7~
"We're clear," Marcie reported to Anne, after peering out of the closet door, and seeing a pair of guards leave the office across the hall from them. When the guards left the hall entirely, she opened the door quietly, and the two ran into the office.
Silently closing the door behind her, Marcie watched Anne jog to her small desk, and take out a small mirror from a drawer. Then, her mother took time to examine the details, or lack, thereof, on her smooth, plump face.
A quick glance back towards Marcie, and Anne knew what she was thinking. Her daughter had moved heaven and earth to rescue her, and wanted to leave with her as fast as humanly possible, if not more so. However…
"I hate to tell you this, Marcie," Anne sighed, regretfully. "But we're going to have to figure out how to get back to that assembly floor, if I'm to have any chance of being normal again. Youth is fine, but I wouldn't want to relive puberty, if I can help it."
"What's the matter, Mom?" Marcie teased, still finding her mother's condition difficult to believe. "You weren't popular in those days?"
"Funny."
"How old do you think you are, now?" Marcie asked.
After another few seconds of studying her contours, Anne came to her decision. "I…think this is what I looked like when I was...twelve. Give or take a year. It's a good thing you took me out when you did."
Anne put the mirror on the desk, then, she pulled out her chair out, and climbed on it to reach a bland painting that hung behind the work area.
"What are you doing, Mom?"
"I can't leave without getting my folder," her mother said, swinging the hinged picture to the side to reveal a wall safe. "I had this installed a few years ago to keep my papers safe."
"What are they?"
"My life, well, my life as a scientist and inventor, really. Everything I ever came up with, whether it worked or not, is in this old folder. I suppose I kept it with me forever, it seems."
With a deft spin of the tumbler, the safe opened, and Marcie could see what her mother reverently slid out, a large, old, dog-eared folder.
Anne carefully tossed the folder on the top of the desk, closed the safe, and climbed down. Marcie locked the office door and went over to the desk, as Anne opened the fat folio.
Within was, indeed, Anne's whole scientific life, stuffed with penned diagrams and schematics, flashes of ideas and conceptual drawings scribbled hastily on scrap pieces of paper and fast-food napkins, and the corner of a single, upside-down photo peeking out from the pile.
Curious, Marcie took hold of the corner, and carefully pulled it out. Turning it over, she saw that it was a photo of the whole family having a picnic. Winslow, Anne, and little, four-year old Marcie, playing with a toy robot.
"We took that so long ago," Anne said, wistfully. "And you were so smart, even then. Did you know that you could read when you were two? We were so proud of you, Marcie."
Marcie's stomach began to knot up with emotions that only an old picture could summon. She almost regretted removing the photo, as if it was a plug that kept the uncomfortable questions from coming. But, now, that it was pulled free, they felt like they needed to be asked, at last.
"Mom," Marcie asked, softly. "Did you…love Dad?"
Anne sighed. It was a long time in coming, but she knew that her daughter deserved the answer to that question, and many others. She pushed the office chair around to Marcie, and sat.
"I did love Winslow very much, dear," she said, her words looking strange coming from a pre-teen. "I was a forensics scientist, working for some big city police department. I was young, er, older, hard-working and a little cocky. That attitude came back to bite me.
"A man named Deacon Caldswell was captured in connection to a huge embezzlement scheme. All evidence pointed to Deacon as the likely suspect, and at his trial, my forensic work was used to prove his innocence. The trouble was that my work was…flawed, and as a result, it incriminated him.
"Later, it was revealed that I made mistakes in my conclusions and caused his false imprisonment. Even though that was enough for an appeal, the mess I made had me fired. Knowing that no one in the city would hire me, I left to start a new life, elsewhere.
"That elsewhere was Crystal Cove," Marcie guessed.
"Yes. I was hired by the police during a manpower shortage. This time, I learned my lesson, and was more humble in my work ethic."
Marcie was so riveted from the tail, she had forgotten all about Quest and his goons, for the moment. "So, how did you meet Dad?"
"During a case where a bank robber hid out in an amusement park, I met your father. I guess I've got a thing for glasses. We fell in love, got married, and had you, a year later. For a while, things were good for us," Anne related with a wistful smile. That smile soon fell.
