It Begins With A
Junior Agent Astrid Farnsworthy liked to think she was a generally tolerant and forgiving person. But Dr. Walter Bishop was a definite strain on her forgiving nature.
Nonetheless, he'd apologized for drugging her. In his own way, which was all that could be gotten out of a genius who had been in a mental hospital for seventeen years. And she had to clear the air between them if the team Agent Dunham had put together was to work with any degree of effectiveness. So she walked into the lab with her fighting face on and prepared to read Walter Bishop the riot act.
Which turned out to be very hard to do.
He was milking Jean when she came up behind him. He didn't jump when he saw her-never surprised was Dr. Bishop-but his eyes got very wide.
"Oh! You came back."
He stood and put the milk pail in a cooler of ice.
"Listen, you and I need to talk," she told him.
"Oh dear." he promptly sat on a stool, hands folded.
"Now, first off, you ever drug me again, and I won't just drug you back, I will take apart this lab, including that tank you love, and grind everything into little pieces as soon as I wake up."
"That seems rather extreme-"
"Do not interrupt me, I'm not done. Now, number two on my list of things that you do that irritate me-my name is ASTRID. Like the Latin for 'star'. ASTRID. If I have to work with you, you need to remember my name. You remember Peter's name and Agent Dunham's name and even Jean's name but not mine. Astrid. A-S-T-R-I-D," she spelled it out.
"I'm sorry, Astrid," he wrung his hands. "It's so unusual, I can't always remember it. My head's so full. I know your face. I know you like coffee with milk but no sugar. I know that you can get everything I need when I need it. I know to never ask you to muck out Jean's stall or you will do serious injury to my person, and that you will make sure her stall is mucked out by someone. But I'm terrible with names of any sort."
She had her hands on her hips. Taking a deep breath, she spoke.
"Walter, you take your coffee black with no milk but three sugars. You pasteurize Jean's milk so you can drink it. You love popcorn and SpongeBob SquarePants and your favorite Chinese takeout is lo mein."
He smiled at her, that she knew all these things about him.
"So, we'll do baby steps. You won't drug me, and remember that my name begins with 'A'. I won't yell at you for having a head full of-well, whatever your head is so full of most of the time."
"And maybe make popcorn again?"
He said it with a wistful expression.
"I will totally make popcorn again. And show you how to use a cell phone," she added under her breath, turning to find her lab coat.
. . . . . .. . . . . .
A few days later, putting up files, Walter asked her to put that box someplace 'dear'.
"What's my name?" she asked.
Walter bit his lip. Thought about it harder then any problem Peter or Olivia had brought to the lab.
Then his face brightened and his eyes cleared.
"It begins with 'A'," he announced.
She smiled at him and made a mental note to bring that ice cream maker to the lab. After all, he could make root beer, why couldn't she make ice cream from Jean's milk that he kept scattered all round every cold storage place in the lab?
Author's Note: This is my first Fringe piece, for the episode 'Power Hungry'. I'm just now getting the series off Netflix, so I haven't got beyond that episode. Review?