"Well that may be so, but I don't think it's correct to say someone is stupider than Mandark. I believe he's about as ignorant as a person can get." Dexter said, "I don't know Susan well but I can't say she's stupid." Alse shrugged, "I didn't think she was all that deep." Dexter handed Alse her Utonium nano, "I'd hate to hear what you think of me," Dexter smirked. "I think we're done for today. I'll call Susan myself. I'll also have to call Green and update him on what's going on with his nano; and I'll also most likely put out some sort of message or warning about it."
"Well I can help you with some of that." Alse said. "It's alright, you did enough for me today; you can leave now. Computress can take care of some of the brunt work. She should be almost done recharging by now anyway. Thank you for your help again Alse." Alse sighed, "Ok fine, if you insist I guess I'll go. See you tomorrow!" She said, leaving his lab and walking to her apartment nearby.
Meanwhile Susan was shopping in the Pokey Oaks mall with her uncle and he was giving her trouble. She insisted that she pay for her own clothing but he would hold her back from the register and paid for the things himself. They had spent all day shopping and out of politeness Susan chose the cheapest clothing; the bulk of which was in black and red. "Uncle Lou I appreciate you doing this for me but I don't want to feel like I'm a burden or I'm taking advantage of you." Susan said. "Oh you are no burden Suzie! I want to help you. You aren't taking advantage of me I promise." Lou said cheerfully. "That is so nice of you," Susan's Dee Dee nano chirped, floating next to Susan's head. Her Mandark nano was on her shoulder while Dexter sat on Lou's shoulder. Lou was holding several large paper shopping bags while Susan had only three. Lou refused to let her carry more than that. "Thank you little Dee Dee," Lou said to the tiny pink ballerina. Susan's phone rang while they were walking back to Lou's house. She picked up the phone, "Hello?"
"Greetings this is Dexter." Dexter said from the other end.
"How can I help you?" Susan asked, puzzled.
"You are friends with Mandark, correct?"
"Not really, I'm good friends with his cousin."
"You do have access to his lab though, yes?"
"Yes."
"Can you please do me a favor and check on the efficiency of his Fusion Matter refining equipment? Some of the nanos that are being created are failing and it's due to the refining process however my machines are running at 100% as usual. Alse tried calling Mandark a moment ago but he was hostile as usual and didn't listen to her."
"Sure," Susan said, "I'll talk to Sugar later and see what we can do. I'll let you know what's going on then. Bye." Susan hung up before Dexter could respond. Susan explained to Lou what happened. "So you work for Mandark now?" Lou asked Susan. "Yes and no, I'm really good friends with his cousin but sometimes I am Mandark's assistant in the lab. I don't get paid though but I do notice I get some extra FM when I do missions for him. I'm betting that's Sugar's doing though." Susan smiled. "I hope he's good to you." Lou said sternly. "Which one?" Susan asked. "Uh, well, b-both of them." Lou stammered. "Sugar's good, Mandark is sometimes a pain, but he's like that with everyone. So I think I can say they're good to me." Susan nodded. "That's good because if it were any other way I'd flush them to kingdom come!" Lou said triumphantly.
Susan giggled, "Thanks Uncle Lou." Lou smiled, "No problem!"
Lou took Susan home and took out her new clothing on the kitchen table. He started to cut the tags off of everything and got ready to wash the new clothes. Susan took her new sneakers up to her bedroom and threw away her old ones which were pretty ratty and worn. Lou put all the clothing into one of the shopping bags and brought it down to the basement where he kept the washer and dryer and put the clothes in and washed them. He went back upstairs and started preparing a simple dinner of macaroni and cheese made from scratch. He was overjoyed to have treated Susan to new clothing and to make her dinner. Susan did not feel the same; she felt like she was a burden and she still had trouble adjusting to being around him.
Once dinner was finished cooking Lou called for Susan and her nanos. He set up a bowl for himself and Susan and one for her nanos to share from with three little forks next to it. He also set up three tall glasses filled with cold iced tea; the one for the nanos had three straws in it so they could easily drink from it. When Susan walked into the kitchen she was delighted to see that Lou had set up a place for her nanos at the table. "It smells so good!" the little Dee Dee shouted. "Yeah it does," Dexter nodded in agreement. "Dig in," Lou said sitting down. Susan sat her nanos on the table by their bowl and sat in her chair, "This looks great." She said. "Thank you," Lou smiled from ear to ear, "I'm glad you're here to share this with me." Susan smiled awkwardly and began to eat. She noticed her nanos had some trouble holding their forks but they eventually figured it out by holding the fork with both of their hands and scooping up the food for one of the other nanos. "They aren't used to cutlery?" Lou asked. "No, they're also not used to sitting at a table. I usually used to feed them myself." Susan said.
Lou looked at the nanos feeding each other and wondered if there was anything cuter in the world. "I think they'll get used to it soon. Do they sell special forks and stuff for them?"
"Yes," Susan said, "they sell little clothes for them and glasses, costumes, beds, hats, even little mittens for the winter." Lou chuckled to himself, "I bet the tiny mittens get lost easily."