"Then, came the hard times. Mayor Avacados, corrupt, and always in debt from gambling, would secretly steal money from the city budget. Seeing that the crime rate in Crystal Cove was low, he figured that the police didn't need as big a budget as they used to, and so he had it slashed, forcing the employees to take massive pay-cuts, including me.
"On Winslow's end, the park wasn't doing so well, so, he became more focused on it. He soon put more priority on it, than his family, becoming more and more miserly.
"It strained our marriage, and our finances, to the point where we didn't even have enough money to pay for our water bill, and thus, had to bathe in the recycled hot dog water he brought home from his park's concession stands."
Marcie shivered at the memory of those days. Days that doomed her to a moniker that haunted her, still.
"At that point, I had enough," Anne said, firmly. "Although it hurt to do it, I divorced him."
Marcie didn't want to comment on the divorce. It was their decision, and she couldn't bend it, either way. It just felt like the end of their story, just something that sadly happened to them, and to her.
"Couldn't I have come with you?" Marcie asked.
"I wish you could've, dear, but because of what happened to me in the Caldswell case, the court believed that I could make mistakes of a similar magnitude while raising you, so, I lost custody of you to Winslow."
"Oh."
"I moved away, after that. Good thing I had a van, because I wound up living in it, for a while, as I went from place to place. I figured that we wanted to keep the past in the past, which was why I didn't keep in touch with Winslow."
"But I'm part of that past," Marcie said, the hurt showing through her statement. "Why didn't you try to contact me? Let me know where you were. Tell me that you were alright?"
There. The question she was most afraid to face, because it demonstrated that her assumptions had, once again, caused another innocent to be penalized. Marcie deserved to know.
"I didn't keep in touch with you because I didn't…know...if I should have," came the uncomfortable answer.
"I don't understand."
Anne sighed. "I didn't have much luck finding anyone who wanted a scientist. Jobs were filled in every place I went. What kind of life could I give you, living in a van and bouncing from town to town?"
Marcie frowned at that. What that the kind of life was Velma living, now? Living like a vagabond, and traveling wherever whim would take her?
Coming from Anne, it sounded like a hard life, until she imagined a life of just her and Velma riding free, together. Being with someone she loved made living like that bearable, even pleasurable.
Someone like her mother.
"I wouldn't have cared, Mom," Marcie told her. "If I got to be with you, it wouldn't have matter what we did, as long as we were together."
"I know that, now, darling. But, back then, I was so wrapped up in trying to survive, I didn't…I didn't…think of you," Anne confessed, the tears welling in her large eyes, and the shame of years, almost made her look old, again. She hung her head, low, feeling unworthy to look at her daughter in the eye, anymore. "I'm so sorry, Marcie."
Marcie watched her mother, mentor, and friend, break down on her chair, looking every bit the sad, little girl that she felt inside.
She realized that her mother could have done more to keep their relationship strong, but a maturity within told her that it was a confusing time for her and Winslow. That, as parents, it was hard, sometimes, to remember that they are human, too, and could screw up as well as anybody.
'Even me,' Marcie thought, as she walked over and hugged her little mother.
"I understand, Mom," she whispered. "It's okay."
"It's not okay," Anne sobbed, softly. "You needed a mother, while you were growing up. Even though Winslow and I were separated, didn't mean that you had to suffer, because of us. There's no excuse for it."
Giving Anne an understanding smile, Marcie released the hug, but still held her, at arm's length, by her shoulders, and looked deep into her, to emphasize her next words.
"But, that was in the past, Mom," she said, sincerely. "I'm stronger, now. It wasn't easy, at times, but I had a very good friend, and your memory, to help me through those tough times. Trust me. I took after you, after all."
Anne slowly lifted her head, feeling the forgiveness radiate from Marcie, like a sun. A sun she feared would never shine on her, again.
"Are you sure that it's okay?" she asked, feebly.
"I promise, Mom. It's okay."
This time, it was Anne who reached out to hug her daughter, who gladly returned the favor.
Then, Anne hoped off the chair, wiped her eyes, and took a cleansing breath, blowing the ghosts of the past, once and for all. She felt exorcized. She felt alive.
Feeling like a mother, again, she stood before Marcie, and looked at her, appraisingly.
