Spilling Guts

Part 6 - Lists and Deals

Louis put two hot mugs down on his desk. One he sipped slowly, the other he left on an insulating coaster. A handy invention to have. He glared at the stack of folders in his inbox. He doubted there would be anything as handy as the coaster in all those patents he had to sort and log. There was no way he would get through them all by the end of the day, not with his arm.

Paperwork wasn't impossible with a cast on Louis' dominant left arm; just a dragged out process that made it feel like torture. He almost wished the Watch had used an old fashioned plaster and bandage cast; then at least he would have something to doodle on instead of scraps of paper that surrounded him like shedding fur.

Beni and Reese had taken over one desk and were plowing through their collective inbox in between sips of soda. They occasionally glanced over at him and Will's empty desk. Louis was tempted to ask them again if they knew where Will was, but he knew they would keep up the lie.

He picked up the next folder.

Good god, this had to be the third design he had seen for a damn cheese grater. It looked like a torture device for tires. Why reinvent the cheese wheel? Didn't people have better things to do? Like buy pre-shredded cheese?

Beni tossed an empty can of soda towards the blue bin by Will's desk. It bounced off the rim. Reese booed and retrieved it for a rim shot.

Louis took another fortifying gulp of coffee and continued the process of putting in the file numbers and description into the database.

How many more weeks of this did he have to put up with? He had forgotten. The Bermuda Triangle of Files did that to a person.

Deskwork and paperwork was technically punishment for "being a reckless idiot", according to Cetz. But another part of it was to keep Louis inside the building. Away from prying eyes. Away from Retten who, though they thought him long gone, still had interest in Louis and what he had accomplished back in the Freewill compound.

Cetz can't keep me boxed up forever, thought Louis, poking the keyboard one-handed. As long as I am with Watch Two I am Agent Louis Patriarch. Not Tech Patriarch. Not celebrated lab-rat. Agent Patriarch.

Though, lately he had been Agent Patriarch, party of one. Go figure, he finally got Will to shut up about the importance of recycling and the impact of science fiction, and now he felt isolated. He even somewhat missed Reese and Beni's secretive chatting.

His mentally-fueled aggravation only lasted so long. The repeated numbers and names to fill in for the database chipped away at it until his mind drifted back to the list he saw on Will's desk.

Louis had figured when Will made a list for the shrink, he would be writing down all the things he hated about Louis. Little flaws and mental cracks that needed mending. Instead it hadn't been issues with him; it had been a list of symptoms.

Louis' hand abandoned the keyboard and flicked a pencil between his fingers. What had been on that list? Something important because when he had read it something pinged in the back of his head, like the echo of a sourly tuned bell.

Sleeplessness had been one. Louis wrote that on a scrap of paper. Addled thoughts. Easily angered. Laziness.

It sounded less like psychology and more like a cold. But there was something else...

Louis glanced at Will's still empty desk. He could go back and look at the list. It wasn't snooping; the list was right there out in the open on the back of an envelope. Even Reese and Beni wouldn't think looking at a list was morally reprehensible. Then again their bar for morals wasn't exactly straight.