"Letters"
by Acey
Disclaimer: There aren't enough ways to say this-- I don't own DBZ. So sad, so sad.
Author's Note: Happy Fourth of July to everybody.
Shoutouts:
Kelly Neptunus: I'm a updating! I'm a updating!
Sailor J-chan: You read that story? Really? (I think it was in my Literature book a few years ago, at any rate, I've always remembered it.)
And now, installment number nine. I hope you like it.
The cook pulled a plain apple cake from the oven and sighed. Two hours, and her mistress had not come downstairs from that laboratory of hers once, not even to get a bite to eat. It was a shame, and besides, one of the few things her mistress enjoyed intensely that the cook baked was her apple cakes. Most other menu items would be eaten without complaint, but without much appreciation, either.
Cook, in all simple honesty, figured that the cake would get the old doctor back to her normal, slightly snappish, overpaying self. She thought that the pretense of her laboratory work was her excuse to take a nap, and indeed it had been in times past.
'Poor Miss, not enough sleep last night,' and she truly pitied the scientist for being so foolish as to not have taken the "stuff," as the cook referred to anything and everything in a medicine bottle, for insomnia. 'Poor, poor old gal.' **********************************************************************
The second that she realized Gero's intent she wanted to burn every letter.
The next few seconds after that she was not so sure, doubtful, nearly, of whether that was the right way to go. After all, she would have no proof if she set the little stack of looseleaf paper on fire.
'Burning the evidence, eh?' a small voice whispered in her mind. 'Burning it to shreds so your friend can get off scot free, is that it, Doctor _______? Guilty of omission, my friend, guilty, guilty, guilty. What a terrible final act (you're getting up in years, even you should have realized that by this time-- there's no more a philosopher's stone now than there was before you were born, however you try denying it) for the woman beloved as the last image Earth had to offer of the decent, solitary little scientist in the white lab coat and goggles! Terrible, terrible, isn't it, ________?'
"Stop it," she muttered. "Stop it."
'I'll go find somebody. Somebody's got to believe me. Somebody.'
"Miss?"
"Cook, I--"
"Miss," the cook called again from the foot of the steps. "I know you said you were going to be in there for the day, but I thought you might like your mail."
Cook, confound her decent soul, was only trying to help her lonely mistress. The reply she got was the worst since the elderly lady found that the cook had not separated the lights from the darks in the laundry several years before.
"No, I do not want my mail! I don't ever want my mail, do you understand? No more mail."
'Old gal's gone crazy,' the cook thought but kept the opinion to herself. Ah, well, no serious harm done. Misses' eccentricities could be tracked in the cook's mind to too much scientific work and not enough free time. The cook thought that science had driven her slightly mad. 'Poor thing.' **********************************************************************
'Got to do something. Got to tell someone. Got to--'
Wait. She had forgotten the hints he'd left in the other letters, and she still had not opened them all. If he'd implied things in them-- things like where he was-- then she could prove it. She could prove it, and tell someone, and then they'd have to believe her, just have to, just have to, and then--
"I'm sorry, Cook. That was foolish of me. Please, I want my letters."
Disclaimer: There aren't enough ways to say this-- I don't own DBZ. So sad, so sad.
Author's Note: Happy Fourth of July to everybody.
Shoutouts:
Kelly Neptunus: I'm a updating! I'm a updating!
Sailor J-chan: You read that story? Really? (I think it was in my Literature book a few years ago, at any rate, I've always remembered it.)
And now, installment number nine. I hope you like it.
The cook pulled a plain apple cake from the oven and sighed. Two hours, and her mistress had not come downstairs from that laboratory of hers once, not even to get a bite to eat. It was a shame, and besides, one of the few things her mistress enjoyed intensely that the cook baked was her apple cakes. Most other menu items would be eaten without complaint, but without much appreciation, either.
Cook, in all simple honesty, figured that the cake would get the old doctor back to her normal, slightly snappish, overpaying self. She thought that the pretense of her laboratory work was her excuse to take a nap, and indeed it had been in times past.
'Poor Miss, not enough sleep last night,' and she truly pitied the scientist for being so foolish as to not have taken the "stuff," as the cook referred to anything and everything in a medicine bottle, for insomnia. 'Poor, poor old gal.' **********************************************************************
The second that she realized Gero's intent she wanted to burn every letter.
The next few seconds after that she was not so sure, doubtful, nearly, of whether that was the right way to go. After all, she would have no proof if she set the little stack of looseleaf paper on fire.
'Burning the evidence, eh?' a small voice whispered in her mind. 'Burning it to shreds so your friend can get off scot free, is that it, Doctor _______? Guilty of omission, my friend, guilty, guilty, guilty. What a terrible final act (you're getting up in years, even you should have realized that by this time-- there's no more a philosopher's stone now than there was before you were born, however you try denying it) for the woman beloved as the last image Earth had to offer of the decent, solitary little scientist in the white lab coat and goggles! Terrible, terrible, isn't it, ________?'
"Stop it," she muttered. "Stop it."
'I'll go find somebody. Somebody's got to believe me. Somebody.'
"Miss?"
"Cook, I--"
"Miss," the cook called again from the foot of the steps. "I know you said you were going to be in there for the day, but I thought you might like your mail."
Cook, confound her decent soul, was only trying to help her lonely mistress. The reply she got was the worst since the elderly lady found that the cook had not separated the lights from the darks in the laundry several years before.
"No, I do not want my mail! I don't ever want my mail, do you understand? No more mail."
'Old gal's gone crazy,' the cook thought but kept the opinion to herself. Ah, well, no serious harm done. Misses' eccentricities could be tracked in the cook's mind to too much scientific work and not enough free time. The cook thought that science had driven her slightly mad. 'Poor thing.' **********************************************************************
'Got to do something. Got to tell someone. Got to--'
Wait. She had forgotten the hints he'd left in the other letters, and she still had not opened them all. If he'd implied things in them-- things like where he was-- then she could prove it. She could prove it, and tell someone, and then they'd have to believe her, just have to, just have to, and then--
"I'm sorry, Cook. That was foolish of me. Please, I want my letters."