"Well, let me look at you," she said. "My goodness, you're as tall as a weed."
"Yeah, now," said Marcie.
Anne smiled and looked at the lab coat that Marcie was wearing. It looked like she was born to wear it. Old thoughts of seeing Marcie becoming a successful scientist returned, in force, and she finally gushed, "Oh, baby. I always knew, someday, I'd see you dressed in white."
Knowing what that sounded like, Marcie muttered, shyly, "Mom..."
Although Anne's new size made her stand out among the scientists who moved through the research floor, like worker ants, they were so concerned with their work, that they hardly noticed her.
She and Marcie headed non-chalantly for the elevator that would take them back to the lower levels, where, if they were lucky, they could sneak back into the Hour Arch chamber, and reverse the process.
"I almost forgot to ask," Marcie said to her mother, in low tones. "But, how did you ever get hooked up with a man like Quest, anyway?"
Anne said, "Well, when I came to Gatorsburg, to look for work, I decided to get a drink at this run-down dive where washed up mad scientists go to forget their troubles."
"You mean, The Dirty Test Tube?" Marcie asked.
Anne raised an eyebrow. "How do you know about that place?"
"Oh, uh, somebody mentioned it, once."
"You've been there, haven't you?"
Marcie sheepishly confessed. "Yes."
Anne sighed, maternally. "We're going to have to talk about this, Marcie. Anyway, I meet Race Bannon, who tells me that Dr. Quest is looking for scientists to work in his Gatorsburg lab. Of course, I jumped at the chance to work with the famous Quest, and so, I began my new life, working there.
"Life was fine, and I'm busy, but then, I started to hear rumors that Benton was obsessed with time travel theory. I finally learned from the water cooler, that he lost his wife in some accident, and he wanted to use time travel to bring her back."
"That explains things," said Marcie.
"After being constantly turned away by Sundial, he became reckless, even law-breaking. That's why the scientific community shuns him, now. But, when I heard that he had business in Crystal Cove that had some connection with you, I got worried."
"That's when you donned your goggles, and became the scientific sentinel of the city...Lab Rat!" Marcie said, in the style of an old radio narrator.
"Shhh!"Anne hushed, eyes darting from one oblivious worker to the next. "Before Quest discovered my little secret, I would, sometimes, learn about his plans, and throw a little monkey wrench in them. In fact, I wonder how he finally found out who I was."
Marcie guiltily looked away, remembering her slip of the tongue in front of Deeds, in the bar, earlier. "I guess it's a mystery, Mom. Besides, I figured it out, too."
"Fair enough," Anne shrugged. "Want to be my sidekick?"
Marcie rolled her eyes. "Oh, that's great, Mom," she said, sarcastically. "And what should I call myself? Chemical Girl?"
"Smart-aleck," Anne muttered. "Anyway, I wanted to protect you from whatever Quest and his mysterious business partner were cooking up. Who knew it would be a killer robot, huh?"
They were a few from the elevator, when its door opened, revealing an attractive Indian teenager, wearing his traditional garb of a jeweled turban and Nehru jacket ensemble.
"So that's where you were hiding," he chided, in clipped English, before raising a hand towards them. The duo didn't have time to run.
Some invisible force, like a giant, unseen hand, clutched their bodies, and lifted them slowly in the direction the Indian mentally guided, which was back where they came.
"That's...Hadji, Mom," Marcie tried to introduce to Anne, while she struggled to get free.
"I know...dear," Anne gasped.
Hadji Singh confidently walked past the scientists, holding his captives aloft like party balloons. If any of the workers had any objections as to what was transpiring, for the sake of their jobs, if not their lives, they stayed silent.
He arrived at a chemical laboratory, and opened its door with an imperious twitch of his other hand. Upon seeing him, the lab chaotically emptied of all frightened personnel, leaving him alone to toss mother and daughter to the far side of the room, with a flick of his hand.
"This is a place of experimentation," Hadji said, calmly, watching them, as they stood. "Before I bring you back to Dr. Quest, I will test my mental skills on you. Prepare."
Anne managed to think of the word, "Huh?", before she felt the cloying sensation of another mind quickly entering hers, her muscles tensing for action.
Then, Hadji moved his puppet.
