That night, Grem and Melvin passed a bottle back and forth in a small lounge Zundapp had set aside for his lieutenants. Though the Janus had often threatened to throw anyone caught using illicit drugs on the rig overboard, he turned a blind eye to ethanol use. Grem expected the Professor to call him to the metal shop at any time to be fitted with the promised missile launcher, and having been through a similar experience when he'd been equipped with his machine gun, he preferred to be heavily intoxicated for the procedure. If the Trunkov mechanic was as stingy with the anesthetic as he'd been last time, Grem planned to arrive at his shop already well-anesthesized.
Acer was noticeably absent, for he was sulking back in the room they shared, jealous that he had been selected to receive a second machine gun instead of a more menacing missile launcher, which was, in his own words, a cooler weapon. Grem thought he would give him some time before he'd get over it, but for all his surliness, Acer did have a point. Missile launchers were a highly coveted accessory among the lieutenants, and the news that he'd been awarded one had caused some dissension among his friends.
"Man, I'm glad I'm not you tonight, Rocket," Melvin cooed with mock sympathy as he poured another shot for the orange hatchback, who frowned at his new nickname. "You're going to be hurting bad, but if you can still function after that then maybe I've got something that will cheer you up." He scuffed a tire on the ground, looking vaguely hesitant. "That new Pacer girl that Trunklis recruited? Zundapp sorta pushed her on me, and I'm not really in the mood tonight, so if you can convince her, it's your lucky day."
Grem lifted the drink to his mouth with a wobbling tire and scowled, for the Professor, well aware of his past troubles, delighted in tormenting him by encouraging new female recruits to pursue him romantically, or at least physically. Evidently he inflicted the same on Melvin.
"Sorry, no can do," he gulped, turning away as if he was settling the issue once and for all. "I'm unofficially considered 'on call' every night and I have to be ready at a moment's notice. Why on Earth aren't you taking the chance? I've seen her; she's into you and it's not like opportunities like this happen often." His words held considerable truth, for the scarce female recruits tended to be either entirely work-oriented with no time for romantic entanglements or solely devoted to the pursuit of Zundapp's officers.
Melvin had expected Grem to jump at the chance to spend the night with the new recruit, whom he had to secretly admit was attractive, at least for a Pacer.
"Look," he admitted, "I wouldn't say this to anyone but my closest friend here on the rig, but..." He paused, mentally scrabbling for the right thing to falsely confide in his friend. Should he tell his fellow AMC he was not interested in girls? Lie about having a girlfriend back on shore? He then remembered the prejudice the Lemons held against each other's models. "Pacer chicks don't do much for me," he said casually. "If that's not the case for you, more power to you."
"You look, because I wouldn't confide this in just anyone, either. I can't take her," Grem admitted, by now wary that the ethanol had loosened his tongue. "I mean I can't. The Allinol screwed me up something bad," he confessed, coughing on the harsh taste of his drink. "You tell anyone that and I'll throw you to Trihull, but it's true. I haven't had much luck in that department lately, but that hasn't stopped the Professor from sending the ladies my way. I swear he gets off on seeing me sweat those situations out." He grit his teeth bitterly. "It would wreck my reputation to send them away unsatisfied, so my usual tactic is to offer them free access to our liquor cabinet and then let Acer take over. It hasn't failed me yet."
Melvin shot him an incredulous look. "They're okay with that?"
Grem shrugged his fenders in response. "Why wouldn't they be? All they're really after is the power trip of being with a lieutenant, so it hardly matters if it's me or Acer. They're getting what they want."
"Bummer that you can't enjoy yourself for once, though. Your secret's safe with me, but I can't believe you're so badass and yet still a-"
"I never said I was," Grem interrupted stormily. "I've been with a girl before." His face fell. "One time back in Kenosha I...I paid a girl to do some things, and we did just enough before...well, at any rate I don't consider myself one anymore." Gritting his teeth, he tried to soothe away the memory of that night, long before he'd met Donna. "It was something I paid for, okay?" he shot back at the other AMC, who had fallen silent in apparent disbelief. "And she charged me extra." He snorted. "A lemon surcharge, I never heard of such a thing." His hood felt like it was burning. Grem had never mentioned this to anyone before, not even Acer, and he was already wishing he could take back his words.
"Aw, man,"Melvin said sympathetically. "You've really had it rough." He set down his drink, announcing he was done for the night. "That much hard luck would drive anyone to the oil derricks." Smiling grimly, he added, "I guess it won't kill me to invite Gwen in tonight if she comes knocking."
"Do your worst," Grem boldly challenged the Trunkov welder, flashing him his coldest snarl. He had already bewildered the poor mechanic by rolling agreeably, uninvited, into the metal shop and parking himself on the lift as though he was coming in for a minor, routine procedure instead of a complicated and considerably risky modification the mainstream medical field would no doubt frown upon.