"Probably," Susan said between forkfuls of the food, "I really only have pajamas for them and I always keep them in my pocket." Susan then realized she no longer had the pajamas for them because the hospital cut up her clothes. That also meant that the nanos have been wearing the same exact clothing for over three days in a row. "Oh no, I don't have pajamas for them anymore." She said.
Lou frowned, "I know we forgot something." He said. Susan shook her head, "It's fine; most people don't buy more than one set of clothing for their nanos so they're ok. It's not like nanos sweat or anything. I will just go and buy them some new things tomorrow." Dee Dee stood up excitedly and shouted, "Ooh can I get a new dress? And ballet shoes?" she bounced on the balls of her feet. Susan and Lou smiled, "of course you can get whatever you want." Susan said. Dee Dee jumped around and did a pirouette of joy. "Dee Dee you're such a beautiful dancer!" the Mandark nano said, Dexter sighed, "Just eat, Mandark." He said.
After dinner, Susan cleared the table and dropped the dishes in the sink. Lou put on some bright pink rubber gloves which he claimed were the last color left on the shelves at the supermarket and washed the dishes in the sink. By the time Lou was finished putting the clean dishes away the new clothes being washed were done. He moved the wet clothes out of the washer and into the dryer. Susan was up in her room thinking about what happened during the day. She then remembered the call she got from Dexter about Mandark's Fusion Matter refinery machines. Susan picked up her cell phone and dialed Sugar's number. Sugar was busy playing solitaire on Mandark's supercomputer when Susan called him. Sugar paused his game and picked up, "Hello!" He said cheerfully.
"Hey it's Sooz," Susan said, "Dexter called me earlier and explained something about some nanos being corrupted because of Mandark's FM refinery machines not working at full capacity or something."
Sugar nodded, "Uh, let me check it. Hold on a moment sweetie!" He said sweetly. Sugar brought up the program that monitored all of Mandark's machinery and he clicked through them until he found the FM refining machines. "Yeah it looks like one of them has a broken pressure valve. According to the computer it's only a tiny little crack but it's still making a huge impact. I'm gonna go and fix that right now." Sugar said in a serious tone, "even a tiny fracture could cause the FM machine to explode and it'd kill everyone in the area."
Susan gasped softly, "I had no idea it was so serious. I'm really glad I called then."
"I heard Alse tried to call earlier but Mandark was in a foul mood as usual. He's messing around trying to create the perfect rose for his perfect beloved Dee Dee."
"Aw, that's so romantic!" Susan said. "I know," Sugar said, "it's so sickeningly sweet isn't it? Well I have to go fix that machine now. I'll call you back later after I call Dexter when it's fixed. Bye Sooz!" Sugar said hanging up. Sugar got out of the chair and walked to the other end of the room and picked up his tools in a black metal toolbox with a red "M" painted on the front. Sugar took the elevator all the way down fifty flights to the very bottom of the lab where the FM refining machines were stored. There were six massive, black silo-shaped things that used immense pressure to refine the Fusion Matter all lined up in a row quietly hissing in the large, hot and humid room. Sugar quickly found the tiny crack no bigger than half an inch on the machine farthest to the left. The crack was in the dead center of the metal. Sugar thought to himself that the pressure inside the FM chamber must be too high if it's causing the extremely thick metal to crack even the slightest. That; or it was Mandark cutting corners again with costs. It wasn't that his company needed every penny in fact Mandark Industries had an immense surplus of cash; it was just Mandark's indelible greed that seemed to be a strong-enough motive to risk a lot of lives on something as important as the quality of an FM chamber. Sugar quickly put on his welding gloves and mask and began to hook up the welder to fix the 'injury' as Mandark would call it.
Sugar wondered what the place would be like if the chambers did explode. It'd kill everyone in the lab and it would melt through most of the building causing it to collapse under its own weight. In fact it might even damage part of Dexter's building across the square. Minus Sugar's probable death in that scenario it sounded like a rather good deal. Sugar has been plotting Mandark's death for a long time. His motive was indeed greed but it was also jealousy. Sugar was jealous of Mandark's success in the science and business fields. Sugar was no genius but he was a very skilled mechanic and learned quickly when it came to hands-on things. No matter how good Sugar got at something Mandark was always better or faster and overshadowed his cousin. Sugar was always told that living a good life was the best revenge but Sugar had a far different opinion: he was going to get sweet revenge by taking away Mandark's life and accomplishments to exploit for himself.
'Money is thicker than blood' Sugar always said to himself. As much as Sugar would have loved to see Mandark drown in a boiling hot pool of ill-refined Fusion Matter it just wasn't the right way to kill him. Sugar wanted the least damage to the building as possible and wanted the death to look like an accident or perhaps a suicide. At first Sugar wanted to re-wire a Mandroid with the orders to specifically kill Mandark in his sleep however rewiring a robot is easily tracked and Sugar would be busted in a heartbeat. Another idea Sugar had was poison but that was just as easily tracked. He was running out of patience and options and grew more and more loathing of Mandark each passing moment. Mandark of course was none-the-wiser about Sugar's murderous plot; too busy fruitlessly trying to impress Dee Dee than to care about anything else.
