West of Nothing

14. Bachelor Pad

"Hey, Peeper," Shouter said. "It's past midnight. You ready to call it a night?"

It was hard to believe the day had started off in his dorm room back on campus. "Yeah, guess I should be getting back." He reached into his pocket for his phone. He knew it wasn't there, but the reflex was hard to kick. "Could someone call an Uber for me?"

"An Uber here?!" Shouter laughed. "If a strange car pulled up, they'd bazooka the motherfucker."

"You can bunk at our place for the night," Doogie said affably.

"Yeah, sure!" Shouter chimed in. "We'll have ourselves a bachelor sleepover! We can stay up all night watching porn!"

Mason expected Corny to jump in (she was usually the one to rein in Shouter) but her station was empty along with Gabby's and Skunkworks'. When had they left? "I'm pretty bushed. Just a couch to sleep on would be great."

"A couch, sure! You want some extra cushions and maybe an electric blanket to keep your feet toasty?"

"Naw. At this point, anything flat will do."

"Come on, then," Doogie said. He and Shouter were already waiting at the doors.

Although Mason's neurons were burned down to nubs, it took a force of will to tear his eyes from the wireframe floating on the screen. "Someone will be monitoring the X-Bot, right?"

"Don't worry, there's no hole in the lid this time. But just in case, Gabby wrote a nanny program. If the X-Bot makes any unexpected moves, we'll know about it."

The so-called "bachelor pad" turned out to be a conference room a half-minute walk from the Bridge. The table and chairs were pushed aside to make room on the floor for sleeping. There were military issue duffle bags, one for each of them, containing sleeping bags, water bottles and toiletries, everything one needed for a night of roughing it indoors.

"It's not the Ritz," Doogie said. "But it's the best we got. There aren't any decent hotels within a twenty mile radius of this place. Even if there were, our personal expense budget converges asymptotically on zero."

"Where's the rest of the group?"

"The women have their own place down the hall. Skunkworks is probably staying off-base. He still has connections from when he worked as an outside consultant. Anyway, everything you need should be right there in the duffle. The bathroom is down the hall to the left. No showers unfortunately, but you'll find a sponge and soap in the bag. There's fresh underwear and clothes too. Hope you don't mind khakis. It's either that or camo. Oh, and there's a key card in there. Keep it on you at all times, even when you go to the bathroom."

"I need a security badge to use the john?"

"No, but you'll need it to get back into this room. Any more questions?"

"How do I order up adult movies?"

"Ha, good one!" Shouter thumped him on the back. "By the way, if you snore, I will fucking smother you!"

A box fan had been placed in a corner to make the room feel less stuffy. It failed in that regard, but its steady drone had a somnolent effect. Mason had barely inserted himself into the sleeping bag when he fell fast asleep and into the grip of a vivid dream.

The dream was a feverish cross between War of the Worlds and Honey, I Shrunk the Kids with a bit of Mad Max thrown in. Humans had been shrunk down to the size of ants and driven out into the Sonoran desert where they had to fend off giant scorpions. If that weren't bad enough, along came an army of X-Bots, striding around on their serpent-mechanical legs like water towers from the apocalypse. With their over-sized feet, they scooped up wriggling humans and tossed them into pickle jars.

As part of a dwindling band of renegades, Mason and Corny crouched behind a small rock-cum-boulder, hefting a shoulder-mounted missile launcher that was actually a spring-loaded mechanical pencil with the tip barely screwed on. With an X-Bot reaper bearing down on them, they lined up the pencil and threw their weight onto the trigger. The metal tip zinged off and scored a direct hit, blowing off the hard hat and exposing a Chinaman-alien with a green, mantis-like body. He cursed vigorously in Chinese as he worked the levers of his broken machine. The reaper stumbled, tipping him into a jar where he was ripped apart by vengeful humans, splattering ichor onto the glass.

Mason woke with a start. Reassured by the drone of the box fan, terror gave way to self-conscious embarrassment. Weren't dreams supposed to be like horoscopes, vague and symbolic? Why did his have to be so loony and literal?

The circular wall clock, now in bluish night-glow mode, was the only source of illumination. Not even 5:30 yet. Crap! He was too wound up to go back to sleep. But since he didn't know his way back to the Bridge, he had little choice but to sit tight. He sure as hell wasn't going to disturb Shouter's beauty rest. This was never a problem on campus where the fab-lab was open twenty-four-seven and only a ten-minute walk away.

After thirty minutes of failing to move the clock with his psychic powers, he quietly squirmed out of his sleeping bag. He grabbed the duffle bag and made his way to the bathroom where he unpacked its contents onto the counter. Along with the usual hygiene paraphernalia, he found a small bottle of scented shampoo and a roll of breath mints. Nice touch.

He felt a bit ridiculous as he sponged himself down in front of the long mirror. The uneven slant of his nose made him look clownish and a bit sly. Was his skin really that pasty or was it just the lighting? Trails of wetness tingled on his skin, making him want to giggle. The khaki clothes fit about as well as expected. His body type could be graciously described as Michael Phelps-ish, with short legs and a long, wide torso. The ends of the trousers dragged on the floor while the shirt wouldn't stay tucked in. He applied an extra layer of deodorant and changed back into his civilian clothes.

He nearly walked into Shouter on the way out. The Indian was in baggy white underwear and carrying his own duffle bag. "Watch where the fuck you're going!" he said by way of good morning.

By 6:30, they were filing back onto the Bridge where the other team members were already at their stations. A small cart was wheeled in with a coffee carafe and a tray of bran muffins. The X-Bot brooded in its glass bell, plotting its revenge. Stop projecting! he chided himself. One nightmare was no cause to start feeling paranoid.

"Special delivery for Peeper," Skunkworks said.

"What is it?" Mason asked.

He nodded toward the Storeroom. "Go have a look for yourself."

Must be the Table of Requirement then. Had he asked for something?

When he saw what was sitting on the table, Mason put his hands to his cheeks like a child at Christmas who'd just received that one special gift they hadn't dared hope for. It was a boxy black contraption about the size of an espresso machine with a bit of scuffing around the edges and several spools of colored filament stacked up next to it. A slightly used MakerBot Mini 3D replicator. And boy, was it beautiful.