"Well, c'mon, these restraints ain't gonna fasten themselves," the smart-aleck Gremlin added, waggling a tire to emphasize the point. Lubomir's brow furrowed in disapproval as he approached his patient and quickly detected he was intoxicated, no doubt on something cheap he'd procured during his last visit to port.
"The ethanol, it only thins your oil and prolongs your recovery period, but all you cars believe it somehow helps and I cannot convince you otherwise," he scolded, cinching a strap around the first of the AMC's wheels and examining its tightness. It would do no good to leave his patient any slack to involuntarily pull a tire free and flail at him in the midst of the extended welding session that was to follow.
Soon he was ready for the next step, and the Gremlin regarded him through watery eyes with slightly dilated pupils as he filled a slender gravity syringe with a greenish clear liquid.
"Zundapp would not be very forgiving if I overdid this and put you too far under and something bad were to happen, and seeing as that swill you downed does have a soporific effect, I cannot accurately estimate the anesthetic needed for my procedure." His sympathetic smile abruptly changed to a malicious grin, revealing the face Grem could scarcely forget from his last treatment. "So I'll just have to err on the side of caution and give you a miniscule dose, say the same that I'd administer to the smallest Hugo."
Ignoring Grem's cry of protest, Lubomir unceremoniously flung open his gas hatch and drained the meager contents of the syringe inside, hearing a faint, faraway splash as the anesthetic combined with the contents of his near-empty fuel tank. Lubomir didn't even wait for the stuff to take what little effect it could before he'd raised the lift and began chalking marks on the edge of the orange hatchback's underside where the rocket launcher would be mounted. It wasn't until he'd flipped down his protective eyeshield and lit up the acetylene torch that his patient's eyes flooded with concern, as though he'd finally recognized the gravity of the situation as well as the likelihood that no small amount of pain would be involved.
"Hey, keep that thing far away from my junk, willya?" Grem pleaded, rapidly losing his tough attitude. Something spongy was shoved in his mouth in response and he fought the urge to gag.
"Bite down on this," he was advised, "if you have enough teeth left to do so." Lubomir ignored the impudent American car's muffled yells as he went to his work, making some haphazard welds along the Gremlin's already rusty seam lines close to the base of his door. He'd been aboard the oil derrick a full seven years, longer than nearly all the others, and had received only scant recognition from Professor Zundapp, despite having saved more than one of his men from the brink of death. Therefore he was not so reluctant to treat any of the lieutenants with less than his full respect or his top standard of care, so long as he got the job done to Zundapp's satisfaction.
"He's coming to," a faraway voice said, "I will require a private audience with him now and you may be dismissed." The Professor's eyes, one partially obscured by the glare of the overhead lights against the glass of his monocle, came into view as Grem's vision cleared. Behind him, a door closed as the Trunkov made his way out, glad to leave behind the smell of the torch for a while.
A thin tire was pressed against Grem's feverish side and hastily withdrawn. "You have not yet cooled down," the Janus observed. "This was quite the experimental procedure for Lubomir, as he's armed your compatriots with more conventional weapons, but rarely something as heavy or complicated as this." His eyes narrowed. "You will practice tomorrow striking crates with dummy missiles until you are proficient in the use of your new weaponry as well as used to the extra weight on your frame. You may think I'm being overly cautious, sparing no expense in fitting each of you with the best technology money can buy, but you can only imagine how heavily armed our enemies already are."
"Activate it," he instructed soon after, jerking his tire to demonstrate how to control the rocket. Mimicking his actions, the hatchback set into motion the foreign new appendage he had gained, wincing from the discomfort. It jutted out sharply from his right side with a series of mechanical clicks as the moving parts slid into place, revealing a thick metal arm that ended in a platform. The tube resting on the platform was, for now, empty, but the unloaded apparatus already felt heavy and unwieldy, even more so than the machine gun mounted under his other fender.
"Take the utmost care of it, for it was not easily acquired, nor would it be replaceable. Lubomir's procedure today has made you possibly the most valuable living weapon aboard the derricks, and in return for acquiring such coveted technology, you will be among my first line of defense should the secret agents ever discover our operation."
Grem blinked, stunned to hear that he was considered to be of value to anyone until it dawned on him that Zundapp was most likely referring to the weapon itself.
"You said I might be your greatest living weapon," he pointed out, emboldened by the ethanol still in his system, "but that thing you had under an old bed sheet at the meeting? That's your real masterpiece, isn't it?"
"You're no fool," the microcar replied after a brief pause. "I know I made the right choice for the car to entrust it to." He cast a suspicious look at the closed door. "We will speak no more of this now, for Trunkovs have notoriously excellent hearing, but get your rest and sober up, for your training schedule accelerates tomorrow."