and crossing his arms across his chest in a pose that reeked of smug superiority, he was going to unleash hell on her.
"You damn overeager grad students are all the fucking same. Always thinkin' they're goin' to be the breakthrough guy. You always, always, always bite off more than you can chew. What you did today was just pure dumb luck. Listen up, Iowa Girl. You don't know squat 'bout what we're doin'. Your lil' textbook knowledge can't help you here, a'ight?"
"Anyways," he continued. "Next week, expect to do a shitload more observing an' holding all ya fuckin' questions 'til the end of the day. Now seriously, GET. OUT."
They stood in a standstill for a solid seven seconds, dull green eyes glaring at trembling golden brown. Letting out a disgusted scoff, Rick walked past her, sat at his desk, and picked up the paperwork that he had to fill out for the damage made. He looked up again to see Maddie back in front of his desk, her hands balled up tightly into fists, biting her lower lip, presumably going over what she had to say.
"What, another question?" She shot him a look of utter hatred that bared her teeth.
"You really are an asshole, aren't you?" She ran out, slamming the door behind her.
The silence that should've been a relief now
Rick slumped back into his chair and pinched the bridge of his nose.
"Aw, fuck."
This was going to be one helluva summer.
